“Well, people call telegraphing, ‘wiring,’ and a telegram a ‘wire.’”
“Ain’t telegraph its real name?”
“Yes; but wire is shorter—easier to say.”
“Is thet why you said it?”
“Not exactly. But why?”
“Oh, nothin’; only when Pop had a cold and I said to you he could sca’cely talk ’cause he had frost in his pipes, you said it was wrong to say thet, and to say ‘my father has a sore throat.’ Ain’t ‘frost in your pipes’ quicker than sayin’ ‘my father has a sore throat’?”
She looked up from Smoke as David laughed, her gravely smiling lips vivid in contrast with the clear, healthy brown of her rounded young cheek.
He gazed at her a moment, and the pert, shabbily-clad Swickey of a year ago returned his gaze for a fleeting instant. Then a new Swickey, with full, brown eyes and the rich coloring of abundant health, pushed back the frayed cap from her smooth, girlish forehead, and laughed, laughed with the buoyant melody of youth and happiness.
“You’re actually pretty, Swickey.”
She grasped the import of his words with a slow realization of the compliment, perhaps the first that had ever been paid her, and a sudden consciousness of self overwhelmed her throat and cheek with rushing color. She pulled her skirt, that Smoke had disarranged, closer about her knees.