“Hello, Elinor,” Vic said, calmly, making room for her on the stone steps. “Take a seat.”
Elinor sat down beside him, throwing her hat on the ground.
“Whither away?” Vic asked.
“I'll tell you presently. I want to get over my stage fright first.”
“All right, look at this view. I'll give it to you if you like it.” Vic had turned to the west again and was looking away toward the dreamy prairies beyond the valley.
Elinor recalled the September day when the bull snake lay sunning itself on this very stone. How shy and awkward he seemed then, with only a deep sweet voice to attract favorable attention. And now, big, and graceful, and handsome, and reserved—any girl might be proud to have his regard. Of course, for herself, there was Vincent Burgess in the pleasant inevitable sometime. She gave little thought to that. She was living in the present. And in the wooing spirit of the April afternoon Elinor was glad to sit here beside Victor Burleigh.
“What time next month do we have the big baseball game?” she asked. “The game that is to make Sunrise the champion college in Kansas, and you our college champion?” Vic's lips suddenly grew gray.
“Friday, the thirteenth—auspicious date!” he answered. “But I may not play in it. I might fail.”
“Oh, we must win this game, anyhow, and you never do fail. Don't forget the name your mother gave you. Do you remember when you told me that?”
“A couple of thousand years ago, wasn't it?” Vic asked, smiling down on her. “If I don't play Sunrise needn't fail, even for Friday, the thirteenth.”