"In jest a minute. Them's the daintiest roses yet. Thank you, Miss Laury. You ain't above helping a person like me. There's them that is here in New Eden. But I know 'em—I know 'em. They talk to your back and never say a word to your face, not a blamed word. But you're not like 'em. Everybody says you're just like your brother, an' that's enough for anybody to know in the Sage Brush country. He's been the best friend I ever had, I know that. I hope that pink-'n'-white city girl 'll find out that much pretty quick. Somebody ought to tell her, too. Well, good day, Miss Laury. My umberel's right outside in the umberel-stand."
Poor Laura! She was no fighter from choice, no imputer of evil motives, but her love for her brother amounted almost to idolatry.
"I'm her one weakness," York often said. "Her strength is in her sense of humor, her kind heart, her love of beautiful things, and the power of the old scrapping blood of the Macphersons that will stand so much—and then Joan of Arc is a tennis-player alongside of my blessed sister in her righteous wrath."
That rainy day ended with a problem in the minds of at least three New Eden dwellers: York Macpherson, who carried a bigger load now than Joe Thomson's unwise but determined mortgage matter; Junius Brutus Ponk, who was sharing York's problem to a degree, and Laura Macpherson, who realized that a malicious under-current was already started whose undermining influence might sooner or later grow into a menacing power.
And Jerry Swaim, unconscious cause of all this problem element, ate and slept and laughed and dreamed her pretty day-dreams in utter content. It was well that the next day was Sunday. The rain-washed prairie and the June sunshine did so much to lift the tension in this New Eden where even the good little snakes are not always so very good.
VI
PARADISE LOST
Laura Macpherson came through the dining-room on Monday morning with her hands full of wild flowers.
"Wherefore?" York asked, seeing the breakfast-table already decorated with a vase of sweet-peas.