"I didn't read it carefully enough before I handed it in, I'm afraid," she replied.
"Oh, and did you write it?" He looked down at her and she nodded her head. "Yes, and I find that I do better with stories than at anything else," she said. "I have three accepted in the North and I have a book under way. That was the trouble with me, Jim; I wanted to write and I didn't know what ailed me, I was a crank."
"You are an angel."
He was leading her by the hand, and she looked up at him, but said nothing.
Just in front of them they saw the dying glow of a cabin in coals. A long clump of bushes hid the spot from view. They passed the bushes, looking to the left, and suddenly the girl screamed. Not more than twenty yards away stood the Major, with his back against a tree—gripping the bent barrel of a gun; and ten feet from him stood Mayo, slowly raising a pistol. She screamed and snatched the giant's gun and fired it. Mayo wheeled about, dropped his pistol, clutched his bare arm, and with the blood spouting up between his fingers he turned to flee. Two white men sprang out in from of him, and the Major shouted: "Don't kill him—he is to be hanged on the public square. I was trying to take him alive—and had to knock down two of his men. Tie him."
He held out his arms to Louise, and with her head on his breast and with mischief in her eyes, she looked up and said: "I have more than a daughter's claim on you. I have the claim of gallantry and upon this I base my plea."
He rebuked her with a hug and a kiss, saying not a word; but big Jim, standing there, turned about, laughing.
"What are you snorting at, Goliath? Has a David at last sunk a joke into your head? Come, let us go to the house."
"Father," said Louise, "I am going to show you how much I love you. And oh, how I longed to rest in your arms the time you held them out to me, in that desolate hall, the night of death; but I knew that if I yielded I would go back to the nest with my wings untried. I had to go away. I will tell you all about it, and I know that you will not be ashamed of me."
Silently they took their way homeward, choosing a shorter route; and coming upon an oozy place in the woods, Jim said to Louise: "I'm going to carry you in my arms." He did not wait for her to protest, but gathered her in his arms, and her head lay upon his shoulder.