“He’s your neighbour, isn’t he? Ten miles east?”
Blanche was urging the girl in the gentlest fashion. At the sound of her voice Molly turned sharply back to her stove. She bent over her work again and spoke rapidly, without even glancing in her friend’s direction.
“Yes. He’s Andy McFardell, and he’s set up his homestead along down the creek ten miles east of here. I’m—he’s going to marry me. We’ll be married—before summer’s out.”
There was just the shadow of a break in the girl’s final announcement. Blanche noted her attitude, and a wave of pity she could not account for stirred her deeply.
“You’re engaged? You’re going to be married? Why, Molly, you hadn’t said a thing. Tell me. Just tell me all about it. I’m surely dying to know. Is he a good-looker? Has he a swell farm? My!”
Blanche was acting. She condemned herself for it. Her enthusiasm was sheer pretence. She remembered that the man Molly had said she was going to marry was—Andrew McFardell.
The girl’s reply came with a rush. It came with all the spontaneity which Blanche had missed before. And all the time Molly was talking Blanche felt that every word she was speaking was in some measure defensive, not against her, not against any individual, but against some feeling, in conflict with some emotion of her own.
“Maybe you won’t understand,” she cried. “How could you? Nobody could understand the way I feel. I guess I just love him to death.” She laughed a little meaninglessly. “I love him so he could beat me, so he could walk all over my fool body. I just can’t think what things would be without him. The thing he says goes all the time, and when I hear him I can’t even think for myself. Do you know how I mean? Of course you don’t. It’s love, I guess. There isn’t a sun in the sky to compare with his smile. With him around I just want to sit an’ listen, an’ do the thing he says. Oh, Blanche, it’s awful, just awful, when you feel that way. I think it sets you crazy. Yes, yes. That’s it, plumb crazy. If he said he was goin’ to kill me I’d be glad. If he said I was a fool girl I’d know I was. It wouldn’t matter what he said or did—so long as he didn’t quit me. Oh, I want him, and—and he’s goin’ to marry me before the summer’s out. Think of it, Blanche. When summer’s through he’ll be along here. I’ll have him with me always. Every day I’ll wake to find him near by, to listen to his voice, to see his eyes smile deep into mine. It—it’ll be heaven—just heaven. Oh, how I’ll work around to make this farm a home to him! His homestead’s a poor sort of place. He’s been working lone-handed. You see, he’s only had it come two years, since he quit the Police. He hasn’t had a good time. No. They’ve surely been cruel to him. But it don’t matter now. I’ll make that all different. Think of it, he’ll be all mine to work for, an’ to make happy. An’ this farm’s good, and some day he’ll be well fixed. And—and I’ll have helped to do that for him.”
She drew a deep breath and stood up straight. And Blanche saw the wonderful light shining in her eyes.
“It’s—it’s all just wonderful to think that way, Blanche,” she went on. “It makes me feel—it makes——”