Page:Curwood--The Courage of Captain Plum.djvu/163

 looked frankly into the other's face. "I worshipped her!"

"Oh-h-h!"

"From a distance," he hastened. "She was as pure as Winnsome is now. Little Winn looks like her. Some day she will be as beautiful."

"She is beautiful now."

"But she is a mere child. Why, it seems only a year ago that I was toting her about on my shoulders! And—by George, that was a year before her mother died! She is sixteen now."

Nathaniel laughed softly.

"To-morrow she will be making love, Neil, and before you know it she will be married and have a family of her own. I tell you she is a woman—and if you are not a fool you will take her away with Marion."

With a powerful stroke of his paddle Neil brought the canoe in to the shore.

"There!" he whispered. "You have only