Page:Frank Spearman--Whispering Smith.djvu/440

 Marion smiled. “A year isn’t forever, Dicksie.”

“Well, it’s pretty near forever when you are in love,” declared Dicksie energetically. “I know just how he felt,” she went on in a quieter tone. “He felt that all the disagreeable excitement and talk we had here then bore heaviest on you. He said if he stayed in Medicine Bend the newspapers never would cease talking and people never would stop annoying you—and you know George did say they were asking to have passenger trains held here just so people could see Whispering Smith. And, Marion, think of it, he actually doesn’t know yet that George and I are married! How could we notify him without knowing where he was? And he doesn’t know that trains are running up the Crawling Stone Valley. Mercy! a year goes like an hour when you’re in love, doesn’t it? George said he knew we should hear from him within six months—and George has never yet been mistaken excepting when he said I should grow to like the railroad business—and now it is a year and no news from him.” Dicksie sprang from her chair. “I am going to call up Mr. Rooney Lee and just demand my husband! I think Mr. Lee handles trains shockingly every time George tries to get home like this on Saturday nights—now don’t you? And passenger trains ought to get out of the way, 414