Page:Hard-pan; a story of bonanza fortunes (IA hardpanbonanza00bonnrich).pdf/139

Rh "Have you ever seen her before?" asked Letitia.

"No, but I 've heard of her. Everybody 's heard of her."

"It 's very odd; I never did till the other day."

"You might n't have. The boys, I mean. All of a sudden, every feller 's begun askin' every other feller if he knows Colonel Reed's daughter. She 's sort of in the air, like microbes."

"Why should she be?"

Tod shrugged.

"Oh, a girl as pretty as that can't be expected to blush unseen down in South Park forever."

John Gault rose suddenly and went to the back of the box, where he joined his brother, who was silently digesting his pleasure in the music. Tod, quite unconscious of any offense, was glad to be left in sole possession of Letitia, and rambled on, repeating tag-ends of gossip that had lodged in his shallow brain.

"The colonel 's a great old chap. He likes the 'long green.' He once had plenty of it, and once you get the habit of having it, it 's worse than morphine to get cured of. The colonel ain't got cured."

"He has n't got a cent," said Letitia, "so I don't see but that he's got to get cured."

"There 's two good ways of getting money