Page:Hard-pan; a story of bonanza fortunes (IA hardpanbonanza00bonnrich).pdf/58

46 lowship that existed between them. Now and then, it is true, he had vaguely thought of the young girl as his wife, and had wondered, in an idle way, whether he could win her affection. He thought that no man could ever find a better wife than she would make. But these were aimless speculations, and no one knew of them. Even Maud Gault sometimes felt discouraged—he was so exasperatingly pleased when she told him of Letitia's admirers!

Though it was so early, Gault found one of these rivals already before him. Tod McCormick, the only son of Jerry McCormick, who had been "made" by Colonel Reed, was sitting with Letitia in the drawing-room, to which the umbrella-plants and palms gave an overheated and tropical appearance. The sunlight poured into the room, and, shining through the green of all this juicy and outspreading foliage over the lustrous silks on piled-up cushions and upholstered chairs, gave an impression of radiance and color even more brilliant than that imparted by the lamplight.

In the midst of the rainbow brightness Letitia sat among the cushions. She was very upright, for she was not of the long, lithe order of women who lounge gracefully, but in her tight-drawn silks and pendulating laces she found her habitual attitude of square-shouldered erectness more comfortable.