Page:Randall Parrish--My Lady of the South.djvu/29

IN WHICH I SEE AND HEAR ideal surely yet no less a living, breathing fact. My ears finally caught the words of the slave:

"But shorely, Miss Jean, I reckon I don't git dis jist straight, somehow. Why should n't ye do it, honey, when yo' pa an Massa George both want ye to? Dat's what I don't understan' nohow. Don't ye want ter marry Massa Calvert?"

The delicately arched mouth drew down severely, the biue-gray eyes drooping behind lowered lashes.

"I only wish I knew, Joe; I sure wish I knew," her soft voice filled with doubt. "I reckon I always expected to have to do this some day, but that never seemed so bad when it was a long way off. But now they insist it must be to-night, and—and it sure scares me."

"But don't ye love him, honey?"

The girl's eyes opened wide, gazing straight into the black, troubled face fronting her.

"I just don't know, Joe, that's a fact; but—but I'm afraid not. He is just the same to me now as he was when we were children and played together. Sometimes I don't mind being with him, and then there are other times when I am actually afraid to have him near me. I don't think I ever really care whether he is here or not, and—and I do get awfully tired of him when he talks to me; he—he treats me like a little girl, and acts so superior. It almost makes me hate him." She put her hands up to her head, rumpling up the brown hair, a little pucker showing across her forehead. "He has been away most of the last two years, and—and, well, I haven't missed [ 21 ]