Page:The leopard's spots - a romance of the white man's burden-1865-1900 (IA leopardsspotsrom00dixo).pdf/249



My train left me. Will you have compassion on a stranger in a strange city and let me call to see you again to-day?

He waited impatiently until he heard his train leave, and then told the boy to make tracks for the General's house.

A peal of laughter rang through the hall when Sallie's dancing eyes read that note.

"Oh! the storyteller!" she cried.

And this was the answer she sent back.

"Certainly. Come out at once. I'll take you buggy driving all by myself over a lovely road up the river. I do this in acknowledgment of the gracious flattery you pay me in the story you told about the train. Of course I know you waited till the train left before you sent the note.

"Now I wonder if that young rascal of a boy told her I wrote that note an hour ago? I'll wring his neck if he did. Come here boy!"

The negro came up grinning in hopes of another quarter.

"Did you tell that young lady anything about when I wrote that note?"

"Na-sah! Nebber tole her nuffin. She des laugh and laugh fit ter kill herse'f des quick es she reads de note."

Gaston smiled and threw him another tip.

"Yassah, she's a knowin' lady, sho's you bawn, I been dar lots er times fo' dis!"

Gaston was tempted to ask him for whom he carried those former messages. He walked with bounding steps, his being tingling to his finger tips with the joy of living. The avenue leading the full length of the city toward