Page:Under the Tonto Rim - 1926.djvu/23

 These backwoodsmen are not Bluebeards or Mormons, though they are strong on gettin’ wives. They are a clean, hardy, pioneer people. Edd Denmeade, for instance now—he’s a young man the like of which you won’t see often. He's a queer fellow—a bee hunter, wonderful good to look at, wild like them woods he lives in, but a cleaner, finer boy I never knew. He loves his sisters. He gives his mother every dollar he earns, which, Lord knows, isn’t many.... Now, Miss Lucy, Edd like as not will grab you right up an’ pack you off an’ marry you. That would settle your welfare work.”

“But, Mrs. Lynn,” protested Lucy, laughing, “it takes two to make a bargain. I did not come up here to marry anyone. With all due respect to Mister Edd’s manner of courting, I feel perfectly capable of taking care of myself. We can dismiss that.”

“Don’t you be too sure!” ejaculated Mrs. Lynn, bluntly. “It’s better to be safe than sorry! ... I ain’t above tellin’ you, though—if Edd Denmeade really fell in love with you—that’d be different. Edd has been tryin’ to marry every single girl in the country. An’ I don’t believe he’s been in love with any one of them. He’s just woman hungry, as sometimes these backwoodsmen get. That speaks well for him bein’ too clean an’ fine to be like many others. An’ as to that, Edd is only one of a lot of good. boys.”

“Thanks for telling me,” replied Lucy, simply. “Of course I want to know all I can find out about these people. But just now what I need to know is how to get among them.”

“Mary, I’ve been thinkin’,” spoke up Mr. Lynn, “an’ I've an idea. Suppose I call in the Rim Cabin school-teacher. He’s in the post ofice now—just rode in. I reckon he’s the one to help Miss Watson.”

“Fetch him in pronto,” replied Mrs. Lynn, with alacrity; and as her husband went out she continued: “It’s Mr. Jenks, the school-teacher. First man teacher ever here. You see, the youngsters at Rim Cabin school never got much teachin’,