Achmed Abdullah

“ I—why, girl, there isn't a thing in the world I wouldn't do for you. Perhaps I am just a fool, just a silly, superstitious fool. But last year, back on the Killicott, when I looked at you, pretty and dainty and well-educated and the daughter of a rich man, when I looked at myself, just a poor horse wrangler with not a cent in my jeans, nothing but my sixty bucks or so to live on, I used to pray. Yes! I prayed to God to give me money!"
"Tom!"
"Wrong to pray for money, you think? Not a bit of it! For when I prayed for money, I prayed for what's best, what's most strong, most decent in me! ”

“ I know that even the truest love in the world can't make a go of it on sixty bucks a month, that even the truest love in the world has got to eat and drink and—" smiling and leveling a shameless thumb at her dainty little dance frock of lavender tulle, girdled with a shimmering length of blue and silver brocade, "buy one of those things once in a while. ”

“ Why, girl, I hear your voice at night, and it haunts me in my dreams. I've smelt the open range in springtime when all the little unknown flowers peep up overnight and make the air sweet and soft—and you, your presence, leaves just such a fragrance behind! ”