Laura Spencer Portor

“ Again all eyes turned to her, and Paxton seemed climbing fatly over his collar as he turned his head, this time, to look at her.
"I never thought of it," she said, in the same silvery voice that sounded to him quiet and far-off, "but I think it might probably stand to reason."
"Well," returned Taunton, "when Ples hurt the gander Dug's wife didn't storm, or rage, or cast one black look, and, of course, the old man and the boys hated her for that. There is nothing will make the unlovely hate you like the lack of their own unloveliness in yourself. ”

“ And the men are sacrificed, killed, just as your man Dug was, and the women are left, with empty hands, empty lives, horribly, horribly empty lives—"
It seemed intolerable to Taunton that the woman beside him should be subjected to this new insistence.
"Well," he said, lamely, "I can't feel that the world is lost so long as the women are left. They, at least, however they suffer, can carry on the tradition of love." ”

“ Now, with Romeo and Juliet, for instance, the hatred of old Capulet and old Montague was the 'third party.' It supplied the tragedy."
No one spoke.
"It's a singular thing how often it happens. Now I once knew a case of what I call mixed marriage, in the Kentucky mountains—"
Here portly Mr. Ridgeway got up. "Now, Taunton, that's what I like to hear. Go ahead with your Kentucky mountain story!" ”

“ Old Holcomb and Ples got out of the state and away. The Parrots took her back to her father, in Magoffin. She's got enough wits to tend the geese. I tried to do something for her. Well, you can't do much for those people. They tell me she looks over the flock of geese carefully each night for the old gander. Sometimes she almost, but never quite, finds him."
There was a moment's pause. Then the portières parted and Mrs. Hastings came in, in her furs, her cheeks glowing. ”

“ Every one knows she would have remained a Capulet, and he a Montague, quite happily, to the end of time. It never would have disturbed either of them. Can you imagine either trying to convert the other? If a difference of 'religion' was ever likely not to count, it was likely not to count there. ”

“ She had not moved. She was standing, shrunken against the wall, the firelight playing on her hair wonderfully. Her eyes were fixed not on the loft-hole now, but on a spot not far from her, on the cabin floor, where, between the cracks of the floor-boards of the loft, something was beginning to drip, drip. Presently she felt her way, staggeringly, along the wall, and reached the ladder.
" 'Let me go first,' I said. She paid no heed. I ran back for some clean rags drying by the fire. When I got to the loft she was turning Dug over. He had fallen on his face. ”

“ She began again: 'They were all white, right pure white.' Again she stroked the head of the gander. Then she took my wrist and spoke in my ear: 'I'll tell you something. I'd ruther hev Dug layin' out there dead afore me than to hev him kill ary man. But he hain't dead. He's sleepin'; and he hain't kill nobody, nuther; and he's stood by his blood-kin, too. Don't you wake him. He'll wake up by and by hisself, when he gets sleep enough. Dug's like me; he don't like to kill nobody.' "
As Taunton finished, there was dead silence. ”

“ Aloud, I said:
" 'All right, don't sneak or hide; but after supper get the horse saddled and just ride with me back to the Blue-Grass—just until I can get things straightened out with McCree. You see, I know McCree. That will help. Your wife can go up to the Parrots' to-morrow morning.' I turned my eyes to the woman.
" 'Oh, I hain't afraid to stay alone,' she said, dully. 'I've got the gander.'
" 'I ain't goin' to sneak,' Dug replied. ”

“ He and she slept up in the loft, the rest in the one room below.
"The others treated her civilly enough at first. She was an acquisition to the cabin. They had lived like wild pigs before; they began living now like moderately well-cared for animals. She served them and waited on them. The women down in that country do not presume to sit down to a meal with the men. ”

“ There had been a raid back in the mountains. She did not say a raid on the mountain still, but I knew without being told. The men had made their escape, but not before old Holcomb had killed one of the deputies and Ples had badly wounded another.
" 'And Dug?' I said, anxiously.
" 'Oh, Dug hain't in it. It's no consarn o' his'n.'
" 'But he'll be suspected.'
" 'I reckon he air suspicioned a'ready,' " she said, dully. 'He were out with his gun to get me a rabbit fer supper. He war'n' fur from the killin'. Hit's likely they seen him. Dug he seen his pappy shoot a man. ”

“ They were the type that fling chairs at one another when they are angry. Hut she was naturally gentle, naturally forgiving; and, more than that, she was a woman with whom love was having its way. If a woman really loves—deeply, I mean—she can't really hate. Shakespeare knew that. Look at Juliet. He lets love possess her—fairly possess her—and after that it isn't in her to hate."
Again Taunton's glance, sweeping around the circle of his listeners, fell on Mrs. ”