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Buck, Charles Neville, 1879-1930

"A Pagan of the Hills"

You're hyar an' hit mout
prove right hard ter keep my eyes turned t'other way. I'm an
easy-goin' sort of feller anyhow, an' I likes ter let my glance kind of
rove hyar an' thar."
Her hands trembled on the gun and her voice shook into huskiness.
"Begone," she warned. "I kain't hold down my temper much longer."
"An' es fer comin' back," Jerry continued blandly, "some day you're
ergoin' ter _invite_ me back. Anyhow, I reckon I'd come, because
thar's somethin' hyar thet'll kinderly pulls me hither stronger then
guns kin skeer me off."
The girl sat there on her doorstep with her rifle across her knees and
halfway to the fence-line Jerry paused and looked back. The rifle came
up--and dropped back again as Alexander belatedly pretended that she
had not seen him. At the stile O'Keefe paused to turn his head again.
He even waved his hat, and this time she looked through him as through
a pane of glass.
But when she had been sitting broodingly for a long while, the cloud
slowly dissipated from her face. In her eyes a twinkle of merriment
battled with the fire of righteous indignation, and at last she even
laughed with a low pealing note like a silver bell.


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