The Tabor independent. [volume] (Tabor, S.D.) 1913-19??, 1916-04-20
CHAPTER III.
CoUNTERPLAYs.

The girl had been very silent, though
nothing better than her silence had
been needed to confirm Kilrain in the
shock of his disappointment in her.
1 would never have dreamed 1t Of
you, Jess, he groaned. II never would
me So"
For the first time then Jess made O.
sound. She laughed, a bitter thread In
the laughter catching her fathers no.
tice.
NO. you never would "a dreamed II,
father, II you hadn't been put to sleep
with burr on your mattress. That's
Aunt Agnes doin's. Some peoples so
loaded down with goodness that the
bad in 'em floats on top, like cream.
So she told you was out here to meet
Blass Cardross, an you swallowed It!
you'll have to cough up a lie then,
father"
weight seemed to have slipped from his
heart Il heard"
You heard horse gallopin'. So did
l. II you'd come just q little farther
you'd a heard me tallSin' to the man
ridin' that horse. That amt sayin' il
was Blass Cardross. Go look In your
stable, father, an see whose horse Is
missin'. An, talrin' bout dreamin',"
That the citizen In the exercise of a
Jess went on, II never would n
dreamed, father, that Aunt Agnes
could throw sand in your eyes an make
you think It was a thunder storm"
She could not see Kilrain's abashed
smile.
I'm feared she done xactly that" he
admitted, but your aunt means well
Jess"
"oh, sure!" laughed Jess. she
means well when she gives us rhubarb
pies, but II you eat 'em you wish YOU
hadn't. Meanin' well an dom well
QlUnUa oil
the meanin' p'isons you"
I'm sorry, Jess"
Som !, father. 'Tain't good to be
thought bad Of"
Kilrain was silent.
Indeed, his mind was not at ease.
There'stin remained the matter Of Jess
intimacy with Cardross. He said no
! more upon the subject then, however
nor did Jess; but when she had gone
on TO her room upon reaching the
house she did not get ready for bed.
Sitting by her open window, she
seemed to wait, and while she waited
Jess Kilrain's thoughts were busy
She had told her father the truth,
but not the whole truth. Not even to
herself had she ever told what for some
time intuition had been vainly endeavor-
ing to warn her.
She was not happy in her love for
Blass Cardross. Some indefina Bile
ached in the Joy Of her heart, too vague
to be unhappiness, yet, like q baser al
10y IN pure gold, subtly changing its
color.
1t was something which made the
girl long this night for the mother she
had never known. Jess Kilr4in had
grown up a mans woman. All her life
she had been among men-among them
yet apart, as the woman must ever be-
1t had made her unusually self reliant
1t had left her strangely alone.
Indeed, for some days past the girls
mind had been wavering on the point
Of speaking to her father Of her love
for Cardross; but intuition, telling her
that he would not be In sympathy with
hat love, had helped to prevent her
doing so.
The growing Opposition toward
Cardross in all those about her on the
Loop had, while stimulating her 10y
atty to her lover, made her even more
inclined to be reticent. Her fathers
action this night in rebuking her so
sternly for what he had supposed had
carried her abroad drove all confidence
back upon her own heart.
The room behind Jess was In total
| darkness.
Beyond her window the prairie
stretched an indeterminate space oyer
hung by the warm stars. A sense
keener than that of either hearing or
sight, compounded Of both, made her
aware that she had heard a sound;
that she saw an indistinguishable blur
upon the gray darkness blur that
moved silently, furtively; that gave
her an uneasy feeling of being seen
herself far more clearly than she could
see.