The Bridgeport times and evening farmer., 1922-09-16
CHAPTER IT. | A Quick Romance.

l DOQy!' Sne aSkeu. CHAPTER II. 1 A Quick Romance. l I couldn't answer her for a minute. She was a type of girl such as I'd | never seen before in our part of the l country. There was something in her | look which gave me a tightening in | my throat.
 | You've come to see my father. | perhaps said she. "1'11 call him if you want me to. We don't have so many visitors that I want to send one away.''
 l She spoke in a pleasant kind of way that made me feel plumb guilty. | Take it from me, if Morehard hssd | been the biggest crook on earth, and l yet the father of his girl, I wouldn't | have dared to say a mean word to | him.
 l ''Why-why' Is stammered, "my | name is Havens-Brixton Havens" r I felt my face turning red, for her whole attitude changed in a minute; | her figure stiffened, and she stepped | into the path in front of me so as | to bar my way. I could see in a. | flash that her father had told her | about our quarrel
 | You're MT. Ravens. from the | farm down yonder?" she said Well ! she added spunkly. "You threatened my father before today, but you'll not do it again while I'm around" | What do you think of that? I said | something in reply, but for the life 1 of me I can't remember what 1t was l All I wanted to do was to get a | chance to back out of the garden gate.
 | I did so at last. and walked down I Bl1lehrnOy i- I a dream. I had called there to order l that girl and her father out of my house, and now I confessed to my 1 self that I'd give everything in the world to keep them there. | Who were these Morehards, any how? I racked my brain to recall | everything I had ever heard about 1 them; but that wasn't much This man had come here one day | with his daughter and settled in our country. Folks said they were rnys- | terious, kept to themselves and made | no friends; but then our people were always suspicious of strangers l I slept very little that night All could see and think of was that | girls full throat. the devilish tease in her eyes. and the look of wrath | she had turned on me. | The next morning I pulled myself | together and called at the house 1 again. She met me at the door and Instantly barred my passage. l 1 suppose you want to turn us
 out of your house now" she said, rather spitefully, it seemed to me. | Nothing of the sort" I protested
 And in the end she let me come in. I sat down in chair in their l living-room, and as I looked around l felt somehow that the Morehards
 were superior kind of folks. Every
 object in their home seemed to have
 been transformed by the witchery of
 that girls touch.
 When MT. Morehard showed up ]
 apologized for what I'd said to him
 the day before. But he passed of
 our quarrel as if it hadn't amounted
 to anything He was a quiet man | I took it from what he said that he
 had a weak heart and was trying tc
 brace up his health by hunting in the
 woods.
 "I call at their house again and
 again, I wanted to make them fee
 that wasn't the sort of ugly brute
 they must have thought I was IT
 the end I succeeded.
 When Il told my mother of my in.
 tentions she got alarmed at once
 She had always wanted me to choose
 a wife from among the families we
 knew.
 l
 don't know anything about these
 people. They are not we'll talked
 about. They're strangers"
 "Ah. mother.'' I said moodily, "that
 girl will never have mel"
 She's clever,'' said my poor mother in a tone of worry. She's laid hel
 plans we'll. She knows you are the
 best catch in our county
 Still these were the last words rnJ mother said on the subject-she saw
 I'd set my mind upon. Probably she , thought I had my late fathers stub. born spirit, and there was no ust
 opposing me.
 Emma Morehard's father, althougf l felt he didn't quite take to me
 raised no objections. When I frs
 put my arms around that girl ant ; kissed her I felt I'd won the world,
 I guess some of you are thinkfns that I started this story at u pcin , where other stories finish But Tn
 going to warn you that this was jus
 the beginning of a long, black chaiy
 of history that made me an altered ) man.