The St. Johns herald., 1922-12-14
MISS LULU BET

gan. Il think you nave IL pretty hard around here."
 TF" Lulu was genuinely aston ished.
 "Yes, sir. Do you have to work like this all the time? I guess you won't mind my asking"
 "Well, I ought to work. I have a home with them. Mother, too."
 'Yes, but glory! You ought to have some kind of life of your own. You want it, too. You told me you did that first day"
 She was silent. Again he was in- vesting her with a longing which she had never really had, until he had planted that longing. She had wanted she knew not what. Now she accept ed the dim, the romantic interest of this role.
 'T guess you don't see how 1t seems" he said, ito me, coming along "a stranger so. I don't like it."
 He drowned, regarded the river, f1icked away ashes, his diamond obedi- ently shining. Lulu's look, her head dropping, had the liquid air of the look of a young girl. For the first time in her life she was feeling her helplessness. It intoxicated her.
 "They're very good to me-" she said.
 He turned. Do you know why you think that? Because you've never had anybody really good to you. That's why"
 'But they treat me good"
 "They make slave of you. Regu- lar slave" He puffed, frowning. 'D-d shame, call it," he said.
 Her loyalty stirred Lulu. "We have our whole living"
 "And you earn 1t. been watching you since been here Don't you ever go anywheresT"
 She said: "This is the first place in-in years"
 'Lord! Don't you want to? Of course you dol"
 "NOt so much places like this"
 q see. What you want Is to get away-like you'd ought to-" He re- garded her. You've been a blamed fine-looking woman," he said.
 She did not flush, but the faint, un- suspected Lulu spoke for her:
 "YOu must have been a good-look- ing man once yourself"
 His laugh went ringing across the water. You're pretty good" he said. He regarded her approvingly. q don't see how you do it," he unused. ''blamed If I do."
 "HOw do what"
 "Why come back, quick like that, with what you say"
 Lulu's heart YVES beating painfully. The effort to hold her own in talk like this was terrifying. She had never talked in this fashion to anyone. It was as if some matter of life or death hung on her ability to speak an alien tongue. And yet, when she was most at loss, that other Lulu, whom she had never known anything about, seemed suddenly to speak for her. AS now:
 'It's my grand education" she said.
 She sat bumped on the log, her beautiful hair shining in the light of the warm sky. She had thrown off her hat and the linen duster, and was in her blue gingham gown against the sky and leaves. But she sat stif1y, her feet carefully covered, her hands Ill at ease, her eyes rather piteOus in their hope somehow to hold her vague own. Yet from her came these sufficient, insOuciant replies.
 Education" he said laughing heart fly. That's mine, too." He spoke a creed. "I ain't never had 1t and ain't never missed it."
 ''MOst folks are happy without an educatiOn," said Lulu.
 You're not very happy, though"
 "Oh, no," she said.
 "Well, sir," said Ninian, "PIl tell you what we'll do. While Pm here I'm going to. take you and Ina and Dwight up to the city,"
 'TO the city?"
 gro a show. Dinner and a show. I'll give you one good time"
 "Oh" Lulu leaned forward. 'Ina and Dwight go sometimes. I never been"
 "Well, just you come with me. I'll look up what's good. You tell me just what you like to eat, and we'll get it."
 q haven't had anything to eat in years that I haven't cooked myself"
 He planned for that time to come, and Lulu listened as one intensely ex- periencing every word that he uttered. Yet it was not in that future merry making that she found her joy, but in the consciousness that he-sOme one anyone-was planning like this for her.
 Meanwhile Di and Bobby had round- l