Clever Betsy. Clara Louise Burnham

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СКАЧАТЬ one believe that the locality was alive with factories. The girl’s curious gaze roamed about, and she thought wistfully of such travelers as might visit at their leisure the wonders about her.

      There were great beauties, however, even for a heaver to enjoy. The morning’s ride had been a keen pleasure in the intervals of her embarrassment. The profusion of wild flowers; monk’s-hood, hare-bells, and Indian paintbrush, had fed her eyes with their splashes of color; and the behavior of the wild animals made one think of the millennium. Sure of protection from being hunted and slain, the chipmunks sat up on their hind legs close to the road, to watch the stage go by, clasping their tiny hands beneath their chins, like children in ecstasy at seeing a pretty show. Frequently one would be seen sitting up and nibbling the seeds from a long stem of grass, which he held in such a manner that he appeared to be playing a flute. A big marmot here and there lay along a bough or rock, turning his head lazily to view the tourists through his Eden. Boiling springs and boiling rivers, hill, vale, mountain, and waterfall – all these had Rosalie enjoyed, even with the fear that the Bruces would turn around; and now! Think of making one stage of the picturesque journey with no companion but her own thoughts! It seemed too good to be true; and she soon found that indeed it was so.

      The driver drew his horses to a walk, and Rosalie perceived that many of the other stages were in sight, some of them stopping, and that tourists were entering them from the roadside.

      Soon it became the turn of the last stage, and Rosalie’s heart bounded to recognize all the companions of the morning.

      She saw Mrs. Bruce gaze sharply at the stout man in her seat by the driver.

      “Won’t your mother go up there, Nixie?” asked Irving.

      Mrs. Nixon refusing, her son put Miss Maynard up, the young woman climbing to the place with alacrity.

      Rosalie turned her head to gaze fixedly at the other side of the road. She grew warm as she felt some one climb into the seat beside her, but did not turn her head back, even when the coach started.

      Finding herself not addressed, presently she turned about and looked squarely into the eyes of Betsy Foster.

      “How do you do, Rosalie?” said the latter composedly.

      “O Betsy!” exclaimed the girl softly, and seized the older woman’s hand with an appealing grasp.

      Betsy gave her one-sided smile, and Rosalie’s eyes filled.

      “You don’t seem surprised!” she said unsteadily.

      “I am, though,” returned Betsy. “I supposed we’d left you behind at Norris.”

      “You saw me there! Did the – did Mrs. Bruce?”

      Betsy shook her head. “No; and she hasn’t yet; but I was thinkin’ about you as we came up to the stage, and when all of a sudden I saw you, I thought I’d get in here.”

      The Nixon party were directly in front of them, and the Bruces in the next seat, and all were conversing busily among themselves.

      “I’m so glad to see you, Betsy, that I can hardly bear it;” and a bright tear rolled swiftly down Rosalie’s cheek, as she leaned back in her corner to regain her self-control.

      “I’ve thought about you considerable,” returned Betsy, “and I haven’t been any too easy.”

      “I told Mrs. Pogram, I promised her, that if I were in any trouble I would write. How kind of you!” with a sudden burst of gratitude and a continued clinging to Betsy’s slender fingers. “How kind of you to care!”

      “Of course I cared, child,” returned the other.

      “And you saw me being a waitress!”

      “Yes. First-rate idea for college boys,” answered Betsy quietly. “It’s quite the fashion for a lot of ’em to help themselves through school that way. I don’t know about it exactly for girls in a strange land, – little country girls that don’t know anything about the world; I don’t know whether I like it or not.”

      “It’s a good way to see the world,” said Rosalie, without enthusiasm.

      “Yes; and ain’t it a beautiful one out here? Is that what you did it for, Rosalie?”

      “Partly – not exactly. I was getting away from Loomis.”

      Betsy nodded. “I heard he pestered you.”

      Rosalie looked off reminiscently. “I didn’t tell Auntie Pogram, because I didn’t want to hurt her feelings; but the reason Loomis began being so unkind to me was because I wouldn’t marry him.”

      “I suspected as much,” said Betsy.

      “So long as he was Auntie Pogram’s brother I knew there was no hope of escaping him if I stayed there, and so – I ran away. It was selfish. My conscience has never felt easy; but I couldn’t endure his insults.”

      “I suppose not,” returned Betsy. Her tone was quiet, but there were sparks in her usually inexpressive eyes, and had Loomis Brown suddenly appeared it might have gone ill with his rapidly thinning hair.

      “What did you do? How did you manage to get so far from home?” continued Betsy.

      “I first went to a boarding-house that I knew of in Portland, and there I met a lady who had been taken ill and wanted to go back to her home in Chicago; but she had a little child and didn’t feel able to travel with him alone; so she agreed to pay my fare to Chicago if I would help her home. I didn’t know how I would ever get back, but it was getting away from Loomis, so I went. On the train I met a woman who spoke of a place in Chicago where they took girls to wait on table in the Yellowstone; so as soon as I could, I applied, and they took me and sent me out here.”

      “And do you like it?” asked Betsy, eyeing the mignonne face closely.

      “No, of course I don’t like it, exactly, and I’ve been frightened ever since I saw you all at the Mammoth Hot Springs, for I was sure Mrs. Bruce would be disgusted with me. She expected me to make some use of her kindness.”

      “Don’t worry,” returned Betsy dryly. “She’s short-sighted, and ten to one she won’t see you; and if she does, she probably won’t remember you.”

      “I may yet, you know,” said Rosalie eagerly, “I may yet reward her kindness; but I had no money, so I couldn’t stop to see about any school position; and besides, Loomis lives in Portland.”

      “Oh, don’t bother about him,” said Betsy carelessly. “One donkey more or less that you meet in the street isn’t goin’ to affect you. He’ll be busy wavin’ his long ears at Mrs. Pogram’s new help; for she’ll have to get somebody. I went to see her just before we left, and heard the whole story.”

      Rosalie laughed softly, and her eyes filled again. “O Betsy, it’s so long since I laughed!” she said; and her tone was so earnest and sad that Betsy averted her head and saw the scenery through a blur. “I was in the stage all this morning. It’s a wonder you didn’t feel how longingly I looked at the back of your head.”

      “You were?” asked Betsy, surprised. “Are you goin’ with us all the way?”

      “I don’t know. I may be left anywhere. I thought I had left you this time and hoped so, Betsy, because I was afraid of Mrs. Bruce; but oh, СКАЧАТЬ