Chumley's Post; A Story of the Pawnee Trail (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER IIL VERY DIFFERENT PEOPLE. Sing Sing prison ia a long distance from Chum- ley's Post, and so are many other spots upon the earth's broad surface. One of those other spots, even more distant, was elegantly furnished. It had a well-set table in the middle of it, not for dinner but for "luncheon," and near one end of this a lady and a gentleman were standing at the very time when the old Indian said " Ugh!" at seeing the pole lifted so easily. The gentleman was a broad-shouldered youth ot perhaps five-and-twenty, with very blond hair and side-whiskers, while the lady was a very pretty brunette, evidently at least three years younger, whom he had twice already spoken to as " dar- ling." " Your mother will be down in a minute," she said. " She has a letter from Dick this morning." " Glad of it. Where is he now ?" "North America, somewhere. I can't quite make it out. He does not speak of you or me." " He'll recover his senses one of these days. Meantime, travel will be good for him." " Chelmsford, love, it was no fault of mine " "We are all agreed on that point Even his mother says he has only himself to blame. Don't speak of it, darling." " Seems to me I was not even giddy. But he talks of land and settling and remaining." " Good sign. Mind recovering its tone. Been awfully seasick several times. Nothing like it I must see the letter, though. Come, darling. That's mother's voice. I'm wolfishly hungry." He looked lovingly at his " darling" while eating, and he ate well, and the portly lady at the head of the table talked freely about Dick and his doings, but she was the only member of the trio who went so far as to say,? " How I would like to see him! Think of it! he has been around the world since " "Now, mother," interrupted the blond ...