Friendship Village Love Stories

Road. The Eight Big Shows Combined had arrived in the gray dawn; and word had not yet gone the rounds that, the Fair Ground being too wet, the performance woul

ground. Who in the vicinity of the village had not known the Pump pasture of old? Haunted of Jerseys and Guernseys and orioles, it had lain expressionless as the hills,[Pg 63] for as long as memory. When in spring, "Where you goin'? Don't you go far in the hot sun!" from Friendship mothers

chariots casually disposed, the air of the hurrying men, so amazingly used to what they were doing—these ga

hy Toplady, Jr., ecstatically, as th

d, looked up at his brown Adam's apple—she hardly ever lifte

t it just what yo

" said Timothy, solemn

he could tell when it was there, and she promptly turned her head, displaying to Timothy's ardent eyes tight coils of beautiful blond crinkly hair, a little

" he

nd there they spread their lunch. The sunny slope was dotted with other lunchers. The look of it all was very gay, partly because the trees were in June green, and among

ed, pretending not to notice; and Timothy looked wistfully in her face to see if she wished that she had not come with him. However, Timothy[Pg 65] never dared look at her long enough to find out an

's eyes and their father's eyes, and of Timothy's own, and "Our eyes match, mine and yours," he had blurted out, crimson. And yet, even on these terms, he had taken the liberty of being wretched because of her. How much more now when he was infinitely nearer to her? For with the long spring evenings upon them, when he had sat late at the Vesey farm, matters had so far advanced with Timothy that,

y over lunch. If only she would "bring up the subject," then he cou

think this was the Pum

same, does it? You'd think you was in a city or

ount the e

id I. And they was too many of 'em shut up. I don't know whether it's much o

a. For Liva would have teased a bit if Timothy would

They're apt to be the kind that carouse around. I

g

't know,"

owing a faux pas, save that this silence was longer, and was terminated by Liva

ouldn't think this was the Pump pas

Liva said. "Y

e, as the pasture had been until the strange

d them and the four greeted one another with the delicate, sheepish enjoyment of lovers who look on and understand other lovers. Then Timothy's look went back to Liva. Liva's rose-pink dress was cut distr

mie! That was the lion

g

ly, as if there wer

the lion?"

; he thought it migh

mmie?" his sweetheart asked

ed to the lin

re pasture looks so diffe

"it does look di

sly past the snake show, the Eats-'em-alive show, and the Eastern vaudeville. But hard b

aphs put up in Tintype style AT Tintype price. Three for a quarter. The fourth of a dozen for the fourth of a dollar. Elegant pic

e he had any idea tha

g

begged, "co

hment in her eyes, it is certain that he had never loved he

ill, Timmie," she

rry bit of paper at which he had hardly dared so much as glance, and he had given another blurry bit into her keeping. But that was not all. When she thanked hi

ed and spotted things of the wild, with teeth and claws quick to kill, and with generations of the jungle in their shifting eyes. The bright[Pg 70] wings of unknown birds, the scream of some harsh throat of an alien wood, the monkeys chattering, the soft stamp and padding of the elephants chained in a stately central line along the clover—it was certain, one would have said, that these must change the humo

grasping his elbows and looking at that flitting flame and orange. Dare

ere alight; but there was always in Timothy's eyes a look, a softness, a kind of speech that Liva's could not match. He longed inexpressibly to say to her what was in his heart con

n the Pump pasture where nothin' but cows

othy fervently. "Don't seem like it

ly lifted

oo," she said, and flushed a l

all that Timothy could see was tight coils of blond, crinkled hair, an

herd in the next pasture; past the cage in which the lioness lay snarling and baring her teeth above her cubs, so pathetically akin to the meadow in her motherhood; past unknown creatures with surprising horns and shaggy necks and loll

said. "Loo

lding a bl

the tigers; i

it to me?" was Tim

hand, laughing a li

"Tigers have walked over it. My, ain'

as differ'nt can be

o the birds again,"

stood staring at the orange and flame in the cage:

ot daring to look

eem like the Pump

es glamour as his grave survives a man. Liva and Timothy sat on the top row of seats and felt it all, and believed it to be merely honest mirth. Occasionally Liva turned and peered out through the crack in the canvas where the side met the roof,

et. Do you s'pose it is? When I look out

ing, a great hope living in

et. It's a nice show. Nice performance

eaning against the tree, the sun burnishing her hair and shining dazzlingly on the smooth silver locket. And when he drove back, and reached down a hand to draw her up to[Pg 74] the seat beside him, and saw her for a moment, as she mounted, with all the panorama of the field

he looked at the field, elliptical tent, fluttering pennons, streaming c

row when I go to town with the pie-plant, it'l

p at him and d

sure,"

ean?" he asked

shook h

"but I don't think somehow the Pum

a moment. Oh, could she

the old pasture looks diffe

nted Liva,

g

and the elder Veseys had been gone to prayer-meeting for

er presence. He had tried, all the way home that afternoon, to call her attention innocently to its absence, but the thing that he

e?" Liva

didn't—didn't you have it off whi

d blankly; she ha

uckboard and had found nothin

ght a lantern and hitch up and driv

?" Liva h

sly, magnificently happy in being alone by[Pg 76] her side in the warm dusk, and on her ministry. She was silent, and, for almost the first time since he

ut no longer expressionless; for instantly their imagination quickened it with all the music an

ading feet. The pasture was girdled by trees—locusts and box-alders outlined dimly upon the sky, nest-places for orioles; and here and there a great oak or a cottonwood made a mysteri

it looked here this aft

ny, so do I

is light,[Pg 77] first on tufted grass, then on red-tasselled sorrel, then—lying there as sim

o glad. Oh, thank you

her for

almighty glad?

ad!" she said in surprise. "So of co

I'm sure," he r

tle skipping s

a little ways and come by where the big

ur was gone

e will do!" he

d stretched the great elliptical tent that had prisoned for them colour and music and life, as in a cup. And so at last they stepped along that green way of the pasture where underfoot lay the grass and the not infrequent moss a

e hills, dependable as a nurse, had that day known strange breath, strange tramplings, cries and trumpetings, music and colour and life and the beating of wild hearts—and was it not certain that these must change the humour of the place as the coming of the grotesque and the vast alters the humour of the m

. Her cheek lay against his shoulder and he lifted her face and k

g

time—every day—I've meant

his arms. And then he would have her words and "Did you?" he begged again. He could

, "I don't know. I don't k

ge came upon hi

y wife?"

d the words faltered away. But

lo, it was suddenly as if, with these, he were become art

turf. And in its little circle of brightness they saw something coloured

one of the circu

oriole feather. One of th

folded it away with[Pg 80] the violet Liva had gathered that afternoon. After all

you wear the picture—my

rry. The locket's one I bought che

more. She wondered a little, too, when on the edge

mp pasture seem differ'nt? Don

id, "it don't

, "it ain't the pasture th

e—softly, and very

at this afternoo

ype="