Red Saunders by Henry Wallace Phillips
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Henry Wallace Phillips >> Red Saunders
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It was near noon, intensely hot, and the street of Fairfield was
deserted. No one saw the dog, and if his occasional rattling,
strangling howl reached any ears, they were dead to its meaning.
He was unheeded until he lurched through the gate which Lettis had
left open, as usual, and spinning around in a circle gave voice to
his cry.
It brought Miss Mattie to her feet in an unknown terror; it brought
Red from the barn in a full cognizance--he had heard that sound
before, when a mad coyote landed in a cabin-full of fairly strong
nerved cowmen, and set them screeching like hysterical women before
a chance shot ended him.
Red saw the brute jump toward Miss Mattie. Instantly his hand flew
to his hip, and as instantly he remembered there was nothing there.
Then with great, uneven leaps he sprang forward. "Keep your hands
up, Mattie, and don't move!" he screamed. "Let him chew the dress!
For God's sake, don't move!"
She turned her white face toward his, and through the dimness of
sight from his straining efforts, he saw her try to smile, as she
obeyed him to the letter, and without a sound. "O, brave girl!" he
thought, and threw the ground behind him desperately.
At twenty feet distance he dove like a base-runner, and his hands
closed around the dog's neck. Over they went with the shock of the
onset, and before they were still, the hands had finished their
work. A clutch, and a snap, and it was done.
The dog lay quivering. Red rose to his knees wondering at the
humming in his head. His wits came back to him sharply.
"Did he bite you, Mattie?" he cried. But she had already caught
his hands and was looking at them, with a savage eagerness one
would not have believed to be in her.
"There is no mark," she said, suddenly weak, "he didn't touch you?"
"Answer me when I speak to you!" shouted Red, beside himself. "Did
he bite you?"
She answered him with a sob "No." And then his question asked
itself, and answered itself, although, again, he did not know it.
He gathered her up in his arms, kissed her like one raised from the
dead, and swore and prayed and thanked God all in the same breath.
His old imperious nature came back with the relief. "Here!" said
he, putting her away for a moment. "Take off that dress--that
slime on there's enough to kill a hundred men--take it right off."
Miss Mattie started blindly to obey, then stopped. "Not here,
Will--I'll go in the house," she said.
"You'll take it off right here and now," said Red, "and I'll burn
it up on the spot. I'd ruther have forty rattlesnakes around than
that stuff--off with it. This is no child's play, and I don't care
a damn what the old lady next door thinks."
Miss Mattie slipped off her outer skirt, and stood a second,
confused and dainty. She took flight to the house, running as
lithely as a greyhound.
"By Jingo!" said Red in admiration.
"Let's see you bring another woman that can run like that!"
He gathered some hay and piled it on the dress, firing the heap.
Then he turned to his antagonist. "Poor old boy! Hard luck, eh?
But I had to do it," he said, and gave him decent interment at the
end of the garden; washed his hands carefully and went into the
house on pleasanter duties.
"I'll ask her now, by the great horn spoon!" said he, valiantly.
Miss Mattie was in a curious state of mind. There was an after
effect from the fright, which made her tremble, and a remembrance
of Cousin Will's actions which made her tremble more yet. When she
heard him coming she started to fly, although now clothed beyond
reproach, but her knees deserted her, and she was forced to sink
back in her chair. Red came in whistling blithely--vainglorious
man!
He had _his_ suspicions, generated by the peculiar fervour Miss
Mattie had shown in regard to his hands.
"Mattie," quoth he, "I'm tired of living out there in the barn--I
want a respectable house of my own."
"Yes, Will," replied Miss Mattie, astonished that he should choose
such a subject at such a time.
"Yes," he continued, "and I want a wife, too. You often said you'd
like to do something for me, Mattie; suppose you take the job?"
How much of glancing at a thing in one's mind as a beautiful
improbability will ever make such a cold fact less astonishing?
Miss Mattie eyed him with eyes that saw not; speech was stricken
from her.
Red caught fright. He sprang forward and took her hand. "Couldn't
you do it, Mattie?" said he. There was a world of pleading in the
tone. Miss Mattie looked up, her own honest self; all the little
feminine shrinkings left her immediately.
"Ah, but I _could_, Will!" she said. Lettis came up on the stoop
unheard. He stopped, then gingerly turned and made his way back on
tip-toe, holding his arms like wings.
"Well, by George!" he murmured, "I'll come back in a little while,
when I'll be more welcome."
He spoke to Red in strong reproach that night, in the barn. "You
never told me a word, you old sinner!" said he.
"Tell you the honest truth, Let," replied Red earnestly, looking up
from drawing off a boot, "I didn't know it myself till you told me
about it."
They talked it all over a long time before blowing out the light,
but then the little window shut its bright eye, and the only life
the mid-night stars saw in Fairfield was Miss Mattie, her elbow on
the casement, looking far, far out into the tranquil night, and
thinking mistily.
THE END
By Stewart Edward White
THE BLAZED TRAIL
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By George Douglas
THE HOUSE WITH THE GREEN SHUTTERS
A story remarkable for its power, remarkable for its originality,
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By Seumas McManus
Author of "Through the Turf Smoke"
"A LAD OF THE O'FRIEL'S"
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By Shan F. Bullock
Author of "The Barrys," "Irish Pastorals"
THE SQUIREEN
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By Arthur Morrison
THE HOLE IN THE WALL
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Author of "The Great Babylon Hotel"
ANNA OF THE FIVE TOWNS
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