"Hit don't hardly pay a man ter walk backward in these hyar
mountings," she told him. The painter looked covertly up to see if at
last he had discovered a flash of humor. He had the idea that her lips
would shape themselves rather fascinatingly in a smile, but her pupils
mirrored no mirth. She had spoken in perfect seriousness.
The man rose to his feet, but he tottered and reeled against the wall
of ragged stone. The blow on his head had left him faint and dizzy. He
sat down again.
"I'm afraid," he ruefully admitted, "that I'm not quite ready for
discharge from your hospital."
"You jest set where yer at." The girl rose, and pointed up the
mountainside. "I'll light out across the hill, and fotch Samson an' his
mule."
"Who and where is Samson?" he inquired. He realized that the bottom of
the valley would shortly thicken into darkness, and that the way out,
unguided, would become impossible. "It sounds like the name of a strong
man."
"I means Samson South," she enlightened, as though further description
of one so celebrated would be redundant. "He's over thar 'bout three
quarters."
"Three quarters of a mile?"
She nodded. What else could three quarters mean?
"How long will it take you?" he asked.
She deliberated. "Samson's hoein' corn in the fur-hill field. He'll
hev ter cotch his mule. Hit mout tek a half-hour."
Lescott had been riding the tortuous labyrinths that twisted through
creek bottoms and over ridges for several days. In places two miles an
hour had been his rate of speed, though mounted and following so-called
roads. She must climb a mountain through the woods. He thought it
"mout" take longer, and his scepticism found utterance.
"You can't do it in a half-hour, can you?"
"I'll jest take my foot in my hand, an' light out." She turned, and
with a nod was gone. The man rose, and made his way carefully over to a
mossy bank, where he sat down with his back against a century-old tree
to wait.
The beauty of this forest interior had first lured him to pause, and
then to begin painting. The place had not treated him kindly, as the
pain in his wrist reminded.
No, but the beauty was undeniable. A clump of rhododendron, a little
higher up, dashed its pale clusters against a background of evergreen
thicket, and a catalpa tree loaned the perfume of its white blossoms
with their wild little splashes of crimson and purple and orange to the
incense which the elder bushes were contributing.