Everybodys Chance | Page 6

could do the whole job myself, in a very short time. Oh, I feel like a giant."
"Indeed?" was the reply, given almost with a sneer.
"Yes, indeed. Oh, you may look that way if you like, but you don't understand the feeling. Just wait, though, until you are fairly in love yourself, an'--"
"Oh, don't talk to me in that way," exclaimed Champ, biting his lips and turning aside; he felt that if he did not quickly get away he would fly at the fellow and strangle him.
"But I must talk so," persisted Charley, "and you are the only man to whom I can do it, for no one else knows of my great fortune but you. To think that I am the only man in the village who is so richly blessed. There's no other girl in Brundy who can compare with Luce; honestly now, old fellow, is there?"
Champ took his knife from his pocket and began to shave the rough bark from the coat of a slippery-elm tree.
"I do believe you think there is," said Charley, looking curiously at his companion, "and that you're in love with her. Oh, you sly chap! You always were the quietest young man in the town, and have seldom paid attention to any of the girls, but I do believe I have found you out. Who is she? I won't tell anybody. I'd like to know that some other man is as happy as I. Has she said 'Yes'?"
"Will you kindly attend to your own business and leave mine to me?" asked Champ, suddenly turning on Charley a face like a thunder-cloud. The younger man exclaimed quickly:
"I beg a thousand pardons, Champ. I didn't mean to be impertinent. You never saw anything like that in me, did you?"
"Not until a few moments ago," was the reply. "But I don't want ever to see it again."
"You shan't, I assure you," said Charley in haste, as he began to tone down his excitement by attacking the largest tree near at hand. He worked vigorously several moments, but finally stopped to say:
"Let me talk of Luce, though. She is so grand, so good, so unlike all other girls. I've thought myself in love before, but I soon found out 'twas all fancy." Charley leaned on his axe and looked contemplatively at the ground a moment or two before he continued: "Other girls seemed to like me to make love to them, but it soon became an old story to both of us, for they seemed to have nothing in their minds but what was trifling and merely romantic, but Luce-- why, there's something in the very tone of her voice that makes her seem different from every other young woman, and better. She's-- she's-- oh, she's thoroughly womanly, while the others are merely girlish. Don't you think that is the proper distinction, so far as you have observed her and other Brundy girls?"
As Charley asked this question he raised his eyes for the answer, but Champ was no longer standing before him. Charley looked slowly about him, but could see Champ nowhere; then he quickly peered between the trees, in every direction, and finally saw Champ, some distance away, walking rapidly and with his fingers to his ears.
"I declare," exclaimed the young man to himself, yet softly, as if he feared that even the trees had ears, "I believe I've been making a fool of myself. I didn't suppose, though, that a man generally so kind and sympathetic as Champ could have been quite so rude. Did I really say anything that was dreadfully silly?"
He thought a little while about it, and this naturally set him to thinking about Luce, and the subject was so interesting that he could not give any attention to anything else, so he leaned against a tree and indulged in delightful day-dreaming for he knew not how long. Neither could he afterward imagine how long he might have continued at his congenial occupation had he not been startled by a footfall, and, looking about him, seen Champ returning with an axe in his hand. Champ at first looked sheepishly toward him and said:
"I thought I could spare half a day to help you." When, however, the big fellow cast his eyes about and saw not a tree had been felled since he made his escape he glared savagely at Charley, and exclaimed:
"You're a fine fellow to think of marrying, aren't you? You've not chopped a stroke since I left you. I had better have offered this wood to a better man, even if I had been obliged to look for one not in love. I suppose you would like me to do all the work for you, after giving you the trees-- eh?"
Charley's face turned scarlet; he seized his axe and began