Flip and Found at Blazing Star | Page 9

of the door. Miss Porter grasped
it firmly from the inside. There was a slight struggle.
All of which was part of a dream to the boyish Cass. But he awoke
from it--a man! "Do you," he asked, in a voice he scarcely recognized

himself,--"Do you want this man inside?"
"No!"
Cass caught at Hornsby's wrist like a young tiger. But alas! what
availed instinctive chivalry against main strength? He only succeeded
in forcing the door open in spite of Miss Porter's superior strategy,
and--I fear I must add, muscle also--and threw himself passionately at
Hornsby's throat, where he hung on and calmly awaited dissolution.
But he had, in the onset, driven Hornsby out into the road and the
moonlight.
"Here! Somebody take my lines." The voice was "Mountain Charley's,"
the driver. The figure that jumped from the box and separated the
struggling men belonged to this singularly direct person.
"You're riding inside?" said Charley, interrogatively, to Cass. Before he
could reply Miss Porter's voice came from the window.
"He is!"
Charley promptly bundled Cass into the coach.
"And YOU?" to Hornsby, "onless you're kalkilatin' to take a little
'pasear' you're booked OUTSIDE. Get up."
It is probable that Charley assisted Mr. Hornsby as promptly to his seat,
for the next moment the coach was rolling on.
Meanwhile Cass, by reason of his forced entry, had been deposited in
Miss Porter's lap, whence, freeing himself, he had attempted to climb
over the middle seat, but in the starting of the coach was again thrown
heavily against her hat and shoulder; all of which was inconsistent with
the attitude of dignified reserve he had intended to display. Miss Porter,
meanwhile, recovered her good humor.
"What a brute he was, ugh!" she said, retying the ribbons of her bonnet
under her square chin, and smoothing out her linen duster.

Cass tried to look as if he had forgotten the whole affair. "Who? Oh,
yes I see!" he responded, absently.
"I suppose I ought to thank you," she went on with a smile, "but you
know, really, I could have kept him out if you hadn't pulled his wrist
from outside. I'll show you. Look! Put your hand on the handle there!
Now, I'll hold the lock inside firmly. You see, you can't turn the catch!"
She indeed held the lock fast. It was a firm hand, yet soft--their fingers
had touched over the handle--and looked white in the moonlight. He
made no reply, but sank back again in his seat with a singular sensation
in the fingers that had touched hers. He was in the shadow, and,
without being seen, could abandon his reserve and glance at her face. It
struck him that he had never really seen her before. She was not so tall
as she had appeared to be. Her eyes were not large, but her pupils were
black, moist, velvety, and so convex as to seem embossed on the white.
She had an indistinctive nose, a rather colorless face--whiter at the
angles of the mouth and nose through the relief of tiny freckles like
grains of pepper. Her mouth was straight, dark, red, but moist as her
eyes. She had drawn herself into the corner of the back seat, her wrist
put through and hanging over the swinging strap, the easy lines of her
plump figure swaying from side to side with the motion of the coach.
Finally, forgetful of any presence in the dark corner opposite, she threw
her head a little farther back, slipped a trifle lower, and placing two
well-booted feet upon the middle seat, completed a charming and
wholesome picture.
Five minutes elapsed. She was looking straight at the moon. Cass
Beard felt his dignified reserve becoming very much like awkwardness.
He ought to be coldly polite.
"I hope you're not flustered, Miss, by the--by the--" he began.
"I?" She straightened herself up in the seat, cast a curious glance into
the dark corner, and then, letting herself down again, said: "Oh, dear,
no!"
Another five minutes elapsed. She had evidently forgotten him. She

might, at least, have been civil. He took refuge again in his reserve. But
it was now mixed with a certain pique.
Yet how much softer her face looked in the moonlight! Even her square
jaw had lost that hard, matter-of-fact, practical indication which was so
distasteful to him, and always had suggested a harsh criticism of his
weakness. How moist her eyes were--actually shining in the light! How
that light seemed to concentrate in the corner of the lashes, and then
slipped--a flash--away! Was she? Yes, she was crying.
Cass melted. He moved. Miss Porter put her head out of the window
and drew it back in a moment, dry-eyed.
"One meets all sorts of folks traveling," said Cass, with what he wished