The Long Dim TrailHooker, Forrestine C. (Forrestine Cooper)
General
The Long Dim Trail
Hooker, Forrestine C. (Forrestine Cooper)
Arizona -- Fiction; Cowboys -- Fiction; Ranch life -- Fiction; Western stories
"What bright little things they are!" Nell smiled at the yapping little
animal that shouted pigmy challenge twenty feet distant.
"If they had long tails," Jamie hastened to say, "they'd be like the
squirrels we used to feed in the Park."
"We'll get Limber to trap one for you," promised Traynor. "You won't
have to keep it in a cage after it knows you, for it will dig a hole
close to the house and never leave."
Jamie's shining eyes met Nell's and he gave an ecstatic sigh as he
settled against her shoulder. But in an instant he was alert, watching a
cotton-tail rabbit dash across the road. It halted by a mesquite bush.
"Maybe I can catch it." Traynor handed the reins to his wife and stepped
cautiously until he reached down and picked the cowering creature by its
ears. Jamie uttered a cry of delight as his hands closed gently over the
rabbit.
"Once in a while you can do that," commented the man as he took the
reins again. "The Apaches often catch them that way, but I'd hate to
have my dinner depend on the success of getting a rabbit by this
method."
The child was holding the quivering captive against his cheek. Its eyes
were bright with terror, and when Jamie looked up at Traynor, his eyes
held something of the same bright, frightened appeal. "Won't you please
let it go home now? I'm afraid it will be lonesome tonight, like I used
to be when Nell was away working all day in New York."
Traynor lifted the tiny prisoner and let it slip to the ground. They
laughed together as it scurried and leaped across the prairie until it
was lost to sight.
"He knew the right way home," said Jamie, clapping his hands, "and it
has gone to tell its little boys and girls about the giants that caught
it and how it got away. They will be awful glad to see him come home,
won't they?" Nell nodded, and the boy went on, "Sometimes I used to
think maybe a giant would catch Nell so she couldn't come home to me
when it got dark, and it made my throat hurt. But you always did come,"
he finished with a smile at his sister, who thus learned for the first
time of his childish fear.
Her arm went about him suddenly and she held him close as she answered,
"And the giants didn't catch me, you see. Instead, you and I ran away to
a wonderful, new country, where the Prince came and found us, and now he
is taking us home to live with him."
"And we won't have to go back again, ever, will we Nell?" he asked in
sudden anxiety.
"No, dear," she answered. "It's going to be just like the story books.
Don't you remember? 'And they all lived happily for ever afterward!'"
The child leaned back with a contented sigh, and his closed eyes did not
see the look that passed between Nell and Traynor. The horses had slowed
down to a walk and Traynor's right hand held the reins loosely, but his
left hand closed over the girl's ungloved one with its new golden band
on the slender finger. He smiled at her, and then her eyes filled with
quick tears, as he leaned over to kiss her tenderly.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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