But before I stepped in at the door something murky had cleared away
inside me.
"Oh, Hildreth! Darrie!"
The women came dragging forward. But with them, too, it was a passing
mood.
My indignation at the personal outrage of the impending mob incited me
as them ... till I think not one of the three of us would have stepped
aside from the path of a herd of stampeding elephants.
"The yokels," and Darrie's nostrils flared, her blue blood showing, "to
dare even think of such an action, against their betters!"
* * * * *
We lit a roaring log fire. We sat reading aloud from Shelley. As the
hours drew by ... eight ... nine ... ten ... eleven ... there is no
doubt that our nerves grew to a very fine edge....
And at twelve o'clock--
Far off, at a respectful distance, a carol of rough, humorous voices
sang the song, "_Happily Married_"!
"H-a-double-p-y," etc.
And we knew that my bluff had worked.
* * * * *
The next day we went through a let-down.
Hildreth was quite nerve-shaken, and so was Darrie.
But I strutted about with my chest out, the cock of the walk.
* * * * *
But, nevertheless, and despite their bravery and the fiasco of the mob's
attack, the hearts seemed to have left the bodies of both "my" women.
* * * * *
The cold weather that Darrie and the old settlers had predicted was now
descending on the countryside.
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