In Apple-Blossom Time Part 21

"Oh, no, I don't like you. How can I? People don't like utter strangers.

One feels worship, adoration for a creature that drops from the skies, and lifts a wretched helpless girl out of torturing captivity into the free sweet air of heaven."

"Well, that'll do," returned Ben, nodding. "Adoration and worship will do to begin with. Let us go over to the village and be married--_my beautiful darling_."

Geraldine colored vividly under this escape of her companion's ungovernable steam, but she did not change her expression.

"I certainly shall not do that," she answered quietly.

Ben relaxed his tense, appealing posture.

"Well, then," he said, drawing a long breath, "if you positively decline the trap--oh, it was a trap all right--if you are determined to postpone the wedding, I'll tell you that I really don't believe your father forged those checks."

"Oh, Mr. Barry--" the girl leaned toward him.

"Ben, or I won't go on."

"Ben, then. It is no sort of a name compared to the one I have been giving you. I've been calling you Sir Galahad."

Ben smiled at her blissfully. "Nice," he said. "I don't believe Miss Upton went beyond that."

"Oh, please go on, Mr. Barry--Ben--Sir Galahad."

"Why couldn't our cheerful friend have shown you any checks he drew to your father's name and claim that they were forged?"

Geraldine's eyes shone. "I never thought of that."

"Of course I cannot be sure of it. I would far rather get something definite on the old scamp."

Geraldine shuddered. "He is so cruel. He is so rough to that poor little fellow Pete. Think what I owe that boy! He managed to get your message to me even when threatened with his master's whip. Mr. Carder saw you speaking to him and questioned him."

"Oh, you mean that nut who took my letter?"

"The hero who took your letter. He had to lie outside my door every night to keep me from escaping, and he slipped your message under it.

Where should I be now but for him? Poor child, he is as friendless as I am"--Geraldine interrupted herself with a grateful look at her companion--"as I was, I mean. He had to follow me and guard me wherever I went, always keeping at a distance, because he mustn't speak to me and the ogre was always watching. How I thank Heaven," added Geraldine fervently, "that Mr. Carder himself had called Pete off duty for the first time before the--the archangel swooped down from the sky."

"I'm getting on," said Ben. "If you keep on promoting me, I'll arrive first thing you know."

"I should honestly be wretched if I had to think Mr. Carder was blaming Pete for my escape. The boy did tell me his life depended on my safety."

"Well, I don't understand," said Ben with a puzzled frown. "Who lies in front of Pete's door? Why does he stay there? Why doesn't he light out some time between two days?"

"Oh, Mr. Carder has told him no one would employ him, that Pete would starve but for him. Did you notice how ragged and neglected he looked?"

"He looked like a nut. I was afraid he was so stupid that you would never receive the message." Ben looked thoughtful. "How long has he lived at the farm?"

"For years. Mrs. Carder took him from the orphan asylum when he was a child. She thought he would be more useful than a girl. They keep him as a slave. You saw how very bow-legged he is. He can't get about normally, but he drives the car and helps in the kitchen and does every sort of menial task. There was such a look in his eyes always when he saw me.

Little as I could do for him, or even speak to him, I'm afraid he is missing me terribly." Geraldine's look suddenly grew misty. "See how faithful he was about Daddy's letter. Poor little Pete. Mr. Carder will be out of his mind at my flight. I hope he doesn't visit it on that poor boy."

"Well," said Ben, heroically refraining from putting his arms around her, "why don't we take him?"

"We? Take Pete? How wonderful!" she returned, her handkerchief pausing in mid-air.

"Sure thing, if you want him. Send him to the barber and have his hair mowed. Have some trousers cut out for him with a circular saw and fix him up to the queen's taste."

"Oh, Mr. Barry--Ben! You don't know what you're saying. It would give me more relief than I can express, for the boy's lot is so miserable and starved."

"Well, then, that is settled, my princess."

"But you can't get him. I can't help feeling that anyone who has lived there so long, and been so unconsidered and unnoticed, must know more than Mr. Carder wishes to have go to the outside world. His mother hinted some things." Geraldine gasped with reminiscent horror of that low-ceiled kitchen.

Her companion suddenly looked very alert. "Highly probable," he returned. "Why didn't you say that before? We certainly will take Pete in. What are his habits? You say he drives the car."

"Yes, he did until he was set to dog my movements. I often heard it referred to. Do you mean--you could never get him in this blessed chariot. He will probably never see the meadow again unless they send him to get the cows."

Ben shook his head. "No; I think he will have to be bagged some other way. What's the matter with my going back to the farm on my motor-cycle and engaging him, overbidding the ogre?"

Geraldine actually clasped her hands on the leathern arm beside her.

"Promise me," she said fervently, looking into her companion's eyes--"promise me that you will never go back to that farm alone."

"You want to go with me?"

"Don't joke. Promise me solemnly."

Ben's lips took a grave line and he put one hand over the beseeching ones.

"Then what will you promise me?" he returned.

The blood mantled high over the girl's face. "You're taking me to Miss Upton, aren't you?" she returned irrelevantly.

"Yes, if you positively refuse still to go to the parson."

The expression of her anxious eyes grew inscrutable.

"I want your mother to love me," she said navely.

Ben lifted her hands and held them to his lips.

"You haven't promised," she said softly. "I know he suspects you now. I think he is a madman when he is angry."

"Very well, I promise." Ben released her hands and smiled down with adoring eyes. "Now, we will go home," he said.

Again the great bird rose and winged its way between heaven and earth.

Now it was not as before when Geraldine's whole being had seemed absorbed in flight and freedom. The earth was before her and a new life.

She had a lover. Wonderful, sweet, incredible fact. A good man, Miss Upton said. Could it be that never again desolation and fear should sicken her heart; that like the princess of the tales her great third day had come and brought her love as well as liberty? Happiness deluged her, flushed her cheeks, and shone in her eyes. She longed and dreaded to alight again upon that earth which had never shown her kindness.

Could it be possible that she should reign queen in a good man's heart?

For so many years she had been habitually in the background, kept there either by her stepmother's will or her own desire to hide her shabbiness, and when need had at last forced her to initiative, she had received such humiliating stabs from the greed of men--could it be that she was to walk surrounded by protection, and love, and _respect_?

She closed her eyes. Spring, sunlight, joy coursed through every vein.