A faint beating in her throat
betrayed what it was she half hoped. She was so desperately lonesome!
Pat tilted his head and looked up at her and licked her hand until she
drew it away impatiently.
"Good gracious, Pat! Do you want to plaster me with germs?" she reproved.
And Pat dropped his head down upon his paws and eyed her furtively from
under his brown lids, waiting for her to repent her harshness and smooth
his head caressingly, as was her wont.
But Helen May was watching that slow-moving column of dust, just as
she had watched the cloud which had heralded the coming into her life
of Holman Sommers. It might be--but it couldn't, for this was away
off the road. No one would be cutting straight across that hummocky
flat, unless--
From the desert I come to thee,
On my Arab shod with fire--
"Oh, I'm getting absolutely mushy!" she muttered angrily. "If I've
reached the point where I can't see a spot of dust without getting
heart-failure over it, why it's time I was shut up somewhere. What are
you lolling around me for, Pat? Go on and tend to your goats, why don't
you? And do get off my skirt!"
Pat sprang up as though she had struck him; gave her an injured glance
that was perfectly maddening to Helen May, whose conscience was
sufficient punishment, and went slinking off down the slope.
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