I wondered about many things, but I could
not think anything.
"I have no present plans. Father Josef and Esmond Clarenden thought it
would be well for me to come up to Kansas and look at green prairies
instead of red mesas for a while; to rest my eyes, and get my strength
again--which I have never lost," Eloise said, with a smile. "And Jondo
says--"
She did not tell me what Jondo had said, for Beverly and Mat and the two
rollicking boys joined us just then and we talked of many things of the
earlier years.
I cannot tell how that June slipped by, nor how Eloise, in the full
bloom of her young womanhood, with the burdens lifted from her heart and
hands, was no more the clinging, crushed Eloise who had sat beside me in
the church of San Miguel, but a self-reliant and deliciously
companionable girl-woman. With Beverly she was always gay, matching him,
mood for mood; and if sometimes I caught the fleeting edge of a shadow
in her eyes, it was gone too soon to measure. I did not seek her company
alone, because I knew that I could not trust myself. Over and over,
Jondo's words, when he had told me the story of Mary Marchland, came
back to me:
"And although they loved each other always, they never saw each other
again.
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