My stay in the place was brief, and I saw little of Eloise until the
evening before I was to return to Kansas City. I had meant to go away,
as she had left me in the San Christobal Valley, without one backward
look, but I couldn't do it; and at the close of my last day I went to
the Krane home, where I found her alone. It was the long after-sunset
hour, with the refreshing evening breezes pouring in from all the green
levels about us.
"Rex is at the store, and the others are all gone fishing," Eloise said,
in answer to my inquiry for the family.
"Mat and Bev always did go fishing on every occasion that I can
remember, and they will make fishermen of little Esmond and Rex now.
Would you like to go up to the west side of town and look into New
Mexico?" I asked, wondering why Beverly should go fishing with Mat when
Eloise was waiting for his smile.
But I was desperately lonely to-night, and I might not see Eloise again
until after she and Beverly--I could not go farther. She smiled and
said, lightly:
"I'm just honin' for a walk, as Aunty Boone would say, but I'm not quite
ready to see New Mexico yet."
"Oh, it's only a thing made of evening mists rising from the meadows,
and bits of sunset lights left over when the day was finished," I
assured her.
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