Oh, what's goin' to
become o' me now, anyhow?"
"Well, but I don't--" The revelation came to me before I could complete
the sentence. Jim's face had told the story of his heart!
"Jim," I said, laying my hand on his shoulder, "do you love Ruby?"
"Sit down here," he said, in a hopeless, despondent voice, "and mebbe
I'll git grit enough to tell ye. I ain't never told none o' the folks
that comes up here o' how things was, but I'm goin' to tell you. And I'm
goin' to tell it to ye plumb from the beginnin'. too." And a sigh like
the moan of one in pain escaped him.
"Twelve years ago I come here from New York. I'd been cleaned out o'
everything I had by a man I trusted, and I was flat broke. I didn't care
where I went, so's I got away from the city and from people. I wanted to
git somewheres out into the country, and so I got aboard the train and
kep' on till I'd struck Plymouth. There my money gin out and I started
up the road into the mountains. I thought I'd hire out to some choppers
for the winter.
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