CHAPTER XXX
HER FIRST CASE
October hovered over Kentucky that year in a golden halo of enchantment.
The beech-trees ran the gamut of glory, and every shrub and weed had its
hour of transient splendor. A soft haze from burning brush lent the world
a sense of mystery and immensity. Day after day on the south porch at
Hillcrest Mac Clarke lay propped with cushions on a wicker couch, while
Nance Molloy sat beside him, and all about them was a stir of whispering,
dancing, falling leaves. The hillside was carpeted with them, the brook
below the pergola was strewn with bits of color, while overhead the warm
sunshine filtered through canopies of russet and crimson and green.
"I tell you the boy is infatuated with that girl," Mr. Clarke warned his
wife from time to time.
"What nonsense!" Mrs. Clarke answered. "He is just amusing himself a bit.
He will forget her as soon as he gets out and about."
"But the girl?"
"Oh, she's too sensible to have any hopes of that kind. She really is
an exceptionally nice girl. Rather too frank in her speech, and
frequently ungrammatical and slangy, but I don't know what we should do
without her."
But even Mrs. Clarke's complacence was a bit shaken as the weeks slipped
away, and Mac's obsession became the gossip of the household. To be sure,
so long as Nance continued to regard the whole matter as a joke and
refused to take Mac seriously, no harm would be done. But that very
indifference that assured his adoring mother, at the same time piqued her
pride.
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