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About The west shore. (Portland, Or.) 1875-1891 | View Entire Issue (Nov. 1, 1888)
THE WEST SHORE. on tbo grass, and Carmen flung herself wearily upon them, and lay there, Boft, beautiful, voluptuous. When Nil had been to tho houso and made known their wishes to her mother, she stole back, and stood looking at tho lady, still with that troubled look in her eyes. " What a complexion! " said Carmen, looking care lessly at her. " Child, how do you keep that soft color in your face?" " It's nothin' to your'n," said Nil, drawing a deep breath. " Mine!" she laughed, lazily, and tho pink deep ened in her cheeks. " Oh, but mine is not my own, you know." " Not your'n! " cried Nil, earnestly. " D'you mean thct it b'longs to him? " with a look at the fair man. They all laughed now, ho mirthfully that tho child colorM painfully. " No, to tho other gentleman," said Carmen, but sho looked softly at tho fair ono. " Child, how would you liko to go with me, out and down into tho world, leaving theso mountains behind you forever? I would make you beautiful sb as you seem to think I am; and," bitterly, "your compleiion should belong to whomever you chose" Into tho child's face- camo a rosy radiance, liko that which Hushes tho eastern sky at sunrise. Her nostrils dilated, her lips quivered, hor eyes wero filled with a swift ruh of tears. Her whole being seemed to bo trembling, throbbing, leaping up to be free. "Oh," sho cried, "you do not mean it! Dear lady, you do not mean it!" A soft moihturo camo into tho woman's cold oyes, as sho turned them swiftly away. But when sho looked back, they wero dry again. " Why not?" sho said, with a look of defiance at tho men, though in reality sho was answering the re monstrances of her own despised conscience. " Sho could l so useful to mo now, and after yo gods! what a fortuno I could get for her if that face keeps its promise." "For shame!" said tho dark man, with sullen soorn. " Have you not blackness in your soul now, without betraying a littlo child?" A yellow gleam of auger camo into tho woman's eyes. " Ho pretends to lovo me," sho cried, smiling into tho fair one's face, " but I always doubted him-al-ways. Ono never can be&ve a man." " Take her," said he, catching the cuo to pleaso her. " Sho will bo happier with you than in theso lonely mountains. Who, indeed would not? " " Leave her, Carmen " said the other, with less sternness and inoro entreaty in his tone, "She is only a littlo child puro and white as tbo edelweiss. Why should you wish to put sin into anything sweet and so free from it now?" " Why!" cried the woman, bitterly. "Ab,th indeed, Oscar? It is honorable of you to ask me that question! Why? If only because I know that yon after having found me so weak as to allow mysel! to be dragged down to dishonor by you, yet reverence purity and virtue above all things on earth. If only for that, I would see denied every pure thing on earth." " Yes," said the man, bitterly, "yet no pure woman ever bound men to her with her fascinations as do yon, and all others like you. Do you think, Carmen, that I could leave you now, while you are sweet and gracious, for a better woman? Your own power telli you no. Let this be your comfort always when yon are troubled." " I am seldom troubled," said she, laughing, and flecking her face with the crimson roses, " only I shall have my way; the child shall go with me," Nil had heard, without understanding, this con. versation. To go with the beautiful lady, to be al ways near her, to watch the shadows in her eyes and the sunlight on her hair, sometimes to go quite near her, and touch her soft hand, her dress, her white arm, to learn to speak in that sweet, low voice, like clear water running over pebbles, this was all Nil cared to understand. Of course, she loved her moun tains and her beautiful valley, and would be sad at parting with them; but, perhaps, she would find some as lovely down in tho world, and there would always be some one who understood her. The beautiful Car men found it an easy task to persuade Nil's parenU to let her take the child. She must ba good, they thought, to care for such a daft thing as NiL " Yuh'll bring er back afore long," her mother said, with a disparaging look at the child. " Yuh'll git tired o' her pokin' around alono, lookin' at a mite o' red in th' sky, an' a-talkin' to th' rocks an' things." " Yuh be daft yurself cried the old grandmother. " The fine lady yander 's not so good 's sho looli The child never bo meant to be seen 's she be, with all 'er finery an' soft hands." Carmen laughed a littlo, but she glanced more than once at the old woman, whoso dim eyes hai pierced her mask, but she felt no anger. " She is so old," she said to herself, toying with her roses. " I do not mind when the young folk look at me, for they, perhaps, are only good because they have had no tomptation. But tho old -kind heaven! how old eyes look at one, and how plai&ly they see us. And she is bo old so old one could not feel anger at her." She put gold in their hands, and bade them bate everything ready in an hour, that they might bedota in tho valley by moonrise.