"
"Oh, but do you know it? is it true? who told you? when will he
come? where is he? tell me about him!"
Her head popped up from her friend's neck and she smiled
brilliantly through the tears that were still sparkling on her
long black lashes.
"I didn't mean that I had heard from him, and I don't know where
he is; but--but they always come back."
"You say that because your man--because Lieutenant Beverley has
returned. It is always so. You have everything to make you happy,
while I--I--"
Again her eyes spilled their shower, and she hid her face in her
hands which Alice tried in vain to remove.
"Don't cry, Adrienne. You didn't see me crying--"
"No, of course not; you didn't have a thing to cry about.
Lieutenant Beverley told you just where he was going and just
what--"
"But think, Adrienne, only think of the awful story they told--
that he was killed, that Governor Hamilton had paid Long-Hair for
killing him and bringing back his scalp--oh dear, just think! And
I thought it was true."
"Well, I'd be willing to think and believe anything in the world,
if Rene would come back," said Adrienne, her face, now uncovered,
showing pitiful lines of suffering. "O Alice, Alice, and he never,
never will come!"
Alice exhausted every device to cheer, encourage and comfort her.
Adrienne had been so good to her when she lay recovering from the
shock of Hamilton's pistol bullet, which, although it came near
killing her, made no serious wound--only a bruise, in fact.
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