Read How the West Was Won (1963) for Free Online

to move. By sun-up I may be long gone. Good night.
    Linus Rawlings took up his rifle and moved away from the fire, pausing to glance at the arrangement of the camp. Grudgingly, he admitted that for tenderfeet they had placed their camp wisely, and when he saw Sam Prescott settling down to stand watch, he turned his back and walked toward his canoe. Movement under a tree near the shore drew his attention, and he saw Eve kneeling there, spreading blankets over a pile of neatly cut boughs. The distinctly Indian pattern of the blankets was obvious even in the dim light. Those look like my blankets.
    They are.
    Then I'm a mite confused. Whose bed would that be?
    Yours.
    You cut all them boughs?
    Is it enough? she asked anxiously. I never made a bough bed before. You did right well. He glanced at her warily. Why? Why would you do a thing like this? You ain't thinkin' you've got to pay me for that beaver pelt? She got to her feet, as gracefully as any Indian girl. It ain't ... isn't polite to ask a girl why she does things.
    My manners ain't much, ma'am. Had no use for them for some time now. He placed his rifle carefully on the boughs where his hand could fall easily upon it Thanky, ma'am, an' good night.
    She made no move. Are those Indian girls pretty? Some of them ... some of the others-well, it depends on how long since you've seen a white girl. They get prettier an' prettier as time goes by, seems to me. How long since you have seen a white girl?
    Linus was cautious. He was too experienced a trapper not to be wary, and he sensed trouble. I ain't quite sure where you're headed, ma'am, but it's gettin' right late. Your pa might- How pretty do I look to you?
    Ain't you bein' a bit forward, ma'am? I mean ... well, you'd be a mighty pretty girl if a man never went away at all. You'd be counted pretty wherever, but it seems to me this conversation is headed right into some mighty swampy country. You're headed upriver and I'm going down. There isn't much time to get questions answered.
    Are you sure-dead sure-you want em answered? She was proud, he thought suddenly, very proud. It was not like her to talk so to just any man ... she had gumption, all right. And she was lovely. He had scarcely dared look before, not being a forward man himself, and knowing from long experience that strangers had better be careful in their attentions to womenfolk. He shifted his feet uneasily. This thing had come upon him too fast, and he was not accustomed to judging such situations quickly. If it had been a buffalo, now, or a cougar ... or any kind of a redskin ... but this was a civilized white girl, and a very pretty one. Are you sure, ma'am? he repeated.
    Yes.
    Bein' alone at nighttime ... in the forest and all ... it ain't exactly the safest place for a girl to be. There's something about the woods, ma'am-it stirs need in a man.
    In a woman, too.
    He shifted his feet. This was getting out of hand. He was ready as the next man, but this here ... she was a decent girl, with her folks hard by. I've come a far piece, ma'am, and I'm goin' on. You'll likely never see me again.
    There is a chance of that. She looked straight into his eyes. I would be sorry if that happened.
    He took her by the shoulders and drew her toward him. She came willingly, yet with a certain reserve that let him know this was something special, something different for her. He took her in his arms and held her close and kissed her. He kissed her thoroughly, becoming more interested as the seconds fled, but he kissed her no more thoroughly than she kissed him. She stepped back, breathless. Glory be!
    Linus was startled to find himself a bit breathless too, and the feeling worried him. Ma'am ... seems like you've not done much kissing before. I never been kissed permanent before.
    Uneasily, he glanced toward the fire, almost wishing her father would come looking for her. Linus Rawlings had never cared for the word permanent and it aroused all his old-time wariness, which had been in