I don' call to
min' any sech name ez that. Yo'-all's f'om up No'th likely." He was
beyond the reaches of fame.
"No," said Gideon, hardly knowing whether he was glad or sorry--"no, I
live south of heah. What-all's yo' name?"
The girl giggled deliciously.
"Man," she said, "I shu got the mos' reediculoustest name you eveh did
heah. They call me Vashti--yo' bacon's bu'nin'." She stepped out, and
ran past him to snatch his skillet deftly from the fire.
"Vashti"--a strange and delightful name. Gideon followed her slowly.
Her romantic coming and her romantic name pleased him; and, too, he
thought her beautiful. She was scarcely more than a girl, slim and
strong and almost of his own height. She was barefooted, but her
blue-checked gingham was clean and belted smartly about a small waist.
He remembered only one woman who ran as lithely as she did, one of the
numerous "diving beauties" of the vaudeville stage.
She cooked their breakfast, but he served her with an elaborate
gallantry, putting forward all his new and foreign graces, garnishing
his speech with imposing polysyllables, casting about their picnic
breakfast a radiant aura of grandeur borrowed from the recent days of
his fame.
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