"Yes," David answered simply. "We walked all night and we're rather tired, but we thought there was no use in going in to Canfield until pretty near nine o'clock."

"I guess Millie can fix up a bed so the little lady can s.n.a.t.c.h a nap 'tween now and then," Buckner offered. "Pitch in, folks! it ain't much, but you're welcome. Farmer, eh?" and his narrow eyes measured David's splendid young body thoughtfully. "Aim to locate around here? Old man Webster, the man I rent this patch of ground from, is needing hands bad.

He's got a shack over the hill that he'd likely fix up for you if you ain't got anything better in mind. Not quite as nice as this house-we got three rooms, counting this lean-to, and the shack I'm referrin' to is only one room and a lean-to, but the little lady could fix it up real pretty if she's got a knack that way, like Millie here has."

Sally almost choked on her mouthful of buckwheat cake. Were all her dreams of a home to come to this-or worse than this? One room and a lean-to! She felt suddenly ill and was swaying in her chair when David's firm, big hand closed over hers that lay laxly on the table.

"Thanks, Mr. Buckner," she heard David's voice faintly as from a great distance. "That's mighty nice of you, but Sally and I have other plans."

Other plans? Sally smiled at him tremulously, adoringly, knowing full well that he had no plans at all beyond the all-important marriage ceremony. But after breakfast she lay down on the bed that Millie Buckner hastily "straightened" and drifted off to sleep, as happy as if her future were blue-printed and insured against poverty. For no matter what might be in store for her, there would always be David-

They left the tenant farmer's shack at half past eight o'clock, Millie and Jim Buckner and the baby waving them goodby. Buckner, ashamed of his ungraciousness, had refused to take the dollar, but David had wrapped the baby's small sticky fingers about the folded bill.

"Shall we go up the hill and see 'Old Man' Webster?" David asked gravely when they were in the lane leading to the highway.

"Let's" agreed Sally valiantly.

"You'd really be willing to live-like that?" David marveled, his head jerking toward the dreary little shack they were leaving behind them.

"If-if you were with me, it wouldn't matter," Sally answered seriously.

"You'll never have to!" David exulted, sweeping her to his breast and kissing her regardless of the fact that the Buckners were still watching them. "I promise you it will never be as bad as that, honey. But maybe Jim Buckner promised Millie the same thing," he added in a troubled, uncertain voice.

"I'll never be sorry," Sally promised huskily.

They reached Canfield a few minutes after nine and had no difficulty in finding the county court house, for its grounds formed the "square"

which was the hub of the small town. An old man pottering about the tobacco-stained halls with a mop and pail directed them to the marriage license bureau, without waiting for David to frame his embarra.s.sed question.

The clerk, a pale, very thin young man, whose weak eyes were enlarged by thick-lensed gla.s.ses, thrust a printed form through the wicket of his cage, and went on with his work upon a big ledger, having apparently not the slightest interest in foolish young couples who wanted to commit matrimony.

"Answer all the questions," the clerk mumbled, without looking up.

"Table in the corner over there. Pen and ink."

Sally and David were laughing helplessly by the time they had taken seats at the pine table in the corner. "Proving you're never as important as you think you are," David chuckled. "Let's see. 'Place of residence?' I suppose we'll have to put Capital City. But that chap certainly doesn't give a continental who we are or where we're from.

We're all in the day's work with him, thank heaven. Don't forget to put your age at eighteen, darling."

When they presented their filled-in and signed application for a marriage license, the clerk accepted it with supreme indifference, glancing at it and drew a stack of marriage license blanks toward him.

As he began to write in the names, however, he frowned thoughtfully, then peered through the bars of his cage at the blushing, frightened couple.

"Your names sound awfully familiar to me," he puzzled. "Where you from?

Capital City? Say, you're the kids that got into a row with a farmer and busted his leg, ain't you?"

Sally pressed close to David, her hands locking tightly over his arm, but David, as if he did not understand her signal, answered the clerk in a steady voice: "Yes, we are."

"I read all about you in the papers," the clerk went on in a strangely friendly voice. "I reckon your story made a deep impression on me because I was raised in an orphans' home myself and ran away when I was fourteen. I hoped at the time that you kids would make a clean get-away.

I see the young lady's had a couple of birthdays in the last month," he grinned and winked. "Eighteen now, eh?"

"Yes," Sally quavered and then laughed, the lid of her right eye fluttering slowly down until the two fringes of black lashes met and entangled.

The clerk's pen scratched busily. "All right, youngsters. Here you are.

Justice of the peace wedding?"

"We'd rather be married by a minister," David answered as he laid a $20 bill under the wicket and reached for the marriage license.

"That's easy," the clerk a.s.sured him heartily. "Like every county seat, Canfield's got her 'marrying parson.' Name of Greer. He's building a new church out of the fees that the eloping couples pay him. Lives on Chestnut street. White church and parsonage. Five blocks up Main street and turn to your right, then walk a block and a half. You can't miss it.

And good luck, kids. You'll need lots of it."

David thrust a hand beneath the wicket and the two young men shook hands, David flushed and embarra.s.sed but smiling, the clerk grinning good-naturedly.

"Hey, don't forget your change," their new friend called as David and Sally were turning away. "Marriage licenses in this state cost only $1.50. If you've got any spare change, give it to Parson Greer."

"Oh, he was sweet!" Sally cried, between laughter and tears, as they walked out of the courthouse. "I thought I would faint when he asked us that awful question. But everything's all right now."

"We're as good as married," David a.s.sured her triumphantly, slapping his breast pocket and c.o.c.king his head to listen to the crackling of the marriage license. "Five blocks up Main street. Up must mean north-"

Within five minutes they were awaiting an answer to their ring at the door of the little white parsonage half hidden behind the rather shabby white frame building of the church.

A stout, rosy-cheeked, white-haired old lady opened the door and beamed upon them. "You're looking for the 'marrying parson,' aren't you?" she chuckled. "Well, now, it's a shame, children, but you'll have to wait quite a spell for him. He's conducting a funeral at the home of one of our parishioners, and won't be back until about half past eleven. I'm Mrs. Greer. Won't you come in and wait?"

Sally and David consulted each other with troubled, disappointed eyes.

Sally wanted to cry out to David that she was afraid to wait two hours, afraid to wait even half an hour, but with Mrs. Greer beaming expectantly upon them she did not dare.

"Thank you, Mrs. Greer," David answered, his hand tightening warningly upon Sally's. "We'll wait."

As they followed Mrs. Greer into the stuffy, over-furnished little parlor, he managed to whisper rea.s.suringly in Sally's ear: "Just two hours, darling. Nothing can happen."

But Sally was shaking with fright-

CHAPTER XV

During the two hours that they waited for the Reverend Mr. Greer, "the marrying parson," David and Sally sat stiffly side by side on a horsehair sofa, only their fingers touching shyly, listening to countless romances of eloping couples with which old Mrs. Greer regaled them in a kindly effort to help them pa.s.s the tedious time of waiting.

Her daughter-in-law, widowed by the death of the only son of the family, trailed weakly in and out of the living room, her big, mournful black eyes devouring David's magnificent youth and vigor.

"You remind her of Sonny Bob," Mrs. Greer leaned forward in her arm chair to whisper to David. "Killed in the war he was, and Cora just can't become reconciled. Seems like the only pleasure she gets out of life now is acting as witness for weddings. And I must say she cries as beautiful and sweet as any bride's mother could. Some of the eloping brides appreciate it and some don't, but Cora means well. Once, I recollect, she spoiled a wedding. It seems that the girl's mother was dead set against this boy, and when Cora started to cry, just like a mother-"

The story went on and on, but Sally heard little of it, for her heart was suddenly desolate with need of her own mother. Lucky girls who had mothers to cry for them at their weddings! Her cold fingers gripped David's comforting, warm hand spasmodically. Somewhere in the world there was a woman who was her mother, a woman who had not waited for the marriage ceremony before succ.u.mbing to just such love as that woman's unwanted daughter now felt for David.

Understanding and pity for that hara.s.sed, shame-stricken girl that her mother must have been just sixteen years ago gushed suddenly into Sally's heart. If David had not been so fine, so tender, so good-she shivered and clung more tightly to his hand. In a few minutes she would be his wife and safe, safe from Mrs. Stone, the orphans' home, the reformatory.

"I hear Mr. Greer coming in," Mrs. Greer beamed upon them and bustled from the room. She returned immediately, a plump hand resting affectionately on the shoulder of a tall, thin, stooped old man, whose sweet, bloodless, wrinkled face glowed with a faint radiance of kindliness and benediction.

"This is little Miss Sally Ford and David Nash, Papa," Mrs. Greer told him. "They've been waiting patiently for two hours to get married. I've been entertaining them the best I could with some of our very own romances. I often tell Papa we ought to write stories for the magazines-"

"Well, well!" The "marrying parson" rubbed his beautiful, thin hands together and smiled upon Sally and David. "You're pretty young, aren't you? But Mama and I believe in youthful marriages. I was nineteen and she was seventeen when we took the big step, and we've never regretted it. You have your license, I presume?"