"Where would you like to go?" she asked as they neared the intersection.

"For a car ride on the elevated," he replied promptly.

"Then we will go right down this street. This is Thirty-third, and there's an elevated station a few blocks from here."

They walked along leisurely, she listening attentively, while he talked freely of the West, his life there and what he was doing. When they reached the L. he assisted her upstairs to the station, and in so doing touched her arm for the first time. The contact gave him a slight sensation but he felt more easy when they had entered the car and taken a seat together. A moment later they were gazing out over the great city below as the cars sped through the air.

It was growing dark when they returned, and she invited him to dinner.

He accepted and thereupon met Ethel and her husband.

Ethel was all pomp and ceremony, while her husband, with his cue from her, acted in the same manner, and they rather bored Jean Baptiste with their airs. He was glad when the meal was over. He followed Orlean back to the parlor, where they took a seat on the davenport again, and drew closer to her this time. Soon she said: "Do you play?"

"Lord, no!" he exclaimed; "but I shall be glad to listen to you."

"I can't play much," she said modestly; "but I will play what little I know." Thereupon she became seated and played and sang, he thought, very well. After she had played a few pieces, she turned and looked up at him, and he caught the full expression of her eyes. He could see that they were tender eyes; eyes behind which there was not apparently the force of will that he desired; but Orlean McCarthy was a fine girl. She was fine because she was not wicked; because she was intelligent and had been carefully reared; she was fine because she had never cultivated the society of undesirable or common people; but she was not a fine girl because she had a great mind, or great ability; or because she had done anything illustrious. And this Jean Baptiste, a judge of human nature could readily see; but he would marry her, he would be good to her; and she would, he hoped, never have cause to regret having married him. And thereupon he bent close to her, took her chin in his hand and kissed her upon the lips. She turned away when he had done this. In truth she was not expecting such from him and knew not just how to accept it. Her lips burned with a new sensation; she had a peculiar feeling about the heart.

She arose and went to the piano and her fingers wandered idly over the keys as she endeavored to still her beating heart.

Shortly she felt his hand upon her shoulder and she turned to hear him say:

"Won't you come back into the parlor? I--would like to speak to you?"

She consented without hesitation, and arising followed him timidly back to the seat they had occupied a few minutes before. Again seated he drew closely but did not deign to place his arm about her, looked toward the rear of the house where the others were, and, seeing that the doors were closed between them, sighed lightly and turned to her.

"Now, Miss McCarthy," he began, evenly. "I am going to say something to you that I have never said to a woman before." He paused while she waited with abated breath.

"I haven't known you long; but that is not the point. What I should say is, that in view of our brief correspondence, it will perhaps appear rather bold of me to say what I wish to. Yet, there comes a time in life when circumstances alter cases.

"Now, to be frank, I have always regarded matrimony as a business proposition, and while sentiment is a very great deal in a way, business considerations should be the first expedient." She was all attention.

She was peculiarly thrilled. It was wonderful to listen to him, she thought, and not for anything would she interrupt him. But _what_ did he mean; what was he _going_ to say.

"Well, I, Miss McCarthy, need a wife. I want a wife; but my life has not been lived where social intercourse with girls of my race has been afforded, as you might understand." She nodded understandingly, sympathetically. Her woman's nature was to sympathize, and what she did was only natural with all women.

"It has not been my privilege to know any girl of my race intimately; I am not, as I sit here beside you able to conscientiously, or truly, go to one and say: 'I love you, dear, and want you to be my wife,' in the conventional sense. Therefore, can I be forgiven if I say to you; if I ask you, Miss McCarthy," and so saying, he turned to her, his face serious, "to become my wife?"

He had paused, and her soul was afire. Was _this_ a proposal or was it a play? For a time she was afraid to say anything. She wouldn't say no, and she was afraid to say yes, until--well, until she was positive that he had actually asked her to marry him. As it was, she hesitated. But it was so wonderful she thought. It was so beautiful to be so near such a wonderful young man, such a strong young man. The young men she had known had not been like this one. And, really, she wanted to marry. She was twenty-six, and since her sister had married, she had found life lonely. To be a man's wife and go and live alone with him must be wonderful. She was a reader, and he had sent her books. In all books and life and everything there was love. And love always had its climax in a place where one lived alone with a man. Oh, glorious! She was _ready to listen to anything he had to say_.

"Now, I do not profess love to you, Miss McCarthy, in trying to make this clear. I could not, and be truthful. And I have always tried to be truthful. Indeed, I could not feel very happy, I am sure, unless I was truthful. To pretend that which I am not is hypocrisy, and I despise a hypocrite. I am an owner of land in the West, and I believe you will agree with me, that it behooves any Negro to acquire all he can. We are such a race of paupers! We own so little, and have such little prestige.

Thankfully, I am at present, on the high road to success, and, because of that, I want a wife, a dear, kind girl as a mate, the most natural thing in the world." She nodded unaware. What he was saying had not been said to her in that way; but the way he said it was so much to the point. She had not been trained to observe that which was practical; indeed, her father was regarded as a most impractical man; but she liked this man beside her now, and was anxious for him to go on. He did.

"I own 520 acres of very valuable land, and have consummated a deal for 480 more acres. This land is divided into tracts of 160 acres each, and must be homesteaded before the same is patented.

"Now, my grandmother, and also a sister are already in the West, and will homestead on two places. The other, I have arranged for you. The proceeding is simple. It will be necessary only for you to journey out West, file on this land as per my directions, after which we can be married any time after, and we can then live together on your claim. Do you understand?"

"I think so," she said a bit falteringly.

"Now, my dear, do not feel that I am a charter barterer; we can simply acquire a valuable tract of land by this process and be as we would under any other circumstances. Once you were out there all would be very plain to you, but at this distance, it is perhaps foreign to you, that I understand."

She looked up into his face trustingly. Right then she wanted him to kiss her. It was all so irregular; but he was a man and she a maid, and she had never had a love.... He seemed to understand, and passionately he caught her to him, and kissed her many, many times.

It was all over then, as far as she was concerned. She had not said yes or no with words, but her lips had been her consent, and she knew she would love him. It was the happiest hour in the simple life she had lived, and she was ready to become his forever.

CHAPTER V

A PROPOSAL; A PROPOSITION; A CERTAIN MRS. PRUITT--AND A LETTER

"Oh, mama, Mr. Baptiste has asked me to marry him," cried Orlean, rushing into the room and to the bed where her mother lay reading, after Jean Baptiste had left.

"Why, my child, this--this is rather sudden, is it not? Mr. Baptiste has known you only a few months and has been corresponding with you just a little while," her mother said with some excitement, suddenly sitting erect in the bed.

"Yes, mama, what you say is true, but he explained. He said--well, I can't quite explain, but he--he wants to marry me, mama, and you know--well, mama, you understand, don't you?"

"Yes, I understand. All girls want husbands, but it must be regular. So take off your clothes, dear, get into bed and tell me just what Mr.

Baptiste did say."

The other did as instructed, and as best she could, tried to make plain what Jean had said to her regarding the land and all. She didn't make it very plain, and the matter rather worried her, but the fact that he had asked her to marry him, was uppermost in her mind, and she finally went to sleep happier than she had ever been in her life before.

"Now, when the young man calls today, you will have him take his business up with me," her mother instructed judiciously the following morning.

"He will explain it all, mama. He can do so very easily," she said, glad to be relieved of the difficult task. Yet she had her worries withal.

Her mother was a very difficult person to explain anything to; besides, Orlean knew her mother was in constant fear of her father who was a Presiding Elder, traveling over the southern part of the state, and who came into the city only every few months. And if her mother was hard to make understand anything, her father was worse--and business, he knew next to nothing about although he was then five and fifty.

Jean Baptiste had accomplished a great many more difficult tasks than explaining to his prospective mother-in-law in regard to the land. When she seemed to have sensed what it all meant, he observed that she would give a peculiar little start, and he would have to try it all over again. In truth she understood better than she appeared to; but it was the girl's father whom she feared to anger--for in all her life she had never been able to please him.

But she found a way out along late that afternoon when a caller was announced.

The visitor was a woman possessed of rare wits, and of all the people that Mrs. McCarthy disliked, and of all who disliked Mrs. McCarthy, Mrs.

Pruitt was the most pronounced. Yet, it was Mrs. Pruitt who settled the difficulty and saved the day for Orlean and Jean Baptiste. But as to why Mrs. Pruitt should dislike Mrs. McCarthy, and Mrs. McCarthy should dislike Mrs. Pruitt, there is a story that was known among all their friends and acquaintances.

When Miss Rankin had said what she did about Rev. N.J. McCarthy, she had not told all, nor had she referred to any woman in particular. She was not a scandal monger. But she knew as all Chicago knew, that in so far as the parties in question were concerned there was a friendship between Mrs. Pruitt and the Reverend that was rather subtle, and had been for years. And it was this which caused the two mentioned to dislike each other with an unspoken hatred.

But Mrs. McCarthy trusted Orlean's going eight hundred miles west to file on a homestead, and what might come of it, to Mrs. Pruitt rather than to herself. While she could--was aware of it--she did not dare venture anything to the contrary where it might come back to her husband's ears, she knew Mrs. Pruitt had more influence with her husband than had she.... Therefore when she invited Jean Baptiste to meet Mrs.

Pruitt, who had met him years before, she breathed a sigh of relief.

It was over in a few hours. Mrs. Pruitt would accompany Orlean to the West and back, with Jean Baptiste paying expenses, and preparations were made thereto.

In two days they had reached Gregory where the great land excitement was on. From over all the country people had gathered, and the demand for the land had reached its greatest boom since Jean Baptiste had come to the country.

His sister and grandmother had arrived during his absence, and, after greeting them, he was handed a letter, which read:

_My dear Mr. Baptiste_:

Your most delightful letter was received by me today, and that you may see just how much I appreciate it, I am answering at _once_ and hope you will receive the same real soon.

To begin with: the reason I have not answered sooner is quite obvious. I was away on a short visit, and only returned home today, to find that your _most_ interesting letter had been here several days. Think of it, and I would have given most _anything_ to have had it sooner.