How the West Was Won (1963) Read Online Free PDF Page B

is- Linus moved the canoe alongside the raft and stepped out of it as he talked-you call a man a liar and it means shooting. He tied up the canoe, and when he straightened up he saw the girl standing beside the other man. She was slender, but beautifully rounded, and she had a poised, proud way about her that he liked ... like a young doe at the edge of a clearing.
    I never had a chance to look at a beaver pelt, Mr. Rawlings, Eve said. Would you show me one of yours?
    Well, ma'am, in that case--
    He knelt on the edge of the raft and loosened the rawhide thongs which bound the deerhide in place, and from beneath it he drew a beaver pelt. The fur was thick, brown and lustrous. When he stood up to hand it to her she realized for the first time how tall he was.
    There was a kind of quizzical good humor in his face that she immediately liked, yet there was coolness and a quiet strength such as she had never seen in anyone before.
    It's soft, Eve said, real soft.
    That's a prime pelt.
    We was afeared you might be a pirate, Harvey said. We've heard tell of them. Come up to supper, Prescott added, and get acquainted. We would admire to hear talk of the western lands.
    Eve handed the pelt to Linus, but gently he pushed it back. It's a present. You keep it, ma'am.
    Too surprised to thank him, she held the pelt close against her cheek, watching his lean back as he walked to the fire with her father. Lilith moved up beside Eve. Well! she whispered. You wasted no time! Is that the backwoodsman you've set your cap for? Likely he's got a wife and six kids waiting for him back east.
    Sam came from the shadows and walked to the fire, and Linus glanced at him.
    You'll do. Pays to be careful.
    Sam flushed with embarrassed pride. Mister, that's a fine rifle you've got there. Have you been all the way to the shining mountains? Lived in em. Been fourteen years from home.
    He seated himself cross-legged a little back from the firelight and accepted a plate from Rebecca Prescott. The Harveys trooped over, bringing their pots and kettles and placing them around the Prescott fire. That land to the west, Harvey asked, is it good farm land? Hadn't farming in mind, but some of it is, I reckon. Maybe most of it. Trouble is that folks back east spent two hundred years learning how to pioneer in timber country, and when they first see the plains they call it a desert. It ain't nothing of the kind. Just a different way of living, that's all. He cleaned his plate and accepted a refill. Lilith had begun playing I Wish I was Single on the accordion, playing softly to keep from disturbing the conversation.
    You're traveling late, Harvey commented.
    Anxious to reach Pittsburgh. It's been years since I've seen a city, and I aim to whoop it up a mite.
    Are those mountains out there as high as they say? Sam asked. Now, about that-Linus frowned thoughtfully, emptying his plate-I can't rightly say. Jim Bridger and me, we started out one time to climb one of those itty bitty foothills. That was early June. About mid-July we were gettin' pretty well up toward the actual mountains when we seen a feller with nice white wings and a harp in his hands. Jim,' I says, I don't like the way that feller is lookin' at us.' Jim, he looked and he said, Neither do I.' So we skedaddled back down again, and to this day I can't rightly say how high those mountains are.
    In the brief silence that followed, Zebulon cleared his throat, but before he could say anything, Rebecca spoke. Now, Zebulon, you just stop. One liar's enough.
    Linus passed his plate to Rebecca, who refilled it without comment, and Linus said, Thanky, ma'am. That there's right tasty. Don't know how you could tell, she said shortly. You've already had two plates.
    Doesn't pay to eat too much on an empty stomach, ma'am, but I can't say I ever et better.
    Zebulon got to his feet. Bedtime ... we make an early start. You'll have breakfast with us, Mr. Rawlings?
    Thanky, Mr. Prescott, but sometimes I wake up and take the urge