"I was going to give you some of them there Injun feathers of mine to remember me by," I tells her, "but if you don't want 'em, there's plenty of others would be glad to take 'em."But she says she would like to have them.
"Well," I says, "I will bring them to you to-morrow afternoon."
She says, "Thank you."
Finally I couldn't stand it no longer. I got brave all of a sudden, and busted out: "Martha, I--I--I--"But I got to stuttering, and my braveness stut-tered itself away. And I finishes up by saying:
"I like you a hull lot, Martha." Which wasn't jest exactly what I had planned fur to say.
Martha, she says she kind of likes me, too.
"Martha," I says, "I like you more'n any girl I ever run acrost before."She says, "Thank you," agin. The way she said it riled me up. She said it like she didn't know what I meant, nor what I was trying to get out of me. But she did know all the time. Iknowed she did. She knowed I knowed it, too.
Gosh-dern it, I says to myself, here I am wasting all this time jest TALKING to her. The right thing to do come to me all of a sudden, and like to took my breath away. But I done it. I grabbed her and I kissed her.
Twice. And then agin. Because the first was on the chin on account of her jerking her head back. And the second one she didn't help me none.
But the third time she helped me a little. And the ones after that she helped me considerable.
Well, they ain't no use trying to talk about the rest of that afternoon. I couldn't rightly describe it if I wanted to. And I reckon it's none of any-body's business.
Well, it makes you feel kind of funny. You want to go out and pick on somebody about four sizes bigger'n you are and knock the socks off'n him. It stands to reason others has felt that-a-way, but you don't believe it. You want to tell people about it one minute. The next minute you have got chills and ague fur fear some one will guess it.
And you think the way you are about her is going to last fur always.
That evening, when I was cooking supper, I laughed every time I was spoke to. When Looey and I was hitching up to drive down town to give the show, one of the hosses stepped on his foot and I laughed at that, and there was purty nigh a fight.
And I was handling some bottles and broke one and cut my hand on a piece of glass. I held it out fur a minute dumb-like, with the blood and medicine dripping off of it, and all of a sudden Ibusted out laughing agin. The doctor asts if I am crazy. And Looey says he has thought I was from the very first, and some night him and the doctor will be killed whilst asleep. One of the things we have every night in the show is an Injun dance, and Looey and I sings what the doctor calls the Siwash war chant, whirling round and round each other, and making licks at each other with our tommyhawks, and letting out sudden wild yips in the midst of that chant. That night I like to of killed Looey with that tommyhawk, I was feeling so good. If it had been a real one, instead of painted-up wood, I would of killed Looey, the lick I give him.
The worst part of that was that, after the show, when we got back to camp and the hosses was picketed out fur the night, I had to tell Looey all about how I felt fur an explanation of why I hit him.
Which it made Looey right low in his sperrits, and he shakes his head and says no good will come of it.
"Did you ever hear of Romeo and Joliet?" he says:
"Mebby," I says, "but what it was I hearn I can't remember. What about them?"
"Well," he says, "they carried on the same as you. And now where are they?""Well," I says, "where are they?"