A Collection of Stories, Reviews and Essays

wondering what her Dick and Ole would do.

“It is queer Dick didn’t come right over after me. He surely came,

for he would have left town before the storm began and he might just

as well come right on as go back. If he’d hurried he would have

gotten here before the preacher came. I suppose he was afraid to

come, for he knew Canuteson could pound him to jelly, the coward!”

Her eyes flashed angrily.

The weary hours wore on and Lena began to grow horribly lonesome. It

was an uncanny night and this was an uncanny place to be in. She

could hear the coyotes howling hungrily a little way from the cabin,

and more terrible still were all the unknown noises of the storm.

She remembered the tales they told of the big log overhead and she

was afraid of those snaky things on the window sills. She remembered

the man who had been killed in the draw, and she wondered what she

would do if she saw crazy Lou’s white face glaring into the window.

The rattling of the door became unbearable, she thought the latch

must be loose and took the lamp to look at it. Then for the first

time she saw the ugly brown snake skins whose death rattle sounded

every time the wind jarred the door.

“Canute, Canute!” she screamed in terror.

Outside the door she heard a heavy sound as of a big dog getting up

and shaking himself. The door opened and Canute stood before her,

white as a snow drift.

“What is it?” he asked kindly.

“I am cold,” she faltered.

He went out and got an armful of wood and a basket of cobs and

filled the stove. Then he went out and lay in the snow before the

door. Presently he heard her calling again.

“What is it?” he said, sitting up.

“I’m so lonesome, I’m afraid to stay in here all alone.”

“I will go over and get your mother.” And he got up.

“She won’t come.”

“I’ll bring her,” said Canute grimly.

“No, no. I don’t want her, she will scold all the time.”

“Well, I will bring your father.”

She spoke again and it seemed as though her mouth was close up to

the key-hole. She spoke lower than he had ever heard her speak

before, so low that he had to put his ear up to the lock to hear

her.

“I don’t want him either, Canute,—I’d rather have you.”

For a moment she heard no noise at all, then something like a groan.

With a cry of fear she opened the door, and saw Canute stretched in

the snow at her feet, his face in his hands, sobbing on the door

step.

Overland Monthly

, January 1896

Eric Hermannson’s Soul

I.

It was a great night at the Lone Star schoolhouse—a night when the