"Can't you wait for me to do that,Norrie?I have only one more engagement for the afternoon,and Miss Saxon will be wanting to dust in here soon."Dr.Fenneben looked fondly at his niece,a man to make other men jealous,if occasion offered.
"Please don't,Miss Elinor,"Vincent Burgess urged.
"I shall be delighted to explore darkest Kansas with you at any time.""There is no mistaking that look in a man's eyes,"Dr.Fenneben thought as he watched the two pass through the rotunda and out of the great front door."I have guessed Joshua's plan easily enough,but I've only half guessed him out.Why did he mention his money matters to me?
There is enough merit in him worth the shaping Sunrise will give him,however,and I must do a man's part,anyhow.As for Elinor,there's a ready-made missionary field in her,so Joshua warns me.
But he is a poor judge sometimes.I wish I might have begun with her sooner.
I cannot think she is quite as mercenary as he represents her to be."Through the window he saw a pretty picture.Outlined against the dark green cedars of the north angle was Professor Burgess,tall,slender,fair of face,faultless in dress.Beside him was Elinor Wream,all dainty and sweet and white,from the broad-brimmed hat set jauntily on her dark hair to the white bows on the instep of her neat little canvas shoes.
A wave of loneliness swept over Dr.Fenneben's soul as he looked.
"It must have been a thousand years ago that I was in love and walked in my Eden.There are no serpents here as there were in mine."Just then his eyes fell upon the wide stone landing of the campus steps.
At the same moment Elinor gave a scream of fright.A bull snake,big and ugly,had crawled half out of the burned grasses of the slope and stretched itself lazily in the sunshine along the warm stone.
It roused itself at the scream,emitting its hoarse hiss,after the manner of bull snakes.Elinor clutched at her companion's arm,pale with fear.
"Kill it!Kill it!"she cried,trying to force her slender white parasol into his hand.
Before he could move,Vic Burleigh leaped out from behind the cedars,and,picking up a sharp-edged bit of limestone,tipped his hand dexterously and sent it clean as a knife cut across the space.
It struck the snake just below the head,half severing it from the body.
Another leap and Burleigh had kicked the whole writhing mass--it would have measured five feet--off the stone into the sunflower stalks and long grasses of the steep slope.
"How did you ever dare?"Elinor asked.
"Oh,he's not poison;he just doesn't belong up here."The bluntness of timidity was in Vic's answer,but the strength and musical depth of his resonant voice was almost startling.
"There is no Eden without a serpent,Miss Elinor,"Professor Burgess said lightly.
"Nor a serpent without some sort of Eden built around it.
The thing's mate will be along after it pretty soon.
Look out for it down there.The best place to catch it is right behind its ears,"came the boy's quick response.
Burleigh looked back defiantly at Burgess as he disappeared indoors.
And the antagonism born in the meeting of these two men in the morning took on a tiny degree of strength in the afternoon.
"What a wonderful voice,Vincent.It makes one want to hear it again,"Elinor exclaimed.
"Yes,and what an overgrown pile of awkwardness.It makes one hope never to see it again,"her companion responded.
"But he killed that snake in a way that looked expert to me,"Elinor insisted.
"My dear Miss Elinor,he was probably born in some Kansas cabin and has practiced killing snakes all his life.Not a very elevating feat.
Let's go down and explore Lagonda Ledge now before the other snake comes in for the coroner's inquest."And the two passed down the stone steps to the shady level campus and on to the town beyond it.
"You are hard on snakes,Burleigh,"Dr.Fenneben said as he welcomed the country boy into his study."A bull snake is a harmless creature,and he is the farmer's friend.""Let him stay on the farm then.I hate him.He's no friend of mine,"Vic replied.
He was overflowing the chair recently graced by Professor Burgess and clutching his derby as if it might escape and leave him bareheaded forever.
His face had a dogged expression and his glance was stern.
Yet his direct words and the deep richness of his voice put him outside of the class of commonplace beginners.
"Are you fond of killing things?"the Dean asked.
The ruddy color deepened in Vic Burleigh's brown cheek,but the steadfast gaze of his eyes and the firm lines of his mouth told the head of Sunrise something of what he would find in the sturdy young Jayhawker.
"Sometimes,"came the blunt answer."I've always lived on a Kansas claim.
Unless you know what that means you might not understand--how hard a life"--Vic stopped abruptly and squeezed the rim of his derby.
"Never mind.We take only face value here.Fine view from that window,"and Lloyd Fenneben's genial smile began to win the heart of the country boy as most young hearts were won to him.
Burleigh leaned toward the window,forgetful of the chair arms he had striven to subdue,the late afternoon sunlight falling on his brown face and glinting in his auburn hair.