The Mountain Girl - 20 - Emma Payne Erskine - Web Novel

IN WHICH THE BISHOP AND HIS WIFE PASS AN EVENTFUL DAT AT THE FALL PLACE

"Do you know, James," said Betty Towers, as she walked at her husband's side in the sweet morning, slowly climbing up to David's cabin from the Fall Place, "I feel almost vexed with you for never bringing me here before."

"Why—my dear!"

"Yes, I do. To think of all this loveliness, and for six years you have been here many times, and never once told me you knew a place hardly two hours away as entrancing as heaven. Even now, James, if it hadn't been for Cassandra, I wouldn't have come. Why—it's the loveliest spot on earth. Stand still a minute, James, and listen. That's a thrush. Oh, something smells so sweet! It's a locust! And that's a redbird's note. There he is, like a red blossom in those bushes. There—no, there. You will look in the wrong direction, James, and now he's gone. You remember what David Thryng wrote? 'It's good just to be alive.' He's always saying that, and now I understand—in such a place as this. Oh, just breathe the air, James!"

"I certainly can't help doing that, dear." The bishop was puffing a little over the climb his slight young wife took so easily.

"I don't care. Here I've lived in cities all my life, while you have lived down here, and it has lost its charm to you. Only think of all this gorgeous display of nature just for these mountain people, and what is it to them?"