by Gwen Bristow
She took out the cards.
Pocket pushed back his chair. He came around to her side of the table and stood looking down at the pack in her hand. “I see. You want to consult your friends.”
Marny gave a start of defense. “Do you mind?” she flashed at him.
“Some day,” Pocket answered patiently, “you’re going to get it into that thick head of yours that I don’t mind anything you do. I love you the way you are. Long before I asked you to marry me I knew you liked to ask the cards about your future. Why shouldn’t you?”
Placated, Marny began to lay out the cards. Pocket stood by her and watched. All of a sudden Marny stopped, holding a card halfway between the pack and the table. “Pocket!” she exclaimed.
“Yes ma’am?” said Pocket.
“I’ve just thought of something,” said Marny, still holding the card in midair. “I don’t need to ask the cards to foretell anything about this. I foretold it myself, a long time ago.”
As she looked up from the layout to Pocket she saw a humorous quiver about his lips. “Yes,” he said, “I remember.”
“You do?”
Again Pocket pulled out a handkerchief—a different handkerchief this time, as he usually carried five or six—and again he was laughing.
“Why yes,” he replied, “that day at Sutter’s Fort when you found that Delbert had gone off with your dust.”
With a teasing green twinkle, Marny nodded. Pocket went on,
“You said to me, ‘Somewhere in the world there’s some chump of a man who’s going to pay me for this.’”
Marny was laughing too, her own soft silken laughter. “Yes, that’s right. And I said, ‘Trust me, Pocket. I’ll find him.’” She reached up and used the card to stroke his cheek. “Pocket,” she continued, and though she was laughing there was a note of astonishment in her voice, “Pocket, I do believe I’ve found that chump of a man.”
Pocket too was still laughing. “It looks that way,” he said.
But then Marny gave a start, and caught her breath. “Pocket—that’s not exactly right. I didn’t find you. You found me.”
Tossing all the cards on the table, she stood up and grabbed his hands in hers and held them.
“Pocket, are those hoodlums going to set another fire?”
This time Pocket spoke gravely. “There’s talk of it. I’m afraid they are.”
Her grip on his hands tightened. “And that man—the tenant you were telling me about—he’s still going to build that sumptuous hotel?”
“Why yes,” Pocket answered smiling. Then he was grave again. “It’s the same old war, Marny. The folks who want to build and the folks who want to destroy. I guess it’ll be going on as long as the world lasts. Anyway, we know which side we’re on.”
Marny let go his hands. “We,” she repeated. “We, Pocket!”
“Yes, dear,” he said gently.
“Just think,” she murmured, “I don’t have to pretend any more that I like it when nobody cares what becomes of me.”
Pocket put his arms around her and she dropped her head on his shoulder.
“You chump of a man,” she whispered, “I’m so glad you found me.”
About the Author
Gwen Bristow (1903–1980), the author of seven bestselling historical novels that bring to life momentous events in American history, such as the siege of Charleston during the American Revolution (Celia Garth) and the great California gold rush (Calico Palace), was born in South Carolina, where the Bristow family had settled in the seventeenth century. After graduating from Judson College in Alabama and attending the Columbia School of Journalism, Bristow worked as a reporter for New Orleans’ Times-Picayune from 1925 to 1934. Through her husband, screenwriter Bruce Manning, she developed an interest in longer forms of writing—novels and screenplays.
After Bristow moved to Hollywood, her literary career took off with the publication of Deep Summer, the first novel in a trilogy of Louisiana-set historical novels, which also includes The Handsome Road and This Side of Glory. Bristow continued to write about the American South and explored the settling of the American West in her bestselling novels Jubilee Trail, which was made into a film in 1954, and in her only work of nonfiction, Golden Dreams. Her novel Tomorrow Is Forever also became a film, starring Claudette Colbert, Orson Welles, and Natalie Wood, in 1946.
All rights reserved, including without limitation the right to reproduce this ebook or any portion thereof in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, events, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, businesses, companies, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 1970 by Gwen Bristow
Cover design by Connie Gabbert
978-1-4804-8510-5
This edition published in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
345 Hudson Street
New York, NY 10014
www.openroadmedia.com
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