How long are you going to
be away? I shall be glad to see you back, and so will Florence
Grant, and all your other friends, of whom you have many in
Groveton. Write soon to your affectionate friend,
"LINTON."
This letter quite cheered up Luke, who, in his first absence
from home, naturally felt a little lonely at times.
"Linny is a true friend," he said. "He is just as well off as
Randolph, but never puts on airs. He is as popular as Randolph
is unpopular. I wish I could go to Europe with him."
Upon the earlier portions of Luke's journey to the Black Hills
we need not dwell. The last hundred or hundred and fifty miles
had to be traversed in a stage, and this form of traveling Luke
found wearisome, yet not without interest. There was a spice of
danger, too, which added excitement, if not pleasure, to the trip.
The Black Hills stage had on more than one occasion been stopped
by highwaymen and the passengers robbed.
The thought that this might happen proved a source of nervous
alarm to some, of excitement to others.
Luke's fellow passengers included a large, portly man, a merchant
from some Western city; a clergyman with a white necktie, who was
sent out by some missionary society to start a church at the Black
Hills; two or three laboring men, of farmerlike appearance, who
were probably intending to work in the mines; one or two others,
who could not be classified, and a genuine dude, as far as
appearance went, a slender-waisted, soft-voiced young man, dressed
in the latest style, who spoke with a slight lisp.
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