Free Corral Nocturne by Elisabeth Grace Foley Page B

beyond her,
could not yet sink into her brain, holding her motionless until it
did. It was all a dream. Cole’s arms tightened around her, and he
bent his handsome dark head down to hers. And then all at once she
saw and felt and heard with marvelous clarity; she knew that she
was sitting with one shoe off in the starlight on the fallen rails
of an old corral, and that Cole Newcomb was kissing her, and it had
gone beyond dreams.
    He stopped, and looked down questioningly at
her, as if seeking his answer. Ellie’s face was lifted to his, her
lips parted, her eyes starry with wonder. “Oh,” she said softly,
breathlessly, and then with a thrill of new feeling in the whisper,
“Oh, Cole…”
    He kissed her again, and her arms slipped
around him almost without her realizing it. And the stars were
alive again, only now they seemed to be blazing and spinning in
flashes and cartwheels across the sky, better than any fireworks of
the Fourth.
    “You looked like a princess tonight,” said
Cole, low and close to her ear, his cheek against hers. “I guess
I’ve been falling in love with you ever since I met you, Ellie—but
it was tonight when I saw you that I said to myself, ‘That’s my
girl.’ I guess I knew it, but I’d never said it right out to myself
before.”
    “I think—it was the same with me,” whispered
Ellie. “I didn’t know—until tonight.”
    Cole drew back a little, so he could look
into her eyes. His own were flaming with exultant happiness.
“What’d you know, sweetheart?”
    She said simply, “That I love you.”
    Cole took both her hands in his. “Marry me,
Ellie.”
    “Yes,” she said; “yes, I will!”
    He pulled her to him again and they both
laughed softly; shy, jubilant, half-incredulous.
    “It must be after midnight,” said Ellie after
a moment.
    “Oh, who cares,” said Cole. “It takes just as
long to walk a mile after midnight as before. Besides, I haven’t
heard the fireworks from town yet.”
    She moved her head to look up at him, her
cheek against the front of his shirt. “What are you going to do
about getting home? You can’t walk all that way back.”
    “Probably not,” Cole admitted, “although just
about now I feel like I could do anything. If my team hasn’t turned
in at your place out of sheer habit, I’ll just walk on to
McGregors’ and borrow a mule.”
    For some reason this was so funny that they
both went off into fits of laughter. In the midst of it, a faint
bang sounded in the distance. They turned to see a tiny red star
rise from the prairie far to the north and shimmer briefly,
followed by shining streaks of blue and green.
    “There they are,” said Cole. They watched
them together, Cole still kneeling in the grass by Ellie’s feet,
her slender arm resting around his neck. The fireworks were far
enough away that the sounds were mere pops and dim thuds; all
around them, the thin trilling of crickets and the whisper of the
night breeze that fluttered Ellie’s skirt seemed louder and
clearer. The tiny fireworks snapped and flashed on the horizon, a
cluster of small colored sparkles, and after a little while,
fizzled out and left the night-sounds alone.
    “Well,” said Cole, turning back to Ellie
again, “there’s midnight. And now, I’d better get you home.”
    He stood up, and bent and swung her up
lightly from the bars of the old corral into his arms. This time
Ellie protested: “You don’t really have to carry me. I’m not hurt,
Cole; I can walk.”
    “Sure you can. But I’m not about to let go of
you so easily, now I’ve got you! And you like this better anyway,
don’t you?”
    Ellie was forced to laugh and blush a little,
and own that she did. She put her head against his shoulder,
thinking how short the miles to home looked now, when every moment
with him was joy. She could hardly credit the way she had felt just
a little while before.
    “What was it, really, that made you run away
tonight?” Cole said to her after a little