Bonny Jean, and A Severe Threat — page 36: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

BONNY JEAN. 29 cloth, fitted the petite form as though it had been molded to every curve of the dainty, elegant figure, and her black straw hat, shading the delicate face, was turned up on one side, with a couple of long, black ostrich plumes which swept over the graceful, sloping shoulders. The horse—Flirt, as it was called—was a slender-limbed, high-stepping creature, whose every movement betrayed its pedigree. Flirt had come of good old Kentucky blue-grass stock, and there was not her match in the whole pine woods. Horse and mistress were both perfection, and a pretty picture they made as they stood, the young lady laughing gayly, on the opposite side of the rail fence which they had just leaped, and which inclosed a large rice field. ‘The girl stooped in the saddle and patted the arched neck of the horse approvingly. ‘‘Well done, Flirt!” she cried; ‘‘though I expect we will suffer for our temerity, for here we are, in Mr. John Averill’s rice field; and, upon my word, yonder comes Mr. John Averill himself !” For a tall, slim figure was coming down the field with rapid strides—a young man in his shirt-sleeves, with gray nether gar- ments, and a broad-brimmed straw hat upon his close-cut brown hair; a man with grave, dark eyes, and stern, determined fea- tures, and a heavy dark mustache. He lifted his hat as his eyes fell upon the intruder, and an amused smile chased away the frown of annoyance which had crossed his face at sight of a horse and rider within the sacred precincts of his rice field. ‘‘Good-evening, Miss Lee,” he began. ‘‘Are you not a little out of your road?” ‘‘Lady Lee,” as she was called (her name was Adelaide), blushed a trifle, then her saucy, willful nature reasserted itself. ‘‘No,” she returned; ‘‘your field brings me half a mile nearer home, sol thought I’d go through it. The path through the center is quite wide enough for Flirt and me,” John Averill smiled, Eomichooks (e(o)