She patted his arm lightly. "I've always got you to depend on anyway,
haven't I, Bob?" Her soft, lazy, sliding voice was itself a caress.

"You sure have. Anytime, anywhere. No matter what happens, I can't ever
change, Pearl. Lord! You ought to know that by this time."

"Maybe I do, Bob, and maybe I like knowing it."

"I hope you do, but it wouldn't make any difference whether you did or
didn't. I got to love you. I guess the cards fell that way for me before
I was born and nothing can ever change that layout."

"You've never failed me yet, Bob."

"And never will. Oh, Pearl, don't you, can't you see your way to
marrying me?"

She stirred restlessly, a faintly troubled look shadowing her face.
"There's so many of me, and I never know what I'm going to do or how I'm
going to feel. I'd just be bound to make you miserable."

"It wouldn't be the first time," he said a little sadly. "But you see I
know you. I ain't got any mistaken notions about you, and I love you
more than any other man in this life'll ever do, Pearl."

Again she moved and looked at him as if his words had roused in her some
regret. "I guess that's so; but--it wouldn't be a square deal."

"I'll tend to that," he urged, "and you'll just have to know that I'm