KITTY'S CONQUEST.

BY CHARLES KING, U.S.A.,

AUTHOR OF "THE COLONEL'S DAUGHTER."

PHILADELPHIA:
J. B. LIPPINCOTT COMPANY.
1890.

Copyright. 1884, by J. B. Lippincott & Co.

PREFACE.

The incidents of this little story occurred some twelve years ago, andit was then that the story was mainly written.

If it meet with half the kindness bestowed upon his later work it willmore than fulfil the hopes of

THE AUTHOR.

February, 1884.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XIX.

KITTY'S CONQUEST.

CHAPTER I.

It was just after Christmas, and discontentedly enough I had left mycosy surroundings in New Orleans, to take a business-trip through thecounties on the border-line between Tennessee and northern Mississippiand Alabama. One sunny afternoon I found myself on the "freight andpassenger" of what was termed "The Great Southern Mail Route." We hadbeen trundling slowly, sleepily along ever since the conductor's "allaboard!" after dinner; had met the Mobile Express at Corinth when theshadows were already lengthening upon the ruddy, barren-lookinglandscape, and now, with Iuka just before us, and the warning whistle ofthe engine shrieking in our ears with a discordant pertinacity attainedonly on our Southern railroads, I took a last glance at the sun justdisappearing behind the distant forest in our wake, drew the lastbreath of life, from my cigar, and then, taking advantage of the halt atthe station, strolled back from the dinginess of the smoking-car to morecomfortable quarters in the rear.

There were only three passenger-cars on the train, and, judging from thescarcity of occupants, one would have been enough. Elbowing my waythrough the gaping, lazy swarms of unsavory black humanity on theplatform, and the equally repulsive-looking knots of "poor white trash,"the invariable features of every country stopping-place south of Masonand Dixon, I reached the last car, and entering, chose one of a dozenempty seats, and took a listless look at my fellow-passengers,—six inall,—and of them, two only worth a second glance.

One, a young, perhaps very young, lady, so girlish, petit