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diff --git a/8537.txt b/8537.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..8064fe3 --- /dev/null +++ b/8537.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7930 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Lonesome Land, by B. M. Bower + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Lonesome Land + +Author: B. M. Bower + + +Release Date: July, 2005 [EBook #8537] +This file was first posted on July 21, 2003 +Last Updated: April 17, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LONESOME LAND *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Aldarondo, Tiffany Vergon, Charles +Franks, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + +LONESOME LAND + +By B. M. Bower + + +Author of "Chip, of the Flying U," etc. + + +With Four Illustrations (not included) + +By Stanley L. Wood + + + +[Illustration: As he raced over the uneven prairie he fumbled +with the saddle string] + + +_Contents_ + +CHAPTER + I. THE ARRIVAL OF VAL + II. WELL-MEANT ADVICE + III. A LADY IN A TEMPER + IV. THE "SHIVAREE" + V. COLD SPRING RANCH + VI. MANLEY'S FIRE GUARD + VII. VAL'S NEW DUTIES + VIII. THE PRAIRIE FIRE + IX. KENT TO THE RESCUE + X. DESOLATION + XI. VAL'S AWAKENING + XII. A LESSON IN FORGIVENESS + XIII. ARLINE GIVES A DANCE + XIV. A WEDDING PRESENT + XV. A COMPACT + XVI. MANLEY'S NEW TACTICS + XVII. VAL BECOMES AN AUTHOR +XVIII. VAL'S DISCOVERY + XIX. KENT'S CONFESSION + XX. A BLOTCHED BRAND + XXI. VAL DECIDES + XXII. A FRIEND IN NEED +XXIII. CAUGHT! + XXIV. RETRIBUTION + + +_List of Illustrations_ + +As he raced over the uneven prairie he fumbled with the saddle string + +He was jeered unmercifully by Fred De Garmo and his crowd + +"Little woman, listen here," he said. "You're playing hard luck, and I know +it" + +To draw the red hot spur across the fresh VP did not take long + + + + +CHAPTER I. THE ARRIVAL OF VAL + +In northern Montana there lies a great, lonely stretch of prairie land, +gashed deep where flows the Missouri. Indeed, there are many such--big, +impassive, impressive in their very loneliness, in summer given over to +the winds and the meadow larks and to the shadows fleeing always over the +hilltops. Wild range cattle feed there and grow sleek and fat for the fall +shipping of beef. At night the coyotes yap quaveringly and prowl abroad +after the long-eared jack rabbits, which bounce away at their hunger-driven +approach. In winter it is not good to be there; even the beasts shrink then +from the bleak, level reaches, and shun the still bleaker heights. + +But men will live anywhere if by so doing there is money to be gained, and +so a town snuggled up against the northern rim of the bench land, where the +bleakness was softened a bit by the sheltering hills, and a willow-fringed +creek with wild rosebushes and chokecherries made a vivid green background +for the meager huddle of little, unpainted buildings. + +To the passengers on the through trains which watered at the red tank near +the creek, the place looked crudely picturesque--interesting, so long as +one was not compelled to live there and could retain a perfectly impersonal +viewpoint. After five or ten minutes spent hi watching curiously the one +little street, with the long hitching poles planted firmly and frequently +down both sides--usually within a very few steps of a saloon door--and the +horses nodding and stamping at the flies, and the loitering figures +that appeared now and then in desultory fashion, many of them imagined +that they understood the West and sympathized with it, and appreciated its +bigness and its freedom from conventions. + +One slim young woman had just told the thin-faced school teacher on a +vacation, with whom she had formed one of those evanescent traveling +acquaintances, that she already knew the West, from instinct and from +Manley's letters. She loved it, she said, because Manley loved it, and +because it was to be her home, and because it was so big and so free. +Out here one could think and grow and really live, she declared, with +enthusiasm. Manley had lived here for three years, and his letters, she +told the thin-faced teacher, were an education in themselves. + +The teacher had already learned that the slim young woman, with the +yellow-brown hair and yellow-brown eyes to match, was going to marry +Manley--she had forgotten his other name, though the young woman had +mentioned it--and would live on a ranch, a cattle ranch. She smiled with +somewhat wistful sympathy, and hoped the young woman would be happy; and +the young woman waved her hand, with the glove only half pulled on, toward +the shadow-dappled prairie and the willow-fringed creek, and the hills +beyond. + +"Happy!" she echoed joyously. "Could one be anything else, in such a +country? And then--you don't know Manley, you see. It's horribly bad form, +and undignified and all that, to prate of one's private affairs, but I just +can't help bubbling over. I'm not looking for heaven, and I expect to have +plenty of bumpy places in the trail--trail is anything that you travel +over, out here; Manley has coached me faithfully--but I'm going to be +happy. My mind is quite made up. Well, good-by--I'm so glad you happened +to be on this train, and I wish I might meet you again. Isn't it a funny +little depot? Oh, yes--thank you! I almost forgot that umbrella, and I +might need it. Yes, I'll write to you--I should hate to drop out of +your mind completely. Address me Mrs. Manley Fleetwood, Hope, Montana. +Good-by--I wish--" + +She trailed off down the aisle with eyes shining, in the wake of the +grinning porter. She hurried down the steps, glanced hastily along the +platform, up at the car window where the faded little school teacher was +smiling wearily down at her, waved her hand, threw a dainty little kiss, +nodded a gay farewell, smiled vaguely at the conductor, who had been +respectfully pleasant to her--and then she was looking at the rear platform +of the receding train mechanically, not yet quite realizing why it was that +her heart went heavy so suddenly. She turned then and looked about her in +a surprised, inquiring fashion. Manley, it would seem, was not at hand to +welcome her. She had expected his face to be the first she looked upon in +that town, but she tried not to be greatly perturbed at his absence; so +many things may detain one. + +At that moment a young fellow, whose clothes emphatically proclaimed him a +cowboy, came diffidently up to her, tilted his hat backward an inch or so, +and left it that way, thereby unconsciously giving himself an air of candor +which should have been reassuring. + +"Fleetwood was detained. You were expecting to--you're the lady he was +expecting, aren't you?" + +She had been looking questioningly at her violin box and two trunks +standing on their ends farther down the platform, and she smiled vaguely +without glancing at him. + +"Yes. I hope he isn't sick, or--" + +"I'll take you over to the hotel, and go tell him you're here," he +volunteered, somewhat curtly, and picked up her bag. + +"Oh, thank you." This time her eyes grazed his face inattentively. She +followed him down the rough steps of planking and up an extremely dusty +road--one could scarcely call it a street--to an uninviting building with +crooked windows and a high, false front of unpainted boards. + +The young fellow opened a sagging door, let her pass into a narrow hallway, +and from there into a stuffy, hopelessly conventional fifth-rate parlor, +handed her the bag, and departed with another tilt of the hat which placed +it at a different angle. The sentence meant for farewell she did not catch, +for she was staring at a wooden-faced portrait upon an easel, the portrait +of a man with a drooping mustache, and porky cheeks, and dead-looking eyes. + +"And I expected bearskin rugs, and antlers on the walls, and big +fireplaces!" she remarked aloud, and sighed. Then she turned and pulled +aside a coarse curtain of dusty, machine-made lace, and looked after her +guide. He was just disappearing into a saloon across the street, and she +dropped the curtain precipitately, as if she were ashamed of spying. "Oh, +well--I've heard all cowboys are more or less intemperate," she excused, +again aloud. + +She sat down upon an atrocious red plush chair, and wrinkled her +nose spitefully at the porky-cheeked portrait. "I suppose you're the +proprietor," she accused, "or else the proprietor's son. I wish you +wouldn't squint like that. If I have to stop here longer than ten minutes, +I shall certainly turn you face to the wall." Whereupon, with another +grimace, she turned her back upon it and looked out of the window. Then she +stood up impatiently, looked at her watch, and sat down again upon the red +plush chair. + +"He didn't tell me whether Manley is sick," she said suddenly, with some +resentment. "He was awfully abrupt in his manner. Oh, you--" She rose, +picked up an old newspaper from the marble-topped table with uncertain +legs, and spread it ungently over the portrait upon the easel. Then she +went to the window and looked out again. "I feel perfectly sure that cowboy +went and got drunk immediately," she complained, drumming pettishly upon +the glass. "And I don't suppose he told Manley at all." + +The cowboy was innocent of the charge, however, and he was doing his +energetic best to tell Manley. He had gone straight through the saloon and +into the small room behind, where a man lay sprawled upon a bed in one +corner. He was asleep, and his clothes were wrinkled as if he had lain +there long. His head rested upon his folded arms, and he was snoring +loudly. The young fellow went up and took him roughly by the shoulder. + +"Here! I thought I told you to straighten up," he cried disgustedly. "Come +alive! The train's come and gone, and your girl's waiting for you over to +the hotel. D' you hear?" + +"Uh-huh!" The man opened one eye, grunted, and closed it again. + +The other yanked him half off the bed, and swore. This brought both eyes +open, glassy with whisky and sleep. He sat wobbling upon the edge of the +bed, staring stupidly. + +"Can't you get anything through you?" his tormentor exclaimed. "You want +your girl to find out you're drunk? You got the license in your pocket. +You're supposed to get spliced this evening--and look at you!" He turned +and went out to the bartender. + +"Why didn't you pour that coffee into him, like I told you?" he demanded. +"We've got to get him steady on his pins _somehow!_" + +The bartender was sprawled half over the bar, apathetically reading the +sporting news of a torn Sunday edition of an Eastern paper. He looked up +from under his eyebrows and grunted. + +"How you going to pour coffee down a man that lays flat on his belly and +won't open his mouth?" he inquired, in an injured tone. "Sleep's all he +needs, anyway. He'll be all right by morning." + +The other snorted dissent. "He'll be all right by dark--or he'll feel a +whole lot worse," he promised grimly. "Dig up some ice. And a good jolt of +bromo, if you've got it--and a towel or two." + +The bartender wearily pushed the paper to one side, reached languidly under +the bar, and laid hold of a round blue bottle. Yawning uninterestedly, he +poured a double portion of the white crystals into a glass, half filled +another under the faucet of the water cooler, and held them out. + +"Dump that into him, then," he advised. "It'll help some, if you get it +down. What's the sweat to get him married off to-day? Won't the girl wait?" + +"I never asked her. You pound up some ice and bring it in, will you?" The +volunteer nurse kicked open the door into the little room and went in, +hastily pouring the bromo seltzer from one glass to the other to keep it +from foaming out of all bounds. His patient was still sitting upon the edge +of the bed where he had left him, slumped forward with his head in his +hands. He looked up stupidly, his eyes bloodshot and swollen of lid. + +"'S the train come in yet?" he asked thickly. "'S you, is it, Kent?" + +"The train's come, and your girl is waiting for you at the hotel. Here, +throw this into you--and for God's sake, brace up! You make me tired. Drink +her down quick--the foam's good for you. Here, you take the stuff in the +bottom, too. Got it? Take off your coat, so I can get at you. You don't +look much like getting married, and that's no josh." + +Fleetwood shook his head with drunken gravity, and groaned. "I ought to be +killed. Drunk to-day!" He sagged forward again, and seemed disposed to shed +tears. "She'll never forgive me; she--" + +Kent jerked him to his feet peremptorily. "Aw, look here! I'm trying +to sober you up. You've got to do your part--see? Here's some ice in a +towel--you get it on your head. Open up your shirt, so I can bathe your +chest. Don't do any good to blubber around about it. Your girl can't hear +you, and Jim and I ain't sympathetic. Set down in this chair, where we can +get at you." He enforced his command with some vigor, and Fleetwood groaned +again. But he shed no more tears, and he grew momentarily more lucid, as +the treatment took effect. + +The tears were being shed in the stuffy little hotel parlor. The young +woman looked often at her watch, went into the hallway, and opened the +outer door several times, meditating a search of the town, and drew back +always with a timid fluttering of heart because it was all so crude and +strange, and the saloons so numerous and terrifying in their very bald +simplicity. + +She was worried about Manley, and she wished that cowboy would come out +of the saloon and bring her lover to her. She had never dreamed of being +treated in this way. No one came near her--and she had secretly expected to +cause something of a flutter in this little town they called Hope. + +Surely, young girls from the East, come out to get married to their +sweethearts, weren't so numerous that they should be ignored. If there were +other people in the hotel, they did not manifest their presence, save by +disquieting noises muffled by intervening partitions. + +She grew thirsty, but she hesitated to explore the depths of this dreary +abode, in fear of worse horrors than the parlor furniture, and all the +places of refreshment which she could see from the window or the door +looked terribly masculine and unmoral, and as if they did not know there +existed such things as ice cream, or soda, or sherbet. + +It was after an hour of this that the tears came, which is saying a good +deal for her courage. It seemed to her then that Manley must be dead. What +else could keep him so long away from her, after three years of impassioned +longing written twice a week with punctilious regularity? + +He knew that she was coming. She had telegraphed from St. Paul, and had +received a joyful reply, lavishly expressed in seventeen words instead of +the ten-word limit. And they were to have been married immediately upon her +arrival. + +That cowboy had known she was coming; he must also have known why Manley +did not meet her, and she wished futilely that she had questioned him, +instead of walking beside him without a word. He should have explained. He +would have explained if he had not been so very anxious to get inside that +saloon and get drunk. + +She had always heard that cowboys were chivalrous, and brave, and +fascinating in their picturesque dare-deviltry, but from the lone specimen +which she had met she could not see that they possessed any of those +qualities. If all cowboys were like that, she hoped that she would not be +compelled to meet any of them. And _why_ didn't Manley come? + +It was then that an inner door--a door which she had wanted to open, but +had lacked courage--squeaked upon its hinges, and an ill-kept bundle of +hair was thrust in, topping a weather-beaten face and a scrawny little +body. Two faded, inquisitive eyes looked her over, and the woman sidled in, +somewhat abashed, but too curious to remain outside. + +"Oh yes!" She seemed to be answering some inner question. "I didn't know +you was here." She went over and removed the newspaper from the portrait. +"That breed girl of mine ain't got the least idea of how to straighten up +a room," she observed complainingly. "I guess she thinks this picture was +made to hang things on. I'll have to round her up again and tell her a few +things. This is my first husband. He was in politics and got beat, and so +he killed himself. He couldn't stand to have folks give him the laugh." She +spoke with pride. "He was a real handsome man, don't you think? You mighta +took off the paper; it didn't belong there, and he does brighten up the +room. A good picture is real company, seems to me. When my old man gets on +the rampage till I can't stand it no longer, I come in here and set, and +look at Walt. 'T ain't every man that's got nerve to kill himself--with a +shotgun. It was turrible! He took and tied a string to the trigger--" + +"Oh, please!" + +The landlady stopped short and stared at her. "What? Oh, I won't go into +details--it was awful messy, and that's a fact. I didn't git over it for a +couple of months. He coulda killed himself with a six-shooter; it's always +been a mystery why he dug up that old shotgun, but he did. I always thought +he wanted to show his nerve." She sighed, and drew her fingers across her +eyes. "I don't s'pose I ever will git over it," she added complacently. "It +was a turrible shock." + +"Do you know," the girl began desperately, "if Mr. Manley Fleetwood is in +town? I expected him to meet me at the train." + +"Oh! I kinda _thought_ you was Man Fleetwood's girl. My name's Hawley. You +going to be married to-night, ain't you?" + +"I--I haven't seen Mr. Fleetwood yet," hesitated the girl, and her eyes +filled again with tears. "I'm afraid something may have happened to him. +He--" + +Mrs. Hawley glimpsed the tears, and instantly became motherly in her +manner. She even went up and patted the girl on the shoulder. + +"There, now, don't you worry none. Man's all right; I seen him at dinner +time. He was--" She stopped short, looked keenly at the delicate face, +and at the yellow-brown eyes which gazed back at her, innocent of evil, +trusting, wistful. "He spoke about your coming, and said he'd want the use +of the parlor this evening, for the wedding. I had an idea you was coming +on the six-twenty train. Maybe he thought so, too. I never heard you come +in--I was busy frying doughnuts in the kitchen--and I just happened to come +in here after something. You'd oughta rapped on that door. Then I'd 'a' +known you was here. I'll go and have my old man hunt him up. He must be +around town somewheres. Like as not he'll meet the six-twenty, expecting +you to be on it." + +She smiled reassuringly as she turned to the inner door. + +"You take off your hat and jacket, and pretty soon I'll show you up to a +room. I'll have to round up my old man first--and that's liable to take +time." She turned her eyes quizzically to the porky-cheeked portrait. "You +jest let Walt keep you company till I get back. He was real good company +when he was livin'." + +She smiled again and went out briskly, came back, and stood with her hand +upon the cracked doorknob. + +"I clean forgot your name," she hinted. "Man told me, at dinner time, but +I'm no good on earth at remembering names till after I've seen the person +it belongs to." + +"Valeria Peyson--Val, they call me usually, at home." The homesickness of +the girl shone in her misty eyes, haunted her voice. Mrs. Hawley read it, +and spoke more briskly than she would otherwise have done. + +"Well, we're plumb strangers, but we ain't going to stay that way, because +every time you come to town you'll have to stop here; there ain't any other +place to stop. And I'm going to start right in calling you Val. We don't +use no ceremony with folk's names, out here. Val's a real nice name, short +and easy to say. Mine's Arline. You can call me by it if you want to. I +don't let everybody--so many wants to cut it down to Leen, and I won't +stand for that; I'm _lean_ enough, without havin' it throwed up to me. We +might jest as well start in the way we're likely to keep it up, and you +won't feel so much like a stranger. + +"I'm awful glad you're going to settle here--there ain't so awful many +women in the country; we have to rake and scrape to git enough for three +sets when we have a dance--and more likely we can't make out more 'n two. +D' you dance? Somebody said they seen a fiddle box down to the depot, with +a couple of big trunks; d' you play the fiddle?" + +"A little," Valeria smiled faintly. + +"Well, that'll come in awful handy at dances. We'd have 'em real often in +the winter if it wasn't such a job to git music. Well, I got too much to do +to be standin' here talkin'. I have to keep right after that breed girl all +the time, or she won't do nothing. I'll git my old man after your fellow +right away. Jest make yourself to home, and anything you want ask for it +in the kitchen." She smiled in friendly fashion and closed the door with a +little slam to make sure that it latched. + +Valeria stood for a moment with her hands hanging straight at her +sides, staring absently at the door. Then she glanced at Walt, staring +wooden-faced from his gilt frame upon his gilt easel, and shivered. She +pushed the red plush chair as far away from him as possible, sat down with +her back to the picture, and immediately felt his dull, black eyes boring +into her back. + +"What a fool I must be!" she said aloud, glancing reluctantly over her +shoulder at the portrait. She got up resolutely, placed the chair where it +had stood before, and stared deliberately at Walt, as if she would prove +how little she cared. But in a moment more she was crying dismally. + + + + +CHAPTER II. WELL-MEANT ADVICE + +Kent Burnett, bearing over his arm a coat newly pressed in the Delmonico +restaurant, dodged in at the back door of the saloon, threw the coat down +upon the tousled bed, and pushed back his hat with a gesture of relief at +an onerous duty well performed. + +"I had one hell of a time," he announced plaintively, "and that Chink will +likely try to poison me if I eat over there, after this--but I got her +ironed, all right. Get into it, Man, and chase yourself over there to the +hotel. Got a clean collar? That one's all-over coffee." + +Fleetwood stifled a groan, reached into a trousers pocket, and brought up a +dollar. "Get me one at the store, will you, Kent? Fifteen and a half--and a +tie, if they've got any that's decent. And hurry! Such a triple-three-star +fool as I am ought to be taken out and shot." + +He went on cursing himself audibly and bitterly, even after Kent +had hurried out. He was sober now--was Manley Fleetwood--sober and +self-condemnatory and penitent. His head ached splittingly; his eyes +were heavy-lidded and bloodshot, and his hands trembled so that he could +scarcely button his coat. But he was sober. He did not even carry the odor +of whisky upon his breath or his person; for Kent had been very thoughtful +and very thorough. He had compelled his patient to crunch and swallow many +nauseous tablets of "whisky killer," and he had sprinkled his clothes +liberally with Jockey Club; Fleetwood, therefore, while he emanated odors +in plenty, carried about him none of the aroma properly belonging to +intoxication. + +In ten minutes Kent was back, with a celluloid collar and two ties of +questionable taste. Manley just glanced at them, waved them away with +gloomy finality, and swore. + +"They're just about the limit, and that's no dream," sympathized Kent, "but +they're clean, and they don't look like they'd been slept in for a month. +You've got to put 'em on--by George, I sized up the layout in both those +imitation stores, and I drew the highest in the deck. And for the Lord's +sake, get a move on. Here, I'll button it for you." + +Behind Fleetwood's back, when collar and tie were in place, Kent grinned +and lowered an eyelid at Jim, who put his head in from the saloon to see +how far the sobering had progressed. + +"You look fine!" he encouraged heartily. "That green-and-blue tie's just +what you need to set you off. And the collar sure is shiny and nice--your +girl will be plumb dazzled. She won't see anything wrong--believe _me_. +Now, run along and get married. Here, you better sneak out the back way; if +she happened to be looking out, she'd likely wonder what you were doing, +coming out of a saloon. Duck out past the coal shed and cut into the street +by Brinberg's. Tell her you're sick--got a sick headache. Your looks'll +swear it's the truth. Hike!" He opened the door and pushed Fleetwood out, +watched him out of sight around the corner of Brinberg's store, and turned +back into the close-smelling little room. + +"Do you know," he remarked to Jim, "I never thought of it before, but I've +been playing a low-down trick on that poor girl. I kinda wish now I'd put +her next, and given her a chance to draw outa the game if she wanted to. +It's stacking the deck on her, if you ask _me_!" He pushed his hat back +upon his head, gave his shoulders a twist of dissatisfaction, and told Jim +to dig up some Eastern beer; drank it meditatively, and set down the glass +with some force. + +"Yes, sir," he said disgustedly, "darn my fool soul, I stacked the deck on +that girl--and she looked to be real nice. Kinda innocent and trusting, +like she hasn't found out yet how rotten mean men critters can be." He took +the bottle and poured himself another glass. "She's sure due to wise up a +lot," he added grimly. + +"You bet your sweet life!" Jim agreed, and then he reconsidered. "Still, I +dunno; Man ain't so worse. He ain't what you can call a real booze fighter. +This here's what I'd call an accidental jag; got it in the exuberance of +the joyful moment when he knew his girl was coming. He'll likely straighten +up and be all right. He--" Jim broke off there and looked to see who had +opened the door. + +"Hello, Polly," he greeted carelessly. + +The man came forward, grinning skinnily. Polycarp Jenks was the outrageous +name of him. He was under the average height, and he was lean to the point +of emaciation. His mouth was absolutely curveless--a straight gash across +his face; a gash which simply stopped short without any tapering or any +turn at the corners, when it had reached as far as was decent. His nose was +also straight and high, and owned no perceptible slope; indeed, it seemed +merely a pendant attached to his forehead, and its upper termination was +indefinite, except that somewhere between his eyebrows one felt impelled to +consider it forehead rather than nose. His eyes also were rather long and +narrow, like buttonholes cut to match the mouth. When he grinned his face +appeared to break up into splinters. + +He was intensely proud of his name, and his pleasure was almost pathetic +when one pronounced it without curtailment in his presence. His skinniness +was also a matter of pride. And when you realize that he was an +indefatigable gossip, and seemed always to be riding at large, gathering or +imparting trivial news, you should know fairly well Polycarp Jenks. + +"I see Man Fleetwood's might' near sober enough to git married," Polycarp +began, coming up to the two and leaning a sharp elbow upon the bar beside +Kent. "By granny, gitting married'd sober anybody! Dinner time he was so +drunk he couldn't find his mouth. I met him up here a little ways just now, +and he was so sober he remembered to pay me that ten I lent him t' other +day--_he-he!_ Open up a bottle of pop, James. + +"His girl's been might' near crying her eyes out, 'cause he didn't show +up. Mis' Hawley says she looked like she was due at a funeral 'stid of a +weddin'. 'Clined to be stuck up, accordin' to Mis' Hawley--shied at hearin' +about Walt--_he-he!_ I'll bet there ain't been a transient to that hotel in +the last five year, man or woman, that ain't had to hear about Walt and the +shotgun--Pop's all right on a hot day, you bet! + +"She's got two trunks and a fiddle over to the depot--don't see how 'n the +world Man's going to git 'em out to the ranch; they're might' near as big +as claim shacks, both of 'em. Time she gits 'em into Man's shack she'll +have to go outside every time she wants to turn around--_he-he!_ By +granny--two trunks, to one woman! Have some pop, Kenneth, on me. + +"The boys are talkin' about a shivaree t'-night. On the quiet, y' know. +Some of 'em's workin' on a horse fiddle now, over in the lumber yard. +Wanted me to play a coal-oil can, but I dunno. I'm gittin' a leetle old for +sech doings. Keeps you up nights too much. Man had any sense, he'd marry +and pull outa town. 'Bout fifteen or twenty in the bunch, and a string of +cans and irons to reach clean across the street. By granny, I'm going to +plug m' ears good with cotton when it comes off--_he-he!_ 'Nother bottle of +pop, James." + +"Who's running the show, Polycarp?" Kent asked, accepting the glass of soda +because he disliked to offend. "Funny I didn't hear about it." + +Polycarp twisted his slit of a mouth knowingly, and closed one slit of an +eye to assist the facial elucidation. + +"Ain't funny--not when I tell you Fred De Garmo's handing out the +_in_vites, and he sure aims to have plenty of excitement--_he-he!_ +Betcher Manley won't be able to set on the wagon seat an' hold the lines +t'-morrow--not if he comes out when he's called and does the thing +proper--_he-he!_ An' if he don't show up, they aim to jest about pull the +old shebang down over his ears. Hope'll think it's the day of judgment, +sure--_he-he!_ Reckon I might's well git in on the fun--they won't be no +sleepin' within ten mile of the place, nohow, and a feller always sees the +joke better when he's lendin' a hand. Too bad you an' Fred's on the outs, +Kenneth." + +"Oh, I don't know--it suits me fine," Kent declared easily, setting down +his glass with a sigh of relief; he hated "pop." + +"What's it all about, anyway?" quizzed Polycarp, hungering for the details +which had thus far been denied him. "De Garmo sees red whenever anybody +mentions your name, Kenneth--but I never did hear no particulars." + +"No?" Kent was turning toward the door. "Well, you see, Fred claims he +can holler louder than I can, and I say he can't." He opened the door and +calmly departed, leaving Polycarp looking exceedingly foolish and a bit +angry. + +Straight to the hotel, without any pretense at disguising his destination, +marched Kent. He went into the office--which was really a saloon--invited +Hawley to drink with him, and then wondered audibly if he could beg some +pie from Mrs. Hawley. + +"Supper'll be ready in a few minutes," Hawley informed him, glancing up at +the round, dust-covered clock screwed to the wall. + +"I don't want supper--I want pie," Kent retorted, and opened a door which +led into the hallway. He went down the narrow passage to another door, +opened it without ceremony, and was assailed by the odor of many +things--the odor which spoke plainly of supper, or some other assortment of +food. No one was in sight, so he entered the dining room boldly, stepped to +another door, tapped very lightly upon it, and went in. By this somewhat +roundabout method he invaded the parlor. + +Manley Fleetwood was lying upon an extremely uncomfortable couch, of the +kind which is called a sofa. He had a lace-edged handkerchief folded upon +his brow, and upon his face was an expression of conscious unworthiness +which struck Kent as being extremely humorous. He grinned understandingly +and Manley flushed--also understandingly. Valeria hastily released Manley's +hand and looked very prim and a bit haughty, as she regarded the intruder +from the red plush chair, pulled close to the couch. + +"Mr. Fleetwood's head is very bad yet," she informed Kent coldly. "I really +do not think he ought to see--anybody." + +Kent tapped his hat gently against his leg and faced her unflinchingly, +quite unconscious of the fact that she regarded him as a dissolute, drunken +cowboy with whom Manley ought not to associate. + +"That's too bad." His eyes failed to drop guiltily before hers, but +continued to regard her calmly. "I'm only going to stay a minute. I came to +tell you that there's a scheme to raise--to 'shivaree' you two, tonight. I +thought you might want to pull out, along about dark." + +Manley looked up at him inquiringly with the eye which was not covered by +the lace-edged handkerchief. Valeria seemed startled, just at first. Then +she gave Kent a little shock of surprise. + +"I have read about such things. A _charivari_, even out here in this +uncivilized section of the country, can hardly be dangerous. I really do +not think we care to run away, thank you." Her lip curled unmistakably. +"Mr. Fleetwood is suffering from a sick headache. He needs rest--not a +cowardly night ride." + +Naturally Kent admired the spirit she showed, in spite of that eloquent +lip, the scorn of which seemed aimed directly at him. But he still faced +her steadily. + +"Sure. But if I had a headache--like that--I'd certainly burn the earth +getting outa town to-night. _Shivarees_"--he stuck stubbornly to his own +way of saying it--"are bad for the head. They aren't what you could call +silent--not out here in this uncivilized section of the country. They're +plumb--" He hesitated for just a fraction of a second, and his resentment +of her tone melted into a twinkle of the eyes. "They've got fifty coal-oil +cans strung with irons on a rope, and there'll be about ninety-five +six-shooters popping, and eight or ten horse-fiddles, and they'll all be +yelling to beat four of a kind. They're going," he said quite gravely, "to +play the full orchestra. And I don't believe," he added ironically, "it's +going to help Mr. Fleetwood's head any." + +Valeria looked at him doubtingly with steady, amber-colored eyes before she +turned solicitously to readjust the lace-edged handkerchief. Kent seized +the opportunity to stare fixedly at Fleetwood and jerk his head meaningly +backward, but when, warned by Manley's changing expression, she glanced +suspiciously over her shoulder, Kent was standing quietly by the door with +his hat in his hand, gazing absently at Walt in his gilt-edged frame upon +the gilt easel, and waiting, evidently, for their decision. + +"I shall tell them that Mr. Fleetwood is sick--that he has a horrible +headache, and mustn't be disturbed." + +Kent forgot himself so far as to cough slightly behind his hand. Valeria's +eyes sparkled. + +"Even out here," she went on cuttingly, "there must be some men who are +gentlemen!" + +Kent refrained from looking at her, but the blood crept darkly into his +tanned cheeks. Evidently she "had it in for him," but he could not see why. +He wondered swiftly if she blamed him for Manley's condition. + +Fleetwood suddenly sat up, spilling the handkerchief to the floor. When +Valeria essayed to push him back he put her hand gently away. He rose and +came over to Kent. + +"Is this straight goods?" he demanded. "Why don't you stop it?" + +"Fred De Garmo's running this show. My influence wouldn't go as far--" + +Fleetwood turned to the girl, and his manner was masterful. "I'm going out +with Kent--oh, Val, this is Mr. Burnett. Kent, Miss Peyson. I forgot you +two aren't acquainted." + +From Valeria's manner, they were in no danger of becoming friends. Her +acknowledgment was barely perceptible. Kent bowed stiffly. + +"I'm going to see about this, Val," continued Fleetwood. "Oh, my head's +better--a lot better, really. Maybe we'd better leave town--" + +"If your head is better, I don't see why we need run away from a lot of +silly noise," Valeria interposed, with merciless logic. "They'll think +we're awful cowards." + +"Well, I'll try and find out--I won't be gone a minute, dear." After that +word, spoken before another, he appeared to be in great haste, and pushed +Kent rather unceremoniously through the door. In the dining room, Kent +diplomatically included the landlady in the conference, by a gesture of +much mystery bringing her in from the kitchen, where she had been curiously +peeping out at them. + +"Got to let her in," he whispered to Manley, "to keep her face closed." + +They murmured together for five minutes. Kent seemed to meet with some +opposition from Fleetwood--an aftermath of Valeria's objections to +flight--and became brutally direct. + +"Go ahead--do as you please," he said roughly. "But you know that bunch. +You'll have to show up, and you'll have to set 'em up, and--aw, thunder! +By morning you'll be plumb laid out. You'll be headed into one of your +four-day jags, and you know it. I was thinking of the girl--but if you +don't care, I guess it's none of my funeral. Go to it--but darned if I'd +want to start my honeymoon out like that!" + +Fleetwood weakened, but still he hesitated. "If I didn't show up--" he +began hopefully. But Kent wittered him with a look. + +"That bunch will be two-thirds full before they start out. If you don't +show up, they'll go up and haul you outa bed--hell, Man! You'd likely start +in to kill somebody off. Fred De Garmo don't love you much better than he +loves me. You know what him and his friends would do then, I should think." +He stopped, and seemed to consider briefly a plan, but shook his head +over it. "I could round up a bunch and stand 'em off, maybe--but we'd be +shooting each other up, first rattle of the box. It's a whole lot easier +for you to get outa town." + +"I'll tell somebody you got the bridal chamber," hissed Arline, in a very +loud whisper. "That's number two, in front. I can keep a light going and +pass back 'n' forth once in a while, to look like you're there. That'll +fool 'em good. They'll wait till the light's been out quite a while before +they start in. You go ahead and git married at seven, jest as you was going +to--and if Kent'll have the team ready somewheres, I can easy sneak you out +the back way." + +"I couldn't get the team out of town without giving the whole deal away," +Kent objected. "You'll have to go horseback.". + +"Val can't ride," Fleetwood stated, as if that settled the matter. + +"Damn it, she's got to ride!" snapped Kent, losing patience. "Unless you +want to stay and go on a toot that'll last a week, most likely." + +"Val belongs to the W.C.T.U.," shrugged Fleetwood. "She'd never--" + +"Well, it's that or have a fight on your hands you maybe can't handle. I +don't see any sense in haggling about going, now you know what to expect. +But, of course," he added, with some acrimony, "it's your own business. I +don't know what the dickens I'm getting all worked up over it for. Suit +yourself." He turned toward the door. + +"She could ride my Mollie--and I got a sidesaddle hanging up in the coal +shed. She could use that, or a stock saddle, either one," planned Mrs. +Hawley anxiously. "You better pull out, Man." + +"Hold on, Kent! Don't rush off--we'll go," Fleetwood surrendered. "Val +won't like it, but I'll explain as well as I can, without--Say! you stay +and see us married, won't you? It's at seven, and--" + +Kent's fingers curled around the doorknob. "No, thanks. Weddings and +funerals are two bunches of trouble I always ride 'way around. Time enough +when you've got to be _it_. Along about nine o'clock you try and get out to +the stockyards without letting the whole town see you go, and I'll have the +horses there; just beyond the wings, by that pile of ties. You know the +place. I'll wait there till ten, and not a minute longer. That'll give you +an hour, and you won't need any more time than that if you get down to +business. You find out from her what saddle she wants, and you can tell me +while I'm eating supper, Mrs. Hawley. I'll 'tend to the rest." He did not +wait to hear whether they agreed to the plan, but went moodily down the +narrow passage, and entered frowningly the "office." Several men were +gathered there, waiting the supper summons. Hawley glanced up from wiping a +glass, and grinned. + +"Well, did you git the pie?" + +"Naw. She said I'd got to wait for mealtime. She plumb chased me out." + +Fred De Garmo, sprawled in an armchair and smoking a cigar, lazily fanned +the smoke cloud from before his face and looked at Kent attentively. + + + + +CHAPTER III. A LADY IN A TEMPER + +To saddle two horses when the night has grown black and to lead them, +unobserved, so short a distance as two hundred yards or so seems a simple +thing; and for two healthy young people with full use of their wits and +their legs to steal quietly away to where those horses are waiting +would seem quite as simple. At the same time, to prevent the successful +accomplishment of these things is not difficult, if one but fully +understands the designs of the fugitives. + +Hawley Hotel did a flourishing business that night. The two long tables in +the dining room, usually not more than half filled by those who hungered +and were not over-nice concerning the food they ate, were twice filled to +overflowing. Mrs. Hawley and the "breed" girl held hasty consultations in +the kitchen over the supply, and never was there such a rattling of dishes +hurriedly cleansed for the next comer. + +Kent managed to find a chair at the first table, and eyed the landlady +unobtrusively. But Fred De Garmo sat down opposite, and his eyes were +bright and watchful, so that there seemed no possible way of delivering a +message undetected--until, indeed, Mrs. Hawley in desperation resorted to +strategy, and urged Kent unnecessarily to take another slice of bacon. + +"Have some more--it's _side_!" she hissed in his ear, and watched anxiously +his face. + +"All right," said Kent, and speared a slice with his fork, although his +plate was already well supplied with bacon. Then, glancing up, he detected +Fred in a thoughtful stare which seemed evenly divided between the landlady +and himself. Kent was conscious of a passing, mental discomfort, which he +put aside as foolish, because De Garmo could not possibly know what Mrs. +Hawley meant. To ease his mind still further he glared insolently at Fred, +and then at Polycarp Jenks _te-hee_ing a few chairs away. After that he +finished as quickly as possible without exciting remark, and went his way. + +He had not, however, been two minutes in the office before De Garmo +entered. From that time on through the whole evening Fred was never far +distant; wherever he went, Kent could not shake him off though De Garmo +never seemed to pay any attention to him, and his presence was always +apparently accidental. + +"I reckon I'll have to lick that son of a gun yet," sighed Kent, when a +glance at the round clock in the hotel office told him that in just twenty +minutes it would strike nine; and not a move made toward getting those +horses saddled and out to the stockyards. + +There was much talk of the wedding, which had taken place quietly in the +parlor at the appointed hour, but not a man mentioned a _charivari_. There +were many who wished openly that Fleetwood would come out and be sociable +about it, but not a hint that they intended to take measures to bring him +among them. He had caused a box of cigars to be placed upon the bar of +every saloon in town, where men might help themselves at his expense. +Evidently he had considered that with the cigars his social obligations +were canceled. They smoked the cigars, and, with the same breath, gossiped +of him and his affairs. + +At just fourteen minutes to nine Kent went out, and, without any attempt +at concealment, hurried to the Hawley stables. Half a minute behind him +trailed De Garmo, also without subterfuge. + +Half an hour later the bridal couple stole away from the rear of the hotel, +and, keeping to the shadows, went stumbling over the uneven ground to the +stockyards. + +"Here's the tie pile," Fleetwood announced, in an undertone, when they +reached the place. "You stay here, Val, and I'll look farther along the +fence; maybe the horses are down there." + +Valeria did not reply, but stood very straight and dignified in the shadow +of the huge pile of rotting railroad ties. He was gone but a moment, and +came anxiously back to her. + +"They're not here," he said, in a low voice. "Don't worry, dear. He'll +come--I know Kent Burnett." + +"Are you sure?" queried Val sweetly. "From what I have seen of the +gentleman, your high estimate of him seems quite unauthorized. Aside from +escorting me to the hotel, he has been anything but reliable. Instead of +telling you that I was here, or telling me that you were sick, he went +straight into a saloon and forgot all about us both. You know that. If he +were your friend, why should he immediately begin carousing, instead of--" + +"He didn't," Fleetwood defended weakly. + +"No? Then perhaps you can explain his behavior. Why didn't he tell me you +were sick? Why didn't he tell you I came on that train? Can you tell me +that, Manley?" + +Manley, for a very good reason, could not; so he put his arms around her +and tried to coax her into good humor. + +"Sweetheart, let's not quarrel so soon--why, we're only two hours married! +I want you to be happy, and if you'll only be brave and--" + +"Brave!" Mrs. Fleetwood laughed rather contemptuously, for a bride. "Please +to understand, Manley, that I'm not frightened in the least. It's you and +that horrid cowboy--_I_ don't see why we need run away, like criminals. +Those men don't intend to _murder_ us, do they?" Her mood softened a +little, and she squeezed his arm between her hands. "You dear old silly, +I'm not blaming _you_. With your head in such a state, you can't think +things out properly, and you let that cowboy influence you against your +better judgment. You're afraid I might be annoyed--but, really, Manley, +this silly idea of running away annoys me much more than all the noise +those fellows could possibly make. Indeed, I don't think I would mind--it +would give me a glimpse of the real West; and, perhaps, if they grew +too boisterous, and I spoke to them and asked them not to be quite so +rough--and, really, they only mean it as a sort of welcome, in their crude +way. We could invite some of the nicest in to have cake and coffee--or +maybe we might get some ice cream somewhere--and it might turn out a very +pleasant little affair. I don't mind meeting them, Manley. The worst of +them can't be as bad as that--but, of course, if he's your friend, I +suppose I oughtn't to speak too freely my opinion of him!" + +Fleetwood held her closely, patted her cheek absently, and tried to think +of some effective argument. + +"They'll be drunk, sweetheart," he told her, after a silence. + +"I don't think so," she returned firmly. "I have been watching the street +all the evening. I saw any number of men passing back and forth, and I +didn't see one who staggered. And they were all very quiet, considering +their rough ways, which one must expect. Why, Manley, you always wrote +about these Western men being such fine fellows, and so generous and +big-hearted, under their rough exterior. Your letters were full of it--and +how chivalrous they all are toward nice women." + +She laid her head coaxingly against his shoulder. "Let's go back, Manley. +I--_want_ to see a _charivari_, dear. It will be fun. I want to write all +about it to the girls. They'll be perfectly wild with envy." She struggled +with her conventional upbringing. "And even if some of them are slightly +under the influence--of liquor, we needn't _meet_ them. You needn't +introduce those at all, and I'm sure they will understand." + +"Don't be silly, Val!" Fleetwood did not mean to be rude, but a faint +glimmer of her romantic viewpoint--a viewpoint gained chiefly from current +fiction and the stage--came to him and contrasted rather brutally with the +reality. He did not know how to make her understand, without incriminating +himself. His letters had been rather idealistic, he admitted to himself. +They had been written unthinkingly, because he wanted her to like this big +land; naturally he had not been too baldly truthful in picturing the place +and the people. He had passed lightly over their faults and thrown the +limelight on their virtues; and so he had aided unwittingly the stage and +the fiction she had read, in giving her a false impression. + +Offended at his words and his tone, she drew away from him and glanced +wistfully back toward the town, as if she meditated a haughty return to the +hotel. She ended by seating herself upon a projecting tie. + +"Oh, very well, my lord," she retorted, "I shall try and not be silly, but +merely idiotic, as you would have me. You and your friend!" She was very +angry, but she was perfectly well-bred, she hoped. "If I might venture a +word," she began again ironically, "it seems to me that your friend has +been playing a practical joke upon you. He evidently has no intention of +bringing any fleet steeds to us. No doubt he is at this moment laughing +with his dissolute companions, because we are sitting out here in the dark +like two silly chickens!" + +"I think he's coming now," Manley said rather stiffly. "Of course, I don't +ask you to like him; but he's putting himself to a good deal of trouble for +us, and--" + +"Wasted effort, so far as I am concerned," Valeria put in, with a chirpy +accent which was exasperating, even to a bridegroom very much in love with +his bride. + +In the darkness that muffled the land, save where the yellow flare of lamps +in the little town made a misty brightness, came the click of shod hoofs. +Another moment and a man, mounted upon a white horse, loomed indistinct +before them, seeming to take substance from the night. Behind him trailed +another horse, and for the first time in her life Valeria heard the soft, +whispering creak of saddle leather, the faint clank of spur chains, and the +whir of a horse mouthing the "cricket" in his bit. Even in her anger, she +was conscious of an answering tingle of blood, because this was life in +the raw--life such as she had dreamed of in the tight swaddlings of a smug +civilization, and had longed for intensely. + +Kent swung down close beside them, his form indistinct but purposeful. "I'm +late, I guess," he remarked, turning to Fleetwood. "Fred got next, somehow, +and--I was detained." + +"Where is he?" asked Manley, going up and laying a questioning hand upon +the horse, by that means fully recognizing it as Kent's own. + +"In the oats box," said Kent laconically. He turned to the girl. "I +couldn't get the sidesaddle," he explained apologetically. "I looked where +Mrs. Hawley said it was, but I couldn't find it--and I didn't have much +time. You'll have to ride a stock saddle." + +Valeria drew back a step. "You mean--a man's saddle?" Her voice was +carefully polite. + +"Why, yes." And he added: "The horse is dead gentle--and a sidesaddle's no +good, anyhow. You'll like this better." He spoke, as was evident, purely +from a man's viewpoint. + +That viewpoint Mrs. Fleetwood refused to share. "Oh, I couldn't ride a +man's saddle," she protested, still politely, and one could imagine how her +lips were pursed. "Indeed, I'm not sure that I care to leave town at all." +To her the declaration did not seem unreasonable or abrupt but she felt +that Kent was very much shocked. She saw him turn his head and look back +toward the town, as if he half expected a pursuit. + +"I don't reckon the oats box will hold Fred very long," he observed +meditatively. He added reminiscently to Manley: "I had a deuce of a time +getting the cover down and fastened." + +"I'm very sorry," said Valeria, with sweet dignity, "that you gave yourself +so much trouble--" + +"I'm kinda sorry myself," Kent agreed mildly, and Valeria blushed hotly, +and was glad he could not see. + +"Come, Val--you can ride this saddle, all right. All the girls out here--" + +"I did not come West to imitate all the girls. Indeed, I could never think +of such a thing. I couldn't possibly--really, Manley! And, you know, it +does seem so childish of us to run away--" + +Kent moved restlessly, and felt to see if the cinch was tight. + +Fleetwood took her coaxingly by the arm. "Come, sweetheart, don't be +stubborn. You know--" + +"Well, really! If it's a question of obstinacy--You see, I look at the +matter in this way: You believe that you are doing what is best for my +sake; I don't agree with you--and it does seem as if I should be permitted +to judge what I desire." Then her dignity and her sweet calm went down +before a flash of real, unpolished temper. "You two can take those nasty +horses and ride clear to Dakota, if you want to. I'm going back to the +hotel. And I'm going to tell somebody to let that poor fellow out of that +box. I think you're acting perfectly horrid, both of you, when I don't want +to go!" She actually started back toward the scattered points of light. + +She did not, however, get so faraway that she failed to hear Kent's "Well, +I'll be damned!" uttered in a tone of intense disgust. + +"I don't care," she assured herself, because of the thrill of compunction +caused by that one forcible sentence. She had never before in her life +heard a man really swear. It affected her very much as would the accidental +touch of an electric battery. She walked on slowly, stumbling a little and +trying to hear what it was they were saying. + +Then Kent passed her, loping back to the town, the led horse shaking his +saddle so that it rattled the stirrups like castanets as he galloped. "I +don't care," she told herself again very emphatically, because she was +quite sure that she did care--or that she would care if only she permitted +herself to be so foolish. Manley overtook her then, and drew her hand under +his arm to lead her. But he seemed quite sullen, and would not say a word +all the way back. + + + + +CHAPTER IV. THE "SHIVAREE" + +Kent jerked open the stable door, led in his horses, turned them into their +stalls, and removed the saddles with quick, nervous movements which told +plainly how angry he was. + +"I'll get myself all excited trying to do her a favor again--I don't +think!" he growled in the ear of Michael, his gray gelding. "Think of me +getting let down on my face like that! By a woman!" + +He felt along the wall in the intense darkness until his fingers touched +a lantern, took it down from the nail where it hung, and lighted it. He +carried it farther down the rude passage between the stalls, hung it high +upon another nail, and turned to the great oats box, from within which came +a vigorous thumping and the sound of muttered cursing. + +Kent was not in the mood to see the humor of anything in particular. Had he +known anything about Pandora's box he might have drawn a comparison very +neatly while he stood scowling down at the oats box, for certainly he was +likely to release trouble in plenty when he unfastened that lid. He felt of +the gun swinging at his hip, just to assure himself that it was there +and ready for business in case Fred wanted to shoot, and rapped with his +knuckles upon the box, producing instant silence within. + +"Don't make so much noise in there," he advised grimly, "not unless you +want the whole town to know where you are, and have 'em give you the laugh. +And, listen here: I ain't apologizing for what I done, but, all the same, +I'm sorry I did it. It wasn't any use. I'd rather be shut up in an oats box +all night than get let down like I was--and I'm telling you this so as to +start us off even. If you want to fight about it when you come out, all +right; you're the doctor. But I'm just as sorry as you are it happened. +I lay down my hand right here. I hope you shivaree Man and his wife--and +shivaree 'em good. I hope you bust the town wide open." + +"Why this sudden change of heart?" came muffled from within. + +"Ah--that's my own business. Well, I don't like you a little bit, and you +know it; but I'll tell you, just to give you a fair show. I wanted to keep +Man sober, and I tried to get him and his wife out of town before that +shivaree of yours was pulled off. But the lady wouldn't have it that way. +I got let right down on my face, and I'm done. Now you know just where I +stand. Maybe I'm a fool for telling you, but I seem to be in the business +to-night. Come on out." + +He unfastened the big iron hasp, which was showing signs of the strain put +upon it, and stepped back watchfully. The thick, oaken lid was pushed up, +and Fred De Garmo, rather dusty and disheveled and purple from the +close atmosphere of the box and from anger as well, came up like a +jack-in-the-box and glared at Kent. When he had stepped out upon the stable +floor, however, he smiled rather unpleasantly. + +[Illustration: He was jeered unmercifully by Fred De Garmo and his crowd] + +"If you've told the truth," he said maliciously, "I guess the lady has +pretty near evened things up. If you haven't--if I don't find them both at +the hotel--well--Anyway," he added, with an ominous inflection, "there'll +be other days to settle this in!" + +"Why, sure. Help yourself, Fred," Kent retorted cheerfully, and stood where +he was until Fred had gone out. Then he turned and closed the box. "Between +that yellow-eyed dame and the chump that went and left this box wide open +for me to tip Fred into," he soliloquized, while he took down the lantern, +and so sent the shadows dancing weirdly about him, "I've got a bunch of +trouble mixed up, for fair. I wish the son of a gun would fight it out now, +and be done with it; but no, that ain't Fred. He'd a heap rather wait and +let it draw interest!" + +Over in the hotel the "yellow-eyed dame" was doing her unsophisticated best +to meet the situation gracefully, and to realize certain vague and rather +romantic dreams of her life out West. She meant to be very gracious, for +one thing, and to win the chivalrous friendship of every man who came to +participate in the rude congratulations that had been planned. Just how +she meant to do this she did not know--except that the graciousness would +certainly prove a very important factor. + +"I'm going to remain downstairs," she told Manley, when they reached the +hotel. It was the first sentence she had spoken since he overtook her. "I'm +so glad, dear," she added diplomatically, "that you decided to stay. I want +to see that funny landlady now, please, and get her to serve coffee and +cake to our guests in the parlor. I wish I might have had one of my trunks +brought over here; I should like to wear a pretty gown." She glanced down +at her tailored suit with true feminine dissatisfaction. "But everything +was so--so confused, with your being late, and sick--is your head better, +dear?" + +Manley, in very few words, assured her that it was. Manley was struggling +with his inner self, trying to answer one very important question, and to +answer it truthfully: Could he meet "the boys," do his part among them, and +still remain sober? That seemed to be the only course open to him now, and +he knew himself just well enough to doubt his own strength. But if Kent +would help him--He felt an immediate necessity to find Kent. + +"You'll find Mrs. Hawley somewhere around," he said hurriedly. "I've got to +see Kent--" + +"Oh, Manley! Don't have anything to do with that horrid cowboy! He's +not--nice. He--he swore, when he must have known I could hear him; and he +was swearing about _me_, Manley. Didn't you hear him?" She stood in the +doorway and clung to his arm. + +"No," lied Manley. "You must have been mistaken, sweetheart." + +"Oh, I wasn't; I heard him quite plainly." She must have thought it a +terrible thing, for she almost whispered the last words, and she released +him with much reluctance. It seemed to her that Manley was in danger of +falling among low associates, and that she must protect him in spite of +himself. It failed to occur to her that Manley had been exposed to that +danger for three years, without any protection whatever. + +She was thankful, when he came to her later in the parlor, to learn from +him that he had not held any speech with Kent. That was some comfort--and +she felt that she needed a little comforting, just then. Her consultation +with Arline had been rather unsatisfactory. Arline had told her bluntly +that "the bunch" didn't want any coffee and cake. Whisky and cigars, said +Arline, without so much as a blush, was what appealed to them fellows. If +Manley handed it out liberal enough, they wouldn't bother his bride. Very +likely, Arline had assured her, she wouldn't see one of them. That, on the +whole, had been rather discouraging. How was she to show herself a gracious +lady, forsooth, if no one came near her? But she kept these things +jealously tucked away in the remotest corner of her own mind, and managed +to look the relief she did not feel. + +And, after all, the _charivari_, as is apt to be the case when the plans +are laid so carefully, proved a very tame affair. Valeria, sitting rather +dismally in the parlor with Mrs. Hawley for company, at midnight heard a +banging of tin cans somewhere outside, a fitful popping of six-shooters, +and an abortive attempt at a procession coming up the street. But the lines +seemed to waver and then break utterly at the first saloon, where drink was +to be had for the asking and Manley Fleetwood was pledged to pay, and the +rattle of cans was all but drowned in the shouts of laughter and talk which +came from the "office," across the hall. For where is the pleasure or the +profit in _charivaring_ a bridal couple which stays up and waits quite +openly for the clamor? + +"Is it always so noisy here at night?" asked Valeria faintly when Mrs. +Hawley had insisted upon her lying down upon the uncomfortable sofa. + +"Well, no--unless a round-up pulls in, or there's a dance, or it's +Christmas, or something. It's liable to keep up till two or three o'clock, +so the sooner you git used to it, the better off you'll be. I'm going to +leave you here, and go to bed--unless you want to go upstairs yourself. +Only it'll be noisier than ever up in your room, for it's right over the +office, and the way sound travels up is something fierce. Don't you be +afraid--I'll lock this door, and if your husband wants to come in he can +come through the dining room." She looked at Valeria and hesitated before +she spoke the next sentence. "And don't you worry a bit over him, neither. +My old man was in the kitchen a minute ago, when I was out there, and he +says Man ain't drinking a drop to-night. He's keeping as straight as--" + +Valeria sat up suddenly, quite scandalized. "Oh--why, of course Manley +wouldn't drink with them! Why--who ever heard of such a thing? The idea!" +She stared reproachfully at her hostess. + +"Oh, sure! I didn't say such a thing was liable to happen. I just thought +you might be--worrying--they're making so much racket in there," stammered +Arline. + +"Indeed, no. I'm not at all worried, thank you. And please don't let me +keep you up any longer, Mrs. Hawley. I am quite comfortable--mentally and +physically, I assure you. Good night." + +Not even Mrs. Hawley could remain after that. She went out and closed the +door carefully behind her, without even finding voice enough to return +Valeria's sweetly modulated good night. + +"She's got a whole lot to learn," she relieved her feelings somewhat by +muttering as she mounted the stairs. + +What it cost Manley Fleetwood to abstain absolutely and without even the +compromise of "soft" drinks that night, who can say? Three years of free +living in Montana had lowered his standard of morality without giving him +that rugged strength of mind which makes a man master of himself first of +all. He had that day lain, drunken and sleeping, when he should have been +at his mental and physical best to meet the girl who would marry him. It +was that very defection, perhaps, which kept him sober in the midst of his +taunting fellows. Now that Valeria was actually here, and was his wife, he +was possessed by the desire to make some sacrifice by which he might prove +his penitence. At any cost he would spare her pain and humiliation, he told +himself. + +He did it, and he did it under difficulty. He was denied the moral support +of Kent Burnett, for Kent was sulking over his slight, and would have +nothing to say to him. He was jeered unmercifully by Fred De Garmo and his +crowd. He was "baptized" by some drunken reveler, so that the stench of +spilled whisky filled his nostrils and tortured him the night through. +He was urged, he was bullied, he was ridiculed. His head throbbed, his +eyeballs burned. But through it all he stayed among them because he feared +that if he left them and went to Val, some drunken fool might follow him +and shock her with his inebriety. He stayed, and he stayed sober. Val was +his wife. She trusted him, and she was ignorant of his sins. If he went to +her staggering and babbling incoherent foolishness, he knew it would break +her heart. + +When the sky was at last showing faint dawn tints and the clamor had worn +itself out perforce--because even the leaders were, after all, but men, and +there was a limit to their endurance--Manley entered the parlor, haggard +enough, it is true, and bearing with him the stale odor of cigars long +since smoked, and of the baptism of bad whisky, but also with the air +of conscious rectitude which sits so comically upon a man unused to the +feeling of virtue. + +As is so often the case when one fights alone the good fight and manages to +win, he was chagrined to find himself immediately put upon the defensive. +Val, as she speedily demonstrated, declined to look upon him as a hero, or +as being particularly virtuous. She considered herself rather neglected and +abused. She believed that he had stayed away because he was angry with her +on account of her refusal to leave town, and she thought that was rather +brutal of him. Also, her head ached from tears and lack of sleep, and she +hated the town, the hotel--almost she hated Manley himself. + +Manley felt the rebuff of her chilling silence when he came in, and when +she twitched herself loose from his embrace he came near regretting his +extreme virtue. He spent ten minutes trying to explain, without telling all +of the truth, and he felt his good opinion of himself slipping from him +before her inexorable disfavor. + +"Well, I don't blame you for not liking the town, Val," he said at last, +rather desperately. "But you mustn't judge the whole country by it. You'll +like the ranch, dear. You'll feel as if you were in another world--" + +"I hope so," Val interrupted quellingly. + +"We'll drive out there just as soon as we have breakfast." He laid his hand +diffidently upon her tumbled hair. "I _had_ to stay out there with those +fellows. I didn't want to--" + +"I don't want any breakfast," said Val, getting up and going over to the +window--it would seem to avoid his caress. "The odor of that dining room is +enough to make one fast forever." She lifted the grimy lace curtain with +her finger tips and looked disconsolately out upon the street. "It's just a +dirty, squalid little hamlet. I don't suppose the streets have been +cleaned or the garbage removed from the back yards since the place was +first--founded." She laughed shortly at the idea of "founding" a wretched +village like that, but she had no other word at hand. + +"_Arline_," she remarked, in a tone of drawling recklessness. "Arline +swears. Did you know it? I suppose, of course, you do. She said something +that struck me as being shockingly true. She said I'm 'sure having a hell +of a honeymoon.'" Then she bit her lips hard, because her eyelids were +stinging with the tears she refused to shed in his presence. + +"Oh, Val!" From the sofa Manley stared contritely at her back. She must +feel terrible, he thought, to bring herself to repeat that sentence--Val, +so icily pure in her thoughts and her speech. + +Val was blinking her tawny eyes--like the eyes of a lion in color--at the +street. Not for the world would she let him see that she wanted to cry! A +figure, blurred to indistinctness, appealed in a doorway nearly opposite, +stood for a moment looking up at the reddened sky, and came across the +street. As the tears were beaten back she saw and recognized him, with a +curl of the lip. + +"Here comes your cowboy friend--from a saloon, of course." Her voice +was lazily contemptuous. "Only his presence in the street was needed to +complete the picture of desolation. He has been in a fight, judging from +his face. It is all bruised and skinned, and one eye is swollen--ugh! My +guide, my adviser--is it possible, Manley, that you couldn't find a _nice_ +man to meet me at the train?" She turned from the disagreeable sight of +Kent and faced her husband. "Are all the men like that? And are all the +women like--Arline?" + +Manley looked at her dumbly from the sofa. Would Val ever come to +understand the place, and the people, he was wondering. + +She laughed suddenly. "I'm beginning to feel very sorry for Walt," she said +irrelevantly, pointing to the easel and the expressionless crayon portrait +staring out from the gilt frame. "He has to stay in this room always. And +I believe another two hours would drive me hopelessly insane." The word +caught her attention. "Hope!" she laughed ironically. "What imbecile ever +thought of hope in the same breath with this place? What they really ought +to do is paint that 'Abandon-hope' admonition across the whole front of the +depot!" + +Manley, because he had lifted his head too suddenly and so sent white-hot +irons of pain clashing through his brain, turned sullen. "If you hate it as +bad as all that," he said, "why, there'll be a train for the East in about +two hours." + +Val stiffened perceptibly, though the petulance in her face changed to +something wistful. "Do you mean--do you want me to go?" she asked very +calmly. + +Manley pressed his fingers hard against his temples. "You know I don't. I +want you to stay and like the country, and be happy. But--the way you have +been talking makes it seem--a-ah!" He dropped his tortured head upon his +hands and did not trouble to finish what he had intended to say. Nervous +strain, lack of sleep, and a headache to begin with, were taking heavy toll +of him. He could not argue with her; he could not do anything except wish +he were dead, or that his head would stop aching. + +Val took one of her unexpected changes of mood. She went up and laid her +cold fingers lightly upon his temples, where she could see the blood +beating savagely in the swollen veins. "What a little beast I am!" she +murmured contritely. "Shall I get you some coffee, dear? Or some headache +tablets, or--You know a cold cloth helped you last evening. Lie down for a +little while. There's no hurry about starting, is there? I--I don't hate +the place so awfully, Manley. I'm just cross because I couldn't sleep for +the noise. Here's a cushion, dear. I think it's stuffed with scrap iron, +for there doesn't seem to be anything soft about it except the invitation +to 'slumber sweetly,' in red and green silk; but anything is better than +the head of that sofa in its natural state." + +She arranged the cushion to her own liking, if not to his, and when it +was done she bent down impulsively and kissed him on the cheek, blushing +vividly the while. + +"I won't be nasty and cross any more," she promised. "Now, I'm going to +interview Arline. I hear dishes rattling somewhere; perhaps I can get a cup +of real coffee for you." At the door she shook her finger at him playfully. +"Don't you dare stir off that sofa while I'm gone," she admonished. "And, +remember, we're not going to leave town until your head stops aching--not +if we stay here a week!" + +She insisted upon bringing him coffee and toast upon a tray--a battered old +tray, purloined for that purpose from the saloon, if she had only known +it--and she informed him, with a pretty, domestic pride, that she had made +the toast herself. + +"Arline was going to lay slices of bread on top of the stove," she +explained. "She said she always makes toast that way, and no one could tell +the difference! I never heard of such a thing--did you, Manley? But I've +been attending a cooking school ever since you left Fern Hill. I didn't +tell you--I wanted it for a surprise. I could have done better with the +toast before a wood fire--I think poor Arline was nearly distracted at the +way I poked coals down from the grate; but she didn't say anything. Isn't +it funny, to have cream in cans! I don't suppose it ever saw a cow--do you? +The coffee's pretty bad, isn't it? But wait until we get home! I can make +lovely coffee--if you'll get me a percolator. You will, won't you? And I +learned now to make the most delicious fruit salad, just before I left. A +cousin of Mrs. Forman's taught me how. Could you drink another cup, dear?" + +Manley could not, and she deplored the poor quality, although she +generously absolved Arline from blame, because there seemed so much to do +in that kitchen. She refused to take any breakfast herself, telling him +gayly that the odor in the kitchen was both food and drink. + +Because he understood a little of her loathing for the place, Manley lied +heroically about his headache, so that within an hour they were leaving +town, with the two great trunks roped securely to the buckboard behind the +seat, and with Val's suitcase placed flat in the front, where she could +rest her feet upon it. Val was so happy at the prospect of getting away +from the town that she actually threw a kiss in the direction of Arline, +standing with her frowsy head, her dough-spotted apron, and her tired face +in the parlor door. + +Her mood changed immediately, however, for she had no more than turned from +waving her hand at Arline, when they met Kent, riding slowly up the street +with his hat tilted over the eye most swollen. Without a doubt he had seen +her waving and smiling, and so he must have observed the instant cooling of +her manner. He nodded to Manley and lifted his hat while he looked at her +full; and Val, in the arrogant pride of virtuous young womanhood, let her +golden-brown eyes dwell impersonally upon his face; let her white, round +chin dip half an inch downward, and then looked past him as if he were a +post by the roadside. Afterwards she smiled maliciously when she saw, with +a swift, sidelong glance, how he scowled and spurred unnecessarily his gray +gelding. + + + + +CHAPTER V. COLD SPRING RANCH + +For almost three years the letters from Manley had been headed "Cold +Spring Ranch." For quite as long Val had possessed a mental picture of the +place--a picture of a gurgly little brook with rocks and watercress and +distracting little pools the size of a bathtub, and with a great, frowning +boulder--a cliff, almost--at the head. The brook bubbled out and formed +a basin in the shadow of the rock. Around it grew trees, unnamed in the +picture, it is true, but trees, nevertheless. Below the spring stood a +picturesque little cottage. A shack, Manley had written, was but a synonym +for a small cottage, and Val had many small cottages in mind, from which +she sketched one into her picture. The sun shone on it, and the western +breezes flapped white curtains in the windows, and there was a porch where +she would swing her hammock and gaze out over the great, beautiful country, +fascinating in its very immensity. + +Somewhere beyond the cottage--"shack," she usually corrected herself--were +the corrals; they were as yet rather impressionistic; high, round, +mysterious inclosures forming an effective, if somewhat hazy, background to +the picture. She left them to work out their attractive details upon closer +acquaintance, for at most they were merely the background. The front yard, +however, she dwelt upon, and made aglow with sturdy, bright-hued flowers. +Manley had that spring planted sweet peas, and poppies, and pansies, and +other things, he wrote her, and they had come up very nicely. Afterward, +in a postscript, he answered her oft-repeated questions about the flower +garden: + +The flowers aren't doing as well as they might. They need your tender care. +I don't have much time to pet them along. The onions are doing pretty well, +but they need weeding badly. + +In spite of that, the flowers bloomed luxuriantly in her mental picture, +though she conscientiously remembered that they weren't doing as well as +they might. They were weedy and unkempt, she supposed, but a little time +and care would remedy that; and was she not coming to be the mistress of +all this, and to make everything beautiful? Besides, the spring, and the +brook which ran from it, and the trees which shaded it, were the chief +attractions. + +Perhaps she betrayed a lack of domesticity because she had not been able +to "see" the interior of the cottage--"shack"--very clearly. Sunny rooms, +white curtains, bright cushions and books, pictures and rugs mingled +together rather confusingly in her mind when she dwelt upon the inside of +her future home. It would be bright, and cozy, and "homy," she knew. She +would love it because it would be hers and Manley's, and she could do with +it what she would. She bothered about that no more than she did about the +dresses she would be wearing next year. + +Cold Spring Ranch! Think of the allurement of that name, just as it +stands, without any disconcerting qualification whatever! Any girl with +yellow-brown hair and yellow-brown eyes to match, and a dreamy temperament +that beautifies everything her imagination touches, would be sure to build +a veritable Eve's garden around those three small words. + +With that picture still before her mental vision, clear as if she had all +her life been familiar with it in reality, she rode beside Manley for three +weary hours, across a wide, wide prairie which looked perfectly level when +you viewed it as a whole, but which proved all hills and hollows when +you drove over it. During those three hours they passed not one human +habitation after the first five miles were behind them. There had been a +ranch, back there against a reddish-yellow bluff. Val had gazed upon it, +and then turned her head away, distressed because human beings could +consent to live in such unattractive surroundings. It was bad in its way as +Hope, she thought, but did not say, because Manley was talking about his +cattle, and she did not want to interrupt him. + +After that there had been no houses of any sort. There was a barbed-wire +fence stretching away and away until the posts were mere pencil lines +against the blue, where the fence dipped over the last hill before the sky +bent down and kissed the earth. + +The length of that fence was appalling in a vague, wordless way, Val +unconsciously drew closer to her husband when she looked at it, and +shivered in spite of the midsummer heat. + +"You're getting tired." Manley put his arm around her and held her there. + +"We're over half-way now. A little longer and we'll be home." Then he +bethought him that she might want some preparation for that home-coming. +"You mustn't expect much, little wife. It's a bachelor's house, so far. +You'll have to do some fixing before it will suit you. You don't look +forward to anything like Fern Hill, do you?" + +Val laughed, and bent solicitously over the suitcase, which her feet had +marred. "Of course I don't. Nothing out here is like Fern Hill. I know our +ranch is different from anything I ever knew--but I know just how it will +be, and how everything will look." + +"Oh! Do you?" Manley looked at her a bit anxiously. + +"For three years," Val reminded him, "you have been describing things +to me. You told me what it was like when you first took the place. You +described everything, from Cold Spring Coulee to the house you built, and +the spring under the rock wall, and even the meadow lark's nest you found +in the weeds. Of _course_ I know." + +"It's going to seem pretty rough, at first," he observed rather +apologetically. + +"Yes--but I shall not mind that. I want it to be rough. I'm tired to death +of the smug smoothness of my life so far. Oh, if you only knew how I have +hated Fern Hill, these last three years, especially since I graduated. Just +the same petty little lives lived in the same petty little way, day in and +day out. Every Sunday the class in Sunday school, and the bells ringing +and the same little walk of four blocks there and back. Every Tuesday and +Friday the club meeting--the Merry Maids, and the Mascot, both just alike, +where you did the same things. And the same round of calls with mamma, +on the same people, twice a month the year round. And the little social +festivities--ah, Manley, if you only knew how I tong for something rough +and real in my life!" It was very nearly what she said to the tired-faced +teacher on the train. + +"Well, if that's what you want, you've come to the right place," he told +her dryly. + +Later, when they drew close to a red coulee rim which he said was the far +side of Cold Spring Coulee, she forgot how tired she was, and felt every +nerve quiver with eagerness. + +Later still, when in the glare of a July sun they drove around a low knoll, +dipped into a wide, parched coulee, and then came upon a barren little +habitation inclosed in a meager fence of the barbed wire she thought so +detestable, she shut her eyes mentally to something she could not quite +bring herself to face. + +He lifted her out and tumbled the great trunks upon the ground before he +drove on to the corrals. "Here's the key," he said, "if you want to go in. +I won't be more than a minute or two." He did not look into her face when +he spoke. + +Val stood just inside the gate and tried to adjust all this to her mental +picture. There was the front yard, for instance. A few straggling vines +against the porch, and a sickly cluster or two of blossoms--those were the +sweet peas, surely. The sun-baked bed of pale-green plants without so much +as a bud of promise, she recognized, after a second glance, as the poppies. +For the rest, there were weeds against the fence, sun-ripened grass trodden +flat, yellow, gravelly patches where nothing grew--and a glaring, burning +sun beating down upon it all. + +The cottage--never afterward did she think of it by that name, but always +as a shack--was built of boards placed perpendicularly, with battens nailed +over the cracks to keep out the wind and the snow. At one side was a +"lean-to" kitchen, and on the other side was the porch that was just +a narrow platform with a roof over it. It was not wide enough for a +rocking-chair, to say nothing of swinging a hammock. In the first hasty +inspection this seemed to be about all. She was still hesitating before the +door when Manley came back from putting up the horses. + +"I'm afraid your flowers are a lost cause," he remarked cheerfully. "They +were looking pretty good two or three weeks ago. This hot weather has dried +them up. Next year we'll have water down here to the house. All these +things take time." + +"Oh, of course they do." Val managed to smile into his eyes. "Let's see how +many dishes you left dirty; bachelors always leave their dishes unwashed on +the table, don't they?" + +"Sometimes--but I generally wash mine." He led the way into the house, +which smelled hot and close, with the odor of food long since cooked +and eaten, before he threw all the windows open. The front room was +clean--after a man's idea of cleanliness. The floor was covered with an +exceedingly dusty carpet, and a rug or two. Her latest photograph was +nailed to the wall; and when Val saw it she broke into hysterical laughter. + +"You've nailed your colors to the mast," she cried, and after that it was +all a joke. The home-made couch, with the calico cushions and the cowhide +spread, was a matter for mirth. She sat down upon it to try it, and was +informed that chicken wire makes a fine spring. The rickety table, with +tobacco, magazines, and books placed upon it in orderly piles, was +something to smile over. The chairs, and especially the one cane rocker +which went sidewise over the floor if you rocked in it long enough, were +pronounced original. + +In the kitchen the same masculine idea of cleanliness and order obtained. +The stove was quite red, but it had been swept clean. The table was pushed +against the only window there, and the back part was filled with glass +preserve jars, cans, and a loaf of bread wrapped carefully in paper; but +the oilcloth cover was clean--did it not show quite plainly the marks of +the last washing? Two frying pans were turned bottom up on an obscure table +in an obscure corner of the room, and a zinc water pail stood beside them. + +There were other details which impressed themselves upon her shrinking +brain, and though she still insisted upon smiling at everything, she stood +in the middle of the room holding up her skirts quite unconsciously, as if +she were standing at a muddy street crossing, wondering how in the world +she was ever going to reach the Other side. + +"Isn't it all--deliciously--primitive?" she asked, in a weak little voice, +when the smile would stay no longer. "I--love it, dear." That was a lie; +more, she was not in the habit of fibbing for the sake of politeness or +anything else, so that the words stood for a good deal. + +Manley looked into the zinc water pail, took it up, and started for an +outer door, rattling the tin dipper as he went. "Want to go up to the +spring?" he queried, over his shoulder, "Water's the first thing--I'm +horribly thirsty." + +Val turned to follow him. "Oh, yes--the spring!" She stopped, however, as +soon as she had spoken. "No, dear. There'll be plenty of other times. I'll +stay here." + +He gave her a glance bright with love and blind happiness in her presence +there, and went off whistling and rattling the pail at his side. + +Val did not even watch him go. She stood still in the kitchen and looked at +the table, and at the stove, and at the upturned frying pans. She watched +two great horseflies buzzing against a window-pane, and when she could +endure that no longer, she went into the front room and stared vacantly +around at the bare walls. When she saw her picture again, nailed +fast beside the kitchen door, her face lost a little of its frozen +blankness--enough so that her lips quivered until she bit them into +steadiness. + +She went then to the door and stood looking dully out into the parched +yard, and at the wizened little pea vines clutching feebly at their +white-twine trellis. Beyond stretched the bare hills with the wavering +brown line running down the nearest one--the line that she knew was the +trail from town. She was guilty of just one rebellious sentence before she +struggled back to optimism. + +"I said I wanted it to be rough, but I didn't mean--why, this is just +squalid!" She looked down the coulee and glimpsed the river flowing calmly +past the mouth of it, a majestic blue belt fringed sparsely with green. +It must be a mile away, but it relieved wonderfully the monotony of brown +hills, and the vivid coloring brightened her eyes. She heard Manley enter +the kitchen, set down the pail of water, and come on to where she stood. + +"I'd forgotten you said we could see the river from here," she told him, +smiling over her shoulder. "It's beautiful, isn't it? I don't suppose, +though, there's a boat within millions of miles." + +"Oh, there's a boat down there. It leaks, though. I just use it for ducks, +close to shore. Admiring our view? Great, don't you think?" + +Val clasped her hands before her and let her gaze travel again over the +sweep of rugged hills. "It's--wonderful. I thought I knew, but I see I +didn't. I feel very small, Manley; does one ever grow up to it?" + +He seemed dimly to catch the note of utter desolation. "You'll get used to +all that," he assured her. "I thought I'd reached the jumping-off place, at +first. But now--you couldn't dog me outa the country." + +He was slipping into the vernacular, and Val noticed it, and wondered dully +if she would ever do likewise. She had not yet admitted to herself that +Manley was different. She had told herself many times that it would take +weeks to wipe out the strangeness born of three years' separation. He was +the same, of course; everything else was new and--different. That was all. +He seemed intensely practical, and he seemed to feel that his love-making +had all been done by letter, and that nothing now remained save the +business of living. So, when he told her to rest, and that he would get +dinner and show her how a bachelor kept house, she let him go with no reply +save that vague, impersonal smile which Kent had encountered at the depot. + +While he rattled things about in the kitchen, she stood still in the +doorway with her fingers doubled into tight little fists, and stared out +over the great, treeless, unpeopled land which had swallowed her alive. She +tried to think--and then, in another moment, she was trying not to think. + +Glancing quickly over her shoulder, to make sure Manley was too busy to +follow her, she went off the porch and stood uncertain in the parched +inclosure which was the front yard. + +"I may as well see it all, and be done," she whispered, and went stealthily +around the corner of the house, holding up her skirts as she had done in +the kitchen. There was a dim path beaten in the wiry grass--a path which +started at the kitchen door and wound away up the coulee. She followed it. +Undoubtedly it would lead her to the spring; beyond that she refused to let +her thoughts travel. + +In five minutes--for she went slowly--she stopped beside a stock-trampled +pool of water and yellow mud. A few steps farther on, a barrel had been +sunk in the ground at the base of a huge gray rock; a barrel which filled +slowly and spilled the overflow into the mud. There was also a trough, and +there was a barrier made of poles and barbed wire to keep the cattle from +the barrel. One crawled between two wires, it would seem, to dip up water +for the house. There were no trees--not real trees. There were some +chokecherry bushes higher than her head, and there were other bushes that +did not look particularly enlivening. + +With a smile of bitter amusement, she tucked her skirts tightly around her, +crept through the fence, and filled a chipped granite cup which stood upon +a rock ledge, and drank slowly. Then she laughed aloud. + +"The water really _is_ cold," she said. "Anywhere else it would be +delicious. And that's a spring, I suppose." Mercilessly she was stripping +her mind of her illusions, and was clothing it in the harsher weave of +reality. "All these hills are Manley's--our ranch." She took another sip +and set down the cup. "And so Cold Spring Ranch means--all this." + +Down the coulee she heard Manley call. She stood still, pushing back a +fallen lock of fine, yellow hair. She turned toward the sound, and the sun +in her eyes turned them yellow as the hair above them. She was beautiful, +in an odd, white-and-gold way. If her eyes had been blue, or gray--or even +brown--she would have been merely pretty; but as they were, that amber tint +where one looked for something else struck one unexpectedly and made her +whole face unforgettably lovely. However, the color of her eyes and her +hair did not interest her then, or make life any easier. She was quite +ordinarily miserable and homesick, as she went reluctantly back along the +grassy trails The odor of fried bacon came up to her, and she hated bacon. +She hated everything. + +"I've been to the spring," she called out, resolutely cheerful, as soon as +she came in sight of Manley, waiting in the kitchen door; she ran toward +him lightly. "However does the water keep so deliciously cool through this +hot weather? I don't wonder you call this Cold Spring Ranch." + +Manley straightened proudly. "I'm glad you like it; I was afraid you might +not, just at first. But you're the right stuff--I might have known it. Not +every woman could come out here and appreciate this country right at the +start." + +Val stopped at the steps, panting a little from her run, and smiled +unflinchingly up into his face. + + + + +CHAPTER VI. MANLEY'S FIRE GUARD + +Hot sunlight, winds as hot, a shimmering heat which distorted objects at a +distance and made the sky line a dazzling, wavering ribbon of faded blue; +and then the dull haze of smoke which hung over the land, and, without +tempering the heat, turned the sun into a huge coppery balloon, which +drifted imperceptibly from the east to the west, and at evening time +settled softly down upon a parched hilltop and disappeared, leaving behind +it an ominous red glow as of hidden fires. + +When the wind blew, the touch of it seared the face, as the smoke tang +assailed the nostrils. All the world was a weird, unnatural tint, hard to +name, never to be forgotten. The far horizons drew steadily closer as the +days passed slowly and thickened the veil of smoke. The distant mountains +drew daily back into dimmer distance; became an obscure, formless blot +against the sky, and vanished completely. The horizon crouched then upon +the bluffs across the river, moved up to the line of trees along its banks, +blotted them out one day, and impudently established itself half-way up the +coulee. + +Time ceased to be measured accurately; events moved slowly in an unreal +world of sultry heat and smoke and a red sun wading heavily through the +copper-brown sky from the east to the west, and a moon as red which +followed meekly after. + +Men rode uneasily here and there, and when they met they talked of prairie +fires and of fire guards and the direction of the wind, and of the faint +prospect of rain. Cattle, driven from their accustomed feeding grounds, +wandered aimlessly over the still-unburned range, and lowed often in the +night as they drifted before the flame-heated wind. + +Fifteen miles to the east of Cold Spring Coulee, the Wishbone outfit +watched uneasily the deepening haze. Kent and Bob Royden were put to riding +the range from the river north and west, and Polycarp Jenks, who had taken +a claim where were good water and some shelter, and who never seemed to +be there for more than a few hours at a time, because of his boundless +curiosity, wandered about on his great, raw-boned sorrel with the white +legs, and seemed always to have the latest fire news on the tip of his +tongue, and always eager to impart it to somebody. + +To the northwest there was the Double Diamond, also sleeping with both eyes +open, so to speak. They also had two men out watching the range, though +the fires were said to be all across the river. But there was the railroad +seaming the country straight through the grassland, and though the company +was prompt at plowing fire guards, contract work would always bear +watching, said the stockmen, and with the high winds that prevailed there +was no telling what might happen. + +So Fred De Garmo and Bill Madison patrolled the country in rather desultory +fashion, if the truth be known. They liked best to ride to the north and +east--which, while following faithfully the railroad and the danger line, +would bring them eventually to Hope, where they never failed to stop as +long as they dared. For, although they never analyzed their feelings, they +knew that as long as they kept their jobs and their pay was forthcoming, a +few miles of blackened range concerned them personally not at all. +Still, barring a fondness for the trail which led to town, they were not +unfaithful to their trust. + +One day Kent and Polycarp met on the brink of a deep coulee, and, as is the +way of men who ride the dim trails, they stopped to talk a bit. + +Polycarp, cracking his face across the middle with his habitual grin, +straightened his right leg to its full length, slid his hand with +difficulty into his pocket, brought up a dirty fragment of "plug" tobacco, +looked it over inquiringly, and pried off the corner with his teeth. When +he had rolled it comfortably into his cheek and had straightened his leg +and replaced the tobacco in his pocket, he was "all set" and ready for +conversation. + +Kent had taken the opportunity to roll a cigarette, though smoking on the +range was a weakness to be indulged in with much care. He pinched out the +blaze of his match, as usual, and then spat upon it for added safety before +throwing it away. + +"If this heat doesn't let up," he remarked, "the grass is going to blaze up +from sunburn." + +"It won't need to, if you ask me. I wouldn't be su'prised to see this hull +range afire any time. Between you an' me, Kenneth, them Double Diamond +fellers ain't watching it as close as they might. I was away over Dry Creek +way yesterday, and I seen where there was two different fires got through +the company's guards, and kited off across the country. It jest _happened_ +that the grass give out in that red day soil, and starved 'em both out. +They wa'n't _put_ out. I looked close all around, and there wasn't nary a +track of man or horse. That's their business--ridin' line on the railroad. +The section men's been workin' off down the other way, where a culvert got +scorched up pretty bad. By granny, Fred 'n' Bill Madison spend might' nigh +all their time ridin' the trail to town. They're might' p'ticular about +watchin' the railroad between the switches--_he-he!_" + +"That's something for the Double Diamond to worry over," Kent rebuffed. He +hated that sort of gossip which must speak ill of somebody. "Our winter +range lays mostly south and east; we could stop a fire between here and the +Double Diamond, even if they let one get past 'em." + +Polycarp regarded him cunningly with his little, slitlike eyes. "Mebbe you +could," he said doubtfully. "And then again, mebbe you couldn't. Oncet +it got past Cold Spring--" He shook his wizened head slowly, leaned, and +expectorated gravely. + +"Man Fleetwood's keeping tab pretty close over that way." + +Polycarp gave a grunt that was half a chuckle. "Man Fleetwood's keeping tab +on what runs down his gullet," he corrected. "I seen him an' his wife out +burnin' guards t' other day--over on his west line--and, by granny, it +wouldn't stop nothing! A toad could jump it--_he-he!_" He sent another +stream of tobacco juice afar, with the grave air as before. + +"And I told him so. 'Man,' I says, 'what you think you're doing?' + +"'Buildin' a fire guard,' he says. 'My wife, Mr. Jenks.' + +"'Polycarp Jenks is my cognomen,' I says. 'And I don't want no misterin' +in mine. Polycarp's good enough for me,' I says, and I took off my hat and +bowed to 'is wife. Funny kinda eyes, she's got--ever take notice? Yeller, +by granny! first time I ever seen yeller eyes in a human's face. Mebbe it +was the sun in 'em, but they sure was yeller. I dunno as they hurt her +looks none, either. Kinda queer lookin', but when you git used to 'em you +kinda like 'em. + +"'N' I says: 'Tain't half wide enough, nor a third'--spoke right up to 'im! +I was thinkin' of the hull blamed country, and I didn't care how he took +it. 'Any good, able-bodied wind'll jump a fire across that guard so quick +it won't reelize there was any there,' I says. + +"Man didn't like it none too well, either. He says to me: 'That guard'll +stop any fire I ever saw,' and I got right back at him--_he-he!_ 'Man,' I +says, 'you ain't never saw a prairie fire'--just like that. 'You wait,' I +says, 'till the real thing comes along. We ain't had any fires since you +come into the country,' I says, 'and you don't know what they're like. Now, +you take my advice and plow another four or five furrows--and plow 'em out, +seventy-five or a hundred feet from here,' I says, 'an' make sure you +git all the grass burned off between--and do it on a still day,' I says. +'You'll burn up the hull country if you keep on this here way you're +doing,' I told him--straight out, just like that. 'And when you do it,' I +says, 'you better let somebody know, so's they can come an' help,' I says. +''Tain't any job a man oughta tackle alone,' I says to him. 'Git help, Man, +git help.' + +"Well, by granny--_he-he!_ Man's wife brustled up at me like a--a--" He +searched his brain for a simile, and failed to find one. "'I have been +helping Manley, Mr. Polycarp Jenks,' she says to me, 'and I flatter myself +I have done as well as any _man_ could do.' And, by granny! the way them +yeller eyes of hern blazed at me--_he-he!_ I had to laugh, jest to look +at her. Dressed jest like a city girl, by granny! with ruffles on her +skirts--to ketch afire if she wasn't mighty keerful!--and a big straw hat +tied down with a veil, and kid gloves on her hands, and her yeller +hair kinda fallin' around her face--and them yeller eyes snappin' like +flames--by granny! if she didn't make as purty a picture as I ever want +to set eyes on! Slim and straight, jest like a storybook woman--_he-he!_ +'Course, she was all smoke an' dirt; a big flake of burned grass was on her +hair, I took notice, and them ruffles was black up to her knees--_he-he!_ +And she had a big smut on her cheek--but she was right there with her stack +of blues, by granny! Settin' into the game like a--a--" He leaned and +spat "But burnin' guards ain't no work for a woman to do, an' I told Man +so--straight out. 'You git help,' I says. 'I see you're might' near through +with this here strip,' I says, 'an' I'm in a hurry, or I'd stay, right +now.' And, by granny! if that there wife of Man's didn't up an' hit me +another biff--_he-he!_ + +"'Thank you very much,' she says to me, like ice water. 'When we need +your help, we'll be sure to let you know--but at present,' she says, 'we +couldn't think of troubling you.' And then, by granny! she turns right +around and smiles up at me--_he-he!_ Made me feel like somebody'd tickled +m' ear with a spear of hay when I was asleep, by granny! Never felt +anything like it--not jest with somebody smilin' at me. + +"'Polycarp Jenks,' she says to me, 'we do appreciate what you've told us, +and I believe you're right,' she says. 'But don't insiniwate I'm not as +good a fighter as any man who ever breathed,' she says. 'Manley has another +of his headaches to-day--going to town always gives him a sick headache,' +she says, 'and I've done nearly all of this my own, lone self,' she says. +'And I'm horribly proud of it, and I'll never forgive you for saying I--' +And then, by granny! if she didn't begin to blink them eyes, and I felt +like a--a--" He put the usual period to his hesitation. + +"Between you an' _me_, Kenneth," he added, looking at Kent slyly, "she +ain't having none too easy a time. Man's gone back to drinkin'--I knowed +all the time he wouldn't stay braced up very long--lasted about six weeks, +from all I c'n hear. Mebbe she reely thinks it's jest headaches ails him +when he comes back from town--I dunno. You can't never tell what idees a +woman's got tacked away under her hair--from all I c'n gether. I don't +p'tend to know nothing about 'em--don't want to know--_he-he!_ But I +guess," he hinted cunningly, "I know as much about 'em as you do--hey, +Kenneth? You don't seem to chase after 'em none, yourself--_he-he!_" + +"Whereabouts did Man run his guards?" asked Kent, passing over the +invitation to personal confessions. + +Polycarp gave a grunt of disdain. "Just on the west rim of his coulee. +About forty rod of six-foot guard, and slanted so it'll shoot a fire right +into high grass at the head of the coulee and send it kitin' over this way. +That's supposin' it turns a fire, which it won't. Six feet--a fall like +this here! Why, I never see grass so thick on this range--did you?" + +"I wonder, did he burn that extra guard?" Kent was keeping himself rigidly +to the subject of real importance. + +"No, by granny! he didn't--not unless he done it since yest'day. He went +to town for suthin, and he might' nigh forgot to go home--_he-he!_ He was +there yest'day about three o'clock, an' I says to him--" + +"Well, so-long; I got to, be moving." Kent gathered up the reins and went +his way, leaving Polycarp just in the act of drawing his "plug" from his +pocket, by his usual laborious method, in mental preparation for another +half hour of talk. + +"If you're ridin' over that way, Kenneth, you better take a look at Man's +guard," he called after him. "A good mile of guard, along there, would +help a lot if a fire got started beyond. The way he fixed it, it ain't no +account at all." + +Kent proved by a gesture that he heard him, and rode on without turning to +look back. Already his form was blurred as Polycarp gazed after him, and +in another minute or two he was blotted out completely by the smoke veil, +though he rode upon the level. Polycarp watched him craftily, though there +was no need, until he was completely hidden, then he went on, ruminating +upon the faults of his acquaintances. + +Kent had no intention of riding over to Cold Spring. He had not been there +since Manley's marriage, though he had been a frequent visitor before, and +unless necessity drove him there, it would be long before he faced again +the antagonism of Mrs. Fleetwood. Still, he was mentally uncomfortable, and +he felt much resentment against Polycarp Jenks because he had caused that +discomfort. What was it to him, if Manley had gone bock to drinking? He +asked the question more than once, and he answered always that it was +nothing to him, of course. Still, he wished futilely that he had not been +quite so eager to cover up Manley's weakness and deceive the girl. He ought +to have given her a chance-- + +A cinder like a huge black snowflake struck him suddenly upon the cheek. He +looked up, startled, and tried to see farther into the haze which closed +him round. It seemed to him, now that his mind was turned from his musings, +that the smoke was thicker, the smell of burning grass stronger, and the +breath of wind hotter upon his face. He turned, looked away to the west, +fancied there a tumbled blackness new to his sight, and put his horse to a +run. If there were fire close, then every second counted; and as he raced +over the uneven prairie he fumbled with the saddle string that held a +sodden sack tied fast to the saddle, that he might lose no time. + +The cinders grew thicker, until the air was filled with them, like a +snowstorm done in India ink. A little farther and he heard a faint +crackling; topped a ridge and saw not far ahead, a dancing, yellow line. +His horse was breathing heavily with the pace he was keeping, but Kent, +swinging away from the onrush of flame and heat, spurred him to a greater +speed. They neared the end of the crackling, red line, and as Kent swung in +behind it upon the burned ground, he saw several men beating steadily at +the flames. + +He was hardly at work when Polycarp came running up and took his place +beside him; but beyond that Kent paid no attention to the others, though he +heard and recognized the voice of Fred De Garmo calling out to some one. +The smoke which rolled up in uneven volumes as the wind lifted it and bore +it away, or let it suck backward as it veered for an instant, blinded him +while he fought. He heard other men gallop up, and after a little some one +clattered up with a wagon filled with barrels of water. He ran to wet +his sack, and saw that it was Blumenthall himself, foreman of the Double +Diamond, who drove the team. + +"Lucky it ain't as windy as it was yesterday and the day before," +Blumenthall cried out, as Kent stepped upon the brake block to reach a +barrel. "It'd sweep the whole country if it was." + +Kent nodded, and ran back to the fire, trailing the dripping sack after +him. As he passed Polycarp and another, he heard Polycarp saying something +about Man Fleetwood's fire guard; but he did not stop to hear what it was. +Polycarp was always talking, and he didn't always keep too closely to +facts. + +Then, of a sudden, he saw men dimly when he glanced down the leaping fire +line, and he knew that the fire was almost conquered. Another frenzied +minute or two, and he was standing in a group of men, who dropped their +charred, blackened fragments of blanket and bags, and began to feel for +their smoking material, while they stamped upon stray embers which looked +live enough to be dangerous. + +"Well, she's out," said a voice, "But it did look for a while as if it'd +get away in spite of us." + +Kent turned away, wiping an eye which held a cinder fast under the lid. It +was Fred De Garmo who spoke. + +"If somebody'd been watchin' the railroad a leetle might closer--" Polycarp +began, in his thin, rasping voice. + +Fred cut him short. "I thought you laid it to Man Fleetwood, burning fire +guards," he retorted. "Keep on, and you'll get it right pretty soon. This +never come from the railroad; you can gamble on that." + +Blumenthall had left his team and come among them. "If you want to know how +it started, I can tell you. Somebody dropped a match, or a cigarette, or +something, by the trail up here a ways. I saw where it started when I went +to Cold Spring after the last load of water. And if I knew who it was--" + +Polycarp launched his opinion first, as usual. "Well, I don't _know_ who +done it--but, by granny! I can might' nigh guess who it was. There's jest +one man that I know of been traveling that trail lately when he wa'n't in +his sober senses--" + +Here Manley Fleetwood rode up to them, coughing at the soot his horse +kicked up. "Say! you fellows come on over to the house and have something +to eat--and," he added significantly, "something _wet_. I told my wife, +when I saw the fire, to make plenty of coffee, for fighting fire's hungry +work, let me tell. Come on--no hanging back, you know. There'll be lots of +coffee, and I've got a quart of something better cached in the haystack!" + +As he had said, fighting fire is hungry work, and none save Blumenthall, +who was dyspeptic and only ate twice a day, and then of certain foods +prepared by himself, declined the invitation. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. VAL'S NEW DUTIES + +To Val the days of heat and smoke, and the isolation, had made life seem +unreal, like a dream which holds one fast and yet is absurd and utterly +improbable. Her past was pushed so far from her that she could not even +long for it as she had done during the first few weeks. There were nights +of utter desolation, when Manley was in town upon some errand which +prevented his speedy return--nights when the coyotes howled much louder +than usual, and she could not sleep for the mysterious snapping and +creaking about the shack, but lay shivering with fear until dawn; but not +for worlds would she have admitted to Manley her dread of staying alone. +She believed it to be necessary, or he would not require it of her, and she +wanted to be all that he expected her to be. She was very sensitive, in +those days, about doing her whole duty as a wife--the wife of a Western +rancher. + +For that reason, when Manley shouted to her the news of the fire as he +galloped past the shack, and told her to have something for the men to eat +when the fire was out, she never thought of demurring, or explaining to +him that there was scarcely any wood, and that she could not cook a meal +without fuel. Instead, she waved her hand to him and let him go; and when +he was quite out of sight she went up to the corrals to see if she could +find another useless pole, or a broken board or two which her slight +strength would be sufficient to break up with the axe. Till she came to +Montana, Val had never taken an axe in her hands; but its use was only +one of the many things she must learn, of which she had all her life been +ignorant. + +There was an old post there, lying beside a rusty, overturned plow. More +than once she had stopped and eyed it speculatively, and the day before she +had gone so far as to lift an end of it tentatively; but she had found +it very heavy, and she had also disturbed a lot of black bugs that went +scurrying here and there, so that she was forced to gather her skirts close +about her and run for her life. + +Where Manley had built his hayrack she had yesterday discovered some ends +of planking hidden away in the rank, ripened weeds and grass. She went +there now, but there were no more, look closely as she might. She circled +the evil-smelling stable in discouragement, picked up one short piece of +rotten board, and came back to the post. As she neared it she involuntarily +caught her skirts and held them close, in terror of the black bugs. + +She eyed it with extreme disfavor, and finally ventured to poke it with her +slipper toe; one lone bug scuttled out and away in the tall weeds. With +the piece of board she turned it over, stared hard at the yellowed grass +beneath, discovered nothing so very terrifying after all, and, in pure +desperation, dragged the post laboriously down to the place where had been +the woodpile. Then, lifting the heavy axe, she went awkwardly to work +upon it, and actually succeeded, in the course of half an hour or so, in +worrying an armful of splinters off it. + +She started a fire, and then she had to take the big zinc pail and carry +some water down from the spring before she could really begin to cook +anything. Manley's work, every bit of it--but then Manley was so very busy, +and he couldn't remember all these little things, and Val hated to keep +reminding him. Theoretically, Manley objected to her chopping wood or +carrying water, and always seemed to feel a personal resentment when he +discovered her doing it. Practically, however, he was more and more often +making it necessary for her to do these things. + +That is why he returned with the fire fighters and found Val just laying +the cloth upon the table, which she had moved into the front room so that +there would be space to seat her guests at all four sides. He frowned when +he looked in and saw that they must wait indefinitely, and her cheeks took +on a deeper shade of pink. + +"Everything will be ready in ten minutes," she hurriedly assured him. "How +many are there, dear?" + +"Eight, counting myself," he answered gruffly. "Get some clean towels, and +we'll go up to the spring to wash; and try and have dinner ready when we +get back--we're half starved." With the towels over his arm, he led the way +up to the spring. He must have taken the trail which led past the haystack, +for he returned in much better humor, and introduced the men to his wife +with the genial air of a host who loves to entertain largely. + +Val stood back and watched them file in to the table and seat themselves +with a noisy confusion. Unpolished they were, in clothes and manner, though +she dimly appreciated the way in which they refrained from looking at her +too intently, and the conscious lowering of their voices while they talked +among themselves. + +They did, however, glance at her surreptitiously while she was moving +quietly about, with her flushed cheeks and her yellow-brown hair falling +becomingly down at the temples because she had not found a spare minute in +which to brush it smooth, and her dainty dress and crisp, white apron. She +was not like the women they were accustomed to meet, and they paid her the +high tribute of being embarrassed by her presence. + +She poured coffee until all the cups were full, replenished the bread plate +and brought more butter, and hunted the kitchen over for the can opener, +to punch little holes in another can of condensed cream; and she rather +astonished her guests by serving it in a beautiful cut-glass pitcher +instead of the can in which it was bought. + +They handled the pitcher awkwardly because of their mental uneasiness, +and Val shared with them their fear of breaking it, and was guilty of an +audible sigh of relief when at last it found safety upon the table. + +So perturbed was she that even when she decided that she could do no more +for their comfort and retreated to the kitchen, she failed to realize that +the one extra plate meant an absent guest, and not a miscount in placing +them, as she fancied. + +She remembered that she would need plenty of hot water to wash all those +dishes, and the zinc pail was empty; it always was, it seemed to her, no +matter how often she filed it. She took the tin dipper out of it, so that +it would not rattle and betray her purpose to Manley, sitting just inside +the door with his back toward her, and tiptoed quite guiltily out of the +kitchen. Once well away from the shack, she ran. + +She reached the spring quite out of breath, and she actually bumped into +a man who stood carefully rinsing a bloodstained handkerchief under the +overflow from the horse trough. She gave a little scream, and the pail went +rolling noisily down the steep bank and lay on its side in the mud. + +Kent turned and looked at her, himself rather startled by the unexpected +collision. Involuntarily he threw out his hand to steady her. "How do you +do, Mrs. Fleetwood?" he said, with all the composure he could muster to his +aid. "I'm afraid I scared you. My nose got to bleeding--with the heat, I +guess. I just now managed to stop it." He did not consider it necessary to +explain his presence, but he did feel that talking would help her recover +her breath and her color. "It's a plumb nuisance to have the nosebleed so +much," he added plaintively. + +Val was still trembling and staring at him with her odd, yellow-brown eyes. +He glanced at her swiftly, and then bent to squeeze the water from his +handkerchief; but his trained eyes saw her in all her dainty allurement; +saw how the coppery sunlight gave a strange glint to her hair, and how +her eyes almost matched it in color, and how the pupils had widened with +fright. He saw, too, something wistful in her face, as though life was +none too kind to her, and she had not yet abandoned her first sensation of +pained surprise that it should treat her so. + +"That's what I get for running," she said, still panting a little as she +watched him. "I thought all the men were at the table, you see. Your dinner +will be cold, Mr. Burnett." + +Kent was a bit surprised at the absence of cold hauteur in her manner; his +memory of her had been so different. + +"Well, I'm used to cold grub," he smiled over his shoulder. "And, anyway, +when your nose gets to acting up with you, it's like riding a pitching +horse; you've got to pass up everything and give it all your time and +attention." Then, with the daring that sometimes possessed him like a +devil, he looked straight at her. + +"Sure you intend to give me my dinner?" he quizzed, his lips' lifting +humorously at the corners. "I kinda thought, from the way you turned me +down cold when we met before, you'd shut your door in my face if I came +pestering around. How _about_ that?" + +Little flames of light nickered in her eyes. "You are the guest of my +husband, here by his invitation," she answered him coldly. "Of course I +shall give you your dinner, if you want any." + +He inspected his handkerchief critically, decided that it was not quite +clean, and held it again under the stream of water. "If I want it--yes," he +drawled maliciously. "Maybe I'm not sure about that part. Are you a pretty +fair cook?" + +"Perhaps you'd better interview your friends," she retorted, "if you are so +very fastidious. I--" She drew her brows together, as if she was in doubt +as to the proper method of dealing with this impertinence. She suspected +that he was teasing her purposely, but still-- + +"Oh, I can eat 'most any old thing," he assured her, with calm effrontery. +"You look as if you'd learn easy, and Man ain't the worst cook I ever ate +after. If he's trained you faithful, maybe it'll be safe to take a change. +How _about_ that? Can you make sour-dough bread yet?" + +"No!" she flung the word at him. "And I don't want to learn," she added, at +the expense of her dignity. + +Kent shook his head disapprovingly. "That sure ain't the proper spirit to +show," he commented. "Man must have to beat you up a good deal, if you talk +back to _him_ that way." He eyed her sidelong. "You're a real little wolf, +aren't you?" He shook his head again solemnly, and sighed. "A fellow sure +must build himself lots of trouble when he annexes a wife--a wife that +won't learn to make sour-dough bread, and that talks back. I'm plumb sorry +for Man. We used to be pretty good friends--" He stopped short, his face +contrite. + +Val was looking away, and she was winking very fast. Also, her lips were +quivering unmistakably, though she was biting them to keep them steady. + +Kent stared at her helplessly. "Say! I never thought you'd mind a little +joshing," he said gently, when the silence was growing awkward. "I ought to +be killed! You--you must get awful lonesome--" + +She turned her face toward him quickly, as if he were the first person +who had understood her blank loneliness. "That," she told him, in an +odd, hesitating manner, "atones for the--the 'joshing.' No one seems to +realize--" + +"Why don't you get out and ride around, or do something beside stick right +here in this coulee like a--a cactus?" he demanded, with a roughness that +somehow was grateful to her. "I'll bet you haven't been a mile from the +ranch since Man brought you here. Why don't you go to town with him when +he goes? It'd be a whole lot better for you--for both of you. Have you got +acquainted with any of the women here yet? I'll gamble you haven't!" He was +waving the handkerchief gently like a flag, to dry it. + +Val watched him; she had never seen any one hold a handkerchief by the +corners and wave it up and down like that for quick drying, and the +expedient interested her, even while she was wondering if it was quite +proper for him to lecture her in that manner. His scolding was even more +confusing than his teasing. + +"I've been down to the river twice," she defended weakly, and was angry +with herself that she could not find words with which to quell him. + +"Really?" He down at her indulgently. "How did you ever manage to get so +far? It must be all of half a mile!" + +"Oh, you're perfectly horrible!" she flashed suddenly. "I don't see how it +can possibly concern you whether I go anywhere or not." + +"It does, though. I'm a lot public-spirited. I hate to see taxes go up, and +every lunatic that goes to the asylum costs the State just that much more. +I don't know an easier recipe for going crazy than just to stay off alone +and think. It's a fright the way it gets sheep-herders, and such." + +"I'm _such_, I suppose!" + +Kent glanced at her, approved mentally of the color in her cheeks and the +angry light in her eyes, and laughed at her quite openly. + +"There's nothing like getting good and mad once in a while, to take +the kinks out of your brain," he observed. "And there's nothing like +lonesomeness to put 'em in. A good fighting mad is what you need, now and +then; I'll have to put Man next, I guess. He's too mild." + +"No one could accuse you of that," she retorted, laughing a little in spite +of herself. "If I were a man I should want to blacken your eyes--" And she +blushed hotly at being betrayed into a personality which seemed to her +undignified, and, what was worse, unrefined. She turned her back squarely +toward him, started down the path, and remembered that she had not filled +the water bucket, and that without it she could not consistently return to +the house. + +Kent interpreted her glance, went sliding down the steep bank and recovered +the pail; he was laughing to himself while he rinsed and filled it at the +spring, but he made no effort to explain his amusement. When he came back +to where she stood watching him, Val gave her head a slight downward tilt +to indicate her thanks, turned, and led the way back to the house without +a word. And he, following after, watched her slim figure swinging lightly +down the hill before him, and wondered vaguely what sort of a hell her life +was going to be, out here where everything was different from what she had +been accustomed to, and where she did not seem to "fit into the scenery," +as he put it. + +"You ought to learn to ride horseback," he advised unexpectedly. + +"Pardon me--you ought to learn to wait until your advice is wanted," she +replied calmly, without turning her head. And she added, with a sort of +defiance: "I do not feel the need of either society or diversion, I assure +you; I am perfectly contented." + +"That's real nice," he approved. "There's nothing like being satisfied with +what's handed out to you." But, though he spoke with much unconcern, his +tone betrayed his skepticism. + +The others had finished eating and were sitting upon their heels in the +shade of the house, smoking and talking in that desultory fashion common to +men just after a good meal. Two or three glanced rather curiously at Kent +and his companion, and he detected the covert smile on the scandal-hungry +face of Polycarp Jenks, and also the amused twist of Fred De Garmo's lips. +He went past them without a sign of understanding, set the water pail down +in its proper place upon a bench inside the kitchen door, tilted his hat +to Val, who happened to be looking toward him at that moment, and went out +again. + +"What's the hurry, Kenneth?" quizzed Polycarp, when Kent started toward the +corral. + +"Follow my trail long enough and you'll find out--maybe," Kent snapped in +reply. He felt that the whole group was watching hum, and he knew that if +he looked back and caught another glimpse of Fred De Garmo's sneering face +he would feel compelled to strike it a blow. There would be no plausible +explanation, of course, and Kent was not by nature a trouble hunter; and so +he chose to ride away without his dinner. + +While Polycarp was still wondering audibly what was the matter, Kent passed +the house on his gray, called "So-long, Man," with scarcely a glance at his +host, and speedily became a dim figure in the smoke haze. + +"He must be runnin' away from you, Fred," Polycarp hinted, grinning +cunningly. "What you done to him--hey?" + +Fred answered him with an unsatisfactory scowl. "You sure would be wise, if +you found out everything you wanted to know," he said contemptuously, after +an appreciable Wait. "I guess we better be moving along, Bill." He rose, +brushed off his trousers with a downward sweep of his hands, and strolled +toward the corrals, followed languidly by Bill Madison. + +As if they had been waiting for a leader, the others rose also and prepared +to depart. Polycarp proceeded, in his usual laborious manner, to draw his +tobacco from his pocket, and pry off a corner. + +"Why don't you burn them guards now, Manley, while you got plenty of help?" +he suggested, turning his slit-lidded eyes toward the kitchen door, where +Val appeared for an instant to reach the broom which stood outside. + +"Because I don't want to," snapped Manley: "I've got plenty to do without +that." + +"Well, they ain't wide enough, nor long enough, and they don't run in the +right direction--if you ask me." Polycarp spat solemnly off to the right. + +"I don't ask you, as it happens." Manley turned and went into the home. + +Polycarp looked quizzically at the closed door. "He's mighty touchy about +them guards, for a feller that thinks they're all right--_he-he!_" he +remarked, to no one in particular. "Some of these days, by granny, he'll +wisht he'd took my advice!" + +Since no one gave him the slightest attention, Polycarp did not pursue the +subject further. Instead, with both ears open to catch all that was said, +he trailed after the others to the corral. It was a matter of instinct, +as well as principle, with Polycarp Jenks, to let no sentence, however +trivial, slip past his hearing and his memory. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII. THE PRAIRIE FIRE + +A calamity expected, feared, and guarded against by a whole community does +sometimes occur, and with a suddenness which finds the victims unprepared +in spite of all their elaborate precautions. Compared with the importance +of saving the range from fire, it was but a trivial thing which took nearly +every man who dwelt in Lonesome Land to town on a certain day when the wind +blew free from out the west. They were weary of watching for the fire which +did not come licking through the prairie grass, and a special campaign +train bearing a prospective President of our United States was expected to +pass through Hope that afternoon. + +Since all trains watered at the red tank by the creek, there would be a +five-minute stop, during which the prospective President would stand upon +the rear platform and deliver a three-minute address--a few gracious words +to tickle the self-esteem of his listeners--and would employ the other two +minutes in shaking the hand of every man, woman, and child who could reach +him before the train pulled out. There would be a cheer or two given as he +was borne away--and there would be something to talk about afterward in the +saloons. Scarce a man of then had ever seen a President, and it was worth +riding far to look upon a man who even hoped for so exalted a position. + +Manley went because he intended to vote for the man, and called it an act +of loyalty to his party to greet the candidate; also because it took very +little, now that haying was over and work did not press, to start him down +the trail in the direction of Hope. + +At the Blumenthall ranch no man save the cook remained at home, and he only +because he had a boil on his neck which sapped his interest in all things +else. Polycarp Jenks was in town by nine o'clock, and only one man remained +at the Wishbone. That man was Kent, and he stayed because, according to his +outraged companions, he was an ornery cuss, and his bump of patriotism was +a hollow in his skull. Kent had told them, one and all, that he wouldn't +ride twenty-five miles to shake hands with the Deity Himself--which, +however, is not a verbatim report of his statement. The prospective +President had not done anything so big, he said, that a man should want to +break his neck getting to town just to watch him go by. He was dead sure +he, for one, wasn't going to make a fool of himself over any swell-headed +politician. + +Still, he saddled and rode with his fellows for a mile or two, and called +them unseemly names in a facetious tone; and the men of the Wishbone +answered his taunts with shrill yells of derision when he swung out of the +trail and jogged away to the south, and finally passed out of sight in the +haze which still hung depressingly over the land. + +Oddly enough, while all the able-bodied men save Kent were waiting +hilariously in Hope to greet, with enthusiasm, the brief presence of the +man who would fain be their political chief, the train which bore him +eastward scattered fiery destruction abroad as it sped across their range, +four minutes late and straining to make up the time before the next stop. + +They had thought the railroad safe at last, what with the guards and the +numerous burned patches where the fire had jumped the plowed boundary and +blackened the earth to the fence which marked the line of the right of way, +and, in some places, had burned beyond. It took a flag-flying special train +of that bitter Presidential campaign to find a weak spot in the guard, and +to send a spark straight into the thickest bunch of wiry sand grass, where +the wind could fan it to a blaze and then seize it and bend the tall flame +tongues until they licked around the next tuft of grass, and the next, +and the next--until the spark was grown to a long, leaping line of fire, +sweeping eastward with the relentless rush of a tidal wave upon a low-lying +beach. + +Arline Hawley was, perhaps, the only citizen of Hope who had deliberately +chosen to absent herself from the crowd standing, in perspiring +expectation, upon the depot platform. She had permitted Minnie, the "breed" +girl, to go, and had even grudgingly consented to her using a box of +cornstarch as first aid to her complexion. Arline had not approved, +however, of either the complexion or the occasion. + +"What you want to go and plaster your face up with starch for, gits me," +she had criticised frankly. "Seems to me you're homely enough without +lookin' silly, into the bargain. Nobody's going to look at you, no matter +what you do. They're out to rubber at a higher mark than you be. And what +they expect to see so great, gits me. He ain't nothing but a man--and, land +knows, men is common enough, and ornery enough, without runnin' like a band +of sheep to see one. I don't see as he's any better, jest because he's +runnin' for President; if he gits beat, he'll want to hide his head in a +hole in the ground. Look at my Walt. _He_ was the biggest man in Hope, and +so swell-headed he wouldn't so much as pack a bucket of water all fall, or +chop up a tie for kindlin'--till the day after 'lection. And what was he +then but a frazzled-out back number, that everybody give the laugh--till he +up and blowed his brains out! Any fool can _run_ for President--it's the +feller that gits there that counts. + +"Say, that red-white-'n'-blue ribbon sure looks fierce on that green +dress--but I reckon blood will tell, even if it's Injun blood. G'wan, or +you'll be late and have your trouble for your pay. But hurry back soon's +the agony's over; the bread'll be ready to mix out." + +Even after the girl was gone, her finery a-flutter in the sweeping west +wind, Arline muttered aloud her opinion of men, and particularly of +politicians who rode about in special trains and expected the homage of +their fellows. + +She was in the back yard, taking her "white clothes" off the line, when the +special came puffing slowly into town. To emphasize her disapproval of the +whole system of politics, she turned her back square toward it, and laid +violent hold of a sheet. There was a smudge of cinders upon its white +surface, and it crushed crisply under her thumb with the unmistakable feel +of burned grass. + +"Now, what in time--" began Arline aloud, after the manner of women whose +tongues must keep pace with their thoughts. "That there feels fresh +and"--with a sniff at the spot--"_smells_ fresh." + +With the wisdom of much experience she faced the hot wind and sniffed +again, while her eyes searched keenly the sky line, which was the ragged +top of the bluff marking the northern boundary of the great prairie land. A +trifle darker it was there, and there was a certain sullen glow discernible +only to eyes trained to read the sky for warning signals of snow, fire, and +flood. + +"That's a fire, and it's this side of the river. And if it is, then the +railroad set it, and there ain't a livin' thing to stop it. An' the wind's +jest right--" A curdled roll of smoke showed plainly for a moment in the +haze. She crammed her armful of sheets into the battered willow basket, +threw two clothespins hastily toward the same receptacle, and ran. + +The special had just come to a stop at the depot. The cattlemen, cowboys, +and townspeople were packed close around the rear of the train, their backs +to the wind and the disaster sweeping down upon them, their browned faces +upturned to the sleek, carefully groomed man in the light-gray suit, with a +flaunting, prairie sunflower ostentatiously displayed in his buttonhole and +with his campaign smile upon his lips and dull boredom looking out of his +eyes. + +"Ladies and gentlemen," he was saying, as he smiled, "you favoured ones +whose happy lot it is to live in the most glorious State of our glorious +union, I greet you, and I envy you--" + +Arline, with her soiled kitchen apron, her ragged coil of dust-brown hair, +her work-drawn face and faded eyes which blazed with excitement, pushed +unceremoniously through the crowd and confronted him undazzled. + +"Mister Candidate, you better move on and give these men a chancet to save +their prope'ty," she cried shrilly. "They got something to do besides stand +around here and listen at you throwin' campaign loads. The hull country's +afire back of us, and the wind bringin' it down on a long lope." + +She turned from the astounded candidate and glared at the startled crowd, +every one of whom she knew personally. + +"I must say I got my opinion of a bunch that'll stand here swallowin' a lot +of hot air, while their coat tails is most ready to ketch afire!" Her voice +was rasping, and it carried to the farthest of them. "You make me _tired!_ +Political slush, all of it--and the hull darned country a-blazin' behind +you!" + +The crowd moved uneasily, then scattered away from the shelter of the depot +to where they could snuff inquiringly the wind, like dogs in the leash. + +"That's right," yelled Blumenthall, of the Double Diamond. "There's a fire, +sure as hell!" He started to run. + +The man behind him hesitated but a second, then gripped his hat against the +push of the wind, and began running. Presently men, women, and children +were running, all in one direction. + +The prospective President stood agape upon the platform of his +bunting-draped car, his chosen allies grouped foolishly around him. It +was the first time men had turned from his presence with his gracious, +flatteringly noncommittal speech unuttered, his hand unshaken, his smiling, +bowing departure unmarked by cheers growing fainter as he receded. Only +Arline tarried, her thin fingers gripping the arm of her "breed girl," lest +she catch the panic and run with the others. + +Arline tilted back her head upon her scrawny shoulders and eyed the +prospective President with antagonism unconcealed. + +"I got something to say to you before you go," she announced, in her +rasping voice, with its querulous note. "I want to tell you that the +chances are a hundred to one you set that fire yourself, with your engine +that's haulin' you around over the country, so you can jolly men into +votin' for you. Your train's the only one over the road since noon, and +that fire started from the railroad. The hull town's liable to burn, unless +it can be stopped the other side the creek, to say nothing of the range, +that feeds our stock, and the hay, and maybe houses--and maybe _people!_" + +She caught her breath, and almost shrieked the last three words, as a +dreadful probability flashed into her mind. + +"I know a woman--just a girl--and she's back there twenty mile--_alone_, +and her man's here to look at you go by! I hope you git beat, just for +that! + +"If this town ketches afire and burns up, I hope you run into the ditch +before you git ten mile! If you was a man, and them fellers with you was +men, you'd hold up your train and help save the town. Every feller counts, +when it comes to fightin' fire." + +She stopped and eyed the group keenly. "But you won't. I don't reckon you +ever done anything with them hands in your life that would grind a little +honest dirt into your knuckles and under them shiny nails!" + +The prospective President turned red to his ears, and hastily removed his +immaculate hands from where they had been resting upon the railing. And he +did not hold up the train while he and his allies stopped to help save the +town. The whistle gave a warning toot, the bell jangled, and the train slid +away toward the next town, leaving Arline staring, tight-lipped, after it. + +"The darned chump--he'd 'a' made votes hand over fist if he'd called my +bluff; but, I knew he wouldn't, soon as I seen his face. He ain't man +enough." + +"He's real good-lookin'," sighed Minnie, feebly attempting to release her +arm from the grasp of her mistress. "And did you notice the fellow with the +big yellow mustache? He kept eyin' me--" + +"Well, I don't wonder--but it ain't anything to your credit," snapped +Arline, facing her toward the hotel, "You do look like sin a-flyin', in +that green dress, and with all that starch on your face. You git along to +the house and mix that bread, first thing you do, and start a fire. And if +I ain't back by that time, you go ahead with the supper; you know what to +git. We're liable to have all the tables full, so you set all of 'em." + +She was hurrying away, when the girl called to her. + +"Did you mean Mis' Fleetwood, when you said that about the woman burning? +And do you s'pose she's really in the fire?" + +"You shut up and go along!" cried Arline roughly, under the stress of her +own fears. "How in time's anybody going to tell, that's twenty miles away?" + +She left the street and went hurrying through back yards and across vacant +lots, crawled through a wire fence, and so reached, without any roundabout +method, the trail which led to the top of the bluff, where the whole town +was breathlessly assembling. Her flat-chested, un-corseted figure merged +into the haze as she half trotted up the steep road, swinging her arms like +a man, her skirts flapping in the wind. As she went, she kept muttering to +herself: + +"If she really is caught by the fire--and her alone--and Man more'n half +drunk--" She whirled, and stood waiting for the horseman who was galloping +up the trail behind her. "You going home, Man? You don't think it could +git to your place, do you?" She shouted the questions at him as he pounded +past. + +Manley, sallow white with terror, shook his head vaguely and swung his +heavy quirt down upon the flanks of his horse. Arline lowered her head +against the dust kicked into her face as he went tearing past her, and +kept doggedly on. Some one came rattling up behind her with empty barrels +dancing erratically in a wagon, and she left the trail to make room. The +hostler from their own stable it was who drove, and at the creek ahead of +them he stopped to fill the barrels. Arline passed him by and kept on. + +At the brow of the hill the women and children were gathered in a +whimpering group. Arline joined them and gazed out over the prairie, where +the smoke was rolling toward them, and, lifting here and there, let a flare +of yellow through. + +"It'll show up fine at dark," a fat woman in a buggy remarked. "There's +nothing grander to look at than a prairie fire at night. I do hope," she +added weakly, "it don't do no great damage!" + +"Oh, it won't," Arline cut in, with savage sarcasm, panting from her climb. +"It's bound to sweep the hull country slick an' clean, and maybe burn us +all out--but that won't matter, so long as it looks purty after dark!" + +"They say it's a good ten mile away yet," another woman volunteered +encouragingly. "They'll git it stopped, all right. There's lots of men here +to fight it, thank goodness!" + +Arline moved on to where a plow was being hurriedly unloaded from a wagon, +the horses hitched to it, and a man already grasping the handles in an +aggressive manner. As she came up he went off, yelling his opinions and +turning a shallow, uneven furrow for a back fire. Within five minutes +another plow was tearing up the sod in an opposite direction. + +"If it jumps here, or they can't turn it, the creek'll help a lot," some +one was yelling. + +The plowed furrows lengthened, the horses sweating and throwing their heads +up and down with the discomfort of the pace they must keep. Whiplashes +whistled and the drivers urged them on with much shouting. Blumenthall, cut +off, with his men, from reaching his own ranch, was directing a group +about to set a back fire. His voice boomed as if he were shouting across a +milling herd. A roll of his eye brought his attention momentarily from the +work, and he ran toward a horseman who was gesticulating wildly and seemed +on the point of riding straight toward the fire. + +"Hi! Fleetwood, we need you here!" he yelled. "You can't get home now, and +you know it. The fire's past your place already; you'd have to ride through +it, you fool! Hey? Your wife home alone--_alone!_" + +He stood absolutely still and stared out to the southwest, where the smoke +cloud was rolling closer with every breath. He drew his fingers across his +forehead and glanced at the men around him, also stunned into inactivity by +the tragedy behind the words. + +"Well--get to work, men. We've got to save the town. Fine time to burn +guards--when a fire's loping up on you! But that's the way it goes, +generally. This ought to've been done a month ago. Put it off and put it +off--while they haggle over bids--Brinberg, you and I'll string the fire. +The rest of you watch it don't jump back. And, say!" he shouted to the +group around Manley. "Don't let that crazy fool start off now. Put him to +work. Best thing for him. But--my God, that's awful!" He did not shout the +last sentence. He spoke so that only the nearest man heard him--heard, and +nodded dumb assent. + +Manley raged, sitting helpless there upon his horse. They would not let him +ride out toward that sweeping wave of fire. He could not have gone five +miles toward home before he met the flames. He stood in the stirrups +and shook his fists impotently. He strained his eyes to see what it was +impossible for him to see--his ranch and Val, and how they had fared. He +pictured mentally the guard he had burned beyond the coulee to protect them +from just this danger, and his heart squeezed tight at the realization of +his own shiftlessness. That guard! A twelve-foot strip of half-burned sod, +with tufts of grass left standing here and there--and he had meant to burn +it wider, and had put it off from day to day, until now. _Now!_ + +His clenched fist dropped upon the saddle horn, and he stared dully at the +rushing, rolling smoke and fire. It was not _that_ he saw--it was Val, with +cinder-blackened ruffles, grimy face, and yellow hair falling in loose +locks upon her cheeks--locks which she must stop to push out of her eyes, +so that she could see where to swing the sodden sack while she helped +him--him, Manley, who had permitted her to do work it for none but a man's +hard muscles, so that he might finish the sooner and ride to town upon some +flimsy pretext. And he could not even reach her now--or the place where she +had been! + +The group had thinned around him, for there was something to do besides +give sympathy to a man bereaved. Unless they bestirred themselves, they +might all be in need of sympathy before the day was done. Manley took his +eyes from the coming fire and glanced around him, saw that he was alone, +and, with a despairing oath, wheeled his horse and raced back down the hill +to town, as if fiends rode behind the saddle. + +At the saloon opposite the Hawley Hotel he drew up; rather, his horse +stopped there of his own accord, as if he were quite at home at that +particular hitching pole. Manley dismounted heavily and lurched inside. The +place was deserted save for Jim, who was paid to watch the wares of his +employer, and was now standing upon a chair at the window, that he might +see over the top of Hawley's coal shed and glimpse the hilltop beyond. Jim +stepped down and came toward him. + +"How's the fire?" he demanded anxiously. "Think she'll swing over this +way?" + +But Manley had sunk into a chair and buried his face in his arms, folded +upon a whisky-spotted card table. + +"Val--my Val!" he wailed, "Back there alone--get me a drink," he added +thickly, "or I'll go crazy!" + +Jim hastily poured a full glass, and stood over him anxiously. + +"Here it is. Drink 'er down, and brace up. What you mean? Is your wife--" + +Manley lifted his head long enough to gulp the whisky, then dropped it +again upon his arms and groaned. + + + + +CHAPTER IX. KENT TO THE RESCUE + +The fire had been burning a possible half-hour when Kent, jogging aimlessly +toward a log ridge with the lazy notion of riding to the top and taking +a look at the country to the west before returning to the ranch, first +smelled the stronger tang of burned grass and swung instinctively into the +wind. He galloped to higher ground, and, trained by long watching of the +prairie to detect the smoke of a nearer fire in the haze of those long +distant, saw at once what must have happened, and knew also the danger. His +horse was fresh, and he raced him over the uneven prairie toward the blaze. + +It was tearing straight across the high ground between Dry Creek and Cold +Spring Coulee when he first saw it plainly, and he altered his course +a trifle. The roar of it came faintly on the wind, like the sound of +storm-beaten surf pounding heavily upon a sand bar when the tide is out, +except that this roar was continuous, and was full of sharp cracklings and +sputterings; and there was also the red line of flame to visualize the +sound. + +When his eyes first swept the mile-long blaze, he felt his helplessness, +and cursed aloud the man who had drawn all the fighting force from the +prairie that day. They might at least have been able to harry it and hamper +it and turn the savage sweep of it into barren ground upon some rock-bound +coulee's rim. If they could have caught it at the start, or even in the +first mile of its burning--or, even now, if Blumenthall's outfit were on +the spot--or if Manley Fleetwood's fire guards held it back--He hoped some +of them had stayed at home, so that they could help fight it. + +In that brief glimpse before he rode down into a hollow and so lost sight +of it, he knew that the fire they had fought and vanquished before had been +a puny blaze compared with this one. The ground it had burned was not broad +enough to do more than check this fire temporarily. It would simply burn +around the blackened area and rush on and on, until the bend of the river +turned it back to the north, where the river's first tributary stream would +stop it for good and all. But before that happened it would have done its +worst--and its worst was enough to pale the face of every prairie dweller. + +Once more he caught sight of the fire as he was riding swiftly across +the level land to the east of Cold Spring Coulee. He was going to see if +Manley's fire guards were any good, and if anyone was there ready to fight +it when it came up; they could set a back fire from the guards, he thought, +even if the guards themselves were not wide enough to hold the main fire. + +He pounded heavily down the long trail into the coulee, passed close by the +house with a glance sidelong to see if anybody was in sight there, rounded +the corral to follow the trail which wound zigzag up the farther coulee +wall, and overtook Val, running bareheaded up the hill, dragging a wet sack +after her. She was panting already from the climb, and she had on thin +slippers with high heels, he noticed, that impeded her progress and +promised a sprained ankle before she reached the top. Kent laughed grimly +when he overtook her; he thought it was like a five-year-old child running +with a cup of water to put out a burning house. + +"Where do you think you're going with that sack?" he called out, by way of +greeting. + +She turned a pale, terrified face toward him, and reached up a hand +mechanically to push her fair hair out of her eyes. "So much smoke was +rolling into the coulee," she panted, "and I knew there must be a fire. And +I've never felt quite easy about our guards since Polycarp Jenks said--Do +you know where it is--the fire?" + +"It's between here and the railroad. Give me that sack, and you go on back +to the house. You can't do any good." And when she handed the sack up to +him and then kept on up the hill, he became autocratic in his tone. "Go on +back to the house, I tell you!" + +"I shall not do anything of the kind," she retorted indignantly, and Kent +gave a snort of disapproval, kicked his horse into a lunging gallop, and +left her. + +"You'll spoil your complexion," he cried over his shoulder, "and that's +about all you will do. You better go back and get a parasol." + +Val did not attempt to reply, but she refused to let his taunts turn her +back, and kept stubbornly climbing, though tears of pure rage filled her +eyes and even slipped over the lids to her cheeks. Before she had reached +the top, he was charging down upon her again, and the pallor of his face +told her much. + +"All hell couldn't stop that fire!" he cried, before he was near her, and +the words were barely distinguishable in the roar which was growing louder +and more terrifying. _"Get back!_ You want to stand there till it comes +down on you?" Then, just as he was passing, he saw how white and trembling +she was, and he pulled up, with Michael sliding his front feet in the loose +soil that he might stop on that steep slope. + +"You don't want to go and faint," he remonstrated in a more kindly tone, +vaguely conscious that he had perhaps seemed brutal. "Here, give me your +hand, and stick your toe in the stirrup. Ah, don't waste time trying to +make up your mind--up you come! Don't you want to save the house and +corrals--and the haystacks? We've got our work cut out, let me tell you, if +we do it." + +He had leaned and lifted her up bodily, helped her to put her foot in the +stirrup from which he had drawn his own, and he held her beside him while +he sent Michael down the trail as fast as he dared. It was a good deal of +a nuisance, having to look after her when seconds were so precious, but +he couldn't go on and leave her, though she might easily have reached the +bottom as soon as he if she had not been so frightened. He was afraid to +trust her; she looked, to him, as if she were going to faint in his arms. + +"You don't want to get scared," he said, as calmly as he could. "It's back +two or three miles on the bench yet, and I guess we can easy stop it from +burning anything but the grass. It's this wind, you see. Manley went to +town, I suppose?" + +"Yes," she answered weakly. "He went yesterday, and stayed over. I'm all +alone, and I didn't know what to do, only to go up and try--" + +"No use, up there." + +They were at the corral gate then, and he set her down carefully, then +dismounted and turned Michael into the corral and shut the gate. + +"If we can't step it, and I ain't close by, I wish you'd let Michael out," +he said hurriedly, his eyes taking in the immediate surroundings and +measuring the danger which lurked in weeds, grass, and scattered hay. "A +horse don't have much show when he's shut up, and--Out there where that dry +ditch runs, we'll back-fire. You take this sack and come and watch out my +fire don't jump the ditch. We'll carry it around the house, just the other +side the trail." He was pulling a handful of grass for a torch, and while +he was twisting it and feeling in his pocket for a match, he looked at her +keenly. "You aren't going to get hysterics and leave me to fight it alone, +are you?" he challenged. + +"I hope I'm not quite such a silly," she answered stiffly, and he smiled to +himself as he ran along the far side of the ditch with his blazing tuft +of grass, setting fire to the tangled, brown mat which covered the coulee +bottom. + +Val followed slowly behind him, watching that the blaze did not blow back +across the ditch, and beating it out when it seemed likely to do so. Now +that she could actually do something, she was no more excited than he, if +one could judge by her manner. She did look sulky, however, at his way of +treating her. + +To back-fire on short notice, with no fresh-turned furrow of moist earth, +but only a shallow little dry ditch with the grass almost meeting over its +top in places, is ticklish business at best. Kent went slowly, stamping out +incipient blazes that seemed likely to turn unruly, and not trusting +Val any more than he was compelled to do. She was a woman, and Kent's +experience with women of her particular type had not been extensive enough +to breed confidence in an emergency like this. + +He had no more than finished stringing his line of fire in the irregular +half circle which enclosed house, corral, stables, and haystacks, and had +for its eastern half the muddy depression which, in seasons less dry, was +a fair-sized creek fed by the spring, when a jagged line of fire with an +upper wall of tumbling, brown smoke, leaped into view at the top of the +bluff. + +One thing was in his favor: The grass upon the hillside was scantier +than on the level upland, and here and there were patches of yellow soil +absolutely bare of vegetation, where a fire would be compelled to halt and +creep slowly around. Also, fire usually burns slower down a hill than over +a level. On the other hand, the long, seamlike depressions which ran to the +top were filled with dry brush, and even the coulee bottom had clumps of +rosebushes and wild currant, where the flames would revel briefly. + +But already the black, smoking line which curved around the haystacks to +the north, and around the house toward the south, was widening with every +passing second. + +Val had a tub half filled with water at the house, and that helped +amazingly by making it possible to keep the sacks wet, so that every blow +counted as they beat out the ragged tongues of flame which, in that wind, +would jump here and there the ditch and the road, and go creeping back +toward the stacks and the buildings. For it was a long line they were +guarding, and there was a good deal of running up and down in their +endeavor to be in two places at once. + +Then Val, in turning to strike a new-born flame behind her, swept her +skirt across a tuft of smoldering grass and set herself afire. With the +excitement of watching all points at once, and with the smoke and smell of +fire all about her, she did not see what had happened, and must have paid a +frightful penalty if Kent had not, at that moment, been running past her to +reach a point where a blaze had jumped the ditch. + +He swerved, and swung a newly wet sack around her with a force which would +have knocked her down if he had not at the same time caught and held her. +Val screamed, and struggled in his arms, and Kent knew that it was of +him she was afraid. As soon as he dared, he released her and backed away +sullenly. + +"Sorry I didn't have time to say please--you were just ready to go up in +smoke," he flung savagely over his shoulder. But he found himself shaking +and weak, so that when he reached the blaze he must beat out, the sack was +heavy as lead. "Afraid of _me_--women sure do beat hell!" he told himself, +when he was a bit steadier. He glanced back at her resentfully. Val was +stooping, inspecting the damage done to her dress. She stood up, looked +at him, and he saw that her face was white again, as it had been upon the +hillside. + +A moment later he was near her again. + +"Mr. Burnett, I'm--ashamed--but I didn't know, and you--you startled me," +she stopped him long enough to confess, though she did not meet his eyes. +"You saved--" + +"You'll be startled worse, if you let the fire hang there in that bunch of +grass," he interrupted coolly. "Behind you, there." + +She turned obediently, and swung her sack down several times upon a +smoldering spot, and the incident was closed. + +Speedily it was forgotten, also. For with the meeting of the fires, which +they stood still to watch, a patch of wild rosebushes was caught fairly +upon both sides, and flared high, with a great snapping and crackling. +The wind seized upon the blaze, flung it toward them like a great, yellow +banner, and swept cinders and burning twigs far out over the blackened +path of the back fire. Kent watched it and hardly breathed, but Val was +shielding her face from the searing heat with her arms, and so did not +see what happened then. A burning branch like a long, flaming dagger flew +straight with the wind and lighted true as if flung by the hand of an +enemy. A long, neatly tapered stack received it fairly, and Kent's cry +brought Val's arms down, and her scared eyes staring at him. + +"That settles the hay," he exclaimed, and raced for the stacks knowing all +the while that he could do nothing, and yet panting in his hurry to reach +the spot. + +Michael, trampling uneasily in the corral, lifted his head and neighed +shrilly as Kent passed him on the run. Michael had watched fearfully the +fire sweeping down upon him, and his fear had troubled Val not a little. +When she saw Kent pass the gate, she hurried up and threw it open, +wondering a little that Kent should forget his horse. He had told her to +see that he was turned loose if the fire could not be stopped--and now he +seemed to have forgotten it. + +Michael, with a snort and an upward toss of his head to throw the dragging +reins away from his feet, left the corral with one jump, and clattered +away, past the house and up the hill, on the trail which led toward home. +Val stood for a moment watching him. Could he out-run the fire? He was +holding his head turned to one side now, so that the reins dangled away +from his pounding feet; once he stumbled to his knees, but he was up in a +flash, and running faster than ever. He passed out of sight over the hill, +and Val, with eyes smarting and cheeks burning from the heat, drew a long +breath and started after Kent. + +Kent was backing, step by step, away from the heat of the burning stacks. +The roar, and the crackle, and the heat were terrific; it was as if the +whole world was burning around them, and they only were left. A brand flew +low over Val's head as she ran staggeringly, with a bewildered sense that +she must hurry somewhere and do something immediately, to save something +which positively must be saved. A spark from the brand fell upon her hand, +and she looked up stupidly. The heat and the smoke were choking her so that +she could scarcely breathe. + +A new crackle was added to the uproar of flames. Kent, still backing from +the furnace of blazing hay, turned, and saw that the stable, with its roof +of musty hay, was afire. And, just beyond, Val, her face covered with her +sooty hands, was staggering drunkenly. He reached her as she fell to her +knees. + +"I--can't--fight--any more," she whispered faintly. + +He picked her up in his arms and hesitated, his face toward the house; then +ran straight away from it, stumbled across the dry ditch and out across the +blackened strip which their own back fire had swept clean of grass. The hot +earth burned his feet through the soles of his riding boots, but the wind +carried the heat and the smoke away, behind them. Clumps of bushes were +still burning at the roots, but he avoided them and kept on to the far side +hill, where a barren, yellow patch, with jutting sandstone rocks, offered +a resting place. He set Val down upon a rock, placed himself beside her so +that she was leaning against him, and began fanning her vigorously with his +hat. + +"Thank the Lord, we're behind that smoke, anyhow," he observed, when he +could get his breath. He felt that silence was not good for the woman +beside him, though he doubted much whether she was in a condition to +understand him. She was gasping irregularly, and her body was a dead weight +against him. "It was sure fierce, there, for a few minutes." + +He looked out across the coulee at the burning stables, and waited for the +house to catch. He could not hope that it would escape, but he did not +mention the probability of its burning. + +"Keep your eyes shut," he said. "That'll help some, and soon as we can +we'll go to the spring and give our faces and hands a good bath." He untied +his silk neckerchief, shook out the cinders, and pressed it against her +closed eyes. "Keep that over 'em," he commanded, "till we can do better. My +eyes are more used to smoke than yours, I guess. Working around branding +fires toughens 'em some." + +Still she did not attempt to speak, and she did not seem to have energy +enough left to keep the silk over her eyes. The wind blew it off without +her stirring a finger to prevent, and Kent caught it just in time to save +it from sailing away toward the fire. After that he held it in place +himself, and he did not try to keep talking. He sat quietly, with his arm +around her, as impersonal in the embrace as if he were holding a strange +partner in a dance, and watched the stacks burn, and the stables. He saw +the corral take fire, rail by rail, until it was all ablaze. He saw hens +and roosters running heavily, with wings dragging, until the heat toppled +them over. He saw a cat, with white spots upon its sides, leave the bushes +down by the creek and go bounding in terror to the house. + +And still the house stood there, the curtains flapping in and out through +the open windows, the kitchen door banging open and shut as the gusts of +wind caught it. The fire licked as close as burned ground and rocky creek +bed would let it, and the flames which had stayed behind to eat the +spare gleanings died, while the main line raged on up the hillside and +disappeared in a huge, curling wave of smoke. The stacks burned down +to blackened, smoldering butts. The willows next the spring, and the +chokecherries and wild currants withered in the heat and waved charred, +naked arms impotently in the wind. The stable crumpled up, flared, and +became a heap of embers. The corral was but a ragged line of smoking, +half-burned sticks and ashes. Spirals of smoke, like dying camp fires, blew +thin ribbons out over the desolation. + +Kent drew a long breath and glanced down at the limp figure in his arms. +She lay so very still that in spite of a quivering breath now and then he +had a swift, unreasoning fear she might be dead. Her hair was a tangled +mass of gold upon her head, and spilled over his arm. He carefully picked a +flake or two of charred grass from the locks on her temples, and discovered +how fine and soft was the hair. He lifted the grimy neckerchief from her +eyes and looked down at her face, smoke-soiled and reddened from the heat. +Her lips were drooped pitifully, like a hurt child. Her lashes, he noticed +for the first time, were at least four shades darker than her hair. His +gaze traveled on down her slim figure to her ringed fingers lying loosely +in her lap, a long, dry-looking blister upon one hand near the thumb; down +to her slippers, showing beneath her scorched skirt. And he drew another +long breath. He did not know why, but he had a strange, fleeting sense of +possession, and it startled him into action. + +"You gone to sleep?" he called gently, and gave her a little shake. "We can +get to the spring now, if you feel like walking that far; if you don't, I +reckon I'll have to carry you--for I sure do want a drink!" + +She half lifted her lashes and let them drop again, as if life were not +worth the effort of living. Kent hesitated, set his lips tightly together, +and lifted her up straighter. His eyes were intent and stern, as though +some great issue was at stake, and he must rouse her at once, in spite of +everything. + +"Here, this won't do at all," he said--but he was speaking to himself and +his quivering nerves, more than to her. + +She sighed, made a conscious effort, and half opened her eyes again. But +she seemed not to share his anxiety for action, and her mental and physical +apathy were not to be mistaken. The girl was utterly exhausted with +fire-fighting and nervous strain. + +"You seem to be all in," he observed, his voice softly complaining. "Well, +I packed you over here, and I reckon I better pack you back again--if you +_won't_ try to walk." + +She muttered something, of which Kent only distinguished "a minute." But +she was still limp, and absolutely without interest in anything, and so, +after a moment of hesitation, he gathered her up in his arms and carried +her back to the house, kicked the door savagely open, took her in through +the kitchen, and laid her down upon the couch, with a sigh of relief that +he was rid of her. + +The couch was gay with a bright, silk spread of "crazy" patchwork, and +piled generously with dainty cushions, too evidently made for ornamental +purposes than for use. But Kent piled the cushions recklessly around her, +tucked her smudgy skirts close, went and got a towel, which he immersed +recklessly in the water pail, and bathed her face and hands with clumsy +gentleness, and pushed back her tangled hair. The burn upon her hand showed +an angry red around the white of the blister, and he laid the wet towel +carefully upon it. She did not move. + +He was a man, and he had lived all his life among men. He could fight +anything that was fightable. He could save her life, but after this slight +attention to her comfort he had reached the limitations set by his purely +masculine training. He lowered the shades so that the room was dusky and as +cool as any other place in that fire-tortured land, and felt that he could +no do more for her. + +He stood for a moment looking down at the inert, grimy little figure +stretched out straight, like a corpse, upon the bright-hued couch, her eyes +closed and sunken, with blue shadows beneath, her lips pale and still with +that tired, pitiful droop. He stooped and rearranged the wet towel on her +burned hand, held his face close above hers for a second, sighed, frowned, +and tiptoed out into the kitchen, closing the door carefully behind him. + + + + +CHAPTER X. DESOLATION + +For more than two hours Kent sat outside in the shade of the house, and +stared out over the black desolation of the coulee. His horse was gone, so +that he could not ride anywhere--and there was nowhere in particular to +ride. For twenty miles around there was no woman whom he could bring to +Val's assistance, even if he had been sure that she needed assistance. +Several times he tiptoed into the kitchen, opened the door into the front +room an inch or so, and peered in at her. The third time, she had relaxed +from the corpselike position, and had thrown an arm up over her face, as if +she were shielding her eyes from something. He took heart at that, and went +out and foraged for firewood. + +There was a hard-beaten zone around the corral and stables, which had kept +the fire from spreading toward the house, and the wind had borne the sparks +and embers back toward the spring, so that the house stood in a brown oasis +of unburned grass and weeds, scanty enough, it is true, but yet a relief +from the dead black surroundings. + +The woodpile had not suffered. A chopping block, a decrepit sawhorse, +an axe, and a rusty bucksaw marked the spot; also three ties, hacked +eloquently in places, and just five sticks of wood, evidently chopped from +a tie by a man in haste. Kent looked at that woodpile, and swore. He had +always known that Manley had an aversion to laboring with his hands, but he +was unprepared for such an exhibition of shiftlessness. + +He savagely attacked the three ties, chopped them into firewood, and piled +them neatly, and then, walking upon his toes, he made a fire in the kitchen +stove, filled the woodbox, the teakettle, and the water pail, sat out in +the shade until he heard the kettle boiling over on the stove, took another +peep in at Val, and then, moving as quietly as he could, proceeded to cook +supper for them both. + +He had been perfectly familiar with the kitchen arrangements in the days +when Manley was a bachelor, and it interested him and filled him with a +respectful admiration for woman in the abstract and for Val in particular, +to see how changed everything was, and how daintily clean and orderly. +Val's smooth, white hands, with their two sparkly rings and the broad +wedding band, did not suggest a familiarity with actual work about a house, +but the effect of her labor and thought confronted him at every turn. + +"You can see your face in everything you pick up that was made to shine," +he commented, standing for a moment while he surveyed the bottom of a +stewpan. "She don't look it, but that yellow-eyed little dame sure knows +how to keep house." Then he heard her cough, and set down the stewpan +hurriedly and went to see if she wanted anything. + +Val was sitting upon the couch, her two hands pushing back her hair, gazing +stupidly around her. + +"Everything's all ready but the tea," Kent announced, in a perfectly +matter-of-fact tone. "I was just waiting to see how strong you want it." + +Val turned her yellow-brown eyes upon him in bewilderment. "Why, Mr. +Burnett--maybe I wasn't dreaming, then. I thought there was a fire. Was +there?" + +Kent grinned. "Kinda. You worked like a son of a gun, too--till there +wasn't any more to do, and then you laid 'em down for fair. You were all +in, so I packed you in and put you there where you could be comfortable. +And supper's ready--but how strong do you want your tea? I kinda had an +idea," he added lamely, "that women drink tea, mostly. I made coffee for +myself." + +Val let herself drop back among the pretty pillows. "I don't want any. If +there was a fire," she said dully, "then it's true. Everything's all burned +up. I don't want any tea. I want to die!" + +Kent studied her for a moment. "Well, in that case--shall I get the axe?" + +Val had closed her eyes, but she opened them again. "I don't care what you +do," she said. + +"Well, I aim to please," he told her calmly. "What _I'd_ do, in your place, +would be to go and put on something that ain't all smoked and scorched like +a--a ham, and then I'd sit up and drink some tea, and be nice about it. +But, of course, if you want to cash in--" + +Val gave a sob. "I can't help it--I'd just as soon be dead as alive. It +was bad enough before--and now everything's burned up--and all Manley's +nice--ha-ay--" + +"Well," Kent interrupted mercilessly, "I've heard of women doing all kinds +of fool things--but this is the first time I ever knew one to commit +suicide over a couple of measly haystacks!" He went out and slammed the +door so that the house shook, and tramped three times across the kitchen +floor. "That'll make her so mad at me she won't think about anything else +for a while," he reasoned shrewdly. But all the while his eyes were shiny, +and when he winked, his lashes became unaccountably moist. He stopped and +looked out at the blackened coulee. "Shut into this hole, week after week, +without a woman to speak to--it must be--damned tough!" he muttered. + +He tiptoed up and laid his ear against the inner door, and heard a +smothered sobbing inside. That did not sound as if she were "mad," and he +promptly cursed himself for a fool and a brute. With his own judgment to +guide him, he brewed some very creditable tea, sugared and creamed it +lavishly, browned a slice of bread on top of the stove--blowing off the +dust beforehand--after Arline's recipe for making toast, buttered it until +it dripped oil, and carried it in to her with the air of a man who will +have peace even though he must fight for it. The forlorn picture she made, +lying there with her face buried in a pink-and-blue cushion, and with her +shoulders shaking with sobs, almost made him retreat, quite unnerved. As it +was, he merely spilled a third of the tea and just missed letting the toast +slide from the plate to the floor; when he had righted his burden he had +recovered his composure to a degree. + +"Here, this won't do at all," he reproved, pulling a chair to the couch by +the simple method of hooking his toe under a round and dragging it toward +him. "You don't want Man to come and catch you acting like this. He's +liable to feel pretty blue himself, and he'll need some cheering up--don't +you think? I don't know for sure--but I've always been kinda under the +impression that's what a man gets a wife for. Ain't it? You don't want to +throw down your cards now. You sit up and drink this tea, and eat this +toast, and I'll gamble you'll feel about two hundred per cent better. + +"Come," he urged gently, after a minute. "I never thought a nervy little +woman like you would give up so easy. I was plumb ashamed of myself, the +way you worked on that back fire. You had me going, for a while. You're +just tired out, is all ails you. You want to hurry up and drink this, +before it gets cold. Come on. I'm liable to feel, insulted if you pass up +my cooking this way." + +Val choked back the tears, and, without taking her face from the pillow, +put out the burned hand gropingly until it touched his knee. + +"Oh, you--you're good," she said brokenly. "I used to think you +were--horrid, and I'm a--ashamed. You're good, and I--" + +"Well, I ain't going to be good much longer, if you don't get your head +outa that pillow and drink this tea!" His tone was amused and half +impatient. But his face--more particularly his eyes--told another story, +which perhaps it was as well she did not read. "I'll be dropping the blamed +stuff in another minute. My elbow's plumb getting a cramp in it," he added +complainingly. + +Val made a sound half-way between a sob and a laugh, and sat up. With more +haste than the occasion warranted, Kent put the tea and toast on the chair +and started for the kitchen. + +"I was bound you'd eat before I did," he explained, "and I could stand a +cup of coffee myself. And, say! If there's anything more you want, just +holler, and I'll come on the long lope." + +Val took up the teaspoon, tasted the tea, and then regarded the cup +doubtfully. She never drank sugar in her tea. She wondered how much of it +he had put in. Her head ached frightfully, and she felt weak and utterly +hopeless of ever feeling different. + +"Everything all right?" came Kent's voice from the kitchen. + +"Yes," Val answered hastily, trying hard to speak with some life and cheer +in her tone. "It's lovely--all of it." + +"Want more tea?" It sounded, out there, as though he was pushing back his +chair to rise from the table. + +"No, no, this is plenty." Val glanced fearfully toward the kitchen door, +lifted the teacup, and heroically drank every drop. It was, she considered, +the least that she could do. + +When he had finished eating he came in, and found her nibbling +apathetically at the toast. She looked up at him with an apology in her +eyes. + +"Mr. Burnett, don't think I am always so silly," she began, leaning back +against the piled pillows with a sigh. "I have always thought that I could +bear anything. But last night I didn't sleep much. I dreamed about fires, +and that Manley was--dead--and I woke up in a perfect horror. It was only +ten o'clock. So then I sat up and tried to read, and every five minutes I +would go out and look at the sky, to see if there was a glow anywhere. +It was foolish, of course. And I didn't sleep at all to-day, either. The +minute I would lie down I'd imagine I heard a fire roaring. And then it +came. But I was all used up before that, so I wasn't really--I must have +fainted, for I don't remember getting into the house--and I do think +fainting is the silliest thing! I never did such a thing before," she +finished abjectly. + +"Oh, well--I guess you had a license to faint if you felt that way," he +comforted awkwardly. "It was the smoke and the heat, I reckon; they were +enough to put a crimp in anybody. Did Man say about when he would be back? +Because I ought to be moving along; it's quite a walk to the Wishbone." + +"Oh--you won't go till Manley comes! Please! I--I'd go crazy, here alone, +and--and he might not come--he's frequently detained. I--I've such a +horror of fires--" She certainly looked as if she had. She was sitting up +straight, her hands held out appealingly to him, her eyes big and bright. + +"Sure I won't go if you feel that way about it." Kent was half frightened +at her wild manner. "I guess Man will be along pretty soon, anyway. He'll +hit the trail as soon as he can get behind the fire, that's a cinch. He'll +be worried to death about you. And you don't need to be afraid of prairie +fires any more, Mrs. Fleetwood; you're safe. There can't be any more fires +till next year, anyway; there's nothing left to burn." He turned his face +to the window and stared out somberly at the ravaged hillside. "Yes--you're +dead safe, now!" + +"I'm such a fool," Val confessed, her eyes also turning to the window, "If +you want to go, I--" Her mouth was quivering, and she did not finish the +sentence. + +"Oh, I'll stay till Man comes. He's liable to be along any time, now." He +glanced at her scorched, smoke-stained dress. "He'll sure think you made a +hand, all right!" + +Val took the hint, and blushed with true feminine shame that she was not +looking her best. "I'll go and change," she murmured, and rose wearily. +"But I feel as if the world had been 'rolled up in a scroll and burned,' as +the Bible puts it, and as if nothing matters any more." + +"It does, though. We'll all go right along living the same as ever, and +the first snow will make this fire seem as old as the war--except to the +cattle; they're the ones to get it in the neck this winter." + +He went out and walked aimlessly around in the yard, and went over to the +smoking remains of the stable, and to the heap of black ashes where the +stacks had been. Manley would be hard hit, he knew. He wished he would +hurry and come, and relieve him of the responsibility of keeping Val +company. He wondered a little, in his masculine way, that women should +always be afraid when there was no cause for fear. For instance, she had +stayed alone a good many times, evidently, when there was real danger of a +fire sweeping down upon her at any hour of the day or night; but now, when +there was no longer a possibility of anything happening, she had turned +white and begged him to stay--and Val, he judged shrewdly, was not the sort +of woman who finds it easy to beg favors of anybody. + +There came a sound of galloping, up on the hill, and he turned quickly. +Dull dusk was settling bleakly down upon the land, but he could see three +or four horsemen just making the first descent from the top. He shouted a +wordless greeting, and heard their answering yells. In another minute or +two they were pulling up at the house, where he had hurried to meet them. +Val, tucking a side comb hastily into her freshly coiled hair, her pretty +self clothed all in white linen, appeased eagerly in the doorway. + +"Why--where's Manley?" she demanded anxiously. + +Blumenthall was dismounting near her, and he touched his hat before he +answered. "We were on the way home, and we thought we'd better ride around +this way and see how you came out," he evaded. "I see you lost your hay and +buildings--pretty close call for the house, too, I should judge. You must +have got here in time to do something, Kent." + +"But where's Manley?" Val was growing pale again. "Has anything happened? +Is he hurt? Tell me!" + +"Oh, he's all right, Mrs. Fleetwood." Blumenthall glanced meaningly at +Kent--and Fred De Garmo, sitting to one side of his saddle, looked at +Polycarp Jenks and smiled slightly. "We left town ahead of him, and knocked +right along." + +Val regarded the group suspiciously. "He's coming, then, is he?" + +"Oh, certainly. Glad you're all right, Mrs. Fleetwood. That was an awful +fire--it swept the whole country clean between the two rivers, I'm afraid. +This wind made it bad." He was tightening his cinch, and now he unhooked +the stirrup from the horn and mounted again. "We'll have to be getting +along--don't know, yet, how we came out of it over to the ranch. But our +guards ought to have stopped it there." He looked at Kent. "How did the +Wishbone make it?" he inquired. + +"I was just going to ask you if you knew," Kent replied, scowling because +he saw Fred looking at Val in what he considered an impertinent manner. "My +horse ran off while I was fighting fire here, so I'm afoot. I was waiting +for Man to show up." + +"You'll git all of that you want--_he-he!_" Polycarp cut in tactlessly. +"Man won't git home t'-night--not unless--" + +"Aw, come on." Fred started along the charred trail which led across the +coulee and up the farther side. Blumenthall spoke a last, commonplace +sentence or two, just to round off the conversation and make the +termination not too abrupt, and they rode away, with Polycarp glancing +curiously back, now and then, as though he was tempted to stay and gossip, +and yet was anxious to know all that had happened at the Double Diamond. + +"What did Polycarp Jenks mean--about Manley not coming to-night?" Val was +standing in the doorway, staring after the group of horsemen. + +"Nothing, I guess, Polycarp never does mean anything half the time; he just +talks to hear his head roar. Man'll come, all right. This bunch happened to +beat him out, is all." + +"Oh, do you think so? Mr. Blumenthall acted as if there was something--" + +"Well, what can you expect of a man that lives on oatmeal mush and toast +and hot water?" Kent demanded aggressively. "And Fred De Garmo is always +grinning and winking at somebody; and that other fellow is a Swede and got +about as much sense as a prairie dog--and Polycarp is an old granny gossip +that nobody ever pays any attention to. Man won't stay in town--hell be too +anxious." + +"It's terrible," sighed Val, "about the hay and the stables. Manley will +be so discouraged--he worked so hard to cut and stack that hay. And he was +just going to gather the calves together and put them in the river field, +in a couple of weeks--and now there isn't anything to feed them!" + +"I guess he's coming; I hear somebody." Kent was straining his eyes to see +the top of the hill, where the dismal sight shadows lay heavily upon the +dismal black earth. "Sounds to me like a rig, though. Maybe he drove out." +He left her, went to the wire gate which gave egress from the tiny, unkempt +yard, and walked along the trail to meet the newcomer. + +"You stay there," he called back, when he thought he heard Val following +him. "I'm just going to tell him you're all right. You'll get that white +dress all smudged up in these ashes." + +In the narrow little gully where the trail crossed the half-dry channel +from the spring he met the rig. The driver pulled up when he caught sight +of Kent. + +"Who's that? Did she git out of it?" cried Arline Hawley, in a breathless +undertone, "Oh--it's you, is it, Kent? I couldn't stand it--I just had to +come and see if she's alive. So I made Hank hitch right up--as soon as we +knew the fire wasn't going to git into all that brush along the creek, and +run down to the town--and bring me over. And the way--" + +"But where's Man?" Kent laid a hand upon the wheel and shot the question +into the stream of Arline's talk. + +"Man! I dunno what devil gits into men sometimes. Man went and got drunk +as a fool soon as he seen the fire and knew what coulda happened out here. +Started right in to drownd his sorrows before he made sure whether he had +any to drown! If that ain't like a man, every time! Time we all got back to +town, and the fire was kiting away from us instead of coming up toward +us, he was too drunk to do anything. He must of poured it down him by the +quart. He--" + +"Manley! Is that you, dear?" It was Val, a slim, white figure against the +blackness all around her, coming down the trail to see what delayed them. +"Why don't you come to the house? There _is_ a house, you know. We aren't +quite burned out. And I'm all right, so there's no need to worry any more." + +"Now, ain't that a darned shame?" muttered Arline wrathfully to Kent. "A +feller that'll drink when he's got a wife like that had oughta be hung! + +"It's me, Arline Hawley!" She raised her voice to its ordinary shrill +level. "It ain't just the proper time to make a call, I guess, but it's +better late than never. Man, he was took with one of his spells, so I told +him I'd come on out and take you back to town. How are you, anyhow? Scared +plumb to death, I'll bet, when that fire come over the hill. You needn't +'a' tramped clear down here--we was coming on to the house in a minute. I +got to chewin' the rag with Kent. Git in; you might as well ride back to +the house, now you're here." + +"Manley didn't come?" Val was standing beside the rig, near Kent. Her +white-clothed figure was indistinct, and her face obscured in the dark. Her +voice was quiet--lifelessly quiet. "Is he sick?" + +"Well--of course has nerves was all upset--" + +"Oh! Then he _is_ sick?" + +"Well--nothing dangerous, but--he wasn't feelin' well, so I thought I'd +come out and take you back with me." + +"Oh!" + +"Man was awful worried; you mustn't think he wasn't. He was pretty near +crazy, for a while." + +"Oh, yes, certainly." + +"Get in and ride. And you mustn't worry none about Man, nor feel hurt that +he didn't come. He felt so bad--" + +"I'll walk, thank you; it's only a few steps. And I'm not worried at all. I +quite understand." + +The team started on slowly, and Mrs. Hawley turned in the seat so that she +could continue talking without interruption to the two who walked behind. +But it was Kent who answered her at intervals, when she asked a direct +question or appeared to be waiting for some comment. Betweenwhiles he was +wondering if Val did, after all, understand. She knew so little of the West +and its ways, and her faith in Manley was so firm and unquestioning, +that he felt sure she was only hurt at what looked very much like an +indifference to her welfare. He suspected shrewdly that she was thinking +what she would have done in Manley's place, and was trying to reconcile +Mrs. Hawley's assurances that Manley was not actually sick or disabled with +the blunt fact that he had stayed in town and permitted others to come out +to see if she were alive or dead. + +And Kent had another problem to solve. Should he tell her the truth? He had +never ceased to feel, in some measure, responsible for her position. And +she was sure to discover the truth before long; not even her innocence +and her ignorance of life could shield her from that knowledge. He let +a question or two of Arline's go unanswered while he struggled for a +decision, but when they reached the house, only one point was dearly +settled in his mind. Instead of riding as far as he might, and then walking +across the prairie to the Wishbone, he intended to go on to town with +them--"to see her through with it." + + + + +CHAPTER XI. VAL'S AWAKENING + +Val stood just inside the door of the hotel parlor and glanced swiftly +around at the place of unpleasant memory. + +"No, I must see Manley before I can tell you whether we shall want to stay +or not," she replied to Arline's insistence that she "go right up to a +room" and lie down. "I feel quite well, and you must not bother about me at +all. If Mr. Burnett will be good enough to send Manley to me--I must see +him first of all." It was Val in her most unapproachable mood, and Arline +subsided before it. + +"Well, then, I'll go and send word to Man, and see about some supper for +us. I feel as if _I_ could eat ten-penny nails!" She went out into the +hall, hesitated a moment, and then boldly invaded the "office." + +"Say! have you got Man rounded up yit?" she demanded of her husband. "And +how is he, anyhow? That girl ain't got the first idea of what ails him--how +anybody with the brains and education she's got can be so thick-headed gits +me. Jim told me Man's been packing a bottle or two home with him every trip +he's made for the last month--and she don't know a thing about it. I'd like +to know what 'n time they learn folks back East, anyhow; to put their eyes +and their sense in their pockets, I guess, and go along blind as bats. +Where's Kent at? Did he go after him? She won't do nothing till she sees +Man--" + +At that moment Kent came in, and his disgust needed no words. He answered +Mrs. Hawley's inquiring look with a shake of the head. + +"I can't do anything with him," he said morosely. "He's so full he don't +know he's got a wife, hardly. You better go and tell her, Mrs. Hawley. +Somebody's got to." + +"Oh, my heavens!" Arline clutched at the doorknob for moral support. "I +could no more face them yellow eyes of hern when they blaze up--you go tell +her yourself, if you want her told. I've got to see about some supper for +us. I ain't had a bite since dinner, and Min's off gadding somewheres--" +She hurried away, mentally washing her hands of the affair. "Women's got to +learn some time what men is," she soliloquized, "and I guess she ain't +no better than any of the rest of us, that she can't learn to take her +medicine--but _I_ ain't goin' to be the one to tell her what kinda fellow +she's tied to. My stunt'll be helpin' her pick up the pieces and make the +best of it after she's told." + +She stopped, just inside the dining room, and listened until she heard Kent +cross the hall from the office and open the parlor door. "Gee! It's like a +hangin'," she sighed. "If she wasn't so plumb innocent--" She started +for the door which opened into the parlor from the dining room, strongly +tempted to eavesdrop. She did yield so far as to put her ear to the +keyhole, but the silence within impressed her strangely, and she retreated +to the kitchen and closed the door tightly behind her as the most practical +method of bidding Satan begone. + +The silence in the parlor lasted while Kent, standing with his back against +the door, faced Val and meditated swiftly upon the manner of his telling. + +"Well?" she demanded at last. "I am still waiting to see Manley. I am not +quite a child, Mr. Burnett. I know something is the matter, and you--if you +have any pity, or any feeling of friendship, you will tell me the truth. +Don't you suppose I know that Arline was--_lying_ to me all the time about +Manley? You helped her to lie. So did that other man. I waited until I +reached town, where I could do something, and now you must tell me the +truth. Manley is badly hurt, or he is dead. Tell me which it is, and take +me to him." She spoke fast, as if she was afraid she might not be able to +finish, though her voice was even and low, it was also flat and toneless +with her effort to seem perfectly calm and self-controlled. + +Kent looked at her, forgot all about leading up to the truth by easy +stages, as he had intended to do, and gave it to her straight. "He ain't +either one," he said. "He's drunk!" + +Val stared at him. "Drunk!" He could see how even her lips shrank from the +word. She threw up her head. "That," she declared icily, "I know to be +impossible!" + +"Oh, do you? Let me tell you that's _never_ impossible with a man, not when +there's whisky handy." + +"Manley is not that sort of a man. When he left me, three years ago, he +promised me never to frequent places where liquor is sold. He never had +touched liquor; he never was tempted to touch it. But, just to be doubly +sure, he promised me, on his honor. He has never broken that promise; I +know, because he told me so." She made the explanation scornfully, as +if her pride and her belief in Manley almost forbade the indignity of +explaining. "I don't know why you should come here and insult me," she +added, with a lofty charity for his sin. + +"I don't see how it can insult you," he contended. "You're got a different +way of looking at things, but that won't help you to dodge facts. Man's +drunk. I said it, and I mean it. It ain't the first time, nor the second. +He was drunk the day you came, and couldn't meet the train. That's why I +met you. I ought to've told you, I guess, but I hated to make you feel bad. +So I went to work and sobered him up, and sent him over to get married. +I've always been kinda sorry for that. It was a low-down trick to play on +you, and that's a fact. You ought to've had a chance to draw outa the game, +but I didn't think about it at the time. Man and I have always been pretty +good friends, and I was thinking of _his_ side of the case. I thought he'd +straighten up after he got married; he wasn't such a hard drinker--only +he'd go on a toot when he got into town, like lots of men. I didn't think +it had such a strong hold on him. And I knew he thought a lot of you, and +if you went back on him it'd hit him pretty hard. Man ain't a bad fellow, +only for that. And he's liable to do better when he finds out you know +about it. A man will do 'most anything for a woman he thinks a lot of." + +"Indeed!" Val was sitting now upon the red plush chair. Her face was +perfectly colorless, her manner frozen. The word seemed to speak itself, +without having any relation whatever to her thoughts and her emotions. + +Kent waited. It seemed to him that she took it harder than she would have +taken the news that Manley was dead. He had no means of gauging the horror +of a young woman who has all her life been familiar with such terms as "the +demon rum," and who has been taught that "intemperance is the doorway to +perdition"; a young woman whose life has been sheltered jealously from all +contact with the ugly things of the world, and who believes that she might +better die than marry a drunkard. He watched her unobtrusively. + +"Anyway, it was worrying over you that made him get off wrong to-day," he +ventured at last, as a sort of palliative. "They say he was going to start +home right in the face of the fire, and when they wouldn't let him, he +headed straight for a saloon and commenced to pour whisky down him. He +thought sure you--he thought the fire would--" + +"I see," Val interrupted stonily. "For the very doubtful honor of shaking +the hand of a politician, he left me alone to face as best I might +the possibility of burning alive; and when it seemed likely that the +possibility had become a certainty, he must celebrate his bereavement by +becoming a beast. Is that what you would have me believe of my husband?" + +"That's about the size of it," Kent admitted reluctantly. "Only I wouldn't +have put it just that way, maybe." + +"Indeed! And how would you pit it, then?" + +Kent leaned harder against the door, and looked at her curiously. Women, it +seemed to him, were always going to extremes; they were either too soft and +meek, or else they were too hard and unmerciful. + +"How would you put it? I am rather curious to know your point of view." + +"Well, I know men better than you do, Mrs. Fleetwood. I know they can do +some things that look pretty rotten on the surface, and yet be fairly +decent underneath. You don't know how a habit like that gets a fellow just +where he's weakest. Man ain't a beast. He's selfish and careless, and he +gives way too easy, but he thinks the world of you. Jim says he cried like +a baby when he came into the saloon, and acted like a crazy man. You don't +want to be too hard on him. I've an idea this will learn him a lesson. If +you take him the right way, Mrs. Fleetwood, the chances are he'll quit +drinking." + +Val smiled. Kent thought he had never before seen a smile like that, and +hoped he never would see another. There was in it neither mercy nor mirth, +but only the hard judgment of a woman who does not understand. + +"Will you bring him to me here, Mr. Burnett? I do not feel quite equal +to invading a saloon and begging him, on my knees, to come--after the +conventional manner of drunkards' wives. But I should like to see him." + +Kent stared. "He ain't in any shape to argue with," he remonstrated. "You +better wait a while." + +She rested her chin upon her hands, folded upon the high chair back, and +gazed at him with her tawny eyes, that somehow reminded Kent of a lioness +in a cage. He thought swiftly that a lioness would have as much mercy as +she had in that mood. + +"Mr. Burnett," she began quietly, when Kent's nerves were beginning to feel +the strain of her silent stare, "I want to see Manley _as he is now_. I +will tell you why. You aren't a woman, and you never will understand, but I +shall tell you; I want to tell _somebody_. + +"I was raised well--that sounds queer, but modesty forbids more. At any +rate, my mother was very careful about me. She believed in a girl marrying +and becoming a good wife to a good man, and to that end she taught me and +trained me. A woman must give her all--her life, her past, present, and +future--to the man she marries. For three years I thought how unworthy I +was to be Manley's wife. _Unworthy_, do you hear? I slept with his letters +under my pillow." The self-contempt in her tone! "I studied the things I +thought would make me a better companion out here in the wilderness. I +practiced hours and hours every day upon my violin, because Manley had +admired my playing, and I thought it would please him to have me play in +the firelight on winter evenings, when the blizzards were howling about the +house! I learned to cook, to wash clothes, to iron, to sweep, and to scrub, +and to make my own clothes, because Manley's wife would live where +she could not hire servants to do these things. I lived a beautiful, +picturesque dream of domestic happiness. + +"I left my friends, my home, all the things I had been accustomed to all my +life, and I came out here to live that dream!" She laughed bitterly. + +"You can easily guess how much of it has come true, Mr. Burnett. But you +don't know what it costs a girl to come down from the clouds and find that +reality is hard and ugly--from dreaming of a cozy little nest of a home, +and the love and care of--of Manley, to the reality--to carrying water and +chopping wood and being left alone, day after day, and to find that his +love only meant--Oh, you don't know how a woman clings to her ideals! You +don't know how I have dung to mine. They have become rather tattered, and I +have had to mend them often, but I have clung to them, even though they do +not resemble much the dreams I brought with me to this horrible country. + +"But if it's true, what you tell me--if Manley himself is another +disillusionment--if beyond his selfishness and his carelessness he is a +drunken brute whom I can't even respect, then I'm done with my ideals. I +want to see him just as he is. I want to see him once without the halo I +have kept shining all these months. I've got my life to live--but I want to +face facts and live facts. I can't go on dreaming and making believe, after +this." She stopped and looked at him speculatively, absolutely without +emotion. + +"Just before I left home," she went on in the same calm quiet, "a girl +showed me some verses written by a very wicked man. At least, they say he +is very wicked--at any rate, he is in jail. I thought the verses horrible +and brutal; but now I think the man must be very wise. I remember a few +lines, and they seem to me to mean Manley. + + "For each man kills the thing he loves-- + Some do it with a bitter look, + Some with a flattering word; + The coward does it with a kiss, + The brave man with a sword. + +"I don't remember all of it, but there was another line or two: + + "The kindest use a knife, because + The dead so soon grow cold. + +"I wish I had that poem now--I think I could understand it. I think--" + +"I think you've got talking hysterics, if there is such a thing," Kent +interrupted harshly. "You don't know half what you're saying. You've had +a hard day, and you're all tired out, and everything looks outa focus. I +know--I've seen men like that sometimes when some trouble hit 'em hard and +unexpected. What you want is sleep; not poetry about killing people. A +man, in the shape you are in, takes to whisky. You're taking to graveyard +poetry--and, if you ask _me_, that's worse than whisky. You ain't normal. +What you want to do is go straight to bed. When you wake up in the morning +you won't feel so bad. You won't have half as many troubles as you've got +now." + +"I knew you wouldn't understand it," Val remarked coldly, still staring at +him with her chin on her hands. + +"You won't yourself, to-morrow morning," Kent declared unsympathetically, +and called Mrs. Hawley from the kitchen. "You better put Mrs. Fleetwood +to bed," he advised gruffly. "And if you've got anything that'll make her +sleep, give her a dose of it. She's so tired she can't see straight." He +was nearly to the outside door when Val recovered her speech. + +"You men are all alike," she said contemptuously. "You give orders and you +consider yourselves above all the laws of morality or decency; in reality +you are beneath them. We shouldn't expect anything of the lower animals! +How I _despise_ men!" + +"Now you're _talking_," grinned Kent, quite unmoved. "Whack us in a bunch +all you like--but don't make one poor devil take it all. Men as a class are +used to it and can stand it." He was laughing as he left the room, but his +amusement lasted only until the door was closed behind him. "Lord!" he +exclaimed, and drew a deep breath. "I'd sure hate to have that little +woman say all them things about _me!_" and glanced involuntarily over his +shoulder to where a crack of light showed under the faded green shade of +one of the parlor windows. + +He crossed the street and entered the saloon where Manley was still +drinking heavily, his face crimson and blear-eyed and brutalized, his +speech thickened disgustingly. He was sprawled in an armchair, waving an +empty glass in an erratic attempt to mark the time of a college ditty six +or seven years out of date, which he was trying to sing. He leered up at +Kent. + +"Wife 'sall righ'," he informed him solemnly. "Knew she would be--fine +guards's got out there. 'Sall righ'--somebody shaid sho. Have a drink." + +Kent glowered down at him, made a swift, mental decision, and pipped him +by the shoulder. "You come with me," he commanded. "I've got something +important I want to tell you. Come on--if you can walk." + +"'Course I c'n walk all righ'. Shertainly I can walk. Wha's makes you think +I can't walk? Want to inshult me? 'Sall my friends here--no secrets from my +friends. Wha's want tell me? Shay it here." + +Kent was a big man; that is to say, he was tall, well-muscled and active. +But so was Manley. Kent tried the power of persuasion, leaving force as a +last, doubtful result. In fifteen minutes or thereabouts he had succeeded +in getting Manley outside the door, and there he balked. + +"Wha's matter wish you?" he complained, pulling back. "C'm on back 'n' have +drink. Wha's wanna tell me?" + +"You wait. I'll tell you all about it in a minute. I've got something to +show you, and I don't want the bunch to get next. Savvy?" + +He had a sickening sense that the subterfuge would not have deceived a +five-year-old child, but it was accepted without question. + +He led Manley stumbling up the street, evading a direct statement as to his +destination, pulled him off the board walk, and took him across a vacant +lot well sprinkled with old shoes and tin cans. Here Manley fell down, and +Kent's patience was well tested before he got him up and going again. + +"Where y' goin'?" Manley inquired pettishly, as often as he could bring his +tongue to the labor of articulation. + +"You wait and I'll show you," was Kent's unvaried reply. + +At last he pushed open a door and led his victim into the darkness of a +small, windowless building. "It's in here--back against the wall, there," +he said, pulling Manley after him. By feeling, and by a good sense of +location, he arrived at a rough bunk built against the farther wall, with a +blanket or two upon it. + +"There you are," he announced grimly. "You'll have a sweet time getting +anything to drink here, old boy. When you're sober enough to face your wife +and have some show of squaring yourself with her, I'll come and let you +out." He had pushed Manley down upon the bunk, and had reached the door +before the other could get up and come at him. He pulled the door shut +with a slam, slipped a padlock into the staple, and snapped it just before +Manley lurched heavily against it. He was cursing as well as he could--was +Manley, and he began kicking like an unruly child shut into a closet. + +"Aw, let up," Kent advised him, through a crack in the wall. "Want to know +where you are? Well, you're in Hawley's ice house; you know it's a fine +place for drunks to sober up in; it's awful popular for that purpose. Aw, +you can't do any business kicking--that's been tried lots of times. This +is sure well built, for an ice house. No, I can't let you out. Couldn't +possibly, you know. I haven't got the key--old lady Hawley has got it, and +she's gone to bed hours ago. You go to sleep and forget about it. I'll talk +to you in the morning. Good night, and pleasant dreams!" + +The last thing Kent heard as he walked away was Manley's profane promise to +cut Kent's heart out very early the next day. + +"The darned fool," Kent commented, as he stopped in the first patch of +lamplight to roll a cigarette. "He ain't got another friend in town that'd +go to the trouble I've gone to for him. He'll realize it, too, when all +that whisky quits stewing inside him." + + + + +CHAPTER XII. A LESSON IN FORGIVENESS + +"Well, old-timer, how you coming? You sure do sleep sound--this is the +third time I've come to tell you breakfast is ready and then some. You'll +get the bottom of the coffeepot, for fair, if you don't hustle." Kent left +the door of the ice house wide open behind him, so that the warmth of +mid-morning swept in to do battle with the chill and damp of wet sawdust +and buried ice. + +Manley rolled over so that he faced his visitor, and his reply was abusive +in the extreme. Kent waited, with an air of impersonal interest, until +he was done and had turned his face away as though the subject was quite +exhausted. + +"Well, now you've got that load off your mind, come on over and get a cup +of coffee. But while you're thinking about whether you want anything but my +heart's blood, I'm going to speak right up and tell you a few things that +commonly ain't none of my business. + +"Do you know your wife came within an ace of burning to death yesterday?" +Manley sat up with a jerk and glared at him. "Do you know you're burned +out, slick and clean--all except the shack? Hay, stables, corral, wagons, +chickens--" Kent spread his hands in a gesture including all minor details. +"I rode over there when I saw the fire coming, and it's lucky I did, +old-timer. I back-fired and saved the house--and your wife--from going up +in smoke. But everything else went. Let that sink into your system, will +you? And just see if you can draw a picture of what woulda happened if +nobody had showed up--if that fire had hit the coulee with nobody there but +your wife. Why, I run onto her half-way up the bluff, packing a wet sack, +to fight it at the fire guards I Now, Man, it ain't any credit to, _you_ +that the worst didn't happen. I'd sure like to tell you what I think of a +fellow that will leave a woman out there, twenty miles from town and ten +from the nearest neighbor--and them not at home--to take a chance on a +thing like that; but I can't. I never learned words enough. + +"There's another thing. Old lady Hawley took more interest in her than +you did; she drove out there to see how about it, as soon as the fire +had burned on past and left the trail safe. And it didn't look good to +her--that little woman stuck out there all by herself. She made her pack up +some clothes, and brought her to town with her. She didn't want to come; +she had an idea that she ought to stay with it till you showed up. But the +only original Hawley is sure all right! She talked your wife plumb outa the +house and into the rig, and brought her to town. She's over to the hotel +now." + +"Val at the hotel? How long has she been there?" Manley began smoothing his +hair and his crumpled clothes with his hands, "Good heavens! You told her +I'd gone on out, and had missed her on the trail, didn't you, Kent? She +doesn't know I'm in town, does she? You always were a good fellow--I +haven't forgotten how you--" + +"Well, you can forget it now. I didn't tell her anything like that. I +didn't think of it, for one thing. She knew all the time that you were in +town. I'm tired of lying to her. I told her the truth. I told her you were +drunk." + +Manley's jaw dropped. "You--you told her--" + +"Ex-actly. I told her you were drunk." Kent nodded gravely, and his lips +curled as he watched the other cringe. "She called me a liar," he added, +with a certain reminiscent amusement. + +Manley brightened. "That's Val--once she believes in a person she's loyal +as--" + +"She ain't now," Kent interposed dryly. "When I let up she was plumb +convinced. She knows now what ailed you the day she came and you didn't +meet her." + +"You dirty cur! And I thought you were a friend. You--" + +"You thought right--until you got to rooting a little too deep in the mud, +old-timer. And let me tell you something. I was your friend when I told +her. She's got to know--you couldn't go on like this much longer without +having her get wise; she ain't a fool. The thing for you to do now is to +buck up and let her reform you. I've always heard that women are tickled +plumb to death when they can reform a man. You go on over there and make +your little talk, and then buckle down and live up to it. Savvy? That's +your only chance now. It'll work, too. + +"You _ought_ to straighten up, Man, and act white! Not just to square +yourself with her, but because you're going downhill pretty fast, if you +only knew it. You ain't anything like you were two years ago, when we +bached together. You've got to brace up pretty sudden, or you'll be so far +gone you can't climb back. And when a man has got a wife to look after, +it seems to me he ought to be the best it's in him to be. You were a fine +fellow when you first hit the country--and she thought she was getting that +same fine fellow when she came away out here to marry you. It ain't any of +my business--but do you think you're giving her a square deal?" He waited a +minute, and spoke the next sentence with a certain diffidence. "I'll gamble +you haven't been disappointed in _her_." + +"She's an angel--and I'm a beast!" groaned Manley, with the exaggerated +self-abasement which so frequently follows close upon the heels of +intoxication. "She'll never forgive a thing like that--the best thing I can +do is to blow my brains out!" + +"Like Walt. And have your picture enlarged and put in a gold frame, and +hubby number two learning his morals from your awful example," elaborated +Kent, in much the same tone he had employed when Val, only the day before, +had rashly expressed a wish for a speedy death. + +Manley sat up straighter and sent a look of resentment toward the man who +bantered when he should have sympathized. "It's all a big joke with you, of +course," he flared weakly. "You're not married--to a perfect woman; a woman +who never did anything wrong in her life, and can't understand how anybody +should want to, and can't forgive him when he does. She expects a man to be +a saint. Why, I don't even smoke in the house--and she doesn't dream I'd +ever swear, under any circumstances. + +"Why, Kent, a fellow's _got_ to go to town and turn himself loose +sometimes, when he lives in a rarified atmosphere of refined morality, and +listens to Songs Without Words and weepy classics on the violin, and never +a thing to make your feet tingle. She doesn't believe in public dances, +either. Nor cards. She reads 'The Ring and the Book' evenings, and wants to +discuss it and read passages of it to me. I used to take some interest in +those things, and she doesn't seem to see I've changed. Why, hang it, Kent, +Cold Spring Coulee's no place for Browning--he doesn't fit in. All that +sort of thing is a thousand miles behind me--and I've got to--" He stopped +short and brooded, his eyes upon the dank sawdust at his feet. + +"I'm a beast," he repeated rather lugubriously. "She's an angel--an +Eastern-bred angel. And let me tell you, Kent, all that's pretty hard to +live up to!" + +Kent looked down at him meditatively, wondering if there was not a good +deal of truth and justice in Manley's argument. But his sympathies had +already gone to the other side, and Kent was not the man to make an +emotional pendulum of himself. + +"Well, what you going to do about it?" he asked, after a short silence. + +For answer Manley rose to his feet with a certain air of determination, +which flamed up oddly above his general weakness, like the last sputter +of a candle burned down. "I'm going over and take my medicine--face the +music," he said almost sullenly, "She's too good for me--I always knew it. +And I haven't treated her right--I've left her out there alone too much. +But she wouldn't come to town with me--she said she couldn't endure the +sight of it. What could I do? _I_ couldn't stay out there all the time; +there were times when I had to come. She didn't seem to mind staying alone. +She never objected. She was always sweet sad good-natured--and shut up +inside of herself. She just gives you what she pleases of her mind, and the +rest she hides--" + +Kent laughed suddenly. "You married men sure do have all kinds of trouble," +he remarked. "A fellow like me can go on a jamboree any time he likes, and +as long as he likes, and it don't concern anybody but himself--and maybe +the man he's working for; and look at you, scared plumb silly thinking of +what your wife's going to say about it. If you ask me, I'm going to trot +alone; I'd rather be lonesome than good, any old time." + +That, however, did not tend to raise Manley's spirits any. He entered the +hotel with visible reluctance, looked into the parlor, and heaved a sigh +of relief when he saw that it was empty, wavered at the foot of the steep, +narrow stairs, and retreated to the dining room, with Kent at his heels +knowing that the matter had passed quite beyond his help or hindrance and +had entered that mysterious realm of matrimony where no unwedded man or +woman may follow and yet is curious enough to linger. + +Just inside the door Manley stopped so suddenly that Kent bumped against +him. Val, sweet and calm and cool, was sitting just where the smoke-dimmed +sunlight poured in through a window upon her, and a breeze came with it and +stirred her hair. She had those purple shadows under her eyes which betray +us after long, sleepless hours when we live with our troubles and the world +dreams around us; she had no color at all in her cheeks, and she had that +aloofness of manner which Manley, in his outburst, had described as being +shut up inside herself. She glanced up at them, just as she would have done +had they both been strangers, and went on sugaring her coffee with a dainty +exactness which, under the circumstances, seemed altogether too elaborate +to be unconscious. + +"Good morning," she greeted them quietly. "I think we must be the laziest +people in town; at any rate, we seem to be the latest risers." + +Kent stared at her frankly, so that she flushed a little under the +scrutiny. Manley consciously avoided looking at her, and muttered something +unintelligible while he pulled out a chair three places distant from her. + +Val stole a sidelong, measuring look at her husband while she took a sip of +coffee, and then her eyes turned upon Kent. More than ever, it seemed to +him, they resembled the eyes of a lioness watching you quietly from the +corner of her cage. You could look at them, but you could not look into +them. Always they met your gaze with a baffling veil of inscrutability. But +they were darker than the eyes of a lioness; they were human eyes; woman +eyes--alluring eyes. She did not say a word, and, after a brief stare which +might have meant almost anything, she turned to her plate of toast and +broke away the burned edges of a slice and nibbled at the passable center +as if she had no trouble beyond a rather unsatisfactory breakfast. + +It was foolish, it was childish for three people who knew one another very +well, to sit and pretend to eat, and to speak no word; so Kent thought, +and tried to break the silence with some remark which would not sound +constrained. + +"It's going to storm," he flung into the silence, like chucking a rock into +a pond. + +"Do you think so?" Val asked languidly, just grazing him with a glance, +in that inattentive way she sometimes had. "Are you going out home--or to +what's left of it--to-day, Manley?" She did not look at him at all, Kent +observed. + +"I don't know--I'll have to hire a team--I'll see what--" + +"Mrs. Hawley thinks we ought to stay here for a few days--or that I +ought--while you make arrangements for building a new stable, and all +that." + +"If you want to stay," Manley agreed rather eagerly, "why, of course, you +can. There's nothing out there to--" + +"Oh, it doesn't matter in the slightest degree where I stay. I only +mentioned it because I promised her I would speak to you about it." There +was more than languor in her tone. + +"They're going to start the fireworks pretty quick," Kent mentally +diagnosed the situation and rose hurriedly. "Well, I've got to hunt a +horse, myself, and pull out for the Wishbone," he explained gratuitously. +"Ought to've gone last night. Good-bye." He closed the door behind him and +shrugged his shoulders. "Now they can fight it out," he told himself. "Glad +_I_ ain't a married man!" + +However, they did not fight it out then. Kent had no more than reached the +office when Val rose, hoped that Manley would please excuse her, and left +the room also. Manley heard her go up-stairs, found out from Arline what +was the number of Val's room, and followed her. The door was locked, but +when he rapped upon it Val opened it an inch and held it so. + +"Val, let me in. I want to talk with you. I--God knows how sorry I am--" + +"If He does, that ought to be sufficient," she answered coldly. "I don't +feel like talking now--especially upon the subject you would choose. You're +a man, supposedly. You must know what it is your duty to do. Please let us +not discuss it--now or ever. + +"But, Val--" + +"I don't want to talk about it, I tell you! I won't--I _can't_. You must do +without the conventional confession and absolution. You must have some sort +of conscience--let that receive your penitence." She started to close the +door, but he caught it with his hand. + +"Val--do you hate me?" + +She looked at him for a moment, as if she were trying to decide. "No," she +said at last, "I don't think I do; I'm quite sure that I do not. But I'm +terribly hurt and disappointed." She closed the door then and turned the +key. + +Manley stood for a moment rather blankly before it, then put his hands as +deep in his pockets as they would go, and went slowly down the stairs. At +that moment he did not feel particularly penitent. She would not listen to +"the conventional confession!" + +"That girl can be hard as nails!" he muttered, under his breath. + +He went into the office, got a cigar, and lighted it moodily. He glanced at +the bottles ranged upon the shelves behind the bar, drew in his breath for +speech, let it go in a sigh, and walked out. He knew perfectly well what +Val had meant. She had deliberately thrown him back upon his own strength. +He had fallen by himself, he must pick himself up; and she would stand +back and watch the struggle, and judge him according to his failure or his +success. He had a dim sense that it was a dangerous experiment. + +He looked for Kent, found him just as he was mounting at the stables, and +let him go almost without a word. After all, no one could help him. He +stood there smoking after Kent had gone, and when his cigar was finished he +wandered back to the hotel. As was always the case after hard drinking, he +had a splitting headache. He got a room as close to Val's as he could, +shut himself into it, and gave himself up to his headache and to gloomy +meditation. All day he lay upon the bed, and part of the time he slept. At +supper time he rapped upon Val's door, got no answer, and went down alone, +to find her in the dining room. There was an empty chair beside her, and he +took it as his right. She talked a little--about the fire and the damage it +had done. She said she was worried because she had forgotten to bring the +cat, and what would it find to eat out there? + +"Everything's burned perfectly black for miles and miles, you know," she +reminded him. + +They left the room together, and he followed her upstairs and to her door. +This time she did not shut him out, and he went in and sat down by the +window, and looked out upon the meager little street. Never, in the years +he had known her, had she been so far from him. He watched her covertly +while she searched for something in her suit case. + +"I'm afraid I didn't bring enough clothes to last more than a day or two," +she remarked. "I couldn't seem to think of anything that night. Arline did +most of the packing for me. I'm afraid I misjudged that woman, Manley; +there's a good deal to her, after all. But she _is_ funny." + +"Val, I want to tell you I'm going to--to be different. I've been a beast, +but I'm going to--" So much he had rushed out before she could freeze him +to silence again. + +"I hope so," she cut in, as he hesitated, "That is something you must judge +for yourself, and do by yourself. Do you think you will be able to get a +team tomorrow?" + +"Oh--to hell with a team!" Manley exploded. + +Val dropped her hairbrush upon the floor. "Manley Fleetwood! Has it come +to that, also? Isn't it enough to--" She choked. "Manley, you can be a--a +drunken sot, if you choose--I've no power to prevent you; but you shall +not swear in my presence. I thought you had some of the instincts of a +gentleman, but--" She set her teeth hard together. She was white around the +mouth, and her whole, slim body was aquiver with outraged dignity. + +There was something queer in Manley's eyes as he looked at her, the length +of the tiny room between them. + +"Oh, I beg your pardon. I remember, now, your Fern Hill ethics. I may _go_ +to hell, for all of you--you will simply hold back your immaculate, moral +skirts so that I may pass without smirching them; but I must not mention my +destination--that is so unrefined!" He got up from the chair, with a laugh +that was almost a snort. "You refuse to discuss a certain subject, though +it's almost a matter of life and death with me; at least, it was. Your +happiness and my own was at stake, I thought. But it's all right--I needn't +have worried about it. I still have some of the instincts of a gentleman, +and your pure ears shall not be offended by any profanity or any +disagreeable 'conventional confessions.' The absolution, let me say, I +expected to do without." He started, full of some secret intent, for the +door. + +Val humanized suddenly. By the time his fingers touched the door knob she +had read his purpose, had readied his side, and was clutching his arm with +both her hands. + +"Manley Fleetwood, what are you going to do?" She was actually panting with +the jump of her heart. + +He turned the knob, so that the latch clicked. "Get drunk. Be the drunken +sot you expect me to be. Go to that vulgar place which I must not mention +in your presence. Let go my arm, Val." + +She was all woman, then. She pulled him away from the door and the unnamed +horror which lay outside. She was not the crying sort, but she cried, just +the same--heartbrokenly, her head against his shoulder, as if she herself +were the sinner. She clung to him, she begged him to forgive her hardness. + +She learned something which every woman must learn if she would keep a +little happiness in her life: she learned how to forgive the man she loved, +and to trust him afterward. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII. ARLINE GIVES A DANCE + +A house, it would seem, is almost the least important part of a ranch; +one can camp, with frying pan and blankets, in the shade of a bush or the +shelter of canvas. But to do anything upon a ranch, one must have many +things--burnable things, for the most part, as Manley was to learn by +experience when he left Val at the hotel and rode out, the next day, to +Cold Spring Coulee. + +To ride over twenty miles of blackness is depressing enough in itself, +but to find, at the end of the journey, that one's work has all gone +for nothing, and one's money and one's plans and hopes, is worse than +depressing. Manley sat upon his horse and gazed rather blankly at the heap +of black cinders that had been his haystacks, and at the cold embers where +had stood his stables, and at the warped bits of iron that had been his +buckboard, his wagon, his rake and mower--all the things he had gathered +around him in the three years he had spent upon the place. + +The house merely emphasized his loss. He got down, picked up the cat, which +was mewing plaintively beside his horse, snuggled it into his arm, and +remounted. Val had told him to be sure and find the cat, and bring it back +with him. His horses and his cattle--not many, to be sure, in that land of +large holdings--were scattered, and it would take the round-up to gather +them together again. So the cat, and the horse he rode, the bleak coulee, +and the unattractive little house with its three rooms and its meager +porch, were all that he could visualize as his worldly possessions. And +when he thought of his bank account he winced mentally. Before snow fell he +would be debt-ridden, the best he could do. For he must have a stable, and +corral, and hay, and a wagon, and--he refused to remind himself of all the +things he must have if he would stay on the ranch. + +His was not a strong nature at best, and now he shrank from facing his +misfortune and wanted only to get away from the place. He loped his horse +half-way up the hill, which was not merciful riding. The half-starved cat +yowled in his arms, and struck her claws through his coat till he felt the +prick of them, and he swore; at the cat, nominally, but really at the trick +fate had played upon him. + +For a week he dallied in town, without heart or courage though Val urged +him to buy lumber and build, and cheered him as best she could. He did make +a half-hearted attempt to get lumber to the place, but there seemed to be +no team in town which he could hire. Every one was busy, and put him off. +He tried to buy hay of Blumenthall, of the Wishbone, of every man he met +who had hay. No one had any hay to sell, however. Blumenthall complained +that he was short, himself, and would buy if he could, rather than sell. +The Wishbone foreman declared profanely--that hay was going to be worth a +dollar a pound to _them_, before spring. They were all sorry for Manley, +and told him he was "sure playing tough luck," but they couldn't sell any +hay, that was certain. + +"But we must manage somehow to fix the place so we can live on it this +winter," Val would insist, when he told her how every move seemed blocked. +"You're very brave, dear, and I'm proud of the way you are holding out--but +Hope is not a good place for you. It would be foolish to stay in town. +Can't you buy enough hay here in town--baled hay from the store--to keep +our horses through the winter?" + +"Well, I tried," Manley responded gloomily. "But Brinberg is nearly out. +He's expecting a carload in, but it hasn't come yet. He said he'd let me +know when it gets here." + +Meanwhile the days slipped away, and imperceptibly the heat and haze of the +fires gave place to bright sunlight and chill winds, and then to the chill +winds without the sunshine. One morning the ground was frozen hard, and all +the roofs gleamed white with the heavy frost. Arline bestirred herself, and +had a heating stove set up in the parlor, and Val went down to the dry heat +and the peculiar odor of a rusted stove in the flush of its first fire +since spring. + +The next day, as she sat by her window up-stairs, she looked out at the +first nip of winter. A few great snowflakes drifted down from the slaty +sky; a puff of wind sent them dancing down the street, shook more down, +and whirled them giddily. Then the storm came and swept through the little +street and whined lonesomely around the hotel. + +Over at the saloon--"Pop's Place," it proclaimed itself in washed-out +lettering--three tied horses circled uneasily until they were standing back +to the storm, their bodies hunched together with the chill of it, their +tails whipping between their legs. They accentuated the blank dreariness of +the empty street. The snow was whitening their rumps and clinging, in tiny +drifts, upon the saddle skirts behind the cantles. + +All the little hollows of the rough, frozen ground were filling slowly, +making white patches against the brown of the earth--patches which widened +and widened until they met, and the whole street was blanketed with fresh, +untrodden snow. Val shivered suddenly, and hurried down-stairs where the +air was warm and all a-steam with cooking, and the odor of frying onions +smote the nostrils like a blow in the face. + +"I suppose we must stay here, now, till the storm is over," she sighed, +when she met Manley at dinner. "But as soon as it clears we must go back to +the ranch. I simply cannot endure another week of it." + +"You're gitting uneasy--I seen that, two or three days ago," said Arline, +who had come into the dining room with a tray of meat and vegetables, and +overheard her. "You want to stay, now, till after the dance. There's going +to be a dance Friday night, you know--everybody's coming. You got to wait +for that." + +"I don't attend public dances," Val stated calmly. "I am going home as soon +as the storm clears--if Manley can buy a little hay, and find our horses, +and get some sort of a driving vehicle." + +"Well, if he can't, maybe he can round up a _ridin'_ vee-hicle," Arline +remarked dryly, placing the meat before Manley, the potatoes before Val, +and the gravy exactly between the two, with mathematical precision. "I'm +givin' that dance myself. You'll have to go--I'm givin' it in your honor." + +"In--my--why, the _idea!_ It's good of you, but--" + +"And you're goin', and you're goin' to take your vi'lin over and play us +some pieces. I tucked it into the rig and brought it in, on purpose. I +planned out the hull thing, driving out to your place. In case you wasn't +all burned up, I made up my mind I was going to give you a dance, and git +you acquainted with folks. You needn't to hang back--I've told everybody it +was in your honor, and that you played the vi'lin swell, and we'd have +some real music. And I've sent to Chinook for the dance music--harp, two +fiddles, and a coronet--and you ain't going to stall the hull thing now. I +didn't mean to tell you till the last minute, but you've got to have time +to mate up your mind you'll go to a public dance for oncet in your life. +It ain't going to hurt you none. I've went, ever sence I was big enough to +reach up and grab holt of my pardner--and I'm every bit as virtuous as you +be. You're going, and you'n Man are going to head the grand march." + +Val's face was flushed, her lips pursed, and her eyes wide. Plainly she was +not quite sure whether she was angry, amused, or insulted. She descended +straight to a purely feminine objection. + +"But I haven't a thing to wear, and--" + +"Oh, yes, you have. While you was dillydallying out in the front room, that +night, wondering whether you'd have hysterics, or faint, or what all, I +dug deep in that biggest trunk of yourn, and fished up one of your party +dresses--white satin, it is, with embroid'ry all up 'n' down the front, and +slimpsy lace; it's kinda low-'n'-behold--one of them--" + +"My white satin--why, Mrs. Hawley! That--you must have brought the gown I +wore to my farewell club reception. It has a train, and--why, the _idea!_" + +"You can cut off the trail--you got plenty of time--or you can pin it up. +I didn't have time that night to see how the thing was made, and I took it +because I found white skirts and stockin's, and white satin slippers to go +with it, right handy. You're a bride, and white'll be suitable, and the +dance is in your honor. Wear it just as it is, fer all me. Show the folks +what real clothes look like. I never seen a woman dressed up that way in +my hull life. You wear it, Val, trail 'n' all. I'll back you up in it, and +tell folks it's my idee, and not yourn." + +"I'm not in the habit of apologizing to people for the clothes I wear." Val +lifted her chin haughtily. "I am not at all sure that I shall go. In fact, +I--" + +"Oh, you'll go!" Arline rested her arms upon her bony hips and snapped her +meager jaws together. "You'll go, if I have to carry you over. I've sent +for fifteen yards of buntin' to decorate the hall with. I ain't going to +all that trouble for nothing. I ain't giving a dance in honor of a certain +person, and then let that person stay away. You--why, you'd queer yourself +with the hull country, Val Fleetwood! You ain't got the least sign of an +excuse You got the clothes, and you ain't sick. There's a reason why you +got to show up. I ain't going into no details at present, but under the +circumstances, it's _advisable_." She smelled something burning then, and +bolted for the kitchen, where her sharp, rather nasal voice was heard +upbraiding Minnie for some neglect. + +Polycarp Jenks came in, eyed Val and Manley from under one lifted, eyebrow, +smiled skinnily, and pulled out a chair with a rasping noise, and sat down +facing them. Instinctively Val refrained from speaking her mind about +Arline and her dance before Polycarp, but afterward, in their own room, +she grew rather eloquent upon the subject. She would not go. She would not +permit that woman to browbeat her into doing what she did not want to do, +she said. In her honor, indeed! The impertinence of going to the bottom of +her trunk, and meddling with her clothes--with that reception gown, of all +others! The idea of wearing that gown to a frontier dance--even if she +consented to go to such a dance! And expecting her to amuse the company by +playing "pieces" on the violin! + +"Well, why not?" Manley was sitting rather apathetically upon the edge of +the bed, his arms resting upon his knees, his eyes moodily studying the +intricate rose pattern in the faded Brussels carpet. They were the first +words he had spoken; one might easily have doubted whether he had heard all +Val said. + +"Why not? Manley Fleetwood, do you mean to tell me--" + +"Why not go, and get acquainted, and quit feeling that you're a pearl cast +among swine? It strikes me the Hawley person is pretty level-headed on the +subject. If you're going to live in this country, why not quit thinking +how out of place you are, and how superior, and meet us all on a level? It +won't hurt you to go to that dance, and it won't hurt you to play for them, +if they want you to. You _can_ play, you know; you used to play at all the +musical doings in Fern Hill, and even in the city sometimes. And, let me +tell you, Val, we aren't quite savages, out here. I've even suspected, +sometimes, that we're just as good as Fern Hill." + +"We?" Val looked at him steadily. "So you wish to identify yourself with +these people--with Polycarp Jenks, and Arline Hawley, and--" + +"Why not? They're shaky on grammar, and their manners could stand a little +polish, but aside from that they're exactly like the people you've lived +among all your life. Sure, I wish to identify myself with them. I'm just a +rancher--pretty small punkins, too, among all these big outfits, and you're +a rancher's wife. The Hawley person could buy us out for cash to-morrow, if +she wanted to, and never miss the money. And, Val, she's giving that dance +in your honor; you ought to appreciate that. The Hawley doesn't take a +fancy to every woman she sees--and, let me tell you, she stands ace-high in +this country. If she didn't like you, she could make you wish she did." + +"Well, upon my word! I begin to suspect you of being a humorist, Manley. +And even if you mean that seriously--why, it's all the funnier." To prove +it, she laughed. + +Manley hesitated, then left the room with a snort, a scowl, and a slam of +the door; and the sound of Val's laughter followed him down the stairs. + +Arline came up, her arms full of white satin, white lace, white cambric, +and the toes of two white satin slippers showing just above the top of her +apron pockets. She walked briskly in and deposited her burden upon the bed. + +"My! them's the nicest smellin' things I ever had a hold of," she observed. +"And still they don't seem to smell, either. Must be a dandy perfumery +you've got. I brought up the things, seein' you know they're here. I +thought you could take your time about cuttin' off the trail and fillin' in +the neck and sleeves." + +She sat down upon the foot of the bed, carefully tucking her gingham apron +close about her so that it might not come in contact with the other. + +"I never did see such clothes," she sighed. "I dunno how you'll ever git +a chancet to wear 'em out in this country--seems to me they're most too +pretty to wear, anyhow, I can git Marthy Winters to come over and help +you--she does sewin'--and you can use my machine any time you want to. I'd +take a hold myself if I didn't have all the baking to do for the dance. +That Min can't learn nothing, seems like. I can't trust her to do a thing, +hardly, unless I stand right over her. Breed girls ain't much account ever; +but they're all that'll work out, in this country, seems like. Sometimes I +swear I'll git a Chink and be done with it--only I got to have somebody I +can talk to oncet in a while. I couldn't never talk to a Chink--they don't +seem hardly human to me. Do they to you? + +"And say! I've got some allover lace--it's eecrue--that you can fill in the +neck with; you're welcome to use it--there's most a yard of it, and I won't +never find a use for it. Or I was thinkin', there'll be enough cut off'n +the trail to make a gamp of the satin, sleeves and all." She lifted the +shining stuff with manifest awe. "It does seem a shame to put the shears +to it--but you never'll git any wear out of it the way it is, and I don't +believe--" + +"Mis' _Hawley!_" shrilled the voice of Minnie at the foot of the stairs. +"There's a couple of _drummers_ off'n the _train_, 'n' they want _supper_, +'n' what'll I _give_ 'em?" + +"My heavens! That girl'll drive me crazy, sure!" Arline hurried to the +door. "Don't take the roof off'n the house," she cried querulously down the +stairway. "I'm comin'." + +Val had not spoken a word. She went over to the bed, lifted a fold of +satin, and smiled down at it ironically. "Mamma and I spent a whole month +planning and sewing and gloating over you," she said aloud. "You were +almost as important as a wedding gown; the club's farewell reception--'To +what base uses we do--'" + +"Oh, here's your slippers!" Arline thrust half her body into the room and +held the slippers out to Val. "I stuck 'em into my pockets to bring up, and +forgot all about 'em, mind you, till I was handin' the drummers their tea. +And one of 'em happened to notice 'em, and raised right up outa his chair, +an' said: 'Cind'rilla, sure as I live! Say, if there's a foot in this town +that'll go into them slippers, for God's sake introduce me to the owner!' +I told him to mind his own business. Drummers do get awful fresh when they +think they can get away with it." She departed in a hurry, as usual. + +Every day after that Arline talked about altering the satin gown. Every day +Val was noncommittal and unenthusiastic. Occasionally she told Arline that +she was not going to the dance, but Arline declined to take seriously so +preposterous a declaration. + +"You want to break a leg, then," she told Val grimly on Thursday. "That's +the only excuse that'll go down with this bunch. And you better git a move +on--it comes off to-morrer night, remember." + +"I won't go, Manley!" Val consoled herself by declaring, again and again. +"The idea of Arline Hawley ordering me about like a child! Why should I go +if I don't care to go?" + +"Search me." Manley shrugged his shoulders. "It isn't so long, though, +since you were just as determined to stay and have the shivaree, you +remember." + +"Well, you and Mr. Burnett tried to do exactly what Arline is doing. You +seemed to think I was a child, to be ordered about." + +At the very last minute--to be explicit, an hour before the hall was +lighted, several hours after smoke first began to rise from the chimney, +Val suddenly swerved to a reckless mood. Arline had gone to her own room to +dress, too angry to speak what was in her mind. She had worked since five +o'clock that morning. She had bullied Val, she had argued, she had begged, +she had wheedled. Val would not go. Arline had appealed to Manley, and +Manley had assured her, with a suspicious slurring of his _esses_ that he +was out of it, and had nothing to say. Val, he said, could not be driven. + +It was after Arline had gone to her room and Manley had returned to the +"office" that Val suddenly picked up her hairbrush and, with an impish +light in her eyes, began to pile her hair high upon her head. With her lips +curved to match the mockery of her eyes, she began hurriedly to dress. +Later, she went down to the parlor, where four women from the neighboring +ranches were sitting stiffly and in constrained silence, waiting to be +escorted to the hall. She swept in upon them, a glorious, shimmery creature +all in white and gold. The women steed, wavered, and looked away--at the +wall, the floor, at anything but Val's bare, white shoulders and arms as +white. Arline had forgotten to look for gloves. + +Val read the consternation in their weather-tanned faces, and smiled in +wicked enjoyment. She would shock all of Hope; she would shock even Arline, +who had insisted upon this. Like a child in mischief, she turned and went +rustling down the ball to the dining room. She wanted to show Arline. She +had not thought of the possibility of finding any one but Arline and Minnie +there, so that she was taken slightly aback when she discovered Kent and +another man eating a belated supper. + +Kent looked up, eyed her sharply for just an instant, and smiled. + +"Good evening, Mrs. Fleetwood," he said calmly. "Ready for the ball, I see. +We got in late." He went on spreading butter upon his bread, evidently +quite unimpressed by her magnificence. + +The other man stared fixedly at his plate. It was a trifle, but Val +suddenly felt foolish and ashamed. She took a step or two toward the +kitchen, then retreated; down the hall she went, up the stairs and into her +own room, the door of which she shut and locked. + +"Such a fool!" she whispered vehemently, and stamped her white-shod foot +upon the carpet. "He looked perfectly disgusted--and so did that other man. +And no wonder. Such--it's _vulgar_, Val Fleetwood! It's just ill-bred, and +coarse, and horrid!" She threw herself upon the bed and put her face in the +pillow. + +Some one--she thought it sounded like Manley--came up and tried the door, +stood a moment before it, and went away again. Arline's voice, sharpened +with displeasure, she heard speaking to Minnie upon the stairs. They went +down, and there was a confusion of voices below. In the street beneath her +window footsteps sounded intermittently, coming and going with a certain +eagerness of tread. After a time there came, from a distance, the sound of +violins and the "coronet" of which Arline had been so proud; and mingled +with it was an undercurrent of shuffling feet, a mere whisper of sound, cut +sharply now and then by the sharp commands of the floor manager. They were +dancing--in her honor. And she was a fool; a proud, ill-tempered, selfish +fool.. + +With one of her quick changes of mood she rose, patted her hair smooth, +caught up a wrap oddly inharmonious with the gown and slippers, looped +her train over her arm, tool her violin, and ran lightly down-stairs. The +parlor, the dining room, the kitchen were deserted and the lights turned +low. She braced herself mentally, and, flushing at the unaccustomed act, +rapped timidly upon the door which opened into the office--which by that +time she knew was really a saloon. Hawley himself opened the door, and in +his eyes bulged at sight of her. + +"Is Mr. Fleetwood here? I--I thought, after all, I'd go to the dance," she +said, in rather a timid voice, shrinking back into the shadow. + +"Fleetwood? Why, I guess he's gone on over. He said you wasn't going. You +wait a minute. I--here, Kent! You take Mrs. Fleetwood over to the hall. +Man's gone." + +"Oh, no! I--really, it doesn't matter--" + +But Kent had already thrown away his cigarette and come out to her, closing +the door immediately after him. + +"I'll take you over--I was just going, anyway," He assured her, his eyes +dwelling upon her rather intently. + +"Oh--I wanted Manley. I--I hate to go--like this, it seems so--so queer, in +this place. At first I--I thought it would be a joke, but it isn't; it's +silly and,--and ill-bred. You--everybody will be shocked, and--" + +Kent took a step toward her, where she was shrinking against the stairway. +Once before she had lost her calm composure and had let him peep into her +mind. Then it had been on account of Manley; now, womanlike, it was her +clothes. + +"You couldn't be anything but all right, if you tried," he told her, +speaking softly. "It isn't silly to look the way the Lord meant you to +look. You--you--oh, you needn't worry--nobody's going to be shocked very +hard." He reached out and took the violin from her; took also her arm +and opened the outer door. "You're late," he said, speaking in a more +commonplace tone. "You ought to have overshoes, or something--those white +slippers won't be so white time you get there. Maybe I ought to carry you." + +"The idea!" she stepped out daintily upon the slushy walk. + +"Well, I can take you a block or two around, and have sidewalk all the way; +that'll help some. Women sure are a lot of bother--I'm plumb sorry for the +poor devils that get inveigled into marrying one." + +"Why, Mr. Burnett! Do you always talk like that? Because if you do, I don't +wonder--" + +"No," Kent interrupted, looking down at her and smiling grimly, "as it +happens, I don't. I'm real nice, generally speaking. Say! this is going to +be a good deal of trouble, do you know? After you dance with hubby, you've +got to waltz with me." + +"_Got_ to?" Val raised her eyebrows, though the expression was lost upon +him. + +"Sure. Look at the way I worked like a horse, saving your life--and the +cat's--and now leading you all over town to keep those nice white slippers +clean! By rights, you oughtn't to dance with anybody else. But I ain't +looking for real gratitude. Four or five waltzes is all I'll insist on, +but--" His tone was lugubrious in the extreme. + +"Well, I'll waltz with you once--for saving the cat; and once for saving +the slippers. For saving me, I'm not sure that I thank you." Val stepped +carefully over a muddy spot on the walk. "Mr. Burnett, you--really, you're +an awfully queer man." + +Kent walked to the next crossing and helped her over it before he answered +her. "Yes," he admitted soberly then, "I reckon you're right. I am--queer." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV. A WEDDING PRESENT + +Sunday it was, and Val had insisted stubbornly upon going back to the +ranch; somewhat to her surprise, if one might judge by her face, Arline +Hawley no longer demurred, but put up lunch enough for a week almost, and +announced that she was going along. Hank would have to drive out, to bring +back the team, and she said she needed a rest, after all the work and worry +of that dance. Manley, upon whose account it was that Val was so anxious, +seemed to have nothing whatever to say about it. He was sullenly +acquiescent--as was perhaps to be expected of a man who had slipped into +his old habits and despised himself for doing so, and almost hated his wife +because she had discovered it and said nothing. Val was thankful, during +that long, bleak ride over the prairie, for Arline's incessant chatter. It +was better than silence, when the silence means bitter thoughts. + +"Now," said Arline, moving excitedly in her seat when they neared Cold +Spring Coulee, "maybe I better tell you that the folks round here has kinda +planned a little su'prise for you. They don't make much of a showin' about +bein' neighborly--not when things go smooth--but they're right there when +trouble comes. It's jest a little weddin' present--and if it comes kinda +late in the day, why, you don't want to mind that. My dance that I gave was +a weddin' party, too, if you care to call it that. Anyway, it was to raise +the money to pay for our present, as far as it went--and I want to tell you +right now, Val, that you was sure the queen of the ball; everybody said you +looked jest like a queen in a picture, and I never heard a word ag'inst +your low-neck dress. It looked all right on _you_, don't you see? On me, +for instance, it woulda been something fierce. And I'm real glad you took a +hold and danced like you did, and never passed nobody up, like some woulda +done. You'll be glad you did, now you know what it was for. Even danced +with Polycarp Jenks--and there ain't hardly any woman but what'll turn +_him_ down; I'll bet he tromped all over your toes, didn't he?" + +"Sometimes," Val admitted. "What about the surprise you were speaking of, +Mrs. Hawley?" + +"It does seem as if you might call me Arline," she complained irrelevantly. +"We're comin' to that--don't you worry." + +"Is it--a piano?" + +"My lands, no! You don't need a fiddle and a piano both, do you? Man, +what'd you rather have for a weddin' present?" + +Manley, upon the front seat beside Hank, gave his shoulders an impatient +twitch. "Fifty thousand dollars," he replied glumly. + +"I'm glad you're real modest about it," Arline retorted sharply. She was +beginning to tell herself quite frequently that she "didn't have no time +for Man Fleetwood, seeing he wouldn't brace up and quit drinkin." + +Val's lips curled as she looked at Manley's back. "What I should like," she +said distinctly, "is a great, big pile of wood, all cut and ready for the +stove, and water pails that never would go empty. It's astonishing how +one's desires eventually narrow down to bare essentials, isn't it? But as +we near the place, I find those two things more desirable than a piano!" +Then she bit her lip angrily because she had permitted herself to give the +thrust. + +"Why, you poor thing! Man Fleetwood, do you--" + +Val impulsively caught her by the arm. "Oh, hush! I was only joking," she +said hastily. "I was trying to balance Manley's wish for fifty thousand +dollars, don't you see? It was stupid of me, I know." She laughed +unconvincingly. "Let me guess what the surprise is. First, is it large or +small?" + +"Kinda big," tittered Arline, falling into the spirit of the joke. + +"Bigger than a--wait, now. A sewing machine?" + +Arline covered her mouth with her hand and nodded dumbly. + +"You say all the neighbors gave it and the dance helped pay for it--let me +see. Could it possibly be--what in the world could it be? Manley, help me +guess! Is it something useful, or just something nice?" + +"Useful," said Arline, and snapped her jaws together as if she feared to +let another word loose. + +"Larger than a sewing machine, and useful." Val puckered her brows over the +puzzle. "And all the neighbors gave it. Do you know, I've been thinking all +sorts of nasty things about our poor neighbors, because they refused to +sell Manley any hay. And all the while they were planning this sur--" She +never finished that sentence, or the word, even. + +With a jolt over a rock, and a sharp turn to the right, Hank had brought +them to the very brow of the hill, where they could look down into the +coulee, and upon the house standing in its tiny, unkempt yard, just beyond +the sparse growth of bushes which marked the spring creek. Involuntarily +every head turned that way, and every pair of eyes looked downward. Hank +chirped to the horses, threw all his weight upon the brake, and they +rattled down the grade, the brake block squealing against the rear wheels. +They were half-way down before any one spoke. It was Val, and she almost +whispered one word: + +"Manley!" + +Arline's eyes were wet, and there was a croak in her voice when she cried +jubilantly: "Well, ain't that better 'n a sewin' machine--or a piano?" + +But Val did not attempt an answer. She was staring--staring as if she could +not convince herself of the reality. Even Manley was jarred out of his +gloomy meditations, and half rose in the seat that he might see over Hank's +shoulder. + +"That's what your neighbors have done," Arline began eagerly, "and they +nearly busted tryin' to git through in time, and to keep it a dead secret. +They worked like whiteheads, lemme tell you, and never even stopped for the +storm. The night of the dance I heard all about how they had to hurry. And +I guess Kent's there an' got a fire started, like I told him to. I was +afraid it might be colder'n what it is. I asked him if he wouldn't ride +over an' warm up the house t'day--and I see there's a smoke, all right." +She looked at Manley, and then turned to Val. "Well, ain't you goin' to say +anything? You dumb, both of you?" + +Val took a deep breath. "We should be dumb," she said contritely. "We +should go down on our knees and beg their pardon and yours--I especially. I +think I've never in my life felt quite so humbled--so overwhelmed with the +goodness of my fellows, and my own unworthiness. I--I can't put it into +words--all the resentment I have felt against the country and the people in +it--as if--oh, tell them all how I want them to forgive me for--for the way +I have felt. And--_Arline_--" + +"There, now--I didn't bargain for you to make it so serious," Arline +expostulated, herself near to crying. "It ain't nothing much--us folks +believe in helpin' when help's needed, that's all. For Heaven's sake, don't +go 'n' cry about it!" + +Hank pulled up at the gate with a loud _whoa_ and a grip of the brake. From +the kitchen stovepipe a blue ribbon of smoke waved high in the clear air. +Kent appeared, grinning amiably, in the doorway, but Val was looking +beyond, and scarcely saw him--beyond, where stood a new stable upon the +ashes of the old; a new corral, the posts standing solidly in the holes dug +for those burned away; a new haystack--when hay was almost priceless! A +few chickens wandered about near the stable, and Val recognized them as +Arline's prized Plymouth Rocks. Small wonder that she and Manley were +stunned to silence. Manley still looked as if some one had dealt him an +unexpected blow in the face. Val was white and wide-eyed. + +Together they walked out to the stable. When they stopped, she put her hand +timidly upon his aim. "Dear," she said softly, "there is only one way to +thank them for this, and that is to be the very best it is in us to be. We +will, won't we? We--we haven't been our best, but we'll start in right now. +Shall we, Manley?" + +Manley looked down at her for a moment, saying nothing. + +"Shall we, Manley? Let us start now, and try again. Let's play the fire +burned up our old selves, and we're all new, and strong--shall we? And we +won't feel any resentment for what is past, but we'll work together, and +think together, and talk together, without any hidden thing we can't +discuss freely. Please, Manley!" + +He knew what she meant, well enough. For the last two days he had been +drinking again. On the night of the dance he had barely kept within the +limit of decent behavior. He had read Val's complete understanding and her +disgust the morning after--and since then they had barely spoken except +when speech was necessary. Oh, he knew what she meant! He stood for another +minute, and she let go his arm and stood apart, watching his face. + +A good deal depended upon the next minute, and they both knew it, and +hardly breathed. His hand went slowly into a deep pocket of his overcoat, +his fingers closed over something, and drew it reluctantly to the light. +Shamefaced, he held it up for her to see--a flat bottle of generous size, +full to within a inch of the cork with a pale, yellow liquid. + +"There--take it, and break it into a million pieces," he said huskily. +"I'll try again." + +Her yellow-brown eyes darkened perceptibly. "Manley Fleetwood, _you_ must +throw it away. This is your fight--be a man and _fight_." + +"Well--there! May God damn me forever if I touch liquor again! I'm through +with the stuff for keeps!" He held the bottle high, without looking at it, +and sent it crashing against the stable door. + +"Manley!" She stopped her ears, aghast at his words, but for all that her +eyes were ashine. She went up to him and put her arms around him. "Now +we can start all over again," she said. "We'll count our lives from this +minute, dear, and we'll keep them clean and happy. Oh, I'm so glad! So glad +and so proud, dear!" + +Kent had got half-way down the path from the house; he stopped when Manley +threw the bottle, and waited. Now he turned abruptly and retraced his +steps, and he did not look particularly happy, though he had been smiling +when he left the kitchen. + +Arline turned from the window as he entered. + +"Looks like Man has swore off ag'in," she observed dryly. "Well, let's hope +'n' pray he stays swore off." + + + + +CHAPTER XV. A COMPACT + +The blackened prairie was fast hiding the mark of its fire torture under a +cloak of tender new grass, vividly green as a freshly watered, well-kept +lawn. Meadow larks hopped here and there, searching long for a sheltered +nesting place, and missing the weeds where they were wont to sway and +swell their yellow breasts and sing at the sun. They sang just as happily, +however, on their short, low flights over the levels, or sitting upon gray, +half-buried boulders upon some barren hilltop. Spring had come with lavish +warmth. The smoke of burning ranges, the bleak winter with its sweeping +storms of snow and wind, were pushed info the past, half forgotten in this +new heaven and new earth, when men were glad simply because they were +alive. + +On a still, Sunday morning--that day which, when work does not press, is +set apart in the range land for slight errands, attention to one's personal +affairs, and to the pursuit of pleasure--Kent jogged placidly down the long +hill into Cold Spring Coulee and pulled up at the familiar little unpainted +house of rough boards, with its incongruously dainty curtains at the +windows and its tiny yard, green and scrupulously clean. + +The cat with white spots on its sides was washing its face on the kitchen +doorstep. Val was kneeling beside the front porch, painstakingly stringing +white grocery twine upon nails, which she drove into the rough posts with a +small rock. The primitive trellis which resulted was obviously intended +for the future encouragement of the sweet-pea plants just unfolding their +second clusters of leaves an inch above ground. She did not see Kent at +first, and he sat quiet in the saddle, watching her with a flicker of +amusement in his eyes; but in a moment she struck her finger and sprang up +with a sharp little cry, throwing the rock from her. + +"Didn't you know that was going to happen, sooner or later?" Kent inquired, +and so made known his presence. + +"Oh--how do you do?" She came smiling down to the gate, holding the hurt +finger tightly clasped in the other hand. "How comes it you are riding this +way? Our trail is all growing up to grass, so few ever travel it." + +"We're all hard-working folks these days. Where's Man?" + +"Manley is down to the river, I think." She rested both arms upon the +gatepost and regarded him with her steady eyes. "If you can wait, he will +be back soon. He only went to see if the river is fordable. He thinks two +or three of our horses are on the other side, and he'd like to get them. +The river has been too high, but it's lowering rather fast. Won't you come +in?" She was pleasant, she was unusually friendly, but Kent felt vaguely +that, somehow, she was different. + +He had not seen her for three months. Just after Christmas he had met her +and Manley in town, when he was about to leave for a visit to his people in +Nebraska. He had returned only a week or so before, and, if the truth were +known, he was not displeased at the errand which brought him this way. He +dismounted, and when she moved away from the gate he opened it and went in. + +"Well," he began lightly, when he was seated upon the floor of the porch +and she was back at her trellis, "and how's the world been using you? Had +any more calamities while I've been gone?" + +She busied herself with tying together two pieces of string, so that the +whole would reach to a certain nail driven higher than her head. She stood +with both hands uplifted, and her face, and her eyes; she did not reply for +so long that Kent began to wonder if she had heard him. There was no reason +why he should watch her so intently, or why he should want to get up and +push back the one lock of hair which seemed always in rebellion and always +falling across her temple by itself. + +He was drifting into a dreamy wonder that all women with yellow-brown hair +should not be given yellow-brown eyes also, and to wishing vaguely that it +might be his luck to meet one some time--one who was not married--when she +looked down at him quite unexpectedly. He was startled, and half ashamed, +and afraid that she might not like what he, had been thinking. + +She was staring straight into his eyes, and he knew that she was thinking +of something that affected her a good deal. + +"Unless it's a calamity to discover that the world is--what it is, and +people in it are--what they are, and that you have been a blind idiot. Is +that a calamity, Mr. Cowboy? Or is it a blessing? I've been wondering." + +Kent discovered, when he started to speak, that he had run short of breath. +"I reckon that depends on how the discovery pans out," he ventured, after +a moment. He was not looking at her then. For some reason, unexplained to +himself, he felt that it wasn't right for him to look at her; nor wise; nor +quite pleasant in its effect. He did not know exactly what she meant, but +he knew very well that she meant something more than to make conversation. + +"That," she said, and gave a little sigh--"that takes so long--don't +you know? The panning out, as you call it. It's hard to see things very +clearly, and to make a decision that you know is going to stand the test, +and then--just sit down and fold your hands, because some sordid, petty +little reason absolutely prevents your doing anything. I hate waiting +for anything. Don't you? When I want to do a thing, I want to do it +immediately. These sweet-peas--now I've fixed the trellis for them to climb +upon, I resent it because they don't take hold right now. Nasty little +things--two inches high, when they should be two yards, and all covered +with beautiful blossoms." + +[Illustration: "Little woman, listen here," he said. "You're playing hard +luck, and I know it"] + +"Not the last of April," he qualified. "Give 'em a fair chance, can't you? +They'll make it, all right; things take time." + +She laughed surrenderingly, and came and sat down upon the porch near him, +and tapped a slipper toe nervously upon the soft, green sod. + +"Time! Yes--" She threw back her head and smiled at him brightly--and +appealingly, it seemed to Kent. "You remember what you told me once--about +sheep-herders and _such_ going crazy out here? The _such_ is sometimes +ready to agree with you." She turned her head with a quick impatience. +"Such is learning to ride a horse," she informed him airily. "Such does it +on the sly--and she fell off once and skinned her elbow, and she--well, +Such hasn't any sidesaddle--but she's learning, 'by granny!'" + +Kent laughed unsteadily, and looked sidelong at her with eyes alight. She +matched the glance for just about one second, and turned her eyes away with +a certain consciousness that gave Kent a savage delight. Of a truth, she +was different! She was human, she was intolerably alluring. She was not the +prim, perfectly well-bred young woman he had met at the train. Lonesome +Land was doing its work. She was beginning to think as an individual--as a +woman; not merely as a member of conventional society. + +"Such is beginning to be the proper stuff--'by granny," he told her softly. + +He was afraid his tone had offended her. She rose, and her color flared and +faded. She leaned slightly against the post beside her, and, with a hand +thrown up and half shielding her face, she stared out across the coulee to +the hill beyond. + +"Did you--I feel like a fool for talking like this, but one sometimes +clutches at the least glimmer of sympathy and--and understanding, and +speaks what should be kept bottled up inside, I suppose. But I've been +bottled up for so _long_--" She struck her free hand suddenly against her +lips, as if she would apply physical force to keep them from losing all +self-control. When she spoke again, her voice was calmer. "Did you ever get +to the point, Mr. Cowboy, where you--you dug right down to the bottom of +things, and found that you must do something or go mad--and there wasn't a +thing you could do? Did you ever?" She did not turn toward him, but kept +her eyes to the hills. When he did not answer, however, she swung her head +slowly and looked down at him, where he sat almost at her feet. + +Kent was leaning forward, studying the gashes he had cut in the sod with +his spurs. His brows were knitted close. + +"I kinda think I'm getting there pretty fast," he owned gravely when he +felt her gaze upon him. "Why?" + +"Oh--because you can understand how one must speak sometimes. Ever since I +came, you have been--I don't know--different. At first I didn't like you at +all; but I could see you were different. Since then--well, you have now and +then said something that made me see one could speak to you, and you would +understand. So I--" She broke off suddenly and laughed an apology. "Am I +boring you dreadfully? One grows so self-centered living alone. If you +aren't interested--" + +"I am." Kent was obliged to clear his throat to get those two words out. +"Go on. Say all you want to say." + +She laughed again wearily. "Lately," she confessed nervously, "I've taken +to telling my thoughts to the cat. It's perfectly safe, but, after all, it +isn't quite satisfying." She stopped again, and stood silent for a moment. + +"It's because I am alone, day after day, week in and week out," she went +on. "In a way, I don't mind it--under the circumstances I prefer to be +alone, really. I mean, I wouldn't want any of my people near me. But one +has too much time to think. I tell you this because I feel I ought to let +you know that you were right that time; I don't suppose you even remember +it! But I do. Once last fall--the first time you came to the ranch--you +know, the time I met you at the spring, you seemed to see that this big, +lonesome country was a little too much for me. I resented it then. I didn't +want any one to tell me what I refused to admit to myself. I was trying so +hard to like it--it seemed my only hope, you see. But now I'll tell you you +were right. + +"Sometimes I feel very wicked about it. Sometimes I don't care. And +sometimes I--I feel I shall go crazy if I can't talk to some one. Nobody +comes here, except Polycarp Jenks. The only woman I know really well in +the country is Arline Hawley. She's good as gold, but--she's intensely +practical; you can't tell her your troubles--not unless they're concrete +and have to do with your physical well-being. Arline lacks imagination." +She laughed again shortly. + +"I don't know why I'm taking it for granted you don't," she said. "You +think I'm talking pore nonsense, don't you, Mr. Cowboy?" She turned full +toward him, and her yellow-brown eyes challenged him, begged him for +sympathy and understanding, held him at bay--but most of all they set his +blood pounding sullenly in his veins. He got unsteadily to his feet. + +"You seem to pass up a lot of things that count, or you wouldn't say that," +he reminded her huskily. "That night in town, just after the fire, for +instance. And here, that same afternoon. I tried to jolly you out of +feeling bad, both those times; but you know I understood. You know damn' +_well_ I understood! And you know I was sorry. And if you don't know, I'd +do anything on God's green earth--" He turned sharply away from her and +stood kicking savagely backward at a clod with his rowel. Then he felt +her hand touch his arm, and started. After that he stood perfectly still, +except that he quivered like a frightened horse. + +"Oh, it doesn't mean much to you--you have your life, and you're a man, and +can do things when you want to. But I do so need a friend! Just somebody +who understands, to whom I can talk when that is the only thing will keep +me sane. You saved my life once, so I feel--no, I don't mean that. It isn't +because of anything you did; it's just that I feel I can talk to you more +freely than to any one I know. I don't mean whine. I hope I'm not a whiner. +If I've blundered, I'm willing to--to take my medicine, as you would say. +But if I can feel that somewhere in this big, empty country just one person +will always feel kindly toward me, and wish me well, and be sorry for we +when I--when I'm miserable, and--" She could not go on. She pressed her +lips together tightly, and winked back the tears. + +Kent faced about and laid both his hands upon her shoulders. His face was +very tender and rather sad, and if she had only understood as well as he +did--. But she did not. + +"Little woman, listen here," he said. "You're playing hard luck, and I know +it; maybe I don't know just how hard--but maybe I can kinda give a guess. +If you'll think of me as your friend--your pal, and if you'll always tell +yourself that your pal is going to stand by you, no matter what comes, +why--all right." He caught his breath. + +She smiled up at him, honestly pleased, wholly without guile--and wholly +blind. "I'd rather have such a friend, just now, than anything I know, +except--. But if your sweetheart should object--could you--" + +His fingers gripped her shoulders tighter for just a second, and he let her +go. "I guess that part'll be all right," he rejoined in a tone she could +not quite fathom. "I never had one in m' life." + +"Why, you poor thing!" She stood back and tilted her head at him. "You +poor--_pal_. I'll have to see about that immediately. Every young man wants +a sweetheart--at least, all the young men I ever knew wanted one, and--" + +"And I'll gamble they all wanted the same one," he hinted wickedly, feeling +himself unreasonably happy over something he could not quite put into +words, even if he had dared. + +"Oh, no. Hardly ever the same one, luckily. Do you know--pal, I've quite +forgotten what it was all about--the unburdening of my soul, I mean. After +all, I think I must have been just lonesome. The country is just as big, +but it isn't quite so--so _empty_, you see. Aren't you awfully vain, to see +how you have peopled it with your friendship?" She clasped her hands behind +her and regarded him speculatively. "I hope, Mr. Cowboy, you're in earnest +about this," she observed doubtfully. "I hope you have imagination enough +to see it isn't silly, because if I suspected you weren't playing fair, +and would go away and laugh at me, I'd--scratch--you." She nodded her head +slowly at him. "I've always been told that, with tiger eyes, you find the +disposition of a tiger. So if you don't mean it, you'd better let me know +at once." + +Kent brought the color into her cheeks with his steady gaze. "I was just +getting scared _you_ didn't mean it," he averred. "If my pal goes back on +me--why, Lord help her!" + +She took a slow, deep breath. "How is it you men ratify a solemn +agreement?" she puzzled. "Oh, yes." With a pretty impulse she held out her +right hand, half grave, half playful. "Shake on it, pal!" + +Kent took her hand and pressed it as hard as he dared. "You're going to be +a dandy little chum," he predicted gamely. "But let me tell you right now, +if you ever get up on your stilts with me, there's going to be all kinds of +trouble. You call me Kent--that is," he qualified, with a little, unsteady +laugh, "when there ain't any one around to get shocked." + +"I suppose this _isn't_ quite conventional," she conceded, as if the +thought had just then occurred to her. "But, thank goodness, out here there +aren't any conventions. Every one lives as every one sees fit. It isn't the +best thing for some people," she added drearily. "Some people have to +be bolstered up by conventions, or they can't help miring in their own +weaknesses. But we don't; and as long as we understand--" She looked to him +for confirmation. + +"As long as we understand, why, it ain't anybody's business but our own," +he declared steadily. + +She seemed relieved of some lingering doubt. "That's exactly it. I don't +know why I should deny myself a friend, just because that friend happens to +be a man, and I happen to be--married. I never did have much patience with +the rule that a man must either be perfectly indifferent, or else make +love. I'm so glad you--understand. So that's all settled," she finished +briskly, "and I find that, as I said, it isn't at all necessary for me to +unburden my soul." + +They stood quiet for a moment, their thoughts too intangible for speech. + +"Come inside, won't you?" she invited at last, coming back to everyday +matters. "Of course you're hungry--or you ought to be. You daren't run away +from my cooking this time, Mr. Cowboy. Manley will be back soon, I think. I +must get some lunch ready." + +Kent replied that he would stay outside and smoke, so she left him with a +fleeting smile, infinitely friendly and confiding and glad. He turned and +looked after her soberly, gave a great sigh, and reached mechanically for +his tobacco and papers; thoughtfully rolled a cigarette, lighted it, and +held the match until it burned quite down to his thumb and fingers. "Pals!" +he said just under his breath, for the mere sound of the word. "All +right--pals it is, then." + +He smoked slowly, listening to her moving about in the house. Her steps +came nearer. He turned to look. + +"What was it you wanted to see Manley about?" she asked him from the +doorway. "I just happened to wonder what it could be." + +"Well, the Wishbone needs men, and sent me over to tell him he can go to +work. The wagons are going to start to-morrow. He'll want to gather his +cattle up, and of course we know about how he's fixed--for saddle horses +and the like. He can work for the outfit and draw wages, and get his cattle +thrown back on this range and his calves branded besides. Get paid for +doing what he'll have to do anyhow, you see." + +"I see." Val pushed back the rebellious lock of hair. "Of course you +suggested the idea to the Wishbone. You're always doing something--" + +"The outfit is short-handed," he reiterated. "They need him. They ain't +straining a point to do Man a favor--don't you ever think it! Well--he's +coming," he broke off, and started to the gate. + +Manley clattered up, vociferously glad to greet him. Kent, at his urgent +invitation, led his horse to the stable and turned him into the corral, +unsaddled and unbridled him so that he could eat. Also, he told his errand. +Manley interrupted the conversation to produce a bottle of whisky from a +cunningly concealed hole in the depleted haystack, and insisted that Kent +should take a drink. Kent waved it off, and Manley drew the cork and held +the bottle to his own lips. + +As he stood there, with his face uplifted while the yellow liquor gurgled +down his throat, Kent watched him with a curiously detached interest. So +that's how Manley had kept his vow! he was thinking, with an impersonal +contempt. Four good swallows--Kent counted them. + +"You're hitting it pretty strong, Man, for a fellow that swore off last +fall," he commented aloud. + +Manley took down the bottle, gave a sigh of pure, animal satisfaction, and +pushed the cork in with an unconsciously regretful movement. + +"A fellow's got to get something out of life," he defended peevishly. "I've +had pretty hard luck--it's enough to drive a fellow to most any kind of +relief. Burnt out, last fall--cattle scattered and calves running the range +all winter--I haven't got stock enough to stand that sort of a deal, Kent. +No telling where I stand now on the cattle question. I did have close to a +hundred head--and three of my best geldings are missing--a poor man can't +stand luck like that. I'm in debt too--and when you've got an iceberg in +the house--when a man's own wife don't stand by him--when he can't get +any sympathy from the very one that ought to--but, then, I hope I'm a +gentleman; I don't make any kick against _her_--my domestic affairs are +my own affairs. Sure. But when your wife freezes up solid--" He held the +bottle up and looked at it. "Best friend I've got," he finished, with a +whining note in his voice. + +Kent turned away disgusted. Manley had coarsened. He had "slopped down" +just when he should have braced up and caught the fighting spirit--the +spirit that fights and overcomes obstacles. With a tightening of his chest, +he thought of his "pal," tied for life to this whining drunkard. No wonder +she felt the need of a friend! + +"Well, are you going out with the Wishbone?" he asked tersely, jerking his +thoughts back to his errand. "If you are, you'll need to go over there +to-night--the wagons start out to-morrow. Maybe you better ride around by +Polly's place and have him come over here, once in a while, to look after +things. You can't leave your wife alone without somebody to kinda keep an +eye out for her, you know. Polycarp ain't going to ride this spring; he's +got rheumatism, or some darned thing. But he can chop what wood she'll +need, and go to town for her once in a while, and make sure she's all +right. You better leave your gentlest horse here for her to use, too. She +can't be left afoot out here." + +Manley was taking another long swallow from the bottle, but he heard. + +"Why, sure--I never thought about that. I guess maybe I _had_ better get +Polycarp. But Val could make out all right alone. Why, she's held it down +here for a week at a time--last winter, when I'd forgot to come home"--he +winked shamelessly--"or a storm would come up so I couldn't get home. Val +isn't like some fool women, I'll say that much for her. She don't care +whether I'm around or not; fact is, sometimes I think she's better pleased +when I'm gone. But you're right--I'll see Polycarp and have him come over +once in a while. Sure. Glad you spoke of it. You always had a great head +for thinking about other people, Kent. You ought to get married." + +"No, thanks," Kent scowled. "I haven't got any grudge against women. +The world's full of men ready and willing to give 'em a taste of pure, +unadulterated hell." + +Manley stared at him stupidly, and then laughed doubtfully, as if he felt +certain of having, by his dullness, missed the point of a very good joke. + +After that the time was filled with the preparations for Manley's absence. +Kent did what he could to help, and Val went calmly about the house, +packing the few necessary personal belongings which might be stuffed into a +"war bag" and used during round-up. Beyond an occasional glance of friendly +understanding, she seemed to have forgotten the compact she had made with +Kent. + +But when they were ready to ride away, Kent purposely left his gloves lying +upon the couch, and remembered them only after Manley was in the saddle. +So he went back, and Val followed him into the room. He wanted to say +something--he did not quite know what--something that would bring them a +little closer together, and keep them so; something that would make her +think of him often and kindly. He picked up his gloves and held out his +hand to her--and then a diffidence seized his tongue. There was nothing he +dared say. All the eloquence, all the tenderness, was in his eyes. + +"Well--good-by, pal. Be good to yourself," he said simply. + +Val smiled up at him tremulously. "Good-by, my one friend. Don't--don't get +hurt!" + +Their clasp tightened, their hands dropped apart rather limply. Kent went +out and got upon his horse, and rode away beside Manley, and talked of the +range and of the round-up and of cattle and a dozen other things which +interest men. But all the while one exultant thought kept reiterating +itself in his mind: "She never said that much to _him!_ She never said that +much to _him!_" + + + + +CHAPTER XVI. MANLEY'S NEW TACTICS + +To the east, to the south, to the north went the riders of the Wishbone, +gathering the cattle which the fires had driven afar. No rivers stopped +them, nor mountains, nor the deep-scarred coulees, nor the plains. It was +Manley's first experience in real round-up work, for his own little herd he +had managed to keep close at home, and what few strayed afar were turned +back, when opportunity afforded, by his neighbors, who wished him well. Now +he tasted the pride of ownership to the full, when a VP cow and her calf +mingled with the milling Wishbones and Double Diamonds. He was proud of his +brand, and proud of the sentiment which had made him choose Val's initials. +More than once he explained to his fellows that VP meant Val Peyson, and +that he had got it recorded just after he and Val were engaged. He was not +sentimental about her now, but he liked to dwell upon the fact that he had +been; it showed that he was capable of fine feeling. + +More dominant, however, as the weeks passed and the branding went on, +became the desire to accumulate property--cattle. The Wishbone brand went +scorching through the hair of hundreds of calves, while the VP scared tens. +It was not right. He felt, somehow, cheated by fate. He mentally figured +the increase of his herd, and it seemed to him that it took a long while, +much longer than it should, to gain a respectable number in that manner. He +cast about in his mind for some rich acquaintance in the East who might be +prevailed upon to lend him capital enough to buy, say, five hundred cows. +He began to talk about it occasionally when the boys lay around in the +evenings. + +"You want to ride with a long rope," suggested Bob Royden, grinning openly +at the others. "That's the way to work up in the cow business. Capital +nothing! You don't get enough excitement buying cattle; you want to steal +'em. That's what I'd do if I had a brand of my own and all your ambitions +to get rich." + +"And get sent up," Manley rounded out the situation. "No, thanks." He +laughed. "It's a better way to get to the pen than it is to get rich, from +all accounts." + +Sandy Moran remembered a fellow who worked a brand and kept it up for seven +or eight years before they caught him, and he recounted the tale between +puffs at his cigarette. "Only they didn't catch him" he finished. "A +puncher put him wise to what was in the wind, and he sold out cheap to a +tenderfoot and pulled his freight. They never did locate him." Then, with a +pointed rock which he picked up beside him, he drew a rude diagram or two +in the dirt. "That's how he done it," he explained. "Pretty smooth, too." + +So the talk went on, as such things will, idly, without purpose save to +pass the time. Shop talk of the range it was. Tales of stealing, of working +brands, and of branding unmarked yearlings at weaning time. Of this big +cattleman and that, who practically stole whole herds, and thereby took +long strides toward wealth. Range scandals grown old; range gossip all of +it, of men who had changed a brand or made one, using a cinch ring at a +tiny fire in a secluded hollow, or a spur, or a jackknife; who were caught +in the act, after the act, or merely suspected of the crime. Of "sweat" +brands, blotched brands, brands added to and altered, of trials, of +shootings, of hangings, even, and "getaways" spectacular and humorous and +pathetic. + +Manley, being in a measure a pilgrim, and having no experience to draw +upon, and not much imagination, took no part in the talk, except that he +listened and was intensely interested. Two months of mingling with men who +talked little else had its influence. + +That fall, when Manley had his hay up, and his cattle once more ranging +close, toward the river and in the broken country bounded upon the west by +the fenced-in railroad, three calves bore the VP brand--three husky heifers +that never had suckled a VP mother. So had the range gossip, sown by chance +in the soil of his greed of gain and his weakening moral fiber, borne +fruit. + +The deed scared him sober for a month. For a month his color changed and +his blood quickened whenever a horseman showed upon the rim of Cold Spring +Coulee. For a month he never left the ranch unless business compelled him +to do so, and his return was speedy, his eyes anxious until he knew that +all was well. After that his confidence returned. He grew more secretive, +more self-assured, more at ease with his guilt. He looked the Wishbone men +squarely in the eye, and it seldom occurred to him that he was a thief; or +if it did, the word was but a synonym for luck, with shrewdness behind. +Sometimes he regretted his timidity. Why three calves only? In a deep +little coulee next the river--a coulee which the round-up had missed--had +been more than three. He might have doubled the number and risked no more +than for the three. The longer he dwelt upon that the more inclined he was +to feel that he had cheated himself. + +That fall there were no fires. It would be long before men grew careless +when the grass was ripened and the winds blew hot and dry from out the +west. The big prairie which lay high between the river and Hope was dotted +with feeding cattle. Wishbones and Double Diamonds, mostly, with here and +there a stray. + +Manley grew wily, and began to plan far in advance. He rode here and there, +quietly keeping his own cattle well down toward the river. There was +shelter there, and feed, and the idea was a good one. Just before the river +broke up he saw to it that a few of his own cattle, and with them some +Wishbone cows and a steer or two, were ranging in a deep, bushy coulee, +isolated and easily passed by. He had driven them there, and he left them +there. That spring he worked again with the Wishbone. + +When the round-up swept the home range, gathering and branding, it chanced +that his part of the circle took him and Sandy Moran down that way. It was +hot, and they had thirty or forty head of cattle before them when they +neared that particular place. + +"No need going down into the breaks here," he told Sandy easily. "I've +been hazing out everything I came across lately. They were mostly my own, +anyway. I believe I've got it pretty well cleaned up along here." + +Sandy was not the man to hunt hard riding. He went to the rim of the coulee +and looked down for a minute. He saw nothing moving, and took Manley's word +for it with no stirring of his easy-going conscience. He said all right, +and rode on. + + + + +CHAPTER XVII. VAL BECOMES AN AUTHOR + +Quite as marked had been the change in Val that year. Every time Kent saw +her, he recognized the fact that she was a little different; a little less +superior in her attitude, a little more independent in her views of life. +Her standards seemed slowly changing, and her way of thinking. He did not +see her often, but when he did the mockery of their friendship struck him +more keenly, his inward rebellion against circumstances grew more bitter. +He wondered how she could be so blind as to think they were just pals, and +no more. She did think so. All the little confidences, all the glances, all +the smiles, she gave and received frankly, in the name of friendship. + +"You know, Kent, this is my ideal of how people should be," she told him +once, with a perfectly honest enthusiasm. "I've always dreamed of such a +friendship, and I've always believed that some day the right man would come +along and make it possible. Not one in a thousand could understand and meet +one half-way--" + +"They'd be liable to go farther," Kent assented dryly. + +"Yes. That's just the trouble. They'd spoil an ideal friendship by falling +in love." + +"Darned chumps," Kent classed them sweepingly. + +"Exactly. Pal, your vocabulary excites my envy. It's so forcible +sometimes." + +Kent grinned reminiscently. "It sure is, old girl." + +"Oh, I don't mean necessarily profane. I wonder what your vocabulary will +do to the secret I'm going to tell you." The sweet-peas had reached the +desired height and profusion of blossoms, thanks to the pails and pails +of water Val had carried and lavished upon them, and she was gathering a +handful of the prettiest blooms for him. Her cheeks turned a bit pinker as +she spoke, and her hesitation raised a wild hope briefly in Kent's heart. + +"What is it?" He had to force the words out. + +"I--I hate to tell, but I want you to--to help me." + +"Well?" To Kent, at that moment, she was not Manley's wife; she was not any +man's wife; she was the girl he loved--loved with the primitive, absorbing +passion of the man who lives naturally and does not borrow his morals from +his next-door neighbor. His code of ethics was his own, thought out by +himself. Val hated her husband, and her husband did not seem to care much +for her. They were tied together legally. And a mere legality could not +hold back the emotions and the desires of Kent Burnett. With him, it was +not a question of morals: it was a question of Val's feeling in the matter. + +Val looked up at him, found something strange in his eyes, and immediately +looked away again. + +"Your eyes are always saying things I can't hear," she observed +irrelevantly. + +"Are they? Do you want me to act as interpreter?" + +"No. I just want you to listen. Have you noticed anything different about +me lately, Kent?" She tilted her head, while she passed judgment upon a +cluster of speckled blossoms, odd but not particularly pretty. + +"What do you mean, anyway? I'm liable to get off wrong if I tell you--" + +"Oh, you're so horribly cautious! Have I seemed any more content--any +happier lately?" + +Kent picked a spray of flowers and puled them ruthlessly to pieces. "Maybe +I've kinda hoped so," he said, almost in a whisper. + +"Well, I've a new interest in life. I just discovered it by accident, +almost--" + +Kent lifted his head and looked keenly at her, and his face was a lighter +shade of brown than it had been. + +"It seems to change everything. Pal, I--I've been writing things." + +Kent discovered he had been holding his breath, and let it go in a long +sigh. + +"Oh!" After a minute he smiled philosophically. "What kinda things?" he +drawled. + +"Well, verses, but mostly stories. You see," she explained impulsively, "I +want to earn some money--of my own. I haven't said much, because I hate +whining; but really, things are growing pretty bad--between Manley and me. +I hope it isn't my fault. I have tried every way I know to keep my faith in +him, and to--to help him. But he's not the same as he was. You know that. +And I have a good deal of pride. I can't--oh, it's intolerable having to +ask a man for money! Especially when he doesn't want to give you any," she +added naively. "At first it wasn't necessary; I had a little of my own, and +all my things were new. But one must eventually buy things--for the +house, you know, and for one's personal needs--and he seems to resent +it dreadfully. I never would have believed that Manley could be +stingy--actually stingy; but he is, unfortunately. I hate to speak of his +faults, even to you. But I've got to be honest with you. It isn't nice to +say that I'm writing, not for any particularly burning desire to express +my thoughts, nor for the sentiment of it, but to earn money. It's terribly +sordid, isn't it?" She smiled wistfully up at him. "But there seems to be +money in it, for those who succeed, and it's work that I can do here. I +have oceans of time, and I'm not disturbed!" Her lips curved into bitter +lines. "I do so much thinking, I might as well put my brain to some use." +With one of her sudden changes of mood, she turned to Kent and clasped both +hands upon his arm. + +"Now you see, pal, how much our friendship means to me," she said softly. +"I couldn't have told this to another living soul! It seems awfully +treacherous, saying it even to you--I mean about him. But you're so +good--you always understand, don't you, pal?" + +"I guess so." Kent forced the words out naturally, and kept his breath +even, and his arms from clasping her. He considered that he performed quite +a feat of endurance. + +"You're modest!" She gave his arm a little shake. "Of course you do. You +know I'm not treacherous, really. You know I'd do anything I could for him. +But this is something that doesn't concern him at all. He doesn't know it, +but that is because he would only sneer. When I have really sold something, +and received the money for it, then it won't matter to me who knows. But +now it's a solemn secret, just between me and my pal." Her yellow-brown +eyes dwelt upon his face. + +Kent, stealing a glance at her from under his drooped lids, wondered if she +had ever given any time to analyzing herself. He would have given much to +know if, down deep in her heart, she really believed in this pal business; +if she was really a friend, and no more. She puzzled him a good deal, +sometimes. + +"Well--if anybody can make good at that business, you sure ought to; +you've got brains enough to write a dictionary." He permitted himself the +indulgence of saying that much, and he was perfectly sincere. He honestly +considered Val the cleverest woman in the world. + +She laughed with gratification. "Your sublime confidence, while it is +undoubtedly mistaken, is nevertheless appreciated," she told him primly, +moving away with her hands full of flowers. "If you've got the nerve, come +inside and read some of my stuff; I want to know if it's any good at all." + +Presently he was seated upon the couch in the little, pathetically bright +front room, and he was knitting his eyebrows over Val's beautifully regular +handwriting,--pages and pages of it, so that there seemed no end to the +task,--and was trying to give his mind to what he was reading instead of to +the author, sitting near him with her hands folded demurely in her lap and +her eyes fixed expectantly upon his face, trying to read his decision even +as it was forming. + +Some verses she had tried on him first. Kent, by using all his +determination of character, read them all, every word of them. + +"That's sure all right," he said, though, beyond a telling phrase or +two,--one line in particular which would stick in his memory: + + "Men live and love and die in that lonely land,"-- + +he had no very clear idea of what it was all about. Certain lines seemed to +go bumping along, and one had to mispronounce some of the final words to +make them rhyme with others gone before, but it was all right--Val wrote +it. + +"I think I do better at stories," she ventured modestly. "I wrote one--a +little story about university life--and sent it to a magazine. They wrote a +lovely letter about it, but it seems that field is overdone, or something. +The editor asked me why, living out here in the very heart of the West, I +don't try Western stories. I think I shall--and that's why I said I should +need your help. I thought we might work together, you know. You've lived +here so long, and ought to have some splendid ideas--things that have +happened, or that you've heard--and you could tell me, and I'd write them +up. Wouldn't you like to collaborate--'go in cahoots' on it?" + +"Sure." Kent regarded her thoughtfully. She really was looking brighter and +happier, and her enthusiasm was not to be mistaken. Her world had changed. +"Anything I can do to help, you know--" + +"Of course I know, I think it's perfectly splendid, don't you? We'll divide +the money--when there _is_ any, and--" + +"Will we?" His tone was noncommittal in the extreme. + +"Of course. Now, don't let's quarrel about that till we come to it. I have +a good idea of my own, I think, for the first story. A man comes out here +and disappears, you know, and after a while his sister comes to find him. +She gets into all kinds of trouble--is kidnapped by a gang of robbers, and +kept in a cave. When the leader of the gang comes back--he has been away +on some depredation--you see, I have only the bare outline of the story +yet--and, well, it's her brother! He kills the one who kidnapped her, and +she reforms him. Of course, there ought to be some love interest. I think, +perhaps, one member of the gang ought to fall in love with her, don't you +know? And after a while he wins her--" + +"She'll reform him, too, I reckon." + +"Oh, yes. She couldn't love a man she couldn't respect--no woman could." + +"Oh!" Kent took a minute to apply that personally. It was of value to him, +because it was an indication of Val's own code. "Maybe," he suggested +tentatively, "she'd get busy and reform the whole bunch." + +"Oh, say--that would be great! She's an awfully sweet little +thing--perfectly lovely, you know--and they'd all be in love with her, so +it wouldn't be improbable. Don't you remember, Kent, you told me once that +a man would do _anything_ for a woman, if he cared enough for her?" + +"Sure. He would, too." Kent fought back a momentary temptation to prove the +truth of it by his own acquiescence in this pal business. He was saved from +disaster by a suspicion that Val would not be able to see it from his point +of view, and by the fact that he would much rather be pals than nothing. + +She would have gone on, talking and planning and discussing, indefinitely. +But the sun slid lower and lower, and Kent was not his own master. The time +came when he had to go, regardless of his own wishes, or hers. + +When he came again, the story was finished, and Val was waiting, with +extreme impatience, to read it to him and hear his opinion before she sent +it away. Kent was not so impatient to hear it, but he did not tell her so. +He had not seen her for a month, and he wanted to talk; not about anything +in particular--just talk about little things, and see her eyes light up +once in a while, and her lips purse primly when he said something daring, +and maybe have her play something on the violin, while he smoked and +watched her slim wrist bend and rise and fall with the movement of the bow. +He could imagine no single thing more fascinating than that--that, and the +way she cuddled the violin under her chin, in the hollow of her neck. + +But Val would not play--she had been too busy to practice, all spring and +summer; she scarcely ever touched the violin, she said. And she did not +want to talk--or if she did, it was plain that she had only one theme. So +Kent, perforce, listened to the story. Afterward, he assured her that it +was "outa sight." As a matter of fact, half the time he had not heard a +word of what she was reading; he had been too busy just looking at her and +being glad he was there. He had, however, a dim impression that it was a +story with people in it whom one does not try to imagine as ever being +alive, and with a West which, beyond its evident scarcity of inhabitants, +was not the West he knew anything about. One paragraph of description had +caught his attention, because it seemed a fairly accurate picture of the +bench land which surrounded Cold Spring Coulee; but it had not seemed to +have anything to do with the story itself. Of course, it must be good--Val +wrote it. He began to admire her intensely, quite apart from his own +personal subjugation. + +Val was pleased with his praise. For two solid hours she talked of nothing +but that story, and she gave him some fresh chocolate cake and a pitcher +of lemonade, and urged him to come again in about three weeks, when she +expected to hear from the magazine she thought would be glad to take the +story; the one whose editor had suggested that she write of the West. + +In the fall, and in the winter, their discussions were frequently hampered +by Manley's presence. But Val's enthusiasm, though nipped here and there +by unappreciative editors, managed, somehow, to live; or perhaps it had +developed into a dogged determination to succeed in spite of everything. +She still wrote things, and she still read them to Kent when there was +time and opportunity; sometimes he was bold enough to criticize the worst +places, and to tell her how she might, in his opinion, remedy them. +Occasionally Val would take his advice. + +So the months passed. The winds blew and brought storm and heat and +sunshine and cloud. Nothing, in that big land, appreciably changed, except +the people; and they so imperceptibly that they failed to realize it until +afterward. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII. VAL'S DISCOVERY + +With a blood-red sun at his back and a rosy tinge upon all the hills before +him, Manley rode slowly down the western rim of Cold Spring Coulee, driving +five rebellious calves that had escaped the branding iron in the spring. +Though they were not easily driven in any given direction, he was +singularly patient with them, and refrained from bellowing epithets and +admonitions, as might have been expected. When he was almost down the hill, +he saw Val standing in the kitchen door, shading her eyes with her hands +that she might watch his approach. + +"Open the corral gate!" he shouted to her, in the tone of command. "And +stand back where you can head 'em off if they start up the coulee!" + +Val replied by doing as she was told; she was not in the habit of wasting +words upon Manley; they seemed always to precipitate an unpleasant +discussion of some sort, as if he took it for granted she disapproved of +all he did or said, and was always upon the defensive. + +The calves came on, lumbering awkwardly in a half-hearted gallop, as if +they had very little energy left. Their tongues protruded, their mouths +dribbled a lathery foam, and their rough, sweaty hides told Val of the long +chase--for she was wiser in the ways of the range land than she had been. +She stood back, gently waving her ruffled white apron at them, and when +they dodged into the corral, rolling eyes at her, she ran up and slammed +the gate shut upon them, looped the chain around the post, and dropped the +iron hook into a link to fasten it. Manley galloped up, threw himself off +his panting horse, and began to unsaddle. + +"Get some wood and start a fire, and put the iron in, Val," he told her +brusquely. + +Val looked at him quickly. "Now? Supper's all ready, Manley. There's no +hurry about branding them, is there?" And she added: "Dear me! The round-up +must have just skimmed the top off this range last spring. You've had to +brand a lot of calves that were missed." + +"What the devil is it to you?" he demanded roughly. "I want that fire, +madam, and I want it _now_. I rather think I knew when I want to brand +without asking your advice." + +Val curved her lips scornfully, shrugged and obeyed She was used to that +sort of thing, and she did not mind very much. He had brutalized by +degrees, and by degrees she had hardened. He could rouse no feeling now but +contempt. + +"If you'll kindly wait until I put back the supper," she said coldly. "I +suppose in your zeal one need not sacrifice your food; you're still rather +particular about that. I observe." + +Manley was leading his horse to the stable, and, though he answered +something, the words were no more than a surly mumble. + +"He's been drinking again," Val decided dispassionately, on the way to the +house. "I suppose he carried a bottle in his pocket--and emptied it." + +She was not long; there was a penalty of profane reproach attached to +delay, however slight, when Manley was in that mood. She had the fire going +and the VP iron heating by the time he had stabled and fed his horse, and +had driven the calves into the smaller pen. He drove a big, line-backed +heifer into a corner, roped and tied her down with surprising dexterity, +and turned impatiently. + +"Come! Isn't that iron ready yet?" + +Val, on the other side of the fence, drew it out and inspected it +indifferently. + +"It is not, Mr. Fleetwood. If you are in a very great hurry, why not apply +your temper to it--and a few choice remarks?" + +"Oh, don't try to be sarcastic--it's too pathetic. Kick a little life into +that fire." + +"Yes, sir--thank you, sir." Val could be rather exasperating when she +chose. She always could be sure of making Manley silently furious when +she adopted that tone of respectful servility--as employed by butlers and +footmen upon the stage. Her mimicry, be it said, was very good. + +"'Ere it is, sir----thank you, sir--'ope I 'aven't kept you wyting, sir," +she announced, after he had fumed for two minutes inside the corral, and +she had cynically hummed her way quite through the hymn which begins "Blest +be the tie that binds." She passed the white-hot iron deftly through the +rails to him, and fixed the fire for another heating. + +Really, she was not thinking of Manley at all, nor of his mood, nor of his +brutal coarseness. She was thinking of the rebuilt typewriter, advertised +as being exactly as good as a new one, and scandalously cheap, for which +she had sold her watch to Arline Hawley to get money to buy. She was +counting mentally the days since she had sent the money order, and was +thinking it should come that week surely. + +She was also planning to seize upon the opportunity afforded by Manley's +next absence for a day from the ranch, and drive to Hope on the chance of +getting the machine. Only--she wished she could be sure whether Kent would +be coming soon. She did not want to miss seeing him; she decided to sound +Polycarp Jenks the next time he came. Polycarp would know, of course, +whether the Wishbone outfit was in from round-up. Polycarp always knew +everything that had been done, or was intended, among the neighbors. + +Manley passed the ill-smelling iron back to her, and she put it in the +fire, quite mechanically. It was not the first time, nor the second, that +she had been called upon to help brand. She could heat an iron as quickly +and evenly as most men, though Manley had never troubled to tell her so. + +Five times she heated the iron, and heard, with an inward quiver of pity +and disgust, the spasmodic blat of the calf in the pen when the VP went +searing into the hide on its ribs. She did not see why they must be branded +that evening, in particular, but it was as well to have it done with. Also, +if Manley meant to wean them, she would have to see that they were fed and +watered, she supposed. That would make her trip to town a hurried one, if +she went at all; she would have to go and come the same day, and Arline +Hawley would scold and beg her to stay, and call her a fool. + +"Now, how about that supper?" asked Manley, when they were through, and the +air was clearing a little from the smoke and the smell of burned hair. + +"I really don't know--I smelled the potatoes burning some time ago. I'll +see, however." She brushed her hands with her handkerchief, pushed back the +lock of hair that was always falling across her temple, and, because she +was really offended by Manley's attitude and tone, she sang softly all the +way to the house, merely to conceal from him the fact that he could move +her even to irritation. Her best weapon, she had discovered long ago, was +absolute indifference--the indifference which overlooked his presence and +was deaf to his recriminations. + +She completed her preparations for his supper, made sure that nothing was +lacking and that the tea was just right, placed his chair in position, +filled the water glass beside his plate, set the tea-pot where he could +reach it handily, and went into the living room and closed the door +between. In the past year, filed as it had been with her literary ambitions +and endeavors, she had neglected her music; but she took her violin from +the box, hunted the cake of resin, tuned the strings, and, when she heard +him come into the kitchen and sit down at the table, seated herself upon +the front doorstep and began to play. + +There was one bit of music which Manley thoroughly detested. That was the +"Traumerei." Therefore, she played the "Traumerei" slowly--as it should, +of course, be played--with full value given to all the pensive, long-drawn +notes, and with a finale positively creepy in its dreamy wistfulness. Val, +as has been stated, could be very exasperating when she chose. + +In the kitchen there was the subdued rattle of dishes, unbroken and +unhurried. Val went on playing, but she forgot that she had begun in a +half-conscious desire to annoy her husband. She stared dreamily at the hill +which shut out the world to the east, and yielded to a mood of loneliness; +of longing, in the abstract, for all the pleasant things she was missing in +this life which she had chosen in her ignorance. + +When Manley flung open the inner door, she gave a stifled exclamation; she +had forgotten all about Manley. + +"By all the big and little gods of Greece!" he swore angrily. "Calves +bawling their heads off in the corral, and you squalling that whiny stuff +you call music in the house--home's sure a hell of a happy place! I'm going +to town. You don't want to leave the place till I come back--I want those +calves looked after." He seemed to consider something mentally, and then +added: + +"If I'm not back before they quit bawling, you can turn 'em down in the +river field with the rest. You know when they're weaned and ready to settle +down. Don't feed 'em too much hay, like you did that other bunch; just give +'em what they need; you don't have to pile the corral full. And don't keep +'em shut up an hour longer than necessary." + +Val nodded her head to show that she heard, and went on playing. There was +seldom any pretense of good feeling between them now. She tuned the violin +to minor, and poised the bow over the strings, in some doubt as to her +memory of a serenade she wanted to try next. + +"Shall I have Polycarp take the team and haul up some wood from the river?" +she asked carelessly. "We're nearly out again." + +"Oh, _I_ don't care--if he happens along." He turned and went out, his +mind turning eagerly to the town and what it could give him in the way of +pleasure. + +Val, still sitting in the doorway, saw him ride away up the grade and +disappear over the brow of the hill. The dusk was settling softly upon the +land, so that his figure was but a vague shape. She was alone again; she +rather liked being alone, now that she had no longer a blind, unreasoning +terror of the empty land. She had her thoughts and her work; the presence +of Manley was merely an unpleasant interruption to both. + +Some time in the night she heard the lowing of a cow somewhere near. She +wondered dreamily what it could be doing in the coulee, and went to sleep +again. The five calves were all bawling in a chorus of complaint against +their forced separation from their mothers, and the deeper, throaty tones +of the cow mingled not inharmoniously with the sound. + +Range cattle were not permitted in the coulee, and when by chance they +found a broken panel in the fence and strayed down there, Val drove them +out; afoot, usually, with shouts and badly aimed stones to accelerate their +lumbering pace. + +After she had eaten her breakfast in the morning she went out to +investigate. Beyond the corral, her nose thrust close against the rails, +a cow was bawling dismally. Inside, in much the same position, its tail +waving a violent signal of its owner's distress, a calf was clamoring +hysterically for its mother and its mother's milk. + +Val sympathized with them both; but the cow did not belong in the coulee, +and she gathered two or three small stones and went around where she could +frighten her away from the fence without, however, exposing herself too +recklessly to her uncertain temper. Cows at weaning time did sometimes +object to being driven from their calves. + +"Shoo! Go on away from there!" Val raised a stone and poised it +threateningly. + +The cow turned and regarded her, wild-eyed. It backed a step or two, +evidently uncertain of its next move. + +"Go on away!" Val was just on the point of throwing the rock, when she +dropped it unheeded to the ground and stared. "Why, you--you--why--the +_idea!_" She turned slowly white. Certain things must filter to the +understanding through amazement and disbelief; it took Val a minute or two +to grasp the significance of what she saw. By the time she did grasp it, +her knees were beading weakly beneath the weight of her body. She put out +a groping hand and caught at the corner of the corral to keep herself from +falling. And she stared and stared. + +"It--oh, surely not!" she whispered, protesting against her understanding. +She gave a little sob that had no immediate relation to tears. +"Surely--_surely_--not!" It was of no use; understanding came, and came +clearly, pitilessly. Many things--trifles, all of them--to which she had +given no thought at the time, or which she had forgotten immediately, came +back to her of their own accord; things she tried _not_ to remember. + +The cow stared at her for a minute, and, when she made no hostile move, +turned its attention back to its bereavement. Once again it thrust +its moist muzzle between two rails, gave a preliminary, vibrant +_mmm--mmmmm--m_, and then, with a spasmodic heaving of ribs and of flank, +burst into a long-drawn _baww--aw--aw--aw_, which rose rapidly in a +tremulous crescendo and died to a throaty rumbling. + +Val started nervously, though her eyes were fixed upon the cow and she knew +the sound was coming. It served, however, to release her from the spell of +horror which had gripped her. She was still white, and when she moved she +felt intolerably heavy, so that her feet dragged; but she was no longer +dazed. She went slowly around to the gate, reached up wearily and undid the +chain fastening, opened the gate slightly, and went in. + +Four of the calves were huddled together for mutual comfort in a corner. +They were blatting indefatigably. Val went over to where the fifth one +still stood beside the fence, as near the cow as it could get, and threw +a small stone, that bounced off the calf's rump. The calf jumped and ran +aimlessly before her until it reached the half-open gate, when it dodged +out, as if it could scarcely believe its own good fortune. Before Val could +follow it outside, it was nuzzling rapturously its mother, and the cow was +contorting her body so that she could caress her offspring with her tongue, +while she rumbled her satisfaction. + +Val closed and fastened the gate carefully, and went back to where the cow +still lingered. With her lips drawn to a thin, colorless line, she drove +her across the coulee and up the hill, the calf gamboling close alongside. +When they had gone out of sight, up on the level, Val turned back and went +slowly to the house. She stood for a minute staring stupidly at it and at +the coulee, went in and gazed around her with that blankness which follows +a great mental shock. After a minute she shivered, threw up her hands +before her face, and dropped, a pitiful, sorrowing heap of quivering +rebellion, upon the couch. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX. KENT'S CONFESSION + +Polycarp Jenks came ambling into the coulee, rapped perfunctorily upon the +door-casing, and entered the kitchen as one who feels perfectly at home, +and sure of his welcome; as was not unfitting, considering the fact that he +had "chored around" for Val during the last year, and longer. + +"Anybody to home?" he called, seeing the front door shut tight. + +There was a stir within, and Val, still pale, and with an almost furtive +expression in her eyes, opened the door and looked out. + +"Oh, it's you, Polycarp," she said lifelessly. "Is there anything--" + +"What's the matter? Sick? You look kinda peaked and frazzled out. I met Man +las' night, and he told me you needed wood; I thought I'd ride over and +see. By granny, you do look bad." + +"Just a headache," Val evaded, shrinking back guiltily. "Just do whatever +there is to do, Polycarp. I think--I don't believe the chickens have had +anything to eat to-day--" + +"Them headaches are sure a fright; they're might' nigh as bad as rheumatiz, +when they hit you hard. You jest go back and lay down, and I'll look around +and see what they is to do. Any idee when Man's comin' back?" + +"No." Val brought the word out with an involuntary sharpness. + +"No, I reckon not. I hear him and Fred De Garmo come might' near havin' a +fight las' night. Blumenthall was tellin' me this mornin'. Fred's quit +the Double Diamond, I hear. He's got himself appointed dep'ty stock +inspector--and how he managed to git the job is more 'n I can figure out. +They say he's all swelled up over it--got his headquarters in town, you +know, and seems he got to lordin' it over Man las' night, and I guess if +somebody hadn't stopped 'em they'd of been a mix-up, all right. Man wasn't +in no shape to fight--he'd been drinkin' pretty--" + +"Yes--well, just do whatever there is to do, Polycarp. The horses are in +the upper pasture, I think--if you want to haul wood." She closed the +door--gently, but with exceeding firmness, and, Polycarp took the hint. + +"Women is queer," he muttered, as he left the house. "Now, she knows Man +drinks like a fish--and she knows everybody else knows it--but if you so +much as mention sech a thing, why--" He waggled his head disapprovingly and +proceeded, in his habitually laborious manner, to take a chew of tobacco. +"No matter how much they may know a thing is so, if it don't suit 'em you +can't never git 'em to stand right up and face it out--seems like, by +granny, it comes natural to 'em to make believe things is different. Now, +she knows might' well she can't fool _me_. I've hearn Man swear at her +like--" + +He reached the corral, and his insatiable curiosity turned his thoughts +into a different channel. He inspected the four calves gravely, wondered +audibly where Man had found them, and how the round-up came to miss them, +and criticized his application of the brand; in the opinion of Polycarp, +Manley either burned too deep or not deep enough. + +"Time that line-backed heifer scabs off, you can't tell what's on her," he +asserted, expectorating solemnly before he turned away to his work. + +Prom a window, Val watched him with cold terror. Would he suspect? Or was +there anything to suspect? "It's silly--it's perfectly idiotic," she told +herself impatiently; "but if he hangs around that corral another minute, I +shall scream!" She watched until she saw him mount his horse and ride off +toward the upper pasture. Then she went out and began apathetically picking +seed pods off her sweet-peas, which the early frosts had spared. + +"Head better?" called Polycarp, half an hour later, when he went rattling +past the house with the wagon, bound for the river bottom where they got +their supply of wood. + +"A little," Val answered inattentively, without looking at him. + +It was while Polycarp was after the wood, and while she was sitting upon +the edge of the porch, listlessly arranging and rearranging a handful of +long-stemmed blossoms, that Kent galloped down the hill and up to the gate. +She saw him coming and set her teeth hard together. She did not want to see +Kent just then; she did not want to see anybody. + +Kent, however, wanted to see her. It seemed to him at least a month since +he had had a glimpse of her, though it was no more than half that time. He +watched her covertly while he came up the path. His mind, all the way over +from the Wishbone, had been very clear and very decided. He had a certain +thing to tell her, and a certain thing to do; he had thought it all out +during the nights when he could not sleep and the days when men called him +surly, and there was no going back, no reconsideration of the matter. He +had been telling himself that, over and over, ever since the house came +into view and he saw her sitting there on the porch. She would probably +want to argue, and perhaps she would try to persuade him, but it would be +absolutely useless; absolutely. + +"Well, hello!" he cried, with more than his usual buoyancy of +manner--because he knew he must hurt her later on. "Hello, Madam Authoress. +Why this haughty air? This stuckupiness? Shall I get a ladder and climb +up where you can hear me say howdy?" He took off his hat and slapped her +gently upon the top of her head with it. "Come out of the fog!" + +"Oh--I wish you wouldn't!" She glanced up at him so briefly that he caught +only a flicker of her yellow-brown eyes, and went on fumbling her flowers. +Kent stood and looked down at her for a moment. + +"Mad?" he inquired cheerfully. "Say, you look awfully savage. On the dead, +you do. What do _you_ care if they sent it back? You had all the fun of +writing it--and you know it's a dandy. Please smile. _Pretty_ please!" he +wheedled. It was not the first time he had discovered her in a despondent +mood, nor the first time he had bantered and badgered her out of her gloom. +Presently it dawned upon him that this was more serious; he had never seen +her quite so colorless or so completely without spirit. + +"Sick, pal?" he asked gently, sitting down beside her. + +"No-o--I suppose not." Val bit her lips, as soon as she had spoken, to +check their quivering. + +"Well, what is it? I wish you'd tell me. I came over here full of something +I had to tell you--but I can't, now; not while you're like this." He +watched her yearningly. + +"Oh, I can't tell you. It's nothing." Val jerked a sweet-pea viciously from +its stem, pressed her hand against her mouth, and turned reluctantly toward +him. "What was it you came to tell me?" + +He watched her narrowly. "I'll gamble you're down in the mouth about +something hubby has said or done. You needn't tell me--but I just want to +ask you if you think it's worth while? You needn't tell me that, either. +You know blamed well it ain't. He can't deal you any more misery than you +let him hand out; you want to keep that in mind." + +Another blossom was demolished. "What was it you came to tell me?" she +repeated steadily, though she did not look at him. + +"Oh, nothing much. I'm going to leave the country, is all." + +"Kent!" After a minute she forced another word out. "Why?" + +Kent regarded her somberly. "You better think twice before you ask me +that," he warned; "because I ain't much good at beating all around the +bush. If you ask me again, I'll tell you--and I'm liable to tell you +without any frills." He drew a hard breath. "So I'd advise you not to ask," +he finished, half challengingly. + +Val placed a pale lavender blossom against a creamy white one, and held the +two up for inspection. + +"When are you going?" she asked evenly. + +"I don't know exactly--in a day or so. Saturday, maybe." + +She hesitated over the flowers in her lap, and selected a pink one, which +she tried with the white and the lavender. + +"And--_why_ are you going?" she asked him deliberately. + +Kent stared at her fixedly. A faint, pink flush was creeping into her +cheeks. He watched it deepen, and knew that his silence was filling her +with uneasiness. He wondered how much she guessed of what he was going to +say, and how much it would mean to her. + +"All right--I'll tell you why, fast enough." His tone was grim. "I'm going +to leave the country because I can't stay any longer--not while you're in +it." + +"Why--Kent!" She seemed inexpressibly shocked. + +"I don't know," he went on relentlessly, "what you think a man's made of, +anyhow. And I don't know what _you_ think of this pal business; I know what +I think: It's a mighty good way to drive a man crazy. I've had about all of +it I can stand, if you want to know." + +"I'm sorry, if you don't--if you can't be friends any longer," she said, +and he winced to see how her eyes filled with tears. "But, of course, if +you can't--if it bores you--" + +Kent seized her arm, a bit roughly, "Have I got to come right out and tell +you, in plain English, that I--that it's because I'm so deep in love with +you I can't. If you only knew what it's cost me this last year--to play the +game and not play it too hard! What do you think a man's made of? Do you +think a man can care for a woman, like I care for you, and--Do you think he +wants to be just pals? And stand back and watch some drunken brute abuse +her--and never--Here!" His voice grew testier. "Don't do that--don't! I +didn't want to hurt you--God knows I didn't want to hurt you!" He threw his +seem around her shoulders and pulled her toward him. + +"Don't--pal, I'm a brute, I guess, like all the rest of the male humans. I +don't mean to be--it's the way I'm made. When a woman means so much to me +that I can't think of anything else, day or night, and get to counting +days and scheming to see her--why--being friends--like we've been--is like +giving a man a teaspoon of milk and water when he's starving to death, and +thinking that oughta do. But I shouldn't have let it hurt you. I tried +to stand for it, little woman. These were times when I just had to fight +myself not to take you up in my arms and carry you of and keep you. You +must admit," he argued, smiling rather wanly, "that, considering how I've +felt about it, I've done pretty tolerable well up till now. You don't--you +never will know how much it's cost. Why, my nerves are getting so raw I +can't stand anything any more. That's why I'm going. I don't want to hang +around till I do something--foolish." + +He took his arm away from her shoulders and moved farther off; he was not +sure how far he might trust himself. + +"If I thought you cared--or if there was anything I could do for you," he +ventured, after a moment, "why, it would be different. But--" + +Val lifted her head and turned to him. + +"There is something--or there was--or--oh, I can't think any more! I +suppose"--doubtfully--"if you feel as you say you do, why--it would +be--wicked to stay. But you don't; you must just imagine it." + +"Oh, all right," Kent interpolated ironically. + +"But if you go away--" She got up and stood before him, breathing unevenly, +in little gasps. "Oh, you mustn't go away! Please don't go! I--there's +something terrible happened--oh, Kent, I need you! I can't tell you what +it is--it's the most horrible thing I ever heard of! You can't imagine +anything more horrible, Kent!" + +She twisted her fingers together nervously, and the blossoms dropped, one +by one, on the ground. "If you go," she pleaded, "I won't have a friend in +the country, not a real friend. And--and I never needed a friend as much +as I do now, and you mustn't go. I--I can't let you go!" It was like her +hysterical fear of being left alone after the fire. + +Kent eyed her keenly. He knew there must have been something to put her +into this state--something more than his own rebellion. He felt suddenly +ashamed of his weakness in giving way--in telling her how it was with +him. The faint, far-off chuckle of a wagon came to his ears. He turned +impatiently toward the sound. Polycarp was driving up the coulee with a +load of wood; already he was nearing the gate which opened into the lower +field. Kent stood up, reached out, and caught Val by the hand. + +"Come on into the house," he said peremptorily. "Polly's coming, and you +don't want him goggling and listening. And I want you," he added, when he +had led her inside and closed the door, "to tell me what all this is about. +There's something, and I want to know what. If it concerns you, then it +concerns me a whole lot, too. And what concerns me I'm going to find out +about--what is it?" + +Val sat down, got up immediately, and crossed the room aimlessly to sit in +another chair. She pressed her palms tightly against both cheeks, drew in +her breath as if she were going to speak, and, after all, said nothing. She +looked out of the window, pushing back the errant strand of hair. + +"I can't--I don't know how to tell you," she began desperately. "It's too +horrible." + +"Maybe it is--I don't know what you'd call too horrible; I kinda think it +wouldn't be what I'd tack those words to. Anyway--what is it?" He went +close, and he spoke insistently. + +She took a long breath. + +"Manley's a thief!" She jerked the words out like as automaton. They were +not, evidently, the Words she had meant to speak, for she seemed frightened +afterward. + +"Oh, that's it!" Kent made a sound which was not far from a snort. "Well, +what about it? What's he done? How did you find it out?" + +Val straightened in the chair and gazed up at him. Once more her tawny eyes +gave him a certain shock, as if he had never before noticed them. + +"After all our neighbors have done for him," she cried bitterly; "after +giving him hay, when his was burned and he couldn't buy any; after building +stables, and corral, and--everything they did--the kindest, best neighbors +a man ever had--oh, it's too shameful for utterance! I might forgive it--I +might, only for that. The--the ingratitude! It's too despicable--too--" + +Kent laid a steadying hand upon her arm. + +"Yes--but what is it?" he interrupted. + +Val shook off his hand unconsciously, impatient of any touch. + +"Oh, the bare deed itself--well, it's rather petty, too--and cheap." Her +voice became full of contempt. "It was the calves. He brought home five +last night--five that hadn't been branded last spring. Where he found them +_I_ don't know--I didn't care enough about it to ask. He had been drinking, +I think; I can usually tell--and he often carries a bottle in his pocket, +as I happen to know. + +"Well, he had me make a fire and heat the iron for him, and he branded +them--last night; he was very touchy about it when I asked him what was his +hurry. I think now it was a stupid thing for him to do. And--well, in the +night, some time, I heard a cow bawling around close, and this morning I +went out to drive her away; the fence is always down somewhere--I suppose +she found a place to get through. So I went out to drive her away." Her +eyes dropped, as if she were making a confession of her own misdeed. She +clenched her hands tightly in her lap. + +"Well--it was a Wishbone cow." After all, she said it very quietly. + +"The devil it was!" Kent had been prepared for something of the sort; but, +nevertheless, he started when he heard his own outfit mentioned. + +"Yes. It was a Wishbone cow." Her voice was flat and monotonous. "He had +stolen her calf. He had it in the corral, and he had branded it with his +own brand--with a VP. _With my initials!_" she wailed suddenly, as if +the thought had just struck her, and was intolerably bitter. "She had +followed--had been hunting her calf; it was rather a little calf, smaller +than the others. And it was crowded up against the fence, trying to get to +her. There was no mistaking their relationship. I tried to think he had +made a mistake; but it's of no use--I know he didn't. I know he _stole_ +that calf. And for all I know, the others, too. Oh, it's perfectly horrible +to think of!" + +Kent could easily guess her horror of it, and he was sorry for her. But his +mind turned instantly to the practical side of it. + +"Well--maybe it can be fixed up, if you feel so bad about it. Does +Polycarp--did he see the cow hanging around?" + +Val shook her head apathetically. "No--he didn't come till just a little +while ago. That was this morning. And I drove her out of the coulee--her +and her calf. They went off up over the hill." + +Kent stood looking down at her rather stupidly. + +"You--_what?_ What was it you did?" It seemed to him that something--some +vital point of the story--had eluded him. + +"I drove them away. I didn't think they ought to be permitted to +hang around here." Her lips quivered again. "I--I didn't want to see +him--get--into any trouble." + +"You drove them away? Both of them?" Kent was frowning at her now. + +Val sprang up and faced him, all a-tremble with indignation. "Certainly, +both! _I'm_ not a thief, Kent Burnett! When I knew--when there was no +possible doubt--why, what, in Heaven's name, _could_ I do? It wasn't +Manley's calf. I turned it loose to go back where it belonged." + +"With a VP on its ribs!" Kent was staring at her curiously. + +"Well, I don't care! Fifty VP's couldn't make the calf Manley's. If anybody +came and saw that cow, why--" Val looked at him rafter pityingly, as if she +could not quite understand how he could even question her upon that point. +"And, after all," she added forlornly, "he's my husband. I couldn't--I had +to do what I could to shield him--just for sake of the past, I suppose. +Much as I despise him, I can't forget that--that I cared once. It's because +I wanted your advice that I--" + +"It's a pity you didn't get it sooner, then! Can't you see what you've +done? Why, think a minute! A VP calf running with a Wishbone cow--why, +it's--you couldn't advertise Man as a rustler any better if you tried. The +first fellow that runs onto that cow and calf--well, he won't need to do +any guessing--he'll _know_. It's a ticket to Deer Lodge--that VP calf. Now +do you see?" He turned away to the window and stood looking absently at the +brown hillside, his hands thrust deep into his pockets. + +"And there's Fred De Garmo, with his new job, ranging around the country +just aching to cinch somebody and show his authority. It's a matter of days +almost. He'd like nothing better than to get a whack at Man, even if the +Wishbone--" + +Outside, they could hear Polycarp throwing the wood off the wagon; knowing +him as they did, they knew, it would not be long before he found an excuse +for coming into the house. He had more than once evinced a good deal of +interest in Kent's visits there, and shown an unmistakable desire to know +what they were talking about. They had never paid much attention to him; +but now even Val felt a vague uneasiness lest he overhear. She had been +sitting, her face buried in her arms, crushed beneath the knowledge of what +she had done. + +"Don't worry, little woman." Kent went over and passed his hand lightly +over her hair. "You did what looked to you to be the right thing--the +honest thing. And the chances are he'd get caught before long, anyhow. I +don't reckon this is the first time he's done it." + +"Oh-h--but to think--to think that _I_ should do it--when I wanted to save +him! He--Kent, I despise him--he has killed all the love I ever felt for +him--killed it over and over--but if anybody finds that calf, and--and +if they--Kent, I shall go crazy if I have to feel that _I_ sent +him--to--prison. To think of him--shut up there--and to know that I did +it--I can't bear it!" She caught his arm. She pressed her forehead +against it. "Kent, isn't there some way to get it back? If I should find +it--and--and shoot it--and pay the Wishbone what it's worth--oh, _any_ +amount--or shoot the cow--or--" she raised her face imploringly to +his--"tell me, pal--or I shall go stark, raving mad!" + +Polycarp came into the kitchen, and, from the sound, he was trying to enter +as unobtrusively as possible, even to the extent of walking on his toes. + +"Go see what that darned old sneak wants," Kent commanded in an undertone. +"Act as if nothing happened--if you can." He watched anxiously, while she +drew a long breath, pressed her hands hard against her cheeks, closed her +lips tightly, and then, with something like composure, went quietly to the +door and threw it open. Polycarp was standing very close to it, on the +other side. He drew back a step. + +"I wondered if I better git another load, now I've got the team hooked +up," he began in his rasping, nasal voice, his slitlike eyes peering +inquisitively into the room. "Hello, Kenneth--I _thought_ that was your +horse standin' outside. Or would you rather I cut up a pile? I dunno but +what I'll have to go t'town t'-morrerr or next day--mebby I better cut you +some wood, hey? If Man ain't likely to be home, mebby--" + +"I think, Polycarp, well have a storm soon. So it would be good policy to +haul another load, don't you think? I can manage very well with what there +is cut until Manley returns; and there are always small branches that I can +break easily with the axe. I really think it would be safer to have another +load hauled now while we can. Don't you think so?" Val even managed to +smile at him. "If my head wasn't so bad," she added deceitfully, "I should +be tempted to go along, just for a dose sight of the river. Mr. Burnett is +going directly--perhaps I may walk down later on. But you had better not +wait--I shouldn't want to keep you working till dark." + +Polycarp, eying her and Kent, and the room in all its details, forced his +hand into his trousers pocket, brought up his battered plug of tobacco and +pried off a piece, which he rolled into his left cheek with his tongue. + +"Jest as you say," he surrendered, though it was perfectly plain that he +would much prefer to cut wood and so be able to see all that went on, even +though he was denied the gratification of hearing what they said. He waited +a moment, but Val turned away, and even had the audacity to close the +door upon his unfinished reply. He listened for a moment, his head craned +forward. + +"Purty kinda goings-on!" he mumbled. "Time Man had a flea put in 'is ear, +by granny, if he don't want to lose that yeller-eyed wife of hisn." To +Polycarp, a closed door--when a man and woman were alone upon the other +side--could mean nothing but surreptitious kisses and the like. He +went stumbling out and drove away down the coulee, his head turning +automatically so that his eyes were constantly upon the house; from +his attitude, as Kent saw him through the window Polycarp expected an +explosion, at the very least. His outraged virtue vested itself in one more +sentence; "Purty blamed nervy, by granny--to go 'n' shut the door right in +m' face!" + +Inside the room, Val stood for a minute with her back against the door, as +if she half feared Polycarp would break in and drag her secret from her. +When she heard him leave the kitchen she drew a long breath, eloquent in +itself: when the rattle of the wagon came to them there, she left the +door and went slowly across the room until she stood close to Kent. The +interruption had steadied them both. Her voice was a constrained calm when +she spoke. + +[Illustration: To draw the red hot spur across the fresh VP did not take +long] + +"Well--is there anything I can do? Because I suppose every minute is +dangerous." + +Kent kept his eyes upon the departing Polycarp. + +"There's nothing you can do, no. Maybe I can do something; soon as that +granny gossip is outa sight, I'll go and round up that cow and calf--if +somebody hasn't beaten me to it." + +Val looked at him with a certain timid helplessness. + +"Oh! Will you--won't it be against the law if you--if you kill it?" She +grew slightly excited again. "Kent, you shall not get into any trouble +for--for his sake! If it comes to a choice, why--let him suffer for his +crime. You shall not!" + +Kent turned his head slowly and gazed down at her. "Don't run away with the +idea I'm doing it for him," he told her distinctly. "I love Man Fleetwood +like I love a wolf. But if that VP calf catches him up, you'd fight your +head over it, God only knows how long. I know you! You'd think so much +about the part you played that you'd wind up by forgetting everything else. +You'd get to thinking of him as a martyr, maybe! No--it's for you. I kinda +got you into this, you recollect? If I'd let you see Man drank, that day, +you'd never have married him; I know that now. So I'm going to get you out +of it. My side of the question can wait." + +She stared up at him with a grave understanding. + +"But you know what I said--you won't do anything that can make you +trouble--won't you tell me, Kent, what you're going to do?" + +He had already started to the door, but he stopped and smiled reassuringly. + +"Nothing so fierce. If I can find 'em, I aim to bar out that VP. Sabe?" + + + + +CHAPTER XX. A BLOTCHED BRAND + +At the brow of the hill, which was the western rim of the coulee, Kent +turned and waved a farewell to Val, watching him wistfully from the kitchen +door. She had wanted to go along; she had almost cried to go and help, but +Kent would not permit her--and beneath the unpleasantness of denying her +anything, there had been a certain primitive joy in feeling himself master +of the situation and of her actions; for that one time it was as if she +belonged to him. At the last he had accepted the field glasses, which she +insisted upon lending him, and now he was tempted to take them from their +worn, leathern case and focus them upon her face, just for the meager +satisfaction of one more look at her. But he rode on, oat of sight, for the +necessity which drove him forth did not permit much loitering if he would +succeed in what he had set out to do. + +Personally he would have felt no compunctions whatever about letting the +calf go, a walking advertisement of Manley's guilt. It seemed to him a sort +of grim retribution, and no more than he deserved. He had not exaggerated +his sentiments when he intimated plainly to her his hatred of Manley, and +he agreed with her that the fellow was making a despicable return for the +kindness his neighbors had always shown him. No doubt he had stolen from +the Double Diamond as well as the Wishbone. + +Once Kent pulled up, half minded to go back and let events shape themselves +without any interference from him. But there was Val--women were so queer +about such things. It seemed to Kent that, if any man had caused him as +much misery as Manley had caused Val, he would not waste much time worrying +over him, if he tangled himself up with his own misdeeds. However, Val +wanted that bit of evidence covered up; so, while Kent did not approve, he +went at the business with his customary thoroughness. + +The field glasses were a great convenience. More than once they saved him +the trouble of riding a mile or so to inspect a small bunch of stock. +Nevertheless, he rode for several hours before, just at sundown, he +discovered the cow feeding alone with her calf in a shallow depression near +the rough country next the river. They were wild, and he ran them out of +the hollow and up on high ground before he managed to drop his loop over +the calf's head. + +"You sure are a dandy-fine sign-post, all right," he observed, and grinned +down at the staring VP brand. + +"It's a pity you can't be left that way." He glanced cautiously around him +at the great, empty prairie. A mile or two away, a lone horseman was loping +leisurely along, evidently bound for the Double Diamond. + +"Say--this is kinda public," Kent complained to the calf. "Let's you and +me go down outa sight for a minute." He started off toward the hollow, +dragging the calf, a protesting bundle of stiffened muscles pulling against +the rope. The cow, shaking her head in a halfhearted defiance, followed. +Kent kept an uneasy eye upon the horseman, and hoped fervently the fellow +was absorbed in meditation and, would not glance in his direction. Once he +was almost at the point of turning the calf loose; for barring out brands, +even illegal brands, is justly looked upon with disfavor, to say the least. + +Down in the hollow, which Kent reached with a sigh of relief, he dismounted +and hastily started a little fire on a barren patch of ground beneath a +jutting sandstone ledge. The calf, tied helpless, lay near by, and the cow +hovered close, uneasy, but lacking courage for a rush. + +Kent laid hand upon his saddle, hesitated, and shook his head; he might +need it in a hurry, and cinch ring takes time both in the removal and the +replacement--and is vitally important withal. His knife he had lost on the +last round-up. He scowled at the necessity, lifted his heel, and took off +a spur. "And if that darned ginny don't get too blamed curious and cone +fogging over this way--" He spoke the phrase aloud, out of the middle of a +mental arrangement of the chance he was taking. + +To heat the spur red-hot, draw it across the fresh VP again and again, and +finally drag it crisscross once or twice to make assurance an absolute +certainty, did not take long. Kent was particular about not wasting any +seconds. The calf stopped its dismal blatting, and when Kent released it +and coiled his rope, it jumped up and ran for its life, the cows ambling +solicitously at its heels. Kent kicked the dirt over the fire, eyed it +sharply a moment to make sure it was perfectly harmless, mounted in haste, +and rode up the sloping side down, which he had come. Just under the top of +the slope, he peeked anxiously out over the prairie, ducked precipitately, +and went clattering away down the hollow to the farther side; dodged around +a spur of rocks, forced his horse down over a wicked jumble of boulders to +level land below, and rode as if a hangman's noose were the penalty for +delay. + +When he reached the river--which he did after many windings and +turnings--he got off and washed his spur, scrubbing it diligently with sand +in an effort to remove the traces of fire. When the evidence was at least +less conspicuous, he put it on his heel and jogged down the river bank +quite innocently, inwardly thankful over his escape. He had certainly done +nothing wrong; but one sometimes finds it rather awkward to be forced into +an explanation of a perfectly righteous deed. + +"If I'd been stealing that calf, I'd never have been crazy enough to take +such a long chance," he mused, and laughed a little. "I'll bet Fred thought +he was due to grab a rustler right in the act--only he was a little bit +slow about making up his mind; deputy stock inspectors had oughta think +quicker than that--he was just about five minutes too deliberate. I'll +gamble he's scratching his head, right now, over that blotched brand, +trying to _sabe_ the play--which he won't, not in a thousand years!" + +He gave the reins a twitch and began to climb through the dusk to the +lighter hilltop, at a point just east of Cold Spring Coulee. At the top he +put the spurs to his horse and headed straight as might be for the Wishbone +ranch. He would like to have told Val of his success, but he was afraid +Manley might be there, or Polycarp; it was wise always to avoid Polycarp +Jenks, if one had anything to conceal from his fellows. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI. VAL DECIDES + +It was the middle of the next forenoon when Manley came riding home, sullen +from drink and a losing game of poker, which had kept him all night at the +table, and at sunrise sent him forth in the mood which meets a grievance +more than half-way. He did not stop at the house, though he saw Val through +the open door; he did not trouble to speak to her, even, but rode on to the +stable, stopping at the corral to look over the fence at the calves, still +bawling sporadically between half-hearted nibblings at the hay which +Polycarp had thrown in to them. + +Just at first he did not notice anything wrong, but soon a vague disquiet +seized him, and he frowned thoughtfully at the little group. Something +puzzled him; but his brain, fogged with whisky and loss of sleep, and the +reaction from hours of concentration upon the game, could not quite grasp +the thing that troubled him. In a moment, however, he gave an inarticulate +bellow, wheeled about, and rode back to the house. He threw himself from +the horse almost before it stopped, and rushed into the kitchen. Val, +ironing one of her ruffled white aprons, looked up quickly, turned rather +pale, and then stiffened perceptibly for the conflict that was coming. + +"There's only four calves in the corral--and I brought in five. Where's the +other one?" He came up and stood quite close to her--so close that Val took +a step backward. He did not speak loud, but there was something in his +tone, in his look, that drove the little remaining color from her face. + +"Manley," she said, with a catch of the breath, "why did you do that +horrible thing? What devil possessed you? I--" + +"I asked you 'where is that other calf'? Where is it? There's only four. I +brought in five." His very calmness was terrifying. + +Val threw back her head, and her eyes were--as they frequently became in +moments of stress--yellow, inscrutable, like the eyes of a lion in a cage. + +"Yes, you brought in five. One of the five, at least, you--stole. You put +your brand, Manley Fleetwood, on a calf that did not belong to you; it +belonged to the Wishbone, and you know it. I have learned many disagreeable +things about you, Manley, in the past two years; yesterday morning I +learned that you were a _thief_. Ah-h--I despise you! Stealing from the +very men who helped you--the men to whom you owe nothing but gratitude +and--and friendship! Have you no manhood whatever? Besides being weak and +shiftless, are you a criminal as well? _How_ can you be so utterly lacking +in--in common decency, even?" She eyed him as she would look at some +strange monster in a museum about which she was rather curious. + +"I asked you where that other calf is--and you'd better tell me!" It was +the tone which goes well with a knife thrust or a blow. But the contempt in +Val's face did not change. + +"Well, you'll have to hunt for it if you want it. The cow--a Wishbone cow, +mind you!--came and claimed it; I let her have it. No stolen goods +can remain on this ranch with my knowledge, Manley Fleetwood. Please +remember--" + +"Oh, you turned it out, did you? You turned it out?" He had her by the +throat, shaking her as a puppy shakes a purloined shoe. "I could--_kill_ +you for that!" + +"Manley! Ah-h-h--" It was not pleasant--that gurgling cry, as she straggled +to get free. + +He had the look of a maniac as he pressed his fingers into her throat and +glared down into her purpling face. + +With a sudden impulse he cast her limp form violently from him. She struck +against a chair, fell from that to the floor, and lay a huddled heap, her +crisp, ruffled skirt just giving a glimpse of tiny, half-worn slippers, her +yellow hair fallen loose and hiding her face. + +He stared down at her, but he felt no remorse--she had jeopardized his +liberty, his standing among men. A cold horror caught him when he thought +of the calf turned loose on the range, his brand on its ribs. He rushed +in a panic from the kitchen, flung himself into the saddle, and went off +across the coulee, whipping both sides of his horse. She had not told +him--indeed, he had not asked her--which way the cow had gone, but +instinctively he rode to the west, the direction from which he had driven +the calves. One thought possessed him utterly; he must find that calf. + +So he rode here and there, doubling and turning to search every feeding +herd he glimpsed, fearing to face the possibility of failure and its +inevitable consequence. + +The cat with the white spots on its sides--Val called her Mary Arabella, +for some whimsical reason--came into the kitchen, looked inquiringly at +the huddled figure upon the floor, gave a faint mew, and went slowly up, +purring and arching her back; she snuffed a moment at Val's hair, then +settled herself in the hollow of Val's arm, and curled down for a nap. The +sun, sliding up to midday, shone straight in upon them through the open +door. + +Polycarp Jenks, riding that way in obedience to some obscure impulse, +lifted his hand to give his customary tap-tap before he walked in; saw +Val lying there, and almost fell headlong into the room in his haste and +perturbation. It looked very much as if he had at last stumbled upon the +horrible tragedy which was his one daydream. To be an eyewitness of a +murder, and to be able to tell the tale afterward with minute, horrifying +detail--that, to Polycarp, would make life really worth living. He shuffled +over to Val, pushed aside the mass of yellow hair, turned her head so that +he could look into her face, saw at once the bruised marks upon her throat, +and stood up very straight. + +"Foul play has been done here!" he exclaimed melodramatically, eying the +cat sternly. "Murder--that's what it is, by granny--a foul murder!" + +The victim of the foul murder stirred slightly. Polycarp started and bent +over her again, somewhat disconcerted, perhaps, but more humanly anxious. + +"Mis' Fleetwood--Mis' Fleetwood! You hurt? It's Polycarp Jenks talkin' to +you!" He hesitated, pushed the cat away, lifted Val with some difficulty, +and carried her into the front room and deposited her on the couch. Then he +hurried after some water. + +"Come might' nigh bein' a murder, by granny--from the marks on 'er +neck--come might' nigh, all right!" + +He sprinkled water lavishly upon her face, bethought him of a possible +whisky flask in the haystack, and ran every step of the way there and back. +He found a discarded bottle with a very little left in it, and forced the +liquor down her throat. + +"That'll fetch ye if anything will--_he-he!_" he mumbled, tittering from +sheer excitement. Beyond a very natural desire to do what he could for her, +he was extremely anxious to bring her to her senses, so that he could hear +what had happened, and how it had happened. + +"Betche Man got jealous of her'n Kenneth--by granny, I betche that's how it +come about--hey? Feelin' better, Mis' Fleetwood?" + +Val had opened her eyes and was looking at him rather stupidly. There was a +bruise upon her head, as well as upon her throat. She had been stunned, +and her wits came back slowly. When she recognized Polycarp, she tried +ineffectually to sit up. + +"I--he--is--he--gone?" Her voice was husky, her speech labored. + +"Man, you mean? He's gone, yes. Don't you be afeared--not whilst I'm here, +by granny! How came it he done this to ye?" + +Val was still staring at him bewilderedly. Polycarp repeated his question +three times before the blank look left her eyes. + +"I--turned the calf--out--the cow--came and--claimed it--Manley--" She +lifted her hand as if it were very, very heavy, and fumbled at her throat. +"Manley--when I told him--he was a--thief--" She dropped her hand wearily +to her side and closed her eyes, as if the sight of Polycarp's face, so +close to hers and so insatiably curious and eager and cunning, was more +than she could bear. + +"Go away," she commanded, after a minute or two. "I'm--all right. It's +nothing. I fell. It was--the heat. Thank you--so much--" She opened her +eyes and saw him there still. She looked at him gravely, speculatively. She +waved her hand toward the bedroom. "Get me my hand glass--in there on the +dresser," she said. + +When he had tiptoed in and got it for her, she lifted it up slowly, with +both hands, until she could see her throat. There were distinct, telltale +marks upon the tender flesh--unmistakable finger prints. She shivered and +dropped the glass to the floor. But she stared steadily up at Polycarp, and +after a moment she spoke with a certain fierceness. + +"Polycarp Jenks, don't ever tell--about those marks. I--I don't want any +one to know. When--after a while--I want to think first--perhaps you can +help me. Go away now--not away from the ranch, but--let me think. I'm all +right--or I will be. Please go." + +Polycarp recognized that tone, however it might be hoarsened by bruised +muscles and the shock of what she had suffered. He recognized also that +look in her eyes; he had always obeyed that look and that tone--he obeyed +them now, though with visible reluctance. He sat down in the kitchen to +wait, and while he waited he chewed tobacco incessantly, and ruminated upon +the mystery which lay behind the few words Val had first spoken, before she +realized just what it was she was saying. + +After a long, long while--so long that even Polycarp's patience was feeling +the strain--Val opened the door and stood leaning weakly against the +casing. Her throat was swathed in a piece of white silk. + +"I wish, Polycarp, you'd get the team and hitch it to the light rig," she +said. "I want to go to town, and I don't feel able to drive. Can you take +me in? Can you spare the time?" + +"Why, certainly, I c'n take you in, Mis' Fleetwood. I was jest thinkn' it +wa'n't safe for you out here--" + +"It is perfectly safe," Val interrupted chillingly. "I am going because I +Want to see Arline Hawley." She raised her hand to the bandage. "I have +a sore throat," she stated, staring hard at him. Then, with one of her +impulsive changes, she smiled wistfully. + +"You'll be my friend, Polycarp, won't you?" she pleaded. "I can trust you, +I know, with my--secret. It is a secret--it _must_ be a secret! I'll tell +you the truth, Polycarp. It was Manley--he had been drinking again. He--we +had a quarrel--about something. He didn't know what he was doing--he didn't +mean to hurt me. But I fell--I struck my head; see, there is a great +lump there." She pushed back her hair to show him the place. "So it's a +secret--just between you and me, Polycarp Jenks!" + +"Why, certainly, Mis' Fleetwood; don't you be the least mite oneasy; I'm +your friend--I always have been. A feller ain't to be held responsible when +he's drinkin'--by granny, that's a fact, he ain't." + +"No," Val agreed laconically, "I suppose not. Let us go, then, as soon as +we can, please. I'll stay overnight with Mrs. Hawley, and you can bring me +back to-morrow, can't you? And you'll remember not to mention--anything, +won't you, Polycarp?" + +Polycarp stood very straight and dignified. + +"I hope, Mis' Fleetwood, you can always depend on Polycarp Jenks," he +replied virtuously. "Your secret is safe with me." + +Val smiled--somewhat doubtfully, it is true--and let him go. "Maybe it +is--I hope so," she sighed, as she turned away to dress for the trip. + +All through that long ride to town, Polycarp talked and talked and talked. +He made surmises and waited openly to hear them confirmed or denied; he +gave her advice; he told her everything he had ever heard about Manley, or +had seen or knew from some other source; everything, that is, save what was +good. The sums he had lost at poker, or had borrowed; the debts he owed to +the merchants; the reputation he had for "talking big and doing little;" +the trouble he had had with this man and that man; and what he did not know +for a certainty he guessed at, and so kept the subject alive. + +True, Val did not speak at all, except when he asked her how she felt. Then +she would reply dully, "Pretty well, thank you, Polycarp." Invariably those +were the words she used. Whenever he stole a furtive, sidelong glance at +her, she was staring straight ahead at the great, undulating prairie with +the brown ribbon, which was the trail, thrown carelessly across to the sky +line. + +Polycarp suspected that she did not see anything--she just stared with her +eyes, while her thoughts were somewhere else. He was not even sure that she +heard what he was saying. He thought she must be pretty sick, she was so +pale, and she had such wide, purple rings under her eyes. Also, he rather +resented her desire to keep her trouble a secret; he favored telling +everybody, and organizing a party to go out and run Man Fleetwood out of +the country, as the very mildest rebuke which the outraged community could +give and remain self-respecting. He even fell silent daring the last three +or four miles, while he dwelt longingly upon the keen pleasure there would +be in leading such an expedition. + +"You'll remember, Polycarp, not to speak of this?" Val urged abruptly when +he drew up before the Hawley Hotel. "Not a hint, you know until--until I +give you permission. You promised." + +"Oh, certainly, Mis' Fleetwood. Certainly. Don't you be a mite oneasy." But +the tone of Polycarp was dejected in the extreme. + +"And please be ready to drive me back in the morning. I should like to be +at the ranch by noon, at the latest." With that she left him and went into +the hotel. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII. A FRIEND IN NEED + +"And so," Val finished, rather apathetically, pushing back the fallen lock +of hair, "it has come to that. I can't remain here and keep any shred of +self-respect. All my life I've been taught to believe divorce a terrible +thing--a crime, almost; now I think it is sometimes a crime _not_ to be +divorced. For months I have been coming slowly to a decision, so this +is really not as sudden as it may seem to you. It is humiliating to be +compelled to borrow money--but I would much rather ask you than any of my +own people. My pride is going to suffer enough when I meet them, as it is; +I can't let them know just how miserable and sordid a failure--" + +Arline gave an inarticulate snort, bent her scrawny body nearly double, +and reached frankly into her stocking. She fumbled there a moment and +straightened triumphantly, grasping a flat, buckskin bag. + +"I'd feel like shakin' you if you went to anybody else but me," she +declared, untying the bag. "I know what men is--Lord knows I see enough of +'em and their meanness--and if I can help a woman outa the clutches of one, +I'm tickled to death to git the chancet. I ain't sayin' they're all of 'em +bad--I c'n afford to give the devil his due and still say that men is the +limit. The good ones is so durn scarce it ain't one woman in fifty lucky +enough to git one. All I blame you for is stayin' with him as long as you +have. I'd of quit long ago; I was beginnin' to think you never would come +to your senses. But you had to fight that thing out for yourself; every +woman has to. + +"I'm glad you've woke up to the fact that Man Fleetwood didn't git a deed +to you, body and soul, when he married you; you've been actin' as if you +thought he had. And I'm glad you've got sense enough to pull outa the game +when you know the best you can expect is the worst of it. There ain't no +hope for Man Fleetwood; I seen that when he went back to drinkin' again +after you was burnt out. I did think that would steady him down, but he +ain't the kind that braces up when trouble hits him--he's the sort that +stays down ruther than go to the trouble of gittin' up. He's hopeless now +as a rotten egg, and has been for the last year. Here; you take the hull +works, and if you need more, I can easy git it for you by sendin' in to the +bank." + +"Oh, but this is too much!" Val protested when she had counted the money. +"You're so good--but really and truly, I won't need half--" + +Arline pushed away the proffered money impatiently. "How'n time are you +goin' to tell how much you'll need? Lemme tell you, Val Peyson--I ain't +goin' to call you by his name no more, the dirty cur!--I've been packin' +that money in my stockin' for six months, jest so'st to have it handy when +you wanted it. Divorces cost more'n marriage licenses, as you'll find out +when you git started. And--" + +"You--why, the idea!" Val pursed her lips with something like her old +spirit. "How could _you_ know I'd need to borrow money? I didn't know it +myself, even. I--" + +"Well, I c'n see through a wall when there's a knothole in it," paraphrased +Arline calmly. "You may not know it, but you've been gittin' your back-East +notions knocked outa you pretty fast the last year or so. It was all a +question of what kinda stuff you was made of underneath. You c'n put a +polish on most anything, so I couldn't tell, right at first, what there was +to you. But you're all right--I've seen that a long time back; and so I +knowed durn well you'd be wantin' money to pull loose with. It takes money, +though I know it ain't polite to say much about real dollars 'n' cents. +You'll likely use every cent of that before you're through with the +deal--and remember, there's a lot more growin' on the same bush, if you +need it. It's only waitin' to be picked." + +Val stared, found her eyes blurring so that she could not see, and with +a sudden, impulsive movement leaned over and put her arms around Arline, +unkempt, scrawny, and wholly unlovely though she was. + +"Arline, you're an angel of goodness!" she cried brokenly. "You're the best +friend I ever had in my life--I've had many who petted me and flattered +me--but you--you _do_ things! I'm ashamed--because I haven't loved you +every minute since I first saw you. I judged you--I mean--oh, you're pure, +shining gold inside, instead of--" + +"Oh, git out!" Arline was compelled to gulp twice before she could say even +that much. "I don't shine nowhere--inside er out. I know that well enough. +I never had no chancet to shine. It's always been wore off with hard +knocks. But I like shiny folks all right--when they're fine clear through, +and--" + +"Arline--dear, I do love you. I always shall. I--" + +Arline loosened her clasp and jumped up precipitately. + +"Git out!" she repeated bashfully. "If you git me to cryin', Val Peyson, +I'll wish you was in Halifax. You go to bed, 'n' go to sleep, er I'll--" +She almost ran from the room. Outside, she stopped in a darkened corner +of the hallway and stood for some minutes with her checked gingham apron +pressed tightly over her face, and several times she sniffed audibly. When +she finally returned to the kitchen her nose was pink, her eyelids were +pink, and she was extremely petulant when she caught Minnie eying her +curiously. + +Val had refused to eat any supper, and, beyond telling Arline that she had +decided to leave Manley and return to her mother in Fern Hill, she had not +explained anything very clearly--her colorless face, for instance, nor her +tightly swathed throat, nor the very noticeable bruise upon her temple. + +Arline had not asked a single question. Now, however, she spent some time +fixing a tray with the daintiest food she knew and could procure, and took +it upstairs with a certain diffidence in her manner and a rare tenderness +in her faded, worldly-wise eyes. + +"You got to eat, you know," she reminded Val gently. "You're bucking up +ag'inst the hardest part of the trail, and grub's a necessity. Take it like +you would medicine--unless your throat's too sore. I see you got it all +tied up." + +Val raised her hands in a swift alarm and clasped her throat as if she +feared Arline would remove the bandages. + +"Oh, it's not sore--that is, it is sore--I mean not very much," she +stammered betrayingly. + +Arline set down the tray upon the dresser and faced Val grimly. + +"I never asked you any questions, did I?" she demanded. "But you act for +all the world as if--do you want me to give a guess about that tied-up +neck, and that black'n'blue lump on your forehead? I never asked any +questions--I didn't need to. Man Fleetwood's been maulin' you abound. I was +kinda afraid he'd git to that point some day when he got mad enough; he's +just the brand to beat up a woman. But if it took a beatin' to bring you +to the quitting point, I'm glad he done it. _Only_," she added darkly, "he +better keep outa my reach; I'm jest in the humor to claw him up some if I +should git close enough. And if I happened to forget I'm a lady, I'd sure +bawl him out, and the bigger crowd heard me the better. Now, you eat +this--and don't get the idee you can cover up any meanness of Man +Fleetwood's; not from me, anyhow. I know men better'n you do; you couldn't +tell me nothing about 'em that would su'prise me the least bit. I'm only +thankful he didn't murder you in cold blood. Are you going to eat?" + +"Not if you keep on reminding me of such h-horrid things," wailed Val, +and sobbed into her pillow. "It's bad enough to--to have him ch-choke me +without having you t-talk about it all the time!" + +"Now, honey, don't you waste no tears on a brute like him--he ain't w-worth +it!" Arline was on her bony knees beside the bed, crying with sympathy and +self-reproach. + +So, in truly feminine fashion, the two wept their way back to the solid +ground of everyday living. Before they reached that desirable state of +composure, however, Val told her everything--within certain limits set not +by caution, but rather by her woman's instinct. She did not, for instance, +say much about Kent, though she regretted openly that Polycarp knew so much +about it. + +"Hope never needed no newspaper so long as Polycarp lives here," Arline +grumbled when Val was sitting up again and trying to eat Arline's toast, +and jelly made of buffalo berries, and sipping the tea which had gone +cold. "But if I can round him up in time, I'll try and git him to keep his +mouth shet. I'll scare the liver outa him some way. But if he caught onto +that calf deal--" She shook her head doubtfully. "The worst of it is, +Fred's in town, and he's always pumpin' Polycarp dry, jest to find out all +that's goin' on. You go to bed, and I'll see if I can find out whether +they're together. If they are--but you needn't to worry none. I reckon I'm +a match for the both of 'em. Why, I'd dope their coffee and send 'em both +to sleep till Man got outa the country, if I had to!" + +She stood with her hands upon her angular hips and glared at Val. + +"I sure would do that, very thing--for _you_," she reiterated solemnly, "I +don't purtend I'd do it for Man--but I would for you. But it's likely Kent +has fixed things up so they can't git nothing on Man if they try. He would +if he said he would; that there's _one_ feller that's on the square. You go +to bed now, whilst I go on a still hunt of my own. I'll come and tell you +if there's anything to tell." + +It was easy enough to make the promise, but keeping it was so difficult +that she yielded to the temptation of going to bed and letting Val sleep in +peace; which she could not have done if she had known that Polycarp Jenks +and Fred De Garmo left town on horseback within an hour after Polycarp had +entered it, and that they told no man their errand. + +Over behind Brinberg's store, Polycarp had told Fred all he knew, all he +suspected, and all he believed would come to pass. "Strictly on the quiet," +of course--he reminded Fred of that, over and over, because he had promised +Mrs. Fleetwood that he would not mention it. + +"But, by granny," he apologized, "I didn't like the idee of keepin' _a_ +thing like that from _you_; it would kinda look as if I was standin' in on +the deal, which I ain't. Nobody can't accuse me of rustlin', no matter what +else I might do; you know that, Fred." + +"Sure, I know you're honest, anyway," Fred responded quite sincerely. + +"Well, I considered it my duty to tell you. I've kinda had my suspicions +all fall, that there was somethin' scaly goin' on at Cold Spring. Looked to +me like Man had too blamed many calves missed by spring round-up--for the +size of his herd. I dunno, of course, jest where he gits 'em--you'll have +to find that out. But he's brung twelve er fourteen to the ranch, two er +three at a time. And what she said when she first come to--told me right +out, by granny, 'at Man choked her because she called 'im a thief, and +somethin' about a cow comin' an' claimin' her calf, and her turnin' it out. +That oughta be might' nigh all the evidence you need, Fred, if you find it. +She don't know she said it, but she wouldn't of told it, by granny, if it +wasn't so--now would she?" + +"And you say all this happened to-day?" Fred pondered for a minute. "That's +queer, because I almost caught a fellow last night doing some funny work +on a calf. A Wishbone cow it was, and her calf fresh burned--a barred-out +brand, by thunder! If it was to-day, I'd, say Man found it and blotched the +brand. I wish now I'd hazed them over to the Double Diamond and corralled +'em, like I had a mind to. But we can find them, easy enough. But that +was last night, and you say this big setting came off to-day; you _sure_, +Polly?" + +"'Course I'm sure." Polycarp waggled his head solemnly. He was enjoying +himself to the limit. He was the man on the inside, giving out information +of the greatest importance, and an officer of the law was hanging anxiously +upon his words. He spoke slowly, giving weight to every word. "I rode up to +the house--Man's house--somewhere close to noon, an' there she was, layin' +on the kitchen floor. Didn't know nothin', an' had the marks of somebody's +fingers on 'er throat; the rest of her neck's so white they showed up, by +granny, like--like--" Polycarp never could think of a simile. He always +expectorated in such an emergency, and left his sentence unfinished. He did +so now, and Fred cut in unfeelingly. + +"Never mind that--you've gone over it half a dozen times. You say it was +to-day, at noon, or thereabouts. Man must have done it when he found out +she'd turned the calf loose--he wouldn't unless he was pretty mad, and +scared. He isn't cold-blooded enough to wait till he'd barred out the +brand, and then go home and choke his wife. He didn't know about the calf +till to-day, that's a cinch." He studied the matter with an air of grave +importance. + +"Polycarp," he said abruptly, "I'm going to need you. We've got to find +that bunch of cattle--it ought to be easy enough, and haze 'em down into +Man's field where his bunch of calves are--see? Any calf that's been weaned +in the last three weeks will be pretty likely to claim its mother; and if +he's got any calves branded that claim cows with some other brand--well--" +He threw out his hands in a comprehensive gesture. "That's the quickest way +I know to get him," he said. "I want a witness along, and some help. And +you," he eyed Polycarp keenly, "ain't safe running around town loose. All +your brains seem to leak out your mouth. So you come along with me." + +"Well--any time after to-morrer," hedged Polycarp, offended by the +implication that he talked too much. "I've got to drive the team home for +Mis' Fleetwood to-morrer, I tol' her I would--" + +"Well, you won't. You're going to hit the trail with me just as soon as I +can find a horse for you to ride. We'll sleep at the Double Diamond, and +start from there in the morning. And if I catch you letting a word outa you +about this deal, I'll just about have to arrest you for--" He did not +quite know what, but the very vagueness of the threat had its effect upon +Polycarp. + +He went without further argument, though first he went to the Hawley +Hotel--with Fred close beside him as a precaution against imprudent +gossip--and left word in the office that he would not be able to drive Mrs. +Fleetwood home, the next morning, but would be back to take her out the day +after that, if she did not mind staying in town. It was that message which +Arline deliberately held back from Val until morning. + +"You better stay here," she advised then. "Polycarp an' Fred's up to some +devilment, that's a cinch; but whatever it is, you're better off right here +with me. S'posen you should drive out there and run into Man--what then?" + +Val shivered. "I--that's the only thing I can't bear," she admitted, as if +the time for proud dignity and reserve had gone by. "If I could be sure I +wouldn't need to meet him, I'd rather go alone; really and truly, I would. +You know the horses are perfectly safe--I've driven them to town fifty +times if I have once. I had to, out there alone so much of the time. I'd +rather not have Polycarp spying around. I've got to pack up--there are so +many things of no value to--to _him_, things I brought out here with me. +And there are all my manuscripts; I can't leave them lying around, even if +they aren't worth anything; especially since they aren't worth anything." +She pushed back her hair with a weary movement. "If I could only be +sure--if I knew where _he_ is," she sighed. + +"I'll lend you my gun," Arline offered in good faith. "If he comes around +you and starts any funny business again, you can stand him off, even if you +got some delicate feelin's about blowin' his brains out." + +"Oh, I couldn't. I'm deadly afraid of guns." Val shuddered. + +"Well, then you can't go atone. I'd go with you, if you could git packed +up so as to come back to-day. I guess Min could make out to git two meals +alone." + +"Oh, no. Really and truly, Arline, I'd just as soon go alone. I would +rather, dear." + +Arline was not accustomed to being called "dear." She surrendered with some +confusion and a blush. + +"Well, you better wait," she admonished temporizingly. "Something may turn +up." + +Presently something did turn up. She rushed breathlessly into Val's room +and caught her by the arm. + +"Now's your chancet, Val," she hissed in a loud whisper. "Man jest now rode +into town; he's over in Pop's place--I seen him go in. He's good for the +day, sure. I'll have Hank hitch right up, an' you can go down to the stable +and start from there, so'st he won't see you. An' I'll keep an eye out, 'n' +if he leaves town I won't be fur behind, lemme tell you. He won't, though; +there ain't one chancet in a hundred he'll leave that saloon till he's +full--an' if he tries t' go then, I'll have somebody lock 'im up in the ice +house till you git back. You want to hurry up that packin', an' git in here +quick's you can." + +She went to the stable with Val, her apron thrown over her head for want +of a hat. "When Val was settling herself in the seat, Arline caught at the +wheel. + +"Say! How'n time you goin' to git your trunks loaded into the wagon?" she +cried. "You can't do it alone." Val parsed her lips; she had not thought of +that. + +"But Polycarp will come, by the time I am ready," she decided. "You +couldn't keep him away, Arline; he would be afraid he might miss something, +because I suppose ours is the only ranch in the country where the wheels +aren't turning smoothly. Polycarp and I can manage." + +Hank, grinning under his ragged, brown mustache, handed her the lines. +"I've got my orders," he told her briefly. "I'll watch out the trail's kept +clear." + +"Oh, thank you. I've so many good friends," Val answered, giving him a +smile to stir his sluggish blood. "Good-bye, Arline. Don't worry about me, +there's a dear. I shall not be back before to-morrow night, probably." + +Both Arline and Hank stood where they were and watched her out of sight +before they turned back to the sordid tasks which made up their lives. + +"She'll make it--she's the proper stuff," Hank remarked, and lighted his +pipe. Arline, for a wonder, sighed and said nothing. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII. CAUGHT! + +After two nights and a day of torment unbearable, Kent bolted from his +work, which would have taken him that day, as it had done the day before, +in a direction opposite to that which his mind and his heart followed, and +without apology or explanation to his foreman rode straight to Cold Spring +Coulee. He had no very definite plan, except to see Val. He did not even +know what he would say when he faced her. + +Michael was steaming from nose to tail when he stopped at the yard gate, +which shows how impatience had driven his master. Kent glanced quickly +around the place as he walked up the narrow path to the house. Nothing +was changed in the slightest particular, as far as he could see, and he +realized then that he had been uneasy as well as anxious. Both doors were +closed, so that he was obliged to knock before Val became visible. He had a +fleeting impression of extreme caution in the way she opened the door and +looked out, but he forgot it immediately in his joy at seeing her. + +"Oh, it's you. Come in, and--you won't mind if I close the door? I'm afraid +I'm the victim of nerves, to-day." + +"Why?" Kent was instantly solicitous. "Has anything happened since I was +here?" + +Val shook her head, smiling faintly. "Nothing that need to worry _you_, +pal. I don't want to talk about worries. I want to be cheered up; I haven't +laughed, Kent, for so long I'm afraid my facial muscles are getting stiff. +Say something funny, can't you?" + +Kent pushed his hat far back on his head and sat down upon a corner of the +table. "Such is life in the far West--and the farther West you go, the +livelier--" he began to declaim dutifully. + +"The livelier it gets. Yes, I've heard that a million tunes, I believe. I +can't laugh at that; I never did think it funny." She sighed, and twitched +her shoulders impatiently because of it. "I see you brought back the +glasses," she remarked inanely. "You certainly weren't in any great hurry, +were you?" + +"Oh, they had us riding over east of the home ranch, hazing in some outa +the hills. I'm supposed to be over there right now--but I ain't. I expect +I'll get the can, all right--" + +"If you're going away, what do you care?" she taunted. + +"H'm--sure, what do I care?" He eyed her from under his brows while he bent +to light a match upon the sole of his boot. Val had long ago settled his +compunctions about smoking in her presence. "You seem to be all tore up, +here," he observed irrelevantly. "Cleaning house?" + +"Yes--cleaning house." Val smiled ambiguously. + +"Hubby in town?" + +"Yes--he went in yesterday, and hasn't come back yet." + +Kent smoked for a moment meditatively. "I found that calf, all right," he +informed her at last. "It was too late to ride around this way and tell you +that night. So you needn't worry any more about that." + +"I'm not worrying about that." Val stooped and picked up a hairpin from the +floor, and twirled it absently in her fingers. "I don't think it matters, +any more. Yesterday afternoon Fred De Garmo and Polycarp Jenks came into +the coulee with a bunch of cattle, and turned all the calves out of the +river field with them; and, after a little, they drove the whole lot of +them away somewhere--over that way." She waved a slim hand to the west. +"They let out the calves in the corral, too. I saw them from the window, +but I didn't ask them any questions. I really didn't need to, did I?" She +grazed him with a glance. "I thought perhaps you had failed to find that +calf; I'm glad you did, though--so it wasn't that started them hunting +around here--Polycarp and Fred I mean." + +Kent looked at her queerly. Her voice was without any emotion whatever, as +if the subject held no personal interest for her. He finished his cigarette +and threw the stub out into the yard before either of them spoke another +word. He closed the door again, stood there for a minute making up his +mind, and went slowly over to where she was sitting listlessly in a chair, +her hands folded loosely in her lap. He gripped with one hand the chairback +and stared down at her high-piled, yellow hair. + +"How long do you think I'm going to stand around and let you be dragged +into trouble like this?" he began abruptly. "You know what I told you the +other day--I could say the same thing over again, and a lot more; and I'd +mean more than I could find words for. Maybe you can stand this sort +of thing--I can't. I'm not going to try. If you're bound to stick to +that--that gentleman, I'm going to get outa the country where I can't see +you killed by inches. Every time I come, you're a little bit whiter, and a +little bigger-eyed--I can't stand it, I tell you! + +"You weren't made for a hell like you're living. You were meant to be +happy--and I was meant to make you happy. Every morning when I open my +eyes--do you know what I think? I think it's another day we oughta be happy +in, you and me." He took her suddenly by the shoulder and brought her up, +facing him, where he could look into her eyes. + +"We've only got just one life to live, Val!" he pleaded. "And we could be +happy together--I'd stake my life on that. I can't go on forever just being +friends, and eating my heart out for you, and seeing you abused--and what +for? Just because a preacher mumbled some words over you two! Only for +that, you wouldn't stay with him over-night, and you know it! Is _that_ +what ought to tie two human beings together--without love, or even +friendship? You hate him; you can't look me in the eyes and say you don't. +And he's tired of you. Some other woman would please him better. And I +could make you happy!" + +Val broke away from his grasp, and retreated until the table was between +them. Her listlessness was a thing forgotten. She was panting with the +quick beating of her heart. + +"Kent--don't, pal! You mustn't say those things--it's wicked." + +"It's true," he cried hotly. "Can you look at me and say it ain't the +truth?" + +"You've spoiled our friendship, Kent!" she accused, while she evaded his +question. "It meant so much to me--just your dear, good friendship." + +"My love could mean a whole lot more," he declared sturdily. + +"But you mustn't say those things--you mustn't feel that way, Kent!" + +"Oh!" He laughed grimly. "Mustn't I? How are you going to stop me?" He +stared hard at her, his face growing slowly rigid. "There's just one way to +stop me from saying such wicked things," he told her. "You can tell me you +don't care anything about me, and never could, not even if that down-east +conscience of yours didn't butt into the game. You can tell me that, and +swear it's the truth, and I'll leave the country. I'll go so far you'll +newer see me again, so I'll never bother you any more. I can't promise I'll +stop loving you--but for my own sake I'll sure try hard enough." He set his +teeth hard together and stood quiet, watching her. + +Val tied to answer him. Evidently she could not manage her voice, for he +saw her begin softly beating her lips with her fist, fighting to get back +her self-control. Once or twice he had seen her do that, when, womanlike, +the tears would come in spite of her. + +"I don't want you to go a-away," she articulated at last, with a hint of +stubbornness. + +"Well, what _do_ you want? I can't stay, unless--" He did not attempt to +finish the sentence. He knew there was no need; she understood well enough +the alternative. + +For long minutes she did not speak, because she could not. Like many women, +she fought desperately against the tears which seemed a badge of her +femininity. She sat down in a chair, dropped her face upon her folded +arms, and bit her lips until they were sore. Kent took a step toward her, +reconsidered, and went over to the window, where he stood staring moodily +out until she began speaking. Even then, he did not turn immediately toward +her. + +"You needn't go, Kent," she said with some semblance of calm. "Because I'm +going. I didn't tell you--but I'm going home. I'm going to get free, by +the same law that tied me to him. You are right--I have a 'down-east' +conscience. I think I was born with it. It demands that I get my freedom +honestly; I can't steal it--pal. I couldn't be happy if I did that, no +matter how hard I might try--or you." + +He turned eagerly toward her then, but she stopped him with a gesture. + +"No--stay where you are. I want to solve my problem and--and leave you out +of it; you're a complication, pal--when you talk like--like you've just +been talking. It makes my conscience wonder whether I'm honest with myself. +I've got to leave you out, don't you see? And so, leaving you out, I don't +feel that any woman should be expected to go on like I'm doing. You don't +know--I couldn't tell you just how--impossible--this marriage of mine has +become. The day after--well, yesterday--no, the day before yesterday--he +came home and found out--what I'd done. He--I couldn't stay here, after +that, so--" + +"What did he do?" Kent demanded sharply. "He didn't dare to lay his hands +on you--did he? By--" + +"Don't swear, Kent--I hear so much of that from him!" Val smiled curiously. +"He--he swore at me. I couldn't stay with him, after that--could I, dear?" +Whether she really meant to speak that last word or not, it set Kent's +blood dancing so that he forgot to urge his question farther. He took two +eager steps toward her, and she retreated again behind the table. + +"Kent, don't! How can I tell you anything, if you won't be good?" She +waited until he was standing rather sulkily by the window again. "Anyway, +it doesn't matter now what he has done. I am going to leave him. I'm going +to get a divorce. Not even the strictest 'down-east' conscience could +demand that I stay. I'm perfectly at ease upon that point. About this last +trouble--with the calves--if I could help him, I would, of course. But all +I could say would only make matters worse--and I'm a wretched failure at +lying. I can help him more, I think, by going away. I feel certain there's +going to be trouble over those calves. Fred De Garmo never would have come +down here and driven them all away, would he, unless there was going to be +trouble?" + +"If he came in here and got the calves, it looks as if he meant business, +all right." Kent frowned absently at the white window curtain. "I've seen +the time," he added reflectively, "when I'd be all broke up to have Man get +into trouble. We used to be pretty good friends!" + +"A year ago it would have broken my heart," Val sighed. "We do change so! I +can't quite understand Why I should feel so indifferent about it now; even +the other day it was terrible. But when I felt his fingers--" she stopped +guiltily. "He seems a stranger to me now. I don't even hate him so very +much. I don't want to meet him, though." + +"Neither do I." But there was a different meaning in Kent's tone. "So +you're going to quit?" He looked at her thoughtfully--"You'll leave your +address, I hope!" + +"Oh, yes." Val's voice betrayed some inward trepidation. "I'm not running +away; I'm just going." + +"I see." He sighed, impatient at the restraint she had put upon him. "That +don't mean you won't ever come back, does it? Or that the trains are going +to quit carrying passengers to your town? Because you can't _always_ keep +me outa your 'problem,' let me tell you. Is it against the rules to ask +when you're going--and how?" + +"Just as soon as I can get my trunks packed, and Polycarp--or +somebody--comes to help me load them into the spring wagon. I promised +Arline Hawley I would be in town to-night. I don't know, though--I don't +seem to be making much progress with my packing." She smiled at him more +brightly. "Let's wade ashore, pal, and get to work instead of talking about +things better left alone. I know just exactly what you're thinking--and I'm +going to let you help me instead of Polycarp. I'm frightfully angry with +him, anyway. He promised me, on his word of honor, that he wouldn't mention +a thing--and he must have actually hunted for a chance to tell! He didn't +have the nerve to come to the house yesterday, when he was here with +Fred--perhaps he won't come to-day, after all. So you'll have to help me +make my getaway, pal." + +Kent wavered. "You're the limit, all right," he told her after a period of +hesitation. "You just wait, old girl, till you get that conscience of +yours squared! What shall I do? I can pack a war-bag in one minute and +three-quarters, and a horse in five minutes--provided he don't get gay and +pitch the pack off a time or two, and somebody's around to help throw the +hitch. Just tell me where to start in, and you won't be able to see me for +dust!" + +"You seem in a frightful hurry to have me go," Val complained, laughing +nevertheless with the nervous reaction. "Packing a trunk takes time, and +care, and intelligence." + +"Now isn't that awful?" Kent's eyes flared with mirth, all the more +pronounced because it was entirely superficial. "Well, you take the time +and care, Mrs. Goodpacker, and I'll cheerfully furnish the intelligence, +This goes, I reckon?" He squeezed a pink cushion into as small a space as +possible, and held it out at arm's length. + +"That goes--to Arline. _Don't_ put it in there!" Val's laughter was not far +from hysteria. Kent was pretending to stuff the pink cushion into her hand +bag. + +"Better take it; you'll--" + +The front door was pushed violently open and Manley almost fell into the +room. Val gave a little, inarticulate cry and shrank back against the wall +before she could recover herself. They had for the moment forgotten Manley, +and all he stood for in the way of heartbreak. + +A strange-looking Manley he was, with his white face and staring, bloodshot +eyes, and the cruel, animal lines around his mouth. Hardly recognizable to +one who had not seen him since three or four years before, he would have +been. He stopped short just over the threshold, and glanced suspiciously +from one to the other before he came farther into the room. + +"Dig up some grub, Val--in a bag, so I can carry it on horseback," he +commanded. "And a blanket--where did you put those rifle cartridges?" He +hurried across the room to where his rifle and belt hung upon the wall, +just over the little, homemade bookcase. "I had a couple of boxes--where +are they?" He snatched down the rifle, took the belt, and began buckling it +around him with fumbling fingers. + +Mechanically Val reached upon a higher shelf and got him the two boxes of +shells. Her eyes were fixed curiously upon his face. + +"What has happened?" she asked him as he tore open a box and began pushing +the shells, one by one, into his belt. + +"Fred De Garmo--he tried to arrest me--in town--I shot him dead," He +glanced furtively at Kent. "Can I take your horse, Kent? I want to get +across the river before--" + +"You shot--Fred--" Val was staring at him stupidly. He whirled savagely +toward her. + +"Yes, and I'd shoot any man that walked up and tried to take me. He was +a fool if he thought all he had to do was crook his finger and say 'Come +along.' It was over those calves--and I'd say you had a hand in it, if I +hadn't found that calf, and saw how you burned out the brand before you +turned it loose. You might have told me--I wouldn't have--" He shifted his +gaze toward Kent. "The hell of it is, the sheriff happened to be in town +for something; he's back a couple of miles--for God's sake, move! And get +that flour and bacon, and some matches. I've got to get across the river. I +can shake 'em off, on the other side. Hurry, Val!" + +She went out into the kitchen, and they heard her moving about, collecting +the things he needed. + +"I'll have to take your horse, Kent." Manley turned to him with a certain +wheedling tone, infinitely disgusting to the other. "Mine's all in--I rode +him down, getting this far. I've got to get across the river, and into +the hills the other side--I can dodge 'em over there. You can have my +horse--he's good as yours, anyway." He seemed to fed a slight discomfort at +Kent's silence. "You've always stood by me--anyway, it wasn't so much +my fault--he came at me unawares, and says 'Man Fleetwood, you're my +prisoner!' Why, the very tone of him was an insult--and I won't stand for +being arrested--I pulled my gun and got him through the lungs--heard 'em +yelling he was dead--Hurry up with that grub! I can't wait here till--" + +"I ought to tell you Michael's no good for water," Kent forced himself to +say. "He's liable to turn back on you; he's scared of it." + +"He won't turn back with _me_--not with old Jake Bondy at my heels!" Manley +snatched the bag of provisions from Val when she appeared, and started for +the door. + +"You better leave off some of that hardware, then," Kent advised +perfunctorily. "You're liable to have to swim." + +"I don't care how I get across, just so--" A panic seemed to seize him +then. Without a word of thanks or farewell he rushed out, threw himself +into Kent's saddle without taking time to tie on his bundle of bacon and +flour, or remembering the blanket he had asked for. Holding his provisions +under his arm, his rifle in one hand, and his reins clutched in the other, +he struck the spurs home and raced down the coulee toward the river. Fred +and Polycarp had not troubled to put up the wire gate after emptying the +river field, so he had a straight run of it to the very river bank. The two +stood together at the window and watched him go. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV. RETRIBUTION + +"He thought it was I burned out that, brand; did you notice what he said?" +Val, as frequently happens in times of stress, spoke first of a trivial +matter, before her mind would grasp the greater issues. + +"He'll never make it," said Kent, speaking involuntarily his thought. +"There comes old Jake Bondy, now, down the hill. Still, I dunno--if Michael +takes to the water all right--" + +"If the sheriff comes here, what shall we tell him? Shall we--" + +"He won't. He's turning off, don't you see? He must have got a sight of +Man from the top of the hill. Michael's tolerably fresh, and Jake's horse +isn't; that makes a big difference." + +Val weakened unexpectedly, as the full meaning of it all swept through her +mind. + +"Oh, it's horrible!" she whispered. "Kent, what can we do?" + +"Not a thing, only keep our heads, and don't give way to nerves," he +hinted. "It's something out of our reach; let's not go all to pieces over +it, pal." + +She steadied under his calm voice. + +"I'm always acting foolish just at the wrong time--but to think he could--" + +"Don't think! You'll have enough of that to do, managing your own affairs. +All this doesn't change a thing for you. It makes you feel bad--and for +that I could kill him, almost!" So much flashed out, and then he brought +himself in hand again. "You've still got to pack your trunks, and take the +train home, just the same as if this hadn't happened. I didn't like the +idea at first, but now I see it's the best thing you can do, for the +present. After awhile--we'll see about it. Don't look out, if it upsets +you, Val. You can't do any good, and you've got to save your nerves. Let +pull down the shade--" + +"Oh, I've got to see!" Perversely, she caught up the field glasses from the +table, drew them from their case, and, letting down the upper window sash +with a slam, focused the glasses upon the river. "He usually crosses right +at the mouth of the coulee--" She swung the glasses slowly about. "Oh, +there he is--just on the bank. The river looks rather high--oh, your horse +doesn't want to go in, Kent. He whirls on his hind feet, and tried to bolt +when Manley started in--" + +Kent had been watching her face jealously. "Here, let me take a look, will +you? I can tell--" She yielded reluctantly, and in a moment he had caught +the focus. + +"Tell me what you see, Kent--everything," she begged, looking anxiously +from his face to the river. + +"Well, old Jake is fogging along down the coulee--but he ain't to the river +yet, not by a long shot! Ah-h! Man's riding back to take a run in. That's +the stuff--got Michael's feet wet that time, the old freak! They came near +going clean outa sight." + +"The sheriff--is he close enough--" Val began fearfully. "Oh, we're too far +away to do a thing!" + +Kent kept his eyes to the glasses. "We couldn't do a thing if we were right +there. Man's in swimming water already. Jake ain't riding in--from the +motions he's ordering Man back." + +"Oh, please let me look a minute! I won't get excited, Kent, and I'll tell +you everything I see--_please!_" Val's teeth were fairly chattering with +excitement, so that Kent hesitated before he gave up the glasses. But it +seemed boorish to refuse. She snatched at them as he took them from his +eyes, and placed them nervously to her own. + +"Oh, I see them both!" she cried, after a second or two. "The sheriff's got +his rifle in his hands--Kent, do you suppose he'd--" + +"Just a bluff, pal. They all do it. What--" + +Val gave a start. "Oh, he shot, Kent! I saw him take aim--it looked as if +he pointed it straight at Manley, and the smoke--" She moved the glasses +slowly, searching the river. + +"Well, he'd have to be a dandy, to hit anything on the water, and with the +sun in his eyes, too," Kent assured her, hardly taking his eyes from her +face with its varying expression. Almost he could see what was taking place +at the river, just by watching her. + +"Oh, there's Manley, away out! Why, your Michael is swimming beautifully, +Kent! His head is high out of the water, and the water is churning +like--Oh, Manley's holding his rifle up over his head--he's looking back +toward shore. I wonder," she added softly, "what he's thinking about! +Manley! you're my husband--and once I--" + +"Draw a bead on that gazabo on shore," Kent interrupted her faint faring up +of sentiment toward the man she had once loved and loved no more. + +Val drew a long breath and turned the glasses reluctantly from the +fugitive. "I don't see him--oh, yes! He's down beside a rock, on one knee, +and he's taking a rest across the rock, and is squinting along--oh, he +can't hit him at that distance, can he, Kent? Would he dare--why, it would +be murder, wouldn't it? Oh-h--_he shot again_!" + +Kent reached up a hand and took the glasses from her eyes with a masterful +gesture. "You let me look," he said laconically. "I'm steadier than you." + +Val crept closer to him, and looked up into his face. She could read +nothing there; his mouth was shut tight so that it was a stern, straight +line, but that told her nothing. He always looked so when he was intent +upon something, or thinking deeply. She turned her eyes toward the river, +flowing smoothly across the mouth of the coulee. Between, the land lay +sleeping lazily in the hazy sunlight of mid-autumn. The grass was brown, +the rocky outcroppings of the coulee wall yellow and gray and red--and the +river was so blue, and so quiet! Surely that sleepy coulee and that placid +river could not be witnessing a tragedy. She turned her head, irritated +by its very calmness. Her eyes dwelt wistfully upon Kent's half-concealed +face. + +"What are they doing now, Kent?" Her tone was hushed. + +"I can't--exactly--" He mumbled absently, his mind a mile away. She waited +a moment. + +"Can you see--Manley?" + +This time he did not answer at all; he seemed terribly far off, as if only +his shell of a body remained with her in the room. + +"Why don't you talk?" she wailed. She waited until she could endure no +more, then reached up and snatched the glasses from his eyes. + +"I can't help it--I shall go crazy standing here. I've just got to see!" +she panted. + +For a moment he clung to the glasses and stared down at her. "You better +not, sweetheart," he urged gently, but when she still held fast he let them +go. She raised them hurriedly to her eyes, and turned to the river with a +shrinking impatience to know the worst and have it over with. + +"E-everything j-joggles so," she whimpered complainingly, trying vainly +to steady the glasses. He slipped his arms around her, and let her lean +against him; she did not even seem to realize it. Just then she had caught +sight of something, and her intense interest steadied her so that she stood +perfectly still. + +"Why, your horse--" she gasped. "Michael--he's got his feet straight up in +the air--oh, Kent, he's rolling over sad over! I can't see--" She held her +breath. + +The glasses sagged as if they had grown all at once too heavy to hold. +"I--I thought I saw--" She shivered and hid her face upon one upflung arm. + +Kent caught up the glasses and looked long at the river, unmindful of the +girl sobbing wildly beside him. Finally he turned to her, hesitated, and +then gathered her close in his arms. The glasses slid unheeded to the +floor. + +"Don't cry--it's better this way, though it's hard enough, God knows." His +voice was very gentle. "Think how awful it would have been, Val, if the +law had got him. Don't cry like that! Such things are happening every day, +somewhere--" He realized suddenly that this was no way to comfort her, and +stopped. He patted her shoulder with a sense of blank helplessness. He +could make love--but this was not the time for love-making; and since he +was denied that outlet for his feelings, he did not know what to do, except +that he led her to the couch, and settled her among the cushions so that +she would be physically comfortable, at least. He turned restlessly to the +window, looked; out, and then went to the couch and bent over her. + +"I'm going out to the gate--I want to see Jake Bondy. He's coming up the +coulee," he said. "I won't be far. Poor little girl--poor little pal, I +wish I could help you." He touched his lips to her hair, so lightly she +could not feel it, and left her. + +At the gate he met, not the sheriff, who was riding slowly, and had just +passed through the field gate, but Arline and Hank, rattling up in the +Hawley buck-board. + +"Thank the good Lord!" he exclaimed when he helped her from the rig. "I +never was so glad to see anybody in my life. Go on in--she's in there +crying her heart out. Man's dead--the sheriff shot him in the river--oh, +there's been hell to pay out here!" + +"My heavens above!" Arline stared up at him while she grasped the +significance of his words. "I knowed he'd hit for here--I followed right +out as quick as Hank could hitch up the team. Did you hear about Fred--" + +"Yes, yes, yes, I know all about it!" Kent was guilty of pulling her +through the gate, and then pushing her toward the house. "You go and do +something for that poor girl. Pack her up and take her to town as quick as +God'll let you. There's been misery enough for her out here to kill a dozen +women." + +He watched until she had reached the porch, and then swung back to Hank, +sitting calmly in the buckboard, with the lines gripped between his knees +while he filled his pipe. + +"I can take care of the man's side of this business, fast enough," Kent +confessed whimsically, "but there's some things it takes a woman to +handle." He glanced again over his shoulder, gave a huge sigh of relief +when he glimpsed Arline's thin face as she passed the window and knelt +beside the couch, and turned with a lighter heart to meet the sheriff. + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Lonesome Land, by B. M. 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