Part 27 (1/2)

She wiped an errant tear away, and made her way to a store--a new place sprung up, like the bank and the hotel, with the growing importance of the town. The stock of ready-made clothing drove her to despair. It seemed that what women resided in Hazleton must invariably dress in Mother Hubbard gowns of cheap cotton print with other garments to match. But eventually they found for her undergarments of a sort, a waist and skirt, and a comfortable pair of shoes. Hats, as a milliner would understand the term, there were none. And in default of such she stuck to the gray felt sombrero she had worn into the Klappan and out again--which, in truth, became her very well, when tilted at the proper angle above her heavy black hair. Then she went back to the hotel, and sought a bathroom.

Returning from this she found Bill, a Bill all shaved and shorn, unloading himself of sundry packages of new attire.

”Aha, everything is lovely,” he greeted enthusiastically. ”Old Hack jumped at the pelts, and paid a fat price for the lot. Also the ranch deal has gone through. He's a prince, old Hack. Sent up a man and had it surveyed and cla.s.sified and the deed waiting for me. And--oh, say, here's a letter for you.”

”For me? Oh, yes,” as she looked at the hand-writing and postmark. ”I wrote to Loraine Marsh when we were going north. Good heavens, look at the date--it's been here since last September!”

”Hackaberry knew where we were,” Bill explained. ”Sometimes in camps like this they hold mail two or three years for men that have gone into the interior.”

She put aside the letter, and dressed while Bill had his bath. Then, with the smoke and grime of a hard trail obliterated, and with decent clothes upon them, they sought the dining-room. There, while they waited to be served, Hazel read Loraine Marsh's letter, and pa.s.sed it to Bill with a self-conscious little laugh.

”There's an invitation there we might accept,” she said casually.

Bill read. There were certain comments upon her marriage, such as the average girl might be expected to address to her chum who has forsaken spinsterhood, a lot of chatty mention of Granville people and Granville happenings, which held no particular interest for Bill since he knew neither one nor the other, and it ended with an apparently sincere hope that Hazel and her husband would visit Granville soon as the Marshes'

guests.

He returned the letter as the waitress brought their food.

”Wouldn't it be nice to take a trip home?” Hazel suggested thoughtfully. ”I'd love to.”

”We are going home,” Bill reminded gently.

”Oh, of course,” she smiled. ”But I mean to Granville. I'd like to go back there with you for a while, just to--just to--”

”To show 'em,” he supplied laconically.

”Oh, Bill!” she pouted.

Nevertheless, she could not deny that there was a measure of truth in his brief remark. She did want to ”show 'em.” Bill's vernacular expressed it exactly. She had compa.s.sed success in a manner that Granville--and especially that portion of Granville which she knew and which knew her--could appreciate and understand and envy according to its individual tendencies.

She looked across the table at her husband, and thought to herself with proud satisfaction that she had done well. Viewed from any angle whatsoever, Bill Wagstaff stood head and shoulders above all the men she had ever known. Big, physically and mentally, clean-minded and capable--indubitably she had captured a lion, and, though she might have denied stoutly the imputation, she wanted Granville to see her lion and hear him roar.

Whether they realize the fact or not, to the average individual, male or female, reflected glory is better than none at all. And when two people stand in the most intimate relation to each other, the success of one lends a measure of its l.u.s.ter to the other. Those who had been so readily impressed by Andrew Bush's device to singe her social wings with the flame of gossip had long since learned their mistake. She had the word of Loraine Marsh and Jack Barrow that they were genuinely sorry for having been carried away by appearances. And she could nail her colors to the mast if she came home the wife of a man like Bill Wagstaff, who could wrest a fortune from the wilderness in a briefer span of time than it took most men to make current expenses. Hazel was quite too human to refuse a march triumphal if it came her way. She had left Granville in bitterness of spirit, and some of that bitterness required balm.

”Still thinking Granville?” Bill queried, when they had finished an uncommonly silent meal.

Hazel flushed slightly. She was, and momentarily she felt that she should have been thinking of their little nest up by Pine River Pa.s.s instead. She knew that Bill was homing to the cabin. She herself regarded it with affection, but of a different degree from his. Her mind was more occupied with another, more palpitating circle of life than was possible at the cabin, much as she appreciated its green and peaceful beauty. The sack of gold lying in the bank had somehow opened up far-flung possibilities. She skipped the interval of affairs which she knew must be attended to, and betook herself and Bill to Granville, thence to the bigger, older cities, where money shouted in the voice of command, where all things were possible to those who had the price.

She had had her fill of the wilderness--for the time being, she put it.

It loomed behind her--vast, bleak, a desolation of loneliness from which she must get away. She knew now, beyond peradventure, that her heart had brought her back to the man in spite of, rather than because of, his environment. And secure in the knowledge of his love for her and her love for him, she was already beginning to indulge a dream of transplanting him permanently to kindlier surroundings, where he would have wider scope for his natural ability and she less isolation.

But she was beginning to know this husband of hers too well to propose anything of the sort abruptly. Behind his tenderness and patience she had sometimes glimpsed something inflexible, unyielding as the wilderness he loved. So she merely answered:

”In a way, yes.”

”Let's go outside where I can smoke a decent cigar on top of this fairly decent meal,” he suggested. ”Then we'll figure on the next move. I think about twenty-four hours in Hazleton will do me. There's a steamer goes down-river to-morrow.”

CHAPTER XXIV

NEIGHBORS