Part 29 (1/2)

Daylight felt inexpressibly saddened. He was suddenly aware of a great emptiness. What would a Sunday be without Dede? And Sundays without end without her? He drummed perplexedly on the desk with his fingers.

”Who bought her?” he asked. Dede's eyes flashed in the way long since familiar to him when she was angry.

”Don't you dare buy her back for me,” she cried. ”And don't deny that that was what you had in mind.”

”I won't deny it. It was my idea to a tee. But I wouldn't have done it without asking you first, and seeing how you feel about it, I won't even ask you. But you thought a heap of that mare, and it's pretty hard on you to lose her. I'm sure sorry. And I'm sorry, too, that you won't be riding with me tomorrow. I'll be plumb lost. I won't know what to do with myself.”

”Neither shall I,” Dede confessed mournfully, ”except that I shall be able to catch up with my sewing.”

”But I haven't any sewing.”

Daylight's tone was whimsically plaintive, but secretly he was delighted with her confession of loneliness. It was almost worth the loss of the mare to get that out of her. At any rate, he meant something to her. He was not utterly unliked.

”I wish you would reconsider, Miss Mason,” he said softly. ”Not alone for the mare's sake, but for my sake. Money don't cut any ice in this.

For me to buy that mare wouldn't mean as it does to most men to send a bouquet of flowers or a box of candy to a young lady. And I've never sent you flowers or candy.” He observed the warning flash of her eyes, and hurried on to escape refusal. ”I'll tell you what we'll do.

Suppose I buy the mare and own her myself, and lend her to you when you want to ride. There's nothing wrong in that. Anybody borrows a horse from anybody, you know.”

Agin he saw refusal, and headed her off.

”Lots of men take women buggy-riding. There's nothing wrong in that.

And the man always furnishes the horse and buggy. Well, now, what's the difference between my taking you buggy-riding and furnis.h.i.+ng the horse and buggy, and taking you horse-back-riding and furnis.h.i.+ng the horses?”

She shook her head, and declined to answer, at the same time looking at the door as if to intimate that it was time for this unbusinesslike conversation to end. He made one more effort.

”Do you know, Miss Mason, I haven't a friend in the world outside you?

I mean a real friend, man or woman, the kind you chum with, you know, and that you're glad to be with and sorry to be away from. Hegan is the nearest man I get to, and he's a million miles away from me.

Outside business, we don't hitch. He's got a big library of books, and some crazy kind of culture, and he spends all his off times reading things in French and German and other outlandish lingoes--when he ain't writing plays and poetry. There's n.o.body I feel chummy with except you, and you know how little we've chummed--once a week, if it didn't rain, on Sunday. I've grown kind of to depend on you. You're a sort of--of--of--”

”A sort of habit,” she said with a smile.

”That's about it. And that mare, and you astride of her, coming along the road under the trees or through the suns.h.i.+ne--why, with both you and the mare missing, there won't be anything worth waiting through the week for. If you'd just let me buy her back--”

”No, no; I tell you no.” Dede rose impatiently, but her eyes were moist with the memory of her pet. ”Please don't mention her to me again. If you think it was easy to part with her, you are mistaken.

But I've seen the last of her, and I want to forget her.”

Daylight made no answer, and the door closed behind him.

Half an hour later he was conferring with Jones, the erstwhile elevator boy and rabid proletarian whom Daylight long before had grubstaked to literature for a year. The resulting novel had been a failure.

Editors and publishers would not look at it, and now Daylight was using the disgruntled author in a little private secret service system he had been compelled to establish for himself. Jones, who affected to be surprised at nothing after his crus.h.i.+ng experience with railroad freight rates on firewood and charcoal, betrayed no surprise now when the task was given to him to locate the purchaser of a certain sorrel mare.

”How high shall I pay for her?” he asked.

”Any price. You've got to get her, that's the point. Drive a sharp bargain so as not to excite suspicion, but buy her. Then you deliver her to that address up in Sonoma County. The man's the caretaker on a little ranch I have there. Tell him he's to take whacking good care of her. And after that forget all about it. Don't tell me the name of the man you buy her from. Don't tell me anything about it except that you've got her and delivered her. Savvee?”

But the week had not pa.s.sed, when Daylight noted the flash in Dede's eyes that boded trouble.

”Something's gone wrong--what is it?” he asked boldly.