Part 29 (1/2)

”Course it is,” said Billy. ”Father and mother are living in Laramie.”

”It's all straight,” said the cow-puncher. ”I never saw her till three years ago. I haven't anything to hide, only--only--only it don't come easy to tell.”

I rose. ”Miss Buckner,” said I, ”he will tell you. But he will not tell you he paid dearly for what was no fault of his. It has been no secret.

It is only something his friends and his enemies have forgotten.”

But all the while I was speaking this, Jessamine's eyes were fixed on Lin, and her face remained white.

I left the girl and the man and the little boy together, and crossed to the hotel. But its air was foul, and I got my roll of camp blankets to sleep in the clean night, if sleeping-time should come; meanwhile I walked about in the silence To have taken a wife once in good faith, ignorant she was another's, left no stain, raised no barrier. I could have told Jessamine the same old story myself--or almost; but what had it to do with her at all? Why need she know? Reasoning thus, yet with something left uncleared by reason that I could not state, I watched the moon edge into sight, heavy and rich-hued, a melon-slice of glow, seemingly near, like a great lantern tilted over the plain. The smell of the sage-brush flavored the air; the hush of Wyoming folded distant and near things, and all Separ but those three inside the lighted window were in bed. Dark windows were everywhere else, and looming above rose the water-tank, a dull ma.s.s in the night, and forever somehow to me a Sphinx emblem, the vision I instantly see when I think of Separ. Soon I heard a door creaking. It was Billy, coming alone, and on seeing me he walked up and spoke in a half-awed voice.

”She's a-crying,” said he.

I withheld from questions, and as he kept along by my side he said: ”I'm sorry. Do you think she's mad with Lin for what he's told her? She just sat, and when she started crying he made me go away.”

”I don't believe she's mad,” I told Billy; and I sat down on my blanket, he beside me, talking while the moon grew small as it rose over the plain, and the light steadily shone in Jessamine's window. Soon young Billy fell asleep, and I looked at him, thinking how in a way it was he who had brought this trouble on the man who had saved him and loved him.

But that man had no such untender thoughts. Once more the door opened, and it was he who came this time, alone also. She did not follow him and stand to watch him from the threshold, though he forgot to close the door, and, coming over to me, stood looking down.

”What?” I said at length.

I don't know that he heard me. He stooped over Billy and shook him gently. ”Wake, son,” said he. ”You and I must get to our camp now.”

”Now?” said Billy. ”Can't we wait till morning?”

”No, son. We can't wait here any more. Go and get the horses and put the saddles on.” As Billy obeyed, Lin looked at the lighted window. ”She is in there,” he said. ”She's in there. So near.” He looked, and turned to the hotel, from which he brought his chaps and spurs and put them on.

”I understand her words,” he continued. ”Her words, the meaning of them.

But not what she means, I guess. It will take studyin' over. Why, she don't blame me!” he suddenly said, speaking to me instead of to himself.

”Lin,” I answered, ”she has only just heard this, you see. Wait awhile.”

”That's not the trouble. She knows what kind of man I have been, and she forgives that just the way she did her brother. And she knows how I didn't intentionally conceal anything. Billy hasn't been around, and she never realized about his mother and me. We've talked awful open, but that was not pleasant to speak of, and the whole country knew it so long--and I never thought! She don't blame me. She says she understands; but she says I have a wife livin'.”

”That is nonsense,” I declared.

”Yu' mustn't say that,” said he. ”She don't claim she's a wife, either.

She just shakes her head when I asked her why she feels so. It must be different to you and me from the way it seems to her. I don't see her view; maybe I never can see it; but she's made me feel she has it, and that she's honest, and loves me true--” His voice broke for a moment.

”She said she'd wait.”

”You can't have a marriage broken that was never tied,” I said. ”But perhaps Governor Barker or Judge Henry--”

”No,” said the cow-puncher. ”Law couldn't fool her. She's thinking of something back of law. She said she'd wait--always. And when I took it in that this was all over and done, and when I thought of my ranch and the chickens--well, I couldn't think of things at all, and I came and waked Billy to clear out and quit.”

”What did you tell her?” I asked.

”Tell her? Nothin', I guess. I don't remember getting out of the room.

Why, here's actually her pistol, and she's got mine!”