Part 8 (1/2)
Three years on this ranch, seeing her uncle every day almost, living under the same roof with him, talking with him upon the everyday business of life,--and to-night, for the first time, the forbidden subject had been opened. She had said things that until lately she had not realized were in her mind. She had never liked her uncle, who was so different from her father, but she had never accused him in her mind of unfairness until she had written something of the sort in her ledger. She had never thought of quarrelling,--and yet one could scarcely call this encounter less than a quarrel. And the strange part of it was that she still believed what she had said; she still intended to do the things she declared she would do. Just how she would do them she did not know, but her purpose was hardening and coming clean-cut out of the vague background of her mind.
After awhile the dim outline of the high-shouldered hills glowed under a yellowing patch of light. Jean sat with her chin in her palms and watched the glow brighten swiftly. Then some unseen force seemed to be pus.h.i.+ng a bright yellow disk up through a gap in the hills, and the gap was almost too narrow, so that the disk touched either side as it slid slowly upward. At last it was up, launched fairly upon its leisurely, drifting journey across to the farther hills behind her. It was not quite round. That was because one edge had sc.r.a.ped too hard against the side of the hill, perhaps. But warped though it was, its light fell softly upon Jean's face, and showed it set and still and stern-eyed and somber.
She sat there awhile longer, until the slopes lay softly revealed to her, their hollows filled with inky shadows. She drew a long breath then, and looked around her at the familiar details of the Bar Nothing dwelling-place, softened a little by the moonlight, but harsh with her memories of unhappy days spent there. She rose and went into the house and to her room, and changed the hated striped percale for her riding-clothes.
A tall, lank form detached itself from the black shade of the bunk-house as she went by, hesitated perceptibly, and then followed her down to the corral. When she had gone in with a rope and later led out Pard, the form stood forth in the white light of the moon.
”Where are you going, Jean?” Lite asked her in a tone that was soothing in its friendliness.
”That you, Lite? I'm going--well, just going. I've got to ride.” She pulled Pard's bridle off the peg where she always hung it, and laid an arm over his neck while she held the bit against his clinched teeth.
Pard never did take kindly to the feel of the cold steel in his mouth, and she spoke to him sharply before his jaws slackened.
”Want me to go along with you?” Lite asked, and reached for his saddle and blanket.
”No, I want you to go to bed.” Jean's tone was softer than it had been for that whole day. ”You've had all the riding you need. I've been shut up with Aunt Ella and her favorite form of torture.”
”Got your gun?” Lite gave the latigo a final pull which made Pard grunt.
”Of course. Why?”
”Nothing,--only it's a good night for coyotes, and you might get a shot at one. Another thing, a gun's no good on earth when you haven't got it with you.”
”Yes, and you've told me so about once a week ever since I was big enough to pull a trigger,” Jean retorted, with something approaching her natural tone. ”Maybe I won't come back, Lite. Maybe I'll camp over home till morning.”
Lite did not say anything in reply to that. He leaned his long person against a corral post and watched her out of sight on the trail up the hill. Then he caught his own horse, saddled it leisurely, and rode away.
Jean rode slowly, leaving the trail and striking out across the open country straight for the Lazy A. She had no direct purpose in riding this way; she had not intended to ride to the Lazy A until she named the place to Lite as her destination, but since she had told him so, she knew that was where she was going. The picture-people would not be there at night, and she felt the need of coming as close as possible to her father; at the Lazy A, where his thoughts would cling, she felt near to him,--much nearer than when she was at the Bar Nothing. And that the gruesome memory of what had happened there did not make the place seem utterly horrible merely proves how unshakable was her faith in him.
A coyote trotted up out of a hollow facing her, stiffened with astonishment, dropped nose and tail, and slid away in the shadow of the hill. A couple of minutes later Jean saw him sitting alert upon his haunches on a moon-bathed slope, watching to see what she would do.
She did nothing; and the coyote pointed his nose to the moon, yap-yap-yapped a quavering defiance, and slunk out of sight over the hill crest.
Her mind now was more at ease than it had been since the day of horror when she had first stared black tragedy in the face. She was pa.s.sing through that phase of calm elation which follows close upon the heels of a great resolve. She had not yet come to the actual surmounting of the obstacles that would squeeze hope from the heart of her; she had not yet looked upon the possibility of absolute failure.
She was going to buy back the Lazy A from her Uncle Carl, and she was going to tear away that atmosphere of emptiness and desolation which it had worn so long. She was going to prove to all men that her father never had killed Johnny Croft. She was going to do it! Then life would begin where it had left off three years ago. And when this deadening load of trouble was lifted, then perhaps she could do some of the glorious, great things she had all of her life dreamed of doing.
Or, if she never did the glorious, great things, she would at least have done something to justify her existence. She would be content in her cage if she could go round and round doing things for dad.
A level stretch of country lay at the foot of the long bluff, which farther along held the Lazy A coulee close against its rocky side. The high ridges stood out boldly in the moonlight, so that she could see every rock and the shadow that it cast upon the ground. Little, soothing night noises fitted themselves into her thoughts and changed them to waking dreams. Crickets that hushed while she pa.s.sed them by; the faint hissing of a half-wakened breeze that straightway slept upon the gra.s.ses it had stirred; the sleepy protest of some bird which Pard's footsteps had startled.
She came into Lazy A coulee, half fancying that it was a real home-coming. But when she reached the gate and found it lying flat upon the ground away from the broad tread of the picture-people's machine, her mind jarred from dreams back to reality. From sheer habit she dismounted, picked up the spineless thing of stakes and barbed wire, dragged it into place across the trail, and fastened it securely to the post. She remounted and went on, and a little of the hopefulness was gone from her face.
”I'll just about have to rob a bank, I guess,” she told herself with a grim humor at the tremendous undertaking to which she had so calmly committed herself. ”This is what dad would call a man-sized job, I reckon.” She pulled up in the white-lighted trail and stared along the empty, sagging-roofed sheds and stables, and at the corral with its open gate and warped rails and leaning posts. ”I'll just about have to rob a bank,--or write a book that will make me famous.”
She touched Pard with a rein end and went on slowly. ”Robbing a bank would be the quickest and easiest,” she decided whimsically, as she neared the place where she always sheltered Pard. ”But not so ladylike. I guess I'll write a book. It should be something real thrilly, so the people will rush madly to all the bookstores to buy it.
It should have a beautiful girl, and at least two handsome men,--one with all the human virtues, and the other with all the arts of the devil and the cruel strength of the savage. And--I think some Indians and outlaws would add several dollars' worth of thrills; or else a ghost and a haunted house. I wonder which would sell the best?
Indians could steal the girl and give her two handsome men a chance to do chapters of stunts, and the wicked one could find her first and carry her away in front of him on a horse (they do those things in books!) and the hero could follow in a mad chase for miles and miles--
”But then, ghosts can be made very creepy, with tantalizing glimpses of them now and then in about every other chapter, and mysterious hints here and there, and characters coming down to breakfast with white, drawn faces and haggard eyes. And the wicked one would look over his shoulder and then utter a sardonic laugh. Sardonic is such an effective word; I don't believe Indians would give him any excuse for sardonic laughter.”
She swung down from the saddle and led Pard into his stall, that was very black next the manger and very light where the moon shone in at the door. ”I must have lots of moonlight and several stormy sunsets, and the wind soughing in the branches. I shall have to buy a new dictionary,--a big, fat, heavy one with the flags of all nations and how to measure the contents of an empty hogshead, and the deaf and dumb alphabet, and everything but the word you want to know the meaning of and whether it begins with ph or an f.”