Part 8 (1/2)
”He did not. He cantered off back, courteous as he came. And this morning we went out on the job, and have cut all day, and nothing has happened.”
”I guess he found you were not to be bluffed,” said Zen, and Transley could not prevent a flush of pleasure at her compliment. ”Of course Landson has no real claim to the hay, has he, Dad?”
”Of course not. I reckon them'll be his stacks we saw down the valley.
Well, I'm not wantin' to rob him of the fruit of his labor, an' if he keeps calm perhaps we'll let him have what he has cut, but if he don't--” Y.D.'s face hardened with the set of a man accustomed to fight, and win, his own battles. ”I think we'll just stick around a day or two in case he tries to start anythin',” he continued.
”Well, five o'clock comes early,” said Transley, ”and you folks must be tired with your long drive. We've had your tent pitched down by the water, Zen, so that its murmurs may sing you to sleep. You see, I have some of the poetic in me, too. Mr. Linder will show you down, and I will see that your father is made comfortable. And remember--five o'clock does not apply to visitors.”
The camp now lay in complete darkness, save where a lantern threw its light from a tent by the river. Zen walked by Linder's side. Presently she reached out and took his arm.
”I beg your pardon,” said Linder. ”I should have offered--”
”Of course you should. Mr. Transley would not have waited to be told.
Dad thinks that anything that's worth having in this world is worth going after, and going after hard. I guess I'm Dad's daughter in more ways than one.”
”I suppose he's right,” Linder confessed, ”but I've always been shy. I get along all right with men.”
”The truth is, Mr Linder, you're not shy--you're frightened. Now I can well believe that no man could frighten you. Consequently you get along all right with men. Do I need to tell you the rest?”
”I never thought of myself as being afraid of women,” he replied. ”It has always seemed that they were, well, just out of my line.”
They had reached the tent but the girl made no sign of going in. In the silence the sibilant lisp of the stream rose loud about them.
”Mr. Linder,” she said at length, ”do you know why Mr. Transley sent you down here with me?”
”I'm sure I don't, except to show you to your tent.”
”That was the least of his purposes. He wanted to show you that he wasn't afraid of you; and he wanted to show me that he wasn't afraid of you. Mr. Transley is a very self-confident individual. There is such a thing as being too self-confident, Mr. Linder, just as there is such a thing as being too shy. Do you get me? Good night!” And with a little rush she was in her tent.
Linder walked slowly down to the water's edge, and stood there, thinking, until her light went out. His brain was in a whirl with a sensation entirely strange to it. A light wind, laden with snow-smell from the mountains, pressed gently against his features, and presently Linder took deeper breaths than he had ever known before.
”By Jove!” he said. ”Who'd have thought it possible?”
CHAPTER V
When Zen awoke next morning the mowing machines of Transley's outfit were already singing their symphony in the meadows; she could hear the metallic rhythm as it came borne on the early breeze. She lay awake on her camp cot for a few minutes, stretching her fingers to the canvas ceiling and feeling that it was good to be alive. And it was. The ripple of water came from almost underneath the walls of her tent; the smell of spruce trees and balm-o'-Gilead and new-mown hay was in the air. She could feel the warmth of the suns.h.i.+ne already pouring upon her white roof; she could trace the gentle sway of the trees by the leafy patterns gliding forward and back. A cheeky gopher, exploring about the door of her tent, ventured in, and, sitting bolt upright, sent his shrill whistle boldly forth. She watched his fine bravery for a minute, then clapped her hands together, and laughed as he fled.
”Therein we have the figures of both Transley and Linder,” she mused to herself. ”Upright, Transley; horizontal, Linder. I doubt if the poor fellow slept last night after the fright I gave him.” Slowly and calmly she turned the incident over in her mind. She wondered a little if she had been quite fair with Linder. Her words and conduct were capable of very broad interpretations. She was not at all in love with Linder; of that Zen was very sure. She was equally sure that she was not at all in love with Transley. She admitted that she admired Transley for his calm a.s.sumptions, but they nettled her a little nevertheless. If this should develop into a love affair--IF it should--she had no intention that it was to be a pleasant afternoon's canter. It was to be a race--a race, mind you--and may the best man win! She had a feeling, amounting almost to a conviction, that Transley underrated his foreman's possibilities in such a contest. She had seen many a dark horse, less promising than Linder, gallop home with the stakes.
Then Zen smiled her own quiet, self-confident smile, the smile which had come down to her from Y.D. and from the Wilsons--the only family that had ever mastered him. The idea of either Transley or Linder thinking he could gallop home with HER! For the moment she forgot to do Linder the justice of remembering that nothing was further from his thoughts. She would show them. She would make a race of it--ALMOST to the wire. In the home stretch she would make the leap, out and over the fence. She was in it for the race, not for the finish.
Zen contemplated for some minutes the possibilities of that race; then, as the imagination threatened to become involved, she sprang from her cot and thrust a cautious head through the door of her tent. The gang had long since gone to the fields, and friendly bushes sheltered her from view from the cook-car. She drew on her boots, shook out her hair, threw a towel across her shoulders, and, soap in hand, walked boldly the few steps to the stream rippling over its s.h.i.+ny gravel bed. She stopped and tested the water with her fingers; then brought it in fresh, cool handfuls about her face and neck.
”Mornin', Zen!” said a familiar voice. ”'Scuse me for happenin' to be here. I was jus' waterin' that Pete-horse after a hard ride.”
”Now look here, Mr. Drazk!” said the girl, whipping her scanty clothing about her, ”if I had a gun that Pete-horse would be scheduled for his fastest travel in the next twenty seconds, and he'd end it without a rider, too. I won't have you spying about!”
”Aw, don' be cross,” Drazk protested. He was sitting on his horse in the ford a dozen yards away. ”I jus' happened along. I guess the outside belongs to all of us. Say, Zen, if I was to get properly interduced, what's the chances?”
”Not one in a million, and if that isn't odds enough I'll double it.”