Part 28 (2/2)
They made an early start, riding out of the ranch just as the sun topped the heights to the eastward. Dew hung heavily on the sage from which fresh, clean fragrance rose as their horses stirred the brush.
Their shadows were thrown far in advance as they followed a narrow gulch and the sunlight was caught and concentrated and scattered again as the drops flew from leaf and twig.
The girl breathed deeply of the light, sweet air and looked at Beck with a little laugh as of relief.
”When I sit at that desk, I feel like a prosaic business woman whose interest is in ledgers,” she said, ”but when I ride in this country I feel like a character in some romantic story.”
Tom scratched his chin thoughtfully.
”That's too bad, 'ma'am,” he said.
”Which?”
”Both.”
”I can see disadvantages to the first, but why the other?”
”I guess I ain't struck much with stories. Used to read 'em, used to get real interested in some but that was before I commenced to get interested in folks.”
”Yes?” she encouraged after a moment.
”You see, I think the folks I see and hear and live with and get to know are a lot more interestin' than the folks somebody's thought up out of his head.
”A man in a book talks and acts like a man in a book an' nothing else.
You never hear men talk out here in the bunk house or ridin' the country like a writer would make 'em talk on the page of a book; take my word for that....
”Folks are mighty interestin'. The best fun I get is watching folks, studying them. It's a lot more fun than reading about some man or woman you know ain't real, ma'am.
”Life is mighty interesting if you look at it right. If you try to glorify and lie about it you cheapen the whole works. It's either d.a.m.ned serious or a joke. There's no in between. I don't know which it is, yet, but I do know that most of the books I ever read was th'
in-between kind, neither one thing nor the other.
”I've been around considerable among men but I never seen things happen in life like writers make things happen in books. Everything works out so lovely in books, folks never make mistakes in anything ... that is, the heroes don't. Why, love even works out right in books!”
He spoke the last in a lowered voice as if he talked of a sacred thing that had been mistreated. Unconsciously he had voiced the fear that had grown in his own soul and when he turned to look at her his eyes reflected a queer mental conflict, almost fright!
She caught something of his mood and waited a moment to summon the courage to ask very gently:
”And doesn't it ... doesn't love work out in life?”
He shook his head.
”Seldom, ma'am. In books folks gamble with it like it was ... why, ma'am, like their love was a white chip!”
Again he spoke as of a sacrilege and his earnestness, though he did not appear to be thinking of her, confused the girl. The wordless interval which followed was distressing to her so she said:
”And the other forms of expression? Music? Poetry? Painting?”
”You've got me on music,” he confessed with a laugh. ”I've heard greasers playin' fandangoes on busted old guitars that sounded a lot sweeter to me than any band I ever heard.
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