Part 42 (1/2)

”But, Tom”--Masters broke chokingly off.

”Please don't try to thank me.”

”Not perhaps for myself, but I happen to know that your means have supported not only your own family but my family as well.”

”Larry,”--Colonel Wallifarro spoke in a harder tone than was customary with him--”your folly has been almost criminal ... but if it meant stripping myself to beggary I couldn't see Anne's father accused of a breach of trust. Even if I cared nothing for you, my boy, it would come to the same thing. I fancy I shall sell the farm.”

”My G.o.d!” groaned Masters. ”It's the apple of your eye, Tom.”

Colonel Wallifarro fumbled for a cigar and lighted it, saying nothing for a time. When he spoke it was with an irrelevant change of topic.

”Not quite, Larry. The apple of my eye is a dream. If, before I die, I can trot a grandchild on my knee--a child with Morgan's will and Anne's fine-fibred sweetness--” he paused a moment and then gave a short laugh--”then I could contentedly strike my tent for the beyond.”

”I'm afraid her heart--”

Colonel Wallifarro raised a hand in interruption.

”I know, Larry. Don't misunderstand me. It would have to be along the way of her happiness or not at all. I feel almost a paternal interest in Boone Wellver. But I've always believed that they'd grow apart with the years and she and Morgan would grow together. Anyhow it's my dream, and for a time yet I sha'n't let go my hold upon it.” His tone changed and again he spoke as a lawyer weighing the inelastic force of facts. ”But time is vital to you. These options must be taken up. There must be no suspicious delay. I'll catch the next train back to town and arrange to get money in your hands at once.”

CHAPTER x.x.xIV

Boone had written to Anne after the election in a vein of satisfaction for a race won. ”It is a small thing,” he candidly confessed; ”nothing more than a corporal's stripe to the man who covets the baton of a field marshal, but you know the light that leads me, dear Evening Star. You'll find me scrambling up the hillside toward you at least, even if, as they would say hereabouts, 'hit's a right-smart slavish upgoin'.'”

But with McCalloway, to whom he need not soften the edges of disclosure, he spoke of something else. His victory in primary and election seemed to demonstrate an augmented popularity, and yet he had become instinctively cognizant of a covert but bitter undertow of hatred against him: something unspoken and indefinable but existent and malign.

McCalloway paused with his supper coffee cup half way to his lips when Boone announced that conviction one evening, and eyed the other intently before he made an answer.

”I dare say,” he hazarded at length, ”that the old scars of the Carr-Gregory war have never entirely healed. The rancour may begin to smart afresh as your former enemies see your influence mounting.”

But Boone shook his head.

”Of course, I've thought of that--but this is something else.”

”Then, my boy, what is your conjecture?”

Boone's reply came slowly and thoughtfully.

”To you, sir, I can speak bluntly and without fear of being charged with timidity. Frankly, sir, I'm more than half expecting to be 'lay-wayed'

some fine day as I ride along a tangled trail.”

”I've had to take some chances in my time,” a.s.serted the soldier modestly, while his brows gathered in a frown, ”but that is one form of danger that always sends a s.h.i.+ver down my spine; the attack that comes without warning.” He broke off, then energetically added: ”If _you_ give credence to such a possibility, it's not to be lightly dismissed. You must not ride alone, hereafter.”

Boone laughed. ”For five years old Parson Fletcher never went abroad without the escort of an armed bodyguard. He even built a stockade around his house, but they got him. Jim Garrard was shot to death while militiamen stood in a hollow square about him. Precautions of that sort don't succeed. They are only a public confession of fear, and in politics a man can't afford such an admission. All I can do is to be watchful.”

”Have you a guess as to who the man is behind this enmity?”

Boone nodded as he rose and went to the mantel where the pipes and tobacco lay.

”Here and there of late I've heard a name mentioned that hasn't been much discussed for years--the name of a man who has been away.”