Part 23 (1/2)

”That's him--that feller Sim Longley.”

The storekeeper stared.

”You sure?”

”Sure? Gee! I was after him fer nigh three--Say,” he broke off--it was not his way to indulge in reminiscence--”I guess he's workin' with James.” Then he laughed. ”Gee! I allow he was rigged elegant--most like some Bible-smas.h.i.+n' sky-pilot.”

Minky was still laboring hard to understand.

”But all that yarn of the gold-stage?” he said sharply.

”That?” Bill at once became serious. ”Wal, that's pretty near right.

You ain't yearnin' fer that gang to come snoopin' around Suffering Creek. So I'm guessin' we'll hev to pa.s.s a gold-stage out o' her some time.”

”You're mad,” cried Minky in consternation.

”That's as may be,” retorted Bill, quite unruffled. ”Anyways, I guess I spent a hundred dollars in a mighty good deal this day--if it was rotten bad poker.”

And he turned away to talk to Slade of Kentucky, who entered the store at that moment with his friend O'Brien.

CHAPTER XII

THE WOMAN

The woman turned from the window at the sound of footsteps somewhere behind her. That was her way now. She started at each fresh sound that suggested anyone approaching. Her nerves were on edge for some reason she could never have put into words. She did not fear, yet a curious nervousness was hers which made her listen acutely at every footstep, and breathe her relief if the sound died away without further intrusion upon her privacy.

Presently she turned back to the window with just such relief. The footstep had pa.s.sed. She drew her feet up into the ample seat of the rocking-chair, and, with her elbow resting upon its arm, heavily pressed her chin into the palm of her hand, and again stared at the rampart of mountains beyond.

Nor had all the beauties spread out before her yearning gaze the least appeal for her. How should they? Her thoughts were roaming in a world of her own, and her eyes were occupied in gazing upon her woman's pictures as she saw them in her mind. The wonders of that scene of natural splendor laid out before her had no power to penetrate the armor of her preoccupation. All her mind and heart were stirred and torn by emotions such as only a woman can understand, only a woman can feel. The ancient battle of t.i.tanic forces, which had brought into existence that world of stupendous might upon which her unseeing eyes gazed, was as nothing, it seemed, to the pa.s.sionate struggle going on in her torn heart. To her there was nothing beyond her own regretful misery, her own dread of the future, her pa.s.sionate revulsion at thoughts of the past.

The truth was, she had not yet found the happiness she had promised herself, that had been promised to her. She had left behind her all that life which, when it had been hers, she had hated. Her pa.s.sionate nature had drawn her whither its stormy waves listed. And now that the tempest was pa.s.sed, and the driving forces had ceased to urge, leaving her in a rock-bound pool of reflection, she saw the enormity of the step she had taken, she realized the strength of Nature's tendrils which still bound her no less surely.

The mild face of Scipio haunted her. She saw in her remorseful fancy his wondering blue eyes filled with the stricken look of a man powerless to resent, powerless to resist. She read into her thought the feelings of his simple heart which she had so wantonly crushed.

For she knew his love as only a woman can. She had probed its depth and found it fathomless--fathomless in its devotion to herself. And now she had thrown him and his love, the great legitimate love of the father of her children, headlong out of her life.

A dozen times she bolstered her actions with the a.s.surance that she did not want his love, that he was not the man she had ever cared for seriously, could ever care for. She told herself that the insignificance of his character, his personality, were beneath contempt. She desired a man of strength for her partner, a man who could make himself of some account in the world which was theirs.

No, she did not want Scipio. He was useless in the scheme of life, and she did not wish to have to ”mother” her husband. Far rather would she be the slave of a man whose ruthless domination extended even to herself. And yet Scipio's mild eyes haunted her, and stirred something in her heart that maddened her, and robbed her of all satisfaction in the step she had taken.

But this was only a small part of the cause of her present mood. She had not at first had the vaguest understanding of the bonds which really fettered her, holding her fast to the life that had been hers for so long. Now she knew. And the knowledge brought with it its bitter cost. Some forewarning had been hers when she appealed to her lover for the possession of her children. But although her mother's instinct had been stirred to alarm at parting, she had not, at that time, experienced the real horror of what she was doing in abandoning her children.

She was inconsolable now. With all her mind and heart she was crying out for the warm, moist pressure of infant lips. Her whole body yearned for those who were flesh of her flesh, for the gentle beating hearts to which her body had given life. They were hers--hers, and of her own action she had put them out of her life. They were hers, and she was maddened at the thought that she had left them to another.

They were hers, and--yes, she must have them. Whatever happened, they must be restored to her. Life would be intolerable without them.

She was in a wholly unreasoning state of mind. All the mother in her was uppermost, craving, yearning, panting for her own. For the time, at least, all else was lost in an overwhelming regret, and such a power of love for her offspring, that she had no room for the man who had brought about the separation.