Part 40 (2/2)
”Right you are!' cried Jack, bitter and hard and ringing of voice.
'Right, by G.o.d! But am I all to blame? Did I bring myself here on this earth!... There's something wrong in me that's not all my fault.... You can't shame me or scare me or hurt me. I could fling in your face those d.a.m.ned three years of h.e.l.l you sent me to! But what's the use for you to roar at me or for me to reproach you? I'm ruined unless you give me Collie--make her love me. That will save me. And I want it for your sake and hers--not for my own. Even if I do love her madly I'm not wanting her for that. I'm no good. I'm not fit to touch her.... I've just come to tell you the truth. I feel for Collie--I'd do for Collie--as you did for my mother! Can't you understand? I'm your son. I've some of you in me. And I've found out what it is. Do you and Collie want to take me at my word?'
”I think it took dad longer to read something strange and convincing in Jack than it took me. Anyway, dad got the stunning consciousness that Jack _knew_ by some divine or intuitive power that his reformation was inevitable, if I loved him. Never have I had such a distressing and terrible moment as that revelation brought to me! I felt the truth. I could save Jack Belllounds. No woman is ever fooled at such critical moments of life. Ben Wade once said that I could have reformed Jack were it possible to love him. Now the truth of that came home to me, and somehow it was overwhelming.
”Dad received this truth--and it was beyond me to realize what it meant to him. He must have seen all his earlier hopes fulfilled, his pride vindicated, his shame forgotten, his love rewarded. Yet he must have seen all that, as would a man leaning with one foot over a bottomless abyss. He looked transfigured, yet conscious of terrible peril. His great heart seemed to leap to meet this last opportunity, with all forgiveness, with all grat.i.tude; but his will yielded with a final and irrevocable resolve. A resolve dark and sinister!
”He raised his huge fists higher and higher, and all his body lifted and strained, towering and trembling, while his face was that of a righteous and angry G.o.d.
”'My son, I take your word!' he rolled out, his voice filling the room and reverberating through the house. 'I give you Collie!... She will be yours!... But, by the love I bore your mother--I swear--if you ever steal again--I'll kill you!'
”I can't say any more--
”COLUMBINE.”
CHAPTER XIV
Spring came early that year at White Slides Ranch. The snow melted off the valleys, and the wild flowers peeped from the greening gra.s.s while yet the mountain domes were white. The long stone slides were glistening wet, and the brooks ran full-banked, noisy and turbulent and roily.
Soft and fresh of color the gray old sage slopes came out from under their winter mantle; the bleached tufts of gra.s.s waved in the wind and showed tiny blades of green at the roots; the aspens and oaks, and the vines on fences and cliffs, and the round-clumped, brook-bordering willows took on a hue of spring.
The mustangs and colts in the pastures snorted and ran and kicked and cavorted; and on the hillsides the cows began to climb higher, searching for the tender greens, bawling for the new-born calves. Eagles shrieked the release of the snow-bound peaks, and the elks bugled their piercing calls. The grouse-c.o.c.ks spread their gorgeous brown plumage in parade before their twittering mates, and the jays screeched in the woods, and the sage-hens sailed along the bosom of the gray slopes.
Black bears, and browns, and grizzlies came out of their winter's sleep, and left huge, muddy tracks on the trails; the timber wolves at dusk mourned their hungry calls for life, for meat, for the wildness that was pa.s.sing; the coyotes yelped at sunset, joyous and sharp and impudent.
But winter yielded reluctantly its hold on the mountains. The black, scudding clouds, and the squalls of rain and sleet and snow, whitening and melting and vanis.h.i.+ng, and the cold, clear nights, with crackling frost, all r.e.t.a.r.ded the work of the warming sun. The day came, however, when the greens held their own with the grays; and this was the a.s.surance of nature that spring could not be denied, and that summer would follow.
Bent Wade was hiding in the willows along the trail that followed one of the brooks. Of late, on several mornings, he had skulked like an Indian under cover, watching for some one. On this morning, when Columbine Belllounds came riding along, he stepped out into the trail in front of her.
”Oh, Ben! you startled me!” she exclaimed, as she held hard on the frightened horse.
”Good mornin', Collie,” replied Wade. ”I'm sorry to scare you, but I'm particular anxious to see you. An' considerin' how you avoid me these days, I had to waylay you in regular road-agent style.”
Wade gazed up searchingly at her. It had been some time since he had been given the privilege and pleasure of seeing her close at hand. He needed only one look at her to confirm his fears. The pale, sweet, resolute face told him much.
”Well, now you've waylaid me, what do you want?” she queried, deliberately.
”I'm goin' to take you to see Wils Moore,” replied Wade, watching her closely.
”No!” she cried, with the red staining her temples.
”Collie, see here. Did I ever oppose anythin' you wanted to do?”
”Not--yet,” she said.
”I reckon you expect me to?”
She did not answer that. Her eyes drooped, and she nervously twisted the bridle reins.
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