CHAPTER XV
"Jeanette, if you have nothing else to do to-day suppose we take a ride together. I have scarcely seen you alone for weeks except at night when you are too tired to talk. You have no other engagement, have you?"
Jeanette Colter shook her head.
She and Via were standing out on the veranda of the lodge soon after breakfast on an August morning.
"No, Via, I have nothing especial to do. Everybody is tired at the big house from our excursion to the Indian reservation yesterday. I think the Barrets were disappointed. They expected to find the Indians as they were centuries ago. They looked entirely too matter-of-fact and comfortable; the men were sitting outside their tents smoking and sleeping, the women cooking and scolding the children. Nothing was in the least picturesque or romantic. It is only Eastern people who expect to find romance among our Western Indians at present. They appear to be under the impression that they live as they did in the old days of Lina's far-off legend of the 'Silver Arrow.'
"What is it you wish to do, Via? Do you feel strong enough for a long ride?"
A faint color crept into the pale cheeks of the younger of the two girls.
"Why not, Jeanette? I am not ill. I get very weary of people behaving as if I were. Couldn't we take our lunch and ride down to the bottom of the ravine where we found the silver arrow? I never have been there from that day to this. Besides, I want to have a nice long, intimate talk with you such as we used to have."
An instant the older girl hesitated. Then she said warmly:
"Certainly, Via dear, if you wish it. I have been thinking of late you did not care for me as you once did. Will you see about lunch, and I'll look after our horses? There is a shorter ride down into the ravine than the one we took when we first made the discovery. Now the underbrush has been cleared away, we can ride straight down the path we came out by. Don't say anything to Eda or Lina; for once it will be pleasanter to be just to ourselves!"
Soon after, still in the early morning sunshine, two of the new Ranch Girls were riding slowly down the steep path which led to the small lake in its bed among the rocks below.
They talked little. The riding required all their attention and neither were they in the mood for conversation. Both girls wore old riding-costumes of brown khaki bleached to gold by the sun.
Physically Jeanette Colter never had looked better. Mentally she was also more serene. These past two weeks she had been spending most of the time away from her family, having a hurried breakfast with them and an occasional dinner. Usually she was with her new friends who were occupying her own old home.
Mrs. Perry was a woman of sudden fancies to which she was apt to give free play. From the first Jeanette had attracted her strongly. Now as the days went by she grew more and more interested in Jeanette's graceful carriage, her promise of unusual beauty as she grew older. Her physical prowess also attracted the older woman, who was altogether unlike her and had been raised in a more conventional atmosphere. She always had wanted a daughter and perhaps for this reason had kept Cecil in surroundings that were not always wise.
Moreover, Jeanette had conceived a young girl's admiration for a pretty woman a good many years older than herself. She also believed that at last she had found the new friends she secretly had been longing for. If Cecil Perry openly preferred Lina, Mason Barret was more friendly with her than with any girl he had met in the neighborhood. Whenever it was possible they rode beside each other in their outdoor excursions through the country. In any games, tennis, or croquet, or whatever it might be, they played partners.
In Margery Barret, Jeanette believed she had discovered the friend who represents the ideal of every girl in the world. At present in Jeanette's eyes Margery was perfection. Never before had she a girl friend for whom she cherished any deep admiration, or more than an everyday affection. She and Martha Putnam and a half dozen other girls in the neighborhood had grown up together, played, quarreled and made friends. They were without illusions concerning one another and without any sense of the delightful mystery that awaits the forming of new friendships. Until of late her own sisters had occupied a more important part in her daily life. With them she had found her chief congeniality. Via was right, recently she had not cared so much for them or their society.
To-day as they traveled down the ravine, she found herself wishing Margery Barret were with her instead of Via. They had been longing to have a confidential conversation together. Already Jeanette had confided her own purpose. Tired of home and of the West, she intended to go East to school in the autumn. Margery had been for two years at a boarding school on Long Island, so there could be no other plan than that Jeanette induce her father to allow her to attend the same school.
Under the circumstances one can see how much the two girls had to discuss and arrange.
Hearing Via singing a quiet little song behind her as they moved slowly along, Jeanette had the grace to feel ashamed of herself.
Of course she adored Via, perhaps more than any one in the world at present. She was disappointed in her father and estranged from her former devotion to him. He might have been willing to make more of an effort to permit her to go East to school. They could not be so poor that an ordinary expense could not be met. To say that she and Lina might go later meant nothing, as the future did not interest her. It was the next few months, the next year that counted. From uncongenial surroundings and people she must make her escape.
An exclamation aroused her a second time.
"Jeanette dear, do you see? There lies the enchanted lake below us. It is more beautiful than I remembered it!"
Dismounting, the girls were hungry from their ride.
Broken bits of twigs fallen from the bushes that grew almost out of sheer rocks, Jeanette gathered and laid in a pile. As Via unpacked their box of lunch she lighted a fire more for the pleasure of seeing the small aspiring flames than for any actual need. The day was warm and they preferred the iced tea brought in a vacuum bottle to anything hot that could be boiled over their miniature fire.
Yet both girls kept the fire ablaze even after luncheon was over. Now and then one or the other would rise and wander about the foot of the cliff or about the edges of the lake, returning with a meagre supply of fuel.
By and by Jeanette spread out the blanket she had carried under her saddle and lay down.
"I am more tired than I realized, Via dear. Let the silly little fire go out if you wish, I intend taking a nap. I have been having a wonderful time lately with Mrs. Perry and her friends, but it has been more fatiguing than I realized. You are a peaceful child, I am glad you asked me to come with you to-day; when Lina and I are together we do nothing but argue."
A little while Jeanette slept.
When she awakened she only half lifted her lids. Her younger sister, seated only a few feet away, was gazing gravely at her.
The light from the sun slanted across a break between the tall cliffs, touching the younger girl's fair hair with streaks of light that made it appear half silver, half gold.
"Via's eyes were the color of certain shades in autumn leaves, a kind of coppery brown," Jeanette was thinking idly, before she was aware of the expression with which they were regarding her.
Then her own eyes closed with an instinctive idea of self-protection.
In her sister's expression she believed by accident she had caught a glimpse into a mirror from which of late she had been turning away. It was not the admiring look of the younger sister toward the older that had been Via's lifelong attitude toward her. The eyes showed a kind of hurt suspicion, almost distrust.
Instantly Jeanette recalled the fact that she had believed Via had some obscure knowledge of her own failure to win the riding contest fairly. Of late she almost had forgotten the occurrence herself, concluding that no one had observed her action because no one had spoken of it.
"Why do you look at me like that, Via?" she demanded sharply, sitting up. "I have not been asleep for the last few moments, but have been watching you staring at me."
Never before could she remember speaking to her younger sister in such a tone or with such a sense of annoyance. Few persons ever spoke harshly to Via. Besides her gentleness she had an unusual dignity and poise.
At this moment she lost neither.
"Was I looking at you strangely, Jeanette? I did not know it and beg your pardon if I have made you angry. I confess I was thinking of you. Perhaps you do not care to hear that I was thinking how much you had changed since the day the silver arrow fell so unexpectedly at our feet."
"Nonsense!" Jeanette interrupted.
Via continued: "I was trying to make up my mind the real reason. Surely the silver arrow could not have brought you evil fortune rather than good! You were first to touch it and the arrow belonged to you until you decided to form a club and offer it as the prize."
Via smiled. Her smile always changed her face completely, affording it a beauty she did not at other times possess.
"Of course I do not think the arrow is in any way responsible, Jeanette! I do think, however, that you first changed because of your prejudice against father's marrying again. Later on there was something else. I never have understood exactly; it occurred only a few weeks ago. Since then you have not cared a great deal for any member of your family. I have watched you and——"
Jeanette's eyes flashed. Nothing is simpler than a pretense of anger to save one from an accusation in which there is truth.
"I hate being spied upon, Via, and you are well aware of it. Of course I have realized that you have been watching me and thinking things about me. It isyouhave changed toward me, notItoward you." The older girl shrugged her shoulders. "It does not make any difference; if you can be influenced against me, I had just as soon you would be. Of course I know who is responsible. Mrs. Colter, or Jack, as you and Lina absurdly call her, never has liked me any better than I do her. I am not in the dark. I know she has done everything in her power to estrange all of you from me, including father. Suppose we do not discuss the subject. I don't know how I am going to be able to arrange it, but I shall not remain at home much longer."
"You are unfair, Jeanette," said Via. "The worst of it is that you really know you are being unfair. This is what has troubled me about you of late, dear. You used to have a greater sense of justice and fair play than any one of us, and Lina and Eda and I always depended upon this characteristic in you more than any other. Since the day of the riding contest——"
"Look, Via, and stop talking. Tell me instead if I am dreaming."
Jeanette suddenly arose to her feet and stood close beside her sister, pointing ahead.
Bounding down a side of the cliff they beheld a young Indian boy of about sixteen or seventeen. He was the color of light bronze, with strong, regular features and straight black hair, falling below his ears. He wore fringed leather trousers, a gayly colored shirt and about his head the circle of feathers.
Indians were not unusual figures in the neighborhood of the Rainbow Ranch. With a group of visitors to Mrs. Perry Jeanette had paid a visit to one of the nearby Indian reservations only the day before.
What especially interested the two girls at present was that the young Indian carried a bow in one hand. Thrust into the belt about his waist were half a dozen crudely fashioned Indian arrows.
"Are we awake, Via? Is this 'White Heart,' the hero of Lina's legend of the Silver Arrow? It is too impossible to be true!"
The young Indian was searching for something in and out among the hidden crevices of the rocks.
The Young Indian was Searching Among the Rocks.
The Young Indian was Searching Among the Rocks.
He caught the sound of Jeanette's voice.
The instant he saw the two girls he turned and, climbing up the face of a cliff as easily and swiftly as he had descended, disappeared.
Jeanette followed him with her blessing, deciding that there would be no further opportunity for an intimate conversation between Via and herself. They must go home at once. Under the present circumstances her father would not desire them to be out alone.