CHAPTER XVIII
"The Silver Arrow is to be yours, Jeanette. The club has decided without a single dissenting voice."
Martha Putnam was speaking.
Jeanette smiled, flushed and shook her head.
"Thank you, no, I must decline an honor I never gained."
The girls were out of doors. They were not in the vicinity of the big house, nor of the old lodge which was now a burned-out pile of charred logs. They were hovering about the front porch of the ranch house where the men who were employed on the Rainbow Ranch formerly had lived.
On the day after the fire the men at the ranch house had offered to vacate their own quarters and allow the members of the Colter family to move in until they could make more satisfactory arrangements.
Gladly Mr. Colter accepted. There were tents in which the ranchmen could make their temporary quarters until the coming of cold weather. By that time they would have found a new house or moved back into one of their own. Mrs. Colter desired that the old lodge be restored, but the question had not yet been finally settled.
No one of them appeared especially depressed by the disaster, although coming at a particularly trying time when the family finances were low and the large house rented until Christmas. Still, no one had been injured. At first Mrs. Perry insisted the entire family live with her; later she offered to surrender the lease on the house if Mr. Colter wished it.
Neither of her kind offers had been accepted.
This afternoon, to assure their friends that they were neither uncomfortable nor unhappy at the ranch house, Mrs. Colter was entertaining the entire club of the Silver Arrow together with a few older friends.
At this moment she and Mrs. Perry were standing outside the group of younger people.
"But, Jeanette, you must not refuse," Lina protested. "You understood that the honor was to be bestowed upon the individual member of the club who accomplished the most courageous deed during the summer. You helped make this decision and possess no power to change it. The club was to ask the advice of a few older friends and then vote on the question. We have followed the rules and there is no appeal. The fact that you warned us that the lodge was on fire and then went back a second time to help mother and Viawasa courageous act. Jeanette dear, I don't think you need feel you have no right to the arrow."
"Here, here!" Cecil Perry and Eric Lawton cried in chorus.
Their voices were followed by a clapping of hands.
"Then why does mother—Mrs. Colter, of course, I mean—not receive the award? She returned first to search for Via and found her; they were more than halfway down the stairs when I reached them."
"Jeanette, Mrs. Colter is not a member of the Club of the Silver Arrow and you therefore have no rival," Eric Lawton, the president of the club, announced with an admiring glance toward the older woman.
Jeanette Colter's face wore the obstinate expression with which her friends were familiar.
"I have something to tell you, several things in fact. Then you will understand why I have no right to the silver arrow and cannot permit you to present it me."
Jeanette was wearing a white muslin gown Mrs. Perry had made from one of her own, the greater number of Jeanette's clothes having perished in the lodge fire. The dress was singularly becoming, although at this moment her face was nearly as white as her gown. From her eyes the blue seemed to have disappeared until they looked the shade of smoke-gray clouds.
"I not only have no claim upon the silver badge of courage, I had no right to the prize I received at the riding contest. I won unfairly. Often I have puzzled over no one's seeing that I pulled my horse directly in front of my stepmother in order to force her to lose the race. She has always been aware of the fact and at first I feared she might speak of it. Afterwards I began depending upon the knowledge that she would never speak of it."
"Jeanette dear, do you think this is necessary?" she could hear her stepmother's voice pleading.
Jeanette's chin looked squarer, her lips became firmer.
"Yes, I do think it is necessary. I don't want to create a scene, but I do wish everybody to know the truth. Since I decided after the fire to confess to father I have wanted all our friends to know. I wrote a letter to the club and sent back the Swastika pin, but because of their affection for father I believe no one has spoken of what I did. I can no longer endure sailing under false colors. It is curious I have changed, at first I dreaded anyone's hearing. A great experience does change one sometimes, don't you think?
"So you see I not only have no right to the silver arrow, I am afraid I have even lost the right to continue a member of the club. But I hope you will learn to forgive me and permit me to do this."
The girl's voice softened and her lips trembled.
"Some day I may be able to prove I still know how to play fair."
"You have proved this already, Jeanette!" Cecil asserted. "I think your confession braver than helping to rescue the people you care for. I vote that you be awarded the silver arrow of courage."
Again Jeanette shook her head. This time she laughed with a note of relief, as if a burden had been lifted.
"Sorry, Cecil, but the silver arrow is no longer the club's to bestow. The other day father and I rode down into the ravine and sat there by the edge of the enchanted lake for a long talk together. Again we saw the same Indian boy whom Via and I had caught a glimpse of a short time ago. As father was with me this time he did not run away, but continued searching for something. By and by father grew interested and went over and asked what he had lost. At first the boy appeared frightened and declined to speak, afterwards he broke down and poured forth this story. Suppose we sit down in a circle on the ground while I tell it you. I have been awaiting this opportunity."
The circle was a large one. In order that every one might hear, Jeanette established herself in the center of the circle, following the ancient Indian custom.
"You remember the Indian legend Lina related to you. I shall not repeat it in detail. You recall that long ago a young Indian lad, White Heart, was presented with the silver arrow, not because he understood the arts of war, but for wisdom and kindness, the arts of peace.
"We were under the impression that this was merely a legend, a myth, and that no Indian tribe at the present time was in possession of the famous arrow of silver. Well, in a way, no tribe is in possession of it. The arrow fell at our feet and I was first to pick it up.
"The boy confided to father that he was the son of a chieftain whom father happens to know personally. No one outside the tribe is supposed to be informed, but from generation to generation a silver arrow has passed from one chieftain to the next. This arrow he is to guard with his honor and life. The silver arrow is supposed to show the greatness of his tribe and the long line of his descent.
"The Indian lad we observed had stolen the arrow from his father. It is said to bring one good fortune. He had concealed the silver arrow among others he carried in his quiver, and one afternoon by mistake he fired it into the canyon. From that day to this he has been seeking what he had lost. If the arrow is not restored he fears his life will prove a forfeit."
Possessing the dramatic gift, Jeanette made her voice low and appealing.
"I trust you will agree that the silver arrow is no longer ours to keep. If it is true that the 'Club of the Silver Arrow' still wishes to present the arrow to me after what I have confessed to you, then I ask you to allow me to return it to the Indian boy. Some day he hopes to be chief of his tribe."
By and by, when the club had agreed with her point of view Jeanette slipped away and joined her stepmother and friend, Mrs. Perry.
She thrust an arm in each of theirs and the three of them began walking slowly up and down.
"I presume you have given up all thought of going East to school this autumn, Jeanette? I shall not stay on at Rainbow Castle many months longer. I am sure Mr. and Mrs. Colter must wish to return to their own home and are too considerate to ask me to leave. So I shall miss seeing you."
Jeanette glanced toward her stepmother.
Jack smiled and nodded.
"Yes, I am going East to school; I have been intending to tell you, but wanted to be sure. You must not think we are ungrateful to you, but Jack, I mean my stepmother—we never have known what to call her—is to pay my expenses. She and father and I have decided this is wisest."
Jeanette glanced at the older woman and a smile of understanding passed between them.
"The truth is, Mrs. Perry, now I have learned to like my stepmother better, I am not half so anxious to leave home. I know I shall be dreadfully homesick, and yet I must not back down at this late date."
Mrs. Perry glanced from the one face to the other.
"Yes, I am glad for your sakes. I have realized that the night of the fire burned the barrier that stood between you. But I am sorry, Jeanette, I shall never have the same share in you. Still, you are to allow me to look after you in the East and spend your holidays with me whenever you are unable to return home.
"I wonder if any one has ever said you and Jeanette were alike?" Mrs. Perry suddenly inquired, turning from the girl to the woman.
They laughed in unison.
"Poor Jeanette," Mrs. Colter murmured.
"Poor Jack," Jeanette protested.
Later, when the guests were saying farewell, Cecil Perry and Jeanette had a moment together.
"I always suspected you believed I had not won the racing contest fairly. Was this true, Cecil?"
He shook his head.
"No, Jeanette, why should you think it?"
"Because when one does not play fair the world looks upside down."