"COURAGE MAKES THE MAN"
THERE were as many as twenty men waiting to talk to Ralph Merrit within the vicinity of the Rainbow Mine. And they chanced to be standing close together near one of the big rocks that rose like a miniature fortress beside Rainbow Creek. After Ralph had entered the group, Jean managed without being observed to slip behind this rock where she was in safe hiding.
But just why she had followed the two men and what her motive was for concealing herself she did not try to explain to herself. Simply she had yielded to an impulse of fear, of curiosity and perhaps to some other instinct that was partly protective. One young fellow among so many older, rougher and more lawless characters! What might not happen to him?
And yet Jean Bruce had not her cousin Jacqueline's physical bravery nor determinationof purpose, and moreover she had an openly expressed dislike of mixing herself up in the things which she did not consider essentially feminine. However, she had no idea now of letting anyone guess her nearness, not even Ralph Merrit himself.
Sitting down on the ground in a kind of scooped-out cave in a rock she could occasionally manage to get a glimpse of the miners, although at present while they were talking quietly she could only rarely catch a word or so of what they were saying, and not a sound from Ralph, who seemed the calmest and most self-controlled of them all. After a while she realized that John Raines, the man who had been sent to summon her companion, must now have been chosen as spokesman for the lot and was evidently making his voice sufficiently loud for them all to hear distinctly. And this of course included the unknown listener.
"See here, Mr. Merrit," John Raines began quietly, "us men have been talking things over among ourselves for some time past and we have done come to the pretty positive conclusion that we don't like the wayyou'rerunning things at Rainbow Mine. And we thought it might be fairer to you,all told, just to mention this little fact and to let you quit without any kind of rumpus or trouble for nobody."
Jean could not see Ralph Merrit's face or even his figure, he was so closely surrounded, but because he too was speaking so that his entire audience might hear, Jean understood every word.
"What's the trouble with me, Raines, as a boss?" he asked with such self-control and apparent lack of anger that Jean was both amazed and pleased.
Then there was a kind of low muttering among the other men and finally their spokesman went on:
"I guess you know most of our complaints pretty well by this time—we've been tellin' 'em to you long enough and hard enough. If this is a profit-sharing business, as you and Jim Colter and Miss Ralston said it was goin' to be, then you ain't gettin' gold enough out of the Rainbow Mine to suit us."
"But we are getting all we can, aren't we? You men aren't loafing with the work?" Ralph interrupted.
John Raines scowled. "That's senseless talk! You know what the trouble is; we have already gotten out most all the goldthere is near the surface of the earth around here. Now what we have got to do to make it pay big again is to get more machinery and try different ways of working. And we want a boss to tell Miss Ralston and Jim Colter to get busy buying the new machinery and then to show us how to run it. We are not going to waste any more time around here on a few dollars pay a day."
From her hiding place Jean did her best to hear Ralph. Here of course was the time and place for him to make the same confession to the miners that he had recently made to her. For he did intend to do just what the men had demanded of him, resign his work and give way for a better man. Nevertheless, he evidently intended delaying a bit longer before making the confession.
"But I have explained to you men before this why I have not done what you ask," he went on, still in a reasonable tone of voice. "I told you that I did not feel certain that it was thebestthing to do. We are by no means sure that there is enough gold below the present mine to make it worth while to go deeper. You men know what a lot of money the machinery for certain kinds of gold digging takes. It would probably eat up prettymuch all the capital that the owners of the Rainbow Mine have. And I don't want to tell them to buy this machinery until I am a lot surer that the gold is down there waiting to be hauled out."
John Raines glanced about at the faces surrounding him. It was easy enough to take his tone from their expressions.
"Then there is no use wasting any more of our time and yours in talk, Merrit," the older man announced in a rougher manner than he had before employed. "Your sentiments was pretty well known to us before you spouted them forth. And that's just the point! You don't know what ought to be done about things and we do. And we want a man to boss us that knows same as we. Now, young man, you just get out pleasant and the quicker the better."
All over her body, to the very tips of her ears, Jean felt herself tingling with sudden, overpowering anger. Why had Ralph Merrit not said what he intended saying before now? To resign at this moment in the face of this other man's insolence, which represented the same feeling in his companions, was to behave like a small boy at school who had been stood up in a corner and soundly thrashedby his schoolmaster and then made to apologize for his pains. Jean felt that she would never care to look Ralph in the face again. But he was speaking now for the third time.
"She Had Heard That Masterful Tone Before""She Had Heard That Masterful Tone Before"
"Have Miss Ralston and Mr. Colter told you that they wanted me to quit?" he inquired. "It seems like they would have mentioned the matter to me first. I have usually taken my orders from them and not from the menunderme."
There was quite a different ring in Ralph Merrit's voice during this speech that made the girl behind the rock unexpectedly put up her cold hands to cool her hot cheeks. She had heard that masterful tone before, but not in some time.
"No, they ain't said nothing yet," Raines admitted. "But it don't matter; you got to quit just the same. You can't run a gold mine by yourself with all your 'book larnin,' and it's either you or us that gets out."
"Then it'll be you," Ralph replied in such a matter-of-fact and undisturbed fashion that Jean could hardly believe she had heard him aright, or else she must have been dreaming less than an hour before.
"Look here, fellows, don't be fools," Ralphwent on, still showing no loss of temper. "The hour Mr. Colter and Miss Ralston tell me they want me to give up my job at the Rainbow Mine, that hour I go. And the minute I am really convinced that another man is able to do my work better than I can, that man gets my position, if I can persuade the Rainbow Mine owners to try him. But I've got to study things out here a little longer, I've got to make some new experiments and maybe kind of feel my way slowly toward deciding what had best be done. I have been away for the past ten days studying conditions at other mines and trying to find out some of the latest ideas in mining machinery."
But the other men were making no pretense of listening and were muttering and talking among themselves as a direct and intentional insult to the speaker. Ralph waited in silence, and Jean had an intuition that the end of the discussion was about to take place. The noises that the miners were making were ugly, vicious sounds entirely unfamiliar to the girl's ears and she had no conception of what they might portend. She had a sudden fear that they might mean some bodily injury to the younger man. Thenwould she have the courage to rush out to his defense as Jack undoubtedly would have, no matter what overtook her?
But she was mistaken in the form of her present uneasiness.
"You can talk that way here, if it makes you feel better, young fellow," one of the other miners announced contemptuously, "but it ain't goin' to make a mite of difference in the way things has to go. We give you thirty-six hours' notice to get clear of Rainbow Mine, and if you don't, why you can stay around here and play by yourself as long as you like provided your bosses are willing to give up the gold-mining business. Because if you stay, we git out and that means there is not another miner going to be allowed down a shaft in this here mine."
"You mean," said Ralph, "that you are going to strike and make the other men boycott us. I don't believe your union will stand for it. You haven't got a kick coming to you about your hours of work, or your pay, or any of the conditions about the mine. And just because you don't think I've got brains enough for my job is no reason why you should strike. I want you to know, you fellows," and here Ralph's voice was nolonger in the least conciliatory, but as firm and decisive as a judge's sentence, "I am a union man myself, but you must understand once and for all that if the Rainbow Mine owners agree to stand by me I am going to keep on with the job of bossing this mine. And I am going to keep on digging out the gold we can get with our old tools until there's a way of knowing what ought to be done next. But I think in the future it is going to suit me better to have another lot of men to work with me and I think I'll be able to get hold of them. You may go to your quarters now. I'll let you hear in the morning what Miss Ralston and Mr. Colter want to do."
And to Jean Bruce's immense amazement, though some of the men laughed rudely and others muttered threats and curses, the entire number after some delay and further discussion among themselves, walked off, leaving Ralph Merrit entirely alone. Notwithstanding, the miners were evidently unanimous in their intention.
Jean snuggled closer than before in her rocky alcove, scarcely daring to breathe for fear of their discovering her and so creating further ill feeling. Then after they had gone, and the last man of them was entirelyout of sight, she still did not move. For Ralph Merrit had never stirred from his position and she did not know whether she even wished him to learn of her eavesdropping.
Ralph did not move and Jean was growing bored with her cramped position, now that events were no longer sufficiently exciting to make her forget herself. Besides, did she not really wish to let Ralph know just how she felt about him?
Curiously he did not turn around until she was within a few feet of him. Yet when he did, Jean laughed and clapped her hands childishly at the change in his expression since their interview on the veranda.
"Why, Jean, where have you come from? You did not see anybody, did you, on your way from the house? This is not a place where you should be."
Jean nodded. "Yes, I did see everybody and heard everything. Please forgive me for being a horrid spy," she confessed, "but I was hiding behind that rock the whole blessed time. And oh, Ralph, I am so pleased and proud of you! Of course Jack and Jim will stand by you to the bitter end—I should dare them not to; but then nobody need everaccuse Jim and Jack of not enjoying a good, clean fight."
Jean put her hand through the young man's arm. "Do come on back to the Lodge with me. It is almost time for the others to be coming home. You must rest a while first and have dinner and then tell them what you intend to do."
A little dazed by the girl's unexpected appearance and by her sudden flow of words, and still deeply engrossed on what had just taken place, Ralph Merrit allowed himself to be led along for a few steps in silence.
"You must think I am a good deal of a turncoat, Jean, and don't know my own mind for half an hour," he said finally. "Maybe I haven't the right after all to get you people into trouble."
Jean gave the young man's arm a vehement shake. "You haven't got the right to be anything but—a man, Ralph Merrit!" she announced. "Goodness, you don't know how ashamed I was of you and for you a while ago! I suppose it is because I am such a coward myself, because I am so afraid of rough things and rough places, that I love courage more than anything else in the world."
"Do you, Jean?" Ralph murmured almost to himself. "Well, I have been a coward in more ways than one in these past six months."
THE MIDNIGHT CONFERENCE
FOR hours after dinner the family at the Rainbow Lodge sat in their big living room talking over matters with Ralph Merrit. Better than he had been able to explain to Jean he now made the present situation clear to his listeners. And by his frankness in acknowledging that he had not yet been able to make up his mind as to what was best to be done for the future of Rainbow Mine he restored Jim's and Jack's full confidence.
The discussion was absorbing; only Frieda, after an hour or so of what seemed to her a repetition of the same conversation, grew sleepy and now and then dozed for a few moments with her yellow head nodding uncomfortably.
Why stay awake longer when she understood the state of things perfectly? Ralph had said that they would probably have much less money out of the Rainbow Mine for atime. Later, if he saw his way clear by spending their capital and buying new machinery, they might become a great deal wealthier. And while naturally the first of this information was discouraging, the second idea had kept Frieda quite wide awake until ten o'clock. Earlier in the evening she had felt frightened at the thought of the miners striking and the trouble that they might be going to have on the ranch for the next few days; but Jim and Jack did not appear alarmed, so after a time her nervousness was partly allayed.
They both had declared that Ralph must not for a moment consider surrendering to the men; for apparently they intended not only to dismiss him but thereafter to run the Rainbow Mine with no consideration for its owners. It might take a few days for Ralph to get together another group of capable miners, but the delay was the only annoyance. For no one appeared to believe that the old men would make trouble. They were merely trying to bluff and threaten Ralph.
Jean, having seen with her own eyes the bitterness and dissatisfaction among the workers, was not so completely convinced. Nevertheless she said nothing of her own doubt, notregarding her opinion in the matter as of special value. Moreover, she enjoyed seeing Ralph Merrit so sure of himself once more and so determined to swing things to a successful issue. It recalled the days when he had first been summoned to help them with his judgment as to whether or not Rainbow Mine contained sufficient gold to make it of importance. And what a change in their lives their wealth had created for them! At least Jean had previously believed this to be true, but studying the faces in the little group about her tonight she was not so sure of the others. Assuredly Ruth and Jim, who were sitting on a sofa with Ruth's hand slipped quietly and quite unconsciously inside Jim's, were not dependent for their happiness on the possession of a great deal of money. And there was Jack leaning both elbows on a small table nearby with her face in her hands, listening intently to every word Ralph was saying. Had she ever seen her cousin more animated or more interested? Well, she had always known that the mere spending of money had never given Jack the same degree of pleasure that it had her. It was "making things happen" that Jack cared most for, and now that difficulties were presentingthemselves in regard to the Rainbow Mine, actually Jack seemed almost to be enjoying the prospect. Frieda was nodding, so that even she could not be very deeply concerned at the prospect of poverty, and Olive could certainly not be accused of being mercenary, since she was calmly turning her back on a large fortune rather than fulfil the conditions of her grandmother's will.
Jean smiled and sighed almost in the same breath. She could not pretend to any such highmindedness, she was afraid that she was the kind of girl whom she had heard people describe as "loving luxury like a cat." Certainly she did care more than she should for beautiful clothes, handsome houses, travel, society and everything that money alone could buy. And yet, after all, the wealth of Rainbow Mine was not hers: it belonged to Jack and Frieda, though they had always shared their income with her as though she had been their sister instead of their cousin. Whether their gold mine had now ceased to be of value or whether deeper down under the earth it should hold a larger fortune, was it not still her place to make her own future? With a start Jean came to herself. The clock had just struck midnight and Ralph had risen.
"As soon as things straighten out, Mr. Colter, I am going to ask you to let me send for two or three of the big mining experts. For of course you would want their opinion as well as mine. I will tell the men your decision in the morning. Thank all of you for your faith in me and good-night."
But Ralph's movement must have awakened Frieda, for she sat up suddenly and yawned. "Who is it you are going to send for to come to the ranch?" she demanded unexpectedly. "Oh, I do hope some one who isn't a hundred years old. Why can't you ever ask a young man's advice, Ralph Merrit—you are young yourself?"
And then as everybody laughed, Jack pinched her sister's inviting pink cheek.
"What a foolish baby you are, Frieda Ralston," she declared, "I hardly think that Ralph's mining experts will be of the slightest interest to you."
After Jim and Ralph had gone out in the hall together and were talking quietly Jean slipped out after them.
"Don't you think, Jim," she asked, "that Ralph had better not go down to his old quarters to sleep tonight? You know his room is in the same house with half a dozenof the miners and of course nothing will happen, but I don't believe the men are exactly devoted to him and—" Jean put her hand coaxingly on the young man's coat sleeve. "Sleep on the divan in the living room tonight, won't you? We haven't a spare room, but I assure you it is most comfortable."
Jim nodded. "That isn't a bad idea, Ralph."
But the younger man shook his head, although his eyes thanked the girl for her interest.
"No, Jim," he said, "you and Jean are both awfully kind, but the one thing that the fellows I disagreed with today must not think is that I am in the least afraid of them. Oh, I realize I am up against a pretty tough proposition—they are not the kind to back down easily and are accustomed to getting their own way, but your faith and belief in me——"
Ralph stopped, his voice a little husky. "Good-night, Jean, and thank you." Then he turned to Jim Colter. "I wonder if you would mind walking a short distance with me. There is something else I must tell you that I could not mention in there tonight."
And as the two men disappeared Jean had a sudden feeling of thankfulness. How curiously things turned out. If she had not chanced to be on the porch at Rainbow Lodge that afternoon she might never have heard Ralph Merrit's confession. If the men had not summoned him for their talk just when they did, Ralph would have gone away from Rainbow Mine feeling that he had made a failure of his life and of his work.
And Jean's pretty brown eyes filled with tears. They had all been fond of Ralph for several years and would have been sorry to have him vanish out of their lives. She was glad too that he had recovered from the idea that he once had of caring for her more than the other girls. Or at least Jean believed that she was glad, for it is a very rare woman who can honestly rejoice at the loss of a lover, even though he continues to be her friend.
Out in the dark together Jim Colter put his great arm across the younger man's shoulder. "Yes, I know it is more serious, boy, than we pretended in there, but I'm with you to the uttermost and things will turn out all right. It may not hurt my girls to have less money for a while, though ofcourse it would come pretty hard on them now to be poor, after we have taught them such extravagant tastes. But in any case, old fellow, the fault will not be yours and you must not take the result too seriously."
Ralph had not spoken, but he now braced himself and drew a slow breath.
"Look here, Jim, I didn't say all I ought to have said in there with your wife and the girls—somehow I couldn't. For I let you say you would stand by me and have faith in me when all the time I knew I wasn't worth it."
Then Ralph made the same confession to his man friend and employer as he had to Jean earlier in the day. He told him that he had been speculating steadily for the past six months. To Jim's question as to why he felt he had to grow rich in such a hurry, again Ralph made no reply. When the older man put out his hand to say good-night, Ralph Merrit held it for a moment longer than usual.
"Jim," he asked, "may I make a promise to you? This has been one of the biggest days in my life. I came home this afternoon pretty well down-and-out, intending to give up my work and pretty much everything Iwant to attain in the world. Then—well, wonderful, unexpected things began to happen. Now I hope I am a man again. So I want to promise, not so much you as myself, that I am going to cut this speculating business out absolutely and that I am going to keep on being a man if I can manage it, no matter what happens."
There was something in Ralph's words and in his manner that made Jim's blue eyes shine and gave the extra warmth and heartiness to the farewell clasp of his hand. Moreover, he had suddenly recalled a confidence that Jack had made to him in regard to Ralph Merrit's feeling for Jean. And if ever there was a man who knew how to offer sympathy and understanding to a discouraged lover, that man was Jim Colter.
A DILEMMA AND A VISITOR
"GREAT SCOTT," muttered Jim Colter at the breakfast table some days later, "if there was only another man around this place to take care of you women, I would not let Ralph Merrit carry so much of this burden alone. It's getting past a one-man's game to manage our present affairs."
In return Jack shook her fist at him with what was not all a pretense of indignation. "Ruth, you may not object to hearing your husband speak of you as a burden," she protested, "but I can't say I ever like hearing that I am not able to look after myself. Oh, yes, I know what the family thinks of my vanity! But seriously, Jim, there isn't any danger, no matter what goes on down at the mine, of anybody's annoying us. You need not worry over leaving us alone. I am quite sure we don't need 'another man.' The ranch is too full of them already!" AndJack shrugged her shoulders in the face of her guardian.
But from her place at the head of the table behind a big silver coffee urn, Ruth looked at the girl in the seat next her who had just finished speaking.
"I am sorry to hear you say that, Jack," she began quietly, "because pretty soon we are going to have what you and Jim are pleased to call 'another man' as our guest at the Rainbow Lodge and one whom of all others I most wish to see."
Jack was puzzled, but Olive Van Mater, with a swift glance at the older woman, felt the blood leaving her face and her hands turning cold. Her lids drooped swiftly over her dark eyes and immediately she devoted herself to eating her breakfast, though all the while she was studying Jack's expression.
At this moment a diversion was created by the entrance of a very fluffy, blue-eyed person in a pale blue breakfast toilet, who after kissing Ruth slipped into a place next her sister.
"Sorry I'm late," she said, without any suggestion of real contrition, "but since Jim makes us stay in the house so much lately there isn't any reason for getting up."
"Thank you, Frieda darling, for the pleasure you take in our society," Jean murmured, setting down her coffee cup in mock indignation. "I am sure that each and every member of your family feels grateful to you for your flattering suggestion. But since we are of no interest to you, perhaps you would like to hear that Ruth has just said we are to have an unexpected visitor—a man!"
Frieda first helped herself to the entire pile of griddle cakes. "I suppose everyone else has nearly finished," she remarked by way of explanation. And then: "Oh, I suppose the visitor is one of those tiresome men who is coming to help Ralph about the mine. I do wish things would quiet down, because as soon as our new house is finished Jean and I are dying to have a houseparty. Ralph said himself that his mining engineers were too old to be any fun—the youngest one is past thirty!"
"Yet I am still able to get about at that age, Frieda Ralston," Jim Colter protested.
At this instant Jack shook her head. "We are being very impolite to Ruth by talking so much," she declared. "Ruth was going to tell us about a new visitorand of course we are desperately anxious to hear. Who is he, Ruth, a stranger or an old friend? And where are you going to find a place for any one else at Rainbow Lodge?"
Purposely Ruth waited a moment in the silence that followed.
"I'll give you three guesses," she said finally.
"Peter Drummond and Jessica! Wouldn't it be splendid if they came to us on their wedding trip?" Jack answered immediately.
"No," Ruth answered.
"Tom, the chocolate-drop boy!" Jean exclaimed, laughing at Frieda's sudden blush.
But Olive Van Mater had put down her knife and fork and was looking quietly at Ruth. "May I have a turn at guessing, please?" she asked in her usual gentle fashion. "Isn't our visitor to be Frank Kent?"
And then as Ruth nodded with a smile of pleasure every pair of eyes at the table immediately turned upon Jacqueline Ralston.
And Jack's cheeks grew suddenly a deeper pink, like the heart of a pink rose, for she was too surprised for the present to be self-conscious.
"You must be mistaken, Ruth dear," sheinsisted. "Frank hasn't written me; I haven't said that he could come." And then seeing what her words suggested, she went on in greater confusion, "I thought he was to wait until our house was finished or until later in the summer or until some time," she ended lamely. "I don't understand."
"Perhaps Frank will explain to you, dear," Ruth replied carelessly. And then turning toward the other girls:
"You see Frank has been writing me about his visit for several weeks. But he and I both wanted his coming to be a surprise. He has said that he could not endure waiting longer to see his dearest friends. So a week ago when he arrived in New York he telegraphed me to know when he could come to the Rainbow Ranch and of course I said 'at once.' I rather think he may be here some time this afternoon. You won't have to worry now, Jim, about taking care of your wife and family, for Frank will——"
But Frieda was clapping her hands together with much more pleasure than that slightly selfish young person usually showed.
"Oh, I am so glad, Jack. We do likeFrank better than any one we know, don't we? And if you don't, I am sure Olive does," she persisted.
Jim got up from his place. "I don't like this fashion you have, Mrs. Colter, of corresponding with gentlemen and not informing your husband, but just the same I am delighted that Kent is coming to us. It's amazing what a fine fellow he is for an Englishman, and certainly we owe him a lot. When a man marries at another's house—and such a wedding—it's hard work getting even with him!"
Out to the door Ruth followed her husband.
"I am dreadfully uneasy about this trouble at the mine. I did not dare show how much I am worried before the girls. But you must tell me just what the conditions are, Jim. You know we don't believe in marriages where the woman is shut out from facts," Ruth insisted.
For half a moment the man hesitated. Then he kissed the little woman who had to stand on her tip-toes to be on a level with his chin.
"I don't tell you the facts, Ruthie dear, because I don't know them," he answered. "How can I tell what a lot of crazy, obstinatemen are going to do? But evidently the miners who deserted us have managed to intimidate the other mine workers in this neighborhood. Ralph has not been able to get hold of any men who want to work for us, and things at the mine have been idle for some time, as you know. So far, all we have been able to do is to have the cowboys do picket duty down at the mine so as to keep the other fellows from wrecking our machinery or blowing us up. There, don't turn white as a sheet, Ruth! I don't believe that the old miners are that anxious to injure us; yet we have to be on the look-out. Merrit has got to be away all daytodayhunting for men, so I must be on the job. Sorry I can't meet Kent, but you'll see that he is looked after all right and I'll be with you at dinner tonight. I'll bring Merrit with me if I can persuade him—he is apt to be pretty well fagged."
The greater part of the day the four girls spent together in the garden near the Lodge. It was a lovely June day, with the air full of the scents of innumerable wild flowers. And everything within the immediate neighborhood of the Lodge was as peaceful and undisturbed as though the mine were ahundred miles away. Jean and Jack at least half a dozen times confessed to the desire to walk over to the mine and see what was taking place; but since Jim had given strict orders against it they did not quite dare.
A part of the time they spent helping Frieda gather great bunches of violets from her old violet beds, which had never been allowed to die out, until the Lodge was finally filled with them and the big living room was fair and fragrant enough for any festival.
Then, when other amusements failed, there was always the new house to be investigated. It was now so nearly completed that when things quieted down at the mine again, if they were still to have a sufficient income to meet expenses, the moving into the new home was to take place.
While the other three girls were rummaging about making suggestions Jack managed to slip quietly away. She went directly to Ruth, who was in the nursery with her little son. And as Jack was never used to evasions or to trying to get her own way by indirect methods, she asked immediately:
"Ruth dear, may Olive and I drive to the station and meet Frank Kent this afternoon? I have a special reason for wishingto be there. You see, dear, I don't want Frank to think that I am not delighted to see him or that I have put off his coming to us because I had forgotten him. You knew he had been wanting to come for a long time, didn't you?"
Ruth nodded. "I had guessed it, Jack, though I did not know positively until Frank's letter to me. Nor do I know now why you put off his visit. I am not asking you to tell me," she added quickly. For, observing the sudden look of reserve on the girl's face, she appreciated that it must be respected. "Frank merely said that he wanted to see us so much, and I did not see how his coming could fail to give pleasure. You don't mind, do you, dear?" Ruth concluded, wondering if this might be the moment for confidence.
Although still keeping her clear, almost transparently honest gray eyes on her friend, Jack flushed.
"Yes dear, I do want Frank, now that Olive is here," she replied. "I meant to write him and ask him just as soon as things were quiet at the mine again. Now may we go to meet him?"
Ruth looked worried. "I have been wondering what we ought to do about going tothe station all morning," she returned. "Of course some of the family must meet Frank or he will feel deeply wounded, but I can't leave the baby and yet there seems no man about the place to go with you girls. Jim has taken possession of everybody."
Jack kissed Ruth on the hair and then bent over and looked at the baby with a new expression of wonder and reverence. She had always been much more afraid of the "little Jimmikins" than the other girls.
"Don't trouble over things a minute, Ruth. You know the danger that Jim is fearful of for us is what may happen here on the ranch. But we shall be leaving the ranch as soon as we drive through the gate. Moreover, we can take Carlos with us for an escort; he is only a boy, but he will do perfectly well. And if we don't take him, it won't make much difference since he would be more than likely to follow us. As far as I can see he trails constantly after Olive like a faithful dog. It would annoy me, but I don't believe she has even noticed how much he does it. I wonder what the boy's exact reason is? Nevertheless, as it gives Carlos a regular occupation, I suppose we should be grateful."
CROSS PURPOSES
OLIVE was not so unconscious of the Indian boy's attitude toward her as Jack believed. Indeed she could not well be. And now as the three of them drove together to the station she was pondering on whether or not she should confide her experience to Jack. But Jack was not sympathetic toward Carlos, for with her intense and forceful nature it was hard for her to understand the boy's idleness and dreaming. Therefore to tell her what had recently occurred would doubtless make her prejudice the deeper. For she was almost sure to regard the boy's behavior as impertinence and to wish to send him at once away from the ranch.
Yet though Olive herself was annoyed, she did not wish matters to go so far as that. For she had a peculiar appreciation and pity for the Indian boy's difficulties which no one else could so readily have.Had she not been raised among the Indian people and did she not comprehend their shy, proud natures? For white people to realize that the Indian, even in the midst of his overthrow and degradation, still considers himself their superior is an almost impossible conception. Nevertheless Olive knew this to be true. The white man's religion is to the Indian less full of visions and of dreams. An educated Indian writes:
"When we plant our plumes where the shrines are, our first prayer is for good thoughts—that our children may be wise and strong, and that the God of the sky may be glad of us. I have listened to the mission talk many days, and nothing in the words of the missionary is more white than the thought which we plant with the prayer plumes on our shrines."
Neither does the Indian, though of course there are exceptions in his race as in all other things, have the respect that we feel he should have for the advantages of our education. What more does it teach him of the woods and the fields, of the beauty and imagery of nature, of all that he cares to know? Of a boy who had been to a government school an Indian says:
"He comes back to his people and knows that if he lives there it must be as his father lived—except that now he has more cultivated tastes to satisfy, and no further means or methods of earning the price of them. To plant the corn, herd the sheep, hunt the rabbits, take care of his share of his own village—these are the life-work of the Indian. The schools teach him to do that no better than his fathers did it before him. He is taught to read and write, and he asks 'for what?'
"The cities of the mesa have no books, and have never felt the need of them. Why should he read of the American life he lives apart from?"
Therefore Olive understood that though the boy Carlos might not be able to express himself in this fashion, in his heart of hearts this was exactly the way that he felt. Why should he study what Jim Colter and the girls wished him to learn? Books and figures had no possible interest for him or relation to the life which he meant to lead. His world was the outdoor one, among the animals and birds, under the new moons of each succeeding month, and lifting up his eyes and his heart to the sun when he wished to be glad.
To work like the other men did about the ranch, digging under the earth or plowing in the fields! This was not for the son and the grandson of many chieftains! It was not merely laziness on Carlos' part that kept him from making himself useful, but the feeling that any such labor as he might be expected to do was beneath his dignity. Therefore the boy could never really get into his mind the idea that the white people were his masters, although in a vague way he knew that they felt themselves to be. It was this thought that was always the foundation of Carlos' sullenness and lack of gratitude.
So Olive realized that the Indian boy's letter to her, which she had found at her door one day hidden among a bunch of prairie roses, had not been written in any spirit of presumption or audacity. Had she not at one time seemed to be an Indian like himself? Had she not lived among them, eaten their food and spoken their speech? And was it not for her sake that Carlos had left his own tribe and taken upon himself many of the ways of the white man? The boy had cared for his "Princess Olilie" always, but in years past he had been a boy and felt as one. Now he was a man!
All this and more Carlos had put into his note. Olive remembered it at the present moment almost word for word, for it had touched and hurt her at the same time. Although Carlos was too young to mean all that he had said, she knew that with his queer nature he must suffer from her reply.
For he had written:
My Lady of the Lone Trail:Are you not weary of the life and the ways of the white women and men? Are you not tired of having your soul shut up between four walls of wood with no vision for your eyes by day and no night wind to touch your cheek as you lay asleep? You and I have grown older now; there is no one in any Indian tribe to hurt us. Have I not stayed quietly here waiting and watching for you, learning many things which I have hated, that we might not fail to understand each other? For my love for you is as the Tu-wa-ni-ne-ma, the sand of the desert.Therefore will you not come away with me back to the wonderful, free outdoor world, where we lived together for a little while when both of us were children. Under a tree in a dim forest I shall build for you such a nest as only a man shall build for his mate. Then in the day time I shall plant corn while you weave the beautiful Indian blanket, which the Indian Laska taught you to make. And in the night we shall listen to the little night bird of the desert, the Hoetska. But both day and night we shall be alone and awayfrom these people who do not understand me as you do and who will never love you as I do.Whenever you will come with me, I shall have two horses waiting.
Are you not weary of the life and the ways of the white women and men? Are you not tired of having your soul shut up between four walls of wood with no vision for your eyes by day and no night wind to touch your cheek as you lay asleep? You and I have grown older now; there is no one in any Indian tribe to hurt us. Have I not stayed quietly here waiting and watching for you, learning many things which I have hated, that we might not fail to understand each other? For my love for you is as the Tu-wa-ni-ne-ma, the sand of the desert.
Therefore will you not come away with me back to the wonderful, free outdoor world, where we lived together for a little while when both of us were children. Under a tree in a dim forest I shall build for you such a nest as only a man shall build for his mate. Then in the day time I shall plant corn while you weave the beautiful Indian blanket, which the Indian Laska taught you to make. And in the night we shall listen to the little night bird of the desert, the Hoetska. But both day and night we shall be alone and awayfrom these people who do not understand me as you do and who will never love you as I do.
Whenever you will come with me, I shall have two horses waiting.
Olive stole a glimpse at Jacqueline's face. For a quarter of an hour they had been sitting beside each other, and yet neither one of them had uttered a word. But certainly she should not tell Jack of Carlos' unhappy and impossible letter. For Jack might be amused, she might be angry, and certainly she would be resentful.
No, Olive decided that she must keep the boy's secret inviolate. Some day she would have a chance to see him alone. Then she might be able to explain how far she herself had traveled from the old Indian days—how she could never again love the things that the boy did, nor endure the life which he wished to lead. Besides, Carlos was only a boy, while she was almost a woman—at least a good many years his senior! Perhaps she might even tell Carlos that it would be best for him to go away from Rainbow Ranch, back to his own people where he could live with Indian boys and girls of his own age. There was the Indian villagenot far off to which she herself might return after a few years. For one of these days the Indians were to have a teacher whocouldunderstand their point of view as well as that of the white people. Perhaps Carlos might by that time be married to a girl of his own race and be able to help her with her chosen work.
But she must not speak of this idea to Jacqueline either, for the suggestion always made her friend unhappy. It was odd how utterly devoted she and Jack were and how intimate; yet they did not often speak of the deepest desires of their hearts to each other. Not once had Jack voluntarily mentioned Frank Kent's name since their return from the visit to Lord and Lady Kent the year before.
Was Jack in love with Frank? Olive could not make up her mind. Because if she were, what was standing in the way of their engagement? Of course Jack could never have dreamed of her foolish, impossible affection for Frank, who had never been anything except her good friend. Olive was quite certain that she had never by any sign betrayed herself. She believed that she had entirely recovered from her former feeling,and was hoping with all her heart that Jack and Frank would now find out that they truly loved each other.
But what was making Jacqueline so unusually quiet? Olive's slender hand slipped into her friend's larger and firmer one, and Jack's fingers closed over it lovingly.
They were now almost at the depot and Frank Kent's train would be due in another quarter of an hour. If only Jack would not look so pale and reserved—she was not nearly so pretty as usual! Her face was white and her eyes had dark shadows under them. Jean and Frieda had insisted that Jack wear a new silk suit that had recently been made for her, but it was not half so becoming as her old brown corduroys or faded khaki; neither was her cream-colored straw hat with its single brown rose so picturesque as the ranch hat in which Frank had first seen her.
Olive sighed, and the sigh attracted the other girl's attention.
"I have been a dreadfully stupid companion, Olive dear. Forgive me," Jack murmured penitently. And then: "How pretty you are looking! Frank will be so glad to see you, I know!"
At this moment Carlos stopped the carriage and pair of horses before the station platform, where both girls got out without time for further speech. Yet all this while Jacqueline had been thinking: "If Olive still cares for Frank after this year of absence I am sure that her feeling will never change. So if this be true I shall tell Frank that I do not care for him enough to marry him. Olive has had too unhappy a life for me to add to her unhappiness. Surely when Frank believes that I do not love him, he will find out what Olive means to him and how immeasurably she is my superior, in beauty, brains, sweetness and everything that counts. Then he will know that he has liked her best all along!"
Nevertheless and in spite of all her excellent reasoning as the whistle blew announcing the approaching train, Jack caught her breath. She hoped that Frank would not be angry with her for having refused to let him come to Rainbow Ranch for almost a year. Could she dare to pretend that she had forgotten the conversation which they had had in that last ride together between the hawthorn hedges of an English lane?
When Frank Kent came down the steps of the train with his grave, handsome faceflushed with eagerness—and something else—it was Olive Van Mater whom he found waiting for him alone on the platform. With all his old delightful friendliness and charm of manner he greeted her, dropping his luggage to hold both her hands close for a moment.
Yet Olive to save her life could not at once be equally friendly and natural. For what in heaven's name had become of Jacqueline Ralston at this critical moment? As the train drew in, she had been standing close by her side. Here she was approaching them at last, holding out her hand stiffly, with a frozen smile on her face.
"Awfully glad to see you, Frank; you are looking very fit after a trip across the continent. Sorry not to be here when your train got in, but I had to attend to something about the horses. Give me your check and let me see after your trunk. Everybody at the ranch is well and tremendously anxious to see you."
Frank smiled. Holding on to his trunk check he followed the girl a few yards to the spot where his trunk had been thrown out. Olive waited alone to watch his bags.
"Hope you will be more enthusiastic over seeing me yourself, dear, when I have a chanceto talk to you," Frank remarked in the quiet fashion that always had its effect on the girl's ardent nature. "You are glad, aren't you?"
And while Jack nodded, not entirely trusting herself to speak, Frank laughed, saying: "Here comes a porter. I'll have him carry my stuff to the carriage. It is like you, Miss America, to wish to start out by taking care of me. But if I am an Englishman and too much accustomed to being waited upon, at least I won't endure that!"