Courtlandt thrust his hands hard into the pockets of his dinner coat. The atmosphere tingled with electricity. The girl wondered if he were throttling a desire to shake her. She hoped so. He met her eyes steadily for a moment before he turned to leave the room. Jerry took a hasty step after him.
"Wait, please—if—if——" as he kept on she added desperately, "Steve, please." He stopped and turned. "If—if you should see Dad—do not mention the fact that Bruce—that Mr. Greyson's ranch is near your uncle's."
"Why not?" relentlessly.
"Because in an attack of homesickness last winter I became engaged to him."
In the music-room of the Manor the rugs had been rolled back, the voice of the phonograph released from captivity and the Courtlandts' guests were dancing, at least some of them were. Sir Peter had beguiled Glamorgan to the library for a smoke. The oil-king had cast a gloom over the dinner. Was it because he was disturbed about Nicholas Fairfax, Jerry wondered. To the amazement of all, he and the ranchman had become great friends. It would be like her father to be irritable if he were moved. Perhaps it had been the arrival of Greyson which had infuriated him. Last winter he had quickly made her see the folly of her engagement to the owner of the X Y Z, and now she was grateful to him. She had known at the time that she did not love Bruce Greyson, but that she was in love with love. In a way her life had been a lonely one, and when he had pleaded with her to marry him, she had agreed to a tentative engagement. Now she was glad that she had kept him at a distance, even in those two weeks.
She looked up at Greyson as he sat beside her in one of the deep embrasures of a window. A distinguished looking man, he gave the impression of having lived in great spaces, of having achieved worth-while things, of being absolutely poised and self-assured. His dark hair was tending toward neutral at the temples, his keen blue eyes had fine lines radiating from them, which denoted long-distance gazing. The weather-beaten texture of his skin was emphasized by the immaculate white of the shirt and collar of his up-to-the-minute dinner clothes.
Peggy Glamorgan, as she danced with her brother-in-law, was doing direful things to the heart of young Don Curtis, whose family estate adjoined the Manor. She was a charming, younger model of her sister, except that where Jerry's eyes were brown, Peggy's were a somewhat elfish hazel. She was making the most of a week-end freedom from school discipline. Steve Courtlandt's glance wandered to the two in the deep window. Peggy looked up at him with tormenting concern.
"That's the second time you've lost step, Steve. I protest. I hate being trodden on." Her laughing eyes and mischievously curved lips robbed the words of their sting.
"I'm sorry! Give me one more trial, Peg-o'-my-heart, and I'll do better," promised Steve. He had taken an immense liking to the girl, she was so genuine, so unaffected, so brimming over with the zest of living.
"Nothing doing, brother. Go get Jerry. It's a part of her job to put up with your poor dancing, isn't it? A part of the love, honor and obey stuff? Catch me saying 'I will' to that. Jerry's different. She'd walk over the proverbial ploughshares if she thought duty called." She looked across the room to where her sister sat and added softly, "It's a queer trick of fortune that Bruce Greyson should be your uncle's confidential man and should come to this house."
"Why accent this?" demanded Steve Courtlandt bluntly.
Peggy flushed guiltily beneath his stern eyes.
"That's only my exclamatory style. I meant that it was strange that Jerry should meet him here after—after—I—I wonder if that was what made her cry last night?"
"Did Jerry cry last night?"
"She cross-my-throat-and-hope-to-die swore she didn't, this morning, but her lids were suspiciously pink. Didn't you notice it? Thank you, I should love it," she responded to young Curtis who had been impatiently hovering in the offing. "There really isn't much fun dancing with old married men," she confided in a tone intended to reach Steve. She made an impudent little face at her brother-in-law over her partner's shoulder. He smiled and blew her a kiss as she danced away but her words hurt, hurt because he knew that she was right. He felt years older than he had that epoch-making October night when his father had revealed to him the state of the family finances, and had presented the means whereby it could be remedied. Had he chosen wisely, he wondered; wouldn't it have been better to let the property go than to have married a girl who had so quickly acquired an aversion for him?
He looked across at the two engrossed faces in the window. He'd break that up. Jerry should remember where she was and not give occasion for silly gossip. Already Felice Denbigh, who had motored out from town for dinner, had called his attention to Greyson's apparent devotion. With eyes combative, Steve strolled to where Jerry sat.
"Will you dance with me, Mrs. Courtlandt?" he asked with aggressive formality. In the midst of a sentence, she looked up in startled surprise. Greyson rose.
"I have committed the unpardonable blunder of monopolizing my hostess, Steve," he apologized, "but the temptation to live over a perfect friendship was too great to be resisted. I will beg a dance from your sister, Mrs. Courtlandt."
Jerry's eyes followed him as he crossed the room. They made Steve think of deep, troubled pools when she looked up at him. Was it because Peg had put the idea into his head or did they look as though they had known recent tears? Was she finding her marriage a bar to happiness already? His face was a trifle white, a trifle grim as he reminded:
"Do we dance?"
Without answering she rose, and he put his arm about her. Except for taking her hand it was the first time he had touched her. How slender she was, how soft, how graceful. He could feel her heart pound heavily against his breast. One might think that she was frightened, but with him—that was absurd. Her dancing like her walk was perfection of motion. He was careful of his steps as they danced down the long room. Jerry should have no occasion to echo Peg's reprimand. She stopped.
"Tired?" he asked solicitously, his senses still throbbing from the appeal of music and dance. She shook her head.
"Tired! I don't know what it is to be tired. Some of our guests are not dancing. Mrs. Denbigh is quite alone and looking horribly bored. Peg seems to have appropriated more than her share of men; she is surrounded. Don't you think that as host you should dance with Felice?"
"Presently. I have something to say to you first." He changed his position so that he stood between her and the others in the room.
"Why did you cry?"
She crimsoned even under the tiny curls at the nape of her white neck.
"I! Crying! How absurd. You really should go and dance with your guest——"
"Not until you tell me why you cried."
"But I haven't been crying."
"Oh, yes you have. I——"
"Supper is served in the library, Mrs. Courtlandt," interrupted Judson of the velvet tread. As they left the room in the wake of their guests the butler detained Stephen Courtlandt and said something in a low tone.
"Has Mr. Greyson gone up?" he asked hurriedly and when Judson answered in the affirmative he turned to Jerry:
"I must go to Uncle Nick. I may not be down again."
"Is he——" but he was mounting the stairs two steps at a time before Jerry had finished the sentence. With a feeling of foreboding she entered the library. The guests were grouped around the fire with Judson and a maid serving supper. She stopped in the shadow of the doorway. Up-stairs the spirit of an old, weary man was passing, here—the room and its furnishings made a rich background for the shimmering satin of dainty gowns; the firelight played mad pranks with jewels at white throats and on pink fingers, with the glittering buckles on silver slippers; bright eyes were laughing into eyes that pleaded or compelled, young voices were teasing, challenging.
Jerry's breath came unevenly. She had cried last night. It was a rare indulgence for her. She could not tell now why. How could Steve have known? She hoped that none of these chattering boys and girls suspected it. She looked about the room. How she loved it! It stood for all the background she had acquired by her marriage. She loved the old seventeenth century Courtlandt, she held long, one-sided conversations with him when she was sure that she was quite alone. He had given her to understand that amarriage de convenancequite met with his approval, that in his day girls married to please their parents. She wasn't so sure of the judgment of Steve's mother. Her eyes, so like her son's, looked down with a grave question in their depths when she appealed to her.
The group around the fire made room as they welcomed her with gay reproof for tardiness. Felice Denbigh inquired impatiently for Steve. Jerry made his apologies and explained his absence. The voices of the guests became hushed. One by one they left, almost tiptoeing through the hall. Peggy snuggled up to her sister when the two were alone.
"Has—has Uncle N-Nick—gone?" she whispered. Then as Jerry shook her head, "If—if he does will you come and sleep with me?"
"I will, dear, but there is nothing to frighten you. Why should there be in the passing of an old man's spirit?"
"But—but he was such a cross old man. What has made you so brave, Jerry? Once you would have dreaded it as much as I—being here at a time like this, I mean."
"Perhaps it is the hours I have spent in the hospital with the sick and wounded soldiers. I have seen so much and felt so much, that death has seemed beautiful, not terrible. Go to bed, child. I'll come in later and stay with you."
She went down the hall. "But he was such a cross old man!" Peggy's obituary of Nicholas Fairfax echoed persistently in her mind. What a tragic thing to have said about one. She couldn't blame her sister. Old Nick had been consistently disagreeable to her and Peg was too young to take into consideration his age and illness. She lingered for a moment before the door of the room in which Nicholas Fairfax lay. Could she help? The nurse came out suddenly and almost collided with her.
"Goodness, Mrs. Courtlandt, you gave me a start! I was just coming for you. Mr. Stephen sent me. His uncle wants you."
With her breath coming hurriedly, her heart pounding, Jerry followed the woman. What could Old Nick want? To continue his insults? She passed into the inner room. The window was open to let in the clear winter air. The old man was raised high on his pillows. Steve held one of the gnarled hands. Courtlandt was behind him. Greyson, as rigid and immovable as one of the mountains of his own country, stood at the foot of the bed. Doctor Rand, his face grave and deeply lined, motioned the girl to take her place opposite Steve, then he and the nurse and Greyson moved back to the outer room. As Jerry bent over him, Nicholas Fairfax looked up into her eyes. They met his tenderly. The tenseness of his expression relaxed, he fumbled for something under his pillow. Jerry reached for him and drew out an open prayer-book. His shaking finger pointed to the page; it was the marriage service.
"Read that—read that—aloud," he commanded in a voice which still held a ring of power.
Slipping to her knees beside the bed the girl read. Haltingly, huskily at first, but as she lost thought of self in the beauty and meaning of the words her voice cleared.
"'Wilt thou have this man to be thy wedded husband, to live together after God's ordinance in the holy estate of matrimony and forsaking all others keep thee only to him as long as ye both shall live?'"
The gnarled, claw-like hand fell on the book. The Old man leaned forward. His voice, weaker now, interrupted:
"'And forsaking all others keep thee only to him as long as ye both—shall live,' did you mean it, girl, when you made that vow?"
Jerry's face was colorless. There was a broken exclamation from Steve. She laid her hand gently over the icy hand on the book. Her young ardent eyes met his dim ones steadily.
"I did, Uncle Nick."
He dropped back with a faint sigh.
"Then it will be all right—Steve. I was afraid—that I might have—but I meant it for the best—it will come right Doc Rand says—things will come right—marvelously—unbelievably—right!"
His voice trailed off into silence. The lines of pain and weakness in his face disappeared as though a soothing hand had been laid upon them. The curtains at the open window stirred for a moment and then were still.
Caleb Lawson paused in the reading of the will of Nicholas Fairfax to peer over his half-moon spectacles. His pursed lips made a red, bulbous blot on his pale face as he regarded the three persons in the library at the Manor. Outside an ice-tipped vine struck with a ghostly tap! tap! tap! against the diamond-paned window. Geraldine sat beside Peter Courtlandt. Stephen stood with his back to the fireplace. The sunlight which streamed in at the window touched the girl's hair and transformed it into a crown of bronze with curious red and gold lights. The lawyer's gaze lingered on her for a moment before he cleared his throat with a force which sent a premonitory thrill down the spines of his hearers and resumed the reading of the bulky document he held.
"'Lastly, all the rest, residue and remainder of the property both real and personal of which I may be possessed or to which I may be entitled at my decease, I give and devise to my nephew Stephen Courtlandt, to him and his heirs forever, on condition, however, that he take possession and management of my ranch in the State of Wyoming not later than three months after my decease and live there one year with his wife Geraldine Glamorgan Courtlandt. And on the further condition that his said wife, during said year, shall refuse to receive income from the fund her father has provided for her, and shall dispose of all securities and money she may have. If my nephew Stephen Courtlandt or his wife, Geraldine Glamorgan Courtlandt, fail to fulfil any one of these conditions said property shall be divided as follows:'"
The lawyer laid down his papers and looked over the edge of his spectacles at Stephen Courtlandt.
"There is no need of my reading that long list of beneficiaries until I know your decision, Stephen. If your father will take me to his study we'll leave you and Mrs. Courtlandt to talk it over."
"You may proceed with the reading. I refuse to accede to the conditions," Steve announced with grim lips.
"Steve," his father protested, "think it over before you say that." He looked imploringly at the girl beside him but her eyes were fixed on the interlacing fingers which lay passively on the lap of her black gown. "Talk with him, Jerry. Don't let him fling this away recklessly," he pleaded. "Come, Lawson, we'll leave the young people to thresh this thing out."
He followed the lawyer from the room and closed the door. Stephen poked viciously at the coals in the fireplace till a fountain of sparks sputtered up the chimney. Then he backed up against the mantel and with a face from which every drop of color had drained, looked down at the bent head of the girl he had married. He laughed shortly.
"Old Nick had a genius for messing things up, hadn't he? When I heard the first clause of that will, which related to me, even when the condition followed that I was to live on the ranch for a year—nothing but a mad sense of freedom thrilled me. I would be my own man once more, rich enough to pay back to your father every cursed cent he had loaned on the Courtlandt property and then have a living income. I could——"
His eyes burned, the veins stood out on his forehead. Jerry realized for the first time the sacrifice of pride and happiness he had made for his family name. She finished the sentence for him:
"You could have your marriage annulled."
He looked at her steadily.
"That did not enter into my plan. Why, oh why, did Uncle Nick have to wreck the whole thing by involving you? I wouldn't take you if you would go. You married me for what I could give you socially. A lot I could give you out there in the wilderness."
"Nevertheless, I shall go with you."
"What! Why, by your own confession you would starve for people in a wilderness."
"Do you want this fortune?"
"More than I ever wanted anything—except one—in my life."
Jerry whitened at his amendment.
"I suppose that one thing was Felice. In spite of that I shall go with you. I shall fulfil my part of the conditions and after you have fulfilled yours then—then we'll consider."
He strode over to her, seized her hands and pulled her to her feet beside him. His face was white, his eyes searching.
"Peg said that you would walk over burning ploughshares if you thought duty called; she's right. But—but I shan't let you make the sacrifice."
"You can't help yourself if I am determined to go. You don't want to start a scandal in high society, do you, by refusing to take me? I don't care to go any more than you care to have me," bitterly, "but—but I promised. Uncle Nick knew what he was doing when he made me read that marriage service, 'and forsaking all others'—I shall be doing that all right. But it was not a fair-weather vow. If your interests take you to the ranch I shall go with you."
"What will your father say?"
She shrank away from him but he still had her hands in his and drew her back. Her lips curved in a disdainful smile.
"I think—I think we shall have what the miners used to call a 'helofarow.'"
"He will never consent to your going."
"What difference will that make? How can he prevent it? He cannot take back what he has given your father. That is all that need concern you," with exasperated frankness. He flushed darkly at her tone, dropped her hands, and touched a bell. When the butler opened the door he commanded curtly, "Judson, ask Mr. Lawson and my father to come here."
When the two men appeared in answer to the summons Glamorgan was with them. His face was deeply flushed, his little green eyes snapped with anger.
"Look here, Jerry, what's this I hear about your going off on a ranch? It can't be done, I tell you. Steve doesn't need that—that old mischief-maker's money," his voice broke queerly, but he steadied it and went on, "Why doesn't he stay here and spend mine?"
"You are quite right, Mr. Glamorgan. I have been trying to impress your daughter with the fact that she need not take her marriage vows literally. I am content to eat the crumbs which fall from my rich father-in-law's table."
"Steve!" Peter Courtlandt protested brokenly.
Jerry faced her father. Her black gown brought out the pallor of her face and throat. The only color about her was the vivid curves of her lips; even her usually brown eyes were black.
"I'm sorry if it hurts you, Dad, but I shall go with Steve. He is entitled to his uncle's fortune. What is a year out of our lives? Nothing. I—married to please you. Now I shall interpret my marriage vows to please myself." She was most lovely as she defied him. His green eyes contracted to emerald sparks. The veins stood out on his forehead like cords. Jerry remembered that it was the first time one of his children had gone contrary to his command.
"What will you do for money? That infernal will strips you of everything. Ask Steve for it? I can see you. Come, Jerry, give this thing up. Settle down here at the Manor and be happy."
For the first time since she had come into the lives of the Courtlandts Jerry looked like her father. There was the same determination about her eyes, about her lips.
"Be happy! Does smooth going necessarily mean happiness? Does jogging along on the path beaten by our social set mean happiness? Do you know how I feel, Dad? It is as though Steve and I had come up against an enormous sign-post bearing the startling information,Road Closed: Detour. The detour may be hard going, detours usually are, but they also offer more thrills and adventures than the broad highway. I'm willing to take a sporting chance if—if Steve wants me——"
Young Courtlandt laid his hands lightly on her shoulders and looked down at her with inscrutable eyes.
"I do want you, but remember, if I win out, half of what I have will be settled unreservedly on you. You will have earned it." She looked up at him for a moment.
"Then when you have rewarded me for being a good girl and have paid back Father, you will consider yourself in a position to snap your fingers at the Glamorgans?" He looked down at her with disconcerting steadiness as he answered cryptically:
"I shall consider myself in a position to dictate terms to one member of the family. Mr. Lawson, I accept the conditions of my uncle's will."
With each stop of the cross-continent train rain-coated men, with occasionally a woman, entered the car and passed down the corridor to disappear into the compartments. Porters wearing that air of authority and responsibility for which one might justly look in a premier or secretary of state, came and went; conductors punched tickets and answered questions more or less amiably; the wheels rattled and roared and ground ceaselessly; outside the rain descended with a persistence worthy a better cause.
From the window of her compartment Geraldine Courtlandt looked out upon a drenched world. There was nothing to see save a dense white sheet ten feet beyond the window. In an hour she and Steve would reach their destination, the first stop on the detour, she thought with a sudden mist before her eyes. She hoped that the storm was not an omen of what lay before them. She shook herself mentally. "Don't be silly and superstitious," she admonished that Jerry Courtlandt who persisted in having a queer lumpy feeling in the region of her throat whenever she thought of the curious twist the apparently broad, straight road of her marriage had taken.
Her father had maintained his attitude of angry aloofness. He had not come to the station to see her off, she had waited on the platform until the train started, hoping that he would relent at the last moment. He had sent a curt typewritten note to the effect that if she and Steve regained their common sense and returned to the Manor before the end of the year he would double the income he had allowed them. There were a dozen glorious American beauties in her compartment when she entered it. The roses had set the atmosphere tingling with life and color and love. Jerry laughed happily and kissed each one of them. How like her father it was to write the note with one hand and send flowers with the other.
What difference would it make if her income were doubled if she were disloyal to the promise she made when she married Steve, the girl thought, as chin on her hand she gazed unseeingly out at the rain. "An easy conscience is more to be desired than great riches," she paraphrased to herself as she thought of the weeks when she had been engaged to Greyson. Her heart still smarted with contrition as she remembered how ashamed she had been that she could make so little response to the love he lavished upon her. "Never again!" she said aloud. "I've made two mistakes, Bruce and Steve. From now on I'll do what I know to be right even if I hurt someone else and—and hate doing it. But—but just what shall I do for money?" she questioned with puckered brows.
She opened her beaded bag and poured the contents into her lap. "How are the mighty fallen!" she quoted with a laugh as she looked down upon the collection displayed. A handkerchief, one gold pencil, the key to her safe-deposit box, the membership card of her club, a book of postage stamps. Nothing else. She had carried out the terms of the will in letter and spirit. After her bills had been paid she had transferred her bank balance to her father and had dropped her remaining cash into the box of a Salvation Army lassie as she entered the station to take the west-bound train. The woman in the red-banded pokebonnet, standing on a board to keep her stout boots from the dampness, had looked at the bills crushed into her box, then after the donor incredulously. Such lavish generosity was rare in her experience.
Jerry frowningly regarded the objects in her lap. Not one cent of money. "Being marooned on a desert island has nothing on being marooned on a ranch without a penny," she mused under her breath. She hastily stuffed her belongings back into her bag as she heard an approaching whistle. It was Steve. The queer merry-go-round of fortune had accomplished one thing, it had restored Steve's spirits. Since leaving New York he had been a different person from the morose, touchy individual she had known since her engagement to him. He had been companionable, sympathetic in a fraternal sort of way which had made her wish fervently that Fate had given her a brother instead of a husband.
"Won't you come in?" she asked as Courtlandt stopped at the open door, then as he entered, "Is it time to get on my coat?"
"Not for half an hour." He seated himself opposite her. There was a new expression in his eyes which set the girl's heart to beating uncomfortably. She couldn't define it, she couldn't meet it long enough to define it.
"Jerry," there was an "'tention company" note in his voice which brought her chin up defiantly, "I suppose—if you complied with the terms of Uncle Nick's will you must be rather down and out financially—yes?" She succumbed to the lure of his smile and the laughter in his eyes.
"Thought telepathy," she responded gayly. "I was taking account of stock when you appeared. I have in this bag, one pencil, one handkerchief, one perfectly good club-membership card—good, that is, until January first—and a book of two-cent stamps. Those stamps won't imperil our hopes of the inheritance, will they?" she asked with exaggerated anxiety. "Caleb Lawson held me up before I boarded the train. I had to sign a paper and show him my empty purse to prove that I was really the Beggar-maid, bare-pursed instead of barefooted, following my King Cophetua out into the cold, cold world."
"Your simile is faulty. As I remember it the Beggar-maid loved the King."
"Also the King loved the Beggar-maid. You're right, the similarity ceases with my lack of funds."
"I shall open an account for you in the bank at Slippy Bend. Until then——" his hand went to his pocket. The girl's face whitened.
"Don't offer me money, Steve," she commanded tensely.
"I'm not offering money. I am giving you what belongs to you. Aren't you earning what Uncle Nick left as well as I?"
"Weren't you earning your share of Father's money when you married me?"
"That's different."
"Why? You refused to take my money. I refuse to take yours."
"You will take it."
Jerry leaned forward, her face as colorless as his.
"Take that 'Hands up!' expression out of your eyes, Steve. I shall not take a cent of your money. You will find that a Glamorgan has as much pride as a Courtlandt if she hasn't several generations of aristocrats behind her." Her angry eyes blazed as he retorted laughingly:
"You forget. You're not a Glamorgan now."
She shrugged lightly.
"More's the pity."
"Do you mean that?" Consternation banished the smile from his lips. He caught her hands in his. "The day Uncle Nick arrived I heard you say——"
"Nex' stop Slippy Bend, Miss. Porter for your bags," interrupted a Jamaican voice with a Chicago accent. Jerry's face flushed with relief as the black head with its gleaming eyes and teeth bobbed in at the door. She pointed to the bags. As the man went out with them she turned to Courtlandt with an embarrassed laugh.
"You've won this time, Steve. I had forgotten the porter. You'll have to tip him and the maid for me. However, as this is really a deferred wedding-trip the expenses naturally fall to the groom, don't they?" with reckless daring.
He looked at her until her laughing eyes fell before the glow of his.
"You've said it—if this can be called a wedding-trip—but take it from me, sometime, Mrs. Courtlandt, I'll show you what a real honeymoon can be. Porter, here's another bag."
He followed the black man into the corridor. Jerry settled her smart toque and pinned on her veil before the mirror, but she couldn't see her own face, only Steve's with that curious I'm-biding-my-time look in his eyes. What had he meant about a honeymoon? Did he mean that he and Felice—no,no, Steve was not that kind. She looked about the compartment to make sure that she had left nothing. Three roses still glowing with beauty remained of the dozen. She pinned them to the front of her coat. She would take so much of her father into her new life with her.
The wooden shanty which served as a shelter for telegraph, freight and passengers at Slippy Bend was as depressing as rain, flapping shingles and a skewed roof could make it. The road which struggled up a slope to hide between two shabby buildings was a river of mud. A knock-kneed man with a string of slat-ribbed calico horses and cayuses following him, waded downward through the middle of it. Every few steps he would stop to yank a howling, red-eyed bulldog from a hole which had betrayed him. Jerry valiantly blinked back the tears as she watched him. She had never seen anything quite as sordid and depressing as her surroundings. The only note of civilization in the dreary scene was the large, curtained touring car by the platform. As she looked at it, two legs, which had acquired Queen Anne curves from many hours spent in the saddle, wriggled from under the curtains followed by a large body. A Belgian police dog, tawny, noble, aloof, followed the man. Courtlandt who had been busy with the luggage turned with a boyish laugh and held out his hand.
"It sure is great to be back, Pete. Down, Goober, down, boy!" to the dog who, after an uncertain second, had leaped to lick his face. He kept one hand on the animal's head as he turned to the girl beside him. "Jerry, this is Pete Gerrish, who taught me all I know about ranching. He is Uncle Nick's right-hand man. Pete, this is Mrs. Courtlandt."
"He's got me wrong, ma'am. Iwasthe old gentleman's right-hand man, but Ranlett's in the saddle now. I'm sure pleased to meet you an' I hope you'll be downright happy with us."
"Thank you, Mr. Gerrish." Jerry felt the tears absurdly near as she looked up at him. He was regarding her with unqualified approval. His large face was cross-currented with fine lines and smiles; his Stetson came close to ears which looked as though the Almighty had designed them as hat-rests and had made a surprisingly good job of it. He carried the marks of his calling in the devil-may-care poise of his body, in his clothing, in his rollicking Irish eyes.
"I'll give Baldy Jennings a hand with the trunks to get 'em out of the rain till the boys get here for them. They're teamin' in. How the devil did yer expect to get all them things out to the ranch over these spring roads, Steve—I would say Chief? The boys has decided that even if they did teach the new owner most of what he knows about ranchin', it won't do to be familiar-like no more. So we've decided to call him chief, ma'am," Gerrish inserted the bit of information to Jerry in the midst of his dissertation on the condition of the roads. "I went up to the hubs gettin' here with no load. By cripes, I don't know what'll happen goin' back."
Jerry was tempted to echo that "By cripes!" later, when the big car laboring through what seemed rivers of mud, foundered in a hole. She unfastened the curtain and looked out. Goober on the running-board, plastered with mud, looked like nothing so much as a model sketchily done in clay as he peered down inquiringly. Gerrish expressed himself in language which the girl was sure was being painfully expurgated because of her. The wheels groaned and choked as they churned up fountains of mud. As she watched the wheel under her Jerry could think of nothing but a gigantic egg-beater gone mad from the futility of its efforts. The back of Gerrish's neck had taken on a dangerous, apoplectic color generated, doubtless, by restraint from the fullest self-expression.
"Would it help if I got out?" she ventured in the lull while the engine rested.
"Haw! I guess if yer did we'd have to haul you out in a hurry or send a rescue-party through to China," Gerrish discouraged while Courtlandt commanded:
"Stay where you are! I'll take the wheel, Pete. We have nothing to put under the back wheels; it would do no good if we had. The engine will have to do the trick."
He threw on the switch. The engine started. The spinning wheels hitched forward, he reversed, hitched forward, reversed, hitched forward till Jerry experienced all of the discomforts, and none of the stimulation, of being aboard ship on a high and choppy sea. Courtlandt grimly pursued his tactics till with a roar from the motor and a lurch which sent Jerry's teeth into her lower lip, the car, looking like an uncanny prehistoric animal which had been wallowing in a mud bath, dragged itself from its hole, skidded with hair-raising irresponsibility, came back to the road and struggled on. The rain stopped. The sky showed shapeless spots of light where the clouds were thinning. Vapors floated lightly above the fields.
It was twilight, a crimson and gold twilight, when Courtlandt turned into the avenue of cottonwoods which led to the ranch-house of the Double O. The air was fragrant with fresh washed earth and the spicy breath which the storm had beaten from the pines. From somewhere a meadow-lark trilled an ecstatic greeting and as though frightened at its temerity as suddenly subsided. The naming color in the west might have been the glow from a blazing forest, but it was only the sun flinging its good-night over sky and fields and mountains in the whole-hearted Western way. Against the red light squatted the shadowy shape of the ranch-house.
When the car stopped Goober sprang to the porch and stood as if awaiting orders. In the background hovered two Chinese servants, a man and a woman. Their slant-eyes in their moon faces were ludicrously alike. The woman in her gay silks and embroideries looked like a painting on rice-paper.
Pete and Hopi Soy carried in the bags. At a nod from Courtlandt the woman followed. Steve held the door wide. With a curious choked feeling Jerry entered the house. Then her emotion found vent in a little cry of delight. After the grayness and mud of the ride out the great living-room glowed like a jewel. The color stole through her senses like an elixir and rested and refreshed her. Her eyes shone, her lips curved in a faint smile as she looked about her. The servants had disappeared. She and Steve were alone.
Logs blazed in the great stone fireplace. Safely out of scorching distance a white cat dozed in front of it, her fluffy coat rosy in the firelight, her wide eyes like blinking topaz as she regarded the newcomers. Gorgeous serapes from old Mexico, Hopi saddle-blankets, heavily beaded garments of the Blackfeet, Apache bows and quivers full of arrows, Navaho blankets, skins of mountain lions and lynx there were, each one placed in artistic relation to its neighbor. A profusion of books and magazines, a baby-grand piano, a phonographde luxe, softly shaded lamps, added their note of civilization to the array of savage trophies and over the mantel——
"Why, Steve! There's Mother!" whispered Jerry softly.
For a silent moment the man and girl standing side by side looked up at the tender, laughing face of the woman in riding costume. She didn't seem like a thing of paint and canvass, she was real, vital, alive and welcoming. Jerry was the first to stir. She colored with confusion.
"Steve, I—I beg your pardon! I—I shouldn't have called her—mother. But I was so—so surprised. It seemed for a moment as if she held out welcoming arms to me." She turned away. Courtlandt gripped her shoulders with a force which hurt.
"She is your mother—I——" he released her abruptly and threw open a door. "These are your rooms. Mine are opposite. You see we have but one story in the ranch-house. Your bags are in your room. Ming Soy will come to help you when you ring." He put his two hands on her shoulders again. "I'm glad that you wore my roses."
"Your roses! Why I thought—I thought——" Her voice was drenched with disappointment. Steve's face was a mask, only his eyes seemed alive as he removed his hands and asked crisply:
"That they came from Greyson?"
"No, Steve, no! How could you think such a thing? I thought that Dad had relented and—and had sent the roses to——" she winked her lashes furiously but not before Steve had seen the diamond-like drops that beaded them. His voice was tender as he comforted:
"Your father will come round, Jerry. Just believe with old Doc Rand that things have a way of coming marvelously, unbelievably right. You are not sorry that you came, are you?"
"I'll say I'm not!" She had essayed an imitation of his voice and words but the emotion which had threatened her all day surged in her heart and betrayed her. Steve caught her hands in his.
"Don't look like that, little girl. You're going to love the life here and the ranch and—and—and Goober," he added with a short laugh as the dog bounded into the room.
Jerry Courtlandt sent her horse up the slope and came out on a bluff above the Double O. As the girl sat motionless looking off over the plain, an artist would have labeled the picture she made, "A Study in Browns," before he slipped it into his mental portfolio. Her mount, Patches, was a deep mahogany in color, her riding boots were but a shade lighter than his satin skin, her breeches and long coat were of khaki, her blouse was fawn color, her eyes were deeply, darkly bronze. Rebellious tendrils of lustrous brown hair escaped from under the broad brim of the campaign hat she wore, one of Steve's army hats with its gold and black cord. He had insisted upon her using it. The hats she had brought to the ranch had been urban affairs, not designed to shade her eyes from the glare of white roads. As she had had no money with which to buy another she had taken it.
Jerry pulled it off as she took a deep breath of the glorious air asparkle with bubbles of life. She loved the spot. Every day that she rode she stopped to look down upon the valley. Far away among the foot-hills a silver stream cleft rocky bluffs, then coiled and foamed its way until it broadened and flashed in gleaming waterfalls. In places where it boiled and frothed rustic bridges had been thrown across. Toward the east lay the sturdily built stock corrals, storehouses spick and span with whitewash, towering silos. Toward the west were fenced-off alfalfa fields and beyond them a mosaic of varicolored pasture-lands, dotted with grazing herds, stretched out to the foot-hills.
Beyond the foot-hills loomed mountains darkly green with pine and spruce to the timberline, above which reared sombre, forbidding rock until against the ragged edge of gold-lined clouds, white peaks flamed crimson in the slanting sun. Toward the north she could see the gap in the mountains through which the railroad cut. The gap was known as the Devil's Hold-up because of the natural facilities it had offered—and still offered for that matter,—to the class whose pleasing pastime it had been to maintain their divine right in the other man's property at the point of a gun.
Almost beneath her, approached by a broad, well-graded road, lay the ranch-house. Telephone wires from all directions rounded up the activities of the Double O at the office near by. The house was a rambling structure of rudely squared timbers set in fieldstone and cement. Its one story was built around a court on which many doors opened and which was gayly brocaded with shrubs and plants in blossom this late June day.
Where was Steve, Jerry wondered, as her eyes lingered on the office building. She saw him less and less as the days passed, as more and more he assumed the responsibilities of the Double O. He was off before she was up in the morning riding the range or in the dairies or barns until night. She had hardly believed her eyes when on the evening after her arrival, she had seen Steve and Tommy Benson, his secretary, come into the living-room in dinner coats. Courtlandt had answered her unspoken question with the explanation that it had been Nicholas Fairfax's unvarying rule to shed ranch problems at night, and he had found that getting into the dress of the city helped. A man just naturally would curb an impulse to toddle down to the corral if he were in dinner clothes. The two didn't seem to go together.
Steve had appointed Tommy Benson her squire, he himself had so little time to give her. A laugh curved Jerry's lips as she thought of Tommy. He was a slight youth with a face of one of Raphael's cherubs grown up and a book for his inseparable companion. His almost yellow hair was short and wavy, his eyes were a brilliant blue, his skin was as nearly pink and white as human skin can be after it has been ranch-seasoned, his lips seemed made for laughter. He and Steve had been officers in the same company and when they returned from overseas the two had gone to the ranch to recuperate. Tommy had remained there to please his mother. He was in the throes of a virulent attack of stage fever and Mrs. Benson had begged him to wait a few years before he decided upon acting as his career. She had assured him that if after reflection he still felt that it was the profession for him she would attend his première without a qualm. So he had stayed at the Double O. There was plenty of money back of him and he had grown to love the ranch life, apparently.
Tommy was taking the responsibility of training the lady of the ranch seriously, that is as seriously as a boy could who was forever expressing his emotions and convictions in the words of the immortals, Jerry thought with a smile. She had ridden since she was a little girl but Tommy was making her proficient in some hair-raising stunts. Steve didn't know of those but he had ordained that she was to learn to saddle Patches, that she must be able to fasten and unfasten gates securely while mounted, that she was to rope and shoot from her horse's back.
Her days were full but filled with her own pleasures. She did nothing for others, she thought ruefully as she gazed down upon the smoke rising from the cook-house chimney. Her only link with the outside world was Sandy, the carrier, whose appearance sent her imagination winging into the past whenever she saw him. The queer little postman wore a tall gray hat which, Tommy Benson insisted, was a left-over from the wardrobe of Gentleman Rick whose zeal as a promoter of pleasure in Slippy Bend in the nineties had lured men through miles of wilderness. Jerry often sat on the wall beside the mail-box to await his coming. He always had news and a quaint bit of philosophy if he hadn't letters. Letters! There weren't many for her. She had had hosts of friends in school and college but she heard from them seldom now. Her conscience administered a vicious pinch. Yes, it was quite all her fault, she answered it. The girls apparently had adored her, but she had been unable to accept their devotion with single-minded pleasure. Always in the back of her mind had skulked the ghost of that first home near the coal-fields. Would they have cared for her could they have seen that? After her marriage events had moved too rapidly for her to pick up the scattered lines of her correspondence. However, she no longer had that excuse, her days now were long and uneventful. She would write to every friend she had. It would be like sending out a fleet of ships. How eagerly she would await the return cargoes.
She broke into her own good resolutions with a laugh. To send out letters one must have stamps. She had used the last one she possessed yesterday and to get more she must have money. "Money!" Jerry laughed again as she repeated the word aloud. Conditions were reversed now as to money, she thought as she stared unseeingly off at the mountain tops which pricked the crimsoning sky. Steve had the income from his uncle's large property as long as he remained on the ranch. It would not be his unreservedly until a year from the day they had arrived at the Double O. She had persistently refused to accept money from him. If she wrote to the girls she would need a regiment of postage stamps. If she could earn——
Her eyes flashed earthward from the mountains as she heard the click of a hoof against rock and the creak of saddle leather. A horse and rider topped the slope. It was Courtlandt on his favorite mount, Blue Devil, a horse all spirit, shining blue-black satin. He was a regal creature from his flowing mane to his silken fetlock. He nosed Patches who showed an undignified haste to snuggle up to him in return.
"Did you think you had lost me, Steve?" Jerry asked gayly as she noted the seriousness of his blue eyes and the crease in his forehead which his broad-brimmed Stetson was not drawn low enough to hide. How unnecessarily good looking he was in his riding clothes, she thought. He wore a black tie with his khaki shirt, his heavy riding breeches were tucked into the tops of high boots which laced up the front and had curious sloping heels. He had removed one of his riding gloves and the dark stone of his ring, which bore the seal of the Courtlandts, made the browned hand seem white in contrast. He gave the impression of being absolute master of his horse and of any situation which might arise. Jerry's heart unaccountably skipped a beat as he answered her question.
"No, I saw you from the road. You looked like one of Dallin's bronzes. Where is Tommy?" with quick displeasure.
"Don't glower. I sent him back. I don't want him always at my heels. I love to come up here alone and, figuratively speaking, look down upon my blessings."
"Was that what you were doing when I came up? Your expression belied you. Instead of looking beatific, you looked worried."
She laughed up at him with warm friendliness as she bent forward and confided in a theatrical whisper:
"You are right. I was figuring finances. I have just——" The color flew to her face as she thought of what he might infer. She stumbled on quite conscious that she was making matters worse. "I'm about at the end of my stamp book and—and—I've developed a sudden fervor for letter writing and—and——" she broke off her breathless explanation as he laid his finely-shaped hand on her saddle-bow. Even back in the Manor days his hands had fascinated her.
"I'm glad that you've brought up the subject of finances, Jerry. The money question between you and me has got to be cleared up, and cleared up now. You've had your way long enough. Don't be foolish any longer, little girl, I——"
"I shall not take your money, Steve. Would you take mine?" then as his eyes darkened stormily, "Oh, truly, I didn't mean to rouse sleeping dogs—but—but I won't take it. I do nothing for you—if I even had anything to do about the house but Ming and Hopi Soy run the household motor noiselessly, perfectly, with every cylinder hitting. If there was anything I could do——"
"There is something you can do."
Jerry's heart flew to her throat. What did he mean? He looked grim and determined.
"W-what is it?" she asked faintly. She put on her hat, tightened her reins unconsciously.
Courtlandt laughed. The sternness left his face. There was an expression in his eyes which she couldn't translate as he teased:
"Don't run, Jerry. You don't trust me over much, do you? To return to finances, if you want to help you can do so tremendously by taking over the accounts and my correspondence. Tommy's had that job but I need him outside. Ranlett's leaving. You'll soon get the hang of the accounting and it won't take much of your time."
"But if it took all I'd love to do it, Steve. Shall I have a desk in the office?" she asked eagerly.
"If you agree to accept a salary."
"But I don't want to be paid for helping."
He turned his horse's head toward the slope.
"That settles it. I shall send to the agency to-morrow for a private secretary." As she did not answer he looked at her with a smile which lighted eyes and lips. "Now will you be good?"
She regarded him with oblique scrutiny. With an adorable imitation of Pete Gerrish she drawled:
"You're sure puttin' it straight, Chief. You win. Now shall we mosey 'long home?" With a touch of spurs she wheeled Patches and headed him down the slope.
"Why is Ranlett leaving?" she asked as their horses trotted side by side along the hard white ranch road. Courtlandt's face reddened darkly.
"Because I thought it time to determine the status of the alien on Double O ranch. Ranlett had a couple of men in the outfit who have not taken out first naturalization papers, even, who had been pointing out to my boys deficiencies of the government. They're flares set here to ignite any chaff of discontent which may be blowing about."
"But you're not against freedom of speech, Steve?"
"You bet I am against the inflammatory brand on the tongue of an alien. What is he in this country but a guest? If a man came to stay in my home and began a systematic undermining of the ideas and ideals on which that home was built, what do you think I'd do to him?"
"I'll say you'd sure put him out, Chief," with Gerrish's drawl and a little rush of laughter.
"I'll say I would. So quick he'd wonder what struck him. Why should the government put up with their vicious patter? It's bad enough when an honest-to-God citizen breaks loose and turns red, but for a man who is here by courtesy—well, as I remarked before, there is no place for him on the Double O ranch. Aliens will keep their jobs here only so long as they conform to my ideas of fitness."
"You're right, Steve. I have never thought of agitators in that light but they are a sort of human slow-match timed to fire a mine of discontent, aren't they? And half the time the mine doesn't know what it is blowing-up about. How do the men feel about Ranlett's defection?"
"I haven't asked them. What's the infernal row?" he demanded as they drew rein at the gate of the court. Jerry looked at him in surprise. His tone was that of a man whose nerves were taut to snapping point. She slid from her horse and dropped the reins. Patches loped quietly but determinedly in the direction of the corral and supper. Blue Devil, with a reproachful glance at the deserter, followed daintily in the steps of his master as Courtlandt and the girl entered the garden. The court was a riot of plants and shrubs. The air was sweet with the fragrance of roses just coming into bloom and rent by agitated yelps and a hoarse, croaking voice.
When Jerry and Steve reached storm centre they saw a combination of scarlet, blue and green, swaying precariously on the top of a shutter. It was José's parrot, Benito, flinging to the breeze the most vituperative epithets a rich and racy vocabulary could suggest. Below him Goober sat on his haunches. Between barks his tongue dripped, his mouth hung open as though in riotous laughter. His tawny eyes flashed ruby light. Tommy Benson, his finger between the pages of a book, his hair rampant, his blue eyes sparkling with mirth, egged on the two as he quoted from his favorite "Ancient Mariner":