Ridgway of Montana Part 33

"Make it right!" The former congressman got up with an oath. "Make it right! Can you give me back my reputation, my future? Can you take away the shame that has come upon my wife, and that my children will have to bear in the years to come? Can you give us back our home, our comfort, our peace of mind?"

"No, I can't do this, but I can help you to do it all," the cattleman made answer quietly.

He offered no defense, though he knew perfectly well none was needed.

He had no responsibility in the calamity that had befallen this family.

Pelton's wrong-doing had come home to those he loved, and he could rightly blame n.o.body but himself. However much he might arraign those who had been the agents of his fall, he knew in his heart that the fault had been his own.

Norma Pelton, tensely self-repressed, spoke now. "How can you do this, sir?"

"I can't do it so long as you hold me for an enemy, ma'am. I'm ready to cry quits with your husband and try a new deal. If I injured him he tried to even things up. Well, let's say things are squared and start fresh. I've got a business proposition to make if you're willing to listen to it."

"What sort of a proposition?"

"I'm running about twenty-five thousand sheep up in the hills. I've just bought a ranch with a comfortable ranch-house on it for a kind of central point. My winter feeding will all be done from it as a chief place of distribution. Same with the shearing and s.h.i.+pping. I want a good man to put in charge of my sheep as head manager, and I would be willing to pay a proper salary. There ain't any reason why this shouldn't work into a partners.h.i.+p if he makes good. With wool jumping, as it's going to do in the next four years, the right kind of man can make himself independent for life. My idea is to increase my holdings right along, and let my manager in as a partner as soon as he shows he is worth it. Now that ranch-house is a decent place. There's a pretty good school, ma'am, for the children. The folks round that neighborhood may not have any frills, but--"

"Are you offering Tom the place as manager?" she demanded, in amazement.

"That was my idea, ma'am. It's not what you been used to, o' course, but if you're looking for a change I thought I'd speak of it," he said diffidently.

She looked at him in a dumb surprise. She, too, in her heart knew that this man was blameless. He had done his duty, and had nearly lost his life for it at the hands of her husband. Now, he had come to lift them out of the hideous nightmare into which they had fallen. He had come to offer them peace and quiet and plenty in exchange for the future of poverty and shame and despair which menaced them. They were to escape into G.o.d's great hills, away from the averted looks and whispering tongues and the temptations to drown his trouble that so constantly beset the father of her children. Despite his faults she still loved Tom Pelton; he was a kind and loving husband and father. Out on the range there still waited a future for him. When she thought of it a lump rose in her throat for very happiness. She, who had been like a rock beside him in his trouble, broke down now and buried her head in her husband's coat.

"Don't you, honey--now, don't you cry." The big man had lost all his pomposity, and was comforting his sweetheart as simply as a boy. "It's all been my fault. I've been doing wrong for years--trying to pull myself out of the mire by my bootstraps. By Gad, you're a man, Sam Yesler, that's what you are. If I don't turn ovah a new leaf I'd ought to be shot. We'll make a fresh start, sweetheart. Dash me, I'm nothing but a dashed baby." And with that the overwrought man broke down, too.

Yesler, moved a good deal himself, maintained the burden of the conversation cheerfully.

"That's all settled, then. Tell you I'm right glad to get a competent man to put in charge. Things have been running at loose ends, because I haven't the time to look after them. This takes a big load off my mind.

You better arrange to go up there with me as soon as you have time, Pelton, and look the ground over. You'll want to make some changes if you mean to take your family up there. Better to spend a few hundreds and have things the way you want them for Mrs. Pelton than to move in with things not up to the mark. Of course, I'll put the house in the shape you want it. But we can talk of that after we look it over."

In his embarra.s.sment he looked so much the boy, so much the culprit caught stealing apples and up for sentence, that Norma Pelton's grat.i.tude took courage. She came across to him and held out both hands, the s.h.i.+mmer of tears still in the soft brown eyes.

"You've given us more than life, Mr. Yesler. You can't ever know what you have done for us. Some things are worse than death to some people.

I don't mean poverty, but--other things. We can begin again far away from this tainted air that has poisoned us. I know it isn't good form to be saying this. One shouldn't have feelings in public. But I don't care. I think of the children--and Tom. I didn't expect ever to be happy again, but we shall. I feel it."

She broke down again and dabbed at her eyes with her kerchief. Sam, very much embarra.s.sed but not at all displeased at this display of feeling, patted her dark hair and encouraged her to composure.

"There. It's all right, now, ma'am. Sure you'll be happy. Any mother that's got kids like these--"

He caught up the little girl in his arms by way of diverting attention from himself.

This gave a new notion to the impulsive little woman.

"I want you to kiss them both. Come here, Kennie. This is Mr. Yesler, and he is the best man you've ever seen. I want you to remember that he has been our best friend."

"Yes, mama."

"Oh, sho, ma'am!" protested the overwhelmed cattleman, kissing both the children, nevertheless.

Pelton laughed. He felt a trifle hysterical himself. "If she thinks it she'll say it when she feels that way. I'm right surprised she don't kiss you, too."

"I will," announced Norma promptly, with a pretty little tide of color.

She turned toward him, and Yesler, laughing, met the red lips of the new friend he had made.

"Now, you've got just grounds for shooting me," he said gaily, and instantly regretted his infelicitous remark.

For both husband and wife fell grave at his words. It was Pelton that answered them.

"I've been taught a lesson, Mr. Yesler. I'm never going to pack a gun again as long as I live, unless I'm hunting or something of that sort, and I'm never going to drink another drop of liquor. It's all right for some men, but it isn't right for me."

"Glad to hear it. I never did believe in the hip-pocket habit. I've lived here twenty years, and I never found it necessary except on special occasions. When it comes to whisky, I reckon we'd all be better without it."

Yesler made his escape at the earliest opportunity and left them alone together. He lunched at the club, attended to some correspondence he had, and about 3:30 drifted down the street toward the post-office. He had expectations of meeting a young woman who often pa.s.sed about that time on her way home from school duties.

It was, however, another young woman whose bow he met in front of Mesa's largest department store.

"Good afternoon, Miss Balfour."

She nodded greeting and cast eyes of derision on him.

"I've been hearing about you. Aren't you ashamed of yourself?"

"Yes, ma'am. What for in particular? There are so many things."

"You're a fine Christian, aren't you?" she scoffed.

"I ain't much of a one. That's a fact," he admitted. "What is it this time--poker?"

"No, it isn't poker. Worse than that. You've been setting a deplorable example to the young."

"To young ladies--like Miss Virginia?" he wanted to know.

"No, to young Christians. I don't know what our good deacons will say about it." She illuminated her severity with a flas.h.i.+ng smile. "Don't you know that the sins of the fathers are to descend upon their children even to the third and fourth generation? Don't you know that when a man does wrong he must die punished, and his children and his wife, of course, and that the proper thing to do is to stand back and thank Heaven we haven't been vile sinners?"

"Now, don't you begin on that, Miss Virginia," he warned.

"And after the man had disgraced himself and shot you, after all respectable people had given him an extra kick to let him know he must stay down and had then turned their backs upon him. I'm not surprised that you're ashamed."

"Where did you get hold of this fairy-tale?" he plucked up courage to demand.

"From Norma Pelton. She told me everything, the whole story from beginning to end."

"It's right funny you should be calling on her, and you a respectable young lady--unless you went to deliver that extra kick you was mentioning," he grinned.

She dropped her raillery. "It was splendid. I meant to ask Mr. Ridgway to do something for them, but this is so much better. It takes them away from the place of his disgrace and away from temptation. Oh, I don't wonder Norma kissed you."

"She told you that, too, did she?"

"Yes. I should have done it, too, in her place."