In the Shadow of the Hills Part 50

"Your friends have always known you would win," she said, smiling up at him.

He seated himself on the rock beside her.

"It's but a short time ago, Janet, that I had no friends, or so few they could be counted on the fingers of one hand. Business acquaintances, yes. Professional companions, yes. Men who perhaps respected my ability as an engineer, yes. But real friends, scarcely one. And now I think I have gained some, which is the greatest satisfaction I have from all that has happened. After years the pendulum has swung to my side. Do you know the hour my luck changed?"

Janet shook her head wonderingly.

"No, I can't even guess," said she.

"Well, it was that afternoon, and that moment, I found you sitting in your stalled car in the creek down there. That was the beginning. From that time things began to run in my favor and they haven't ceased to do so for a moment since, I now see looking back over events. You brought good luck to me that day in your car."

"What an extraordinary idea! Then at bottom you're superst.i.tious,"

Janet replied. "I shall have to give you a new name; I must no longer call you 'Cold Steel.'"

"I really never liked that name," Weir said quickly. "Perhaps I was cold steel once, but I have changed along with everything else. And you're responsible for that too."

Janet leaned forward and looked into his eyes.

"You were never truly harsh to any one except those who deserved it,"

she said. "I know! You would never have been so quick to help Mary Johnson or me, or others who needed help, if your heart was not always generous and sympathetic. Only against evil were you as steel, and in moments requiring supreme courage and sacrifice. And that's how you gained the name before you ever came here."

"Anyway I've changed," said he. "I'm out from under the cloud which I felt always hung above me. As I say, you brought me good luck that day--and I see clearly that I shall continue to be superst.i.tious."

"Why, all occasion for that is past now."

"No," said Steele Weir. "No, less than ever. For I'm certain you hold my good fortune in your hand yet, and will continue to hold it. And that means----"

He paused, regarding her so intensely that the blood beat up into her face. There was no mistaking that look and it thrilled her to the soul.

"Yes?" she managed to say.

"It means my happiness, now and for all time to come," he went on.

"See, I shall have accomplished what I set out to do and what in justice had to be done, bringing these men to punishment--to punishment in one form or another. I shall have given my employer, the company, service worthy of the hire. I shall have rid you and San Mateo of an unscrupulous parasite in the person of Ed Sorenson, though my persecution of him now shall stop and I shall leave him enough out of the property recovered from his father to live in comfort somewhere with his mother.

"Mr. Pollock states I shall have no trouble in getting legal t.i.tle and possession of most of the wealth of these four men,--I and any relatives of the dead Jim Dent who can be found. For thirty years'

acc.u.mulated interest charges owing me will swallow up all the men's properties. That, however, is only a material victory. I shall have relieved Johnson of fear of financial constraint; and saved his daughter from a serious mistake. I shall have started Martinez on the road to success--and I should not be surprised if he prospered, became the leading attorney in this county, was elected judge and so on.

"In a way, too, I shall have helped to remove the oppressive weight of these men, Sorenson, Burkhardt, Judge Gordon and Vorse, with their sinister influence, from this community and region. They have always held the natives in more or less open subjection, financial, political, and moral. There should be a freer air in San Mateo henceforth. The people will have a chance to grow. They no longer will feel the threat of brutal masters always over them; and with the completion of the irrigation project and the infusion of new settlers they will become better citizens.

"I see all this," he concluded. "It pleases me; it gives me cause for satisfaction. But it doesn't give me the happiness I want, or the love. That is alone in your hands to bestow."

Janet felt herself trembling; she could not speak.

"I think I felt the stirring of love from the moment I saw you there at the ford," he exclaimed. "Last night when I knew that wretch had carried you off to the mountains, I could have torn him limb from limb. That was my love speaking, Janet. If I should have to go through life without you--oh, the thought is too bitter to dwell on!--then I should think life not worth living. But I have imagined that you might have for me a little----"

Janet swiftly clasped his hand with her own.

"I love you," she cried softly. "I was sitting here when you came because I loved you. If I am necessary to your happiness, you also are necessary to mine. I honor you for what you have done and love you for what you are, a strong true heart."

"Ah, Janet, you give me the greatest joy in the world," he whispered.

"Love--that is more than all."

His arms drew her to his breast. Her lips went to his in consecration of that love. Their hearts beat the rapture of that love.

Over the silent peaceful mountains the moon spread its effulgent light. Over the mesa that was no more to know the fierce sound of strife. Over the town, at last free of its avaricious masters, free of the savage spirit of an outlaw time. Over the Burntwood River flowing in a s.h.i.+mmering band to the horizon. Over the camp where centered so many men's plans and labors. And over the lovers, chief of all, that light fell as in a silvery halo.

THE END