The Golden Woman Part 36

glory at your expense. Wal, git right up, an' grit your teeth an'

fight good. Don't sit around feeling mean. If you'd do that, I tell you that cuss'll hit the trail so quick you won't git time to see it, an' you'll bust yourself laffin' to think you ever tho't it was around your layout. An' before I done talkin' I'll ast you to remember that when menfolks git around insultin' a helpless gal, cuss or no cuss, he's goin' to git his med'cine good--an' from me."

Buck's effort had its reward. The smile that had gradually found its way into his own eyes caught something of a reflection in those of the girl. He had dragged her from the depths of her despair by the force of the frank courage that was his. He had lifted her by the sheer strength and human honesty which lay at the foundation of his whole, simple nature. Joan sighed, and it was an acknowledgment of his success.

"Thank you, Buck," she said gently. "You are always so good to me. You have been so ever since I came. And goodness knows you have little enough reason for it, seeing it is I who have turned you out of this home of yours----"

"We got your money," interrupted Buck, almost brusquely. "This farm was the Padre's. You never turned me out. An' say, the Padre don't live a big ways from here. Maybe you'd like him to tell you about cusses an' things." His eyes twinkled. "He's sure great on cusses."

But Joan did not respond to the lightness of his manner, and Buck realized that her trouble was still strong upon her.

He waited anxiously, watching for the signs of her acceptance of his invitation. But they were not forthcoming. The deep violet of her eyes seemed to grow deeper with a weight of thought, and gradually the man's hopes sank. He had wanted her to see his friend, he had wanted his friend to see her. But more than all he had wanted to welcome her to his own home. Nor was the reason of his desire clear even to himself.

At last she rose from her seat and crossed over to the window, just as the sound of voices heralded the return of Mrs. Ransford and the hired man. It was at that moment she turned to him, speaking over her shoulder.

"They've got back," she said. "What are you going to do?"

"Send those--others--on into camp."

"Yes." Joan s.h.i.+vered.

Then she came back to him, and stood with one hand resting on the table.

"I--I think I should like to see the Padre. Will you take me to him one day?"

CHAPTER XXIII

THE BRIDGING OF YEARS

It was nearly a week later that Joan paid her visit to the fur fort.

The Padre moved about the room a little uncertainly. Its plainness troubled him, but its cleanliness was unquestionable. Both he and Buck had spent over two hours, earlier in the day, setting the place to rights and preparing for their visitor.

He shook his head as he viewed the primitive condition of the furniture. It was all very, very home-made. There was not one seat he felt to be suitable to offer to a lady. He was very dissatisfied.

Dissatisfied with it all, and particularly with Buck for bringing Joan to this wretched mountain abode. It would have been far better had he called at the farm. It even occurred to him now as curious that he had never done so before.

Yet perhaps it was not so curious after all. He had been attached to the home which had sheltered him all those years, the home his own two hands had built. Yes, it was different making a place, building it, driving every nail oneself, setting up every fence post, turning every clod of soil. It was different to purchasing it, ready-made, or hiring labor. He had no desire to go near the farm again. That, like other things, had pa.s.sed out of his life forever.

Three times he rearranged the room in the vain hope of giving it an added appearance of comfort, but the task was hopeless. Finally, he sat down and lit his pipe, smiling at his almost childish desire that his home should find favor in the eyes of the girl Buck was bringing to see him.

Buck had told him very little. He had spoken of the visit, and hinted at Joan's desire for advice. He had been very vague. But then that was Buck's way in some things. It was not often that he had need to go into reasons in his intercourse with his friend. Such a perfect understanding had always existed between them that they were rarely discoursive. He had told the Padre of the shooting, and explained the apparent cause. He had also told him of the reception of the news in the camp, and how a small section of the older inhabitants had adopted an att.i.tude of resentment against the innocent cause of it. He had shown him that there was plainly no sympathy, or very little, for Joan when the story was told. And to the elder man this was disquieting.

Buck had treated it with the contempt of youth, but the Padre had detected in it a food for graver thought than he let the boy understand.

It would be time enough to break up Buck's confidence should any trouble develop. In the meantime he had understood that there was something like real necessity for him to see this girl. If she needed any help then it was plainly his duty to give it her. And, besides, there was another reason. Buck desired this interview.

He smiled to himself as he thought of the turn events had taken with Buck. He must have been blind indeed if he had not seen from the very first the way things were going. The boy had fallen hopelessly in love with the first girl with whom he had definitely been brought into contact. And why not? Yes, he was rather anxious to see and talk with this girl who had set the boy's heart on fire.

Yet it seemed strange. Buck had never been anything but a boy to him.

He had never really grown up. He was still the small, pathetic figure he had first encountered on the trail-side. And now here he was hopelessly, madly in love with a girl. He would never forget the fire of jealousy that had lain behind his words when Buck had told him that Ike had forcibly kissed her.

His thought lost its more sympathetic note, and he became grave. Love had come into this youngster's life, and he wondered in what direction it would influence it. He knew well enough, no one better, how much damage love could do. He knew well enough the other, and right side of the picture. But Buck was an unusual experiment. Even to him, who knew the boy so well, he was still something of a problem in many ways. One thing was certain. He would get the trouble badly, and time alone could show what ravages and complications might be forthcoming.

He rose from his chair and knocked out his pipe. Then, in smiling dismay, he sniffed the air. He had done the very thing he had meant to avoid. He shook his white head, and opened wide both the window and the door in the hope that the fresh mountain air would sweeten the atmosphere before the girl's arrival.

But his hopes were quickly dashed. As he took up his position in the doorway, prepared to extend her the heartiest greeting, he heard the clatter of hoofs on the trail, and the man and the girl rode into the stockade.

Buck had departed to perform his usual evening tasks. He had gone to water and feed the horses, to "buck" cord-wood for the stove, and to draw the water for their household purposes. He was full early with his work, but he was anxious that the Padre and Joan should remain undisturbed. Such was his faith in the Padre that he felt that on this visit depended much of the girl's future peace of mind.

Now the white-haired man and the girl were alone--alone with the ruddy westering sun pouring in through window and door, in an almost horizontal shaft of gracious light. Joan was sitting bending over the cook-stove, her feet resting on the rack at the foot of the oven, her hands outstretched to the warming glow of the fire. The evenings in the hills, even in the height of summer, were never without a nip of cold which drifted down from the dour, ages-old glaciers crowning the distant peaks. She was talking, gazing into the glowing coals. She was piecing out her story as it had been told her by her Aunt Mercy, feeling that only with a full knowledge of it could this wise old white-haired friend of Buck's understand and help her.

The Padre was sitting close under the window. His back was turned to it, so that his face was almost lost in the shadow. And it was as well. As the story proceeded, as incident after incident was unfolded, the man's face became gray with unspeakable emotion, and from robust middle age he jumped to an old, old man.

But Joan saw none of this. Never once did she turn her eyes in his direction. She was lost in painful recollections of the hideous things with which she seemed to be surrounded. She told him of her birth, those strange circ.u.mstances which her aunt had told her of, and which now, in her own cold words, sounded so like a fairy tale. She told him of her father and her father's friend, the man who had always been his evil genius. She told him of her father's sudden good fortune, and of the swift-following disaster. She told him of his dreadful death at the hands of his friend. Then she went on, mechanically reciting the extraordinary events which had occurred to her--how, in each case where men sought her regard and love, disaster had followed hard upon their heels; how she had finally fled before the disaster which dogged her; how she had come here, here where she thought she might be free from a.s.sociations so painful, only to find that escape was impossible.

"I need not tell you what has happened since I came," she finished up dully. "You know it all. They say I brought them their luck. Luck? Was there ever such luck? First my coming cost a man's life, and now--now Ike and Pete. What is to follow?"

The Padre had not once interrupted her in her long story, and, even now, as the last sound of her voice died out, it was some moments before he spoke.

The fire in the grate rustled and the cinders shook down.

It was then that the girl stirred as though suddenly made aware of the silence. Immediately the man's voice, cold--almost harsh, in contrast to his usual tone, startled her.

"'Rest' is not your name," he said. "You have changed your name--to further aid your escape from----"

"How do you know that?" Then the girl went on, wondering at the man's quickness of understanding. "I had not intended telling you. But it doesn't matter. Nothing seems to matter. Evidently my disguise is useless with you. No, my name is not Rest. My father was Charles Stanmore."

The man made no reply. He did not move. His keen eyes were on the red-gold hair so neatly coiled about the girl's head. His lips were compressed, and a deep frown had disturbed the usual serenity of his broad brow.

For a moment Joan bowed her head, and her hands clasped tightly as they were held toward the fire. Presently her voice sounded again. It began low, held under a forced calm.

"Is there no hope?" she implored him. "Buck said you could help me.

What have I done that these things should curse my life? I only want peace--just a little peace. I am content to live and die just as I am.

I desire nothing more than to be left--alone."

"Who told you--all this?" The Padre's voice had no sympathy.

"My aunt. Aunt Mercy."

"You were--happy before she told you?"

"Yes."

"Why did she tell you?"

"I don't know. At least--yes, she told me so as to warn me. So that I might avoid bringing disaster upon those whom I had no desire to hurt."