Where the Trail Divides Part 17

But the girl did not stir. Had empires depended upon it that moment, she could not have complied. Could she have cried, as the chin had at first presaged, she might perhaps have done so; but she was beyond the reach of tears now. The complete meaning of the scene had come to her at last, the realisation of personal menace; and a fear such as she had never before known, gripped her relentlessly. She could hear, hear every word; but her muscles refused to act. She merely stood there, the old telescope satchel she carried gripped tight in her hand, her great eyes, wide and soft as those of a wild thing, staring out into the now rapidly acc.u.mulating rabble; merely stared and waited.

"Bess," repeated the persuading voice, "come, please. Don't stand there, come."

At last the girl seemed to hear, to understand. Hesitatingly, with trembling steps, she came a pace forward, and another; then of a sudden she gave a little cry and her free hand lifted defensively. But she was not quick enough, had seen too late; and that instant came the _denouement._ A second turnip, decayed like its predecessor, aimed likewise unerringly, caught her fair in the mouth, spattered, and broke into fragments that fell to the car steps. Following, swift as rain after a thunderclap, a spurt of blood came to her lips and trickled down her face.

Simultaneously the crowd went silent; silent as the still prairie about them, awed irresistibly by the thing they had themselves wittingly or unwittingly done. Save one, not a human being stirred. That one, no need to tell whom, transformed visibly; transformed as they had never seen a human being alter before. With not a step, but a bound, he was himself on the platform of the coach; the girl, protected behind him, hid from sight. She was sobbing now; sobbing tumultuously, hysterically. In the stillness every listening ear on the platform could hear distinctly. For an instant after he had reached her the Indian stood so, his left arm about her, his back toward them. He did not say a word, he did not move.

For the first time in his life he dared not. He did not see red that moment, this man; he saw black--black as prairie loam. Every savage instinct in his brain was clamouring for freedom, clamouring until his free hand was clenched tight to keep it from the bulging holster behind his right hip. Before this instant, when they were baiting him alone, it was nothing, he could forgive; but now--now--He stared away from them, stared up into the smiling, sarcastic prairie sky; but, listening, they, who almost with fascination watched, could hear beneath the catch of the girl's sobs the sound of his breathing.

Ever at climaxes time seems suspended. Whether it was a second or a minute he stood there so, they who watched could never tell. What they did know was that at last he turned, stood facing them. All their lives they had seen pa.s.sion, seen it in every phase, seen it until it was commonplace. It was in the very air of the frontier, to be expected, life of the life; but as this man s.h.i.+fted they saw a kind of which they had never dreamed. For How Landor was master of himself again, master, as well--they knew it, every man and youth who saw,--of them. For another indefinitely long deathly silent s.p.a.ce he merely looked at them; looked eye to eye, individual by individual, into every face within the surrounding semi-circle. Once before another man, a drunken cowman, had seen that identical look. Now not one but a score saw it, felt a terrible ice-cold menace creep from his brain into their brains. Even yet he did not speak, did not make a sound; nor did they. Explain it as you will, he did this thing. Another thing he did as well; and that was the end. Slowly, deliberately, he stepped to the platform and held out his hand. Obediently the girl followed. She was not crying now. Her eyes were red and a drop of blood came now and then to her lips; but she had grown wonderfully quiet all at once, wonderfully calm--almost as much so as the man. Deliberately as he had stepped down into the spectators'

midst, the Indian took the old telescope from the girl's hand and, she following by his side, moved a step forward. He did not touch her again nor did she him. They merely moved ahead toward the sidewalk that led up the single street; moved deliberately, leisurely, as though they were alone. Not around the crowd, but straight through it they pa.s.sed; through a lane that opened as by magic as they went, and as by magic closed behind them, until they were within a solid human square. But of all the a.s.sembled spectators that day, an aggregation irresponsible, unchivalrous as no other rabble on earth--a mob of the frontier,--not one spoke to challenge their action, not one attempted to bar their way.

The complete length of the platform they went so, turned the corner by the station--and, simultaneously, the crowd disappeared from view, hid by the building itself. Then in sudden reaction, the girl weakened.

Irresistibly she caught at the man's arm, held it fast.

"Oh, How! How!" she trembled, "is it to be always like this with you and me? Is it to be always, everywhere, so?"

But the man said never a word.

Two hours had pa.s.sed. The girl had breakfasted. A wood fire crackled cheerfully in the sheet iron heater of the tiny room where the same two people sat alone. Already the world had taken on a different aspect. Not that Elizabeth Landor had forgotten that recent incident at the depot.

She would never forget it. It had merely pa.s.sed into temporary abeyance, taken its proper place in the eternal scheme of things.

Another consideration, paramount, all-compelling, had inevitably crowded it from the stage. It was this consideration that had held her silent far longer than was normal. It was its overshadowing influence that at last prompted speech.

"How did you know I was coming to-day?" she queried suddenly.

"How did _you_ know I would be at the train to meet you?" echoed a voice.

The girl did not answer, did not pursue the subject.

"Tell me of Aunt Mary, please," she digressed. "I felt somehow when you wrote as if I--I--" A swiftly gathered shower called a halt. Tear drops, ever so near, stood in her eyes. "Please tell me," she completed.

The man told her. It did not take long. As of her prosaic life, so there was little to record of the death of Mary Landor. "It was best that you were away," he ended. "It was best for her that she went when she did."

"You think so, How, honestly?" No affectation in that anxious query.

"You think I didn't do wrong in leaving as I did?"

"No, you did no wrong, Bess." A pause. "You could not."

A moment the girl sat looking at him; in wonder and something more.

"I believe you knew all the time Aunt Mary would--go while I was away," she said suddenly, tensely. "I believe you helped me away on purpose."

No answer.

"Tell me, How. I want to know."

"I thought so, Bess," simply.

For a long time the girl sat so; silent, marvelling. A new understanding of this solitary human stole over her, an appreciation that drowned the sadness of a moment ago. "How you must care for me," she voiced almost unconsciously. "How you must care for me!"

She did not expect an answer. She was not disappointed. Again a silence fell; a silence of which she was unconscious, for she was thinking.

Minutes pa.s.sed. In the barn the bronchos were pa.s.sively waiting. At the parsonage the young minister still sat scowling in his study. No time had been set for the visit he expected. There was no apparent reason why he should not have gone about his work; but for some reason he could not. Angry with himself, he thrust the new half eagle into his pocket and, placing the offending licence beneath a pile of papers, he walked over to the window and stood staring out into the suns.h.i.+ne.

Within the tiny room at the hotel the gaze of the girl s.h.i.+fted, dropped to her feet. Despite an effort her face tinged slowly red.

"Did you think," she queried abruptly, "when you expected me to-day that I would come alone?"

The Indian showed no surprise.

"Yes, Bess," he answered. "I knew you would be alone."

"Why, How?" The question was just audible.

"Because I trusted you, Bess."

Silence again. Surrept.i.tiously, swiftly, the girl's brown eyes glanced up; but he was not looking at her, and again her glance fell. A longer pause followed, a pause wherein the girl could not have spoken if she would. A great preventing lump was in her throat, an obstacle that precluded speech. Many things had happened in the short time since she had last been with this man, some things of which she was not proud; and beside such a trust as this Bess Landor was speechless. Without volition upon her part, the cup of life had been placed to her lips and, likewise without knowledge of what it contained, she had tasted. The memory of that draught was with her now. Under its influence she spoke.

"You are better than I am, How," she said.

If the man understood he gave no evidence of the knowledge. He did not even look at her. Time was pa.s.sing, time which should have found them upon their way, but he showed no impatience. It was his day, his moment, his by right; but no one looking at him would have doubted that he himself would never first suggest the fact. Conditions had changed very rapidly in the recent past, altered until, from his view-point, it was impossible for him to make the move toward the old relation, to even intimate its desirability. With the patience of his race he waited. In the fulness of time he was rewarded.

"How," of a sudden initiated a voice, withal an embarra.s.sed voice, "will you do me a favour?"

"What is it, Bess?"

The girl coloured. Instinctively the man knew that at last the recall had come, and for the first time he was looking at her steadily.

"Promise me, please," temporised the girl.

"I promise."

Even yet Elizabeth Landor found it difficult to say what she wished to say.

"You won't be--offended or angry, How?"

"No, Bess. You could hurt me, but you couldn't make me angry."

"Thank you, How. It's a little thing, but I'd like to have you humour me." She met his look directly. "It's when we are married to-day you'll be dressed--well, not the way you usually dress." Her colour came and went, her throat was a-throb. "Dressed like--You understand, How."

Of a sudden the Indian was upon his feet; then as suddenly he checked himself. Characteristically, he now ignored the immaterial, went, as ever, straight to fundamentals without preface or delay. Scarce one human in a generation would have held aloof at that moment. It was his, his by every right; but even yet he would not take it, not until--.

"Bess," he said slowly. "I want to ask you a question and I want you to answer me--as you would answer your mother were she alive." Once again, unconsciously, he fell into pose, his arms across his breast, his great shoulders squared. "I have seen Mr. Landor's will. He has left you nearly everything. You are rich, Bess; I won't tell you how rich because you wouldn't understand. You are young and can live any life you wish.

You know what marrying me means. I am as I am and cannot change. You know what others, people of your own race, think when you are with me.

They have shown you to-day. Answer me, Bess, have you thought of all this? Was it duty that brought you back, or did you really wish to come?

Don't take me into consideration at all when you answer. Don't do it, or we shall both live to regret. Tell me, Bess, as you know I love you, whether you have thought of all this and still wish to marry me. Tell me." He was silent. Once again it was a climax, and once again came oblivion of pa.s.sing time. For minutes pa.s.sed, minutes wherein, with wide open eyes, the girl made her choice. Not in hot blood was the decision made, not as before in ignorance of what that decision meant.

Deliberately, with the puerile confidence we humans feel in our insight of future, she chose; as she believed, honestly.

"Yes, How," she said slowly. "I have thought of it all and I wish to marry you. I've no place else in the world to go. There's no one in the world that I trust as I trust you. I wish to marry you to-day, How."