The Land of Strong Men Part 45

The girl stared at him, amazed.

"Is he crazy? He has no right--"

"So I told him."

"And you will always be welcome, while the ranch is mine, or beneath any roof that is mine."

"Thank you," he said simply.

"But this is beyond everything!" she flamed indignantly. "I am not a child. I make my own friends. I will tell him--"

"He is an old man. Pay no attention to it. I am sorry, now, that I said to him what I did."

"What did you quarrel about? Tell me!"

"About the whole thing, I think."

"Then it was all on my account. From first to last, I've made trouble for you. I am sorry."

"You needn't be. All the trouble you have made me is a joy."

"Why--Angus!" The color rose in the girl's cheeks.

"Didn't you know it?"

"I know you have been very--good--to me."

"You have known more than that," he said.

"No, good heavens, no! Angus--"

"I have only known it myself since that day in the rain," he interrupted. "Before that, I thought I was only helping you, as I would have helped any woman--or man, either. But then I knew it was something else. And to-day when G.o.dfrey French said he would not have our names coupled together--"

"Oh!" the girl cried sharply.

"And that you would not think twice of a rough, uneducated man like myself," he pursued. "I decided to find out to-night whether he was right or wrong."

"He was wrong!" she cried. "That is--I mean--that you are not rough and uneducated, and--"

"I am both," Angus admitted gravely. "I have worked hard since I was a boy, and what education I have I have got for myself. In that he was right. And so I find it very hard to tell you what I want to, as a woman should be told, because words do not come to my tongue easily, and never did. The thoughts I have had I have always kept to myself, for that, and because there was no one who would understand even if I could have put them into words. And this is all I can say, that I love you as a man loves one woman in his lifetime, and I want you for my wife. Is it yes or no, Faith?"

"But--Angus--I never thought of such a thing--not really, I mean. You were always kind, helpful, but never like--like--"

"Never like a lover?"

"Well--no."

Angus laid his great hands on her shoulders. The ordinary grimness of his face was lacking. It was replaced by something ineffably tender.

Slowly he drew her to him until they stood breast to breast.

"I can be like a lover, Faith," he said, "if you will have it so."

For a long moment Faith Winton's clear eyes looked into his, and then went blank as she searched her own heart for an answer and found it.

"I will have it so--dear!" she said.

CHAPTER XXV

CROSS CURRENTS

Jean Mackay, rustling through the house with broom and duster after breakfast, came on her brother reading what at first glance she took to be a magazine. This gave her what was destined to be the first of a string of surprises, for Angus never loafed around the house.

"Shoo! Get out of here!" she said. "You'll get all choked with dust. I declare I don't know where all the dirt comes from."

In proof of her words she raised a cloud which made him cough. "Told you so," she said. "Do go somewhere else, Angus. You're only in my way."

"In a minute," he replied, frowning at his reading.

"Where did you go last night--to Faith's?"

"Uh-huh!"

"You might have asked me to go along."

"Huh!"

"You're extra polite this morning!" his sister observed with irony.

"Whatever are you reading? Well, of all things! A jeweler's catalogue!

What on earth--"

Angus held it out to her.

"Here," he said, "I know nothing about such things. Pick out a ring."

"A ring!" Miss Jean exclaimed, astounded. "I don't want a ring, I mean I can get along without one."

"That's lucky," said her brother, "because the ring I want you to pick out is for Faith."

"Good Lord!" cried Miss Jean, and fell limply upon a couch. Recovering herself she rushed upon him, threw her arms around his neck, and punctuated her words with emphatic hugs. "You big, old fraud. But I'm glad, really I am. When--where--"

"Last night," Angus told her. "That was what I was making up my mind about. I didn't know whether I should ask her just now."

"Why shouldn't you? If she cares--"