Hope Hathaway Part 12

"No," she replied quickly. "Not in that one thing, at least. To be honest, I have never _felt_ that you were a stranger to me; but a girl, even a rough Western girl, must sometimes remember and be restricted by conventionalities. I know what you are thinking, that conventionalities include politeness, and I have been rude to you. Perhaps that is the reason I wouldn't let you go back to Harris' with me the other night--I had not known you long enough."

He answered her simply: "I am not thinking of that night, but that you have just told me you are my friend--that you think kindly of me." She flashed him a look of surprise.

"But I _never_ told you that!" she exclaimed.

"Not in just those words, true," he said. "But it is so. Didn't you say that you had never felt me to be a _stranger_ to you? If you had not approved of me--thought kindly of me in the start, could you have felt so? No. When two people meet, they are friends, or they are still strangers--and _you have never felt me to be a stranger_. Is that not so?"

"I cannot deny what I have just said," she replied. "And I will not deny that I believed what I was saying, but your argument, though good, doesn't down me, because I honestly think that a person may see another person just once, feel that he never could be a stranger, and yet have no earthly regard or respect for that person."

"Have you ever experienced that?" he inquired.

"N--no. You are trying to corner me; but that isn't what I came to talk about, and it is time to go," she said, turning away from the grave. He walked with her down the hill toward her horse.

"I wanted to ask you, Mr. Livingston, about the little German girl," she said, standing with her back against the side of her horse, one arm around the pommel loosely holding the reins, and the other stretched upon the glossy back of the gentle animal. "When are you expecting her, and what are you going to do about her?"

"She should be here the last of the week. Poor girl! My heart bleeds for her. There is nothing to do except to tell her the sad story, and see that she gets started safely back to her country and her friends," he answered.

Hope stood upright, taking a step toward him.

"You would not--oh, it would be inhuman to send her back over the long, terrible journey with that cruel pain in her heart! Think how tired she will be, the thousands of miles of travel through strange lands, and the mult.i.tude of foreigners she will have pa.s.sed! Think of the way she has traveled, those close, packed emigrant cars, and everything. It is terrible!"

"I never thought of that. She will be tired. You are right, it would never do to send her over that long journey so soon, though she is not coming through as an emigrant, but first cla.s.s, for she is of good family over there. So was Fritz--a sort of cousin, I believe, but the poor boy got into some trouble with his family and came over here penniless. He was to have met her in town and they expected to get married at once. He was going to bring her out here to the ranch to live until he had hunted up a location for a home. If I am not mistaken she has some money of her own with which they were going to buy sheep. She has been well educated, and has had some instruction in English, as had Fritz.

"I thought only of getting her back among her friends again and I never gave a thought about the long, weary trip and the poor, tired girl. She must rest for a time. You have shown me the right way, Miss Hathaway--and yet, what am I to do? I could bring her out here to the ranch, but there is no woman on the place. Perhaps I may be able to secure a man and his wife who need a situation, but it is not likely.

There may be some good family about who would keep her for awhile. Do you know of one?"

"There are several families around here who might welcome a boarder, but none with whom a girl of that kind could be contented, or even comfortable. If only I were at home, and could take her there! I _might_ send her over there. But, no, that would be worse than anything! There is no other way," she said suddenly, placing her hand upon his sleeve with a quick unconscious motion. "You must let me take care of her, up here, as I am, at Harris'!" Excitement had flushed her cheeks scarlet.

Her eyes were filled with the light of inspiration and more than earthly beauty. She waited, intense, for him to speak, but he could not. He felt her hand upon his arm, saw the wonderful light in her face--and was dumb.

"Tell me that I may take care of her. I must--there is no other way,"

she insisted. "And it will give me the privilege of doing one little act of kindness. Say it will be all right!"

"If she cannot find comfort and strength in you, she cannot find it upon earth," he said softly. "I have no words with which to thank you!"

She took her hand from his arm with a little sigh of content, turned around and stood at her horse's head a moment, then mounted as lightly and quickly as a boy.

"Where's your horse?" she asked, whirling the animal about until it faced him. The wonderful light in her face had given place to a careless, light-hearted look.

"Up at the stable. Have you the time and patience to wait for me?" said Livingston.

"Plenty of patience, but no time," she replied. "I promised to meet one of the twins at six o'clock, so I've got to hurry up. I'll meet you over at Syd's camp in a little while."

Before he had time to either speak or bow she was gone. As she disappeared behind the ledge of rocks a clear boyish whistle of some popular air floated back to him.

Walking quickly through the pasture toward the ranch buildings Edward Livingston thought of many things--and wondered.

CHAPTER XII

At six o'clock on this afternoon in May the sun was still high above the mountain tops. By the time Edward Livingston reached his ranch buildings and saddled his horse to go to Carter's camp Hope had ridden the two miles or more between his fence and the school-house. There she found, idly waiting beside the isolated building, surrounded by several gaunt staghounds, not one of the twins, but both.

The soft-voiced twin was all smiles, but Dave with his back against the front of the building was scowling sullenly, giving vent to his ugliness by kicking small stones with the toe of his boot and watching them as they went sailing high into the air, then down the sloping stretch of young green below. At one of those stones Hope's horse shied, but the girl smiled, knowing full well the young savage's mood. She rode rapidly, and stopped beside the boys, but did not dismount.

"Am I late?" she inquired of the scowling twin. "I see you are on time with the gun like a good boy, Dave, and you've brought your own along, too. We won't do a thing to those chickens if we get sight of them to-night!" She smiled at the boy, who became a trifle more amiable; then she turned to his soft-voiced twin. "How is it you're back so soon?"

He brushed a speck of dust from his overalls before replying, and his voice was particularly sweet.

"Had to come to report. You see when I got there they was just quittin', so I came along back with some o' the fellers. Didn't you meet Long Bill and Shorty Smith up the road there a piece when you come along?" The girl nodded. "Well, I come back with them's far as home; then I saw Dave getting the guns, so I thought I'd get mine an' come along, too. Say, what's a gating gun?" Hope looked perplexed for an instant, then laughed outright.

"Oh, you mean a Gatling gun!" She laughed, then very soberly: "It's a terrible weapon of war--a wicked thing. Why do you ask?"

"Oh, I just wanted to know," replied the boy evasively. "I heard some o'

the men talkin' about one, so I thought I'd ask you. Must shoot pretty fast, don't they? Long Bill was tellin' about one that fired two thousand shots a second."

"That must have been a terror of one!" exclaimed the girl. "But they don't shoot quite as many as that, not even in a minute, but they are bad enough. A few of them would simply perforate an army of men. They're a machine gun," she went on to explain. "Just a lot of barrels fastened in a bunch together and turned by a crank which feeds in the cartridges and fires them, too. They shoot over a thousand shots a minute."

"I wish we'd 'a' had one the other night," exclaimed Dave, waking at last to a new interest in life. "And I'd 'a' had hold of the crank!"

"Wasn't it bad enough!" remonstrated the girl. "Didn't you do enough damage to satisfy your savage soul for awhile?"

"Shorty Smith's got a game leg," returned the boy gleefully, "an' so's old Peter. Long Bill, he's got his hand all done up in a sling, too, an'

couldn't go back on the round-up!"

"I wonder how Bill done that," mused the other twin with a sweet, indrawn breath. Hope flushed scarlet, which faded instantly, leaving her face its rich, dark olive.

"Come on," she cried severely, "if we are to get any birds to-day!"

"I know where there's a coyote's den," said the soft-voiced twin. Dave was all attention immediately.

"Where?" he exclaimed eagerly. Hope, interested, too, leaned forward resting her arm upon the pommel of the saddle.

"Well," said the boy, deliberately, sweetly--too sweetly, thought the girl, who watched him keenly--"I was goin' to keep it to myself, an' get 'em all on the quiet, but it's in a kind of a bad place to get at, so mebbe I can't do it alone. It's 'bout a half mile back there, between here an' home, up on that ridge behind old Peter's shack. There's a hole under the side of the rocks, but it's hard diggin', kind of sandstone, I reckon. I left a pickax an' shovel up there."

"Let's go up there now," cried Dave, "an' get the whole bloomin' nest of 'em! We can get the chickens later."

"Now, look here," said the other quietly. "The find's mine. If you're in on this here deal, you'll have to work for your share. If you'll do the diggin' you can have half of the bounty on 'em. How's that?"

Dave grunted. "Supposin' there ain't any there," he demurred.

The soft-voiced twin shrugged his shoulders contemptuously.

"What'd you suppose _I'd_ be diggin' there for if there wasn't none?

There's a whole litter o' pups."

"Come on, then!" exclaimed Dave, convinced of his good fortune, for the bounty on coyotes was four dollars for each and every one.