Still Jim Part 22

"I am getting our meals right here," said Pen. "The steward said we could have them sent up from the mess, but it's less expensive and more fun to get them camp fashion here. The government store is a very good one and all the neighbors have called and have brought me everything from fresh baked bread to cans of jelly. They are so wonderfully kind to me!"

Sara was staring at Jim with an insolent sort of interest. He had full use of his arms, as was evident when he gave the great wheel chair a quick flip about so as to shade his eyes from the lamp. As Jim watched him all the resentment of the past eight years welled up within him with an added repugnance for Sara's fat helplessness and ugly temper that made it difficult for him to sit by the invalid's chair.

When Pen had finished her account Sara said, "You made rather a mess, didn't you, in handling the flood today?"

"You were splendid, Jimmy!" cried Pen. "I saw the whole thing!"

Jim shook his head. "It was expensive splendor!"

"You will find it difficult to explain your lack of preparation to an investigating committee, won't you?" asked Sara.

"If you can give a recipe for flood preparation," said Jim good naturedly, "you will have every dam builder in the world at your feet."

Sara grunted and changed the subject and his manner abruptly.

"Got any decent smoking tobacco, Still?"

"That is hard to find here," replied Jim. "It dries out fast and loses flavor. I've got some over at the house I brought back from the East.

I'll go over and get it now. Will you let Pen walk over with me? I'd like to have her see my house."

"Makes no difference to me what she does. Hand me that book, Pen, before you start."

Out under the stars Jim pulled Pen's hand within his arm and asked, "Pen, is he always like that?"

"Always," answered Pen. "Do you remember the 'Wood-carver of Olympus'?

How he was hurt like Sara and how he blasphemed G.o.d and was embittered for years? He was reconciled to his lot after a time and people loved him. I have so hoped for that change in poor Sara, but none has come."

"Pen!" cried Jim suddenly. "I gave you my sign and seal! Why did you marry Saradokis?"

Pen answered slowly, "Jim, why wouldn't you understand and take me West with you when I begged you to?"

"Understand what?" asked Jim, tensely.

"That Sara's hold on me was almost hypnotic, that it was you I really cared for, as I realized as soon as Sara was hurt. If only you had had the courage of your convictions, Still!"

Jim winced but found no reply and Pen went on, her voice meditative and soft as if she were talking not of herself but of some half-forgotten acquaintance.

"I used to feel resentful that Sara thought I was worth such constant attention, while you, in spite of the Sign and Seal, were quite as contented with Uncle Denny as with me. And yet, after it all was over and I had settled down to nursing Sara for the rest of my life, I could see that I had had nothing to give you then and Uncle Denny had. Life is so mercilessly logical--to look back on, Jimmy."

Jim put his hand over the cold little fingers on his arm. Pen went on.

"I did not try to write to you. I----"

But Jim could bear no more. "Pen! Pen! What a miserable fool I am!"

"You are nothing of the kind!" exclaimed Pen, indignantly "What do you think of the mess I've made of my life, if you think you are foolish?"

"What am I to do? How can I make it up to you?" cried Jim.

"By letting me stay in your desert for a time," answered Pen. "I know I'm going to love it."

They were at Jim's doorstep and he made no reply. As usual, words seemed futile to him. He showed Pen his house and found the tobacco, letting Mrs. Flynn do all the talking. Then, still in silence, he led Pen back to her tent. At the door he gave her the tobacco and left her.

Jim had a bad night. He stayed in bed until midnight; then to get away from his own thoughts he dressed and went out to the dam. The water had reached its height. There was nothing to be done save wait until Old Jezebel grew weary of mischief. But Jim tramped up and down the great road between the dam and the lower town all night.

His mind swung from Pen to the Hearing and from the Hearing to the flood, then back to Pen again. From Pen his thoughts went to his father and with his father he paused for a long time.

Was the evil destiny that had made his father fail to follow him, too?

Jim had always believed himself stronger than his father, somehow better fitted to cope with destiny. Yet ever since his trouble with Freet on the Makon there had been growing in Jim a vague distrust of his own powers. He could build the dams, yes, if "they" would leave him free to do so. If "they" would not fret and hound him until his efficiency was gone. It was the very subtlety and intangibility of "they" that made him uneasy, made him less sure of himself and his own ability.

He had planned, after he had finished his work, to turn his attention to solving the problems of old Exham. How was he to do this if he was not big enough to cope with his own circ.u.mstance? And was he going to miss the continuation of the Manning line because he had failed to grasp opportunity in love as in everything else?

Dawn found Jim watching the Elephant grow bronze against the sky. The Elephant had a very real personality to Jim as it had to everyone else in the valley.

"What is to be, is to be, eh, old friend?" said Jim. "But why? Tell me why?"

The sun rolled up and the Elephant changed from bronze to gold. Jim sighed and went up to his house.

All that day crowds of workmen on the banks watched Old Jezebel romp over their working place and they swore large and vivid oaths regarding what they would do to her once they got to balking her again. It was about noon that a buckboard drawn by two good horses stopped at the foot of the cable tower. The driver called to Iron Skull Williams, who was chewing a toothpick and chatting to Pen. Williams led Pen up to the buckboard.

"Like to introduce Oscar Ames, one of our old-time irrigation farmers,"

said Iron Skull. "And this is Mrs. Ames, his boss. And this lady is a friend of the Big Boss--Mrs. Saradokis."

Pen held out her hand and the two women looked at each other in the quick appraising way of women. Mrs. Ames was perhaps fifty years old.

She was small and thin and brown, with thin gray hair under her dusty hat and a thin throat showing under her linen duster. Her face was heavily lined. Her eyes were wonderful; a clear blue with the far-seeing gaze of eyes that have looked long on the endless distances of the desert. Yet, perhaps, the look was not due altogether to the desert, for young as she was, Pen's eyes had the same expression.

"I am glad to know you," said Penelope.

"Thank you," said Mrs. Ames, bashfully.

Oscar Ames shook hands heartily. He was a big man of fifty, with hair and skin one shade of ruddy tan.

"Glad to meet you, ma'am. Say, Iron Skull, how'd you come to let the water beat you to it? This adds another big cost to us farmers' bill."

Williams grunted. "Wish you folk had been up on the Makon. That's where we had real floods. Ames, we are doing our limit. Ain't you old enough yet to know that a lift under the arm carries a fellow twice as far as a kick in the pants? Here's the Boss now. Light on _him_! Poor old scout!"

Jim was on horseback. He rode slowly up and dismounted. "How are you, Ames? And Mrs. Ames? Have you met Mrs. Saradokis? Ames, before you begin to chant my funeral march let me ask you if you don't want to sell that south forty you say I'm not irrigating right. Mr. Saradokis represents some Eastern interests. Perhaps you'd like to meet him."

Oscar grinned a little sheepishly. "Business before pleasure! I'll go right up to see him now."

"Then you must come up with me," said Penelope to Mrs. Ames, and the two women followed after Jim and Oscar.

The climb was short but stiff. Pen had not yet become accustomed to the five thousand feet of elevation at which the officers' camp was set, so she had no breath for conversation until they reached the tent house.

Sara lay in his invalid chair before the open door, maps, tobacco and magazines scattered over the swing table that covered his lap. Pen, as if to ward off any rudeness, began to explain as she mounted the steps:

"Here is a gentleman who has land for sale, Sara." Sara's scowl disappeared. He gave the Ames family such a pleasant welcome that Jim was puzzled. Ames and Jim dropped down on the doorstep while Mrs. Ames and Pen took the hammock chairs.

"Have you people been long in this country?" asked Pen.

"Thirty years this coming fall," replied Ames, taking the cigar Sara offered him and smelling it critically. "I was a kid of 21 when I took up my section down on the old ca.n.a.l. I couldn't have sold that land for two bits an acre a year after I took it up. I refused two hundred dollars an acre for the alfalfa land the other day."