The Girl from Keller's Part 4

The dealer frowned. He hated to think of a customer going to somebody else. In fact, this was, for a debtor, an unpardonable offense.

"Charnock's trouble is that he's not quite straight. Ought to have stayed with me, told me how he was fixed, and let me see what I could do. If he's going to deal with the new man, I'd better pull him up and try to get my money back."

"You can't get it," said Keller dryly. "He can't pay now, and if you let him go on until harvest, you'll have a crowd of others with long bills fighting for what's left."

"Looks like that," the dealer agreed. "Well, I'd have liked to keep him going if he'd stayed with me, but I can't stand for losing the dollars he owes. What are we going to do about the thing?"

Keller explained his plans, and after some argument the other agreed.

The decision they came to would bring Charnock's farming to an end, but Keller left the office with some doubts. His scheme was going to succeed, but he wondered whether he had indulged Sadie too far. Much depended on her firmness, and she might find the job harder than she thought; but on the whole he imagined she would be equal to the strain.

A week later, Charnock sat, one afternoon, in the saddle of his gang-plow, tearing a row of furrows through the dusty sod. The sweating horses moved leisurely, and he did not urge them as he moodily watched the tangled gra.s.s part before the shares and vanish beneath the polished surface of the turned-up clods. He was breaking new soil, doing work that would be paid for in the future, and knew the reward of his labor might never be his. When he reached the end of the plowing he stopped and let the horses rest while he looked about.

One side of the long furrows gleamed in the strong light, and another team was moving towards him from the opposite end. The sun was hot, but the wind was fresh, and thin clouds of dust blew across the plain. Still the belt he was plowing was good soil; the firm black _gumbo_ that holds the moisture the wheat plant needs. There was something exhilarating in the rushing breeze and glow of light, but Charnock frowned and wondered why he had worked so long. He had no real hope, and admitted that he had continued his spasmodic efforts because he could not face defeat.

For all that, he had not been fighting entirely for his farm. He wanted to keep his freedom; to break through trammels that were getting tighter, and try to regain something that he had lost. Sometimes he felt desperate, but now and then saw an elusive ray of hope. If he could hold out until harvest and reap a record crop----

Then his hired man, driving the other plow, waved his arm, and Charnock saw a rig lurch across a rise amidst a cloud of sand. It was the mail-carrier going his round, but he would not have come that way unless he had letters, and Charnock waited until the man arrived.

"Here's your lot," he said, taking out three or four envelopes.

Charnock's hand shook as he opened the first, it was large and had an official look, and he found a number of unpaid accounts inside. Besides these, there was a lawyer's letter, stating that certain dealers had instructed him to recover payment of the debts Charnock owed. He crushed the letter in his clenched hand and the veins stood out on his forehead, while his face got red. The blow he feared had fallen and he was ruined; but when the shock began to pa.s.s he felt a faint relief. It was something to be free from doubt and anxiety, and there were consolations. Now he was beaten, the line he must take was plain, and it had some advantages.

"You can quit plowing and put the teams in the stable," he said to the hired man.

"Quit now!" exclaimed the other. "What about the machines?"

"Let them stop," said Charnock. "It seems they belong to my creditors, who can look after them. I'm going to Concord and don't know when I'll be back."

He went off towards the homestead and half an hour later drove away across the plain.

CHAPTER IV

FESTING COMMITS THEFT

The air was sharp and wonderfully invigorating when Festing stopped for a few moments, one evening, outside Charnock's homestead. A row of sandhills glimmered faintly against the blue haze in the east, but the western edge of the plain ran in a hard black line beneath a blaze of smoky red. It was not dark, but the house was shadowy, and Festing noticed a smell of burning as he entered.

The top was off the stove in Charnock's room, and the flame that licked about the hole showed that the floor was strewn with torn paper.

Charnock was busy picking up the pieces, and when he threw a handful into the stove a blaze streamed out and the light shone upon the wall.

Festing noted that the portrait that had hung there had gone, and looking round in search of it, saw a piece of the broken frame lying on the stove. It was half burned and a thin streak of smoke rose from its glowing end. Festing remarked this with a sense of anger.

"What are you doing, Bob?" he asked.

"Cleaning up," Charnock answered, with a hoa.r.s.e laugh, as he sat down among the litter. "Proper thing when you mean to make a fresh start!

Suppose you take a drink and help."

A whisky bottle and a gla.s.s stood on the table, and Festing thought Charnock had taken some liquor, although he was not drunk. Stooping down, he began to pick up the papers, which, for the most part, looked like bills. There were, however, a few letters in a woman's hand, and by and by he found a bit of riband, a glove, and a locket that seemed to have been trampled on.

"Are these to be burned?" he asked.

"Yes," said Charnock. "Don't want them about to remind me----Burn the lot."

Festing, with some reluctance, threw them into the stove. He was not, as a rule, romantic, but it jarred him to see the things destroyed. They had, no doubt, once been valued for the giver's sake; dainty hands had touched them; the locket had rested on somebody's white skin. They were pledges of trust and affection, and he had found them, trampled by Charnock's heavy boots, among the dust and rubbish.

"You'd get on faster if you used a brush," he suggested.

"Can't find the brush. Confounded thing's hidden itself somewhere. Can't remember where I put anything to-night. Suppose you don't see a small lace handkerchief about?"

Festing said he did not, and Charnock made a gesture of resignation.

"Looks as if I'd burned it with the other truck, but I got that from Sadie, and there'll be trouble if she wants to know where it's gone. She may want to know some time. Sadie doesn't forget."

"Did Sadie give you the locket?"

"She did not," said Charnock. "You're a tactless brute. But there's something else I want, and I don't know where it can have got."

He upset a chair as he turned over some rubbish near the table, under which he presently crawled, while Festing looking about, noted a small white square laying half hidden by the stove. Picking it up, he saw it was the portrait of the English girl, and resolved with a thrill of indignation that Charnock should not burn this. He felt that its destruction would be something of an outrage.

He glanced at Charnock, but the latter's legs alone stuck out from under the table, and as it was obvious that he could not see, Festing dusted the portrait and put it in his pocket. By and by Charnock crept out and got upon his feet. It was dark now, but the glow of the burning paper flickered about the room and touched his face. His hair was ruffled, his eyes were dull, and his mouth had a slack droop. Festing felt some pity for the man, though he was also sensible of scornful impatience. The smell of burned paper disturbed him with its hint of vanished romance.

Putting the lid on the stove, he took the lamp from Charnock's unsteady hand, and, when he had lighted it, found a brush and set to work.

Presently Charnock made a vague sign of relief as he looked at the swept floor.

"All gone!" he remarked. "There was something I couldn't find. Suppose I burned it, though I don't remember."

"There's nothing left," said Festing, who felt guilty. "Why did you destroy the things?"

Charnock sat down and awkwardly lighted his pipe. "Wanted to begin again with what they call a clean slate. Besides, the stove's the best place for bills that bother you."

"You can't get rid of the debts by burning the bills."

"That's true," said Charnock with a grin. "Unfortunately obvious, in fact! However, I cut up my account book."

"I don't see how that would help."

"My creditors can now amuse themselves by finding out how I stand."

Festing frowned impatiently. "A rather childish trick! It doesn't strike me as humorous."

"You're a disgustingly serious fellow," Charnock rejoined. "But you might be a bit sympathetic, because I've had a nasty knock. My creditors have come down on me, and I'm going to be married."

Festing smiled. He had some sense of humor, and Charnock's manner seemed to indicate that he felt he was confronted with two misfortunes.

"You must have known your creditors would pull you up unless you came to terms with them, but one would expect you to please yourself about getting married."

"I'm not sure your joke's in good taste," Charnock answered sullenly.

"But in a way, one thing depended on the other. Perhaps I oughtn't to have said so, but I'm upset to-night. Though I did expect to be pulled up, it was a knock."

"No doubt. Are you going to marry Sadie?"