The High Calling Part 33

And in a direct, plain way, as she had always talked with her children, Esther told Helen what Bauer had told her.

When she finished, the girl was silent so long, that her mother began to fear again, that deadening fear she had experienced of late whenever she had come to realise the girl's infatuation for the luxurious life. But Esther was not prepared for the question Helen asked when she broke her long silence.

"How did you come to know all this, mother? How do you know it is true?"

It was Esther's turn to be silent. If she told Helen that her source of information was Bauer, the girl might reasonably put it down as due to the jealousy of a rival, and so question its reliability. As a matter of fact, at that very moment, Van Shaw's parting words were in Helen's memory, "Don't believe all the stories you may hear about me."

"Mr. Bauer told me," said Esther slowly. "He knew the facts. They are known to others at Burrton. His only motive was to save you the------"

"He might spare himself the trouble," said Helen, sharply. "I can't help thinking he is interfering in my affairs and especially in Mr. Van Shaw's."

"He certainly interfered in his affairs when he saved his life to-night," said Esther quietly, and the words smote Helen almost like a blow. For she realised for the first time that night that her sympathy and imagination had been exercised almost wholly for Van Shaw, broken and bruised in that awful fall over the cliff. "Saved his life!" Bauer had done that! After telling her mother the story she had just heard! It was a most wonderful thing to do, as Elijah Clifford had said in his narrative out there a little while ago. And yet, and yet, she heard herself saying to her mother the next moment:

"It seems strange that Mr. Bauer should tell you this. It doesn't seem possible. I can't believe it!"

At that, Esther could not suppress a heart cry so full of agony that Helen was terrified.

"Mother! mother!" was all she could say. But Esther quickly calmed herself.

"Helen, if this young man should be unworthy of you, could you give yourself to him simply because he had money to offer?"

"No, no, mother, I am not wicked like that. You must not think so. I could not help questioning Mr. Bauer's statements. He is not altogether------" she could not say the word "disinterested," and her mother said it for her.

"But he knows how hopeless his case is. He is not expecting to gain any favour by telling me what he knows. Can you not see it is simply to save you from making the most awful mistake a girl can make in all her life when she unknowingly marries such a man? Bauer never expects to be a successful suitor. I do not believe you have any true measure of his feeling for you. But he is willing to risk anything to spare you misery.

Cannot you see that? What other motive could he have? He is not a rival.

The poor fellow told me frankly that he had given up all hope for himself. It is pure friendship, and it is so rare and so beautiful a thing that you cannot afford to trample it down or disbelieve the story he told me. Helen, if you should let your admiration for money and its power take such a step as to encourage a man like Van Shaw, it would break your mother's heart. But worse than that, it would break your own.

Oh, you cannot, you will not do such a thing."

What could Helen say to that? And what less could Esther say to her? Let the careless mothers in America answer--the mothers who never talk frankly with their daughters about these things, and the careless daughters who never take their mothers into their confidence. How many unhappy marriages would never occur if mothers did their duty and daughters listened to and heeded the best friend they have on earth.

When Mrs. Douglas had finally fallen asleep, Helen still remained broad awake. Things had been said in the heart talk that made it impossible for her to compose herself to sleep. She could no longer doubt the truthfulness of Bauer or his clear motive, and strange tumult arose in her thought over the statement her mother had made about his abandonment of any thought of her as her suitor. The fact that he had expressed such a sentiment to her mother made Helen a little angry. Why should he give up all hope so easily--why--what was she thinking? She said to herself she did not want men to be cowards, but surely Felix Bauer was not a coward. A man who would go over a cliff like that did not deserve to have a timid girl like her call him a coward. Only------

And in the midst of all her other feelings she could not altogether shut out the sight of Van Shaw, broken and bruised as he had lain in agony there on the seat in the little chapel and she could not, even after all her mother had said, quite dismiss him from her thought. Her cheek glowed, as she raised the question in her imagination, of money and its fascinating power. Were all young men of wealth like Van Shaw? Would it never be possible for her to marry wealth and virtue together? And again there was that strange commingling of shame and exultation as she realised what a power she possessed to attract even such an one as Van Shaw, and try as hard as she would she did not drive out the scene of his declaration that morning. At any rate, it was genuine. Let him be what he had been, might she not awaken all the latent good in his nature and save him--her mother's ideas were very strict and serious. They were perhaps puritanical. But after all------

So she restlessly went back and forth in her argument and only fell asleep towards morning, her heart and mind wearied with the whole thing.

Before she fell asleep she resolved to have a talk with Miss Gray and make her tell what she knew. She said to herself she would at least not dismiss Van Shaw entirely until she knew even more than her mother had been able to tell her about him.

But before the opportunity came for Miss Gray's confidence, several unexpected events occurred that made Helen wonder if she were in a land of enchantment. After what had already become a part of her history in this strange land, she might be pardoned, if, with her highly romantic temperament, she felt excited to an unusual degree.

In the first place, Mr. Masters had word, that next morning after the snake dance, that he was needed imperatively at Tolchaco on account of the illness of Ansa, old Begwoettins' grandchild. This was Miss Gray's favourite, and she was eager to return to the mission with Mr. and Mrs.

Masters as soon as possible. Accordingly the fastest team and the lightest outfit were pressed into service and a short time after breakfast Mr. and Mrs. Masters and Miss Gray were ready to take the road by the Oraibi Wash, hoping to make Tolchaco by the next afternoon.

Elijah Clifford wanted to go but it seemed necessary for him to remain with Mr. and Mrs. Douglas and help pack up for the return trip. Besides, two of the chuck wagon teams had broken their hobbles in the night and wandered off into the "indefinite nowhere," as Clifford said, and until they were found and brought back, it was impossible for the rest of the party to hitch in and leave Oraibi.

As if Providence had come to the special help of Walter, just before Masters had finished his preparations to leave, the Navajo runner who had brought word of Ansa's illness went silently to Walter and handed him a letter that had reached Tolchaco post office the day the runner started. It had a special delivery stamp on it to indicate the desire of the sender for haste, and after reading, Walter rushed over to his father who was helping Masters. .h.i.tch up the traces.

"Listen to this, father!" he said in great excitement, while Mrs.

Masters and Miss Gray were getting into the wagon and saying good-bye to Mrs. Douglas and Helen. "Anderson writes that Blake, the a.s.sistant foreman, is sick, and if I can come on and help him work over the installation of those new Reimark dynamos before term opens, he can promise me a good place as second a.s.sistant in the coil room this winter. I know more about the Reimark than Anderson himself and it will be a fine chance for me. He says I can have full pay for summer term work. I shall have to start back to Burrton by the first, anyway, and if Mr. Masters can take me along now, I can get over to Canyon Diablo or Winslow in time to make the California express and get into Burrton next week."

Masters gave a quick consent.

"We can take four as well as three. Come on."

Walter rushed his few camp things into his suit case, stowed it under the seat, kissed his mother and Helen, shook hands with Bauer, who was able to sit up on his cot in the near by tent, and climbed into the wagon by the side of Mr. Masters.

Elijah Clifford was not present when all this occurred, and when he came into camp two hours later trailing the fugitive horses after him, Masters's wagon was a black speck down by the Oraibi Wash.

Bauer told him of Walter's unexpected return to Tolchaco with Mr.

Masters and Miss Gray.

"Yes, I told you," said Clifford. And for a moment Bauer thought he could detect a note of pensive regret in his words. "I told you Walter was lost. It's wonderful what providences there are for some people.

That professor in that school couldn't have figured on getting that letter here at a more real serviceable opportunity for Walter, if he had been a real first cla.s.s magician. And did you say there was a special delivery stamp on the letter? That beats everything worse than nothing.

That's the first time, I reckon, in five hundred years that a special delivery stamp was ever used on a Tolchaco letter. And just think of the way things cogged into the right openings to get that letter there by special messenger. Well, well, I wouldn't mind being in Walter's place myself if I didn't feel so necessary here. But Mr. Douglas can't drive these mustangs back to Tolchaco."

He winked at Bauer good naturedly and hastened to inquire into his condition.

"I'm black and blue," said Bauer, "but otherwise, sehr gut. This is a miraculous climate. My hemorrhage is slight, and I don't believe it will recur. I have no symptoms. I don't want you to delay the return on my account." Then he added after a pause, "How is Van Shaw?"

"That fellow," said Elijah, "has missed breaking his neck by a miracle.

His collar bone was fractured clear up to the last bone in his spinal column. Both of his legs were broken below the knee. He must have struck right on his toes when he fell, and doubled up on himself. He can't move out of here for some while. But I understand his mother has sent a wire from Winslow for Mr. Van Shaw to come on from Pittsburgh. She is pretty well upset by the whole business. She tried to thank me for saving her son's life and I think she was too hysterical and excited to understand me when I told her you were the party. She hinted that her husband would probably deed a railroad or two to me for saving her precious son's life. If they send the railroad out here I'll turn it over to you. I don't want it."

"But you did save him," said Bauer with some feeling.

"Well, no, I reckon I just preserved him. You had him saved, and I just took what you handed over and pa.s.sed it up. But, what were you doing out there on the edge of that rock last night, anyhow? I forgot to ask when I was down there on the ledge and never thought of it again until just now."

Bauer was spared the embarra.s.sment of trying to satisfy Clifford's good natured curiosity by the arrival into the tent of Mrs. Douglas, accompanied by the tourist doctor who had offered his services to both Bauer and Van Shaw and had fortunately had enough of his repair kit with him to do all that could be done outside of a well appointed hospital.

He p.r.o.nounced Bauer to be in good condition and antic.i.p.ated no recurrence of the flow for him if he were careful. Van Shaw was in a more serious case. He was suffering from a nervous shock and would have to stay where he was for some time. A room had been hired in a small stone house belonging to the government farmer, and Van Shaw was as comfortable as he could be under the circ.u.mstances. But he was delirious a part of the time and the doctor evidently believed his condition to be serious, if not critical.

Helen received the news of all this from her mother when she came back from Bauer's tent. She was much shocked at the account Mrs. Douglas gave. And again, as during the night, she found herself dwelling more over Van Shaw's suffering than Bauer's heroism.

The doctor advised two days' rest for Bauer before starting back to Tolchaco, so Clifford delayed the preparations for their start and during that time Talavenka came to see Helen, and Helen, with her accustomed enthusiasm, suggested to her in Esther's presence, a plan for going east and completing her education.

Talavenka listened with perfect equanimity to Helen's glowing account of the opportunities for education in the girls' school at Milton. Then she said with more than a quiet manner,--it was a poise of all the faculties, that a white person seldom possesses:

"You are kind, but I ought to stay here with my mother for awhile. She needs me."

"But would she not be willing to have you go away for a little while just to gain more power for your people? Mother, would you be willing to have Talavenka stay with us this winter?"

"I have already talked with your father and Mr. and Mrs. Masters about Talavenka and we are ready to take her into our home and treat her like one of our own circle," said Esther, who was chairman of the missionary committee in her church and a great enthusiast in all forms of missionary work.

Talavenka turned her black eyes to Mrs. Douglas. Her face shone. The light of her Christian faith illuminated her countenance like a gleam of sunshine. It was so marked that both Mrs. Douglas and Helen were startled by it.

"I do not know how to thank you. But my mother needs me this winter. I must stay with her."

She said it so gently, with such a complete sense of joyousness and an absence of all thought of renunciation, that Helen was profoundly moved.

There was no possibility of changing her mind or insisting. There was something about Talavenka's simple statement that was distinctly final.

When the girl rose to go, Helen noticed the reddish brown water jar that Talavenka had dropped by the tent opening when she had entered.