The Last Straw Part 11

"But you're not going to, not to-day. I'm giving you that order,"--with resolution. "I wouldn't want you to be hurt, ma'am. I--"

He checked himself, realizing that he had become very earnest and that she was looking straight into his eyes, reading the concern that was there.

There was talk of that ride in the bunkhouse when the men came in.

Jimmy Oliver had seen from a distance and asked Beck for the story. He related the incident rather lightly and ended:

"Tried to keep her off him, but only got orders to take orders. If she breaks her neck tryin' some such tricks, I wouldn't be surprised."

"She appears to have sand, though," Oliver commented, as though he were making a concession.

Others had opinions to pa.s.s, briefly, to the point. Those men were not given to accepting readily a stranger and this stranger, being a woman, came to them under an added handicap. Where a man, inept and showing the same courage, might have found himself quietly accepted, Jane's attempt at riding was not received with noticeable warmth. The performance was in her favor, and that was about all that could be said.

A close observer might have noticed that Tom Beck gave attention whenever another spoke of their new boss, as though deeply interested in what the men had to say. Yet when he spoke of her, his manner was rather disparaging.

Mail had come in that afternoon and, a happening without precedent, there were two letters for Two-Bits. The man, who could not write and whose reading was limited to brands, never received mail and before he arrived there was speculation as to the writer of the one letter. Of the other there was no mystery because each man of the outfit had received a similar envelope containing a circular letter from a boot manufacturer.

Two-Bits arrived late, riding slowly toward the corral with his eyes on the ranch house for a possible look at his fair employer.

"Mail for you, Two-Bits," Curtis remarked casually as he entered.

The others concealed their interest while Beck handed the letters to Two-Bits, who stood eyeing them gravely, striving to cover his surprise. This could not be done, though, for his agitated Adam's apple gave him away as he stood with a letter in each hand, looking from one to the other.

"I'll bet two-bits somebody's dead," he said with concern, then walked to the window under a growing sense of importance at his deluge of correspondence.

He opened the letter which they knew contained the solicitation of the maker of boots and all watched him as he stood scowling at it for minutes. He folded the sheet with a sigh and stuffed it, with the other letter, into his _chap_ pocket and walked thoughtfully to his bunk, sitting down heavily, elbows on his knees. He shook his head sorrowfully and made a depreciatory clicking with his tongue.

"Boys, I always knowed that girl'd turn out a bad one! It's awful....

An' her mother a lady!"

For a moment their restraint held and then their laughter cut loose with a roar. Curtis fell face down on his bunk and laughed until his entire length shook. Jimmy Oliver gasped for breath, hands across his stomach, and the others reeled about the floor or leaned against the walls, weak with mirth.

"It ain't nothin' to laugh at!" Two-Bits protested, but when he failed to convince them of the gravity he shammed, he rose and permitted an abashed grin to distort his freckled face, muttered something about feeding his horse and walked out.

It was Sat.u.r.day evening in a season of light work and the social diversions of Ute Crossing had called HC riders. Hepburn departed early and after their horses had eaten Beck and Two-Bits rode out of the ranch townward bound. Out of sight of the building Two-Bits said:

"Tom, my eyes ain't very good. I'd like to get you to read this here other letter for me."

Beck knew that such confidence was high compliment for Two-Bits was sensitive over his educational shortcomings, so he took the letter and, after glancing down the single page, said:

"This is from the Reverend Azariah Beal."

"Oh, my gosh! That's my brother! What's the matter with him, Tom?"

The other read as follows:

My dear Brother:--G.o.d willing, I shall visit you. I have often been impelled to renew our fraternal relationships but my various charges have demanded my sole attention. Now, however, I am on a brief sojourn in the marts of trade and my interests call me in your direction. I expect to arrive shortly after you receive this. May the Almighty guard and bless thee and keep thee safe until our hands meet in the clasp of brotherly love.

"Oh, my gosh!" cried Two-Bits again, Adam's apple leaping and his gray eyes, usually so mild, alight with enthusiasm. "He's comin' to visit me. Gosh, Tom, but he's a smart man! Ain't that elegant language? Say, he's the smartest man in our family an' he's comin' clean from Texas to see me."

"How long since you've seen him?"

"Oh, quite a while. Since I was three years old."

"And how long ago was that?"

"You got me. I heard about him. He's a preacher. My, oh my, but _she_'ll like him. He's smart, like she is."

His manner was high elation and he spoke breathlessly, and while they trotted on he chattered in his high voice, eulogizing the virtues of this brother he had not seen since infancy, regaling the other with long and vague tales of his accomplishments. Pressed for details he could not offer them because his knowledge of the relative had come to him verbally through the devious channels of the cattle country, but this did not shake his conviction that the Reverend Beal was peerless.

Tom's mind was not on the extravagant talk of Two-Bits. Curiously, it persisted in thinking of Jane Hunter.

Two days before he had thought this girl from the east was a rattle-brained piece of inconsequence with her selection of a foreman by the drawing of straws. Now he was not so sure that she did not possess at least several admirable qualities. He had offended her, gently bullied her, only last evening; he had sensed the waning of her own feeling of superiority, had understood that, behind her pique, she took to heart the things he had said, things which he had said not because he thought she should know them but because he wanted to see how she would react to blunt truths.

She wanted something very badly. Not money; that had been a means.

Perhaps it was that vague thing, Herself, of which he had spoken. He did not understand, but he liked her determination.... And what was this other stranger, this man, to her?

He put his horse into a lope with a queer misgiving. He was taking this woman seriously! He was saying slighting things about her and yet hoping that other men would speak about her highly! He had never taken many things--particularly women--seriously before and his experience with women had not been meager. It frightened him....

They dismounted before the saloon which adjoined the hotel, eased their cinches and approached the doorway.

In the shadow of the next building two men were talking and Beck eyed the figures closely. One, he knew, was Hepburn, and the other, from the intonation of his cautiously lowered voice, he took to be Pat Webb, the rancher of whom he had spoken to Jane Hunter, telling her that his presence in the country was not an a.s.set for her.

He went inside, rather absorbed. Sam McKee was there, one of Webb's riders, the one on whom Beck had inflicted terrible punishment for cruelty to a horse. McKee looked away, a nasty light playing across his gray eyes, but Beck did not even give him a glance. What was Hepburn doing in close talk with Webb? he asked himself. For years Webb had been under suspicion as a thief and a friend of the lawless. Colonel Hunter had never trusted him, and now the foreman of the HC was talking with him, secretly....

A moment later Hepburn entered and lounged up to the bar and shortly afterwards Webb came in. He was a small man with sharp features and bright, b.u.t.ton-like eyes which roved restlessly. His skin was mottled, his lips hard and cruel; his body seemed to be all nerves for he was in constant motion.

Webb ordered a drink and glanced about, eyeing Beck and Two-Bits with a suggestive smile. He drank with a swagger and wiped his lips with a sharp smack, still smiling as though some unpleasant thought amused him.

A man at the far end of the bar moved closer to Hepburn.

"How's the new boss?" he said with a grin, and Hepburn said, in his benevolent manner, that he believed she would do very well.

Others, interested, came closer and more questions followed. Then Webb broke in:

"I shouldn't think that you HC waddies 'uld be in town nights any more,"--his glittering eyes on them rather jubilantly.

The talk stopped, for Webb, unsavory as to reputation, was still a figure in the country and his manner as he spoke was laden with significance.

"How's that, Webb?" Hepburn asked.

"How's that!" the other mocked. "I've seen her, ain't that enough?

There's only two reasons why men want to come to this hole nights; one's booze, an' th' other's women. You can carry your booze out home an'--"

He went on with his blackguard inference and when he had ended a laugh went up, a ribald, obscene, barroom laugh. It had reached its height when Tom Beck, whose eyes had been on Hepburn as Webb gave voice to his insult, elbowed the foreman from his way and faced the one who had occasioned that laugh.