The Price of the Prairie Part 36

But the query, "Where's Phil, now?" was going the rounds, and the answers were many. My doings had not been reported in the town, and gossip still was active concerning me.

"Up at Topeka," "Gone to St. Louis," "Back in Ma.s.sachusetts." These were followed by Dave Mead's declaration:

"The best boy that ever went out of Springvale. Just his father over again. He'll make some place prouder than it would have been without him."

n.o.body knew who started the story just then, but it grew rapidly from Tillhurst's side of the table that I had gone to Rockport, Ma.s.sachusetts, to settle in my father's old home-town.

"Stands to reason a boy who can live in Kansas would go back to Ma.s.sachusetts, doesn't it?" Dr. John declared scornfully.

"But Phil's to be married soon, to that stylish Miss Melrose. She's got the money, and Phil would become a fortune. Besides, she was perfectly infatuated with him."

"Well," somebody else a.s.serted, "if he does marry her, he can bring her back here to live. My! but Judge Baronet's home will be a grand place to go to then. It was always good enough."

Amid all this clatter Marjie was as indifferent and self-possessed as if my name were a stranger's. Those who had always known her did not dream of what lay back of that sweet girl-face. She was the belle of Springvale, and she had too many admirers for any suspicion of the truth to find a place.

While the story ran on Bud turned to her and said in a low voice, "Marjie, I'm going to Phil. He needth me now."

n.o.body except Bud noticed how white the girl was, as the company rising from the table swept her away from him.

That night Dr. Hemingway's prayer was fervent with love. The boys were always on his heart, and he called us all by name. He prayed for the young men of Springvale, who had grown up to the life here and on whom the cares of citizenship, and the town's good name were soon to rest; and for the young men who would not be with us again: for Tell Mapleson, that the snares of a great city like St. Louis might not entrap him; for James Conlow, whose lines had led him away from us; for David Mead, going soon to the far-away lands where the Sierras dip down the golden slope to the Pacific seas; for August Anderson, also about to go away from us, that life and health might be his; and last of all for Philip Baronet. A deeper hush fell upon the company bowed in prayer.

"For Philip Baronet, the strong, manly boy whom we all love, the brave-hearted hero who has gone out from among us, and as his father did before him for the homes of a nation, so now the son has gone to fight the battles of the prairie domain, and to build up a wall of safety before the homes and hearthstones of our frontier." And then he offered thanksgiving to a merciful Father that, "in the awful conflict which Philip, with a little handful of heroes, has helped to wage against the savage red man, a struggle in which so many lives have gone out, our Philip has been spared." His voice broke here, and he controlled it by an effort, as in calm, low tones he finished his simple prayer with the earnest pet.i.tion, "Keep Thou these our boys; and though they may walk through the valley of the shadow of death, may they fear no evil, for Thou art with them. Amen."

It was the first intimation the town had had of what I was doing.

Springvale was not without a regard for me who had loved it always, and then the thought of danger to a fellow citizen is not without its appeal. I have been told that Judge Baronet and Aunt Candace could not get down the aisle after service until after ten o'clock that night and that the tears of men as well as women fell fast as my father gave the words of the message sent to him by Governor Crawford on the evening before. Even Chris Mead, always a quiet, stern man, sat with head bowed on the railing of the pew before him during the recital. It was noted afterwards that Judson did not remain, but took Lettie Conlow home as soon as the doxology was ended. The next day my stock in Springvale was at a premium; for a genuine love, beside which fame and popularity are ashes and dust, was in the heart of that plain, good little Kansas town.

Bud called to say good-bye to Marjie, before he left home.

"Are you going out West to stay?" Marjie asked.

"I'm going to try it out there. Clate'th got all the law here a young man can get; he'th gobbled up Dave and Phil'th share of the thing. John will be the coming M. D. of the town, and Bill Mead already taketh to the bank like a duck to water. I'm going to try the Wetht. What word may I take to Phil for you?"

"There's nothing to say," Marjie answered.

To his words, "I hoped there might be," she only said gayly, "Good-bye, Bud. Be a good boy, and be sure not to forget Springvale, for we'll always love your memory."

And so he left her. He was a good boy, nor did he forget the town where his memory is green still in the hearts of all who knew him. His last thought was of Springvale, and he babbled of the Neosho, and fancied himself in the shallows down by the Deep Hole. He clung to me, as in his childhood, and begged me to carry him on my shoulders when waters of Death were rolling over him. I held his hand to the last, and when the silence fell, I stretched myself on the brown curly mesquite beside him and thanked G.o.d that He had let me know this boy. Ever more my life will be richer for the remembrance it holds of him.

Bud left Springvale in one of those dripping, chilly, wet days our Kansas Octobers sometimes mix in with their opal-hued hours of Indian summer. That evening Tell Mapleson dropped into Judson's store and O'mie was let off early.

The little Irishman ran up the street at once to the Whately home. Mrs.

Whately had retired. Eight o'clock was bed time for middle-aged people in our town. Marjie sat alone by the fire. How many times that summer we had talked of the long winter evenings we should spend together by that fireplace in Marjie's cosy sitting-room. And now she was beside the hearth, and I was far away. I might have been forgiven without a word had I walked in that evening and found her, as O'mie did, alone with her sad thoughts. Marjie never tried to hide anything from O'mie. She knew he could see through any pretence of hers. She knew, too, that he would keep sacred anything he saw.

"Marjie, I'm lonesome to-night."

Marjie gave him a seat beside the fire.

"What makes you lonesome, O'mie?" she asked gravely.

"The wrongs av the world bear heavily upon me."

Marjory looked at him curiously to see if he was joking.

"What I need to do is to shrive myself, I guess, and then get up an inquisition, with myself as chief inquisitor."

Marjie, studying the pictures in the burning coals, said nothing. O'mie also sat silent for a time.

"Marjie," he said at length, "when you see things goin' all wrong end to, and you know what's behind 'em, drivin' 'em wrong, what's your rale Presbyterian duty then? Let 'em go? or tend to somethin' else besides your own business? Honest, now, what's what?"

"I don't know what you're up to, O'mie." She was looking dreamily into the grate, the firelight on her young face and thoughtful brown eyes making a picture tenderly sweet and fair. In her mind was the image of Judge Baronet as he looked the night before, when he lifted his head after Dr. Hemingway's prayer for his son. And then maybe a picture of the graceless son himself came unbidden, and his eyes were full of love as when they looked down into hers on the day Rachel Melrose came into Judge Baronet's office demanding his attention. "What's the matter, O'mie? Is Uncle Cam being imposed on? You'd never stand that, I know."

"No, little girl, Cambridge Gentry can still take care of Cam's interest and do a kind act to more folks off-hand better than any other man I know. Marjie, it's Phil Baronet."

Marjie gave a start, but she made no effort to hide her interest.

"Little girl, he's been wronged, and lied about, and misunderstood, by a crowd av us who have knowed him day in and day out since he was a little boy. Marjory Whately, did anybody iver catch him in a lie? Did he iver turn coward in a place where courage was needed? Did he iver do a cruelty to a helpless thing, or fight a smaller boy? Did he iver decaive? Honestly, now, was there iver anything in all the years we run together that wasn't square and clane and fearless and lovin'?"

Marjie sat with bowed head before the flickering fire. When O'mie spoke again his voice was husky.

"Little girl, when I was tied hand and foot, and left to die in that dark Hermit's Cave, it was Phil Baronet who brought in the sunlight and a face radiant with love. When Jean Pahusca, drunk as a fury, was after you out on the prairie with that cruel knife ready, the knife I've seen him kill many a helpless thing with when he was drunk, when this Jean was ridin' like a fiend after you, Phil turned to me that day and his white agonized face I'll never forget. Now, Marjie, it's to right his wrong, and the wrongs of some he loves that I'm studyin' about. The week Phil came home from the rally I took a vacation. Shall I tell you why?"

Marjie nodded.

"Well, Star-face, it was laid on me conscience heavy to pay a part av the debt I owe to the boy who saved me life. I ain't got eyes fur nothin', and I see the clouds gatherin' black about that boy's head.

Back of 'em was jealousy, that was a girl; hate, that was a man whose cruel, ugly deeds Phil had knocked down and trampled on and prevented from comin' to a harvest of sufferin'; and revenge, that was a rebel-hearted scoundrel who'd have destroyed this town but for Phil; and last, a selfish, money-lovin' son of a horse-thief who was grabbing for riches and pulling hard at the covers to hide some sins he'd never want to come to the light, being a deacon in the Presbyterian Church. All thim in one cloud makes a hurricane, and with 'em comes a shallow, selfish, pretty girl. Oh, it was a sight, Marjie. If I can do somethin'

to keep shipwreck not only from them the storm's aimed at, but them that's pilin' up trouble fur themselves, too, I'm goin' to do it."

Marjie made no reply.

"So I took a vacation and wint off on a visit to me rich relatives in Westport."

Marjie could not help smiling now. O'mie had not a soul to call his next of kin.

"Oh, yis, I wint," he continued, "on tin days' holiday. The actual start to it was on the evenin' Phil got home from Topeka. The night of the party at Anderson's Lettie Conlow comes into the store just at closin'.

I was behind a pile of ginghams fixin' some papers and cord below the counter. And Judson, being a fool by inheritance and choice of profession, takes no more notice of me than if I was a dog; says things he oughtn't to when he knows I'm 'round. But he forgits me in the pride of his stuck-uppityness. And I heard Judson say to her low, 'Now be sure to go right after dark and look in there again. You're sure you know just which crevice of the rock it is?' Lettie laughed and said, she'd watched it too long not to know. And so they arranged it, and I arranged my wrappin'-cord, and when I straightened up (I'm little, ye know), they didn't see my rid head by the pile of ginghams; and so she went away.

When I got ready I wint, too. I trailed round after dark until I found meself under that point av rock by the bushes in the steep bend up-street. I was in a little corner full of crevices, when along comes Lettie. She seemed to be tryin' to get somethin' out of 'em, and her short fat arm couldn't reach it. Blamed inconvanient bein' little and short! She tried and tried and thin she said some ugly words only a boy has a right to say when he's cussin' somethin'. Just thin somethin' made a noise between her and the steps, and she made a rush for 'em and was gone. My eyes was gettin' catty and used to the dark now, and I could make out pretty sure it was Phil who sails up nixt, aisy, like he knowed the premises, and in his hand goes and he got out somethin' sayin' to himself--and me:

"'Well, Marjie tucked it in good and safe. I didn't know that hole was so deep.'

"Marjie, maybe if that hole's too deep for Lettie to reach clear in, there might be somethin' she's missed. I dunno'. But niver moind. I took me vacation, went sailin' out with Dever fur a rale splurge to Kansas City. Across the Neosho Dever turns the stage aside, U. S. mail and all, and lands me siven miles up the river and ferries me on this side again.

Dever can keep the stillest of any livin' stage-driver whose business is to drive stage on the side and gossip on the main line. He never cheeped a chirp. I come back that same day and put in tin days studyin' things.

I just turned myself into a holy inquisition for tin mortial days. Now, what I know has a value to Phil's good name, who has been accused of doing more diviltry than the thief on the cross. Marjie, I'm goin' to proceed now and turn on screws till the heretics squeal. It's not exactly my business; but--well, yes, it's the Lord's business to right the wrongs, and we must do His work now and then, 'unworthy though we be,' as Grandpa Mead says, in prayer meetin'."

"O'mie, you heard Dr. Hemingway's prayer last night?" Marjie asked, in a voice that quivered with tears.

"Oh, good G.o.d! Marjie, the men that's fighting the battles on the frontier, the fire-guards around them prairie homes, they are the salt of the earth." He dropped his head between his hands and groaned.

Presently he rose to say good-night.

"Shall I do it, little sister? See to what's not my business at all, at all, and start a fire in this town big enough to light the skies clear to where Phil is this rainy night, and he can read a welcome home in it?"