The Ranch Girls and Their Heart's Desire Part 8

Many times she has told me how deeply she appreciated that fact that you and Frieda shared alike with her the output of the Rainbow mine when she was only your cousin and with no legal right to your inheritance. Having lost Jean's money, although she gave me her consent, even urged me to the investment, she has lost faith in me. What is more serious, I am even beginning to have less faith in myself. Yet I don't know why I am telling you all this, Jack, I had not intended to do more than say good-by. What hurts worse is that Jean does not care for me any more; I wonder now if she ever did care as I did. You know how important she has always counted wealth and position and I believed once I could give them to her, but lately I have failed and so Jean is disappointed. Funny thing marriage, Jack!"

"Funny thing life, Ralph, one is just a part of the whole! I think you are mistaken about Jean, but I have no right to express an opinion. Only if you do consider it wiser to fight it out alone, don't worry over Jean and the little girls. Jim would look after them even if I were not here.

Queer that Jim, who came to us first as a cowboy and then the manager of the Rainbow ranch, should have been even kinder than an own father! Not that I think of Jim as so much older than I am! However, 111 stand by Jean through whatever comes, Ralph! And after a time, even if she is disappointed and hurt for the present, she is sure to change. I wish I dared to tell her the mistake she is making, only I don't dare. In any case, I'll do my best."

Ralph Merritt held out his hand.

"Shake hands, Jack, and let us say good-by. But before I leave you I want to say to you something else, something which may surprise you. I believe you came back to this country for some good purpose, Jacqueline Kent, some purpose none of us recognizes at present and you least of all. But if the day should come when you feel that some work calls you, don't be afraid to undertake it. Life has a queer fashion of preparing people for what she wishes them to accomplish, without their knowing."

Jack smiled.

"I wonder what there can be ahead for me, Ralph? Yet some day I must find something, as I shall never marry again. Life on the old ranch is restful and charming, yet I suppose it won't continue to be enough. So let us wish each other good luck here in the shadow of the old mine where we discovered the 'Pot of Gold.' There must be other kinds of gold at the end of other rainbows."

CHAPTER IX

A YEAR LATER

"It is harder to endure, Jack, because so much my own fault, all my life I must feel in a measure responsible, and I cannot feel hopeful as you insist you do, perhaps for that very reason. However, we must not talk too much of this now, to-morrow will be time enough. You must keep all the strength and self-control you possess for to-night."

It was more than a year later, and Jean Merritt and Jacqueline Ralston were in Jean's beautiful bedroom in the big house on the Rainbow ranch.

Jean was sitting on a low couch with her hands clasped tightly together, while Jack was moving restlessly up and down the large, fragrant room.

"But I can't make a speech to-night, Jean, not after the bewildering news we have just received, although I will not believe it to be final.

Why did I ever think I could? Yet surely there is a sufficient reason now for me to be excused!"

"Sit down for a few moments please, Jack," Jean answered with such an evidence of self-control and of unselfishness that her companion suffered a swift emotion of shame and compunction.

"Now there isn't any question but you must go on to-night with what you intended doing. Remember we all have decided that, for the time at least, it will be wiser to keep secret the information we have just received. Therefore you cannot make this your excuse for failing to speak as you planned. If you fail to speak this evening it will appear either that you are afraid to say what you think, or else that you have changed your opinion."

Jack flushed.

"But I _am_ afraid. Am I not the last person in the world you would ever have dreamed attempting a public speech? And here I am involved in the effort to make one to-night, simply because I began talking first to our own ranchmen and then to the men on the neighboring ranches of some of the work I thought we ought to undertake in Wyoming. When I first began I did not know I was making a speech. To-night I shall probably know it without being able to make it. Still, I don't want to talk about myself in the face of your problem, Jean. Now let us go over the news you have received and see if we both understand. Ralph has been away over a year, hasn't he, working always at the mine in New Mexico and writing regularly? The mine so far has not proved a success, but Ralph insisted that he still had faith in it and never spoke of leaving, or changing his work. Now word arrives that two weeks ago he had a serious fall into a pit which had been left uncovered, but that he seemed not badly hurt, only a little bruised and shaken and that he had continued with his duties that same day as if nothing had occurred. Then next morning, as he failed to appear, one of his men going to look for him found his tent empty. He has not been seen since. Yet no one had heard him go away in the night and there was nothing to suggest that he had intended remaining away, as his clothes and private papers were left behind.

Naturally the people at the mine believed we had heard some word of him, and I believe we soon shall hear. Ralph will write or come to the Rainbow ranch, I am convinced of it. What is it you really think, Jean?"

Jean shook her head.

"I don't know what to think. Some tragedy may have happened to Ralph, or he may simply have grown too weary and discouraged to remain where he was any longer."

Getting up, Jean began walking up and down the big room with its rose-colored carpet as if her uncertainty and unhappiness must have a physical outlet.

"I have never told you in so many words, Jack, although I must have said enough for you to guess that Ralph and I parted without the tenderness and faith I should have shown him even if I believed he had made mistakes, because the mistakes were made chiefly for my sake. I thought I had learned a good deal in this year of his absence, but perhaps it was not enough, so I must bear this new anxiety. Ralph would have been happier married to you, Jack, than to me; I have thought this a good many times. You care nothing for wealth and society; I have always cared too much until lately. Now after this year with all of you at the old ranch I was learning a new set of values; except for wanting Ralph I have been so happy here just as we used to be as children, even if we have a new group of younger Ranch girls. Now, unless I hear from Ralph within the next twenty-four hours I mean to go to New Mexico to find him. I should have been with him through this year, enduring the hardships he has been forced to endure, instead of living in comfort and idleness here at the ranch."

"But you have not lived in idleness, Jean, whatever else you may accuse yourself of. Managing this big place, keeping house for Jim and his little girls and for Frieda and her family is hardly being idle. Jim says he has not been so at ease since Ruth died. It's funny Jim told me he thought it wiser for Professor Russell to go in search of Ralph unless we receive word immediately than that he should go, although Jim and Ralph are devoted friends. Jim says that Henry is a scientist, but a more practical man of affairs than the rest of us give him credit for being. Yet somehow I don't believe Jim is willing to leave us alone at the ranch, not only his own little girls, but you and Frieda and Olive and me. He insists on driving me over to Laramie to-night, although I do not feel he likes my speaking in public. However, when I asked his advice he merely said: 'Go ahead, Jack, do what you wish to do; your life is your own. If I am an old fogy and should prefer you to stay quietly at the lodge, I never have expected it of you since you came back and resumed your American citizenship. As long as you don't go too far I'll stand behind you.'"

Jack smiled.

"Of course I don't know what Jim means by 'too far,' but I suppose he will tell me in time. Now I am going away, Jean dear, and leave you to try to rest. Remember, I believe firmly that we shall hear from Ralph within the next few days, or the next few hours, who knows? But Olive and Captain MacDonnell will stay with you to-night, as Frieda and Professor Russell wish to drive over to the Woman's Club with me. At least if I am to make a speech I am glad it is to be made there. Frieda is too funny. She is torn between being rather proud of my being a sufficiently prominent person in the neighborhood for people to be willing to listen to me, and thinking it unwomanly of me to attempt to speak. Besides, I think she shares my present conviction that I am going to break down and so disgrace myself and all of us. Yet it is such a simple thing I wish to talk about, and anyone ought to be able to say what one thinks."

As Jack rose, Jean placed her hands on her cousin's shoulders, her brown eyes gazing steadfastly into Jack's gray ones.

"No, it is not going to be difficult for you to-night, Jack, not after you have once started with your speech. It will be difficult at first, of course, to face an audience of men and women for the first time in your life. You have said a good many times just what you will say to-night, but I know that you have never considered before that you _were_ making a speech. But it will be a success, Jack, because to you it is always a simple thing for people to be straightforward and honest and public-spirited. Now go and lie down yourself for an hour or so. I am going to see what the little girls are doing."

Jack laughed.

"No, I am going off for a ride alone, Jean. It is funny, but Billy Preston, one of our cowboys, told me I should not ride alone, not even over our own ranch. Already there seems to be a good deal of feeling against me because of what I have been advocating. As if I were of enough importance to be considered dangerous! But please don't speak of this to any one else; I must ride alone now and then, and I have promised Jim never to leave our ranch without an escort. It is curious that I can think better on horseback than at any other times. Other people manage the same thing by lying down, or walking through the country, or in crowded city streets. I believe some writers can only dictate when they are striding up and down their rooms. But I am off now, really this time, Jean. I'll have a light supper at the lodge, as we start about seven. In the morning I'll tell you the worst, or probably Frieda will tell you before I can see you."

A moment after Jacqueline Kent was gone.

After her departure Jean suffered a stronger sensation of discouragement. It was always true that Jacqueline Kent possessed a vitality so keen and a sweetness of character so inherently sincere, that one was apt to be stimulated and cheered by her companionship.

Later in the same day driving toward town, Jack remained unusually quiet. She was riding in the front seat of a Ford car seated beside Jim Colter and listening with some amus.e.m.e.nt to her sister Frieda's conversation with her husband, which Frieda had not the slightest objection to having overheard.

"I feel perfectly convinced that Jack is going to break down, Henry, or perhaps not even be able to begin her speech when she faces her audience. I do wish I had not come. Of course you and Jim won't mind so much because you are no real relation to Jack, so I shall feel much more embarra.s.sed than anyone else. However, my one comfort will be that if Jack does make a complete failure to-night she will never attempt to speak in public again. I don't see why she should care so much what the other ranchmen in Wyoming do, so long as we are successful with our own ranch. But then one never has been able to count upon what Jack would think or do. We are not in the least alike."

"But my dear Frieda," Professor Russell expostulated, speaking in a hushed voice intended only for Frieda's ears, "don't you think it unkind of you to suggest failure to your sister at this late hour? If you did not wish her to speak you should have remonstrated earlier."

"Oh, I did talk to her; indeed I am sure I have discussed nothing else for the past week. Sometimes I have told Jack I would never forgive her, if she went on with what she had been doing, and then again I advised her to make a perfectly wonderful speech at the Woman's Club to-night, just to show the stupid people who object to her how clever and charming she is, and how right. Of course I think Jack is right about a few things now and then."

In answer to Jack's gay laughter from the front seat and Jim Colter's chuckle, even to her husband's amused smile, Frieda continued undisturbed.

"Frieda dear, you are a tonic and I won't dare fail if you feel as you do about me," Jack called back over her shoulder. "You are more refreshing than Jim, who tells me I am sure to succeed in convincing my audience to-night, when deep down inside of him he is sure I will not.

Yet you won't desert me if the worst happens, Frieda?"

Frieda shook her blonde head.

"No, Jack, I shall never turn my back upon you really, no matter what you do, even if I disapprove of it most dreadfully, perhaps not even if you should run for some public office in the state of Wyoming as if you were a man. Of course the suggestion is absurd, but I did hear some one say you might become an influence in the state of Wyoming."

"Yes, that was absurd, Frieda dear," Jack returned, resting her head lightly on Jim Colter's shoulder and closing her ears to Frieda's patter in order to try to think more clearly of the task ahead of her.

The subject upon which Jacqueline Kent was to speak to-night was a simple one, so simple that she had not understood why there should be any opposition to her suggestion. In the beginning it had been only a suggestion.

Jacqueline Kent desired the ranchmen of Wyoming to increase the number of their livestock and to have larger herds of cattle, and droves of sheep, with a view of making the state of Wyoming the most important ranch state in the country. The world was never before in so great need of food and clothing.

Yet soon her little talks with the Rainbow ranchmen and the men from the adjoining ranches became known throughout the neighborhood. Then to her surprise Jack discovered that a large number of the prominent men in Wyoming opposed her suggestion. Among these men were Senator Marshall and her former acquaintance, Peter Stevens, who was employed as an attorney to limit the supply of livestock raised in Wyoming.

To-night Jack had been asked to present her view of the question before a group of men and women in the Woman's Club in Laramie. The building was a large one. Later, when Jack stepped out upon the platform she faced an audience of several hundred persons.

An instant the faces swam before her and her courage failed. Then she appreciated that her first sentences could not be heard beyond the first few rows of chairs.

CHAPTER X

A MAIDEN SPEECH