The Ranchman Part 18

Norton looked sharply at Taylor's feet.

"You sprain one of yours?" he asked.

"Lord, no!" denied Taylor. "I was just wondering. How long?" he insisted.

"About two weeks. Say, Squint, your brain wasn't injured in that ruckus, was it?" he asked solicitously.

"It's as good as it ever was."

"I don't believe it!" declared Norton. "Here you've started something serious, and you go to rambling about sprained ankles."

"Norton," said Taylor slowly, "a sprained ankle is a mighty serious thing-when you've forgotten which one it was!"

"What in--"

"And," resumed Taylor, "when you don't know but that she took particular pains to make a mental note of it. If I'd wrap the left one up, now, and she knew it was the right one that had been hurt-or if I'd wrap up the right one, and she knew it was the wrong one, why she'd likely--"

_"She?"_ groaned Norton, looking at his friend with bulging eyes that were haunted by a fear that Taylor's brain _had_ cracked under the strain of the excitement he had undergone. He remembered now, that Taylor _had_ acted in a peculiar manner during the fight; that he had grinned all through it when he should have been in deadly earnest.

"Plumb loco!" he muttered.

And then he saw Taylor grinning broadly at him; and he was suddenly struck with the conviction that Taylor was not insane; that he was in possession of some secret that he was trying to confide to his friend, and that he had begun obliquely. Norton drew a deep breath of relief.

"Lord!" he sighed, "you sure had me going. And you don't know which ankle you sprained?"

"I've clean forgot. And now she'll find out that I've lied to her."

"_She?_" said Norton significantly.

"Marion Harlan," grinned Taylor.

Norton caught his breath with a gasp. "You mean you've fallen in love with her? And that you've made her-Oh, Lord! What a situation! Don't you know her uncle and Carrington are in cahoots in this deal?"

"It's my recollection that I told you about that the day I got back,"

Taylor reminded him. And then Taylor told him the story of the bandaged ankle.

When Taylor concluded, Norton lay back in his chair and regarded his friend blankly.

"And you mean to tell me that all the time you were fighting Carrington and Danforth you were thinking about that ankle?"

"Mostly all the time," Taylor admitted.

Norton made a gesture of impotence. "Well," he said, "if a man can keep his mind on a girl while two men are trying to knock h.e.l.l out of him, he's sure got a bad case. And all I've got to say is that you're going to have a lovely ruckus!"

CHAPTER XV-GLOOM-AND PLANS

Elam Parsons sat all day on the wide porch of the big house nursing his resentment. He was hunched up in the chair, his shoulders were slouched forward, his chin resting on the wings of his high, starched collar, his lips in a pout, his eyes sullen and gleaming with malevolence.

Parsons was beginning to recover from his astonishment over the attack Carrington had made on him. He saw now that he should have known Carrington was the kind of man he had shown himself to be; for now that Parsons reflected, he remembered little things that Carrington had done which should have warned him.

Carrington had never been a real friend. Carrington had used him-that was it; Carrington had made him think he was an important member of the partnership, and he had thought so himself. Now he understood Carrington. Carrington was selfish and cruel-more, Carrington was a beast and an ingrate. For it had been Parsons who had made it possible for Carrington to succeed-for he had used Parsons' money all along-having had very little himself.

So Parsons reflected, knowing, however, that he had not the courage to oppose Carrington. He feared Carrington; he had always feared him, but now his fear had become terror-and hate. For Parsons could still feel the man's fingers at his throat; and as he sat there on the porch his own fingers stroked the spot, while in his heart flamed a great yearning for vengeance.

Marion Harlan had got up this morning feeling rather more interested in the big house than she had felt the day before-or upon any day that she had occupied it. She, like Parsons, had awakened with a presentiment of impending pleasure. But, unlike Parsons, she found it impossible to definitely select an outstanding incident or memory upon which to base her expectations.

Her antic.i.p.ations seemed to be broad and inclusive-like a clear, un.o.bstructed sunset, with an effulgent glow that seemed to embrace the whole world, warming it, bringing a great peace.

For upon this morning, suddenly awakening to the pure, white light that shone into her window, she was conscious of a feeling of satisfaction with life that was strange and foreign-a thing that she had never before experienced. Always there had been a shadow of the past to darken her vision of the future, but this morning that shadow seemed to have vanished.

For a long time she could not understand, and she snuggled up in bed, her brow thoughtfully furrowed, trying to solve the mystery. It was not until she got up and was looking out of the window at the mighty basin in which-like a dot of brown in a lake of emerald green-cl.u.s.tered the buildings of the Arrow ranch, that knowledge in an overwhelming flood a.s.sailed her. Then a crimson flush stained her cheeks, her eyes glowed with happiness, and she clasped her hands and stood rigid for a long time.

She knew now. A name sprang to her lips, and she murmured it aloud, softly: "Quinton Taylor."

Later she appeared to Martha-a vision that made the negro woman gasp with amazement.

"What happen to you, honey? You-all git good news? You look light an'

airy-like you's goin' to fly!"

"I've decided to like this place-after all, Martha. I-I thought at first that I wouldn't, but I have changed my mind."

Martha looked sharply at her, a sidelong glance that had quite a little subtle knowledge in it.

"I reckon that 'Squint' Taylor make a good many girls change their mind, honey-he, he, he!"

"Martha!"

"Doan you git 'sturbed, now, honey. Martha shuah knows the signs. I done discover the signs a long while ago-when I fall in love with a worfless n.i.g.g.e.r in St. Louis. He shuah did captivate me, honey. I done try to wiggle out of it-but 'tain't no use. Face the fac's, Martha, face the fac's, I tell myself-an' I done it. Ain't no use for to try an' fool the fac's, honey-not one bit of use! The ol' fac' he look at you an'

say: 'Doan you try to wiggle 'way from me; I's heah, an' heah I's goin'

to stay!' That Squint man ain't no lady-killer, honey, but he's shuah a he-man from the groun' up!"

Marion escaped Martha as quickly as she could; and after breakfast began systematically to rearrange the furniture to suit her artistic ideals.

Martha helped, but not again did Martha refer to Quinton Taylor-something in Marion's manner warned her that she could trespa.s.s too far in that direction.

Some time during the morning Marion saw Parsons ride up and dismount at the stable door; and later she heard him cross the porch. She looked out of one of the front windows and saw him huddled in a big rocking-chair, and she wondered at the depression that sat so heavily upon him.

The girl did not pause in her work long enough to partake of the lunch that Martha set for her-so interested was she; and therefore she did not know whether or not Parsons came into the house. But along about four o'clock in the afternoon, wearied of her task, Marion entered the kitchen. From Martha she learned that Parsons had not stirred from the chair on the porch during the entire day.

Concerned, Marion went out to him.

Parsons did not hear her; he was still moodily and resentfully reviewing the incident of the morning.