The Reclaimers Part 26

As they pa.s.sed down the walk to the little gray car York Macpherson looked after them, conscious of the impossible thing in Ponk's mind, and wondering wherein lay the charm of this pink-and-white inefficient girl to grip with so strong a hold on the heart of a sensible man like Ponk.

"It is her power to be what she has never been, but what she will become," he said to himself. "She's the biggest contradiction to all rules that I ever knew, but she's a dead-sure proposition."

The coming of callers found York in his best mood, and when his sister bade him good night he put his arms around her, saying, gently:

"You are the best woman in the world, Laura, and you mustn't carry a single hidden worry."

"Neither must you, York," Laura replied, and each knew that the other understood.

Meantime, out on the upper Sage Brush road Jerry was letting the beauty of the evening lift the weight from her mind. She was just beginning to understand that, while she had imagined herself to be doing her own thinking heretofore, she had been merely willing that her thinking should be done for her. She was now at the place where her will meant little and her judgment everything in shaping her acts. The recognition brought a sense of freedom she had never known before. What she had overheard from the porch seemed far away, and her wounded spirit grew whole again as she began to find herself standing on her own feet, not commanding that somebody else should hold her up. Jerry's mind worked rapidly, and before the gray car had been turned at the northern end of the evening's ride it was not the Jerry Swaim of an hour ago, but a young warrior, clad in armor, with shining weapons in her hand, who sat beside the adoring little hotel-keeper of the faulty grammar and the kindly heart.

Ponk halted the car at the far end of the drive up-stream, to take in a moonlight view of the Sage Brush Valley.

"Them three lights down yonder's the court-house an' the school-house an' the station. The other town glims are all hid by trees an' bushes and sundry in the wrinkles of the praira." Ponk always said "praira."

"But it's a beautiful country when you douse the sunshine and turn on the starlight, or a half-size moon like that young pullet in the west sky yonder. Ever see the blowout by moonlight? Sorta reclaims its cussed ugliness, you might say, an' the dimmer glow softens down an' subdues the infernal old beast considerable."

Jerry turned quickly toward her companion. "Blowout is a word taboo in my presence," she said, gravely. "Anybody who wants to be listed as a friend of mine will never mention it to me, for to me there is no such thing. I have no real estate in Kansas, nor anywhere else, for that matter. I'm just a poor orphan child." The girl smiled brightly. "All the world is mine, even though none of it really belongs to me. If you want my good-will, even my speaking acquaintance, you'll remember the road to it is _never_ to _mention_ that _horrid thing_ to me again."

"I never won't," Ponk declared, seriously. "If that's the only restriction, I'm in the middle of your good-will so far I'll never find the outside gate again."

"I hope you won't," Jerry said, lightly.

"I'm seriouser than you are, Miss Swaim, and I asked you to take this ride for three reasons," Ponk returned.

"Name them," Jerry demanded, in the dim light noting the flush on his round cheeks.

"Firstly, and mainly, just selfish pleasure. Secondly, because I wanted to do you a favor if I might presume, and thirdly, to tell you why I wanted to do it."

"You are very kind," Jerry said, sincerely.

"What I want to say in that favor business is the same I told York to say that Sunday we met you in the cemetery, where I'd been callin' on mother, and you come to get away from New Eden and all that in it is, for a little while. You remember York came trailing after you with some excuse or other, an' right behind him comes another trailer, a womankind?"

"I remember York, that's all," Jerry replied, trying to recall the woman, whom she had forgotten.

"Well, she didn't forget you. It's that Stellar Bahrr, and she made capital, princ.i.p.al, and compound interest out of the innocent event, as she does out of every move everybody in that burg makes. But don't let it disturb you a mite."

"I won't," Jerry replied, indifferently. "But tell me why she should make capital out of me?"

"'Cause she hates you," Ponk said, calmly.

"Me? Why?" Jerry's eyes were black now, and the faintly gleaming ripples above her white forehead and her faintly pink cheeks in the light of the moon made a delicious picture.

"Just because you are you, young, admired. I don't dare to say no more, no matter what I feel. It's a snaky jealousy, and she'll trail you constant. It's got to be the habit of her life, and it's ruined her as it will any person."

"Well, let her trail." Jerry's voice had a clear defiance now. "I'm here to earn an honest living by my own efforts. I shall pay my bills and take care of my own business. I have not intentionally injured anybody."

She paused and remembered Laura Macpherson, her shapely hands gripped together, emphasizing her unbreakable determination.

"And you are goin' to win. Don't never be afraid of the end and finis.

But, knowin' Sage Brush, an' how scared it is of Mrs. Bahrr, yet listenin' constant to every word she says, I felt it my duty to warn you of breakers ahead. I've known more 'n one, bein' innocent, to fall for her tricks. And I'm telling you out of pure kindness. There's only two ways to handle her--keep still and try to live above her, or stand straight up an' tell her to go to the devil. Excuse me, Miss Swaim, I'm not really a profane man, but I mean well by you, and I'm not just settin' here to gossip about a fellow-citizenness."

"I know you mean well, Mr. Ponk. You have been more than kind to me ever since the night I reached New Eden, and I do appreciate your friendship and good-will," Jerry said, earnestly. "Now as to Mrs. Bahrr, which course do you advise me to follow?"

Junius Brutus Ponk was hanging on every word of Jerry's, and his face was a full moon of pleasure, for he was frankly and madly in love with her, and he knew it.

"I can't advise at all; it just ain't for me to do that. You are honorin' us by stoppin' in our midst. What I want you to do is to be on the lookout, an' if things start wrong, anywhere--school or church or with your friends, the Macphersons, for instance, as they might--just run down old Stellar before you go to guessin', or misunderstandin', and if you can't do it alone"--Ponk smote his broad bosom dramatically--"I'm here to help. That leads me to the thirdly of my triplet purpose in askin' the pleasure of your company."

Jerry looked up with a smile. The little man was so thoroughly good, and yet so impossible. York Macpherson seemed head and shoulders above any other man she had ever known in her life--except her father. In fact, he seemed like a sort of father to her--and Joe Thomson. That was just a shadow across her consciousness, for all these men belonged here and at heart were not of her world.

"Miss Swaim, will you let me, without no recompense, be a friend at court whenever you need my help? You seem to me like a sort of female Robinson Crusoe cast away on the desert island of the Sage Brush country in Kansas. Let me be your Man Friday. I'd like to be your Sat.u.r.day and Sunday and Monday and Tuesday and Wednesday. York Macpherson would come lopin' in to claim Thursday, I reckon."

The sincerity of the fat little man offset the pompous ridiculousness of his speech.

"If I seem cuttin' into the Macpherson melon-patch it's because I got on to some of Stellar Bahrr's gossip that set me thinkin'. She's up to turnin' Miss Laury against you because of York's admiring you so much."

Jerry grasped the situation now. The hotel-keeper was not only wishing to befriend and shield her--he thought he was in love with her. And he thought that York Macpherson was also in love. Was he? The girl's mind worked rapidly. Little as she cared for the opinion of New-Edenites, outside of these three good friends, she realized that these same New-Edenites were interested in her and dared to discuss her affairs; and that if she stayed here, as she meant to do, she must meet them and be, in a way, of them. How much of this newly discovered admiration which her companion evidently felt, and which he felt sure York Macpherson possessed, might be really the outgrowth of pity for her in the new position in which she found herself? And there was Laura.

Stellar Bahrr had hinted about her being neglected by her brother for other women. Whatever might be the real motive, Jerry and love had parted company on the day that Eugene Wellington's letter had come telling of his renunciation of his art for an easy clerkship. But Laura didn't know that, and she might have heard the town-meddler--Oh, bother Stellar and all her works! Jerry Swaim would have none of them. And Laura was such a sweet, companionable, refined friend. This thing must be overcome in some way.

"Tell me, Mr. Ponk, why do the New Eden people listen to a sharp-tongued trouble-maker, since they know her power?" Jerry asked, after a pause.

"Why? 'Cause they enjoy it when 'tain't about them--all of us do that, bein' human. Are you right sure you wouldn't believe her yourself, much as you despised any story of hers you'd be forced to listen to? Well as I know her, I have to keep pinchin' my right arm to see if it's got nerve enough to strike back if I'm hit, you might say."

On Jerry's cheeks the bloom deepened. She had let a word of Mrs. Bahrr's set her to wondering about both her host and hostess.

"They's one more thing I want to say, the third reason for askin' you out this evenin'," Ponk went on, and the pompous manner fell from him somewhat in his earnestness. "I don't want you to leave Macpherson's home for anything, right now. They want you and--well, I hope you won't.

Even at the loss of a boarder for myself at the hotel and gurrage I hope you won't. But if some time--if it was ever possible you'd find a need for me more 'n what we spoke of--I ain't no show. I'm clear below your society back East, but, if you ever needed a real, devoted, honest man who tried to be a Christian--"

Jerry caught his full meaning now. "You are a Christian, Mr. Ponk. I'm not. You are kind to me in my need, and I shall rely on your sincerity and your friendship, and if there is any way in which I could return it, even in a small measure, I would be so happy. We will be the best of friends."

Jerry's smile was winsome as she frankly put out her hand to seal the bond in a clasp of good-fellowship. And Junius Brutus Ponk understood.

"It's no use," he said to himself, sadly. "I wish it might have been, but it ain't. I ain't such a fool I can't see a door when it's shut right before me. I'm blessed to be her friend, and I'll be it if the heavens drop. I'm in my Waterloo an' must just wade across an' shake myself. That's all."

His sunny nature always overcame his disappointments, but from that hour in an upper niche of his heart's shrine he placed Jerry's image, one of the beautiful things of life he might do homage to but could never possess.

"They's just one favor I want to ask of you," he said, aloud, "an' that is that you'll go with me to call on mother out to the cemetery sometimes. I'd like her to know you, too. She was good, and a good mother just lives on."

Jerry's cheek paled a shade, but she said, graciously: "I'll be glad to do that, Mr. Ponk. Maybe it will make me a little less rebellious, and you will be doing me the favor."

Ponk's face beamed with pleasure at her words the while a real tear rolled unnoticed down his cheek. That night marked the beginning of a new spiritual life for Jerry Swaim.

XIV

JIM SWAIM'S WISH