Where the Trail Divides Part 24

The man's face twitched; but he obeyed.

"You're maddening, Bess," he flamed. "Positively maddening!"

"Perhaps," evenly. "I warned you that if you stayed we'd be ourselves to-day. I merely told you things as they are."

Craig opened his lips to speak; but closed them again in silence. One of his hands, long fingered, white as a woman's, lay in his lap. Against his will now and then a muscle contracted nervously; and of a sudden he thrust the telltale member deep into his trousers pocket.

"But the future, Bess," he challenged, "your future. You can't go on this way indefinitely. What are you going to do?"

"I don't know."

"Haven't you ever thought of it?"

"It seems to me I've thought of nothing else--for an age."

"And you've decided nothing?"

"Absolutely nothing."

Again the man drew a long breath; but even thereafter his voice trembled.

"Let me decide for you then, Bess," he said.

"You?" The girl inspected him slowly through level eyes. "By what right should you be permitted to decide?"

The man returned her look. Of a sudden he had become calm. His eyes were steady. Deep down in his consciousness he realised that he would win, that the moment was his moment.

"The right is mine because I love you, Bess Landor," he said simply.

"Love me, after what you have done?"

"Yes. I have been mad--and done mad things. But I've discovered my fault. That's why I've come back; to tell you so--and to make amends."

Intensely, desperately intensely, the girl continued her look; but the man was master of himself now, sure of himself, so sure that he voiced a challenge.

"And you, Bess Landor, love me. In spite of the fact that you ran away, in spite of the fact that you are married, you love me!"

Into the girl's brown face there crept a trace of colour; her lips parted, but she said no word.

"You can't deny it," exulted the man. "You can't--because it is true."

A moment longer they sat so, motionless; then for a second time that day Clayton Craig did a wise thing, inspiration wise. While yet he was master of the situation, while yet the time was his, he arose.

"I'm going now, Bess," he said, "but I'll come again." He looked at her deeply, meaningly. "I've said all there is to say, for I've told you that I love you. Good-bye for now, and remember this: If I've stolen your happiness, I'll give it all back. As G.o.d is my witness, I'll give it all back with interest." Swiftly, before she could answer, he turned away and strode toward the impatient thoroughbred. Equally swiftly he undid the tie strap and mounted. Without another word, or a backward glance, he rode away; the galloping hoofs of his mount m.u.f.fled in the damp spring earth.

Equally silent, the girl sat looking after him. She did not move. She did not make a sound. Not until the horse turned in at the C-C ranch house, until the buildings hid the owner from view, did her eyes leave him. Then, as if compelled by an instinct, she looked away over the prairie, away where the last time she had glanced a tiny black dot stood out against the intense blue sky. But look as she might she could not find it. It was there no more. It had been for long; but now was not.

Clean as though drawn by a crayon on a freshly washed blackboard, the unbroken horizon line stretched out in a great circle before her eyes.

With no watcher save the grey wolf staring forth from the stable doorway, she was alone with her thoughts.

CHAPTER XVI

THE RECKONING

It was later than usual when How Landor returned that evening, and as he came up the path that led from the stable, he shuffled his feet as one unconsciously will when very weary. He was wearing his ready-made clothes and starched collar; but the trousers were deplorably baggy at the knees from much riding, and his linen and polished shoes were soiled with the dust of the prairie.

Supper was waiting for him, a supper hot and carefully prepared. Serving it was a young woman he had not seen for long, a young woman minus the slightest trace of listlessness, with a dash of red ribbon at belt and throat, and a reflection of the same colour burning on either cheek. A young woman, moreover, who antic.i.p.ated his slightest wish, who took his hat and fetched his moccasins, and when the meal was over brought the buffalo robes and stretched them carefully on the gently sloping terrace just outside the ranch house door. Meanwhile she chatted bubblingly, continuously; with a suggestion of the light-hearted gaiety of a year before. To one less intimately acquainted with her than the man, her companion, she would have seemed again her old girlish self, returned, unchanged; but to him who knew her as himself there was now and then a note that rang false, a hint of suppressed excitement in the unwonted colour, an abnormal energy bordering on the feverish in her every motion. Not in the least deceived was this impa.s.sive, all-observing human, not in the least in doubt as to the cause of the transformation: yet through it all he gave no intimation of consciousness of the unusual, through it all he smiled, and smiled and smiled again. Never was there a more appreciative diner than he, never a more attentive, sympathetic listener. He said but little; but that was not remarkable.

He had never done so except when she had not. When he looked at her there was an intensity that was almost uncanny in his gaze; but that also was not unusual. There was ever a mystery in the depths of his steady black eyes. Never more himself, never outwardly more unsuspicious was the man than on this occasion; even when, the meal complete, the girl had led him hand in hand out of doors, out into the soft spring night, out under the stars where she had stretched the two robes intimately close.

Thus, side by side, but not touching, they lay there, the soft south breeze fanning their faces, whispering wordless secrets in their ears; about them the friendly enveloping darkness, in their nostrils the subtle, indescribable fragrance of awakening earth and of growing things. But not even then could the girl be still. Far too full of this day's revelation and of antic.i.p.ation of things to come was she to be silent. The mood of her merely changed. The chatter, heretofore aimless, ceased. In its place came a definite intent, a motive that prompted a definite question. She was lying stretched out like a child, her crossed arms pillowing her head, her eyes looking up into the great unknown, when she gave it voice. Even when she had done so, she did not alter her position.

"I wonder," she said, "whether if one has made a mistake, it were better to go on without acknowledging it, living a lie and dying so, or to admit it and make another, who is innocent, instead of one's self, pay the penalty?" She paused for breath after the long sentence. "What do you think, How?"

In the semi-darkness the man looked at her. Against the lighter sky her face stood out distinct, clear-cut as a silhouette.

"I do not think it ever right to live a lie, Bess," he answered.

"Not even to keep another, who is innocent, from suffering?"

"No," quickly, "not even to keep another from suffering."

The girl shifted restlessly, repressedly.

"But supposing one's acknowledging the lie and living the truth makes one, according to the world, bad. Would that make any difference, How?"

The Indian did not stir, merely lay there looking at her with his steady eyes.

"There are some things one has to decide for one's self," he said. "I think this is one of them."

Again the arms beneath the girl's head shifted unconsciously.

"Others judge us after we do decide, though," she objected.

"What they think doesn't count. We're good or bad, as we're honest with ourselves or not."

"You think that, really?"

"I know it, Bess. There's no room for doubt."

Silence fell, and in it the girl's mind wandered on and on. At last, abrupt as before, abstractedly as before, came a new thought, a new query.

"Is happiness, after all, the chief end of life, How?" she questioned.

"Happiness, Bess?" He halted. "Happiness?" repeated; but there was no irony in the voice, only, had the girl noticed, a terrible mute pain.

"How should I know what is best in life, I, who have never known life at all?"