Winning the Wilderness Part 30

Nothing is too late Until the tired heart shall cease to palpitate.

--Longfellow.

The twilight had fallen on the prairie. Gra.s.s River, running bank full from the heavy May rains, lay like a band of molten silver glistening in the after-sunset light. The draw, once choked with wild plum bushes in the first days of the struggle in the wilderness, was the outlet now to the little lake that nestled in the heart of the Aydelot grove. The odors of early summer came faintly on the soft twilight breeze. Somewhere among the cottonwoods a bird called a tender good-night to its mate. Upon the low swell the lights were beginning to twinkle from the windows of the Aydelot home, and the sounds of voices and of hurrying footsteps told of something unusual going on within. Asher Aydelot, driving down the old Gra.s.s River trail, saw from far away the windows of his home beginning to glow like beacons in the twilight. Beyond it was the glimmer of the waters of the river and before it spread the mile-long grove, dim and shadowy in the mist-folds rising up from the prairie.

"A man can win a kingdom in the West, I told my mother one spring evening long ago," he murmured as his eyes took in the view. "It's surely more like a kingdom now than it was when we came down this trail a quarter of a century ago. Twenty-five good years of life, but it's worth the effort, and we are just now at the opening of our best years. A man's real usefulness begins at fifty. This is more like a kingdom, too, than it was ten years ago when those old hulks of wrecks that strew the prairie down the river were banks, and hotels, and opera houses, and factories of boomed-up Cloverdale. We are doing something for the land. I hope our boy will make up his mind to want to keep it when his time comes."

He lifted his head bravely, as if to throw off all doubt, and tightening the reins on his horses he swung away down the trail toward the home lights shining in the gathering gloom.

As he neared the house Thaine Aydelot leaped from the side porch and hurried toward him. Climbing into the moving wagon, he put one hand affectionately on his father's shoulder.

"Don't you know whose birthday this is?" he inquired with serious countenance, "and you've not spoken to me all day."

"I know my boy is nineteen today and expects to have a birthday party here tonight, and that I left him asleep when I started to town this forenoon about nine o'clock."

"Nine cats! You left at six sharp to go with John Jacobs over to Wolf Creek after what you never got, judging from this empty wagon. And I had half of the feeding done when you left the house here. I saw you when I was out by the old stone corral looking after the pigs, but they squealed so loud you could not hear me telling you good-by."

"All pigs squeal alike to me," Asher began, but Thaine choked him to silence.

"Hurry up and get togged out for the party," he urged. "The Benningtons will be over early. Jo's been here all day. I'll take care of the horses.

Hike!"

"Be sure to rub them down. They had to pull hard today," Asher called back as he went up the walk toward the house.

"Oh, fiddle! Always take care of a horse like it was a prize poodle. Farms like he was decorating chinaware. Good enough dad, but too particular. Me for the State University and the professional or military life. This ranch is all right for Asher Aydelot, but it's pretty blamed slow for T. A. And Jo Bennington doesn't like a farm either," he added with a smile.

In the superiority of his youth Thaine fumed at his father's commands, but failed not to obey them. He was just nineteen, as tall as his father, and brawny with the strength of the outdoors life of the prairie ranch.

Strength of character was not expressed in his face so much as the promise of strength with the right conditions for its development in future days.

His features were his mother's set in masculine lines, with the same abundant dark hair, the same l.u.s.trous dark eyes, the same straight nose and well-formed chin. The same imperious will of all the Thaines to do as he chose was his heritage, too, and he walked the prairies like a king.

"The real story of the plains is the story of the second generation; the real romance here will be Thaine Aydelot's romance, for he was born here."

So Virginia Aydelot had declared on the day she had gone to visit the Bennington baby, Josephine, and coming home had met Asher with little Thaine beside Mercy Pennington's grave. Sorrow for the dead had become a tender memory that day, and joy in the living made life full of hope.

In Virginia's mind a pretty romance was begun in which Thaine and Josephine were central figures. For mothers will evermore weave romances for their children so long as the memory of their own romance lives.

The time of the second generation came swiftly, even before the wilderness of the father's day had been driven entirely from the prairie. Some compensation for the loss of eastern advantages belonged to the simple life of the plains children. If they lacked the culture of city society they were also without its frivolity and temptations. What the prairies denied them in luxuries they matched with a resourcefulness to meet their needs. Something of the breadth of the landscape and of the free sweeping winds of heaven gave them breadth and power to look the world squarely in the face, and to measure it at its true value, when their hour for action came.

The Gra.s.s River children could ride like Plains Indians. They could cut a steer out of a herd and prevent or escape a stampede. They had no fear of distance, nor storm, nor prairie fire, nor blizzard. Because their opportunities were few, they squandered them the less. Matched against the city-bred young folks their talents differed in kind, not in number, nor in character-value.

Tonight the Aydelots were to give a party in honor of Thaine's birthday, and the farmhouse was dressed for the occasion. Thaine had been busy all day carrying furniture in or out, mowing the front lawn where the old double fireguard once lay, and fixing a seat under the white honeysuckle trellis, "for the afflicted ones," he declared to pretty Jo Bennington.

Jo's blush was becoming. Thaine felt sure that he must be in love with her. All the other boys were, too, he knew that well enough.

"What's going on in the dining room?" Asher asked, as he sat at supper with Virginia in the kitchen.

"The decorating committee is fixing it up for dancing. Bo Peep is coming with his fiddle and there'll be a sound of revelry by night."

"Who's the decorating committee?" Asher inquired.

"Jo Bennington is helping Thaine, and our new hired girl, Rosie Gimpke, from over on Little Wolf. She came this morning just after you left,"

Virginia replied. "She acts and looks like she'd never had a kind word spoken to her."

"Rosie Gimpke must be Hans Wyker's granddaughter. There's a nest of them over on Little Wolf. They give John Jacobs no end of trouble, but you must have help," Asher said thoughtfully.

Virginia's mind was not on hired help, however, as the sound of laughter came from the dining room.

"The bridal wreath and s...o...b..a.l.l.s make it look like a wedding was expected in there," she declared.

"Will the Arnolds and the Archibalds be up? Have you heard from the Sp.o.o.pend.y.k.es and the Gilliwigs?" Asher inquired with a smile.

"Oh, Asher! What a change since the days when we invented parties for our lonely evenings here! What has become of the old prairie?"

"It's out there still, under the wheat fields. We have driven the wilderness back; plowed a fireguard around the whole valley; tempered the hot winds by windbreaks and groves."

"It seems impossible that there ever was a one-room sod cabin here, and only you and I and Jim and faithful old Pilot in all the valley."

"Since so many things have come true it may be that many more will also by the time Thaine is as old as I was when I came out here and thought the Lord had forgotten all about this prairie until I reminded Him of it. We can almost forget the hard work and the waiting for results," Asher said.

"Oh, we don't want to forget," Virginia replied. "Not a season's joy or sorrow but had its uses for us. Do you remember that first supper here and the sunflowers in the old tin can?"

"Yes, and Jim sitting outside so lonely. What a blessing Leigh has been to his life. There they come now."

The next moment Jim's tall form filled the doorway.

"Good evening, folks. I can't resist the habit of the sod shack days to come right into the kitchen. I understand that we forty-niners are to have an old settlers' reunion while the young folks dance," he said.

There were lines of care on his face now, suggesting a bodily weariness that might never grow less. The old hopefulness and purpose seemed fading away. But the kindly light of the eyes had not disappeared, nor the direct gaze of an honest man whose judgment might bring him to tragedy, while his sense of honor was still sublime.

"Come in, Jim. Where are Pryor and Leigh? Did you take it you were all we expected?" Asher asked.

"Leigh went in the front door like a Christian. As to Pryor," he hesitated a moment. "I'll tell you later about him."

"Take this chair. I must help the children," Virginia said cordially as she rose and left the kitchen.

Leigh Shirley was coming from the front hall as she entered the dining room, and Virginia paused a moment to look at her. Something about Leigh made most people want more than a glance. Tonight, as she stood in the doorway, Virginia could think of nothing but the pink roses that grew in the rose garden of the old Thaine mansion house of her girlhood. A vision swept across her memory of Asher Aydelot--just Thaine's age then--of a moonlit night, sweet with the odor of many blossoms, and the tinkling waters of the fountain in the rose garden, and herself a happy young girl.

Leigh's fair face was set in the golden brown shadows of her hair. On either side of her square white forehead the sunny ripples kept the only memory of the golden curls of babyhood. The darker eyebrows and heavy lashes and the deep violet-blue eyes, the pink bloom of the cheeks, and the resolute mouth gave to Leigh's face all the charm of the sweet young girl. But the deeper charm that claimed the steady gaze lay in the spirit back of the face, in the self-reliance and penetrating power, combined with something of the artist's dreams; and swayed altogether by genuine good nature and good will.

Tonight she wore a simple white gown revealing her white throat and the line of her neck and shoulder. White flowers nestled in the folds of her hair, and the whole effect enhanced the dainty coloring of cheeks and lips. Leigh had an artist's eye in dress and knew by instinct what to wear. She had an artist's hand also, as her mother had had before her, and was far more skilled in the painting of prairie landscapes than any of the Gra.s.s River folk dreamed of.

Thaine was busy on the top of the stepladder and did not see Leigh as she came in. Jo Bennington, who was holding sprays of spirea for him to festoon above the window, stared at Leigh until Thaine, waiting for the flowers, turned to see the pink-cheeked living picture framed against the shadows of the hall behind her.

"I thought you were coming early to help us. This Gimpke girl doesn't know how to do a thing," Jo exclaimed.

If her voice was a trifle high-pitched it was not out of keeping with her brilliant coloring and dashing manners. Even the thoughtless rebuke of the Gimpke girl seemed excusable from her lips, and Rosie Gimpke looked at her with unblinking eyes.

"You can put on my ap.r.o.n and finish, but don't change a thing, now mind.

I'll go and dress. I brought my whole wardrobe over early in the week," Jo rattled on, and thrusting her gingham ap.r.o.n into Leigh's hands she dashed through the hall toward the stairway.