A NIGHT AT "HAYS."
CHAPTER I.
It was difficult to say if Hays' farmhouse, or "Hays," as it wasfamiliarly called, looked any more bleak and cheerless that winterafternoon than it usually did in the strong summer sunshine. Painteda cold merciless white, with scant projections for shadows, a roof ofwhite-pine shingles, bleached lighter through sun and wind, and coveredwith low, white-capped chimneys, it looked even more stark and chillythan the drifts which had climbed its low roadside fence, and yet seemedhopeless of gaining a foothold on the glancing walls, or slippery,wind-swept roof. The storm, which had already heaped the hollows ofthe road with snow, hurled its finely-granulated flakes against thebuilding, but they were whirled along the gutters and ridges, anddisappeared in smokelike puffs across the icy roof. The granite outcropin the hilly field beyond had long ago whitened and vanished; the dwarffirs and larches which had at first taken uncouth shapes in the driftblended vaguely together, and then merged into an unbroken formlesswave. But the gaunt angles and rigid outlines of the building remainedsharp and unchanged. It would seem as if the rigors of winter had onlyaccented their hardness, as the fierceness of summer had previously madethem intolerable.
It was believed that some of this unyielding grimness attached to Hayshimself. Certain it is that neither hardship nor prosperity had touchedhis character. Years ago his emigrant team had broken down in this wildbut wooded defile of the Sierras, and he had been forced to a winterencampment, with only a rude log-cabin for shelter, on the very verge ofthe promised land. Unable to enter it himself, he was nevertheless ableto assist the better-equipped teams that followed him with wood andwater and a coarse forage gathered from a sheltered slope of wild oats.This was the beginning of a rude "supply station" which afterwardsbecame so profitable that when spring came and Hays' team weresufficiently recruited to follow the flood of immigrating gold-seekersto the placers and valleys, there seemed no occasion for it. His fortunehad been already found in the belt of arable slope behind the woodeddefile, and in the miraculously located coign of vantage on what was nowthe great highway of travel and the only oasis and first relief of theweary journey; the breaking down of his own team at that spot hadnot only been the salvation of those who found at "Hays" the means ofprosecuting the last part of their pilgrimage, but later provided theequipment of returning teams.
The first two years of this experience had not been without hardship anddanger. He had been raided by Indians and besieged for three days in hisstockaded cabin; he had been invested by wintry drifts of twenty feet ofsnow, cut off equally from incoming teams from the pass and thevalley below. During the second year his wife had joined him with fourchildren, but whether the enforced separation had dulled her conjugalaffection, or whether she was tempted by a natural feminine longing forthe land of promise beyond, she sought it one morning with a fascinatingteamster, leaving her two sons and two daughters behind her; two yearslater the elder of the daughters followed the mother's example, withsuch maidenly discretion, however, as to forbear compromising herself byany previous matrimonial formality whatever. From that day Hays had nofurther personal intercourse with the valley below. He put up a hotela mile away from the farmhouse that he might not have to dispensehospitality to his customers, nor accept their near companionship.Always a severe Presbyterian, and an uncompromising deacon of afar-scattered and scanty community who occasionally held their servicein one of his barns, he grew more rigid, sectarian, and narrow dayby day. He was feared, and although neither respected nor loved, hisdomination and endurance were accepted. A grim landlord, hard creditor,close-fisted patron, and a smileless neighbor who neither gambled nordrank, "Old Hays," as he was called, while yet scarce fifty, had fewacquaintances and fewer friends. There were those who believed that hisdomestic infelicities were the result of his unsympathetic nature; itnever occurred to any one (but himself probably) that they might havebeen the cause. In those Sierran altitudes, as elsewhere, the beliefin original sin--popularly known as "pure cussedness"--dominated andoverbore any consideration of passive, impelling circumstances ortemptation, unless they had been actively demonstrated with a revolver.The passive expression of harshness, suspicion, distrust, and morosenesswas looked upon as inherent wickedness.
The storm raged violently as Hays emerged from the last of a long rangeof outbuildings and sheds, and crossed the open space between him andthe farmhouse. Before he had reached the porch, with its scant shelter,he had floundered through a snowdrift, and faced the full fury of thestorm. But the snow seemed to have glanced from his hard angular figureas it had from his roof-ridge, for when he entered the narrow hall-wayhis pilot jacket was unmarked, except where a narrow line of powderedflakes outlined the seams as if worn. To the right was an apartment,half office, half sitting-room, furnished with a dark and chilly ironsafe, a sofa and chairs covered with black and coldly shining horsehair.Here Hays not only removed his upper coat but his under one also, anddrawing a chair before the fire sat down in his shirt-sleeves. It washis usual rustic pioneer habit, and might have been some lingeringreminiscence of certain remote ancestors to whom clothes were animpediment. He was warming his hands and placidly ignoring his gauntarms in their thinly-clad "hickory" sleeves, when a young girl ofeighteen sauntered, half perfunctorily, half inquisitively intothe room. It was his only remaining daughter. Already elected bycircumstances to a dry household virginity, her somewhat large features,sallow complexion, and tasteless, unattractive dress, did not obviouslysuggest a sacrifice. Since her sister's departure she had taken solecharge of her father's domestic affairs and the few rude servantshe employed, with a certain inherited following of his own moods andmethods. To the neighbors she was known as "Miss Hays,"--a dubiousrespect that, in a community of familiar "Sallies," "Mamies," "Pussies,"was grimly prophetic. Yet she rejoiced in the Oriental appellationof "Zuleika." To this it is needless to add that it was impossible toconceive any one who looked more decidedly Western.
"Ye kin put some things in my carpet bag agin the time the sled comesround," said her father meditatively, without looking up.
"Then you're not coming back tonight?" asked the girl curiously. "What'sgoin' on at the summit, father?"
"I am," he said grimly. "You don't reckon I kalkilate to stop thar!I'm going on as far as Horseley's to close up that contract afore theweather changes."
"I kinder allowed it was funny you'd go to the hotel to-night. There'sa dance there; those two Wetherbee girls and Mamie Harris passed up theroad an hour ago on a wood-sled, nigh blown to pieces and sittin' up inthe snow like skeert white rabbits."
Hays' brow darkened heavily.
"Let 'em go," he said, in a hard voice that the fire did not seem tohave softened. "Let 'em go for all the good their fool-parents will everget outer them, or the herd of wayside cattle they've let them looseamong.
"I reckon they haven't much to do at home, or are hard put for company,to travel six miles in the snow to show off their prinkin' to a lot ofidle louts shiny with bear's grease and scented up with doctor's stuff,"added the girl, shrugging her shoulders, with a touch of her father'smood and manner.
Perhaps it struck Hays at that moment that her attitude was somewhatmonstrous and unnatural for one still young and presumably like othergirls, for, after glancing at her under his heavy brows, he said, in agentler tone:--
"Never YOU mind, Zuly. When your brother Jack comes home he'll knowwhat's what, and have all the proper New York ways and style. It's nighon three years now that he's had the best training Dr. Dawson's Academycould give,--sayin' nothing of the pow'ful Christian example of oneof the best preachers in the States. They mayn't have worldly, ungodlyfandangoes where he is, and riotous livin', and scarlet abominations,but I've been told that they've 'tea circles,' and 'assemblies,' and'harmony concerts' of young folks--and dancin'--yes, fine square dancin'under control. No, I ain't stinted him in anythin'. You kin rememberthat, Zuleika, when you hear any more gossip and backbitin' about yourfather's meanness. I ain't spared no money for him."
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br /> "I reckon not," said the girl, a little sharply. "Why, there's thatdraft fur two hundred and fifty dollars that kem only last week from theDoctor's fur extras."
"Yes," replied Hays, with a slight knitting of the brows, "the Doctormout hev writ more particklers, but parsons ain't allus business men.I reckon these here extrys were to push Jack along in the term, as theDoctor knew I wanted him back here in the spring, now that his brotherhas got to be too stiff-necked and self-opinionated to do his father'swork." It seemed from this that there had been a quarrel between Haysand his eldest son, who conducted his branch business at Sacramento, andwho had in a passion threatened to set up a rival establishment to hisfather's. And it was also evident from the manner of the girl that shewas by no means a strong partisan of her father in the quarrel.
"You'd better find out first how all the schoolin' and trainin' ofJack's is goin' to jibe with the Ranch, and if he ain't been eddicatedout of all knowledge of station business or keer for it. New York ain'tHays' Ranch, and these yer 'assemblies' and 'harmony' doin's and theirairs and graces may put him out of conceit with our plain ways. I reckonye didn't take that to mind when you've been hustlin' round payin' twohundred and fifty dollar drafts for Jack and quo'llin' with Bijah! Iain't sayin' nothin', father, only mebbe if Bijah had had drafts andextrys flourished around him a little more, mebbe he'd have been morepolite and not so rough spoken. Mebbe," she continued with a littlelaugh, "even I'D be a little more in the style to suit Master Jack whenhe comes ef I had three hundred dollars' worth of convent schoolin' likeMamie Harris."
"Yes, and you'd have only made yourself fair game for ev'ry schemin',lazy sport or counter-jumper along the road from this to Sacramento!"responded Hays savagely.
Zuleika laughed again constrainedly, but in a way that might havesuggested that this dreadful contingency was still one that it waspossible to contemplate without entire consternation. As she movedslowly towards the door she stopped, with her hand on the lock, and saidtentatively: "I reckon you won't be wantin' any supper before you go?You're almost sure to be offered suthin' up at Horseley's, while if Ihave to cook you up suthin' now and still have the men's regular supperto get at seven, it makes all the expense of an extra meal."
Hays hesitated. He would have preferred his supper now, and had hisdaughter pressed him would have accepted it. But economy, which wasone of Zuleika's inherited instincts, vaguely appearing to him to be avirtue, interchangeable with chastity and abstemiousness, was certainlyto be encouraged in a young girl. It hardly seems possible that with aneye single to the integrity of the larder she could ever look kindly onthe blandishments of his sex, or, indeed, be exposed to them. He saidsimply: "Don't cook for me," and resumed his attitude before the fire asthe girl left the room.
As he sat there, grim and immovable as one of the battered fire-dogsbefore him, the wind in the chimney seemed to carry on a deep-throated,dejected, and confidential conversation with him, but really had verylittle to reveal. There were no haunting reminiscences of his marriedlife in this room, which he had always occupied in preference to thecompany or sitting-room beyond. There were no familiar shadows of thepast lurking in its corners to pervade his reverie. When he did reflect,which was seldom, there was always in his mind a vague idea of a centralinjustice to which he had been subjected, that was to be avoided bycircuitous movement, to be hidden by work, but never to be surmounted.And to-night he was going out in the storm, which he could understandand fight, as he had often done before, and he was going to drive abargain with a man like himself and get the better of him if he could,as he had done before, and another day would be gone, and that centralinjustice which he could not understand would be circumvented, and hewould still be holding his own in the world. And the God of Israelwhom he believed in, and who was a hard but conscientious Providence,something like himself, would assist him perhaps some day to theunderstanding of this same vague injustice which He was, for somestrange reason, permitting. But never more unrelenting and unsparing ofothers than when under conviction of Sin himself, and never more harshand unforgiving than when fresh from the contemplation of the DivineMercy, he still sat there grimly holding his hand to a warmth that neverseemed to get nearer his heart than that, when his daughter re-enteredthe room with his carpet-bag.
To rise, put on his coat and overcoat, secure a fur cap on his head by awoolen comforter, covering his ears and twined round his throat, and torigidly offer a square and weather-beaten cheek to his daughter's dustykiss, did not, apparently, suggest any lingering or hesitation. The sledwas at the door, which, for a tumultuous moment, opened on the storm andthe white vision of a horse knee-deep in a drift, and then closed behindhim. Zuleika shot the bolt, brushed some flakes of the invading snowfrom the mat, and, after frugally raking down the fire on the hearth herfather had just quitted, retired through the long passage to the kitchenand her domestic supervision.
It was a few hours later, supper had long past; the "hands" had one byone returned to their quarters under the roof or in the adjacent lofts,and Zuleika and the two maids had at last abandoned the kitchen fortheir bedrooms beyond. Zuleika herself, by the light of a solitarycandle, had entered the office and had dropped meditatively into achair, as she slowly raked the warm ashes over the still smoulderingfire. The barking of dogs had momentarily attracted her attention, butit had suddenly ceased. It was followed, however, by a more startlingincident,--a slight movement outside, and an attempt to raise thewindow!
She was not frightened; perhaps there was little for her to fear; it wasknown that Hays kept no money in the house, the safe was only used forsecurities and contracts, and there were half a dozen men within call.It was, therefore, only her usual active, burning curiosity for novelincident that made her run to the window and peer out; but it was with aspontaneous cry of astonishment she turned and darted to the front door,and opened it to the muffled figure of a young man.
"Jack! Saints alive! Why, of all things!" she gasped, incoherently.
He stopped her with an impatient gesture and a hand that prevented herfrom closing the door again.
"Dad ain't here?" he asked quickly.
"No."
"When'll he be back?"
"Not to-night."
"Good," he said, turning to the door again. She could see a motionlesshorse and sleigh in the road, with a woman holding the reins.
He beckoned to the woman, who drove to the door and jumped out. Tall,handsome, and audacious, she looked at Zuleika with a quick laugh ofconfidence, as at some recognized absurdity.
"Go in there," said the young man, opening the door of the office; "I'llcome back in a minute."
As she entered, still smiling, as if taking part in some humorous butrisky situation, he turned quickly to Zuleika and said in a low voice:"Where can we talk?"
The girl held out her hand and glided hurriedly through the passageuntil she reached a door, which she opened. By the light of a dying firehe could see it was her bedroom. Lighting a candle on the mantel, shelooked eagerly in his face as he threw aside his muffler and opened hiscoat. It disclosed a spare, youthful figure, and a thin, weak facethat a budding mustache only seemed to make still more immature. Foran instant brother and sister gazed at each other. Astonishment on herpart, nervous impatience on his, apparently repressed any demonstrationof family affection. Yet when she was about to speak he stopped herroughly.
"There now; don't talk. I know what you're goin' to say--could say itmyself if I wanted to--and it's no use. Well then, here I am. You sawHER. Well, she's MY WIFE--we've been married three months. Yes, my WIFE;married three months ago. I'm here because I ran away from school--thatis, I HAVEN'T BEEN THERE for the last three months. I came out withher last steamer; we went up to the Summit Hotel last night--where theydidn't know me--until we could see how the land lay, before popping downon dad. I happened to learn that he was out to-night, and I broughther down here to have a talk. We can go back again before he comes, youknow, unless"--
"But," interrupted the girl, with su
dden practicality, "you say youain't been at Doctor Dawson's for three months! Why, only last week hedrew on dad for two hundred and fifty dollars for your extras!"
He glanced around him and then arranged his necktie in the glass abovethe mantel with a nervous laugh.
"OH, THAT! I fixed that up, and got the money for it in New York to payour passage with. It's all right, you know."
CHAPTER II.
The girl stood looking at the ingenious forger with an odd, breathlesssmile. It was difficult to determine, however, if gratified curiositywere not its most dominant expression.
"And you've got a wife--and THAT'S her?" she resumed.
"Yes."
"Where did you first meet her? Who is she?"
"She's an actress--mighty popular in 'Frisco--I mean New York. Lot o'chaps tried to get her--I cut 'em out. For all dad's trying to keep meat Dawson's--I ain't such a fool, eh?"
Nevertheless, as he stood there stroking his fair mustache, hisastuteness did not seem to impress his sister to enthusiastic assent.Yet she did not relax her breathless, inquisitive smile as she wenton:--
"And what are you going to do about dad?"
He turned upon her querulously.
"Well, that's what I want to talk about."
"You'll catch it!" she said impressively. But here her brother'snervousness broke out into a weak, impotent fury. It was evident, too,that in spite of its apparent spontaneous irritation its intent wasstudied. Catch it! Would he? Oh, yes! Well, she'd see WHO'D catch it!Not him. No, he'd had enough of this meanness, and wanted it ended! Hewasn't a woman to be treated like his sister,--like their mother--liketheir brother, if it came to that, for he knew how he was to be broughtback to take Bijah's place in the spring; he'd heard the whole story.No, he was going to stand up for his rights,--he was going to be treatedas the son of a man who was worth half a million ought to be treated! Hewasn't going to be skimped, while his father was wallowing in money thathe didn't know what to do with,--money that by rights ought to havebeen given to their mother and their sister. Why, even the law wouldn'tpermit such meanness--if he was dead. No, he'd come back with Lottie,his wife, to show his father that there was one of the family thatcouldn't be fooled and bullied, and wouldn't put up with it any longer.There was going to be a fair division of the property, and his sisterAnnie's property, and hers--Zuleika's--too, if she'd have the pluck tospeak up for herself. All this and much more he said. Yet even whilehis small fury was genuine and characteristic, there was such an evidentincongruity between himself and his speech that it seemed to fithim loosely, and in a measure flapped in his gestures like another'sgarment. Zuleika, who had exhibited neither disgust nor sympathy withhis rebellion, but had rather appeared to enjoy it as a novel domesticperformance, the morality of which devolved solely upon the performer,retained her curious smile. And then a knock at the door startled them.
It was the stranger,--slightly apologetic and still humorous, but firmand self-confident withal. She was sorry to interrupt their familycouncil, but the fire was going out where she sat, and she would likea cup of tea or some refreshment. She did not look at Jack, but,completely ignoring him, addressed herself to Zuleika with what seemedto be a direct challenge; in that feminine eye-grapple there was aquick, instinctive, and final struggle between the two women. Thestranger triumphed. Zuleika's vacant smile changed to one of submission,and then, equally ignoring her brother in this double defeat, shehastened to the kitchen to do the visitor's bidding. The woman closedthe door behind her, and took Zuleika's place before the fire.
"Well?" she said, in a half-contemptuous toleration.
"Well?" said Jack, in an equally ill-disguised discontent, but anevident desire to placate the woman before him. "It's all right, youknow. I've had my say. It'll come right, Lottie, you'll see."
The woman smiled again, and glanced around the bare walls of the room.
"And I suppose," she said, drily, "when it comes right I'm to take theplace of your sister in the charge of this workhouse and succeed to thekeys of that safe in the other room?"
"It'll come all right, I tell you; you can fix things up here any wayyou'll like when we get the old man straight," said Jack, with theiteration of feebleness. "And as to that safe, I've seen it chock fullof securities."
"It'll hold one less to-night," she said, looking at the fire.
"What are you talking about?" he asked, in querulous suspicion.
She drew a paper from her pocket.
"It's that draft of yours that you were crazy enough to sign Dawson'sname to. It was lying out there on the desk. I reckon it isn't a thingyou care to have kept as evidence, even by your father."
She held it in the flames until it was consumed.
"By Jove, your head is level, Lottie!" he said, with an admiration thatwas not, however, without a weak reserve of suspicion.
"No, it isn't, or I wouldn't be here," she said, curtly. Then she added,as if dismissing the subject, "Well, what did you tell her?"
"Oh, I said I met you in New York. You see I thought she might think itqueer if she knew I only met you in San Francisco three weeks ago. Ofcourse I said we were married."
She looked at him with weary astonishment.
"And of course, whether things go right or not, she'll find out thatI've got a husband living, that I never met you in New York, but on thesteamer, and that you've lied. I don't see the USE of it. You saidyou were going to tell the whole thing squarely and say the truth, andthat's why I came to help you."
"Yes; but don't you see, hang it all!" he stammered, in the irritationof weak confusion, "I had to tell her SOMETHING. Father won't dare totell her the truth, no more than he will the neighbors. He'll hush itup, you bet; and when we get this thing fixed you'll go and get yourdivorce, you know, and we'll be married privately on the square."
He looked so vague, so immature, yet so fatuously self-confident, thatthe woman extended her hand with a laugh and tapped him on the back asshe might have patted a dog. Then she disappeared to follow Zuleika inthe kitchen.
When the two women returned together they were evidently on the bestof terms. So much so that the man, with the easy reaction of a shallownature, became sanguine and exalted, even to an ostentatious exhibitionof those New York graces on which the paternal Hays had set such store.He complacently explained the methods by which he had deceived Dr.Dawson; how he had himself written a letter from his father commandinghim to return to take his brother's place, and how he had shown it tothe Doctor and been three months in San Francisco looking for work andassisting Lottie at the theatre, until a conviction of the righteousnessof his cause, perhaps combined with the fact that they were also shortof money and she had no engagement, impelled him to his present heroicstep. All of which Zuleika listened to with childish interest, butsuperior appreciation of his companion. The fact that this woman was anactress, an abomination vaguely alluded to by her father as being evenmore mysteriously wicked than her sister and mother, and correspondinglyexciting, as offering a possible permanent relief to the monotony of herhome life, seemed to excuse her brother's weakness. She was almost readyto become his partisan--AFTER she had seen her father.
They had talked largely of their plans; they had settled small detailsof the future and the arrangement of the property; they had agreed thatZuleika should be relieved of her household drudgery, and sent toa fashionable school in San Francisco with a music teacher and adressmaker. They had discussed everything but the precise manner inwhich the revelation should be conveyed to Hays. There was still plentyof time for that, for he would not return until to-morrow at noon,and it was already tacitly understood that the vehicle of transmissionshould be a letter from the Summit Hotel. The possible contingency ofa sudden outburst of human passion not entirely controlled by religiousfeeling was to be guarded against.
They were sitting comfortably before the replenished fire; the wind wasstill moaning in the chimney, when, suddenly, in a lull of the stormthe sound of sleigh-bells seemed to fill the room. It was fol
lowed by avoice from without, and, with a hysterical cry, Zuleika started to herfeet. The same breathless smile with which she had greeted her brotheran hour ago was upon her lips as she gasped:--
"Lord, save us!--but it's dad come back!"
I grieve to say that here the doughty redresser of domestic wrongs andretriever of the family honor lapsed white-faced in his chair idealessand tremulous. It was his frailer companion who rose to the occasionand even partly dragged him with her. "Go back to the hotel," she saidquickly, "and take the sled with you,--you are not fit to face him now!But he does not know ME, and I will stay!" To the staring Zuleika: "I ama stranger stopped by a broken sleigh on my way to the hotel. Leave therest to me. Now clear out, both of you. I'll let him in."
She looked so confident, self-contained, and superior, that the thoughtof opposition never entered their minds, and as an impatient rappingrose from the door they let her, with a half-impatient, half-laughinggesture, drive them before her from the room. When they had disappearedin the distance, she turned to the front door, unbolted and opened it.Hays blundered in out of the snow with a muttered exclamation, and then,as the light from the open office door revealed a stranger, started andfell back.
"Miss Hays is busy," said the woman quietly, "I am afraid, on myaccount. But my sleigh broke down on the way to the hotel and I wasforced to get out here. I suppose this is Mr. Hays?"
A strange woman--by her dress and appearance a very worldling--and evenbraver in looks and apparel than many he had seen in the cities--seemed,in spite of all his precautions, to have fallen short of the hoteland been precipitated upon him! Yet under the influence of some oddabstraction he was affected by it less than he could have believed. Heeven achieved a rude bow as he bolted the door and ushered her intothe office. More than that, he found himself explaining to the fairtrespasser the reasons of his return to his own home. For, like a directman, he had a consciousness of some inconsistency in his return--orin the circumstances that induced a change of plans which mightconscientiously require an explanation.
"You see, ma'am, a rather singular thing happened to me after I passedthe summit. Three times I lost the track, got off it somehow, and foundmyself traveling in a circle. The third time, when I struck my owntracks again, I concluded I'd just follow them back here. I supposeI might have got the road again by tryin' and fightin' the snow--butther's some things not worth the fightin'. This was a matter ofbusiness, and, after all, ma'am, business ain't everythin', is it?"
He was evidently in some unusual mood, the mood that with certainreticent natures often compels them to make their brief confidences toutter strangers rather than impart them to those intimate friends whomight remind them of their weakness. She agreed with him pleasantly, butnot so obviously as to excite suspicion. "And you preferred to let yourbusiness go, and come back to the comfort of your own home and family."
"The comfort of my home and family?" he repeated in a dry, deliberatevoice. "Well, I reckon I ain't been tempted much by THAT. That isn'twhat I meant." But he went back to the phrase, repeating it grimly, asif it were some mandatory text. "The comfort of my OWN HOME AND FAMILY!Well, Satan hasn't set THAT trap for my feet yet, ma'am. No; ye saw mydaughter? well, that's all my family; ye see this room? that's all myhome. My wife ran away from me; my daughter cleared out too, my eldestson as was with me here has quo'lled with me and reckons to set upa rival business agin me. No," he said, still more meditatively anddeliberately; "it wasn't to come back to the comforts of my own home andfamily that I faced round on Heavy Tree Hill, I reckon."
As the woman, for certain reasons, had no desire to check thisauspicious and unlooked for confidence, she waited patiently. Haysremained silent for an instant, warming his hands before the fire, andthen looked up interrogatively.
"A professor of religion, ma'am, or under conviction?"
"Not exactly," said the lady smiling.
"Excuse me, but in spite of your fine clothes I reckoned you had aserious look just now. A reader of Scripture, may be?"
"I know the Bible."
"You remember when the angel with the flamin' sword appeared unto Saulon the road to Damascus?"
"Yes."
"It mout hev been suthin' in that style that stopped me," he said slowlyand tentatively. "Though nat'rally I didn't SEE anything, and only hadthe queer feelin'. It might hev been THAT shied my mare off the track."
"But Saul was up to some wickedness, wasn't he?" said the ladysmilingly, "while YOU were simply going somewhere on business?"
"Yes," said Hays thoughtfully, "but my BUSINESS might hev seemed likepersecution. I don't mind tellin' you what it was if you'd care tolisten. But mebbe you're tired. Mebbe you want to retire. You know," hewent on with a sudden hospitable outburst, "you needn't be in anyhurry to go; we kin take care of you here to-night, and it'll cost younothin'. And I'll send you on with my sleigh in the mornin'. Per'apsyou'd like suthin' to eat--a cup of tea--or--I'll call Zuleika;" and herose with an expression of awkward courtesy.
But the lady, albeit with a self-satisfied sparkle in her darkeyes, here carelessly assured him that Zuleika had already given herrefreshment, and, indeed, was at that moment preparing her own room forher. She begged he would not interrupt his interesting story.
Hays looked relieved.
"Well, I reckon I won't call her, for what I was goin' to say ain'texackly the sort o' thin' for an innocent, simple sort o' thing like herto hear--I mean," he interrupted himself hastily--"that folks of moreexperience of the world like you and me don't mind speakin' of--I'msorter takin' it for granted that you're a married woman, ma'am."
The lady, who had regarded him with a sudden rigidity, here relaxed herexpression and nodded.
"Well," continued Hays, resuming his place by the fire, "you see thisyer man I was goin' to see lives about four miles beyond the summit ona ranch that furnishes most of the hay for the stock that side of theDivide. He's bin holdin' off his next year's contracts with me, hopin'to make better terms from the prospects of a late spring and higherprices. He held his head mighty high and talked big of waitin' his owntime. I happened to know he couldn't do it."
He put his hands on his knees and stared at the fire, and then wenton:--
"Ye see this man had had crosses and family trials. He had a wife thatleft him to jine a lot of bally dancers and painted women in the 'Friscoplayhouses when he was livin' in the southern country. You'll say thatwas like MY own case,--and mebbe that was why it came to him to tellme about it,--but the difference betwixt HIM and ME was that insteadof restin' unto the Lord and findin' Him, and pluckin' out the eyethat offended him 'cordin' to Scripter, as I did, HE followed after HERtryin' to get her back, until, findin' that wasn't no use, he took abig disgust and came up here to hide hisself, where there wasn't noplayhouse nor play-actors, and no wimmen but Injin squaws. He pre-emptedthe land, and nat'rally, there bein' no one ez cared to live there buthimself, he had it all his own way, made it pay, and, as I was sayin'before, held his head high for prices. Well--you ain't gettin' tired,ma'am?"
"No," said the lady, resting her cheek on her hand and gazing on thefire, "it's all very interesting; and so odd that you two men, withnearly the same experiences, should be neighbors."
"Say buyer and seller, ma'am, not neighbors--at least Scriptoorily--norfriends. Well,--now this is where the Speshal Providence comes in,--onlythis afternoon Jim Briggs, hearin' me speak of Horseley's offishness"--
"WHOSE offishness?" asked the lady.
"Horseley's offishness,--Horseley's the name of the man I'm talkin'about. Well, hearin' that, he says: 'You hold on, Hays, and he'llclimb down. That wife of his has left the stage--got sick of it--and isdriftin' round in 'Frisco with some fellow. When Horseley gets to hearthat, you can't keep him here,--he'll settle up, sell out, and realizeon everything he's got to go after her agin,--you bet.' That's whatBriggs said. Well, that's what sent me up to Horseley's to-night--to getthere, drop the news, and then pin him down to that contract."
"It looked like
a good stroke of business and a fair one," said the ladyin an odd voice. It was so odd that Hays looked up. But she had somewhataltered her position, and was gazing at the ceiling, and with her handto her face seemed to have just recovered from a slight yawn, at whichhe hesitated with a new and timid sense of politeness.
"You're gettin' tired, ma'am?"
"Oh dear, no!" she said in the same voice, but clearing her throat witha little cough. "And why didn't you see this Mr. Horseley after all? Oh,I forgot!--you said you changed your mind from something you'd heard."
He had turned his eyes to the fire again, but without noticing as hedid so that she slowly moved her face, still half hidden by her hand,towards him and was watching him intently.
"No," he said, slowly, "nothin' I heard, somethin' I felt. It mout hevbeen that that set me off the track. It kem to me all of a sudden thathe might be sittin' thar calm and peaceful like ez I might be here,hevin' forgot all about her and his trouble, and here was me goin' todrop down upon him and start it all fresh agin. It looked a little likepersecution--yes, like persecution. I got rid of it, sayin' to myselfit was business. But I'd got off the road meantime, and had to findit again, and whenever I got back to the track and was pointed for hishouse, it all seemed to come back on me and set me off agin. When thathad happened three times, I turned round and started for home."
"And do you mean to say," said the lady, with a discordant laugh, "thatyou believe, because YOU didn't go there and break the news, that nobodyelse will? That he won't hear of it from the first man he meets?"
"He don't meet any one up where he lives, and only Briggs and myselfknow it, and I'll see that Briggs don't tell. But it was mighty queerthis whole thing comin' upon me suddenly,--wasn't it?"
"Very queer," replied the lady; "for"--with the same metalliclaugh--"you don't seem to be given to this kind of weakness with yourown family."
If there was any doubt as to the sarcastic suggestion of her voice,there certainly could be none in the wicked glitter of her eyes fixedupon his face under her shading hand. But haply he seemed unconscious ofboth, and even accepted her statement without an ulterior significance.
"Yes," he said, communingly, to the glaring embers of the hearth, "itmust have been a special revelation."
There was something so fatuous and one-idea'd in his attitude andexpression, so monstrously inconsistent and inadequate to what was goingon around him, and so hopelessly stupid--if a mere simulation--that theangry suspicion that he was acting a part slowly faded from her eyes,and a hysterical smile began to twitch her set lips. She still gazedat him. The wind howled drearily in the chimney; all that was economic,grim, and cheerless in the room seemed to gather as flitting shadowsaround that central figure. Suddenly she arose with such a quickrustling of her skirts that he lifted his eyes with a start; for shewas standing immediately before him, her hands behind her, her handsome,audacious face bent smilingly forward, and her bold, brilliant eyeswithin a foot of his own.
"Now, Mr. Hays, do you want to know what this warning or specialrevelation of yours REALLY meant? Well, it had nothing whatever to dowith that man on the summit. No. The whole interest, gist, and meaningof it was simply this, that you should turn round and come straightback here and"--she drew back and made him an exaggerated theatricalcurtsey--"have the supreme pleasure of making MY acquaintance! That wasall. And now, as you've HAD IT, in five minutes I must be off. You'veoffered me already your horse and sleigh to go to the summit. I acceptit and go! Good-by!"
He knew nothing of a woman's coquettish humor; he knew still less ofthat mimic stage from which her present voice, gesture, and expressionwere borrowed; he had no knowledge of the burlesque emotions which thatvoice, gesture, and expression were supposed to portray, and finally andfatally he was unable to detect the feminine hysteric jar and discordthat underlay it all. He thought it was strong, characteristic, andreal, and accepted it literally. He rose.
"Ef you allow you can't stay, why I'll go and get the horse. I reckon heain't bin put up yet."
"Do, please."
He grimly resumed his coat and hat and disappeared through the passageinto the kitchen, whence, a moment later, Zuleika came flying.
"Well, what has happened?" she said eagerly.
"It's all right," said the woman quickly, "though he knows nothing yet.But I've got things fixed generally, so that he'll be quite ready tohave it broken to him by this time to-morrow. But don't you say anythingtill I've seen Jack and you hear from HIM. Remember."
She spoke rapidly; her cheeks were quite glowing from some suddenenergy; so were Zuleika's with the excitement of curiosity. Presentlythe sound of sleigh-bells again filled the room. It was Hays leading thehorse and sleigh to the door, beneath a sky now starlit and crispunder a northeast wind. The fair stranger cast a significant glance atZuleika, and whispered hurriedly, "You know he must not come with me.You must keep him here."
She ran to the door muffled and hooded, leaped into the sleigh, andgathered up the reins.
"But you cannot go alone," said Hays, with awkward courtesy. "I waskalkilatin'"--
"You're too tired to go out again, dad," broke in Zuleika's voicequickly. "You ain't fit; you're all gray and krinkly now, like as whenyou had one of your last spells. She'll send the sleigh back to-morrow."
"I can find my way," said the lady briskly; "there's only one turn off,I believe, and that"--
"Leads to the stage station three miles west. You needn't be afraid ofgettin' off on that, for you'll likely see the down stage crossin' yourroad ez soon ez you get clear of the ranch."
"Good-night," said the lady. An arc of white spray sprang before theforward runner, and the sleigh vanished in the road.
Father and daughter returned to the office.
"You didn't get to know her, dad, did ye?" queried Zuleika.
"No," responded Hays gravely, "except to see she wasn't no backwoods ormountaineering sort. Now, there's the kind of woman, Zuly, as knows herown mind and yours too; that a man like your brother Jack oughter pickout when he marries."
Zuleika's face beamed behind her father. "You ain't goin' to sit up anylonger, dad?" she said, as she noticed him resume his seat by the fire."It's gettin' late, and you look mighty tuckered out with your night'swork."
"Do you know what she said, Zuly?" returned her father, after a pause,which turned out to have been a long, silent laugh.
"No."
"She said," he repeated slowly, "that she reckoned I came back hereto-night to have the pleasure of her acquaintance!" He brought histwo hands heavily down upon his knees, rubbing them down deliberatelytowards his ankles, and leaning forward with his face to the fire and along-sustained smile of complete though tardy appreciation.
He was still in this attitude when Zuleika left him. The wind croonedover him confidentially, but he still sat there, given up apparently tosome posthumous enjoyment of his visitor's departing witticism.
It was scarcely daylight when Zuleika, while dressing, heard a quicktapping upon her shutter. She opened it to the scared and bewilderedface of her brother.
"What happened with her and father last night?" he said hoarsely.
"Nothing--why?"
"Read that. It was brought to me half an hour ago by a man in dad'ssleigh, from the stage station."
He handed her a crumpled note with trembling fingers. She took it andread:--
"The game's up and I'm out of it! Take my advice and clear out of ittoo, until you can come back in better shape. Don't be such a fool asto try and follow me. Your father isn't one, and that's where you'veslipped up."
"He shall pay for it, whatever he's done," said her brother with anaccess of wild passion. "Where is he?"
"Why, Jack, you wouldn't dare to see him now?"
"Wouldn't I?" He turned and ran, convulsed with passion, before thewindows towards the front of the house. Zuleika slipped out of herbedroom and ran to her father's room. He was not there. Already shecould hear her brother hammering frantically against the locked front
door.
The door of the office was partly open. Her father was still there.Asleep? Yes, for he had apparently sunk forward before the cold hearth.But the hands that he had always been trying to warm were colder thanthe hearth or ashes, and he himself never again spoke nor stirred.
*****
It was deemed providential by the neighbors that his youngest andfavorite son, alarmed by news of his father's failing health, hadarrived from the Atlantic States just at the last moment. But it wasthought singular that after the division of the property he entirelyabandoned the Ranch, and that even pending the division his beautifulbut fastidious Eastern bride declined to visit it with her husband.