Winston of the Prairie Part 35

"Still," persisted Winston, and the girl checked him with a smile.

"I fancy you are wasting time," she said. "Now, I wonder whether, when you were in England, you ever saw a play founded on an incident in the life of a once famous actor. At the time it rather appealed to me.

The hero, with a chivalric purpose a.s.sumed various shortcomings he had really no sympathy with--but while there is, of course, no similarity beyond the generous impulse, between the cases--he did not do it clumsily. It is, however, a trifle difficult to understand what purpose you could have, and one cannot help fancying that you owe a little to Silverdale and yourself."

It was a somewhat daring parallel, for Winston, who dare not look at his companion and saw that he had failed, knew the play.

"Isn't the subject a trifle difficult?" he asked.

"Then," said Maud Barrington, "we will end it. Still, you promised that I should understand--a good deal--when the time came."

Winston nodded gravely. "You shall," he said.

Then, somewhat to his embarra.s.sment, the two figures moved further across the window, and as they were silhouetted against the blue duskiness, he saw that there was an arm about the waist of the girl's white dress. He became sensible that Maud Barrington saw it too, and then that, perhaps to save the situation, she was smiling. The two figures, however, vanished, and a minute later a young girl in a long white dress came in, and stood still, apparently dismayed when she saw Maud Barrington. She did not notice Winston, who sat further in the shadow. He, however, saw her face suddenly crimson.

"Have you been here long?" she asked.

"Yes," said Maud Barrington, with a significant glance towards the window. "At least ten minutes. I am sorry, but I really couldn't help it. It was very hot in the other room, and Allender was singing."

"Then," said the girl, with a little tremor in her voice, "you will not tell?"

"No," said Maud Barrington. "But you must not do it again."

The girl stooped swiftly and kissed her, then recoiled with a gasp when she saw the man, but Maud Barrington laughed.

"I think," she said, "I can answer for Mr. Courthorne's silence.

Still, when I have an opportunity, I am going to lecture you."

Winston turned with a twinkle he could not quite repress in his eyes, and with a flutter of her dress the girl whisked away.

"I'm afraid this makes me an accessory, but I can only neglect my manifest duty, which would be to warn her mother," said Maud Barrington.

"Is it a duty?" asked Winston, feeling that the further he drifted away from the previous topic the better it would be for him.

"Some people would fancy so," said his companion, "Lily will have a good deal of money, by and by, and she is very young. Atterly has nothing but an unprofitable farm; but he is an honest lad, and I know she is very fond of him."

"And would that count against the dollars?"

Maud Barrington laughed a little. "Yes," she said quietly. "I think it would if the girl is wise. Even now such things do happen, but I fancy it is time I went back again."

She moved away, but Winston stayed where he was until the lad came in with a cigar in his hand.

"Hallo, Courthorne!" he said. "Did you notice anybody pa.s.s the window a little while ago?"

"You are the first to come in through it," said Winston dryly. "The kind of things you wear admit of climbing."

The lad glanced at him with a trace of embarra.s.sment.

"I don't quite understand you, but I meant a man," he said. "He was walking curiously, as if he was half-asleep, but he slipped round the corner of the building and I lost him."

Winston laughed. "There's a want of finish in the tale, but you needn't worry about me. I didn't see a man."

"There is rather less wisdom than usual in your remarks to-night, but I tell you I saw him," said the lad.

He pa.s.sed on, and a minute later there was a cry from the inner room.

"It's there again! Can't you see the face at the window?"

Winston was in the larger room next moment, and saw, as a startled girl had evidently done, a face that showed distorted and white to ghastliness through the window. He also recognized it, and running back through the hall was outside in another few seconds. Courthorne was leaning against one of the cas.e.m.e.nts as though faint with weakness or pain, and collapsed when Winston dragged him backwards into the shadow. He had scarcely laid him down when the window was opened, and Colonel Barrington's shoulders showed black against the light.

"Come outside alone, sir," said Winston.

Barrington did so, and Winston stood so that no light fell on the pallid face in the gra.s.s. "It's a man I have dealings with," he said.

"He has evidently ridden out from the settlement and fallen from his horse."

"Why should he fall?" asked the Colonel.

Winston laughed. "There is a perfume about him that is tolerably conclusive. I was, however, on the point of going, and if you will tell your hired man to get my wagon out, I'll take him away quietly.

You can make light of the affair to the others."

"Yes," said Barrington. "Unless you think the man is hurt, that would be best, but we'll keep him if you like."

"No, sir. I couldn't trouble you," said Winston hastily. "Men of his kind are also very hard to kill."

Five minutes later he and the hired man hoisted Courthorne into the wagon and packed some hay about him, while, soon after the rattle of wheels sank into the silence of the prairie, the girl Maud Barrington had spoken to rejoined her companion.

"Could Courthorne have seen you coming in?" he asked.

"Yes," said the girl, blus.h.i.+ng. "He did."

"Then it can't be helped, and, after all, Courthorne wouldn't talk, even if he wasn't what he is," said the lad. "You don't know why, and I'm not going to tell you, but it wouldn't become him."

"You don't mean Maud Barrington?" asked his companion.

"No," said the lad, with a laugh. "Courthorne is not like me. He has no sense. It's quite another kind of girl, you see."

CHAPTER XXII

COLONEL BARRINGTON IS CONVINCED

It was not until early morning that Courthorne awakened from the stupor he sank into soon after Winston conveyed him into his homestead.

First, however, he asked for a little food, and ate it with apparent difficulty. When Winston came in he looked up from the bed where he lay, with the dust still white upon his clothing, and his face showed gray and haggard in the creeping light.

"I'm feeling a trifle better now," he said; "still, I scarcely fancy I could get up just yet. I gave you a little surprise last night?"

Winston nodded. "You did. Of course, I knew how much your promise was worth, but in view of the risks you ran, I had not expected you to turn up at the Grange."