The Heart of Thunder Mountain Part 32

"It's getting late, Robert," she said, s.h.i.+vering a little.

"So it is," he replied. "And you've no warm wrap for the night air."

He drew the lap-robe around her, and started the automobile. Through the gathering night they drove, almost without speaking, to Huntington's, where the best supper that Claire could contrive from the limited stores at her disposal awaited the prodigal. There was naturally some constraint at table. Huntington had made his peace with Hillyer, having apologized humbly, and expatiated on the cause of his wrath. But he did not know how he stood with Marion, who had been a long time in the camp of the enemy, and who doubtless knew too of his speech about her trunks. He had not dared to ask Hillyer whether he had related that incident to her, and he felt the need of extreme discretion until he should discover what kind of a rod she had in pickle for him, or, at any rate, until the time should be propitious to tell her that he was sorry for his conduct. Marion was tired, and disinclined to talk, while Hillyer, on his side, had his mind fully occupied, between his deal in mines and his deal in love, in both of which he had encountered unexpected difficulties. Only Claire was gay and untroubled, and she accepted eagerly the task of saving the party from awkward silences. For once in many moons she was allowed to talk unchecked, and she made the most of her opportunity.

After supper, Marion announced her purpose to go to bed at once. She was sure, she declared, that she could sleep "around the clock."

"I'll be off before you're up, then," said Hillyer.

"You must go to-morrow?" asked Claire.

"Absolutely. It means thousands."

"Then we'll sit on the veranda a few minutes," said Marion. "Not long, though. I'm dreadfully sleepy."

It was not long. They found they had little to say to each other, since the one subject of which both were thinking, each from a different point of view, was tacitly barred. And Hillyer soon saw that Marion was sorely in need of rest.

"Go to bed now, dear girl!" he said presently. "And please take good care of yourself. I want to see the color back in your cheeks when I return."

"I will, Robert," she answered. "I'll be quite all right in a day or two."

"And you--don't really think of staying here all winter?" he ventured to ask diffidently.

"No," she replied. "That's hardly possible."

"Then good-by--until you hear my horn in the road down yonder."

"Good-by, Robert, and good luck!"

She gave him both her hands, for a moment, with a tenderness that lingered with him far on his way.

CHAPTER XVII

INTERLUDE

August ripened into September, and the Park underwent a subtle and fascinating change. In the meadows the hay lay in long windrows, golden green; on the slopes vermilion flowers succeeded blue; in the sunsets tender pinks yielded to burnt orange and vivid red. The nights had grown perceptibly colder, but the days were still warm and dry and radiant, though with a tang in the air that stirred the blood. And a thousand perfumes, known and unknown, distilled from meadow and field and forest, scented every vagrant breeze.

Marion was soon herself again, in body if not in mind. A few long nights of sleep, a few days in the saddle, and sufficient nourishment (for she had neglected herself at Haig's, despite Jim's solicitude) restored her physically to what she had been on the day of Haig's accident. But she, too, had changed, and as subtly as the season.

"What's come over Marion?" asked Huntington of Claire one day, after he had caught himself regarding her with the rapt interest of a discoverer.

Claire looked at him pityingly. She knew, but she was not going to tell him.

"Why?" she asked innocently.

"Well, I don't exactly know," he replied doubtfully. "She's prettier than ever--but so are you. That isn't it. She's kind of--It's no use.

I don't know."

Claire laughed, and then became severe.

"That's because she's forgiven you," she said.

"No, it isn't!" he a.s.severated, not without embarra.s.sment. "You can see for yourself that she's different."

"Very well!" she retorted maliciously. "Perhaps if you'd done such a n.o.ble thing as nursing Haig back to life you'd be different too."

"I'd see him in--"

"Shame!" she cried. "You wouldn't do anything of the kind. Your bark's worse than your bite, sir. And besides, while I think of it, you really must stop saying 'h.e.l.l' and 'd.a.m.n' so much. The habit's growing on you."

Having no ready answer to that speech, he merely looked at her, perhaps a little guiltily, then bent down and kissed her, and hurried out of the house. He was, in truth, though he never would have had the courage to acknowledge it, even to Claire, ashamed of himself, and anxious too. His inflammable temper had rather out-flamed itself in its last-recorded performance, and he had begun to suspect that it had been responsible for some, though by no means all, of his troubles.

The killing of Haig's bull, he now realized, was a foolish and indefensible act, which could be traced easily to him because of the bull that was gored; and he must prepare to account to Haig for it.

And so, knowing that he would again be in the wrong, as in the affair at the post-office, he was torn between accentuated bitterness toward Haig and growing discontent with himself. He would never be afraid of Haig, but he was becoming steadily more afraid of Marion. Whether it was that he had really developed intuition, which told him of Marion's spiritual growth, or that he was in constant dread lest she make some new demand upon him in regard to Haig, he lived in much awe of her.

She had once spoken, on a memorable occasion, of making peace between Haig and himself. It would be just like her, wouldn't it, to try to bring them together? Well, let her try it! He would be the last man in Paradise Park. And so on, until he was once more almost satisfied with himself.

The faithful Smythe, meanwhile, brought Marion almost daily news of Philip. That he was rapidly recovering she heard with a ringing joy, which had its alloy of fear; for she knew that the day he felt himself to be in full possession of his powers he would attempt again to conquer Sunnysides. So from day to day her apprehension mounted until it became well-nigh insupportable. And her own helplessness maddened her. What could she do? Nothing! Nothing but wait, and pray G.o.d to protect him. Every night she prayed for him, and every morning, on her knees; and every hour the prayer was in her heart. She rode sometimes as far as the farther edge of the woods that crowned the ridge, and looked long at the little valley, and at the smoke rising in a thin spiral from the ranch house that she could not see. At the right of it would be the cottage, and at the left the barn, and the corral where Sunnysides bided his time. And then, having looked until she could endure no more, she would ride slowly home, to await the next coming of Smythe with news.

Once she went to the glade of the columbines. She did not feel any longer the antipathy she once felt to the spot that had, in one devastating moment, revealed to her the fatuity of her dreams. Now she was in search of the old hopes that she had once revelled in, while she gathered armloads of columbines, and imagined they were for Philip.

Dismounting eagerly at the foot of the little hill, she plunged through the brush, and halted at the margin of the glade, stricken with the keenest disappointment. The columbines were gone; only a brave, pale blossom here and there lingered pathetically in a waste of dried and drooping stems. She stood staring at them a moment; then, with a cry, she threw herself down among them, and gave herself up to grief, letting the tears come in what flood they would, while her hand clutched one poor survivor of the summer glory.

Gone, then, like the summer, were all those dreams. And very soon must come the end of all. Barely two weeks remained to her in the Park,--barely two weeks in which the miracle that she awaited could be wrought. What miracle could move him when her love had failed? And yet--Once, in her desperation, she suggested to Claire and Seth that she should remain all winter in the Park; but they rose up together against any such scheme. It was absurd, they agreed. They would be delighted to have her with them as many summers as she might wish; and they were already counting on her return to them next June. But the Park in winter was no place for a woman, unless she had been long inured to such hards.h.i.+ps as were involved in that hibernation. Claire had remained two winters there, it was true, but Seth had vowed that she should never miss the last stage again. Marion's proposal only clinched the matter the more firmly; and it was eventually agreed that Claire should go with Marion to New York, where they would live very quietly, taking what pleasures their means would permit, until spring should bring them back to the mountains. And so, barring a miracle, she was at the end of her hopes.

Meanwhile, she had heard from Robert. He was nearly wild, he wrote.

The big deal was going slowly--not badly, but with maddening delays.

He was tempted to "chuck the whole business," though it meant thousands, perhaps half a million. Yet how could he do that? He was working for her; and if he left Denver the deal would certainly fall through. But there was yet time; any day the stubborn partner might yield; and so on. Poor Robert! thought Marion. She imagined what Philip would have done if he had wanted her as Robert did. Would any deal, any prospect of millions, have kept him away from her? So she reasoned, forgetting entirely the other side of the case. Haig, if she could have asked him, would have told her: yes, that's all very well, but the man would have to get those thousands or other thousands afterwards, just the same; a woman wants to have her cake and eat it too; and so much the worse for the man if he cannot dance attendance on her and make money for her at the same time!

She wrote to Robert that be must not think of leaving his business.

Moreover, she would soon be in Denver, on her way back home.

In the late afternoon Haig leaned against Sunnysides' corral, smoking his pipe and gazing fixedly at the golden outlaw. The air was very still, almost too still, as if nature had paused before a sudden and violent alteration of her mood. In the bright sky, a little hard even for September, there was no cloud, except on the western horizon, where dark vapors hovered over the bald head of Thunder Mountain. The scent of the harvest in the meadows blended with the odor of burning pine that came from the ranch house, where Flick built the fire for supper. On the hill the pines were still, but the brook babbled on, and there was an incessant low twittering of birds in the cottonwoods.

Haig had now fully recovered. He had taken to his horse again some days before, to ride a little the first day, and more the next, each day adding something to his exercise, until he felt the blood running warmly in his veins, and his muscles tightening at his will. Then he had hardened himself with every kind of labor around the ranch. For he was impatient to remove the stigma of doubt that Sunnysides had burned into his soul. He had told Marion that she was incapable of understanding why he must conquer Sunnysides. He was not sure that he understood it himself. But he knew that he must. Ever since that day when he had fled into the world he had fought to be master of himself; and his way of being master of himself was to be master of every man and every animal and every obstacle that appeared across his path,--that irresponsible, uncharted path that had neither beginning nor end, that led he knew not where nor cared. Every moment was a moment to itself, and every day was its own if he had done what he had set out to do. His one purpose in life was not to be beaten, never to fail, though he should throw away to-morrow what he had won to-day.

So it was that to conquer Sunnysides was for the moment the one thing that counted, and he would have no rest until it was done.

Twilight settled down upon the valley. Haig's pipe went out, and still he stood gazing at Sunnysides. In the dusk the horse glowed like a living jewel that holds the light when the sun has gone. Night fell, and the golden hide became a s.h.i.+mmer in the dark, as the outlaw moved restlessly to and fro in his prison. Then, of a sudden, with the unexpectedness and unreason of a dog's wolf-howl at the rising moon, there rose from the gloom of the corral a shrill, wild neigh that shattered the peaceful silence of the night.

Haig left the fence, and walked swiftly to the barn.

"Farris.h.!.+" he said shortly. "We'll break Sunnysides to-morrow. Tell Pete and Curly not to ride away in the morning. The cattle can wait."

CHAPTER XVIII