The Land of Strong Men Part 83

"I am sorry," he said again.

"I understand," she said. "You are sorry that it had to be. I knew what might happen if the boys were overtaken. It was inevitable. Well, they made their choice and took their chance, and it went against them. I think Gavin will tell me more than you have told me--some day. Well, this is the end of a good many things. I was merely waiting for word.

To-morrow I am going away."

"There is no need. If you would stay with us--"

"I am just as grateful, but it is best not."

"It may be," he admitted. "Is there anything I can do?"

"If you would take Finn? He's too lively for Faith, but he's a good horse. I hate to sell him to a stranger."

"I will buy him."

"You will not buy him. Are you too proud to do me that kindness?"

"No. I will take him and give him a good home all his life."

"Thank you."

"For taking the gift of a good horse?"

"You know better. Finn and I were friends. He--he may miss me a little."

For the first time her voice was not quite steady. "To feel that way about a horse!" she said scornfully. "Well, it's something to be missed--even by a horse."

"I shall miss you," Angus told her. Her eyes rested on him gravely for a long moment.

"I know what you mean," she said. "You liked me because I was a frank sort of individual. You may think of me now and then, when there is nothing else on your mind. But as for missing me--pshaw! n.o.body will miss me. I had no friends."

It was brutally true. Kathleen French, highly organized, sensitive, proud, had repelled friends.h.i.+ps. She had hidden real loneliness under a cloak of indifference. Apparently sufficient unto herself, others had taken her at her own apparent valuation. Her voice was tinged with bitterness. Angus realized vaguely a part of the truth.

"I don't think anybody thought you wanted friends."

"Everybody wants friends," she returned. "Often the people who want them most have not the knack of making them. But I am not complaining. I have always been able to take my medicine without making a very bad face."

"You are a clean, straight, game girl," he said. "One of these days you will marry, and your husband will be a lucky man."

She smiled for the first time, but her mouth twitched slightly.

"I am game enough," she said. "I suppose that goes with the breed--like other things. Oh, yes, I am game enough to run true under punishment.

But as for marrying--I don't think so. I was in love once--or thought I was."

"I didn't know about that," Angus said in surprise. "I'm sorry I said anything."

"No, of course you didn't know. n.o.body did--not even the man in the case. He married another girl."

"He lost a mighty fine wife," Angus said.

"That's nice of you. But heaven knows what sort of wife I'd have made.

The girl he married will suit him better. And now I mustn't keep you, Angus. Faith will be waiting. I won't see either of you again. She hasn't much cause to love me or mine, but she has never shown it by word or look. She is real, Angus, and I hope you will be very happy, both of you, all through life. Some day--oh, a long time hence, when the things that are so real and hard now have been dimmed and softened by the years--I may see you both again. Till then--good-by."

Angus took her strong, firm hand in his, and looked into her somber eyes.

"Good-by," he said, "and thank you for your good wishes. Good luck to you and to Gavin. Tell him that. And remember that anything I can do at any time for either you or him will be done cheerfully."

"I will remember," she said. "I wish you and Gavin had known each other better. You would have been friends. You are both real men."

She knew nothing of Gavin's connection with his father's death, for that was one of several things he had not told her. Another was that he had lied to Bush. He had said that he had found no trace of Gavin. Kathleen stood beside him as he mounted, and when, having ridden a few hundred yards, he turned in the saddle and glanced back she was still standing where he had left her, motionless.

But as the French ranch vanished from view Angus drew a long breath. It was more than the relief from the performance of an unpleasant duty. A chapter seemed to have closed, the old order of things ended, a new one begun.

Already the shadows were falling, the hills purple black against the west. Well, he would be home as fast as a good horse could carry him.

Turkey would have told Faith, and she would be waiting for him. He shook the big, gaunted chestnut into a fast lope.

But at a sharp bend he met Faith, almost riding her down.

"Why, old girl!" he cried, while Chief's hoofs slid and grooved the trail and the reliable Doughnut side-stepped expertly. "This is fine!"

"I couldn't wait," she said. "I have been waiting too long already. So when Turkey came home I came to meet you."

"We had to travel slowly. And somebody had to tell Kathleen. I thought it was better that I should."

"I am very sorry for her."

"So am I. But tell me about yourself. How does it feel to be a gra.s.s widow?"

"I'm not going to tell you. I've been worried. I suppose I've been silly. But Jean will tell you all about that. She was aways telling me not to worry, cheering me up."

"Has she made it up with Chetwood yet?"

"Well, my goodness!" Faith exclaimed.

"Why, they're not married, are they?"

"No. Why, it went clean out of my mind, but this afternoon when I saw Turkey coming, I ran down to meet him and came around the corner of the wagon shed, and there the two of them were. And they looked as if they had been--well, you know."

"Kissing each other?"

"Yes, it looked like that."

But the ranch came in sight, its broad, fertile acres dim in the fading light. The smell of the fresh earth of fall plowing struck the nostrils, and a tang of wood smoke from new clearing. From the corrals came the voices of cattle. A colt whinnied in youthful falsetto for his dam. All sounds carried far in the hush of evening.

"Seems odd to think this will be broken up," Angus said. "Houses and streets on the good land; maybe a church on that knoll, a school over yonder. I ought to be glad, because it means money. But I'm not."

"I know," his wife nodded wisely. "I've been a wanderer and a city dweller most of my life, but I can understand how the one spot on all the earth may claim a man. And you'll always want a ranch, and stock, and wide s.p.a.ces, no matter how much money you have. Oh, yes, boy, I know."

"I guess you are right," he admitted. "I grew up that way. Well, there's plenty of time to think it over. I can take another crop off this." He lifted his head and sniffed the air. "Old girl," he said, "I believe I smell grub--real grub--cooking. And I haven't had a real meal for three days. We were sort of shy coming out, you know."