Thrice Armed Part 36

"No," he said, "I don't think it's unexpected; you knew what I meant from the beginning."

This was, as a matter of fact, correct, but the color grew plainer in Eleanor's cheek. She had known exactly what her companion's advances were worth, and at times it had cost her a strenuous effort to hold her anger in check. It was, however, characteristic of her that she had made the effort.

"After that, I think it would save both of us trouble if you understood once for all that I will not go," she said.

Carnforth laughed harshly, while his face flushed with ill-suppressed pa.s.sion. "Pshaw! you don't mean it. For several months you have led me on, and now that I'm yours altogether, I'm not going to California without you. You know that, too; you have to go."

"You have had your answer," and Eleanor rose and faced him with portentous quietness. "Don't make me say anything more."

The man moved forward suddenly, and laid a hot grasp on her wrist. There was as yet no dismay in his face, and it was very evident that he would not believe her. There were excuses for him, and the fact that it was so roused the girl, who remembered what her part had been, to almost uncontrollable anger.

"You are going to say that you are willing and coming with me, if I have to make you," he said fiercely. "I mean just that, and I am not afraid of you, though at times one can see something in your eyes that would scare off most men. It's there now, but it's one of the things that make me want you. Eleanor, put an end to this. You know you have me altogether--isn't that enough? Do you want to drive me mad?"

He stopped a moment, and broke into a harsh laugh as the girl, with a strength he had not looked for, shook off his grasp. "Oh," he said, "it seems I've gone on too fast. I'll fix about the wedding soon as I break with Merril."

There was certainly something in Eleanor Wheelock's eyes just then that few people would have cared to face. The vindictive hatred she bore Merril had for the time being driven every womanly attribute out of her, but she remembered how she had loathed this man's advances and endured them. To carry out her purpose she would, indeed, have stooped to anything, for her hatred had possessed her wholly and altogether. Now it was momentarily turned on her companion.

"It would have been wiser if you had made that clear first," she said, with a slow incisiveness that made the words cut like the lash of a whip. "Still, I suppose, the offer is generous, in view of the trouble you would very probably bring on yourself by attempting to carry it out."

The man appeared staggered for a moment, but he recovered himself.

"Well," he said, with a little forceful gesture, "there are parts of my record I can't boast about, but there are points on which you'd go 'way beyond me. That, I guess, is what got hold of me and won't let me go. By the Lord, Eleanor, nothing would be impossible to you and me if we pulled together."

"That will never happen," said the girl, still with a very significant quietness. "Don't force me to speak too plainly."

Carnforth appeared bewildered, for at last he was compelled to recognize that she meant what she said, but there was anger in his eyes.

"Well," he said stupidly, "what in the name of wonder did you want? You know you led me on."

"Perhaps I did. Now that I know what you are, I tell you to go. Had you been any other man I might have felt some slight compunction, or, at least, a little kindliness toward you. As it is, I am only longing to shake off the contamination you have brought upon me."

She broke off with a little gesture of relief, and moving toward the window flung the shutters back.

"They have finished chopping, and I hear the ox-team in the bush," she said. "Forster will be here in a minute or two."

Carnforth stood still, irresolute, though his face was darkly flushed; and Eleanor felt the silence become oppressive as she wondered whether the rancher would come back to the house or lead his team on into the bush. Then the trample of the slowly moving oxen's feet apparently reached her companion, for with a little abrupt movement he took up his wide hat from the table. He waited a few moments, however, crumpling the brim of it in one hand, while Eleanor was conscious that her heart was beating unpleasantly fast as she watched for the first sign of Forster or his hired man among the dark fir-trunks. At last she heard her companion move toward the door, and when it swung to behind him she drew in her breath with a gasp of relief.

CHAPTER XXVII

JORDAN'S SCHEME

Carnforth had been gone some twenty minutes when Eleanor stood among the orchard gra.s.s, from which the ranks of blackened fir-stumps rose outside the ranch. She had recovered her composure, and was looking toward the dusty road which wound, a sinuous white ribbon, between the somber firs.

Jordan, whom she had not expected to see just then, was walking along it with Forster, and, since it was evident that he must have met Carnforth, she was wondering, with a somewhat natural shrinking from doing so, how far it would be necessary to take him into her confidence. This, as she recognized, must be done eventually; but she was not sure that her legitimate lover would be in a mood to understand or appreciate her course of action when fresh from a meeting with the one she had discarded. Jordan had laid very little restraint upon her, but he was, after all, human and had a temper.

She lost sight of the two men for a few minutes when they pa.s.sed behind a great colonnade of fir-trunks that partly obscured her view of the road, but she could see them plainly when they emerged again from the shadow. Instead of turning toward the house they came toward her, and there was, she noticed, a curious red mark on Jordan's cheek, as well as a broad smear of dust on his soft hat, which appeared somewhat crushed.

His attire was also disordered, and his face was darker in color than usual. Forster, who walked a pace or two behind him, because the path through the gra.s.s was narrow, also appeared disturbed in mind, and when they stopped close by the girl it was he who spoke first.

"I had gone down the road to see whether there was any sign of Mrs.

Forster when I came upon Mr. Jordan; and, considering how he was engaged, it is perhaps fortunate that I did," he said. "Although it is not exactly my business, I can't help fancying that you have something to say to him."

He went on, but he had said enough to leave Eleanor with a tolerably accurate notion of what had happened, and to make it clear that he was not altogether pleased. The rancher and his wife were easy-going, kindly people, with liberal views, but it was evident that their toleration would not cover everything. Then she turned to Jordan, who stood looking at her steadily with a certain hardness in his face, and the red mark showing very plainly on his cheek.

"Well," she said, "how did you get here?"

"On my feet," said Jordan. "There was little to do this afternoon in the city, and two or three things were worrying me. It struck me that I'd walk it off, and I'm glad I did."

"Ah!" said Eleanor, "won't you go on a little?'"

"It's what I mean to do. I met Carnforth driving away from here, and since the fact that he has been here quite often has been troubling me lately, I invited him to pull up right away. When he didn't do it I managed to get hold of the horses' heads, and went right across the road with them. Still, I stopped the team, and I was getting up to talk to Carnforth when Forster came along. I hated to see him then."

Somewhat to his astonishment, Eleanor laughed softly. "Forster persuaded you to abandon the--discussion?"

"He did. If there's a split up the back of my jacket, as I believe there is, he made it. Anyway, he wasn't quite pleased, and I don't blame him.

He and his wife have let you do 'most whatever you like, but, after all, you couldn't expect them to put up with everything."

"Or expect too much from you? You feel you have borne a good deal, Charley? Well, Forster was right in one respect. We have something to say to each other, and it may take a little time. There is a big fir he has just chopped yonder."

She walked slowly toward the fallen tree, and seated herself on a great branch before she turned to the man who was about to take a place beside her.

"No," she said, "you can stand there, Charley, where I can see you. To commence with, how much confidence have you in me?"

"All that a man could have;" and there was no doubt about Jordan's sincerity. "Still, I don't like Carnforth. He's not fit for you to talk to, and I can't have him coming here. In fact, I'll see that he doesn't.

I've wanted to say this for quite a while, but it would have pleased me better to say it first to him. That's one reason why I feel it's particularly unfortunate Forster didn't stay away a minute or two longer."

A faint tinge of color crept into Eleanor's cheek, but she looked at him with a smile.

"Charley," she said, "I am a little sorry too that Forster came along when he did. I don't know that it's what every girl would say, but I think if you had thrashed that man to within an inch of his life it would have pleased me."

She stopped for a moment, and the color grew a trifle plainer in her face, though there was no wavering in her gaze. "I want you to understand that I knew just what that man was--and still I led him on.

It is a little hard to speak of; but one has to be honest, and when it is necessary I think both of us can face an unpleasant thing. Well, I encouraged him because I couldn't see how I was to attain my object any other way. Still, you mustn't suppose it cost me nothing. It hurt all the time--hurt me horribly--and now I almost feel that I shall never shake off the contamination."

The man, who did not know yet what her purpose was, realized that the task she had undertaken must have heavily taxed her strength and courage. He knew that she was vindictive, and one who was not addicted to counting the cost, but he also knew that there was a certain Puritanical pride in her which must have rendered the part she had played almost insufferably repulsive. His face burned as he thought of it, and he drew in his breath with a curious little gasp while he gazed at her with a look in his eyes that sent a thrill of dismay through her.

"Oh!" she said, "don't ask, Charley. I couldn't bear that from you. I--I kept him at a due distance all the time."

Jordan's tense face relaxed. "I can't forgive Forster for coming along when he did," he said. "Eleanor, you have courage enough for anything.

In one way, it isn't natural."

"You have felt that now and then?"

The man said nothing for almost a minute, for he was still a little shaken by what she had told him. It had roused him to fierce resentment and brought the blood to his face, but he now recognized that there were respects in which the momentary dismay of which he had been sensible was groundless. She had given him sympathy and encouragement freely, and at times had shown him a certain half-reserved tenderness, but very little more, and he felt that it should have been quite clear to him that she had unbent no further toward the stranger. Then he straightened himself as he looked at her.

"My dear," he said, "I needn't tell you there is n.o.body on this earth I would place beside you."

Eleanor smiled wistfully. "Ah!" she said, "I like to hear you say that, though it is, of course, foolish of you; and perhaps I shall change and be gentler and more like other women some day. Still, that wouldn't be advisable just now. We must wait, and in the meanwhile there are other things to think of. Listen for a minute, and you will understand why I led Carnforth on. He is, of course, never coming here again."