_ CHAPTER XV. MRS. YORKE MAKES A MATCH
The next day Keith was able to sit up, though the Doctor refused to let him go out of the house. He was alone in his room when a messenger announced that a woman wished to see him. When the visitor came up it was Terpy. She was in a state of suppressed excitement. Her face was white, her eyes glittered. Her voice as she spoke was tremulous with emotion.
"They're on to him," she said in a husky voice. "That man that comed over on the stage with you give a description of him, this mornin', 't made 'em tumble to him after we had throwed 'em off the track. If I ever git a show at him! They knows 'twas Bill. That little devil Dennison is out ag'in."
"Oh, they won't catch him," said Keith; but as he spoke his face changed. "What if he should get drunk and come into town?" he asked himself.
"If they git him, they'll hang him," pursued the girl, without heeding him. "They're all up. You are so popular.
"Me?" exclaimed Keith, laughing.
"It's so," said the girl, gravely. "That Dave Dennison would kill anybody for you, and they're ag'in' Bill, all of 'em."
"Can't you get word to him?" began Keith, and paused. He looked at her keenly. "You must keep him out of the way.'
"He's wounded. You got him in the shoulder. He's got to see a doctor. The ball's still in there."
"I knew it," said Keith, quietly.
The girl gazed at him a moment, and then looked away.
"That was the reason I have been a-pesterin' you, goin' back'ards and for'ards. I hope you will excuse me of it," she said irrelevantly.
Keith sat quite still for a moment, as it all came over him. It was, then, him that the man was after, not robbery, and this girl, unable to restrain her discarded suitor without pointing suspicion to him, had imperilled her life for Keith, when he was conceited enough to more than half accept the hints of strangers that she cared for him.
"We must get him away," he said, rising painfully. "Where is he?"
"He's hid in a house down the road. I have flung 'em off the track by abusin' of him. They know I am against him, and they think I am after you," she said, looking at him with frank eyes; "and I have been lettin' 'em think it," she added quietly.
Keith almost gasped. Truly this girl was past his comprehension.
"We must get him away," he said.
"How can we do it?" she asked. "They suspicion he's here, and the pickets are out. If he warn't hit in the shoulder so bad, he could fight his way out. He ain't afraid of none of 'em," she added, with a flash of the old pride. "I could go with him and help him; I have done it before; but I would have to break up here. He's got to see a doctor."
Keith sat in reflection for a moment.
"Tim Gilsey is going to drive the stage over to Eden to-night. Go down and see if the places are all taken."
"I have got a place on it," she said, "on the boot."
As Keith looked at her, she added in explanation:
"I take it regular, so as to have it when I want it."
Under Keith's glance she turned away her eyes.
"I am going to Eden to-night," said Keith.
She looked puzzled.
"If you could get old Tim to stop at that house for five minutes till I give Bluffy a letter to Dr. Balsam over at the Springs, I think we might arrange it. My clothes will fit him. You will have to see Uncle Tim."
Her countenance lit up.
"You mean you would stop there and let him take your place?"
"Yes."
The light of craft that must have been in Delilah's eyes when Samson lay at her feet was in her face. She sprang up.
"I will never forgit you, and Bill won't neither. He knows now what a hound he has been. When you let him off last night after he had slipped on the rock, he says that was enough for him. Before he will ever pull a pistol on you ag'in, he says he will blow his own brains out; and he will, or I will for him." She looked capable of it as she stood with glowing eyes and after a moment held out her hand. She appeared about to speak, but reflected and turned away.
When the girl left Keith's room a few moments later, she carried a large bundle under her arm, and that night the stage stopped in the darkness at a little shanty at the far end of the fast-growing street, and Keith descended painfully and went into the house. Whilst the stage waited, old Tim attempted to do something to the lamp on that side, and in turning it down he put it out. Just then Keith, with his arm in a sling and wrapped in a heavy coat, came out, and was helped by old Tim up to the seat beside him. The stage arrived somewhat ahead of time at the point which the railroad had now reached, and old Tim, without waiting for daylight, took the trouble to hire a buggy and send the wounded man on, declaring that it was important that he should get to a hospital as soon as possible.
Amusements were scarce in Gumbolt, and Ferdy Wickersham had been there only a day or two when, under Mr. Plume's guidance, he sought the entertainment of Terpsichore's Hall. He had been greatly struck by Terpy that night on the road, when she had faced down the men and had afterwards bound up Keith's arm. He had heard from Plume rumors of her frequent trips over the road and jests of her fancy for Keith. He would test it. It would break the monotony and give zest to the pursuit to make an inroad on Keith's preserve. When he saw her on the little stage he was astonished at her dancing. Why, the girl was an artist! As good a figure, as active a tripper, as high a kicker, as dainty a pair of ankles as he had seen in a long time, not to mention a keen pair of eyes with the devil peeping from them. To his surprise, he found Terpy stony to his advances. Her eyes glittered with dislike for him.
He became one of the highest players that had ever entered the gilded apartment on Terpsichore's second floor; he ordered more champagne than any man in Gumbolt; but for all this he failed to ingratiate himself with its presiding genius. Terpsichore still looked at him with level eyes in which was a cold gleam, and when she showed her white teeth it was generally to emphasize some gibe at him. One evening, after a little passage at arms, Wickersham chucked her under the chin and called her "Darling." Terpsichore wheeled on him.
"Keep your dirty hands to yourself" she said, with a flash in her eye, and gave him such a box on the ear as made his head ring. The men around broke into a guffaw.
Wickersham was more than angry; he was enraged. He had heard a score of men call her by endearing names. He had also seen some of them get the same return that he received; but none so vicious. He sprang to his feet, his face flushed. The next second his senses returned, and he saw that he must make the best of it.
"You vixen!" he said, with a laugh, and caught the girl by the wrist. "I will make you pay for that." As he tried to draw her to him, she whipped from her dress a small stiletto which she wore as an ornament, and drew it back.
"Let go, or I'll drive it into you," she said, with fire darting from her eyes; and Wickersham let go amid the laughter and jeers of those about them, who were egging the girl on and calling to her to "give it to him."
Wickersham after this tried to make his peace, but without avail. Though he did not know it, Terpsichore had in her heart a feeling of hate which was relentless. It was his description that had set the sheriff's posse on the track of her dissipated lover, and though she had "washed her hands of Bill Bluffy," as she said, she could not forgive the man who had injured him.
Then Wickersham, having committed one error, committed another. He tried to get revenge, and the man who sets out to get revenge on a woman starts on a sad journey. At least, it was so with Wickersham.
He attributed the snubbing he had received to the girl's liking for Keith, and he began to meditate how he should get even with them. The chance presented itself, as he thought, when one night he attended a ball at the Windsor. It was a gay occasion, for the Wickershams had opened their first mine, and Gumbolt's future was assured. The whole of Gumbolt was there--at least, all of those who did not side with Mr. Drummond, the Methodist preacher. Terpsichore was there, and Keith, who danced with her. She was the handsomest-dressed woman in the throng, and, to Wickersham's surprise, she was dressed with some taste, and her manners were quiet and subdued.
Toward morning the scene became hilarious, and a call was made for Terpsichore to give a Spanish dance. The girl held back, but her admirers were in no mood for refusal, and the call became insistent. Keith had gone to his room, but Wickersham was still there, and his champagne had flowed freely. At length the girl yielded, and, after a few words with the host of the Windsor, she stepped forward and began to dance.
She danced in such a way that the applause made the brass chandeliers ring. Even Wickersham, though he hated her, could not but admire her.
Keith, who had found it useless to try to sleep even in a remote corner of the hotel, returned just then, and whether it was that Terpsichore caught sight of him as she glanced his way, or that she caught sight of Wickersham's hostile face, she faltered and stopped suddenly.
Wickersham thought she had broken down, and, under the influence of the champagne, turned with a jeer to Plume.
"She can't dance, Plume," he called across to the editor, who was at some little distance in the crowd.
Those nearest to the dancer urged her to continue, but she had heard Wickersham's jeer, and she suddenly faced him and, pointing her long, bare arm toward him, said: "Put that man out, or I won't go on."
Wickersham gave a laugh. "Go on? You can't go on," he said, trying to steady himself on his feet. "You can't dance any more than a cow."
He had never heard before the hum of an angry crowd.
"Throw him out! Fling him out of the window!" were the words he caught.
In a second a score of men were about him, and more than a score were rushing in his direction with a sound that brought him quickly to his senses.
Fortunately two men with cool heads were near by. With a spring Keith and a short, stout young fellow with gray eyes were making their way to his side, dragging men back, throwing them aside, expostulating, ordering, and, before anything else had happened than the tearing of his coat half off of his back, Wickersham found himself with Keith and Dave Dennison standing in front of him, defending him against the angry revellers.
The determined air of the two officers held the assailants in check long enough for them to get their attention, and, after a moment, order was restored on condition that Wickersham should "apologize to the lady and leave town."
This Wickersham, well sobered by the handling he had received, was willing to do, and he was made to walk up and offer a humble apology to Terpsichore, who accepted it with but indifferent grace.
* * * * *
That winter the railroad reached Gumbolt, and Gumbolt, or New Leeds, as it was now called, sprang at once, so to speak, from a chrysalis to a full-fledged butterfly with wings unfolding in the sun of prosperity.
Lands that a year or two before might have been had for a song, and mineral rights that might have been had for less than a song, were now held at fabulous prices.
Keith was sitting at his table, one day, writing, when there was a heavy step outside, and Squire Rawson walked in on him.
When all matters of mutual interest had been talked over, the squire broached the real object of his visit; at least, he began to approach it. He took out his pipe and filled it.
"Well, it's come," he said.
"What has come?"
"The railroad. That young man Rhodes said 'twas comin', and so it's done. He was something of a prophet." The old fellow chuckled softly and lit his pipe. "That there friend of yours, Mr. Wickersham, is been down here ag'in. Kind o' hangs around. What's he up to?"
Keith laughed.
"Well, it's pretty hard to tell what Wickersham is up to,--at least, by what he says,--especially when you don't tell me what he is doing."
The old man looked pleased. Keith had let him believe that he did not know what he was talking of, and had expressed an opinion in which he agreed.
"That's what I think. Well, it's about my land up here."
Keith looked relived.
"Has he made you another offer for it?"
"No; he ain't done that, and he won't do it. That's what I tells him. If he wants it, let him make me a good offer; but he won't do that. He kind o' circles around like a pigeon before he lights, and talks about what I paid for it, and a hundred per cent. advance, and all that. I give a sight for that land he don't know nothin' about--years of hard work on the mountain-side, sweatin' o' days, and layin' out in the cold at nights, lookin' up at the stars and wonderin' how I was to git along--studin' of folks jest as I studied cattle. That's what I paid for that land. He wants me to set him a price, and I won't do that--he might give it." He looked shrewdly at Keith. "Ain't I right?"
"I think so."
"He wants me to let him have control of it; but I ain't a-goin' to do that neither."
"That's certainly right," said Keith, heartily.
"I tell him I'm a-goin' to hold to that for Phrony. Phrony says she wants me to sell it to him, too. But women-folks don't know about business."
Keith wondered what effect this piece of information had on Wickersham, and also what further design the old squire had in mind.
"I think it's about time to do something with that land. If all he says is true,--not about _my_ land (he makes out as _my_ land is situate too far away ever to be much account--fact is, he don't allow I've got any land; he says it's all his anyway), but about other lands--everybody else's land but mine,--it might be a good time to look around. I know as my land is the best land up here. I holds the key to the situation. That's what we used to call it durin' the war.
"Well, there ain't but three ways to git to them coal-lands back up yonder in the Gap: one's by way of heaven, and I 'lows there ain't many land-speculators goin' by that way; the other is through hell, a way they'll know more about hereafter; and the third's through my land."
Keith laughed and waited.
"He seems to be hangin' around Phrony pretty considerable?"
Keith caught the gleam in the old fellow's deep eye, and looked away.
"I can't make it out. Phrony she likes him."
Keith fastened his gaze on something out of the window.
"I don't know him," pursued the squire; "But I don't think--he'd suit Phrony. His ways ain't like ours, and--." He lapsed into reflection, and Keith, with his eyes still fastened on something outside the window, sighed to think of the old man's innocence. That he should imagine that Wickersham had any serious idea of marrying the granddaughter of a backwoods magistrate! The old squire broke the silence.
"You don't suppose he could be hankerin' after Phrony for her property, do you?"
"No, I do not," said Keith, positively, relieved that at last a question was put which he could answer directly.
"Because she ain't got any," asserted the squire. "She's got prospects; but I'm goin' to remove them. It don't do for a young woman to have too much prospects. I'm goin' to sell that land and git it down in cash, where I can do what I want with it. And I want you to take charge of it for me."
This, then, was the real object of his visit. He wanted Keith to take charge of his properties. It was a tempting offer to make Keith. The old man had been a shrewd negotiator.
There is no success so sweet as that which comes to a young man.
That night Keith spent out under the stars. Success had come. And its other name was Alice Yorke.
The way before Keith still stretched steep enough, but the light was on it, the sunshine caught peak after peak high up among the clouds themselves, and crowning the highest point, bathed in perpetual sunlight, was the image of Alice Yorke.
Alice Yorke had been abroad now for some time; but he had followed her. Often when his work was done he had locked his door and shut himself in from the turmoil of the bustling, noisy throng outside to dream of her--to read and study that he might become worthy of her.
He had just seen by the papers that Alice Yorke had returned.
She had escaped the dangers of a foreign service; but, by the account, she was the belle of the season at the watering-place which she was honoring with her presence. As he read the account, a little jealousy crept into the satisfaction which he had felt as he began. Mr. Lancaster was spoken of too pointedly; and there was mention of too many yacht-parties and entertainments in which their names appeared together.
In fact, the forces exerted, against Alice Yorke had begun to tell. Her mother, overawed by her husband's determination, had reluctantly abandoned her dreams of a foreign title with its attendant honors to herself, and, of late, had turned all her energies to furthering the suit of Mr. Lancaster. It would be a great establishment that he would give Alice, and no name in the country stood higher. He was the soul of honor, personal and commercial; and in an age when many were endeavoring to amass great fortunes and make a dazzling display, he was content to live modestly, and was known for his broad-minded philanthropy. What did it matter that he was considerably older than Alice? reflected Mrs. Yorke. Mrs. Creamer and half the mothers she knew would give their eyes to secure him for their daughters; and certainly he had shown that he knew how to enter into Alice's feelings.
Even Mr. Yorke had begun to favor Mr. Lancaster after Mrs. Yorke had skilfully pointed out that Alice's next most attentive admirer was Ferdy Wickersham.
"Why, I thought he was still trying to get that Caldwell girl," said he.
"You know he cannot get her; she is married," replied Mrs. Yorke.
"I guess that would make precious little difference to that young man, if she would say the word. I wish he would keep away from here."
"Oh, Ferdy is no worse than some others; you were always unjust to him. Most young men sow their wild oats."
No man likes to be charged with injustice by his wife, and Mr. Yorke's tone showed that he was no exception to this rule.
"He is worse than most others _I_ know, and the crop of oats he is sowing, if he does not look out, he will reap somewhere else besides in New York. Alice shall marry whom she pleases, provided it is not that young man; but she shall not marry him if she wants to."
"She does not want to marry him," said Mrs. Yorke; "if she had she could have done it long ago."
"Not while I lived," said Mr. Yorke, firmly. But from this time Mr. Yorke began to acquiesce in his wife's plans touching Mr. Lancaster.
Finally Alice herself began to yield. The influences were very strong, and were skilfully exerted. The only man who had ever made any lasting impression on her heart was, she felt, out of the question. The young school-teacher, with his pride and his scorn of modern ways, had influenced her life more than any one else she had ever known, and though under her mother's management the feeling had gradually subsided, and had been merged into what was merely a cherished recollection, Memory, stirred at times by some picture or story of heroism and devotion, reminded her that she too might, under other conditions, have had a real romance. Still, after two or three years, her life appeared to have been made for her by Fate, and she yielded, not recognizing that Fate was only a very ambitious and somewhat short-sighted mamma aided by the conditions of an artificial state of life known as fashionable society.
Keith wrote Alice Yorke a letter congratulating her upon her safe return; but a feeling, part shyness, part pride, seized him. He had received no acknowledgment of his last letter. Why should he write again? He mailed the letter in the waste-basket. Now, however, that success had come to him, he wrote her a brief note congratulating her upon her return, a stiff little plea for remembrance. He spoke of his good fortune: he was the agent for the most valuable lands in that region, and the future was beginning to look very bright. Business, he said, might take him North before long, and the humming-birds would show him the way to the fairest roses. The hope of seeing her shone in every line. It reached Alice Yorke in the midst of preparation for her marriage.
Alice Yorke sat for some time in meditation over this letter. It brought back vividly the time which she had never wholly forgotten. Often, in the midst of scenes so gay and rich as to amaze her, she had recalled the springtime in the budding woods, with an ardent boy beside her, worshipping her with adoring eyes. She had lived close to Nature then, and Content once or twice peeped forth at her from its covert with calm and gentle eyes. She had known pleasure since then, joy, delight, but never content. However, it was too late now. Mr. Lancaster and her mother had won the day; she had at last accepted him and an establishment. She had accepted her fate or had made it.
She showed the letter to her mother. Mrs. Yorke's face took on an inscrutable expression.
"You are not going to answer it, of course?" she said.
"Of course, I am; I am going to write him the nicest letter that I know how to write. He is one of the best friends I ever had."
"What will Mr. Lancaster say?"
"Mr. Lancaster quite understands. He is going to be reasonable; that is the condition."
This appeared to be satisfactory to Mrs. Yorke, or, at least, she said no more.
Alice's letter to Keith was friendly and even kind. She had never forgotten him, she said. Some day she hoped to meet him again. Keith read this with a pleasant light in his eyes. He turned the page, and his face suddenly whitened. She had a piece of news to tell him which might surprise him. She was engaged to be married to an old friend of her family's, Mr. Lancaster. He had met Mr. Lancaster, she remembered, and was sure he would like him, as Mr. Lancaster had liked him so much.
Keith sat long over this letter, his face hard set and very white. She was lost to him. He had not known till then how largely he had built his life upon the memory of Alice Yorke. Deep down under everything that he had striven for had lain the foundation of his hope to win her. It went down with a crash. He went to his room, and unlocking his desk, took from his drawer a small package of letters and other little mementos of the past that had been so sweet. These he put in the fire and, with a grim face, watched them blaze and burn to ashes. She was dead to him. He reserved nothing.
The newspapers described the Yorke-Lancaster wedding as one of the most brilliant affairs of the season. They dwelt particularly on the fortunes of both parties, the value of the presents, and the splendor of the dresses worn on the occasion. One journal mentioned that Mr. Lancaster was considerably older than the bride, and was regarded as one of the best, because one of the safest, matches to be found in society.
Keith recalled Mr. Lancaster: dignified, cultivated, and coldly gracious. Then he recalled his gray hair, and found some satisfaction in it. He recalled, too, Mrs. Yorke's friendliness for him. This, then, was what it meant. He wondered to himself how he could have been so blind to it. When he came to think of it, Mr. Lancaster came nearer possessing what others strove for than any one else he knew. Yet, Youth looks on Youth as peculiarly its own, and Keith found it hard to look on Alice Yorke's marriage as anything but a sale.
"They talk about the sin of selling negroes," he said; "that is as very a sale as ever took place at a slave-auction."
For a time he plunged into the gayest life that Gumbolt offered. He even began to visit Terpsichore. But this was not for long. Mr. Plume's congratulations were too distasteful to him for him to stomach them; and Terpy began to show her partiality too plainly for him to take advantage of it. Besides, after all, though Alice Yorke had failed him, it was treason to the ideal he had so long carried in his heart. This still remained to him.
He went back to his work, resolved to tear from his heart all memory of Alice Yorke. She was married and forever beyond his dreams. If he had worked before with enthusiasm, he now worked with fury. Mr. Lancaster, as wealthy as he was, as completely equipped with all that success could give, lacked one thing that Keith possessed: he lacked the promise of the Future. Keith would show these Yorkes who he was. _