_ PART II CHAPTER XII. THE YOUNG EAGLE FLUTTERS THE DOVE-COTE
The little town of Marmion was built on the high, grassy, parklike bank of the Cedar River; at least, the main part of the residences and stores stood on the upper level, while below, beside the roaring water, only a couple of mills and some miserable shacks straggled along a road which ran close to the sheer walls of water-worn limestone.
The town was considered "picturesque" by citizens of the smaller farm villages standing bleakly where the prairie lanes intersected. To be able to live in Marmion was held to be eminent good fortune by the people roundabout, and the notion was worth working for. "If things turn out well we will buy a lot in Marmion and build a house there," husbands occasionally said to their wives and daughters, to console them for the mud, or dirt, or heat, or cold of the farm life. One by one some of those who had come into the country early, and whose land had grown steadily in value as population increased, were able to rent their farms to advantage and "move into town." Thus the streets gradually lengthened out into the lanes, and brick blocks slowly replaced the battlemented wooden stores of earlier frontier construction.
To Harold Excell, fresh from the wide spaces of the plains, the town appeared smothered in leaves, and the air was oppressively stagnant. He came into the railway station early one July morning, tired and dusty, with a ride of two days and a night in an ordinary coach. As he walked slowly up the street toward the center of the sleeping village, the odor of ripe grain and the familiar smell of poplar and maple trees went to his heart. His blood leaped with remembered joys. Under such trees, in the midst of such fragrance, he had once walked with his sister and with Jack. His heart swelled with the thought of the Burns' farm, and the hearty greeting they would give him could he but ride up to the door.
And Mary! How would she seem to him now? Four years was a long time at that period of a girl's life, but he was certain he would recognize her. He had not written to her of his coming, for he wished to announce himself. There were elements of adventure and surprise in the plan which pleased him. He had not heard from her for nearly a year, and that troubled him a little; perhaps she had moved away or was married. The thought of losing her made him shiver with sudden doubt of the good sense of his action. Anyhow, he would soon know.
The clerk of the principal hotel was sleeping on a cot behind the counter, and Mose considerately decided not to wake him. Taking a seat by the window, he resumed his thinking, while the morning light infiltrated the sky. He was only twenty-two years of age, but in his own thought he had left boyhood far behind. As a matter of fact he looked to be five years older than he was. His face was set in lines indicating resolution and daring, his drooping mustache hid the boyish curves of his lips, and he carried himself with a singular grace, self-confident, decisive, but not assertive. The swing of his shoulders had charm, and he walked well. The cowboy's painful hobble had not yet been fastened upon him.
Sitting there waiting the dawn, his face became tired, somber, almost haggard, with self-accusing thought. He was not yet a cattle king, he was, in fact, still a cowboy. The time had gone by when a hired hand could easily acquire a bunch of cattle and start in for himself--and yet, though he had little beyond his saddle and a couple of horses, he was in Marmion to look upon the face of the girl who had helped him to keep "square" and clean in a land where dishonesty and vice were common as sage brush. He had sworn never to set foot in Rock River again, and no one but Jack knew of his visit to Marmion.
Now that he was actually in the town where Mary lived he was puzzled to know how to proceed. He had wit enough to know that in Marmion a girl could not receive visits from a strange young man and escape the fire of infuriate gossip. He feared to expose her to such comment, and yet, having traveled six hundred miles to see her, he was not to be deterred by any other considerations, especially by any affecting himself.
He knew something, but not all, of the evil fame his name conveyed to the citizens in his native state. As "Harry Excell, _alias_ Black Mose," he had figured in the great newspapers of Chicago, and Denver, and Omaha. Imaginative and secretly admiring young reporters had heaped alliterative words together to characterize his daring, his skill as a marksman and horseman, and had also darkly hinted of his part in desperate stage and railway robbery in the Farther West. To all this--up to the time of his return--Harold had replied, "These chaps must earn a living some way, I reckon." He was said to have shot down six men in his first "scrimmage." "No one presumes to any impertinent inquiries when 'Black Mose' rides into town."
Another enterprising newspaper youth had worked out the secret history of "Black Mose": "He began his career of crime early; at sixteen years of age he served in State's prison for knifing a rival back in the States." This report enabled the Rock River Call to identify Harold Excell with "Black Mose," to the pain and humiliation of Pastor Excell.
Harold paid very little heed to all this till his longing to see Mary grew intolerable--even now, waiting for the Sabbath day to dawn, he did not fully realize the black shadow which streamed from his name and his supposititious violences. He divined enough of it to know that he must remain unknown to others, and he registered as "M. Harding, Omaha."
He was somewhat startled to find himself without appetite, and pushing away his tough steak and fried potatoes, he arose and returned to the street. The problem before him required delicacy of handling, and he was not one to assume a tactful manner. The closer he came to the meeting the more difficult it became. He must see her without causing comment, and without Jack's aid he saw no way of doing it. He had written to Jack, asking him to meet him, and so he waited.
He was a perilously notable figure in spite of his neat black suit and quiet ways. His wide hat sat upon his head with a negligence which stopped short of swagger, and his coat revealed the splendid lines of his muscular shoulders. He had grown to a physical manhood which had the leopard's lithe grace and the lion's gravity. His dimpled and clean-shaven chin was strong, and the line of his lips firm. His eyes were steady and penetrating, giving an impression of reticence. His hands were slender and brown, and soft in the palms as those of a girl. The citizens marveled over him as he moved slowly through the streets, thinking himself quite indistinguishable among the other young men in dark suits and linen collars.
Waiting was most difficult, and to remain indoors was impossible, so he walked steadily about the town. As he returned from the river road for the fifth time, the bells began to ring for church, filling him with other memories of his youth, of his father and his pulpit, and brought to his mind also the sudden recollection of one of Jack's letters, wherein he mentioned Mary's singing in the choir. If she were at home she would be singing yet, he argued, and set forth definitely to find her.
To inquire was out of the question--so he started in at the largest church with intent to make the rounds. After waiting till the choir was about to begin the first hymn, he slipped in and took a seat near the door, his heart beating loudly and his breath much quickened.
The interior was so familiar, it seemed for the moment to be his father's church in Rock River. The odors, sounds, movements were quite the same. The same deaf old men, led by determined, sturdy old women, were going up the aisle to the front pews. The pretty girls, taking their seats in the middle pews (where their new hats could be enjoyed by the young men at the rear) became Dot, and Alice, and Nettie--and for the moment the cowboy was very boyish and tender. The choir assembling above the pulpit made him shiver with emotion. "Perhaps one of them will be Mary and I won't know her," he said to himself. "I will know her voice," he added.
But, as the soprano took her place, his heart ceased to pound--she was small, and dark, and thin. He arose and slipped out to continue his search.
They were singing as he entered the next chapel, and it required but a moment's listening to convince himself that Mary was not there. The third church was a small stone building of odd structure, and while he hesitated before its door, a woman's voice took up a solo strain, powerful, exultant, and so piercingly sweet that the plainsman shivered as if with sudden cold. Around him the softly moving maples threw dappling shadows on the walk. The birds in the orchards, the insects in the grass, the clouds overhead seemed somehow involved in the poetry and joy of that song. The wild heart of the young trailer became like that of a child, made sweet and tender by the sovereign power of a voice.
He did not move till the clear melody sank into the harmony of the organ, then, with bent head and limbs unwontedly infirm, he entered the lovely little audience room. He stumbled into the first seat in the corner, his eyes piercing the colored dusk which lay between him and the singer. It was Mary, and it seemed to him that she had become a princess, sitting upon a throne. Accustomed to see only the slatternly women of the cow towns, or the thin, hard-worked, and poorly-dressed wives and daughters of the ranchers, he humbled himself before the beauty and dignity and refinement of this young singer.
She was a mature woman, full-bosomed, grave of feature, introspective of glance. Her graceful hat, her daintily gloved hands, her tasteful dress, impressed the cowboy with a feeling that all art and poetry and refinement were represented by her. For the moment his own serenity and self-command were shaken. He cowered in his seat like a dust-covered plowman in a parlor, and when Mary looked in his direction his breath quickened and he shrank. He was not yet ready to have her recognize him.
The preacher, a handsome and scholarly young fellow, arose to speak, and Harold was interested in him at once. The service had nothing of the old-time chant or drawl or drone. In calm, unhesitating speech the young man proceeded, from a text of Hebrew scripture, to argue points of right and wrong among men, and to urge upon his congregation right thinking and right action. He used a great many of the technical phrases of carpenters and stonemasons and sailors. He showed familiarity also with the phrases of the cattle country. Several times a low laugh rippled over his congregation as he uttered some peculiarly apt phrase or made use of some witty illustration. To the cowboy this sort of preaching came with surprise. He thought: "The boys would kieto to this chap all right." He was not eager to have them listen to Mary singing.
Sitting there amid the little audience of thoughtful people, his brain filled with new conceptions of the world and of human life. Nothing was clearly defined in the tumult of opposing pictures. At one moment he thought of his sister and his family, but before he could imagine her home or decide on how to see her, a picture of his father, or Jack, or the peaceful Burns' farm came whirling like another cloud before his brain, and all the time his eyes searched Mary's calm and beautiful face. He saw her smile, too, when the preacher made a telling application of a story. How would she receive him after so many years? She had not answered his last letter; perhaps she was married. Again the chilly wind from the canon of doubt blew upon him. If she was, why that ended it. He would go back to the mountains and never return.
The minister finished at last and Mary arose again to sing. She was taller, Harold perceived, and more matronly in all ways. As she sang, the lonely soul of the plainsman was moved to an ecstasy which filled his throat and made his eyes misty with tears. He thought of his days in the gray prison, and of this girlish voice singing like an angel to comfort him. She did not seem to be singing to him now. She sang as a bird sings out of abounding health and happiness, and as she sang, the mountains retreated into vast distances. The rush of the cattle on the drive was fainter than the sigh of the wind, and the fluting of the Ute lover was of another world. For the moment he felt the majesty and the irrevocableness of human life.
He stood in a shadowed corner at the close of the service and watched her come down the aisle. As she drew near his breath left him, and the desire to lay his hand on her arm became so intense that his fingers locked upon the back of his pew--but he let her pass. She glanced at him casually, then turned to smile at some word of the preacher walking just behind her. Her passing was like music, and the fragrance of her garments was sweeter than any mountain flower. The grace of her walk, the exquisite fairness of her skin subdued him, who acknowledged no master and no mistress. She walked on out into the Sabbath sunshine and he followed, only to see her turn up the sidewalk close to the shoulder of the handsome young minister.
The lonely youth walked back to his hotel with manner so changed his mountain companions would have marveled at it. A visit which had seemed so simple on the Arickaree became each moment more complicated in civilization. The refined young minister with the brown pointed beard, so kindly and thoughtful and wholesome of manner, was a new sort of man to such as Harold Excell. He feared no rivalry among the youth of the village, but this scholar----
Jack met him at the hotel--faithful old Jack, whose freckled face beamed, and whose spectacled eyes were dim with gladness. They shook hands again and again, crying out confused phrases. "Old man, how are you?" "I'm all right, how are you?" "You look it." "Where'd you find the red whiskers?" "They came in a box." "Your mustache is a wonder."
Ultimately they took seats and looked at each other narrowly and quietly. Then Harold said, "I'm Mr. Harding here."
Jack replied: "I understand. Your father knows, too. He wants to come up and see you. I said I'd wire, shall I?"
"Of course--if he wants to see me--but I want to talk to you first. I've seen Mary!"
"Have you? How did you manage?"
"I trailed her. Went to all the churches in town. She sings in a little stone church over here."
"I know. I've been up here to see her once or twice myself."
Harold seized him by the arm. "See here, Jack--I must talk with her. How can I manage it without doing her harm?"
"That's the question. If these people should connect you with 'Black Mose' they'd form a procession behind you. Harry, you don't know, you can't imagine the stories they've got up about you. They've made you into a regular Oklahoma Billy the Kid and train robber. The first great spread was that fight you had at Running Bear, that got into the Omaha papers in three solid columns about six months after it happened. Of course I knew all about it from your letters--no one had laid it to you then, but now everybody knows you are 'Black Mose,' and if you should be recognized you couldn't see Mary without doing her an awful lot of harm. You must be careful."
"I know all that," replied Harold gloomily. "But you must arrange for me to see her right away, this afternoon or to-night."
"I'll manage it. They know me here and I can call on her and take a friend, an old classmate, you see, without attracting much attention--but it isn't safe for you to stay here long, somebody is dead-sure to identify you. They've had two or three pictures of you going around that really looked like you, and then your father coming up may let the secret out. We must be careful. I'll call on Mary immediately after dinner and tell her you are here."
"Is she married? Some way she seemed like a married woman."
"No, she's not married, but the young preacher you heard this morning is after her, they say, and he's a mighty nice chap."
There was no more laughter on the gentle, red-bearded face of young Burns. Had Harold glanced at him sharply at that moment, he would have seen a tremor in Jack's lips and a singular shadow in his eyes. His voice indeed did affect Harold, though he took it to be sympathetic sadness only.
Jack brightened up suddenly. "I can't really believe it is you, Harry. You've grown so big and burly, and you look so old." He smiled. "I wish I could see some of that shooting they all tell about, but that _would_ let the cat out."
Harold could not be drawn off to discuss such matters.
"Come out to the ranch and I'll show you. But how are we to meet father? If he is seen talking with me it may start people off----"
"I'll tell you. We'll have him come up and join you on the train and go down to Rock River together. I don't mean for you to get off, you can keep right on. Now, you mustn't wear that broad hat; you wear a grape-box straw hat while you're here. Take mine and I'll wear a cap."
He took charge of Harold's affairs with ready and tactful hand. He was eager to hear his story, but Harold refused to talk on any other subject than Mary. At dinner he sat in gloomy silence, disregarding his friend's pleasant, low-voiced gossip concerning old friends in Rock River.
After Jack left the hotel Harold went to his room and took a look at himself in the glass. He was concerned to see of what manner of man he really was. He was not well-satisfied with himself; his face and hands were too brown and leathery, and when he thought of his failure as a rancher his brow darkened. He was as far from being a cattle king as when he wrote that boyish letter four years before, and he had sense enough to know that a girl of Mary's grace and charm does not lack for suitors. "Probably she is engaged or married," he thought. Life seemed a confusion and weariness at the moment.
As soon as he heard Jack on the stairs he hurried to meet him.
"What luck? Have you seen her?"
Jack closed the door before replying, "Yes."
"What did she say?"
"She turned a little paler and just sat still for a minute or two. You know she isn't much of a talker. Then she said, 'Was he at church to-day?' I said 'Yes'; then she said, 'I think I saw him. I saw a stranger and was attracted by his face, but of course I never thought it could be Harold.' She was completely helpless for a while, but as I talked she began to see her way. She finally said, 'He has come a long way and I must see him. I _must_ talk with him, but people must not know who he is.' I told her we were going to be very careful for her sake."
"That's right, we must," Harold interrupted.
"She didn't seem scared about herself. 'It won't harm me,' she said, 'but father is hard to manage when anything displeases him. We must be careful on Harold's account.'"
Harold's throat again contracted with emotion. "She never thinks of herself; that's her way."
"Now we've just got to walk boldly up the walk, the two of us together, and call on her. I'll introduce you to her father or she will; he knows me. We will talk about our school days while the old gentleman is around. He will drift away after a time, naturally. If he doesn't I'll take him out for a walk."
This they did. Made less of a cowboy by Jack's straw hat, Harold went forth on a trail whose course was not well-defined in his mind, though now that Jack had arranged details so deftly that Mary was not in danger of being put to shame, his native courage and resolution came back to him. In the full springtide of his powerful manhood Mary's name and face had come at last to stand for everything worth having in the world, and like a bold gambler he was staking all he had on a single whirl of the wheel.
Their meeting was so self-contained that only a close observer could have detected the tension. Mary was no more given to externalizing her emotions than he. She met him with a pale, sweet, dignified mask of face. She put out her hand, and said, "I am glad to see you, Mr. Harding," but his eyes burned down into hers with such intensity that she turned to escape his glance. "Father, you know Mr. Burns, and this is his friend, Mr. Harding, whom I used to know."
Jack came gallantly to the rescue. He talked crops, politics, weather, church affairs, and mining. He chattered and laughed in a way which would have amazed Harold had he not been much preoccupied. He was unprepared for the change in Mary. He had carried her in his mind all these years as a little slip of a maiden, wrapt in expression, somber of mood, something half angel and half child, and always she walked in a gray half light, never in the sun. Now here she faced him, a dignified woman, with deep, serene eyes, and he could not comprehend how the pale girl had become the magnetic, self-contained woman. He was thrown into doubt and confusion, but so far from showing this he sat in absolute silence, gazing at her with eyes which made her shiver with emotion.
Talk was purposeless and commonplace at first, a painful waiting. Suddenly they missed Jack and the father. They were alone and free to speak their most important words. Harold seized upon the opportunity with most disconcerting directness.
"I've come for you, Mary," he said, as if he had not hitherto uttered a word, and his voice aroused some mysterious vibration within her bosom. "I'm not a cattle king; I have nothing but two horses, a couple of guns, and a saddle--but all the same, here I am. I got lonesome for you, and at last I took the back trail to find out whether you had forgot me or not."
His pause seemed to require an answer and her lips were dry as she said in a low voice, "No, I did not forget, but I thought you had forgotten _me_."
"A man don't forget such a girl as you are, Mary. You were in my mind all the time. Your singing did more for me than anything else. I've tried to keep out of trouble for your sake. I haven't succeeded very well as you know--but most of the stories about me are lies. I've only had two fights and they were both in self-defense and I don't think I killed anybody. I never know exactly what I'm doing when I get into a scrap. But I've kept out of the way of it on your account. I never go after a man. It's pretty hard not to shoot out there where men go on the rampage so often. It's easier, now than it used to be, for they are afraid of me."
He seemed to come to a halt in that direction, and after a moment's pause took a new start. "I saw you at church to-day, and I saw you walk off with the minister, and that gave me a sudden jolt. It seemed to me you--liked him mighty well----"
She was sitting in silence and apparent calmness, but she flushed and her lips set close together. It was evident that no half-explanations would suffice this soul of the mountain land.
He arose finally and stood for an instant looking at her with piercing intentness. His deep excitement had forced him to physical action.
"I could see he was the man for you, not me. Right there I felt like quitting. I went back to my hotel doing more thinking to the square minute than ever before in my life, I reckon. I ought to have pulled out for the mountains right then, but you see, I had caught a glimpse of you again, and I couldn't. The smell of your dress----" he paused a moment. "You are the finest girl God ever made and I just couldn't go without seeing you, at least once more."
He was tense, almost rigid with the stress of his sudden passion. She remained silent with eyes fixed upon him, musing and somber. She was slower to utter emotion than he, and could not speak even when he had finished.
He began to walk up and down just before her, his brows moodily knitted. "I'm not fit to ask a girl like you to marry me, I know that. I've served time in jail, and I'm under indictment by the courts this very minute in two States. I'm no good on earth but to rope cattle. I can't bring myself to farm or sell goods back here, and if I could you oughtn't to have anything to do with me--but all the same you're worth more to me than anything else. I don't suppose there has been an hour of my life since I met you first that I haven't thought of you. I dreamed of you--when I'm riding at night--I try to think----"
He stopped abruptly and caught up her left hand. "You've got a ring on your finger--is that from the minister?"
Her eyes fled from his and she said, "Yes."
He dropped her hand. "I don't blame you any. I've made a failure of it." His tone was that of a bankrupt at fifty. "I don't know enough to write a letter--I'm only a rough, tough fool. I thought you'd be thinking of me just the way I was thinking of you, and there was nothing to write about because I wasn't getting ahead as I expected. So I kept waiting till something turned up to encourage me. Nothing did, and now I'm paid for it."
His voice had a quality which made her weep. She tried to think of some words of comfort but could not. She was indeed too deeply concerned with her own contending emotions. There was marvelous appeal in this powerful, bronzed, undisciplined youth. His lack of tact and gallantry, his disconcerting directness of look and speech shook her, troubled her, and rendered her weak. She was but a year younger than he, and her life had been almost as simple exteriorly, but at center she was of far finer development. She had always been introspective, and she had grown self-analytic. She knew that the touch of this young desperado's hand had changed her relation toward the world. As he talked she listened without formulating a reply.
When at last she began to speak she hesitated and her sentences were broken. "I am very sorry--but you see I had not heard from you for a long time--it would be impossible--for me to live on the plains so far away--even if--even if I had not promised Mr. King----"
"Well, that ends it," he said harshly, and his voice brought tears again. "I go back to my cow punching, the only business I know. As you say, the cow country is no place for a girl like you. It's a mighty hard place for women of any kind, and you ... Besides, you're a singer, you can't afford to go with me. It's all a part of my luck. Things have gone against me from the start."
He paused to get a secure hold on his voice. "Well, now, I'm going, but I don't want you to forget me; don't pray for me, just _sing_ for me. I'll hear you, and it'll help keep me out of mischief. Will you do that?"
"Yes--if you--if it will help----"
Jack's voice, unusually loud, interrupted her, and when the father entered, there was little outward sign of the passionate drama just enacted.
"Won't you sing for us, Mary?" asked Jack a few minutes later.
Mary looked at Harold significantly and arose to comply. Harold sat with head propped on his palm and eyes fixed immovably upon her face while she sang, If I Were a Voice. The voice was stronger, sweeter, and the phrasing was more mature, but it was after all the same soul singing through the prison gloom, straight to his heart. She charged the words with a special, intimate, tender meaning. She conveyed to him the message she dared not speak, "Be true in spite of all. My heart is sore for you, let me comfort you."
He, on his part, realized that one who could sing like that had a wider mission in the world than to accompany a cowboy to the bleak plains of the West. To comfort him was a small part of her work in the world. It was her mission to go on singing solace and pleasure to thousands all over the nation.
When she had finished he arose and offered his hand with a singular calmness which moved the girl more deeply than any word he had said. "When you sing that song, think of me, sometimes, will you?"
"Yes--always," she replied.
"Good-by," he said abruptly. Dropping her-hand, he went out without speaking another word.
Jack, taking her hand in parting, found it cold and nerveless.
"May I see you again before we go?" he asked.
Her eyes lighted a little and her hand tightened in his. "Yes--I want to speak with you," she said, and ended in a whisper, "about him."
Jack overtook Harold but remained silent. When they reached their room, Harold dropped into a chair like one exhausted by a fierce race.
"This ends it, Jack, I'll never set foot in the States again; from this time on I keep to the mountains." _