Came an evening three days before the date for the lease on the Swaim land to expire. Jerry sat alone on the Macpherson porch. It had been an extremely hot day for June, with the dead, tasteless air that presages the coming of a storm, and to-night the moon seemed to struggle up toward the zenith against choking gray clouds that threatened to smother out its light.
Jerry was not happy to-night. She wanted Joe Thomson to come this evening. It had been such a long while since he had had time to leave the ranch for an evening with her.
And with the wishing Joe came. With firm step and the face of a victor he came. From his dark eyes hope and tenderness were looking out.
"I haven"t seen you for ages, and ages are awfully long, you know,"
Jerry declared.
"I"ve been very busy," Joe replied. "You know you can"t break the laws of the ranch and expect a harvest, any more than you can break the laws of geometry and depend on results. I would have been up sooner, though, but for one thing: a fellow on the ranch above mine who got hurt once with a mowing-machine had another accident and I"ve been helping the owner, that stout-hearted little Norwegian girl, Thelma Ekblad, to take care of their crops, too. Thelma is a courageous soul who has worked her way through the university, and she is a mighty capable girl, too. She would be a splendid success as a teacher, she is so well trained, but her family need her, and all of us down there need her."
Jerry caught her breath. It was the first time in three years that Joe had ever mentioned any girl with interest. But now this was all right and just as things should be. A neighbor, a capable Western girl--women see far, after all, and Jerry"s romance had not been a foolish one.
"That"s all right, Joe, but I have been wanting to see you"--the old "I want" as imperative again to-night as in the days when all of this girl"s wants had been met by the mere expression of them.
"And I"m always wanting to see you, and never so much as to-night," Joe began, earnestly.
"Let me tell you first why I have wanted to see you once more," Jerry broke in, hastily.
In the dull light her dreamy dark-blue eyes and her golden hair falling away from her white brow left an imprint that Joe Thomson"s mind kept henceforth; at the same time that "once more" cut a deeper wound than Jerry could know.
"My aunt Jerry Darby is dead." The girl"s voice was very low. "I can"t grieve for her, for she was old and tired of life and unhappy. You remember I told you about her one night here three years ago."
Joe did remember.
"She left all her fortune to Cousin Gene Wellington."
"The artist who turned out to be a bank clerk?" Joe asked. "I really always doubted that story."
"Yes, but, you know, he did it to please Aunt Jerry. Think of a sacrifice like that! Giving up one"s dearest life-work!"
"I"m thinking of it. Excuse me. Go on," Joe said.
Jerry lifted her big dreamy eyes. The sparkle was gone and only the soft light of romance illumined them now.
"Gene is coming out to see me soon. I look for him any day. Everything is all settled about the property, and everything is going to be all right, after all, I am sure. And I"m so tired of teaching." Jerry broke off suddenly.
"But, oh, Joe," she began presently, "you will never, never know how much your comradeship has helped me through these three trying years of hard work and hopelessness. We have been only friends, of course, and you are such a good, helpful kind of a friend. I never could have gotten through without you."
"Thank you, the pleasure is mine. I--I think I must go now."
Joe rose suddenly and started to leave the porch. In an instant the very earth had slidden out from under his feet. The memory of York Macpherson"s warning swept across his mind as the blowout sands sweep over the green prairie. And he had come to say such different words to-night. He had reached the end of a long, heart-breaking warfare with nature and he had won. And now a new warfare broke forth in his soul.
At that moment a sudden boom of thunder crashed out of the horizon and all the lightnings of the heavens were unleashed, while a swirling dust-deluge filled the darkening air. Jerry sprang forward, clutching Joe"s arm with her slender fingers.
"The storm will be here in a minute," she cried, "You must not leave now. You mustn"t face this wind. Look at that awful black cloud and see how fast it is coming on. I don"t want you to go away. Where can you go?"
But Joe only shook off her grip, saying, hoa.r.s.ely:
"I"m going down the Sage Brush. If you ever want me again, you"ll find me beyond the blowout."
The word struck like a blow. For three years Jerry had not heard it spoken. It was the one term forever dropped from her vocabulary. All who loved her must forget its very existence.
There was a sudden dead calm in the hot yellow air; a moment of gathering forces before the storm would burst upon the town.
"If you ever see me beyond that blowout, you"ll know that I do want you," Jerry said, slowly.
In the blue lightning glare that followed, her white face and big dark eyes recalled to Joe Thomson"s mind the moment, so long ago now, it seemed, when Jerry had first looked out at the desert from under the bough of the oak-grove.
During the prolonged, terrific burst of thunder that followed, the young ranchman strode away and the darkness swallowed his stalwart form as the worst storm the Sage Brush country had ever known broke furiously upon the whole valley.
And out on the porch steps stood a girl conscious, not of the storm-wind, nor the beating rain, nor cleaving lightning; conscious only that something had suddenly gone out of her life into the blackness whither Joe Thomson had gone; and with the heartache of the loss of the moment was a strange resentment toward a brave-hearted little Norwegian girl--a harvest-hand with a crippled brother, an adopted baby, and a university education.
XVIII
THE LORD HATH HIS WAY IN THE STORM
Laura Macpherson sat on the porch, watching her brother coming slowly up the street, seemingly as oblivious to the splendor of the sunset to-night as he had been on a June evening three summers ago.
"That was the worst cloudburst I ever heard of out here," he declared, when he reached the porch. "Every man in town who could carry a shovel has been out all day, up-stream or down-stream, helping to dig out the bottomland farms. I"ve been clear to the upper Sage Brush, doing a stunt or two myself. I left my muddy boots and overalls at the office so that I wouldn"t be smearing up your old Castle here."
Even in the smallest things York"s thoughts were for his crippled sister.
"There"s a lot of wild stories out about buildings being swept away and lives being lost, here and there in the valley. You needn"t believe all of them until your trustworthy brother confirms them for you, little sister. Such events have their tragedies, but the first estimate is always oversize."
"Even if your Big Dipper tells me, shall I wait for your confirmation?"
Laura inquired, blandly.
"Oh, Laura, I"m going to cut out all that astronomical business now, even if I always did know that the right way to p.r.o.nounce the name Bahrr is plain Bear, however much you have to stutter to spell it. Stellar has been, as the Methodists say, "redeemed and washed in the blood of the Lamb." I"m taking her in on probation, myself, and if she sticks it out for six months I"ll take her into full membership."
"What do you mean, York?" Laura inquired.
"I mean that since they settled the school row in secret session, Mrs.
Bahrr has been as different a woman as one can be who has let the habit of evil thinking become a taskmaster. I"ve never told you that her husband is still living, a shabby old fellow who gives me money for her support as fast as he can earn it, but he won"t live with her. She flies from hat-tr.i.m.m.i.n.g to sewing and baking and nursing and back to sewing, and she never earns much anywhere, and works up trouble just for pure cussedness. But to-day she went to the upper Sage Brush to help old Mrs.
Poser. The Posers were nearly washed away, and the old lady is sick and lonely and almost helpless. She needs somebody to stay with her. Yes, Stellar is really becoming a star--a plain, homely planet, doing a good-angel line where she"s most useful. We"ll let the past stay where it belongs, and count her reclaimed to better things now."
"Amen! And what about the valley down-stream? It must be worse, because the storm came up from that way," Laura declared.
"There are plenty of rumors, but I haven"t heard anything definite yet, for I just got here, you know, and, as I telephoned you, found Mr.
Wellington had registered at Ponk"s inn. The traveling-men who were on the branch line have brought the first word to town to-day. The train is stuck somewhere down the valley, and the tracks, for the most part, are at the bottom of the Sage Brush. There are washouts all along the road-bed, and the pa.s.sengers have been hauled up the stream, across fields, and every other way, except by the regular route. No automobile can travel the trail now, so our Philadelphia gentleman arrives a good bit disgusted with this bloomin" Western country, don"t you know; and sore from miles of jolting; and hungry; and sort of mussy-looking for a banker; but c.o.c.ksure of a welcome and of the power to bring salvation to one of us at least."
York dropped down on the porch step with a frown, flinging aside his hat and thrusting his fingers savagely into his heavy hair.
"Oh, well!" he exclaimed, dejectedly. "There"s been a three years"