UNDER THE MOON
Lights still were burning at headquarters when Steele Weir slowly
drove his runabout up the hillside slope to the dam camp. The men who
had acted as guards about the jail, except those who went with Madden,
were somewhere on the road behind him, returning home in the wagons. A
reaction of mind and body had set in for Weir; after the previous
night's loss of sleep and prolonged exertions, after the swift
succession of dramatic events, after the tremendous call that had been
made upon his brain power, nervous force and will, he experienced a
strange unrest of spirit. His triumph seemed yet incomplete, somehow
unsatisfying.
It was as he approached the camp that he saw a slender girlish figure
sitting on a rock in the moonlight. He swung his car off the road
beside the spot where Janet Hosmer sat.
"What, you are still awake?" he asked, with a smile.
"Could I sleep while not knowing what was happening or what danger you
might be in?" she returned. "Mr. Pollock said we must not think of
returning home until quiet was restored in San Mateo. One of the
engineer's houses was given to us by Mr. Meyers before he left, where
Mary and I could sleep. But I could not close my eyes. So much had
happened, so much was yet going on! So I came out here to be alone and
to think and watch."
"And your father?"
"He's attending the wounded Mexicans in the store."
Steel alighted and tossing his hat upon the car seat gazed out over
the mesa, misty in the moonlight.
"There will be no more trouble," said he. "Sorenson and Burkhardt are
Madden's prisoners, and on their way to a place of safe-keeping in
another county. Vorse is dead. The people in town have a fairly good
understanding of matters now, I think."
"How in the world did such a change of opinion occur?" Janet
exclaimed.
"I had a little talk with the crowd and made explanations. The feeling
for me was almost friendly when I left; what enmity remains will soon
die out, I'm sure."
Though unaware from Steele Weir's laconic statement of what had
actually occurred, the girl divined that his words concealed vastly
more than their surface purport. With the general hostility against
the engineer that had existed, for him to swing the community to his
side meant a dramatic moment and a remarkable moral conquest.
"Your friends have always known you would win," she said, smiling up
at him.
He seated himself on the rock beside her.
"It's but a short time ago, Janet, that I had no friends, or so
few they could be counted on the fingers of one hand. Business
acquaintances, yes. Professional companions, yes. Men who perhaps
respected my ability as an engineer, yes. But real friends, scarcely
one. And now I think I have gained some, which is the greatest
satisfaction I have from all that has happened. After years the
pendulum has swung to my side. Do you know the hour my luck changed?"
Janet shook her head wonderingly.
"No, I can't even guess," said she.
"Well, it was that afternoon, and that moment, I found you sitting in
your stalled car in the creek down there. That was the beginning. From
that time things began to run in my favor and they haven't ceased to
do so for a moment since, I now see looking back over events. You
brought good luck to me that day in your car."
"What an extraordinary idea! Then at bottom you're superstitious,"
Janet replied. "I shall have to give you a new name; I must no longer
call you 'Cold Steel.'"
"I really never liked that name," Weir said quickly. "Perhaps I was
cold steel once, but I have changed along with everything else. And
you're responsible for that too."
Janet leaned forward and looked into his eyes.
"You were never truly harsh to any one except those who deserved it,"
she said. "I know! You would never have been so quick to help Mary
Johnson or me, or others who needed help, if your heart was not always
generous and sympathetic. Only against evil were you as steel, and in
moments requiring supreme courage and sacrifice. And that's how you
gained the name before you ever came here."
"Anyway I've changed," said he. "I'm out from under the cloud which I
felt always hung above me. As I say, you brought me good luck that
day--and I see clearly that I shall continue to be superstitious."
"Why, all occasion for that is past now."
"No," said Steele Weir. "No, less than ever. For I'm certain you hold
my good fortune in your hand yet, and will continue to hold it. And
that means----"
He paused, regarding her so intensely that the blood beat up into her
face. There was no mistaking that look and it thrilled her to the
soul.
"Yes?" she managed to say.
"It means my happiness, now and for all time to come," he went on.
"See, I shall have accomplished what I set out to do and what in
justice had to be done, bringing these men to punishment--to
punishment in one form or another. I shall have given my employer, the
company, service worthy of the hire. I shall have rid you and San
Mateo of an unscrupulous parasite in the person of Ed Sorenson, though
my persecution of him now shall stop and I shall leave him enough out
of the property recovered from his father to live in comfort somewhere
with his mother.
"Mr. Pollock states I shall have no trouble in getting legal title and
possession of most of the wealth of these four men,--I and any
relatives of the dead Jim Dent who can be found. For thirty years'
accumulated interest charges owing me will swallow up all the men's
properties. That, however, is only a material victory. I shall have
relieved Johnson of fear of financial constraint; and saved his
daughter from a serious mistake. I shall have started Martinez on the
road to success--and I should not be surprised if he prospered, became
the leading attorney in this county, was elected judge and so on.
"In a way, too, I shall have helped to remove the oppressive weight of
these men, Sorenson, Burkhardt, Judge Gordon and Vorse, with their
sinister influence, from this community and region. They have always
held the natives in more or less open subjection, financial,
political, and moral. There should be a freer air in San Mateo
henceforth. The people will have a chance to grow. They no longer will
feel the threat of brutal masters always over them; and with the
completion of the irrigation project and the infusion of new settlers
they will become better citizens.
"I see all this," he concluded. "It pleases me; it gives me cause for
satisfaction. But it doesn't give me the happiness I want, or the
love. That is alone in your hands to bestow."
Janet felt herself trembling; she could not speak.
"I think I felt the stirring of love from the moment I saw you there
at the ford," he exclaimed. "Last night when I knew that wretch had
carried you off to the mountains, I could have torn him limb from
limb. That was my love speaking, Janet. If I should have to go through
life without you--oh, the thought is too bitter to dwell on!--then I
should think life not worth living. But I have imagined that you might
have for me a little----"
Janet swiftly clasped his hand with her own.
"I love you," she cried softly. "I was sitting here when you came
because I loved you. If I am necessary to your happiness, you also are
necessary to mine. I honor you for what you have done and love you for
what you are, a strong true heart."
"Ah, Janet, you give me the greatest joy in the world," he whispered.
"Love--that is more than all."
His arms drew her to his breast. Her lips went to his in consecration
of that love. Their hearts beat the rapture of that love.
Over the silent peaceful mountains the moon spread its effulgent
light. Over the mesa that was no more to know the fierce sound of
strife. Over the town, at last free of its avaricious masters, free of
the savage spirit of an outlaw time. Over the Burntwood River flowing
in a shimmering band to the horizon. Over the camp where centered so
many men's plans and labors. And over the lovers, chief of all, that
light fell as in a silvery halo.
THE END
End of Project Gutenberg's In the Shadow of the Hills, by George C. Shedd