CERTAIN COMPLICATIONS RESULT
Many authorities assert that a man's looks count for nothing in the
pursuit of women and the game of love. And they seem to have the rights
of the matter. Citations can be had in plenty. Take the case of the Lazy
L boss. Floyd was not unlike an amiable gorilla. Well over the two-score
mark in years, he rambled somewhat in his shape. In the first place, his
shoulders were too broad for his height, and his jaw and mouth were
entirely too wide. Moreover, his legs had the liveliest scorn one for
the other. The boss always compelled interest and respect, it is true;
but so does a bulldog. Yet he owned the Lazy L and all its herds; he had
the prettiest wife in the country, and there were those who said she
adored him; and he had a son and heir, two years old. All of which set
Lafe to marveling over the inscrutable contrivings of Providence.
It was seven miles from the shipping pens to the ranch, another seven to
the Tracey home. Consequently the widow stayed to supper, though it
meant enduring Floyd's cold scrutiny for an hour of chat. The boss was
civil to her in a heavy, formal way, bestowing sidelong looks when he
was persuaded she could not see him. However, there was a full moon and
it would fall to Johnson to take her home. She was a persevering woman.
Floyd presented himself to his wife on the second day and said, in his
usual blunt style: "Sally, better be decent to that fellow Johnson. Will
you?"
"Why, sure, Tom. What's got into your head now?"
"Some of this last bunch of cattle are awful poor stuff. Where the
tarnation Reb picked up these brindles and swaybacks and old, hipped
long-horns beats me. Lafe will cut 'em all back. He'll just go through
that herd like a prairie fire. So keep him in a good humor, Sally, will
you? Is it a go?"
"Tom, you're dreadful. Do you think I'll help you cheat Mr. Horne by
flirting with Lafe? You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Tom Floyd."
"Who asked you to flirt? I've seen you mighty handy with them eyes of
yours on other fellows, without being asked," he said good-humoredly.
"Oh, what a lie, Tom! I won't. Remember, I won't."
But, being a good wife, she did.
Autumn was rattling the dry bones of summer, and she and Johnson rode
together every day. A keen southwest wind swirled the dead grass and
leaves about their horses' feet. He would listen to her chatter by the
hour, watching the pink grow in her cheeks. Lafe was very good-humored,
indeed. With the improvement in his circumstances had come a marked
improvement in appearance. He had imported what is known as a
"hand-me-down" suit at the cost of a week's pay, and he took a
pardonable pride in it, for the reason that the tailors expressly stated
in their advertising that they catered only to gentlemen of refined
tastes. Also, he had done some trafficking with Buffalo Jim, thereby
obtaining a pair of whole boots.
[Illustration: "She and Johnson rode together every day."]
Often he spent hours with the baby Tommy, fashioning him ridiculous
playthings, and tumbling on the ground for the child's delectation. And
Sally gloated over Mrs. Tracey, who scarcely saw Lafe at all. Mrs. Floyd
looked not an hour over eighteen.
Twice she brought Johnson up short.
"Now, Lafe, none of that. I won't listen."
Let us disregard the fruits of our experience and believe that Mrs.
Floyd did not perceive what was growing in Johnson during those two
weeks of companionship, although we may be convinced that even a stupid
woman can sense it a mile off; and Mrs. Floyd was clever. But she would
not give ear to her own doubts.
"That widow won't get him, anyhow," she said, standing in front of a
mirror. She could not resist giving her hips an approving pat, and she
smiled.
One evening, as they sat on the veranda, Lafe put up a forefinger
languidly and touched a stray curl. She dashed his hand away.
"It's just as black and silky as ever," he said.
"Perhaps. But you keep your hands off! Do you hear?" Then she added:
"There's no gray in it, anyhow."
Just for whom this shaft was meant will ever remain a profound mystery.
Both Lafe and Mrs. Tracey had gray in their hair. That night Sally was
demonstrative with Floyd, hanging over the back of his chair with her
hands locked under his chin and her face snuggling against the top of
his head. The boss blew clouds of smoke and seemed gently amused. These
manifestations of devotion had become frequent of late, but it should
not be hastily inferred that because Lafe was a spectator they were done
for his benefit. That could not be, because he took them with such
extraordinary fortitude. If he was harassed, Johnson stifled all
expression of his condition grandly.
Floyd was much away from home. Sometimes he was in the south, buying
stock cattle. Again, he went north and east to sell of his herds. Sally
told Lafe that he left her alone too much. Lafe coughed and said
something unintelligible, and lighted a cigarette.
"What did you say?" she asked sharply.
"When a feller is getting old and ain't got long to live--"
"You quit that kind of talk right now. I won't stand for it."
It was the first time she had been really angry at any of his frequent
sallies concerning Floyd, and it put them at once on a different
footing. The safe frankness of raillery was gone.
Alas, that Lafe could draw the line so sharply between business and the
courtesies of leisure hours. A trail herd arrived. They plied Johnson
with strong drink and worked in relays to get him drunk. He partook
sociably, but without noticeable impairment of his faculties, and he cut
the herd ruthlessly to a remnant. The boss grew dizzy figuring his
losses and departed from the roundup, unable to endure the spectacle
without interference, leaving instructions to be notified when the fool
was done.
"I'm working for Horne," said Lafe cheerfully. "Did you think I couldn't
tell a two-year-old from a three, Floyd? Those boys tried to run a bunch
by me."
Mrs. Tracey drove over to the Floyd headquarters twice, on matters
relating to a recipe for a cake and certain patterns, and then asked her
friend and Mr. Johnson to dinner. She invited Floyd, too, but it was
done so perfunctorily that Sally felt the stab and was furious. However,
she went. The widow was as sleek as a kitten and wore such a secretive
air that Mrs. Floyd had much ado to keep her temper during the meal.
Afterward, Mrs. Tracey excused herself for a few minutes on some pretext
and left them alone in the sitting-room. When she had to pass through on
her way upstairs, she hurried as though intruding, and said: "Oh, I beg
your pardon!"
"The cat!" Mrs. Floyd cried, gritting her teeth.
"There wasn't no call for her to say that?"
"Of course there wasn't, booby. That doesn't make it any better. It
makes it worse."
Two days later: "Now guess what?"
"I done quit guessing," Johnson answered.
"That Tracey woman tried to tell me this morning that my Tom was too
friendly with one of those Baptismo girls."
"Pshaw!" said Lafe. "Pshaw! What does she want to go and tell them lies
for? What good does it do?"
"You don't see?"
"I reckon I'm dull."
"Oh, you great baby!" Mrs. Floyd gurgled delightedly.
This display of malice disturbed Lafe greatly. Such weapons were beyond
his knowledge and capacity, and he felt hotly uncomfortable when Sally
intimated that they might expect Mrs. Tracey to be talking of them
next--if, indeed, she had not done so already. She was for going to
Rowdy Canon without delay to bestow a tongue-lashing on the widow.
"What's the use?" the cowboy said. "Her talk can't hurt nobody. They all
know you."
"Some people will believe her."
"Some people will do anything. Never bother with poor trash, Sally. It
don't matter what that kind thinks. Leave her be. What can you expect
from a pig but a grunt?"
That was no way to speak of a lady, but Mrs. Floyd jumped from her chair
and cried "Goody!", greatly consoled. Just before the evening meal, she
put on a pink dress for which Lafe had professed admiration, and parted
her hair in the middle. Had there been a woman within seven miles, she
would not have done this, but Lafe liked it that way. So also did her
husband, for that matter.
"As if I'd get jealous of Tom!" she sniffed. "Huh! you won't get Lafe
that way, my lady."
I have said that they rode together every day. Sometimes Floyd watched
the two meditatively. His instructions were being carried out--no doubt
of that--and Johnson was good-natured. But the boss was a silent man and
opposed no objection. As for Sally, if she gave it a thought at all, she
probably found justification in a dozen reasons a woman would
appreciate, which are beyond male ken.
Lafe helped her down from her horse late one afternoon, though she
needed no help. And he held her for just the fraction of a second. She
stiffened with an injured air, but she did not reprove him. On another
occasion--they were on the veranda and it was growing to dusk--after
staring helplessly at her for a full quarter of an hour, while she
purposely said as little as possible and toyed with the lace of her
handkerchief, her head on one side that he might get the benefit of her
profile--suddenly he seized her in his arms and tried to kiss her. He
did, in fact, obtain the merest peck at the tip of her ear.
"You darn fool!" she said, tearing loose.
Then she saw his face, and went hastily indoors and huddled in a chair
in a dark corner. She sat there until called to supper, striving to fix
recent happenings in proper sequence.
After putting the baby to bed, she beckoned Lafe on to the veranda. Her
manner was hurried.
"Lafe, you've got to go away. You've got to go to-morrow."
"Why? I can't, Sally. There's three thousand more--"
"You must! You must! Can't you see? You've got to go. We're--"
"Sure, I see," he said. It was very dark and he came closer. "You care!
That's what it is. You used to, Sally, and you do now."
"Lafe, let me go! Please--please!"
She broke away and gained the door. She was panting. In the lighted
entrance, she looked back.
"You've got to go to-morrow, remember," she said faintly.
But he did not go on the morrow. Floyd was astir before dawn--he usually
fell asleep on a sofa immediately after his supper, thereby gaining a
few hours on everyone else--and rode away with ten men to bring up the
last herd of the sixteen thousand head he would ship.
Sally was distrait and restless all day. She punished the baby for
upsetting a pitcher, and then ordered the Mexican nurse to take him and
keep him out of her sight. Johnson stayed away from the house and busied
himself at the corrals, where some newly purchased mules were being
broken to harness for his employer. He never gave an order, yet the boys
obeyed his slow-voiced suggestions with the same promptitude they gave
to the boss's crisp commands. Lafe could always get obedience without
visible exercise of authority. He knew his business and followed it
without fluster.
At sunset, a cloud of dust whirled madly across country, with the rain
close behind it. Sally ate alone--Lafe had evidently stayed at the
bunkhouse--and she felt vaguely resentful. About nine she tucked the
child into his bed and went out on to the veranda. The wind was dying,
and the rain fell in a soft, steady murmur.
Johnson came running along the pathway and took the steps at a jump. He
was wet, but jeered at her suggestion that he change.
"Only got this one suit," he said. "If it gets to shrinking much more on
me, I'll have for to steal a blanket to-morrow, Sally."
He took a chair beside her and they watched the lightning play above the
black jumble of hills to the east. Sally uttered hardly a syllable.
When she spoke at all, the words came jerkily. Lafe leaned over once to
brush some sparks of his cigarette from his coat. A delicate perfume
reached him.
"The river," he said, clearing his throat, "the river'll be way up.
Bridge is like to go out."
"I'm afraid so. Oh, dear! Tom promised he'd come home to-night, too."
"Come home to-night? Why, it's thirty miles."
"I know it. But he's never failed to keep his word yet," she said.
"He won't come home to-night."
A writhing fork of lightning leaped from east to north. There was no
thunder. They sat tensely quiet and the rain dripped sadly from the
roof.
"No, he won't come home to-night," he said in a hoarse voice. "He
can't."
"Sally!" he breathed, bending toward her. "Sally!"