INTERLUDE
August ripened into September, and the Park underwent a subtle and
fascinating change. In the meadows the hay lay in long windrows,
golden green; on the slopes vermilion flowers succeeded blue; in the
sunsets tender pinks yielded to burnt orange and vivid red. The nights
had grown perceptibly colder, but the days were still warm and dry and
radiant, though with a tang in the air that stirred the blood. And a
thousand perfumes, known and unknown, distilled from meadow and field
and forest, scented every vagrant breeze.
Marion was soon herself again, in body if not in mind. A few long
nights of sleep, a few days in the saddle, and sufficient nourishment
(for she had neglected herself at Haig's, despite Jim's solicitude)
restored her physically to what she had been on the day of Haig's
accident. But she, too, had changed, and as subtly as the season.
"What's come over Marion?" asked Huntington of Claire one day, after
he had caught himself regarding her with the rapt interest of a
discoverer.
Claire looked at him pityingly. She knew, but she was not going to
tell him.
"Why?" she asked innocently.
"Well, I don't exactly know," he replied doubtfully. "She's prettier
than ever--but so are you. That isn't it. She's kind of--It's no use.
I don't know."
Claire laughed, and then became severe.
"That's because she's forgiven you," she said.
"No, it isn't!" he asseverated, not without embarrassment. "You can
see for yourself that she's different."
"Very well!" she retorted maliciously. "Perhaps if you'd done such a
noble thing as nursing Haig back to life you'd be different too."
"I'd see him in--"
"Shame!" she cried. "You wouldn't do anything of the kind. Your bark's
worse than your bite, sir. And besides, while I think of it, you
really must stop saying 'hell' and 'damn' so much. The habit's growing
on you."
Having no ready answer to that speech, he merely looked at her,
perhaps a little guiltily, then bent down and kissed her, and hurried
out of the house. He was, in truth, though he never would have had the
courage to acknowledge it, even to Claire, ashamed of himself, and
anxious too. His inflammable temper had rather out-flamed itself in
its last-recorded performance, and he had begun to suspect that it had
been responsible for some, though by no means all, of his troubles.
The killing of Haig's bull, he now realized, was a foolish and
indefensible act, which could be traced easily to him because of the
bull that was gored; and he must prepare to account to Haig for it.
And so, knowing that he would again be in the wrong, as in the affair
at the post-office, he was torn between accentuated bitterness toward
Haig and growing discontent with himself. He would never be afraid of
Haig, but he was becoming steadily more afraid of Marion. Whether it
was that he had really developed intuition, which told him of Marion's
spiritual growth, or that he was in constant dread lest she make some
new demand upon him in regard to Haig, he lived in much awe of her.
She had once spoken, on a memorable occasion, of making peace between
Haig and himself. It would be just like her, wouldn't it, to try to
bring them together? Well, let her try it! He would be the last man in
Paradise Park. And so on, until he was once more almost satisfied with
himself.
The faithful Smythe, meanwhile, brought Marion almost daily news of
Philip. That he was rapidly recovering she heard with a ringing joy,
which had its alloy of fear; for she knew that the day he felt himself
to be in full possession of his powers he would attempt again to
conquer Sunnysides. So from day to day her apprehension mounted until
it became well-nigh insupportable. And her own helplessness maddened
her. What could she do? Nothing! Nothing but wait, and pray God to
protect him. Every night she prayed for him, and every morning, on her
knees; and every hour the prayer was in her heart. She rode sometimes
as far as the farther edge of the woods that crowned the ridge, and
looked long at the little valley, and at the smoke rising in a thin
spiral from the ranch house that she could not see. At the right of it
would be the cottage, and at the left the barn, and the corral where
Sunnysides bided his time. And then, having looked until she could
endure no more, she would ride slowly home, to await the next coming
of Smythe with news.
Once she went to the glade of the columbines. She did not feel any
longer the antipathy she once felt to the spot that had, in one
devastating moment, revealed to her the fatuity of her dreams. Now she
was in search of the old hopes that she had once revelled in, while
she gathered armloads of columbines, and imagined they were for
Philip.
Dismounting eagerly at the foot of the little hill, she plunged
through the brush, and halted at the margin of the glade, stricken
with the keenest disappointment. The columbines were gone; only a
brave, pale blossom here and there lingered pathetically in a waste of
dried and drooping stems. She stood staring at them a moment; then,
with a cry, she threw herself down among them, and gave herself up to
grief, letting the tears come in what flood they would, while her hand
clutched one poor survivor of the summer glory.
Gone, then, like the summer, were all those dreams. And very soon must
come the end of all. Barely two weeks remained to her in the
Park,--barely two weeks in which the miracle that she awaited could be
wrought. What miracle could move him when her love had failed? And
yet--Once, in her desperation, she suggested to Claire and Seth that
she should remain all winter in the Park; but they rose up together
against any such scheme. It was absurd, they agreed. They would be
delighted to have her with them as many summers as she might wish; and
they were already counting on her return to them next June. But the
Park in winter was no place for a woman, unless she had been long
inured to such hardships as were involved in that hibernation. Claire
had remained two winters there, it was true, but Seth had vowed that
she should never miss the last stage again. Marion's proposal only
clinched the matter the more firmly; and it was eventually agreed that
Claire should go with Marion to New York, where they would live very
quietly, taking what pleasures their means would permit, until spring
should bring them back to the mountains. And so, barring a miracle,
she was at the end of her hopes.
Meanwhile, she had heard from Robert. He was nearly wild, he wrote.
The big deal was going slowly--not badly, but with maddening delays.
He was tempted to "chuck the whole business," though it meant
thousands, perhaps half a million. Yet how could he do that? He was
working for her; and if he left Denver the deal would certainly fall
through. But there was yet time; any day the stubborn partner might
yield; and so on. Poor Robert! thought Marion. She imagined what
Philip would have done if he had wanted her as Robert did. Would any
deal, any prospect of millions, have kept him away from her? So she
reasoned, forgetting entirely the other side of the case. Haig, if she
could have asked him, would have told her: yes, that's all very well,
but the man would have to get those thousands or other thousands
afterwards, just the same; a woman wants to have her cake and eat it
too; and so much the worse for the man if he cannot dance attendance
on her and make money for her at the same time!
She wrote to Robert that be must not think of leaving his business.
Moreover, she would soon be in Denver, on her way back home.
In the late afternoon Haig leaned against Sunnysides' corral, smoking
his pipe and gazing fixedly at the golden outlaw. The air was very
still, almost too still, as if nature had paused before a sudden
and violent alteration of her mood. In the bright sky, a little
hard even for September, there was no cloud, except on the western
horizon, where dark vapors hovered over the bald head of Thunder
Mountain. The scent of the harvest in the meadows blended with the
odor of burning pine that came from the ranch house, where Flick built
the fire for supper. On the hill the pines were still, but the brook
babbled on, and there was an incessant low twittering of birds in
the cottonwoods.
Haig had now fully recovered. He had taken to his horse again some
days before, to ride a little the first day, and more the next, each
day adding something to his exercise, until he felt the blood running
warmly in his veins, and his muscles tightening at his will. Then he
had hardened himself with every kind of labor around the ranch. For he
was impatient to remove the stigma of doubt that Sunnysides had burned
into his soul. He had told Marion that she was incapable of
understanding why he must conquer Sunnysides. He was not sure that he
understood it himself. But he knew that he must. Ever since that day
when he had fled into the world he had fought to be master of himself;
and his way of being master of himself was to be master of every man
and every animal and every obstacle that appeared across his
path,--that irresponsible, uncharted path that had neither beginning
nor end, that led he knew not where nor cared. Every moment was a
moment to itself, and every day was its own if he had done what he
had set out to do. His one purpose in life was not to be beaten, never
to fail, though he should throw away to-morrow what he had won to-day.
So it was that to conquer Sunnysides was for the moment the one thing
that counted, and he would have no rest until it was done.
Twilight settled down upon the valley. Haig's pipe went out, and still
he stood gazing at Sunnysides. In the dusk the horse glowed like a
living jewel that holds the light when the sun has gone. Night fell,
and the golden hide became a shimmer in the dark, as the outlaw moved
restlessly to and fro in his prison. Then, of a sudden, with the
unexpectedness and unreason of a dog's wolf-howl at the rising moon,
there rose from the gloom of the corral a shrill, wild neigh that
shattered the peaceful silence of the night.
Haig left the fence, and walked swiftly to the barn.
"Farrish!" he said shortly. "We'll break Sunnysides to-morrow. Tell
Pete and Curly not to ride away in the morning. The cattle can wait."