KELLER INTERFERES
For two or three weeks after the picnic Charnock did not meet Sadie. The
rebuff he had got did not rankle much, and was rather provocative than
daunting, but he understood why she had told him he made her cheap. She
meant to keep her caresses for her husband or declared lover, and if he
wanted her, he must pay the regular price. This was very proper, from
her point of view, but from his the price was high.
Sadie was pretty, capable, and amusing, but he was not sure he would
like to see her every day, in his house and at his table. Besides, the
house would really be hers, and Sadie would not forget this. She was
determined and liked her own way. He had promised to marry another girl,
of a very different stamp, but his conscience was clear on that point.
It was better for Helen's sake that he should give her up, because he
was on the edge of ruin and she was much too good for him. Irresolution,
however, was perhaps his greatest failing, and now he must decide, he
wavered and thought about what he had lost.
There were days when he would not admit that all was lost, and
harnessing his team in the early morning, drove the gang-plow through
the soil until the red sunset faded off the plain. In his heart, he
knew the fight was hopeless; Festing, for example, in his place, might
perhaps make good, but he had not the stamina for the long struggle.
All the same, he worked with savage energy until his mood changed and
he went off to hunt sandhill cranes. He would sooner have gone to the
poolroom, but there was a risk of his meeting Sadie at the settlement.
In the meantime the days got warmer and a flush of vivid green spread
across the grass. The roaring wind that swept the tableland drove clouds
that never broke across the dazzling sky, and where there were belts
of plowed land the harrows clanked across the furrows amidst a haze of
blowing dust. The ducks and geese had gone, and red lilies began to sway
above the rolling waves of grass. Farmer and hired man worked with tense
activity, but Charnock's efforts were spasmodic and often slack.
In the meantime, trade was brisk at the settlement, and Keller found his
business made demands on him that he could hardly meet. It was rapidly
growing, and his strength got less. Indeed, he would have sold out but
for Sadie. The girl was clever and had tone; he wanted her to find life
smooth and taste pleasure her mother had not enjoyed. The latter had
helped him in a hard fight when dollars were very scarce, and died, worn
out, just before the tide turned. Since then he had schemed and sweated
to make her child's future safe.
Now he thought he had done so, but it had been a struggle, and he knew
he had held on too long. Keeping store in a wheat-growing district was
not a simple matter of selling groceries; one was in reality a banker.
Bills were not often paid until the crop was harvested, farmers began
without much money, and one must know whom to trust. Indeed, one often
financed a hustler who had no capital, and kept an honest man who had
lost a crop on his feet; but the risk was great, and one felt the strain
when there was rust and autumn frost.
One bright afternoon Keller stood on the sidewalk in front of the store.
He was not old, but his hair was gray and his face was pinched. It
was rather a hard face, for Keller's glance was keen and his lips were
generally firmly set. Yet he was liked by his customers. Now he was
breathing hard because he had helped a farmer to put a heavy bag of
flour in his wagon. The farmer drove away and a cloud of dust the team
stirred up blew down the street. The fronts of the wooden houses were
cracking in the hot sun; there was not a tree to relieve the bare
ugliness of the place, and the glare was dazzling. Keller at first
imagined this was why he could not see the wagon well, but after a few
moments he knew better.
He went into the store with a staggering step, and the rank smell of
cheese and salt-pork nauseated him. The room felt very hot and was full
of flies that buzzed in a tormenting cloud round his head. He wanted
quietness and made his way to the dark back office, where he dropped
into a chair.
“Go to the hotel,” he ordered the clerk who entered after him. “Tell
Jake to give you a big glass of the special whisky. Be quick, but don't
run and spill the stuff.”
The clerk came back in a few minutes, and Keller pulled himself together
when he had drained the glass, though his forehead was damp with sweat.
“Now where's the list of the truck Gascoyne got?” he said. “I'll look it
up.”
“Sure you feel all right?” the clerk inquired.
“Get the list,” said Keller. “Take that glass away.”
He picked up a pen, but put it down when he found his hand shook, and
told the clerk to charge the goods. When the latter had gone, he sat
still for some minutes and then opened a book of accounts. He had
had another warning, sharper than the last, and had better put things
straight while he could. With this object he worked later than usual,
and when he returned to the hotel called Sadie into his private room.
The girl sat down, and he studied her, leaning his elbow heavily on the
table.
Sadie had a strained look and had been quiet for the last week or two
except when she was angry. This indicated that her nerves were on edge,
and Keller thought he knew why.
“I guess we've got to have a talk,” he said. “I've put it off, but now's
the time.”
Sadie waited calmly. She had courage and knew she must be frank with
her father. He did not, as a rule, say much, but he noted things and
understood.
“Well,” he resumed, “I've built up a pretty good business here, but I'll
have to quit and leave you some day, and reckon you won't be satisfied
to stop at the hotel all your life. You're smart and a looker, and I
guess you want to go out and see the world. That's all right, and you'll
be able, as far as dollars count; but I can't go with you and you can't
go alone.”
Sadie shivered. Keller's face was pinched, and she knew his health was
not good, although she did not know how bad it really was.
“I couldn't leave you, anyway, and hope you'll be with me a long time
yet.”
“It's possible,” said Keller. “All the same, I can't keep my grip on
the business long and want a man to help. But I'm not going to trust a
stranger or a hired man. You see where this leads?”
Sadie saw and made a vague gesture, though her glance was level.
“Very well. The man who carries on my business must be your husband.
Now there are three or four of the boys in the settlement who could
be taught to run the store and hotel, but I allow you don't want me to
choose from them. Have I got that right?”
“Yes,” said Sadie with quiet calm, although her heart beat. “None of
them would suit.”
Keller knitted his brows and his look was grave. “They're good boys, and
if you had taken one of that bunch, I'd have been satisfied. I reckon
the trouble is they're my kind and belong where I do, while you mean
to go higher. Well, that's right; I've put up the dollars to give you a
good time, but you can't get where you want on your own feet.” He paused
with a dry smile. “I allow you're smart enough to figure this out.”
“I have,” said Sadie. “There's much I don't know and couldn't learn
here. If I'm to move up, my husband must help.”
“Then I only know two men round the settlement who could help. Festing's
my choice.”
A wave of color flushed Sadie's white skin, but her voice was quiet. “He
isn't mine. I allow, in some ways, he's the better man, but that doesn't
count.”
Keller looked hard at her. “I used to think your head would guide you,
not your heart; but it seems you're like the rest--well, I was a very
poor man when your mother married me! Now I like Charnock and he has
tone; but if you take him, there's a risk--”
“I know the risk.”
“It's plain! I'd stop the thing right now if you were a different girl,
but you know what you want and how to keep it when it's got. It looks as
if you had made up your mind?”
Sadie's hands moved nervously. She made a sign of agreement, but did not
speak, and Keller went on:
“Anyhow, you'd better understand what you're up against. Sometimes
you'll have to hustle Charnock and sometimes hold him tight. You must
keep him off the liquor, and maybe stop him getting after other girls.
Then when you sell out the business, you'll hold the dollars.”
For a moment Sadie turned her head and then got up and stood by her
father's chair. Her look was strained but resolute as she put her hand
on his arm.
“I know all that! Bob has plenty of faults, but he's the man I love.”
Keller took and pressed her hand. He had some misgivings, but he knew
his daughter.
“We all like Charnock, and though I wouldn't trust him far, I can trust
you. I think you've got that right and won't forget. Very well, since
you want Charnock I'll get him for you.”
Sadie stooped and kissed him and then went out. She was moved, but there
was nothing to be said. Her father was not a sentimentalist, but he had
never failed her and would not do so now. When she sat down in her room,
however, her face was grave. Her courage was high, but she felt
half afraid. Although she loved Bob Charnock, life with him might be
difficult. He was older than she and knew much more, but she must lead
him and be firm where he was weak. It was a hard task for an ignorant
girl, but she resolved to carry it out.
Next morning Keller went down the street and entered a wooden building
filled with gaudily painted mowers and plows. He was not the man to
waste time when he had made a plan, and moreover felt that he had not
much time to lose. Finding the implement dealer in his office, he sat
down, breathing rather hard.
“You don't look very spry this morning,” the dealer remarked.
“I don't feel so bright. The boys have been rushing me the last week or
two. Say, trade is booming now!”
“It surely is. I could sell more machines than I've got, but I've got
a lot of money standing out, and after the bad harvest last fall, don't
know who to trust.”
They compared notes about their customers, and presently the dealer
remarked: “Charnock was in a few days ago, asking about a new wagon, a
mower, and some small tools.”
“Ah!” said Keller, rather sharply. “Then it looks as if he meant to hold
on! He reckoned, not long since, that he'd have to quit. But what did
you tell him?”
“To come again. I'd like to keep Bob Charnock up, but guess it's
dangerous. Owes me a pile. How does he stand with you?”
Keller supplied the information, and the other looked thoughtful.
“Didn't know it was quite so bad as that. I allow I'd better not let him
have the goods.”
“Well, I reckon he's trying the new man at Concord. Smith said he met
him there yesterday.”
The dealer frowned. He hated to think of a customer going to somebody
else. In fact, this was, for a debtor, an unpardonable offense.
“Charnock's trouble is that he's not quite straight. Ought to have
stayed with me, told me how he was fixed, and let me see what I could
do. If he's going to deal with the new man, I'd better pull him up and
try to get my money back.”
“You can't get it,” said Keller dryly. “He can't pay now, and if you let
him go on until harvest, you'll have a crowd of others with long bills
fighting for what's left.”
“Looks like that,” the dealer agreed. “Well, I'd have liked to keep him
going if he'd stayed with me, but I can't stand for losing the dollars
he owes. What are we going to do about the thing?”
Keller explained his plans, and after some argument the other agreed.
The decision they came to would bring Charnock's farming to an end,
but Keller left the office with some doubts. His scheme was going to
succeed, but he wondered whether he had indulged Sadie too far. Much
depended on her firmness, and she might find the job harder than she
thought; but on the whole he imagined she would be equal to the strain.
A week later, Charnock sat, one afternoon, in the saddle of his
gang-plow, tearing a row of furrows through the dusty sod. The sweating
horses moved leisurely, and he did not urge them as he moodily watched
the tangled grass part before the shares and vanish beneath the polished
surface of the turned-up clods. He was breaking new soil, doing work
that would be paid for in the future, and knew the reward of his labor
might never be his. When he reached the end of the plowing he stopped
and let the horses rest while he looked about.
One side of the long furrows gleamed in the strong light, and another
team was moving towards him from the opposite end. The sun was hot, but
the wind was fresh, and thin clouds of dust blew across the plain. Still
the belt he was plowing was good soil; the firm black _gumbo_ that holds
the moisture the wheat plant needs. There was something exhilarating in
the rushing breeze and glow of light, but Charnock frowned and wondered
why he had worked so long. He had no real hope, and admitted that he had
continued his spasmodic efforts because he could not face defeat.
For all that, he had not been fighting entirely for his farm. He
wanted to keep his freedom; to break through trammels that were getting
tighter, and try to regain something that he had lost. Sometimes he felt
desperate, but now and then saw an elusive ray of hope. If he could hold
out until harvest and reap a record crop----
Then his hired man, driving the other plow, waved his arm, and Charnock
saw a rig lurch across a rise amidst a cloud of sand. It was the
mail-carrier going his round, but he would not have come that way unless
he had letters, and Charnock waited until the man arrived.
“Here's your lot,” he said, taking out three or four envelopes.
Charnock's hand shook as he opened the first, it was large and had an
official look, and he found a number of unpaid accounts inside. Besides
these, there was a lawyer's letter, stating that certain dealers had
instructed him to recover payment of the debts Charnock owed. He crushed
the letter in his clenched hand and the veins stood out on his forehead,
while his face got red. The blow he feared had fallen and he was
ruined; but when the shock began to pass he felt a faint relief. It
was something to be free from doubt and anxiety, and there were
consolations. Now he was beaten, the line he must take was plain, and it
had some advantages.
“You can quit plowing and put the teams in the stable,” he said to the
hired man.
“Quit now!” exclaimed the other. “What about the machines?”
“Let them stop,” said Charnock. “It seems they belong to my creditors,
who can look after them. I'm going to Concord and don't know when I'll
be back.”
He went off towards the homestead and half an hour later drove away
across the plain.