A CONSULTATION.
That mysterious warm-air current known as the Chinook wind steals
through the depressions of the Rocky Mountains, at certain seasons
of the year, from the mild surface of the Pacific, and tempers the
severity of the winters in some portions of Montana, Wyoming, and
the great West to a degree that renders them milder than many places
farther south.
It was early in the month of May, when even in the Middle States it is
not often comfortable to remain seated out of doors after the close of
day, but Sterry and Whitney found it pleasant to occupy their chairs
in front of the building, with no other protection then their own warm
garments.
Whitney's wound was doing so well that he expressed himself ashamed
to wear his arm in a sling. He freed it from the support, moved it
readily about, and declared that after the next morning he would no
longer shirk duty.
In one sense, Monteith Sterry was disappointed. He hoped they would be
joined by Jennie, from whom he parted earlier in the evening, but he
reflected that the hour was late, and she probably felt that her duty
was with her sorrowing mother.
"She belongs there," he concluded, "and I respect her for doing her
duty."
But she heard the murmur of voices after they had talked a few
minutes, and appeared at the outer door, where she greeted her friend
and listened with an intensity of interest that may be imagined to
his account of his brush with the rustlers. Although she had become
accustomed to danger during her life in the West, there could be no
mistaking her solicitude for him. She said little, however, and,
excusing herself, bade the two good-night.
"I tell you," said her brother, when she was gone, "if you stay, or
rather attempt to stay, in this section, Mont, it is suicide--nothing
more nor less."
"Well, I know times are likely to be warm, but, hang it, I can't bear
the thought of being run out of Wyoming. It's a mighty big State, and
there ought to be room enough for me."
"You persist in treating it lightly, but it is no trifling matter;
you have been warned; were shot at, when we had our flurry with the
rustlers; and, even while attempting to ride across the country,
had the narrowest escape of your life--an escape so curious that it
couldn't be repeated in a hundred years."
"It's the unexpected that happens."
"Not so often as the expected. Mont, what made you leave us so
abruptly to-night?"
"O, I can hardly tell," replied the other, carelessly flinging one leg
over the other and puffing at his cigar, as though the matter was of
no importance.
"I know; you believed that if you stayed here you would increase the
peril to us."
"You've hit it exactly; that was it."
"What sort of friends do you take us to be?"
"That isn't it; rather, what sort of friend would I be, thus knowingly
to place you and your mother and sister in danger? If those rustlers
knew where I am, a dozen would be here before sunrise."
"What of it? We are ready for them."
"That's a poor answer to my statement; you had enough of that woeful
business yesterday; they hold me in such hatred that they would burn
down your place, if they could reach me in no other way."
"And yet you propose to stay in Wyoming and have it out with them?"
"I haven't said that," remarked Sterry, more thoughtfully; "I may soon
leave for a more civilized section, much as I hate to play the seeming
coward; but what you said about my parents, brothers and sisters at
home, gave me something to think over while riding across the prairie
to-night."
"I shall hate to lose your company, for it is like old times to
talk over our school days, but I would not be a friend to allow my
selfishness to stand in the way of your good."
Sterry smoked a moment in silence, and then flung away his cigar and
turned abruptly on his companion.
"Fred, if you could have prevented what took place yesterday by
sacrificing every dollar of the property you have in Wyoming, you
would have done it."
"Yes, God knows I would have done it a thousand times over; mother
will never recover from the blow."
"And yet you may be the next to fall during this frightful state of
affairs. If the situation of your mother and sister is so sad because
of the loss of the head of the household, what will it be if you
should be taken?"
"I appreciate your kindness, Mont, but you put the case too strongly;
in one sense we all stand in danger of sudden death every day. I might
live to threescore and ten in Wyoming, and be killed in a railroad
accident or some other way the first day I left it. There is no
particular enmity between the rustlers and me; that brush yesterday
was one of those sudden outbursts that was not premeditated by them."
"It didn't look that way to me."
"You were not there when it opened. They were driving a lot of
mavericks toward their ranch down the river, when Budd Hankinson saw
a steer among them with our brand. You know it--a sort of cross with
father's initials. Without asking for its return, Budd called them a
gang of thieves, cut out the steer and drove him toward our range. If
he had gone at the thing in the right way there would have been no
trouble, but his ugly words made them mad, and the next thing we were
all shooting at each other."
"You inflicted more harm than they, and they won't forget it."
"I don't want them to forget it," said Fred, bitterly, "but they won't
carry their enmity to the extent of making an unprovoked attack on me
or any of my people."
"Possibly not, but you don't want to bank on the theory."
"You must not forget," continued the practical Whitney, "that all we
have in the world is invested in this business, and it would be a
sacrifice for us to sell out and move eastward, where I would be
without any business."
"You could soon make one for yourself."
"Well," said Whitney, thoughtfully, "I will promise to turn it over
in my mind; the associations, however, that will always cling to this
place, and particularly my sympathy for mother and Jennie, will be the
strongest influences actuating me, provided I decide to change."
Mont Sterry experienced a thrill of delight, for he knew that when
a man talks in that fashion he is on the point of yielding. He
determined to urge the matter upon Jennie, and there was just enough
hope in his heart that the prospect of being on the same side of the
Mississippi with him would have some slight weight.
"I am glad to hear you speak thus, for it is certain there will be
serious trouble with the rustlers."
"All which emphasizes what I said earlier in the evening about your
duty to make a change of location."
The proposition, now that there was reason to believe that Fred
Whitney had come over to his way of thinking, struck Sterry more
favourably than before. In fact he reflected, with a shudder, what a
dismal, unattractive section this would be, after the removal of his
friends.
"I shall not forget your words; what you said has great influence with
me, and you need not be surprised if I bid adieu to Wyoming within a
week or a few days."
"It can't be too soon for your own safety, much as we shall regret to
lose your company."