When Margaret arrived behind the curtain she was aware of many cries and
questions hurled at her like an avalanche, but, ignoring them all, she
sprang past the noisy, excited group of young people, darted through the
dressing-room to the right and out into the night and coolness. Her head
was swimming, and things went black before her eyes. She felt that her
breath was going, going, and she must get to the air.
But when she passed the hot wave of the school-room, and the sharp air
of the night struck her face, consciousness seemed to turn and come back
into her again; for there over her head was the wideness of the vast,
starry Arizona night, and there, before her, in Nick Bottom's somber
costume, eating one of the chicken sandwiches that Mrs. Tanner had sent
down to her, stood Gardley! He was pale and shaken from his recent
experience; but he was undaunted, and when he saw Margaret coming toward
him through the doorway with her soul in her eyes and her spirit all
aflame with joy and relief, he came to meet her under the stars, and,
forgetting everything else, just folded her gently in his arms!
It was a most astonishing thing to do, of course, right there outside
the dressing-room door, with the curtain just about to rise on the scene
and Gardley's wig was not on yet. He had not even asked nor obtained
permission. But the soul sometimes grows impatient waiting for the lips
to speak, and Margaret felt her trust had been justified and her heart
had found its home. Right there behind the school-house, out in the
great wide night, while the crowded, clamoring audience waited for them,
and the young actors grew frantic, they plighted their troth, his lips
upon hers, and with not a word spoken.
Voices from the dressing-room roused them. "Come in quick, Mr. Gardley;
it's time for the curtain to rise, and everybody is ready. Where on
earth has Miss Earle vanished? Miss Earle! Oh, Miss Earle!"
There was a rush to the dressing-room to find the missing ones; but Bud,
as ever, present where was the most need, stood with his back to the
outside world in the door of the dressing-room and called loudly:
"They're comin', all right. Go on! Get to your places. Miss Earle says
to get to your places."
The two in the darkness groped for each other's hands as they stood
suddenly apart, and with one quick pressure and a glance hurried in.
There was not any need for words. They understood, these two, and
trusted.
With her cheeks glowing now, and her eyes like two stars, Margaret fled
across the stage and took her place at the piano again, just as the
curtain began to be drawn; and Forsythe, who had been slightly uneasy at
the look on her face as she left them, wondered now and leaned forward
to tell her how well she was looking.
He kept his honeyed phrase to himself, however, for she was not heeding
him. Her eyes were on the rising curtain, and Forsythe suddenly
remembered that this was the scene in which Jed was to have
appeared--and Jed had a broken leg! What had Margaret done about it? It
was scarcely a part that could be left out. Why hadn't he thought of it
sooner and offered to take it? He could have bluffed it out somehow--he
had heard it so much--made up words where he couldn't remember them all,
and it would have been a splendid opportunity to do some real
love-making with Rosa. Why hadn't he thought of it? Why hadn't Rosa?
Perhaps she hadn't heard about Jed soon enough to suggest it.
The curtain was fully open now, and Bud's voice as Peter Quince, a
trifle high and cracked with excitement, broke the stillness, while the
awed audience gazed upon this new, strange world presented to them.
"Is all our company here?" lilted out Bud, excitedly, and Nick Bottom
replied with Gardley's voice:
"You were best to call them generally, man by man, according to the
scrip."
Forsythe turned deadly white. Jasper Kemp, whose keen eye was upon him,
saw it through the tan, saw his lips go pale and purple points of fear
start in his eyes, as he looked and looked again, and could not believe
his senses.
Furtively he darted a glance around, like one about to steal away; then,
seeing Jasper Kemp's eyes upon him, settled back with a strained look
upon his face. Once he stole a look at Margaret and caught her face all
transfigured with great joy; looked again and felt rebuked somehow by
the pureness of her maiden joy and trust.
Not once had she turned her eyes to his. He was forgotten, and somehow
he knew the look he would get if she should see him. It would be
contempt and scorn that would burn his very soul. It is only a maid now
and then to whom it is given thus to pierce and bruise the soul of a man
who plays with love and trust and womanhood for selfishness. Such a
woman never knows her power. She punishes all unconscious to herself. It
was so that Margaret Earle, without being herself aware, and by her very
indifference and contempt, showed the little soul of this puppet man to
himself.
He stole away at last when he thought no one was looking, and reached
the back of the school-house at the open door of the girls'
dressing-room, where he knew Titania would be posing in between the
acts. He beckoned her to his side and began to question her in quick,
eager, almost angry tones, as if the failure of their plans were her
fault. Had her father been at home all day? Had anything happened--any
one been there? Did Gardley come? Had there been any report from the
men? Had that short, thick-set Scotchman with the ugly grin been there?
She must remember that she was the one to suggest the scheme in the
first place, and it was her business to keep a watch. There was no
telling now what might happen. He turned, and there stood Jasper Kemp
close to his elbow, his short stature drawn to its full, his thick-set
shoulders squaring themselves, his ugly grin standing out in bold
relief, menacingly, in the night.
The young man let forth some words not in a gentleman's code, and turned
to leave the frightened girl, who by this time was almost crying; but
Jasper Kemp kept pace with Forsythe as he walked.
"Was you addressing me?" he asked, politely; "because I could tell you a
few things a sight more appropriate for you than what you just handed to
me."
Forsythe hurried around to the front of the school-house, making no
reply.
"Nice, pleasant evening to be _free_," went on Jasper Kemp, looking up
at the stars. "Rather onpleasant for some folks that have to be shut up
in jail."
Forsythe wheeled upon him. "What do you mean?" he demanded, angrily,
albeit he was white with fear.
"Oh, nothing much," drawled Jasper, affably. "I was just thinking how
much pleasanter it was to be a free man than shut up in prison on a
night like this. It's so much healthier, you know."
Forsythe looked at him a moment, a kind of panic of intelligence growing
in his face; then he turned and went toward the back of the
school-house, where he had left his horse some hours before.
"Where are you going?" demanded Jasper. "It's 'most time you went back
to your fiddling, ain't it?"
But Forsythe answered him not a word. He was mounting his horse
hurriedly--his horse, which, all unknown to him, had been many miles
since he last rode him.
"You think you have to go, then?" said Jasper, deprecatingly. "Well,
now, that's a pity, seeing you was fiddling so nice an' all. Shall I
tell them you've gone for your health?"
Thus recalled, Forsythe stared at his tormentor wildly for a second.
"Tell her--tell her"--he muttered, hoarsely--"tell her I've been taken
suddenly ill." And he was off on a wild gallop toward the fort.
"I'll tell her you've gone for your health!" called Jasper Kemp, with
his hands to his mouth like a megaphone. "I reckon he won't return again
very soon, either," he chuckled. "This country's better off without such
pests as him an' that measley parson." Then, turning, he beheld Titania,
the queen of the fairies, white and frightened, staring wildly into the
starry darkness after the departed rider. "Poor little fool!" he
muttered under his breath as he looked at the girl and turned away.
"Poor, pretty little fool!" Suddenly he stepped up to her side and
touched her white-clad shoulder gently. "Don't you go for to care,
lassie," he said in a tender tone. "He ain't worth a tear from your
pretty eye. He ain't fit to wipe your feet on--your pretty wee feet!"
But Rosa turned angrily and stamped her foot.
"Go away! You bad old man!" she shrieked. "Go away! I shall tell my
father!" And she flouted herself into the school-house.
Jasper stood looking ruefully after her, shaking his head. "The little
de'il!" he said aloud; "the poor, pretty little de'il. She'll get her
dues aplenty afore she's done." And Jasper went back to the play.
Meantime, inside the school-house, the play went gloriously on to the
finish, and Gardley as Nick Bottom took the house by storm. Poor absent
Jed's father, sent by the sufferer to report it all, stood at the back
of the house while tears of pride and disappointment rolled down his
cheeks--pride that Jed had been so well represented, disappointment that
it couldn't have been his son up there play-acting like that.
The hour was late when the play was over, and Margaret stood at last in
front of the stage to receive the congratulations of the entire
countryside, while the young actors posed and laughed and chattered
excitedly, then went away by two and threes, their tired, happy voices
sounding back along the road. The people from the fort had been the
first to surge around Margaret with their eager congratulations and
gushing sentiments: "So sweet, my dear! So perfectly wonderful! You
really have got some dandy actors!" And, "Why don't you try something
lighter--something simpler, don't you know. Something really popular
that these poor people could understand and appreciate? A little farce!
I could help you pick one out!"
And all the while they gushed Jasper Kemp and his men, grim and
forbidding, stood like a cordon drawn about her to protect her, with
Gardley in the center, just behind her, as though he had a right there
and meant to stay; till at last the fort people hurried away and the
school-house grew suddenly empty with just those two and the eight men
behind; and by the door Bud, talking to Pop and Mom Wallis in the
buckboard outside.
Amid this admiring bodyguard at last Gardley took Margaret home.
Perhaps she wondered a little that they all went along, but she laid it
to their pride in the play and their desire to talk it over.
They had sent Mom and Pop Wallis home horseback, after all, and put
Margaret and Gardley in the buckboard, Margaret never dreaming that it
was because Gardley was not fit to walk. Indeed, he did not realize
himself why they all stuck so closely to him. He had lived through so
much since Jasper and his men had burst into his prison and freed him,
bringing him in hot haste to the school-house, with Bud wildly riding
ahead. But it was enough for him to sit beside Margaret in the sweet
night and remember how she had come out to him under the stars. Her hand
lay beside him on the seat, and without intending it his own brushed it.
Then he laid his gently, reverently, down upon hers with a quiet
pressure, and her smaller fingers thrilled and nestled in his grasp.
In the shadow of a big tree beside the house he bade her good-by, the
men busying themselves with turning about the buckboard noisily, and Bud
discreetly taking himself to the back door to get one of the men a drink
of water.
"You have been suffering in some way," said Margaret, with sudden
intuition, as she looked up into Gardley's face. "You have been in
peril, somehow--"
"A little," he answered, lightly. "I'll tell you about it to-morrow. I
mustn't keep the men waiting now. I shall have a great deal to tell you
to-morrow--if you will let me. Good night, _Margaret_!" Their hands
lingered in a clasp, and then he rode away with his bodyguard.
But Margaret did not have to wait until the morrow to hear the story,
for Bud was just fairly bursting.
Mrs. Tanner had prepared a nice little supper--more cold chicken, pie,
doughnuts, coffee, some of her famous marble cake, and preserves--and
she insisted on Margaret's coming into the dining-room and eating it,
though the girl would much rather have gone with her happy heart up to
her own room by herself.
Bud did not wait on ceremony. He began at once when Margaret was seated,
even before his mother could get her properly waited on.
"Well, we had _some ride_, we sure did! The Kid's a great old scout."
Margaret perceived that this was a leader. "Why, that's so, what became
of you, William? I hunted everywhere for you. Things were pretty
strenuous there for a while, and I needed you dreadfully."
"Well, I know," Bud apologized. "I'd oughta let you know before I went,
but there wasn't time. You see, I had to pinch that guy's horse to go,
and I knew it was just a chance if we could get back, anyway; but I had
to take it. You see, if I could 'a' gone right to the cabin it would
have been a dead cinch, but I had to ride to camp for the men, and then,
taking the short trail across, it was some ride to Ouida's Cabin!"
Mrs. Tanner stepped aghast as she was cutting a piece of dried-apple pie
for Margaret. "Now, Buddie--mother's boy--you don't mean to tell me
_you_ went to _Ouida's Cabin_? Why, sonnie, that's an _awful place_!
Don't you know your pa told you he'd whip you if you ever went on that
trail?"
"I should worry, Ma! I _had_ to go. They had Mr. Gardley tied up there,
and we had to go and get him rescued."
"_You_ had to go, Buddie--now what could _you_ do in that awful place?"
Mrs. Tanner was almost reduced to tears. She saw her offspring at the
edge of perdition at once.
But Bud ignored his mother and went on with his tale. "You jest oughta
seen Jap Kemp's face when I told him what that guy said to you! Some
face, b'lieve me! He saw right through the whole thing, too. I could see
that! He ner the men hadn't had a bite o' supper yet; they'd just got
back from somewheres. They thought the Kid was over here all day helping
you. He said yesterday when he left 'em here's where he's
a-comin'"--Bud's mouth was so full he could hardly articulate--"an' when
I told 'em, he jest blew his little whistle--like what they all
carry--three times, and those men every one jest stopped right where
they was, whatever they was doin'. Long Bill had the comb in the air
gettin' ready to comb his hair, an' he left it there and come away, and
Big Jim never stopped to wipe his face on the roller-towel, he just let
the wind dry it; and they all hustled on their horses fast as ever they
could and beat it after Jap Kemp. Jap, he rode alongside o' me and asked
me questions. He made me tell all what the guy from the fort said over
again, three or four times, and then he ast what time he got to the
school-house, and whether the Kid had been there at all yest'iday ur
t'day; and a lot of other questions, and then he rode alongside each man
and told him in just a few words where we was goin' and what the guy
from the fort had said. Gee! but you'd oughta heard what the men said
when he told 'em! Gee! but they was some mad! Bimeby we came to the
woods round the cabin, and Jap Kemp made me stick alongside Long Bill,
and he sent the men off in different directions all in a _big_ circle,
and waited till each man was in his place, and then we all rode hard as we
could and came softly up round that cabin just as the sun was goin' down.
Gee! but you'd oughta seen the scairt look on them women's faces; there
was two of 'em--an old un an' a skinny-looking long-drink-o'-pump-water.
I guess she was a girl. I don't know. Her eyes looked real old. There
was only three men in the cabin; the rest was off somewheres. They
wasn't looking for anybody to come that time o' day, I guess. One of the
men was sick on a bunk in the corner. He had his head tied up, and his
arm, like he'd been shot, and the other two men came jumping up to the
door with their guns, but when they saw how many men _we_ had they
looked awful scairt. _We_ all had _our_ guns out, too!--Jap Kemp gave me
one to carry--" Bud tried not to swagger as he told this, but it was
almost too much for him. "Two of our men held the horses, and all the
rest of us got down and went into the cabin. Jap Kemp, sounded his
whistle and all our men done the same just as they went in the
door--some kind of signals they have for the Lone Fox Camp! The two men
in the doorway aimed straight at Jap Kemp and fired, but Jap was onto
'em and jumped one side and our men fired, too, and we soon had 'em tied
up and went in--that is, Jap and me and Long Bill went in, the rest
stayed by the door--and it wasn't long 'fore their other men came riding
back hot haste; they'd heard the shots, you know--and some more of _our_
men--why, most twenty or thirty there was, I guess, altogether; some
from Lone Fox Camp that was watching off in the woods came and when we
got outside again there they all were, like a big army. Most of the men
belonging to the cabin was tied and harmless by that time, for our men
took 'em one at a time as they came riding in. Two of 'em got away, but
Jap Kemp said they couldn't go far without being caught, 'cause there
was a watch out for 'em--they'd been stealing cattle long back something
terrible. Well, so Jap Kemp and Long Bill and I went into the cabin
after the two men that shot was tied with ropes we'd brung along, and
handcuffs, and we went hunting for the Kid. At first we couldn't find
him at all. Gee! It was something fierce! And the old woman kep'
a-crying and saying we'd kill her sick son, and she didn't know nothing
about the man we was hunting for. But pretty soon I spied the Kid's foot
stickin' out from under the cot where the sick man was, and when I told
Jap Kemp that sick man pulled out a gun he had under the blanket and
aimed it right at me!"
"Oh, mother's little Buddie!" whimpered Mrs. Tanner, with her apron to
her eyes.
"_Aw, Ma_, cut it out! _he_ didn't _hurt_ me! The gun just went off
crooked, and grazed Jap Kemp's hand a little, not much. Jap knocked it
out of the sick man's hand just as he was pullin' the trigger. Say, Ma,
ain't you got any more of those cucumber pickles? It makes a man mighty
hungry to do all that riding and shooting. Well, it certainly was
something fierce--Say, Miss Earle, you take that last piece o' pie. Oh,
g'wan! _Take_ it! _You_ worked hard. No, I don't want it, really! Well,
if you won't take it _anyway_, I might eat it just to save it. Got any
more coffee, Ma?"
But Margaret was not eating. Her face was pale and her eyes were starry
with unshed tears, and she waited in patient but breathless suspense for
the vagaries of the story to work out to the finish.
"Yes, it certainly was something fierce, that cabin," went on the
narrator. "Why, Ma, it looked as if it had never been swept under that
cot when we hauled the Kid out. He was tied all up in knots, and great
heavy ropes wound tight from his shoulders down to his ankles. Why, they
were bound so tight they made great heavy welts in his wrists and
shoulders and round his ankles when we took 'em off; and they had a
great big rag stuffed into his mouth so he couldn't yell. Gee! It was
something fierce! He was 'most dippy, too; but Jap Kemp brought him
round pretty quick and got him outside in the air. That was the worst
place I ever was in myself. You couldn't breathe, and the dirt was
something fierce. It was like a pigpen. I sure was glad to get outdoors
again. And then--well, the Kid came around all right and they got him on
a horse and gave him something out of a bottle Jap Kemp had, and pretty
soon he could ride again. Why, you'd oughta seen his nerve. He just sat
up there as straight, his lips all white yet and his eyes looked some
queer; but he straightened up and he looked those rascals right in the
eye, and told 'em a few things, and he gave orders to the other men from
Lone Fox Camp what to do with 'em; and he had the two women
disarmed--they had guns, too--and carried away, and the cabin nailed up,
and a notice put on the door, and every one of those men were
handcuffed--the sick one and all--and he told 'em to bring a wagon and
put the sick one's cot in and take 'em over to Ashland to the jail, and
he sent word to Mr. Rogers. Then we rode home and got to the
school-house just when you was playing the last chords of the ov'rtcher.
Gee! It was some fierce ride and some _close shave_! The Kid he hadn't
had a thing to eat since Monday noon, and he was some hungry! I found a
sandwich on the window of the dressing-room, and he ate it while he got
togged up--'course I told him 'bout Jed soon's we left the cabin, and
Jap Kemp said he'd oughta go right home to camp after all he had been
through; but he wouldn't; he said he was goin' to _act_. So 'course he
had his way! But, gee! You could see it wasn't any cinch game for him!
He 'most fell over every time after the curtain fell. You see, they gave
him some kind of drugged whisky up there at the cabin that made his head
feel queer. Say, he thinks that guy from the fort came in and looked at
him once while he was asleep. He says it was only a dream, but I bet he
did. Say, Ma, ain't you gonta give me another doughnut?"
In the quiet of her chamber at last, Margaret knelt before her window
toward the purple, shadowy mountain under the starry dome, and gave
thanks for the deliverance of Gardley; while Bud, in his comfortable
loft, lay down to his well-earned rest and dreamed of pirates and angels
and a hero who looked like the Kid.