IN WANDA'S CAVE
Willie Dart's sunny nature seemed to grow ever brighter as the days
wore on. Once or twice he sighed at Wayne Shandon's failure to respond
to his levities; and when he felt particularly unappreciated he carried
his dimpling personality to the bunk house where he was hailed with
delight. When a flask that had come in with Long Steve, who had made a
brief trip to the outer world, disappeared before that joyous gentleman
had consumed half of the potent contents, and when later the empty
flask was found in the covers of Emmet's bunk, Willie Dart looked on
with sorrowful, innocent eyes while Steve and Emmet resorted to
physical argument. When a game of crib was being played while half a
dozen men looked on, and a portion of the deck vanished, only to turn
up ten minutes later in the hip pocket of Tony Harris, who had not once
been near the table and was most thoroughly mystified, no one thought
of blaming the cheerful Mr. Dart. It was only when he offered
privately to collect for Big Bill a debt of six bits long owing to him
from Dave Platt that the real gift of those wonderful hands of his
began to be at all apparent.
Then, too, the method of his progress over the range was another source
of unfailing delight and unbounded admiration. He had ridden a horse
to the Bar L-M, but no man of them ever saw his little legs astride a
horse again. He found, back of the blacksmith shop, the wreck of an
old cart which years ago had been used for breaking colts; he
improvised shafts and seat; he discovered the encouraging fact that Old
Bots, a shambling derelict who had lost an eye when Wayne Shandon was
quite young, was gentle and trustworthy. After that, wherever he went
abroad, and he travelled all over the countryside, he rode in the cart,
steering Old Bots this way and that with much shouting, prodding and
jerking of reins. And he drove where perhaps no man had ever driven
before. His smiling confidence in Old Bots, in his rattling, creaking
old cart, in his own ability as a driver were all characteristic of his
joyous optimism.
In the meantime Wayne Shandon had at last seen Wanda. His reasons for
making no effort to see her immediately after his heated interview with
Martin Leland were clear in his own mind; he expected to find that they
had been equally as clear to her, and that she would have understood.
But the Wanda he found one riotously brilliant morning was rather cool,
distant, unapproachable.
He had ridden up on the cliffs which towered at the upper end of the
Echo Creek ranch, from which he could look down the valley and see her
when she left the house, as he felt confident that she would. He saw
her when it was not yet nine o'clock. She was riding out across the
valley toward the cliffs opposite at the north end of the valley,
toward the cave she had found there. Shandon marked the course she was
taking, swung his horse across a ridge and hastened to the meeting with
her. He came upon her as she dismounted near the big cedar against the
rocks.
"Wanda!" he called softly.
She turned toward him, her face paler, he thought, than it should be.
He slipped from the saddle and came swiftly toward her, his eyes
shining, his arms out. Then she raised her hand, stopping him.
"Good morning, Wayne," she said quietly.
"Wanda," he cried, a little perplexed. "What is it? Aren't you glad
to see me?"
She smiled, put down the parcel she had been carrying, and perched upon
a big broken boulder forcing her eyes to look merrily into his. And
what she read in his look sent a quick, glad flutter into her heart.
But she did not let him know it.
"Glad to see you?" she replied gaily. "Why, of course I am. But,"
teasingly, a little cruelly, "aren't you the least bit afraid?"
"Afraid of what?" he asked blankly.
"Of papa!" she retorted, her dimples playing because she meant to look
as though she was quite a heart whole maiden, and because the very ring
of his earnest voice swept away all the uncertainty that had come to
her during these last days of waiting. "You are on his land, you know."
"Surely you don't imagine--" he began.
She laughed lightly.
"My dear Wayne, how should I know?"
"I don't understand you, Wanda," he said a little stiffly. "After what
happened the other day--"
In spite of her a little glowing colour ran up into her cheeks.
"Goodness," she exclaimed, persisting in the part she had vowed many
times a day she would play for him, "haven't you forgotten that?
Really, after you'd had time to think about it didn't you have to
laugh? Weren't we a couple of precious kidlets?"
For a moment he stared at her as though dazed. This was a Wanda he had
never seen before; he did not know what to make of her. And then
suddenly he put his head back, the gladness that had sung in his heart
when first he rode to meet her surged back and he laughed the great,
deep, happy laugh the girl knew so well.
"You little witch!" he cried gaily, as gaily as Wanda had spoken at
first and more genuinely so. "You've just set out to plague me. And
I'll show you how I treat little girls who tease!"
Without more ado he came close to the rock upon which she sat looking
down at him with demure eyes, swept her off into his arms and kissed
her before he put her down.
"Now, Wanda Witch," he said softly, his eyes laughing into hers. "Are
you sorry? And do you love me so hard it almost hurts?"
"So," she said when at last he released her, not certain in her heart
that she had held out quite long enough, "that is the way you treat
little girls who tease, is it? All little girls who tease? The
'Roosian' princess, for instance?"
"The _what_?" he demanded, having for the moment forgotten Dart's wild
tale.
"Helga," she told him quite as seriously as she could, rearranging her
disturbed hair and meanwhile looking up at him with eyes that were
beginning to defy her and smile.
As he remembered, as he thought of the things Dart had told her to
"boost his game" he became for one of the rare times in his life just a
trifle embarrassed. She must think him a fool for letting that little
cur yap all kind of nonsense into her ears, or the ears of any one who
would listen. He flushed under her teasing eyes.
"I'm going to wring Willie Dart's little neck the first thing when I
get home," he said. "Look here, Wanda--"
"Oho!" Her brows lifted and she looked at him speculatively. "So
there really is a Helga, is there?"
But he was laughing again, again threatening to kiss her adorable red
mouth if she did not behave and tell him all about herself.
"If you had really wanted to know couldn't you have ridden over
sooner?" she asked.
Then he told her why he had stayed away, how he had wanted to see her
every day, how he had thought that she would understand.
"Your father forbade me the ranch," he reminded her. "At first I
thought that it would be impossible for me to bring myself to set foot
upon property belonging to him. I thought of sending word to you by
Garth, by Dart even, asking you to meet me somewhere, anywhere that I
would not be trespassing. And, dear, even before I would ask you to
meet me, if you still cared!" with mock seriousness, "I wanted time to
fight things out with myself, a few days in which to see if there was
not some way out better than this one. I hoped, even, that your father
would change his mind, that he would be fair with me as it is his way
to be. And then at last, when I could not wait any longer, I came.
And now, my Wanda Witch, I am going to stay until you come and put both
arms around my neck and admit that you love me so hard that you've been
perfectly miserable since you saw me!"
"And Helga?" she insisted lightly but with just a hint of curiosity.
"If you go on that way much more," he assured her, "I'll say, 'Damn
Helga!' Tell me about yourself."
There was much to tell and it came at last as they sat together under
the cedar, oblivious of the world about them, careless of what might
lie in the future for them. There was the story of her rides, the
murder of a bear cub, the meeting with Willie Dart, and--
"And, first of all," she cried triumphantly, "the discovery of a
wonderful secret."
She refused to tell him what it was until he obeyed her bidding. She
sent him scouting to see that no human eye could spy upon them, and
then she sent him climbing the cedar.
"What's this?" he rebelled. "At least tell me whether I'm supposed to
gather an armful of clouds or wait until dark and bring down some
stars."
"Go straight up until I tell you to stop," she laughed. "And be sure
you don't fall."
"Would you care very much, Wanda?" he asked loverlike and foolishly.
"I should," she informed him, her eyes twinkling. "For I shall be
climbing right under you."
"Oh, I know, then. We're going to heaven."
And up he went. Laughing, calling back and forward like two children,
their hearts gay and surcharged with something sweeter than mere
gaiety, they made their way steadily, he always above, she just below
him and carrying the parcel done up in a newspaper.
"You might at least let me carry our baggage upon our journey," he
offered more than once. But she insisted that this too was a part of
the secret.
At last he came to the limb that lay out across the ledge of rock and
would have kept on climbing, he was so busy looking down at the rosy
face that was looking up at him. But she commanded him to use his eyes
for something else than just to make love with, and he understood.
"You mean to say you've been up here before? That you've gone out
across that sort of a bridge?" he exclaimed in amazement. "Aren't you
afraid of anything in the world, Wanda?"
"Yes," she answered. "Yes, to both questions. I'm inclined to be
afraid of spiders; I think that I'd be afraid of an alligator. And now
the secret!"
"A cave," he cried. "Way up here! How in the world did you happen to
find it?"
When he had crossed first and given his hand to her she came swiftly to
his side, thanked him with a nod and set him to work.
"This is my own private estate," she told him. "No one enters my
portals until he has been invited. You are not invited yet. In that
seam in the rock you will find plenty of wood and dry cones. If you'll
put them at the doorway I'll let you know when you can come in. And,
Wayne--"
"Yes?"
"No one knows of this place except we two. Keep behind the cedar,
won't you, so that if any one should be about you won't be seen?"
Wayne gathered great armfuls of wood, piled cones conveniently, and in
the meantime got no single glimpse of the interior of the cavern. For
Wanda had slipped within, had drawn over the wide opening the screen of
branches her own hands had made against the occasion, and was
completely hidden by that and the curtain which reinforced it against a
ray of light. He could hear her singing softly, happily as she went
back and forth. At last her voice came to him, calling merrily.
"You may come in, Mr. Shandon. Don't bring the wood with you yet; just
come to look and admire."
He thrust aside the screen, stepped through and his short exclamation
amply repaid her for the many hours of preparation.
A dozen tall candles burned here and there, set into niches in the
rough walls, gummed in their own grease to knobs of stone, their
pointed flames standing still like fairy spear blades menacing the
shadows which still clung to the lofty ceiling. Giving added light was
a blazing fire of pine cones at the far side of the cave, near the
mouth of the passage leading to the cleft where the water shot down.
Strewn across the whole floor, masking its rough surface, were pine
needles which, while they made a thick mat underfoot, filled the cave
with their resinous tang. And there was another odour, agreeable,
homelike. Shandon looked again at the fire; set on each side of a bed
of coals were two flat stones, perched on the stones a battered,
blackened old coffee pot.
"I called you a witch, didn't I, Wanda?"
"You might at least have called me a Fairy," she retorted, her eyes
bright with the joy of a day-dream come true.
"Did you conjure this out of a broken eggshell with a wand? Is this
how you got your name, Wanda?"
She took him on a tour of exploration, pointing out each little thing
which she had already seen alone, which, when she had seen it had
promised her a day like to-day when she could show it to him. They
went down the sloping passageway and stood for a little while silently
before the chasm with its din of falling waters. They speculated upon
what might lie upon the farther side if a man could cross. They came
back to the fire and Wayne was shown how the air drew through the cave
so that the passageway at the back gave exit to the smoke. They had
just a peep, for Wanda would allow him no more now, into a hidden
recess not five steps from her fireplace where there were mysterious
packages hinting that they might be bacon and butter and sugar and
coffee. And then they came back to the screened entrance and stepped
outside. Wanda held up her field glasses to him.
"Look out that way," she ordered him. "No, Goosy. Not at the trunk of
the tree. Between those two branches yonder. What do you see?"
He adjusted the glasses while she watched his face. And he found the
clearing about the Bar L-M headquarters, the buildings themselves set
upon the knoll.
"It's wonderful," he cried. "Why, we could signal--"
"Wait a minute," she interrupted brightly. "This isn't your discovery,
not a bit of it. It's all mine and I'm jealous of it. And I've
thought it all out. Now, if you'll come inside we'll have a cup of
coffee and a sandwich which you'll eat politely just as though you were
hungry."
"I'm starved!"
"And I'll tell you _my_ invention. First, though, while I serve
luncheon you can be the hired man and bring in all your wood. I'm
perfectly willing to be cook but I refuse to get my wood any longer."
When he had completed his task he came to her. She had poured two tin
cups of coffee, sweetened and cooled with condensed milk, and upon a
clean piece of bark served her sandwiches. And they sat on the floor
upon heaped-up pine needles and she told him her plan.
There was an old spy glass at the Bar L-M, wasn't there? All right.
Then his first duty when he got back home would be to spend a patient
time locating with it her cedar and the cliffs back of it. To-morrow
morning, early, she would be here--no, no. Not in the cave nor even
upon the ledge outside; they must guard so carefully against their
secret being lost; but upon the big boulder at the top of the cliff.
She would have her field glasses. He could step out upon the front
porch at the Bar L-M, and if any of the boys were about he could
pretend to be looking idly at a herd of cows somewhere, or at a hawk or
at anything but at her. They could see each other quite distinctly.
"If it wasn't so far we could talk on our fingers!"
"Do I have to remind you again that this is my discovery, my invention?"
She tried so charmingly to be severe, and failed so delightfully that
he assured her he was going to put down his coffee cup and come over
and kiss her. But when she threatened that if he misbehaved she would
not stir out of the house again for a week he sighed and finished his
coffee and listened obediently.
"Suppose," she went on, "that you stood very still on your porch, both
hands holding your spyglass? That would mean one thing. Suppose you
leaned lazily against the door post? That would mean another. If you
came down the steps, if you took off your hat, if you put on your hat,
if you sat down on the bench, if you turned your back to me, if you
lifted both arms above your head as if you were yawning and stretching,
if you stooped to pick up something, if you stooped once, walked five
steps and stooped again--don't you see that even with your whole outfit
looking on we can say 'Good morning,' and 'Good night,' and anything
else we choose to say? Isn't it splendid?"
For an hour they worked on what Wayne termed the Wanda-code. She had a
pencil and tiny memorandum book and they made duplicate copies of their
code of signals as they worked them out. Thus:
_1. Standing straight, both hands up--I love you, dear, with my whole
heart. (That was Wayne's contribution to the code, and he insisted
that it be number one in the book.)_
_2. Leaning against a tree or post--I must see you immediately._
_3. Removing hat--Be careful. We are being watched._
_4. Turning back--Something has happened to prevent our meeting to-day._
_5. Stooping once--That's all. Good bye._
And so on until there were no less than two dozen signals each with its
meaning, each to carry across the miles a lover's message.
They agreed upon the exact time when every day their love would laugh
at the miles separating them; an early hour when they had waited just
long enough to give Wanda time to ride hither and the Bar L-M men time
to have gone about the day's work. And if Wayne were not upon his
porch then Wanda was to understand that he was already riding to meet
her.
"But your mother," he said. "Doesn't she often go with you?"
"Not when I want to be alone," Wanda smiled back at him. "Mamma knows,
Wayne."
"You have told her? Your father told her?"
"It isn't something that papa talks about, dear. I told. And, Wayne--"
Suddenly they ceased to be children playing and became very serious.
For while the love brimming their young hearts had been like a fountain
from which laughter bubbled up, still its song had not deafened their
ears to the murmur of life about them. There were things to be told
each other, questions to ask and answer, their own future to look
soberly in the face.
Day after day Shandon had looked for word from Martin Leland, had
counted on receiving from him an offer for the water to be employed in
bringing fertility to Dry Valley. He told her of Ruf Ettinger and his
counter scheme, how close he had come to being drawn into it; he
wondered if something had happened to cause Leland and Hume to give up
their proposition.
No, whatever this proposition was they had not given it up, Wanda was
sure of that. Her father was away much of the time; she knew that he
had been often in Dry Valley, that he had had some sort of dealings
with Ruf Ettinger. She had heard him say to her mother last night that
the man was a hog, that when offered an unheard of price for his land
he had held out for something still better, and that Leland had broken
off negotiations with him entirely. Yes, it must be the same
proposition about which Ettinger had gone to Shandon. Strange that
Garth had not told him anything. She knew that Garth regularly met her
father and Sledge Hume; she knew that whatever the business was that
had drawn Leland and Hume together had drawn Conway into it also.
That matter finally disposed of, left with the unsatisfactory
conclusion that Garth had his own reasons for remaining silent, and
that Shandon would soon hear from Leland, Wanda broached the other
subject which had all along been the one cloud upon her happiness.
Driven to the rim of her mind by her gayer moods it was still there,
sinister and black upon the horizon.
"I should have told you the other day," she said slowly, "the day when
we found so much else to talk of. You will understand why papa has
refused to let you come to the house."
"What is it, Wanda?" he asked eagerly, hoping there would be a direct
charge so that he might vindicate himself.
"Have you no idea, Wayne?" a little curiously. "Have you never had a
suspicion of the reason that makes papa hate you so?"
"He disliked my father--"
"It is not that. Maybe that makes him the more ready to suspect you--"
And then she blurted it out, a little defiantly, laying her hand softly
upon his arm. "He thinks, he has thought all along, that you killed
Arthur!"
He stared at her gravely, the shock of such a charge too great to be
appreciated to its fullest extent in a moment.
"He thinks that I killed Arthur?" he repeated incredulously. And then,
bitterly, "My God, Wanda. This is too horrible."
"Listen, Wayne. We must talk this over calmly and see what is to be
done. You see papa has disliked you because he hated your father. Oh,
it's unjust but it's so human! He has believed all the hard things men
have said of you and they have said many. He knows that the day before
Arthur was killed you and he quarrelled. Then you went away, you were
gone a year and he didn't think that you would ever come back. You
came back, you made me love you. Believing as he did, papa did the
natural thing when he refused to let you come again."
"He had no right to believe it," he cried angrily. "I shall tell him
so. I shall make him tell me of a single thread of the wildest
circumstantial evidence to point to this hideous thing!"
"It will do no good," she said simply. "Nothing in the world can be
done unless--oh, I have thought so much about this, Wayne--unless the
real murderer can be found. Surely if you offered rewards, if you
hired detectives, if you talked with MacKelvey--"
"Wanda," he interrupted, his voice at once stern and troubled. "Do you
remember when you gave me the revolver that morning? I didn't explain
to you, even you. I couldn't. If I went away and stayed so long, if I
didn't remain here doing the thing you suggest, offering rewards,
hiring detectives to hunt his murderer down, couldn't you guess why?
You found the revolver that killed him."
"Wayne!"
"And the day Arthur and I rode into El Toyon I gave the thing to him.
It was his own then. He shot himself. God knows why. I should have
spoken then, I should have told MacKelvey, your father, every one. But
I hated to, I hated the thought of it, of having people know that
Arthur had committed suicide, of having men talk of it. I thought that
there would be investigations, of course, but that they would die down.
I knew that no man would be accused; it was my secret. I would keep it
for Arthur's sake."
He broke off sharply, moved strongly by his own words that conjured up
something he had striven manfully to shut out of his mind, strongly
moving the girl who heard him. She watched him with piteous, sad eyes
while he strode up and down, back and forth in the candle lighted cave.
Suddenly he stopped, exclaiming bitterly,
"Your father thinks this of me. Who else? Does half the countryside
believe me a murderer? Does Garth believe it? Does Hume? Does your
mother?"
"I don't know what Garth and Sledge Hume think," she answered. "I do
know about mamma. Wayne, even she was afraid at first, even mamma.
But she knows you too well, dear. She says that you are the other
Wayne Shandon, over and over; that you may have been a spendthrift and
a brawler,--forgive me,--dear, but that you have always been an honest
and manly man. She knows that we love each other, Wayne. She knows
that I have expected to see you. Isn't that enough?"
"Next to you, Wanda, she is the sweetest woman in the world." He took
the girl's hands in his and stood looking down at her gravely. "And
you, you have never been afraid? You recognised the revolver, you
brought it to me. Are you very sure--"
"Kiss me, Wayne," she said for answer.
And yet, when they parted lingeringly, the little cloud was still upon
the horizon, the uneasy feeling of uncertainty upon them. If, at this
late hour, he went to the sheriff and told the truth, what would be the
result? Would it sound like the truth to MacKelvey? To Martin Leland?