Collected Works of Zane Grey

by Zane Grey

  “Do you occupy all the land on this range?” inquired Martha flippantly.

  She shook the hair out of her eyes to see a tall, wide-shouldered young man in blue jeans. His face was familiar. She saw a sudden cloud of red tinge his brown cheek. His gray gaze seemed to bore right through her.

  “You!” he burst out.

  “Who else did you think I am?”

  “Wyoming Mad!” And he threw up his hands.

  Then Martha Ann recognized him. He was changed somehow, thinner, sun blistered yet he was the one real hero of her hitchhike, the rescuer who had so rudely disapproved of her, and whom she could never forget — Andrew Bonning.

  “You!” she exclaimed weakly, and she would have crawled into a hole had there been one near to hide her blush.

  “Howdy, little kick hunter...Who else do you think I am?”

  “Here — in Wyoming — on Uncle Nick’s ranch?”

  “Sure. Don’t you see me?”

  “You’re the new hired man — the handy man — who works for his board?”

  “The very same, Wyoming Mad,” returned Bonning, with a bow.

  Martha Ann leaped in front of him. “Then — you’re fired!” she cried.

  CHAPTER VII

  ANDREW BONNING LEANED back against the corral gate a victim of emotions that were compounded of surprise, annoyance, amusement and reluctant admiration. So this independent young hitchhiker who had haunted him for the past few weeks had turned up again under even more complex and bewildering circumstances. He might have expected her to bob up any day.

  “Yeah? So I’m fired?” he queried slowly.

  “You bet you are,” she snapped.

  “Who’s firing me?”

  “I am.”

  Andrew studied the girl. She was certainly angry, as well as surprised. Her face was pale and her eyes were blazing. She had the strangest, most beautiful eyes he had ever seen in a woman, and though he remembered them, this nearer view under the bright sun seemed to render null his former impression. They flared upon him with a clear amber light. She had red lips, just now set determinedly.

  “Who are you?” asked Andrew.

  “I’m Martha Ann Dixon. Mr. Bligh is my uncle. And I’ve come west to help him run his ranch.”

  A laugh interrupted Andrew’s gravity. “Miss Martha Ann Dixon,” he said. “That accounts for the M A D...Well, we seem fated to meet each other. I’m sorry...Do you mean to run Bligh’s ranch, or to run off the hired men who don’t fall for you at the drop of a hat?”

  “Mr. Bonning, all I mean is that I wouldn’t have you on this ranch,” she blazed.

  “I see. Well, if I were to consider only myself, I wouldn’t want to stay. But it just happens that Mr. Bligh needs me.”

  “No more than any other hand, I’m sure.”

  “Indeed he does — more than any man you might find.”

  “Oh. You certainly have a poor opinion of yourself.”

  “If I had, it evidently could not be as poor as yours of me. May I inquire why my presence on this ranch is so obnoxious to you?”

  “If you were on the level you wouldn’t ask.”

  “That’s the last thing I’m not, Miss Dixon,” he returned, coldly. “And if you’re not throwing a bluff with your pretty pride, your outraged dignity, you’ll explain why you say I’m not on the level.”

  “You’re not — because you — you insulted me.”

  “I did nothing of the sort,” declared Andrew flatly.

  “You did! I was terribly indebted to you when you rescued me from those tramps. But you spoiled it by — by taking me for a common — for something I’m not.”

  “Miss Dixon, that wild stunt of yours, hiking the roads alone, hunting for kicks, ready and willing to be picked up by anyone, laid you open to—”

  “I wasn’t hunting for kicks,” she interrupted almost in tears. “I wasn’t ready and willing to be picked up by anybody—”

  “Now you’re not being on the level,” he returned, with obvious sarcasm in his voice. His anger was struggling with a deeper emotion.

  “I am on the level, but I don’t care to prove it to you,” she retorted, her face flaming red. “I simply don’t care what you think. I did, but not any more...For all I know you might be a confidence man, a rustler — anything but a Missouri farm hand.”

  “I might be, but I’m not. It doesn’t matter in the least to you, or to anyone out here, what or who I am. I’m honest, and I chose to offer my services free to your uncle because I needed a home and he needed an honest hired man. That’s all. And you’re sore at me because I saw through you.”

  “You didn’t see through me.”

  “Wyoming Mad, you’ll understand me better if I say that you’re not very convincing.”

  She grew white even to her bright red lips.

  “Andrew Bonning, you thought me a wild, wayward girl, didn’t you?” she queried furiously.

  “What else could I think?” he retorted.

  “You called me ‘an unforgettable kid,’ didn’t you?”

  “I’m afraid you are.”

  “Why am I?”

  “You are rather pretty and distinctly original,” he answered in a way that made what he said sound almost uncomplimentary.

  “But sailing under false colors?”

  “I certainly wouldn’t call you true blue. You strike me as the chameleon type, Miss Dixon. You change your color — or your line — to suit the individual you want to impress.”

  “You think I flirted with that boy who took me to dinner?”

  “I saw you. And you impressed me as a fast little worker — especially with hicks like him.”

  “You think — I’m even — worse?” she faltered, in a suffocated little voice.

  “I’m ashamed to confess that I did. I let my imagination run riot — and pictured you with him in the park, or in his car.”

  “Oh, you’re like all the rest of the beastly men,” she cried, with renewed fury. “You’ve a one-track mind when it comes to women. What kind of sister could you have, or girl friends?...Isn’t there any man who can understand a girl’s longings to be free — to have adventures — to find herself — to be let alone? Oh, what a rotten world! I thought I’d escape from all that — way out here in Wyoming.”

  “So did I, Miss Dixon,” he returned, stung to a bitterness that overcame his surprise.

  “Well, you can go to blazes!” she concluded, with finality, as she turned away.

  “Thank you. After firing me you consign me to blazes. You certainly have a nice, gentle, sweet disposition,” he replied, following her around the barn. “Here’s your uncle now. I’ll tell him.”

  It was evident that Miss Dixon wanted to escape this encounter.

  “Hello, here you are,” called out Bligh, intercepting them. “Have you scraped an acquaintance?...Martha, this is Andrew—”

  “Uncle, we’ve met before, to my sorrow,” interposed the girl icily.

  “Eh? What? Wall now?”

  “Mr. Bligh, we have met, back in Nebraska somewhere,” said Andrew hurriedly. “I did her some trifling service. But I offended her because I disapproved of a young girl hiking alone along the highway — picking up men to ride with. I’m sorry. But I think it’s a pretty reckless stunt even for these modern days. I had no right to criticize her. And for that I apologize. The harm is done, however...and in fact she won’t have me on the ranch.”

  “Uncle, I fired him,” cried Martha. “I hope you agree with me!”

  “Fired him!...Why, lass, what’re you talkin’ about? Of course I wouldn’t keep any man — but be reasonable. I agree with Andrew that your hike out here was a pretty wild thing to do. The Lord must have watched over you, Martha...An’ as for Andrew’s leavin’ — I’d hate to see him go. Cowboys are hard customers for me to handle, Martha. They drink an’ leave the ranch. Now Andrew is steady. He’s different, lass. He’ll fit in here. Jim Fenner particularly likes him. Can’t we fix up your quarrel somehow?�
�

  “No, Uncle. But if Mr. Bonning is so valuable to you I withdraw my objection,” replied the girl, and walked away with her head proudly erect.

  “Wal, Andrew, this day is one of surprises,” said the rancher. “Strange you two should meet on the road an’ then meet again out here. She seems a mighty fiery little lass...Which of you is to blame for this?”

  “I am,” replied Andrew, emphatically. “I reproved her pretty harshly for this hiking stunt. It was none of my business.”

  “Reckon you’ve been pretty hard on the lass. She’s only a spirited filly. Like her mother and grandmother before her...Fine old family — the Campbells. Poor now, an’ perhaps thet’s one reason why Martha ran off. I ran off thirty years ago...How about you?”

  “Well, I ran off from something, that’s sure. Probably my own morbid self.”

  “It will all come right. But not soon. The Campbells don’t forgive easily...Thet was funny about her firm’ you. Wal, she withdrew her objection. I hope thet’ll be the end of it.”

  Andrew had his doubts about that. As he walked away toward his quarters he found that his unreasonable temper had cooled, and that he was now in a state close to self-reproach. He had answered the girl’s pertinent queries coolly and to her discredit. Any young woman with a grain of spirit would have resented what he had said and would have defended herself. She had done more. Then remembering what she had declaimed so passionately, he felt deeply ashamed, and suddenly he was horrified by the thought that it was quite possible that he had completely misjudged her. How scathingly she had denounced all men! It made him feel decidedly uncomfortable. She was perfectly right. But what else could she expect from men? It seemed to Andrew that she had almost invited approach. Of all the escapades that had ever come under his notice, of all the crazy stunts that he could conceive, this hiking alone by a stunningly pretty girl through the West was the most audacious and questionable. She seemed clever, intelligent, refined. Bligh vouched for her good blood.

  All the more reason to suspect her! This twentieth-century restlessness and thoughtlessness, this boldness so typical of the age, this urge for thrills she could not satisfy at home, this wanderlust of the past combined with this modern obsession to meet and captivate strange men — these all must be at the bottom of Martha Ann Dixon’s flight from a good home. It was a pity. Old Bligh would never be able to see through this clever little minx.

  “But she can’t fool me,” he reassured himself. “Not a chance! She knows her stuff. She has my sister and Connie tied to the mast. For they played the game openly and aboveboard.”

  Having delivered this ultimatum to his smarting conscience, Andrew stamped into the old cabin where he had elected to make his abode. It was getting to mean a great deal to him — this ancient abandoned cabin. The initials cut on the logs and the charcoal drawings of brands on the stone fireplace, the accumulation of years of range dust on the rafters, the friendly mice and squirrels that had at first regarded his presence as an intrusion, the bleached antlers over the mantel, the old couch of boughs in one corner, the black smoke stains on the chimney, the holes in the roof that he had not yet mended — these things and everything about the big room held for him the atmosphere of bygone frontier days.

  Andrew worked at odd times on making the cabin more habitable. Before the snow came he would have it snug and dry and comfortable. Just now there was nothing but his blankets and his bags and saddle. He pictured himself during the winter, on dark nights when the blizzard was howling, sitting beside an open fire, watching the red embers, and reveling in his solitude.

  His favorite place during this summer weather was out on the porch that faced the river and the magnificent reach of purple and gold stretching to the Rockies.

  This porch spoke as eloquently as the big room of what had happened there. It certainly needed a good many repairs. Andrew decided, however, that the bullet holes in the posts and cabin wall, made during a rustler-cowboy war in early days, should not be removed for any repairs. The slope of the land toward the river caused the floor of the porch to stand high off the ground. The wide steps leading down had rotted away until they were now unsafe.

  Andrew flung himself into one of the old crude chairs, and threw his sombrero aside. His brow and hair were moist. No matter how hot it was in the sun, the shade was always cool. Bligh’s cattle grazed along the river banks and down in the bottom lands. Soon they would work up into the draws of the hills; and then the real riding for Andrew would begin. There were horses out on the grassy slope.

  All at once it struck Andrew that a rift had come into his new and pleasant way of life. He did not need to puzzle it out. That amber-eyed girl! He thought he had dismissed her and the disturbing thoughts she had aroused with a scornful finality. And here she was back!

  “What a sweet, pretty kid!” he mused regretfully. “She will put this range on the blink...Damn it, I like her! Maybe she didn’t hand it to me! Eyes and lips! Never will I forget those eyes...If that girl was only straight I’d — I’d — fall for her like a ton of bricks.”

  Andrew admitted this startling possibility. He realized, too, that he was in a strangely receptive and unusual condition of mind. He had severed old ties. He had traveled far and every league, it seemed, had eased his pain and bitterness. This great open range land had expanded his soul. Now this new self seemed in conflict with the old.

  While Andrew was in the midst of these introspective self-confessions, the little Arizonian, Jim Fenner, limped into the cabin.

  “Where are you, Andrew?”

  “Come out here, Jim.”

  “Bligh wants some goods trucked from town. Will you drive me in? I’m leery of thet truck. She bucked on me last time.”

  “Jim, I can make her run if anybody can.”

  “Wal, I’d like to see you take to hosses thet way. But we haven’t a decent nag in the outfit.”

  “What’d a good horse cost, Jim?”

  “Around fifty. An’ thet reminds me. I heerd the little cyclone who jest blew in askin’ about hosses. Andrew, we haven’t one thet’s safe for her. An’ Bligh can’t afford to buy one.”

  “Is he pretty hard up, Jim?” queried Andrew thoughtfully.

  “Hard up ain’t tellin’ it. But I’m glad this niece came. She’ll put new life in us, Andrew.”

  “Life? If that were only all!”

  “Say, I was in the barn when you an’ Martha had thet set-to,” confided the Arizonian.

  “Yeah?...Then you heard me get fired?”

  “Wal, I reckon, an’ told to go to blazes...Andrew, you an’ me took to each other right off. We’re goin’ to get along. Mebbe thet doesn’t give me license to be too curious. All the same I’ll risk it...Wasn’t you an’ Martha kinda gone on each other — before you landed out west?”

  “No. I never met her until one night on the road. I came on her in the hands of a tramp, so I slugged him. We met once after that.”

  “An’ what happened then?”

  “Nothing. We had very few words until this meeting. Then we had plenty, believe me.”

  “I savvied thet you had sort of a pore opinion of her an’ it riled her.”

  “Yes.”

  “How pore an opinion, Bonnin’?”

  Andrew shook his head as if reluctant to interrogate himself. “Pretty poor, I’m afraid, Jim.”

  “Wal, you know these eastern youngsters. An’ I reckon they’re a wild outfit these days. It shore was a turrible thing for thet kid to run off from home an’ come out here alone.”

  Andrew nodded gloomily.

  “But she’s honest, Andrew.”

  “Honest?” echoed Andrew, quickly.

  “Straight, I mean. No matter how wild thet kid’s been she is decent. Sabe, Senor?”

  The curt assertion of the Arizonian annoyed Andrew as much as the hint of his own lack of chivalry.

  “Jim, I’m sure I didn’t think—”

  “Wal, I’m glad you didn’t,” interrupted Jim bluntly. �
��My hunch came from my wife, Sue. She never made a mistake about figgerin’ a girl. She cottoned pronto to this pore little runaway. An’ so did I. An’ Bligh, why she’ll make a new man out of him. I’m tellin’ you, Andrew, ‘cause I want you on our side of the fence.”

  “Thanks, Jim...Lordy, I’m not such a poor fish...And see here, old-timer, I’ve got something to tell you. It has weighed on my mind.”

  “Wal, go ahaid an’ shoot,” replied the Arizonian, leaning back against a post to fix Andrew with his penetrating eyes.

  “Listen. The night I reached town I camped out in the brush,” began Andrew swiftly. “Walked in to buy some grub. It was dark when I got back to camp. You couldn’t see my car from the road. I was about to make a fire when a horseman came along from the open country. Then a man on foot from town. They met — came off the road — near where I had crouched down. Briefly, the rider was a cowboy called Texas something. The other was a cattleman. He owed the cowboy money for branding calves with his brand. The man’s name was McCall. He told Texas about Bligh’s recent arrival on the range — that Bligh had driven in so much stock, an’ he wanted Texas to begin what I grasped to be wholesale stealing. Texas refused. He agreed to brand calves as before. Also to carry a message for McCall to another cowboy, named Smoky Reed, who was to clean out Bligh...I heard all the conversation distinctly. When Texas rode away McCall made a crack that showed he feared the cowboy.”

  “Wal, you don’t say?” mused Jim thoughtfully.

  “I forgot to include some pertinent remarks about Sheriff Slade. He must get a rake-off from bootleggers and Texas knows it. Next morning when I was about to start out here that sheriff searched my car. Quite a crowd collected, and I told Slade to his face that for all I knew he might be a bootlegger himself.”

  “Andy, you’ll do,” returned Jim dryly. And Andrew gathered that a compliment greater than he could estimate had been paid him. “Wal, I oughta have a smoke...Say, why didn’t you tell Bligh about this deal?”