The Westerners

by Stewart Edward White

  XXXIV

  LOVE'S EYES UNBANDAGED

  After the vociferating group had made Houston comfortable with thebandages and rough surgery of the frontier, it again took up thediscussion of ways and means. It was a tired crowd, haggard fromdissipation and want of sleep. And then, too, it was a cross crowd.

  A majority were savage. Their passions were aroused to an unreasoningpitch, as is the manner of mobs. To them it was not a question ofdiscussion, but of destruction. They wanted to burn the Company'sbuildings, and they were so set on it, and so impatient of even a wordof opposition, that Lafond began to be a little frightened for his newproperty. His attempts at dissuasion were everywhere met with rebuff.Finally, on a sudden inspiration, he sprang to his own window ledge andsigned his desire to speak.

  Such men as Moroney, Kelly, Graham, and Williams, cooler heads, whosestake in the camp's fate was still heavy, succeeded in obtaining amomentary silence.

  "Boys," shouted Mike, "I'll pay you myself!"

  They paused in good earnest now, to see what these astounding wordsmight signify.

  "I'll pay you myself!" repeated Lafond. Then--for he was too shrewd topromise a thing of such moment without giving a plausible reason forit--he went on, "I can't afford to let this camp bust; I got too muchin it. I can afford better that I spend a little to help it along. Idon't know what it is that the Company intends; but I will find out;and this I promise to you, if the Company does not pay you, I will makesome arrangement for the mine and I will pay you myself!"

  Even Graham and Moroney were a little deceived. Both perceived dimlyan ulterior motive, but on the surface the offer was generous and therecould be no doubt that Lafond's word was perfectly good in such amatter. As for the men, they were more than satisfied.

  "But of course," Lafond was saying, "you must not do any injury to theproperty."

  Which went without saying, as every one could see.

  Michail Lafond ate his breakfast with many long pauses. He had littleappetite. His plans had gone well, and yet in their outcome rested alittle remnant of the indecisive that annoyed him out of allproportion. Billy had been discharged from his position assuperintendent and driven from camp, yet his exit had beenmelodramatically brilliant and had somehow done much to leave hismemory in good odor. He, Lafond, had the promise of the property; buteven yet the deeds were in escrow at Rapid. It was forty-five miles toRapid--ten hours! Much might happen in ten hours. At the thought,which Lafond instinctively paused to note was not in his usualconfident manner, he started up and commanded Frosty to harness histeam of bays to the buckboard. He would complete the contract beforesunset. While the animals were being harnessed, he tried to smoke apipe. It went out. He attempted to read a paper. He could not.Finally he went out of doors and strode rapidly up and down. He feltchilled, for the air of the early morning was sharp. He thrust his armthrough the open window and took down his old canvas coat from behindthe door, and put it on. In spite of its protection he shivered again.

  "Hurry up, hurry up, hurry up!" he growled at Frosty. He snapped thelash of his black-snake whip, making the bays dance to the hindrance ofFrosty's task. His eye caught the new dance hall.

  "She's been worth while, if she never does another thing," he commentedto himself, and then realized that he had said it, not because hebelieved it, but because he wanted to keep his courage up. What wasthis dread of the intangible? He could not understand it. "Gettingtoo old to sit up all night," he explained it to himself.

  His thoughts went back to the night. It had left with him animpression of being unsatisfactory. Why should it? There wassomething about the girl, he did not recall exactly what. Oh yes,Cheyenne Harry! That affair had balked. Well, it did not much matter:that was a detail. Now that the dance hall was up, the girl could beforced to take her place. Lafond told himself that he was a littletired of finesse and delicate planning--too tired to undertake anotherlong campaign of the kind merely for the satisfaction to be found inthe process. Besides, in this case it was not necessary. He wouldsettle the affair now, get it off his mind.

  He strode over to the girl's shack and pushed open the door. She waslying flat on her face, fully dressed as in her first transport ofshame, but she had now fallen into a light sleep. At the creak of thedoor, however, she looked up, her eyes red with crying.

  "That was a hell of a performance last night," said Lafond brutally,"and it don't go again."

  He had never spoken to her so before.

  She sat upright on the bed and stared at him, clasping one hand nearher throat.

  "That ain't what you're here for," continued Mike. "There'll beanother dance Saturday night, and you be on hand and stay on hand.That's your job now--understand?"

  A slow comprehension of his meaning crept into her eyes, and shecovered them with her hands. The halfbreed stood in the doorwaycoiling and uncoiling the lash of his whip. He wanted some indicationof how she was going to take it.

  "Understand?" he repeated.

  She merely shuddered.

  "Damn it! can't you answer?" he cried impatiently. "What do you thinkI've raised you for anyway? You're none of my breed. Answer,you----," and he spat out an epithet.

  She lowered her hands and looked at him again with wide-open eyes fromwhich all expression had faded. This stony silence irritated Lafond.

  "You've had your head long enough. Now you're going to show whatyou're made for. Understand? Great God!" he cried, "you've got atongue, haven't you? Why don't you answer when I ask you a question?"In one of the sudden Latin gusts of passion, which generally he held sowell in control, Lafond lashed her across the breast with hisblack-snake whip. Almost before the impulse had quitted his brain heregretted it, for her scream would bring out the camp, and Lafond couldsee the awkwardness of an explanation. It was better to break her ingradually. To his relief, she did not cry out, but merely shiveredpitifully and closed her eyes.

  "That's what you'll get if you don't toe the mark," threatened Lafond,only too glad to avoid a scene. He slouched out of the door, climbedinto his light wagon shaking his heavy head sullenly, and drove away inthe direction of Rapid.

  After he had gone and the sound of his wheels had died away, the girlarose staggeringly from her bed. The bright world had crumbled. Forthe first time in her young existence her thoughts turned to the vagueconception of a higher Being which she had built, Heaven knows how,from materials gathered, Heaven knows where.

  "God, God, God!" she cried, "I thought this was a happy world wherepeople laughed. I did not know there was so much sorrow in the world.You did not make the world to be sorrowful, did you, God?"

  She was almost blind. She knew that she must kill herself: that alonewas clear. It was that or the dance hall. She was to be like BismarckAnne. And she realized in a moment that she knew Black Mike, his ironwill and his cruel heart; and she was afraid of him, deadly afraid.She began to grope about the room. There was a dim square: that mustbe the window. Her hands passed fumblingly over the table, justmissing the long sewing scissors. Nothing there. Quick, quick, hemight come back! She almost fell over the cloak, which had fallen tothe floor, and was now entangled about her feet. There was anothersquare of light: it must be the door. She stumbled out into a glare ofmerciless sunshine that filled her brain and beat on the walls of herunderstanding until she covered her eyes, and still stumbled on. Shethought she heard men shouting. She was not sure.

  From his work of sweeping out the stale saloon, Frosty had seen her.She was a strange sight, her hair half down, her face white and drawn,her step so uncertain. Frosty was very fond of her in his stupidsilent way. He yelled and ran toward her.

  In this day of excitement, a cry brought a dozen heads to a dozenwindows and doors. In a moment the girl was surrounded. The men werepuzzled. "Plain case of bug-juice," said one, a little sorrowfully.

  She felt someone trying gently to lead her somewhere, but she resisted,crying "Let me go, let me go. I want to
get to the big rock."

  Graham pushed his way anxiously into the group. He had not been ableto bring himself to attend the dance the evening before, but he hadbeen told the details, and up to now had felt rather relieved thanotherwise at the turn affairs had taken.

  "Why do you want to go to the big rock, Molly?" he asked gently.

  At the sound of his voice she began to cry a little. "It is so high upthere, so high," she said over and over.

  "Of course it's high, Molly, very high; but don't you think you'dbetter wait until to-morrow?"

  The men stood about with awe-stricken faces. They saw now that therewas more in this than they had at first supposed. "Nutty," theywhispered to each other in undertones.

  "Such a long way down, a long way down," went on the girl. "I couldjump from there very easily; such a long way down!"

  Graham took her quietly by the shoulders.

  "Listen, Molly, it's I, Jack Graham."

  "Yes, Jack."

  "And I want you to do just as I say. Will you do it?"

  "Yes, Jack."

  "I want you to go with me. Do you trust me, Molly?"

  She began to sob violently, almost convulsively, dabbing uncertainly ather eyes.

  "What is it, Jack? What am I doing here?"

  "Nothing; it's all right. Will you come with me? Ah, that's better."

  She looked about her with intelligence.

  "What is it, boys? How did I come here?" Her glance wandered pastthem to the dance hall, and she turned away suddenly. "Ah! Iremember!" The strained look began to come back into her face.

  "Here, here, Molly!" cried Graham in alarm, "that won't do! Here, youmust do just exactly as I say. You must come with me now, and getsomething to eat and some sleep. Don't you trust me, Molly?"

  He looked steadily into her eyes, his brow contorted with anxiety.

  "Oh, Jack, Jack," she cried suddenly, "whom else could I trust but you?You have been the only man whom I could have trusted from the veryfirst, the only man I should have trusted. I see that now. I haveknown it all the while, but I would not acknowledge it."

  "Will you go with me then, Molly?" asked Graham again.

  This time it was she who raised her hands to his shoulders. "Jack,"said she solemnly, "a few minutes ago I was on the point of killingmyself because I saw nothing but death or that dance hall before me. Ihad forgotten. I will never do so again. I will go with you now,Jack, wherever you want me to; and I will go with you, Jack, forever,to the end of the world."

  She leaned suddenly forward and kissed him, and then as suddenly fellto weeping again, with great sobs that shook her slender body cruelly.

  Never was a stranger love scene; never was one more in keeping with thewayward, capricious, yet intrinsically sterling character of MollyLafond. She did not understand it; but she felt to her inmost soulthat it was real; and that if she did not love Jack Graham now, atleast she respected him above all men and above herself, and that heraffection for him would never diminish, but rather increase as the timewent on. And this the event proved to be true. Nor did Grahamunderstand, but he too felt the sincerity of it. As for the men beforewhose audience the curious drama had been enacted, they understoodstill less.

  But it was very simple after all.

  In her nature, as in all other natures, two forces had struggled forthe mastery. With her they happened to be called heredity, or theEast; and education, or the West. Her training, her environment, hermental atmosphere had powerfully affected her general conduct of life;but in the great crisis her deeper nature had spoken, and she hadobeyed.