He had said: "There are two kinds of women." And Judith, knowing that his ideal was an impossible but poetic She, rich in subtle feminine graces, steeped in that vague charm of her sex like a rose in its own perfume, had accepted his friendship during a dark hour, allowing herself to forget that upon the morrow, if morrow came to them at all, he would hold her in that gentle scorn of his.
"A narrow-minded, bigoted fool!" she cried in the seclusion of her bedroom. "I'll show you where you get off, Mr. Bud Lee! Just you wait."
When she and Lee met, she looked him straight in the eye with marked coolness, oddly aloof, and Lee, lifting his hat, was stiff and short-worded.
In the long, quiet hours which came during the few days following the end of a fruitless search for Quinnion and Shorty, he had ample time to analyze his own emotion. He liked her; from the bottom of his heart he liked her. But she was not the lady of his dreams. She rode like a man, she shot like a man, she gave her orders like a man. She was efficient. She was as square as a die; under fire she was a pardner for any man. But she was not a little lady to be thought of sentimentally. He wondered what she would look like if she shed boots and broad hat and riding-habit and appeared before a man in an evening gown—"all lacy and ribbony, you know." He couldn't picture her that way; he couldn't imagine her dallying, as the lady of his dreams dallied, in an atmosphere of rose-leaves, perhaps a volume of Tennyson on her knee.
"Shucks!" he grinned to himself, a trifle shame-facedly. "It's just the springtime in the air."
In such a mood there appeared to Bud Lee a vision. Nothing less. He was in the little meadow hidden from the ranch-house by gentle hills still green with young June. He had been working Lovelady, a newly broken saddle-mare. Standing with his back to a tree, a cigarette in the making in his hands, his black hat far back upon his head, he smilingly watched Lovelady as with regained freedom she galloped back across the meadow to her herd. Then a shadow on the grass drew Lee's eyes swiftly away from the mare and to the vision.
Over the verdant flooring of the meadow, stepping daintily in and out among the big golden buttercups, came one who might well have been that lady of his dreams. A milk-white hand held up a pale-pink skirt, disclosing the lacy flounce of a fine underskirt, pale-pink stockings and mincing little slippers; a pink parasol cast the most delicate of tints upon a pretty face from which big blue eyes looked out a little timorously upon the tall horse foreman.
He knew that this was Marcia Langworthy. He had never known until now just how pretty she was, how like a flower.
Marcia paused, seemed to hesitate, dodged suddenly as a noisy bumblebee sailed down the air. Then the bee buzzed on and Marcia smiled. Still stepping daintily she came on until, with her parasol twirling over her shoulder, she stood in the shade with Lee.
"You're Mr. Lee, aren't you?" asked Marcia. She was still smiling and looked cool and fresh and very alluring.
Lee dropped the makings of his cigarette, ground the paper into the sod with his heel and removed his hat with a gallantry little short of reverence.
"Yes," he answered, his gravity touched with the hint of a responsive smile. "Is there something I can do for you, Miss Langworthy?"
"Oh!" cried Marcia. "So you know who I am? Yet I have never seen you, I think."
"The star doesn't always see the moth, you know," offered Lee, a little intoxicated by the first "vision" of this kind he had seen in many years.
"Oh!" cried Marcia again, and then stopped, looking at him, frankly puzzled. She knew little first-hand of horse foremen. But she had seen Carson, even talked with him. And she had seen other workmen. She would, until now, have summed them all up as illiterate, awkward, and impossibly backward and shy. A second long, curious glance at Lee failed to show that he was embarrassed, though in truth he had had time to be a bit ashamed of that moth-and-star observation of his. Instead, he appeared quite self-possessed. And he was good-looking, remarkably good-looking. And he didn't seem illiterate; quite the contrary, Marcia thought. In an instant she catalogued this tall, dark, calm-eyed man as interesting.
She twirled her parasol at him and laughed softly. A strand of blond hair that was very becoming where it was, against her delicate cheek, she tucked back where it evidently belonged, since there it looked even more becoming.
"Mr. Hampton isn't here, is he?" she asked.
"No. Come to think of it, he did say this morning that he would be out right after lunch to help me break Lovelady. But I haven't seen him."
"He wanted me to stroll out here with him," Marcia explained. "And I wouldn't. It was too hot. Didn't you find it terribly hot about an hour ago, Mr. Lee?"
As a matter of fact Bud Lee had been altogether too busy an hour ago with the capers of Lovelady to note whether it was hot or cold. But he courteously agreed with Miss Langworthy.
"Then," she ran on brightly, "it got cool all of a sudden. Or at least I did. And I thought that Polly had come out here, so I walked out to surprise him. And now, he isn't here!"
Marcia looked up at Lee helplessly, smilingly, fascinatingly. It was quite as though she had added: "Oh, dear! What shall I do?"
Pollock Hampton had fully meant to come. But by now he had forgotten all about Bud Lee and horses to ride and to be bucked off by. A telegram had come from a nasty little tailor in San Francisco who had discovered Hampton's retreat and who was devilishly insistent upon a small matter—oh, some suits and things, you know. The whole thing totalled scarcely seven hundred dollars. He went to find Judith, to beg an advance against his wages or allowance or dividends or whatever you call it. Judith was out somewhere at the Lower End, Mrs. Simpson thought. Hampton saddled his own horse and went to find her. All this Marcia was to learn that evening.
After the swift passing of a few bright minutes, Marcia and Bud Lee strolled together across the meadow to the spring. Marcia, it seemed, was interested in everything. Lee told her much of the ways of horses, of breaking them, of a score of little ranch matters, not without their color. Marcia noted that he spoke rather slowly, and guessed that he was choosing his words with particular care.
She was delighted when they came to the bank under the willows where a pipe sent forth a clear, cold stream of water from a shady recess in the hillside. Here, at Lee's solicitous suggestion, she rested after her long walk—it was nearly a half-mile to the ranch-house—disposing her skirts fluffily about her, taking her seat upon a convenient log from which, with his hat, Lee had swept the loose dust.
"I'm dreadfully improper, am I not?" said Marcia. "But I am tired, and it is hot, isn't it? Out there in the fields, I mean. Here it's just lovely. And I do so love to hear about all the things you know which are so wonderful to me. Isn't life narrow in the cities? Don't you think so, Mr. Lee?"
The breeze playing gently with the ribbons of her sunshade brought to him the faintest of violet perfumes. He lay at her feet, obeying her tardy command to have the smoke which she had interrupted. His eyes were full of her.
"I'd so love," went on Marcia dreamily, "to live always out-of-doors. Out here I feel so sorry for the people I know in town. Here women must grow up so sweet and pure and innocent; men must be so fine and manly and strong!"
And she meant it. It was perfectly clear that she spoke in utter sincerity. For this long, summer day, no matter how she would feel to-morrow, Marcia was in tune with the open, yearned for the life blown clean with the air of the mountains. In the morning her mood had been one of rebellion, for her mother had said things which both hurt and shocked the girl. Her mother was so mercenary, so unromantic. Now, as a bit of reaction, the rebellious spirit had grown tender; opposition had been followed by listlessness; and into the mood of tender listlessness there had come a man. A man whom Marcia had never noted until now and who was an anomaly, almost a mystery.
Fate, in the form of old Carson, turned a herd of bellowing steers out into the fields lying between the meadow and the ranch-house that afternoon just as Marcia, making a late concession to propriety, was shaki
ng her skirts and lifting her parasol. It was scarcely to be wondered at that the steers seemed to Marcia a great herd of bloodthirsty beasts. Then there were her pink gown and sunshade.…
"Oh, dear, oh, dear!" cried Marcia.
So it was under Lee's protection that she went back through the meadows and to the house. At first she was frightened by the strange noises his led horse made, little snorts which made her jump. But in the end she put out a timid hand and stroked the velvet nose. When finally Bud Lee lifted his hat to her at the base of the knoll upon which the house stood Marcia thanked him for his kindness.
"I've been terribly unconventional, haven't I?" she smiled at him. "But I mustn't again. Next time we meet, Mr. Lee, I am not even going to speak to you. Unless," relenting brightly, "you come up to the house and are properly introduced!"
As she went through the lilacs Lee saw her wave her parasol to him.
XV
JUST A GIRL, AFTER ALL
Three days later Bud Lee learned that Judith Sanford was, after all, "just a girl, you know"; that at least for once in her life she had slipped away to be by herself and to cry. He stopped dead in his tracks when he came unexpectedly upon her, become suddenly awkward, embarrassed, a moment uncertain, but yielding swiftly to an impulse to run for it.
"Come here, Bud Lee!" commanded Judith sharply, dabbing at her eyes. "I want to talk with you."
He was at the Upper End where he had ridden for half a dozen young horses which were to be taken down into the meadow for their education. And here she was, on a bench outside the old cabin, indulging herself in a hearty cry.
"I—I didn't know you were here," he stammered. "I was going to make some coffee and have lunch here. I do, sometimes. It's a real fine day, isn't it, Miss Sanford? Nice and warm and—" His voice trailed off indistinctly.
"Oh, scat!" cried Judith at him, half laughing, still half crying. She had wiped her eyes but still two big tears, untouched, trembled on her cheeks. In spite of him Lee couldn't keep his eyes off of them.
"I'm just crying," Judith told him then, with a sudden assumption of cool dignity which had in it something of defiance. "I've got a right to, if I want to, haven't I? What do you look at me like that for?"
"Sure," he answered hastily. "It does you good to cry; I know. Great thing. All ladies do, sometimes——"
Judith sniffed.
"You know all that there is to be known about 'ladies,' don't you? In your vast wisdom all you've got to do is lump 'em in one of your brilliant generalities. That's the man of you!"
"Maybe I'd better go make the coffee?" he suggested hurriedly. "It's after twelve. And it'll do you good. A nice hot cup."
"Maybe you had," said Judith icily. "Perhaps I can postpone my conversation with you until the water boils."
Lee went into the cabin without looking back. Judith, watching him, saw that he ran his hand across his forehead. She sniffed at him again. But when Lee had the coffee ready she had washed her face at the spring, had tucked her tumbled hair back under her hat, and, looking remarkably cool, came into the cabin. Lee thought of his meeting with Marcia, of her repeated assurance that she knew she had violated the conventions.
"You can make coffee," Judith nodded her approval as she sipped at the black beverage, cooled a little by condensed milk. Lee was busied with a tin containing potted meat. "Now, have you got over your shock so that I can talk with you?"
He smiled at her across the little oil-cloth-covered table, and answered lightly and with his old assurance that he guessed he had steadied his nerve. Hadn't he told her a cup of coffee would do wonders?
"Would it go to your head," began the girl abruptly, "if I were to tell you that I size you up as the best man I've got on my pay-roll?"
"I'd try to keep both feet on the ground," he said gravely, though he wondered what was coming.
"I'll explain," she continued, her tone impersonally businesslike. "Next to you, I count on Doc Tripp; next to Tripp, on Carson. They are good men; they are trustworthy; they understand ranch conditions and they know what loyalty to the home-range means. But Tripp is just a veterinarian; simply that and nothing more. His horizon isn't very wide. Neither is Carson's."
"And mine?" he grinned at her. "Read me my horoscope, Miss Sanford!"
"You have taken the trouble to be something more than just a horse foreman," she told him quietly. "I don't know what your advantages have been; if you haven't gone through high school, then at least you have been ambitious enough to get books, to read, to educate yourself. You have developed further than Carson; you have broadened more than Tripp."
"Thanks," he offered dryly.
"Oh, I'm not seeking to intrude into your private affairs, Mr. Bud Lee!" she cried warmly at his tone. "I have no desire to do so, having no interest in them. First of all, I want one thing clear: You said when I first came that you'd stay a few days, long enough for me to get a man in your place. We have both been rather too busy to think of your leaving or my seeking a substitute. Now what? The job is yours as long as you want it—if you'll stay. I don't want you leaving me in the lurch. Do you want to go? Or do you want to stick?"
What did he want? He had anticipated an interference from the girl in his management of the duty allotted him and no such interference had come. She left him unhampered, even as she did Tripp and Carson. He had his interest in his horses. It was pleasant here. This cabin was a sort of home to him. Besides, he had the idea that Quinnion and Shorty might again be heard from—that if Trevors was backing their play, there would be other threats offered the Blue Lake outfit from which he had no desire to run. There was such a thing as loyalty to the home-range, and in the half-year he had worked here it had become a part of him.
"I'll stick," he said quietly.
"I'm glad of that," replied Judith. "Oh, you'll have your work cut out for you, Bud Lee, and, that you may be the better fitted to do it, I want you to know just what I am up against."
She paused a moment, stirring her coffee with one of Lee's tin spoons, gathering her thoughts. Then, speaking thoughtfully, she explained:
"It's a gamble, with us bucking the long odds. Dad left me a third interest, clear, valued, counting stock, at a good deal more than four hundred thousand dollars. He left me no cash. Dad never had any cash. Just so soon as he got his hands on it he put it to work. I knew he had planned taking over another one-third interest, and I went on with his plans. I mortgaged my share for two hundred thousand dollars, which I got at five per cent. That means I have to dig up each year, just interest, ten thousand dollars. That's a pretty big lump, you know."
"Yes," he admitted slowly. "That's big; mighty big."
"With the money I raised," Judith continued, "I bought out the third owner, Timothy Gray. He let his holding go for three hundred and fifty thousand. It was a bargain for me—if I can make a go of it. I still owe, on the principal, one hundred and fifty thousand dollars. I owe on my mortgage two hundred thousand. Total of my indebtedness, three hundred and fifty thousand dollars. And that's bigger, Bud Lee."
"Yes. That's bigger figures than I can quite get the hang of."
No wonder she had been crying. Even if everything went smooth on the Blue Lake she, too, had her work cut out for her.
"Now," she ran on, her voice stirring him with the ringing note in it, "I can make a go of it—if they will just let me alone! I am playing close to the table, Lee, close! I have a little money in the bank, enough to run along for two or three months, that's all. I said that dad left no cash. I didn't mention his insurance." Her eyes grew suddenly wet but she did not avert them from Lee's face, going on quietly: "That was ten thousand dollars. Close to seven thousand had to go for his current obligations. I have about two thousand to run on."
"Close hauled," grunted Lee. And to himself, he remarked as he had remarked once before: "She's got her sand."
Quite naturally Bud Lee thought swiftly of his horses. He had told Trevors that he wanted to make no sale for at least six months. Given unt
il then—if Judith could make a go of it without forcing a sale—he'd show her the way to at least seven or eight thousand, with a good percentage of clear profit.
"To begin with," Judith's voice interrupted his musings, "I am going to have trouble with Carson. I admit that he's an exceptionally good cattle foreman; I admit, too, that he has his limitations. He is of the old school, and has got to learn something! Already he has his weather-eye cocked for the lean season; he'll be coming to me in August or September, telling me I've got to begin selling. That's the way they all do! And the result is that beef cattle drop and the market clogs with them. What I am going to do is make Carson start in buying then. Oh, he'll buck like one of his own red bay steers but he'll buy!"
"We're pretty well stocked up," Lee offered gently. "Turning the hills over to the hogs makes a difference, too. We're going to be short of feed long before September is over."
"Short of range feed, yes," she retorted warmly. "But we're going to put our trust in our silos, Lee, and make them do such work for us as they have never done before. Then, when other folks are forced to sell off for what they can get, we'll hold on and buy. We won't sell before December or January, when the market is up."
He shook his head. Though not of the old school which had produced Carson, still he put little faith in those tall towers into which alfalfa and Indian corn were fed to make lush fodder.
"I don't know a whole lot about silos," he admitted.
"Neither does Carson," said Judith. "He looks at such things as silos and milking-machines and tractors and fences even as the old Indians must have looked at the inroads of the white men. But, do you know where he has been these last few days?"
"In San Francisco? Heard him say he was going to take a few days off."
Judith laughed.
"That's Carson for you! He wouldn't admit where he was going. I sent him down to Davis where the State experimental farm and laboratories are. He's going to see silo, study silo, think silo until he gets a new idea into his head. I have ordered a big extension in our irrigated area, I have begun the construction of two more silos. When Carson gets back he's going to look around for some more shorthorns at bargain prices. I have an idea it wouldn't do you any harm either, to look over what we are doing down at the Lower End."
Judith of Blue Lake Ranch Page 11