The Fighting Shepherdess

by Lockhart, Caroline

  After some embarrassed uncertainty as to who was to conduct whom, and which arm should be used, the guests filed into the dining room at an hour when, commonly, they were preparing to retire.

  In the confusion Mrs. Toomey found the opportunity to say:

  “Jap, our goose is cooked!”

  Adversity had sharpened her intuitions, developed her sensibilities; what others might fear, she knew, and this commonplace held all her disappointment, all the chagrin and hopelessness that in an instant had dissipated the roseate dreams she had again dared to entertain.

  Toomey was too dazed to reply. What did it mean, he was asking himself in bewilderment as he found the seat at the table which had been assigned him. When he had disparaged and insulted Kate, why had Prentiss not resented it verbally, knocked him down? Why had he made a secret of their relationship?

  Notwithstanding Gov'nor Sudds’s best efforts, ably supported by Mr. Scales and Hiram Butefish, the banquet did not promise to be an unqualified success. There was a tension which did not make for a proper appreciation of the excellently prepared food. In truth, nobody was entirely at his ease save Prentiss and Kate—and Abram Pantin. The complacency of the cat who has eaten the canary was discontent beside the satisfaction upon Mr. Pantin’s face as he sent triumphant glances at his wife. It was well towards the end of the banquet that the belated train whistled and Mr. Teeters excused himself—first reaching for a stalk of celery which he ate as he went, and looking, as Mr. Butefish observed to fill a pause, “like a pig with a corn husk hanging out of its mouth.”

  When the several courses had passed in review, the tension increased with the realization that the moment which meant so much to everyone present had arrived at last.

  So many times they had allowed themselves to hope only to know disappointment. But Prentiss inspired a confidence they never had had in the prospective investors who had gone before. He was of quite a different sort.

  But the most adroit questioning had failed to extract the slightest hint as to his intentions. In any event, they would soon be out of their suspense, and they waited with an impatience not too well concealed for Gov'nor Sudds to finish his labored speech.

  Toomey was called upon next but he begged to be excused, intimating that he was a man of deeds, not words.

  Mr. Butefish then recounted the natural resources of the country with a glibness that carried the suggestion that he could do the same in his sleep, and Mr. Scales arose to affirm his confidence in the day when Prouty would be heralded as “the Denver of the State.”

  Noting the growing signs of restlessness, the Gov'nor ignored the expectant looks of other prominent citizens and called upon Mr. Prentiss, admitting, as though he were conceding a disputed fact, that the decision they were anticipating was a matter of interest—even of considerable concern—to the town.

  So general was the appreciation of what Prentiss’s speech meant that the cook came out of the kitchen and the waitresses hovered within hearing as Prentiss crumpled his napkin and slowly got up.

  He looked thoroughly the man of affairs and of the world in his faultless dinner clothes, while the air of power which emanated from him seemed to be something concrete—definite. In the pleasant voice and well-chosen words of one accustomed to thinking on his feet, he thanked the Boosters Club graciously for their hospitality and courtesies extended during his short stay in the town. Then, without further preliminaries, he went direct to the subject which was uppermost in every mind.

  The project had merit, he was convinced of that. It would take considerable capital to enlarge the ditch and to put it in perfect condition, but the returns would warrant the outlay in time. The numerous failures had complicated the affairs of the company somewhat, but patience and the desire to be just would straighten these entanglements out.

  The loosening of the tension as he talked evidenced itself in audible breaths and growing smiles upon every face. The encouraging words acted as the stimulant of a hypodermic in sluggish veins, eyes brightening and cheeks flushing at the mental pictures conjured up by the prospect of getting their money back.

  “It is a proposition,” Prentiss went on in his agreeable voice, “which I should feel justified either in taking up or letting alone. While it is legitimate and safe, in so far as I can see, I have on the other hand interests which claim a large share of my time, and this undertaking would be an additional demand.

  “Therefore,” his gaze traveled the length of the table and back to where Toomey sat, “I have concluded to determine the matter by a somewhat unique means. I shall leave the decision to my daughter here. Prouty, one may say, is her home. She has grown up among you. Many of you, no doubt, she numbers among her friends. At any rate, she has the final say. I have informed her of my intention, but I have no more notion than yourselves what her answer will be, and,” he added, “I have quite as much curiosity.”

  Blank surprise was followed by the exchange of startled, inquiring looks. Abram Pantin was perhaps the only one who did not find some grounds for uneasiness.

  The swift transition from relief to their former state of suspense was marked, and their feelings found an outlet in a sudden nervous movement of hands and feet. The town had given her rather a hard deal in some ways, all were ready to admit that, but had she felt it? Did she entertain resentment because of it? She looked so young, so feminine, so exquisitely soft that, somehow, they thought not.

  Toomey’s sallow skin had taken on a saffron shade, and Mrs. Toomey sat with her thin hands clenched in her lap, a strained smile fixed on her face, waiting for—she knew not what.

  Turning in his chair, Prentiss laid his hand upon the back of Kate’s, and his keen worldly eyes shone with the peculiar satisfaction which human nature finds in its own flesh and blood when it reflects credit upon themselves. Immeasurable pride was in his face as he looked at her.

  The miracle of clothes and an altered frame of mind had done wonders for Kate. The austere expression, the tense lines which came from responsibility and unhappiness had been smoothed out, while much of the tan of her years in the open air had vanished in a few weeks in the moist climate of the east. She looked not more than twenty-two or three in the soft glow of the shaded lights, and of the awkward self-conscious girl whom they remembered on that night in this same dining room, there was not a trace.

  She had the quiet assurance of authority, the poise of self-reliance and reserve force, but there was not a shade of triumph in her face, at the power with which her father had vested her.

  There seemed not to be even heart beats in the tense silence while Kate sat with her eyes downcast, clinking, with her jewelled fingers, a bit of ice against the sides of her drinking glass. Even when she spoke finally she did not look up, but began in a low, even voice:

  “A fable that I read long ago keeps coming to me to-night—the story of a king, powerful and cruel, who, when his time came to appear before the Great Judge, the single entry in his favor that the Recording Angel could find was the whim which had induced him when walking one day to have a pig that he saw suffering in the gutter put out of its misery.

  “The story is applicable in that as I sit here I realize that in all the years I have been among you there is only one,” she raised her eyes and indicated Teeters’s empty chair, “who ever has done me the smallest disinterested kindness.

  “Until I got beyond the need of it, I cannot remember one unselfish, friendly act, or, at a time when every man’s hand was against me, one sympathetic word or look. It sounds incredible, but it is the truth. It seems the irony of Fate indeed that this decision, which means so much to you, should rest with me.”

  She stopped and lowered her eyes again to the glass which she twirled slowly as she deliberated, as if choosing the words which should most exactly express her thoughts.

  She began again:

  “You will excuse me if I speak much of myself, but there is no other way to make clear what I have to say.” She paused for a breathless moment, and we
nt on: “We all have our peculiarities of temperament and mind, our individual idiosyncracies, to distinguish us, and they are as marked as physical characteristics, and it happens to be mine that either a kindness or an injury is something to be paid in full as surely as a promissory note, if it is possible to do so.

  “The debts I owe to you are for acts of wanton cruelty that one would have to look to Indians to find their counterpart, for deliberate insults that had not even the excuse of personal animus to justify them, but were due solely to the cowardice which likes to strike where it is safe—the eagerness to hurt, which seems to be the first instinct of small minds and natures. I have no taste to rehearse my grievances, but it is necessary, that you may quite understand why it is that I feel as I do towards you.”

  Somewhat in the tone of a person reciting a lesson she continued:

  “I was a young girl when I first came among you—to the dance here, into this very room. I was ignorant, unsophisticated. I met you with my hand outstretched, yearning for your friendship; and you would as well have struck me in my upturned face as do what you did.

  “I had no mother, no woman friend to tell me that I was absurd in my paper flowers and the dress that I had made with my inexperienced fingers, and you could find no excuse for my ridiculous appearance, but enjoyed it openly.

  “When you laughed in my face you had not yet inflicted pain enough to satisfy you—you had to turn the knife to see me quiver. And you did—mercilessly—relishing my humiliation when I had to leave.

  “There was not one among you generous enough to make allowance for my youth and inexperience, and spare me. You saw only that I was absurd in my fantastic clothes, and overly anxious to be friendly. I was the daughter of 'Jezebel of the Sand Coulee' and the protegée of a ‘sheepherder.’

  “I did not know you then as I do now and your pose of superiority impressed me; I took you at your own valuation and overestimated you; so I was all but crushed by your condemnation. I was like a child that is whipped without knowing for what it is being punished.”

  She paused a moment before going on.

  “Worse things came to me afterwards, but none from which I suffered more keenly—in a different way, perhaps, but not more acutely. The wounds you inflicted that night left scars that never have healed entirely.

  “The turning-point in my life came when 'Mormon Joe' was murdered. He was more than a guardian and a benefactor—he had been father, mother, teacher, to me, but with no other grounds than that I benefited by his death, the stigma of murder was placed upon me. There was not evidence to hold me, so I remained a suspect, proven neither guilty nor innocent.

  “The murder was little more than an agreeable break in the monotony to most of you, but it revolutionized the world for me—changed the whole scheme of my life—and,” with a smile that was tinged with bitterness, “demonstrated to my entire satisfaction the extent to which character is affected by environment.”

  She went on thoughtfully:

  “I have come to believe that to know human nature—at least to know it as its worst—one must be the victim of some discreditable misfortune in a small community. Moral cowardice, ingratitude, the greed which is ready to take advantage of some one unable to make an effective protest, the gratuitous insults offered the 'under dog' because he is helpless to fight back—he discovers it all, and when all is done he has little faith in human nature left.

  “This experience I had at your hands, to the last ounce. I know the ‘friendship’ that couldn’t 'stand the gaff' of public opinion, the ingratitude that makes no count of personal sacrifice, the rapacity that takes it to the border of dishonesty to attain its end. Yet, curiously enough, after the lapse of years these things shrink into comparative insignificance beside the uncalled for insolence, unwarranted affronts, which were offered me by many of you with whom I had not even a speaking acquaintance.

  “My friendlessness aroused no pity in your hearts; I was only an unresisting target at which to throw a convenient stone. For years I stood out in the open, as it were, with the storms to whip the life out of me, and not one of you offered me a cloak.

  “Upon any nature this experience would have had its effect—most women, I think, it would have crushed. In me it developed traits that in other circumstances might always have lain dormant. Along with a pride that was tremendous, it aroused a desire for revenge that was savage in its ferocity. I’ve lived for some such hour as this—worked, and sacrificed my happiness for it.

  “If it could have been of my own planning I could not have conceived of a more gratifying situation than this.

  “I know how much my decision means to you; I know that there isn’t one here who would not be affected directly or indirectly by the collapse of this project; that it will take years for you to get back even to the position you were in when you came, quite as well as I realize that its completion would put you on your feet.”

  She stopped again while they waited for her to go on in a silence that was painful.

  “When I’ve visualized 'The Day' in my waking dreams, I’ve wondered if I should weaken and forgive my enemies as they always do in books—if any argument could move me to relent—if any impulse would soften me toward you—if I might not even pity you.

  “One never knows, but I thought not. And I was right. The desperation of your situation isn’t the sort of pathos that appeals to me. I find that in my nature there is nothing ‘noble’ that pleads for you. I neither pity nor forgive you.

  “Yet this moment is a disappointment. Instead of the sweetness of revenge, I feel only indifference, for I realize as never before how I magnified your importance, that I looked at you through the wrong end of the telescope; and along with my apathy is a feeling of dismay that I have spent all these years working to retaliate upon foes that are not worth what it has cost. The worst thing one could wish you is to be yourselves, for there isn’t one among you who has the qualities to lift him above his present level of mediocrity.”

  A resentful movement to go was initiated by Gov'nor Sudds.

  “Wait a moment!” Kate raised her hand imperiously. “I presume you think you have your answer?” She shook her head slowly. Then, with increased deliberation: “I told you that I always pay my debts. I owe my success to you. It is my enemies who have given me the patience to sit hour after hour and herd sheep—not for weeks nor months, but for years. It is my enemies who have given me the courage to stagger on through cold and snow when the blood in my veins was ice. It is my enemies who have given me the endurance to work in emergencies until I have dropped; to endure poverty, loneliness, derision—and worse. When failures have knocked me down, it is you, my enemies, who have given me the strength to pick myself up and go on.

  “Because of you, I am the better able to appreciate true friendship, integrity, the many qualities which go to make up greatness of mind and heart, and that in happier circumstances I have learned do exist. So you see, if you have taken much, perhaps you have given more, and I have an obligation to discharge. Therefore,” she turned to her father with a slightly inquiring look, “if the decision still remains with me, I should like to know that the project will go through.”

  The tense and pent-up feelings of the guests found an outlet in long-drawn breaths and indignant but unconvincing murmurs that “they’d rather starve,” which did not prevent all attention focusing upon Prentiss, whose face wore a forbidding grimness from which all semblance of friendliness had long since fled.

  “If I had known—if I had dreamed of half of this—I am frank to confess that you could not have interested me in this proposition for the hundredth part of a second. But it will be completed because it is my daughter’s wish. However,” with cold emphasis, “upon my own terms.

  “You may, or may not know, that the involved affairs of the project leave it practically optional with a new company whether they recognize the claims against former companies or repudiate these debts.

  “The local claims amount to somethi
ng like sixty-five thousand dollars, which is a sum of considerable importance, distributed in a town of this size. I had intended to pay these claims in full, largely as a matter of sentiment, presuming that among those affected there were at least a few of my daughter’s friends. What she has said to-night gives the matter a new face. It is now a business proposition with me. I am no philanthropist where my interests or affections are not concerned.

  “The offer I am about to make you can take or you can leave, but I’ve a notion self-interest will prevail over your temporary pique, since you no doubt realize that unless something is done almost immediately this segregated land will revert to the state.

  “I will not pay any debts of former companies, and I will take over the controlling stock—not at the figure at which you are holding it, but at what I consider a fair price. I will enlarge the ditch and complete the project so that it will meet every requirement of the state engineers and turn it over to the settlers under it when it has been demonstrated to be a complete success.”

  They thought he had done, and again looked at each other with deep-drawn breaths, when he resumed:

  “There is one more condition upon which I insist: It is that in the purchase of the stock I deal with the stockholders direct. There shall be no commission paid to a go-between.” He looked at Toomey as he spoke. “My reason for this is purely personal, but nevertheless my offer rests upon this stipulation.” There was no mistaking the finality of his tone or the cold enmity of his voice.

  In a night of surprises this seemed the climax. What did it mean, since there had not been the slightest hint that Toomey and Prentiss were not the warmest of friends? In the dramatic silence each could hear his neighbor breathe.

  Toomey looked stunned, then, as he recovered himself, the vein in his temple swelled and his sallow face darkened to ugly belligerence.