Part 16 (1/2)
”Now I know.”
d.i.c.k staggered to his feet, and started blindly from the house.
”d.i.c.k!” cried Allen, in a broken voice, ”forgive me. She's my child, she loves him now.”
The betrayed friend took his hand without looking at him. In vain he tried to hide his deep emotion. ”I know,” he faltered, ”I'll never trouble her. I'll go away never to return.”
”Where'll you go?” asked Allen.
”Back where I came from, back into the desert--into the land of dead things. Good-by!”
As he wrung the ranchman's hand and turned to walk out of the life of his old comrades and the woman he loved, he heard the minister repeat: ”The blessing of the Almighty Father rest upon and abide with you, now and forevermore. Amen.”
”Evermore. Amen!” faltered d.i.c.k, bidding a last mute farewell to Allen.
The old ranchman watched him quietly as he mounted his horse and rode down the trail.
His reverie was interrupted by the bursts of laughter of the wedding-guests, and the cries of Fresno: ”Kiss the bride, Slim! Kiss the bride!”
CHAPTER X
The Piano
Five weeks had pa.s.sed since the marriage of Echo and Jack. On her return from the honeymoon in the little hunting cabin in the Tortilla Range, the young wife set to work, and already great changes had been made in the ranch-house on the Sweet.w.a.ter. Rooms were repapered and painted. The big center room was altered into a cozy living-room. On the long, low window, giving an outlook on fields of alfalfa, corn and the silver ribbons of the irrigation ditches, dainty muslin curtains now hung. Potted geraniums filled the sill, and in the unused fireplace Echo had placed a jar of ferns. A clock ticking on the mantelpiece added to the cheerfulness and hominess of the house. On the walls, horns of mountain-sheep and antlers of antelope and deer alternated with the mounted heads of puma and buffalo. Through the open window one caught a glimpse of the arms of a windmill, and the outbuildings of the home ranch. Navajo blankets were scattered over the floors and seats.
Echo had taken the souvenirs of the hunt and trail which Jack had collected, and, with a woman's touch of refinement, had used them for decorative effects. She had in truth made the room her very own. The grace and charm of her personality were stamped upon the environment.
The men of the ranch fairly wors.h.i.+ped Echo. Sending to Kansas City, they purchased a piano for her as a birthday-gift. On the morning when the wagon brought it over from Florence station, little work was done about the place. The instrument had been unpacked and placed in the living-room in Echo's absence. Mrs. Allen, Polly, and Jim rode over to be present at the presentation. The donors gathered in the living-room to admire the gift, which shone bravely under the energetic polis.h.i.+ng of Mrs. Allen.
”That's an elegant instrument,” was her observation, as she flicked an imaginary speck of dust from the case.
Polly opened the lid, saying: ”Just what Echo wanted.”
Jim c.o.c.ked his head, as if he were examining a new pinto pony.
”Sent all the way up to Kansas City for it, eh?”
”That's right, Uncle Jim,” chorused the punchers.
”Now the room's complete,” announced Polly. ”Echo's made a big change around here.” The group gravely followed Polly's approving glances.
”That she has,” a.s.sented Mrs. Allen. ”Looked a barn when Jack was a bachelor. This certainly is the finest kind of a birthday-present you all could have thought of.”
”Josephine'll cry in a minute, boys,” chuckled Allen.
”You hesh up,” snapped his wife, glaring at the grinning ranchman.
Sage-brush poured oil on the roughening waters by changing the conversation. Speaking as if making a dare, he challenged: ”What I want to know is, is there anybody here present as can ra.s.sle a tune out of that there box?”
No one came forward.