CHAPTER XLV
BACK TO THE MOUNTAINS
In the cottage in Boney Street, one year later, two women werewaiting. It was ten o'clock at night.
"Isn't it a shame to be disappointed like this?" complained Dicksie,pushing her hair impatiently back. "Really, poor George is worked todeath. He was to be in at six o'clock, Mr. Lee said, and here it isten, and all your beautiful dinner spoiled. Marion, are you keepingsomething from me? Look me in the eye. Have you heard from GordonSmith?"
"No, Dicksie."
"Not since he left the mountains a year ago?"
"Not since he left the mountains a year ago."
Dicksie, sitting forward in her chair, bent her eyes upon the fire."It is so strange. I wonder where he is to-night. How he loves you,Marion! He told me everything when he said good-by. He made me promisenot to tell then; but I didn't promise to keep it forever."
Marion smiled. "A year isn't forever, Dicksie."
"Well, it's pretty near forever when you are in love," declaredDicksie energetically. "I know just how he felt," she went on in aquieter tone. "He felt that all the disagreeable excitement and talkwe had here then bore heaviest on you. He said if he stayed inMedicine Bend the newspapers never would cease talking and peoplenever would stop annoying you--and you know George did say they wereasking to have passenger trains held here just so people could seeWhispering Smith. And, Marion, think of it, he actually doesn't knowyet that George and I are married! How could we notify him withoutknowing where he was? And he doesn't know that trains are running upthe Crawling Stone Valley. Mercy! a year goes like an hour when you'rein love, doesn't it? George said he _knew_ we should hear from himwithin six months--and George has never yet been mistaken exceptingwhen he said I should grow to like the railroad business--and now itis a year and no news from him." Dicksie sprang from her chair. "I amgoing to call up Mr. Rooney Lee and just demand my husband! I thinkMr. Lee handles trains shockingly every time George tries to get homelike this on Saturday nights--now don't you? And passenger trainsought to get out of the way, anyway, when a division superintendentis trying to get home. What difference does it make to a passenger,I'd like to know, whether he is a few hours less or longer in gettingto California or Japan or Manila or Hongkong or Buzzard's Gulch,provided he is safe--and you know there has not been an accident onthe division for a year, Marion. There's a step now. I'll bet that'sGeorge!"
The door opened and it was George.
"Oh, honey!" cried Dicksie softly, waving her arms as she stood aninstant before she ran to him. "But haven't I been a-waitin' foryou!"
"Too bad! and, Marion," he exclaimed, turning without releasing hiswife from his arms, "how can I ever make good for all this delay? Oh,yes, I've had dinner. Never, for Heaven's sake, wait dinner for me!But wait, both of you, till you hear the news!"
Dicksie kept her hands on his shoulders. "You have heard fromWhispering Smith!"
"I have."
"I knew it!"
"Wait till I get it straight. Mr. Bucks is here--I came in with him inhis car. He has news of Whispering Smith. One of our freight-trafficmen in the Puget Sound country, who has been in a hospital inVictoria, learned by the merest accident that Gordon Smith was lyingin the same hospital with typhoid fever."
Marion rose swiftly. "Then the time has come, thank God, when I can dosomething for him; and I am going to him to-night!"
"Fine!" cried McCloud. "So am I, and that is why I'm late."
"Then I am going, too," exclaimed Dicksie solemnly.
"Do you mean it?" asked her husband. "Shall we let her, Marion? Mr.Bucks says I am to take his car and take Barnhardt, and keep the carthere till I can bring Gordon back. Mr. Bucks and his secretary willride to-night as far as Bear Dance with us, and in the morning theyjoin Mr. Glover there." McCloud looked at his watch. "If you are bothgoing, can you be ready by twelve o'clock for the China Mail?"
"We can be ready in an hour," declared Dicksie, throwing her arm halfaround Marion's neck, "can't we, Marion?"
"I can be ready in thirty minutes."
"Then, by Heaven--" McCloud studied his watch.
"What is it, George?"
"We won't wait for the midnight train. We will take an engine, runspecial to Green River, overhaul the Coast Limited, and save a wholeday."
"George, pack your suit-case--quick, dear; and you, too, Marion;suit-cases are all we can take," cried Dicksie, pushing her husbandtoward the bedroom. "I'll telephone Rooney Lee for an engine myselfright away. Dear me, it is kind of nice, to be able to order up atrain when you want one in a hurry, isn't it, Marion? Perhaps I_shall_ come to like it if they ever make George a vice-president."
In half an hour they had joined Bucks in his car, and Bill Dancing waspiling the baggage into the vestibule. Bucks was sitting down tocoffee. Chairs had been provided at the table, and after thegreetings, Bucks, seating Marion Sinclair at his right and Barnhardtand McCloud at his left, asked Dicksie to sit opposite and pour thecoffee. "You are a railroad man's wife now and you must learn toassume responsibility."
McCloud looked apprehensive. "I am afraid she will be assuming thewhole division if you encourage her too much, Mr. Bucks."
"Marrying a railroad man," continued Bucks, pursuing his own thought,"is as bad as marrying into the army; if you have your husband halfthe time you are lucky. Then, too, in the railroad business yourhusband may have to be set back when the traffic falls off. It's alittle light at this moment, too. How should you take it if we had toput him on a freight train for a while, Mrs. McCloud?"
"Oh, Mr. Bucks!"
"Or suppose he should be promoted and should have to go toheadquarters--some of us are getting old, you know."
"Really," Dicksie looked most demure as she filled the president'scup, "really, I often say to Mr. McCloud that I can not believe Mr.Bucks is president of this great road. He always looks to me to be theyoungest man on the whole executive staff. Two lumps of sugar, Mr.Bucks?"
The bachelor president rolled his eyes as he reached for his cup."Thank you, Mrs. McCloud, only one after that." He looked towardMarion. "All I can say is that if Mrs. McCloud's husband had marriedher two years earlier he might have been general manager by this time.Nothing could hold a man back, even a man of his modesty, whose wifecan say as nice things as that. By the way, Mrs. Sinclair, does thisman keep you supplied with transportation?"
"Oh, I have my annual, Mr. Bucks!" Marion opened her bag to find it.
Bucks held out his hand. "Let me see it a moment." He adjusted hiseye-glasses, looked at the pass, and called for a pen; Bucks hadnever lost his gracious way of doing very little things. He laid thecard on the table and wrote across the back of it over his name: "Goodon all passenger trains." When he handed the card back to Marion heturned to Dicksie. "I understand you are laying out two or three townson the ranch, Mrs. McCloud?"
"Two or three! Oh, no, only one as yet, Mr. Bucks! They are layingout, oh, such a pretty town! Cousin Lance is superintending the streetwork--and whom do you think I am going to name it after? You! I think'Bucks' makes a dandy name for a town, don't you? And I am going tohave one town named Dunning; there will be two stations on the ranch,you know, and I think, really, there _ought_ to be three."
"As many as that?"
"I don't believe you can operate a line that long, Mr. Bucks, withstations fourteen miles apart." Bucks opened his eyes in benevolentsurprise. Dicksie, unabashed, kept right on: "Well, do you know howtraffic is increasing over there, with the trains running only twomonths now? Why, the settlers are fairly pouring into the country."
"Will you give me a corner lot if we put another station on theranch?"
"I will give you two if you will give us excursions and run some ofthe Overland passenger trains through the valley."
Bucks threw back his head and laughed in his tremendous way. "I don'tknow about that; I daren't promise offhand, Mrs. McCloud. But if youcan get Whispering Smith to come back you might lay the matter beforehim. He is to take charge of all the co
lonist business when hereturns; he promised to do that before he went away for his vacation.Whispering Smith is really the man you will have to stand in with."
* * * * *
Whispering Smith, lying on his iron bed in the hospital, professed notto be able quite to understand why they had made such a fuss about it.He underwent the excitement of the appearance of Barnhardt and thefirst talk with McCloud and Dicksie with hardly a rise in histemperature, and, lying in the sunshine of the afternoon, he waswaiting for Marion. When she opened the door his face was turnedwistfully toward it. He held out his hands with the old smile. She ranhalf blinded across the room and dropped on her knee beside him.
"My dear Marion, why did they drag you away out here?"
"They did not drag me away out here. Did you expect me to sit withfolded hands when I heard you were ill anywhere in the wide world?"
He looked hungrily at her. "I didn't suppose any one in the wide worldwould take it very seriously."
"Mr. McCloud is crushed this afternoon to think you have said youwould not go back with him. You would not believe how he misses you."
"It has been pretty lonesome for the last year. I didn't think it_could_ be so lonesome anywhere."
"Nor did I."
"Have you noticed it? I shouldn't think you could in the mountains.Was there much water last spring? Heavens, I'd like to see theCrawling Stone again!"
"Why don't you come back?"
He folded her hands in his own. "Marion, it is you. I've been afraid Icouldn't stand it to be near you and not tell you----"
"What need you be afraid to tell me?"
"That I have loved you so long."
Her head sunk close to his. "Don't you know you have said it to memany times without words? I've only been waiting for a chance to tellyou how happy it makes me to think it is true."
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