Mr. Butefish laid down the proof-sheet, sighed deeply, and quite unconsciously moistened his lips.
He was for Reform, certainly, but the thought would intrude that when Vice moved on to greener fields it took with it much of the zest of living. In the days when a man could get drunk as he liked and as often as he liked without fear of criticism, sure of being laid away tenderly by tolerant friends, instead of, as now,—being snaked, scuffling, to the calaboose by the constable—
The arrival of the mail with its exchanges interrupted thoughts flowing in a dangerous channel.
The soaring price of wool, featured in the headlines, caught his attention instantly, since, naturally, anything that pertained to the sheep industry was of interest to the community. Mr. Butefish used his scissors freely and opined that the next issue of the Grit would be a corker. Then an idea came to him. Why not make it a sheep number exclusively? Give all the wool-growers in the vicinity a write-up. Great! He’d do it. Mr. Butefish enumerated them on his fingers. When he came to Kate Prentice, he hesitated. Would Prouty stand for it—the eulogy he contemplated? In a small paper one had to consider local prejudices—besides, she was not a subscriber.
While Mr. Butefish debated, a spirit of rebellion rose within him. Ever since he had established the paper he had been a worm, and what had it got him? It had got him in debt to the point of bankruptcy—that’s what it had got him—and he was good and sick of it! He was tired of grovelling—nauseated with catering to a public that paid in rutabagas and elk meat that was “spoilin’ on ’em.” He hadn’t started in right—that was half the trouble. If he had dug into their pasts and blackmailed ’em, they’d be eating out of his hand, instead of pounding on the desk in front of him if he transposed their initials. He would have been a power in the country in place of having to drag his hat brim to ’em, lest they take out their advertisement of a setting of eggs or a Plymouth Rock rooster.
He’d show ’em, by gorry! He’d show ’em! Mr. Butefish jabbed his pen into the potato he used as a penwiper, instead of the ink, in his fury. He wrote with the rapidity of inspiration, and words came which he had not known were in his vocabulary as he extolled Kate and her achievements. Emotion welled within him until his collar choked him, so he removed it, while the pen spread with the force he put into the actual writing. And when he had finished, he walked the floor reading the editorial, his voice vibrating, tingling with his own eloquence. The article snorted defiance. Mr. Butefish tacitly waved the bright flag of personal freedom in the face of Public Opinion. He bellowed his liberty, as it were, over Kate’s shoulder. He strode, he swaggered—he had not known such a glorious feeling of independence since he left off plumbing. And he could go back to it if he had to! Mr. Butefish stopped in the middle of the floor and showed his teeth at an invisible audience of advertisers and subscribers.
The article came out exactly as written. Reflection did not temper Mr. Butefish’s attitude with caution. The bruised worm not only had turned, but rolled clean over.
The following week, Kate rode into Prouty in ignorance of the flattering tribute which the editor had paid her. Coming at a leisurely gait down Main Street she looked as usual in pitiless scrutiny at the signs which told of the collapse of the town’s prosperity. She saw without compassion the graying hair, the tired eyes of anxiety, the lines of brooding and despondency deepening in faces she remembered as carefree and hopeful, the look of resignation that comes to the weaklings who have lost their grip, the emptiness of burned-out passion, the weary languor of repeated failure—she saw it all through the eyes of her relentless hatred.
But to-day there was a something different which, in her extreme sensitiveness, she was quick to see and feel. There was a new expression in the eyes of the passersby with whom she exchanged glances. Eyes which for years had stared at her with impudence, indifference, or ostentatious blankness now held a sort of friendly inquiry, something conciliatory, which told her they would have spoken had they not been met by the immobile mask of imperturbability that she wore in Prouty.
“Why the chinook?” Kate asked herself ironically.
The warm wave met her everywhere and she continued to wonder, though it did not melt the ice about her heart that was of many years' accumulation.
Kate had sold her wool, finally, through a commission house, and at an advance over the price at which she had held it when Bowers had advised her to accept the buyer’s offer. She expected the draft in the three weeks’ accumulation of mail for which she had come to Prouty. When the mail was handed out to her, she looked in astonishment at the amount of it. At first glance, there appeared to be only a little less than a bushel. The postmaster, who had forgotten Bowers’s instructions, grinned knowingly as he passed out photographs and sweet-scented, pink-tinted envelopes addressed to the sheepherder in feminine writing.
“So he had done it!” Kate mused as she crowded them all into the leather mail sack which bulged to the point of refusing to buckle. The letter she expected was among the rest, and, as she looked at the draft it contained, a smile that had meant not only gratification but exultation lurked at the corners of her mouth. She led her horse to the bank and tied it. Mr. Wentz came nimbly forward to the receiving teller’s window as she entered, and flashed his eloquent eyes at her.
“You’re quite a stranger!” he greeted her tritely, and added, “But we’ve been reading about you.”
Kate looked her surprise.
“In the Grit—haven’t you seen it? A great boost! Butefish really writes vurry, vurry well when he puts his mind to it.”
This explained the warmer temperature, she thought sardonically, but said merely:
“I haven’t seen the paper.” Then changing the subject: “I’ve decided to increase the size of my account with you, Mr. Wentz. I’ll leave this draft on open deposit, though it may be considerable time before I need it.” She passed it to him carelessly.
Since leaving the laundry, where he had been as temperamental as he liked, and taken it out on the wringer, Mr. Wentz had endeavored to train himself to conceal his feelings, and imagined he had succeeded. But now the wild impulse he felt to crawl through the aperture and embrace Kate told him otherwise.
Kate watched the play of emotions over his face in deep satisfaction. There was no need of words to express his gratitude—which was mostly relief.
“I appreciate this, Miss Prentice, I do indeed. I am glad that you do not hold it against us because upon a time we were not able to accommodate you.”
“A bank must abide by its rules, I presume,” she replied noncommittally.
“Exactly! A bank must protect its customers at all hazards.”
“And the directors.”
Mr. Wentz colored. Did she mean anything in particular? He wondered. He continued to speculate after her departure. It was a random shot, he decided. If it had been otherwise she scarcely would be giving him her business now, especially to the extent of this deposit—which he was needing—well, nobody but Mr. Wentz knew exactly how much.
There was a quizzical smile upon Kate’s face as she passed down the steps of the bank and turned up the street on another errand. She was walking with her eyes bent upon the sidewalk, thinking hard, when her way was blocked by Mrs. Abram Pantin extending a high supine hand with the charming cordiality which distinguished her best social manner. Mrs. Pantin slipped her manner on and off, as the occasion warranted, as she did her kitchen apron.
The suddenness of the meeting surprised Kate into a look of astonishment.
“This is Miss Prentice, isn’t it?”
“That’s the general impression,” Kate answered.
Mrs. Pantin registered vivacity by winking rapidly and twittering in a pert birdlike fashion:
“I’ve so much wanted to know you!”
The reply that there always had been ample opportunity seemed superfluous, so Kate said nothing.
“I’ve been reading about you, you know, and I want to tell you how proud we all are of you
and of what you have accomplished. This is Woman’s Day, isn’t it?”
Since she seemed not to expect an answer, Kate made none and Mrs. Pantin continued:
“I’ve been wanting to see you that I might ask you to come to me—say next Thursday?”
Mrs. Pantin’s manner was tinged with patronage.
Kate’s silence deceived her. She imagined that Kate was awed and tongue-tied in her presence. The woman was, as Prissy had assured Abram, “tickled to pieces.”
In the meanwhile, interested observers of the meeting were saying to each other cynically:
“Nothing succeeds like success, does it?”
This time, apparently, Mrs. Pantin expected an answer, so Kate asked bluntly:
“What for?”
“Luncheon. At one—we are very old-fashioned. I want you to meet some of our best ladies—Mrs. Sudds—Mrs. Neifkins—Mrs. Toomey—and others.”
As she enumerated the guests on her fingers the tip of Mrs. Pantin’s pink tongue darted in and out with the rapierlike movement of an ant-eater.
Kate’s face hardened and she replied curtly:
“I already have had that doubtful pleasure upon an occasion, which you should remember.”
Mrs. Pantin flushed. Disconcerted for a moment, she collected herself, and instead of protesting ignorance of her meaning, as she was tempted, she said candidly:
“We must let bygones be bygones, Miss Prentice, and be friends. We are older now, and wiser, aren’t we?”
Kate clasped her hands behind her, a mannerism with which offending herders were familiar, and regarded Mrs. Pantin steadily.
“Older but not wiser, apparently, else you would have known better than to suggest the possibility of friendship between us. You are a poor judge of human nature, and conceited past my understanding, to imagine that it is a matter which is entirely optional with you.” With the slow one-sided smile of irony which her face sometimes wore, she bowed slightly. Then, “You will excuse me?” and passed on.
* * *
CHAPTER XXVI
TAKING HER MEDICINE
The moon was up when Kate got in from town, for she had not hurried. There was no one there to greet her except the sheep dog that ran out barking. She unsaddled, turned the horse in the corral, and picked up the mail sack heavy with Bowers’s missives.
She had not eaten since noon, but she was not hungry, and she went to her wagon immediately. Opening the door she stood there for a moment. The stillness appalled her. How could such a small space give forth such a sense of big emptiness, she wondered. Everything was empty—her life, her arms, and, for the moment, even her ambitions. Unexpectedly the thought overwhelmed her.
Throwing down the mail sack and tossing her hat upon it, she sank on the side bench where she folded her arms on the edge of the bunk and buried her face in them. For a long time she remained so, motionless, in the silence that seemed to crush her.
When Kate arose finally it was as if she were lifting a burden. Undressing slowly, she lay down on the bunk and looked out through the window at the white world swimming in moonlight. Ordinarily, she shut her eyes to moonlight, it had a way of stirring up emotions which had no place in her scheme of life. It always made her think of Disston, of the light in his eyes when he had looked at her, of the feeling of his arms about her, of his lips on hers when he had kissed her. At such times it filled her with a longing for him which was a kind of sweet torture that unnerved her and made the goal for which she strove of infinitesimal importance.
But that was one of the tricks of moonlight, she told herself angrily, to dwarf the things which counted, and with its false glamour give a fictitious value to those which in reality were but impediments. To-night the arguments were hollow as echoes. It was like telling herself, she thought, that she was going to sleep when she knew she was not. She yearned for Disston with all the intensity of her strong nature, and her efforts to conquer the longing seemed only to increase it.
“God!” She sat up suddenly and struck her breast as though the blow might somehow stop the pain there, and asked herself fiercely: “Must I live forever with this heartache? Isn’t there some peace? Some way of dulling it until my heart stops beating?” She stretched out her arms and her voice broke with the sob that choked her as she cried miserably:
“Oh, Hughie! Hughie! I love you, and I can’t help it!”
She felt herself stifling in the wagon and flung aside the covering. Thrusting her bare feet into moccasins and slipping on a sweater, she stepped into the white world that had the still emptiness of space.
The sheep dog got up from under the wagon and stood in front of her with a look of inquiry, but she gave no heed to him; instead, after a moment’s indecision, she walked swiftly to the hillside where a shaft of marble shone in the moonlight. The sheep dog was at her heels, and when she crawled beneath the wire that fenced the spot where Mormon Joe had turned to dust, it followed.
Mormon Joe was only a name, a memory, but he had loved her unselfishly and truly. Kate clasped her arms about the shaft and laid her cheek against it as if in some way she might draw consolation from it. But its coldness chilled her. Then, with her face upturned in supplication, as though his soul might be somewhere in the infinite space above her, she cried aloud in her anguish as she had in another and different kind of crisis:
“Uncle Joe, I’m lost! I don’t know which way to go—there’s no signboard to direct me. Please, please, if you can, come back and help me—please—help Katie Prentice!”
The sheep dog with his head on his paws watched her gravely. In the corral below there was the sound of stirring horses; otherwise only silence answered her. No light, no help came to her. Her hands dropped gradually to her sides. It was always so—in the end she was thrown back upon herself. Nothing came to her save by her own efforts. There were no miracles performed for Kate Prentice. A sullen defiance filled her. If this was all life had for her she could stand it; she could go on as usual taking her medicine with as little fuss as possible. That’s all life seemed to be—taking the medicine the Fates doled out in one form or another. To live bravely, to die with all the courage one could muster, were the principal things anyhow. She got up from her knees by the sunken grave slowly and stood erect once more, holding her chin high in self-sufficient arrogance. She would take the best out of life as it offered and be done with ideals that ended in emotional hysteria like this present experience. Life was a compromise anyhow. If she couldn’t have the substance, she would have the shadow. If she couldn’t have friendships given her, she’d buy imitations that would answer. If love and romance were not for her, she’d accept the expedient that offered and be satisfied!
Bowers was not due at headquarters for several days, so as soon as Kate found the leisure she set out to take his mail to him, anticipating with some enjoyment his confusion when he saw the extent of it. She came across him out in the hills, engaged in some occupation which so absorbed him that he did not hear her until she was all but upon him.
“Oh, hello!” His face lighted up in pleased surprise when he saw her. “I was jest skinnin’ out a rattlesnake for you.”
“Were you, Bowers?” She looked at him oddly. “You are always doing something nice for me, aren’t you?”
“This is the purtiest rattler I’ve seen this season,” he declared with enthusiasm. “Look at the markin’ on him. I thought it ud show up kind of nifty laid around the cantle of your saddle. A rattlesnake skin shore makes a purty trimmin’, to my notion. Don’t know what he was doin’ out of his hole so late in the season. He was so chilled I got him easy—an old feller—nine rattles and a button.”
Kate got off her horse and sat down to watch him while Bowers enumerated the possibilities of snake skins as decorations.
“I brought your mail to you,” she said when he had finished.—“Letters.”
“Now who could be writin’ to me?” he demanded in feigned innocence.
“I’m curious myself, since there’s a bushel
,” she answered dryly.
Bowers looked up at the bulging mail sack and colored furiously. Then he blurted out in desperate candor:
“I ain’t honest, but I won’t lie—I been advertisin’.”
“What for?”
The perspiration broke out on Bowers’s forehead.
“I thought I’d git married, if anybody that looked good to me would have me.”
“You’re not happy, Bowers?” she asked gently.
“I ain’t sufferin’, but I ain’t livin’ in what you’d call no seventh heaven.”
Kate smiled at the grim irony of his tone.
“It’s not up to much, this life of ours out here,” she agreed in a low voice.
“Nothin’ to look forward to—nothin’ to look back to,” he said bitterly.
“I understand,” Kate nodded.
“I never had as much home life as a coyote,” he continued with rebellion in his tone. “A coyote does git a den and a family around him every spring.” And he added shortly, “I’m lonesome.”
They sat in a long silence, Kate with her hands clasped about a knee and looking off at the mountain. She turned to him after a while:
“Do you like me, Bowers?”
“I shore do.”
Then she asked with quiet deliberation:
“Well enough to—marry me?”
Bowers looked at her, speechless. He managed finally:
“Are you joshin’?”
“No.”
A prairie dog rose up in front of them and chattered. They both stared at him. Bowers reached over and took her gloved fingers between his two palms—in the same fashion a loyal subject might have touched his queen’s hand.
“That’s a great thing you said to me, Miss Kate. I never expected any such honor ever to come to me. I’d crawl through cut glass and cactus for you. I guess you know it, too, but anything like that would be a mistake, Miss Kate. I ain’t in your class.”
“My class!” bitterly. “What is my class? I’m in one by myself—I don’t belong anywhere.” She paused a moment, then went on: “We needn’t pretend to love each other—we’re not hypocrites, but we understand each other, our interests are the same, we are good friends, at least, and in the experiment there might be something better than our present existence.”
The Fighting Shepherdess Page 27
