"Yes," the Ramblin' Kid broke in with a slow drawl, "fight one with sour-dough biscuits at a hundred yards! That'd be sensible—then both of you'd be genuine heroes!"
"Gosh, th' Ramblin' Kid's awake!" Bert laughed. "How does it happen you ain't fell in love with Carolyn June?" he asked, turning toward the slender, dark-eyed, young cowboy. "So far you're the only one that's escaped. The rest of us are breaking our hearts—"
For an instant the Ramblin' Kid flashed on Bert a look of hot anger while a dull red glow spread over his sun-tanned cheeks.
"There's enough damned fools loose on th' Kiowa range without me bein' one, too!" he retorted slowly, getting up and going toward Captain Jack.
"Blamed if he'll stand a bit of joshing on that subject!" Bert muttered, his own face flushing from the look the Ramblin' Kid had given him.
"Not a darned bit," Chuck added, "but it is funny; the way he shys off from Carolyn June!"
"Th' Ramblin' Kid ain't interested in women," Charley said, as they pitched their plates to one side and the meal was finished. "He ain't the kind that bothers with females!"
When Chuck had idly suggested that Old Heck and Ophelia might be married before Parker and the Quarter Circle KT cowboys returned to the ranch from the beef hunt, he did not know it, but the words he spoke in jest voiced the very thought at the same instant in the mind of Old Heck—miles away though he was. Perhaps it was mental telepathy, thought vibration, subconscious soul communication—or a mere coincident, that caused Chuck, far out on the open range, to speak the thing Old Heck, sitting at supper with Carolyn June, Ophelia and Skinny, at the Quarter Circle KT was thinking.
Ever since Parker had voluntarily surrendered during the Rodeo, his right to alternate, day and day about, with Old Heck in the widow's society, the owner of the Quarter Circle KT had been watching Ophelia, covertly and carefully, for any sign of "Movements" or an outbreak as a dreaded suffragette.
While he watched her the widow was becoming more and more a necessity in the life of Old Heck.
The night of the conversation between Parker and the cowboys, away over at Rock Creek, Old Heck sat at the supper table in the kitchen at the ranch and debated in his mind the future relationships of Parker, Ophelia and himself. In a few days Parker would return. Almost certainly the foreman would again wish to share, fifty-fifty, in the courtship of the widow. Old Heck felt that if such were so those odd days, when Parker was with Ophelia, would be little less than hell. Yet, he dreaded that suffragette business. If she would only break loose and let him see how bad she was liable to be he could easily make up his mind. He was almost ready to take a chance, to ask Ophelia to marry him and settle it all at once.
Throughout the meal he was moody. After supper he had little to say and the next few days he brooded constantly over the matter.
Tuesday Parker and the cowboys were expected to return with the beef cattle. Monday morning, at breakfast, the widow asked Old Heck if he would take her to Eagle Butte that day.
"I must see the minister's wife," she said, as Old Heck steered the
Clagstone "Six" up the grade that led out to the bench and to Eagle
Butte, "—it is very important"
Old Heck murmured assent and drove silently on. Probably she was going to start a "Movement" or something to-day! To-morrow, Parker would be back. It sure did put a man in a dickens of a fix!
Before they reached the long bridge across the Cimarron a mile from
Eagle Butte Old Heck's mind was made up.
"You want to stop at the preacher's house?" he asked.
"If you please," Ophelia replied, "for some little time. There are things to discuss—"
"Would you mind if I drove around to the court-house first?" Old Heck questioned again.
"Not at all," she answered sweetly.
A few moments later Old Heck stopped the Clagstone "Six" in front of the yellow sandstone county building. Leaving Ophelia in the car with the remark, "I'll be out in a minute!" he went inside and hurried along the dark corridor that led to the clerk's office.
CHAPTER XVIII
A SHAME TO WASTE IT
In Old Heck's eyes was a set, determined look when he came out of the court-house and stepped up to the Clagstone "Six" in which he had left Ophelia a few moments before. The end of a long yellow envelope protruded from the side pocket of his coat. His face was flushed and his hand trembled slightly as he opened the door of the car and climbed into the front seat beside the widow. He pressed his foot on the "starter," threw the clutch into gear and turning the car about drove slowly toward the home of Reverend Hector R. Patterson, Eagle Butte's only resident clergyman.
He did not speak until the car stopped at the gate of the little unpainted parsonage beside the white, weather-boarded church.
"Wait a minute," he said as Ophelia started to get out of the Clagstone
"Six," "maybe I'll go in with you!"
"Splendid," the widow replied, settling again against the cushions. "I'd be delighted to have you come along and I'm sure Mr. and Mrs. Patterson would be glad to see you!"
"Well, it—it"—Old Heck stammered, not knowing how to begin what he wanted to say—"it—it all depends on you! Here"—he said abruptly as a bright thought came to him—"read that and—and—tell me what you think about it!" at the same time pulling the yellow envelope from his pocket and handing it to Ophelia.
With a questioning lift of her eyebrows the widow drew the folded, official-looking document from the envelope.
"Why, it's a—it's a—" she started to say and stopped confused, her cheeks blazing crimson.
"It's a marriage license—" Old Heck said, coming to her rescue, "—made out for you and me. I—I—didn't know what to tell the clerk when he asked me how old you was—so I just guessed at it!"
The widow looked shyly down at the names written on the document.
The license granted "Ophelia Cobb, age twenty-three, of Hartville,
Connecticut, and Josiah Alonzo Heck, age forty-eight, of Kiowa County,
Texas," the right to marry.
Ophelia's actual years were thirty-nine!
From under drooping lashes she glanced up suspiciously into the earnest gray eyes beside her. She saw that Old Heck had been sincere in his "guess."
"But—but—"
"I know it's kind of unexpected," Old Heck interrupted nervously, "—perhaps I had ought to have said something about it first, but, well, I figured I'd go on and get the license and show that my intentions was good and—and—sort of risk the whole thing on one throw! It always seemed like there was something missing at the Quarter Circle KT," he went on, his voice grown softer and trembling a bit, "and—and when you came I—I—found out what it was—"
Ophelia sat silently with downcast eyes, her pulse racing, the license unfolded on her lap, while she bit uncertainly at the tip of the finger of her glove.
"I—I—know I ain't very good-looking or—or—anything," Old Heck continued, "but I thought maybe you—you—liked me a little—enough anyhow to get married—that is if you—. Oh-h—thunder, Ophelia!" he exclaimed in despair, feeling that he was hopelessly floundering, "I—I—love you! Please let's use that license! Let's use it right away —to-day—and get it over with!" he urged as the widow still hesitated.
"But—I—I'm not suitably dressed—" she stammered.
"I think that dress you've got on is the prettiest goods I ever saw in my life," he interrupted, looking adoringly at the clinging summer fabric caressing Ophelia's shapely form, "I always did think it would be awful appropriate for us to—to—get married in!" he finished pleadingly.
"But—Carolyn June and—and—Parker—" Ophelia murmured.
At the mention of Parker, Old Heck started while a look of anguish came into his eyes. So she loved Parker! That was why she was so backward, he thought. Well, the Quarter Circle KT foreman was a little better-looking, maybe, and some younger! He couldn't blame her.
His head dropped. For a moment Old
Heck was silent, a dull, sickening hurt gripping his heart. A deep sigh escaped from his lips. He reached over and picked up the license.
"I—I—guess I made a mistake," he said numbly. "We'll just—just—tear this thing up and forget about it!"
Ophelia looked demurely up at him, her mouth twitching. One small gloved hand slipped over and rested on the strong brown fingers that held the license. Roses flamed over the full round throat and spread their blush to her cheeks. Her eyes were like pools of liquid blue:
"Don't tear it—it—up!" she whispered with a little laugh—a laugh that sent the blood leaping, like fire, through Old Heck's veins, "it—it would be a shame to waste it!"
For an instant Old Heck was dazed. He looked at her as if he could not believe he had heard aright. Suddenly a wave of undiluted happiness swept over him.
"Ophelia!" he cried huskily. "Oh, Ophelia!" and the minister's three small sons, pausing in their play in the grassless yard at the side of the house, while they watched the beautiful car standing in front of the parsonage gate, saw the owner of the Quarter Circle KT, in broad daylight, on the principal residence street of Eagle Butte, before the eyes of the whole world—if the whole world cared to look—throw his arms around the plump lady sitting beside him and press one long, rapturous kiss on her moist, unresisting lips!
A moment later Ophelia and Old Heck, both much embarrassed but tremulously happy, stepped inside the door of the parsonage.
They were driving away from the minister's house—going to the Occidental Hotel for a little all-by-their-ownselves "wedding luncheon"—before either thought of the matter concerning which Ophelia had desired to see the clergyman's wife.
"Gee whiz!" Old Heck exclaimed, "you forgot that consultation or whatever it was with Mrs. Patterson to start your woman's suffrage 'movement'—"
"To start my what?"
"Your 'woman's rights,' 'female voter's organization'—or whatever it is!" Old Heck explained, a new-born tolerance in his voice. "I didn't mean to interfere with your political activities—"
Ophelia threw back! her head, while a ripple of laughter trilled out above the purr of the Clagstone "Six."
"Why, my dear—dear—Old Boy!" she cried, "I am not engaged in 'political activities,' or 'suffragette movements!' Of course," she continued archly, "I believe women ought to be allowed to vote—if they haven't intelligence enough for that they haven't brains enough to be good 'pardners' with their husbands—"
"By gosh, you're right!" Old Heck agreed, "I never thought of it that way before!"
"And," she continued, "naturally I shall vote whenever the opportunity comes, but I'm not an 'Organizer' for anything of that kind. Mrs. Patterson and I are going to organize the wives, sisters and sweethearts, in Eagle Butte, into a club for the study of 'Scientific and Efficient Management of the Home!' We think we should be as proficient in those arts—and which we believe are peculiarly womanly functions—as the men are in the direction of the more strenuous business affairs in which they themselves are engaged."
"So that's what you're an 'Organizer' for?" Old Heck queried while a radiant contentment spread over his face.
"That is it," Ophelia said simply, adding with a most becoming heightening of color, "it is so we will be—will be—better wives!"
"My Gawd!" Old Heck breathed fervently. "My Gawd! The Lord has been good to me to-day!"
While Old Heck and Ophelia were in Eagle Butte getting married, Skinny and Carolyn June had been riding line on the upland pasture fence. They had just returned to the Quarter Circle KT, unsaddled their horses, turned them into the pasture, gone to the house and stopped a moment on the front porch to watch the glow in the west—the sun was dipping into a thundercap over the Costejo Mountains—when the Clagstone "Six" rolled down the grade and up to the string of poplars before the house.
"Gee, we thought you two had eloped!" Carolyn June laughed as the couple climbed out of the car and came, rather bashfully, in at the gate. Old Heck and Ophelia looked at each other guiltily.
"We did come darn near it!" Old Heck chuckled, plunging at once into the task of breaking the news. "We got married—I reckon you'd call that the next thing to eloping!"
"Got married?" Skinny and Carolyn June cried together.
"Who—who—got married?" Skinny repeated incredulously.
"Ophelia and me," Old Heck answered with a sheepish grin but proudly. "Who else did you think we meant? We just thought," he continued by way of explanation, "we'd go ahead and do it kind of private and save a lot of excitement and everything!"
Carolyn June threw her arms around Ophelia and kissed her.
"Good-by, chaperon," she laughed With a half-sob in her throat, "h—hello, 'Aunt.'" Then she strangled Old Heck with a hug that made him gasp.
"What the devil—are you trying to do—choke me?"
"Well, by thunder, Old Heck!" Skinny finally managed to ejaculate, "it was the sensiblest thing you ever done! I—I've—been"—with a sidelong look at Carolyn June—"kind of figuring on doing it myself!"
Carolyn June saw the expression in Skinny's eyes. A pained look came into her own. She had known, for a long while, that sooner or later there would have to come an understanding between this big, overgrown, juvenile-hearted cowboy and herself. She resolved then that it should come quickly. Further delay would be cruel to him. Besides, she was sick of flirtations. Her disappointment in the character of the Ramblin' Kid, her realization of his weakness, when he had gotten, as she believed, beastly drunk at the moment so much depended on him the day of the two-mile sweepstakes, had hurt deeply. Somehow, even his magnificent ride and the fact that, in spite of his condition, he won the race, had not taken the sting away. She had thought the Ramblin' Kid was real—rough and crude, perhaps, but all man, rugged-hearted and honest. Sometimes she wondered if the queer unexplainable antagonism between herself and the sensitive young cowboy had not, in a measure, been responsible for his sudden moral breaking down. The thought caused her to lose some of that frivolity that inspired the dance and the wild flirtations she carried on that night with all the cowboys of the Quarter Circle KT. After all, these plain, simple-acting men of the range were just boys grown big in God's great out-of-doors where things are taken for what they seem to be. No wonder an artless look from sophisticated brown eyes swept them off their feet!
She made up her mind to disillusion Skinny at once.
After supper the quartette gathered in the front room.
"Come on, Skinny," Carolyn June said with forced gaiety, "let us take a walk. That pair of cooing doves"—with a playfully tender glance at Ophelia and Old Heck—"wish nothing so much as to be permitted to 'goo-goo' at each other all by their little lonelies!"
Bareheaded she and Skinny strolled out the front gate and along the road that led up to the bench. At the top of the grade they sat down, side by side, on a large boulder that hung on the brink of the bench. The Quarter Circle KT lay before them—restful and calm in the shadows of early evening. The poplars along the front-yard fence stood limp in the silent air. Across the valley the sand-hills were mellowing with the coming softness of twilight. Up the river, to the west, beyond Eagle Butte, a summer thunder-cloud was climbing higher and higher into the sky. In the direction of Dry Buck, far toward the northwest, a fog of dust was creeping along the horizon, gradually approaching the upland pasture. Skinny saw it.
"By golly," he cried, "that's either Parker and the boys coming in with the cattle—or else it's a band of sheep! It surely can't be 'woollys'—they never get over in there! If it's our outfit, though, they've got through quicker than they figured!"
A few moments later the dim bulk of the "grub-wagon" appeared, miles away, slowly crawling toward the Quarter Circle KT.
For a time Skinny and Carolyn June were silent.
Skinny's hand crept slyly across the rock and found the pink fingers of
Carolyn June. She did not draw away.
"Carolyn June," he whispered haltingly, "Carolyn June—I�
��Old Heck and
Ophelia have got married—let's you and—and—"
"Please, Skinny, don't say it!" she interrupted, her voice trembling. "I—I know what you mean! It hurts me. Listen, Skinny"—she hurried on, determined to end it quickly—"maybe you will despise me, but—I like you, truly I do—but not that way! I don't want to grieve you—I wish us to be just good friends—that's why I'm telling you! Let's be friends, Skinny—just friends—we can't be any more than that—"
Skinny understood. A dull, throbbing pain tightened about his throat. His fingers gripped Carolyn June's hand an instant and then relaxed. The whole world seemed suddenly blank.
"Can't you—won't you—ever—ca—care?" he asked in a voice filled with despair.
"I do care, boy," she replied softly, "I do care—but not that way! Oh, Skinny," she exclaimed, wishing to make it as easy as possible for the sentimental cowboy at her side, "maybe I have done wrong to let you go ahead, but, well, I found out—I guessed the 'arrangements'—how you had been chosen to make 'love' to me and how Parker and Uncle Josiah were to divide Ophelia between them. Perhaps that is why I have flirted so—just to punish you all! Truly, Skinny, I'm sorry. Please don't hate me like—like—the Ramblin' Kid does!" she finished with a shaky little laugh.
"He—don't hate you," Skinny answered dully, "at least I don't think th' Ramblin' Kid hates you—or anybody. And you knowed all the time that I was getting paid to make love to you? Well, I was," he added chokingly, "but I'd have done it for nothing if I'd had the chance!"
"Yes, Skinny," she replied, "I knew—I know—and I don't blame you!"
"I don't blame you, either," he said humbly, "it was a—a—excuse me, Carolyn June—a damned mean trick to frame up on you and Ophelia that way—but we didn't know what to do with you! I reckon," he continued in the same despairing tone, "I was a blamed fool!"
For a long moment they sat silent.
"Carolyn June," Skinny finally said, a sigh of resignation breaking from his lips, "I'll be what you said—just a good friend—I always will be that to you! But before we start in, do you mind if I—if I—go up to Eagle Butte and get—drunk!"
The Ramblin Kid Page 19
