He was not accustomed to being ordered about, and it amused him. Grace would never have thought of questioning his judgment in this or any other matter; but this girl’s attitude implied that she considered his judgment faulty and his decisions of no consequence. She evidently had the courage of her convictions, for she caught up her own horse and rode over to the men, who had resumed their work, to tell them that Custer was too badly burned to remain with them.
“I told him that he must go back to the house and have his burns dressed; but he doesn’t want to. Maybe he would pay more attention to you, if you told him.”
“Sure, we’ll tell him,” cried one of them. “Here comes Colonel Pennington now. He’ll make him go, if it’s necessary.”
Colonel Pennington reined in a dripping horse beside his son, and Shannon rode over to them. Custer was telling him about the accident to the team.
“Burned, was he?” exclaimed the colonel. “Why damn it, man, you’re burned!”
“It’s nothing,” replied the younger man.
“It is something, colonel,” cried Shannon. “Please make him go back to the house. He won’t pay any attention to me, and he ought to be cared for right away. He should have a doctor just as quickly as we can get one.”
“Can you ride?” snapped the colonel at Custer.
“Of course I can ride!”
“Then get out of here and take care of yourself. Will you go with him, Shannon? Have them call Dr. Baldwin.”
As the horses moved slowly along the dusty trail, Shannon, riding a pace behind the man, watched his profile for signs of pain, that she knew he must be suffering. Once, when he winced, she almost gave a little cry, as if it had been she who was tortured. They were riding very close, and she laid her hand gently upon his right arm, in sympathy.
“I am so sorry!” she said. “I know it must pain you terribly.”
He turned to her with a smile on his face, now white and drawn.
“It does hurt a little now,” he said.
By the time they reached the house she could see that the man was suffering excruciating pain. The stableman had gone to help the fire fighters, as had every able-bodied man on the ranch, so that she had to help Custer from the Apache. After tying the two horses at the stable, she put an arm about him and assisted him up the long flight of steps to the house. There Mrs. Pennington and Hannah came at her call and took him to his room, while she ran to the office to telephone for the doctor.
When she returned, they had Custer undressed and in bed, and were giving such first aid as they could. She stood in the doorway for a moment, watching him, as he fought to hide the agony he was enduring. He rolled his head slowly from side to side, as his mother and Hannah worked over him; but he stifled even a faint moan, though Shannon knew that his tortured body must be goading him to screams. He opened his eyes and saw her, and tried to smile.
Mrs. Pennington turned then and discovered her.
“Please let me do something, Mrs. Pennington, if there is anything I can do.”
“I guess we can’t do much until the doctor comes. If we only had something to quiet the pain until then!”
If they only had something to quiet the pain. The horror of it! She had something that would quiet the pain; but at what a frightful cost to herself must she divulge it! They would know then, the sordid story of her vice. There could be no other explanation of her having such an outfit in her possession. How they would loathe her! To see disgust in the eyes of these friends, whose good opinion was her one cherished longing, seemed a punishment too great to bear.
And then there was the realization of that new force that had entered her life with the knowledge that she loved Custer Pennington. It was a hopeless love, she knew; but she might at least have had the happiness of knowing that he respected her. Was she to be spared nothing? Was her sin to deprive her of even the respect of the man she loved?
She saw him lying there, and saw the muscles of his jaws tensing as he battled to conceal his pain; and then she turned and ran up the stairway to her rooms. She did not hesitate again, but went directly to her bag, unlocked it, and took out the little black case. Carefully she dissolved a little of the white powder — a fraction of what she could have taken without danger of serious results, but enough to allay his suffering until the doctor came. She knew that this was the end — that she might not remain under that roof another night.
She drew the liquid through the needle into the glass barrel of the syringe, wrapped it in her handkerchief, and descended the stairs. She felt as if she moved in a dream. She felt that she was not Shannon Burke at all, but another whom Shannon Burke watched with pitying eyes; for it did not seem possible that she could enter that room and before his eyes and Mrs. Pennington’s and Hannah’s reveal the thing that she carried in her handkerchief.
Ah, the pity of it! To realize her first love, and in the same hour to slay the respect of its object with her own hand! Yet she entered the room with a brave step, fearlessly. Had he not risked his life for the two dumb brutes he loved? Could she be less courageous? Perhaps though, she was braver, for she was knowingly surrendering what was dearer to her than life.
Mrs. Pennington turned toward her as she entered.
“He has fainted,” she said. “My poor boy!”
Tears stood in his mother’s eyes.
“He is not suffering, then?” asked Shannon, trembling.
“Not now. For his sake, I hope he won’t recover consciousness until after the doctor comes.”
Shannon Burke staggered and would have fallen had she not grasped the frame of the door.
It was not long before the doctor came, and then she went back up the stairs to her rooms, still trembling. She took the filled hypodermic syringe from her handkerchief and looked at it. Then she carried it into the bathroom.
“You can never tempt me again,” she said aloud, as she emptied its contents into the lavatory. “Oh, dear God, I love him!”
CHAPTER 17
That night Shannon insisted upon taking her turn at Custer’s bedside, and she was so determined that they could not refuse her. He was still suffering, but not so acutely. The doctor had left morphine, with explicit directions for its administration should it be required. The burns, while numerous, and reaching from his left ankle to his cheek, were superficial, and, though painful, not necessarily dangerous.
He slept but little, and when he was awake he wanted to talk. He told her about Grace. It was his first confidence — a sweetly sad one — for he was a reticent man concerning those things that were nearest his heart and consequently the most sacred to him. He had not heard from Grace for some time, and her mother had had but one letter — a letter that had not sounded like Grace at all. They were anxious about her.
“I wish she would come home!” he said wistfully. “You would like her, Shannon. We could have such bully times together! I think I would be content here if Grace were back; but without her it seems very different, and very lonely. You know we have always been together, all of us, since we were children — Grace, Eva, Guy, and I; and now that you are here it would be better, for you are just like us. You seem like us, at least — as if you had always lived here, too.”
“It’s nice to have you say that; but I haven’t always been here, and, really, you know I don’t belong.”
“But you do belong!”
“And I’m going away again pretty soon. I must go back to the city.”
“Please don’t go back,” he begged. “You don’t really have to, do you?”
“I had intended telling you all this morning; but after the spurs, I couldn’t.”
“Do you really have to go?” Custer insisted.
“I don’t have to, but I think I ought to. Do you want me to stay - honestly?”
“Honest Injun!” he said, smiling.
“Maybe I will.”
He could have voiced no higher praise.
He asked about the fire, and especially about the horses. He was de
lighted when she told him that a man had just come down to say that the fire was practically out, and the colonel was coming in shortly; and that the veterinary had been there and found the team not seriously injured.
“I think that fire was incendiary,” he said; “but now that Slick Allen is in jail, I don’t know who would set it.”
“Who is Slick Allen,” she asked, “and why should he want to set fire to Ganado?”
He told her, and she was silent for a while, thinking about Allen and the last time she had seen him. She wondered what he would do when he got out of jail. She would hate to be in Wilson Crumb’s boots then, for she guessed that Allen was a hard character.
While she was thinking of Allen, Custer mentioned Guy Evans. Instantly there came to her mind, for the first time since that last evening at the Vista del Paso bungalow, Crumb’s conversation with Allen and the latter’s account of the disposition of the stolen whiskey. His very words returned to her.
“Got a young high-blood at the edge of the valley handling it — a fellow by the name of Evans.”
She had not connected Allen or that conversation or the Evans he had mentioned with these people; but now she knew that it was Guy Evans who was disposing of the stolen liquor. She wondered if Allen would return to this part of the country after he was released from jail. If he did, and saw her, he would be sure to recognize her, for he must have had her features impressed upon his memory by the fact that she so resembled some one he had known.
If he recognized her, would he expose her? She did not doubt but that he would. The chances were that he would attempt to blackmail her; but, worst of all, he might tell Crumb where she was. That was the thing she dreaded most - seeing Wilson Crumb again, or having him discover her whereabouts; for she knew that he would leave no stone unturned and hesitate to stoop to no dishonorable act, to get her back again. She shuddered when she thought of him — a man whose love, even, was a dishonorable and dishonoring thing.
Then she turned her eyes to the face of the man lying there on the bed beside which she sat. He would never love her; but her love for him had already ennobled her.
Custer moved restlessly. Again he was giving evidence of suffering. She laid a cool palm upon his forehead, and stroked it. He opened his eyes and smiled up at her.
“It’s bully of you to sit with me,” he said; “but you ought to be in bed. You’ve had a pretty hard day, and you’re not as used to it as we are.”
“I am not tired,” she said, “and I should like to stay — if you would like to have me.”
He took her hand from his forehead and kissed it.
“Of course I like to have you here, Shannon — you’re just like a sister. It’s funny, isn’t it, that we should all feel that way about you, when we’ve only known you a few weeks? It must have been because of the way you fitted in. You belonged right from the start — you were just like us.”
She turned her head away suddenly, casting her eyes upon the floor and biting her lip to keep back the tears.
“What’s the matter?” he asked.
“I am not like you, Custer; but I have tried to be.”
“Why aren’t you like us?” he demanded.
“I — why, I — couldn’t ride a horse,” she explained lamely.
“Don’t make me laugh, please; my face is burned,” he pleaded in mock irony. “Do you think that’s all we know, or think of, or possess — our horsemanship? We have hearts, and minds, such as they are — and souls, I hope. It was of these things that I was thinking. I was thinking too, that we Penningtons demand a higher standard in women than is customary nowadays. We are a little old-fashioned, I guess. We want the blood of our horses and the minds of our women pure. Here is a case in point — I can tell you, because you don’t know the girl and never will. She was the daughter of a friend of Cousin William — our New York cousin. She was spending the winter in Pasadena, and we had her out here on Cousin William’s account. She was a pippin of a looker, and I suppose she was all right morally; but she didn’t have a clean mind. I discovered it about the first time I talked with her alone; and Eva asked me a question about something that she couldn’t have known about at all except through this girl. I didn’t know what to do. She was a girl and so I couldn’t talk about her to any one, not even my father or mother; but I didn’t want her around Eva. I wondered if I was just a narrow prig, and if, after all, there was nothing that any one need take exception to in the girl. I got to analyzing the thing, and I came to the conclusion that I would be ashamed of mother and Eva if they talked or thought along such lines. Consequently, it wasn’t right to expose Eva to that influence. That was what I decided, and I don’t just think I was right — I know I was.”
“And what did you do?” Shannon asked in a very small voice.
“I did what under any other circumstances would have been unpardonable. I went to the girl and asked her to make some excuse that would terminate her visit. It was a very hard thing to do; but I would do more than that — I would sacrifice my most cherished friendship — for Eva.”
“And the girl — did you tell her why you asked her to go?”
“I didn’t want to, but she insisted, and I told her.”
“Did she understand?”
“She did not.”
They were silent for some time.
“Do you think I did wrong?” he asked.
“No. There is mental virtue as well as physical. It is as much your duty to protect your sister’s mind as to protect her body.”
“I knew you’d think as I do about it; but let me tell you it was an awful jolt to the cherished Pennington hospitality. I hope I never have to do it again!”
“I hope you never do.”
He commenced to show increasing signs of suffering, presently, and then he asked for morphine.
“I don’t want to take it unless I have to,” he explained.
“No,” she said, “do not take it unless you have to.”
She prepared and administered it, but she felt no desire for it herself. Then Eva came to relieve her, and she bade them good night and went up to bed. She awoke about four o’clock in the morning, and immediately thought of the little black case; but she only smiled, turned over, and went back to sleep again.
CHAPTER 18
It was several weeks before Custer could ride again, and in the meantime Shannon had gone down to her own place to live. She came up every day on Baldy, who had been loaned to her until Custer should be able to select a horse for her. She insisted that she would own nothing but a Morgan, and that she wanted one of the Apache’s brothers.
“You’ll have to wait, then, until I can break one for you,” Custer told her. “There are a couple of four-year-olds that are saddle-broke and bridle- wise in a way; but I wouldn’t want you to ride either of them until they’ve had the finishing touches. I want to ride them enough to learn their faults, if they have any. In the meantime you just keep Baldy down there and use him. How’s ranching? You look as if it agreed with you. Nobody’d know you for the same girl. You look like an Indian, and how your cheeks have filled out!”
The girl smiled happily. Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes dancing. She was a picture of life and health and happiness; and Custer’s eyes were sparkling, too.
“Gee!” he exclaimed. “You’re a regular Pennington!”
“I wish I were!” the girl thought to herself. “You honor me,” was what she said aloud.
Custer laughed.
“That sounded rotten, didn’t it? But you know what I meant — it’s nice to have people whom we like like the same things we do. It doesn’t necessarily mean that we think our likes are the best in the world. I didn’t mean to be egotistical.”
Eva had just entered the patio. She walked over and perched on his knee and kissed him.
“Do you know, I think I’ll go on the stage or the screen — wouldn’t it be splishous, though?— ‘Miss Eva Pennington is starring in the new and popular success based on the story by G
uy Thackeray Evans, the eminent author!’”
“Oh, Eva!” cried Shannon, genuine concern in her tone. “Surely you wouldn’t think of the screen, would you? You’re not serious?”
“Oh, yes,” said Custer. “She’s serious — serious is her middle name. To-morrow she will want to be a painter, and day after to-morrow the world’s most celebrated harpist. Eva is nothing if not serious, while her tenacity of purpose is absolutely inspiring. Why, once, for one whole day, she wanted to do the same thing.”
Eva was laughing with her brother and Shannon.
“If she were just like every one else, you wouldn’t love your little sister any more,” she said, running her fingers through his hair. “Honestly, ever since I met Wilson Crumb, I have thought I should like to be a movie star.”
“Wilson Crumb!” exclaimed Shannon. “What do you know of Wilson Crumb?”
“Oh, I’ve met him,” said Eva airily. “Don’t you envy me?”
“What do you know about him, Shannon?” asked Custer. “Your tone indicated that you may have heard something about him that wasn’t complimentary.”
“No — I don’t know him. It’s only what I’ve heard. I don’t think you’d like him.” Shannon almost shuddered at the thought of this dear child even so much as knowing Wilson Crumb. “Oh, Eva!” she cried impulsively. “You mustn’t even think of going into pictures. I lived in Los Angeles long enough to learn that the life is oftentimes a hard one, filled with disappointment, disillusionment, and regrets — principally regrets.”
“And Grace is there now,” said Custer in a low voice, a worried look in his eyes.
“Can’t you persuade her to return?”
He shook his head.
“It wouldn’t be fair,” he said. “She is trying to succeed, and we ought to encourage her. It is probably hard enough for her at best, without all of us suggesting antagonism to her ambition by constantly urging her to abandon it, so we try to keep our letters cheerful.”
“Have you been to see her since she left? No, I know you haven’t. If I were you, I’d run down to L.A. It might mean a lot to her, Custer; it might mean more than you can guess.”
Delphi Collected Works of Edgar Rice Burroughs (Illustrated) (Series Four Book 26) Page 755
