The Charles Alden Seltzer Megapack

by Charles Alden Seltzer

  He stood for an instant, glaring around at them all, and then his gaze at last centered on Calumet. Calumet silently motioned toward Betty.

  In response to the movement, Taggart’s lips moved. “I’m apologizin’,” he said. He turned to his horse. After he had climbed into the saddle he looked around at Calumet. He sneered through his swollen lips.

  “You’ll be gettin’ what I owe you,” he threatened.

  “I’m your friend,” jeered Calumet. “I’ve been your friend since the day you tried to bore me with a rifle bullet out there in the valley—the day I come here—after runnin’ like a coyote from the daylight. I’ve got an idea what you was hangin’ around for that day—I’ve got the same idea now. You’re tryin’ to locate that heathen idol. You’re wastin’ your time. You’re doin’ more—you’re runnin’ a heap of risk. For what you’ve just got is only a sample of what you’ll get if you stray over onto my range again. That goes for the sneakin’ thief you call your father, or any of your damned crowd.”

  He stood, slouching a little, watching Taggart until the latter rode well out into the valley. Then without a word he walked over to the sill upon which he had been working before the arrival of Taggart, seized a hammer, and began to drive wedges wherever they were necessary.

  Presently he heard a voice behind him, and he turned to confront Betty.

  “I heard what you said to Taggart, of course, about him trying to shoot you. I didn’t know that. He deserved punishment for it. But I am sure that part of the punishment you dealt him was administered because of the way he talked about me. If that is so, I wish to thank you.”

  “You might as well save your breath,” he said gruffly; “I didn’t do it for you.”

  She laughed. “Then why didn’t you choose another place to call him to account?”

  He did not answer, driving another wedge home with an extra vicious blow.

  She watched him in silence for an instant, and then, with a laugh which might have meant amusement or something akin to it, she turned and walked to the house.

  CHAPTER XII

  A PEACE OFFERING

  If there was one trait in Betty’s character that bothered Calumet more than another, it was her frankness. More than once during the days that followed Neal Taggart’s visit Calumet was made to feel the absence of guile in her treatment of him. The glances she gave him were as straightforward and direct as her words, and it became plain to him that with her there were no mental reservations. Her attitude toward him had not changed; she still dealt with him as the school teacher deals with the unruly scholar—with a personal aloofness that promised an ever-widening gulf if he persisted in defying her authority. Calumet got this impression and it grew on him; it was disconcerting, irritating, and he tried hard to shake it off, to no avail.

  He had considered carefully the impulse which had moved him to entice Taggart to the Lazy Y, and was convinced that it had been aroused through a desire to take some step to avenge his father. He told himself that if in the action there had been any desire to champion Betty he had not been conscious of it. It angered him to think that she should presume to imagine such a thing. And yet he had felt a throb of emotion when she had thanked him—a reluctant, savage, resentful satisfaction which later changed to amusement. If she believed he had thrashed Taggart in defense of her, let her continue to believe that. It made no difference one way or another. But he would take good care to see that she should have no occasion to thank him again. She did not interfere with the work, which went steadily on. The ranchhouse began to take on a prosperous appearance. Within a week after the beginning of the work the sills were all in, the rotted bottoms of the studding had been replaced, and the outside walls patched up. During the next week the old porches were torn down and new ones built in their places. At the end of the third week the roof had been repaired, and then there were some odds and ends that had to be looked to, so that the fourth week was nearly gone when Dade and Calumet cleared up the débris. It was Dade who, in spite of Calumet’s remonstrances, went inside to announce the news to Betty, and she came out with him and looked the work over with a critical, though approving, eye. Calumet was watching her, and when she had concluded her inspection she turned to him with a smile.

  “Tomorrow you can go to Lazette and get some paint,” she said.

  “Want it done up in style, eh?”

  “Of course,” she returned; “why not?”

  “That’s it,” he growled; “why not? You don’t have to do the work.”

  She laughed. “I should dislike to think you are lazy.”

  He flushed. “I reckon I ain’t none lazy.” He could think of nothing else to say. Her voice had a taunt in it; her attack was direct and merciless. She looked at Dade, whose face was red with some emotion, but she spoke to Calumet.

  “I don’t think you ought to complain about the work,” she said. “You were to do it alone, but on my own responsibility I gave you Dade.”

  “Pitied me, I reckon,” he sneered.

  “Yes.” Her gaze was steady. “I pity you in more ways than one.”

  “When did you think I needed any pity?” he demanded truculently, angered.

  “Oh,” she said, in pretended surprise, “you are in one of your moods again! Well, I am not going to quarrel with you.” She turned abruptly and entered the house, and Calumet fell to kicking savagely into a hummock with the toe of his boot. As in every clash he had had with her yet, he emerged feeling like a reproved school boy. What made it worse was that he was beginning to feel that there was no justification for his rage against her. As in the present case, he had been the aggressor and deserved all the scorn she had heaped upon him. But the rage was with him, nevertheless, perhaps the more poignant because he felt its impotency. He looked around at Dade. That young man was trying to appear unconscious of the embarrassing predicament of his fellow workman. He endeavored to lighten the load for him.

  “She certainly does talk straight to the point,” he said. “But I reckon she don’t mean more’n half of it.”

  Calumet shot a malignant look at him. “Who in hell is askin’ for your opinion?” he demanded.

  The paint, however, was secured, Calumet making the trip to Lazette for it. He returned after dark, and Bob, who was sitting in the kitchen where Betty was washing the dishes, hobbled out to greet him. Bob had been outside only a few minutes when Betty heard his voice, raised joyously. She went to a rear window, but the darkness outside was impenetrable and she could see nothing. Presently, though, she heard Bob’s step on the porch, and almost instantly he appeared, holding in his arm a three-month-old puppy of doubtful breed. He radiated delight.

  “Calumet brought it!” he said, in answer to Betty’s quick interrogation. “He said it was to take the place of Lonesome. I reckon he ain’t so bad, after all—is he Betty?”

  Betty patted the puppy’s head, leaning over so that Bob did not see the strange light in her eyes.

  “He’s nice,” she said.

  “Who?” said Bob, quickly—“Calumet?”

  Betty rose, her face flushing. “No,” she said sharply; “the puppy.”

  Bob looked at her twice before he said, in a slightly disappointed voice, “Uh-huh.”

  When Calumet came into the kitchen half an hour later, having stabled his horses and washed his face and hands from the basin he found on the porch, he found his supper set out on the table; but Betty was nowhere to be seen.

  “Where’s Betty?” he demanded of Bob, who was romping delightedly with the new dog, which showed its appreciation of its new friend by yelping joyously.

  “I reckon she’s gone to bed,” returned the young man.

  For a few minutes Calumet stood near the door, watching the dog and the boy. Several times he looked toward the other doors, disappointment revealed in his eyes. Was he to take Betty’s departure before his arrival as an indication that she had fled from him? He had seen her when she had pressed her face to the window some time before, and it
now appeared to him that she had deliberately left the room to avoid meeting him. He frowned and walked to the table, looking down at the food. She had thought of him, at any rate.

  He sat at the table and took several bites of food before he spoke again.

  “Betty see the pup?” he asked.

  “Yep.”

  “Like him?”

  “Yep.”

  He hesitated, while Bob looked at him, intent for more questions. He had liked Calumet from the first, despite the killing of Lonesome. He could not forget the gruff words of consolation that had been spoken by Calumet on that occasion—they had been sincere, at any rate—his boy’s heart knew that. He worshiped Calumet since he had given him the dog. And so he wanted to talk.

  “She patted him on the head,” he said.

  “Just what did she say?” inquired Calumet.

  “She said he was nice.”

  “Them the exact words?”

  “Yep.”

  There was a silence again, while Calumet chewed meditatively at his food. Bob suspended play with the puppy to watch him.

  “Well,” said Calumet finally, “that shows just what a woman knows about dogs—or anything. He ain’t none nice, not at all, takin’ dogs as dogs. He’s nothin’ but a fool yellow mongrel.”

  Bob contemplated his benefactor, sourly at first, for already he and the dog were friends, and thus Calumet’s derogatory words were in the nature of a base slander. But he reasoned that all was not well between Betty and Calumet, and therefore perhaps Calumet had not meant them in exactly that spirit.

  “Well,” he said at last, “I like him a lot, anyway.”

  “What’s that?” said Calumet, startled. He had forgotten about the dog. He had been wondering if Betty had gone to bed, or whether she was in the sitting room, reading, as she was accustomed to doing. A light came through the sitting room door, and Calumet had been watching it, momentarily expecting to see Betty’s shadow. “What’s that?” he repeated. “You like him, anyway? Why?”

  “Because you gave him to me,” said Bob, blushing at the admission.

  Calumet looked at him, sourly at first; and then, with a crafty grin on his face as he watched the sitting room door, he raised his voice so that if Betty were in the sitting room she could not help hearing it.

  “Well,” he said, “you like him because I gave him to you, eh? Shucks. I reckon that ain’t the reason Betty likes him.”

  Apparently Bob had no answer to make to this, for he kept silent. But Calumet saw a shadow cross the sitting room floor, and presently he heard a light footstep on the stairs. He smiled and went on eating.

  CHAPTER XIII

  SUSPICION

  “If the repairs on the ranchhouse were not finished by this time you would not be reading this,” began a letter drawn from a tightly sealed envelope Betty had given Calumet after he and Dade had completed the painting. Supper had been over for some time, but the dishes had not yet been cleared away, and when Betty had handed Calumet the letter he had shoved the tablecloth back to make room for his elbows while he read. Bob had gone to bed; Malcolm and Dade were somewhere outside. Calumet had started to go with them, but had remained when Betty had told him quietly that she wanted to talk to him on a matter of importance. She sat opposite him now, unconcernedly balancing a knife on the edge of a coffee cup, while she waited for him to finish reading the letter.

  “Therefore,” continued the letter, “by this time your heart must have softened a little toward me. I am certain of this, for I know that, in spite of your other weaknesses, that cupidity and greed have no place in your mental make-up. I know, too, that you are no fool, and by this time you must have digested my first letter, and if you have you are not blaming me as much as you did in the beginning.

  “I have talked this over with Betty, and she is of the opinion that as you have thus far obeyed my wishes you should be permitted to have a free hand henceforth, for she insists that perhaps by this time the restraint she has put on you will have resulted in you hating her, and in that case she says she will not care to remain here any longer. But as I have said, I do not think you are a fool, and nobody but a fool could hate Betty. So I have persuaded her that even if you should come to look upon her in that light she owes it to me to stay until the conditions are fulfilled.

  “It is my own hope that by this time you have made friends with her. Perhaps—I am not going to offer you any advice, but Betty is a jewel, and you might do worse. You probably will if you haven’t sense enough to take her—if you can get her. I have given her your picture, and she likes you in spite of the reputation I have given you. She says you have good eyes. Now, if a girl once gets in that mood there’s no end of the things she won’t do for a man. And the man would be an ingrate if he didn’t try to live up to her specifications after he found that out. That’s why I am telling you. Faith made a certain disciple walk on the water, and lack of it caused the same one to sink. Do a little thinking just here. If you do you are safe, and if you don’t you are not worth saving.

  “This is all about Betty. Whatever happens, I think she will be a match for you.

  “Betty will give you another thousand dollars. With it you will fix up the corrals, the bunkhouse, and the stable.

  “Perhaps you will want to know why I have not so much faith in you as Betty has. It is because one day a man from the Durango country stopped here for a day. He told me he knew you—that you were cold-blooded and a hard case. Then I knew you hadn’t improved after leaving home. And so you must continue to do Betty’s will, and mine. Do you doubt this is for your own good?

  “YOUR FATHER.”

  When Calumet folded the letter and placed it in a pocket, he leaned his arms on the table again and regarded Betty intently.

  “Do you know what is in this letter?” he said, tapping the pocket into which he had placed it.

  “No.”

  “There is something missing from the letter, ain’t there?”

  “Yes,” she returned; “a thousand dollars.” She passed it over to him. As before, there were ten one-hundred-dollar bills.

  His eyes flashed with mocking triumph. “If you don’t know what is in this letter—if you didn’t read it—how do you know that I am to have this money?” he said.

  She silently passed over another envelope and watched him with a smile of quiet contempt as he removed the contents and read:

  “BETTY:—

  “Give Calumet a thousand dollars when you turn over letter number three to him.

  “JAMES MARSTON.”

  Calumet looked at the envelope; Betty’s name was on the face of it. The triumph in his eyes was succeeded by embarrassment. He looked up to see Betty’s amused gaze on him.

  “Well?” she questioned.

  “Most women would have read it,” he said. He got up and went outside, leaving her to look after him, not knowing whether he had meant to compliment her or not.

  He found Dade and Malcolm standing near the stable. There was a brilliant moon. At Dade’s invitation they all went down to the bunkhouse. In spite of the dilapidated appearance of its exterior, the interior of the building was in comparatively good condition—due to the continual tinkering of Malcolm, who liked to spend his idle hours there—and Malcolm lighted a candle, placed it on the rough table, took a deck of cards from the shelf, and the three played “pitch” for two hours. At the end of that time Malcolm said he was going to bed. Dade signified that he intended doing likewise. He occupied half of Calumet’s bed. Since the day following the clash with Dade, Calumet had insisted on this.

  “Just to show you that what you said ain’t botherin’ me a heap,” he had told Dade. “You’re still yearlin’ and need some one to keep an eye on you, so’s some careless son of a gun won’t herd-ride you.”

  That Dade accepted this in the spirit in which it was spoken made it possible for them to bunk together in amity. If Dade had “sized up” Calumet, the latter had made no mistake in Dade.

  Dade snuf
fed out the candle and followed Malcolm out. The latter went immediately to the ranchhouse, but Dade lingered until Calumet stepped down from the door of the bunkhouse.

  “Bed suits me,” suggested Dade. “Comin’?”

  “I’m smokin’ a cigarette first,” said Calumet. “Mebbe two,” he added as an afterthought.

  He watched Malcolm go in; saw the light from the lamp on the table in the kitchen flare its light out through the kitchen door as Dade entered; heard the door close. The lamp still burned after he had seen Dade’s shadow vanish, and he knew that Dade had gone upstairs. Dade had left the light burning for him.

  Alone, Calumet rolled the cigarette he had promised himself, lit it, and then, in the flood of moonlight, walked slowly around the bunkhouse, estimating the material and work that would be necessary to repair it. Then, puffing at his cigarette, he made a round of the corral fence. It was a long trip, and he stopped twice to roll new cigarettes before he circled it. Then he examined the stable. This finished, he stepped over to the corral fence, leaned his arms on the top rail, and, in the moonlight that came over his shoulder, reread his father’s letter, making out the picturesque chirography with difficulty.

  As during the first days of his return, when he had watched the army of memories pass in review, he lingered over them now, and, to his surprise, discovered that he felt some little regret over his own conduct in those days preceding his leave-taking. To be sure, he had been only a boy at that time, but he had been a man since, and the cold light of reason should have shown him that there must have been cause for his father’s brutal treatment of him—if indeed it had been brutal. In fact, if he had acted in his youth as he had acted since reaching maturity, there was small reason to wonder that he had received blows. Boys needed to be reprimanded, punished, and perhaps he had deserved all he had received.

  The tone of his father’s letters was distinctly sorrowful. Remorse, sincere remorse, had afflicted him. His father had been wronged, misled, betrayed, and humiliated by the Taggarts, and as Calumet stood beside the corral fence he found that all his rage—the bitter, malignant hatred which had once been in his heart against his father—had vanished, that it had been succeeded by an emotion that was new to him—pity. An hour, two hours, passed before he turned and walked toward the ranchhouse. His lips were grim and white, tell-tale signs of a new resolve, as he stepped softly upon the rear porch, stealthily opened the kitchen door, and let himself in. He halted at the table on which stood the kerosene lamp, looking at the chair in which he had been sitting some hours before talking to Betty, blinking at the chair in which she had sat, summoning into his mind the picture she had made when he had voiced his suspicions about her knowledge of the contents of the letter she had given him. “Nobody but a fool could hate Betty,” the letter had read. And at the instant he had read the words he had known that he didn’t hate her. But he was a fool, just the same; he was a fool for treating her as he did—as Dade had said. He had known that all along; he knew that was the reason why he had curbed his rage when it would have driven him to commit some rash action. He had been a fool, but had he let himself go he would have been a bigger one.