The Ranch at the Wolverine

by B. M. Bower

  CHAPTER IX

  WHEN EMOTIONS ARE BOTTLED

  One day, when the sun was warm and the breeze that filtered down thegorge was pleasantly cool, Ward straightened his aching back, waded outto dry ground, and sat down to rest a few minutes and make a smoke.His interest in the work had oozed steadily since sunrise, and leftnothing but the back-breaking toil. He had found a nugget the size ofa hazelnut in the second pan that morning, so it was not discouragementthat had made his monotonous movements grow slow and reluctant. Untilhe had smoked half the cigarette, he himself did not know what it wasthat ailed him. Then he flung up his head quite suddenly and gave asnort of understanding.

  "Hang the gold! I'm going visiting for a change."

  He concealed the goldpan and his pick, shovel, and sacks in the clumpof service berries and chokeberries that grew at the foot of the ledgeand hid from view the bank where he dug out his pay dirt. That did nottake more than two or three minutes, and he made them up after he hadswung into the saddle on the farther hillside. It was not a goodtrail, and except for his first exultant ride home that way, he hadridden it at a walk. Now he made Rattler trot where loping was toorisky; and so he came clattering down the steep trail into the littleflat beside his cabin. He would have something to eat, and feedRattler a little hay, and then ride on to the Wolverine. And now thathe had yielded to his hunger to see the one person in the world forwhom he felt any tenderness, he grudged every minute that separated himfrom her. He loosened the cinch with one or two yanks and left thesaddle on Rattler, to save time. He turned him loose in the hay corralwith the bridle off, rather than spend the extra minutes it would taketo put him in a stall and carry him a forkful of hay. He thought hewould not bother to start a fire and boil coffee; he would eat thesour-dough bread and fried rabbit hams he had taken with him for lunch,and he would start down the creek in half an hour. He imagined himselfan extremely sensible young man and considerate of his horse's comfort,to give him thirty precious minutes in which to eat hay. It was notabsolutely necessary; Rattler could travel forty miles instead oftwenty without another mouthful, so far as that was concerned. Wardwas simply behaving in a perfectly normal manner and was not lettinghis feelings get the better of him in the slightest degree. As to hisimpromptu vacation, he was certainly entitled to it; he ought to havetaken one long ago, he told himself virtuously. He had panned dirt allday, the Fourth of July; that was last week, he believed. And he hadnot made more than two dollars, either. No, he was not behavingfoolishly at all. He had himself well in hand.

  Then he flung open the door of his cabin and went white with sheerastonishment.

  "'Lo, Ward!" Billy Louise had been standing behind the door, and shejumped out at him, laughing, just as if she were ten years old insteadof nearly twenty.

  Ward tried to say, "'Lo, Bill," in return, but the words would notcome. His lips trembled too much, and his voice was pinched out in histhroat. His mind refused to tell him what he ought to do; but his armsdid not wait upon his paralyzed mental processes. They shot out oftheir own accord, caught Billy Louise, and brought her close againsthis pounding heart. Ward was startled and a little shocked at what hehad done, but he held her closer and closer, until Billy Louise wasgasping from something more than surprise.

  Next, Ward's lips joined the mutiny against his reason, and laidthemselves upon the parted, panting lips of Billy Louise, as thoughthat was where they belonged.

  Billy Louise had probably not expected anything like that, though of atruth one can never safely guess at what is in the mind of a girl. Shetried to pull herself free, and when she could make no impression uponthe grip of those arms--they had been growing muscles of ironmanipulating that goldpan, remember!--she very sensibly yielded tonecessity and stood still.

  "Stop, Ward! You--I--you haven't any right to--"

  "Well, give me the right, then." Ward managed to find voice enough tomake the demand, and then he kissed her many times before he attemptedto say another word. Lord, but he had been hungry for her, these lastthree months!

  "You'll give me the right, won't you, Wilhemina?" he murmured againsther ear, brushing a lock of hair away with his lips. "You know youbelong to me, don't you? And I belong to you--body and soul. You knowthat, don't you? I've known it ever since the world was made. I knewit when God said, 'Let there be light,' and there was light. You wereit."

  "You sill-y thing." Billy Louise did not seem to know whether shewanted to laugh or cry. "What do you think you're talking about,anyway?"

  "About the way the world was made." Ward loosened his clasp a littleand looked down deep into her eyes. "My world, I mean." He bent andkissed her again, gravely and very, very tenderly. "Oh, Wilhemina, youknow--" he waited, gazing down with that intent look which had a newsoftness behind it--"you know there's nothing in this world but you.As far as I'm concerned, there isn't. There never will be."

  Billy Louise reached up her hands to his shoulders and tried to givehim a shake. "Is that why you've stuck yourself in these hills forthree whole months and never come near? You fibber!"

  "That's why, lady-girl. I've been sticking here, working like oneson-of-a-gun--for you. So I could have you sooner." He lifted hisbent head and looked around the little cabin like a man who has justwakened to his surroundings. "I knocked off work a little while ago,and I was going to see you. I couldn't stand it any longer. And--hereyou iss!" he went on, giving her shoulders a little squeeze. "Astraight case of 'two souls with but a single thought,' don't youreckon?"

  Billy Louise, by a visible effort, brought the situation down to earth.She twisted herself free and went over to the stove and saved afrying-pan of potatoes from burning to a crisp.

  "I don't know about your soul," she said, glancing back at him. "Ihappen to have two or three thoughts in mine. One is that I'm halfstarved. The second is that you're not acting a bit nice, under thecircumstances; no perfectly polite young man makes love to a girl whenshe is supposedly helpless and under his protection." She stoppedthere to wrinkle her nose at him and twist her mouth humorously. "Thethird thought is that if you don't behave, I shall go straight home andnever be nice to you again. And," she added, getting back of thecoffee-pot--which looked new--"the rest of my soul is one great bigblob of question-marks. If you can eat and talk at the same time, youmay tell me what this frantic industry is all about. If you can't,I'll have to wait till after dinner; not even my curiosity is going topunish my poor tummy any longer." She pulled a pan of biscuits fromthe oven, lifted them out one at a time with dainty little nabs becausethey were hot, and stole a glance now and then at Ward from under hereyebrows.

  Ward stood and looked at her until the food was all on the table. Hewas breathing unnaturally, and his jaws were set hard together. Whenshe pushed a box up to the table and sat down upon it, and rested herelbows on the oilcloth and looked straight at him with her chin nestedin her two palms, he drew a long breath, hunched his shoulders withsome mental surrender, and grinned wryly.

  "So be it," he yielded, throwing his hat upon the bunk. "I kindaoverplayed my hand, anyway. I most humbly ask your pardon!" He bowedfarcically and took up the wash-basin from its bench just outside thedoor.

  "You see, William Louisa," he went on quizzically, when he had seatedhimself opposite her and was helping himself to the potatoes, "when ayoung lady invades strange territory, and hides behind strange doors,and jumps out at an unsuspecting but terribly well-meaning young man,she's apt to get a surprise. When emotions are bottled--"

  "Never mind the bottled emotions. I'd like some potatoes, if you don'twant them all. I see you haven't the faintest idea how to treat aguest. Charlie Fox would have died before he would help himself andset down the dish away out of my reach. You could stick pins into himtill he howled, but you couldn't make him be rude to a lady."

  "I'd sure like to," muttered Ward ambiguously and handed her every bitof food within his reach.

  "You can talk and eat at the same time, I see. S
o tell me what you'vebeen doing all this while." Billy Louise spoke lightly, evenflippantly, but her eyes were making love to him shyly, whether sheknew it or not.

  "Working," answered Ward promptly and briefly. He was thinking at therate of a million thoughts a minute, it seemed to him, and he wasafraid to let go of himself and say what he thought. One thing he knewbeyond all doubt, and that was that he must be careful or he would seehis air-castle blow up in small fragments and come down a hopelessruin. He needed time to think, and Billy Louise was not giving himeven a minute. So he clutched at two decisions which instinct told himmight help him win to safety: He would not make love, and he would nottell Billy Louise about the gold.

  "Working! Well, so have I. But working at what? Did you hire out toJunkins again? I thought you said you wouldn't till fall." BillyLouise was watching Ward rather closely, perhaps to see how far shemight trust his recovered inscrutability. "Why don't you show somehuman inquisitiveness about my being here?" she asked irrelevantly,just as Ward was hastily choosing how he would answer her withoutsaying too much.

  "It wouldn't be polite to be inquisitive about a lady, would it?" Wardretorted, thankful for the change of subject.

  "N-no--but, then, you never bother about being just polite! CharlieFox would--"

  "Charlie Fox would think you came to see him," Ward asserteduncharitably. "My head isn't swelled to that extent. Why did youcome, anyway?"

  "To see you." Billy Louise lost her nerve when she saw the light leapinto his eyes. "To see whether you were dead or not," she revisedhastily, "so mommie would stop worrying about you. Mommie has pesteredthe life out of me for the last month, thinking you might be sick orhurt or something. So--I was riding up this way, anyway, and--"

  "I see I'll have to ride down and prove to mommie that I'm very muchalive. I'm sure glad to know that somebody takes an interest in me--asif I were a real human." Ward's eyes watched furtively her face, butBilly Louise refused even to nibble at the bait.

  "Why didn't you come before, then? You know mommie likes to have you."

  "How about mommie's child?" Ward's look was dangerous to his goodresolutions.

  "Listen here, Ward." Billy Louise took refuge behind her terriblefrankness. "If you make love, I won't like you half as well. Don'tyou know that all the time when I used to play with my pretend WardWarren, he--he never made love?" A dimple tried to show itself in hercheek and was sent about its business with a twist of her lips. "Mypretend Ward was lovely; he liked me to pieces, but he never came rightout and said so. He--he skated around the subject--" Billy Louiseillustrated the skating process by drawing her forefinger in a widecircle around her cup. "He made love--with his eyes--and he kissed mewith his--voice--but he never spoiled it with words."

  Ward grunted a word that sounded like "damchump."

  "Nothing of the kind!" Billy Louise flew to the defense of her"pretend." "He knew just exactly how a girl likes to be made love to.And, anyway, you've been doing the selfsame thing yourself, WardWarren, till just now. And--"

  "Oh, have I?"

  "Yes, you have. And I might have known better than to--to startle you.You always, eternally, do something nobody'd ever dream of your doing.The first time, when I threw that chip, you pulled a gun on me--" Thevoice of Billy Louise squeezed down to a wisp of a whisper. Her eyeswere remorseful. "Oh, Ward, I didn't mean to--to--"

  "It's all right. I've got it coming." It was as if a mask had droppedbefore Ward's features. Even his eyes looked strange and hard in thatface of set muscles, though the thin, bitter lips and quiveringnostrils showed that there was feeling behind it all. "I see whereyou're right, William. You needn't be afraid; I won't make love again."

  Billy Louise looked as though she wanted to beat something--herself,most likely. She stared as they stare who watch from the dock while aloved one slips farther and farther away on a voyage from which theremay be no return; only Billy Louise was not one to watch and do nothingelse.

  "Now, Ward, don't be silly." The fright in her voice was overlaid witha sharpened tenderness. "You know perfectly well I didn't mean that.You're only proving that in the human problem you're raised to-- Stoplooking darning-needles at that coffee-pot and listen here!" BillyLouise leaned over the table and caught at his nearest hand, which wasa closed fist. With her own little fingers digging persistently intothe tensed muscles, she pried the fist open. "Ward, behave yourself,or I'll go straight home!" She held his straightened fingers in herown and drew a sharp breath because they lay inert--dead things so faras any response came to her clasp; the first and middle fingersyellowed a little from cigarettes, the nails soft and pink from muchimmersion in water. A tale they told, if Billy Louise had been payingattention.

  "Ward, you certainly are--the limit! You know as well as I do thatthat doesn't make a particle of difference. If I had been a boyinstead of a girl, and had bucked the world for a living, I'd probablyhave done worse; and, anyway, it doesn't matter!" Her voice rose as ifshe were growing desperate. "I--I--like you--to pieces, Ward, andI'd--I'd rather marry you--than anyone else. But I don't want to thinkabout that for a long while. I don't want to be engaged, or--or anydifferent than the way we've been. It was good to be just pals. Itwas like my pretend Ward. I--I always wanted him--to love me, but Iwouldn't play that he--told me, Ward. Oh, don't you see?" She shuther teeth hard together, because if she hadn't she would have beencrying in another ten seconds.

  "I see." Ward spoke dully, evenly, and he still stared at thecoffee-pot with that gimlet gaze of his that made Billy Louise want toscream. "I see a whole lot that I'd been shutting my eyes to. Whydon't you feel insulted--"

  "Ward Warren, if you're going to act like a--a--" I suspect that BillyLouise, in her desperation, was tempted to use a swear word, but sheresisted the temptation. She got up and went around to him, hesitatedwhile she looked down at his set face, drew a long breath, and blinkedback some tears of self-reproach because of the devils of memory shehad unwittingly turned loose to jibe at this man.

  "This is why," she said softly; and leaning, she pressed her lips downupon his bitter ones and let them lie there for a dozen heart-beats.

  Ward's face relaxed, and his eyes went to hers with the hungrytenderness she had seen so often there. He leaned his head against herand threw up an arm to clasp her close. He did not say a word.

  "After I have kissed a man," said Billy Louise, struggling back to herold whimsical manner, "it won't be a bit polite for him to have anydoubts of my feelings toward him, or my belief in him, or his belief inhimself." Her fingers tangled themselves in his hair, just where thewave was the most pronounced.

  She had drawn the poison. Now she set herself to restore a perfectlynormal atmosphere.

  "He's going to be just exactly the same good pal he was before," shewent on, speaking softly. "And he's going to bring some water so I canwash the dishes, and then bring Blue so I can go home, and he isn'tgoing to say a single thing more about--anything that matters twowhoops."

  Ward's clasp tightened and then grew loose. He drew a long breath andlet her go.

  "You do like me--a little bit, don't you?" His eyes were like the eyesof the damned asking for water.

  "I like you two little bits." Billy Louise took his face between hertwo palms and smiled down at him bravely, with the pure candor that wasa part of her. "But I don't want us to be anything but pals; not for along while. It's so good, just being friends. And once we get awayfrom that point, we can't go back to it again, ever. And I'm sure it'sgood enough to be worth while making it last as long as we can. Sonow--"

  "It's going to be quite a contract, Wilhemina." Ward still looked ather with his heart in his eyes.

  "Oh, no, it won't! You've had lots of practice," Billy Louise assuredhim confidently and began putting the few dishes in a neat little pile."And, anyway, you are perfectly able to handle any kind of a contract.All you need do is make up your mind. And that's made up already. Sothe next thing on
the programme is to bring a bucket of water. Did younotice anything different about your cabin? I thought you bragged tome about being such a good housekeeper! Why, you hadn't swept thefloor, even, since goodness knows when. And I've made up a bundle ofyour dirty shirts and things that I found under the bed, and I'm goingto take them home and let Phoebe wash them. She can do them thisevening and have them ready for you to bring back to-morrow. When Iwas a kid and went to see Marthy and Jase, I used to promise themcookies with 'raisings' in the middle. I thought there was nothingbetter in the world. I was just thinking--I'll maybe bake you somecookies with raisings on top, to bring home. You don't seem to wastemuch time cooking stuff. Bacon and beans, and potatoes and sour-doughbread: that seems to be your regular bill of fare. And tomatoes forSunday, I reckon; I saw some empty cans outside. Don't you ever feellike coming down to the ranch and getting a square meal?"

  "Oh, you William the Conqueror!" Ward stood with the water bucket inhis hand, and looked at her with that smile hidden just behind his lipsand his eyes. "You sure sabe how to make things come your way, don'tyou?" He started for the door, stopped with his toes over thethreshold, and looked back at her. "If I knew how to get what I want,as easily as you do," he said, "we'd be married and keeping housebefore to-morrow night!" He laughed grimly at the start she gave. "Asit is, you're the doctor, William Louisa. We remain mere friends!"With that he went off to the creek.

  He was gone at least four times as long as was necessary, but he cameback whistling, and he did not make love to her except with his eyes.