But would he come? Yes, for the sake of such
a battle as this he would journey to the end of the
world and give his services for nothing.
THE FAILURE
Before noon Shorty, that lightweight and tireless
rider, unwearied, to all appearance, by his efforts
of that night, had started towards Glosterville with
her letter to Perris, but it was not until the next
day that she confessed what she had done to Hervey.
Certainly he had done more than his share in his effort
to get back the Coles horses and she had no wish to
needlessly hurt his feelings by letting him know that
the business was to be taken out of his hands and given
into those of a more efficient worker. But Hervey
surprised her by the complaisance with which he heard
the tidings.
“Never in my life hung out a shingle as a hoss-catcher,”
he assured her. “He’s welcome to
the job. Me and the boys won’t envy him
none. It’ll be a long trail and a tolerable
lonely one, most like.”
After that she settled down to wait with as great
a feeling of security as though the mares were already
safely back in the corral. If he came, the death-warrant
of Alcatraz was as good as signed. But when the
third day of waiting ended without bringing Shorty
and Perris, as it should have done, the “if”
began to assume greater proportions, and by late afternoon
of the fourth day she had made up her mind that Perris
was gone from Glosterville and that Shorty was on
a wild goose chase after him. So great was her
gloom that even her father, usually blind to all emotions
around him, delayed a moment after he had been helped
into his buckboard and stared thoughtfully down at
her.
The habit had grown on Oliver Jordan of late.
When the westering sun lost most of its heat and threw
slant shadows and a yellow light over the mountains,
Oliver would have a pair of ancient greys, patient
as burros and hardly faster, hitched to a buckboard
and then drive off into the evening and perhaps, long
after the dinner hour. Only foul weather kept
him in from these lonely jaunts on which he never took
a companion. To Marianne they were a never-ending
source of wonder and sorrow, for she saw her father
slowly withdrawing himself from the life about him
and dwelling in a gentle, uninterrupted melancholy.
She met his stare, on this evening, with eyes clouded
with tears.
Truly he had aged wonderfully in the past years.
The accident which robbed him of his physical freedom
seemed, at the same time, to destroy all spirit of
youth. Whether walking or sitting he was bowed.
His eyes were dull. Beside his mouth and between
his eyes deep lines gave a sad dignity to his expression.
And though, as his cowpunchers swore, his hand was
as swift to draw a gun as ever and his eye as steady
on a target, he had gradually lost interest in even
his revolvers. Indeed, what real interest remained
to him in the world, Marianne was unable to tell.
He lived and moved as one in a dream surrounded by
a world of dreams. His eyes were dull from looking
into the dim distance of strange thoughts, and the
smile which was rarely away from his lips was rather
whimsically enduring than a sign of mirth.
