CHAPTER XII. HIGH WATER
It was nearing the middle of June, and it was getting to be a very hotJune at that. For two days the trail-herd had toiled wearily over thehills and across the coulees between the Missouri and Milk River. Thenthe sky threatened for a day, and after that they plodded in the rain.
"Thank the Lord that's done with," sighed Park when he saw the lastof the herd climb, all dripping, up the north bank of the Milk River."To-morrow we can turn 'em loose. And I tell yuh, Bud, we didn't getacross none too soon. Yuh notice how the river's coming up? A day laterand we'd have had to hold the herd on the other side, no telling howlong."
"It is higher than usual; I noticed that," Thurston agreed absently. Hewas thinking more of Mona just then than of the river. He wondered ifshe would be at home. He could easily ride down there and find out.It wasn't far; not a quarter of a mile, but he assured himself that hewasn't going, and that he was not quite a fool, he hoped Even if shewere at home, what good could that possibly do him? Just give himseveral bad nights, when he would lie in his corner of the tent andlisten to the boys snoring with a different key for every man. Suchnights were not pleasant, nor were the thoughts that caused them.
From where they were camped upon a ridge which bounded a broad couleeon the east, he could look down upon the Stevens ranch nestling in thebottomland, the house half hidden among the cottonwoods. Through thelast hours of the afternoon he watched it hungrily. The big corral randown to the water's edge, and he noted idly that three panels of thefence extended out into the river, and that the muddy water was creepingsteadily up until at sundown the posts of the first panel barely showedabove the water.
Park came up to him and looked down upon the little valley. "I neverdid see any sense in Jack Stevens building where he did," he remarked."There ain't a June flood that don't put his corral under water, andsome uh these days it's going to get the house. He was too lazy to diga well back on high ground; he'd rather take chances on having the wholebusiness washed off the face uh the earth."
"There must be danger of it this year if ever," Thurston observeduneasily. "The river is coming up pretty fast, it seems to me. It musthave raised three feet since we crossed this afternoon."
"I'll course there's danger, with all that snow coming out uh themountains. And like as not Jack's in Shellanne roosting on somebody'spool table and telling it scary, instead uh staying at home lookingafter his stuff. Where yuh going, Bud?"
"I'm going to ride down there," Thurston answered constrainedly. "Thewomen may be all alone."
"Well, I'll go along, if you'll hold on a minute. Jack ain't got a lickuh sense. I don't care if he is Mona's brother."
"Half brother," corrected Thurston, as he swung up into the saddle. Hehad a poor opinion of Jack and resented even that slight relation toMona.
The road was soggy with the rain which fell steadily; down in thebottom, the low places in the road were already under water, and theriver, widening almost perceptibly in its headlong rush down the narrowvalley, crept inch by inch up its low banks. When they galloped into theyard which sloped from the house gently down to the river fifty yardsaway, Mona's face appeared for a moment in the window. Evidently she hadbeen watching for some one, and Thurston's heart flopped in his chestas he wondered, fleetingly, if it could be himself. When she opened thedoor her eyes greeted him with a certain wistful expression that he hadnever seen in them before. He was guilty of wishing that Park had stayedin camp.
"Oh, I'm glad you rode over," she welcomed--but she was careful, afterthat first swift glance, to look at Park. "Jack wasn't at camp, was he?He went to town this morning, and I looked for hi back long before now.But it's a mistake ever to look for Jack until he's actually in sight."
Park smiled vaguely. He was afraid it would not be polite to agree withher as emphatically as he would like to have done. But Thurston had nosmile ready, polite or otherwise. Instead he drew down his brows in away not complimentary to Jack.
"Where is your mother?" he asked, almost peremptorily.
"Mamma went to Great Falls last week," she told him primly, justgrazing him with one of her impersonal glances which nearly drove him todesperation. "Aunt Mary has typhoid fever--there seems to be so much ofthat this spring and they sent for mamma. She's such a splendid nurse,you know."
Thurston did know, but he passed over the subject. "And you're alone?"he demanded.
"Certainly not; aren't you two here?" Mona could be very pert when shetried. "Jack and I are holding down the ranch just now; the boys are allon roundup, of course. Jack went to town today to see some one.
"Um-m-yes, of course." It was Park, still trying to be polite and notcommit himself on the subject of Jack. The "some one" whom Jack wentoftenest to see was the bartender in the Palace saloon, but it was notnecessary to tell her that.
"The river's coming up pretty fast, Mona," he ventured. "Don't yuh thinkyuh ought to pull out and go visiting?"
"No, I don't." Mona's tone was very decided. "I wouldn't drop down on aneighbor without warning just because the river happens to be coming up.It has 'come up' every June since we've been living here, and there havebeen several of them. At the worst it never came inside the gate."
"You can never tell what it might do," Park argued. "Yuh know yourselfthere's never been so much snow in the mountains. This hot weather we'vebeen having lately, and then the rain, will bring it a-whooping. Can'tyuh ride over to the Jonses? One of us'll go with yuh."
"No, I can't." Mona's chin went up perversely. "I'm no coward, I hope,even if there was any danger which there isn't."
Thurston's chin went up also, and he sat a bit straighter. Whether shemeant it or not, he took her words as a covert stab at himself. Probablyshe did not mean it; at any rate the blood flew consciously to hercheeks after she had spoken, and she caught her under lip sharplybetween her teeth. And that did not help matters or make her temper moreyielding.
"Anyway," she added hurriedly, "Jack will be here; he's likely to comeany minute now."
"Uh course, if Jack's got some new kind of half-hitch he can put onthe river and hold it back yuh'll be all right," fleered Park, with thefreedom of an old friend. He had known Mona when she wore dresses to hershoe-tops and her hair in long, brown curls down her back.
She wrinkled her nose at him also with the freedom of an old friend andThurston stirred restlessly in his chair. He did not like even Park tobe too familiar with Mona, though he knew there was a girl in Shellannewhose name Park sometimes spoke in his sleep.
She lifted the big glass lamp down from its place on the clock shelfand lighted it with fingers not quite steady. "You men," she remarked,"think women ought to be wrapped in pink cotton and put in a glasscabinet. If, by any miracle, the river should come up around the house,I flatter myself I should be able to cope with the situation. I'd justsaddle my horse and ride out to high ground!"
"Would yuh?" Park grinned skeptically. "The road from here to the hillis half under water right now; the river's got over the bank above, andis flooding down through the horse pasture. By the time the water got uphere the river'd be as wide and deep one side uh yuh as the other. Thenwhere'd yuh be at?"
"It won't get up here, though," Mona asserted coolly. "It never has."
"No, and the Lazy Eight never had to work the Yellowstone range onspring roundup before either," Park told her meaningly.
Whereupon Mona got upon her pedestal and smiled her unpleasant smile,against which even Park had no argument ready.
They lingered till long after all good cowpunchers are supposed to bein their beds--unless they are standing night-guard--but Jack failed toappear. The rain drummed upon the roof and the river swished and gurgledagainst the crumbling banks, and grumbled audibly to itself because thehills stood immovably in their places and set bounds which it could notpass, however much it might rage against their base.
When the clock struck a wheezy nine Mona glanced at it significantlyand smothered a yawn more than half affected. It was a hint which no man
with an atom of self-respect could overlook. With mutual understandingthe two rose.
"I guess we'll have to be going," Park said with some ceremony. "I keptthink ing maybe Jack would show up; it ain't right to leave yuh herealone like this."
"I don't see why not; I'm not the least bit afraid," Mona said. Her tonewas impersonal and had in it a note of dismissal.
So, there being nothing else that they could do, they said good-nightand took themselves off.
"This is sure fierce," Park grumbled when they struck the lower ground."Darn a man like Jack Stevens! He'll hang out there in town and bowl upon other men's money till plumb daylight. It's a wonder Mona didn't gowith her mother. But no--it'd be awful if Jack had to cook his own grubfor a week. Say, the water has come up a lot, don't yuh think, Bud?If it raises much more Mona'll sure have a chance to 'cope with thesituation. It'd just about serve her right, too."
Thurston did not think so, but he was in too dispirited a mood to arguethe point. It had not been good for his peace of mind to sit andwatch the color come and go in Mona's cheeks, and the laughter springunheralded into her dear, big eyes, and the light tangle itself in thewaves of her hair.
He guided his horse carefully through the deep places, and noteduneasily how much deeper it was than when they had crossed before. Hecursed the conventions which forbade his staying and watching over thegirl back there in the house which already stood upon an island, cut offfrom the safe, high land by a strip of backwater that was widening anddeepening every minute, and, when it rose high enough to flow into theriver below, would have a current that would make a nasty crossing.
On the first rise he stopped and looked back at the light which shoneout from among the dripping cottonwoods. Even then he was tempted to goback and brave her anger that he might feel assured of her safety.
"Oh, come on," Park cried impatiently. "We can't do any good sittingout here in the rain. I don't suppose the water will get clear up tothe house; it'll likely do things to the sheds and corrals, though, andserve Jack right. Come on, Bud. Mona won't have us around, so the soonerwe get under cover the better for us. She's got lots uh nerve; I guessshe'll make out all right."
There was common sense in the argument, and Thurston recognized it androde on to camp. But instead of unsaddling, as he would naturally havedone, he tied Sunfish to the bed-wagon and threw his slicker over hisback to protect him from the rain. And though Park said nothing, hefollowed Thurston's example.