BOOK TWO: The Estray
CHAPTER I
A WILD CAT
The Lazy-Y ranch-house, a one-storied building of logs, was builtabout three sides of a paved court. In the middle of this court stooda well with a high rustic top, and about this well on a certainbrilliant July night, a tall man was strolling with his hands behindhis back. It was a night of full moon, sailing high, which pouredwhiteness into the court, making its cobbles embedded in the earthlook like milky bubbles and drawing clear-cut shadows of the well-topand the gables and chimneys of the house. The man slowly circled thecourt beginning close to the walls and narrowing till he made a loopabout the well, and then, reversing, worked in widening orbits as faras the walls again. His wife, looking out at him through one of thewindows, thought that, in the moonlight, followed by his own squat,active shadow, he looked like a huge spider weaving a web. This effectwas heightened by the fact that he never looked up. He was deep insome plan to which it was impossible for her not to believe that thecurious pattern of his walk bore some relation.
From the northern wing of the ranch-house, strongly lighted, came atumult of sound; music, thumping feet, a man's voice chantingcouplets:
"Oh, you walk right through and you turn around and swing the girl that finds you, And you come right back by the same old track and turn the girl behind you."
Some one was directing a quadrille in native fashion. There was muchlaughter, confusion, and applause. None of this noise disturbed theman. He did not look at the lighted windows. He might really have beena gigantic insect entirely unrelated to the human creatures so noisilynear at hand.
A man came round the corner of the house, crossed the square, and,lurching a little, made for the door of the lighted wing. Shortlyafter his entrance the sound of music and dancing abruptly stopped.This stillness gave the spider pause, but he was about to renew hisweaving, when, in the silence, a woman spoke.
"You, Mabel, don't you go home," she said.
She had not spoken loudly, but her voice beat against the walls of thecourt as though it could have filled the whole moonlight night withdangerous beauty. The listener outside lifted his head with a low,startled exclamation. Suddenly the world was alive with adventure andalarm.
"Mind your own business, you wild cat," answered a man's raucousvoice. "She's my wife, which is somethin' that your sort knows nothin'about. Come on, you Mabel. You think that outlaw can keep me fromtakin' home my wife, you're betting wrong."
Another silence; then the voice again, a little louder, as though thespeaker had stepped out into the center of the room.
"Mabel is not a-goin' home with you," it said; and the listeneroutside threw back his head with the gesture of a man sensitive tomusic who listens to some ecstatic melody. "She happens to be stoppin'here with us to-night. You say that she's your wife, but that don'tmean that she belongs to you, body and soul, Bill Greer--not to you,who don't possess your own body, or soul. Why, you can't keep yourfeet steady, you can't pull your hand away from mine. You can't holdyour tipsy eyes on mine. Do you call that ownin' your own body? And asfer your soul, it's a hell of rage and dirty feelin's that I'd hate toburn my eyes by lookin' closely at."
A deep, short, alarming chorus of laughter interrupted the speech. Thespeaker evidently had her audience.
"So you don't own anything to-night," went on the extraordinary,deliberate voice; "surely you don't own Mabel. You can't get a claimon her, not thataway. She's her own. She belongs to her own self. Whenyou're fit to take her, why, then come and tell us about it, and if wejudge you're a-tellin' us the truth, mebbe we'll let her go. Tillthen--" a pause which was filled with a rapid shuffling of feet. Thedoor flew open and in its lighted oblong the observer saw a huddledfigure behind which rose a woman's black and shapely head. "Tillthen," repeated the deep-toned, ringing voice, "_get out_!" And thehuddled man came on a staggering run which ended in a backward fall onthe cobbles of the court.
The man who watched trod lightly past him and came to the open door.Inside, firelight beat on the golden log walls and salmon-coloredtimber ceiling; a lamp hanging from a beam threw down a strong,conflicting arc of white light. A dozen brown-faced, booted young menstood about, three musicians were ready to take up their interruptedmusic, the little fat man who had called out the figures of thequadrille, stood on a barrel, his arms folded across his paunch. Afair-haired girl, her face marred by recent tears, drooped near him.Two of the young men were murmuring reassurances to her; otherssurrounded a stout, red-faced girl who was laughing and talkingloudly. The Jew's eyes wandered till they came to the fireplace. Thereanother woman leaned against the wall.
The music struck up, the dancing began again, the two other girls,quickly provided with partners, began to waltz, the superfluous menstood up together and went at it with gravity and grace. No one askedthis woman, who stood at ease, watching the dancers, her hands restingon her hips, her head tilted back against the logs. As he looked ather, the intruder had a queer little thrill of fright. He rememberedsomething he had once seen--a tame panther which was to be used insome moving-picture play. Its confident owner had led it in on a chainand held it negligently in a corner of the room, waiting for his cue.The panther had stood there drowsily, its eyes shifting a little,then, watching people, its inky head had begun to move from side toside. He remembered the way the loose chain jerked. The animal's eyeshalf-closed, it lowered its head, its upper lip began to draw awayfrom its teeth. All at once it had dropped on its belly. Some onecried out, "Hold your beast!"
This young woman by the fireplace had just that panther-air ofperilous quietness. She was very haggard, very thin; she wore hermassive, black hair drawn away hideously from brow and temple, and outof this lean, unshaded face a pair of deep eyes looked drowsily,dangerously. Her mouth was straightened into an expression of proudbitterness, her round chin thrust forward; there was a deep, scowlingline that rose from the bridge of her straight, short nose almost tothe roots of her hair. It cut across a splendidly modeled brow. Shewas very graceful, if such a bundle of bones might be said to have anygrace. Her pose was arresting. There was a tragic force and attractionabout her.
The man by the door appraised her carefully between his narrowed lids.He kept in mind the remembered melody of her voice, and, after a fewmoments, he strolled across the floor and came up to her.
"Will you dance?" he said.
He had a very charming and subtle smile, a very charming andsympathetic look. The woman was startled, color rose into her face.She stared at him.
"I'm not dancing, Mr. Morena," she answered.
"You know my name," smiled Morena; "and I don't know yours. I've beenon Mr. Yarnall's ranch for a month. Why haven't I seen you?"
"Fer not lookin', I suppose." She had given him that one startledglance, and now she had turned her eyes back to the dancers and wore agrim, contemptuous air. Her speeches, though they were cut into short,crisp words, were full of music of a sharp, metallic quality differentfrom the tone of her other speech, but quite as beautifully expressive.
"May I smoke?" asked Morena. He was still smiling his charming smileand watching her out of the corners of his eyes.
"I'm not hinderin' you any," said she.
Morena smiled deeper. He took some time making and lighting hiscigarette.
"You don't smoke, yourself?" he asked.
"No."
"Nor dance?"
"No."
"Nor behave prettily to polite young men?"
Again the woman looked at him. "You ain't so awful young, are you?"
He laughed aloud.
"I amuse you, don't I? Well, I'm not always so all-fired funny,"drawled the creature, lowering her head a little.
"No. I've heard that you're not. You rather run things here, I gather;got the boys 'plumb-scared'?"
"Did Mr. Yarnall tell you that?"
"Yes. I've just in the last few minutes remembered who you are. You'reJane. You cook for the 'outfit,' and Yarnall w
as telling us the othernight how he sent one of the boys out for a cook, the last one, a man,having been beaten up, and how the boy had brought you back behind himon his saddle. He said you'd kept order for him ever since, werebetter than a foreman. Who was the man you threw out to-night?"
"Perhaps," drawled Jane, "he was just a feller who asked too manyquestions?"
Again Morena's smile deepened into his cheeks. He gave way, in theJewish fashion so deceptively suggestive of meekness and timidity,when it is, at its worst, merely pliable insolence, at its best,pliable determination. "You must pardon me, Miss Jane," he said in hismurmuring, cultivated voice. "You see I've had a great misfortune.I've never been in your West. I've lived in New York where goodmanners haven't time or space to flourish. I hadn't the leastintention of being impertinent. Do you want me to go?"
He moved as if to leave her, and she did not lift a finger to detainhim.
"I'm not carin'. Do as you please," she said with entire indifference.
"Oh," said Morena, looking back at her, "I don't stay where people are'not carin'.'"
She gave him an extraordinarily intelligent look. "I should say that'sthe only place you'd be wantin' to stay in at all--where you're notexactly urged to come," she said.
Morena flushed and his lids flickered. He was for an instant absurdlyinclined to anger and made two or three steps away. But he came back.
He bowed and spoke as he would have spoken to a great lady, suavely,deferentially.
"Good-night. I wish I could think that you have enjoyed our talk asgreatly as I have, Miss Jane. I should very much like to be allowed torepeat it. May I be stupidly personal and tell you that you are verybeautiful?" He bowed, gave her an upward look and went out, findinghis way cleverly among the dancers.
Outside, in the moonlit court, he stood, threw back his head andlaughed, not loudly but consumedly. He was remembering her white faceof mute astonishment. She looked almost as if his compliment had givenher sharp pain.
Morena went laughing to his room in the opposite wing. He wanted todescribe the interview to his wife.