CHAPTER XXXVIII.
THE HERITAGE OF BARBARA WORTH.
Barbara, walking quickly, left the little village and, crossing DryRiver on the bridge that now spanned the deep gorge where the old SanFelipe trail once led down into the ancient wash, climbed the slightgrade to the grave that was marked by the simple headstone with its oneword--"Mother."
That morning Jefferson Worth had told her of the tin box found by TexasJoe and Pat. With reverent care she had read the papers and letters andhad looked long at the portraits of her parents and people. She couldnot at first realize that the desert had at last given up the secretthat she had so longed to know. It was not real to her, the revelationwas so sudden, so startling. She could not think of herself save as thedaughter of Jefferson Worth, whom she loved as a father.
As soon as the noon day meal was over she had left her room in thehotel, and once out of doors her steps had instinctively turned towardher mother's grave beside the old trail.
Standing before the headstone she looked at the one word. "Mother," shesaid softly. "Mother!" Then, still in a whisper, she repeated theunfamiliar names: "Gertrude Greenfield; William Greenfield--my mother;my father! I am Barbara Greenfield--Barbara Greenfield!"
Seating herself on the ground beside the grave, she looked about: atthe sand hills in the distance; at the Dry River gorge and the powerplant; at the canals shining like silver bands among the green fieldsof the ranchers to the southeast; and at the little town. An hourpassed; then another; and another.
Across the river she saw Pablo riding out of the town and away alongthe road that follows the canal. Then from the power house came Abe Leewith the Seer. She watched them as they walked along the bank of theold channel. Once she thought she would call to them, but hesitated. Ifthey crossed the bridge and came up the hill they would be sure to seeher. So she waited, keeping still. They passed the bridge and continuedon down the bank of the stream.
Barbara knew instinctively that they were talking of her and the secretthat the desert had at last revealed, for she had asked her father totell them. She thought of her father who had gone to Republic. He wouldreturn that evening and Mr. Greenfield, her uncle, would be with him."Her uncle"--how strange!
Then Barbara saw on the other side of the river a horseman riding fromthe south toward the town. She could not mistake the khaki-clad figurethat, while fully at home in the saddle, still lacked theindescribable, easy looseness and swinging grace of the western rider.It was Willard Holmes, and the young woman's heart told her why theengineer had come. Since that meeting at the river in the hour of hisvictory she had known that he would come and she had known what heranswer would be.
He had evidently ridden from the river, from his work. Did he know? No,she decided, he could not know yet. Then the quick thought came: he_must not know until_--until she herself should tell him. Quickly theyoung woman walked down the hill across the bridge toward the town.
Willard Holmes arrived at the hotel and, learning that Miss Worth wasout, carried a chair to the arcade on the street to await her return.He had not waited long when a voice at his shoulder said with mockformality: "I believe this is Mr. Willard Holmes."
The engineer sprang to his feet. "Miss Worth! They told me that youwere out. I was sitting here waiting for you."
"I was out when you arrived," she confessed; "but I saw you coming andhurried back pronto. I knew you had just left the river, you see. Andof course," she added, as though that explained her eagerness to seehim, "I wanted to hear the latest news from the work."
"There is no news," he answered, as though dismissing the matterfinally.
"And may I ask what brings you to Barba?"
He looked at her steadily. "You brought me to Barba."
"I?"
"Yes--you. I stopped in Republic on my way back from the city theevening of the day you left. I was forced to go on to the river, buttook the first opportunity to ride out here, for I understood youexpected to be in Barba several days. Surely you know why I have come.The work I stayed in the Basin to do is finished. I have another offerfrom the S. & C. which, if I accept, will keep me here for severalyears. I have come to you with it as I came with the other. What shallI do? Please don't pretend that you don't understand me."
The direct forcefulness of the man almost made Barbara forget thelittle plan she had arranged on her way to the hotel to meet him. "Iwon't pretend, Mr. Holmes," she answered seriously. "But--will you gowith me for a little ride into the desert?"
Her words recalled to his mind instantly their first meeting in RubioCity, but Holmes was not astonished now. The invitation coming fromBarbara under the circumstances seemed the most natural thing in theworld.
The young woman went to her room to make ready while the engineerbrought the horses, and in a very few minutes they had crossed theriver and were following the old San Felipe trail toward the sand hills.
Very few words passed between them until they reached the great driftthat had held so long its secret. Leaving the horses at Barbara'srequest, they climbed the steep sides of the great sand mound. From thetop they could see on every hand the many miles of The King's Basincountry--from Lone Mountain at the end of the delta dam to thesnow-capped sentinels of San Antonio Pass; and from the sky line of theMesa and the low hills on the east to No Man's Mountains and the boldwall of the Coast Range that shuts out the beautiful country on thewest.
The soft, many-colored veils and scarfs of the desert, with the gold ofthe sand hills, the purple of the mountains, the gray and green of thedesert vegetation, with the ragged patches of dun plain, were all therestill as when Willard Holmes had first looked upon it, for the work ofReclamation was still far from finished.
But there was more in Barbara's Desert now than pictures wovenmagically in the air. There were beautiful scenes of farms with housesand barns and fences and stacks, with cattle and horses in thepastures, and fields of growing grain, the dark green of alfalfa, withthreads and lines and spots of water that, under the flood of whitelight from the wide sky, shone in the distance like gleaming silver.Barbara and the engineer could even distinguish the little towns ofRepublic and Frontera, with Barba nearby; and even as they looked theymarked the tall column of smoke from a locomotive on the S. & C. movingtoward the crossing of the old San Felipe trail, and on the King'sBasin Central another, coming toward the town on Dry River where oncebeside a dry water hole a woman lay dead with an empty canteen by herside.
Willard Holmes drew a long breath.
"You like my Desert?" asked the young woman softly, coming closer tohis side--so close that he felt her presence as clearly as he felt thepresence of the spirit that lives in the desert itself.
"Like it!" he repeated, turning toward her. "It is my desert now; mineas well as yours. Oh, Barbara! Barbara! I have learned the language ofyour land. Must I leave it now? Won't you tell me to stay?"
He held out his hands to her, but she drew back a little from hiseagerness. "Wait. I must know something first before I can answer."
He looked at her questioningly. "What must you know, Barbara?"
"Did you ever hear the story of what happened here in these very sandhills? Do you know that I am not the daughter of Jefferson Worth?"
"Yes," he answered gravely. "I know that Mr. Worth is not your ownfather, but I did not know that this was the scene of the tragedy."
"And you understand that I am nameless; that no one knows my parentage?That there may even be Mexican or Indian blood in my veins? Youunderstand--you realize all that?"
He started toward her almost roughly. "Yes, I understand all that, butI care only that you are Barbara. I know only that I want you--you,Barbara!"
"But your family--Mr. Greenfield--your friends back home--think what itmeans to them. Can you afford-"
"Barbara," he cried. "Stop! Why are you saying these things? Listen tome. Don't you _know_ that I love you? Don't you know that nothing elsematters? Your Desert has taught me many things, dear, but nothing sogreat as this--that I want y
ou and that nothing else matters. I wantyou for my wife."
"But you said once that you would never _marry me_," persisted theyoung woman. "What has changed you?"
"_I_ said that I would never marry you? I said that? That cannot be,Barbara; you are mistaken."
She shook her head. "That is what you said. I heard you myself. Youtold Mr. Greenfield at my house that morning he came to see you whenyou were hurt. I--I--the door into the dining room was open and Iheard."
The light of quick understanding broke over the engineer's face. "Andyou heard what Uncle Jim said to me? But Barbara, didn't you hear thereason I gave him for saying that I would not marry you?"
"I--I couldn't hear anything after that," she said simply.
At her confession the man's strong face shone with triumph. "Listen,dear, I told Uncle Jim I would never marry you because you lovedsomeone else and that there was no chance for me."
Barbara's brown eyes opened wide. "You thought that?"
"Yes. I thought you loved Abe Lee."
"Why--why I _do_ love Abe."
The man laughed. "Of course you do; but I thought you loved him as Iwanted you to love me; don't you understand?"
"Oh-h!" The exclamation was a confession, an explanation and anexpression of complete understanding. "But that"--she added as she wentto him--"that _could not be_."
And then--
But Barbara's words, rightly understood, mark the end of my story.
Rarely is it given in the story of life, to those who work greatly orlove greatly, to gather the fruit of their toil or passion. But it isgiven those others, perhaps--those for whom it could not be--to know ahappiness greater, it may be, than the joy of possession.
THE END.
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