The Sagebrusher, Emerson Hough [best love novels of all time txt] 📗

It ain't."

"Your letters seemed like you seem now," she broke in. "It seems to me you must have written every word."

"Ma'am——" said Sim Gage; and broke down.

"Yes, sir?"

"Them is the finest words I ever heard in my life! I ain't been much. If I could only live up to them words, now——

"Besides," he went on, a rising happiness in his tones, "seems like you and me was one just as honest as the other, and both meaning fair. That makes me feel a heap easier. If it does you, you're welcome."

Blind as she was, Mary Warren knew now the gulf between this man's life and hers. But his words were so kind. And she so much needed a friend.

"You're a forgiving man, Mr. Gage," said she.

"No, I ain't. I'm a awful man. When you learn more about me you'll think I'm the worst man you ever seen."

"We'll have to wait," was all that Mary Warren could think to say. But after a time she turned her face toward him once more.

"Do you know," said she, "I think you're a gentleman!"

"Oh, my Lord!" said Sim Gage, his eyes going every which way. "Oh, my good Lord!"

"Well, it's true. Look—you haven't said a word or done a thing—you haven't touched me—or laughed—or—or hinted—not once. That's being a gentleman, in a time like this. This—this is a very hard place for a woman."

"It ain't so easy fer a man! But I couldn't have done no other way, could I?"

She made no answer. "Are there many other women in this valley, Mr. Gage?" she asked after a time. "Who are they? What are they like?"

"Five, in twenty-two miles between my place and town, ma'am," he answered, "when they're home. The nearedest one to us is about couple miles, unless you cut through the fields."

"Who is she? What is she like?"

"That is Mis' Davidson, our school ma'am— She's the only woman I seen a'most all last summer, unlessen onct in a while a woman would come out with some fishing party in a automobile. Most of them crosses up above on the bridge and comes down the other side of the creek from us. Seems to me sometimes women has always been just acrosst the creek from me, ma'am. I don't know much about them. Now, Wid—Wid Gardner—he's the next rancher to me, this side—he sometimes has folks come there in the fishing season."

"Your log house is all painted and nice, isn't it?"

"Painted, ma'am? Lord, no! You don't paint a log house none."

"I never saw one in my life," said she contritely; then, sighing. "I never will, now."

"Do men come to your place very much, then?" she asked at length.

"Why, Wid, he sometimes comes over."

"And who is Wid?"

"Like I said, he's got the next ranch to mine. He's maybe a forwarder sort of man than me."

"Did he have anything to do with—that advertisement?"

"How can you guess things like that?"

"He thought you were all alone?"

"We did have some talk. But I want to tell you one thing, ma'am—if I had ever thought onct that we'd a-brung a woman like you here, I'd never of been part nor party to it. I guess not!"

"And yet you can't see why you're a gentleman!" said she again slowly.

"You said you'd be going back home again before long?" It was the first thing Sim Gage could say.

"I haven't any home."

"Nor no folks neither?"

"There's not a soul in the world that I could go back to, Mr. Gage. So now, I've told you the truth."

"But there was oncet, maybe?" he said shrewdly. "How old are you?" He flushed suddenly at this question, which he asked before he thought.

"I'm twenty-five."

"You don't look that old. Me, I'm thirty-seven. I'm too old to marry. Now I never will."

"How do you know?" she said. "What do you mean?" As she spoke she felt the tears come again on her cheeks, felt her hands trembling.

"Well, ma'am, I know mighty well I'll never marry now. Of course, if one sort of woman had came out here—big and strong enough to be a housekeeper and nothing else, and all that, and one thing with another—I won't say what might have happened. Strange things has happened that way—right out of them damn Hearts Aflame ads—right around along in here, in this here valley, too, I know. Well, of course, a man can't get along so well, ranching, unless he has a wife——"

"Or a housekeeper?"

"Why, yes. That's what we advertised fer. I didn't know it."

Mary Warren pondered for a long time.

"Look at me," she said at last. "There's no place for me back home, and none here. What sort of housekeeper would I make—and what sort of—of—wife? I'm disappointing you; and you're disappointing me. What shall we both do?"

"Why, how do you mean?" said Sim Gage, wonderingly. "Disappoint you? Of course I couldn't marry a woman like you! You don't want me to do that? That wouldn't be right."

"Oh, I don't mean that! I don't know what I did mean!"

Some sense of her perturbation must have come to him. "Now don't you worry, ma'am. Don't you git troubled none a-tall. I'm a-goin' to take care of you myself until everything gits all right."

"I'm a thief! I'm a beggar!" was all she could say.

"The same here, ma'am! You've got nothing on me," said Sim Gage. "What I said is, we're in the same boat, and we got to go the best way we can till things shapes out. It ain't very much I got to offer you. Us sagebrushers has to take the leavings."

"You've said the truth for me—the very truth. I'm of the discard—I can't earn my living. Leavings! And I wanted to earn my living."

"You've earned it now, ma'am," said Sim Gage; and perhaps made the largest speech of all his life.

"Well, anyways, we're going to come to my land right now," he added after a time. "We've passed the school house, only couple mile from my place. On ahead here is Wid Gardner's ranch, on the left hand side. I don't reckon he's at home. I told you the school ma'am had maybe went off to her homestead, didn't I? Maybe Nels Jensen, he's maybe driving her to the Big Springs station down below. This here is Wid Gardner's team and buckboard, ma'am. I ain't got around to fixing mine up this spring. I've got to drive back after a while and take these things back to Wid."

Her situation grew more tense. They were coming now to the end of the journey—to her home—to his home. She did not speak. To her ears the sound of the horses' feet seemed less, as though they were passing on a road not so much used.

"This is a sort of alley, like, down along between the willers and the rail fence," explained Sim Gage. "It's about half a mile of this. Then we come to my gate."

And presently they did come to his gate, where the silver-edged willows came close on the one side and the wide hay meadows reached out on the other toward the curving pathway of the river. He pulled up.

"Could you hold these horses, ma'am, fer a minute? I got to open the gate."

He handed her the reins, it never occurring to him that there was any one in the world who had never driven horses. She was frightened, but resolved to appear brave and useful.

Sim Gage began to untwist the short club which bound the wire gate shut. He pulled it back, and clucked to the horses, seeing that she did not start them.

Mary Warren knew nothing of horses. It seemed to her that the correct thing to do was to drop the reins loosely, shaking them a little. The half wild horses, with their uncanny brute sense, knew the absence of a master, and took instant advantage of the knowledge. With one will they sprang, lunged, and started forward, plunging. Mary Warren dropped the lines.

"Sit still there!" she heard a voice call out imperatively. Then, "Whoa! damn you, whoa now!"

She could see nothing, but sensed combat. Sim Gage had sprung forward and caught the cheek strap of the nearest horse. It reared and struck out wildly. She heard an exclamation, as though of pain, but could not see him as he swung across to the other horse and caught his fingers in its nostrils, still calling out to them, imperiously, in the voice of a commander.

At length they halted, quieted. She heard his voice speaking brokenly. "Set still where you are, ma'am. I'll tie 'em."

"You're hurt!" she called out. "It was my fault."

"I'm all right. Just you set still."

Apparently he finished fastening the horses to something. She heard him come to the end of the seat, knew that he was reaching up his arms to help her down. But when she swung her weight from the seat she felt him wince.

"One of 'em caught me on the knee," he admitted. "It was my new pants, too."

She could not see his face, gray with pain now under the dust.

"It's all my fault—I didn't dare tell you—I don't know anything about horses. I don't know anything about anything out here!"

"Take hold of my left hand coat sleeve," he answered to her confession. "We'll walk on into the yard. Keep hold of me, and I'll keep hold of them horses. I'll look out if they jump."

For some reason of their own the team became less fractious. He limped along the road, his hand at the bit of the more vicious. She could feel him limp.

"You're hurt—they did jump on you!" she reiterated.

"Knee's busted some, but we'll git along. Don't you mind. Anyhow, we're here. Now, you go off, a little ways—it's all level here—and I'll unhitch these critters."

"That's the barn over there," he added, pointing in a direction which she could not see. "Plain trail between the house and the corral gate. On beyond is my hay lands and the willers along the creek. There's a sort of spring thataway"—again he pointed, invisibly to her—"and along it runs a band of willers—say a hundred yards from the house. It all ain't much. I never ought to of brought you here a-tall, but like I said, we'll do the best we can. Please don't be afraid, or nothing."

Stripped of their harness, the wild team turned and made off at a run down the road, through the gate and back to their own home.

"Good riddance," said Sim Gage, stooping, his hands at his cut knee-cap. "Wid can come over here fer his own buckboard, fer all of me."

"Take right a-holt of my arm tight, and go easy now," he added, turning to Mary Warren. She felt his hand on her arm.

They passed around the corner of the cabin. She reached out a hand to touch the side post as she heard the door open.

"It's a right small little place inside," said Sim Gage, "only one bunk in it. I've got some new blankets and I'll fix it all up. Maybe you'll want to lay down and rest a while before long.

"Over at the left is the stove—when I git the fire going you can tell where it is, all right. Between the stove and the bunk is the table, where we eat—I mean where I used to eat. It all ain't so big. Pretty soon you'll learn where the things all is. It's like learning where things is in the dark, ma'am, I suppose?"

"Yes. What time is it?" she asked suddenly. "You see, I can't tell."

"Coming on evening, ma'am. I reckon it's around three or four o'clock. You see, I ain't got a clock. I ain't got round to gitting one yet. Mine's just got busted recent.

"This here's a chair, ma'am," he said. "Jest set down and take it right easy. Lay off your wraps, and I'll put 'em on the bunk. You mustn't worry about nothing. We're here now."

By and by she felt his hand touch her sleeve.

"Here's a couple of poker sticks," said he. "I reckon maybe you'll