Part 2

“Wall, yis, I allow he is,” said Gammer, reflectively. “I allow he must be; an’ yit he ain’t, nuther. Zeph ain’t no fool. Ef a man gits took thet way ’bout a woman, he can’t holp hisself, ’thout he kin git shet ’v her outern out. Thet’s what I’m tellin’ him allers. I sez to him jest this last week, sez I, ‘Zeph Riker, yeow jest light aout er hyar; yeow take yer team,’—he’s got a fust-rate team ef he hain’t sold ’em since last week to git money ’n’ go hunt fur thet hussy,—‘yeow take yeour team ’n’ ther young uns, ’n’ light aout; ’n’ yeow keep er travellin’ till yer’ve got whar yer can’t never hear name of her agin. Yeow kin stop when your money’s giv aout, ’n’ work till yer git more ter go on with; ’n’ yeow jest keep movin’. I allow Californy’d be fur enough; ’n’ livin’ ’s easy made thar, everybody sez thet’s ben thar; yeow jest light aout er hyar.’”

“What did he say?” asked Miss Sophy, breathlessly.

“He didn’t say but jest tew words, he didn’t,” replied Gammer. “But them tew, ’n’ the way he sed ’em, wuz more ’n some folks’s preachin’ all day. He sez, sez he, ‘Gammer, I can’t;’ ’n’ I allow to yeow I ’spect thet’s jest the trew on’t; ’n’ ef he can’t, he can’t.”

“You don’t mean to tell me you think he loves the woman still!” cried Miss Sophy.

“But he doos,” said Gammer. “Thet’s why Vilm sez he’s a fool, ’n’ I can’t gainsay ’t he ain’t; ’n’ yit thar’s times, I allow to yeow, when I git ter feelin’ ’s ef he wuz better ’n most folks. He don’t never give her a hash word; he’s allers’s glad ter see her ’s aour pup hyar ter see the chillen cumin’ hum when school’s aout; ’n’ he’ll slave hisself ter death, ’n’ sell the coat offen his back, ter git her all she wants; ’n’ she don’t give him ser much ’s a word er a look, let alone disgracin’ him ’n’ his chillen ’n’ the name he’s gin her! I donno ’s the Lord ’s gwine ter call him a fool er not. It kind o’ cums over me cur’us sometimes, ther way he acts.” And the old woman gazed half-inquiringly, half-shamefacedly, into Miss Sophy’s face.

Miss Sophy’s eyes were full of tears. She tried to keep them back, but they were too big to be concealed,—genuine, unmistakable tears. Brushing them away impatiently, she said, “Well, he’s a fool, anyhow!”

“I s’pose he must be,” replied Gammer. “Thar ain’t many like him.”

“I wonder where he is now,” said Miss Sophy.

“No knowin’,” said Gammer. “It’s two days naow he’s ben huntin’ her. He won’t go in bold like ’n’ ask ef she’s thar ’t these places, kase it mads her. He’ll jest hang raound ’n’ watch. He sez he won’t mortify her! Him mortify her! Thet sounds likely, don’t it? He sed thet ter me wunst, when I sed ter him, sez I, ‘Zeph Riker, ef yer want her ser bad’s yer say, take er perliceman ’n’ go git her. She’s yer wife. The law guvs her ter ye where somever yer kin ketch her.’ ‘I wouldn’t mortify her thet way,’ sez he; ’n’ then I jest up ’n’ I sez ter him—wall, I pollergized ter him arter fur the words I used; they wuz outrageous, ’n’ ther wouldn’t nobody but a fool ha’ stood ’em, Vilm sed; but somehow, I allow ter yeow, I’ve allers liked him better sence thet day. Sez he, ‘I don’t feel ter blame yer, not fur nothin’ yer say. Thar can’t nobody understand, but I can’t holp myself.’”

Strange emotions were tugging at Miss Sophy’s heart-strings. What had this poor man’s experiences in common with hers? Nothing, surely. The lover she had lost had been an upright man. Her affection had never been put to the strain of wrestling with even so much as a suspicion of the unworthiness of its object. And if such evil destiny as that had ever befallen her, she would have seemed to be the last person,—she with her practical common sense, clear business head, matter-of-fact way of looking at life,—the last person, surely, to have clung to a base and dishonored man. And yet this pathetic story she was hearing of Zeph Riker’s inalienable affection for the miserable creature he called wife seemed to be breaking up within her bosom the very foundations of some strange, undreamed-of, mighty emotion which threatened to overwhelm her.

“I don’t know what’s the matter with me,” thought Miss Sophy. “It must be the long walk. It always does upset me to walk.”

“I must be going now,” she said suddenly. “I have a great deal to do. I wish you’d let me know if there is anything I can do to help this poor man. If he wants work I can give him a good deal.” And she turned abruptly away, to the great discomfiture of Gammer Stein, who had not said half her say.

“Ye’ll call raound agen, won’t ye?” she called after her. “Dew. I’d like ter see yer fust-rate.”

“Perhaps I will,” said Miss Sophy, “some day. But I’m very busy. You must come and see me.”

This pleased Gammer even better.

“I allow I will,” she said eagerly. “I’d like ter see yer place. I wuz by thar. It’s an awful nice house yer got.”

“Good afternoon,” said Miss Sophy, already some paces away, and quickening her steps to avoid further talk. She walked unconsciously faster and faster till she reached home. Not for ten years had Miss Sophy’s spinster breast been the seat of such keen and conflicting emotion. She could neither analyze it nor shake it off. The image of her long-buried lover rose up before her with almost terrifying vividness, and she seemed compelled by some strange power outside of herself to continue thinking of him, fancying what would have been the result had their marriage taken place and he afterward proved as unfit for trust, unworthy of love, as Zeph’s wife. She felt herself disloyal at the very thought, but she could not free herself from it.

“What nonsense!” she said to herself, sternly. “There wasn’t a bad drop of blood in Robert Barrett’s veins, not one; not a man in that family ever went to the bad.”

“But what if he had?” persisted this strangely disquieted spirit in her breast. “What if he had? What if he had been overpowered by temptation? He was human. Men seemingly as good as he have fallen; have become drunkards; have been unfaithful to their wives. What if he had? What would you have done? Wouldn’t you have clung to him through everything? Do you suppose you could ever have left off loving him, no matter what he had done?”

“No, I know I couldn’t,” responded Miss Sophy’s passionate heart, also strangely disquieted in her breast; “I know I couldn’t!”

And then by a not unnatural sequence there came into her thoughts the solemn words of the marriage service, which she could never hear without a strange pang, remembering that she had once expected to hear them spoken for herself. “‘For better, for worse; till death do us part.’ What does that mean,” she said, “if it does not mean just what this poor Zeph is doing? ‘For better, for worse,’ no matter how much worse! I do believe I should have looked at it just as he does, this very minute! I wouldn’t wonder if I’d ha’ been just such a fool ’s he is; an’ I don’t know as I call it exactly bein’ a fool, neither, any more ’n she does!” And with a tremendous effort Miss Sophy shook herself free from the bootless soliloquy, and went about her work, reiterating in her mind the original resolution with which she had left home early in the afternoon,—that that man must be “looked after.”

II.

When Zeph left Miss Sophy’s door he had in his mind no specific plan of action, although from his brisk gait one would have supposed him to have in view a definite goal which he wished to reach in the shortest possible time. He walked on, looking neither to the right nor the left, till he reached the outskirts of the town, at the farthest possible remove from his own house. Here the land fell away abruptly into bottoms through which ran a stream, low and shrunken now from the long drought. The sight of the water was the first thing which roused him from the vague yet painful reverie in which he had been walking. As he looked into the water, he thought to himself, “If it was ’s high ’s I’ve seen it in the spring freshets, I believe I’d jump in and make an end o’ this misery. Perhaps ’twould be better for her if I was out o’ the world altogether. But a fellow ’d have to hold himself down, to drown in that depth o’ water.” And with a dreary smile at the thought he turned back towards the town. Suddenly a new idea struck him.

“Mebbe she’s gone home now, an’ she’ll be worse ’n ever, not findin’ any fire nor nothin’ to cook. I’ll go home an’ clear up, and get some steak!” He put his hand in his pocket and drew out the few bits of money he had there,—less than two dollars in all. He sighed bitterly as he looked at it. “Come to that, has it, an’ I hain’t bought a mouthful to eat to-day! Don’t take long to play a man out, lying by this way. But there’s enough for a good supper to-night!” And he quickened his pace.

How many times had he made just such bootless returns as this, each time lured on by a stronger and stronger hope that surely now she would have come back; he would see a light at the window telling him she was there; she must have come by this time! And each time it had been only a delusion; each time the empty, silent house and the cold, blackened hearth had mocked his misery anew, and he had turned away sicker at heart, more despairing than ever, to resume his hopeless quest.

“She likes beefsteak better ’n anythin’ else,” he said to himself as he entered the streets once more and looked on the brightly lighted shops on either hand. “I’ll get a first-rate good one; and there’s a bit o’ horse-radish left in the tumbler; she likes that.” And as he went on with his foolish, affectionate plannings, the hope in his bosom grew stronger, till he half persuaded himself that he knew she was at home waiting for him to bring the supper, or that his thus making ready for her would bring her before long. And yet he had done this very thing, hoped this unreasoning hope, scores of times before, all in vain. Why did he still continue to hope? He could not have told.

As he paid for the meat the butcher, eying him closely, said, “All well at home, Riker?”

Zeph gave a slight start, but recovering himself instantly, replied, “Thank you; I hope so. Hain’t been home since mornin’.”

“Don’t that beat all?” said the butcher, after he had gone, turning to his assistant. “Nobody’s never heard Zeph Riker admit it yet when his wife’s run off from him an’ he’s a huntin’ her; an’ he don’t never exactly lie about it neither. He’s always got his answer ready.”

“He’s a blamed fool he don’t bill her,” said the assistant.

“That’s so,” replied the other. “A little teched in the upper story, I reckon. But he’s a good fellow ’s ever lived; an’ she’s a handsome huzzy. I expect he can’t let go on her.”

“Well, I’d let go on her mighty quick if she b’longed to me. I know that! I say he’s a blamed fool!” replied the assistant, waxing wrathy. “Why, she’s been took up, ’n’ in jail. She was down to the beer-garden with that Nat ’n’ a lot o’ others, ’n’ they all got tight, ’n’ kicked up such a row the night watchman clapped the hull batch of ’em into the lock-up; ’n’ Riker he went right into court ’n’ paid everything, ’n’ got her out ’n’ took her home. She might ha’ rotted there for all me, if I’d been her husband.”

“When ye’ve got a wife o’ your own, mebbe ye’ll know more ’n you do now,” said the butcher, going to the door and looking after Zeph’s figure, now nearly lost in the darkness. “He’s a streakin’ it like lightnin’. I do believe the fellow thinks she’s to home waitin’ for him.”

“Where is she?” asked the assistant.

“Out on the mesa, in them freighters’ camp,” replied the butcher. “She’s been there three days, cookin’ for ’em, ’n’ trainin’ like Sam Hill. I tell you she’s a flyer! But she can cook, you bet. Tim was in to-day buyin’ veal ’n’ a turkey. He said they was goin’ to keep Sunday in that camp, and no mistake! they’d got Rusha Riker for cook and Sal Leeson for preacher! If Riker’d ever ask anybody where she’s gone to, he’d find out a heap quicker ’n he does. But he’s too proud. He never opens his head to nobody, an’ there ain’t nobody goin’ to volunteer to tell him; ’n’ so he goes sozzlin’ round, ’n’ wastin’ his time, ’n’ gettin’ out o’ pocket. I hain’t much patience with him myself, I own; but I don’t know how we’d any of us act if we was placed just ’s he is. It’s pretty hard tellin’.”

As Zeph drew near his home he walked faster. The more he thought, the surer he felt she would be there; the more he blamed himself for not having had everything ready for her at early dusk. “I might ha’ remembered,” he said to himself remorsefully, “that its bein’ Saturday night ’d be likely to bring her home, for she hain’t took none o’ her best things nor the youngsters’, an’ of course she’ll come back to get ’em even if she don’t stay.” And he broke into a run at the top of the hill above the Flat walling it to the west. Twinkling lights like fireflies shone all over the place; the humble homes there were thick set; a rush of emotion came over Zeph as he saw the glimmering lights. “All them homes,” he thought, “an’ not one of ’em ’s got such trouble ’s I have! God! but it’s hard!” And he pressed on, newly disheartened, as so many lonely souls have been, by the simple sight of home-lights gleaming.

As he turned the corner, where, if a light were burning in his own window it would greet his eye, his heart beat loud. “If she ain’t there this time I think it’ll kill me!” he muttered.

All was dark. She was not there. He stopped, gazed, threw down his parcels on the ground, and folded his arms on his breast. The moon was just coming up in the east, beyond the wide plains which stretched away, it seemed endlessly. Zeph looked at it with dogged dislike. “I don’t need no moonlight to-night,” he thought. “I forgot ’twas full moon. I might ha’ known she wouldn’t come home early if ’twas full moon. She’s foolin’ somewhere.”

The moon came up fast; its white light fell on the beams of the unfinished frame, which stood mute record of the terrible ruin of all Zeph’s plans and hopes of a home. The outlines of the building loomed out against the sky like a black skeleton, and smote Zeph’s very heart. “Just about ’s much home ’s I’ve got,” he said to himself. “A kind of a ghost it looks like, in this light, ’n’ that’s about what it is! I believe I’ll take the thing down. The lumber ’d bring considerable. But she’ll throw it up at me if I do; she’s always blamin’ me for not finishin’ it. I guess most folks ’d say the house she’s got’s good enough to run away from!” And Zeph strode on gloomily, with reluctant steps.

Entering the house, he looked around the room with a bitter expression on his face. “I’ve a mind to clear out too,” he thought. “What’s the use o’ goin’ on this way? But, no, I can’t. I can’t leave her so long ’s there’s a chance o’ gettin’ her right. She did care for me once, I know she did; an’ she is real fond o’ the children; there can’t nobody say she doesn’t love them even if she has got so set against me; an’ if she hadn’t got some good heart somewhere she’d hate them too just because I’m their father. I’ve heard o’ women’s turnin’ thet way till they couldn’t bide the sight o’ husband nor children, either one o’ them. It’s a kind o’ craziness comes over ’em. Poor Rushy! Seems’s if she must be crazy.”

While thinking these thoughts he was mechanically moving about the rooms, setting things into place, putting back the tumbled clothes into the drawers, making the beds; then he lighted a fire in the stove, and opening the drawer in the table took out a fresh candle and set it in the candlestick. “That’s the last but one,” he said, “but I’ll light it, an’ then if she does come in, she’ll know I’ll be back before long.”

He put the beefsteak on a platter by the candlestick. “So she’ll see it first thing,” he thought, “an’ know I got something good for supper.”

Then he went out, locking the door and putting the key in their usual hiding-place for it,—a hollow under the tying-post.

The thought of the freighters’ camp had at last occurred to him, and he could not rest now till he had found out if his wife were there. He groaned aloud as he turned his steps toward the mesa.

“I’d ’most as soon find her dead,” he thought, “as find her there! Don’t know but I’d sooner! If she’s been there all this time, ’tain’t for no good. But then she’s got the children along. She wouldn’t—” And Zeph clenched his hands and groaned again.

The “mesa” was a high table-land stretching away to the north of the town, not over a quarter of a mile wide on the top. Its sides were broken up into alternating shallow cañons and soft rounding ridges, grass-grown,—good places for grazing and shelter; at the base of the western side ran a little brook. It was a favorite spot for camping, and at times in the summer looked like an army encampment, so thickly dotted was it with white tents and wagons and picketed horses.

“It’s the strangest thing I never thought o’ that before!” mused Zeph as he struck out into the plain. “They’ll pay good wages to a cook, the boys will, when they’re in town; and Rushy can’t be beat at cookin’, that’s one thing.” And he tried manfully to keep out all other interpretations of her presence there. “If so be’s she’s here,” he reiterated to himself, “I’m a dumb fool to cry out ’fore I know I’m hurt worse ’n I am by just not knowin’ what’s got her.”

The moon was riding high in the heavens and flooding plain, mesa, mountains, all, with a light hardly less clear than sun, as Zeph finally climbed up through one of the shorter cañons and came out on the top of the mesa. The freighters’ camp was close before him,—so close that he started, and involuntarily retreated a step or two into cover of the ridge, lest he should be too suddenly seen. There was but one tent. From that came sounds of fiddling and riotous laughter.

“She’s there, for sure!” sighed Zeph. “Lord have mercy on me! Has she got them children in there this time o’ night?” and he glanced up at the moon. “Ten o’clock if it’s a minute! The poor young uns!”

There were ten of the freight-wagons arranged in a circle around the tent, some of them with rounded white tops. Cautiously Zeph stole up to one of these, parted the flaps at the back, and looked in. Surely his fatherly instinct had guided him to the spot. There lay his two children sound asleep on a straw bed in the bottom of the wagon. Surprise, joy, anguish, all held Zeph dumb. As he stood looking at them the boy raised his head and opened his eyes.

“Pappy, pappy!” he cried, and scrambled towards him, rousing the baby, who began to whimper.

“Hush, sis, hush!” he exclaimed. “Mammy said she’d whip ye if ye cried! It’s pappy! Don’t ye know pappy?” In a second more the little creature was in her father’s arms, and for a brief moment Zeph felt himself glad. Only for a moment, however.

“Zephie,” he said, “where’s your mammy?”

“In there,” replied the child, pointing towards the tent. “There’s a lot o’ men in there; they’re dancin’; the men’s beds is all took out.”

“Who’s there besides mammy? any other women besides mammy?” asked Zeph, his words stifling him as he spoke them.

“Nobody but Sal,” replied Zephie. “She’s here all the time to help mam cook. Mam says she never cooked so much vittles before. Mam reckons they must ben starved where they come from. Splendid vittles, pap, they has! It’s bully! Why didn’t you come too, pap? Mam was tellin’ some o’ the men she was a lookin’ for ye to come ’fore now.”

Bitter gall and wormwood to the father’s ears were these innocent prattlings of his boy. Too well he knew the gibe and jest with which his wife had told “some of the men” she was looking for him to appear on the scene. Too well he knew the “Sal” who was her assistant,—one of the most notorious women in the town, and sister of the man to whom Zeph still persuaded himself he owed all the misery which had come into his married life. He was mistaken. Nat Leeson was merely one man among many who had had right to mock at his dishonor; but it was Nat Leeson with whom his wife’s relations were now openly and flauntingly intimate. It was Nat Leeson for whom she really cared, so far as it was in her shallow, unprincipled nature to care for any man.

“We’re comin’ home to-morrow, pap,” continued Zephie; “mam says she’s tired out; ’n’ the teams is all goin’ to start up the mountains early Monday mornin’; so mam ’n’ Sally’s goin’ to cook up lots o’ vittles to-morrow for ’em to take, ’n’ then we’re comin’ home.”

“Be ye? That’s good!” said Zeph. “You tell mammy pap’s real glad ye’re comin’ home, will ye?”

“Stay, pap,” replied the boy. “You stay, too; there’s lots room in here. Sal and mam and us all sleeps in here. You stay; we’re goin’ to have turkey to-morrow,—an awful big one.”

“No, I can’t stay, my boy,” replied Zeph. “Mammy’s too busy. She don’t want me. You help her all you can, Zephie, an’ you be sure ’n’ tell her pap was here, ’n’ he was dreadful glad you was all comin’ home to-morrow, will ye? Tell her pap’s ben dreadful lonesome. Don’t ye forget now to tell her ’s soon ’s she comes to bed.”

“I’ll tell her ’n the mornin’,” said Zephie. “I’ll be asleep when she comes to bed.”

“No, you tell her to-night, Zephie,” said his father. “You stay awake till she comes. She’ll be here pretty soon, I guess. It’s late now.”

“Well, I’ll try,” said the child; “but, pap, I’ll be awful sleepy ’s soon ’s you’re gone. Why don’t you go up ’n’ speak to her in the tent?”

“Oh, I don’t want to interrupt the dancing!” said poor Zeph. “I don’t know any o’ the men.”

“Yes, Nat’s there! you know him,” said the child. “All the rest is freighters.”

This was the last drop in unhappy Zeph’s cup. It overflowed.

“I’ll—” he began in a loud tone. “No, I won’t either,” he continued; and kissing the baby, who had nestled herself to sleep in his arms, he laid her gently down on the straw, and then kissing the boy, said, “Good-night, Zephie; be a good boy, and take care of your little sister. Good-night; I must go now.” And as cautiously as he had come, he stole down the cañon and was gone.

Skirting along the base of the mesa for some rods, he climbed up again at a point some distance the other side of the tent, where stood a clump of huge pine-trees. Seating himself on the ground, partially hid by the trunk of the largest of these trees, he fixed his eyes on the tent. Now that he knew his wife was there, he would watch the place all night. It appeared to him that the moon stood still in the sky, so long did the moments seem before the freighters’ revelry broke up. At last, with loud laughing and talking, the party came out from the tent and separated for the night: the men going to their respective wagons, and his wife and Sal—with what breathless anguish he watched their every step!—to the wagon in which the children lay. Soon the lights were all out, and the stillness, the unutterable wilderness stillness, rested on the place. Zeph drew a long breath of relief. “That’s over!” he said aloud, and leaned his head back against the tree.