Sawtooth Ranch Page 7

  CHAPTER VII

  THE MAN AT WHISPER

  Brit Hunter finished washing the breakfast dishes and put a stick ofwood into the broken old cook-stove that had served him and Frank forfifteen years and was feeling its age. Lorraine's breakfast was in theoven, keeping warm. Brit looked in, tested the heat with his gnarledhand to make sure that the sour-dough biscuits would not be dried tocrusts, and closed the door upon them and the bacon and fried potatoes.Frank Johnson had the horses saddled and it was time to go, yet Britlingered, uneasily conscious that his habitation was lacking in manythings which a beautiful young woman might consider absolutenecessities. He had seen in Lorraine's eyes, as they glanced here andthere about the grimy walls, a certain disparagement of hersurroundings. The look had made him wince, though he could not quitedecide what it was that displeased her. Maybe she wanted lacecurtains, or something.

  He set the four chairs in a row against the wall, swept up the bits ofbark and ashes beside the stove, made sure that the water bucket wasstanding full on its bench beside the door, sent another criticalglance around the room, and tip-toed over to the dish cupboard and letdown the flowered calico curtain that had been looped up over a nailfor convenience. The sun sent a bright, wide bar of yellow lightacross the room to rest on the shelf behind the stove where stood thesalt can, the soda, the teapot, a box of matches and two pepper cans,one empty and the other full. Brit always meant to throw out thatempty pepper can and always neglected to do so. Just now he rememberedpicking up the empty one and shaking it over the potatoes futilely andthen changing it for the full one. But he did not take it away; in thewilderness one learns to save useless things in the faint hope thatsome day they may become useful. The shelves were cluttered with fitcompanions to that empty pepper can. Brit thought that he would have"cleaned out" had he known that Lorraine was coming. Since she washere, it scarcely seemed worth while.

  He walked on his boot-toes to the door of the second room of the cabin,listened there for a minute, heard no sound and took a tablet andpencil off another shelf littered with useless things. The note whichhe wrote painstakingly, lest she might think him lacking in education,he laid upon the table beside Lorraine's plate; then went out, closingthe door behind him as quietly as a squeaking door can be made to close.

  Lorraine, in the other room, heard the squeak and sat up. Her wristwatch, on the chair beside her bed, said that it was fifteen minutespast six, which she considered an unearthly hour for rising. Shepulled up the covers and tried to sleep again. The day would be longenough, at best. There was nothing to do, unless she took that queerold horse with withers like the breastbone of a lean Christmas turkeyand hips that reminded her of the little roofs over dormer windows, andwent for a ride. And if she did that, there was nowhere to go andnothing to do when she arrived there.

  In a very few days Lorraine had exhausted the sights of Quirt Creek andvicinity. If she rode south she would eventually come to the top of ahill whence she could look down upon further stretches of barrenness.If she rode east she would come eventually to the road along which shehad walked from Echo, Idaho. Lorraine had had enough of that road. Ifshe went north she would--well, she would not meet Mr Lone Morganagain, for she had tried it twice, and had turned back because thereseemed no end to the trail twisting through the sage and rocks. Westshe had not gone, but she had no doubt that it would be the same drearymonotony of dull gray landscape.

  Monotony of landscape was one thing which Lorraine could not endure,unless it had a foreground of riders hurtling here and there, and ofperspiring men around a camera tripod. At the Sawtooth ranch, aftershe was able to be up, she had seen cowboys, but they had lacked thedash and the picturesque costuming of the West she knew. They weremostly commonplace young men, jogging past the house on horseback, orloitering down by the corrals. They had offered absolutely no interestor "colour" to the place, and the owner's son, Bob Warfield, had drivenher over to the Quirt in a Ford and had seemed exactly like any otherbig, good-looking young man who thought well of himself. Lorraine wasnot susceptible to mere good looks, three years with the "movies"having disillusioned her quite thoroughly. Too many young men of BobWarfield's general type had attempted to make love to her--lightly andnot too well--for Lorraine to be greatly impressed.

  She yawned, looked at her watch again, found that she had spent exactlysix minutes in meditating upon her immediate surroundings, and fell towondering why it was that the real West was so terribly commonplace.Why, yesterday she had been brought to such a pass of sheer lonelinessthat she had actually been driven to reading an old horse-doctor book!She had learned the symptoms of epizootic--whatever that was--andpoll-evil and stringhalt, and had gone from that to making a shoppingtour through a Montgomery-Ward catalogue. There was nothing else inthe house to read, except a half-dozen old copies of the _Boise News_.

  There was nothing to do, nothing lo see, no one to talk to. Her dadand the big, heavy-set man whom he called Frank, seemed uncomfortablyaware of their deficiencies and were pitiably anxious to make her feelwelcome--and failed. They called her "Raine." The other two men didnot call her anything at all. They were both sandy-complexioned andthey both chewed tobacco quite noticeably, and when they sat down intheir shirt sleeves to eat, Lorraine had seen irregular humps in theirhip pockets which must be six-guns; though why they should carry themin their pockets instead of in holster belts buckled properly aroundtheir bodies and sagging savagely down at one side and swingingferociously when they walked, Lorraine could not imagine. They did notwear chaps, either, and their spurs were just spurs, without so much asa silver concho anywhere. Cowboys in overalls and blue gingham shirtsand faded old coats whose lapels lay in wrinkles and whose pockets weretorn down at the corners! If Lorraine had not been positive that thiswas actually a cattle ranch in Idaho, she never would have believedthat they were anything but day labourers.

  "It's a comedy part for the cattle-queen's daughter," she admitted,putting out a hand to stroke the lean, gray cat that jumped upon herbed from the open window. "Ket, it's a _scream_! I'll take my Westbefore the camera, thank you; or I would, if I hadn't jumped right intothe middle of this trick West before I knew what I was doing. Ket,what do you do to pass away the time? I don't see how you can have thenerve to live in an empty space like this and purr!"

  She got up then, looked into the kitchen and saw the paper on thetable. This was new and vaguely promised some sort of break in thedeadly monotony which she saw stretching endlessly before her.Carrying the nameless cat in her arms, Lorraine went in her bare feetacross the grimy, bare floor to the table and picked up the note. Itread simply:

  "Your brekfast is in the oven we wont be back till dark maby. Dontleave the ranch today. Yr loveing father."

  Lorraine hugged the cat so violently that she choked off a purr in themiddle. "'Don't leave the ranch to-day!' Ket, I believe it's going tobe dangerous or something, after all."

  She dressed quickly and went outside into the sunlight, the cat at herheels, the thrill of that one command filling the gray monotone of thehills with wonderful possibilities of adventure. Her father had madeno objection before when she went for a ride. He had merely instructedher to keep to the trails, and if she didn't know the way home, to letthe reins lie loose on Yellowjacket's neck and he would bring her tothe gate.

  Yellowjacket's instinct for direction had not been working that day,however. Lorraine had no sooner left the ranch out of sight behind herthan she pretended that she was lost. Yellowjacket had thereuponwalked a few rods farther and stopped, patiently indifferent to thelocation of his oats box. Lorraine had waited until his head began todroop lower and lower, and his switching at flies had become purelyautomatic. Yellowjacket was going to sleep without making any effortto find the way home. But since Lorraine had not told her fatheranything about it, his injunction could not have anything to do withthe unreliability of the horse.

  "Now," she said to the cat, "if three or four bandits would appear onthe ri
dge, over there, and come tearing down into the immediateforeground, jump the gate and surround the house, I'd know this was thereal thing. They'd want to make me tell where dad kept his gold orwhatever it was they wanted, and they'd have me tied to a chair--andthen, cut to Lone Morgan (that's a perfectly _wonderful_ name for thelead!) hearing shots and coming on a dead run to the rescue." Shepicked up the cat and walked slowly down the hard-trodden path to thestable. "But there aren't any bandits, and dad hasn't any gold oranything else worth stealing--Ket, if dad isn't a miser, he's _poor_!And Lone Morgan is merely ashamed of the way I talked to him, andafraid I'll queer myself with the neighbours. No Western lead that _I_ever saw would act like that. Why, he didn't even want to ride homewith me, that day.

  "And Bob Warfield and his Ford are incidents of the past, and not onesoul at the Sawtooth seems to give a darn whether I'm in the country orout of it. Soon as they found out where I belonged, they brought meover here and dropped me and forgot all about me. And that, I suppose,is what they call in fiction the Western spirit!

  "Dad looked exactly as if he'd opened the door to a book agent when Icame. He--he _tolerates_ my presence, Ket! And Frank Johnson's pipesmells to high heaven, and I hate him in the house and 'theboys'--hmhm! The _boys_--Ket, it would be terribly funny, if I didn'thave to stay here."

  She had reached the corral and stood balancing the cat on a warped toprail, staring disconsolately at Yellowjacket, who stood in a far cornerswitching at flies and shamelessly displaying all the angularity of hisbones under a yellowish hide with roughened hair that was sheddingdreadfully, as Lorraine had discovered to her dismay when she removedher green corduroy skirt after riding him. Yellowjacket's lower lipsagged with senility or lack of spirit, Lorraine could not tell which.

  "You look like the frontispiece in that horse-doctor book," sheremarked, eyeing him with disfavour. "I can't say that comedy hideyou've got improves your appearance. You'd be better peeled, Ibelieve."

  She heard a chuckle behind her and turned quickly, palm up to shieldher eyes from the straight, bright rays of the sun. Now here was alive man, after all, with his hat tilted down over his forehead, acigarette in one hand and his reins in the other, looking at her andsmiling.

  "Why don't you peel him, just on a chance?" His smile broadened to agrin, but when Lorraine continued to look at him with a neutralexpression in her eyes, he threw away his cigarette and abandoned withit his free-and-easy manner.

  "You're Miss Hunter, aren't you? I rode over to see your father.Thought I'd find him somewhere around the corral, maybe."

  "You won't, because he's gone for the day. No, I don't know where."

  "I--see. Is Mr Johnson anywhere about?"

  "No, I don't believe anyone is anywhere about. They were all gone whenI got up, a little while ago." Then, remembering that she did not knowthis man, and that she was a long way from neighbours, she added, "Ifyou'll leave a message I can tell dad when he comes home."

  "No-o--I'll ride over to-morrow or next day. I'm the man at Whisper.You can tell him I called, and that I'll call again."

  Still he did not go, and Lorraine waited. Some instinct warned herthat the man had not yet stated his real reason for coming, and shewondered a little what it could be. He seemed to be watching hercovertly, yet she failed to catch any telltale admiration for her inhis scrutiny. She decided that his forehead was too narrow to pleaseher, and that his eyes were too close together, and that the linesaround his mouth were cruel lines and gave the lie to his smile, whichwas pleasant enough if you just looked at the smile and paid noattention to anything else in his face.

  "You had quite an experience getting out here, they tell me," heobserved carelessly; too carelessly, thought Lorraine, who was wellschooled in the circumlocutions of delinquent tenants, agents ofvarious sorts and those who crave small gossip of their neighbours."Heard you were lost up in Rock City all night."

  Lorraine looked up at him, startled. "I caught a terrible cold," shesaid, laughing nervously. "I'm not used to the climate," she addedguardedly.

  The man fumbled in his pocket and produced smoking material. "Do youmind if I smoke?" he asked perfunctorily.

  "Why, no. It doesn't concern me in the slightest degree." Why, shethought confusedly, must she always be reminded of that horrible placeof rocks? What was it to this man where she had been lost?

  "You must of got there about the time the storm broke," the manhazarded after a silence. "It's sure a bad place in a thunderstorm.Them rocks draw lightning. Pretty bad, wasn't it?"

  "Lightning is always bad, isn't it?" Lorraine tried to hold her voicesteady. "I don't know much about it. We don't have thunderstorms toamount to anything, in Los Angeles. It sometimes does thunder there inthe winter, but it is very mild."

  With hands that trembled she picked the cat off the rail and startedtoward the house. "I'll tell dad what you said," she told him,glancing back over her shoulder. When she saw that he had turned hishorse and was frankly following her to the house, her heart jumpedwildly into her throat--judging by the feel of it.

  "I'm plumb out of matches. I wonder if you can let me have some," hesaid, still speaking too carelessly to reassure her. "So you stuck itout in Rock City all through that storm! That's more than what I'dwant to do."

  She did not answer that, but once on the door-step Lorraine turned andfaced him. Quite suddenly it came to her--the knowledge of why she didnot like this man. She stared at him, her eyes wide and bright.

  "Your hat's brown!" she exclaimed unguardedly. "I--I saw a man with abrown hat----"

  He laughed suddenly. "If you stay around here long you'll see a goodmany," he said, taking off his hat and turning it on his hand beforeher. "This here hat I traded for yesterday. I had a gray one, but itdidn't suit me. Too narrow in the brim. Brown hats are getting to bethe style. If I can borrow half a dozen matches, Miss Hunter, I'll begoing."

  Lorraine looked at him again doubtfully and went after the matches. Hethanked her, smiling down at her quizzically. "A man can get alongwithout lots of things, but he's plumb lost without matches. You'vemaybe saved my life, Miss Hunter, if you only knew it."

  She watched him as he rode away, opening the gate and letting himselfthrough without dismounting. He disappeared finally around a smallspur of the hill, and Lorraine found her knees trembling under her.

  "Ket, you're an awful fool," she exclaimed fiercely. "Why did you letme give myself away to that man? I--I believe he _was_ the man. Andif I really did see him, it wasn't my imagination at all. He saw methere, perhaps. Ket, I'm scared! I'm not going to stay on this ranchall alone. I'm going to saddle the family skeleton, and I'm going toride till dark. There's something queer about that man from Whisper.I'm afraid of him."

  After awhile, when she had finished her breakfast and was putting up alunch, Lorraine picked up the nameless gray cat and holding its headbetween her slim fingers, looked at it steadily. "Ket, you're thehumanest thing I've seen since I left home," she said wistfully. "I_hate_ a country where horrible things happen under the surface and thetop is just gray and quiet and so dull it makes you want to scream.Lone Morgan lied to me. He lied--he lied!" She hugged the catimpulsively and rubbed her cheek absently against it, so that it beganpurring immediately.

  "Ket--I'm afraid of that man at Whisper!" she breathed miserablyagainst its fur.