30,000 On the Hoof (24 page)

"Yes, unless Barbara wants to change her dress."

"I'll ride as I am. Give me a blanket," said the girl, and she climbed into the wagon upon the hay beside George. Grant rode behind, leading George's horse.

Lucinda thought she would never forget the bonfires, blazing up anew, the square log cabin with its gleaming lights, the pioneers standing around discussing the fight, the young couples coming out of the dark woods to join the dancers, the monotonous squeak of the fiddle and the strange, intense, rhythmic tread of feet. How weird were the tall black pines!

They reminded Lucinda of those she had seen first in Arizona, a score and more of years ago.

Logan wrapped a blanket around her and clucked to the horses.

"Well, home by sun-up," he said, cheerfully. "Maw, I tell you I made a good deal to-night. Holbert put me on to it. Pretty decent of him. But he's in no shape to take up any deal. Besides, he couldn't find the browse. That's where Sycamore Canyon has all these ranges beat. My oak thickets, my maple thickets with all their browsing leafage--they'll sure make my fortune yet!"

Chapter
TWELVE
.

The first snow had fallen, making ample amends in its white drifts and blanched trees for the tardiness of its arrival.

Just when the wintry twilight began to steal down from the rims, Grant came stamping into the cabin with brimming pails of milk.

"Dad and Abe not home yet?" he stopped whistling to ask. "When did they ever come back early from a hunt? And the first this fall!" returned his mother.

"Doggone it! Let's not wait supper for them. What say, George?"

The eldest son sat near the wall close to the red fire, which shone ruddily on his thin cheek. He was mending from his wounds.

"Not very long, anyhow," he said.

"Where are your ears--you?" interposed Barbara. "I can hear Dad's deep voice."

Lucinda had often heard this welcome sound with gladness and relief. How many, many times! She could tell that Logan had had good hunting. Heavy footfalls on the porch preceded the opening of the door. Logan entered to set his rifle against the wall and throw off his snow-covered coat. His broad visage wore a bright smile of satisfaction at sight of them all and the cheery fire and steaming pots. Abe followed, burly in his buckskins, soft of step and still-faced, with glad eyes for Barbara and his mother.

They brought cold air and the piney breath of the forest with them.

"What luck, Dad?" asked Grant, eagerly.

"Four-point buck and two turks for me," replied his father, with immense gratification in the telling. "Ask Abe what he got."

"I couldn't hit a flock of barns to-day," replied Abe ruefully. "But, Dad, I really didn't have a good shot."

"Ha! ha! You had the same as I--at the buck, anyway."

"Take care, father," taunted Barbara. "You know it's happened that you and Abe shot at the same buck at the same time--and you thought you hit when really you missed."

"By thunder, you're right, Bab. I forgot... It sure was fine up on top to-day. 'Pears I can't walk as I used to. Abe had my tongue hanging out... Luce, it's good to get home. Something smells awful good. My mouth has begun to water. What you got for supper?"

"Beef and potato stew, for one thing," replied Lucinda. "If you and Abe wash up a bit, supper will be ready."

"Maw, how about that apple pie you promised if I'd drag Dad home before dark?" queried Abe, gaily.

"Barbara baked one for you."

"Bab, you're just an old darling!"

"Whose darling?" asked the girl, wistfully.

"Well, the Huetts' yet, thank heaven!"

Lucinda saw her husband and their sons and Barbara sit down to a lavish supper. They were a happy family. George's dereliction had been forgiven, if not forgotten. And as soon as he frankly confessed his shame and regret, as Lucinda knew he would do, they would forget that one unfortunate episode. The hunters ate like men of the open after long abstinence. George and Grant did not show failing appetites.

"Abe, are you going to give me a piece of that pie?" asked the latter.

"Couldn't think of it."

"Well, you doggone stingy hawg!" asserted Grant, half in jest and half in earnest.

"Why, Grant, of course he'll give you a piece," expostulated Barbara.

"Here, I'll cut it."

"Make it a small piece, lady," said Abe, grudgingly. Supper over, Abe washed the dishes and utensils, while Lucinda and Barbara wiped them.

"Grant, fetch in a couple of chunks of oak and some pine cones," spoke up Logan, as he reached for his pipe and pouch. He filled it, lighted it with a red coal, and sat down in his big home-made armchair with a sigh.

"Doggone!--Snow at last and winter set in. Holed up till spring! Never before felt so good about that. Reckon the deal with Widow Steadman to feed her herd on half shares has a lot to do with it."

"Dad, you'll have to brand her calves," said George.

"Only half of them, son."

Abe sat down Indian fashion on the hearth and stretched his wet moccasins to the fire. They began to steam. Barbara, from the bench by the table in the background, watched him with eyes unconscious of their worship.

George got down the little box with his tame baby chipmunks, scarcely larger than his thumbs, and, like a boy, in great glee let them run over his lap.

"I reckon that was a good business deal, Dad," went on, George. "It ensures you of two dozen and more calves next spring. Costs nothing.

Double the calf count the following year. Sure does mount up when you get going... What can stop us now?"

"Once I swore nothing could. But the years have made me leery... I reckon only rustlers could."

"Rustlers!--Say, Dad, you're not long-headed. It'd take a mighty big and bold band of cattle-thieves to cost us much here."

"I hear you, son. Powerful sweet talk. But how do you figure?"

"No rustlers would have the nerve to drive up the road here, right tinder our very noses. They'd have to make a hole in one of the fenced gaps. No fun driving steers out that way. It just almost couldn't be done. But if they did--well, Abe could track them. That'd be a bad deal for them, Dad."

"I reckon," returned Logan, soberly. "Mebbe bad for us, too."

"Can't see it that way. We'd track them to a camp or a cabin, make sure they had our cattle--then shoot before we talked... Dad, I've heard some dark hints about the Campbells. You know where there's smoke in these woods there's bound to be fire... I'd told you before--only I--well, I was loco about Mil Campbell. I'd have been fool enough to go the whole way with her, if Jack hadn't squealed on her."

"Son, you got out of that lucky. The Campbells are on the wrong trail.

We'll hear from them some day."

Abe looked up to speak: "Did I tell you I met a cowboy on the road last Wednesday--no, it was day before yesterday, Tuesday? He's one of Collier's riders. Told me Jack was burned bad, but lost nothing 'cept hair and hide. He was up and around."

"I'm glad to hear that," said George, with a ring in his voice. "When I meet Jack next I want him to have both eyes."

"George, you'll have to look pretty hard to see him before I do," rejoined Abe.

"Sons, we'll never look for trouble," interposed Huett. "But that outfit had better steer clear of us. Come to think of it, though, we've worse outfits to watch."

Lucinda sat across the hearth from Logan in the other armchair, her neglected knitting in her lap, her gaze on the glowing red coals of the fire. For once such conversation from her militant husband and sons failed to rouse her. The rising wind outside in the pines, the soft seeping of snow against the cabin, the crackle and sparkle of embers--these seemed to take more hold upon her imagination than the hard words she heard. These familiar sounds took her back through the long years to the time of which she was thinking.

"Barbara, come here. Sit by me," she said, sweetly.

The girl rose obediently from the shadow to recline on the bearskin rug at Lucinda's feet.

"Aw, now--Luce," protested Logan, in a strangled voice.

"I have something to tell Barbara and the boys," rejoined Lucinda, stroking the glossy flaxen head resting on her knee.

"But what's your hurry?" expostulated Logan.

"It should have been told long ago," answered Lucinda, sadly.

Logan sank back sighing, and puffed moodily at a pipe which had gone out.

"Barbara, what I have to confess will amaze and grieve you," began Lucinda, with grave tenderness. "But it is best for your happiness, for the future that I see can be yours. And surely best for all of us Huetts.

It has taken me years--years to come to this decision--to break one aspect of our happy home life here for a possible fuller and better one."

"Why, Mother!" exclaimed the girl in astonishment. She rose to her knees before Lucinda.

"That is just--the--the secret," Lucinda faltered. "Barbara, I am not your mother. You are not a sister to Abe and George and Grant. You are no relation to us at all."

For a moment Barbara was stunned.

"Ah!... How dreadful! Oh, mercy--what am I--who am I?" cried Barbara, in anguish.

"The first is easy to answer," replied Lucinda, gaining strength to go on. "You are the sweetest and best girl I ever knew. You are as good as you are beautiful. But who you are is a mystery. You came of gentlefolk, surely. But what they were and where they came from we never found out."

"Oh--dear God! Then I'm a waif--a nameless--"

"Listen, Barbara. It is a tragedy, yes, but nothing to be heartbroken about."

"Then why did y-you ever--tell me?" sobbed the girl.

"Because it is the only way we can ever keep you with us always."

"I don't understand."

"Let me talk, dear... My eyes were opened at the dance last month. You were the belle of that dance. Many of these Arizonians are in love with you. And despite the fact that you don't care for any particular one of them--and that you've been happy with my sons--you will be forced to marry some day. Someone will pack you off and make you his wife whether you like it or not. That is western."

"But I wouldn't--I wouldn't!" burst out Barbara, incredulously.

"Well, darling, I don't know exactly how it would happen. But a pretty and healthy girl can't stay unmarried out here. She just can't."

"Then--how are you going to keep me--with you?" queried Barbara, in wistful misery.

"Let that rest for a moment. I want to tell you how you came to us."

"Oh do--do--even though it'll hurt so terribly."

"Barbara, it's almost unbelievable. But it was seventeen years ago. You are a young woman of twenty, yet the years have gone so swiftly, so brightly, so happily that to us you are still a child... George was four years old, Abe was three, and Grant two. At that immature age, Barbara, these youngsters were as bad as little boys can be. Abe was the naughtiest. I've always been glad since that he was, because if he hadn't been disobedient, a little savage who liked to run off and hunt in the woods--we might never have known an' loved you. For it was Abe who found you, Barbara, a little lost babe in the woods... Let me tell you.

Seventeen years, ago last October--the fourteenth--I shall never forget it--the boys ran away from the cabin. I was busy and upset. I forgot about the boys until I went outside for something and they were gone. I called. No answer.--I left off work and ran to find them. At the corrals I came upon their tracks. Abe's barefoot prints led up the road, where I had expressly fort bidden the boys to go. George and Grant followed him.

It was nearing sunset. I ran, calling and panting--up the road, through the gate, on through the woods. By this time I was distracted. When I came upon them playing by some logs that have rotted away long ago, instead of three children there were four. The little stranger was a girl--flaxen-haired, with eyes of violet. She was shy and sweet. When I asked her who she was she said: 'Barb'ra'... And to this day we have never known more. Her dress was of fine material. She wore pretty little shoes, but no stockings. I have saved those things all these years, and I shall give them to you... Abe had found you crying along the road. Wagons had passed there that day, and in some strange way you had become lost from one of them. I looked for a camp and listened for voices. But darkness was close, and as there appeared to be no camp near, I brought you back here with the boys. Logan said there must be a camp out on the road. He went to look, but in vain. Next day he trailed the wagons down to Payson, making sure you had become lost from one of them, and that you would be hunted. But here is the most astounding and inexplicable part of the story. These wagons did not stop at Payson. They went through at night.

No one ever heard of a little girl being lost. No one ever came back to hunt for you!... That's all, Barbara. And it's all we'll ever know. Logan and I adopted you as our own. The boys from that day to this have loved you more than any sister anyone could have had."

When Lucinda ceased, the girl's flaxen head drooped and she wept unrestrainedly. Logan laid aside his pipe with a cough, and gazed at Barbara with wet eyes. Abe sat transfixed and rapt. Grant's tanned face was one ruddy beam in the firelight. George looked a stricken man.