Justin Wingate, Ranchman

A sudden confusion had attacked Lucy Davison, who recalled certain conversations with Justin. They were in the nature of sacred confidences, so could not be mentioned even to Mary Jasper; but she, at least, knew that Sibyl was herself the girl whom Clayton had drawn from the cañon with that dangling broken arm, and whom he had afterward married. Why had he deserted her, or she him? And why were they now living apart? Believing that the name of Sibyl’s husband had been Dudley, Mary had failed to guess the truth.

Mary told Lucy that it would not be surprising if Mrs. Dudley married again, as there was “just the dearest man” who called on her with much frequency and seemed to be greatly enamored of her.

“He has a funny little bald head,” said Mary, “and he wears glasses, the kind you pinch on your nose; he keeps them dangling against his coat by a black cord. And he is as kind as kind can be, and a perfect gentleman. Mrs. Dudley says he is very rich, and I really believe she will marry him some time, for she seems to like him.”

The name of this amiable gentleman, Lucy learned, was Mr. Plimpton, and he was a Denver stock broker. Neither Mary nor Lucy dreamed of the truth of his relations with Sibyl Dudley.

Having recurred to people and affairs in Paradise Valley, Mary chattered on like a gay little blackbird, and knew she was very bewitching, bolstered among the pillows. Her illness had taken some of the color out of her cheeks, yet they still showed a rosy tint when contrasted with the pillows, and the whiteness of the pillows emphasized the color of her eyes and hair. She asked Lucy to move the little dresser farther along the wall, that she might see herself in the mirror. She desired to get certain stubborn tangles out of her hair, she averred; but she really wanted to contemplate her own loveliness.

“Mrs. Dudley puts the dresser that way for me sometimes, even when I don’t ask her to; and often I lay for hours, looking into the mirror, when she has gone out of the room. It’s like looking into the clouds, you know. You remember how we used to lie on the rocks there by the edge of the Black Cañon and look up at the clouds? We could see all kinds of things in them—men and horses, and wild animals, and just everything. When I let myself dream into the mirror that way I can see the same things there. And sometimes I try to picture what my future will be. Once I thought I saw a man’s face looking out at me, and it wasn’t Ben’s! Mrs. Dudley said I had been dreaming, and didn’t see anything, but it seemed real. I suppose I shall marry Ben, of course, just as you will marry Justin.”

Lucy’s face flushed.

“I don’t see why that should be a matter of course!”

“So you’ve seen some one in the East who is better looking? You can’t fool me! I know! What’s his name?”

“Truly I haven’t seen any one in the East who is better looking. I wasn’t thinking of anything of the kind.”

“Then he is still the best looking, is he? If you still think so, it’s a sure sign that you’ll marry him. That’s why I think I shall marry Ben. I haven’t seen any one in Denver I like as well as Ben, or who is as good looking; and one has a chance to see a good many men in a city like this.”

“Has Ben been to call on you?”

“Oh, yes; he was here only last week. When I first came up here I couldn’t get him to call, though I was told I might invite him. But when he got started he kept coming and coming, and now he comes almost too often. Mrs. Dudley has been very kind and good to him, and sometimes I’m almost jealous, thinking he likes her almost as much as he does me. I should be truly jealous, I think, if I didn’t know about Mr. Plimpton.”

She studied her mirrored reflection, wondering if it could be possible for Ben to find Mrs. Dudley, who was so much older and had already been married, more charming than herself. It was so unpleasant a thought that she frowned; and then, remembering that frowns will spoil even the smoothest forehead, she drove the frown away, and began to talk again.

Though Lucy Davison would not admit it, she was anxious to hasten on to Paradise Valley; so she remained but a day with Mary Jasper. Yet in that time Sibyl contrived to exhibit to her the carriage, the magnificent horses and the liveried driver, taking her as she did so on a long drive through some of the fashionable streets and avenues.

As the carriage swung them homeward Sibyl made a purchase of fruits and flowers, with which she descended into a shabby dwelling. When she came out she was followed to the door by a slatternly woman, who curtsied and thanked her volubly with a foreign accent.

“She’s an Italian—just a dago, as some people say—but her husband has been sick for a month or more, and I try to brighten her home up a bit. I don’t know what he does when he’s well; works for the railroad, I believe.”

Then the carriage moved on again, away from the cheap tenements, and into the wealthier sections once more, where Sibyl lived.

“You mustn’t tell father that I’m sick,” was Mary’s parting injunction to Lucy. “If he knew he might want me to come home. I will be entirely well by another week. I write to him every Sunday, just as if I was in the best of health; and so long as I don’t tell him he thinks I’m as well as ever. And truly I am as well as ever, or will be in a few days. If you tell him anything, tell him I’ll be down to see him this fall. I thought I should go last winter, but those awful storms came on, and I was so busy besides, that I just didn’t. But I do think of him often, and you may tell him that, too, if you tell him anything.”

CHAPTER XIII

WHEN AMBITION CAME

Lucy Davison was seldom absent from Justin’s mind; and he was thinking of her as he drove to town to make some purchases for Pearl, who, though married, was still the housekeeper at the ranch. The knowledge that Lucy was to arrive at home in a short time filled him with longing and delight.

As he drove along he could but note the appearance of the valley, and the houses of the new settlers and the old. Sanders had purchased more land, and had moved his dug-out close up to the trail and much nearer to the river. He had been indefatigable in his efforts to induce settlers to come into the valley, and successful to a degree that surprised Justin and the Davisons, Of the newer arrivals several were men of force and intelligence. They had given the valley their approval, and had set to work.

Sanders, it now appeared, had sold his land at Sumner for a considerable sum of money. At Sumner, irrigation was being practiced successfully. He was firm in his belief that Paradise Valley could be irrigated as easily, and would make an agricultural section as rich. Therefore, he and the new farmers, joined by certain of the older ones, among them Sloan Jasper, had built a dam across the stream near Jasper’s and turned the water thus secured into some small canals, from which laterals conveyed it to the places where it was required.

They were working under unfavorable conditions, however; their dam was cheaply and hastily constructed, and the canals and ditches being new sucked up the water almost as fast as it could be turned into them.

Naturally Davison and Fogg were not pleased. The water which the farmers were using decreased the supply in the water-holes, and threatened suffering for the cattle if a dry season came on. They did not accept the theory promulgated by the farmers, that the water would find its way back through the soil into the stream. That the new enterprise troubled the ranchmen gave secret joy to William Sanders, whose bitter and vindictive mind was filled with ineradicable hatred of Davison and all connected with him. To strike a blow at Davison delighted him immeasurably.

Justin had a dusty drive that afternoon, for the land was dry. For several days a strong south wind had been blowing, and the mountain was draping its wide shoulders in misty vapor. These were good portents of rain; and when rain came at that season, after a period of drought, it came usually in a heavy storm.

Ben Davison had set out for the town ahead of Justin, on his pony. Ben had practically ceased to work on the ranch, except at intervals. He was much in the company of Clem Arkwright, and enjoyed certain pleasures of the town, to which Arkwright had introduced him. For one thing, Arkwright played a game of poker that few men could beat. Arkwright was a small politician, and by virtue of that fact held the office of justice-of-the-peace. Arkwright had thrown his political following to Ben’s support, in a recent county convention; and that, with the influence of Davison and Fogg, had given to Ben Davison the nomination to the state legislature.

As the bronchos climbed to the summit of a low divide, giving a long view of the trail, Justin saw Ben, far ahead, nearing the town. It gave him thought. Ben was not only ahead of him on the trail that day, but in other ways.

That summer of patient toil and sturdy thought spent high in the mountains with the sheep had brought to Justin the knowledge that he was now a man. As a man he was beginning to feel that he must do something, must set about the work of making a place and a name for himself in the world. Influenced by the idealist, Clayton, and by his love for Lucy, he had heretofore fed on love and dreams. He still loved, and he still dreamed, but he knew now that to these must be added action and accomplishment.

No one understood Ben Davison’s unworthiness more thoroughly than Justin. Because of the influence of his father and the support given to his candidacy by a tricky politician Ben was apparently on the high road to political preferment and honors. His name was mentioned in the Denver dailies, and his picture was in the county paper.

Philip Davison was pleased, probably Lucy was pleased also, and Justin felt that he really ought to look upon the matter in a kindly and amiable light. Yet, even as he thought so, he felt his heart burning.

“I might have had that nomination, if things had been different!”

That was Justin’s thought. He knew to the core of his being that in every way he was better qualified than Ben Davison to fill that important place. He had not only mental but moral qualities which Ben totally lacked. In addition, the position and the honor appealed to his growing desire to be something and do something. It would give opportunity to talents which he was sure he possessed. Denver represented the great world beyond, where men struggled for the things worth while. Ben Davison would go to Denver, become a member of the legislature, and would have the doors of possibility opened to him, when he had not the ability nor the moral stamina to walk through them when they were opened, and he—Justin—would remain—a cowboy.

When Justin reached the town, which consisted of a double row of frame houses strung along the railroad track, he hitched the bronchos to the pole in front of one of the stores and proceeded to the purchase of the groceries required by the housekeeper. That done he walked to the postoffice for the ranch mail. As he came out with it in his hands and began to look over the county paper, where he saw Ben Davison’s name and political qualifications blazoned, he observed several men converging toward a low building. Over its door was a sign, “Justice of the Peace.”

“Arkwright’s got a trial on to-day,” said one of the men, speaking to him. “You ranchers air gittin’ pugnacious. Borden has brought suit against Sam Turner for the killin’ of them cattle. I s’pose you heard about it?”

Justin’s interest was aroused. He was acquainted with both Arkwright and Borden, and he knew of the killing of the cattle, but he had not heard of the lawsuit. Borden’s ranch lay over beyond the first mesa, along Pine Creek. It had been established since the Davison ranch. Not all the line between the two ranches was fenced, and the open line Justin had ridden for a time with one of Borden’s cowboys.

There were a few settlers along Pine Creek, one of them being Sam Turner, a young farmer from Illinois. Justin remembered Turner well, and Turner’s wife, a timid little woman wholly unfit for the life she was compelled to live in this new country. She had a deathly fear of Borden’s cowboys, a fear that was too often provoked by their actions. They were chiefly Mexicans and half-breeds, a wild lot, much given to drinking, and often when they came riding home from the town in their sprees they came with their bronchos at a dead run, firing their revolvers and yelling like Indians as they swept by Turner’s house. Whenever she saw them coming Mrs. Turner would catch up her little girl in her arms, dart into the house, lock and bar the doors, and pull down the blinds. The cowboys observed this, and it aroused them to even wilder demonstrations; so that now they never passed Turner’s without a fusillade and a demoniacal outburst of yells.

The death of the cattle had come about through no fault of Turner. They had simply broken down a fence during a storm, and getting into Turner’s sorghum had so gorged themselves with the young plants that some of them had died. It did not seem to matter to Borden that Turner’s sorghum had been devoured. In his rage over his loss Turner had threatened violence, and Borden was answering with this suit for damages for the loss of the cattle.

Justin squeezed into the midst of the crowd that already filled the office. Clem Arkwright’s red face showed behind his desk, which was raised on a platform. Justin, still thinking of Lucy and Ben, looked at Arkwright with interest. He did not admire Arkwright himself, but Ben Davison thought highly of him, and that was something. A heap of law books was stacked on Arkwright’s desk. A pair of pettifogging lawyers had been kicking up a legal dust, and one of them, Borden’s lawyer, was still at it. As the lawyer talked, Clem Arkwright took down one of the books and began to examine a decision to which his attention was called.

While Arkwright looked at the decision, the lawyer went right on, pounding the book he held in his hand and shaking his fist now and then at the justice and now and then at Sam Turner and the opposing lawyer. Turner sat with his counsel, and at intervals whispered in his ear. Justin had never attended a trial and he found it interesting. His sympathies were with Turner.

From the claims made by Borden’s lawyer, it appeared that Sam Turner was wholly in the wrong. He should have guarded his crops or fenced his land. He had done neither, and as a result Borden’s cattle had lost their lives and Borden had sustained financial loss. Borden was not required to maintain a fence, nor to employ riders to hold the cattle beyond any certain imaginary line, the lawyer maintained; but he had kept riders so employed, and had built a fence on a part of his range. He had done these things, that his cattle might not become mixed up with cattle belonging to other ranches, and particularly, as it appeared, in pure kindness of heart, that they might not trespass on the farms of such men as the defendant. It was admitted that Turner had a perfect right to live on and cultivate his land; it was his, to do with as he pleased, by virtue of title conveyed to him by the government under the homestead laws. But he was compelled, if he wished to prevent trespass of this kind, to erect and maintain a stock-tight fence, or guard his land in some other substantial way; and having failed to do that, he should be mulcted in damages for the loss sustained by the plaintiff.

Justin was listening with much interest to the argument of Borden’s lawyer, when he felt a hand on his shoulder. Turning about he beheld William Sanders.

“We want to see you outside a minute er two,” said Sanders.

He tried to smile pleasantly, but there was a queer gleam in his little eyes.

“All right,” said Justin, wondering what Sanders could want.

Several farmers and a few of the citizens of the town were awaiting him outside, he discovered, and had sent Sanders in to get him.

“We want to have a talk with you about the election,” said one of them. “We’ll go into that back room over there; we’ve got the privilege of using it awhile.”

Sloan Jasper shambled up, his hands in his pockets.

“Howdy, Justin!” he exclaimed, with an anxious smile. “I’ve been talkin’ round a bit amongst my friends, and what I’ve said about you I don’t take back for any man.”

Somewhat bewildered, Justin accompanied these men into the vacant room they had indicated, back of one of the stores. Here William Sanders established himself at a small table; the doors were closed, the men dropped into seats, and Sanders rapped with his knuckles for order. That queer gleam still shone in his little eyes.

“Gentlemen,” he said, rising, “I’m goin’ to ask Mr. Jasper to set out the object of this meetin’. Me and him talked it up first, I guess; and he understands it as well as I do, and maybe can set it out better.”

Sloan Jasper shambled to his feet, declaring that he was no speaker; and then proceeded to a heated denunciation of the ranchmen and their methods.

“How many times have they tramped me an’ my farm under foot as if we was muck?” he asked. “That trial over there before that scoundrel, Arkwright, is a sample of it. They’ve run the county till they think they own it. But they don’t own me! Justin hyer is a cowboy and can draw cowboy votes. We all think well of him, because we know he can be depended on to do the fair thing by everybody. That’s all we’re askin’—the fair thing; we don’t want to take advantage of anybody, er injure anybody; but we do intend to protect ourselves, and to do it we’ve got to stand together, and stand up fer men who will stand up fer us. There’s certain things that will come before this next legislature in which we’re interested. If Ben Davison sets in it as the representative frum this county he’ll vote ag’inst us every time. Now, there’s a lot o’ men in this town who don’t like him, ner Arkwright; and all over the county it’s the same way. So I say if we’ll stand together, us farmers, as one man, and can git somebody that the cowboys like to run ag’inst Ben Davison, we can beat him out of his boots, fer he ain’t popular, though the newspaper and his friends is tryin’ to make it out that he is. And that’s why we’re hyer—a sort of delegation of the farmers an’ the people of the town who have talked the thing over; an’ we’re goin’ to ask Justin Wingate to make the race fer us ag’inst Ben Davison. If he does it, we’ll take off our coats and work fer him until the sun goes down on the day of election; and so help me God, I believe as truly as I stand hyer, that we can elect him, and give Ben Davison the worst beatin’ he’ll ever git in his life.”

Sloan Jasper sat down with flushed face, amid a round of applause. Before Justin could get upon his feet, William Sanders was speaking. He said he had come to see that Justin was the man they wanted—the man who could make the race and have a chance of winning; and for that reason he favored him, and would do all in his power for him, if he would run.

Justin was confused and gratified. His pulses leaped at the bugle call of a new ambition. He knew how justly unpopular Ben was. It was possible, it even seemed probable, that if he became the candidate of the men who would naturally oppose the ranching interests he could defeat Ben Davison. But would not such an attempt be akin to treachery? He was in the employ of Philip Davison.

“I don’t think I ought to consider such a thing,” he urged, in some confusion, without rising to his feet. “Mr. Davison has treated me well. I want to remain on friendly terms with him and with Ben. I couldn’t do that, if I ran against Ben. I’m obliged to you, just the same, you know, for the compliment and the honor; but, really, I don’t think I ought to consider it.”

He saw these men believed that he and Ben Davison were not on terms of good friendship; on that they based their hope that he would become their candidate. They were not to be dissuaded easily, and they surrounded him, and plied him with appeals and arguments.

“We’ll give you till Thursday to think it over,” they said, still hoping to win him. “We’re going to put some one up against Ben, and you’re the one we want.”

Though Justin did not retreat from his declaration that it was a thing he should not consider, they observed that he did not say he would not consider it. The stirrings of ambition, the flattery of their words, and the gratifying discovery that the world regarded him now as a full-grown man, kept him from saying that.

Just beyond the town, as he proceeded homeward, he was overtaken by Ben Davison, who had ridden hard after him on his pony. Ben’s face was white, his eyes unnaturally bright, and his hand shook on his bridle-rein.

“I’ve been hearing that talk in town,” he began, “and I want to know about it!”

Justin felt the hot blood sing in his ears. With difficulty he crowded down the violent temper that leaped for utterance.

“What did you hear?” he asked.

“That you intend to run against me.”

Justin gave him a look that made the shining eyes shift and turn away.

“Some of the farmers, and others, want you to run,” said Ben.

“Yes, that is true.”

“And do you intend to?”

“I haven’t said that I did.”

“Well, I want to know!”

“What if I decline to answer?”

Ben changed his tone.

“It will make trouble for me, if you run. If you keep out of it I’ve got the thing cinched—they can’t beat me, for I will pull the cowboy vote. You might split that vote. I don’t say I think you could be elected, for I don’t; but it would make me a lot of trouble, and would kick up bad feeling all round.”

“In what way?” said Justin, speaking coldly. He was studying Ben closely; he had never seen his face so white nor his eyes so unnaturally bright.

“Well, with father, for one thing. He wouldn’t like it; he wants me to be elected, and has already spent a lot of money.”

“Ben,” said Justin, speaking slowly, “you have yourself to blame largely for this stirring up of the farmers. You have made them hate you. They will put up some one against you, whether I run or not.”

“They can’t beat me, unless they run some fellow who can swing the cowboy vote, and they know it. That’s why they came to you.”

“Yes; they said it was.”

“You told them you wouldn’t run?”

“I told them I ought not consider it.”

“Well, that’s right; you oughtn’t.”

“But I want you to understand, Ben, that I have just as good a right to run as you have!”

“I don’t think so; not while you’re working for father, and when I’m already in the race.”

Mentally, Justin acknowledged that this was a point well taken.

“You won’t run?” said Ben, anxiously.

Justin hesitated, shifting uneasily on the high spring seat.

“N-o, I hardly think I ought to.”

“Thank you! I wanted to make sure.”

Ben wheeled his pony, and galloped back toward the town.

“Am I easy?” Justin asked himself, as his eyes followed the receding figure. “But, really, it does seem that I oughtn’t to think of such a thing, under the circumstances. Davison would be angry—and I don’t suppose Lucy would be at all pleased.”

He drove on, turning the matter over in his mind, recalling with pleasure the flattery of the farmers, and wondering why Ben Davison’s face looked so unnaturally white and his eyes so bright. He knew that anger alone was not the cause.

CHAPTER XIV

IN THE STORM

The threatened rainstorm broke, bringing early night, as Justin reached home. Lemuel Fogg was at the ranch house with Davison. Fogg’s shining photograph wagon had been brought out and a pair of horses hitched to it.

“Ben isn’t here,” said Davison; “I suppose he’s in town, looking after election matters; so, as soon as you can get those things into the house, I want you to ride along the line fence and see that everything is all right, for we don’t want any cattle breaking out and making trouble with the farmers just now. Fogg and I are going up the trail together in his wagon. He wants to get a photograph. We’ll be near the dam, or a short distance below it, where Jasper’s lateral makes out into his fields. I think you will find us at the bridge there over the lateral, and you can come there and make your report, when you’ve looked at the fence. Report promptly, if there’s any trouble.”

Fogg came out of the house in oil hat and slicker, buttoned to the chin against the storm. He resembled a yellow, overgrown Santa Claus, minus the beard.