Chapter 17

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_ CHAPTER XVII

The mail came irregularly to Shoulder-blade creek, but even irregular deliveries may bring bad news. Halloway received a letter, one day, containing a summons which he could not disregard. He had spoken contemptuously to Brent of money-grubbing, but his inflated wealth carried certain responsibilities which even he acknowledged.

He was perfectly willing that his world should see in him an incorrigible scoffer at moral conventions. He rather enjoyed being the object of maternal warnings to young daughters, but in financial affairs no stern moralist could have been more observant of rigid integrity, and in that, as in other things, he reversed the usual order. The business involved in the letter does not concern this narrative save in so far as it called him in peremptory terms away from Alexander and, at that, he fumed sulphurously.

He had, for the present, one more evening with her and he meant to make the most of it. If there was in him any power of hypnotism, and he still believed there was, he meant to exert it to the full.

Even in midsummer, there are chill nights in the mountains, and as he approached Alexander's house he thought gratefully of the fire that would be burning on her hearth.

She was sitting alone when he entered, by a small table, sewing, and she did not rise to welcome him. Lamp and firelight mingled in an orange and carmine glow that fell softly upon her. For a moment, as Halloway, pausing just inside the door, gazed at her, that adventurous hunger that fed upon her beauty became a positive avidity. Perhaps because he was leaving her, her beauty seemed what no earthly beauty is--absolute.

"Alexander," said Halloway slowly, "I've got ter go away fer a spell, an' I hates hit--I hates hit like all torment!"

She looked quickly up, and his narrow scrutiny told him that she had given ever so slight a start and that into her eyes had come a quickly repressed disappointment.

"I'll miss ye, Jack," she said simply. "What business calls ye away?"

That was an expected question and its answer was ready.

"I've done heired me a small piece of property from an uncle, way acrost ther Verginny line, an' I've got ter fare over thar an' sign some papers or do somethin' ter thet amount."

"How long does ye 'low ter be gone?"

He shook his head moodily. "Hit's a long journey through ther roughs an' I don't know how much time I'll hev ter spend over ther business, but I reckon ye knows thet I won't tarry no longer then need be."

"Don't hasten unduly on my account," she coolly counseled him. "I'll strive ter mek shift somehow ter go on livin'."

The man had taken a chair near her and was bending forward, almost, but not quite, touching her. Now he rose and his voice trembled.

"Fer God's sake, Alexander, don't belittle me ner mek light of me ternight. I kain't endure hit. Heven't ye got no idee how master much I loves ye? Don't ye see thet ther two of us war made fer each other? I don't aim ter brag none--but ye knows I'm ther only man hyar-abouts thet understands ye--thet holds ye in full-high appreciation!"

He paused and she inquired calmly, "Air ye?"

"Ye knows hit!" He was talking tumultuously with the onrush of that dynamic spirit which drove him and gave him power. He stood there with his coat open over his magnificent chest, and his eyes alight with the forces that made him exceptional.

"Ye knows thet _you_ hain't no every-day woman nuther. Ye knows thet ther like of yore beauty hain't been seed afore in these hills--not in mortal feature ner in ther blossomin' woods ner in ther blue skies over 'em all!"

Again he paused, and even while he adhered to a crude vernacular, there was, in the cadence of his voice, a forceful sort of eloquence. In the latent intensity of his personality dwelt a sheer wizardry which few women could have withstood.

"Hev ye ever seed a comet in ther heavens?" he abruptly demanded and without waiting for a reply swept rapidly on. "Well ye're like ter a comet, Alexander. Every star thet shines out thar ternight is hung high up in heaven an' every one is bright. But when a comet goes sweepin' acrost ther skies, with a furrow of light trailin' along behind hit--we plum fergits them leetle stars--hit's like they'd all been snuffed. Hit's ther same way with you, Alexander. Deep down in yore heart thar's powerful fires a-burnin' thet no weak man kain't satisfy. When I looks at ye I clean fergits every other star that ever shone--because I've done seed _you_."

Once more Alexander began to feel that old uncertainty of reeling senses. His intonations were caresses. His eyes were beacons, and she took a tight hold on herself--for despite the hypnotic spell that he was weaving about her, a voice within her cautioned, "Be steady!" That indefinable ghost of suspicion stirred and troubled her.

"An' so sence I'm ther comet amongst them numerous small stars," she observed with an even voice, though her pulse beat was far from regular, "ye 'lows thet I'd ought ter belong ter _you_?"

He ignored the teasing brightness of her eyes; a light of defensive disguise.

"I 'lows thet hevin' oncet seed ye, an' loved ye, I hain't nuver goin' ter be satisfied with no lesser star."

The fire had leaped up and the room had grown warm. Halloway, in his impetuous fashion, ripped off his coat, flinging it to the floor, and stood with his great shoulders and chest bulking mightily beneath his flannel shirt.

Under the hurricane sweep of his love-making the girl from time to time closed her eyes in an effort to hold to her waning steadiness. This was one of those occasions when the fire in her responded to the fire in him; when she felt, with a sense of deep misgiving, that she could not resist him.

"Alexander," said the man, abruptly, dropping his voice from its impetuous pitch, to a more quiet and yet more ardent quality, "Ye 'lowed oncet thet I shouldn't never tech ye withouten ye said I mout. I've done obeyed ye--but now." He slowly extended both arms and stood upright in gladiatorial strength and compelling erectness. "But now ye're a-comin' inter my arms--of yore own accord--because we was made fer one another."

Again her lids came down over the girl's eyes and her fingers tightly gripped the chair-arms for support. Something in her heart was driving her irresistibly into those outstretched arms and something else--though that was growing weaker, she thought--kept whispering its warning, "Steady! Go steady! This is a spell but it isn't love."

She heard the hypnotic voice again. "Ye're a-comin' inter my arms, Alexander--ye're a-comin'--now!"

Her glance, ranging in desperation, fell on his coat at her feet, and with the instinct of grasping at any pretext, for a moment of thought and reprieve, she exclaimed:

"Give me thet coat, Jack!" Having breathlessly gone that far, she was able to finish with greater self-command. "Ther linin's in sheer rags. I kin be mendin' thet wust place by the sleeve thar--whilst ye talks."

"The coat kin wait," he declared. Her line of defense was bending now, under the weight of his onslaught, and it was no time for trivial interruption, but Alexander leaned forward and picked the thing up.

She had not yet begun to sew--her fingers lacked the needful steadiness--but she was making a pretense of studying the torn lining. She must avert her gaze from him for a moment or the tides that he was lashing about her would lift and carry her on their outsweep.

Then suddenly she gave a violent start, and from her lips explosively broke the one word, "Jack!"

He knew that she was under a strained tension of emotion, and though the way she had flashed out that word was a marked contrast with her past attempts to seem controlled, he construed it as an evidence of final surrender to her feelings. She was already very pale and so she turned no paler, but in that moment something had happened to Alexander. Some thought or instinct or fact had brought her up short--transformed her out of weakness into strength, and when she spoke again it was with the self-containment of one who has been near the cliff's edge but who has definitely drawn back.

"I hed hit in head ter ask ye a question," she announced, slowly, "but I've done decided not ter do hit. This thread hain't suited ter ther job. I'll git me another spool."

She rose from her chair, and dismayed at the astonishing swiftness of her changed mood, Halloway took an impulsive step toward her. His arms were still receptively outstretched, but suddenly he felt that attitude to have become absurd. An altered light shone in her eyes now, and it was unpleasantly suggestive of contempt. She turned, absent-mindedly carrying the coat, and went into the other room.

What had happened, wondered the man. Something portentous had been born and matured in a breathing space--but what it was he could not guess. He knew only that victory had been between his open fingers and had slipped away. In this new and hardened mood of Alexander's, he might as well talk passionate love to the Sphinx.

But that was Alexander, he reflected. The tempestuous change from sun to storm was the capricious climate of her nature. She had been close to surrender and had wrested her independence out of his closing grasp by pure will-power. The reaction, he inferred, had been instantaneous--bringing the old resentment against being forced. Again he had lost--but also again he would win.

Alexander was not gone long and she returned with a restored calm. The fingers that stitched industriously at his torn coat, were as steady as before his coming.

"I don't aim ter be fo'ced, Jack," she quietly announced. "Ye boasts thet ye kin mek me come into yore arms of my own free will. If ye kin--all right--but hit won't be afore ye fares back from yore journey. Hit won't be ternight."

Two weeks after Jack Halloway had started on his alleged trip across the Virginia boundary, Alexander also set out upon a journey.

She was going to Perry Center and meant to be there for some days, since matters concerning the farm were to be discussed with her uncle. This time the undertaking was less arduous than the trip from there back to Shoulder-blade had been.

Now it was midsummer and the railroad washouts had been repaired, so she had only to cross two mountain ridges and take the jerky little train from a point ten miles distant to her destination.

Perry Center was a hub about which swung a limited perimeter of rich farming lands. This fertile area was an oasis with steep desolation hedging it in on all sides, but within its narrow confines men could raise not only the corn which constituted the staple of their less fortunate neighbors, but the richer crop of wheat as well.

Therefore the men about Perry Center were as sheiks among goat-herds.

When Alexander set out on her ten-mile walk hefting the pack that held her necessaries for the trip, Jerry O'Keefe materialized grinning amiably from a clump of laurel. It was characteristic of Jerry to so appear from nowhere.

Now he nodded, and his eyes were brimming with that infectious smile of his.

"I jest kinderly happened ter hev a day off, Alexander," he assured her, "and I 'lowed hit wouldn't hurt none fer me ter come along es far es ther railroad train with ye an' tote thet bundle."

She gave it over to him, and since the trail there was narrow and thorn-hedged, she strode on ahead of him. Jerry was content, for through the midsummer woods, still dewy with morning freshness, he could follow no lovelier guide, and Jerry could be silent as well as loquacious.

They had put two-thirds of the journey behind them, when Alexander suggested, "Let's rest hyar a spell. Hit's a right good place ter pause an' eat a snack."

They stood on a pinnacle where time-corroded shoulders of sandstone broke eruptively through the soil. In a cluster of paw-paw trees there was a carpet of moss spread over ancient boulders, and off behind them stretched the nobility of forests unspoiled; of oak and ash and poplar and the mighty plumes of the pine. The crimson flower of the trumpet flower trailed everywhere, and a mighty vista was spread from foreground to horizon where the ashy purple of the last ridge merged with the sky.

But for Jerry the chief beauty was all close at hand.

"Alexander," he said, with his heart in his eyes, "ye're ther purtiest gal I ever seed--ther purtiest gal I reckon anybody ever seed."

The tease in her came to the surface. "Another feller likened me ter a comet amongst small stars, Jerry."

"I reckon I kin hazard a guess who thet feller war," he answered soberly. "There's only one man hyarabouts thet's got a gift of speech like thet. Myself, I don't like ter think of ye as a comet, Alexander, they're so plum outen reach."

She did not reply and Jerry went on. "An' yit mebby he's right--I reckon thet's jest another reason for likenin' ye ter one--an' I reckon he knows, too, thet he flames right bright hisself."

The girl lifted her brows questioningly and Jerry went on.

"Hit's right hard fer me ter think erbout anything else. He stands betwixt me an' you an' he bulks so big thet he's kinderly hard ter git eround."

Alexander was sitting on the mossy rock, her eyes wandering off across the far-flung landscape. Now their gaze came back, recalled by something wistful in her companion's voice, and it occurred to her that this man himself would have towered above the generality.

"Ye're a right sizable sort of feller yore own self, Jerry," she reminded him and he laughed a shade bitterly. It was a very unusual thing for bitterness to tingle Jerry's voice, and it augured a bruised heart.

"I'm big amongst leetle fellers," he replied. "But along side him, I'm a runt."

"Ef he's got some thing ye hain't got, like es not, hit wucks t'other way round too. Ye're strong enough an' ye've got gentleness."

Jerry leaned forward to her. His voice trembled and his eyes broke into a sudden snap of flame.

"Alexander--ye knows ther way I loves ye. Ye kain't fathom ther full extent of hit all, but ye knows some small part of hit. Ye're good ter me--but when a man feels like I does towards you, thar hain't but one sort of goodness thet counts. I knows thet I cuts a sorry sort of figger alongside him, an' I hes ter fight myself day-long an' night-long ter keep from hatin' him fer hit. I hain't no Goliath outen ther Bible, but after all a right puny leetle feller took his measure."

He paused for an instant then swept feelingly on. "I wants ye ter answer me one question. Air hit jest because he's so monster big an' fine-looking thet ye thinks he's a piece of ther moon?"

"I hain't nuver said I thought he was," she interrupted, but Jerry stubbornly proceeded, and no one looking at his set face could doubt that he meant all he said.

"Because ef thet's hit, Alexander, afore God Almighty I'm plum willin' ter meet him an' fight him fer ye with my bare hands 'twell one of us dies. I hain't none afeared of him, ef so be I'm fightin' fer you--an' ef he wins ther fight I'd rather be dead anyhow."

Alexander had never seen him so passion-ridden of manner before--and she thought that if such a combat took place, even with the odds uneven, the outcome would not be altogether certain.

Had Jerry known it, he was at that moment nearer to stirring the girl in the way that Halloway had stirred her, than he had ever been before, but her reply came in a grave and low-pitched voice.

"I hain't ter be won by no battle, Jerry."

"No, o'course not." He had brought himself back with an effort to a quieter mood and he even sought valiantly to muster the twinkle into his eyes and the whimsical note into his tone as he said:

"But atter all, I'm a right easy sort of feller ter git along with, an' I mout be kinderly handy eround ther house. These masterful husbands sometimes don't w'ar so well. Hit's like havin' ter live with a king, I reckon."

Now, it was the woman who insisted on gravity. "Look at me, Jerry," she commanded and their glances held level as she went on in deep earnestness.

"I'd hate fer ther two of ye ter think thet I'm playin' fast an' loose with ye. I'd hate ter think hit myself. Hit hain't thet--I was raised up a boy--I thought I'd always stay thet-a-way. Then I found I couldn't."

"Yes, I knows thet, Alexander. Thar hain't no censure fer ye es ter thet."

"Mebby thar ought ter be though. But ye sees hit's kinderly like I was livin' in a new world--an' I don't know hit well yit. I've got ter go slow. I hain't made up my mind an' then changed hit--I hain't blowed hot an' cold. Hit's jest thet I hain't been able ter come ter no conclusion one way ner t'other."

She had spoken with a defensive tone, one hardly certain, but as she finished a prideful note crept into her voice. "But when I does decide, I decides fer all time an' ther man I weds with kin trust me." _

Read next: Chapter 18

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