Then I'll Come Back to You

alf hopeful that he might overtake the boy who had gone in the night. But none of the farmers on the outlying roa

t his anger had somehow oozed away during the night. Allison's concern was too genuine to be feigned; and Caleb learned too, that morning, that beneath his neighbor's amusement at

zed that the search was useless. And at last one day in early fall, Caleb started alone upon his erran

er and the boy had camped only a few days before. But it was a two days' journey around the backbone of that ridge alone, by trail. And even then, when he did locate the "Jenkinses," it took hours of quiet argument before Caleb could convince those shy and suspicious people that his errand was an honest one. Eventually they did come to believe him; they led him, a-foo

not even known existed; he left them half-doubting its genuineness, until later when there came an opportunity to spend it.

aimed as she glimpsed his fa

is heart aching at the

h," he said gently enough. "Bu

hich the tin box yielded up. Most of them were covered with a cramped and misspelled handwriting which they knew must be

ese puzzled him for a moment, until, at the very bottom of the box he found a folded and legal-looking document. He opened that and then he understood-he understood just how every penny had been spent which Old Tom had been able to earn. After the swiftest of examinations

ve known absolutely, without this evidence. They laughed at him; they made fun of him-and there isn't any better blood than flows in that boy's veins! He was Stephen O'

thin hands over t

I recall it all. She died, and he-he went all to pieces. They said, at his death, that he was destitute. And when he did follow her-across

odded h

"He says that he wasn't going to let civilization make of the boy's life the wreck which he, poor, queer, honest soul, thought it had made of his father's. And do you know, Sarah, do you know, I can't help but be

outlasted the years which followed. She never weakened in her belief that some day the boy would come back-she and one other whose faith in his last boyish promise, phrased in bitterness, al

come back?" she

way fashion, it was, nevertheless, tinged with hope. Five years lengthened into ten, and still Steve did not come. But whenever Barb

ark-eyed creature of more than usual beauty whom Caleb had seen, as through the boy's own eyes, in the promise of the years. Caleb had long before given up all hope, but he wondered just the same. And then there ca

ch never left her eyes. She developed what her brother termed a habit of "seeing America first and last, and in the interval between." But he, beneath his jocularity, was glad enough to accompany her upon those rambling

ed his sleeplessness, as usual, upon the weather. He was glad to be home again that morning; he had been so lonely away from home that he was warmed unaccountably by the thought that Allison was in the hills, too. And he was sure of that fact,

," Allison called it, always with a wry face and a gesture toward his wallet pocket. He was wondering, as he came down the stairs, if she wo

have to wonde

across his forehead as though he doubted his own eyes. But when he looked again it was still there, sitting chin in palm, small head under a rather weather-beaten felt hat thrust slightly forward, gazing fixedly t

in greeting. And instantly, as they had a dozen years before, Barbara Allison's eyes swung in instant scrutiny of the one who was seated at Caleb's feet. She hesitated, and recovered herself. But when, with quite dignified deliberation, she finally came forward to pass that motionless figure

le Cal," she murmu

air was still wavy, still chestnut in the shadows. And Caleb, though he could not force a word from his tightened

adn't changed a bit. They were still the same steady and unwavering gray. A smile crept into them, a smile crept across the even lips, and for all the change th

m, Stephen O'Mara held out a sinewy brown hand. His voice was a little unsteady, but the mimicry of his own drawlin

e do, Uncle Ca

When, little by little, she faced around at last, it was fairly to feel those grave gray eyes resting upon her own face. The blood of a sudden came storming up into Barbara's cheeks.

figure in blue flannel and corduroy, and although he had never seen him in all the months that the latter had been in his employ, Allison knew this must be the one in whose keeping lay, directly

tense, sturdily confident little hill-boy's bearing but what came back to her at that moment. She remembered them all, and seconds later, when Steve's fingers had closed over her own outstretched hand, she realized that she was staring at him in a childishly concentrated effort to read

d come back," she murmured then.

into saying the one thing she least of all had wanted to voice. Even an inane remark concerning the weather would have been better than that girlish naiveté which she felt seemed

And in that instant when Allison's first words reached her burning ears, even before Steve could reply to her greeting, she wr

n ample smile embraced the tall figure in riverman's garb and his own daughter's crimson countenance-a most meaningful smile of roguery. "Well, from what I've heard," he stated, "and what I've … seen, I should say that you are my man, O'Mara. M

ughter rum

eve's eyes had left her face. Now she forgot her confusion

dignantly. "Your man! Why, he-he's m

essary to tell either Caleb or Steve that she had been abo

rs of his eyelids, seemed totally detached and impersonal; and yet it hinted, too, at an intimate enjoyment of the sit

tilts with Destiny, depends one-half upon luck, and the other half on being on the ground personally, when the-affair-starts." He half faced

iately that Allison's placid appropriation of the blue flannel-shirted one as his own particular property wa

s-I and two or three others, including

ood contemplating the small hand st

d me," he remarked, "but-er-any objection

y was really funny. From the door Barbara echoed hi

chanted mockingly, and d

scowled

r thing I've heard about you, Mr. O'Mara, if you will pardon a garrulous old

ting was all that Caleb found most lovable in the man's whole make-up-his prone

eting," he said, as he shook hands. "Now I want to tell you that I

ring ruefully at his reddened

ained. "Your telegram found me here, and I wai

tt's own reports on the work are so tinged with his eternal optimism, so colored by what you aptly termed his romantic zest for the game, that I wanted your own opinion concerning the possibi

lder, and spin him around toward the light and stare and stare into his face; but he waited because he found much that wa

s early morning call presage

the answer was to be. The request found h

" Caleb asked. "Will you tell her, please, that we a

eft Allison fro

to formula-that last remark of yours. But, do you know, just for a minute it sort of reminde

ad and led the

. "I believe it was O'Mara himself who … but I didn't know tha

d his reply. "Quite some t

essed laughter, but Allison

, either, though I suppose both of us are old enough to be his father. He's Elliott's find. Elliott suggested him as the one man for this job, when I consolidated with the Ainnesley crowd and t

said it wouldn't stand when the ice began to move in the spring-and it didn't! Oh, he knows his business! But it wasn't his successes which caught Elliott's eye. It's the way he has failed a couple of times, fighting right back to the last ditch-and fighting and fighting!-when all the rest had quit, that

art, in spite of his desire to murmur, "But I told you so, Dexter, years ago," still found room to wonder at a thin strain of speculation which seemed to underrun the speaker's words. In h

thing is beyond the pale of possibility. I believed it six months ago, when Elliott and Ainnesley and the rest of them were so keen for it, and I believe it still, even though I have seen Elliott's engineer and know what he has already accomplished. That track'll never

e of Caleb's mild astoni

strictly entre nous. But, win or lose, this man O'Mara will

if you remember a little fishing trip that we took, some ten or twelve years ago, Dexter, up into the hills? It was

"Why, yes, now that you mention it, I do remem

y this O'Mara reminded me of something, too-some

el

yllable was coo

t was?" Caleb asked, pos

rtune for some man in that valley, if h

nge to Caleb save one. The Honorable Archibald Wickersham, who was said to represent huge foreign interests, he had known as a boy. And Caleb had seen

e would remain with me this long? It-it was something that you said concerning the making of a gentleman

e doorway, pinker of cheek and more tremulous of lip than her brother had ever seen her before. She

fairly chortled, "and there are