Then I'll Come Back to You

remained with Caleb and Miss Sarah long after the logs in the fireplace had crumbled away to a flaky ash, discussing that ink-smeared record which C

ch things, I started to look it up myself. And when I found out from the records that a boy by that name had disappeared-perhaps been stolen by an old servant-I remembered instantly, of course, the box over which Old Tom used to hang, hour after hour. I came back into the woods lo

and his eyes t

der to border and coast to coast, looking for you." He stopped to scan the browned face close

ce colored

prepossessing an object, on any of those visits, after I had tramped in overland. The house was closed both times I came. And then I did write once-that was from Sa

as plain enough. Caleb faced about

ah stopped him with an capable nod of her head. "We didn't get that letter, Stev

tared down at h

at there were too many presidents on that island, both coming an

and took the conversa

her soft, almost lisping voice, "something which Caleb b

during her absence. For a second or so he had almost believed that she might have run across that bunch of loose tax receipts and the folded, legal-looking document which he ha

r thank you enough," he murmured. "I can only t

his hand. She did not need his disconnected

r since we found it; and I should miss it greatly if I were not to see it often. Do you mind leaving it here, in your room upstairs? I am going to ask that of you, and

more delicately flattering than all the effusion in the world could ever have been

day," he said slowly. "I wondered then if there could be oth

b sm

he remarked. "And I don't know. I don't know!

years before in Old Tom's tin box. Even if he had not been entirely certain of it that first day when he had neglected to show them to Sarah, he knew now just what reason underlay his secrecy. Like Old Tom, he felt that hi

rence with Mr. Allison, Steve?" he

ness left the other's face. He looked awa

oward the end of the week, if I could get away. He said no doubt I wou

, privately, your opinion of this job which the East Coast Company has on its h

s pause while Steve's eyes rov

that it wasn't so very much more than a man-sized gamble. Nor Mr. Ainnesley, either, I think. So t

murmured C

black velvet suit-a vision of a bleak-faced boy with bruised lips who had insisted upon going back downtown for

," he ventured. "Unforeseen interference which, unles

emed very,

not see Steve's face behind the cupped hands at his pipe bo

elivered might be construed as somehow relative. Fat Joe had been driving for an hour, silent some of the time, but for the most part devoted

hand to-day who'll be a distinct addition to our gang up-river. Just to while away the dark hours I'll let you guess for a while

h had interrupted him. He had just been thinking about the tight grip of a slender hand which had fallen upon his arm that afternoon when a red

n," grun

ness Fat Joe si

met up with him, down the road a piece, and Allison had fired him for keeps, he said. He asked me if we didn't have room for a nice steady hand, so I hired him. And I'll leave it to you if it ain't Harrigan's feet that's mostly unsteady, at that. He seemed awful cheerful for a man who'd

r had long before learned to read the signs; he knew when his best efforts were only waste

tion of Allison's bluff cordiality with O'Mara only made him the more ashamed of his suspicion, and yet the next morning at table he attemp

ud. "He's in it, along with Elliott and Ainnesley, even if he isn't i

ed a reply that might be worth considering, but w

e murmured absently. "He's so much b

tly a relevant answer, bu

ed judiciously. "But he

rk poised, an

ho?" she neglected he

eb. "Isn't that what w

ng to his daughter and-and our boy, Stephen. I was going to ask you if you thought she could be entirely disin

ot," agreed

p again-I'm wondering if Archibald Wickersham woul

back his head and laughed until Sarah'

you have introduced the subject I might remark that there are two individuals to be considered. Maybe she migh

th in Sarah's eyes.

en I stopped him, that he hadn't written again because he wasn't certain that we wanted to hear; and he was painfully conscious of how childish it would sound in words, too. Some men quit when they are whipped once, bu

laborate at considerable length the reason for his certainty. His argument was r

nelessly to strum their instruments, to insure their later tunefulness, did she reluctantly abandon her positi

re fur-edged wrap, slipped in at the door, having stolen away ostensibly to display to them her costume. It was after the hour of ten, but the girl lingered a

ome," she hesitated. "I had promised both Garr

statement for what it was-a question w

nt back into camp," she answered. "He,

a second later, when she had drawn back suddenly into the room with a muffled exclamation, her brother was astonished at her beaming face. A moment earlier he would have sworn

r inability to analyze that strange mood which, twice in the last few nights, had sent her with aching throat and wet cheeks into Miriam's room, she was within arm's length of the dark figure in the hedge gap through which she had

imself that he would not go, he had found himself reopening the mental discussion, and yet-and strangely enough-it was not the recollection of Barbara's repeated invitations, or even her distress over Garry Devereau, who had been ceaselessly in his thoughts ever since she had spoken of him, which finally achieved the decision. An insistent desire again to meet the Honorable Archibald Wickersham in the end led him to request Fat Joe to hook up the team, that

w up one small hand, as if to shield her face. And then, the cloak falling open at her throat, a slender, swaying figure in blue and shimmering whi

ways prepare to greet y

at her-stared much as if he mi

ed at last, but even the words were tinged

rays that wavered over his shoulder from the windows behind him disclosed the misty gladness of welcome in her eyes, splashed now with points of light not so very unlike t

ed, when his fingers touche

t the hand holding her own, contemplating her small white fingers curled up now into a warm

ered at the new pulse in her throat, which beat

. I'd begun to believe that you hadn't forgotten-that you didn't care to.... Will you please

he treble strains of violins beyond. Once, in that quiet, his eyes strayed to the small and round, and yellow object which she carried in the crook of one arm-a tin

e up in his eyes-the old undisguised wonder of the boy of ten years before, for which, until that instant, she had looked in vain-but it was a man's wonder of woman now, utter and absolute and all-enveloping. She caught her breath then; she touched her lips

eathed. "Do I-pass inspection? D

d, lips parted, she listened, conscious o

ways, yourself. And you are not permitted to ask forgiveness from me, nor pardon. Men do not admit that there can be need of that, where they have worship

ealized that his free arm was lifted toward her. As she started forward, her ankles became entangled in the soft pile of satin at her feet, and she stopped to free them-and started forward again. But when, at her inarticulate effort at speech, he bent his head to her swiftly upflung face, her whole slender body tightened at the rough cont

ck the black cowl that hid his face and began to speak, Stephen O'Mara recognized that terribly pale,

ve yielded to spirit of frivolity. Two hours ago I appeared masked in these dingy vestments as Love's Young Dream; but with me the mood has passed. Fellow romancers, you have witnessed a metamorphosis; you are now gazing upon the Wrath of God, about to thunder forth upon a coal black ch

sings, my children!"

felicitations! An

still I may sense y

did animal quivered and bunched hard thigh muscles and spurned the gravel. White face whiter still against the background of his somber

had been that black-robed horseman, straight ahead of her. Then a tremor shook her. Mechanically she started forward,

e?" he asked

no move t

ntle voice commanded this time

There was nothing girlish in his reply-nothing boyish in that high-held chin and stiffened body. A hard note marred her utterance, a perfection of insolence edged with scorn, wh

to despise myself as utterly as you have taught me to, at this minute. And since you choose to regard it now as yo

throat and cheek and brow, and then ebb away. She gave him time to answer, but he did not speak; and

taining me,

dged sapphire cloak about her and fastened it close beneath her uptilted chin. He waited, bare of head, in the hedge gap until she had crossed the lawn to the house that

carcely any rest at all. And hour after hour he drove in silence, checking himself apologetically once or twice when he forgot himself long enough t

night," mused the

t much longer. His pent-up spiri

an openin' to whale in. Lonesome? Say, it gives me chills, a night like this. It don't seem to have no heart, somehow, nor mercy nor nuthin', does it? It's all wrong! It ain't dark enough, and it ain't light enough; it's too quiet, and th

ly inattentive, but the flood-ga

't exactly genteel to call a lady out of her name, any way you look at it. And not that I've reache

red yards, with the long bunk houses already visible, the weird hoot of an owl fluted through the darkness. At its third repetition Fat Joe's song hushed; he cocked his head on one side to listen, and shot a glance at Steve, but he knew that the latter had not

e East Coast job as office and domicile, too. While Fat Joe laid on the whip a man came hurtling past the outflung door, sprang to his feet and, running low to the ground, disappeared into the blackness of the brush. Joe swung the horses up in a

o stroke the soft nose of the black horse standing there with reins a-trail. It was Ragtime, wet with lather and caked with dust. But even then he was not prepared for the sight which met him when he entered the shack. Seconds must have passed while he stood staring from the threshold, for Fat Joe came puffing back from his

emarked with bad mildness; "and, say, thi

loose and slack, and the plump one caught sigh

wasn't so far gone that he couldn't put up a tidy little battle, was he? Funny about that, too

pounced forward and recovered a

take us more than two weeks to replace 'em neither-not more'n two precious, priceless weeks. I'm only hopin' now that when our other caller, who seems to want them more tha

ickeningly slack figure upon his own bunk. He was listening now to his heart, and at a jerk of his head Fat Joe joined him at the bedside. The latter's thick fingers w

ead! It ain't that scratch on the head that's got him slippin', either." Joe paused and turned to address Garry Devereau's still white face itself. "You sat in an' backed my game like a gentleman born," he said, "and now I'm a-goin' to play yo

nia, for brandy, for a half-dozen drugs from the camp hospital chest; and each of them Steve brought

e asked in an interv

h a tightening of his jaws, an

eamed at them, cursed them frothingly, and Fat Joe hung on and cursed him back-cursed him and promised him profanely that he would not let him die. Steve's face was gray, sweat was pouring from Fat Joe's scarlet face when the life-tide ebbed l

g tenor, "there, by God! And if I ain't created a

anely, about the room. His gaze flitted wonderingly from wall to wall before it rested, fearfully fixed, upon Steve's brown face. Instantly he looked away, flinchingly, and met Fat Joe's voluminous grin-and looked back again, cun

e words laboriously. "I wasn't s

ried to smile-his sl

tered. "And how are you, Steve-a