CHAPTER X
"It ain't nothing to laugh about," said Harrison savagely, "you have changed, every way. You ain't the same girl you was a month ago. You dress different; you act different; you treat me different; and it's gettin' to be more'n I'm goin' to stand for."
Ethel Mason only laughed again in answer. A month had passed since her father's death, an aunt from the lake coming up to the mountain to live with her; but, according to Seneca's gossip, and according to Seneca's general ideas of the fitness of things, this was but a temporary arrangement, to last merely until such time had elapsed as would suit the rough conventions of the county, when Ethel Mason would then become Mrs. Jack Harrison.
According to Jack's ideas, indeed, the proper period had fully elapsed, and on this special evening he had walked over from his cabin with a definite purpose in mind; only to find, as sometimes happens when man proposes, that the girl in the case was in mood capricious, even frivolous, always somehow evading, by turn and twist of the conversation, the subject uppermost in his thoughts. Gradually the little frown between his eyes had grown darker and darker, and finally the girl's failure to be serious had provoked him to open wrath.
"Dear me," mocked the girl, "more'n you're going to stand for. And I wonder what you're going to do about it. Are you boss over me? Haven't I a right to dress as I please, and act as I please, and treat you as I please? I guess I don't understand what you mean by not standing for it?"
The young miner winced. Certainly he was not making the headway he had expected, nor was the conversation coming any nearer the desired end. Restlessly he fidgeted in his chair, uncrossed his legs, and immediately recrossed them again, swallowed desperately once or twice, and finally plunged headlong into the speech he had lately rehearsed so many times to himself.
"Look here, Ethel," he began, his voice sounding strangely in his own ears, "this ain't no way for you to live, up here alone by yourself, an' you ought to make a change mighty quick. If things had broke different, and Jim hadn't gone so sudden, I'd have had plenty to say before this, but of course that went and changed everything. You're owner of the mine now, and whatever Jim might have meant to do for me, as it is, I'm nothin' but your hired man; foreman of your mine, workin' under you."
He paused uncertainly for a moment; then, as the girl made no effort to break the silence, he continued, "You know what I think of you, Ethel; you know I've loved you from the day you first set foot in Seneca; you know I've always meant to ask you to marry me the minute I felt I was well enough fixed to have the right to ask; and now—well, everything's changed; you're rich and I'm poor, but, by God, Ethel—" and his voice rang vibrant with a strong man's pride—"I'm a man, and when the papers go through I'll be foreman of the mine for the company at the salary they meant to give Jim, and if you'll have me, I swear I'll never touch a cent of your money; I'll work my hands to the bone for you; and I'll look out for you every way I can, as true and faithful as a man could. I mean it, Ethel, every word; I love you, and if you'll marry me, that's all in the world I ask."
Abruptly he stopped speaking. To the last few words the girl had seemed scarcely to be listening, as the faint sound of wheels, the sound she had been expecting, came to her ears. She leaned forward, speaking low and rapidly.
"Jack," she said, "you know how fond I am of you, but we can't have to-night to ourselves. Mr. Gordon's coming over to talk some business about the mine, and I can't very well put him off, for he's going East to-morrow. Come over to-morrow night, Jack, and we'll be all by ourselves then."
The tone, fully as much as the words themselves, seemed entirely to satisfy Harrison. Without objection he rose.
"All right," he answered, "I'll be over to-morrow night, and I'll be looking to hear good news, too."
The girl made no answer. For a moment, Harrison paused at the door, then turned and came swiftly toward her. "Just one kiss, Ethel," he said, "just to show everything's all right between us."
With a little laugh the girl rose and yielded herself to his embrace, nor did Harrison, consumed with passion, note that her lips met his without response. Once, twice, thrice, he kissed her upturned lips; then without a word half threw her from him and burst blindly from the room.
Scarcely five minutes later, and Gordon sat in the self-same chair which Harrison had occupied, gazing with approval at the slender figure opposite. Beyond question, the strain of the past few weeks had changed her, and not for the worse. The girl's face was thinner and more thoughtful, and yet far more attractive even than before; the soft, petulant prettiness of the child giving place to the real beauty of the woman.
"You wanted to see me about the mine?" she queried.
Gordon shook his head. "That," he answered, "was only a somewhat clumsy excuse. But I did want to see you very much, and I wanted to see you alone, so I thought the mine would serve."
The girl nodded. "And now?" she asked.
Gordon noted the little smile that played about her lips. In some things, he acknowledged on the instant to himself, no man could ever hope to cope successfully with a woman. And he smiled in answer.
"Yes," he said slowly, "that's it. I want you to marry me to-morrow morning, and start East with me on the express to-morrow afternoon."
Ethel Mason laughed outright. "You're more business-like than the others," she said mockingly, "and yet haven't you forgotten something else? Sometimes, you know, just a word or so, about—love."
Gordon shrugged his shoulders. "I didn't forget it," he said, "I'd have put it in if I'd thought you expected it; glad to, really, because I do it rather well. But what's the use? You know I've got all the feeling for you that sex has for sex; that goes without saying; you've seen it in a hundred ways; and in addition I know that together we can go a hundred times as far as we'll ever get separately. But beyond that—the dying for you, and shedding my heart's blood, and all that—why, these days, that's a little bit out of date."
The girl gazed at him with an expression hard to fathom. "It's not very flattering," she suggested.
Gordon made a little impatient gesture. "Oh, come," he said, "I'm perfectly frank. Why can't you be so, too? Does the woman marry just for love? Doesn't the woman want to feel passion first? Or, if she isn't that kind, doesn't she figure what she's getting in return for herself? Dollars and cents, these days. I say again, story-book love's gone by."
The girl shook her head. "You're talking for the city woman," she said, "who's got so civilized she's lost the instinct every woman once had. With a woman, unless she stifles it till it's dead, there's one thing comes ahead of everything else, and that's to be protected, cared for, guarded, to be safe. Perhaps it isn't quite love, but it's pretty nearly the same thing. Somebody stronger to lean on, some one in time of danger who won't fail her. That's what comes first."
Gordon gazed at her with real surprise. Then, without hesitation, he nodded. "You're right," he said, "and that I can give you, too. Will you marry me, Ethel?"
The girl did not answer; the long silence seeming in no way to embarrass her. At last, with a little sigh, she looked up at him.
"I will be frank with you," she said, "it's so hard to know what to do. Jack was here to-night before you came, and he asked me the same question you're asking now. Jack's rough, and he isn't educated, but he's big and strong, and I know he thinks a lot of me, and, besides, he's really a man."
Gordon, with the skill not to provoke opposition, nodded assent. "You're right," he said with conviction, "no one thinks more of Jack than I do. But, Ethel, without flattery, you're a woman in a thousand—in looks, in charm, in every way. And Jack—it isn't his fault—Jack is rough and uneducated, and it's too late to change him now. And, with all his good qualities, you'd never be happy with him all your life through. You couldn't, Ethel. Think what it would mean to live your life here on the mountain, no friends, no interests, nothing but life with Jack and the mine. No, we only live once, and it's our duty to make the most of it. And think of the other side of the picture. Wealth, social position, everything you could desire. I'm not a man of great wealth yet, but let me swing the mine the way I want to, and I'll be a millionaire ten times over. Think of it, Ethel. Your city house, your country place, servants, horses, motors, around the world in a steam yacht; we'd get out of life what only a chosen few can get. Say you'll marry me, Ethel, and you'll never live to regret it, so help me God."
There was a silence even longer than before. Then the girl rose and began to pace the room with quick, nervous steps.
"Oh, I don't know," she cried, "you make it so hard. It's my whole life you're asking me to decide. And I believe you're honest, too, and sincere; but, I've known Jack all my life. Oh, I don't know what to do."
Gordon rose, and coming quickly across the room, took her in his arms. She made no resistance, and very gently he stooped and kissed her.
"I know it's hard," he said. "It's hard to give up Jack. It's hard to leave the place that's always been your home; but, Ethel, it's the only way. I'm not going to urge my claims too far. After all's said, you're the one to decide. I'm going back now, and I'm coming here at ten o'clock to-morrow morning. Make your decision then, and whatever it is, in every way, Ethel, I'll always stand your friend. Good night, and I shall hope—and expect—to find you ready when I come."
He was gone, and the girl was left alone. Alone, to lie awake the long night through, thinking, planning, deciding and then changing her decision, in a tremor of doubt and uncertainty, until the morning sunlight, sweet and wholesome, forced its cheery way through the shutters of the little room.
For Jack Harrison, never did day seem so long. The hours dragged on leaden feet, even the minutes seemed mockingly to lengthen all through the dreary day. It was dusk when he started for the cabin, and as he neared it, absently he noticed that the light was not yet lit in the kitchen window. With a step so buoyant as to become almost a run, he thrust open the gate, and gained the porch. The door was shut, and the latch did not yield to his eager pressure. Then, suddenly coming to himself, he gave a gasp of fear, and half staggered back on the porch. As he did so, his eye caught, pinned to the door, a square of white. With trembling fingers he lit a match, tore open the letter, and read the few brief words it contained. Then, silent, as if mortally stricken, he staggered here and there, as if still blindly seeking, in the place she had loved so well, the girl he had loved—and lost.
On his knees he dropped, clasping the railing with his hands, and in dumb agony gazed out as if for help across the mighty silences of the darkening valley. The west wind, sweeping free, moaned through the tree tops below; dark clouds, driven low, one by one blotted out the light of stars; faintly, here and there, on the mountain side, gleamed the lights of other cabins, homes—such as the home he had some day meant to build. With a sudden uncontrollable gesture, he raised his eyes to the heavens, where, amid the flying cloud wrack, one star still faintly shone.
"Oh, God! Oh, God!" he cried. "And I loved her so."
Faster sped the hurrying clouds, louder moaned the freshening wind; even the single star no longer shone, and darkness, like a pall, settled down over Burnt Mountain.
