Imogene's cabin, however, was the only one showing a light when they stopped before the pair of little houses, and only Imogene was at home. She was delighted to go with Lee and Louise. Ruth had driven with Charlie Menocal to Kennard earlier in the afternoon, she briefly stated. Then she remarked:

"Aren't you dissipating frightfully to-night, Lee?"

"Like a regular devil," was the response.

CHAPTER XIX

Imogene had been startled by a note in Lee's answer to her bantering question that she never before had heard him use. Though his words were uttered lightly, there nevertheless was a hard ring to them, a grate, as if his teeth were on edge. Something had happened. Ruth had driven during the afternoon to see him and returned exceedingly put out. If anything had occurred, Imogene hoped it was--well, one certain thing.

When Bryant brought her home that evening, he went with her into her cabin. In silence he built up the fire, fussed for a time with the lamp-wick, lighted a cigarette, took a turn across the cabin, inspected thoughtfully the back of one hand, and then lifted his gaze to Imogene. She had been waiting, with a vague alarm. And this his stern visage and burning eyes increased.

"Will Ruth marry me at once, do you think?" he questioned.

"To-morrow--or the next day?" His tone was calm. He might have been speaking of the cabin, asking if it kept out the wind.

Imogene was dumbfounded by that voice and that inquiry. She had expected anything but either.

"Not then; not so soon, I suspect," she said, at length.

"When? At the end of a week, the end of a fortnight?"

"I can't say," she replied with a sensation now of being harried.

This would not do; she must get herself in hand. "The fact is, Lee, I'm not in Ruth's confidence. Haven't been for some considerable time.

We've drifted a little apart."

"Only a little?"

"Only a little--I hope."

The cigarette Bryant held had gone out. Presently he glanced at it, then crushed it in his palm and dropped it into a coat pocket.

"Don't fence with me, Imogene," he said. "Give me the truth."

The truth--well, why not? He was ent.i.tled to it. Besides, since he had eyes and a brain with which to reason he was not ignorant of the girls' waning friendship. Pretense was foolish. Imogene leaned forward in her seat and rested her crossed arms upon her knees, directing her look at the floor. Her fluffy golden hair had been slightly disarranged when she removed her hat and so remained. Her face was thinner than in the summer, with a pinched aspect about her lips.

"The situation is this," she began, slowly. "Ruth and I are not really on good terms and we've been perilously near a break several times.

But I've restrained my temper and my tongue to avoid one, because I feel I must remain as long as she does. No, I can't leave her here alone--that would be brutal. And ruinous for her, too. I've thought it all out pretty carefully. You see, we both agreed to stay when we came, until we agreed to go or had proved up on our claims. Probably I don't make myself very clear to you. I think now that I made a mistake and that neither of us ought ever to have attempted homesteading. So much has happened that is different from what I antic.i.p.ated. Not the existence itself; I don't mean that. Other things. Ruth's change, chiefly. See, Lee, I speak frankly, for we've usually been frank toward each other. You two are engaged, but"--she straightened up in order to meet his eyes--"she's treating you abominably and shamelessly. Ordinarily, I would hold my peace, I've held it hitherto, but I can no longer. Why, I choke sometimes! Going constantly with Gretzinger, who's so despicable that he tries to use her as a tool to reach and corrupt you, or Charlie Menocal, who's your out-and-out enemy, it's too much for me, Lee. And uncle and aunt are furious with me for staying. She listen to me? Ruth listens neither to me nor any one." She rose and came close to Bryant. "You're right to marry her immediately. If you two love each other, that is." Her look was penetrating, questioning. "For she needs a restraining influence.

People in Kennard are talking----"

"My G.o.d!" Bryant cried, hoa.r.s.ely. "No, no; not Ruth! She couldn't do anything wrong!"

"No, there's nothing bad. But she has given grounds for gossip, she and some other girls. She sees too much of this Gretzinger and Charlie Menocal and men like them; and the time may come when I'll tremble.

I've begged her to be discreet and considerate of your good opinion and love, but she always declares that she's acting eminently proper.

Lee."

"Yes."

"There's something more. Gretzinger's not only finding amus.e.m.e.nt in her company, he's in love with her. After the women he's been accustomed to in New York, the rouged and jaded type he naturally would know, her freshness and spirits appeal to him. But you know what sort of man he is--cynical, unscrupulous, without principles."

A long time pa.s.sed before Bryant made a response. He stood knitting his brows, as if preoccupied. Imogene wondered if he had been following her at the last.

"I'll speak to him about his principles in connection with Ruth," he said. The utterance was amazingly dispa.s.sionate. Then quite unexpectedly he remarked, "I've never yet had to kill a man, never as yet."

Imogene shuddered, and she was terrified. It was as if a curtain had been jerked aside disclosing figures grouped for tragedy.

"It must never come to that," she breathed.

Bryant stirred, then began to look about the room. He grew observant.

"This is bad for you, Imogene," he said, presently. "Impossible! Your uncle is right. This wretched cabin doesn't keep out cold or wind; you have to chop wood and carry water, tasks beyond your strength; you're lonely, you're ill at times--"

"And Ruth?"

"Well?"

"You know her situation. Financial, I mean."

"I less than any one know it. Extraordinary, too, now that I think of it," he said, reflectively. "What is her situation?" Immediately he added, "Of course, I guess that she has no great means and she has said that she lacks training to earn a livelihood. But her family?"

"She lived with an aunt until she came here, Lee."

"So she mentioned."

"They didn't get on well together after Ruth went to stay with her on her parents' death," Imogene explained. "The woman was narrow-minded and exacting, especially in matters of amus.e.m.e.nts and religion. You know the type." Bryant nodded. "And Ruth was young, exuberant, and, as I now see, wilful. Their clashes were the cause of her desire to come West. We had been good friends, but not intimates; and I marvel at myself now at having gone so rashly into a thing like this, without inquiring whether our habits, tastes, desires, natures, everything, fitted us for prolonged companionship. Yes, I marvel." She sat motionless, staring at the lamp fixedly. "However, I'm in it now up to my neck. Ruth declares that she will never return to her aunt."

"And she can't earn a living."

"Nor would if she could, I fear," Imogene added, a little sadly. "At least, now. It would be too dull."

"Then I must marry her at once."

Imogene gave him a strange look.

"She is waiting," said she.

"For marriage?"

"No, to see how you succeed. Oh, to have to say these things is dreadful, Lee!" she exclaimed. But Bryant brushed this aside with a gesture almost august in its indifference. "If you finish your project on time, she will be ready for the ceremony," the girl went on. "If you fail, she'll postpone it until you're able to provide more than just a roof, a chair, and a broom. Her very words! Love must not prevent people from being practical, from her viewpoint. So, as I say, she's waiting to discover the outcome." A corner of her mouth twisted up while she paused. Then she concluded in a low voice, "And probably something else."

Bryant had again fallen into study. Imogene doubted if he had heard her added remark, and she could not divine from his countenance how fierce or in what direction his covered pa.s.sion was beating.

"It will be too late," said he, suddenly and, as it seemed to her, irrelevantly.

Then she thought that she understood.

"He's going home in a few days, for the Christmas holidays," she stated. "Possibly then Ruth will--I'm planning for us all to be at uncle's, you with us."