"Nope, you're wrong, d.i.c.k," snapped Pan insolently. "I got here just in time to save her from that doubtful honor."

"You'd break her engagement to me?" rasped Hardman huskily, and he actually shook in his saddle.

"I have broken it."

"Lucy, tell me he lies!" begged Hardman, turning to her in poignant distress. If he had any good in him it showed then.

Lucy came out from the shade of the tree into the sunlight. She was pale, but composed.

"d.i.c.k, it's true," she said, steadily. "I've broken my word. I can't marry you.... I love Pan. I've loved him always. It would be a sin to marry you now."

"_h.e.l.lsfire!_" shrieked Hardman. His face grew frightful to see--beastly with rage. "You're as bad as that hussy who threw me down for him. I'll fix you, Lucy Blake. And I'll put your cow-thief father behind the bars for life."

Pan leaped at Hardman and struck him a body blow that sent him tumbling out of his saddle to thud on the ground. The frightened horse ran down the path toward the gate.

"You dirty-mouthed cur," said Pan. "Get up, and if you've got a gun--throw it."

Hardman laboriously got to his feet. The breath had been partly knocked out of him. Baleful eyes rolled at Pan. Instinctive wrath, however, had been given a setback. Hardman had been forced to think of something beside the frustration of his imperious will.

"I'm--not--packing--my gun," he panted, heavily. "You saw--that--Pan Smith."

"Well, you'd better pack it after this," replied Pan with contempt.

"Because I'm liable to throw on you at sight."

"I'll have--you--run--out of this country," replied d.i.c.k huskily.

"Bah! don't waste your breath. Run me out of this country? Me!

Reckon you never heard of Panhandle Smith. You're so thickheaded you couldn't take a hunch. Well, I'll give you one, anyway. You and your crooked father, and your two bit of a sheriff pardner would do well to leave this country. Savvy that! Now get out of here p.r.o.nto."

Hardman gave Pan a ghastly stare and wheeled away to stride down the path. Once he turned to flash his convulsed face at Lucy. Then he pa.s.sed out of sight among the trees in search of his horse.

Pan stood gazing down the green aisle. He had acted true to himself.

How impossible to meet this situation in any other way! It meant the spilling of blood. He knew it--accepted it--and made no attempt to change the cold pa.s.sion deep within him. Lucy--his mother and father would suffer. But wouldn't they suffer more if he did not confront this conflict as his hard training dictated? He was almost afraid to turn and look at Lucy. Just a little while before he had promised her forbearance. So his amaze was great when she faced him, violet eyes ablaze, to clasp him, and creep close to him, with lingering traces of fear giving way to woman's admiration and love.

"Panhandle Smith!" she whispered, gazing up into his face. "I heard your story. It thrilled me.... But I never understood--till you faced d.i.c.k Hardman.... Oh, what have you done for me? ... Oh, Pan, you have saved me from ruin."

CHAPTER EIGHT

Pan and Lucy did not realize the pa.s.sing of time until they were called to dinner. As they stepped upon the little porch, Lucy tried to withdraw her hand from Pan's, but did not succeed.

"See here," said he, very seriously, yielding to an urge he could not resist. "Wouldn't it be wise for us to--to get married at once?"

Lucy blushed furiously. "Pan Smith! Are you crazy?"

"Reckon I am," he replied, ruefully. "But I got to thinking how I'll be out after wild horses.... And I'm afraid something might happen.

Please marry me this afternoon?"

"Pan! You're--you're terrible," cried Lucy, and s.n.a.t.c.hing away her hand, scarlet of face she rushed into the house ahead of him.

He followed, to find Lucy gone. His father was smiling, and his mother had wide-open hopeful eyes. A slim young girl, with freckles, grave sweet eyes and curly hair was standing by a window. She turned and devoured him with those shy eyes. From that look he knew who she was.

"Alice! Little sister!" he exclaimed, meeting her. "Well, by golly, this is great."

It did not take long for Pan to grasp that a subtle change had come over his mother and father. Not the excitement of his presence nor the wonder about Lucy accounted for it, but a difference, a lessening of strain, a relief. Pan sensed a reliance upon him that they were not yet conscious of.

"Son, what was the matter with Lucy?" inquired his father, shrewdly.

"Why nothing to speak of," replied Pan, nonchalantly. "Reckon she was a little fl.u.s.tered because I wanted her to marry me this afternoon."

"Good gracious!" cried his mother. "You are a cowboy. Lucy marry you when she's engaged to another man!"

"Mother, dear, that's broken off. Don't remind me of it. I want to look pleasant, so you'll all be glad I'm home."

"Glad!" his mother laughed, with a catch in her voice. "My prayers have been answered.... Come now to dinner. Remember, Pan, when you used to yell, 'Come an' get it before I throw it out'?"

Bobby left Pan's knee and made a beeline for the kitchen. Alice raced after him.

"Pan, I met d.i.c.k Hardman on the road. He looked like h.e.l.l, and was sure punishin' his horse. I said when I seen him I'd bet he's run into Pan. How about it?"

"Reckon he did," laughed Pan. "It was pretty tough on him, I'm bound to admit. He rode down the path and caught me--well, the truth is, Dad, I was kissing the young lady he imagined belonged to him."

"You range ridin' son-of-a-gun!" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed his father, in unmitigated admiration and gladness. "What come off?"

"I'll tell you after dinner. Gee, I smell applesauce! ... Dad, I never forgot Mother's cooking."

They went into the little whitewashed kitchen, where Pan had to stoop to avoid the ceiling, and took seats at the table. Pan feasted his eyes. His mother had not been idle during the hours that he was out in the orchard with Lucy, nor had she forgotten the things that he had always liked. Alice acted as waitress, and Bobby sat in a high chair beaming upon Pan. At that juncture Lucy came in. She had changed her gray blouse to one of white, with wide collar that was cut a little low and showed the golden contour of her superb neck. She had put her hair up. Pan could not take his eyes off her. In hers he saw a dancing subdued light, and a beautiful rose color in her cheeks.

"Well, I've got to eat," said Pan, as if by way of explanation and excuse for removing his gaze from this radiant picture.

Thus his home coming proved to be a happier event than he had ever dared to hope for. Lucy was quiet and ate but little. At times Pan caught her stealing a glimpse at him, and each time she blushed. She could not meet his eyes again. Alice too stole shy glances at him, wondering, loving. Bobby was hungry, but he did not forget that Pan sat across from him. Mrs. Smith watched Pan with an expression that would have pained him had he allowed remorse to come back then. And his father was funny. He tried to be natural, to meet Pan on a plane of the old western insouciance, but it was impossible. No doubt such happiness had not reigned in that household for years.

"Dad, let's go out and have a talk," proposed Pan, after dinner.

As they walked down toward the corrals Pan's father was silent, yet it was clear he labored with suppressed feeling.

"All right, fire away," he burst out at last, "but first tell me, for Gawd's sake, how'd you do it?"

"What?" queried Pan, looking round from his survey of the farm land.

"Mother! She's _well_. She wasn't well at all," exclaimed the older man, breathing hard. "An' that girl! Did you ever see such eyes?"

"Reckon I never did," replied Pan, with joyous bluntness.

"This mornin' I left Lucy crushed. Her eyes were like lead. An'

now!... Pan, I'm thankin' G.o.d for them. But tell me how'd you do it?"