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CHAPTER IV


"To accomplish a dessert as simple and inexpensive as it is tasty,"
prescribes The Complete Manual of Cookery, p. 48, "take one cup of thick
molasses--" But why should I infringe a copyright when the culinary
reader may acquire the whole range of kitchen lore by expending
eighty-nine cents plus postage on 39 T 337? Banneker had faithfully
followed the prescribed instructions. The result had certainly been
simple and inexpensive; presumably it would have proven tasty. He
regretted and resented the rape of the pie. What aroused greater
concern, however, was the presence of thieves. In the soft ground near
the window he found some rather small footprints which suggested that it
was the younger of the two hoboes who had committed the depredation.

Theorizing, however, was not the order of his day. Routine and
extra-routine claimed all his time. There was his supplementary report
to make out; the marooned travelers in Manzanita to be looked after and
their bitter complaints to be listened to; consultations over the wire
as to the condition and probabilities of the roadbed, for the floods had
come again; and in and out of it all, the busy, weary, indefatigable
Gardner, giving to the agent as much information as he asked from him.
When their final lists were compared, Banneker noticed that there was no
name with the initials I.O.W. on Gardner's. He thought of mentioning the
clue, but decided that it was of too little definiteness and importance.
The news value of mystery, enhanced by youth and beauty, which the
veriest cub who had ever smelled printer's ink would have appreciated,
was a sealed book to him.

Not until late that afternoon did a rescue train limp cautiously along
an improvised track to set the interrupted travelers on their way.
Gardner went on it, leaving an address and an invitation to "keep in
touch." Mr. Vanney took his departure with a few benign and well-chosen
words of farewell, accompanied by the assurance that he would "make it
his special purpose to commend," and so on. His nephew, Herbert Cressey,
the lily-clad messenger, stopped at the station to shake hands and grin
rather vacantly, and adjure Banneker, whom he addressed as "old chap,"
to be sure and look him up in the East; he'd be glad to see him any
time. Banneker believed that he meant it. He promised to do so, though
without particular interest. With the others departed Miss Camilla Van
Arsdale's two emergency guests, one of them the rather splendid young
woman who had helped with the wounded. They invaded Banneker's office
with supplementary telegrams and talked about their hostess with that
freedom which women of the world use before dogs or uniformed officials.

"What a woman!" said the amateur nurse.

"And what a house!" supplemented the other, a faded and lined
middle-aged wife who had just sent a reassuring and very long wire to a
husband in Pittsburgh.

"Very much the ch;telaine; grande dame and that sort of thing," pursued
the other. "One might almost think her English."

"No." The other shook her head positively. "Old American. As old and as
good as her name. You wouldn't flatter her by guessing her to be
anything else. I dare say she would consider the average British
aristocrat a little shoddy and loud."

"So they are when they come over here. But what on earth is her type
doing out here, buried with a one-eyed, half-breed manservant?"

"And a concert grand piano. Don't forget that. She tunes it herself,
too. Did you notice the tools? A possible romance. You've quite a nose
for such things, Sue. Couldn't you get anything out of her?"

"It's much too good a nose to put in the crack of a door," retorted the
pretty woman. "I shouldn't care to lay myself open to being snubbed by
her. It might be painful."

"It probably would." The Pittsburgher turned to Banneker with a change
of tone, implying that he could not have taken any possible heed of what
went before. "Has Miss Van Arsdale lived here long, do you know?"

The agent looked at her intently for a moment before replying: "Longer
than I have." He transferred his gaze to the pretty woman. "You two were
her guests, weren't you?" he asked.

The visitors glanced at each other, half amused, half aghast. The tone
and implication of the question had been too significant to be
misunderstood. "Well, of all extraordinary--" began one of them under
her breath; and the other said more loudly, "I really beg--" and then
she, too, broke off.

They went out. "Ch;telaine and knightly defender," commented the younger
one in the refuge of the outer office. "Have we been dumped off a train
into the midst of the Middle Ages? Where do you get station-agents like
that?"

"The one at our suburban station chews tobacco and says 'Marm' through
his nose."

Banneker emerged, seeking the conductor of the special with a message.

"He is rather a beautiful young thing, isn't he?" she added.

Returning, he helped them on the train with their hand-luggage. When the
bustle and confusion of dispatching an extra were over, he sat down to
think. But not of Miss Camilla Van Arsdale. That was an old story,
though its chapters were few, and none of them as potentially eventful
as this intrusion of Vanneys and female chatterers.

It was the molasses pie that stuck in his mind. There was no time to
make another. Further, the thought of depredators hanging about
disturbed him. That shack of his was full of Aladdin treasures,
delivered by the summoned genii of the Great Book. Though it was secured
by Little Guardian locks and fortified with the Scarem Buzz alarm, he
did not feel sure of it. He decided to sleep there that night with his
.45-caliber Sure-shot revolver. Let them come again; he'd give 'em a
lesson! On second thought, he rebaited the window-ledge with a can of
Special Juicy Apricot Preserve. At ten o'clock he turned in, determined
to sleep lightly, and immediately plunged into fathomless depths of
unconsciousness, lulled by a singing wind and the drone of the rain.

A light, flashing across his eyes, awakened him. For a moment he lay,
dazed, confused by the gentle and unfamiliar oscillations of his
hammock. Another flicker of light and a rumble of thunder brought him to
his full senses. The rain had degenerated into a casual drizzle and the
wind had withdrawn into the higher areas. He heard some one moving
outside.

Very quietly he reached out to the stand at his elbow, got his revolver
and his flashlight, and slipped to the floor. The malefactor without was
approaching the window. Another flash of lightning would have revealed
much to Banneker had he not been crouching close under the sill, on the
inside, so that the radiance of his light, when he found the button,
should not expose him to a straight shot.

A hand fumbled at the open window. Finger on trigger, Banneker held up
his flashlight in his left hand and irradiated the spot. He saw the
hand, groping, and on one of its fingers something which returned a more
brilliant gleam than the electric ray. In his crass amazement, the agent
straightened up, a full mark for murder, staring at a diamond-and-ruby
ring set upon a short, delicate finger.

No sound came from outside. But the hand became instantly tense. It fell
upon the sill and clutched it so hard that the knuckles stood out,
white, strained and garish. Banneker's own strong hand descended upon
the wrist. A voice said softly and tremulously:

"Please!"

The appeal went straight to Banneker's heart and quivered there, like a
soft flame, like music heard in an unrealizable dream.

"Who are you?" he asked, and the voice said:

"Don't hurt me."

"Why should I?" returned Banneker stupidly.

"Some one did," said the voice.

"Who?" he demanded fiercely.

"Won't you let me go?" pleaded the voice.

In the shock of his discovery he had released the flash-lever so that
this colloquy passed in darkness. Now he pressed it. A girlish figure
was revealed, one protective arm thrown across the eyes.

"Don't strike me," said the girl again, and again Banneker's heart was
shaken within him by such tremors as the crisis of some deadly fear
might cause.

"You needn't be afraid," he stammered.

"I've never been afraid before," she said, hanging her weight away from
him. "Won't you let me go?"

His grip relaxed slightly, then tightened again. "Where to?"

"I don't know," said the appealing voice mournfully.

An inspiration came to Banneker. "Are you afraid of me?" he asked
quietly.

"Of every thing. Of the night."

He pressed the flash into her hand, turning the light upon himself.
"Look," he said.

It seemed to him that she could not fail to read in his face the
profound and ardent wish to help her; to comfort and assure an uneasy
and frightened spirit wandering in the night.

He heard a little, soft sigh. "I don't know you," said the voice. "Do
I?"

"No," he answered soothingly as if to a child. "I'm the station-agent
here. You must come in out of the wet."

"Very well."

He tossed an overcoat on over his pajamas, ran to the door and swung it
open. The tiny ray of light advanced, hesitated, advanced again. She
walked into the shack, and immediately the rain burst again upon the
outer world. Banneker's fleeting impression was of a vivid but dimmed
beauty. He pushed forward a chair, found a blanket for her feet, lighted
the "Quick-heater" oil-stove on which he did his cooking. She followed
him with her eyes, deeply glowing but vague and troubled.

"This is not a station," she said.

"No. It's my shack. Are you cold?"

"Not very." She shivered a little.

"You say that some one hurt you?"

"Yes. They struck me. It made my head feel queer."

A murderous fury surged into his brain. His hand twitched toward his
revolver.

"The hoboes," he whispered under his breath. "But they didn't rob you,"
he said aloud, looking at the jeweled hand.

"No. I don't think so. I ran away."

"Where was it?"

"On the train."

Enlightenment burst upon him. "You're sure--" he began. Then, "Tell me
all you can about it."

"I don't remember anything. I was in my stateroom in the car. The door
was open. Some one must have come in and struck me. Here." She put her
left hand tenderly to her head.

Banneker, leaning over her, only half suppressed a cry. Back of the
temple rose a great, puffed, leaden-blue wale.

"Sit still," he said. "I'll fix it."

While he busied himself heating water, getting out clean bandages and
gauze, she leaned back with half-closed eyes in which there was neither
fear nor wonder nor curiosity: only a still content. Banneker washed the
wound very carefully.

"Does it hurt?" he asked.

"My head feels queer. Inside."

"I think the hair ought to be cut away around the place. Right here.
It's quite raw."

It was glorious hair. Not black, as Cressey had described it in his
hasty sketch of the unknown I.O.W.; too alive with gleams and glints of
luster for that. Nor were her eyes black, but rather of a deep-hued,
clouded hazel, showing troubled shadows between their dark-lashed, heavy
lids. Yet Banneker made no doubt but that this was the missing girl of
Cressey's inquiry.

"May I?" he said.

"Cut my hair?" she asked. "Oh, no!"

"Just a little, in one place. I think I can do it so that it won't show.
There's so much of it."

"Please," she answered, yielding.

He was deft. She sat quiet and soothed under his ministerings.
Completed, the bandage looked not too unworkmanlike, and was cool and
comforting to the hot throb of the wound.

"Our doctor went back on the train, worse luck!" he said.

"I don't want any other doctor," she murmured. "I'd rather have you."

"But I'm not a doctor."

"No," she acquiesced. "Who are you? Did you tell me? You are one of the
passengers, aren't you?"

"I'm the station-agent at Manzanita."

For a moment she looked at him wonderingly. "Are you? I don't seem to
understand. My head is very queer."

"Don't try to. Here's some tea and crackers."

"I'm starved," she said.

With subtle stirrings of delight, he watched her eat the bit that he had
prepared for her while heating the water. But he was wise enough to know
that she must not have much while the extent of her injury was still
undetermined.

"Are you wet?" he inquired.

She nodded. "I haven't been dry since the flood."

"I have a room with a real stove in it over the station. I'll build a
fire, and you must take off your wet things and go to bed and sleep. If
you need anything you can hammer on the floor."

"But you--"

"I'll be in my office, below. I'm on night duty to-night," said he,
tactfully fabricating.

"Very well. You're awfully kind."

He adjusted the oil-stove, threw a warmed blanket over her feet, and
hurried to his room to build the promised fire. When he came back she
smiled.

"You are good to me! It's stupid of me--my head is so queer--did you say
you were--"

"The station-agent. My name is Banneker. I'm responsible to the company
for your safety and comfort. You're not to worry about it, nor think
about it, nor ask any questions."

"No," she agreed, and rose.

He threw the blanket around her shoulders. At the protective touch she
slipped her hand through his arm. So they went out into the night.

Mounting the stairs, she stumbled, and for a moment he felt the firm,
warm pressure of her body against him. It shook him strangely.

"I'm sorry," she murmured. And, a moment later, "Good-night, and thank
you."

Taking the hand which she held out, he returned her good-night. The door
closed. He turned away and was halfway down the flight when a sudden
thought recalled him. He tapped on the door.

"What is it?" asked the serene music of the voice.

"I don't want to bother you, but there's just one thing I forgot. Please
give me your name."

"What for?" returned the voice doubtfully.

"I must report it to the company."

"Must you?" The voice seemed to be vaguely troubled. "To-night?"

"Don't give a thought to it," he said. "To-morrow will do just as well.
I'm sorry to have troubled you."

"Good-night," she said again.

"Can't remember her own name!" thought Banneker, moved and pitiful.

Darkness and quiet were grateful to him as he entered the office. By
sense of direction he found his chair, and sank into it. Overhead he
could hear the soft sound of her feet moving about the room, his room.
Quiet succeeded. Banneker, leagues removed from sleep, or the hope of
it, despite his bodily weariness, followed the spirit of wonder through
starlit and sunlit realms of dream.

The telegraph-receiver clicked. Not his call. But it brought him back to
actualities. He lighted his lamp and brought down the letter-file from
which had been extracted the description of the wreck for Gardner of the
Angelica City Herald.

Drawing out the special paper, he looked at the heading and smiled.
"Letters to Nobody." He took a fresh sheet and began to write. Through
the night he wrote and dreamed and dozed and wrote again. When a sound
of song, faint and sweet and imminent, roused him to lift his
sleep-bowed head from the desk upon which it had sunk, the gray, soiled
light of a stormy morning was in his eyes. The last words he had written
were:

"The breast of the world rises and falls with your breathing."

Banneker was twenty-four years old, and had the untainted soul of a boy
of sixteen.




CHAPTER V


Overhead she was singing. The voice was clear and sweet and happy. He
did not know the melody; some minor refrain of broken rhythm which
seemed always to die away short of fulfillment. A haunting thing of
mystery and glamour, such mystery and glamour as had irradiated his long
and wonderful night. He heard the door open and then her light footsteps
on the stair outside. Hot-eyed and disheveled, he rose, staggering a
little at first as he hurried to greet her.

She stood poised on the lower step.

"Good-morning," he said.

She made no return to his accost other than a slow smile. "I thought you
were a dream," she murmured.

"No. I'm real enough. Are you better? Your head?"

She put a hand to the bandage. "It's sore. Otherwise I'm quite fit. I've
slept like the dead."

"I'm glad to hear it," he replied mechanically. He was drinking her in,
all the grace and loveliness and wonder of her, himself quite
unconscious of the intensity of his gaze.

She accepted the mute tribute untroubled; but there was a suggestion of
puzzlement in the frown which began to pucker her forehead.

"You're really the station-agent?" she asked with a slight emphasis upon
the adverb.

"Yes. Why not?"

"Nothing. No reason. Won't you tell me what happened?"

"Come inside." He held open the door against the wind.

"No. It's musty." She wrinkled a dainty nose. "Can't we talk here? I
love the feel of the air and the wet. And the world! I'm glad I wasn't
killed."

"So am I," he said soberly.

"When my brain wouldn't work quite right yesterday, I thought that some
one had hit me. That isn't so, is it?"

"No. Your train was wrecked. You were injured. In the confusion you must
have run away."

"Yes. I remember being frightened. Terribly frightened. I'd never been
that way before. Outside of that one idea of fear, everything was mixed
up. I ran until I couldn't run any more and dropped down."

"And then?"

"I got up and ran again. Have you ever been afraid?"

"Plenty of times."

"I hadn't realized before that there was anything in the world to be
afraid of. But the thought of that blow, coming so suddenly from
nowhere, and the fear that I might be struck again--it drove me." She
flung out her hands in a little desperate gesture that twitched at
Banneker's breath.

"You must have been out all night in the rain."'

"No. I found a sort of cabin in the woods. It was deserted."

"Dutch Cal's place. It's only a few rods back in."

"I saw a light from there and that suggested to my muddled brain that I
might get something to eat."

"So you came over here."

"Yes. But the fear came on me again and I didn't dare knock. I suppose I
prowled."

"Gardner thought he heard ghosts. But ghosts don't steal molasses pie."

She looked at him solemnly. "Must one steal to get anything to eat
here?"

"I'm sorry," he cried. "I'll get you breakfast right away. What will you
have? There isn't much."

"Anything there is. But if I'm to board with you, you must let me pay my
way."

"The company is responsible for that."

Her brooding eyes were still fixed upon him. "You actually are the
agent," she mused. "That's quaint."

"I don't see anything quaint about it. Now, if you'll make yourself
comfortable I'll go over to the shack and rustle something for
breakfast."

"No; I'd rather go with you. Perhaps I can help."

Such help as the guest afforded was negligible. When, from sundry of the
Sears-Roebuck cans and bottles, a condensed and preserved sort of meal
had been derived, she set to it with a good grace.

"There's more of a kick in tea than in a cocktail, I believe, when you
really need it," she remarked gratefully. "You spoke of a Mr. Gardner.
Who is he?"

"A reporter who spent night before last here."

She dropped her cracker, oleomargarine-side down. "A reporter?"

"He came down to write up the wreck. It's a bad one. Nine dead, so far."

"Is he still here?"

"No. Gone back to Angelica City."

Retrieving her cracker, the guest finished her meal, heartily but
thoughtfully. She insisted on lending a hand to the washing-up process,
and complimented Banneker on his neatness.

"You haven't told me your name yet," he reminded her when the last
shining tin was hung up.

"No; I haven't. What will you do with it when you get it?"

"Report it to the company for their lists."

"Suppose I don't want it reported to the company?'

"Why on earth shouldn't you?"

"I may have my reasons. Would it be put in the papers?"

"Very likely."

"I don't _want_ it in the papers," said the girl with decision.

"Don't you want it known that you're all right? Your people--"

"I'll wire my people. Or you can wire them for me. Can't you?"

"Of course. But the company has a right to know what has happened to its
passengers."

"Not to me! What has the company done for me but wreck me and give me an
awful bang on the head and lose my baggage and--Oh, I nearly forgot. I
took my traveling-bag when I ran. It's in the hut. I wonder if you would
get it for me?"

"Of course. I'll go now."

"That's good of you. And for your own self, but not your old company,
I'll tell you my name. I'm--"

"Wait a moment. Whatever you tell me I'll have to report."

"You can't," she returned imperiously. "It's in confidence."

"I won't accept it so."

"You're a most extraordinary sta--a most extraordinary sort of man. Then
I'll give you this much for yourself, and if your company collects pet
names, you can pass it on. My friends call me Io."

"Yes. I know. You're I.O.W."

"How do you know that? And how much more do you know?"

"No more. A man on the train reported your initials from your baggage."

"I'll feel ever so much better when I have that bag. Is there a hotel
near here?"

"A sort of one at Manzanita. It isn't very clean. But there'll be a
train through to-night and I'll get you space on that. I'd better get a
doctor for you first, hadn't I?"

"No, indeed! All I need is some fresh things."

Banneker set off at a brisk pace. He found the extravagant little
traveling-case safely closed and locked, and delivered it outside his
own door which was also closed and, he suspected, locked.

"I'm thinking," said the soft voice of the girl within. "Don't let me
interrupt your work."

Beneath, at his routine, Banneker also set himself to think; confused,
bewildered, impossibly conjectural thoughts not unmingled with
semi-official anxiety. Harboring a woman on company property, even
though she were, in some sense, a charge of the company, might be open
to misconceptions. He wished that the mysterious Io would declare
herself.

At noon she did. She declared herself ready for luncheon. There was
about her a matter-of-fact acceptance of the situation as natural, even
inevitable, which entranced Banneker when it did not appall him. After
the meal was over, the girl seated herself on a low bench which Banneker
had built with his own hands and the Right-and-Ready Tool Kit (9 T 603),
her knee between her clasped hands and an elfish expression on her face.

"Don't you think," she suggested, "that we'd get on quicker if you
washed the dishes and I sat here and talked to you?"

"Very likely."

"It isn't so easy to begin, you know," she remarked, nursing her knee
thoughtfully. "Am I--Do you find me very much in the way?'"

"No."

"Don't suppress your wild enthusiasm on my account," she besought him.
"I haven't interfered with your duties so far, have I?"

"No," answered Banneker wondering what was coming next.

"You see"--her tone became ruminative and confidential--"if I give you
my name and you report it, there'll be all kinds of a mix-up. They'll
come after me and take me away."

Banneker dropped a tin on the floor and stood, staring.

"Isn't that what you want?"

"It's evident enough that it's what _you_ want," she returned,
aggrieved.

"No. Not at all," he disclaimed. "Only--well, out here--alone--I don't
understand."

"Can't you understand that if one had happened to drop out of the world
by chance, it might be desirable to stay out for a while?"

"For _you_? No; I can't understand that."

"What about yourself?" she challenged with a swift, amused gleam. "You
are certainly staying out of the world here."

"This is my world."

Her eyes and voice dropped. "Truly?" she murmured. Then, as he made no
reply, "It isn't much of a world for a man."

To this his response touched the heights of the unexpected. He stretched
out his arm toward the near window through which could be seen the white
splendor of Mount Carstairs, dim in the wreathing murk.

"Lo! For there, amidst the flowers and grasses, Only the mightier
movement sounds and passes, Only winds and rivers, Life and death,"
he quoted.

Her eyes glowed with sheer, incredulous astonishment. "How came you by
that Stevenson?" she demanded. "Are you poet as well as recluse?"

"I met him once."

"Tell me about it."

"Some other time. We've other things to talk of now."

"Some other time? Then I'm to stay!"

"In Manzanita?"

"Manzanita? No. Here."

"In this station? Alone? But why--"

"Because I'm Io Welland and I want to, and I always get what I want,"
she retorted calmly and superbly.

"Welland," he repeated. "Miss I.O. Welland. And the address is New York,
isn't it?"

Her hands grew tense across her knee, and deep in her shadowed eyes
there was a flash. But her voice suggested not only appeal, but almost a
hint of caress as she said:

"Are you going to betray a guest? I've always heard that Western
hospitality--"

"You're not my guest. You're the company's."

"And you won't take me for yours?"

"Be reasonable, Miss Welland."

"I suppose it's a question of the conventionalities," she mocked.

"I don't know or care anything about the conventionalities--"

"Nor I," she interrupted. "Out here."

"--but my guess would be that they apply only to people who live in the
same world. We don't, you and I."

"That's rather shrewd of you," she observed.

"It isn't an easy matter to talk about to a young girl, you know."

"Oh, yes, it is," she returned with composure. "Just take it for granted
that I know about all there is to be known and am not afraid of it. I'm
not afraid of anything, I think, except of--of having to go back just
now." She rose and went to him, looking down into his eyes. "A woman
knows whom she can trust in--in certain things. That's her gift, a gift
no man has or quite understands. Dazed as I was last night, I knew I
could trust you. I still know it. So we may dismiss that."

"That is true," said Banneker, "so far as it goes."

"What farther is there? If it's a matter of the inconvenience--"

"No. You know it isn't that."

"Then let me stay in this funny little shack just for a few days," she
pleaded. "If you don't, I'll get on to-night's train and go on and--and
do something I'll be sorry for all the rest of my life. And it'll be
your fault! I was going to do it when the accident prevented. Do you
believe in Providence?"

"Not as a butt-in," he answered promptly. "I don't believe that
Providence would pitch a rock into a train and kill a lot of people,
just to prevent a girl from making a foo--a bad break."

"Nor I," she smiled. "I suppose there's some kind of a General Manager
over this queer world; but I believe He plays the game fair and square
and doesn't break the rules He has made Himself. If I didn't, I wouldn't
want to play at all!... Oh, my telegram! I must wire my aunt in New
York. I'll tell her that I've stopped off to visit friends, if you don't
object to that description as being too compromising," she added
mischievously. She accepted a pad which he handed her and sat at the
table, pondering. "Mr. Banneker," she said after a moment.

"Well?"

"If the telegram goes from here, will it be headed by the name of the
station?"

"Yes."

"So that inquiry might be made here for me?"

"It might, certainly."

"But I don't want it to be. Couldn't you leave off the station?"

"Not very well."

"Just for me?" she wheedled. "For your guest that you've been so
insistent on keeping," she added slyly.

"The message wouldn't be accepted."

"Oh, dear! Then I won't send it."

"If you don't notify your family, I must report you to the company."

"What an irritating sense of duty you have! It must be dreadful to be
afflicted that way. Can't you suggest something?" she flashed. "Won't
you do a _thing_ to help me stay? I believe you don't want me, after
all."

"If the up-train gets through this evening, I'll give your wire to the
engineer and he'll transmit it from any office you say."

Childlike with pleasure she clapped her hands. "Of course! Give him
this, will you?" From a bag at her wrist she extracted a five-dollar
bill. "By the way, if I'm to be a guest I must be a paying guest, of
course."

"You can pay for a cot that I'll get in town," he agreed, "and your
share of the food."

"But the use of the house, and--and all the trouble I'm making you," she
said doubtfully. "I ought to pay for that."

"Do you think so?" He looked at her with a peculiar expression which,
however, was not beyond the power of her intuition to interpret.

"No; I don't," she declared.

Banneker answered her smile with his own, as he resumed his dish-wiping.
Io wrote out her telegram with care. Her next observation startled the
agent.

"Are you, by any chance, married?"

"No; I'm not. What makes you ask that?"

"There's been a woman in here before."

Confusedly his thoughts flew back to Carlotta. But the Mexican girl had
never been in the shack. He was quite absurdly and inexplicably glad now
that she had not.

"A woman?" he said. "Why do you think so?"

"Something in the arrangement of the place. That hanging, yonder. And
that little vase--it's good, by the way. The way that Navajo is placed
on the door. One feels it."

"It's true. A friend of mine came here one day and turned everything
topsy-turvy."

"I'm not asking questions just for curiosity. But is that the reason you
didn't want me to stay?"

He laughed, thinking of Miss Van Arsdale. "Heavens, no! Wait till you
meet her. She's a very wonderful person; but--"

"Meet her? Does she live near here, then?"

"A few miles away."

"Suppose she should come and find me here?"

"It's what I've been wishing."

"Is it! Well, it isn't what I wish at all."

"In fact," continued the imperturbable Banneker, "I rather planned to
ride over to her place this afternoon."

"Why, if you please?"

"To tell her about you and ask her advice."

Io's face darkened rebelliously. "Do you think it necessary to tattle to
a woman who is a total stranger to me?"

"I think it would be wise to get her view," he replied, unmoved.

"Well, I think it would be horrid. I think if you do any such thing, you
are--Mr. Banneker! You're not listening to me."

"Some one is coming through the woods trail," said he.

"Perhaps it's your local friend."

"That's my guess."

"Please understand this, Mr. Banneker," she said with an obstinate
outthrust of her little chin. "I don't know who your friend is and I
don't care. If you make it necessary, I can go to the hotel in town; but
while I stay here I won't have my affairs or even my presence discussed
with any one else."

"You're too late," said Banneker.

Out from a hardly discernible opening in the brush shouldered a big
roan. Tossing up his head, he stretched out in the long, easy lope of
the desert-bred, his rider sitting him loosely and with slack bridle.

"That's Miss Van Arsdale," said Banneker.




CHAPTER VI


Seated in her saddle the newcomer hailed Banneker.

"What news, Ban? Is the wreck cleared up?"

"Yes. But the track is out twenty miles east. Every arroyo and barranca
is bank-high and over."

He had crossed the platform to her. Now she raised her deep-set, quiet
eyes and rested them on the girl. That the station should harbor a
visitor at that hour was not surprising. But the beauty of the stranger
caught Miss Van Arsdale's regard, and her bearing held it.

"A passenger, Ban?" she asked, lowering her voice.

"Yes, Miss Camilla."

"Left over from the wreck?"

He nodded. "You came in the nick of time. I don't quite know what to do
with her."

"Why didn't she go on the relief train?"

"She didn't show up until last night."

"Where did she stay the night?"

"Here."

"In your office?"

"In my room. I worked in the office."

"You should have brought her to me."

"She was hurt. Queer in the head. I'm not sure that she isn't so yet."

Miss Van Arsdale swung her tall form easily out of the saddle. The girl
came forward at once, not waiting for Banneker's introduction, with a
formal gravity.

"How do you do? I am Irene Welland."

The older woman took the extended hand. There was courtesy rather than
kindliness in her voice as she asked, "Are you much hurt?"

"I'm quite over it, thank you. All but the bandage. Mr. Banneker was
just speaking of you when you rode up, Miss Van Arsdale."

The other smiled wanly. "It is a little startling to hear one's name
like that, in a voice from another world. When do you go on?"

"Ah, that's a point under discussion. Mr. Banneker would, I believe,
summon a special train if he could, in his anxiety to get rid of me."

"Not at all," disclaimed the agent.

But Miss Van Arsdale interrupted, addressing the girl:

"You must be anxious, yourself, to get back to civilization."

"Why?" returned the girl lightly. "This seems a beautiful locality."

"Were you traveling alone?"

The girl flushed a little, but her eyes met the question without
wavering. "Quite alone."

"To the coast?"

"To join friends there."

"If they can patch up the washed-out track," put in Banneker, "Number
Seven ought to get through to-night."

"And Mr. Banneker in his official capacity was almost ready to put me
aboard by force, when I succeeded in gaining a reprieve. Now he calls
you to his rescue."

"What do you want to do?" inquired Miss Van Arsdale with lifted brows.

"Stay here for a few days, in that funny little house." She indicated
the portable shack.

"That is Mr. Banneker's own place."

"I understand perfectly."

"I don't think it would do, Miss Welland. It is _Miss_ Welland, isn't
it?"

"Yes, indeed. Why wouldn't it do, Miss Van Arsdale?"

"Ask yourself."

"I am quite capable of taking care of myself," returned the girl calmly.
"As for Mr. Banneker, I assume that he is equally competent. And," she
added with a smiling effrontery, "he's quite as much compromised already
as he could possibly be by my staying."

Banneker flushed angrily. "There's no question of my being compromised,"
he began shortly.

"You're wrong, Ban; there is," Miss Van Arsdale's quiet voice cut him
short again. "And still more of Miss Welland's. What sort of escapade
this may be," she added, turning to the girl, "I have no idea. But you
cannot stay here alone."

"Can't I?" retorted the other mutinously. "I think that rests with Mr.
Banneker to say. Will you turn me out, Mr. Banneker? After our
agreement?"

"No," said Banneker.

"You can hardly kidnap me, even with all the conventionalities on your
side," Miss Welland pointed out to Miss Van Arsdale.

That lady made no answer to the taunt. She was looking at the
station-agent with a humorously expectant regard. He did not disappoint
her.

"If I get an extra cot for the shack, Miss Van Arsdale," he asked,
"could you get your things and come over here to stay?"

"Certainly."

"I won't be treated like a child!" cried the derelict in exactly the
tone of one, and a very naughty one. "I won't! I won't!" She stamped.

Banneker laughed.

"You're a coward," said Io.

Miss Van Arsdale laughed.

"I'll go to the hotel in the town and stay there."

"Think twice before you do that," advised the woman.

"Why?" asked Io, struck by the tone.

"Crawly things," replied Miss Van Arsdale sententiously.

"Big, hungry ones," added Banneker.

He could almost feel the little rippling shudders passing across the
girl's delicate skin. "Oh, I think you're _loathly_!" she cried. "Both
of you."

Tears of vexation made lucent the shadowed depths of her eyes. "I've
never been treated so in my life!" she declared, overcome by the
self-pity of a struggling soul trammeled by the world's injustice.

"Why not be sensible and stay with me to-night while you think it all
over?" suggested Miss Van Arsdale.

"Thank you," returned the other with an unexpected and baffling change
to the amenable and formal "You are very kind. I'd be delighted to."

"Pack up your things, then, and I'll bring an extra horse from the town.
I'll be back in an hour."

The girl went up to Banneker's room, and got her few belongings
together. Descending she found the agent busy among his papers. He put
them aside and came out to her.

"Your telegram ought to get off from Williams sometime to-morrow," he
said.

"That will be time enough," she answered.

"Will there be any answer?"

"How can there be? I haven't given any address."

"I could wire Williams later."

"No. I don't want to be bothered. I want to be let alone. I'm tired."

He cast a glance about the lowering horizon. "More rain coming," he
said. "I wish you could have seen the desert in the sunshine."

"I'll wait."

"Will you?" he cried eagerly. "It may be quite a while."

"Perhaps Miss Van Arsdale will keep me, as you wouldn't."

He shook his head. "You know that it isn't because I don't want you to
stay. But she is right. It just wouldn't do.... Here she comes now."

Io took a step nearer to him. "I've been looking at your books."

He returned her gaze unembarrassed. "Odds and ends," he said. "You
wouldn't find much to interest you."

"On the contrary. Everything interested me. You're a mystery--and I hate
mysteries."

"That's rather hard."

"Until they're solved. Perhaps I shall stay until I solve you."

"Stay longer. It wouldn't take any time at all. There's no mystery to
solve." He spoke with an air of such perfect candor as compelled her
belief in his sincerity.

"Perhaps you'll solve it for me. Here's Miss Van Arsdale. Good-bye, and
thank you. You'll come and see me? Or shall I come and see you?"

"Both," smiled Banneker. "That's fairest."

The pair rode away leaving the station feeling empty and unsustained. At
least Banneker credited it with that feeling. He tried to get back to
work, but found his routine dispiriting. He walked out into the desert,
musing and aimless.

Silence fell between the two women as they rode. Once Miss Welland
stopped to adjust her traveling-bag which had shifted a little in the
straps.

"Is riding cross-saddle uncomfortable for you?" asked Miss Van Arsdale.

"Not in the least. I often do it at home."

Suddenly her mount, a thick-set, soft-going pony shied, almost unseating
her. A gun had banged close by. Immediately there was a second report.
Miss Van Arsdale dismounted, replacing a short-barreled shot-gun in its
saddle-holster, stepped from the trail, and presently returned carrying
a brace of plump, slate-gray birds.

"Wild dove," she said, stroking them. "You'll find them a welcome
addition to a meager bill of fare."

"I should be quite content with whatever you usually have."

"Doubted," replied the other. "I live rather a frugal life. It saves
trouble."

"And I'm afraid I'm going to make you trouble. But you brought it upon
yourself."

"By interfering. Exactly. How old are you?"

"Twenty."

"Good Heavens! You have the aplomb of fifty."

"Experience," smiled the girl, flattered.

"And the recklessness of fifteen."

"I abide by the rules of the game. And when I find myself--well, out of
bounds, I make my own rules."

Miss Van Arsdale shook her firmly poised head. "It won't do. The rules
are the same everywhere, for honorable people."

"Honorable!" There was a flash of resentful pride as the girl turned in
the saddle to face her companion.

"I have no intention of preaching at you or of questioning you,"
continued the calm, assured voice. "If you are looking for
sanctuary"--the fine lips smiled slightly--"though I'm sure I can't see
why you should need it, this is the place. But there are rules of
sanctuary, also."

"I suppose," surmised the girl, "you want to know why I don't go back
into the world at once."

"No."

"Then I'll tell you."

"As you wish."

"I came West to be married."

"To Delavan Eyre?"

Again the dun pony jumped, this time because a sudden involuntary
contraction of his rider's muscles had startled him. "What do you know
of Delavan Eyre, Miss Van Arsdale?"

"I occasionally see a New York newspaper."

"Then you know who I am, too?"

"Yes. You are the pet of the society column paragraphers; the famous
'Io' Welland." She spoke with a curious intonation.

"Ah, you read the society news?"

"With a qualmish stomach. I see the names of those whom I used to know
advertising themselves in the papers as if they had a shaving-soap or a
chewing-gum to sell."

"Part of the game," returned the girl airily. "The newcomers, the
climbers, would give their souls to get the place in print that we get
without an effort."

"Doesn't it seem to you a bit vulgar?" asked the other.

"Perhaps. But it's the way the game is played nowadays."

"With counters which you have let the parvenues establish for you. In my
day we tried to keep out of the papers."

"Clever of you," approved the girl. "The more you try to keep out, the
more eager the papers are to print your picture. They're crazy over
exclusiveness," she laughed.

"Speculation, pro and con, as to who is going to marry whom, and who is
about to divorce whom, and whether Miss Welland's engagement to Mr. Eyre
is authentic, 'as announced exclusively in this column'--more
exclusiveness--; or whether--"

"It wasn't Del Eyre that I came out here to marry."

"No?"

"No. It's Carter Holmesley. Of course you know about him."

"By advertisement, also; the society-column kind."

"Really, you know, he couldn't keep out of the papers. He hates it with
all his British soul. But being what he is, a prospective duke, an
international poloist, and all that sort of thing, the reporters
naturally swarm to him. Columns and columns; more pictures than a
popular _danseuse_. And all without his lifting his hand."

"_Une mariage de reclame_," observed Miss Van Arsdale. "Is it that that
constitutes his charm for you?"

Miss Van Arsdale's smile was still instinct with mockery, but there had
crept into it a quality of indulgence.

"No," answered the girl. Her face became thoughtful and serious. "It's
something else. He--he carried me off my feet from the moment I met him.
He was drunk, too, that first time. I don't believe I've ever seen him
cold sober. But it's a joyous kind of intoxication; vine-leaves and
Bacchus and that sort of thing 'weave a circle 'round him thrice'--_you_
know. It _is_ honey-dew and the milk of Paradise to him." She laughed
nervously. "And charm! It's in the very air about him. He can make me
follow his lead like a little curly poodle when I'm with him."

"Were you engaged to Delavan Eyre when you met him?"

"Oh, engaged!" returned the girl fretfully. "There was never more than a
sort of understanding. A _mariage de convenance_ on both sides, if it
ever came off. I _am_ fond of Del, too. But he was South, and the other
came like a whirlwind, and I'm--I'm queer about some things," she went
on half shamefacedly. "I suppose I'm awfully susceptible to physical
impressions. Are all girls that way? Or is that gross and--and
underbred?"

"It's part of us, I expect; but we're not all so honest with ourselves.
So you decided to throw over Mr. Eyre and marry your Briton."

"Well--yes. The new British Ambassador, who arrives from Japan next
week, is Carty's uncle, and we were going to make him stage-manage the
wedding, you see. A sort of officially certified elopement."

"More advertisement!" said Miss Van Arsdale coldly. "Really, Miss
Welland, if marriage seems to you nothing more than an opportunity to
create a newspaper sensation I cannot congratulate you on your
prospects."

This time her tone stung. Io Welland's eyes became sullen. But her voice
was almost caressingly amiable as she said:

"Tastes differ. It is, I believe, possible to create a sensation in New
York society without any newspaper publicity, and without at all meaning
or wishing to. At least, it was, fifteen years ago; so I'm told."

Camilla Van Arsdale's face was white and lifeless and still, as she
turned it toward the girl.

"You must have been a very precocious five-year-old," she said steadily.

"All the Olneys are precocious. My mother was an Olney, a first cousin
of Mrs. Willis Enderby, you know."

"Yes; I remember now."

The malicious smile on the girl's delicate lips faded. "I wish I, hadn't
said that," she cried impulsively. "I hate Cousin Mabel. I always have
hated her. She's a cat. And I think the way she, acted in--in
the--the--well, about Judge Enderby and--".

"Please!" Miss Van Arsdale's tone was peremptory. "Here is my place."
She indicated a clearing with a little nest of a camp in it.

"Shall I go back?" asked Io remorsefully.

"No."

Miss Van Arsdale dismounted and, after a moment's hesitancy, the other
followed her example. The hostess threw open the door and a beautiful,
white-ruffed collie rushed to her with barks of joy. She held out a hand
to her new guest.

"Be welcome," she said with a certain stately gravity, "for as long as
you will stay."

"It might be some time," answered Io shyly. "You're tempting me."

"When is your wedding?"

"Wedding! Oh, didn't I tell you? I'm not going to marry Carter Holmesley
either."

"You are not going--"

"No. The bump on my head must have settled my brain. As soon as I came
to I saw how crazy it would be. That is why I don't want to go on West."

"I see. For fear of his overbearing you."

"Yes. Though I don't think he could now. I think I'm over it. Poor old
Del! He's had a narrow escape from losing me. I hope he never hears of
it. Placid though he is, that might stir him up."

"Then you'll go back to him?"

The girl sighed. "I suppose so. How can I tell? I'm only twenty, and it
seems to me that somebody has been trying to marry me ever since I
stopped petting my dolls. I'm tired of men, men, men! That's why I want
to live alone and quiet for a while in the station-agent's shack."

"Then you don't consider Mr. Banneker as belonging to the tribe of men?"

"He's an official. I could always see his uniform, at need." She fell
into thought. "It's a curious thing," she mused.

Miss Van Arsdale said nothing.

"This queer young cub of a station-agent of yours is strangely like
Carter Holmesley, not as much in looks as in--well--atmosphere. Only,
he's ever so much better-looking."

"Won't you have some tea? You must be tired," said Miss Van Arsdale
politely.