O’Brien’s eyes twinkled, and a deep chuckle came from somewhere in the depths of his beard.
“Ken you beat it?” he inquired, with cordial appreciation. “Do you get his play?”
“Play?” The girl turned a pair of angry, bewildered eyes upon her companion. “Impertinence!”
The man nodded significantly.
“Sure. Them two scallywags of yours ain’t got nothin’ to give to the building of the chu’ch. Which means they’ll need to get busy workin’ on it. Guess work never did come welcome to Mister Peter Clancy and Nick. They hate work worse’n washin’ – an’ that’s some. Guess they borrowed your team to do a bit o’ haulin’, which – kind o’ squares their account. They’re bright boys.”
“Bright? They’re impertinent rascals and – and – oh!”
Helen’s exasperation left her almost speechless.
“Which is mighty nigh a compliment to them,” observed the man.
But Helen’s sense of humor utterly failed her now.
“It’s – too bad, Dirty,” she cried. “And poor Kate thinks they’re out cutting our winter hay. I begged of her only this morning to ‘fire’ them both. I’m – I’m sure they’re going to get us into trouble when – when the police come here. I hate the sight of them both. Last time Pete got drunk he – he very nearly asked me to marry him. I believe he would have, only I had a bucket of boiling water in my hand.”
Again came the man’s curious chuckle.
“It won’t be you folks they get into trouble,” he declared enigmatically. “An’ I guess it ain’t goin’ to be ’emselves, neither. But when the p’lice get hot after ’em, why, they’ll shift the scent – sure.”
Helen’s eyes had suddenly become anxious.
“You mean – Charlie Bryant,” she half whispered.
The man nodded.
“Sure. An’ anybody else, so —they get clear.” O’Brien’s eyes hardened as they contemplated the distant teamster. “Say,” he went on, after a brief pause, “there are some low-down bums in this city. There’s Shorty Solon, the Jew boy. He’s wanted across the border fer shootin’ up a bank manager, and gettin’ off with the cash. Ther’s Crank Heufer, the squarehead stage robber, shot up more folks, women, too, in Montana than ’ud populate a full-sized city. Ther’s Kid Blaney, the faro sharp, who broke penitentiary in Dakota twelve months back. Ther’s Macaddo, the train ‘hold-up,’ mighty badly wanted in Minnesota. Ther’s Stormy Longton, full of scalps to his gun, a bad man by nature. Ther’s Holy Dick, over there,” he went on, pointing at a gray-bearded, mild-looking man, sitting on a log beside a small group of lounging spectators. “He owes the States Government seven good years for robbing a church. Ther’s Danny Jarvis and Fighting Mike, both of ’em dodgin’ the law, an’ would shoot their own fathers up fer fi’ cents. It’s a dandy tally of crooks, but they ain’t a circumstance beside them two boys of yours. They’re bred bad ’uns, an’ they couldn’t play even the crook’s game right. I’d sure say they’d be a fortune to Fyles, when he gets busy cleaning up this place. They’d give Satan away if they see things gettin’ busy their way.”
The anxiety deepened in Helen’s eyes as the man denounced the two men who were her sister’s hired help. She knew that all he said of them was true. She had known it for months. Now she was thinking of Charlie Bryant and Kate. If Fyles ever got hold of Charlie it would break poor Kate’s heart.
“You think they’d give – any one away?”
The man shook his head.
“I don’t think. Guess I know.” Then, after a pause, he went on, speaking rapidly and earnestly. “See here, Miss Helen, I don’t hold no brief fer nobody but myself, an’ I guess that brief needs a hell of a piece of studyin’ right. There’s things in it I don’t need to shout about, and anyway I don’t fancy Fyles’s long nose smudging the ink on it. You an’ Miss Kate are jest about two o’ the most wholesome bits o’ women in this township, an’ there ain’t many of us as wouldn’t fix ourselves up clean an’ neat to pay our respec’s to either of you. Wal, Miss Kate’s got a hell of a notion for that drunken bum, Charlie Bryant. That bein’ so, tell her to keep a swift eye on her two boys. They’re in with him, sure, an’ they’ll put him away if it suits ’em. Savee? Tell her I said so – since Fyles is goin’ to butt in around here. I don’t want to see Charlie Bryant in a stripe soot, penitentiary way. I need him. An’ I need the liquor he runs.”
The man turned away abruptly. He had broken the unwritten law of Rocky Springs, where it was understood that no man spoke of another man’s past, or questioned his present doings, or even admitted knowledge of them. But like all the rest of the male portion of Rocky Springs, he possessed a soft spot in his vicious heart for the two sisters, who, in the mire of iniquity which flooded the township, contrived a clean, wholesome living out of the soil, and were womanly enough to find interest, and even pleasure, in their sordid surroundings. Now, he hurried off down to his saloon, much in the manner of a man who fears the consequences of feelings which have been allowed to run away with him.
Left to herself, Helen only remained long enough to pass a few cheery greetings with the rest of the onlookers; then she, too, took her departure.
For some moments she certainly was troubled by the direct warning of a man like Dirty O’Brien. With all the many criminal attainments of the other citizens of Rocky Springs, she knew him to be the shrewdest man in the place. A warning from him was more than significant. What should she do? Tell her sister? Certainly she would do that, but she felt it to be well-nigh useless. Kate was the gentlest soul in the world. She was the essence of kindliness, of sympathy, of loyalty to her friends, but she was determined to a degree. She saw always with her own eyes, and would go the way she saw.
Had she not warned her herself before? Had she not endeavored to persuade her a dozen times? It was all quite useless. Kate was something of an enigma, a contradiction. For all her gentleness Helen knew she could be as hard as iron.
Finally, with a sigh, she dismissed the matter from her mind until such time as opportunity served. Meanwhile she must put in an appearance at Mrs. John Day’s house. Mrs. John Day was the social pivot of Rocky Springs, and, to disobey her summons, Helen knew would be to risk a displeasure which would find reflection in every woman in the place.
That was a catastrophe she had no desire to face. It was enough for her to remember that she had imprisoned herself in such a place. She had no desire to earn the ill-will of the wardresses.
She laughed to herself. But she really felt that it was very dreadful that her life must be passed among these people. She wanted to be free – to live all these good years of her life. She wanted to attend parties, and – and dances among those people amid whom she had been brought up. She craved for the society of cultured folks – of men. Yes, she admitted it, she wanted all those things which make a young girl’s life enjoyable – theatres, dances, skating, hockey and – and, yes, flirtations. Instead of those things what had she – what was she? That was it. What was she? She had been planted in the furrows of life a decorative flower, and some terrible botanical disaster had brought her up a – cabbage.
She laughed outright, and in the midst of her laugh, looking out across the valley, she beheld her sister leaving the Meeting House, which stood almost in the shadow of the great pine, far up on the distant slope.
Her laugh sobered. Her thoughts passed from herself to Kate with a feeling which was almost resentment. Her high-spirited, adventure-loving, handsome sister. What of her? It was terrible. So full of promise, so full of possibilities. Look at her. She was clad in a big gingham apron. No doubt her beautiful, artistic hands were all messed up with the stains of scrubbing out a Meeting House, which, in turn, right back to the miserable Indian days, had served the purposes of saloon, a trader’s