Her voice trembled just a little as she acknowledged the introduction; but her words were few and frigid, and made Philip feel as if she had suddenly held him off at arm's length and bade him come no nearer. She said:
"I did not know you had a partner, Stephen. You never said anything about it in your letters. I am afraid I have been wrong in coming without waiting to hear from you before I started."
But Philip had noticed the tremble in her voice, and he hastened to make her most welcome as far as he was concerned.
Nevertheless, a stiffness hung about the trio which made it hard for them to be natural; and, had it not been for another pistol-shot from the shanty down the road and another clamor of voices, they might have stood still some time longer.
Margaret started in spite of herself, and asked nervously:
"Oh! what can be the matter? What a dreadful place this must be!" And Philip found in himself a new instinct of protection.
"We must get your sister out of this, Steve," he said. "We must take her home."
And somehow the word "home" sounded a haven as he pronounced it. The thoughts of the two young men galloping furiously on their way to the station had been but of how they should reach there as soon as the train. They had made no plans. It was impossible for them to realize the importance of the charge that was about to be put upon them.
But now the manners of the world from which they had come some years before, and from which this young woman had but just come, suddenly dropped down upon them as a forgotten garment, and they knew at once the wretchedness of their limitations.
"It isn't much of a place to call home," said the brother, apologetically, "but I guess it's better than this. If we had only known before, we'd have had something fine fixed up some way."
He made the statement airily, and perhaps he thought it was true. Philip found himself wondering what it would have been. There was not a house where she might have been lodged comfortably within fifty miles.
"How do you think we'd better arrange the journey?" said Stephen, suddenly brought face to face with a problem.
"You see," said he in explanation to his sister, "we had no time to hitch up, if we had thought of it, though I'm blamed if it occurred to me but that we could carry you in our pockets. Say, Phil, guess I'll go over and see if I can get Foxy's buckboard."
"Foxy's gone over to Butte in his buckboard with his mother. I saw him go this afternoon," answered Philip.
Stephen whistled.
"I'll ask Dunn for his wagon," said Stephen starting off.
"Hold on!" said Philip shortly. "I’ll go myself. You stay here."
"Couldn't we go down to the station and see after my trunk, Mr. Earle?" said Margaret timidly. And to his ears the name never had so sweet a sound.
"Give me your checks, and stay here, please," he said in quite a different tone from that in which he had addressed Stephen; and, turning, he left them standing in the dark, while the mist closed in behind him and shut him from their sight as if he had left the world.
Alone with her brother, Margaret suddenly put out her hands appealingly to him.
"You are a little bit glad I've come, aren't you, Stephen?" she said.
"I'm no end of glad," he answered, rousing out of his sulkiness that Philip would not let him go. He knew that Philip had good reason for making him stay. "But we're a rough lot out here. I don't know how you'll stand it."
His voice had lost a shade of the gayety, and she thought it was touched with anxiety. She hastened to assure him.
"O, I shall not mind a bit. And I shall try to make things a little pleasanter for you. You think I can, don't you?" This in an anxious voice.
"I'm sure you can," said Stephen heartily. There was something in her voice that appealed to his better self, and reminded him strangely of his childhood. It could not be his father; for his father had always been silent and grave, and this voice was sweet and enthusiastic, and flowed out as if it loved to speak. And yet it must be the likeness to the father's voice he noticed.
"I am so anxious to get you in the light and see how you look," she said ardently, and then added softly, "My dear brother."
Stephen slid his arm about her awkwardly, and kissed her on the forehead. He felt embarrassed in doing this; yet it was by no means the first time he had kissed a girl. Perhaps it was the memory of those other kisses hovering near that shamed him now. He half felt this, and it made him awkward. He was glad to hear Philip's step coming toward them.
"Dunn's wagon has broken down, and both the front wheels are off for repairs. There isn't a thing we can get in town tonight," said Philip anxiously. "Miss Halstead, can you ride? Horseback, I mean."
"Why, I can try," said Margaret a little tremulously. This was a rather startling proposition to even her dauntless courage. Involuntarily she glanced down at her city-made gown in the darkness. She felt hampered by it.
"It's too bad, Miss Halstead," he said apologetically, while Stephen in the dark wondered at his new tone and manner. "But there's no other way, and I think you'll enjoy getting out of this, anyway. There's going to be a big row over there," he added in a low tone to Stephen. "Jim Peters is on his high horse. Hurry!"
Then in a cheery tone he said:
"It won't be so bad. You can rest your foot in the stirrup, and Steve and I'll take turns walking beside the horse. She'd better ride your horse, Steve. He's the gentler of the two."
Margaret Halstead felt herself suddenly lifted in the dark by strong arms and seated on a horse. She clung to the saddle, and left her foot obediently in the stirrup where it was placed by a firm hand; but she was not certain whether her brother or his friend had put her there. It was bewildering, all in the dark that way, and neither of them spoke till both were standing by her side. She was glad the horse stood quite still. She expected him to start nervously. She felt timid about Western horses. They had a reputation for wildness. But it was Stephen who after a moment of low talk came and stood by her side and placed his arm about her as they started.
"My suitcase and my bag," she murmured.
"Phil has them all safe," said her brother.
"And the trunks?"
"They are locked safe in the station, Miss Halstead, and we will get them early in the morning," said a voice out of the mist before her.
Then there was silence as she looked anxiously into the darkness, and could not see a spot of road for the horse to place his foot.
The road was rough and her seat unsteady. A man's saddle is not the surest thing to ride sideways upon. She put her hand timidly on her brother's shoulder, and the touch seemed to give her courage. It gave Stephen a strange new sense of his power of protection.
They went slowly, for the night was dark and the mist lay thick about them. The road was so rough that horse and leader could keep together only by moving slowly. The sounds of disturbance behind them grew fainter as they went on, but now and then a shriek or a fragment of an oath would reach them as if it had been flung out wildly in the night and lost its way.
Margaret shuddered when this happened, and said in a half-frightened tone:
"What awful people they must be, Stephen! Isn't it unpleasant to live in their neighborhood?"
And Stephen somewhat uneasily answered:
"O, they never bother us. They've got a little too much tonight, that's all; and, when they get like that, they can't stand a difference of opinion."
"How dreadful!" said Margaret in low, awestruck tones. Then after a minute she added:
"O Stephen, I'm so glad my brother is not like that. Of course it wouldn't be likely, but they must be somebody's brothers, and how their sisters must feel—and