“No, really. I happened to bag a couple of hooters before you wakened.”
“You're a missionary of the good-foods movement. I shall name your mission St. Sherry's-in-the-Wilderness.”
“Ah, Sherry's! That's since my time. I don't suppose I should know my way about in little old New York now.”
She found him eager to pick up again the broken strands that had connected him with the big world from which he had once come. It had been long since she had enjoyed a talk more, for he expressed himself with wit and dexterity. But through her enjoyment ran a note of apprehension. He was for the moment a resurrected gentleman. But what would he be next? She had an insistent memory of a heavenly flood of music broken by a horrible discord of raucous oaths.
It was he that lingered over their breakfast, loath to make the first move to bring him back into realities; and it was she that had to suggest the need of setting out. But once on his feet, he saddled and packed swiftly, with a deftness born of experience.
“We'll have to ask Two-step to carry double to-day,” he said, as he helped her to a place behind him.
Two-step had evidently made an end of the bronco spree upon which he had been the evening before, for he submitted sedately to his unusual burden. The first hilltop they reached had its surprise to offer the girl. In a little valley below them, scarce a mile away, nestled a ranch with its corrals and buildings.
“Look!” she exclaimed; and then swiftly, “Didn't you know it was there?”
“Yes, that's the Hilke place,” he answered with composure. “It hasn't been occupied for years.”
“Isn't that some one crossing to the corral now?”
“No. A stray cow, I reckon.”
They dropped into a hollow between the hills and left the ranch on their left. She was not satisfied, and yet she had not grounds enough upon which to base a suspicion. For surely the figure she had seen had been that of a man.
Chapter 12.
Mistress and Maid
Now that it was safely concluded, Helen thought the adventure almost worthwhile for the spontaneous expressions of good will it had drawn forth from her adherents. Mrs. Winslow and Nora had taken her to their arms and wept and laughed over her in turn, and in their silent undemonstrative way she had felt herself hedged in by unusual solicitude on the part of her riders. It was good—none but she knew how good—to be back among her own, to bask in a friendliness she could not doubt. It was best of all to sit opposite Ned Bannister again with no weight on her heart from the consciousness of his unworthiness.
She could affect to disregard the gray eyes that followed her with such magnetized content about the living room, but beneath her cool self-containment she knew the joyous heart in her was strangely buoyant. He loved her, and she had a right to let herself love him. This was enough for the present.
“They're so plumb glad to see y'u they can't let y'u alone,” laughed Bannister at the sound of a knock on the door that was about the fifth in as many minutes.
This time it proved to be Nora, come to find out what her mistress would like for supper. Helen turned to the invalid.
“What would you like, Mr. Bannister?”
“I should like a porterhouse with mushrooms,” he announced promptly.
“You can't have it. You know what the doctor said.” Very peremptorily she smiled this at him.
“He's an old granny, Miss Messiter.”
“You may have an egg on toast.”
“Make it two,” he pleaded. “Excitement's just like caviar to the appetite, and seeing y'u safe—”
“Very well—two,” she conceded.
They ate supper together in a renewal of the pleasant intimacy so delightful to both. He lay on the lounge, propped up with sofa cushions, the while he watched her deft fingers butter the toast and prepare his egg. It was surely worth while to be a convalescent, given so sweet a comrade for a nurse; and after he had moved over to the table he enjoyed immensely the gay firmness with which she denied him what was not good for him.
“I'll bet y'u didn't have supper like this at Robbers' Roost.” he told her, enthusiastically.
“It wasn't so bad, considering everything.” She was looking directly at him as she spoke. “Your cousin is rather a remarkable man in some ways. He manages to live on the best that can be got in tin-can land.”
“Did he tell y'u he was my cousin?” he asked, slowly.
“Yes, and that his name was Ned Bannister, too?”
“Did that explain anything to y'u?”
“It explained a great deal, but it left some things not clear yet.”
“For instance?”
“For one thing, the reason why you should bear the odium of his crimes. I suppose you don't care for him, though I can see how you might in a way.”
“I don't care for him in the least, though I used to when we were boys. As to letting myself be blamed for his crimes. I did it because I couldn't help myself. We look more or less alike, and he was cunning enough to manufacture evidence against me. We were never seen together, and so very few know that there are two Bannisters. At first I used to protest, but I gave it up. There wasn't the least use. I could only wait for him to be captured or killed. In the meantime it didn't make me any more popular to be a sheepman.”
“Weren't you taking a long chance of being killed first? Some one with a grudge against him might have shot you.”
“They haven't yet,” he smiled.
“You might at least have told me how it was,” she reproached.
“I started to tell y'u that first day, but it looked so much of a fairy tale to unload that I passed it up.”
“Then you ought not to blame me for thinking you what you were not.”
“I don't remember blaming y'u. The fact is I thought it awful white of y'u to do your Christian duty so thorough, me being such a miscreant,” he drawled.
“You gave me no chance to think well of you.”
“But yet y'u did your duty from A to Z.”
“We're not talking about my duty,” she flashed back. “My point is that you weren't fair to me. If I thought ill of you how could I help it?”
“I expaict your Kalamazoo conscience is worryin' y'u because y'u misjudged me.”
“It isn't,” she denied instantly.
“I ain't of a revengeful disposition. I'll forgive y'u for doing your duty and saving my life twice,” he said, with a smile of whimsical irony.
“I don't want your forgiveness.”
“Well, then for thinking me a 'bad man.'”
“You ought to beg my pardon. I was a friend, at least you say I acted like one—and you didn't care enough to right yourself with me.”
“Maybe I cared too much to risk trying it. I knew there would be proof some time, and I decided to lie under the suspicion until I could get it. I see now that wasn't kind or fair to you. I am sorry I didn't tell y'u all about it. May I tell y'u the story now?”
“If you wish.”
It was a long story, but the main points can be told in a paragraph. The grandfather of the two cousins, General Edward Bannister, had worn the Confederate gray for four years, and