章节正文
never said anything to anybody." He looked at the two
contritely. "I never knew, till you folks came to Nogales
looking for me, that things panned out the way
they did. I thought Carl was going to give himself up,
and would be cleared. I never once dreamed he was
the kinda mark that would let his own brother take the
blame that way."
"I guess nobody did." Lite folded the letter and
pushed it back into the envelope. "I can look back
now, though, and see how it come about. He hung
back till Aleck found the body and was arrested; and
after that he just simply didn't have the nerve to step
out and say that he was the one that did it. He tried
hard to save Aleck, but he wouldn't--"
"The coward! The low, mean coward!" Jean
stood up and looked from one to the other, and spoke
through her clinched teeth. "To let dad suffer all this
while! Lite, when did you say that train left for Salt
Lake? We can take the taxi back down town, and save
time." She was at the door when she turned toward
the two again. "Hurry up! Don't you know we've
got to hurry? Dad's in prison all this while! And
Uncle Carl,--there's no telling where Uncle Carl is!
That wire I sent him was the worst thing I could have
done!"
"Or the best," suggested Lite laconically, as he led
the way down the hall and out to the rain-drenched,
waiting taxicab.
CHAPTER XXV
LITE COMES OUT OF THE BACKGROUND
For hours Jean had sat staring out at the drear
stretches of desert dripping under the dismal rain
that streaked the car windows. The clouds hung leaden
and gray close over the earth; the smoke from the engine
trailed a funereal plume across the grease-wood covered
plain. Away in the distance a low line of hills
stretched vaguely, as though they were placed there to
hold up the sky that was so heavy and dank. Alongside
the track every ditch ran full of clay-colored water
that wrapped little, ragged wreaths of dirty foam around
every obstruction, like the tawdry finery of the slums.
From the smoking-room where he had been for the
past two hours with Art Osgood, Lite came unsteadily
down the aisle, heralded as it were by the muffled
scream of the whistle at a country crossing. Jean
turned toward him a face as depressed as the desert out
there under the rain. Lite, looking at her keenly, saw
on her cheeks the traces of tears. He let himself down
wearily into the seat beside her, reached over calmly,
and took her hand from off her lap and held it snugly
in his own.
"This is likely a snowstorm, up home," he said in
his quiet, matter-of-fact way. "I guess we'll have to
make our headquarters in town till I get things hauled
out to the ranch. That's it, when you can't look ahead
and see what's coming. I could have had everything
ready to go right on out, only I thought there wouldn't
be any use, before spring, anyway. But if this storm
ain't a blizzard up there, a couple of days will straighten
things out."
Jean turned her head and regarded him attentively.
"Out where?" she asked him bluntly. "What are you
talking about? Have you and Art been celebrating?"
She knew better than that. Lite never indulged in
liquid celebrations, and Jean knew it.
Lite reached into his pocket with the hand that was
free, and drew forth a telegramenvelope. He released
her hand while he drew out the message, but he did not
hand it to her immediately. "I wired Rossman from
Los Angeles," he informed her, "and told him what
was up, and asked him to put me up to date on that end
of the line. So he did. I got this back there at that
last town." He laid his hand over hers again, and
looked down at her sidelong.
"Ever since the trouble," he began abruptly, but
still in that quiet, matter-of-fact way, "I've been playing
a lone hand and kinda holding back and waiting for
something to drop. I had that idea all along that
you've had this summer: getting hold of the Lazy A and
fixing it up so your dad would have a place to come
back to. I never said anything, because talking don't
come natural to me like it does to some, and I'd rather
do a thing first and then talk about it afterwards if I
have to.
"So I hung on to what money I had saved up along;
I was going to get me a bunch of cattle and fix up that
homestead of mine some day, and maybe have a little
home." His eyes went surreptitiously to her face, and
lingered there wistfully. "So after the trouble I
buckled down to work and saved a little faster, if
anything. It looked to me like there wasn't much hope of
doing anything for your dad till his sentence ran out,
so I never said anything about it. Long as Carl didn't
try to sell it to anybody else, I just waited and got
together all the money I could. I didn't see as there was
anything else to do."
Jean was chewing a corner of her lip, and was staring
out of the window. "I didn't know I was stealing
your thunder, Lite," she said dispiritedly. "Why
didn't you tell me?"
`Wasn't anything to tell--till there was something
to tell. Now, this telegram here,--this is what I
started out to talk about. It'll be just as well if you
know it before we get to Helena. I showed it to Art,
and he thought the same as I did. You know,--or
I reckon you don't, because I never said anything,--
away last summer, along about the time you went to
work for Burns, I got to thinking things over, and I
wondered if Carl didn't have something on his mind
about that killing. So I wrote to Rossman. I didn't
much like the way he handled your dad's case, but he
knew all the ins and outs, so I could talk to him without
going away back at the beginning. He knew Carl,
too, so that made it easier.
"I wrote and told him how Carl was prowling
around through the house nights, and the like of that,
and to look up the title to the Lazy A--"
"Why wouldn't you wait and let me buy it myself?"
Jean asked him with just a shade of sharpness in her
voice. "You knew I wanted to."
"So I got Rossman started, quite a while back. He
thought as I did, that Carl was actingmighty funny.
I was with Carl more than you was, and I could tell
he had something laying heavy on his mind. But then,
the rest of us had things laying pretty heavy on our
minds, too, that wasn't guilt; so there wasn't any way
to tell what was bothering Carl." Lite made no attempt
to answer the question she had asked.
"Now, here's this wire Rossman sent me. You don't
want to get the wrong idea, Jean, and feel too bad about
this. You don't want to think you had anything to do
with it. Carl was gradually building up to something
of this kind,--has been for a long time. His coming
over to the ranch nights, looking for that letter that
he had hunted all over for at first, shows he wasn't right
in his mind on the subject. But--"
"Well, heavens and earth, Lite!" Jean's tone was
exasperated more than it was worried. "Why don't
you say what you want to say? What's it all about?
Let me read that telegram and be done with it. I--I
should think you'd know I can stand things, by this
time. I haven't shown any weak knees, have I?"
"Well, I hate to pile on any more," Lite muttered
defensively. "But you've got to know this. I wish
you didn't, but--"
Jean did not say any more. She reached over and
with her free hand took the telegram from him. She
did not pull away the hand Lite was holding, however,
and the heart of him gave an exultant bound because
she let it lie there quiet under his own. She pinched
her brows together over the message, and let it drop
into her lap. Her head went back against the towel
covered head-rest, and for a minute her eyes closed as
if she could not look any longer upon trouble.
Lite waited a second, pulled her head over against
his shoulder, and picked up the telegram and read it
through slowly, though he could have repeated it word
for word with his eyes shut.
L Avery,
En Route Train 23, S. L. & D. R. R.
Carl Douglas suicided yesterday, leaving letter confessing
murder of Croft. Had just completed transfer of land and
cattle to your name. Am taking steps placing matter
before governor immediately expect him to act at once upon
pardon. Bring your man my office at once deposition may
be required.
J. W. ROSSMAN.
"Now, I told you not to worry about this," Lite
reminded the girl firmly. "Looks to me like it takes a
load off our hands,--Carl's doing what he done. Saves
us dragging it all through court again; and, Jean, it'll
let your dad out a whole lot quicker. Sounds kinda
cold-blooded, maybe, but if you could look at it as good
news,--that's the way it strikes me."
Jean did not say a word, just then. She did what
you might not expect Jean to do, after all her strong-
mindedness and her independence: She made an
uncertain movement toward sitting up and facing things
calmly, man-fashion; then she leaned and dropped her
very independent brown head back upon Lite's shoulder,
and behind her handkerchief she cried quietly
while Lite held her close.
"Now, that's long enough to cry," he whispered to
her, after a season of mental intoxication such as he had
never before experienced. "I started out three years
ago to be the boss. I ain't been working at it regular,
as you might say, all the time. But I'm going to wind
up that way. I hate to turn you over to your dad without
some little show of making good at the job."
Jean gave a little gurgle that may have been related
to laughter, and Lite's lips quirked with humorous
embarrassment as he went on.
"I don't guess," he said slowly, "that I'm going to
turn you over at all, Jean. Not altogether. I guess
I've just about got to keep you. It--takes two to
make a home, and--I've got my heart set on us making
a home outa the Lazy A again; you and me, making a
home for us and your dad. How--how does that
sound to you, Jean?"
Jean was wiping her eyes as unobtrusively as she
might. She did not answer.
contritely. "I never knew, till you folks came to Nogales
looking for me, that things panned out the way
they did. I thought Carl was going to give himself up,
and would be cleared. I never once dreamed he was
the kinda mark that would let his own brother take the
blame that way."
"I guess nobody did." Lite folded the letter and
pushed it back into the envelope. "I can look back
now, though, and see how it come about. He hung
back till Aleck found the body and was arrested; and
after that he just simply didn't have the nerve to step
out and say that he was the one that did it. He tried
hard to save Aleck, but he wouldn't--"
"The coward! The low, mean coward!" Jean
stood up and looked from one to the other, and spoke
through her clinched teeth. "To let dad suffer all this
while! Lite, when did you say that train left for Salt
Lake? We can take the taxi back down town, and save
time." She was at the door when she turned toward
the two again. "Hurry up! Don't you know we've
got to hurry? Dad's in prison all this while! And
Uncle Carl,--there's no telling where Uncle Carl is!
That wire I sent him was the worst thing I could have
done!"
"Or the best," suggested Lite laconically, as he led
the way down the hall and out to the rain-drenched,
waiting taxicab.
CHAPTER XXV
LITE COMES OUT OF THE BACKGROUND
For hours Jean had sat staring out at the drear
stretches of desert dripping under the dismal rain
that streaked the car windows. The clouds hung leaden
and gray close over the earth; the smoke from the engine
trailed a funereal plume across the grease-wood covered
plain. Away in the distance a low line of hills
stretched vaguely, as though they were placed there to
hold up the sky that was so heavy and dank. Alongside
the track every ditch ran full of clay-colored water
that wrapped little, ragged wreaths of dirty foam around
every obstruction, like the tawdry finery of the slums.
From the smoking-room where he had been for the
past two hours with Art Osgood, Lite came unsteadily
down the aisle, heralded as it were by the muffled
scream of the whistle at a country crossing. Jean
turned toward him a face as depressed as the desert out
there under the rain. Lite, looking at her keenly, saw
on her cheeks the traces of tears. He let himself down
wearily into the seat beside her, reached over calmly,
and took her hand from off her lap and held it snugly
in his own.
"This is likely a snowstorm, up home," he said in
his quiet, matter-of-fact way. "I guess we'll have to
make our headquarters in town till I get things hauled
out to the ranch. That's it, when you can't look ahead
and see what's coming. I could have had everything
ready to go right on out, only I thought there wouldn't
be any use, before spring, anyway. But if this storm
ain't a blizzard up there, a couple of days will straighten
things out."
Jean turned her head and regarded him attentively.
"Out where?" she asked him bluntly. "What are you
talking about? Have you and Art been celebrating?"
She knew better than that. Lite never indulged in
liquid celebrations, and Jean knew it.
Lite reached into his pocket with the hand that was
free, and drew forth a telegramenvelope. He released
her hand while he drew out the message, but he did not
hand it to her immediately. "I wired Rossman from
Los Angeles," he informed her, "and told him what
was up, and asked him to put me up to date on that end
of the line. So he did. I got this back there at that
last town." He laid his hand over hers again, and
looked down at her sidelong.
"Ever since the trouble," he began abruptly, but
still in that quiet, matter-of-fact way, "I've been playing
a lone hand and kinda holding back and waiting for
something to drop. I had that idea all along that
you've had this summer: getting hold of the Lazy A and
fixing it up so your dad would have a place to come
back to. I never said anything, because talking don't
come natural to me like it does to some, and I'd rather
do a thing first and then talk about it afterwards if I
have to.
"So I hung on to what money I had saved up along;
I was going to get me a bunch of cattle and fix up that
homestead of mine some day, and maybe have a little
home." His eyes went surreptitiously to her face, and
lingered there wistfully. "So after the trouble I
buckled down to work and saved a little faster, if
anything. It looked to me like there wasn't much hope of
doing anything for your dad till his sentence ran out,
so I never said anything about it. Long as Carl didn't
try to sell it to anybody else, I just waited and got
together all the money I could. I didn't see as there was
anything else to do."
Jean was chewing a corner of her lip, and was staring
out of the window. "I didn't know I was stealing
your thunder, Lite," she said dispiritedly. "Why
didn't you tell me?"
`Wasn't anything to tell--till there was something
to tell. Now, this telegram here,--this is what I
started out to talk about. It'll be just as well if you
know it before we get to Helena. I showed it to Art,
and he thought the same as I did. You know,--or
I reckon you don't, because I never said anything,--
away last summer, along about the time you went to
work for Burns, I got to thinking things over, and I
wondered if Carl didn't have something on his mind
about that killing. So I wrote to Rossman. I didn't
much like the way he handled your dad's case, but he
knew all the ins and outs, so I could talk to him without
going away back at the beginning. He knew Carl,
too, so that made it easier.
"I wrote and told him how Carl was prowling
around through the house nights, and the like of that,
and to look up the title to the Lazy A--"
"Why wouldn't you wait and let me buy it myself?"
Jean asked him with just a shade of sharpness in her
voice. "You knew I wanted to."
"So I got Rossman started, quite a while back. He
thought as I did, that Carl was actingmighty funny.
I was with Carl more than you was, and I could tell
he had something laying heavy on his mind. But then,
the rest of us had things laying pretty heavy on our
minds, too, that wasn't guilt; so there wasn't any way
to tell what was bothering Carl." Lite made no attempt
to answer the question she had asked.
"Now, here's this wire Rossman sent me. You don't
want to get the wrong idea, Jean, and feel too bad about
this. You don't want to think you had anything to do
with it. Carl was gradually building up to something
of this kind,--has been for a long time. His coming
over to the ranch nights, looking for that letter that
he had hunted all over for at first, shows he wasn't right
in his mind on the subject. But--"
"Well, heavens and earth, Lite!" Jean's tone was
exasperated more than it was worried. "Why don't
you say what you want to say? What's it all about?
Let me read that telegram and be done with it. I--I
should think you'd know I can stand things, by this
time. I haven't shown any weak knees, have I?"
"Well, I hate to pile on any more," Lite muttered
defensively. "But you've got to know this. I wish
you didn't, but--"
Jean did not say any more. She reached over and
with her free hand took the telegram from him. She
did not pull away the hand Lite was holding, however,
and the heart of him gave an exultant bound because
she let it lie there quiet under his own. She pinched
her brows together over the message, and let it drop
into her lap. Her head went back against the towel
covered head-rest, and for a minute her eyes closed as
if she could not look any longer upon trouble.
Lite waited a second, pulled her head over against
his shoulder, and picked up the telegram and read it
through slowly, though he could have repeated it word
for word with his eyes shut.
L Avery,
En Route Train 23, S. L. & D. R. R.
Carl Douglas suicided yesterday, leaving letter confessing
murder of Croft. Had just completed transfer of land and
cattle to your name. Am taking steps placing matter
before governor immediately expect him to act at once upon
pardon. Bring your man my office at once deposition may
be required.
J. W. ROSSMAN.
"Now, I told you not to worry about this," Lite
reminded the girl firmly. "Looks to me like it takes a
load off our hands,--Carl's doing what he done. Saves
us dragging it all through court again; and, Jean, it'll
let your dad out a whole lot quicker. Sounds kinda
cold-blooded, maybe, but if you could look at it as good
news,--that's the way it strikes me."
Jean did not say a word, just then. She did what
you might not expect Jean to do, after all her strong-
mindedness and her independence: She made an
uncertain movement toward sitting up and facing things
calmly, man-fashion; then she leaned and dropped her
very independent brown head back upon Lite's shoulder,
and behind her handkerchief she cried quietly
while Lite held her close.
"Now, that's long enough to cry," he whispered to
her, after a season of mental intoxication such as he had
never before experienced. "I started out three years
ago to be the boss. I ain't been working at it regular,
as you might say, all the time. But I'm going to wind
up that way. I hate to turn you over to your dad without
some little show of making good at the job."
Jean gave a little gurgle that may have been related
to laughter, and Lite's lips quirked with humorous
embarrassment as he went on.
"I don't guess," he said slowly, "that I'm going to
turn you over at all, Jean. Not altogether. I guess
I've just about got to keep you. It--takes two to
make a home, and--I've got my heart set on us making
a home outa the Lazy A again; you and me, making a
home for us and your dad. How--how does that
sound to you, Jean?"
Jean was wiping her eyes as unobtrusively as she
might. She did not answer.
- envelope [´envələup]
n.信封，封皮 (初中英语单词) - whistle [´wisəl] v.吹哨 n.口哨；汽笛 (初中英语单词)
- keenly [´ki:nli] ad.敏锐地；强烈地 (初中英语单词)
- headquarters [´hed,kwɔ:təz] n.总部(署)，司令部 (初中英语单词)
- telegram [´teligræm] n.电报 (初中英语单词)
- abruptly [ə´brʌptli] ad.突然地；粗鲁地 (初中英语单词)
- waiting [´weitiŋ] n.等候；伺候 (初中英语单词)
- sentence [´sentəns] n.判决 vt.宣判；处刑 (初中英语单词)
- thunder [´θʌndə] n.雷 vi.打雷 vt.吼出 (初中英语单词)
- reckon [´rekən] v.计算；认为；估计 (初中英语单词)
- beginning [bi´giniŋ] n.开始，开端；起源 (初中英语单词)
- acting [´æktiŋ] a.代理的 n.演戏 (初中英语单词)
- yesterday [´jestədi] n.&ad.昨天；前不久 (初中英语单词)
- transfer [træns´fə:] v.&n.迁移；调动；转让 (初中英语单词)
- governor [´gʌvənə] n.总督；州长 (初中英语单词)
- firmly [´fə:mli] ad.坚固地，稳定地 (初中英语单词)
- independence [,indi´pendəns] n.独立，自主，自立 (初中英语单词)
- movement [´mu:vmənt] n.活动；运动；动作 (初中英语单词)
- handkerchief [´hæŋkətʃif] n.手帕，手绢 (初中英语单词)
- mental [´mentl] a.精神的；心理的 (初中英语单词)
- working [´wə:kiŋ] a.工人的；劳动的 (初中英语单词)
- laughter [´lɑ:ftə] n.笑，笑声 (初中英语单词)
- altogether [,ɔ:ltə´geðə] ad.完全；总而言之 (初中英语单词)
- dismal [´dizməl] a.灰暗的；阴郁的 (高中英语单词)
- ragged [´rægid] a.衣服破烂的 (高中英语单词)
- mighty [´maiti] a.强有力的 ad.很 (高中英语单词)
- repeated [ri´pi:tid] a.反复的；重复的 (高中英语单词)
- vaguely [´veigli] ad.含糊地，暖昧地 (英语四级单词)
- experienced [ik´spiəriənst] a.有经验的；熟练的 (英语四级单词)
- obstruction [əb´strʌkʃən] n.阻塞；妨碍；障碍物 (英语六级单词)
- depressed [di´prest] a.消沉的；萧条的 (英语六级单词)
- snowstorm [´snəustɔ:m] n.暴风雪；雪暴 (英语六级单词)
- matter-of-fact [mætərɔv´fækt] a.实事求是的 (英语六级单词)
- blizzard [´blizəd] n.暴风雪 (英语六级单词)
- bluntly [´blʌntli] ad.钝，迟钝地；直率地 (英语六级单词)
- holding [´həuldiŋ] n.保持，固定，存储 (英语六级单词)
- wistfully [´wistfuli] ad.渴望地；不满足地 (英语六级单词)
- taking [´teikiŋ] a.迷人的 n.捕获物 (英语六级单词)
- gurgle [´gə:gl] vt.&vi.潺潺而流 (英语六级单词)
文章标签:名著
章节正文
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