The Heart of Thunder Mountain

She almost forgot to limp, but bethought herself in time, and gasped as he led her to an empty soap box at the side of the stable door. Having seated her there, he called out to the man on guard at Sunnysides’ corral: “Where’s Curly?”

“Down by the crick,” was the answer.

“Bring him here! I’ll watch the horse.”

Thereupon he took the man’s place, and stood with his arms crossed on the top rail of the fence, his eyes fixed on the golden horse. And Marion felt a real pain at last,–a pang of jealousy. So he preferred to look at the horse, did he? If he had chanced at that instant to glance at her he would have seen a pair of blue eyes blazing with wrath.

The two men came hurrying from the creek.

“Here, Curly!” said Haig, resigning his post. “Miss Gaylord has hurt her ankle. I found her unseated down the road yonder.” He paused, as if to let that be thoroughly understood. “I want you to hitch up the sorrels and drive her home.”

“Right!” responded Curly, going into the stable.

Marion then did almost faint. She had not foreseen that manœuver.

“I’d rather not, please,” she said, as sweetly as she could in her dismay.

“Rather not what?” asked Haig, turning at last to her.

“I’d rather rest a while–somewhere–” Her glance went past him in the direction of the cottage. “Then I can ride home–alone.”

“And tumble off in the road somewhere!” he retorted, with a touch of derision in his tone.

“Oh, no!” she pleaded. “It’s not as bad as that.”

“No matter! I can’t allow you to take any chances,” he insisted curtly.

“Really, I need only a little rest,” she persisted. “If I could lie down a few minutes–” her eyes again were turned toward the cottage.

He saw what she meant, and frowned.

“No!” he snapped. Then, checking himself, “I don’t mean to be inhospitable, but you ought to know that’s impossible.”

“You mean–Cousin Seth?”

He shot a look at her that frightened her, but gratified her too. Was she rousing him at last?

“Yes, if you like,” he said, quietly enough. “I’m having a hard enough time with the fool without a woman being mixed up in the affair.”

“I don’t understand,” said Marion.

“You don’t understand!” he repeated. “Of course not. Women never understand–until afterwards. I’ll make it plainer. I’m a bad man, as you have doubtless heard. What would Paradise Park say when it learned that you had been inveigled into my house?”

She was silent a moment.

“Well then, let me sit here and rest!” she insisted.

“But why?” he demanded impatiently.

She took her courage in both hands, and plunged.

“I want to talk to you,” she said eagerly. “I want to ask you if there is no way–”

“Excuse me!” he broke in. “I don’t want you to talk to me. If I did–”

He stopped, with a shrug. Marion felt her face reddening, but she dissembled her embarrassment.

“Oh!” she exclaimed. “You’re not afraid of me, are you?”

It was spoken archly, in her most playful, most kittenish manner, and so she was amazed to see his face distorted as if by some violent emotion. But he spoke with restraint, though in a tone that was hard and harsh.

“Yes, I am afraid of you. The only thing in the world a man needs to fear is a woman.”

The first effect of this speech was to surprise and shock her. The next was to make her heart leap. Had she come near the secret, after all? Then, finally, something deep in the man’s eyes roused in her a thrill of pity. In another minute she would have melted, in her compassion, and begged him humbly to pardon her. But at that instant Curly emerged from the barn, leading the sorrels; and the devil that lurks behind a woman’s tongue spoke for her before she was aware of it.

“So you’d rather one of your men took me to Cousin Seth!”

It was scarcely out before she regretted it with all her heart. If there was a devil behind her tongue there was another back of the somber shadows in Haig’s eyes. He flashed one comprehending look at her; his whole manner underwent a swift and terrifying change; he was again the Philip Haig of that day at the post office.

“Great!” he exclaimed. “That will be the best joke of all. I’ll drive you home myself, of course.”

For a moment Marion sat very still on the soap box, stunned, staring open-mouthed at Haig. What had she done? That mad speech! Then she leaped to her feet.

“No! No!” she cried. “You shall not!”

He smiled at her.

“Shall not?” he repeated sardonically.

“I mean–please not that!” she faltered.

“Why not?” he demanded, almost gaily.

“Oh, please! I didn’t mean it that way.”

“Of course you didn’t mean it! Women never do mean it–that way. And I suppose you didn’t mean to let those men ride on to Paradise when they told you the horse was mine, did you?”

“Oh!” cried Marion, almost in a scream. “How did you–know?”

He laughed.

“I happened to ask Larkin if he had met nobody on the road who could have directed him. He said there was no one but a ‘purty girl.’ That was you, wasn’t it?”

She was speechless.

“And my warning to Huntington. Did you deliver that?”

“No,” she answered, scarcely above a whisper.