The Forbidden Way

"Camilla and Bent," he muttered. "I'm glad Jeff's not here. It's been getting on his nerves. I hope if Bent sells out he'll hunt a new field. There are too few women around here – too few like Camilla. I wonder if she really cares. I wonder – "

He stopped, his eyes contracted to pin points. The pair on the horses had halted, and the man had drawn close to his companion, leaning forward. Was he fixing her saddle? An unconscious exclamation came from Berkely's lips.

"He's got his nerve – right in plain view of the town, too. What – ?"

The girl's horse suddenly drew ahead and came galloping down through the scrub-oak, the man following. Berkely smiled. "The race isn't always to the swift, Cort Bent," he muttered.

At the head of the street he saw Miss Irwin's horse turn in at the livery stable where she kept him, but Cortland Bent's came straight on at an easy canter and halted at Berkely's door.

"Is Wray there?" asked Bent.

"No, but he told me to ask you to wait. Won't you come in?"

"Just tell him I'll be in in the morning."

"Jeff may go to Denver to-morrow," said Larry, "but of course there's no hurry – "

Bent took out a silver cigarette case and offered it to Berkely. "See here, Larry," he said, "what the devil do you fellows want with the 'Lone Tree'? Are you going to work it, or are you getting it for some one else? Of course, it's none of my business – but I'd like to know, just – "

"Oh, I'm not in this. This is Jeff's deal. I don't know much about it, but I think he'd probably work it for a while."

Together they walked into the office, and Berkely spread some papers out over the desk. "Jeff told me to draw these up. I think you'll find everything properly stated."

Bent nodded. "Humph! He feels pretty certain I'll sign, doesn't he?"

Berkely stood beside him, smoking and leaning over his shoulder, but didn't reply.

Bent laughed. "Well, it's all cut and dried. Seems a pity to have put you to so much trouble, Larry. I haven't made up my mind. They say twice as much money goes into gold mines as ever comes out of 'em. I guess it's true. If it wasn't for Jeff Wray in this deal I'd sign that paper in a minute. But I've always had an idea that some day he'd make his pile, and I don't relish the idea of his making it on me. He's a visionary – a fanatic on the gold in these mountains, but fortune has a way of favoring the fool – "

"Sounds as though you might be talking about me," said a voice from the doorway, where Jeff stood smiling, his broad figure completely blocking the entrance.

Bent turned, confused, but recovered himself with a short laugh. "Yes, I was," he replied slowly. "I've put twenty thousand dollars in that hole in the rocks, and I hate to leave it."

Jeff Wray wiped his brow, went to the cooler, drew a glass of water, and slowly drank it.

"Well, my friend," he said carelessly between swallows, "there's still time to back down. You're not committed to anything. Neither am I. Suit yourself. I'm going to get a mine or so. But I'm not particular which one. The 'Daisy' looks good to me, but they want too much for it. The terms on your mine, the 'Lone Tree,' just about suited me – that's all. It's not a 'big' proposition. It might pan thirty or forty to the ton, but there's not much in that – not away up there. Take my offer – or leave it, Bent. I don't give a d – n."

He tossed his hat on the chair, took off his coat, and opened the door of the back office.

"Larry," he added, "you needn't bother to stay, I've got some writing to do. I'll lock up when I go."

If Mr. Mulrennan had been present he would have lost his senses in sheer admiration or sheer dismay. Berkely remembered that "bluff" later, when he learned how much had depended on its success.

But it worked beautifully.

"Oh, well," said Bent peevishly, "let's get it over. I'll sign. Are you ready to make a settlement?"

CHAPTER II

CAMILLA

Her pupils had all been dismissed for the day and the schoolmistress sat at her desk, a half-written letter before her, gazing out through the open doorway over the squalid roofs of the "residence section" of Mesa City. The "Watch Us Grow" sign on the false front over Jeff Wray's office was just visible over the flat roof of the brick bank building. "Watch Us Grow!" The shadow in her eyes deepened. For two long years she had seen that sign from doorway and window of the school, and, even when she went home to Mrs. Brennan's bungalow up above, she must see it again from the veranda. Jeff's business card was the most prominent object in town, except perhaps Jeff himself. It was so much larger than it had any right to be, out of scale, so vulgar, so insistent, so – so like Jeff. Jeff had stood in the doorway of the schoolhouse while they were building his office, and, in his masterful way, had told her of the trade-mark he had adopted for his business; he wanted it in plain sight of her desk so that she could see it every day and watch Mesa City (and himself) fulfil the prophecy.

That seemed ages ago now. It was before the "Jeff Wray" had been painted out and "Wray and Berkely" put in its place, before Larry came out, or Cortland Bent, in the days when Jeff was a new kind of animal to her, when she had arrived fresh from her boarding school in Kansas. "Watch Us Grow!" How could any one grow in a place like this – grow anything, at least, but wrinkled and stale and ugly. The sign had been a continual mockery to her, a travesty on the deeper possibilities of life which Fate had so far denied her. She shut her eyes and resolutely turned her head away, but she could not get Jeff Wray out of her mind. She was thoroughly frightened. His air of proprietorship so suddenly assumed yesterday and the brutality of his kiss had brought her own feelings to a crisis – for she had learned in that moment that their relationship was impossible. But her fingers tingled still – at the memory of the blow she had given him. She had promised to marry him when he "made good." But in Mesa City that had seemed like no promise at all. How could any one succeed in anything here?

She leaned forward on the desk and buried her face in her hands. What chance had she? Where was the fairy prince who would rescue her from her hut and broth kettle?

She raised her head at the sound of a voice and saw Cortland Bent's broad shoulders at the open window.

"Morning!" he said, cheerfully. "You look like Ariadne deserted. May I come in?"

She nodded assent, and, thrusting her school books and unfinished letter in the desk, turned the key viciously in its lock.

"Aren't you riding to-day?" he asked from the doorway.

"No."

He came forward, sat on the top of one of the small desks facing her, and examined her at his ease.

"You're peevish – no? What?"

"Yes. I'm in a frightful mood. You'd better not stay."

He only laughed up at the sunflower dangling from the water pitcher. "Oh, I don't mind. I've a heavenly disposition."

"How do you show it?" she broke in impetuously. "Every man thinks the one way to get on with a woman is to make love to her – "

"No – not altogether," he reproached her. "You and I have had other topics, you know – Swinburne and Shakespeare and the musical glasses."

"Oh, yes, but you always drifted back again."

"How can you blame me? If I've made love to you, it was – "

"Oh, I know. I'm a rustic, and it's a good game."

"You're the least rustic person I've ever known," he said seriously. "It's not a game. I can't think of it as a game. It is something more serious than that." He took a few paces up and down the aisle before her and then went on.

"I know you've never been willing to give me credit for anything I've said when I've tried to show you how much you were to me – and yet, I think you cared – you've showed it sometimes. But I've tried to go about my work and forget you, because I thought it was best for us both. But I can't, Camilla, I tell you I can't get you out of my head. I think of something else, and then, in a moment, there you are again – elusive, mocking, scornful, tender, all in a breath. And then, when I find you're there to stay, I don't try any more. I don't want to think of anything else." He leaned across the desk and seized one of her hands with an ardor which took her by storm. "You've got into my blood like wine, Camilla. To be near you means to reach forward and take you – the sound of your voice, the response of your eyes, the appeal of your mind to mine in this wilderness of spirit – I can't deny them – I don't want to deny them."

Her head sank, but she withdrew her hands. "And my sanity?" she asked clearly. "That does not appeal to you."

"Perhaps it does – most of all. It maddens me, too – that I can't make you care for me enough to forget yourself."

She looked up at him, smiling gently now. "It is easy to say forget myself, that you may have one more frail woman to remember. Am I so provincial, Cortland Bent? Am I really so rustic? Two days ago you were telling me I had all the savoir faireof the great lady."

He did not reply to that, but, while she watched him, he got up and walked slowly over to the map of the United States which hung between the windows.

"I don't suppose it will mean anything to you when I tell you I'm going," he said bitterly.