The Plow-Woman. Gates Eleanor
settled——"
She faced him squarely for a moment, and he met her eyes. They were grey, with tawny flecks, wide-open, clear and comprehending. "My father's Evan Lancaster," she explained.
"Lancaster—oh, he's traded at my store."
"That's him over there with Marylyn."
Lounsbury turned in his saddle and looked toward the shack. "Marylyn?" he said. "What a pretty name! Sounds like Maryland. How'd she——" He paused questioningly.
"Mother's name was Mary Lynn," she answered, her voice lowered. "So she just put it together."
"And yours?"
"Mine's Dallas. I was born in Texas."
He leaned back against his high cantle and smiled. "I could 'a' guessed that," he declared.
Again she coloured sensitively, and hastened to swing the team around until Betty stood in the furrow. "My father's coming," she said.
Instantly Lounsbury was all regret, for he saw that she had misunderstood him. "You don't look Texas," he said earnestly. "It's just the name. And—and I think Dallas is pretty, too."
The implied jest on her native State did not do away with her displeasure. She nodded gravely and, turning, put the lines about her shoulders. The mules started.
"Now I've got you down on me," he said penitently. "Honest, I didn't mean——"
She paid no heed.
He clapped on his hat, whipped his horse and followed alongside, waiting for her to look up. Opposite the shack, Lancaster and his other daughter were standing by the furrow. Here she drew rein. "This is Marylyn," she said, as the storekeeper leaned to grasp her father's hand.
Lounsbury again lifted his hat and looked down, long and admiringly, upon the younger girl. Her fair hair, framing in soft waves a pale, oval face, and her blue eyes, watching him in some confusion, were strongly in contrast with the straight, heavy braids—brown, and showing burnished tints in the light—and the unwavering eyes of her sister. Looking at her, he was reminded of girls he had seen beyond the Alleghanies—girls who knew little, or no, toil, and who jealously guarded their beauty from sun and wind. Answering Lancaster's blunt questions, that followed close upon each other, he paid her prettiness constant and wondering homage; and she, noting the attention, retreated a little and was quiet and abashed.
"Who's you' party?" the elder man demanded, indicating the distant camp with one crutch, and leaning heavily upon the other.
"Surveyors," replied Lounsbury.
"Surveyors!" There was alarm in Lancaster's tone. He suddenly recalled how, slighting Dallas' advice, he had delayed a trip to the land-office for the purpose of filing on the claim. "W'at they doin'?"
"Something right in your line, sir. They're laying out a railroad."
"A railroad? You don' say! How'll it come?"
"Why, right this way."
Lancaster caught the other by the bootstrap. "Shore?" he asked.
"Sure," repeated Lounsbury; "sure as death and taxes. It's bound to run somewhere between the coulée and Medicine Mountain, and it'll stop—at least for a few years—at the Missouri. With those sloughs in the way at the south end of the gap, it can't reach the river without coming over your land. First thing you know, you'll have stores and saloons around your house. There's going to be a town on the Bend, sir."
The elder man scanned the younger's face. Lounsbury was smiling half teasingly, yet undoubtedly he was in earnest.
"W'y, Lawd!" breathed the section-boss, realising the whole import of the news. A railroad would mean immeasurable good fortune to the trio of settlers who, like young prairie-chickens that fear to leave the side of their mother, had chosen quarter-sections near the guarding fort. And to him, penniless, with motherless girls, it meant——
"The ferrying's so good right here," went on the storekeeper. "Why, it's a ten-to-one shot the track'll end on your claim."
With one accord all looked across the level quarter, where the new green was creeping in after the late rains.
"A railroad! An' a town!" The section-boss pulled at his grizzled goatee. "They'll make this piece worth a heap!"
"They will," agreed Lounsbury. "But road or no road, seems to me you've got about the cream of this side of the river."
"You' right," said Lancaster. But the girls were silent, except that Dallas gave a sigh, deep and full of happiness.
Lounsbury glanced at her. "You like the place, don't you?" he asked; "even if——" He suddenly paused. Her palms were open and half turned upward. Across each lay a crimson stripe—the mark of the plow-handle.
For the second time she read his meaning. "Yes, I like the prairie," she answered, "if I do have to plow." And she stepped from the furrow to the unturned sod.
As she stood there, Lounsbury caught the clear outline of her firmly drawn face. Beside her, Marylyn, slight and colourless, was for the moment eclipsed. The hat of the elder girl was brushed back, displaying a forehead upon which shone the very spirit of the unshackled. Her hands, large, yet not too large for the splendid figure of which they were the instruments, were clasped upon her breast. Watching her, it seemed to Lounsbury that she must have sprung as she was from the plains one day—grave, full-grown and gallant.
Her father's voice broke in harshly. "Ah didn' want she should plow," he protested. "Ah figgered t' git someone on tick, but seems like Dallas, she——"
"We like it here," she interrupted, "because the air 's so cool, and there's lots of grass." Then after bending to gather a purple flower, she stepped back to the plow.
"You're planning to stay, then," said Lounsbury.
"Stay!" burst forth the section-boss. "Don' it look like it?"
Lounsbury made no reply, only smiled genially.
"Maybe y' reckon we-all ain't safe?" continued Lancaster. "Wal, th' nesters 'roun' Fort Sully's safe 'nough."
The storekeeper pointed across the river to where a flag was flying at the centre of the post quadrangle. "You're in sight of that," he said simply.
The other snorted. Then, stifling a retort, he searched Lounsbury's face with his milky-blue eyes. "Ah'd like t' ast w'y y' didn' tell me 'bout th' track when Ah seen y' las'," he observed suspiciously.
The storekeeper gave a hearty laugh. "And why didn't you say you had daughters?" he demanded.
Instantly a change came over the elder man. He darkened angrily. His breath shortened, as if he had been running. Visible trembling seized him, body and limbs.
Mystified, Lounsbury turned to Dallas, and saw that her eyes were fastened upon her father imploringly. "No, no, dad," he heard her whisper; "no, no."
The storekeeper hastened to speak. "Joking aside," he said, "the reason is this: The railroad company wants the right kind of people to settle on the land along the survey. It doesn't want men who'd file just to get a price. So the story hasn't leaked much."
Lancaster was fumbling at his crutches. "Ah see, Ah see," he said sulkily. Then, with an attempt at being courteous, "Come up t' th' shack, Lounsb'ry. Y' brung good news; y' got t' hev you' dinner."
"I ate back there," said Lounsbury, dismounting; "but I'll stop off for a while, just the same." As he slipped the reins over his horse's head, Marylyn remembered the meal she had abandoned and started homeward. The storekeeper, leading his mount, strode away beside her.
Dallas clucked to the mules.
"Ain't you comin'?" called her father. "W'y, my gal, you worked 'nough this mornin'."
"I'll keep at it just a little longer," she answered.
"We