Code of the West. Zane Grey

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СКАЧАТЬ be glad to go meet your sister,” he declared, turning to her. “I was only waitin’ to see how they’d wiggle out of it.”

      “Thank you, Cal. I’m certain you won’t be sorry,” replied the teacher, gratefully. She was indeed pleased, and now began to revolve in mind just how to prepare Cal for the advent of Georgiana. Certainly up to that moment it had not occurred to her to go on with the deception.

      “She’s to come on the stage from Globe?” inquired Cal, as he walked with Miss Stockwell toward the corral gate.

      “Yes. Tomorrow.”

      “What’ll I take—the buckboard or car?”

      The teacher thought that over a moment.

      “It’s an awful old clap-trap—that bundle of rusty iron,” observed the teacher, remembering her few experiences in the family automobile. “I don’t believe it’s as safe as the buckboard.”

      “Sure I’ll get her here safe,” replied Cal, with a laugh.

      By this time they had reached the corral gate, which he opened for her. Suddenly loud cries of mirth resounded from the boys back by the barn. The teacher turned with Cal to see what had occasioned them such amusement. Some of them were standing with their heads close together and were apparently conversing earnestly. Their very air intimated deviltry and secrecy.

      Cal gazed at them suspiciously, and a darker fire gleamed in his eyes. He had a smooth, almost beardless face, clear brown tan, and less of the leanness and craggy hardness that characterized his brothers’ features. He looked something better than handsome, the teacher thought.

      “Say, that outfit is up to tricks,” he muttered. And he pushed back his huge sombrero to run a sinewy hand through his brown hair.

      “Tricks?” echoed Miss Stockwell, vague. Had she better not divulge her own duplicity?

      “Sure. Just look at Tim. He’s plannin’ something now. He always wags his head that way when he’s . . . Aw, I can read their minds.”

      “What are they going to do?” inquired Miss Stockwell, curiously.

      “They’ll be in Ryson tomorrow when I meet your sister,” he answered, grimly.

      “What! They will?” cried the teacher, almost too eagerly. Cal looked at her dubiously, and again he brushed back his hair. He wanted, and meant, to be obliging, but evidently he did not have any delightful anticipations at the prospect before him. Almost like a flash came the inspiration to Miss Stockwell to go on with the deception and not enlighten Cal as to the truth regarding Georgiana. He would be all the more amazed and dazed when the realization burst suddenly upon him. How supremely happy he would be to lord it over his tricky comrades! And as for Tim Matthews, and those few evidently elected to have great fun at Cal’s expense—what poignant consternation and regret they would suffer! Miss Stockwell reveled in her idea. Georgiana, too, would make the best of it.

      “Let me see that picture you showed the boys—so I’ll know her,” said Cal.

      Miss Stockwell handed it to him without a word. Cal gazed at it for a moment.

      “Can’t see any resemblance to you,” he remarked, presently. “She’s homely an’ you’re good-lookin’.”

      “Thank you, Cal,” replied Miss Stockwell, demurely. “I appreciate your compliment. But you didn’t have to say so just because you found my—my sister plain.”

      “Say!—I mean it, teacher. Why, Enoch thinks you’re the best-lookin’ woman he ever saw. An’ sure he’s a good judge.”

      Miss Stockwell felt a little warmth on her cheek that was not all the westering sun. She liked the boy’s faith in Enoch. There was a singularly fine relation between these brothers, and one that augured well for the boy’s future.

      “Cal, I think I’d take the buckboard instead of that old car,” suggested Miss Stockwell. She was thinking of the spirited black horses usually driven with the buckboard, and how much more they might appeal to a girl.

      “Aw, she won’t mind the looks of that old gas-wagon. An’ sure I don’t care,” said Cal, with a laugh. “You see, the stage gets in late sometimes, an’ if I take the car I can drive your sister out here quick, before dark. It’s fifteen miles to Ryson, you know, an’ would take me several hours with the team. I’d like to get home before dark.”

      “Why—so particularly? I’ve heard how you can ride the trails after night.”

      “Aw, that outfit will be up to some trick, an’ between you an’ me I’d rather not be caught along a dark road with that old—I mean—your sister,” replied Cal, finishing lamely.

      “Oh, I see,” mused Miss Stockwell, slowly, studying the perplexed face of the young man. “Very well, Cal. You do as you think best. But take a hunch from me, as you boys say. You won’t be sorry I inflicted this job on you.”

      “Aw, now, teacher, I didn’t mean you’d done that,” he protested. “It’s only Tim an’ those darn fools. They’ve got a chance to get even. You don’t know what I did to them last dance.”

      “Well, I don’t care what you did to them or what they do to you—tomorrow. You’re not going to be sorry you went. You might be very glad.”

      “Why?” he asked, with a dawning of curiosity. He eyed her in confidence, yet withal as a boy who realized an unknown quantity in women. He had not the slightest idea what she meant, yet he had acquired an interest apart from his kindliness or desire to oblige her. “Maybe she’s rich an’ will give me a new saddle or somethin’,” he remarked, jokingly.

      “Maybe. She’ll give you something, that’s certain,” replied Miss Stockwell, mysteriously.

      She left him at the corral gate, holding it open for her, a pleased and rather vaguely expectant smile on his face as he turned to look back at his scheming comrades.

CHAPTER TWO

      NEXT morning when Cal presented himself at the breakfast table, fully two hours later than the usual time for the riders, he was filled with dismay to discover that several of his comrades had not gone off about their range tasks.

      “Howdy,” was Pan Handle’s greeting.

      “Mawnin’, Cal,” drawled Arizona.

      “Wal, Cal, you shore hit the hay last night,” said Wess, dryly.

      “Reckon it’s bad fer you to have meetin’ ladies on yore mind,” added Tim Matthews, solicitously.

      “Ahuh!” growled Cal as he eyed his friends distrustfully.

      During warm weather the Thurmans served meals on the porch that connected the adjoining sections of the large, rambling ranch house. A roof of rough boards stretched rather low above the porch, and a stairway led from the floor up to a hole in the attic. Here some of the riders slept. Cal, who preferred the outdoors, had slept in a little log bunkhouse of one room, which he had erected himself. With a knowing smile Cal passed the boys at the long table and proceeded to a bench against the log wall, where he filled a basin with water and vigorously washed face and hands. In fact, he splashed СКАЧАТЬ