Page:Caroline Lockhart--The Fighting Shepherdess.djvu/110

 The Toomeys had lost no time in retiring after the entertainment, for the house, upon their return, was like a refrigerator. Almost instantly Toomey was slumbering tranquilly, but Mrs. Toomey had symptoms which she recognized as presaging hours of wakefulness. The unwonted excitement of being out in the evening had much to do with her restlessness, but chiefly it came from thinking of the cook stove. Of course she could see the force of Jap's argument as to the necessity of keeping up appearances by being seen in public places and spending money as though there was more where that came from, yet she wondered if it really deceived anybody.

And supposing Teeters foreclosed the mortgage! It seemed as though they were slipping week by week, day by day, deeper into the black depths at the bottom of which was actual beggary. Her nervousness increased as her imagination painted darker and darker pictures until she longed to scream for the relief it would have afforded her. The single hope was Mormon Joe's Kate and her promise, and that was too fantastic and far-fetched to dare count on. It was not logical to suppose that a man whom Jap had quarreled with and insulted would come to their rescue even if he could afford to do so, which she doubted.

How still it was — the eloquent stillness of terrible cold! The town was soundless. Chickens humped in their feathers were freezing on their roosts, horses and cows tied in their stalls were suffering, and, as always, she visualized the desolate white stretches where hungry coyotes, gaunt and vigilant, padded along the ridges, and horses and cattle, turned out to shift for themselves, huddled shivering in the gulches and under the willows.

She knew from the snapping and cracking of lumber and metal about the house that it was growing colder,