Page:Lost Ecstasy (1927).pdf/377

 She sat down. The elephants were plodding past, each clutching the absurd tail of the one ahead with his trunk, the trainers with their prod sticks running alongside. In the darkness their great gray bodies looked like houses walking. She looked at them. For a little time, this, perhaps. But soon, please God

Like the stockmen and the wheat growers, sitting there in the dust she too made her small inarticulate prayer; for love and peace in the back country, for the sun, for rain in season, for all the growing things; for the scent of the sage at dawn, and the mountains turning purple after sunset; for the women who sat with their hands folded, resting after the heat of the day; for the men who brought in their tired horses at night, led by the lights of home.

Suddenly Tom dropped down onto the ground beside her, and putting his arms around her, dropped his head onto her knees.

"Oh, girl, girl!" he said. "It's been hell all right. But here we are!"

Long after he had gone she sat as he had left her. Time enough to think later, to make plans. They would go back and start again, but this time they would have a fairer chance. She would never change him; as he was he would always be. But it was as he was that she loved him. He was Tom, her lover, her sweetheart and her child.

When he came back to her the performance was over, and the cowboys were riding their horses to the cars. Once again she heard the slow tired movement of horses' feet in darkness, the rustle of chaps on leather, the faint jingle of bridles and buckles. The day's work was over. Soon the horses would be in the cars. A voice would call out:

"Jerry next."

"Jerry coming."

A shadowy horse would sniff at the runway, and then with a thunder of hoofs dash up and into the car. The loading would go on, and when it was finished there would be the "privilege" car, and then the night's rest.

So they moved on, and as they moved they sang. Tom's