The Boss of Wind River/Chapter 5

N less than a week from their first meeting, Edith Garwood and Joe Kent were giving a very fair imitation of a flirtation. Joe, as has been said before, was merely an average young man. He was not genuinely or at all in love at first; but he was strongly attracted, and he played the pleasant game without much thought of consequences. And Edith Garwood, being so constituted that admiration was as the breath of life to her, entered into it with zest.

Not that she confined herself to Joe. Mallane, Leadly, and half a dozen others basked in the sunshine of her smiles, and she held the balance fairly level, enjoying her power. Thus jealousies sprang up which threatened to disrupt the entente cordiale normally existing in the younger set of Falls City. These were by no means confined to the young men, for certain young ladies found themselves suddenly deserted by cavaliers to whose loyalty they would have sworn, and were much displeased thereby.

These things bore somewhat hardly on Jack Crooks. She was a frank, unspoiled, straightforward girl, and loyalty to her friends was one of her distinguishing features. But she was very human, and the general male adoration of her guest made her just a little tired. No young hostess likes to be completely outshone by a visitor, even a very lovely one, and to find herself practically overlooked by the young men of her own town was a new and unpleasant experience.

“I thought Joe, anyway, had more sense,” she reflected. “She doesn't care for him any more than for the others, and he ought to see it. Oh, well, let him burn his fingers. I don't care.”

But she did care, because he was a very old friend, and she rather resented the pumping process to which Miss Garwood subjected her one evening. That young lady, after eliciting certain information as to the habits, characters, and worldly prospects of several young gentlemen, at last came around to Kent, a sequence which was suspicious in itself.

“Now your Mr. Kent, dear—tell me about him!”

“He's not my Mr. Kent,” said Jack, a shade of red stealing into her cheeks. “Joe's a nice boy, quite the nicest I know. We played together when we were kids—that is, he condescended to amuse me when he was nine and I was five, and that's quite a concession for a boy, isn't it? Lately he's been away at college, and so we haven't seen much of each other.”

“His father died recently. He is the only son, isn't he?”

“Yes. And his mother died when he was a little fellow, so he is quite alone. He is carrying on the business himself.”

“It's a big business, isn't it? Somebody said the late Mr. Kent was quite wealthy.”

Jack's brows drew together a little. She disliked these questions, perfectly natural though they were.

“I believe he was; that is, of course, he owned mills and timber limits and so on. I suppose Joe is well off, but he has never confided in me.”

“But he may some day?” The unmistakable meaning in the words brought the red to Jack's cheeks again. She turned the question carelessly.

“Oh, perhaps, when he is in a confidential mood. He always was a clam, though.”

“Jack, dear,” said Miss Garwood, “look at me. Is there anything between you and Mr. Kent?”

“Not a blessed thing,” said Jack honestly. “Why?”

“I wanted to make sure I wasn't trespassing,” replied Miss Garwood lightly.

“Well, you're not,” said Jack. “Now let me ask a question: Have you fallen in love with him?”

“No, not exactly,” said Miss Garwood. “But—well, dearie, I half suspect that he has fallen in love with me.”

In spite of herself Jack winced. It was what she had told herself, but to hear it from Edith Garwood's careless lips was different. And yet why should she care? Joe was no more to her than any other old friend. Naturally he would fall in love some day and marry. Perhaps Edith, in spite of her denial, did care for him. In that caseShe gave herself a mental shake and met the curious look in her guest's blue eyes squarely.

“I don't see how he could help it,” she said truthfully. “He isn't the only one, either. Shall you marry him, Edith?”

Edith Garwood laughed, well pleased, for she liked to be told of her conquests. “It's rather early to say,” she replied. “You see, dear, he hasn't asked me yet. And if he did, there are all sorts of things to be considered.”

“Such as what?” asked Jack. “If you love one another that's the main thing, isn't it?”

“You dear, unsophisticated child!” laughed Miss Garwood. “That's only one thing. We should have to live after we were married, you see.”

“Well, I suppose Joe has enough money for that,” Jack commented. “And then you have plenty of money yourself, or your father has.”

“Yes,” Miss Garwood agreed; “but papa has his own ideas of what would be a suitable match for me. I'm not sure he would approve of Joe—I mean Mr. Kent. Confidentially, Jack, how much do you suppose he is worth?”

“I never supposed,” said Jack shortly. “His income may be one thousand or ten thousand a year; I don't know. You aren't marrying him for his money.”

“I haven't decided to marry him at all, you goose,” said Miss Garwood lightly. “It will be time enough to make up my mind when he asks me.”

Nevertheless she lay awake for half an hour that night, thinking. Her flirtation with Joe had reached a point for thought. She wondered how Hugh Garwood would regard him as a prospective son-in-law. Finding the answer rather doubtful, she sighed, turned her facile mind to something else, and almost immediately slept.

For hours after her guest slumbered, Jack Crooks stared from her bed at the treetops outside the window, and watched the patch of moonlight on the floor slowly shift and finally disappear. And this sleeplessness was the more unaccountable because she told herself again that she didn't care whether Joe married Edith or not. She was quite honest about it.

“But I didn't like her questions about his money,” she reflected. “She has or will have enough for both. I know if I were in love—which thank goodness I'm not—the amount of money a young man had would be the last thing I'd think of. I don't believe dad would think of it either, just so we had enough to live on, and good prospects. Of course not. She can't think much of Joe if she lets that stand in the way. If he isn't exactly rich he can't be poor. Mr. Kent was as well off as dad, I should think. Oh, dear! I've simply got to go to sleep.” And finally she did, just as the faintest light grew in the east.

Meanwhile, Joe Kent was doing a little soul searching himself, without coming to any definite conclusion. He liked Edith Garwood, and he suffered acute jealousy when she accepted the marked attentions of others; but to save his life he couldn't make up his mind whether he would care to look at her across his breakfast coffee as long as they both should live. The question of money occurred to him, but not as an important factor. He knew that old Hugh Garwood, the president of the O. & N. Railway, had it to burn, to throw at the birds, to stuff cats with, and half a dozen other ways of disposition. But he himself had enough to keep a wife in the modest comfort which had always been his. He was clean, healthy, well educated, and owned a business which, though encumbered, was perfectly solvent. Therefore he considered himself, without egotism, eligible for the hand of any girl, no matter how wealthy her father might be.

But apart from the question of whether he loved Edith Garwood or not was the somewhat embarrassing one of whether she loved him. It was all right to flirt, to play the two-handed game for fun. But suppose it was for marbles; suppose one took it seriously

“Hang it,” said young Kent to himself, “I don't know whether I've got the real thing or not; and I don't know whether she has been stringing me along or not. But if she hasn't been it's pretty nearly up to me to come across with a formal proposal. I wish I knew where I was at. I wonder if I could get a line from Jack?”

From which the experienced will readily deduce that young Mr. Kent was somewhat rattled and a little afraid of the future, but not altogether unwilling to pay for his fun like a man.

His endeavour to sound Miss Crooks was by no means a success. With unwonted density she did not or would not see the drift of his questions, framed with what he considered great subtlety; and when he became more direct she went to the point with embarrassing candour:

“Do you want to marry her, or don't you?” she asked.

“Why, Jack, I'll be hanged if I know,” he admitted.

“Well, when you make up your mind, ask her,” said Jack. “Meanwhile don't try to pump me. I don't know anything about her sentiments, and if I did I wouldn't tell you.”

So Joe had to go it blind. The flirtation, however, progressed. One night the moon, rising gorgeous and serene above a notch in the hills, discovered Edith Garwood and Joe Kent seated prosaically upon a huge log by the river side, both very tongue-tied, and both apparently absorbed in the engrossing pastime of tossing pebbles into the black water and seeing the rings spread. In fact it had come to a showdown. It was distinctly Joe's play, but he held up his hand. It was provoking, from Miss Garwood's standpoint.

“I think,” she said, “that we should go home.”

“Oh, not yet; it's early,” said Joe.

Pause. Miss Garwood sighed inaudibly but impatiently, and her fingers played nervously with a ring. Joe stared blankly at the water. The ring, escaping from the lady's hand, fell tinkling on the beach pebbles.

“Oh!” she exclaimed, “I've dropped my ring!”

She knelt at once and began to search for it in the semi-darkness. So did Joe. Quite by accident her slim white hand came in contact with his broad brown one. And the natural thing happened.

“Mr. Kent!”

“Yes—Edith!”

“Please!”

But she swayed toward him slightly. Accepting the situation, Joe Kent's unoccupied hand and arm encircled her waist with considerable facility. He even applied gentle pressure. She yielded a little, but protested:

“Mr. Kent—Joe!”

“Yes, dear!”

“You shouldn't—I shouldn't. I never gave you any reason to think that I thought that you thought—I mean you couldn't think I did, could you?” Which confusion of speech went to show that the usually composed Miss Garwood was slightly rattled. She had created the situation and she felt it slipping beyond her control. Joe, who had accepted it recklessly, drew a long breath and made the plunge.

“I hope you do. I—I love you, Edith.” He wondered if the words rang true. To him they sounded hollow and forced. But Miss Garwood's waist yielded a little more. The fingers of her disengaged hand clasped the lapel of his coat and played with it, and her sweet blue eyes looked up pleadingly, trustfully, into his brown ones.

“Joe,” she murmured, “I don't know what to say. I'm not sure, but I half suspect that I—I—oh!”

The exclamation was smothered, for again the natural thing had happened.

Five minutes afterward Miss Garwood smoothed her hair and said irrelevantly:

“But we haven't found my ring!”

“Good old ring,” said Joe, producing it from his pocket.

“Joe!” she cried in unaffected astonishment. “Did you have it there all the time?”

“I found it pretty early in the game,” he acknowledged without shame. “I'll buy you another to-morrow.”

The dim light hid the sudden gravity of her features. “Do you mean an engagement ring, Joe?”

“Of course.”

“Are we really engaged?”

“Simple process, isn't it? I guess we are.”

Miss Garwood dug a daintily shod foot into the sand. This was getting serious.

“But we ought to have papa's consent first.”

“Well, I'll take a run over to your town and tell him about it,” said Joe carelessly. “Matter of form, I suppose. I'll look after that in a day or two.”

Miss Garwood laughed uneasily. “It's plain that you don't know him. I think you would better leave that to me—about our engagement, I mean. And meantime we won't say anything about it to anybody.”

“I don't like that,” said Joe frankly. Having made the plunge he was ready to stay in the water. “Why shouldn't we announce it? Do you mean your father wouldn't consent?”

“I doubt if he would, at first,” she replied, apparently with equal frankness. “You see he expects me—please don't be offended—but he expects me to make what is called a good marriage.”

“Do you mean he expects you to marry for money?”

“No, not altogether. But money and social position are desirable.” Thus early she sought to provide an avenue of retreat.

Joe stared at her, his pride hurt. It had never occurred to him that his own social position was not as good as any one's. He was received everywhere he wished to go; of fashionable society and the grades and jealousies of it he knew little and cared less. He had no social ambitions whatever, and his own modest place was perfectly assured.

“I don't quite get it,” said he. “I have enough to live on. And I suppose I could butt into society, if that's what you mean.”

She explained gently, shouldering the responsibility upon her father. In any event they could not marry at once. Then let their engagement remain a secret between them. She sighed with relief when she carried her point, for it gave her time to pause and reflect. Joe had swept her away a little, for she really liked him. Now she saw things clearly once more. Relative values emerged. Even a temporary engagement to a comparatively poor, obscure young man would never do; that is, it must not be made public. But she was given to following the line of the least resistance. It never occurred to her to doubt that he was genuinely in love, and she hated a scene. Later it would be an easy thing to break with him. Meanwhile she would have what fun she could out of it, for Joe was really very nice.