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Because of that singular reply Madeline found faith to go farther with the cowboy. But at the moment she really did not think about what he had said. Any answer to her would have served if it had been kind. His silence had augmented her nervousness, compelling her to voice her fear. Still, even if he had not replied at all she would have gone on with him. She shuddered at the idea of returning to the station, where she believed there had been murder; she could hardly have forced herself to go back to those dim lights in the street; she did not want to wander around alone in the dark.
And as she walked on into the windy darkness, much relieved that he had answered as he had, reflecting that he had yet to prove his words true, she began to grasp the deeper significance of them. There was a revival of pride that made her feel that she ought to scorn to think at all about such a man. But Madeline Hammond discovered that thought was involuntary, that there were feelings in her never dreamed of before this night.
Presently Madeline's guide turned off the walk and rapped at a door of a low-roofed house.
“Hullo—who's there?” a deep voice answered.
“Gene Stewart,” said the cowboy. “Call Florence—quick!”
Thump of footsteps followed, a tap on a door, and voices. Madeline heard a woman exclaim: “Gene! here when there's a dance in town! Something wrong out on the range.” A light flared up and shone bright through a window. In another moment there came a patter of soft steps, and the door opened to disclose a woman holding a lamp.
“Gene! Al's not—”
“Al is all right,” interrupted the cowboy.
Madeline had two sensations then—one of wonder at the note of alarm and love in the woman's voice, and the other of unutterable relief to be safe with a friend of her brother's.
“It's Al's sister—came on to-night's train,” the cowboy was saying. “I happened to be at the station, and I've fetched her up to you.”
Madeline came forward out of the shadow.
“Not—not really Majesty Hammond!” exclaimed Florence Kingsley. She nearly dropped the lamp, and she looked and looked, astounded beyond belief.
“Yes, I am really she,” replied Madeline. “My train was late, and for some reason Alfred did not meet me. Mr.—Mr. Stewart saw fit to bring me to you instead of taking me to a hotel.”
“Oh, I'm so glad to meet you,” replied Florence, warmly. “Do come in. I'm so surprised, I forget my manners. Why, Al never mentioned your coming.”
“He surely could not have received my messages,” said Madeline, as she entered.
The cowboy, who came in with her satchel, had to stoop to enter the door, and, once in, he seemed to fill the room. Florence set the lamp down upon the table. Madeline saw a young woman with a smiling, friendly face, and a profusion of fair hair hanging down over her dressing-gown.
“Oh, but Al will be glad!” cried Florence. “Why, you are white as a sheet. You must be tired. What a long wait you had at the station! I heard the train come in hours ago as I was going to bed. That station is lonely at night. If I had known you were coming! Indeed, you are very pale. Are you ill?”
“No. Only I am very tired. Traveling so far by rail is harder than I imagined. I did have rather a long wait after arriving at the station, but I can't say that it was lonely.”
Florence Kingsley searched Madeline's face with keen eyes, and then took a long, significant look at the silent Stewart. With that she deliberately and quietly closed a door leading into another room.
“Miss Hammond, what has happened?” She had lowered her voice.
“I do not wish to recall all that has happened,” replied Madeline. “I shall tell Alfred, however, that I would rather have met a hostile Apache than a cowboy.”
“Please don't tell Al that!” cried Florence. Then she grasped Stewart and pulled him close to the light. “Gene, you're drunk!”
“I was pretty drunk,” he replied, hanging his head.
“Oh, what have you done?”
“Now, see here, Flo, I only—”
“I don't want to know. I'd tell it. Gene, aren't you ever going to learn decency? Aren't you ever going to stop drinking? You'll lose all your friends. Stillwell has stuck to you. Al's been your best friend. Molly and I have pleaded with you, and now you've gone and done—God knows what!”
“What do women want to wear veils for?” he growled. “I'd have known her but for that veil.”
“And you wouldn't have insulted her. But you would the next girl who came along. Gene, you are hopeless. Now, you get out of here and don't ever come back.”
“Flo!” he entreated.
“I mean it.”
“I reckon then I'll come back to-morrow and take my medicine,” he replied.
“Don't you dare!” she cried.
Stewart went out and closed the door.
“Miss Hammond, you—you don't know how this hurts me,” said Florence. “What you must think of us! It's so unlucky that you should have had this happen right at first. Now, maybe you won't have the heart to stay. Oh, I've known more than one Eastern girl to go home without ever learning what we really are cut here. Miss Hammond, Gene Stewart is a fiend when he's drunk. All the same I know, whatever he did, he meant no shame to you. Come now, don't think about it again to-night.” She took up the lamp and led Madeline into a little room. “This is out West,” she went on, smiling, as she indicated the few furnishings; “but you can rest. You're perfectly safe. Won't you let me help you undress—can't I do anything for you?”
“You are very kind, thank you, but I can manage,” replied Madeline.
“Well, then, good night. The sooner I go the sooner you'll rest. Just forget what happened and think how fine a surprise you're to give your brother to-morrow.”
With that she slipped out and softly shut the door.
As Madeline laid her watch on the bureau she noticed that the time was past two o'clock. It seemed long since she had gotten off the train. When she had turned out the lamp and crept wearily into bed she knew what it was to be utterly spent. She was too tired to move a finger. But her brain whirled.
She had at first no control over it, and a thousand thronging sensations came and went and recurred with little logical relation. There were the roar of the train; the feeling of being lost; the sound of pounding hoofs; a picture of her brother's face as she had last seen it five years before; a long, dim line of lights; the jingle of silver spurs; night, wind, darkness, stars. Then the gloomy station, the shadowy blanketed Mexican, the empty room, the dim lights across the square, the tramp of the dancers and vacant laughs and discordant music, the door flung wide and the entrance of the cowboy. She did not recall how he had looked or what he had done. And the next instant she saw him cool, smiling, devilish—saw
