Judith of the Godless Valley Part 21

"Do you think that's a decent thing to do? A girl, running cattle and with a confessed murderer at that? I sure am ashamed of you, Jude!"

"Can you beat a man!" cried Judith to the flaming heavens. "He won't even give me credit for being a cattle wrangler! And he says he loves me!"

Doug's voice was furious. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself, stealing cattle and running round with that Inez Rodman!"

"You just be careful of what you say, Doug Spencer!" "Careful! Why should I be careful. You aren't careful!"

"I'm a whole lot better than you, at that! If it's so smart for you to do all these things, why isn't it for me?"

"A woman has to be good. It's her job to be good. If she isn't good in a cattle country like this, everything goes to pieces."

"It's a wonder you men don't set us women an example," said Judith coolly.

"Don't I try to keep you straight?"

"Yeh! A wonderful example you set me!"

Douglas' voice broke with anger. "Don't talk like a fool! The world isn't like that! The women have to be good. The men want 'em to be, no matter how hard they try to make the women bad. And the more you care for a girl, the more you want her to be perfect."

"The world is plumb loco and you with it!"

"You're as cold as a dead rabbit!" exclaimed Doug,

Judith laughed mirthlessly. "Yes, I'm cold! I'm as cold as fire!" And suddenly she put her head down on her knees and burst into tears.

Instantly Douglas melted. He put his arms about. Judith and drew her head to his shoulder. "O Jude! Don't! If I could only make you see it's my love for you makes me so mad!"

"You,--you don't want me to have any fun!" sobbed Judith. "How'd you like to be asked to give up everything yourself and stay home like a woman?"

"I wouldn't like it. But a regular girl oughtn't to want to do such things."

"Why not? I like horses and dogs and the wind on Fire Mesa just as much as you do. And dancing and hunting by moonlight and getting away with somebody else's cattle and all of it. I love it! And you ask me to give it up because you want me to be good. What do you call good, anyhow?"

Douglas did not answer at once. In the first place, Judith's flushed cheek in his neck upset his equilibrium, and in the second place he was overwhelmed with a sudden consciousness of the truth of Peter's statement, that he had not a clean-cut idea to his name.

But finally he stammered, "Well, I call being good not drinking or stealing or being loose with men or any of those things--for a girl."

"And for a man?" asked Judith, sitting erect.

"Aw, who wants a man to be good?" laughed Douglas.

"I do," replied Judith, with a sudden thrilling intensity in her young voice. "I want his strength to be as the strength of ten, because his heart is pure,"

"Judith, you really do?"

"Yes, I really do."

Douglas drew a long breath. "Judith, would you want me to be that way?"

"I sure would."

"Well, then, Judith, so help me G.o.d, I will be!"

Judith put her slender, muscular hand on Doug's, swallowed hard once or twice, but said nothing. Then the tense moment past, she asked, "Honest, Doug, don't you think that was kind of a smart stunt of mine?"

"I certainly do," with heart-felt conviction. "But I want you to promise me one thing. That you won't run any more cattle. Will you, Jude?"

"I'll promise you, if you'll promise me," returned Judith promptly.

"But it's different with a man," repeated Douglas.

"But you promised about that other."

"That was different. It was something personal between you and me. The other is business."

"All right! I don't promise unless you do."

"I can't promise, Jude. Honest, I can't."

Jude laughed and jumped to her feet. "You are a goose, Doug, but I sure am fond of you." Then she left him.

Douglas sat still, his head pressed against the indescribable sweetness of the alfalfa hay, eyes on the wonder of the stars. Finally he said aloud, "I wish there was somebody a fellow could talk to that knows things. I wish my grandfather Douglas was alive. Peter jaws too much.

What I want is to know facts, then judge for myself."

His father pa.s.sed by the haystack, pitchfork on shoulder. "Who are you talking to, Doug?" he asked.

"The biggest fool in Lost Chief," replied Douglas, rising and following his father to the house.

CHAPTER VI

LITTLE SWIFT CROSSES THE DIVIDE

"Ride 'em till they drop, then break another. That's what Nature does and that's what I do."

--_John Spencer_

The following afternoon when Douglas rode after the mail he went round by the west trail to call on Charleton. He found the crippled philosopher propped up in bed, reading the _Atlantic Monthly_ and smoking a pipe.

Mrs. Falkner and Little Marion were in the corral doing the ch.o.r.es.

"Well, how's the Moose after his disappointment?" asked Charleton.

"Going strong! Any news of Scott?"

"No; I don't expect any news for a week till I get on my feet."