Carley was awakened by rattling sounds in her room. The raising of sleepy eyelids disclosed Flo on her knees before the little stove, in the act of lighting a fire.
“Mawnin’, Carley,” she drawled. “It’s shore cold. Reckon it’ll snow today, worse luck, just because you’re here. Take my hunch and stay in bed till the fire burns up.”
“I shall do no such thing,” declared Carley, heroically.
“We’re afraid you’ll take cold,” said Flo. “This is desert country with high altitude. Spring is here when the sun shines. But it’s only shinin’ in streaks these days. That means winter, really. Please be good.”
“Well, it doesn’t require much self-denial to stay here awhile longer,” replied Carley, lazily.
Flo left with a parting admonition not to let the stove get red-hot. And Carley lay snuggled in the warm blankets, dreading the ordeal of getting out into that cold bare room. Her nose was cold. When her nose grew cold, it being a faithful barometer as to temperature, Carley knew there was frost in the air. She preferred summer. Steam-heated rooms with hothouse flowers lending their perfume had certainly not trained Carley for primitive conditions. She had a spirit, however, that was waxing a little rebellious to all this intimation as to her susceptibility to colds and her probable weakness under privation. Carley got up. Her bare feet landed upon the board floor instead of the Navajo rug, and she thought she had encountered cold stone. Stove and hot water notwithstanding, by the time she was half dressed she was also half frozen. “Some actor fellow once said w-when you w-went West you were c-camping out,” chattered Carley. “Believe me, he said something.”
The fact was Carley had never camped out. Her set played golf, rode horseback, motored and house-boated, but they had never gone in for uncomfortable trips. The camps and hotels in the Adirondacks were as warm and luxurious as Carley’s own home. Carley now missed many things. And assuredly her flesh was weak. It cost her effort of will and real pain to finish lacing her boots. As she had made an engagement with Glenn to visit his cabin, she had donned an outdoor suit. She wondered if the cold had anything to do with the perceptible diminishing of the sound of the waterfall. Perhaps some of the water had frozen, like her fingers.
Carley went downstairs to the living room, and made no effort to resist a rush to the open fire. Flo and her mother were amused at Carley’s impetuosity. “You’ll like that stingin’ of the air after you get used to it,” said Mrs. Hutter. Carley had her doubts. When she was thoroughly thawed out she discovered an appetite quite unusual for her, and she enjoyed her breakfast. Then it was time to sally forth to meet Glenn.
“It’s pretty sharp this mawnin’,” said Flo. “You’ll need gloves and sweater.”
Having fortified herself with these, Carley asked how to find West Fork Canyon.
“It’s down the road a little way,” replied Flo. “A great narrow canyon opening on the right side. You can’t miss it.”
Flo accompanied her as far as the porch steps. A queer-looking individual was slouching along with ax over his shoulder.
“There’s Charley,” said Flo. “He’ll show you.” Then she whispered: “He’s sort of dotty sometimes. A horse kicked him once. But mostly he’s sensible.”
At Flo’s call the fellow halted with a grin. He was long, lean, loose jointed, dressed in blue overalls stuck into the tops of muddy boots, and his face was clear olive without beard or line. His brow bulged a little, and from under it peered out a pair of wistful brown eyes that reminded Carley of those of a dog she had once owned.
“Wal, it ain’t a-goin’ to be a nice day,” remarked Charley, as he tried to accommodate his strides to Carley’s steps.
“How can you tell?” asked Carley. “It looks clear and bright.”
“Naw, this is a dark mawnin’. Thet’s a cloudy sun. We’ll hev snow on an’ off.”
“Do you mind bad weather?”
“Me? All the same to me. Reckon, though, I like it cold so I can loaf round a big fire at night.”
“I like a big fire, too.”
“Ever camped out?” he asked.
“Not what you’d call the real thing,” replied Carley.
“Wal, thet’s too bad. Reckon it’ll be tough fer you,” he went on, kindly. “There was a gurl tenderfoot heah two years ago an’ she had a hell of a time. They all joked her, ’cept me, an’ played tricks on her. An’ on her side she was always puttin’ her foot in it. I was shore sorry fer her.”
“You were very kind to be an exception,” murmured Carley.
“You look out fer Tom Hutter, an’ I reckon Flo ain’t so darn above layin’ traps fer you. ’Specially as she’s sweet on your beau. I seen them together a lot.”
“Yes?” interrogated Carley, encouragingly.
“Kilbourne is the best fellar thet ever happened along Oak Creek. I helped him build his cabin. We’ve hunted some together. Did you ever hunt?”
“No.”
“Wal, you’ve shore missed a lot of fun,” he said. “Turkey huntin’. Thet’s what fetches the gurls. I reckon because turkeys are so good to eat. The old gobblers hev begun to gobble now. I’ll take you gobbler huntin’ if you’d like to go.”
“I’m sure I would.”
“There’s good trout fishin’ along heah a little later,” he said, pointing to the stream. “Crick’s too high now. I like West Fork best. I’ve ketched some lammin’ big ones up there.”
Carley was amused and interested. She could not say that Charley had shown any indication of his mental peculiarity to her. It took considerable restraint not to lead him to talk more about Flo and Glenn. Presently they reached the turn in the road, opposite the cottage Carley had noticed yesterday, and here her loquacious escort halted.
“You take the trail heah,” he said, pointing it out, “an’ foller it into West Fork. So long, an’ don’t forget we’re goin’ huntin’ turkeys.”
Carley smiled her thanks, and, taking to the trail, she stepped out briskly, now giving attention to her surroundings. The canyon had widened, and the creek with its deep thicket of green and white had sheered to the left. On her right the canyon wall appeared to be lifting higher—and higher. She could not see it well, owing to intervening treetops. The trail led her through a grove of maples and sycamores, out into an open park-like bench that turned to the right toward the cliff. Suddenly Carley saw a break in the red wall. It was the intersecting canyon, West Fork. What a narrow red-walled gateway! Huge pine trees spread wide gnarled branches over her head. The wind made soft rush in their tops, sending the brown needles lightly on the air. Carley turned the bulging corner, to be halted by a magnificent spectacle. It seemed a mountain wall loomed over her. It was the western side of this canyon, so lofty that Carley had to tip back her head to see the top. She swept her astonished gaze down the face of this tremendous red mountain wall and then slowly swept it upward again. This phenomenon of a cliff seemed beyond the comprehension of her sight. It looked a mile high. The few trees along its bold rampart resembled short spear-pointed bushes outlined against the steel gray of sky. Ledges, caves, seams, cracks, fissures, beetling red brows, yellow crumbling crags, benches of green growths and niches choked with brush, and bold points where single lonely pine trees grew perilously, and blank walls a thousand feet across their shadowed faces—these features gradually took shape in Carley’s confused sight, until the colossal mountain front stood up before her in all its strange, wild, magnificent ruggedness and beauty.
“Arizona! Perhaps this is what he meant,” murmured Carley. “I never dreamed of anything like this.... But, oh! it overshadows me—bears me down! I could never have a moment’s peace under it.”
It fascinated her. There were inaccessible ledges that haunted her with their remote fastnesses. How wonderful would it be to get there, rest there, if that were possible! But only eagles could reach them. There were places, then, that the desecrating hands of man could not touch. The dark caves were mystically potent in their vacant staring out at the world beneath them. The crumbling crags, the toppling ledges, the leaning rocks all threatened to come thundering down at the breath of wind. How deep and soft the red color in contrast with the green! How splendid the sheer bold uplift of gigantic steps! Carley found herself marveling at the forces that had so rudely, violently, and grandly left this monument to nature.
“Well, old Fifth Avenue gadder!” called a gay voice. “If the back wall of my yard so halts you—what will you ever do when you see the Painted Desert, or climb Sunset Peak, or look down into the Grand Canyon?”
“Oh, Glenn, where are you?” cried Carley, gazing everywhere near at hand. But he was farther away. The clearness of his voice had deceived her. Presently she espied him a little distance away, across a creek she had not before noticed.
“Come on,” he called. “I want to see you cross the stepping stones.”
Carley ran ahead, down a little slope of clean red rock, to the shore of the green water. It was clear, swift, deep in some places and shallow in others, with white wreathes or ripples around the rocks evidently placed there as a means to cross. Carley drew back aghast.
“Glenn, I could never make it,” she called.
“Come on, my Alpine climber,” he taunted. “Will you let Arizona daunt you?”
“Do you want me to fall in and catch cold?” she cried, desperately.
“Carley, big women might even cross the bad places of modern life on stepping stones of their dead selves!” he went on, with something of mockery. “Surely a few physical steps are not beyond you.”
“Say, are you mangling Tennyson or just kidding me?” she demanded slangily.
“My love, Flo could cross here with her eyes shut.”
That thrust spurred Carley to action. His words were jest, yet they held a hint of earnest. With her heart at her throat Carley stepped on the first rock, and, poising, she calculated on a running leap from stone to stone. Once launched, she felt she was falling downhill. She swayed, she splashed, she slipped; and clearing the longest leap from the last stone to shore she lost her balance and fell into Glenn’s arms. His kisses drove away both her panic and her resentment.
“By Jove! I didn’t think you’d even attempt it!” he declared, manifestly pleased. “I made sure I’d have to pack you over—in fact, rather liked the idea.”
“I wouldn’t advise you to employ any such means again—to dare me,” she retorted.
“That’s a nifty outdoor suit you’ve on,” he said, admiringly. “I was wondering what you’d wear. I like short outing skirts for women, rather than trousers. The service sort of made the fair sex dippy about pants.”
“It made them dippy about more than that,” she replied. “You and I will never live to see the day that women recover their balance.”
“I agree with you,” replied Glenn.
Carley locked her arm in his. “Honey, I want to have a good time today. Cut out all the other women stuff.... Take me to see your little gray home in the West. Or is it gray?”
He laughed. “Why, yes, it’s gray, just about. The logs have bleached some.”
Glenn led her away up a trail that climbed between bowlders, and meandered on over piny mats of needles under great, silent, spreading pines; and closer to the impondering mountain wall, where at the base of the red rock the creek murmured strangely with hollow gurgle, where the sun had no chance to affect the cold damp gloom; and on through sweet-smelling woods, out into the sunlight again, and across a wider breadth of stream; and up a slow slope covered with stately pines, to a little cabin that faced the west.
“Here we are, sweetheart,” said Glenn. “Now we shall see what you are made of.”
Carley was non-committal as to that. Her intense interest precluded any humor at this moment. Not until she actually saw the log cabin Glenn had erected with his own hands had she been conscious of any great interest. But sight of it awoke something unaccustomed in Carley. As she stepped into the cabin her heart was not acting normally for a young woman who had no illusions about love in a cottage.
Glenn’s cabin contained one room about fifteen feet wide by twenty long. Between the peeled logs were lines of red mud, hard dried. There was a small window opposite the door. In one corner was a couch of poles, with green tips of pine boughs peeping from under the blankets. The floor consisted of flat rocks laid irregularly, with many spaces of earth showing between. The open fireplace appeared too large for the room, but the very bigness of it, as well as the blazing sticks and glowing embers, appealed strongly to Carley. A rough-hewn log formed the mantel, and on it Carley’s picture held the place of honor. Above this a rifle lay across deer antlers. Carley paused here in her survey long enough to kiss Glenn and point to her photograph.
“You couldn’t have pleased me more.”
To the left of the fireplace was a rude cupboard of shelves, packed with boxes, cans, bags, and utensils. Below the cupboard, hung upon pegs, were blackened pots and pans, a long-handled skillet, and a bucket. Glenn’s table was a masterpiece. There was no danger of knocking it over. It consisted of four poles driven into the ground, upon which had been nailed two wide slabs. This table showed considerable evidence of having been scrubbed scrupulously clean. There were two low stools, made out of boughs, and the seats had been covered with woolly sheep hide. In the right-hand corner stood a neat pile of firewood, cut with an ax, and beyond this hung saddle and saddle blanket, bridle and spurs. An old sombrero was hooked upon the pommel of the saddle. Upon the wall, higher up, hung a lantern, resting in a coil of rope that Carley took to be a lasso. Under a shelf upon which lay a suitcase hung some rough wearing apparel.
Carley noted that her picture and the suit case were absolutely the only physical evidences of Glenn’s connection with his Eastern life. That had an unaccountable effect upon Carley. What had she expected? Then, after another survey of the room, she began to pester Glenn with questions. He had to show her the spring outside and the little bench with basin and soap. Sight of his soiled towel made her throw up her hands. She sat on the stools. She lay on the couch. She rummaged into the contents of the cupboard. She threw wood on the fire. Then, finally, having exhausted her search and inquiry, she flopped down on one of the stools to gaze at Glenn in awe and admiration and incredulity.
“Glenn—you’ve actually lived here!” she ejaculated.
“Since last fall before the snow came,” he said, smiling.
“Snow! Did it snow?” she inquired.
“Well, I guess. I was snowed in for a week.”
“Why did you choose this lonely place—way off from the Lodge?” she asked, slowly.
“I wanted to be by myself,” he replied, briefly.
“You mean this is a sort of camp-out place?”
“Carley, I call it my home,” he replied, and there was a low, strong sweetness in his voice she had never heard before.
That silenced her for a while. She went to the door and gazed up at the towering wall, more wonderful than ever, and more fearful, too, in her sight. Presently tears dimmed her eyes. She did not understand her feeling; she was ashamed of it; she hid it from Glenn. Indeed, there was something terribly wrong between her and Glenn, and it was not in him. This cabin he called home gave her a shock which would take time to analyze. At length she turned to him with gay utterance upon her lips. She tried to put out of her mind a dawning sense that this close-to-the-earth habitation, this primitive dwelling, held strange inscrutable power over a self she had never divined she possessed. The very stones in the hearth seemed to call out from some remote past, and the strong sweet smell of burnt wood thrilled to the marrow of her bones. How little she knew of herself! But she had intelligence enough to understand that there was a woman in her, the female of the species; and through that the sensations from logs and stones and earth and fire had strange power to call up the emotions handed down to her from the ages. The thrill, the queer heartbeat, the vague, haunting memory of something, as of a dim childhood adventure, the strange prickling sense of dread—these abided with her and augmented while she tried to show Glenn her pride in him and also how funny his cabin seemed to her.
Once or twice he hesitatingly, and somewhat appealingly, she imagined, tried to broach the subject of his work there in the West. But Carley wanted a little while with him free of disagreeable argument. It was a foregone conclusion that she would not like his work. Her intention at first had been to begin at once to use all persuasion in her power toward having him go back East with her, or at the latest some time this year. But the rude log cabin had checked her impulse. She felt that haste would be unwise.
“Glenn Kilbourne, I told you why I came West to see you,” she said, spiritedly. “Well, since you still swear allegiance to your girl from the East, you might entertain her a little bit before getting down to business talk.”
“All right, Carley,” he replied, laughing. “What do you want to do? The day is at your disposal. I wish it were June. Then if you didn’t fall in love with West Fork you’d be no good.”
“Glenn, I love people, not places,” she returned.
“So I remember. And that’s one thing I don’t like. But let’s not quarrel. What’ll we do?”
“Suppose you tramp with me all around, until I’m good and hungry. Then we’ll come back here—and you can cook dinner for me.”
“Fine! Oh, I know you’re just bursting with curiosity to see how I’ll do it. Well, you may be surprised, miss.”
“Let’s go,” she urged.
“Shall I take my gun or fishing rod?”
“You shall take nothing but me,” retorted Carley. “What chance has a girl with a man, if he can hunt or fish?”
So they went out hand in hand. Half of the belt of sky above was obscured by swiftly moving gray clouds. The other half was blue and was being slowly encroached upon by the dark storm-like pall. How cold the air! Carley had already learned that when the sun was hidden the atmosphere was cold. Glenn led her down a trail to the brook, where he calmly picked her up in his arms, quite easily, it appeared, and leisurely packed her across, kissing her half a dozen times before he deposited her on her feet.
“Glenn, you do this sort of thing so well that it makes me imagine you have practice now and then,” she said.
“No. But you are pretty and sweet, and like the girl you were four years ago. That takes me back to those days.”
“I thank you. That’s dear of you. I think I am something of a cat.... I’ll be glad if this walk leads us often to the creek.”
Spring might have been fresh and keen in the air, but it had not yet brought much green to the brown earth or to the trees. The cotton-woods showed a light feathery verdure. The long grass was a bleached white, and low down close to the sod fresh tiny green blades showed. The great fern leaves were sear and ragged, and they rustled in the breeze. Small gray sheath-barked trees with clumpy foliage and snags of dead branches, Glenn called cedars; and, grotesque as these were, Carley rather liked them. They were approachable, not majestic and lofty like the pines, and they smelled sweetly wild, and best of all they afforded some protection from the bitter wind. Carley rested better than she walked. The huge sections of red rock that had tumbled from above also interested Carley, especially when the sun happened to come out for a few moments and brought out their color. She enjoyed walking on the fallen pines, with Glenn below, keeping pace with her and holding her hand. Carley looked in vain for flowers and birds. The only living things she saw were rainbow trout that Glenn pointed out to her in the beautiful clear pools. The way the great gray bowlders trooped down to the brook as if they were cattle going to drink; the dark caverns under the shelving cliffs, where the water murmured with such hollow mockery; the low spear-pointed gray plants, resembling century plants, and which Glenn called mescal cactus, each with its single straight dead stalk standing on high with fluted head; the narrow gorges, perpendicularly walled in red, where the constricted brook plunged in amber and white cascades over fall after fall, tumbling, rushing, singing its water melody—these all held singular appeal for Carley as aspects of the wild land, fascinating for the moment, symbolic of the lonely red man and his forbears, and by their raw contrast making more necessary and desirable and elevating the comforts and conventions of civilization. The cave man theory interested Carley only as mythology.
Lonelier, wilder, grander grew Glenn’s canyon. Carley was finally forced to shift her attention from the intimate objects of the canyon floor to the aloof and unattainable heights. Singular to feel the difference! That which she could see close at hand, touch if she willed, seemed to, become part of her knowledge, could be observed and so possessed and passed by. But the gold-red ramparts against the sky, the crannied cliffs, the crags of the eagles, the lofty, distant blank walls, where the winds of the gods had written their wars—these haunted because they could never be possessed. Carley had often gazed at the Alps as at celebrated pictures. She admired, she appreciated—then she forgot. But the canyon heights did not affect her that way. They vaguely dissatisfied, and as she could not be sure of what they dissatisfied, she had to conclude that it was in herself. To see, to watch, to dream, to seek, to strive, to endure, to find! Was that what they meant? They might make her thoughtful of the vast earth, and its endless age, and its staggering mystery. But what more!
The storm that had threatened blackened the sky, and gray scudding clouds buried the canyon rims, and long veils of rain and sleet began to descend. The wind roared through the pines, drowning the roar of the brook. Quite suddenly the air grew piercingly cold. Carley had forgotten her gloves, and her pockets had not been constructed to protect hands. Glenn drew her into a sheltered nook where a rock jutted out from overhead and a thicket of young pines helped break the onslaught of the wind. There Carley sat on a cold rock, huddled up close to Glenn, and wearing to a state she knew would be misery. Glenn not only seemed content; he was happy. “This is great,” he said. His coat was open, his hands uncovered, and he watched the storm and listened with manifest delight. Carley hated to betray what a weakling she was, so she resigned herself to her fate, and imagined she felt her fingers numbing into ice, and her sensitive nose slowly and painfully freezing.
The storm passed, however, before Carley sank into abject and open wretchedness. She managed to keep pace with Glenn until exercise warmed her blood. At every little ascent in the trail she found herself laboring to get her breath. There was assuredly evidence of abundance of air in this canyon, but somehow she could not get enough of it. Glenn detected this and said it was owing to the altitude. When they reached the cabin Carley was wet, stiff, cold, exhausted. How welcome the shelter, the open fireplace! Seeing the cabin in new light, Carley had the grace to acknowledge to herself that, after all, it was not so bad.
“Now for a good fire and then dinner,” announced Glenn, with the air of one who knew his ground.
“Can I help?” queried Carley.
“Not today. I do not want you to spring any domestic science on me now.” Carley was not averse to withholding her ignorance. She watched Glenn with surpassing curiosity and interest. First he threw a quantity of wood upon the smoldering fire.
“I have ham and mutton of my own raising,” announced Glenn, with importance. “Which would you prefer?”
“Of your own raising. What do you mean?” queried Carley.
“My dear, you’ve been so steeped in the fog of the crowd that you are blind to the homely and necessary things of living. I mean I have here meat of both sheep and hog that I raised myself. That is to say, mutton and ham. Which do you like?”
“Ham!” cried Carley, incredulously.
Without more ado Glenn settled to brisk action, every move of which Carley watched with keen eyes. The usurping of a woman’s province by a man was always an amusing thing. But for Glenn Kilbourne—what more would it be? He evidently knew what he wanted, for every movement was quick, decisive. One after another he placed bags, cans, sacks, pans, utensils on the table. Then he kicked at the roaring fire, settling some of the sticks. He strode outside to return with a bucket of water, a basin, towel, and soap. Then he took down two queer little iron pots with heavy lids. To each pot was attached a wire handle. He removed the lids, then set both the pots right on the fire or in it. Pouring water into the basin, he proceeded to wash his hands. Next he took a large pail, and from a sack he filled it half full of flour. To this he added baking powder and salt. It was instructive for Carley to see him run his skillful fingers all through that flour, as if searching for lumps. After this he knelt before the fire and, lifting off one of the iron pots with a forked stick, he proceeded to wipe out the inside of the pot and grease it with a piece of fat. His next move was to rake out a pile of the red coals, a feat he performed with the stick, and upon these he placed the pot. Also he removed the other pot from the fire, leaving it, however, quite close.
“Well, all eyes?” he bantered, suddenly staring at her. “Didn’t I say I’d surprise you?”
“Don’t mind me. This is about the happiest and most bewildered moment—of my life,” replied Carley.
Returning to the table, Glenn dug at something in a large red can. He paused a moment to eye Carley.
“Girl, do you know how to make biscuits?” he queried.
“I might have known in my school days, but I’ve forgotten,” she replied.
“Can you make apple pie?” he demanded, imperiously.
“No,” rejoined Carley.
“How do you expect to please your husband?”
“Why—by marrying him, I suppose,” answered Carley, as if weighing a problem.
“That has been the universal feminine point of view for a good many years,” replied Glenn, flourishing a flour-whitened hand. “But it never served the women of the Revolution or the pioneers. And they were the builders of the nation. It will never serve the wives of the future, if we are to survive.”
“Glenn, you rave!” ejaculated Carley, not knowing whether to laugh or be grave. “You were talking of humble housewifely things.”
“Precisely. The humble things that were the foundation of the great nation of Americans. I meant work and children.”
Carley could only stare at him. The look he flashed at her, the sudden intensity and passion of his ringing words, were as if he gave her a glimpse into the very depths of him. He might have begun in fun, but he had finished otherwise. She felt that she really did not know this man. Had he arraigned her in judgment? A flush, seemingly hot and cold, passed over her. Then it relieved her to see that he had returned to his task.
He mixed the shortening with the flour, and, adding water, he began a thorough kneading. When the consistency of the mixture appeared to satisfy him he took a handful of it, rolled it into a ball, patted and flattened it into a biscuit, and dropped it into the oven he had set aside on the hot coals. Swiftly he shaped eight or ten other biscuits and dropped them as the first. Then he put the heavy iron lid on the pot, and with a rude shovel, improvised from a flattened tin can, he shoveled red coals out of the fire, and covered the lid with them. His next move was to pare and slice potatoes, placing these aside in a pan. A small black coffee-pot half full of water, was set on a glowing part of the fire. Then he brought into use a huge, heavy knife, a murderous-looking implement it appeared to Carley, with which he cut slices of ham. These he dropped into the second pot, which he left uncovered. Next he removed the flour sack and other inpedimenta from the table, and proceeded to set places for two—blue-enamel plate and cup, with plain, substantial-looking knives, forks, and spoons. He went outside, to return presently carrying a small crock of butter. Evidently he had kept the butter in or near the spring. It looked dewy and cold and hard. After that he peeped under the lid of the pot which contained the biscuits. The other pot was sizzling and smoking, giving forth a delicious savory odor that affected Carley most agreeably. The coffee-pot had begun to steam. With a long fork Glenn turned the slices of ham and stood a moment watching them. Next he placed cans of three sizes upon the table; and these Carley conjectured contained sugar, salt, and pepper. Carley might not have been present, for all the attention he paid to her. Again he peeped at the biscuits. At the edge of the hot embers he placed a tin plate, upon which he carefully deposited the slices of ham. Carley had not needed sight of them to know she was hungry; they made her simply ravenous. That done, he poured the pan of sliced potatoes into the pot. Carley judged the heat of that pot to be extreme. Next he removed the lid from the other pot, exposing biscuits slightly browned; and evidently satisfied with these, he removed them from the coals. He stirred the slices of potatoes round and round; he emptied two heaping tablespoonfuls of coffee into the coffee-pot.
“Carley,” he said, at last turning to her with a warm smile, “out here in the West the cook usually yells, ‘Come and get it.’ Draw up your stool.”
And presently Carley found herself seated across the crude table from Glenn, with the background of chinked logs in her sight, and the smart of wood smoke in her eyes. In years past she had sat with him in the soft, subdued, gold-green shadows of the Astor, or in the sumptuous atmosphere of the St. Regis. But this event was so different, so striking, that she felt it would have limitless significance. For one thing, the look of Glenn! When had he ever seemed like this, wonderfully happy to have her there, consciously proud of this dinner he had prepared in half an hour, strangely studying her as one on trial? This might have had its effect upon Carley’s reaction to the situation, making it sweet, trenchant with meaning, but she was hungry enough and the dinner was good enough to make this hour memorable on that score alone. She ate until she was actually ashamed of herself. She laughed heartily, she talked, she made love to Glenn. Then suddenly an idea flashed into her quick mind.
“Glenn, did this girl Flo teach you to cook?” she queried, sharply.
“No. I always was handy in camp. Then out here I had the luck to fall in with an old fellow who was a wonderful cook. He lived with me for a while. ... Why, what difference would it have made—had Flo taught me?”
Carley felt the heat of blood in her face. “I don’t know that it would have made a difference. Only—I’m glad she didn’t teach you. I’d rather no girl could teach you what I couldn’t.”
“You think I’m a pretty good cook, then?” he asked.
“I’ve enjoyed this dinner more than any I’ve ever eaten.”
“Thanks, Carley. That’ll help a lot,” he said, gayly, but his eyes shone with earnest, glad light. “I hoped I’d surprise you. I’ve found out here that I want to do things well. The West stirs something in a man. It must be an unwritten law. You stand or fall by your own hands. Back East you know meals are just occasions—to hurry through—to dress for—to meet somebody—to eat because you have to eat. But out here they are different. I don’t know how. In the city, producers, merchants, waiters serve you for money. The meal is a transaction. It has no significance. It is money that keeps you from starvation. But in the West money doesn’t mean much. You must work to live.”
Carley leaned her elbows on the table and gazed at him curiously and admiringly. “Old fellow, you’re a wonder. I can’t tell you how proud I am of you. That you could come West weak and sick, and fight your way to health, and learn to be self-sufficient! It is a splendid achievement. It amazes me. I don’t grasp it. I want to think. Nevertheless I—”
“What?” he queried, as she hesitated.
“Oh, never mind now,” she replied, hastily, averting her eyes.
The day was far spent when Carley returned to the Lodge—and in spite of the discomfort of cold and sleet, and the bitter wind that beat in her face as she struggled up the trail—it was a day never to be forgotten. Nothing had been wanting in Glenn’s attention or affection. He had been comrade, lover, all she craved for. And but for his few singular words about work and children there had been no serious talk. Only a play day in his canyon and his cabin! Yet had she appeared at her best? Something vague and perplexing knocked at the gate of her consciousness.
