Ironheart

Betty was whipping mayonnaise in the kitchen when a voice hailed the Diamond Bar K ranch in general.

“Hello the house!”

Through the window she saw a rider on a horse, and a moment later her brain localized him as a neighborhood boy who had recently joined the forest rangers. She went to the door, sleeves still rolled back to the elbows of the firm satiny arms.

“Hoo-hoo!” she called, flinging a small hand wildly above her head in greeting. “Hoo-hoo, Billy boy!”

He turned, caught sight of her, and at once began to smile. It was noticeable that when Betty laughed, as she frequently did for no good reason at all except a general state of well-being, others were likely to join in her happiness.

“Oh, there you are,” he said, and at once descended.

“Umpha! Here I am, but I won’t be long. I’m making salad dressing. Come in to the kitchen if you like. I’ll give you a cookie. Just out o’ the oven.”

“Listens good to Billy,” he said, and stayed not on the order of his coming.

She found him a plate of cookies and a stool. “Sit there. And tell me what’s new in the hills. Did you pass the dam as you came down? And what d’you know about the tunnel?”

The ranger stopped a cookie halfway to his mouth. “Say, that fellow—the one drivin’ the tunnel—he’s been shot.”

“What!”

“Last night—at Don Black’s cabin.”

A cold hand laid itself on her heart and stopped its beating. “You mean—on purpose?”

He nodded. “Shot through the window at dark.”

“Mr. Hollister—that who you mean?”

“Yep. That’s what he calls himself now. Jones it was at first.”

“Is he—hurt badly?”

“I’ll say so. In the side—internal injuries. Outa his head when I was there this mo’ning.”

“What does the doctor say?”

“He ain’t seen him yet. On the way up now. I ’phoned down from Meagher’s ranch. He’d ought to pass here soon.”

“But why didn’t they get the doctor sooner? What were they thinking about?” she cried.

“Nobody with him but Don Black. He couldn’t leave him alone, he claims. Lucky I dropped in when I did.”

Impulsively Betty made up her mind. “I’m going to him. You’ll have to take me, Billy.”

“You!” exclaimed the ranger. “What’s the big idea, Betty?”

“Dad’s gone to Denver to the stock show. I’m going to look after him. That’s what Dad would want if he were here. Some one’s got to nurse him. What other woman can go in on snowshoes and do it?”

“Does he have to have a woman nurse? Can’t Mr. Merrick send a man up there to look after him?”

“Don’t argue, Billy boy,” she told him. “You see how it is. They don’t even get a doctor to him for fifteen or sixteen hours. By this time he may be—” She stopped and bit her lip to check a sudden swell of emotion that choked up her throat.

Bridget came into the kitchen. Betty’s announcement was both a decision and an appeal. “Mr. Hollister’s been hurt—shot—up in the hills. I’m going up to Justin to make him take me to him.”

“Is he hur-rt bad?” asked the buxom housekeeper.

“Yes. I don’t know. Billy thinks so. If I hurry I can get there before night.”

Bridget hesitated. “I was thinkin’ it might be better for me to go, dearie. You know how folks talk.”

“Oh, talk!” Betty was explosively impatient. She always was when anybody interfered with one of her enthusiasms. “Of course, if you could go. But you’d never get in through the snow. And what could they say—except that I went to save a man’s life if I could?”

“Mr. Merrick might not like it.”

“Of course he’d like it.” The girl was nobly indignant for her fiancé. “Why wouldn’t he like it? It’s just what he’d want me to do.” Under the brown bloom of her cheeks was the peach glow of excitement.

Bridget had traveled some distance on the journey of life, and she had her own opinion about that. Merrick, if she guessed him at all correctly, was a possessive man. He could appreciate Betty’s valiant eagerness when it went out to him, but he would be likely to resent her generous giving of herself to another. He did not belong to the type of lover that recognizes the right of a sweetheart or a wife to express herself in her own way. She was pledged to him. Her vocation and avocation in life were to be his wife.

But Bridget was wise in her generation. She knew that Betty was of the temperament that had to learn from experience. She asked how they would travel to the dam.

“On horseback—if we can get through. The road’s not broken yet probably after yesterday’s storm. We’ll start right away. I can’t get Justin on the ’phone. The wire must be down.”

The ranger saddled for her and they took the road. Betty carried with her a small emergency kit of medical supplies.

Travel back and forth had broken the road in the valley. It was not until the riders struck the hill trail that they had to buck drifts. It was slow, wearing work, and, by the time they came in sight of the dam, Betty’s watch told her that it was two o’clock.

Merrick saw them coming down the long white slope and wondered what travelers had business urgent enough to bring them through heavy drifts to the isolated camp. As soon as he recognized Betty, he went to meet her. Billy rode on down to the tents. He knew when he was not needed.

Rich color glowed in her cheeks, excitement sparkled in her eyes.

“What in the world are you doing here?” Merrick asked.

She was the least bit dashed by his manner. It suggested censure, implied that her adventure—whatever the cause of it—was a bit of headstrong folly. Did he think it was a girl’s place to stay at home in weather like this? Did he think that she was unmaidenly, had bucked miles of snowdrifts because she could not stay away from him?

“Have you heard about Mr. Hollister? He’s been hurt—shot.”

“Shot?”

“Last night. At Black’s cabin.”

“Who shot him?”

“I don’t know. He’s pretty bad, Billy says.”

“Doctor seen him yet?”

“He’s on the way now. I want you to take me to him, Justin.”

“Take you? What for?”

“To nurse him.”

He smiled, the superior smile of one prepared to argue away the foolish fancies of a girl.

“Is your father home yet?”

“No. He’ll be back to-morrow. Why?”

“Because, dear girl, you can’t go farther. In the first place, it’s not necessary. I’ll do all that can be done for Hollister. The trip from here won’t be a picnic.”

“I’ve brought my skis. I can get in all right,” she protested eagerly.

“I grant that. But there’s no need for you to go. You’d far better not. It’s not quite—” He stopped in mid-sentence, with an expressive lift of the shoulders.

“Not quite proper. I didn’t expect you to say that, Justin,” she reproached. “After what he did for us.”

“He did only what any self-respecting man would do.”

Her smile coaxed him. “Well, I want to do only what any self-respecting woman would do. Surely it’ll be all right if you go along.”

How could he tell her that he knew no other unmarried woman of her age, outside of professional nurses, who would consider such a thing for the sake of a comparative stranger? How could he make her see that Black’s cabin was no place for a young girl to stay? He was exasperated at her persistence. It offended his amour propre. Why all this discussion about one of his employees who had been a tramp only a few months since?

Merrick shook his head. His lips smiled, but there was no smile in his eyes. “You’re a very impulsive and very generous young woman. But if you were a little older you would see—”

She broke impatiently into his argument. “Don’t you see how I feel, Justin? I’ve got to do what I can for him. We’re not in a city where we can ring up for a trained nurse. I’m the only available woman that can get in to him. Why did I take my Red Cross training if I’m not to help those who are sick?”

“Can’t you trust me to look out for him?”

“Of course I can. That’s not the point. There’s so much in nursing. Any doctor will tell you so. Maybe he needs expert care. I really can nurse. I’ve done it all my life.”

“You don’t expect to nurse everybody in the county that falls sick, do you? Don’t you see, dear girl, that Black’s shack is no place for you?”

“Why isn’t it? I’m a ranchman’s daughter. It doesn’t shock or offend me to see things that might distress a city girl.” She cast about in her mind for another way to put it. “I remember my mother leaving us once for days to look after a homesteader who had been hurt ’way up on Rabbit Ear Creek. Why, that’s what all the women on the frontier did.”

“The frontier days are past,” he said. “And that’s beside the point, anyhow. I’ll have him well looked after. You needn’t worry about that.”

“But I would,” she urged. “I’d worry a lot. I want to go myself, Justin—to make sure it’s all right and that everything’s being done for him that can be. You think it’s just foolishness in me, but it isn’t.”

She put her hand shyly on his sleeve. The gesture was an appeal for understanding of the impulse that was urgent in her. If he could only sympathize with it and acknowledge its obligation.

“I think it’s neither necessary nor wise. It’s my duty, not yours, to have him nursed properly. I’ll not shirk it.” He spoke with the finality of a dominant man who has made up his mind.

Betty felt thrown back on herself. She was disappointed in him and her feelings were hurt. Why must he be so obtuse, so correct and formal? Why couldn’t he see that she had to go? After all, a decision as to what course she would follow lay with her and not with him. He had no right to assume otherwise. She was determined to go, anyhow, but she would not quarrel with him.

“When are you going up to Black’s?” she asked.

“At once.”

“Do take me, please.”

He shook his head. “It isn’t best, dear girl.”

In her heart flamed smokily rebellious fires. “Then I’ll go with Billy.”

He interpreted the words as a challenge. Their eyes met in a long, steady look. Each measured the strength of the other. It was the first time they had come into open conflict.

“I wouldn’t do that, Betty,” he said quietly.

“You don’t know how I feel about it. You won’t understand.” Her voice shook with emotion. “I’ve got to go.”

Merrick knew that he could prevent the ranger from guiding Betty to the gulch where the wounded man was, but it was possible to pay too great a price for victory. He yielded, grudgingly.

“I’ll take you. After you’ve seen Hollister, you can give us directions for nursing him. I should think the doctor ought to know, but, if you haven’t confidence in him, you can see to it yourself.”

Betty found no pleasure now in her desire to help. Justin’s opposition had taken all the joy out of it. Nor did his surrender give her any gratification. He had not yielded because he appreciated the validity of her purpose, but because he had chosen to avoid an open breach. She felt a thousand miles away from him in spirit.

“Thank you,” she said formally, choking down a lump in her throat.