Lahoma

CHAPTER XIX

LIKE LOVERS

On reaching Chickasha, Wilfred Compton telegraphed to Kansas City asking his brother if Lahoma was still at Mr. Gledware's house in the country. In the course of a few hours the reply came that she had already started home to Greer County, Texas. After reading the message, Wilfred haunted the station, not willing to let even the most unpromising freight train escape observation.

Everything that came down the track on this last reach of the railroad into Southwest Oklahoma, was crowded with people, cattle, household furniture, stores of hardware, groceries, dry-goods—all that man requires for his physical well-being. The town itself was swarming with eager jostling throngs bound for many diverse points, and friends of a day shouted hearty good-bys, or exchanged good-natured badinage, as they separated to meet no more.

Men on horseback leading heavily laden pack-horses, covered wagons from which peeped women and children half-reclining upon bedding, their eyes filled with grave wonder at a world so unlike their homes in the East or North—pyramids of undressed lumber fastened somehow upon four wheels and surmounted in precarious fashion by sprawling men whose faces and garments suggested Broadway, New York and Leadville, Colorado—Wilfred gazed upon the unending panorama. In those corded tents he saw the pioneer family already in possession of the new land; in the stacks of pine boards he beheld houses already sending up the smoke of peace and prosperity from their chimneys; and in the men and women who streamed by, their faces alight with hope, their bodies ready for the grapple with drought, flood, cyclone, famine, he saw the guaranty of a young and dominant state.

Strangers greeted one another with easy comrade-ship. Sometimes it was just, "Hello, neighbor!"—and if a warning were shouted across the street to one endangered by the current of swelling life, it might be— "Look out there, brother!" The sense of kinship tingled in the air, opening men's hearts and supplying aid to weaker brethren. Those who gathered along the track awaiting the arrival of the trains had already the air of old-timers, eager to extend the hospitality of a well-loved land.

In such a crowd Wilfred was standing when he first caught sight of Lahoma among those descending to the jostling platform. He had not known how she would look, and certainly she was much changed from the girl of fifteen, but he made his way to her side without the slightest hesitation.

"Lahoma!"

She turned sharply with a certain ease of movement suggesting fearless freedom. Her eyes looked straight into the young man's with penetrating keenness which instantly softened to pleasure. "Why I how glad I am to see you!" she cried, giving him her hand as they withdrew from the rush. "But how did you know me?"

"How did YOU know?" he returned, pleased and thrilled by her glowing brown hair, her eloquent eyes, her warm-tinted cheeks, her form, as erect as of yore, but not so thin—as pleased and thrilled as if all these belonged to him. "How did you know ME?" he repeated, looking and looking, as if he would never be able to believe that she had turned out so much better than he had ever dreamed she would.

"Oh," said Lahoma, "when I looked into your face, I saw myself as a girl sitting under the cedar trees in the cove, with Brick and Bill."

"Just you three?" demanded Wilfred wistfully—also smilingly.

"Oho!" exclaimed Lahoma, showing her perfect little teeth as if about to bite, in a way that filled him with fearful joy, "and so they showed you that letter!"

"JUST you three?" repeated Wilfred. "Just room enough in the cove for you—and Brick—and Bill?"

"Listen to me, Wilfred, and I will do the talking."

"Well?"

She lowered her voice to a whisper— "Lean your head closer."

Wilfred put down his head. "Is this close enough?" he whispered, feeling exalted. Men, women and children circled about them; the air vibrated with the shock of trunks and mail bags hurled upon the platform.

"No," said Lahoma, rising on tiptoe.

Wilfred took off his hat and got under hers.

She whispered in his ear, "Red Kimball came on this train—there he is—he hasn't seen me, yet—was in another coach."

"Well? Go on talking. Lahoma—I'd get closer if I could."

"S-H-H! He knows me, for he was a porter in our hotel. When he sees us he'll know I've come home to warn Brick. S-H-H! Then he'll try to keep me from doing it. Look—some of his gang are speaking to him—they've been waiting here to meet him—they'll go with him, I expect. We'll all be in the stage-coach together!"

"What do you want me to do to 'em, Lahoma?"

"I want you to pretend that you don't know me—and they mustn't find out your name is Compton, or they'll think Mr. Edgerton got word to you to join me here. Be a stranger till we're safe in the cove."

"All right. Good-by—but suppose I hadn't come?"

"Oh, I could have done without you," said Lahoma. "Or I think I could."

"You could never have done without me!" Wilfred declared decidedly.

"I can right NOW—" She drew away. "I'll get into the stage; don't follow too soon."

There were three stage-coaches drawn up at a short distance from the platform, and Lahoma went swiftly to the one bound for her part of the country. She was the first to enter; she was seated quietly in a corner when the two long seats that faced each other began filling up. The last to come were four men: one, tall, slender, red-faced and red-haired, two others of dark and lowering faces, who looked upon the former as their leader, and the last, Wilfred Compton, who had unobtrusively joined himself to this remnant of Red Kimball's gang.

The stage, which was built after the manner of the old-fashioned omnibus, afforded no opportunity of moving to and fro in the selection of seats, hence, when Red Kimball discovered Lahoma's identity—the exact moment of the discovery was marked by his violent start—she was safeguarded from his approach by her proximity to a very large woman flanked by a thin spinster. These were two sisters, going to the evening's station where the coach would stop for supper, and Lahoma discussed with them their plans and hopes with bright cheerfulness and ready friendship.

Wilfred watched Red Kimball as he glared in that direction, and guessed his thoughts. Although Kimball knew Lahoma, he was not sure that she knew him; and though he was convinced at once that she was on a mission of warning, that might be true without her knowing that he had left Kansas City. Red Kimball was burning to find out if he were a stranger to her, but at the same time fearful of disclosing himself. He muttered to his companions hoarsely, careful that Wilfred, whom he regarded askance, should overhear nothing that he said.

The situation was such as could not very well continue during the days it would take the coach to reach Mangum but although Wilfred was conscious of the strain, he felt excitedly happy. Very little of his attention was given to Kimball, and a great deal to Lahoma. She was talking to the sisters about the baby of the one and the chickens of the other, offering advice on both subjects from the experience of a certain Mrs. Featherby whom she had known as a child.

"Mrs. Featherby was a very wonderful woman," Lahoma announced with conviction, "and the first woman I ever knew. And when her baby was teething..." The very large lady listened with great attention.

"She told me this when I was a small girl," Wilfred presently heard Lahoma saying. "And I treasured it in my mind. I stored myself with her experience about everything there is. It came to me, then, that if she moved away from Headquarters Mountain—that's my mountain—maybe no other woman would ever come there to live; so I stored myself, because I was determined to learn the business of being a woman."

The large woman gazed upon her admiringly. "I guess you learned, all right."

They had not gone five miles before the large woman and her younger sister were in love with Lahoma—but it hadn't taken Wilfred five miles. As he listened to her bright suggestions, and noted her living eyes, her impulsive gestures—for she could not talk without making little movements with her hands—and her flexible sympathetic voice, he saw her moving about a well-ordered household.... It was on his farm, of course; and the house was his,—and she was his Lahoma....

Red Kimball watched her with the same sidewise attention, but his face was brooding, his half-veiled eyes were red and threatening. What would happen in the nighttime as the stage pursued its lonely way across the bleak prairie? Since Red Kimball meant to appeal to the law in his revenge against Brick, there was no danger of his transgressing it openly. But in the darkness with two unscrupulous companions under his command, he would most probably execute some scheme to prevent Lahoma from reaching her destination.

The evening shadows were stretching far toward the east from the few trees that marked the dried bed of a stream, when the coach stopped among a collection of hovels and tents. As the horses were led away, the passengers dismounted, and both Wilfred and Red Kimball hurriedly drew close to Lahoma.

Lahoma, however, appeared unaware of their presence. The sisters had been met by the husband of the older, and as they gathered about the big wagon, Lahoma was urged to go home with them to supper.

"We're only a little ways out," she was told, "and we'll sure get you back before the stage leaves—the victuals at the station ain't fit to eat."

A very little insistence induced Lahoma to comply, and both the young man and the former highwayman saw her go with disappointment. Kimball and his friends went into the "Dining Hall" to gulp down a hasty meal, and Wilfred entered with them. He remained only a moment, however, just long enough to purchase a number of sandwiches which he stored away, as if meaning to eat them in the coach.

As soon as he was in the single street with the door closed behind him, he darted toward the stage barn, and by means of a handsome deposit obtained two horses. Springing upon one, he rode rapidly from the settlement, leading the other, and in a short time, came in sight of a cabin, which, with its outhouses, was the only building in all the wide expanse. From its appearance he knew it to be the one described to Lahoma, and he galloped up to the door with the certainty of finding her within. The big wagon had been unhitched, and the horses were fastened to its wheels, eating from the bed.

The family was about to sit down to supper; the first to discover Wilfred as he flitted past the single window in the side of the cabin, was Lahoma. Before he could knock on the door, she had opened it.

"Oh, Wilfred!" she reproached him, "they'll miss you and know you've come to consult with me about warning Brick."

"Quick, Lahoma!" said Wilfred, as if she had not spoken, "you can ride a horse, I suppose?" He smiled, but his eyes were sparkling with impatience.

In a flash, Lahoma's face was glowing with enthusiasm. She looked back into the room and cried, "Good-by!" Then Wilfred swung her to the back of the led horse. "We'll beat 'em!" cried Lahoma, as he sprang upon his horse. "Fast as you please—I've never been left behind, yet!"

The young man noted with sudden relief that she was dressed for the hardships of the prairie. It came to him with a sense of wonder that he had not noticed that before, perhaps from never having seen her in fashionable attire. As they galloped from the cabin, from whose door looked astonished faces, Lahoma answered his thought—

"Up there," she said, nodding her head toward the East, "I dressed for people—but out here, for wind and sand."

Looking back, she saw the family running out of the cottage, waving handkerchiefs and bonnets as in the mad joy of congratulation.

"They think we're running away together!" shouted Wilfred with exultation. The hurry of their flight, the certainty of pursuit, the prospect of dangers from man and nature, thrilled his blood, fixed his jaw, illumined his eye. All life seemed suddenly a flight across a level world whose cloud of yellow dust enveloped only himself and Lahoma. "They think we're running away together. Look at them, Lahoma. How happy they are at the idea!"

"They don't know there's nobody to object, if we don't," returned Lahoma gaily, as she urged on her steed. "Come along, Wilfred," she taunted, as his horse fell a neck behind hers, "what are you staying back THERE for? Tired? If we get into the trail before that coach starts, we'll have to put on all speed."

"Doing my best," he called, "but I made a bad bargain when I got this beast. This is his best lick, and it doesn't promise to last long. However, it was the only one left at the barn."

Lahoma slightly checked her animal. "That's a good thing, anyway—if there's none left, those horrible men can't follow."

Wilfred did not answer. He was sure the stage would be driven in pursuit at breakneck speed, and from the breathing of his horse he feared it could not long endure the contest. To be sure, Red Kimball and his men had no lawful excuse to offer the stage-driver for an attempt to stop them; but three men who had once been desperate highwaymen might not look for lawful excuses on a dark night in a dreary desert. Besides, Kimball might, with some show of reason, argue that since he was bent on the legitimate object of having a writ served on Brick Willock, he would be justified in preventing Brick from being warned out of the country.

They galloped on in silence, Lahoma slightly holding back. Night rapidly drew on.