The Man of the Forest by Zane Grey (novels for beginners txt) 📖

“Ma'am, I dunno, but I heard him tell Roy he reckoned his name was mud,” replied the boy, smiling.

Helen's heart gave a quick throb. That sounded like Las Vegas. She hurried on, and upon entering the courtyard she espied Roy Beeman holding the halter of a beautiful, wild-looking mustang. There was another horse with another man, who was in the act of dismounting on the far side. When he stepped into better view Helen recognized Las Vegas. And he saw her at the same instant.

Helen did not look up again until she was near the porch. She had dreaded this meeting, yet she was so glad that she could have cried aloud.

“Miss Helen, I shore am glad to see you,” he said, standing bareheaded before her, the same young, frank-faced cowboy she had seen first from the train.

“Tom!” she exclaimed, and offered her hands.

He wrung them hard while he looked at her. The swift woman's glance Helen gave in return seemed to drive something dark and doubtful out of her heart. This was the same boy she had known—whom she had liked so well—who had won her sister's love. Helen imagined facing him thus was like awakening from a vague nightmare of doubt. Carmichael's face was clean, fresh, young, with its healthy tan; it wore the old glad smile, cool, easy, and natural; his eyes were like Dale's—penetrating, clear as crystal, without a shadow. What had evil, drink, blood, to do with the real inherent nobility of this splendid specimen of Western hardihood? Wherever he had been, whatever he had done during that long absence, he had returned long separated from that wild and savage character she could now forget. Perhaps there would never again be call for it.

“How's my girl?” he asked, just as naturally as if he had been gone a few days on some errand of his employer's.

“Bo? Oh, she's well—fine. I—I rather think she'll be glad to see you,” replied Helen, warmly.

“An' how's thet big Indian, Dale?” he drawled.

“Well, too—I'm sure.”

“Reckon I got back heah in time to see you-all married?”

“I—I assure you I—no one around here has been married yet,” replied Helen, with a blush.

“Thet shore is fine. Was some worried,” he said, lazily. “I've been chasin' wild hosses over in New Mexico, an' I got after this heah blue roan. He kept me chasin' him fer a spell. I've fetched him back for Bo.”

Helen looked at the mustang Roy was holding, to be instantly delighted. He was a roan almost blue in color, neither large nor heavy, but powerfully built, clean-limbed, and racy, with a long mane and tail, black as coal, and a beautiful head that made Helen love him at once.

“Well, I'm jealous,” declared Helen, archly. “I never did see such a pony.”

“I reckoned you'd never ride any hoss but Ranger,” said Las Vegas.

“No, I never will. But I can be jealous, anyhow, can't I?”

“Shore. An I reckon if you say you're goin' to have him—wal, Bo 'd be funny,” he drawled.

“I reckon she would be funny,” retorted Helen. She was so happy that she imitated his speech. She wanted to hug him. It was too good to be true—the return of this cowboy. He understood her. He had come back with nothing that could alienate her. He had apparently forgotten the terrible role he had accepted and the doom he had meted out to her enemies. That moment was wonderful for Helen in its revelation of the strange significance of the West as embodied in this cowboy. He was great. But he did not know that.

Then the door of the living-room opened, and a sweet, high voice pealed out:

“Roy! Oh, what a mustang! Whose is he?”

“Wal, Bo, if all I hear is so he belongs to you,” replied Roy with a huge grin.

Bo appeared in the door. She stepped out upon the porch. She saw the cowboy. The excited flash of her pretty face vanished as she paled.

“Bo, I shore am glad to see you,” drawled Las Vegas, as he stepped forward, sombrero in hand. Helen could not see any sign of confusion in him. But, indeed, she saw gladness. Then she expected to behold Bo run right into the cowboys's arms. It appeared, however, that she was doomed to disappointment.

“Tom, I'm glad to see you,” she replied.

They shook hands as old friends.

“You're lookin' right fine,” he said.

“Oh, I'm well.... And how have you been these six months?” she queried.

“Reckon I though it was longer,” he drawled. “Wal, I'm pretty tip-top now, but I was laid up with heart trouble for a spell.”

“Heart trouble?” she echoed, dubiously.

“Shore.... I ate too much over heah in New Mexico.”

“It's no news to me—where your heart's located,” laughed Bo. Then she ran off the porch to see the blue mustang. She walked round and round him, clasping her hands in sheer delight.

“Bo, he's a plumb dandy,” said Roy. “Never seen a prettier hoss. He'll run like a streak. An' he's got good eyes. He'll be a pet some day. But I reckon he'll always be spunky.”

“Bo ventured to step closer, and at last got a hand on the mustang, and then another. She smoothed his quivering neck and called softly to him, until he submitted to her hold.

“What's his name?” she asked.

“Blue somethin' or other,” replied Roy.

“Tom, has my new mustang a name?” asked Bo, turning to the cowboy.

“Shore.”

“What then?”

“Wal, I named him Blue-Bo,” answered Las Vegas, with a smile.

“Blue-Boy?”

“Nope. He's named after you. An' I chased him, roped him, broke him all myself.”

“Very well. Blue-Bo he is, then.... And he's a wonderful darling horse. Oh, Nell, just look at him.... Tom, I can't thank you enough.”

“Reckon I don't want any thanks,” drawled the cowboy. “But see heah, Bo, you shore got to live up to conditions before you ride him.”

“What!” exclaimed Bo, who was startled by his slow, cool, meaning tone, of voice.

Helen delighted in looking at Las Vegas then. He had never appeared to better advantage. So cool, careless, and assured! He seemed master of a situation in which his terms must be accepted. Yet he might have been actuated by a cowboy motive beyond the power of Helen to divine.

“Bo Rayner,” drawled Las Vegas,