happens to you—"
"I have a son to carry on after me and work the ranch," said I. "I've got to go, Silver."
He walked slowly up to me again, and raised his face so that I could see a sort of gentleness and sadness in it. He took my hand.
"I don't even know your name," he said.
"Bill Avon," I said, "and—"
"Bill Avon," said Silver, and gave my hand a good, long grip.
I could feel that the strength of that grasp had sealed us together, and I wished that he had given me the grip after I had done something worth while, not before. I had the uneasy feeling of a man who has been paid in advance for goods that have not been delivered and that will be hard to find.
When he stepped away from me, he said:
"That pony has done some hard traveling today. You'll do better by him and yourself if you unsaddle here and let him rest an hour or so. Give him a drink and cool him off. After that, you can ride as fast as you please on the trail. And another thing—will your wife be breaking her heart when you don't turn up at home?"
I thought of Charlotte and drew in a long, slow breath.
"No," I said shortly. "She won't be breaking her heart!"
CHAPTER IX
The Cary Domain
IT was not a great deal after noon of that day before I got around the half circle of riding that I had to complete before I was near the hang-out of the Cary clan. Grandfather Cary had his head about him when he picked out that spot. It was a little mountain kingdom all of its own. The mountains fenced it around in a circle. Half a dozen creeks flowed down through it. The forests came off the highlands and slipped in green floods over the valleys, and where the forests ended, the grazing land began, pushing out arms among the woods and extending over a great central portion of the plateau where there were only occasional groves of trees. In one of those groves was the old Cary house.
Almost any other people in the world would have become rich with such a domain to exploit, but the Carys could not accumulate wealth so long as "Old Man" Cary lived. And he seemed to defy death like a stone. Time could crack and wear and seam and color him, but it could not rub him out.
Old Man Cary possessed a queer cross between faith in God and hatred of man. He refused to take ordinary precautions. He refused to build the big barns and feeding yards where a great herd of cattle could be sheltered when bad winters came along—and, of course, bad winters came pretty frequently at that altitude. But when the thermometer dropped toward zero and often dipped below it, Old Man Cary shrugged his shoulders and left everything to the will of God. That was why the big Cary herd would increase for half a dozen seasons and then half of it would be wiped out. The bones lay heaped, here and there. I saw a whole white windrow of them under the edge of a bluff against which hundreds and hundreds of beeves had been driven by a fierce blizzard and where they had stood until they froze. That had been many years before, but the same disaster had happened over and over again. And Old Man Cary always said that it was the will of God, and he would look around through his family to find out a recent sin which the Lord might be punishing.
There were plenty of sins to be found. A few of his descendants, like Dean Cary, had left the home preserve and founded homes here and there, but the majority of them preferred to remain in the land of their inheritance. They were all slaves of the old man's word, and he had plenty of words. He said when cattle could be driven to market, and that was the moment when they had to be taken out, no matter what the state of the market might be. He said when and how much timber should be felled for the winter store of wood. He named the creeks that could be fished and the ones where the stock must be allowed to accumulate. Now and then he would step down into more intimate details and invade the privacy of the home of one of his sons or grandsons, and the terrible old
"I have a son to carry on after me and work the ranch," said I. "I've got to go, Silver."
He walked slowly up to me again, and raised his face so that I could see a sort of gentleness and sadness in it. He took my hand.
"I don't even know your name," he said.
"Bill Avon," I said, "and—"
"Bill Avon," said Silver, and gave my hand a good, long grip.
I could feel that the strength of that grasp had sealed us together, and I wished that he had given me the grip after I had done something worth while, not before. I had the uneasy feeling of a man who has been paid in advance for goods that have not been delivered and that will be hard to find.
When he stepped away from me, he said:
"That pony has done some hard traveling today. You'll do better by him and yourself if you unsaddle here and let him rest an hour or so. Give him a drink and cool him off. After that, you can ride as fast as you please on the trail. And another thing—will your wife be breaking her heart when you don't turn up at home?"
I thought of Charlotte and drew in a long, slow breath.
"No," I said shortly. "She won't be breaking her heart!"
CHAPTER IX
The Cary Domain
IT was not a great deal after noon of that day before I got around the half circle of riding that I had to complete before I was near the hang-out of the Cary clan. Grandfather Cary had his head about him when he picked out that spot. It was a little mountain kingdom all of its own. The mountains fenced it around in a circle. Half a dozen creeks flowed down through it. The forests came off the highlands and slipped in green floods over the valleys, and where the forests ended, the grazing land began, pushing out arms among the woods and extending over a great central portion of the plateau where there were only occasional groves of trees. In one of those groves was the old Cary house.
Almost any other people in the world would have become rich with such a domain to exploit, but the Carys could not accumulate wealth so long as "Old Man" Cary lived. And he seemed to defy death like a stone. Time could crack and wear and seam and color him, but it could not rub him out.
Old Man Cary possessed a queer cross between faith in God and hatred of man. He refused to take ordinary precautions. He refused to build the big barns and feeding yards where a great herd of cattle could be sheltered when bad winters came along—and, of course, bad winters came pretty frequently at that altitude. But when the thermometer dropped toward zero and often dipped below it, Old Man Cary shrugged his shoulders and left everything to the will of God. That was why the big Cary herd would increase for half a dozen seasons and then half of it would be wiped out. The bones lay heaped, here and there. I saw a whole white windrow of them under the edge of a bluff against which hundreds and hundreds of beeves had been driven by a fierce blizzard and where they had stood until they froze. That had been many years before, but the same disaster had happened over and over again. And Old Man Cary always said that it was the will of God, and he would look around through his family to find out a recent sin which the Lord might be punishing.
There were plenty of sins to be found. A few of his descendants, like Dean Cary, had left the home preserve and founded homes here and there, but the majority of them preferred to remain in the land of their inheritance. They were all slaves of the old man's word, and he had plenty of words. He said when cattle could be driven to market, and that was the moment when they had to be taken out, no matter what the state of the market might be. He said when and how much timber should be felled for the winter store of wood. He named the creeks that could be fished and the ones where the stock must be allowed to accumulate. Now and then he would step down into more intimate details and invade the privacy of the home of one of his sons or grandsons, and the terrible old
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