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Show THE SALT LAKE TRIBUNE, SUNDAY MORNING, APRIL ICE 66 J YVE you farm!? skolotonl x Uorriol Hcult on hod, ' And thereby hongs this to ot th odvsntures on tui continent of on of th moot delightful koroino in modern fiction on emodng ivisp of m girl, who wo equally at homo on tk bock of bucking broncho or to thing in prodding oner tk o Boston drawing room. If you rood that muck discussed novel, Tk Branding Iron" you knout what to pct in tki now Blue Rib-bo- n serial by tk com author. If you didnt, you kv a treat im i m 'Jh, M such a splendid naughty little glrL She has papa's obstinacy and bis blue, honest eyes. Yes, and. I'm afraid, bis temper. But Baby is Just a coxy, round, brown baby of the thumb sucking variety a chubby bunch of contentment. Ispa adores them. I wish I could give Jrou better news of him, darling, but you know how relentless papa la. He will never be shaken In his opinion of your marriage. He can't bear even a mention of you. So I bave had to stop tny poor, weak little efforts at reconciliation. I am surt he mJeses you and grlevca over you, and loves you in hla heart, for sometimes I flnd'him looking at my two little girls with the saddest thinking of the lime when we used to play together." ."No" this Is another letter of later date "I dont read your letters to Jane any mors. W quarrel over them so dreadfully. Jane gets more and more set and difficult. I do miss your dear, sunny affection. Tet your letters give me so much and you sre so wonderfully brave. Merriala adventure with the bucking horse really terrifies m. Is ber at all. I quits agree with her about the spanking. Margaret a polls her children aad'y since papa's death. While he was living with ber ehe kept up a pretense of discipline. Little Alice Is a dreadful child." cold gray eye of a Cotton February looked In, aa grimly aa aa a New England conscience, tluough the window of Merrlal lloulton'a . upstair sitting room. This eye, for all Its grlmnesa, could make little of the fresh, falr face bent over a with red letter on her knee. . It was sufficiently a New England face aa to fair coloring and a certain neatness of feature. but It held In reserve behind extrava--' gantly curly eye Julies an Impish possibility of wildness. TIE EM" l'e f -- -I By Katherine Newlin Burt "Tripp! llow splendid you look! Why, didn't you let me knowT" I wanted," be said gently, "to give you a surprise. Besides, I didn't aa y until just s day or so ago that things acre really coming so thoroughly my way. That old war of mine with the T. y. outfit's over, Merry, end won. You can figure It out for yourself what that means to me. U meant that my cattle have the range, and It mesne that my herd Is the largest between Middle Fork and the Flying U." I slwsye knew it would be so.- You've deserved It, Tripp. Dad will be for crlrbiat-irg- . He always prophesied success for you, and he la good at that prophesy Ing, I mean. He can always pick a winner. He picked you when you wt.ro aboqt ten and a bx-years old."' Tripp followed her over to tho fireplace. "Let's go upstairs," sho said, "to my sitting room. It'e so formal ber and I can't quit get used lo jou In s business suit let Slone entertaining you In a drawing room. If only you could rido Into Boston town in Aa though for comfort Merrlal turned te Margaret Beauforts letters again. "I cry my eyes out." she read, "over Hubert's condition. I shall never resign myself to the bitterness of It. To see my darling boy, so strong and handsome before that awful accident, lying helpless, and to know that, even if be lives, he will never be an active man I But I can't betr to write about It. The girls are s great comfort. They are ready to glvs tip anything and everything for Hubert's slim chance of recovery. The treatments are frightfully expensive, of course." In another letter; " I bate to return your check, dear, but I must not use Jamee money not after all that has passed between him and our family. Jane would never forgive me." There were marks of tears on this letter, and Merrlal, with s 'contraction ef stori. O AA. 23, 3920 1 2 so." Well." h on hoping. Menial Into the saddle again and up got brushed off the alkali Ill begin riding tor When l'v - another fall." Ehe looked a lilt) frightened at that, and more Ilian a little obstinate. Her eyes dwelt upon l.ltn thoughtfully. "I shall have to she said. begin all over again royeelf, "Hut I'm not going lo to begin until have this other business settled. I am deterMerrlal's mouth It was a very mined resolute word Indeed" to put something through. When that's don successfully done. Tripp well, then, we'U see. But but " pleat don't think I mean A very banner of hope rushed up te his fat. He had the sense to hold hla tongue, lie put out hi hand. " Here's luck Merrlal. Ill be going." " Going? ah repeated blankly. "YYheraT "h t "In . " Back west." She was on htr feet, close beside him. holding hit arm In both hands, shaking IL "Tripp, you mustnt dream of going. You haven't seen father!" " 1 raw him this morning In th office before I came here. 1U let you tell him. If you will, or, if you'd rather. Ill stop on my way to th station." "O, 1 would rather no. Tripp, what selfish little beast I am! Of course Ill tell I deserve that much punishhim myself. ment. Don't look like that, pleas. You will try to be happy, wont you. Tripp? " ' "Yes, ma'am. I told you I'd begin riding for another fall Besides, l'v a whole lot to do." Perhaps she was a trifle piqued, but she was generously remorseful and swallowed any expression of such feeling. Will father be angry with me, do you think?" Th young westerner laughed out at this, I can see splendid, big musical laugh. him! Anti you won't tell me about your a . 1 ' r remarked with a quaint air, rm pretty strong . ? o Uhs "Can you tell me about It? She shook her head. Ehe wax looking at him again, and th dead pallor of hla face smote tier with a fresh consciousness of what she had don. Even his firm and very beautiful mouth was colorless. That Tripp with hU splendid, steady cheerfulness should look like that! She remembered one day when he had been carried up from the corrals when a bore had kicked him. 11 had bees In agony, his teeth la his Up. And not a eound. Thats the way he looked now, though he retrained even from biting his lip. And he was smiling at htr and asking her about ber plans. She was overwhelmed by a passion of admiration, of affection, of contused remorseful feeling. "I don't deserve to succeed In anything , I've ever planned. Tripp, when I've hurt you -- - It era Merry! "Gertrude," be ld "I right." " U, no, eho Isn't not If she said tome-thir- g about me. Gertrude's never right thee too clever ie be right. She's in town now, you know. She and your Aunt Helen got back from Tari a week ego." " Yes. 1 met her at the station. Funny, wasn't It? She looked like the sunr.y south." "And )ou look Ukn the breezy west. And you met In a Boston station. Wiiat did the sunny south ray to tho breezy weet, Tripp?" "She told me," drawled Tripp, and hla face of a bronxe Mercury displayed a certain pallor, "that when one talks to an optimist one must be very careful to point out the hole In the doughnut. She raid there was a very large bole in min. I didnt believe her." Then the lono of grim humor dropped from him altogether and be sat by Merria! and laid ""bis hand across her, where it rested in a cushion. , "She said you'd changed." he whispered said you had plana of tremulously. jiur own." Merrlal was looking at him widely, an astonishingly childlike look. Tripp, she said, you're queer. I haven't changed rot for a second but I have plans. Of course. I always have plans. And I've had plans no. Ive had on plan ver vine 1 was 10 years old. I know. Tripp to be a success, to live In the, west all of ue, for always. Both of ua for alwuys." Ue bad spoken it so quietly that for an Instant Merrlal missed Its meaning. Then her fair, cool thin face Homed and she drew away her hand. .Even In this matter of reading old. old s there was not the expression to bo expected on the face of a young girl. 'Che did not look sentimental, pathetic; no, nor even bored. She looked like a lawyer making out point, taking down notea She would look a difficult case, selecting m&teiial to tbs up with a shrewd gleam "Ah, theres someor with a head shake thing to my purpose and a tightening of sweet pink Ups "That can do nothing for me.1 And each letter, as she read it. was laid aside with the lingering touch that promises a second reading. They were the letters of Meyrlals English relations written to her dead mother, and ."O, Trlppl O, Tripp!" they were written across a chasm of estrange"Merrlal, you surely understood. Hold ment and of bitterness: so old a chasm and you once. Don't you remember on the mounho wldo a one that it would take, assuredly, tain that day above Crystal creek when wed something stronger than the resolution exbcen watching the eaglr?" pressed in a girl's sweet tightening Ups to "Tripp, dear! Ten years ago! Two chilbridge the gulf. I I had forgotten. dren!' Merrial'a lashes lifted her burden of thought That word rut him with pain 'so that be now and again, showing eyes that did not drew himself together to bear it manfully. take In her turroundlngs. These, now, were "O, Tripp!" She could repeat it only helpemphatically to be censored by the eye of a lessly, for she, too, was beginning to suffer. New England day, for here was no Puritan He stood up and walked across th room; maidens bower of chiptx and white and blue. back. The brilliance had faded from came Merrial'a upstairs sitting room, with Its bandhe looked only more of a man. And but him, windows Commonwealth some avenue, facing his face smiled. took the mind leaping across rugged tnllea It'e all right. I've got to round up my In that corner it was a bunting lodge, in Ideaa a little. That's all. The hard's kind of this an Indian tepee; over the fireplace hung scattered. I reckon I've ecn a plumb tool the head of a mountain sheep, brought low in this business. by Menial's own gun laid with rifle and Don't talk weet, Tripp. I can't bear It Cahing rod across the elk ,feet over there Have w both gope crazy? " really. beaide above her lounge; and the lounge No. dear. I wish you weren't quit so over an antique Italian prie-dieher snow-shoe- s sane, that's all. It It a sure thing. Merry were crossed, behind them an Indian you won't msrry me? " H searched her coat beaded and strung with wampun. Here, with ryes that had searched Immense ranges too, was a kodak picture beautifully eneyes so clear and piercing that they were larged, showing a Uthe youth In an attitude mors hank eyes than the eyea of a man. of bronzo Immobility, a cowboy, hands on She looked up at him from a white face his saddle horn, staring above the beautiful with a look that was unfalteringly honest. wind blown bead of Ids horse at mountains "No. which one fancied as blue and steady as bis It la not an easy monosyllable for a great, eyes. x long cherished, hopeful love to bear. Tripp Menial's books French, EngUeh, Italian bore it as a man may. He looked down steadtjK were at one side of the fireplace, and her ily into the hopelessly honest. eyes of thla Tripp dear t Ten years ago I Two children t I I had forgotten .' tennis racquets and' golf sticks at the other. girl who had been hla. he thought, ever sines she had marched or riddeu valiantly beside Here In the window seat the sat, small and bim. short skirted and curly hulred, a slim slender and erect, neither huntress, traveler, of her throat, wondered if they were from It good for her to rldo about with those wild I do miss chaps, taps, and latlgo straps of fascinating comradeship, across nor athlete, by the look of her, an enigmatiscrap You or the ths reader's cant writers eho swears! the cowherds? Tou eay eyes. picturesqueness of you." and up mountain trails. His heart ranges cal, attVactle figure, very thoughtfully enmean that seriously, Theadora, I hope." , "Jane has gone to live at Holmbury in a Sorry, Merrlal-My cowboy days are was wrenched as though it hod been physin Its own purposes. grossed little cottage. She can't stand the racket over. Im tho boss now. Merrlal chose a sheet from the smaller pile twisted out of ila place. lie felt a little ically Into of the children and she fancies she adds to two piles, Dear The letters had been divided of ber Aunt Jane's cold missives: In the upstairs sitting room Merrlal went faint. Merrlal turned her eyes from him. A one very much smaller than the other, adTheodora, you keep on urging me to write to . our trouble heaven and ber own sensitiveback to her window seat and Tripp Ilart sat man mastering pain should be given brave ness know whyl Tea, ehe la as handsome dressed and written In two very different you. What pleasure can my letters be.to you. end stood and moved about, looking at everythe tribute of lowered eyelids. We or me? to between have nothing aa ever, I think, though ehe has lost her yours handwritings. Those In the larger pile, writthing and listening at first to her light and But a sudden 'thought struck ber and us now but bitter memories and the few thouten by Menial's Aunt Margaret, who had bright color, and seems, since papas death, easy chatter. Everything in the room, as it broke the painful moment. She exclaimed sand miles of water and prairie that you married a Mr. Beaufort'Ver delicately and fell under his observation, prompted Merrlal graver and sterner than she used to be. I'm In vast dismay: I believe It must have been I noththere. back to take chosen have put afraid she will never marry. Alice and she to reminiscence. In front of the enlarged vaguely penned; those In the smaller pile, what father meant I never thought ing I have said to your American husband. don't seem to get on at all. It's a vexation from Miss Coke, Merrlal's Aunt Jane, bora kodak picture Tripp stopped and a fine flame What he meant when?" asked Tripp I will never change my opinion of your marto me. In fact, all tho children are afraid of pleasure ran up into his handsome face. rigid black, angular rows of large letters. life seems me abominato Tour' the enough and with even more than steadily riage. of their Aunt Jane. I wonder how your Merrlal skipped from one to the other, dip"Me on Gunpowder! he. ejaculated unhis usual gentleness. tion of desolation." rearnow now Merrlal to her! would I sometimes here, take there, comparing, ping grammatically. "All aorta of times. How stupid I've "So much for lhat!" commented Menial, amuse myself with a fancy of their first ranging. "Doesnt that please your vanity. Big been! He Tripp, be expected this. He wantsod another sheeL braved Interview. My picture of Merrlal suggests - Chief? " she asked . . There's no use trying to deceive v drylysuperfluously. ed it. a And such audacious little "You speak of an expected accession of this from one of the pretty, me, darling Theodora, person. He strode back and towered above her. Yes, dear, I know. But don't think of I wealth. I hope so, for your sake, but how your stories of her show a quick, not to say delicate, vague sheets of Mrs. Beaufort " I dont know about the vanity, but be that now, please. can read between your lines. Tou'ro brave can Yankee dollars make up to you for the saucy, wit. There would be a lively time, It sure warms my drew a deep breath I can't help thinking r T" disappoint afraid. But 1 me! dear Im show I and a of loss it's all a heart. It shows you havent and make great O, of a beautiful English boms? cheerfulness, thought dad! " forgotten." dream our dream. I suppose I shall never know you're proud. I suppose, too, that you of you last night when the rooks fwer wheelThis was a trifle cruel and Tripp's tightEhe put out her slender, cool hand and see your Merrlal havs the dreadful, bitter feeling that w ing and cawing and of a fathers affection look as cool and kind. " Silly to lifted a him lips showed the flick of an extra hurt. ening There came a knock, and a neat maid and have. But Ill never believe that James and respect. I wont mention your sister Ive made you unhappy and I've ever I Was Tripp, at Tripp! good any forgetting? a demure announcement:" Mr. Tripp Hart. can make you happy. , Forgive me for Jane's because I know I am a bad tempers I father. How wicked and disappointed . "Youre the same?" It brought Merrlal to r feet and a quick being frank. Its a Coke falling. The de- tyrant and always gav you a great deal of been! And Ive thoughtless stupid! I cant Inch me. of French boarding "Every flash of feeling to her face. She quickly scrlptions of your life on the horrible ranch misery. IU admit I like your stories about bear myself. It was our friendship that school and out all. and west The coming mako me shiver. To think of your sweet gathered together the letters she had dropped tbo ranch and tho people out there. . It la blinded me. Our dear friendship. Now sinks In, Tripp. It gets into your bonea and put them carefully with the 'others Into soft hands pulling up water from a well and ail amusing and out of th common, and I I've lost that, and I dont think I can live Those In times th the open, rang riding a lacquered box; then, without a glance at am tired, tired, tired of this same dull o'.d carrying buckets! Where, please, was James it. without with you Ill never lose a minute of them. her mirror, without even a pat to her soft with the American chivalry to women they're English round sermons and tea and muffins, Ehe with a sincerity of desolation spoke see to to them and Ive shut my eyes only curly hair and this might have caused her always boasting of? And you have, to sit parish visits and muffins again. The world hid her tears. and were smell And feel and them them. you visitor a certain feeling of dismay ehe went down to table and eat with the cowherds s is sometime to ms like on great muffin. You'll never live without my friendship. always there. Tripp. I can't help seeing you quietly and quickly down the staircase and that the right name for them? They must will have to bo your correhe said, quickly; " you cant keep on Merry, of west: I think time the you every working into tho handsome room where Mr. Tripp be really horrid. I should think, and probably at spondent. I am too cross and unforgiving. all without that, savvy? It's ther or tramping or riding and you can ride! living Hart stood and waited for her. , smell of the stables." I hate James. Hs has spoiled our lives, to for ? Squaw-killeryou Will ever with play with, you forget your fight The large drawing room, for all its cheerful which were never In any case fashioned to " "Stable!" chuckled Merrlal here, forgetTripp! I never played with It." of and tho drew Its open furnishings leaping my heart's desire. Dont answer this please. No. Of course not. I beg your p&rdo-ting to be a lawyer and laughing aloud. She nor on this clouded winter day, the was I dark rot rather maam; "No, tongue quirting -- -- Jxx. had a mental picture of her young, pink -I didnt mean that. " But It's yours to do from your father for letting him buck.' Nor' but the young man who came to meet Her-ria- l I think "Merriala spinster aunt breaks cheeked mother, a vision of healthful happianything you like with. You didn't tfcinL the glorious spill the little outlaw gave me had a positive brilliance of his own. This out "again, aa though irresistibly Impelled I was such a quitter that I'd want to drop " ness, throned at one end of a long table, down could buck! time. sure the first lie was partly tho vivid coloring of health In his ? Menial must bo a very forward little minx. either side of which the clean, brave cowfceyf " 1 wish Dick bad had more of it. Poor your friendship because you cant see your brown face and sparkling eyes; It was partly with their Immaculate hands ste In bushed Quite American! That speech about. I guess way to giving me more. But I do feel sort Dick!" also the gleam of his thick yellow thatch of If I were daddy 1 would spank ms, Is rather deference to her presence. of dazed." he added youthfully, "for, honH aura more this of Dick, than Merry? always hair, but. "Why poor physical seemed to me to be ridlnr to win. How can you endure the prospect of amusing, but, frankly, I dont liko It a bit. estly, Merrlal, I thought you had been wait-- , vitality. It was a chining of spirit. The tall, Go! ders it? " I dont know why 1 said 'poor Dick. It sing, too. And that awful expression, lithe figure breathed an almost extravagant bringing up your tiny Merrlal In such sur" I'll never forgive myself that I wasn't that you quote as though eho had actually a phrase In a letter I was reading this was and roundings T" another letter took up the courage. hopefulness used itl Theodora, you must havs changed theme. " I trust, dear, that at least James Merrlal took his outstretched hand and It waiting. I I am very queer. I'm always morning. And it surprised me just as it surOf course, 1 so busy that I don't stop to think. I've bad closed round her fingers with a pulsing has sent the boys to boarding school. That prised you then. That brother of mine algreatly to lajigh at that. would be something off your hnds. .Thst ways does puzzle me. but I never thought on my bead so full of other things. Other laughed, but I never was as proper ss you. eater ness He did not speak nor smile, but 1 toughed, but 1 confess your stories about plans. I have a very big. important one on celling him poor Dick befora And I can't poor little Dick! pressed his lips together a if to control unsee why any on els should. Ther was steadiness. She's my mind now. 1 wish you could ms my Alice. your daughter don't warm my heart towards let-let- Tripp actually smllid. nothing In tho Ictlerto explain It, either poor little Du-There was a certain Impatience now In the Menial! manner of th young westerner, he suid, rather sharply. "Tripp!" she mocked him. Her ervlaxhe were thote of a teas. 1 K wonderful plan? I can't honestly. Not yet. It's too tremendous." She looked wistfully away and during the little moment of her abstraction hit eyes devoured her face. Good by, dear. You'll think of me that wsy sometimes. I havent given up; Just thrown a new hitch, savvy?" A startled, uncertain look from her he carried away with him a light load for th vast, empty sack of expectation he bid . brought, but It was something' to have trou-bled the cool clearness of those eyes. And, to spare her the trouble of confession, he stopped at Mr. Houlton's office. He decided that a cut or so mors of anguish was all In this day's bad work. 11s had not quits realized how the eager, congratulatory welcome so certain of success would hurt. He bad an unwilling lmaglratlon for pain. It was very rarely Indsed that Merrlal dreaded th overJng return of her father from his office. But on th evening after Tripp's strange and unhappy visit she so , dreaded it that she twic changed her frock and three time rearranged her balr In nervous postponement of the meeting. And, at last, it was a pals, apologetic fairy In delicate evening dress there waa always someabout Merrlal who stole lute thing fatry-likthe dining room a good twenty minute late for dinner. Mr. lloulton was waiting fop her before the high fireplace. The mantel should havs dwarfed him into insignificance, for It was t mighty mantel and Mr. Houlton waa a small and slender man; but standing there in his trim evening clothes he was a dominating personality. His keen, sweet, peering face; his shapely, well thatched head; the graceful, stooping, clever carriage of a wiry body these so emphasized themselves, so plea' antly and emphatically and compellingly emphasized themselves, that the great marble mantel and the great portrait of a dead judge and th two enormous Chines vases and even the stately proportions of ths dining room and its tall attendant English servants seemed merely an appropriate setting for th small, slight, middle aged man that owned them all. He put out hla hand, drawing it from the other behind his back, and pulled Merrlal towards him. They did not sjieak. but in a quick pressure of her fingers and a shining mile of reassurance he let her know that he waa aware of ber failure and had forgiven it. They had the usual pleasant dinner, not perhaps quite ss merry as it uSually was, but lighted Just the same by tho lneviiab'e humors qf the two. and afterwards, when in a smaller room they had made a cory circle of easy chaire and coffee and eigareta e (Continued on fulloulnGJi r |
