When, however, the time was ripe, and "Waldy," having fulfilled these conditions, was fairly off for college, the ranchman had signified his approval of his son's course by escorting him a few miles on his way. The boy had felt himself highly honored by the attention, yet when the time of parting came, it was with no such stricture about his throat as had taken him at unawares in the early morning, that he watched the tall form disappearing among the pine-trees. There was a certain self-sufficiency about the "old man,"—aged forty-five,—that precluded any embarrassing tenderness in one's relations with him.
Waldo was thinking of his father as he strode down the pass with that welt on his cheek. He had an idea that his father would not make so much of the affair as he was taking himself to task for not doing. And up to this time his father had been his standard. He not only had a very high opinion of him as he was, but he had a boyish faith in what he might have been, a belief that if he had had half a chance he would have made his mark in the world. He was glad that he bore his father's name, and he was quite determined to make it stand for something in the minds of men before he got through with it. It sounded like a name that was to be made to mean something.
Suddenly the sound of wheels coming down the pass struck his ear. They were the wheels of a buggy, he thought, and of a buggy drawn by a pair of horses. The suggestion was distasteful to Waldo Kean just at that moment, and he quickened his pace somewhat. Presently the wheels stopped close behind him, a firm step sounded on the road, he felt a heavy hand on his shoulder. He looked up, and his worst forebodings were realized. It was the face he had caught sight of in that particular buggy which he did not like to think about, and the hand that rested on his shoulder was the one which had swung the whip to such good purpose.
A very hearty and pleasant voice was saying; "Do you know, I never did anything in all my life I was so sorry for!" but the boy strode on as stolidly as if he had been stone-deaf.
The other, though a man of heavy build, kept pace with him easily.
"You see," he remarked, after waiting a reasonable time for a reply; "I never knew what it was to owe any one so much as I owe you!"
Not being, in fact, stone-deaf, Waldo found himself obliged to make some response. As much from embarrassment as from anger, he spoke gruffly.
"That's nothing," he said. "I'd have done as much for a stray dog,—and like as not I'd have got bit all the same!"
His companion was making a study of him rather than of his words;—of the defiant pose of the head above the shabby, uncouth figure,—of the stormy eyes set in the fiery crimson of the face. He could not resent the rough words, but neither could he help being amused at the tragic exaggeration of the figure.
"Do you know, you do look like a brigand!" he said, in an easy tone, that had a curious effect upon the excited boy. "I don't so much wonder that I took you for a footpad!"