"Well, Belle, this thing I know; if you set your mind to it I'd bet—if I weren't a preacher—I'd bet there's not a thing could stand against you."
"I like your faith, Jim; but 'faith without works is dead'; and that means we must get up and rustle."
"What do you suggest?"
"Well, I have been rustling this long while back. I've been working Dr. Jebb and Mrs. Jebb and anybody else I could get hold of, to have your probation extended for another year. And the best news we have so far is the possibility of another six months. After that, you must go back to college to complete your course."
COLLEGE! Jim was thunderstruck. How many a man has all his dream of bliss summed up in that one word—college? "Oh, if only I had money enough to go to college!" is the cry of hundreds who hunger for the things that college means; and yet, to Jim, it was like a doom of death. College, with all the horror of the classroom ten times worse since knowing the better things. College in the far-off East—deadly, lifeless, crushing thing; college that meant good-bye to Belle, to life, and red blood on the plains. Yes, he knew it was coming, if ever he gave the horrid thing a thought; but now that it was close at hand the idea was maddening. College was simply another name for hell. The effect of the sudden thought on his wild, impulsive nature was one great surging tide of rebellion.
"I won't go!" he thundered. "Belle, do you suppose God brought me out here to meet you, and have you save me from ruin and help me to know the best things on earth, just to chuck it all and go back to a lot of useless rot about the number of wives the kings of Judah used to have, or how some two-faced Hebrew woman laid traps for some wine-soaked Philistine brute, and stuck the rotten loafer in the back with a kitchen knife all for the pleasure and glory of a righteous God! I don't want any more of it, Belle; I won't go! You've told me often enough that my instincts are better than my judgment, and my instincts tell me to stay right here," and his face flushed red with passion.
"Dear boy! Don't you know I'm trying to help you? Don't you know I mean to keep you here? You know that we can get anything we want, if we are willing to pay the price, and will have it. I mean to keep you here; only I am trying not to pay too high a price."
She laid her hand on his. He reached out and put an arm about her. She said nothing, and did nothing. She knew that he must blow off this fierce steam, and that the reaction would then set in with equal force.
They rode for a mile in silence; she wanted him to speak first.
"You always help me," he said at last, heaving a great sigh. "You are wiser than I am."