Tuttle lagged behind and thought about the situation. Sympathize though he did with Mead’s trouble, he could not help a little feeling of gratification that after all there was to be no wife to come between them and take Emerson away from him and Nick. Emerson would forget all about it in a little while and their lifelong friendship would go on and be just as it had always been. On the whole, he felt pleased, and at the same time ashamed that he was pleased, that Miss Delarue was going to marry Wellesly.
“I don’t think much of her judgment, though,” he commented to himself, contemptuously. “Any girl that would take that scrub Wellesly when she might have Emerson Mead—well, she can’t amount to much! Bah! Emerson’s better off without her!”
That evening, as the four men sat smoking under the cottonwoods, Mead said quietly:
“Judge, I’m goin’ to pull my freight.”
“What do you mean, Emerson?”
“I mean that this country will be better off without me and I’ll be better off without it. I’m goin’ to light out.”
“Soon?”
“As soon as I can give away this ranch to the Fillmore outfit, or anybody that will have it. Nick, you and Tom better take it. I’ll give it to you for love and affection and one dollar, if you want to take the fight along with it.”
“Nothing would please me better,” Nick replied, “than to clean up all your old scores against the Fillmore outfit, but I reckon if we take it we’ll just run it for you until you-all come back.”
“All right. I’ll turn it over to you to-morrow. You can have all you can make out of it and if I’m not back inside of five years you can divide it between you.”