“She’ll get nothing out of me,” he repeated, as the others in the room behind him made no remark, and his eyes ranged gloatingly over the cattle under the foothills and the buildings which he had gathered together to proclaim his substantial greatness in the West. “Not a sous markee,” he added, clinking some coins in his pocket. “She’s got no rights.”
“Cassy’s got as much right here as any of us, Abel, and she’s coming to say it, I guess.”
The voice which spoke was unlike a Western voice. It was deep and full and slow, with an organ-like quality. It was in good keeping with the tall, spare body and large, fine rugged face of the woman to whom it belonged. She sat in a rocking-chair, but did not rock, her fingers busy with the knitting-needles, her feet planted squarely on the home-made hassock at her feet.
The old man waited for a minute in a painful silence, then he turned slowly round, and, with tight-pressed lips, looked at the woman in the rocking-chair. If it had been anyone else who had “talked back” at him, he would have made quick work of them, for he was of that class of tyrant who pride themselves on being self-made, and have an undue respect for their own judgment and importance. But the woman who had ventured to challenge his cold-blooded remarks about his dead son’s wife, now hastening over the snow to the house her husband had left under a cloud eight years before, had no fear of him, and, maybe, no deep regard for him. He respected her, as did all who knew her—a very reticent, thoughtful, busy being, who had been like a well of comfort to so many that had drunk and passed on out of her life, out of time and time’s experiences. Seventy-nine years saw her still upstanding, strong, full of work, and fuller of life’s knowledge. It was she who had sent the horses and sleigh for “Gassy,” when the old man, having read the letter that Cassy had written him, said that she could “freeze at the station” for all of him. Aunt Kate had said nothing then, but, when the time came, by her orders the sleigh and horses were at the station; and the old man had made no direct protest, for she was the one person he had never dominated nor bullied. If she had only talked, he would have worn her down, for he was fond of talking, and it was said by those who were cynical and incredulous about him that he had gone to prayer-meetings, had been a local preacher, only to hear his own voice. Probably if there had been any politics in the West in his day, he would have been a politician, though it would have been too costly for his taste, and religion was very cheap; it enabled him to refuse to join in many forms of expenditure, on the ground that he “did not hold by such things.”
In Aunt Kate, the sister of his wife, dead so many years ago, he had found a spirit stronger than his own. He valued her; he had said more than once, to those who he thought would never repeat it to her, that she was a “great woman”; but self-interest was the mainspring of his appreciation. Since she had come again to his house—she had lived with him once before for two years when his wife was slowly dying—it had been a different place. Housekeeping had cost less than before, yet the cooking was better, the place was beautifully clean, and discipline without rigidity reigned everywhere. One by one the old woman’s boys and girls had died—four of them—and she was now alone, with not a single grandchild left to cheer her; and the life out here with Abel Baragar had been unrelieved by much that was heartening to a woman; for Black Andy, Abel’s son, was not an inspiring figure, though even his moroseness gave way under her influence. So it was that when Cassy’s letter came, her breast seemed to grow warmer, and swell with longing to see the wife of her nephew, who had such a bad reputation in Abel’s eyes, and to see George’s little boy, who was coming too. After all, whatever Cassy was, she was the mother of Abel’s son’s son; and Aunt Kate was too old and wise to be frightened by tales told of Cassy or any one else. So, having had her own way so far regarding Cassy’s coming, she looked Abel calmly in the eyes, over the gold-rimmed spectacles which were her dearest possession—almost the only thing of value she had. She was not afraid of Abel’s anger, and he knew it; but his eldest son, Black Andy, was present, and he must make a show of being master of the situation.
“Aunt Kate,” he said, “I didn’t make a fuss about you sending the horses and sleigh for her, because women do fool things sometimes. I suppose curiosity got the best of you. Anyhow, mebbe it’s right Cassy should find out, once for all, how things stand, and that they haven’t altered since she took George away, and ruined his life, and sent him to his grave. That’s why I didn’t order Mick back when I saw him going out with the team.”
“Cassy Mavor,” interjected a third voice from a corner behind the great stove—“Cassy Mavor, of the variety-dance-and-song, and a talk with the gallery between!”
Aunt Kate looked over at Black Andy, and stopped knitting, for there was that in the tone of the sullen ranchman which stirred in her a sudden anger, and anger was a rare and uncomfortable sensation to her. A flush crept slowly over her face, then it died away, and she said quietly to Black Andy—for she had ever prayed to be master of the demon of temper down deep in her, and she was praying now:
“She earnt her living by singing and dancing, and she’s brought up George’s boy by it, and singing and dancing isn’t a crime. David danced before the Lord. I danced myself when I was a young girl, and before I joined the church. ‘Twas about the only pleasure I ever had; ‘bout the only one I like to remember. There’s no difference to me ‘twixt making your feet handy and clever and full of music, and playing with your fingers on the piano or on a melodeon at a meeting. As for singing, it’s God’s gift; and many a time I wisht I had it. I’d have sung the blackness out of your face and heart, Andy.” She leaned back again and began to knit very fast. “I’d like to hear Cassy sing, and see her dance too.”
Black Andy chuckled coarsely, “I often heard her sing and saw her dance down at Lumley’s before she took George away East. You wouldn’t have guessed she had consumption. She knocked the boys over down to Lumley’s. The first night at Lumley’s done for George.”