“Jim’s dead-shot by a U. S. marshal by mistake for a smuggler,” answered Black Andy suggestively. “Lance is up on the Yukon, busted; Jerry is one of our hands on the place; and Abner is in jail.”
“Abner-in jail!” she exclaimed in a dazed way. “What did he do? Abner always seemed so straight.”
“Oh, he sloped with a thousand dollars of the railway people’s money. They caught him, and he got seven years.”
“He was married, wasn’t he?” she asked in a low voice. “Yes, to Phenie Tyson. There’s no children, so she’s all right, and divorce is cheap over in the States, where she is now.”
“Phenie Tyson didn’t marry Abner because he was a saint, but because he was a man, I suppose,” she replied gravely. “And the old folks?”
“Both dead. What Abner done sent the old man to his grave. But Abner’s mother died a year before.”
“What Abner done killed his father,” said Abel Baragar with dry emphasis. “Phenie Tyson was extravagant-wanted this and that, and nothin’ was too good for her. Abner spoilt his life gettin’ her what she wanted; and it broke old Ezra Lumley’s heart.”
George’s wife looked at him for a moment with her eyes screwed up, and then she laughed softly. “My, it’s curious how some folks go up and some go down! It must be lonely for Phenie waiting all these years for Abner to get free.... I had the happiest time in my life at Lumley’s. I was getting better of my-cold. While I was there I got lots of strength stored up, to last me many a year when I needed it; and, then, George and I were married at Lumley’s....”
Aunt Kate came slowly over with the boy, and laid a hand on Cassy’s shoulder, for there was an undercurrent to the conversation which boded no good. The very first words uttered had plunged Abel Baragar and his son’s wife into the midst of the difficulty which she had hoped might, after all, be avoided.
“Come, and I’ll show you your room, Cassy,” she said. “It faces south, and you’ll get the sun all day. It’s like a sun-parlour. We’re going to have supper in a couple of hours, and you must rest some first. Is the house warm enough for you?”