"That's so. Runs this ranch with me. Guess you've seen me once before, though it was your clerk I made the deal with. That's why we're here on rented land making 'bout enough to buy groceries and tobacco. You know how much the ranch you bounced us out of was worth to you. Anyway, you can't have that jack and spanner."
Anthea flushed with anger, but she saw that her father was very quiet.
"Well," he said dryly, "they belong to you, but I'm not sure it wouldn't have been as wise to let me have them."
The rancher laughed. "You don't hold our mortgage now, and if I could get hold of that newspaper-man I could give him a pointer or two. Seems to me he's getting right down on to the trail of you. Are you coming in out of the sun, Miss Merril?"
"Certainly not," said Anthea; and the man took out his pipe and quietly filled it when Merril told her to walk the horses on again.
Though she was a trifle perplexed by what she had heard, it seemed to her that her father's attitude was the correct one, and she seldom asked unnecessary questions. She had lived away from home a good deal since the death of her mother when she was very young, but her father had always been indulgent, and she had cherished an unquestioning confidence in him. It was also pleasant to know that he was a man of mark and influence, and one looked up to by the community. Of late, however, several circumstances besides the newspaper attacks on him had seemed to cast a doubt upon the latter point, but she would not entertain it for a moment, or ask herself whether there was anything to warrant them. It was reassuring to remember her father's little smile when she had ventured to offer him her sympathy; but she could not help admitting that there must, at least, have been some cause for the rancher's rancor. The man, she felt, would not have displayed such vindictive bitterness without any reason at all. She, however, decided that he had no doubt made some imprudent bargain with her father, and was unwarrantedly blaming the latter for the unfortunate result of it.
They went on in silence, and Merril, who walked beside the wagon, shook the wheel loose now and then when the horses stopped, until they reached Forster's homestead. The rancher greeted Anthea pleasantly, but she felt that there was a subtle change in his manner when he turned to her father, who explained their difficulty.
"The trouble is that I have rather an important appointment in Vancouver this afternoon," said the latter.
"My wife is there now with our only driving wagon, or I would offer to take you over," said Forster. "I can, however, lend you a saddle-horse, and Miss Merril could stay with Miss Wheelock until we see what can be done with the wagon. If necessary, I will drive her across when my wife comes back."
Merril thanked him, and presently moved away toward the stable with the hired man while Forster led Anthea to the house, and left her in the big general room where, as it happened, Eleanor Wheelock sat sewing. The green lattices outside the open windows were partly drawn to, but the shadowy room was very hot, and the little air that entered brought the smell of the pines with it. It was not the aromatic scent they have at evening, but the almost overpowering smell filled with the clogging sweetness of honey the afternoon sun calls forth from them. The ranch was also very still, and for no evident reason Anthea felt the drowsy quietness weigh upon her. Her companion said nothing to break it, but sat near the window sewing quietly, and Anthea became sensible of a faint shrinking from the girl, though she would have liked to overcome it for reasons she was not altogether willing to confess to herself.