"I'll have to tell you, Evie. You'd sort of made me forget. These days have been the happiest I've ever known, and you've made 'em so. That's how I forgot to tell you of things I guess you ought to know."
But the woman before him had no desire for his present mood. She smilingly shook her head in a decided negative. The last thing she desired was anything in the nature of a confidence.
"Is there any need—now?" she asked. Then she smiled. "The stores are waiting."
But she had yet to learn the real character of the man whom she had married. She had yet to understand the meaning of the simple sobriquet "Honest Jeff," which Nan Tristram had long since bestowed upon him. He was not the man to be turned from a decision once taken. The decision on this occasion was arrived at through the depth of the passionate devotion which controlled his every thought. His love for Elvine made his purpose only the more irrevocable.
"I think they had best wait a shade longer," he said with a shadowy smile. "You see, Evie, I kind of figure there's things that matter more than just gathering in the fancy goods money'll buy—even for you. Guess I owe you most everything a man can give, the same as you feel toward me. That's how marriage—marriage like ours—seems to me. As far as I can make it there's not going to be a thing on my conscience toward you. I'd have told you this before, only—only you just drove it right out of my head with the sight of your beautiful face, the sound of your voice, which I just love, and the thought that you—you were to be my wife. You see," he went on simply, "I hadn't room in my head for anything else."
His manner was so firmly gentle that Elvine's protest melted before it. After all it was very sweet, and—and—— She drew a chair forward and sat down. But her smile hid her real feelings. Confidences, confessions, even from a husband, were repugnant to her.
Jeff remained standing. He gazed for a few silent moments in the direction of the open window. The expression of his blue eyes suggested a deep, searching introspection. He might have been searching for an opening. Again, he might simply have been reviewing scenes which stirred his innermost soul with their horror and pain.
At last, however, Elvine made a half impatient movement. Instantly the blue eyes turned in her direction, and their expression startled her. They were full of a stony, passionless regard. Not for her, but inspired by the thought behind them. She shivered under their gaze and their impression upon her was never afterward obliterated.
"It's four years past now," he began, in a voice she scarcely recognized. "These rustlers brought it all back to me. Say, Evie, I had a twin brother, Ronald. Maybe that won't convey much. I sort of loved him—better than myself. That's all. He was a bit queer. I mean he just didn't care a heap for running along the main trail of things. He was apt to get all mussed up running around byways. Well, when Bud and I fixed up the Obar partnership, I was just crazy to hunt Ronny down, and hand him a share. Bud's a great feller, and I told him. I knew whereabouts the boy had staked out, and, figuring we'd earned a vacation, Bud and I set out to round him up, and hand him a piece which I guessed would keep him with me the rest of his life."
He paused. He drew a deep breath, and his eyes, hard as marble, had turned again in the direction of the window.