“Well, I suppose you must,” Peter went on. “I’ve got work, too.” He pointed at his pile of dirt on the table. “You see, there’s gold in all that muck, and––I’ve got to find it.”
CHAPTER VI
EVE AND WILL
Elia was staring at his sister with wide, expectant eyes. Suspense was evidently his dominant feeling at the moment. A suspense which gave him a sickly feeling in the pit of the stomach. It was the apprehension of a prisoner awaiting a verdict; the nauseating sensation of one who sees death facing him, with the chances a thousand to one against him. A half-plaited rawhide rope was lying in his lap; the hobby of making these his sister had persuaded him to turn to profitable account. He was expert in their manufacture, and found a ready market for his wares on the neighboring ranches.
Eve was staring out of the window considering, her pretty face seriously cast, her eyes far away. Will Henderson, his boyishly handsome face moodily set, was standing beside the work-table that occupied the centre of the living-room, the fingers of one hand restlessly groping among the litter of dress stuffs lying upon it. He was awaiting her answer to a question of his, awaiting it in suspense, like Elia, but with different feelings.
Nor did the girl seem inclined to hurry. To her mind a lot depended on her answer. Her acquiescence meant the giving up of all the little features that had crept into her struggling years of independence. There was her brother. She must think for his welfare. There was her business, worked up so laboriously. There was the possible 72 removal from Barnriff to the world of hills and valleys, which was Will’s world. There were so many things to think of,––yet––yet she knew her answer beforehand. She loved, and she was a woman, worldly-wise, but unworldly.
The evening was drawing in, and the soft shadows were creeping out of the corners of the little room. There was a gentle mellowness in the twilight which softened the darns in the patchwork picture the place presented. This room was before all things her shop; and, in consequence, comfort and the picturesque were sacrificed to utility. Yet there was a pleasant femininity about it. A femininity which never fails to act upon the opposite sex. It carries with it an influence that can best be likened, in a metaphoric sense, to a mental aroma which soothes the jagged edges of the rougher senses. It lulls them to a gentle feeling of seductive delight, a condition which lays men so often open to a bad woman’s unscrupulousness, but also to a good woman’s influence for bringing out all that is greatest and best in their nature.
The waiting was too long for Will. He was a lover of no great restraint.