Dennison Grant: A Novel of To-day

by Robert J. C. Stead

After a week she admitted, much against her will, that possibly Dennison Grant had something to do with it. She had not seen him since she had pressed his fingers and he had ridden away through the smoke-haze of the South Y.D. She had dutifully tried to force him from her mind. But he would not stay out of it. It was about that fact that her misgivings seemed most to centre. When she would be thinking of Transley, and wondering about the future, suddenly she would discover that she was not thinking of Transley, but of Dennison Grant. These discoveries shocked and humiliated her. It was an impossible position. She would throw Grant forcibly out of her mind and turn to Transley. And then, in an unguarded moment, Transley would fade from her consciousness, and she would know again that she was thinking of Grant.

At length she allowed herself the luxury of thinking frankly about Dennison Grant. It WAS a luxury. It brought her a secret happiness which she was wholly at a loss to understand, but which was very delightful, nevertheless. She amused herself with comparing Grant with Transley. They had two points in common: their physical perfection and their fearless, self-confident manner. With these exceptions they seemed to be complete contradictions. The ambitious Transley worshipped success; the philosophical Grant despised it. That difference in attitude toward the world and its affairs was a ridge which separated the whole current of their lives. It even, in a way, shut one from the view of the other; at least it shut Grant from the view of Transley. Transley would never understand Grant, but Grant might, and probably did, understand Transley. That was why Grant was the greater of the two....

She reproached herself for such a thought; it was disloyal to admit that this stranger on the Landson ranch was a greater man than her husband-to-be. And yet honesty—or, perhaps, something deeper than honesty—compelled her to make that admission.... She ran back over the remembered incidents of the night they had spent together, marooned like shipwrecked sailors on a rock in the foothills. His attentiveness, his courtesy, his freedom from any conventional restraint, his manly respect which was so much greater than conventional restraint—all these came back to her with a poignant tenderness. She pictured Transley in his place. Transley would probably have proposed even before he bandaged her ankle. Grant had not said a word of love, or even of affection. He had talked freely of himself—at her request—but there had been nothing that might not have been said before the world. She had been safe with Grant....

After she had thought on this theme for a while Zen would acknowledge to herself that the situation was absurd and impossible. Grant had given no evidence of thinking more of her than of any other girl whom he might have met. He had been chivalrous only. She had sat up with a start at the thought that there might be another girl.... Or there might be no girl. Grant was an unusual character....

At any rate, the thing for her to do was to forget about him. She should have no place in her mind for any man but Transley. It was true he had stampeded her, but she had accepted the situation in which she found herself. Transley was worthy of her—she had nothing to take back—she would go through with it.

On the principle that the way to drive an unwelcome thought out of the mind is to think vigorously about something else, Zen occupied herself with plans and day-dreams centering about the new home that was to be built in town. Neither her father nor Transley had as yet returned from the trip on which they had gone with a view to forming a partnership, so there had been no opportunity to discuss the plans for the future, but Zen took it for granted that Transley would build in town. He was so enthusiastic over the possibilities of that young and bustling centre of population that there was no doubt he would want to throw in his lot with it. This prospect was quite pleasing to the girl; it would leave her within easy distance of her old home; it would introduce her to a type of society with which she was well acquainted, and where she could do herself justice, and it would not break up the associations of her young life. She would still be able, now and again, to take long rides through the tawny foothills; to mingle with her old friends; possibly to maintain a somewhat sisterly acquaintance with Dennison Grant....

After ten days Y.D. returned—alone. He had scarcely been able to believe the developments which he had seen. It was as though the sleepy, lazy cow-town had become electrified. Y.D. had looked on for three days, wondering if he were not in some kind of a dream from which he would awaken presently among his herds in the foothills. After three days he bought a property. Before he left he sold it at a profit greater than the earnings of his first five years on the ranch. It would be indeed a stubborn confidence which could not be won by such an experience, and before leaving for the ranch Y.D. had arranged for Transley practically an open credit with his bankers, and had undertaken to send down all the horses and equipment that could be spared.

Transley had planned to return to the foothills with Y.D., but at the last moment business matters developed which required his attention. He placed a tiny package in Y.D.‘s capacious palm.

“For the girl,” he said. “I should deliver it myself, but you’ll explain?”

Y.D. fumbled the tiny package into a vest pocket. “Sure, I’ll attend to that,” he promised. “Wasn’t much of these fancy trimmin’s when I settled into double harness, but lots of things has changed since then. You’ll be out soon?”