The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1907-10-13

And it's all mine-thank God! The
last fee is paid
She stood in the low door of the
little shack in the canyon, tall, girl
ish figure, and looked out over q sight
ly prospect of natural meadow and ul-
innate mountains. Near by the beau
tiful little garden patch smiled at her
in all shades of loving green; for 1t was
her hand that led the water in the IT.
rigating bitches from the tiny spring
above.
The shack was backed up against
one of the canyons walls to have ad-
vantage of the dugout feature. The
friendly sod ran down over it for both
roof and walls, and above that shelter
nothing was between it and God but
an occasional birds wing; for no clouds
ever came into the sky at Little Rest.
Lydia Danbv had started for New
Mexico three years before, with her
husband and child, TO take up a home
stead claim. This journey was a Sc
quence of failures, mistakes. calamities
"a sequence which had had its begin
ming in her wedding itself, and had
closed i'm that crude, sordid little west
ern railroad town where Dandy had
relaxed his feeble hold on life and left
her a widow of %, alone, with almost
no money, and the child.
reason ana common StISt- WCii
as letters from home-advised widowed
Lydia to turn back. But mighty
craving to own some spot on earth
which she could call home, a sick re-
volt from the thought of bringing up
the child in that surrounding where
It had been born, these nerved her to
persist Thrift. industry. the honest,
kindly help of good neighbOrs, the gem
erous favor of a masculine and largely
A.nv-
prosperity. Today saw her with lit
tie bunch of twenty-five cows. a patch
of garden, which she tended, and whose
produce she could sell without leaving
the ranch. the child Norah in abound
ing health and well-being, and the
prospect seemed to smile.
Lydia looked about upon 1t all, then
glanced backward into the soft obscur-
city of the room behind her where the
child lay sleeping.
For Gods sake"
1t was a hoarse, husky sound, scarce
above a whisper, and Ii reached Lydia s
ears seemingly from the back Of the
house Not for nothing had she lived
three years upon this edge-this de-
batable border land-of civilization.
She neither screamed nor started wild
ly: but with a whitened face and eyes
that questioned intent drew inward
from the doorway and moved slowly
toward the little kitchen whence the
voice had seemed to come.
AS she went she was aware that a
sound like heavy breathing grew more
and more audible to her. When her
ewes had become accustomed TO the
dim light of the little room she made
out a face at the tiny side window
a Young face 1t was, well featured, but
hageard. drawn, marked with long.
red blaze athwart one temple, where
a bullet had grazed but recently. and
lit by a pair of hunted eyes Which
cleaned with dark intensity.
She saw instantly how the intruder
had crept up to the little shack I'M
der cover of the rocks and irregulari-
ties that approached it on the side.
''What-what is it?" she asked whis-
peringiy.
"Water-a drink of water first!'
came the quick answer. She moved to
the water bucket, his famished eyes
following her in a way that brought
lump into her throat.
She would have filled him an ordi-
nary cup: but That" he uttered, in
dicating with his eyes only a big tin
measure. and at the word and the look
that went with it the tears sprang in
to her own blue eyes. She held the
great cup to him, and as she watched
him drink the heart i'm her tender
breast utterly melted, and she wiped
the piteous tears from her face.