The Odanah star. [volume] (Odanah, Ashland Co., Wis.) 1912-1916, 1915-11-12
cHAPTER>v.
Wild Blood and Horseflesh,


the austere gloom of the mighty coun.
try thrilled Sandry with strange
compelling; oftener it held him at a
dripping window with a load of lead
on his heart. He had no companions.
John Daily. easy. simple, suggesting
tried force. was his only comfort. In
him he found something vaguely fine.
as the plain little stone at the bottom
of clear waters takes on certain
simple beauty. They spent an occa-
sional evening together in the little
office, talking of the work, and the new
owner asked and learned many things.
Into the ample heart of white-haired
Ma Daily Sandry had stepped that first
night, wholly without intent.
"He speaks like a man." she opined
decisively, IAN you mark my words
he'll prove himself so, if his hands are
white"
Of the girl Siletz he had scarcely
taken moments notice. He did not
even know that when she served him
silently at the oilcloth covered table
the two long braids were tied togeth-
er at the nape of her neck SO that by
no chance could they fall against his
hand. Neither did he know that the
dog Coosnah watched him always with
pale eyes OF these two he knew less
than of any others in camp with whom
he had as much to do. AS for the girl
herself, she kept away from his vicin-
ity. Oftener they two, the girl and the
dog. silent with a common consent
like wild things of the woods, sought
the wind-swept top of the great stump
on the western ridge. Here Siletz
looked down on the dropping slope
and wondered of the cities and the
sea- He had come from them both
She had never seen man Ike him.
His clothes were different. His speech
was unlike. So were his hands, white
and fine grained.
Also there was another of his pos
sessions that she knew in every line
and turn, Black Bolt, the splendid
horse that stamped and whinnied with
Impotence in the lean-to behind the
filing shed. She could no more let him
alone than she could refrain from lying
down to drink from a mountain rill.
He called to her blood with irresist-
ible force. Day after day she crept
shyly to the lean-to and dreamed,
watching the slope and the log-trail.
"Oh, you beauty!" she whispered
with a soft hand on the arching neck.
"Oh, you beauty of the world! God
made you strong to serve and beauti-
full to be loved!"
And at that moment, on that par
ticular day, Walter Sandry stepped
into the doorway of the lean-to. At
his foot on the sill the girl whirled
upon him, her dark eyes wide with
fright and confusion.
Il" she stammered like a child.
Sandry looked at her for the first
time keenly.
You are fond of the horse?" he
asked.
But her tongue Glove suddenly to
the roof of her mouth and one of the
inherent silences that sometimes fell
upon her shut her lips.
She dropped her. eyes, twisted her
fingers in Black Bolts name, and then.
with a gliding motion, soft-footed and
swift, went past him, running toward
the cook-shack.
The incident was nothing in itself,
but it set the man thinking of her.
He had seen alteration in the eyes she
bent on the splendid animal, heard it
in the words, stilted and incongruous.
Queer youngster." said Sandry to
himself.
That night after supper he came out.
contrary to his custom, from the little
south room with its patchwork quilts,
its crocheted mat and its antique
Bible, into the big eating room.
He found Ma Daily rocking in the
little chair, her tired old hands lying
comfortably on the Portland Weekly
spread out on her slanting lap. The
wall lamps in their tin refiectors sill