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That night when Halleck had left the old man to the care of Marcia and Olive, for the time, a note was brought to him from Bartley's lawyer, begging the favor of a few moments' interview on very important business. It might be some offer of reparation or advance in Marcia's interest, and Halleck went with the bearer of the note. The lawyer met him hospitably at the door of his office.
Hubbard, about a personal misunderstanding between you and Mr. Ricker?" "I'm sure I don't know," said Bartley; "but I suppose that if you have heard anything you know." "I have heard," proceeded Witherby, a little dashed by Bartley's coolness, "that Mr.
It related with righteous indignation how Mr. Bartley's miners had burned the dead body of a miner suspected of having fired the mine, and put his own life in jeopardy as well as those of others; and then, not content with that monstrous act, had fallen upon and beaten to death a gentleman in whom they thought they detected a resemblance to some person who had been, or was suspected of being that miner's accomplice; "but so far from that," said the writer, "we are now informed, on sure authority, that the gentleman in question is a large and wealthy landed proprietor, quite beyond any temptation to crime or dishonesty, and had actually visited this part of the world only in the character of a peace-maker, and to discharge a very delicate commission, which it would not be our business to publish even if the details had been confided to us."
But now, as he looked at Bartley's back, he had his misgivings; it struck him as the back of a degenerate man, and that increasing bulk seemed not to represent an increase of wholesome substance, but a corky, buoyant tissue, materially responsive to some sort of moral dry-rot. Bartley pushed on to the Events office in a blithe humor.
"That there Cheyenne is the fastest gun artist and the biggest coward that ever come out of Wyoming. Ain't that right, Lon?" "I never worked in Wyoming," said Long Lon. Mrs. Senator Brown did not at all approve of Bartley's determination to accompany Cheyenne in search of the stolen horses.
At the end he could say nothing but "Better come home with me, Marcia," and he suffered in meekness the indignation with which she rebuked him: "I will stay in Bartley's house till he comes back to me. If he is dead, I will die here."
Wilson glanced toward the fire, where Bartley's profile was still wreathed in cigar smoke that curled up more and more slowly. His shoulders were sunk deep in the cushions and one hand hung large and passive over the arm of his chair. He had slipped on a purple velvet smoking-coat. His wife, Wilson surmised, had chosen it. She was clearly very proud of his good looks and his fine color.
Bartley come to him; to be sure, he came softly, because of the other clerk, who was washing his hands and brushing his hair in the lobby. So Bartley's hand, fell gently, but all in a moment, on Monckton's shoulder, and they say the shoulder is a sensitive part in conscious rogues.
Moreover, though he was a little wrong-headed and not a little pig-headed, he was a noble-minded man, and nothing noble passed him unobserved or unappreciated. "That Bartley's daughter!" said he to Julia. "Ay, when roses spring from dunghills, and eagles are born of sparrow-hawks. Brave girl! brave girl!" "Oh, uncle," said Julia, "I am so glad you appreciate her!"
The managing editor of the Chronicle-Abstract was reading a manuscript, and he did not desist from his work on Bartley's appearance, which he gave no sign of welcoming. But he had a whimsical, shrewd, kind face, and Bartley felt that he should get on with him, though he did not rise, and though he let Bartley stand. "Yes," he said. "Lumbering, hey?
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