Homing Hearts

: The Highgrader

Jack Kilmeny had not been brought up in the dry sunbaked West for

nothing. The winds of the Rockies had entered into his character as well

as into his physique. He was a willful man, with a good deal of granite

in his make-up. A fighter from his youth, he did not find it easy to

yield the point upon which he differed from Moya. There was in her so

much of impulsive generosity that he had expected to overpower her

scrup
es. But she stood like a rock planted in the soil.



It came to him as he walked home after a long fight with her that in his

heart he did not want her to yield. She was the Moya Dwight he loved

because she would not compromise with her conviction. Yet, though he

wanted her to stand firm, he hated the thought of giving way himself. It

galled his pride that he must come to her without a penny, knowing that

she had the means to keep them both modestly. Nor could he, without a

pang, think of surrendering the twenty-eight thousand dollars he had

fought for and won. He was no visionary. The value of money he

understood perfectly. It stood for power, place, honor, the things that

were worth having. Given what he had, Jack knew he could double it in

Goldbanks within the year. There were legitimate opportunities for

investment that were bound to make rich returns. But without a dollar he

would be like Samson shorn of his locks.



All through the night he was joined in battle with himself, but when at

early dawn he stood on the top of Son-of-a-Gun hill and faced a sky

faintly pink with the warning of a coming sun his decision had been

made.



On his way back he met Moya and Miss Seldon. Joyce pounced upon him with

a grievance.



"You haven't told me yet how much you're going to give for the new

hospital, Mr. Kilmeny. You know we're leaving to-morrow, and you'll have

to decide at once. Be generous, please. You said yourself it was a good

cause."



He nodded agreement. "The most worthy charity I know. I've often

wondered why some Andrew Carnegie didn't set the fashion of endowing

hospitals by wholesale. They ought to be free to all poor folks out of

health. When a man is losing his wages and his family is scrimping he

ought not to be facing a thirty-dollar-a-week hospital charge. Yes, I'm

for the new hospital, Miss Seldon."



"How strong are you for it?" Joyce asked, laughing at her newly acquired

American slang. "Mr. Verinder has promised to give me two dollars for

every one I can raise among my other friends. So don't be a--a----"



"A tightwad," supplied Moya with a smile. She could do a little in the

native slang herself.



Jack went into his pocket for a checkbook and a fountain pen. He wrote

for a few seconds, tore the check from the stub, and handed it to Joyce.



That young woman gasped.



"Why--you don't really mean--it's for twenty-eight thousand two hundred

and fourteen dollars," she cried.



"And seventeen cents. Please don't forget that," he added.



"But--what on earth do you mean?"



Jack was looking at Moya, and she at him with shining eyes in which joy

swam.



"It's a little thank offering, Miss Seldon."



"Because you were rescued from the mine, I suppose. Still...."



"Because I'm engaged to be married to the best woman in the world," he

corrected.



Joyce whirled upon Moya with instant divination. "You little wretch, and

you never told me."



If Miss Dwight had not known it herself till this moment she gave no

sign to that effect. "We're telling you now, dear," she explained.



"How long have you been engaged? Was it yesterday in the bucket?"



Jack laughed. "Nothing so romantic. We've been engaged a little less

than half a minute. You get the first chance to wish Moya joy on having

won so great a catch. She's marrying a pauper, you know."



"I think we're very rich," differed his sweetheart shyly.



Joyce looked from one to the other suspiciously. "I haven't a notion

what either of you mean, but I know I'm going to hang on to this check,

Mr. Millionaire Pauper."



Imps of mischief sparkled in the highgrader's eyes. "Don't forget that

Verinder has to write one for twice as much."



Miss Seldon could not help laughing. "I'll see to that. He's not a

welcher, but ... I wonder how he'll look when I tell him."



"You ought to tell him as soon as you can," Jack hinted boldly.



"Oh, ought I? Did you say you had been engaged less than a minute, Mr.

Kilmeny? How much will you give me to go down now and tell him?"



"I've nothing left to give--except my gratitude."



"You're the first man who ever was so ungallant as to tell me he would

be grateful to have me leave him."



"I'm the first who ever proposed to another girl in your presence. The

circumstance is unusual," he flung back gayly.



"I didn't hear you propose. All you did was to announce it," she replied

saucily.



"That's true too," admitted Kilmeny. "Well, I'm going to propose now if

it isn't too late. You may stay if you like."



"Thanks, no." Joyce kissed her friend. "I hope you'll be very happy,

dear. I ... I believe you will."



Moya choked on her words. "I know I shall, Joy."



Miss Seldon looked at Jack with an expression in which embarrassment and

audacity were blended. "I've always rather liked your pauper," she

confided aloud to Moya.



Her confidences had their limits. She omitted to mention what had just

popped into her mind, that within the fortnight he had proposed to her

too on the same spot.



Jack bowed with exaggerated deference when she shook hands with him. He

was just now riding the seventh wave of happiness and felt friendly to

the whole world.



"Thanks very much. You're a good scout, Joyce."



"Good gracious! What may that be? Some more of your American slang, I

suppose." She broke away from persiflage to add seriously: "You're

right about one thing, though. You've got the best girl in the world. Be

good to her, Jack Kilmeny."



With that she turned and walked down the hill.



The other two walked up.



"I'm so proud of you, Jack, boy," whispered one of them.



He laughed happily. "I'm proud of myself. I've done the best day's work

I ever did for myself when I won Moya Dwight."



"You know what I mean, Jack. What other man would have thrown away a

small fortune--all he had--just for me?"



"I can name one other," suggested Kilmeny.



"Ned! But he's a saint."



"And I'm a sinner," her lover replied blithely.



"You're the sinner I love, then."



They had reached a clump of firs. Without knowing how it happened she

found herself in his arms. There were both tears and laughter in her

eyes as her lips turned slowly to meet his.



"The first time since we were kiddies on the Victorian, sweetheart,"

he told her.



"Yes, it's true. I loved you then. I love you now.... Jack, boy, I'm

just the happiest girl alive."



A mist-like veil of old rose hung above the mountain tops. Hand in hand

they watched the rising sun pierce through it and flood the crotches of

the hills with God's splendid canvases. It was a part of love's egoism

that all this glory of the young day seemed an accompaniment to the song

of joy that pulsed through them.



Later they came to earth and babbled the nonsense that is the highest

wisdom of lovers. They built air castles and lived in them, seeing life

through a poetic ambient as a long summer day in which they should ride

and work and play together.



At last she remembered Lady Farquhar and began to laugh.



"We must go down and tell her at once, Jack."



He agreed. "Yes, let's go back and have it out. If you like you may go

to your room and I'll tackle her alone."



"I'd rather go with you."



He delighted in her answer.



Farquhar was taking an early morning stroll, arm in arm with Lady Jim,

when he caught sight of them.



"Look, Di!"



Both of the lovers knew how to walk. Lady Farquhar, watching them,

thought she had never seen as fine a pair of untamed human beings. In

his step was the fine free swing of the hillman, and the young woman

breasted the slope lightly as a faun.



The Englishman chuckled. "You're beaten, Di. The highwayman wins."



"Nonsense," she retorted sharply, but with anxiety manifest in her

frown.



"Fact, just the same. He's coming to tell us he means to take our little

girl to his robber den."



"I believe you'd actually let him," she said scornfully.



"Even you can't stop him. It's written in the books. Not sure I'd

interfere if I could. For a middle-aged Pharisee with the gout I'm

incurably romantic. It's the child's one great chance for happiness. But

I wish to the deuce he wasn't a highgrader."



"She shan't sacrifice herself if I can prevent it," Lady Farquhar

insisted stanchly.



"I 'member a girl who sacrificed herself for a line lieutenant without a

shilling to call his own," he soliloquized aloud. "Would have him, and

did, by Jove! Three deaths made him Lord Farquhar later, but she married

the penniless subaltern."



"I've always been glad I did." She squeezed his arm fondly. "But this is

different, James."



Kilmeny and Moya stopped. The young man doffed his gray felt hat and

bowed.



"Mornin', Lady Farquhar--Lord Farquhar. We've come to ask your

permission for our marriage."



"Mornin', rebels. Fancy I'll have to refuse it," cut back Farquhar, eyes

twinkling. For this bold directness pleased and amused him.



"That would distress us extremely," answered Kilmeny with a genial

smile.



"But would not affect your plans, I understand you to mean."



"You catch the idea exactly, sir."



Lady Farquhar entered the conversation. "Are you planning to go to

prison with him, Moya, when he is convicted of highgrading?" she asked

pleasantly.



Moya told in three sentences of what her lover had done. The Englishman

wrung Kilmeny's hand cordially.



"By Jove, you reform thoroughly when you go about it. Don't think I'd

have enjoyed writing that check for Miss Joyce. Leaves you strapped,

does it?"



"Dead broke," came the very cheerful reply.



"But of course Moya has some money," said Lady Farquhar quietly.



The Westerner winced. "Wish she hadn't. It's the only thing I have to

forgive her."



Farquhar lifted his eyebrows. "Di," he remonstrated.



His wife came to time with a frank apology. "That was downright nasty of

me, Mr. Kilmeny. I withdraw it. None the less, I think Moya would be

throwing herself away. Do you realize what you are proposing? She's been

used to the best ever since she was born. Have you the means to supply

her needs? Or are you considering a Phyllida and Corydon idyll in a

cottage?"



"It will have to be something of that sort at first. I've told her all

this too, Lady Farquhar."



"What does that matter if we love each other?" Moya asked.



"You'll find it matters a good deal," said Lady Jim dryly. "When poverty

comes in love is likely to wink out any day. Of course I realize that

yours is of a quality quite unusual. It always is, my dear. Every lover

has thought that since time began."



"We'll have to take our fighting chance of that," Jack replied.



Moya, her eyes shining, nodded agreement. No great gain can be won

without risk. She knew there was a chance that she might not find

happiness in her love. But where it called her she must follow--to a

larger life certainly, to joy and to sorrow, to the fuller experiences

that must come to every woman who fulfills her destiny.



A voice hailed Jack. Colter was hurrying up the street, plainly excited.

Kilmeny moved a few steps toward him.



Lady Jim took advantage of his absence to attack Moya from another

angle. "My dear, I wish I could show you how much depends on a

similarity of tastes, of habits, of standards. Matrimony means more than

love. It means adjustment."



"I've thought of that too. But ... when you love enough that doesn't

help the adjustment?" asked the girl naively.



She had appealed to Farquhar. That gentleman came to her assistance. "It

does."



"This isn't a matter to be decided merely by personal preference," urged

the older woman. "There may be--consequences."



The color beat into the face of the young woman in a wave, but her eyes

held steadily to those of Lady Farquhar.



"I ... hope so."



"Bravo, Moya!" applauded her guardian, clapping his hands softly.



"Don't you think they--the consequences--deserve a better chance than

you will give them?"



"I'll answer that, Di," spoke up Farquhar. "When a girl chooses for the

father of her children a man who is clean and strong and virile, and on

top of that her lover, she is giving them the best possible chance in

life."



Moya's gratitude shone through the eyes that met those of her guardian.



Kilmeny swung back to the group he had left. "I've good news, friends.

This is my lucky day. You remember that when I was rescued from the

Golden Nugget my pockets were full of ore samples I had picked up as I

was tunneling."



"Yes ... picked them up while you were delirious, didn't you?" Farquhar

replied.



"Must have, I reckon. Well, you know how miners are always having pieces

of quartz assayed. Colter took these to the man we employ. He's just

learned that it is high-grade stuff."



"You've made a strike?"



"Looks like it. Colter wasn't taking any chances, anyhow. He hiked right

around to the owners of the mine and signed up a five-year lease in his

name and mine."



Farquhar shook hands with him cordially. "Hope you make a fortune,

Kilmeny."



Moya's chaperon, facing the inevitable, capitulated as graceful as she

could. After all, the girl might have done worse. The man she had chosen

was well born, good looking, forceful, and a leader in his community. If

this fortunate strike was going to leave him well off, clearly she must

make the best of him.



"You're a lucky man. I hope you know you don't deserve a girl like

Moya," she told him as she shook hands.



"I know it, all right. Can you tell me who does?" he flung back, with a

gay insouciant smile.



At that moment Ned Kilmeny stepped out upon the hotel porch. Lady Jim

nodded toward him.



"Perhaps," his cousin conceded. "But in this little old world a man

doesn't get what he deserves."



"I see he doesn't. Ned is a better man than you."



"Yes," he admitted.



Captain Kilmeny, coming down the porch steps, saw in a flash what had

happened. He came forward with the even stride and impassive face that

seldom deserted him. In two sentences Lady Farquhar told him the facts.



"You lucky dog," he said to his cousin as their hands gripped.



Jack had never liked him better than in this moment when he was giving

up so cheerfully the thing he wanted most in the world.



"It isn't always the best man that wins, captain. I take off my hat to

the better men who have tried and failed. Perhaps it may be a comfort to

them to know that I'm the man that needs her most."



The captain turned to Moya. "So you've found that good hunting already,"

he said to her in a low voice.



"Yes, I think I have ... I'm sure of it, Ned." Her eyes were full of

tender sympathy for him. She wished she could tell him how much she

admired his fine spirit.



"God keep you happy," he said wistfully.



Jack joined them and slipped Moya's arm into his. "Amen to that,

captain. And since Jack Kilmeny has been appointed deputy on the job I'm

going to see your wish comes true."



Moya looked at her lover and smiled.



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