Part 29

Jimmy Grayson listened with intense attention to Harley's story. When the tale was over, he and Harley whispered together long and earnestly, and Jimmy Grayson frequently nodded his head in assent. Then they awoke the driver, a heavy man, but with a keen Western mind that at once became alert at the news of danger.

"Yes, I got my bearings now," he said, in reply to a question of Harley's. "I asked the old fellow about it when I came up from the stable, and Speedwell is straight north from here. I can take one of the horses and hit the town before daylight. I know everybody there."

"But how about the dogs?" asked Jimmy Grayson. "Can you get past them?"

"No trouble there at all. After we came, the old fellow locked 'em up in a stall in the stable and left 'em there. I guess he didn't want to look to us as if he was too suspicious."

"Then go, and God go with you!" said Jimmy Grayson, with deep feeling.

The driver left at once, not by the stairway, near the foot of which the old man might be watching, but by a much simpler road. He raised the window of the room and swung out, sustained by Jimmy Grayson's powerful arms until his feet were within a yard of the ground. Then he dropped, ran lightly across the lawn, sprang over the wire fence, and soon disappeared in the grove where the girl had said that the horses were waiting. Jimmy Grayson closed the window with a deep sigh of relief.

"He will do his part," he said; "now for ours."

He did not seek to sleep again, and Harley could not think of it. One task occupied him a little while--the replacing of the lock on the door--but after that the hours passed heavily and in silence. The flush of dawn appeared in the east at last, and then they heard a faint step in the hall outside and the gentle turning of a key in a lock. Jimmy Grayson and Harley looked at each other and smiled grimly, but they said nothing. A half-hour later there was a loud knock on their door, and old Daniel Simpson bade them rise and get ready for breakfast.

"It is chiefly in your hands now," said Harley, in a low tone to Jimmy Grayson.

"We'll be down in a few minutes, and we have had a good night's sleep, for which we thank you," he called to the old man.

"You're welcome to it," replied Simpson. "You'll find water and towels on the porch down-stairs, and then you can come straight in to breakfast."

They heard his step passing down the hall to the stairway, where it died away, and then they dressed deliberately. On the porch they found the water and towels as Simpson had said, and bathed and rubbed their faces. A golden sun was just rising from the prairie, and beads of water from the night's rain sparkled on the trees and grass. The wind came out of the southwest, fresh and glorious.

They entered the dining-room, where the breakfast smoked on the table, and the old man and his wife were waiting. Harley could not see that they had changed in appearance in the morning glow. Simpson was still rugged and grim, while the woman yet cowered and now and then raised terrified and appealing eyes.

"Whar's your driver?" asked Simpson.

"He has gone down to the stable to feed and care for his horses," replied the candidate, easily. "He's a very careful man, always looks after his horses before he looks after himself. He told us not to wait for him, as he'll be along directly."

"Then be seated," said the old man, hospitably. "We've got corn-bread and ham-and-eggs and coffee, an' I guess you kin make out."

"I should think so," said Jimmy Grayson. "Why, if I had not been as hungry as a wolf already, it would make me hungry just to look at it."

The three sat down at the table, while Mrs. Simpson served them, going back and forth to the little kitchen adjoining for fresh supplies of hot food. Mr. Grayson did most of the talking, and it was addressed in an easy, confidential manner to old Daniel Simpson. The candidate's gift of conversational talk was equal to his gift of platform oratory, but never before had Harley known him to be so interesting and so attractive. He fairly radiated with the quality called personal magnetism, and soon the old man ate mechanically, while his attention was riveted on Jimmy Grayson. But by-and-by he seemed to remember something.

"That driver of yourn is tarnal slow," he said; "he ought to be comin' in to breakfast."

"You have diagnosed his chief fault," said Jimmy Grayson, with an easy laugh. "He is slow, extremely slow, but he will be along directly, and he doesn't mind cold victuals."

Then he turned back to the easy flow of anecdote, chiefly about his political campaign, and Harley saw that the interest of the old man was centred upon him. The woman, without a word, brought in hot biscuits from the kitchen, but she did not lose her frightened look, glancing from one to another of the three with furtive, lowered eyes. But Jimmy Grayson, the golden-mouthed, talked gracefully, and the note of his discourse that morning was the sweetness and kindness of life; he saw only the sunny side of things; people were good and true, and peace was better than strife. His smiling, benevolent face and the mellow flow of his words enforced the lesson.

The old man's face softened a little, and even Harley, though a prey to anxieties, felt the influence of Jimmy Grayson's spell. The little dining-room where they sat was at the rear of the house. Harley saw the golden sunshine of a perfect October day, and the wind that sang across the plain had the soft strain of a girl's voice. He felt that it was good to live that morning, and his spirits rose as he saw the old man fall further and further under the spell of Jimmy Grayson's eloquence.

But Simpson raised himself presently and glanced at the door.

"That driver of yourn is tarnal slow," he repeated. "Seems to me he'll never finish feedin' an' curryin' them horses!"

"He is slow, extremely slow," laughed Jimmy Grayson. "If he were not so we should not have got lost last night, and we should not be here now, Mr. Simpson, trespassing on your hospitality. Perhaps the man does not want any breakfast; it's not the first time since he's been with us that he's gone without it."

Then he launched again into the stream of a very pretty story that he had been telling, and the wavering attention of the old man returned. Harley gave all assistance. Despite his anxiety and his listening for sounds without, he kept his eyes fixed upon Jimmy Grayson's face as if he would not miss a word.

The breakfast went on to an unusual length. The candidate and Harley called again and again for hot biscuits and more coffee, and always the old woman served them silently, almost furtively.

The story was finished, and just as it came to its end Simpson said, with a grim inflection: