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After they had lighted their cigars, Lawson said privately to Curtis: "Now there's a girl with too much moral purpose – just as Elsie is spoiled by too little. However, I prefer a wholesome pagan to a morbid Christian."

"It's rather curious," Curtis replied. "Miss Colson is a pretty girl – a very pretty girl; but I can't quite imagine a man being in love with her. What could you do with such inexorable moral purpose? You couldn't put your arm round it, could you?"

"You'd have to hang her up by a string, like one of these toy angels the Dutch put atop their Christmas-trees. The Tetongs fairly dread to see her coming – they think she's deranged."

"I know it – the children go to her with reluctance; she doesn't seem wholesome to them, as Miss Diehl does. And yet I can't discharge her."

"Naturally not! You'd hear from the missionary world. Think of it! 'I find Miss Colson too pious, please take her away.'" Both men laughed at the absurdity of this, and Lawson went on: "I wished a dozen times during dinner that Elsie Bee Bee had been present. It would have given her a jolt to come in contact with such inartistic, unshakable convictions."

"She would have been here, only her resentment towards me is still very strong."

"She has it in for you, sure thing. I can't budge her," said Lawson, smiling. "She's going to have you removed the moment she reaches Washington."

"I have moments when I think I'd like to be removed," said Curtis, as he turned towards Mr. Slicer and his other guests. "Suppose we go into the library, gentlemen."

VI
CURTIS SEEKS A TRUCE

"Our artists are going to flit," remarked Jennie, one evening, as they were taking seats at luncheon.

He looked up quickly. "Are they?"

"Yes, Miss Brisbane is going back to Washington, and Mr. Lawson will follow, no doubt."

He unfolded his napkin with unmoved countenance. "Well, they are wise; we are likely to have a norther any day now."

The soldier had all the responsibilities and perplexities he could master without the addition of Elsie Brisbane's disturbing lure. The value of her good opinion was enormously enhanced by the news of her intended departure, and for a day or two Curtis went about his duties with absent-minded ineffectiveness; he even detected himself once or twice sitting with his pen in his hand creating aimless markings on his blotting-pad. Wilson, the clerk, on one occasion waited full five minutes for an answer while his chief debated with himself whether to call upon Miss Brisbane at the studio or at the house. He began to find excuses for her – "A man who is a villain in business may be a very attractive citizen in private life – and she may have been very fond of Sennett. From her point of view – anyhow, she is a lovely young girl, and it is absurd to place her among my enemies." The thought of her face set in bitter scorn against him caused his heart to contract painfully. "I've been too harsh. These people are repugnant to one so dainty and superrefined. There are excuses for her prejudice. I can't let her go away in anger." And in this humble mood he stopped at the door of her studio one morning, prepared to be very patient and very persuasive.

"Good-morning, Miss Brisbane. May I come in?"

"Certainly, if my work will interest you," she replied; "you'll excuse my going on. I want to finish this portrait of Little Peta to-day."

"By all means – I do not intend to interrupt." He took a seat to the front and a little to the left of her, and sat in silence for a few moments. Her brown hair, piled loosely on her head, brought out the exquisite fairness of her complexion, and the big, loose sleeve of her blouse made her hand seem like a child's, but it was strong and steady. She was working with her whole mind, breathing quickly as she mixed her colors, holding her breath as she put her brush against the canvas. She used the apparently aimless yet secure movement of the born painter. With half-closed eyes and head a little to one side, with small hand lifted to measure and compare, she took on a new expression, a bewitching intentness, which quite transformed her.

"I hear you are going away," said Curtis at last, speaking with some effort, uncertain of her temper.

"Yes, we break up and vacate to-morrow."

"Why break up? You will want to come back next spring. Leave the place as it is."

She gave him a quick, keen glance, and put her head again on one side to squint.

"I have no intention of returning."

"Have you exhausted Indian subjects?"

"Oh no!" she exclaimed, with sudden, artistic enthusiasm. "I have just begun to see what I want to do."

"Then why not come back?" She did not reply, and he resumed, with tender gravity: "I hope I haven't made it so unpleasant for you that you are running away to escape me?"

She turned with a sharp word on her tongue, but he was so frank and so handsome, and withal so humble, that she instantly relented. She was used to this humility in men and knew the meaning thereof, and a flush of gratified pride rose to her face. The proud soldier had become a suitor like the others.

"Oh no – you have nothing to do with it," she replied, carelessly.

"I am glad of that. I was afraid you might think me unsympathetic, but I am not. I am here this morning to offer you my cordial assistance, for I am eager to see this people put into art. So far as I know, they have never been adequately treated in painting or in sculpture."

"Thank you," she said, "I don't think I shall go very far with them. They are very pleasant on canvas, but there are too many disagreeable things connected with painting them. I don't see how you endure the thought of living here among them." She shuddered. "I hate them!"

"I don't understand that hardness in you, Miss Brisbane," he replied.

"I'm sure it isn't mysterious. I hate dirt and rags, even when painted. Now Little Peta here is quite different. She is a dear little thing. See her sigh – she gets so tired, but she's patient."

"You are making a beautiful picture of her. Your skill is marvellous." His method of approach was more adroit than he realized; she softened yet again.

"Thank you. I seem to have hit her off very well."

"Will you exhibit in Washington this winter?" he asked, with boyish eagerness.

"I may – I haven't quite decided," she said, quite off guard at last.

"If you do I wish you would let me know. I may be able to visit the exhibition and witness your triumph."

She began to suspect his motives. "Oh, my little row of paintings couldn't be tortured into a triumph. I've stolen the time for them from Mr. Lawson, whose illustrations I have neglected." She was again cold and repellent.

"Miss Brisbane, this whole situation has become intolerable to me." He rose and faced her, very sincere and deeply earnest. "I do not like to have you go away carrying an unpleasant impression of me. What can I do to change it? If I have been boorish or presuming in any way I sincerely beg your pardon."

She motioned to Peta. "You can go now, dear, I've done all I can to-day."

Curtis took up his hat. "I hope I have not broken up your sitting. It would be unpardonable in me."

She squinted back at the picture with professional gravity. "Oh no; I only had a few touches to put in under the chin – that luminous shadow is so hard to get. I'm quite finished."

She went behind a screen for a few moments, and when she reappeared without her brushes and her blouse she was the society young lady in tone and manner.

"Would you like to look at my sketches?" she asked. "They're jolly rubbish, the whole lot, but they represent a deal of enthusiasm."

Her tone was friendly – too friendly, considering the point at which he had paused, and he was a little hurt by it. Was she playing with him?

His tone was firm and his manner direct as he said: "Miss Brisbane, I am accustomed to deal directly with friends as well as enemies, and I like to have people equally frank with me. I know you are angry because of my action in the case of your uncle. I do not ask pardon for that; I was acting there in line of my duty. But if I have spoken harshly or without due regard to your feelings at any time I ask you to forgive me."

He made a powerful appeal to her at this moment, but she wilfully replied: "You made no effort to soften my uncle's disgrace."

"I didn't know he was your uncle at that time," he said, but his face grew grave quickly. "It would have made no difference if I had – my orders were to step between him and the records of the office. So far as my orders enlightened me, he was a man to be watched." He turned towards the door. "Is there anything I can do to help you reach the station to-morrow? My sister and I would gladly drive you down."

She was unrelenting, but very lovely as she replied: "Thank you; you are very kind, but all arrangements are made."

"Good-afternoon, Miss Brisbane."

"Good-bye, Captain Curtis."

"She is hard – hard as iron," he said, as he walked away. "Her father's daughter in every fibre."

He was ashamed to acknowledge how deeply he felt her rejection of his friendship, and the thought of not seeing her again gave him a sudden sense of weakness and loneliness.

Elsie, on her part, was surprised to find a new nerve tingling in her brain, and this tremor cut into the complete self-satisfaction she expected to feel over her refusal of the peace-pipe. Several times during the afternoon, while superintending her packing, she found herself standing in an attitude of meditation – her inward eye reverting to the fine, manly figure he made, while his grave, sweet voice vibrated in her ears. She began to see herself in an unpleasant light, and when at the dinner-table Lawson spoke of Curtis, she listened to him with more real interest than ever before.

"He is making wonderful changes here," Lawson was saying. "Everywhere you go you see Tetongs working at fence-building, bridge-making, cabin-raising, with their eagle feathers fluttering in the winds, their small hands chapped with cold. They are sawing boards and piling grain in the warehouse and daubing red paint on the roofs. They are in a frenzy of work. Every man has his rations and is happy. In some way he has persuaded the chiefs to bring in all the school-children, and the benches are full of the little shock-heads, wild as colts."

"A new broom, etc.," murmured Elsie.

"His predecessor never was a new broom," retorted Lawson, quickly. "Sennett always had a nasty slaunch to him. He never in his life cleaned the dirt from the corners, and I don't see exactly why you take such pains in defending him."

"Because he is my uncle," she replied.

"Uncle Boot-jack! That is pure fudge, Bee Bee. You didn't speak to him once a week; you privately despised him – anybody could see that. You are simply making a cudgel of him now to beat Curtis with – and, to speak plainly, I think it petty of you. More than this, you'd better hedge, for I'm not at all sure that Sennett has not been peculating."

Elsie stopped him with an angry gesture. "I'll not have you accusing him behind his back."

Lawson threw out his hands in a gesture of despair. "All right! But make a note of it: you'll regret this taking sides with a disreputable old bummer against an officer of Captain Curtis's reputation."

"You are not my master!" she said, and her eyes were fiercely bright. "I do not wish to hear you use that tone to me again! I resent it!" and she struck the floor with her foot. "Henceforth, if we are to remain friends, you will refrain from lecturing me!" and she left the room with a feeling of having done two men a wrong by being unjust to herself, and this feeling deepened into shame as she lay in her bed that night. It was her first serious difference with Lawson and she grew unhappy over it. "But he shouldn't take sides against me like that," she said, in an attempt to justify her anger.

On the second morning thereafter Lawson came into the office and said: "Well, Captain, we leave you this morning."

Curtis looked up into his visitor's fine, sensitive face, and exclaimed, abruptly – almost violently: "I'm going to miss you, old man."

"My heart's with you," replied Lawson. "And I shall return next spring."

"Bring Miss Brisbane with you."

"I'd like to do so, but she is vastly out of key – and I doubt. Meanwhile, if I can be of any use to you in Washington let me know."

"Thank you, Lawson, I trust you perfectly," Curtis replied, with a glow of warm liking.

As he stood at the gate looking up into Elsie's face, she seemed very much softened, and he wished to reach his hand and stay her where she sat; but the last word was spoken, and the wagon rolled away with no more definite assurance of her growing friendship than was to be read in a polite smile.

Jennie was tearful as she said: "After all, they were worth while."

Curtis sighed as he said: "Sis, the realities of our position begin to make themselves felt. Play-spells will be fewer now that our artists are gone."

"They certainly broke our fall," replied Jennie, soberly. "Osborne Lawson is fine, and I don't believe Elsie Bee Bee is as ferocious as she pretends to be."

"It's her training. She has breathed the air of rapacity from childhood. I can't blame her for being her father's child."

Jennie looked at him as if he were presented from a new angle of vision. "George, there is a queer streak in you – for a soldier; you're too soft-hearted. But don't you get too much interested in Elsie Bee Bee; she's dangerous – and, besides, Mr. Lawson wears an air of command."

VII
ELSIE RELENTS A LITTLE

The feeling against the redmen, intensified throughout the State by the removal of Sennett, beat against Curtis like a flood. Delegations of citizens, headed by Streeter and Johnson, proceeded at once to Washington, laden with briefs, affidavits, and petitions, and there laid siege to Congress as soon as the members began to assemble. The twenty original homesteaders were taken as the text for most impassioned appeals by local orators, and their melancholy situation was skilfully enlarged upon. They were described as hardy and industrious patriots, hemmed in by sullen savages, with no outlet for trade and scant pasturage for their flocks – in nightly fear of the torch and the scalping-knife.

To Curtis, these settlers were by no interpretation martyrs in the cause of civilization – they were quite other. His birth, his military training, and his natural refinement tended to make him critical of them. They were to him, for the most part, "poor whites," too pitiless to be civilized, and too degenerate to have the interest of their primitive red neighbors. "The best of them," he said to Jennie, "are foolhardy pioneers who have exiled their wives and children for no good reason. The others are cattlemen who followed the cavalry in order to fatten their stock under the protection of our guidon."

The citizens of Pinon City wondered why their delegates made so little impression on the department, but Streeter was not left long in doubt.

The Secretary interrupted him in the midst of his first presentation of the matter.

"Mr. Streeter, you are a cattleman, I believe?"

Streeter looked a little set back. "I am – yes, sir, Mr. Secretary."

The Secretary took up a slip of paper. "Are you the Streeter located on the reservation itself?"

"Yes, sir."

"Well, you are an interested witness. How can you expect me to take your word against that of Captain Curtis? He tells me the Tetongs are peaceful, and quick to respond to fair treatment. The department has absolute confidence in Captain Curtis, and you are wasting time in the effort to discredit him. The tribe will not be removed. Is there any other question you would like to raise?"

Streeter took his dismissal hard. He hurried at once to Brisbane, his face scarlet with rage. "He turned me down," he snarled, "and he's got to suffer for it. There's a way to get at him, and you must find it."

Brisbane was too crafty to promise any definite thing. "Now wait a moment, neighbor; never try to yank a badger out of his den – wait and catch him on the open plain. We must sound the Committee on Indian Affairs, and then move on the House. If we can't put through our removal bill we'll substitute the plan for buying out the settlers. If that don't work I've a little scheme for cutting down the reservation. We must keep cool – and don't mention my name in the matter. What we want to do is to pave the way for my return to the Senate next fall; then I can be of some real service to you. I am now entirely out of it, as you can see, but I'll do what I can."

Streeter went away with a feeling that Brisbane was losing his vigor, and a few days later returned to the West, very bitter and very inflammatory of speech. "The bill is lost. It will be smothered in committee," he said to Calvin.

Brisbane, after leaving Streeter that day, went home to dinner with an awakened curiosity to know more about this young man in whom the department had such confidence. Lawson was dining at his table that night, and it occurred to him to ask a little more fully about Curtis.

"See here, Lawson, you were out there on the Fort Smith reservation, weren't you? Wasn't that where you and Elsie camped this summer?"

Elsie replied, "Yes, papa. We were there when Uncle Sennett was dismissed."

Brisbane started a little. "Why, of course you were; my memory is failing me. Well, what about this man Curtis – he's a crank on the Indian question, like yourself, isn't he?"

Lawson smiled. "We believe in fair play, Governor. Yes, he's friendly to the Indians."

"And a man of some ability, I take it?"

"A man of unusual ability. He is an able forester, a well-read ethnologist, and has made many valuable surveys for the War Department."

"His word seems to have great weight with the department."

"Justly, too, for he is as able a man as ever held an agent's position. A few men like Curtis would solve the Indian problem."

Elsie, who had been listening in meditative silence, now spoke. "Nevertheless, his treatment of Uncle Sennett was brutal. He arrested him and searched all his private papers – don't you remember?"

Brisbane looked at Lawson solemnly and winked the eye farthest from his daughter. Lawson's lips quivered with his efforts to restrain a smile. Turning then to Elsie, Brisbane said: "I recall your story now – yes, he was pretty rigorous, but I'm holding up the department for that; the agent wasn't to blame. He was sent there to do that kind of a job, and from all accounts he did it well."

Elsie lifted her eyebrows. "Does that excuse him? He kept repeating to me that he was under orders, but I took his saying so to be just a subterfuge."

"Mighty little you know about war, my girl. To be a soldier means to obey orders from general down to corporal. Moreover, your uncle has given me a whole lot of trouble, and I wouldn't insist on a relationship which does us no credit. I've held his chin above water about as long as I'm going to."

Elsie was getting deeper into the motives and private opinions of her father than ever before, and, as he spoke, her mind reverted to the handsome figure of the young soldier as he stood before her in the studio, asking for a kindlier good-bye. His head was really beautiful, and his eyes were deep and sincere. She looked up at her father with frowning brows. "I thought you liked Mr. Sennett? He told me you got him his place."

Brisbane laughed. "My dear chicken, he was a political choice. He was doing work for our side, and had to be paid."

"Do you mean you knew the kind of a man he was when you put him there?"

Brisbane pulled himself up short. "Now see here, my daughter, you're getting out of your bailiwick."

"But I want to understand – if you knew he was stealing – "

"I didn't know it. How should I know it? I put him there to keep him busy. I didn't suppose he was a sot and a petty plunderer. Now let's have no more of this." Brisbane was getting old and a trifle irritable, but he was still master of himself. "I don't know why I should be taken to task by my own daughter."

Elsie said no more, but her lips straightened and her eyes grew reflective. As the coffee and cigars came in, she left the two men at the table and went out into the music-room. It seemed very lonely in the big house that night, and she sat down at the piano to play, thinking to cure herself of an uneasy conscience. She was almost as good a pianist as a painter, and the common criticism of her was on this score. "Bee does everything too well," Penrose said.

She played softly, musingly, and, for some reason, sadly. "I wonder if I have done him an injustice?" she thought. And then that brutal leer on her father's face came to disturb her. "I wish he hadn't spoken to me like that," she said. "I don't like his political world. I wish he would get out of it. It isn't nice."

In the end, she left off playing and went slowly up to her studio, half determined to write a letter of apology. Her "work-shop," which had been added to the house since her return from Paris, was on a level with her sitting-room, which served as a reception hall to the studio itself. Her artist friends declared it to be too beautiful to work in, and so it seemed, for it was full of cosey corners and soft divans – a glorious lounging-place. Nevertheless, its walls were covered with pictures of her own making. Costly rugs and a polished floor seemed not to deter her from effort. She remained a miracle of industry in spite of the scoffing of her fellows, who were stowed about the city in dusty lofts like pigeons.

Proud and wilful as she seemed, Elsie had always prided herself on being just, and to be placed in the position of doing an honorable man a wrong was intolerable. The longer she dwelt upon her action the more uneasy she became. Her vision clarified. All that had been hidden by her absurd prejudice and reasonless dislike – the soldier's frank and manly firmness, Lawson's reproaches, her aunt's open reproof – all these grew in power and significance as she mused.

Taking a seat at her desk, she began a letter, "Captain Curtis, Dear Sir – " But this seemed so palpably a continuance of her repellent mood that she tore it up, and started another in the spirit of friendliness and contrition which had seized upon her:

"Dear Captain Curtis, – I have just heard something which convinces me that I have done you an injustice, and I hasten to beg your pardon. I knew my uncle Sennett only as a child knows a man of middle age – he was always kind and good and amusing to me. I had no conception of his real self. My present understanding of him has changed my feeling towards your action. I still think you were harsh and unsympathetic, but I now see that you were simply doing the will of the department. So far I apologize. If you come to Washington I hope you will let us know."

As she re-read this it seemed to be a very great concession indeed; but as she recalled the handsome, troubled face of the soldier, she decided to send it, no matter what he might think of her. As she sealed the letter her heart grew lighter, and she smiled.

When she re-entered the library her father was saying: "No, I don't expect to get him removed. The present administration and its whole policy must be overthrown. Curtis is only a fly on the rim of the wheel. He don't count."

"Any man counts who is a moral force," Lawson replied, with calm sincerity. "Curtis will bother you yet."