Amy Bell Marlowe

“ Grimes, heartlessly.
“Oh, sir! I could not take such an apparent victory at such a cost!” cried Helen, wiping her eyes again. “You say you believe Allen Chesterton was guilty instead of father. But you put forward no evidence—no more than the mere suspicion that cursed poor dad. No, no, sir! To claim new evidence, but to show no new evidence, is not enough. I must find out for sure just who stole that money. That is what dad himself said would be the only way in which his name could be cleared.”
“Nonsense, girl!” ejaculated Fenwick Grimes, scowling again. ”

“ With lively company a journey across this great continent of ours is a cheerful and inspiring experience. And, of course, Youth can never remain depressed for long. But in Helen Morrell’s case the trip could not be counted as an enjoyable one.
She was always solitary amid the crowd of travelers. Even when she went back to the observation platform she was alone. She had nobody with whom to discuss the beauties of the landscape, or the wonders of Nature past which the train flashed.
This was her own fault to a degree, of course. The girl from Sunset Ranch was diffident. ”

“ You see it yourself, perhaps?”
“Perhaps I do, sir,” replied the girl from Sunset Ranch.
“You would be quite at a disadvantage beside my girls—ahem! You would not be happy here. And of course, you haven’t a particle of claim upon us.”
“No, sir; not a particle,” repeated Helen.
“So you see, all things considered, it would be much better for you to return to your own people—ahem—own people,” said Mr. Starkweather, with emphasis. “Now—er—you are rather shabby, I fear, Helen. I am not as rich a man as you may suppose. ”

“ But Helen hadn’t time to go shopping as yet. She was too eager to tell Sadie of her good fortune. Sadie was to be found—cold as the day was—pacing the walk before Finkelstein’s shop, on the sharp lookout for a customer. But there were a few flakes of snow in the air, the wind from the river was very raw, and it did seem to Helen as though the Russian girl was endangering her health.
“But what can poor folks do?” demanded Sadie, hoarsely, for she already had a heavy cold. “There is nothing for me to do inside the store. If I catch a customer I make somet’ings yet. Well, we must all work!” ”

“ May, as she had promised, was bringing, one or two at a time, her friends who, as children when Cornelius Starkweather was alive, had haunted this old house because they loved old Mary Boyle. And May was proving, too, to the Western girl, that all New York people of wealth were neither heartless or ungrateful. Yet the crime of forgetfulness these young women must plead to.
The visits delighted Mary Boyle. Helen knew 270 that she slept better—after these little excitements of the calls—and did not go pattering up and down the halls with her crutch in the dead of night. ”

“ Nobody could associate with the delightful little old woman without gaining good from the association. Instead of being friends with the old nurse, and loving her and being loved by her, the Starkweather girls tucked her away in the attic and tried to ignore her existence.
“They don’t know what they’re missing—poor things!” murmured Helen, thinking the situation over.
And from that time her own attitude changed toward her cousins. She began to look out for chances to help them, instead of making herself more and more objectionable to Belle, Hortense, and Flossie. ”

“ With clasped hands and parted lips the girl from Sunset Ranch watched eagerly the glowing streets, parted by the rushing train. As it slowed down at 125th Street she could see far along that broad 66 thoroughfare—an uptown Broadway. There were thousands and thousands of people in sight—with the glare of shoplights—the clanging electric cars—the taxicabs and autos shooting across the main stem of Harlem into the avenues running north and south. ”

“ Helen jumped up and went to the tiny bathroom. “Now, I’ll play maid for you, Flossie.”
“Oh, all right,” said the younger girl. “I suppose, as you say, crying isn’t going to help.”
“Not at all. No amount of tears will solve a problem in algebra. And you let me see the questions. You see,” added Helen, slowly, beginning to bathe her cousin’s forehead and swollen eyes, “we once had a very fine school-teacher at the ranch. He was a college professor. But he had weak lungs and he came out there to Montana to rest.” ”

“ So, as long as it rained steadily, it looked as though the girl from Sunset Ranch was a sure-enough “shut-in.” Nor did she contemplate this possibility with any pleasure.
There was nothing for her to do but read. And one cannot read all the time. She had no “fancy-work” with which to keep her hands and mind busy. She wondered what her cousins did on such days. She found out by keeping her ears and eyes open. After breakfast Belle went shopping in the limousine. There was an early luncheon and all three of the Starkweather girls went to a matinée. ”

“ There were a few pedestrians headed uptown like herself. Some well-dressed men seemed walking to business. A few neat shop girls were hurrying along the pavement, too. But Helen, and the dogs in leash, had the avenue mostly to themselves at this hour.
The sleepy maids, or footmen, or pages stared at the Western girl with curiosity as she strode 98 along. For, unlike many from the plains, Helen could walk well in addition to riding well. ”

“ But Helen saw that Belle was furious and she began to take a wicked delight in expatiating upon her home and her own outdoor accomplishments.
When she told Miss Van Ramsden how she and 180 her cowboy friends rode after jack-rabbits and roped them—if they could!—and shot antelope from the saddle, and that the boys sometimes attacked a mountain lion with nothing but their lariats, Miss Van Ramsden burst out with:
“Why, that’s perfectly grand! What fun you must have! Do hear her, girls! Why, what we do is tame and insipid beside things that happen out there in Montana every day.” ”

“ At first Helen had merely bowed to the girls to whom she was introduced. She had meant to drink her tea quietly and excuse herself. She did not wish now to display a rude manner before Belle’s guests; but her oldest cousin seemed determined to rouse animosity in her soul.
“Yes,” she said, “Helen is paying us a little visit—a very brief one. She is not at all used to our ways. In fact, Indian squaws and what-do-you call-’ems—Greasers—are about all the people she sees out her way.”
“Is that so?” cried Miss Van Ramsden. “It must be a perfectly charming country. ”

“ It’s funny he should go into business with a mysterious capital right after the old firm was closed out, when before that he had had no money to invest in the firm of which he was a member.”
“I feared as much,” sighed Helen. “And he was so eager to throw suspicion on the lost bookkeeper, just to satisfy my curiosity and put me off the track. He’s as bad as Uncle Starkweather. He doesn’t want me to go ahead because of the possible scandal, and Mr. Grimes is afraid for his own sake, I very much fear. What a wicked man he must be!”
“Possibly,” said Dud, eyeing the girl sharply. ”

“ That you are a frequenter of low tenement houses; that you associate with foreigners and the most disgusting of beggars——”
“I wish you would stop, Uncle,” said Helen, quickly, her face flushing now and her eyes sparkling. “Sadie Goronsky is a nice girl, and her family is respectable. And poor old Mr. Lurcher is only unfortunate and half-blind. He will not harm me.”
“Beggars! Yiddish shoestring pedlars! A girl like you! Where—ahem!—where did you ever get such low tastes, girl?”
“Don’t blame yourself, Uncle,” said Helen, with some bitterness. ”

“ Starkweather, angrily, “unless you can speak with more respect for—ahem!—for a faithful old servitor of the Starkweather family, I shall have to—ahem!—ask you to leave the table.”
“You won’t have to ask me—I’m going!” exclaimed Flossie, flirting out of her chair and picking up her books. “But I want to say one thing while I’m on my way,” observed the slangy youngster: “You’re all just as tiresome as you can be! Why don’t you own up that you’d never have given the old woman a thought if it wasn’t for May Van Ramsden and her friends—and Helen?” ”

“ As Helen walked up and down the platform at Elberon, waiting for the east-bound Transcontinental, she looked to be a very plain country girl with nothing in her dress to denote that she was one of the wealthiest young women in the State of Montana.
Sunset Ranch was one of the few remaining great cattle ranches of the West. Her father could justly have been called “a cattle king,” only Prince Morrell was not the sort of man who likes to see his name in print. ”

“ So—as may be easily conceived—Helen was not met at dinner by her relatives in any conciliatory manner. Yet the girl from the West really wished she might make friends with Uncle Starkweather and her cousins.
“It must be that a part of the fault is with me,” she told herself, when she crept up to her room after a gloomy time in the dining-room. “If I had it in me to please them—to make them happier—surely they could not treat me as they do. Oh, dear, I wish I had learned better how to be popular.” ”

“ Helen observed her new friend with amazement. Although she knew Sadie could be no older than herself, she used the tact of long business experience in handling the woman. And she got her into the store, too!
“I wash my hands of ’em when they get inside,” she said, laughing, and coming back to Helen. “If Old Yawcob and his wife and his salesladies can’t hold ’em, it isn’t my fault, you understand. I’m about the youngest puller-in there is along Madison Street—although that little hunchback in front of the millinery shop yonder looks younger.” ”

“ A strawberry roan forever!”
Her “E-e-e-yow! yow!” awoke the pony to desperate endeavor. She seemed to merely skim the dry grass of the open plateau, and in ten minutes Helen saw a riderless mount plunging up the side of a coulée far ahead.
“There he goes!” cried the girl. “After him, Rosie! Make your pretty hoofs fly!”
The excitement of the chase roused in Helen that feeling of freedom and confidence that is a part of life on the plains. Those who live much in the open air, and especially in the saddle, seldom think of failure.
She knew she was going to catch the runaway pony. ”

“ The housekeeper began to warm toward her in manner, at least. She took her up another flight of stairs and to a very large and handsomely furnished chamber, although it was at the rear of the house, and right beside the stairs leading to the servants’ quarters. At least, so Mrs. Olstrom said they were.
“You will not mind, Miss,” she said, grimly. “You may hear the sound of walking in this hall. It is nothing. The foolish maids call it ‘the ghost walk’; but it is only a sound. You’re not superstitious; are you?”
“I hope not!” exclaimed Helen. ”

“ Helen got up the next morning with one well-defined determination. She would put into practice her uncle’s suggestion. She would buy one of the cheap but showy dresses which shopgirls and minor clerks had to buy to keep up appearances.
It was a very serious trouble to Helen that she was not to buy and disport herself in pretty frocks and hats. The desire to dress prettily and tastefully is born in most girls—just as surely as is the desire to breathe. And Helen was no exception. ”

“ You do not look like a young person who would be easily frightened,” he said, laughing. “You are traveling alone?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Far?”
“To New York, sir,” said Helen.
“Ah! a long way for a girl to go by herself—even a self-possessed one like you,” said the fatherly old fellow. “I hope you have friends to meet you there?”
“Relatives.”
“You have never been there, I take it?”
“I have never been farther east than Denver before,” she replied.
“Indeed! And so you have not met the relatives you are going to?” he suggested, shrewdly. ”

“ Could it be possible that her message to Uncle Starkweather had not been delivered? Otherwise, how could this situation be explained?
Such a thing as inhospitality could not be imagined by Helen Morrell. A begging Indian was never turned away from Sunset Ranch. A perfect stranger—even a sheepman—would be hospitably treated in Montana.
The soft patter of the footman’s steps soon sounded and the sharp eyes disappeared. ”

“ But, believe me, if I didn’t have to I would never go back!”
“Why do you have to go back?” asked Helen, simply.
“Business. Necessity of earning one’s living. I’m in the way of being a lawyer—when my days of studying, and all, are over. And then, I’ve got a sister who might not fit into the mosaic of this freer country, either.”
“Well, Dudley Stone,” quoth the girl from Sunset Ranch, “we’d better not stay talking here. It’s getting darker every minute. And I reckon your foot needs attention.”
“I hate to move it,” confessed the young Easterner.
“You can’t stay here, you know,” insisted Helen. ”

“ He’s always hoping he’d get enough money to have the glasses. That’s all he needs, the doctor told him. But they cost fourteen dollars.”
“He shall have them!” declared Helen.
“You don’t mean it, Helen?” cried the Russian girl. “You haven’t got that much money for him?”
“Yes, I have. Will you go around there with me? We’ll get the prescription and have it filled.”
“Wait a bit,” said Sadie. “I want to finish this hat. And lemme tell you—it’s right in style. What do you think?”
“How wonderfully clever you are!” cried the Western girl. “It looks as though it had just come out of a shop.” ”

“ She thanked him and went out into the hall again. The footman in livery—very sleepy and tousled as yet—was unchaining the front door. A yawning maid was at work in one of the parlors with a duster. She stared at Helen in amazement, but Gregson stood stiffly at attention as the visitor went forth into the daylight.
“My, how funny city people live!” thought Helen Morrell. “I don’t believe I ever could stand it. Up till all hours, and then no breakfast until nine. What a way to live! ”

“ Helen smiled deprecatingly. “It will be due to your own kind heart, Miss Van Ramsden,” she returned. “I see that everybody in the city is not 240 so busy with their own affairs that they cannot think of other people.”
The young lady kissed her again and said goodbye. But that did not end the matter—no, indeed! The news that Miss Van Ramsden had been taken to the topmost story of the Starkweather mansion—supposedly to Helen’s own room only—by the Western girl, dribbled through the servants to Belle Starkweather herself when she came home. ”

“ There were other people in the great city who were sorry to see Helen Morrell start West. Through Dud Stone, Allen Chesterton had been found light work and a pleasant boarding place. There would always be a watchful eye upon the old man—and that eye belonged to Miss Sadie Goronsky—rather, “S. Goron, Milliner,” as the new sign over the hat shop door read.
“For you see,” said Miss Sadie, with a toss of her head, “there ain’t no use in advertisin’ it that you are a Yid. That don’t do no good, as I tell mommer. Sure, I’m proud I’m a Jew. We’re the greatest people in the world yet. ”

“ I got her to leave off her wig yet. Catch me wearin’ a wig when I’m married just to make me look ugly. Not!”
All this rather puzzled Helen; but she was too polite to ask questions. She knew vaguely that Jewish people followed peculiar rabbinical laws and customs; but what they were she had no idea. However, she liked Sadie, and it mattered nothing to Helen what the East Side girl’s faith or bringing up had been. Sadie was kind, and friendly, and was really the only person in all this big city in whom the ranch girl could place the smallest confidence. ”