Honoré Willsie

“ When Marten had stopped his engine before the oil tank he said to Hugh in a tone that was as nearly surly as he ever had used to the Gray Stallion:
“You have to give me half an hour to get after that cylinder that’s been missing the last few miles.”
Hugh nodded, removed his goggles and stood staring up the valley at the slow-moving flocks. Christmas Eve! How like a Tissot the sheep, the little hills, the twisted cedars. Hugh’s mind deserted Miriam’s death agony for a moment and went back to his mother, his tall, gray-eyed mother and the Christmas star. ”

“ He saw Hugh at college, concentrating on geology to the exclusion of sports and friendships. He saw Hugh mad with first love; love of Jessie. And he saw Hugh turn from love and from Jessie when she scorned his fossils. He saw Bookie endeavoring by every tactful method he could evolve, to force Hugh to see himself and his capacities in other lights than that of paleontology. He checked over his attitude toward Pink, Mrs. Morgan, Jessie, Miriam, Mrs. Ellis, and he saw that he never had judged of them save as they interfered or did not interfere with his chosen work. ”

“ Out of all this agony you two are going to rear on the coals of that flaming physical passion you had for each other in your youth a very great and wonderful love. I’m not doubting the sincerity of your feeling for Miriam Page when I say this, either.”
Hugh looked out the window for a long moment before he said, “I wonder if all men fail their friends as I seem to have failed mine.”
“You’ve not failed anybody, Hughie. The people of greater promise have greater demands made on them, that’s all. I think we’ve all been selfish in what we’ve expected of you. ”

“ Again and again he ran the panorama through, pausing over certain sections to analyze motives, until he had satisfied himself that once and for all he understood the man Hugh. And it was with a sudden and overwhelmingly thrilling sense of shame and of gladness that he realized that at last he had envisaged the truth about himself. Life holds no more final satisfaction than this for any man. ”

“ But we shall all keep right on expecting! That’s life.”
"There’s something worse than not coming up to the expectations of your friends,” said Hugh. “A recognition of your own inner failure.”
Mrs. Ellis rose and slowly crossed to Hugh’s side. She looked down into his tired eyes, then smoothed the hair back from his forehead and kissed him.
“If your mother were living,” she said, "she’d gather you to her heart and comfort you as no other woman can. My dear, go mount Fossil, sweat your way up to the cave and then come back and tell me what you find there.” ”

“ Fossil broke trail willingly enough along the river edge as long as they were on the flats. But when the canyon walls began to hem them in, gradually crowding them closer and closer to the raging, ice-caked current, he began to struggle to turn homeward. But Hugh forced him on to within a mile of the cave, where the trail began to lift. ”

“ That’s all right, Governor,” said Marten. “Here, I’ll feed the crowd, before you make the start.”
“Make it quick,” ordered the doctor. “Minutes count with this little bundle.”
He turned to take the baby from Hugh. But Hugh shook his head. “Hands off, Doctor! This is my charge,” and he settled himself on the bench, his face bent thoughtfully above the quiet little burden in his arms.
It was barely breakfast time when the Dinosaur rolled quietly across the field to the hangar below Fort Sioux. Hugh and the doctor alighted and tramped wearily up the trail toward the hotel. ”

“ Again he felt the nearness to a great glory and that great world tragedy—felt his mother’s passionate love for him and his for her—how different, how very different, from this later love—felt again his mother’s overwhelming desire for him to achieve something as stupendous as that other mother had desired for that other and deeply tragic child. ”

“ The sheep herder raised his haggard face.
“George, come over here and keep the baby warm while I chop more wood.”
“Put it down on the bench,” said George, dully, turning back to Dora.
“No, George! It needs to be held close to the heat. Come, old timer! We’ll put it through, won’t we? It’s her own flesh and blood we’ve got to save.”
George rose stiffly and held out his arms for the child. Hugh pulled the blanket gently over Dora’s face, then slipped out to the cedar logs behind the wagon. He stood for a moment looking up at the Christmas star. His mother. Miriam. Jessie. God! What was life? ”

“ Ellis.
“I’m aching to talk with some one who won’t sit in judgment,” Hugh sighed as he spoke.
“My dear, you sat in judgment, didn’t you, when you found out what Miriam had done?”
“What I did was with regard to her personal deception of me. You condemned her love for me. I think love, such as I thought hers was for me, is its own justification.”
“Hughie,” said the mother of the Code, “when you are as white-headed as I am, you’ll find that love based on selfishness always comes a cropper. Jessie’s did. Yours did. Miriam’s did. Mine did.”
“Yours?” asked Hugh. ”

“ It’s awful! She’s going through hell up there. She’ll die if we don’t get a doctor. Does—does either of you folks know anything about birthing a baby?”
“No!” replied Hugh and Marten together.
“God!” cried the sheep herder. “How long would it take you to go up to Fort Sioux for the doctor in that thing?”
“Six hours for the round trip,” replied Marten.
The sheep herder clutched his hair. “She’ll be dead by then.”
Marten said suddenly, “This here is Hon. Hugh Stewart, the new governor of Wyoming. He’s on his way to the bedside of a—a friend that’s dying.” ”

“ Miriam dying, leaving behind her nothing but Hugh’s aching heart. The sheep herder’s wife, ignorant and coarse in all probability, but fighting to perform the woman’s racial task.
“Is your engine in shape, Marten?” asked Hugh finally. ”