The Virginian walked in the open air with thoughts disturbed. “I am of two minds about one thing,” he said to himself uneasily.
Gossip ran in advance of him; but as he came by, the talk fell away until he had passed. Then they looked after him, and their words again rose audibly. Thus everywhere a little eddy of silence accompanied his steps.
“It don’t trouble him much,” one said, having read nothing in the Virginian’s face.
“It may trouble his girl some,” said another.
“She’ll not know,” said a third, “until it’s over.”
“He’ll not tell her?”
“I wouldn’t. It’s no woman’s business.”
“Maybe that’s so. Well, it would have suited me to have Trampas die sooner.”
“How would it suit you to have him live longer?” inquired a member of the opposite faction, suspected of being himself a cattle thief.
“I could answer your question, if I had other folks’ calves I wanted to brand.” This raised both a laugh and a silence.
Thus the town talked, filling in the time before sunset.
The Virginian, still walking aloof in the open air, paused at the edge of the town. “I’d sooner have a sickness than be undecided this way,” he said, and he looked up and down. Then a grim smile came at his own expense. “I reckon it would make me sick--but there’s not time.”
Over there in the hotel sat his sweetheart alone, away from her mother, her friends, her home, waiting his return, knowing nothing. He looked into the west. Between the sun and the bright ridges of the mountains was still a space of sky; but the shadow from the mountains’ feet had drawn halfway toward the town. “About forty minutes more,” he said aloud. “She has been raised so different.” And he sighed as he turned back. As he went slowly, he did not know how great was his own unhappiness. “She has been raised so different,” he said again.
Opposite the post-office the bishop of Wyoming met him and greeted him. His lonely heart throbbed at the warm, firm grasp of this friend’s hand. The bishop saw his eyes glow suddenly, as if tears were close. But none came, and no word more open than, “I’m glad to see you.”
But gossip had reached the bishop, and he was sorely troubled also. “What is all this?” said he, coming straight to it.
The Virginian looked at the clergyman frankly. ‘Yu’ know just as much about it as I do,” he said. “And I’ll tell yu’ anything yu’ ask.”
“Have you told Miss Wood?” inquired the bishop.
The eyes of the bridegroom fell, and the bishop’s face grew at once more keen and more troubled. Then the bridegroom raised his eyes again, and the bishop almost loved him. He touched his arm, like a brother. “This is hard luck,” he said.
The bridegroom could scarce keep his voice steady. “I want to do right to-day more than any day I have ever lived,” said he.