The Branding Iron - Page 136/142

So now Pierre fought down his suspicions and his fears. He had not

recognized Prosper. The man who had come in out of the white night,

four years ago, had worn his cap low over his eyes, his collar turned

up about his face, and, even at that, Pierre, in his drunken stupor,

had not been able to see him very clearly. This Prosper Gael who had

stood behind the footlights, this Prosper Gael at whom Joan, from some

unknown cause, had sprung like a woman maddened by injury, was a

person entirely strange to Pierre. But Pierre hated him. The man had

done Joan some insufferable mischief, which at the last had driven her

beside herself. Pierre put up a hand, pressing it against his eyes. He

wanted to shut out the picture of that struggling girl with her torn

dress and the double scar across her shoulder. If it hadn't been for

the scar he would never have known her--his Joan, his gentle, silent

Joan! What had they been doing to her to change her so? No, not they.

He. He had changed her. He had branded her and driven her out. It was

his fault. He must try to find her again, to find the old Joan--if she

should live. The doctor had said that she was desperately ill. O God!

What was keeping him so long? Why didn't he come?

The arrival of the trained nurse distracted Pierre for a few moments.

She went past him in her gray cloak, very quiet and earnest, and the

elevator lifted her out of sight.

"Were you in the theater to-night?" asked the girl at the desk, seeing

that he was temporarily aware of her again.

"Yes, ma'am."

She was puzzled by his appearance and the fashion of his speech. He

must be a gentleman, she thought, for his bearing was gentle and

assured and unself-conscious, but he wore his clothes differently and

spoke differently from other gentlemen. That "Yes, ma'am," especially

disturbed her. Then she remembered a novel she had read and her mind

jumped to a conclusion. She leaned forward.

"Say, aren't you from the West?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"You weren't ever a cowboy, were you?"

Pierre smiled. "Yes, ma'am. I was raised in a cow-camp. I was a cowboy

till about seven years ago when I took to ranchin'."

"Where was that?"

"Out in Wyoming."

"And you've come straight from there to New York?" She pronounced it

"Noo Yoik."

"No, ma'am. I've been in Alasky for two years now. I've been in a

lumber-camp."