It was as if a siren beckoned, and he had to follow.
For days he had been worried almost to the breaking point. Things had not
shaped themselves as he had planned. Event piled upon event, and now
disaster--definite disaster--threatened to descend upon him.
All morning, despite the intense heat, he had been about the ranch,
appraising this and that, mentally; pottering in the shed; looking at his
horses--the few that were left!--smiling at the thought of his wheezing
Ford, wondering just when he would clear out altogether.
Not that young Gilbert Jones was a pessimist. And yet he wasn't one of
those damnable Pollyanna optimists he so abominated--the kind who went
about saying continually that God was in His heaven and all was right with
the world. No, indeed! He was just a normal, regular fellow, ready to face
a difficult situation when it came about as the natural result of a series
of events. He saw the impending catastrophe as the logical finale of many
happenings--for some of which he was not in any way responsible.
Who could have foreseen the Great War, for instance? Surely _that_ was not
his fault! A pitiful archduke was murdered in a European city. He
remembered reading about it, and then instantly dismissing it from his mind
as of no consequence.
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