“I? I! Well, I guess not. Not a step will I step–––”
“But several steps I’ll step, Mrs. Benton. I advise the money going into the office safe, that old Ephraim uses when he’s at home. One of us better camp out on the lounge in the room there till we get rid of whoever’s cash that is. I’ll bunk there myself, if you like, Mrs. Trent, after I step outside and see if all’s serene with my prisoner,” said Samson, cheerfully.
“May I go with you, Samson? May I, mother?” asked Jessica.
The mother’s consent was somewhat reluctant, for now she could not bear to have her darling out of sight. Yet if anybody on earth was to be trusted with so precious a charge it was the herder. Besides, she was annoyed at this talk of “ghosts,” and knew that the shortest way to convince Jessica how nonsensical it was, would be by allowing her to go out and seek for them herself.
But Samson answered cordially:
“You do me proud, little one. Suppose you take your rifle, and then, if we see any specter you can pin it to the mission wall, and we’ll have a show, charging ten pins’ admission.”
They went out, laughing and gay; the child clinging to the giant’s hand, and hoping that she might really see the phantom of Aunt Sally’s story, for she had no fear concerning it. They came back, five minutes later, looking grave and seriously alarmed.
“What’s happened?” asked Mrs. Trent, foreboding fresh trouble, since, of late, trouble had become so familiar a visitor.
“Well, ma’am, the bird has flown.”
“Please explain, Samson,” she anxiously urged.
“That bird of dark plumage––Ferd, the dwarf. He’s escaped, vamoosed, took wings and flew.”
“Oh, Samson! I’m so sorry. I hoped you would look after him until I could find some suitable institution in which to place him. It’s time he should be helped, for if he’s so sharp to do evil, he must have equal capacity for better things.”
“Yes, ma’am. So I allow; and I had them same hopes myself, not ten minutes ago. I hadn’t said a word to anybody, but after you gave him to me, I remembered what the little captain had commanded, for it sort of struck home, that did. I ain’t overly saintlike, myself, but what of goodness I’d catched from you all I meant to pass on to the coyote––I mean, Ferdinand Bernal. I reckon it was his face, ’stead of a ghost’s, that Aunt Sally saw by the window.”
“I thought you locked him in some room?”
“Lock and double-locked. Bolted, besides. Worst is, all bolts and locks are just as I left ’em. Had the key in my pocket and went in, saluting, and 91 there wasn’t anybody to salute. Well, ma’am, if he’s out, and ’twas him saw that money, there’d better two of us sleep beside it, rather than one. He’s the uncanniest creature ever I met, and I hope never to meet his mate.”
“Very well. I do not see what harm he can do, after all, except to himself, now. Jessica, dear, please bring the key, and John can put this money in the safe. If it weren’t for Elsa’s satisfaction, I should regret that Pedro ever found it. Then we must all to sleep. It’s been a most eventful day, and we are tired.”
Before long the whole household was asleep; but the last to seek her rest was Mrs. Benton; nor did she do that until she had locked whatever locks would fasten, peeped under every bed, and invaded the sacredness of Wun Lung’s “heatheny den.” Then she placed her Bible on one side her bed, a broom and horsewhip on the other, and lay down to watch, explaining:
“’Cause I’m goin’ to watch, even if I am resting my body horizontal. I’m so tired I can’t set up straight, nohow, and I shan’t wink a wink till daylight comes and the rest are moving.”
Having called out this valiant resolution to Mrs. Trent, in the adjoining room, she instantly closed her heavy lids, and opened them no more till a series of thumps upon her shoulders aroused her. Then she realized that Ned and Luis were reminding her of yesterday’s promise that, if they’d eat no more plum cake overnight they should have some for their breakfasts.
“Land of love! What you doing? Is it daylight? Why, ’twas dark as Egypt when I lay down, and I–––Can it be that I––I––have overslept?”
“Plum cake, Aunt Sally,” reminded Ned.
“Plumsally!” cried Luis, with a forcible whack. Which was instantly returned, and with such added interest that he ran howling away, leaving the disturbed matron to scold herself at leisure for her lapse from duty, while she hurriedly dressed.
Naturally, she had to submit to some teasing on account of her valiant resolution of the previous night that she “wouldn’t wink a wink,” but Mrs. Trent was delighted that the faithful woman had, at last, enjoyed a needed rest. Besides, everything was bright at the ranch on that happy morning. Even Wun Lung had caught the infection of Christmas preparations, and was intent upon providing some dainties of his own, against the approaching festival, which should so far outshine the homelier pies and puddings of Mrs. Benton, as his own revered country outshone, in his opinion, even this pleasant one in which, at present, his lot was cast. He had also felt good-natured enough to put aside a plentiful breakfast for his mate––or foe––of the kitchen; and since it was such a time of happiness, Aunt Sally condescended not only to eat it, but to pronounce it “good.”
Hearing this unexpected praise, the Chinaman wound and unwound his precious queue, after a fashion he had of expressing satisfaction; and smilingly advised Mrs. Benton to “step black polch,” where she would find things to do.
So to the back porch the good lady retreated, carrying with her great dishes of fruit to prepare, and not forgetting two enormous slices of the rich plum cake she had promised the little boys, and which would have made less active, hardily reared children ill.
Mrs. Trent had moved her sewing machine to the porch, and Jessica sat near, with a little table before her, trying to write the Christmas invitations that had been so delayed, and to express them after a style which should not too painfully expose her own ignorance. The result was not so bad, considering the slight training the child had had, and her few years, yet it did not satisfy the mother, who felt that education was the one good thing, and who longed to have her child’s bright intellect developed as it should be.
Poor Jessica had written and rewritten the note intended for Mr. Hale a number of times, and still had it returned to her with many corrections, after Mrs. Trent’s reading of it, and now laid it aside with a sigh of discouragement.
“Can’t that wait a while, mother? If I may write to my darling Ninian Sharp, I’ll get myself rested. He doesn’t mind trifles like wrong capitals in the right places––oh! dear, I mean––I don’t know what I mean. But may I?”
“Certainly, dear. Though, first, come here and let me try the length of this sleeve.”
Lady Jess obeyed readily, for new clothes were rare events in her simple life. This natty little “Christmas frock” was white, with scarlet trimmings, and quite sufficiently in contrast with the plain blue flannel ones of everyday use to captivate her fancy and make her patient under the tedious process of “fitting.” Yet she was glad to return to her table and her letter to Ninian Sharp, which she found no difficulty in composing, since she was free to do as she chose.
And this was the epistle which, after some delay, reached the newspaper man, at a time when he happened 94 to need cheering up, and brought new life and interest into his overworked brain:
“MY VERY DEAR MISTER SHARP: My mother and the children and aunt sally, and Me and all the rest the Boys, are well and send Their LUV. We are Now Inviteing you To come and Spend the holidays at dear Sobrante. everybody is Coming, most, and i Got lost and was found in a Hole. The Hole is in the ground. there was Money in It, that the Boys said my fortynineer stole and He Didn’t. It was elsa winklers and wolfgang was mad at her, and there was a Ghost, but it got away, else samson and Me would have shot it against the mission cordiror wall and had a nexibition. and ferd that was lock up got away two; and say, please my dear mister sharp, Will you see if this stone that’s in the package is any good? Pedro, thats a hundred years, says it’s copper and copper is worth money. We need some money bad, and i hope it is, and I don’t no anybody as clever as you. so Please write write away and tell us if you will come and tell ephraim Marsh, that the Boys will be at marion railway station with a buckborde and horses enough. i am Making something to put in everybodys stocking. i Began to make the things after last Christmas, that ever was, and i Have more than twenty-five presunts to Make and i Have got three done, one of Them is Yours. your Loving friend,
“JESSICA TRENT.”
When the letters were completed, the little captain felt that she needed recreation, and her mother agreed with her; but, unlike her former habit, could not consent to the child’s going anywhere alone. The recent terrible experience had banished from 95 Mrs. Trent’s heart that comfortable sense of security which had prevented life on the isolated ranch from being a lonely one. She now felt, as Aunt Sally phrased it:
“Afraid of your own shadder, ain’t you, Gabriell’, and well you may be. In the midst of life we are in the hands of them Bernals, and no knowin’. That son John of mine may try to hoodwink me that ’twasn’t no ghost I saw last night, but ghost it was if ever one walked this earth. It wasn’t, so to speak, a spooky ghost, neither; it was an avaricious one, and it wasn’t after no folks, but ’twas after that money, sharp. Ain’t disappeared, for good, neither. Liable to spring up and out anywhere happens; and you do well, Gabriell’, not to trust our girl off alone again. Not right to once. Where’s she hankerin’ to travel now? She’d ought to be learnt to sew patchwork, instead of riding all over the country, hitherty-yender, a bareback on a broncho or a burro. If she was my girl–––”
“If she was your girl, dear Aunt Sally, you couldn’t have been more anxious than you were while she was lost. And the life is good for her. It’s right for all women to understand sewing and household arts, but the captain isn’t a woman yet, and I have faith she’ll acquire all fitting knowledge in due time. She’s anxious to ride to Pedro’s. She says there was something different in his manner, last night, from ordinary, and, indeed, I fancied so myself. She’s gone to find which one of the boys can best leave his work to ride with her.”
“It’ll be John Benton, Gabriella Trent. You see if it ain’t. That man just sees the world through Jessica’s eyes, and he’s never got over being jealous ’at he wasn’t the one took her to Los Angeles 96 that time. If he had all the work in creation piled up before him, and she happened to say ‘Come,’ some other whither, whither, ’twould be, and not a minute’s hesitation. Anyhow, it’s Marty’s day for mailridin’, and there he lopes this instant.”
The ranchmen took turns in riding to the post, each esteeming it a privilege, and finding nothing but pleasure in the sixty miles’ gallop to Marion and back. At that moment, indeed, Marty was swinging out of sight on his own fine mount, the mailbag before him on his heavy Mexican saddle, the wind created by the swift motion of the beast raising the brim of his broad hat and thrilling him with that sense of abounding life and freedom which comes so forcibly to men in the wide spaces of the earth.
He was the youngest of the “boys,” even though past his first youth, and the “life” of the ranchmen’s quarters, where all liked and some loved him.
The women on the porch watched him till he became a mere speck in the distance, and Aunt Sally sighed:
“That George Cromarty is as likely a youth as ever I knew. He’s that good to his old mother, back in the East, I tell my own son John, he ought to profit by such an example. I should hate to have anything happen to him. Yes, indeedy, I should hate to have a single bad thing happen to poor George Cromarty.”
A little nervous shiver ran through Mrs. Trent’s slender frame, yet she turned upon her companion, as she threaded her needle, with a laugh, exclaiming:
“Oh! you dear old croaker! Why can’t you let well enough alone, without mentioning more evil? 97 You know the old saying that to speak of trouble is to invite its visitation. Surely, there was nothing about to-day’s postman to suggest disaster. George is a typical ranchman, and my husband used to point him out to visitors as what a man might be, who grew up, or old, where ‘there was room enough.’ Big-hearted, full of fun, tender as a woman, but intolerant of meanness and evil doing. It would be a dark day for Sobrante if ill befell our ‘Marty.’”
“Well, I don’t know. Something’s going to go wrong somewhere. I feel it in my bones, seems if. There, I told you so! Yonder comes that lazy boy of mine and Jessie. There’s more things needing him here on this place than you could shake a stick at, yet off he’ll go traipsing just at a nod from his captain.”
“Don’t begrudge them their happiness, Aunt Sally. Certainly, after grief, it is their due. Well, John, will you act escort for the little lady of Sobrante?” asked its mistress.
“Will I not? And do me proud. She ain’t to be trusted with any of the flighty ones, Samson now, or–––”
Mrs. Trent’s laughter––that morning as heart-whole and free as a girl’s––interrupted the ranchman’s disparaging comments on his fellows, sedate grayheads as most of them were; for well she understood the universal devotion of all to their darling captain.
“Oh, John, I can scarcely associate the idea of frivolity or carelessness with our big Samson; but wait a moment, please, before you start. There’s such a store of good things left, though in fragments, that I’d like to pack a basket for Pedro. I 98 wish he did not insist upon living so alone. He is so old and I feel, as the native Californians used, that the older a person grew the more precious. I wish you’d try to persuade him to let somebody else take his place with the sheep, and to arrange his small affairs so that when he comes down for his Navidad he will remain. There’s enough to keep him busy and happy here.”
“I’ll try, mistress. But he’ll not be persuaded. Old Pedro wouldn’t think he could breathe down here in the valley, for long at a time. Well, good-by. Ready, captain?”
“Ready, John, as soon as mother gets the basket. Quiet, Buster. I believe you’re more eager for a canter than I am, even.”
Then when the basket had been handed up to John, the pair merrily saluted the women on the porch and rode away; but Mrs. Benton called shrilly after them:
“Turn back and start over again! Turn back, I say! Both your horses set off left feet first. That means bad luck as sure as you are born!”
But nobody paid any heed to Aunt Sally’s forecasts of evil, save to laugh at them. Only Mrs. Trent again felt that nervous shiver seize her, and but for shame’s sake would have begged her daughter to defer her ride until another day.
However, shame prevailed; or common sense, which is far better; and well it was––or ill––that the riders kept serenely on their way, indifferent to “signs” and ignorant of what lay before them.
The train from Los Angeles rolled slowly up to the little station at Marion and the asthmatic engine seemed to wheeze its relief that its labor was ended, as an old man stepped from the last car and looked eagerly along the platform. Then a certain degree of disappointment overspread his fine face, and shouldering a heavy parcel, strapped round with leather to give a holding place, he strode rather unsteadily forward over the same sandy road, or street, which had tried Ninian Sharp’s patience on his first visit to the post town.
Yet, after a little, the man grew accustomed to his own stiffness of limb and moved with a sort of halting swiftness which soon brought him to the little hostelry of one Aleck McLeod, where a group of ranchmen were sunning themselves while they waited the distribution of the mail.
It was noticeable that the porch was spotlessly clean and that none of the idlers profaned its cleanliness by so much as one expectoration of tobacco juice, though all were either smoking or chewing that weed. They had far too great respect for Janet, Aleck’s wife, and for the labor that cleanliness meant in that waterless region. They were all deep in the discussion of the late events at Sobrante and none heard the old traveler’s approach over the soft ground, till he stood close beside them with his foot on the lower step.
But he heard them and their eager talk; and, pausing a bit, the more completely to surprise them by an intended halloo, he forgot that and all else save what they were saying.
“It was ten to one she was never found. ’Pears like a miracle to me, that old Pedro was led to find that very cave just when he did. My wife claims it was a miracle, same as used to be in Bible days, and you can’t talk her out of it. You know how women are,” said one ranchman, who had aided in the search for Jessica.
“Well, first and last, them Trents have done a heap for this section of our ‘native.’ And they’re square folks, every identical of them. Even the little tacker, that boy Ned. There’s more in his head than he gets credit for, and one these days he’ll show there is. He’s a master hand with a gun, baby as he is, and if he’d had one handy I wager he’d have put some shot into the ugly carcass of that Ferd––– But he hadn’t the iron and he didn’t,” added another smoker.
“It was a prime spread Mis’ Trent gave us. Must have took about all the provisions she had in store, but nothing was too good for them that helped her in her trouble. Or tried to help, same thing; since it was her own man, Pedro, found the child. Away down in the bottom of a pit in the depth of an unknown cave! Think of it, somebody! It just makes my hair rise on end, known’ there is such a fool and scoundrel joined in one dwarf’s body––Hello! hel––lo!”
The last speaker’s words ended in a sort of screech of astonishment and recognition, as a hard hand was laid upon his shoulder, and Ephraim Marsh demanded, fiercely:
“What’s that you say, neighbor?”
“Why, hello, Marsh! Where’d you drop from?” cried one, rising and extending a hand in greeting.
“You’re a sight to cure sick folks!” shouted another, pressing to “Forty-niner’s” side, and slapping the veteran’s shoulder in high good will.
But Ephraim had no feeling at present, save anxiety to know what their discussion had meant; and, all talking, they laid a succinct history of the last few days before him. He listened in increasing alarm and amazement and his old limbs tottered beneath him, so that he called out, hastily:
“Give me a seat, somebody, quick, before I fall. I––I––to think of my little gell––my own sweet-faced, lovin’ little gell–––Oh, I can’t believe it! I can’t and I won’t. It’s some plaguey Californy yarn’ you’re passin’ the time with. Atlantic! But you might have chose a likelier subject to fool over, you might.”
But Aleck himself had seen the arrival through the window and came out to greet him with the heartiness accorded all the Sobrante people, and to assure him that the story was all true; and that, after all, it were better that he had not been at home when the trouble came; “for it would have broke your heart, ‘Forty-niner,’ into more pieces than old Stiffleg broke your bones, and it wouldn’t have healed so soon, neither. But, come in, come in, boy, and have a mouthful of dinner. Janet has as fine a dish of haggis as ever I tasted in Aberdeen at home, and it should relish to you, after all that hospital fare and so on. Janet! Janet! Here’s Ephraim Marsh! Come welcome him!”
And Janet came quickly, like her husband cordial and sympathetic, and led the deeply moved frontiersman 102 into her own kitchen, where no uninvited ranchman dared intrude, and there served him well with good things, including the haggis. And as she served she talked in a wise, womanly way that soothed his agitation and turned his thoughts from enmity against the dwarf into thanksgiving that now all was well.
“For since it is over and done with we can reckon the gain. The sweet bit bairnie has won for herself fresh friends. In all the countryside there was but one feeling, ‘The child must be found.’ No other thing was of any moment, and found she was, by a man so much older than any of the rest that nobody, not even you, can grudge him the honor. More hot milk? Oat cake? Nothing? Well, well; for a man that’s traveling you’ve a small appetite. Must be off already and pack your own bundle? Why, friend, you would better leave that till one the boys rides up for the mail. Due before this, indeed, for Sobrante ranchers are ever keen for their post stuff. No? A horse, then? Aleck was going to do a bit of plowing with her, later on, but he’ll eagerly give over that for you.”
But Ephraim felt that he could delay for nothing more, not even for the arrival of a Sobrante messenger; and as for Jean, the sorrel mare––he and she were old acquaintances, and he declined her services with a grim smile, saying:
“Thank you, Janet, it’s kindly offered, but I’m in haste and I’d rather trust my own lame leg than her four lagging ones. Besides, if Aleck has been afield in this search he’ll be behindhand in his work, and he’s a hand to keep things up to the level line. Good-by, good-by. Oh! wait a bit, though. I’d clean forgot that I put a scrap of white Scotch linen 103 and a yard or two of plaid bodice stuff in my pack for you. This business of my captain getting lost has shaken my wits.”
Though Janet protested against the trouble her face glowed at prospect of her gifts, and as she assisted him to unstrap and refasten his canvas sack, and even begged to be shown the simple remembrances he had procured for everybody he knew “at home;” not least among them being calicoes of brilliantly unwashable colors for Aunt Sally’s patchwork. Then he set off alone, staff in hand, stolidly yet swiftly covering the ground with that halting stride of his that soon took him out of sight.
The assembled ranchmen received their own mail matter, mounted and rode away; and there settled over the little town that monotonous quiet which would not be broken again until the arrival of the evening train, when, possibly, some chance passenger might alight on the deserted platform.
Meanwhile, Ephraim was passing over the level road toward “home,” feeling keener delight and longing with each step’s advance, and when he came to a little branch trail, where a rude signpost stated the fact that he had come “Five miles from Marion,” he made his first halt, sitting to rest for a few moments under the eucalyptus trees bordering the arroyo. The branch road led to and disappeared among a group of buildings, some distance to the north, on the ranch of one Miguel Solano, a friend of Antonio Bernal, and a Mexican of ill-repute. The ranch was comparatively new and was rich in olive orchards and all the conveniences for producing a fine quality of oil, and had been bought and arranged by an easterner with all the accessories of profitable farming. Death had put an end to the settler’s 104 industry, and the property had come, at a low figure, into Solano’s hands; whereupon everything industrious lapsed, neglect and discomfort usurping the place of thrifty comfort.
Gazing toward this place, Ephraim reflected that; “If that Greaser had half as much snap as he has wickedness he’d be a rich man. As ’tis, honest folks sort of give Solano’s a wide berth. I’m thirsty as a dog and wouldn’t mind havin’ a drink out that artesian well they have there, but––Atlantic! There’s somebody already stoopin’ over it; looks mighty familiar!”
Then the old man stood up and shielded his eyes with his hand as he peered into the distance, ending his scrutiny with a shake of his fist in the direction he had gazed, and muttering aloud:
“No, I’m better off here. Queer how you can recognize a snake, no matter how far off! That’s Ferd, the dwarf; and if I was near enough to touch him I couldn’t keep my fingers off his dirty throat, nohow, till I’d choked the life out of him! Ugh! When I think––– But I mustn’t think. I must just get up and jog on till I see a prettier sight than that. If I can spy the hunchback at one mile off I can see my little captain’s bonny head at ten. Home, old ‘Forty-niner’! Home’s the word!”
As if the thought of Jessica had put new strength into his body Ephraim again shouldered his pack and started forward; but he had proceeded a short distance only when he again halted and this time in consternation. On the road before him, where it dipped slightly into a hollow, lay the prostrate figure of a man, face downward in the dust; and from the shrubbery near by came the helpless floundering of some big animal and its occasional 105 cry of distress, than which there is no sound more pitiful in all the world.
Away flew the pack, and Ephraim bent over the man, gently turning him over, and crying in fresh dismay:
“It’s Marty! George Cromarty, of all men, dead as a doornail!”
Alas! Ephraim’s home-coming was proving anything but the delight he had anticipated. To be met first by the story of the trouble which had visited Sobrante and now by this dreadful discovery almost unnerved him; but he was a man of action and his hand flew to Marty’s breast to feel if his heart still beat. With the other hand he softly brushed the dust from the rigid features and rubbed the colorless temples. After a second or two his face brightened, and he cried aloud, as if the other might hear and be cheered:
“Well, you aren’t a dead man, after all, Marty, my lad! But I’d give a heap, this minute, for a bit of cold water to give you. And, Atlantic! I believe I’m losing my wits. ’Course, he’s got it himself, handy. All the boys carry a flask in their pockets, even on the short ride to post, but Marty, being teetotal, fills his with water and gets laughed at for his notions. A mighty good notion it’ll prove for him if it saves his life, and here goes!”
Raising Marty’s lean body so that his head rested on the fallen bundle, Ephraim secured the flask, found it full, and began to moisten the white lips; then, cautiously, to force a few drops down the stiffening throat. Success soon crowned his efforts since, fortunately, the ranchman was merely stunned, not killed, by the ugly fall he had taken 106 when his horse so suddenly pitched forward and tossed him overhead against the pile of rocks.
For it was a horse in agony which sent that moving appeal from the thicket near by, and as soon as “Forty-niner” was sure that the man was recovering, though he could not as yet speak, he sought the poor beast and saw, to his distress, that for it there was no respite save in death.
“Well, well, well! This is a bad job all round, but better a horse than a man, and lucky for both I came when I did. If I had a gun I’d end the misery of one, straight off. And maybe Marty has. I’ll look and see.”
Returning to the road he was greeted by a prolonged stare from the dazed ranchman, who had, indeed, been able to drag his body to a sitting posture, but vainly sought to understand what had happened.
Ephraim spoke to him, asking in a matter-of-fact tone:
“Got a revolver with you, lad?”
“Eh? W-h-a-t?” returned Marty, wonder drawing upon him at finding who his companion was. “You––Eph?”
“Course. Who else! Been quite a spell since we two met, but better late than never. Got a pistol, I say?”
“What for?”
The sharpshooter hesitated, then gave an evasive answer:
“Powerful long since I done any practicin’, and feel like I better try my hand.”
At that instant there was another heavy floundering behind the bushes and another brutish moan of 107 pain. With this full consciousness came to the injured ranchman and he tried to rise, crying in his own distress:
“That’s Comanche!”
“Forty-niner” gravely nodded.
“He’s hurt?” demanded Marty, as if he defied the answer to be affirmative.
Ephraim turned away his face. To them, horses were almost as human beings, and the love of a master for his beast was something fraternal.
“Help me to him,” said the ranchman, staggering to his feet.
“Better not, lad. Best trust to me,” protested the elder man.
“Trust––what?”
The look in Ephraim’s eyes was all the answer needed to this fierce question, and Marty turned away his own gaze as he faltered the next one:
“Yes, mate, but take it like a man. Better him than you, and––give me the gun.”
Marty straightened and stiffened himself.
“Help me to him. Something’s wrong with my legs. I’ll see for myself. If it must be, I’ll do it for myself.”
The frontiersman understood the sentiment and respected it. He had had to do a like hard duty for his own horseflesh before that, and he had always felt it a sort of murder. He did not look at Marty’s face as he carefully guided his wavering steps into the thicket and the presence of the suffering Comanche, where one look sufficed his master.
“Oh, you poor fellow!”
For an instant the tall head stooped to the level of the struggling animal, and a strange, expressive look passed between the great equine eyes and the misty ones of the man. Then Marty’s hand went swiftly around to his pocket, there was the click of a weapon, a flash and report, and Comanche moved no more.
More shaken and ill from this deed than from his terrible fall, Marty sat long in silence by Ephraim’s side beneath the eucalyptus trees; then suddenly rousing, exclaimed:
“Now, to find out the cause!”
It was not far to seek, though difficult to understand. Of all men in that countryside, gay, big-hearted George Cromarty had most friends and fewest enemies. He took life lightly, merrily, with a good word for the virtues of others and silence for their vices; yet there before them, unmistakably plain, was the trap that had been set for his life. A pit had been dug across the whole width of the road, shallow, indeed, but sufficiently deep to throw any horse passing over it. Its top had been screened with interlacing twigs, over which had been scattered soil and dust enough to hide them. One who rode with his eyes on the ground, as Antonio used, might easily, perhaps, have discovered the fiendish work; but he who rode with head upraised and his gaze on the distance would ride to his ruin as Marty had done. To make the treachery more secure, some sprays of wild grapes had been tightly stretched beneath the whole, and this showed a deliberation of evil that turned Ephraim sick, but the other man furious.
“Who did that will pay the price! I swear it!” he cried.
“It surely was meant for a Sobrante man, for they’re few besides who ride this way,” answered “Forty-niner,” thoughtfully. “And, Atlantic! Here’s the mail pouch! Maybe ’twas robbery, pure and simple. Was it a money day, for supplies or such?”
“Reckon it was. The mistress herself locked and gave the bag to me, bidding me be careful. As if I was ever careless; but there was one letter in it I heard about, that the little captain wrote to Ninian Sharp. Wrote herself, an invite to the Christmas doings. Try it.”
Examination proved that the bag had been tampered with, though the lock was a spring and now securely fastened; but a small leather flap, intended to cover the keyhole, had been torn from its fastenings and lay on the ground. The pouch itself had been flung slightly out of the way, under the bushes, as if the trespasser had satisfied himself with and concerning it and had no further use for it.
“Well, there used to be three keys to this concern. One the mistress has; one the postmaster keeps at the office; and the other was Antonio’s, since he always was wanting to open and put something extra in the bag after Mrs. Trent had done with it. I never liked the look of that, and it’s my opinion that it’s the very key has unlocked this bag, if unlocked it’s been. Which is more’n likely.”
Cromarty’s head was again beginning to grow dizzy, and he sat again upon the rock to recover himself, making no answer to Ephraim’s words than the exclamation:
“How am I going to get that bag to post in time?”
Jessica and her escort, John Benton, rode swiftly up the canyon trail and over the brow of the mesa toward the shepherd’s cabin; but they had not proceeded far along the upland before a sense of the strangeness of things oppressed them both.
John’s keen eye detected the neglect of the sheep, which were still huddled in the corral, though long past their hour for pasturage; while their bleating expressed hunger as well as dislike of their unusual imprisonment. But Jessica saw first the abject attitude of the collie, Keno, who came reluctantly to greet them with down-hanging head and tail and a reproachful upward glance of his brown eyes.
“Why, you poor doggie! What’s happened you? You look as if you’d been beaten. Where’s your master, good Keno? Keno, where’s Pedro?”
The Indian was nowhere visible, and as if he fully understood the question, the collie answered by a long, lugubrious whine.
“Something’s wrong. That’s as plain as preachin’!” cried John, and hurried to the little house, whose door stood open, but about which there was no sign of life.
He had tossed his bridle to the captain, meaning that if aught were amiss within she should be detained for the present by holding the horses. However, 111 she saw through this ruse, and, leaping from Buster, swiftly hobbled both animals and ran after the carpenter.
Keno kept close at her heels, the very presentment of canine misery, and uttering at every few steps that doleful whine which was so unusual to him. But, arrived at the cabin, he left her and with one bound had reached the Indian’s side, where he still sat beside his window, his head against its casing and his blanket––Jessica’s gift––closely wrapped about him. He did not move when they entered, nor respond even by objection to the collie’s frantic blandishments, but John raised his hand for silence, as she stood sorrowfully gazing downward upon the face of death.
Yes, it was that. He had more than rounded his century of years, he had lived uprightly, as the good padres had taught; he had bestowed upon those he loved the secret of great wealth, and he had gone to keep his precious Navidad in the home of eternal youth.
Jessica comprehended the truth at once, and her eyes filled with the tears which, as yet, did not overflow; for as she gazed upon the sleeper’s face it filled her with amazement and something akin to delight; and at last she exclaimed:
“Why, how young and glad he looks! He’s even nobler than he was when he rode away from me last night, and I’d never seen him so dignified and grand as he was then. It’s––it’s as if he had done with everything is hard, like worries, and evil, and loneliness, and––all.”
“Ay, lassie; he has done with all––that you or I know aught about; and every inch a man he seems as he sits there in the majesty of death.”
By then the child’s tears had begun to flow, and she caught up Pedro’s hand with an outburst of grief and love.
“Poor, poor Pedro! To have been here all alone when it came! What shall I do without him who was always so good, so good to me? Oh, I can’t have it so, John! I can’t, I can’t!”
He was wise enough to attempt no consolation, knowing well how small a part of her life the venerable Indian had been and how easily youth accustoms itself to such a loss. But, after he had allowed her to sob for a time, he gently touched her shoulder, and said:
“Come. Pedro has finished his work and has passed it on to us. Those poor sheep must be cared for, and somebody must ride home at once; or, rather, should ride at once to Marion to make the necessary arrangements. I wish–––” And he paused in perplexity, regarding her as if in doubt what was best to be done.
They left the cottage with that quiet tread which seems natural in the presence of those whom no sound can trouble, and, hand in hand, walked sadly to the fold, where the penned sheep greeted them with eager cries and restless movements.
“Pedro used to say they talked and he knew what they said. I begin to believe he did, for, listen! This sound isn’t like that other first one, which told us they were hungry. This says: ‘I’m glad you’ve come!’ Doesn’t it?”
“So it sounds to me, lassie; and I, too, am glad we came. It’s queer, though, how set you were on it, even against the mistress’ wish that you should wait.”
“Yes, John, I had to come. I just had to. And this is what I think: When we’ve taken care of the sheep, we’ll lay Pedro on his bed and lock the door. Keno will keep guard, if we tell him; though whoever comes here, anyway? Then you must ride to Marion to see about––about”––here, for a moment, grief interrupted her again, but she suppressed her tears as soon as possible and went on quite calmly––“about what always has to be at such a time. I remember––I remember it all when my father–––No, no, John, I’m not going to cry again. I won’t make bad worse, never, if I can help it. But this I say: You ride to Marion and send word to the mission so that a priest may come; and do all the rest. I will ride home and the boys will come up and fetch him to Sobrante. It must be in the little old chapel that we never use, because my father said he would not put to a common service a room that had once been given to God. Pedro always loved it. It was there he used to say his ‘devotions’ and there he must lie––in state––isn’t that what they call it when great folks die? Pedro was great. He had lived so very long and he had always been so devout. What do you say?”
“What do I say, little captain, but that you’ve a long head on your young shoulders, and I’m sorry this load of grief had to rest on it so early. More than that; I undertook to be your guardeen to-day, and I’ve no notion of shirking the job––even now. I passed my word to the ‘admiral’ that I’d fetch you home safe, and so I will. It won’t take much longer and it’s right. Home first, and Marion afterward.”
“Well, maybe, that is best; and surely it is pleasantest. I didn’t want to be selfish, but I’d rather 114 you stayed with me. Are you ready? Shall we leave him just as he is?”
“Just so. We’ll close the window and the door, and then––home.”
But it was with widely different feelings that they cantered down the canyon from those with which they had ridden up it, and when she saw them returning so soon and so swiftly, Mrs. Trent went out to meet them, saying nothing, indeed, yet asking the question with her eyes:
“What trouble now?”
Then John told their story speedily and suggested that some of the men ride to the mesa and attend to what was needful. Also, repeated Jessica’s opinion about the chapel, with which the lady instantly agreed; then, clasping her daughter’s hand very close, returned with her to the porch and began to fold away her sewing.
But both Aunt Sally, when she came and heard the news, and the little girl asked:
“Why do you put it away, mother, dear? If Pedro is happy now, as we believe, why shouldn’t we be, too? All the rest must have their holiday, and I think––I think he’d like to have me look nice. He always did.”
“Jessie is right, Gabriell’. Things do happen terrible upsettin’ lately, seems to me; but by the time you and me get to be a hundred odd, I reckon we shan’t care a mite whether folks wear red and white dresses or horrid humbly ones. I’m goin’ on just the same as ever, for that’s the only way I’ll ever keep my common senses in this spooky place. I knew when they two started off, left hoof foremost, they was ridin’, to trouble; and this morning my hen 115 chicken crowed to beat any rooster I ever heard, and that’s a sure sign of death.”
“Aunt Sally, don’t!” protested Mrs. Trent, glancing anxiously at her daughter’s face. But she need not have feared; for the child smiled back upon her, serene and happy, despite the traces of tears that still marked her bright eyes.
“It’s all right, mother, dear; and I’m thinking how glad Pedro must be now, to have found all those he’d so long outlived. He just went to sleep, you see, alone, and waked up with them around him. I think it was beautiful––beautiful; and his last deed was to find me and to tell you how you could grow rich if you want to. Where are the little boys, I wonder?”
They presently appeared, in wild excitement, having been at the men’s quarters when John rode thither to impart his news and directions; yet in this excitement was not a vestige of grief. They seemed to feel relieved of some dread, and Ned more than once punched Luis, whispering shrilly enough for all to hear:
“We can do it now, and not get caught! Yes, siree! We can do it now! Don’t you tell!”
And Luis responded by an ecstatic hug and the customary echo:
“Do it now; don’t you tell! Yes, siree!”
John Benton had nearly covered the distance to Marion, when he perceived two men slowly advancing toward him along the level road. For a moment, engrossed by thoughts of recent happenings, he paid slight attention to the fact, though idly wondering what strangers might be having business, and on foot, with Sobrante, at which point 116 the road ended. But, as he drew nearer to them, something familiar in the bearing of the taller man, and startling in the appearance of the other, caused him to shield his eyes from the sunshine and peer critically into the distance. Then he slapped his thigh so excitedly that his horse suddenly stopped, reared and nearly unseated him.
“Oh, you idiot! Can’t a feller slap himself without your takin’ it to heart? If I ain’t a blind man, and maybe I am, that’s old ‘Forty-niner’ hoofing himself home, and–––Whew! That’s Marty, limpin’ and leanin’ alongside. Well, I ’low! More trouble and plenty of it. Seems if all creation was just a-happenin’ our way, blamed if it don’t. Giddap there, Moses!”
In a few minutes he had reached the pedestrians and saluted them with unfeigned astonishment, and Ephraim with great friendliness of expression, but also the question:
“What fresh calamities you two fetchin’, now?”
They told him, as briefly as possible, and he found his own perplexity increased as he demanded:
“What in creation is to be done? Here’s Pedro gone and died in the most unhandy place and time; and here be you two, with not a decent leg between you, twenty miles from home, and one horse for the three of us!”
At the word “horse” poor Marty winced, as from a personal blow, while both he and Ephraim were greatly amazed at the news of the shepherd’s death. They began to feel, as John had said, that “nothing save disaster was meant for Sobrante folks;” yet, after a moment, “Forty-niner” perceived another side of the matter, and expressed himself thus: