right. We couldn't budge 'em. They went on en' split round the
rocks, en' the most of 'em was turned sharp to the left by a deep
wash we hedn't seen--hed no chance to see.
"The other three boys--Jimmy Vail, Joe Willis, an' thet little
Cairns boy--a nervy kid! they, with Cairns leadin', tried to buck
thet herd round to the pocket. It was a wild, fool idee. I
couldn't do nothin'. The boys got hemmed in between the steers
an' the wash--thet they hedn't no chance to see, either. Vail an'
Willis was run down right before our eyes. An' Cairns, who rode a
fine hoss, he did some ridin'. I never seen equaled, en' would
hev beat the steers if there'd been any room to run in. I was
high up an' could see how the steers kept spillin' by twos an'
threes over into the wash. Cairns put his hoss to a place thet
was too wide fer any hoss, an' broke his neck an' the hoss's too.
We found that out after, an' as fer Vail an' Willis--two thousand
steers ran over the poor boys. There wasn't much left to pack
home fer burying!...An', Miss Withersteen, thet all happened
yesterday, en' I believe, if the white herd didn't run over the
wall of the Pass, it's runnin' yet."
On the morning of the second day after Judkins's
recital, during
which time Jane remained
indoors a prey to regret and sorrow for
the boy riders, and a new and now
strangelyinsistent fear for
her own person, she again heard what she had missed more than she
dared
honestly confess--the soft, jingling step of Lassiter.
Almost
overwhelmingrelief surged through her, a feeling as akin
to joy as any she could have been
capable of in those gloomy
hours of shadow, and one that suddenly stunned her with the
significance of what Lassiter had come to mean to her. She had
begged him, for his own sake, to leave Cottonwoods. She might yet
beg that, if her weakening courage permitted her to dare absolute
loneliness and
helplessness, but she realized now that if she
were left alone her life would become one long, hideous
nightmare.
When his soft steps clinked into the hall, in answer to her
greeting, and his tall, black-garbed form filled the door, she
felt an inexpressible sense of immediate safety. In his presence
she lost her fear of the dim passageways of Withersteen House and
of every sound. Always it had been that, when he entered the
court or the hall, she had
experienced a
distinctlysickening but
gradually lessening shock at sight of the huge black guns
swinging at his sides. This time the
sickening shock again
visited her, it was, however, because a revealing flash of
thought told her that it was not alone Lassiter who was
thrillingly
welcome, but also his fatal weapons. They meant so
much. How she had fallen--how broken and spiritless must she
be--to have still the same old
horror of Lassiter's guns and his
name, yet feel somehow a cold, shrinking
protection in their law
and might and use.
"Did you trail Venters--find his wonderful
valley?" she asked,
eagerly.
"Yes, an' I
reckon it's sure a wonderful place."
"Is he safe there?"
"That's been botherin' me some. I tracked him an' part of the
trail was the hardest I ever tackled. Mebbe there's a rustler or
somebody in this country who's as good at trackin' as I am. If
that's so Venters ain't safe."
"Well--tell me all about Bern and his
valley."
To Jane's surprise Lassiter showed disinclination for further
talk about his trip. He appeared to be
extremely fatigued. Jane
reflected that one hundred and twenty miles, with probably a
great deal of climbing on foot, all in three days, was enough to
tire any rider. Moreover, it
presently developed that Lassiter
had returned in a mood of
singularsadness and preoccupation. She
put it down to a moodiness over the loss of her white herd and
the now
precarious condition of her fortune.
Several days passed, and as nothing happened, Jane's spirits
began to
brighten. Once in her musings she thought that this
tendency of hers to rebound was as sad as it was futile.
Meanwhile, she had resumed her walks through the grove with
little Fay.
One morning she went as far as the sage. She had not seen the
slope since the
beginning of the rains, and now it bloomed a rich
deep
purple. There was a high wind blowing, and the sage tossed
and waved and colored
beautifully from light to dark. Clouds
scudded across the sky and their shadows sailed
darkly down the
sunny slope.
Upon her return toward the house she went by the lane to the
stables, and she had scarcely entered the great open space with
its corrals and sheds when she saw Lassiter hurriedly
approaching. Fay broke from her and,
running to a corral fence,
began to pat and pull the long,
hanging ears of a
drowsy burro.
One look at Lassiter armed her for a blow.
Without a word he led her across the wide yard to the rise of the
ground upon which the
stable stood.
"Jane--look!" he said, and
pointed to the ground.
Jane glanced down, and again, and upon steadier
vision made out
splotches of blood on the stones, and broad, smooth marks in the
dust, leading out toward the sage.
"What made these?" she asked.
"I
reckon somebody has dragged dead or wounded men out to where
there was hosses in the sage."
"Dead--or--wounded--men!"
"I
reckon--Jane, are you strong? Can you bear up?"
His hands were
gentlyholding hers, and his eyes--suddenly 'she
could no longer look into them. "Strong?" she echoed, trembling.
"I--I will be."
Up on the stone-flag drive, nicked with the marks made by the
iron-shod hoofs of her racers, Lassiter led her, his grasp ever
growing firmer.
"Where's Blake--and--and Jerb?" she asked, haltingly.
"I don't know where Jerb is. Bolted, most likely," replied
Lassiter, as he took her through the stone door. "But Blake--poor
Blake! He's gone forever!...Be prepared, Jane."
With a cold prickling of her skin, with a queer thrumming in her
ears, with fixed and staring eyes, Jane saw a gun lying at her
feet with
chamber swung and empty, and discharged shells
scattered near.
Outstretched upon the
stable floor lay Blake, ghastly
white--dead--one hand clutching a gun and the other twisted in
his
bloody blouse.
"Whoever the
thieves were, whether your people or rustlers--Blake
killed some of them!" said Lassiter.
"Thieves?" whispered Jane.
"I
reckon. Hoss-
thieves!...Look!" Lassiter waved his hand toward
the stalls.
The first stall--Bells's stall--was empty. All the stalls were
empty. No racer whinnied and stamped greeting to her. Night was
gone! Black Star was gone!
CHAPTER XVI. GOLD
As Lassiter had reported to Jane, Venters "went through" safely,
and after a toilsome journey reached the
peaceful shelter of
Surprise Valley. When finally he lay
wearily down under the
silver spruces, resting from the
strain of dragging packs and
burros up the slope and through the entrance to Surprise Valley,
he had
leisure to think, and a great deal of the time went in
regretting that he had not been frank with his loyal friend, Jane
Withersteen.
But, he kept
continually recalling, when he had stood once more
face to face with her and had been shocked at the change in her
and had heard the details of her
adversity, he had not had the
heart to tell her of the closer interest which had entered his
life. He had not lied; yet he had kept silence.
Bess was in transports over the stores of supplies and the outfit
he had packed from Cottonwoods. He had certainly brought a
hundred times more than he had gone for; enough, surely, for
years, perhaps to make
permanent home in the
valley. He saw no
reason why he need ever leave there again.
After a day of rest he recovered his strength and shared Bess's
pleasure in rummaging over the endless packs, and began to plan
for the future. And in this planning, his trip to Cottonwoods,
with its revived hate of Tull and
consequent unleashing of fierce
passions, soon faded out of mind. By slower degrees his
friendship for Jane Withersteen and his contrition drifted from
the active preoccupation of his present thought to a place in
memory, with more and more infrequent recalls.
And as far as the state of his mind was
concerned, upon the
second day after his return, the
valley, with its golden hues and
purple shades, the
speaking west wind and the cool, silent night,
and Bess's watching eyes with their wonderful light, so wrought
upon Venters that he might never have left them at all.
That very afternoon he set to work. Only one thing hindered him
upon
beginning, though it in no wise checked his delight, and
that in the multiplicity of tasks planned to make a
paradise out
of the
valley he could not choose the one with which to begin. He
had to grow into the habit of passing from one
dreamy pleasure to
another, like a bee going from flower to flower in the
valley,
and he found this wandering habit likely to extend to his labors.
Nevertheless, he made a start.
At the outset he discovered Bess to be both a
considerable help
in some ways and a very great
hindrance in others. Her excitement
and joy were spurs, inspirations; but she was utterly
impracticable in her ideas, and she flitted from one plan to
another with bewildering vacillation. Moreover, he fancied that
she grew more eager,
youthful, and sweet; and he marked that it
was far easier to watch her and listen to her than it was to
work. Therefore he gave her tasks that necessitated her going
often to the cave where he had stored his packs.
Upon the last of these trips, when he was some distance down the
terrace and out of sight of camp, he heard a
scream, and then the
sharp barking of the dogs.
For an
instant he straightened up, amazed. Danger for her had
been
absolutely out of his mind. She had seen a rattlesnake--or a
wildcat. Still she would not have been likely to
scream at sight
of either; and the barking of the dogs was
ominous. Dropping his
work, he dashed back along the
terrace. Upon breaking through a
clump of aspens he saw the dark form of a man in the camp. Cold,
then hot, Venters burst into frenzied speed to reach his guns. He
was cursing himself for a
thoughtless fool when the man's tall
form became familiar and he recognized Lassiter. Then the
reversal of emotions changed his run to a walk; he tried to call
out, but his voice refused to carry; when he reached camp there
was Lassiter staring at the white-faced girl. By that time Ring
and Whitie had recognized him.
"Hello, Venters! I'm makin' you a visit," said Lassiter, slowly.
"An' I'm some surprised to see you've a--a young feller for
company."
One glance had sufficed for the keen rider to read Bess's real
sex, and for once his cool calm had deserted him. He stared till
the white of Bess's cheeks flared into
crimson. That, if it were
needed, was the concluding evidence of her femininity, for it
went fittingly with her sun-tinted hair and darkened, dilated
eyes, the
sweetness of her mouth, and the
striking symmetry of
her
slender shape.
"Heavens! Lassiter!" panted Venters, when he caught his breath.
"What
relief--it's only you! How--in the name of all that's
wonderful--did you ever get here?"
"I trailed you. We--I wanted to know where you was, if you had a
safe place. So I trailed you."
"Trailed me," cried Venters, bluntly.
"I
reckon. It was some of a job after I got to them smooth rocks.
I was all day trackin' you up to them little cut steps in the