Trailin'!

by Max Brand

  CHAPTER VII

  BLUEBEARD'S ROOM

  As Anthony Woodbury, he knelt beside the dying. As Anthony Bard he rosewith the dead man in his arms a mighty burden even for his supplestrength; yet he went staggering up the slope, across a level terrace,and back to the house. There it was Peters who answered his call, Peterswith a flabby face grown grey, but still the perfect servant who askedno questions; together they bore the weight up the stairs and placed iton John Bard's bed. While Anthony kept his steady vigil by the dead man,it was Peters again who summoned the police and the useless doctor.

  To the old, uniformed sergeant, Anthony told a simple lie. His fatherhad gone for a walk through the grounds because the night was fine, andAnthony was to join him there later, but when he arrived he found adying man who could not even explain the manner of his death.

  "Nothin' surprises me about a rich man's death," said the sergeant,"not in these here days of anarchy. Got a place to write? I want to makeout my report."

  So Anthony led the grizzled fellow to the library and supplied him withwhat he wished. The sergeant, saying good-bye, shook hands with alingering grip.

  "I knew John Woodbury," he said, "just by sight, but I'm here to tellthe world that you've lost a father who was just about all man. So long;I'll be seein' you again."

  Left alone, Anthony Bard went to the secret room. The key fittedsmoothly into the lock. What the door opened upon was a little greyapartment with an arched ceiling, a place devoid of a single article offurniture save a straight-backed chair in the centre. Otherwise Anthonysaw three things-two pictures on the wall and a little box in thecorner. He went about his work very calmly, for here, he knew, was theonly light upon the past of John Bard, that past which had lain passiveso long and overwhelmed him on this night.

  First he took up the box, as being by far the most promising of thethree to give him what he wished to know; the name of the slayer, theplace where he could be found, and the cause of the slaying. It heldonly two things; a piece of dirty silk and a small oil can; but the oilcan and the black smears on the silk made him look closer, closer untilthe meaning struck him in a flare, as the glow of a lighted matchsuddenly illumines, even if faintly, an entire room.

  In that box the revolver had lain, and here every day through all theyear, John Bard retired to clean and oil his gun, oil and reclean it,keeping it ready for the crisis. That was why he went to the secret roomas soon as he heard the call from the garden, and carrying that gun withhim he had walked out, prepared. The time had come for which he hadwaited a quarter of a century, knowing all that time that the day mustarrive. It was easy to understand now many an act of the big grim man;but still there was no light upon the slayer.

  As he sat pondering he began to feel as if eyes were fastened upon him,watching, waiting, mocking him, eyes from behind which stared until achill ran up his back. He jerked his head up, at last, and flashed aglance over his shoulder.

  Indeed there was mockery in the smile with which she stared down to himfrom her frame, down to him and past him as if she scorned in him allmen forever. It was not that which made Anthony close his eyes. He wastrying with all his might to conjure up his own image vividly. Helooked again, comparing his picture with this portrait on the wall, andthen he knew why the grey man at the Garden had said: "Son, who's yourmother?" For this was she into whose eyes he now stared.

  She had the same deep, dark eyes, the same black hair, the same ratheraquiline, thin face which her woman's eyes and lovely mouth madebeautiful, but otherwise the same. He was simply a copy of that headhewn with a rough chisel--a sculptor's clay model rather than a smoothlyfinished re-production.

  Ah, and the fine spirit of her, the buoyant, proud, scornful spirit! Hestretched out his arms to her, drew closer, smiling as if she could meetand welcome his caress, and then remembered that this was a thing ofcanvas and paint--a bright shadow; no more.

  To the second picture he turned with a deeper hope, but his heart fellat once, for all he saw was an enlarged photograph, two mountains,snow-topped in the distance, and in the foreground, first a mighty pinewith the branches lopped smoothly from the side as though sometremendous ax had trimmed it, behind this a ranch-house, and fartherback the smooth waters of a lake.

  He turned away sadly and had reached the door when something made himturn back and stand once more before the photograph. It was quite thesame, but it took on a different significance as he linked it with thetwo other objects in the room, the picture of his mother and therevolver box. He found himself searching among the forest for thefigures of two great grey men, equal in bulk, such Titans as that wildcountry needed.

  West it must be, but where? North or South? West, and from the Westsurely that grey man at the Garden had come, and from the West John Bardhimself. Those two mountains, spearing the sky with their sharphorns--they would be the pole by which he steered his course.

  A strong purpose is to a man what an engine is to a ship. Suppose a hulllies in the water, stanchly built, graceful in lines of strength andspeed, nosing at the wharf or tugging back on the mooring line, it maybe a fine piece of building but it cannot be much admired. But place anengine in the hull and add to those fine lines the purr of amotor--there is a sight which brings a smile to the lips and a light inthe eyes. Anthony had been like the unengined hulk, moored in gentlewaters with never the hope of a voyage to rough seas. Now that hispurpose came to him he was calmly eager, almost gay in the prospect ofthe battle.

  On the highest hill of Anson Place in a tomb overlooking the waters ofthe sound, they lowered the body of John Bard.

  Afterward Anthony Bard went back to the secret room of his father. Theold name of Anthony Woodbury he had abandoned; in fact, he felt almostlike dating a new existence from the moment when he heard the voicecalling out of the garden: "John Bard, come out to me!" If life was athread, that voice was the shears which snapped the trend of his lifeand gave him a new beginning. As Anthony Bard he opened once more thedoor of the chamber.

  He had replaced the revolver of John Bard in the box with the oiledsilk. Now he took it out again and shoved it into his back trouserpocket, and then stood a long moment under the picture of the woman heknew was his mother. As he stared he felt himself receding to youth, toboyhood, to child days, finally to a helpless infant which that woman,perhaps, had held and loved. In those dark, brooding eyes he strove toread the mystery of his existence, but they remained as unriddled as thefree stars of heaven.

  He repeated to himself his new name, his real name: "Anthony Bard." Itseemed to make him a stranger in his own eyes. "Woodbury" had been aname of culture; it suggested the air of a long descent. "Bard" wasterse, short, brutally abrupt, alive with possibilities of action. Thosepossibilities he would never learn from the dead lips of his father. Hesought them from his mother, but only the painted mouth and the paintedsmile answered him.

  He turned again to the picture of the house with the snow-toppedmountains in the distance. There surely, was the solution; somewhere inthe infinite reaches of the West.

  Finally he cut the picture from its frame and rolled it up. He felt thatin so doing he would carry with him an identification tag--a clue tohimself. With that clue in his travelling bag, he started for the city,bought his ticket, and boarded a train for the West.