Justin Wingate, Ranchman

by John Harvey Whitson

  CHAPTER XVI

  THE WAGES OF SIN

  The knowledge of why Mary had returned so suddenly came first toJustin through Sloan Jasper himself. Jasper met Justin as he rodealong the trail the next day, and told him all about it, withoutveiled words, and with many fierce oaths.

  "He's killed my girl, damn him; broke her heart! She's home, cryin'her eyes out day and night, and all on account of him. She's a fool; Iwouldn't look at the skunk ag'in, if't was me; but she's a woman andthat accounts fer it, and it's killin' her."

  Justin hastened to convey the news to Curtis Clayton, whom he found athome, in the front yard, engaged in freeing a butterfly from thespoke-like web of a geometric spider. A flush of indignation sweptthrough Justin, as the thought came to him that perhaps Clayton hadknown all along and had kept silent. Clayton took the butterfly in hishands and began to remove the clinging mesh from its golden wings.When he had done so his fingers were smeared with its gold dust and itcrawled along unable to fly. He regarded it thoughtfully.

  "I've done the best I could; I released it, but I can't put the goldback on its wings, nor mend them. The rest of its life it will be adraggled wreck, but luckily its life will be short."

  Then Justin told him what he had learned from Sloan Jasper.

  Clayton cast the draggled butterfly away and sank to a seat on thedoor-step. His face filled with a troubled look. For a little while hesaid nothing.

  "I suppose that I am partly to blame for that," he confessed, humbly."I have never talked to you about Mrs. Dudley, but I will tell you nowthat she was once my wife."

  Justin showed no surprise.

  "I knew it."

  "You knew it! How? I never mentioned it to you."

  "No, but I have seen that photograph of her you have treasured, and Isaw her that day of the rabbit hunt. Putting those two thingstogether, with something that Mary told Lucy, made me sure that shehad once been your wife."

  Clayton was bewildered.

  "Something Mary told Lucy?"

  "Yes, about your arm; Mrs. Dudley told Mary how you came to have astiff arm, and though she did not admit that she was the woman whocaused it, and Mary did not suspect it then, Lucy did; and she told meabout it."

  Clayton stared at the butterfly crawling away through the grass.

  "When I heard that Mary had gone with Mrs. Dudley to Denver, I rodeover to Sloan Jasper's to tell him that I feared it was not wise. But,really, I had nothing on which to base a charge, except my suspicions.I knew why I had left her, but nothing more. And my courage failed. Isaid nothing, and I should have said something. But," he leaned backwearily against the door, "when you come to love a woman as I lovedher, Justin, you will perhaps know how I felt, and why I hesitated. Iwas weak, because of that love; that is all I can say about it."

  The contempt growing for Clayton in Justin's heart was swept away. Heknew what love, true love, is; the love which believeth all things,hopeth all things, endureth all things; which changes never, thoughall the world is changed.

  "I loved her," Clayton went on, his deep voice trembling, "and ratherthan say anything that might not be true I said nothing. I did wrong.And I am punished, for this thing hurts me more than you can know."

  Justin had come close to Clayton's heart many times, but never closerthan now. He looked at the suffering man with much sympathy. Claytonswung his stiff arm toward the crawling butterfly.

  "It can never be the same again; I was never the same again, nor canBen be. It has been in the web, and its wings are broken and the goldgone. We think that under given circumstances we would not do certainthings, but we don't know. Environment, heredity, passions of variouskinds, selfishness, pull us this way and that; and when we declare, asso many do, that if we were this person or that we should not do as heor she does, we simply proclaim our ignorance. There is not a manalive who knows himself to the innermost core of his being. I am adozen men rolled into one, and the whole dozen are contemptible. Idespise myself more than you can."

  "Why should you say that?"

  "You did despise me, or came near it, a moment ago; I saw it in yourmanner."

  "Was my manner different? I didn't know it, and didn't intend that itshould be. But I couldn't understand how you could keep still so long,if you knew."

  "I kept still because I am a coward, and because I loved that woman.That explains everything; explains why I am here in Paradise Valley,living like a hermit. I wanted to get away, and I wanted to forget. Igot away, but if one could take the wings of the morning he couldnever out-fly memory. I could never live happily with that woman, andI have never been able to live happily without her. When she came intomy life she wrecked it. Some women are born to that fate, I suppose;and if that is so, perhaps they ought not to be blamed too severely.But I am sorry for Mary Jasper, and I am more than sorry for Ben. Hewas already going to the devil at a lively gait. Sibyl is one of thosewomen whose feet take hold on hell, and she will drag him down withher, if he does not get out of her web, or is not helped out. And I'mafraid he can't be helped out."

  Clayton set out to see Davison, and have a talk with him on thisdisagreeable subject; but, as before when he desired to speak to SloanJasper, he turned back without saying anything.

  Davison seemed not to know what had occurred. He and Fogg went oftento and from Denver, as they continued their work of exploitingParadise Valley for the benefit of their pockets. From Denver they hadbrought an engineer, who had made a survey and report on the availablesources of water. Behind a granite ridge, at the head of the valley,flowed Warrior River, a swift stream that wasted itself uselessly inthe deep gorges that lay to the southwest. The engineer's reportshowed that a tunnel cut through that ridge would pour Warrior Riverinto Paradise Creek and water many thousands of acres of land whichcould not now be touched.

  "We'll do it later," Fogg had said to Davison, when they examined theplans and estimates. "It's going to take too much money right now.We'll try to get those thousands of acres into our own hands first.Then we'll cut that tunnel and build that dam, and we'll squeeze afortune out of the business. We may have to float irrigating bonds,and put blanket mortgages on the land, but it will pay big in theend."

  Davison was subservient to the man who had the Midas touch. It wasstill for Ben, all for Ben; to gain wealth for Ben he was permittinghimself to be led by one who in matters of business never had astraight thought.

  As they returned from Denver one night by a late train, a lantern wasswung across the track at the cut near the head of Paradise Valley, amile above the town. The whistle screamed, and the air-brakes beingapplied, the train came to a stop so suddenly that the passengers werealmost thrown from their seats. Before the grinding of the wheels hadceased shots were heard outside.

  Fogg clutched the big wallet tucked in the inner pocket of his coat.

  "By George, it's a hold-up," he cried, his fat body trembling, "andI've got a thousand dollars in cash here to give to those fool farmerswho wouldn't accept our checks in payment for their land!"

  He sank back into the seat, quivering like a bag of jelly. Fear of theloss of that money unnerved him. Davison was of different mold. As theshots continued, and he heard voices, and saw men jumping from theirseats, he sprang into the aisle, tugging at the revolver he carried inhis hip pocket. Fogg sought to restrain him.

  "Sit down! Don't be a fool! Let the other fellows do the fighting.That's always my rule, and it's a good one. If I'm not troubled here,I'll promise not to trouble anybody."

  But Davison was gone, following close after a man he saw hurrying tothe platform. He and Fogg were in the smoking car, which was next tothe combination baggage-and-express car. Other men dropped from theplatform steps to the ground as he did, and some of them began to fireoff their revolvers, shooting apparently into the air.

  Davison was not a man to waste his ammunition in a mere effort tofrighten the robbers by the rattle of a harmless fusillade. He saw amasked figure moving near the forward car, and he let drive, with aimso true that the ma
sked figure pitched forward on its face. The otherrobbers, disconcerted by the resistance, were already in retreat.

  With a grim feeling of satisfaction Davison called loudly for alantern. One was brought hurriedly; and a train man, whipping out hisknife, severed the strings that held the mask in place over the faceof the slain robber. Fogg was still in the smoker, his fat bodyshaking with fear.

  As the mask dropped aside, the light of the lantern revealed to thestartled gaze of Philip Davison Ben's pallid, dissipated face. He wasbending forward to look, and with a hoarse and inarticulate cry hefell headlong across the body of his son.

  One of the robbers was captured that night, as he attempted to escapeinto the hills. The town and the valley had been aroused. SteveHarkness led the capturing party, and short work was made of thisrobber. When morning dawned a rope and a telegraph pole alone upheldhim from the earth. As the body swung at the sport of the wind, theblackened face was turned now and then toward the flat-toppedmountain. On the breast was displayed this scrawl:

  "SO'S HE CAN LOOK AT THE SCENERY."

  The body was that of Clem Arkwright.