Stairs of Sand

by Zane Grey

  Adam swung the long whip round his head, faster and faster until it fairly whistled.

  “HYAR, BUTCH!”

  His stentorian voice filled the canyon with its volume hard, ringing, terrifying. Then he leaped and brought down the whip with tremendous force. It cracked like a pistol.

  Old Butch screamed and jumped as if he had been shot. The black whip slipped off his left front leg just above the fetlock. A huge welt bulged out as if by magic. Butch uttered another sound, not unlike a groan. Then he limped up to Adam and actually laid his head against him.

  “Aha, you old Mohave scoundrel. You haven’t forgotten me,” said Adam, pulling the gray ears.

  Every line of Old Butch had seemingly softened, and he was shaking.

  “Wal, I’ll be doggoned!” ejaculated Merryvale, scratching his grizzled head. “That’s shore a new one on me.”

  “There’s only one place you can hurt a mule,” returned Adam. I’ll bet Butch hasn’t been hit there since I last drove him. Now we can hitch up.”

  Adam threw the whip into the wagon, and leading Butch into place beside the other mule, he threw the harness over him. In a few moments more the team was hitched up and ready.

  “Come, Ruth,” called Adam.

  Without protest she permitted Adam to help her up to the wagon seat.

  “Merryvale, you drive. I’ll go ahead with the burros,” he directed, and turned away.

  “Wal, now, this is shore goin’ to be fine,” replied the old man, as he laboriously climbed to the seat and took up the reins. “I ain’t no crack mule driver, but I’ll rise to the occasion. Now, Ruth, let me put my coat back of you. This heah seat is hard. There…. Giddep, you mules!”

  Adam stalked on ahead, driving the two burros.

  Out of the narrow golden-walled canyon confines into the open!

  The silver-ribbed desert rolled and spread away, down and down, into vast monotony. It smote Ruth mercilessly.

  After a moment she shut the desert out of her consciousness and locked herself with her grief. At last she knew what had become of her mother. The mystery, the uncertainty, the dread were at an end forever. She realized the tragedy now. She had read between the lines of Adam’s story. He had tried to spare her. But the truth was hers in all its stark and naked ghastliness. She buried it deep, never to be uncovered again. And with bowed head and face hidden in her veil she grieved for her mother. The bitterness of loss, the sad memory of past love,—these augmented into dark hopeless misery, into cold pang of laboring breast, into sluggish beat of heart and deadened pulse.

  She endured this black hour, sustained by the one unforgettable fact of her mother’s love, and prayer that she be not victim to the heritage of blood bequeathed her. It was this thought which pierced into the darkness of her soul and brought the first ray of light. By it she groped her way back, slowly dispelling the shadows.

  When again Ruth grew aware of the outside world, she had been carried far across the sands to the rim of the vast desert bowl of southern California.

  Down the sweep of the endless gradual slope three dark figures moved against the wavering heat veils—Wansfell and his two burros.

  Farther on a green spot shone against the glaring red and white—and that was the oasis, Lost Lake. It lay at the foot of the stairs of sand, which in Ruth’s morbid mind, she had been destined never to climb to the heights of freedom. Beyond the sand-bed of the vanished lake, where pale mirages gleamed and sheets of white dust rose, stretched the corrugated desert, disrupted at last by the weird Rio Colorado, beyond which heaved the denuded colored hills of Arizona, rising to dim ghostly ranges.

  Above this boundless scene of desolation arched the copper sky, with half of it a blazing blinding light, too intense for the gaze of man. The morning was half gone and the sun had assumed its full mastery. The heat burned through Ruth’s gloves, and the linen coat which protected her. Yet it was nothing like the heat of mid-summer, and the absence of blowing sand or rising alkali dust, made the day endurable.

  “Wal, we’re shore gettin’ along,” ventured Merryvale, who had from time to time endeavored to draw Ruth out of her stony silence. “Reckon Adam will be stoppin’ to rest the burros when he gets to them palo verde trees. But they’re far off yet from us, an’ he’ll aboot be movin’ again when we get there.”

  Ruth watched the dark figure, markedly tall even at long distance. This desert man had again come into her life, and the promise of agony which had haunted her at Santa Ysabel seemed sure of its fruition.

  “Tell me about him,” she suddenly said to Merryvale.

  “Aboot who? Adam? Wal, there’s a lot to tell aboot that man, an’ I reckon I don’t know one hundredth of what he’s done.”

  “How old is he?” queried Ruth.

  “Wal, he was eighteen when he first come to Picacho, an’ that was precisely eighteen years ago,” replied Merryvale, nodding his head.

  “Only thirty-six!” exclaimed Ruth in astonishment. “Why he’s really young. I didn’t think him old, though…. Picacho? Isn’t that near Yuma?”

  “Shore, twenty miles or more up the river. See that purple peak, all by itself, stickin’ up away over heah. The little black peak is Pilot Knob, as you must know, if you’ve been to Yuma. Wal, Picacho stands to the left.”

  “I see it. How far away?”

  “Reckon it’s over a hundred miles as a bird flies. Picacho—the Peak! The minin’ camp laid right under the mountain. She was a hummer in those days—when Adam happened along. Deserted an’ forgotten now.”

  “It was there Adam thought he’d killed his brother?” went on Ruth.

  “Yep, right there at Picacho,” returned the old man, dreamily, as he flicked the reins over the laboring mules.

  “Why, I wonder? What was the trouble?”

  “Wal, it shore wasn’t no Cain an’ Abel matter,” rejoined Merryvale. “Listen now, Ruth, an’ I’ll tell you somethin’ wonderful an’ sad. I was the first person to know Adam at Picacho. He had come down river from Ehrenburg in a skiff. The minute I seen him I knowed he’d run off from someone. He was shore a tenderfoot, but there never was a more strappin’, fine-lookin’ lad. I took to him on sight an’ I reckon I sowed in him seeds that have borne fruit. He got a job at the mill an’ lodgins at the house of a Mexican. What was his name? Ara-Arallanes. Wal, he had a step-daughter, Margarita, an’ she was a little slip of a greaser girl, like a mescal plant, with eyes that burned you. She lay in wait for Adam, mawnin’ an’ night; an’ the lad, lonely an’ hungry for companionship, soon fell into intimacy with her. Margarita was mad aboot men. An’ Adam was too fine an’ honest for her. He reckoned it his duty to protect her—even marry her.”

  Merryvale paused a moment to gaze across the leagues of sand and stone toward the dim purple peak in the distance.

  “Wal, one day a boat stopped from up-river. There was a lot of passengers an’ one of them turned out to be Adam’s brother. He was the handsomest young man I ever seen, a little older than Adam, an’ more of a man. He was shore a reckless devil. It was easy to see that the wild life of the west had got him … Wal, first thing he ran plumb into Margarita, an’ I reckon it didn’t take him long to win her. She met him more than half way. Arallanes told Adam aboot it, an’ Adam confronted the two on the river bank, as I seen. I didn’t miss much them days, an’ I shore was fond of Adam. Wal, the brothers had it hot an’ heavy over the pretty hussy. She shore enjoyed that. You see Adam wanted to save Margarita from this brother, who he knew had bad influence on women. It was a tough hour for Adam. His brother couldn’t understand this guardianship. An’ at last Adam’s slip, an’ then honest intentions toward Margarita had to come out. What shame for poor Adam! His brother was tremendous surprised that Adam could fall for a little greaser girl. An’ next he was full of fiendish glee. He hated Adam. I seen that plain. An’ right then an’ there he made Margarita jilt Adam.

  “That night I went to the camp an’ into the big gamblin’ hall. Adam was there drinkin�
�. An’ his brother was there gamblin’ an’ losin. He had a friend with him, a sheriff, an’ they wanted money off Adam. ‘You’ll get no more from me,’ said Adam. An’ I learned afterward that this brother had nagged and cheated Adam out of most of the money left by their mother. They had hot words an’ Adam struck his brother, knockin’ him over a table … Wal, I never seen a whiter-faced man than that brother. It all come out then, like burstin’ fire—the hate he’d always had for Adam. My Gawd, but he was beautiful to look at! I’ll never forget…. He made that gamblin’ hell as quiet as a church, as he told in bitin’ speech of Adam’s downfall over a little greaser hussy. Adam—the Sunday School boy—the clean, sweet favorite—mama’s boy—to sink to the level of a minin’ camp’s rag! An’ he scorned Adam, shoutin’, ‘damn your lyin’ milk-sop soul! If only your mother could be heah to know!’ An’ Adam, as if hurt turrible deep, answered: ‘If you speak of my mother heah, I’ll kill you!’

  “An’ that wild brother did speak, hotter an’ fiercer than ever. Adam threw his gun, but the sheriff knocked it up. Then the two brothers closed in desprit fight over the gun. In the struggle it went off … An’ that handsome devil fell over the table with a great widenin’ spot of red on his white shirt. He looked as if death was near. The sheriff yelled: ‘You’ll hang for this!’ … An’ Adam fled.”

  The narrative, broken here by Merryvale, gave Ruth a moment free of suspense, in which she took a deep breath.

  Merryvale raised a brown hand and pointed.

  “You see that crinkly brown range? Wal, it’s the Chocolate Mountains. Somewhere between Yuma an’ the Chocolates, Adam fell on the desert. He’d run miles. He’d gone thirst mad. A prospector named Dismukes found him an’ saved his life. Adam had lost seventy pounds in one day! Fact. The desert—but you know how the desert dries up anythin’. Dismukes was a great man. He saw Adam’s trouble, told him what the desert was—how it made beast or god of man—gave him a burro an’ food an’ set him on the trail he had to follow…. Now look farther along the range—half way. Do you see a green spot?”

  “Yes, I do,” replied Ruth, as she sighted faint color on that sinister background of red.

  “Wal, there’s the first camp Adam made. His burro set fire to his pack an’ then ran off. Adam’s supplies all burned. He was left to perish. He could not go back. He went on. There is an oasis at the west end of the range, an’ Indians live there at certain seasons. Adam reached it. But the Indians were gone. Heah began his fight for life. Slowly he starved. Rabbits an’ birds were scarce an’ finally there was no more. He ate lizards an’ snakes. He grew so weak he could scarcely crawl. Last, he was trying to kill a rattlesnake to eat, when he fell an’ the reptile bit him. Indians came an’ saved his life. He stayed with them a long time, learnin’ the ways of desert life.

  “That was the beginnin’ of Adam’s wanderin’. He grew an’ the desert changed him. Made him like it—like the Eagle. In years to come he got another name. Wansfell, the Wanderer. He knew where there was gold on the desert, but he did not want it. He kept to the lonely waste, seldom visitin’ the mines an’ camps, an’ towns on the border. Evil men—of which there are many on the desert—learned to fear him. He was ever on the side of the weak, the lost—of which, too, there’s many in the desert—an’ he had a turrible avengin’ hand. It has dealt death to many—an’ always, so I’ve heard, they’ve been bad men, such as stole Genie Linwood from her mother. An’ so at last he came down the trails to Santa Ysabel.”

  “Oh, what a life! All for nothing,” murmured Ruth.

  “Wal, I used to think so myself, but I’m changin’. Adam’s life heah in this wasteland has been beyond words of human to tell, even if he knew. I’ve jest given you a few threads to piece together. It don’t take no pains to see he’s great. He told you why he ran away from you at Santa Ysabel. But he didn’t tell you the months of torture out heah, fightin’ to give you up, an’ then fightin’ to surrender to the law. It was right over there in that oasis where he nearly starved eighteen years ago. There he fought such a battle as I reckon no other man ever fought…. I was in Picacho when he came to sacrifice himself. I was the one to tell him aboot his awful mistake—that he hadn’t killed his brother at all. An’ I’ve been with him ever since. An’ it’s since then that I’ve learned Adam’s life when a boy—how he loved this brother who from childhood up robbed him of everything…. By Gawd, that’s the dastard part of it, an’ why I was always sorry he didn’t kill his brother!”

  “Merryvale! What a harsh—a cruel—thing to say!” exclaimed Ruth, aghast at his sudden passion.

  “No matter. Adam was a gentle, kindly boy, favorite of his mother. He loved his brother as I never knew any brother to be loved. An’ in turn he was hated. Always everythin’ he had or wanted went to his brother. Toys sweets, clothes, girls, money—and finally honor. The mother died. Adam gave half his little heritage to save his brother. He fetched him out west, always hopin’. An’ he saw him go the way of the gamblin’ hells. The split came at Ehrenberg an’ then the bitter fight at Picacho…. An’ there goes Adam now, ploddin’ along after eighteen years of hellsfire.”

  After that Merryvale maintained a long silence. And Ruth was absorbing something strange and new about a man’s attitude toward life.

  Meanwhile they reached the palo verdes, pale green trees with shiny trunk and branches and twigs, and a few yellow blossoms. Wansfell had unpacked his burros and was sitting in the shade.

  “Rest here a while,” he said, as Merryvale drove in; and he rose to help Ruth out.

  “How did you stand the ride?” he asked.

  “Quite well, except that I’m tired,” she replied.

  “Walk a little, then sit here. I will fix something comfortable. The worst of the day is still before us, and we had better spend it here.”

  “I remember those palo verdes. Aren’t we near Lost Lake?”

  “Ten miles, perhaps. We will get there in three hours.”

  Ruth threw off hat and coat and walked among the trees. Beside the palo verdes there were numbers of the beautiful and forbidding crucifixion thorn trees, or smoke trees, as the prospectors called them, because at a distance they resembled soft clouds of rising blue smoke. The place was a sandy wash, dry as tinder, from which the heat rose in filmy sheets. There was not a living thing to be seen, not even an ant or a buzzing fly or a passing bee. Yet there seemed to be a faint hum of something in and about the trees.

  Soon Ruth returned to the men. The burros cropped at the brittle weeds; the mules stood motionless, heads low. Merryvale lay on the sand. Adam motioned Ruth to a comfortable place he had arranged with packs and blankets. She was glad to recline there. Face and hands were moist; an oppression of her breast hindered breathing; and her head hurt. What relief to stretch a little and close her eyes! Dull thought faded into blankness and she slept.

  Upon awakening from her siesta Ruth felt free of the headache and the oppression, though she seemed as uncomfortably warm as before. The great blaze of sun had slanted far to the west. Adam called Merryvale to bring the burros for repacking.

  “Ruth,” he said, coming to her side. “I know how you feel. It’s hard. I hated to make you come back. I wanted to take you far away. I love you the same as any other man. Yet I think I have a higher love than that I’ll find happiness in making your burden easier—in keeping my word to your mother.”

  “You shame me,” she replied, with lowered eyes. “I—I wish I could repeat what I said to you in Santa Ysabel. I would if you were any other man. But you’ll never regard me as free.”

  Once more Merryvale drove out upon the glaring desert, this time with a slight wind blowing from behind. It whipped up thin streaks of dust. Adam, stalking ahead, did not gain this time, for the road was freer of sand and had more of a descent. Far across the basin gleamed a wide bar of pale blue water and beyond it loomed dark mountains. There were beauty and sublimity in the grand sweep of this desert, in the range of jagged hills and peaks, glimpses of w
hich Ruth had now and then through her parted veil. What had happened to her that she could see anything but the ghastliness of the desert all around? She pondered over that. It had to do with Adam Wansfell. He began to room in her thought.

  The hours slipped by and towards sunset the dust ceased to blow and the heat lessened. Ruth removed her veil. The green trees and squat adobe huts of the Indians and Mexicans showed plainly now, a mile or more distant. They clustered below the heavy dark patch of verdant foliage which marked the water-hole owned by Caleb Hunt, Ruth’s grandfather. This clump of green hid the house where Ruth lived. Soon the square whitewashed freighting post showed below the green.

  Sight of it reminded Ruth of what lay in wait for her. She experienced a relief at the thought of returning to her grandfather. He would be so overjoyed to see her that he would forget her dereliction. She was stirred then by thought of Stone, and her husband, Guerd Larey. But it was merely curiosity, gratification, excitement. The last twenty-four hours had removed her immeasureably from these men—a consciousness of which dawned vaguely upon her remembrance of them.

  Adam halted his burros just short of the post and waited for Merryvale to come up. They then proceeded under Ruth’s direction. The wide space, rather than street, in front of the post, was deserted. It and the long low white structure had a tinge of faint red from the setting sun. Ruth was glad there did not appear to be anyone to see her return. Assuredly no one had remarked her departure the previous morning with Stone, as it had occurred before daylight.

  What from a distance had resembled an oasis was only a thick hedge of palo verdes, cactus and brush that surrounded a bed of green rushes, and stood somewhat higher than the freighting post. Water from the spring flowed through a pipe to a stone trough.