by Zane Grey
Rhoda was glad to pillow her head on her arm but it was long before she slept. She tried to piece together her faint and distorted recollection of the occurrences since the morning when the mesa had risen through the dawn. But her only clear picture was of John DeWitt’s wild face as she disappeared into the fissure. She recalled its look of agony and sobbed a little to herself as she realized what torture he and the Newmans must have endured since her disappearance. And yet she was very hopeful. If her friends could come as close to her as they did before the mesa, they must be learning Kut-le’s methods. Surely the next time luck would not play so well for the Indian.
Rhoda woke in the morning to the sound of song. Marie knelt on the ground before a sloping slab of stone and patiently kneeded corn with a smaller stone. Her song, a quaint repetition of short mellow syllables pleased Rhoda’s sensitive ear and she lay listening. When Marie saw Rhoda’s wide eyes she came to the girl’s side.
“You feel good now?” she queried.
“Yes, much better. I want to get up.”
The Indian woman nodded.
“Marie clean white squaw’s clothes. White squaw wear Marie’s. Now Marie help you wash.”
Rhoda smiled.
“You are not an Apache if you want me to bathe!”
Marie answered indignantly.
“Marie is Pueblo squaw!”
The clothes that Marie brought, Rhoda thought very attractive. There was a soft wool underdress of creamiest tint. Over this Marie pulled, fastening it at one shoulder, a gay, many-colored overdress which, like the one she herself wore, reached to the knees. Rhoda pulled on her own high laced boots which had been neatly mended. Then the two turned their attention to the neglected braid of hair.
When it was loosened and hung in tangled masses nearly to Rhoda’s knees, Marie’s delight in its loveliness knew no expression. She fetched a queer battered old comb which she washed and then proceeded with true feminine rapture to comb the wonderful waving locks. In the midst of this Kut-le entered. He gazed on Rhoda’s new disguise with delight. Indeed her delicate face, above the many-hued garment, was like a harebell growing in a gaudy nasturtium bed.
“We can only let you on the roof,” said Kut-le, who was carrying Rhoda’s sombrero.
Rhoda made no reply but when Marie had plaited her hair in a rippling braid she followed Kut-le up the short ladder. Her sense of cleanliness after the weeks of disorder was delightful. As she stepped on the flat-topped roof and the sweet clear air filled her lungs she felt as if reborn. With Navajo blankets, Kut-le had contrived an awning that not only made a bit of shade but precluded view from below. The rich tints of the blankets were startlingly picturesque against the yellow gray of the adobe. Rhoda, dropped luxuriantly to the heap of blankets and turned her face toward the mountain, many-colored and bare toward the base, deep-cloaked with piñon, oak and Juniper on the uplands. From its base flowed the little river, gurgling over its shallow bed of stone and rich with green along its flat banks. Close beside the river was the Pueblo village, the many-terraced buildings, on one of the roofs of which Rhoda sat.
Kut-le, stretched on the roof near by, smoked cigarette after cigarette as he watched the girl’s quiet face, but he did not speak. For three or four hours the two sat thus in silence. Just as the sun sank behind the mountain, a bell clanged and then fell to tolling softly. Then Kut-le broke his silence.
“That’s the bell of the old mission. Some one has been buried, I guess. We can look. There are no tourists now.”
There was a sound of wailing: a deep mournful sound that caught Rhoda’s heart to her throat and blanched her face. It was the sound of the grief of primitive man, the cry of the forlorn and broken-hearted, uncloaked by convention. It touched a primitive chord of response in Rhoda that set her to trembling. Surely, when the world was young she too had wept so. Surely she too had voiced a poignant, unbearable loss in just such a wild outpouring of grief!
They moved to the edge of the terrace and looked below into the street. Down the rocky way a line of Indians was bearing hand-mills and jars and armloads of ornaments.
“They will take those to the ‘killing place’ and break them that the dead owner may have them afterward,” explained Kut-le softly. “It always makes me think of a verse in the Bible. I can’t recall the words exactly though.”
Rhoda glanced up into the dark face with a look of appreciation.
“‘And the grinders shall cease because they are few!’” she said, “‘and those that look out of the windows be darkened. And the doors shall be shut in the street when the sound of the grinding is low, because man goeth to his long home and mourners go about the street.’”
“And there is something else,” murmured Kut-le, “about ‘the silver cord.’”
“‘Or ever the silver cord be loosed or the golden bowl be broken or the pitcher be broken at the fountain or the wheel broken at the cistern. Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was and the spirit to God who gave it.’”
They stood in silence again. The wailing died into the distance. The sun touched to molten gold the heavy shadows of the mountain arroyos. Rhoda was deeply moved by the scene below her. She felt as if she had been thrust back through the ages to look upon the sorrow of some little Judean town. The little rocky street, the vivid robes, the weird, dying wail, the broken ornaments and utensils that some folded tired hands would use no more, and, above all, the simple unquestioning faith, roused in her a sudden longing for a life that she never had known. For a long time she stood in thought. As darkness fell she roused herself.
“Let me go back to my room,” she said.
As they turned, neither noticed that Rhoda’s little handkerchief, which she had carried through all her experiences, fluttered from her sleeve to the street.
Again it was long before Rhoda slept. Through her window there floated the sound of song, the evening singing of Indian lads in the village street. There was a vibrant quality in their voices that Rhoda could liken only to the music of stringed instruments. There was neither the mellow smoothness of the negro voice nor the flute-like sweetness of the white, yet the voices compassed all the mystical appealing quality of violin notes.
The music woke in Rhoda a longing for she knew not what. It seemed to her as if she were peering past a misty veil into the childhood of the world to whose simple beauty and delights civilization had made her alien. The vibrating voices chanted slower and slower. Rhoda stirred uneasily. To be free again as these voices were free! Not to long for the civilization she had left but for open skies and trails! To be free again!
As the voices melted into silence, a guitar was touched softly under Rhoda’s window and Kut-le’s voice rose in La Golondrina:
“Whither so swiftly flies the timid swallow?
What distant bourne seeks her untiring wing?
To reach her nest what needle does she follow
When darkness wraps the poor wee storm-tossed thing?”
Rhoda stirred restlessly and threw her arms above her head.
“To build her nest near to my couch I’ll call her!
Why go so far dark and strange skies to seek?
Safe would she be, no evil should befall her,
For I’m an exile sad, too sad to weep!”
Mist-like floated across Rhoda’s mind a memory of the trail with voice of mating bird at dawn, with stars and the night wind and the open way. And going before, always Kut-le—Kut-le of the unfathomable eyes, of the merry smile, of the gentle touch. The music merged itself into Rhoda’s dreams.
She spent the following day on the roof. Curled on her Navajo she watched the changing tones on the mountains and listened to the soft voices of the Pueblo women in the street below. Naked brown babies climbed up and down the ladders and paddled in the shallow river Indian women with scarlet shawls acr
oss their shoulders filled their ollas at the river and stood gossiping, the brimming ollas on their heads. In the early morning the men had trudged to the alfalfa and melon fields and returned at sundown to be greeted joyfully by the women and children.
Kut-le spent the day at Rhoda’s side. They talked but little, though Rhoda had definitely abandoned her rule of silence toward the Indian. Her mind during most of the day was absorbed in wondering why she so enjoyed watching the life in this Indian town and why she was not more impatient to be gone.
As the sun dropped behind the mountain Marie appeared on the roof, her black eyes very bright.
“Half-breed Philip find white squaw’s handkerchief. Give to white men, maybe! Marie see Philip get handkerchief from little girl.”
Kut-le gave Rhoda an inscrutable look, but she did not tell him that she shared his surprise.
“Well,” said Kut-le calmly, “maybe we had better mosey along.”
They descended to find Marie hastily doing up a bundle of bread and fruit. While Kut-le went for blankets Rhoda, at Marie’s request, donned her old clothing of the trail. She had been wearing the squaw’s holiday outfit. Very shortly, with a hasty farewell to Marie, they were in the dusky street. “Shall I gag you,” asked Kut-le, “or will you give me your word of honor to give neither sign nor sound until we get to the mountain, and to keep your face covered with your Navajo?”
Rhoda sighed.
“Very well, I promise,” she said.
In a very short time they had reached the end of the little street and were climbing an arroyo up into the mountain. When they reached the piñons Kut-le gave the coyote call. It thrilled Rhoda with the misery of the night of her capture. Almost immediately there was an answering call and close in the shadow of the piñon they found Alchise and the two squaws. Molly ran to Rhoda with a squeal of joy and patted the girl’s hand but Alchise and Cesca gave no heed to her greeting.
The ponies were ready and Rhoda swung herself to her saddle, with a thrill at the touch of the muscular little horse. And once more she rode after Kut-le with the mystery of the night trail before her.
The sound of water falling, the cheep of wakening birds, the subtle odor of moisture-drenched soil roused Rhoda from her half sleep on the horse’s back at the end of the night’s journey. The trail had not been hard, through an endless pine forest for the most part. Kut-le drew rein beside a little waterfall deep in the mountain fastness. Rhoda saw a chaos of rock masses huge and distorted, as if an inconceivably cruel and gigantic hand had juggled with weights seemingly immovable; about these the loveliness of vine and shrub; above them the towering junipers dwarfed by the rocks they shaded; and falling softly over the harsh brown rifts of rock, the liquid green and white of a mountain brook which, as it reached the level, rushed away in a roar of foam.
Rhoda’s horse drank thirstily and she stood beside him watching the mystical gray of the dawn lift to the riotous rose of the sunrise. She wondered at the quick throb of her pulse. It was very different from its wonted soft beat. Then she threw herself on her blanket to sleep.
When Rhoda woke, late in the day, Kut-le had spread Marie’s cakes and fruit on leaves which he had washed in the brook.
“They are quite clean, I think,” he said a little anxiously. “At least the squaws haven’t touched them.”
Rhoda and Kut-le sat on a rock and ate hungrily. When she had finished Rhoda clasped her hands about her knees. She looked singularly boyish, with her sombrero pushed back from her face and short locks of damp hair curling from beneath the crown.
“Isn’t it queer,” she said, “that you elude Jack and John DeWitt so easily?”
“The trouble is,” said Kut-le, “that you don’t appreciate the prowess of your captors.”
“Humph!” sniffed Rhoda.
“Listen!” cried Kut-le with sudden enthusiasm. “Once in my boyhood Geronima and about twenty warriors, with twice as many squaws and children, fled to the mountains. They never drew rein until they were one hundred and twenty miles from the reservation. Then for six months they were pursued by two thousand American soldiers and they never lost a man!”
“How many whites were killed?” asked Rhoda.
“About a hundred!”
“I don’t understand yet,” Rhoda shook her head, “how savages could outwit whites for so long a time.”
“But it’s not a contest of brains. Whites must travel like whites, with food and rests. The Apache travels like the coyote, living off the country. Your ancestors have been training your brain for a thousand years. Mine have spent centuries of days, twenty-four hours a day, training the body to endure hardships. You have had a glimpse of what the hardships of this country might mean to a white!”
As Kut-le talked, Rhoda sat with her eyes fastened on the rough face of a distant rock. As she watched she saw a thick, leafy bush move up to the rock. Rhoda caught her breath, glanced at the unconscious Kut-le, then back at the bush. It moved slowly back among the trees and after a moment Rhoda saw the undergrowth far beyond move as with a passing breeze. She glanced at the nodding Alchise and the squaws, then smiled and turned to Kut-le.
“Go on with your boasting, Kut-le. It’s your one weakness, I think.”
Kut-le grinned.
“Well now, honestly, what do you think that a lot of Caucasians can do with an enemy whose existence has always been a fist to fist fight with nature at her cruelest? We have fought with our bare hands and we have won,” he continued, half to himself. “No white man or any number of whites can capture me on my own ground!”
“Boaster!” laughed Rhoda.
Just beyond the falls an aspen quivered. John DeWitt stepped into view. Haggard and wild-eyed, he stared at Rhoda. She raised her finger to her lips, but too late. Kut-le too looked up, and raised his gun. Rhoda hurled herself toward him and struck up the barrel. Kut-le dropped the gun and caught Rhoda in his arms.
“The woods are full of them!” he grunted. With one hand across Rhoda’s mouth, he ran around the falls and dropped six feet to a narrow back trail.
“My own ground!” Rhoda heard him chuckle.
CHAPTER XIV
THE BEAUTY OF THE WORLD
For many hurrying minutes, Rhoda saw only the passing tree branches black against the evening sky as she lay across Kut-le’s breast. The pursuers had made no sound nor had Kut-le broken a single twig. The entire incident might have been a pantomime, with every actor tragically intent.
Having long learned the futility of struggling, Rhoda lay quietly enough, her ears keen to catch the sound of pursuit. Kut-le did not remove his hand from her mouth. But as he dropped rapidly and skilfully down the mountainside he whispered:
“My own ground, you see! It will take them a good while in the dusk to find that back trail. Only a few Indians know it.”
But Rhoda’s heart was beating high. Let Kut-le boast as he would, she was sure that Jack and John DeWitt were learning to follow the trail. The most vivid picture in her mind was of the utter weariness of John’s face. In the past weeks Rhoda had learned how fearful had been the hardships that would bring such weariness to a human face. Tears came to her eyes. No one so weak, so useless as herself, she felt, could be worth such travail.
Silently they moved through the dusk. Rhoda knew that the other Indians must be close behind them, yet no sound betrayed their presence. After a half-hour or so she struggled to be set down. But Kut-le only tightened his hold and it was fully two hours later that he set her on her feet.
“Don’t move,” he said. “We are on a cañon edge.”
Rhoda swung her blanket to her shoulders, for the night was stinging sharp. She was not afraid. She had grown so accustomed to the night trail that she moved unhesitatingly along black rims that had at first paralyzed her with fear.
“Now,” said Kut-le, “I’m
not going to travel on foot. The only horses within easy distance are some that a bunch of Navajos have in the cañon below here. So we will go down and get them. We will go together because I can’t risk coming back for you. We will have to hike pronto after we get ’em. Just remember that you are contaminated by the company you are keeping and that if you make any noise, the Navajos will shoot you up, with the rest of us! Keep right behind me.”
The little group moved carefully down the cañon trail. In a short time they reached a growth of trees. They stole through these, the only sound Rhoda’s panting breaths. Suddenly Kut-le stopped.
“Wait here!” he breathed in Rhoda’s ear, and he and Alchise disappeared.
A hand was laid on her arm and Rhoda knew that Molly and Cesca were guarding her. Almost immediately the soft thud of hoofs was upon them. Kut-le seized Rhoda and tossed her to a pony’s back.
“It was dead easy!” he whispered. “They were all asleep! I even took a saddle for you! Now hike!”
Rhoda gripped her pony with her knees as the little fellow cantered unerringly through the darkness after Kut-le. She felt a sudden pride and exultation in the security she had developed in the saddle during the travail of her night rides. She knew that no man of her acquaintance could ride a horse as she could now. And with the exultation she was trembling with excitement. She knew that none of them could expect mercy if the Navajos discovered their loss in time to take up the chase. All the eagerness of the gambler who stakes his life on a throw of the dice; all the wild thrill of the chase; all the trembling of the panting, woodland things that hunt and are hunted, were Rhoda’s as the night wind rushed past her face. The apathy of illness was gone. Tonight she was as wild a thing as the night’s birds that brushed across their trail on sweeping wing.
When they made camp at dawn Rhoda tumbled into her blanket and was asleep before Alchise finished covering their trail. When she woke she found that they were camped in a strange eerie. They were high up on a mountain on a shelf that gave back into a shallow cave. In front, facing the desert, was a heap of rock that formed a natural rampart. A tiny spring bubbled from the cave floor. Here the little party would seem as secure in their dizzy seclusion as eagles of the Andes.
