by Zane Grey
“Bags of bones,” some rider loudly said.
And then Slone drew dose to the excited group. Brackton held the center; he was gesticulating; his thin voice rose piercingly.
“Creech! Whar’s Peg an’ the Roan? Gawd Almighty, man! You ain’t meanin’ them cayuses thar are all you’ve got left of thet grand bunch of hosses?”
There was scarcely a sound. All the riders were still. Slone fastened his eyes on Creech. He saw a gaunt, haggard face almost black with dust—worn and sad—with big eyes of terrible gloom. He saw an unkempt, ragged form that had been wet and muddy, and was now dust-caked.
Creech stood silent in a dignity of despair that wrung Slone’s heart. His silence was an answer. It was Joel Creech who broke the suspense.
“Didn’t I tell you-all what’d happen?” he shrilled. “Parched an’ starved!”
“Aw no!” chorused the riders.
Brackton shook all over. Tears dimmed his eyes—tears that he had no shame for. “So help me Gawd—I’m sorry!” was his broken exclamation.
Slone had forgotten himself and possible revelation concerning him. But when Holley appeared close to him with a significant warning look, Slone grew keen once more on his own account. He felt a hot flame inside him—a deep and burning anger at the man who might have saved Creech’s horses. And he, like Brackton, felt sorrow for Creech, and a rider’s sense of loss, of pain. These horses—these dumb brutes—faithful and sometimes devoted, had to suffer an agonizing death because of the selfishness of men.
“I reckon we’d all like to hear what come off, Creech, if you don’t feel too bad to tell us,” said Brackton.
“Gimme a drink,” replied Creech.
“Wal, damn my old head!” exclaimed Brackton. “I’m gittin’ old. Come on in. All of you! We’re glad to see Creech home.”
The riders filed in after Brackton and the Creeches. Holley stayed close beside Slone, both of them in the background.
“I heerd the flood comin’ thet night,” said Creech to his silent and tense-faced listeners. “I heerd it miles up the canyon. ’Peared a bigger roar than any flood before. As it happened, I was alone, an’ it took time to git the hosses up. If there’d been an Indian with me—or even Joel—mebbe—” His voice quavered slightly, broke, and then he resumed. “Even when I got the hosses over to the landin’ it wasn’t too late—if only someone had heerd me an’ come down. I yelled an’ shot. Nobody heerd. The river was risin’ fast. An’ thet roar had begun to make my hair raise. It seemed like years the time I waited there.… Then the flood came down—black an’ windy an’ awful. I had hell gittin’ the hosses back.
“Next mornin’ two Piutes come down. They had lost mustangs up on the rocks. All the feed on my place was gone. There wasn’t nothin’ to do but try to git out. The Piutes said there wasn’t no chance north—no water—no grass—an’ so I decided to go south, if we could climb over thet last slide. Peg broke her leg there, an’—I—I had to shoot her. But we climbed out with the rest of the bunch. I left it then to the Piutes. We traveled five days west to head the canyons. No grass an’ only a little water, salt at thet. Blue Roan was game if ever I seen a game hoss. Then the Piutes took to workin’ in an’ out an’ around, not to git out, but to find a little grazin’. I never knowed the earth was so barren. One by one them hosses went down.… An’ at last, I couldn’t—I couldn’t see Blue Roan starvin’—dyin’ right before my eyes—an’ I shot him, too.… An’ what hurts me most now is thet I didn’t have the nerve to kill him fust off.”
There was a long pause in Creech’s narrative.
“Them Piutes will git paid if ever I can pay them. I’d parched myself but for them.… We circled an’ crossed them red cliffs an’ then the strip of red sand, an’ worked down into the canyon. Under the wall was a long stretch of beach—sandy—an’ at the head of this we found Bostil’s boat.”
“Wal,—!” burst out the profane Brackton. “Bostil’s boat!… Say, ain’t Joel told you yet about thet boat?”
“No, Joel ain’t said a word about the boat,” replied Creech. “What about it?”
“It was cut loose jest before the flood.”
Manifestly Brackton expected this to be staggering to Creech. But he did not even show surprise.
“There’s a rider here named Slone—a wild-hoss wrangler,” went on Brackton, “an’ Joel swears this Slone cut the boat loose so’s he’d have a better chance to win the race. Joel swears he tracked this feller Slone.”
For Slone the moment was fraught with many emotions, but not one of them was fear. He did not need the sudden force of Holley’s strong hand, pushing him forward. Slone broke into the group and faced Creech.
“It’s not true. I never cut that boat loose,” he declared ringingly.
“Who’re you?” queried Creech.
“My name’s Slone. I rode in here with a wild horse, an’ he won a race. Then I was blamed for this trick.”
Creech’s steady, gloomy eyes seemed to pierce Slone through. They were terrible eyes to look into, yet they held no menace for him. “An’ Joel accused you?”
“So they say. I fought with him—struck him for an insult to a girl.”
“Come round hyar, Joel,” called Creech, sternly. His big, scaly, black hand closed on the boy’s shoulder. Joel cringed under it. “Son, you’ve lied. What for?”
Joel showed abject fear of his father. “He’s gone on Lucy—an’ I seen him with her,” muttered the boy.
“An’ you lied to hurt Slone?”
Joel would not reply to this in speech, though that was scarcely needed to show he had lied. He seemed to have no sense of guilt. Creech eyed him pityingly and then pushed him back.
“Men, my son has done this rider dirt,” said Creech. “You-all see thet. Slone never cut the boat loose.… An’ say, you-all seem to think cuttin’ thet boat loose was the crime.… No! Thet wasn’t the crime. The crime was keepin’ the boat out of the water fer days when my hosses could have been crossed.”
Slone stepped back, forgotten, it seemed to him. Both joy and sorrow swayed him. He had been exonerated. But this hard and gloomy Creech—he knew things. And Slone thought of Lucy.
“Who did cut thet thar boat loose?” demanded Brackton, incredulously.
Creech gave him a strange glance. “As I was sayin’, we come on the boat fast at the head of the long stretch. I seen the cables had been cut. An’ I seen more’n thet.… Wal, the river was high an’ swift. But this was a long stretch with good landin’ way below on the other side. We got the boat in, an’ by rowin’ hard an’ driftin’ we got acrost, leadin’ the hosses. We had five when we took to the river. Two went down on the way over. We climbed out then. The Piutes went to find some Navajos an’ get hosses. An’ I headed fer the Ford—made camp twice. An’ Joel seen me comin’ out a ways.”
“Creech, was there anythin’ left in thet boat?” began Brackton, with intense but pondering curiosity. “Anythin’ on the ropes—or so—thet might give an idee who cut her loose?”
Creech made no reply to that. The gloom burned darker in his eyes. He seemed a man with a secret. He trusted no one there. These men were all friends of his, but friends under strange conditions. His silence was tragic, and all about the man breathed vengeance.
CHAPTER XVI
No moon showed that night, and few stars twinkled between the slow-moving clouds. The air was thick and oppressive, full of the day’s heat that had not blown away. A dry storm moved in dry majesty across the horizon, and the sheets and ropes of lightning, blazing white behind the black monuments, gave weird and beautiful grandeur to the desert.
Lucy Bostil had to evade her aunt to get out of the house, and the window, that had not been the means of exit since Bostil left, once more came into use. Aunt Jane had grown suspicious of late, and Lucy, much as she wanted to trust her with her secret, dared not do it. For some reason unknown to Lucy, Holley had also been hard to manage, particularly today. Lucy certainly did not want Holley to accompany h
er on her nightly rendezvous with Slone. She changed her light gown to the darker and thicker riding-habit.
There was a longed-for, all-satisfying flavor in this night adventure—something that had not all to do with love. The stealth, the outwitting of guardians, the darkness, the silence, the risk—all these called to some deep, undeveloped instinct in her, and thrilled along her veins, cool, keen, exciting. She had the blood in her of the greatest adventurer of his day.
Lucy feared she was a little late. Allaying the suspicions of Aunt Jane and changing her dress had taken time. Lucy burned with less cautious steps. Still she had only used caution in the grove because she had promised Slone to do so. This night she forgot or disregarded it. And the shadows were thick—darker than at any other time when she had undertaken this venture. She had always been a little afraid of the dark—a fact that made her contemptuous of herself. Nevertheless, she did not peer into the deeper pits of gloom. She knew her way and could slip swiftly along with only a rustle of leaves she touched.
Suddenly she imagined she heard a step and she halted, still as a tree-trunk. There was no reason to be afraid of a step. It had been a surprise to her that she had never encountered a rider walking and smoking under the trees. Listening, she assured herself she had been mistaken, and then went on. But she looked back. Did she see a shadow—darker than others—moving? It was only her imagination. Yet she sustained a slight chill. The air seemed more oppressive, or else there was some intangible and strange thing hovering in it. She went on—reached the lane that divided the grove. But she did not cross at once. It was lighter in this lane; she could see quite far.
As she stood there, listening, keenly responsive to all the influences of the night, she received an impression that did not have its origin in sight nor sound. And only the leaves touched her—and only their dry fragrance came to her. But she felt a presence—a strange, indefinable presence.
But Lucy was brave, and this feeling, whatever it might be, angered her. She entered the lane and stole swiftly along toward the end of the grove. Paths crossed the lane at right angles, and at these points she went swifter. It would be something to tell Slone—she had been frightened. But thought of him drove away her fear and nervousness, and her anger with herself.
Then she came to a wider path. She scarcely noted it and passed on. Then came a quick rustle—a swift shadow. Between two steps—as her heart leaped—violent arms swept her off the ground. A hard hand was clapped over her mouth. She was being carried swiftly through the gloom.
Lucy tried to struggle. She could scarcely move a muscle. Iron arms wrapped her in coils that crushed her. She tried to scream, but her lips were tight-pressed. Her nostrils were almost closed between two hard fingers that smelled of horse.
Whoever had her, she was helpless. Lucy’s fury admitted of reason. Then both succumbed to a paralyzing horror. Cordts had got her! She knew it. She grew limp as a rag and her senses dulled. She almost fainted. The sickening paralysis of her faculties lingered. But she felt her body released—she was placed upon her feet—she was shaken by a rough hand. She swayed, and but for that hand might have fallen. She could see a tall, dark form over her, and horses, and the gloomy gray open of the sage slope. The hand left her face.
“Don’t yap, girl!” This command in a hard, low voice pierced her ears. She saw the glint of a gun held before her. Instinctive fear revived her old faculties. The horrible sick weakness, the dimness, the shaking internal collapse all left her.
“I’ll—be—quiet!” she faltered. She knew what her father had always feared had come to pass. And though she had been told to put no value on her life, in that event, she could not run. All in an instant—when life had been so sweet—she could not face pain or death.
The man moved back a step. He was tall, gaunt, ragged. But not like Cordts! Never would she forget Cordts. She peered up at him. In the dim light of the few stars she recognized Joel Creech’s father.
“Oh, thank God!” she whispered, in the shock of blessed relief. “I thought—you were—Cordts!”
“Keep quiet,” he whispered back, sternly, and with rough hand he shook her.
Lucy awoke to realities. Something evil menaced her, even though this man was not Cordts. Her mind could not grasp it. She was amazed—stunned. She struggled to speak, yet to keep within that warning command.
“What—on earth—does this—mean?” she gasped, very low. She had no sense of fear of Creech. Once, when he and her father had been friends, she had been a favorite of Creech’s. When a little girl she had ridden his knee many times. Between Creech and Cordts there was immeasurable distance. Yet she had been violently seized and carried out into the sage and menaced.
Creech leaned down. His gaunt face, lighted by terrible eyes, made her recoil. “Bostil ruined me—an’ killed my hosses,” he whispered, grimly. “An’ I’m takin’ you away. An’ I’ll hold you in ransom for the King an’ Sarchedon—an’ all his racers!”
“Oh!” cried Lucy, in startling surprise that yet held a pang. “Oh, Creech!… Then you mean me no harm!”
The man straightened up and stood a moment, darkly silent, as if her query had presented a new aspect of the case. “Lucy Bostil, I’m a broken man an’ wild an’ full of hate. But God knows I never thought of thet—of harm to you.… No, child, I won’t harm you. But you must obey an’ go quietly, for there’s a devil in me.”
“Where will you take me?” she asked.
“Down in the canyons, where no one can track me,” he said. “It’ll be hard goin’ fer you, child, an’ hard fare.… But I’m strikin’ at Bostil’s heart as he has broken mine. I’ll send him word. An’ I’ll tell him if he won’t give his hosses thet I’ll sell you to Cordts.”
“Oh, Creech—but you wouldn’t!” she whispered, and her hand went to his brawny arm.
“Lucy, in thet case I’d make as poor a blackguard as anythin’ else I’ve been,” he said, forlornly. “But I’m figgerin’ Bostil will give up his hosses fer you.”
“Creech, I’m afraid he won’t. You’d better give me up. Let me go back. I’ll never tell. I don’t blame you. I think you’re square. My dad is.… But, oh, don’t make me suffer! You used to—to care for me, when I was little.”
“Thet ain’t no use,” he replied. “Don’t talk no more.… Git up hyar now an’ ride in front of me.”
He led her to a lean mustang. Lucy swung into the saddle. She thought how singular a coincidence it was that she had worn a riding-habit. It was dark and thick, and comfortable for riding. Suppose she had worn the flimsy dress, in which she had met Slone every night save this one? Thought of Slone gave her a pang. He would wait and wait and wait. He would go back to his cabin, not knowing what had befallen her.
Suddenly Lucy noticed another man, near at hand, holding two mustangs. He mounted, rode before her, and then she recognized Joel Creech. Assurance of this brought back something of the dread. But the father could control the son!
“Ride on,” said Creech, hitting her horse from behind.
And Lucy found herself riding single file, with two men and a pack-horse, out upon the windy, dark sage slope. They faced the direction of the monuments, looming now and then so weirdly black and grand against the broad flare of lightning-blazed sky.
Ever since Lucy had reached her teens there had been predictions that she would be kidnapped, and now the thing had come to pass. She was in danger, she knew, but in infinitely less than had any other wild character of the uplands been her captor. She believed, if she went quietly and obediently with Creech, that she would be, at least, safe from harm. It was hard luck for Bostil, she thought, but no worse than he deserved. Retribution had overtaken him. How terribly hard he would take the loss of his horses! Lucy wondered if he really ever would part with the King, even to save her from privation and peril. Bostil was more likely to trail her with his riders and to kill the Creeches than to concede their demands. Perhaps, though, that threat to sell her to Cordts would frighten the hard old ma
n.
The horses trotted and swung up over the slope, turning gradually, evidently to make a wide detour round the Ford, until Lucy’s back was toward the monuments. Before her stretched the bleak, barren, dark desert, and through the opaque gloom she could see nothing. Lucy knew she was headed for the north, toward the wild canyons, unknown to the riders. Cordts and his gang hid in there. What might not happen if the Creeches fell in with Cordts? Lucy’s confidence sustained a check. Still, she remembered the Creeches were like Indians. And what would Slone do? He would ride out on her trail. Lucy shivered for the Creeches if Slone ever caught up with them, and remembering his wild-horse-hunter’s skill at tracking, and the fleet and tireless Wildfire, she grew convinced that Creech could not long hold her captive. For Slone would be wary. He would give no sign of his pursuit. He would steal upon the Creeches in the dark and— Lucy shivered again. What an awful fate had been that of Dick Sears!
So as she rode on Lucy’s mind was full. She was used to riding, and in the motion of a horse there was something in harmony with her blood. Even now, with worry and dread and plotting strong upon her, habit had such power over her that riding made the hours fleet. She was surprised to be halted, to see dimly low, dark mounds of rock ahead.
“Git off,” said Creech.
“Where are we?” asked Lucy.
“Reckon hyar’s the rocks. An’ you sleep some, fer you’ll need it.” He spread a blanket, laid her saddle at the head of it, and dropped another blanket. “What I want to know is—shall I tie you up or not?” asked Creech. “If I do you’ll git sore. An’ this’ll be the toughest trip you ever made.”
“You mean will I try to get away from you—or not?” queried Lucy.
