by Zane Grey
“What’s the rash, Jacqueline?” asked Wade, at length.
“We must—get there—first,” panted the girl.
By this time Wade had hazarded a guess at her trouble, and the memory of Hogue’s queer talk and action confirmed it. She led him in a wide detour around the ranch house to the north end where the pines grew thickest on the slope of the knoll. A half moon had begun to silver the trees and sage. The range toward the desert gloomed weird and gray, silent as its shadow. Above towered the bulk of the mountain, black under the stars, and deceivingly clear in the night. Jacqueline led the way in among the pines to a secluded nook, which Wade remembered the sisters had frequented on hot days the preceding summer. A hammock and a bench showed dimly in the moonlight. Jacqueline led Wade in behind these where they could see the little moonlit glade without being visible themselves. She was out of breath from exertion or emotion, no doubt from both.
“Brandon—they meet—here,” she whispered, with tragic incoherence.
“Who meet?” asked Wade, though he had guessed well enough.
“Rona and Hogue. Many nights—since you’ve—been gone. . . . I discovered by accident. I was—sitting at my window—looking out—wondering how you. . . . And suddenly I saw some one in white—gliding along there—and here. Rona! . . . Then Hogue came—the brazen cowboy! Smoking a cigarette. . . . To make sure I went into—Rona’s room. She had fixed her bed— put something in it—that even to the feel fooled me. But she was gone!”
“Well!” ejaculated Wade, soberly. “Damn that cowboy!”
“I don’t believe we can—blame Hogue so much,” went on Jacqueline. “When Rona wants anything—she always gets it. . . . She has developed into a woman—all at once it seems—full of fire and passion. She has grown so strange of late—older, self-contained, dreamy, secretive—and bold as a lioness. I didn’t tell her what I’d seen. But I asked her—about Hogue—if he had made love to her—and she lied. . . . Rona lied!—And she’s just passed sixteen!”
“Sixteen is old enough for a girl to fall in love—to lie—to do anything,” replied Wade, thoughtfully. “But surely this is only a case of boy and girl love? You know.”
“Oh, I don’t know,” wailed Jacqueline. “And I’m terribly afraid.”
“Of what?”
“That they’ve gone so—so far we cain’t—”
“Jacqueline, I swear Hogue wouldn’t take advantage of that child.”
“Oh, you think so,” she exclaimed, grasping at hope. “But how could he help it—if she—if she. . . . Rona has burst out like a full-bloom rose. She takes my breath. . . . And Hogue—that rough, wild, lonely cowboy!—It wouldn’t be natural or human to resist her. It’s just one of those tragedies that cain’t be foreseen.”
“All true,” agreed Wade. “They must be in love—to dare this. I’m sure I wouldn’t blame either of them. Rona is sweet. And Hogue is just what she called him—won—der—ful! All natural and human. I can’t see any shame in it. . . . I know Hogue. He wouldn’t lay a hand on her.”
“No he wouldn’t!—Just you wait,” returned Jacqueline, passionately. “I couldn’t believe my eyes. But I saw.”
“What did you see?” demanded Wade, fearfully.
“I saw Rona run—run into his arms. . . . They stood back up there—right in the open. They stood clasped together. A long time! Then Hogue picked Rona up and packed her down here.”
“My God! It’s the real thing. . . . But Jacqueline—that doesn’t mean the crazy kids have. . . . I tell you I know Hogue wouldn’t lose his head that far.”
“How do you know?”
“I don’t know how I know. I just feel it,” said Wade, thoughtfully. “Hogue is no common sort. He had gone to the bad, sure. He told me. It was for a crippled sister. His people were poor. They had a hard time. . . . I found Hogue before he had become actually a criminal. Believe me, he snatched at the chance I gave him to go straight. And he has been just fine. I mustn’t forget to tell you that when he saw Rona first he begged me to let him go. I reckon he fell then. But I wouldn’t let him go. . . . Later, one day he told me it had happened—he was crazy about her, and wanted to go get himself killed. Well, I talked him out of it. Jacqueline, despite the look of this, I’ll gamble on Hogue’s honor.”
“Oh—I’ve hated myself—for being so suspicious,” whispered Jacqueline, beginning to cry from over-emotion and relief. “But it scared me so. Rona is the apple of Dad’s eye. He’d kill Hogue if—if. . . . He’d be furious in any event. . . . Oh, I’m glad— you’re back. I’ve been so helpless. . . . Somehow—I rely—on you.”
She wept quietly, but unrestrainedly, and one look at her so close, so helpless in her trouble and her trust in him, was enough for Wade. He felt a great current sweeping him on and on toward a maelstrom.
“Don’t cry, Jacqueline,” he said, a little huskily. “I’ll help you. Maybe it’s not so bad. . . . But what are we doing here, spying on them. Hogue is a cowboy—a woodsman. He’ll catch us.”
“Much you know about love, Mr. Brandon,” replied Jacqueline. “Neither of them could heah—the crack of doom.”
“Even so, Hogue will hear you, if you don’t stop crying.”
“I’ll stop. This is the first time—I’ve broken down,” she said, wiping her eyes. “Your being heah with me—sharing it—standing so loyally by Hogue—just—”
“Quiet!” whispered Wade in her ear. “They’re coming.” And he drew Jacqueline a little farther back in the shadow. He had heard a light step—too light for the boot of a cowboy unused to walking.
Wade saw a gliding shadow. It vanished—again appeared. Jacqueline saw it, too, for she clutched Wade’s warning hand. Then a white slender form came out in the moonlight. Rona! Her hair shone silver. She had the poise of a listening deer, but there was no hint of fear in her intensity. She was an alert girl, impatient for her lover. What a picture she made! Wade was moved to his depths. Could any man, much less a lonely unloved cowboy, resist that youth, loveliness, desire?
Suddenly Rona’s slender form appeared to leap! She had heard what she expected. Running to the bench she sat down with her back toward the moonlit aisle down which she expected Hogue to come. The posture she assumed was one of indifference. How strange compared to her former lithe intentness, her listening passion.
Wade saw the red fire of a cigarette before he made out the tall cowboy. Hogue came on slowly and stealthily, and when he gained the aisle his cigarette no longer burned. He peered into the shadow. Sight of Rona completely overcame the caution of his slow approach. Then he reached her, spoke in a low tender tone.
“You’re late,” she replied, petulantly.
“I’m sorry. Just couldn’t help it. Thet outfit an’ your Dad Then Tex—”
“If you loved me you’d not let anyone, even Tex, keep you.”
“Love you? My Gawd, girl, I’m mad about you. I’m riskin’ my life—for Pencarrow would kill me—an’ what’s more I’m riskin’ more. Tex’s friendship an’ respect.”
“But, darling, I haven’t been with you for three whole days,” protested Rona, passionately.
“Haven’t I longed for you? Haven’t I watched you from afar? Haven’t I looked at the light in your window till it went out, night after night?”
“You like to talk to those cowboys,” replied Rona, jealously. “You’d rather play cairds. And now that Tex is back, you forget me.”
“Rona, be sensible,” said Hogue, patiently. “I didn’t forget you. I lied to Tex, tryin’ to get out of somethin’. Told him I was sick.”
“Get out of what?” queried Rona, her lovely head coming erect.
“Aw, never mind. But it took my nerve.”
“Hogue!—What did Tex want?”
“Wal, he’s leavin’ for town in the mornin’. Takin’ Hal, Kid, Bilt an’ me. I tried to get out of it. Tex was some surprised. He looked at me—an’ did I sink into my boots? Then he said sort of contemptuous thet Pd let him go to Holbrook when there was a
shore chance he’d run into a fight. I just couldn’t back out—”
“Fight?” cried Rona.
“Shore they’ll be a fight. Blue an’ his rustlers are up thet way. Been to Winslow. An’ it’s ten to one we’ll run into them at Holbrook. I couldn’t fail Tex. He wants me. I’d be so damn proud I’d bust if it wasn’t for you. I’m so in love with you I can’t be half a man. But I’m goin’. I wouldn’t miss seein’ Brandon fight Holbrook Kent for anythin’ in the world.”
Wade became aware of more than his reaction to Hogues passion and Rona’s sudden awakening. Jacqueline gave a start. She gripped Wade’s hand tight. But it was fear for him in her distended eyes that shook his nerve. A convulsed cry from Rona prevented any wild response in Wade to Jacqueline’s fear for his life.
Rona had leaped up to throw her arms around Hogue’s neck. Murmuring brokenly, incoherently, she pulled him to her, kissing him passionately, clasping him with frantic hands. Hogue manifestly resisted this avalanche of terror and love until it overcame him. Then he lifted her off the ground and lavished on her all the wild caresses of which any cowboy could have been capable. When he put her down she seemed so spent and weak that she could not stand without his support.
“Rona. Some day—you’ll make—me less than half—a man,” he panted.
“But—I love you. Hogue, I love you. I’m frightened,” she sobbed.
“Shore you are. But you gotta be game. Why can’t you have nerve like your sister?”
“Jacque—Pooh! You don’t know—what I know. . . . Hogue, I try to be brave. I have been and happy, too, since you’ve been heah. But now—you’re going away with that devil, Tex Brandon —to fight. . . . You might be—be—”
“Darlin’, the chances are a hundred to one against my bein’ hurt. Ain’t you gambler enough to take that long chance? Tex has only an even chance. An‘ he’ll get killed or bad shot, shore, before he’s done all he’s set himself.”
“But if you were shot. . . . Oh, Hogue, what’d I do?”
“I won’t be shot. I’ll hide, dodge—I’ll be bulletproof.”
“Listen,” she cried, excitedly, leaning back with her hands locked behind his neck. “When you get back this time, will you run off with me? . . . To Winslow! And—and marry me there?”
“Aw, Rona!” gasped Hogue. “I can’t do thet. I can’t. . . . Tex trusts me. Your Dad trusts me. They’re gonna make me foreman now that Tex is a pardner. . . . Your sister would despise me.”
“She would not. Jacque loves you, like a sister. Hogue, they couldn’t do a single thing. Dad would raise the roof. But let him. Tex would beat you an’ he’d look scorn at me with his terrible eyes. But let him. . . . We’d be married. It’d be too late!”
“Rona, for Gawd’s sake, listen to me. I love you. An’ I’ll die for you. But I won’t dishonor you! I won’t put shame on you.”
“Hogue, darling, there is no dishonor in eloping. We just cain’t wait,” replied the temptress.
“You don’t know I was an outlaw—a rustler—when Tex got hold of me,” said Hogue, hoarsely.
“What?”
“I was. Shore if you split hairs on it, as Tex did. I hadn’t gone plumb to the bad yet. But I know. . . . Wal, I’d have to wipe thet out, an’ square the debt of cattle I stole—even if it wasn’t for myself, before I ever, ever dare to ask Pencarrow for you. Now, unless you’re gonna make it wuss for me, you’ll change your tune.”
“Forgive me, Hogue,” she pleaded. “You’ve been won—der— full! You told me before I fell in love with you—that you’d been a wild hombre. But I didn’t know—didn’t guess. . . . Hogue, I don’t care what you’ve been. I love you. I’ll be true to you. . . . If only you’ll not let that cold-blooded, flint and steel Brandon thrust you into the very teeth of death. Oh, he’s so hard, so relentless. Hal just told me how Brandon shot Mason and hanged Harrobin to a post in the main street of Quirts.”
“Wal, your brother ought to be kicked for telling an’ I’ll shore do thet little job,” replied Hogue, grimly. “An’ you’re all wrong about Tex. Shore he’s got two sides to him. But thet hard one is the gunman, an’ thet ain’t uppermost one tenth the time.”
“I like Tex. He fascinates me. But now I almost hate him. He is unhuman.”
“I’m surprised at you, Rona. But I’ll make allowance for the way you feel. Only I hate to see you so set in a wrong idee. Tex Brandon is the finest, biggest hearted, most unselfish man I ever knew.”
“Hogue, he hasn’t got a heart,” retorted Rona.
“What makes you say thet when I tell you he has?”
“Well, one reason, a woman’s reason, if you will—he’s the only man who ever saw Jacqueline and was like the very rocks toward her. He has insulted her, snubbed her, avoided her. It wouldn’t have mattered if Jacque hadn’t taken it amiss. She likes that man, Hogue, and he hurt her.”
“Wal, if thet’s one of your reasons I don’t want to hear the others. An’ I’m gonna make you crawl, Rona Pencarrow. . . . When I found out I was tumble in love with you I went to Tex an’ I told him. I confessed. An’ I begged him to let me go before I made a fool of myself an’ brought trouble to you. I told him I couldn’t endure it. An’ when he refused again I called him much what you just called him. I was leavin’ when he made me come back. . . . Then he told me what he was endurin’. From the very first sight of Jacqueline he had loved her—the first an’ only girl he ever loved. It grew an’ grew until it was the very breath of his life. But he had to hide it. He could never dream of her love—of havin’ her—of all thet’s so dear to a lonely man. . . . Why Tex near died when thet McComb fellow was here, hangin’ around Jacqueline. I saw thet an’ I was sorry for him. He has all the tumble feelin’s of a lover who can’t ever tell his love, let alone have the touch of hands and lips—all thet you an’ I know are 30 precious. . . . But Tex would not leave her. He would not ride off thinkin’ of himself, of his unrequited love, when your father was harassed to ruin. No, by Gawd! he wouldn’t. An’ thet settled me. I’d been happy to do the same if you hadn’t found me out— an’ kissed me—an’ made me like wax. . . . But I just couldn’t let you think ill of Tex. An’ I beg you to keep his secret as I’ve kept it till now.”
“Oh, how won—der—ful!” cried Rona. “That makes me see. . . . Oh, I’m sorry for any pighaidedness. . . . I’ll love Tex now. I always wanted to. . . . How strange!—What would Jacque say?”
“Lord only knows. Women are queer. Don’t you ever tell her unless you want to lose me.”
“I swear. I cross my heart. . . . Oh, Hogue, you’ve lifted the burden there. But, darling, what will we do?”
“Wait. Thet’s all. I’ve got the grandest chance thet ever came to a no-good cowboy. Tex will help me. All I gotta do is be with him. He’ll clean out these rustlers. An’ if he’s killed—which I pray he never is—I’ll go on with his work. Peace an’ prosperity will come to this range. I see it, Rona. An’ then with all thet’s black against me washed off an’ forgotten—then I may dare to ask Pencarrow for the most precious creature Gawd ever put breath into.”
“Oh, Hogue, you have made me ashamed—and glad—and happy all at once,” said Rona. “What a brainless little wretch I am. . . . But kiss me. I pledge myself. I am yours.”
“Bless you, precious,” replied Hogue, his arms tightening about her. “Come now. You must go. Don’t worry about me. . . .”
Their voices trailed into silence and their forms melted into the shadows. Wade stood motionless, hardly breathing. The world had come to an end for him. Yet somehow he was glad.
Jacqueline slipped her hand from his. For the moment she seemed concerned mostly with her sister’s romance.
“They will never know what they have to forgive in me,” she said. “Tex Brandon, your faith, your bigness put me to shame. . . . I shall help them. I shall win Dad for them.”
“And I will have a care for Hogue, though I’d never dare to make him shirk danger,” replied Wade.
�
�Will you have a care for yourself?” she asked.
“That I cannot promise. There are times when sheer coldblooded nerve carries a man like me through. But I am not heedless, ever.”
She walked out of the shade into the moonlight and stood by the bench where Rona had waited. Wade followed with hesitation. He could not stay here a moment longer.
“It’s getting late,” he said, huskily.
“Yes. But I want to stay here to think—alone—”
Then I’ll go. Good night.”
She stood white and still, her profile turned clear and beautiful in the moonlight. She did not look at him or offer her hand. Silently and swiftly he turned away only to be halted by her voice.
“Did you call?” he queried.
“Yes. . . . Good night, friend of the Pencarrows,” she said, softly.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
ONCE away from the softening influence of the Pencarrows, Wade caught up with his single and relentless purpose. He did not let his incredible luck undermine the imperative need for eternal vigilance. Even the trees and the stones were enemies. Spring brought more than balmy air and green grass to that range. It brought action for dark riders who had been holed up all winter.
How soon Rand Blue would learn of the fight in Red Gulch and the breaking of that large faction of the rustlers was a matter of conjecture for Wade. Rumor did not fly over ruddy roads. Blue had been seen in Winslow. The chances were that he would not learn of the death of Mason and Harrobin until he went back to Pine Mound.
Wade found travel slow and irksome. When he rode horseback he had to confine his pace to that of the wagons. But up on the plateau the road had dried out, and the drivers made up for dragging mud. They reached Holbrook after dark and unhitched at the corrals just outside of town. Wade called his cowboys together.
“We’ll split up and slip into town,” he said. “Hogue, you go alone. Kid, you and Bilt go together. Hal, you go alone, and be sure no one sees you. Keep in the dark. I’ll follow. The idea is to find out if Blue’s gang is in town before they find out we are. Caution is the word. We’ll come back here and sleep in the wagons.”
