Wanderer Of the Wasteland (1982)

by Grey, Zane

  "An' you saw the young driver through his trouble?"

  "That I did. And it was more trouble than he told us then. The boss Carricks had was low-down and cunning. He's got smitten with the lad's wife--a pretty girl, but frail in health. He kept Carricks on jobs away from home. We didn't meet the lad any too soon."

  "Humph! That's got a familiar sound to me," declared Dismukes. "Wansfell, what'd you do to thet low-down boss?"

  "Go on with your story," replied Adam.

  "Aha! That's so. I want to make Two Palms Well before dark...Wansfell, like a horned-toad on the desert, I changed my outside at Frisco. Alas! I imagined all within--blood--mind--soul had changed!...Went to Denver, St. Louis, an' looked at the sights, not much disappointed, because my time seemed far ahead. Then I went to my old home. There I had my first jar. Folks all dead! Not a relation livin'. Could not even find my mother's grave. No one remembered me an' I couldn't find anyone I ever knew. The village had grown to a town. My old home was gone. The picture of it--the little grey cottage--the vines an' orchard--lived in my mind. I found the place. All gone! Three new houses there. Forty years is a long time! I didn't build the church or set out a park for the village of my boyhood...Then I went on to Chicago, Philadelphia, New York. Stayed long in New York. At first it fascinated me. I felt I wanted to see it out of curiosity. I was lookin' for some place, somethin' I expected. But I never saw it. The hotels, theatres, saloons, gamblin' hells, an' worse--the operas an' parks an' churches--an' the wonderful stores--I saw them all. Men an' women like ants rushin' to an' fro. No rest, no sleep, no quiet, no peace! I met people, a few good, but most bad. An' in some hotels an' places I got to be well known. I got to have a name for throwin' gold around. Men of business sought my acquaintance, took me to dinners, made much of me--all to get me to invest in their schemes. Women! Aw! the women were my second disappointment! Wansfell, women are like desert mirages. Beautiful women, in silks an' satins, diamonds blazin' on bare necks an' arms, made eyes at me, talked soft an' sweet, an' flattered me an' praised me an' threw themselves at me--all because they thought I had stacks an' rolls an' bags of gold. Never a woman did I meet who liked me, who had any thought to hear my story, to learn my hope! Never a kind whisper! Never any keen eye that saw through my outside!

  "Well, I wasn't seein' an findin' the life I'd hoped for. That New York is as near hell as I ever, got. I saw men with quiet faces an' women who seemed happy. But only in the passin' crowds. I never got to meet any of them. They had their homes an' troubles an' happiness, I figured, an' they were not lookin' for anyone to fleece. It was my habit to get into a crowd an' watch, for I come to believe the mass of busy, workin' ordinary people were good. Maybe if I'd somehow made acquaintance with a few of them it 'd have been better. But that wasn't seein' life. I thought I knew what I wanted.

  "All my yearnin's an' dreams seemed to pall on me. Where was the joy? Wansfell, the only joy I had was in findin' some poor beggar or bootblack or poor family, an' givin' them gold. The great city was full of them. An' I gave away thousands of dollars. God knows that was some good. An' now I see if I could have stuck it out, livin' among such people, I might have been of some use in the world. But, man! livin' was not possible in New York. All night the hotels roared. All night the streets hummed an' clanged. There was as many people rushin' around by night as by day, an' different from each other, like bats an hawks. I got restless an' half sick. I couldn't sleep. I seemed suffocatin' for fresh air. I wanted room to breathe. When I looked up at night I couldn't see the stars. Think of that for a desert man!

  "At last I knew I couldn't find what I wanted in New York, an' I couldn't hunt any longer there. I had to leave. My plans called for goin' abroad. Then came a strange feelin' that I must have had all the time, but didn't realise. The West called me back. I seemed to want the Middle West, where I'd planned to buy the green farm. But you know I'm a man who sticks to his mind, when it's made up. There were London, Paris, Rome I'd dreamed about an' had planned to see. Well, I had a hell of a fight with somethin' in myself before I could get on that ship. Right off then I got seasick. Wansfell, the bite of a rattlesnake never made me half as sick as that dirty-grey, windy sea. The trip across was a nightmare...London was a dreary place as big as the Mohave an' full of queer fishy-eyed people whom I couldn't understand. But I liked their slow, easygoin' ways. Then Paris...Wansfell, that Paris was a wonderful, glitterin' beautiful city, an' if a city had been a place for me, Paris would have been it. But, I was lost. I couldn't speak French--couldn't learn a word. My tongue refused to twist round their queer words. All the same, I saw what I'd set out to see...Wansfell, if a man fights despair for the women of the world, he'll get licked in Paris. An' the reason is, there you see the same thing in the homely, good, an' virtuous little wives as you see in those terrible, fascinatin', dazzlin' actresses. What that somethin' is I couldn't guess. But you like all French-women. They're gay an' happy an' square. If I applied the truth of this desert to these Frenchwomen, I'd say the somethin' so fascinatin' in them is that the race is peterin' out an' the women are dyin' game.

  "From Paris I went to Rome, an' there a queer state of mind came to me. I could look at temples an' old ruins without even seein' them--with my mind on my own country. All this travel idea, seein' and learnin' an' doin' changed so that it was hateful. I cut out Egypt, an' I can't remember much of India an' Japan. But when I got on ship bound for Frisco I couldn't see anythin' for a different reason, an' that was tears. I'd come far to find joy of life, an' now I wept tears of joy because I was homeward bound. It was a great an' splendid feeling!

  "The Pacific isn't like the Atlantic. It's vast an' smooth an' peaceful, with swells like the mile-long ridges of the desert. I didn't get seasick. An' on that voyage I got some rest. Maybe the sea is like the desert. Anyway, it calmed me, an' I could think clear once more. As I walked the deck by day, or hung over the rail by night, my yearnin's an' dreams came back. When I reached Frisco I'd take train for the Middle West, an' somewhere I'd buy the green ranch an' settle down to peace an' quiet for the rest of my life. The hope was beautiful. I believed in it. That wild desire to search for the joy of life had to be buried. I had been wrong about that. It was only a dream--a boy's dream, on the hope of which I had spent the manhood of my best years. Ah! it was bitter bitter to realise that. I--who had never given in to defeat...But I conquered my regret because I knew I had just mistaken what I wanted. An' it was not wholly too late!...Wansfell, you've no idea of the size of the old earth. I've been round it. An' that Pacific! Oh, what an endless ocean of waters! It seemed eternal, like the sky. But--at last--I got to--Frisco."

  Here Dismukes choked and broke down. The deep, rolling voice lost its strength for a moment. He drew a long, long breath that it hurt Adam to hear.

  "Wansfell, when my feet once more touched land it was as though I'd really found happiness," presently went on Dismukes, clearing his throat of huskiness. "I was in the clouds. I could have kissed the very dirt. My own, my native land!...Now for the last leg of the journey--an' the little farm--the home to be--friends to make--perhaps a sweet-faced woman an' a child! Oh, it was as glorious as my lost dreams!

  "But suddenly somethin' strange an' terrible seized hold of me. A hand as strong as the wind gripped my heart...The desert called me I...Day an' night I walked the streets. Fierce as the desert itself I fought. Oh, I fought my last an' hardest fight!...On one hand was the dream of my life--the hope of a home an' happiness--what I had slaved for. Forty years of toil! On the other hand the call of the desert! Loneliness, solitude, silence, the white, hot days, the starlit nights, the vast open desert, free and peaceful, the grey wastes, the coloured mountains, sunrise and sunset. Ah! The desert was my only home. I belonged to the silence an' desolation. Forty years a wanderer on the desert, blindly seekin' for gold! But, oh, it was not gold I wanted! Not gold! Nor fortune! That was my dream, my boyish dream. Gold did not nail me to the desert sands. That was only my idea. That was what brought me into the was
telands. I misunderstood the lure of the desert. I thought it was gold, but, no! For me the desert existed as the burrow for the fox. For me the desert linked my strange content to the past ages. For me the soul of the desert was my soul...I had to go back!...I could live nowhere else...Forty years! My youth--my manhood!...I'm old now--old! My dreams are done...Oh, my God!...I HAD TO COME BACK!"

  Adam sat confounded in grief, in shock. His lips were mute. Like a statue he gazed across the wasteland, so terribly magnified, so terribly illumined by the old prospector's revelation. How awful the gigantic red rock barriers! How awful the lonely, limitless expanse of sand! The eternal grey, the eternal monotony!

  "Comrade, take the story of my life to heart," added Dismukes. "You're a young man still. Think of my forty years of hell, that now has made me a part of the desert. Think of how I set out upon my journey so full of wild, sweet hope! Think of my wonderful journey, through the glitterin' cities, round the world, only to find my hope a delusion...A desert mirage!"

  "Man, I cannot think!" burst out Adam. "I am stunned...Oh, the pity of it--the sickening, pitiless fatality! Oh, my heart breaks for you!...Dismukes, of what use is hope? Oh, why do we fight? Where--where does joy abide for such as you and me?"

  The great, rolling ox eyes gleamed upon Adam, strong with the soul of peace, of victory in their depths.

  "Wansfell, joy an' happiness, whatever makes life worth livin', is in you. No man can go forth to find what he hasn't got within him."

  Then he gazed away across the desert, across sand and cactus and mesquite, across the blue-hazed, canyon-streaked ranges toward the north.

  "I go to Death Valley," he continued, slowly, in his deep voice. "I had left enough gold to grub-stake me. An' I go to Death Valley, but not to seek my fortune. It will be quiet and lonely there. An' I can think an' rest an' sleep. Perhaps I'll dig a little of the precious yellow dust, just to throw it away. Gold!...The man who loves gold is ruined. Passion makes men mad...An' now I must go."

  "Death Valley? No! No!" whispered Adam.

  "Straight for Death Valley! It has called me across half the earth. I remember no desert place so lonely an' silent an' free. So different from the noisy world of men that crowds my mind still There I shall find peace, perhaps my grave. See! life is all a hopin' to find! I go on my way. Wansfell, we never know what drives us. But I am happy now...Our trails have crossed for the last time. Good-bye."

  He wrung Adam's hand and quickly whirled to his burros.

  "Hehaw! Gedap!" he shouted, with a smack on their haunches. Adam whispered a farewell he could not speak. Then, motionless, he watched the old prospector face the grey wastes toward the north and the beckoning mountains. Adam had an almost irresistible desire to run after Dismukes, to go with him. But the man wanted to be alone. What a stride he had I The fruitless quest had left him that at least. The same old rolling gait, the same doggedness! Dismukes was a man who could not be halted. Adam watched him--saw him at last merge and disappear in the gray, lonely sage. And then into Adam's strained sight seemed to play a quivering mirage--a vision of Death Valley, ghastly and white and naked, the abode of silence and decay set down under its dark-red walls--the end of the desert and the grave of Dismukes.

  Chapter XXV

  The November morning was keen and cold and Adam and Genie were on their way to spend the day at Andreas Canyon. Adam carried a lunch, a gun, and a book. Genie seemed so exuberant with wonderful spirits that she could scarcely keep her little moccasined feet on the sand. Adam had an unconscious joy in the sight of her.

  A dim old Indian trail led up one of the slopes of Andreas Canyon, to which Adam called Genie's attention.

  "We'll climb this some day--when it comes time to take you away," said Adam. "It's a hard climb, but the shortest way out. And you'll get to see the desert from the top of old Jacinto. That will be worth all the climb."

  His words made Genie pensive. Of late the girl had become more and more beyond Adam's comprehension--wistful and sad and dreamy by turns, now like a bird and again like a thundercloud, but mostly a dancing, singing creature full of unutterable sweetness of life.

  Beyond the oasis, some distance up the canyon, was a dense growth of mesquite and other brush. It surrounded a sandy glade in which bubbled forth a crystal spring of hot water. The bottom was clean white sand that boiled up in the centre like shining bubbles. Indians in times past had laid stones around the pool. A small cottonwood tree on the west side of the glade had begun to change the green colour of the leaves to amber and gold. All around the glade, like a wild, untrimmed hedge, the green and brown mesquites stood up, hiding the grey desert, insulating this cool, sandy, beautiful spot, hiding it away from the stern hardness outside.

  Genie had never been here. Quickly she lost her pensiveness and began to sing like a lark. She kicked one moccasin one way and the other in another direction. Straightway she was on the stones, with her bare, slender, brown feet in the water.

  "Ooooo! It's hot!" she cried, ecstatically. "But, oh, it's fine!" And she dipped them back.

  "Genie, you stay here and amuse yourself," said Adam. "I'm going to climb. Maybe I'll be back soon--maybe not. You play and read, and eat the lunch when you're hungry."

  "All right, Wanny," she replied, gaily. "But I should think you'd rather stay with me."

  Adam had to be alone. He needed to be high above the desert, where he could look down. Another crisis in his transformation was painfully pending. The meeting with Dismukes had been of profound significance, and its effect was going to be far reaching.

  He climbed up the zigzag, dim trail, rising till the canyon yawned beneath him, and the green thicket where he had left Genie was but a dot. Then the way led round the slope of the great foothill, where he left the trail and climbed to the craggy summit. It was a round, bare peak of jagged bronze rock, and from this height half a mile above the desert the outlook was magnificent. Beyond and above him the grey walls and fringed peaks of San Jacinto towered sculptured and grand against the azure blue.

  Finding a comfortable seat with rest for his back, Adam faced the illimitable gulf of colour and distance below. Always a height such as this, where, like a lonely eagle, he could command an unobstructed view, had been a charm, a strange delight of his desert years. Not wholly had love of climbing, or to see afar, or to feel alone, or to travel in beauty, been accountable for this habit.

  Adam's first reward for this climb, before he had settled himself to watch the desert, was sight of a condor. Only rarely did Adam see this great and loneliest of lonely birds--king of the eagles and of the blue heights. Never had Adam seen one close. A wild, slate-coloured bird, huge of build, with grisly neck and wonderful, clean-cut head, cruelly beaked! Even as Adam looked the condor pitched off the crag and spread his enormous wings.

  A few flaps of those wide wings--then he sailed, out over the gulf, and around, rising as he circled. When he started he was below Adam; on the first lap of that circle he rose even with Adam's position; and when he came round again he sailed over Adam, perhaps fifty feet. Adam thrilled at the sight. The condor was peering down with gleaming, dark, uncanny eyes. He saw Adam. His keen head and great, crooked beak moved to and fro; the sun shone on his grey-flecked breast; every feather of his immense wings seemed to show, to quiver in the air, and the tip feathers were ragged and separate. He cut the air with a soft swish.

  Around he sailed, widening his circle, rising higher, with never a movement of his wings. That fact, assured by Adam's sharp sight, was so marvellous that it fascinated him. What power enabled the condor to rise without propelling himself? No wind stirred down there under the peaks, so he could not left himself by its aid. He sailed aloft. He came down on one slope of his circle, to rise up on the other, and always he went higher. How easily I How gracefully! He was peering down for sight of prey in which to sink cruel beak and talons. Once he crossed the sun and Adam saw his shadow on the gleaming rocks below. Then his circles widened across the deep baryon high above the higher
foothills, until he approached the lofty peak. Higher still, and here the winds of the heights caught him. How he breasted them, sailing on and up, soaring toward the blue!

  Adam watched the bird with strained eyes that hurt but never tired. To watch him was one of the things Adam needed. On and ever upward soared the condor. His range had changed with the height. His speed had increased with the wind. His spirit had mounted as he climbed. The craggy grey peak might have harboured his nest and his mate, but he gave no sign. High over the lonely cold heights he soared. There, far above his domain, he circled level for a while, then swooped down like a falling star, miles across the sky, to sail, to soar, to rise again. Away across the heavens he flew, wide winged and free, king of the eagles and of the winds, lonely and grand in the blue. Never a movement of his wings! Higher he sailed. Higher he soared till he was a fading speck, till, he was gone out of sight to his realm above.

  "Gone!" sighed Adam. "He is gone. And for all I know he may be a spirit of the wind. From his invisible abode in the heavens he can see the sheep on the crags--he can see me here--he can see Genie below--he can see the rabbit at his burrow...Nature! Life! Oh, what use to think? What use to torture myself over mystery I can never solve?--I learn one great truth only to find it involved in greater mystery."

  Adam had realised the need of shocks, else the desert influence would insulate him forever in his physical life. The meeting with Dismukes had been one.

  Why had Dismukes been compelled to come back to the desert? What was the lure of the silent places? How could men sacrifice friends, people, home, love, civilisation for the solitude and loneliness of the wastelands? Where lay the infinite fascination in death and decay and desolation? Who could solve the desert secret?