The Great Trek

by Zane Grey

  “Oh, Sterl, how wonderful you are,” she murmured, her big eyes worshipfully upon him.

  “Yeah?” retorted Sterl, feeling foolish.

  “Red is wonderful, too. You both could deceive anyone. So that’s my part? Ohhh! But it’s for Dad, for Mum, for Mister Dann, for you. Yes, I can do it.”

  “Good-o! I’ll bet you turn out wonderful yourself. Run! Here comes Red. From the way he walks, I’d gamble he’s mad! Good night, my Australian cowgirl.”

  Leslie rose to dart away while Red stalked into the firelight, his eyes like daggers, his hand to his mouth. He removed it to expose a swollen and bloody lip.

  “Wal, you…liar!” he said. “You promised not to sock me, an’ look what you did. No hoss ever knocked me that hard.”

  “I’m sorry, pard,” replied Sterl, stifling a laugh. “Honestly, I didn’t mean to. But I was riled before you came up. Then when I swung, you dumb-head, instead of ducking, you met it.”

  “I shore met it. But you’re a better actor than me,’ cause you don’t pretend nothin’. Why, my lower teeth air all loose, an’ my lip is busted so I couldn’t kiss Beryl, if she’d let me, which I think, by thunder, she would. Pard, thet is all thet was good about thet sock …the surprisin’ way she came across. I never figgered thet. She was sweet as apple pie to me, an’ mebbe Ormiston wasn’t sore. Aw, no! But, Sterl, I don’t like how he’s got around her. Not one damn bit! Thet hombre has a way with wimmin. Kinda like a snake with a dove!”

  “Well, I’m glad Leslie is more of a hawk. Red, what’s your angle?”

  “Pard, I ain’t stuck on this deal a-tall,” Red replied ponderingly. “I heah somebody comin’. Let’s go in our tent an’ hit the hay. Then I’ll talk.”

  Sterl had to strain his eyes to make out Friday’s prone form under the low-drooping wattle branches. Somehow he had come to liken the black to a watchdog. He felt how infinitely keener the aborigine was than any white man, and most likely far keener than any Indian scout Sterl had ever known.

  Thirty-one days later, according to Leslie’s journal, on the twenty-ninth of June, after a prodigious trek through a jungle pass, Stanley Dann called a halt for a rest and repairs, both to equipment and drovers and mob.

  The trip had been the most expansive in acquired knowledge of natural things that Sterl Hazelton ever experienced. He had lost track of days until Leslie’s appeal to help her with her journal staggered him with the actual brevity of a strenuous and full period which had seemed endless. About all that she entered in her journal were the dates and the number of miles and a few outstanding incidents.

  Ormiston, with the two partners and drovers whom he dominated, broke out of the pass into the open, after a three-mile trek which took more than half the day. The Danns followed on his heels. Slyter’s cattle and riders found the grass and brush trampled, the tree ferns and sassafras knocked down, the creekbanks cut into lanes, stray cattle and horses which they drove on, an easy trek except for the grades.

  Sterl, the last rider to hold up the rear, halted King on the crest of the saddle between the lofty slopes and faced with a gasp the extraordinary scene that burst in glory before him.

  “Umpumm,” he soliloquized wearily. Long hours and excessive fatigue had dulled his faculties of reception and appreciation. Moreover a score of days up this astounding pass, with its labyrinthine jungle marvels and beauties, had left him unable to absorb the appalling loveliness of the rolling golden-purple open spreading boundlessly before tired eyes. He reverted to Red’s cowboy repudiation of facts. “Dog-gone it, there ain’t no such country!”

  An hour’s rest on the flat of his back, a bath and a shave, and change of clothes, restored Sterl to some semblance of his former self. Red was longer at these imperative details. The faithful and tireless Friday performed their chores meanwhile. Sterl then had a short talk with Slyter, cheerful and energetic again. Mrs. Slyter appeared none the worse for the long wagon rides and the many camps with their incessant tasks. But Leslie showed the wear of six weeks and more hard riding in fair weather and rain, across numberless fords, and through miles and miles of brush and jungle.

  “Howdy, ragamuffin,” said Sterl, coming at her call.

  “I am, aren’t I?” she replied ruefully, surveying herself. “I’ve got two other suits, but I’ll mend these rags and make them go as far as possible. My, how spic and span you look. Very handsome, Sterl!”

  “That goes for you, Les,” he rejoined heartily. “How prettily you tan! And you’ve lost weight. All to the good!”

  “Flatterer! I’ve had to ride myself nearly to death to extract that compliment from you. Good-o for this rest. It was high time. Oh, what a trek! Sterl, you must help me with my journal.”

  “Sure will. Let’s see.” It was then that Sterl discovered they had trekked only thirty-one days through these mountain ranges for an aggregate of one hundred and seventy-eight miles. “Not so good.”

  “My journal? Dog-gone! You don’t help me. There’s so little time, it’s often dark and wet.”

  “I was referring to our trek, not your journal. It’s very neat. Only there’s so little. I saw Beryl’s journal the other night. It has yours skinned to a frazzle.”

  “Yeah? She writes in the wagon. And Red helps her at night. That was another thing which made Ormiston jealous.”

  “Well, add a long footnote here. I can remember the important things.”

  “Put this down. Slyter lost two horses and some twenty-odd head of cattle. Bad crossing at the ford you called Wattle Rapids. You’re good on names, Les. Flooded a wagon there, but no damage. Visited by only a few blacks. Growing unfriendly. Mosquitoes terrible at the Forks. Big tree-ferns. Grand mountain ash trees. Over two hundred feet high. Huge and fluted at base. Bad going last few days. Short treks. Wagons need of repairs and grease. Last day…today…the worst. Cattle tired and hungry. Horses fine. Riders the same, except Larry thrown and lamed. That’s all, Leslie.”

  “Oh, good-o!” cried Leslie with satisfaction. “Sterl, I just couldn’t take this trek, let alone do my journal without you.”

  “I forgot a couple of items. Leslie about stripped to rags and lost, say, five pounds.”

  “Umpumm, cowboy! I don’t record that. You’re getting as bad as Red.”

  “Just how bad is Red?” Sterl queried anxiously, being reminded of his worry about this friend. Red was a problem, but only where a girl was concerned. Apparently he had progressed further with Beryl than with the important work he had undertaken. According to Red he was not so far behind Ormiston in the race for the Dann girl’s favor. Red’s heart, however, always ran away with his head.

  Supper, as usual on short day treks, came early this time, as happened often, without Red in attendance. Members of Slyter’s group were always too hungry to mind the sameness of fare. They had a well-balanced ration of which dried fruits, served in different dishes, were especially relished along with game. Damper, tea, and beans were the other essentials, and on occasion Bill, the cook, managed some surprising pastry. Sterl had concluded that their diet offered a better nourishing and strength-sustaining food than what he had been accustomed to on American treks. Cowboys drank too much coffee, sometimes ten cups a day. Sterl and Red had learned to like tea, but they confined drinking it to two meals a day.

  “Les, it’d pay us to walk up to that saddle at sunset, if you’re not too tired,” Sterl said, when he had finished supper.

  “Good-o! I’m not tired,” she replied happily. “I need to stretch my legs.”

  Slyter interposed to ask Sterl to go with him first to Dann’s camp.

  “Grand country, don’t you think?” queried the drover, as Sterl accompanied him.

  “It is, boss, beyond compare. But that pass through the ranges was no place for cattle.”

  “How are we doing?”

  “Not so good, from a cowboy’s standpoint.”

  “Nor from a drover’s. But we’ve moving. Some places on this trek we’ll be held up weeks, by drought o
r flood. We haven’t talked with Stanley for ten days.”

  The Dann camp was bustling. Evidently supper had been served. One wagon had been jacked up, while the hubs had been partly unpacked; tents were in progress of erection; a brawny drover was splitting firewood. Red sat on the ground beside a hammock, in which Beryl was laboriously writing in her journal. Ormiston did not appear to be in evidence.

  Dann, the blond, golden-haired giant, assuredly had his place in that camp. He greeted Slyter and Sterl in booming welcome.

  “Heard my order that we hold up here a week?” he queried.

  “Yes. Heald fetched it. I’m glad. A good few days will put us right again. Sterl agrees.”

  “Just had words with Ormiston. He disagrees. Says one day is rest enough. We want to make time. I told him he had my order. He replied that he’d go on with Woolcott and Hathaway. At that I put my foot down, and told him that he wouldn’t do anything of the kind. Reminded him that I was the leader of this trek. He left in high dudgeon.”

  Slyter demurred at Ormiston’s continued antagonism. Sterl queried ponderingly: “Why does he try to block everything? Why? Any fool would know the cattle need rest, and there are needful things to do. Let’s ask Red.”

  Sterl called to the happily engaged cowboy who did not hear him the first time. Then at Sterl’s trenchant call he bounced up and came on the run, an awkward, bowlegged figure at that gait.

  “What the hell? Injuns, or have I gotta dig post holes?” he growled, but his eyes belied his complaint.

  Dann informed the cowboy of Ormiston’s defection and asked if he could throw any light on it.

  “Shore. Jest Ormiston’s policy. He’s gonna oppose you in all ways,’ cause it’s stuck in his craw to fight you on the big issue.”

  “Policy, eh? It does seem like that. If I had known this man was so obstinate, so incapable of working with me, I’d never have made a partner of him. But it is nothing. Merely a flea bite. We are going through. I anticipated obstacles.”

  “Boss, I cain’t give any reason yet for Ormiston’s angle, except he’s a mean cuss. I’m playin’ my game slow. I’m shore, though, he’ll never go through with that bluff.”

  “Immaterial to me whether he does or not. He’d surely wait for us to catch up.”

  Dann and Slyter withdrew, leaving Red to return to Beryl, accompanied by Sterl. She received Sterl with a rather distant hauteur. If anything Beryl had gained on the trek, in a golden tan, a little weight, and certainly in beauty. Sterl took advantage of the moment to tell her so. Her answering pleasure betrayed the jewel of her soul. Even if she hated a man, she could not help responding to a tribute to her beauty.

  “Pard, will you mosey off somewhere, so I can help Beryl? You’re a turrible distractin’ cowboy.”

  “Don’t be rude, Red. He may stay.”

  “Umpumm. Two’s company. Besides I have a date with Leslie,” replied Sterl.

  “How is she? She hasn’t been over for days. Tell her she must come, now that we have leisure ahead.”

  “Leslie’s brown and fine.”

  Sterl returned to Slyter’s camp, where Leslie eagerly awaited him. Letting her carry his rifle, he secured a long, stout stick, and they set out with Leslie firing rapid questions. The grass was knee-high, partly green and purple, mostly gold in color. Magpies were caroling. Once more the thick, pungent fragrance of eucalyptus filled the air. As the cattle had been driven to the right coming down from the saddle, the grass had not been trampled, and Sterl kept an eye out for snakes. Recently he experienced several close calls, one with a death-adder, and he thought it behooved him to be vigilant. Presently a movement of grass and a sibilant hiss startled them to jump back. Then with the long stick Sterl located the snake. It was a tiger snake as thick as his wrist, and nothing if not aggressive. Jones had informed Sterl that this species was very poisonous and during the mating season would attack a man. Sterl felt reasonably safe with the forked stick.

  “Isn’t he pretty? Tan, almost gold, with dark bars. Hasn’t got a triangular-shaped head as our bad snakes have.”

  “Step back, Sterl. Let me shoot his head off,” demanded Leslie who manifestly was not sentimental over snakes.

  “Umpumm. What for? He might be a gentleman like our rattler, who won’t strike you unless you step on him.”

  “This tiger is no gentleman, I can assure you.”

  Sterl gave the snake a poke. It slid away into the grass then, exposing six feet of thick body.

  “You’re very tender-hearted over snakes, aren’t you?” queried Leslie with a subtlety. Sterl thought he had better not inquire.

  It turned out that Sterl had chosen a fitting time to reach the saddle. As they surmounted the ridge, now a well-trodden road packed down by thousands of hoofs, they looked down into the magnificent mountain pass through which they had come. Sterl had not calculated at all upon a backward view. It had been the forward and unknown one that he had anticipated. But he stood spellbound.

  From behind the sun shone golden and red, striking far on in the pass, leaving the descent of the saddle in shadow. In places the shining ribbon of stream wound through verdure, and on the far flat, flame trees were mounds of burning foliage, and the wedge-shaped sassafras trees glistened as with golden frost. But most striking of all was a waterfall Sterl had not seen on the way through, a lacy, downward-smoking cascade, leaping fall after fall in golden glory from the mountainside, full in the blaze of the sun.

  “Sterl, not there…here!” cried Leslie, tugging to wheel him around. “That is pretty…reminds me of home. But this here…this purple land we are trekking into…. Oh, Sterl, how wonderful!”

  Indeed, the scene to west and north struck Sterl with its appealing loveliness. Like most cowboys, always exposed to the phenomena of nature, always alert to the spectacles that had to be waited for and came but once, Sterl succumbed to silent transport. At first the scene was too blazing, or too glorious, to be encompassed. He rubbed his eyes, and the dimness returned. He felt Leslie clinging to him, as mute, as rapt as he, yet this was her native land. It was only gradually, as the blaze began to soften, that Sterl’s sight cleared, and his mind grasped the details of this incomparable panorama.

  “Oh, Sterl,” whispered the girl. “The Kimberley country is like this! Where we are trekking to make homes!”

  From the height where they stood, the glistening, grassy slope with tufts and flowers like bits of fire descended gradually to the camp, where tents and canvas wagon tops shone white, and columns of blue smoke curled up, and great gum trees towered, their smooth trunks opal-hued up to the immense spread and sweep of hoary branches, fringed with leaves that were thin glints of green against the golden sky.

  These spreading gums were like pillars of an arch, a wide portal opening down into a softly colored vale, from which swells of land, covered with flowering trees, rose and fell away into a plain, spotted with flame-trees and wattles, which lured the gaze on over timbered ridges, on and on with dimming gold into the luminous purple that intensified and darkened into the never-ending vastness.

  Sterl gazed until the purple encroached upon the gold, and the sun sank behind the western horizon. Then he became aware that Leslie was pressing close to his side, clinging to him, gazing up with dark, shining eyes.

  “My Australia,” she murmured. “Isn’t it glorious? Don’t you love it? Aren’t you glad you came?”

  “Yes, Leslie…yes,” he said, his emotion naturally shifting to the sense of her beauty and nearness.

  “You will never leave Australia?”

  “No, child…never,” he replied with sadness in his voice.

  “You are my dearest friend?”

  “I hope so. I’m trying hard to be…your friend.”

  “And my big brother?”

  Suddenly there came a convulsion within his breast, a hot gush of blood that swiftly followed his surrender to her sweetness, to her appeal. “Not your big brother, Leslie,” he said thickly, as he clasped her tight. “S
top these…these childish notions. You’re a woman…sweet. No man could resist…. And you torment me.” He kissed her passionately, again and again…until she lay relaxed and acquiescent on his breast.

  “My God! Now I’ve done it,” he exclaimed remorsefully.

  “Sterl!” She drew back to gaze up with wondering eyes and flaming face. Then with a cry she turned and fled down the slope. Sterl watched her out of sight.

  “Cowboy, that’s what Australia has done to you,” he said, and bent to pick up his rifle.

  Chapter Nine

  Day after day the great trek crept across the wilderness that Leslie had called the Purple Land. Day after day the smoke signals of the aborigines arose and drifted away over the horizon in that mystic telegraphy of theirs which betrayed to the pioneers how closely their daily movements and advances were marked.

  Slyter, who knew the coast blacks well, maintained it was merely one band of natives telling another of the approach of the trek. Eric Dann averred a menace increased with their penetration into the interior. Friday grew mysterious and reticent, answering queries with a puzzling: “Might be.”

  Sterl, grown wise from his long experience with the American Indians, had learned not to question the black about his people. He had gathered that some aborigines were friendly, but most were inimical. Those who had never had contact with the whites were not to be trusted. Those who had were afraid and would not openly attack.

  Stanley Dann had no fear of blacks or endless trek or flood or heat or drought. As the difficulties imperceptibly increased, so did his cheer and courage and zeal, and his unshakable faith in himself and comrades. On Sundays in camp he held a short religious service which all were importuned to attend. Sterl noted, as the days passed, and the spell of the wilderness encroached and worked upon the minds of the trekkers, that the attendance on these simple services gradually decreased. Faith did not fail Stanley Dann, but it lost its hold on the others, who retrograded toward the primitive. All day in the open, under the hot sun, in the teeth of rain and wind, in the solemn stillness of the vast purple earth, stretching away forever in its beautiful monotony, and all night under the star-fired vault of heaven, in the wild solitude, nights and days on end, weeks augmenting into months—all this time, with its need only of the senses, developing the physical while civilization had demanded but less and less, imperceptibly and inevitably took its victims back along the trail of evolution.