Sunset Pass

by Zane Grey

“Thiry’s comin’,” said Winter, with anticipated pleasure. “Sent me word she an’ Alice would stay two nights with us.”

  “Wonder what she’ll wear—and if I can recognize her?” mused Rock, with shining eyes. “I’ll bet a hundred I’ll know her pronto.”

  “Wal, True, you don’t look much like a disconsolate lover.”

  “Don’t I? By gosh! I am, all the same.”

  “No! Wal, that’s new for you. How’re things generally out Sunset Pass way?”

  “Pretty bad, Sol. But there’s too much of it to tell now.”

  “Bet you had a run-in with Ash!”

  “Nope. Outside of stealin’ my horse, Ash acted tolerable nice, for him.”

  “Stole your horse!—an’ he’s alive yet?” ejaculated Winter, his shrewd old eyes warm upon Rock.

  “Sol, I took it as if I was complimented.”

  “True Rock, you ’pear rational enough, an’ you shore ain’t drunk,” returned Winter, reflectively.

  “Honest, Sol. I’m tellin’ you truth. Now what do you say?”

  “Wal, all I can say is love works wonders.”

  “Does it? All right, old-timer. Let’s hope it lasts. . . . But to leave off and talk serious, Sol. I want to find out somethin’.”

  “What?” asked Winter, as Rock led him back into the store.

  “Preston drove in here a couple of days ago,” went on Rock, lowering his voice. “In the outfit were three wagons I know of. One was full of hides, which I helped pack. The other two were loaded with meat. Beeves! Now I want to find out how many beeves there were and where they went. But I don’t want this information unless we can get it absolutely without rousin’ the slightest curiosity or question. Savvy old pardner?”

  “Wal, I’ll be darned if that ain’t funny,” ejaculated Winter, his eyes narrowing to mere slits.

  “Humph! Nothin’ funny about it, as I can show you,” said Rock, bluntly.

  “Wal, mebbe I mean queer. For I shore can tell you right now what you’re so damn keen about knowin’.”

  “Good Lord!” exclaimed Rock, with a quick breath, and he sat down heavily upon the counter. He had actually to nerve himself for the disclosure.

  “Heard it quite by accident,” went on Winter. “Jackson, who runs Dabb’s butcher shop, once worked for me. An’ if I do say it myself he liked workin’ for me better than for Dabb. Wal, I went in last night to buy some beefsteak to take home. An’ I seen a lot of fresh meat hangin’ up. Shore I always was curious, but I never let on I was. All I said was: ‘See you’re stocked up plenty an’ fresh. How’re you ever goin’ to sell all that meat before it spoils?”

  “‘It won’t last over the Fourth,’ he said. ‘Long as I got plenty an’ can sell cheap to the Mexicans an’ lumbermen, it shore goes fast. Wagontongue will soon stand another butcher shop, Sol, an’ any time you want to talk business with me I’m ready.’

  “‘I’ll think it over, Jackson,’ I said. ‘I’m out of debt an’ doin’ well again. But where’ll we get the meat? Reckon we couldn’t cut in on Dabb’s supply?’

  “‘No, we can’t,’ he told me, ‘but Preston is killin’ now altogether instead of sellin’ any more on the hoof. He’s gettin’ thirty dollars more by killin’, on each head of stock. He’ll sell to anybody. Today he shipped thirty-six beeves. Driscoll told me. Shipped them to Marigold.’”

  Winter paused to see what effect this news might have upon Rock.

  “Thirty-six!” muttered Rock, with unreadable face and voice.

  “Yep. An’ I counted ten beeves hangin’ up on Jackson’s hooks. All fresh. So that makes forty-six. Now let me see. Forty-six times thirty. . . . Thirteen hundred an’ eighty dollars more. Hum! Not so poor, Rock.—What you want to know all this for?”

  “Gee, Sol, you’re a gabby old lady!” returned Rock. “I was just askin’, because you and I might go into the meat business. . . . And say, who runs the Half Moon brand?”

  “New cattleman named Hesbitt,” replied Winter. “He’s been on the range over two years. I’ve seen him, but don’t know him. They say he hails from Wyomin’, has got lots of money, an’ runs a hard outfit. Clink Peeples is foreman. You ought to know him, Rock.”

  “Clink Peeples. By gum! that sounds familiar. I’ve heard his name, anyway. What does he look like, Sol?”

  “Onusual tall puncher. Sandy complected. Eyes sharp like a hawk’s, but tawny. Light tawny. Somethin’ of a dandy, leastways in town. Always wears a red scarf. An’ he’s one of the gun-packin’ fraternity. Clink will be in town shore over the Fourth.”

  “Red scarf? Ahum!” said Rock, dropping his head. “Clink? Where does he get that name?”

  “Wal, somebody said he had a habit of clinkin’ gold coins at the bar.”

  “Sounds like the range,” laughed Rock. “They sure can call a puncher proper. . . . Well, Sol, I’ll run along, and drop in again.”

  He did run along, as if hurrying to get away from some one; but it was only from himself and his coalescing thoughts. Pretty soon some one was likely to come up to him with one of Ash Preston’s boots! Rock wondered if he were lucky or unlucky. He concluded it was the latter, for wherever he roamed, unfortunate persons and untoward events centered around him.

  Reaching Dabb’s new store, where the windows were full of merchandise of all sorts, Rock went in and hunted up the suit department. It chanced that there was in stock a black broadcloth suit, with frock coat, which might have been made for him, so well did it fit. Rock purchased it and an embroidered vest of fancy design, a white shirt with ruffles in the bosom, a wide white collar and a black flowing bow-tie to go with it. Lastly he bought shiny leather shoes, rather light and soft, which augured well for dancing. Not forgetting a mask, he asked for a plain black one. None of any kind was available. All false faces and masks of humorous design had been sold.

  Rock carried his possessions back to the hotel, certain that some of his youthful cowboy sensations were not wholly dead. While in his room he cut a pattern of a mask out of paper, and taking this back to the store he bought a piece of black cloth and fashioned it after the pattern he had cut.

  Then to kill time and to forget the burden on his mind, Rock went about renewing old acquaintances, whom he found in greater numbers than he had anticipated. But he shied away from the saloons; not that he distrusted his strength, but because he believed he had parted company with that atmosphere for good and all. He met cowboys on the street corners and stopped to chat; he met ranchers in the post-office and in the county clerk’s hall, where he went to investigate cattle brands.

  What with a late dinner and another visit at Sol Winter’s store, a call at the stable to see Egypt, and then more leisurely random saunterings around town, the day passed by. After supper the hotel man, Clark, got hold of him and in a genial way whose intent was obvious to Rock, tried to pump him about the Prestons. Rock had met that same attitude before during the day, and though without apparent evasion, he did not commit himself. Then who but Jem Slagle stamped into the hotel lobby, in his rough range garb.

  Slagle had been trifling with the bottle, but he was not by any means drunk. He was, however, under the influence of rum, and his happened to be a disposition aversely affected by it.

  “Howdy, thar, Sunset Pass puncher!” he said, loud and leering.

  “Hello, Jem! How are you? I called on the way in.”

  “Left home yesterday. Stayin’ till after the fireworks. Are you goin’ back to Preston?”

  “Why, certainly! Like my new job fine,” responded Rock. “I’m sort of a foreman over the younger Prestons.”

  “Rock, it was a hell of a good bet that Gage Preston would never put you to butcherin’.”

  “So you say. Well, I reckon ’most any rancher could figure I’d never go in for that kind of work.”

  “Ho! Ho!—Preston was figgerin’ deeper’n that, Rock,” returned Slagle, with evil eye. “Want a drink with me?”

  “No, thanks. I’ve sworn off,” replied Rock, sho
rtly, and he went out to walk in the darkness. Slagle’s remarks did not set lightly upon Rock. They were trenchant with meaning. Slagle, of course, hated Preston, and naturally would be prone to cast slurs. But would he make two-sided remarks like that, just out of rancor? It would go severely with him if one of them ever came to Preston’s ears. And rattlesnake Ash Preston would strike at less than that.

  The night air bore the cool freshness of past rain, and the scents of a desert moistened and revivified.

  Rock strolled to and fro, between the hotel lights and those on the corner. When would the Prestons arrive in Wagontongue? The boys would ride it through in one day, except perhaps one or two of them who would accompany the womenfolk. They would require a day and a half to make the journey, possibly a little less. Rock, yielding to musings not wholly free from pain, dared to dwell on a possible dance with Thiry. But that was too wonderful to come true, at least now. He would not be so weak and selfish as to jeopardize her evening’s pleasure, by asking. Still, he wanted to see her at that dance, if only from some obscure corner behind the crowd.

  As he came again into the yellow flare of light, quick pattering footsteps sounded behind him, and soon the swish of skirts. A hand, small, eager, and strong, seized his arm, and a feminine voice he knew rang under his ear.

  “True Rock, I’ve been on your trail all afternoon.”

  CHAPTER

  NINE

  ROCK stared down into the piquant flushed face of his old sweetheart, Amy Wund.

  “Now I’ve got you and I’m going to hang on to you,” she said, with a roguishness that did not altogether conceal a firm determination.

  “Why—how do—Mrs. Dabb? You sure—”

  “Oh, Mrs. Dabb, h—!” she interrupted, flashing dark passionate eyes up at him. “Call me Amy, can’t you? What’s the sense of being so formal? You used to call me ‘darling Amy’.”

  There was no gainsaying that. And he did not admire profanity from a woman’s lips, no matter how pretty they were. Amy’s checked him up to reasonableness sooner than could have any proper speech.

  “Well, good-evenin’, Amy,” he drawled. “I’ve forgotten what I used to call you. Reckon it’s not just good taste for you to remind me.”

  “Perhaps not, True. But you make me furious. I could do anything.”

  “Sure you could. But, for instance, do you think it wise to hang on to me—this way—right in front of the hotel?”

  “Let’s get out of the light, then. I’ve got to talk to you,” she replied, and pressing his arm tight she hurried him down the dark street.

  “Amy, listen to sense. Oughtn’t you be home?” asked Rock, gravely.

  “Sense from True Rock? Ye Gods! When I was sixteen you made me meet you out, at night, because my father wouldn’t let you come to our house,” she retorted.

  “That’s so, Amy. I guess I was no good. But I’ve learned a little in all these years—at least enough to consider a woman’s name.”

  “Thank you. I believe you have. And it’s not true you were no good. . . . Now about my being at home. I suppose I ought to be there, since I took the responsibility of it. But it’s an empty home, Trueman. I am alone most of the time. John has men come there to drink and play cards and talk business. He objects to my friends. He is as jealous as the devil. Just a selfish rich old man! I have money, horses. I think children would have made it a home, but there are none—and never will be.”

  “Aw, too bad, Amy,” replied Rock, deeply touched. “You never should have married Dabb.”

  “Father was in debt to John. . . . And I had to foot that bill, True,” she returned, bitterly. “But I didn’t waylay you to talk about myself.”

  “How’d you know I was in town?” asked Rock, glad to have the subject changed.

  “I heard it this morning. And I sure was thrilled. True, did you get the invitation to my dance?”

  “I did. Many thanks, Amy. It was good of you. I rather expected to be left out.”

  “Would you have been hurt if you had?” she asked, curiously.

  “Reckon I would. Men are such queer hombres.”

  “Are you coming, True?”

  “Well, now, that’s a horse of another color,” he said. “I’d sure like to. I might drop in for a little—to look on.”

  “True Rock! You look on at a dance! Why, cowboy, are you growing old?”

  “No, Amy, I feel far from being old. But there are reasons. You should know one of them, anyhow.”

  “You mean my husband?”

  “Sure do. He never had any use for me after I quit him.”

  “All the same, Trueman. I could get him to hire you as foreman of the whole outfit. And that’s a job. John is running thirty thousand head.”

  “You could not,” returned Rock, incredulously.

  “Do you want the job?” she retorted, with uplift of chin he remembered well.

  “Why, Amy, no. I’ve got one job. Thank you all the same.”

  “True, that Preston job is a poor-paying one and a risky one.”

  “How do you know that, Amy?”

  “I heard John say so. But let’s get this dance question settled. Will you come?”

  They halted at the end of the sidewalk, on the outskirts of town. The stars were shining brightly, and by their light Rock saw Amy’s face, upturned to his.

  “Amy, you make me angry,” said Rock, though he was not so sure of that. “Here you are—an old sweetheart of mine, and now married to a man who hates me—coaxing me to come to a dance.”

  “That’s why, Trueman.”

  “Then I sure better not come.”

  “Oh, that was partly a lie,” she cried, in disgust at herself. “I can’t even tell the truth any more. I’d like you to come for several reasons, Trueman.”

  “All right, fire away,” he said, lightly.

  “First for old times’ sake. Then because certain of my friends say you won’t come. Next because—well, True, I’ve been a darned fool. I’ve gone—a—a little too far with a certain cowboy. And I’m afraid of him. He’s coming to my dance. And I thought—if you were there—I’d not be afraid, anyhow.”

  “A certain cowboy. Why certain, Amy?” he inquired, looking dubiously at her, aware she could not meet his eyes.

  “Trueman, I might as well make a clean breast of it,” she said, almost with defiance. “I’d met this fellow often. Oh, I liked him, I guess. But I wasn’t crazy about him, and I never encouraged him until that day you snubbed me.”

  “Then what did you do?”

  “I flirted—oh, worse than ever,” she replied, and she had the courage to look shamefacedly up at Rock. “I’ve met him twice since. And the last time—I—well—”

  “Amy, how far did you go?” broke in Rock, as she paused.

  “Too far! . . . I let him kiss me—hug me.”

  “Amy Wund!” exclaimed Trueman. “It wouldn’t have amounted to much before, but now I’m ashamed of you.”

  “But, Trueman, I came to my senses,” she protested. “I don’t want to see him again. But he’ll come to the dance. . . . And they tell me he’s a pretty wild cowboy. At that he’s no boy, I’ll tell you.”

  “Who is he, Amy?”

  “I don’t know his real first name. His last is Peeples. Clink, they call him.”

  “Clink Peeples. I’ve sure heard of him. Rides for this new rancher, Hesbitt.”

  “Yes. And Hesbitt—”

  “One thing at a time, Amy. Is this the last reason you have for wanting me at that dance?”

  “No, Trueman, there’s another. A woman’s reason, and therefore the most important.”

  “What is it?”

  “I won’t tell you.”

  “Very well, I reckon your third reason is enough to fetch me. I’ll come.”

  “Oh, thank you, Trueman,” she replied, in delight, squeezing his hand. “You always were the dearest, kindest fellow when anyone was in trouble. . . . Trueman, you could steady me. God knows I need it.”

/>   “Amy, I don’t exactly trust you,” said Rock, dubiously. “I never did. But that doesn’t mean I haven’t faith in you at all. You’ve got it in you to become a splendid woman. Could I help you—as a friend or brother? Be honest, Amy, I’d despise you if you lied.”

  “Yes, you could, and I’ll be grateful for that—if I can’t have more,” she rejoined, won to sincerity by his force.

  “All right. Shake hands on it,” he said, earnestly, smiling down on her.

  “But, True, I won’t promise not to try to—to make you be more,” she said, rebelliously.

  “Don’t talk nonsense,” he returned, sharply. “Amy, will you consent to my callin’ on your husband?”

  “You want to see John?” she queried, astounded, her eyes opening wide. “What on earth for?”

  “Well, I think it might be a good idea,” he rejoined, evasively.

  “It might, at that,” she agreed, her dark eyes full of thought. Then she tossed her head and laughed. “All right, go ahead. You have my consent.”

  “You’re game, Amy. No one could say not. . . . Can I ask John anythin’ I like and tell him what I want?”

  “Trueman Rock, you son-of-a-gun!” she burst out, as if astonished into a corner. “Yes, darn you, anything except I was once in love with you—and that it’s not utterly impossible for me to be so foolish again.”

  “I’ll take good care you don’t do that,” he laughed, wondering why he had been so unkind. She was amenable, and perhaps not so dangerous as he had imagined.

  “Trueman, I have something more to say,” she said, hesitatingly, lacking her former confidence and spirit.

  “Well then, say it. A woman always leaves the worst for the last.”

  “I think you’d better quit riding for the Prestons,” she answered, her reluctance giving place to intense earnestness.

  “Why?” he inquired, freezing a little.

  “I’m afraid I can’t explain what may be only my intuition. But I give you my word of honor, Trueman, that it’s not because I—I might be jealous of Thiry Preston.”

  To do her justice, Rock had to admit to himself that the deceitful side of her seemed to be in abeyance at this moment. She was grave. Her eyes were big with perplexity.