by Zane Grey
Holderness,
too!"
"Martin, this lust to kill is a fearful thing. Come in, you must pray
with the Bishop."
"No, it's not prayer I need, Elder," replied Cole, stubbornly. "I'm
still a good Mormon. What I want is the stock I've lost, and my fields
green again."
August Naab had no answer for his friend. A very old man with snow-white
hair and beard came out on the porch.
"Bishop, brother Martin is railing again," said Naab, as Cole bared his
head.
"Martin, my son, unbosom thyself," rejoined the Bishop.
"Black doubt and no light," said Cole, despondently. "I'm of the younger
generation of Mormons, and faith is harder for me. I see signs you can't
see. I've had trials hard to bear. I was rich in cattle, sheep, and
water. These Gentiles, this rancher Holderness and this outlaw Dene,
have driven my cattle, killed my sheep, piped my water off my fields. I
don't like the present. We are no longer in the old days. Our young men
are drifting away, and the few who return come with ideas opposed to
Mormonism. Our girls and boys are growing up influenced by the Gentiles
among us. They intermarry, and that's a death-blow to our creed."
"Martin, cast out this poison from your heart. Return to your faith. The
millennium will come. Christ will reign on earth again. The ten tribes
of Israel will be restored. The Book of Mormon is the Word of God. The
creed will live. We may suffer here and die, but our spirits will go
marching on; and the City of Zion will be builded over our graves."
Cole held up his hands in a meekness that signified hope if not faith.
August Naab bent over Hare. "I would like to have the Bishop administer
to you," he said.
"What's that?" asked Hare.
"A Mormon custom, 'the laying on of hands.' We know its efficacy in
trouble and illness. A Bishop of the Mormon Church has the gift of
tongues, of prophecy, of revelation, of healing. Let him administer to
you. It entails no obligation. Accept it as a prayer."
"I'm willing," replied the young man.
Thereupon Naab spoke a few low words to some one through the open door.
Voices ceased; soft footsteps sounded without; women crossed the
threshold, followed by tall young men and rosy-checked girls and round-
eyed children. A white-haired old woman came forward with solemn
dignity. She carried a silver bowl which she held for the Bishop as he
stood close by Hare's couch. The Bishop put his hands into the bowl,
anointing them with fragrant oil; then he placed them on the young man's
head, and offered up a brief prayer, beautiful in its simplicity and
tremulous utterance.
The ceremony ended, the onlookers came forward with pleasant words on
their lips, pleasant smiles on their faces. The children filed by his
couch, bashful yet sympathetic; the women murmured, the young men
grasped his hand. Mescal flitted by with downcast eye, with shy smile,
but no word.
"Your fever is gone," said August Naab, with his hand on Hare's cheek.
"It comes and goes suddenly," replied Hare. "I feel better now, only I'm
oppressed. I can't breathe freely. I want air, and I'm hungry."
"Mother Mary, the lad's hungry. Judith, Esther, where are your wits?
Help your mother. Mescal, wait on him, see to his comfort."
Mescal brought a little table and a pillow, and the other girls soon
followed with food and drink; then they hovered about, absorbed in
caring for him.
"They said I fell among thieves," mused Hare, when he was once more
alone. "I've fallen among saints as well." He felt that he could never
repay this August Naab. "If only I might live!" he ejaculated. How
restful was this cottage garden! The green sward was a balm to his eyes.
Flowers new to him, though of familiar springtime hue, lifted fresh
faces everywhere; fruit-trees, with branches intermingling, blended the
white and pink of blossoms. There was the soft laughter of children in
the garden. Strange birds darted among the trees. Their notes were new,
but their song was the old delicious monotone--the joy of living and
love of spring. A green-bowered irrigation ditch led by the porch and
unseen water flowed gently, with gurgle and tinkle, with music in its
hurry. Innumerable bees murmured amid the blossoms.
Hare fell asleep. Upon returning drowsily to consciousness he caught
through half-open eyes the gleam of level shafts of gold sunlight low
down in the trees; then he felt himself being carried into the house to
be laid upon a bed. Some one gently unbuttoned his shirt at the neck,
removed his shoes, and covered him with a blanket. Before he had fully
awakened he was left alone, and quiet settled over the house. A
languorous sense of ease and rest lulled him to sleep again. In another
moment, it seemed to him, he was awake; bright daylight streamed through
the window, and a morning breeze stirred the faded curtain.
The drag in his breathing which was always a forerunner of a coughing-
spell warned him now; he put on coat and shoes and went outside, where
his cough attacked him, had its sway, and left him.
"Good-morning," sang out August Naab's cheery voice. "Sixteen hours of
sleep, my lad!"
"I did sleep, didn't I? No wonder I feel well this morning. A
peculiarity of my illness is that one day I'm down, the next day up."
"With the goodness of God, my lad, we'll gradually increase the days up.
Go in to breakfast. Afterward I want to talk to you. This'll be a busy
day for me, shoeing the horses and packing supplies. I want to start for
home to-morrow."
Hare pondered over Naab's words while he ate. The suggestion in them,
implying a relation to his future, made him wonder if the good Mormon
intended to take him to his desert home. He hoped so, and warmed anew to
this friend. But he had no enthusiasm for himself; his future seemed
hopeless.
Naab was waiting for him on the porch, and drew him away from the
cottage down the path toward the gate.
"I want you to go home with me."
"You're kind--I'm only a sort of beggar--I've no strength left to work
my way. I'll go--though it's only to die."
"I haven't the gift of revelation--yet somehow I see that you won't die
of this illness. You will come home with me. It's a beautiful place, my
Navajo oasis. The Indians call it the Garden of Eschtah. If you can get
well anywhere it'll be there."
"I'll go but I ought not. What can I do for you?"
"No man can ever tell what he may do for another. The time may come--
well, John, is it settled?" He offered his huge broad hand.
"It's settled--I--" Hare faltered as he put his hand in Naab's. The
Mormon's grip straightened his frame and braced him. Strength and
simplicity flowed from the giant's toil-hardened palm. Hare swallowed
his thanks along with his emotion, and for what he had intended to say
he substituted: "No one ever called me John. I don't know the name. Call
me Jack."
"Very well, Jack, and now let's see. You'll need some things from the
store. Can you come with me? I
t's not far."
"Surely. And now what I need most is a razor to scrape the alkali and
stubble off my face."
The wide street, bordered by cottages peeping out of green and white
orchards, stretched in a straight line to the base of the ascent which
led up to the Pink Cliffs. A green square enclosed a gray church, a
school-house and public hall. Farther down the main thoroughfare were
several weather-boarded whitewashed stores. Two dusty men were riding
along, one on each side of the wildest, most vicious little horse Hare
had ever seen. It reared and bucked and kicked, trying to escape from
two lassoes. In front of the largest store were a number of mustangs all
standing free, with bridles thrown over their heads and trailing on the
ground. The loungers leaning against the railing and about the doors
were lank brown men very like Naab's sons. Some wore sheepskin "chaps,"
some blue overalls; all wore boots and spurs, wide soft hats, and in
their belts, far to the back, hung large Colt's revolvers.
"We'll buy what you need, just as if you expected to ride the ranges for
me to-morrow," said Naab. "The first thing we ask a new man is, can he
ride? Next, can he shoot?"
"I could ride before I got so weak. I've never handled a revolver, but I
can shoot a rifle. Never shot at anything except targets, and it seemed
to come natural for me to hit them."
"Good. We'll show you some targets--lions, bears, deer, cats, wolves.
There's a fine forty-four Winchester here that my friend Abe has been
trying to sell. It has a long barrel and weighs eight pounds. Our desert
riders like the light carbines that go easy on a saddle. Most of the
mustangs aren't weight-carriers. This rifle has a great range; I've shot
it, and it's just the gun for you to use on wolves and coyotes. You'll
need a Colt and a saddle, too."
"By-the-way," he went on, as they mounted the store steps, "here's the
kind of money we use in this country." He handed Hare a slip of blue
paper, a written check for a sum of money, signed, but without register
of bank or name of firm. "We don't use real money," he added. "There's
very little coin or currency in southern Utah. Most of the Gentiles
lately come in have money, and some of us Mormons have a bag or two of
gold, but scarcely any of it gets into circulation. We use these checks,
which go from man to man sometimes for six months. The roundup of a
check means sheep, cattle, horses, grain, merchandise or labor. Every
man gets his real money's value without paying out an actual cent."
"Such a system at least means honest men," said Hare, laughing his
surprise.
They went into a wide door to tread a maze of narrow aisles between
boxes and barrels, stacks of canned vegetables, and piles of harness and
dry goods; they entered an open space where several men leaned on a
counter.
"Hello, Abe," said Naab; "seen anything of Snap?"
"Hello, August. Yes, Snap's inside. So's Holderness. Says he rode in off
the range on purpose to see you." Abe designated an open doorway from
which issued loud voices. Hare glanced into a long narrow room full of
smoke and the fumes of rum. Through the haze he made out a crowd of men
at a rude bar. Abe went to the door and called out: "Hey, Snap, your dad
wants you. Holderness, here's August Naab."
A man staggered up the few steps leading to the store and swayed in. His
long face had a hawkish cast, and it was gray, not with age, but with
the sage-gray of the desert. His eyes were of the same hue, cold yet
burning with little fiery flecks in their depths. He appeared short of
stature because of a curvature of the spine, but straightened up he
would have been tall. He wore a blue flannel shirt, and blue overalls;
round his lean hips was a belt holding two Colt's revolvers, their
heavy, dark butts projecting outward, and he had on high boots with
long, cruel spurs.
"Howdy, father?" he said.
"I'm packing to-day," returned August Naab. "We ride out to-morrow. I
need your help."
"All-l right. When I get my pinto from Larsen."
"Never mind Larsen. If he got the better of you let the matter drop."
"Jeff got my pinto for a mustang with three legs. If I hadn't been drunk
I'd never have traded. So I'm looking for Jeff."
He bit out the last words with a peculiar snap of his long teeth, a
circumstance which caused Hare instantly to associate the savage
clicking with the name he had heard given this man. August Naab looked
at him with gloomy eyes and stern shut mouth, an expression of righteous
anger, helplessness and grief combined, the look of a man to whom
obstacles had been nothing, at last confronted with crowning defeat.
Hare realized that this son was Naab's first-born, best-loved, a thorn
in his side, a black sheep.
"Say, father, is that the spy you found on the trail?" Snap's pale eyes
gleamed on Hare and the little flames seemed to darken and leap.
"This is John Hare, the young man I found. But he's not a spy."
"You can't make any one believe that. He's down as a spy. Dene's spy!
His name's gone over the ranges as a counter of unbranded stock. Dene
has named him and Dene has marked him. Don't take him home, as you've
taken so many sick and hunted men before. What's the good of it? You
never made a Mormon of one of them yet. Don't take him--unless you want
another grave for your cemetery. Ha! Ha!"
Hare recoiled with a shock. Snap Naab swayed to the door, and stepped
down, all the time with his face over his shoulder, his baleful glance
on Hare; then the blue haze swallowed him.
The several loungers went out; August engaged the storekeeper in
conversation, introducing Hare and explaining their wants. They
inspected the various needs of a range-rider, selecting, in the end, not
the few suggested by Hare, but the many chosen by Naab. The last
purchase was the rifle Naab had talked about. It was a beautiful weapon,
finely polished and carved, entirely out of place among the plain
coarse-sighted and coarse-stocked guns in the rack.
"Never had a chance to sell it," said Abe. "Too long and heavy for the
riders. I'll let it go cheap, half price, and the cartridges also, two
thousand."
"Taken," replied Naab, quickly, with a satisfaction which showed he
liked a bargain.
"August, you must be going to shoot some?" queried Abe. "Something
bigger than rabbits and coyotes. Its about time--even if you are an
Elder. We Mormons must--" he broke off, continuing in a low tone:
"Here's Holderness now."
Hare wheeled with the interest that had gathered with the reiteration of
this man's name. A new-comer stooped to get in the door. He out-topped
even Naab in height, and was a superb blond-bearded man, striding with
the spring of a mountaineer.
"Good-day to you, Naab," he said. "Is this the young fellow you picked
up?"
"Yes. Jack Hare," rejoined Naab.
"Well, Hare, I'm Holderness. You'll recall my name. You were sent to
Lund by men interested in my ranges. I ex
pected to see you in Lund, but
couldn't get over."
Hare met the proffered hand with his own, and as he had recoiled from
Snap Naab so now he received another shock, different indeed but
impelling in its power, instinctive of some great portent. Hare was
impressed by an indefinable subtlety, a nameless distrust, as colorless
as the clear penetrating amber lightness of the eyes that bent upon him.
"Holderness, will you right the story about Hare?" inquired Naab.
"You mean about his being a spy? Well, Naab, the truth is that was his
job. I advised against sending a man down here for that sort of work. It
won't do. These Mormons will steal each other's cattle, and they've got
to get rid of them; so they won't have a man taking account of stock,
brands, and all that. If the Mormons would stand for it the rustlers
wouldn't. I'll take Hare out to the ranch and give him work, if he
wants. But he'd do best to leave Utah."
"Thank you, no," replied Hare, decidedly.
"He's going with me," said August Naab.
Holderness accepted this with an almost imperceptible nod, and he swept
Hare with eyes that searched and probed for latent possibilities. It was
the keen intelligence of a man who knew what development meant on the
desert; not in any sense an interest in the young man at present. Then
he turned his back.
Hare, feeling that Holderness wished to talk with Naab, walked to the
counter, and began assorting his purchases, but he could not help
hearing what was said.
"Lungs bad?" queried Holderness.
"One of them," replied Naab.
"He's all in. Better send him out of the country. He's got the name of
Dene's spy and he'll never get another on this desert. Dene will kill
him. This isn't good judgment, Naab, to take him with you. Even your
friends don't like it, and it means trouble for you."
"We've settled it," said Naab, coldly.
"Well, remember, I've warned you. I've tried to be friendly with you,
Naab, but you won't have it. Anyway, I've wanted to see you lately to
find out how we stand."
"What do you mean?"
"How we stand on several things--to begin with, there Mescal."
"You asked me several times for Mescal, and I said no."
"But I never said I'd marry her. Now I want her, and I will marry her."
"No," rejoined Naab, adding brevity to his coldness.
"Why not?" demanded Holderness. "Oh, well, I can't take that as an
insult. I know there's not enough money in Utah to get a girl away from
a Mormon.... About the offer for the water-rights--how do we stand? I'll
give you ten thousand dollars for the rights to Seeping Springs and
Silver Cup."
"Ten thousand!" ejaculated Naab. "Holderness, I wouldn't take a hundred
thousand. You might as well ask to buy my home, my stock, my range,
twenty years of toil, for ten thousand dollars!"
"You refuse? All right. I think I've made you a fair proposition," said
Holderness, in a smooth, quick tone. "The land is owned by the
Government, and though your ranges are across the Arizona line they
really figure as Utah land. My company's spending big money, and the
Government won't let you have a monopoly. No one man can control the
water-supply of a hundred miles of range. Times are changing. You want
to see that. You ought to protect yourself before it's too late."
"Holderness, this is a desert. No men save Mormons could ever have made
it habitable. The Government scarcely knows of its existence. It'll be
fifty years before man can come in here to take our water."
"Why can't he? The water doesn't belong to any one. Why can't he?"
"Because of the unwritten law of the desert. No Mormon would refuse you
or your horse a drink, or even a reasonable supply for your stock. But
you can't come in here and take our water for your own use, to supplant
us, to parch our stock. Why, even an Indian respects desert law!"
"Bah! I'm not a Mormon or an Indian. I'm a cattleman. It's plain
business with me. Once more I make you the offer."
Naab scorned to reply. The men faced each other for a silent moment,
their glances scintillating. Then Holderness whirled on his heel,
jostling into Hare.
"Get out of my way," said the rancher, in the disgust of intense
irritation. He swung his arm, and his open hand sent Hare reeling
against the counter.
"Jack," said Naab, breathing hard, "Holderness showed his real self to-
day. I always knew it, yet I gave him the benefit of the doubt.... For
him to strike you! I've not the gift of revelation, but I see--let us
go."
On the return to the Bishop's cottage Naab did not speak once; the
transformation which had begun with the appearance of his drunken son
had reached a climax of gloomy silence after the clash with Holderness.
Naab went directly to the Bishop, and presently the quavering voice of
the old minister rose in prayer.
Hare dropped wearily into the chair on the porch; and presently fell
into a doze, from which he awakened with a start. Naab's sons, with
Martin Cole and several other men, were standing in the yard. Naab
himself was gently crowding the women into the house. When he got them
all inside he closed the door and turned to Cole.
"Was it a fair fight?"
"Yes, an even break. They met in front of Abe's. I saw the meeting.
Neither was surprised. They stood for a moment watching each other. Then
they drew--only Snap was quicker. Larsen's gun went off as he fell. That
trick you taught Snap saved his life again. Larsen was no slouch on the
draw."
"Where's Snap now?"
"Gone after his pinto. He was sober. Said he'd pack at once. Larsen's
friends are ugly. Snap said to tell you to hurry out of the village with
young Hare, if you want to take him at all. Dene has ridden in; he
swears you won't take Hare away."
"We're all packed and ready to hitch up," returned Naab. "We could start
at once, only until dark I'd rather take chances here than out on the
trail."
"Snap said Dene would ride right into the Bishop's after Hare."
"No. He wouldn't dare."
"Father!" Dave Naab spoke sharply from where he stood high on a grassy
bank. "Here's Dene now, riding up with Culver, and some man I don't
know. They're coming in. Dene's jumped the fence! Look out!"
A clatter of hoofs and rattling of gravel preceded the appearance of a
black horse in the garden path. His rider bent low to dodge the vines of
the arbor, and reined in before the porch to slip out of the saddle with
the agility of an Indian. It was Dene, dark, smiling, nonchalant.
"What do you seek in the house of a Bishop?" challenged August Naab,
planting his broad bulk square before Hare.
"Dene's spy!"
"What do you seek in the house of a Bishop?" repeated Naab.
"I shore want to see the young feller you lied to me about," returned
Dene, his smile slowly fading.
"No speech could be a lie to an outlaw."
"I want him, you Mormon preacher!"
"You can't have him."
"I'll shore get him."
> In one great stride Naab confronted and towered over Dene.
The rustler's gaze shifted warily from Naab to the quiet Mormons and
back again. Then his right hand quivered and shot downward. Naab's act
was even quicker. A Colt gleamed and whirled to the grass, and the
outlaw cried as his arm cracked in the Mormon's grasp.
Dave Naab leaped off the bank directly in front of Dene's approaching
companions, and faced them, alert and silent, his hand on his hip.
August Naab swung the outlaw against the porch-post and held him there
with brawny arm.
"Whelp of an evil breed!" he thundered, shaking his gray head. "Do you
think we fear you and your gunsharp tricks? Look! See this!" He released
Dene and stepped back with his hand before him. Suddenly it moved,
quicker than sight, and a Colt revolver lay in his outstretched palm. He
dropped it back into the holster. "Let that teach you never to draw on
me again." He doubled his huge fist and shoved it before Dene's eyes.
"One blow would crack your skull like an egg-shell. Why don't I deal it?
Because, you mindless hell-hound, because there's a higher law than
man's--God's law--Thou shalt not kill! Understand that if you can. Leave
me and mine alone from this day. Now go!"
He pushed Dene down the path into the arms of his companions.
"Out with you!" said Dave Naab. "Hurry! Get your horse. Hurry! I'm not
so particular about God as Dad is!"
III. THE TRAIL OF THE RED WALL
AFTER the departure of Dene and his comrades Naab decided to leave White
Sage at nightfall. Martin Cole and the Bishop's sons tried to persuade
him to remain,
