The Heritage of the Desert: A Novel
Page 25
could not bring himself to leave the room.
He never saw Snap touch her; he never heard Mescal's voice; he believed
that she spoke very little. When the hour was over and Mescal rose to
pass to her room, then his doubt, his fear, his misery, were as though
they had never been, for as Mescal said good-night she would give him
one look, swift as a flash, and in it were womanliness and purity, and
something beyond his comprehension. Her Indian serenity and mysticism
veiled yet suggested some secret, some power by which she might yet
escape the iron band of this Mormon rule. Hare could not fathom it. In
that good-night glance was a meaning for him alone, if meaning ever
shone in woman's eyes, and it said: "I will be true to you and to
myself!"
Once the idea struck him that as soon as spring returned it would be an
easy matter, and probably wise, for him to leave the oasis and go up
into Utah, far from the desert-canyon country. But the thought refused
to stay before his consciousness a moment. New life had flushed his
veins here. He loved the dreamy, sleepy oasis with its mellow sunshine
always at rest on the glistening walls; he loved the cedar-scented
plateau where hope had dawned, and the wind-swept sand-strips, where
hard out-of-door life and work had renewed his wasting youth; he loved
the canyon winding away toward Coconina, opening into wide abyss; and
always, more than all, he loved the Painted Desert, with its ever-
changing pictures, printed in sweeping dust and bare peaks and purple
haze. He loved the beauty of these places, and the wildness in them had
an affinity with something strange and untamed in him. He would never
leave them. When his blood had cooled, when this tumultuous thrill and
swell had worn themselves out, happiness would come again.
Early in the winter Snap Naab had forced his wife to visit his father's
house with him; and she had remained in the room, white-faced,
passionately jealous, while he wooed Mescal. Then had come a scene. Hare
had not been present, but he knew its results. Snap had been furious,
his father grave, Mescal tearful and ashamed. The wife found many ways
to interrupt her husband's lovemaking. She sent the children for him;
she was taken suddenly ill; she discovered that the corral gate was open
and his cream-colored pinto, dearest to his heart, was running loose;
she even set her cottage on fire.
One Sunday evening just before twilight Hare was sitting on the porch
with August Naab and Dave, when their talk was interrupted by Snap's
loud calling for his wife. At first the sounds came from inside his
cabin. Then he put his head out of a window and yelled. Plainly he was
both impatient and angry. It was nearly time for him to make his Sunday
call upon Mescal.
"Something's wrong," muttered Dave.
"Hester! Hester!" yelled Snap.
Mother Ruth came out and said that Hester was not there.
"Where is she?" Snap banged on the window-sill with his fists. "Find
her, somebody--Hester!"
"Son, this is the Sabbath," called Father Naab, gravely. "Lower your
voice. Now what's the matter?"
"Matter!" bawled Snap, giving way to rage. "When I was asleep Hester
stole all my clothes. She's hid them--she's run off--there's not a d--n
thing for me to put on! I'll--"
The roar of laughter from August and Dave drowned the rest of the
speech. Hare managed to stifle his own mirth. Snap pulled in his head
and slammed the window shut.
"Jack," said August, "even among Mormons the course of true love never
runs smooth."
Hare finally forgot his bitter humor in pity for the wife. Snap came to
care not at all for her messages and tricks, and he let nothing
interfere with his evening beside Mescal. It was plain that he had gone
far on the road of love. Whatever he had been in the beginning of the
betrothal, he was now a lover, eager, importunate. His hawk's eyes were
softer than Hare had ever seen them; he was obliging, kind, gay, an
altogether different Snap Naab. He groomed himself often, and wore clean
scarfs, and left off his bloody spurs. For eight months he had not
touched the bottle. When spring approached he was madly in love with
Mescal. And the marriage was delayed because his wife would not have
another woman in her home.
Once Hare heard Snap remonstrating with his father.
"If she don't come to time soon I'll keep the kids and send her back to
her father."
"Don't be hasty, son. Let her have time," replied August. "Women must be
humored. I'll wager she'll give in before the cottonwood blows, and
that's not long."
It was Hare's habit, as the days grew warmer, to walk a good deal, and
one evening, as twilight shadowed the oasis and grew black under the
towering walls, he strolled out toward the fields. While passing Snap's
cottage Hare heard a woman's voice in passionate protest and a man's in
strident anger. Later as he stood with his arm on Silvermane, a woman's
scream, at first high-pitched, then suddenly faint and smothered, caused
him to grow rigid, and his hand clinched tight. When he went back by the
cottage a low moaning confirmed his suspicion.
That evening Snap appeared unusually bright and happy; and he asked his
father to name the day for the wedding. August did so in a loud voice
and with evident relief. Then the quaint Mormon congratulations were
offered to Mescal. To Hare, watching the strange girl with the
distressingly keen intuition of an unfortunate lover, she appeared as
pleased as any of them that the marriage was settled. But there was no
shyness, no blushing confusion. When Snap bent to kiss her--his first
kiss--she slightly turned her face, so that his lips brushed her cheek,
yet even then her self-command did not break for an instant. It was a
task for Hare to pretend to congratulate her; nevertheless he mumbled
something. She lifted her long lashes, and there, deep beneath the
shadows, was unutterable anguish. It gave him a shock. He went to his
room, convinced that she had yielded; and though he could not blame her,
and he knew she was helpless, he cried out in reproach and resentment.
She had failed him, as he had known she must fail. He tossed on his bed
and thought; he lay quiet, wide-open eyes staring into the darkness, and
his mind burned and seethed. Through the hours of that long night he
learned what love had cost him.
With the morning light came some degree of resignation. Several days
went slowly by, bringing the first of April, which was to be the
wedding-day. August Naab had said it would come before the cottonwoods
shed their white floss; and their buds had just commenced to open. The
day was not a holiday, and George and Zeke and Dave began to pack for
the ranges, yet there was an air of jollity and festivity. Snap Naab had
a springy step and jaunty mien. Once he regarded Hare with a slow smile.
Piute prepared to drive his new flock up on the plateau. The women of
the household were busy and excited; the children romped.
The afternoon waned into tw
ilight, and Hare sought the quiet shadows
under the wall near the river trail. He meant to stay there until August
Naab had pronounced his son and Mescal man and wife. The dull roar of
the rapids borne on a faint puff of westerly breeze was lulled into a
soothing murmur. A radiant white star peeped over the black rim of the
wall. The solitude and silence were speaking to Hare's heart, easing his
pain, when a soft patter of moccasined feet brought him bolt upright.
A slender form rounded the corner wall. It was Mescal. The white dog
Wolf hung close by her side. Swiftly she reached Hare.
"Mescal!" he exclaimed.
"Hush! Speak softly," she whispered fearfully. Her hands were clinging
to his.
"Jack, do you love me still?"
More than woman's sweetness was in the whisper; the portent of
indefinable motive made Hare tremble like a shaking leaf.
"Good heavens! You are to be married in a few minutes--What do you mean?
Where are you