by Brand, Max
The brain of Connor groped slowly in the rear of these words. He was too stunned by disappointment to think clearly, but vaguely he made out that David had dismissed the argument and was now asking him to come for a walk by the lake.
"The lake's well enough," he answered, "but it occurs to me that I've got to get on with my journey."
"You must leave me?"
There was such real anxiety in his voice that Connor softened a little.
"I've got a lot to do," he explained. "I only stopped over to rest my nags, in the first place. Then this other idea came along, but since the voice has rapped it there's nothing for me to do but to get on my way again."
"It is a long trip?"
"Long enough."
"The Garden of Eden is a lonely place."
"You'll have the voice to cheer you up."
"The voice is an awful thing. There is no companionship in it. This thought comes to me. Leave the mule and the horse. Take Shakra. She will carry you swiftly and safely over the mountains and bring you back again. And I shall be happy to know that she is with you while you are away. Then go, brother, if you must, and return in haste."
It was the opening of the gates of heaven to Connor at the very moment when he had surrendered the last hope. He heard David call the servants, heard an order to bring Shakra saddled at once. The canteen was being filled for the journey. Into the incredulous mind of the gambler the truth filtered by degrees, as candlelight probes a room full of treasure, flashing ever and anon into new corners filled with undiscovered riches.
Shakra was his to ride over the mountains. And why stop there? There was no mark on her, and his brand would make her his. She would be safe in an Eastern racing stable before they even dreamed of pursuit. And when her victories on the track had built his fortune he could return her, and raise a breed of peerless horses. A theft? Yes, but so was the stealing of the fire from heaven for the use of mankind.
He would have been glad to leave the Garden of Eden at once, but that was not in David's scheme of things. To him a departure into the world beyond the mountains was as a voyage into an uncharted sea. His dignity kept him from asking questions, but it was obvious that he was painfully anxious to learn the necessity of Connor's going.
That night in the patio he held forth at length of the things they would do together when the gambler returned. "The Garden is a book," he explained. "And I must teach you to turn the pages and read in them."
There was little sleep for Connor that night. He lay awake, turning over the possibilities of a last minute failure, and when he finally dropped into a deep, aching slumber it was to be awakened almost at once by the voice of David calling in the patio. He wakened and found it was the pink of the dawn.
"Shakra waits at the gate of the patio. Start early, Benjamin, and thereby you will return soon."
It brought Connor to his feet with a leap. As if he required urging!
Through the hasty breakfast he could not retain his joyous laughter until he saw David growing thoughtful. But that breakfast was over, and David's kind solicitations, at length. Shakra was brought to him; his feet were settled into the stirrups, and the dream changed to a sense of the glorious reality. She was his--Shakra!
"A journey of happiness for your sake and a speed for mine, Benjamin."
Connor looked down for the last time into the face of the master of the Garden, half wild and half calm--the face of a savage with the mind of a man behind it. "If he should take my trail!" he thought with horror.
"Good-by!" he called aloud, and in a burst of joy and sudden compunction, "God bless you, David!"
"He has blessed me already, for He has given to me a friend."
A touch of the rope--for no Eden Gray would endure a bit--whirled Shakra and sent her down the terraces like the wind. The avenue of the eucalyptus trees poured behind them, and out of this, with astonishing suddenness, they reached the gate.
The fire already burned, for the night was hardly past, and Joseph squatted with the thin smoke blowing across his face unheeded. He was grinning with savage hatred and muttering.
Connor knew what profound curse was being called down upon his head, but he had only a careless glance for Joseph. His eye up yonder where the full morning shone on the mountains, his mind was out in the world, at the race track, seeing in prospect beautiful Shakra fleeing away from the finest of the thoroughbreds. And he saw the face of Ruth, as her eyes would light at the sight of Shakra. He could have burst into song.
Connor looking forward, high-headed, threw up his arm with a low shout, and Shakra burst into full gallop down the ravine.
Chapter NINETEEN
When Ruth Manning read the note through for the first time she raised her glance to the bearer. The boy was so sun-blackened that the paler skin of the eyelids made his eyes seem supremely large. He was now poised accurately on one foot, rubbing his calloused heel up and down his shin, while he drank in the particulars of the telegraph office. He could hardly be a party to a deception. She looked over the note again, and read:
DEAR MISS MANNING:
I am a couple of miles out of Lukin, in a place to which the bearer of this note will bring you. I am sure you will come, for I am in trouble, out of which you can very easily help me.
It is a matter which I cannot confide to any other person in Lukin. I am impatiently expecting you.
BEN CONNOR.
She crumpled the note in her hand thoughtfully, but, on the verge of dropping it in the waste basket, she smoothed it again, and for the third time went over the contents. Then she rose abruptly and confided her place to the lad who idled at the counter.
"The wire's dead," she told him. "Besides, I'll be back in an hour or so."
And she rode off a moment later with the boy. He had a blanket-pad without stirrups, and he kept prodding the sliding elbows of the horse with his bare toes while he chattered at Ruth, for the drum of the sounder had fascinated him and he wanted it explained. She listened to him with a smile of inattention, for she was thinking busily of Connor.
Those thoughts made her look down to the dust that puffed up from the feet of the horses and became a light mist behind them; then, raising her head, she saw the blue ravines of the farther mountains and the sun haze about the crests. Connor had always been to her as the ship is to a traveler; the glamour of strange places was about him.
Presently they left the trail, and passing about a hillside, came to an old shack whose unpainted wood had blackened with time.
"There he is," said the boy, and waving his hand to her, turned his pony on the back trail at a gallop.
Connor called to her from the shack and came to meet her, but she had dismounted before he could reach the stirrup. He kept her hand in his for a moment as he greeted her. It surprised him to find how glad he was to see her. He told her so frankly.
"After the mountains and all that," he said cheerfully, "it's like meeting an old chum again to see you. How have things been going?"
This direct friendliness in a young man was something new to the girl.
The youths who came in to the dances at Lukin were an embarrassed lot who kept a sulky distance, as though they made it a matter of pride to show they were able to resist the attraction of a pretty girl. But if she gave them the least encouragement, the merest shadow of a friendly smile, they were at once all eagerness. They would flock around her, sending savage glances to one another, and simpering foolishly at her.
They had stock conversation of politeness; they forced out prodigious compliments to an accompaniment of much writhing. Social conversation was a torture to them, and the girl knew it.
Not that she despised them. She understood perfectly well that most of them were fine fellows and strong men. But their talents had been cultivated in roping two-year-olds and bulldogging yearlings. They could encounter the rush of a mad bull far more easily than they could withstand a verbal quip. With the familiarity of years, she knew, they lost both their sullenness and their sta
rched politeness. They became kindly, gentle men with infinite patience, infinite devotion to their "womenfolk." Homelier girls in Lukin had an easier time with them. But in the presence of Ruth Manning, who was a more or less celebrated beauty, they were a hopeless lot. In short, she had all her life been in an amphibious position, of the mountain desert and yet not of the mountain desert. On the one hand she despised the "slick dudes" who now and again drifted into Lukin with marvelous neckties and curiously patterned clothes; on the other hand, something in her revolted at the thought of becoming one of the "womenfolk."
As a matter of fact, there are two things which every young girl should have. The first is the presence of a mother, which is the oldest of truisms; the second is the friendship of at least one man of nearly her own age. Ruth had neither. That is the crying hurt of Western life. The men are too busy to bother with women until the need for a wife and a home and children, and all the physical destiny of a man, overwhelms them. When they reach this point there is no selection. The first girl they meet they make love to.
And most of this Ruth understood. She wanted to make some of those lumbering, fearless, strong-handed, gentle-souled men her friends. But she dared not make the approaches. The first kind word or the first winning smile brought forth a volley of tremendous compliments, close on the heels of which followed the heavy artillery of a proposal of marriage. No wonder that she was rejoiced beyond words to meet this frank friendliness in Ben Connor. And what a joy to be able to speak back freely, without putting a guard over eyes and voice!
"Things have gone on just the same--but I've missed you a lot!"
"That's good to hear."
"You see," she explained, "I've been living in Lukin with just half a mind--the rest of it has been living off the wire. And you're about the only interesting thing that's come to me except in the Morse."
And what a happiness to see that there was no stiffening of his glance as he tried to read some profound meaning into her words! He accepted them as they were, with a good-natured laughter that warmed her heart.
"Sit down over here," he went on, spreading a blanket over a chairlike arrangement of two boulders. "You look tired out."
She accepted with a smile, and letting her head go back against the upper edge of the blanket she closed her eyes for a moment and permitted her mind to drift into utter relaxation.
"I am tired," she whispered. It was inexpressibly pleasant to lie there with the sense of being guarded by this man. "They never guess how tired I get--never--never! I feel--I feel--as if I were living under the whip all the time."
"Steady up, partner." He had picked up that word in the mountains, and he liked it. "Steady, partner. Everybody has to let himself go. You tell me what's wrong. I may not be able to fix anything, but it always helps to let off steam."
She heard him sit down beside her, and for an instant, though her eyes were still closed, she stiffened a little, fearful that he would touch her hand, attempt a caress. Any other man in Lukin would have become familiar long ago. But Connor did not attempt to approach her.
"Turn and turn about," he was saying smoothly. "When I went into your telegraph office the other night my nerves were in a knot. Tell you straight I never knew I had real nerves before. I went in ready to curse like a drunk. When I saw you, it straightened me out. By the Lord, it was like a cool wind in my face. You were so steady, Ruth; straight eyes; and it ironed out the wrinkles to hear your voice. I blurted out a lot of stuff. But when I remembered it later on I wasn't ashamed. I knew you'd understand. Besides, I knew that what I'd said would stop with you. Just about one girl in a million who can keep her mouth shut--and each one of 'em is worth her weight in gold. You did me several thousand dollars' worth of good that night. That's honest!"
She allowed her eyes to open, slowly, and looked at him with a misty content. The mountains had already done him good. The sharp sun had flushed him a little and tinted his cheeks and strong chin with tan. He looked more manly, somehow, and stronger in himself. Of course he had flattered her, but the feeling that she had actually helped him so much by merely listening on that other night wakened in her a new self-reverence. She was too prone to look on life as a career of manlike endeavor; it was pleasant to know that a woman could accomplish something even more important by simply sitting still and listening. He was watching her gravely now, even though she permitted herself the luxury of smiling at him.
All at once she cried softly: "Thank Heaven that you're not a fool, Ben Connor!"
"What do you mean by that?"
"I don't think I can tell you." She added hastily: "I'm not trying to be mysterious."
He waved the need of an apology away.
"Tell you what. Never knew a girl yet that was worth her salt who could be understood all the time, or who even understood herself."
She closed her eyes again to ponder this, lazily. She could not arrive at a conclusion, but she did not care. Missing links in this conversation were not vitally important.
"Take it easy, Ruth; we'll talk later on," he said after a time.
She did not look at him as she answered: "Tell me why?"
There was a sort of childlike confiding in all this that troubled Ben Connor. He had seen her with a mind as direct and an enthusiasm as strong as that of a man. This relaxing and softening alarmed him, because it showed him another side of her, a new and vital side. She was very lovely with the shadows of the sombrero brim cutting across the softness of her lips and setting aglow the clear olive tan of her chin and throat. Her hand lay palm upward beside her, very small, very delicate in the making. But what a power was in that hand! He realized with a thrill of not unmixed pleasure that if the girl set herself to the task she could mold him like wax with the gestures of that hand. If into the softness of her voice she allowed a single note of warmth to creep, what would happen in Ben Connor? He felt within himself a chord ready to vibrate in answer.
Now he caught himself leaning a little closer to study the purple stain of weariness in her eyelids. Even exhaustion was attractive in her. It showed something new, and newly appealing. Weariness gave merely a new edge to her beauty. What if her eyes, opening slowly now, were to look upon him not with the gentleness of friendship, but with something more--the little shade of difference in a girl's wide eyes that admits a man to her secrets--and traps him in so doing.
Ben Connor drew himself up with a shake of the shoulders. He felt that he must keep careful guard from now on. What a power she was. What a power! If she set herself to the task who could deal with her? What man could keep from her? Then the picture of David jumped into his mind out of nothingness. And on the heels of that picture the inspiration came with a sudden uplifting of the heart, surety, intoxicating insight. He wanted to jump to his feet and shout until the great ravine beneath them echoed. With an effort he remained quiet. But he was thinking rapidly--rapidly. He had intended to use her merely to arrange for shipping Shakra away from Lukin Junction. For he dared not linger about the town where expert horse thieves might see the mare. But now something new, something more came to him. The girl was a power? Why not use her?
What he said was: "Do you know why you close your eyes?"
Still without looking up she answered: "Why?"
"All of these mountains--you see?" She did not see, so he went on to describe them. "There's that big peak opposite us. Looks a hundred yards away, but it's two miles. Comes down in big jags and walks up into the sky--Lord knows how many thousand feet. And behind it the other ranges stepping off into the horizon with purple in the gorges and mist at the tops. Fine picture, eh? But hard to look at, Ruth. Mighty hard to look at. First thing you know you get to squinting to make out whether that's a cactus on the side of that mountain or a hundred-foot pine tree. Might be either. Can't tell the distance in this air. Well, you begin to squint. That's how the people around here get that long-distance look behind their eyes and the long-distance wrinkles around the corners of their eyes. All the men have those wrinkles. B
ut the women have them, too, after a while. You'll get them after a while, Ruth. Wrinkles around the eyes and wrinkles in the mind to match, eh?"
Her eyes opened at last, slowly, slowly. She smiled at him plaintively.
"Don't I know, Ben? It's a man's country. It isn't made for woman."
"Ah, there you've hit the nail on the head. Exactly! A man's country. Do you know what it does to the women?"
"Tell me."
"Makes 'em like the men. Hardens their hands after a while. Roughens their voices. Takes time, but that's what comes after a while.
Understand?"
"Oh, don't I understand!"
And he knew how the fear had haunted her, then, for the first time.
"What does this dry, hot wind do to you in the mountains? What does it do to your skin? Takes the velvet off, after a while; makes it dry and hard. Lord, girl, I'd hate to see the change it's going to make in you!"
All at once she sat up, wide awake.
"What are you trying to do to me, Ben Connor?"
"I'm trying to wake you up."
"I am awake. But what can I do?"
"You think you're awake, but you're not. Tell you what a girl needs, a stage--just like an actor. Think they can put on a play with these mountains for a setting? Never in the world. Make the actors look too small. Make everything they say sound too thin.
"Same way with a girl. She needs a setting. A room, a rug, a picture, a comfortable chair, and a dress that goes with it. Shuts out the rest of the world and gives her a chance to make a man focus on her--see her behind the footlights. See?"
"Yes," she whispered.
"Do you know what I've been doing while I watched you just now?"
"Tell me."
He was fighting for a great purpose now, and a quality of earnest emotion crept into his voice. "Around your throat I've been running an edging of yellow old lace. Under your hand that was lying there I put a deep blue velvet; I had your shoulders as white as snow, with a flash to 'em like snow when you turned in the light; I had you proud as a queen, Ruth, with a blur of violets at your breast. I took out the tired look in your face. Instead, I put in happiness."
