Fighting Caravans

by Zane Grey

  “Will you make fun? . . . I’m tryin’ to—to ——”

  “Oh, I know, Buff, darling, I always knew. You were so full of things you almost burst, yet you couldn’t say them.”

  “Reckon I’ll say somethin’ now—or die,” he replied, huskily, moistening his lips.

  “Don’t die.”

  “May—you called me darlin’!” he ejaculated, in awe and bliss.

  “It slipped out. But to be honest, I’ve called you that—in my mind—since—well, since I read a book full of the word, and I liked it.”

  “Then I call you—darlin’,” he said, in hushed accents at his temerity. “There! . . . An’ I must tell you somethin’ else that I never said before. I should of, though, long ago. For I did. But, honest, May, I never knew it till this afternoon. . . . Bless that handsome West Pointer!”

  “Buff, you are talking riddles,” she rejoined, happily.

  “Are you any good at riddles?” he queried, slipping his arm around her slim waist.

  “No good at all,” she murmured.

  “I wish I could tell it the way I felt it. . . . I was lookin’ away out over the blue open that’s the Great Plains. An’ it seemed all the work an’ longin’ an’ fear, an’ the hurt of sun an’ blister an’ cold, an’ the bite of Indian arrows—an’ the agony of my loss—all these just burst with the truth of what ailed me. . . . Little May, it was then I found out I loved you.”

  “Oh, Clint! . . . Oh, Buff!” she whispered, lifting her face from his shoulder. The moonlight showed it rapt and lovely, with eyes like night.

  “Yes, I love you, May, an’ the feelin’ isn’t much different from that turrible pain I had at supper.”

  With his left hand he drew a cord from round his neck. Something bright dangled at the end.

  “Oh!—a ring!” she said, thrillingly.

  “It’s all I have of my mother’s. Paw gave it to her when she was a girl. . . . It was too small for her in later life. But it’ll fit you. Let’s see.”

  She held out a little hand that shook, and he essayed to slip it on her finger.

  “Not that one. . . . The third. . . . Oh, it fits! . . . Clint, I’ll treasure it all my life.”

  They were silent for a while. She was lying on his breast now, her head in the hollow of his neck, her hair brushing his lips.

  The moon soared, and silent night reigned. The camp fires had died. The last late freighters had sought their blankets. The coyotes had ceased their yelp and wail. Bells on the hobbled horses no longer jangled.

  “May, wasn’t it awful—when we met in the store?” he asked, presently.

  “Awful sweet.”

  “Weren’t you petrified with—with shame?”

  “Me! I gloried in it! . . . Oh, it was all so—so good, until that Lee Murdock pulled me away—and struck you.”

  “Aw! He did. I’d forgotten,” replied Clint, broodingly.

  “Buff, I liked him at first. Less after he—he tried to take liberties with me. And now I hate him.”

  “What liberties?” queried Clint, violently.

  “Oh, never mind. He only tried. And I slapped his face till my hand burned for hours. . . . Clint, you keep out of his way. He’d stop at nothing. Mr. Clement knows something he won’t tell his wife or me. I’ll be glad to see the last of Murdock.”

  “But will you?” demanded Clint.

  “We understand he leaves the caravan here. He had plenty of money to buy pelts.”

  “Aw, I’m glad. Let’s forget him. . . . But not our meetin’. May, dearest, do you know just what you did then?”

  “When?”

  “At the store—just after the freighter told you I was Buff Belmet.”

  “Oh! . . . I guess I ran to you, didn’t I?”

  “Ran? You flew. . . . That was the most turrible glorious moment I’d ever lived—up to then.”

  “And then I suppose I flew right into your arms?”

  “You did!”

  “Well, you had them wide open. What was a poor distracted girl to do?”

  “I don’t know how it happened, but all at once you were there.”

  “And then did you hug me—or did I hug you? One of us did, for my ribs ached.”

  “I reckon, maybe, I’m most to blame for that. Uncle Jim says I don’t know my strength.”

  “I knocked your hat off, didn’t I?”

  “You sure did.”

  “And tousled your hair?”

  “Yes.”

  “And then—before all that gaping crowd—I shamelessly kissed you, didn’t I?”

  “Not shamelessly, darlin’, though you were as red as fire.”

  “It was shamelessly. Not that I’d have cared the littlest bit—if you had only kissed me back. . . . But, Buff Belmet, you didn’t. You didn’t! . . . And I shall never kiss you again.”

  “Aw, May, that’s what I was gettin’ at.”

  “Oh, I see. . . . Clint, I spoiled you back on the plains, when I was ten years old. I did all the love-making. Now if you want anything of the kind you will have to make up for lost ——”

  Clint closed her saucy lips with his own. When he rose from that contact she lay in his arms, wistful and surrendering, awakened to the fire and glory of love, and too honest to deny it.

  “Buff, I reckon I’ll have to take that back,” she whispered, and lifted her arms.

  At a late hour, when Clint wended his slow way back to the ranch house it seemed that the moon, the night, the earth, the universe had been created for him. He could only accept, humbly, wondering, reverent. All that he had endured lost its utter cruelty in the light of the love he felt and the love bestowed upon him.

  He lingered, sitting on the doorstep of the adobe shack behind the range house. Even the dogs at the corrals were quiet, like their wild brothers out on the range. Over Maxwell’s ranch hung the pale moon-mantle, mysterious and beautiful. But Clint could not think. He only dreamed over May’s sweet willing kisses. Tomorrow, perhaps, he could face the realities of his new responsibilities. And he found, too, that sleep was something he did not require for a long while. As a consequence he was late at breakfast next morning, to the amusement of Maxwell.

  “Buff, if you stay up late at night playin’ with the ladies, you’ll never make a good scout,” he teased.

  “I’d hate not to make a good scout,” returned Clint, “but last night was worth it.”

  “I reckon,” laughed the rancher. “Well, Buff, come to my office this mornin’. I want a little talk with you.”

  Clint knew that meant something private and he was puzzled, and so interested he took early advantage of the invitation. Maxwell was busy with freighters. Upon concluding his business with them he pushed a chair toward Clint, and also a box of cigars, which he immediately withdrew. “Buff, I forgot you didn’t smoke. . . . Well, lad, I don’t need to ask you if you fixed it up with May.”

  “No, sir. But it was May an’ you who fixed it,” rejoined Clint, gratefully.

  “All’s well, then, lad?”

  “I never dreamed I could be so happy,” said Clint, simply.

  “Couch told me your age, but I’ve forgotten.”

  “Near eighteen now, Mr. Maxwell.”

  “Well, out here on the frontier years don’t matter. An’ May is sixteen. Pioneer girls marry young, which is a good thing.”

  “What—what you—you aimin’ at, sir?” stammered Clint, red in the face.

  “I’ve a hunch you an’ May ought to get married,” replied the rancher, earnestly.

  “Oh! . . . W-w-when?”

  “Just as quick as the Clements will let you. They adopted the girl an’ they love her as their own. But I might persuade Hall. I don’t savvy about the misses, though.”

  “Uncle Jim Couch might have somethin’ to say. He has charge of me till I’m twenty-one.”

  “Ahuh. Jim Couch is all right, among train bosses. But he gets sore now an’ then, at delays an’ on important drives. Then he takes chances. An’, Buf
f, take a hunch from me. Couch’s bones will bleach on the prairie, the same as those of so many good frontiersmen. . . . An’ the point is I don’t want you to break that little girl’s heart.”

  “But, Mr. Maxwell—I—I wouldn’t!” expostulated Clint.

  “You couldn’t help it if you got killed.”

  “Killed!”

  “That’s what I said. Buff, I’m not goin’ to advise the freighters to quit, because my business depends on them. If the caravans stop I’m ruined. . . . Now take this confidentially. The war is goin’ to play hell on the frontier. Freightin’ supplies is goin’ to be ten times as dangerous as ever before. The time is comin’ pronto when a small caravan will have no chance. In a year, maybe this summer, all the Apaches, Comanches, Kiowas, an’ Pawnees will be on the warpath. An’ bad white outfits are growin’, Buff.”

  “An’ you’re just about advisin’ me to quit freightin’ overland?” queried Clint, aghast.

  “Yes. For the little girl’s sake,” said Maxwell, and leaned his head on his hand, shading his eyes. “I’ll tell you a secret, Buff. . . . Once I loved a girl like May. I stayed away too long. . . . She thought me dead, or swore she did! She married another, an’ life has never been the same to me since. I don’t want you to risk so much with your sweetheart.”

  “But May would be true,” replied Clint, passionately, as if a doubt of her was preposterous.

  “She was, an’ she might be for a while yet—when she’s so young. But a beautiful girl like May can’t stay unmarried or at least unpossessed. Not out here very long!”

  “That’s turrible, Mr. Maxwell,” ejaculated Clint, aghast.

  “Man’s hunger for woman is too strong. Look at the white men who marry Indian girls an’ become squawmen. Kit Carson married a half-Mexican woman. Very estimable indeed. But I’m illustratin’ a point. . . . Buff, you an’ May are orphans. You haven’t any relations. You’re just alone. You’ve been long unhappy. You We each other, an’ you ought to get married.”

  “Yes, sir. But—but when?” asked Clint, feebly. He had no will to fight this glorious prospect.

  “Right away. Before Preacher Smith leaves. He’s on his way to California. An’ I’m tellin’ you, lad, preachers are scarce, an’ they’ll be scarcer for some years.”

  “Who’ll I ask first?” whispered Clint.

  “May, of course. An’ then if she’s willin’, you can go to Couch. He’ll consent all right, but I believe he’ll kick on your quittin’ the freightin’ game. An’, Buff, if you marry May you’ll sure have to take care of her. If you wait you’ll have to trust that to God, an’ somebody else. I’ve never had a white woman on my ranch. I made that rule. But I’d have May, only for one reason. I may be ruined here, by the war. Or I might sell out. Keep this under your hat, lad. It’s for you I’m thinkin’ an’ talkin’.”

  “Thank you, sir. I realize that. An’ I—I’m sort of knocked flat.”

  “Of course you are, Buff. But I know this frontier. An’ so does Kit Carson. He’ll be here today or tomorrow. I’ll bet he’ll advise you to marry May an’ go on to California.”

  “California? . . . But I love the Great Plains!” burst out Clint.

  “Ah!” Maxwell threw up his hands. “More than May Bell?”

  “No! No!”

  “Well then go to her, an’ if you can persuade her, an’ the rest of them—marry her before it’s too late.”

  “Too late for what?”

  “Ever to do it. A few more years of caravans an’ you’ll be a plainsman. Then it’ll be too late. The life will claim you. Kit Carson had to quit. An’ just in time. Curtis, Glade, Rockwell—they all saw what was comin’. Jim Couch, Dagget, Grace—they’ve stuck at it too long. They’ll never quit. An’ their scalps will ornament some redskin’s lodge.”

  “Were you ever a plainsman, Mr. Maxwell?” queried Clint.

  “No. I crossed enough, though, to feel the strange fascination of the Great Plains. To understand it. Most men never find out why. It’s the tremendous barrenness, the ever-callin’, never-endin’ land, the eternal monotony of the prairie, the strange loneliness—an’ then the drive, the camp, the watch, the fight—these change a boy’s very soul an’ grip him as a man.”

  Clint rose, trembling in the presence of this wise and good man. “Mr. Maxwell,” he said, standing straight, “as far as I can I’ll take your advice. I’m grateful for such a friend as you—an’ Kit Carson. But until I’m twenty-one I must obey Uncle Jim.”

  “An’ that’s right. I’ll admit Couch is our hard proposition here. But he’ll have you an’ May an’ me to reckon with. A pretty good combination! Now run along, Buff, an’ tackle May.”

  “I’ll go, but I’m plumb scared.”

  “What? Of that sweet, soft-eyed little thing?”

  “Maybe it’s because she’s so—so wonderful. . . . I’m afraid I’d have to beg her, sir. Not make her do anythin’.”

  Maxwell laid down his cigar and regarded Clint almost hopelessly.

  “You made a name for yourself when you were a boy. The boy freighter, they called you once. I heard of you long before I ever saw you. An’ now you’re a big husky lad, near six feet tall, an’ they tell me you’ve stopped your share of Indians. You’re a man! Well, get out of here pronto an’ show May Bell you’re man enough in love, too.”

  “Yes, sir—but—but what shall I do?” faltered Clint, feeling caught between contending tides.

  “Catch her alone, if you have to wait till night,” said Maxwell, seriously, with a dreamy light of the past in his dark eyes. “Then grab her in your arms—yank her off her feet—hug an’ kiss her till she hasn’t sense or desire or breath left to say no. . . . Can you try that, Buff? How does it strike you?”

  “Makes me turrible weak, sir. . . . But ought I try such an awful trick when I know she’d say yes to anythin’ I’d ask her?”

  “Don’t you believe it, Buff. Women are funny. You can never tell what a girl will do. Changes her mind with the wind. Like as not you’ll find her makin’ eyes at Lieutenant Clayborn or that Murdock fellow. He’s too old an’ keen for her, Buff. You keep her away from him. Mind what I say! . . . Now run. I’ve got men waitin’ to see me. I can’t spend all day on your love affair.”

  Clint ran all right. And Maxwell called after him. “Buff, I wish I were you. . . . Come back an’ tell me what happens.”

  Clint raced out, half beside himself, and then bent hurried steps across the courtyard, which was crowded with idle trappers, hunters, Indians, and freighters, waiting for something to turn up.

  Presently he almost bumped into Couch, who evidently had come up the slope from the camp.

  “Hello, Uncle Jim! . . . What you lookin’ so glum about?”

  “Buff, I just had a run-in with Buell—new agent for Aull an’ Company,” replied Couch, fuming. “He’s got ninety wagon-loads of pelt that have got to be in Westport before end of August. An’ he swears if I don’t take the contract an’ pack at once I’ll never get another with his company.”

  “What are you goin’ to do?” asked Clint, anxiously.

  “I don’t know. I’m stumped.”

  “What do the men think?”

  “They haven’t heard it yet.”

  “But, uncle, you know you oughtn’t start out now unless you have a troop of soldiers. You’ll have to wait for another caravan to join you.”

  “Sure I know. But Dagget says he can’t get along from Santa Fé for weeks. Maybe six. . . . Buff, the worst of it is Buell offered me more money per hundred weight, an’ a bonus of five hundred dollars if I landed the freight in Westport by August fifteenth.”

  “Uncle, that’s a temptin’ offer, but I hope you don’t accept it,” rejoined Clint, seriously.

  “Hey, you don’t say we!” ejaculated Couch, testily. “That means you don’t want to go.”

  “No, I don’t, Uncle,” replied Clint, quietly.

  “Wal, I reckon you’ll do as I say,” said Couch, harshly. “I’
m more than your train boss. I’m your guardian.”

  Couch, usually the kindest and most genial of men, could be most stubborn when crossed. And when he drank he became sullen and taciturn. Clint feared that he was somewhat under the influence of liquor.

  “Uncle, I’ll not disobey you.”

  “Wal, I’m glad to hear that. You never did. . . . Buff, it’s a rotten deal. You’ve just found your sweetheart again, an’ God knows I’d hate to separate you from her. . . . Damn the luck, anyhow.”

  Without another word Couch strode on toward Maxwell’s store, leaving Clint in a worse quandary than ever. He decided he had better not be in a hurry to see May, at least until he had pondered over Uncle Jim’s predicament. Freighters were going to be scarce, in spite of high pay. Couch would need all the drivers he could muster.

  But the momentary setback to Clint’s buoyant hopes and enchanting dreams did not persist. It would take more than predicaments, caravans, and Indians to subdue the joy in him that day. Suddenly he conceived the fine idea of going to the store to purchase May a box of the fresh candy that had come with Dagget’s train. So he recrossed the courtyard.

  When he glanced up, what were his amaze and consternation to be confronted by May Bell and Lieutenant Clayborn coming out of the store. She did not at once see Clint because she was looking up at the soldier. Her bright eyes, her parted red lips, her smile, lifted to this West Point officer, gave Clint a stab. She carried one of the boxes of candy Clint had imagined he was going to buy for her.

  Then she saw him, and the bright eyes, the parted lips, the smile that had been for Clayborn suddenly augmented their beauty and sweetness tenfold.

  Clint observed that, realized in a flash his utter foolishness, felt the rush of ecstasy at the beautiful light on her face, which was for him; but not that nor anything kept him from bowing stiffly as he doffed his hat and bolted into the store.

  Chapter Thirteen

  CLINT stalked through the store, blind to customers and clerks alike; and he fell over sacks and bales, and out the back door, in a boiling rage with himself, with May, with that lady-killing lieutenant and the whole world.

  He went by Mexican quarters, barns, corrals, only to rush back to the courtyard. His rage melted into self-pity and mortification, and they lasted through another nameless stalk, at the end of which remorse edged into his conflicting emotions. But it was too late to bank the fires of jealousy. He walked, he sat on a box, he leaned on a hitching-rail, watching like an Indian from a hill.