by Max Brand
CHAPTER X
THE GUARD
Consciousness returned to Pierre like the light of the rising moonwhich breaks dimly through the window and makes all the objects in aroom grotesquely large and blackly shadowed. Many a time his eyesopened, and he saw nothing, but when he did see and hear it was byvague glimpses.
He heard the crying crunch of the snow underfoot; he heard the pantingand snorting of the horses; he felt the swing and jolt of the saddlebeneath him; he saw the grim faces of the long-riders, and he said:"The law has taken me."
Thereafter he let his will lapse, and surrendered to the sleepynumbness which assailed his brain in waves. He was riding withoutsupport by this time, but it was an automatic effort. There was nomore real life in him than in a dummy figure. It was not the effect ofthe blow. It was rather the long exposure and the over-exertion ofnerves and mind and body during the evening and night. He had simplycollapsed beneath the strain.
But an old army man has said: "Give me a soldier of eighteen or twenty.In a single day he may not march quite so far as a more mature man orcarry quite so much weight. He will go to sleep each night dead to theworld. But in the morning he awakens a new man. He is like a slatefrom which all the writing has been erased. He is ready for a new dayand a new world. Thirty days of campaigning leaves him as strong andfresh as ever.
"Thirty days of campaigning leaves the old soldier a wreck. Why?Because as a man grows older he loses the ability to sleep soundly. Hecarries the nervous strain of one day over to the next. Life is aserious problem to a man over thirty. To a man under thirty it issimply a game. For my part, give me men who can play at war."
So it was with Pierre le Rouge. He woke with a faint heaviness ofhead, and stretched himself. There were many sore places, but nothingmore. He looked up, and the slant winter sun cut across his face andmade a patch of bright yellow on the wall beside him.
Next he heard a faint humming, and, turning his head, saw a boy offourteen or perhaps a little more, busily cleaning a rifle in a waythat betokened the most expert knowledge of the weapon. Pierre himselfknew rifles as a preacher knows his Bible, and as he lay half awake andhalf asleep he smiled with enjoyment to see the deft fingers move hereand there, wiping away the oil. A green hand will spend half a daycleaning a gun, and then do the work imperfectly; an expert does thejob efficiently in ten minutes. This was an expert.
Undoubtedly this was a true son of the mountain desert. He wore hisold slouch hat even in the house, and his skin was that olive brownwhich comes from many years of exposure to the wind and sun. At thesame time there was a peculiar fineness about the boy. His feet wereastonishingly small and the hands thin and slender for all their supplestrength. And his neck was not bony, as it is in most youths at thisgawky age, but smoothly rounded.
Men grow big of bone and sparse of flesh in the mountain desert. Itwas the more surprising to Pierre to see this young fellow with themarvelously delicate-cut features. By some freak of nature here was aplace where the breed ran to high blood.
The cleaning completed, the boy tossed the butt of the gun to hisshoulder and squinted down the barrel. Then he loaded the magazine,weighted the gun deftly at the balance, and dropped the rifle acrosshis knees.
"Morning," said Pierre le Rouge cheerily, and swung off the bunk to thefloor. "How old's the gun?"
The boy, without the slightest show of excitement, snapped the butt tohis shoulder and drew a bead on Pierre's breast.
"Sit down before you get all heated up," said a musical voice."There's nobody waiting for you on horseback."
And Pierre sat down, partly because Western men never argue a pointwhen that little black hole is staring them in the face, partly becausehe remembered with a rush that the last time he had fully possessed hisconsciousness he had been lying in the snow with the cross gripped hardand the toppling mass of the landslide above him. All that hadhappened between was blotted from his memory. He fumbled at histhroat. The cross was not there. He touched his pockets.
"Ease your hands away from your hip," said the cold voice of the boy,who had dropped his gun to the ready with a significant finger curledaround the trigger, "or I'll drill you clean."
Pierre obediently raised his hands to the level of his shoulders. Theboy sneered, and a light of infinite scorn blazed into those greatblack eyes.
"This isn't a hold-up," he explained. "Put 'em down again, but watchyourself."
The sneer varied to a contemptuous smile.
"I guess you're tame, all right."
"Point that gun another way, will you, son?"
The boy started and flushed a little.
"Don't call me son."
"Is this a lockup--a jail?"
"This?"
"What is it, then? The last I remember I was lying in the snow with--"
"I wish to God you'd been let there," said the boy bitterly.
But Pierre, overwhelmed with the endeavor to recollect, rushed on withhis questions and paid no heed to the tone.
"I had a cross in my hand--"
The scorn of the boy grew to mighty proportions.
"It's there in the breast-pocket of your shirt."
Pierre drew out the little cross, and the touch of it against his palmrestored whatever of his strength was lacking. Very carefully heattached it to the chain about his throat. Then he looked up to thecontempt of the boy, and as he did so another memory burst on him andbrought him to his feet. The gun went to the boy's shoulders at thesame time.
"When I was found--was any one else with me?"
"Nope."
"What happened?"
"Must have been buried in the landslide. Half a hill caved in, and thedirt rolled you down to the bottom. Plain luck, that's all, that keptyou from going out."
"Luck?" said Pierre and he laid his hand against his breast where hecould feel the outline of the cross. "Yes, I suppose it was luck. Andshe--"
He sat down slowly and buried his face in his hands. A new tone camein the voice of the boy. His tone was thrillingly gentle as he asked:"Was a woman with you?" But Pierre heard only the tone and not thewords. His face was gray when he looked up again, and his voice hard.
"Tell me as briefly as you can how I come here, and who picked me up."
"My father and his men. They passed you lying on the snow. Theybrought you home."
"Who is your father?"
The boy stiffened and his color rose in pride and defiance.
"My father is Jim Boone."
Instinctively, while he stared, the right hand of Pierre le Rouge crepttoward his hip.
"Keep your hand steady," said the boy. "I got a nervoustrigger-finger. Yeh, dad is pretty well known."
"You're his son?"
"I'm Jack Boone."
"But I've heard--tell me, do you look like your father?"
Jack Boone smiled, strove to frown, and then burst into surprisinglymusical laughter. It came in bursts and ripples, and seemed that itwould never end. His merriment ended slowly, for he saw the eyes ofPierre stare into blank distance, and knew that the man with the redhair was thinking of the woman whom the landslide had buried.Something that was partially sympathy and partially curiosity alteredJack's expression.
After all, it was very difficult to remain hostile in front of thesteady blue eyes of this stranger.
Pierre said gravely: "Why am I under guard?"
Jack was instantly aflame with the old anger.
"Not because I want you here."
"Who does?"
"Dad."
"Put away your pop-gun and talk sense. I won't try to get away untilJim Boone comes. I only fight men."
Even the anger and grief of the boy could not keep him from smiling inhis peculiarly winning way.
"Just the same I'll keep the shooting-iron handy. Sit still. A gundon't keep me from talking sense, does it? You're here to take Hal'splace. Hal!"
The little wail told a thousand things, and Pierre, shocked out of
thethought of his own troubles, waited.
"My brother, Hal; he's dead; he died last night, and on the way backdad found you and brought you to take Hal's place. _Hal's_ place!"
The accent showed how impossible it was that Hal's place could be takenby any mortal man.
"I got orders to keep you here, but if I was to do what I'd like to do,I'd give you the best horse on the place and tell you to clear out.That's me!"
"Then do it."
"And face dad afterward?"
"Tell him I overpowered you. That would be easy; you a slip of a boy,and me a man."
"Stranger, it goes to show you may have heard of Jim Boone, but youdon't anyways know him. When he orders a thing done he wants it done,and he don't care how, and he don't ask questions why. He just raiseshell."
"He really expects to keep me here?"
"Expects? He will."
"Going to tie me up?" asked Pierre ironically.
"Maybe," answered Jack, overlooking the irony. "Maybe he'll just putyou on my shoulders to guard."
He moved the gun significantly.
"And I can do it."
"Of course. But he would have to let me go some time."
"Not till you'd promised to stick by him. I told him that myself, buthe said that you're young and that he'd teach you to like this lifewhether you wanted to or not. Me speaking personally, I agree withBlack Gandil: This is the worst fool thing that dad has ever done.What do we want with you--in Hal's place!"
And a suggestion of a sob came in Jack's voice, though he set his teethto keep it back.
"But I've got a thing to do right away--to-day; it can't wait.
"Give dad your word to come back and he'll let you go. He says you'rethe kind that will keep your word. You see, he found you with a crossin your hand."
And Jack's lips curled again.
It was all absurd, too impossible to be real. The only real thingswere the body of white-handed, yellow-haired Mary Brown under thetumbled rocks and dirt of the landslide, and the body of Martin Ryderwaiting to be placed in that corner plot where the grass grew quickerthan all other grass in the spring of the year.
However, having fallen among madmen, he must use cunning to get awaybefore the outlaw and his men came back from wherever they had gone.Otherwise there would be more bloodshed, more play of guns and hum oflead.
"Tell me of Hal," he said, and dropped his elbows on his knees as if heaccepted his fate.
"Don't know you well enough to talk of Hal."
"I'm sorry."
The boy made a little gesture of apology.
"I guess that was a low-down mean thing to say. Sure I'll tell youabout Hal--if I can."
For his lips trembled at the thought of the dead.
"Tell me anything you can," said Pierre gently, "because I've got totry to be like him, haven't I?"
"You could try till rattlers got tame, but it'd take ten like you tomake one like Hal. He was dad's own son--he was my brother."
The sob came openly now, and the tears were a bright mist in the boy'seyes.
"What's your name?"
"Pierre."
"Pierre? I suppose I got to learn it."
"I suppose so." And he edged farther forward, so that he was sittingonly on the edge of the bunk.
"Please do." And he gathered his feet under him, ready for a springforward and a grip at the boy's threatening rifle.
Jack had canted his head a little to one side, smiling faintly for thejoy of the memory.
"Did you ever see a horse that was gentle and yet had never beenridden, or his spirit broke, Pierre--"
Here Pierre made his leap swift as some bobcat of the northern woods;his hand whipped out as lightning fast as the striking paw of the lynx,and the gun was jerked from the hands of Jack. Not before the boyclutched at it with a cry of horror, but the force of the pull sent himlurching to the floor and broke his grip.
He was up in an instant, however, and a knife of ugly length glitteredin his hand; as he sprang at Pierre his lips were as white as the teethover which they snarled.
Pierre tossed aside the rifle and met the attack bare-handed. Deadlyswift was the thrust of the knife, but compared with the motion ofPierre it was as slow as tame things are when they are likened to thewild.
He caught the knife-bearing hand at the wrist and under his grip thehand loosened its hold and the steel tinkled on the floor. His otherarm caught the body of Jack in a mighty vise.
There was a brief and futile struggle, and a hissing of breath in thesilence till the hat tumbled from the head of Jack and down over theshoulders streamed a torrent of silken black hair.
Pierre stepped back. This was the meaning, then, of the strangelysmall feet and hands and the low music of the voice. It was the bodyof a girl that he had held, and his arm still tingled from thefinger-tips to the shoulder.
