by Harold Titus
CHAPTER XVI
The Candle Burns
Time went on, and the country dropped back from the singing pitch ofexcitement to which the killing of the horse buyer raised it. Menagreed that some one of that country had fired the shots into thatblanket, but it is not a safe thing to suspect too openly. Dick Worthworked continually, but his efforts were without result. A reward oftwo hundred and fifty dollars for the slayer, dead or alive, disclosednothing.
After the evidence had been sifted, and each man had asked his quota ofquestions and passed judgment on the veracity of the myriad stories,Dick said to himself: "We'll settle down now and see who leaves thecountry."
Jed and VB went about the winter's work in a leisurely way. For daysafter the visit of Worth the old man was quieter than usual. Therealization of how the world looked on this young fellow he had come tolove had been driven in upon him. There could be no mistaking it; andas he reasoned the situation out, he recognized the attitude of men asthe only logical thing to expect.
With his quietness came a new tenderness, a deeper devotion. The twosat, one night, listening to the drawing of the stove and the whip ofthe wind as it sucked down the gulch. The candle burned steadily in itsbottle. Jed watched it a long time, and, still gazing at the steadyflame, he said, as though unconscious that thoughts found vocalexpression: "Th' candle's burnin' bright, VB."
The other looked slowly around at it and smiled.
"Yes, Jed; it surely burns bright."
At the instant an unusually vicious gust of wind rattled the windowsand a vagrant draft caught the flame of the taper, bending it low,dulling its orange.
"But yet sometimes," the younger man went on, "something comesalong--something that makes it flicker--that takes some of theassurance from it."
Jed had started in his chair as the flame bowed before the draft.
"But it-- You ain't been flickerin' lately, have you?" he asked, with alook in the old eyes that was beseeching.
Young VB rose and commenced to walk about thumbs hooked in his belt.
"I don't know, Jed," he said. "That's the whole of it: I don't know.Sometimes I'm glad I don't; but other times I wish--_wish_ thatwhatever is coming would come. I seem to be gaining; I can think ofdrink now without going crazy. Now and then it gets hold of me; butmoving around and getting busy stifles it. Still, I know it's there.That's what counts. I know I've had the habit, been down and out, andthere's no telling which way it's going to turn. If I could ever besure of myself; if I could ever come right up against it, where Ineeded a drink, where I wanted it--then, if I could refuse, I'd besure."
He quickened his stride.
"Seems to me you're worryin' needless," Jed argued. "Don't you see, VB,this is th' worst night we've had; th' worst wind. An' yet it ain'tblowed th' candle out! It bends low an' gets smoky, to be sure. But italways keeps on shinin'!"
"But when it bends low and gets smoky its resistance is lower," VBsaid. "It wouldn't take much at such a time to blow it out and let thedarkness come in. You never can tell, Jed; you never can tell."
Ten minutes later he added: "Especially when you're afraid of yourselfand daren't hunt out a test."
Another time they talked of the man that he had been before he came toColt. They were riding the hills, the Captain snuggling close to thepinto pony Jed rode. The sun poured its light down on the white land.Far away, over on the divide, they could see huge spirals of snowpicked up by the wind and carried along countless miles, finally to beblasted into veils of silver dust that melted away into distance. Aneagle flapped majestically to a perch on a scrub cedar across thegulch; a dozen deer left off their browsing, watched the approach ofthe riders a moment, and then bounded easily away. The sharp air settheir blood running high, and it was good to live.
"Ain't this a good place, VB?" Jed asked, turning his eyes away from asnow-capped crag that thrust into the heavens fifty miles to the east.
VB slapped the Captain's neck gladly. "I never saw a finer, Jed!" hecried. "If those people back in New York could only get the _feel_ ofthis country! You bet if they once did, it would empty that dinkylittle island."
"You never want to go back?" the older man ventured.
VB did not answer for a long time. When he did he said: "Some day Ishall go back, Jed, but not to stay. I will not go back, either, untilI've come to be as good and as strong a man as the Captain is a goodand strong horse. That's something to set up as a goal, isn't it? But Imean every word. When I left the city I was--nothing. When I go back Iwant to be everything that a man should be--as this old fellow iseverything that a horse should be."
He leaned forward and pulled the Captain's ears fondly, while thestallion champed the bit and lifted his forefeet high in play. VBstraightened then, and looked dreamily ahead.
"I hope that time will come before a man there gets to the end ofthings. He was hard with me, my father, Jed--mighty hard. But I know hewas right. Perhaps I'm not doing all I could for his comfort, perhapsI'm making a bad gamble, but when I go back I want to be as I believeevery man can be--at some time in his life."
He turned his eyes on the little, huddled figure that rode at his side.
"Then, when I've seen New York once more, with all its artificialityand dishonest motives and its unrealities--from the painted faces ofits women to its very reasons for living and doing--I'll come backhere, Jed; back to the Captain and to the hills.
"I've seen the other! Oh, I've seen it, not from the ground up, butfrom the ground down! I've gone to the very subcellars ofrottenness--and there's nothing to attract. But here there's a bigness,a freedom, an incentive to be real that you won't find in places wheremen huddle together and lie and cheat and scheme!"
They returned to the ranch in late afternoon and found that a passingcowboy had left mail for them--papers and circulars--and a picturepostal card. VB had picked up the bundle of mail first, and for a longtime he gazed at the gaudy colorings of that card. Palm trees,faultlessly kept lawns, a huge, rambling building set back from theroad that formed a foreground, and a glimpse of a superblue Pacific inthe distance. He held it in his fingers and took in every detail. Then,with a queer little feeling about his middle, he turned it over. Asmall hand--he remembered just how firm the fingers were that held thepen--had written:
+--------------------------+ | Mr. VB | | Ranger, Colorado | +--------------------------+
And across the correspondence section of the card was inscribed this:
Give my very best regards to the Captain and to Mr. Avery. Home earlyin April.
He read the message again and again, looking curiously at the way shehad formed the letters. Then he muttered:
"Why didn't she send it to Jed--or to the Captain?"
When Jed came into the cabin VB asked him, as though it were a matterof great concern:
"Where's that calendar we had around here?"
That night the young fellow lay awake long hours. The thirst had comeagain. Not so ravishing as it used to be, not inspiring all the oldterror, but still it was there, and as it tugged at his throat andteased from every fiber of his being, he thought of Gail Thorpe--andtossed uneasily.
"Why?" he asked himself. "Why is it that the thirst calls so loudlywhen I think of that girl?"
He could not answer, and suddenly the query seemed so portentous thathe sat up in bed, prying the darkness with his eyes, as though to finda solution of the enigma there. And his wandering mind, circling anddoubling and shooting out in crazy directions, settled back on theCaptain, and with it the hurt of his jumping nerves became dulled.
He closed his eyes, picturing the great stallion as he had first seenhim, standing there on a little rim-rock protecting his band of mares,watching with regal scorn the approach of his adversary.
"And his spirit didn't break," VB muttered. "It's all there, just assound as it ever was--but it's standing for different things. It's nolonger defiance--it's love."
When March was well on its way Jed and VB drove to
Ranger for moresupplies. The Captain had been turned into the lower pasture, andfollowed them as far as he could. When stopped by the fence he stoodlooking after them inquiringly, and when they topped a little swell inthe road, ready to drop out of sight, a long-drawn neighing came fromhim.
"Poor Captain!" muttered VB. "It's like going away from a home--toleave him."
"You're foolish!" snorted Jed. Later he said sharply: "No, you ain't,either!"
When they reached Ranger three cowboys were shooting at a tin can outon the flat, and before entering the store they stopped to watch. A mancame out of the saloon and walked swiftly toward the buildings alongthe road. As he approached both recognized Rhues.
"Better come in," said Jed, moving toward the door.
"Wait!"
With apparent carelessness VB lounged against a post that supported thewooden awning. Rhues slowed his pace a trifle as he saw who the menwere, and VB could see his mouth draw into an expression of nasty hateas he passed close and entered the blacksmith shop. No further sign ofrecognition had passed between them.
When the trading was finished and they walked back toward the corralJed remarked uneasily: "I don't feel right--havin' you around Rhues,VB. He's bound to try to get you some time. I know his breed. He'llnever forget th' beatin' you give him, an' th' first time he sees anopenin' he'll try for you. Men like him lives just to settle one biggrudge--nothin' else counts."
VB raised a hand to his side and gripped the forty-five that was slungin a shoulder holster under his shirt.
"I know it, Jed. I hate to pack this gun--makes me feel like a yellowdog or a Broadway cow-puncher--I don't know which. But I know he meansbusiness. I don't want to let him think I'd step an inch out of hisway, though; that's why I didn't go into the store."
He lowered his voice and went on: "Jed, I wouldn't say a word thatwould send the worst man in the world into trouble with the law unlessI was absolutely certain. I've never mentioned it even to you--but Ithink when Kelly was killed the man who did that shooting believed hewas getting me."
Jed spat lingeringly.
"VB, I've thought so, too," he said.
They reached the ranch the next afternoon, greeted by a shrilling fromthe Captain that endured from the time they came in sight until VB wasbeside him.
"Captain," the boy whispered, rubbing the velvety nose, "making themrespect you is worth having a gunman on my trail--it is."
