VIII
"Look on my face. My name is Might-Have-Been-- I am also called No-More, Too-Late, Farewell." --_Credit Lost._
"It is a hard world," sighed Charlie See. "Life is first one thing andthen it is a broom factory."
They made a gay cavalcade of laughter and shining life, those fouryoung people. They had been to show Charlie over the gristmill and thebroom factory, new jewels in Garfield's crown, and now they turnedfrom deed to dream, rode merry for a glimpsing of to-morrow, whereHobby Lull planned a conquest more lasting than Caesar's. Their way lednow beyond the mother ditch to lands yet unredeemed, which in theyears to come would lie under a high ditch yet to be. So they said andthought. But what in truth they rode forth for to see was east of thesun and west of the moon--not to be told here. Where youth rides withyouth under a singing sky the chronicle should be broad-spaced betweenthe lines; a double story, word and silence. To what far-off divineevent we move, there shall be no rapture keener than hoping time inunspoiled youth.
The embankments of the mother ditch were head-high to them as theyrode. They paused on the high bridge between the desert and the sown.Behind lay the broad and level clearings, orchard, kempt steading andalfalfa; a step beyond was the raw wilderness, the yucca and the sand,dark mesquite in hummocks and mottes and clumps, a brown winding beltbetween the mother ditch and the first low bench land. The air camebrisk and sweet; it rippled the fields to undulant shimmer of flashingpurple and green and gold.
"Your _'cequia madre_ is sure brimful this evenin'," remarked theguest.
"Always is--when we don't need it. In dry weather she gets pretty lowenough," said Hobby. "Colorado people get the first whack at thewater, and New Mexico takes what is left. Never high water here exceptat flood time. Fix that different some day. We got to fight flood anddrought now, one down, another come on. Some day we'll save the floodwater. Sure! No floods, no drought. Easy as lying! _Vamonos!_"
The road followed the curving ditch; their voices were tuned tolipping water and the drone of bees. Lull pointed out the lines wherehis high ditch was to run at the base of the bench land, with flume atgully and canyon steeps. As eye and mapping hand turned toward Redgatea man came down Redgate road to meet them; a man on a Maltese horse.He rode briskly, poised, sure-swaying as ever bird on bough. CharlieSee warmed to the lithe youth of him.
"There, fellow citizens," he said, "there is what I'd call a goodrider!"
As the good rider came abreast he swept off his hat. His eyes weremerry; he nodded greeting and shook back a mop of blackest hair. Thesun had looked upon him. He checked the blue horse in his stride--notto stop, but to slow him; he spoke to Lull in passing.
"Garfield post office?" He jerked a thumb toward the bridge; forindeed, seen across the ramparts of the ditch, there was smalldistinction between visible Garfield and the scattered farmsteads."This way?"
"Yes."
"Just across the bridge," added Lyn. The story scorns to suppress thetruth--she smiled her dimpliest.
"Thanks," said the stranger; and then, as he came abreast of CharlieSee: "And the road to Hillsboro? Back this way--or straight on?"
"Straight through. Take the right hand at the post office--straight tothe ford. You'll have to swim, I reckon."
"Yes," said the stranger indifferently. He was well beyond See andEdith Harkey now, and the blue horse came back into the road and intohis reaching stride. "Thanks." The stranger looked back with the lastword; at the same time Miss Dyer turned her head. They smiled.
"And they turned Lot's wife into a pillar of salt!" said Mr. Lullbitterly.
"He had such smiling eyes," urged Lyn.
"Ruin and destruction! See! Edith! Spread out--head her off!" Hobbygrabbed Lyn's bridle rein and led his captive away at a triumphanttrot.
They turned aside to inspect the doubtful passage where the futureditch must clamber and twist to cross Deadman; Hobby Lull explained,defended, expounded; he bristled with estimates, alternative levelsand acre costs; here was the inevitable way, but yonder there was achoosing; at that long gray point, miles away, the ditch must leavethe river to gain the needed grades. He sparkled with irresistibleenthusiasm, he overbore opposition.
"Look here, folks!" said Hobby. "See those thunder-heads? It'sclouding up fast. It's going to rain and there's not a man in town canstop it. I aimed to take you up and show you the place we picked tomake the ditch head, but I judge we best go home. We can see the ditchhead another day."
"Now was I convinced or only persuaded?" Charlie See made thegrumbling demand of Edith as they set their faces homeward.
Yet he was secretly impressed; he paused by jungle and sandy swaleor ribbed and gullied slope for admiration of orchards unplantedand friendly homesteads yet to be; he drew rein by a pear thicketand peered half enviously into its thorny impenetrable keeps.
"Who lives there, Edith? That's the best place we've seen. Bigfine house and all, but it looks comfortable and homey, just thesame--mighty pleasant and friendly. And them old-fashioned flowerbeds are right quaint."
"Hollyhocks," she breathed; "and marigolds, and four o'clocks. Anold-fashioned woman lives here."
Charlie's voice grew wistful. "I might have had a place like this justas well as not--if I'd only had sense enough to hear and hark. HobbyLull brought me out here and put me wise, years ago, but I wouldn'tlisten. There was a bunch of us. Hobby and--and--now who else wasit? It was a merry crowd, I can remember that. Hobby did all thetalking--but who were the others? And have they forgotten too? It wasa long time ago, before the big ditch. Oh, dear! I do wish I couldremember who was with me!"
His voice trailed off to silence and a sigh that was only halfassumed.
"You make it seem very real," she said, unconscious of her answeringdeeper sigh.
"Real. It is real! Look there--and there--and there!"
"That is all Hobby's work," said Edith as her eyes followed hispointing finger, and saw there what he saw--the city of his vision,the courts and palaces of love. "He has the builder's mind."
"Yes. It is a great gift." It was said ungrudgingly. "I wish I had it.That way lies happiness. Me--I am a spectator."
She shook her reins to go, with a last look at his phantom farmlands."'An' I 'a stubb'd Thurnaby waaeste.' That's what they'll put onHobby's tombstone."
She lifted up her eyes from the waste places and the seeming, and letthem rest on the glowing mesas beyond the river and the long dimridges of misty mountain beyond and over all; and saw them in thelight that never was on sea or land. The heart of the good warmboisterous earth called to kindred clay, "and turned her sweet bloodinto wine."
Shy happiness tinged her pale cheek with color, a tint of wild roseand sea-shell delicacy, faint and all unnoted; he was half inattentiveto her as she rode beside him, glowing in her splendid spring, a nobletemple of life, a sanctuary ready for clean sacrifice.
"Yes. Hobby, he's all right. Him and his likes, they put up the brainsand take the risks and do the work. But after it's all done some ofthese austere men we read about, they'll ooze in and gather thecrops."
"He doesn't miss much worth having. What may be weighed and countedand stolen and piled in heaps--oh, yes, Hobby Lull may miss that. Notreal things, like laughter and joy and--and love, Charlie."
Charlie See turned his head toward Redgate. She read his thought; inher face the glow of life faded behind the white skin. But he did notsee it; nor the thread of pain in her eyes. In his thought she waslinked with Adam Forbes, and at her word he smiled to think of hisfriend, and looked up to Redgate where, even then, "Nicanor lay deadin his harness."
* * * * *
Pete Harkey's buckboard stood by the platform in front of the littlestore, and the young people waited there for him and his marketing.
"Mail day?" asked Charlie.
"Nope. To-morrow is the big day."
"We used to get it three times a week," said Lyn. "Now it's onlytwice."
&nb
sp; "When I was a boy," said See thoughtfully, "I always wanted to rob astage, just once. Somehow or other I never got round to it." His browclouded.
"Why, Mr. See!"
"Charlie," said Mr. See. "Well, you needn't be shocked. Society isvery unevenly divided between the criminal and the non-criminalclasses."
"That," said Edith, "might be called a spiral remark. Would it beimpertinent to ask you to specify?"
"Not at all. Superfluous. See for yourself. Old Sobersides, here--youmight give him the benefit of the doubt--he's so durned practical. ButAdam and me, Uncle Dan and your Dad--there's no doubt about us, I'mafraid. It's right quaint to see how proud those old roosters are ofthe lurid past. When one of 'em gets on the peck, all you got to do isto start relatin' how wild they used to be, and they'll be eatin' outof your hand in no time. They ought to be ashamed of themselves--sillyold donkeys!"
"How about the women?" asked Lyn.
"I've never been able to make a guess. But there's so few of you outhere at the world's end, that you don't count for much, either way."
"Lyn realizes that," said Hobby. "Here at the ragged edge of thingsshe knows that the men outnumber the women five to one. So she triesto make up for it. She is a friendly soul."
Miss Lyn Dyer ignored this little speech and harked back to the lastobservation of Charlie See. "So you did manage to notice that, didyou? I'm surprised. They've amused me for years--Uncle Dan and UnclePete; how mean they were, the wild old days and the chimes atmidnight! But a girl--oh, dear me, how very different! No hoydens needapply! A notably unwild boy is reproached as a sissy and regarded withsuspicion, but a girl must not even play at being wild. 'Prunes,prisms and potatoes!' Podsnap! Pecksniff! Turveydrop and Company!Doesn't anyone ever realize that it might be a tame business never tobe wild at all?"
"'Tis better to be wild and weep--"
"Now, Hobby Lull, you hush up! The answer is, No. Catechism. A manexpects from his womankind a scrupulous decorum which he is far toobroad-minded to require from himself or his mates--charitable soul!Laughter and applause. Cries of 'That's true!'--Anything more grosslyunfair--"
_Rub-a-dub! Rub-a-dub! Rub-a-dub!_
Three men thundered over the _'cequia_ bridge. At the first drum offurious hoofs See wheeled his horse sharply.
"What's that? Trouble!" The three horsemen swooped from the bridge,pounding on the beaten road. "Trouble, sure!"
"You two girls light out of this! Ride!" said Lull. He spurred to theopen door of the store. "Pete!" he called, and turned back.
"Adam?" said Charlie. "Something wrong up Redgate way. Adam's there,and no one else that we know of."
"I'm afraid so. Horse fell on him maybe--dynamite or something. Herethey come. Big Ed and Jody Weir. I don't know the third man."
The horsemen were upon them. "Murder!" cried Caney. "Adam Forbes hasbeen murdered! Up in Redgate. The murderer came this way. We trailedhim to the bridge. His horse had lost a shoe."
"Adam Forbes!"
"Who is to tell Edith?" said Charlie See, under his breath.
"Someone's going to hang for this. When we found him--I never had sucha shock in my life!" said Jody Weir. "Shot from behind--three times.The powder burned his shirt. Adam never had a chance. Cold-bloodedmurder. Adam was holding fast to his rifle, wrong side up, just as hepulled it from the scabbard. That man came through here."
"Or stopped here," amended Caney. "Might have been a Garfield man, ofcourse. I've heard that Forbes was tol'able arbitrary."
"We met a stranger coming down from Redgate, something like an hourand a half ago," said Hobby. "But if he had just killed a man, I'lleat my hat. That man was feeling fine. Only a boy, too. Someone elsedid it, I guess."
"And he'd been riding slow. No sweat on his horse," added Charlie.
"Couldn't have been anyone else. There wasn't any other tracks, exceptthe tracks of Adam's horse. They turned off south as soon as he gotout of the mouth of the canyon."
"How'd you know it was Adam's horse?" This was Pete Harkey, at theopen door.
"Saw where the bridle reins dragged. Say! Any you fellows comin' withus? That man killed Forbes, I tell you--and we're goin' after him.Only about two hours till dark--two and a half at most--and a raincoming up. This is no time for talking. We can talk on the road."
"Anybody stay with Adam?" asked Pete.
"No. There was just the three of us. We came full chisel after themurderer, hard as we could ride. Come on--get some of your mentogether--let's ride," said Caney impatiently. "Get a wiggle on, can'tyou? Let's find out which way he went and what he looked like. He camehere. No chance for mistake. The body was still warm."
"I saw him! I saw him!" cackled the storekeeper. "Little man, smallerthan Charlie--and young. About twenty. Came in after you all left," hesaid, addressing Lull. "Mailed a letter. Ridin' a blue horse, hewas--a _grullo_. That the man you met?"
"Yes. But riding a blue horse doesn't prove that a man has donemurder. Nor yet mailing a letter. Or being young. We knew that manwent through Garfield. That's nothing new. He told us he was going onto Hillsboro."
"That was a blind, I reckon. He can turn always back, soon as he getsout of sight," said Hales.
"He went that way," piped the storekeeper. "Mailed a letter here,bought a shoe and tacked it on his horse. I fished round to find outwho he was, but he put me off. Finally I asked him, p'int-blank. 'Youdidn't say what your name was,' says I. 'No,' says he, 'I didn't.' Andoff he went, laughing, impydent as hell!"
"Did you notice the brand on his horse?" asked Charlie. "He passed onour right-hand side, so we didn't see it."
"No, I didn't. He took the Greenhorn road, and he was ridin' middlin'slow."
"If you had used your mouth less and your eyes more, you might havesomething to tell us," sneered Hales.
"Little man on a _grullo_ horse--that's enough for us--we're goin'!"snapped Caney. "Say, you fellers make me plumb sick! The murderer'sgetting away, and all you do is blat. We're goin', and we're goin'now!"
"Something tells me you won't," said Pete Harkey.
He had mysteriously acquired a shotgun from his buckboard, and hecocked both hammers with the word. "Not till we talk a little.According to your tell, the killing was done in Sierra County. That'smy county, and we figure we are plenty competent to skin our ownskunks. Also, we want one good long look before we leap. You three arethe only men who can tell us anything, and we want to know what youknow, so we'll not lose time or make mistakes. We can't afford toshoot so as to hit if it's a deer and miss if it's a mule. You fellersare excited. What you need is a head. I'll be head.
"You just calm down a little. I'll be getting a posse together to goback and look into this. You can be fixing to give us some idea what'shappened. After that, these two boys can go with you. They've seenthis stranger and they'll know him on a fresh horse. All you threeknow about his looks is a blue horse. I'm going up where Adam waskilled. Where was it? Don't be nervous about this gun. I never shot aman accidentally in my life. Where was Adam killed?"
"In Redgate. Near the upper end. We was looking--"
"That's enough. You wait till I send for some friends of mine." Peteraised his voice. "Girls! Ride over here! Now you folks keep stilltill the girls get away. Toad Hales, is it? I've seen you before, Mr.Hales.... Edith, you go to the mill and tell Jerome I want him. Lyn,you go to Chuck Barefoot's and tell him to get Jim-Ike-Jones and comehere and be quick about it. Then you girls go home."
"What is it, Uncle Pete? Adam?" said Lyn, with a quivering lip.
"Yes, dear. Go on, now."
"Dead?"
"Murdered!"
"Adam!"
Both girls cried the name in an agony of horror and pity. Edith bentto her horse's mane; and Lyn rode straight to Hobby Lull.
"Oh, Hobby! Be careful--come back to me!" She raised her lips to his.He took her in his arms and kissed her; she clung to him, shaken withsobbing. "Oh, poor Adam!" She cried. "Poor Adam!"
Charlie See turned away. For one heart beat of flinchi
ng his hauntedsoul looked from his eyes; then with a gray courage, he set his lipsto silence. If his face was bleak--why not, for Adam, his friend?
And Edith Harkey, on her sad errand, envied the happy dead. She, aloneof them all, had seen that stricken face.
"Lyn, you go on," said Pete. "Get Barefoot. Then go home and find outwhere your Uncle Dan is, and send him along just as fast as everGod'll let him come."
He turned back to the men.
"Now, then, you fellows! Begin at the beginning. Hales, you didn'tknow Adam, so you won't be so bad broke up as the others. Suppose youtell us what you know. Wait a minute. Sam, you be saddling up a horsefor me. Now, Mr. Hales?"
"We were looking out for that gang of saddle thieves. Went up 'PacheCanyon. Along in the park we saw tracks where two shod horses turneddown into Redgate, and we followed them up. One of 'em had beenchasing a bunch of cattle--or so we thought, though we didn't noticethat part very close, having no particular reason for it then. We'dlooked through two-three bunches of cattle ourselves earlier, forJody's stuff."
"Yes, and you had breakfast, likely--but what do I care? You get onwith your story."
"Say, old man," said Hales in some exasperation, "if you don't wantthis man caught, I'm satisfied. It's nothing to me. I didn't knowForbes. If you want this friend of yours to get away, I'm willing toget down and stay all night. You're pretty overbearing with yourlittle old shotgun."
He made as if to dismount.
"Oh, I wouldn't do that," said Pete mildly. "Look at your friends,first. They're just as overborne as you are, likely--but you noticethey are not making any complaints. They know me, you see. They knowhow Adam Forbes stood in Garfield, and what kind of folks live inGarfield; and they know that whoever killed Adam is in trouble up tohis neck. You mustn't mind our little ways. However, as the witnessis peeved, we'll try another. Jody, speak up and tell us."
"You act like we was under suspicion," sneered Hales.
"Sure, you're under suspicion! What do you expect? Everybody's undersuspicion till we find the right man. I'm going to send word up anddown to hold all strangers. That part is all right. Hello, Jerome! Youmissed most of the evidence! I'll tell you about it as we go up."
"Now why the little gun?" said Jerome Martin, tranquilly.
"Been holding an election. Now, Jody--your little piece."
"There's not much to tell. We found Adam's body a little ways down thecanyon, maybe a quarter or a little more; and just this side of it wefound where a yearling had been branded, or a big calf; ashes stillwarm. Looks just like this fellow had been stealing one of Adam'scalves, and Adam caught him at it."
"But you said Adam was shot in the back at close range," objectedCharlie. "Adam Forbes wouldn't turn his back to any man, under thosecircumstances. That won't work."
"Yes, we thought of that," said Caney. "More likely he saw Adam comingand killed him before he got to the calf--pretending to be friendly.Anyhow, Adam's horse went off down the canyon, and the other man wentdown the canyon, and we came after him. Oh, yes! His horse lost a shoe,as we told you before--the murderer's. Must have lost it chasingthat calf. Tracks didn't show it in the soft ground in the park,anyhow--though we didn't look very close till we found Adam. Butafter he left Adam's body his tracks showed one shoe gone. That'sall. Adam's horse bore off to the left. He had a larger foot thanthe other, and we could see where the bridle dragged."
"I'll send someone to find him. You didn't hear any shots?"
"Oh, no--we just thought maybe we'd meet up with some puncher ridin'the range, and ask him had he seen any strangers. This gang of saddlethieves--"
"Yes, I know about them. Thankee, gentlemen. You can ride now. If youcatch your man beyond the river you might as well take him on toHillsboro. Be mighty sure to remember not to forget to be particularto take this young man alive. We want to hang the man that killed AdamForbes. That's all."
"Here, I want some cartridges," said Hobby. He leaped off and jingledinto the store. "Hi, Sam! Get me a box of forty-fives," he called.Then to Harkey, in a guarded voice: "Pete, this looks fishy as hell!Those ashes were warm, they said. Look what time it is now--half pastfour. The way they were riding, this bunch made it from Redgate inhalf an hour. We met this stranger near two hours ago. That don't holdtogether. If the stranger man built that fire, the ashes would havebeen cold when Caney's bunch found them. And they say there are noother tracks. Wrong--all wrong!"
"And all the rest of it. Son, I didn't miss a bet. Neither did CharlieSee. He looked hard at me. Save your breath. Say nothing and seeeverything. You do your part and I'll do mine. I'll know more beforedark if it don't rain and rub out the tracks. Our Father which is inGarfield hates a lie, and he's fixed up this here solar system sothere is no safe place in it for a lie. Sh-h! Here comes Caney!" Heraised his voice. "What the devil do you need of more men? Five toone--what more do you want?"
"Well, but we may lose track of him and want to spread out to look andask, while some of us go on--"
"Where can I find drinking water?" asked Caney.
"Back there," said Pete, pointing. Then, to Hobby: "Well, pick upsomeone in Arrey, then, or on the way. I want the men round here to gowith me and look round before it gets dark. Say, Sam--you send someoneup with a wagon to bring Adam back, will you? I'm off--me and Jerome.Tell Jones and Barefoot to come right on. Take care of my team forme."
He went out on the platform. Lull and Caney followed.
"Well, so long, you fellows," said Pete. "Send word back if you findyour man. Because there's going to be a lot of irritated strangerswhen we start to picking them up."
"We had some plunder--grub and a blanket apiece tied behind oursaddles, and we dumped it, to ride light, where we found Adam--justkept our slickers," said Caney. "Have 'em bring 'em in, will you,Harkey?"
"Sure," said Pete.
Stepsons of Light Page 8