by Zane Grey
“Good morning, Weymer,” he said, not without effort. “Hope you’ll overlook the way I shot off my mouth last night. I was sore.”
“Sure. Glad to forget it,” replied Chane, cheerfully. Manifestly Manerube had been talked to.
At this juncture Slack called out, “Come an’ git it.”
Whereupon the five men attended to the business of breakfast, a matter of cardinal importance in the desert. They ate in silence until all the food and drink had been consumed.
“Bud, what’re you doing today?” inquired Manerube, as he rose, wiping his mouth.
“Wal, thet depends on the boss of this hyar outfit,” answered McPherson, slowly, and he stared hard at Manerube. But this worthy did not take the hint, if there really was one.
“Weymer, you said once you’d be hitting the trail for the Hole in the Wall,” went on Manerube, “soon as the Piutes rounded up the rest of the mustangs you bought.”
“Why, yes. What’s it to you?” asked Chane, easily.
“You’re going to sell in Wund, so you said. Well, that’s where we’re bound for, and we’ll help you drive through. But let’s rustle along. It’s been raining up at the head of the San Juan. There’ll be high water.”
“The San Juan is up now, so Toddy told me yesterday. I reckon I’ll wait for it to go down,” replied Chane.
“But that might take weeks,” declared Manerube.
“I don’t care how long it takes,” retorted Chane. “You fellows don’t need to wait for me. I’ll take some Piutes. I’d rather have them, anyhow.”
“The hell you say!” burst out Manerube, suddenly flaming.
At that McPherson violently struck Manerube in the chest and thrust him backward.
“See hyar, Bent Manerube,” he said, in voice contrasting with his action, “we ain’t goin’ to have you talk for us. Me an’ Jim an’ Hod are shore glad to wait on Weymer. We’re out of grub, an’ we don’t aim to let you make him sore on us.”
The sullen amaze with which Manerube took this action and speech convinced Chane that he had no authority over these three men, and a break was imminent.
CHAPTER II
CHANE ABRUPTLY LEFT the camp fire circle, not averse to the possibility of argument and action that might leave him less to contend with. Loud angry voices attested to a quarrel among the men. He made significant note of the fact that he did not distinguish McPherson’s voice.
“Cool sort of chap,” soliloquized Chane. “If Manerube has any sense he’ll not rile that man. But I hope he does.”
Chane possessed himself of his rifle, which during his daily rides he had left in camp. For a wild-horse hunter a rifle was a nuisance and a burden on a saddle. But he had reflected that such a long-range weapon might do more than even up the advantage Manerube and his associates had in numbers, for they carried only the short Colt gun common to riders of the range. In the future he would pack the rifle on his saddle, whether it was cumbersome or not.
With this in hand, and his bridle, Chane left camp to hunt for his horses. Glancing back from the edge of the slope, he was pleased to observe that the four unwelcome guests were engaged in a hot argument.
“I’d sure like to know just what and who they are,” muttered Chane. “I’ll bet they’re going to steal my mustangs. Well, that’d be no great loss. But they’ve all taken a shine to Brutus. I don’t like that. They’ll have to take him over my dead body.”
Brutus was Chane’s new horse, an acquisition of this last trip through the Mormon country. Chane had not ridden him and had not yet seen him go through any kind of test. Two years earlier, Chane had lost a beloved horse and since then had been indifferent to all horses except the great and almost mythical Panquitch. The loss had hurt Chane so deeply that he dreaded to find another animal he might love. Brutus, however, had been gradually growing on him, especially since the arrival of the four self-styled horse-wranglers. Horn had tried to beg Brutus of Chane; Slack wanted to borrow him; Manerube offered to buy him; and McPherson jocularly declared that he intended to steal him.
“Funny how men will take to a certain horse,” thought Chane as he swung down the slope. “Now Brutus filled my eye first time I saw him, but I’d never have bought him if he hadn’t been such a bargain. Reckon I was wrong.”
And Chane tried to recall the remarkable eulogy given the horse by the Mormons. Brutus had come from the finest strain of Colorado-bred stock. His sire was a stallion that had been born wild; his dam had come from a long line of blooded horses. He was six years old. All his life he had run over the rockiest, brushiest country in western Colorado. His equal as a cow horse had never been seen there. And as he had not been ridden by cowboys, his fine disposition had not been ruined. He had never been known to fall, or pitch, or balk at anything. He was fast and no rider yet had ever tired him. So much Chane remembered, and he was surprised at himself that he had not taken credence of it long ago. He understood his reluctance, however, for the very thought of Brutus or even Panquitch taking the vacant place in his heart gave him a pang.
Chane left the trail where it crossed Beaver Brook, and followed the watercourse up the canyon, through willow and cedar thickets, under a looming yellow wall of stone. Chane had three pack horses, and two saddle horses besides Brutus; these had been herded by Toddy Nokin up Beaver Canyon. The brush was still wet from the rain yesterday and the water of the brook was not so clear and amber-colored as usual. Bits of brush and dead leaves floated on the swift current. Blue jays screeched from the piñons; canyon swifts twittered and glinted in the sunlight; Indian sheep were bleating somewhere in the distance.
Presently the canyon opened into a narrow park, purple with sage, dotted by red rocks, and bordered by a wandering line of green where grass and willows lined the brook. Here Chane found his horses. He had been riding a white animal called Andy, which, according to the wranglers, was known at St. George as a one-man horse. Chane, more out of vanity to show he could manage Andy than for any other reason, had given him precedence over Brutus. Andy was white, except for a few black markings, lean, rangy, tough, and of nervous disposition. Chane had found him good in every kind of going except sand. Andy did not know sand.
Chane approached the horses with the usual caution of a wrangler, and all of them, except Brutus, moved out of his reach. Brutus gave his superb head a quick uplift and regarded Chane with keen, distrustful eyes.
“Brutus, I reckon we’ve got horse thieves in camp, so I’m going to look you over,” said Chane. He had a habit of talking to horses, perhaps owing to the fact that he was so much alone.
Whereupon he walked round Brutus as if he had never seen him before. He made the discovery that he had never really looked at Brutus. Reluctantly Chane had to confess the horse was magnificent. And he suffered a twinge of conscience that he could ever be so far faithless to the memory of the beloved horse of the past. That confession and remorse changed the status of Brutus.
“Well, you and I must get acquainted,” Chane decided.
Brutus was not exactly a giant of a horse, though he was much higher and heavier than the average. His muscular development made him appear unusual; indeed, a little more muscle would have deformed him. His chest was massive, broad, deep, a wonderful storehouse of energy. Such powerful, perfectly proportioned, and sound legs Chane had seldom seen, and his great hoofs matched them. His body was large, round, smooth, showing no bones. He had a broad arched neck and a fine head, which he held high as he looked directly at Chane. There was an oval white spot on his face, just below the wide space between his eyes. His color was a dark mottled brown, almost black, and his coat glistened in the sunlight.
At the last Chane always judged horses as he judged men — by the look in their eyes. Horses had as much character as men, and similar emotions and instincts. Chane had a theory, not shared by many wranglers, that kindness brought out the best in any horse. If a horse was mean it did not always follow that he had been born so.
Brutus had large dark eyes, s
oft yet full of spirit, just now questioning and uncertain. They showed his intelligence. Chane made sure that the horse had not been spurred and jerked and jammed around as had most horses six years old. He had not been hurt. The way he threw up his head appealed strongly to Chane. There was pride and fire in his look. It seemed he questioned Chane — what have you to say for yourself?
“Brutus, I had — a horse once,” said Chane, faltering a little, “and I haven’t cared for one since.... But you and I are going to be friends.”
With the words Chane’s old gentle and confident way of handling horses came back to him. He approached Brutus, placing a slow sure strong hand on the glossy neck. Brutus quivered, but did not jerk away. He snorted, and turned his head to look at Chane. It pleased Chane to find that he did not need a rope or halter. Brutus stood to be bridled, not altogether satisfied about it, not liking the rifle Chane held under his arm, but he took the bit easily and began to champ it. Then he followed Chane willingly. He had a long stride and his nose soon came abreast of Chane’s shoulder. Before Chane reached camp he decided that Brutus had missed the attention and company of a rider.
Chane discovered McPherson and his two comrades in camp, but Manerube was not in sight. While Chane saddled the horse McPherson strode up. His face seemed the same rough bronze mask, his eyes told nothing, yet there were traces about his person of recent spent passion.
“Wal, Manerube helped hisself to your grub, packed, an’ rode off,” announced McPherson.
“He’s welcome,” declared Chane, heartily.
“Me an’ him had some hard words, but he wouldn’t throw a gun, so nothin’ come of it.”
“Where’d he head for?” queried Chane.
“He said Bluff, but I reckon thet’s a bluff, all right,” returned the other. “He took the main trail out of Beaver. I climbed the stone over thar an’ watched him. I seen him turn off the trail in the cedars.”
McPherson pointed with sturdy hand across the canyon toward the foot of a cedared ridge. A trail branched off there, leading to the camp of the Piutes.
“I savvy, Bud,” rejoined Chane, laconically. “You’re giving me a hunch.”
“Man, shore as you’re a hoss-wrangler he’ll rustle off with your little Piute squaw.”
Chane’s good humor gave place to irritation. He eyed McPherson with plain disfavor.
“She’s not my squaw,” he said, sharply.
“Wal, I meant no offense. But she belongs to somebody. Toddy Nokin shore. An’ I’m sayin’ thet if Toddy or you hit Manerube’s trail — —”
“I’ll beat him to Toddy’s hogan,” interrupted Chane, leaping on Brutus.
“Hey!” yelled McPherson, hastily. “Don’t git the idee because Manerube didn’t draw on me thet he won’t on you. Me an’ you might be different propositions.”
“Much obliged,” Chane called back. “If Manerube beats me to a gun you’re welcome to my grub.”
McPherson yelled another parting sally, which Chane could not distinguish, owing to the sudden pounding of hoofs. Brutus had not needed spur or word; his answer to the touch of bridle was something that thrilled Chane.
“Say, old boy, you’re there!” he called.
But only a few rods away was the edge of a rocky slope, where Chane had to rein Brutus in. It was not necessary to haul on the bridle and hold hard as in the case of Andy and most spirited horses Chane had ridden. Brutus pounded down the rock-strewn trail and splashed across the brook. His hoofs rang hollow on the stone bench where the water rushed. Chane rode at a gallop up the canyon, through the sage flat, and on to a low cedared break in the wall. There was a trail leading over this, down upon the sage upland beyond, where the Indians pastured their horses and sheep. By the time Chane surmounted this ragged rocky eminence he was aware that he bestrode one horse in a million. His heart warmed to Brutus. Apparently he climbed with no more effort than that required on a level. Once on top, he gave a great heave of his bellows-like chest, and that was the only sign of exertion he manifested.
“Look here, Brutus, I reckon I overlooked you, but you needn’t rub it in,” remarked Chane.
It was an easy ride down the long gradual slope. The fragrant breath of the sage came strong on the breeze. Away rolled the heaving purple upland, with its clumps of green cedar, its groups of yellow rocks, its long level lines of canyon rims, red in the morning sun. Herds of mustangs colored the soft gray and purple of the sage flats; a flock of sheep moved like a wide white-and- black patch out on the desert. A sage prairie it seemed, almost endless to the eastward; but in the north interrupted lines and notches betrayed the break-off down into the wilderness world of wind-worn rock.
Toddy Nokin’s hogan, and that of his relatives, stood at the base of the slope, on the edge of the bare upland. These mounds of earth plastered over framework of cedar were no different from the Navajo structures. The one door faced the east. Door as well as hogan invited the sun. Temporary as were these homes of the Piutes, they yet had the appearance of service. Blue smoke curled from the circular holes in the roofs; white and black puppies played with half naked, dusky-skinned children; mustangs with crude Indian saddles and blankets of bright colors stood bridles down; in a round corral, made of cedar branches planted in the ground, a flock of sheep and goats baa-baaed at Chane’s approach, and the shepherd dogs barked viciously.
As Chane rode down to the first hogan the Indian children disappeared as if by magic, and one of Toddy Nokin’s squaws came out. Inquiry for Toddy elicited the information that he was out hunting horses. An old brave, gray and wrinkled, appeared at the hogan door, to bend a dark skinny hand in direction too complicated for Chane’s deduction. Then he asked for Sosie, assured that, if Manerube really had designs upon her, there was time to outwit him. The squaw pointed toward a clump of cedars on the rise of slope just beyond the corral.
Chane rode thither, to find Sosie in the shade of the trees, beside an older squaw who was weaving a blanket. Chane dismounted and, approaching them, he bent a more than usually interested gaze upon Sosie. His greeting was answered in good English. The Indian maiden, though only sixteen years old, had spent the latter nine of these in the government school. She was very pretty, compared with the older Indian women, as she had retained the cleanly and tidy habits fostered upon her at the school. She was slight in build, with small oval face, a golden-bronze complexion, and hair black as the wing of a raven. Her eyes were too large for her face, but they were beautiful. She wore a dark velveteen blouse and necklaces of silver, and her skirt was long, full, and of a bright color. Her little feet were incased in silver-buttoned moccasins.
Her somber face changed at Chane’s arrival. He was used to finding her moody, and thought that indeed she had reason to be. Sosie talked well, and had told Chane more about the Indians, and the tragedy of educated girls like herself, than he could otherwise have learned. It appeared that this morning she had another grievance. Her father, Toddy Nokin, wanted her to marry a young Piute who already had a wife, and he could not understand her objection. Chane sympathized with her and advised her not to marry any Indian she could not love.
“I couldn’t love an Indian,” replied Sosie, in disgust.
“Why not?” queried Chane.
“Because Indian boys who are educated go back to the dirty habits of their people. We girls learn the white people’s way of living. We learn to like clean bodies, clean clothes, clean food. When we try to correct our mothers and fathers we’re accused of being too good for our own people. My father says to me: ‘You’re my blood. Why aren’t my ways right for you?’ Then when I tell him, he can’t understand.”
“Why don’t you leave them and live among white people?” asked Chane.
“I’d have to be a servant. Only a few Indian girls find good places.”
“Well, Sosie, it doesn’t look as if education for Indian girls was right,” said Chane, soberly.
“I don’t say it’s wrong, but it’s hard. If I could help my family I’d be g
lad. But I can’t. And when I look at a white man they are angry.”
“Sosie, most white men — out here, anyway — are not fit for you to look at,” replied Chane, earnestly.
“Why? I like them better than Indians,” she said, bluntly.
Chane found his mission rather embarrassing, as it had not occurred to him that Sosie would prefer the company of a bad white man to the best Indian her father could present. After deliberating a moment, he talked to her as plainly and kindly as if she had been his sister, explaining why Manerube or one of his class meant nothing but evil toward her. Chane exhausted his argument, at the conclusion of which Sosie said: “You preach like our missionary at school. I’d rather be made love to.”
“But, Sosie,” exclaimed Chane, aghast at her simplicity, “I never made love to you!”
“No. You’re different from other white men out here,” she replied, in a tone that did not indicate that she respected him for it.
“If I made love to you I’d ask you to marry me,” continued Chane, at a loss what to say to this misguided child.
Her reception of this was a shy surprise, a hint of coquetry and response singularly appealing. It made Chane pity her. At the same time he divined that other white men, in their attention to her, had never touched the chord of fineness and sweetness that lay deep in her. Suddenly he realized the fatality of her position, and it distressed him. He did not love her, but almost he wished he did. In his anxious perturbation he launched into an emphatic declaration against Manerube. Sosie listened intently. It was evidently an exciting hour for her.
“But Manerube says he will take me away,” she replied when Chane had concluded his tirade.
Chane was shocked. “Surely he will. But you mustn’t let him.”
“I’ll run off with him,” the girl replied, with something inevitable about her.
“No, you won’t, Sosie,” declared Chane. “I’ll stop you. I told Manerube he’d better not let me see him with you again.”