CHAPTER XI
FINGER MARK AND IRONWOOD AT LAST
It was another noon in Lost Valley. The summer sun sailed the azureskies in majesty. Little soft winds from the south wimpled the grassof the rolling ranges, shook all the leaves of the poplars. Down theface of the Wall the Vestal's Veil shimmered and shone like a millionmiles of lace.
At Corvan wild excitement ruled. Swift things had come upon them,things that staggered the tight-lipped community, even though it wasused to speed and tragedy. For one thing, Ellen, pale, sweet flower,had hanged herself in the gaudy apartment of Lola behind the GoldenCloud where the dance-hall woman had peremptorily brought her whenthey took her off Cleve Whitmore's shoulder. She left a little notefor Courtrey, a pathetic short scrawl, which simply reiterated thatshe had "ben true to him as his shadow," and that if he did no longerwant her, she did not want herself.
At that pitiful end to a guiltless life, Lola, who knew innocence andsin, sat down on the only carpeted floor in Corvan and wept. When shefinished, she was done with Corvan and Lost Valley, ready to move onas she had moved through an eventful life.
For another thing, two strange men had ridden up the Wall from theBottle Neck a few days back, and they had put through some mysteriousdoings.
This day at noon these two strangers were riding down on Corvan fromup the Pomo way, while from the Stronghold, Buck Courtrey's men werethundering in with the cattle king at their head. He was grim andsilent, black with gathering rage. His news-veins tapped the Valley,he knew a deal that others tried to hide, and he was coming in toreach a savage hand once more toward that supremacy which he knew fullwell to be slipping from him.
And from the blind mouth in the Rockface at the west where the roofedcut led to the mystery and the grandeur of the Canon Country, astrange procession came slowly out to crawl across the greenexpanse--a woman on a silver horse, a rider on a red roan who satbehind the saddle and bore in his arms a man whose heavy head lolledupon his shoulder in all but mortal weakness.
Thus Fate, who had for so long played with life and death in LostValley, tiring of the play, drew in the strings of the puppets and setthe stage for the last act.
As Tharon and Billy crept up to Baston's store and stopped at thesteps, a dozen eager men leaped forward to their help.
"Easy!" warned the girl. "He's ben hurt a long time, an' he's had anawful trip. There's fever in him, an' th' wound in his shoulder openeda bit with th' haulin'. Lay him down on th' porch a while to rest."
But Kenset opened his dark eyes with the old quiet smile and looked ather.
"I'm worth a dozen dead men yet, Miss Last," he said.
As he lay, a trim, long figure in his semi-military garments, on theedge of the porch, the populace of Corvan streamed in from theoutskirts and gathered in the open street. Whispers and comments wererife among them, a new courage was noticeable everywhere. TheVigilantes were present, many of them.
Question and answer passed swiftly and quietly back and forth betweenDixon, Jameson, Hill and Tharon. In a few pregnant moments she knewwhat had happened in Corvan--they knew the secret of False Ridge andthe Cup o' God.
"An' now these strangers from below--they ben a-actin' awful queer,ain't a-feared o' nothin' an' they ben goin' all over like a couple o'hounds. One of 'em's got on a badge of some sort," said Jameson,"didn't mean t' show it, I allow, but Hill, here, seen it bychanct----"
Kenset raised himself quickly on an elbow.
"By all that's lucky!" he said softly, excitedly. "Burn-Harris andO'Hallan! My Secret Service men!"
* * * * *
And it was even so, for by the end of another hour the two strangerscame riding in and were brought forward to the steps where Kenset lay,to clasp his hand and greet him with all the pleasure of previousacquaintance.
Then they requested that a space be cleared to the end of ear-shot andtogether with Kenset, Tharon, Billy, and all the Vigilantes, they helda long and earnest colloquy.
At its end Kenset's eyes were deep and troubled, but Tharon's werebeginning to glow with the old fire that all the Holding knew, theleaping flame that rose and died and rose again, exciting to thebeholder, promising, threatening, unfathomable.
"Why, it's a cinch!" said O'Hallan, "a dead moral cinch! Don't see howit's held on like it has. Couldn't have in any other place in the goodold U. S. A. but this God forsaken hole! Well named, Lost Valley!Why, we've found enough evidence already to convict a dozen men! YourCourtrey's the man that planned a dozen murders, I can see that, andhe's pulled off a lot of them himself. The people are talking now,rumbling from one end of the Valley to the other. We've had to hold upour hands to ward them off lately. Your Vigilantes here have opened upsince we got them together and showed some of them your letter. Youwere wise to tell us to go ahead if you were not here--what did youlook for?"
"Just about what I got," said Kenset smiling, "and I wanted things tobe pushed through anyway."
"Well,--they're pushing," said Burn-Harris. "Your little old sheriffhas had the fear-of-the-Lord put into him somewhat. He's shaking inhis boots about the snow-packer. There's only one thing lacking tomake our grip close down on Courtrey, and that's vital--the gun withthe untrue firing pin you speak about in your instructions."
"Not lackin'," said Tharon grimly, "we've got it, Mister."
The Secret Service man whirled to her.
"You have?" he cried, "then show me your man!"
But Tharon stood for a long moment looking off across the rollinggreen stretches, toward the north where a moving dot was drawingdown--the riders from the Stronghold.
"This," she said at last, tapping the gun which Billy handed over,"this, then, is proof--is proof in law?"
"If it's the true gun that fits the shell which Mr. Kenset left for ushere at Baston's--yes."
"Then," said Burn-Harris, "a little time and your man's ours as sure'sthe sun shines. Why, this is a hot-bed of crime--there's enough workhere to keep a whole force busy for months."
But Tharon Last did not heed his words. Her mind had leaped away fromthe present back to that day in spring when Jim Last came home to die.She heard again his last command, "Th' best gun woman in Lost Valley,"heard her own voice promising to his dulling ears, "I'll get him, sohelp me, God!"
And this was the end. Strangers were waiting to fulfill that promise,to take her work out of her hands. She absently watched the moving dottake form and sharply string out into a line of riding men. Thesestrangers with their hidden signs of authority would bring to his justdesserts Buck Courtrey, the man who had instigated the killing of poorHarkness, who had personally shot her daddy in the back! For them,then, she had made her crosses of promise in the granite under thepointing pine.
They who had no right in Lost Valley would settle its blood scores,would pay her debts!
She frowned and the fingers of her right hand fiddled at the gun-buttat her hip.
For what had she striven all these many months? For what had sheperfected herself in Jim Last's art?
A little white line drew in about her lips, the flame in her blue eyesleaped and flickered. The tawny brows gathered into a puckered frown.
Billy, watching, moved restlessly on his booted feet. He it was whosaw--who feared. He touched her wrist with timid fingers and sheflashed him a swift glance that half melted to a smile. Then sheforgot him and all the rest--for the Ironwoods were thundering in fromthe outside levels, were coming into town.
Ahead rode Courtrey, big, black, keen, his wide hat swept back on hisiron-grey hair, an imposing presence.
"Here's your man!" said Kenset softly, rising excitedly on his elbow."He's coming! And God grant that there is no bloodshed!"
All of Corvan, so long meek and quiet under Courtrey's foot, moveddramatically back to give him room to come thundering down to hisaccounting.
In a few seconds he would be encompassed by his enemies.
And then, on the tick of fate, that universally unknown factor, awoman's heart
, flung its last pawn in the balance.
Lola, gleaming like a bird of paradise in her gay habiliments, leaningforward from the further steps of Baston's store where she had slippedup unnoticed, cupped her white hands to her scarlet mouth, and sentout a cry like a clarion.
"Buck!" she called, bell-like, clear, far-reaching--"Buck! Turn back!They've called your turn! It's all up for you! Go! Go--down--the Wall!And--God bless you--Buck! Good-bye!"
For one awful moment the great red Ironwood, Bolt, flung up his headand slid forward on his haunches, ploughing up the earth in a cloud.
Then, while the half-stunned crowd gaped in silence, he gatheredhimself, straightened, whirled, shook his giant frame and leaped clearof the ground in a spectacular turn. The man on his back snatched offhis hat and shook it defiantly at the town--the people--the veryValley that he had ruled so long. It was a dramatic gesture--daring,scorning, renouncing. Then, without a word to his henchmen, a singlelook of farewell, Buck Courtrey struck the Ironwood, and was gone backalong the little street.
His men whirled after him, but strange turn of destiny, they swungdirectly north away from him, for he was turning south at the town'sedge.
"For the--Wall!" breathed Lola, her face like milk, one hand on herglittering breast. "He--goes--for below!"
Then all the watchers knew the same.
The master of the Stronghold, having played for Lost Valley and for awoman and lost them both--was done with both.
He leaned on the Ironwood's mighty neck and went south toward theBottle Neck.
All eyes were upon him--all, that is, save the earnest grey ones ofBilly Brent. They were fixed in anguish on the face of Tharon Lastbeside him--Tharon Last, who shoved the gun-butts hard down in theholsters at her hips, who whirled on her booted heel, who cleared thespace between her and El Rey in three cat-like leaps.
As she went up the stallion rose with her, came down with a poundingof iron-shod hoofs, dropped his huge hips in the first leap--and wasaway.
Corvan saw the silver horse shoot out from its midst and woke from itslethargy.
"_Th' race!_" some one cried, high and shrill, "_th' race at last!_"
The two strangers saw it, and their lips fell open with amaze.
Kenset from his low porch saw it--and dropped his face on his arms.
"Lord God!" he groaned, "it's come! I couldn't hold her! I might haveknown! I might have known! She's Valley bred--she _is_ the Valley!I--and all I stand for--chaff in the wind! Nothing could hold her now!Aye--nothing could hold her."
True at last to herself--true to Harkness--true to Jim Last--true tothe Vigilantes and to the Valley she loved, Tharon flung the sombrerofrom her bright head, settled her feet in the stirrups, slid the reinon El Rey's neck, leaned down above him and began to call in hisears.
No need of that cry.
El Rey heeded nothing that she might say. She was not his master--neverhad been. He had had but one, the big, stern man whose sharp wordhad been his law--the one who had ever had his best, his love and hisspeed.
What was it now that rode in his saddle--the saddle with the long darkstain?
Assuredly it was not the slim girl-thing with the golden voice!
El Rey had ever looked through, beyond her.
Nay, it was something bigger, stronger, sterner--who shall say?Perhaps the spirit of that master whom he had served, whom he hadbrought faithfully home that night in spring, for whom he had lookedand listened all these weary months! There was something, indeed--forEl Rey, the great, lay down to earth and ran without the need ofguidance. He set the long red horse out there on the green plainbefore him like a beacon and put the mighty machinery of his massivebody into motion. Bolt was a rival worthy of his best--Bolt, the kingof the Ironwoods, huge, spirited, fast as the wind and wild as fire.El Rey's silver ears lay back along his neck, the mane above them waslike a cloud, his long tail streamed behind him like a comet--andforgotten was his singlefooting. He ran, his great limbs gathering andspreading beneath him--gathering and spreading--with the regularity,of clock-work.
Tharon's blue eyes were narrow as her father's, the little lines aboutthem stood out. She rode low, like a limpet clinging, and her mind wason the two ahead--the man and the great bay horse.
As she felt the wind sing by her cheeks, sting the tears beneath herlids, she shut her lips tighter and hugged the pommel closer.
The green carpet went by beneath her like a blur. The thunder of ElRey's beating hoofs was like the sound of the cataracts when thecanyons shot their freshets from the Rockface.
The note of his speed was rising--rising--rising. The blood began topound in her temples with pride and exultation.
She saw the distance narrowing just the smallest bit between her andCourtrey. Just the smallest trifle, indeed, but _narrowing_.
"He ain't a-puttin' Bolt down to his best," she told herself tensely,"I know what he can do." And she remembered that ride from the mouthof Black Coulee to the pine-guarded glade--and Kenset. At that thoughtshe pressed her lips tighter.
No thought of Kenset must come to her now--to weaken her with memoryof those pressing, vital hands of his above his pounding heart.
No--she was herself again--Tharon Last, Jim Last's girl, the gun womanof Lost Valley--and yonder went her father's killer.
She leaned down and called again in El Rey's ear.
No slightest spurt of speed rewarded her--nothing but the rising note.Then she saw that the distance was widening--just a tiny bit.
Truly it was widening. Courtrey, looking back, had caught the sun onher golden hair, on her face as white as milk. He saw that her handswere at her hips--loosely set back at her hips--and what thought hemight have had of mercy at her hands--what wild vision he might haveseen of speech with her--of parley--of persuasion--was dead.
He leaned down and struck the Ironwood with his open hand.
Bolt, the beautiful, leaped in answer. A little more--slowly--thedistance between pursuer and pursued widened. Then--Tharon blinked themist from her eyes to make sure--the gain was lost. Slowly, steadily,El Rey closed up the extra width. Then for a time there was no change.The open plain resounded to the roar of hoofs, the wind sang by liketaut strings struck. The earth was still that racing green blurbeneath.
And still the electric note of rising speed hummed softly higher.
If Jim Last rode his silver stallion to the goal of vengeance he mustsurely have been satisfied. The great shoulders worked like pistons,the whole massive body was level as the flowing floor beneath, thesteel-thewed limbs reached and doubled--reached and doubled--withwonderful power and precision.
And then at last Tharon knew--knew that El Rey was gaining, slowly,steadily, surely. The splendid bay horse was running magnificently,but El Rey ran like a super-horse. His silver head was straight as alevel, his ears laid back, his nostrils wide and flaring, red asblood, his big eyes glowed with the wildness of savage flight.
The great king was mad with speed!
Jim Last's girl was mad also--mad with the lust of conquest, ofrevenge.
She rose a little from the stallion's whipping mane, and her blue eyesburned on the man ahead.
"I said I'd get you, Buck Courtrey!" she muttered, "that some day I'drun th' Ironwoods off their feet--th' heart out of their master!
"Run, damn you--for it's your last ride!"
Then she dropped forward again and watched the distance closing down.
Nearer--nearer--nearer!
The note rose another notch.
Never in his life had El Rey run as he ran now. Always he had hadreserves. He had them now. The bottom of his power was not reached.
Bolt was doing his best. Once he threw up his head and foam flew onthe wind--red foam that shot back and whipped on Tharon's hand, a wetpink stain, thinned and faded.
At that sight an exultant cry, savage, inhuman, ugly, burst from herthroat.
She was within long gunshot now--was closing her fingers lightly onthe blue gun-butts----.
Courtrey
heard that cry.
He rose in his saddle--turned--flashed up his hand and fired. Quick asthe motion of the gun man was, Tharon Last was quicker. She droppedover El Rey's shoulder like a cat, firing as she went.
Courtrey's bullet clipped the cantle of the big saddle an inch aboveher flattened leg across it. Hers did something else--what she haddreamed of. It struck that other wrist of Courtrey's, the left--andsent his six-gun tumbling.
Once again she yelled as she came back in her saddle.
And El Rey was closing--closing up the gap between.
Once again Tharon raised her guns to shoot--both, this time, as herdaddy had taught her. This was the pinnacle of her life, her skill,her training.
Never again would she live a moment like it. She laughed and crouchedfor the final act.
But a sudden coldness went over her from head to foot, sent the hotblood shaking down her spine.
What was Courtrey doing?
He rode straight up at last, like an Indian showing, and his bleedingleft hand swung at his side. With the other he had swept off his widehat, so that his handsome iron-grey head was bare to the summer sun.His keen hawk face was lifted. He made a spectacular figure--like awarrior, unarmed, waiting his end with courage.
_Unarmed!_
That it was which struck Tharon like a hand across her face. The gunhe had used with his left hand was his only one! He had carried butone since that night at the Stronghold when she had first marked him.
She should have known! Word of this had been about Corvan and theValley.
And so she had Buck Courtrey at her mercy. She could close thelessening gap and kill him in his saddle----
But the icy blood still seemed to trickle down her back.
She--and Jim Last--they had always fought in fair-and-open. Theywere no murderers.... They did not strike in the dark--shoot a man fromambush--nor kill a man unarmed.... And Kenset--Kenset of thefoothills--what had he said about the stain of blood--blood-guilt--cleanhands----
The girl caught her breath with a choking sob.
The game was up.
Neither Jim Last--nor Kenset--nor she--would shoot a man unarmed.
And Courtrey was riding toward the Bottle Neck.
He would go down the Wall to freedom.
And the crosses in Jim Last's granite--they would be foreverunredeemed, a shame, a sadness, a living accusation!
Nay--not that! Not that!
She had promised--and the Law was waiting--the big Law of below.
She was Jim Last's daughter still.
She leaned closer to El Rey's neck--held her two guns ready--and rodewith the very wind.
She was near now--she could see Courtrey's face, waxen white butfearless, his dark eyes turned back toward her in a sort of desperateadmiration.... Courtrey loved strength and courage and all things wildand fierce. She could see Bolt's staring eyeballs, his open mouth,gasping and piteous. One more moment--another--yet one more--then sherose in her stirrups and fired straight at the broad bay temple,shining and black with sweat!
The great gallant Ironwood went down in a huge arc--first hisbeautiful head, then the sinking arch of his neck, then the shouldersthat had worked so wondrously. He rolled on his back like a hoop, hisiron-shod hoofs spinning for one spectacular moment in the air. Thenhe lay at sudden ease, his still fluttering nose pointing directlyback the way he had come.
With the first catching stumble of the true forefeet, the man on hisback had shot out of the saddle and far ahead. He landed twenty feetaway and squarely on his head and shoulders. Like Bolt, Courtrey'sbody turned a complete somersault--and lay still, at sudden peace.
Tharon Last and El Rey went on like an arrow--they could not stop.
When at last she did draw the great king down she was far and awayfrom the spot. She turned her head, panting and dizzy, and lookedback.... She could see the prone red heap that was Bolt--a little waybeyond that other, lesser, darker heap....
For a long time she sat on El Rey's heaving back and stared unseeinglyat the green earth where the short grasses quivered in the littlewind.
There was a deathly white line about her lips, but her eyes blazedwith the fire that had characterized them from birth, the flickering,unfathomable flame that came and went.
Then, presently, new lines came in her young face, unstable lines thatquivered and worked, and all the good green earth danced grotesquelybefore her vision, for a wall of tears shut out the world. ... Shelaid her head down on El Rey's cloudy mane--and wept.
* * * * *
It was early dawn at Last's Holding. The sun was not yet up behind theeastern ramparts. The cottonwoods whispered in the dawn-wind, thespring beneath the milk-house talked and murmured. Out in the bigcorrals the cattle were beginning to stir and bawl.
In the kitchen old Anita and young Paula had breakfast waiting for themen.
Deep in that dim south room where the pale Virgin kept watch and ward,Kenset of the foothills slept in healing peace.
And at the step of the western door, Billy stood by Golden--Golden thebeautiful, who ranked next to El Rey himself--and his face was liftedto Tharon who drooped against the lintel with her forehead on herarm.
The boy held her hand clasped in both of his own, and there was ayearning tenderness in his soft voice when he spoke, a pride and joyineffable that glowed above the pain that was never to leave him.
"It ain't that I love you less, Tharon, dear," he said gently, "that Imust go. Not that, little girl. I'll love you till I die--that I knowin dead certainty. But I can't stay here--not where I'll have to seeyou givin' all your sweet self to another man. A good man, too,Tharon--I think there ain't a better one in th' land--but--well,--Ican't--that's all. I can't thank you for all you've done for me senceyou was a little mite of a girl--five years back,"--his voice broke abit, but he controlled it, "nor for th' joy you've given me--th' ridestogether--an' th' jokes an' playin'----"
He paused a moment, unhappily, and the mistress of Last's drooped moreheavily against the old adobe wall.
"Nor for Golden here," went on the rider, "we'll be pals as long as weboth live--nor fer-fer--" he stopped again, hesitated, lookedyearningly at the quivering cheek against the curving arm, and went onto the finish.
"Nor fer that one kiss, Tharon--it's my one treasure for life, so helpme, God--that you give me that night. An' over all I want to thank youfer--fer--killin' th' Pomo half-breed in th' Cup o' God--_fer you donethat trick fer me_! Th' one stain on your dear hands--fer me--the_only_ one, fer Fate killed Courtrey, not you. His neck was cleanbroke when they picked him up.... That memory will keep me alive, willsave th' beauty of th' stars at night fer me, will make th' rest worthlivin'.... That one kiss."
He stopped again and stood for a long time looking at her as if hewould fix forever in his memory the beauty of her, the fire, thespirit, the elusive quality that was Tharon Last herself.
Then he sighed and smiled and gently shook the hand he held.
"Come--tell me good-bye, Tharon, dear," he said softly.
For answer the mistress of Last's once again reached out her arms anddrew his head to her heart--once more pressed her lips upon his own.
"Oh, Billy," she said with a sound of tears in her voice, "Kenset'sth' one man--that's true, an' I'm helpless before th' fact--butthere'll never be another can take your place in my heart--there'llnever be no one to ride with me in th' Big Shadow in just th' sameway, Billy--to hold my hand as we come home to Last's with that samesweet, honest friendship, that don't need words! I've got mylife-love, but I've lost my life-friend--an' my heart's sore--sorewith pain!"
The rider lifted his face and it was glorified in the first rays ofthe sun that was rising over the eastern mountains. His gayly studdedbelt and riding cuffs, his spurs and the vanity of silver on his widehat caught the glow and sparkled brightly. Joy became paramount oversadness.
"Don't you fret, Tharon," he said, still in that soft voice, "I'malways at your shoulder in spirit
--in body, too, if you ever want meor need me. So long."
And he kissed both the hands he held, dropped them, turned and mountedGolden, waved a hand to all the Holding, and putting the horse to arun, went down the sounding-board as if he dared not look back.
Until horse and rider were a tiny speck on the living green--untilthey passed the Silver Hollow and the mouth of Black Coulee, TharonLast stood in the western door and watched them with dim blue eyes.
Ail the wide expanse of Lost Valley was still and sweet with dawn,smiling as if with a new and wondrous peace, the Vestal's Veilshimmered on the Rockface, the distant peaks above the Canon Countrycut the skies.
She scanned the little world about and felt this peace press down uponher soul--as if the questions all were answered, the duty done.
Never in all her life before had Last's Holding seemed to her sosecure and settled, so sweet and to be desired....
Within it lay her destiny--the man in the cool south room.
Without in the great Valley lay a future.
Love was with her--friendship would be with her always in memory, oneglowing with its vital presence, the other softened and doubly sweetwith the sorrow of absence.
She raised her hand and made the sign of the Cross between herself andthat disappearing speck, then she turned and followed old Anitacarrying gruels to that dim south room.
THE END
Tharon of Lost Valley Page 11