Stairs of Sand

by Zane Grey

  “Huh! What you want?” queried Hindfoot.

  “We go all round post,” replied Menyvale, getting up. “Look for tracks made last night.”

  “What kind tracks?”

  “Any kind.”

  “Come?” asked the Indian, pointing north, and then turning to the south with brown hand outstretched he went on: “Go?”

  “Shore. Hoss an’ wheel tracks,” rejoined Merryvale, eagerly. “Then I want to know if any man or woman tracks came in last night or left.”

  “Me savvy,” said the Indian, and stepping back into the road he put his toe against a narrow wheel track, identical with that which Merryvale had trailed on the other side of the post.

  “Come an’ go last night. Me see um,” continued Hindfoot, cautiously, his sombre gaze hard on his listener.

  Merryvale, with hand that shook, gave the Indian another gold coin.

  “Tell me—who?” demanded Merryvale.

  “You no make bad?” asked Hindfoot, tapping his breast with forefinger.

  “No. I’ll not give you away,” answered Merryvale, in deadly earnest. “No make you trouble.”

  Hindfoot covered his right eye, hiding it with one hand, while with his other hand he pointed to his uncovered eye.

  “One-eye man come.”

  Merryvale’s frame leaped as if it had been galvanized.

  “By Gawd, it was Collishaw!”

  “Four hoss. Wagon come. Me see um.” He held up two fingers. “Mex and one eye man. No stop post. Stop far way. Long time. Go fast!”

  “Hindfoot, you’re an Indian,” replied Merryvale, wiping his wet face. “Whew! … Did you see these men get out, or meet anybody?”

  “No. All dark there.”

  “Did you heah a woman scream?” went on Merryvale, breathing hard.

  “No. All quiet.”

  “Did you see Larey, then?”

  “No. He drink like fish. Go way soon.”

  “All right, Hindfoot. Now we’ll look for tracks. You go far round. Meet me Indian Jim’s. I go this side.”

  They separated. Merryvale had chosen the upper half of Lost Lake to circle, and he strode off with searching eyes bent on the ground. In some sandy patches and likewise on hard-packed gravel, tracks would have been difficult to find. On the other hand, there were stretches of adobe clay which would have betrayed the imprint of the lightest foot. Merryvale did not sight any fresh tracks. Back of Ruth’s yard he passed his own and Adam’s footprints made several days previous. From that point down and round to Indian Jim’s there was no sign to be detected.

  Hindfoot was waiting for Merryvale, though that fact would not have been evident to anyone else.

  “No see more tracks,” said the Indian.

  “Where me get hoss to ride?” asked Merryvale, his mind leaping on to the next issue.

  “Jim got mule.”

  “Saddle?”

  “Injun saddle. Heap good.”

  “Hindfoot, go get Jim’s mule an’ saddle. Fetch over there,” said Merryvale, pointing to his shack through the palo verdes.

  “Huh!” replied the Indian.

  Upon arriving at the shed, the shade of which was markedly welcome, Merryvale threw off his coat, surprised to find his shirt wet and his body burning.

  “Wal, think of me gettin’ het up,” he soliloquized. “These heah June days are comin’ on hot. Reckon I mustn’t forget water.”

  He searched among his effects for his canteen, and finding it he sat down to rest and wait. His mind was full, though no longer whirling. It was imperative that he get to Adam that day, in time for them to return to Lost Lake and catch the stage in the morning. Adam, once in possession of all Merryvale had heard and seen and thought in connection with Ruth’s disappearance, would act with the eagle-like swiftness for which he was famed. Merryvale did not know just what direction this action would take, beyond getting to Yuma with all possible speed, but he began to feel the old revelry in peril and mystery that the desert had bred in him.

  Hindfoot arrived with the mule, a dilapidated anti-deluvian beast that Merryvale eyed askance. He despatched the Indian to fill his canteen at the post watering-trough, while he lengthened the stirrups. Soon, then, he was mounted and riding in a detour through the trees, to avoid being seen.

  A mile above the post, Merryvale struck the wash, along the margin of which Adam’s tracks showed plainly in the sand. Merryvale kept to them, yet he had eye for the sweep of the slope, the broken horizon line, and sometimes he seemed pulled around to gaze at the awful desolation behind.

  Lost Lake, shrunken to a spot of green, then dropped under the ridge, out of sight. The desert changed as if by magic and seemed to come into its own. That spot of verdure was inimical to the purpose of the weathering rock, the shifting sand.

  Heat and glare and silence, the great openness with out life, the silver sand, the red outcropping ledges, the copper sky,—these closed in upon Merryvale, gradually to color his thought, and to alienate him from all that was in contrast to them.

  Five miles or more up the slow heave of desert there was a break in the monotony. It was the mouth of a canyon. Merryvale entered and rode along a winding ditch of sand, where water ran in times of flood. He had come into the region of rock. The walls grew higher until they towered above, stained and seamed.

  He rode at almost a level. The canyon cut its way back into a rising bulge of plateau. A few scant weeds, an occasional ocatilla and a rarer stunted specimen of the bisnagi, barrel cactus, a clump of blue smoke trees, emphasized the lifelessness of the scene.

  As he progressed, the canyon grew wider, darker; weird, and full of a silence that did not seem of earth. Yet there was life to give the lie to the morbid imagination of the traveler. He saw a green lizard, beautiful as a strip of gems, scurry across the sand, leaving a tiny trail. A rat, the color of the sand, scurried among the rocks. Across the streak of sky above, swept an eagle, with bowed wings, swift and grand in its flight. These creatures knew how to defeat the desert, at least for a brief span of days.

  The canyon forked in an amphitheatre of ruined cliffs, of vast sections of wall, and slopes of weathered sandstone. Merryvale found Adam’s trail, well defined now, leading up the left fork. This was a dismal crack between two overhanging precipices. It might have been a gateway to an inferno.

  Farther on there was a widening of the canyon, lighter, with less frightfully leaning rims and balancing crags and split shafts. Riding around a corner Merryvale came suddenly upon one of those amazing surprises to which the desert wilfully treated its faithful adherents upon rare occasions. The great walls formed an oval bowl, gold in hue, with magnificent blank faces, sheering down to a beautiful floor of lucent sand and amber rock fringed by green growths. The glittering sun struck white light from a pool of water, set in solid rock.

  As Merryvale rode into this paradise, guiding the mule towards the shady side, Adam suddenly stepped from behind a huge rock, gun in hand.

  “Hello, Merryvale. I heard you a long way off,” he said, advancing.

  “Wal, you skeered me. Reckon I’m nervous, an’ I shore come through an arm of Hades to get heah,” returned Merryvale, and reaching the shade he dismounted. “Howdy, pard.”

  “I’m well, Merryvale, but seldom have I felt the loneliness and terror of the desert as I have here. There’s nothing to do but wait for the hours to pass.”

  “Reckon it shore must be hell,” replied Merryvale. “But it was your fault you had to wait so long. I told you it’d be better to see Ruth often. Every night anyhow. If you’d only come last night—”

  Merryvale broke off huskily, as if he were guilty, and afraid to meet the lightning of those gray eyes that pierced him.

  “You’ve bad news. I knew that when I first saw you.”

  “Pard, it couldn’t be no worse. Ruth, is gone again!”

  In one stride Adam reached Merryvale, to lay those talon-like hands upon him.

  “Yes, Adam. Gone! Gone again with Stone or—”


  “NO!” Adam’s voice, high, ringing like a sonorous bell, clapped in echo from wall to wall.

  There was a streak of cruelty in Merryvale, a twist of his nature, that came out now in his sorrow for Adam, his anger at Ruth, and in his conception of the fateful situation.

  “Wal, if she didn’t go with Stone it’s a damn sight wuss,” he declared, throwing off his hat and flipping the sweat from his forehead.

  “Merryvale, you’re old and crabbed sometimes—when you’re worn out or discouraged. But, friend, I can’t be patient with you now.”

  “Adam, I ain’t wore out, but I’m shore blue.”

  “Talk! Facts I want! Not what you think,” commanded Adam, shaking Merryvale as if he were a limp sack.

  Whereupon Merryvale poured out the story of Ruth’s disappearance confining himself sternly to what he had heard and seen and done.

  “She never accompanied Stone—willingly,” replied Adam, with such tremendous weight that Merryvale felt his slow sluggish blood quicken.

  “It does seem impossible—now I see you, Adam,” he said. “I hope to Gawd I wasn’t traitor to Ruth.”

  “You were, unfortunately. But you named my brother only in connection with his attack on Dabb—the lost money—and Stone?”

  “Wal, you yelled for facts only,” replied Merryvale, conscious of an obstacle that had strangely arisen to his opportunity to set the destroying angels loose upon Guerd Larey. Ruth’s face—her look—her whisper! Merryvale could not voice what his sagacity had evolved.

  “I’d rather it would be Ruth’s dishonor than Guerd’s crime,” Adam wrung out.

  Merryvale sprang up as if lashed by a whip. “Gawd Almighty! What’re you sayin’, Adam?—That girl, still good, fightin’ the devil that was born in her an’ the beasts of men who want her body! I’d die for her an’ sell my soul to save her honor…. Adam, you are mad.”

  “No, not yet,” said Adam, lifting a face like ice. “I would love her the same—even more. I could save her…. But if Guerd laid his lustful hand on her—so help me God, … I’d tear out his heart!”

  The great horny desert-talon hands gripped the air with appalling intensity.

  “An’ that’d be good!” choked Merryvale, overcome by passion. He walked away and paced under the wall until he had gained a semblance to composure.

  “Merryvale, time is flying,” spoke up Adam, gravely, as he approached.

  “Wal, I was thinkin’ of that,” responded Merryvale.

  “How soon can we get to Yuma?”

  “Down stage due today,” replied Merryvale. “It leaves in the mawnin’.”

  “You go on that stage,” said Adam, swiftly. “I’ll pack my burros and leave here before dark. By sunup tomorrow I’ll be out by Bitter Seeps. I’ll wait there. If my brother Guerd is on that stage you throw a paper or a bottle or anything out upon the road. If he’s not I’ll stop the stage and go with you.”

  “So far, so good. Suppose Guerd’s on the stage?” queried Merryvale.

  “Would he recognize me?” asked Adam, a spasm of agony crossing his face. “Do you remember the boy who came to Picacho—eighteen years ago? … It seems a life time. Have I not changed terribly? Who would know in Wansfell the boy Adam Larey? … Merryvale, would he know me?”

  “Never in the world!” ejaculated Merryvale, shrilly. “You could face him for an hour an’ he’d not see anythin’ familiar in you. Adam, pard, you forget the tramsformin’ power of the desert.”

  “But I could not trust myself,” went on Adam, his tragic supplicating gaze on Merryvale. “I will never confront Guerd—or let him confront me—unless it is to be the end!”

  Mournful words! Merryvale suffered anew in the trial of his friend. Adam shook his frame like a rousing lion.

  “Enough. If Guerd’s on the stage, I will walk to Yuma,” he decided. “Hide my packs and leave the burros at Bitter Seeps. Travel by night. Get to Yuma only twelve hours behind you. Meet you at Augustine’s. You know his place. I befriended him. He owes me much. Augustine can find Ruth for us—no matter where they hide her.”

  “Wal, pard, I’m on my way pronto,” replied Merryvale.

  Neither heat nor rough travel, nor sinister desert had place in Merryvale’s consciousness. He was lifted above himself, inspired by something, the greatness of which he began to divine but which ever held aloof from perfect understanding. The miles and hours were as if they were not.

  It was after dark when he rode into Lost Lake, unaware of fatigue or hunger. After returning the mule, Merryvale hurried up to see Hunt, whom he found at supper, and who bade him sit and eat. Then Hunt plied him with queries.

  “Wal, Ruth will probably be sittin’ heah at your table again in less than a week,” replied Merryvale, answering all questions at once.

  “If I could be sure of that, I’d be relieved of a burden,” returned Hunt, grateful, yet full of doubt.

  “You can be shore, providin’ Ruth is alive. No one can tell what’s in store on this desert.”

  “Larey came up to see me,” announced Hunt.

  “You don’t say? Surprises me. What did he want?” exclaimed Merryvale, powerfully interested.

  “I was astonished myself,” went on Hunt. “He seemed to have forgotten the scurvy way he’d treated me. He asked many questions about Ruth. He was curious, bitter, but evidently had gotten over his fury.”

  “Humph! How’d you know Larey was furious?” asked Merryvale, bluntly.

  “I met Mrs. Dorn. You know what a gossip she is. Well, she had been to the post. According to her story Larey nearly tore the place down. He was like a madman. Indoors and outdoors he raved and cursed. The Indians ran away. The Mexicans were afraid of him, too.”

  “Ahuh, I savvy. Shoutin’ it out to the skies, hey? His wife run off again with Stone?”

  “Yes. Mrs. Dorn said as much. But here with me he was composed. He said Stone wasn’t much to blame. A beautiful woman played hell with a man. Last he told me he’d go north on the stage to meet Collishaw at Salton Springs—that he would require Collishaw in Yuma, where he must hurry to catch Stone and Ruth. He would fetch Ruth back, and this time make her live with him.”

  “Wal, I’m a son-of-a-gun!” burst out Merryvale.

  “It’s clear enough to me,” went on Hunt. “And if Ruth would only care enough for Larey to go back to him, and make a decent man of him, it’d remove our burdens.”

  “It shore would, Mr. Hunt,” returned Merryvale, with sarcasm.

  “The up stage arrived early this afternoon and left very soon afterward,” said Hunt. “I suppose Larey in his hurry was responsible for this unusual proceeding.”

  “The down stage in yet?” asked Merryvale, ponderingly, forgetting the cup of coffee he held.

  “I haven’t heard it. But it’s overdue.”

  “Wal, I’ll go see,” said Merryvale, rising. “Don’t worry too much, Mr. Hunt. It mightn’t turn out so bad. Goodnight.”

  Merryvale strode out into the darkness, down the winding path, out toward the dim yellow lights of the post, reiterating one muttered exclamation. “What next? What next?”

  Larey’s move, at first flush, perplexed Merryvale. If Collishaw had already gone on to Yuma, Larey certainly was aware of it; and if so why did Larey go north to meet him? If Stone had been party to some underhand game of abducting Ruth, why would Larey trust him for longer than seemed necessary? Could it be possible that Larey was not in the secret? Merryvale did not credit this supposition. He would have staked anything on his belief that he saw Larey under his mask. It must be that Larev in his extremity, or under powerful suggestion from Collishaw, had resorted to more finesse, more cunning.

  In front of the saloon, where the yellow light flared, Merryvale encountered Dabb.

  “Hello. Where you been?” greeted the latter, curiously, and yet with welcome.

  “Off in the hills to see my pard,” replied Merryvale. “Where’d you get the double chin?”

  “Don’t be funny,
” growled Dabb. “You saw that—hit me.

  “Wal, I shore did. An’ I’ve been wonderin’ ever since why you didn’t respond like a Westerner.”

  “Because I’m a damned coward. But I couldn’t fight Larey with my fists or meet him with a gun. All the same I’ll—”

  “Where is he?” interrupted Merryvale.

  “Gone north. Took the stage off ahead of time today. An’ that cooks our little deal up the Valley.”

  “Mebbe not. You’re in too big a hurry, Dabb. I’d like to bet Larey never thinks of water rights on this trip.”

  “I had that hunch, too,” said Dabb.

  “Wal, we’ll talk again,” replied Merryvale, and went into the saloon. It was noisy, full of smoke and smell of rum. As Merryvale had expected he found the stage driver with whom he had previously scraped acquaintance.

  “Come an’ have a drink,” invited Merryvale.

  “Don’t care if I do,” responded the driver with alacrity.

  “How aboot a seat to Yuma in the mawnin’?” asked Merryvale, over his glass.

  “Plenty room, old timer. Only three aboard this trip down.”

  “Good. An’ bein’ a desert man who loves the open I’d like to set with you up on top. How aboot it?”

  “You’re welcome. You’ll have fiften hours of open, all right, ‘specially if it’s blowin’. I’m startin’ early—at six.”

  “All the same to me. Have a good trip down?”

  “Fair, only hotter’n hell over that below-sea-level stretch.”

  “Is Collishaw one of your passengers?” asked Merryvale, with apparently casual interest.

  “No. I asked about him at Twenty Nine. But he hadn’t been there.”

  “Wal, reckon I’d better turn in. See you in the mawnin’.”

  “What’s your name, old timer? Mine is Hank Day.”

  “Mine’s Merryvale, when I’m home,” answered Merryvale with a grin.

  Merryvale, once he lay down on his bed, realized the mental and physical strain exacted from him that day. His brain throbbed and his body ached. He was on the eve of great events. The desert voice whispered that to him. Broodingly the silence lay upon that desert world, thick as the starless night; and it weighed him down to oblivion.