by Max Brand
“Not here,” they were told. “And what’s up, boys?”
“The hound has run out on Tom Vance. He’s showed yaller! He’s quit without daring to show his face!”
“No, no!” cried Kate.
“Here’s a hundred of us to swear to it,” said Canton Douglas furiously.
And Kate raised her hands to her face.
It was hard going over the mountains. Though the wagons had beaten out a trail, it was deep with snow, and the two horsemen let their mounts labor on, giving them what aid they could to guide them until the clouds were brushed from the sky and the stars looked down to show them the way. A little later, they reached the last of the ridges. Below them spread the lowlands and a safer and an easier trail to follow.
Here they drew rein, and Gerald looked back.
“Cher ami” said Banti, “no halting by the way. The small waiting makes the great heart ache. Forward, comrade!”
“Hush, Louis. It is my last look!”
“Ah, my friend, it will be far better when you have your first look at your kingdom yonder over the sea.”
“But this is my country,” he said. “And this is the last time that I shall see it.”
So the silence grew, while Banti gnawed his lip with anxiety.
“It is my torment if you linger here,” he said gently at last.
“Louis,” murmured his friend, “what is it that a woman detests most in a man?”
“A close string drawn on the pocketbook.”
“We are not in France,” said Gerald with a touch of scorn. “Tell me again.”
“Long silences at the table,” said Banti. “They drive the poor dears mad. Yes, a silent husband is even worse than a pinched wallet.”
“Still wrong,” said Gerald. “What a woman hates most of all in a man is cowardice. A woman ceases to love a man who runs away from danger.”
“Eh?”
“Because that is rot at the heart of the tree.”
“Perhaps you are right. But what of that?”
“Nothing,” said Gerald. “Let us ride on again.”
They passed on down the slope. And the steady trot of the horses covered the weary miles one by one. As for Banti, he whistled; he sang; he told wild tales of a dozen lands, and all without drawing a word from his companion until, as they drew near to a town, he said:
“What is in your head now, Gerald? Tell me the thought which has stopped that restless tongue of yours so long?”
“I shall tell you,” said Gerald, “though it will mean nothing to you. I have been thinking of Christmas Day Louis, and the power of prayer.”
Louis considered a moment.
“Ah, yes,” he said at last. “I had forgotten. But this is Christmas, and on this day one goes back to the silly thoughts of one’s childhood. Is it not so?”
Acknowledgements
“The Black Rider” by George Owen Baxter was first published in Western Story Magazine (1/3/25). Copyright © 1925 by Street & Smith Publications, Inc. Copyright © renewed 1952 by Dorothy Faust. Acknowledgment is made to Condé Nast Publications, Inc., for their cooperation. Reprinted by arrangement with Golden West Literary Agency. All rights reserved.
“The Dream of Macdonald” was first published under the title “‘Sunset’ Wins” by George Owen Baxter in Western Story Magazine (4/7/23). Copyright © 1923 by Street & Smith Publications, Inc. Copyright © renewed 1951 by Dorothy Faust. Copyright © 1996 for restored material by Jane Faust Easton and Adriana Faust Bianchi. Acknowledgment is made to Conde Nast Publications, Inc., for their cooperation. Reprinted by arrangement with Golden West Literary Agency. All rights reserved.
“Partners” by Frederick Faust was first published in The American Magazine (1/38). Copyright © 1938 by Crowell Publishing Corporation. Copyright © renewed 1966 by Jane Faust Easton, John Frederick Faust, and Judith Faust. Reprinted by arrangement with Golden West Literary Agency. All rights reserved.
“The Power of Prayer” by John Frederick was first published in Western Story Magazine (12/23/22). Copyright © 1922 by Street & Smith Publications, Inc. Copyright © renewed 1950 by Dorothy Faust. Copyright © 1996 for restored material by Jane Faust Easton and Adriana Faust Bianchi. Acknowledgment is made to Conde Nast Publications, Inc., for their cooperation. Reprinted by arrangement with Golden West Literary Agency. All rights reserved.
About the Author
Max Brand is the best-known pen name of Frederick Faust, creator of Dr. Kildare, Destry, and many other fictional characters popular with readers and viewers worldwide. Faust wrote for a variety of audiences in many genres. His enormous output, totaling approximately 30,000,000 words or the equivalent of 530 ordinary books, covered nearly every field: crime, fantasy, historical romance, espionage, Westerns, science fiction, adventure, animal stories, love, war, and fashionable society, big business and big medicine. Eighty motion pictures have been based on his work along with many radio and television programs. For good measure he also published four volumes of poetry. Perhaps no other author has reached more people in more different ways.
Born in Seattle in 1892, orphaned early, Faust grew up in the rural San Joaquín Valley of California. At Berkeley he became a student rebel and one-man literary movement, contributing prodigiously to all campus publications. Denied a degree because of unconventional conduct, he embarked on a series of adventures culminating in New York City where, after a period of near starvation, he received simultaneous recognition as a serious poet and successful author of fiction. Later, he traveled widely, making his home in New York, then in Florence, and finally in Los Angeles.
Once the United States entered the Second World War, Faust abandoned his lucrative writing career and his work as a screenwriter to serve as a war correspondent with the infantry in Italy, despite his fifty-one years and a bad heart. He was killed during a night attack on a hilltop village held by the German army. New books based on magazine serials or unpublished manuscripts or restored versions continue to appear so that, alive or dead, he has averaged a new book every four months for seventy-five years. Beyond this, some work by him is newly reprinted every week of every year in one or another format somewhere in the world. A great deal more about this author and his work can be found in The Max Brand Companion (Greenwood Press, 1997) edited by Jon Tuska and Vicki Piekarski.
Other Leisure books by Max Brand ®:
THE CITY IN THE SKY
CROSSROADS
LUCK
RED ROCK’S SECRET
DOGS OF THE CAPTAIN
THE LAWLESS WEST
(Anthology)
THE FUGITIVE
TWISTED BARS
TROUBLE’S MESSENGER
BAD MAN’S GULCH
THE RANGE FINDER
MOUNTAIN STORMS
THE GOLDEN CAT
PETER BLUE
MORE TALES OF THE WILD
WEST
FLAMING FORTUNE
THE RUNAWAYS
BLUE KINGDOM
JOKERS EXTRA WILD
CRUSADER
SMOKING GUNS
THE LONE RIDER
THE UNTAMED WEST
(Anthology)
THE TYRANT
THE WELDING QUIRT
THE BRIGHT FACE OF
DANGER
DON DIABLO
THE OUTLAW REDEEMER
THE GOLD TRAIL
THE PERIL TREK
THE MASTERMAN
TIMBER LINE
THE OVERLAND KID
THE GOLDEN WEST
(Anthology)
THE HOUSE OF GOLD
THE GERALDI TRAIL
GUNMAN’S GOAL
CHINOOK
IN THE HILLS OF
MONTEREY
THE LOST VALLEY
THE FUGITIVE’S MISSION
THE SURVIVAL OF JUAN
ORO
THE GAUNTLET
STOLEN GOLD
THE WOLF STRAIN
MEN BEYOND THE LAW
BEYOND THE OUTPOSTS
<
br /> THE STONE THAT SHINES
THE OATH OF OFFICE
DUST ACROSS THE RANGE/
THE CROSS BRAND
THE ROCK OF KIEVER
SOFT METAL
THUNDER MOON AND THE
SKY PEOPLE
RED WIND AND THUNDER
MOON
THE LEGEND OF THUNDER
MOON
THE QUEST OF LEE
GARRISON
SAFETY McTEE
TWO SIXES
SIXTEEN IN NOME
Copyright
A LEISURE BOOK®
September 2008
Published by special arrangement with Golden West Literary Agency.
Dorchester Publishing Co., Inc.
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Copyright © 1996 by Jane Faust Easton and Adriana Faust Bianchi. Foreword and headnotes © 1996 by Jon Tuska.
The name Max Brand is trademarked by the U. S. Patent and Trademark Office and cannot be used without express written permission.
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E-ISBN: 978-1-4285-0622-0
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