“Sure we can. When dark comes.”
“We’ll never … get home. There’s men there. I see fire.”
In sudden terror René’s eyes swept the entrance to the pass, where once had blazed the campfires of Dolan’s men. He saw nothing.
“Below,” moaned Zion, “that … little canyon.”
Then, from a small notch south of the pass, René saw a wisp of blue smoke curling up. A man was there, climbing through the jack pines to the pass, and René knew that guards were camped at Sentry Crags, posted there to keep in Yance and Abel—to keep out Joel and Zion and him. His heart seemed to die in his breast then. So far, so desperately, they had fought to this haven. Now it was barred to them.
He was almost glad to see that Zion had relapsed into that coma he had been in most of the time since leaving Piney’s cabin. He lay limp upon the stallion, his black hair mingling with the golden mane. He wasn’t suffering. He was more dead than living, only the iron in him still enduring. René knew he must get him home tonight—or never. Iron couldn’t last forever.
High on one of those broken buttes, behind which Zion had raced the posse to Sentry Crags, René found an overhanging shelf of rock, wide enough too conceal their horses, and with a niche far back under the sloping roof, where Zion would be protected from the wind that blew with a cutting edge and the smell of snow.
Snow freighted the clouds now heavily, obscuring all hint of the rising sun. Big, wide-spaced flakes were falling, the beginning of a real snowstorm, the first of winter, early—even up here.
Fumbling, with cold-stiffened hands, he untied Zion and carried him into this shelter. He dared not build a fire. But he covered Zion with Piney’s blankets, and, fearing this wasn’t enough, although bitterly cold himself, he spread his own coat over Zion, who, heated by a fatal flame, did not feel the cold.
Then, too worried to rest, to think of eating, although some of the bread and venison he’d brought from Piney’s still remained, René went out to the edge of the shelf and stared off at the Picture Rocks, crouching there, shivering, studying the ground for some way to get past the guards. It seemed hopeless. From their camp in that protected canyon, the guards could view all approaches to the pass. They would watch against anyone making a break at night. Abel and Yance played that trick on them. They couldn’t be fooled the same way twice. Yet he had to get Zion home tonight.
“Pard …” Zion’s faint cry reached him.
Crawling back, René found him fighting at his blankets, feverishly insisting: “Someone’s … comin’.”
René listened. He could hear nothing. He thought Zion was growing delirious again. “It’s the wind,” he told him. “It makes queer noises … howlin’ through these rocks. Its snowin’, Zion. Comin’ down fast. Snow makes things sound different. See Black Wing out there … restin’? He’d let us know if someone was around.”
“Someone is!” insisted Zion wildly. “Go see.”
To quiet him, René went out and looked. He even climbed to the top of the ledge. But in all that vast scope of broken canyon and mountain, already taking on a tinge of white, he saw nothing he shouldn’t see, but, going down to tell Zion, he saw that Black Wing was uneasy. His head was up, and he was looking all about, his nostrils working, as though he weren’t sure in what direction lay the danger he warned of, but drawing that peculiar whistling breath.
Racing back to the ledge, René scanned the landscape again. There was no sign of anything hostile to them. No tracks marred the thin white covering that lay over everything. But he was nervous, too. Black Wing never gave a false alarm. Was he warning of the nearness of that dangerous contestant in this race, as dogs are said to howl at its dread approach?
In mad haste to refute this, he plunged down the slope, bringing up short at sight of a man, who was standing there beneath the wall, silently watching him. Instinctively, René reached for his gun. But he never drew. Nor was this because the man had the drop on him, or had made any threatening movement. But because his dark-ringed, hollow eyes were blue, a rare and piercing blue; because his face, so grimly set in seams of anguish, with all the bronze worn off, was the face of a Jore; because, unkempt as this man was, dressed in mismatched odds and ends of clothes, there was about him a dash and daring that might have won any woman to renounce it all.
His lips moved, almost without sound. “Am I in time?”
At René’s nod, “Thank God!” said Joel Jore. He leaned weakly against the wall. “Piney told me. I stopped there. I’ve come night and day since. I saw you come in here. Where is he?”
René showed him where Zion lay. But he didn’t follow him in. He couldn’t bear to witness that reunion. He could hardly bear the echoes that came to him, a man’s crying, great racking sobs that broke him up, the delirious joy of a homesick, dying young fellow that man had parted from five years ago and had never expected to see again, now seeing him—like that.
After a bit, when all was quiet, René went back. Joel knelt on the cold stones, holding Zion in his arms. Zion’s eyes were shut. He seemed in final sleep. But René heard his whisper: “Gee, Dad … gee.” And, with a confidence that made René’s eyes smart, he added: “I’d a-got you out … I bet.”
“Sure,” Joel said, as confident.
“But you … beat me … to it.”
The man’s arms tightened. “Thank God, I could, son. Why did you do it?”
Zion seemed to be rallying his thoughts. They must have been scattered far. His voice seemed to come from afar. “For mother. She missed you.” His smile was piteous. “It hurts … missin’ folks.” He sighed, and slept.
Gently, Joel laid him down and, covering him, groped his way out. Silently, René followed him. For a long time, the man stood staring at the great dome. What must it have meant to him? Everything he loved in life lay within those whitening rims.
He turned abruptly. “Tell me about them. I’ve heard everything that outsiders is mixed in. Lots of news goes to prison. I’ve heard all you’ve done. I’ve thanked you a thousand times … in my cage. I never hoped to do it face to face. But I’m doin’ it, son, from my heart.”
René said: “Don’t.”
“But”—Joel flung a hand up at the big cup—“of what goes on in there, I never hear. Not a whisper. How’s my wife? And my little girl?” A sad smile crossed his weary face. “I keep forgettin’, Eden will be a woman. Tell me about them.”
As hungrily as René, that May day on the far-off track, had listened to Race tell of the Jores, for the pleasure of hearing someone speak of his homeland, did this Jore, crouched there beneath that ledge, the snow beating about them, listen to René—now inextricably a part of the Jores’ red history—tell of home. If the young fellow, in his love and longing, showed his heart in this talk of Eden, it must have had her father’s full approval, for he begged for more.
When René reminded him, “You’ll be seein’ them soon,” pain that he was at a loss to understand twisted Joel’s face out of its seams.
“When I hear what Zion was doin’,” said the man, when he had stored in his heart every scrap of this talk of home, “what he hoped to do, I about went mad and made the break. I’d found friends … even in prison. They helped. All along the line, friends helped. I just aimed to get Zion back. And”—his eyes, fixed on the great cup, flashed naked hate—“settle a score of long standin’. But I hear Shang Haman never come back from the basin. So my brothers must have settled for me.”
After a time, he said: “Just one thing, and I’d be at peace with the world. Luke Chartres …” His eyes now blazed with a light of personal outrage. “How could he help the sheriff for that horse? What kind of stuff is he made of? And I … I was fool enough to think that with me out of the way …” His laugh was a brittle thing that broke in his throat.
They sat in silence, while the snow went swiftly on, hanging wreaths on dead boughs, shaking out the whi
te folds of its enveloping shroud, drawing a veil between them and the great dome, casting over the wild scene a light that made all seem unreal, spectral.
Joel asked suddenly: “You know there’s a watch up there?”
“Yeah. Zion spotted their fire.”
“Have you made any plan for gettin’ in?”
“Not yet. I just know I am gettin’ him in … tonight.”
The man’s eyes kindled at this spirit. But he shook his head. “Tonight”—his voice broke—“will be too late. We’ve got to beat that. Revel will be wantin’ to see Zion before he … goes. Zion must see his mother. Son,” he said tensely, “we must get him home today.”
Tears stood in René’s eyes. “How?”
“The guards up there don’t know we’re together. I can draw them off, while you and Zion slip in the basin. I’ll ride out near enough so they can see who I am. They’ll come for me, and I’ll run. It’s not likely they’ll follow far, for they’ll have orders to watch that pass. So I’ll drop from my horse and make a stand in that draw you can see from here … just down the trail. I’ll have to, for my horse is too fagged to run. But I can keep ’em occupied, and, if some have stuck to camp, they won’t lose any time comin’ to help their partners, knowin’ they’ve got Joel Jore, the lifer, cornered. There’s nothin’ to it, René.”
René cried earnestly: “You’d never get out of there.”
“I don’t expect to.”
René’s voice trembled. “You mean, you’d die, or go back to prison for the rest of your life, so Zion can spend his last moment at home?”
Joel Jore answered: “I’d die every day of every year left to me for Revel. I’ve died every day of every year I’ve been down there, thinkin’ of the wrong I done her … in ever lovin’ her, lettin’ her love me … a Jore. I don’t expect to get away from that … ever. I don’t deserve the happiness I feel now … doin’ this for her.”
“Then,” pleaded René, loving him as he never had another man, “make her happy, too, by goin’ home. You take Zion in! I’ll draw the guards off. It won’t matter much if I’m caught. I ain’t wanted for anything serious.”
“You’ve done enough for the Jores.” Joel’s heart was in that smile of thanks to René. “Too much … if I didn’t feel a Jore would reward you. And it’s doubtful if they’d follow you. This is my job. The snow will be a big help … it will hinder their aim, and be as a screen for you and Zion. And now, promise one thing, whatever happens to me, you’ll go on with Zion. You won’t turn back, no matter what.”
“It’s hard to promise.”
“Hard, yes. But that’s your job.”
René promised.
“Then”—tightly Joel clasped his hand—“we’ll carry this through all right.”
“When?”
Joel got up. There was a radiance on his face, as if the sun had suddenly emerged to shine on it and nothing else. But this glory was not of the sun, buried above gray cloud drifts, more thickly spilling their cargo of snow.
He said quietly: “Now.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
THE HOME STRETCH
High in the spires, through driving snowstorm, as through rain and shine, blue eyes haunted the Picture Rocks trail. Long, long weeks they had watched in awful longing and fear, for sweetheart and brother, for father, as well, since news had reached the basin that he had broken prison. Of late, with such wild hope as heart never dared before, did this daughter of a Jore watch for the coming of yet another. Now, as her gaze left the trail, straying fleetingly over that wild, grand, wintry panorama, her expression crystallized into wonder.
Excitedly, she whirled on the sentinel. “Uncle Abel, riders just dropped in behind that flag-shaped butte.”
“That’s queer,” said Abel, frowning and striving to pierce the snow between. “Nothin’ to come from there but wolves. Who’d be prowlin’ up in that wilderness? None of the guards. They’re in camp … all six of them.”
Her upturned face glowed with eagerness. “Do you suppose that it’s …”
“Chartres? No, lass. He’d be alone. And he’d come from Big Sandy.”
“But it could be,” she insisted pleadingly. “Something could take him out of the way. Somebody could be with him. Somebody who had to come. There’s bound to be a lot of red tape. It could be, couldn’t it?”
“It could,” he was forced to admit, “but it ain’t. You’re buildin’ false hopes, Eden. That’s too much for even Luke Chartres to swing. It’s just a pipe-dream.”
But she said, with a faith that touched him: “No, it’s not. It’s one dream that’s coming true. I know it. He’ll come. And when he does”—never did hope star eyes to such brilliance—“we’ll be through with all this.” Her gesture seemed to sweep into nothingness the law’s grim guardians, the contested pass, the eternal rims she stood upon, even the Winchester, propped against a rock, within easy reach of Abel’s hand.
But Abel Jore knew better than to dream. Always, dreams turned into nightmares—for Jores.
Yet, as intent as the girl, he watched that butte, as excited, too, when one of the riders she had seen emerged from behind it—too far off, too snow-obscured for recognition. But as he came on, more in the open, they knew by his horse—a black they had never seen—that it wasn’t the Val Verde rancher. Before they could study him further, he dropped into a ravine, and was lost to sight.
Glancing back, Abel was surprised to see no sign of the other riders. “Funny they don’t show up. Sure you seen more?”
“Yes. It was just a glimpse. But I counted three.”
Definitely uneasy, Abel Jore picked up his rifle, wiped the snow from it carefully, made sure it was ready for any emergency, and then crouched, waiting. Beside him, a slim little snow-powdered figure, crouched Eden. The eyes of both, straining on the end of that ravine where the black would emerge, saw his black head bob out, and, a moment later, he struggled up the steep bank to level ground.
Then they saw him through that white, slow, drifting veil of snow, across too wide a space to make possible the distinguishing of any feature. But something in his riding, some dearly remembered swing, shrieked his identity to them.
“He will come,” Joel Jore’s wife had said, “through snow and ice and storm.”
Now he was coming—coming, although he knew the pass was watched, or he wouldn’t have taken that rough route. Coming, in reckless defiance of it, they thought, in his desire to get home, right into the open, where, in a moment more, the guards would see him.
“Quick, lass”—the nightmare had commenced—“bring Yance! I can’t fire the signal without drawin’ the attention of the camp.”
But the small, taut, snowy figure did not stir. The blue eyes—hopeless, wide, and fearful—never left her father.
“Go! Get Yance!” said Abel huskily.
But she whispered, with fear-frozen lips: “There isn’t time.”
Nor was there. Before she could reach the cabins, whatever was to take place here would be all over. There was time for nothing, except to watch that loved form coming through the storm, but—not to them; to die a thousand deaths; to pray that Dolan’s men be stricken with blindness; that God make it snow so fast—anything, so the guards didn’t see him.
But, mocking their prayers, there was an actual lessening in the fall. Even before they feared, the guards saw Joel. For all was wild commotion in the camp down there. Men were running from their tents, pitched in the jack pines, others already springing to their saddles. And Joel, as if just aware that he had been seen, was spurring his jaded horse madly toward the pass.
“He’ll never make it!” Crazed with his sense of helplessness, Abel paced the crags. “They’ll cut him off before he gets halfway in. He must see that as well as us. Why don’t he turn and run? This ain’t like him. Reckless, he was, but cool in a crisis. Prison can’t have worke
d this change. Girl, there’s something funny going on.”
She saw nothing but her father riding to death or capture and those six hard-riding forms bearing down on him. And she moaned. “Oh, stop them! Do something!”
“There’s not a thing I can do,” Abel groaned. “They’re out of range. They’ll get him before they ever come in reach of my gun.”
But he lifted the gun and fired six fast shots.
“When that happens,” he said grimly, “I’ll need Yance.”
They had a faint hope, then, that it might not happen. For Joel seemed to realize that he couldn’t get in. They saw his head turn toward the oncoming men, saw him yank his plunging horse to a stop and, for one awful instant, in which a howl of recognition went up, look about him in apparent confusion, then, wheeling straight away from the pass, strike off down the Big Sandy trail.
“Lass,” cried Abel Jore, “them other riders … Joel’s up to something. Do you reckon …?”
No! She knew. Her gaze, flashing to that butte, had been stopped short by sight of a bay horse, dark against the snow, and, bright as a patch of sunlight on it, a buckskin. And she screamed: “It’s them! I see Black Wing! It’s René and Zion! Dad’s luring the guards off, so they can get in!”
Now Abel saw them, waiting, unseen by the officers, who were in hot pursuit of Joel, and almost far enough down the trail to permit René and Zion to beat them to the pass. They were, too, almost in shooting range of Joel—in range. For they heard snow-muffled shots. Saw Joel leap from his horse to the shelter of the trailside undergrowth, and run for the draw beyond.
“He’ll make it!” Abel cried, with a mighty throb of thanksgiving. “He can hold ’em back there, till me and Yance—”then broke off to curse a fate that had ever been the implacable enemy of the Jores.
For suddenly, out of the storm, a rider had loomed, directly in Joel’s path. An enemy, whoever he was, unless—wildly they prayed he was that other rider for whom Eden had so hopefully watched.
But Joel, finding himself between two fires, cut off from the draw, where he had hoped to hold the guards while René and Zion slipped in the pass, was forced to take refuge among the boulders beside the trail—meager shelter, but enough to daunt six of the most dauntless men, when held by a Jore with his back to the wall. The guards pulled up in sharp respect. And the fateful rider pulled up, uncertain what course to take, then, circling those rocks, rode like the very wind to join the guards.
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