Robber's Roost (1989)

by Grey, Zane

  "My spirit is willing but my flesh is weak," she said.

  "You did wonderfully. It was a hard ride, after a tough day," he replied. "I'm afraid I did not have thought enough for you. . . .

  Rest here while I unpack. Then I'll soon make you comfortable."

  Jim flew at the task, his rush of physical action a counter- irritant to his agitations. In a quarter-hour before dusk he had unpacked, hobbled and fed the horses, built a fire and put water on to boil. He had brought three canteens full of water and one canvas bag. Rainstorms, he reflected, would be good for the horses and bad for travel. He would take any chance before attempting to cross the Dirty Devil. Through his mind ran recollection of Hays one night telling about a marvellously fertile valley far up this river---a place once cultivated by Mormons, and then deserted. Jim would find that valley if he could.

  He carried his bed under the shelf and unrolled it, changed and doubled the blankets and folded the tarpaulin so that it could be pulled up in case rain beat in. That was likely to happen, for the rumble of thunder had grown closer and the cavern was not deep enough for shelter, unless the storm came from behind.

  The fire sent a ruddy light into the cavern, and all at once Jim discovered that the girl was watching him with wide, dark, unnaturally bright eyes. In that deceiving light the ravages of the past weeks did not show so plainly in her face. It seemed to have an unearthly beauty.

  "Are you able to get up and walk a little?" he asked. "And you must eat and drink, too, or we'll never escape."

  "I'll try."

  He helped her up, and out of the cumbersome slicker, and led her a few steps, after which she managed it alone.

  "Fine! You've got spunk, Helen. Now you walk up and down while I cook supper."

  "Are we safe here?"

  "God only knows! I think so--I hope so. It's a lonely desert.

  Our enemies have gone the other way. Don't worry. They're more scared of us than we are of them. But Morley got away with at least one of his men. The others belonged to Heeseman's outfit.

  They know they nearly wiped out Hays, and they'll try again with reinforcements. They knew Hays had a fortune in cash--and YOU."

  "Morley? . . . I remember the name, but not the connection. Hays was always telling me stories of love--what HE called love--and hate, revenge, death. . . . Would this Morley try to capture me to hold for ransom, too?"

  "Helen, that ransom idea of Hays' began in sincerity, but--lonely, hunted men in this hard country are wild dogs," ended Jim, gloomily.

  He did not look up from his tasks, and she passed on with her light, dragging step. Rain had begun to fall, sputtering on the hot coals and the iron oven. He did not need to bake biscuits, for he had packed a sackful, a few of which he warmed. With these, and fresh meat, sugar and coffee, and canned fruit he felt that they fared well. Now and again he was aware of her passing, but he never looked around at her. No matter where they camped or what the peril was, she must be free to come and go at will. But he would caution her that because he was a fugitive, so was she. At last he called her, only to discover that she sat behind him, watching.

  To his concern and discomfiture, she ate very little. She tried, only to fail. But she did drink her coffee.

  "That is more than I've had for long," she said. "Perhaps if I wasn't so excited I'd have more appetite."

  "You'll pick up," he replied, hopefully. "Sleep, though, is more necessary than food."

  "Sleep!--Oh, when have I really slept? . . . But now it will be different."

  Jim stared thoughtfully into the camp fire. Paling, flowing opalescent embers hissed when the raindrops fell upon them. He must remember to collect dry wood and put it under shelter for the night, and see that the horses did not stray.

  "Jim, I can't pull off my boots," she said. "Please help me."

  "Better sleep in them, as I shall in mine."

  "But my feet hurt so. I'm afraid they are swollen."

  She was sitting on the bed when Jim took hold of the boot she elevated. It did not come off easily. The other one, however, was not hard to remove.

  "There are holes in your stockings," he observed. "Have you another pair?"

  "One other. . . . My feet are so sore. They burn. What a luxury a bath would be! The few I've had were stolen. Hays would fetch me hot water, and then sneak around to watch me, so that it was always cold before I could use it."

  "Shut up about Hays, please," replied Jim, sharply.

  "I'm sorry. But he has so hung over my days and nights, like the weight of a mountain," she murmured in explanation, startled by his abruptness.

  "Look to see if you have any blisters," he said. "I'll bathe your feet in a little cold water and salt."

  "Cold water? And have ice blocks for feet all night?"

  "I have a stone heating for you. I'll wrap it in a sack. That will keep you warm."

  Bringing a pan of water, he knelt before her; and to look at her then was to find the past destroying weeks hard to believe.

  "I never had any gentlemen bathe my feet," she said, with a flash of humor which Jim was almost too perturbed to notice.

  "Don't stand on ceremony, Helen. Stick out your foot. . . . My dear woman, this is purely kindness on my part. I really don't want to do it."

  "You've changed somehow since Star Ranch," she mused. "Very well, thank you." And she put out her small feet.

  Jim lost no time in pressing them down into the cold, salt water, which made her cry out, and what he lacked in gentleness he made up in effectiveness. And he had to use his scarf to dry them because he had no towel and hers was in her bundle. Then he rubbed her feet until they were red, during which operation she did not exactly squeal, though she emitted sounds which were similar.

  "Put your stockings back on and sleep in your clothes," he said.

  "I could scarcely do anything else, Mr. Jim. . . . Tell me, did you ever have a wife?"

  "My God, no!" ejaculated Jim, hastily.

  "Or sweetheart?"

  Jim dropped his head. "Not really--not one I could speak of to you. . . . Long ago, before I became a thief--"

  "Nonsense! You're not a thief. I asked you because you did that in such a--a detached manner. I once had pretty feet, if I remember rightly. But you did not notice them. Oh, how silly of me! . . . Jim, I can't help talking. My tongue appears to be freed!"

  "Talk all you want, but no more tonight. We'll have a tough day tomorrow. . . . Wait before you crawl in--I'll bring the stone."

  He kicked the round rock out of the fire, and wrapping it in burlap, he laid it under her blankets. "Push that down."

  "Ooooo!" She stretched out with a slow, final movement, and pulled the blankets up under her chin. Her eyes were purple pools, unfathomable with emotion and thought.

  "Go to sleep," he said, gazing down at her, conscious that these involuntary words were not what he thought he wanted to say. "I can't swear we're safe or that I'll get you out alive. But if we're caught I'll kill you before they do me."

  "In any case you are my savior. I grew hopeless back there. I could pray no more. But I shall tonight. God has--not--forsaken-- me."

  And it appeared that almost instantly she fell asleep with the flickering firelight upon her face, and her white hands clasped over the edge of the blankets.

  Much of Jim Wall's life, since he was sixteen, had been spent in the open around camp fires. But there had never been any night comparable to this. He could not understand the oppression upon his heart. His moods changed in a trice.

  He walked out to find the horses close to camp and making out fairly well on the grass. Rain was falling steadily now, though not copiously. No stars showed. Far off down the desert fitful flares of lightning ran across the horizon, revealing black, weird buttes and long, level escarpments. In the south thunder still rumbled. Probably tomorrow the storm would set in. The place appeared more desolate than the roost because there rustling leaves and tinkling water seemed to break the solitude, while here there was nothing. E
ven the rain fell silently.

  Jim gathered a quantity of dead cedar wood which he stowed away to keep dry. Then he unrolled the bed he had brought for himself.

  This one had belonged to Smoky. Jim thought of the implacable little gunman, lion-hearted, going out to save his comrades because he felt that he alone could do it. Lying stark and stiff now, out on the naked rock, with the rain beating down upon his face! That was his creed toward men. His creed toward women could not have been very different.

  Jim paced to and fro, unmindful of the misty rain. He put another billet upon the fire and some bits of dry brush. The flame licked up through the twigs and brightened the shadow, and appeared to cast a halo round the girl's white face. But that was the gold sheen of her hair. Softly Jim took a step or two closer, to peer down. Deep in slumber as any child! Strangely his mother's face stood out in the dim years--as she had looked when she lay dead.

  Fugitive from the law, he had risked liberty to see her once more.

  A sad and heart-broken face it was, yet not as this sleeping girl's, helpless in his power, trusting him as she would have trusted her brother.

  He patrolled his beat between the flickering fire and the sleeping girl, up and down from shadow to shadow, bowed, plodding heedless of the rain, sleepless for hours, on guard, almost as ruthless to himself as he would have been to marauders of the night. And after that when he slept it was with one eye open.

  Toward dawn he got up and rolled his bed. The air was raw and cold, blowing a fine rain in his face. It was still too early to begin preparations for breakfast and too dark to look up the horses. So he strode again the beat of the preceding hours, which seemed farther back in the past than one night.

  Two days' travel, sixty miles, without delay, ought to take them out of the brakes. Would the girl be able to make it? He had to choose between a serious break-down for her and the possibility of being held up in the brakes by the rainy season. His decision was instant. He would carry her in his arms, if she gave out, but if the floods came, their predicament would be deplorable. All this region, except the rock, when it got thoroughly wet, became what the riders called gumbo mud. And the overdue rains appeared about to burst upon them.

  Under the cliff the deep shadows grew gray as dawn approached. As soon as it was light enough to see, Jim looked at Helen. She lay exactly as she had fallen asleep ten hours before; even her hands had not come unclasped. Her face made a pale blotch against the dark blanket. She might be dead. A pang rent him. Bending low, he listened, to be rewarded by the sound of soft breathing. Then he sprang erect, conscious that former emotions stirred. Must he have them to fight every day?

  Jim hurried out to find the horses. It was a sodden, wet world, overhung by clouds as gray as the shrouded ridges and dismal flats.

  The horses had strayed and he felt alarmed. Still, he could track them by daylight. Leaving Helen alone, however, small as the risk was, he hated to consider. As luck would have it, he came upon all four animals grazing in another little valley. Taking off their rope hobbles, he drove them back to camp, an easy task with horses that had been fed grain the night before. He had four square pieces of canvas upon which he spilled a quart of grain for each horse. Then he strapped on the pack-saddles. The riding-saddles, however, he left for the last task.

  By the time breakfast was cooking, daylight had broken. The rain had ceased. There were breaks in the gray canopy of cloud, but no blue showed. The air seemed to be pregnant with storm. Finding a thin, flat rock, Jim placed Helen's breakfast upon it and carried it to her bedside. Then he called her. No answer! A second call did not pierce her deep slumber; whereupon he had to give her a little shake. At that her eyes opened. Jim recoiled from the purple depths. She had awakened as on the mornings past. Then as he knelt there came a transformation in her gaze, which, when he realized the absolute reversal in it, flayed him more bitterly than had the other. No help for him! He seemed at the mercy of uncontrollable vagaries of feeling.

  "You were hard to awaken," he said. "I've brought some food and strong coffee. You must get it down somehow."

  "I heard you call. I felt your hand. I thought--" She broke off and struggled to sit up. "I'll eat if it tastes like sawdust."

  Jim repaired to his own breakfast, after which he wrapped up biscuits and meat to take on the day's ride.

  "Did you steal my boots, Mr. Robber?" she called.

  He made haste to get them from the fire, where he had placed them to dry.

  "I am more of a robber than you think," he replied.

  "You've dried them. Thank you. . . . Play your strange part, Jim Wall, but I know what I know. . . . Oh, I'm so stiff and sore! My bones! But I'll do or die."

  She pulled on her boots, and crawling out and straightening up with slow, painful effort she asked for a little hot water. Jim fetched it, and also the bundle that contained her things.

  Free then to pack, Jim applied himself with swift, methodical hands, his mind at once both busy and absent. At length all was ready except her bundle, which he turned to get. He saw her coming along the shelving wall, walking slowly, her hat shading her features.

  "I did better this morning," she said, presently, as she reached him.

  "Let's see if you can get on your horse," he replied, and led the gray up. "You can put on the slicker after you're up."

  She did mount unassisted. Jim helped her into the long slicker, and tucked the ends round her boots.

  "It'll be a tough day," he went on. "But we're starting dry and if you don't fall off in a puddle you'll stay dry. Hang on as long as you can. Then I'll pack you, if necessary. We absolutely must get out of these brakes."

  With that he tied her canvas bundle back of his saddle, and donning the slicker that had been Smoky's he lined up the pack-animals, and they were off.

  Beyond the ridge the country looked the same as it had to the rear-- hummocks of rotting shale, ridges of brush and gravel, swales and flats and little valleys on each side, with the difference that as they enlarged to the west and to the east they roughened up into the dark red, irregularly streaked brakes. Jim traveled as best he could, keeping to no single direction, though the trend was northerly, and following ground that appeared passable. The pack- horses led, and one of them scented water or knew where he was going, possibilities not lost upon Jim. He followed them, and Helen brought up the rear. Watching her at first, Jim lost something of his anxiety. For the present she would not retard their progress.

  It began to rain and that did not cause Jim to spare the girl.

  They had to travel as fast as the pack-horses could walk on rough ground and trot where possible. Jim could not see more than half a mile to the fore. Dim mounds stood up in that cloud that overhung the whole country. Jim conceived the idea he was swinging to the west, but for the time being could not make sure.

  The rain fell all morning, and let up at intervals. Again the clouds broke their solid, dull phalanx, to let light through. Once a rift of blue sky showed far ahead, with sunlight gilding a very tall, strangely tipped butte. Jim marveled at this, and believed it was one he had seen from the high slope under the Henry Mountains, a hundred miles and more to the southward.

  Shortly after this, black clouds gathered, and a storm, with thunder and lightning, burst upon them. The thirsty horses soon had opportunity to drink. Water ran in sheets off the rocks, where Jim, without dismounting, filled the empty canteens.

  Soon down every gully and wash rushed a muddy torrent. The lead pack-horse knew his business and earned Jim's respect. Jim was sure now that he had traveled this way before. The rain slackened, but the floods increased. At length the fugitives came to a veritable river at which the lead horse balked. Bay, however, did not show any qualms. The flood was fifty yards across, evidently a shallow gully, down which rocks bumped and rumbled in the current.

  All about was desolation. No shelter or wood or grass could Jim see. So he put Bay to the task. The big horse made it easily, with water coming up to his flanks. Where
upon Jim rode him back, after which, the pack-horses, intelligent and sensible, essayed the ford. The one with the heavier load was all but swept away.

  Luckily, he kept his feet, and lunged out in a great splash, snorting his terror.

  Then Jim returned for Helen.

  "I'll carry you while you hang on to your bridle," said Jim, riding close to the gray. "Slip your feet free and come on." He had to lift her sheer off her horse and around in front of him, where he upheld her with his left arm. "Here's your bridle. Hang on. . . .

  Get up, Bay, you old water-dog."

  They made it, with the splendid horse staggering out under his double burden just in the nick of time. A perceptible rise in the flood, like a wave, swelled by them. He let Helen down.

  "Look at that!" exclaimed Jim. "See the water come up? If we'd been in the middle then it'd been good-by."

  "To what?"

  "I don't know. All that's ahead. Hear the water roaring below, where it drops into a gulch? . . . I tell you luck is with us."

  "God and luck," she corrected.

  "Are you afraid?" asked Jim.

  "Not in the least. Under happier circumstances this would be an adventure. . . . I must move about a little. My legs are gone.

  And I have a terrible pain in my side."

  "You are doing fine. We have come eighteen or twenty miles. But I don't like the look ahead. We're climbing all the time. I think I hear the Dirty Devil."

  "That dull, distant rumble? . . . If we had gone down the way he-- the way we came--we'd surely have been lost. Could those men have made it?"

  "No. They might be marooned on some high bank, or they might have turned back. In which case they would see our tracks."

  "Would they follow us?"

  "I don't know. Not soon. But we can't afford to waste any time."

  "We will get out safely. I feel it. Please help me up."

  When once more they were on the way Jim gave her a biscuit and a strip of meat. "Eat. The rain will be on us soon."

  And it was, a deluge that obliterated objects at a few paces. The lead pack-horse did not show himself at fault. He had indeed been along there. Jim saw evidences of an old trail and this encouraged him. It must lead somewhere. That storm passed, leaving a drizzle in its wake. Wide pools stood on the flats and cataracts leaped off the rocks. But the washes were shallow.