As he climbed the long hill he grappled deeply with this new and inexplicable weakness. He had always been a decent fellow as respects women, and had maintained the same regard for the moral code that he instinctively bore toward the laws of his adopted country. He could not, therefore, regard this girl (low as her parentage seemed) in the light of license; for (he thought) whatever of evil may have been planted deep in her nature by her ill-assorted father and mother, she is at the moment sweet and fine, and the man who would awaken her other self should be accursed.
In this mood, too, he acknowledged the loneliness of his life for the first time, and rode his silent way up the trail like one in a dream. He went over his life story in detail, wondering if he had not made a mistake in leaving England, in taking out his American citizenship. He considered again, very seriously, the question of going back to live on the estate of his mother, and once more decided that its revenue was too small. To return to it meant an acceptance of the restricted life of an English farmer, and, worst of all, an acquiescence in the social despotism which he had come to feel and to hate.
The English empire to him was falling apart. Its supremacy was already threatened by Germany, whereas the future of the States appealed to his imagination. Here the problems of popular government and of industry were to be worked out on the grandest scale. The West inspired him. “Some day each of these great ranges will be a national forest, and each of these canons will contain its lake, its reservoir.” There was something fine in this vision of man’s conquest of nature. “Surely in this development there is a place for me,” he said.
Start at any place he pleased, his mind circled and came back to Lee Virginia. He reproached himself for not having remained one more day to help her. She was in the midst of a most bleak and difficult pass, and whether she came through or not depended on something not derived from either her father or her mother. The test of her character was being made.
“Happily the father is dead, and his exploits fading to a dim legend; but the mother may live for years to dishearten and corrupt. It is foolish of the girl to stay, and yet to have her go would leave me and the whole valley poorer.”
He perceived in her a symbol. “She is the new West just as the mother represents the old, and the law of inheritance holds in her as it holds in the State. She is a mixture of good and evil, of liberty and license. She must still draw forward, for a time, the dead weight of her past, just as the West must bear with and gradually slough off its violent moods.”
His pony plodded slowly, and the afternoon was half-spent before he came in sight of the long, low log-cabin which was the only home he possessed in all America. For the first time since he built it, the station seemed lonely and disheartening. “Would any woman, for love of me, come to such a hearthstone?” he asked himself. “And if she consented to do so, could I be so selfish as to exact such sacrifice? No, the forest ranger in these attitudes must be young and heart-free; otherwise his life would be miserably solitary.”
He unsaddled his horse and went about his duties with a leaden pall over his spirit, a fierce turmoil in his brain. He was no longer single-hearted in his allegiance to the forest. He could not banish that appealing girlish face, that trusting gaze. Lee Virginia needed him as he needed her; and yet—and yet—the people’s lands demanded his care, his social prejudices forbade his marriage.
He was just dishing out his rude supper when the feet of a horse on the log bridge announced a visitor.
With a feeling of pleasure as well as relief, he rose to greet the stranger. “Any visitor is welcome this night,” he said.
The horseman proved to be his former prisoner, the old man Edwards, who slipped from his saddle with the never-failing grace of the cow-man, and came slowly toward the cabin. He smiled wearily as he said: “I’m on your trail, Mr. Ranger, but I bear no malice. You were doing your duty. Can you tell me how far it is to Ambro’s camp?”
There was something forlorn in the man’s attitude, and Cavanagh’s heart softened. “Turn your horse into the corral and come to supper,” he commanded, with Western bluntness; “we’ll talk about all that later.”
Edwards accepted his hospitality without hesitation, and when he had disposed of his mount and made himself ready for the meal, he came in and took a seat at the table in silence, while the ranger served him and waited for his explanation.
“I’m going up to take Ambro’s place,” he began, after a few minutes of silent eating. “Know where his camp is?”
“I do,” replied Ross, to whom the stranger now appeared in pathetic guise. “Any man of his age consenting to herd sheep is surely hard hit by the rough hand of the world,” he reasoned, and the closer he studied his visitor the plainlier he felt his ungoverned past. His chest was hollow, his eyes unnaturally large, and his hands thin, but he still displayed faint lines of the beauty and power he had once gloried in. His clothing was worn and poor, and Ross said: “You’ll need plenty of bedding up there.”
“Is it high?”
“About eleven thousand feet.”
“Jehosaphat! How will I stand that kind of air? Still, it may be it’s what I need. I’ve been living down in the low country for ten years, and I’m a little bit hide-bound.”
“Lung trouble?”
“Oh no; old age, I reckon.”
“You’re not old—not more than fifty-five.”
“I’m no colt,” he admitted; “and, besides, I’ve lived pretty swift.”
In this was the hint of a confession, but Cavanagh did not care to have him proceed further in that line. “I suppose Gregg paid your fine?”
“Yes.”
“In any other town in the State you’d have gone down the line.”
He roused himself. “See here, Mr. Ranger, you’ve no warrant to believe me, but I told you the God’s truth. Young Gregg got me to ride into the range and show him the trail. I didn’t intend to get mixed up with a game warden. I’ve had all the confinement I need.”
“Well, it’s a closed incident now,” interposed Ross; “we won’t reopen it. Make yourself at home.”
The stranger, hungry as he was, ate with unexpected gentility, and, as the hot coffee sent its cheerful glow through his body, he asked, with livening interest, a good many questions about the ranger and the Forest Service. “You fellers have to be all-round men. The cowboys think you have a snap, but I guess you earn your money.”
“A man that builds trail, lays bridges, burns brush, fights fire, rides the round-up, and covers seventy-five miles of trail every week on eighty dollars per month, and feeds himself and his horses, isn’t what I would call enjoying a soft snap.”
“What do you do it for?”
“God knows! I’ve been asking myself that question all day to-day.”
“This playin’ game warden has some outs, too. That was a wild crowd last night. The town is the same old hell-hole it was when I knew it years ago. Fine girl of Lize Wetherford’s. She blocked me all right.” He smiled wanly. “I certainly was on my way to the green timber when she put the bars up.”
Ross made no comment, and the other went on, in a tone of reminiscent sadness. “Lize has changed terribly. I used to know her when she was a girl. Judas Priest! but she could ride and shoot in those days!” His eyes kindled with the memory of her. “She could back a horse to beat any woman that ever crossed the range, but I didn’t expect to see her have such a skein of silk as that girl. She sure looks the queen to me.”
Cavanagh did not greatly relish this line of conversation, but the pause enabled him to say: “Miss Wetherford is not much Western; she got her training in the East. She’s been with an aunt ever since her father’s death.”
“He’s dead, is he?”
“So far as anybody knows, he is.”
“Well, he’s no loss. I knew him, too. He was all kinds of a fool; let a few slick ones seduce him with fizz-water and oysters on the half-shell—that’s the kind of a weak sister he was. He got on the wrong side of the rustl
er line-up—you know all about that, I reckon? Fierce old days, those. We didn’t know anything about forest rangers or game wardens in them days.”
The stranger’s tone was now that of a man quite certain of himself. He had become less furtive under the influence of the food and fire.
Ross defended Wetherford for Virginia’s sake. “He wasn’t altogether to blame, as I see it. He was the Western type in full flower, that’s all. He had to go like the Indian and the buffalo. And these hobos like Ballard and Gregg will go next.”
Edwards sank back into his chair. “I reckon that’s right,” he agreed, and made offer to help clear away the supper dishes.
“No, you’re tired,” replied Ross; “rest and smoke. I’ll soon be done.”
The poacher each moment seemed less of the hardened criminal, and more and more of the man prematurely aged by sickness and dissipation, and gradually the ranger lost all feeling of resentment.
As he sat down beside the fire, Edwards said: “Them Wetherford women think a whole lot of you. ’Pears like they’d both fight for you. Are you sweet on the girl?”
“Now, see here, old man,” Ross retorted, sharply, “you want to do a lot of thinking before you comment on Miss Wetherford. I won’t stand for any nasty clack.”
Edwards meekly answered: “I wasn’t going to say anything out of the way. I was fixin’ for to praise her.”
“All the same, I don’t intend to discuss her with you,” was Cavanagh’s curt answer.
The herder fell back into silence while the ranger prepared his bunk for the night. The fact that he transferred some of the blankets from his own bed to that of his visitor did not escape Edwards’s keen eyes, and with grateful intent he said:
“I can give you a tip, Mr. Ranger,” said he, breaking out of a silence. “The triangle outfit is holding more cattle on the forest than their permits call for.”
“How do you know?”
“I heard one of the boys braggin’ about it.”
“Much obliged,” responded Ross. “I’ll look into it.”
Edwards went on: “Furthermore, they’re fixing for another sheep-kill over there, too; all the sheepmen are armed. That’s why I left the country. I don’t want to run any more chances of being shot up. I’ve had enough of trouble; I can’t afford to be hobnobbing with judges and juries.”
“When does your parole end?” asked Ross.
Edwards forced a grin. “I was handing you one when I said that,” he declared, weakly. “I was workin’ up sympathy. I’m not out on parole; I’m just a broken-down old cow-puncher herdin’ sheep in order to keep clear of the liquor belt.”
This seemed reasonable, and the ranger remarked, by way of dropping the subject: “I’ve nothing to say further than this—obey the rules of the forest, and you won’t get into any further trouble with me. And as for being shot up by the cow-men, you’ll not be disturbed on any national forest. There never has been a single herder shot nor a sheep destroyed on this forest.”
“I’m mighty glad to hear that,” replied Edwards, with sincere relief. “I’ve had my share of shooting up and shooting down. All I ask now is quiet and the society of sheep. I take a kind of pleasure in protecting the fool brutes. It’s about all I’m good for.”
He did, indeed, look like a man in the final year of life as he spoke. “Better turn in,” he said, in kindlier tone; “I’m an early riser.”
The old fellow rose stiffly, and, laying aside his boots and trousers, rolled into his bunk and was asleep in three minutes.
Cavanagh himself was very tired, and went to bed soon after, to sleep dreamlessly till daylight. He sprang from his bed, and after a plunge in the stream set about breakfast; while Edwards rose from his bunk, groaning and sighing, and went forth to wrangle the horses, rubbing his hands and shivering as he met the keen edge of the mountain wind. When he returned, breakfast was ready, and again he expressed his gratitude.
“Haven’t you any slicker?” asked Cavanagh. “It looks like rain.”
“No, I’m run down pretty low,” he replied. “The truth is, Mr. Ranger, I blew in all my wages at roulette last week.”
Ross brought out a canvas coat, well worn but serviceable. “Take this along with you. It’s likely to storm before we reach the sheep-camp. And you don’t look very strong. You must take care of yourself.”
Edwards was visibly moved by this kindness. “Sure you can spare it?”
“Certain sure; I’ve another,” returned the ranger, curtly.
It was hardly more than sunrise as they mounted their ponies and started on their trail, which led sharply upward after they left the canon. The wind was strong and stinging cold. Over the high peaks the gray-black vapor was rushing, and farther away a huge dome of cloud was advancing like an army in action. It was all in the day’s work of the ranger, but the plainsman behind him turned timorous eyes toward the sky. “It looks owly,” he repeated. “I didn’t know I was going so high—Gregg didn’t say the camp was so near timber-line.”
“You’ve cut out a lonesome job for yourself,” Ross assured him, “and if you can find anything else to do you’d better give this up and go back.”
“I’m used to being lonesome,” the stranger said, “but I can’t stand the cold and the wet as I used to. I never was a mountaineer.”
Taking pity on the shivering man, Cavanagh turned off the trail into a sheltered nook behind some twisted pine-trees. “How do you expect to take care of your sheep a thousand feet higher than this?” he demanded as they entered the still place, where the sun shone warm.
“That’s what I’m asking myself,” replied Edwards. He slipped from his horse and crouched close to the rock. “My blood is mostly ditch-water, seems like. The wind blows right through me.”
“How do you happen to be reduced to herding sheep? You look like a man who has seen better days.”
Edwards, chafing his thin fingers to warm them, made reluctant answer: “It’s a long story, Mr. Ranger, and it concerns a whole lot of other people—some of them decent folks—so I’d rather not go into it.”
“John Barleycorn was involved, I reckon.”
“Sure thing—he’s generally always in it.”
“You’d better take my gloves—it’s likely to snow in half an hour. Go ahead—I’m a younger man than you are.”
The other made a decent show of resistance, but finally accepted the offer, saying: “You certainly are white to me. I want to apologize for making that attempt to sneak away that night—I had a powerful good reason for not staying any longer.”
Ross smiled a little. “You showed bad judgment—as it turned out.”
“I sure did. That girl can shoot. Her gun was steady as a door-knob. She filled the door. Where did she learn to hold a gun like that?”
“Her father taught her, so she said.”
“She wouldn’t remember me—an old cuss like me—but I’ve seen her with Wetherford when she was a kidlet. I never thought she’d grow up into such a ‘queen.’ She’s a wonder.”
Strange to say, Ross no longer objected to the old man’s words of admiration; on the contrary, he encouraged him to talk on.
“Her courage is greater than you know. When she came to that hotel it was a place of dirt and vermin. She has transformed it. She’s now engaged on the reformation of her mother.”
“Lize was straight when I knew her,” remarked the other, in the tone of one who wishes to defend a memory. “Straight as a die.”
“In certain ways she’s straight now, but she’s been hard pushed at times, and has traded in liquor to help out—then she’s naturally a slattern.”
“She didn’t used to be,” asserted Edwards; “she was a mighty handsome woman when I used to see her riding around with Ed.”
“She’s down at the heel now, quite like the town.”
“She looked sick to me. You shouldn’t be too hard on a sick woman, but she ought to send her girl away or get out. As you say, the Fork is no kind of a place for such
a girl. If I had a son, a fine young feller like that girl is, do you suppose I’d let him load himself up with an old soak like me? No, sir; Lize has no right to spoil that girl’s life. I’m nothing but a ham-strung old cow-puncher, but I’ve too much pride to saddle my pack on the shoulders of my son the way Lize seems to be doin’ with that girl.”
He spoke with a good deal of feeling, and the ranger studied him with deepening interest. He had taken on dignity in the heat of his protest, and in his eyes blazed something that was both manly and admirable.
Cavanagh took his turn at defending Lize. “As a matter of fact, she tried to send her daughter away, but Lee refuses to go, insisting that it is her duty to remain. In spite of her bad blood the girl is surprisingly true and sweet. She makes me wonder whether there is as much in heredity as we think.”
“Her blood ain’t so bad. Wetherford was a fool and a daredevil, but he came of good Virginia stock—so I’ve heard.”
“Well, whatever was good in both sire and dame this girl seems to have mysteriously gathered to herself.”
The old man looked at him with a bright sidelong glance. “You are a little sweet on the girl, eh?”
Ross began to regret his confidence. “She’s making a good fight, and I feel like helping her.”
“And she rather likes being helped by you. I could see that when she brought the coffee to you. She likes to stand close—”
Ross cut him short. “We’ll not discuss her any further.”
“I don’t mean any harm, Mr. Ranger; we hobos have a whole lot of time to gossip, and I’m old enough to like a nice girl in a fatherly way. I reckon the whole valley rides in to see her, just the way you do.”
Cavanagh winced. “You can’t very well hide a handsome woman in a cattle country.”
Edwards smiled again, sadly. “Not in my day you couldn’t. Why, a girl like that would ‘a’ been worth a thousand head o’ steers. I’ve seen a man come in with a span of mules and three ordinary female daughters, and without cinching a saddle to a pony accumulate five thousand cattle.” Then he grew grave again. “Don’t happen to have a picture of the girl, do you?”
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