Skyrider

by B. M. Bower

  CHAPTER FIVE

  DESERT GLIMPSES

  Mary V was indefatigably pursuing a new and apparently fascinatingavocation, for which her mother expressed little sympathy, no enthusiasmwhatever, and a grudgingly given consent. Mary V was making a collectionof Desert Glimpses for educational purposes at her boarding school. Shehad long been urged to do so by her schoolmates and teachers, she toldher mother, and now she was going to do it. It should be the very best,most complete collection any one could possibly make within ridingdistance of the Rolling R. Incidentally she meant to collect jackrabbitears and rattlesnake rattles, for the purpose of thrilling the girls, butshe did not tell her mother that. Neither did she tell her mother justwhy her quest always lay to the southward when there was plenty of desertto be glimpsed toward the north and to the east and the west. She did noteven tell herself why she did that.

  So Mary V, knowing well the terrific heat she would have to face in themiddle of the day, ordered her horse saddled when the boys saddled theirown--which was about sunrise. She did not keep it standing more than halfan hour or so before she came out and mounted him. She was well equippedfor her enterprise. She carried a camera, three extra rolls of film, atelescoped tripod which she tied under her right stirrup leather, a pairof high-power Busch glasses (to glimpse with, probably), two duck-coveredcanteens filled and dripping, a generous lunch of sandwiches and cake andsour pickles, a box-magazine .22 rifle, a knife, a tube of cold creamwrapped in a bit of cheesecloth, and a very compact yet very completevanity case. Jostling the vanity case in her saddle pocket were two boxesof soft-nose, .22-long cartridges for the rifle. Furthermore, for specialpersonal protection she had an extremely businesslike six-shooter whichshe carried in a shoulder holster under her riding shirt; a concession toher father, who had made her promise never to ride away from the ranchwithout it.

  For apparel Mary V wore a checked riding coat and breeches, together withblack puttees. The suit had grown a bit shabby for Los Angeles, and MaryV's mother believed that town cast-offs should be worn out on the ranch.Mary V did not mind. She hated the cumbersome riding skirts of the rangegirl proper, and much preferred the breeches. When she had put a littledistance between herself and the ranch, she usually removed the coat andtied it in a roll behind the cantle. She looked then like a slim boy--orshe would have, except for the hat. Mary V cherished her complexion,which Arizona sun and winds would have burned a brick red. In coolweather she wore a Stetson like the boys; but now she favored a great,straw sombrero such as you see section hands wear along the railroadtrack in Arizona. To keep it on her head in the winds she had resorted totying a ribbon down over the brim from the front of the crown to the napeof her neck; and tying another ribbon from the back of the crown downunder her chin. Thus doubly anchored, and skewered with two hatpinsbesides, the hat might be counted upon to give Mary V no trouble, but agreat deal of protection. Worn with the checked riding breeches and theheavy, black puttees, it was not particularly becoming, but Mary V didnot expect to meet many pairs of critical eyes. Rolling R boys were toomuch like home folks to bother about, having been accustomed to seeingMary V in strange and various guises since she was a tiny tot.

  Southward she rode, and as swiftly as was wise if she valued thewell-being of her horse. Movies will have it that nothing short of agallop is tolerated by riders in the West; whereas Mary V had been taughtfrom her childhood up that she must never "run" her horse unless therewas need of it. She therefore contented herself with ambling along thetrail at a distance-devouring trail-trot, slowing her horse to a walk onthe rising slopes and urging him a little with her spurred heels on thelevels. She did not let him lag--she could not, if she covered thedistance she had in her mind to cover.

  Away over to the south--almost to Sinkhole Camp, in fact--was a ridgethat was climbable on horseback. Not every ridge in that country was,and Mary V was not fond of walking in the sand on a hot day. The ridgecommanded a far view, and was said to be a metropolis among the snakesthat populated the region. Mary V had, very casually, mentioned to theboys that some day she meant to get a good picture of a snake den. Shesaid "the girls" did not believe that snakes went in bunches and writhedamicably together in their dens. She was going to prove it to them.

  A perfectly logical quest it was therefore that led her toward thatridge. You could not blame Mary V if the view from the top of it extendedto Sinkhole Camp and beyond. She had not made the view, remember, nor hadshe advised the snakes to choose that ridge for their dens. She was noteven perfectly sure that they did choose it. The boys had told her thatBlack Ridge was "full up" with snake dens, and she meant to see if theytold the truth.

  Wherefore her horse Tango laboriously carried Mary V up the ridge andkept his ears perked for the warning buzz of rattlers, and his eyes openfor a feasible line retreat in case he heard one. Tango knew just as wellas Mary V when they were in snake country. He had gone so far as to arguethe point of climbing that ridge, but as usual Mary V's argument wasstronger than Tango's, and he had yielded with an injured air that wasquite lost upon his rider. Mary V was thinking of something else.

  They reached the top without having seen a single snake. Tango seemedsomewhat surprised at this, but Mary V was not. Mary V thought it was toohot even for rattlesnakes, and as for the dearth of lizards--well shesupposed the snakes had eaten them all. She had let Tango stop often tobreathe, and whenever he did so she had looked south, scanning as much ofthe lower level as she could see, which was not the proper way to goabout hunting snake dens, I assure you. But at the top she permittedTango to walk into the shade of a boulder that radiated heat like a stovebut was still preferable to the blistering sunlight, and there she lefthim while she walked a little nearer the edge of the rimrock that toppedthe ridge on its southern side.

  Once more she scanned the sweltering expanse of sagebrush, scant grass,many rock patches and much sand. She saw a rider moving along a shallowwatercourse, and immediately she focused her glasses upon him. She gavean ejaculation of surprise when the powerful lenses annihilated ninetenths of the distance between them. One would judge from her manner andher tone that, while she had not been surprised to see a rider, thatrider's identity was wholly unexpected.

  She watched him until, having reached a certain place where a group ofcottonwoods shaded the gully, he stopped and dismounted to fuss with hiscinches. Mary V could not be sure whether he was merely killing time, orwhether he really needed to tighten the saddle; but when another riderappeared suddenly from the eastward, she did know that the first ridershowed no symptoms of surprise.

  She did not know the second arrival at the cottonwoods. She could seethat he was Mexican, and that was all. The two talked together with muchgesturing on the part of the Mexican, and sundry affirmative nods on thepart of the first rider. The Mexican frequently waved a hand toward thesouth--toward Sinkhole Camp, perhaps. They seemed to be in a hurry, MaryV thought. They did not tarry more than five minutes before they parted,the Mexican riding back toward the east, the first rider returningwestward. He had come cautiously, at an easy pace. He went back ridingat a long lope, as though time was precious to him.

  Mary V watched until she saw him emerge out of that hollow and duck intoanother which led toward the northwest and, if he followed it, wouldbring him out near the head of Dry Gulch, which was several miles nearerthe Rolling R home ranch than was the ridge where she stood. When he hadgone, she turned again to see where the Mexican was going. The Mexican,she discovered, was going east as fast as his horse could carry himwithout dropping dead in that heat; and he, also, was keeping to thehollows.

  "Here's a pretty howdy-do!" said Mary V to the palpitating atmosphere."I'm just going to tell dad about Tex sneaking away down here to meetMexicans and things on the sly! I never did like that Tex. I don't likehis eyes. You can't see into them at all. I'll bet they're framing upsomething on Johnny Jewel--they were pointing right toward his camp.There's no telling _what_ they're up to! I'm going right and tell dad--"

  But she couldn't.
Mary V knew she couldn't. In the first place, her dadwould ask her what she was doing on Black Ridge, which was far beyond herpermitted range of activities. Her dad would foolishly maintain that shecould glimpse all the desert necessary without going that far from theranch. In the second place, he would probably tell her that he was payingTex to ride the range and, if he met a Mexican, it was his business tosend that same Mexican back where he came from. In the third place, hewould think she was riding over there for a reason which was untrue andvery, very unjust. And he wouldn't fire Tex, because Tex was a good"hand" and hands were hard to find. He would simply make her promiseto stay at home.

  "He'd say it was perfectly all right for Tex--and perfectly all wrong forme. Dad's _tremendously_ pin-headed where I am concerned. So I supposeI'll just have to say nothing, and ride all that long way in the hot sunto make sure that horrid Johnny Jewel is not being murdered or something.It doesn't, of course, concern me personally at all--but dad is _so_short-handed this summer. And he actually _threatened_ that he couldn'tafford me a new car this winter if wages go up or horses go down, oranything happens that doesn't just please him. And I suppose Johnny Jewelhas his uses, in the general scheme of dad's business, so even if he is amean, conceited little shrimp personally, I'll have to go and make surehe isn't killed, because it would be just like dad to call that bad luck,and grouch around and not get me the car."

  Mary V had barely reached this goal of personal unconcern for anythingbut her own private interests, when Tango began to manifest certainviolent symptoms of having seen or heard something very disagreeable.Mary V had to take some long, boyish steps in order to snatch his reinsbefore he bolted and left her afoot, which would have been a realcalamity. But she caught him, scolded him shrewishly and slapped hischeek until he backed from her wall-eyed, and then she mounted him andwent clattering down off the ridge without having seen any snake dens atall. Doubtless the boys had lied to her, as usual.

  To Sinkhole Camp was a long way, much longer than it had looked from thetop of Black Ridge. Mary V, her face red with heat, hurried on and on,wishing over and over that she had never started at all, but lacking theresolution to turn back. Yet she was considered a very resolute youngwoman by those who knew her most intimately.

  Perversely she blamed Johnny Jewel for putting her to all this troubleand discomfort, and for interrupting her in her work of getting DesertGlimpses. She repeatedly told herself that he would not even have thecommon human instinct to feel grateful toward her for riding away downthere to see if he were murdered.

  She was right in that conjecture, at least. When she rode up to thesquat adobe cabin, somewhere near noon, she found Johnny Jewel stretchedmorosely on his back, staring up at the low roof and thinking thegloomiest thoughts which a lonesome young man of twenty-one or two mayconjure from a fit of the blues. That he was not murdered or even menacedwith any danger seemed to Mary V a personal grievance against herselfafter that terrifically hot ride.

  Johnny turned a gloomy glance upon her when she walked in and sat downlimply on the one chair in the cabin; but he did not show any keenpleasure in her presence, nor any gratitude.

  "Well! You're still alive, then!" she said rather crossly.

  "I guess I am. Why?" Johnny, his meditations disturbed by her coming,rose languidly and sat upon the side of his bunk, slouched forward withhis arms resting across his strong young legs and his glance inclined tothe floor.

  "Oh, nothing." Mary V took off her hat, but she was too fagged to fanherself with it. Her one emotion, at that moment, was an overwhelmingregret that she had come. If Johnny Jewel had the nerve to think that shewanted to see _him_--

  "You must love the sun," Johnny observed apathetically. "Lizards, even,have got sense enough to stay in the shade such weather as this." Herumpled his hair to let the faint breeze in to his scalp, and looked ather. "You're red as a pickled beet at a picnic," he told herungraciously.

  Mary V pulled together her lagging wits, marshaled her fighting forces,and flaunted a war banner in the shape of a smile that was demure.

  "Well, one must expect to make some sacrifices when one is working in agood cause," she replied amiably, and paused.

  "Yeh?" Johnny's eyes lost a little of their dullness. It is possible thathe recognized that war banner of hers. "One didn't expect to see one downhere--on a good cause."

  "No? Well, you do see one, nevertheless. One is at work on an exhibit forone's school, you see. Each of us girls was assigned a subject forvacation work. Mine is 'Desert Glimpses'--a collection of pictures,curios and so on, representing points of interest in the desert country.I've a horned toad at home, and a blue-tailed lizard, and some picturesof jack rabbits, with their ears attached to the frame, and quite a fewrattlesnake rattles. So to-day," she smiled again at him, "I rode downhere to take a picture of you!"

  "Thanks," said Johnny, apparently unmoved. "I didn't know I was a pointof interest in your eyes; but seeing I am, I'm willing the girls shouldhave a picture of me framed. If you'll go out and sit in the shade of theshack while I shave and doll up a little, you may take a picture. AndI'll autograph it for you. Five years from now," he went on complacently,"you're going to brag about having it in your possession. One of thoseI-knew-him-when kind of brags. And if you'll bring the girls around sometime when I'm pulling off an exhibition flight, I'll let 'em shake handswith me."

  "Well, of all the conceit!" By that one futile phrase Mary V ownedherself defeated in the first charge. "Of all--"

  "Conceit? Nothing like that! When you thought it was a good cause toride all these miles on the hottest day of the year, just to get mypicture--" Johnny smirked at her in a perfectly maddening way. He knew itwas maddening to Mary V, for he had meant it to be so.

  "I did not!" Mary V's face could not be any redder than the heat had madeit, but even so one could see the rise in her mental temperature.

  "You said you did."

  "Well--I merely want your picture to put with my collection of donkeys!You--"

  "You said points of interest," Johnny reminded her. He had lost all hismoroseness in the interest of the conversation. He had forgotten what atonic his word-battles with Mary V could furnish. "You better stick toit, because it will sure pan out that way. You'll hate to admit, fiveyears from now, that you once took me for a donkey. Besides, you can'thave my ears to pin to the frame; I'll need 'em to listen to all the nicethings some _real_ girls will be saying to me when I've just made anexhibition flight."

  "Exhibition flight--of your imagination!" fleered Mary V, curling her lipat him. "And I won't need your ears to prove you're a donkey, so don'tworry about that."

  Johnny Jewel stood up, lifted his arms high above his head to stretchhis healthy young muscles, pulled his face all askew in a yawn, rumpledhis hair again and reached for his papers and tobacco. He knew that MaryV never noticed or cared if a fellow smoked; she was too thoroughlyrange-bred for that affectation.

  "Good golly! Things must sure be dull at the ranch, if you had to ridetwenty miles on a day like this to pick a fight with me," he observed,leisurely singling one leaf out of his book of papers. "Left your horseto bake in the sun, too, I suppose, while you practice the art ofpersiflage on me."

  He finished rolling his cigarette, languidly helped himself to a matchfrom a box on the wide window ledge near him, and sauntered to thedoor--with a slanting, downward glance at Mary V as he passed her. Alittle smile lurked at the corners of his lips now that his face was notvisible to her. Mary V was studying her wrist watch as though it wasvital that she knew the time down to the last second. He judged that shehad no retort ready for him, so he picked up his hat and went out intothe glaring sunlight.

  Tango was sweating patiently under the scant shelter of the eaves,switching at flies and trying to doze. Johnny led him down to the creekand gave him about half as much water as he wanted, then took him to thecorral and unsaddled him under the brush shed that sheltered his ownhorse from the worst of the heat. Whatever her mood and whatever hererrand, he guessed shr
ewdly that Mary V would not be anxious to leave forhome until the midday fierceness of the heat was past; and even if shewere anxious, common sense and some mercy for her horse would restrainher.

  Johnny did not confess to himself that he was glad to see Mary V, but itis a fact that his deep gloom had for some reason disappeared, and thathe even whistled under his breath while he untied her lunch and cameraand took them back with him to the cabin.

  Mary V had been calmly inspecting his new Correspondence Course in theArt of Flying, the first lessons of which had arrived at Johnny's mailbox a few days before. She seemed much amused, and she registered heramusement in certain marginal notes as she read. At the top of the firstlesson she drew a fairly clever cartoon of Johnny in an airplane,ascending to the star Venus. She made it appear that Johnny's hair stoodstraight on end and his eyes goggled with fear, and she made Venus along-nosed, skinny, old-maid face with a wide, welcoming simper. Up ina corner she placed the moon, with one eye closed and a twisted grin.

  On the blank space at the end of the first lesson she wrote thefollowing--and could scarcely refrain from calling Johnny's attention toit, she was so proud of it:

  "Skyrider, Skyrider, where have you been? I've been to see Venus, which made the moon grin. Skyrider, Skyrider, what saw you there? I saw old maid Venus a-dyeing her hair!"

  Having through much industry accomplished all this while Johnny wasputting up her horse, Mary V slid the revised lesson out of sight underother papers and was almost decently civil to Johnny when he returned.She did not help him with dinner--which was served cold for obviousreasons--but she divided her sandwiches and sour pickles with him inreturn for a fried rabbit leg and a dish of stewed fruit. In theintervals of their quarreling, which continued intermittently all thewhile she was there, Mary V quizzed him about his ambition to fly. Didhe really intend to learn "the game"? Had he ever been up in a flyingmachine? It seemed that Johnny had made two ecstatic trips into theair--for a price--at the San Francisco Fair the fall before, and that hisimagination had never quite felt solid ground under it since! Where--orhow--could he learn?

  If she were secretly trying to inveigle Johnny into showing her his newCorrespondence Course, so that she might be a gleeful witness when hediscovered her additions and revisions, she must have been a greatlydisappointed young woman. For Johnny that day demonstrated how well hecould keep a secret. He warmed to her apparent interest in his chosenprofession, but he did not once hint at the lessons, and kept rigidly togeneralities.

  Mary V mentally called him sly and deceitful, and started another quarrelover nothing. While this particular battle was raging, there came aninterruption which Mary V first considered sinister, then peculiar, andat last, after much cogitation, extremely suspicious and a furtherevidence of Johnny's slyness.

  A Mexican rode up to the doorway, coming from the east. Not Tomaso,who would have convinced even Mary V of his harmlessness, but abroad-shouldered, square-faced man with squinty eyes, a constant smile,and only a slight accent.

  Johnny went to the door, plainly hesitating over the common littlecourtesy of inviting him in. The man dismounted, announced that he wasTomaso's brother, and then caught sight of Mary V inside and staring outat him curiously.

  His manner changed a little. Even Mary V could see that. He stopped wherehe was, squinting into the cabin, smiling still.

  "I come to borrow one, two matches, senor, if you have to spare," he saidglibly. "Me, I'm riding past this way, and stop for my horse to drink.She's awful hot to-day--yes?"

  Johnny gave him the matches, made what replies were needful, and stood inthe doorway watching the fellow ride to the creek and afterwards proceedto eliminate himself from the landscape. Mary V leaned sidewise so thatshe too could watch him from where she sat at the table. She was sure,when she saw him ride off, that he was the same man who had met Tex awayback there in the arroyo.

  She watched Johnny, wondering if he knew the man, or knew what was hisreal reason for coming. Whatever his real reason was, he had gone offwithout stating it, and Mary V believed that he had gone because she wasthere. She wished she knew why he had come, but she would not ask Johnny.She merely watched him covertly.

  Johnny had turned thoughtful. He did not even see that Mary V waswatching him, he was so busy wishing that she had not come at all, orthat she had gone before this man rode up. Inwardly Johnny was alla-quiver with excitement. He believed that he knew why Tomaso's brotherhad come.