THE END OF THE TRAIL
The cañon was sandy and rough. Rhoda could see the monastery set among
olive-trees. Beyond this where the cañon opened to the desert she knew
that the white men's camp lay, though she could not see it.
She had no fear of losing her way, with the cañon walls hemming her in.
She still was sobbing softly to herself as she started along the foot
of the wall. She tramped steadily for a time, then she stopped
abruptly. She would not go on! The sacrifice was too much! She
looked back to the cañon top. Kut-le had disappeared. Already he must
be only a memory to her!
Then of a sudden Rhoda felt a sense of shame that her strength of
purpose should be so much less than the Indian's. At least, she could
carry in her heart forever the example of his fortitude. It would be
like his warm hand guiding and lifting her through the hard days and
years to come. Strangely comforted and strengthened by this thought,
Rhoda started on through the familiar wilderness of the desert.
This, she thought, was her last moment alone in the desert, for without
Kut-le she would never return to it. She watched the gray-green cactus
against the painted rock heaps. She watched the brown, tortured crest
of the cañon against the violet sky. She watched the melting haze
above the monastery, the buzzards sliding through the motionless air,
the far multi-colored ranges, as if she would etch forever on her
memory the world that Kut-le loved. And she knew that, let her body
wander where it must, her spirit would forever belong to the desert.
Rhoda passed the monastery, where she thought she saw men among the
olive-trees. But she did not stop. She gradually worked out into an
easy trail that led toward the open desert.
The little camp at the cañon's mouth was preparing to move when Jack
Newman jumped excitedly to his feet. Coming toward them through the
sand was a boyish figure that moved with a beautiful stride, tireless
and swift. As the newcomer drew nearer they saw that she was erect and
lithe, slender but full-chested and that her face--
"Rhoda!" shouted John DeWitt.
In a moment, Jack was grasping one of her hands and John DeWitt the
other, while Billy Porter and Carlos shook each other's hands excitedly.
"Gee whiz!" cried Jack. "John said you were in superb condition, but I
didn't realize that it meant this! Why, Rhoda, if it wasn't for your
hair and eyes and the dimple in your chin, I wouldn't know you!"
"Are you all right?" asked DeWitt anxiously. "Where in the world did
you come from? Where have you been?"
"Were you hurt much in the fight?" cried Rhoda. "Oh!" looking about at
the eager listeners, "that was the most awful thing I ever saw, that
fight! And Billy Porter, you are all right, I see. How shall I ever
repay you all for what you have done for me!"
"Gosh!" exclaimed Porter. "I'm repaid just by looking at you! If that
pison Piute hasn't made monkeys of us all, I'd like to know who has!
How did you get away from him?"
"He let me go," answered Rhoda simply.
The men gasped.
"What was the matter with him!" ejaculated Porter, "Was he sick or
dying?"
"No," said Rhoda mechanically; "I guess he saw that it was useless."
"And he dropped you in the desert without water or food or horse!"
cried DeWitt. "Oh, that Apache cur!"
"No! No!" exclaimed Rhoda. "He dropped me not far from here. We saw
the camp and he sent me to it."
The men looked at each other incredulously. Jack Newman's face was
puzzled. He knew Kut-le and it was hard to believe that he would give
up what he already had won. DeWitt spoke excitedly.
"Then he's still within our reach! Hurry up, friends!"
Rhoda turned swiftly to the gaunt-faced man. Then she spoke very
distinctly, with that in her deep gray eyes that stirred each listener
with a vague sense of loss and yearning.
"I don't want Kut-le harmed! I shan't tell you anything that will help
you locate him. He did me no harm. On the contrary, he made me a well
woman, physically and mentally. If I can forgive his effrontery in
stealing me, surely you all will grant me this favor to top all that
you have done for me."
Porter's under lip protruded with the old obstinate look.
"That fellow's got to be made an example of, Miss Rhoda," he said. "No
white that's a man can stand for what he's done. He's bound to be
hunted down, you know. If we don't, others will!"
Rhoda turned impatiently to DeWitt.
"John, after all our talk, you must understand! You know what good
Kut-le has done me and how big it was of him to let me go. Make them
promise to let him alone!"
But there was no answering look of understanding in DeWitt's worn face.
"Rhoda, you haven't any idea what you're asking! It isn't a question
of forgiveness! You don't get the point of view that you ought! Why,
the whole country is worked up over this thing! The newspapers are
full of it. Just as Porter says, the Apache's got to be made an
example of. We will hunt him down, if it takes a year!"
So far Jack Newman had said nothing. Rhoda looked at him as if he were
her last hope.
"Oh, Jack!" she cried. "He was your friend, your dearest friend! And
he sent me back! Why, you never would have got me if he hadn't
voluntarily let me go! He is wonderful on the trail!"
"So we found!" said DeWitt grimly.
But Rhoda was watching Jack.
"Rhoda," Jack said at last, "I know how you feel. I know what a bully
chap Kut-le is. This just about does me up. But what he's done can't
be let go. We've got to punish him!"
"'Punish him!'" repeated Rhoda. "Just what do you mean by that?"
"We mean," answered DeWitt, "that when we find him, I'll shoot him!"
"No!" cried Rhoda. "No! Why he _sent me back_!"
The three men looked at Rhoda uncomfortably and at each other
wonderingly. A woman's magnanimity is never to be understood by a man!
"Are you tired, Rhoda?" asked DeWitt abruptly. "Do you feel able to
take to the saddle at once?"
"I'm all right!" exclaimed Rhoda impatiently. "What are your plans?"
DeWitt pointed out across the sand to the cañon wall. A line of
slender footprints led through the level wastes as plainly as if on
new-fallen snow.
"We will follow your trail," he said.
There was silence for an instant in the little camp while the men eyed
the girlish face, flushed and vivid beneath the tan. As it had come
when DeWitt had rescued her, the old sense of the appalling nature of
her experience was returning to her again. With sickening clarity she
was getting the men's view-point. The old Rhoda would have protested,
would have fought desperately and blindly. The new Rhoda had lived
through hours of hopeless battle with circumstance. She had learned
the desert's lesson of patience.
"I have thought," she said slowly, "so much of the joy of my return to
you! God only knows how the picture of it has kept me alive from day
to day. All _your_ joy seems swallowed up in your thirst for revenge.
All right, my friends. Only, wherever you go, I go too!"
Billy Porter shook his head with a muttered "Gosh!" as if the ways of
women were quite beyond him.
"I think you had better ride on to the ranch with Carlos," said DeWitt,
"while we take up Kut-le's trail. This will be no trip for a woman."
"You're foolish!" exclaimed Jack. "We'll not let her out of our sight
again. You can't tell what stunt Kut-le is up to!"
"That's right!" said Porter. "It'll be hard on her, but she'd better
come with us."
"Don't trouble to discuss the matter," said Rhoda coolly. "I am coming
with you. Katherine probably sent some clothing for me, didn't she?"
"Why, yes!" exclaimed Jack. "That was one of the first things she
thought of. She sent her own riding things for you. She spoke of the
little silk dress you had on and said you hadn't anything appropriate
in your trunks for the rough trip you might have to take after we found
you."
Jack was talking rapidly, as if to relieve the tension of the
situation. He undid a pack that he had kept tied to his saddle during
all the long weeks of pursuit.
"We can rig up a dressing-room of blankets in no time," he went on,
putting a bundle into Rhoda's hands.
Rhoda stood holding the bundle in silence while all hands set to
rigging up her dressing-room. She felt suddenly cool-headed and
resourceful. Her mind was forced away from her own sorrow to the
solution of another heavy problem. In the little blanket tent she
unrolled the bundle and smiled tenderly at the evidence of Katherine's
thoughtfulness. There were underwear, handkerchiefs, toilet articles
and Katherine's own pretty corduroy divided skirt and Norfolk jacket
with a little blouse and Ascot scarf.
Rhoda took off her buckskins and tattered blue shirt slowly, with lips
that would quiver. This was the last, the very last of Kut-le! She
dressed herself in Katherine's clothes, then folded up the buckskins
and shirt. She would keep them, always! When she came out from the
tent she stepped awkwardly, for the skirts bothered her, and Jack,
waiting nearby, smiled at her. At another time Rhoda would have joined
in his amusement, but now she asked soberly:
"Which horse is for me?"
"Rhoda!" cried DeWitt, "I really wouldn't know you! I thought I never
could want you anything but ethereal, but--Jack! Isn't she wonderful!"
Jack grinned. Rhoda, tanned and oval-cheeked, and straight of back and
shoulder, was not to be compared with the invalid Rhoda.
"Gee!" he said. "Wait till Katherine sees her!"
Rhoda shrugged her shoulders.
"My pleasure in all that is swallowed up by this savage obsession of
yours."
John DeWitt led out Rhoda's pony.
"You don't understand, dear," he said. "You can't doubt my heavenly
joy at having you safe. But the outrage of it all-- That Apache
devil!"
"I do understand, John," answered Rhoda wearily. "Don't try to explain
again. I know just how you all feel. Only, I will not have Kut-le
killed."
"Rhoda," said DeWitt hoarsely, "I shall kill him as I would a yellow
dog!"
Rhoda turned away. The line of march was quickly formed. Porter led.
Carlos closed the rear. DeWitt and Newman rode on either side of
Rhoda. They were not long in reaching the trail down the cañon wall.
Here they paused, for the rough ascent was impossible for the horses.
The men looked questioningly at Rhoda but she volunteered no
information. She believed that Kut-le had left the camp at the top
long since. If for any reason he had delayed his going, she knew that
he had watched every movement in the white camp and could protect
himself easily.
"We can leave Carlos with the horses," said Porter, "while we climb up
and see where the trail leads."
Rhoda dismounted, still silent, and followed Porter and DeWitt up the
trail. Jack following her. The trail had been difficult to descend
and was very hard to ascend. There was a dumb purposefulness about the
men's movements that sickened Rhoda. She had seen too much of men in
this mood of late and she feared them, She knew that all the amenities
of civilization had been stripped from them and that she was only
pitting her feeble strength against a world-old instinct.
Her heart was beating heavily as they neared the top, but not from the
hard climb. She was inured to difficult trails. There was a sheer
pull, shoulder high, at the top. The four accomplished it in one
breathless group, then stood as if paralyzed.
Sunlight flickered through the pines. Molly and Cesca prepared the
trail packs. And Kut-le sat beside the spring, eying his visitors
grimly. He looked very cool and well groomed in comparison with his
trail-worn adversaries.
DeWitt pulled out his Colt.
"I think I have you, this time," he said.
"Yes?" asked Kut-le, without stirring. "And what are you going to do
with me?"
"I'm going to take about a minute to tell you what I think of you, and
give you another minute in which to offer up some sort of an Indian
prayer. Then I'm going to shoot you!"
Kut-le glanced from DeWitt to Rhoda, thence to Porter and Newman.
Porter's under lip protruded. Jack looked sick. Both the men had
their hands on their guns. Rhoda moistened her lips to speak, but
Kut-le was before her.
"Are you a good shot, DeWitt?" he asked. "Because I know that Jack and
Porter are sure in their aim."
"You'll never know whether I am or not," replied DeWitt. "You'd better
be thankful that we are shooting you instead of hanging you, as you
deserve, you cur! You'd better be glad you're dying! You haven't a
white friend left in the country! All your ambition and hard work have
come to this because you couldn't change your Indian hide, after all!
Now then, say your prayers! Rhoda, cover up your eyes!"
Kut-le rose slowly. The whites noticed with a little pang of shame
that he made no attempt to touch his gun which lay on the ground beside
him.
"You'd better let Jack and Billy shoot with you," he said quietly.
"You won't like to think about the shot that killed me, afterward. It
isn't nice, I've heard, the memory of killing a man!"
"I'm shooting an Indian, not a man!" said DeWitt. "Say your prayers!"
The spell of fear that had paralyzed Rhoda snapped. Before Jack or
Billy could detain her she ran to DeWitt's side and grasped his arm.
"John! John! Listen to me, one moment! Look at me! In spite of all,
look, see what he's made of me, for you to reap the harvest! Look at
me! I beg of you, do not shoot him! Let him go! Make him promise to
leave the country. Make him promise anything! He keeps promises
because he is an Indian! But if you have any love for me, if you care
anything for my happiness, don't kill Kut-le! I tell you I will never
marry you with his blood on your hands!"
A look curiously hard, curiously suspicious, came to DeWitt's eyes.
Without lowering his gun or looking at the girl, he answered:
"You plead too well, Rhoda! I want this Indian to pay for more torture
of mine than you can dream of! Get back out of the way! Are you
ready, Kut-le?"
Rhoda's slender body was rigid. She moved away from DeWitt until she
could encompass the four men in her glance. With arms folded across
her arching chest she spoke with a richness in her voice that none of
her hearers ever could forget.
"Remember, friends, you have forced me to this! You had me safe, but
you thought more of revenge than you did of my safety! John, if you
kill Kut-le you will kill the man that I love with all the passion of
my soul!"
DeWitt gasped as if he had been struck. Newman and Porter stared
dizzily. Only Kut-le stood composed. His eyes with the old look of
tragic tenderness were fastened on the girl.
"Are you going to shoot him now, John?"
"Rhoda!" cried DeWitt fiercely. "Rhoda! Do you realize what you are
saying?"
"Yes," said Rhoda steadily. "I realize that a force greater than race
pride, greater than self love, greater than intelligence or fear, is
gripping me! John, I love this man! He and I have lived through
experiences together too great for words. He had me in the hollow of
his hand but he sent me back to you, his enemy. You say that you love
me. But you would not listen to my pleading, you would not grant me
the only favor I ever asked you, the granting of which could not have
harmed you."
Her listeners did not stir. Rhoda moistened her lips.
"Kut-le---- Think what he sacrificed for me. He gave up his dearest
friendships. He gave up his honor and his country and risked his life,
for me. And then when he thought the sacrifice would prove too great
on my part, he gave me up! I ask you to give him his life, for me.
Because, John, and Billy Porter, and Jack, I tell you that I love him!"
"My God!" panted DeWitt. "Rhoda, don't! You don't know what you're
saying! Rhoda!"
Rhoda looked off where the afternoon sun lay like the very glory of God
upon the chaos of range and desert. Almost--almost the secret of life
itself seemed to bare itself to the girl's wide eyes. The white men
watched her aghast. There was a desperate, hunted look in DeWitt's
tired face. Rhoda turned back.
"I know what I'm saying," she replied. "But I tell you that this thing
is bigger than I am! I have fought it, defied it, ignored it. It only
grows the stronger! I know that this comes to humans but rarely. Yet
it has come to me! It is the greatest force in the world! It is what
makes life persist! To most people it comes only in small degree and
they call that love! To me, in this boundless country, it has come
boundlessly. It is greater than what you know as love. It is greater
than I am. I don't know what sorrow or what joy my decision may bring
me but--John, I want you to let Kut-le live that I may marry him!"
DeWitt's arm dropped as if dead.
"Rhoda," he repeated, agonizedly, "you don't know what you are saying!"
"Don't I?" asked Rhoda steadily. "Have I fought my fight without
coming to know the risk? Don't I know what atavism means, and race
alienation, and hunger for my own? But this which has come to me is
stronger than all these. I love Kut-le, John, and I ask you to give
his life to me!"
Still Kut-le stood motionless, as did Jack and Porter. DeWitt, without
taking his eyes from Rhoda's, slowly, very slowly, slipped his Colt
back into his belt. For a long moment he gazed at the wonder of the
girl's exalted face. Then he passed his hands across his eyes.
"I give up!" he said quietly. Then he turned, walked slowly to the
cañon edge, and clambered deliberately down the trail.
Jack and Billy stood dazed for a moment longer, then Porter cleared his
throat.
"Miss Rhoda, don't do this! Now don't you! Come with us back to the
ranch. Just for a month till you get away from this Injun's influence!
Come back and talk to Mrs. Newman. Come back and get some other
woman's ideas! For God's sake, Miss Rhoda, don't ruin your life this
way!"
"When Katherine knows it all, she'll understand and agree with me,"
replied Rhoda. "Jack, try to remember everything I said, to tell
Katherine."
"_I_ tell her!" cried Jack. "Why can't you tell her yourself? What
are you planning to do?"
"That is for Kut-le to say," answered Rhoda.
"Rhoda," said Jack, and his voice shook with earnestness, "listen!
Listen to me, your old playmate! I know how fascinating Kut-le is.
Lord help us, girl, he's been my best friend for years! And in spite
of everything, he's my friend still. But, Rhoda, it won't do! It
won't work out right. He's a fine man for men. But as a husband to a
white woman, he's still an Indian; and after the first, that must
always come between you! Think again, Rhoda! I tell you, it won't do!"
Rhoda's voice still was clear and high, still bore the note of
exaltation.
"I have thought again and again, Jack. There could be no end to the
thinking, so I gave it up!"
Kut-le's eyes were on the girl, inscrutable and calm as the desert
itself, but still he did not speak.
Billy Porter wiped his forehead again and again on a cloth that bore no
resemblance to a handkerchief.
"I can't put up any kind of an argument. All I can say is I don't see
how any one like you could do it, Miss Rhoda! Just think! His folks
is Injuns, dirty, blanket Injuns! They scratch themselves from one
day's end to the other. They will be your relatives, too! They'll be
hanging round you all the time. I'm not a married man but I've noticed
when you marry a man you generally marry his whole darn family.
I--I--oh, there's no use talking to her! Let's take her away by force,
Jack!"
Rhoda caught her breath and instinctively moved toward Kut-le. But
Jack did not stir.
"No," he answered; "I've done all the chasing and trying to kidnap that
I care about. But, Rhoda, once and for all I tell you that I think you
are doing you and yours a deadly wrong!"
"Perhaps I am," replied Rhoda steadily. "I make no pretense of
knowing. At any rate, I'm going to stay with Kut-le."
"For heaven's sake, Rhoda," cried Jack, "at least come back to the
ranch and let Katherine give you a wedding. She'll never forgive me
for leaving you this way!"
Porter turned on Jack savagely.
"Look here!" he shouted. "Are you crazy too! You're talking about her
_marrying_ this Apache!"
Jack spoke through his teeth obstinately.
"I've sweated blood over this thing as long as I propose to. If Rhoda
wants to marry Kut-le, that's her business. I always did like Kut-le
and I always shall. I've done my full duty in trying to get Rhoda
back. Now that she says that she cares for him, it's neither your nor
my business--nor DeWitt's. But I want them to come back to the ranch
with me and let Katherine give them a nice wedding."
"But--but--" spluttered Porter. Then he stopped as the good sense of
Jack's attitude suddenly came home to him. "All right," he said
sullenly. "I'm like DeWitt. I pass. Only--if you try to take this
Injun back to the ranch, he'll never get there alive. He'll be lynched
by the first bunch of cowboys or miners we strike. Miss Rhoda nor you
can't stop 'em. You want to remember how the whole country is worked
up over this!"
Rhoda whitened.
"Do you think that too, Jack and Kut-le?"
For the first time, Jack spoke to Kut-le.
"What do you think, Kut-le?" he said.
"Porter's right, of course," answered Kut-le. "My plan always has been
to slip down into Mexico and then go to Paris for a year or two. I've
got enough money for that. I've always wanted to do some work in the
Sorbonne. By the end of two years I think the Southwest will be
willing to welcome us back."
Nothing could have so simplified the situation as Kut-le's calm
reference to his plans for carrying on his profession. He stood in his
well-cut clothes, not an Indian, but a well-bred, clean-cut man of the
world. Even Porter recognized this, and with a sigh he resigned
himself to the inevitable.
"You folks better come down to the monastery and be married," he said.
"There's a padre down there."
"Gee! What'll I say to Katherine!" groaned Jack.
"Katherine will understand," said Rhoda. "Katherine always loved
Kut-le. Even now I can't believe that she has altogether turned
against him."
Jack Newman heaved a sigh.
"Well," he said, "Kut-le, will you and Rhoda come down to the monastery
with us and be married?" His young niece was solemn.
"Yes," answered Kut-le, "if Rhoda is agreed."
Rhoda's face still wore the look of exaltation.
"I will come!" she said.
Kut-le did not let his glance rest on her, but turned to Billy.
"Mr. Porter," he said courteously, "will you come to my wedding?"
Billy looked dazed. He stared from Kut-le to Rhoda, and Rhoda smiled
at him. His last defense was down.
"I'll be there, thanks!" he said.
"There is a side trail that we can take my horses down," said Kut-le.
They all were silent as Kut-le led the way down the side trail and by a
circuitous path to the monastery. He made his way up through a rude,
grass-grown path to a cloistered front that was in fairly good repair.
Here they dismounted and waited while Kut-le pulled a long bell-rope
that hung beside a battered door. There was not long to wait before
the door opened and a white-faced old padre stood staring in amazement
at the little group.
Kut-le talked rapidly, now in Spanish and now in English, and at last
the padre turned to Rhoda with a smile.
"And you?" he asked. "You are quite willing?"
"Yes," said Rhoda, though her voice trembled in spite of her.
"And you?" asked the padre, turning to Jack and Billy.
The two men nodded.
"Then enter!" said the padre.
And with Cesca and Molly bringing up the rear, the wedding party
followed the padre down a long adobe hallway across a courtyard where
palms still shaded a trickling fountain, into a dim chapel, with grim
adobe walls and pews hacked and worn by centuries of use.
The padre was excited and pleased.
"If," he said, "you all will sit, I will call my two choir-boys who are
at work in the olive orchard. They are not far away. We are always
ready to hold service for such as may wish to attend."
He disappeared through the door of the choir loft and returned shortly,
followed by two tall Mexican half-breeds, clad in priceless surplices
that had been wrought in Spain two centuries before. They lighted some
meager candles before the altar and began their chant in soft,
well-trained voices.
The padre turned and waited. Kut-le rose and, taking Rhoda's hand, he
led her before the aged priest.
To the two white men the scene was unforgetable. The dim old chapel,
scene of who could tell what heart-burnings of desert history; the
priest of the ancient religion; standing before him the two young
people, one of a vanishing and one of a conquering race, both
startlingly vivid in the perfection of their beauty; and, looking on,
the two wide-eyed squaws with aboriginal wonder in their eyes.
It was but a moment before Kut-le had slipped a ring on Rhoda's finger;
but a moment before the priest had pronounced them man and wife.
As the two left the priest, Jack kissed Rhoda solemnly twice.
"Once for Katherine," he said, "and once for me. I don't understand
much how it all has come about, but I know Kut-le, and I'm willing to
trust you to him."
Kut-le gave Jack a clear look.
"Jack, I'll never forget that speech. If I live long enough, I'll
repay you for it."
"And an Indian keeps his promises," said Rhoda softly.
Billy Porter was not to be outdone.
"Now that it's all over with, I'll say that Kut-le is a good fighter
and that you are the handsomest couple I ever saw."
Kut-le chuckled.
"Cesca, am I such a heap fool?"
Cesca sniffed.
"White squaws no good! They--"
But Molly elbowed Cesca aside.
"You no listen to her!" she said.
"O Molly! Molly!" cried Rhoda. "You are a woman! I'm glad you were
here!" And the men's eyes blurred a little as the Indian woman hugged
the white girl to her and crooned over her.
"You no cry! You no cry! When you come back, Molly come to your
house, take care of you!"
After a moment Rhoda wiped her eyes, and Kut-le, who had been giving
the old padre something that the old fellow eyed with joy, took the
girl's hand gently.
"Come!" he said.
At the door the others watched them mount and ride away. The two sat
their horses with the grace that comes of long, hard trails.
"Maybe I've done wrong," said Jack. "But I don't feel so. I'm awful
sorry for DeWitt."
"I'm awful sorry for DeWitt," agreed Porter, "but I'm sorrier for
myself. I'm older than DeWitt a whole lot. He's young enough to get
over anything."
When they had ridden out of sight of the monastery, Kut-le pulled in
his horse and dismounted. Then he stood looking up into Rhoda's face.
In his eyes was the same look of exaltation that made hers wonderful.
He put his hand on her knee.
"We've a long ride ahead of us," he said softly. "I want something
that I can't have on horseback."
Rhoda laid her hand on his.
"You meant it all, Rhoda? It was not only to save my life?"
"Do you have to ask that?" said Rhoda.
"No!" answered Kut-le simply. "You see I waited for you. I knew that
they would bring you back. And if you had not spoken, I would rather
have died. I had made up my mind to that. O my love! It has come to
us greatly!"
Then, as if the flood, controlled all these months, had burst its
bonds, Kut-le lifted Rhoda from her saddle to his arms and laid his
lips to hers. For a long moment the two clung to each other as if they
knew that life could hold no moment for them so sweet as this. Then
they mounted and, side by side, they rode off into the desert sunset.