TO SPRUCE CROSSING
The eyes of the night were there alone to see. It was as well. There
are moments in men's lives when it is best that it should be so.
Passions are not always sane. They are not always human.
So it was with Jeffrey Masters. The change in him had been rapid. It
was almost magical. Always one who lacked something of the softer
human qualities, he yet must have been counted a man of balance. If
sympathy, sentiment, were never his strong points, he was by no means
lacking in loyalty, kindliness, rightness of purpose. All his life,
achievement, achievement under the strictest canons of honesty, or
moral scruple, had been the motive urging him. He had seen neither to
the right nor to the left of these things.
Then had come the woman into his life and the lighting of those natural
fires which belong to all human life. He yielded to them, and the
suddenness of it all seemed to sweep away every cooler method which had
always governed him. There had been no thought, no calculation in his
yielding, such as might have been expected. He was the victim of his
own temperament. His powerful restraint had been suddenly relaxed.
And, for the time, he had been completely overwhelmed by the intensity
of his passion.
But this passion for the woman who had so suddenly entered his life was
merely the opening of vials of emotion hitherto held sealed. It was no
radical transformation. All that had been his before still remained,
buried perhaps for the moment under the avalanche of feeling, but
nevertheless still occupying its place. These things could not be
swept away. They could not be destroyed. They would remain when the
passionate fires had completely burned themselves out.
But the unlooked-for had happened. These fires had not been permitted
to burn themselves out. They had been extinguished, deluged out of
existence when the idol of his worship was flung headlong from its
pedestal by the complete revolt of his moral being. His prejudices,
his instincts, matured through years of effort, were the stronger part
of him, and the conflict was decided before it began. The shock of
discovery had brought a terrible reaction. His love was killed under
the blow. And though for a while the sense of overwhelming disaster
had been crushing, the measure of that disaster was taken swiftly. It
left him disillusioned, it left him harder, colder. But it left him
sane.
These things were not all, however. On this night he had approached
far nearer the hell which only a woman can create for a man than his
first discovery had borne him. The irony of it was perfect. Out of
her great love for him, solely in his interest, in a great desire to
shield him from a danger she saw threatening him, she had contrived to
convince him that she had been as ready to sacrifice him, his
interests, the interests of his friends, as she had been to accept the
price offered for the blood of his twin brother.
So the eyes of the night looked down upon the haunting figure of a man
who knew neither mercy, nor pity, nor hope. The world of human
happiness had closed its doors upon him, and his whole spirit and body
demanded a fierce retaliation.
That was the mood which looked out of his coldly shining eyes. That
was the mood which drove the horse under him at a headlong gait, and
left his spurs blood-stained upon his heels. That was the mood that
left him caring nothing for any danger that might lurk under cover of
the starlit dark of night. The fierceness of his temper demanded
outlet. Bodily outlet. Active conflict. Anything, so that a burning
lust for hurt should be satisfied. He cared nothing at all for
himself. No bodily suffering could compare with the anguish of mind he
had passed through, was still passing through. And so he rode headlong
till the youth accompanying him was hard put to it to keep pace with
him.
The hammering of the horses' hoofs upon the sun-baked earth was a
fitting accompaniment to his mood. The sigh of the night breezes
through the trees was no less desolate than his heart. Nor was the
darkness one whit more dark than the stream of thought which flowed
through his hot brain.
Not one word did he exchange with the man behind him. In truth the
youth who had brought the summons had no part in the thing that was
happening, at least not in Jeffrey Masters' mind. There was no one
besides himself in this. There was just himself and his goal--whatever
that might bring forth--with a wild, almost insane desire to act
fiercely and without mercy should opportunity offer.
The land rose and fell, from hill to valley, from valley to hill. The
way lay through avenues of bluff-lined grass, or across hollows of
virgin pasture. Trickling mountain streams barred the way, only to be
passed without a thought of their depth, or the dangers of their
treacherous, sodden banks. The mountain barrier ahead, looming darkly
forbidding in the starlight, with its mazing hollows and woodland
crowns, was incapable of inspiration at the moment. There are moments
when Nature's profoundest awe is powerless to affect the mind of man.
These were such moments. The whole mind of Jeffrey Masters was
absorbed till there was no room for any influence which did not arise
out of the burden of his bitterness.
But if he were indifferent to his surroundings, the man riding hard
behind him moved with eyes and ears fully alert. That which he was
seeking would have been impossible to tell. Nevertheless every shadow
seemed to possess interest, every night sound to possess some quality
worth remarking. Not for an instant, after the hills had been entered,
did his vigilance relax.
Spruce Crossing lay deep in the hills, a clearing to the south of the
junction of converging mountain streams. It was a mere cattle station,
neither better nor worse than several others lying on the outskirts of
the Obar territory. Yet it was important that it headed a valley
running north and south amongst the hills, where the grass was sweet,
and rich, and fattening, one of those surprise natural pastures which
the hills love to yield occasionally to those who seek out their wealth.
A glimmer of light, like some distant star fallen to earth from its
velvet setting above, marked the station, house. It was visible at a
great distance down the flat stretch of the valley. The ranchman's
horse was headed directly for it, and the animal moved readily, eagerly
now, nor were the spurs needed to urge him further. The instinct of
its journey's end was sufficient to encourage its flagging spirits.
The distant light grew brighter. It took on the rectangular form of a
window opening in a log-built hut.
Jeffrey Masters had fixed his gaze upon it, and so the shadowy scene
about him passed all unnoticed. He saw nothing of the darker objects
lying on the ground adjacent to his way. The slumbering kine which
bore his brand remained all unheeded. He had no thought for them. His
course took him over a track which passed down a land between two
fenced pastures. These, too, were stocked with fattening steers, or
with the brood cows and their attendant calves. At another time, under
other conditions, these things would have held for him an absorbing
interest. Now they concerned him not at all.
The dark pastures gave place to a number of corrals, also lost in the
summer night. A dog barked. Then, in a moment, its sharp yelps became
silent, and the stillness became once more unbroken except for the hard
pounding hoofs of the two horsemen approaching.
A few moments later these sounds ceased as the dark outline of the
station house itself took shape.
For a few seconds Jeff gazed at the window opening where the light from
within was still shining. A sound had caught and held his attention.
It came from within the hut, and there was no mistaking it. It was the
sound inspired by physical suffering, and the voice that uttered it was
a man's. He sprang out of the saddle and turned to hand his horse to
the man who had accompanied him. But he found himself standing alone.
With a shrug of the shoulders he left his horse and turned at once to
the hut. Just for an instant he hesitated once more. It was his
thought to look in through the window. The hesitation passed. The
next moment he passed along the lateral log walls to the far end of the
building where he knew the door to be situated.
The door was closed. He placed his hand on the heavy wooden latch. A
second passed. He glanced over his shoulder. It had occurred to him
to wonder at the sudden going of the youth who had accompanied him.
But there was neither sight nor sound of the vanished youth. He raised
the latch and swung the door open.