Wade noticed that after her trying experience with him and Wilson and
Belllounds Columbine did not ride frequently.
He managed to get a word or two with her whenever he went to the
ranch-house, and he needed only look at her to read her sensitive mind.
All was well with Columbine, despite her trouble. She remained upheld in
spirit, while yet she seemed to brood over an unsolvable problem. She
had said, "But--let what will come!"--and she was waiting.
Wade hunted for more than lions and wolves these days. Like an Indian
scout who scented peril or heard an unknown step upon his trail, Wade
rode the hills, and spent long hours hidden on the lonely slopes,
watching with somber, keen eyes. They were eyes that knew what they were
looking for. They had marked the strange sight of the son of Bill
Belllounds, gliding along that trail where Moore had met Columbine,
sneaking and stooping, at last with many a covert glance about, to kneel
in the trail and compare the horse tracks there with horseshoes he took
from his pocket. That alone made Bent Wade eternally vigilant. He kept
his counsel. He worked more swiftly, so that he might have leisure for
his peculiar seeking. He spent an hour each night with the cowboys,
listening to their recounting of the day and to their homely and shrewd
opinions. He haunted the vicinity of the ranch-house at night, watching
and listening for that moment which was to aid him in the crisis that
was impending. Many a time he had been near when Columbine passed from
the living-room to her corner of the house. He had heard her sigh and
could almost have touched her.
Buster Jack had suffered a regurgitation of the old driving and
insatiate temper, and there was gloom in the house of Belllounds.
Trouble clouded the old man's eyes.
May came with the spring round-up. Wade was called to use a rope and
brand calves under the order of Jack Belllounds, foreman of White
Slides. That round-up showed a loss of one hundred head of stock, some
branded steers, and yearlings, and many calves, in all a mixed herd.
Belllounds received the amazing news with a roar. He had been ready for
something to roar at. The cowboys gave as reasons winter-kill, and
lions, and perhaps some head stolen since the thaw. Wade emphatically
denied this. Very few cattle had fallen prey to the big cats, and none,
so far as he could find, had been frozen or caught in drifts. It was the
young foreman who stunned them all. "Rustled," he said, darkly. "There's
too many loafers and homesteaders in these hills!" And he stalked out to
leave his hearers food for reflection.
Jack Belllounds drank, but no one saw him drunk, and no one could tell
where he got the liquor. He rode hard and fast; he drove the cowboys one
way while he went another; he had grown shifty, cunning, more intolerant
than ever. Some nights he rode to Kremmling, or said he had been there,
when next day the cowboys found another spent and broken horse to turn
out. On other nights he coaxed and bullied them into playing poker. They
won more of his money than they cared to count.
Columbine confided to Wade, with mournful whisper, that Jack paid no
attention to her whatever, and that the old rancher attributed this
coldness, and Jack's backsliding, to her irresponsiveness and her
tardiness in setting the wedding-day that must be set. To this Wade had
whispered in reply, "Don't ever forget what I said to you an' Wils
that day!"
So Wade upheld Columbine with his subtle dominance, and watched over
her, as it were, from afar. No longer was he welcome in the big
living-room. Belllounds reacted to his son's influence.
Twice in the early mornings Wade had surprised Jack Belllounds in the
blacksmith shop. The meetings were accidental, yet Wade ever remembered
how coincidence beckoned him thither and how circumstance magnified
strange reflections. There was no reason why Jack should not be
tinkering in the blacksmith shop early of a morning. But Wade followed
an uncanny guidance. Like his hound Fox, he never split on trails. When
opportunity afforded he went into the shop and looked it over with eyes
as keen as the nose of his dog. And in the dust of the floor he had
discovered little circles with dots in the middle, all uniform in size.
Sight of them did not shock him until they recalled vividly the little
circles with dots in the earthen floor of Wilson Moore's cabin. Little
marks made by the end of Moore's crutch! Wade grinned then like a wolf
showing his fangs. And the vitals of a wolf could no more strongly have
felt the instinct to rend.
For Wade, the cloud on his horizon spread and darkened, gathered
sinister shape of storm, harboring lightning and havoc. It was the cloud
in his mind, the foreshadowing of his soul, the prophetic sense of like
to like. Where he wandered there the blight fell!
* * * * *
Significant was the fact that Belllounds hired new men. Bludsoe had
quit. Montana Jim grew surly these days and packed a gun. Lem Billings
had threatened to leave. New and strange hands for Jack Belllounds to
direct had a tendency to release a strain and tide things over.
Every time the old rancher saw Wade he rolled his eyes and wagged his
head, as if combating superstition with an intelligent sense of justice.
Wade knew what troubled Belllounds, and it strengthened the gloomy mood
that, like a poison lichen, seemed finding root.
Every day Wade visited his friend Wilson Moore, and most of their
conversation centered round that which had become a ruling passion for
both. But the time came when Wade deviated from his gentleness of speech
and leisure of action.
"Bent, you're not like you were," said Moore, once, in surprise at the
discovery. "You're losing hope and confidence."
"No. I've only somethin' on my mind."
"What?"
"I reckon I'm not goin' to tell you now."
"You've got _hell_ on your mind!" flashed the cowboy, in grim
inspiration.
Wade ignored the insinuation and turned the conversation to another
subject.
"Wils, you're buyin' stock right along?"
"Sure am. I saved some money, you know. And what's the use to hoard it?
I'll buy cheap. In five years I'll have five hundred, maybe a thousand
head. Wade, my old dad will be pleased to find out I've made the start
I have."
"Well, it's a fine start, I'll allow. Have you picked up any unbranded
stock?"
"Sure I have. Say, pard, are you worrying about this two-bit rustler
work that's been going on?"
"Wils, it ain't two bits any more. I reckon it's gettin' into the
four-bit class."
"I've been careful to have my business transactions all in writing,"
said Moore. "It makes these fellows sore, because some of them can't
write. And they're not used to it. But I'm starting this game in my
own way."
"Have you sold any stock?"
"Not yet. But the Andrews boys are driving some thirty-odd head to
Kremmling for me to be sold."
"Ahuh! Well, I'll be goin'," Wade replied, and it was significant of his
state of mind that he left his young friend sorely puzzled. Not that
Wade did not see Moore's anxiety! But the drift of events at White
Slides had passed beyond the stage where sympathetic and inspiring hope
might serve Wade's purpose. Besides, his mood was gradually changing as
these events, like many fibers of a web, gradually closed in toward a
culminating knot.
That night Wade lounged with the cowboys and new hands in front of the
little storehouse where Belllounds kept supplies for all. He had lounged
there before in the expectation of seeing the rancher's son. And this
time anticipation was verified. Jack Belllounds swaggered over from the
ranch-house. He met civility and obedience now where formerly he had
earned but ridicule and opposition. So long as he worked hard himself
the cowboys endured. The subtle change in him seemed of sterner stuff.
The talk, as usual, centered round the stock subjects and the banter and
gossip of ranch-hands. Wade selected an interval when there was a lull
in the conversation, and with eyes that burned under the shadow of his
broad-brimmed sombrero he watched the son of Belllounds.
"Say, boys, Wils Moore has begun sellin' cattle," remarked Wade,
casually. "The Andrews brothers are drivin' for him."
"Wal, so Wils's spread-eaglin' into a real rancher!" ejaculated Lem
Billings. "Mighty glad to hear it. Thet boy shore will git rich."
Wade's remark incited no further expressions of interest. But it was
Jack Belllounds's secret mind that Wade wished to pierce. He saw the
leaping of a thought that was neither interest nor indifference nor
contempt, but a creative thing which lent a fleeting flash to the face,
a slight shock to the body. Then Jack Belllounds bent his head, lounged
there for a little while longer, lost in absorption, and presently he
strolled away.
Whatever that mounting thought of Jack Belllounds's was it brought
instant decision to Wade. He went to the ranch-house and knocked upon
the living-room door. There was a light within, sending rays out through
the windows into the semi-darkness. Columbine opened the door and
admitted Wade. A bright fire crackled in the hearth. Wade flashed a
reassuring look at Columbine.
"Evenin', Miss Collie. Is your dad in?"
"Oh, it's you, Ben!" she replied, after her start. "Yes, dad's here."
The old rancher looked up from his reading. "Howdy, Wade! What can I do
fer you?"
"Belllounds, I've cleaned out the cats an' most of the varmints on your
range. An' my work, lately, has been all sorts, not leavin' me any time
for little jobs of my own. An' I want to quit."
"Wade, you've clashed with Jack!" exclaimed the rancher, jerking erect.
"Nothin' of the kind. Jack an' me haven't had words a good while. I'm
not denyin' we might, an' probably would clash sooner or later. But
that's not my reason for quittin'."
Manifestly this put an entirely different complexion upon the matter.
Belllounds appeared immensely relieved.
"Wal, all right. I'll pay you at the end of the month. Let's see, thet's
not long now. You can lay off to-morrow."
Wade thanked him and waited for further remarks. Columbine had fixed
big, questioning eyes upon Wade, which he found hard to endure. Again he
tried to flash her a message of reassurance. But Columbine did not lose
her look of blank wonder and gravity.
"Ben! Oh, you're not going to leave White Slides?" she asked.
"Reckon I'll hang around yet awhile," he replied.
Belllounds was wagging his head regretfully and ponderingly.
"Wal, I remember the day when no man quit me. Wal, wal!--times change.
I'm an old man now. Mebbe, mebbe I'm testy. An' then thar's thet boy!"
With a shrug of his broad shoulders he dismissed what seemed an
encroachment of pessimistic thought.
"Wade, you're packin' off, then, on the trail? Always on the go, eh?"
"No, I'm not hurryin' off," replied Wade.
"Wal, might I ask what you're figgerin' on?"
"Sure. I'm considerin' a cattle deal with Moore. He's a pretty keen boy
an' his father has big ranchin' interests. I've saved a little money an'
I'm no spring chicken any more. Wils has begun to buy an' sell stock, so
I reckon I'll go in with him."
"Ahuh!" Belllounds gave a grunt of comprehension. He frowned, and his
big eyes set seriously upon the blazing fire. He grasped complications
in this information.
"Wal, it's a free country," he said at length, and evidently his
personal anxieties were subjected to his sense of justice. "Owin' to the
peculiar circumstances hyar at my range, I'd prefer thet Moore an' you
began somewhar else. Thet's natural. But you've my good will to start on
an' I hope I've yours."
"Belllounds, you've every man's good will," replied Wade. "I hope you
won't take offense at my leavin'. You see I'm on Wils Moore's side
in--in what you called these peculiar circumstances. He's got nobody
else. An' I reckon you can look back an' remember how you've taken sides
with some poor devil an' stuck to him. Can't you?"
"Wal, I reckon I can. An' I'm not thinkin' less of you fer speakin' out
like thet."
"All right. Now about the dogs. I turn the pack over to you, an' it's a
good one. I'd like to buy Fox."
"Buy nothin', man. You can have Fox, an' welcome."
"Much obliged," returned the hunter, as he turned to go. "Fox will sure
be help for me. Belllounds, I'm goin' to round up this outfit that's
rustlin' your cattle. They're gettin' sort of bold."
"Wade, you'll do thet on your own hook?" asked the rancher, in surprise.
"Sure. I like huntin' men more than other varmints. Then I've a personal
interest. You know the hint about homesteaders hereabouts reflects some
on Wils Moore."
"Stuff!" exploded the rancher, heartily. "Do you think any cattleman in
these hills would believe Wils Moore a rustler?"
"The hunch has been whispered," said Wade. "An' you know how all
ranchers say they rustled a little on the start."
"Aw, hell! Thet's different. Every new rancher drives in a few unbranded
calves an' keeps them. But stealin' stock--thet's different. An' I'd as
soon suspect my own son of rustlin' as Wils Moore."
Belllounds spoke with a sincere and frank ardor of defense for a young
man once employed by him and known to be honest. The significance of the
comparison he used had not struck him. His was the epitome of a
successful rancher, sure in his opinions, speaking proudly and
unreflectingly of his own son, and being just to another man.
Wade bowed and backed out of the door. "Sure that's what I'd reckon
you'd say, Belllounds.... I'll drop in on you if I find any sign in the
woods. Good night."
Columbine went with him to the end of the porch, as she had used to go
before the shadow had settled over the lives of the Belllounds.
"Ben, you're up to something," she whispered, seizing him with hands
that shook.
"Sure. But don't you worry," he whispered back.
"Do they hint that Wilson is a rustler?" she asked, intensely.
"Somebody did, Collie."
"How vile! Who? Who?" she demanded, and her face gleamed white.
"Hush, lass! You're all a-tremble," he returned, warily, and he held her
hands.
"Ben, they're pressing me hard to set another wedding-day. Dad is angry
with me now. Jack has begun again to demand. Oh, I'm afraid of him! He
has no respect for me. He catches at me with hands like claws. I have to
jerk away.... Oh, Ben, Ben! dear friend, what on earth shall I do?"
"Don't give in. Fight Jack! Tell the old man you must have time. Watch
your chance when Jack is away an' ride up the Buffalo Park trail an'
look for me."
Wade had to release his hands from her clasp and urge her gently back.
How pale and tragic her face gleamed!
* * * * *
Wade took his horses, his outfit, and the dog Fox, and made his abode
with Wilson Moore. The cowboy hailed Wade's coming with joy and pestered
him with endless questions.
From that day Wade haunted the hills above White Slides, early and late,
alone with his thoughts, his plans, more and more feeling the suspense
of happenings to come. It was on a June day when Jack Belllounds rode to
Kremmling that Wade met Columbine on the Buffalo Park trail. She needed
to see him, to find comfort and strength. Wade far exceeded his own
confidence in his effort to uphold her. Columbine was in a strange
state, not of vacillation between two courses, but of a standstill, as
if her will had become obstructed and waited for some force to upset the
hindrance. She did not inquire as to the welfare of Wilson Moore, and
Wade vouchsafed no word of him. But she importuned the hunter to see her
every day or no more at all. And Wade answered her appeal and her need
by assuring her that he would see her, come what might. So she was to
risk more frequent rides.
During the second week of June Wade rode up to visit the prospector,
Lewis, and learned that which complicated the matter of the rustlers.
Lewis had been suspicious, and active on his own account. According to
the best of his evidence and judgment there had been a gang of rough men
come of late to Gore Peak, where they presumably were prospecting. This
gang was composed of strangers to Lewis. They had ridden to his cabin,
bought and borrowed of him, and, during his absence, had stolen from
him. He believed they were in hiding, probably being guilty of some
depredation in another locality. They gave both Kremmling and Elgeria a
wide berth. On the other hand, the Smith gang from Elgeria rode to and
fro, like ranchers searching for lost horses. There were only three in
this gang, including Smith. Lewis had seen these men driving unbranded
stock. And lastly, Lewis casually imparted the information, highly
interesting to Wade, that he had seen Jack Belllounds riding through the
forest. The prospector did not in the least, however, connect the
appearance of the son of Belllounds with the other facts so peculiarly
interesting to Wade. Cowboys and hunters rode trails across the range,
and though they did so rather infrequently, there was nothing unusual
about encountering them.
Wade remained all night with Lewis, and next morning rode six miles
along the divide, and then down into a valley, where at length he found
a cabin described by the prospector. It was well hidden in the edge of
the forest, where a spring gushed from under a low cliff. But for water
and horse tracks Wade would not have found it easily. Rifle in hand, and
on foot, he slipped around in the woods, as a hunter might have, to
stalk drinking deer. There were no smoke, no noise, no horses anywhere
round the cabin, and after watching awhile Wade went forward to look at
it. It was an old ramshackle hunter's or prospector's cabin, with dirt
floor, a crumbling fireplace and chimney, and a bed platform made of
boughs. Including the door, it had three apertures, and the two smaller
ones, serving as windows, looked as if they had been intended for
port-holes as well. The inside of the cabin was large and unusually well
lighted, owing to the windows and to the open chinks between the logs.
Wade saw a deck of cards lying bent and scattered in one corner, as if
a violent hand had flung them against the wall. Strange that Wade's
memory returned a vivid picture of Jack Belllounds in just that act of
violence! The only other thing around the place which earned scrutiny
from Wade was a number of horseshoe tracks outside, with the left front
shoe track familiar to him. He examined the clearest imprints very
carefully. If they had not been put there by Wilson Moore's white
mustang, Spottie, then they had been made by a horse with a strangely
similar hoof and shoe. Spottie had a hoof malformed, somewhat in the
shape of a triangle, and the iron shoe to fit it always had to be bent,
so that the curve was sharp and the ends closer together than those of
his other shoes.
Wade rode down to White Slides that day, and at the evening meal he
casually asked Moore if he had been riding Spottie of late.
"Sure. What other horse could I ride? Do you think I'm up to trying one
of those broncs?" asked Moore, in derision.
"Reckon you haven't been leavin' any tracks up Buffalo Park way?"
The cowboy slammed down his knife. "Say, Wade, are you growing dotty?
Good Lord! if I'd ridden that far--if I was able to do it--wouldn't you
hear me yell?"
"Reckon so, come to think of it. I just saw a track like Spottie's, made
two days ago."
"Well, it wasn't his, you can gamble on that," returned the cowboy.
* * * * *
Wade spent four days hiding in an aspen grove, on top of one of the
highest foothills above White Slides Ranch. There he lay at ease, like
an Indian, calm and somber, watching the trails below, waiting for what
he knew was to come.
On the fifth morning he was at his post at sunrise. A casual remark of
one of the new cowboys the night before accounted for the early hour of
Wade's reconnoiter. The dawn was fresh and cool, with sweet odor of sage
on the air; the jays were squalling their annoyance at this early
disturber of their grove; the east was rosy above the black range and
soon glowed with gold and then changed to fire. The sun had risen. All
the mountain world of black range and gray hill and green valley, with
its shining stream, was transformed as if by magic color. Wade sat down
with his back to an aspen-tree, his gaze down upon the ranch-house and
the corrals. A lazy column of blue smoke curled up toward the sky, to be
lost there. The burros were braying, the calves were bawling, the colts
were whistling. One of the hounds bayed full and clear.
The scene was pastoral and beautiful. Wade saw it clearly and whole.
Peace and plenty, a happy rancher's home, the joy of the dawn and the
birth of summer, the rewards of toil--all seemed significant there. But
Wade pondered on how pregnant with life that scene was--nature in its
simplicity and freedom and hidden cruelty, and the existence of people,
blindly hating, loving, sacrificing, mostly serving some noble aim, and
yet with baseness among them, the lees with the wine, evil intermixed
with good.
By and by the cowboys appeared on their spring mustangs, and in twos and
threes they rode off in different directions. But none rode Wade's way.
The sun rose higher, and there was warmth in the air. Bees began to hum
by Wade, and fluttering moths winged uncertain flight over him.
At the end of another hour Jack Belllounds came out of the house, gazed
around him, and then stalked to the barn where he kept his horses. For a
little while he was not in sight; then he reappeared, mounted on a white
horse, and he rode into the pasture, and across that to the hay-field,
and along the edge of this to the slope of the hill. Here he climbed to
a small clump of aspens. This grove was not so far from Wilson Moore's
cabin; in fact, it marked the boundary-line between the rancher's range
and the acres that Moore had acquired. Jack vanished from sight here,
but not before Wade had made sure he was dismounting.
"Reckon he kept to that grassy ground for a reason of his own--and
plainer to me than any tracks," soliloquized Wade, as he strained his
eyes. At length Belllounds came out of the grove, and led his horse
round to where Wade knew there was a trail leading to and from Moore's
cabin. At this point Jack mounted and rode west. Contrary to his usual
custom, which was to ride hard and fast, he trotted the white horse as a
cowboy might have done when going out on a day's work. Wade had to
change his position to watch Belllounds, and his somber gaze followed
him across the hill, down the slope, along the willow-bordered brook,
and so on to the opposite side of the great valley, where Jack began to
climb in the direction of Buffalo Park.
After Belllounds had disappeared and had been gone for an hour, Wade
went down on the other side of the hill, found his horse where he had
left him, in a thicket, and, mounting, he rode around to strike the
trail upon which Belllounds had ridden. The imprint of fresh horse
tracks showed clear in the soft dust. And the left front track had been
made by a shoe crudely triangular in shape, identical with that peculiar
to Wilson Moore's horse.
"Ahuh!" muttered Wade, in greeting to what he had expected to see.
"Well, Buster Jack, it's a plain trail now--damn your crooked soul!"
The hunter took up that trail, and he followed it into the woods. There
he hesitated. Men who left crooked trails frequently ambushed them, and
Belllounds had made no effort to conceal his tracks. Indeed, he had
chosen the soft, open ground, even after he had left the trail to take
to the grassy, wooded benches. There were cattle here, but not as many
as on the more open aspen slopes across the valley. After deliberating a
moment, Wade decided that he must risk being caught trailing Belllounds.
But he would go slowly, trusting to eye and ear, to outwit this
strangely acting foreman of White Slides Ranch.
To that end he dismounted and took the trail. Wade had not followed it
far before he became convinced that Belllounds had been looking in the
thickets for cattle; and he had not climbed another mile through the
aspens and spruce before he discovered that Belllounds was driving
cattle. Thereafter Wade proceeded more cautiously. If the long grass had
not been wet he would have encountered great difficulty in trailing
Belllounds. Evidence was clear now that he was hiding the tracks of the
cattle by keeping to the grassy levels and slopes which, after the sun
had dried them, would not leave a trace. There were stretches where even
the keen-eyed hunter had to work to find the direction taken by
Belllounds. But here and there, in other localities, there showed faint
signs of cattle and horse tracks.
The morning passed, with Wade slowly climbing to the edge of the black
timber. Then, in a hollow where a spring gushed forth, he saw the tracks
of a few cattle that had halted to drink, and on top of these the tracks
of a horse with a crooked left front shoe. The rider of this horse had
dismounted. There was an imprint of a cowboy's boot, and near it little
sharp circles with dots in the center.
"Well, I'll be damned!" ejaculated Wade. "I call that mighty cunnin'.
Here they are--proofs as plain as writin'--that Wils Moore rustled Old
Bill's cattle!... Buster Jack, you're not such a fool as I thought....
He's made somethin' like the end of Wils's crutch. An' knowin' how Wils
uses that every time he gets off his horse, why, the dirty pup carried
his instrument with him an' made these tracks!"
Wade left the trail then, and, leading his horse to a covert of spruce,
he sat down to rest and think. Was there any reason for following
Belllounds farther? It did not seem needful to take the risk of being
discovered. The forest above was open. No doubt Belllounds would drive
the cattle somewhere and turn them over to his accomplices.
"Buster Jack's outbusted himself this time, sure," soliloquized Wade.
"He's double-crossin' his rustler friends, same as he is Moore. For he's
goin' to blame this cattle-stealin' onto Wils. An' to do that he's
layin' his tracks so he can follow them, or so any good trailer can. It
doesn't concern me so much now who're his pards in this deal. Reckon
it's Smith an' some of his gang."
Suddenly it dawned upon Wade that Jack Belllounds was stealing cattle
from his father. "Whew!" he whistled softly. "Awful hard on the old man!
Who's to tell him when all this comes out? Aw, I'd hate to do it. I
wouldn't. There's some things even I'd not tell."
Straightway this strange aspect of the case confronted Wade and gripped
his soul. He seemed to feel himself changing inwardly, as if a gray,
gloomy, sodden hand, as intangible as a ghostly dream, had taken him
bodily from himself and was now leading him into shadows, into drear,
lonely, dark solitude, where all was cold and bleak; and on and on over
naked shingles that marked the world of tragedy. Here he must tell his
tale, and as he plodded on his relentless leader forced him to tell his
tale anew.
Wade recognized this as his black mood. It was a morbid dominance of the
mind. He fought it as he would have fought a devil. And mastery still
was his. But his brow was clammy and his heart was leaden when he had
wrested that somber, mystic control from his will.
"Reckon I'd do well to take up this trail to-morrow an' see where it
leads," he said, and as a gloomy man, burdened with thought, he retraced
his way down the long slope, and over the benches, to the grassy slopes
and aspen groves, and thus to the sage hills.
It was dark when he reached the cabin, and Moore had supper almost
ready.
"Well, old-timer, you look fagged out," called out the cowboy, cheerily.
"Throw off your boots, wash up, and come and get it!"
"Pard Wils, I'm not reboundin' as natural as I'd like. I reckon I've
lived some years before I got here, an' a lifetime since."
"Wade, you have a queer look, lately," observed Moore, shaking his head
solemnly. "Why, I've seen a dying man look just like you--now--round the
mouth--but most in the eyes!"
"Maybe the end of the long trail is White Slides Ranch," replied Wade,
sadly and dreamily, as if to himself.
"If Collie heard you say that!" exclaimed Moore, in anxious concern.
"Collie an' you will hear me say a lot before long," returned Wade.
"But, as it's calculated to make you happy--why, all's well. I'm tired
an' hungry."
Wade did not choose to sit round the fire that night, fearing to invite
interrogation from his anxious friend, and for that matter from his
other inquisitively morbid self.
Next morning, though Wade felt rested, and the sky was blue and full of
fleecy clouds, and the melody of birds charmed his ear, and over all the
June air seemed thick and beating with the invisible spirit he loved, he
sensed the oppression, the nameless something that presaged catastrophe.
Therefore, when he looked out of the door to see Columbine swiftly
riding up the trail, her fair hair flying and shining in the sunlight,
he merely ejaculated, "Ahuh!"
"What's that?" queried Moore, sharp to catch the inflection.
"Look out," replied Wade, as he began to fill his pipe.
"Heavens! It's Collie! Look at her riding! Uphill, too!"
Wade followed him outdoors. Columbine was not long in arriving at the
cabin, and she threw the bridle and swung off in the same motion,
landing with a light thud. Then she faced them, pale, resolute, stern,
all the sweetness gone to bitter strength--another and a strange
Columbine.
"I've not slept a wink!" she said. "And I came as soon as I could get
away."
Moore had no word for her, not even a greeting. The look of her had
stricken him. It could have only one meaning.
"Mornin', lass," said the hunter, and he took her hand. "I couldn't tell
you looked sleepy, for all you said. Let's go into the cabin."
So he led Columbine in, and Moore followed. The girl manifestly was in a
high state of agitation, but she was neither trembling nor frightened
nor sorrowful. Nor did she betray any lack of an unflinching and
indomitable spirit. Wade read the truth of what she imagined was her
doom in the white glow of her, in the matured lines of womanhood that
had come since yesternight, in the sustained passion of her look.
"Ben! Wilson! The worst has come!" she announced.
Moore could not speak. Wade held Columbine's hand in both of his.
"Worst! Now, Collie, that's a terrible word. I've heard it many times.
An' all my life the worst's been comin'. An' it hasn't come yet.
You--only twenty years old--talkin' wild--the worst has come!... Tell me
your trouble now an' I'll tell you where you're wrong."
"Jack's a thief--a cattle-thief!" rang Columbine's voice, high and
clear.
"Ahuh! Well, go on," said Wade.
"Jack has taken money from rustlers--_for cattle stolen from his
father!_"
Wade felt the lift of her passion, and he vibrated to it.
"Reckon that's no news to me," he replied.
Then she quivered up to a strong and passionate delivery of the thing
that had transformed her.
"I'M GOING TO MARRY JACK BELLLOUNDS!"
Wilson Moore leaped toward her with a cry, to be held back by Wade's
hand.
"Now, Collie," he soothed, "tell us all about it."
Columbine, still upheld by the strength of her spirit, related how she
had ridden out the day before, early in the afternoon, in the hope of
meeting Wade. She rode over the sage hills, along the edges of the aspen
benches, everywhere that she might expect to meet or see the hunter,
but as he did not appear, and as she was greatly desirous of talking
with him, she went on up into the woods, following the line of the
Buffalo Park trail, though keeping aside from it. She rode very slowly
and cautiously, remembering Wade's instructions. In this way she
ascended the aspen benches, and the spruce-bordered ridges, and then the
first rise of the black forest. Finally she had gone farther than ever
before and farther than was wise.
When she was about to turn back she heard the thud of hoofs ahead of
her. Pronto shot up his ears. Alarmed and anxious, Columbine swiftly
gazed about her. It would not do for her to be seen. Yet, on the other
hand, the chances were that the approaching horse carried Wade. It was
lucky that she was on Pronto, for he could be trusted to stand still and
not neigh. Columbine rode into a thick clump of spruces that had long,
shelving branches, reaching down. Here she hid, holding Pronto
motionless.
Presently the sound of hoofs denoted the approach of several horses.
That augmented Columbine's anxiety. Peering out of her covert, she
espied three horsemen trotting along the trail, and one of them was Jack
Belllounds. They appeared to be in strong argument, judging from
gestures and emphatic movements of their heads. As chance would have it
they halted their horses not half a dozen rods from Columbine's place of
concealment. The two men with Belllounds were rough-looking, one of
them, evidently a leader, having a dark face disfigured by a
horrible scar.
Naturally they did not talk loud, and Columbine had to strain her ears
to catch anything. But a word distinguished here and there, and
accompanying actions, made transparent the meaning of their presence and
argument. The big man refused to ride any farther. Evidently he had
come so far without realizing it. His importunities were for "more head
of stock." His scorn was for a "measly little bunch not worth the risk."
His anger was for Belllounds's foolhardiness in "leavin' a trail."
Belllounds had little to say, and most of that was spoken in a tone too
low to be heard. His manner seemed indifferent, even reckless. But he
wanted "money." The scar-faced man's name was "Smith." Then Columbine
gathered from Smith's dogged and forceful gestures, and his words, "no
money" and "bigger bunch," that he was unwilling to pay what had been
agreed upon unless Belllounds promised to bring a larger number of
cattle. Here Belllounds roundly cursed the rustler, and apparently
argued that course "next to impossible." Smith made a sweeping movement
with his arm, pointing south, indicating some place afar, and part of
his speech was "Gore Peak." The little man, companion of Smith, got into
the argument, and, dismounting from his horse, he made marks upon the
smooth earth of the trail. He was drawing a rude map showing direction
and locality. At length, when Belllounds nodded as if convinced or now
informed, this third member of the party remounted, and seemed to have
no more to say. Belllounds pondered sullenly. He snatched a switch from
off a bough overhead and flicked his boot and stirrup with it, an action
that made his horse restive. Smith leered and spoke derisively, of which
speech Columbine heard, "Aw hell!" and "yellow streak," and "no one'd
ever," and "son of Bill Belllounds," and "rustlin' stock." Then this
scar-faced man drew out a buckskin bag. Either the contempt or the gold,
or both, overbalanced vacillation in the weak mind of Jack Belllounds,
for he lifted his head, showing his face pale and malignant, and without
trace of shame or compunction he snatched the bag of gold, shouted a
hoarse, "All right, damn you!" and, wheeling the white mustang, he
spurred away, quickly disappearing.
The rustlers sat their horses, gazing down the trail, and Smith wagged
his dark head doubtfully. Then he spoke quite distinctly, "I ain't
a-trustin' thet Belllounds pup!" and his comrade replied, "Boss, we
ain't stealin' the stock, so what th' hell!" Then they turned their
horses and trotted out of sight and hearing up the timbered slope.
Columbine was so stunned, and so frightened and horrified, that she
remained hidden there for a long time before she ventured forth. Then,
heading homeward, she skirted the trail and kept to the edge of the
forest, making a wide detour over the hills, finally reaching the ranch
at sunset. Jack did not appear at the evening meal. His father had one
of his spells of depression and seemed not to have noticed her absence.
She lay awake all night thinking and praying.
Columbine concluded her narrative there, and, panting from her agitation
and hurry, she gazed at the bowed figure of Moore, and then at Wade.
"I _had_ to tell you this shameful secret," she began again. "I'm
forced. If you do not help me, if something is not done, there'll be a
horrible--end to all!"
"We'll help you, but how?" asked Moore, raising a white face.
"I don't know yet. I only _feel_--I only _feel_ what may happen, if I
don't prevent it.... Wilson, you must go home--at least for a while."
"It'll not look right for Wils to leave White Slides now," interposed
Wade, positively.
"But why? Oh, I fear--"
"Never mind now, lass. It's a good reason. An' you mustn't fear
anythin'. I agree with you--we've got to prevent this--this that's goin'
to happen."
"Oh, Ben, my dear friend, we must prevent it--you _must!_"
"Ahuh!... So I was figurin'."
"Ben, you must go to Jack an' tell him--show him the peril--frighten him
terribly--so that he will not do--do this shameful thing again."
"Lass, I reckon I could scare Jack out of his skin. But what good would
that do?"
"It'll stop this--this madness.... Then I'll marry him--and keep him
safe--after that!"
"Collie, do you think marryin' Buster Jack will stop his bustin' out?"
"Oh, I _know_ it will. He had conquered over the evil in him. I saw
that. I felt it. He conquered over his baser nature for love of me.
Then--when he heard--from my own lips--that I loved Wilson--why, then he
fell. He didn't care. He drank again. He let go. He sank. And now he'll
ruin us all. Oh, it looks as if he meant it that way!... But I can
change him. I will marry him. I will love him--or I will _live a lie!_ I
will make him think I love him!"
Wilson Moore, deadly pale, faced her with flaming eyes.
"Collie, _why?_ For God's sake, explain why you will shame your
womanhood and ruin me--all for that coward--that thief?"
Columbine broke from Wade and ran to Wilson, as if to clasp him, but
something halted her and she stood before him.
"Because dad will kill him!" she cried.
"My God! what are you saying?" exclaimed Moore, incredulously. "Old Bill
would roar and rage, but hurt that boy of his--never!"
"Wils, I reckon Collie is right. You haven't got Old Bill figured. I
know," interposed Wade, with one of his forceful gestures.
"Wilson, listen, and don't set your heart against me. For I _must_ do
this thing," pleaded Columbine. "I heard dad swear he'd kill Jack. Oh,
I'll never forget! He was terrible! If he ever finds out that Jack stole
from his own father--stole cattle like a common rustler, and sold them
for gold to gamble and drink with--he will kill him!... That's as true
as fate.... Think how horrible that would be for me! Because I'm to
blame here, mostly. I fell in love with _you_, Wilson Moore, otherwise I
could have saved Jack already.
"But it's not that I think of myself. Dad has loved me. He has been as a
father to me. You know he's not my real father. Oh, if I only had a real
one!... And I owe him so much. But then it's not because I owe him or
because I love him. It's because of his own soul!... That splendid,
noble old man, who has been so good to every one--who had only one
fault, and that love of his son--must he be let go in blinded and insane
rage at the failure of his life, the ruin of his son--must he be allowed
to kill his own flesh and blood?... It would be _murder!_ It would damn
dad's soul to everlasting torment. No! No! I'll not let that be!"
"Collie--how about--your own soul?" whispered Moore, lifting himself as
if about to expend a tremendous breath.
"That doesn't matter," she replied.
"Collie--Collie--" he stammered, but could not go on.
Then it seemed to Wade that they both turned to him unconscious of the
inevitableness of his relation to this catastrophe, yet looking to him
for the spirit, the guidance that became habitual to them. It brought
the warm blood back to Wade's cold heart. It was his great reward. How
intensely and implacably did his soul mount to that crisis!
"Collie, I'll never fail you," he said, and his gentle voice was deep
and full. "If Jack can be scared into haltin' in his mad ride to
hell--then I'll do it. I'm not promisin' so much for him. But I'll swear
to you that Old Belllounds's hands will never be stained with his
son's blood!"
"Oh, Ben! Ben!" she cried, in passionate gratitude. "I'll love
you--bless you all my life!"
"Hush, lass! I'm not one to bless.... An' now you must do as I say. Go
home an' tell them you'll marry Jack in August. Say August thirteenth."
"So long! Oh, why put it off? Wouldn't it be better--safer, to settle it
all--once and forever?"
"No man can tell everythin'. But that's my judgment."
"Why August thirteenth?" she queried, with strange curiosity. "An
unlucky date!"
"Well, it just happened to come to my mind--that date," replied Wade, in
his slow, soft voice of reminiscence. "I was married on August
thirteenth--twenty-one years ago.... An', Collie, my wife looked
somethin' like you. Isn't that strange, now? It's a little world.... An'
she's been gone eighteen years!"
"Ben, I never dreamed you ever had a wife," said Columbine, softly, with
her hands going to his shoulder. "You must tell me of her some day....
But now--if you want time--if you think it best--I'll not marry Jack
till August thirteenth."
"That'll give me time," replied Wade. "I'm thinkin' Jack ought to
be--reformed, let's call it--before you marry him. If all you say is
true--why we can turn him round. Your promise will do most.... So,
then, it's settled?"
"Yes--dear--friends," faltered the girl, tremulously, on the verge of a
breakdown, now that the ordeal was past.
Wilson Moore stood gazing out of the door, his eyes far away on the gray
slopes.
"Queer how things turn out," he said, dreamily. "August thirteenth!...
That's about the time the columbines blow on the hills.... And I always
meant columbine-time--"
Here he sharply interrupted himself, and the dreamy musing gave way to
passion. "But I mean it yet! I'll--I'll die before I give up hope
of you!"