THE ASHES OF HOPE
It was dark of the moon and Sheriff Price Selwood sat on his horse a
little distance from McKane’s store at Cordova, his hat pulled over
his brows, his hands on his saddle horn.
Inside the lighted store four tables were going.
A bunch of cattlemen from the Upper Country were in and most of the
Cathrew men were down from Sky Line.
The nine or ten bona-fide citizens of Cordova were present also, and
McKane was in high fettle. The few houses of the town were dark for
it was fairly late. All these things the sheriff noted in the
quarter hour he sat patiently watching.
When he was satisfied that all the families were represented inside,
that the dogs of the place were settled to inaction, and that no one
was likely to leave the store for several hours at least, he did a
peculiar thing.
He tied his horse to a tree near where it stood and went forward
quietly on foot, stopping at the rack where the Cathrew horses stood
in a row. They were good stock. Cattle Kate would have nothing else
at Sky Line.
Selwood took plenty of time, patting a shoulder here, stroking a
nose there, and finally stepped in between a big brown mare and the
rangy grey gelding which Sud Provine always rode. He fondled the
animal for a few moments, then ran his hand down the left foreleg
and picked up the hoof. It was shod, saddle-horse fashion. He placed
the foot between his knees, very much after the manner of a
blacksmith, and taking a small coarse file from his coat pocket,
proceeded to file a small notch in the shoe.
Then he put the file away, gave the grey a last friendly slap, got
his own horse and rode away.
He intended to have a good night’s sleep.
* * * * *
Several days later Kate Cathrew came down to Cordova and held a
short private conversation with McKane.
“McKane,” she said, “who gives you the heaviest trade in this man’s
country?”
“You do,” said McKane promptly, “far and away.”
“Do you value it?”
“Does a duck swim?”
“Then give me a moment’s attention,” said Kate Cathrew, “and keep
what I say under your hat.”
“I’m like the well that old saw tells of—the stone sinks and is
never seen again. Confession in the heart of a friend, you know.”
“Thanks. Now listen.”
When the woman rode away a half hour later, carrying another of
those letters from New York which the trader had come to hate ever
since Selwood’s suggestion concerning the writer, his eyes had a
very strange expression. It was a mixture of several expressions,
rather—astonishment, of personal gratification, and a vague,
incongruous regret. If he had been a better man that last faint
seeming of sorrow might have denoted the loss of an ideal, the death
of something fine.
But he looked after Cattle Kate with a fire of passion that was
slowly growing with every interview.
* * * * *
Life at the homestead on Nameless took on a new color with the
advent of Sonny Fair. Mrs. Allison, an epitome of universal
motherhood, looked over the scant, well-mended belongings of the
family and laid out such articles as she judged could be spared.
These she began expertly to make over into little garments.
“When did Brand buy you these pants, Sonny?” she inquired, but the
child shook his head.
“I don’t know,” he answered.
“H’m. Must be pretty poor,” she opined, but Bud scowled in
disapproval.
“Pretty durn stingy, I’d say,” he remarked.
“Hold judgment, Bud,” counseled Nance, “when a man travels for two
years he don’t have much time to make money. We’re poor, too, but
that don’t spell anything.”
Bud held his tongue, but it was plain he was not convinced.
“What makes him so contrary, I wonder?” said the girl later.
“He’s jealous,” said Mrs. Allison calmly, “because you champion th’
stranger. It’s natural.”
The field of corn was beautiful.
Its blades were broad and satiny, covering the brown earth from
view, and the waving green floor came well up along the horses’ legs
as Nance rode down the rows on the shackly cultivator.
For three days she had been at it, a labor of love. She had many
dreams as she watched the light wimpling on the silky banners,
vague, pleasant dreams that had to do with her cancelled debt at the
store, with the trip to Bement about the carpet, and with the new
blue dress she hoped to get with the surplus.
Bud must have some new things, too, and her Mammy needed shoes the
worst way.
All these things the growing field promised her, whispering under
the little wind, and she was happy deep in her innocent heart.
She wondered if she dared ask Brand to let her take Sonny on that
trip to Bement, then instantly decided she should not.
There might be someone from Nameless in the town, and Brand was
particularly insistent on his staying out of sight.
She never ceased to wonder about that.
What could be his reason?
What could there be in the Deep Heart country to whom a little child
could make a difference?
But it was none of her business, she sagely concluded, and could
wait the light of the future. Maybe Brand would some day tell her
all about it.
So she worked and planned for two days more. At their end she drove
the cultivator to the stable and stood stretching her tired shoulder
muscles while Bud unharnessed the team.
She looked back at the field with smiling eyes.
“Can only get in it about once more,” she said, “it’s growing so
fast.”
“Pretty,” Bud said, “pretty as you, almost. Do you know you’re
awfully pretty, Sis?”
“Hush!” she laughed. “You’ll make me vain. Pretty is as pretty does,
you know.”
“Well, the Lord knows you do enough,” returned the boy bitterly, “if
I was only half a man——”
“Bud!” cried Nance quickly, “you’re the most sure-enough he-man I
know. You’ve got the patience and the courage of ten common men. If
it hadn’t been for your steady backing I’d never be on Nameless now.
I’d have quit long back.”
“Like the dickens you would!” said Bud, but a grin replaced the
shadow of bitterness on his face.
Supper that night was particularly pleasant.
There were new potatoes and green peas from the garden down by the
river, and a plate of the never failing cookies of which Sonny could
not get enough.
“He’s hollow to his toes,” said Mrs. Allison, “I can’t never seem to
get him full.”
“The little shaver’s starved,” said Bud.
“Not starved, but he ain’t had regular food—not right to grow on. I
can see a difference already.”
Nance reached over an investigating hand to feel the small shoulder.
It bore proudly a brand new shirt made from one of Bud’s old ones.
To be sure, there was a striking dissimilitude of colors, since part
of the fabric had been under a pocket and had not faded, but Sonny
wore it with the air of kings and princes.
“Yes, sir,” she said judicially, “he _is_ gaining, sure as the
world!”
It seemed to Nance that night that all was well with the world, very
well. There seemed a wider margin of hope than usual, as if success,
so long denied them, was hovering like a gigantic bird above the
homestead, as if their long labor was about to have its reward. She
fell asleep thinking of the whispering field, of the trip to Bement,
and—of Brand Fair’s quiet, dark eyes, the look of the chin-strap on
his brown cheek.
She laid a loving hand on Sonny’s little head on the pillow of the
improvised crib beyond her own big bed—and the world went swiftly
from her consciousness. She slept quickly and deeply, as do all
those who work hard in the sun and wind—the blessed boon of labor.
* * * * *
It seemed to her that she had hardly lost consciousness when Old
John announced from his rafter perch the coming of another day and
she saw the faint light of dawn on the sky outside.
She dressed as usual, looked lovingly at the small face of the
little sleeper in the crib, and went out, soft-footed, to start the
kitchen fire. That done, she took the pail and went out to the well.
She rested the bucket on the curb a moment, lifted the well-board,
and stood looking at the faint aureole of light that was beginning
to crown Rainbow Cliff. The cliff itself was black, blue-black as
deepest indigo, its foot lost in the shadows that deepened down
Mystery Ridge. She could hear the murmuring of Nameless, soft and
mysterious in the dawn, feel the little wind that was beginning to
stir to greet the coming day. Then, as was her habit, she turned her
eyes out across the waving green field of her precious corn.
It must be earlier than she thought, she reflected, for there was
not the shimmer of light which usually met her gaze.
She looked again at the eastern sky.
Why, yes—it was light as usual there.
Once more she looked at the field—then she leaned forward, peering
hard, her hands still lying on the bucket’s rim. Her brows drew down
together as she strained her sharp sight to focus on what she saw—or
what she thought she saw. For a long time she stood so. Then, as
realization struck home to her consciousness, the hands on the
bucket gripped down until the knuckles shone white under the tanned
skin. Her lips fell open loosely. The breath stopped for a moment in
her lungs and she felt as if she were drowning. An odd dizziness
attacked her brain, so that the dim world of shadow and light
wavered grotesquely. Her knees seemed buckling beneath her and for
the first time in her life she felt as if she might faint.... Her
Mammy had fainted once—when they brought John Allison home.... But
she gathered herself with a supreme effort, closed her lips, wet
them with her tongue, straightened her shoulders and, taking her
hands from their grip on the pail, walked out toward the field.
At the gate she stopped and gazed dully at the ruin before her.
Where yesterday had been a vigorous, lusty, dark green growth, fair
to her sight as the edges of Paradise, there was now the bald,
piteous unsightliness of destruction.
Of all the great field there was scarcely a dozen stalks left
standing. It was a sodden mass of trampled pulp, cut and slashed and
beaten into the loose earth by hundreds of milling hoofs.
Far across at the upper end she could dimly see in the growing light
a huge gap in the fence—two, three posts were entirely gone. It had
taken many head of cattle, driven in and harried, to work that
havoc. It was complete.
For a long, long time Nance Allison stood and looked at it. Then
with a sigh that seemed the embodiment of all weariness, she turned
away and went slowly back to the cabin.
At the open door she met Bud and pushed him back with both hands.
Her mother was at the stove, lifting a lid.
At sight of her daughter’s face she held it in mid-air.
“Hold hard, girl,” she said quietly, “what’s up?”
Nance leaned against the door-jamb. Every fibre of her body longed
to crumple down, to let go, to relax in defeat, but she would not
have it so.
Instead she looked at these two, so greatly dependent upon her, and
faced the issue squarely.
“It’s the cornfield,” she said with difficulty, “it’s gone.”
“What?”
“Gone? Gone—how?”
“Gone—destroyed—wiped off the earth—trampled out by cattle,” she
said dully, “every blade—every stalk—root, stem and branch!”
“My Lord A’mighty!” gasped Mrs. Allison, and the words were not
blasphemy.
“Cattle Kate!” cried Bud. “Oh, damn her soul to hell!”
“Oh, Bud—don’t, don’t!” said Nance, her lips beginning to quiver,
“‘He who—who is guilty of damn—and damnation—shall be in
danger—danger of hell fire.’”
But the boy’s blue eyes were blazing and he did not even hear her.
He jerked his sagging shoulder up, for a moment, in line with its
mate and shut his hands into straining fists.
“Gimme a gun——” he rasped, “Pappy’s gun——”
But the mother spoke.
“No guns, Bud—I’ve seen feud—in Missouri. There’s land an’ sunlight
in other places beside Nameless. With life we can——”
The boy shook his head with a slow, savage motion.
“Not for us,” he said, “I’d die first.”
Nance straightened by the door. She lifted her head and looked at
his grim young face. Some of its grimness came subtly into her own.
“Right,” she said, “so would I. We belong to Nameless River—where
our Pappy left us—and here we’ll stay. Only—I pray God to keep me
from—from——” she wet her lips again, “from what is stirring inside
me.”
“He will,” said Bud. “But I’m not so particular. We own this
land—and we’ll fight for our own.”
“Amen,” said Nance, “we will. We’ve still got the hogs to sell.
Mammy—let’s have breakfast. I’m going down to Cordova—it’s right
McKane should know.”