Beginning the Search
Aaron King lay with closed eyes, but not asleep. He was thinking,
thinking, thinking In a weary circle, his tired brain went round and
round, finding no place to stop. The man on horseback, the automobile,
some accident that might have befallen the girl in her distraught state of
mind--he could find no place in the weary treadmill of conjecture to rest.
While it was still too dark to see, Brian Oakley called him. And the call
was a relief.
As the artist pulled on his boots, the Ranger said, "It'll be light enough
to see, by the time we get above Carleton's. We know the automobile went
that far anyway."
At the Carleton ranch, as they passed, they saw, by the lights, that the
mountaineer's family were already making ready for the gathering of the
riders. A little beyond, they met two men from the Company Head-Work, on
their way to the meeting place. Soon, in the gray, early morning light,
the tracks of the automobile were clearly seen. Eagerly, they followed to
the foot of the Oak Knoll trail, where the machine had stopped and,
turning around, had started back down the canyon. With experienced care,
Brian Oakley searched every inch of the ground in the vicinity.
Shaking his head, at last, as though forced to give up hope of finding
any positive signs pointing to the solution of the puzzle, the officer
remounted, slowly. "I can't make it out," he said. "The road is so dry and
cut up with tracks, and the trail is so gravelly, that there are no clear
signs at all. Come, we better get back to Carleton's, and start the boys
out. When Milt returns from Fairlands he may know something."
With the rising of the sun, the mountain folk, summoned in the night by
the Ranger's messengers, assembled at the ranch; every man armed and
mounted with the best his possessions afforded. Tied to the trees in the
yard, and along the fence in front, or standing with bridle-reins over
their heads, the horses waited. Lying on the porch, or squatting on their
heels, in unconscious picturesque attitudes, the mountain riders who had
arrived first and had finished their breakfast were ready for the Ranger's
word. In the ranch kitchen, the table was filled with the later ones; and
these, as fast as they finished their meal, made way for the new arrivals.
There was no loud talk; no boisterous laughter; no uneasy restlessness.
Calm-eyed, soft-voiced, deliberate in movement, these hardy mountaineers
had answered Brian Oakley's call; and they placed themselves, now, under
his command, with no idle comment, no wasteful excitement but with a
purpose and spirit that would, if need be, hold them in their saddles
until their horses dropped under them, and would, then, send them on,
afoot, as long as their iron nerves and muscles could be made to respond
to their wills.
There was scarce a man in that company, who did not know and love Sibyl
Andrés, and who had not known and loved her parents. Many of them had
ridden with the Ranger at the time of Will Andrés' death. When the officer
and his companion appeared, they gathered round their leader with simple
words of greeting, and stood silently ready for his word.
Briefly, Brian Oakley divided them into parties, and assigned the
territory to be covered by each. Three shots in quick succession, at
intervals of two minutes, would signal that the search was finished. Two
men, he held to go with him up Oak Knoll trail, after his messenger to the
Sheriff had returned. At sunset, they were all to reassemble at the ranch
for further orders. When the officer finished speaking, the little group
of men turned to the horses, and, without the loss of a moment, were out
of sight in the mountain wilderness.
A half hour before he was due, young Carleton appeared with the Sheriff's
answer to the Ranger's letter. "Well done, boy," said Brian Oakley,
heartily. "Take care of your horse, now, and then get some rest yourself,
and be ready for whatever comes next."
He turned to those he had held to go with him; "All right, boys, let's
ride. Sheriff will take care of the Fairlands end. Come, Aaron."
All the way up the Oak Knoll trail the Ranger rode in the lead, bending
low from his saddle, his gaze fixed on the little path. Twice he
dismounted and walked ahead, leaving the chestnut to follow or to wait, at
his word. When they came out on the pipe-line trail, he halted the party,
and, on foot, went carefully over the ground either way from the point
where they stood.
"Boys," he said at last, "I have a hunch that there was a horse on this
trail last night. It's been so blamed dry, and for so long, though, that I
can't be sure. I held you two men because I know you are good trailers.
Follow the pipe-line up the canyon, and see what you can find. It isn't
necessary to say stay with it if you strike anything that even looks like
it might be a lead. Aaron and I will take the other way, and up the Galena
trail to the fire-break."
While Brian Oakley had been searching for signs in the little path, and
the artist, with the others, was waiting, Aaron King's mind went back to
that day when he and Conrad Lagrange had sat there under the oaks and, in
a spirit of irresponsible fun, had committed themselves to the leadership
of Croesus. To the young man, now, that day, with its care-free leisure,
seemed long ago. Remembering the novelist's fanciful oration to the burro,
he thought grimly how unconscious they had been, in their merriment, of
the great issues that did actually rest upon the seemingly trivial
incident. He recalled, too, with startling vividness, the times that he
had climbed to that spot with Sibyl, or, reaching it from either way on
the pipe-line, had gone with her down the zigzag path to the road in the
canyon below. Had she, last night, alone, or with some unwelcome
companions, paused a moment under those oaks? Had she remembered the hours
that she had spent there with him?
As he followed the Ranger over the ground that he had walked with her,
that day of their last climb together, it seemed to him that every step
of the way was haunted by her sweet personality. The objects along the
trail--a point of rock, a pine, the barrel where they had filled their
canteen, a broken section of the concrete pipe left by the workmen, the
very rocks and cliffs, the flowers--dry and withered now--that grew along
the little path--a thousand things that met his eyes--recalled her to his
mind until he felt her presence so vividly that he almost expected to find
her waiting, with smiling, winsome face, just around the next turn. The
officer, who, moving ahead, scanned with careful eyes every foot of the
way, seemed to the artist, now, to be playing some fantastic game. He
could not, for the moment, believe that the girl he loved was--God! where
was she? Why did Brian Oakley move so slowly, on foot, while his horse,
leisurely cropping the grass, followed? He should be in the saddle! They
should be riding, riding riding--as he had ridden last night. Last night!
Was it only last night?
Where the Government trail crosses the fire-break on the crest of the
Galenas, Brian Oakley paused. "I don't think there's been anything over
this way," he said. "We'll follow the fire-break to that point up there,
for a look around."
At noon, they stood by the big rock, under the clump of pines, where Aaron
King and Sibyl Andrés had eaten their lunch.
"We'll be here some time," said the Ranger. "Make yourself comfortable. I
want to see if there's anything stirring down yonder."
With his back to the rock, he searched the Galena Valley side of the
range, through his powerful glass; commenting, now and then, when some
object came in the field of his vision, to his companion who sat beside
him.
They had risen to go and the officer was returning his glass to its case
on his saddle, when Aaron King--pointing toward Fairlands, lying dim and
hazy in the distant valley--said, "Look there!"
The other turned his head to see a flash of light that winked through the
dull, smoky veil, with startling clearness. He smiled and turned again to
his saddle. "You'll often see that," he said. "It's the sun striking some
bright object that happens to be at just the right angle to hit you with
the reflection. A bit of new tin on a roof, a window, an automobile
shield, anything bright enough, will do the trick. Come, we'll go back to
the trail and follow the break the other way."
In the dusk of the evening, at the close of the long, hard day, as Brian
Oakley and Aaron King were starting down the Oak Knoll trail on their
return to the ranch, the Ranger uttered an exclamation. His quick eyes had
caught the twinkling gleam of a light at Sibyl's old home, far below,
across the canyon. The next instant, the chestnut, followed by his
four-footed companion, was going down the steep trail at a pace that sent
the gravel flying and forced the artist, unaccustomed to such riding, to
cling desperately to the saddle. Up the canyon road, the Ranger sent the
chestnut at a run, nor did he draw rein as they crossed the rough
boulder-strewn wash. Plunging through the tumbling water of the creek,
the horses scrambled up the farther bank, and dashed along the old,
weed-grown road, into the little clearing They were met by Czar with a
bark of welcome. A moment later, they were greeted by Conrad Lagrange and
Myra Willard.
"But why don't you stay down at the ranch, Myra?" asked the Ranger, when
he had told them that his day's work was without results.
"Listen, Mr. Oakley," returned the woman with the disfigured face. "I know
Sibyl too well not to understand the possibilities of her temperament.
Natures, fine and sensitive as hers, though brave and cool and strong
under ordinary circumstances, under peculiar mental stress such as I
believe caused her to leave us, are easily thrown out of balance. We know
nothing. The child may be wandering, alone--dazed and helpless under the
shock of a cruel and malicious attempt to wreck her happiness. Only some
terrible stress of emotion could have caused her to leave me as she did.
If she _is_ alone, out here in the hills, there is a chance that--even in
her distracted state of mind--she will find her way to her old home." The
woman paused, and then, in the silence, added hesitatingly, "I--I may say
that I know from experience the possibilities of which I speak."
The three men bowed their heads. Brian Oakley said softly, "Myra, you've
got more heart and more sense than all of us put together." To Conrad
Lagrange, he added, "You will stay here with Miss Willard?"
"Yes," answered the novelist, "I would be little good in the hills, at
such work as you are doing, Brian. I will do what I can, here."
When the Ranger and the artist were riding down the canyon to the ranch,
the officer said, "There's a big chance that Myra is right, Aaron. After
all, she knows Sibyl better than any of us, and I can see that she's got a
fairly clear idea of what sent the child off like this. As it stands now,
the girl may be just wandering around. If she _is_, the boys will pick her
up before many hours. She may have met with some accident. If _that's_ it,
we'll know before long. She may have been--I tell you, Aaron, it's that
automobile acting the way it did that I can't get around."
The searchers were all at the ranch when the two men arrived. No one had a
word of encouragement to report. A messenger from the Sheriff brought no
light on the mystery of the automobile. The two men who had followed the
pipe-line trail had found nothing. A few times, they thought they had
signs that a horse had been over the trail the night before, but there was
no certainty; and after the pipe-line reached the floor of the canyon
there was absolutely nothing. Jack Carleton was back from the Galena
Valley neighborhood, and, with him, was the horseman who had gone down the
canyon the evening before. The man was known to all. He had been hunting,
and was on his way home when Henry Carleton and the Ranger had seen him.
He had come, now, to help in the search.
Picking a half dozen men from the party, Brian Oakley sent them to spend
the night riding the higher trails and fire-breaks, watching for
camp-fire lights. The others, he ordered to rest, in readiness to take up
the search at daylight, should the night riders come in without results.
Aaron King, exhausted, physically and mentally, sank into a stupor that
could scarcely be called sleep.
At daybreak, the riders who had been all night on the higher trails and
fire-breaks, searching the darkness for the possible gleam of a
camp-fire's light, came in.
All that day--Wednesday--the mountain horsemen rode, widening the area of
their search under the direction of the Ranger. From sundown until long
after dark, they came straggling wearily back; their horses nearly
exhausted, the riders beginning to fear that Sibyl would never be found
alive. There was no further word from the Sheriff at Fairlands.
Then suddenly, out of the blackness of the night, a rider from the other
side of the Galenas arrived with the word that the girl's horse had been
found. The animal was grazing in the neighborhood of Pine Glen. The saddle
and the horse's sides were stained with dirt, as if the animal had fallen.
The bridle-reins had been broken. The horse might have rolled on the
saddle; he might have stepped on the bridle-reins; he might have fallen
and left his rider lying senseless. In any case, they reasoned, the animal
would scarcely have found his way over the Galena range after he had been
left to wander at will.
Brian Oakley decided to send the main company of riders over into the Pine
Glen country, to continue the search there. He knew that the men who found
the horse would follow the animal's track back as far as possible. He
knew, also, that if the animal had been wandering several hours, as was
likely, it would be impossible to back-track far. Late as it was, Aaron
King rode up the canyon to tell Myra Willard and Conrad Lagrange the
result of the day's work.
The artist's voice trembled as he told the general opinion of the
mountaineers; but Myra Willard said, "Mr. King, they are wrong. My baby
will come back. There's harm come to her no doubt; but she is not dead
or--I would know it."
In spite of the fact that Aaron King's reason told him the woman of the
disfigured face had no ground for her belief, he was somehow helped, by
her words, to hope.