THE ACID TEST
In the living-room below they heard it, Dan and Kate Cumberland. All day
she had sat by the fire which still blazed on the hearth, replenished
from time to time by the care of Wung Lu. She had taken up some sewing,
and she worked at it steadily. Some of that time Dan Barry was in the
room, sitting through long intervals, watching her with lynx-eyed
attention. Very rarely did he speak--almost never, and she could have
numbered upon her two hands the words he had spoken--ay, and she could
have repeated them one by one. Now and again he rose and went out, and
the wolf-dog went with him each time. But towards the last Black Bart
preferred to stay in the room, crouched in front of her and blinking at
the fire, as if he knew that each time his master would return to the
fire. Then, why leave the pleasant warmth for the chilly greyness of the
day outside?
There he remained, stirring only now and then to lift a clumsy paw and
brush it across his eyes in an oddly human gesture. Once or twice, also,
he lifted that great, scarred head and laid it on her knees, looking
curiously from her busy hands to her face, and from her face back again
to her work, until, having apparently assured himself that all was well,
he dropped his head again and lay once more motionless. She could see
him open a listless eye when the master entered the room again. And with
each coming of Dan Barry she felt again surrounded as if by invisible
arms. Something was prying at her, striving to win a secret from her.
As the day wore on, a great, singing happiness rose in her throat, and
at about the same time she heard a faint sound, impalpable, from the
farther side of the room where Dan Barry sat. He was whistling.
A simple thing for a man to do, to be sure, but the astonishment of it
nearly stopped the heart of Kate Cumberland. For in all her life she had
never before heard him whistle except when he was in the open, and
preferably when he was astride of the strength and the speed of Satan,
with Black Bart scouting swiftly and smoothly ahead. But now he whistled
here by the warmth of the fire. To be sure the sound was small and thin,
but there was such music in it as she had never heard before. It was so
thin that it was almost ghostly, as if the soul of wild Paganini played
here on a muted violin. No tune that might be repeated, but as always
when she heard it, a picture rose before the eyes of Kate. It wavered at
first against the yellow glow of the firelight. Then it quite shut out
all else.
It was deep night, starry night. The black horse and his rider wound up
a deep ravine. To one side a bold mountain tumbled up to an infinite
height, bristling with misshapen trees here and there, and losing its
head against the very stars. On the other side were jagged hills, all
carved in the solid rock. And down the valley, between the mountains and
the stars, blew a soft wind; as if that wind made the music. They were
climbing up, up, up, and now they reach--the music rising also to a soft
but triumphant outburst--a high plateau. They were pressed up against
the heart of the sky. The stars burned low, and low. Around them the
whole earth seemed in prospect at their feet. The moon burst through a
mass of clouds, and she saw, far off, a great river running silver
through the night.
Happy? Ay, and he was happy too, and his happiness was one with hers. He
was not even looking out the window while he whistled, but his eyes were
fixed steadily, unchangingly, upon her face.
It was then that they heard it: "Dan! Dan Barry! Come out!"
A hoarse, ringing cry, as of one who is shouting against a great wind:
"Dan! Dan Barry! Come out!"
Dan Barry was on his feet and gliding to the wall, where he took down
his belt from a nail and buckled it swiftly around him. And Kate ran to
the window with the wolf-dog snarling beside her and saw standing in
front of the house, his hat off, his black hair wildly tumbled, and two
guns in his hands, Buck Daniels! Behind him the tall bay mare shook
with her panting and glistened with the sweat of the long ride.
She heard a scratching next and saw the wolf-dog rear up and paw at the
door. Once through that door and he would be at the throat of the man
outside, she knew. Nor he alone, for Dan Barry was coming swiftly across
the room with that strange, padding step. He had no eye for her. He was
smiling, and she had rather have seen him in a cursing fury than to see
this smile. It curled the upper lip with something like a sneer; and she
caught the white glint of his teeth; the wolf-dog snarled back over his
shoulder to hurry his master. It was the crisis which she had known all
day was coming, sooner or later. She had only prayed that it might be
delayed for a little time. And confronting the danger was like stepping
into the path of runaway horses. Fear ruled her with an iron hand, and
she swayed back against the wall and supported herself with an
outstretched hand.
What was there to be done? If she stepped in between him and his man, he
would brush her aside from his path and out of his life forever. If he
went on to his vengeance he would no less be started on the path which
led around the world away from her. The law would be the hound which
pursued him and relentlessly nipped at his heels--an eternal terror and
unrest. No thought of Buck Daniels who had done so much for her. She
cast his services out of her mind with the natural cruelty of woman.
Her whole thought was, selfishly, for the man before her, and for
herself.
He was there--his hand was upon the knob of the door. And then she
remembered how the teeth of Black Bart had closed over her arm--and how
they had not broken even the skin. In an instant she was pressed against
the door before Dan Barry--her arms outstretched.
He fell back the slightest bit before her, and then he came again and
brushed her slowly, gently, to one side, with an irresistible strength.
She had to meet his eyes now--there was no help for it--and she saw
there that swirl of yellow light--that insatiable hunger. And she knew,
fully and bitterly, that she had failed. With the wolf-dog, indeed, she
had conquered, but the man escaped her. If time had been granted her she
would have won, she knew, but the hand of Buck Daniels, so long her
ally, had destroyed her chances. It was his hand now which shook the
knob of the door, and she turned with a sob of despair to face the new
danger.
In her wildest dreams she had never visioned Buck Daniels transformed
like this. She knew that in his past, as one of those long-riders who
roam the mountain-desert, their hand against the hands of every man,
Buck Daniels had been known and feared by the strongest. But all she had
seen of Buck Daniels had been gentleness itself. Yet what faced her as
the door flew wide was a nightmare thing with haggard face and
shadow-buried, glittering eyes--unshaven, unkempt of hair, his shirt
open at the throat, his great hands clenched for the battle. The
wolf-dog, at that familiar sight, whined a low greeting, but with a
glance at his master knew that there was a change--the old alliance was
broken--so he bared his white teeth and changed his whine to a snarl of
hate.
Then a strange terror struck Kate Cumberland. She had never dreamed that
she could fear for Dan Barry at the hands of any man, but now the
desperate resolve which breathed from every line of Buck Daniels,
chilled her blood at the heart. She sprang back before Dan Barry. Facing
him, she saw that demoniac glitter of yellow rising momently brighter in
his eyes, and he was smiling. No execration or loud voiced curse could
have contained the distilled malignancy of that smile. All this she
caught in a single glimpse. The next instant she had whirled and stood
before Dan, shielding him with outspread arms and facing Buck Daniels.
The latter thrust back into the holster the gun which he had drawn when
he entered the room.
"Stand away from him, Kate," he commanded, and his eyes went past her to
dwell on the face of Barry. "Stand away from him. It's been comin' for a
long time, and now it's here. Barry I'm takin' no start on you. Stand
away from the girl and pull your gun--and I'll pump you full of lead."
The softest of soft voices murmured behind her: "I been waitin' for you,
Buck, days and days and days. I ain't never been so glad to see
anybody!"
And she felt Barry slip shadowlike to one side. She sprang in front of
him again with a wild cry.
"Buck!" she begged, "don't shoot!"
Laughter, ringing and unhuman, filled the throat of Buck Daniels.
"Is it him you're beggin' for?" he sneered at her. "Is it him you got
your fears for? Ain't you got a word of pity for poor Buck Daniels that
sneaked off like a whipped puppy? Bah! Dan Barry, the time is come. I
been leadin' the life of a houn' dog for your sake. But it's ended. Pull
your gun and get out from behind the skirts of that girl!"
As long as they faced each other with the challenge in their eyes,
nothing on earth could avert the fight, she knew, but if she could delay
them for one moment--she felt that swift moving form behind her slipping
away from behind her--she could follow Barry's movements by the light in
Daniels' eyes.
"Buck!" she cried, "for God's sake--for my sake turn away from
him--and--roll another cigarette!"
For she remembered the story--how Daniels had turned under the very nose
of danger and done this insane thing in the saloon at Brownsville and in
her despair she could think of no other appeal.
It was the very strangeness of it that gave it point. Buck Daniels
turned on his heel.
"It's the last kindness I do you, Dan," he said, with his broad back to
them. "But before you die you got to know why I'm killin' you. I'm going
to roll one cigarette and smoke it and while I smoke it I'm goin' to
tell you the concentrated truth about your worthless self and when I'm
done smokin' I'm goin' to turn around and drop you where you stand.
D'ye hear?"
"They's no need of waitin'," answered the soft voice of Barry. "Talkin'
don't mean much."
But Kate Cumberland turned and faced him. He was fairly a-quiver with
eagerness and the hate welled and blazed and flickered in his eyes; his
face was pale--very pale--and it seemed to her that she could make out
in the pallor the print of the fingers of Buck Daniels and that blow
those many days before. And she feared him as she had never feared him
before--yet she blocked his way still with the outspread arms.
They could hear the crinkle of the cigarette paper as Buck rolled his
smoke.
"No," said Buck, his voice suddenly altered to an almost casual
moderation, "talk don't mean nothin' to you. Talk is human, and nothin'
human means nothin' to you. But I got to tell you why you ought to die,
Barry.
"I started out this mornin' hatin' the ground you walked on, but now I
see that they ain't no use to hate you. Is they any use hatin' a
mountain-lion that kills calves? No, you don't hate it, but you get a
gun and trail it and shoot it down. And that's the way with you."
They heard the scratch of his match.
"That's the way with you. I got my back to you right now because if I
looked you in the eye I couldn't let you live no more'n I could let a
mountain-lion live. I know you're faster with your gun than I am and
stronger than I am, and made to fight. But I know I'm going to kill you.
You've done your work--you've left hell on all sides of you--it's your
time to die. I know it! You been lyin' like a snake in the rocks with
your poison ready for any man that walks past you. Now your poison is
about used up."
He paused, and then when he spoke again there was a ring of exultation
in his voice: "I tell you, Dan, I don't fear you, and I know that the
bullet in this gun here on my hips is the one that's goin' to tear your
heart out. I _know_ it!"
Something like a sob came from the lips of Dan Barry. His hands moved
out towards Buck Daniels as though he were plucking something from the
empty air.
"You've said enough," he said. "You said plenty. Now turn around and
fight!"
And Kate Cumberland stepped back, out of line of the two. She knew that
in what followed she could not play the part of the protector or the
delayer. Here they stood, hungry, for battle, and there was no power in
her weak hands to separate them. She stood far back and fumbled with her
hands at the wall for support. She tried to close her eyes, but the
fascination of the horror forced her to watch against her strongest
will. And the chief part of that dreadful suspense lay in the even, calm
voice of Buck Daniels as he went on: "I'll turn around and fight soon
enough. But Kate asked me to smoke another cigarette. I know what she
means. She wants me to leave you the way I done in the saloon that day.
I ain't goin' to leave, Dan. But I'm glad she asked me to turn away,
because it gives me a chance to tell you some things you got to know
before you go west.
"Dan, you been like a fire that burns every hand that touches you." He
inhaled a long breath of smoke and blew it up towards the ceiling.
"You've busted the heart of the friend that follered you; you've busted
the heart of the girl that loves you."
He paused again, for another long inhalation, and Kate Cumberland,
staring in fearful suspense, waiting for the instant when Buck should at
last turn and when the shots should explode, saw that the yellow glow
was now somewhat misted in the eyes of Barry. He frowned, as one
bewildered.
"Think of her, Dan!" went on Buck Daniels. "Think of her wasting herself
on a no-good houn' dog like you--a no-good wild _wolf_! My God A'mighty,
she might of made some good man happy--some man with a soul and a
heart--but instead of that God sent you like a blast across her--you
with your damned soul of wind and your heart of stone! Think of it! When
you see what you been, Barry, I wonder you don't go out and take your
own gun and blow off your head."
"Buck," called Dan Barry, "so help me God, if you don't turn your face
to me--I'll shoot you through the back!"
"I knew," said the imperturbable Daniels, "that you'd come to that in
the end. You used to fight like a man, but now you're followin' your
instincts, and you fight like a huntin' wolf. Look at the brute that's
slinkin' up to me there! That's what you are. You kill for the sake of
killin'--like the beasts.
"If you was a man, could you treat me like you've done? Your damned cold
heart and your yaller eyes and all would of burned up in the barn the
other night--you and your wolf and your damned hoss. Why didn't I let
you burn? Because I was a fool. Because I still thought they was
something of the man in you. But I seen afterwards what you was, and I
rode off to get out of your way--to keep your hands from gettin' red
with my blood. And then you plan on follerin' me--damn you!--on
follerin' _me!_
"So that, Dan, is why I've come to put you out of the world--as I'm
goin' to do now! Once you hated to give pain, and if you hurt people it
was because you couldn't help it. But now you live on torturin' others.
Barry, pull your gun!"
And as he spoke, he whirled, the heavy revolver leaping into his hand.
Still Kate Cumberland could not close her eyes on the horror. She could
not even cry out; she was frozen.
But there was no report--no spurt of smoke--no form of a man stumbling
blindly towards death. Dan Barry stood with one hand pressed over his
eyes and the other dangled at his side, harmless, while he frowned in
bewilderment at the floor.
He said slowly, at length: "Buck, I kind of think you're right. They
ain't no use in me. I been rememberin', Buck, how you sent Kate to me
when I was sick."
There was a loud clatter; the revolver dropped from the hand of Buck
Daniels.
The musical voice of Dan Barry murmured again: "And I remember how you
stood up to Jim Silent, for my sake. Buck, what's come between us since
them days? You hit me a while back, and since then I been wantin' your
blood--but hearin' you talk now, somehow--I feel sort of lost and
lonesome--like I'd thrown somethin' away that I valued most."
Buck Daniels threw out his great arms and his voice was broken terribly.
"Oh, God A'mighty, Dan," he cried, "jest take one step back to me and
I'll come all the way around the world to meet you!"
He stumbled across the floor and grasped at the hand of Barry, for a
mist had half-blinded his eyes.
"Dan," he pleaded, "ain't things as they once was? D'you forgive me?"
"Why, Buck," murmured Dan Barry, in that same bewildered fashion, "seems
like we was bunkies once."
"Dan," muttered Buck Daniels, choking, "Dan----" but he dared not trust
his voice further, and turning, he fairly fled from the room.
The dazed eyes of Dan Barry followed him. Then they moved until they
encountered the face of Kate Cumberland. A shock, as if of surprise,
widened the lids. For a long moment they stared in silence, and then he
began to walk, very slowly, a step at a time, towards the girl. Now, as
he faced her, she saw that there was no longer a hint of the yellow in
his eyes, but he stepped closer and closer; he was right before her,
watching her with an expression of mute suffering that made her heart
grow large.
He said, more to himself than to her: "Seems like I been away a long
time."
"A very long time," she whispered.
He drew a great breath.
"Is it true, what Buck said? About you?"
"Oh, my dear, my dear!" she cried. "Don't you see?"
He started a little, and taking both her hands he made her face the dull
light from the windows.
"Seems like you're kind of pale, Kate."
"The colour went while I waited for you, Dan."
"But there comes a touch of red--like morning--in your throat, and
runnin' up your cheeks."
"Don't you see? It's because you've come back!"
He closed his eyes and murmured: "I remember we was close--closer than
this. We were sittin' here--in this room--by a fire. And then something
called me out and I follered it."
"The wild geese--yes."
"Wild geese?" he repeated blankly, and then shook his head. "How could
wild geese call me? But things happened. I was kept away. Sometimes I
wanted to come back to you, but somehow I could never get started. Was
it ten years ago that I left?"
"Months--months longer than years."
"What is it?" he asked. "I been watchin' you, and waitin' to find out
what was different in you. Black Bart seen something in you. I dunno
what. Today I sort of guessed what it is. I can feel it now. It's
something like a pain. It starts sort of in the stomach, Kate. It's like
bein' away from a place where you want to be. Queer, ain't it? I ain't
far from you. I've got your hands in mine, but somehow you don't feel
near. I want to walk--a long ways--closer. And the pain keeps growin'."
His voice fell away to a murmur, and now a deadly silence lay between
them, and it seemed as if lights were varying upon their faces, so swift
and subtle were the changes of expression. And they drew closer by
imperceptible degrees. So his arms, fumbling, found their away about
her, drew her closer, till her head drooped back, and her face was close
beneath his.
"Was it true," he whispered, "what Buck said?"
"There's nothing true except that we're together."
"But your eyes are brimful of tears!"
"The same pain you feel, Dan; the same loneliness and the hurt."
"But it's going now. I feel as if I'd been riding three days without
more'n enough water to moisten my tongue every hour; with the sand white
hot, and my hoss staggerin', and the sun droppin' closer and closer till
the mountains are touched with white fire. Then I come, in the evenin',
to a valley with cool shadows beginning to slip across from the western
side, and I stand in the shadow and feel the red-hot blood go smashin',
smashin', smashin' in my temples--and then--a sound of runnin' water
somewhere up the hill-side. Runnin', cool, fresh, sparkling water
whispering over the rocks. Ah, God, that's what it means to me to stand
here close to you, Kate!
"And it's like standin' up in the mornin' on the top of a high hill and
seein' the light jump up quick in the east, and there lies all the world
at my feet, mile after mile of it--they's a river like silver away off
yonder--and they's range after range walkin' off into a blue nothing.
That's what it's like to stand here and look down into them blue eyes of
yours, Kate--miles and miles into 'em, till I feel as if I seen your
heart beneath. And they's the rose of the mornin' on your cheeks, and
the breath of the mornin' stirrin' between your lips, and the light of
the risin' sun comes flarin' in your eyes. And I own the world--I own
the world.'
"Two burnin' pieces of wood, that's you and me, and when I was away from
you the fire went down to a smoulder; but now that we're close a wind
hits us, and the flames come together and rise and jump and twine
together. Two pieces of burnin' wood, but only one flame--d'you feel
it?--Oh, Kate, our bodies is ashes and dust, and all that's worth while
is that flame blowin' up from us, settin' the world on fire!"