As has been related, Thady Shea somewhat vaguely set out upon the way to
Magdalena, after disposing of his shoeless flivver and its snoring load.
The dawn came up and found him plodding onward. An hour later he was
hailed from the roadside by a venerable ancient having one very blue eye
and a long white beard. This worthy proved to be a tramp printer, who
intended to get work at Magdalena when his money gave out.
For the present, however, the ancient had no intention of working; so he
proposed a road partnership, stating that he liked Shea's looks. Thady
Shea wanted to sleep, which "Dad" Griffith, as the ancient was named,
deemed a highly laudable ambition.
Accordingly, a little while afterward, Shea found himself snugly
ensconced in a camp well back from the road and well hidden in a clump
of trees. Before sleeping, he explored his pockets and found some money,
left from the sum given him by Mrs. Crump for his Zacaton City
purchases.
"Take it, friend," he said, drowsily, thrusting the money upon the
ancient. "Take it, and add it to thy scanty store, that so we may have
wherewithal to live."
"You bet I will, partner," and Dad Griffith seized it. "It'll keep us
quite a spell, with what I got. No sense workin', I says, when they's no
need. I figger on gettin' a job to Magdalena when I got to work. I had a
job there two year ago. These here goshly-gorful linotypes is puttin'
honest printers out o' business. Why, I seen th' day----"
In the midst of a dissertation upon the elegancies of hand-set type and
the blasted frightfulness of an existence surrounded by linotype
machines, Shea stretched out and fell asleep. The ancient droned along,
regardless. When Shea wakened toward sunset, old Griffith was still
discoursing upon the same topic.
Over a tiny smokeless fire Griffith conjured biscuits, coffee, and
beans, and the two men ate. Thady Shea probed his companion's mind for
future plans, and found only a vague emptiness; the ancient liked to
spend each night in a different spot, that was all. Thady Shea proposed,
with pursuit in mind, that it might be better to camp during the day and
to tramp at night.
At this suggestion the ancient winked his one intensely blue eye. He
winked with the uncanny gusto of an old man, with the horrible
craftiness of an old man. His one eye winked, and the ancient was
transformed. He became an emblem of doddering truancy, a living symbol
of the soul which desires ever to flee responsibilities and to shirk the
onus of labour inherited from Father Adam.
"Suits me, pardner. I used to do that over in Missouri, one time, 'count
of a hawg bein' missed from a pen. Anyhow, these nights is too cold to
sleep 'thout blankets, which mine ain't extra good.
"Still, a spry young feller like you, Thady, ought to have more get up
an' get to him than to be gettin' in a mess o' trouble. Take a
goshly-gorful old ranger like me, and it's all right; I'm a sinful man,
an' proud of it. But you, now--you'd ought to be aimin' for something. I
know, I do! That's the trouble with folks; ain't got no aim ahead. But
no use talkin'. You got your reasons, I reckon."
Thady Shea sat and stared into the fire. He did not take the hint to
retail his story. He was suddenly thinking.
Memory worked within him. "It ain't lack of ambition that makes folks
mis'able and unsatisfied; it's lack o' purpose!" Mrs. Crump had said
those words, and they had been burned into Shea's brain. Purpose,
indeed! What purpose now lay ahead, except the vague desire to
rehabilitate himself? To become a vagrant with this tramp printer--why,
this would be to shake off all the shackles of purpose! Yet, what else
was there to do? What could be done, except to evade the law which by
this time must be seeking him?
His head drooped. Was some higher Power extending its hand against him,
closing every avenue of escape from his old drifting existence, forcing
him back into vagrancy? His eyes widened under the thought. The thought
staggered him. Then, slowly, his mouth tightened, his wide lips drew
firmly clenched. A flush of fever darkened his high cheekbones.
Very well; he would go on fighting! For once the superstitious nature of
the man was borne down by his inward anger, was borne down by the
impotent feeling that he was a pawn in Destiny's game; he rebelled
against it. He rebelled against everything.
"By heaven, I'll _make_ a purpose!" he mentally vowed. "I'll look for
one--find one--fight for one!"
Even as the words rose in him, he choked down a vague feeling that they
were false and erroneous, a feeling that this purpose could not be
sought, but must seek him out, must come to him of itself. Yet he choked
down the feeling, repulsed it. He reiterated his mental vow, fiercely
insistent upon it.
All this while the ancient had been droning something about the beauties
of the old flat-bed presses, and the goshly-gorfulness of machine
printing. Now Shea became aware of a more personal note in the droning.
"If I was you," and the ancient chuckled in his dirty white beard,
transfixing Thady Shea with his one bright-blue eye, "if I was you, I'd
grow whiskers!
"They's places and places I can't never go no more without these here
whiskers. Yes, they is! I'm a sinful man an' proud of it; mebbe ye think
I'm old, but I can show you young fellers a thing or two, he, he! Grow
whiskers, Thady. You can take 'em with ye to go a-sinning, and then go
back over the same trail without 'em, and nobody the wiser!"
Shea's gorge rose. He suddenly saw Dad Griffith as the latter really
was--a foul old man, a worthless wastrel of humanity, seemingly dead to
all higher things. He grew afraid for himself; he was vaguely alarmed,
as though he had touched some slimy, crawling thing in the darkness. He
came to his feet with an impellent desire to crush this unholy man like
a toad, to flee into the night, to lie under the stars and seek
clearance for his troubles. However, he did none of these things. Shea
reached for his pipe, filled it, lighted it with an ember from the fire.
Here he got a new sensation--the tang and sweetness of an ember-lighted
pipe!
"Let's be moving," said Thady Shea, crisply. "It's a fine night."
An hour later they were plodding along, sharing the load of provisions.
Thady Shea was quite aware that something was wrong with him in the
body, but he felt no definite pain. It was an errant "something" which
he could not place, and which he was too uplifted in spirit to heed.
The night wore on. With every step, Thady Shea was learning from the
lore of Dad Griffith. He was learning the worldly wise lore of the
roads--to walk with straight feet, to carry his body uphill on bended
knees, to take the high side of a wet trail. The ancient talked
continually, eternally. The ancient seemed to like Thady Shea immensely.
Some time after midnight they left the road by a faint and unknown
trail, followed it until they were weary, and then camped. Griffith had
a pair of tattered blankets. Thady Shea refused to share them; he slept
in his clothes. When he wakened at sunrise his head was heavy with
fever. A mile distant the ancient descried a creek, and they moved over
to it for the day. Thady Shea felt peculiar, and detailed his symptoms,
whereupon the ancient produced a tattered little case of leather. He
opened the case and disclosed three vials.
"All the med'cine a man needs, I claim," he declared. "Middle one's
quinine; right's physic; left's physic again, only more so. Take your
choice, one or all!"
"Give me the more so," said Thady, who felt miserable in the extreme.
The ancient began to look alarmed. His one intensely blue eye shone with
an uneasy light. His continual talk became querulous. After a time he
forced Thady Shea to continue their progress; the trail, said he, must
lead them to a ranch. Groaning, Shea protested; but presently he yielded
to the urgings of Griffith. The two men followed the trail.
There was a man named Fred Ross, who had homesteaded a canon in the
hills beyond the Datils. Thus far unmarried, although he had his hopes,
he lived alone; a hard, rough man, kindly at heart, redly wrinkled of
face, and keenly alert of eye, he shot beaver and turkey when the forest
rangers were not around, and fared well. Indeed, he was wont to say that
he was the last man in the United States to know the taste of that
succulent morsel, a beaver's tail.
Fred Ross was plowing on the flat behind his shack when he observed the
approach of a tattered old man who moved in trembling haste. Having no
liking for tramps, Ross set his hands on his hips and met the visitor
with a vigilant eye.
"Well?" he snapped. "Who in time are _you_?"
"Don't matter 'bout me, mister," said the other, agitatedly pawing a
long and dirty white beard. "A friend o' mine is down the canon a ways,
plumb petered out. He was took sick last night--I reckon he's got a
touch o' fever. D'you s'pose you could let him lay somewheres--mebbe in
that cowshed yonder?"
"You be damned, you old fool," said Ross, harshly. "I ain't got no room
for sick men in my shed--which ain't no cowshed, neither. Where is he?"
"He--he give out by them trees," faltered Dad Griffith, backing away. "I
got a little money, mister----"
"You be blistered, you an' your money!" roared Ross. "I don't want no
tramps around here, savvy? I got trouble of my own. Let's have a look at
this friend o' yours--if you-all are tryin' any skin game on _me_, look
out!"
He strode forward, and Dad Griffith fluttered away. After him strode
Ross. Ten minutes later they came to the gaunt figure of Thady Shea
lying beneath some scrub oaks and muttering faintly. Ross leaned over
him then straightened up and faced the ancient.
"You--on your way!" he said, roughly, "I'll take care o' this feller,
but I don't aim to keep two of ye."
"Devil take ye, I don't want none of ye!" quavered Griffith in querulous
anger. "I'm goin' to Magdalena to get me a job; you tell him so when he
can travel, ye goshly-gorful old ranch hand!"
Disdaining a response, Ross stooped; after some effort, he got Thady
Shea in the "fireman's grip" and staggered erect, the delirious man
still muttering. He turned and walked toward his shack, striding heavily
under the burden. Dad Griffith hesitated, then wagged his beard--he did
not deem it wise to follow.
"Hey!" he lifted his voice after the departing rancher. "You be good to
him, hear me? Mind my words, if ye ain't good to him I'll--I'll come
back and burn ye out some night!"
Ross paid no heed but strode on out of sight. Dad Griffith shook his
fist in senile rage, then slowly, and with a sigh, turned about and
started in the opposite direction.
The shack which Ross had built, anticipating matrimony, was a two-room
affair with a lean-to kitchen. Grunting beneath his load, Ross stooped
into the house and deposited Thady Shea upon an iron bed.
Ross came erect, panting, and stared down at Shea's fever-flushed
features. He scratched his head, as though in perplexity, and his eyes
were suddenly very kindly.
"Poor devil!" he said, being a man who talked much to himself. "Poor
devil! Got a real good face, too. What in time can I do? The car's broke
down and there's no doctor closer'n Magdalena anyhow. Well, I never
knowed whiskey to fail curin' any trouble, and I guess a bit o' quinine
will help out. Thank the Lord I got whiskey to burn!"
He went to a cupboard in the corner and drew forth a wicker demijohn, a
new demijohn, a demijohn that hung heavy in his hand. Upon the chair
beside the bed he put a big crockery cup, thick and heavy. He poured
whiskey into it; he filled it nearly to the brim with raw red liquor; a
ray of sunlight fell upon the cup and made it seem filled with rich thin
blood.
"Just for a starter," murmured Ross. "Now the quinine."
The hours passed, and darkness fell. Ross went out to stable and bed
down his team. He came back, ate, resumed his vigil.
Ross was starkly amazed by his muttering patient. Cup upon cup of
whiskey and quinine he poured down the gaunt man's throat; the man drank
it like water, avidly, without visible effect. He seemed to soak up the
raw red liquid as a sponge soaks up water. It seeped down his throat and
was gone.
"My Lord!" exclaimed Ross at last, awed despite himself. "The man ain't
human!"
Thady Shea was human; although invisible, the effect was there. Through
the hours of darkness his sonorous voice rose and filled the shack. He
spoke of things past the understanding of the watching Ross. He used
strange names--names like Ophelia or Rosalind or Desdemona; at times
passion shook his voice, a fury of resonant passion; at times his words
trembled with grief, his rolling words quavered and surged with a
vehemently agonized utterance, until the listening Ross felt a vague
ache wrenched into his own throat.
About midnight, Thady Shea fell asleep. It was a deep, full slumber, a
slumber of stertorous breathing, a sound and absolute slumber, a drunken
slumber. Thady Shea lay motionless except for his deeply heaving chest.
His hands, face, and body were glistening wet, were wet with
perspiration that streamed from him, were wet with salty sweat oozing
from his fever-baked flesh. Fred Ross turned out the lamp and climbed
into a bunk in the corner.
"That ends it," he said, drowsily. "He'll sweat out the fever and sleep
off the whiskey, and wake up cured. Can't beat whiskey! Cures
everything!"
Upon the following morning Ross returned from his chores to find Thady
Shea still lustily snoring, the fever gone. He got breakfast and
departed to his work, leaving the coffee ready to hand. From time to
time he came in from the nearer end of the flat to inspect his patient.
He was a big man, a rough-tongued man, a deep-hearted man.
Thady Shea wakened to an uncomfortable sensation. He dimly and vaguely
recognized the sensation; he was bewildered and frightened by it. He had
felt that uncomfortable sensation many times in his life, always on the
morning after a night spent with the jorum.
He tried to sit up, and succeeded, only to close his eyes before a
blinding wave of pain. A headache? It went with the other symptoms, of
course. He had no remembrance of drinking. Indeed, he had a fierce
remembrance of having meant never to drink again. Where was he and how
had he come here? His last memory was of trees, and the ancient helping
him as he sank down. He looked around; the strange room bewildered him.
He was maddeningly conscious that his body, his soul, his whole being,
was a soaked and impregnated thing, soaked and impregnated with whiskey.
His body cried out for more whiskey, his soul writhed within him for
more whiskey. His haggard gaze fell upon a cup, on a chair at his
bedside. He reached out and picked up the cup. It was half full of
bitter whiskey, and a bottle of powdered quinine explained the
bitterness.
Even then, Shea hesitated. He hesitated, but he could not resist. No
living man could have resisted the fearful outcry of body and soul upon
such an awakening. It was no mere craving. It was a tumultuous, riotous,
lawless eagerness--a fierceness for whiskey, an awful tormenting passion
for whiskey such as he had never before known. That was because of the
flood that had seeped and soaked through his whole being. The raw red
liquor like thin blood had permeated all his body tissues and nerves, as
water permeates the sun-dried earth, leaving it not the hard white earth
but the brown soft mud. The earth dries again and cracks open, calling
avidly for more water. So with Thady Shea's body and soul.
He drank gulpingly, until the cup was empty. He sat down the cup; it was
a heavy cup of thick crockery. His nostrils quivered to the smell of
coffee. He began to take in his surroundings, to realize them, to
appraise them. He began to understand that he must have been drunk.
Drunk! Who was responsible?
A shadow darkened the morning sunlight in the doorway. There on the
threshold, a black blotch against the brightness outside, stood Fred
Ross, staring at the man who sat on the edge of the bed and stared back
at him. Shea saw only a man--the man responsible.
"Did you----" He paused, licked his lips, and continued thickly. "Did
you give me whiskey? Did you?"
Ross stepped into the room.
"Yes, I did," he began, roughly. He did not finish.
Something shot from the bedside, something large and thick, something
white and heavy, that left the hand of Thady Shea like a bullet. It was
the thick, heavy crockery cup. Shea flung it blindly. It struck Ross
over the ear with a "_whick!_"
Fred Ross looked vaguely surprised. His knees appeared to give way
beneath him. He caught at the table and seemed to swing himself forward,
half around. He fell, and lay without moving. The heavy white crockery
cup, unhurt by the impact, rolled in the doorway.
Relaxing on the edge of the bed, Thady Shea gave no more attention to
Fred Ross, but lowered his face in his two hands. They were big, strong
hands; they clutched into his hair and skin until their knuckles stood
out white. Shea sat motionless, thus, as though he were trying to
produce some exterior which would quell the anguish within him.
His voice rang with a sonorous bitterness as he spoke aloud. The
recumbent Ross moved, then sat up with a lithe, agile motion; but Thady
Shea did not stir. He was lost in the words that seemed wrung from his
very soul.
"I've tried, I've tried! How have I been weak, how have I failed? Yet I
have failed. I've been drunk. I always fail."
His speech was heavy, slow, words coming tenuously to his numbed brain.
He did not hear the slight sound made by Ross in rising erect, in
stepping to the wall. He did not see Ross at all, nor the hand of Ross
that plucked a revolver from a holster suspended on the wall. He spoke
again, the words coming with more coherence.
"Always an unseen hand blocks me. Is it your doing, oh, God? Before, it
was my own fault, for I was weak. This time it was not my fault; I knew
nothing about it. God, are You trying to turn me back into the old
shiftless life, into the old vagabond, aimless existence? God, are You
trying to make me a drunkard again? Are You trying to rob me of all
purpose?"
He paused. The breath came from his lungs; it was a deep and uneven
breath, a sobbing breath, the breath of one who is fast in the grip of
terrible emotion. At him stood and stared Ross. Inch by inch the
revolver lowered. The keen, alert, battling eyes of the rancher were
filled with perplexity, with comprehension, with a strange gentleness.
Again Shea spoke, his face still in his hands:
"I've done my best, God knows! I've put whiskey out of my life, stifled
the craving for it, forgotten about it. And now--now! Why is it that
even this one purpose is denied me? Is there no help--is there no help?
Is there no help for----"
His fingers clenched upon his iron-gray hair, swept through it. His head
came up. His blazing black eyes stared into the gaze of Ross. For half a
moment the two men looked at each other, motionless.
Then, abruptly, Ross pushed home the revolver into its holster.
"Pardner," he said, casually, "let's have a cup o' coffee."
He went to the stove in the kitchen, raked up charred black brands,
opened the draft, and put the coffeepot over the kindling embers. He set
two thick crockery cups upon the boards of the table. He got out spoons
and sugar and "canned cow." Then he turned to the other room and with a
jerk of the head invited his guest.
Thady Shea rose, very unsteadily, and came.