A chill, gray, somber dawn was breaking when Ellen dragged herself into
the cabin and crept under her blankets, there to sleep the sleep of
exhaustion.
When she awoke the hour appeared to be late afternoon. Sun and sky
shone through the sunken and decayed roof of the old cabin. Her uncle,
Tad Jorth, lay upon a blanket bed upheld by a crude couch of boughs.
The light fell upon his face, pale, lined, cast in a still mold of
suffering. He was not dead, for she heard his respiration.
The floor underneath Ellen’s blankets was bare clay. She and Jorth
were alone in this cabin. It contained nothing besides their beds and
a rank growth of weeds along the decayed lower logs. Half of the cabin
had a rude ceiling of rough-hewn boards which formed a kind of loft.
This attic extended through to the adjoining cabin, forming the ceiling
of the porch-like space between the two structures. There was no
partition. A ladder of two aspen saplings, pegged to the logs, and
with braces between for steps, led up to the attic.
Ellen smelled wood smoke and the odor of frying meat, and she heard the
voices of men. She looked out to see that Slater and Somers had joined
their party—an addition that might have strengthened it for defense,
but did not lend her own situation anything favorable. Somers had
always appeared the one best to avoid.
Colter espied her and called her to “Come an’ feed your pale face.” His
comrades laughed, not loudly, but guardedly, as if noise was something
to avoid. Nevertheless, they awoke Tad Jorth, who began to toss and
moan on the bed.
Ellen hurried to his side and at once ascertained that he had a high
fever and was in a critical condition. Every time he tossed he opened
a wound in his right breast, rather high up. For all she could see,
nothing had been done for him except the binding of a scarf round his
neck and under his arm. This scant bandage had worked loose. Going to
the door, she called out:
“Fetch me some water.” When Colter brought it, Ellen was rummaging in
her pack for some clothing or towel that she could use for bandages.
“Weren’t any of y’u decent enough to look after my uncle?” she queried.
“Huh! Wal, what the hell!” rejoined Colter. “We shore did all we
could. I reckon y’u think it wasn’t a tough job to pack him up the Rim.
He was done for then an’ I said so.”
“I’ll do all I can for him,” said Ellen.
“Shore. Go ahaid. When I get plugged or knifed by that half-breed I
shore hope y’u’ll be round to nurse me.”
“Y’u seem to be pretty shore of your fate, Colter.”
“Shore as hell!” he bit out, darkly. “Somers saw Isbel an’ his gang
trailin’ us to the Jorth ranch.”
“Are y’u goin’ to stay heah—an’ wait for them?”
“Shore I’ve been quarrelin’ with the fellars out there over that very
question. I’m for leavin’ the country. But Queen, the damn gun
fighter, is daid set to kill that cowman, Blue, who swore he was King
Fisher, the old Texas outlaw. None but Queen are spoilin’ for another
fight. All the same they won’t leave Tad Jorth heah alone.”
Then Colter leaned in at the door and whispered: “Ellen, I cain’t boss
this outfit. So let’s y’u an’ me shake ’em. I’ve got your dad’s gold.
Let’s ride off to-night an’ shake this country.”
Colter, muttering under his breath, left the door and returned to his
comrades. Ellen had received her first intimation of his cowardice;
and his mention of her father’s gold started a train of thought that
persisted in spite of her efforts to put all her mind to attending her
uncle. He grew conscious enough to recognize her working over him, and
thanked her with a look that touched Ellen deeply. It changed the
direction of her mind. His suffering and imminent death, which she was
able to alleviate and retard somewhat, worked upon her pity and
compassion so that she forgot her own plight. Half the night she was
tending him, cooling his fever, holding him quiet. Well she realized
that but for her ministrations he would have died. At length he went
to sleep.
And Ellen, sitting beside him in the lonely, silent darkness of that
late hour, received again the intimation of nature, those vague and
nameless stirrings of her innermost being, those whisperings out of the
night and the forest and the sky. Something great would not let go of
her soul. She pondered.
Attention to the wounded man occupied Ellen; and soon she redoubled her
activities in this regard, finding in them something of protection
against Colter.
He had waylaid her as she went to a spring for water, and with a lunge
like that of a bear he had tried to embrace her. But Ellen had been
too quick.
“Wal, are y’u goin’ away with me?” he demanded.
“No. I’ll stick by my uncle,” she replied.
That motive of hers seemed to obstruct his will. Ellen was keen to see
that Colter and his comrades were at a last stand and disintegrating
under a severe strain. Nerve and courage of the open and the wild they
possessed, but only in a limited degree. Colter seemed obsessed by his
passion for her, and though Ellen in her stubborn pride did not yet
fear him, she realized she ought to. After that incident she watched
closely, never leaving her uncle’s bedside except when Colter was
absent. One or more of the men kept constant lookout somewhere down
the canyon.
Day after day passed on the wings of suspense, of watching, of
ministering to her uncle, of waiting for some hour that seemed fixed.
Colter was like a hound upon her trail. At every turn he was there to
importune her to run off with him, to frighten her with the menace of
the Isbels, to beg her to give herself to him. It came to pass that
the only relief she had was when she ate with the men or barred the
cabin door at night. Not much relief, however, was there in the shut
and barred door. With one thrust of his powerful arm Colter could have
caved it in. He knew this as well as Ellen. Still she did not have
the fear she should have had. There was her rifle beside her, and
though she did not allow her mind to run darkly on its possible use,
still the fact of its being there at hand somehow strengthened her.
Colter was a cat playing with a mouse, but not yet sure of his quarry.
Ellen came to know hours when she was weak—weak physically, mentally,
spiritually, morally—when under the sheer weight of this frightful and
growing burden of suspense she was not capable of fighting her misery,
her abasement, her low ebb of vitality, and at the same time wholly
withstanding Colter’s advances.
He would come into the cabin and, utterly indifferent to Tad Jorth, he
would try to make bold and unrestrained love to Ellen. When he caught
her in one of her unresisting moments and was able to hold her in his
arms and kiss her he seemed to be beside himself with the wonder of
her. At such moments, if he had any softness or gentleness in him,
they expressed themselves in his sooner or later letting her go, when
apparently she was about to faint. So it must have become
fascinatingly fixed in Colter’s mind that at times Ellen repulsed him
with scorn and at others could not resist him.
Ellen had escaped two crises in her relation with this man, and as a
morbid doubt, like a poisonous fungus, began to strangle her mind, she
instinctively divined that there was an approaching and final crisis.
No uplift of her spirit came this time—no intimations—no whisperings.
How horrible it all was! To long to be good and noble—to realize that
she was neither—to sink lower day by day! Must she decay there like
one of these rotting logs? Worst of all, then, was the insinuating and
ever-growing hopelessness. What was the use? What did it matter? Who
would ever think of Ellen Jorth? “O God!” she whispered in her
distraction, “is there nothing left—nothing at all?”
A period of several days of less torment to Ellen followed. Her uncle
apparently took a turn for the better and Colter let her alone. This
last circumstance nonplused Ellen. She was at a loss to understand it
unless the Isbel menace now encroached upon Colter so formidably that
he had forgotten her for the present.
Then one bright August morning, when she had just begun to relax her
eternal vigilance and breathe without oppression, Colter encountered
her and, darkly silent and fierce, he grasped her and drew her off her
feet. Ellen struggled violently, but the total surprise had deprived
her of strength. And that paralyzing weakness assailed her as never
before. Without apparent effort Colter carried her, striding rapidly
away from the cabins into the border of spruce trees at the foot of the
canyon wall.
“Colter—where—oh, where are Y’u takin’ me?” she found voice to cry
out.
“By God! I don’t know,” he replied, with strong, vibrant passion. “I
was a fool not to carry y’u off long ago. But I waited. I was hopin’
y’u’d love me!... An’ now that Isbel gang has corralled us. Somers
seen the half-breed up on the rocks. An’ Springer seen the rest of
them sneakin’ around. I run back after my horse an’ y’u.”
“But Uncle Tad!... We mustn’t leave him alone,” cried Ellen.
“We’ve got to,” replied Colter, grimly. “Tad shore won’t worry y’u no
more—soon as Jean Isbel gets to him.”
“Oh, let me stay,” implored Ellen. “I will save him.”
Colter laughed at the utter absurdity of her appeal and claim. Suddenly
he set her down upon her feet. “Stand still,” he ordered. Ellen saw
his big bay horse, saddled, with pack and blanket, tied there in the
shade of a spruce. With swift hands Colter untied him and mounted him,
scarcely moving his piercing gaze from Ellen. He reached to grasp her.
“Up with y’u!... Put your foot in the stirrup!” His will, like his
powerful arm, was irresistible for Ellen at that moment. She found
herself swung up behind him. Then the horse plunged away. What with
the hard motion and Colter’s iron grasp on her Ellen was in a painful
position. Her knees and feet came into violent contact with branches
and snags. He galloped the horse, tearing through the dense thicket of
willows that served to hide the entrance to the side canyon, and when
out in the larger and more open canyon he urged him to a run.
Presently when Colter put the horse to a slow rise of ground, thereby
bringing him to a walk, it was just in time to save Ellen a serious
bruising. Again the sunlight appeared to shade over. They were in the
pines. Suddenly with backward lunge Colter halted the horse. Ellen
heard a yell. She recognized Queen’s voice.
“Turn back, Colter! Turn back!”
With an oath Colter wheeled his mount. “If I didn’t run plump into
them,” he ejaculated, harshly. And scarcely had the goaded horse
gotten a start when a shot rang out. Ellen felt a violent shock, as if
her momentum had suddenly met with a check, and then she felt herself
wrenched from Colter, from the saddle, and propelled into the air. She
alighted on soft ground and thick grass, and was unhurt save for the
violent wrench and shaking that had rendered her breathless. Before
she could rise Colter was pulling at her, lifting her to her feet. She
saw the horse lying with bloody head. Tall pines loomed all around.
Another rifle cracked. “Run!” hissed Colter, and he bounded off,
dragging her by the hand. Another yell pealed out. “Here we are,
Colter!”. Again it was Queen’s shrill voice. Ellen ran with all her
might, her heart in her throat, her sight failing to record more than a
blur of passing pines and a blank green wall of spruce. Then she lost
her balance, was falling, yet could not fall because of that steel grip
on her hand, and was dragged, and finally carried, into a dense shade.
She was blinded. The trees whirled and faded. Voices and shots
sounded far away. Then something black seemed to be wiped across her
feeling.
It turned to gray, to moving blankness, to dim, hazy objects, spectral
and tall, like blanketed trees, and when Ellen fully recovered
consciousness she was being carried through the forest.
“Wal, little one, that was a close shave for y’u,” said Colter’s hard
voice, growing clearer. “Reckon your keelin’ over was natural enough.”
He held her lightly in both arms, her head resting above his left
elbow. Ellen saw his face as a gray blur, then taking sharper outline,
until it stood out distinctly, pale and clammy, with eyes cold and
wonderful in their intense flare. As she gazed upward Colter turned
his head to look back through the woods, and his motion betrayed a
keen, wild vigilance. The veins of his lean, brown neck stood out like
whipcords. Two comrades were stalking beside him. Ellen heard their
stealthy steps, and she felt Colter sheer from one side or the other.
They were proceeding cautiously, fearful of the rear, but not wholly
trusting to the fore.
“Reckon we’d better go slow an’ look before we leap,” said one whose
voice Ellen recognized as Springer’s.
“Shore. That open slope ain’t to my likin’, with our Nez Perce friend
prowlin’ round,” drawled Colter, as he set Ellen down on her feet.
Another of the rustlers laughed. “Say, can’t he twinkle through the
forest? I had four shots at him. Harder to hit than a turkey runnin’
crossways.”
This facetious speaker was the evil-visaged, sardonic Somers. He
carried two rifles and wore two belts of cartridges.
“Ellen, shore y’u ain’t so daid white as y’u was,” observed Colter, and
he chucked her under the chin with familiar hand. “Set down heah. I
don’t want y’u stoppin’ any bullets. An’ there’s no tellin’.”
Ellen was glad to comply with his wish. She had begun to recover wits
and strength, yet she still felt shaky. She observed that their
position then was on the edge of a well-wooded slope from which she
could see the grassy canyon floor below. They were on a level bench,
projecting out from the main canyon wall that loomed gray and rugged
and pine fringed. Somers and Cotter and Springer gave careful attention
to all points of the compass, especially in the direction from which
they had come. They evidently anticipated being trailed or circled or
headed off, but did not manifest much concern. Somers lit a cigarette;
Springer wiped his face with a grimy hand and counted the shells in his
belt, which appeared to be half empty. Colter stretched his long neck
like a vulture and peered down the slope and through the aisles of the
forest up toward the canyon rim.
“Listen!” he said, tersely, and bent his head a little to one side, ear
to the slight breeze.
They all listened. Ellen heard the beating of her heart, the rustle of
leaves, the tapping of a woodpecker, and faint, remote sounds that she
could not name.
“Deer, I reckon,” spoke up Somers.
“Ahuh! Wal, I reckon they ain’t trailin’ us yet,” replied Colter. “We
gave them a shade better ’n they sent us.”
“Short an’ sweet!” ejaculated Springer, and he removed his black
sombrero to poke a dirty forefinger through a buffet hole in the crown.
“Thet’s how close I come to cashin’. I was lyin’ behind a log,
listenin’ an’ watchin’, an’ when I stuck my head up a little—zam!
Somebody made my bonnet leak.”
“Where’s Queen?” asked Colter.
“He was with me fust off,” replied Somers. “An’ then when the shootin’
slacked—after I’d plugged thet big, red-faced, white-haired pal of
Isbel’s—”
“Reckon thet was Blaisdell,” interrupted Springer.
“Queen—he got tired layin’ low,” went on Somers. “He wanted action. I
heerd him chewin’ to himself, an’ when I asked him what was eatin’ him
he up an’ growled he was goin’ to quit this Injun fightin’. An’ he
slipped off in the woods.”
“Wal, that’s the gun fighter of it,” declared Colter, wagging his head,
“Ever since that cowman, Blue, braced us an’ said he was King Fisher,
why Queen has been sulkier an’ sulkier. He cain’t help it. He’ll do
the same trick as Blue tried. An’ shore he’ll get his everlastin’. But
he’s the Texas breed all right.”
“Say, do you reckon Blue really is King Fisher?” queried Somers.
“Naw!” ejaculated Colter, with downward sweep of his hand. “Many a
would-be gun slinger has borrowed Fisher’s name. But Fisher is daid
these many years.”
“Ahuh! Wal, mebbe, but don’t you fergit it—thet Blue was no
would-be,” declared Somers. “He was the genuine article.”
“I should smile!” affirmed Springer.
The subject irritated Colter, and he dismissed it with another forcible
gesture and a counter question.
“How many left in that Isbel outfit?”
“No tellin’. There shore was enough of them,” replied Somers.
“Anyhow, the woods was full of flyin’ bullets.... Springer, did you
account for any of them?”
“Nope—not thet I noticed,” responded Springer, dryly. “I had my
chance at the half-breed.... Reckon I was nervous.”
“Was Slater near you when he yelled out?”
“No. He was lyin’ beside Somers.”
“Wasn’t thet a queer way fer a man to act?” broke in Somers. “A bullet
hit Slater, cut him down the back as he was lyin’ flat. Reckon it
wasn’t bad. But it hurt him so thet he jumped right up an’ staggered
around. He made a target big as a tree. An’ mebbe them Isbels didn’t
riddle him!”
“That was when I got my crack at Bill Isbel,” declared Colter, with
grim satisfaction. “When they shot my horse out from under me I had
Ellen to think of an’ couldn’t get my rifle. Shore had to run, as yu
seen. Wal, as I only had my six-shooter, there was nothin’ for me to
do but lay low an’ listen to the sping of lead. Wells was standin’ up
behind a tree about thirty yards off. He got plugged, an’ fallin’ over
he began to crawl my way, still holdin’ to his rifle. I crawled along
the log to meet him. But he dropped aboot half-way. I went on an’
took his rifle an’ belt. When I peeped out from behind a spruce bush
then I seen Bill Isbel. He was shootin’ fast, an’ all of them was
shootin’ fast. That war, when they had the open shot at Slater....
Wal, I bored Bill Isbel right through his middle. He dropped his rifle
an’, all bent double, he fooled around in a circle till he flopped over
the Rim. I reckon he’s layin’ right up there somewhere below that daid
spruce. I’d shore like to see him.”
“I Wal, you’d be as crazy as Queen if you tried thet,” declared Somers.
“We’re not out of the woods yet.”
“I reckon not,” replied Colter. “An’ I’ve lost my horse. Where’d y’u
leave yours?”
“They’re down the canyon, below thet willow brake. An’ saddled an’
none of them tied. Reckon we’ll have to look them up before dark.”
“Colter, what ’re we goin’ to do?” demanded Springer.
“Wait heah a while—then cross the canyon an’ work round up under the
bluff, back to the cabin.”
“An’ then what?” queried Somers, doubtfully eying Colter.
“We’ve got to eat—we’ve got to have blankets,” rejoined Colter,
testily. “An’ I reckon we can hide there an’ stand a better show in a
fight than runnin’ for it in the woods.”
“Wal, I’m givin’ you a hunch thet it looked like you was runnin’ fer
it,” retorted Somers.
“Yes, an’ packin’ the girl,” added Springer. “Looks funny to me.”
Both rustlers eyed Colter with dark and distrustful glances. What he
might have replied never transpired, for the reason that his gaze,
always shifting around, had suddenly fixed on something.
“Is that a wolf?” he asked, pointing to the Rim.
Both his comrades moved to get in line with his finger. Ellen could
not see from her position.
“Shore thet’s a big lofer,” declared Somers. “Reckon he scented us.”
“There he goes along the Rim,” observed Colter. “He doesn’t act leary.
Looks like a good sign to me. Mebbe the Isbels have gone the other
way.”
“Looks bad to me,” rejoined Springer, gloomily.
“An’ why?” demanded Colter.
“I seen thet animal. Fust time I reckoned it was a lofer. Second time
it was right near them Isbels. An’ I’m damned now if I don’t believe
it’s thet half-lofer sheep dog of Gass Isbel’s.”
“Wal, what if it is?”
“Ha!... Shore we needn’t worry about hidin’ out,” replied Springer,
sententiously. “With thet dog Jean Isbel could trail a grasshopper.”
“The hell y’u say!” muttered Colter. Manifestly such a possibility put
a different light upon the present situation. The men grew silent and
watchful, occupied by brooding thoughts and vigilant surveillance of
all points. Somers slipped off into the brush, soon to return, with
intent look of importance.
“I heerd somethin’,” he whispered, jerking his thumb backward. “Rollin’
gravel—crackin’ of twigs. No deer!... Reckon it’d be a good idee for
us to slip round acrost this bench.”
“Wal, y’u fellars go, an’ I’ll watch heah,” returned Colter.
“Not much,” said Somers, while Springer leered knowingly.
Colter became incensed, but he did not give way to it. Pondering a
moment, he finally turned to Ellen. “Y’u wait heah till I come back.
An’ if I don’t come in reasonable time y’u slip across the canyon an’
through the willows to the cabins. Wait till aboot dark.” With that
he possessed himself of one of the extra rifles and belts and silently
joined his comrades. Together they noiselessly stole into the brush.
Ellen had no other thought than to comply with Colter’s wishes. There
was her wounded uncle who had been left unattended, and she was anxious
to get back to him. Besides, if she had wanted to run off from Colter,
where could she go? Alone in the woods, she would get lost and die of
starvation. Her lot must be cast with the Jorth faction until the end.
That did not seem far away.
Her strained attention and suspense made the moments fly. By and by
several shots pealed out far across the side canyon on her right, and
they were answered by reports sounding closer to her. The fight was on
again. But these shots were not repeated. The flies buzzed, the hot
sun beat down and sloped to the west, the soft, warm breeze stirred the
aspens, the ravens croaked, the red squirrels and blue jays chattered.
Suddenly a quick, short, yelp electrified Ellen, brought her upright
with sharp, listening rigidity. Surely it was not a wolf and hardly
could it be a coyote. Again she heard it. The yelp of a sheep dog!
She had heard that’ often enough to know. And she rose to change her
position so she could command a view of the rocky bluff above.
Presently she espied what really appeared to be a big timber wolf. But
another yelp satisfied her that it really was a dog. She watched him.
Soon it became evident that he wanted to get down over the bluff. He
ran to and fro, and then out of sight. In a few moments his yelp
sounded from lower down, at the base of the bluff, and it was now the
cry of an intelligent dog that was trying to call some one to his aid.
Ellen grew convinced that the dog was near where Colter had said Bill
Isbel had plunged over the declivity. Would the dog yelp that way if
the man was dead? Ellen thought not.
No one came, and the continuous yelping of the dog got on Ellen’s
nerves. It was a call for help. And finally she surrendered to it.
Since her natural terror when Colter’s horse was shot from under her
and she had been dragged away, she had not recovered from fear of the
Isbels. But calm consideration now convinced her that she could hardly
be in a worse plight in their hands than if she remained in Colter’s.
So she started out to find the dog.
The wooded bench was level for a few hundred yards, and then it began
to heave in rugged, rocky bulges up toward the Rim. It did not appear
far to where the dog was barking, but the latter part of the distance
proved to be a hard climb over jumbled rocks and through thick brush.
Panting and hot, she at length reached the base of the bluff, to find
that it was not very high.
The dog espied her before she saw him, for he was coming toward her
when she discovered him. Big, shaggy, grayish white and black, with
wild, keen face and eyes he assuredly looked the reputation Springer
had accorded him. But sagacious, guarded as was his approach, he
appeared friendly.
“Hello—doggie!” panted Ellen. “What’s—wrong—up heah?”
He yelped, his ears lost their stiffness, his body sank a little, and
his bushy tail wagged to and fro. What a gray, clear, intelligent look
he gave her! Then he trotted back.
Ellen followed him around a corner of bluff to see the body of a man
lying on his back. Fresh earth and gravel lay about him, attesting to
his fall from above. He had on neither coat nor hat, and the position
of his body and limbs suggested broken bones. As Ellen hurried to his
side she saw that the front of his shirt, low down, was a bloody
blotch. But he could lift his head; his eyes were open; he was
perfectly conscious. Ellen did not recognize the dusty, skinned face,
yet the mold of features, the look of the eyes, seemed strangely
familiar.
“You’re—Jorth’s—girl,” he said, in faint voice of surprise.
“Yes, I’m Ellen Jorth,” she replied. “An’ are y’u Bill Isbel?”
“All thet’s left of me. But I’m thankin’ God somebody come—even a
Jorth.”
Ellen knelt beside him and examined the wound in his abdomen. A heavy
bullet had indeed, as Colter had avowed, torn clear through his middle.
Even if he had not sustained other serious injury from the fall over
the cliff, that terrible bullet wound meant death very shortly. Ellen
shuddered. How inexplicable were men! How cruel, bloody, mindless!
“Isbel, I’m sorry—there’s no hope,” she said, low voiced. “Y’u’ve not
long to live. I cain’t help y’u. God knows I’d do so if I could.”
“All over!” he sighed, with his eyes looking beyond her. “I reckon—I’m
glad.... But y’u can—do somethin’ for or me. Will y’u?”
“Indeed, Yes. Tell me,” she replied, lifting his dusty head on her
knee. Her hands trembled as she brushed his wet hair back from his
clammy brow.
“I’ve somethin’—on my conscience,” he whispered.
The woman, the sensitive in Ellen, understood and pitied him then.
“Yes,” she encouraged him.
“I stole cattle—my dad’s an’ Blaisdell’s—an’ made deals—with
Daggs.... All the crookedness—wasn’t on—Jorth’s side.... I want—my
brother Jean—to know.”
“I’ll try—to tell him,” whispered Ellen, out of her great amaze.
“We were all—a bad lot—except Jean,” went on Isbel. “Dad wasn’t
fair.... God! how he hated Jorth! Jorth, yes, who was—your father....
Wal, they’re even now.”
“How—so?” faltered Ellen.
“Your father killed dad.... At the last—dad wanted to—save us. He
sent word—he’d meet him—face to face—an’ let thet end the feud. They
met out in the road.... But some one shot dad down—with a rifle—an’
then your father finished him.”
“An’ then, Isbel,” added Ellen, with unconscious mocking bitterness,
“Your brother murdered my dad!”
“What!” whispered Bill Isbel. “Shore y’u’ve got—it wrong. I reckon
Jean—could have killed—your father.... But he didn’t. Queer, we all
thought.”
“Ah!... Who did kill my father?” burst out Ellen, and her voice rang
like great hammers at her ears.
“It was Blue. He went in the store—alone—faced the whole gang alone.
Bluffed them—taunted them—told them he was King Fisher.... Then he
killed—your dad—an’ Jackson Jorth.... Jean was out—back of the
store. We were out—front. There was shootin’. Colmor was hit. Then
Blue ran out—bad hurt.... Both of them—died in Meeker’s yard.”
“An’ so Jean Isbel has not killed a Jorth!” said Ellen, in strange,
deep voice.
“No,” replied Isbel, earnestly. “I reckon this feud—was hardest on
Jean. He never lived heah.... An’ my sister Ann said—he got sweet on
y’u.... Now did he?”
Slow, stinging tears filled Ellen’s eyes, and her head sank low and
lower.
“Yes—he did,” she murmured, tremulously.
“Ahuh! Wal, thet accounts,” replied Isbel, wonderingly. “Too bad!...
It might have been.... A man always sees—different when—he’s
dyin’.... If I had—my life—to live over again!... My poor
kids—deserted in their babyhood—ruined for life! All for nothin’....
May God forgive—”
Then he choked and whispered for water.
Ellen laid his head back and, rising, she took his sombrero and started
hurriedly down the slope, making dust fly and rocks roll. Her mind was
a seething ferment. Leaping, bounding, sliding down the weathered
slope, she gained the bench, to run across that, and so on down into
the open canyon to the willow-bordered brook. Here she filled the
sombrero with water and started back, forced now to walk slowly and
carefully. It was then, with the violence and fury of intense muscular
activity denied her, that the tremendous import of Bill Isbel’s
revelation burst upon her very flesh and blood and transfiguring the
very world of golden light and azure sky and speaking forestland that
encompassed her.
Not a drop of the precious water did she spill. Not a misstep did she
make. Yet so great was the spell upon her that she was not aware she
had climbed the steep slope until the dog yelped his welcome. Then
with all the flood of her emotion surging and resurging she knelt to
allay the parching thirst of this dying enemy whose words had changed
frailty to strength, hate to love, and, the gloomy hell of despair to
something unutterable. But she had returned too late. Bill Isbel was
dead.