SIGNS AND OMENS
When a man like Bible-Back Murray, the biggest man in the country--a
sheep-owner, a store-keeper, a political power--goes out of his way to
break up a trade there is something significant behind it. Denver had
come to Pinal in response to a prophecy, in search of two hidden
treasures between which he must make his choice; and now, added to that,
was the further question of whether he should venture to oppose Murray.
If he did, he could proceed in the spirit of the prophecy and choose
between the silver and gold treasures; but if he did not there would be
no real choice at all, but simply an elimination. He must turn away from
the silver treasure, that precious vein of metal which led so temptingly
into the hill, and take the little stringer of quartz which the
Professor had offered as a gold mine. Denver thought it all over out in
front of his cave that night and at last he came back to the prophecy.
"Courage and constancy," it said, "will attend you through life, but in
the end will prove your undoing, for you will meet your death at the
hands of your dearest friend."
Denver's heart fell again at the thought of that hard fate but it did
not divert him from his purpose. Mother Trigedgo had said that he should
be brave, nevertheless--very well then, he would dare oppose Murray. But
now to choose between the two, between the Professor's stringer of gold
and Bunker's vein of silver--with the ill will of Murray attached.
Denver pondered them well and at last he lit a candle and referred it to
Napoleon's Oraculum.
In the front of the Book of Fate were thirty-two questions the answers
to which, on the succeeding pages, would give counsel on every problem
of life. The questions, at first sight, seemed more adapted to love-sick
swains than to the practical problem before Denver, but he came back to
number nine.
"Shall I be SUCCESSFUL in my present undertaking?"
All he had to do was to decide to buy the silver claim and then put the
matter to the test. He spread a sheet of fair paper on the clear corner
of his table and made five rows of short lines across it, each
containing more than the requisite twelve marks. Then he counted each
row and, opposite every one that came even, he placed two dots; opposite
every line that came odd, one dot. This made a series of five dots, one
above the other, of which the first two were double and the last three
single, and he turned to the fateful Key.
It was spread across two pages, a solid mass of signs and letters,
arranged in a curious order; and along the side were the numbers of the
questions, across the top the different combinations of dots. Against
the thirty-two questions there were thirty-two combinations in which the
odd and even dots could be arranged, and Denver's series was the seventh
in order. The number of his question was nine. Where the seventh line
from the side met the ninth from the top there occurred the letter O.
Denver turned to the Oraculum and on the page marked O he found
thirty-two answers, each starred with a different combination of dots.
The seventh answer from the top was the one he sought--it said:
"Fear not, if thou are prudent."
"Good enough!" exclaimed Denver, shutting the book with a slap; but as
he went out into the night a sudden doubt assailed him--what did it mean
by: "If thou art prudent?"
"Fear not!" he understood, it was the first and only motto in the
bright, brief lexicon of his life; but what was the meaning of
"prudent?" Did it mean he was to refrain from opposing Old Bible-Back,
or merely that he should oppose him within reason? That was the trouble
with all these prophecies--you never could tell what they meant. Take
the silver and golden treasures--how would he know them when he saw
them? And he had to choose wisely between the two. And now, when he
referred the whole business to the Oraculum it said: "Fear not, if thou
art prudent."
He paced up and down on the smooth ledge of rock that made up the
entrance to his home and as he sunk his head in thought a voice came up
to him out of the blackness of the town below. It was the girl again,
singing, high and clear as a flute, as pure and ethereal as an angel,
and now she was singing a song. Denver roused up and listened, then
lowered his head and tramped back and forth on the ledge. The voice came
again in a song that he knew--it was one that he had on a record--and he
paused in his impatient striding. She could sing, this girl of Bunk's,
she knew something besides scales and running up and down. It was a song
that he knew well, only he never remembered the names on the records.
They were in German and French and strange, foreign languages, while all
that he cared for was the music. He listened again, for her singing was
different; and then, as she began another operatic selection he started
off down the trail. It was a rough one at best and he felt his way
carefully, avoiding the cactus and thorns; but as he crossed the creek
he suddenly took shame and stopped in the shadow of the sycamore.
What if the Professor, that old prowler, should come along and find him,
peeping in through Bunker's open door? What if the ray of light which
struck out through the door-frame should reveal him to the singer
within? And yet he was curious to see her. Since his first brusque
refusal to go in and meet her, Bunker had not mentioned his daughter
again--perhaps he remembered what was said. For Denver had stated that
he had plenty of music himself, if he could ever get his phonograph from
Globe. Yet he had had the instrument for nearly a week and never
unpacked the records. They were all good records, no cheap stuff or
rag-time; but somehow, with her singing, it didn't seem right to start
up a machine against her. And especially when he had refused to come
down and meet her--a fine lady, practicing for grand opera.
He sat down in the black shadow of the mighty sycamore and strained his
ears to hear; but a chorus of tree-frogs, silenced for the moment by his
coming, drowned the music with their eerie refrain. He hurled a rock
into the depths of the pool and the frog chorus ceased abruptly, but the
music from the house had been clearer from his cave-mouth than it was
from the bed of the creek. For half an hour he sat, gazing out into the
ghostly moonlight for some sign of the snooping Diffenderfer; and then
by degrees he edged up the trail until he stood in the shadow of the
store. The music was impressive--it was Marguerite's part, in "Faust,"
sung consecutively, aria by aria--and as Denver lay listening it
suddenly came over him that life was tragic and inexorable. He felt a
great longing, a great unrest, a sense of disaster and despair; and then
abruptly the singing ceased, and with it passed the mood.
There was a murmur of voices, a strumming on the piano, a passing of
shadows to and fro; and then from the doorway there came gay and
spritely music--and at last a song that he knew. Denver listened
intently, trying to remember the record which had contained this lilting
air. He had it--the "Barcarolle," the boat-song from the "Tales of
Hoffmann!" And she was singing the words in English. He left the shadow
and stepped out into the open, forgetful of everything but the singer,
and the words came out to him clearly.
"Night divine, O night of love,
O smile on our enchantment;
Moon and stars keep watch above
This radiant night of love!"
She came to the end, riding up and down in an ecstatic series of "Ahs!"
and as the song floated away into piano and pianissimo Denver braved the
light to see her.
She was standing by the piano, swaying like a flower to the music; and a
lamp behind made her face like a cameo, her hair like a mass of gold.
That was all he saw in the swift, stolen moment before he retreated in a
panic to his cave. It was she, the beautiful woman that the seeress had
predicted, the one he should fall in love with! She had won his heart
before he even saw her, but how could he hope to win her? She was a
singer, an artist as Mother Trigedgo had said, and he was a hobo miner.
He stood by his cavern looking down on the town and up at the moon and
stars and the words of her song came back to his ears in a continual,
haunting refrain.
"Ah! smile on our enchantment,
Night of Love, O night of love!
Ah, Ah! Ah, Ah! Ah, Ah! Ah, Ah!"
It floated away in a lilting diminuendo, a joyous, mocking refrain; and
long after the night was quiet again the music still ran through his
head. It possessed him, it broke his sleep, it followed him in dreams;
and with it all went the vision of the singer, surrounded like St.
Cecilia with a golden halo of light. He woke up at dawn with a fire in
his brain, a tumult of unrest in his breast; and like a buck when he
feels the first sting of a wound he turned his face towards the heights.
The valley seemed to oppress him, to cabin him in; but up on the cliffs
where the eagles soared there was space and the breath of free winds. He
toiled up tirelessly, a fierce energy in his limbs, a mill-race of
thoughts in his mind, and at last on the summit he turned and looked
down on the house that sheltered his beloved.
She was the woman, he knew it, for his heart had told him long before he
had thought of the prophecy; and now the choice between the gold and
silver treasures seemed as nothing compared to winning her. Of all the
admonitions which had been laid upon him by the words of the Cornish
seeress, none seemed more onerous than this about the woman that he
would love.
"You will fall in love with a beautiful woman who is an artist," Mother
Trigedgo had written, "but beware how you reveal your affection or she
will confer her hand upon another."
On another! This woman, whom he had worshipped from the moment he had
seen her, would flaunt him if he revealed his love! That was the thought
which had tortured him and driven him to the heights, where he could
wrestle with his problem alone. How could he meet her without her
reading in his eyes the secret he must not reveal? And yet he was
possessed with a mad desire to see her--to see her and hear her sing.
All her scales and roulades, her runs and trills, had passed by him like
so much smoke; but when the mood had come and she had sung her
song-of-songs he had lost his heart to her instantly. But if, in her
presence, he revealed this new love she would confer her hand upon
another!
He stood on the edge of Apache Leap and gazed down at the valley below,
then he looked far away where peak piled on peak and the desert sloped
away to the horizon. It was hot, barren land, every ridge spiked with
giant cactus, every gulch a bruising tangle of brush and rocks; but
Pinal lay sleeping in the cool shadow of the Leap, and Drusilla slept
there too. But who would think to look for her in a place like that, or
for the treasures of silver and gold? The finger of destiny had pointed
him plain, for he stood on the Place of Death. It was lifeless yet, save
for the uneasy eagles who watched him from a splintered crag; and the
clean, black shadow that lapped out over the plain held the woman and
the treasures in its compass.
A sense of awe, of religious exaltation, came over Denver as he
considered the prophecy, and from somewhere within him there came a new
strength which stilled the fierce tumult in his breast. Since the stars
had willed it that he should have this woman if he veiled his love from
her eyes he would be brave then, and constant, and steel his boy's heart
to resist her matchless charms. He would watch over her from afar,
feeding his love in secret, and when the time came he would reap his
reward and the prophecy would be fulfilled. And while he stood aloof,
stealing a glimpse of her at night or listening to the magic of her
songs; he must win the two treasures, both the silver and the gold, to
lay as an offering at her feet.
The shadow of the Leap drew back from the town, leaving the houses
sun-struck and bare, and as his mind went back to the choice between the
treasures he watched the moving objects below. He saw a steer wandering
down the empty street, and Old Bunk going across to the store; and then
in the walled garden that lay behind the house he beheld a woman's form.
It was draped in white and it moved about rhythmically, bending slowly
from side to side; and then with the graceful ethereal lightness it
leapt and whirled in a dance. In the profundity of the distance all was
lost but the grace of it, the fairy-like flitting to and fro; and, as
Denver watched, the tears leapt to his eyes at the thought of her
perfect beauty.
She was a woman from another world, which a horny-handed miner could
hardly hope to enter; yet if he won the two treasures, which would make
them both rich, the doors would swing open before him. All it needed was
a wise choice between the silver and the gold, and destiny would attend
to the rest. Well--if he chose the gold he would offend her own father,
who was urgently in need of funds; and if he chose the silver he would
offend Bible-Back Murray, and Diffenderfer as well. He considered the
two claims from every standpoint, looking hopefully about for some sign;
and as he stepped to the edge and looked down into the depths, the male
eagle left his crag.
Riding high on the wind which, striking against the face of the cliff,
floated him up into the spaces above; he wheeled in a smooth circle,
turning his head from side to side as he watched the invader of his
eyrie. And at each turn of his head Denver caught the flash of gold,
though he was loath to accept it as a sign. He waited, fighting against
it, marshaling reasons to sustain him; and then, folding his wings, the
eagle descended like a plummet, shooting past him with a shrill, defiant
scream. Denver flinched and stepped back, then he leaned forward eagerly
to watch where the bird's flight would take him. No Roman legionary,
going into unequal battle with his war eagle wheeling above its
standard, ever watched its swift course with higher hopes or believed
more fully in the omen. The eagle spread his wings and glided off to the
west, flying low as he approached the plain; and as he passed over Pinal
and the claim by Queen Creek, Denver laughed and slapped his leg.
"It's a go!" he exulted, "the silver wins!"
And he bounded off down the trail.