Brainard did not follow the old plainsman’s advice to stick to the
railroad for his travels. Instead, he induced Gunnison to leave his
dugout and guide his chance guest across the Mexican border.
It was not as easy as it looks on the map in the railroad folder to get
from Phantom, Arizona—which was the name of the water tank where he had
dropped from the train—into the State of Chihuahua; but Brainard did not
feel pressed for time. Indeed he judged it might be as well for him to
remain out of all possible contact with civilized centers for several
weeks, to “let things settle down,” as he phrased it. Pursuit would
naturally relax after the first unsuccessful attempts and would probably
concentrate upon New York where it might be supposed that he would
ultimately turn up. Moreover, every day of delay made it less likely
that some observing busybody would recall the sensational newspaper story
and identify him and his bag with the description of the robber who had
left San Francisco on the evening of April 26. Gunnison asked no
questions. The virtue of reticence, Brainard found, was admirably
cultivated in these sparsely habited parts of the earth. The old man
seemed to have no pressing duties to recall him to his dugout, and so
they followed the trail leisurely, making a few miles each day and
occasionally stopping for a day or two to rest while Gunnison procured
supplies from one of the small mining towns.
Those weeks on the trail with old Gunnison and the pack train of two
horses and a mule were full of joy to the city-bred man, who had rarely
escaped the pavements. The high altitudes, the vivid desert colors, the
beauty and the savage wildness of this little-known part of the world
filled him with ecstatic happiness as well as abounding health. He
became hard and rugged, losing the pallor of the city man and all the
petty physical weakness that had contributed largely to his fits of
depression. Health made a new man of him in mind as well as in body. He
hardly recognized himself when he awoke in the morning. Never before had
he known what it was to be heartily in love with life, thoroughly vital,
eager to act, to plan, to embrace the struggle of living; so light and
free from distressing doubts, so willing to test what destiny held in
store for him! Just as the exciting events of his sudden journey and his
hours in Krutzmacht’s office had awakened his will and his self-reliance,
so these weeks of wandering free through the desert and the mountains
were the best sort of preparation for a strong, active manhood.
Fortunately they had come to him before it was too late, before his
character had finally settled into its groove, and new powers were evoked
in him, even physical possibilities, that he might never have suspected
to be his.
The nights under the glittering cover of the Arizona heavens, the long
days of peaceful activity in the sunlight, the silence and the majesty of
these vast desert spaces appealed to him strongly, satisfied that love of
beauty and of mystery that had been crushed hitherto. Lying awake
beneath the stars, his head pillowed on his bag, which had rapidly lost
its suspicious appearance of newness, he speculated upon much that had
never before entered his head. And his feeling about Krutzmacht and the
accident that had brought them together changed. It was no longer a mere
wild jaunt, something unreal, like an adventure in piracy. It was part
of the great enfolding mystery of the universe that had touched him and
enlisted his life. It seemed that he had embarked upon a mission that
must end in a great experience.
At this time of life, with the blood flowing actively through his body,
his mind awake to all the voices of the earth, it was but natural that
woman should enter into the affair. Krutzmacht’s last mumbled word,—that
dubious “Melody,”—served him as point of departure for romantic dreams.
Forgetting altogether his reasonable hypothesis that it might prove to be
the name of some firm of German bankers he assumed that “Melody” must be
the name of a woman. A queer name, doubtless, especially for one in any
way connected with the old German, who seemed to have no affinity for
fine art or even womanhood, other than the common stenographer of his
office. Nevertheless, in obedience to the desire of his heart, Brainard
created a person to fit the name, and thought of Melody as a woman.
From this his thoughts wandered occasionally to the little girl who had
guided him to old Gunnison’s. He saw her slight, wistful figure as she
stood motionless watching the procession of trains, heard her soft voice
and gurgling laugh. He resolved to return some day to this wonderful
country, his mission fulfilled, and discover that abandoned mining town
of Monument, and find there the little girl on the pony who had come to
his rescue in the darkness. He had probed old Gunnison for more exact
information about the girl, but either he knew nothing more than that
“she belonged up Moniment way” or did not care to tell what he knew.
On other matters he was more communicative. He had been long in the
country, knew it in the old days before it had been invaded by railroads
and large mining companies. He had prospected from the Colorado River
south to Chihuahua in old Mexico. He had driven cattle from Texas to
Nebraska, and latterly worked on the railroad. He knew Indians,
“greasers,” miners, cowboys, and for hour after hour he talked of what he
had seen “before it got so dern ceevilized in these parts.” In other
words, before there was a railroad line two hundred miles to the east and
another three or four hundred miles west! He knew where to camp and
where supplies could be got without arousing undue curiosity. He knew
horses and mules and men. And he taught the young man some of these
useful things that he knew so that when they parted in the city of
Guadalajara Brainard felt more grateful to him than to any one of the
regular instructors of youth, who had given him his so-called
“education.” He paid him liberally for his services, and the old man,
sticking the bills beneath the band of his felt hat, made a few final
remarks to his patron:
“I don’t know where you come from, my son,—hain’t asked yer, and I don’
want to know. You’ve treated me right, and I’ve treated you right. I
guess if you keep free of cards, and drink, and women, and keep on agoin’
due saouth, you’ll likely strike the City of Mexico, before you be much
older, and keep your belongin’s with yer,” he added, smiling upon the bag
that Brainard had so carefully guarded.
“I think I’ll try the railroad for a change,” Brainard laughed back.
“It’s quicker—sometimes,” the old man admitted, “if you don’t find too
many troublesome persons traveling the same way!”
With this last hint he waved farewell and started northwards for the
States.