THE TRAIL OVER THE PASS
"Some riders' spurs are the lightest when their hearts are the heaviest."
--_The Moose_.
It was a clear day, but in the increasing light, white clouds could be
seen whirling from the crest of Lost Chief.
"Lost Chief is making snow, but we won't get it before evening," said
Peter, as they dismounted at the post-office corral. "Now we'll just
outfit for a couple of days. I'm believing we'll overtake one or both
before night, but you can't tell. If Jude was crazy enough to run away
in zero weather, she's crazy enough to have taken any kind of a risk and
to be paying for it."
Douglas went swiftly and silently to work. The sun was just pushing over
the Indian Range when, each leading a pack-horse, they crossed Lost
Chief Creek and started up the long climb to the Pass. Here the wind was
rising and dry snow sifted constantly across the trail, obliterating any
trace of hoofs that might have been there. It was slow going, too, for
there had been much snow on the Pass and the drifts were frequent and
deep. Douglas was extremely sparing of his mount. Nothing that he could
do should interfere with his efficiency in the search, and although his
mad desire bade him rowell the straining brute, he rode light of heel,
resting at frequent enough intervals to satisfy even Peter's large ideas
of what was owing to a horse.
It was not until they were half-way to the summit, pushing between
towering jade green walls, where the wind was excluded, that Douglas
suddenly pulled up. The snow was level and hard-packed. There were hoof
and wheel marks, leading south. Friday's mail stage. A number of hoof
marks leading north. The two men dismounted and for many minutes studied
these.
"Here!" exclaimed Peter at last. "Four horses in a walk, up to this
point. Here, they break into a trot; and this is old Johnny on Jingo,
and that is the Wolf Cub.
"Easy, Doug! Don't kill the horses. It's only a guess you are
following."
Douglas grunted impatiently and set his horse, Justus, to the trot. At
the summit, still following trail, they pulled up to breathe the horses,
then plunged downward. Half through the afternoon they followed the hoof
marks. The biting wind rose and the sun warmed their backs as they
crested the ridges. The wind fell and the sun darkened as they dropped
into the valleys. Eagles on the hunt hung watchfully in the sky. Coyotes
now and again sneaked across the trail before them. The two men threshed
their arms across their chests or dropped their aching feet from the
stirrups, and still the hoof marks of five horses led on before them.
Their shadows had grown long and blue-black on the trail before them
when suddenly Douglas pulled Justus up, and Peter pushed up beside him.
About a quarter of a mile farther on lay the half-way house. They were
crossing a broad, flat valley into which the trail dipped lazily. Just
before them, the tracks of two horses and a dog led sharply to the left
and disappeared. Some one had fallen. There was a confusion of tracks,
then a two-horse trail led on toward the half-way house. Without a
word, they put their horses to a gallop that did not ease until they
pulled in at the little log corral, of the half-way house. There were
two horses, John's and old Johnny's, in the shed.
Crumpled on the doorstep was old Johnny, Doug's shot-gun across his
knees, at first glance, sound asleep. It was bitter cold. Douglas and
Peter pounded their numbed fingers, then examined the little old cowman.
He was, indeed, asleep, but his was the sleep that knows no waking.
"I thought he knew better than this," said Douglas, pitifully.
"He hadn't any outside clothes on." Peter fingered the cotton jumper.
"Had a sudden thought and went off as crazy as Jude. Let's lift him into
the house."
They opened the door. On the floor beside the stove lay John, his right
leg bloody. They laid old Johnny carefully against the wall. Douglas
stood rigidly staring at his father. Peter hurriedly lifted the wounded
man's hands, then forced some whiskey down his throat.
"Start a fire, Doug!" he ordered.
Douglas did not stir. He stood, blue eyes haggard, cheeks frost-burned,
staring at his father. John opened his eyes.
"Get my right boot off, for God's sake!" he said faintly.
"Wait!" said Douglas peremptorily, when Peter would have obeyed. "Give
him some more whiskey so I can hear the story and be off. Those were
Judith's tracks back, there."
"The pain is killing me!" protested John.
"Where is Judith? Have you hurt her?" demanded Doug.
Peter applied his flask again to John's mouth. John drank, then groaned.
"I was drunk. Awful drunk. If Doug hadn't been so crazy about the
preacher he'd have seen that. Jude went down to the house to get some
warm things while she hunted for the preacher. I followed her. The house
was warm and got me even more fuddled than I was. I don't know what I
said but she came at me like a wild cat. Then she ran out of the house
and me after her. I never touched her. I never saw such riding. I could
just keep her in sight, and it wasn't till daylight that I came up to
her in this valley. After I sobered up I kept yelling at her, trying to
explain. But she didn't even turn her head. Then I rode my horse round
in front of her and she turned that devilish little wild mare loose on
me, kicking and biting my horse like a stallion. In the middle of the
mix-up, that blank old fool of a Johnny gallops up, half-dressed and
shooting in every direction. Jude she takes off up the valley and Johnny
gave me this leg when I tried to follow. I got up here, him following
me, and the fool wouldn't help me. Just sat guard outside the door. I
kept telling him he'd freeze to death. He kept saying he was saving Jude
for Douglas." John ended with another groan.
Douglas stood clenching and unclenching his gloved hands. Suddenly he
turned on his heel. "Come on, Peter."
"We can't leave your father this way, Doug."
"Come on, I tell you!" Doug's low voice was as hard as his eyes.
"Wait!" cried Peter.
"Wait! Wait! While Judith freezes to death too!" exclaimed Douglas.
"She couldn't freeze to death. She's too mad!" groaned John.
"An hour won't make any difference," urged Peter. "I guess Jude had this
thing planned out."
"Planned!" Douglas' blue eyes burned. "She's gone off her head with
anger and disgust and she doesn't care where she goes as long as she's
rid of him. I know Jude!"
"You don't know Jude!" contradicted Peter. "Help me to lift John to the
bunk. He's gat to be taken care of."
Douglas turned on his heel, took a quilt from the bunk and laid it over
old Johnny, gray and silent against the wall. Then without a word, he
lifted the door-latch.
"Don't forget that this is your father after all."
"But I have forgotten!" returned Douglas clearly.
"Stop that kind of talk," said Peter sharply, "and help me get his boot
off!"
Douglas gave Peter a long stare of resentment; then, without a word, he
rushed out of the cabin. He watered the horses, mounted Justus, and took
the lead rope of his pack-animal, putting both horses to the gallop.
When he reached the point where Judith had left the main trail he turned
and followed her tracks, which were rapidly drifting over with snow.
The whole world was white. Lifting from the valley to the right, little
hills rolled over into one another like foaming billows. Beyond these
were distant ranges blue, white, and gold. Judith's trail led along the
base of the little hills into a grove of Lebanon cedars, gnarled and
wind-distorted. There was little snow among the trees and so for a while
the trail was lost. But when the cedars opened out on a circular mesa
where the snow was taking on the saffron tints of the evening sky, he
picked it up again.
The mesa ended abruptly in a drifted mountain, opalescent pink from its
foot to its cone-shaped head. The snow on the mesa was not deep, and
Douglas realized that Judith had followed an old trapper's trail that
worked south toward Lost Chief Peak.
By the time Doug reached the foot of the mountain it was so dark that he
barely could discern that Judith had circled to the right, around the
base of the peak. There would be a moon a little later. Douglas
dismounted in the shelter of a huge rock, cut down a small cedar, and
made himself a fire and cooked some coffee. And he fed the horses.
He sat for an hour over the fire, waiting for the moon. He was not
conscious of weariness. He was not thinking. It was as if there had been
no burning of his ranch, no preacher, no old Johnny. His whole mind was
focussed on finding Judith. On finding her and somehow ending the
intolerable uncertainty and longing which he had endured for so many
years.
The threatened snow thus far had held off. If the clear weather would
hold for another twelve hours, he was sure that he could overtake her.
He was impatient of delay and watched restlessly for the moon. Shortly
after seven o'clock it sailed over the mountain, flooding the world with
a light so intense and pure that the unbelievable colors of the daytime
returned like prismatic ghosts.
Douglas mounted and slowly and carefully followed the trail around the
mountain. He found the spot where Judith had made a fire. He paused over
a drift where one of her horses had floundered. He urged his tired
horses to a trot where Judith had followed a beaten coyote trail along a
hidden brook. Hours of this, and then--a thickening cloud across the
moon and a sudden thickening blast of snow in his face. He had been
fearing this all day, yet the moon had risen so clearly that his fears
had been lulled. He pushed on as long as he could distinguish the
trail. Then, with a groan, he pulled up beside a clump of bushes. The
horses sighed gratefully. Justus' shoulders were quivering with fatigue.
Douglas unsaddled the horses and hobbled them; then he shoveled snow
away from beneath some of the bushes and made a rough shelter over the
open space with a blanket. He built a fire, crept under his rude canopy,
and rolled himself in many blankets. He was very, very tired, and after
a time he dropped miles deep into slumber.
It was gray dawn when he awoke and he was snug beneath a foot of snow
that had blown over his bed-covering. He crawled out stiffly and made a
fire. Then he fed the horses and ate his breakfast, examining the
landscape as he did so.
Lost Chief Range rose to the left. To the right lay a broad mesa cut by
impassable canyons. Far to the south and to the right lifted Black Devil
Range, forming, with Lost Chief, a deep valley, the valley in which
Elijah Nelson had settled. From Douglas' camp, the valley was almost
inaccessible: almost, but not quite. Just under the crest of Black Devil
Peak lay a pass. If this could be crossed one dropped southward into a
cup-shaped valley called Johnson's Basin. Beyond the basin a lesser pass
into sheep country, and thence still south to the railroad and the whole
wide world.
Black Devil Pass was used in summer but only by seasoned hunters and
cattle-men. In winter, it was closed by snow and ice. Yet now, Douglas
was convinced that, unless big snows had stopped her, Judith was
attempting that perilous passage. She was by now cooled down; she would
not turn back. Pride, resentment, restlessness, and that virile love of
adventure which only increased as she grew older, would urge her on and
on. And to cross Black Devil Pass in winter was a feat which even
Charleton would refuse to undertake. Yet, he did not believe that
Judith would attempt such a journey without carefully outfitting. And
where could she have done this? Had she foreseen her flight and cached
food and fodder? Douglas shrugged this suggestion aside as highly
improbable. But she could have gone into Mormon Valley for supplies. It
was possible to reach Black Devil Pass from the upper end of Mormon
Valley, possible in summer at least. Possible also to reach the Pass by
swinging around to the right of the Black Devil Range.
Douglas, with a grim tightening of his lips, looked over his supplies.
Bacon, coffee, flour, matches; enough for a week if eked out by
cottontails and porcupines. But the horses had only a day's fodder. He
remade the pack, mounted and pushed on through the snows, which grew
deeper as the elevation increased.
On either hand, the two ranges flung mountain beyond mountain, in shades
of jade, creviced by deep blue snow. The tiny, weary cavalcade wound on
and on with not a trace of Judith to lighten the way. It was noon when
Douglas reached the forest which choked the end of Mormon Valley. He
knew the spot. Nature first had covered the floor of the passage with
boulders. Between the boulders, she had planted the pine-trees. The pine
had grown thick and tall and had waxed old and fallen, and other pines
had grown above the dead tree-trunks. In summer, if extreme care and
patience were used, a horse could be led through this chaos. In winter,
deep-blanketed with snow--!
Douglas drew up before the pines and dismounted. The snow was
waist-deep. Very slowly, he began to pick a winding, intricate path
between the trees. He fell many times but he finally emerged into the
smoother floor of the valley. Then he turned and followed his own trail
back, kicking and pounding the snow to make better footing for the
horses. He took Justus' reins and led him into the trail.
Horses hate the snow. These shied and balked, stood trembling and
uncertain, shook their heads and kicked, and Justus nipped at Doug's
shoulder with ugly, yellow teeth. But he pulled them on and by
mid-afternoon they were in the open valley with snow not above the
animals' knees. Gradually the Mormon buck fences appeared, and, just at
dusk, a twinkling light.
Douglas rode up to the cabin and, dismounting, knocked at the door.
It was opened by Elijah Nelson, his big bulk silhouetted in the
door-frame.
"Good-evening!" said Douglas.
"Good-evening!" returned the Mormon.
"Did Judith Spencer come through this way?"
Nelson shrugged his shoulders. "I don't care to hold converse with any
one from Lost Chief."
Douglas moistened his wind-fevered lips. "I'm not trying to hold
converse with you. My sister has run away from home. I've lost her trail
and I'm scared about her. I won't stop a minute if you'll just answer my
question."
A woman pushed up beside Elijah. "Who is it, Pa? For pity's sake, young
man, come in! It's a fearful cold night and this open door is freezing
the whole house."
Elijah stood back and Douglas strode into the kitchen. Several children
were sitting around the supper table. Nelson repeated Douglas' query to
his wife, adding, "He's the young man who brought the preacher into Lost
Chief and who called me a bastard American."
The woman stared at Douglas. He was haggard and unshaved. Nevertheless,
standing, with his broad shoulders back, his blue eyes wide and steady
yet full of a consuming anxiety, his youth was very appealing.
"Have you been out long?" she asked.
"Since Sunday dawn."
"She's your sister, you say?"
Douglas looked down at the woman. She could not have been much over
thirty and her brown eyes were kindly. "She's only a foster sister," he
replied, his low voice a little husky. "I--I--" he hesitated, then gave
way for a moment. "If I'd stayed at home as her mother wanted me to,
instead of bringing the preacher in, it never would have happened!
Religion! Look what it's brought me and Judith!"
"Religion never brought anything but good to any one," said Elijah
Nelson. "It's religion now that makes me allow you within my doors."
Douglas gave the Mormon a quick glance. Somewhere back of his anxiety it
occurred to him that he would like to ask this man some of the questions
that had troubled him for years. But now he said urgently to the woman,
"If Judith was here, for God's sake, tell me! She must not try to cross
Black Devil Pass."
The woman turned to Elijah. "Tell him, Pa!"
Elijah scratched his head, eying Douglas keenly the while. "Peter Knight
told me something about you. You don't seem to have been tarred with the
same brush as the rest of the Gentiles in Lost Chief. That isn't saying
I excuse the way you talked to me up at your chapel, but I guess you're
to be trusted as far as women are concerned. The girl came in here last
night. She was pretty well tuckered but as mad as hops. She told me that
Saturday night she had a violent quarrel with John Spencer and that she
fled from home in a burst of anger that was still on her when she got
here. She's headed for the Pass and the railroad beyond and nothing that
I know of can stop her. My wife and I did all we could to make her give
up the idea but she was sure she could make it. And I almost believe she
can! She's as strong as a young mountain lion: the way God intended
women to be. She stayed here all night and got away about an hour before
dawn. We outfitted her good. She thought maybe she could make through
the Pass by to-night, but I doubt it. Snow is awful deep up on Black
Devil. We've been looking for her back all day."
Douglas drew a long breath. "Thank you, Mr. Nelson!" he said, and
started for the door.
"Wait! Wait!" cried Mrs. Nelson. "You must have some supper and you must
rest. You look terrible!"
Douglas shook his head. "Every minute counts. I'm not tired, only
terribly worried. I couldn't rest."
Nelson walked over to the door deliberately, and put a big hand on
Doug's shoulder. "You fill yourself with some hot food, Spencer. You
know better than to tackle this job empty. That girl is in a desperate
frame of mind. You are going to have a struggle with her, if you do
overtake her. You must be cool and save your mind and body. How did she
come to be in such, a state of mind?"
"She wasn't desperate," said Mrs. Nelson, unexpectedly. "She was sort
of--of wild. I can't just find the word for it. But lots of young women
are like that now-a-days."
Douglas looked at her curiously. Some phrase of Peter's, half forgotten,
came back to him. "Revolt," he muttered. "Revolt, that's it."
The woman nodded. "Yes, revolt's the word."
Elijah shook Doug's shoulder. "How many horses have you?"
"Two."
"I'll feed 'em. Go sit down to that table and let my wife fix you up."
Douglas slowly pulled off his gloves, and his voice broke boyishly as he
said, "You folks are awful kind."
"Yes, I've sometimes suspected that us Mormons was almost human beings,"
grunted Elijah as he pulled on his mackinaw.
Doug's cracked lips managed a shadow of his old whimsical smile. Mrs.
Nelson heaped his plate and filled his cup with scalding coffee. Then
she shooed the children to bed in the next room and, returning, looked
down at Douglas half tenderly.
"She's a splendid big thing, that girl of yours. If I was a man I'd be
plumb crazy about her. Has to be something fine in a girl to go crazy
mad, just the way she was. It wasn't all about your father. It had
heaped up for years. Though undoubtedly it was your father started her
off this weather."
Elijah came in and sat down to his interrupted meal. "Good horses you've
got," he said. "But you've worked them hard."
"Will you sell me some oats?" asked Douglas.
Elijah nodded. "I'll fix you up. Do you know how to get to the Pass?"
"No; I've never crossed, even in summer."
"Well, I can direct you, though I've never made it myself in winter.
After you get over the Pass and into the Basin it will be easy going and
you can get fodder there. A Mormon friend of mine is in the Basin this
winter with sheep. I told Judith that and exactly how to get there."
"Was she in bad trim?" asked Douglas abruptly.
"No. A little used up for lack of sleep, that was all," replied Elijah.
Mrs. Nelson suddenly chuckled. "My, she was mad! It did me good to see
her."
Her husband looked at her curiously. "How was that, Ma?"
"It's the way I've wanted to feel, lots of times," said Mrs. Nelson. "Go
on with your directions, Pa. You wouldn't understand in a hundred
years."
Elijah snorted, then went on. "There's no trail. But if you reach the
summit, get a line on a bare patch in the middle of the basin, that's
the lake, and the highest peak across the basin. It's got the mark of a
big cross on it. You can't miss it. If you keep on this line, it will
bring you out at Bowdin's sheep ranch. I don't know whether the snows
are as bad on the other side of Black Devil as they are on this.
Johnson's Basin drops down to about three thousand feet elevation and
there's not enough snow in the basin itself to stop sheep grazing. But
the climb down is something awful, even in summer. Ma, you put up a
bundle of grub."
"I've got grub for a week, thanks!" exclaimed Douglas. Then he asked
Elijah, hesitatingly, "Will you tell me why you are so kind to me?"
"As I said, it's my religion."
Douglas stared at his host's kindly face. "I'm dog sorry," he said, "for
what I called you. But, how was I to know? I've been brought up to hate
Mormons."
Elijah nodded. "I guess we're square. What kind of a man is Fowler?"
"I like him. But I don't know whether he's the man for the job I set
him, or not. But he's going to stay," lips tightening. "I'll see to
that! Have you always been a Mormon, Mr. Nelson?"
"Brought up in it. And I've brought my children up in it. Judith told us
about the rotten trick they did you over in Lost Chief. What are you
going to do about it?"
"Get them!" replied Douglas. "That is, after I find Judith. I think I
know the men who did it, and the sooner they get out of our valley, the
more comfortable they'll be and so will I."
"But where is that poor old man?" cried Nelson. "Have you looked for
him?"
"I was trying to get a line on him from Scott Parsons when her mother
brought word Judith was gone." Douglas paused and gave Elijah a straight
look. "I wouldn't stop to look for any one on earth, if Judith needed
me."
"Judith can take care of herself better than that old man," insisted
Elijah.
"Nothing to it!" grunted Douglas. "He's been in the cow country forty
years. Not but what I know it was a frightful thing to leave him. But it
can't be helped."
"What shall you do about a church now?" asked Mr. Nelson.
"Build it again for the hounds to burn again! If I believed in a God I'd
say he was off his job as far as I'm concerned."
"Humph!" exclaimed Elijah. "If I don't miss my guess, the Almighty is
directing your business these days as he never has before. You are just
about doing what He says and flattering yourself it's your own plan. God
moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform."
"I wish I could believe it," muttered Douglas, starting for the door.
"Now, I shifted saddle and pack for you to two horses of mine!" said
Elijah. "If you find that girl, bring her back here. I want to have some
talk with you both. You can pay me rent for 'em, so don't waste your
breath arguing."
"Well, whether you are a Sioux or a Mormon," exclaimed Douglas, "you
sure are white!"
Elijah grinned broadly. "Well, that's a real concession for a Gentile!
Be sure you stop here on the way out."
It was Douglas' turn to grin. "We'll sure be glad to head straight for
here. But I'll warn you now. You can't make Mormons of us!"
"I'm not a-going to try. But I want to say a few things to you. No harm
in that, is there?"
"None at all!" Douglas shook hands with his host, then turned to Mrs.
Nelson. "I'm sure obliged to you," he said.
"That's nothing. But look, Mr. Spencer, don't you be too sure you're
going to bring that girl back with you, even if you overtake her."
Douglas nodded. "I know," he agreed huskily, "I've got my work cut out
for me." Then he went out into the starlight.
Elijah followed. "The moon will be up by the time you need it. Follow
trail up to the timber line. Skirt the timber line till you reach the
first shoulder of Black Devil. After that, God help you! The horse you
are on is named Tom. If you aren't back in five days, I'll go over to
Lost Chief and get help to look for you."
"Thanks," said Douglas, and he rode away.
Warmed, refreshed, and with hope shadowing his anxiety, Douglas turned
the horses southward. Tom horse was a big, broad-hoofed brute,
hard-bitted and not at all enthusiastic about his prospective trip. But
--he was a stronger animal than Justus and Douglas pushed him sharply
through the snow.
The trail through the fields for three or four miles was easy to find in
the starlight. The valley narrowed as it rose and finally Lost Chief and
Black Devil thrust foot to foot in a narrow canyon. Douglas did not
enter the canyon but twined upward to the right along the timber line
that clothed the ankles of Black Devil. The moon had not yet risen when
the timber disappeared at the foot of the first shoulder. Douglas pulled
up the panting horses, turned back to the wind and rested for a few
moments, then put Tom to the climb. The snow was without crust but it
was knee-deep and Tom didn't like it. He floundered and snorted, but
Douglas spurred him relentlessly and they crested the shoulder without
pause. Here, however, Doug decided to wait for the moon.
He moved into the shelter of a rock heap, for the wind was huge, and,
beating his arms across his chest, waited with what patience he could
muster. Where was she now? Could even her splendid courage stand up
against the eerie loneliness. If only he could see her now, returning
defeated, though still defiant. But he knew that he would not meet her
so. She would not give up while she had strength to pursue the
adventure.
There was no view of the peak from this spot. Before him lifted a dark,
shadowy wall, sloping interminably to the remote heavens. To the east,
Lost Chief Range was silhouetted against a faint glow that told of the
coming moon. To the west was a chaos of unfamiliar peaks. When the dusk
of the mountain-slope before him turned to radiant silver, Douglas
started the horses on and spurred Tom relentlessly. And if he had
known how to pray, he told himself, he would have asked the Almighty to
give him strength for the tremendous venture which lay before him.