THE FINDING OF SUCATASH
De Launay came into the cabin the next morning with an armload of wood
to find Solange sitting up in bed with the blankets clutched about
her, staring at the unfamiliar surroundings. He smiled at her, and was
delighted to be met with an answering, though somewhat puzzled smile.
"You are better?" he asked.
"Yes," she said. "And you--brought me here?"
He nodded and knelt to rebuild the fire. When it was crackling again
he straightened up.
"I was afraid you were going to be ill. You had a bad shock."
Solange shuddered. "It is true. That evil old man! He hurt my head.
But I am all right again."
"You had better lie quiet for a day or two, just the same. You have
had a bad blow. If you feel well enough, though, there is something I
must do. Will you be all right if I leave you for a few hours?"
Her face darkened a little but she nodded. "If you must. You have been
very kind, monsieur. You brought me here?"
Her eyes fell on her leather coat flung over the end of the bunk and
she flushed, looking sideways at the man. He seemed impassive,
unconscious, and her puzzled gaze wandered over his face and form. She
noted striking differences in the tanned, lean face and the lithe
body. The skin was clear and the eyes no longer red and swollen. He
stood upright and moved with a swift, deft certainty far from his
former slouch.
"You are changed," she commented.
"Some," he answered. "Fresh air and exercise have benefited me."
"That is true. Yet there seems to be another difference. You look
purposeful, if I may say it."
"I?" he seemed to protest. "What purpose is there for me?"
"You must tell me that."
He went out into the other room and returned with broth for her. But
she was hungry and the broth did not satisfy her. He brought in meat
and bread, and she made a fairly hearty breakfast. It pleased De
Launay to see her enjoying the food frankly, bringing her nearer to
the earth which he, himself, inhabited.
"The only purpose I have," he said, while she ate, "is that of finding
what has become of your escort. There's another matter, too, on which
I am curious. Do you think you can get along all right if I leave food
for you here and go down to the camp? I will be back before evening."
"You will be careful of that crazy old man?"
He laughed. "If I am not mistaken he thinks I am a ghost and is
frightened out of seven years' growth," he said, easily. His voice
changed subtly, became swiftly grim. "He may well be," he added, half
to himself.
Breakfast over and the camp cleared up, De Launay took from his packs
a second automatic, hanging the holster, a left-hand one, to the bunk.
He showed Solange how to operate the mechanism and found that she
readily grasped the principle of it, though the squat, flat weapon was
incongruous in her small hand. The rifle also he left within her
reach.
Shortly he was mounted on his way out of the crater. He made good time
through the down timber and, in about an hour and a half, was headed
into the canyon. He searched carefully for traces of Dave but found
none. The snow was over a foot deep and had drifted much deeper in
many spots. Especially on the talus slopes at the bottom of the canyon
had it gathered to a depth of several feet.
Finally he came to the site of the camp where he had rescued Solange
from the mad prospector. Here he was surprised to find no trace of the
man although the burros were scraping forlornly in the snow on the
slopes trying to uncover forage. Camp equipment was scattered around,
and a piece of tarpaulin covered a bundle of stuff. This was tucked
away by a rock, but De Launay ran on it after some search.
He devoted his efforts to finding the shell from Banker's rifle which
he had seen on the snow when he left the place. It was finally
uncovered and he put it in his pocket. Then he left the place and
headed down the canyon, searching for signs of the cow-puncher.
He found none, since Dave had not been in this direction. But De
Launay pushed on until almost noon. He rode high on the slopes where
the snow was shallower and where he could get an unrestricted view of
the canyon.
He was about to give it up, however, and turn back when his horse
stopped and pricked his ears forward, raising its head. De Launay
followed this indication and saw what he took to be a clump of
sagebrush on the snow about half a mile away. He watched it and
thought it moved.
Intent observation confirmed this impression and it was made a
certainty when he saw the black patch waver upward, stagger forward
and then fall again.
With an exclamation, De Launay spurred his horse recklessly down the
slope toward the figure on the snow. He galloped up to it and flung
himself to the ground beside it. The figure raised itself on arms from
which the sleeves hung in tatters and turned a pale and ghastly face
toward him.
It was Sucatash.
Battered and bruised, with an arm almost helpless and a leg as bad,
the cow-puncher was dragging himself indomitably along while his
failing strength held out. But he was almost at the end of his
resources. Hunger and weakness, wounds and bruises, had done their
work and he could have gone little farther.
De Launay raised his head and chafed his blue and frozen hands. The
cow-puncher tried to grin.
"Glad to see you, old-timer," he croaked. "You're just about in
time."
"What happened to you, man?"
"Don't know. Heard a horse nicker and then mine stumbled and pinned
me. Got a bad fall and when I come to I was lying down the hill
against some greasewood. Leg a'most busted and an arm as bad. Horse
nowhere around. Got anything to drink? Snow ain't much for thirst."
De Launay had food and water and gave it to him. After eating
ravenously for a moment he was stronger.
"Funny thing, that horse nickerin'. It was snowin' and I didn't see
him. But, after I come to I tried to climb up where I was throwed. It
was some job but I made it. There was my horse, half covered with
snow. Some one had shot him."
"Shot him? And then left you to lie there?"
"Just about that. There wasn't no tracks. Snow had filled 'em. But I
reckon that horse wasn't just shot by accident."
"It was not. And Dave's gone."
"Dave? What's that?"
"He's gone. Left the camp day before yesterday and never came back. I
wasn't there."
"And madame? She all right?"
"She is--now. I found her yesterday morning with Banker, the
prospector. He was trying to torture her into telling him where that
mine is located. Hurt her pretty bad."
Sucatash lay silent for a moment. Then:
"Jumpin' snakes!" he said. "That fellow has got a lot comin' to him,
ain't he?"
"He has," said De Launay, shortly. "More than you know."
Again the cow-puncher was silent for a space.
"Reckon he beefed Dave?" he said at last.
"Shouldn't be surprised," said De Launay. "I searched for him but
couldn't find him. He wouldn't get lost or hurt. But Jim Banker's done
enough, in any case."
"He sure has," said Sucatash.
De Launay helped the cow-puncher up in front of him and turned back to
the crater. He rode past Banker's camp without stopping, but keeping
along the slope to avoid the deeper snow he came upon a stake set in a
pile of small rocks. This was evidently newly placed. He showed it to
Sucatash.
"The fellow's staked ground here. What could he have found?"
"Maybe the old lunatic thinks he's run onto French Pete's strike,"
grinned Sucatash. "This don't look very likely to me."
"Gone to Maryville to register it, I suppose. That accounts for his
leaving the burros and part of his stuff. He'd travel light."
"He better come back heavy though. If he aims to winter in here he'll
need bookoo rations. It'd take some mine to make me do it."
Sucatash was in bad shape, and De Launay was not particularly
interested in old Jim's vagaries at the present time, so he made all
speed back to the crater. Sucatash, who knew of the windfall, would
not believe that the soldier had found an entrance into the place
until he had actually treaded the game trail.
He looked backward from the heights above the tangle after they had
come through it.
"Some stronghold," he commented. "It'd take an army to dig you outa
here."
They found Solange as De Launay had left her. She was overjoyed to see
Sucatash and at the same time distressed to observe his condition. She
heard with indignation his account of his mishap and, like De Launay,
suspected Banker of being responsible for it. Indeed, unless they
assumed that some mysterious presence was abroad at this unseasonable
time in the mountains, there was no one else to suspect.
She would have risen and assumed the duties of nursing the
cow-puncher, but De Launay forbade it. She was still very weak and her
head was painful. The soldier therefore took upon himself the task of
caring for both of them.
He made a bed for Sucatash in the kitchen of the cabin and went about
the work of getting them both on their feet with quiet efficiency.
This bade fair to be a task of some days' duration though both were
strong and healthy and yielded readily to rest and treatment.
It was night again before he had them comfortably settled and
sleeping. Once more, with camp lantern lit, he sat before the slab
table and examined his bullets and the shell he had picked up at
Banker's camp.
He found that both bullets fitted it tightly. Then he turned the rim
to the light and looked at it.
Stamped in the brass were the cabalistic figures:
U. M. C. SAV. .303.
For some time he sat there, his mouth set in straight, hard lines, his
memory playing backward over nineteen years. He recalled the men he
had known on the range, a scattered company, every one of whom could
be numbered, every one of whom had possessions, weapons, accouterment,
known to nearly all the others. In that primitive community of few
individuals the tools of their trades were as a part of them. Men were
marked by their saddles, their chaparajos, their weapons. A pair of
silver-mounted spurs owned by one was remarked by all the others.
Louisiana had known the weapons of the range riders even as they knew
his. The six-shooter with which he had often performed his feats would
have been as readily recognized as he, himself. When a new rifle
appeared in the West its advent was a matter of note.
In Maryville, then a small cow town and outfitting place for the men
of the range, there had been one store in which weapons could be
bought. In that store, the proprietor had stocked just one rifle of
the new make. The Savage, shooting an odd caliber cartridge, had been
distrusted because of that fact, the men of the country fearing that
they would have difficulty in procuring shells of such an unusual
caliber. Unable to sell it, he had finally parted with it for a mere
fraction of its value to one who would chance its inconvenience. The
man who possessed it had been known far and wide and, at that time, he
was the sole owner of such a rifle in all that region.
Yet, with this infallible clew to the identity of French Pete's
murderer at hand, it had been assumed that the bullet was 30-30.
De Launay envisioned that worn and battered rifle butt projecting from
the scabbard slung to the burro in Sulphur Falls. Nineteen years, and
the man still carried and used the weapon which was to prove his
guilt.
Once more he got up and went in to look at the sleeping girl. Should
he tell her that the murderer of her father was discovered? What good
would it do? He doubted that, if confronted with the knowledge, she
could find the fortitude to exact the vengeance which she had vowed.
And if, faced with the facts, she drew back, what reproach would she
always visit upon herself for her weakness? Torn between a barbaric
code and her own gentle instincts, she would be unhappy whatever
eventuated.
But he was free from gentleness--at least toward every one but her. He
had killed. He was callous. Five years in the _Légion des Etrangers_
and fourteen more of war and preparation for war had rendered him
proof against squeamishness. The man was a loathly thing who had slain
in cold blood, cowardly, evil, and unclean. Possibly he had murdered
within the past few days, and, at any rate he had attempted murder and
torture.
Why tell her about it? He had no ties; no aims; nothing to regret
leaving. He had nothing but wealth which was useless to him, but which
would lift her above all unhappiness after he was gone. And he could
kill the desert rat as he would snuff out a candle.
Yet--the thought of it gave him a qualm. The man was so contemptible;
so unutterably low and vile and cowardly. To kill him would be like
crushing vermin. He would not fight; he would cower and cringe and
shriek. There might be a battle when they took De Launay for the
"murder," of course, but even his passing, desperate as he might make
it, would not entirely wipe out the disgrace of such a butchery. He
was a soldier; a commander with a glorious record, and it went against
the grain to go out of life in an obscure brawl brought on by the
slaughter of this rat.
Still, he had dedicated himself to the service of this girl, half in
jest, perhaps, but it was the only service left to him to perform. He
had lived his life; had his little day of glory. It was time to go.
She was his wife and to her he would make his last gesture and depart,
serving her.
Then, as he looked at her, her eyes opened and flashed upon him. In
their depths something gleamed, a new light more baffling than any he
had seen there before. There was fire and softness, warmth and
sweetness in it. He dropped on his knees beside the bunk.
"What is it, _mon ami_?" Solange was smiling at him, a smile that drew
him like a magnet.
"Nothing," he said, and rose to his feet. Her hand had strayed lightly
over his hair in that instant of forgetfulness. "I looked to see that
you were comfortable."
"You are changed," she said, uncertainly. "It is better so."
He smiled at her. "Yes. I am changed again. I am the légionnaire.
Nameless, hopeless, careless! You must sleep, _mon enfant_! Good
night!"
He brushed the hand she held out to him with his lips and turned to
the door. As he went out she heard him singing softly:
"_Soldats de la Légion,
De la Légion Etrangère,
N'ayant pas de Nation,
La France est votre Mère._"
He did not see that the light in her marvelous eyes had grown very
tender. Nor did she dream that he had made a mat of his glory for her
to walk upon.