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- vertical-align: bottom; - padding-left: .3em; - white-space: nowrap; -} - -.pagenum { - position: absolute; - right: 4px; - text-indent: 0em; - text-align: right; - font-size: 70%; - font-weight: normal; - font-variant: normal; - font-style: normal; - letter-spacing: normal; - line-height: normal; - color: #acacac; - border: 1px solid #acacac; - background: #ffffff; - padding: 1px 2px; -} - -.figcenter { - margin: 2em auto 2em auto; - text-align: center; - page-break-inside: avoid; - max-width: 100%; -} -.figcenter.p4 {margin-top: 4em;} - -img { - padding: 0; - max-width: 100%; - height: auto; -} - -.caption {text-align: center; margin-top: 0;} - -.transnote { - background-color: #999999; - border: thin dotted; - font-family: sans-serif, serif; - margin-left: 5%; - margin-right: 5%; - margin-top: 4em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - padding: 1em; -} - -.sigright { - margin-right: 2em; - text-align: right;} - -.wspace {word-spacing: .3em;} - -span.locked {white-space:nowrap;} - -.narrow {max-width: 20em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} -.bt {border-top: thin solid black; padding-top: .5em;} -.bb {border-bottom: thin solid black;padding-bottom: .5em;} - -@media print, handheld -{ - h1, .chapter, .newpage {page-break-before: always;} - h1.nobreak, h2.nobreak, .nobreak {page-break-before: avoid; padding-top: 0;} - - p { - margin-top: .5em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: .25em; - } - - table {width: 100%; max-width: 100%;} - - .tdl { - padding-left: 1em; - text-indent: -1em; - padding-right: 0; - } - - p.drop-cap {text-indent: 1.75em; margin-bottom: .24em;} - p.drop-cap:first-letter { - float: none; - font-size: 100%; - margin-left: 0; - margin-right: 0; - text-indent: 1.75em; - } - - p.drop-cap .smcap1, - p.drop-cap.b .smcap1, p.drop-cap.al .smcap1 {margin-left: 0;} - p .smcap1 {font-size: 100%;} - .smcap1 {font-variant: normal;} - - .figcenter.p4 {margin-top: 0; page-break-before: always;} - .noepub {display: none; visibility: hidden;} - -} - -@media handheld -{ - body {margin: 0;} - - hr { - margin-top: .1em; - margin-bottom: .1em; - visibility: hidden; - color: white; - width: .01em; - display: none; - } - - .transnote { - page-break-inside: avoid; - margin-left: 2%; - margin-right: 2%; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - padding: .5em; - } - -} - - - h1.pg { margin-top: 0em; } - h3,h4 { text-align: center; - clear: both; } - hr.full { width: 100%; - margin-top: 3em; - margin-bottom: 0em; - margin-left: auto; - margin-right: auto; - height: 4px; - border-width: 4px 0 0 0; /* remove all borders except the top one */ - border-style: solid; - border-color: #000000; - clear: both; } - </style> -</head> -<body> -<h1 class="pg">The Project Gutenberg eBook, Wanderer of the Wasteland, by Zane Grey, -Illustrated by W. Herbert Dunton</h1> -<p>This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States -and most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no -restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it -under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this -eBook or online at <a -href="http://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you are not -located in the United States, you'll have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this ebook.</p> -<p>Title: Wanderer of the Wasteland</p> -<p>Author: Zane Grey</p> -<p>Release Date: August 15, 2019 [eBook #60102]</p> -<p>Language: English</p> -<p>Character set encoding: UTF-8</p> -<p>***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WANDERER OF THE WASTELAND***</p> -<p> </p> -<h4>E-text prepared by Tim Lindell, Charlie Howard,<br /> - and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team<br /> - (<a href="http://www.pgdp.net">http://www.pgdp.net</a>)<br /> - from page images generously made available by<br /> - Internet Archive<br /> - (<a href="https://archive.org">https://archive.org</a>)</h4> -<p> </p> -<table border="0" style="background-color: #ccccff;margin: 0 auto;" cellpadding="10"> - <tr> - <td valign="top"> - Note: - </td> - <td> - Images of the original pages are available through - Internet Archive. See - <a href="https://archive.org/details/wandererofwastel00grey_0"> - https://archive.org/details/wandererofwastel00grey_0</a> - </td> - </tr> -</table> -<p> </p> -<hr class="full" /> -<p> </p> -<p> </p> -<p> </p> - -<div class="newpage p4 figcenter noepub" style="max-width: 25em;"> - <img src="images/cover.jpg" width="565" height="800" alt="Cover" /> - </div> - -<h1 class="vspace wspace">WANDERER OF THE<br />WASTELAND</h1> - -<div class="figcenter" style="max-width: 6em;"> - <img src="images/i_000.jpg" width="83" height="51" alt="" /></div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="narrow"> -<p class="newpage p4 center bb"><span class="smcap">Books by</span><br /> -ZANE GREY</p> - -<p class="in0 in4 bb"> -<span class="smcap">Wanderer of the Wasteland</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">Tales of Lonely Trails</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">To the Last Man</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Mysterious Rider</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Man of the Forest</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">Tales of Fishes</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Desert of Wheat</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The U. P. Trail</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">Wildfire</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Border Legion</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Rainbow Trail</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Lone Star Ranger</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Light of Western Stars</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">Desert Gold</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Heritage of the Desert</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">Riders of the Purple Sage</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Young Forester</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Young Pitcher</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">The Young Lion Hunter</span><br /> -<span class="smcap">Ken Ward in the Jungle</span> -</p> - -<p class="p1 center"><span class="smcap">The Musson Book Company, Ltd.</span><br /> -<i>Publishers</i></p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div id="i_frontis" class="newpage p4 figcenter" style="max-width: 30em;"> - <img src="images/i_001.jpg" width="465" height="600" alt="" /> - <div class="caption">THE GIRL’S RED LIPS CURLED IN POUTED SCORN</div></div> - -<hr /> - -<p class="newpage p4 center xxlarge vspace wspace"> -WANDERER<br /> -OF THE WASTELAND</p> - -<p class="p2 center xlarge wspace wspace"><span class="small">by</span><br /> - -Zane Grey</p> - -<p class="center smaller"><i>Author of</i><br /> - -“The Man of the Forest,” “To the Last Man,”<br /> -“Riders of the Purple Sage,” Etc.</p> - -<p class="p2 center"><i>With Illustrations by</i><br /> -W. HERBERT DUNTON</p> - -<div id="if_i_002" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 7em;"> - <img src="images/i_002.jpg" width="100" height="99" alt="" /></div> - -<p class="p2 center">TORONTO: THE MUSSON BOOK COMPANY LTD.<br /> -NEW YORK: <span class="in6">HARPER & BROTHERS</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="narrow"> -<p class="newpage p4 center bb"> -WANDERER OF THE WASTELAND</p> - -<p class="center vspace bb">Copyright, Canada, 1923<br /> -<span class="smcap">By The Musson Book Company, Ltd.</span><br /> -Printed in Canada</p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="narrow"> -<p class="newpage p4 center vspace"> -Dedicated to my wife<br /> - -<span class="larger wspace">LINA ELISE GREY</span></p> - -<p class="center">Without whose love, faith, spirit<br /> -and help I never could have<br /> -written this novel</p> - -<p class="p1 sigright"><span class="smcap">Zane Grey</span></p> -</div> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CONTENTS">CONTENTS</h2> -</div> - -<table id="toc" summary="Contents"> - <tr class="small"> - <td> </td> - <td class="tdr">PAGE</td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER I</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">1</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER II</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">11</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER III</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">18</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER IV</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">27</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER V</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">39</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER VI</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">52</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER VII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">64</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER VIII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">79</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER IX</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">92</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER X</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">102</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XI</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">118</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">134</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XIII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">151</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XIV</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">156</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XV</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">172</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XVI</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">195</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XVII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">212</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XVIII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">231</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XIX</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">252</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XX</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX">262</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXI</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI">285</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXII">295</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXIII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII">309</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXIV</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV">329</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXV</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXV">348</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXVI</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI">358</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXVII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII">370</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXVIII</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII">393</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXIX</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX">403</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl">CHAPTER XXX</td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXX">413</a></td></tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="ILLUSTRATIONS">ILLUSTRATIONS</h2> -</div> - -<table id="loi" summary="Illustrations"> - <tr> - <td class="tdl"><span class="smcap">The Girl’s Red Lips Curled in Pouted Scorn</span></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#i_frontis"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl"><span class="smcap">Then the Gun Boomed with Muffled Report—and Guerd Larey, Uttering a Cry of Agony, Fell Away from Adam</span></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_58">58</a></td></tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdl"><span class="smcap">But at Length the Burden of a Heavy Weight, and the Dragging Sand, and the Hot Sun Brought Adam to a Pass Where Rest Was Imperative</span></td> - <td class="tdr"><a href="#ip_172">172</a></td></tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_1">1</span></p> -<h2 id="WANDERER_OF_THE_WASTELAND"><span class="larger">WANDERER OF THE<br />WASTELAND</span></h2> -</div> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_I" class="p2 nobreak wspace">CHAPTER I</h2> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Adam Larey</span> gazed with hard and wondering eyes -down the silent current of the red river upon which -he meant to drift away into the desert.</p> - -<p>The Rio Colorado was no river to trust. It chafed at -its banks as if to engulf them; muddy and thick it swirled -and glided along in flood, sweeping in curves back and -forth from Arizona to California shore. Majestic and -gleaming under the hot sky, it swung southward between -wide green borders of willow and cottonwood toward a -stark and naked upflung wilderness of mountain peaks, -the red ramparts of the unknown and trackless desert.</p> - -<p>Adam rushed down the bank and threw his pack into -a boat. There his rapid action seemed checked by the -same violence that had inspired his haste. He looked back, -up at the dusty adobe town of Ehrenberg, asleep now under -the glaring noonday heat. It would not wake out of that -siesta till the return of the weary gold diggers, or the -arrival of the stagecoach or the steamer. A tall Indian, -swarthy and unkempt, stood motionless in the shade of -a wall, watching stolidly.</p> - -<p>Adam broke down then. Sobs made his utterance incoherent. -“Guerd is no brother—of mine—any more!” he -burst out. His accent was one of humiliation and cheated -love. “And as for—for <em>her</em>—I’ll never—never think of -her—again.”</p> - -<p>When once more he turned to the river, a spirit wrestled<span class="pagenum" id="Page_2">2</span> -with the emotion that had unnerved him. Adam Larey -appeared to be a boy of eighteen, with darkly tanned, clear-cut, -and comely face, and a lofty stature, straight and spare -and wide. Untying the boat from its mooring, he became -conscious of a singular thrill. Sight of the silent -river fascinated him. If it had been drink that had fortified -his reckless resolve, it was some strange call to the -wildness in him that had stirred exaltation in the prospect -of adventure. But there was more. Never again to be -dominated by that selfish Guerd, his brother who had taken -all and given nothing! Guerd would be stung by this -desertion. Perhaps he would be sorry. That thought gave -Adam a pang. Long habit of being influenced, and -strength of love fostered in playmate days, these made -him waver. But the tide of resentment surged up once -more; and there flowed the red Colorado, rolling away to -the southwest, a gateway to the illimitable wastes of -desert land, with its mystery, its adventure, its gold and -alluring freedom.</p> - -<p>“I’ll go,” he declared, passionately, and with a shove -he sent the boat adrift and leaped over the bow to the -rowing seat. The boat floated lazily, half circling, till it -edged into the current; then, as if grasped by unseen -power, it glided downstream. Adam seemed to feel the -resistless current of this mysterious river take hold of his -heart. There would be no coming back—no breasting that -mighty flood with puny oars. The moment was sudden -and poignant in its revelation. How swiftly receded the -cluster of brown adobe huts, the somber, motionless -Indian! He had left Ehrenberg behind, and a brother -who was his only near relative, and a little sum of love -that had failed him.</p> - -<p>“I’m done with Guerd forever,” he muttered, looking -back with hard dry eyes. “It’s his fault. Mother always -warned me.... Ah! if she had lived I would still be -home. Home! and not here—in this awful desert of heat -and wastelands—among men like wolves and women -like....”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_3">3</span> -He did not finish the thought, but from his pack he -took a bottle that glittered in the sunlight, and, waving it -defiantly at the backward scene of glare and dust and -lonely habitation, he drank deeply. Then he flung the -bottle from him with a violent gesture of repulsion. He -had no love for strong drink. The bottle fell with hollow -splash, rode the muddy swirls, and sank. Whereupon -Adam applied himself to the oars with long and powerful -sweep.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>In that moment of bitter soliloquy there had flashed -through Adam Larey’s mind memories and pictures of -the past—the old homestead back East, vivid and unforgetable—the -sad face of his mother, who had loved him -as she had never loved his brother Guerd. There had been -a mystery about the father who had died in Adam’s childhood. -Adam thought of these facts now, seeing a vague -connection between them and his presence there alone upon -that desert river. When his mother died she had left all -her money to him. But Adam had shared his small fortune -with Guerd. That money had been the beginning of evil -days. If it had not changed Guerd it had awakened slumbering -jealousy and passion. Guerd squandered his share -and disgraced himself in the home town. Then had begun -his ceaseless importunity for Adam to leave college, -to see life, to seek adventures, to sail round the Horn to -the California gold fields. Adam had been true to the -brother spirit within him and the voice of the tempter had -fallen upon too thrilling ears. Yearning to be with his -brother, and to see wild life upon his own account, Adam -yielded to the importunity. He chose, however, to travel -westward by land. At various points <i xml:lang="fr" lang="fr">en route</i> Guerd had -fallen in with evil companions, among whom he seemed -to feel freer. At Tucson he launched himself upon the -easy and doubtful career of a gambler, which practice did -not spare even his brother. At Ehrenberg, Guerd had -found life to his liking—a mining and outfitting post remote -from civilization, where he made friends compatible<span class="pagenum" id="Page_4">4</span> -with his lately developed tastes, where he finally filched -the favor of dark eyes that had smiled first upon Adam.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>It was a June sun that burned down upon the Colorado -desert and its red river. Adam Larey had taken to rowing -the boat with a powerful energy. But the fiery liquor he -had absorbed and the intense heat beating down upon -him soon prostrated him, half drunk and wholly helpless, -upon the bottom of the leaky boat, now at the mercy of -the current.</p> - -<p>Strangest of all rivers was the Rio Colorado. Many -names it had borne, though none so fitting and lasting as -that which designated its color. Neither crimson nor -scarlet was it, nor any namable shade of red, yet somehow -red was its hue. Like blood with life gone from it! -With its source at high altitude, fed by snow fields and a -thousand lakes and streams, the Colorado stormed its great -canyoned confines with a mighty torrent; and then, spent -and leveled, but still tremendous and insatiate, it bore -down across the desert with its burden of silt and sand. -It was silent, it seemed to glide along, yet it was appalling.</p> - -<p>The boat that carried Adam Larey might as well have -been a rudderless craft in an ocean current. Slowly round -and round it turned, as if every rod of the river was an -eddy, sweeping near one shore and then the other. The -hot hours of the afternoon waned. Sunset was a glaring -blaze without clouds. Cranes and bitterns swept -in lumbering flight over the wide green crests of the -bottom lands, and desert buzzards sailed down from the -ruddy sky. The boat drifted on. Before darkness fell -the boat had drifted out of the current into a back eddy, -where slowly it rode round and round, at last to catch -hold of the arrowweeds and lodge in a thicket.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>At dawn Adam Larey awoke, sober enough, but sick -and aching, parched with thirst. The eastern horizon, -rose-flushed and golden, told him of the advent of another -day. He thrilled even in his misery. Scooping up<span class="pagenum" id="Page_5">5</span> -the muddy and sand-laden water, which was cold and -held a taste of snow, he quenched his thirst and bathed -his hot face. Then opening his pack, he took out food he -had been careful to bring.</p> - -<p>Then he endeavored to get his bearings. Adam could -see by the stain on the arrowweeds that the flood had subsided -a foot during the night. A reasonable calculation -was that he had drifted a good many miles. “I’ll row -till it gets hot, then rest up in a shady place,” he decided. -Pushing away from the weeds, he set the oars -and rowed out to meet the current. As soon as that -caught him the motion became exhilarating. By and by, -what with the exercise and the cool breeze of morning -on his face and the sweet, dank smell of river lowlands, -he began to wear off the effects of the liquor and with it -the disgust and sense of unfitness with which it had left -him. Then at length gloom faded from his mind, though -a pang abided in his breast. It was not an unfamiliar -sensation. Resolutely he faced that wide traveling river, -grateful for something nameless that seemed borne on its -bosom, conscious of a strange expansion of his soul, ready -to see, to hear, to smell, to feel, to taste the wildness and -wonder of freedom as he had dreamed it.</p> - -<p>The sun rose, and Adam’s face and hands felt as if -some hot material thing had touched them. He began to -sweat, which was all that was needed to restore his usual -healthy feeling of body. From time to time he saw -herons, and other long-legged waterfowl, and snipe flitting -over the sand bars, and somber, gray-hued birds that -he could not name. The spell of river or desert hovered -over these birds. The fact brought to Adam the strange -nature of this silence. Like an invisible blanket it covered -all, water and brush and land.</p> - -<p>“It’s desert silence,” he said, wonderingly.</p> - -<p>When he raised the oars and rested them there seemed -absolutely no sound. And this fact struck him overpoweringly -with its meaning and with a sudden unfamiliar joy. -On the gentle wind came a fragrant hot breath that<span class="pagenum" id="Page_6">6</span> -mingled with the rank odor of flooded bottom lands. The -sun, hot as it was, felt good upon his face and back. He -loved the sun as he hated cold.</p> - -<p>“Maybe Guerd’s coaxing me West will turn out well -for me,” soliloquized Adam, with resurging boyish hope. -“As the Mexicans say, <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Quien sabe?</i>”</p> - -<p>At length he espied a sloping bank where it appeared -safe to risk landing. This was a cove comparatively free -of brush and the bank sloped gradually to the water. -The summit of the bank was about forty or fifty feet -high, and before Adam had wholly ascended it he began -to see the bronze tips of mountains on all sides.</p> - -<p>“By Jove!” exclaimed Adam. “No sign of man! No -sign of life!”</p> - -<p>Some distance from the river bank stood a high knoll. -Adam climbed to the top of it, and what he saw here made -him yearn for the mountain peaks. He had never stood -at any great elevation. Southward the Colorado appeared -to enter a mountain gateway and to turn and disappear.</p> - -<p>When he had refreshed himself with food and drink he -settled himself into a comfortable position to rest and -sleep a little while. He had plucked at the roots of love, -but not yet had he torn it from his heart. Guerd, his -brother! The old boyhood days flashed up. Adam found -the pang deep in his heart and ineradicable. The old -beautiful bond, the something warm and intimate between -him and Guerd, was gone forever. For its loss there -could be no recompense. He knew every hour would -sever him the farther from this brother who had proved -false. Adam hid his face in the dry grass, and there in -the loneliness of that desert he began to see into the gulf -of his soul.</p> - -<p>“I can fight—I can forget!” he muttered. Then he set -his mind to the problem of his immediate future. Where -would he go? There were two points below on the river—Picacho, -a mining camp, and Yuma, a frontier town—about -both of which he had heard strange, exciting tales. -And at that moment Adam felt a reckless eagerness for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_7">7</span> -adventure, and a sadness for the retreating of his old -dream of successful and useful life. At length he fell -asleep.</p> - -<p>When he awoke he felt hot and wet with sweat. A -luminous gold light shone through the willows and there -was vivid color in the west. He had slept hours. When -he moved to sit up he heard rustlings in the willows. -These unseen creatures roused interest and caution in -Adam. In his travels across Arizona he had passed -through wild places and incidents. And remembering -tales of bad Indians, bad Mexicans, bad white men, and -the fierce beasts and reptiles of the desert, Adam fortified -himself to encounters that must come.</p> - -<p>When he stepped out of the shady covert it was to see -river and valley as if encompassed by an immense loneliness, -different somehow for the few hours of his thought -and slumber. The river seemed redder and the mountains -veiled in ruby haze. Earth and sky were bathed in the -hue of sunset light.</p> - -<p>He descended to the river. Shoving the boat off, he -applied himself to the oars. His strong strokes, aided by -the current, sent the boat along swiftly, perhaps ten miles -an hour. The rose faded out of the sky, the clouds -turned drab, the blue deepened, and a pale star shone. -Twilight failed. With the cooling of the air Adam lay -back more powerfully upon the oars. Night fell, and one -by one, and then many by many, the stars came out. This -night ride began to be thrilling. There must have been -danger ahead. By night the river seemed vast, hurrying, -shadowy, and silent as the grave. Its silence wore upon -Adam until it seemed unnatural.</p> - -<p>As the stars multiplied and brightened, the deep cut -where the river wound changed its character, becoming -dark and clear where it had been gloomily impenetrable. -The dim, high outlines of the banks showed, and above -them loomed the black domes of mountains. From time -to time he turned the boat and, resting upon his oars, he -drifted with the current, straining his eyes and ears.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_8">8</span> -These moments of inaction brought the cold, tingling -prickle of skin up and down his back. It was impossible -not to be afraid, yet he thrilled even in his fear. In the -clear obscurity of the night he could see several rods -ahead of him over the gleaming river. But the peril that -haunted Adam seemed more in the distant shadows, round -the bends. What a soundless, nameless, unintelligible -river! To be alone on a river like that, so vast, so strange, -with the grand and solemn arch of heaven blazed and -clouded white by stars, taught a lesson incalculable in -its effects.</p> - -<p>The hour came when an invisible something, like a -blight, passed across the heavens, paling the blue, dimming -the starlight. The intense purity of the sky sustained -a dull change, then darkened. Adam welcomed the -first faint gleam of light over the eastern horizon. It -brightened. The wan stars faded. The mountains -heightened their clearness of silhouette, and along the bold, -dark outlines appeared a faint rose color, herald of the -sun. It deepened, it spread as the gray light turned pink -and yellow. The shadows lifted from the river valley and -it was day again.</p> - -<p>“Always I have slept away the great hour,” said Adam. -An exhilaration uplifted him.</p> - -<p>He drifted round a bend in the river while once more -eating sparingly of his food; and suddenly he espied a -high column of smoke rising to the southwest. Whereupon -he took the oars again and, having become rested -and encouraged, he rowed with a stroke that would make -short work of the few miles to the camp.</p> - -<p>“Picacho!” soliloquized Adam, remembering tales he -had heard. “Now what shall I do?... I’ll work at anything.” -He carried a considerable sum of money in a belt -round his waist—the last of the money left him by his -mother, and he wanted to keep it as long as possible.</p> - -<p>Adam was not long in reaching the landing, which appeared -to be only a muddy bank. A small, dilapidated -stern-wheel steamer, such as Adam had seen on the Ohio<span class="pagenum" id="Page_9">9</span> -River, lay resting upon the mud. On the bow sat a gaunt -weather-beaten man with a grizzled beard. He held a long -crooked fishing pole out over the water, and evidently -was fishing. The bank sloped up to fine white sand and -a dense growth of green, in the middle of which there -appeared to be a narrow lane. Here in a flowing serape -stood a Mexican girl, slender and small, with a single -touch of red in all her darkness of dress.</p> - -<p>Adam ran the boat ashore. Lifting his pack, he climbed -a narrow bench of the bank and walked down to a point -opposite the fisherman. Adam greeted him and inquired -if this place was Picacho.</p> - -<p>“Mornin’, stranger,” came the reply. “Yes, this here’s -the gold diggin’s, an’ she’s hummin’ these days.”</p> - -<p>“Catching any fish?” Adam inquired, with interest.</p> - -<p>“Yep; I ketched one day before yestiddy,” replied the -man, complacently.</p> - -<p>“What kind?” went on Adam.</p> - -<p>“I’ll be doggoned if I know, but he was good to eat,” -answered the angler, with a grin. “Where you hail from, -stranger?”</p> - -<p>“Back East.”</p> - -<p>“So I reckoned. No Westerner would tackle the -Colorado when she was in flood. I opine you hit the -river at Ehrenberg. Wal, you’re lucky. Goin’ to prospect -for gold?”</p> - -<p>“No, I’d rather work. Can I get a job here?”</p> - -<p>“Son, if you’re as straight as you look you can get a -good job. But a husky lad like you, if he stayed sober, -could strike it rich in the diggin’s.”</p> - -<p>“How about a place to eat and sleep?”</p> - -<p>“Thet ain’t so easy to find up at the camp. It’s a -few miles up the canyon. But say, I’m forgettin’ about -the feller who stayed here with the Mexicans. They -jest buried him. You could get his place. It’s the ’dobe -house—first one. Ask Margarita, there. She’ll show -you.”</p> - -<p>Thus directed, Adam saw the Mexican girl standing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_10">10</span> -above him. Climbing the path to the top of the bank, he -threw down his pack.</p> - -<p>“<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Buenas dias</i>, señor.” The girl’s soft, liquid accents -fitted a dark, piquant little face, framed by hair as black -as the wing of a raven, and lighted by big eyes, like night.</p> - -<p>Adam’s Spanish was not that of the Mexicans, but it -enabled him to talk fairly well. He replied to the girl’s -greeting, yet hesitated with the query he had on his lips. -He felt a slight shrinking as these dark eyes reminded him -of others of like allurement which he had willed to forget. -Yet he experienced a warmth and thrill of pleasure in a -pretty face. Women invariably smiled upon Adam. This -one, a girl in her teens, smiled with half-lowered eyes, -the more provocative for that; and she turned partly away -with a lithe, quick grace. Adam’s hesitation had been a -sudden chill at the proximity of something feminine and -attractive—of something that had hurt him. But it passed. -He had done more than boldly step across the threshold -of a new and freer life.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_11">11</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">For</span> Adam’s questions Margarita had a shy, “<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Si</i>, -señor,” and the same subtle smile that had attracted -him. Whereupon he took up his pack and followed her.</p> - -<p>Back from the river the sand was thick and heavy, clean -and white. The girl led down a path bordered by willows -and mesquites which opened into a clearing where stood -several squat adobe houses.</p> - -<p>Margarita stopped at the first house. The girl’s mother -appeared to be an indolent person, rather careless of her -attire. She greeted Adam in English, but when he exercised -some of his laborsome Spanish her dark face beamed -with smiles that made it pleasant to behold. The little -room indoors, to which she led Adam, was dark, poorly -ventilated, and altogether unsatisfactory. Adam said so. -The señora waxed eloquent. Margarita managed to convey -her great disappointment by one swift look. Then -they led him outdoors and round under the low-branching -mesquites, where he had to stoop, to a small structure. -The walls were made of two rows of long slender -poles, nailed upon heavier uprights at the corners, and -between these rows had been poured wet adobe mud. -The hut contained two rooms, the closed one full of wood -and rubbish, and the other, which had an open front, like -a porch, faced the river. It was empty, with a floor of -white sand. This appeared very much to Adam’s liking, -and he agreed upon a price for it, to the señora’s satisfaction -and Margarita’s shy rapture. Adam saw the -latter with some misgiving, yet he was pleased, and in -spite of himself he warmed toward this pretty señorita -who had apparently taken a sudden fancy to him. He -was a stranger in a strange land, with a sore and yearning<span class="pagenum" id="Page_12">12</span> -heart. While Adam untied his pack and spread out its -contents the women fetched a low bench, a bucket of -water, and a basin. These simple articles constituted the -furniture of his new lodgings. He was to get his meals -at the house, where, it was assured, he would be well -cared for. In moving away, Margarita, who was looking -back, caught her hair in a thorny branch of the mesquite. -Adam was quick to spring to her assistance. Then she -ran off after her mother.</p> - -<p>“What eyes! Well, well!” exclaimed Adam, sensible -of a warmth along his veins. Suddenly at that moment -he thought of his brother Guerd. “I’m glad he’s not -here.” Margarita had prompted that thought. Guerd was -a handsome devil, irresistible to women. Adam went back -to his unpacking, conscious of a sobered enthusiasm.</p> - -<p>He hung his few clothes and belongings upon the walls, -made his bed of blankets on the sand, and then surveyed -the homely habitation with pleasure.</p> - -<p>He found the old fisherman in precisely the same posture. -Adam climbed on board the boat.</p> - -<p>“Get any bites?” he queried.</p> - -<p>“I believe I jest had one,” replied the fisherman.</p> - -<p>Adam saw that he was about fifty years old, lean and -dried, with a wrinkled tanned face and scant beard.</p> - -<p>“Have a smoke,” said Adam, proffering one of the last -of his cigars.</p> - -<p>“Lordy!” ejaculated the fisherman, his eyes lighting. -“When have I seen one of them?... Young man, you’re -an obligin’ feller. What’s your name?”</p> - -<p>Adam told him, and that he hailed from the East and -had been a tenderfoot for several memorable weeks.</p> - -<p>“My handle’s Merryvale,” replied the other. “I came -West twenty-eight years ago when I was about your age. -Reckon you’re about twenty.”</p> - -<p>“No. Only eighteen. Say, you must have almost seen -the old days of ’forty-nine.”</p> - -<p>“It was in ’fifty. Yes, I was in the gold rush.”</p> - -<p>“Did you strike any gold?” asked Adam, eagerly.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_13">13</span> -“Son, I was a prospector for twenty years. I’ve made -an’ lost more than one fortune. Drink an’ faro an’ bad -women!... And now I’m a broken-down night watchman -at Picacho.”</p> - -<p>“I’m sorry,” said Adam, sincerely. “I’ll bet you’ve seen -some great old times. Won’t you tell me about them? You -see, I’m foot-loose now and sort of wild.”</p> - -<p>Merryvale nodded sympathetically. He studied Adam -with eyes that were shrewd and penetrating, for all their -kindliness. Wherefore Adam talked frankly about himself -and his travels West. Merryvale listened with a -nod now and then.</p> - -<p>“Son, I hate to see the likes of you hittin’ this gold -diggin’s,” he said.</p> - -<p>“Why? Oh, I can learn to take care of myself. It -must be a man’s game. I’ll love the desert.”</p> - -<p>“Wal, son, I oughtn’t discourage you,” replied Merryvale. -“An’ it ain’t fair for me to think because I went -wrong, an’ because I seen so many boys go wrong, thet -you’ll do the same.... But this gold diggin’s is a hell of a -place for a tough old timer, let alone a boy runnin’ wild.”</p> - -<p>And then he began to talk like a man whose memory -was a vast treasure store of history and adventure and -life. Gold had been discovered at Picacho in 1864. In -1872 the mill was erected near the river, and the ore was -mined five miles up the canyon and hauled down on a -narrow-gauge railroad. The machinery and construction -for this great enterprise, together with all supplies, were -brought by San Francisco steamers round into the Gulf -of California, loaded on smaller steamers, and carried -up the Colorado River to Picacho. These steamers also -hauled supplies to Yuma and Ehrenberg, where they were -freighted by wagon trains into the interior. At the present -time, 1878, the mine was paying well and there were between -five and six hundred men employed. The camp -was always full of adventurers and gamblers, together -with a few bad women whose capacity for making trouble -magnified their number.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_14">14</span> -“Down here at the boat landin’ an’ the mill it’s always -sorta quiet,” said Merryvale. “You see, there ain’t many -men here. An’ the gamblin’ hells are all up at the camp, -where, in fact, everybody goes of an evenin’. Lord knows -I’ve bucked the tiger in every gold camp in California. -There’s a fever grips a man. I never seen the good of -gold to the man thet dug it.... So, son, if you’re askin’ -me for a hunch, let me tell you, drink little an’ gamble -light an’ fight shy of the females!”</p> - -<p>“Merryvale, I’m more of a tenderfoot than I look, I -guess,” replied Adam. “You’d hardly believe I never -drank till I started West a few months ago. I can’t stand -liquor.”</p> - -<p>Adam’s face lost its brightness and his eyes shadowed, -though they held frankly to Merryvale’s curious gaze.</p> - -<p>“Son, you’re a strappin’ youngster an’ you’ve got looks -no woman will pass by,” said Merryvale. “An’ in this -country the preference of women brings trouble. Wal, -for thet matter, all the trouble anywheres is made by -them. But in the desert, where it’s wild an’ hot an’ there’s -few females of any species, the fightin’ gets bloody.”</p> - -<p>“Women have been the least of my fights or troubles,” -rejoined Adam. “But lately I had a—a little more serious -affair—that ended suddenly before I fell in deep.”</p> - -<p>“Lordy! son, you’ll be a lamb among wolves!” broke -in Merryvale. “See here, I’m goin’ to start you right. -This country is no place for a nice clean boy, more’s the -shame and pity. Every man who gets on in the West, let -alone in the desert where the West is magnified, has got -to live up to the standard. He must work, he must endure, -he must fight men, he must measure up to women. I -ain’t sayin’ it’s a fine standard, but it’s the one by which -men have survived in a hard country at a hard time.”</p> - -<p>“Survival of the fittest,” muttered Adam, soberly.</p> - -<p>“You’ve said it, son. Thet law makes the livin’ things -of this desert, whether man or otherwise. <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Quien sabe?</i> -You can never tell what’s in a man till he’s tried. Son, -I’ve known desert men whose lives were beyond all understandin.’<span class="pagenum" id="Page_15">15</span> -But not one man in a thousand can live on -the desert. Thet has to do with his mind first; then -his endurance. But to come back to this here Picacho. -I’d not be afraid to back you against it if you meet it -right.”</p> - -<p>“How is that?”</p> - -<p>“Lordy! son, I wish I could say the right word,” returned -Merryvale, in pathetic earnestness. “You ain’t -to be turned back?”</p> - -<p>“No. I’m here for better or worse. Back home I had -my hopes, my dreams. They’re gone—vanished.... I’ve -no near relatives except a brother who—who is not my -kind. I didn’t want to come West. But I seem to have -been freed from a cage. This grand wild desert! It -will do something wonderful—or terrible with me.”</p> - -<p>“Wal, wal, you talk like you look,” replied Merryvale, -with a sigh. “Time was, son, when a hunch of mine might -be doubtful. But now I’m old, an’ as I go down the years -I remember more my youth an’ I love it more. You can -trust me.” Then he paused, taking a deep breath, as if -his concluding speech involved somehow his faith in himself -and his good will to a stranger. “Be a man with your -body! Don’t shirk work or play or fight. Eat an’ drink -an’ be merry, but don’t live jest for thet. Lend a helpin’ -hand—be generous with your gold. Put aside a third -of your earnin’s for gamblin’ an’ look to lose it. Don’t -ever get drunk. You can’t steer clear of women, good -or bad. An’ the only way is to be game an’ kind an’ -square.”</p> - -<p>“Game—kind—square,” mused Adam, thoughtfully.</p> - -<p>“Wal, I need a new fishin’ line,” said Merryvale, as he -pulled in his rod. “We’ll go up to the store an’ then I’ll -take you to the mill.”</p> - -<p>While passing the adobe house where Adam had engaged -board and lodging he asked his companion the name -of the people.</p> - -<p>“Arallanes—Juan Arallanes lives there,” replied Merryvale. -“An’ he’s the whitest greaser I ever seen. He’s a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_16">16</span> -foreman of the Mexicans employed at the mill. His wife -is nice, too. But thet black-eyed hussy <span class="locked">Margarita——”</span></p> - -<p>Merryvale shook his grizzled head, but did not complete -his dubious beginning. The suggestion piqued Adam’s -curiosity. Presently Merryvale pointed out a cluster of -huts and cabins and one rather pretentious stone house, -low and square, with windows. Both white- and dark-skinned -children were playing on the sand in the shady -places. Idle men lounged in front of the stone house, -which Merryvale said was the store. Upon entering, -Adam saw a complete general store of groceries, merchandise, -hardware, and supplies; and he felt amazed until -he remembered how the river steamers made transportation -easy as far as the border of the desert. Then Merryvale -led on to the huge structure of stone and iron and -wood that Adam had espied from far up the river. As -Adam drew near he heard the escape of steam, the roar -of heavy machinery, and a sound that must have been a -movement and crushing of ore, with a rush of flowing -water.</p> - -<p>Merryvale evidently found the manager, who was a man -of medium height, powerfully built, with an unshaven -broad face, strong and ruddy. He wore a red-flannel shirt, -wet with sweat, a gun at his belt, overalls thrust into -cowhide boots; and altogether he looked a rough and -practical miner.</p> - -<p>“Mac, shake hands with my young friend here,” said -Merryvale. “He wants a job.”</p> - -<p>“Howdy!” replied the other, proffering a big hand that -Adam certainly felt belonged to a man. Also he was aware -of one quick all-embracing glance. “Are you good at -figures?”</p> - -<p>“Why, yes,” answered Adam, “but I want to work.”</p> - -<p>“All right. You can help me in the office where I’m -stuck. An’ I’ll give you outside work, besides. To-morrow.” -And with this brusque promise the manager strode -away in a hurry.</p> - -<p>“Mac don’t get time to eat,” explained Merryvale.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_17">17</span> -Adam had to laugh at the incident. Here he had been -recommended by a stranger, engaged to work for a man -whose name he had not heard and who had not asked his, -and no mention made of wages. Adam liked this simplicity. -A man must pass in this country for what he was.</p> - -<p>Merryvale went his way then, leaving Adam alone. It -seemed to Adam, as he pondered there, that his impressions -of that gold mill did not augur well for a satisfaction -with his job. He had no distaste for hard labor, though -to bend over a desk did not appeal to him. Then he -turned his gaze to the river and valley. What a splendid -scene! The green borderland offered soft and relieving -contrast to the bare and grisly ridges upon which he stood. -At that distance the river shone red gold, sweeping through -its rugged iron gateway and winding majestically down -the valley to lose itself round a bold bluff.</p> - -<p>Adam drew a long breath. A scene like this world of -mountain wilderness, of untrodden ways, was going to -take hold of him. And then, singularly, there flashed into -memory an image of the girl, Margarita. Just then Adam -resented thought of her. It was not because she had -made eyes at him—for he had to confess this was pleasing—but -because he did not like the idea of a deep and -vague emotion running parallel in his mind with thought -of a roguish and coquettish little girl, of doubtful yet -engaging possibilities.</p> - -<p>“I think too much,” declared Adam. It was action he -needed. Work, play, hunting, exploring, even gold digging—anything -with change of scene and movement of -muscle—these things that he had instinctively felt to be -the need of his body, now seemed equally the need of his -soul.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_18">18</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Arallanes,</span> the foreman, did not strike Adam as -being typical of the Mexicans among whom he -lived. He was not a little runt of a swarthy-skinned -man, but well built, of a clean olive complexion and regular -features.</p> - -<p>After supper Arallanes invited Adam to ride up to the -camp. Whereupon Margarita asked to be taken. Arallanes -laughed, and then talked so fast that Adam could -not understand. He gathered, however, that the empty -ore train traveled up the canyon to the camp, there to -remain until morning. Also Adam perceived that Margarita -did not get along well with this man, who was her -stepfather. They appeared on the verge of a quarrel. -But the señora spoke a few soft words that worked magic -upon Arallanes, though they did not change the passion of -the girl. How swiftly she had paled! Her black eyes -burned with a dusky fire. When she turned them upon -Adam it was certain that he had a new sensation.</p> - -<p>“Will not the gracious señor take Margarita to the -dance?”</p> - -<p>That was how Adam translated her swift, eloquent -words. Embarrassed and hesitating, he felt that he cut a -rather sorry figure before her. Then he realized the -singular beauty of her big eyes, sloe black and brilliant, -neither half veiled nor shy now, but bold and wide and -burning, as if the issue at stake was not trivial.</p> - -<p>Arallanes put a hand on Adam. “No, señor,” he said. -“Some other time you may take Margarita.”</p> - -<p>“I—I shall be pleased,” stammered Adam.</p> - -<p>The girl’s red lips curled in pouting scorn, and with a -wonderful dusky flash of eyes she whirled away.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_19">19</span> -Outside, Arallanes led Adam across the sands, still with -that familiar hand upon him.</p> - -<p>“Boy,” he said, in English, “that girl—she no blood of -mine. She damn leetle wild cat—mucha Indian—on fire -all time.”</p> - -<p>If ever Adam had felt the certainty of his youthful -years, it had been during those last few moments. His -collar was hot and tight. A sense of shock remained with -him. He had not fortified himself at all, nor had he -surrendered himself to recklessness. But to think of -going to a dance this very night, in a mining camp, with -a dusky-eyed little Spanish girl who appeared exactly what -Arallanes had called her—the very idea took Adam’s breath -with the surprise of it, the wildness of it, the strange -appeal to him.</p> - -<p>“Señor veree beeg, but young—like colt,” said Arallanes, -with good nature. “Tenderfeet, the gamblers say.... -He mos’ dam’ sure have tough feet soon on Picacho!”</p> - -<p>“Well, Arallanes, that can’t come too soon for me,” -declared Adam, and the statement seemed to give relief.</p> - -<p>They climbed to the track where the ore train stood, -already with laborers in almost every car. After a little -wait that seemed long to the impatient Adam the train -started. The track was built a few feet above the sand, -but showed signs of having been submerged, and in fact -washed out in places. The canyon was tortuous, and -grew more so as it narrowed. Adam descried tunnels dug -in the red walls and holes dug in gravel benches, which -place Arallanes explained had been made by prospectors -hunting for gold. It developed, however, that there -was a considerable upgrade. That seemed a long five -miles to Adam. The train halted and the laborers yelled -merrily.</p> - -<p>Arallanes led Adam up a long winding path, quite steep, -and the other men followed in single file. When Adam -reached a level once more, Arallanes called out, “Picacho!”</p> - -<p>But he certainly could not have meant the wide gravelly -plateau with its squalid huts, its adobe shacks, its rambling<span class="pagenum" id="Page_20">20</span> -square of low flat buildings, like a stockade fort roofed -with poles and dirt. Arallanes meant the mountain that -dominated the place—Picacho, the Peak.</p> - -<p>Adam faced the west as the sun was setting. The -mountain, standing magnificently above the bold knobs -and ridges around it, was a dark purple mass framed in -sunset gold; and from its frowning summit, notched and -edged, streamed a long ruddy golden ray of sunlight that -shone down through a wind-worn hole. With the sun -blocked and hidden except for that small aperture there -was yet a wonderful effect of sunset. A ruddy haze, shading -the blue, filled the canyons and the spaces. Picacho -seemed grand there, towering to the sky, crowned in gold, -aloof, unscalable, a massive rock sculptured by the ages.</p> - -<p>Arallanes laughed at Adam, then sauntered on. Mexicans -jabbered as they passed, and some of the white men -made jocular comment at the boy standing there so wide -eyed and still. A little Irishman gaped at Adam and said -to a comrade:</p> - -<p>“Begorra, he’s after seein’ a peanut atop ole Picacho.... -What-th’-hell now, me young fri’nd? Come hev a -drink.”</p> - -<p>The crowd passed on, and Arallanes lingered, making -himself a cigarette the while.</p> - -<p>Adam had not been prepared for such a spectacle of -grandeur and desolation. He seemed to feel himself a -mite flung there, encompassed by colossal and immeasurable -fragments of upheaved rock, jagged and jutted, with -never a softening curve, and all steeped in vivid and -intense light. The plateau was a ridged and scarred waste, -lying under the half circle of range behind, and sloping -down toward where the river lay hidden. The range to -the left bore a crimson crest, and it lost itself in a region -of a thousand peaks. The range to the right was cold -pure purple and it ended in a dim infinity. Between these -ranges, far flung across the Colorado, loomed now with -exquisite clearness in Adam’s sight the mountain world -he had gotten a glimpse of from below. But now he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_21">21</span> -perceived its marvelous all-embracing immensity, magnified -by the transparent light, its limitless horizon line an -illusion, its thin purple distances unbelievable. The lilac-veiled -canyons lay clear in his sight; the naked bones of -the mountains showed hungrily the nature of the desert -earth; and over all the vast area revealed by the setting -sun lay the awful barrenness of a dead world, beautiful -and terrible, with its changing rose and topaz hues only -mockeries to the lover of life.</p> - -<p>A hand fell upon Adam’s shoulder.</p> - -<p>“Come, let us look at games of gold and women,” said -Arallanes.</p> - -<p>Then he led Adam into a big, poorly lighted, low-ceiled -place, as crudely constructed as a shed, and full of noise -and smoke. The attraction seemed to be a rude bar, -various gambling games, and some hawk-faced, ghastly -spectacles of women drinking with men at the tables. From -an adjoining apartment came discordant music. This scene -was intensely interesting to Adam, yet disappointing. His -first sight of a wild frontier gambling hell did not thrill -him.</p> - -<p>It developed that Arallanes liked to drink and talk loud -and laugh, and to take a bold chance at a gambling game. -But Adam refused, and meant to avoid drinking as long -as he could. He wandered around by himself, to find -that everybody was merry and friendly. Adam tried not -to look at any of the women while they looked at him. -The apartment from which came the music was merely -a bare canvas-covered room with a board floor. Dancing -was going on.</p> - -<p>Adam’s aimless steps finally led him back to the sand-floored -hall, where he became absorbed in watching a -game of poker that a bystander said had no limit. Then -Adam sauntered on, and presently was attracted by a -quarrel among some Mexicans. To his surprise, it -apparently concerned Arallanes. All of them showed the -effects of liquor, and, after the manner of their kind, they -were gesticulating and talking excitedly. Suddenly one<span class="pagenum" id="Page_22">22</span> -of them drew a knife and lunged toward Arallanes. Adam -saw the movement, and then the long shining blade, before -he saw what the man looked like. That action silenced -the little group.</p> - -<p>The outstretched hand, quivering with the skewerlike -dagger, paused in its sweep as it reached a point opposite -Adam. Instinctively he leaped, and quick as a flash he -caught the wrist in a grip so hard that the fellow yelled. -Adam, now that he possessed the menacing hand, did -not know what to do with it. With a powerful jerk he -pulled the Mexican off his feet, and then, exerting his -strength to his utmost, he swung him round, knocking -over men and tables, until his hold loosened. The knife -flew one way and the Mexican the other. He lay where -he fell. Arallanes and his comrades made much of Adam.</p> - -<p>“We are friends. You will drink with me,” said Arallanes, -grandly.</p> - -<p>Though no one would have suspected it, Adam was -really in need of something bracing.</p> - -<p>“Señor is only a boy, but he has an arm,” said Arallanes, -as he clutched Adam’s shoulder and biceps with a nervous -hand.... “When señor becomes a man he will be a giant.”</p> - -<p>Adam’s next change of emotion was from fright to a -sense of foolishness at his standing there. Then he had -another drink, and after his feelings changed again, and -for that matter the whole complexion of everything -changed.</p> - -<p>He never could have found the narrow path leading -down into the canyon. Arallanes was his guide. Walking -on the sandy floor was hard work and made him sweat. -The loose sand and gravel dragged at his feet. Not long -was it before he had walked off the effects of the strong -liquor. He became curious as to why the Mexican had -threatened Arallanes, and was told that during the day -the foreman had discharged this fellow.</p> - -<p>“He ran after Margarita,” added Arallanes, “and I -kicked him out of the house. The women, señor—ah! -they do not mind what a man is!... Have a care of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_23">23</span> -Margarita. She has as many loves and lives as a spotted -cat.”</p> - -<p>For the most part, however, the two men were silent -on this laborious walk. By and by the canyon widened -out so that Adam could view the great expanse of sky, -fretted with fire, and the mountain spurs, rising on all -sides, cold and dark against the blue. At last Arallanes -announced that they were home. Adam had not seen a -single house in the gray shadows. A few more steps, however, -brought tangible substance of walls to Adam’s touch. -Then he drew a long deep breath and realized how tired -he was. The darkness gradually changed from pitch -black to a pale obscurity. He could see dim, spectral -outlines of mesquites, and a star shining through. At -first the night appeared to be absolutely silent, but after -a while, by straining his ears, he heard a rustling of mice -or ground squirrels in the adobe walls. The sound comforted -him, however, and when one of them, or at least -some little animal, ran softly over his bed the feeling of -utter loneliness was broken.</p> - -<p>“I’ve begun it,” he whispered, and meant the lonely life -that was to be his. The silence, the darkness, the loneliness -seemed to give him deeper thought. The thing that -puzzled him and alarmed him was what seemed to be -swift changes going on in him. If he changed his mind -every hour, now cast down because of memories he could -not wholly shake, or lifted to strange exaltation by the -beauty of a desert sunset, or again swayed by the appeal -of a girl’s dusky eyes, and then instinctively leaping into -a fight with a Mexican—if he were going to be as vacillating -and wild as these impulses led him to suppose he -might be, it was certain that he faced a hopeless future.</p> - -<p>But could he help himself? Then it seemed his fine -instincts, his fine principles, and the hopes and dreams -that would not die, began to contend with a new uprising -force in him, a wilder something he had never known, a -strange stirring and live emotion.</p> - -<p>“But I’m glad,” he burst out, as if telling his secret to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_24">24</span> -the darkness. “Glad to be rid of Guerd—damn him and -his meanness!... Glad to be alone!... Glad to come -into this wild desert!... Glad that girl made eyes at -me! I’ll not lie to myself. I wanted to hug her—to kiss -her—and I’ll do it if she’ll let me.... That gambling -hell disgusted me, and sight of the greaser’s knife scared -me cold. Yet when I got hold of him—felt my strength—how -helpless he was—that I could have cracked his -bones—why, scared as I was, I felt a strange wild something -that is not gone yet.... I’m changing. It’s a -different life. And I’ve got to meet things as they come, -and be game.”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Next morning Adam went to work and it developed -that this was to copy MacKay’s lead-pencil scrawls, and -after that was done to keep accurate account of ore -mined and operated.</p> - -<p>Several days passed before Adam caught up with his -work to the hour. Then MacKay, true to his word, said -he would set him on a man’s job part of the time. The -job upon which MacKay put Adam was no less than -keeping up the fire under the huge boilers. As wood had -to be used for fuel and as it was consumed rapidly, the -task of stoking was not easy. Besides, hot as the furnace -was, it seemed the sun was hotter. Adam sweat till he -could wring water out of his shirt.</p> - -<p>That night he made certain MacKay was playing a joke -on him. Arallanes confided this intelligence, and even -Margarita had been let into the secret. MacKay had -many laborers for the hard work, and he wanted to cure -the tenderfoot of his desire for a man’s job, such as he -had asked for. It was all good-natured, and amused -Adam. He imagined he knew what he needed, and while -he was trying to find it he could have just as much fun -as MacKay.</p> - -<p>Much to MacKay’s surprise, Adam presented himself -next afternoon, in boots, overalls, and undershirt, to go -on with his job of firing the engine.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_25">25</span> -“Wasn’t yesterday enough?” queried the boss.</p> - -<p>“I can stand it.”</p> - -<p>Then it pleased Adam to see a considerable evidence -of respect in the rough mill operator’s expression. For -a week Adam kept up with his office work and labored -each afternoon at the stoking job. No one suspected that -he suffered, though it was plain enough that he lost flesh -and was exceedingly fatigued. Then Margarita’s reception -of him, when he trudged home in the waning sunset -hour, was sweet despite the fact that he tried to repudiate -its sweetness. Once she put a little brown hand on his -blistered arm, and her touch held the tenderness of woman. -All women must be akin. They liked a man who could -do things, and the greater his feats of labor or fight the -better they liked him.</p> - -<p>The following week MacKay took a Herculean laborer -off a strenuous job with the ore and put Adam in his -place. MacKay maintained his good humor, but he had -acquired a little grimness. This long-limbed tenderfoot -was a hard nut to crack. Adam’s father had been a man -of huge stature and tremendous strength; and many a -time had Adam heard it said that he might grow to be -like his father. Far indeed was he from that now; but -he took the brawny and seasoned laborer’s place and -kept it. If the other job had been toil for Adam, this -new one was pain. He learned there what labor meant. -Also he learned how there was only one thing that common -men understood and respected in a co-laborer, and -it was the grit and muscle to stand the grind. Adam was -eighteen years old and far from having reached his growth. -This fact might have been manifest to his fellow workers, -but it was not that which counted. He realized that those -long hours of toil at which he stubbornly stuck had set -his spirit in some immeasurable and unquenchable relation -to the strange life that he divined was to be his.</p> - -<p>Two weeks and more went by. MacKay, in proportion -to the growth of his admiration and friendship for Adam, -gradually weakened on his joke. And one day, when<span class="pagenum" id="Page_26">26</span> -banteringly he dared Adam to tip a car of ore that two -Mexicans were laboring at, and Adam in a single heave -sent the tons of ore roaring into the shaft, then MacKay -gave up and in true Western fashion swore his defeat -and shook hands with the boy.</p> - -<p>So in those few days Adam made friends who changed -the color and direction of his life. From Merryvale he -learned the legend and history of the frontier. MacKay -opened his eyes to the great health for mind and body -in sheer toil. Arallanes represented a warmth of friendship -that came unsought, showing what might be hidden -in any man. Margarita was still an unknown quantity -in Adam’s development. Their acquaintance had gone -on mostly under the eyes of the señora or Arallanes. -Sometimes at sunset Adam had sat with her on the sand -of the river bank. Her charm grew. Then the unexpected -happened. A break occurred in the machinery and a -small but invaluable part could not be repaired. It had -to come from San Francisco.</p> - -<p>Adam seemed to be thrown back upon his own resources. -He did not know what to do with himself. -Arallanes advised him not to go panning for gold, and to -be cautious if he went up to Picacho, for the Mexican -Adam had so roughly handled was the ringleader in a -bad gang that it would be well to avoid. All things conspired, -it seemed, to throw Adam into the company of -Margarita, who always waited around the corner of every -hour, watching with her dusky eyes.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_27">27</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap b"><span class="smcap1">So</span> as the slow, solemn days drifted onward, like the -wonderful river which dominated the desert valley, -it came to pass that the dreaming, pondering Adam -suddenly awakened to the danger in this dusky-eyed -maiden.</p> - -<p>The realization came to Adam at the still sunset hour -when he and Margarita were watching the river slide -like a gleam of gold out of the west. They were walking -among the scattered mesquites along the sandy bank, a -place lonesome and hidden from the village behind, yet -open to the wide space of river and valley beyond. The -air seemed full of marvelous tints of gold and rose and -purple. The majestic scene, beautiful and sad, needed -life to make it perfect. Adam, more than usually drawn -by Margarita’s sympathy, was trying to tell her something -of the burden on his mind, that he was alone in -the world, with only a hard gray future before him, with -no one to care whether he lived or died.</p> - -<p>Then had come his awakening. It did not speak well -for Margarita’s conceptions of behavior, but it proved her -a creature of heart and blood. To be suddenly enveloped -by a wind of flame, in the slender twining form of this -girl of Spanish nature, was for Adam at once a revelation -and a catastrophe. But if he was staggered, he was also -responsive, as in a former moment of poignancy he had -vowed he would be. A strong and shuddering power took -hold of his heart and he felt the leap, the beat, the burn -of his blood. When he lifted Margarita and gathered her -in a close embrace it was more than a hot upflashing of -boyish passion that flushed his face and started tears -from under his tight-shut eyelids. It was a sore hunger<span class="pagenum" id="Page_28">28</span> -for he knew not what, a gratefulness that he could express -only by violence, a yielding to something deeper -and more far-reaching than was true of the moment.</p> - -<p>Adam loosened Margarita’s hold upon his neck and -held her back from him so he could see her face. It was -sweet, rosy. Her eyes were shining, black and fathomless -as night, soft with a light that had never shone upon -Adam from any other woman’s.</p> - -<p>“Girl, do you—love me?” he demanded, and if his voice -broke with the strange eagerness of a boy, his look had -all the sternness of a man.</p> - -<p>“Ah...!” whispered Margarita.</p> - -<p>“You—you big-hearted girl!” he exclaimed, with a -laugh that was glad, yet had a tremor in it. “Margarita, -I—I must love you, too—since I feel so queer.”</p> - -<p>Then he bent to her lips, and from these first real kisses -that had ever been spent upon him by a woman he realized -in one flash his danger. He released Margarita in a consideration -she did not comprehend; and in her pouting -reproach, her soft-eyed appeal, her little brown hands -that would not let go of him, there was further menace to -his principles.</p> - -<p>Adam, gay and teasing, yet kindly and tactfully, tried -to find a way to resist her.</p> - -<p>“Señorita, some one will see us,” he said.</p> - -<p>“Who cares?”</p> - -<p>“But, child, we—we must think.”</p> - -<p>“Señor, no woman ever thinks when love is in her heart -and on her lips.”</p> - -<p>Her reply seemed to rebuke Adam, for he sensed in it -what might be true of life, rather than just of this one -little girl, swayed by unknown and uncontrollable forces. -She appeared to him then subtly and strongly, as if there -was infinitely more than willful love in her. But it did -not seem to be the peril of her proffered love that restrained -Adam so much as the strange consciousness of -the willingness of his spirit to meet hers halfway.</p> - -<p>Suddenly Margarita’s mood changed. She became like<span class="pagenum" id="Page_29">29</span> -a cat that had been purring under a soft, agreeable hand -and then had been stroked the wrong way.</p> - -<p>“Señor think he love me?” she flashed, growing white.</p> - -<p>“Yes—I said so—Margarita. Of course I do,” he -hastened to assure her.</p> - -<p>“Maybe you—a gringo liar!”</p> - -<p>Adam might have resented this insulting hint but for -his uncertainty of himself, his consequent embarrassment, -and his thrilling sense of the nearness of her blazing -eyes. What a little devil she looked! This did not antagonize -Adam, but it gave him proof of his impudence, of -his dreaming carelessness. Margarita might not be a -girl to whom he should have made love, but it was too -late. Besides, he did not regret that. Only he was upset; -he wanted to think.</p> - -<p>“If the <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">grande</i> señor trifle—Margarita will cut out his -heart!”</p> - -<p>This swift speech, inflexible and wonderful with a -passion that revealed to Adam the half-savage nature of -a woman whose race was alien to his, astounded and horrified -him, and yet made his blood tingle wildly.</p> - -<p>“Margarita, I do not trifle,” replied Adam, earnestly. -“God knows I’m glad you—you care for me. How have -I offended you? What is it you want?”</p> - -<p>“Let señor swear he love me,” she demanded, imperiously.</p> - -<p>Adam answered to that with the wildness that truly -seemed flashing more and more from him; and the -laughter and boldness on his lips hid the gravity that had -settled there. He was no clod. Under the softness of -him hid a flint that struck fire.</p> - -<p>As Margarita had been alluring and provocative, then -as furious as a barbarian queen, so she now changed again -to another personality in which it pleased her to be proud, -cold, aloof, an outraged woman to be wooed back to -tenderness. If, at the last moment of the walk home, -Margarita evinced signs of another sudden transformation, -Adam appeared not to note them. Leaving her in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_30">30</span> -the dusk at the door where the señora sat, he strode away -to the bank of the river. When he felt himself free and -safe once more, he let out a great breath of relief.</p> - -<p>“Whew! Now I’ve done it!... So she’d cut my -heart out? And I had to swear I loved her! The little -savage!... But she’s amazing—and she’s adorable, with -all her cat claws. Wouldn’t Guerd rave over a girl like -Margarita?... And here I am, standing on my two -feet, in possession of all my faculties, Adam Larey, a -boy who thought he had principles—yet now I’m a ranting -lover of a dark-skinned, black-eyed slip of a greaser -girl! It can’t be true!”</p> - -<p>With that outburst came sobering thought. Adam’s -resolve not to ponder and brood about himself was as -if it had never been. He knew he would never make -such a resolve again. For hours he strolled up and down -the sandy bank, deep in thought, yet aware of the night -and the stars, the encompassing mountains, and the silent, -gleaming river winding away in the gloom. As he had -become used to being alone out in the solitude and darkness, -there had come to him a vague awakening sense of -their affinity with his nature. Success and people might -fail and betray him, but the silent, lonely starlit nights -were going to be teachers, even as they had been to the -Wise Men of the Arabian waste.</p> - -<p>Adam at length gave up in despair and went to bed, -hoping in slumber to forget a complexity of circumstance -and emotion that seemed to him an epitome of his callow -helplessness. The desert began to loom to Adam as a -region inimical to comfort and culture. He had almost -decided that the physical nature of the desert was going -to be good for him. But what of its spirit, mood, passion -as typified by Margarita Arallanes?</p> - -<p>Adam could ask himself that far-reaching query, and -yet, all the answer he got was a rush of hot blood at -memory of the sweet fire of her kisses. He saw her to -be a simple child of the desert, like an Indian, answering -to savage impulses, wholly unconscious of what had been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_31">31</span> -a breach of womanly reserve and restraint. Was she -good or bad? How could she be bad if she did not know -any better? Thus Adam pondered and conjectured, and -cursed his ignorance, and lamented his failings, all the -time honest to acknowledge that he was fond of Margarita -and drawn to her. About the only conclusion he formed -from his perplexity was the one that he owed it to Margarita -to live up to his principles.</p> - -<p>At this juncture he recollected Merryvale’s significant -remarks about the qualities needed by men who were to -survive in the desert, and his nobler sentiments suffered -a rout. The suddenness, harshness, fierceness of the desert -grafted different and combating qualities upon a man or else -it snuffed him out, like a candle blown by a gusty wind.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Next morning, as every morning, the awakening was -sweet, fresh, new, hopeful. Another day! And the wonderful -dry keenness of the air, the colors that made the -earth seem a land of enchantment, were enough in themselves -to make life worth living. In the morning he -always felt like a boy.</p> - -<p>Margarita’s repentance for her moods of yesterday took -a material turn in the preparation of an unusually good -breakfast for Adam. He was always hungry and good -meals were rare. Adam liked her attentions, and he -encouraged them; though not before the señora or Arallanes, -for the former approved too obviously and the -latter disapproved too mysteriously.</p> - -<p>When, some time later, a boat arrived, Adam was -among the first to meet it at the dock.</p> - -<p>He encountered MacKay coming ashore in the company -of a man and two women, one of whom was young. The -manager showed a beaming face for the first time in many -days. Repairs for the mill engine had come. MacKay -at once introduced Adam to the party; and it so turned -out that presently the manager, who was extremely busy, -left his friends for Adam to entertain. They were people -whom Adam liked immediately, and as the girl was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_32">32</span> -pretty, of a blond type seldom seen in the Southwest, it -seemed to Adam that his task was more than agreeable. -He showed them around the little village and then explained -how interesting it would be for them to see the -gold mill. How long a time it seemed since he had been -in the company of a girl like those he had known at home! -She was merry, intelligent, a little shy.</p> - -<p>He was invited aboard the boat to have lunch with the -mother and daughter. Everything tended to make this a -red-letter day for Adam. The hours passed all too swiftly -and time came for the boat to depart. When the boat -swung free from the shore Adam read in the girl’s eyes -the thought keen in his own mind—that they would never -meet again. The round of circumstances might never -again bring a girl like that into Adam’s life, if it were -to be lived in these untrodden ways. He waved his hand -with all the eloquence which it would express. Then the -obtruding foliage on the bank hid the boat and the girl -was gone. His last thought was a selfish one—that his -brother Guerd would not see her at Ehrenberg.</p> - -<p>Some of MacKay’s laborers were working with unloaded -freight on the dock. One of these was Regan, the little -Irishman who had been keen to mark Adam on several -occasions. He winked at MacKay and pointed at Adam.</p> - -<p>“Mac, shure thot boy’s a divil with the wimmen!”</p> - -<p>MacKay roared with laughter and looked significantly -past Adam as if this mirth was not wholly due to his -presence alone. Some one else seemed implicated. Suddenly -Adam turned. Margarita stood there, with face -and mien of a tragedy queen, and it seemed to Adam -that her burning black eyes did not see anything in the -world but him. Then, with one of her swift actions, -graceful and lithe, yet violent, she wheeled and fled.</p> - -<p>“O Lord!” murmured Adam, aghast at the sudden-dawning -significance of the case. He had absolutely forgotten -Margarita’s existence. Most assuredly she had seen -every move of his with her big eyes, and read his mind, -too. He could not see the humor of his situation at the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_33">33</span> -moment, but as he took a short cut through the shady -mesquites toward his hut, and presently espied Margarita -in ambush. What fiendish glee this predicament of his -would have aroused in his brother Guerd! Adam, the -lofty, the supercilious, had come a cropper at last—such -would have been Guerd’s scorn and rapture!</p> - -<p>Margarita came rushing from the side, right upon him -even as he turned. So swiftly she came that he could -not get a good look at her, but she appeared a writhing, -supple little thing, instinct with fury. Hissing Spanish -maledictions, she flung herself upward, and before he -could ward her off she had slapped and scratched his -face and beat wildly at him with flying brown fists. He -thrust her away, but she sprang back. Then, suddenly -hot with anger, he grasped her and, jerking her off her -feet, he shook her with far from gentle force, and did -not desist till he saw that he was hurting her. Letting -her down and holding her at arm’s length, he gazed hard -at the white face framed by disheveled black hair and -lighted by eyes so magnificently expressive of supreme -passion that his anger was shocked into wonder and -admiration. Desert eyes! Right there a conception -dawned in his mind—he was seeing a spirit through eyes -developed by the desert.</p> - -<p>“Margarita!” he exclaimed, “are you a cat—that -<span class="locked">you——”</span></p> - -<p>“I hate you,” she hissed, interrupting him. The expulsion -of her breath, the bursting swell of her breast, the -quiver of her whole lissom body, all were exceedingly -potent of an intensity that utterly amazed Adam. Such a -little girl, such a frail strength, such a deficient brain to -hold all that passion! What would she do if she had -real cause for wrath?</p> - -<p>“Ah, Margarita, you don’t mean that. I didn’t do anything. -Let me tell you.”</p> - -<p>She repeated her passionate utterance, and Adam saw -that he could no more change her then than he could hope -to move the mountain. Resentment stirred in him.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_34">34</span> -“Well,” he burst out, boyishly, “if you’re so darned -fickle as that I’m glad you do hate me.”</p> - -<p>Then he released his hold on her arms and, turning -away without another glance in her direction, he strode -from the glade. He took the gun he had repaired and -set off down the river trail. When he got into the bottom -lands of willow and cottonwood he glided noiselessly -along, watching and listening for game of some kind.</p> - -<p>In the wide mouth of a wash not more than a mile -from the village Adam halted to admire some exceedingly -beautiful trees. The first was one of a species he had -often noted there, and it was a particularly fine specimen, -perhaps five times as high as his head and full and round -in proportion. The trunk was large at the ground, soon -separating into innumerable branches that in turn spread -and drooped and separated into a million twigs and stems -and points. Trunk and branch and twig, every inch -of this wonderful tree was a bright, soft green color, -as smooth as if polished, and it did not have a single leaf. -As Adam gazed at this strange, unknown tree, grasping -the nature of it and its exquisite color and grace and -life, he wondered anew at the marvel of the desert.</p> - -<p>As he walked around to the side toward the river he -heard a cry. Wheeling quickly, he espied Margarita -running toward him. Margarita’s hair was flying. Blood -showed on her white face. She had torn her dress.</p> - -<p>“Margarita!” cried Adam, as he reached her. “What’s -the matter?”</p> - -<p>She was so out of breath she could scarcely speak.</p> - -<p>“Felix—he hide back there—in trail,” she panted. “Margarita -watch—she know—she go round.”</p> - -<p>The girl labored under extreme agitation, which, however, -did not seem to be fright.</p> - -<p>“Felix? You mean the Mexican who drew a knife on -your father? The fellow I threw around—up at Picacho?”</p> - -<p>“<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Si</i>—señor,” replied Margarita.</p> - -<p>“Well, what of it? Why does Felix hide up in the -trail?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_35">35</span> -“Felix swore revenge. He kill you.”</p> - -<p>“Oh-ho!... So that’s it,” ejaculated Adam, and he -whistled his surprise. A hot, tight sensation struck deeply -inside him. “Then you came to find me—warn me?”</p> - -<p>She nodded vehemently and clung to him, evidently -wearied and weakening.</p> - -<p>“Margarita, that was good of you,” said Adam, earnestly, -and he led her out of the sun into the shade of the -tree. With his handkerchief he wiped the blood from -thorn scratches on her cheek. The dusky eyes shone with -a vastly different light from the lurid hate of a few hours -back. “I thank you, girl, and I’ll not forget it.... But -why did you run out in the sun and through the thorns -to warn me?”</p> - -<p>“Señor know now—he kill Felix before Felix kill him,” -replied Margarita, in speech that might have been naïve -had its simplicity not been so deadly.</p> - -<p>Adam laughed again, a little grimly. This was not -the first time there had been forced upon him a hint of -the inevitableness of life in the desert. But it was not -his duty to ambush the Mexican who would ambush him. -The little coldness thrilled out of Adam to the close, throbbing -presence of Margarita. The fragrance, the very -breath of her, went to his head like wine.</p> - -<p>“But girl—only a little while ago—you slapped me—scratched -me—hated me,” he said, in wonder and reproach.</p> - -<p>“No—no—no! Margarita love señor!” she cried, and -seemed to twine around him and climb into his arms at -once. The same fire, the same intensity as of that unforgetable -moment of hate and passion, dominated her now, -only it was love.</p> - -<p>And this time it was Adam who sought her red lips -and returned her kisses. Again that shuddering wild gust -in his blood! It was as strange and imperious to him -then as in a sober reflection it had been bold, gripping, -physical, a drawing of him not sanctioned by his will. -In this instance he was weaker in its grip, but still he -conquered. Releasing Margarita, he led her to a shady<span class="pagenum" id="Page_36">36</span> -place in the sand under the green tree, and found a seat -where he could lean against a low branch. Margarita -fell against his shoulder, and there clung to him and wept. -Her dusky hair rippled over him, soft and silky to the -touch of his fingers. The poor, faded dress, of a fabric -unknown to Adam, ragged and dusty and torn, and the -little shoes, worn and cracked, showing the soles of her -stockingless feet, spoke eloquently of poverty. Adam -noted the slender grace of her slight form, the arch of -the bare instep, and the shapeliness of her ankles, brown -almost as an Indian’s. And all at once there charged -over him an overwhelming sense of the pitifulness and the -wonderfulness of her—a ragged, half-dressed little Mexican -girl, whose care of her hair and face, and the few -knots of ribbon, betrayed the worshipful vanity that was -the jewel of her soul, and whose physical perfection was in -such strange contrast to the cramped, undeveloped mind.</p> - -<p>“My God!” whispered Adam, under his breath. Something -big and undefined was born in him then. He saw -her, he pitied her, he loved her, he wanted her; but these -feelings were not so much what constituted the bigness -and vagueness that waved through his soul. He could -not grasp it. But it had to do with the life, the beauty, -the passion, the soul of this Mexican girl; and it was -akin to a reverence he felt for the things in her that she -could not understand.</p> - -<p>Margarita soon recovered, and assumed a demeanor so -shy and modest and wistful that Adam could not believe -she was the same girl. Nevertheless, he took good care -not to awaken her other characteristics.</p> - -<p>“Margarita, what is the name of this beautiful tree?” -he asked.</p> - -<p>“<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Palo verde.</i> It means green tree.”</p> - -<p>It interested him then to instruct himself further in -regard to the desert growths that had been strange to him; -and to this end he led Margarita from one point to -another, pleased to learn how familiar she was with every -growing thing.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_37">37</span> -Presently Margarita brought to Adam’s gaze a tree that -resembled smoke, so blue-gray was it, so soft and hazy -against the sky, so columnar and mushrooming. What a -strange, graceful tree and what deep-blue blossoms it -bore! Upon examination Adam was amazed to discover -that every branch and twig of this tree was a thorn. A -hard, cruel, beautiful tree of thorns that at a little distance -resembled smoke!</p> - -<p>“<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Palo Christi</i>,” murmured Margarita, making the sign -of the cross. And she told Adam that this was the -Crucifixion tree, which was the species that furnished the -crown of thorns for the head of Christ.</p> - -<p>Sunset ended several happy and profitable hours for -Adam. He had not forgotten about the Mexican, Felix, -and had thought it just as well to let time pass and to keep -out of trouble as long as he could. He and Margarita -reached home without seeing any sign of Felix. Arallanes, -however, had espied the Mexican sneaking around, and -he warned Adam in no uncertain terms. Merryvale, too, -had a word for Adam’s ear; and it was significant that -he did not advise a waiting course. In spite of all Adam’s -reflections he did not need a great deal of urging. After -supper he started off for Picacho with Arallanes and a -teamster who was freighting supplies up to the camp.</p> - -<p>Picacho was in full blast when they arrived. The dim -lights, the discordant yells, the raw smell of spirits, the -violence of the crude gambling hall worked upon Adam’s -already excited mind; and by the time he had imbibed -a few drinks he was ready for anything. But they did -not find Felix.</p> - -<p>Then Adam, if not half drunk, at least somewhat under -the influence of rum, started to walk back to his lodgings. -The walk was long and, by reason of the heavy, dragging -sand, one of considerable labor. Adam was in full possession -of his faculties when he reached the village. But -his blood was hot from the exercise, and the excitement -of the prospective battle of the early evening had given -way to an excitement of the senses, in the youthful<span class="pagenum" id="Page_38">38</span> -romance felt in the dark, the starlight, the wildness of the -place. So when in the pale gloom of the mesquites Margarita -glided to him like a lissom spectre, to enfold him -and cling and whisper, Adam had neither the will, nor -the heart, nor the desire to resist her.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_39">39</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Adam’s</span> dull eyelids opened on a dim, gray desert dawn. -The coming of the dawn was in his mind, and it -showed pale through his shut lids. He could not hold -back the hours. Something had happened in the night -and he would never be the same again. With a sharp -pang, a sense of incomprehensible loss, Adam felt die in -him the old unreasoning, instinctive boy. And there was -more, too deep and too subtle for him to divine. It had -to do with a feminine strain in him, a sweetness and -purity inherited from his mother and developed by her -teachings. It had separated him from his brother Guerd -and kept him aloof from a baseness common to their -comrades. Nevertheless, the wildness of this raw, uncouth, -primitive West had been his undoing.</p> - -<p>It was with bitterness that Adam again faced the growing -light. All he could do was to resign himself to fate. -The joy of life, the enchantments—all that had made him -feel different from other boys and hide his dreams—failed -now in this cool dark morning of reality. He could not -understand the severity of the judgment he meted out -to himself. His spirit suffered an ineffaceable blunting. -And the tight-drawing knot in his breast, the gnawing of -remorse, the strange, dark oppression—these grew and -reached a climax, until something gave way within him -and there was a sinking of the heart, a weary and inscrutable -feeling.</p> - -<p>Then he remembered Margarita, and the very life -and current of his blood seemed to change. Like a hot -wave the memory of Margarita surged over Adam, her -strange new sweetness, the cunning of her when she waylaid -him in the dead of the night, the clinging lissomness<span class="pagenum" id="Page_40">40</span> -of her and the whispered incoherence that needed no -translation, the inevitableness of the silent, imperious demand -of her presence, unashamed and insistent.</p> - -<p>Adam leaped out of his blankets, breaking up this -mood and thought by violent action. For Adam then -the sunrise was glorious, the valley was beautiful, the -desert was wild and free, the earth was an immense -region to explore, and nature, however insatiable and -inexorable, was prodigal of compensations. He drank -a sweet cup that held one drop of poison bitterness. Life -swelled in his breast. He wished he were an Indian. As -he walked along there flashed into mind words spoken -long ago by his mother: “My son, you take things too -seriously, you feel too intensely the ordinary moments of -life.” He understood her now, but he could not distinguish -ordinary things from great things. How could -anything be little?</p> - -<p>Margarita’s greeting was at once a delight and a surprise. -Her smile, the light of her dusky eyes, would -have made any man happier. But there was a subtle air -about her this morning that gave Adam a slight shock, an -undefined impression that he represented less to Margarita -than he had on yesterday.</p> - -<p>Then came the shrill whistle of the downriver boat. -Idle men flocked toward the dock. When Adam reached -the open space on the bank before the dock he found it -crowded with an unusual number of men, all manifestly -more than ordinarily interested in something concerning -the boat. By slipping through the mesquites Adam got -around to the edge of the crowd.</p> - -<p>A tall, gaunt man, clad in black, strode off the gangplank. -His height, his form, his gait were familiar to -Adam. He had seen that embroidered flowery vest with -its silver star conspicuously in sight, and the brown beardless -face with its square jaw and seamy lines.</p> - -<p>“Collishaw!” ejaculated Adam, in dismay. He recognized -in this man one whom he had known at Ehrenberg, -a gambling, gun-fighting sheriff to whom Guerd had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_41">41</span> -become attached. As his glance swept back of Collishaw -his pulse beat quicker. The next passenger to stride off -the gangplank was a very tall, superbly built young man. -Adam would have known that form in a crowd of a -thousand men. His heart leaped with a great throb. -Guerd, his brother!</p> - -<p>Guerd looked up. His handsome, heated face, bold and -keen and reckless, flashed in the sunlight. His piercing -gaze swept over the crowd upon the bank.</p> - -<p>“Hello, Adam!” he yelled, with gay, hard laugh. Then -he prodded Collishaw and pointed up at Adam. “There -he is! We’ve found him.”</p> - -<p>Adam plunged away into the thickest of mesquites, -and, indifferent to the clawing thorns, he did not halt -until he was far down the bank.</p> - -<p>It died hard, that regurgitation of brother love. It -represented most of his life, and all of his home associations, -and the memories of youth. The strength of it -proved his loyalty to himself. How warm and fine that -suddenly revived emotion! How deep seated, beyond his -control! He could have sobbed out over the pity of it, -the loss of it, the fallacy of it. Plucked out by the roots, -it yet lived hidden in the depths of him. Adam in his -flight to be alone had yielded to the amaze and shame and -fury stirred in him by a realization of joy in the mere -sight of this brother who hated him. For years his love -had fought against the gradual truth of Guerd’s hate. -He had not been able to prove it, but he felt it. Adam -had no fear of Guerd, nor any reason why he could -not face him, except this tenderness of which he was -ashamed. When he had fought down the mawkish -sentiment he would show Guerd and Collishaw what he -was made of. Money! That was Guerd’s motive, with -an added possibility of further desire to dominate and -hound.</p> - -<p>“I’ll fool him,” said Adam, resolutely, as he got up to -return.</p> - -<p>Adam did not know exactly what he would do, but<span class="pagenum" id="Page_42">42</span> -he was certain that he had reached the end of his tether. -He went back to the village by a roundabout way. Turning -a sharp curve in the canyon, he came suddenly upon a -number of workmen, mostly Mexicans. They were standing -under a wooden trestle that had been built across the -canyon at this narrow point. All of them appeared to -be gazing upward, and naturally Adam directed his gaze -likewise.</p> - -<p>Thus without warning he saw the distorted and ghastly -face of a man hanging by the neck on a rope tied to the -trestle. The spectacle gave Adam a terrible shock.</p> - -<p>“That’s Collishaw’s work,” muttered Adam, darkly, and -he remembered stories told of the sheriff’s grim hand in -more than one act of border justice. What a hard -country!</p> - -<p>In front of the village store Adam encountered Merryvale, -and he asked him for particulars about the execution.</p> - -<p>“Wal, I don’t know much,” replied the old watchman, -scratching his head. “There’s been some placer miners -shot an’ robbed up the river. This Collishaw is a regular -sure-enough sheriff, takin’ the law to himself. Reckon -there ain’t any law. Wal, he an’ his deputies say they -tracked thet murderin’ gang to Picacho, an’ swore they -identified one of them. Arallanes stuck up for thet greaser. -There was a hot argument, an’, by gosh! I jest swore -Collishaw was goin’ to draw on Arallanes. But Arallanes -backed down, as any man not crazy would have done. -The greaser swore by all his Virgins thet he wasn’t the -man, an’ was swearin’ he could prove it when the rope -choked him off.... I don’t know, Adam. I don’t know. -I was fer waitin’ a little to give the feller a chance. But -Collishaw came down here to hang some one an’ you bet -he was goin’ to do it.”</p> - -<p>“I know him, Merryvale, and you’re betting right,” -replied Adam, forcefully.</p> - -<p>“Adam, one of his men is a fine-lookin’ young chap -thet sure must be your brother. Now, ain’t he?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, you’re right about that, too.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_43">43</span> -“Wal, wal! You don’t seem powerful glad.... Son, -jest be careful what you say to Collishaw. He’s hard an’ -I reckon he’s square as he sees justice, but he doesn’t -ring right to an old timer like me. He courts the crowd. -An’ he’s been askin’ fer you. There he comes now.”</p> - -<p>The sheriff appeared, approaching with several companions, -and halted before the store. His was a striking -figure, picturesque, commanding, but his face was repellent. -His massive head was set on a bull neck of swarthy -and weathered skin like wrinkled leather; his broad face, -of similar hue, appeared a mass of crisscrossed lines, -deep at the eyes, and long on each side of the cruel, thin-lipped, -tight-shut mouth; his chin stuck out like a square -rock; and his eyes, dark and glittering, roved incessantly -in all directions, had been trained to see men before they -saw him.</p> - -<p>Adam knew that Collishaw had seen him first, and, -acting upon the resolution that he had made down in the -thicket, he strode over to the sheriff.</p> - -<p>“Collishaw, I’ve been told you wanted me,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>“Hello, Larey! Yes, I was inquirin’ aboot you,” replied -Collishaw, with the accent of a Texan.</p> - -<p>“What do you want of me?” asked Adam.</p> - -<p>Collishaw drew Adam aside out of earshot of the other -men.</p> - -<p>“It’s a matter of thet little gamblin’ debt you owe -Guerd,” he replied, in low voice.</p> - -<p>“Collishaw, are you threatening me with some such -job as you put up on that poor greaser?” inquired Adam, -sarcastically, as he waved his hand up the canyon.</p> - -<p>Probably nothing could have surprised this hardened -sheriff, but he straightened up with a jerk and shed his -confidential and admonishing air.</p> - -<p>“No, I can’t arrest you on a gamblin’ debt,” he replied, -bluntly, “but I’m shore goin’ to make you pay.”</p> - -<p>“You are, like hell!” retorted Adam. “What had you -to do with it? If Guerd owed you money in that game, -I’m not responsible. And I didn’t pay because I caught<span class="pagenum" id="Page_44">44</span> -Guerd cheating. I’m not much of a gambler, Collishaw, -but I’ll bet you a stack of gold twenties against your fancy -vest that Guerd never collects a dollar of his crooked -deal.”</p> - -<p>With that Adam turned on his heel and strode off -toward the river. His hard-earned independence added -something to the wrong done him by these men. He -saw himself in different light. The rankling of the injustice -he had suffered at Ehrenberg had softened only -in regard to the girl in the case. Remembering her again, -it seemed her part in his alienation from Guerd did not -loom so darkly and closely. Margarita had come between -that affair and the present hour. This other girl had -really been nothing to him, but Margarita had become -everything. A gratefulness, a big, generous warmth, -stirred in Adam’s heart for the dark-eyed Mexican girl. -What did it matter who she was? In this desert he must -learn to adjust differences of class and race and habit -in relation to the wildness of time and place.</p> - -<p>In the open sandy space leading to the houses near the -river Adam met Arallanes. The usually genial foreman -appeared pale, somber, sick. To Adam’s surprise, Arallanes -would not talk about the hanging. Adam had another -significant estimate of the character of Collishaw. -Arallanes, however, was not so close lipped concerning -Guerd Larey.</p> - -<p>“<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Quien sabe, señor?</i>” he concluded. “Maybe it’s best -for you. Margarita is a she-cat. You are my friend. I -should tell you.... But, well, señor, if you would keep -Margarita, look out for your brother.”</p> - -<p>Adam gaped his astonishment and had not a word for -Arallanes as he turned away. It took him some time to -realize the content of Arallanes warning and advice. But -what fixed itself in Adam’s mind was the fact that Guerd -had run across Margarita and had been attracted by her. -How perfectly natural! How absolutely inevitable! -Adam could not remember any girl he had ever admired -or liked in all his life that Guerd had not taken away<span class="pagenum" id="Page_45">45</span> -from him. Among the boys at home it used to be a huge -joke, in which Adam had good-naturedly shared. All -for Guerd! Adam could recall the time when he had been -happy to give up anything or anyone to his brother. But -out here in the desert, where he was beginning to assimilate -the meaning of a man’s fight for his life and his -possessions, he felt vastly different. Moreover, he had -gone too far with Margarita, regretable as the fact was. -She belonged to him, and his principles were such that -he believed he owed her a like return of affection, and -besides that, loyalty and guardianship. Margarita was -only seventeen years old. No doubt Guerd would fascinate -her if she was not kept out of his way.</p> - -<p>“But—suppose she likes Guerd—and wants him—as -she wanted me?” muttered Adam, answering a divining -flash of the inevitable order of things to be. Still, he -repudiated that. His intellect told him what to expect, -but his feeling was too strong to harbor doubt of Margarita. -Only last night she had changed the world for -him—opened his eyes to life not as it was dreamed, but -lived!</p> - -<p>Adam found the wife of Arallanes home alone.</p> - -<p>“Señora, where is Margarita?”</p> - -<p>“Margarita is there,” she replied, with dark, eloquent -glance upon Adam and a slow gesture toward the river -bank.</p> - -<p>Adam soon espied Guerd and Margarita on the river -bank some few rods below the landing place. Here was -a pretty sandy nook, shaded by a large mesquite, and -somewhat out of sight of passers-by going to and fro -from village to dock. Two enormous wheels connected -by an iron bar, a piece of discarded mill machinery, stood -in the shade of the tree. Margarita sat on the cross-bar -and Guerd stood beside her. They were close together, -facing a broad sweep of the river and the wonderland -of colored peaks beyond. They did not hear Adam’s -approach on the soft sand.</p> - -<p>“Señorita, one look from your midnight eyes and I fell<span class="pagenum" id="Page_46">46</span> -in love with you,” Guerd was declaring, with gay passion, -and his hand upon her was as bold as his speech. “You -little Spanish princess!... Beautiful as the moon and -stars!... Hidden in this mining camp, a desert flower -born to blush unseen! I <span class="locked">shall——”</span></p> - -<p>It was here that Adam walked around the high wheels -to confront them. For him the moment was exceedingly -poignant. But despite the tumult within him he preserved -a cool and quiet exterior. Margarita’s radiance vanished -in surprise.</p> - -<p>“Well, if it ain’t Adam!” ejaculated her companion. -“You son-of-a-gun!... Why, you’ve changed!”</p> - -<p>“Guerd,” began Adam, and then his voice halted. To -meet his brother this way was a tremendous ordeal. And -Guerd’s presence seemed to charge the very air. Worship -of this magnificent brother had been the strongest thing -in Adam’s life, next to love of mother. To see him -again! Guerd Larey’s face was beautiful, yet virile and -strong. The beauty was mere perfection of feature. The -big curved mouth, the square chin, the straight nose, the -large hazel-green eyes full of laughter and love of life, -the broad forehead and clustering fair hair—all these -were features that made him singularly handsome. His -skin was clear brown tan with a tinge of red. Adam saw -no change in Guerd, except perhaps an intensifying of an -expression of wildness which made him all the more -fascinating to look at. For Adam the mocking thing -about Guerd’s godlike beauty was the fact that it deceived. -At heart, at soul, Guerd was as false as hell!</p> - -<p>“Adam, are you goin’ to shake hands?” queried Guerd, -lazily extending his arm. “You sure strike me queer, -boy!”</p> - -<p>“No,” replied Adam, and his quick-revolving thoughts -grasped at Guerd’s slipshod speech. Guerd had absorbed -even the provincial words and idioms of the uncouth West.</p> - -<p>“All right. Suit yourself,” said Guerd. “I reckon you -see I’m rather pleasantly engaged.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I see,” returned Adam, bitterly, with a fleeting<span class="pagenum" id="Page_47">47</span> -glance at Margarita. She had recovered from her surprise -and now showed cunning feminine curiosity. “Guerd, -I met Collishaw, and he had the gall to brace me for that -gambling debt. And I’ve hunted you up to tell you that -you cheated me. I’ll not pay it.”</p> - -<p>“Oh yes, you will,” replied Guerd, smilingly.</p> - -<p>“I will not,” said Adam, forcefully.</p> - -<p>“Boy, you’ll pay it or I’ll take it out of your hide,” -declared Guerd, slowly frowning, as if a curious hint of -some change in Adam had dawned upon him.</p> - -<p>“You can’t take it that way—or any other way,” retorted -Adam.</p> - -<p>“But, say—I didn’t cheat,” remonstrated Guerd, evidently -making a last stand of argument to gain his end.</p> - -<p>“You lie!” flashed Adam. “You know it. I know -it.... Guerd, let’s waste no words. I told you at -Ehrenberg—after you played that shabby trick on me—over -the girl there—I told you I was through with you -for good.”</p> - -<p>Guerd seemed to realize with wonder and chagrin that -he had now to deal with a man. How the change in his -expression thrilled Adam! What relief came to him in -the consciousness that he was now stronger than Guerd! -He had never been certain of that.</p> - -<p>“Through and be damned!” exclaimed Guerd, and he -took his arm from around Margarita and rose from his -leaning posture to his lofty height. “I’m sick of your -milksop ideas. All I want of you is that money. If you -don’t pony up with it I’ll tear your clothes off gettin’ it. -Savvy that?”</p> - -<p>“Ha-ha!” laughed Adam, tauntingly. “I say to you -what I said to Collishaw—you will, like hell!”</p> - -<p>Guerd Larey’s lips framed curses that were inaudible. -He was astounded. The red flamed his neck and face.</p> - -<p>“I’ll meet you after I get through talking to this girl,” -he said.</p> - -<p>“Any time you want,” rejoined Adam, bitingly, “but -I’ll have my say now, once and for all.... The worm<span class="pagenum" id="Page_48">48</span> -has turned, Guerd Larey. Your goose has stopped laying -golden eggs. I will take no more burdens of yours on -my shoulders. You’ve bullied me all my life. You’ve -hated me. I know now. Oh, I remember so well! You -robbed me of toys, clothes, playmates. Then girl friends! -Then money!... Then—a worthless woman!... -You’re a fraud—a cheat—a liar.... You’ve fallen in -with your kind out here and you’re going straight to -hell.”</p> - -<p>The whiteness of Guerd’s face attested to his roused -passion. But he had more restraint than Adam. He was -older, and the difference of age between them showed -markedly.</p> - -<p>“So you followed me out here to say all that?” he -queried.</p> - -<p>“No, not altogether,” replied Adam. “I came after -Margarita.”</p> - -<p>“Came after Margarita?” echoed Guerd, blankly. “Is -that her name? Say, Adam, is this one of your goody-goody -tricks? Rescuing a damsel in distress sort of -thing!... You and I have fallen out more than once -over that. I <span class="locked">kick—I——”</span></p> - -<p>“Guerd, we’ve fallen out forever,” interrupted Adam, -and then he turned to the girl. “Margarita, I want -<span class="locked">you——”</span></p> - -<p>“But it’s none of your damned business,” burst out -Guerd, hotly, interrupting in turn. “What do you care -about a Mexican girl? I won’t stand your interference. -You clear out and let me alone.”</p> - -<p>“But, Guerd—it is my business,” returned Adam, haltingly. -Some inward force dragged at his tongue. “She’s—my -girl.”</p> - -<p>“What!” ejaculated Guerd, incredulously. Then he bent -down to peer into Margarita’s face, and from that he -swept a flashing, keen glance at Adam. His eyes were -wonderful then, intensely bright, quickened and sharpened -with swift turns of thought. “Boy, you don’t mean you’re -on friendly terms with this greaser girl?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_49">49</span> -“Yes,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“You’ve made love to her!” cried Guerd, and the radiance -of his face then was beyond Adam’s understanding.</p> - -<p>“Yes.”</p> - -<p>Guerd violently controlled what must have been a spasm -of fiendish glee. His amaze, deep as it was, seemed not -to be his predominant feeling, but that very amaze was -something to force exquisitely upon Adam how far he -had fallen. The moment was dark, hateful, far-reaching -in effect, impossible to realize. Guerd’s glance flashed -back and forth from Adam to Margarita. But he had -not yet grasped what was the tragic thing for Adam—the -truth of how fatefully far this love affair had fallen. -Adam’s heart sank like lead in his breast. What humiliation -he must suffer if he betrayed himself! Hard he -fought for composure and dignity to hide his secret.</p> - -<p>“Adam, in matters of the heart, where two gentlemen -admire the lady in question, the choice is always left to -her,” began Guerd, with something of mockery in his rich -voice. A devil gleamed from him then, and the look of -him, the stature, the gallant action of him as he bowed -before Margarita, fascinated Adam even in his miserable -struggle to appear a man.</p> - -<p>“But, Guerd, you—you’ve known Margarita only a few -moments,” he expostulated, and the sound of his voice -made him weak. “How can you put such a choice to—to -her? It’s—it’s an insult.”</p> - -<p>“Adam, that is for Margarita to decide,” responded -Guerd. “Women change. It is something you have not -learned.” Then as he turned to Margarita he seemed to -blaze with magnetism. The grace of him and the beauty -of him in that moment made of him a perfect physical -embodiment of the emotions of which he was master. -He knew his power over women. “Margarita, Adam and -I are brothers. We are always falling in love with the -same girl. You must choose between us. Adam would -tie you down—keep you from the eyes of other men. -I would leave you free as a bird.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_50">50</span> -And he bent over to whisper in her ear, with his strong -brown hand on her arm, at once gallant yet masterful.</p> - -<p>The scene was a nightmare to Adam. How could this -be something that was happening? But he had sight! -Margarita seemed a transformed creature, shy, coy, alluring, -with the half-veiled dusky eyes, heavy-lidded, lighted -with the same fire that had shone in them for Adam.</p> - -<p>“Margarita, will you come?” cried Adam, goaded to end -this situation.</p> - -<p>“No,” she replied, softly.</p> - -<p>“I beg of you—come!” implored Adam.</p> - -<p>The girl shook her black head. A haunting mockery -hung around her, in her slight smile, in the light of her -face. She radiated a strange glow like the warm shade -of an opal. Older she seemed to Adam and surer of -herself and somewhat deeper in that mystic obsession of -passion he had often sensed in her. No spiritual conception -of what Adam regarded as his obligation to her -could ever dawn in that little brain. She loved her pretty -face and beautiful body. She gloried in her power over -men. And the new man she felt to be still unwon—who -was stronger of instinct and harder to hold, under whose -brutal hand she would cringe and thrill and pant and -fight—him she would choose. So Adam read Margarita -in that moment. If he had felt love for her, which he -doubted, it was dead. A great pity flooded over him. It -seemed that of the three there, he was the only one who -was true and who understood.</p> - -<p>“Margarita, have you forgotten last night?” asked -Adam, huskily.</p> - -<p>“Ah, señor—so long ago and far away!” she said.</p> - -<p>Adam whirled abruptly and, plunging into the thicket -of mesquites, he tore a way through, unmindful of the -thorns. When he reached his quarters there was blood -on his hands and face, but the sting of the thorns was as -nothing to the hurt in his heart. He lay down.</p> - -<p>“Again!” he whispered. “Guerd has come—and it’s -the same old story. Only worse!... But, it’s better so!<span class="pagenum" id="Page_51">51</span> -I—I didn’t know—her!... Arallanes knew—he told me.... -And I—I dreamed so many—many fool things. Yes—it’s -better—better. I didn’t love her right. It—it was -something she roused. I never loved her—but if I did -love her—it’s gone. It’s not loss that—that stabs me -now. It’s Guerd—Guerd! Again—and I ran off from -him.... ‘So long ago and far away,’ she said! Are all -women like that? I can’t believe it. I never will. I -remember my mother.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_52">52</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">That</span> night in the dead late hours Adam suddenly -awoke. The night seemed the same as all the desert -nights—dark and cool under the mesquites—the same -dead, unbroken silence. Adam’s keen intentness could -not detect a slightest sound of wind or brush or beast. -Something had pierced his slumbers, and as he pondered -deeply there seemed to come out of the vagueness beyond -that impenetrable wall of sleep a voice, a cry, a whisper. -Had Margarita, sleeping or waking, called to him? -Such queer visitations of mind, often repeated, had -convinced Adam that he possessed a mystic power or -sense.</p> - -<p>When Adam awoke late, in the light of the sunny morning, -unrealities of the night dispersed like the gray shadows -and vanished. He arose eager, vigorous, breathing hard, -instinctively seeking for action. The day was Sunday. -Another idle wait, fruitful of brooding moods! But he -vowed he would not go to the willow brakes, there to -hide from Guerd and Collishaw. Let them have their -say—do their worst! We would go up to Picacho and -gamble and drink with the rest of the drifters. Merryvale’s -words of desert-learned wisdom rang through -Adam’s head. As for Margarita, all Adam wanted was -one more look at her face, into her dusky eyes, and that -would forever end his relation to her.</p> - -<p>At breakfast Arallanes presented a thoughtful and forbidding -appearance, although this demeanor was somewhat -softened by the few times he broke silence. The señora’s -impassive serenity lacked its usual kindliness, and her -lowered eyes kept their secrets. Margarita had not yet -arisen. Adam could not be sure there was really a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_53">53</span> -shadow hovering over the home, or in his own mind, -coloring, darkening his every prospect.</p> - -<p>After breakfast he went out to stroll along the river -bank and then around the village. He ascertained from -Merryvale that Collishaw, Guerd, and their associates had -found lodgings at different houses for the night, and -after breakfast had left for the mining camp. As usual, -Merryvale spoke pointedly: “You’re brother said they -were goin’ to clear out the camp. An’ I reckon he didn’t -mean greasers, but whisky an’ gold. Son, you stay -away from Picacho to-day.” For once, however, the kind -old man’s advice fell upon deaf ears. Adam had to fight -his impatience to be off up the canyon; and only a driving -need to see Margarita held him there. He walked to -and fro, from village to river and back again. By and -by he espied Arallanes and his wife, with their friends, -dressed in their best, parading toward the little adobe -church. Margarita was not with them.</p> - -<p>Adam waited a little while, hoping to see her appear. -He did not analyze his strong hope that she would go -to church this Sunday as usual. But as no sign of her -was forthcoming he strode down to the little brown -house and entered at the open door.</p> - -<p>“Margarita!” he called. No answer broke the quiet. -His second call, however, brought her from her room, -a dragging figure with a pale face that Adam had never -before seen pale.</p> - -<p>“Señor Ad-dam,” she faltered.</p> - -<p>The look of her, and that voice, stung Adam out of the -gentleness habitual with him. Leaping at her, he dragged -her into the light of the door. She cried out in a fear -that shocked him. When he let go of her, abrupt and -sharp in his motions, she threw up her arms as if to -ward off attack.</p> - -<p>“Do you think I would hurt you?” he cried, harshly. -“No, Margarita! I only wanted to see you—just once -more.”</p> - -<p>She dropped her arms and raised her face. Then Adam,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_54">54</span> -keen in that poignant moment, saw in her the passing of -an actual fear of death. It struck him mute. It betrayed -her. What had been the dalliance of yesterday, playful -and passionate in its wild youth, through the night had -become dishonor. Yesterday she had been a cat that -loved to be stroked; to-day she was a maimed creature, -a broken woman.</p> - -<p>“Lift your face—higher,” said Adam, hoarsely, as he -put out a shaking hand to touch her. But he could not -touch her. She did lift it and looked at him, denying -nothing, still unashamed. But now there was soul in -that face. Adam felt it limned on his memory forever—the -stark truth of her frailty, the courage of a primitive -nature fearing only death, yearning for brutal blows as -proof of the survival of jealous love, a dawning consciousness -of his honesty and truth. Terrible was it for Adam -to realize that if she had been given that choice again -she would have decided differently. But it was too late.</p> - -<p>“<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Adios</i>, señorita,” he said, bowing, and backed out of -the door. He stopped, and the small pale face with its -tragic eyes, straining, unutterably eloquent of wrong to -him and to herself, passed slowly out of his sight.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Swiftly Adam strode up the canyon, his fierce energy -in keeping with his thoughts. He overtook the Irishman, -Regan, who accosted him.</p> - -<p>“Hullo, Wansfell, ould fri’nd!” he called. “Don’t yez -walk so dom’ fast.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell! Why do you call me that?” asked Adam. -How curiously the name struck his ear!</p> - -<p>“Ain’t thot your noime?”</p> - -<p>“No, it’s not.”</p> - -<p>“Wal, all right. Will yez hev a dhrink?” Regan produced -a brown bottle and handed it to Adam.</p> - -<p>They walked on up the canyon, Regan with his short, -stunted legs being hard put to it to keep up with Adam’s -long strides. The Irishman would attach himself to Adam, -that was evident; and he was a most talkative and friendly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_55">55</span> -fellow. Whenever he got out of breath he halted to -draw out the bottle. The liquor in an ordinary hour -would have befuddled Adam’s wits, but now it only -heated his blood.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, if yez ain’t the dom’dest foinest young feller -in these diggin’s!” ejaculated Regan.</p> - -<p>“Thank you, friend. But don’t call me that queer -name. Mine’s Adam.”</p> - -<p>“A-dom?” echoed Regan. “Phwat a hell of a noime! -Adom an’ Eve, huh? I seen yez with thot black-eyed -wench. She’s purty.”</p> - -<p>They finished the contents of the bottle and proceeded -on their way. Regan waxed warmer in his regard for -Adam and launched forth a strong argument in favor -of their going on a prospecting trip.</p> - -<p>“Yez would make a foine prospector an’ pard,” he said. -“Out on the desert yez are free an’ happy, b’gorra! No -place loike the desert, pard, whin yez come to know it! -Thar’s air to breathe an’ long days wid the sun on yer -back an’ noights whin a mon knows shlape. Mebbe we’ll -hev the luck to foind Pegleg Smith’s lost gold mine.”</p> - -<p>“Who was Pegleg Smith and what gold mine did he -lose?” queried Adam.</p> - -<p>Then as they plodded on up the canyon, trying to keep -to the shady strips and out of the hot sun, Adam heard -for a second time the story of the famous lost gold mine. -Regan told it differently, perhaps exaggerating after the -manner of prospectors. But the story was impelling to -any man with a drop of adventurous blood in his veins. -The lure of gold had not yet obsessed Adam, but he had -begun to feel the lure of the desert.</p> - -<p>Adam concluded that under happier circumstances this -Regan would be a man well worth cultivating in spite -of his love for the bottle. They reached the camp about -noon, had a lunch at the stand of a Chinaman, and then, -entering the saloon, they mingled with the crowd, where -Adam soon became separated from Regan. Liquor flowed -like water, and gold thudded in sacks and clinked musically<span class="pagenum" id="Page_56">56</span> -in coins upon the tables. Adam had one drink, and -that incited him to take another. Again the throb and -burn of his blood warmed out the coldness and bitterness -of his mood. Deliberately he drank and deliberately he -stifled the voice of conscience until he was in a reckless -and dangerous frame of mind. There seemed to be a -fire consuming him now, to which liquor was only fuel.</p> - -<p>He swaggered through the crowded hall, and for once -the drunken miners, the painted hags, the cold-faced -gamblers, did not disgust him. The smell of rum and -smoke, the feel of the thick sand under his feet, the sight -of the motley crowd of shirt-sleeved and booted men, the -discordant din of music, glasses, gold, and voices—all -these sensations struck him full and intimately with their -proof that he was a part of this wild assembly of free -adventurers. He remembered again Merryvale’s idea of -a man equipped to cope with this lawless gang and hold -his own. Suddenly when he espied his brother Guerd he -shook with the driving passion that had led him there.</p> - -<p>Guerd sat at table, gambling with Collishaw and -MacKay and other men of Picacho well known to Adam. -Guerd looked the worse for liquor and bad luck. When -he glanced up to see Adam, a light gleamed across his -hot face. He dropped his cards, and as Adam stepped -near he rose from the table and in two strides confronted -him, arrogant, menacing, with the manner of a man -dangerous to cross.</p> - -<p>“I want money,” demanded Guerd.</p> - -<p>Adam laughed in his face.</p> - -<p>“Go to work. You’re not slick enough with the cards -to hide your tricks,” replied Adam, in deliberate scorn.</p> - -<p>Temper, and not forethought, actuated Guerd then. -He slapped Adam, with the moderate force of an older -brother punishing an impertinence. Swift and hard Adam -returned that blow, staggering Guerd, who fell against -the table, but was upheld by Collishaw. He uttered a loud -and piercing cry.</p> - -<p>Sharply the din ceased. The crowd slid back over the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_57">57</span> -sand, leaving Adam in the center of a wide space, confronting -Guerd, who still leaned against Collishaw. Guerd -panted for breath. His hot face turned white except for -the red place where Adam’s fist had struck. MacKay -righted the table, then hurriedly drew back. Guerd’s fury -of astonishment passed to stronger controlled passion. He -rose from Collishaw’s hold and seemed to tower magnificently. -He had the terrible look of a man who had waited -years for a moment of revenge, at last to recognize it.</p> - -<p>“You hit me! I’ll beat you for that—I’ll smash your -face,” he said, stridently.</p> - -<p>“Come on,” cried Adam.</p> - -<p>At this instant the Irishman, Regan, staggered out of -the crowd into the open circle. He was drunk.</p> - -<p>“Sic ’em, Wansfell, sic ’em,” he bawled. “I’m wid yez. -We’ll lick thot—loidy face—an’ ivery <span class="locked">dom’——”</span></p> - -<p>Some miner reached out a long arm and dragged Regan -back.</p> - -<p>Guerd Larey leaned over to pound with his fist on the -table. A leaping glow radiated from his face, as if a -genius of hate had inspired some word or speech that -Adam must find insupportable. His look let loose a -bursting gush of blood through Adam’s throbbing veins. -This was no situation built on a quarrel or a jealous -rivalry. It was backed by years, and by some secret not -easily to be divined, though its source was the very soul -of Cain.</p> - -<p>“So that’s your game,” declared Guerd, with ringing -passion. “You want to fight and you make this debt of -yours a pretense. But I’m on to you. It’s because of the -girl I took from you.”</p> - -<p>“Shut up! Have you no sense of decency? Can’t you -be half a man?” burst out Adam, beginning to shake.</p> - -<p>“Ha! Ha! Ha! Listen to Goody-Goody!... Mother’s -nice <span class="locked">boy——”</span></p> - -<p>“By Heaven, Guerd Larey, if you speak of my—my -mother—here—I’ll tear out your tongue!”</p> - -<p>They were close together now, with only the table between<span class="pagenum" id="Page_58">58</span> -them—Cain and Abel—the old bitter story plain -in the hate of one flashing face and the agony of the -other. Guerd Larey had divined the means to torture and -to crucify this brother whose heart and soul were raw.</p> - -<p>“Talk about the fall of Saint Anthony!” cried Guerd, -with a voice magical in its steely joy. “Never was there -a fall like Adam Larey’s—the Sunday-school boy—too -sweet—too innocent—too pure to touch the hand of a -girl!... Ha-ha! Oh, we can fight, Adam. I’ll fight -you. But let me talk—let me tell my friends what a -damned hypocrite you are.... Gentlemen, behold the immaculate -Saint Adam whose Eve was a little greaser girl!”</p> - -<p>There was no shout of mirth. The hall held a low-breathing -silence. It was a new scene, a diversion for -the gamblers and miners and their painted consorts, a -clash of a different kind and spirit. Guerd paused to -catch his breath and evidently to gather supreme passion -for the delivery of what seemed more to him than life -itself. His face was marble white, quivering and straining, -and his eyes blazed with a piercing flame.</p> - -<p>Adam saw the living, visible proof of a hate he had -long divined. The magnificence of Guerd’s passion, the -terrible reality of his hate, the imminence of a mortal -blow, locked Adam’s lips and jaws as in a vise, while a -gathering fury, as terrible as Guerd’s hate, flooded and -dammed at the gates of his energy, ready to break out -in destroying violence.</p> - -<p>“She told me!” Guerd flung the words like bullets. -“You needn’t bluff it out with your damned lying white -face. She told me!... You—you, Adam Larey, with -your pure thoughts and lofty ideals ... the <em>rot</em> of -them! <em>You</em>—damn your milksop soul!—you were the -slave of a dirty little greaser girl who fooled you, laughed -in your face, left you for me—for me at the snap of my -fingers.... And, by God! my cup would be full—if -your mother could only <span class="locked">know——”</span></p> - -<div id="ip_58" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 29em;"> - <img src="images/i_058.jpg" width="462" height="600" alt="" /> - <div class="caption">THEN THE GUN BOOMED WITH MUFFLED REPORT—AND GUERD LAREY, - UTTERING A CRY OF AGONY, FELL AWAY FROM ADAM</div></div> - -<p>It was Collishaw’s swift hand that knocked up Adam’s -flinging arm and the gun which spouted red and boomed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_59">59</span> -heavily. Collishaw grappled with him—was flung off—and -then Guerd lunged in close to save himself. A writhing, -wrestling struggle—quick, terrible; then the gun -boomed with muffled report—and Guerd Larey, uttering -a cry of agony, fell away from Adam, backward over the -table. His gaze, conscious, appalling, was fixed on Adam. -A dark crimson spot stained his white shirt. Then he -lay there with fading eyes—the beauty and radiance and -hate of his face slowly shading.</p> - -<p>Collishaw leaned over him. Then with hard, grim gesture -he shouted, hoarsely: “Dead, by God!... You’ll -hang for this!”</p> - -<p>A creeping horror was slowly paralyzing Adam. But -at that harsh speech he leaped wildly, flinging his gun -with terrific force into the sheriff’s face. Like an upright -stone dislodged Collishaw fell. Then Adam, bounding -forward, flung aside the men obstructing his passage and -fled out of the door.</p> - -<p>Terror lent wings to his feet. In a few moments he -was beyond the outskirts of the camp. Even here, fierce -in his energy, he bounded upward, from rock to rock, -until he reached the steep jumble of talus where swift -progress was impossible. Then with hands and feet working -in unison, as if he had been an ape, he climbed -steadily.</p> - -<p>From the top of the first rocky slope he gazed back -fearfully. Yes, men were pursuing him, strung out along -the road of the mining camp; and among the last was a -tall, black-coated, bareheaded man that Adam took to be -Collishaw. This pursuer was staggering along, flinging -his arms.</p> - -<p>Adam headed straight up the ascent. Picacho loomed -to the right, a colossal buttress of red rock, wild and ragged -and rugged. But the ascent that had looked so short -and easy—how long and steep! Every shadow was a lie, -every space of slope in the sunlight hid the truth of its -width. Sweat poured from his hot body. He burned. -His breath came in labored bursts. A painful stab in his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_60">60</span> -side spread and swelled to the whole region of his breast. -He could hear the mighty throb of his heart, and he could -hear it in another way—a deep muffled throb through his -ears.</p> - -<p>At last he reached the height of the slope where it -ended under a wall of rock, the backbone of that ridge, -bare and jagged, with no loose shale on its almost perpendicular -side. Here it took hard labor of hand and -foot to climb and zigzag and pull himself up. Here he -fell exhausted.</p> - -<p>But the convulsion was short lived. His will power -was supreme and his endurance had not been permanently -disabled. He crawled before he could walk, and when he -recovered enough to stagger erect he plodded on, invincible -in his spirit to escape.</p> - -<p>From this height, which was a foothill to the great -peak, he got his bearings and started down.</p> - -<p>“They can’t—trail me—here,” he whispered, hoarsely, -as he looked back with the eyes of a fugitive. “And—down -there—I’ll keep off the road.”</p> - -<p>After that brief moment of reasoning he became once -more victim to fear and desperate passion to hurry. He -had escaped, his pursuers could not see him now, he could -hide, the descent was tortuous; yet these apparent facts, -favorable as they were, could not save him. Adam pushed -on, gaining strength as he recovered breath. As his direction -led him downhill, he went swiftly, sometimes at a -rapid walk, again sliding down here and rushing there, -and at other places he stepped from rock to rock, like a -balancing rope walker.</p> - -<p>The descent here appeared to be a long, even slant of -broken rocks, close together like cobblestones in a street, -and of a dark-bronze hue. They shone as if they had -been varnished. And a closer glance showed Adam the -many reddish tints of <i>bisnagi</i> cactus growing in the cracks -between the stones.</p> - -<p>His misgivings were soon verified. He had to descend -here, for the afternoon was far gone, and whatever the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_61">61</span> -labor and pain, he must reach the road before dark. The -rocks were sharp, uneven, and as slippery as if they had -been wet. At the very outset Adam slipped, and, falling -with both hands forward, he thrust them into a cactus. -The pain stung, and when he had to pull hard to free -himself from the thorns, it was as if his hands had been -nailed. He could not repress moans as he tried to pull -out the thorns with his teeth. They stuck tight. The -blood ran in little streams. But he limped on, down the -black slope.</p> - -<p>The white road below grew closer and closer. It was -a goal. This slope of treacherous rocks and torturing -cacti was a physical ordeal that precluded memory of the -past or consideration of the present. When Adam at last -reached the road, there to fall exhausted and wet and -burning upon a flat rock, it seemed that he had been -delivered from an inferno.</p> - -<p>Presently he sat up to look around him. A wonderful -light showed upon the world—the afterglow of sunset. -Picacho bore a crown of gold. All the lower tips of -ranges were purpling in shadow. To the southward a -wide gray barren led to an endless bleak plateau, flat and -dark, with dim spurs of mountains in the distance. Desolate, -lifeless, silent—the gateway to the desert! Adam -felt steal over him a sense of awe. The vastness of seen -and suggested desert seemed flung at him, as if nature -meant to reveal to him the mystery and might of space. -The marvelous light magnified the cacti and the rocks, -and the winding ranges and the bold peaks, and the distances, -until all were unreal. Adam felt that he had -overcome a great hardship, accomplished a remarkable -feat, had climbed and descended a range as sharp toothed -as jagged lava. But to what end! Something in the -bewildering light of the west, in the purple shadows growing -cold in the east, in the tremendous oppression of -illimitable space and silence and solitude and desolation—something -inexplicable repudiated and mocked his physical -sense of great achievement.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_62">62</span> -All at once, in a flash, he remembered his passion, his -crime, his terror, his flight. Not until that instant had -intelligence operated in harmony with his feelings. He -lifted his face in the cool, darkening twilight. The frowning -mountains held aloof, and all about him seemed detached, -rendering his loneliness absolute and immutable.</p> - -<p>“Oh! Oh!” he moaned. “What will become of me?... -No family—no friends—no hope!... Oh, Guerd—my -brother! His blood on my hands!... He ruined -my life! He’s killed my soul!... Oh, damn him, damn -him! he’s made me a murderer!”</p> - -<p>Adam fell face down on the rock with breaking heart. -His exceeding bitter cries seemed faint and lost in the -midst of the vastness of desert and sky. The deepening -of twilight to darkness, the cold black grandeur of the -great peak, the mournful wail of a desert wolf, the pure -pale evening star that pierced the purple sky, the stupendous -loneliness and silence of that solitude—all these -facts seemed Nature’s pitiless proof of her indifference -to man and his despair. His hope, his prayer, his frailty, -his fall, his burden and agony and life—these were nothing -to the desert that worked inscrutably through its -millions of years, nor to the illimitable expanse of heaven, -deepening its blue and opening its cold, starry eyes. But -a spirit as illimitable and as inscrutable breathed out of -the universe and over the immensity of desert space—a -spirit that breathed to the soul of the ruined man and -bade him rise and take up his burden and go on down the -naked shingles of the world.</p> - -<p>Despair and pride and fear of death, and this strange -breath of life, dragged Adam up and drove him down -the desert road. For a mile he staggered and plodded -along, bent and bowed like an old man, half blinded by -tears and choked by sobs, abject in his misery; yet even -so, the something in him that was strongest of all—the -instinct to survive—made him keep to the hard, gravelly -side of the road, that his tracks might not show in the -dust.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_63">63</span> -And that action of blood and muscle, because it came -first in the order of energy, gradually assumed dominance -of him, until again he was an escaping fugitive, mostly -concerned with direction and objective things. The direction -took care of itself, being merely a matter of keeping -along the edge of the road that gleamed pale in front -of him. Objects near at hand, however, had to be carefully -avoided. Rocks were indistinct in the gloom; <i>ocatilla</i> -cacti thrust out long spectral arms; like the tentacles of -an octopus; and shadows along the road took the alarming -shape of men and horses and wagons. All around -him, except to the west, was profound obscurity, and in -that direction an endless horizon, wild and black and -sharp, with sweeping bold lines between the spurs, stood -silhouetted against a pale-blue, star-fired sky. Miles and -miles he walked, and with a strength that had renewed. -He never looked up at the heavens above. Often he -halted to turn and listen. These moments were dreaded -ones. But he heard only a faint breeze.</p> - -<p>Morning broke swiftly and relentlessly, a gray, desert -dawning. Dim columns of smoke scarce a mile away -showed him that Yuma was close. Fields and cattle -along the road, and then an Indian hut, warned him that -he was approaching the habitations of men and sooner -or later he would be seen. He must hide by day and travel -by night. Bordering the road to his left was a dense -thicket of arrowweed, indicating that he had reached the -bottom lands of the river. Into this Adam crawled like -a wounded and stealthy deer. Hunger and thirst were -slight, but his whole body seemed a throbbing ache. Both -mind and body longed for the oblivion that came at once -in sleep.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_64">64</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Adam’s</span> heavy slumbers were punctuated by periods -when he half awakened, drowsily aware of extreme -heat, of discomfort and sluggish pain, and of vague -sounds.</p> - -<p>Twilight had fallen when he fully awakened, stiff and -sore, with a gnawing at his stomach and a parching of -mouth and throat from thirst. He crawled out of the -copse of arrowweed, to the opening by which he had -entered it, and, stealthily proceeding on to the road, he -peered out and listened. No man in sight—no sound to -alarm! Consciousness of immense relief brought bitterly -home to him the fact that he was a fugitive. Taking to -the road, he walked rapidly in the direction of the lights. -He passed low, dark huts somewhat back from the road, -and he heard strange voices, probably of Indians.</p> - -<p>In about a quarter of an hour he came to the river -basin, where the road dropped down somewhat into the -outskirts of Yuma. Most of the lights were across the -river on the Arizona side. He met both Mexicans and -Indians who took no apparent notice of him, and this -encouraged Adam to go on with them down to a ferry-boat.</p> - -<p>The boat was shoved off. Adam saw that it was fastened -to the cable overhead by ropes and pulleys. The current -worked it across the river. Adam got out with the rest -of the passengers, and, leaving them, he walked down -the bank a few rods. He found a little dock with a skiff -moored to it, and here he lay flat and drank his fill. The -water was full of sand, but cool and palatable. Then he -washed his face and hands. The latter were swollen and -stiff from the cactus thorns, rendering them clumsy.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_65">65</span> -Next in order for him was to find a place to eat, and -soon he came at once upon an eating house where several -rough-looking white men and some Mexicans were being -served by a Chinaman.</p> - -<p>When he ended this meal he had determined upon a -course to take. He needed a gun, ammunition, canteen, -burro, and outfit; and he hardly expected to be able to -purchase them after dark, without exciting suspicion. All -the same, he set out to look.</p> - -<p>A short walk brought Adam to a wide street, dimly -lighted by the flare of lamps from open doors of saloons -and stores. He halted in a shadow on the corner. -A stream of men was passing—rugged, unshaven, -dusty-booted white men, and Mexicans with their peaked -sombreros and embroidered jackets and tight braided -trousers.</p> - -<p>Presently Adam ventured forth and walked up the -street. The town resembled Picacho in its noisiest hours, -magnified many times. He felt a wildness he could not see -or hear. It dragged at him. It somehow made him a -part of the frontier life. He longed to escape from -himself.</p> - -<p>A glimpse of a tall man in black frock coat startled -Adam. That coat reminded him of Collishaw. He sheered -down a side street into the gloom. He saw wagons and -heard the munch of horses in stalls. Evidently this place -was a barnyard and might afford him a safe retreat for -the night. The first wagon he examined contained straw. -Climbing into it, he lay down. For a long time he lay -there, worrying over the risk he must run next day, until -at length he fell asleep.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>When day dawned, however, Adam had not such overpowering -dread. The sun was rising in red splendor and -the day promised to be hot. As it was early, but few -people were to be encountered, and this fact lent Adam -more courage. He had no difficulty in finding the place -where he had eaten the night before. Adam ate as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_66">66</span> -heartily as he could, not because he was hungry, but for -the reason that he had an idea he might have to travel -far on this meal.</p> - -<p>That done, he sallied forth to find a store where he -could purchase the outfit he needed; and he approached -the business section by a street that climbed to what was -apparently the highest point in Yuma.</p> - -<p>Adam entered a store, and almost forgot himself in -the interest of the purchases he wanted to make. He -needed a small mule, or burro, to pack his outfit, and -while the storekeeper went out to get it for Adam several -Mexicans entered. One of them recognized Adam. He -cried out, “Santa Maria!” and ran out, followed by his -amazed but less hurried comrades. It took Adam a -moment to place the man in mind. Felix! the Mexican -that had drawn a knife on Arallanes.</p> - -<p>Therefore Adam pondered. He must take risks to get -away with this necessary outfit. The storekeeper, who -had gone out through the back of the store, returned to -say he could furnish a good burro ready to be packed at -once. Adam made a deal with him for the whole outfit -and began to count out the money. The storekeeper did -not wait, and, gathering up an armful of Adam’s purchases, -he carried them out through the back door. This -gave Adam opportunity to have a look from the front -door into the street. There strode Felix, gesticulating -wildly to the white man Adam had seen before, the black-coated -tall Collishaw, significant and grim, with a white -bandage over his face.</p> - -<p>A shock pierced Adam’s heart, and it was followed by -a terrible icy compression, and then a bursting gush of -blood, a flood of fire over all his body. Leaping like a -deer, he bounded back through the store, out of the door, -and across an open space full of implements, wagons, -and obstacles he had to run around or jump over. He -did not see the storekeeper. One vault took him over a -high board fence into an alley, and through this he ran -into a street. He headed for the river, running fleetly,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_67">67</span> -blind to all around him but the ground flying under his -feet and the end of the street. He gained that. The -river, broad and swirling, lay beneath him. Plunging -down the bank, he flew toward the dock. Upon reaching -the dock, Adam espied a skiff, with oars in place, with -bow pulled up on the sand. One powerful shove sent -it, with him aboard, out into the stream. He bent the -oars in his long, strong sweeps, and it took him only a -few moments to cross. Not yet had any men appeared -in pursuit or even to take notice of him. As he jumped -out on the California shore of the river and began to run -north, he found that he faced the lone black mountain -peak which dominated the rise of the desert. The dust -was ankle deep. It stifled him, choked him, and caked -on his sweaty face and hands. He strode swiftly, oppressed -by the dust and intolerant of the confining borders -of yellow brush. The frequent bends in the road were -at once a relief and a dread. They hid him, yet obstructed -his own view. He seemed obsessed by a great, passionate -energy to escape. When he looked back he thought of -Collishaw, of sure pursuit; when he looked ahead he -thought of the road, the dust, the brush into which he -wanted to hide, the physical things to be overcome.</p> - -<p>By and by he climbed and passed out of the zone of -brush. He was on the open gravel ridges, like the ridges -of a washboard, up and down, and just as bare. Yet, -as a whole, there was a distinct slope upward. He could -not see the level of the desert, but the lone mountain peak, -close at hand now, red and black and shining, towered -bleakly over him.</p> - -<p>Adam derived satisfaction from the fact that the hard -gravel ridges did not take imprint of his boots. Assured -now that escape was in his grasp, he began to put his -mind upon other considerations of his flight. He was not -such a fool as to underrate the danger of his venturing out -upon the desert without food, and especially without -water. Already he was thirsty. These thoughts, and -counter ones, pressed hard upon him until he surmounted<span class="pagenum" id="Page_68">68</span> -the long slope to the top of the desert mesa. Here he -looked back.</p> - -<p>First he saw clouds of dust puffing up from the brush-covered -lowlands, and then, in an open space where the -road crossed, he espied horsemen coming at a gallop. -Again, and just as fiercely, did his veins seem to freeze, -his blood to halt, and then to burst into flame.</p> - -<p>“Collishaw—and his men!” gasped Adam, his jaw -dropping. “They’ve trailed me!... They’re after me—on -horses!”</p> - -<p>The apparent fact was terrific in its stunning force. -Adam reeled; his sight blurred. It was a full moment -before he could rally his forces. Then, gazing keenly, -he saw that his pursuers were still miles away.</p> - -<p>At first he ran fleetly, with endurance apparently unimpaired, -but he meant to slow down and husband his -strength as soon as he dared. Before him stretched a -desert floor of fine, shining gravel, like marbles, absolutely -bare of any vegetation for what seemed hundreds -of yards; and then began to appear short bunches of low -meager brush called greasewood, and here and there isolated -patches of <i>ocatilla</i>. These multiplied and enlarged -in the distance until they looked as if they would afford -cover enough to hide Adam from his pursuers. Hot, wet -with sweat, strong, and panting, he ran another mile, to -find the character of the desert changing.</p> - -<p>Reaching the zone of plant life, he soon placed a thin -but effective barrier of greasewood and <i>ocatilla</i> behind -him. Then he slowed down to catch his breath. Before -him extended a vast hazy expanse, growing darker with -accumulated growths in the distance. To the right rose -the chocolate mountain range, and it ran on to fade in the -dim horizon. Behind him now stood the lone black peak, -and to the left rose a low, faint wavering line of white, -like billows of a sea. This puzzled him until at length -he realized it was sand. Sand—and it, like the range, -faded in the distant horizon.</p> - -<p>Adam also made the discovery that as he looked back<span class="pagenum" id="Page_69">69</span> -over his shoulder he was really looking down a long, -gradual slope. Plainly he could see the edge of the desert -where he had come up, and often, as he traveled along -at a jog trot, he gazed around with fearful expectancy. -He had imagined that his running had given rise to the -breeze blowing in his face. But this was not so. A rather -stiff wind was blowing straight at him. It retarded his -progress, and little puffs of fine, invisible sand or dust -irritated his eyes. Then the tears would flow and wash -them clear again. With all his senses and feelings there -mingled a growing preponderance of thought or realization -of the tremendous openness of the desert. He felt -as though a door of the universe had opened to him, and -all before him was boundless. He had no fear of it; -indeed, there seemed a comfort in the sense of being lost -in such a vastness; but there was something intangible -working on his mind. The wind weighed upon him, the -coppery sky weighed upon him, the white sun weighed -upon him, and his feet began to take hold of the ground. -How hot the top of his head and his face! All at once -the sweat appeared less copious and his skin drier. With -this came a strong thirst. The saliva of his mouth was -pasty and scant. He swallowed hard and his throat -tightened. A couple of pebbles that he put into his -mouth mitigated these last sensations.</p> - -<p>Intelligence gave him pause then, and he halted in his -tracks. If death was relentlessly pursuing him, it was -no less confronting him there to the fore, if he passed on -out of reach of the river. Death from thirst was preferable -to capture, but Adam was not ready to die. He -who had loved life clung to it all the more fiercely now -that the sin of Cain branded his soul. He still felt unlimited -strength and believed that he could go far. But -the sun was hotter than he had ever experienced it; the -heat appeared to strike up from the earth as well as burn -down from above; and it was having a strange effect upon -him. He had sensed a difficulty in keeping to a straight -line of travel, and at first had put it down to his instinct<span class="pagenum" id="Page_70">70</span> -for zigzagging to his greasewood bush and that <i>ocatilla</i> -plant to place them behind him. Moving on again, he -turned toward the chocolate mountain and the river.</p> - -<p>It seemed close. He saw the bare gray desert with -its green growths slope gradually to the rugged base of -the range. Somewhere between him and there ran the -river. He strained his eyesight. How strangely and -clearly the lines of one ridge merged into the lines of -another! There must be distance between them. But it -could not be seen. The range looked larger and farther -away the more he studied it—the air more full of transparent -haze, the red and russet and chocolate hues more -quiveringly suggestive of illusion.</p> - -<p>“Look here,” panted Adam, as he halted once more. -“I’ve been told about the desert. But I didn’t pay particular -attention and now I can’t remember.... I only -know it’s hot—and this won’t do.”</p> - -<p>It was just then that Adam, gazing back down the gray -desert, saw puffs of dust and horses.</p> - -<p>Panic seized him. He ran directly away from his -pursuers, bending low, looking neither to right nor to left, -violent, furious, heedless, like an animal in flight. And -with no sense of direction, with no use of reason, he ran on -till he dropped.</p> - -<p>Then his breast seemed to split and his heart to lift with -terrific pressure, agonizing and suffocating. He lay on -the ground and gasped, with his mouth in the dust. -Gradually the paroxysm subsided.</p> - -<p>He arose to go on, hot, dry, aching, dizzy, but still -strong in his stride.</p> - -<p>“I’ve—got—away,” he said, “and now—the river—the -river.”</p> - -<p>Fear of Collishaw had been dulled. Adam could think -of little besides the heat and his growing thirst, and this -thing—the desert—that was so strange, so big, so menacing. -It did not alarm him that his skin was no longer -wet with sweat, but the fact struck him singularly.</p> - -<p>The wind was blowing sand in his face, obstructing his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_71">71</span> -sight. Suddenly his feet dragged in sand. Dimly then -he made out low sand dunes with hollows between, and -farther on larger dunes waving and billowing on to rise -to what seemed mountains of sand. He saw them as -through a veil of dust. Turning away, he plodded on, -half blinded, fighting the blast of wind that was growing -stronger. The air cleared somewhat. Sand dunes were all -around him, and to his right, in the direction he thought -was wrong, loomed the chocolate range. He went that -way, and again the flying sand hid a clear view. A low, -seeping, silken rustle filled the air, sometimes rising to a -soft roar. He thought of what he had heard about sandstorms, -but he knew this was not one. Unwittingly he -had wandered into the region of the dunes, and the strong -gusty wind swept up the fine sand in sheets and clouds. -He must get out. It could not be far to the level desert -again. He plodded on, and the way he chose, with its -intermittent views of the mountains, at last appeared to -be the wrong one. So he turned again. And as he turned, -a stronger wind, now at his back, whipped up the sand -till all was pale yellow around him, thick and opaque and -moaning, through which the sun shone with strange -magenta hue. He did not dare rest or wait. He had to -plod on. And the way led through soft, uneven sand, -always dragging at his feet.</p> - -<p>After a while Adam discovered that when he trudged -down into the hollows between dunes he became enveloped -in flying sand that forced him to cover mouth and eyes -with his scarf and go choking on, but when he climbed -up over a dune the air became clearer and he could breath -easier. Thus instinctively he favored the ascents, and -thus he lost himself in a world of curved and sculptured -sand dunes, gray and yellow through the flying mists, or -steely silver under the gleaming sunlight. The wind lulled, -letting the sand settle, and then he saw he was lost as -upon a trackless ocean, with no landmarks in sight. On -all sides heaved beautiful white mounds of sand, ribbed -and waved and laced with exquisitely delicate knife-edged<span class="pagenum" id="Page_72">72</span> -curves. And these crests changed like the crests of waves, -only, instead of flying spray, these were curled and -shadowed veils of sand blowing from the scalloped -crowns. Then again the wind, swooping down, whipped -and swept the sand in low thick sheets on and on over -the dunes, until thin rising clouds obscured the sky.</p> - -<p>Adam climbed on, growing weaker. As the heat had -wrought strangely upon his blood, so the sand had dragged -strength from his legs. His situation was grave, but, -though he felt the dread and pity of it, a certain violence -of opposition had left him. That was in his will. He -feared more the instinctive reaction—the physical resistance -that was growing in him. Merryvale had told him -how men lost on the desert could die of thirst in one day. -But Adam had scarcely credited that; certainly he did -not believe it applicable to himself. He realized, however, -that unless he somehow changed the present condition -sun and sand would overwhelm him. So when from -a high knoll of sand he saw down into a large depression, -miles across, where clumps of mesquites showed black -against the silver, he descended toward them and eventually -reached them, ready indeed to drop into the shade.</p> - -<p>Here under a thick-foliaged mesquite he covered his -face with a handkerchief, his head with his coat, and -settled himself to rest and wait. It was a wise move. -At once he felt by contrast what the fierce sun had been. -Gradually the splitting headache subsided to a sensation -that seemed to Adam like a gentle boiling of blood in his -brain. He could hear it. His dry skin became a little -moist; the intolerable burn left it; his heart and pulse -ceased such labored throbbing; and after a time his condition -was limited to less pain, a difficulty in breathing, -and thirst. These were bearable.</p> - -<p>From time to time Adam removed the coverings to -look about him. The sun was westering. When it sank -the wind would cease to blow and then he could find a -way out of this wilderness of sand dunes. Leaning back -against a low branch of the tree, he stretched out, and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_73">73</span> -such was his exhaustion and the restfulness of the posture -that he fell asleep.</p> - -<p>When he awoke he felt better, though half smothered. -He had rested. His body was full of dull aches, but no -more pain. His mouth did not appear so dry or his -tongue so swollen; nevertheless, the thirst remained, giving -his throat a sensation of puckering, such as he remembered -he used to have after eating green persimmons.</p> - -<p>Then Adam, suddenly realizing what covered his head, -threw off the coat and handkerchief. And his eyes were -startled by such a sight as they had never beheld—a -marvelous unreality of silver sheen and black shadow, a -starry tracery of labyrinthine streams on a medium as -weird and beautiful and intangible as a dream.</p> - -<p>“O God! am I alive or dead?” he whispered in awe. -And his voice proved to him that he and his burden had -not slipped into the oblivion of the beyond.</p> - -<p>Night had fallen. The moon had arisen. The stars -shone lustrously. The sky burned a deep rich blue. And -all this unreal beauty that had mocked him was only the -sculptured world of sand translating the magnificence and -splendor of the heavens.</p> - -<p>More than all else, Adam grew sensitive to the oppressiveness -of the silence. His first steps were painful, a -staggering, halting gait, that exercise at length worked -into some semblance of his old stride. The cold desert -air invigorated him, and if it had not been for the discomfort -of thirst he would have been doing well under -the circumstances.</p> - -<p>A sense of direction that had nothing to do with his -intelligence prompted him to face east. He obeyed it. -And he walked for what seemed hours over a moon-blanched -sea of sand, to climb at last a high dune from -which he saw the dark, level floor of the desert, and far -across the shadowy space a black range of mountains. -He thought he recognized the rugged contour, and when, -sweeping his gaze southward, he saw the lone mountain -looming like a dark sentinel over the desert gateway, then<span class="pagenum" id="Page_74">74</span> -he was sure of his direction. Over there to the east lay the -river. And he had long hours of the cool night to travel.</p> - -<p>From this vantage point Adam looked back over the -silver sea of sand dunes; and such was the sight of it -that even in his precarious condition he was stirred to his -depths. The huge oblong silver moon hung low over that -vast heaving stretch of desert. It was a wasteland, -shimmering with its belts and plains of moonlit sand, -blank and mysterious in its shadows, an abode of loneliness. -An inexplicable sadness pervaded Adam’s soul. -This wasteland and he seemed identical. How strange -to feel that he did not want to leave it! Life could not -be sustained in this sepulcher of the desert. But it was -not life that his soul yearned for then—only peace. And -peace dwelt there in that solitude of the sands.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Gray dawn found Adam many miles closer to the mountain -range. Yet it was still far and his former dread -returned. On every side what interminable distances!</p> - -<p>A deepening rose color over the eastern horizon appeared -to be reflected upon the mountain peaks, and this -glow crept down the dark slopes. Gray dawn changed -to radiant morning with an ethereal softness of color. -When the blazing disk of the sun shone over the ramparts -of the east all that desert world underwent a wondrous -transfiguration. The lord of day had arisen and -this was his empire. Red was the hue of his authority, -emblazoned in long vivid rays over the ranges and the -wastelands. Then the great orb of fire cleared the horizon -and the desert seemed aflame.</p> - -<p>One moment Adam gave to the marvel and glory of -the sunrise, and then he looked no more. That brief -moment ended in a consciousness of the gravity of his -flight. For the first touch of sun on face and hands -burned hot, as if it suddenly aggravated a former burn -that the night had soothed.</p> - -<p>“Got to reach—river soon,” he muttered, thickly, “or -never will.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_75">75</span> -He walked on while the sun climbed.</p> - -<p>Desert vegetation increased. Adam toiled on, breathing -hard, careless now of the reaching thorns and heedless -of the rougher ground.</p> - -<p>He was perfectly conscious of a subtle changing of his -spirit, but because it seemed a drifting farther and farther -from thought he could not comprehend it. Courage diminished -as fear augmented. More and more his will and -intelligence gave way to sensorial perceptions. More -and more he felt the urge to hurry, and, though reason -warned against the folly of this, it was not strong enough -to compel him to resist. He did hurry more and stumbled -along. Like breath of a furnace the heat rose from the -rocky, sandy soil; and from above there seemed to bear -down the weight of the leaden fire.</p> - -<p>His skin became as dry as dust and began to shrivel. -It did not blister. The pain now came from burn of the -flesh underneath. He felt that his blood was drying up. -A stinging sensation as of puncture by a thousand thorns -throbbed in his face and neck. The heat burned through -his clothes, and the soles of his boots were coals of fire. -Doggedly he strove forward. A whistle accompanied his -panting breaths. Most intolerable of all was thirst—the -bitter, astringent taste in the scant saliva that became pasty -and dry, the pain in his swelling tongue, the parched -constriction in his throat.</p> - -<p>At last he reached the base of a low rocky ridge which -for long had beckoned to him and mocked him. It obstructed -sight of the slope to the mountain range. Surely -between that ridge and the slope ran the river. The hope -spurred him upward.</p> - -<p>As he climbed he gazed up into the coppery sky, but -his hot and tired eyes could not endure the great white -blaze that was the sun. Halfway up he halted to rest, -and from here he had measureless view of the desert. -Then his dull brain revived to a final shock. For he -seemed to see a thousand miles of green-gray barrenness, -of lifting heat veils like transparent smoke, of wastes of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_76">76</span> -waved sand, and of ranges of upheaved rock. How terribly -it confronted him! Pitiless mockery of false distances -on all sides! A sun-blasted world not meant for -man!</p> - -<p>Then Adam ascended to the summit of the ridge. A -glaring void seemed flung at him. His chocolate-hued -mountain range was not far away. From this height he -could see all the gray-green level of desert between him -and the range. He stared. Again there seemed flung in -his face a hot glare of space. There was no river.</p> - -<p>“Where, where’s—the river?” gasped Adam, mistrusting -his eyesight.</p> - -<p>But the wonderful Rio Colorado, the strange red river -beloved by desert wanderers, did not flow before him—or -to either side—or behind. It must have turned to flow -on the other slope of this insurmountable range.</p> - -<p>“God has—forsaken me!” cried Adam, in despair, and -he fell upon the rocks.</p> - -<p>But these rocks, hot as red-hot plates of iron, permitted -of no contact, even in a moment of horror. Adam -was burned to stagger up, to plunge and run and fall -down the slope, out upon the level, to the madness that -awaited him.</p> - -<p>He must rush on to the river—to drink and drink—to -bathe in the cool water that flowed down from the snow-fed -lakes of the north. Thoughts about water possessed -his mind—pleasant, comforting, hurrying him onward. -Memory of the great river made pictures in his mind, and -there flowed the broad red waters, sullen and eddying and -silent. All the streams and rivers and lakes Adam had -known crowded their images across his inward eye, and -this recall of the past was sweet. He remembered the -brook near his old home—the clear green water full of -bright minnows and gold-sided sunfish; how it used to -flow swiftly under the willow banks where violets hid -by mossy stones, and how it tarried in deep dark pools -under shelving banks, green and verdant and sweet smelling; -how the ferns used to bend over in graceful tribute<span class="pagenum" id="Page_77">77</span> -and the lilies float white and gold, with great green-backed -frogs asleep upon the broad leaves. The watering trough -on the way to school, many and many a time, in the happy -days gone by, had he drunk there and splashed his brother -Guerd. Guerd, who hated water and had to be made to -wash, when they were little boys! The old well on Madden’s -farm with its round cobblestoned walls where the -moss and lichen grew, and where the oaken bucket, wet -and dark and green, used to come up bumping and spilling, -brimful of clear cold water—how vividly he remembered -that! His father had called it granite water, and -the best, because it flowed through the cold subterranean -caverns of granite rock. Then there was the spring in -the orchard, sweet, soft water that his mother used to -send him after, and as he trudged home, burdened by the -huge bucket, he would spill some upon his bare feet.</p> - -<p>Yes, as Adam staggered on, aimlessly now, he was -haunted more and more by memories of water. That dear, -unforgetable time of boyhood when he used to love the -water, to swim like a duck and bask like a turtle—it -seemed far back in the past, across some terrible interval -of pain, vague now, yet hateful. Where was he—and -where was Guerd? Something like a blade pierced his -heart.</p> - -<p>Suddenly Adam was startled out of this pleasant reminiscence -by something blue and bright that danced low -down along the desert floor. A lake! He halted with an -inarticulate cry. There was a lake of blue water, glistening, -exquisitely clear, with borders of green. He could -not help but rush forward. The lake shimmered, thinned, -shadowed, and vanished. Adam halted and, rubbing his -eyes, peered hard ahead and all around. Behind him -shone a strip of blue, streaked up and down by desert -plants, and it seemed to be another lake, larger, bluer, -clearer, with a delicate vibrating quiver, as if exquisitely -rippled by a gentle breeze. Green shores were marvelously -reflected in the blue. Adam gaped at this. Had -he waded through a lake? He had crossed that barren<span class="pagenum" id="Page_78">78</span> -flat of greasewood to reach the spot upon which he now -stood. Almost he was forced to run back. But this must -be a deceit of the desert or a madness of his sight. He -bent low, and the lake of blue seemed to lift and quiver -upon a thin darkling line of vapor or transparent shadow. -Adam took two strides back—and the thing vanished! -Desert magic! A deception of nature! A horrible illusion -to a lost man growing crazed by thirst!</p> - -<p>“Mirage!” whispered Adam, hoarsely. “Blue water! -Ha-ha!... Damned lie—it sha’n’t fool me!”</p> - -<p>But as clear perception failed these mirages of the -desert did deceive him. All objects took on a hazy hue, -tinged by the red of blood in his eyes, and they danced in -the heat-veiled air. Shadows, glares, cactus, and brush -stood as immovable as the rocks of ages. Only the illusive -and ethereal mirages gleamed as if by magic and shimmered -and moved in that midday trance of the sun-blasted -desert.</p> - -<p>The time came when Adam plunged toward every -mirage that floated so blue and serene and mystical in the -deceiving atmosphere, until hope and despair and magnified -sight finally brought on a mental state bordering -on the madness sure to come.</p> - -<p>Then, as he staggered toward this green-bordered pond -and that crystal-blue lake, already drinking and laving in -his mind, he began to hear the beautiful sounds of falling -rain, of gurgling brooks, of lapping waves, of roaring -rapids, of gentle river currents, of water—water—water -sweetly tinkling and babbling, of wind-laden murmur of -a mountain stream. And he began to wander in a circle.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_79">79</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Consciousness</span> returned to Adam. He was lying -under an ironwood tree, over branches of which a -canvas had been stretched, evidently to shade him from -the sun. The day appeared to be far spent.</p> - -<p>His head seemed to have been relieved of a hot metal -band; his tongue was no longer bursting in his mouth; -the boil of his blood had subsided. His skin felt moist.</p> - -<p>Then he heard the rough voice of a man talking to -animals, apparently burros. Movement of body was difficult -and somewhat painful; however, he managed to sit -up and look around. Hide-covered boxes and packsaddles, -with duffle and utensils of a prospector, were littered -about, and conspicuous among the articles near him were -three large canvas-covered canteens, still wet. Upon the -smoldering embers of a camp fire steamed a black iron -pot. A little beyond the first stood a very short, broad -man, back turned; and he was evidently feeding choice -morsels of some kind to five eager and jealous burros.</p> - -<p>“Spoiled—every darn one of you!” he was saying, and -the kindness of his voice belied its roughness. “Why, I -used to have burros that could lick labels off tin cans an’ -call it a square meal!”</p> - -<p>Then he turned and espied Adam watching him.</p> - -<p>“Hullo! You’ve come to,” he said, with interest.</p> - -<p>Adam’s gaze encountered an extraordinary-looking man. -He could not have been taller than five and a half feet, -and the enormous breadth of him made him appear as -wide as he was long. He was not fat. His immense bulk -was sheer brawn, betokening remarkable strength. His -dusty, ragged clothes were patched like a crazy-quilt. He -had an immense head, a shock of shaggy hair beginning<span class="pagenum" id="Page_80">80</span> -to show streaks of gray, and a broad face tanned dark -as an Indian’s, the lower half of which was covered with -a scant grizzled beard. His eyes, big, dark, rolling, resembled -those of an ox. His expression seemed to be one -of set tranquillity—the impassiveness of bronze.</p> - -<p>Adam’s voice was a husky whisper: “Where am—I? -Who are you?”</p> - -<p>“Young man, my name’s Dismukes,” came the reply, -“an’ you’re ninety miles from anywhere—an’ alive, which’s -more than I’d bet on yesterday.”</p> - -<p>The words brought Adam a shock of memory. Out -there the desert smoked, sweltering in the spent heat of -the setting sun. Slowly Adam lay back upon the blanket -and bundle that had been placed under him for a bed. -The man sat down on one of the hide-covered boxes, -fastening his great eyes upon Adam.</p> - -<p>“Am I—all right?” whispered Adam.</p> - -<p>“Yes, but it was a close shave,” replied the other.</p> - -<p>“You said—something about yesterday. Tell me.”</p> - -<p>Dismukes fumbled in his patched vest and, fetching -forth a stumpy pipe, he proceeded to fill it. It was -noticeable that he had to use his little finger to press -down the tobacco into the bowl, as the other fingers of -his enormous hands were too large. Adam had never -before seen such scarred, calloused hands.</p> - -<p>“It was day before yesterday I run across you,” began -Dismukes, after a comfortable pull at his pipe. “My -burro Jinny has the best eyes of the pack outfit. When I -seen her ears go up I got to lookin’ hard, an’ presently -spied you staggerin’ in a circle. I’d seen men do that -before. Sometimes you’d run, an’ again you’d wag along, -an’ then you’d fall an’ crawl. I caught you an’ had to tie -you with my rope. You were out of your head. An’ -you looked hard—all dried up—tongue black an’ hangin’ -out. I thought you were done for. I poured a canteen -of water over your head an’ then packed you over here -where there’s wood an’ water. You couldn’t make a sound, -but all the same I knew you were ravin’ for water. I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_81">81</span> -fed you water a spoonful at a time, an’ every little while -I emptied a canteen over you. Was up all night with -you that night. You recovered awful slow. Yesterday -I’d not have gambled much on your chances. But to-day -you came round. I got you to swallow some soft grub, -an’ I guess you’ll soon be pretty good. You’ll be weak, -though. You’re awful thin. I’m curious about how much -you weighed. You look as if you might have been a -husky lad.”</p> - -<p>“I was,” whispered Adam. “Hundred and eighty-five—or -ninety.”</p> - -<p>“So I thought. You’ll not go over one hundred an’ -twenty now. You’ve lost about seventy pounds.... -Oh, it’s a fact! You see, the body is ’most all water, an’ on -this desert in summer a man just dries up an’ blows away.”</p> - -<p>“Seventy—pounds!” exclaimed Adam, incredulously. -But when he glanced at his shrunken hands he believed -the incomprehensible fact. “I must be skin—and bones.”</p> - -<p>“Mostly bones. But they’re long, heavy bones, an’ if -you ever get any flesh on them you’ll be a darned big man. -I’m glad they’re not goin’ to bleach white on the desert, -where I’ve seen so many these last ten years.”</p> - -<p>“You saved my life?” suddenly queried Adam.</p> - -<p>“Boy, there’s no doubt of that,” returned the other. -“Another hour would have finished you.”</p> - -<p>“I—I thank you.... But—so help me God—I wish -you hadn’t,” whispered Adam, poignantly.</p> - -<p>Dismukes spent a strange gaze upon Adam.</p> - -<p>“What’s your name?” he asked.</p> - -<p>Adam halted over the conviction that he could never -reveal his identity; and there leaped to his lips the name -the loquacious Regan had given him.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell,” he replied.</p> - -<p>Dismukes averted his gaze. Manifestly he divined -that Adam had lied. “Well, it’s no matter what a man -calls himself in this country,” he said. “Only everybody -an’ everythin’ has to have a name.”</p> - -<p>“You’re a prospector?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_82">82</span> -“Yes. But I’m more a miner. I hunt for gold. I -don’t waste time tryin’ to sell claims. Years ago I set -out to find a fortune in gold. My limit was five hundred -thousand dollars. I’ve already got a third of it—in banks -an’ hid away safe.”</p> - -<p>“When you get it—your fortune—what then?” inquired -Adam, with thrilling curiosity.</p> - -<p>“I’ll enjoy life. I have no ties—no people. Then I’ll -see the world,” replied the prospector, in deep and sonorous -voice.</p> - -<p>A wonderful passion radiated from him. Adam saw -a quiver run over the huge frame. This Dismukes evidently -was as extraordinary in character as in appearance. -Adam felt the man’s strangeness, his intelligence, and the -inflexible will and fiery spirit. Yet all at once Adam felt -steal over him an emotion of pity that he could not -understand. How strange men were!</p> - -<p>At this juncture the prospector was compelled to drive -the burros out of camp. Then he attended to his cooking -over the fire, and presently brought a bowl of steaming -food to Adam.</p> - -<p>“Eat this slow—with a spoon,” he said, gruffly. “Never -forget that a man starved for grub or water can kill himself -quick.”</p> - -<p>During Adam’s long-drawn-out meal the sun set and -the mantle of heat seemed to move away for the coming -of shadows. Adam found that his weakness was greater -than he had supposed, rendering the effort of sitting up -one he was glad to end. He lay back on the blankets, -wanting to think over his situation rather than fall asleep, -but he found himself very drowsy, and his mind vaguely -wandered until it was a blank. Upon awakening he saw -the first gray of dawn arch the sky. He felt better, -almost like his old self, except for that queer sensation -of thinness and lightness, most noticeable when he lifted -his hand. Dismukes was already astir, and there, a few -rods from camp, stood the ludicrous burros, as if they -had not moved all night. Adam got up and stretched<span class="pagenum" id="Page_83">83</span> -his limbs, pleased to find that he appeared to be all right -again, except for a little dizziness.</p> - -<p>Dismukes evinced gladness at the fact of Adam’s improvement. -“Good!” he exclaimed. “You’d be strong -enough to ride a burro to-day. But it’s goin’ to be hot, -like yesterday. We’d better not risk travelin’.”</p> - -<p>“How do you know it’s going to be as hot as yesterday?” -inquired Adam.</p> - -<p>“I can tell by the feel an’ smell of the air, an’ mostly -that dull lead-colored haze you see over the mountains.”</p> - -<p>Adam thought the air seemed cool and fresh, but he -did see a dull pall over the mountains. Farther toward -the east, where the sunrise lifted an immense and wondrous -glow, this haze was not visible.</p> - -<p>The remark of Dismukes anent the riding of a burro -disturbed Adam. This kindly prospector meant to take -him on to his destination. Impossible! Adam had fled -to the desert to hide, and the desert must hide him, alive -or dead. The old, thick, clamoring emotions knocked at -his heart. Adam felt gratitude toward Dismukes for not -questioning him, and that forbearance made him want to -tell something of his story. Yet how reluctant he was to -open his lips on that score! He helped Dismukes with -the simple morning meal, and afterward with odds and -ends of tasks, all the time cheerful and questioning, putting -off what he knew was inevitable. The day did come -on hot—so hot that life was just bearable for men and -beasts in the shade of the big ironwood tree. Adam -slept some of the hours away. He awoke stronger, with -more active mind. Of the next meal Dismukes permitted -Adam to eat heartily. And later, while Dismukes smoked -and Adam sat before the camp fire, the moment of revelation -came, quite unexpectedly.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, you’ll not be goin’ to Yuma with me to-morrow,” -asserted Dismukes quietly.</p> - -<p>The words startled Adam. He dropped his head. “No—no! -Thank you—I won’t—I can’t go,” he replied, -trembling. The sound of his voice agitated him further.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_84">84</span> -“Boy, tell me or not, just as you please. But I’m a -man you can trust.”</p> - -<p>The kindness and a nameless power invested in this -speech broke down what little restraint remained with -Adam.</p> - -<p>“I—I can’t go.... I’m an outcast.... I must hide—hide -in the—desert,” burst out Adam, covering his face -with his hands.</p> - -<p>“Was that why you came to the desert?”</p> - -<p>“Yes—yes.”</p> - -<p>“But, boy, you came without a canteen or grub or -burro or gun—or anythin’. In all my years on the desert -I never saw the like of that before. An’ only a miracle -saved your life. That miracle was Jinny’s eyes. You -owe your life to a long-eared, white-faced burro. Jinny -has eyes like a mountain sheep. She saw you—miles off. -An’ such luck won’t be yours twice. You can’t last on -this desert without the things to sustain life.... How -did it happen that I found you here alone—without -anythin’?”</p> - -<p>“No time. I—I had to run!” panted Adam.</p> - -<p>“What’d you do? Don’t be afraid to tell me. The -desert is a place for secrets, and it’s a lonely place where -a man learns to read the souls of men—when he meets -them. You’re not vicious. You’re no—— But never -mind—tell me without wastin’ more words. Maybe I can -help you.”</p> - -<p>“No one can—help me,” cried Adam.</p> - -<p>“That’s not so,” quickly spoke up Dismukes, his voice -deep and rolling. “Some one can help you—an’ maybe -it’s me.”</p> - -<p>Here Adam completely broke down. “I—I did—something—awful!”</p> - -<p>“No crime, boy—say it was no crime,” earnestly returned -the prospector.</p> - -<p>“O my God! Yes—yes! It was—a crime!” sobbed -Adam, shuddering. “But, man—I swear, horrible as it -was—I’m innocent! I swear that. Believe me.... I<span class="pagenum" id="Page_85">85</span> -was driven—driven by wrongs, by hate, by taunts. If I’d -stood them longer I’d have been a white-livered coward. -But I was driven and half drunk.”</p> - -<p>“Well—well!” ejaculated Dismukes, shaking his shaggy -head. “It’s bad. But I believe you an’ you needn’t tell -me any more. Life is hell! I was young once.... An’ -now you’ve got to hide away from men—to live on the -desert—to be one of us wanderers of the wastelands?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. I must hide. And I want—I need to live—to -suffer—to atone!”</p> - -<p>“Boy, do you believe in God?” asked the prospector.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know. I think so,” replied Adam, lifting his -head and striving for composure. “My mother was religious. -But my father was not.”</p> - -<p>“Well—well, if you believed in God your case would -not be hopeless. But some men—a few out of the many -wanderers—find God out here in these wilds. Maybe -you will.... Can you tell me what you think you want -to do?”</p> - -<p>“Oh—to go alone—into the loneliest place—to live -there for years—forever,” replied Adam, with passion.</p> - -<p>“Alone. That is my way. An’ I understand how you -feel—what you need. Are you goin’ to hunt gold?”</p> - -<p>“No—no.”</p> - -<p>“Have you any money?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. More than I’ll ever need. I’d like to throw it -all away—or give it to you. But it—it was my mother’s.... -And I promised her I’d not squander it—that I’d -try to save.”</p> - -<p>“Boy, never mind—an’ I don’t want your money,” -interrupted Dismukes. “An’ don’t do any fool trick with -it. You’ll need it to buy outfits. You can always trust -Indians to go to the freightin’ posts for you. But never -let any white men in this desert know you got money. -That’s a hard comparison, an’ it’s justified.”</p> - -<p>“I’m already sick with the love men have for money,” -said Adam, bitterly.</p> - -<p>“An’ now to figure out an’ make good all that brag of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_86">86</span> -mine,” went on Dismukes, reflectively. “I’ll need only -two days’ grub to get to Yuma. There’s one sure water -hole. I can give you one of my canteens, an’ Jinny, the -burro that saved your life. She’s tricky, but a blamed -good burro. An’ by makin’ up enough bread I can spare -my oven. So, all told, I guess I can outfit you good -enough for you to reach a canyon up here to the west -where Indians live. I know them. They’re good. You -can stay with them until the hot weather passes. No -danger of any white men runnin’ across you there.”</p> - -<p>“But you mustn’t let me have all your outfit,” protested -Adam.</p> - -<p>“I’m not. It’s only the grub an’ one burro.”</p> - -<p>“Won’t you run a risk—with only two days’ rations?”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, every move you can make on this desert -is a risk,” replied Dismukes, seriously. “Learn that right -off. But I’m sure. Only accidents or unforeseen circumstances -ever make risks for me now. I’m what they -call a desert rat.”</p> - -<p>“You’re most kind,” said Adam, choking up again, -“to help a stranger—this way.”</p> - -<p>“Boy, I don’t call that help,” declared Dismukes. -“That’s just doin’ for a man as I’d want to be done by. -When I talked about help I meant somethin’ else.”</p> - -<p>“What? God knows I need it. I’ll be grateful. I’ll -do as you tell me,” replied Adam, with a strange thrill -stirring in him.</p> - -<p>“You are a boy—no matter if you’re bigger than most -men. You’ve got the mind of a boy. What a damn pity -you’ve got to do this hidin’ game!” Under strong feeling -the prospector got up, and, emptying his pipe, he began -to take short strides to and fro in the limited shade cast -by the ironwood tree. The indomitable force of the man -showed in his step, in the way he carried himself. Presently -he turned to Adam and the great ox eyes burned -intensely. “Wansfell, if you were a man I’d never feel -the way I do. But you’re only a youngster—you’re not -bad—you’ve had bad luck—an’ for you I can break my<span class="pagenum" id="Page_87">87</span> -rule—an’ I’ll do it if you’re in earnest. I’ve never talked -about the desert—about its secrets—what it’s taught me. -But I’ll tell you what the desert is—how it’ll be your -salvation—how to be a wanderer of the wasteland is to -be strong, free, happy—if you are honest, if you’re big -enough for it.”</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, I swear I’m honest—and I’ll be big, by -God! or I’ll die trying,” declared Adam, passionately.</p> - -<p>The prospector gave Adam a long, steady stare, a -strange gaze such as must have read his soul.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, if you can live on the desert you’ll grow -like it,” he said, solemnly, as if he were pronouncing a -benediction.</p> - -<p>Adam gathered from this speech that Dismukes meant -to unbosom himself of many secrets of this wonderful -wasteland. Evidently, however, the prospector was not -then ready to talk further. With thoughtful mien and -plodding gait he resumed his short walk to and fro. It -struck Adam then that his appearance was almost as ludicrous -as that of his burros, yet at the same time his presence -somehow conveyed a singular sadness. Years of -loneliness burdened the wide bowed shoulders of this -desert man. Adam divined then, in a gust of gratitude, -that this plodding image of Dismukes would always remain -in his mind as a picture, a symbol of the actual good -in human nature.</p> - -<p>The hot day closed without Adam ever venturing out -of the shade of the tree. Once or twice he had put his -hand in a sunny spot to feel the heat, and it had burned. -The night mantled down with its intense silence, all-embracing, -and the stars began to glow white. As Dismukes -sat down near Adam in the glow of the camp fire -it was manifest, from the absence of his pipe and the -penetrating, possession-taking power of his eyes, that he -was under the dominance of a singular passion.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell,” he began, in low, deep voice, “it took me -many years to learn how to live on the desert. I had the -strength an’ the vitality of ten ordinary men. Many times<span class="pagenum" id="Page_88">88</span> -in those desperate years was I close to death from thirst—from -starvation—from poison water—from sickness—from -bad men—and last, though not least—from loneliness. -If I had met a man like myself, as I am now, I -might have been spared a hell of sufferin’. I did meet -desert men who could have helped me. But they passed -me by. The desert locks men’s lips. Let every man save -his own life—find his own soul. That’s the unwritten law -of the wastelands of the world. I’ve broken it for you -because I want to do by you as I’d have liked to be done -by. An’ because I see somethin’ in you.”</p> - -<p>Dismukes paused here to draw a long breath. In the -flickering firelight he seemed a squatting giant immovable -by physical force, and of a will unquenchable while life -lasted.</p> - -<p>“Men crawl over the desert like ants whose nests have -been destroyed an’ who have become separated from one -another,” went on Dismukes. “They all know the lure -of the desert. Each man has his own idea of why the -desert claims him. Mine was gold—is gold—so that some -day I can travel over the world, rich an’ free, an’ see life. -Another man’s will be the need to hide—or the longin’ -to forget—or the call of adventure—or hate of the world—or -love of a woman. Another class is that of bad men. -Robbers, murderers. They are many. There are also -many men, an’ a few women, who just drift or wander -or get lost in the desert. An’ out of all these, if they -stay in the desert, but few survive. They die or they are -killed. The Great American Desert is a vast place an’ -it is covered by unmarked graves an’ bleached bones. -I’ve seen so many—so many.”</p> - -<p>Dismukes paused again while his broad breast heaved -with a sigh.</p> - -<p>“I was talkin’ about what men think the desert means -to them. In my case I say gold, an’ I say that as the -other man will claim he loves the silence or the color or -the loneliness. But I’m wrong, an’ so is he. The great -reason why the desert holds men lies deeper. I feel that.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_89">89</span> -But I’ve never had the brains to solve it. I do know, -however, that life on this wasteland is fierce an’ terrible. -Plants, reptiles, beasts, birds, an’ men all have to fight for -life far out of proportion to what’s necessary in fertile -parts of the earth. You will learn that early, an’ if you -are a watcher an’ a thinker you will understand it.</p> - -<p>“The desert is no place for white men. An oasis is -fit for Indians. They survive there. But they don’t -thrive. I respect the Indians. It will be well for you -to live awhile with Indians.... Now what I most want -you to know is this.”</p> - -<p>The speaker’s pause this time was impressive, and he -raised one of his huge hands, like a monstrous claw, making -a gesture at once eloquent and strong.</p> - -<p>“When the desert claims men it makes most of them -beasts. They sink to that fierce level in order to live. -They are trained by the eternal strife that surrounds them. -A man of evil nature survivin’ in the desert becomes more -terrible than a beast. He is a vulture.... On the other -hand, there are men whom the desert makes like it. Yes—fierce -an’ elemental an’ terrible, like the heat an’ the -storm an’ the avalanche, but greater in another sense—greater -through that eternal strife to live—beyond any -words of mine to tell. What such men have lived—the -patience, the endurance, the toil—the fights with men an’ -all that makes the desert—the wanderin’s an’ perils an’ -tortures—the horrible loneliness that must be fought -hardest, by mind as well as action—all these struggles -are beyond ordinary comprehension an’ belief. But I -know. I’ve met a few such men, an’ if it’s possible for -the divinity of God to walk abroad on earth in the shape -of mankind, it was invested in them. The reason must -be that in the development by the desert, in case of these -few men who did not retrograde, the spiritual kept pace -with the physical. It means these men never forgot, never -reverted to mere unthinking instinct, never let the hard, -fierce, brutal action of survival on the desert kill their -souls. Spirit was stronger than body. I’ve learned this<span class="pagenum" id="Page_90">90</span> -of these men, though I never had the power to attain it. -It takes brains. I was only fairly educated. An’ though -I’ve studied all my years on the desert, an’ never gave up, -I wasn’t big enough to climb as high as I can see. I tell -you all this, Wansfell, because it may be your salvation. -Never give up to the desert or to any of its minions! -Never cease to fight! You must fight to live—an’ so -make that fight equally for your mind an’ your soul! -Thus you will repent for your crime, whatever that was. -Remember—the secret is never to forget your hold on the -past—your memories—an’ through thinkin’ of them to -save your mind an’ apply it to all that faces you out -there.”</p> - -<p>Rising from his seat, Dismukes made a wide, sweeping -gesture, symbolical of a limitless expanse. “An’ the gist -of all this talk of mine—this hope of mine to do for you -as I’d have been done by—is that if you fight an’ think -together like a man meanin’ to repent of his sin—somewhere -out there in the loneliness an’ silence you will find -God!”</p> - -<p>With that he abruptly left the camp fire to stride off -into the darkness; and the sonorous roll of his last words -seemed to linger on the quiet air.</p> - -<p>Every one of his intense words had been burned into -Adam’s sensitive mind in characters and meanings never -to be forgotten. Dismukes had found eager and fertile -soil for the planting of the seeds of his toil-earned philosophy. -The effect upon Adam was profound, and so -wrought upon his emotions that the black and hateful consciousness -which had returned to haunt him was as but a -shadow of his thought. Adam stared out into the night -where Dismukes had vanished. Something great had -happened. Was the man Dismukes a fanatic, a religious -wanderer of the wasteland, who imagined he had found -in Adam an apt pupil, or who had preached a sermon because -the opportunity presented? No! The prospector -had the faith to give out of his lesson of life on the desert. -His motive was the same as when he had risked much<span class="pagenum" id="Page_91">91</span> -to follow Adam, staggering blindly across the hot sands -to his death. And as Adam felt the mounting passion of -conviction, of gratitude, his stirred mind seemed suddenly -to burst into a radiant and scintillating inspiration of resolve -to be the man Dismukes had described, to fight and -to think and to remember as had no one ever before done -on the desert. It was all that seemed left for him. Repentance! -Expiation! True to himself at the last in -spite of a horrible and fatal blunder!</p> - -<p>“Oh, Guerd! Guerd, my brother!” he cried, shuddering -at the whisper of that name. “Wherever you are in -spirit—hear me!... I’ll rise above wrongs and hate and -revenge! I’ll remember our boyhood—how I loved you! -I’ll atone for my crime! I’ll never forget.... I’ll fight -and think to save my soul—and pray for yours!... -Hear me and forgive—you who drove me out into the -wastelands!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_92">92</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Adam</span> lay awake for some length of time, waiting for -Dismukes to return, but he did not come. Adam at -length succumbed to drowsiness. It was Dismukes’s call -that awakened him. The sun already tipped the eastern -range, rosy red, and all the open land lay fresh and colorful -in the morning light. Adam felt no severe effects from -his hard experience, except an inordinate hunger, which -Dismukes was more disposed to appease. Still he cautioned -Adam not to eat too much.</p> - -<p>“Now, Wansfell, you must learn all about burros,” began -Dismukes. “The burro is the most important part of -your outfit. This desert would still be a blank waste, unknown -to white man, if it had not been for those shaggy, -lazy, lop-eared little donkeys. Whenever you get sore at -one an’ feel inclined to kill him for some trick or other, -just remember that you could not get along without him.</p> - -<p>“Most burros are alike. They hang near camp, as you -see mine, hopin’ they can steal a bite of somethin’ if you -don’t give it to them. They’ll eat paper, or ‘most anythin’ -except greasewood. They love paper off bacon. I had -one once that ate my overalls. They never get homesick an’ -seem contented in the most desolate places. I had a burro -that was happy in Death Valley, which’s the hell hole of -this wasteland. Burros are seldom responsive to affection. -They’ll stand great abuse. Never expect any thanks. -Always patient. They are usually easy to catch. But -they must know you. Only way to catch them is to head -them off. Then they stop. Young burros are easily broke -an’ will follow others. They must be driven. Never knew -but one that I could lead. Don’t forget this. They have -the most wonderful endurance—never stumble or fall—an’<span class="pagenum" id="Page_93">93</span> -can exist on practically nothin’. When you turn them -loose they’ll nibble around awhile, then stop an’ stand -like rocks, never movin’ for hours an’ hours, as if they -were wrapped in prehistoric thought. In the mornin’ when -you start off on your day’s travel the burros are fresh an’ -they drive fine. But in the afternoon, when they get tired, -they think of tricks. They’ll lie down—roll over on a -pack—knock against a rock or tree. They’ll get together -in a bunch to tangle the packs. When a burro intends -to lie down he humps his back an’ wriggles his tail. It’s -hard to get burros across streams. Scared of water! -Strange, isn’t that? I’ve had to carry my burros many a -time. But they’ll climb or go down the steepest, roughest -mountain trail without fear. They can slide down a steep -slope that a man will not stick on. Burros have more -patience and good qualities, an’ also cussedness, than any -other beasts. They pick out pardners an’ stick together -all the time. A big bunch of burros will pair off regardless -of sex. Never give each other up! They bray at -night—an awful sound till you get used to it. Remember -this quick some night when you’re lifted out of a sleep -by a terrible unearthly roar.... Well, I guess that’s -an introduction to desert burros. It’s all serious fact, -Wansfell, as you’ll learn, an’ to your cost, unless you -remember.”</p> - -<p>How singular for Adam to have the closing words of -Dismukes reveal the absorbing interest of this simple and -practical talk about burros! It amazed Adam to find that -he had even been amused, ready to laugh.</p> - -<p>“I’ll remember,” he asserted, with conviction.</p> - -<p>“Dare say you will,” replied Dismukes, “but the idea -is you must remember before you get in trouble, not after. -I can’t tell you when to know a burro is goin’ to trick you. -I’m just givin’ you facts as to the nature of burros in -general. You must study an’ learn them yourself. A -man could spend his life studyin’ burros an’ then have lots -to learn. Most prospectors lose half their time trackin’ -their burros. It’s tryin’ to find burros that has cost many<span class="pagenum" id="Page_94">94</span> -a desert man his life. An’ this is why, if you’ve chosen -the desert to live in, you must learn the habits of the burro. -He’s the camel of this Sahara.”</p> - -<p>With that the prospector appeared to have talked himself -out for the present, and he devoted his efforts to a -selection of parts of his outfit that manifestly he meant -to turn over to Adam. At length having made the selection -to his satisfaction, he went out to wake up the burro -Jinny. As he led Jinny into camp all the other burros -trooped along.</p> - -<p>“Watch me pack an’ then you try your hand on Jinny,” -he said.</p> - -<p>Adam was all eyes while the prospector placed in position -the old ragged pads of skins and blankets, and the packsaddles -over them, to be buckled carefully. It was all -comparatively easy until it came to tying the pack on with -a rope in what Dismukes called a hitch. However, after -Dismukes had accomplished it on three of the other -burros, Adam believed he could make a respectable showing. -To this end he began to pack Jinny, and did very -well indeed till he got to the hitch, which was harder to -tie than it looked. After several attempts he succeeded. -During this procedure Jinny stood with one long ear -up and the other down, as if nothing on earth mattered -to her.</p> - -<p>“Carry the canteen of water yourself,” said Dismukes, -as he led Adam out from under the tree and pointed west. -“See where that long, low, sharp ridge comes down to -the desert?... Well, that’s fifty miles. Around that -point lies a wide canyon. Indians live up that canyon. -They are good people. Stay with them—work for them -till you learn the desert.... Now as to gettin’ there. -Go slow. Rest often in the shade of ironwoods like this -one. Take a good rest durin’ the middle of the day. As -long as you sweat you’re in no danger. But if your skin -gets dry you need to get out of the sun an’ to drink. -There are several springs along the base of this range. -Chocolate Mountains, they’re called. By keepin’ a sharp<span class="pagenum" id="Page_95">95</span> -eye for patches of bright-green brush you’ll see where -the water is. An’ don’t ever forget that water is the same -as life blood.”</p> - -<p>Adam nodded solemnly as he realized how the mere -thought of thirst constricted his throat and revived there -a semblance of the pain he had endured.</p> - -<p>“Go slow. Maybe you’ll take two or three days to -reach the Indians. By keepin’ that ridge in sight you -can’t miss them.”</p> - -<p>The next move of the prospector was to take Adam -around on the other side of the tree and wave his hand -at the expanse of desert.</p> - -<p>“Now follow me an’ get these landmarks in your mind. -Behind us lies the Chocolate range. You see it runs down -almost southeast. That shiny black mountain standin’ by -itself is Pilot Knob. It’s near Yuma, as of course you -remember. Now straight across from us a few miles -lies a line of sand dunes. They run same way as the -Chocolates. But they’re low—can’t be seen far. Do you -make out a dim, gray, strange-lookin’ range just over the -top of them?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I see that clearly. Looks like clouds,” replied -Adam.</p> - -<p>“That’s the Superstition Mountains. You will hear -queer stories about them. Most prospectors are afraid -to go there, though it’s said Pegleg Smith’s lost gold mine -is somewhere in there. The Indians think the range is -haunted. An’ everyone who knows this desert will tell -you how the Superstition range changes somehow from -time to time. It does change. Those mountains are giant -sand dunes an’ they change their shape with the shiftin’ -of the winds. That’s the fact, but I’m not gainsayin’ how -strange an’ weird they are. An’ I, for one, believe Pegleg -Smith did find gold there. But there’s no water. An’ -how can a man live without water?... Well, to go on, -that dim, purple, high range beyond the Superstitions lies -across the line in Mexico.... Now, lookin’ round to -the right of the Superstitions, to the northwest, an’ you<span class="pagenum" id="Page_96">96</span> -see how the desert slopes down an’ down on all sides to a -pale, hazy valley that looks like a lake. It’s the Salton -Sink—below sea level—an’ it’s death for a man to try to -cross there at this season. It looks obscured an’ small, -but it’s really a whole desert in itself. In times gone by -the Colorado River has broken its banks while in flood -an’ run back in there to fill that sink. Miles an’ miles of -fresh water which soon evaporated! Well, it’s a queer old -earth an’ this desert teaches much.... Now look straight -up the valley. The ragged high peak is San Jacinto an’ -the other high one farther north is San Gorgonio—two -hundred miles from here. Prospectors call this one Grayback -because it has the shape of a louse. These mountains -are white with snow in the winter. Beyond them lies -the Mohave Desert, an immense waste, which hides Death -Valley in its iron-walled mountains.... Now comin’ -back down the valley on this side you see the Cottonwood -range an’ it runs down to meet the Chocolates. There’s -a break in the range. An’ still farther down there’s a -break in the Chocolate range an’ there’s where your canyon -comes out. You’ll climb the pass some day, to get on top -of the Chuckwalla Mountains, an’ from there you will -see north to the Mohave an’ east to the Colorado—all stark -naked desert that seems to hit a man in the face.... -An’, well, I guess I’ve done my best for you.”</p> - -<p>Adam could not for the moment safely trust himself -to speak. The expanse of desert shown him, thus magnified -into its true perspective, now stretched out with the -nature of its distance and nudity strikingly clear. It did -seem to glare a menace into Adam’s face. It made him -tremble. Yet there was fascination in the luring, deceitful -Superstition range, and a sublimity in the measureless -sweep of haze and purple slope leading north to the great -peaks, and a compelling beckoning urge in the mystery and -unknown that seemed to abide beyond the bronze ridge -which marked Adam’s objective point.</p> - -<p>“I’ll never forget your—your kindness,” said Adam, -finally turning to Dismukes.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_97">97</span> -The prospector shook hands with him, and his grip was -something to endure.</p> - -<p>“Kindness is nothin’. I owed you what a man owes to -himself. But don’t forget anythin’ I told you.”</p> - -<p>“I never will,” replied Adam. “Will you let me pay -you for the—the burro and outfit?” Adam made this -request hesitatingly, because he did not know the law of -the desert, and he did not want to offer what might be an -offense.</p> - -<p>“Sure you got plenty of money?” queried Dismukes, -gruffly.</p> - -<p>“Indeed I have,” rejoined Adam, eagerly.</p> - -<p>“Then I’ll take what the burro an’ grub cost.”</p> - -<p>He named a sum that appeared very small to Adam, and, -receiving the money in his horny hands, he carefully deposited -it in a greasy buckskin sack.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, may we meet again,” he said in farewell. -“Good luck an’ good by.... Don’t forget.”</p> - -<p>“Good by,” returned Adam, unable to say more.</p> - -<p>With a whoop at the four burros and a slap on the -haunch of one of them, Dismukes started them southward. -They trotted ahead with packs bobbing and wagging. -What giant strides Dismukes took! He seemed the incarnation -of dogged strength of manhood, yet something -ludicrous clung about him in his powerful action as well -as in his immense squat form. He did not look back.</p> - -<p>Adam slapped Jinny on the haunch and started her -westward.</p> - -<p>The hour was still early morning. A rosy freshness of -the sunrise still slanted along the bronze slopes of the -range and here and there blossoms of <i>ocatilla</i> shone red. -The desert appeared to be a gently rising floor of gravel, -sparsely decked with ironwood and mesquite, and an occasional -cactus, that, so far as Adam could see, did not -harbor a living creature. The day did not seem to feel -hot, but Adam knew from the rising heat veils that it was -hot. Excitement governed his feelings. Actually he was -on the move, with an outfit and every hope to escape<span class="pagenum" id="Page_98">98</span> -possible pursuers, with the absolute surety of a hard yet -wonderful existence staring him in the face.</p> - -<p>Not until he felt a drag in his steps did he think of his -weakened condition. Resting awhile in the shade of a -tree, he let the burro graze on the scant brush, and then -went on again. Thus he traveled on, with frequent rests, -until the heat made it imperative for him to halt till afternoon. -About the middle of the afternoon he packed and -set forth again.</p> - -<p>A direct line westward appeared to be bringing him -closer to the slope of the mountain; and it was not long -before he saw a thick patch of green brush that surely -indicated a water hole. The very sight seemed to invigorate -him. Nevertheless, the promised oasis was far away, -and not before he had walked till he was weary and rested -many times did he reach it. To find water and grass was -like making a thrilling discovery. Adam unpacked Jinny -and turned her loose, not, however, without some misgivings -as to her staying there.</p> - -<p>Though he suffered from an extreme fatigue and a -weakness that seemed to be in both muscle and bone, a -kind of cheer came to him with the camp-fire duties. -Never had he been so famished! The sun set while he -ate, and, despite his hunger, more than once he had to -stop to gaze down across the measureless slope, smoky and -red, that ended in purple obscurity. It struck him suddenly, -as he was putting some sticks of dead ironwood on -the fire, how he had ceased to look back over his shoulder -toward the south. The fire sputtered, the twilight deepened, -the silence grew vast and vague. His eyelids were -as heavy as lead, and all the nerves and veins of his body -seemed to run together and to sink into an abyss the restfulness -of which was unutterably sweet.</p> - -<p>Some time during Adam’s slumbers a nightmare possessed -him. At the moment he was about to be captured -he awakened, cold with clammy sweat and shaking in -every limb. With violent start of consciousness, with fearful -uncertainty, he raised himself to peer around. The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_99">99</span> -desert night encompassed him. It was late, somewhere -near the morning hour. Low down over the dark horizon -line hung a wan distorted moon that shone with weird -luster. Adam saw the black mountain wall above him -apparently lifting to the stars, and the thick shadow of -gloom filling the mouth of the canyon where he lay. He -listened. And then he breathed a long sigh of relief and -lay back in his blankets. The silence was that of a grave. -There were no pursuers. He had only dreamed. And he -closed his eyes again, feeling some blessed safeguard in -the fact of his loneliness.</p> - -<p>Dawn roused him to his tasks, stronger physically, eager -and keen, but more watchful than he had been the preceding -day and with less thrill than he had felt. He packed -in half an hour and was traveling west when the sun rose. -Gradually with the return of his habit of watchfulness -came his former instinctive tendency to look back over his -shoulder. He continually drove this away and it continually -returned. The only sure banishment of it came through -action, with its attendant exercise of his faculties. Therefore -he rested less and walked more, taxing his strength -to its utmost that morning, until the hot noon hour forced -him to halt. Then while Jinny nibbled at the bitter desert -plants Adam dozed in the thin shade of a mesquite. Close -by grew a large <i>ocatilla</i> cactus covered with red flowers -among which bees hummed. Adam never completely lost -sense of this melodious hum, and it seemed to be trying -to revive memories that he shunned.</p> - -<p>The sun was still high and hot when Adam resumed -travel, but it was westering and the slanting rays were -bearable. After he got thoroughly warmed up and sweating -freely he did not mind the heat, and was able to drive -Jinny and keep up a strong stride for an hour at a time. -His course now led along the base of the mountain wall, -and that long low ridge which marked his destination began -to seem less unattainable. The afternoon waned, the -sun sank, the heat declined, and Jinny began to show -signs of weariness. It bothered Adam to keep her headed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_100">100</span> -straight. He searched the line where desert slope met the -mountain wall for another green thicket of brush marking -a water hole, but he could not see one. Darkness overtook -him and he was compelled to make dry camp. This -occasioned him some uneasiness, not that he did not have -plenty of water for himself, but because he worried about -the burro and the possibility of not finding water the next -day. Nevertheless, he slept soundly.</p> - -<p>On the following morning, when he had been tramping -along for an hour or more, he espied far ahead the unmistakable -green patch of thicket that heralded the presence -of water. The sight stirred him. He walked well that -morning, resting only a couple of hours at noon; but the -green patch, after the manner of distant objects on the -desert, seemed just as far away as when he saw it first. -The time came, however, when there was no more illusion -and he knew he was getting close to the place. At last -he reached it, a large green thicket that choked the mouth -of a narrow canyon. He found a spring welling from -under the mountain base and sending a slender stream -out to be swallowed by the sand.</p> - -<p>Adam gave Jinny a drink before he unpacked her. -There was a desirable camp site, except that it lacked -dead firewood close at hand. Adam removed the pack, -being careful to put boxes and bags together and to cover -them with the canvas. Then he started out to look for some -dead ironwood or mesquite to burn. All the desert growths, -mostly greasewood and mesquite, were young and green. -Adam searched in one direction and then in another, -without so much as finding a stick. Next he walked -west along the rocky wall, and had no better success until -he came to a deep recession in the wall, full of brush; and -here with considerable labor he collected a bundle of dry -sticks. With this he trudged back toward camp.</p> - -<p>Before long he imagined he saw smoke. “Queer how -those smoke trees fool a fellow,” he said. And even after -he thought he smelled smoke, he was sure of deception. -But upon nearing the green thicket that hid his camp he<span class="pagenum" id="Page_101">101</span> -actually did see thin blue smoke low down against the -background of rocky wall. The sight alarmed him. The -only explanation which offered itself to his perplexity was -the possibility that a prospector had arrived at the spring -during his absence and had started a fire. Adam began -to hurry. His alarm increased to dread.</p> - -<p>When he ran around the corner of thicket to his camp -site he did see a fire. It was about burned out. There -was no prospector, no signs of packs or burros. And -Jinny was gone!</p> - -<p>“What—what?” stammered Adam, dropping his bundle -of sticks. He was bewildered. A sense of calamity beset -him. He ran forward.</p> - -<p>“Where—where’s my pack?” he cried.</p> - -<p>The dying fire was but the smoldering remains of his -pack. It had been burned. Blankets, boxes, bags had been -consumed. Some blackened utensils lay on the ground -near the charred remains of his canvas. Only then did -the truth of this catastrophe burst upon him. All his food -had been burned.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_102">102</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap b"><span class="smcap1">Some</span> moments elapsed before the stunning effects -of this loss had worn off enough to permit Adam’s -mind to connect the cause of it with the disappearance -of Jinny.</p> - -<p>After careful scrutiny of tracks near where the pack -had lain, Adam became convinced that Jinny was to blame -for his destitution. His proofs cumulated in a handful of -unburnt matches that manifestly had been flung and scattered -away from the pack. The tricky burro, taking advantage -of Adam’s absence, had pulled the canvas off the -pack, and in tearing around in the boxes for morsels to -eat she had bitten into the box of matches and set them on -fire.</p> - -<p>“I didn’t think—I didn’t think!” cried Adam, remembering -the advice of Dismukes.</p> - -<p>Overcome by the shock, he sank upon the ground and -fell prey to gloomy and hopeless forebodings.</p> - -<p>“I’ll lie down and die,” he muttered. But he could not -so much as lie down. He seemed possessed by a devil -who would not admit the idea of surrender or death. And -this spirit likewise seemed to take him by the hair of his -head and lift him up to scatter the tears from his eyes. -“Why can’t I cuss the luck like a man—then look round -to see what’s got to be done?”</p> - -<p>Jinny had made good her escape. When Adam gave -up all hope of finding the burro the hour was near sunset -and it was high time that he should decide what to do.</p> - -<p>“Go on—to the Indian camp,” he declared, tersely.</p> - -<p>He decided to start at once and walk in the cool of -night, keeping close to the mountain wall so as not to -lose his way. His spirits rallied. Going back to the camp<span class="pagenum" id="Page_103">103</span> -scene, he carefully gathered up all the unburnt matches -and placed them with others he carried in his pocket. He -found his bag of salt only partly consumed, and he made -haste to secure it. His canteen lay beside the spring.</p> - -<p>The ruddy sunset and the stealing down of twilight and -the encroaching blackness of night had no charms for -Adam now. His weariness increased as the hours prolonged -themselves. Short, frequent rests were more advisable -than long ones. The canopy of stars seemed in -procession westward; and many a bright one he watched -sink behind the black slope of mountain toward which he -was bound. There were times when his eyes closed -involuntarily and all his body succumbed to sleep as he -toiled on. These drowsy spells always came to a painful -end, for he would walk into a thorny mesquite. Adam -saw a weird, misshapen moon rise late over a dark range -to blanch the desert with wan light. He walked all night, -and when dawn showed him landmarks now grown familiar -he had a moment of exhilaration. The long, low-reaching -ridge of mountain loomed right before him. -When he rounded the sharp, blunt corner his eyes were -greeted by sight of a deep-mouthed canyon yawning out -of the range, and full of palms and other green trees. -He saw a white stream bed and the shine of water, -and what he took to be the roofs of palm-thatched -huts.</p> - -<p>“I’ve got there. This is the Indian canyon—where Dismukes -told me to stay,” said Adam, with pride in his -achievement. A first sight of what he took to be habitations -cheered him. Again that gloomy companion of his -mind was put to rout. It looked worth striving and suffering -for—this haven. The barrenness of the desert all -around made this green canyon mouth an oasis. It appeared -well hidden, too. Few travelers passing along the -valley would have suspected its presence. The long, low -ridge had to be rounded before the canyon could be -detected.</p> - -<p>With steps that no longer dragged Adam began his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_104">104</span> -descent of the canyon slope. It was a long, gradual incline, -rough toward the bottom, and the bottom was a -good deal farther down than it had seemed. At length he -reached the wide bed of white boulders, strewn about in -profusion, where some flood had rolled them. In the -center of this bed trickled a tiny stream of water, slightly -alkaline, Adam decided, judging from the white stain on -the margin of sand. Following the stream bed, he made -his way up into the zone of green growths, a most welcome -change from the open glare of the desert. He -plodded on perhaps a mile, without reaching the yellow -thatch of palms.</p> - -<p>“Will I—never—get there?” panted Adam, almost spent.</p> - -<p>Finally Adam reached a well-defined trail leading up -out of the stream bed. He followed it to a level flat covered -with willows and cottonwoods, all full foliaged and -luxuriantly green, and among which stately palms, -swaddled in huge straw sheaths of their own making, -towered with lofty tufted crowns. The dust in the trail -showed no imprints of feet. Adam regarded that as -strange. Still, he might be far from the camp or village -that had looked so close from the slope above. Suddenly -he emerged from the green covert into an open glade that -contained palm-thatched huts, and he uttered a little cry -of joy. But it took only a second glance to convince him -that the huts were deserted, and his joy was short lived. -Hastily he roamed from one hut to another. He found -ollas, great, clay water jars, and pieces of broken pottery, -and beds of palm leaves through which the lizards rustled, -but no Indians, nor any signs of recent habitation.</p> - -<p>“Gone! Gone!” he whispered, hoarsely. “Now—I’ll -starve—to death!”</p> - -<p>His accents of despair contained a note of hardness, -of indifference born of his extreme fatigue. His eyes -refused to stay open, and sleep glued them shut. When -he opened them again it was to the light of another day. -Stiff and lame, with a gnawing at the pit of his stomach -and an oppressed mind, Adam found himself in sad<span class="pagenum" id="Page_105">105</span> -plight. Limping down to the stream, he bathed his face -and quenched his thirst, and then, removing his boots, he -saw that his feet were badly blistered. He decided to go -barefoot, to save his boots as well as to give the raw places -a chance to heal.</p> - -<p>Then without any more reflection he wrought himself -into a supreme effort of will, and it was so passionate and -strong that he believed it would hold as long as intelligence -governed his actions.</p> - -<p>“My one chance is to live here until the Indians come -back,” he decided. “There’s water here and green growths. -It’s an oasis where animals, birds, living creatures come -to drink.... I must eat.”</p> - -<p>His first move was to make slow and careful examination -of the trails. One which led toward the mountain -bore faint traces of footprints that a recent rain had -mostly obliterated. He lost this trail on the smooth rock -slope. The others petered out in the stones and sage. -Then he searched along the sand bars of the stream for -tracks of living creatures; and he found many, from cat -tracks to the delicate ones of tiny birds. After all, then, -the desert was an abode for living things. The fact -stimulated Adam, and he returned to the glade to exercise -every faculty he possessed in the invention of instruments -or traps or snares.</p> - -<p>He had a knife and a pair of long leather boot strings. -With these, and a bundle of arrowweed sticks, and a tough -elastic bow of ironwood, and strips of bark, and sharp bits -of flinty rock Adam set to work under the strong, inventive -guiding spirit of necessity. As a boy he had been an -adept at constructing figure-four traps. How marvelous -the accuracy of memory! He had been the one to build -traps for his brother Guerd, who had not patience or -skill, but who loved to set traps in the brier patches for -redbirds. Adam’s nimble fingers slacked a little as his -mind surveyed that best part of his life. To what extremity -a man could be reduced! The dexterity of his -idle youth to serve him thus in his terrible hour of need!<span class="pagenum" id="Page_106">106</span> -He remembered then his skill at making slings; and following -this came the inspired thought of the possibility -of constructing one. He had a strong rubber band -doubled round his pocketbook. Sight of it thrilled him. -He immediately left off experimenting with the bow and -went to making a sling. His difficulty was to find cords -to make connections between the rubbers and a forked -prong, and also between the rubbers and a carrier of some -sort. For the latter he cut a triangular piece out of the -top of his boot. Always in the old days he had utilized -leather from cast-off shoes, and had even made a collection -of old footgear for this purpose. But where to get -the cords? Bark would not be pliable and strong enough. -Somewhere from the clothes he wore he must extract -cords. The problem proved easy. His suspenders were -almost new and they were made of linen threads woven -together. When he began to ravel them he made the -discovery that there was enough rubber in them to serve -for a second sling.</p> - -<p>When the instrument was finished he surveyed it with -satisfaction. He had no doubt that the deadly accuracy -he had once been master of with this boyish engine of -destruction would readily return to him. Then he went -back to work on the other contrivances he had planned.</p> - -<p>A failing of the daylight amazed him. For an instant -he imagined a cloud had crossed the sun. But the sun -had set and darkness was at hand.</p> - -<p>“If days fly like this one, life will soon be over,” he -soliloquized, with a sigh.</p> - -<p>In one of the thatched huts he made a comfortable bed -of palm leaves. They seemed to retain the heat of the -day. When Adam lay down to go to sleep he experienced -a vague, inexplicable sense that the very strangeness of -the present circumstance was familiar to him. But he could -not hold the sensation, so did not understand it. He -was very tired and very sleepy, and there was an uncomfortable -empty feeling within him. He looked out and -listened, slowly aware of a great, soft, silent black enveloping<span class="pagenum" id="Page_107">107</span> -of his environment by the desert night. There seemed -to be an aloofness in the immensity of this approach and -insulation—a nature that, once comprehended, would be -appalling. This thought just flashed by. His mind seemed -concerned with something between worry and fear which -persisted till he fell asleep.</p> - -<p>In the dim, gray dawn he awoke and realized that it was -hunger which had awakened him. And he stole out on -his imperative quest. He did not see the sunrise nor the -broadening day. His instinct was to hunt. Doves and -blackbirds visited the stream, and a covey of desert quail -seemed tame; but, owing to overeagerness and clumsiness, -he did not succeed in killing a single one. He followed -them from place to place, all over the oasis, until he lost -sight of them. He baited his two traps with cactus fruit -and set them, and he prowled into every nook and cranny -of the canyon oasis. Lizards, rattlesnakes, rats, ground -squirrels rustled from his stealthy steps. It amazed him -how wary they were. He might have caught the rattlesnakes, -but the idea of eating them was repugnant and -impossible to him. The day passed more swiftly than had -yesterday. Its close found him so tired he could scarcely -stand, and with gnawing hunger growing worse. The -moment he lay down sleep claimed him.</p> - -<p>Next day he had more and better opportunities to secure -meat, but he failed through haste and poor judgment and -inaccuracy. His lessons were severe and they taught him -the stern need of perfection. That day he saw a hawk -poise high over a spot, dart down swiftly, to rise with a -squealing rat in its claws. Again he saw a shrike, marked -dull gray and black, sail down from a tree, fly very low -along an open space of ground to avoid detection, and -pounce upon a lizard. Likewise he saw a horned toad -shoot out an extraordinarily long and almost invisible -tongue, to snatch a bee from a flower. In these actions -Adam divined his first proof of the perfection of -desert hunters. They did not fail. But he was not thus -equipped.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_108">108</span> -All during the hot period of the day, when birds and -animals rested, Adam practiced with his crude weapons. -His grave, serious eagerness began to give way to instinctive -force, a something of fierceness that began to come -out in him. It seemed every moment had its consciousness -of self, of plight, of presaged agony, but only in -flashes of thought, only fleeting ideas instantly repudiated -by the physical. He had given a tremendous direction to -his mind and it spent its force that way.</p> - -<p>The following morning, just at sunrise, he located the -covey of desert quail. They had sailed down from the -sage slopes to alight among the willows bordering the -stream. Adam crawled on the sand, noiseless as a snake, -his sling held in readiness. He was breathless and hot. -His blood gushed and beat in his veins. The very pursuit -of meat made the saliva drip from his mouth and made -his stomach roll with pangs of emptiness. Then the strain, -the passion of the moment, were beyond his will to control, -even if there had not been a strange, savage joy in -them. He glided through the willows, never rustling a -branch. The plaintive notes of the quail guided him. Then -through an opening he saw them—gray, sleek, plump -birds, some of them with tiny plumes. They were picking -in the damp sand near the water. Adam, lying flat, -stretched his sling and waited for a number of the quail -to bunch. Then he shot. The heavy pebble sped true, -making the gray feathers fly. One quail lay dead. Another -fluttered wildly. The others ran off through the -willows. Adam rushed upon the crippled quail, plunging -down swift and hard; and catching it, he wrung its neck. -Then he picked up the other.</p> - -<p>“I got ’em! I got ’em!” he cried, elated, as he felt the -warm plump bodies. It was a moment of strange sensation. -Breathless, hot, wet with sweat, shaking all over, -he seemed to have reverted to the triumph of the boy -hunter. But there was more, and it had to do with the -physical reactions inside his body. It had to do with -hunger.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_109">109</span> -Picking the feathers off these birds required too much -time. Adam skinned them and cleaned them, and then -washed them in the stream. That done, he hurried back -to his camp to make a fire and cook them. A quick method -would be to broil them. He had learned how to do this -with strips of meat. His hunger prevented him from -waiting until the fire was right, and it also made him -hurry the broiling. The salt that he had rescued from -his pack now found its use, and it was not long before he -had picked clean the bones of these two quail.</p> - -<p>Adam found that this pound or so of meat augmented -his hunger. It changed the gnawing sensations, in fact -modified them, but it induced a greedy, hot hunger for -more. An hour after he had eaten, as far as appetite was -concerned, he seemed worse off. Then he set out again -in quest of meat.</p> - -<p>The hours flew, the day ended, night intervened, and -another dawn broke. Success again crowned his hunt. -He feasted on doves. Thereafter, day by day, he decimated -the covey of tame quail and the flock of tame doves until -the few that were left grew wary and finally departed. -Then he hunted other birds. Quickly they learned the -peril of the white man; and the day came when few birds -visited the oasis.</p> - -<p>Next to invite Adam’s cunning, were the ground squirrels, -the trade rats, and the kangaroo rats. He lived off -them for days. But they grew so wary that he had to dig -them out of the ground, and they finally disappeared. -At this juncture a pair of burros wandered into the oasis. -They were exceedingly wild. Adam failed to trap one -of them. He watched for hours from a steep place where -he might have killed one by throwing down a large rock. -But it was in vain. At last, in desperation, holding his -naked knife in hand, he chased them over stones and -through the willows and under the thorny mesquites, all -to no avail. He dropped from exhaustion and weakness, -and lay where he had fallen till the next morning.</p> - -<p>The pangs of hunger now were maddening. He had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_110">110</span> -suffered them, more or less, and then alleviated them with -meat, and then felt them grow keener and stronger until -the edge wore off. After a few more meatless days the -pains gradually subsided. It was a relief. He began -to force himself to go out and hunt. Then an exceedingly -good stroke of fortune befell him in that he killed a rabbit. -His strength revived, but also his pains.</p> - -<p>Then he lost track of days, but many passed, and each -one of them took something from him in effort, in wakefulness, -in spirit. His aggressiveness diminished daily -and lasted only a short while. The time came when he fell -to eating rattlesnakes and any living creatures in the oasis -that he could kill with a club.</p> - -<p>But at length pain left him, and hunger, and then his -peril revealed itself. He realized it. The desire to kill -diminished. With the cessation of activity there returned -a mental state in which he could think back and remember -all that he had done there, and also look forward to the -inevitable prospect. Every morning he dragged his weary -body, now merely skin and bones, out to the stream to -drink, and then around and around in a futile hunt. He -chewed leaves and bark; he ate mesquite beans and cactus -fruit. After a certain number of hours the longer he went -without meat the less he cared for it, or for living. But -when, now and then, he did kill something to eat, then -his instinct to survive flashed up with revived hunger. -The process of detachment from passion to live was one -of agony, infinitely worse than starvation. He had come -to learn that starvation would be the easiest and most -painless of deaths. It would have been infinitely welcome -but for the thought that always followed resignation—that -he had sworn to fight. That kept him alive.</p> - -<p>His skin turned brown and shriveled up like dried parchment -wrinkling around bones. He did not recognize his -hands, and when he lay flat on the stones to drink from -the stream, he saw reflected there a mummified mask with -awful eyes.</p> - -<p>Longer and longer grew the hours wherein he slept<span class="pagenum" id="Page_111">111</span> -by night and lay idle by day, watching, listening, feeling. -Something came back to him or was born in him during -these hours. But the truth of his state eluded him. It -had to do with peace, with dream, with effacement. He -seemed no longer real. The hot sun, the pleasant wind, the -murmur of bees, the tinkle of water, the everlasting processional -march of the heat veils across the oasis—with -all these things his mind seemed happily concerned. At -dawn when he awoke his old instinct predominated and -he searched for meat. But unless he had some success -this questing mood did not last. It departed as weakness -and lassitude overbalanced the night’s rest. For the other -hours of that day he lay in the sun, or the shade—it did -not matter—and felt or dreamed as he starved.</p> - -<p>As he watched thus one drowsy noon hour, seeing the -honeybees darting to and fro, leaving the flowers to fly -in straight line across the oasis, there occurred to him -the significance of their toil. He watched these flying -bees come and go; and suddenly it flashed over him that -at the end of the bee line there must be a hive. Bees -made nests in trees. If he could find the nest of the -bees that were working here he would find honey. The -idea stimulated him.</p> - -<p>Adam had never heard how bee hunters lined bees to -their hives, but in his dire necessity he instinctively adopted -the correct method. He watched the bees fly away, keeping -them in sight as long as possible, then he walked to -the point he had marked as the last place he had seen -them, and here he watched for others. In half an hour -the straight bee flights led to a large dead cottonwood, -hollow at top and bottom, a tree he had passed hundreds -of times. The bees had a hive in the upper chamber of -the trunk. Adam set fire to the tree and smoked the bees -out. Then the problem consisted of felling the tree, for -he had not the strength to climb it. The trunk was rotten -inside and out. It burned easily, and he helped along the -work by tearing out pieces of the soft wood. Nearly all -the day was consumed in this toil, but at length the tree<span class="pagenum" id="Page_112">112</span> -fell, splitting and breaking to pieces. The hollow chamber -contained many pounds of honey.</p> - -<p>Adam’s struggle then was to listen to an intelligence -that warned him that if he made a glutton of himself it -would cause him great distress and perhaps kill him. -How desperately hard it was to eat sparingly of the delicious -honey! He tried, but did not succeed. That restraint -was beyond human nature. Nevertheless, he -stopped far short of what he wanted. He stored the -honey away in ollas left there by the Indians.</p> - -<p>All night and next day he paid in severe illness for the -honey of which he had partaken. The renewed exercise -of internal organs that had ceased to function produced -convulsions and retching that made him roll on the ground -as a man poisoned. Life was tenacious in him and he -recovered; and thereafter, while the honey lasted, he -slowly gained strength enough to hunt once more for meat. -But the fertile oasis was now as barren of living creatures -as was the naked desert outside. Adam’s hope revived -with his barely recovered strength. He pitied himself -in his moments of deluded cheerfulness, of spirit that -refused to die. Long ago his physical being had resigned -itself, but his soul seemed beyond defeat. How strange -the variations of his moods! His intelligence told him -that sight of an animal would instantly revert him to -the level of a beast of prey or a stalking, bloodthirsty -savage.</p> - -<p>During these days his eyes scanned the bronze slope of -mountain where the tracks of the Indians had faded. -They might return in time to save his life. He hoped in -spite of himself. In the early time of his imprisonment -there he had prayed for succor, but he had long since -ceased that. The desert had locked him in. Every moment, -every hour that had passed, the ceaseless hunts and -then the dreaming spells, held their clear-cut niches in -his memory. Looked back at, they seemed far away in -the past, even those as close as yesterday; and every sensation -was invested by a pang. At night he slept the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_113">113</span> -slumber of weakness, and so the mockery of the dark -hours did not make their terrible mark upon his mind. -But the solemn days! They sped swiftly by, yet, remembered, -they seemed eternities. Desert-bound days—immeasurably -silent—periods of the dominance of the blasting -sun; days of infinite space, beyond time, beyond life, -as they might have been upon the burned-out moon! The -stones that blistered unprotected flesh, the sand and the -dust, the rock-ribbed ranges of bronze and rust—these -tangible evidences of the earth seemed part of those endless -days. There were sky and wind, the domain of the -open and its master; but these existed for the eagles, and -perhaps for the spirits that wailed down the naked shingles -of the desert. A man was nothing. Nature filled this -universe and had its inscrutable and ruthless laws.</p> - -<p>How little the human body required to subsist on! -Adam lived long on that honey; and he gained so much -from it that after it was gone the hunger pangs revived -a hundred times more fiercely than ever. They had been -deadened, which fact left him peace; revived by a windfall -of food, they brought him agony. It drove him out -to hunt for meat. He became a stalking specter whose -keen eye an insect could not have escaped. Hunger now -beset him with all its terrors magnified. To starve was -nothing, but to eat while starving was hell! The pangs -were as if made by a serpent with teeth of fire tearing at -his vitals. Tighter and tighter he buckled his belt until -he could squeeze his waist in his long, skinny hands so -that his fingers met. Whenever his pains began to subside, -like worms growing quiet, then a rat or a stray bird -or a lizard or a scaly little side-winder rattlesnake would -fall to his cunning, as if in mockery of the death that ever -eluded him; and next day the old starving pains would -convulse his bowels again.</p> - -<p>So that he was driven, a gaunt and ever gaunter -shadow of a man, up and down the beaten trails of the -oasis. Soon he would fall and die, be sun-dried and blow -away like powdered leather on the desert wind. By his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_114">114</span> -agonies he measured the inhospitableness and inevitableness -of the wasteland. Every thought had some connection -with his torture or some relation to his physical being -in its fight for existence. In this desert oasis were living -things, creatures grown too wary for him now, and willows, -cacti, sages, that had conquered over the barrenness -of the desert. On his brain had been etched by words of -steel the fact that no power to fight was so great and unquenchable -as that of man’s. He lived on, he staggered -on through the solemn, glaring days.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>One morning huge columnar clouds, white as fleece, with -dark-gray shades along their lower borders, blotted out -the sun. How strangely they shaded the high lights! -Usually when clouds formed on the desert they lodged -round the peaks and hung there. But these were looming -across the wasteland, promising rain. A fresh breeze blew -the leaves.</p> - -<p>Adam was making his weary round of the oasis, dragging -one foot like a dead weight after the other. Once -he thought he heard an unusual sound, and with lips wide -and with bated breath he listened. Only the mocking, -solemn silence! Often he was haunted by the memory -of sounds. Seldom indeed did he hear his own voice any -more. Then he plodded on again with the eyes of a ferret, -roving everywhere.</p> - -<p>He had proceeded a few rods when a distant but shrill -whistle brought him to a startled and thrilling halt. It -sounded like the neigh of a horse. Often he had heard -the brays of wild burros. In the intense silence, as he -strained his ears, he heard only the labored, muffled throbs -of his heart. Gradually his hopes, so new and strange, -subsided. Only another mockery of his memory! Or -perhaps it was a whistle of the wind in a crevice, or of an -eagle in flight.</p> - -<p>Parting the willows before him as he walked, he went -through the thicket out into the open where the stream -flowed. It was very low, just a tiny rill of crystal-clear<span class="pagenum" id="Page_115">115</span> -water. He was about to step forward toward the flat -rock where he always knelt to drink, when another sound -checked him. A loud, high buzz, somehow startling! It -had life.</p> - -<p>Suddenly he espied a huge rattlesnake coiled in the sand, -with head erect and its rattles quivering like the wings of -a poised humming bird. The snake had just shed an ugly, -brown, scaly skin, and now shone forth resplendent, a -beautiful clean gray with markings of black. It did not -show any fear. The flat triangular head, sleek and cunning, -with its deadly jewel-like eyes, was raised half a foot -above the plump coils.</p> - -<p>Adam’s weary, hopeless hunting instinct sustained a -vivifying, galvanizing shock. Like a flash he changed, -beginning to tremble. He dropped his sling as an ineffective -weapon against so large a snake. His staring eyes -quivered like the vibrating point of a compass needle as -he tried to keep them on the snake and at the same time -sight a stone or club with which to attack his quarry. A -bursting gush of blood, hot in its tearing pangs, flooded -out all over his skin, starting the sweat. His heart lifted -high in his breast, almost choking him. A terrible excitement -animated him and it was paralleled by a cold and -sickening dread that the snake would escape and pounds -of meat be lost to him.</p> - -<p>Never taking eyes off the snake, Adam stooped down -to raise a large rock in his hand. He poised it aloft and, -aiming with intense keenness, he flung the missile. It -struck the rattlesnake a glancing blow, tearing its flesh -and bringing blood. With the buzz of a huge bee caught -in a trap the snake lunged at Adam, stretching its mutilated -length on the sand.</p> - -<p>It was long, thick, fat. Adam smelled the exuding blood -and it inflamed him. Almost he became a beast. The -savage urge in him then was to fall upon his prey and -clutch it with his bare hands and choke and tear and -kill. But reason still restrained such limit as that. Stone -after stone he flung, missing every time. Then the rattlesnake<span class="pagenum" id="Page_116">116</span> -began to drag itself over the sand. Its injury did -not retard a swift progress. Adam tried to bound after -it, but he was so weak that swift action seemed beyond -him. Still, he headed off the snake and turned it back. -Stones were of no avail. He could not hit with them, -and every time he bent over to pick one up he got so -dizzy that he could scarcely rise.</p> - -<p>“Club! Club! Got—have club!” he panted, hoarsely. -And espying one along the edge of the stream, he plunged -to secure it. This moment gave the rattlesnake time to -get ahead. Wildly Adam rushed back, brandishing the -club. His tall gaunt form, bent forward, grew overbalanced -as he moved, and he made a long fall, halfway -across the stream. He got up and reached the snake in -time to prevent it from escaping under some brush.</p> - -<p>Then he swung the club. It was not easy to hit the -snake crawling between stones. And the club was of -rotten wood. It broke. With the blunt end Adam managed -to give his victim a blow that retarded its progress.</p> - -<p>Adam let out a hoarse yell. Something burst in him—a -consummation of the instinct to kill and the instinct to -survive. There was no difference between them. Hot -and mad and weak, he staggered after the crippled snake. -The chase had transformed the whole internal order of -him. He was starving to death, and he smelled the blood -of fresh meat. The action infuriated him and the odor -maddened him. Not far indeed was he then from the -actual seizing of that deadly serpent in his bare hands.</p> - -<p>But he tripped and fell again in a long forward plunge. -It brought him to the sand almost on top of the snake. -And here the rattlesnake stopped to coil, scarcely two -feet from Adam’s face.</p> - -<p>Adam tried to rise on his hands. But his strength had -left him. And simultaneously there left him the blood -madness of that chase to kill and eat. He realized his -peril. The rattlesnake would strike him. Adam had one -flashing thought of the justice of it—one sight of the -strange, cold, deadly jewel eyes, one swift sense of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_117">117</span> -beauty and magnificent spirit of this reptile of the desert, -and then horror possessed him. He froze to his marrow. -The icy mace of terror had stunned him. And with it -had passed the flashing of his intelligence. He was only -a fearful animal, fascinated by another, dreading death -by instinct. And as he collapsed, sagging forward, the -rattlesnake struck him in the face with the stinging blow -of a red-hot iron. Then Adam fainted.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_118">118</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">When</span> Adam recovered consciousness he imagined -he was in a dream.</p> - -<p>But a dragging, throbbing pain in his face seemed -actuality enough to discredit any illusions of slumber. It -was shady where he lay or else his eyes were dimmed. -Presently he made out that he reclined under one of the -palm-thatched roofs.</p> - -<p>“I’ve been moved!” he cried, with a start. And that -start, so full of pain and queer dragging sensations as of -a weighted body, brought back memory to him. His mind -whirled and darkened. The sickening horror of close -proximity to the rattlesnake, its smell and color and deadly -intent, all possessed Adam again. Then it cleared away. -What had happened to him? His hand seemed to have -no feeling; just barely could he move it to his face, where -the touch of wet cloth bandages told a story of his rescue -by some one. Probably the Indians had returned. It had -been the whistle of a horse that had thrilled him.</p> - -<p>“I’ve—been—saved!” whispered Adam, and he grew -dizzy. His eyes closed. Dim shapes seemed to float over -the surface of his mind; and there were other strange -answerings of his being to this singular deliverance.</p> - -<p>Then he heard voices—some low, and others deep and -guttural. Voices of Indians! How strong the spirit of -life in him! “I—I wasn’t ready—to die,” he whispered. -Gleams of sunlight low down, slanting on the palm leaves, -turning them to gold, gave him the idea that the time -was near sunset. In the corner of the hut stood ollas and -bags which had not been there before, and on the ground -lay an Indian blanket.</p> - -<p>A shadow crossed the sunlit gleams. An Indian girl<span class="pagenum" id="Page_119">119</span> -entered. She had very dark skin and straight hair as -black as night. Upon seeing Adam staring at her with -wide-open eyes she uttered a cry and ran out. A hubbub -of low voices sounded outside the shack. Then a tall -figure entered; it was that of an Indian, dressed in the -ragged clothes of a white man. He was old, his dark -bronze face like a hard, wrinkled mask.</p> - -<p>“How?” he asked, gruffly, as he bent over Adam. He -had piercing black eyes.</p> - -<p>“All right—good,” replied Adam, trying to smile. He -sensed kindliness in this old Indian.</p> - -<p>“White boy want dig gold—get lost—no grub—heap -sick belly?” queried the Indian, putting a hand on Adam’s -flat abdomen.</p> - -<p>“Yes—you bet,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Hahh! Me Charley Jim—heap big medicine man. Me -fix um. Snake bite no hurt.... White boy sick bad—no -heap grub—long time.”</p> - -<p>“All right—Charley Jim,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Hahh!” Evidently this exclamation was Charley Jim’s -expression for good. He arose and backed away to the -opening that appeared blocked by dark-skinned, black-haired -Indians. Then he pointed at one of them. Adam -saw that he indicated the girl who had first come to him. -She appeared very shy. Adam gathered the impression -that she had been the one who had saved him.</p> - -<p>“Charley Jim, who found me—who saved me from that -rattlesnake?”</p> - -<p>The old Indian understood Adam well enough. He -grinned and pointed at the young girl, and pronounced a -name that sounded to Adam like, “Oella.”</p> - -<p>“When? How long ago? How many days?” asked -Adam.</p> - -<p>Charley Jim held up three fingers, and with that he waved -the other Indians from the opening and went out himself.</p> - -<p>Adam was left to the bewildered thoughts of a tired -and hazy mind. He had no strength at all, and the brief -interview, with its excitement, and exercise of voice,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_120">120</span> -brought him near the verge of unconsciousness. He wavered -amid dim shadows of ideas and thoughts. When -that condition passed, he awoke to dull, leaden pain in his -head. And his body felt like an empty sack the two -sides of which were pasted together flat.</p> - -<p>The sunlit gleams vanished and the shades of evening -made gloom around him. He smelled fragrant wood smoke, -and some other odor, long unfamiliar, that brought a -watery flow to his mouth and a prickling as of many -needles. Then in the semidarkness one of the Indians -entered and knelt beside him. Adam distinguished the -face of the girl, Oella. She covered him with a blanket. -Very gently she lifted his head, and moved her body so -that it would support him. The lifting hurt Adam; he -seemed to reel and sway, and a blackness covered his -sight. The girl held him and put something warm and -wet between his lips. She was trying to feed him with a -stick or a wooden spoon. The act of swallowing made his -throat feel as if it was sore. What a slow process! Adam -rather repelled than assisted his nurse, but his antagonism -was purely physical and involuntary. Whatever the food -was, it had no taste to him. The heat of it, however, and -the soft, wet sensation, grew pleasant. He realized when -hunger awakened again in him, for it was like a shot -through his vitals.</p> - -<p>Then the girl laid him back, spread the blanket high, -and left him. The strange sensation of fullness, of movement -inside Adam’s breast, occupied his mind until drowsiness -overcame him.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Another day awakened Adam to the torture of reviving -hunger and its gnawing pains, so severe that life seemed -unwelcome. The hours were weary and endless. But -next day was not so severe, and thereafter gradually he -grew better and was on the road to a slow recovery.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The Indians that had befriended Adam were of a family -belonging to the Coahuila tribe. Charley Jim appeared to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_121">121</span> -be a chief of some degree, friendly toward the whites, -and nomadic in spirit, as he wandered from oasis to oasis. -He knew Dismukes, and told Adam that the prospector -and he had found gold up this canyon. Charley Jim’s -family consisted of several squaws, some young men, two -girls, of whom Oella was the younger, and a troop of -children, wild as desert rats.</p> - -<p>Adam learned from Charley Jim that the head of this -canyon contained a thicket of mesquite trees, the beans -of which the Indians prized as food. Also there were -abundant willows and arrowweeds, with which wood the -Indians constructed their huge, round, basket granaries. -The women of the family pounded the mesquite beans into -meal or flour, which was dampened and put away for use. -Good grass and water in this remote canyon were further -reasons why Charley Jim frequented it. But he did not -appear to be a poor Indian, for he had good horses, a drove -of burros, pack outfits that were a mixture of Indian and -prospector styles, and numerous tools, utensils, and accouterments -that had been purchased at some freighting post.</p> - -<p>Adam was so long weak, and dependent upon Oella, -that when he did grow strong enough to help himself the -Indian girl’s habit of waiting upon him and caring for -him was hard to break. She seemed to take it for granted -that she was to go on looking after him; and the fineness -and sensitiveness of her, with the strong sense of -her delight in serving him, made it impossible for Adam -to offend her. She was shy and reserved, seldom spoke, -and always maintained before him a simplicity, almost a -humility, as of servant to master. With acquaintance, -too, the still, dark, impassive face of her had become -attractive to look at, especially her large, black, inscrutable -eyes, soft as desert midnight. They watched Adam at -times when she imagined he was unaware of her scrutiny, -and the light of them then pleased Adam, and perturbed -him also, reminding him of what an old aunt had told -him once, “Adam, my boy, women will always love you!” -The prophecy had not been fulfilled, Adam reflected with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_122">122</span> -sadness, and in Oella’s case he concluded his fancies were -groundless.</p> - -<p>Still, he had to talk to somebody or grow into the desert -habit of silence, and so he began to teach Oella his language -and to learn hers. The girl was quick to learn and -could twist her tongue round his words better than he -could round hers. Moreover, she learned quickly anything -he cared to teach her; and naturally even in the -desert there were customs into which Adam preferred to -introduce something of the white man’s way. Indians -were slovenly and dirty, and Adam changed this in Oella’s -case. The dusky desert maiden had little instinctive vanities -that contact with him developed.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>One day, when the summer was waning and Adam was -getting about on his feet, still a gaunt and stalking shadow -of his former self, but gaining faster, the old Indian chief -said:</p> - -<p>“White man heap strong—ride—go away soon?”</p> - -<p>“No, Charley Jim, I want stay here,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Hahh!” replied the Indian, nodding.</p> - -<p>“Me live here—work with Indian. White man no home—no -people. He like Indian. He work—hunt meat for -Indian.”</p> - -<p>“Heap sheep,” replied Charley Jim, with a slow, expressive -wave of his hand toward the mountain peaks.</p> - -<p>“Charley Jim take white man’s money, send to freight -post for gun, shells, clothes, flour, bacon—many things -white man need?”</p> - -<p>“Hahh!” The chief held up four fingers and pointed -west, indicating what Adam gathered was four days’ ride -to a freighting post.</p> - -<p>“Charley Jim no tell white men about me.”</p> - -<p>The Indian took the money with grave comprehension, -and also shook the hand Adam offered.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The Indian boys who rode away to the freighting post -on the river were two weeks in returning. To celebrate<span class="pagenum" id="Page_123">123</span> -the return of the boys Adam suggested a feast and that -he would bake the bread and cook the bacon. Oella took -as by right the seat of honor next to Adam, and her habitual -shyness did not inhibit a rather hearty appetite. On -this occasion Adam finally got the wild little half-naked -dusky children to come to him. They could not resist sweets.</p> - -<p>A shining new rifle, a Winchester .44, was the cynosure -of all eyes in that Indian encampment. When Adam took -it out to practice, the whole family crowded around to -watch, with the intense interest of primitive people who -marveled at the white man’s weapon. Only the little children -ran from the sharp reports of the rifle, and they soon -lost their fear. Whenever Adam made a good shot it -was Oella who showed pride where the others indicated -only their wonder.</p> - -<p>Thus the days of simplicity slipped by, every one of -which now added to Adam’s fast-returning strength. -Flour and bacon quickly built up his reduced weight; and -as for rice and dried fruits, they were so delicious to -Adam that he feared it would not be a great while before -he must needs send for more. He remembered the advice -of Dismukes anent the value of his money.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The hot summer became a season of the past. The -withering winds ceased to blow. In the early autumn -days Adam began his hunting. Charley Jim led the way, -keeping behind a fringe of mesquite, out to a gray expanse -of desert, billowy and beautiful in the ruddy sunlight. -They crawled through sage to the height of a low ridge, -and from here the chief espied game. He pointed down -a long gray slope, but Adam could see only a monotonous -beauty, spotted by large tufts of sage and here and there -a cactus. Then the Indian took Adam’s sombrero, and -the two scarfs he had, one red and one blue, and tied them -round the hat, which he elevated upon a stick. After that -he bent his falcon gaze on the slope. Adam likewise gazed, -with infinite curiosity, thrill, and expectation.</p> - -<p>“Hahh!” grunted Charley Jim, presently, and his sinewy<span class="pagenum" id="Page_124">124</span> -dark hand clutched Adam. Far down vague gray spots -seemed to move. Adam strained his eyes. It seemed a -long time till they approached close enough to distinguish -their species.</p> - -<p>“Antelope, by jiminy!” ejaculated Adam, in excitement.</p> - -<p>“Heap jiminy—you bet!” responded Charley Jim.</p> - -<p>Adam was experiencing that thrill to its utmost, and -also other sensations of wonder and amaze. Was it possible -these wild-looking desert creatures were actually so -curious about the brightly decked sombrero that they could -not resist approaching it to see what it was? There they -came, sleek, tawny-gray, alert, deerlike animals, with fine -pointed heads, long ears, and white rumps. The bold -leader never stopped at all. But some of his followers -hesitated, trotted to and fro, then came on. How graceful -they were! How suggestive of speed and wildness! -Adam’s finger itched to shoot off the gun and scare them -to safety. “Fine hunter, I am!” he muttered. “This is -murder.... Why on earth does a man have to eat meat?” -The Indian beside him was all keen and strung with his -instincts and perhaps they were truer to the needs of -human life.</p> - -<p>Soon, however, all of Adam’s sensations were blended -in a thrilling warmth of excitement. The antelope were -already within range, and had it not been for Charley -Jim’s warning hand Adam would not have been able to -resist the temptation to fire. Perhaps he would have -missed then, for he certainly shook in every muscle, as a -man with the ague. Adam forced himself to get the better -of this spell of nerves.</p> - -<p>“Heap soon!” whispered Charley Jim, relaxing the pressure -of his hand on Adam. The leader approached to -within fifty feet, with several other antelope close behind, -when the Indian whistled. Like statues they became. -Then Adam fired. The leader fell, and also one of those -behind him. The others flashed into gray speeding shapes, -with rumps darting white; and Adam could only stare in -admiring wonder at their incomparable swiftness.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_125">125</span> -“Hahh!” ejaculated the chief, in admiration. “White -man heap hunter—one shoot—two bucks. Him eye like -eagle!”</p> - -<p>Thus did a lucky shot by Adam, killing two antelope -when he had aimed at only one, initiate him into his hunting -on the desert and win for him the Indian sobriquet of -Eagle.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>And so began Adam’s desert education. He had keen -appreciation of his good fortune in his teacher. The -Coahuila chief had been born on that desert and he must -have been nearly sixty years old. As a hunter he had the -eye of a mountain sheep, the ear of a deer, the nose of a -wolf. He had been raised upon meat. He loved the stalking -of game. Thus Adam, through this old Indian’s senses -and long experience and savage skill, began to see the life -of the desert. It unfolded before his eyes, manifold in -its abundance, infinitely strange and marvelous in its ferocity -and ability to survive. Adam learned to see as the -Indian, and had his own keen mind to analyze and weigh -and ponder. But his knowledge came slowly, painfully, -hard earned, in spite of its thrilling time-effacing quality.</p> - -<p>In those wonderful autumn days Adam learned that the -antelope could go long without water, that nature had -endowed it with great speed to escape the wolves and -cats of the desert, that from its prominent eyes it could -see in any direction, that its coloring was the protective -gray of the sage plains.</p> - -<p>He learned that the lizard could change its color like the -chameleon, adapting itself to the color of the rock upon -which it basked in the sun, that it could dart across the -sands almost too swiftly for the eye to follow.</p> - -<p>He learned that the gray desert wolf was a king of -wolves, living high in the mountains and coming down to -the flats; and there, by reason of his wonderfully developed -strength and speed, chasing and killing his prey in the -open.</p> - -<p>He learned that the coyote was an eater of carrion, of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_126">126</span> -rabbits and rats, of bird’s eggs, of mesquite beans, of -anything that happened to come its way—a gray, skulking, -cunning beast, cowardly as the wolf was brave, able, like -the antelope and the jack rabbit, to live without water, and -best adapted of all beasts to the desert.</p> - -<p>He learned that the jack rabbit survived through the -abnormal development of his ears and legs—the first extraordinarily -large organs built to catch sound, and the -latter long, strong members that enable him to run with -ease away from his foes. And he learned that the cottontail -rabbit lived in thickets near holes into which he could -pop, and that his fecundity in reproducing his kind saved -his species from extinction.</p> - -<p>Adam learned about the desert ants, the kangaroo rats, -the trade rats, the horned toads, the lizards, the snakes, -the spiders, the bees, the wasps—the way they lived and -what they lived upon. How marvelously nature adapted -them to their desert environment, each perfect, each in its -place, each fierce and self-sufficient, each fulfilling its -mysterious destiny of sacrificing its individual life to the -survival of its species! How cruel nature was to the -individual—how devoted to the species!</p> - -<p>Adam learned that the same fierce life of all desert -creatures was likewise manifested in the life of the plants. -By thorns and poison sap and leafless branches, and by -roots penetrating far and deep, and by organs developed -to catch and store water, so the plants of the desert outwitted -the beasts and endured the blasting sun and drought. -How beyond human comprehension was the fact that a -cactus developed a fluted structure less exposed to heat—that -a tree developed a leaf that never presented its broad -surface to the sun!</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The days passed, with ruddy sunrises, white, glaring, -solemn noons, and golden sunsets. The simplicity and -violence of life on the desert passed into Adam’s being. -The greatness of stalking game came to him when the -Indian chief took him to the heights after bighorn sheep;<span class="pagenum" id="Page_127">127</span> -but it was not the hunting and killing of this wariest and -finest of wild beasts, wonderful as it was, that constituted -for Adam something great. It was the glory of the -mountain heights. All his life he had dreamed of high -places, those to which he could climb physically and those -that he aspired to spiritually. Lost indeed were hopes -of the latter, but of the former he had all-satisfying fulfillment. -Adam dated his changed soul from the day he -first conquered the heights. There, on top of the Chocolate -range, his keen sight, guided by the desert eyes of the -old Indian, ranged afar over the gray valleys and red -ranges to the Rio Colorado, down the dim wandering line -of which he gazed, to see at last Picacho, a dark, purple -mass above the horizon. From the moment Adam espied -this mountain he suffered a return of memory and a sleepless -and eternal remorse. The terrible past came back to -him; never again, he divined, to fade while life lasted. -His repentance, his promise to Dismukes, his vow to himself, -began there on the heights with the winds sweet and -strong in his face and the dark blue of the sky over his -head, and beneath the vast desert, illimitable on all sides, -lonely and grand, the abode of silence.</p> - -<p>The days passed into months. Far to the north the -dominating peaks of San Jacinto and San Gorgonio took -on the pure-white caps of snow, that slowly spread, as the -days passed, down the rugged slopes. Winter abided up -there. But on the tops of the Chocolate and Chuckwalla -ranges no snow fell, although the winter wind sometimes -blew cold and bleak. Adam loved the wind of the heights. -How cold and pure, untainted by dust or life or use! He -grew to have the stride of a mountaineer. And the days -passed until that one came in which the old Indian chief -let Adam hunt alone. “Go, Eagle!” he said, with sorrow -for his years and pride in the youth of his white friend. -“Go!” And the slow gestures of his long arms were as -the sailing movement of the wings of an eagle.</p> - -<p>The days passed, and few were they that did not see -Adam go out in the sweet, cool dawn, when the east glowed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_128">128</span> -like an opal, to climb the bronze slope, sure footed as a -goat, up and up over the bare ridges and through the high -ravines where the lichens grew and a strange, pale flower -blossomed, on and on over the jumble of weathered rock -to the heights. And there he would face the east with its -glorious burst of golden fire, and spend the last of that -poignant gaze on the sunrise-crowned glory of old Picacho. -The look had the meaning of a prayer to Adam, yet it was -like a blade in his heart. In that look he remembered -his home, his mother, his brother, and the vivid days of -play and love and hope, his fateful journey west, his fall -and his crime and his ruin. Alone on the heights, he -forced that memory to be ever more vivid and torturing. -Hours he consecrated to remorse, to regret, to suffering, -to punishment. He lashed his soul with bitter thoughts, lest -he forget and find peace. Life and health and strength -had returned to him in splendid growing measure which -he must use to pay his debt.</p> - -<p>But there were others hours. He was young. Red -blood throbbed in his veins, and action sent that blood -in a flame over his eager body. To stride along the rocky -heights was something splendid. How free—alone! It -connected Adam’s present hour with a remote past he -could not comprehend. He loved it. He was proud that -the Indians called him Eagle. For to watch the eagles in -their magnificent flights became a passion with him. The -great blue condors and the grisly vultures and the bow-winged -eagles—all were one and the same to him, indistinguishable -from one another as they sailed against the -sky, sailing, sailing so wondrously, with never a movement -of wings, or shooting across the heavens like thunderbolts, -or circling around and upward to vanish in the deep -blue. There were moments when he longed to change his -life to that of an eagle, to find a mate and a nest on a -lofty crag, and there, ringed by the azure world above -and with the lonely barren below, live with the elements.</p> - -<p>Here on the heights Adam was again visited by that -strange sensation, inexplicable and illusive and fast fleeting,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_129">129</span> -which had been born in him one lonely hour in the -desert below. Dismukes had told him how men were lured -by the desert and how they all had their convictions as to -its cause, and how they missed the infinite truth.</p> - -<p>“It will come to me!” cried Adam as he faced the cool -winds.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Stalking mountain sheep upon the mighty slopes was -work to make a man. It was a wild and perilous region -of jagged ridges and bare slants and loose slopes of -weathered rocks. The eyes of the sheep that lived at this -height were like telescopes; they had the keenest sight of -all wild beasts. The marvelous organ of vision stood out -on the head as if it were the half of a pear, so that there -was hardly an angle of the compass toward which a sheep -could not see. Like the antelope, mountain sheep were -curious and could be lured by a bright color and thereby -killed. But Adam learned to abhor this method. He pitted -his sight and his strength and endurance against those of -the sheep. In this way he magnified the game of hunting. -His exhaustion and pain and peril he welcomed as lessons -to the end that his knowledge and achievement must -be in a measure what Dismukes might have respected. -Failure to Adam was nothing but a spur to renewed endeavor. -The long climb, the crumbling ledge, the slipping -rock, the deceitful distance, the crawl over sharp rocks, -the hours of waiting—these too he welcomed as one who -had set himself limitless tasks. Then when he killed a -ram and threw it over his shoulder to carry it down the -mountain, he found labor which was harder even than the -toil of the gold mill at Picacho. To stride erect with a -rifle in one hand, and a hold upon a heavy sheep with -the other, down the slippery ledges, across the sliding -banks, over the cracked and rotten lava, from the sunset-lighted -heights to the gloomy slopes below—this was how -in his own estimation he must earn and keep the respect -of the Indians. They had come to look up to the white -man they called Eagle. He taught them things to do with<span class="pagenum" id="Page_130">130</span> -their hands, work of white men which bettered their existence, -and he impressed them the more by his mastery of -some of their achievements.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The days passed into months. Summer came again and -the vast oval bowl of desert glowed in the rosy sunrise, -glared in the white noon hours, and burned at sunset. The -moving heat veils smoked in rippling clouds over the -Salton Sink; the pale wavering line of the Superstition -Mountains changed mysteriously with each day; the fog -clouds from the Pacific rolled over to lodge against the -fringed peaks. Time did not mean anything to the desert, -though it worked so patiently and ceaselessly in its infinite -details. The desert might have worked for eternity. Its -moments were but the months that were growing into -years of Adam’s life. Again he saw San Jacinto and San -Gorgonio crowned with snow that gleamed so white -against the blue.</p> - -<p>Once Charley Jim showed Adam a hole in the gravel -and sand of a gulley, where Dismukes had dug out a -pocket of gold. Adam gathered that the Indian had -brought Dismukes here. “White man gold mad,” said the -chief. “No happy, little gold. Want dig all—heap hog—dam’ -fool!”</p> - -<p>So Charley Jim characterized Dismukes. Evidently -there had been some just cause, which he did not explain, -for his bringing Dismukes into this hidden canyon. And -also there was some significance in his bringing Adam -there. Many had been the rewards of Charley Jim and -his family for saving and succoring Adam.</p> - -<p>“Indian show Eagle heap gold,” said Charley Jim, and -led him to another gully opening down into the canyon. -In the dry sand and gravel of this wash Adam found gold. -The discovery gave him a wonderful thrill. But it did -not drive him mad. Adam divined in the dark, impassive -face of his guide something of the Indian’s contempt for -a white man’s frenzy over gold.</p> - -<p>Then the chief said in his own tongue that the Indian<span class="pagenum" id="Page_131">131</span> -paid his debt to friend and foe, good for good and evil -for evil—that there were white men to whom he could -trust the secret treasures of the desert.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The day came when something appeared to stimulate -the wandering spirit of the Coahuila chief. Taking his -family and Adam, he began a nomadic quest for change -of scene and work and idleness. The life suited Adam, -for he knew Charley Jim did not frequent the trails of -white men.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>No time so swiftly fleeting as days and nights out in -new and strange places of the desert! Adam kept track -of time by the coming and going of the white crowns of -snow on the peaks, and by the green and gold and then -barren gray of the cottonwoods.</p> - -<p>Like coming home was it to get back to the oasis in -the canyon of the Chocolate range. Adam loved the scene -of his torture. Every stone, every tree, was a familiar -friend, and seemed to whisper welcome to him. Here -also had passed the long, long months of mental anguish. -On this flat rock he had sat a whole day in hopeless pain. -In this sandy-floored aisle of palms he had walked hour -by hour, through many weary days, possessed by the -demon of remorse.</p> - -<p>Best of all, out there reached the gray, endless expanse -of desert, so lonely and melancholy and familiar, extending -away to the infinitude of purple distance; and there -loomed the lofty, bare heights of rock which, when he -scaled them as an Indian climbing to meet his spirits, -seemed to welcome him with sweet, cold winds in his -face. How he thrilled at sight of the winding gleam of -the Rio Colorado! What a shudder, as keen and new a -pang as ever, wrenched him at sight of Picacho! It did -not change. Had he expected that? It towered there in -the dim lilac colors of the desert horizon, colossal and -commanding, immutable and everlasting, like the sin he -had committed in its shadow.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_132">132</span> -Somewhere in the shadow of that doomed and turreted -peak lay the grave of his brother Guerd.</p> - -<p>“I’ll go back some day!” whispered Adam, and the -spoken words seemed the birth of a long-germinating idea. -Picacho haunted him. It called him. It was the place -that had given the gray color and life to his destiny. And -suddenly into his memory flashed an image of Margarita. -Poor, frail, dusky-eyed girl! She had been but the instrument -of his doom. He held her guiltless—long ago he -had forgiven her. But memory of her hurt. Had she -not spoken so lightly of what he meant to hold sacred? -“Ah, señor—so long ago and far away!” Faithless, mindless, -soulless! Adam would never forget. Never a sight -of a green <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">palo verde</i> but a pang struck through his breast!</p> - -<p>At sunset the old chief came to Adam, somber and -grave, but with dignity and kindness tempering the seriousness -of his aspect. He spoke the language of his people.</p> - -<p>“White man, you are of the brood of the eagle. Your -heart is the heart of an Indian. Take my daughter Oella -as your wife.”</p> - -<p>Long had Adam feared this blow, and now it had fallen. -He had tried to pay his debt, but it could not be paid.</p> - -<p>“No, chief, the white man cannot marry Oella. He -has blood upon his hands—a price on his head. Some -day—he might have to hang for his crime. He cannot be -dishonest with the Indian girl who saved him.”</p> - -<p>Perhaps the chief had expected that reply, but his -inscrutable face showed no feeling. He made one of his -slow, impressive gestures—a wave of his hand, indicating -great distance and time; and it meant that Adam was to go.</p> - -<p>Adam dropped his head. That decree was irrevocable -and he knew it was just. While he packed for a long -journey twilight stole down upon the Indian encampment. -Adam knew, when he faced Oella in the shadow of the -palms, that she had been told. Was this the Indian -maiden who had been so shy, so strange? No, this seemed -a woman of full, heaving breast, whose strong, dark face -grew strained, whose magnificent eyes, level and piercing,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_133">133</span> -searched his soul. How blind he had been! All about -her seemed eloquent of woman’s love. His heart beat with -quick, heavy throbs.</p> - -<p>“Oella, your father has ordered me away,” said Adam. -“I am an outcast. I am hunted. If I made you my wife -it might be to your shame and sorrow.”</p> - -<p>“Stay. Oella is not afraid. We will hide in the -canyons,” she said.</p> - -<p>“No. I have sinned. I have blood on my hands. But, -Oella, I am not dishonorable. I will not cheat you.”</p> - -<p>“Take me,” she cried, and the soft, deep-toned, passionate -voice shook Adam’s heart. She would share his -wanderings.</p> - -<p>“Good-by, Oella,” he said, huskily. And he strode forth -to drive his burro out into the lonely, melancholy desert -night.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_134">134</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> second meeting between Adam and the prospector -Dismukes occurred at Tecopah, a mining camp -in the Mohave Desert.</p> - -<p>The mining camp lay in a picturesque valley where -green and gray growths marked the course of the gravel-lined -creek, and sandy benches spread out to dark, -rocky slopes, like lava, that heaved away in the bleak -ranges.</p> - -<p>It was in March, the most colorful season in the Mohave, -that Adam arrived at Tecopah to halt on a grassy bench -at the outskirts of the camp. A little spring welled up here -and trickled down to the creek. It was drinking water -celebrated among desert men, who had been known to go -out of their way to drink there. The telltale ears of -Adam’s burros advised him of the approach of some one, -and he looked up from his camp tasks to find a familiar -figure approaching him. He rubbed his eyes. Was that -strange figure the same as the one so vividly limned on his -memory? Squat, huge, grotesque, the man coming toward -him was Dismukes! His motley, patched garb, his old -slouch hat, his boots yellow with clay and alkali, appeared -the same he had worn on the memorable day Adam’s eyes -had unclosed to see them.</p> - -<p>Dismukes drove his burros up to the edge of the bench, -evidently having in mind the camp site Adam occupied. -When he espied Adam he hesitated and, gruffly calling to -the burros, he turned away.</p> - -<p>“Hello, Dismukes!” called Adam. “Come on. Plenty -room to camp here.”</p> - -<p>The prospector halted stolidly and slowly turned back. -“You know me?” he asked, gruffly, as he came up.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_135">135</span> -“Yes, I know you, Dismukes,” replied Adam, offering -his hand.</p> - -<p>“You’ve got the best of me,” said Dismukes, shaking -hands. He did not seem a day older, but perhaps there -might have been a little more gray in the scant beard. -His great ox eyes, rolling and dark, bent a strange, curious -glance over Adam’s lofty figure.</p> - -<p>“Look close. See if you can recognize a man you befriended -once,” returned Adam. The moment was fraught -with keen pain and a melancholy assurance of the changes -time had made. Strong emotion of gladness, too, was -stirring deep in him. This was the man who had saved -him and who had put into his mind the inspiration and -passion to conquer the desert.</p> - -<p>Dismukes was perplexed, and a little ashamed. His -piercing gaze was that of one who had befriended many -men and could not remember.</p> - -<p>“Stranger, I give it up. I don’t know you.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell,” said Adam, his voice full.</p> - -<p>Dismukes stared. His expression changed, but it was -not with recognition.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell! Wansfell!” he ejaculated. “I know that -name.... Hell, yes! I’ve heard of you all over the -Mohave!... I’m sure glad to meet you.... But, I -never met you before.”</p> - -<p>The poignancy of that meeting for Adam reached a climax -in the absolute failure of Dismukes to recognize him. -Last and certain proof of change! The desert years had -transformed Adam Larey, the youth, into the man Wansfell. -For the first moment in all that time did Adam feel an -absolute sense of safety. He would never be recognized, -never be apprehended for his crime. He seemed born again.</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, how near are you to getting all your five -hundred thousand?” queried Adam, with a smile. There -seemed to be a sad pleasure in thus baffling the old -prospector.</p> - -<p>“By Gad! how’d you know about that?” exclaimed -Dismukes.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_136">136</span> -“You told me.”</p> - -<p>“Say, Wansfell! Am I drunk or are you a mind -reader?” demanded the prospector, bewildered. “Comin’ -along here I was thinkin’ about that five hundred thousand. -But I never told anyone—except a boy once—an’ he’s -dead.”</p> - -<p>“How about your white-faced burro Jinny—the one -that used to steal things out of your pack?” asked Adam, -slowly.</p> - -<p>“Jinny! Jinny!” ejaculated Dismukes, with a start. -His great ox eyes dilated and something of shock ran -through his huge frame. “That burro I never forgot. I -gave her away to a boy who starved on the desert. She -came back to me. Tracked me to Yuma.... An’ you—you—how’d -you know Jinny?... Man, who are you?”</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, I was the boy you saved—down under the -Chocolates—ninety miles from Yuma. Remember ... -it was Jinny saw me wandering in a circle, mad with -thirst. You saved me—gave me Jinny and a pack—told -me how to learn the desert—sent me to the Indians.... -Dismukes, I was that boy. I am now—Wansfell.”</p> - -<p>The prospector seemed to expand with the increased -strain of his gaze into Adam’s eyes, until the instant of -recognition.</p> - -<p>“By God! I know you now!” he boomed, and locked -his horny hands on Adam in a gladness that was beyond -the moment and had to do, perhaps, with a far-past faith -in things. “I thought you died on the desert. Jinny’s -comin’ back seemed proof of that.... But you lived! -You—that boy, tall as a mescal plant—with eyes of agony.... -I never forgot.... An’ now you’re Wansfell!”</p> - -<p>“Yes, my friend. Life is strange on the desert,” replied -Adam. “And now unpack your burros. Make camp with -me here. We’ll eat and talk together.”</p> - -<p>A sunset, rare on the Mohave, glowed over the simple -camp tasks of these men who in their wanderings had met -again. Clouds hung along the mountain tops, colored -into deeper glory as the sun sank. The dark purples had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_137">137</span> -an edge of silver, and the fleecy whites turned to pink and -rose, while golden rays shot up from behind the red-hazed -peaks. Over the valley fell a beautiful and transparent -light, blending and deepening until a shadow as blue as -the sea lay on Tecopah.</p> - -<p>While the men ate their frugal repast they talked, each -gradually growing used to a situation that broke the desert -habit of silence. There was an unconscious deference of -each man toward the other—Wansfell seeing in Dismukes -the savior of his life and a teacher who had inspired him -to scale the heights of human toil and strife; Dismukes -finding in Wansfell a development of his idea, the divine -spirit of man rising above the great primal beasts of the -desert, self-preservation and ferocity.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, have you kept track of time?” asked Dismukes, -reflectively, as he got out a black, stumpy pipe -that Adam remembered.</p> - -<p>“No. Days and weeks glide into years—that’s all I -can keep track of,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“I never could, either. What is time on the desert? -Nothin’.... Well, it flies, that’s sure. An’ it must be -years since I met you first down there in the Colorado. -Let’s see. Three times I went to Yuma—once to Riverside—an’ -twice to San Diego. Six trips inside. That’s -all I’ve made to bank my money since I met you. Six -years. But, say, I missed a year or so.”</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, I’ve seen the snows white on the peaks eight -times. Eight years, my friend, since Jinny cocked her -ears that day and saved me. How little a thing life is in -the desert!”</p> - -<p>“Eight years!” echoed Dismukes, and wagged his huge -shaggy head. “It can’t be.... Well, well, time slips -away.... Wansfell, you’re a young man, though I -see gray over your temples. And you can’t have any -more fear because of that—that crime you confessed -to me. Lord! man, no one would ever know you as -that boy!”</p> - -<p>“No fear that way any more. But fear of myself,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_138">138</span> -Dismukes. If I went back to the haunts of men I would -forget.”</p> - -<p>“Ah yes, yes!” sighed Dismukes. “I understand. I -wonder how it’ll be with me when my hour comes to -leave the desert. I wonder.”</p> - -<p>“Will that be long?”</p> - -<p>“You can never tell. I might strike it rich to-morrow. -Always I dream I’m goin’ to. It’s the dream that keeps -a prospector nailed to the lonely wastes.”</p> - -<p>Indeed, this strange man was a dreamer of dreams. -Adam understood him now, all except that obsession for -just so much gold. It seemed the only flaw in a great -character. But the fidelity to that purpose was great as -it was inexplicable.</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, you had a third of your stake when we -met years ago. How much now?”</p> - -<p>“More than half, Wansfell, safe in banks an’ some hid -away,” came the answer, rolling and strong. What -understanding of endless effort abided in that voice!</p> - -<p>“A quarter of a million! My friend, it is enough. -Take it and go—fulfill your cherished dream. Go before -it’s too late.”</p> - -<p>“I’ve thought of that. Many times when I was sick -an’ worn out with the damned heat an’ loneliness I’ve -tempted myself with what you said. But, no. I’ll never do -that. It’s the same to me now as if I had no money at all.”</p> - -<p>“Take care, Dismukes,” warned Adam. “It’s the gaining -of gold—not what it might bring—that drives you.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Quien sabe</i>, as the Mexicans say?... Wansfell, -have you learned the curse—or it may be the blessing—of -the desert—what makes us wanderers of the -wastelands?”</p> - -<p>“No. I have not. Sometimes I feel it’s close to me, -like the feeling of a spirit out there on the lonely desert -at night. But it’s a great thing, Dismukes. And it is -linked to the very beginnings of us. Some day I’ll know.”</p> - -<p>Dismukes smoked in silence, thoughtful and sad. The -man’s forceful assurance and doggedness seemed the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_139">139</span> -same, yet Adam sensed a subtle difference in him, beyond -power to define. The last gold faded from the bold domes -of the mountains, the clouds turned gray, the twilight -came on as a stealthy host. And from across the creek -came discordant sounds of Tecopah awakening to the -revelry of a gold diggings by night.</p> - -<p>“How’d you happen along here?” queried Dismukes, -presently.</p> - -<p>“Tecopah was just a water hole for me,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Me, too. An’ I’m sure sayin’ that I like to fill my -canteens here. Last year I camped here, an’ when I -went on I kept one of my canteens so long the water -spoiled.... Found some gold trace up in the Kingston -range, but my supplies ran low an’ I had to give up. -My plan now is to go in there an’ then on to the Funeral -Mountains. They’re full of mineral. But a dry, hard, -poison country for a prospector. Do you know that -country?”</p> - -<p>“I’ve been on this side of the range.”</p> - -<p>“Bad enough, but the <em>other</em> side of the Funerals is -Death Valley. That gash in summer is a blastin’, roarin’ -hell. I’ve crossed it every month in the year. None but -madmen ever tackle Death Valley in July, in the middle -of the day. I’ve seen the mercury go to one hundred and -forty degrees. I’ve seen it one hundred and twenty-five -at midnight, an’, friend, when them furnace winds blow -down the valley at night sleep or rest is impossible. You -just gasp for life.... But strange to say, Wansfell, -the fascination of the desert is stronger in Death Valley -than at any other place.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I can appreciate that,” replied Adam, thoughtfully. -“It must be the sublimity of death and desolation—the -terrible loneliness and awfulness of the naked earth. -I am going there.”</p> - -<p>“So I reckoned. An’ see here, Wansfell, I’ll get out -my pencil an’ draw you a little map of the valley, showin’ -my trails an’ water holes. I know that country better than -any other white man. It’s a mineral country. The lower<span class="pagenum" id="Page_140">140</span> -slope of the Funerals is all clay, borax, soda, alkali, salt, -niter, an’ when the weather’s hot an’ that stuff blows on the -hot winds, my God! it’s a horror! But you’ll want to -go through it all an’ you’ll go back again.”</p> - -<p>“Where do you advise me to go in?”</p> - -<p>“Well, I’d follow the Amargosa. It’s bad water, but -better than none. Go across an’ up into the Panamints, -an’ come back across again by Furnace Creek. I’ll make -you a little map. There’s more bad water than good, -an’ some of it’s arsenic. I found the skeletons of six -men near an arsenic water hole. Reckon they’d come on -this water when bad off for thirst an’ didn’t know enough -to test it. An’ they drank their fill an’ died in their -tracks. They had gold, too. But I never could find out -anythin’ about these men. No one ever heard of them -an’ I was the only man who knew of the tragedy. Well, -well, it’s common enough for me, though I never before -run across so many dead men. Wansfell, I reckon you’ve -found that common, too, in your wanderings—dried-up -mummies, yellow as leather, or bleached bones an’ grinnin’ -skull, white in the sun?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I’ve buried the remains of more than one poor -devil,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Is it best to bury them? I let them lay as warnin’ to -other poor devils. No one but a crazy man would drink -at a water hole where there was a skeleton.... Well, -to come back to your goin’ to Death Valley. I’d go in -by the Amargosa. It’s a windin’ stream an’ long, but -safe. An’ there’s firewood an’ a little grass. Now when -you get across the valley you’ll run into prospectors an’ -miners an’ wanderers at the water holes. An’ like as not -you’ll meet some of the claim jumpers an’ robbers that -live in the Panamints. From what I hear about you, -Wansfell, I reckon a meetin’ with them would be a bad -hour for them, an’ somethin’ of good fortune to honest -miners. Hey?”</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, I don’t run from men of that stripe,” replied -Adam, grimly.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_141">141</span> -“Ahuh! I reckon not,” said Dismukes, just as grimly. -“Well, last time I was over there—let’s see, it was in -September, hotter ’n hell, an’ I run across two queer -people up in a canyon I’d never prospected before. Didn’t -see any sign of any other prospectors ever bein’ in there.... -Two queer people—a man an’ a woman livin’ in a -shack they’d built right under the damnedest roughest -slope of weathered rock you ever saw in your life. Why, -it was a plain case of suicide, an’ so I tried to show them! -Every hour you could hear the crack of a rollin’ bowlder -or the graty slip of an avalanche, gettin’ oneasy an’ wantin’ -to slide. But the woman was deathly afraid of her husband -an’ he was a skunk an’ a wolf rolled into a man, if -I ever saw one. I couldn’t do anythin’ for the poor -woman, an’ I couldn’t learn any more than I’m tellin’ you. -That’s not much. But, Wansfell, she wasn’t a common -sort. She’d been beautiful once. She had the saddest -face I ever saw. I got two feelin’s, one that she wasn’t -long for this earth, an’ the other that the man hated her -with a terrible hate.... I meet with queer people an’ -queer situations as I wander over this desert, but here’s -the beat of all my experience. An’, Wansfell, I’d like to -have you go see that couple. I reckon they’ll be there, -if alive yet. He chose a hidden spot, an’ he has Shoshone -Indians pack his supplies in from the ranches way on the -other side of the Panamints. A queer deal, horrible for -that poor woman, an’ I’ve been haunted by her face ever -since. I’d like you to go there.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll go. But why do you say that, Dismukes?” asked -Adam, curiously.</p> - -<p>“Well—you ought to know what your name means to -desert men,” replied Dismukes, constrainedly, and he -looked down at the camp fire, to push forward a piece of -half-burnt wood.</p> - -<p>“No, I never heard,” said Adam. “I’ve lived ’most -always alone. Of course I’ve had to go to freighting -posts and camps. I’ve worked in gold diggings. I’ve -guided wagon trains across the Mohave. Naturally, I’ve<span class="pagenum" id="Page_142">142</span> -been among men. But I never heard that my name meant -anything.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell! I remember <em>now</em> that you called yourself -Wansfell. I’ve heard that name. Some of your doings, -Wansfell, have made camp-fire stories. See here, Wansfell, -you won’t take offense at me.”</p> - -<p>“No offense, friend Dismukes,” replied Adam, strangely -affected. Here was news that forced him to think of -himself as a man somehow related to and responsible to -his kind. He had gone to and fro over the trails of the -desert, and many adventures had befallen him. He had -lived them, with the force the desert seemed to have taught -him, and then had gone his way down the lonely trails, -absorbed in his secret. The years seemed less than the -blowing sand. He had been an unfortunate boy burdened -with a crime; he was now a matured man, still young in -years, but old with the silence and loneliness and strife -of the desert, gray at the temples, with that old burden -still haunting him. How good to learn that strange men -spoke his name with wonder and respect! He had helped -wanderers as Dismukes had helped him; he had meted -out desert violence to evil men who crossed his trail; he -had, doubtless, done many little unremembered deeds of -kindness in a barren world where little deeds might be -truly overappreciated; but the name Wansfell meant nothing -to him, the reputation hinted by Dismukes amazed him, -strangely thrilled him; the implication of nobility filled -him with sadness and remorse. What had he done with -the talents given him?</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, you see—you’re somethin’ of the man I -might have been,” said Dismukes, hesitatingly.</p> - -<p>“Oh no, Dismukes,” protested Adam. “You are a -prospector, honest and industrious, and wealthy now, almost -ready to enjoy the fruits of your long labors. Your -life has a great object.... But I—I am only a wanderer -of the wasteland.”</p> - -<p>“Aye, an’ therein lies your greatness!” boomed the prospector, -his ox eyes dilating and flaring. “I am a selfish<span class="pagenum" id="Page_143">143</span> -pig—a digger in the dirt for gold. My passion has made -me pass by men, an’ women, too, who needed help. Riches—dreams!... -But you—you, Wansfell—out there in the -loneliness an’ silence of the wastelands—you have found -God!... I said you would. I’ve met other men who -had.”</p> - -<p>“No, no,” replied Adam. “You’re wrong. I don’t -think I’ve found God. Not yet!... I have no religion, -no belief. I can’t find any hope out there in the desert. -Nature is pitiless, indifferent. The desert is but one of -her playgrounds. Man has no right there. No, Dismukes, -I have not found God.”</p> - -<p>“You have, but you don’t know it,” responded Dismukes, -with more composure, and he began to refill a neglected -pipe. “Well, I didn’t mean to fetch up such talk as that. -You see, when I do fall in with a prospector once in a -month of Sundays I never talk much. An’ then it’d be -to ask him if he’d seen any float lately or panned any -color. But you’re different. You make my mind work. -An’, Wansfell, sometimes I think my mind has been -crowded with a million thoughts all cryin’ to get free. -That’s the desert. A man’s got to fight the desert with -his intelligence or else become less than a man. An’ I -always did think a lot, if I didn’t talk.”</p> - -<p>“I’m that way, too,” replied Adam. “But a man should -talk when he gets a chance. I talk to my burros, and to -myself, just to hear the sound of my voice.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! Ah!” exclaimed Dismukes, with deep breath. He -nodded his shaggy head. Adam’s words had struck an -answering chord in his heart.</p> - -<p>“You’ve tried for gold here?” queried Adam.</p> - -<p>“No. I was here first just after the strike, an’ often -since. Water’s all that ever drew me. I’d starve before -I’d dig for gold among a pack of beasts. I may be a -desert wolf, but I’m a lone one.”</p> - -<p>“They’re coyotes and you’re the gray wolf. I liken -’most every man I meet to some beast or creature of the -desert.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_144">144</span> -“Aye, you’re right. The desert stamps a man. An’, -Wansfell, it’s stamped you with the look of a desert eagle. -Ha-ha! I ain’t flatterin’ to either of us, am I? Me a -starved gray wolf, huntin’ alone, mean an’ hard an’ fierce! -An’ you a long, lean-headed eagle, with that look of you -like you were about to strike—<em>pong!</em>... Well, well, -there’s no understandin’ the work of the desert. The -way it develops the livin’ creatures! They all have to live, -an’ livin’ on the desert is a thousand times harder than -anywhere else. They all have to be perfect machines for -destruction. Each seems so swift that he gets away, yet -each is also so fierce an’ sure that he catches his prey. -They live on one another, but the species doesn’t die out. -That’s what stumps me about the desert. Take the human -creatures. They grow fiercer than animals. Maybe that’s -because nature did not intend man to live on the desert. -An’ it is no place for man. Nature intended these classes -of plants an’ these species of birds an’ beasts to live, fight, -thrive, an’ reproduce their kind on the desert. But men -can’t thrive nor reproduce their kind here.”</p> - -<p>“How about the Indians who lived in the desert for -hundreds of years?” asked Adam.</p> - -<p>“What’s a handful of Indians? An’ what’s a few years -out of the millions of years that the desert’s been here, -just as it is now? Nothin’—nothin’ at all! Wansfell, -there will be men come into the desert, down there below -the Salton Sink, an’ in other places where the soil is -productive, an’ they’ll build dams an’ storage places for -water. Maybe a lot of fools will even turn the Colorado -River over the desert. They’ll make it green an’ rich an’, -like the Bible says, blossom as a rose. An’ these men -will build ditches for water, an’ reservoirs an’ towns an’ -cities, an’ cross the desert with railroads. An’ they’ll -grow rich an’ proud. They’ll think they’ve conquered it. -But, poor fools! they don’t know the desert! Only a -man who has lived with the desert much of his life can -ever know. Time will pass an’ men will grow old, an’ -their sons an’ grandsons after them. A hundred an’ a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_145">145</span> -thousand years might pass with fruitfulness still in the -control of man. But all that is only a few grains of time -in all the endless sands of eternity. The desert’s work -will have been retarded for a little while. But the desert -works ceaselessly an’ with infinite patience. The sun -burns, the frost cracks, the avalanche rolls, the rain -weathers. Slowly the earth crust heaves up into mountains -an’ slowly the mountains wear down, atom by atom, to be -the sands of the desert. An’ the winds—how they blow -for ever an’ ever! What can avail against the desert -winds? They blow the sand an’ sift an’ seep an’ bury.... -Men will die an’ the places that knew them will know -them no more. An’ the desert will come back to its own. -That is well, for it is what God intended.”</p> - -<p>“God and nature, then, with you are one and the same?” -queried Adam.</p> - -<p>“Yes. Twenty years sleepin’ on the sand with the stars -in my face has taught me that. Is it the same with you?”</p> - -<p>“No. I grant all that you contend for the desert and -for nature. But I can’t reconcile nature and God. Nature -is cruel, inevitable, hopeless. But God must be immortality.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, there’s somethin’ divine in some men, but -not in all, nor in many. So how can that divinity be God? -The immortality you speak of—that is only your life projected -into another life.”</p> - -<p>“You mean if I do not have a child I will not have -immortality?”</p> - -<p>“Exactly.”</p> - -<p>“But what of my soul?” demanded Adam, solemnly.</p> - -<p>Dismukes drooped his shaggy head. “I don’t know. I -don’t know. I’ve gone so deep, but I can’t go any deeper. -That always stumps me. I’ve never found my soul! -Maybe findin’ my soul would be findin’ God. I don’t -know.... An’ you, Wansfell—once I said you had the -spirit an’ mind to find God on the desert. Did you?”</p> - -<p>Adam shook his head. “I’m no farther than you, Dismukes, -though I think differently about life and death.... I’ve<span class="pagenum" id="Page_146">146</span> -fought to live on this wasteland, but I’ve fought -hardest to think. It seems that always nature strikes me -with its terrible mace! I have endless hours to look at the -desert and I see what you see—the strange ferocity of it -all—the fierce purpose. No wonder you say the desert -stamps a man!”</p> - -<p>“Aye! An’ woman, too! Take this she-devil who runs -a place here in Tecopah—Mohave Jo is the name she bears. -Have you seen her?”</p> - -<p>“No, but I’ve heard of her. At Needles I met the wife -of a miner, Clark, who’d been killed here at Tecopah.”</p> - -<p>“Never heard of Clark. But I don’t doubt the story. -It’s common enough—miners bein’ killed an’ robbed. -There’s a gang over in the Panamints who live on miners.”</p> - -<p>“I’m curious to see Mohave Jo,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>“Well, speakin’ of this one-eyed harridan reminds me -of a man I met last trip across the Salton flats, down on -the Colorado. Met him at Walters—a post on the stage -line. He had only one eye, too. There was a terrible -scar where his eye, the right one, had been. He was one -of these Texans lookin’ for a man. There seems to be -possibilities of a railroad openin’ up that part of the desert. -An’ this fellow quizzed me about water holes. Of course, -if any one gets hold of water in that country he’ll strike -it rich as gold, if the country ever opens up. It’s likely to -happen, too. Well, this man had an awful face. He’d -been a sheriff in Texas, some one said, an’ later at Ehrenberg. -Hell on hangin’ men!... Of course I never asked -him how he lost his eye. But he told me—spoke of it -more than once. The deformity had affected his mind. -You meet men like that—sort of crazy on somethin’. He -was always lookin’ for the fellow who’d knocked out his -eye. To kill him!”</p> - -<p>“Do you—recall his—name?” asked Adam, his voice -halting with a thick sensation in his throat. The past -seemed as yesterday.</p> - -<p>“Never was much on rememberin’ names,” responded -Dismukes, scratching his shaggy head. “Let’s see—why,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_147">147</span> -yes, he called himself Collis—Collis—haw. That’s it—Collishaw. -Hard name to remember. But as a man he -struck me easy to remember.... Well, friend Wansfell, -I’ve had enough talkin’ to do me for a spell. I’m goin’ -to bed.”</p> - -<p>While Adam sat beside the fire, motionless, pondering -with slow, painful amaze over what he had just heard, -Dismukes prepared for his night’s rest. He unrolled a -pack, spread a ragged old canvas, folded a blanket upon -it, and arranged another blanket to pull up over him, -together with the end of the canvas. For a pillow he -utilized an old coat that lay on his pack. His sole concession -to man’s custom of undressing for bed was the -removal of his old slouch hat. Then with slow, labored -movement he lay down to stretch his huge body and pull -the coverlets over him. From his cavernous breast heaved -a long, deep sigh. His big eyes, dark and staring, gazed -up at the brightening stars, and then they closed.</p> - -<p>Adam felt tempted to pack and move on to a quiet and -lonely place off in the desert, where he could think without -annoyance. Keen and bitterly faithful as had been -his memory, it had long ceased to revive thoughts of -Collishaw, the relentless sheriff and ally of Guerd. How -strange and poignant had been the shock of recollection! -It had been the blow Adam had dealt—the savage fling of -his gun in Collishaw’s face—that had destroyed an eye and -caused a hideous disfigurement. And the Texan, with -that fatality characteristic of his kind, was ever on the -lookout for the man who had ruined his eyesight. Perhaps -that was only one reason for his thirst for revenge. -Guerd! Had Collishaw not sworn to hang Adam? “You’ll -swing for this!” he had yelled in his cold, ringing voice of -passion. And so Adam lived over again the old agony, -new and strange in its bitter mockery, its vain hope of -forgetfulness. Vast as the desert was, it seemed small -now to Adam, for there wandered over it a relentless and -bloodthirsty Texan, hunting to kill him. The past was -not dead. The present and the future could not be wholly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_148">148</span> -consecrated to atonement. A specter, weird and grotesque -as a yucca tree, loomed out there in the shadows of the -desert night. Death stalked on Adam’s trail. The hatred -of men was beyond power to understand. Work, fame, -use, health, love, home, life itself, could be sacrificed by -some men just to kill a rival or an enemy. Adam remembered -that Collishaw had hated him and loved Guerd. -Moreover, Collishaw had that strange instinct to kill men—a -passion which grew by what it fed on—a morbid mental -twist that drove him to rid himself of the terrible haunting -ghost of his last victim by killing a new one. Added -to that was a certain leaning toward the notorious.</p> - -<p>“We’ll meet some day,” soliloquized Adam. “But he -would never recognize me.”</p> - -<p>The comfort of that fact did not long abide in Adam’s -troubled mind. He would recognize Collishaw. And -that seemed to hold something fatalistic and inevitable. -“When I meet Collishaw I’ll tell him who I am—and I’ll -kill him!” That fierce whisper was the desert voice in -Adam—the desert spirit. He could no more help that -sudden bursting flash of fire than he could help breathing. -Nature in the desert did not teach men to meet a threat -with forgiveness, nor to wait until they were struck. -Instinct had precedence over intelligence and humanity. -In the eternal strife to keep alive on the desert a man who -conquered must have assimilated something of the terrible -nature of the stinging <i>cholla</i> cactus, and the hard, grasping -tenacity of the mesquite roots, and the ferocity of the wildcat, -and the cruelty of the hawk—something of the nature -of all that survived. It was a law. It forced a man to -mete out violence in advance of that meant for him.</p> - -<p>“To fight and to think were to be my blessings,” soliloquized -Adam, and he shook his head with a long-familiar -doubt. Then he had to remember that no blessings of any -kind whatsoever could be his. Stern and terrible duty -to himself!</p> - -<p>So he rolled in his blankets and stretched his long body -to the composure of rest. Sleep did not drop with soft<span class="pagenum" id="Page_149">149</span> -swiftness upon his eyes, as it had upon those of Dismukes. -He had walked far, but he was not tired. He never tired -any more. There seemed to be no task of a single day -that could weary his strength. And for long he lay awake, -listening to the deep breathing of his companion, and the -howl of the coyotes, and the sounds of Tecopah, so unnatural -in the quiet of the desert. A sadness weighed -heavily upon Adam. At first he was glad to have met -Dismukes, but now he was sorry. A tranquillity, a veil -seemed to have been rent. The years had not really -changed the relation of his crime, nor materially the nature -of his sin. But they had gradually, almost imperceptibly, -softened his ceaseless and eternal remorse. By this meeting -with Dismukes he found that time effaced shocks, -blows, stains, just as it wore away the face of the desert -rock. That, too, was a law; and in this Adam divined a -blessing that he could not deny. Dismukes had unleashed -a specter out of the dim glow of the past. Eight years! -So many, and yet they were as eight days! There were the -bright stars, pitiless and cold, and the dark bold mountains -that had seemed part of his strength. In the deep-blue -sky above and in the black shadow below Adam saw a -white face, floating, fading, reappearing, mournful and -accusing and appalling—a face partaking of the old boyish -light and joy and of the godlike beauty of perfect manhood—the -haunting face of his brother Guerd. It haunted -Adam, and the brand of Cain burned into his brain. The -old resurging pangs in his breast, the long sighs, the -oppressed heart, the salt tears, the sleepless hours—these -were Adam’s again, as keen as in the first days of his -awakening down on the Colorado Desert, where from the -peaks of the Chocolate Mountains he had gazed with piercing -eyes far south to the purple peak—Picacho, the monument, -towering above his brother’s grave. “Some day I’ll -go back!” whispered Adam, as if answering to an imperative -and mysterious call.</p> - -<p>The long night wore on with the heavens star-fired by -its golden train, and the sounds at last yielding to the desert<span class="pagenum" id="Page_150">150</span> -silence. Adam could see Dismukes, a wide, prone figure, -with dark face upturned to the sky, a man seemingly as -strange and strong as the wastelands he talked so much -about, yet now helpless in sleep, unguarded, unconscious, -wrapped in his deep dreams of the joy and life his gold -was to bring him. Adam felt a yearning pity for this -dreamer. Did he really love gold or was his passion only -a dream? Whatever that was and whatever the man was, -there rested upon his ragged, dark face a shadow of -tragedy. Adam wondered what his own visage would -reflect when he lay asleep, no more master of a mind that -never rested? The look of an eagle? So Dismukes had -said, and that was not the first time Adam had heard such -comparison. He had seen desert eagles, dead and alive. -He tried to recall how they looked, but the images were -not convincing. The piercing eye, clear as the desert air, -with the power of distance in the gray depths; the lean, -long lines; the wild poise of head, bitter and ruthless and -fierce; the look of loneliness—these characters surely could -not be likened to his face. What a strange coincidence -that Dismukes should hit upon the likeness of an eagle—the -winged thunderbolt of the heights—the lonely bird -Adam loved above all desert creatures! And so Adam -wandered in mind until at last he fell asleep.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_151">151</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">When</span> Adam awoke he saw that Dismukes had breakfast -steaming on the fire.</p> - -<p>“I’m on my way to-day,” announced the prospector. -“What’ll you do?”</p> - -<p>“Well, I’ll hang around Tecopah as long as I can stand -it,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Humph! That won’t be long, unless you got in mind -somethin’ like you did at the Donner Placers, down in -the Providence Mountains.”</p> - -<p>“Friend, what do you know about that?” queried Adam.</p> - -<p>“Nothin’. I only heard about it.... Wansfell, do -you pan any gold?”</p> - -<p>“Sometimes, when I happen to run across it,” replied -Adam, “but that isn’t often.”</p> - -<p>“Do you work?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I’ve worked a good deal, taking it all together. -In the mines, on the river at Needles, driving mule teams -and guiding wagon trains. Never got paid much, though.”</p> - -<p>“How do you live?” asked Dismukes, evidently curious.</p> - -<p>“Oh, I fare well enough to keep flesh on my bones.”</p> - -<p>“You’ve got flesh—or I reckon it’s muscle. Wansfell, -you’re the best-built man I ever saw on the desert. Most -men dry up an’ blow away.... Will you let me give -you—lend you some money?”</p> - -<p>“Money! So that’s why you’re so curious?” responded -Adam. “Thanks, my friend. I don’t need money. I -had some, you know, when you ran across me down in the -Chocolates. I used about a thousand dollars while I lived -with the Coahuila Indians. And I’ve got nine thousand -left.”</p> - -<p>“Say, you don’t pack all that money along with you?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_152">152</span> -“Yes. Where else would I keep it?”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, some of these robbers will murder you.”</p> - -<p>“Not if I see them first. My friend, don’t be concerned. -Surely I don’t look sick.”</p> - -<p>“Humph! Well, just the same, now that you’re headin’ -up into this country, I advise you to be careful. Don’t -let anybody see you with money. I’ve been held up an’ -robbed three times.”</p> - -<p>“Didn’t you make a fight for your gold?”</p> - -<p>“No chance. I was waylaid—had to throw up my hands.... -They tell me you are ready with a gun, Wansfell?”</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, you seem to have heard much about me.”</p> - -<p>“But you didn’t throw a gun on Baldy McKue,” said -Dismukes, with a dark flare from his rolling eyes.</p> - -<p>“No—I did not,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“You killed McKue with your bare hands,” flashed Dismukes. -A red stain appeared to come up under his leathery -skin. “Wansfell, will you tell me about that?”</p> - -<p>“I’d rather not, Dismukes. There are <em>some</em> things I -forget.”</p> - -<p>“Well, it meant a good deal to me,” replied Dismukes. -“McKue did me dirt. He jumped claims of mine down -here near Soda Sink. An’ he threatened to kill me—swore -the claims were his—drove me off. I met him in Riverside, -an’ there he threatened me with arrest. He was a -robber an’ a murderer. I believe he ambushed prospectors. -McKue was like most men who stick to the desert—he -went down to the level of the beast. I hated him.... -This stranger who told me—he swore there wasn’t an -uncracked bone left in McKue’s body.... Wansfell, if -you did that to McKue you’ve squared accounts. Is it -true?”</p> - -<p>“Yes.”</p> - -<p>Dismukes rubbed his huge hands together and his ox -eyes rolled and dilated. A fierce and savage grimness distorted -his hard face for an instant and passed away.</p> - -<p>“What’d you kill him for?”</p> - -<p>“Because he’d have killed me.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_153">153</span> -“Didn’t you look him up on purpose to kill him?”</p> - -<p>“No.... A year before that time I went to Goffs. -Some one took me into an old tent where a woman lay -dying. I could do little for her. She denounced McKue; -she blamed him that she lay there, about to die. She did -die and I buried her. Then I kept an eye open for -McKue.”</p> - -<p>“I wondered—I wondered,” said Dismukes. “It struck -me deep. Lord knows fights are common out here. An’ -death—why, on the desert every way you turn you see -death. It’s the life of the desert. But the way this was -told me struck me deep. It was what I’d like to have -done myself. Wansfell, think of the wonderful meetin’s -of men on the desert—an’, aye, meetin’ of men with women, -too! They happen different out here. Think of the first -time we met! An’ this time! Wansfell, we’ll meet again. -It’s written in those trails of sand out there, wanderin’ -to an’ fro across the desert.”</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, the desert is vast. Sometimes you will not -meet a man in months of travel—and not in years will -you meet a woman. But when you do meet them life -seems intensified. The desert magnifies.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, I want you to go across into Death Valley,” -declared Dismukes, with the deep boom in his voice. -“That woman in the shack! Her eyes haunt me. Somethin’ -terrible wrong! That man who keeps her there—if -he’s not crazy, he’s worse than a gorilla. For a gorilla -kills a woman quick.... Wansfell, I’d give a lot to see -you handle this man like you handled McKue!”</p> - -<p>“<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">Quien sabe</i>, as you say?” replied Adam. “Draw that -map of your trails in Death Valley. I’ve got a little book -here, and a pencil.”</p> - -<p>It was singular to see the gold digger labor with his -great, stumpy, calloused fingers. He took long to draw a -few lines, and make a few marks, and write a few names -in the little book. But when he came to talk of distance -and direction, of trails and springs, of flat valley and -mountain range—then how swift and fluent he was! All<span class="pagenum" id="Page_154">154</span> -that country lay clearly in his mind, as if he were a great -desert condor gazing down from the heights upon the -wasteland which was his home.</p> - -<p>“Now, I’ll be goin’ down into the Funerals soon,” concluded -Dismukes. “You see here’s Furnace Creek where -it runs into Death Valley. You’ll cross here an’ come up -Furnace Creek till you strike the yellow clay hills on the -right. It’s a hell of a jumble of hills—absolutely bare. I -think there’s gold. You’ll find me somewhere.”</p> - -<p>It seemed settled then that Adam and Dismukes were -to meet in some vague place at some vague time. The -desert had no limitations. Time, distance, and place were -thought of in relation to their adaptation to desert men.</p> - -<p>“Well, it’s gettin’ late,” said Dismukes, looking up at -the white flare of sun. “I’ll pack an’ go on my way.”</p> - -<p>While Dismukes strode out to drive in his burros Adam -did the camp chores. In a short time his companion appeared -with the burros trotting ahead of him. And the -sight reminded Adam of the difference between prospectors. -Dismukes was not slow, easy, careless, thoughtless. -He had not suffered the strange deterioration so common -to his class. He did not belong to the type who tracked -his burros all day so that he might get started <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">mañana</i>. -Adam helped him pack.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, may we meet again,” said Dismukes, as they -shook hands.</p> - -<p>“All trails cross on the desert. I hope you strike it -rich.”</p> - -<p>“Some day—some day. Good-by,” returned Dismukes, -and with vigorous slaps he started the burros.</p> - -<p>Adam was left to his own devices. After Dismukes -passed out of sight in the universal gray of the benches -Adam spent a long while watching a lizard on a stone. -It was a chuckwalla, a long, slim, greenish-bronze reptile, -covered with wonderful spots of vivid color, and with -eyes like jewels. Adam spent much time watching the -living things of the desert, or listening to the silence. He -had discovered that watching anything brought its reward—sometimes<span class="pagenum" id="Page_155">155</span> -in a strange action or a phenomenon of nature -or a new thought.</p> - -<p>Later he walked down to the creek bottom where the -smelter was in operation. Laborers were at a premium -there, and he was offered work. He said he would consider -it. But unless there turned out to be some definite -object to keep him in Tecopah, Adam would not have -bartered his freedom to the dust-clouded mill for all the -gold it mined. These clanging mills and hot shafts and -dark holes oppressed him.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_156">156</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER XIV</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> long-deferred hour at last arrived in which Adam, -on a ruddy-gold dawn in early April, drove his burros -out into the lonesome desert toward the Amargosa. He -did not look back. Tecopah would not soon forget Wansfell! -That was his grim thought.</p> - -<p>The long, drab reaches of desert, the undulating bronze -slopes waving up to the dark mountains, called to him in a -language that he felt. If Adam Larey—or Wansfell, -wanderer of the wasteland, as he had come to believe himself—had -any home, it was out in the vast open, under -the great white flare of sunlight and the star-studded -canopy of night.</p> - -<p>This was a still morning in April, and the lurid sun, -bursting above the black escarpment to the east, promised -a rising temperature. Day by day the heat had been -increasing, and now, at sunrise, the smoky heat veils were -waving up from the desert floor. For Adam the most -torrid weather had no terrors, and the warmth of a morning -like this felt pleasant on his cheek. He had been confined -to one place, without action, for so long that now, -as he began to feel the slow sweat burn pleasantly on his -body, there came a loosening of his muscles, a relaxing -of tension, a marshaling, as it were, of his great forces of -strength and endurance. The gray slopes beyond did not -daunt him. His stride was that of a mountaineer, and -his burros had to trot to keep ahead of him.</p> - -<p>And as Adam’s body gradually responded to this readjustment -to the desert and its hard demands, so his mind -seemed to slough off, layer by layer, the morbid, fierce, -and ruthless moods that like lichens had fastened upon it. -The dry, sweet desert air seemed to permeate his brain<span class="pagenum" id="Page_157">157</span> -and clear it of miasmas and shadows. He was free. He -was alone. He was self-sufficient. The desert called. -From far beyond that upheaved black and forbidding -range, the Funeral Mountains, something strange, new, -thrilling awaited his coming. The strife of the desert had -awakened in him a craving to find the unattainable. He -had surmounted all physical obstacles. He would conquer -Death Valley; he would see it in all its ghastliness; he -would absorb all its mysteries; he would defy to the limit -of endurance its most fatal menaces to life.</p> - -<p>In the afternoon Adam rounded a corner of a league-long -sloping mesa and gazed down into the valley of the -Amargosa. It looked the bitterness, the poison, and the -acid suggested by its Spanish name. The narrow meandering -stream gleamed like silver in the sunlight. Mesquite -and other brush spotted its gravelly slopes and sandy -banks. Adam headed down into the valley. The sun was -already westering, and soon, as he descended, it hung over -the ragged peaks. He reached the creek. The burros -drank, but not with relish. Adam gazed at the water of -the Amargosa with interest. It was not palatable, yet it -would save life.</p> - -<p>Adam set about the camp tasks long grown second -nature with him, and which were always congenial and -pleasant. He built a fire of dead mesquite. Then he -scoured his oven with sand, and greased it. He had a -heavy pan which did duty as a gold-pan, a dish-pan, and a -wash-pan. This he half filled with flour, and, adding -water, began to mix the two. He had gotten the dough -to about the proper consistency when a rustling in the -brush attracted his attention. He thought he caught a -glimpse of a rabbit. Such opportunity for fresh meat -was rare on the desert. Hastily wiping his hands, he -caught up his gun and stole out into the aisle between the -mesquites. As luck would have it, he did espy a young cottontail, -and was fortunate enough to make a good shot. -Returning to camp, he made sudden discovery of a catastrophe.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_158">158</span> -Jennie had come out of her nap, if, indeed, she had not -been shamming sleep, and she had her nose in the dish-pan. -She was eating the dough.</p> - -<p>“Hyar, you camp robber!” yelled Adam, making for -her.</p> - -<p>Jennie jerked up her head. The dough stuck to her -nose and the pan stuck to the dough. She eluded Adam, -for she was a quick and nimble burro. The pan fell off, -but the ball of dough adhered to her mouth and nose, and -as she ran around camp in a circle it was certain that she -worked her jaws, eating dough as fast as she could. Manifestly -for Jennie, here was opportunity of a lifetime. -When finally Adam did catch her the dough was mostly -eaten. He gave her a cuff and a kick which she accepted -meekly, and, drooping her ears, she apparently fell asleep -again.</p> - -<p>While Adam was at his simple meal the sun set, filling -the valley with red haze and tipping with gold the peaks -in the distance. The heat had gone with the sun. He -walked to and fro in the lonely twilight. Jennie had -given up hope of any more opportunity to pilfer, and had -gone to grazing somewhere down the stream. There was -absolutely no sound. An infinite silence enfolded the -solitude. It was such solitude as only men of Adam’s -life could bear. To him it was both a blessing and a -curse. But to-night he had an all-pervading and all-satisfying -power. He seemed to be growing at one with the -desert and its elements. After a while the twilight shadows -shaded into the blackness of night, and the stars blazed. -Adam had been conscious all day of the gradual relaxing -of strain, and now in the lonely solitude there fell away -from him the feelings and thoughts engendered at -Tecopah.</p> - -<p>“Loneliness and silence and time!” he soliloquized, as -he paced his sandy beat. “These will cure any trouble—any -disease of mind—any agony of soul. Ah! I know. -I never forget. But how different now to remember!... -That must be the secret of the power of the desert<span class="pagenum" id="Page_159">159</span> -over men. It is the abode of solitude and silence. It is -like the beginning of creation. It is like an eternity of -time.”</p> - -<p>By the slow healing of the long-raw wound in his heart -Adam had come to think of time’s relation to change. -Memory was still as poignant as ever. But a change had -begun in him—a change he divined only after long months -of strife. Dismukes brought a regurgitation of the old -pain; yet it was not quite the same. Eight years! How -impossible to realize that, until confronted by physical -proofs of the passing of time! Adam saw no clear and -serene haven for his wandering spirit, but there seemed -to be a nameless and divine promise in the future. His -steps had not taken hold of hell. He had been driven -down the naked shingles of the desert, through the storms -of sand, under the infernal heat and bitter cold, like a -man scourged naked, with screaming furies to whip the -air at his ears. And, lo! time had begun to ease his -burden, soften the pain, dim the past, change his soul.</p> - -<p>The moment was one of uplift. “I have my task,” he -cried, looking high to the stars. “Oh, stars—so serene -and pitiless and inspiring—teach me to perform that task -as you perform yours!”</p> - -<p>He would go on as he had begun, fighting the desert -and its barrenness, its blasting heat, its evil influences, -wandering over these wastelands that must be his home; -and he would stake the physical prowess of him to yet -harder, fiercer tasks of toil, driving his spirit to an intenser, -whiter flame. If the desert could develop invincible -energy of strength in a man, he would earn it. If -there were a divinity in man, infinitely beyond the beasts -of the desert and the apes of the past, a something in -mysterious affinity with that mighty being he sensed out -there in the darkness, then he would learn it with a -magnified and all-embracing consciousness.</p> - -<p>Adam went to his bed on the warm sands complete in -two characters—a sensing, watching, listening man like -the savage in harmony with the nature of the elements<span class="pagenum" id="Page_160">160</span> -around him, and a feeling, absorbed, and meditating priest -who had begun to divine the secrets beyond the dark-shadowed, -starlit desert waste.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Adam’s first sight of Death Valley came at an early -morning hour, as he turned a last curve in the yawning -canyon he had descended.</p> - -<p>He stood in awe.</p> - -<p>“Oh, desolation!” he cried. And it seemed that, as the -shock of the ghastliness beneath him passed, he remembered -with flashing vividness all that had come to him in -his long desert wanderings, which seemed now to cumulate -its terrible silence, desolation, death, and decay in this -forbidding valley.</p> - -<p>He remembered the origin of that name—Death Valley. -In 1849, when the California gold frenzy had the world in -its grip, seventy Mormon gold seekers had wandered into -this red-walled, white-floored valley, where sixty-eight of -them perished. The two that escaped gave this narrow -sink so many hundred feet below sea level the name Death -Valley! Many and many another emigrant and prospector -and wanderer, by his death from horrible thirst and blasting -heat and poison-dusted wind and destroying avalanche -and blood-freezing cold, had added to the significance of -that name and its dreadful fame. On one side the valley -was shadowed by the ragged Funeral range; on the other -by the red and gloomy Panamints. Furnace Creek, the -hot stream that came down from the burning slopes; and -Ash Meadow, the valley floor, gray and dead, like the -bed of a Dead Sea; and the Devil’s Chair, a huge seat -worn by the elements in the red mountain wall, where -the death king of the valley watched over his fiends—these -names were vivid in Adam’s mind along with others given -by prospectors in uncouth or eloquent speech. “She’s a hummer -in July,” said one; and another, “Salty lid of hell”; and -still another, “Valley of the white shadow of death.”</p> - -<p>Death Valley was more than sixty miles long and from -seven to twelve wide. No two prospectors had ever<span class="pagenum" id="Page_161">161</span> -agreed on these dimensions, although all had been in perfect -harmony as to its hellish qualities. Death was the -guardian of the valley and the specter that patrolled its -beat. Mineral wealth was the irresistible allurement which -dared men to defy its terrors. Gold! Dismukes himself -had claimed there were ledges of gold quartz, and Dismukes -was practical and accurate. Many fabulous stories -of gold hung on the lips of wandering prospectors. The -forbidding red rocks held jewels in their hard confines—garnets, -opals, turquoises; there were cliffs of marble and -walls of onyx. The valley floor was a white crust where -for miles and miles there was nothing but salt and borax. -Beds of soda, of gypsum, of niter, of sulphur, abounded -in the vaster fields of other minerals. It was a valley -where nature had been prodigal of her treasures and terrible -in her hold upon them. But few springs and streams -flowed down into this scoriac sink, and of these all were -heavily impregnated with minerals, all unpalatable, many -sour and sulphuric, some hot, a few of them deadly poison. -In the summer months the heat sometimes went to one -hundred and forty-five degrees. The furnace winds of -midnight were withering to flesh and blood. And sometimes -the air carried invisible death in shape of poison -gas or dust. In winter, sudden changes of temperature, -whirling icy winds down upon a prospector who had gone -to sleep in warmth, would freeze him to death. Avalanches -rolled down the ragged slopes and cloudbursts -carried destruction.</p> - -<p>Adam got his bearings, according to the map made by -Dismukes, and set out from the mouth of the canyon to -cross the valley. A long sandy slope dotted by dwarfed -mesquites extended down to the bare, crinkly floor of the -valley, from which the descent to a lower level was scarcely -perceptible. When Adam’s burros early in the day manifested -uneasiness and weariness there was indeed rough -going. The sand had given way to a hard crust of salt -or borax, and little dimples and cones made it difficult -to place a foot on a level. Some places the crust was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_162">162</span> -fairly hard; in others it cracked and crunched under foot. -The color was a mixture of a dirty white and yellow. Far -ahead Adam could see a dazzling white plain that resembled -frost on a frozen river.</p> - -<p>Adam proceeded cautiously behind the burros. They -did not like the travel, and, wary little beasts that they -were, they stepped gingerly in places, as if trying their -weight before trusting it upon the treacherous-looking -crust. Adam felt the beat of the sun upon him, and the -reflection of heat from the valley floor. He had been less -oppressed upon hotter days than this. The sensations he -began to have here were similar to those he had experienced -in the Salton Sink, where he had gone below sea -level. The oppression seemed to be a blood pressure, as -if the density of the air closed tighter and heavier around -his body.</p> - -<p>At last the burros halted. Adam looked up from the -careful task of placing his feet to see that he had reached -a perfectly smooth bed of salt, glistening as if it were -powdered ice. This was the margin of the place that from -afar had looked like a frozen stream. Stepping down -upon it, Adam found that it trembled and heaved with his -weight, but upheld him. There was absolutely no sign -to tell whether the next yard of surface would hold him -or not. Still, from what he had gone over he believed -he could trust the rest. As he turned to retrace his steps -he saw his tracks just as plainly in the salt as if they had -been imprinted in snow. He led Jennie out, and found -that, though her hoofs sank a little, she could make it by -stepping quickly. She understood as well as he, and when -released went on of her own accord, anxious to get the -serious job over. Adam had to drive the other burro. -The substance grew softer as Adam progressed, and in -the middle of that glistening stream it became wet and -sticky. The burros labored through this lowest level of -the valley, which fortunately was narrow.</p> - -<p>On the other side of it extended a wide flat of salt and -mud, very rough, upheaved as if it had boiled and baked<span class="pagenum" id="Page_163">163</span> -to a crust, then cracked and sunk in places. Full of holes -and pitfalls, and rising in hummocks gnarled and whorled -like huge sea shells, it was an exceedingly toilsome and -dangerous place to travel. The crust continually crumpled -under the hoofs of the burros, and gave forth hollow -sounds, as if a bottomless cavern ran under the valley -floor. As Adam neared the other side he encountered thin -streams of water that resembled acid. It was necessary to -find narrow places in these and leap across. Beyond these -ruts in the crust began an almost imperceptible rise of -the valley floor, which in the course of a couple of miles -led out of the broken, choppy sea of salt to a sand-and-gravel -level. How relieved Adam was to reach that! He -had been more concerned for the safety of the burros -than for his own.</p> - -<p>It was now hot enough for Adam to imagine something -of what a formidable place this valley would be in July -or August. On all sides the mountains stood up dim and -obscure and distant in a strange haze. Low down, the -heat veils lifted in ripples, and any object at a distance -seemed illusive. The last hour taxed Adam’s endurance, -though he could have gone perhaps as far again across -the lavalike crust. When he reached the slope that led -up to the base of the red mountains he halted the burros -for a rest. The drink he took then was significant, for -it was the fullest he had taken in years. He was hot and -wet; his eyes smarted and his feet burned.</p> - -<p>When Adam had rested he consulted the map, and -found that he must travel up the slope and to the west to -gain the black buttress of rock that was his objective point. -And considering how dim it looked through the haze, he -concluded he had better be starting. One moment, however, -he gave to a look at the Funeral range which he had -come through, and which now loomed above the valley, -a magnificent and awe-inspiring upheaval of the earth. -The lower and nearer heights were marked on Dismukes’ -map as the Calico Mountains, and indeed their many colors -justified the name. Beyond and above them towered the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_164">164</span> -Funerals, spiked and peaked, ragged as the edge of a saw, -piercing the blue sky, a gloomy and black-zigzagged and -drab-belted range of desolation and grandeur. Adam’s -gaze slowly shifted westward to the gulf, a hazy void, a -vast valley with streaked and ridged and canyoned slopes -inclosing the abyss into which veils of rain seemed dropping. -Broken clouds had appeared in the west, pierced by -gold and red rays, somewhat dulled by the haze. Adam -was amazed to realize the day was far spent. That scene -up the valley of death was confounding. He gazed spellbound, -and every second saw more and different aspects. -How immense, unreal, weird!</p> - -<p>He got up from the stone seat that had almost burned -through his clothes, and bent his steps westward, driving -the wearying burros ahead of him. Three miles toward the -black buttressed corner he wanted to gain before dark—so -his experienced desert eyes calculated the distance. But -this was Death Valley. No traveler of the desert had ever -correctly measured distance in this valley of shadows and -hazes and illusions. He was making three miles an hour. -Yet at the end of an hour he seemed just as far away as -ever. Another hour was full of deceits and misjudgments. -But at the end of the third he reached the black wall, and -the line that had seemed a corner was the mouth of a -canyon.</p> - -<p>Adam halted, as if at the gateway of the unknown. -The sun was setting behind the mountains that now overhung -him, massive and mighty, a sheer, insurmountable -world of rock which seemed to reach to the ruddy sky. -Wonderful shadows were falling, purple and blue low -down, rosy and gold above; and the canyon smoked with -sunset haze.</p> - -<p>The map of Dismukes marked the canyon, and a spring -of water just beyond its threshold, and also the shack -where the strange man and woman lived under the long -slant of weathered rock. Adam decided not to try to find -the location that night, so he made dry camp.</p> - -<p>Darkness found him weary and oppressed. The day<span class="pagenum" id="Page_165">165</span> -had seemed short, but the distance long. Tired and sleepy -as he was, when he lay down in his bed he felt a striking -dissimilarity of this place to any other he had known on -the desert. How profound the silence! Had any sound -ever pervaded it? All was gloom and shadow below, -with black walls rising to star-fretted sky as blue as -indigo. The valley seemed to be alive. It breathed, yet -invisibly and silently. Indeed, there was a mighty being -awake out there in the black void. Adam could not believe -any man and woman lived up this canyon. Dismukes had -dreamed. Had not Adam heard from many prospectors -how no white woman could live in Death Valley? He had -been there only a day, yet he felt that he could understand -why it must be fatal to women. But it was not so because -of heat and poison wind and cataclysms of nature, for -women could endure those as well as men. But no woman -could stand the alterations of terror and sublimity, of -beauty and horror. That which was feminine in Adam -shuddered at a solitude that seemed fitting to a burned-out -world. He was the last of his race, at the end of its -existence, the strongest finally brought to his doom, and -to-morrow the earth would be sterile—thus Adam’s weary -thoughts passed into dreams.</p> - -<p>He awakened somewhat later than usual. Over the -Funeral range the sun was rising, a coalescing globule of -molten fire, enormous and red, surrounded by a sky-broad -yellow flare. This sunrise seemed strangely closer to the -earth and to him than any sunrise he had ever watched. -The valley was clear, still, empty, a void that made all -objects therein look small and far away. After breakfast -Adam set out to find his burros.</p> - -<p>This high-walled opening did not appear to be a canyon, -but a space made by two mountain slopes running down -to a wash where water flowed at some seasons. Beyond -the corners there opened what seemed to be a gradually -widening and sloping field, gray with rocks and sand and -stunted brush, through the center of which straggled a -line of gnarled mesquites, following the course of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_166">166</span> -wash. Adam found his burros here, Jennie asleep as -usual, and Jack contentedly grazing.</p> - -<p>The cracking of a rock rolling down a rough slope -thrilled Adam. He remembered what Dismukes had said -about the perilous location of the shack where the man -and woman lived under the shadow of a weathering mountain. -Adam turned to look across the space in the direction -whence the sound had come.</p> - -<p>There loomed a mighty mountain slope, absolutely destitute -of plants, a gray, drab million-faceted ascent of rocks. -Adam strode toward it, gradually getting higher and -nearer through the rock-strewn field. It had looked so -close as to seem magnified. But it was a goodly distance. -Presently he espied a rude shack. He halted. That could -not be what he was searching for. Still, it must be. -Adam had not expected the place to be so close to Death -Valley. It was not a quarter of a mile distant from the -valley and not a hundred feet higher than the lowest sink -hole, which was to say that this crude, small structure lay -in Death Valley and below sea level.</p> - -<p>Adam walked on, growing more curious and doubtful. -Surely this hut had been built and abandoned by some -prospector. Yet any prospector could have built a better -abode than this. None but a fool or a knave would have -selected that perilous location. The ground began to -slope a little and become bare of brush, and was dotted -here and there with huge bowlders that looked as if they -had rolled down there recently. No sign of smoke, no -sign of life, no sign of labor—absence of these strengthened -Adam’s doubt of people living there. Suddenly he -espied the deep track of a man’s foot in the sand. Adam -knelt to study it. “Made yesterday,” he said.</p> - -<p>He rose with certainty. Dismukes had been accurate -as to direction, though his distances had been faulty. Adam -gazed beyond the shack, to right, and then left. He espied -a patch of green mesquites and hummocks of grass. There -was the water Dismukes had marked. Then Adam -looked up.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_167">167</span> -A broad belt of huge bowlders lay beyond the shack, -the edge of the talus, the beginning of the base of a -mountain-side, wearing down, weathering away, cracking -into millions of pieces, every one of which had both smooth -and sharp surfaces. This belt was steep and fan shaped, -spreading at the bottom. As it sloped up it grew steeper, -and the rocks grew smaller. It had the flow of a glacier. -It was an avalanche, perhaps sliding inch by inch and -foot by foot, all the time. The curved base of the fan -extended for a couple of miles, in the distance growing -rounded and symmetrical in its lines. It led up to a -stupendous mountain abutment, dull red in color, and so -seamed and cracked and fissured that it had the crisscross -appearance of a rock of net, or numberless stones of -myriad shapes pieced together by some colossal hand, and -now split and broken, ready to fall. Yet this rugged, bold, -uneven surface of mountain wall shone in the sunlight. -It looked as if it had been a solid mass of granite shattered -by some cataclysm of nature. Above this perpendicular -splintered ruin heaved up another slope of broken -rocks, hanging there as if by magic, every one of the -endless heaps of stones leaning ready to roll. Frost and -heat had disintegrated this red mountain. What history -of age was written there! How sinister that dull hue of -red! No beauty shone here, though the sun gleamed on -the millions of facets. The mountain of unstable rock -towered dark and terrible and forbidding even in the -broad light of day. What held that seamed and lined -and sundered mass of rock together! For what was it -waiting? Only time, and the law of the desert! Even -as Adam gazed a weathered fragment loosened from the -heights, rolled off the upper wall, pitched clear into the -air, and cracked ringingly below, to bound and hurtle down -the lower slope, clapping less and less until it ceased with -a little hollow report. That was the story of the mountain. -By atom and by mass it was in motion, working down to -a level. Bowlders twice as large as the shack, weighing -thousands of tons, had rolled down and far out on the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_168">168</span> -field. Any moment another might topple off the rampart -and come hurtling down to find the shack in its path. -Some day the whole slope of loose rock, standing almost -on end, would slide down in avalanche.</p> - -<p>“Well,” muttered Adam, darkly, “any man who made -a woman live there was either crazy or meant her to have -an awful death.”</p> - -<p>Adam strode on to the shack. It might afford shelter -from sun, but not from rain or dust. Packsaddles and -boxes were stacked on one side; empty cans lay scattered -everywhere; a pile of mesquite, recently cut, stood in front -of the aperture that evidently was a door; and on the -sand lay blackened stones and blackened utensils, near -the remains of a still smoldering fire.</p> - -<p>“Hello, inside,” called Adam, as he halted at the door. -No sound answered. He stooped to look in, and saw bare -sand floor, a rude, low table made of box boards, flat -stones for seats, utensils and dishes, shelves littered with -cans and bags. A flimsy partition of poles and canvas, -with a door, separated this room from another and larger -one. Adam saw a narrow bed of blankets raised on poles, -an old valise on the sandy floor, woman’s garments hanging -on the brush walls. He called again, louder this time. -He saw a flash of something gray through the torn canvas, -then heard a low cry—a woman’s voice. Adam raised his -head and stepped back.</p> - -<p>“Elliot!... You’ve come back!” came the voice, -quick, low, and tremulous, betokening relief from dread.</p> - -<p>“No. It’s a stranger,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Oh!” The hurried exclamation was followed by soft -footfalls. A woman in gray appeared in the doorway—a -woman whose proportions were noble, but frail. She had -a white face and large, deep eyes, strained and sad. “Oh—who -are you?”</p> - -<p>“Ma’am, my name’s Wansfell. I’m a friend of Dismukes, -the prospector who was here. I’m crossing Death -Valley and I thought I’d call on you.”</p> - -<p>“Dismukes? The little miner, huge, like a frog?” she<span class="pagenum" id="Page_169">169</span> -queried, quickly, with dilating eyes. “I remember. He -was kind, but— And you’re his friend?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, at your service, ma’am.”</p> - -<p>“Thank—God!” she cried, brokenly, and she leaned back -against the door. “I’m in trouble. I’ve been alone—all—all -night. My husband left yesterday. He took only a -canteen. He said he’d be back for supper.... But—he -didn’t come. Oh, something has happened to him.”</p> - -<p>“Many things happen in the desert,” said Adam. “I’ll -find your husband. I saw his tracks out here in the sand.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, can you find him?”</p> - -<p>“Ma’am, I can track a rabbit to its burrow. Don’t worry -any more. I will track your husband and find him.”</p> - -<p>The woman suddenly seemed to be struck with Adam’s -tone, or the appearance of him. It was as if she had not -particularly noticed him at first. “Once he got lost—was -gone two days. Another time he was overcome by heat—or -something in the air.”</p> - -<p>“You’ve been alone before?” queried Adam, quick to -read the pain of the past in her voice.</p> - -<p>“Alone?... Many—many lonely nights,” she said. -“He’s left me—alone—often—purposely—for me to torture -my soul here in the blackness.... And those rolling -rocks—cracking in the dead of night—and——” Then -the flash of her died out, as if she had realized she was -revealing a shameful secret to a stranger.</p> - -<p>“Ma’am, is your husband just right in his mind?” asked -Adam.</p> - -<p>She hesitated, giving Adam the impression that she -wished to have him think her husband irrational, but -could not truthfully say so.</p> - -<p>“Men do strange things in the desert,” said Adam. “May -I ask, ma’am, have you food and water?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. We’ve plenty. But Elliot makes me cook—and -I never learned how. So we’ve fared poorly. But he eats -little and I less!”</p> - -<p>“Will you tell me how he came to build your hut here -where, sooner or later, it’ll be crushed by rolling stones?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_170">170</span> -A tragic shadow darkened in the large, dark-blue eyes -that Adam now realized were singularly beautiful.</p> - -<p>“I—He— This place was near the water. He cut -the brush here—he didn’t see—wouldn’t believe the -danger,” she faltered. She was telling a lie, and did not -do it well. The fine, sensitive, delicate lips, curved and -soft, sad with pain, had not been fashioned for falsehood.</p> - -<p>“Perhaps I can make him see,” replied Adam. “I’ll go -find him. Probably he’s lost. The heat is not strong -enough to be dangerous. And he’s not been gone long. -Don’t worry. My camp is just below. I’ll fetch him -back to-day—or to-morrow at farthest.”</p> - -<p>She murmured some incoherent thanks. Adam was -again aware of her penetrating glance, staring, wondering -even in her trouble. He strode away with bowed head, -searching the sand for the man’s tracks. Presently he -struck them and saw that they led down toward the -valley.</p> - -<p>To follow such a plain trail was child’s play for Adam’s -desert sight, that had received its early training in the -preservation of his life. He who had trailed lizards to -their holes, and snakes to their rocks, to find them and -eat or die—he was as keen as a wolf on the scent. This -man’s trail led straight down to the open valley, out along -the western bulge of slope, to a dry water hole.</p> - -<p>From there the footprints led down to the parapet of a -wide bench, under which the white crust began its level -monotony toward the other side of the valley. Different -here was it from the place miles below where Adam had -crossed. It was lower—the bottom of the bowl. Adam -found difficulty in breathing, and had sensations like intermittent -rushes of blood to his head. The leaden air -weighed down, and, though his keen scent could not detect -any odor, he knew there was impurity of some kind on the -slow wind. It reminded him that this was Death Valley. -He considered a moment. If the man’s tracks went on -across the valley, Adam would return to camp for a -canteen, then take up the trail again. But the tracks led<span class="pagenum" id="Page_171">171</span> -off westward once more, straggling and aimless. Adam’s -stride made three of one of these steps. He did not care -about the heat. That faint hint of gas, however, caused -him concern. For miles he followed the straggling tracks, -westward to a heave of valley slope that, according to the -map of Dismukes, separated Death Valley from its mate -adjoining—Lost Valley. On the left of this ridge the -tracks wandered up the slope to the base of the mountain -and followed it in wide scallops. The footmarks now -showed the dragging of boots, and little by little they -appeared fresher in the sand. This wanderer had not -rested during the night.</p> - -<p>The tracks grew deeper, more dragging, wavering from -side to side. Here the man had fallen. Adam saw the -imprints of his hands and a smooth furrow where evidently -he had dragged a canteen across the sand. Then -came the telltale signs of where he had again fallen and -had begun to crawl.</p> - -<p>“Looks like the old story,” muttered Adam. “I’ll just -about find him dying or dead.... Better so—for that -woman who called him husband!... I wonder—I -wonder.”</p> - -<p>Adam’s year of wandering had led him far from the -haunts of men, along the lonely desert trails and roads -where only a few solitary humans like himself dared the -elements, or herded in sordid and hard camps; but, nevertheless, -by some virtue growing out of his strife and -adversity, he had come to sense something nameless, to -feel the mighty beat of the heart of the desert, to hear a -mourning music over the silent wastes—a still, sad music -of humanity. It was there, even in the gray wastelands.</p> - -<p>He strode on with contracted eyes, peering through the -hot sunlight. At last he espied a moving object. A huge -land turtle toiling along! No, it was a man crawling on -hands and knees.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_172">172</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Adam</span> ran with the strides of a giant. And he came -up to a man, ragged and dirty, crawling wearily -along, dragging a canteen through the sand.</p> - -<p>“Say, hold on!” called Adam, loudly.</p> - -<p>The man halted, but did not lift his head. Adam bent -down to peer at him.</p> - -<p>“What ails you?” queried Adam, sharply.</p> - -<p>“Huh!” ejaculated the man, stupidly. Adam’s repeated -question, accompanied by a shake, brought only a grunt.</p> - -<p>Adam lifted the man to his feet and, supporting him, -began to lead him over the sand. His equilibrium had been -upset, and, like all men overcome on the desert, he wanted to -plunge off a straight line. Adam persevered, but the labor -of holding him was greater than that of supporting him.</p> - -<p>At length Adam released the straining fellow, as much -out of curiosity to see what he would do as from a realization -that time could not be wasted in this manner. He -did not fall, but swayed and staggered around in a circle, -like an animal that had been struck on the head. The -texture of his ragged garments, the cut of them, the look -of the man, despite his soiled and unkempt appearance, -marked him as one not commonly met with in the desert.</p> - -<p>The coppery sun stood straight overhead and poured -down a strong and leaden heat. Adam calculated that they -were miles from camp and would never reach it at this -rate. He pondered. He must carry the man. Suiting -action to thought, he picked him up and, throwing him -over his shoulder, started to plod on. The weight was -little to one of Adam’s strength, but the squirming and -wrestling of the fellow to get down made Adam flounder -in the sand.</p> - -<div id="ip_172" class="figcenter" style="max-width: 18em;"> - <img src="images/i_172.jpg" width="282" height="600" alt="" /> - <div class="caption">BUT AT LENGTH THE BURDEN OF A HEAVY WEIGHT, AND THE DRAGGING - SAND, AND THE HOT SUN, BROUGHT ADAM TO A PASS WHERE - REST WAS IMPERATIVE</div></div> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_173">173</span> -“You poor devil!” muttered Adam, at last brought to -a standstill. “Maybe I can’t save your life, anyway.”</p> - -<p>With that he set the man down and, swinging a powerful -blow, laid him stunned upon the sand. Whereupon it -was easy to lift him and throw him over a shoulder like -an empty sack. Not for a long distance over the sand -did that task become prodigious. But at length the burden -of a heavy weight and the dragging sand and the hot sun -brought Adam to a pass where rest was imperative. He -laid the unconscious man down while he recovered breath -and strength. Then he picked him up and went on.</p> - -<p>After that he plodded slower, rested oftener, weakened -more perceptibly. Meanwhile the hours passed, and -when he reached the huge gateway in the red iron mountain -wall the sun was gone and purple shadows were -mustering in the valley. When he reached the more level -field where the thick-strewn bowlders lay, all before his -eyes seemed red. A million needles were stinging his -nerves, running like spears of light into his darkened -sight.</p> - -<p>The limit that he had put upon his endurance was to -reach the shack. He did so, and he was nearly blind when -the woman’s poignant call thrilled his throbbing ears. He -saw her—a white shape through ruddy haze. Then he -deposited his burden on the sand.</p> - -<p>“Oh!” the woman moaned. “He’s dead!”</p> - -<p>Adam shook his head. Pity, fear, and even terror rang -in her poignant cry, but not love.</p> - -<p>“Ah!... You’ve saved him, then.... He’s injured—there’s -a great bruise—he breathes so heavily.”</p> - -<p>While Adam sat panting, unable to speak, the woman -wiped her husband’s face and worked over him.</p> - -<p>“He came back once—and fell into a stupor like this, -but not so deep. What can it be?”</p> - -<p>“Poison—air,” choked Adam.</p> - -<p>“Oh, this terrible Death Valley!” she cried.</p> - -<p>Adam’s sight cleared and he saw the woman, clad in -a white robe over her gray dress, a garment clean and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_174">174</span> -rich, falling in thick folds—strange to Adam’s sight, recalling -the past. The afterglow of sunset shone down into the -valley, lighting her face. Once she must have been beautiful. -The perfect lines, the noble brow, the curved lips, -were there, but her face was thin, strained, tragic. Only -the eyes held beauty still.</p> - -<p>“You saved him?” she queried, with quick-drawn breath.</p> - -<p>“Found him—miles and miles—up the—valley—crawling -on—his hands and knees,” panted Adam. “I had—to -carry him.”</p> - -<p>“You carried him!” she exclaimed, incredulously. Then -the large eyes blazed. “So that’s why you were so livid—why -you fell?... Oh, you splendid man! You giant!... -He’d have died out there—alone. I thank you with -all my heart.”</p> - -<p>She reached a white worn hand to touch Adam’s with -an exquisite eloquence of gratitude.</p> - -<p>“Get water—bathe him,” said Adam. “Have you -ammonia or whisky?” And while he laboriously got to -his knees the woman ran into the shack. He rose, feeling -giddy and weak. All his muscles seemed beaten and -bruised, and his heart pained. Soon the woman came -hurrying out, with basin and towel and a little black satchel -that evidently contained medicines. Adam helped her -work over her husband, but, though they revived him, -they could not bring him back to intelligent consciousness.</p> - -<p>“Help me carry him in,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>Inside the little shack it was almost too dark to see -plainly.</p> - -<p>“Have you a light?” he added.</p> - -<p>“No,” she replied.</p> - -<p>“I’ll fetch a candle. You watch over him while I move -my camp up here. You might change his shirt, if he’s -got another. I’ll be back right away, and I’ll start a fire—get -some supper for us.”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>By the time Adam had packed and moved his effects -darkness had settled down between the slopes of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_175">175</span> -mountains. After he had unpacked near the shack, his -first move was to light a candle and take it to the door.</p> - -<p>“Here’s a light, ma’am,” he called.</p> - -<p>She glided silently out of the gloom, her garments gleaming -ghostlike and her white face with its luminous eyes, -dark and strange as midnight, looking like a woman’s face -in tragic dreams. As she took the candle her hand touched -Adam’s.</p> - -<p>“Thank you,” she said. “Please don’t call me ma’am. -My name is Magdalene Virey.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll try to remember.... Has your husband come to -yet?”</p> - -<p>“No. He seems to have fallen into a stupor. Won’t -you look at him?”</p> - -<p>Adam followed her inside and saw that she marked his -lofty height. The shack had not been built for anyone -of his stature.</p> - -<p>“How tall you are!” she murmured.</p> - -<p>The candle did not throw a bright light, yet by its aid -Adam made out the features of the man whose life he -had saved. It seemed to Adam to be the face of a Lucifer -whose fiendish passions were now restrained by sleep. -Whoever this man was, he had suffered a broken heart -and ruined life.</p> - -<p>“He’s asleep,” said Adam. “That’s not a trance or -stupor. He’s worn out. I believe it’d be better not to -wake him.”</p> - -<p>“You think so?” she replied, with quick relief.</p> - -<p>“I’m not sure. Perhaps if you watch him awhile you -can tell.... I’ll get some supper and call you.”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Adam’s habitual dexterity over camp tasks failed him -this evening. Presently, however, the supper was ready, -and he threw brush on the fire to make a light.</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Virey,” he called at the door, “come and eat now.”</p> - -<p>When had the camp fire of his greeted such a vision, except -in his vague dreams? Tall, white-gowned, slender, and -graceful, with the poise of a woman aloof and proud and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_176">176</span> -the sad face of a Madonna—what a woman to sit at -Adam’s camp fire in Death Valley! The shadowed and -thick light hid the ravages that had by day impaired her -beauty. Adam placed a canvas pack for her to sit upon, -and then he served her, with something that was not wholly -unconscious satisfaction. Of all men, he of the desert -could tell the signs of hunger; and the impression had -come to him that she was half starved. The way she ate -brought home to Adam with a pang the memorable days -when he was starving. This woman sitting in the warm, -enhancing glow of the camp fire had an exquisitely spiritual -face. She had seemed all spirit. But self-preservation -was the first instinct and the first law of human nature, -or any nature.</p> - -<p>“When have I eaten so heartily!” she exclaimed at last. -“But, oh! it all tasted so good.... Sir, you are a capital -cook.”</p> - -<p>“Thank you,” replied Adam, much gratified.</p> - -<p>“Do you always fare so well?”</p> - -<p>“No. I’m bound to confess I somewhat outdid myself -to-night. You see, I seldom have such opportunity to -serve a woman.”</p> - -<p>She rested her elbows on her knees, with her hands under -her chin, and looked at him with intense interest. In the -night her eyes seemed very full and large, supernaturally -bright and tragic. They were the eyes of a woman who -still preserved in her something of inherent faith in mankind. -Adam divined that she had scarcely looked at him -before as an individual with a personality, and that some -accent or word of his had struck her singularly.</p> - -<p>“It was that miner, <span class="locked">Dis—Dis——”</span></p> - -<p>“Dismukes,” added Adam.</p> - -<p>“Yes. It was he who sent you here. Are you a miner, -too?”</p> - -<p>“No. I care little for gold.”</p> - -<p>“Ah!... What are you, then?”</p> - -<p>“Just a wanderer. Wansfell, the Wanderer, they call -me.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_177">177</span> -“They? Who are they?”</p> - -<p>“Why, I suppose they are the other wanderers. Men -who tramp over the desert—men who seek gold or forgetfulness -or peace or solitude—men who are driven—or -who hide. These are few, but, taken by the years, they -seem many.”</p> - -<p>“Men of the desert have passed by here, but none like -you,” she replied, with gravity, and her eyes pierced him. -“<em>Why</em> did you come?”</p> - -<p>“Years ago my life was ruined,” said Adam, slowly. -“I chose to fight the desert. And in all the years the thing -that helped me most was not to pass by anyone in trouble. -The desert sees strange visitors. Life is naked here, like -those stark mountain-sides.... Dismukes is my friend—he -saved me from death once. He is a man who knows -this wasteland. He told me about your being here. He -said no white woman could live in Death Valley.... I -wondered—if I might—at least advise you, turn you back—and -so I came.”</p> - -<p>His earnestness deeply affected her.</p> - -<p>“Sir, your kind words warm a cold and forlorn heart,” -she said. “But I cannot be turned back. It’s too late.”</p> - -<p>“No hour is ever too late.... Mrs. Virey, I’ll not -distress you with advice or importunities. I know too well -the need and the meaning of peace. But the fact of your -being here—a woman of your evident quality—a woman -of your sensitiveness and delicate health—why, it is a -terrible thing! This is Death Valley. The month is -April. Soon it will be May—then June. When midsummer -comes you cannot survive here. I know nothing -of <em>why</em> you are here—I don’t seek to know. But you -cannot stay. It would be a miracle for your husband to -find gold here, if that is what he seeks. Surely he has -discovered that.”</p> - -<p>“Virey does not seek gold,” the woman said.</p> - -<p>“Does he know that a white woman absolutely cannot -live here in Death Valley? Even the Indians abandon it -in summer.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_178">178</span> -“He knows. There are Shoshone Indians up on the -mountains now. They pack supplies to us. They have -warned him.”</p> - -<p>Adam could ask no more, yet how impossible not to -feel an absorbing interest in this woman’s fate. As he -sat with bowed head, watching the glowing and paling -of the red embers, he felt her gaze upon him.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, you must have a great heart—like your -body,” she said, presently. “It is blessed to meet such a -man. Your kindness, your interest, soften my harsh and -bitter doubt of men. We are utter strangers. But there’s -something in this desert that bridges time—that bids me -open my lips to you ... a man who traveled this ghastly -valley to serve me!... My husband, Virey, knows that -Death Valley is a hell on earth. So do I. That is why -he brought me ... that is why I came!”</p> - -<p>“My God!” breathed Adam, staring incredulously at -her. Dismukes had prepared him for tragedy; the desert -had shown him many dark and terrible calamities, misfortunes, -mysteries; he had imagined he could no longer -be thrown off his balance by amaze. But that a sad-eyed, -sweet-voiced woman, whose every tone and gesture and -look spoke of refinement and education, of a life infinitely -removed from the wild ruggedness of the desert West—that -she could intimate what seemed in one breath both -murder and suicide—this staggered Adam’s credulity.</p> - -<p>Yet, as he stared at her, realizing the tremendous passion -of will, of spirit, of something more than emanated -from her, divining how in her case intellect and culture -had been added to the eternal feminine of her nature, he -knew she spoke the truth. Adam had met women on the -desert, and all of them were riddles. Yet what a vast -range between Margarita Arallanes and Magdalene Virey!</p> - -<p>“Won’t your husband leave—take you away from here?” -asked Adam, slowly.</p> - -<p>“No.”</p> - -<p>“Well—I have a way of forcing men to see things. -I suppose <span class="locked">I——”</span></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_179">179</span> -“Useless! We have traveled three thousand miles to -get to Death Valley. Years ago Elliot Virey read about -this awful place. He was always interested. He learned -that it was the most arid, ghastly, desolate, and terrible -place of death in all the world.... Then, when he got -me to Sacramento—and to Placerville—he would talk -with miners, prospectors, Indians—anyone who could tell -him about Death Valley.... Virey had a reason for finding -a hell on earth. We crossed the mountains, range after -range—and here we are.... Sir, the hell of which we -read—even in its bottommost pit—cannot be worse than -Death Valley.”</p> - -<p>“You will let me take you home—at least out of the -desert?” queried Adam, with passionate sharpness.</p> - -<p>“Sir, I thank you again,” she replied, her voice thrilling -richly. “But no—no! You do not understand—you cannot—and -it’s impossible to explain.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! Yes, some things are.... Suppose you let me -move your camp higher up, out of this thick, dead air and -heat—where there are trees and good water?”</p> - -<p>“But it is not a beautiful and a comfortable camp that -Virey—that we want,” she said, bitterly.</p> - -<p>“Then let me move your shack across the wash out of -danger. This spot is the most forbidding I ever saw. -That mountain above us is on the move. The whole -cracked slope is sliding like a glacier. It is an avalanche -waiting for a jar—a slip—something to start it. The -rocks are rolling down all the time.”</p> - -<p>“Have I not heard the rocks—cracking, ringing—in the -dead of night!” she cried, shuddering. Her slender form -seemed to draw within itself and the white, slim hands -clenched her gown. “Rocks! How I’ve learned to hate -them! These rolling rocks are living things. I’ve heard -them slide and crack, roll and ring—hit the sand with a -thump, and then with whistle and thud go by where I lay -in the dark.... People who live as I have lived know -nothing of the elements. I had no fear of the desert—nor -of Death Valley. I dared it. I laughed to scorn the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_180">180</span> -idea that any barren wild valley, any maelstrom of the -sea, any Sodom of a city could be worse than the chaos of -my soul.... But I didn’t know. I am human. I’m a -woman. A woman is meant to bear children. Nothing -else!... I learned that I was afraid of the dark—that -such fear had been born in me. These rolling rocks got -on my nerves. I wait—I listen for them. And I pray.... -Then the silence—that became so dreadful. It is -insupportable. Worse than all is the loneliness.... Oh, -this God-forsaken, lonely Death Valley! It will drive -me mad.”</p> - -<p>As Adam had anticipated, no matter what strength of -will, what sense of secrecy bound this woman’s lips, she -had been victim to the sound of her own voice, which, -liberated by his sympathy, had spoken, and a word, as it -were, had led to a full, deep, passionate utterance.</p> - -<p>“True. All too terribly true,” replied Adam. “And -for a woman—for you—these feelings will grow more -intense.... I beg of you, at least let me move your camp -back out of danger.”</p> - -<p>“No! Not a single foot!” she blazed, as if confronted -with something beyond his words. After that she hid -her face in her hands. A long silence ensued. Adam, -watching her, saw when the tremble and heave of her -breast subsided. At length she looked up again, apparently -composed. “Perhaps I talked more than I should have. -But no matter. It was necessary to tell you something. -For you came here to help an unknown woman. Not to -anyone else have I breathed a word of the true state of my -feelings. My husband watches me like a hawk, but not yet -does he know my fears. I’ll thank you, when you speak -to him, if you stay here so long, not to tell him anything -I’ve said.”</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Virey, I’ll stay as long as you are here,” said -Adam, simply.</p> - -<p>The simplicity of his speech, coupled with the tremendous -suggestion in the fact of his physical presence, his -strength and knowledge to serve her despite her bitter<span class="pagenum" id="Page_181">181</span> -repudiation, seemed again to knock at the heart of her -femininity. In the beginning of human life on the earth, -and through its primal development, there was always a -man to protect a woman. But subtly and inevitably there -had been in Adam’s words an intimation that Magdalene -Virey stood absolutely alone. More, for with spirit, if -not with body, she was fighting Death Valley, and also -some terrible relation her husband bore to her.</p> - -<p>“Sir—you would stay here—on a possible chance of -serving me?” she whispered.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Virey will not like that.”</p> - -<p>“I’m not sure, but I suspect it’ll not make any difference -to me what he likes.”</p> - -<p>“If you are kind to me he will drive you away,” she -went on, with agitation.</p> - -<p>“Well, as he’s your husband he may prevent me from -being kind, but he can’t drive me away.”</p> - -<p>“But suppose I ask you to go?”</p> - -<p>“If that’s the greatest kindness I can do you—well, I’ll -go.... But do you ask me?”</p> - -<p>“I—I don’t know. I may be forced to—not by <em>him</em>, -but by my pride,” she said, desperately. “Oh, I’m unstrung! -I don’t know what to say.... After all, just -the sound of a kind voice makes me a coward. O God! -if people in the world only knew the value of kindness! -I never did know.... This desert of horrors teaches the -truth of life.... Once I had the world at my feet!... -Now I break and bow at the sympathy of a stranger!”</p> - -<p>“Never mind your pride,” said Adam, in his slow, cool -way. “I understand. I’ve a good deal of a woman in me. -Whatever brought you to Death Valley, whatever nails you -here, is nothing to me. Even if I learn it, what need that -be to you? If you do not want me to stay to work for -you, watch over your husband—why, let me stay for my -own sake.”</p> - -<p>She rose and faced him, with soul-searching eyes. She -could not escape her nature. Emotion governed her.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_182">182</span> -“Sir, you speak nobly,” she replied, with lips that trembled. -“But I don’t understand you. Stay here—where I -am—for your sake! Explain, please.”</p> - -<p>“I have my burden. Once it was even more terrible -than yours. Through that I can feel as you feel now. -I have lived the loneliness—the insupportable loneliness—of -the desert—the silence, the heat, the hell. But my -burden still weighs on my soul. If I might somehow help -your husband, who is going wrong, blindly following some -road of passion—change him or stop him, why that would -ease my burden. If I might save you weariness, or -physical pain, or hunger, or thirst, or terror—it would be -doing more for myself than for you.... We are in Death -Valley. You refuse to leave. We are, right here, two -hundred feet below sea level. When the furnace heat -comes—when the blasting midnight wind comes—it means -either madness or death.”</p> - -<p>“Stay—Sir Knight,” she said, with a hollow, ringing -gayety. “Who shall say that chivalry is dead?... Stay! -and know this. I fear no man. I scorn death.... But, -ah, the woman of me! I hate dirt and vermin. I’m -afraid of pain. I suffer agonies even before I’m hurt. -I miss so unforgettably the luxuries of life. And lastly, I -have a mortal terror of going mad. Spare me that and -you will have my prayers in this world—and beyond.... -Good night.”</p> - -<p>“Good night,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>She left him to the deepening gloom and the dying camp -fire. Adam soon grew conscious of extreme fatigue in -mind and body. Spreading his blankets on the sands, he -stretched his weary, aching body without even an upward -glance at the stars, and fell asleep.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Daylight again, as if by the opening of eyelids! The -rose color was vying with the blue of the sky and a noble -gold crowned the line of eastern range which Adam could -see through the V-shaped split that opened into the valley.</p> - -<p>He pulled on his boots, and gave his face an unusual<span class="pagenum" id="Page_183">183</span> -and detrimental luxury in the desert. Water was bad -for exposed flesh in arid country. The usual spring and -buoyancy of his physical being was lacking this day. Such -overstrain as yesterday’s would require time to be remedied. -So Adam moved slowly and with caution.</p> - -<p>First Adam went to the spring. He found a bubbling -gush of velvet-looking water pouring out of a hole and -running a few rods to sink into the sand. The color -of it seemed inviting—so clear and soft and somehow -rich. The music of its murmur, too, was melodious. -Adam was a connoisseur of waters. What desert wanderer -of years was not? Before he tasted this water, -despite its promise, he knew it was not good. Yet it -did not have exactly an unpleasant taste. Dismukes had -said this water was all right, yet he seldom stayed long -enough in one locality to learn the ill effects of the -water. Adam knew he too could live on this water. But -he was thinking of the delicate woman lost here in Death -Valley with an idiot or a knave of a husband.</p> - -<p>The spring was located some two hundred yards or -more from the shack and just out of line of the rock-strewn -slope. Spreading like a fan, this weathered slant -of stones extended its long, curved length in the opposite -direction. Adam decided to pitch his permanent camp, -or at least sleeping place, here on the grass. Here he -erected a brush-and-canvas shelter to make shade, and -deposited his effects under it. That done, he returned -to the shack to cook breakfast.</p> - -<p>There appeared to be no life in the rude little misshapen -hut. Had the man who built it ever been a boy? -There were men so utterly helpless and useless out in -the wilds, where existence depended upon labor of hands, -that they seemed foreign to the descendants of Americans. -Adam could not but wonder about the man lying in there, -though he tried hard to confine his reflections to the -woman. He did not like the situation. Of what avail -the strong arm, the desert-taught fierceness to survive? -If this man and woman had ever possessed instincts to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_184">184</span> -live, to fight, to reproduce their kind, to be of use in the -world, they had subverted them to the debasements of -sophisticated and selfish existence. The woman loomed -big to Adam, and he believed she had been dragged down -by a weak and vicious man.</p> - -<p>Leisurely Adam attended to the preparation of breakfast, -prolonging tasks that always passed swiftly through -his hands.</p> - -<p>“Good morning, Sir Wansfell,” called a voice with -something of mockery in it, yet rich and wistful—a low-pitched -contralto voice full of music and pathos and a -pervading bitterness.</p> - -<p>It stirred Adam’s blood, so sluggish this morning. It -seemed to carry an echo from his distant past. Turning, -he saw the woman, clad in gray, with a girdle of cord -twisted around her slender waist. Soft and clean and -fleecy, that gray garment, so out of place there, so utterly -incongruous against the background of crude shack and -wild slope, somehow fitted her voice as it did her fragile -shape, somehow set her infinitely apart from the women -Adam had met in his desert wanderings. She came from -the great world outside, a delicate spark from the solid -flint of class, a thoroughbred whom years before the desert -might have saved.</p> - -<p>“Good morning, Mrs. Virey,” returned Adam. “How -are you—and did your husband awake?”</p> - -<p>“I slept better than for long,” she replied, “and I think -I know why.... Yes, Virey came to. He’s conscious, -and asked for water. But he’s weak—strange. I’d like -you to look at him presently.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I will.”</p> - -<p>“And how are you after your tremendous exertions of -yesterday?” she inquired.</p> - -<p>“Not so spry,” said Adam, with a smile. “But I’ll be -myself in a day or so. I believe the air down in the valley -affected me a little. My lungs are sore.... I think it -would be more comfortable for you if we had breakfast -in your kitchen. The sun is hot.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_185">185</span> -“Indeed yes. So you mean to—to do this—this camp -work for me—in spite <span class="locked">of——”</span></p> - -<p>“Yes. I always oppose women,” he said. “And that -is about once every two or three years. You see, women -are scarce on the desert.”</p> - -<p>“Last night I was upset. I am sorry that I was ungracious. -I thank you, and I am only too glad to accept -your kind service,” she said, earnestly.</p> - -<p>“That is well. Now, will you help me carry in the -breakfast?”</p> - -<p>Unreality was not unusual to Adam. The desert had -as many unrealities, illusions, and specters as it had natural -and tangible things. But while he sat opposite to this -fascinating woman, whose garments exuded some subtle -fragrance of perfume, whose shadowed, beautiful face -shone like a cameo against the drab wall of the brush shack, -he was hard put to it to convince himself of actuality. -She ate daintily, but she was hungry. The gray gown -fell in graceful folds around the low stone seat. The -rude table between them was a box, narrow and uneven.</p> - -<p>“Shall I try to get Virey to eat?” she asked, presently.</p> - -<p>“That depends. On the desert, after a collapse, we -are careful with food and water.”</p> - -<p>“Will you look at him?”</p> - -<p>Adam followed her as she swept aside a flap of the -canvas partition. This room was larger and lighter. It -had an aperture for a window. Adam’s quick glance took -this in, and then the two narrow beds of blankets raised -on brush cots. Virey lay on the one farther from the -door. His pallid brow and unshaven face appeared drawn -into terrible lines, which, of course, Adam could not be -sure were permanent or the result of the collapse in the -valley. He inclined, however, to the conviction that Virey’s -face was the distorted reflection of a tortured soul. Surely -he had been handsome once. He had deep-set black eyes, -a straight nose, and a mouth that betrayed him, despite -its being half hidden under a mustache. Adam, keen and -strung in that moment as he received his impressions of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_186">186</span> -Virey, felt the woman’s intensity as if he had been studying -her instead of her husband. How singular women -were! How could it matter to her what opinion he formed -of her husband? Adam knew he had been powerfully -prejudiced against this man, but he had held in stern -abeyance all judgment until he could look at him. For -long years Adam had gazed into the face of the desert. -Outward appearance could not deceive him. As the cactus -revealed its ruthless nature, as the tiny inch-high flower -bloomed in its perishable but imperative proof of beauty -as well as life, as the long flowing sands of the desert -betrayed the destructive design of the universe—so the -face of any man was the image of his soul. And Adam -recoiled instinctively, if not outwardly, at what he read -in Virey’s face.</p> - -<p>“You’re in pain?” queried Adam.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” came the husky whisper, and Virey put a hand -on his breast.</p> - -<p>“It’s sore here,” said Adam, feeling Virey. “You’ve -breathed poisoned air down in the valley. It acts like -ether.... You just lie quiet for a while. I’ll do the -work around camp.”</p> - -<p>“Thank you,” whispered Virey.</p> - -<p>The woman followed Adam outside and gazed earnestly -up at him, unconscious of herself, with her face closer -than it had ever been to him and full in the sunlight. It -struck Adam that the difference between desert flowers -and the faces of beautiful women was one of emotion. -How much better to have the brief hour of an unconscious -flower, wasting its fragrance on the desert air!</p> - -<p>“He’s ill, don’t you think?” queried the woman.</p> - -<p>“No. But he recovers slowly. A man must have a -perfect heart and powerful lungs to battle against the many -perils in this country. But Virey will get over this all -right.”</p> - -<p>“You never give up, do you?” she inquired.</p> - -<p>“Come to think of that, I guess I never do,” replied -Adam.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_187">187</span> -“Such spirit is worthy of a better cause. You are -doomed here to failure.”</p> - -<p>“Well, I’m not infallible, that’s certain. But you can -never tell. The fact of my standing here is proof of the -overcoming of almost impossible things. I can’t make -Death Valley habitable for you, but I can lessen the hardships. -How long have you been here?”</p> - -<p>“Several months. But it’s years to me.”</p> - -<p>“Who brought you down? How did you get here?”</p> - -<p>“We’ve had different guides. The last were Shoshone -Indians, who accompanied us across a range of mountains, -then a valley, and last over the Panamints. They left us -here. I rode a horse. Virey walked the last stages of -this journey to Death Valley—from which there will be -no return. We turned horse and burros loose. I have -not seen them since.”</p> - -<p>“Are these Shoshones supposed to visit you occasionally?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. Virey made a deal with them to come every full -moon. We’ve had more supplies than we need. The -trouble is that Virey has the inclination to eat, but I have -not the skill to prepare food wholesomely under these -rough conditions. So we almost starved.”</p> - -<p>“Well, let me take charge of camp duties. You nurse -your husband and don’t neglect yourself. It’s the least -you can do. You’ll have hardship and suffering enough, -even at best. You’ve suffered, I can see, but not physically. -And you never knew what hardship meant until you got -into the desert. If you <em>live</em>, these things will cure you of -any trouble. They’ll hardly cure Virey, for he has retrograded. -Most men in the desert follow the line of least -resistance. They sink. But <em>you</em> will not.... And let -me tell you. There are elemental pangs of hunger, of -thirst, of pain that are blessings in disguise. You’ll learn -what rest is and sleep and loneliness. People who live -as you have lived are lopsided. What do they know of life -close to the earth? Any other life is false. Cities, swarms -of men and women, riches, luxury, poverty—these were<span class="pagenum" id="Page_188">188</span> -not in nature’s scheme of life.... Mrs. Virey, if anything -<em>can</em> change your soul it will be the desert.”</p> - -<p>“Ah, Sir Wansfell, so you have philosophy as well as -chivalry,” she replied, with the faint accent that seemed -to be mockery of herself. “Change my soul if you can, -wanderer of the desert! I am a woman, and a woman is -symbolical of change. Teach me to cook, to work, to -grow strong, to endure, to fight, to look up at those dark -hills whence cometh your strength.... I am here in -Death Valley. I will never leave it in body. My bones -will mingle with the sands and molder to dust.... But -my soul—ah! that black gulf of doubt, of agony, of terror, -of hate—change <em>that</em> if you can.”</p> - -<p>These tragic, eloquent words chained Adam to Death -Valley as if they had been links of steel; and thus began -his long sojourn there.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Work or action was always necessary to Adam. They -had become second nature. He planned a brush shelter -from the sun, a sort of outside room adjoining the shack, -a stone fireplace and table and seats, a low stone wall to -keep out blowing sand, and a thick, heavy stone fence -between the shack and the slope of sliding rocks. When -these tasks were finished there would be others, and -always there would be the slopes to climb, the valley to -explore. Idleness in Death Valley was a forerunner of -madness. There must be a reserve fund of long work and -exercise, so that when the blazing, leaden-hazed middays -of August came, with idleness imperative, there would be -both physical force and unclouded mind to endure them. -The men who succumbed to madness in this valley were -those who had not understood how to combat it.</p> - -<p>That day passed swiftly, and the twilight hour seemed -to have less of gloom and forbidding intimations. That -might well have been due to his eternal hope. Mrs. Virey -showed less gravity and melancholy, and not once did she -speak with bitterness or passion. She informed Adam -that Virey had improved.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_189">189</span> -Two more days slipped by, and on the third Virey got -up and came forth into the sunlight. Adam happened to -be at work near by. He saw Virey gaze around at the -improvements that had been made and say something -about them to his wife. He looked a man who should -have been in the prime of life. Approaching with slow -gait and haggard face, he addressed Adam.</p> - -<p>“You expect pay for this puttering around?”</p> - -<p>“No,” replied Adam, shortly.</p> - -<p>“How’s that?”</p> - -<p>“Well, when men are used to the desert, as I am, they -lend a hand where it is needed. That’s not often.”</p> - -<p>“But I didn’t want any such work done round my camp.”</p> - -<p>“I know, and I excuse you because you’re ignorant of -desert ways and needs.”</p> - -<p>“The question of excuse for me is offensive.”</p> - -<p>Adam, rising abreast of the stone wall he was building, -fixed his piercing eyes upon this man. Mrs. Virey stood -a little to one side, but not out of range of Adam’s gaze. -Did a mocking light show in her shadowy eyes? The -doubt, the curiosity in her expression must have related -to Adam. That slight, subtle something about her revealed -to Adam the inevitableness of disappointment in -store for him if he still entertained any hopes of amenable -relations with Virey.</p> - -<p>“We all have to be excused sometimes,” said Adam, -deliberately. “Now I had to excuse you on the score of -ignorance of the desert. You chose this place as a camp. -It happens to be the most dangerous spot I ever saw. Any -moment a stone may roll down that slope to kill you. -Any moment the whole avalanche may start. That slope -is an avalanche.”</p> - -<p>“It’s my business where I camp,” rejoined Virey.</p> - -<p>“Were you aware of the danger here?”</p> - -<p>“I am indifferent to danger.”</p> - -<p>“But you are not alone. You have a woman with you.”</p> - -<p>Manifestly, Virey had been speaking without weighing -words and looking at Adam without really seeing him.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_190">190</span> -The brooding shade passed out of his eyes, and in its -place grew a light of interest that leaped to the crystal-cold -clearness of a lens.</p> - -<p>“You’re a prospector,” he asserted.</p> - -<p>“No. I pan a little gold dust once in a while for fun, -because I happen across it.”</p> - -<p>“You’re no miner, then—nor hunter, nor teamster.”</p> - -<p>“I’ve been a little of all you name, but I can’t be called -any one of them.”</p> - -<p>“You might be one of the robbers that infest these -hills.”</p> - -<p>“I might be, only I’m not,” declared Adam, dryly. The -fire in his depths stirred restlessly, but he kept a cool, -smothering control over it. He felt disposed to be lenient -and kind toward this unfortunate man. If only the woman -had not stood there with that half-veiled mocking shadow -of doubt in her eyes!</p> - -<p>“You’re an educated man!” ejaculated Virey, incredulously.</p> - -<p>“I might claim to be specially educated in the ways of -the desert.”</p> - -<p>“And the ways of women, are <em>they</em> mysteries to you?” -queried Virey, with scorn. His interrogation seemed like -a bitter doubt flung out of an immeasurable depth of -passion.</p> - -<p>“I confess that they are,” replied Adam. “I’ve lived a -lonely life. Few women have crossed my trail.”</p> - -<p>“You don’t realize your good fortune—if you tell the -truth.”</p> - -<p>“I would not lie to any man,” returned Adam, bluntly.</p> - -<p>“Bah! Men are all liars, and women make them so.... -You’re hanging round my camp, making a bluff of -work.”</p> - -<p>“I deny that. Heaving these stones is work. <em>You</em> -lift a few of them in this hot sun.... And my packing -you on my back for ten miles over the floor of Death -Valley—was that a bluff?”</p> - -<p>“You saved my life!” exclaimed the man, stung to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_191">191</span> -passion. There seemed to be contending tides within him—a -fight of old habits of thought, fineness of feeling, -against an all-absorbing and dominating malignancy. -“Man, I can’t thank you for that.... You’ve done me -no service.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t want or expect thanks. I was thinking of the -effort it cost me.”</p> - -<p>“As a man who was once a gentleman, I do thank you—which -is a courtesy due my past. But now that you have -put me in debt for a service I didn’t want, why do you -linger here?”</p> - -<p>“I wish to help your wife.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! that’s frank of you. That frankness is something -for which I really thank you. But you’ll pardon me if -I’m inclined to doubt the idealistic nature of your motive -to help her.”</p> - -<p>Adam pondered over this speech without reply. Words -always came fluently when he was ready to speak. And -he seemed more concerned over Virey’s caustic bitterness -than over his meaning. Then, as he met the magnificent -flash in Magdalene Virey’s eyes, he was inspired into -revelation of Virey’s veiled hint and into a serenity he -divined would be kindest to her pride.</p> - -<p>“Go ahead and help her,” Virey went on. “You have -my sincere felicitations. My charming wife is helpless -enough. I never knew how helpless till we were thrown -upon our own resources. She cannot even cook a potato. -And as for baking bread in one of those miserable black -ovens, stranger, if you eat some of it I will not be long -annoyed by your attentions to her.”</p> - -<p>“Well, I’ll teach her,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>His practical response irritated Virey excessively. It -was as if he wished to insult and inflame, and had not -considered a literal application to his words.</p> - -<p>“Who are you? What’s your name?” he queried, yielding -to a roused curiosity.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell?” echoed Virey. The name struck a chord of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_192">192</span> -memory—a discordant one. He bent forward a little, at -a point between curiosity and excitement. “Wansfell?... -I know that name. Are you the man who in this -desert country is called Wansfell the Wanderer?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I’m that Wansfell.”</p> - -<p>“I heard a prospector tell about you,” went on Virey, -his haggard face now quickened by thought. “It was at -a camp near a gold mine over here somewhere—I forget -where. But the prospector said he had seen you kill a -man named Mc something—McKin—no, McKue. That’s -the name.... Did he tell the truth?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I’m sorry to say. I killed Baldy McKue—or -rather, to speak as I feel, I was the means by which the -desert dealt McKue the death justly due him.”</p> - -<p>Virey now glowed with excitement, changing the man.</p> - -<p>“Somehow that story haunted me,” he said. “I never -heard one like it.... This prospector told how you confronted -McKue in the street of a mining camp. In front -of a gambling hell, or maybe it was a hotel. You yelled -like a demon at McKue. He turned white as a sheet. -He jerked his gun, began to shoot. But you bore a -charmed life. His bullets did not hit you, or, if they -did, to no purpose. You leaped upon him. His gun flew -one way, his hat another.... Then—then you killed him -with your hands!... Is that true?”</p> - -<p>Adam nodded gloomily. The tale, told vividly by this -seemingly galvanized Virey, was not pleasant. And the -woman stood there, transfixed, with white face and tragic -eyes.</p> - -<p>“My God! You killed McKue by sheer strength—with -your bare hands!... I had not looked at your hands. -I see them now.... So McKue was your enemy?”</p> - -<p>“No. I never saw him before that day,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>Virey slowly drew back wonderingly, yet with instinctive -shrinking. Certain it was that his lips stiffened.</p> - -<p>“Then why did you kill him?”</p> - -<p>“He ill-treated a woman.”</p> - -<p>Adam turned away as he replied. He did not choose<span class="pagenum" id="Page_193">193</span> -then to show in his eyes the leaping thought that had been -born of the memory and of Virey’s strange reaction. But -he heard him draw a quick, sharp breath and step back. -Then a silence ensued. Adam gazed up at the endless -slope, at the millions of rocks, all apparently resting lightly -in their pockets, ready to plunge down.</p> - -<p>“So—so that was it,” spoke up Virey, evidently with -effort. “I always wondered. Wild West sort of story, -you know. Strange I should meet you.... Thanks for -telling me. I gather it wasn’t pleasant for you.”</p> - -<p>“It’s sickening to recall, but I have no regrets,” replied -Adam.</p> - -<p>“Quite so. I understand. Man of the desert—ruthless—inhuman -sort of thing.”</p> - -<p>“Inhuman?” queried Adam, and he looked at Virey, at -last stung. Behind Virey’s pale, working face and averted -eyes Adam read a conscience in tumult, a spirit for the -moment terrorized. “Virey, you and I’d never agree on -meanings of words.... I broke McKue’s arms and ribs -and legs, and while I cracked them I told him what an -inhuman dastard he had been—to ruin a girl, to beat her, -to abandon her and her baby—to leave them to die. I -told him how I had watched them die ... then I broke -his neck!... McKue was the inhuman man—not I.”</p> - -<p>Virey turned away, swaying a little, and his white hand, -like a woman’s, sought the stone wall for support, until -he reached the shack, which he entered.</p> - -<p>“I’m sorry, Mrs. Virey, that story had to come up,” -said Adam, confronting her with reluctance. But she -surprised him again. He expected to find her sickened, -shrinking from him as a bloody monster, perhaps half fainting; -he found, however, that she seemed serene, controlling -deep emotions which manifested themselves only in the -marble whiteness of her cheek, the strained darkness of -her eye.</p> - -<p>“The story was beautiful. I had not heard it,” she -said, and the rich tremor of her voice thrilled Adam. -“What woman would not revel in such a story?...<span class="pagenum" id="Page_194">194</span> -Wansfell the Wanderer. It should be Sir Wansfell, -Knight of the Desert!... Don’t look at me so. Have -you not learned that the grandest act on earth is when a -man fights for the honor or love or happiness or life of a -woman?... I am a woman. Many men have loved me. -Virey’s love is so strong that it is hate. But no man -ever yet thought of <em>me</em>—no man ever yet heard the little -songs that echoed through my soul—no man ever fought -to save <em>me</em>!... My friend, I dare speak as you speak, -with the nakedness of the desert. And so I tell you that -just now I watched my husband—I listened to the words -which told his nature, as if that was new to me. I -watched you stand there—I listened to you.... And -so I dare to tell you—if you come to fight my battles I -shall have added to my life of shocks and woes a trouble -that will dwarf all the others ... the awakening of a -woman who has been blind!... The facing of my soul—perhaps -its salvation! A crowning agony—a glory come -too late!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_195">195</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XVI">CHAPTER XVI</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">At</span> sunset Adam cooked supper for the Vireys, satisfying -his own needs after they had finished. Virey -talked lightly, even joked about the first good meal he -had sat down to on the desert. His wife, too, talked -serenely, sometimes with the faintly subtle mockery, as -if she had never intimated that a dividing spear threatened -her heart. That was their way to hide the truth and -emotion when they willed. But Adam was silent.</p> - -<p>Alone, out under the shadow of the towering gate to -the valley, he strode to and fro, absorbed in a maze of -thoughts that gradually cleared, as if by the light of the -solemn stars and virtue of the speaking silence. He had -chanced upon the strangest and most fatal situation in all -his desert years. Yes, but was it by chance? Straight -as an arrow he had come across the barrens to meet a -wonderful woman who was going to love him, and a -despicable man whom he was going to kill. That seemed -the fatality which rang in his ears, shone in the accusing -stars, hid in the heavy shadows. It was a matter of feeling. -His intelligence could not grasp it. Had he been -in Death Valley four days or four months? Was he walking -in his sleep, victim of a nightmare? The desert, faithful -always, answered him. This was nothing but the flux -and reflux of human passion, contending tides between -man and woman, the littleness, the curse, the terror, and -yet the joy of life. Death Valley yawned at his feet, -changeless and shadowy, awful in its locked solemnity of -solitude, its voicelessness, its desolation that had been desolation -in past ages. He could doubt nothing there. His -thoughts seemed almost above human error. A spirit spoke -for him.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_196">196</span> -Virey had dragged his wife to this lonely and dismal -hell hole on earth to share his misery, to isolate her from -men, to hide her glory of charm, to gloat over her loneliness, -to revenge himself for a wrong, to feed his need of -possession, his terrible love that had become hate, to watch -the slow torture of her fading, wilting, drooping in this -ghastly valley, to curse her living, to burn endlessly in -torment because her soul would elude him forever, to -drive her to death and die with her.</p> - -<p>Death Valley seemed a harmonious setting for this -tragedy and a fitting grave for its actors. The worst in -nature calling to the darkest in mankind! What a pity -Virey could not divine his littleness—that he had been a -crawling maggot in the peopled ulcer of the world—that -in the great spaces where the sun beat down was a fiery -cleansing!</p> - -<p>But Magdalene Virey was a riddle beyond solving. -Nevertheless, Adam pondered every thought that would -stay before his consciousness. Any woman was a riddle. -Did not the image of Margarita Arrallanes flash up before -him—that dusky-eyed, mindless, soulless little animal, -victim of nature born in her? Adam’s thought halted with -the seeming sacrilege of associating Magdalene Virey with -memory of the Mexican girl. This Virey woman had complexity—she -had mind, passion, nobility, soul. What had -she done to earn her husband’s hate? She had never loved -him—that was as fixed in Adam’s sight as the North -Star. Nor had she loved another man, at least not with -the passion and spirit of her wonderful womanhood. -Adam divined that with the intensity of feeling which the -desert loneliness and solitude had taught him. He could -have felt the current of any woman’s great passion, whether -it was in torrent, full charged and devastating, or at its -lowering ebb. But, as inevitable as was life itself, there -was the mysterious certainty that Magdalene Virey had -terribly wronged her husband. How? Adam had repudiated -any interest in what had driven them here; not -until this moment had he permitted his doubt to insult<span class="pagenum" id="Page_197">197</span> -the woman. Yet how helpless he was! His heart was -full of unutterable pity. He could never have loved -Magdalene Virey as a man, but as a brother he was yearning -to change her, save her. What else in life was worth -living for, except only the dreams on the heights, the -walks along the lonely trails? By his own agony he had -a strange affinity for anyone in trouble, especially a woman, -and how terribly he saw the tragedy of Magdalene Virey! -And it was not only her death that he saw. Death in a -land where death reigned was nothing. For her he hated -the certainty of physical pain, the turgid pulse, the red-hot -iron band at the temples, the bearing down of weighted -air, the drying up of flesh and blood. More than all he -hated the thought of death of her spirit while her body -lived. There would be a bloodless murder long before her -blood stained Virey’s hands.</p> - -<p>But this thought gave Adam pause. Was he not dealing -with a personality beyond his power to divine? What did -he know of this strange woman? He knew naught, but -felt all. She was beautiful, compelling, secretive, aloof, -and proud, magnificent as a living flame. She was mocking -because knowledge of the world, of the frailty of -women and falsity of men, had been as an open page. -She had lived in sight of the crowded mart, the show -places where men and women passed, knowing no more -of earth than that it was a place for graves. She was -bitter because she had drunk bitterness to the dregs. But -the sudden up-flashing warmth of her, forced out of her -reserve, came from a heart of golden fire. Adam constituted -himself an omniscient judge, answerable only to -his conscience. By all the gods he would be true to the -truth of this woman!</p> - -<p>Never had she been forced into this desert of desolation. -That thought of Adam’s seemed far back in the past. -She had dared to come. Had Death Valley and the death -it was famed for any terrors for her? By the side of -her husband she had willingly come, unutterably despising -him, infinitely brave where he was cowardly, scornfully<span class="pagenum" id="Page_198">198</span> -and magnificently prepared to meet any punishment -that might satisfy him. Adam saw how, in this, Magdalene -Virey was answering to some strange need in itself. Let -the blind, weak, egoist Virey demand the tortures of the -damned! She would pay. But she was paying also a debt -to herself. Adam’s final conception of Magdalene Virey -was that she had been hideously wronged by life, by men; -that in younger days of passionate revolt she had transgressed -the selfish law of husbands; that in maturer years, -with the storm and defeat and disillusion of womanhood, -she had risen to the heights, she had been true to herself; -and with mockery of the man who could so underestimate -her, who dared believe he could make her a craven, whimpering, -guilty wretch, she had faced the desert with him. -She had seen the great love that was not love change to -terrible hate. She had divined the hidden motive. She -let him revel in his hellish secret joy. She welcomed Death -Valley.</p> - -<p>Adam marveled at this unquenchable spirit, this sublime -effrontery of a woman. And he hesitated to dare to turn -that spirit from its superb indifference. But this vacillation -in him was weak. What a wonderful experience it -would be to embody in Magdalene Virey the instinct, the -strife, the nature of the desert! With her mind, if he -had the power to teach, she would grasp the lesson in a -single day.</p> - -<p>And lastly, her unforgettable implication, “the crowning -agony,” of what he might bring upon her. There could be -only one interpretation of that—love. The idea thrilled -him, but only with wonder and pity. It took possession -of Adam’s imagination. Well, such love might come to -pass! The desert storms bridged canyons with sand in -one day. It was a place of violence. The elements waited -not upon time or circumstance. The few women Adam -had come in contact with on the desert had loved him. -Even the one-eyed Mohave Jo, that hideous, unsexed, -monstrous deformity of a woman, whom he had met and -left groveling in the sand at his feet, shamed at last before<span class="pagenum" id="Page_199">199</span> -a crowd of idle, gaping, vile men—even she had awakened -to this strange madness of love. But Adam had not -wanted that of any woman, since the poignant moment of -his youth on the desert, when the dusky-eyed Margarita -had murmured of love so fresh and sweet to him, “Ah, -so long ago and far away!”</p> - -<p>Least of all did Adam want the love of Magdalene -Virey. “If she were young and I were young! Or if she -had never...!” Ah! even possibilities, like might-have-beens, -were useless dreams. But the die was cast. Serve -Magdalene Virey he would, and teach her the secret of -the strength of the sand wastes and the lonely hills, and -that the victory of life was not to yield. Fight for her, -too, he would. In all the multiplicity of ways he had -learned, he would fight the solitude and loneliness of -Death Valley, the ghastliness so inimical to the creative -life of a woman, the heat, the thirst, the starvation, the -poison air, the furnace wind, storm and flood and avalanche. -Just as naturally, if need be, if it fatefully fell -out so, he would lay his slaying hands in all their ruthless -might upon the man who had made her dare her doom.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>When, next morning at sunrise hour, Adam presented -himself at the Virey camp, he was greeted by Mrs. Virey, -seemingly a transformed woman. She wore a riding suit, -the worn condition of which attested to the rough ride -across the mountain. What remarkable difference it made -in her appearance! It detracted from her height. And -the slenderness of her, revealed rather than suggested by -her gowns, showed much of grace and symmetry. She -had braided her hair and let it hang. When the sun had -tanned her white face and hands Magdalene Virey would -really be transformed.</p> - -<p>Adam tried not to stare, but his effort was futile.</p> - -<p>“Good morning,” she said, with a bright smile.</p> - -<p>“Why, Mrs. Virey, I—I hardly knew you!” he -stammered.</p> - -<p>“Thanks. I feel complimented. It is the first time<span class="pagenum" id="Page_200">200</span> -you’ve looked at <em>me</em>. Shorn of my dignity—no, my -worldliness, do I begin well, desert man?... No more -stuffy dresses clogging my feet! No more veils to protect -my face! Let the sun burn! I want to work. I -want to help. I want to learn. If madness must be mine, -let it be a madness to learn what in this God-forsaken land -ever made you the man you are. There, Sir Wansfell, -I have flung down the gage.”</p> - -<p>“Very well,” replied Adam, soberly.</p> - -<p>“And now,” she continued, “I am eager to work. If -I blunder, be patient. If I am stupid, make me see. And -if I faint in the sun or fall beside the trail, remember it -is my poor body that fails, and not my will.”</p> - -<p>So, in the light of her keen interest, Adam found the -humdrum mixing of dough and the baking of bread a -pleasure and a lesson to him, rather than a task.</p> - -<p>“Ah! how important are the homely things of life!” she -said. “A poet said ‘we live too much in the world.’... I -wonder did he mean just this. We grow away from or -never learn the simple things. I remember my grandfather’s -farm—the plowed fields, the green corn, the -yellow wheat, the chickens in the garden, the mice in the -barn, the smell of hay, the smell of burning leaves, the -smell of the rich brown earth.... Wansfell, not for -years have I remembered them. Something about you, the -way you worked over that bread, like a nice old country -lady, made me remember.... Oh, I wonder what I have -missed!”</p> - -<p>“We all miss something. It can’t be helped. But there -are compensations, and it’s never too late.”</p> - -<p>“You are a child, with all your bigness. You have the -mind of a child.”</p> - -<p>“That’s one of my few blessings.... Now you try -your hand at mixing the second batch of dough.”</p> - -<p>She made a picture on her knees, with her sleeves rolled -up, her beautiful hands white with flour, her face beginning -to flush. Adam wanted to laugh at her absolute -failure to mix dough, and at the same moment he had it in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_201">201</span> -him to weep over the earnestness, the sadness, the pathetic -meaning of her.</p> - -<p>Eventually they prepared the meal, and she carried -Virey’s breakfast in to him. Then she returned to eat -with Adam.</p> - -<p>“I shall wash the dishes,” she announced.</p> - -<p>“No,” he protested.</p> - -<p>Then came a clash. It ended with a compromise. And -from that clash Adam realized he might dominate her in -little things, but in a great conflict of wills she would be -the stronger. It was a step in his own slow education. -There was a constitutional difference between men and -women.</p> - -<p>Upon Adam’s resumption of the work around the shack -Mrs. Virey helped him as much as he would permit, which -by midday was somewhat beyond her strength. Her face -sunburned rosily and her hands showed the contact with -dirt and her boots were dusty.</p> - -<p>“You mustn’t overdo it,” he advised. “Rest and sleep -during the noon hours.”</p> - -<p>She retired within the shack and did not reappear till -the middle of the afternoon. Meanwhile, Adam had -worked at his tasks, trying at the same time to keep an -eye on Virey, who wandered around aimlessly over the -rock-strewn field, idling here and plodding there. Adam -saw how Virey watched the shack; and when Magdalene -came out again he saw her and grew as motionless as the -stone where he leaned. Every thought of Virey’s must -have been dominated by this woman’s presence, the meaning -of her, the possibilities of her, the tragedy of her.</p> - -<p>“Oh, how I slept!” she exclaimed. “Is it work that -makes you sleep?”</p> - -<p>“Indeed yes.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! I see my noble husband standing like Mephistopheles, -smiling at grief.... What’s he doing over -there?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know, unless it’s watching for you. He’s been -around like that for hours.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_202">202</span> -“Poor man!” she said, with both compassion and -mockery. “Watching me? What loss of precious time—and -so futile! It is a habit he contracted some years -ago.... Wansfell, take me down to the opening in the -mountain there, so that I can look into Death Valley.”</p> - -<p>“Shall I ask Virey?” queried Adam, in slight uncertainty.</p> - -<p>“No. Let him watch or follow or do as he likes. I am -here in Death Valley. It was his cherished plan to bury -me here. I shall not leave until he takes me—which will -be never. For the rest, he is nothing to me. We are as -far apart as the poles.”</p> - -<p>On the way down the gentle slope Adam halted amid -sun-blasted shrubs, scarcely recognizable as greasewood. -Here he knelt in the gravel to pluck some flowers so tiny -that only a trained eye could ever have espied them. One -was a little pink flower with sage color and sage odor; -another a white daisy, very frail, and without any visible -leaves; and a third was a purple-red flower, half the size -of the tiniest buttercup, and this had small dark-green -leaves.</p> - -<p>“Flowers in Death Valley!” exclaimed Mrs. Virey, in -utter amaze.</p> - -<p>“Yes. Flowers of a day! They sprang up yesterday; -to-day they bloom, to-morrow they will die. I don’t know -their names. To me their blossoming is one of the wonders -of the desert. I think sometimes that it is a promise. -A whole year the tiny seeds lie in the hot sands. Then -comes a mysterious call and the green plant shoots its -inch-long stalk to the sun. Another day beauty unfolds -and there is fragrance on the desert air. Another day -sees them whither and die.”</p> - -<p>“Beauty and fragrance indeed they have,” mused the -woman. “Such tiny flowers to look and smell so sweet! -I never saw their like. Flowers of a day!... They -indeed give rise to thoughts too deep for tears!”</p> - -<p>Adam led his companion to the base of the mountain -wall, and around the corner of the opening, so that they<span class="pagenum" id="Page_203">203</span> -came suddenly and unexpectedly into full view of Death -Valley. He did not look at her. He wanted to wait a -little before doing that. The soft gasp which escaped -her lips and the quick grasping of his hand were significant -of the shock she sustained.</p> - -<p>Their position faced mostly down the valley. It seemed -a vast level, gently sloping up to the borders where specks -of mesquites dotted the sand. Dull gray and flat, these -league-wide wastes of speckled sand bordered a dazzling-white -sunlit belt, the winding bottom of the long bowl, -the salty dead stream of Death Valley. Miles and miles -below, two mountain ranges blended in a purple blaze, and -endless slanting lines of slopes ran down to merge in the -valley floor. The ranges sent down offshoots of mountains -that slanted and lengthened into the valley. One bright-green -oasis, that, lost in the vastness, was comparable to -one of the tiny flowers Adam had plucked out of the sand, -shone wonderfully and illusively out of the glare of gray -and white. A dim, mystic scene!</p> - -<p>“O God!... It is my grave!” cried Magdalene Virey.</p> - -<p>“We all are destined for graves,” replied Adam, solemnly. -“Could any grave elsewhere be so grand—so -lonely—so peaceful?... Now let us walk out a little -way, to the edge of that ridge, and sit there while the -sun sets.”</p> - -<p>On this vantage point they were out some distance in -the valley, so that they could see even the western end -of the Panamint range, where a glaring sun had begun -to change its color over the bold black peaks. A broad -shadow lengthened across the valley and crept up the -yellow foothills to the red Funeral Mountains. This -shadow marvelously changed to purple, and as the radiance -of light continued to shade, the purple deepened. Over -all the valley at the western end appeared a haze the -color of which was nameless. Adam felt the lessening -heat of the sinking sun. Half that blaze was gone. It -had been gold and was now silver. He swept his gaze -around jealously, not to miss the transformations; and his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_204">204</span> -companion, silent and absorbed, instinctively turned with -him. Across the valley the Funerals towered, ragged and -sharp, with rosy crowns; and one, the only dome-shaped -peak, showed its strata of gray and drab through the rose. -Another peak, farther back, lifted a pink shaft into the -blue sky. What a contrast to the lower hills and slopes, -so beautifully pearl gray in tint! And now, almost the -instant Adam had marked the exquisite colors, they began -to fade. On that illimitable horizon line there were soon -no bright tones left. Far to the south, peaks that had been -dim now stood out clear and sharp against the sky. One, -gold capped and radiant, shadowed as if a cloud had come -between it and the sun. Adam turned again to the west, -in time to see the last vestige of silver fire vanish. Sunset!</p> - -<p>A somber smoky sunset it was now, as if this Death -Valley was the gateway of hell and its sinister shades were -upflung from fire. Adam saw a vulture sail across the -clear space of sky, breasting the wind. It lent life to the -desolation.</p> - -<p>The desert day was done and the desert shades began -to descend. The moment was tranquil and sad. It had -little to do with the destiny of man—nothing except that -by some inscrutable design of God or an accident of evolution -man happened to be imprisoned where nature never -intended man to be. Death Valley was only a ragged -rent of the old earth, where men wandered wild, brooding, -lost, or where others sought with folly and passion to dig -forth golden treasure. The mysterious lights changed. -A long pale radiance appeared over the western range -and lengthened along its bold horizon. The only red color -left was way to the south, and that shone dim. The air -held a solemn stillness.</p> - -<p>“Magdalene Virey,” said Adam, “what you see there -resembles death—it may be death—but it is peace. Does -it not rest your troubled soul? A woman must be herself -here.”</p> - -<p>She, whose words could pour out in such torrent of -eloquence, was silent now. Adam looked at her then,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_205">205</span> -into the shadowed eyes. What he saw there awed him. -The abyss seen through those beautiful, unguarded -windows of her soul was like the gray scored valley beneath, -but lighting, quickening with thought, with hope, -with life. Death Valley was a part of the earth dying, -and it would become like a canyon on the burned-out moon; -but this woman’s spirit seemed everlasting. If her soul -had been a whited sepulcher, it was in the way of transfiguration. -Adam experienced a singular exaltation in the -moment, a gladness beyond his comprehension, a sense that -the present strange communion there between this woman’s -awakening and the terrible lessons of his life was creating -for him a far-distant interest, baffling, but great in its -inspiration.</p> - -<p>In the gathering twilight he led her back to camp, content -that it seemed still impossible for her to speak. But -the touch of her hand at parting was more eloquent than -any words.</p> - -<p>Then alone, in his blankets, with gaze up at the inscrutable, -promising stars, Adam gave himself over to insistent -and crowding thoughts, back of which throbbed a dominating, -divine hope in his power to save this woman’s life -and soul, and perhaps even her happiness.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Next day Adam’s natural aggressiveness asserted itself, -controlled now by an imperturbable spirit that nothing -could daunt. He approached Virey relentlessly, though -with kindness, even good nature, and he began to talk -about Death Valley, the perilous nature of the camping -spot, the blasting heat of midsummer and the horror of -the midnight furnace winds, the possibility of the water -drying up. Virey was cold, then impatient, then intolerant, -and finally furious. First he was deaf to Adam’s persuasion, -then he tried to get out of listening, then he -repudiated all Adam had said, and finally he raved and -cursed. Adam persisted in his arguments until Virey -strode off.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Virey heard some of this clash. Apparently<span class="pagenum" id="Page_206">206</span> -Adam’s idea of changing her husband amused her. But -when Virey returned for supper he was glad enough to -eat, and when Adam again launched his argument it appeared -that Mrs. Virey lost the last little trace of mockery. -She listened intently while Adam told her husband why he -would have to take his wife away from Death Valley, -before midsummer. Virey might as well have been stone -deaf. It was not Virey, however, who interested the -woman, but something about Adam that made her look -and listen thoughtfully.</p> - -<p>Thus began a singular time for Adam, unmatched in -all his desert experience. He gave his whole heart to the -task of teaching Magdalene Virey and to the wearing down -of Virey’s will. All the lighter tasks that his hands had -learned he taught her. Then to climb to the heights, to -pick the ledges for signs of gold or pan the sandy washes, -to know the rocks and the few species of vegetation, to -recognize the illusion of distance and color, to watch the -sunsets and the stars became daily experiences. Hard as -work was for her delicate hands and muscles, he urged -her to their limit. During the first days she suffered -sunburn, scalds, skinned fingers, bruised knees, and extreme -fatigue. When she grew tanned and stronger he -led her out on walks and climbs so hard that he had to -help her back to camp. She learned the meaning of -physical pain, and to endure it. She learned the blessing -it was to eat when she was famished, to rest when she -was utterly weary, to sleep when sleep was peace.</p> - -<p>Through these brief, full days Adam attacked Virey at -every opportunity, which time came to be, at length, only -during meals. Virey would leave camp, often to go up -the slope of weathered rocks, a dangerous climb that -manifestly fascinated him. Reaching a large rock that -became his favorite place, he would perch there for long -hours, watching, gazing down like a vulture waiting for -time to strike its prey. All about him seemed to suggest -a brooding wait. He slept during the midday hours and -through the long nights. At dusk, which was usually<span class="pagenum" id="Page_207">207</span> -bedtime for all, Adam often heard him talking to Mrs. -Virey in a low, hard, passionate voice. Sometimes her -melodious tones, with the mockery always present when -she spoke to her husband, thrilled Adam, while at the same -moment it filled him with despair. But Adam never despaired -of driving Virey to leave the valley. The man was -weak in all ways except that side which pertained to -revenge. Notwithstanding the real and growing obstacle -of this passion, Adam clung to his conviction that in the -end Virey would collapse. When, however, one day the -Indians came, and Virey sent them away with a large -order for supplies, Adam gave vent to a grim thought, -“Well, I can always kill him.”</p> - -<p>All the disgust and loathing Adam felt for this waster -of life vanished in the presence of Magdalene Virey. If -that long-passed sunset hour over Death Valley had awakened -the woman, what had been the transformation of -the weeks? Adam had no thoughts that adequately expressed -his feeling for the change in her. It gave him -further reverence for desert sun and heat and thirst and -violence and solitude. It gave him strange new insight -into the mystery of life. Was any healing of disease or -agony impossible—any change of spirit—any renewal of -life? Nothing in relation to human life was impossible. -Magnificently the desert magnified and multiplied time, -thought, effort, pain, health, hope—all that could be felt.</p> - -<p>It seemed to Adam that through the physical relation -to the desert he was changing Magdalene Virey’s body and -heart and soul. Brown her face and hands had grown; -and slowly the graceful, thin lines of her slender body -had begun to round out. She was gaining. If it had not -been for her shadowed eyes, and the permanent sadness -and mockery in the beautiful lips, she would have been like -a girl of eighteen. Her voice, too, with its contralto richness, -its mellow depth, its subtle shades of tone, proclaimed -the woman. Adam at first had imagined her to be about -thirty years old, but as time passed by, and she grew -younger with renewed strength, he changed his mind.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_208">208</span> -Looking at her to guess her age was like looking at the -desert illusions. Absolute certainty he had, however, of -the reward and result of her inflexible will, of splendid -spirit, of sincere gladness. She had endured physical toil -and pain to the limit of her frail strength, until she was -no longer frail. This spirit revived what had probably -been early childish love of natural things; and action and -knowledge developed it until her heart was wholly absorbed -in all that it was possible to do there in that lonesome -fastness. With the genius and intuition of a woman -she had grasped at the one solace left her—the possibility -of learning Adam’s lesson of the desert. What had taken -him years to acquire she learned from him or divined -in days. She had a wonderful mind.</p> - -<p>Once, while they were resting upon a promontory that -overhung the valley, Adam spoke to her. She did not -hear him. Her eyes reflected the wonder and immensity -of the waste beneath her. Indeed, she did not appear to -be brooding or thinking. And when he spoke again, -breaking in upon her abstraction, she was startled. He -forgot what he had intended to say, substituting a query as -to her thoughts.</p> - -<p>“How strange!” she murmured. “I didn’t have a -thought. I forgot where I was. Your voice seemed to -come from far off.”</p> - -<p>“I spoke to you before, but you didn’t hear,” said Adam. -“You looked sort of, well—watchful, I’d call it.”</p> - -<p>“Watchful? Yes, I was. I feel I was, but I don’t -remember. This is indeed a strange state for Magdalene -Virey. It behooves her to cultivate it. But what kind -of a state was it?... Wansfell, could it have been -happiness?”</p> - -<p>She asked that in a whisper, serious, and with pathos, -yet with a smile.</p> - -<p>“It’s always happiness for me to watch from the heights. -Surely you are finding happy moments?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, many, thanks to you, my friend. But they are -conscious happy moments, just sheer joy of movement,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_209">209</span> -or sight of beauty, or a thrill of hope, or perhaps a vague -dream of old, far-off, unhappy things. And it <em>is</em> happiness -to remember them.... But this was different. -It was unconscious. I tell you, Wansfell, I did not have -a thought in my mind! I saw—I watched. Oh, how -illusive it is!”</p> - -<p>“Try to recall it,” he suggested, much interested.</p> - -<p>“I try—I try,” she said, presently, “but the spell is -broken.”</p> - -<p>“Well, then, let me put a thought into your mind,” went -on Adam. “Dismukes and I once had a long talk about -the desert. Why does it fascinate all men? What is the -secret? Dismukes didn’t rate himself high as a thinker. -But he is a thinker. He knows the desert. To me he’s -great. And he and I agreed that the commonly accepted -idea of the desert’s lure is wrong. Men seek gold, solitude, -forgetfulness. Some wander for the love of wandering. -Others seek to hide from the world. Criminals are -driven to the desert. Besides these, all travelers crossing -the desert talk of its enchantments. They all have different -reasons. Loneliness, peace, silence, beauty, wonder, sublimity—a -thousand reasons! Indeed, they are all proofs -of the strange call of the desert. But these men do not -go deep enough.”</p> - -<p>“Have you solved the secret?” she asked, wonderingly.</p> - -<p>“No, not yet,” he replied, a little sadly. “It eludes me. -It’s like finding the water of the mirage.”</p> - -<p>“It’s like the secret of a woman’s heart, Wansfell.”</p> - -<p>“Then if that is so—tell me.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! no woman ever tells that secret.”</p> - -<p>“Have you come to love the desert?”</p> - -<p>“You ask me that often,” she replied, in perplexity. “I -don’t know. I—I reverence—I fear—I thrill. But love—I -can’t say that I love the desert. Not yet. Love comes -slowly and seldom to me. I loved my mother.... Once -I loved a horse.”</p> - -<p>“Have you loved men?” he queried.</p> - -<p>“No!” she flashed, in sudden passion, and her eyes<span class="pagenum" id="Page_210">210</span> -burned dark on his. “Do <em>you</em> imagine that of me?... I -was eighteen when I—when they married me to Virey. I -despised him. I learned to loathe him.... Wansfell, I -never really loved any man. Once I was mad—driven!”</p> - -<p>How easily could Adam strike the chords of her emotion -and rouse her to impassioned speech! His power to do -this haunted him, and sometimes he could not resist it -until wistfulness or trouble in her eyes made him ashamed.</p> - -<p>“Some day I’ll tell you how <em>I</em> was driven once—ruined,” -he said.</p> - -<p>“Ruined! You? Why, Wansfell, you are a man! -Sometimes I think you’re a god of the desert!... But -tell me—what ruined you, as you mean it?”</p> - -<p>“No, not now. I’m interested in your—what is it?—your -lack of power to love.”</p> - -<p>“Lack! How little you know me! I am <em>all</em> power to -love. I am a quivering mass of exquisitely delicate, sensitive -nerves. I am a seething torrent, of hot blood. I -am an empty heart, deep and terrible as this valley, hungry -for love as it is hungry for precious rain or dew. I am an -illimitable emotion, heaving like the tides of the sea. -I am all love.”</p> - -<p>“And I—only a stupid blunderer,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>“You use a knife relentlessly, sometimes.... Wansfell, -listen.... I have a child—a lovely girl. She is -fourteen years old—the sweetest.... Ah! Before she -was born I did not love her—I did not <em>want</em> her. But -afterward!... Wansfell, a mother’s love is divine. But -I had more than that. All—all my heart went out to -Ruth.... <em>Love!</em> Oh, my God! does any man know the -torture of love?... Oh, <em>I</em> know! I had to leave her—I -had to give her up ... and I’ll never—never see—her—again!”</p> - -<p>The woman bowed with hands to her face and all her -slender body shook.</p> - -<p>“Forgive me!” whispered Adam, huskily, in distress. -It was all he could say for a moment. She had stunned -him. Never had he imagined her as a mother. “Yet—yet<span class="pagenum" id="Page_211">211</span> -I’m glad I know now. You should have told me. I am -your friend. I’ve tried to be a—a brother. Tell me, -Magdalene. You’ll be the—the less troubled. I will help -you. I think I understand—just a little. You seemed to -me only a very young woman—and you’re a mother! -Always I say I’ll never be surprised again. Why, the -future is all surprise!... And your little girl’s name is -Ruth? Ruth Virey. What a pretty name!”</p> - -<p>Adam had rambled on, full of contrition, hating himself, -trying somehow to convey sympathy. Perhaps his words, -his touch on her bowed shoulder, helped her somewhat, -for presently she sat up, flung back her hair, and turned -a tear-stained face to him. How changed, how softened, -how beautiful! Slowly her eyes were veiling an emotion, -a glimpse of which uplifted him.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, I’m thirty-eight years old,” she said.</p> - -<p>“No! I can’t believe that!” he ejaculated.</p> - -<p>“It’s true.”</p> - -<p>“Well, well! I guess I’ll go back to figuring the desert. -But speaking of age—you guess mine. I’ll bet you can’t -come any nearer to mine.”</p> - -<p>Gravely she studied him, and in the look and action -once more grew composed.</p> - -<p>“You’re a masculine Sphinx. Those terrible lines from -cheek to jaw—they speak of agony, but not of age. But -you’re gray at the temples. Wansfell, you are thirty-seven—perhaps -forty.”</p> - -<p>“Magdalene Virey!” cried Adam, aghast. “Do I look -so old? Alas for vanished youth!... I am only -twenty-six.”</p> - -<p>It was her turn to be amazed. “We had better confine -ourselves to other riddles than love and age. They are -treacherous.... Come, let us be going.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_212">212</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XVII">CHAPTER XVII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> hour came when Magdalene Virey stirred Adam -to his depths.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell,” she said, with a rare and wonderful tremor -in her voice, “I love the silence, the loneliness, the serenity—even -the tragedy of this valley of shadows. Ah! It is -one place that will never be popular with men—where few -women will ever come. Nature has set it apart for -wanderers of the wastelands, men like you, unquenchable -souls who endure, as you said, to fight, to strive, to seek, -to find.... And surely for lost souls like me! Most -men and all women must find death here, if they stay. -But there is death in life. I’ve faced my soul here, in the -black, lonely watches of the desert nights. And I would -endure any agony to change that soul, to make it as high -and clear and noble as the white cone of the mountain -yonder.”</p> - -<p>Mysterious and inscrutable, the desert influence had -worked upon Magdalene Virey. On the other hand, forces -destructive to her physical being had attacked her. It was -as if an invisible withering wind had blown upon a flower -in the night. Adam saw this with distress. But she -laughed at the truth of it—laughed without mockery. -Something triumphant rang like a bell in her laugh. Always, -in the subtlety of character she had brought with -her and the mystery she had absorbed from the desert, -she stayed beyond Adam’s understanding. It seemed that -she liked to listen to his ceaseless importunities; but merciless -to herself and aloof from Virey, she refused to leave -Death Valley.</p> - -<p>“Suppose I pack the burros and tuck you under my arm -and take you, anyway?” he queried, stubbornly.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_213">213</span> -“I fancy I’d like you to tuck me under your arm,” she -replied, with the low laugh that came readily now, “but -if you did—it would be as far as you’d get.”</p> - -<p>“How so?” he demanded, curiously.</p> - -<p>“Why, I’d exercise the prerogative of the eternal feminine -and command that time should stand still right -there.”</p> - -<p>A sweetness and charm, perhaps of other days, a memory -of power, haunted face and voice then.</p> - -<p>“Time—stand still?” echoed Adam, ponderingly. “Magdalene, -you are beyond me.”</p> - -<p>“So it seems. I’m a little beyond myself sometimes. -You will never see in me the woman who has been courted, -loved, spoiled by men.”</p> - -<p>“Well, I grasp that, I guess. But I don’t care to see you -as such a woman. I might <span class="locked">not——”</span></p> - -<p>“Ah! you might not respect me,” she interrupted. -“Alas!... But, Wansfell, if I had met <em>you</em> when I was -eighteen I would never have been courted and loved and -ruined by men.... You don’t grasp that, either.”</p> - -<p>Adam had long ceased to curse his density. The simplicity -of him antagonized her complexity. His had been -the blessed victory over her bitterness, her mockery, her -consciousness of despair. His had been the gladness of -seeing her grow brown and strong and well, until these -early June days had begun to weaken her. That fact had -augmented his earnestness to get her to leave the valley. -But she was adamant. And all his importunities and arguments -and threats she parried with some subtle femininity -of action or look or speech that left him bewildered.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The time came when only early in the mornings or late -in the afternoons could they walk to their accustomed seat -near the gateway of the valley and climb to the promontories. -Nature moved on remorselessly with her seasons, -and the sun had begun to assume its fiery authority during -most of the daylight hours.</p> - -<p>One morning before sunrise they climbed, much against<span class="pagenum" id="Page_214">214</span> -Adam’s advice, to a high point where Mrs. Virey loved to -face the east at that hour. It was a hard climb, too hard -for her to attempt in the heat and oppression that had -come of late. Nevertheless, she prevailed upon Adam to -take her, and she had just about strength enough to get -there.</p> - -<p>They saw the east luminous and rosy, ethereal and -beautiful, momentarily brightening with a rayed effulgence -that spread from a golden center behind the dark bold -domes of the Funeral Mountains. They saw the sun -rise and change the luminous dawn to lurid day. One -moment, and the beauty, the glory, the promise were as -if they had never been. The light over Death Valley at -that height was too fierce for the gaze of man.</p> - -<p>On the way down, at a narrow ledge, where loose stones -made precarious footing, Adam cautioned his companion -and offered to help her. Waving him on, she followed him -with her lithe free step. Then she slipped off the more -solid trail to a little declivity of loose rocks that began -to slide with her toward a slope where, if she went over -it, she must meet serious injury. She did not scream. -Adam plunged after her and, reaching her with a long -arm just as she was about to fall, he swung her up as -if she had only the weight of a child. Then, holding -her in his arms, he essayed to wade out of the little -stream of sliding rocks. It was difficult only because he -feared he might slip and fall with her. Presently he -reached the solid ledge and was about to set her upon -her feet.</p> - -<p>“Time—stand still here!” she exclaimed, her voice full -of the old mockery of herself, with an added regret for -what might have been, but could never be, with pathos, -with the eternal charm of woman who could never separate -her personality, her consciousness of her sex, from -their old relation to man.</p> - -<p>Adam halted his action as if suddenly chained, and he -gazed down upon her, where she rested with her head on -the bend of his left elbow. There was a smile on the brown<span class="pagenum" id="Page_215">215</span> -face that had once been so pale. Her large eyes, wide -open, exposed to the sky, seemed to reflect its dark blue -color and something of its mystery of light. Adam saw -wonder there, and reverence that must have been for him, -but seemed incredible, and the shading of unutterable -thoughts.</p> - -<p>“Put me down,” she said.</p> - -<p>“Why did you say, ‘Time—stand still here’?” he asked, -as he placed her upon her feet.</p> - -<p>“Do you remember the time when I told you how words -and lines and verses of the poets I used to love come to -mind so vividly out here? Sometimes I speak them, that -is all.”</p> - -<p>“I understand. All I ever read has come back to me -here on the desert, as clear as the print on the page—seen -so many years ago. I used to hate Sunday school when -I was a boy. But now, often, words of the Bible come -before my mind.... But are you telling me the whole -truth? Why did you say, ‘Time—stand still here,’ when -I held you in my arms?”</p> - -<p>“What a boy you are!” she murmured, and her eyes -held a gladness for the sight of him. “Confess, now, -wouldn’t that moment have been a beautiful one for time -to stop—for life to stand still—for the world to be naught—for -thought and memory to cease?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, it would,” he replied, “but no more beautiful than -this moment while you stand there so. When you look -like that you make me hope.”</p> - -<p>“For what?” she queried, softly.</p> - -<p>“For you.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, you are the only man I’ve ever known who -could have held me in his arms and have been blind and -dead to the nature of a woman.... Listen. You’ve done -me the honor to say I have splendid thoughts and noble -emotions. I hope I have. I know you have inspired -many. I know this valley of death has changed my soul.... -But, Wansfell, I am a woman, and a woman is more -than her high and lofty thoughts—her wandering inspirations.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_216">216</span> -A woman is a creature of feeling, somehow -doomed.... When I said, ‘Time—stand still here,’ I -was false to the woman in me that you idealize. A -thousand thoughts, emotions, memories, desires, sorrows, -vanities prompted the words of which you have made me -ashamed. But to spare myself a little, let me say that -it would indeed be beautiful for me to have you take -me up into your arms—and then for time to stand still -forever.”</p> - -<p>“Do you mean that—so—you’d feel safe, protected, -at rest?” he asked, with emotion.</p> - -<p>“Yes, and infinitely more. Wansfell it is a woman’s -fate that the only safe and happy and desired place for -her this side of the grave is in the arms of the man she -loves. A real man—with strength and gentleness—for her -and her alone!... It is a terrible thing in women, the -need to be loved. As a baby I had that need—as a girl—and -as a woman it became a passion. Looking back now, -through the revelation that has come to me here in this -valley of silence—when thought is clairvoyant and all-pervading—I -can see how the need of love, the passion -to be loved, is the strongest instinct in any woman. It <em>is</em> -an instinct. She can no more change it than she can -change the shape of her hand. Poor fated women! Education, -freedom, career may blind them to their real nature. -But it is a man, the right man, that means life to a -woman. Otherwise the best in her dies.... That instinct -in me—for which I confess shame—has been unsatisfied -despite all the men who have loved me. When you -saved me—perhaps from injury—and took me into your -arms, the instinct over which I have no control flashed -up. While it lasted, until you looked at me, I wanted that -moment to last forever. I wanted to be held that way—in -your great, strong arms—until the last trumpet sounded. -I wanted you to see only me, feel only me, hold only me, -live for only me, love <em>me</em> beyond all else on earth and in -heaven!”</p> - -<p>As she paused, her slender brown hands at her heaving<span class="pagenum" id="Page_217">217</span> -breast, her eyes strained as if peering through obscurity -at a distant light, Adam could only stare at her in helpless -fascination. In such moods as this she taught him -as much of the mystery of life as he had taught her of -the nature of the desert.</p> - -<p>“Now the instinct is gone,” she continued. “Chilled -by your aloofness! I am looking at it with intelligence. -And, Wansfell, I’m filled with pity for women. I pity -myself, despite the fact that my mind is free. I can control -my acts, if not my instincts and emotions. I am bound. -I am a woman. I am a she-creature. I am little different -from the fierce she-cats, the she-lions—any of the she-animals -that you’ve told me fight to survive down on your -wild Colorado Desert.... That seems to me the sex, -the fate, the doom of women. Ah! no wonder they fight -for men—spit and hiss and squall and scratch and rend! -It’s a sad thing, seen from a woman’s mind. That great -mass of women who cannot reason about their instincts, -or understand the springs of their emotions—they are -the happier. Too much knowledge is bad for my sex. -Perhaps we are wrongly educated. <em>I</em> am the happier for -what you have taught me. I can see myself now with -pity instead of loathing. I am not to blame for what -life has made me. There are no wicked women. They -must be loved or they are lost.... My friend, the -divinity in human life is seen best in some lost woman -like me.”</p> - -<p>“Magdalene Virey,” protested Adam, “I can’t follow -you.... But to say <em>you</em> are a lost woman—that I won’t -listen to.”</p> - -<p>“I <em>was</em> a lost woman,” interrupted Mrs. Virey, her voice -rising out of the strong, sweet melody. “I had my pride, -and I defied the husband whose heart I broke and whose -life I ruined. I scorned the punishment, the exile he -meted out to me. That was because I was thoroughbred. -But all the same I was lost. Lost to happiness, to hope, -to effort, to repentance, to spiritual uplift. Death Valley -will be my tomb, but there will be resurrection for me....<span class="pagenum" id="Page_218">218</span> -It is you, Wansfell, you have been my salvation.... -<em>You</em> have the power. It has come from your -strife and agony on the desert. It is beyond riches, beyond -honor. It is the divine in you that seeks and finds -the divine in unfortunates who cross your wandering -trail.”</p> - -<p>Adam, rendered mute, could only offer his hand; and in -silence he led her down the slope.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>That afternoon, near the close of the hot hours, Adam -lay in the shade of the brush shelter he had erected near -the Virey shack. He was absorbed in watching a tribe -of red ants, and his posture was so unusual that it gave -pause to Virey, who had come down from the slope. The -man approached and curiously gazed at Adam, to see what -he was doing.</p> - -<p>“Looking for grains of gold?” inquired Virey, with -sarcasm. “I’ll lend you my magnifying glass.”</p> - -<p>“I’m watching these red ants,” replied Adam, without -looking up.</p> - -<p>Virey bent over and, having seen, he slowly straightened -up.</p> - -<p>“Go to the ant, thou sluggard!” he ejaculated, and this -time without sarcasm.</p> - -<p>“Virey, I’m no sluggard,” returned Adam. “It’s you -who are that. I’m a worker.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, I was not meaning you,” said Virey. “There -are things I hate you for, but laziness is certainly not -included in them.... I never worked in my life. I had -money left me. It was a curse. I thought I could buy -everything. I bought a wife—the big-eyed woman to -whom you devote your services—and your attentions.... -And I bought for myself the sweetness of the deadly -nightshade flower—a statue of marble, chiseled in the -beautiful curves of mocking love—a woman of chain -lightning and hate.... If I had lived by industry, as -live those red ants you’re watching, I might not now have -one foot in my grave in Death Valley.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_219">219</span> -Thus there were rare instances when Virey appeared a -man with the human virtues of regret, of comprehension, -of intolerance, but never a word issued from his lips that -was not tinged with bitterness. Had the divinity in him -been blasted forever? Or was it a submerged spark -that could quicken only to a touch of the woman lost to -him? Adam wondered. Sometimes a feeling of pity for -Virey stole over him, but it never lasted long. Adam had -more respect for these red ants than for some men, despite -the alleged divinity. He abhorred the drones of life. The -desert taught how useless were the idlers—how nature -ruthlessly cut them off.</p> - -<p>The red ants had a hill some few paces from the shelter -where Adam lay. One train of ants, empty handed, as -it were, traveled rapidly from the ant hill toward the camp -litter; and another train staggered under tremendous -burdens in the other direction. At first Adam thought -these last were carrying bits of bread, then he thought -they were carrying grains of gravel, and then he discovered, -by moving closer to watch, that they were carrying -round black-and-white globules, several times as large -as their own bodies. Presently he concluded that these -round objects were ant eggs which the tribe was moving -from one hill to another. It was exceedingly interesting -to watch them. He recognized them as the species of -desert ant that could bite almost as fiercely as a scorpion. -Their labor was prodigious. The great difficulty appeared -to be in keeping the eggs in their jaws. These burdens -were continually falling out and rolling away. Some ants -tried many times and in many ways to grasp the hard -little globules. Then, when this was accomplished, came -the work compared with which the labor of man seemed -insignificant. After getting a start the loaded ants made -fair progress over smooth, hard ground, but when they -ran into a crust of earth or a pebble or a chip they began -the toil of a giant. The ant never essayed to go round -the obstacle. He surmounted it. He pushed and lifted -and heaved, and sometimes backed over, dragging his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_220">220</span> -precious burden behind him. Others would meet a little -pitfall and, instead of circling it to get to the ant hill, -they would roll down, over and over, with their eggs, until -they reached the bottom. Then it was uphill work on the -other side, indefatigible, ceaseless, patient, wonderful.</p> - -<p>Adam presently had to forego his little sentiment about -the toil of the ants over their eggs. The black-and-white -globules were seeds of maize. On the night before, Adam’s -burro Jennie had persisted around camp until he gave her -the last of some maize left in one of his packs. Jennie -had spilled generous quantities of the maize in the sand, -and the ants were carrying home the seeds.</p> - -<p>How powerful they were! How endowed with tireless -endurance and a persistence beyond human understanding! -The thing that struck Adam so singularly was that these -ants did not recognize defeat. They could not give up. -Failure was a state unknown to their instincts. And so -they performed marvelous feats. What was the spirit -that actuated them? The mighty life of nature was infinitely -strong in them. It was the same as the tenacity -of the lichen that lived on the desert rocks, or the eyesight -of the condor that could see its prey from the invisible -heights of the sky, or the age-long destructive -movements of the mountain tops wearing down to the -valleys.</p> - -<p>When Adam got up from his pleasant task and meditation -he was surprised to find Mrs. Virey standing near -with eyes intent on him. Then it became incumbent upon -him to show her the toils of the red ants. She watched -them attentively for a while.</p> - -<p>“Wonderful little creatures!” she exclaimed. “So this -watching is one of the secrets of your desert knowledge. -Wansfell, I can’t compare these ants to men. They are -far superior. They have order, purpose. They are passionless, -perfect organizations to carry on their lives. They -will work and live—the descendants of this very tribe of -ants—long after the race of men has disappeared off the -face of the earth.... But wonderful as they are, and interesting<span class="pagenum" id="Page_221">221</span> -as are their labors, I’d prefer to watch you chop -wood, or, better, to climb the slope with your giant stride.”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>That night, some time late, Adam was awakened by a -gale that swooped up through the gateway from the valley. -It blew away the cool mountain air which had settled down -from the heights. It was a warmer wind than any Adam -had ever before experienced at night. It worried him. -Forerunner, it must be, of the midnight furnace winds -that had added to the fame of Death Valley! It brought -a strange, low, hollow roar, unlike any other sound in -nature. It was a voice. Adam harkened to the warning. -On the morrow he would again talk to Virey. Soon it -might be too late to save Magdalene Virey. She had -obstructed his will. She would not leave without her -husband. She had bidden Adam stay there in Death -Valley to serve her, but she seemed to have placed her -husband beyond Adam’s reach. The ferocity in Adam had -never found itself in relation to Virey. Adam had persuaded -and argued with the persistence of the toiling ant, -but to work his way with Virey seemed to demand the -swoop of the desert hawk.</p> - -<p>This strange warm wind, on its first occurrence during -Adam’s stay in the valley, rose to a gale and then gradually -subsided until it moaned away mournfully. Its advent -had robbed Adam of sleep; its going seemed to leave a -deader silence, fraught with the meaning of its visit.</p> - -<p>Adam could sleep no more. This silence belied the blinking -of the stars. It disproved the solidarity of the universe. -Nothing lived, except his soul, that seemingly had departed -from his body in a dream, and now with his -vague thoughts and vaguer feelings wandered over the -wastelands, a phantom in the night. Silence of utter -solitude—most intense, dead, dreaming, waiting, sepulcher-like, -awful! Where was the rustle of the wings of the -bats? The air moved soundlessly, and it seemed to have -the substance of shadows. A dead solitude—a terrible -silence! A man and the earth! The wide spaces, the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_222">222</span> -wild places of the earth as it was in the beginning! Here -could be the last lesson to a thinking man—the last development -of a man into savage or god.</p> - -<p>There! Was that a throb of his heart or a ring in his -ear? Crack of a stone, faint, far away, high on the heights, -a lonely sound making real the lonely night. It relieved -Adam. The tension of him relaxed. And he listened, -hopefully, longing to hear another break in the silence -that would be so insupportable.</p> - -<p>As he listened, the desert moon, oval in shape, orange -hued and weird, sailed over the black brow of the mountain -and illumined the valley in a radiance that did not -seem of land or sea. The darkness of midnight gave -way to orange shadows, mustering and shading, stranger -than the fantastic shapes of dreams.</p> - -<p>Another ring of rock on rock, and sharp rattle, and -roll on roll, assured Adam that the weathering gods of -the mountain were not daunted by the silence and the -loneliness of Death Valley. They were working as ever. -Their task was to level the mountain down to the level of -the sea. The stern, immutable purpose seemed to vibrate -in the ringing cracks and in the hollow reports. These -sounds in their evenness and perfect rhythm and lonely -tone established once more in Adam’s disturbed consciousness -the nature of the place. Death Valley! The rolling -of rocks dispelled phantasms.</p> - -<p>Then came a low, grating roar. The avalanche of endless -broken rocks had slipped an inch. It left an ominous -silence. Adam stirred restlessly in his blankets. There -was a woman in the lee of that tremendous sliding slope—a -woman of delicate frame, of magnificent spirit, of a -heart of living flame. Every hour she slept or lay wide -eyed in the path of that impending cataclysm was one of -exceeding peril. Adam chafed under the invisible bonds -of her will. Because she chose to lie there, fearless, beyond -the mind of man to comprehend, was that any reason -why he should let her perish? Adam vowed that he -would end this dread situation before another nightfall.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_223">223</span> -Yet when he thought of Magdalene Virey his heart contracted. -Only through the fierce spirit of the desert could -he defy her and beat down the jailer who chained her -there. But that fierce spirit of his seemed obstructed by -hers, an aloof thing, greater than ferocity, beyond physical -life.</p> - -<p>And so Adam lay sleepless, listening to the lonely fall -of sliding rocks, the rattle and clash, and then the hollow -settling. Then he listened to the silence.</p> - -<p>It was broken by a different note, louder, harsher—the -rattle and bang of a stone displaced and falling from a -momentum other than its own. It did not settle. Heavy -and large, it cracked down to thud into the sand and bump -out through the brush. Scarcely had it quieted when another -was set in motion, and it brought a low, sliding -crash of many small rocks. Adam sat up, turning his -ear toward the slope. Another large stone banged down -to the sands. Adam heard the whiz of it, evidently -hurtling through the air between his camp and the Vireys’. -If that stone had struck their shack!</p> - -<p>Adam got up and, pulling on his boots, walked out a -little way from his camp. What an opaque orange gloom! -Nevertheless, it had radiance. He could see almost as well -as when the full moon soared in silver effulgence. More -cracking and rolling of little rocks, and then the dislodgment -of a heavy one, convinced Adam that a burro -was climbing the slope or a panther had come down to -prowl around camp. At any rate the displacement of -stones jarred unnaturally on Adam’s sensitive ear.</p> - -<p>Hurrying across to the Virey shack, he approached the -side farther from the slope and called through the brush -wall, “Mrs. Virey!”</p> - -<p>“Yes. What do you want, Wansfell?” she replied, -instantly. She had been wide awake.</p> - -<p>“Have you heard the sliding rocks?”</p> - -<p>“Indeed I have! All through that strange roar of -wind—and later.”</p> - -<p>“You and Virey better get up and take your blankets<span class="pagenum" id="Page_224">224</span> -out a ways, where you will not be in danger. I think there’s -a burro or a panther up on the slope. You know how -loose the stones are—how at the slightest touch they come -sliding and rolling. I’ll go up and scare the beast away.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, you’re wrong,” came the reply, with that old -mockery which always hurt Adam. “You should not insult -a burro—not to speak of a panther.”</p> - -<p>“What?” queried Adam, blankly.</p> - -<p>“It is another kind of an animal.”</p> - -<p>But for that subtle mockery of voice Adam would have -been persuaded the woman was out of her head, or at -least answering him in her sleep.</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Virey, <span class="locked">please——”</span></p> - -<p>“Wansfell, it’s a sneaking coyote,” she called, piercingly, -and then she actually uttered a low laugh.</p> - -<p>Adam was absolutely dumfounded. “Coyote!” he -ejaculated.</p> - -<p>“Yes. It’s my husband. It’s Virey. He found out the -rolling rocks frightened me at night. So he climbs up -there and rolls them.... Sees how close he can come to -hitting the shack!... Oh, he’s done that often!”</p> - -<p>An instant Adam leaned there with his head bent to the -brush wall, as if turned to stone. Then like a man stung he -leaped up and bounded round the shack toward the slope.</p> - -<p>In the orange radiance on that strange, moon-blanched -slope he dimly saw a moving object. It stood upright. -Indeed, no burro or panther! Adam drew a deep and -mighty breath for the yell that must jar the very stones -from their sockets.</p> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">Hyar!</span>” he yelled in stentorian roar. Like thunder -the great sound pealed up the slope. “<span class="smcap">Come down or I’ll -wring your neck!</span>”</p> - -<p>Only the clapping, rolling, immeasurable echoes answered -him. The last hollow clap and roll died away, -leaving the silence deader than before.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Adam spent the remainder of that night pacing to and -fro in the orange-hued shadows, fighting the fierce, grim<span class="pagenum" id="Page_225">225</span> -violence that at last had burst its barrier. Adam could -have wrung the life out of this Virey with less compunction -than he would have in stamping on the head of a -venomous reptile. Yet it was as if a spirit kept in the -shadow of his form, as he strode the bare shingle, gazing -up at the solemn black mountains and at the wan -stars.</p> - -<p>Adam went down to the gateway between the huge -walls. A light was kindling over the far-away Funeral -range, and soon a glorious star swept up, as if by magic, -above the dark rim of the world. The morning star -shining down into Death Valley! No dream—no illusion—no -desert mirage! Like the Star of Bethlehem beckoning -the Wise Men to the East, it seemed to blaze a radiant -path for Adam down across the valley of dim, mystic -shadows. What could be the meaning of such a wonderful -light? Was that blue-white lilac-haloed star only another -earth upon which the sun was shining? Adam lifted -his drawn face to its light and wrestled with the baser -side of his nature. He seemed to be dominated by the -spirit that kept close to his side. Magdalene Virey kept -vigil with him on that lonely beat. It was her agony which -swayed and wore down his elemental passion. Would not -he fail her if he killed this man? Virey’s brutality seemed -not the great question at issue for him.</p> - -<p>“I’ll not kill him—yet!”</p> - -<p>Thus Adam eased the terrible contention within him.</p> - -<p>When he returned to camp the sun had risen red and -hot, with a thin, leaden haze dulling its brightness. No -wind stirred. Not a sound broke the stillness. Magdalene -Virey sat on the stone bench under the brush shelter, waiting -for him. She rose as he drew near. Never had he -seen her like this, smiling a welcome that was as true as -her presence, yet facing him with darkened eyes and -tremulous lips and fear. Adam read her. Not fear of -him, but of what he might do!</p> - -<p>“Is Virey back yet?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Yes. He just returned. He’s inside—going to sleep.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_226">226</span> -“I want to see him—to get something off my mind,” -said Adam.</p> - -<p>“Wait—Adam!” she cried, and reached for him as he -wheeled to go toward the shack.</p> - -<p>One glance at her brought Adam to a standstill, and -then to a slow settling down upon the stone seat, where -he bowed his head. Life had held few more poignant -moments than this, in his pity for others. Yet he thrilled -with admiration for this woman. She came close to him, -leaned against him, and the quiver of her body showed she -needed the support. She put a shaking hand on his -shoulder.</p> - -<p>“My friend—brother,” she whispered, “if you kill him—it -will undo—all the good you’ve done—for me.”</p> - -<p>“You told me once that the grandest act of a man was -to fight for the happiness—the life of a woman,” he -replied.</p> - -<p>“True! And haven’t you fought for my happiness, and -my life, too? I would have died long ago. As for happiness—it -has come out of my fight, my work, my effort -to meet you on your heights—more happiness than I deserve—than -I ever hoped to attain.... But if you kill -Virey—all will have been in vain.”</p> - -<p>“Why?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Because it is I who ruined him,” she replied, in low, -deep voice, significant of the force behind it. “As men -go in the world he was a gentleman, a man of affairs, -happy and carefree. When he met me his life changed. -He worshiped me. It was not his fault that I could not -love him. I hated him because they forced me to marry -him. For years he idolized me.... Then—then came the -shock—his despair, his agony. It made him mad. There -is a very thin line between great love and great hate.”</p> - -<p>“What—what ruined him?” demanded Adam.</p> - -<p>“Adam, it will be harder to confess than any other -ordeal of my whole life. Because—because <em>you</em> are the -one man I should have met years ago.... Do you understand? -And I—who yearn for your respect—for your—Oh,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_227">227</span> -spare me!... I who need your faith—your strange, -incomprehensible faith in me—I, who hug to my hungry -bosom the beautiful hopes you have in me—I must confess -my shame to save my husband’s worthless life.”</p> - -<p>“No. I’ll not have you—you humiliating yourself to -save him anything. I give my word. I’ll never kill Virey -unless he harms you.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! But he has harmed me. He has struck me.... -Wansfell! don’t leap like that. Listen. Virey will harm -me, sooner or later. He is obsessed with his one idea—to -see me suffer. That is why he has let you and me wander -around together so much. He hoped in his narrow soul -to see you come to love me, and me to love you—so -through that I should fall <em>again</em>—to suffer more anguish—to -offer more meat for his hellish revenge.... But, lo! -I am uplifted—forever beyond his reach—never to be rent -by his fiendish glee ... unless you kill him—which would -stain my hands with his blood—bring back the doom of -soul from which you rescued me!”</p> - -<p>“Magdalene, I swear I’ll never kill Virey unless he kills -you,” declared Adam, as if forced beyond endurance.</p> - -<p>“Ah, I ask no more!” she whispered, in passionate gratitude. -“My God! how I feared you—yet somehow gloried -in your look!... And now listen, friend, brother—man -who should have been my lover—I hurry to my abasement. -I kill the she-thing in me and go on to my atonement. I -fight the instincts of a woman. I sacrifice a possible paradise, -for I am young and life is sweet.”</p> - -<p>She circled his head with her arm and drew it against -her heaving breast. The throbs of that tortured heart -beat, beat, beat all through Adam’s blood, to the core of -his body.</p> - -<p>“My daughter Ruth was not Virey’s child,” she went -on, her voice low, yet clear as a bell. “I was only nineteen—a fool—mad—driven. -I thought I was in love, but it -was only one of those insane spells that so often ruin -women.... For years I kept the secret. Then I could -not keep it any longer. At the height of Virey’s goodness<span class="pagenum" id="Page_228">228</span> -to me, and his adoration, and his wonderful love for Ruth, -I told him the truth. I <em>had</em> to tell it.... That killed his -soul. He lived only to make me suffer. The sword he -held over my head was the threat to tell my secret to Ruth. -I could not bear that. A thousand deaths would have -been preferable to that.... So in the frenzy of our -trouble we started west for the desert. My father and -Ruth followed us—caught up with us at Sacramento. -Virey hated Ruth as passionately as he had loved her. I -dared not risk him near her in one of his terrible moods. -So I sent Ruth away with my father, somewhere to -southern California. She did not know it was parting -forever. But, O God in heaven—how I knew it!... -Then, in my desperation, I dared Virey to do his worst. I -had ruined him and I would pay to the last drop of blood -in my bitter heart. We came to Death Valley, as I told -you, because the terror and desolation seemed to Virey -to be as close to a hell on earth as he could find to hide -me. Here he began indeed to make me suffer—dirt and -vermin and thirst and hunger and pain! Oh! the horror -of it all comes back to me!... But even Death Valley -cheated him. You came, Wansfell, and now—at last—I -believe in God!”</p> - -<p>Adam wrapped a long arm around her trembling body -and held her close. At last she had confessed her secret. -It called to the unplumbed depths of him. And the cry -in his heart was for the endless agony of woman. And -it was a bitter cry of doubt. If Magdalene Virey had -at last found faith in God, it was more than Adam had -found, though she called him the instrument of her salvation. -A fierce and terrible rage flamed in him for the -ruin of her. Like a lion he longed to rise up to slay. -Blood and death were the elements that equalized wrong. -Yet through his helpless fury whispered a still voice into -his consciousness—she had been miserable and now she -was at peace; she had been lost and now she was saved. -He could not get around that. His desert passion halted -there. He must go on alone into the waste places and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_229">229</span> -ponder over the wonder of this woman and what had -transformed her. He must remember her soul-moving -words and, away somewhere in the solitude and silence, -learn if the love she intimated was a terrible truth. It -could not be true now, yet the shaking of her slender -form communicated itself to his, and there was inward -tumult, strange, new, a convulsive birth of a sensation -dead these many years—dead since that dusky-eyed Margarita -Arallanes had tilted her black head to say, “Ah, -so long ago and far away!”</p> - -<p>Memory surged up in Adam, moving him to speak -aloud his own deeply hidden secret, by the revelation of -which he might share the shame and remorse and agony -of Magdalene Virey.</p> - -<p>“I will tell you my story,” he said, and the words were -as cruel blades at the closed portals of his heart. Huskily -he began, halting often, breathing hard, while the clammy -sweat beaded upon his brow. What was this life—these -years that deceived with forgetfulness? His trouble was -there as keen as on the day it culminated. He told Magdalene -of his boyhood, of his love for his brother Guerd, -and of their life in the old home, where all, even friendships -of the girls, was for Guerd and nothing for him. -As he progressed, Magdalene Virey’s own agony was forgotten. -The quiver of her body changed to strung intensity, -the heaving of her bosom was no longer the long-drawn -breath to relieve oppression. Remorselessly as she -had bared her great secret, Adam confessed his little, -tawdry, miserable romance—his wild response to the lure -of a vain Mexican girl, and his fall, and the words that -had disillusioned him.</p> - -<p>“Ah, so long ago and far away!” echoed Magdalene -Virey, all the richness of her wonderful voice gathering -in a might of woman’s fury. “Oh, such a thing for a girl -to say!... And Adam—<em>she</em>, this Margarita, was the only -woman you ever loved—ever knew that way?”</p> - -<p>“Yes.”</p> - -<p>“And she was the cause of your ruin?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_230">230</span> -“Indeed she was, poor child!”</p> - -<p>“The damned hussy!” cried Magdalene, passionately. -“And you—only eighteen years old? How I hate her!... -And what of the man who won her fickle heart?”</p> - -<p>Adam bowed as a tree in a storm. “He—he was my -brother.”</p> - -<p>“Oh <em>no</em>!” she burst out. “The boy you loved—the -<em>brother</em>! Oh, it can’t be true!”</p> - -<p>“It was true.... And, Magdalene—I killed him.”</p> - -<p>Then with a gasp she enveloped him, in a fierce, protective -frenzy of tenderness, arms around him, pressing -his face to her breast, hanging over him as a mother over -her child.</p> - -<p>“Oh, my God! Oh, my God! How terrible!... -Your <em>brother</em>!... And I thought my secret, my sin, my -burden so terrible! Oh, my heart bleeds for you.... -Wansfell, poor unhappy wanderer!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_231">231</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XVIII">CHAPTER XVIII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">July! At</span> last the endlessly long, increasingly hot June -days brought the leaden-hazed month of July, when -no sane man ever attempted to cross Death Valley while -the sun was high.</p> - -<p>In all hours, even in the darkness, the bold, rugged slopes -of the Panamints reflected sinister shades of red. And -the valley was one of gray swirling shadows and waving -veils of heat like transparent smoke. Beyond that vast, -strange, dim valley rose the drab and ocher slopes of the -Funeral Mountains, sweeping up to the bronze battlements -and on to the lilac and purple peaks blurred in the leaden-hued -haze that obscured the sky. The sun was sky-broad, -an illimitable flare, with a lurid white heart into which -no man could look.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Adam was compelled to curtail his activities. He did -not suffer greatly from the heat, but he felt its weakening -power. Ever his blood seemed at fever heat. Early in the -mornings and late in the evenings he prepared simple meals, -which, as the days dragged on, were less and ever less -partaken of by his companions and himself. During the -midday hours, through the terrible heat, he lay in the -shade, sweltering and oppressed, in a stupor of sleep. The -nights were the only relief from the immense and merciless -glare, the bearing down of invisible bars of red-hot iron. -Most of these long hours of darkness Adam lay awake -or walked in the gloom or sat in the awful stillness, waiting -for he knew not what. But that he waited for something -he knew with augmenting dread.</p> - -<p>When the full blast of this summer heat came, Virey -changed physically and mentally. He grew thin. He<span class="pagenum" id="Page_232">232</span> -walked with bowed shoulders. His tongue protruded -slightly and he always panted. Every day he ate less and -slept less than on the day before. He obeyed no demands -from Adam and took no precautions. His sufferings -would have been less and his strength would have been -greater had he refrained from exposing himself to the -sun. But he reveled in proofs of the nature of Death -Valley.</p> - -<p>And if Virey had ever worn a mask in front of Adam -he now dropped it. Indeed he ignored Adam, no longer -with scorn or indifference, but as if unaware of his presence. -Whenever Adam wanted to be heard by Virey, -which desire diminished daily, he had to block his path, -confront him forcefully. Virey was given over wholly -to his obsession. His hate possessed him body and soul. -And if it had ever been a primitive hate to destroy, it -had been restrained, and therefore rendered infinitely cruel, -by the slow, measured process of thought, of premeditation.</p> - -<p>Often when Adam absented himself from camp, Virey -had a trick of climbing the weathered slope to roll down -rocks. He seemed mad to do this. Yet when Adam returned -he would come clambering down, wet and spent, -a haggard, sweating wretch not yet quite beyond fear. In -vain had Adam argued, pleaded, talked with him; in vain -had been the strident scorn of a man and the curses of -rage. Virey, however, had a dread of Adam’s huge hands. -Something about them fascinated him. When one of -these, clenched in an enormous fist, was shoved under his -nose with a last threat, then Virey would retire sullenly -to the shack. In every way that was possible he kept before -Magdalene Virey the spectacle of his ruin and the consciousness -that it was her doing. These midsummer days -soon made him a gaunt, unshaven, hollow-eyed wretch. -Miserable and unkempt he presented himself at meals, -and sat there, a haggard ghost, to mouth a little food and -to stare at his wife with accusing eyes. He reminded her -of cool, shaded rooms, of exquisite linen and china, of -dainty morsels, of carved-glass pitchers full of refreshing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_233">233</span> -drink and clinking ice. Always he kept before her the -heat, the squalor, the dirt, the horror of Death Valley. -When he could present himself before her with his thin, -torn garments clinging wet to his emaciated body, his -nerves gone from useless exertions, his hands bloody and -shaking as if with palsy, his tongue hanging out—when he -could surprise her thus and see her shrink, then he experienced -rapture. He seemed to cry out: Woman! behold -the wreck of Virey!</p> - -<p>But if that was rapture for him, to gloat over the doom -of her seemed his glory. Day by day Death Valley -wrought by invisible lines and shades a havoc in Magdalene -Virey’s beauty. To look at her was to have striking proof -that Death Valley had never been intended for a woman, -no matter how magnificent her spirit. The only spirit -that could prevail here was the one which had lost its -earthly habiliments. Like a cat playing with a mouse, -Virey watched his wife. Like Mephistopheles gloating -over the soul of a lost woman, Virey attended to the slow -manifestations of his wife’s failing strength. He meant -to squeeze every drop of blood out of her heart and still -keep, if possible, life lingering in her. His most terrible -bitterness seemed to consist of his failure to hide her -utterly and forever from the gaze of any man save himself. -Here he had hidden her in the most desolate place -in the world, yet another man had come, and, like all the -others, had been ready to lay down his life for her. Virey -writhed under this circumstance over which he had no -control. It was really the only truth about the whole -situation that he was able to grasp. The terrible tragedy -of his hate was that it was not hate, but love. Like a -cannibal, he would have eaten his wife raw, not from -hunger, but from his passion to consume her, incorporate -her heart and blood and flesh into his, make her body his -forever. Thought of her soul, her mind, her spirit, never -occurred to Virey. So he never realized how she escaped -him, never understood her mocking scorn.</p> - -<p>But through his thick and heat-hazed brain there must<span class="pagenum" id="Page_234">234</span> -have pierced some divination of his failing powers to -torture her. The time came when he ceased to confront -her like a scarecrow, he ceased accusing her, he ceased to -hold before her the past and its contrast with the present, -he gave up his refinement of cruelty. This marked in -Virey a further change, a greater abasement. He reverted -to instinct. He retrograded to a savage in his hate, and -that hate found its outlet altogether in primitive ways.</p> - -<p>Adam’s keen eye saw all this, and the slow boil in his -blood was not all owing to the torrid heat of Death Valley. -His great hands, so efficient and ruthless, seemed fettered. -A thousand times he had muttered to the silence of the -night, to the solemn, hazed daylight, to the rocks that had -souls, and to the invisible presence ever beside him: “How -long must I stand this? How long—how long?”</p> - -<p>One afternoon as he awoke late from the sweltering -siesta he heard Mrs. Virey scream. The cry startled him, -because she had never done that before. He ran.</p> - -<p>Adam found her lying at the foot of the stone bench in -a dead faint. The brown had left her skin. How white -the wasted face! What dark shadows under the hollow -eyes! His heart smote him remorselessly.</p> - -<p>As he knelt and was about to lift her head he espied a -huge, black, hairy spider crawling out of the folds of -her gray gown. It was a tarantula, one of the ugliest of -the species. Adam flipped it off with his hand and killed -it under his boot.</p> - -<p>Then with basin of water and wetted scarf he essayed -to bring Mrs. Virey back to consciousness. She did not -come to quickly, but at last she stirred, and opened her -eyes with a flutter. She seemed to be awakening from a -nightmare of fear, loathing, and horror. For that instant -her sight did not take in Adam, but was a dark, humid, -dilated vision of memory.</p> - -<p>“Magdalene, I killed the tarantula,” said he. “It can’t -harm you now.... Wake up! Why, you’re stiff and -you look like—like I don’t know what!... You fainted -and I’ve had a time bringing you to.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_235">235</span> -“Oh!” she cried. “It’s you.” And then she clung to -him while he lifted her, steadying her upon her feet, and -placed her on the stone bench. “So I fainted?... Ugh! -That loathsome spider! Where is it?”</p> - -<p>“I covered it with sand,” he replied.</p> - -<p>“Would it have—bitten me?”</p> - -<p>“No. Not unless you grasped it.”</p> - -<p>Slowly she recovered and, letting go of him, leaned back -in the seat. Crystal beads of sweat stood out upon her -white brow. Her hair was wet. Her sensitive lips -quivered.</p> - -<p>“I’ve a perfect horror of mice, bugs, snakes, spiders—anything -that crawls,” she said. “I can’t restrain it. I -inherited it from my mother.... And what has mind got -to do with most of a woman’s feelings? Virey has finally -found that out.”</p> - -<p>“Virey!... What do you mean?” rejoined Adam.</p> - -<p>“I was leaning back here on the bench when suddenly I -heard Virey slipping up behind me. I knew he was up -to something. But I wouldn’t turn to see what. Then -with two sticks he held the tarantula out over me—almost -in my face. I screamed. I seemed to freeze inside. He -dropped the tarantula in my lap.... Then all went black.”</p> - -<p>“Where—is he now?” asked Adam, finding it difficult -to speak.</p> - -<p>“He’s in the shack.”</p> - -<p>Adam made a giant stride in that direction, only to be -caught and detained by her clinging hands. Earnestly she -gazed up at him, with melancholy, searching eyes.</p> - -<p>He uttered a loud laugh, mirthless, a mere explosion of -surcharged breath. “No!... I can’t get angry. I can’t -be a man any more. This Death Valley and the sun—and -you—have worked on my mind.... But I’ll tell you -what—nothing can stop me from beating Virey—so he’ll -never do that again.”</p> - -<p>“Ah!... So I’ve worked on your mind? Then it’s -the only great deed I ever did.... Wansfell, I told you -Virey has threatened to shoot you. He’s meant to more<span class="pagenum" id="Page_236">236</span> -than once, but when you have come he has been afraid. -But he might.”</p> - -<p>“I wish to heaven he’d try it,” responded Adam, and, -loosing the woman’s hold upon his hands, he strode toward -the shack.</p> - -<p>“Virey, come out!” he called, loudly, though without -any particular feeling. There was no reply, and he repeated -the call, this time louder. Still Virey remained silent. -Waiting a moment longer, Adam finally spoke again, with -deliberate, cold voice. “Virey, I don’t want to mess up -that room, with all your wife’s belongings in there. So -come outside.”</p> - -<p>At that Adam heard a quick, panting breath. Then -Virey appeared—came to the door of the shack. Adam -could not have told what the man’s distorted face resembled. -He carried a gun, and his heart was ferocious if his -will was weak.</p> - -<p>“Don’t you—lay one of your—bloody hands on me,” -he panted.</p> - -<p>Adam took two long strides and halted before Virey, -not six feet distant.</p> - -<p>“So you’ve got your little gun, eh?” he queried, without -any particular force. Adam had been compelled to -smother all that mighty passion within him, or he could -not have answered for his actions. “What are you going -to do with it?”</p> - -<p>“If you make a—move at me—I’ll kill you,” came the -husky, panting response.</p> - -<p>“Virey, I’m going to beat you within an inch of your -worthless life,” declared Adam, monotonously, as if he had -learned this speech by rote. “But I’ve got to talk first. -I’m full of a million things to call you.”</p> - -<p>“Damn you, I’ll not listen,” replied Virey, beginning to -shake with excitement. The idea of using the gun had -become an intent and was acting powerfully upon him. -“You leave my—camp—you get out—of this valley!”</p> - -<p>“Virey, are you crazy?” queried Adam. The use of his -voice had changed that deadlock of his feelings. He must<span class="pagenum" id="Page_237">237</span> -not trust himself to bandy speech with Virey. The beating -must be administered quickly or there would be something -worse. Yet how desperately hard not to try to -awaken conscience or sense in this man!</p> - -<p>“No, I’m not crazy,” yelled Virey.</p> - -<p>“If you’re not crazy, then that trick of throwing a -tarantula on your wife was damnable—mean—hellish—monstrous.... -My God! man, can’t you see what a -coward you are? To torture her—as if you were a -heathen! That delicate woman—all quivering nerves! -To pick on a weakness, like that of a child! Virey, if -you’re not crazy you’re the worst brute I’ve ever met on -the desert. You’ve sunk lower than men whom the desert -has made beasts. <span class="locked">You——”</span></p> - -<p>“Beast I am—thanks to my delicate wife,” cried Virey, -with exceeding bitter passion. “Delicate? Ha-ha! The -last lover of Magdalene Virey can’t see she’s strong as -steel—alive as red fire! How she clings to memory! How -she has nine lives of a cat—and hangs on to them—just to -remember!... And you—meddler! You desert rat of -a preacher! Get out—or I’ll kill you!”</p> - -<p>“Shoot and be damned!” flashed Adam, as with leap -as swift as his voice he reached a sweeping arm.</p> - -<p>Virey’s face turned ashen. He raised the gun. Adam -knocked it up just as it exploded. The powder burned his -forehead, but the bullet sped high. Another blow sent -the gun flying to the sand. Then Adam, fastening a -powerful grip on Virey, clutching shirt and collar and -throat at once, dragged him before the stone bench where -Mrs. Virey sat, wide eyed and pale. Here Adam tripped -the man and threw him heavily upon the sand. Before he -could rise Adam straddled him, bearing him down. Then -Adam’s big right hand swept and dug in the sand to -uncover the dead tarantula.</p> - -<p>“Ah! here’s your spider!” he shouted. And he rubbed -the hairy, half-crushed tarantula in Virey’s face. The -man screamed and wrestled. “Good! you open your mouth. -Now we’ll see.... Eat it—eat it, damn your cowardly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_238">238</span> -soul!” Then Adam essayed to thrust the spider between -Virey’s open lips. He succeeded only partly. Virey let -out a strangling, spitting yell, then closed his teeth as a -vise. Adam smeared what was left of the crushed tarantula -all over Virey’s face.</p> - -<p>“Now get up,” he ordered, and, rising himself, he kicked -Virey. Adam, in the liberation of his emotions by action, -was now safe from himself. He would not kill Virey. He -could even hold in his enormous strength. He could even -think of the joy of violence that was rioting inside him, -of the ruthless fierceness with which he could have rent -this man limb from limb.</p> - -<p>Virey, hissing and panting in a frenzy, scrambled to -his feet. Fight was in him now. He leaped at Adam, -only to meet a blow that laid him on the sand. It had -not stunned him. Up he sprang, bloody, livid, and was -at Adam again. His frenzy lent him strength and in that -moment he had no fear of man or devil. The desert rage -was on him. He swung his fists, beat wildly at Adam, -tore and clawed. Adam slapped him with great broad -hands that clapped like boards, and then, when Virey -lunged close, he closed his fist and smashed it into Virey’s -face. The man of the cities went plowing in the sand. -Then on his hands and knees he crawled like a dog, and, -finding a stone, he jumped up to fling it. Adam dodged -the missile. Wildly Virey clutched for more, throwing -one after another. Adam caught one and threw it back, -to crack hard on his opponent’s shin. Virey yelled no -more. His rage took complete possession of him. Grasping -up a large rock, he held it as a mace and rushed upon -Adam to brain him. That action and intent to kill was -the only big response he had made to this wild environment. -He beat at Adam. He lunged up to meet his foe’s -lofty head. He had no fear. But he was mad. No -dawning came to him that he was being toyed with. -Strong and furious at the moment, he might have succeeded -in killing a lesser man. But before Adam he was -powerless to do murder. Then the time came when Adam<span class="pagenum" id="Page_239">239</span> -knocked the rock out of his hand and began to beat him, -blow on blow to face and body, with violence, but with -checked strength, so that Virey staggered here and there, -upheld by fists. At last, whipped out of rage and power to -retaliate, Virey fell to the sands. Adam dragged him into -the shack and left him prostrate and moaning, an abject -beaten wretch who realized his condition.</p> - -<p>Most difficult of all for Adam then was to face Mrs. -Virey. Yet the instant he did he realized that his ignorance -of women was infinite.</p> - -<p>“Did the bullet—when he fired—did it hit you?” she -queried, her large eyes, intense and glowing, wonderfully -dark with emotion, flashing over him.</p> - -<p>“No—it missed—me,” panted Adam, as with heavy -breaths he sank upon the stone bench.</p> - -<p>“I picked up the gun. I was afraid he’d find it. You’d -better keep it now,” she said, and slipped it into his -pocket.</p> - -<p>“What a—dis—gusting—sight for you—to have—to -watch!” exclaimed Adam, trying to speak and breathe at -once.</p> - -<p>“It was frightful—terrible at first,” she returned. “But -after the gun went flying—and you had stopped trying to -make him eat the—the spider—uggh! how sickening!... -After that it got to be— Well, Wansfell, it was the -first time in the years I’ve known my husband that I respected -him. He meant to kill you. It amazed me. I -admired him.... And as for you—to see you tower over -him—and parry his blows—and hit him when you liked—and -knock him and drag him—oh, that roused a terrible -something in me! I never felt so before in my whole -life. I was some other woman. I watched the blood flow, -I heard the thuds and heavy breaths, I actually smelled -the heat of you, I was so close—and it all inflamed me, -made me strung with savage excitement—I had almost -said joy.... God knows, Wansfell, we have hidden natures -within our breasts.”</p> - -<p>“If only it’s a lesson to him!” sighed Adam.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_240">240</span> -“Then it were well done,” she replied, “but I doubt—I -doubt. Virey is hopeless. Let us forget.... And now -will you please help me search in the sand here for something -I dropped. It fell from my lap when I fainted, I -suppose. It’s a small ivory case with a miniature I think -all the world of. Last and best of my treasures!”</p> - -<p>Adam raked in the sand along the base of the bench, -and presently found the lost treasure. How passionately, -with what eloquent cry of rapture, did she clutch it!</p> - -<p>“Look!” she exclaimed, with wonderful thrill in her -voice, and held the little case open before Adam’s eyes.</p> - -<p>He saw a miniature painting of a girl’s face, oval, pure -as a flower, with beautiful curls of dark bronze, and -magnificent eyes. In these last Adam recognized the -mother of this girl. The look of them, the pride and fire, -if not the color, were the same as Magdalene Virey’s.</p> - -<p>“A sweet and lovely face,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>“Ruth!” she whispered. “My daughter—my only child—my -baby that I abandoned to save her happiness!... -Oh, mockery of life that I was given such a heart to love—that -I was given such a perfect child!”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The midsummer midnight furnace winds began to blow.</p> - -<p>They did not blow every night or many nights consecutively; -otherwise all life in the valley would soon have -become extinct. Adam found the hot winds heretofore, -that he had imagined were those for which the valley was -famed, were really comfortable compared with these terrible -furnace blasts. In trying to understand their nature, -Adam concluded they were caused by a displacement of -higher currents of cool air. Sometime during the middle -of the night there began a downward current of cool air -from the mountain heights; and this caused a disturbance -of the vast area of hot air in the burning valley below -sea level. The tremendous pressure drove the hot air to -find an outlet so it could rise to let the cool air down, and -thus there came gusts and gales of furnace winds, rushing -down the valley, roaring up the canyons.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_241">241</span> -The camp of the Vireys, almost in the center of one of -these outlets and scarcely a quarter of a mile from the -main valley, lay open to the full fury of these winds.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The 1st of August was a hazy, blistering day in which -the valley smoked. Veils of transparent black heat—shrouds -of moving white transparent heat! The mountains’ -tops were invisible, as if obscured in thin, leaden-hued fog; -their bases showed dull, sinister red through the haze. -Nothing moved except the strange veils and the terrible -heaven-wide sun that seemed to have burst. It was a -day when, if a man touched an unshaded stone with his -naked hand, he would be burned as by a hot iron. A -solemn, silent, sulphurous, smoky, deadly day, inimical to -life!</p> - -<p>But at last the sunset of red hell ended that day and -merciful darkness intervened. The fore part of the night -was hot, yet endurable, and a relief compared to the sunlit -hours. Adam marked, however, or imagined, a singular, -ominous, reddish hue of the dim stars, a vast still -veil between him and the sky, a waiting hush. He walked -out into the open, peering through the dimness, trying to -comprehend. The color of the stars and heavens, and of -the dull black slopes, and of the night itself, seemed that -of a world burned out. Immense, dim, mysterious, empty, -desolate! Had this Death Valley finally unhinged his -mind? But he convinced himself that it was normal. -The unreality, the terror, the forbidding hush of all the -elements, the imminence of catastrophe—these were all -actually present. Anything could happen here. Exaggeration -of sense was impossible. This Death Valley was -only a niche of the universe and the universe only a part -of the infinite. He felt his intelligence and emotion, and -at the same time the conviction that only a step away -was death. The old wonder arose—was death the end? -Not possible! Yet the cruelty, the impassivity of nature, -letting the iron consequences fall—this seemed to crush -him. For the sake of a woman who suffered agony of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_242">242</span> -body and mind, Adam was at war with nature and the -spirit of creation. Why? The eternal query had no -answer. It never would be answered.</p> - -<p>As the hours wore away the air grew hotter, denser. -Like a blanket it seemed to lie heavily on Adam. It was -the hottest, stillest, most oppressive, strangest night of -all his desert experience. Sleep was impossible. Rest -was impossible. Inaction was impossible. Every breath -seemed impossible of fulfillment. A pressure constricted -Adam’s lungs. The slow, gentle walk that he drove himself -to take, which it was impossible to keep from taking, -brought out a hot flood of sweat on his body, and the drops -burned as they trickled down his flesh.</p> - -<p>“If the winds blow to-night!” he muttered, in irresistible -dread.</p> - -<p>Something told him they would blow. To-night they -would blow harder and hotter than ever before. The day -of leaden fire had promised that. Nature had her midnight -change to make in the elements. Time would not -stand still. The universe prevailed on its inscrutable -course; the planets burned; the suns blazed upon their -earths; and this ball of rock on which Adam clung, groaning -with the other pygmies of his kind, whirled and hurtled -through space, now dark and then light, now hot and then -cold, slave to a blazing master ninety million miles away. -It was all so inconceivable, inscrutable, unbelievable.</p> - -<p>There came a movement of air fanning his check, emphasizing -the warmth. He smelled anew the dry alkali -dust, the smoky odor, almost like brimstone. The hour -was near midnight and the deathlike silence brooded no -more. A low moan, as of a lost soul, moved somewhere -on the still air. Weird, dismal, uncanny, it fitted the -spectral shadows and shapes around him, and the night -with its mystery. No human sound, though it resembled -the mourn of humanity! A puff of hot wind struck Adam -in the face, rushed by, rustling the dead and withered -brush, passed on to lull and die away. It seemed to leave -a slow movement in the still air, a soft, restless, uneasy<span class="pagenum" id="Page_243">243</span> -shifting, as of an immense volume becoming unsettled. -Adam knew. Behind that sudden birth of life of dead -air pressed the furious blasts of hell—the midnight furnace -wind of Death Valley.</p> - -<p>Adam listened. How strange, low, sad the moan! His -keen ears, attuned to all varieties of desert sound, seemed -to fill and expand. The moan swelled to a low roar, lulling -now, then rising. Like no sound he had ever heard before, -it had strange affinity with the abyss of shadows. Suddenly -the air around Adam began a steady movement -northward. Its density increased, or else the movement, -or pressure behind, made it appear so. And it grew swift, -until it rustled the brush. Down in the valley the roar -swelled like the movement of a mighty storm through a -forest. When the gale reached the gateway below Adam -it gave a hollow bellow.</p> - -<p>The last of the warm, still air was pressed beyond Adam, -apparently leaving a vacuum, for there did not appear -to be air enough to breathe. The roar of wind sounded -still quite distant, though now loud. Then the hot blast -struck Adam—a burning, withering wind. It was as if -he had suddenly faced an open furnace from which flames -and sparks leaped out upon him. That he could breathe, -that he lived a moment, seemed a marvel. Wind and roar -filled the wide space between the slopes and rushed on, -carrying sand and dust and even shadows with it. That -blast softened in volume and had almost died away when -another whooped up through the gateway, louder and -stronger and hotter than its predecessor. It blew down -Adam’s sun shelter of brush and carried the branches -rustling away. Then stormed contending tides of winds -until, what with burning blasts and whirling dust devils -and air thick with powdered salt and alkali, life became -indeed a torment for Adam, man of the desert as he was.</p> - -<p>In the face of these furnace winds, tenacity of life had -new meaning for Adam. The struggle to breathe was -the struggle of a dying man to live. But Adam found -that he could survive. It took labor, greater even than<span class="pagenum" id="Page_244">244</span> -toiling through a sandstorm, or across a sun-scorched -waste to a distant water hole. And it was involuntary -labor. His great lungs were not a bellows for him to open -when he chose. They were compelled to work. But the -process, in addition to the burn and sting, the incessant -thirst, the dust-laden air, the hot skullbone like an iron -lid that must fly off, and the strange, dim, red starlight, -the somber red varying shadow, the weird rush and roar -and lull—all these created heroic fortitude if a man was -to endure. Adam understood why no human being could -long exist in Death Valley.</p> - -<p>“She will not live through the night,” muttered Adam. -“But if she does, I think I’ll take her away.”</p> - -<p>While in the unearthly starlit gloom, so dimly red, -Adam slowly plodded across to the Virey camp, that idea -grew in his mind. It had augmented before this hour, -only to faint at the strength of her spirit, but to-night was -different. It marked a climax. If Magdalene Virey -showed any weakening, any change of spirit, Adam knew -he would have reached the end of his endurance.</p> - -<p>She would be lying or sitting on the stone bench. It -was not possible to breathe inside the shack. Terrible as -were the furnace winds, they had to be breasted—they had -to be fought for the very air of life. She had not the -strength to walk up and down, to and fro, through those -endless hours.</p> - -<p>Adam’s keen eyes, peering through the red-tinged obscurity, -made out the dark shape of Virey staggering -along back and forth like an old man driven and bewildered, -hounded by the death he feared. The sight gave -Adam a moment of fierce satisfaction. Strong as was the -influence of Magdalene Virey, it could not keep down hate -for this selfish and fallen man. Selfish beyond all other -frailty of human nature! The narrow mind obsessed with -self—the I and me and mine—the miserable littleness that -could not forgive, that could not understand! Adam had -pity even in his hate.</p> - -<p>He found the woman on the bench, lying prone, a white,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_245">245</span> -limp, fragile shape, motionless as stone. Sitting down, he -bent over to look into her face. Her unfathomable eyes, -wide and dark and strained, stirred his heart as never -before. They were eyes to which sleep was a stranger—haunted -eyes, like the strange midnight at which they gazed -out, supernaturally bright, mirroring the dim stars, beautiful -as the waking dreams never to come true—eyes of -melancholy, of unutterable passion, of deathless spirit. -They were the eyes of woman and of love.</p> - -<p>Adam took her wasted hand and held it while waiting -for the wind to lull so that she could hear him speak. At -length the hot blast moved on, like the receding of a fire.</p> - -<p>“Magdalene, I can’t stand this any longer,” he said.</p> - -<p>“You mean—these winds—of hell?” she panted, in a -whisper.</p> - -<p>“No. I mean your suffering. I might have stood your -spiritual ordeal. Your remorse—your agony of loss of -the daughter Ruth—your brave spirit defying Virey’s hate.... -But I can’t stand your physical torment. You’re -wasting away. You’re withering—burning up. This hand -is hot as fire—and dry as a leaf. You must drink more -water.... Magdalene, lift your head.”</p> - -<p>“I—cannot,” she whispered, with wan smile. “No—strength -left.”</p> - -<p>Adam lifted her head and gave her water to drink. -Then as he laid her back another blast of wind came roaring -through the strange opaque night. How it moaned -and wailed around the huge bowlders and through the -brush! It was a dance of wind fiends, hounding the lost -spirits of this valley of horrors. Adam felt the slow, tight -tide of his blood called stingingly to his skin and his extremities, -and there it burned. It was not only his heart -and his lungs that were oppressed, but the very life of his -body seemed to be pressing to escape through the pores of -his skin—pressed from inward by the terrible struggle to -survive and pressed back from outside by the tremendous -blast of wind! The wind roared by and lulled to a moan. -The wave of invisible fire passed on. Out there in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_246">246</span> -dim starlight Virey staggered back and forth under the -too great burden of his fate. He made no sound. He -was a specter. Beyond the gray level of gloom with its -strange shadows rose the immense slope of loose stones, -all shining with dim, pale-red glow, all seemingly alive, -waiting for the slide of the avalanche. And on the instant -a rock cracked with faint ring, rolled with little hollow -reports, mockingly, full of terrible and latent power. It -had ominous answer in a slight jar of the earth under -Adam’s feet, perhaps an earthquake settling of the crust, -and then the whole vast slope moved with a low, grating -sound, neither roar nor crash, nor rattle. The avalanche -had slipped a foot. Adam could have pealed out a cry -of dread for this woman. What a ghastly fantasy the -struggle for life in Death Valley! What mockery of -wind and desert and avalanche!</p> - -<p>“Wansfell—listen,” whispered the woman. “Do you -hear—it passing on?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” replied Adam, bending lower to see her eyes. -Did she mean that the roar of wind was dying away?</p> - -<p>“The stormy blast of hell—with restless fury—drives the -spirits onward!” she said, her voice rising.</p> - -<p>“I know—I understand. But you mustn’t speak such -thoughts. You must not give up to the wandering of your -mind. You must fight,” implored Adam.</p> - -<p>“My friend—the fight is over—the victory is mine.... -I shall escape Virey. He possessed my body—poor weak -thing of flesh!... but he wanted my love—my soul.... -My soul to kill! He’ll never have either.... Wansfell, -I’ll not live—through the night.... I am dying now.”</p> - -<p>“No—no!” cried Adam, huskily. “You only imagine -that. It’s only the oppression of these winds—and the -terror of the night—this awful, unearthly valley of death. -You’ll live. The winds will wear out soon. If only you -fight you’ll live.... And to-morrow—Magdalene, so help -me God—I’ll take you away!”</p> - -<p>He expected the inflexible and magnetic opposition of -her will, the resistless power of her spirit to uplift and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_247">247</span> -transform. And this time he was adamant. At last the -desert force within him had arisen above all spiritual -obstacles. The thing that called was life—life as it had -been in the beginning of time. But no mockery or eloquence -of refusal was forthcoming from Magdalene Virey. -Instead, she placed the little ivory case, containing the -miniature painting of her daughter Ruth, in Adam’s hand -and softly pressed it there.</p> - -<p>“But—if I should die—I want you to have this picture -of Ruth,” she said. “I’ve had to hide it from Virey—to -gaze upon it in his absence. Take it, my friend, and keep -it, and look at it until it draws you to her.... Wansfell, -I’ll not bewilder you by mystic prophecies. But I tell you -solemnly—with the clairvoyant truth given to a woman -who feels the presence of death—that my daughter Ruth -will cross your wanderer’s trail—come into your life—and -love you.... Remember what I tell you. I see!... -You are a young man still. She is a budding girl. -You two will meet, perhaps in your own wastelands. -Ruth is all of me—magnified a thousand times. More—she -is as lovely as an unfolding rose at dawn. She will -be a white, living flame.... It will be as if I had met -you long ago—when I was a girl—and gave you what by -the nature of life was yours.... Wansfell, you wakened -my heart—saved my soul—taught me peace.... I wonder -how you did it. You were just a man.... There’s a -falseness of life—the scales fell from my eyes one by one. -It is the heart, the flesh, the bursting stream of red blood -that count with nature. All this strife, this travail, makes -toward a perfection never to be attained. But effort and -pain, agony of flesh, and victory over mind make strength, -virility.... Nature loves barbarian women who nurse -their children. I—with all my love—could not nurse my -baby Ruth. It’s a mystery no longer. Death Valley and -a primitive man have opened my eyes. Nature did not -intend people to live in cities, but in forests, as lived the -Aryans of India, or like the savages of Brazilian jungles. -Like the desert beasts, self-sufficient, bringing forth few<span class="pagenum" id="Page_248">248</span> -of their kind, but better, stronger species. The weak perish. -So should the weak among men.... Ah! hear the -roar! Another wind of death!... But I’ve said all.... -Wansfell, go find Ruth—find me in her—and—remember!”</p> - -<p>The rich voice, growing faint at the last, failed as -another furnace blast came swooping up with its dust -and heat. Adam bowed his head and endured. It passed -and another came. The woman lay with closed eyes and -limp body and nerveless hands. Hours passed and the -terrible winds subsided. The shadow of a man that was -Virey swaying to and fro, like a drunken specter, vanished -in the shack. The woman slept. Adam watched by her -side till dawn, and when the gray light came he could no -more have been changed than could the night have been -recalled. He would find the burros and pack them and -saddle one for Magdalene Virey to ride; he would start -to climb out of Death Valley and when another night fell -he would have her safe on the cool mountain heights. If -Virey tried to prevent this, it would mean the terrible end -he merited. Adam gazed down upon the sleeping woman. -How transparent, how frail a creature! She mystified -Adam. She represented the creative force in life. She -possessed that unintelligible and fatal thing in nature—the -greatest, the most irresistible, the purest expression of -truth, of what nature strove so desperately for—and it was -beauty. Her youth, her error, her mocking acceptance of -life, her magnificent spirit, her mother longing, her agony -and her physical pangs, her awakening and repentance -and victory—all were written on the pale face and with -the indestructible charm of line and curve and classic -feature constituted its infinite loveliness. She was a sleeping -woman, yet she was close to the angels.</p> - -<p>Adam looked from her to the ivory case in his hand.</p> - -<p>“Her daughter Ruth—for me!” he said, wonderingly. -“How strange if we met! If—if— But that’s impossible. -She was wandering in mind.”</p> - -<p>He carried the little case to his camp, searched in his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_249">249</span> -pack for an old silk scarf, and, tearing this, he carefully -wrapped the gift and deposited it inside the leather money -belt he wore hidden round his waist.</p> - -<p>“Now to get ready to leave Death Valley!” he exclaimed, -in grim exultance.</p> - -<p>Adam’s burros seldom strayed far from camp. This -morning, however, he did not find them near the spring -nor down in the notches of the mountain wall. So he -bent his steps in the other direction. At last, round a -corner of slope, out of sight of camp, he espied them, and -soon had them trotting ahead of him.</p> - -<p>He had traversed probably half the distance he had -come when the burro Jennie halted to shoot up her long -ears. Something moving had attracted her attention, but -Adam could not see it. He drove her on. Again she -stopped. Adam could now see the shack, and as he peered -sharply there seemed to cross his vision a bounding gray -object. He rubbed his eyes and muttered. Perhaps the -heat had affected his sight. Then between him and the -shack flashed a rough object, gray-white in color, and it -had the bounding motion of a jack rabbit. But it could -not have been a rabbit, because it was too large, and, -besides, there were none in the valley. A wild cat, perhaps? -Adam urged Jennie on, and it struck him that she -was acting queerly. This burro never grew contrary without -cause. When she squealed and sheered off to one -side Adam knew something was amiss. That vague shock -returned to his consciousness, stronger, more certain and -bewildering. Halting so as to hear better, he held his -breath and listened. Crack and roll of rock—slow sliding -rattle—crack! The mystery of the bounding gray objects -was solved. Virey had again taken to rolling rocks down -the slope.</p> - -<p>Adam broke into a run. He was quite a distance from -the shack, though now he could see it plainly. No person -was in sight. More than once, as he looked, he saw rocks -bound high above the brush and fall to puff up dust. -Virey was industrious this morning, making up for lost<span class="pagenum" id="Page_250">250</span> -time, taking sure advantage of Adam’s absence. Adam ran -faster. He reached a point opposite the fanlike edge of -the great slant of loose stones, and here he seemed to get -into a zone of concatenated sounds. The wind, created by -his run, filled his ears. And his sight, too, seemed not -to be trusted. Did it not magnify a bounding rock and -puff of dust into many rocks and puffs? Streaks were -running low down in the brush, raising little dusty streams. -He saw clumps of brush shake and bend. If something -queer, such as had affected Jennie, did not possess his -sight and mind, then it surely possessed Death Valley. -For something was wrong.</p> - -<p>Suddenly Adam’s ears were deafened by a splitting -shock. He plunged in his giant stride, slowed and halted. -He heard the last of a sliding roar. The avalanche had -slipped. But it had stopped. Bounding rocks hurtled in -front of Adam, behind him, and puffs and streaks of -dust were everywhere. He heard the whiz and thud -of a rolling rock passing close behind him. As he gazed -a large stone bounded from the ground and seemed to -pass right through the shack. The shack collapsed. Adam’s -heart leaped to his throat. He was riveted to the spot. -Then, mercifully it seemed, a white form glided out from -the sun shelter. It was the woman, still unharmed. The -sight unclamped Adam’s voice and muscle.</p> - -<p>“Go across! Hurry!” yelled Adam, with all the power -of his lungs. He measured the distance between him and -her. Two hundred yards! Rocks were hurtling and -pounding across that space.</p> - -<p>The woman heard him. She waved her white hand -and it seemed she was waving him back out of peril. -Then she pointed up the slope. Adam wheeled. What -a thrilling sight! Rocks were streaking down, hurtling -into the air, falling to crack powder from other rocks, -that likewise were set in motion. Far up the long gray -slope, with its million facets of stones shining in the sunlight, -appeared Virey, working frantically. No longer did -he seek to frighten his wife. He meant to kill her. His<span class="pagenum" id="Page_251">251</span> -insane genius had read the secret of the slope, and in an -instant he would have the avalanche in motion. The -cracking clamor increased. Adam opened his lips to yell -a terrible threat up at Virey, but a whizzing bowlder, large -as a bucket, flashing within a foot of his head, awakened -him to his own peril. He saw other rocks bounding down -in line with him, and, changing his position, stepping, leaping, -dodging, he managed to evade them. He had no fear -for himself, but terror for the woman, and for Virey deadly -rage possessed his heart.</p> - -<p>Then a piercing split, as of rocks rent asunder, a -rattling crash, and the lower half of the great gray -slope was in motion. The avalanche! Adam leaped at -the startling sound, and, bounding a few yards to a -huge bowlder, high as his head and higher, he mounted -it. There, unmindful of himself, he wheeled to look for -Magdalene Virey. Too late to reach her! She faced that -avalanche, arms spread aloft, every line of her body -instinct with the magnificent spirit which had been her -doom.</p> - -<p>“<em>Run! Run! Run!</em>” shrieked Adam, wildly.</p> - -<p>Lost was his piercing shriek in the swallowing, gathering -might of the crashing roar of the avalanche. A pall -of dust, a gray tumbling mass, moved down ponderously, -majestically, to hide from Adam’s sight the white form -of Magdalene Virey. It spread to where Adam stood, -enveloped him, and then, in boom and thunder and crash -as of falling worlds, the bowlder was lifted and carried -along with the avalanche.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_252">252</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XIX">CHAPTER XIX</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Adam</span> was thrown prostrate. In the thick, smothering -dust he all but lost his senses. Adam felt what -seemed a stream of stones rolling over his feet. The -thundering, deafening roar rolled on, spread and thinned -to a rattling crash, deadened and ceased. Then from the -hollows of the hills boomed a mighty echo, a lifting and -throwing of measureless sound, that thumped from -battlement to battlement and rumbled away like muttering -thunder.</p> - -<p>The silence then was terrible by contrast. As horror -relaxed its grim clutch Adam began to realize that miraculously -he had been spared. In the hot, dusty pall he -fought for breath like a drowning man. The heavy dust -settled and the lighter drifted away.</p> - -<p>Adam clambered to his feet. The huge bowlder that -had been his ship of safety appeared to be surrounded by -a sea of small rocks, level with where he stood. The -avalanche had spread a deep layer of rocks all over and -beyond the space adjacent to the camp. Not a vestige of -the shack remained. Magdalene Virey had been buried -forever beneath a mass of stone. Adam’s great frame -shuddered with the convulsions of his emotion. He bent -and bowed under the inevitable. “Oh, too late! too late!... -Yet I knew all the time!” was the mournful cry he -sent out into the silence. Dazed, sick, horror-stricken, -he bowed there above Magdalene Virey’s sepulcher and salt -tears burned his eyes and splashed down upon the dusty -stones. He suffered, dully at first, and then acutely, as -his stunned consciousness began to recover. Tragic this -situation had been from the beginning, and it could have -had but one end.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_253">253</span> -Suddenly he remembered Virey. The thought transformed -him.</p> - -<p>“He must have slid with the avalanche,” muttered Adam. -“Buried under here somewhere. One sepulcher for him -and wife!... So he wanted it—alive or dead!”</p> - -<p>The lower part of the great slope was now solid rock, -dusty and earthy in places, in others the gray color of -live granite. It led his eye upward, half a mile, to the -wide, riblike ridge that marked the lower margin of -another slope of weathered rocks. It shone in the hot -sunlight. Dark veils of heat rose, resembling smoke -against the sky. The very air seemed trembling, and over -that mountain-side hovered the shadow of catastrophe.</p> - -<p>A moving white object caught Adam’s roving sight. -His desert eyes magnified that white object. A man! He -was toiling over the loose stones.</p> - -<p>“<em>Virey!</em>” burst out Adam, and with the explosion of -the word all of the desert stormed in him and his nature -was no different from the cataclysm that had shorn and -scarred the slope.</p> - -<p>Like a wide-lunged primordial giant, Adam lifted his -roar of rage toward the heights—a yell that clapped fierce -echoes from the cliffs. Virey heard. He began to clamber -faster over the rocks and sheered off toward the right, -where, under the beetling, steep slopes, every rod was -more fraught with peril.</p> - -<p>Adam bounded like a huge soft-footed cat over and up -the hummocky spread of the avalanche. Virey’s only -avenue of escape lay upward and to the left. Once Adam -cut him off there, he was in a trap.</p> - -<p>To the right over the ridge small stones began to show, -rolling and bouncing, then shooting like bullets off the -bare slant below. Virey was out of Adam’s sight now, -but evidently still headed in the fatal direction. Like a -mountain sheep, surest-footed of beasts, Adam bounded -from loose rock to sharp corner, across the wide holes, -on and upward.</p> - -<p>Another low, vast slope spread out and sheered gradually<span class="pagenum" id="Page_254">254</span> -up before him, breaking its uniformity far to the right, -and waving gracefully to steep slants of loose rock perilous -to behold. Adam heard the faint cracking of stones. He -hurried on, working away from the left, until he was -climbing straight toward the splintered, toppling mass of -mountain peak, a mile above him. All now, in every -direction, was broken rock, round, sharp, flat, octagonal, -every shape, but mostly round, showing how in the process -of ages the rolling and grinding had worn off the edges. -Here the heat smoked up. When Adam laid a hurried -hand on a stone he did not leave it there long.</p> - -<p>At length he again espied Virey, far to the right and -half a mile farther up, climbing like a weary beast on -hands and feet. By choice or by mistake he had gone -upward to the most hazardous zone of all that treacherous, -unstable mountain-side. Even now the little dusty slides -rolled from under him. Adam strode on. He made short -cuts. He avoided the looser slides. He zigzagged the -steeper places. He would attend to safe stepping stones -for a few rods, then halt to lift his gaze toward that white-shirted -man toiling up like a crippled ape. The mountain -slope, though huge and wide under the glaring sun, seemed -to lose something of its openness. The red battlements -and ramparts of the heights were frowning down upon -it, casting a shadow of menace, if not of shade. The -terrible forces of nature became manifest. Here the -thunderbolts boomed and the storms battled, and in past -ages the earthquake and volcanic fire had fretted the once -noble peak. It was ruined. It had disintegrated. Ready -to spread its million cracks and crumble, it lowered -gloomily.</p> - -<p>Red, sinister, bare, ghastly, this smoky slope under the -pitiless sun was a fitting place for Wansfell to get his -hands on Virey—murderer of a woman. Adam thought -of it that way because he remembered how Virey had been -fascinated at the story of Baldy McKue. But mostly -Adam’s mind worked like the cunning instinct of a wolf -to circumvent its prey. Thoughts were but flashes. The<span class="pagenum" id="Page_255">255</span> -red tinge in Adam’s sight did not all come from the color -or the rock. And it was when he halted to look or rest -that he thought at all.</p> - -<p>But the time came when he halted for more than that. -Placing his hands around his mouth, he expanded his -deep lungs and burst into trumpetlike yell:</p> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">Virey!</span>” The fugitive heard, turned from his toiling, -slid to a seat on the precarious slope, and waited. “<span class="smcap">I’ll -break your bones!</span>”</p> - -<p>A wild cry pealed down to ring in Adam’s ears. He -had struck terror to the heart of the murderer. And Adam -beat down his savage eagerness, so as to lengthen the -time till Virey’s doom. Not thus did the desert in Adam -speak, but what the desert had made him. Agony, blood, -death! They were almost as old as the rocks. Other -animate shapes, in another age, had met in strife there, -under the silent, beetling peak. Life was the only uttermost -precious thing. All else, all suffering, all possession, -was nothing. To kill a man was elemental, as to save him -was divine.</p> - -<p>Virey’s progress became a haunting and all-satisfying -spectacle to behold, and Adam’s pursuit became studied, -calculated, retarded—a thing as cruel as the poised beak of -a vulture.</p> - -<p>Virey got halfway up a gray, desolate, weathered slant, -immense in its spread, another fan-shaped, waiting avalanche. -The red ragged heights loomed above; below hung -a mountain-side as unstable as water, restrained, perhaps, -by a mere pebble. Here Virey halted. Farther he could -not climb. Like a spent and cornered rat he meant to -show fight.</p> - -<p>Adam soon reached a point directly below Virey, some -hundreds of yards—a long, hard climb. He paused to -catch his breath.</p> - -<p>“Bad slope for me if he begins to roll stones!” muttered -Adam, grimly.</p> - -<p>But neither rolling stones nor avalanches could stop -Adam. The end of this tragedy was fixed. It had been<span class="pagenum" id="Page_256">256</span> -set for all the years of Virey’s life and back into the -past. The very stones cried out. Glaring sun, smoking -heat, shining slope, and the nameless shadow—all were -tinged with a hue inimical to Virey’s life. The lonely, -solemn, silent desert day, at full noontide heat, bespoke -the culmination of something Virey had long ago ordained. -Far below, over the lower hills of the Panamints, yawned -Death Valley, ghastly gray through the leaden haze, an -abyss of ashes, iron walled and sun blasted, hateful and -horrible as the portal of hell. High up and beyond, faintly -red against an obscure space of sky, towered the Funerals, -grand and desolate.</p> - -<p>Adam began to climb the weathered slope, taking a -zigzag course. Sliding stones only slightly retarded his -ascent. He stepped too quickly. Usually when a stone -slipped his weight had left it.</p> - -<p>Virey set loose a bowlder. It slid, rolled, leaped, fell -with a crack, and then took to hurtling bounds, starting a -multitude of smaller stones. Adam kept keen eye on the -bowlder and paid no attention to the others. Then he -stepped aside out of its course. As it whizzed past him -Virey slid another loose upon the slope. Adam climbed -even as the rock bounded down, and a few strides took -him to one side. Virey ran over, directly in line with -Adam, and started another huge rock. Thus by keeping -on a zigzag ascent Adam kept climbing most of the time, -and managed to avoid the larger missiles. The smaller -ones, however, could not all be avoided. And their contact -was no slight matter. Virey tugged upon a large -rock, deeply embedded, and rolled it down. Huge, bounding, -crashing, it started a rattling slide that would have -swept Adam to destruction had it caught him. But he -leaped out of line just in the nick of time. Virey began -to work harder, to set loose smaller stones and more of -them, so that soon he had the slope a perilous ascent for -Adam. They cracked and banged down, and the debris -rattled after them. Adam swerved and leaped and ran. -He smelled the brimstone powder and the granite dust.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_257">257</span> -Fortunately, no cloud of dust collected to obscure his -watchful sight. He climbed on, swiftly when advantage -offered, cautiously when he must take time to leap and -dodge. Then a big rock started a multitude of small -ones, and all clattered and spread. Adam dashed forward -and backward. The heavier stones bounced high, and -as many came at one time, he could not watch all. As -he dodged one, another waved the hair of his head, and -then another, striking his shoulder, knocked him down. -The instant he lay there, other stones rolled over him. -Adam scrambled up. Even pain could not change his -fierce, cold implacability, but it accelerated his action. He -played no longer with Virey. He yelled again what he -meant to do with his hands, and he spread them aloft, -great, clawlike members, the sight of which inflamed -Virey to desperation. Frantically he plowed up the stones -and rolled them, until he had a deluge plunging down the -slope. But it was not written that Adam should be -disabled. Narrow shaves he had, and exceeding risks he -took, yet closer and closer he climbed. Only a hundred -yards now separated the men. Adam could plainly see -Virey’s ragged shirt, flying in shreds, his ashen face, his -wet hair matted over his eyes.</p> - -<p>Suddenly above the cracks and rattling clash rose a -heavy, penetrating sound. Mighty rasp of a loose body -against one of solidity! Startled to a halt, Adam gazed -down at his feet. The rocks seemed to be heaving. Then -a dreadful yell broke sharply. Virey! Adam flashed his -gaze upward in time to see the whole slope move. And -that move was accompanied by a rattling crash, growing -louder and more prolonged. Virey stood stricken by mortal -terror in the midst of an avalanche.</p> - -<p>Wheeling swiftly, Adam bounded away and down, his -giant strides reaching farther and faster, his quivering -body light and supple, his eye guiding his flying feet to -surfaces that were safe. Behind, beyond, above him the -mountain slope roared until sound no longer meant anything. -His ears were useless. The slope under him<span class="pagenum" id="Page_258">258</span> -heaved and waved. Running for his life, he was at the -same time riding an avalanche. The accelerating motion -under him was strange and terrifying. It endowed him -with wings. His feet scarcely touched the stones and in -a few seconds he had bounded off the moving section of -slope.</p> - -<p>Then he halted to turn and see, irresistibly called to -watch Virey go to what must soon be a just punishment. -The avalanche, waving like swells of the sea, seemed slowing -its motion. Thin dust clouds of powdered rock hung -over it. Adam again became aware of sound—a long-drawn, -rattling roar, decreasing, deadening, dying. Suddenly -as the avalanche had started it halted. But it gave -forth grating, ominous warnings. Only an upper layer -of the loose rock had slid down, and the under layer appeared -precisely like what the surface had been—rocks -and rocks of all sizes, just as loose, just as ready to roll.</p> - -<p>Adam dared to stride back upon that exposed under -layer, the better to see straight down the steep slope. -Grim and grisly it shone beneath the gloomy sun. Perhaps -the powdered dust created an obscurity high in the -air, but low down all was clear.</p> - -<p>Virey could be plainly seen, embedded to his hips in -the loose stones. Writhing, squirming, wrestling, he -sought to free himself from that grip of granite. In -vain! He was caught in a vise of his own making. Prisoner -of the mountain-side that he had used to betray his -wife! He had turned toward Adam, face upward. There -seemed a change in him, but in the racking excitement of -that moment Adam could not tell what.</p> - -<p>Then that desert instinct, like the bursting of a flood, -moved Adam to the violence of strife, the ruthlessness -of nature, the blood-spilling of men. Madness of hate -seized him. The torrid heat of that desert sun boiled in -his blood, the granite of the slope hardened in his heart, -the red veils of smoky shadows colored his sight. Loneliness -and solitude were terrible forces of nature—primitive -as the beginnings of life. For years the contending<span class="pagenum" id="Page_259">259</span> -strife of the desert had been his. For months desolation, -death, decay of Death Valley!</p> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">My turn!</span>” he yelled, in voice of thunder, and, bristling -haired, supple, and long armed, with strength and -laugh and face of a savage, he heaved a huge rock.</p> - -<p>It rolled, it cracked, it banged, it hurtled high, to crash -and smash, and then, leaping aloft, instinct as if with -mockery, it went over Virey’s head to go on down over -the precipice, whence it sent up a sliding roar. Adam -heaved another stone and watched it. Virey grew motionless -as a statue. He could not dance and dodge away from -rolling rocks as Adam had done. How strangely that -second rock rolled! Starting in line with Virey, it swerved -to the right, then hit the slope and swerved back in line, -then, hitting again, swerved once more, missing the miserable -victim by a small margin.</p> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">Aha there, Virey!</span>” yelled Adam, waving his hands. -“<span class="smcap">All day and all night I’ll roll stones!</span>”</p> - -<p>Virey was mute. He was chained. He was helpless. -He could not move or faint or die. Retribution had overtaken -him. The nature of it was to be the nature of the -slow torture and merciless death he had inflicted upon his -wife. As he had chosen the most deadly and lonely and -awful spot on earth to hide her and kill her, so the nature -that he had embraced now chose to turn upon him. There -was law here—law of the unknown forces in life and -in the elements. At that very moment a vulture streaked -down from the hazed heights and sailed, a black shadow -of wide-spread wings, across the slope. What had given -this grisly-omened bird sight and scent illimitable?</p> - -<p>Adam braced his brawny shoulder under the bulge of a -rock weighing tons. Purple grew his face. His muscles -split his shirt. His bones cracked. But there was a nameless -joy in this exercise of his enormous strength. They -were two men—one was weak, the other was strong. -And nature could not abide both. The huge rock grated, -groaned, stirred, moved—and turned over, slowly to roll, -to crunch, to pound, and then to gather speed, growing<span class="pagenum" id="Page_260">260</span> -a thing of power, ponderous, active, changing, at last to -hurtle into the air, to plunge down with thunderous crash, -then to roll straight as a bee line at Virey. But a few -yards in front of him it rose aloft, with something of -grace, airily, and, sailing over Virey’s head, it banged and -boomed out of sight below. Long the echoes clapped, -and at last the silence, the speaking silence of that place, -closed on the slope. It awoke again to Adam’s rolling of -a stone and another and another and then two together. -All these rocks rolled differently. They were playthings -of the god of the mountain. The mover of thunderbolts -might have been aiming his colossal missiles at an invisible -target. All these rolling stones seemed to head straight -for Virey, but they were at the last instant deflected by -chance. They hit the slope and passed wide or high. -They were in league with the evil spirit that had dominated -Virey. They were instruments of torture. They were -of the nature of the desert. They belonged to Death -Valley.</p> - -<p>Adam did not soon tire at his gigantic task. The rolling -stones fascinated him. From dead things they leaped -to life. How they hurtled through space! Some shot -aloft a hundred feet. Others split, and rolled, like wheels, -down and down, the halves passing on either side of the -doomed Virey. A multitude of rocks Adam turned loose, -and then another multitude. Into the heaving of every -one went his intent to kill. But Virey bore a charmed -life.</p> - -<p>A time came when Adam rolled his last stone. Like the -very first one, it sped straight for Virey, and just as it -appeared about to crush him it veered to one side. Adam -stared grim and aghast. Could he never kill Virey as -Virey had murdered his wife and tried to kill him?</p> - -<p>“She—said I’d—never kill—you!” panted Adam, and -the doubt in him was a strange, struggling thing, soon -beaten down by his insatiable rage. Then he took a stride -downward, meaning to descend and finish Virey with his -hands.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_261">261</span> -As he stepped down the avalanche below grated with -strange, harsh sound. It seemed to warn him. Halting, -he gazed with clearer eyes. What was this change in -Virey? Adam bent and peered. Had the man’s hair -turned snow white?</p> - -<p>Adam made another and a longer stride downward. -And that instant the slope trembled. Virey flung up his -arms as if to ward off another rolling stone. A rending, -as of the rock-bound fastness of the slope yielding its -hold—then the avalanche, with Virey in the center, moved -downward, slowly heaving like a swell of weighted waves, -and started to roll with angry roar. It gathered a ponderous -momentum. It would never stop again on that slope. -A shining, red-tinged dust cloud shrouded Virey. And -then the avalanche, spilling over the declivity below, -shocked the whole mountain slope and lifted to the heavens -a thick-crashing, rolling roar of thunder. Death Valley -engulfed the hollow echo and boomed thunder across to -the battlements of the Funeral Mountains. And when -the last rumble wore away, silence and solitude reigned -there, pervasive and peaceful, as they had in the ages -before man, with his passions, had evolved to vex nature.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_262">262</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XX">CHAPTER XX</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Adam’s</span> return to camp was as vague as one of his -desert nightmares. But as thought gained something -of ascendency over agitation he became aware of blood -and dust and sweat caked with his clothes upon his person, -proving the effect of his supreme exertions. He had -heaved an endless number of rocks; he had heaved the -mountain-side down upon Virey, all to no avail. A higher -power had claimed him. And the spirit of Magdalene -Virey, like her living presence, had inscrutably come between -Adam and revenge.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>When Adam had packed his burros, twilight in the -clefts of the hills had deepened to purple. He filled his -canteens, and started the burros down toward the gateway. -The place behind him was as silent as a grave. Adam -did not look back. He felt the gray obscurity close over -the scene.</p> - -<p>Down at the gateway he saw that the valley was still -light with the afterglow of sunset. Diagonally and far -across the ashen waste he descried the little dark patch -which he knew to be an oasis, where the waters of Furnace -Creek sank into the sands.</p> - -<p>The intense heat, the vast stillness, the strange radiation -from the sand, the peculiar gray light of the valley, told -Adam that the midnight furnace winds would blow long before -he reached his destination. But he welcomed any physical -ordeal. He saw how a great strife with the elements, -a strain to the uttermost of his strength and his passion to -fight, would save his faith, his hope, perhaps his mind.</p> - -<p>So gradual was the change from twilight to darkness -that he would scarcely have noted it but for the dimming<span class="pagenum" id="Page_263">263</span> -of the notched peak. Out there in the open valley it was -not dark. It was really the color of moonlight on marble. -Wan, opaque, mystic, it made distance false. The mountains -seemed far away and the stars close. Like the bottom -of the Dead Sea, drained of its bitter waters, was this -Death Valley. Action, strong and steady use of muscle, -always had served to drive subjective broodings and -wonderings and imaginings from Adam’s mind. But not -here, in this sink, at night! He seemed continually and -immensely confronted with the unreality of a fact—a live -man alone on the salt dead waste of Death Valley. Measureless -and unbreakable solitude! The waste hole into -which drained the bitter dregs of the desert!</p> - -<p>He plodded on, driving the burros ahead of him. -Jennie was contrary. Every few steps she edged off a -straight line, and the angle of her ears and head showed -that she was watching her master. She did not want to -cross the valley. Instinct taught her the wisdom of opposition. -Many a burro had saved its master’s life by stubborn -refusal to travel the wrong way. Adam was patient, -even kind, but he relentlessly drove her on in the direction -he had chosen.</p> - -<p>At length the ashen level plain changed its hue and its -surface. The salt crust became hummocky and a dirty -gray. The color caused false steps on his part, and the -burros groped at fault, weary and discouraged. Adam -would mount a slow heave, only to find it a hollow crust -that broke with his weight. Some months before—or -was it years?—when he had crossed the valley, far below -this line, the layer of salt crust had been softer and under -it ran murky waters, heavy as vitriol. Dry now as sun-baked -clay! It made travel more difficult, although less -dangerous. Adam broke through once. It reminded him -that Dismukes had said the floor of Death Valley was -“Forty feet from hell!” Not for a long while had he -thought of Dismukes, yet this hazardous direction he was -taking now appeared to be the outcome of long-made plans -to meet the old prospector.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_264">264</span> -Long hours and slow miles passed behind him. When -the burros broke through Adam had a task for all his -strength. Once he could not pull Jennie out of a pitfall -without unpacking her. And the time came when he had -the added task of leading the way and dragging the burros -with ropes. Burros did not lead well on good ground, -let alone over this scored and burst salt crust.</p> - -<p>The heat and oppressiveness and dense silence increased -toward midnight; and then began a soft and steady movement -of air down the valley. Adam felt a prickling of his -skin and a drying of the sweat upon him. An immense -and mournful moan breathed over the wasteland, like -that of a mighty soul in travail. Adam got out of the -hummocky zone upon the dry, crisp, white level of salt, -soda, borax, alkali, where thin, pale sheets of powder -moved with the silken rustle of seeping and shifting sands. -Most fortunate was the fact that the rising wind was at -his back. He strode on, again driving the burros ahead, -holding straight for the dim notched peak. The rising -wind changed the silence, the night, the stars, the valley—changed -all in some unearthly manner. It seemed to -muster all together, to move all, to insulate even the loneliness, -and clothe them in transforming, drifting, shrouds -of white, formless bodies impelled by nameless domination. -Phantasmagoria of white winds, weird and wild! Midnight -furnace blasts of Death Valley! Nature’s equilibrium—nature’s -eternal and perfect balance of the elements!</p> - -<p>Out here in the open, the hollow roar that had swelled -and lulled through the canyons was absent. An incessant -moaning, now rising, now falling, attended the winds on -their march down the valley. Other difference there was -here, and it was in the more intense heat. And the blowing -of white shrouds into the opaque gloom, the sweeping -of sheets of powdery dust along the level floor, the -thick air that bore taste of bitter salt and odor of poison -gas—these indeed seemed not phenomena of normal earth. -The wind increased to a gale. Then suddenly it lulled and -died, leaving the valley to a pale, silent deadness; and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_265">265</span> -again, preceded by a mournful wail, it rose harder and -fiercer till it was blowing seventy miles an hour. These -winds were the blasts of fury. They held heated substance. -The power behind them was the illimitable upper -air, high as the sky and wide as the desert, relentlessly -bearing down to drive way the day’s torrid heat.</p> - -<p>The gales accelerated Adam’s progress, so that sometimes -he was almost running. Often he was thrown to his -knees. And when the midnight storm reached its height -the light of the stars failed, the outline of mountains faded -in a white, whirling chaos, dim and moaning and terrible. -Adam felt as if blood and flesh were burning up, drying -out, shriveling and cracking. He lost his direction and -clung to the burros, knowing their instinct to be surer -guide than his. There came a time when pain left him, -when sense of physical contacts and motions began to -fade, when his brain seemed to reel. The burros dragged -him on, and lower he swayed; oftener he plunged to his -knees, plowing his big hands in the salt and lowering his -face into the flying sheets of powder. He gasped and -coughed and choked, and fought to breathe through his -smothering scarf. And at last, as he fell exhausted, blind -and almost asphyxiated, the hot gales died away. The -change of air saved Adam from unconsciousness. He lay -there, gradually recovering, until he gained feeling enough -to know the burros were pulling on the rope which tied -them and him together. They were squealing. They -were trying to drag him, to warn him, to frighten him -into the action that would save his life. Thus goaded, -Adam essayed to get upon his feet, and the effort seemed -a vague, interminable lifting of colossal weights, and a -climbing up dragging stairs of sand. But for the burros -he would have plunged in a circle.</p> - -<p>Then followed a black and horrible interval in which -he seemed hauled across a pale shingle of naked earth, -peopled with specters, a wandering, lost man, still alive -but half dead, leashed to the spirits of burros he had -driven to their death. Uphill, always uphill they pulled<span class="pagenum" id="Page_266">266</span> -him, with his feet clogged by the clutching sands. A gray -dawn broke, and his entrance into the light resembled -climbing out of somber depths to the open world. Another -drab wall of iron rock seemed to loom over him. -The valley of the white shadows of death had been crossed. -A green patch of mesquites and cottonwoods gleamed cool -and dark out of the gray sands. The burros ran, with -bobbing packs, straight to the water they had scented. -Staggering on after them, Adam managed to remove their -burdens; and that took the remnant of his strength. Yielding -to a dead darkness of sense, he fell under the trees.</p> - -<p>When he came to the day had far advanced and the -sun, sloping to the west, was sinking behind the Panamints. -Adam stumbled up, his muscles numb, as if contracted -and robbed of their elasticity. His thirst told -the story of that day’s heat, which had parched him, even -while he lay asleep in the shade. Hunger did not trouble -him. Either he was weak from exertion or had suffered -from breathing poisoned air or had lost something of his -equilibrium. Whatever was wrong, it surely behooved -him to get out of the lower part of the valley, up above -sea level to a place where he could regain his strength. -To that end he hunted for his burros. They were close -by, and he soon packed them, though with much less than -his usual dexterity. Then he started, following the course -of the running water.</p> - -<p>This Furnace Creek ran down out of a deep-mouthed -canyon, with yellow walls of gravel. The water looked -like vinegar, and it was hot and had a bad taste. Yet it -would sustain life of man and beast. Adam followed -the lines of mesquites that marked its course up the -gradually ascending floor of the canyon. He soon felt -a loosening of the weight upon his lungs, and lessening -of air pressure. Twilight caught him a couple of miles -up the canyon, where a wide, long thicket of weeds and -grass and mesquites marked the turning of Furnace Creek -into the drab hills, and where springs and little streams -trickled down from the <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">arroyos</i>.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_267">267</span> -Up one of these <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">arroyos</i>, in the midst of some gnarled -mesquites, Adam made camp. Darkness soon set in, and -he ate by the light of a camp fire. After he had partaken -of food he discovered that he was hungry. Also, his eyelids -drooped heavily. Despite these healthy reactions and -a deeper interest in his surroundings, Adam knew he was -not entirely well. He endeavored to sit up awhile, and -tried to think. There were intervals when a deadlock -occurred between thoughts. The old pleasure, the old -watchful listening, the old intimate sense of loneliness, -had gone from him. His mind did not seem to be on -physical things at hand, or on the present moment. And -when he actually discovered that all the time he looked -down toward Death Valley he exclaimed, aghast: “I’m -not here; I’m down there!”</p> - -<p>Gloomy and depressed, he rolled in his blankets. And -he slept twelve hours. Next day he felt better in body, -but no different in mind. He set to work making a comfortable -camp in spite of the fact that he did not seem -to want to stay there. Hard work and plenty of food -improved his condition. His strength of limb soon rallied -to rest and nourishment. But the strange state of mind -persisted, and began to encroach upon every moment. It -took effort of will to attend to any action. Dismukes -must be in this locality somewhere, according to the little -map, but, though Adam remembered this, and reflected -how it accounted for his own presence there, he could -not dwell seriously upon the fact. Dismukes seemed -relegated to the vague future. There was an impondering -present imperative something that haunted Adam, yet -eluded his grasp. At night he walked under the stars -and could not shake off the spell; and next day, when in -an idle hour he found himself walking again and again -down the gravel-bedded canyon toward Death Valley, -then he divined that what he had attributed to absent-mindedness -was a far more serious aberration.</p> - -<p>The discovery brought about a shock that quickened his -mental processes. What ailed him? He was well and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_268">268</span> -strong again. What was wrong with his mind? Where -had gone the old dreaming content, the self-sufficient communion -with all visible forms of nature, and the half-conscious -affinity with all the invisible spirit of the -wilderness? How strangely he had been warped out of -his orbit! Something nameless and dreadful and calling -had come between him and his consciousness. Why did he -face the west, at dawn, in the solemn white-hot noon, at -the red sunset hour, and in the silent lonely watches of -the night? Why did not the stars of the east lure his -dreamy gaze as those in the west? He made the astounding -discovery that there were moments, and moments -increasing in number, when he did not feel alone. Some -one walked in his shadow at noontide. At twilight a -spirit seemed in keeping with his wandering westward -steps. The world and natural objects and old habits -seemed far off. He found himself whispering vagrant -fancies, the substance of which, once realized, was baffling -and disheartening. And at last he divined that a longing -to return to Death Valley consumed him.</p> - -<p>“Ah! So that’s it!” he muttered, in consternation. -“But why?”</p> - -<p>It came to Adam then—the secret of the mystery. -Death Valley called him. All that it was, all that it contained, -all he had lived there, sent out insidious and -enchanting voices of terrible silent power. The long -shadow of that valley of purple shadows still enveloped -him. Death, desolation, and decay; the appalling nudity -of the racked bowels of the earth; the abode of solitude -and silence, where shrieked the furies of the midnight -winds; the grave of Magdalene Virey—these haunted -Adam and lured him back with resistless and insupportable -claim.</p> - -<p>“Death Valley again—for me. I shall go mad,” -soliloquized Adam.</p> - -<p>At last his mind was slowly being unhinged by the -forces of the desert. Some places of the earth were -too strong, too inhuman, too old, and too wasted for any<span class="pagenum" id="Page_269">269</span> -man. Adam realized his peril, and that the worst of his -case consisted in an indifference which he did not want -to combat. Unless something happened—a great, intervening, -destructive agent to counteract the all-enfolding, -trancelike spell of Death Valley—Adam would return to -the valley of avalanches and there he would go mad.</p> - -<p>And the very instant he resigned himself, a cry pierced -his dull ear. Sharply he sat up. The hour was near the -middle of the forenoon. The day was hot and still. -Adam’s pulses slowly quieted down. He had been mistaken. -The water babbled by his camp, bees flew over -with droning hum. Then as he relaxed he was again -startled by a cry, faint and far off. It appeared to come -from up the canyon, round the low yellow corner of wall. -He listened intently, but the sound was not repeated. -Was not the desert full of silent voices? About this cry -there was a tangible reality that stirred Adam out of -his dreams, his glooms.</p> - -<p>Adam went on, and climbed up the gravel bank on the -left side, to a bare slope, and from that to the top of a -ridge. His sluggish blood quickened. The old exploring -instinct awoke. He had heard a distant cry. What next? -There was something in the air.</p> - -<p>Then Adam gazed around him to a distance. Adam -shuddered and thrilled at the beetling, rugged, broken -walls that marked the gateway where so often he had -stood with Magdalene Virey to watch the transformations -of shadowed dawn and sunset in Death Valley.</p> - -<p>He descended to a level, and strode on, looking everywhere, -halting now and then to listen, every moment gaining -some hold on his old self. He went on and on, slow -and sure, missing not a rod of ground, as if the very stones -might speak to him. He welcomed his growing intensity of -sensation, because it meant that he had either received a -premonition or had reverted to his old self, or perhaps both.</p> - -<p>Adam plodded along this wide gravel wash, with the -high bronze saw-toothed peaks of the Funerals on the -left, and some yellow-clay dunes showing their tips over<span class="pagenum" id="Page_270">270</span> -the bank on the right. At length he came to a place that -suggested a possible sloping of these colored clay dunes -down into a basin or canyon. Climbing up the bank, he -took a few steps across the narrow top, there to be halted -as if he had been struck.</p> - -<p>He had been confronted by a tremendous amphitheater, -a yellow gulf, a labyrinthine maze so astounding that he -discredited his sight.</p> - -<p>Before him and on each side the earth was as bare as -the bareness of rock—a mystic region of steps and slopes -and slants, of channels and dunes and mounds, of cone-shaped -and fan-shaped ridges, all of denuded crinkly clay -with tiny tracery of erosion as graceful as the veins of -a leaf, all merging their marvelous hues in a mosaic of -golden amber, of cream yellow, of mauve, of bronze -cinnamon. How bleak and ghastly, yet how beautiful in -their stark purity of denudation! Endless was the number -of smooth, scalloped, and ribbed surfaces, all curving -with exquisite line and grace down into the dry channels -under the dunes. At the base of the lower circle of the -amphitheater the golds and yellows and russets were -strongest, but along the wide wings moving away toward -the abyss below were more vividly wonderful hues—a -dark, beautiful mouse color on the left contrasting with -a strange pearly cream on the other. These were striking -bands of color sweeping the eye away as far as they extended, -and jealously drawing it back again. Between -these great corners of the curve climbed ridges of gray -and heliotrope to meet streaks of green—the mineral green -of copper, like the color of the sea in sunlight—and snowy -traceries of white that were narrow veins of outcropping -borax. High up above the rim of the amphitheater, along -the battlements of the mountain, stood out a zigzag belt -of rusty red, from which the iron stain had run downward -to tinge the lower hues. Above all this wondrous -coloration upheaved the bare breast of the mountain, -growing darker with earthy browns until the bold ramparts -of the peak, gray like rock, gleamed pale against<span class="pagenum" id="Page_271">271</span> -the leaden-blue sky. Low down through the opening of -the amphitheater gleamed a void, a distant bottom of the -bowl, dim and purple and ghastly, with shining white -streaks like silver streams—and this was Death Valley.</p> - -<p>And then Adam, with breast oppressed by feelings too -deep for utterance, retracted his far-seeing gaze, once -more to look over the whole amazing spectacle, from the -crinkly buff clay under his feet to the dim white bottom -of the valley. And at this keen instant he again heard a -cry. Human it was, or else he had lost his mind, and all -which he saw here was disordered imagination.</p> - -<p>Turning back, he ran in the direction whence he believed -the sound had come, passing by some rods the point where -he had climbed out of the wash. And at the apex of the -great curve, toward which tended all the multitude of -wrinkles of the denuded slopes, he found a trail coming -up out of the amphitheater and leading down into the -wash. The dust bore unmistakable signs of fresh moccasin -tracks, of hobnailed boots, and of traces where water -had been spilled. The boot impressions led down and the -moccasin tracks up; and, as these latter were the fresher, -Adam, after a pause of astonishment and a keen glance -all around, began to follow them.</p> - -<p>The trail led across the wash and turned west toward -where the walls commenced to take on the dignity of a -canyon. Bunches of sage and greasewood began to dot -the sand, and beyond showed the thickets of mesquite. -Some prospector was packing water from the creek up -the canyon and down into that amphitheater. Suddenly -Adam thought of Dismukes. He examined the next hobnailed -boot track he descried in the dust with minute care. -The foot that had made it did not belong to Dismukes. -Adam hurried on.</p> - -<p>He came upon a spot where the man he was trailing—surely -an Indian—had fallen in the sand. A dark splotch, -sticky and wet, had never been made by spilled water. -Adam recognized blood when he touched it, but if he -had not known it by the feel, he surely would have by<span class="pagenum" id="Page_272">272</span> -the smell. Probably at that instant Adam became fully -himself again. He was on the track of events, he sensed -some human being in trouble; and the encroaching spell -of Death Valley lost its power.</p> - -<p>The trail led into the mesquites, to a wet glade rank -with sedge and dank with the damp odor of soapy water.</p> - -<p>A few more hurried strides brought Adam upon the -body of an Indian, lying face down at the edge of the -trickling little stream. His black matted hair was bloody. -A ragged, torn, and stained shirt bore further evidence -of violence. Adam turned him over, seeing at a glance -that he had been terribly beaten about the head with a -blunt instrument. He was gasping. Swiftly Adam -scooped up water in his hat. He had heard that kind -of a gasp before. Lifting the Indian’s head, Adam poured -water into the open mouth. Then he bathed the blood-stained -face.</p> - -<p>The Indian was of the tribe that had packed supplies -for the Vireys. He was apparently fatally hurt. It was -evident that he wanted to speak. And from the incoherent -mixture of language which these Indians used in -conversation with white men Adam gathered significant -details of gold, of robbers, of something being driven -round and round, grinding stone like maize.</p> - -<p>“<em>Arrastra!</em>” queried Adam.</p> - -<p>The Indian nodded and made a weak motion of his -hand toward the trail that led to the yellow wilderness -of clay, and then further gestures, which, with a few -more gutturally whispered words, gave Adam the impression -that a man of huge bulk, wide of shoulder, was -working the old Spanish treadmill—<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">arrastra</i>—grinding -for gold. Then the Indian uttered, with a last flash -of spirit, the warning he could not speak, and, falling -back, he gasped and faded into unconsciousness.</p> - -<p>Adam stood up, thinking hard, muttering aloud some -of his thoughts.</p> - -<p>“<em>Arrastra!</em>... That was the way of Dismukes—to -grind for gold.... He’s here—somewhere—down in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_273">273</span> -that yellow hole.... Robbers have jumped his claim—probably -are holding him—torturing him to tell of hidden -gold ... and they beat this poor Indian to death.”</p> - -<p>There was necessity for quick thought and quick action. -The Indian was not dead, but he soon would be. Adam -could do nothing for him. It was imperative to decide -whether to wait here for the return of the water carrier -or at once follow the trail to the yellow clay slopes. Adam -wore a gun, but it held only two unused shells, and there -was no more ammunition in his pack. The Indian had no -weapon. Perhaps the water carrier would be armed. If -Dismukes were dead, there need be no rash hurry to -avenge him; if he lived as prisoner a little time more or -less would not greatly matter. Adam speedily decided -to wait a reasonable time for the man who packed water, -and, if he came, to kill him and then hurry up the trail. -There was, in this way, less danger of being discovered, -and, besides, one of the robbers dispatched would render -the band just so much weaker. Adam especially favored -this course because of the possibility of getting a weapon.</p> - -<p>“And more,” muttered Adam, “if he happens to be a -tall man I can pretend to be him—packing water back.”</p> - -<p>Therefore Adam screened himself behind a thick clump -of mesquite near the trail and waited in ambush like a -panther ready to spring.</p> - -<p>As he crouched there, keen eyes up the canyon, ears -like those of a listening deer, there flashed into Adam’s -mind one of Magdalene Virey’s unforgetable remarks. -“The power of the desert over me lies somewhere in -my strange faculty of forgetting self. I watch, I hear, -I feel, I smell, but I don’t think. Just a gleam—a fleeting -moment—then the state of consciousness or lack of consciousness -is gone! But in that moment lies the secret -lure of the desert. Its power over men!”</p> - -<p>Swiftly as it had come the memory passed, and Adam -became for fleeting moments at a time the embodiment -of Magdalene Virey’s philosophy, all unconscious when -thought was absent from feeling. The hour was approaching<span class="pagenum" id="Page_274">274</span> -midday and the wind began to rustle the mesquites -and seep the sand. Adam smelled a dry dust -somewhat tangy, and tasted the bitterness of it as he -licked his lips. Flies had began to buzz around the dead -Indian. Instinctively Adam gazed aloft, and, yes, there -far above him circled a vulture, and above that another, -sweeping down from the invisible depths of blue, magically -ringing a flight around the heavens, with never a movement -of wings. They sailed round and round, always -down. Where did they come from? What power poised -them so surely in the air?</p> - -<p>Adam waited. All at once his whole body vibrated -with the leap of his heart. A tall, hulking man hove in -sight, balancing a bar across his shoulders, from each end -of which hung a large bucket. These buckets swung to -and fro with the fellow’s steps. Like a lazy man, he -advanced leisurely. Adam saw a little puff of smoke lift -from the red, indistinct patch that was this water carrier’s -face. He had cigarette or pipe. As he approached nearer -and nearer, Adam received steadily growing and changing -impressions of the man he was about to kill, until they -fixed in the image of a long, loosely jointed body, a soiled -shirt open at the neck, bare brown arms, and cruel red -face. Just outside the mesquites, the robber halted to -peer at the spot where the Indian had fallen, and then -ahead as if he expected to see a body lying in the trail.</p> - -<p>“Ho! Ho! if thet durned Injin I beat didn’t crawl way -down hyar! An’ his brains oozin’ out!” he ejaculated -hoarsely, as he strode between the scratching mesquites, -swinging the crossbar and buckets sidewise. “Takes a -hell of a lot to kill some critters!”</p> - -<p>Like a released spring Adam shot up. His big hands -flashed to cut off a startled yell.</p> - -<p>“Not so much!” he called, grimly, and next instant his -giant frame strung to the expenditure of mighty effort.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>At noon the wind was blowing a gusty gale and the -sun shone a deep, weird, magenta color through the pall<span class="pagenum" id="Page_275">275</span> -of yellow dust. The sky was not visible. Down on the -ridges and in the washes dust sheets were whipped up at -intervals. Clouds of flying sand rustled through the air, -and sometimes the wind had force enough to carry grains -of gravel. These intermittent blasts resembled the midnight -furnace winds, except for the strange fact that they -were not so hot, so withering. Every few minutes the -canyon would be obscured in sweeping, curling streaks -and sheets of dust. Then, as the gale roared away, the -dust settled and the air again cleared. But high up, the -dull, yellow pall hung, apparently motionless, with that -weird sun, like a red-orange moon seen through haze, -growing darker.</p> - -<p>The fury of the elements seemed to favor Adam. Heat -and gale and obscurity could tend only to relax the vigilance -of men. Adam counted upon surprising the gang. -To his regret, he had found no weapon on the robber he -had overcome. Wearing the man’s slouch sombrero pulled -down, and carrying the water buckets suspended from the -bar across his shoulders, Adam believed that in the thick -of the duststorm he might approach near the gang, perhaps -get right among them.</p> - -<p>When he got to the top of the amphitheater and found -it a weird and terrible abyss of flying yellow shadows -and full of shriek of wind and moan and roar, he decided -he would go down as far as might seem advisable, then -try to slip up on the robbers, wherever they were, and get -a look at them and their surroundings before rushing to -the attack.</p> - -<p>Down, and yet farther, Adam plodded, amazed at the -depth of the pit, the bottom of which he had not seen. -The plainly defined trail led him on, and in one place -huge boot tracks, familiar to him, acted as a spur. The -tracks were not many days old and had been made by -Dismukes. Adam now expected to find his old friend -dead or in some terrible situation. The place, the day, -the heat, the wind—all presaged terror, violence, gold, and -blood. No human beings would endure this nude and<span class="pagenum" id="Page_276">276</span> -ghastly and burning hell hole of flying dust for anything -except gold.</p> - -<p>At last Adam got so far down, so deep into the yellow -depths, that pall and roar of duststorm appeared above -him. He walked in a strange yellow twilight. And here -the sun showed a darker magenta. Fine siftings of dust -floated and fell all around him, dry, choking, and, when -they touched his face, like invisible sparks of fire.</p> - -<p>Interminably the yellow-walled wash wound this way -and that, widening out to the dimensions of a canyon. -At length Adam smelled smoke. He was close to a camp -of some kind. Depositing the buckets in the trail, he -sheered off and went up an intersecting wash.</p> - -<p>When out of sight of the trail, he climbed up a soft -clay slope and, lying flat at the top, he peeped over. -More yellow ridges like the ribs of a washboard! They -seemed to run out on all sides, in a circling maze, soft -and curved and colorful, and shaded by what seemed -unnatural shadows. But they were almost level. Here -indeed was the pit of the amphitheater. With slow, desert-trained -gaze Adam swept the graceful dunes. All bare! -The twilight of changing yellow shadow hindered sure -sight at considerable distance, and the sweeping rush of -wind above, and then a low hollow roar, made listening -useless.</p> - -<p>At length Adam noticed how all the clay ridges or ends -of slopes to his right ran about a hundred yards and then -sheered down abruptly. Here, then, was the main canyon -through which the trail ran. The line of it, a vague -break in the yellow color, turned toward Adam’s left. -Adam deliberated a moment. Would he go on or return -to the trail? Then he rose, crossed the top of the clay -ridge, plunged down its soft bank, leaped the sandy and -gravelly wash at the bottom, and started up the next -ridge. This was exactly like the one he had surmounted. -Adam kept on, down and up, down and up, until the -yellow twilight in front of him appeared separated by a -lazy column of blue. Adam’s nostrils made sure of that.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_277">277</span> -It was smoke. Cautiously crawling now, down and up, -Adam gained the ridge from behind which rose the smoke. -Here he crouched against the soft clay, breathing hard -from his exertions, listening and peering.</p> - -<p>The ridges about him began to show streaks of brown -earth and ledges of rock. As he looked about he was -startled by a rumbling, grating sound. It was continuous, -but it had louder rumbles, almost bumps. The sound -was rock grating on rock. Adam thought he knew what -made it. With all his might he listened, pressing his ear -down on the clay. The rumble kept on, but Adam could -not hear any other sound until there came a lull in the -wind above. Then he heard a squeaking creak—a sound -of wood moved tight against wood; then sharp cracks, -but of soft substances; then the ring of a shovel on stone; -and at last harsh voices.</p> - -<p>So far, so good, thought Adam. Only a few yards of -clay separated him from mining operations, and he must -see how many men were there and what was the lay of -the land, and how best he could proceed. The old animal -instinct to rush animated him, requiring severe control. -While waiting for the wind to begin again, Adam wondered -if he was to see Dismukes. He did not expect to.</p> - -<p>The elements seemed to await Adam’s wishes. At that -very moment the yellow light shaded a little dimmer and -the sinister-hued sun cloaked its ruddy face. The gale -above howled, and the circling winds, lower down, gathered -up sheets of dust and swept them across the shrouded -amphitheater. And a wave of intenser heat moved down -into the pit.</p> - -<p>Adam sank his fingers into the soft clay and crawled -up this last slope. The rattle of loosened clay and gravel -rolling down was swallowed up in the roar of wind. -Reaching the last foot of ascent, Adam cautiously peeped -over. He saw a wider space, a sort of round pocket between -two yellow ridges, that ran out and widened from -a ledge of crumbling rock. He crawled a few inches -farther, raised himself a little higher. Then he saw brush<span class="pagenum" id="Page_278">278</span> -roofs of structures, evidently erected for shade. The -rumble began again. Higher Adam raised himself. Then -he espied a coat hanging on a corner post of one of the -structures. Dismukes’ coat! Adam could have picked -it out of a thousand coats. Excitement now began to -encroach upon his cool patience and determination. The -gale seemed howling with rage at the truth here, still -hidden from Adam’s eyes. Higher he raised himself.</p> - -<p>The brush-covered structure farther from him was a -sun shelter, and under it lay piles of camp duffle. A camp -fire smoked. Adam’s swift eyes caught the gleam of guns. -The day was too torrid for these campers to pack guns. -The nearer structure was large, octagonal shape, built of -mesquite posts and brush. From under it came the rumble -of rocks and the metallic clink of shovels, and then the -creak and crack and the heavy voice.</p> - -<p>Still higher Adam pulled himself so that he might see -under the brush shelter. A wide rent in the roof—a -huge brown flash across this space—then lower down a -movement of men to and fro—rumble of rocks, clink of -shovel, thud of earth, creak and crack—a red undershirt—blue -jeans—boots, and then passing, bending men nude -to the waist—circle and sweep of long dark streak—then -again the huge brown flash; it all bewildered Adam, so -that one of his usually distinguishing glances failed to -convey clear meaning of this scene. Then he looked and -looked, and when he had looked a long, breathless moment -he fell flat on the soft clay, digging his big hands deep, -trembling and straining with the might of his passion to -rush like a mad bull down upon the ruffians. It took another -moment, that battling restraint. Then he raised to -look with clearer, more calculating gaze.</p> - -<p>The brush roof was a shelter for an <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">arrastra</i>. The -octagonal shape of this sun shade filled the pocket that -nestled between the slopes. Its back stood close to the -ledge of crumbling rock from which the gold-bearing ore -was being extracted. Its front faced the open gully. -Under it an <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">arrastra</i> was in operation. As many of these<span class="pagenum" id="Page_279">279</span> -Spanish devices as Adam had seen, no one of them had -ever resembled this.</p> - -<p>In the center of the octagon a round pit had been dug -into the ground, and lined and floored with flat stones. -An upright beam was set in the middle of this, and was -fastened above to the roof. Crossbeams were attached -to the upright, and from these crossbeams dragged huge -rocks held by chains. A long pole, like the tongue of a -wagon, extended from the upright and reached far out, -at a height of about four feet from the ground. The -principle of operation was to revolve the crossbeams and -upright post, dragging the heavy rocks around and around -the pit, thus crushing the ore. Adam knew that mercury -was then used to absorb the gold from the crevices.</p> - -<p>The motive power sometimes was a horse, and usually -it was a mule. But in this instance the motive power was -furnished by a man. A huge, broad, squat man naked to -the waist! He was bound to the end of the long bar or -tongue, and as he pushed it round and round his body -was bent almost double. What wonderful brawny arms -on which the muscles rippled and strung like ropes! The -breast of this giant was covered with grizzled hair. Like -a tired ox he bowed his huge head, wagging it from side -to side. As he heaved around he exposed his broad back—the -huge brown flash that had mystified Adam—and this -mighty muscled back showed streaks and spots of blood.</p> - -<p>A gaunt man, rawboned and dark, with a face like a -ghoul, stood just outside the circle described by the long -bar. He held a mesquite branch with forked and thorny -end, which he used as a goad. Whenever the hairy, half-naked -giant passed around this gaunt man would swing -the whip. It cracked on the brown back—spattered the -drops of blood.</p> - -<p>There were three other men shoveling, carrying, and -dumping ore into the pit. One was slight of build and -hard of face. A red-undershirted fellow looked tough -and wiry, of middle age, a seasoned desert rat, villainous -as a reptile. The third man had a small, closely cropped<span class="pagenum" id="Page_280">280</span> -head like a bullet, and a jaw that stood out beyond his -brow, a hard visage smeared with sweat and dust. His -big, naked shoulders proclaimed him young.</p> - -<p>And the grizzled giant, whom the others were goading -and working to death there in the terrible heat, was -Adam’s old savior and friend, Dismukes.</p> - -<p>Cautiously Adam backed and slid down the clay slope, -and hurried up and down another. When he had crossed -several he turned to the left and ran down to the trail, -and followed along that until he reached the spot where -he had left the buckets of water.</p> - -<p>There he drank deeply, and tried to restrain his hurry. -But he was not tired or out of breath. And his mind -seemed at a deadlock. A weapon, a shovel, a sledge to -crush their skulls! To keep between them and their guns! -Thus Adam’s thoughts had riveted themselves on a few -actions. There was, on the surface of his body, a cold, -hard, tingling stretch of skin over rippling muscles; and -deep internally, the mysterious and manifold life of blood -and nerve and bone awoke and flamed under the instinct -of the ages. Adam’s body then belonged to the past and to -what the desert had made it.</p> - -<p>Swinging the crossbar over his shoulders and lifting -the buckets, he took the trail down toward the camp! -He bowed his head and his shoulders more than the weight -of the buckets made necessary. The perverse gale blew -more fiercely than ever, and the hollow roar resounded -louder, and the yellow gloom of dust descended closer, -and a weird, dim light streamed through the pall, down -upon the moving shadows. All was somber, naked, earthy -in this thickening, lowering pall. Odor of smoke and -dust! A fiercely burning heat that had the weight of -hotly pressing lead! Bellow and shriek and moan of gale -that died away! It was the portal to an inferno, and -Adam was a man descended in age-long successions from -simian beasts, and he strode in the image of God, with -love his motive, rage his passion, and the wild years of -the desert at his back, driving him on.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_281">281</span> -He rounded the last corner. There was the camp, fifty -yards away. He now could almost straddle the only -avenue of escape.</p> - -<p>The wind lulled. A yellow shadow drifted away from -the sun, and again it shone with sinister magenta hue. -All the air seemed to wait, as if the appalling forces of -nature, aghast at the strange lives of men, had halted -to watch.</p> - -<p>“Thar’s Bill with the water!” yelled the red-shirted man.</p> - -<p>Work and action ceased. The giant Dismukes looked, -then heaved erect with head poised like that of a hawk.</p> - -<p>“Aw, Bill, you son-of-a-gun!” called another robber, in -welcome. “We damn near died, waitin’ fer thet water!”</p> - -<p>“Ho! Ho!... Bill, ye musta run ag’in’ another -Injun.”</p> - -<p>Adam walked on, shortening himself a little more, quickening -his stride. When he reached and passed the shelter -under which lay packs and coats and guns he suddenly -quivered, as if released from dragging restraint.</p> - -<p>The robber of slight frame and hard face had walked -out from under the shelter. He alone had been silent. -He had peered keenly, bending a little.</p> - -<p>“Hey, is thet you, Bill?” he queried, with hard voice -which suited his face.</p> - -<p>The gaunt robber cracked his whip. “Fellars, air we -locoed by this hyar dust? Damn the deceivin’ light!... -Too big fer Bill—er I’m blind with heat!”</p> - -<p>“<em>It ain’t Bill!</em>” screeched the little man, and he bounded -toward where lay the guns.</p> - -<p>Adam dropped the buckets. Down they thudded with -a splash. Two of his great leaps intercepted the little -man, who veered aside, dodged, and then tried to run by. -Adam, with a lunge and a swing, hit him squarely on -the side of the head. The blow rang soddenly. Its -tremendous power propelled the man off his feet, turning -him sidewise as he went through the air, and carried him -with terrific force against one of the shelter posts, round -which his limp body seemed to wrap itself. Crash! the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_282">282</span> -post gave way, letting the roof sag. Then the smitten -man rolled to lodge against a pack, and lay inert.</p> - -<p>Whirling swiftly, Adam drew his gun, and paused a -second, ready to rush.</p> - -<p>The robbers stood stock-still.</p> - -<p>“My Gawd!” hoarsely yelled the red-shirted one. -“Who’s thet?... Did you see him soak Robbins?”</p> - -<p>Dismukes let out a stentorian roar of joy, of hate, of -triumph. Like a chained elephant he plunged to escape. -Failing that, he surged down to yell: “Aha, you bloody -claim jumpers! Now you’re done! It’s Wansfell!”</p> - -<p>“<em>Wansfell!</em>” flashed the gaunt-faced villain, and that -gaunt face turned ashen. “Grab a shovel! Run fer -a gun!”</p> - -<p>Then the red-shirted robber swung aloft his shovel and -rushed at Adam, bawling fierce curses. Adam shot him -through. The man seemed blocked, as if by heavy impact, -then, more fiercely, he rushed again. Adam’s second and -last shot, fired at point-blank, staggered him. But the -shovel descended on Adam’s head, a hard blow, fortunately -from the flat side. Clubbing his gun, Adam beat down -the man, who went falling with his shovel under the -shelter. Both of the other men charged Adam and the -three met at the opening. They leaped so swiftly upon -him and were so heavy bodied that they bore him to the -ground. Adam’s grim intention was to hang on to both -of them so neither could run to get a weapon. To that -end he locked a hold on each. Then began a whirling, -wrestling, thudding battle. To make sure of them Adam -had handicapped himself. He could not swing his malletlike -fists and he had not been fortunate enough to grip -their throats. So, rolling over and over with them, he -took the rain of blows, swinging them back, heaving his -weight upon them. Foot by foot he won his way farther -and farther from where the guns lay. If one yelling -robber surged half erect, Adam swung the other to trip -him. And once inside the wide doorway of that octagon -structure, Adam rose with the struggling men, an iron<span class="pagenum" id="Page_283">283</span> -hand clutching each, and, swinging them wide apart, by -giant effort he brought them back into solid and staggering -impact. He had hoped to bring their heads together. -But only their bodies collided and the force of the collision -broke Adam’s hold on one. The young man of -hulking frame went down, right on the shovel, and, quick -to grasp it, he bounded up, fierce and strong. But as he -swung aloft the weapon, Adam let go of the gaunt-faced -man and hit him, knocking him against the other. They -staggered back, almost falling.</p> - -<p>Swift on that advantage, Adam swung a fist to the -bulging jaw of the man with the shovel. As if struck -by a catapult, he went down over the wooden beam and -the shovel flew far. Then Adam blocked the doorway. -The other fellow charged him, only to be knocked back. -As he reeled, his comrade, panting loud, straddled the -long beam. Just then Dismukes with quick wits heaved forward -on the beam, to which he was bound, and the claim -jumper went sprawling in the dirt. Dismukes celebrated -his entrance into the fray with another stentorian yell.</p> - -<p>Adam awoke now to a different and more intense sense -of the fight. He had his antagonists cornered. They -could never get by him to secure a gun. And the fierce -zest of violent strife, the ruthless law of the desert, the -survival of the strongest, the blood lust, would have made -him refuse any weapon save his hands. He stood on his -feet and his hands were enough. Like a wolf he snapped -his teeth, then locked his jaw. As he swung and battled -and threw these foes backward a strange, wild joy accelerated -his actions. When he struck, the sodden blow -felt good. He avoided no return blows. He breasted -them. The smell of sweat and blood, the heat of panting -breaths in his face, the feel of hot, rippling muscle, all -tended to make him the fiercer. His sight stayed keen, -though tinged with red. He saw the beady, evil eyes of -the big robber, like hot green fire, and the bruised and -bleeding face with its snarling mouth; and as he saw, he -struck out hard with savage thrill. He saw the gaunt<span class="pagenum" id="Page_284">284</span> -and sallow visage of the other, bloody mouthed, with -malignant gaze of frenzied hate, of glinting intent to kill, -and as he saw he beat him down.</p> - -<p>Then into his pulsing senses burst a terrible yell from -Dismukes. The gaunt-faced man had fallen into the pit -of the <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">arrastra</i>, and Dismukes had suddenly started ahead, -shoving the beam over him. The big rocks dragging by -chains from the crossbeam began to pound around on -the ore. Jar and rumble! Then a piercing scream issued -from the man who had been caught under the rocks, who -was being dragged around the <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">arrastra</i>.</p> - -<p>Adam saw, even as he knocked back another rush of -the other man.</p> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">Grindin’ gold, Wansfell!</span>” roared Dismukes. -“<span class="smcap">More ore, pard!... We’re grindin’ gold!</span>”</p> - -<p>The huge prospector bent to his task. Supreme was -his tremendous effort. Strength of ten men! Blood -gushed from the cuts on his brawny back. Faster he -shoved until he was running. And as he came around, -the ferocity of his bristling face and the swelling of the -great chest with its mats of hair seemed to prove him -half man, half beast, a gorilla in a death grapple.</p> - -<p>Again the big robber lunged up, to lower his head and -charge at Adam. He was past yelling. He did not seek -to escape. He would have given his life to kill.</p> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">More ore, pard Wansfell!</span>” yelled Dismukes, as -with whistling breath he shoved round the terrible mill -of rumbling rocks. A horrible, long-drawn cry issued -from under them.</p> - -<p>Then the sweep of the long beam caught the man who -was charging Adam. Down to his knees it forced him, -and, catching under his chin, was dragging him, when -the upright post gave way with a crash. The released -beam, under the tremendous momentum of Dismukes’ -massive weight and strength, seemed to flash across the -half circle, lifting and carrying the man. A low wall of -rock caught his body, and the beam, swinging free from its -fastening, cracked his head as if it had been a ripe melon.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_285">285</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXI">CHAPTER XXI</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap b"><span class="smcap1">Sunset</span> of that momentous and tragic day found -Adam and Dismukes camped beyond the mouth of a -wide pass that bisected the Funeral range.</p> - -<p>It was a dry camp, but water from a pure spring some -miles down had been packed out. Greasewood grew -abundantly on the wide flat, and there were bunches of -dry gray sage.</p> - -<p>Adam felt well-nigh exhausted, and he would have -been gloomy and silent but for his comrade. Dismukes -might never have been harnessed to the beam of an -<i xml:lang="es" lang="es">arrastra</i> and driven like a mule, and his awful treadmill -toil in the terrible heat under the lacerating lash was as -if it had never been. Dismukes was elated, he was exultant, -he was strangely young again.</p> - -<p>Always, to Adam, this giant prospector, Dismukes, had -been beyond understanding. But now he was enigmatic. -He transcended his old self. In the excitement following -his rescue he had not mentioned the fact that Adam had -saved his life. Adam thought greatly of this squaring -of his old debt. But Dismukes seemed not to consider -it. He never mentioned that but for Adam’s intervention -he would have been goaded like a mule, kicked and flayed -and driven in the stifling heat, until he fell down to die. -All Dismukes thought of was the gold he had mined, -the gold the claim jumpers had mined—the bags of heavy -gold that were his, and the possession of which ended -forever his life-long toil for a fortune. A hundred times -that afternoon, as the men had packed and climbed out of -the valley, Dismukes had tried to force upon Adam a half -of the gold, a quarter of it, a share. But Adam refused.</p> - -<p>“Why, for Lord’s sake?” Dismukes at last exploded,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_286">286</span> -his great ox eyes rolling. “It’s gold. Most of it I mined -before those devils came. It’s clean an’ honest. You -deserve a share. An’ the half of it will more than make -up the sum I’ve slaved an’ saved to get. Why, man—why -won’t you take it?”</p> - -<p>“Well, friend, I guess the only reason I’ve got is that -it’s too heavy to pack,” replied Adam. He smiled as he -spoke, but the fact was he had no other reason for refusal.</p> - -<p>Dismukes stared with wide eyes and open mouth. -Adam, apparently, was beyond his comprehension just -the same as Dismukes was beyond Adam’s. Finally he -swore his astonishment, grunted his disapproval, and then, -resigning himself to Adam’s strange apathy, he straightway -glowed again.</p> - -<p>Adam, despite his amusement and something of sadness, -could not help but respond in a measure to the -intense rapture of his friend. Dismukes’ great work had -ended. His long quest for the Golden Fleece had been -rewarded. His thirty-five years of wandering and enduring -and toiling were over, and life had suddenly loomed -beautiful and enchanting. The dream of boyhood had -come true. The fortune had been made. And now to -look forward to ease, rest, travel, joy—all that he had -slaved for. Marvelous past—magnificent prospect of -future!</p> - -<p>Adam listened kindly, and went slowly, with tired limbs, -about the camp tasks; and now he gazed at Dismukes, -and again had an eye for his surroundings. Often he -gazed up at the exceedingly high, blunt break in the -Funeral range. What cataclysm of nature had made that -rent? It was a zigzagged saw-toothed wall, with strata -slanted at an angle of forty-five degrees. Zigzag veins -of black and red bronze ran through the vast drab mass.</p> - -<p>The long purple shadows that Adam loved had begun -to fall. Several huge bats with white heads darted in -irregular flight over the camp. Adam’s hands, and his -jaw, too, were swollen and painful as a result of the fight, -and he served himself and ate with difficulty. And as for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_287">287</span> -speech, he had little chance for that. Dismukes’ words -flowed like a desert flood. The man was bewitched. He -would consume moments in eloquent description of what -he was going to do, then suddenly switch to an irrelevant -subject.</p> - -<p>“Once, years ago, I was lost on the desert,” he said, -reminiscently. “First an’ only time I ever got lost for -sure. Got out of grub. Began to starve. Was goin’ to -kill an’ eat my burro, when he up an’ run off. Finally -got out of water. That’s the last straw, you know.... -I walked all day an’ all night an’ all day, only to find -myself more lost than ever. I thought I had been travelin’ -toward the west to some place I’d heard of water an’ -a ranch. Then I made sure I’d gone the wrong way. -Staggerin’ an’ fallin’ an’ crawlin’ till near daylight, at -last I gave up an’ stretched out to die. Me! I gave up—was -glad to die.... I can remember the look of the pale -stars—the gray mornin’ light—the awful silence an’ loneliness. -Yes, I wanted to die quick.... An’ all at once -I heard a rooster crow!”</p> - -<p>“Well! You’d lain down to die near a ranch. That -was funny,” declared Adam. Life did play queer pranks -on men.</p> - -<p>“Funny! Say, pard Wansfell, there’s nothin’ funny -about death. An’ as for life, I never dreamed how -glorious it is, until I heard that rooster crow. I’ll buy a -farm of green an’ grassy an’ shady land somewhere in -the East—land with runnin’ water everywhere—an’ I’ll -raise a thousand roosters just to hear them crow.”</p> - -<p>“Thought you meant to travel,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>“Sure. But I’ll settle down sometime, I suppose,” replied -Dismukes, reflectively.</p> - -<p>“Friend, will you marry?” inquired Adam, gravely. -How intensely interesting was this man about to go out -into the world!</p> - -<p>“Marry!—What?” ejaculated the prospector.</p> - -<p>“A woman, of course.”</p> - -<p>“My God!” rolled out Dismukes. The thought had<span class="pagenum" id="Page_288">288</span> -startled him. His great ox eyes reflected changes of -amazing thought, shadows of old emotions long submerged. -“That’s somethin’ I never <em>did</em> think of. Me -marry a woman!... No woman would ever have me.”</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, you’re not so old. And you’ll be rich. -When you wear off the desert roughness you can find a -wife. The world is full of good women who need -husbands.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, you ain’t serious?” queried Dismukes, -puzzled and stirred. He ran a broad hand through his -shock of grizzled hair. His eyes were beautiful then. -“I never had wife or sweetheart.... No girl ever looked -at me—when I was a boy. An’ these years on the desert, -women have been scarce, an’ not one was ever anythin’ -to me.”</p> - -<p>“Well, when you get among a lot of pretty girls, just -squeeze one for me,” said Adam, with the smile that -was sad.</p> - -<p>Plain it was how Adam’s attempt at pleasantry, despite -its undercurrent, had opened up a vista of bewildering -and entrancing prospects for Dismukes. This prospector -had grown grizzled on the desert; his long years had been -years of loneliness; and now the forgotten dreams and -desires of youth thronged thick and sweet in his imagination. -Adam left him to that engrossing fancy, hoping it -would keep him content and silent for a while.</p> - -<p>A golden flare brightened over the Panamint range, -silhouetting the long, tapering lines of the peaks. Far -to the west, when the sun had set, floated gray and silver-edged -clouds, and under them a whorl of rosy, dusky, -ruddy haze. All the slopes below were beginning to be -enshrouded in purple, and even while Adam watched they -grew cold and dark. The heat veils were still rising, -but they were from the ridges of dark-brown and pale-gray -earth far this side of the mountains. Death Valley -was hidden, and for that Adam was glad. The winds -had ceased, the clouds of dust had long settled. It was a -bold and desolate scene, of wide scope and tremendous<span class="pagenum" id="Page_289">289</span> -dimensions, a big country. The afterglow of sunset transformed -the clouds. Then the golden flare faded fast, -the clouds paled, the purple gloom deepened. Vast black -ridges of mountains stood out like ragged islands in a -desolate sea.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell,” spoke up Dismukes, “you need your hair -cut.”</p> - -<p>“Maybe. But I’m glad it was long to-day when I got -hit with the shovel.”</p> - -<p>“You sure did come near gettin’ it cut then,” replied -Dismukes, with a hard laugh. “I’ll tell you what your -long hair reminds me of. Years ago I met a big fellow -on the desert. Six feet three he was, an’ ’most as big as -you. An’ a darn good pard on the trail. Well, he wore -his hair very long. It hid his ears. An’ in the hottest -weather he never let me cut it. Well, the funny part -all came out one day. Not so funny for him, to think -of it!... We met men on the trail. They shot him an’ -were nigh on to doin’ for me.... My big pardner was -a horse thief. He’d had his ears cut off for stealin’ -horses. An’ so he wore his hair long like yours to hide -the fact he had no ears.”</p> - -<p>“Friend Dismukes, <em>I</em> have ears, if my long hair is -worrying you,” replied Adam. “And if I had not had -mighty keen ears you’d still be grinding gold for your -claim jumpers.”</p> - -<p>At dusk, while the big bats darted overhead with soft -swishing of wings, and the camp fire burned down to red -and glowing embers, Dismukes talked and talked. And -always he returned to the subject of gold and of his future.</p> - -<p>“Pard, I wish you were goin’ with me,” he said, and -the slow, sweeping gesture of the great horny hand had -something of sublimity. He waved it away toward the -east, and it signified the far places across the desert. -“I’m rich. The years of lonely hell an’ never-endin’ toil -are over. No more sour dough! No more thirst an’ -heat an’ dust! No more hoardin’ of gold! The time has -come for me to spend. I’ll bank my gold an’ draw my<span class="pagenum" id="Page_290">290</span> -checks. At Frisco I’ll boil the alkali out of my carcass, -an’, shaved an’ clipped an’ dressed, I’ll take again the -name of my youth an’ fare forth for adventure. I’ll -pay for the years of hard grub. I’ll eat the best an’ -drink wine—wine—the sweetest an’ oldest of wine! -Wine in thin glasses.... I’ll wear silk next my skin -an’ sleep on feathers. I’ll travel like a prince. I can -see the big niggers roll their eyes. ‘Yas, sah, yas sah, -the best for you, sah!’ An’ I’ll tip them in gold.... -I’ll go to my old home. Some of my people will be -livin’. An’ when they see me they’ll see their ship come -in. They’ll be rich. I’ll not forget the friends of my -youth. That little village will have a church or a park -as my gift. I’ll travel. I’ll see the sights an’ the cities. -New York! Ha! if I like that place, I’ll buy it! I’ll see -all there is to see, buy all there is to buy. I’ll be merry, -I’ll be joyful. I’ll live. I’ll make up for all the lost -years. But I’ll never forget the poor an’ the miserable. -I can spend an’ give a hundred dollars a day for the rest -of my life. I’ll cross the ocean. London! I’ve met -Englishmen in the Southwest. Queer, cold sort of men! -I’ll see how they live. I’ll go all over England. Then -Paris! Never was I drunk, but I’ll get drunk in Paris. -I want to see the wonderful hotels an’ shops an’ theaters. -I’ll look at the beautiful French actresses. I’ll go to hear -the prima donnas sing. I’ll throw gold double-eagles on -the stage. An’ I’ll take a fly at Monte Carlo. An’ travel -on an’ on. To Rome, that great city where the thrones -of the emperors still stand. I’ll go spend a long hour -high up in the ruins of the Coliseum. An’ dreamin’ of -the days of the Cæsars—seein’ the gladiators in the arena—I’ll -think of you, Wansfell. For there never lived on -the old earth a greater fighter than you!... Egypt, the -land of sun an’ sand! I’ll see the grand Sahara. An’ -I’ll travel on an’ on, all over the world. When I’ve seen -it I’ll come back to my native land. An’ then, that green -farm, with wooded hills an’ runnin’ streams! It must be -near a city. Horses I’ll have an’ a man to drive, an’ a<span class="pagenum" id="Page_291">291</span> -house of comfort.... Mebbe there’ll come a woman -into my life. Mebbe children! The thought you planted -in me, pard, somehow makes me yearn. After all, every -man should have a son. I see that now. What blunders -we make! But I’m rich, I’m not so old, I’ll drink life -to the very lees.... I see the lights, I hear the voices -of laughter an’ music, I feel the comfortin’ walls of a -home. A roof over my head! An’ a bed as soft as -downy feathers!... Mebbe, O my pard, mebbe the -sweet smile of a woman—the touch of a lovin’ hand—the -good-night kiss of a child!... My God! how the -thoughts of life can burn an’ thrill!”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Twenty miles a day, resting several hours through the -fierce noon heat, the travelers made down across the -Mohave Desert. To them, who had conquered the terrible -elements and desolation of Death Valley, this waste -of the Mohave presented comparatively little to contend -with. Still, hardened and daring as they were, they did -not incur unnecessary risks.</p> - -<p>The time was September, at the end of a fierce, dry -summer. Cloudless sky, fervid and quivering air, burning -downward rays of sun and rising veils of reflected -heat from sand and rock—these were not to be trifled -with. Dismukes’ little thermometer registered one hundred -and thirty degrees in the shade; that is, whenever -there was any shade to rest in. They did not burden themselves -with the worry of knowing the degrees of heat -while they were on the march.</p> - -<p>Water holes well known to Dismukes, though out of -the beaten track, were found to be dry; and so the -travelers had to go out of a direct line to replenish their -supply. Under that burning sun even Dismukes and -Adam suffered terribly after several hours without water. -A very fine penetrating alkali dust irritated throat and -nostrils and augmented the pain of thirst. Once they -went a whole day without water, and at sundown reached -a well kept by a man who made a living by selling water<span class="pagenum" id="Page_292">292</span> -to prospectors and freighters and drivers of borax wagons. -His prices were exorbitant. On this occasion, surlily -surveying the parched travelers and the thirsty burros, -he said his well was almost dry and he would not sell -any water. Dismukes had told Adam that the well-owner -bore him a grudge. They expostulated and pleaded with -him to no avail. Adam went to the well and, lifting a trap-door, -he peered down, to see quite a goodly supply of -water. Then he returned to the little shack where the -bushy-whiskered hoarder of precious water sat on a box -with a rifle across his knees. Adam always appeared mild -and serene, except when he was angry, at which time a -man would have had to be blind not to see his mood. -The well-owner probably expected Adam to plead again. -But he reckoned falsely. Adam jerked the rifle from him -and with a single movement of his hands he broke off -the stock. Then he laid those big, hard hands on the -man, who seemed to shrink under them.</p> - -<p>“Friend, you’ve plenty of water. It’s a live well. -You can spare enough to save us. We’ll double your -pay. Come.”</p> - -<p>Adam loosened his right hand and doubled up the enormous -malletlike fist and swung it back. The well-owner -suddenly changed his front and became animated, and -the travelers got all the water they needed. But they did -not annoy him further by pitching camp near his place.</p> - -<p>This country was crisscrossed by trails, and, arid desert -though it was, every few miles showed an abandoned -mine, or a prospector working a claim, or a shack containing -a desert dweller. Adam and Dismukes were -approaching the highway that bisected the Mohave Desert. -It grew to be more of a sandy country, and anywhere -in sand, water was always scarce. Another of Dismukes’ -water holes was dry. It had not been visited for months. -The one wanderer who had stopped there lay there half -buried in the sand, a shrunken mummy of a man, with a -dark and horrible mockery in the eyeless sockets of his -skull. His skin was drawn like light-brown parchment<span class="pagenum" id="Page_293">293</span> -over his face. Adam looked, and then again, and gave a -sudden start. He turned the sun-dried visage more to -the light. He recognized that face, set in its iron mask -of death, with its grin that would grin forever until -the brown skull went to dust.</p> - -<p>“Regan!” he exclaimed.</p> - -<p>“You know him?” queried Dismukes.</p> - -<p>“Yes. He was an Irishman I knew years ago. A -talky, cheerful fellow. Hard drinker. He loved the -desert, but drink kept him in the mining camps. The -last time I saw him was at Tecopah, after you left.”</p> - -<p>“Poor devil! He died of thirst. I know that cast of -face.... Let’s give him decent burial.”</p> - -<p>“Yes. Poor Regan! He was the man who named me -Wansfell. Why he called me that I never knew—never -will know.”</p> - -<p>Deep in the sand they buried the remains of Regan -and erected a rude cross to mark his lonely grave.</p> - -<p>Dismukes led Adam off the well-beaten trail one day, -up a narrow sandy wash to a closed pocket that smelled -old and musty. Here a green spring bubbled from under -a bank of sand. Water clear as crystal, slightly green -in tinge, sparkled and murmured. A whitish sediment -bordered the tiny stream of running water.</p> - -<p>“Arsenic!” exclaimed Adam.</p> - -<p>“Yes. An’ here’s where I found a whole caravan of -people dead. It was six years ago. Place hasn’t changed -much. Guess it’s filled up a little with blowin’ sand.... -Aha! Look here!”</p> - -<p>Dismukes put the toe of his boot against a round white -object protruding from the sand. It was a bleached skull.</p> - -<p>“Men mad with desert thirst never stop to read,” replied -Adam, sadly.</p> - -<p>In silence Adam and Dismukes gazed down at the -glistening white skull. Ghastly as it was, it yet had -beauty. Once it had been full of thought, of emotion; and -now it was tenanted by desert sand.</p> - -<p>Adam and Dismukes spent half a day at that arsenic<span class="pagenum" id="Page_294">294</span> -spring, under the burning sun, suffering the thirst they -dared not slake there, and they erected a rude cross that -would stand for many and many a day. Deep in the -crosspiece Adam cut the words: “<span class="smcap">Death! Arsenic -spring! Don’t drink! Good water five miles. Follow -dry stream bed.</span>”</p> - -<p>Dismukes appeared to get deep satisfaction and even -happiness out of this accomplished task. It was a monument -to the end of his desert experience. Good will -toward his fellow men!</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>At last the day came when Adam watched Dismukes -drive his burros out on the lonely trail, striding along -with his rolling gait, a huge, short, broad-backed man, like -a misshapen giant. What a stride he had! The thousands -of desert miles it had mastered had not yet taken its force -and spring. It was the stride of one who imagined he -left nothing of life behind and saw its most calling -adventures to the fore. He had tired of the desert. He -had used it. He had glutted it of the riches he craved. -And now he was heading down the trail toward the glittering -haunts of men and the green pastures. Adam watched -him with grief and yet with gladness, and still with something -of awe. Dismukes’ going forever was incomprehensible. -Adam felt what he could not analyze. The -rolling voice of Dismukes, sonorous and splendid, still -rang in Adam’s ears: “Pard, we’re square!... Good-by!” -Adam understood now why a noble Indian, unspoiled -by white men, reverenced a debt which involved -life. The paying of that debt was all of unity and -brotherhood there existed in the world. If it was great -to feel gratitude for the saving of his life, it was far -greater to remember he had saved the life of his savior. -Adam, deeply agitated, watched Dismukes stride down -the barren trail, behind his bobbing burros, watched him -stride on into the lonely, glaring desert, so solemn and -limitless and mysterious, until he vanished in the gray -monotony.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_295">295</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXII">CHAPTER XXII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">When</span> the following March came, Adam had been -a week plodding southward over the yucca plateaus -of the Mohave.</p> - -<p>The desert had changed its face. Left behind were the -rare calico-veined ranges of mountains, the royal-purple -porphyries, the wonderful white granites, the green-blue -coppers, the yellow sulphurs, and the ruddy red irons. -This desert had color, but not so vivid, not so striking. -And it had become more hospitable to the survival of plant -life. The sandy floor was no longer monotonously gray.</p> - -<p>Adam loved the grotesque yucca trees. They were -really trees that afforded shade and firewood, and they -brought back no bittersweet memories like the <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">palo verdes</i>. -The yuccas were fresh and green, renewed in the spring -from the dusty gray sunburnt trees they had been in the -autumn. Many of them bore great cone-shaped buds -about to open, and on others had blossomed large white -flowers with streaks of pink. A yucca forest presented -a strange sight. These desert trees were deformed, weird, -bristling, shaggy trunked, with grotesque shapes like -specters in torture.</p> - -<p>Adam traveled leisurely, although a nameless and invisible -hand seemed to beckon him from the beyond. -His wandering steps were again guided, and something -awaited him far down toward the Rio Colorado. He -was completing a vast circle of the desert, and he could -not resist that call, that wandering quest down toward -the place which had given the color and direction to his -life. But the way must be long, and as there were the -thorns and rocks for his feet, so must there be bruises -to his spirit.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_296">296</span> -At night on the moon-blanched desert, under the weird, -spectral-armed yuccas, Adam had revelation of the clearness -of teaching that was to become his. The years had -been preparing him. When would come his supreme -trial? What would it be? And there came a whisper -out of the lonely darkness, on the cool night wind, that -some day he would go back to find the grave of his -brother and to meet the punishment that was his due. -Then all that was physical, all that was fierce, enduring, -natural, thrust the thought from him. But though the -savage desert life in him burned strong and resistless, yet -he began to hear a new, a different, a higher voice of -conscience. He imagined he stifled it with fiercely repudiating -gestures, but all the wonderful strength of -his brawny hands, magnified a thousand times, could not -thrust a thought from him.</p> - -<p>Toward sunset one day Adam was down on the level -desert floor, plodding along a sandy trail around the -western wall of San Jacinto. The first <i>bisnagi</i> cacti he -saw seemed to greet him as old friends. They were small, -only a foot or so high, and sparsely scattered over the -long rocky slope that led to the base of the mountain -wall. The tops of these cacti were as pink as wild -roses. Adam was sweeping his gaze along to see how -far they grew out on the desert when he discovered that -his burro Jennie had espied moving objects.</p> - -<p>Coming toward Adam, still a goodly distance off, were -two men and two burros, one of which appeared to have -a rider. Presently they appeared to see Adam, for they -halted, burros and all, for a moment. It struck Adam -that when they started on again they sheered a little off -a straight following of the trail. Whereupon Adam, too, -sheered a little off, so as to pass near them. When they -got fairly close he saw two rough-looking men, one driving -a packed burro, and the other leading a burro upon -which was a ragged slip of a girl. The sunlight caught -a brown flash of her face. When nearly abreast, Adam -hailed them.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_297">297</span> -“Howdy, stranger!” they replied, halting. “Come from -inside?”</p> - -<p>“No. I’m down from the Mohave,” replied Adam. -“How’s the water? Reckon you came by the cottonwoods?”</p> - -<p>“Nope. There ain’t none there,” replied one of the -men, shortly. “Plenty an’ fine water down the trail.”</p> - -<p>“Thanks. Where you headed for?”</p> - -<p>“Riverside. My gal hyar is sick an’ pinin’ fer home.”</p> - -<p>Adam had been aware of the rather sharp scrutiny -of these travelers and that they had exchanged whispers. -Such procedures were natural on the desert, only in this -case they struck Adam as peculiar. Then he shifted his -gaze to the girl on the burro. He could not see her face, -as it was bowed. Apparently she was weeping. She made -a coarse, drab little figure. But her hair shone in the -light of the setting sun—rather short and curly, a rich -dark brown with glints of gold.</p> - -<p>Adam replied to the curt good-by of the men, and after -another glance at them, as they went on, he faced ahead -to his own course. Then he heard low sharp words, -“<em>Shet up!</em>” Wheeling, he was in time to see one of -these men roughly shake the girl, and speak further words -too low for Adam to distinguish. Adam’s natural conclusion -was that the father had impatiently admonished -the child for crying. Something made Adam hesitate and -wonder; and presently, as he proceeded on his way, the -same subtle something turned him round to watch the -receding figures. Again he caught a gleam of sunlight -from that girl’s glossy head.</p> - -<p>“Humph! Somehow I don’t like the looks of those -fellows,” muttered Adam. He was annoyed with himself, -first for being so inquisitive, and secondly for not having -gone over to take a closer look at them. Shaking his -head, dissatisfied with himself, Adam trudged on.</p> - -<p>“They said no water at the cottonwoods,” went on -Adam. “No water when the peak is still white with snow. -Either they lied or didn’t know.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_298">298</span> -Adam turned again to gaze after the little party. He -had nothing tangible upon which to hang suspicions. He -went on, then wheeled about once more, realizing that -the farther on he traveled the stronger grew his desire -to look back. Suddenly the feeling cleared of its vagueness—no -longer curiosity. It had been his thoughts that -had inhibited him.</p> - -<p>“I’ll go back,” said Adam. Tying his burros to greasewood -bushes near the trail, he started to stride back over -the ground he had covered. After a while he caught a -glimmer of firelight through the darkness. They had -made dry camp hardly five miles beyond the place where -Adam had passed them.</p> - -<p>It developed that these travelers had gone off the trail -to camp in a wide, deep wash. Adam lost sight of the -camp-fire glimmer, and had to hunt round until he came -to the edge of the wash. A good-sized fire of greasewood -and sage had been started, so that it would burn down to -hot embers for cooking purposes. As Adam stalked out -of the gloom into the camp he saw both men busy with -preparations for the meal. The girl sat in a disconsolate -attitude. She espied Adam before either of the men -heard him. Adam saw her quiver and start erect. Not -fright, indeed, was it that animated her. Suddenly one -of the men rose, with his hand going to his hip.</p> - -<p>“Who goes thar?” he demanded, warningly.</p> - -<p>Adam halted inside the circle of light. “Say, I lost my -coat. Must have fallen off my pack. Did you fellows -find it?”</p> - -<p>“No, we didn’t find no coat,” replied the man, slowly. -He straightened up, with his hand dropping to his side. -The other fellow was on his knees mixing dough in a pan.</p> - -<p>Adam advanced with natural manner, but his eyes, -hidden under the shadow of his wide hat brim, took -swift stock of that camp.</p> - -<p>“Pshaw! I was sure hoping you’d found it,” he said, -as he reached the fire. “I had a time locating your camp. -Funny you’d come way off the trail, down in here.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_299">299</span> -“Funny or not, stranger, it’s our bizness,” gruffly replied -the man standing. He peered keenly at Adam.</p> - -<p>“Sure,” replied Adam, with slow and apparent good -nature. He was close to the man now, as close as he -ever needed to get to any man who might make a threatening -move. And he looked past him at the girl. She had -a pale little face, too small for a pair of wonderful dark -eyes that seemed full of woe and terror. She held out -thin brown hands to Adam.</p> - -<p>“Reckon you’d better go an’ hunt fer yer coat,” returned -the man, significantly.</p> - -<p>In one stride Adam loomed over him, his leisurely, -casual manner suddenly transformed to an attitude of -menace. He stood fully a foot and a half over this -stockily built man, who also suddenly underwent a change. -He stiffened. Warily he peered up, just a second behind -Adam in decision. His mind worked too slowly to get -the advantage in this situation.</p> - -<p>“Say, I’m curious about this girl you’ve got with you,” -said Adam, deliberately.</p> - -<p>The man gave a start. “Aw, you are, hey?” he rasped -out. “Wal, see hyar, stranger, curious fellars sometimes -die sudden, with their boots on.”</p> - -<p>Adam’s force gathered for swift action. Keeping a -sharp gaze riveted on this man, he addressed the girl: -“Little girl, what’s wrong? Are <span class="locked">you——”</span></p> - -<p>“Shet up! If you blab out I’ll slit your tongue,” -yelled the fellow, whirling fiercely. No father ever spoke -that way to his child. And no child ever showed such -terror of her father.</p> - -<p>“Girl, don’t be afraid. Speak!” called Adam, in a -voice that rang.</p> - -<p>“Oh, save me—save me!” she cried, wildly.</p> - -<p>Then the man, hissing like a snake, was reaching for his -gun when Adam struck him. He fell clear across the fire -and, rolling over some packs, lay still. The other one, -cursing, started to crawl, to reach with flour-whitened -hand for a gun lying in a belt upon the sand. Adam<span class="pagenum" id="Page_300">300</span> -kicked the gun away and pounced upon the man. -Fiercely he yelled and struggled. Adam bore him down, -burrowing his face in the sand. Then placing a ponderous -knee on the back of the man’s neck, he knelt there, holding -him down.</p> - -<p>“Girl, throw me that piece of rope,” said Adam, -pointing.</p> - -<p>She shakily got up, her bare feet sinking in the sand, -and, picking up the rope, she threw it to Adam. In short -order he bound the man’s arms behind his back.</p> - -<p>“Now, little girl, you can tell me what’s wrong,” said -Adam, rising.</p> - -<p>“Oh, they took me away—from mother!” she whispered.</p> - -<p>“Your mother? Where?”</p> - -<p>“She’s at the cottonwoods. We live there.”</p> - -<p>Adam could not see her plainly. The fire had burned -down. He threw on more greasewood and some sage, -that flared up with sparkling smoke. Then he drew the -girl to the light. What a thin arm she had! And in the -small face and staring eyes he read more than the fear -that seemed now losing its intensity. Starvation! No -man so quick as Adam to see that!</p> - -<p>“You live there? Then he lied about the water?” asked -Adam.</p> - -<p>“Oh yes—he lied.”</p> - -<p>“Who are these men?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know. They camped at the water. I—I was -out—gathering firewood. One of them—the one you hit—grabbed -me—carried me off. He put his hand—on my -mouth. Then the other man came—with the burros.... -My mother’s sick. She didn’t know what happened. -She’ll be terribly frightened.... Oh, please take me—home!”</p> - -<p>“Indeed I will,” replied Adam, heartily. “Don’t worry -any more. Come now. Walk right behind me.”</p> - -<p>Adam led the way out of camp without another glance -at the two men, one of whom was groaning. The girl<span class="pagenum" id="Page_301">301</span> -kept close at Adam’s heels. Away from the circle of -camp-fire glow, he could see the gray aisles of clean sand -between the clumps of greasewood, and he wound in and -out between these until he found the trail. Suddenly he -remembered the girl had no shoes.</p> - -<p>“You’ll stick your feet full of cactus,” he said. “You -should have on your shoes.”</p> - -<p>“I have no shoes,” she replied. “But cactus doesn’t -hurt me—except the <i>cholla</i>. Do you know <i>cholla</i>? Even -the Indians think <i>cholla</i> bad.”</p> - -<p>“Guess I do, little girl. Let me carry you.”</p> - -<p>“I can walk.”</p> - -<p>So they set off on the starlit trail, and here she walked -beside him. Adam noted that she was taller than he -would have taken her to be, her small head coming up -to his elbow. She had the free stride of an Indian. He -gazed out across the level gray and drab desert. Whatever -way he directed his wandering steps over this land -of waste, he was always gravitating toward new adventure. -For him the lonely reaches and rock-ribbed canyons were -sure to harbor, sooner or later, some humanity that drew -him like a magnet. Everywhere the desert had its evil, -its suffering, its youth and age. The heat of Adam’s -anger subsided with the thought that somehow he had -let the ruffians off easily; and the presence of this girl, -a mere child, apparently, for all her height, brought home -to him the mystery, the sorrow, the marvel of life on the -desert. A sick woman with a child living in the lonely -shadow of San Jacinto! Adam felt in this girl’s presence, -as he had seen starvation in her face, a cruelty -of life, of fate. But how infinitely grateful he felt for the -random wandering steps which had led him down that -trail!</p> - -<p>All at once a slim, rough little hand slipped into his. -Instinctively Adam closed his own great hand over it. -That touch gave him such a thrill as he had never before -felt in all his life. It seemed to link his strength and this -child’s trust. The rough little fingers and calloused little<span class="pagenum" id="Page_302">302</span> -palm might have belonged to a hard-laboring boy, but -the touch was feminine. Adam, desert trained by years -that had dominated even the habits ingrained in his youth, -and answering mostly to instinct, received here an unintelligible -shock that stirred to the touch of a trusting hand, -but was nothing physical. His body, his mind, his soul -seemed but an exhaustive instrument of creation over -which the desert played masterfully.</p> - -<p>“It was lucky you happened along,” said the girl.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” replied Adam, as if startled.</p> - -<p>“They were bad men. And, oh, I was so glad to see -them—at first. It’s so lonely. No one ever comes except -the Indians—and they come to <em>beg</em> things to eat—never to -<em>give</em>. I thought those white men were prospectors and -would give me a little flour or coffee—or something -mother would like. We’ve had so little to eat.”</p> - -<p>“That so? Well, I have a full pack,” replied Adam. -“Plenty of flour, coffee, sugar, bacon, canned milk, dried -fruit.”</p> - -<p>“And you’ll give us some?” she asked, eagerly, in a -whisper.</p> - -<p>“All you need.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, you’re good—good as those men were bad!” she -exclaimed, with a throb of joy. “Mother has just starved -herself for me. You see, the Indian who packed supplies -to us hasn’t come for long. Nobody has come—except -those bad men. And our food gave out little by little. -Mother starved herself for me.... Oh, I couldn’t make -her eat. She’d say she didn’t want what I’d cook. Then -I’d have to eat it.”</p> - -<p>“Isn’t your mother able to get about?” asked Adam, -turning to peer down into the dark little face.</p> - -<p>“Oh no! She’s dying of consumption,” was the low, -sad reply.</p> - -<p>“And your father?” asked Adam, a little huskily.</p> - -<p>“He died two years ago. I guess it’s two, for the peak -has been white twice.”</p> - -<p>“Died?—here in the desert?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_303">303</span> -“Yes. We buried him by the running water where he -loved to sit.”</p> - -<p>“Tell me—how did your parents and you come to be -here.”</p> - -<p>“They both had consumption long before I was born,” -replied the girl. “Father had it—but mother didn’t—when -they were married. That was back in Iowa. -Mother caught it from him. And they both were going -to die. They had tried every way to get well, but the -doctors said they couldn’t.... So father and mother -started West in a prairie schooner. I was born in it, -somewhere in Kansas. They tried place after place, -trying to find a climate that would cure them. I remember -as far back as Arizona. But father never improved -till we got to this valley. Here he was getting strong -again. Then my uncle came and he found gold -over in the mountains. That made father mad to get -rich—to have gold for me. He worked too hard—and -then he died. Mother has been slowly failing ever -since.”</p> - -<p>“It’s a sad story, little girl,” replied Adam. “The -desert is full of sad stories.... But your uncle—what -became of him?”</p> - -<p>“He went off prospecting for gold. But he came back -several times. And the last was just before father died. -Then he said he would come back again for me some -day and take me out of the desert. Mother lives on -that hope. But I don’t want him to come. All I pray for is -that she gets well. I would never leave her.”</p> - -<p>“So you’ve lived all your life on the desert?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. Mother says I never slept under a real roof.”</p> - -<p>“And how old are you?”</p> - -<p>“Nearly fourteen.”</p> - -<p>“So old as that? Well! I thought you were younger. -And, little girl—may I ask how you learned to talk so—as -if you had been to school?”</p> - -<p>“My mother was a school-teacher. She taught me.”</p> - -<p>“What’s your name?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_304">304</span> -“It’s Eugenie Linwood. But I don’t like Eugenie. -Father and mother always called me Genie.... What’s -your name?”</p> - -<p>“Mine is Wansfell.”</p> - -<p>“You’re the biggest man I ever saw. I thought the -Yuma Indians were giants, but you’re bigger. My poor -father was not big or strong.”</p> - -<p>Presently Adam saw the dark-gray forms of his burros -along the trail. Jennie appeared to be more contrary than -usual, and kicked spitefully at Adam as he untied her. -And as Adam drove her ahead with the other burro she -often lagged to take a nip at the sage. During the several -miles farther down the trail Adam was hard put to it -to keep her going steadily. The girl began to tire, a -circumstance which Adam had expected. She refused to -be assisted, or to be put on one of the burros. The trail -began to circle round the black bulge of the mountain, -finally running into the shadow, where objects were hard -to see. The murmur of flowing water soon reached -Adam’s ears—most welcome and beautiful sound to -desert man. And then big cottonwoods loomed up, and -beyond them the gleam of starlight on stately palm trees. -Adam, peering low down through the shadows, distinguished -a thatch-roofed hut.</p> - -<p>“We’ll not tell mother about the bad men,” whispered -the girl. “It’ll only scare her.”</p> - -<p>“All right, Genie,” said Adam, and he permitted himself -to be led to a door of the hut. Dark as pitch was -it inside.</p> - -<p>“Mother, are you awake?” called Genie.</p> - -<p>“Oh, child, where have you been?” rejoined a voice, -faint and weak, with a note of relief. “I woke up in the -dark.... I called. You didn’t come.”</p> - -<p>Then followed a cough that had a shuddering significance -for Adam.</p> - -<p>“Mother, I’m sorry. I—I met a man on the trail. A -Mr. Wansfell. We talked. And he came with me. He -has a new pack of good things to eat. And, oh, mother!<span class="pagenum" id="Page_305">305</span> -he’s—he’s different from those men who were here; he’ll -help us.”</p> - -<p>“Madam, I’ll be happy to do anything I can for you -and your little girl,” said Adam, in his deep, kindly tones.</p> - -<p>“Sir, your voice startled me,” replied the woman, with -a gasp. “But it’s a voice I trust. The looks of men -in this hard country deceive me sometimes—but never -their voices.... Sir, if you will help us in our extremity, -you will have the gratitude of a dying woman—of a -mother.”</p> - -<p>The darkness was intense inside the hut, and Adam, -leaning at the door, could see nothing. The girl touched -his arm timidly, almost appealingly, as Adam hesitated -over his reply.</p> - -<p>“You can—trust me,” he said, presently. “My name -is Wansfell. I’m just a desert wanderer. If I may—I’ll -stay here—look after your little girl till her uncle comes.”</p> - -<p>“At last—God has answered my—prayer!” exclaimed -the woman, pantingly.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Adam unpacked his burros a half dozen rods from the -hut, under a spreading cottonwood and near the juncture -of two little streams of water that flowed down out of -the gloom, one on each side of the great corner of mountain. -And Adam’s big hands made short shift of camp -well made, with upright poles and thatch, covered by a -thatched roof of palm leaves. The girl came out and -watched him, and Adam had never seen hungrier eyes -even in an Indian.</p> - -<p>“It’d be fun to watch you—you’re so quick—if I -wasn’t starved,” said Genie.</p> - -<p>What a slender, almost flat slip of a girl. Her dress -was in tatters, showing bare brown flesh in places. The -pinched little face further stirred Adam’s pity. And -there waved over him a strange pride in his immense -strength, his wonderful hands, his desert knowledge that -now could be put to the greatest good ever offered him -in his wanderings.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_306">306</span> -“Genie, when you’re starved you must eat very slowly—and -only a little.”</p> - -<p>“I know. I’ve known all about people starving and -thirsting. But I’m not that badly off. I’ve had a <em>little</em> -to eat.”</p> - -<p>“Honest Injun?” he queried.</p> - -<p>She had never heard that expression, so he changed it -to another of like meaning.</p> - -<p>“I wouldn’t lie,” she replied, with direct simplicity that -indeed reminded Adam of an Indian.</p> - -<p>Never had Adam prepared so good a camp dinner in -such short time. And then, hungry as Genie was, she -insisted that her mother should be served first. She took -a lighted candle Adam gave her and led the way into the -hut, while he followed, carrying food and drink that he -believed best for a woman so weak and starved. The hut -had two rooms, the first being a kitchen with stone floor -and well furnished with camp utensils. The second room -contained two rude cots made of poles and palm leaves, -upon one of which Adam saw a pale shadow of a woman -whose eyes verified the tragic words she had spoken.</p> - -<p>Despite the way Adam stooped as he entered, his lofty -head brushed the palm-leafed roof. Genie laughed when -he bumped against a crossbeam.</p> - -<p>“Mother, he’s the tallest man!” exclaimed the girl. -“He could never live in our hut.... Now sit up, mother -dear.... Doesn’t it all smell good. Oooooo! The -Indian fairy has come.”</p> - -<p>“Genie, will you hold the candle so I can see the face -of this kind man?” asked the woman, when she had been -propped up in bed.</p> - -<p>The girl complied, with another little laugh. Adam had -not before been subjected to a scrutiny like the one he -bore then. It seemed to come from beyond this place -and time.</p> - -<p>“Sir, you are a man such as I have never seen,” she -said, at length.</p> - -<p>Plain it was to Adam that the sincerity, or whatever<span class="pagenum" id="Page_307">307</span> -she saw in him, meant more to her than the precious food -of which she stood in such dire need. Her hair was -straggly and gray, her brow lined by pain and care, her -burning eyes were sunk deep in dark hollows, and the -rest of her features seemed mere pale shadows.</p> - -<p>“I’m glad for your confidence,” he said. “But never -mind me. Try to eat some now.”</p> - -<p>“Mother, there’s plenty,” added Genie, with soft eagerness. -“You can’t fib to me about <em>this</em>. Oh, smell that -soup! And there’s rice—clean white rice with sugar -and milk!”</p> - -<p>“Child, if there’s plenty, go and eat.... Thank you, -sir, I can help myself.”</p> - -<p>Adam followed Genie out, and presently the look of -her, as she sat on the sand, in ravenous bewilderment -of what to eat first, brought back poignantly to him the -starvation days of his earlier experience. How blessed -to appreciate food! Indeed, Genie would have made a -little glutton of herself had not Adam wisely obviated -that danger for her.</p> - -<p>Later, when she and her mother were asleep, he strolled -under the cottonwoods along the murmuring stream where -the bright stars shone reflected in the dark water. The -place had the fragrance of spring, of fresh snow water, -of green growths and blossoming flowers. Frogs were -trilling from the gloom, a sweet, melodious music seldom -heard by Adam. A faint, soft night breeze rustled in the -palm leaves. The ragged mountain-side rose precipitously, -a slanted mass of huge rocks, their shining surfaces alternating -with the dark blank spaces. Above spread the -sky, a wonderful deep blue, velvety, intense, from which -blazed magnificent white stars, and countless trains and -groups of smaller stars.</p> - -<p>Rest and thought came to him then. Destiny had dealt -him many parts to play on the desert. So many violent, -harsh, and bitter tasks! But this was to be different. -Not upon evil days had he fallen! Nor had his wandering -steps here taken hold of hell! The fragrance under<span class="pagenum" id="Page_308">308</span> -the shadow of this looming mountain was the fragrance -of an oasis. And in that silent shadow slept a child who -would soon be an orphan. Adam had his chance to live -awhile in one of the desert’s fruitful and blossoming -spots. Only a desert man could appreciate the rest, the -ease, the joy, the contrast of that opportunity. He could -befriend an unfortunate child. But as refreshing and -splendid as were these things, they were as naught compared -to the blessing that would be breathed upon his -head by a dying mother. Adam, lifting up his face -to the starlight, felt that all his intense and passionate -soul could only faintly divine what the agony of that -mother had been, what now would be her relief. She -knew. Her prayer had been answered. And Adam -pondered and pondered over the meaning of her prayer -and the significance of his wandering steps. He seemed -to feel the low beat of a mighty heart, the encompassing -embrace of a mighty and invisible spirit.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_309">309</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXIII">CHAPTER XXIII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Daylight</span> showed to Adam the cottonwood oasis -as he had it pictured in memory, except for the -palm-thatched hut.</p> - -<p>He was hard at camp duties when Genie came out. -The sun was rising, silver and ruddy and gold, and it -shone upon her, played around her glossy head as she -knelt on the grass beside the running water. While she -bathed there, splashing diamond drops of water in the -sunshine, she seemed all brightness and youth. But in -the merciless light of day her face was too small, too -thin, too pinched to have any comeliness. Her shining -hair caught all the beauty of the morning. In one light -it was auburn and in another a dark brown, and in any -light it had glints and gleams of gold. It waved and -curled rebelliously, a rich, thick, rippling mass falling -to her shoulders. When, presently, she came over to -Adam, to greet him and offer to help, then he had his -first look at her eyes by day. Gazing into them, Adam -hardly saw the small, unattractive, starved face. Like -her hair, her eyes shone dark brown, and the lighter -gleams were amber. The expression was of a straightforward -soul, unconscious of unutterable sadness, gazing -out at incomprehensible life, that should have been beautiful -for her, but was not.</p> - -<p>“Good morning, Genie,” said Adam, cheerily. “Of -course you can help me. There’s heaps of work. And -when you help me with that I’ll play with you.”</p> - -<p>“Play!” she murmured, dreamily. She had never had -a playmate.</p> - -<p>Thus began the business of the day for Adam. When -breakfast was over and done with he set to work to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_310">310</span> -improve that camp, and especially with an eye to the -comfort of the invalid. Adam knew the wonderful curative -qualities of desert air, if it was wholly trusted and -lived in. On the shady side of the hut he erected a wide -porch with palm-thatched roof that cut off the glare of -the sky. With his own canvases, and others he found -at the camp, he put up curtains that could be rolled up -or let down as occasion required. Then he constructed -two beds, one at each end of the porch, and instead of -palm leaves he used thick layers of fragrant sage and -greasewood. Mrs. Linwood, with the aid of Genie, -managed to get out to her new quarters. Her pleasure -at the change showed in her wan face. The porch was -shady, cool, fragrant. She could look right out upon the -clean, brown, beautiful streams where they met, and at -the camp fire where Adam and Genie would be engaged, -and at night she could see it blaze and glow, and burn -down red. The low-branching cottonwoods were full -of humming birds and singing birds, and always the -innumerable bees. The clean white sand, the mesquites -bursting into green, the nodding flowers in the grassy -nooks under the great iron-rusted stones, the rugged, upheaved -slope of mountain, and to the east an open vista -between the trees where the desert stretched away gray -and speckled and monotonous, down to the dim mountains -over which the sun would rise; these could not but be -pleasant and helpful. Love of life could not be separated -from such things.</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Linwood, sleeping outdoors is the most wonderful -experience,” said Adam, earnestly. “You feel the -night wind. The darkness folds around you. You look -up through the leaves to the dark-blue sky and shining -stars. You smell the dry sand and the fresh water and -the flowers and the spicy desert plants. Every breath -you draw is new, untainted. Living outdoors, by day -and night, is the secret of my strength.”</p> - -<p>“Alas! We always feared the chill night air,” sighed -Mrs. Linwood. “Life teaches so many lessons—too late.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_311">311</span> -“It is never too late,” returned Adam.</p> - -<p>Then he set himself to further tasks, and soon that day -was ended. Other days like it passed swiftly, and each -one brought more hope of prolonging Mrs. Linwood’s -life. Adam feared she could not live, yet he worked -and hoped for a miracle. Mrs. Linwood improved in -some mysterious way that seemed of spirit rather than -of flesh. As day after day went by and Adam talked with -her, an hour here, an hour there, she manifestly grew -stronger. But was it not only in mind? The sadness of -her changed. The unhappiness of her vanished. The -tragic cast and pallor of her face remained the same, -but the spirit that shone from her eyes and trembled in -her voice was one of love, gratitude, hope. Adam came -at length to understand that the improvement was only -a result of the inception of faith she had in him. With -terrible tenacity she had clung to life, even while starving -herself to give food to her child; and now that succor -had come, her spirit in its exaltation triumphed over her -body. Happiness was more powerful than the ravages -of disease. But if that condition, if that mastery of -mind over body, had continued, it would have been superhuman. -The day came at last in which Mrs. Linwood -sank back into the natural and inevitable state where the -fatality of life ordered the eminence of death.</p> - -<p>When she was convulsed with the spasms of coughing, -which grew worse every day, Adam felt that if he could -pray to the God she believed in, he would pray for her -sufferings to be ended. He hated this mystery of disease, -this cruelty of nature. It was one of the things that -operated against his acceptance of her God. Why was -life so cruel? Was life only nature? Nature was -indeed cruel. But if life was conflict, if life was an -endless progress toward unattainable perfection, toward -greater heights of mind and soul, then was life God, and -in eternal conflict with nature? How hopelessly and -impotently he pondered these distressing questions! Pain -he could endure himself, and he had divined that in<span class="pagenum" id="Page_312">312</span> -enduring it he had enlarged his character. But to suffer -as this poor woman was suffering—to be devoured by -millions of infinitesimal and rapacious animals feasting -on blood and tissue—how insupportably horrible! What -man could endure that—what man of huge frame and -physical might—of intense and pulsing life? Only a -man in whom intellect was supreme, who could look upon -life resignedly as not the ultimate end, who knew not the -delights of sensation, who had no absorbing passion for -the gray old desert or the heaving sea, or the windy -heights and the long purple shadows, who never burned -and beat with red blood running free—only a martyr -living for the future, or a man steeped in religion, could -endure this blight of consumption. When Adam considered -life in nature, he could understand this disease. -It was merely a matter of animals fighting to survive. -Let the fittest win! That was how nature worked toward -higher and stronger life. But when he tried to consider -the God this stricken woman worshiped, Adam could -not reconcile himself to her agony. Why? The eternal -Why was flung at him. She was a good woman. She -had lived a life of sacrifice. She had always been a -Christian. Yet she was not spared this horrible torture. -Why?</p> - -<p>What hurt Adam more than anything else was the terror -in Genie’s mute lips and the anguish in her speaking eyes.</p> - -<p>One day, during an hour when Mrs. Linwood rested -somewhat easily, she called Adam to her. It happened -to be while Genie was absent, listening to the bees or -watching the flow of water.</p> - -<p>“Will you stay here—take care of Genie—until her -uncle comes back?” queried the woman, with her low, -panting breaths.</p> - -<p>“I promised you. But I think you should not want me -to keep her here too long,” replied Adam, earnestly. -“Suppose he does not come back in a year or two?”</p> - -<p>“Ah! I hadn’t thought of that. What, then, is your -idea?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_313">313</span> -“Well, I’d wait here a good long time,” said Adam, -soberly. “Then if Genie’s uncle didn’t come, I’d find -a home for her.”</p> - -<p>“A home—for Genie!... Wansfell, have you considered? -That would take money—to travel—to buy Genie—what -she ought to—have.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I suppose so. That part need not worry you. -I have money. I’ll look out for Genie. I’ll find a home -for her.”</p> - -<p>“You’d do—all that?” whispered the woman.</p> - -<p>“I promise you. Now, Mrs. Linwood, please don’t -distress yourself. It’ll be all right.”</p> - -<p>“It <em>is</em> all right. I’m not—in distress,” she replied, with -something tremulous and new in her voice. “Oh, thank -God—my faith—never failed!”</p> - -<p>Adam was not sure what she meant by this, but as -he revolved it in his mind, hearing again the strange ring -of joy which had been in her voice, he began to feel that -somehow he represented a fulfillment and a reward to -her.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell—listen,” she whispered, with more force. -“I—I should have told you.... Genie is not poor. No!... -She’s rich!... Her father found gold—over in the -mountains.... He slaved at digging.... That killed -him. But he found gold. It’s hidden inside the hut—under -the floor—where I used to lie.... Bags of gold! -Wansfell, my child will be rich!”</p> - -<p>“Well!... Oh, but I’m glad!” exclaimed Adam.</p> - -<p>“Yes. It sustains me.... But I’ve worried so.... -My husband expected me—to take Genie out of the desert.... -I’ve worried about that money. Genie’s uncle—John -Shaver is his name—he’s a good man. He loved her. -He used to drink—but I hope the desert cured him of -that. I think—he’ll be a father to Genie.”</p> - -<p>“Does he know about the gold that will be Genie’s?”</p> - -<p>“No. We never told him. My husband didn’t trust -John—in money matters.... Wansfell, if you’ll say -you’ll go with Genie—when her uncle comes—and invest<span class="pagenum" id="Page_314">314</span> -the money—until she’s of age—I will have no other prayer -except for her happiness.... I will die in peace.”</p> - -<p>“I promise. I’ll do my best,” he declared.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The next time she spoke to him was that evening at -dusk. Frogs were trilling, and a belated mocking bird -was singing low, full-throated melodies. Yet these beautiful -sounds only accentuated the solemn desert stillness.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell—you remember—once we talked of God,” -she said, very low.</p> - -<p>“Yes, I remember,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Are you just where you were—then?”</p> - -<p>“About the same, I guess.”</p> - -<p>“Are you sure you understand yourself?”</p> - -<p>“Sure? Oh no. I change every day.”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, what do you call the thing in you—the will -to tarry here? The manhood that I trusted?... The -forgetfulness of self?... What do you call this strength -of yours that fulfilled my faith—that gave me to God -utterly—that enables me to die happy—that will be the -salvation of my child?”</p> - -<p>“Manhood? Strength?” echoed Adam, in troubled perplexity. -“I’m just sorry for you—for the little girl.”</p> - -<p>“Ah yes, sorry! Indeed you are! But you don’t know -yourself.... Wansfell, there was a presence beside my -bed—just a moment before I called you. Something -neither light nor shadow in substance—something neither -life nor death.... It is gone now. But when I am -dead it will come to you. <em>I</em> will come to you—like that.... -Somewhere out in the solitude and loneliness of -your desert—at night when it is dark and still—and the -heavens look down—there you will face your soul.... -You’ll see the divine in man.... You’ll realize that the -individual dies, but the race lives.... You’ll have -thundered at you from the silence, the vast, lonely land -you love, from the stars and the infinite beyond—that your -soul is immortal.... That this <em>Thing</em> in you is God!”</p> - -<p>When the voice ceased, so vibrant and full at the close,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_315">315</span> -so more than physical, Adam bowed his head and plodded -over the soft sand out to the open desert where mustering -shadows inclosed him, and he toiled to and fro in the -silence—a man bent under the Atlantean doubt and agony -and mystery of the world.</p> - -<p>The next day Genie’s mother died.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Long before sunrise of a later day Adam climbed to -the first bulge of the mountain wall. On lofty heights -his mind worked more slowly—sometimes not at all. -The eye of an eagle sufficed him. Down below, on the -level, during these last few days, while Genie sat mute, -rigid, stricken, Adam had been distracted. The greatest -problem of his desert experience confronted him. Always -a greater problem—always a greater ordeal—that was -his history of the years. Perhaps on the heights might -come inspiration. The eastern sky was rosy. The desert -glowed soft and gray and beautiful. Gray lanes wound -immeasurably among bronze and green spots, like islands -in a monotonous sea. The long range of the Bernardinos -was veiled in the rare lilac haze of the dawn, and the -opposite range speared the deep blue of sky with clear -black-fringed and snowy peaks. Far down the vast valley, -over the dim ridge of the Chocolates, there concentrated -a bright rose and yellow and silver. This marvelous light -intensified, while below the wondrous shadows deepened. -Then the sun rose like liquid silver, bursting to flood -the desert world.</p> - -<p>The sunrise solved Adam’s problem. His kindness, his -pity, his patience and unswerving interest, his argument -and reason and entreaty, had all failed to stir Genie out -of her mute misery. Nothing spiritual could save her. -But Genie had another mother—nature—to whom Adam -meant to appeal as a last hope.</p> - -<p>He descended the slope to the oasis. There, near a -new-made grave that ran parallel with an old one, mossy -and gray, sat Genie, clamped in her wretchedness.</p> - -<p>“Genie,” he called, sharply, intending to startle her.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_316">316</span> -He did startle her. “I’m getting sick. I don’t have -exercise enough. I used to walk miles every day. I -must begin again.”</p> - -<p>“Then go,” she replied.</p> - -<p>“But I can’t leave you alone here,” he protested. “Some -other bad men might come. I’m sorry. You <em>must</em> come -with me.”</p> - -<p>At least she was obedient. Heavily she rose, ready to -accompany him, a thin shadow of a girl, hallowed eyed -and wan, failing every hour. Adam offered his hand -at the stream to help her across. But for that she would -have fallen. She left her hand in his. And they set -out upon the strangest walk Adam had ever undertaken. -It was not long, and before it ended he had to drag her, -and finally carry her. That evening she was so exhausted -she could not repel the food he gave her, and afterward -she soon fell asleep.</p> - -<p>Next day he took her out again, and thereafter every -morning and every afternoon, relentless in his determination, -though his cruelty wrung his heart. Gentle and -kind as he was, he yet saw that she fell into the stream, -that she pricked her bare feet on cactus, that she grew -frightened on the steep slopes, that she walked farther -and harder every day. Nature was as relentless as Adam. -Soon Genie’s insensibility to pain and hunger was as if it -had never been. Whenever she pricked or bruised the -poor little feet Adam always claimed it an accident; and -whenever her starved little body cried out in hunger he -fed her. Thus by action, and the forcing of her senses, -which were involuntary, he turned her mind from her -black despair. This took days and weeks. Many and -many a time Adam’s heart misgave him, but just as often -something else in him remained implacable. He had seen -the training of Indian children. He knew how the mother -fox always threw from her litter the black cub that was -repugnant to her. The poor little black offspring was -an outcast. He was soon weaned, and kicked out of -the nest to die or survive. But if he did survive the cruel,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_317">317</span> -harsh bitterness of strife and heat and thirst and starvation—his -contact with his environment—he would grow -superior to all the carefully mothered and nourished cubs. -Adam expected this singular law of nature, as regarded -action and contact and suffering, to be Genie’s salvation, -provided it did not kill her; and if she had to -die he considered it better for her to die of travail, -of effort beyond her strength, than of a miserable pining -away.</p> - -<p>One morning, as he finished his camp tasks, he missed -her. Upon searching, he found her flat on the grassy -bank of the stream, face downward, with her thin brown -feet in the air. He wondered what she could be doing, -and his heart sank, for she had often said it would be -so easy and sweet to lie down and sleep in the water.</p> - -<p>“Genie, child, what are you doing?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Look! the bees—the honey bees! They’re washing -themselves in the water. First I thought they were drinking. -But no!... They’re washing. It’s so funny.”</p> - -<p>When she looked up, Adam thrilled at sight of her -eyes. If they had always been beautiful in shape and -color, what were they now, with youth returned, and a -light of the birth of wonder and joy in life? Youth -had won over tragedy. Nature hid deep at the heart of -all creation. The moment also had a birth for Adam—an -exquisite birth of the first really happy moment of his -long desert years.</p> - -<p>“Let me see,” he said, and he lowered his ponderous -length and stretched it beside her on the grassy bank. -“Genie, you’re right about the bees being funny, but -wrong about what they’re doing. They are diluting their -honey. Well, I’m not sure, but I think bees on the desert -dilute their honey with water. Watch!... Maybe they -drink at the same time. But you see—some of them have -their heads turned away from the water, as if they meant -to back down.... Bees are hard to understand.”</p> - -<p>“By the great horn spoon!” ejaculated Genie, and then -she laughed.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_318">318</span> -Adam echoed her laugh. He could have shouted or -sung to the skies. Never before, indeed, had he heard -Genie use such an expression, but the content of it was -precious to him. It revealed hitherto unsuspected depths -in her, as the interest in bees hinted of an undeveloped -love of nature.</p> - -<p>“Genie, do you care about bees, birds, flowers—what -they do—how they live and grow?”</p> - -<p>“Love them,” she answered, simply.</p> - -<p>“You do! Ah, that’s fine! So do I. Why, Genie, -I’ve lived so long on the desert, so many years! What -would I have done without love of everything that flies -and crawls and grows?”</p> - -<p>“You’re not old,” she said.</p> - -<p>“It’s good you think that. We’ll be great pards now.... -Look, Genie! Look at that humming bird! There, -he darts over the water. Well! What’s he doing?”</p> - -<p>Adam’s quick ear had caught the metallic hum of tiny, -swift wings. Then he had seen a humming bird poised -over the water. As he called Genie’s attention it hummed -away. Then, swift as a glancing ray, it returned. Adam -could see the blur of its almost invisible wings. As it -quivered there, golden throat shining like live fire, with -bronze and green and amber tints so vivid in the sunlight, -it surely was worthy reason for a worship of nature. -Not only had it beauty, but it had singular action. It -poised, then darted down, swift as light, to disturb the -smooth water, either with piercing bill or flying wings. -Time and again the tiny bird performed this antic. Was -the diminutive-winged creature playing, or drinking, or -performing gyrations for the edification of a female of -his species, hidden somewhere in the overhanging foliage? -Adam knew that some courting male birds cooed, paraded, -strutted, fought before the females they hoped to make -consorts. Why not a humming bird?</p> - -<p>“By your great horn spoon, Genie!” exclaimed Adam. -“I wonder if that’s the way he drinks.”</p> - -<p>But all that Adam could be sure of was the beautiful<span class="pagenum" id="Page_319">319</span> -opal body of the tiny bird, the marvelous poise as it hung -suspended in air, the incredibly swift darts up and down, -and the little widening, circling ripples on the water. No, -there was more Adam could be sure of, and Genie’s -delight proved the truth of it—and that was how sure -the harvest of thought, how sure the joy of life which -was the reward for watching!</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>One morning when Adam arose to greet the sunrise -he looked through the gap between the trees, and low -down along the desert floor he saw a burst of yellow. -At first he imagined it to be a freak of sunlight or -reflection, but he soon decided that it was a <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">palo verde</i> -in blossom. Beautiful, vivid, yellow gold, a fresh hue -of the desert spring. May had come. Adam had forgotten -the flight of time. What bittersweet stinging memory -had that flushing <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">palo verde</i> brought back to him! -He had returned to the desert land he loved best, and -which haunted him.</p> - -<p>Genie responded slowly to the Spartan training. She -had been frail, at best, and when grief clamped her soul -and body she had sunk to the verge. The effort she was -driven to, and the exertion needful, wore her down until -she appeared merely skin and bones. Then came the -dividing line between waste and repair. She began to -mend. Little by little her appetite improved until at last -hunger seized upon her. From that time she grew like -a weed. Thus the forced use of bone and muscle drove -her blood as Adam had driven her, and the result was -a natural functioning of physical life. Hard upon that -change, and equally as natural, came the quickening of -her mind. Healthy pulsing blood did not harbor morbid -grief. Action was constructive; grief was destructive.</p> - -<p>Adam, giving himself wholly to this task of rehabilitation, -added to his relentless developing of Genie’s body a -thoughtful and interesting appeal to her mind. At once -he made two discoveries—first, that Genie would give -herself absorbingly to any story whatsoever, and secondly,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_320">320</span> -that his mind seemed to be a full treasure house -from which to draw. He who had spoken with so few -men and women on the desert now was inspired by a -child.</p> - -<p>He told Genie the beautiful Indian legend of Taquitch -as it had been told to him by Oella, the Coahuila maiden -who had taught him her language.</p> - -<p>When he finished Genie cried out: “Oh, I know. Taquitch -is up on the mountain yet! In summer he hurls -the lightning and thunder. In winter he lets loose the -storm winds. And always, by day and night, he rolls -the rocks.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, Genie, he’s there,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Why did he steal the Indian maidens?” she asked, -wonderingly.</p> - -<p>Genie evolved a question now and then that Adam found -difficult to answer. She had the simplicity of an Indian, -and the inevitableness, and a like ignorance of the so-called -civilization of the white people.</p> - -<p>“Well, I suppose Taquitch fell in love with the Indian -maidens,” replied Adam, slowly.</p> - -<p>“Fell in love. What’s that?”</p> - -<p>“Didn’t your mother ever tell you why she married -your father?”</p> - -<p>“No.”</p> - -<p>“Why do you think she married him?”</p> - -<p>“I suppose they wanted to be together—to work—and -go places, like they came West when they were sick. -To help each other.”</p> - -<p>“Exactly. Well, Genie, they wanted to be together -because they loved each other. They married because -they fell in love with each other. Didn’t you ever have -Indians camp here, and learn from them?”</p> - -<p>“Oh yes, different tribes have been here. But I didn’t -see any Indians falling in love. If a chief wanted a -wife he took any maiden or squaw he wanted. Some -chiefs had lots of wives. And if a brave wanted a wife -he bought her.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_321">321</span> -“Not much falling in love there,” confessed Adam, with -a laugh. “But, Genie, you mustn’t think Indians can’t -love each other. For they can.”</p> - -<p>“I believe I’ve seen birds falling in love,” went on -Genie, seriously. “I’ve watched them when they come -to drink and wash. Quail and road runners, now—they -often come in pairs, and they act funny. At least one -of each pair acted funny. But it was the pretty one—the -one with a topknot—that did all the falling in love. Why?”</p> - -<p>“Well, Genie, the male, or the man-bird, so to speak, -always has brighter colors and crests and the like, and -he—he sort of shines up to the other, the female, and -shows off before her.”</p> - -<p>“Why doesn’t she do the same thing?” queried Genie. -“That’s not fair. It’s all one-sided.”</p> - -<p>“Child, how you talk! Of course love isn’t one-sided,” -declared Adam, getting bewildered.</p> - -<p>“Yes, it is. She ought to show off before him. But -I’ll tell you what—after they began to build a nest I -never saw any more falling in love. It’s a shame. It -ought to last always. I’ve heard mother say things to -father I couldn’t understand. But now I believe she -meant that after he got her—married her—he wasn’t like -he was before.”</p> - -<p>Adam had to laugh. The old discontent of life, the -old mystery of the sexes, the old still, sad music of -humanity spoken by the innocent and unknowing lips -of this child! How feminine! The walls of the inclosing -desert, like those of an immense cloister, might hide a -woman all her days from the illuminating world, but they -could never change her nature.</p> - -<p>“Genie, I must be honest with you,” replied Adam. -“I’ve got to be parents, brother, sister, friend, everybody -to you. And I’ll fall short sometimes in spite of my -intentions. But I’ll be honest.... And the fact is, it -seems to be a sad truth that men and man-birds, and -man-creatures generally, are all very much alike. If they -want anything, they want it badly. And when they fall<span class="pagenum" id="Page_322">322</span> -in love they do act funny. They will do anything. They -show off, beg, bully, quarrel, are as nice and sweet as—as -sugar; and they’ll fight, too, until they get their particular -wives. Then they become natural—like they were -before. It’s my idea, Genie, that all the wives of creation -should demand always the same deportment which won -their love. Don’t you agree with me?”</p> - -<p>“I do, you bet. That’s what <em>I’ll</em> have.... But will <em>I</em> -ever be falling in love?”</p> - -<p>The eyes that looked into Adam’s then were to him -as the wonder of the world.</p> - -<p>“Of course you will. Some day, when you grow up.”</p> - -<p>“With you?” she asked, in dreamy speculation.</p> - -<p>“Oh, Genie! Not me. Why—I—I’m too old!” he -ejaculated. “I’m old enough to be your daddy.”</p> - -<p>“You’re not old,” she replied, with a finality that admitted -of no question. “But if you were—and still like -you are—what difference would it make?”</p> - -<p>“Like I am! Well, Genie, how’s that?” he queried, -curiously.</p> - -<p>“Oh, so big and strong! You can do so much with -those hands. And your voice sort of—of quiets something -inside me. When I lie down to sleep, knowing -you’re there under the cottonwood, I’m not afraid of the -dark.... And your eyes are just like an eagle’s. Oh, -you needn’t laugh! I’ve seen eagles. An Indian here -once had two. I used to love to watch them look. But -then their eyes were never kind like yours.... I think -when I get big I’ll go falling in love with you.”</p> - -<p>“Well, little girl, that’s a long way off,” said Adam, -divided between humor and pathos. “But let’s get back -to natural history. A while ago you mentioned a bird -called a road runner. That’s not as well-known a name -among desert men as chaparral cock. You know out in -the desert there are no roads. This name road runner -comes from a habit—and it’s a friendly habit—of the -bird running along the road ahead of a man or wagon. -Now the road runner is the most wonderful bird of the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_323">323</span> -desert. That is saying a great deal. Genie, tell me all -you know about him.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, I know all about him,” declared Genie, brightly. -“There’s one lives in the mesquite there. I see him every -day, lots of times. Before you came he was very tame. -I guess now he’s afraid. But not so afraid as he was.... -Well, he’s a long bird, with several very long -feathers for a tail. It’s a funny tail, for when he walks -he bobs it up and down. His color is speckled—gray and -brown and white. I’ve seen dots of purple on him, too. -He has a topknot that he can put up and lay down, as -he has a mind to. When it’s up it shows some gold -color, almost red underneath. And when it’s up he’s mad. -He snaps his big bill like—like—oh, I don’t know what -like, but it makes you shiver. I’ve never seen him in -the water, but I know he goes in, because he shakes out -his feathers, picks himself, and sits in the sun. He can -fly, only he doesn’t fly much. But, oh, how he can run! -Like a streak! I see him chase lizards across the sand. -You know how a lizard can run! Well, no lizard ever -gets away from a road runner. There’s a race—a fierce -little tussle in the sand—a snap! snap!—and then old -killer road runner walks proudly back, carrying the lizard -in his bill. If it wasn’t for the way he kills and struts -I could love him. For he was very tame. He used to -come right up to me. But I never cared for him as I -do for other birds.”</p> - -<p>“Genie, you’ve watched a road runner, all right. I -didn’t imagine you knew so much. Yes, he’s a killer, a -murderer. But no worse than other desert birds. They -all kill. They’re all fierce. And if they weren’t they’d -die.... Now I want to tell you the most wonderful -thing a road runner does. He’ll fight and kill and eat -a rattlesnake!”</p> - -<p>“No! Honest Injun?” cried Genie.</p> - -<p>“Yes. I’ve watched many a battle between a road runner -and a rattlesnake, and nearly all of those battles were -won by the birds. But <em>that</em> is not the most wonderful<span class="pagenum" id="Page_324">324</span> -thing a road runner does. I’ll tell you. I’ve never seen -this thing myself, but a friend of mine, an old prospector -named Dismukes, swears it’s true. He knows more about -the desert than any man I ever met, and he wouldn’t tell -a lie. Well, here’s what it is. He says he saw a road -runner come upon a sleeping rattlesnake. But he didn’t -pounce upon the snake. It happened to be that the snake -slept on the sand near some bushes of <i>cholla</i> cactus. You -know how the dead cones fall off and lie around. This -wonderful bird dragged these loose pieces of cactus and -laid them close together in a circle, all around the rattlesnake. -Built a fence around him! Penned him in! Now -I can vouch for how a rattlesnake hates cactus.... Then -the fierce bird flew up and pounced down upon the snake. -Woke him up! The rattlesnake tried to slip away, but -everywhere he turned was a cactus which stuck into -him, and over him the darting, picking bird. So round -and round he went, striking as best he could. But he -was unable to hit the bird, and every pounce upon him -drew the blood. You’ve heard the snap of that big long -beak. Well, the rattlesnake grew desperate and began -to bite himself. And what with his own bites and those -of his enemy he was soon dead.... And then the beautiful, -graceful, speckled bird proceeded to tear and devour -him.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll bet it’s true!” ejaculated Genie. “A road runner -could and would do just that.”</p> - -<p>“Very likely. It’s strange, and perhaps true. Indeed, -the desert is the place for things impossible anywhere -else.”</p> - -<p>“Why do birds and beasts kill and eat each other?” -asked Genie.</p> - -<p>“It is nature, Genie.”</p> - -<p>“Nature could have done better. Why don’t people -eat each other? They do <em>kill</em> each other. And they eat -animals. But isn’t that all?”</p> - -<p>“Genie, some kinds of people—cannibals in the South -Seas—and savages—do kill and eat men. It is horrible<span class="pagenum" id="Page_325">325</span> -to believe. Dismukes told me that he came upon a tribe -of Indians on the west coast of Sonora in Mexico. That’s -not more than four hundred miles from here. He went -down there prospecting for gold. He thought these -savages—the Seri Indians, they’re called—were descended -from cannibals and sometimes ate man flesh themselves. -No one knows but that they do it often. I’ve met prospectors -and travelers who scouted the idea of the Seris -being cannibals. But I’ve heard some bad stories about -them. Dismukes absolutely believed that in a poor season -for meat, if chance offered, they would kill and eat a -white man. Prospectors have gone into that country -never to return.”</p> - -<p>“Ughh! I’ve near starved, but I’d never get that -hungry. I’d die. Wouldn’t you?”</p> - -<p>“Indeed I would, child.”</p> - -<p>And so, during the leisure hours, that grew more and -longer as the hot summer season advanced, Adam led -Genie nearer to nature, always striving with his observations -to teach the truth, however stern, and to instruct -and stimulate her growing mind. All was not music of -birds and perfume of flowers and serene summer content -at the rosy dawns and the golden sunsets. The desert -life was at work. How hard to reconcile the killing -with the living! But when Adam espied an eagle swooping -down from the mountain heights, its wings bowed, -and its dark body shooting so wondrously, then he spoke -of the freedom of the lonely king of birds, and the grace -of his flight, and the noble spirit of his life.</p> - -<p>Likewise when Adam heard the honk of wild geese he -made haste to have Genie see them winging wide and -triangular flight across the blue sky, to the north. He -told her how they lived all the winter in the warm south, -and when spring came a wonderful instinct bade them -rise and fly far northward, to the reedy banks of some -lonely lake, and there gobble and honk and feed and -raise their young.</p> - -<p>On another day, and this was in drowsy June when<span class="pagenum" id="Page_326">326</span> -all the air seemed still, he was roused from his siesta by -cries of delight from Genie. She knelt before him on -the sand, and in one hand she held a beautiful horned toad, -and the other hand she stretched out to Adam.</p> - -<p>“Look! Oh, look!” she cried, ecstatically, and her eyes -then rivaled the jeweled eyes of the desert reptile. Some -dark-red drops of bright liquid showed against the brown -of Genie’s hand. “There! It’s blood! I picked him up -as I had all the others, so many hundreds of times. Only -this time I felt something warm and wet. I looked at -my hand. There! He had squirted the drops of blood! -And, oh, I was quick to look at his eyes! One was still -wet, bloody. I know he squirted the drops of blood from -his eyes!”</p> - -<p>Thus Adam had confirmed for him one of the mysteries -of the desert. Dismukes had been the first to tell Adam -about the strange habit of horned toads ejecting blood -from their eyes. One other desert man, at least, had -corroborated Dismukes. But Adam, who had seldom -passed a horned toad without picking it up to gaze at -the wondrous coloration, and to see it swell and puff, had -never come upon the peculiar phenomenon. And horned -toads on his trails had been many. To interest Genie, -he built her a corral of flat stones in the sand, and he -scoured the surrounding desert for horned toads. What -a miscellaneous collection he gathered! They all had the -same general scalloped outlines and tiny horns, but the -color and design seemed to partake of the physical characteristics -of the spot where each was found. If they -squatted in the sand and lay still, it was almost impossible -to see them, so remarkable was their protective coloration. -Adam turned the assortment over to Genie with instruction -to feed them, and play with them, and tease them -in the hope that one might sometime eject drops of blood -from his eyes. When it actually happened, Genie’s -patience was rewarded.</p> - -<p>Adam’s theory that the reward of the faithful desert -watcher would always come was exemplified in more than<span class="pagenum" id="Page_327">327</span> -one way. Genie had never seen or heard of a tarantula -wasp. She had noticed big and little tarantulas, but of -the fierce, winged, dragon-fly hawk of the desert—the -tarantula wasp—she had no knowledge. Adam, therefore, -had always kept a keen lookout for one.</p> - -<p>They were up in the canyon on a hot June day, resting -in the shade of the rustling palms. A stream babbled -and splashed over the stones, and that was the only sound -to break the dreaming silence of the canyon. All at once -Adam heard a low whir like the hum of tiny wings. As -he turned his head the sound became a buzz. Then he -espied a huge tarantula wasp. Quickly he called to Genie, -and they watched. It flew around and around about a -foot from the ground, a fierce-looking, yet beautiful -creature, with yellow body and blue gauzy wings. It was -fully two inches and more long.</p> - -<p>“He sees a tarantula. Now watch!” whispered Adam.</p> - -<p>Suddenly the wasp darted down to the edge of a low -bush, into some coarse grass that grew there. Instantly -came a fierce whiz of wings, like the buzz of a captured -bumblebee, only much louder and more vibrant. Adam -saw the blades of grass tumble. A struggle to the death -was going on there. Adam crawled over a few yards, -drawing Genie with him; and they saw the finish of a -terrific battle between the wasp and a big hairy tarantula.</p> - -<p>“There! It’s over, and the tarantula is dead,” said -Adam. “Genie, I used to watch this kind of a desert -fight, and not think much more about it. But one day -I made a discovery. I had a camp over here, and I watched -a tarantula wasp kill a tarantula. I didn’t know it then, -but this wasp was a female, ready to lay her eggs. Well, -she rolled the big spider around until she found a place -that suited her. Then she dug a hole, rolled him into it, -covered him over, and flew away. I wondered then why -she did that. I went away from that camp, and after a -while I came back. Then one day I remembered about -the wasp burying the tarantula. And so, just for fun -and curiosity, I found the grave—it was near the end of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_328">328</span> -a stone—and I opened it up. What do you think I -discovered?”</p> - -<p>“Tell me!” exclaimed Genie, breathlessly.</p> - -<p>“I found the tarantula almost eaten up by a lot of -tiny wasps, as much like worms as wasps! Then I understood. -That tarantula wasp had killed the tarantula, laid -her eggs inside his body, tumbled him into his grave, and -covered him over. By and by those eggs hatched, and -the little wasps ate the tarantula—lived and grew, and -after a while came out full-fledged tarantula wasps like -their mother.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_329">329</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXIV">CHAPTER XXIV</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Time</span> passed. The days slipped by to make weeks, -and weeks merged into months. Summer with its -hot midday hours, when man and beast rested or slept, -seemed to shorten its season by half. No human creature -ever entered a desert oasis without joy, nor left it without -regret. As time went fleeting by Adam now and then -remembered Dismukes, and these memories were full of -both gladness and pathos. He tried to visualize the old -prospector in the new role of traveler, absorber of life, -spendthrift, and idler. Nevertheless, Adam could never -be sure in his heart that Dismukes would find what he -sought.</p> - -<p>But for the most part of the still, hot, waking hours, -Adam, when he was not working or sleeping, devoted -himself to Genie. The girl changed every day—how, he -was unable to tell. Most wondrous of all in nature was -human life, and beyond all sublimity was the human -soul!</p> - -<p>Every morning at sunrise Genie knelt by her mother’s -grave with bowed head and clasped hands, and every -evening at sunset or in the golden dusk of twilight she -again knelt in prayer.</p> - -<p>“Genie, why do you kneel there—now?” asked Adam -once, unable to contain his curiosity. “You did not use to -do it. Only the last few weeks or month.”</p> - -<p>“I forgot I’d promised mother,” she replied. “Besides, -could I pray when I wanted to die?”</p> - -<p>“No, I suppose not. It would be hard,” replied Adam, -gravely. “Please don’t think me curious. Tell me, Genie, -what do you pray for?”</p> - -<p>“I used to pray, ‘Now I lay me down to sleep,’ as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_330">330</span> -mother taught me when I was little. But now I make -up my own prayers. I ask God to keep the souls of -mother and father in heaven. I pray I may be good and -happy, so when they look down and see me they will be -glad. I pray for you, and then for every one in the -world.”</p> - -<p>Slow, strong unrest, the endless moving of contending -tides, heaved in Adam’s breast.</p> - -<p>“So you pray for me, Genie?... Well, it is good -of you. I hope I’m worthy.... But, <em>why</em> do you -pray?”</p> - -<p>She pondered the question. Thought was developing -in Genie. “Before mother died I prayed because she -taught me. Since then—lately—it—it lifts me up—it -takes away the sorrow here.” And she put a hand over -her heart.</p> - -<p>“Genie, then you believe in God—the God who is supposed -to answer your prayers?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. And he is not a god like Taquitch—or the beasts -and rocks that the Indians worship. My God is all around -me, in the sunshine, in the air, in the humming bees and -whispering leaves and murmuring water. I feel him -everywhere, and in me, too!”</p> - -<p>“Genie, tell me one prayer, just <em>one</em> of yours or your -mother’s that was truly answered,” appealed Adam, with -earnest feeling.</p> - -<p>“We prayed for some one to come. I know mother -prayed for some one to save me from being alone—from -starving. And I prayed for some one to come and help -her—to relieve her terrible dread about me.... And -<em>you</em> came!”</p> - -<p>Adam was silenced. What had he to contend with here? -Faith and fact were beyond question, as Genie represented -them. What little he knew! He could not even believe -that a divine guidance had been the spirit of his wandering -steps. But he was changing. Always the future—always -the unknown calling—always the presentiment of sterner -struggle, of larger growth, of ultimate fulfillment! His<span class="pagenum" id="Page_331">331</span> -illusion, his fetish, his phantasmagoria rivaled the eternal -and inexplicable faith of his friend Dismukes.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Andreas Canyon was far from the camp under the -cottonwoods, but Adam and Genie, having once feasted -their eyes upon its wildness and beauty and grandeur, -went back again and again, so that presently the distance -in the hot sun was no hindrance, and the wide area of -white, glistening, terrible <i>cholla</i> cactus was no obstacle.</p> - -<p>For that matter the cactus patch was endurable because -of its singular beauty. Adam could not have told why -<i>cholla</i> fascinated him, and, though Genie admitted she -liked to look at the frosty silver-lighted cones and always -had an impulse to prick her fingers on the cruel thorns, -she could not explain why.</p> - -<p>“Genie, the Yaqui Indians in Sonora love this <i>cholla</i>,” -said Adam. “Love it as they hate Mexicans. They will -strip a Mexican naked, tear the skin off the soles of his -feet, and drive him through the <i>cholla</i> until he’s dead. It -wouldn’t take long!... All prospectors hate <i>cholla</i>. I -hate it, yet I—I guess I’m a little like the Yaquis. I -often prick my finger on <i>cholla</i> just to feel the sting, the -burn, the throb. The only pain I could ever compare to -that made by <i>cholla</i> is the sting of the sharp horn of a -little catfish back in Ohio. Oh! I’ll never forget that! -A poison, burning sting!... But <i>cholla</i> is terrible because -the thorns stick in your flesh. When you jerk to free -yourself the thorns leave the cones. Each thorn has an -invisible barb and it works deeper and deeper into flesh.”</p> - -<p>“Don’t <em>I</em> know!” exclaimed Genie, emphatically. “I’ve -spent whole hours digging them out of my feet and legs. -But how pretty the <i>cholla</i> shines! Only it doesn’t tell -the truth, does it, Wanny?”</p> - -<p>“Child, please don’t call me Wanny. It’s so—so silly,” -protested Adam.</p> - -<p>“It’s not. No sillier than your calling me child! I’m -nearly fifteen. I’m growing right out of my clothes.”</p> - -<p>“Call me Adam.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_332">332</span> -“No, I don’t like that name. And I can’t call you -mister or father or brother.”</p> - -<p>“But what’s wrong with Adam?”</p> - -<p>“I read in mother’s bible about Adam and Eve. I -hated her when the devil got into her. And I didn’t like -Adam. And I don’t like the <em>name</em> Adam. You’d never -have been driven from heaven.”</p> - -<p>“I’m not so sure about that,” said Adam, ruefully. -“Genie, I was wicked when I was a—a young man.”</p> - -<p>“You were! Well, I don’t care. <em>You’d</em> never be -tempted to disobey the Lord—not by Eve with all her -stolen apples!”</p> - -<p>“All right, called me Wanny,” returned Adam, and -he made haste to change the subject. There were times -when Genie, with her simplicity, her directness, her curiosity, -and her innocence, caused Adam extreme perplexity, -not to say embarrassment. He remembered his own bringing -up. It seemed every year his childhood days came -back closer. And thrown as he was in constant companionship -with this child of nature, he began to wonder -if the sophisticated education of children, especially girls, -as it had been in his youth, was as fine and simple and -true to life as it might have been.</p> - -<p>Andreas Canyon yawned with wide mouth and huge -yellow cliffs. Just beyond the mouth of the canyon and -across the wide space from cliff to slope bloomed the -most verdant and beautiful oasis of that desert region. -Huge gray bowlders, clean and old, and russet with lichen, -made barricade for a clear stream of green water, as if -to protect it from blowing desert sand. Yet there were -little beaches of white sand, lined by colored pebbles. -Green rushes and flags grew in the water. Beyond the -stream, on the side of the flat-rocked slope, lay a many-acred -thicket of mesquite, impenetrable except for birds -and beasts. The green of the leaves seemed dominated by -bronze colors of the mistletoe.</p> - -<p>The oasis proper, however, was the grove of cottonwoods, -sycamores, and palms. How bright green the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_333">333</span> -foliage of cottonwoods—and smooth white the bark of -sycamores! But verdant and cool as it was under their -shade, Adam and Genie always sought the aloof and -stately palms, wonderful trees not native there, planted -years and years before by the Spanish padres.</p> - -<p>“Oh, I love it here!” exclaimed Genie. “Listen to the -palms whisper!”</p> - -<p>They stood loftily, with spreading green fanlike leaves -at the tops, and all the trunks swathed and bundled -apparently in huge cases of straw. These yellow sheaths -were no less than the leaves that had died. As the palms -grew the new leaves kept bursting from the tufted tops, -and those leaves lowest down died and turned yellow.</p> - -<p>“Genie, your uncle seems a long time coming back for -you,” remarked Adam.</p> - -<p>“I hope he never comes,” she replied.</p> - -<p>Adam was surprised and somewhat disconcerted at her -reply, and yet strangely pleased.</p> - -<p>“Why?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Oh, I never liked him and I don’t want to go away -with him.”</p> - -<p>“Your mother said he was a good man—that he loved -you.”</p> - -<p>“Uncle Ed was good, and very kind to me. I—I -ought to be ashamed,” replied Genie. “But he drank, -and when he drank he kissed me—he put his hands on -me. I hated that.”</p> - -<p>“Did you ever tell your mother?” inquired Adam.</p> - -<p>“Yes. I told her. I asked her why he did that. And -she said not to mind—only to keep away from him when -he drank.”</p> - -<p>“Genie, your uncle did wrong, and your mother did -wrong not to tell you so,” declared Adam, earnestly.</p> - -<p>“Wrong? What do you mean—wrong? I only thought -I didn’t like him.”</p> - -<p>“Well, I’ll tell you some day.... But now, to go -back to what you said about leaving—you know I’m going -with you when your uncle comes.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_334">334</span> -“Wanny, do <em>you</em> want that time to come soon?” she -asked, wistfully.</p> - -<p>“Yes, of course, for your sake. You’re getting to be -a big girl. You must go to school. You must get out -to civilization.”</p> - -<p>“Oh! I’m crazy to go!” she burst out, covering her -face. “Yet I’ve a feeling I’ll hate to leave here.... -I’ve been so happy lately.”</p> - -<p>“Genie, it relieves me to hear you’re anxious to go. -And it pleases me to know you’ve been happy lately. -You see I’m only a—a man, you know. How little I -could do for you! I’ve tried. I’ve done my best. But -at that best I’m only a poor old homeless outcast—a -desert wanderer! <span class="locked">I’m——”</span></p> - -<p>“Hush up!” she cried, with quick, sweet warmth. -Swiftly she enveloped him, hugged him close, and kissed -his cheek. “Wanny, you’re grand!... You’re like -Taquitch—you’re <em>my</em> Taquitch with face like the sun! -And I love you—love you as I never loved anyone except -my mother! And I hope Uncle Ed never comes, so -you’ll have to take care of me always.”</p> - -<p>Adam gently disengaged himself from Genie’s impulsive -arms, yet, despite his embarrassment and confused sense -of helplessness, he felt the better for her action. Natural, -spontaneous, sincere, it warmed his heart. It proved more -than all else what a child she was.</p> - -<p>“Genie, let me make sure you understand,” he said, -gravely. “I love you, too, as if you were my little sister. -And if your uncle doesn’t come I’ll take you somewhere—find -you a home. But I never—much as I would like -to—never can take care of you always.”</p> - -<p>“Why?” she flashed, with her terrible directness.</p> - -<p>Adam had begun his development of Genie by telling -the truth; he had always abided by it; and now, in these -awakening days for her, he must never veer from the -truth.</p> - -<p>“If I tell you why—will you promise never to speak of -it—so long as you live?” he asked, solemnly.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_335">335</span> -“Never! I promise. Never, Wanny!”</p> - -<p>“Genie, I am an outcast. I am a hunted man. I can -never go back to civilization and stay.”</p> - -<p>Then he told her the story of the ruin of his life. -When he finished she fell weeping upon his shoulder and -clung to him. For Adam the moment was sad and sweet—sad -because a few words had opened up the dark, -tragic gulf of his soul; and sweet because the passionate -grief of a child assured him that even he, wanderer as -he was, knew something of sympathy and love.</p> - -<p>“But, Wanny, you—could—go and—be—pun—ished—and -then—come back!” she cried, between sobs. “You’d—never—have to—hide—any -more.”</p> - -<p>Out of her innocence and simplicity she had spoken -confounding truth. What a terrible truth! Those words -of child wisdom sowed in Adam the seed of a terrible -revolt. Revolt—yea, revolt against this horrible need to -hide—this fear and dread of punishment that always and -forever so bitterly mocked his manhood! If he could find -the strength to rise to the heights of Genie’s wisdom—divine -philosophy of a child!—he would no longer hate -his shadowed wandering steps down the naked shingles -and hidden trails of the lonely desert. But, alas! whence -would come that strength? Not from the hills! Not -from the nature that had made him so strong, so fierce, -so sure to preserve his life! It could only come from the -spirit that had stood in the dusky twilight beside a dying -woman’s side. It could come only from the spirit to whom -a child prayed while kneeling at her mother’s grave. And -for Adam that spirit held aloof, illusive as the specters -of the dead, beyond his grasp, an invisible medium, if -indeed it was not a phantom, that seemed impossible of -reality in the face of the fierce, ruthless, inevitable life -and death and decay of the desert. Could God be nature—that -thing, that terrible force, light, fire, water, pulse—that -quickening of plant, flesh, stone, that dying of all -only to renew—that endless purpose and progress, from -the first whirling gas globe of the universe, throughout<span class="pagenum" id="Page_336">336</span> -the ages down to the infinitesimal earth so fixed in its -circling orbit, so pitiful in its present brief fertility? The -answer was as unattainable as to pluck down the stars, -as hopeless as to think of the fleeting of the years, as -mysterious as the truth of where man came from and -whence he was to go.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Snow on the gray old peak! It reminded Adam how, -long ago, from far down the valley, he had watched the -mountain crown itself in dazzling white. Snow on the -heights meant winter that tempered the heat, let loose -the storm winds; and therefore, down in the desert, comfort -and swiftly flying days. Indeed, so swift were they -that Adam, calling out sad and well-remembered words, -“Oh, time, stand still here!” seemed to look at a few more -golden sunsets and, lo! again it was spring. Time would -not stand still! Nor would the budding, blossoming -youth of Genie! Nor would the slow-mounting might of -the tumult in Adam’s soul!</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Then swifter than the past, another year flew by. -Genie’s uncle did not come. And Adam began to doubt -that he would ever come. And the hope of Genie’s, that -he never would come began insidiously to enter into -Adam’s thought. Again the loneliness, the solitude and -silence, and something more he could not name, began to -drag Adam from duty, from effort of mind. The desert -never stopped its work, on plant, or rock, or man. -Adam knew that he required another shock to quicken his -brain, to stir again the spiritual need, to make him fight -the subtle, all-pervading, ever-present influence of the -desert.</p> - -<p>In all that time Adam saw but two white men, prospectors -passing by down the sandy trails. Indians came that -way but seldom. Across the valley there was an encampment, -which he visited occasionally to buy baskets, skins, -meat, and to send Indians out after supplies. The great -problem was clothes for Genie. It was difficult to get materials,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_337">337</span> -difficult for Genie to make dresses, and impossible to -keep her from tearing or wearing or growing out of -them. Adam found that Indian moccasins, and tough -overalls such as prospectors wore, cut down to suit Genie, -and woolen blouses she made herself, were the only things -for her. Like a road runner she ran over the rocks and -sand! For Genie, cactus was as if it were not! As for -a hat, she would not wear one. Adam’s responsibility -weighed upon him. When he asked Genie what in the -world she would wear when he took her out of the desert, -to pass through villages and ranches and towns, where -people lived, she naïvely replied, “What I’ve got on!” -And what she wore at the moment was, of course, the -boyish garb that was all Adam could keep on her, and -which happened just then to be minus the moccasins. -Genie loved to scoop up the warm white sand with her -bare brown feet, and then to dabble them in the running -water.</p> - -<p>“Well, I give up!” exclaimed Adam, resignedly. “But -when we do get to Riverside or San Diego, where there’s -a store, you’ve <em>got</em> to go with me to buy girl’s dresses -and things—and you’ve <em>got</em> to wear them.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Wanny, that will be grand!” she cried, dazzled -at the prospect. “But—let’s don’t go—just yet!”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>In the early fall—what month it was Adam could not -be sure—he crossed the arm of the valley to the encampment -of the Coahuilas. The cool nights and tempering -days had made him hungry for meat. He found the -Indian hunters at home, and, in fact, they had just packed -fresh sheep meat down from the mountain. They were -of the same tribe as the old chief, Charley Jim, who had -taught Adam so much of the desert during those early -hard years over in the Chocolates. Adam always asked -for news of Charley Jim, usually to be disappointed. He -was a nomad, this old chieftain, and his family had his -wandering spirit. Adam shouldered his load of fresh -meat and took his way down out of the canyon where<span class="pagenum" id="Page_338">338</span> -the encampment lay, to the well-beaten trail that zigzagged -along the irregular base of the mountain.</p> - -<p>Adam rested at the dividing point of the trails. It -was early in the day, clear and still. How gray and barren -and monotonous the desert! All seemed dead. A strange, -soft, creeping apathy came over Adam, not a dreaminess, -for in his dreams he lived the past and invented the future, -but a state wherein he watched, listened, smelled, and -felt, all unconscious that he was doing anything. Whenever -he fell into this trance and was roused out of it, -or came out of it naturally, then he experienced a wonderful -sense of vague content. That feeling was evanescent. -Always he longed to get it back, but could not.</p> - -<p>In this instant his quick eye caught sight of something -that was moving. A prospector with a brace of burros—common -sight indeed it was to Adam, though not for -the last few years.</p> - -<p>The man was coming from the south, but outside of -the main trail, for which, no doubt, he was heading. -Adam decided to wait and exchange greetings with him. -After watching awhile Adam was constrained to mutter, -“Well, if that fellow isn’t a great walker, my eyes are -failing!” That interested him all the more. He watched -burros and driver grow larger and clearer. Then they -disappeared behind a long, low swell of sand fringed -by sage and dotted by mesquite. They would reappear -presently, coming out behind the ridge at a point near -Adam.</p> - -<p>Some minutes later he saw that the burros and driver -had not only cleared the end of the ridge, but were now -within a hundred yards of where he sat. The burros -were trotting, with packs bobbing up and down. Only -the old slouch hat of the prospector showed above the -packs. Manifestly he was a short man.</p> - -<p>“Say, but he’s a walker!” ejaculated Adam.</p> - -<p>Suddenly sight of that old slouch hat gave Adam a -thrill. Then the man’s shoulders appeared. How enormously -broad! Then, as the burros veered to one side,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_339">339</span> -the driver’s whole stature was disclosed. What a stride -he had, for a man so short! Almost he seemed as wide as -he was long. His gait was rolling, ponderous. He wore -old, gray, patched clothes that Adam wildly imagined -he had seen somewhere.</p> - -<p>Suddenly he yelled at the burros: “Hehaw! Gedap!”</p> - -<p>That deep voice, those words, brought Adam leaping -to his feet, transfixed and thrilling. Had he lost his -mind? What trick of desert mirage or illusion! No—the -burros were real—they kicked up the dust—rattled the -pebbles in the sage; no—the man was real, however he -seemed a ghost of Adam’s past.</p> - -<p>“<em>Dismukes!</em>” shouted Adam, hoarsely.</p> - -<p>The prospector halted his long, rolling stride and looked. -Then Adam plunged over sand and through sage. He -could not believe his eyes. He must get his hands on -this man, to prove reality. In a trice the intervening -space was covered. Then Adam, breathless and aghast, -gazed into a face that he knew, yet which held what he -did not know.</p> - -<p>“Howdy, Wansfell! Thought I’d meet you sooner -or later,” said the man.</p> - -<p>His voice was unmistakable. He recognized Adam. -Beyond any possibility of doubt—Dismukes! In the -amaze and gladness of the moment Adam embraced this -old savior and comrade and friend—embraced him as a -long-lost brother or as a prodigal son. Then Adam released -him, with sudden dawning consciousness that Dismukes -seemed to have no feeling whatever about this -meeting.</p> - -<p>“Dismukes! I had to grab you—just to feel if it was -you. I’m knocked clean off my pins,” declared Adam, -breathing hard.</p> - -<p>“Yes, it’s me, Wansfell,” replied Dismukes. His large, -steady eyes, dark brown like those of an ox, held an -exceeding and unutterable sadness.</p> - -<p>“Back on the desert? <em>You!</em>” exclaimed Adam. “Dismukes, -then you lost your gold—bad luck—something<span class="pagenum" id="Page_340">340</span> -happened—you never went to the great cities—to spend -your fortune—to live and live?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, friend, I went,” replied Dismukes.</p> - -<p>A great awe fell upon Adam. His keen gaze, cleared -of the mist of amaze, saw Dismukes truly. The ox eyes -had the shadow of supreme tragedy. Their interest was -far off, as if their sight had fixed on a dim, distant -mountain range of the horizon. Yet they held peace. -The broad face had thinned. Gone was the dark, healthy -bronze! And the beard that had once been thick and -grizzled was now scant and white. The whole face expressed -resignation and peace. Those wonderful wide -shoulders of Dismukes appeared just as wide, but they -sagged, and the old, tremendous brawn was not there. -Strangest of all, Dismukes wore the ragged gray prospector’s -garb which had been on his person when Adam -saw him last. There! the yellow stain of Death Valley -clay—and darker stains—sight of which made Adam’s -flesh creep!</p> - -<p>“Ah! So you went, after all,” replied Adam, haltingly. -“Well! Well!... Let’s sit down, old comrade. Here -on this stone. I confess my legs feel weak.... Never -expected to see you again in this world!”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, no man can ever tell. It’s folly to think -an’ toil an’ hope for the future.”</p> - -<p>What strong, sad history of life revealed itself in that -reply!</p> - -<p>“Ah!... I— But never mind what I think. Dismukes, -you’ve not been on the desert long.”</p> - -<p>“About a week. Outfitted at San Diego an’ came over -the mountain trail through El Campo. Landed in Frisco -two weeks an’ more ago. By ship from Japan.”</p> - -<p>“Did you have these old clothes hid away somewhere?” -inquired Adam. “I remember them.”</p> - -<p>“No. I packed them wherever I went for the whole -three years.”</p> - -<p>“Three years! Has it been that long?”</p> - -<p>“Aye, friend Wansfell, three years.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_341">341</span> -Adam gazed out across the desert with slowly dimming -eyes. The wasteland stretched there, vast and illimitable, -the same as all the innumerable times he had gazed. -Solemn and gray and old, indifferent to man, yet strengthening -through its passionless fidelity to its own task!</p> - -<p>“Dismukes, I want you to tell me where you went, -what you did, why you came back,” said Adam, with -earnestness that was entreaty.</p> - -<p>Dismukes heaved a long sigh. He wagged the huge, -shaggy head that was now gray. But he showed no -more indication of emotion. How stolid he seemed—how -locked in his aloofness!</p> - -<p>“Yes, I’ll tell you,” he said. “Maybe it’ll save you -somethin’ of what I went through.”</p> - -<p>Then he became lost in thought, perhaps calling upon -memory, raking up the dead leaves of the past. Adam -recalled that his own memory of Dismukes and the past -brought note of the fact how the old prospector had loved -to break his habit of silence, to talk about the desert, and -to smoke his black pipe while he discoursed. But now -speech did not easily flow and he did not smoke.</p> - -<p>“Lookin’ back, I seem to see myself as crazy,” began -Dismukes. “You’ll remember how crazy. You’ll remember -before we parted up there on the Mohave at that -borax camp where the young man was—who couldn’t -drive the mules.... Wansfell, from the minute I turned -my back on you till now I’ve never thought of that. -Did you drive the ornery mules?”</p> - -<p>“Did I?” Adam’s query was a grim assertion. “Every -day for three months! You remember Old Butch, that -gray devil of a mule. Well, Dismukes, the time came -when <em>he</em> knew me. If I even picked up the long bull -whip Old Butch would scream and run to lay his head -on me.”</p> - -<p>“An’ you saw the young driver through his trouble?”</p> - -<p>“That I did. And it was more trouble than he told -us then. The boss Carricks had was low-down and cunning. -He’d got smitten with the lad’s wife—a pretty<span class="pagenum" id="Page_342">342</span> -girl, but frail in health. He kept Carricks on jobs away -from home. We didn’t meet the lad any too soon.”</p> - -<p>“Humph! That’s got a familiar sound to me,” declared -Dismukes. “Wansfell, what’d you do to thet low-down -boss?”</p> - -<p>“Go on with <em>your</em> story,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Aha! That’s so. I want to make Two Palms Well -before dark.... Wansfell, like a horned-toad on the -desert, I changed my outside at Frisco. Alas! I imagined -all within—blood—mind—soul had changed!... Went -to Denver, St. Louis, an’ looked at the sights, not much -disappointed, because my time seemed far ahead. Then -I went to my old home. There I had my first jar. Folks -all dead! Not a relation livin’. Could not even find my -mother’s grave. No one remembered me an’ I couldn’t -find any one I ever knew. The village had grown to a -town. My old home was gone. The picture of it—the -little gray cottage—the vines an’ orchard—lived in my -mind. I found the place. All gone! Three new houses -there. Forty years is a long time! I didn’t build the -church or set out a park for the village of my boyhood.... -Then I went on to Chicago, Philadelphia, New York. -Stayed long in New York. At first it fascinated me. I -felt I wanted to see it out of curiosity. I was lookin’ -for some place, somethin’ I expected. But I never saw -it. The hotels, theaters, saloons, gamblin’ hells, an’ -worse—the operas an’ parks an’ churches—an’ the wonderful -stores—I saw them all. Men an’ women like ants -rushin’ to an’ fro. No rest, no sleep, no quiet, no peace! -I met people, a few good, but most bad. An’ in some -hotels an’ places I got to be well known. I got to have -a name for throwin’ gold around. Men of business sought -my acquaintance, took me to dinners, made much of me—all -to get me to invest in their schemes. Women! Aw! -the women were my second disappointment! Wansfell, -women are like desert mirages. Beautiful women, in silks -an’ satins, diamonds blazin’ on bare necks an’ arms, made -eyes at me, talked soft an’ sweet, an’ flattered me an’<span class="pagenum" id="Page_343">343</span> -praised me an’ threw themselves at me—all because they -thought I had stacks an’ rolls an’ bags of gold. Never -a woman did I meet who liked <em>me</em>, who had any thought -to hear my story, to learn my hope! Never a kind whisper! -Never any keen eye that saw through my outside!</p> - -<p>“Well, I wasn’t seein’ an’ findin’ the life I’d hoped for. -That New York is as near hell as I ever got. I saw men -with quiet faces an’ women who seemed happy. But only -in the passin’ crowds. I never got to meet any of them. -They had their homes an’ troubles an’ happiness, I figured, -an’ they were not lookin’ for anyone to fleece. It was my -habit to get into a crowd an’ watch, for I come to believe -the mass of busy, workin’ ordinary people were good. -Maybe if I’d somehow made acquaintance with a few of -them it’d have been better. But that wasn’t seein’ life. -I thought I knew what I wanted.</p> - -<p>“All my yearnin’s an’ dreams seemed to pall on me. -Where was the joy? Wansfell, the only joy I had was in -findin’ some poor beggar or bootblack or poor family, an’ -givin’ them gold. The great city was full of them. An’ -I gave away thousands of dollars. God knows <em>that</em> was -some good. An’ now I see if I could have stuck it out, -livin’ among such people, I might have been of some use -in the world. But, man! livin’ was not possible in New -York. All night the hotels roared. All night the streets -hummed an’ clanged. There was as many people rushin’ -around by night as by day, an’ different from each other, -like bats an’ hawks. I got restless an’ half sick. I couldn’t -sleep. I seemed suffocatin’ for fresh air. I wanted room -to breathe. When I looked up at night I couldn’t see the -stars. Think of that for a desert man!</p> - -<p>“At last I knew I couldn’t find what I wanted in New -York, an’ I couldn’t hunt any longer there. I had to -leave. My plans called for goin’ abroad. <em>Then</em> came a -strange feelin’ that I must have had all the time, but -didn’t realize. The West called me back. I seemed to -want the Middle West, where I’d planned to buy the green -farm. But you know I’m a man who sticks to his mind,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_344">344</span> -when it’s made up. There were London, Paris, Rome I’d -dreamed about an’ had planned to see. Well, I had a -hell of a fight with somethin’ in myself before I could get -on that ship. Right off then I got seasick. Wansfell, the -bite of a rattlesnake never made me half as sick as that -dirty-gray, windy sea. The trip across was a nightmare.... -London was a dreary place as big as the Mohave an’ -full of queer fishy-eyed people whom I couldn’t understand. -But I liked their slow, easy-goin’ ways. Then -Paris.... Wansfell, that Paris was a wonderful, glitterin’ -beautiful city, an’ if a city had been a place for me, -Paris would have been it. But I was lost. I couldn’t -speak French—couldn’t learn a word. My tongue refused -to twist round their queer words. All the same, I saw -what I’d set out to see.... Wansfell, if a man fights -despair for the women of the world, he’ll get licked in -Paris. An’ the reason is, there you see the same thing in -the homely, good, an’ virtuous little wives as you see in -those terrible, fascinatin’, dazzlin’ actresses. What that -somethin’ is I couldn’t guess. But you like all Frenchwomen. -They’re gay an’ happy an’ square. If I applied -the truth of this desert to these Frenchwomen, I’d say the -somethin’ so fascinatin’ in them is that the race is peterin’ -out an’ the women are dyin’ game.</p> - -<p>“From Paris I went to Rome, an’ there a queer state of -mind came to me. I could look at temples an’ old ruins -without even seein’ them—with my mind on my own -country. All this travel idea, seein’ an’ learnin’ an’ doin’, -changed so that it was hateful. I cut out Egypt, an’ I -can’t remember much of India an’ Japan. But when I -got on ship bound for Frisco I couldn’t see anythin’ for -a different reason, an’ that was tears. I’d come far to find -joy of life, an’ now I wept tears of joy because I was -homeward bound. It was a great an’ splendid feelin’!</p> - -<p>“The Pacific isn’t like the Atlantic. It’s vast an’ smooth -an’ peaceful, with swells like the mile-long ridges of the -desert. I didn’t get seasick. An’ on that voyage I got -some rest. Maybe the sea is like the desert. Anyway, it<span class="pagenum" id="Page_345">345</span> -calmed me, an’ I could think clear once more. As I walked -the deck by day, or hung over the rail by night, my -yearnin’s an’ dreams came back. When I reached Frisco -I’d take train for the Middle West, an’ somewhere I’d -buy the green ranch an’ settle down to peace an’ quiet -for the rest of my life. The hope was beautiful. I believed -in it. That wild desire to search for the joy of life had -to be buried. I had been wrong about that. It was only -a dream—a boy’s dream, on the hope of which I had spent -the manhood of my best years. Ah! it was bitter—bitter -to realize that. I—who had never given in to defeat!... -But I conquered my regret because I knew I had just -mistaken what I wanted. An’ it was not wholly too late!... -Wansfell, you’ve no idea of the size of the old earth. -I’ve been round it. An’ that Pacific! Oh, what an endless -ocean of waters! It seemed eternal, like the sky. But—at -last—I got to—Frisco.”</p> - -<p>Here Dismukes choked and broke down. The deep, -rolling voice lost its strength for a moment. He drew a -long, long breath that it hurt Adam to hear.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, when my feet once more touched land it -was as though I’d really found happiness,” presently went -on Dismukes, clearing his throat of huskiness. “I was -in the clouds. I could have kissed the very dirt. My -own, my native land!... Now for the last leg of the -journey—an’ the little farm—the home to be—friends to -make—perhaps a sweet-faced woman an’ a child! Oh, -it was as glorious as my lost dreams!</p> - -<p>“But suddenly somethin’ strange an’ terrible seized hold -of me. A hand as strong as the wind gripped my heart.... -<em>The desert called me!</em>... Day an’ night I walked -the streets. Fierce as the desert itself I fought. Oh, I -fought my last an’ hardest fight!... On one hand was -the dream of my life—the hope of a home an’ happiness—what -I had slaved for. Forty years of toil! On the other -hand the call of the desert! Loneliness, solitude, silence, -the white, hot days, the starlit nights, the vast open -desert, free and peaceful, the gray wastes, the colored<span class="pagenum" id="Page_346">346</span> -mountains, sunrise and sunset. Ah! The desert was my -only home. I belonged to the silence an’ desolation. Forty -years a wanderer on the desert, blindly seekin’ for gold! -But, oh, it was not gold I wanted! Not gold! Nor -fortune! That was my dream, my boyish dream. Gold -did not nail me to the desert sands. That was only my -idea. That was what brought me into the wastelands. -I misunderstood the lure of the desert. I thought it was -gold, but, no! For me the desert existed as the burrow -for the fox. For me the desert linked my strange content -to the past ages. For me the soul of the desert was my -soul.... <em>I had to go back!</em>... I could live nowhere -else.... Forty years! My youth—my manhood!... -I’m old now—old! My dreams are done.... Oh, my -God!... <span class="smcap">I had to come back!</span>”</p> - -<p>Adam sat confounded in grief, in shock. His lips were -mute. Like a statue he gazed across the wasteland, so -terribly magnified, so terribly illumined by the old prospector’s -revelation. How awful the gigantic red rock -barriers! How awful the lonely, limitless expanse of -sand! The eternal gray, the eternal monotony!</p> - -<p>“Comrade, take the story of my life to heart,” added -Dismukes. “You’re a young man still. Think of my forty -years of hell, that now has made me a part of the desert. -Think of how I set out upon my journey so full of wild, -sweet hope! Think of my wonderful journey, through -the glitterin’ cities, round the world, only to find my hope -a delusion!... A desert mirage!”</p> - -<p>“Man, I cannot think!” burst out Adam. “I am stunned.... -Oh, the pity of it—the sickening, pitiless fatality! -Oh, my heart breaks for you!... Dismukes, of what -use is hope? Oh, why do we fight? Where—where does -joy abide for such as you and me?”</p> - -<p>The great, rolling ox eyes gleamed upon Adam, strong -with the soul of peace, of victory in their depths.</p> - -<p>“Wansfell, joy an’ happiness, whatever makes life worth -livin’, is in <em>you</em>. No man can go forth to find what he -hasn’t got within him.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_347">347</span> -Then he gazed away across the desert, across sand and -cactus and mesquite, across the blue-hazed, canyon-streaked -ranges toward the north.</p> - -<p>“I go to Death Valley,” he continued, slowly, in his -deep voice. “I had left enough gold to grub-stake me. -An’ I go to Death Valley, but not to seek my fortune. -It will be quiet and lonely there. An’ I can think an’ rest -an’ sleep. Perhaps I’ll dig a little of the precious yellow -dust, just to throw it away. Gold!... The man who -loves gold is ruined. Passion makes men mad.... An’ -now I must go.”</p> - -<p>“Death Valley? No! No!” whispered Adam.</p> - -<p>“Straight for Death Valley! It has called me across -half the earth. I remember no desert place so lonely an’ -silent an’ free. So different from the noisy world of men -that crowds my mind still! There I shall find peace, -perhaps my grave. See! life is all a hopin’ to find! I -go on my way. Wansfell, we never know what drives us. -But I am happy now.... Our trails have crossed for -the last time. Good-by.”</p> - -<p>He wrung Adam’s hand and quickly whirled to his -burros.</p> - -<p>“Hehaw! Gedap!” he shouted, with a smack on their -haunches. Adam whispered a farewell he could not speak. -Then, motionless, he watched the old prospector face the -gray wastes toward the north and the beckoning mountains. -Adam had an almost irresistible desire to run after Dismukes, -to go with him. But the man wanted to be alone. -What a stride he had! The fruitless quest had left him -that at least. The same old rolling gait, the same doggedness! -Dismukes was a man who could not be halted. -Adam watched him—saw him at last merge and disappear -in the gray, lonely sage. And then into Adam’s strained -sight seemed to play a quivering mirage—a vision of -Death Valley, ghastly and white and naked, the abode of -silence and decay set down under its dark-red walls—the -end of the desert and the grave of Dismukes.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_348">348</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXV">CHAPTER XXV</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">The</span> November morning was keen and cold and Adam -and Genie were on their way to spend the day at -Andreas Canyon. Adam carried a lunch, a gun, and a -book. Genie seemed so exuberant with wonderful spirits -that she could scarcely keep her little moccasined feet on -the sand. Adam had an unconscious joy in the sight -of her.</p> - -<p>A dim old Indian trail led up one of the slopes of Andreas -Canyon, to which Adam called Genie’s attention.</p> - -<p>“We’ll climb this some day—when it comes time to take -you away,” said Adam. “It’s a hard climb, but the shortest -way out. And you’ll get to see the desert from the -top of old Jacinto. That will be worth all the climb.”</p> - -<p>His words made Genie pensive. Of late the girl had -become more and more beyond Adam’s comprehension—wistful -and sad and dreamy by turns, now like a bird and -again like a thundercloud, but mostly a dancing, singing -creature full of unutterable sweetness of life.</p> - -<p>Beyond the oasis, some distance up the canyon, was a -dense growth of mesquite and other brush. It surrounded -a sandy glade in which bubbled forth a crystal spring of -hot water. The bottom was clean white sand that boiled -up in the center like shining bubbles. Indians in times -past had laid stones around the pool. A small cottonwood -tree on the west side of the glade had begun to change the -green color of the leaves to amber and gold. All around -the glade, like a wild, untrimmed hedge, the green and -brown mesquites stood up, hiding the gray desert, insulating -this cool, sandy, beautiful spot, hiding it away from -the stern hardness outside.</p> - -<p>Genie had never been here. Quickly she lost her pensiveness<span class="pagenum" id="Page_349">349</span> -and began to sing like a lark. She kicked one moccasin -one way and the other in another direction. Straightway -she was on the stones, with her bare, slender, brown -feet in the water.</p> - -<p>“Ooooo! It’s hot!” she cried, ecstatically. “But, oh, -it’s fine!” And she dipped them back.</p> - -<p>“Genie, you stay here and amuse yourself,” said Adam. -“I’m going to climb. Maybe I’ll be back soon—maybe not. -You play and read, and eat the lunch when you’re hungry.”</p> - -<p>“All right, Wanny,” she replied, gayly. “But I should -think you’d rather stay with me.”</p> - -<p>Adam had to be alone. He needed to be high above the -desert, where he could look down. Another crisis in his -transformation was painfully pending. The meeting with -Dismukes had been of profound significance, and its effect -was going to be far-reaching.</p> - -<p>He climbed up the zigzag, dim trail, rising till the canyon -yawned beneath him, and the green thicket where he had -left Genie was but a dot. Then the way led round the slope -of the great foothill, where he left the trail and climbed -to the craggy summit. It was a round, bare peak of jagged -bronze rock, and from this height half a mile above the -desert the outlook was magnificent. Beyond and above -him the gray walls and fringed peaks of San Jacinto -towered, sculptored and grand against the azure blue.</p> - -<p>Finding a comfortable seat with rest for his back, Adam -faced the illimitable gulf of color and distance below. -Always a height such as this, where, like a lonely eagle, -he could command an unobstructed view, had been a charm, -a strange delight of his desert years. Not wholly had -love of climbing, or to see afar, or to feel alone, or to travel -in beauty, been accountable for this habit.</p> - -<p>Adam’s first reward for this climb, before he had settled -himself to watch the desert, was sight of a condor. Only -rarely did Adam see this great and loneliest of lonely -birds—king of the eagles and of the blue heights. Never -had Adam seen one close. A wild, slate-colored bird, huge -of build, with grisly neck and wonderful, clean-cut head,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_350">350</span> -cruelty beaked! Even as Adam looked the condor pitched -off the crag and spread his enormous wings.</p> - -<p>A few flaps of those wide wings—then he sailed out -over the gulf, and around, rising as he circled. When he -started he was below Adam; on the first lap of that circle -he rose even with Adam’s position; and when he came -round again he sailed over Adam, perhaps fifty feet. -Adam thrilled at the sight. The condor was peering down -with gleaming, dark, uncanny eyes. He saw Adam. His -keen head and great, crooked beak moved to and fro; -the sun shone on his gray-flecked breast; every feather -of his immense wings seemed to show, to quiver in the air, -and the tip feathers were ragged and separate. He cut -the air with a soft swish.</p> - -<p>Around he sailed, widening his circle, rising higher, with -never a movement of his wings. That fact, assured by -Adam’s sharp sight, was so marvelous that it fascinated -him. What power enabled the condor to rise without -propelling himself? No wind stirred down there under -the peaks, so he could not lift himself by its aid. He -sailed aloft. He came down on one slope of his circle, -to rise up on the other, and always he went higher. How -easily! How gracefully! He was peering down for -sight of prey in which to sink cruel beak and talons. Once -he crossed the sun and Adam saw his shadow on the -gleaming rocks below. Then his circles widened across -the deep canyon, high above the higher foothills, until he -approached the lofty peak. Higher still, and here the -winds of the heights caught him. How he breasted them, -sailing on and up, soaring toward the blue!</p> - -<p>Adam watched the bird with strained eyes that hurt -but never tired. To watch him was one of the things -Adam needed. On and ever upward soared the condor. -His range had changed with the height. His speed had -increased with the wind. His spirit had mounted as he -climbed. The craggy gray peak might have harbored his -nest and his mate, but he gave no sign. High over the -lonely cold heights he soared. There, far above his<span class="pagenum" id="Page_351">351</span> -domain, he circled level for a while, then swooped down -like a falling star, miles across the sky, to sail, to soar, -to rise again. Away across the heavens he flew, wide -winged and free, king of the eagles and of the winds, -lonely and grand in the blue. Never a movement of his -wings! Higher he sailed. Higher he soared till he was -a fading speck, till he was gone out of sight to his realm -above.</p> - -<p>“Gone!” sighed Adam. “He is gone. And for all I -know he may be a spirit of the wind. From his invisible -abode in the heavens he can see the sheep on the crags—he -can see me here—he can see Genie below—he can see -the rabbit at his burrow.... Nature! Life! Oh, what -use to think? What use to torture myself over mystery -I can never solve? I learn one great truth only to find -it involved in greater mystery.”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Adam had realized the need of shocks, else the desert -influence would insulate him forever in his physical life. -The meeting with Dismukes had been one.</p> - -<p>Why had Dismukes been compelled to come back to -the desert? What was the lure of the silent places? How -could men sacrifice friends, people, home, love, civilization -for the solitude and loneliness of the wastelands? Where -lay the infinite fascination in death and decay and desolation? -Who could solve the desert secret?</p> - -<p>Like white, living flames, Adam’s thoughts leaped in -his mind.</p> - -<p>These wanderers of the wastelands, like Dismukes and -himself, were not laboring under fancy or blindness or -ignorance or imagination or delusion. They were certainly -not actuated by a feeling for some nameless thing. -The desert was a fact. The spell it cast was a fact. -Also it began to dawn upon Adam that nothing in civilization, -among glittering cities and moving people, in palaces -or hovels, in wealth or poverty, in fame or ignominy, in -any walk of worldly life, could cast a spell of enchantment, -could swell women’s hearts and claim men’s souls<span class="pagenum" id="Page_352">352</span> -like the desert. The secret then had to do with a powerful -effect of the desert—that was to say, of lonely -and desolate and wild places—upon the minds of human -beings.</p> - -<p>Adam remembered how Dismukes had loved to travel -alone. If he had any selfishness in his great heart, it -had been to gloat over the lonely places by himself. Even -with Adam he seldom shared those moments of watching -and listening. Always, some part of every day, he would -spend alone on a ridge, on a height, or out on the sage, -communing with this strange affinity of the desert. Adam -had known Dismukes, at the end of a hard day’s travel, -to walk a mile and climb to a ledge, there to do nothing -at all but watch and listen. It was habit. He did it without -thinking. When Adam confronted him with the fact -he was surprised. On Adam’s side, this strange faculty -or obsession, whatever it was, seemed very much more -greatly marked. Dismukes had, or imagined he had, the -need to seek gold. Adam had little to do but wander over -the waste ways of the desert.</p> - -<p>And now Adam, stirred to his depths by the culminating, -fatal tragedy of Dismukes’ life, and a passionate determination -to understand it, delved into his mind and memory -as never before, to discover forgotten lessons and -larger growths. But not yet in his pondering did they -prove to him why every day of his desert life, and particularly -in the last few years, had he gone to this or -that lonely spot for no reason at all except that it gave -him strange, vague happiness. Here was an astounding -fact. He could have seen the same beauty, color, grandeur, -right from his camp. The hours he had passed thus were -innumerable.</p> - -<p>What had he done, what had gone on in his mind, during -all these seemingly useless and wasted hours? Nothing! -Merely nothing it seemed to sit for hours, gazing -out over the desolate, gray-green, barren desert, to sit -listening to the solitude, or the soft wind, or the seep of -sand, or perhaps the notes of a lonely bird. Nothing,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_353">353</span> -because most of all that time he did not have in his mind -the significance of his presence there. He really did not -know he was there. This state of apparent unconsciousness -had never been known to Adam at all until Magdalene -Virey had given him intimation of it. He had -felt the thing, but had never thought about it. But during -these three years that he had lived near San Jacinto -it had grown until he gained a strange and fleeting power -to exercise it voluntarily. Even this voluntary act seemed -unthinking.</p> - -<p>Adam, now, however, forced it to be a thinking act. -And after many futile efforts he at last, for a lightning -flash of an instant, seemed to capture the state of mind -again. He recognized it because of an equally swift, vague -joy that followed. Joy, he called it, for want of a better -name. It was not joy. But it was wildly sweet—no—not -so—but perhaps sweetly wild. That emotion, then, -was the secret of the idle hours—the secret of the doing -nothing. If he could only grasp the secret of the nothing! -Looked at with profound thought, this nothing resolved -itself into exactly what it had seemed to his first vague, -wandering thought—merely listening, watching, smelling, -feeling the desert. That was all. But now the sense of -it began to assume tremendous importance. Adam believed -himself to be not only on the track of the secret -of the desert’s influence, but also of life itself.</p> - -<p>Adam realized that during these lonely hours he was -one instant a primitive man and the next a thinking, or -civilized, man. The thinking man he understood; all -difficulty of the problem lay hid in this other side of him. -He could watch, he could feel without thinking. That -seemed to be the state of the mind of an animal. Only -it was a higher state—a state of intense, feeling, waiting, -watching suspension! Adam divined that it was the -mental state of the undeveloped savage, and that it brought -fleeting moments of strange emotion.</p> - -<p>Beyond all comprehension was the marvel of inscrutable -nature. Somehow it had developed man. But the instincts<span class="pagenum" id="Page_354">354</span> -of the ages were born with him when he was born. In -blood, bone, tissue, heart, and brain! Wonder beyond that -was the wonder that man had ever become civilized at -all! Some infinite spirit was behind this.</p> - -<p>In the illumination of his mind Adam saw much that -had been mystery to him. When he had hunted meat, -why had the chase been thrilling, exciting, pressing his -heart hot against his side, sending his blood in gusts over -his body? What a joy to run and leap after the quarry! -Strange indeed had been his lust to kill beasts when, after -killing, he was sorry. Stranger than this was a fact keen -in his memory—the most vivid and intense feeling—come -back from his starvation days when he had a wild rapture -in pursuit of birds, rats, snakes that he had to kill with -stones. Never, in all the years, had this rapture faded. -Relic of his cruel boyhood days, when, like all boys, he -had killed for the sake of killing, until some aspect of his -bloody, quivering victim awakened conscience! Conscience -then must be the great factor in human progress—the -difference between savage and civilized man. Terribly -strange for Adam to look at his brawny hands and remember -what they had done to men! Over him, then, gushed -the hot blood, over him quivered the muscular intensity, -over him waved the fierce passion which, compared with -that of his boyhood, was as the blaze of sun to a candle. -He had killed men in ruthless justice, in strife of self-defense, -but always afterward he had regretted. He had -fought men in a terrible, furious joy, with eyes tingeing -red, with nerves impervious to pain, with the salt -taste of a fellow creature’s blood sweet on his snarling -lips, but always afterward he was full of wonder and -shame.</p> - -<p>Just under the skin of every man and every woman, -perhaps stronger in one than another, flowed red blood -in which primitive instincts still lived and would always -live. That was the secret of the desert. The lonely, -desolate land, the naked sand and rock-ribbed hills, the -wilderness of silence and solitude stirred the instinctive<span class="pagenum" id="Page_355">355</span> -memory of a primitive day. Men watched and listened -unthinkingly in the wastelands, for what they knew not, -but it was for the fleeting trancelike transformation back -to savage nature. There were many reasons for which -men became wanderers in the wastelands—love of gold; -the need to forget or to remember; passion and crime and -wanderlust; the appeal of beauty and sublimity—but what -nailed them to the forbidding and inhospitable desert was -the instinct of the savage. That was the secret of the spell -of the desert. Men who had been confined to cities, chained -to dull and humdrum toils, stagnating in the noisy haunts, -sore and sick and deflated, standing for some impossible -end, when let loose in the gray, iron-walled barrens of the -desert were caught by a subtle and insidious enchantment -that transfigured some, made beasts of most, and mysteriously -bound all. Travelers passing across could not -escape it, and they must always afterward remember the -desert with a thrill of strange pleasure and of vague regret. -Women who had been caught by circumstance and nailed -to homes along the roads or edges of the desert must feel -that nameless charm, though they hated the glaring, desolate -void. Magdalene Virey, resigned to her doom -in Death Valley, had responded to the nature that was -in her.</p> - -<p>Through this thing Adam saw the almost inconceivable -progress of men upward. If progress had not been slow, -nature would never have evolved him. And it seemed well -that something of the wild and the primitive must forever -remain instinctive in the human race. If the primitive -were eliminated from men there would be no more -progress. All the gladness of the senses lived in this law. -The sweetness of the ages came back in thoughtless watching. -The glory of the sunrise, the sadness of the sunset, -the whisper of the wind and the murmur of the stream, -the music of birds and their beauty—the magic of these -came back from the dim, mystic dreamland of the primal -day, from the childhood of the race. Nature was every -man’s mother. Nevertheless, the wonder and the splendor<span class="pagenum" id="Page_356">356</span> -of life was the age-long progress of man toward unattainable -perfection, the magnificent victory of humanity over -mastery by primal instincts. And the fact that this seemed -true to Adam made him wonder if the spirit of this -marvelous life was not God.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The sun was westering when he descended the long, -zigzag trail. He walked slowly, tired from his mental -strain. And when he got down the sun was just tipping -the ramparts above, flooding the canyon with golden haze -and ruddy rays. Adam thought that Genie, weary from -long waiting, would be asleep on the sand, or at least -reading, and that he could slip into the glade to surprise -her. They played a game of this sort, and to her had -gone most of the victories.</p> - -<p>Like a panther he slid through the grasping mesquite -boughs, and presently, coming to the denser brush, he -stooped low to avoid making a rustle. As he moved along, -bending so that he touched the sand with his hands, he -came upon two fat beetles wagging and contesting over -possession of some little particle. Scooping up a handful -of sand, he buried them, and then, as they so ludicrously -scrambled out, he gathered them up, intending, if he could -get behind Genie unobserved, to drop them on her book -or bare feet.</p> - -<p>Thus it happened that he did not look ahead until after -he had straightened up inside the glade. All before him -seemed golden gleams and streaks of sunset rose. The -air was thick with amber haze. Genie stood naked, ankle-deep -in the bubbling spring. Like an opal her slender -white body caught glimmer and sheen. Wondrously transparent -she looked, for the sunlight seemed to shine through -her! The red-gold tints of her hair burned like a woven -cord of fire in bronze. Glistening crystal drops of water -fell from her outstretched hands and her round arms -gleamed where the white met the line of tan. The light -of the sun shone upon her pensive, beautiful face as she -stood wholly unaware of intrusion. Then she caught the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_357">357</span> -sound of Adam’s stifled gasp. She saw him. She burst -into a scream of startled, wild laughter that rang with a -trill through the dell.</p> - -<p>Adam, breaking the spell of that transfixed instant, -rushed headlong away.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_358">358</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXVI">CHAPTER XXVI</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Gaining</span> the open, Adam strode swiftly down the -trail to where the canyon spread wide and ended in -the bowlder-strewn desert.</p> - -<p>The world in which he moved seemed transfigured, -radiant with the last glow of dying day, with a glory of -golden gleam. His heart pounded and his blood flooded -to and fro, swelling his veins. Life on the earth for him -had been shot through and through with celestial fire. -His feet were planted on the warm sands and his hands -reached to touch the gray old bowlders. He needed these -to assure himself that he had not been turned into the -soft, cool wind or the slanting amber rays so thickly -glistening with particles of dust, or the great, soaring -king of the eagles. Adam crushed a bunch of odorous -sage to his face, smelled it, breathed it, tasted it; and the -bitter sweetness thrilled his senses. It was real. It was a -part of the vast and glowing desert, of the wonderful -earth, of the infinite universe that he yearned to incorporate -into his being. The last glorious rays of the setting sun -shone upon him and magnified his stature in a long, purple -shadow. How the last warmth seemed to kiss his cheek -as it sank behind the rim of the range! The huge bowlders -were warm and alive under his hands. He pricked his -fingers upon the <i>cholla</i> thorns just to see the ruddy drops -of his life’s current; and there was strange joy in the -sting which proved him flesh and blood and nerve. He -stood alone, as he had many thousands of times on the -gray old desert, his feet on the sand, his knees in the -sage; but the being alone then was inexpressibly different. -It was as if he had, like the tarantula wasp, been born -from a cocoon stage in a dark, dead cell, into a beautiful<span class="pagenum" id="Page_359">359</span> -world of light, of freedom, of color, of beauty, of all -that was life. He felt the glory of his beating heart, his -throbbing pulse, his sight and all his sense. He turned -his face to the cool, sweet, sage-scented breeze, and then -he lifted it to the afterglow of sunset. Ah! the new, -strange joy of life—the incalculable force of the natural -man!</p> - -<p>The luminous desert stretched before him, valley and -mountain, and beyond them was other range and other -valley, leading to the sea, and across its heaving bosom -were other lands; and above him was the vast, deep-blue -sky with its pale evening star, and beyond them began -the infinite.</p> - -<p>Adam felt himself a part of it all. His ecstasy was that -he lived. Nature could not deny him. He stood there, -young and strong and vital.</p> - -<p>Then he heard Genie calling him. With a start he -turned to answer. She was running down the trail. How -swift, how lithe, how light! The desert had given her -the freedom, the grace, the suppleness of its wild denizens. -Like a fawn she bounded over the stones, and her hair -caught the last gleams of glowing sunlight. When she -neared Adam she checked her flying steps, pattering to a -halt, one brown hand over her breast.</p> - -<p>“Wheooo!” she burst out, panting. “I—couldn’t—find—you. -Why’d—you come—so far?”</p> - -<p>The something that had come between Adam’s sight and -the desert now surrounded Genie. Immeasurably she was -transformed, and the change seemed a mystery.</p> - -<p>“We must hurry back. It’ll soon be dark. Come,” -he replied.</p> - -<p>With step as free and swift as his she kept pace with -him.</p> - -<p>“Wanny, you stole up on me—tried to scare me—while -I was bathing,” she said, with arch reproach.</p> - -<p>“Genie, it was an accident,” he returned, hurriedly, and -how strangely the blood tingled in his face! “I meant to -scare you—yes. But I—I never thought—I never dreamed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_360">360</span> -... Genie, I give you my word.... Please say you -believe me!”</p> - -<p>“Why, Wanny,” she said, in surprise, “of course I -believe you! It’s nothing to mind about. I didn’t mind.”</p> - -<p>“Thank you. I—I’m glad you take it that way,” replied -Adam. “I’m sorry I was so—so stupid.”</p> - -<p>“How funny you are!” she exclaimed, and her gay -laugh pealed out. “What’s there to be sorry about?... -You see, I forgot it was getting late.... Ooooo! how -good the water felt! I just couldn’t get enough.... -You did scare me just a little. I heard you—and was -scared before I looked.... Wanny, I guess I was imagining -things—dreaming, you call it. I was all wet, and looking -at myself in the sunlight. I’d never seen myself like -that. I’d read of mermaids with shining scales of gold, -and nymphs of the woods catching falling blossoms. And -I guess I thought I was them—and everything.”</p> - -<p>Then Adam scorned the old husk of worldliness that had -incased his mind in his boyhood, and clung round it still. -This child of nature had taught him many a thought-provoking -lesson, and here was another, somehow elevating -and on a level with his mental progress of the day. Genie -had never lived in the world, nor had she been taught many -of its customs. She was like a shy, wild young fawn; she -was a dreaming, exuberant girl. Genie had been taught -to write and study and read, and was far from being -ignorant; but she had not understood the meaning of -Adam’s apology. What struck Adam so deeply and confounded -him again was the fact that her innocent and -sweet smile now, as she gazed up at him, was little different -from the one upon her face when she saw him staring at -her nude. She had been surprised at his concern and had -laughed at his contrition. And that low, rippling laugh, -so full of vital and natural life, seemed to blow, as the -desert wind blew worn and withered leaves, all of Adam’s -recalled sophistications back into the past whence they -had come.</p> - -<p>Adam and Genie walked hand in hand down the long<span class="pagenum" id="Page_361">361</span> -bowlder-strewn slope to the valley floor, where the <i>cholla</i> -shone paling silver in gathering twilight, and the delicate -crucifixion tree deceived the eye. The lonely November -twilight deepened into night. The stars shone bright. -The cool wind blew. The sage rustled.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Sleep did not soon woo Adam’s eyelids this night, with -the consequence that he awoke a little later than his usual -hour. The rose of the dawn had bloomed.</p> - -<p>Then Adam, on his knees by the brown running stream, -in the midst of his ablutions, halted to stare at the sunrise. -Had it ever before been so strangely beautiful? During -his sleep the earth had revolved, and, lo! here was the -sun again. Wonderful and perennial truth! Not only -had it revolved, but it had gone on its mysterious journey, -hurtling through space with inconceivable rapidity. While -he slept! Again he had awakened. A thousand years ago -he had awakened just like this, so it seemed, to the sunrise, -to the loneliness of lonely places, to the beauty of -nature, to the joy of life. He sensed some past state, -which, when he thought about it, faded back illusively and -was gone. But he knew he had lived somewhere before -this. All of life was in him. The marvelous spirit he -felt now would never die.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>There dawned upon Adam a sudden consciousness of -Genie’s beauty. She was the last realized and the most -beautiful creation of the desert around him.</p> - -<p>It came to him as a great surprise. She, too, knelt at -the stream, splashing the cool water, bathing her face, -wetting the dark, gold-tinted locks and brushing them -back. Curiously and absorbingly Adam gazed at her, with -eyes from which some blinding shutter had fallen. Yes, -she was beautiful. It seemed a simple fact that he had -overlooked, yet it was amazing. It distracted him.</p> - -<p>“Wanny, you’re all eyes,” cried Genie, gayly. “What’s -the matter with me? Why do you look so?”</p> - -<p>“Genie, you’re growing up,” he replied, soberly.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_362">362</span> -“Well, you’d have known that before if you’d seen me -sewing,” she said.</p> - -<p>“How old are you?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Guess I’m nearly seventeen,” she said, and the words -brought back the dreams.</p> - -<p>“Why, you’re a young lady!” ejaculated Adam. “And—and——” -He had been about to add that she was beautiful, -but he held his tongue.</p> - -<p>“I guess that, too.... Hold out your arm.”</p> - -<p>Adam complied, and was further amazed to see, as -she walked under his outstretched arm, that the glossy, -wavy crown of her head almost touched it. She was as -tall and slim and graceful as an arrowweed.</p> - -<p>“There! I’ll have you know you’re a mighty big man,” -she said. “And if you weren’t so big I’d come clear up -to your shoulder.”</p> - -<p>“Genie, don’t you want to leave this desert?” he queried, -bluntly.</p> - -<p>“Oh no,” she replied, instantly. “I love it. And—and—please -don’t make me think of towns, of lots of -people. I want to run wild like a road runner. I’d be -perfectly happy if I didn’t have to spend half the day -mending these old clothes.... Wanny, if they get any -worse they’ll fall off me—and <em>then</em> I’ll have to run around -like you saw me yesterday!... Oh, but for the thorns, -that’d be grand!”</p> - -<p>Her light, rippling laugh rang out, sweet and gay.</p> - -<p>Adam waited for her later, in the shade of Taquitch -Canyon, where from the topmost of a jumble of bowlders -he watched a distant waterfall, white and green as it flashed -over a dark cliff.</p> - -<p>He watched her coming. Her ragged boy’s garb with -its patches and rents no longer hid her femininity and her -charm from his eyes. He saw anew. The litheness of -her, the round and graceful figure from flying feet to -glinting hair, cried aloud to the loneliness of Adam’s heart -the truth of her. An enchantment hung upon her very -movements. She traveled from rock to rock, poising,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_363">363</span> -balancing, leaping, and her curly hair danced on her head. -Quick as those of a wildcat were her leaps. And her gay, -sweet call or cry, birdlike and wild, echoed from the cliffs.</p> - -<p>She was coming to Adam across the great jumble of -rocks—a girl wonderful as a sprite. And her coming was -suddenly realized as fulfillment of dreams. Adam faced -the truth of some facts about his dreaming. Lonely hours -on lonely slopes, of waiting and watching, had created the -shadow of a woman or a girl gliding in the golden glow -of the afternoon sunlight, coming to charm away forever -the silence and solitude. So innumerable times he had -dreamed, but never realized till now those dreams. She -was coming, and the sleepy shade awoke to a gleam and a -voice. The lacy waterfall shone white and its murmur -seemed music of many streams. A canyon swallow -twittered.</p> - -<p>Adam thought how passing strange had been the tortures, -the awakenings, and changings of his desert experience. -And here was a vague dream fulfilled! This -realization was unutterably sweet—so sweet because these -years had been barren of youth, steeped in unconscious -growing worship of beauty, spent alone with pains and -toils. He watched her coming. Fresh as the foam of the -waterfall, clean as the winds of the heights, wild as the -wild young fawn—so she seemed! Youth and gayety—beauty -and life!</p> - -<p>But suddenly Adam seemed struck by an emotion, if -not of terror, then of dread at some inconceivable and -appalling nature of her presence. That emotion was of -the distant past as was the vague peril of her approach. -A girl—a woman creature—mystery of the ages—the giver -of life as the sun gave heat—had come to him, out of the -clouds or the desert sands, and the fatality of her coming -was somewhat terrible.</p> - -<p>Genie reached the huge bowlder upon which Adam sat, -and like a squirrel she ran up its steep side, to plump -herself breathless and panting down against his knees.</p> - -<p>“Ah! Old Taquitch—here’s another—Indian maiden—for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_364">364</span> -you to steal,” she said, roguishly. “But before you—carry -me up to the clouds—duck me under the waterfall!”</p> - -<p>All the accumulated thought and emotion of recent hours -concentrated in the gaze he fixed upon her face.</p> - -<p>Her trilling laugh pealed out. She thought he was playing -Taquitch, god of the heights. He was teasing her -with his piercing eyes.</p> - -<p>“Look! Look at me, O Taquitch!” she cried, with deep, -pretended solemnity. “I am Ula, princess of the Coahuilas. -I have left my father’s house. I have seen the sun shining -in your face, oh, god of the lightnings! And I love—I -love—I love with all the Indian’s heart. I will go with -you to the peaks. But never—never more shall you steal -another maiden!”</p> - -<p>Adam scarcely heard Genie. He was piercing through -eyes and face to the mind and soul and life and meaning -of her beauty. Her skin was creamy, golden brown, transparent, -with tiny tracery of veins underneath and faint -tints of rose. The low forehead and level brows showed -moist and soft and thoughtful under the dark, damp curls -with their amber glints. A hint of desert leanness hid in -the contour of her oval face. Her mouth was strong, with -bowed upper lip, the under sensitive and sad—a red, sweet -mouth, like a flower. And her eyes, now meeting his so -frankly, losing the mock solemnity and the fun, became -deep-brown, crystal gulfs of light and shade, of thought -and feeling, beautiful with the beauty of exquisite color, -but lovelier for the youth, the joy and wonder of life, -the innocence of soul.</p> - -<p>“Wanny—are you—playing?” she asked, tremulously, -and her warm little hand clasped his.</p> - -<p>That changed the spell of her. To look at her beauty -was nothing comparable with the warm throb of her young, -pulsing life. Out of Adam’s slow and painful and intense -thought at last evolved a nucleus of revelation. But those -clear eyes strangely checked this growing sense of a truth -about to overwhelm him. They made him think, and -thought had begun to waver and pale beside some subtler<span class="pagenum" id="Page_365">365</span> -faculty of his being. Thus he realized the slow preponderance -of feeling over thought, of body over soul, -of physical over spiritual. And in this realization of -unequal conflict he divined the meaning of his strange -sense of peril in Genie’s presence. The peril lay in the -sophistication of his mind, not in Genie’s beauty. Naturally -as the mating of the birds he wanted her. That was -all. It was like her simplicity, inevitable as life itself, -and true to nature! But in his thoughts, flashing after -comprehension, the simple fact loomed with staggering, -overwhelming significance.</p> - -<p>Bidding Genie rest or amuse herself, Adam climbed to -a ledge above the waterfall, and there, with the mighty -mass of mountain crowding out the light, he threw himself -upon the bare stone.</p> - -<p>Not long did he torment himself with wonder and fury -and bewilderment over an indubitable fact. Almost at -once he sank into a self-accusing state which grew from -bad to worse, until he was sick, sore, base, and malignant -in his arraignment of self. Again the old order of mind, -the habit of youthful training, the learned precepts and -maxims and laws, flooded back to augment his trouble. -And when they got their sway he cursed himself, he hated -himself, he beat his breast in the shame of an abasement -terribly and inevitably and irretrievably true at that -hour.</p> - -<p>But this was a short-lived passion. It did not ring true -to Adam. It was his youth had suffered shame—the youth -trained by his mother—the youth that had fallen upon -wild and evil days at old Picacho. His youth flaming up -with all its chivalry, its ideals, its sense of honor and -modesty, its white-hot shame at even an unconscious wrong -to a girl! Not the desert philosophy of manhood that -saw nature clearly and saw it whole!</p> - -<p>“Peace!” he cried, huskily, as if driving back a ghost -of his youth. “I am no beast—no animal!”</p> - -<p>Nay, he was a lonely wanderer of the wastelands, who -many and many a time had dreamed himself sweetheart,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_366">366</span> -lover, husband of all the beautiful women in the world. -Ah! it was his love of beauty, of life!</p> - -<p>And so in his dreams, nature, like a panther in ambush, -had come upon him unawares to grip him before he knew. -Aye—he wanted Genie now—yearned for her with all -that intense and longing desire which had falsely seemed -love and joy of the whole living world. But it was not -what it seemed. All the tenderness of a brother, all the -affection of a father Adam had for Genie—emotions that -now faded before the master spirit and the imperious -flame of life. How little and pitiful arose the memory -of Margarita Arallanes—how pale beside this blood fire -of his senses! Life had failed him in his youth; life had -cheated him. Yet he had arisen on stepping stones of -agony to intenser love of that life. He had been faithful, -while life had mocked him.</p> - -<p>Passionate love of life, to see, to hear, to feel, to touch, -had come to him with its saving grace, after the ruthless -and violent strife of the desert had taught him to survive. -But these were not the soul of nature. This was not -nature’s secret. He was a man, a creature of inherited -instincts that the desert had intensified. In nature’s eyes -he was no different from the lonely desert bird or beast -seeking its mate. The law was not wrong, but all the -progress of mankind as represented in Adam’s revolt made -that law wrong.</p> - -<p>When at last he had driven shame from his mind and -justified his manhood over the instincts of which he could -have no control, then he faced the ordeal.</p> - -<p>Contending tides of passion and strife! That had been -his desert life. And as the years had passed each new -mounting tumult in heart or soul, each fight against men -or elements, had exceeded the last. Would there never be -an end? Was this his great ordeal—the last—before which -he must go down in defeat? No—by all the gods false -or true—no, it should never be! Thus he shot arrowy -lightnings of soul at the fiery army of instincts trooping -on to overwhelm his consciousness.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_367">367</span> -For a long time the ordeal never got so far as argument. -It was revel of the senses, unleashed at last, untamed by -the past, fiercer and stronger and more irresistible for all -disuse. Melancholy and terrible was the truth that his -desert years, so hard, so clean, so cold, so pure, the restraint -of his enforced exile, had developed in him instincts -masterless in their importunity. Life shrieking out -of his flesh and blood for the future that nature demanded! -There was revolt here, conscienceless revolt against the -futility of manhood, voices from the old bones of his ancestors, -from the dim and mystic past. Here at last was -revealed the deepest secret of the desert, the eternal law -men read in its lonely, naked face—self-preservation and -reproduction. The individual lived and fought and perished, -but the species survived.</p> - -<p>Adam’s instinctive reaction seemed that of a savage -into whose surging blood had been ejected some inhibitory -current of humanism which chafed at the quivering shores -of his veins and tried to dam the flood. He was like a -strong man convulsed by fever. Like the strung thread -of a bent bow he vibrated.</p> - -<p>There came a knocking at the gate of his mind. The -tempter! The voice of the serpent! Nature or devil, -it was all one—a mighty and eloquent and persuasive force. -It whispered to Adam that he was alone on the desert. -Fate had been cruel. Love had betrayed him. Life had -denied him. A criminal, surely not forgotten by justice, -he could never leave the lonely wastelands to live. A -motherless, fatherless girl, with no kith or kin, had been -left in his care, and he had saved her, succored her. Care -and health and love had made her beautiful. By all the -laws of nature she was his, to hold, to cherish, to cheer -the lonely, gray years. He had but to open his arms and -call to her, reveal to her the mystery and glory of life, -and she would be his forever. Unconsciously she herself -leaned toward this fate, tempting him in all her innocence. -She would grow into a glorious woman—the keen, sweet, -fierce youth of her answering to the work of the desert.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_368">368</span> -Were not all desert flowers more rare and vivid—were -not all desert creatures more beautiful and strong than -their like elsewhere? Genie would be his, as the eagle had -its mate, and she would never know any other life. She -would be compensation for his suffering, a companion for -his wandering. Think! the joy of her, the thrill of her! -The wonderful fire of her dark eyes and the dance of her -curls and the red lips ripe for kisses! No man had any -right to deny himself immortality. What was the world -and its customs to him? Where was the all-wise and -beneficent God who looked after the miserable and forlorn? -Life was life, and that was everything. Beauty in -life—that was eternal, the meaning of nature, and every -man must love it, share it, and mark the image of himself -upon the future. Lastly and most potent, the present -fleeting hour that must soon pass! Let him grasp his -precious jewel before it was too late—live in the moment. -Life might be eternal, but not for him. Soon the seeping -sand would nestle round his bleached bones and fill the -sockets where once his eyes had burned. Genie was a gift -of chance. He had wandered down into this valley, and -now his life should never be lonely again. Lover of beauty -and worshiper of nature, he had but to extend his arms -to receive a treasure far greater than the gold of the -desert, more beautiful than its flaming flowers, more mysterious -than its fierce and inevitable life. A girl whose -white body, like a transparent opal, let the sunshine -through! A woman, gift of the ages to man, flame of -love and life, most beautiful of all things quick or dead, -a mystery for man to cherish, to love, to keep, to bind!</p> - -<p>Then, at the instant when Adam’s fall was imminent, -and catastrophe leaned like the huge overhanging mountain -mass, he wrestled up to fling the supremity of his soul -into the teeth of nature.</p> - -<p>“<em>No!... No!</em>” he gasped, hoarsely. “Not for me!”</p> - -<p>At the last he saw clearly. The love he had for Genie -now proclaimed itself. The other had not been love, -whatever its greatness, its importunity, its almost blasting<span class="pagenum" id="Page_369">369</span> -power. He was an outcast, and any day a man or men -might seek him out to kill him or be killed. What madness -was this of his to chain a joyous girl to his wandering -steps? What but woe to her and remorse to him could -ever come of such relation? Genie was so full of life -and love that she hated to leave even the loneliness of the -desert. To her, in the simplicity and adaptation of her -nature, he was all. But she was a child, and the day he -placed her in an environment where youth called to youth, -and there were work, play, study, cheer, and love, he -would become a memory. The kisses of her red ripe lips -were not for him. The dance of her glinting curls, the -flash of her speaking eyes, the gold-brown flesh of her, -had been created by nature; and nature must go on with -its inscrutable design, its eternal progress, leaving him outside -the pale. The joy he was to feel in Genie must come -of memory, when soon he had gone on down into the -lonely wastelands. She would owe life and happiness to -him, and, though she might not know it, he always would. -A child, a girl, a woman—and some day perhaps a wife -and mother—some happy man’s blessing and joy—and -these by the same inevitable nature that had tortured him -would reward him in the solemn white days and the lonely -starlit nights. For he had been and would be the creator -of their smiles. How fierce and false had been his struggle, -in the light of thought, when the truth was that he would -give his life to spare Genie a moment’s pain!</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_370">370</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXVII">CHAPTER XXVII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">That</span> afternoon when Adam returned to camp sore -in body and spent in force, yet with strangely tranquil -soul, there was an old Indian waiting for him. Genie had -gone back long before Adam, and she sat on the sand, -evidently having difficult but enjoyable conversation with -the visitor.</p> - -<p>At sight of his hard, craggy, bronze face, serried and -seamed with the lines of years, it seemed that a bolt shot -back in Adam’s heart, opening a long-closed door.</p> - -<p>“Charley Jim!” he ejaculated, in startled gladness.</p> - -<p>“How, Eagle!” His deep voice, the familiar yet forgotten -name, the lean brown hand, confirmed Adam’s -sight.</p> - -<p>“Chief, the white man has not forgotten his Indian -friend,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“Eagle no same boy like mescal stalk. Heap big! -Many moon! Snows on the mountain!” said Charley -Jim, with a gleam of a smile breaking the bronze face. -His fingers touched the white hair over Adam’s temples. -Pathos and dignity marked the action.</p> - -<p>“Boy no more, Charley Jim,” returned Adam. “Eagle -has his white feathers now!”</p> - -<p>Genie burst into a trill of laughter.</p> - -<p>“You funny old people! You make me feel old, too,” -she protested, and she ran away.</p> - -<p>Charley Jim’s somber eyes followed her, then returned -to question Adam.</p> - -<p>“She same girl here—long time—sick man’s girl?” And -he made signs to show the height of a child and the weakness -of a man’s lungs.</p> - -<p>“Yes, chief. He her father. Dead. Mother dead, too,”<span class="pagenum" id="Page_371">371</span> -replied Adam, and he pointed to the two green graves -across the stream.</p> - -<p>“Ugh! No live good. No get well.... Eagle, sick -man have brother—him dead. Jim find ’um. Him -dig gold—no water—dead.... Jim find ’um heap -bones.”</p> - -<p>It was thus Adam heard the story of the tragedy of -Genie’s uncle. Charley Jim told it more clearly, though -just as briefly, in his own tongue. Moons before he had -found a prospector’s pack and then a pile of rags and -bones half buried in the sand over in a valley beyond the -Cottonwood Mountains. He recognized the man’s pack -as belonging to the brother of the sick man, Linwood, both -of whom he knew. Adam could trust an Indian’s memory. -Genie’s uncle had come to the not rare end of a wandering -prospector’s life. The old desert tragedy—thirst! All -at once Adam’s eyes seemed to burn blind with a red dim -veil, and his tongue clove to the roof of his mouth, and -through his body passed a cold shudder, and he had -strange vision of himself staggering blindly in a circle, -plunging madly for the false mirage. The haunting plague -passed away. Adam turned to examine the few pack -articles Charley Jim had brought for possible identification -of the dead. One of these, a silver belt buckle of -odd design, oxidized and tarnished, might possibly be remembered -by Genie. Adam called her, placed it in her -hands.</p> - -<p>“Genie, did you ever see that?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Yes,” she replied, with a start of recognition. “It was -my father’s. He gave it to my uncle.”</p> - -<p>Adam nodded to the Indian. “Chief, you were right.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Wanny—it means he’s found my uncle—dead!” -exclaimed Genie, in awe.</p> - -<p>“Yes, Genie,” replied Adam, with a hand of sympathy -upon her shoulder. “We know now. He’ll never come -back.”</p> - -<p>With the buckle in her hands the girl slowly walked -toward the graves of her parents.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_372">372</span> -Charley Jim mounted his pony to ride away.</p> - -<p>“Chief—tell me of Oella,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>The Indian gazed down upon Adam with somber eyes. -Then his lean, sinewy hand swept up with stately and -eloquent gesture to be pressed over his heart.</p> - -<p>“Oella dead,” he replied, sonorously, and then he looked -beyond Adam, out across the lonesome land, beyond the -ranges, perhaps to the realm of his red gods. Adam read -the Indian gesture. Oella had died of a broken heart.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>He stood there at the edge of the oasis, stricken mute, -as his old Indian friend turned to go back across the valley -to the Coahuila encampment. A broken heart! That -superb Indian maiden, so lithe and tall and strong, so -tranquil, so sure—serene of soul as the steady light of her -midnight eyes—dead of a broken heart! She had loved -him—a man alien to her race—a wanderer and a stranger -within her gates, and when he had gone away life became -unendurable. Another mystery of the lonely, gray, melancholy -wastelands! Adam quivered there in the grip of -it all.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Later when he returned to Genie it was to say, simply, -“My dear, as soon as I can find my burros we pack for -the long trail.”</p> - -<p>“No!” she exclaimed, with lighting eyes.</p> - -<p>“Yes. I shall take you out to find you a home.”</p> - -<p>“Honest Injun?” she blazed at him, springing erect.</p> - -<p>“Genie, I would not tease about that. We know your -uncle is dead. The time to go has come. We’ll start at -sunrise.”</p> - -<p>Forgotten were Genie’s dreams of yesterday! A day at -her time of life meant change, growth, oblivion for what -had been. With a cry of wondering delight she flung -herself upon Adam, leaped and climbed to the great height -of his face, and there, like a bird, she pecked at him with -cool, sweet lips, and clung to him in an ecstasy.</p> - -<p>“Don’t!... Still a child, Genie,” he said, huskily, as<span class="pagenum" id="Page_373">373</span> -he disengaged himself from her wild embrace. He meant -that she was not still a child. It amazed him and hurt -him to see her radiance at the thought of leaving the desert -oasis which had been home for so long. Fickleness of -youth! Yesterday she had wanted to live there forever; -to-day the enchantments of new life, people, places, called -alluringly. It was what Adam had expected. It was -what he wanted for her. How clear had been his vision -of the future! How truly, the moment he had fought -down his selfish desires, had he read her innocent heart! -His own swelled with gladness, numbing out the pang. -For him, some little meed of praise! Not little was it to -have conquered self—not little was it to have builded the -happiness of an orphan!</p> - -<p>Adam’s burros had grown gray in their years of idle, -contented life at the oasis. Like the road runners, they -enjoyed the proximity of camp; and he found them shaggy -and fat, half asleep while they grazed. He drove them -back to the shade of the cottonwoods, where Genie, seeing -this last and immutable proof of forthcoming departure, -began to dance over the sand in wild glee.</p> - -<p>“Genie, you’ll do well to save some of your nimbleness,” -admonished Adam. “We’ll have a load. You’ve -got to climb the mountain and walk till I can buy another -burro.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, Wanny, I’ll fly!” she cried.</p> - -<p>“Humph! I rather think you will fly the very first -time a young fellow sees you—a big girl in those ragged -boy’s clothes.”</p> - -<p>Then Adam thrilled anew with the sweetness, the wonder -of her. His cold heart warmed to the core. How he -would live in the hope and happiness and love that surely -must be awaiting this girl! His mention of a young fellow -suddenly rendered Genie amazed, shy, bewildered.</p> - -<p>“But—but—Wanny—you—you won’t let any yo-young -fellow see me <em>this</em> way!” she pleaded.</p> - -<p>“How can I help it? You just wouldn’t sew and make -dresses. Now you’re in for it. We’ll meet a lot of lads.... And,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_374">374</span> -Genie, just the other day you didn’t care how <em>I</em> -saw you.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, but you’re different! You’re my dad, my brother, -old Taquitch, and everything.”</p> - -<p>“Thank you. That makes me feel a little better.”</p> - -<p>Suddenly she turned her dark eyes upon him, piercing -now and dilating with thought.</p> - -<p>“Wanny! Are you <em>sorry</em> to leave?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” he replied, sadly.</p> - -<p>“Then I’ll stay, if you want me—ever—always,” she -said, very low. The golden flush paled on her cheek. -She was a child, yet on the verge of womanhood.</p> - -<p>“Genie, I’m sorry, but I’m glad, too. What I want most -is to see you settled in a happy home, with a guardian, -young friends about you—all you want.”</p> - -<p>She appeared sober now, and Adam gathered that she -had thought more seriously than he had given her credit for.</p> - -<p>“Wanny, you’re good, and your goodness makes you -see all that for me. But a guardian—a happy home—all I -want!... I’ll be poor. I’ll have to work for a living. -I won’t have <em>you</em>!”</p> - -<p>Then suddenly she seemed about to weep. Her beautiful -eyes dimmed. But Adam startled her out of her weakness.</p> - -<p>“Poor! Well, Genie Linwood, you’ve got a surprise in -store for you.”</p> - -<p>Wherewith he led her to the door of the hut and, tearing -up the old wagon boards that had served as a floor, he -dug in the sand underneath and dragged forth bag after -bag, which he dropped at her feet with sodden, heavy -thumps.</p> - -<p>“Gold, Genie! Gold! Yours!... You’ll be rich.... -All this was dug by your father. I don’t know how much, -but it’s a fortune.... Now what do you say?”</p> - -<p>The rapture Adam had anticipated did not manifest -itself. Genie seemed glad, certainly, but the significance -of the gold did not really strike her.</p> - -<p>“And you never told me!... Well, by the great horn -spoon, I’m rich!... Wanny, will <em>you</em> be my guardian?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_375">375</span> -“I will, till I can find you one,” he replied, stoutly.</p> - -<p>“Oh, never look for one—then I <em>will</em> have all I want!”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>The last sunlight, the last starlight night, the last sunrise -for Adam and Genie at the oasis, were beautiful memories -of the past.</p> - -<p>Adam, driving the burros along the dim old Indian -trail, meditated on the inevitableness of the end of all -things. For nearly three years he had seen that trail every -few days and always he had speculated on the distant time -when he would climb it with Genie. That hour had struck. -Genie, with the light feet of an Indian, was behind him, -now chattering like a magpie and then significantly silent. -She had her bright face turned to the enchanting adventures -of the calling future; she was turning her back upon -the only home she could remember.</p> - -<p>“Look, Genie, how gray and dry the canyon is,” said -Adam, hoping to divert her. “Just a little water in that -white wash, and you know it never reaches the valley. -It sinks in the sand.... Now look way above you—high -over the foothills. See those gleams of white—those -streaks of black.... Snow, Genie, and the pines and -spruces!”</p> - -<p>They camped at the edge of the spruces and pines. How -sweet and cool and damp the air to desert dwellers! The -wind sang through the trees with different tone. Adam, -unpacking the burros, turned them loose, sure of their -delight in the rich green grass. Genie, tired out with the -long climb, fell upon one of the open packs to rest.</p> - -<p>With his rifle Adam strode away among the scattered -pines and clumps of spruce. The smell of this forest -almost choked him, yet it seemed he could not smell and -breathe enough. The dark-green, spear-pointed spruces -and the brown-barked pines, so lofty and spreading, intoxicated -his desert eyes. He looked and reveled, forgetting -the gun in his hands, until his aimless steps frightened deer -from right before him. Then, to shoot was habit, the -result of which was regret. These deer were tame, not<span class="pagenum" id="Page_376">376</span> -like the wary, telescope-eyed mountain sheep; and Adam, -after his first exultant thrill—the old recurrent thrill from -out the past—gazed down with sorrow at the sleek, beautiful -deer he had slain. What dual character he had—what -contrast of thrill and pang, of blood and brain, of desert -and civilization, of physical and spiritual, of nature and—But -he did not know what!</p> - -<p>He laughed later, and Genie laughed, too, at how ravenous -he was at supper, how delicious the venison tasted, -how good it was to eat.</p> - -<p>“Guess I’ll give myself up as a bad job,” he told her.</p> - -<p>“Wanny, for me you’ll always be Taquitch, giant of the -desert and god of the clouds.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! You’ll forget me in ten days after you meet <em>him</em>!” -replied Adam, somewhat bitterly.</p> - -<p>Genie could only stare her amaze.</p> - -<p>“Forgive me, child. I don’t mean that. I know you’ll -never forget me.... But you’ve been my—my little girl -so long that it hurts to think of your being some other -man’s.”</p> - -<p>Then he was to see the marvel of Genie’s first blush.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>It was well that Adam had thought to pack extra blankets -for Genie. She had never felt the nip of frost. And -when night settled down black, with the wind rising, she -needed to be warmly wrapped. Adam liked the keen air, -and also the feel of the camp-fire heat upon his outstretched -palms.</p> - -<p>Next morning the sky was overcast with broken, scudding -clouds, and a shrill wind tossed the tips of the pines. -Genie crawled out of her blankets to her first experience of -winter. When she dipped her hands into the water she -squealed and jerked them out. Then at Adam’s bantering -laughter she bravely dashed into the ordeal of bathing -face and hands with that icy water.</p> - -<p>Adam did not have any particular objective point in -mind. He felt strangely content to let circumstances of -travel or chance or his old wandering instinct guide him.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_377">377</span> -They traveled leisurely through the foothills on the -western side of the Sierra Madres, finding easy trails -and good camp sites, and meeting Indians by the way. -Six days out from the desert they reached a wagon -road, and that led down to a beautiful country of soft -velvety-green hills and narrow, pleasant valleys where -clumps of live oaks grew, and here and there nestled a -ranch.</p> - -<p>So they traveled on. The country grew less rugged and -some of it appeared to belong to great ranches, once the -homes of the Spanish grandees. Late one afternoon travel -brought them within sight of Santa Ysabel. Adam turned -off the main road, in search of a place to camp, and, passing -between two beautiful hills, came upon a little valley, all -green with live oaks and brown with tilled ground. He -saw horses, cattle, and finally a farmhouse, low and -picturesque, of the vine-covered adobe style peculiar to a -country first inhabited by the Spanish.</p> - -<p>Adam went toward the house, which was mostly concealed -by vines and oaks, and presently happened upon a -scene that seldom gladdened the eyes of a desert wanderer. -On a green plot under the trees several children stopped -their play to stare at Adam, and one ran to the open door. -There were white pigeons flying about the roof, and gray -rabbits in the grass, and ducks wading in the brook. Adam -heard the cackle of hens and the bray of a burro. A column -of blue smoke lazily rose upward from a gray, adobe, -fire-blackened oven.</p> - -<p>Before Adam got to the door a woman appeared there, -with the child at her skirts. She was middle-aged and -stout, evidently a hard-working rancher’s wife. She had -a brown face, rather serious, but kind, Adam thought. -And he looked keenly, because he was now getting into -the civilized country that he expected would become Genie’s -home.</p> - -<p>“Good evening, ma’am!” he said. “Will you let me -camp out there by the oaks?”</p> - -<p>“How d’ye do, stranger,” she replied. “Yes, you’re welcome.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_378">378</span> -But you’re only a mile or so from Santa Ysabel. -There’s a good inn.”</p> - -<p>“Time enough to go there to-morrow or next day,” replied -Adam. “You see, ma’am, I’m not alone. I’ve a -young girl with me. We’re from the desert. And I want -her to have some—some decent clothes before I take her -where there are people.”</p> - -<p>The woman laughed pleasantly.</p> - -<p>“Your daughter?” she asked, with interest.</p> - -<p>“No relation,” replied Adam. “I—I was a friend of -her mother, who died out on the desert.”</p> - -<p>“Stranger, you’re welcome to my house overnight.”</p> - -<p>“Thank you, but I’d rather not trouble you. We’ll be -very comfortable. It’s a nice place to camp.”</p> - -<p>“Come far?” asked the woman, whose honest blue eyes -were taking stock of Adam.</p> - -<p>“Yes, far for Genie. We’ve been about ten days coming -over the mountains.”</p> - -<p>“Reckon you’d like some milk and eggs for supper?”</p> - -<p>“Well, now, ma’am, if you only knew how I would like -some,” returned Adam, heartily. “And poor Genie, who -has fared so long on desert grub, she’d surely appreciate -your kindness.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll fetch some over, or send it by my boy,” she said.</p> - -<p>Adam returned thoughtfully to the little grove where he -had elected to camp. This woman’s kindness, the glint of -sympathy in her eyes, brought him up short with the certitude -that they were the very virtues he was looking for -in the person to whom he intended to trust Genie. It -behooved him from now on to go keenly at the task of -finding that person. It would not be easy. For the present -he meant to hide any hint of Genie’s small fortune, and had -cautioned her to that end.</p> - -<p>Genie appeared tired and glad to sit on the green grassy -bank. “I’ll help—in a little while,” she said. “Isn’t this -a pretty place? Oh, the grass feels so cool and smells so -sweet!... Wanny, who’d you see at the house?”</p> - -<p>“Some youngsters and a nice woman,” replied Adam.<span class="pagenum" id="Page_379">379</span> -It was on his tongue to tell Genie about the milk and eggs -for supper, but in the interest of a surprise he kept silent.</p> - -<p>Sunset had passed when Adam got the packs spread, -the fire built, and supper under way.</p> - -<p>At length the supper appeared to be about ready, except -for the milk and eggs that had been promised. Adam set -the pot and pan aside at the edge of the fire, and went off -in search of some wood that would be needed later. He -packed a big log of dead oak back to camp, bending under -its weight.</p> - -<p>When he looked up he saw a handsome, stalwart lad, -bareheaded and in shirt sleeves, standing just beyond the -fire, holding out with brown muscular arms a big pan of -milk. The milk was spilling over the edges. And on -one of his fingers hung a small bucket full of eggs. He -had to balance himself carefully while he stooped to deposit -the bucket of eggs on the ground.</p> - -<p>“Hey, Johnnie, where’ll I put the milk?” he called, -cheerily.</p> - -<p>Adam was astounded, and suddenly tickled to see Genie -trying to hide behind one of the packs. She succeeded -in hiding all but her head, which at the moment wore an -old cap that made her look more than ever like a boy.</p> - -<p>“My name’s not Johnnie,” she flashed, with spirit.</p> - -<p>The lad appeared nonplused, probably more at the tone -of voice than the speech. Then he laughed. Adam liked -the sound of that laugh, its ring, its heartiness.</p> - -<p>“Sammy, then.... Come get this milk,” called the boy.</p> - -<p>Genie maintained silence, but she glared over the top -of the pack.</p> - -<p>“Look here, bub,” the lad went on, plaintively, “I can’t -stand this way all night. Mother wants the pan.... -Boy, are you deaf?... Say, bub, I won’t eat you.”</p> - -<p>“How dare you call me bub!” cried Genie, hotly.</p> - -<p>“Well, I’ll be doggoned!” exclaimed the young fellow. -“Listen to the kid!... I’ll call you worse than bub in a -minute. Hurry, bubbie!”</p> - -<p>Genie made a quick movement that whirled her around,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_380">380</span> -with her cap flying off, and then she got to her knees. -Thus, with face disclosed and blazing eyes, and curls no -boy ever had, she presented a vastly different aspect.</p> - -<p>“I’m no boy! I—I’m a—a lady!” she declared, with -angry, trembling voice of outraged dignity.</p> - -<p>“What!” gasped the lad. Then, in his amaze and horror, -he dropped the pan of milk, that splashed all over, nearly -drowning the fire.</p> - -<p>“Hello! What’s the trouble?” asked Adam, genially, -appearing from the oaks.</p> - -<p>“I—I—spilled the milk—mother sent,” he replied, in -confusion.</p> - -<p>“That’s too bad! No wonder, such a lot of milk!... -What’s your name?”</p> - -<p>“It’s Eugene—sir—Eugene Blair.”</p> - -<p>“Well, that’s queer—Eugene Blair.... My name’s -Wansfell, and I’m glad to meet you,” said Adam, offering -his hand. “Now let me make you acquainted with Miss -Eugenie Linwood.”</p> - -<p>The only acknowledgment Genie gave to her first introduction -was a slow sinking down behind the pack. Her -expression delighted Adam. As for the young man—he -appeared to be about twenty years old—he was overcome -with embarrassment.</p> - -<p>“Glad to—to know you Miss—Miss Linwood,” he -gulped. “Please ex-excuse me. Mother never said—there -was a—a girl.... And you looked so—I took you for -a boy.”</p> - -<p>“That’s all right, son,” put in Adam, kindly. “Genie -did look like a boy. So I’ve been telling her.”</p> - -<p>“Now—if you’ll excuse me I’ll run back after more -milk,” said the lad, hurriedly, and, grasping up the pan, -he ran away.</p> - -<p>“Well, Miss Know-it-all,” said Adam, banteringly, -“<em>what</em> did I tell you? Didn’t I tell you we’d meet some -nice young fellow?”</p> - -<p>“He—he didn’t see me—<em>all</em> of me,” replied Genie, -tragically.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_381">381</span> -“What? Why, a fellow with eyes like his could see -right through that pack!” declared Adam.</p> - -<p>“He called me bub!” suddenly exclaimed Genie, her tone -changing from one of tragic woe to one of tragic resentment. -“<em>Bub!</em>... The—the first boy I ever met in my -whole life!”</p> - -<p>“Why shouldn’t he call you bub?” queried Adam. -“There’s no harm in that. And when he discovered his -mistake he apologized like a little man.”</p> - -<p>“I <em>hate</em> him!” flashed Genie. “I’d starve to death before -I’d eat his eggs and milk.” With that she flounced off -into the clump of oaks.</p> - -<p>Adam was seeing Genie in a new light. It amused him -greatly, yet he could not help but look ruefully after her, -somewhat uncertain. Feminine reactions were unknown -quantities. Genie reminded him wonderfully of girls he -had known when he was seventeen.</p> - -<p>Presently young Blair returned with more milk, and -also considerably more self-possession. Not seeing Genie, -he evidently took the hint and quickly left.</p> - -<p>“Come over after supper,” called Adam, after him.</p> - -<p>“All right,” he replied, and then was gone.</p> - -<p>Very shortly then Adam had supper prepared, to which -he cheerfully invited Genie. She came reluctantly, with -furtive eyes on the green beyond camp, and sat down to -fold her feet under her, after the manner of an Indian. -Adam, without any comment, served her supper, not omitting -a generous quantity of fragrant fried eggs and -a brimming cupful of creamy milk. Wherewith Genie -utterly forgot, or magnificently disdained, any recollection -of what she had said. She even asked for more. -But she was vastly removed from the gay and lightsome -Genie.</p> - -<p>“What’d you ask him back here for?” she demanded.</p> - -<p>“I want to talk to him. Don’t you?” replied Adam, -innocently.</p> - -<p>“Me!... When he called me bub?”</p> - -<p>“Genie, be sensible. They’re nice people. I think I’ll<span class="pagenum" id="Page_382">382</span> -camp here a day or so. We’ll rest up, and that’ll give me -time to look around.”</p> - -<p>“Look around!... What’ll become of <em>me</em>?” wailed -Genie, miserably.</p> - -<p>“You can watch camp. I dare say young Blair will forget -your rudeness and be nice to you.”</p> - -<p>Then Genie glared with terrible eyes upon Adam, and -she seemed between tears and rage.</p> - -<p>“I—I never—never knew—you could be like this.”</p> - -<p>“Like what? Genie, I declare, I’m half ashamed of -you! Nothing has happened. Only this lad mistook you -for a boy. Anyone would think the world had come to -an end. All because you woke up and found out you had -on boy’s clothes. Well, you’ve got to take your medicine -now. You <em>would</em> wear them. You never minded <em>me</em>. -You didn’t care <em>how</em> I saw you!”</p> - -<p>“I don’t care how <em>he</em> saw me or sees me, either, so -there,” declared Genie, enigmatically.</p> - -<p>“Oh! Well, what’s wrong, then?” queried Adam, more -curious than ever.</p> - -<p>“I—he—it—it was what he called me,” replied Genie, -confusedly.</p> - -<p>Adam gazed at her downcast face with speculative eyes, -intuitively feeling that she had not told the whole truth. -He had anticipated trouble with this spirited young wild -creature from the desert, once they got into civilization.</p> - -<p>“Genie, I’ve been mostly in fun. Now I’m serious.... -I want you to be perfectly natural and nice with these -Blairs, or anyone else we meet.”</p> - -<p>Manifestly she took that seriously enough. Without -another word she dragged her blankets and canvas away -from the firelight, and at the edge of the gathering gloom -under the oaks she made her bed and crawled into it.</p> - -<p>A little while after dark, young Blair presented himself -at Adam’s fire, and took a seat to which he was invited.</p> - -<p>“I suppose you folks are ranching it?” asked Adam, by -way of opening conversation.</p> - -<p>“It’s hardly a ranch, though we have hopes,” replied<span class="pagenum" id="Page_383">383</span> -Blair. “Mother and I run the farm. My father’s not—he’s -away.”</p> - -<p>“Looks like good soil. Plenty of water and fine grass,” -observed Adam.</p> - -<p>“Best farming country all around—these valleys,” declared -the lad, warming to enthusiasm. “Ranchers taking -it all up. Only a few valleys left. There’s one just below -this—about a hundred acres—if I could only get that!... -But no such luck for me.”</p> - -<p>“You can never tell,” replied Adam, in his quiet way. -“You say ranchers are coming in?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. San Diego is growing fast. People are buying -out the Mexicans and Indians up in these hills. In a few -years any rancher with one of these valleys will be rich.”</p> - -<p>“How much land do you own?”</p> - -<p>“My mother bought this little farm here—ten acres—and -the valley, which was about ninety. But my father—we -lost the valley. And we manage to live here.”</p> - -<p>Adam’s quick sympathy divined that something pertaining -to the lad’s father was bitter and unhappy. He questioned -further about the farm, what they raised, where they -marketed it, how many cattle, horses, chickens, ducks they -had. In half an hour Adam knew the boy and liked him.</p> - -<p>“You’re pretty well educated for a farmer boy,” remarked -Adam.</p> - -<p>“I went to school till I was sixteen. We’re from Indiana—Vincennes. -Father got the gold fever. We came West. -Mother and I took to a surer way of living.”</p> - -<p>“You like ranching, then?”</p> - -<p>“Gee! but I’d love to be a real rancher! There’s not -only money in cattle and horses, on a big scale, but it’s -such a fine life. Outdoors all the time!... Oh, well, I -<em>do</em> have the outdoors as much as anybody. But for mother -and the kids—I’d like to do better by them.”</p> - -<p>“I saw the youngsters and I’d like to get acquainted. -Tell me about them.”</p> - -<p>“Nothing much to tell. They’re like little Indians. -Tommy’s three, Betty’s four, Hal’s five. He was a baby<span class="pagenum" id="Page_384">384</span> -when we came West. The trip was too hard on him. -He’s been delicate. But he’s slowly getting stronger.”</p> - -<p>“Well! You’ve a fine family. How are you going to -educate them?”</p> - -<p>“That’s our problem. Mother and I must do our best—until—maybe -we can send them to school at San Diego.”</p> - -<p>“When your ship comes in?”</p> - -<p>“Yes; I’m always hoping for that. But first I’d like my -ship to start out, so it can come back loaded.”</p> - -<p>The lad laughed. He was imaginative, full of fire and -pathos, yet clear headed and courageous, neither blind to -the handicap under which he labored nor morose at his -fetters.</p> - -<p>“Yes, if a man <em>waits</em> for his ship to come in—sometimes -it never comes,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>“I suppose you’ll be on your way to town early?” asked -Blair, as he rose.</p> - -<p>“Guess I’ll not break camp to-morrow. Genie is tired. -And I won’t mind a little rest. Hope we’ll see you again.”</p> - -<p>“Thank you. Good night.”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>When he was gone, Adam took to pacing along the edge -of the oaks. In the light of the camp fire he saw the gleam -of Genie’s wide-open eyes. She had heard every word of -Adam’s conversation with young Blair. He felt a great -sympathy for Genie. Like a child, she was face to face -with new life, new sensations, poignant and bewildering. -How might he best help her?</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Next morning, when Adam returned from a look around, -he discovered Genie up, puttering at the camp fire. She -greeted him with undue cheerfulness. She was making a -heroic effort to show that this situation was perfectly -natural. She did pretty well, but Adam’s keen eyes and -sense gathered that Genie felt herself on the verge of great -and tremendous events.</p> - -<p>After breakfast Adam asked Genie to accompany him -to the farmhouse. She went, but the free, lithe step<span class="pagenum" id="Page_385">385</span> -wanted something of its old grace. Adam espied the -children in the yard, and now he took cognizance of them. -Tommy was a ragged, tousle-headed, chubby little rascal, -ruddy cheeked and blue eyed. Betty resembled the lad, -Eugene, having his fine dark eyes and open countenance. -Hal was the largest, a red-headed, freckle-faced imp if -Adam ever saw one. They regarded the newcomers with -considerable interest. Genie approached them and offered -to swing Betty, who was sitting in a clumsy little hammock-like -affair made of barrel staves. And Adam, seeing the -children’s mother at the door, went that way.</p> - -<p>“Good morning, Mrs. Blair!” he said. “We’ve come -over to chat a bit and see your youngsters.”</p> - -<p>She greeted them smilingly, and came out wiping her -hands on her apron. “Goodness knows we’re glad to have -you. Gene has gone to work. Won’t you sit on the bench -here?...”</p> - -<p>Then she espied Genie. “For land’s sake! That your -girl in the boy’s clothes? Gene told me what a dunce he’d -been.... Oh, she’s pretty! What shiny hair!”</p> - -<p>“That’s Genie. I want you to meet her—and then, Mrs. -Blair, perhaps you can give an old desert codger a little -advice,” said Adam.</p> - -<p>He called Genie, and she came readily, though not without -shyness. Despite her garb and its rents, Adam could -not but feel proud of her. Mrs. Blair’s kindliness quickly -put the girl at ease. After a little talk, in which Genie’s -part augured well for the impression she was to make -upon people, Adam bade her play with the children.</p> - -<p>“No wonder Gene spilled the milk!” ejaculated Mrs. -Blair.</p> - -<p>“Why?” queried Adam.</p> - -<p>“The girl’s more than pretty. Never saw such hair. -And her eyes! They’re not the color of hair and eyes -I know.”</p> - -<p>“That’s the desert’s work, Mrs. Blair. On the desert -nature makes color, as well as life, more vivid, more -intense.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_386">386</span> -“And this Genie—isn’t it odd—her name is like my -boy Gene’s—she’s no relation of yours?”</p> - -<p>Briefly then Adam related Genie’s story and the circumstances -of his association with her.</p> - -<p>“Laws-a-me! Poor child!... And now she has no -people—no home—not a friend in the world but you?”</p> - -<p>“Not one. It’s pretty sad, Mrs. Blair.”</p> - -<p>“Sad? It’s worse than that.... Strikes me, though, -Mr. Wansfell, you must be family and friends and all -to that girl.... And let a mother tell you what a noble -thing you’ve done—to give three years of your life to -an orphan!”</p> - -<p>“What I did was good for me. Better than anything I -ever did before,” replied Adam, earnestly. “I’d go on if -it were possible. But Genie needs a home, young people, -work, to learn and live her life. And I—I must go back -to the desert.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! So that’s it!” exclaimed the woman, nodding. -“My husband spoke just like you do. He took to the -desert—sold my farm to get money to work his gold claims. -Always he had to go back to the desert.... And now -he’ll never come home again.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, the desert claims many men. But I could and -would sacrifice whatever the desert means to me, for -Genie’s sake, if it—if there was not a reason which makes -that impossible.”</p> - -<p>“And now you’re hunting a home for her?”</p> - -<p>“Yes.”</p> - -<p>“She’s well educated, you said?”</p> - -<p>“Her mother was a school-teacher.”</p> - -<p>“Then she could teach children.... Things work out -strangely in life, don’t they? My Betty might be left -alone. Any girl may become an orphan.”</p> - -<p>“Now, Mrs. Blair, will you be so kind as to take Genie, -or go with us into town, and help us get some clothes -for her? A few simple dresses and things she needs. I’d -be helpless. And Genie knows so little. She ought to -have a woman go with her.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_387">387</span> -“Indeed she shall have,” declared Mrs. Blair. “I’ll be -only too glad to go. I need some things——” Then she -struck her forehead with a plump hand. “I’ve a better -idea. There’s not much to be bought in the store at Santa -Ysabel. But my neighbor up the valley—his name is Hunt—he -has a granddaughter. They’re city folks. They’ve -been somebody once. This granddaughter is older than -Genie—she’s more of a woman’s figure—and I heard -her say only the other day that she brought a lot of -outgrown dresses with her and didn’t know what to do -with them. All her clothes are fine—not like you -buy out here.... I’ll take Genie over there right this -minute!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Blair got up and began to untie her apron. Kindliness -beamed upon her countenance and she seemed to have -acquired a more thoughtful eye.</p> - -<p>“You’re good indeed,” said Adam, gratefully. “I thank -you. It will be so much nicer for Genie. She dreaded -this matter of clothes. You can tell Miss Hunt I’d be -glad to <span class="locked">pay——”</span></p> - -<p>“Shucks! She wouldn’t take your money. She’s quality, -I told you. And her name’s not Hunt. That’s her grandfather’s -name. I don’t know what hers is—except he calls -her Ruth.”</p> - -<p>Ruth! The sudden mention of that name seemed to -Adam like a stab. What a queer, inexplicable sensation -followed it!</p> - -<p>“I’ll be right out,” declared Mrs. Blair, bustling into -the house.</p> - -<p>Adam called Genie to him and explained what was to -happen. She grew radiant.</p> - -<p>“Oh, Wanny, then I won’t have to go into a town—to be -laughed at—and I can get—get dressed like—like a lady—before -he sees me again!” she exclaimed, breathlessly.</p> - -<p>“He? Who’s that, Genie?” inquired Adam, dryly, -though he knew he could guess very well.</p> - -<p>Genie might have lived on the desert, like a shy, lonely, -wild creature, but she was eternally feminine enough to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_388">388</span> -bite her tongue at the slip she had made, and to blush -charmingly.</p> - -<p>Then Mrs. Blair bustled out again, in sunbonnet and -shawl, and with the alacrity of excitement she led Genie -away through the grove of oaks toward the other end of -the valley.</p> - -<p>Adam returned to camp, much relieved and pleased, yet -finding suddenly that a grave, pondering mood had come -upon him. In the still noon hour, when the sun was hot -and the flies buzzed lazily, Adam would surely have -succumbed to drowsiness had he not been vociferously -hailed by some one. He sat up to hear one of the little -Blairs call, “Say, my maw wants you to eat with us.”</p> - -<p>Adam lumbered up and, trying to accommodate his giant -steps to those of the urchin, finally reached the house. He -heard Mrs. Blair in the kitchen. Then something swift -and white rushed upon Adam from somewhere.</p> - -<p>“<em>Look!</em>” it cried, in ecstatic tones, and pirouetted before -his dazzled eyes.</p> - -<p>Genie! In a white dress, white slippers—all white, even -to the rapt, beautiful, strangely transformed face! It -was a Genie he could not recognize. Yet, however her -dark gold-glinting tresses were brushed and arranged, he -would have known their rare, rich color. And the eyes -were Genie’s—vivid like the heart of a magenta cactus -flower, unutterably and terribly expressive of happiness. -But all else—the girl’s height and form and movement—had -acquired something subtly feminine. The essence of -woman breathed from her.</p> - -<p>“Oh, Wanny, I’ve a whole <em>bundle</em> of dresses!” she cried, -rapturously. “And I put this on to please you.”</p> - -<p>“Pleased!... Dear girl, I’m—I’m full of joy for you—overcome -for myself,” exclaimed Adam. How, in that -moment, he blessed the nameless spirit which had come -to him the day Genie’s fate and future hung in the balance! -What a victory for him to remember—seen now in the -light of Genie’s lovely face!</p> - -<p>Then Mrs. Blair bustled in. Easy indeed was it to<span class="pagenum" id="Page_389">389</span> -see how the happiness of others affected her. “It’s good -we have dinner at noon,” she said, as she put dish after -dish upon the table, “else we’d had to do with little. Sit -at table, folks.... Children, you must wait. We’ve -company.... Gene, come to dinner.”</p> - -<p>Adam found himself opposite Genie, who had suddenly -seemed to lose her intensity, though not her glow. She -had softened. The fierce joy had gone. Adam, watching -her, received from her presence a thrill of expectancy, and -realized that at least one of her sensations of the moment -was being conveyed to him. Then Eugene entered. His -face shone. He had wet his hair and brushed it and put -on a coat. If something new and strange was happening -to Genie, it had already happened to Eugene Blair.</p> - -<p>“Folks, help yourselves and help each other,” said Mrs. -Blair.</p> - -<p>Adam was ready for that. What a happy dinner! He -ate with the relish of a desert man long used to sour dough -and bacon, but he had keen ears for Mrs. Blair’s chatter -and eyes for Genie and Eugene. The mother, too, had a -steady and thoughtful gaze for the young couple, and her -mind was apparently upon weightier matters than her -speech indicated.</p> - -<p>“Well, folks,” said Mrs. Blair, presently, “if you’ve all -had enough, I’ll call the children.”</p> - -<p>Eugene arose with alacrity. “Let’s go outdoors,” he -said, stealing a shy look at Genie. She seemed to move in -a trance. Adam went out, too, and found himself under -the oaks. The very air was potent with the expectancy -that Adam had sensed in the house. Something was about -to happen. It puzzled him. Yet he liked the suspense. -But he was nonplused. The young couple did not present -a riddle. All the same, the instant Adam felt convinced -of this he looked at them and lost his conviction. They did -present a riddle. He had not seen any other lad and girl -together for many years, but somehow he wagered to himself -that if he had seen a thousand couples, this one would -stand out strikingly.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_390">390</span> -Then Mrs. Blair appeared. She had the look of a woman -to whom decision had come. The hospitality, the kindly -interest in Genie, the happiness in seeing others made -happy, were in abeyance to a strong, serious emotion.</p> - -<p>“Mr. Wansfell, if you’ll consent I’ll give Genie a home -here with me,” she said.</p> - -<p>“Consent!... I—I gladly do that,” he replied, with -strong agitation. “You are a—a good woman, Mrs. Blair. -I am overwhelmed with gladness for Genie—for her luck.... -It’s so sudden—so unexpected.”</p> - -<p>“Some things happen that way,” she replied. “They -just come about. I took to Genie right off. So did my -boy. I asked him—when we got back from our neighbor’s—if -it would not be a good idea to keep Genie. We are -poor. It’s one more to feed and clothe. But she can help. -And she’ll teach the children. That means a great deal -to me and Gene.... He would be glad, he said. So I -thought it over—and I’ve decided. We’ve your consent.... -Now, Genie, will you stay and have a home with us?”</p> - -<p>“Oh, I’ll—I’ll be so happy! I’ll try so—so hard!” -faltered Genie.</p> - -<p>“Then—it’s settled. My dear girl, we’ll try to make you -happy,” declared Mrs. Blair, and, sitting beside Genie, she -embraced her.</p> - -<p>Adam’s happiness was so acute it seemed pain. But was -his feeling all happiness? What had Genie’s quick look -meant—the intense soul-searching flash she gave him when -Mrs. Blair had said it was all settled? Genie’s desert eyes -saw separation from the man who had been savior, father, -brother. One flash of eyes—then she was again lost in -this immense and heart-numbing idea of a home. Adam -saw Eugene look at her as his mother enfolded her. And -Adam’s heart suddenly lifted to exaltation. Youth to -youth! The wonderful, the calling, the divine! The lad’s -look was soulful, absorbing, full of strange, deep melancholy, -full of dreamy, distant, unconscious enchantment. -What had seemed mysterious was now as clear as the sunlight. -By some happy chance of life the homeless Genie<span class="pagenum" id="Page_391">391</span> -had been guided to a good woman and a noble lad. Goodness -was the commonest quality in the hearts of women; -and nobility, in youth at least, flowered in the breast of -every man.</p> - -<p>And while Eugene thus gazed at Genie she lifted her -eyelids, so heavy with their dreams, and met his gaze. -Suddenly she sweetly, strangely blushed and looked away, -at Adam, through him to the beyond. She seemed full of -a vague, dreaming sweetness of life; a faint smile played -round her lips; her face lost its scarlet wave for pearly -whiteness; and tears splashed down upon her listless hands.</p> - -<p>The moment, with all it revealed to Adam, swiftly passed.</p> - -<p>“Gene, take her and show her the horses,” said Mrs. -Blair. “She said she loved horses. Show her all around. -We’ll let the work go by to-day.”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Mrs. Blair talked awhile with Adam, asking to know -more about Genie, and confiding her own practical plans. -Then she bustled off to look after the children, who had -been forgotten.</p> - -<p>Adam was left to the happiest and most grateful reflections -of his life. Much good must come for him, for his -lonely hours, when once more the wastelands claimed him; -but that was the only thought he gave himself. Lounging -back on the old rustic bench, he gave himself up to a growing -delight of anticipation. These good Blairs did not -dream that in offering Genie a home out of the kindliness -of their hearts they had touched prosperity. They were -poor. But Genie was rich. They meant to share with the -orphan their little; they had no thought of anything Genie -might share with them. Adam decided that he would buy -the ninety acres, and the hundred in the valley beyond it; -and horses, cattle, all the stock and implements for a fine -ranch. Genie, innocent and bewildered child that she -was, had utterly forgotten her bags of gold. On the next -day, or soon, Adam meant to borrow Gene’s horse and -buggy and drive to Santa Ysabel and then to San Diego. -He must find some good investment for the rest of Genie’s<span class="pagenum" id="Page_392">392</span> -gold, and a good bank, and some capable and reliable -person to look after her affairs. How like a fairy story -it would seem to Genie! What amazement and delight -it would occasion Mrs. Blair! And as for the lad, no gold -could enhance Genie’s charm for him. Gene would love -Genie! Adam had seen it written in their unconscious -eyes. And Gene would have the working of the beautiful -ranch his eager heart had longed for. For the first time -Adam realized the worth of gold. Here it would be a -golden harvest.</p> - -<p>Dreaming thus, Adam was only faintly aware of voices -and footsteps that drew nearer; and suddenly he seemed -transfixed and thrilling, his gaze on a face he knew, the -face on the miniature he carried—the lovely face of Ruth -Virey.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_393">393</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXVIII">CHAPTER XXVIII</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">“The</span> foxes have holes—the birds of the air have -nests!” cried Adam.</p> - -<p>Was it he who lay there with aching heart and burning -eyes? Ah! Again the lonely wasteland claimed him. -That illimitable desert was home. Whose face was that -limned on the clouds, and set into the beaten bossy mosaic -of the sands, and sculptored in the contour of the dim, -colored ranges?</p> - -<p>His burros nipped the sage behind him as he lay, back -against a stone, on the lofty height of the Sierra Madre -divide, gazing down into that boundless void. What was -it that had happened? Ah! He had fled! And he lived -over again for the thousandth time, that week—that fleeting -week of transport with its endless regrets—in which -he had found Genie a home, in which the daughter of -Magdalene Virey had stormed his soul.</p> - -<p>Vague and happy those first days when he bought the -valley lands and flooded them with cattle—vague because -of the slow gathering of insupportable and unconscious love—happy -because he lived with Genie’s rapture and her romance. -Vivid were some of the memories—when he placed -in Genie’s little brown hands papers and deeds and bankbooks, -and by a gesture, as if by magic, proclaimed to her -wondering sense the truth of a tale of Aladdin; when, to -the serious-faced mother, pondering the costs, he announced -her once more owner of the long-regretted land; when, to -a fire-eyed lad, he had drawn aside the veil of the future.</p> - -<p>But vague, mystic as a troubled dream, the inception of -a love that rose like the blaze of the sun—vague as the -opaque dawn of the desert! Whenever he looked up, by -night or day, at task or idleness, there shone the lovely<span class="pagenum" id="Page_394">394</span> -face, pale as a dawn-hazed star, a face like Magdalene -Virey’s, with all of its beauty, but naught of its passion; -with all of its charm, yet none of its havoc. With youth, -and bloom, and wide-open purple eyes, dark as midnight, -staring at fate. And a voice like the voice of her mother, -sweet, but not mocking, haunted the dreams of the man -and lived in the winds.</p> - -<p>“And you are a desert man,” she had said.</p> - -<p>“Yes—a desert man,” he had replied.</p> - -<p>“There’s a place I want to go some day—when I am -twenty-one.... Death Valley! Do you know it? My -grandfather says I’m mad.”</p> - -<p>“Death Valley! For such as you? Stay—never go -near that awful hell!”</p> - -<p>The ghastly white pit and its naked red walls, the midnight -furnace winds with their wailing roar, the long, long -slopes to the avalanche graves! Ah! the torment of his -heart, the tragedy he would hide, and the secret he must -keep, and the miniature that burned in its place—they drew -her with the invisible cords of life and fate. What he -would spare her surged in the air that she breathed.</p> - -<p>She had come to him under the oaks, and yet again, -quitting her friends, drawn to the lonely desert man.</p> - -<p>“They told me Genie’s story,” she said, and her eyes -spoke eloquent praise her lips denied. “And so—her -mother and father died on the desert.... Tell me, desert -man, what does Death Valley look like?”</p> - -<p>“It is night; it is hell—death and desolation—the grave -of the desert, yellow and red and gray—lonely, lonely, -lonely silent land!”</p> - -<p>“But you love it!... Genie says the Indians call you -Eagle—because you have the eye of the eagle.... Tell -me.... Tell me....”</p> - -<p>And she made him talk, and she came again. Vague, -sweet, first hours they were, with their drawing pain. Was -it well to wake in the night, with eyes darker than the -darkness, peering into his soul? Her mother’s eyes—with -all the glory and none of the shame! She had come another<span class="pagenum" id="Page_395">395</span> -day and then the next, while time stood still with -its mocking wait.</p> - -<p>Not vaguely came a scene: “I will tell you of the desert,” -and a part of his story followed, brief and hard.</p> - -<p>“Ah! I would be a man,” she said. “I would never -run. I would never hide.”</p> - -<p>Mocking words from a tongue too sweet to mock! She -had her mother’s spirit. And Adam groped in the gloom, -to the glee of his devils of scorn. The grass by day and -the grass by night felt the impress of his face. Then love—first -real love of youth, and noble passion of man—blazed -as the sun in his face. From that revelation all -was clear in the bursting light of calamity.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Ruth was coming under the oaks. She liked the cool -shade and hated the glare. She was nineteen, with a -woman’s form and her mother’s eyes—proud, sweet, aloof.</p> - -<p>“Desert man, I am lonesome,” she said. “My grandfather -has gone again. He is chasing some new will-o’-the-wisp. -Gold and mines, cattle and land—and now it’s -water. He has an ear for every man.”</p> - -<p>“Lonesome? You! What do you know of loneliness?” -asked Adam.</p> - -<p>“There’s a loneliness of soul.”</p> - -<p>“Ah! but you are young. Go help Genie plan her home.”</p> - -<p>“Genie and Gene! Two people with but one voice! -They cannot hear or see anyone but themselves. It’s a -pity to invade their paradise. <em>I</em> will not.... And, oh, -how beautiful the world must be to them!”</p> - -<p>“Ruth, is it not so to you?”</p> - -<p>“Beautiful lands and greens and waters!” she exclaimed, -in restless discontent. “But I cannot live on scenery. -There is joy here, but none for me.... I lost my mother -and I can’t forget. She <em>had</em> to leave me and go with him—my -father. My father who loved me as a child and hated -me as a girl. Oh, it’s all a mystery! She went with him -to the desert. Gold mad—she said he was. She had her -debt to pay. And <em>I</em> could not be taken to Death Valley.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_396">396</span> -“You have never heard from her since the parting?”</p> - -<p>“Never.... And I am a woman now. Some day I -will go to Death Valley.”</p> - -<p>“Why?” he asked.</p> - -<p>“Because <em>they</em> went there.”</p> - -<p>“But no one lives long in that valley of death.”</p> - -<p>“Then I will find their graves,” she said.</p> - -<p>“Ruth, you must not. What good can come of your -traveling there? I’ve told you of its desolate and forbidding -nature. You are all wrong. Wait! Perhaps -your mother will—perhaps you will hear of her some day.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, desert man, I was a child when we parted. I’m a -woman now. I want to <em>know</em>. The mystery haunts me. -<em>She</em> loved me—ah, so well!... Sometimes I cannot bear -to live. My grandfather hides me in lonely places. We -meet but few people, and those he repels. It is because -of <em>me</em>.... Desert man, I am lonelier than was Genie. -She is like a bird. She must have lived on the sun and the -winds. But <em>I</em> am no child, and <em>I</em> am forlorn.”</p> - -<p>Brooding purple eyes of trouble, of longing, of discontent, -of fire for life! The heart and soul of Ruth Virey—the -heritage of need and unrest—shone from her eyes. -All unconsciously she longed to be loved. She stood on the -threshold of womanhood like a leaf in a storm.</p> - -<p>“Talk with me, walk with me, desert man,” she said, -wistfully. “You were Taquitch for Genie. Be Eagle for -me. Your eyes know the desert where my mother sleeps—where -perhaps her spirit wanders. You soothe my -troubled heart. Oh, I can feel <em>myself</em> with you, for you -understand.”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Thus Adam’s soul was stormed. Magdalene Virey had -presaged the future. In the dark stillness of the night, -sleepless, haunted, tossed by torment, it was revealed to -him that Magdalene Virey had risen out of the depths -on noble love for him, and through that love she had seen -with mystic eyes into the future. She had projected that -love into the spirit of the desert, and it had guided Adam’s<span class="pagenum" id="Page_397">397</span> -wandering steps to her daughter Ruth. Was this only a -wanderer’s dream as he lay on the hills? Was it only a -knot in the tangled skein of his desert life? Was it -inscrutable design of a power he disdained?</p> - -<p>Be what this might, the one great love of his years -possessed him, fierce and resistless on its march to his -defeat. It mocked his ordeal. It flaunted a banner in his -face—noble love, noble passion, love of the soul, all that -revered woman, wife, mother, and babe. He had found -his mate. Strange how he remembered Margarita Arallanes -and the wild boy’s love of a day. Poor, pale, wasteful, -sinful, lustful little gleam! And he recalled the spell -of Genie—that strong call of nature in the wilderness. -Above both he had arisen. But Ruth Virey was <em>the</em> -woman. He could win her. The truth beat at his temples, -constricted his throat. Ruth was the flower of her mother’s -tragic longing to be loved. Ruth burned with that longing. -And life was not to be denied. Magdalene Virey had -given him this child of her agony. She trusted the fate -of Ruth in his hands. She saw with superhuman eyes.</p> - -<p>A deep tenderness for Ruth pervaded Adam’s soul. -Who, of all men, could love her, save her, content her as -he? It was not thought of her kisses, of her embraces, -that plucked at the roots of his will. Like a passing wave -the thrill of such bliss went out to the might of a nobler -tide. To save Ruth from the fate of her mother, from -the peril of her own heart! And in the saving, a home—happiness—the -tender smile of a mother—and the kiss of -a child!</p> - -<p>“But I am a criminal! I am a murderer! Any day I -might be hanged before her very eyes!” he whispered, with -his face in the grass, his fingers digging the turf. “Still—no -one would ever recognize me now.... Ah! but <em>he</em>—that -human wolf Collishaw—would not he know me?... -Oh, if there be God—help me in my extremity!”</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Once again he met her. As he rode up the valley at -sunset she came out of the oak grove.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_398">398</span> -“I’ve been with Genie. Desert man, her happiness -frightens me. Oh, I love her! You tell me of your hard, -lonely, terrible desert life. Why, your ears should ring -with bells of joy forever. It is <em>you</em> who have built her -castle. What other deeds, like that, have you done—in -those bitter years you tell of?”</p> - -<p>“Not many, Ruth—perhaps not one.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t believe you. I am learning you, desert man. -And, oh, I wish you knew how it swells my heart to hear -Genie tell of what you did for her. Every day she tells -me something new.... Ah! and more—for to-day she -said you would be leaving soon.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, Ruth—soon,” he said.</p> - -<p>“Back to the lonely land?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, back to the sage and sand and the big dark hills. -Yes, it will be a lonely land,” he replied, sadly.</p> - -<p>“And you will wander down the trails until you meet -some one—some woman or child or man—sick or miserable -or lost—and then you will stop.”</p> - -<p>Adam had no answer.</p> - -<p>“The Indians called you Eagle,” she went on, and her -tone startled him with its hint of remembered mockery. -“You have the desert eye—you see so far.... But you -don’t see <em>here</em>!... Why should you waste your splendid -strength, your magnificent manhood, wandering over the -desert <em>if</em> it’s only for unhappy people? Desert man, you -are great. But you could do more good here—you could -find more misery here.... I know one whose heart is -breaking. And you’ve never <em>seen</em>, for all your eagle eye!”</p> - -<p>“Listen, you morbid girl,” he returned, stung as with -fire. “I am not great. I am lost. I go to the desert because -it is home.... Don’t think of me! But look to -yourself. Look into your heart. Fear it, Ruth Virey. You -are a spoiled, dreamful, passionate child. But you have a -mind and you have a will. You can conquer your unrest, -your discontent. Revere the memory of your mother, but -grieve no more. The past is dead. Learn to fight. You -are no fighter. You are weak. You give in to loneliness,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_399">399</span> -sadness, longing. Resolve to be a woman! You must live -your life. Make it worth while. Every man, every -woman, has a burden. Lift yours cheerfully and begin to -climb.... Work for your grandfather. He needs your -help. Love those with whom fate has placed you. And -fight—fight the dark moods, the selfish thoughts, the hateful -memories! Fight like a desert beast for your life. -Work—work till you bruise those beautiful hands. Work -with a hoe, if you can find nothing else. Love to see things -grow green and flower and give fruit. Love the animals, -the birds, and learn from them; love all nature, so that -when you meet a man some day, <em>the</em> man, you can love -him. That is what it means to be a woman. You are a -beautiful, sweet, useless, and petulant girl. But be so no -more. Be a woman!”</p> - -<p>Pale and shocked, with brimming eyes and tremulous -lips, she replied:</p> - -<p>“Stay—stay, desert man, and make me a woman!”</p> - -<p>And those sad dark eyes and those sweet murmured -words had made him flee—flee like a craven in the night. -Yes, for Ruth’s sake he had fled. Not a farewell to Genie—not -a wave of his hand, but gone in the night—gone -forever out of their lives!</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>“The foxes have holes—the birds of the air have nests!” -cried Adam, to the listening silence.</p> - -<p>Was it he who lay there with broken heart and magnified -sight? Yes, wanderer of the wasteland again! Back -to the lonely land! That limitless expanse of rock and -sand was home. Was not that Ruth’s face limned on the -clouds? Did not her sad, reproachful eyes haunt him in -the dim, purple distances?</p> - -<p>From the lofty divide of the Sierra Madres Adam gazed -down into the void he called home. Beyond the gray -sands and far beyond the red reaches he saw across the -California Desert into Arizona, and down into Mexico, -and to the dim, blue Gulf.</p> - -<p>Home! All the years of Adam’s desert experience were<span class="pagenum" id="Page_400">400</span> -needed to grasp the meaning of the stupendous scene. The -eye of the eagle, the sight of the condor, supreme over the -desert, most marvelous and delicate work of nature, could -only behold, could only range that sun-blasted burned-out -empire of the wastelands. Only the mind of man, the -thought of man, could understand it. And for Adam it -was home, and to his piercing eyes a thing, a place, a world, -terribly true and beautiful and comforting, upon which he -seemed driven to gaze and gaze, so that forever it must -be limned on his vision and his memory.</p> - -<p>The day was one of sunlight and storm, of blue sky -and purple clouds and fleecy white, of palls of swirling -gray snow and dark veils of downward-streaming rain. -The Sierra Madres rolled away on either side, range on -range, rising to the north in the might of slow league-long -mountain swell, until far against the stormy sky stood -the old white-capped heave of San Gorgonio looming over -the gray Mohave; and to the south, like the wave undulations -of a calm sea, sank the long low lines of the arid -arm of desert land.</p> - -<p>Beneath Adam piled the foothills, round and old and -gray, sage gray, lavender gray, lilac gray, all so strangely -gray—upheaved hills of aged earth and dust and stone. -Hill by hill they lowered, with glaring gorges between, -solitary hills and winding ranges and clustered domes, split -by canyons and cleft by brushy ravines—miles and miles -of foothills, reluctantly surrendering allegiance to the peaks -above, moving downward as surely as the grains of their -slopes, weathering and spreading at last in the sands.</p> - -<p>Away and away flowed that gray Sahara with its specks -of sage, ribbed by its ridges of dunes. Immense and unbounded -it swept to its center, the Salton Sink—bowl of -the desert—a great lake of colored silt, a ghastly, glaring -stain on the earth, over which the storm clouds trailed their -veils of rain, and shadows like colossal ships sailed the -sandy main. Away to the southward it flowed, level and -shining, at last to rise and meet the blue sky in lucent -spurs of gold and white. This landmark contrasted singularly<span class="pagenum" id="Page_401">401</span> -with the Salton Sink. It was the illusive and shifting -line of the Superstition Mountains, where the wind sheeted -the sands, and by night or day, like the changing of tides, -went on with its mysterious transformation. These giant -sand hills caught the sunlight through a rift in the broken -clouds. And dim under the dunes showed the scalloped, -dark shadows.</p> - -<p>But these foothills and sand plains were only the edge -of the desert. Beyond marched the mountain ranges. -Vast, upheaved, crinkled crust of the naked earth, scored -by fire, scarred by age, cracked by earthquake, and stained -in the rusty reds and colored chocolates of the iron rocks! -Down to the rim of the Salton Sink sheered a ragged range. -Over it centered the lowering storm clouds, gray and drab -and purple, with rays of the sun filtering through, lighting -the grim, dark hardness, showing the smoky gloom. -And where the ridge ran down to the desert, to make the -lines of the sandy lake, it resembled a shore of the river -Styx.</p> - -<p>Beyond gleamed the Chocolate Mountains, sharp in the -sunshine, canyoned and blue. And still beyond them, over -the valley and far, rose the myriad mountains of Arizona, -dim, hazed land, mystic land, like a land of desert dreams. -In the distant south, around the blunt end of the Chocolates, -came a valley winding palely green, with a line following -its center, where the Rio Colorado meandered in its -course to the blue waters of the Gulf. Over the shadowy -shapes of mountains in haze, over the horizon of Arizona, -there seemed a blank, pale wall of sky, strange to the -eye. Was it the oblivion of sight, the infinitude of heaven? -Piercing constant gaze at last brought to Adam the ghostly -mountains of Mexico, the faintest of faint tracery of peaks, -doubtful, then lost, the lonely Sonorian land.</p> - -<p>“And that is my home!” he cried to the winds. Slow -tears bathed his eyes, and, closing them, he rested his -strained sight. A strange peace seemed to have stolen over -him with his vision and grasp of the desert. A low, soft -moan of wind in the crevices of rocks lulled his senses for<span class="pagenum" id="Page_402">402</span> -the revel that was to come. He heard his burros nipping -at the brush behind his back. From the heights an eagle -shrilled its wild whistle of freedom and of solitude. One -of the burros brayed, loud and bawling, a jarring note -in a silence. Discordant sound it was, that yet brought a -smile and a pang to Adam. For only yesterday—or was -it long ago—what was it that had happened?</p> - -<p>When he opened his eyes the desert under him and the -infinity over him had been transfigured.</p> - -<p>Only the full blaze of the sun! But a glory dwelt in the -clouds and in the wide blue expanse of heaven. Silver-edged -rents, purple ships in a golden sky, the long, fan-shaped -rays of the sun, white rainbows of haze—these -extended from the north across the arch to the open—a -great peacefulness of light, deep and tender and blue.</p> - -<p>Beneath lay the mirror of earth, the sun-fired ranges -like chased and beaten gold, laid with shining jewels all -around the resplendent desert. Mountains of porphyry -marched down to the sands, rocks of bronze red burned -down to the sands. The white columnar pillars of the -clouds seemed reflected in the desert, slow-gliding across -the lucent wastes; and the mosaic of mountain and plain -had its mirage in the sky. Above and below worked the -alchemy of nature, mutable and evanescent, the dying of -day, the passing of life.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_403">403</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXIX">CHAPTER XXIX</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap"><span class="smcap1">Going</span> down into the desert, Adam found that his -steps were no longer wandering and aimless. And -the nearer he got to the canyon pass in the Chocolates, the -stronger grew his strange eagerness.</p> - -<p>For years memory of that camp where he had fought -starvation had drawn him like a magnet. He was weary -with delving into the gulf of himself, trying to know his -nature and heart and soul. Always he was beyond himself. -No sooner was one mystery solved than another and -deeper one presented itself; one victory gained than a -more desperate trial faced him. He only knew the old -camp called him resistlessly. Something would come to -him there.</p> - -<p>Travel and tasks of morn and eve were so habitual with -him that they made little break in his thought. And that -thought, like his desert steps, had traveled in a circle. He -was nearing the places where he had begun his fight with -physical forces. His every step brought him so much -closer to the terrible deed that had so bitterly colored and -directed his desert life.</p> - -<p>He crossed the sandy basin from the Sierra Madres to -the Chocolates in four days, two of his camps being dry. -And on the fifth, in the afternoon, when the long shadows -had begun to creep out from the mountains across sand -and sage, he climbed the swelling, well-remembered slope -where Charley Jim had lured the antelope, and gazed down -into the oasis where he had all but starved to death, and -where Oella had saved his life.</p> - -<p>What struck him with gladness was to find the gray-green, -lonely scene identical with the picture in his memory. -How well he remembered! And it was twelve years—thirteen—fourteen<span class="pagenum" id="Page_404">404</span> -years! Yet time had made little or -no change in the oasis. Nature worked slowly in the -desert.</p> - -<p>His burros scented the water and trotted down the sage -bank, bobbing their packs, kicking up little puffs of odorous -dust. Adam stood still and gazed long. He seemed -to be almost ready to draw a deep, full breath of melancholy -joy. Then he descended to the sandy, rock-studded -floor of the canyon, and on the wide white stream bed, -where, as always, a slender stream tinkled over the pearly -pebbles. How strange that he should fall into the exact -course where once he had worn a trail! The flat stones -upon which he stepped were as familiar as if he had trod -them yesterday. But inside the palm grove time had -made changes. The thatched huts were gone and the open -places were overgrown with brush. No one had inhabited -the oasis for many years.</p> - -<p>Leisurely he pitched camp, working with a sense of comfort -and pleasure at the anticipation of a permanent, or -at least an indefinite, stay there. Of all his lonely camps -on the desert, this had been the loneliest. He called it Lost -Oasis. Here he could spend days and weeks, basking like -a lizard in the sunshine, feeling his loneliness, listening -to the silence; and he could climb to the heights and -dream, and watch, and live again those wonderful, revealing, -unthinking moments when he went back to savage -nature.</p> - -<p>After his work and meal were finished, and sunset was -coloring the sky, Adam wandered around through the -willows and along the stream. He stood for some time -looking down upon the sandy bar where he had stumbled -in pursuit of the rattlesnake and it had bitten him in the -face. And then he went from one familiar place to another, -sitting at last in the twilight, under the palms where -Oella had nursed and fed him back to life and strength. -Where was she now—that tranquil, somber-eyed Indian -maiden who had refused to wed one of her race and who -had died of a broken heart? The twilight seemed prophetic,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_405">405</span> -the rustling palms seemed whispering. Both sadness -and pleasure mingled in Adam’s return.</p> - -<p>But the nameless something, the vague assurance of content, -the end of that restless, strange sense of hurrying -onward still to seek, to find—these feelings seemed about -to come to him, yet held tantalizingly aloof. To-morrow -surely! He was tired with his long travel, and it would -take a little time once more to adjust himself to loneliness. -The perfect peace of loneliness had not yet come back to -him. His mind was too full to attend to the seeing, listening, -feeling that constituted harmony with the desert. Yet -something was beginning to come between remembrances -of the immediate past and the insistent premonitions of the -present. When he lay down in his blankets to hear the -low rustle of the wind in the palms and to see the haunting -stars, it was to realize that they were the same as always, -but that he himself had changed.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Next day he climbed to the heights where he had learned -to hunt mountain sheep, where he had learned the watching, -listening, primitive joy of the Indian. He thrilled in -the climb, he breathed deep of the keen, cold wind, he -gazed afar with piercing eyes. Hours, like those of a -lonely eagle on a crag, Adam spent there, and he wooed -back to him the watching, listening power with its reward -of sweet, wild elation. But as the westering sun sent him -down the mountain, he felt a vague regret. The indefinable -something eluded him.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>In the dusk Adam walked along the rim of the slope -above the oasis. He had watched the sunset fade over -the desert, and the shading of twilight, and the gathering -of dusk.</p> - -<p>He wondered what it would mean to him now to be lost -without water or food down there in the wasteland. Would -panic seize him? He imagined it would be only as long -as he was not sure of death. When he realized that, he -would find strength and peace to meet his doom. But<span class="pagenum" id="Page_406">406</span> -what agony to look up at the starlit heaven and breathe -farewell to beautiful life, to the strong, sweet wine of -nature, to the memory of love!</p> - -<p>To die alone down there? Ah! Why did his thoughts -turn to death? To lie down on the sand and the sage of -the desert, in the dead darkness of night, would be terrible. -Yet, would it really be? Would not something come to his -soul? A strong man’s farewell to life, out there on the -lonesome desert, would be elemental and natural. But the -hour of facing death—how sad, lonely, tragic! Yet it -had been bravely met by countless men over all the desolate -deserts of the dreary world. All men did not feel alike. -Perhaps the strongest, bravest, calmest, would suffer the -least. Still, it was Adam’s conviction that to look up at -the indifferent heavens and to send a hopeless cry out -across the desert, realizing the end, remembering with -anguish the faces of loved ones, would indeed be a bursting -of the heart.</p> - -<p>Life was so short. Hope and love so futile! Home and -family—ah! a brother—should be treasured, and lived for -with all the power of blood and mind. Friends should be -precious. It was realization that a man needed.</p> - -<p>A crescent beautiful moon soared up over the dark bulk -of the mountain. Adam paced to and fro in a sandy glade -of the oasis. All the immensity of desert and infinity of -sky seemed to be at work to overwhelm him. The stars—so -white, wonderful, watching, eyes of heaven, remorseless -and wise! Not a sigh of wind stirred under the palms, -not a quiver of a leaf. Nature seemed so strange, beautiful, -waiting. All waited! Was it for him? The shadows -on the white sand wrote Adam’s story of wild youth and -crime and flight and agony and passion and love. How -sad the low chirp of insects! Adam paced there a long -time, thinking thoughts he never had before, feeling things -he never felt before—realizing the brevity of life, the -soul of sorrow, the truth of nature, the sweetness of -women, the glory of children, the happiness of work and -home.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_407">407</span> -Something was charging the air around Adam; something -was surging deep in his soul.</p> - -<p>What was the meaning of that which confounded his -emotions? Adam’s soul seemed trembling on the verge of -a great lesson, that had been hidden all the years and now -began to dawn upon him in the glory of the firmament—in -the immensity of the earth—in the sense of endless -space—in the meaning of time—in the nothingness of -man.</p> - -<p>Suddenly a faint coldness, not of wind nor of chill air, -but of something intangible, stole over Adam. He shivered. -He had felt it before, though never so strong. And his -sense of loneliness vanished. He was not alone! All -around he peered, not frightened or aghast, but uncertain, -vaguely conscious of a sense that seemed unnatural. The -shadow of his lofty form showed dark on the sand. It -walked with him as he walked. Was there a spirit in -keeping with his steps?</p> - -<p>Disturbed in mind, Adam went to bed. When he awoke -there had come to him in the night, in his sleep or in his -dreams, whispered words from Genie’s mother, ringing -words from Ruth Virey, “I will come to you out on the -desert.” Mrs. Linwood had meant that to be proof of -immortal life of the soul—of God. And Ruth had rung -at him: “I would be a man. I would never run. I would -never hide!”</p> - -<p>Then the still, small voice of conscience became a clarion. -Torment seized Adam. The lonely lure of the desert had -betrayed him. There was no rest—no peace. He was -driven. He had dreamed of himself as a wanderer driven -down the naked shingles of the desert. No dream, but -reality!</p> - -<p>He spent the day upon the heights, feeling that there, -if anywhere, he might shake this burden of his consciousness. -In vain! He was a civilized man, and only in rare -moments could he go back to the forgetfulness of the -savage. He had a soul. It was a living flame. The -heights failed him. A haunting whisper breathed in the<span class="pagenum" id="Page_408">408</span> -wind and an invisible spirit kept pace with his steps. And -at last, in slow-mounting swell of heart, with terror in -his soul, he faced the south. Ah! How sharp the pang -in his breast! Picacho! There, purple against the sky, -seemingly close, stood up the turreted and castled peak -under the shadow of which lay the grave of his brother. -And Adam sent out a lonely and terrible cry down the -winds toward the place that resistlessly called him. He -was called and he must go. He had wandered in a circle. -All his steps had bent toward the scene of his crime. -From the first to the last he had been wandering back to -his punishment. He saw it now. That was the call—that -the guide—that the nameless something charging -the air.</p> - -<p>Realization gave him a moment’s savageness—the power -of body over mind. Heart and blood and pulse and nerve -burst red hot to the fight, and to passionate love of liberty, -of life. He was in the grasp of a giant of the ages. He -fought as he had fought thirst, starvation, loneliness—as -he had fought the desert and the wild beasts and wilder -men of that desert. The deep and powerful instinct which -he had conquered for Genie’s sake—the noble emotion of -love and bliss that he had overcome for Ruth’s sake—what -were these compared to the hell in his heart now? -It was love of life that made him a fierce wild cat of the -desert. Had not the desert taught him its secret to survive, -to breathe, to see, to listen, to live?</p> - -<p>Thus the I of Adam’s soul was arraigned in pitiless strife -with the Me of his body. Like a wild and hunted creature -he roamed the mountain top, halting at the old resting -places, there to sit like a stone, to lie on his face, to writhe -and fight and cry in his torment. At sunset he staggered -down the trail, spent and haggard, to take up useless tasks, -to find food tasteless and sleep impossible. Thus passed -the next day and yet another, before there came a break -in his passion and his strength.</p> - -<p>The violence of physical effort wore itself out. He -remained in camp, still locked in deadly grip with himself,<span class="pagenum" id="Page_409">409</span> -but wearing to that end in which his conscience would -rise supreme, or he would sink forever debased.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>A perfect white night came in which Adam felt that -the oasis and its environment presented a soul-quieting -scene. What incredible paradox that he must go to nature -for the strength to save himself from himself! To the -nature that made him a savage—that urged in him the -strife of the wolf! The moon, half full, shone overhead -in a cloudless blue sky where great white stars twinkled. -No wind stirred. The palms drooped, sad and graceful, -strangely quiet. They were meant for wind. The shadows -they cast were of nameless shapes. A wavering dark -line of horizon wandered away to be lost in the wilderness. -So still, so tranquil, so sweet the night! There -were only two sounds—the melancholy notes of a night -hawk, and the low, faint moan from the desert. The -desert to Adam seemed a vast river, flowing slowly, down -the levels of the earth to distant gates. Its moan was one -of immutable power and motive. By this soft, low, strange -moan the world seemed to be dominated. A spirit was -out there in the gloom—a spirit from the illimitable, star-studded -infinite above. And it was this spirit that came, -at rare intervals, and whispered to Adam’s consciousness. -Madman or knave, he was being conquered.</p> - -<p>“I would never hide!” Ruth Virey had said in passionate -scorn.</p> - -<p>She was like her mother, wonderful as steel in her will. -Yet these women seemed all heart. They transcended men -in love, in sacrifice, in that living flame of soul, turbulent -and unquenchable as the fire of the sun.</p> - -<p>“<em>I’ll hide no more!</em>” burst from Adam, and the whisper -startled him, like those soundless whispers in the shadows.</p> - -<p>He could live no longer a life in hiding. He must stand, -in his own consciousness, if only for a moment, free to -look any man in the face, free to be worthy to love Ruth -Virey, free as the eagle of his spirit. He would no longer -hide from man, from punishment. Love of that purple-eyed<span class="pagenum" id="Page_410">410</span> -girl had been a stinging, quickening spur. But it was -only instrumental in the overthrow of fear. Some other -power, not physical, not love, but cold, pure, passionless, -spiritual, had been drawing him like a wavering compass -needle to its pole.</p> - -<p>Was it the faith Genie’s dying mother had placed in -God? Was it a godlike something in him which conflicted -with nature? Was it the strange progress of life, -inscrutable and inflexible, that dragged men down or lifted -them up, made them base or made them great?</p> - -<p>The darkness of his mind, the blackness of the abyss -of his soul, seemed about to be illumined. But the truth -held aloof. Yet could he not see what constituted greatness -in any man? What was it to be great? The beasts -of the desert and the birds recognized it—strength—speed—ferocity—tenacity -of life. The Indians worshiped greatness -so that they looked up and prayed to their gods. They -worshiped stature, and power and skill of hand, and fleetness -of foot, and above all—endurance. More, they endowed -their great chieftains with wisdom. But above -all—to endure pain, heat, shock, all of the desert hardships, -all of the agonies of life—to endure—that was their -symbol of greatness.</p> - -<p>Adam asked no other for himself or for any man. To -endure and to surmount the ills of life! Any man could -be great. He had his choice. To realize at last—to face -the inevitable fight in any walk of life—to work and to -endure—to slave and to suffer in silence—to stand like -a savage the bloody bruises and broken bones—to bite the -tongue and hold back the gasp—to plod on down the trails -or the roads or the streets and to be true to an ideal—to -endure the stings and blows of misfortune—to bear up -under loss—to fight the bitterness of defeat and the weakness -of grief—to be victor over anger—to smile when -tears were close—to resist disease and evil men and base -instincts—to hate hate and to love love—to go on when -it would seem good to die—to seek ever the glory and -the dream—to look up with unquenchable faith in something<span class="pagenum" id="Page_411">411</span> -evermore about to be—that was what any man could -do and so be great!</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>At midnight Adam paced under the palms. All seemed -dim, gray, cool, spectral, rustling, whispering. The old -familiar sounds were there, only rendered different by his -mood. Midnight was haunting. Somehow the desert with -its mustering shadows, dark and vast and strange, resembled -his soul and his destiny and the mystery of himself. -How sweet the loneliness and solitude of the oasis! There -under the palms he could walk and be himself, with only -the eye of nature and of spirit on him in this final hour -of his extremity.</p> - -<p>Happiness was not imperative; self-indulgence was not -essential to life. Adam realized he had done wonderful -things—perhaps noble things. But nothing great! Perhaps -all his agony had been preparation for this supreme -ordeal.</p> - -<p>How saving and splendid would it be, if out of his -stultified youth, with its blinded love of brother and its -weakness of will—if out of the bitter sting of infidelity -and his fatal, tragic deed—if out of the long torture of -hardship of the desert and its strife and its contact with -souls as wild as his—how glorious it would be if out of -this terrible tide of dark, contending years, so full of remorse -and fear and endless atonement, there should rise -a man who, trained now in the desert’s ferocity to survive, -should use that force to a noble aim, and, climbing beyond -his nature, sacrifice himself to the old biblical law—a life -for a life—and with faith in unknown future lend his spirit -to the progress of the ages!</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>Adam divined that he did not belong to himself. What -he wanted for himself, selfishly, was not commensurable -with the need of others in this life. He was concerned -here with many ideals, the highest of which was sacrifice, -that the evil of him should not go on. Since he had loved -Ruth Virey the whole value of life had shifted. Life was<span class="pagenum" id="Page_412">412</span> -sweet, but no longer if he had to hide, no longer under -the ban of crime. The stain must be washed away. By -slow and gradual change, by torments innumerable, had -he come to this realization. He had deceived himself by -love of life. But the truth in him was the truth of the -immortality of his soul, just as it was truth that he inherited -instincts of the savage. Life was renewal. Every -base, selfish man held back its spirituality.</p> - -<p>“No more! No more!” cried Adam, looking up.</p> - -<p>And in that cry he accepted the spirit of life, the mighty -being that pulsated there in the darkness, the whispering -voice of Genie’s mother, the love of Ruth that never was -to be his, the strange, desperate fights with his instincts, -the stranger fight of his renunciation—he accepted these -on faith as his idea of God.</p> - -<p>“I will give my life for my brother’s,” he said. “I -will offer myself in punishment for my crime. I will pay -with my body that I may save my soul!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_413">413</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"> -<h2 id="CHAPTER_XXX">CHAPTER XXX</h2> -</div> - -<p class="drop-cap al"><span class="smcap1">Adam</span> lingered in his travel through the beautiful Palo -Verde Valley, and at last reached the long swell of -desert slope that led down to the Rio Colorado.</p> - -<p>Tranquil and sad was his gaze on the majestic river -as it swirled red and sullen between its wide green borders -toward the upflung wilderness of colored peaks he remembered -so well.</p> - -<p>All day he strode behind his faithful burros, here high -on the river bank where he could see the somber flood -rolling to the south, and there low in the willow-shaded -trail. And though he had an eye for the green, dry coverts -and the wide, winding valley, he seemed to see most -vividly the scenes of boyhood and of home. And the memory -revived the love he had borne his brother Guerd. -High on the grassy hill at the old village school—he was -there once again, wild and gay, playing the games, tagging -at the heels of his idol.</p> - -<p>The miles slipped by under his tireless stride. Hour by -hour he had quickened his pace. And when sunset caught -him with its call to camp, he could see the grand purple -bulk of old Picacho looming in the sky. Twilight and -dusk and night, and the lonely camp fire! He heard the -sullen gurgle of the river in the weeds and he saw the -trains of stars reflected along its swirling surface. A -killdeer, most mournful of birds, pealed his plaintive, lonely -cry. Across the blue-black sky gleamed a shooting star. -The wind stirred in the leaves, gently and low, and fanned -the glowing embers, and bore the white ashes away into -the darkness. Shadows played from the flickering blaze, -fantastic and weird, like dancing specters in the gloom. -Adam watched the gleaming river rolling on to its grave<span class="pagenum" id="Page_414">414</span> -in the Gulf. Like all things, it died, was dispersed, and -had rebirth in other climes. Then he watched the stars -at their grand and blazing task.</p> - -<div class="tb">* * * * *</div> - -<p>On the afternoon of the third day he turned under -the red bluff into the basin of Picacho. Long the trail had -been overgrown and dim, and cattle tracks were scarce. -The wide willow and mesquite flat, with its groves of -cottonwoods, had grown denser, wilder, no more crisscrossed -by trails. Adam had slowed down now, and he -skirted the edge of the thicket till he reached the bank -of bronze rock that had flowed down from the peaks in -ages past. The <i>ocatillas</i>, so pearly gray, softly green, and -vividly scarlet, grew there just the same as long ago when -he had plucked a flower for the dusky hair of Margarita. -He welcomed sight of them, for they were of the -past.</p> - -<p>And here, side by side, stood the crucifixion tree and -the <i xml:lang="es" lang="es">palo verde</i> under which Margarita had told him their -legends. The years had made no change that Adam could -discern. The smoke tree and the green tree raised their -delicate, exquisite, leafless foliage against the blue of sky, -beautiful and soft, hiding from the eye the harsh law of -their desert nature.</p> - -<p>Adam tarried here. His wandering steps were nearing -their end. And he gazed across the river at the wilderness -of Arizona peaks. It seemed he knew every one. Had -he seen them yesterday or long ago?</p> - -<p>The sculptured turrets of Picacho were taking on a -crown of gold, and from the sheer, ragged bluffs of the -purple mass shadows and hazes and rays were streaming -down into the valley. One golden streak slanted from the -wind-worn hole in the rim. Solemn and noble the castled -mountain towered in the sky. In its lonely grandeur there -was strength.</p> - -<p>One moment longer Adam watched and listened, absorbing -the color and glory and wildness, stung to the -depths of his heart by his farewell to loneliness. He<span class="pagenum" id="Page_415">415</span> -retrograded one last instant to the savage who sensed but -did not think. He thrilled to the old, mysterious, fading -instinct. Then, as in answer to a sonorous call in his ear, -he measured slow and laboring strides through the aisles -to the river.</p> - -<p>His burros scratched their packs on the thorny mesquites -to get down to the arrowweed and willow. Where once -had been open bank, now all was green, except for a narrow -sandy aisle. The dock was gone. A sunken barge lay on -a bar, and moored to its end were two leaky skiffs. Traffic -and trade had departed from the river landing. Adam -remembered a prospector had told him that the mill had -been moved from the river up to the mine under the peak. -So now, he thought, supplies and traffic must come and go -by way of Yuma.</p> - -<p>He drove his burros down the sandy aisle. A glimpse -of an old adobe wall, gray through the mesquites, stopped -his heart. He went on. The house of Arallanes was a -roofless ruin, the vacant windows and doors staring darkly, -the walls crumbling to the sands. The shed where Adam -had slept was now half hidden by mesquites. The <i>ocatilla</i> -poles were bleached and rotten and the brush was gone -from the roof; but the sandy floor looked as clean and -white as the day Adam had spread his blankets there. -Fourteen years! Silent he stood, and the low, mournful -wind was a knell. The past could never be undone.</p> - -<p>He went back to the lane and to the open. Old stone -walls were all that appeared left of houses he expected to -see. Over the trees, far up the slope, he espied the ruins -of the dismantled mill. Unreal it looked there, out of place, -marring the majestic sweep of the slope.</p> - -<p>His keen desert nostrils detected smoke before he saw -blue columns rising through the green. He passed a plot -of sand-mounded graves. Had they been there? How -fierce a pang pierced his heart! Rude stones marked the -graves, and on one a single wooden cross, crude and -weathered, slanted away. Adam peered low at the lettering—M. -A. And swiftly he swung erect.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_416">416</span> -There was a cluster of houses farther on, low and squat, -a few of them new, but most of them Adam remembered. -A post-office sign marked this village of Picacho. The -stone-fronted store looked just the same, and the loungers -there might never have moved from their tracks in fourteen -years. But the faces were strange.</p> - -<p>A lean old man, gray and peaked, detached himself from -the group and tottered toward Adam with his cane in -the sand.</p> - -<p>“Wal, stranger, howdy! You down from upriver?”</p> - -<p>His voice twanged a chord of memory. Merryvale! -Slowly the tide of emotion rose in Adam’s breast. He -peered down into the gray old face, with its narrow, half-shut -eyes and its sunken cheeks. Yes, it was Merryvale.</p> - -<p>“Howdy, friend!” replied Adam. “Yes, I come from -up the river.”</p> - -<p>“Strange in these parts, I reckon?”</p> - -<p>“Yes. But I—I was here years ago.”</p> - -<p>“Was, I knowed you was strange because you come in by -the river. Travelers nowadays go round the mountain. -Prospectors never come any more. The glory of Picacho -has faded.”</p> - -<p>“Aren’t they working the mill?” queried Adam, quickly.</p> - -<p>“Haw! Haw! The mill will never grind with ore that -is gone! No work these last five years. The mill has -rusted out—fallen to ruin. And the gold of old Picacho -is gone. But, stranger, she hummed while she lasted. -Millions in gold—millions in gold!”</p> - -<p>He wagged his lean old head and chuckled.</p> - -<p>“I knew a man here once by the name of Arallanes. -What has become of him?”</p> - -<p>“Arallanes? Wal, I do recollect him. I was watchman -at the mill an’ he was boss of the gang. His daughter -was knifed by a greaser named Felix.... Arallanes left -here these ten years ago an’ he’s never been back.”</p> - -<p>“His—daughter!... Is that her grave back there—the -sunken mound of sand—with the wooden cross?”</p> - -<p>“I reckon that’s Margarita’s grave. She was a pretty<span class="pagenum" id="Page_417">417</span> -wench—mad about men—an’ there’s some who said she -got her just deserts.”</p> - -<p>The broad river gleamed yellow through the breaks in -the mesquites. Ponderous and swirling, it glided on round -the bend. Adam’s gaze then sought the peak. The vast, -stormy, purple mass, like a mountain of cloud, shone with -sunset crown of silver.</p> - -<p>Somewhere near, hidden by the trees, a Mexican broke -the stillness with song—wild, sensuous, Spanish love, in its -haunting melody.</p> - -<p>“I knew another man here,” began Adam, with the words -a sonorous knell in his ear. “His name was Collishaw.... -What’s become of him?”</p> - -<p>“Collishaw? Never will forgit <em>him</em>!” declared the old -man, grimly. “Last I heard he was cheatin’ Injuns out of -water rights over here at Walters—an’ still lookin’ fer -somebody to hang.... Haw! Haw! That Collishaw -was a Texas sheriff.”</p> - -<p>Suddenly Adam bent lower, so that his face was on a -level with Merryvale’s.</p> - -<p>“Don’t you recognize me?”</p> - -<p>“Wal, I shore don’t, stranger,” declared the other. “I’ve -been nigh fifty years in the West an’ never seen your like -yet. If I had I’d never forgot.”</p> - -<p>“Merryvale, do you remember a lad who shot off your -fishing line one day? Do you remember how you took -interest in him—told him of Western ways—that he must -be a man?”</p> - -<p>“Shore I remember that lad!” exclaimed Merryvale, -bluntly. He was old, but he was still keen. “How’d you -know about him?”</p> - -<p>“I am Adam Larey!”</p> - -<p>The old man’s eyes grew piercing. Intensely he gazed, -bending closer, strong and thrilling now, with the zest of -earlier experience sharp in his expression.</p> - -<p>“I know you now. It’s Adam. I’d knowed them eyes -among a thousand, if I’d only looked. Eagle’s eyes, Adam, -once seen never forgot!... An’ look at the giant of<span class="pagenum" id="Page_418">418</span> -him! Wai, you make me feel young again.... Adam, -lad, I ain’t never forgot ye—never! Shake hands with -old Merryvale.”</p> - -<p>Agitated, with tremulous voice and shaking hands, he -grasped Adam, almost embracing him, his gray old face -alight with gladness.</p> - -<p>“It’s good to see you, Merryvale—to learn you’ve not -forgotten me—all these years.”</p> - -<p>“Lad, you was like my own!... But who’d ever know -you now? You’ve white hair, Adam, an’—ah! I see the -desert in your face.”</p> - -<p>“Old friend, did you ever hear of Wansfell?”</p> - -<p>“Wansfell? You mean thet wanderer the prospectors -tell about?... Shore, I’ve been hearin’ tales of him these -many years.”</p> - -<p>“I am Wansfell,” replied Adam.</p> - -<p>“<em>So help me God!</em>... Wansfell?... You, Adam, -the kindly lad!... Didn’t I tell you what a hell of a man -you’d be when you grew up?”</p> - -<p>Adam drew Merryvale aside from the curiously gathering -loungers.</p> - -<p>“Old friend, you are responsible for Wansfell.... -And now, before we tell—before I go—I want you to take -me to—to—my—my brother’s grave?”</p> - -<p>Merryvale stared.</p> - -<p>“<em>What?</em>” he ejaculated, and again his keen old eyes -searched Adam’s.</p> - -<p>“Yes. The grave—of my brother—Guerd,” whispered -Adam.</p> - -<p>“Say, man!... You think Guerd Larey’s buried <em>here</em>?... -Thet’s why you come back?”</p> - -<p>Astonishment seemed to dominate Merryvale, to hold -in check other emotions.</p> - -<p>“My friend,” replied Adam, “I came to see his grave—to -make my peace with him and God—and to give myself -up to the law.”</p> - -<p>“Give yourself—up—to the law!” gasped Merryvale. -“Have you gone desert mad?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum" id="Page_419">419</span> -“No. I’m right in my mind,” returned Adam, patiently. -“I owe it to my conscience, Merryvale.... Fourteen -years of torture! Any punishment I may suffer here, compared -with those long years, will be as nothing.... It -will be happiness to give myself up.”</p> - -<p>Merryvale’s lean jaw quivered as the astonishment and -concern left his face. A light of divination began to -dawn there.</p> - -<p>“But what do you want to give yourself up for?” he -demanded.</p> - -<p>“I told you. My conscience. My need to stand right -with myself. To pay!”</p> - -<p>“I mean—what’d you do?... <em>What for?</em>”</p> - -<p>“Old friend, you’ve grown thick of wits,” rejoined -Adam. “Because of my crime.”</p> - -<p>“An’ what was thet, Adam Larey?” queried Merryvale, -sharply.</p> - -<p>“The crime of Cain,” replied Adam, sadly. “Come, -friend—take me to my brother’s grave.”</p> - -<p>Merryvale seemed galvanized from age to youth.</p> - -<p>“Your brother’s grave!... Guerd Larey’s grave? By -heaven! I wish I could take you to it!... Adam, you’re -out of your head. You <em>are</em> desert mad.... Bless you, -lad, you’ve made a terrible mistake! You’re not what you -think you are. You’ve hid in the desert fourteen years—you’ve -gone through hell—you’ve become Wansfell—all -for nothin’!... My God! to think of thet!... Adam, -you’re no murderer. Your brother is not dead. He wasn’t -even bad hurt. No—no—Guerd Larey’s alive—alive—alive!”</p> - -<p> </p> - -<p class="p2 center small"><span class="bt bb">Press of The Hunter-Rose Company, Limited</span></p> - -<div class="chapter"><div class="transnote"> -<h2 id="Transcribers_Notes" class="nobreak p1">Transcriber’s Note</h2> - -<p>Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made -consistent when a predominant preference was found -in the original book; otherwise they were not changed.</p> - -<p>Simple typographical errors were corrected; unpaired -quotation marks were remedied when the change was -obvious, and otherwise left unpaired.</p> - -<p>Redundant book hemi-title pages have been deleted.</p> - -<p>Table of Contents added by Transcriber.</p> - -<p>Page <a href="#Page_87">87</a>: “you’ll grow like it” was printed that way.</p> - -<p>Page <a href="#Page_128">128</a>: “But there were others hours.” was -printed that way.</p> - -<p>Page <a href="#Page_141">141</a>: “gettin’ oneasy” was printed that way; should be “uneasy”.</p> -</div></div> - -<p> </p> -<p> </p> -<hr class="full" /> -<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK WANDERER OF THE WASTELAND***</p> -<p>******* This file should be named 60102-h.htm or 60102-h.zip *******</p> -<p>This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:<br /> -<a href="http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/6/0/1/0/60102">http://www.gutenberg.org/6/0/1/0/60102</a></p> -<p> -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed.</p> - -<p>Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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