The One-Way Trail: A story of the cattle country

CHAPTER XXXVII
GOLD

The gray of dawn had passed. Now the rosy light of day was spreading its fresh beauty across the heavens, and gladdening the warming air, and painting afresh with generous brush the rolling, open world below.

Yes, the drab of dawn was past, and, as it was with all Nature about them, the rosy light of hope brushed lightly the weary hearts of those who had just passed through the fiery trials of the furnace of despair.

There were three people only standing beneath the tree, under whose shadow a man’s life so recently was to have been offered a sacrifice to human justice–two men and a woman. There was something else there, but life had passed from it, and it lay there waiting, in the calm patience of the last, long sleep, to return to the clay from which it sprang.

Eve was kneeling beside the deformed body of her poor brother. Her tears were falling fast as she bent over the pale upturned face, even more beautiful still since Death had hugged him to its harsh bosom. All the woman’s passionate love and regrets were pouring out over the unconscious clay. His cruelties, his weaknesses were forgotten, brushed away by an infinite love that had no power nor inclination to judge.

She loved him, and he was dead. He was gone beyond her ken; and for the moment in her grief she longed to be with him. In the midst of her tears she prayed–prayed for the poor weak soul, winging its way in the mysterious Beyond. She asked Him that his sins might be forgiven. She prayed Him that the great loving forbearance, so readily yielded to suffering humanity, might be shed upon that weak, benighted soul. She poured out all the longings of her simple woman’s heart in a passionate prayer that the Great Christ, who had shed His blood for all sinners, would stretch out His saving hand, and take her brother’s erring spirit once again to His bosom.

The two men stood by in silence. Their heads were bowed in reverence. They, too, felt something of the woman’s grief.

But presently Peter Blunt raised his head. His kindly blue eyes were full of sympathy. He moved across the intervening grass, and laid a hand with infinite tenderness upon the woman’s shoulder.

“We must take him with us,” he said gently.

The woman started, and looked up through her tears.

“Take him? Take him?” she questioned, without understanding.

Peter nodded.

“We’ll take him to–his new home.”

Eve bowed her head and covered her eyes with her hands.

“He’s yours, Eve,” the man went on softly. “Shall I?”

The woman nodded silently and rose to her feet. Peter stooped and picked the boy up in his arms to carry him as he had carried him before. Then he moved off and Eve followed him.

Jim hesitated for a moment. It almost seemed as though he had no right to force himself upon the woman’s grief. It seemed to him like sacrilege, and yet– Finally he, too, joined in the silent procession.

They followed whither Peter chose to lead. There was no question. It was not a moment for question. The kindly heart dictated. It was only for the others to acquiesce. Peter, too, perhaps in lesser degree, had loved the boy. But then it was in his nature to love all suffering humanity. He had never had anything but kindness for Elia in life. Now that he was dead his feelings were no less.

So they trailed across the prairie–on, slowly and solemnly on. Their course was marked straight as an arrow’s flight in Peter’s mind. Nor did he pause till the mound of gravel beside his cutting was reached.

He stood at the brink of the shallow pit. There in its depths lay a broad, jagged, soil-stained ridge. Here and there on its rough surface patches of dazzling white, streaked with the more generous tints of deep red, and blue, and green, showed where the hard-driven pick had split the gold-bearing quartz.

Eve stared wonderingly down. Jim looked on in silent awe. He knew something of that which was in Peter’s mind. Peter had found the deposits for which he had so long searched. Here–here was the great reef, round which the Indian stories had been woven.

He laid his burden on the edge of the pit. Then he clambered down into it. He signed to Jim, and the waiting man understood. He carefully passed the boy’s body to the man below.

Then he stood up, and Eve came to his side. Silently she rested one hand upon his shoulder, and together they watched the other at his work.

With the utmost tenderness Peter laid the boy down on his gravelly bed. They saw that the dead lad’s face was turned so that its cheek rested against the cold, auriferous quartz. Then the man untied the silk scarf about his own neck and laid it over the waxen face. Then he stood up and stripped the shoring planks from the walls of the pit, and placed them a solid covering over the boy’s body, resting them on two large stones, one at his head and one at his feet. Finally he tested their solidity, and climbed out of the grave.

Now he joined the others, and gazed silently down into the pit. For some moments he stood thus, until presently he glanced across at the eastern sky. A fiery line, like the light of a distant prairie fire, hovered upon the horizon. He knew it was the rising of the sun.

He turned to the still weeping woman.

“Little Eve,” he said gently, pointing into the pit. “There’s gold lies there. He wanted it, and–and I promised he should have it. Jim,” he turned, and looked into the dark eyes of his friend, “that poor, weak, suffering lad saved you, because–because you’d been good to him. Well, old lad, I guess now that we’ve found some of the gold that lies here in Barnriff, we–we must be content. We mustn’t take it with us, we mustn’t rob those who need. We’ve found it, so we’ll just cover it up again, and hope and pray that it may multiply and bear fruit. Then we’ll mark it with a headstone, so that others may know that this gold is to be found if folks will only seek long enough, and hard enough beneath the surface.”

Jim nodded. He understood.

Then, as the great arc of the morning sun lifted above the horizon, both men picked up the shovels lying close by them, and buried forever the treasure Peter had found.

CHAPTER XXXVIII
ON, OVER THE ONE-WAY TRAIL

Eve’s door was suddenly pushed open. She did not look up from her sewing-machine. She guessed who her visitor was.

“Sit down, Annie, dear,” she said, cordially. “I’ll be through with this in a moment.”

Her visitor took the proffered chair and smiled, while the busy machine rattled down the last seam of the skirt on which the other was busy.

Eve was very good to look upon, as she bent over her work, and her visitor was well content to wait. Her slight figure was delightfully gracious; her pretty hair, loosely dressed, looked to have all the velvet softness and lustre of spun silk. Her face was hidden, but the beautifully moulded outline of her cheek was visible. There was such a wholesome air of purpose in her attitude that it was quite easy to imagine that the shadows of the past had long since faded from her gentle eyes, that youth had again conquered, now that those gray days had lightened to the rosy summer of peace.

Something of this was passing through the man’s mind as he hungrily devoured the beauty, which for so long had held him its slave.

It was nearly two months since the happenings which had so nearly ended Jim Thorpe’s earthly career. Two months during which he had honestly struggled to regain that footing he had once held in the district. And now the fall was advancing, and the hopes of winning through with the people of the place seemed as far off as ever.

Prejudice still clung. Barnriff, willing enough to accept his actual innocence on the double charges made against him, still could not forget that he had helped the real thief to escape. It mattered nothing to them that in the end the man had died a violent death. He had been helped to escape–their justice. So there was no employment of any sort in Barnriff for Jim Thorpe. And Eve, too, was only completing orders which had been placed with her weeks before.

“There,” she said, raising her needle and removing the stuff from beneath it. “I hate it, and I’m glad it’s done.”

She looked up with a smile to encounter the dark eyes of Jim Thorpe.

“You?” she cried, in a tone that should have made him glad. “Why, I thought surely it was Annie. But there, I might have known. Annie would not have sat silent so long. You see she was coming over for a gossip. But I s’pose it’s too early for her.”

Jim noticed now that something of the old happy light was in her eyes again. That joyous light which he had not seen in them for nearly a year. What a wonderful thing was youth.

“I saw her as I came along,” he said slowly. “She said she’d come after supper. She sent her love, and said she was going to bring a shirt-waist to get fixed.”

“The dear thing! It’s the one thing that makes my life here possible, Jim. I mean her friendship. She’s the only one in all the village that can forget things. I mean among the women.” She came round the table and sat on its edge facing him, staring out of the window at the ruddy sunset with eyes that had suddenly become shadowed with regret. “Men aren’t like that, it seems to me. They’re fierce, and violent, and all that, but most of them have pretty big hearts when their anger is past.”

Jim’s eyes smiled whimsically.

“Do you think so?” he said. “Guess maybe I won’t contradict you, but it seems to me I’ve learned pretty well how large their hearts are–in the last two months.”

“You mean–you can get no work?”

The man nodded. But he had no bitterness now. He had learned his lesson from Peter Blunt. He had no blame for the weaknesses of human nature. Why should he have? Who was he to judge?

There was a silence for some moments. Eve continued to gaze at the sunset. The glorious ever-changing lights held her physical vision, but her mind was traveling in that realm of woman’s thought, whither no mere man can follow it.

It was Jim who spoke at last.

“But I didn’t come to–to air troubles,” he said thoughtfully. “I came to tell you of two things. One of ’em is Peter. He’s packing his wagon. He goes at sun-up to-morrow. He says he must move on–keep moving. He says all that held him to Barnriff is finished with, so now there’s nothing left but to hit the trail.”

“Poor old Peter!” Eve murmured softly. “I s’pose he means the gold business?”

“Maybe,” replied the man, without conviction.

“Why–what do you mean?”

Eve’s eyes were widely questioning. The other shrugged.

“You can’t tell. It’s hard to get at what’s passing through his quaint mind. I don’t think gold interests him as much as you’d think. Peter has plenty of money. Do you know, he offered to advance me ten thousand dollars to buy up a ranch around here. He pressed it on me, and tried to make out it would be a favor to him if I took it. Said I didn’t know how much I’d be obliging him. He’s a good man. A–a wonderful man. I tried to get him to stop on–but–”

“I don’t blame him for going,” said Eve, regretfully.

“Nor do I.”

Again that silence fell, and each was busy with thoughts they neither could easily have expressed.

“What’s the other?” Eve inquired presently. “You said–two things.”

“Did I? Oh, yes, of course.”

But Jim did not at once tell her the other reason for his visit. Instead he sat thinking of many things, and all his thoughts were centred round her. He was thinking the honest thoughts of a man who loves a woman so well that he shrinks from offering her so little of worldly goods as he possesses. He had come there, as a man will come, to hover round and burn his fingers at the fire which he has not the courage to turn his back upon. He had come there to tell her that he was going away, even as Peter was going–going away to make one more of those many starts which it had been his lot to make in the past.

“Well?” Eve faced him with smiling eyes. She understood that his second reason was troubling him, and she wanted to encourage him.

He shook his head.

“It isn’t a scrap ‘well,’” he said, with an attempt at a lightness he did not feel.

“Nothing can be so bad, as–as some things,” she said. Her eyes had become serious again. She was thinking of those two short months ago.

“No,” he breathed, with a sigh. “I–I suppose not.” Then with a desperate effort he blurted out his resolve. “I’m going away, too,” he said clumsily.

His announcement cost him more than he knew. But Eve showed not the least bit of astonishment.

“I knew you would,” she said. Then she added, as though following out a thought which had been hers for a long time, “You see there are some things nobody can put up with–for long. Barnriff, for instance, when it turns against you.”

Jim nodded. Her understanding delighted him, and he went on more easily.

“I’ve one hundred and fifty head of stock, and a thousand odd dollars,” he said deliberately. “I’m going to make a fresh start.”

He laughed, and somehow his laugh hurt the woman. She understood.

“Don’t laugh like that, Jim,” she said gently. “It’s–it’s not like you.”

“I’m sorry, Eve,” he replied in swift contrition. “But–but it’s not much, is it?”

“I seem to fancy it’s quite a deal.” The girl’s face wore a delightful smile. “Where are you thinking of?”

“Canada. Edmonton. It’s a longish piece off, but it’s good land–and cheap.”

“It’s British.”

“Ye-es.”

“It’s not under the ‘stars and stripes.’”

“Most flags are made of bunting.”

The girl nodded her head.

“A monarchy, too,” she said.

“Monarchs and presidents are both men.”

Jim’s love for his flag was a sore point with him, and he gathered that Eve disapproved. He wanted her approval. He wanted it more than anything else, because– Suddenly he remembered something.

“Peter’s English,” he said slyly.

“God bless him!”

The fervor of the woman’s response was unmistakable.

“I must see him to-night before he goes,” she went on, “because–I’ve got something to tell him.”

She looked down at the table on which the dress she had just finished making was lying.

“That’s the last of them,” she said, pointing at it.

The man knew what she meant. She had completed her last order.

“I’m going to do no more–here.”

Jim’s eyes lit.

“Here?”

Eve shook her head.

“I’m going away,” she said, with a shamefaced smile. “That’s–that’s what I want to tell–Peter.”

Jim sprang to his feet, and looked into the bright smiling eyes.

“I’ve got a sewing-machine,” Eve went on, deliberately mimicking him, “and–and some dollars. And I’m going to make a fresh start.”

Her manner of detailing her stock-in-trade, and the smile that accompanied her words were good to see. Jim’s heart beat hard beneath his buckskin shirt, and the light in his eyes was one of a hope such as he rarely permitted himself.

“Where?” he demanded. But he knew before she said the words.

“Canada, Edmonton. It’s–it’s a longish piece off–but–”

Eve never finished her mimicry. In a moment she was in his arms, and her lips were silenced with his kisses.

Some minutes later she protested.

“You haven’t let me finish, Jim,” she cried.

But he shook his head.

“No need. I’ll tell you the rest. We’ll start in together, up there, and–we’ll keep the sewing-machine for home use. You see my socks ’ll sure need darning.”

“Silly. You don’t do that with a sewing-machine.”

Peter’s spring wagon was standing outside his door. It was a quaint, old-fashioned vehicle–just such a conveyance as one would expect him to possess. It had lain idle during most of his time in Barnriff, and had suffered much from the stress of bitter winters and the blistering sun of summers. But it still possessed four clattering wheels, even though the woodwork and the tires looked conspicuously like parting company.

The last of his household goods, with the exception of his blankets, had been loaded up. There was a confused pile of gold-prospecting tools and domestic chattels. Books and “washing” pans, pictures and steel drills, jostled with each other in a manner thoroughly characteristic of his disregard for the comforts of life. These material matters concerned him so little.

He was scraping out a large frying-pan, the one utensil which shared with his “billy” the privilege of supplying him with a means of cooking his food. The work he was engaged upon was something of a strain. It seemed so unnecessary. Still, the process was his habit of years, so he did not attempt to shirk it. But he looked up with relief when he heard voices, and a glad smile of welcome greeted Jim and Eve as they came up.

“Peter, I’ve–”

“Peter, we’ve–”

Jim and Eve both began to speak at the same time. And both broke off to let the other go on.

Peter glanced swiftly from one to the other. His shrewd eyes took in the situation at once.

“I’m glad,” he said, “real glad. Jim,” he went on, “I guess your luck’s set in. Eve, my dear, your luck’s running, too. I’m just glad.”

The culprits exchanged swift glances of astonishment. Eve blushed, but it was Jim who answered him.

“Guess you see things easy, Peter,” he said. “But you aren’t as glad as I am.”

“We are,” corrected Eve.

Peter bent over his work again, smiling at the friendly pan with renewed interest. He scraped some long congealed black grease from its shoulder and gazed at it ruefully.

“Look at that,” he said, with his quaint smile, holding up the knife with the unwholesome fat sticking to it. “Guess your pans won’t get like that, eh, Eve?” Then he added with a sigh, “It’s sure time I hit the trail. It’s been accumulating too long already. Y’see,” he went on simply, “it’s a good thing moving at times. Things need cleaning once in a while.”

He threw the pan into the wagon-box with a sigh of relief, and turned again to his two friends.

“I’d ask you to sit,” he began. But Jim cut him short.

“There’s no need, old friend. We’ve just come over to say we, too, are going to hit the trail. We’re going to hit it together.”

Peter nodded.

“We’re going to get the parson to marry us,” Jim went on eagerly, “and then we’re going to hit out for Canada–Edmonton–and start up a bit of a one-eyed ranch.”

Peter stood lost in thought, and Jim grew impatient.

“Well?” he inquired. “What do you think of it?”

The other nodded slowly, his eyes twinkling.

“Bully, but you’ll need a wagon to drive you out–when you’re getting married,” he said. “That’s how I was thinking. Guess I’ll drive you out in mine, eh?”

“But you’re going at sun-up,” cried Eve, in dismay. “We–we can’t get married so soon.”

“Guess I’ll wait over,” Peter answered easily. “It just means off-loading–and then loading up again. My frying-pan can have another cleaning.”

“Thanks, old friend,” cried Jim, linking his arm in Eve’s. “You’re a great feller. You’ll see us–married.” He squeezed the girl’s arm. “And then?”

“And then?”

Peter looked away at the dying light. His eyes were full of the kindly thought his two friends knew so well.

“Why, I’ll just hit the trail again,” he said.

“Where to?”

The big man turned his face slowly toward them, and his gentle humor was largely written in his expressive eyes.

“Why, Canada, I guess,” he said. “Edmonton–it seems to me.”