The Cattle-Baron's Daughter
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Title: The Cattle-Baron's Daughter
Author: Harold Bindloss
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Language: English
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THE CATTLE-BARON'S DAUGHTER
by
HAROLD BINDLOSS
Author of "Alton of Somasco," etc.
[Illustration: A FIERCE WHITE FROTHING ABOUT HIM.--Page 335.]
New York
Frederick A. Stokes Company
Publishers
Copyright, 1906, by
Frederick A. Stokes Company
This Edition published in September, 1906
All rights reserved
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I The Portent 1
II Hetty Takes Heed 12
III The Cattle-Barons 26
IV Muller Stands Fast 39
V Hetty Comes Home 50
VI The Incendiary 62
VII Larry Proves Intractable 72
VIII The Sheriff 85
IX The Prisoner 96
X On the Trail 110
XI Larry's Acquittal 122
XII The Sprouting of the Seed 134
XIII Under Fire 144
XIV Torrance's Warning 155
XV Hetty's Bounty 165
XVI Larry Solves the Difficulty 177
XVII Larry's Peril 189
XVIII A Futile Pursuit 201
XIX Torrance Asks a Question 212
XX Hetty's Obstinacy 224
XXI Clavering Appears Ridiculous 238
XXII The Cavalry Officer 250
XXIII Hetty's Avowal 262
XXIV The Stock Train 272
XXV Cheyne Relieves His Feelings 286
XXVI Larry's Reward 296
XXVII Clavering's Last Card 309
XXVIII Larry Rides to Cedar 321
XXIX Hetty Decides 331
XXX Larry's Wedding Day 343
XXXI Torrance Rides Away 355
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
"Come Down!" _Facing page_ 48
"She'll shoot me before she means to." 66
A white face and shadowy head, from which
the fur cap had fallen. 114
"Aren't you a trifle late?" 160
There was a note in her voice that set the man's
heart beating furiously. 268
A fierce white frothing about him. _Frontispiece_
THE CATTLE-BARON'S DAUGHTER
I
THE PORTENT
The hot weather had come suddenly, at least a month earlier than usual,
and New York lay baking under a scorching sun when Miss Hetty Torrance sat
in the coolest corner of the Grand Central Depot she could find. It was by
her own wish she had spent the afternoon in the city unattended, for Miss
Torrance was a self-reliant young woman; but it was fate and the
irregularity of the little gold watch, which had been her dead mother's
gift, that brought her to the depot at least a quarter of an hour too
soon. But she was not wholly sorry, for she had desired more solitude and
time for reflection than she found in the noisy city, where a visit to an
eminent modiste had occupied most of her leisure. There was, she had
reasons for surmising, a decision of some moment to be made that night,
and as yet she was no nearer arriving at it than she had been when the
little note then in her pocket had been handed her.
Still, it was not the note she took out when she found a seat apart from
the hurrying crowd, but a letter from her father, Torrance, the
Cattle-Baron, of Cedar Range. It was terse and to the point, as usual, and
a little smile crept into the girl's face as she read.
"Your letter to hand, and so long as you have a good time don't worry
about the bills. You'll find another five hundred dollars at the bank when
you want them. Thank God, I can give my daughter what her mother should
have had. Two years since I've seen my little girl, and now it seems that
somebody else is wanting her! Well, we were made men and women, and if you
had been meant to live alone dabbling in music you wouldn't have been
given your mother's face. Now, I don't often express myself this way, but
I've had a letter from Captain Jackson Cheyne, U. S. Cavalry, which reads
as straight as I've found the man to be. Nothing wrong with that family,
and they've dollars to spare; but if you like the man I can put down two
for every one of his. Well, I might write a good deal, but you're too much
like your father to be taken in. You want dollars and station, and I can
see you get them, but in a contract of this kind the man is everything.
Make quite sure you're getting the right one."
There was a little more to the same purpose, and when she slipped the
letter into her pocket Hetty Torrance smiled.
"The dear old man!" she said. "It is very like him; but whether Jake is
the right one or not is just what I can't decide."
Then she sat still, looking straight in front of her, a very attractive
picture, as some of the hurrying men who turned to glance at her seemed to
find, in her long light dress. Her face, which showed a delicate oval
under the big white hat, was a trifle paler than is usual with most
Englishwomen of her age, and the figure the thin fabric clung about less
decided in outline. Still, the faint warmth in her cheeks emphasized the
clear pallor of her skin, and there was a depth of brightness in the dark
eyes that would have atoned for a good deal more than there was in her
case necessity for. Her supple slenderness also became Hetty Torrance
well, and there was a suggestion of nervous energy in her very pose. In
addition to all this, she was a rich man's daughter, who had been well
taught in the cities, and had since enjoyed all that wealth and refinement
could offer her. It had also been a cause of mild astonishment to the
friends she had spent the past year with, that with these advantages, she
had remained Miss Torrance. They had been somewhat proud of their guest,
and opportunities had not been wanting had she desired to change her
status.
While she sat there musing, pale-faced citizens hurried past, great
locomotives crawled to and fro, and long trains of cars, white with the
dust of five hundred leagues, rolled in. Swelling in deeper cadence, the
roar of the city came faintly through the din; but, responsive to the
throb of life as she usually was, Hetty Torrance heard nothing of it then,
for she was back in fancy on the grey-white prairie two thousand miles
away. It was a desolate land of parched grass and bitter lakes with
beaches dusty with alkali, but a rich one to the few who held dominion
over it, and she had received the homage of a princess there. Then she
heard a voice that was quite in keeping with the spirit of the scene, and
was scarcely astonished to see that a man was smiling down on her.
He was dressed in city garments, and they became him; but the hand he held
out was lean, and hard, and brown, and, for he stood bareheaded, a paler
streak showed where the wide hat had shielded a face that had been
darkened by stinging alkali dust from the prairie sun. It was a quietly
forceful face, with steady eyes, which had a little sparkle of pleasure in
them, and were clear and brown, while something in the man's sinewy pose
suggested that he would have been at home in the saddle. Indeed, it was in
the saddle that Hetty Torrance remembered him most vividly, hurling his
half-tamed broncho straight at a gully down which the nondescript pack
streamed, while the scarcely seen shape of a coyote blurred by the dust,
streaked the prairie in front of them.
"Hetty!" he said.
"Larry!" said the girl. "Why, whatever are you doing here?"
Then both laughed a little, perhaps to conceal the faint constraint that
was upon them, for a meeting between former comrades has its difficulties
when one is a man and the other a woman, and the bond between them has not
been defined.
"I came in on business a day or two ago," said the man. "Ran round to
check some packages. I'm going back again to-morrow."
"Well," said the girl, "I was in the city, and came here to meet Flo
Schuyler and her sister. They'll be in at four."
The man looked at his watch. "That gives us 'most fifteen minutes, but
it's not going to be enough. We'll lose none of it. What about the
singing?"
Hetty Torrance flushed a trifle. "Larry," she said, "you are quite sure
you don't know?"
The man appeared embarrassed, and there was a trace of gravity in his
smile. "Your father told me a little; but I haven't seen him so often of
late. Any way, I would sooner you told me."
"Then," said the girl, with the faintest of quivers in her voice, "the
folks who understand good music don't care to hear me."
There was incredulity, which pleased his companion, in the man's face, but
his voice vaguely suggested contentment.
"That is just what they can't do," he said decisively. "You sing most
divinely."
"There is a good deal you and the boys at Cedar don't know, Larry. Any
way, lots of people sing better than I do, but I should be angry with you
if I thought you were pleased."
The man smiled gravely. "That would hurt. I'm sorry for you, Hetty; but
again I'm glad. Now there's nothing to keep you in the city, you'll come
back to us. You belong to the prairie, and it's a better place than
this."
He spoke at an opportune moment. Since her cherished ambition had failed
her, Hetty Torrance had grown a trifle tired of the city and the round of
pleasure that must be entered into strenuously, and there were times when,
looking back in reverie, she saw the great silent prairie roll back under
the red sunrise into the east, and fade, vast, solemn, and restful, a cool
land of shadow, when the first pale stars came out. Then she longed for
the jingle of the bridles and the drumming of the hoofs, and felt once
more the rush of the gallop stir her blood. But this was what she would
not show, and her eyes twinkled a trifle maliciously.
"Well, I don't quite know," she said. "There is always one thing left to
most of us."
She saw the man wince ever so slightly, and was pleased at it; but he was,
as she had once told him in the old days, grit all through, and he smiled
a little.
"Of course!" he said. "Still, the trouble is that there are very few of us
good enough for you. But you will come back for a little?"
Miss Torrance would not commit herself. "How are they getting along at the
Range?"
"Doesn't your father write you?"
"Yes," said the girl, colouring a trifle. "I had a letter from him a few
days ago, but he seldom mentioned what he was doing, and I want you to
tell me about him."
The man appeared thoughtful. "Well," he said, "it's quite three months
since I spoke to him. He was stirring round as brisk as ever, and is
rolling the dollars in this year."
"But you used to be always at the Range."
The man nodded, but the slight constraint that was upon him did not escape
the girl. "Still, I don't go there so often now. The Range is lonesome
when you are away."
Miss Torrance accepted the speech as one made by a comrade, and perhaps
was wrong, but a tramp of feet attracted her attention then, and she
looked away from her companion. Driven by the railroad officials, and led
by an interpreter, a band of Teutons some five or six hundred strong filed
into the station. Stalwart and stolid, tow-haired, with the stamp of
acquiescent patience in their homely faces, they came on with the swing,
but none of the usual spirit, of drilled men. They asked no questions, but
went where they were led, and the foulness of the close-packed steerage
seemed to cling about them. For a time the depot rang to the rhythmic
tramp of feet, and when, at a sign from the interpreter, it stopped, two
bewildered children, frowsy and unwashed, in greasy homespun, sat down and
gazed at Miss Torrance with mild blue eyes. She signed to a boy who was
passing with a basket slung before him, and made a little impatient
gesture when the man slipped his hand into his pocket.
"No," she said; "you'll make me vexed with you. Tell him to give them all
he has. They'll be a long while in the cars."
She handed the boy a silver coin, and while the children sat still,
undemonstratively astonished, with the golden fruit about them, the man
passed him a bill.
"Now get some more oranges, and begin right at the top of the line," he
said. "If that doesn't see you through, come back to me for another
bill."
Hetty Torrance's eyes softened. "Larry," she said, "that was dreadfully
good of you. Where are they all going to?"
"Chicago, Nebraska, Minnesota, Montana," said the man. "There are the cars
coming in. Just out of Castle Garden, and it's because of the city
improvements disorganizing traffic they're bringing them this way. They're
the advance guard, you see, and there are more of them coming."
The tramp of feet commenced again, but this time it was a horde of diverse
nationality, Englishmen, Irishmen, Poles, and Finns, but all with the
stamp of toil, and many with that of scarcity upon them. Bedraggled,
unkempt, dejected, eager with the cunning that comes of adversity, they
flowed in, and Hetty Torrance's face grew pitiful as she watched them.
"Do they come every week like this and, even in our big country, have we
got room for all of them?" she said.
There was a curious gleam in the man's brown eyes. "Oh, yes," he said.
"It's the biggest and greatest country this old world has ever seen, and
the Lord made it as a home for the poor--the folks they've no food or use
for back yonder; and, while there are short-sighted fools who would close
the door, we take them in, outcast and hopeless, and put new heart in
them. In a few short years we make them men and useful citizens, the equal
of any on this earth--Americans!"
Hetty Torrance nodded, and there was pride but no amusement in her smile;
for she had a quick enthusiasm, and the reticence of Insular Britain has
no great place in that country.
"Still," she said; "all these people coming in must make a difference."
The man's face grew grave. "Yes," he said; "there will have to be a
change, and it is coming. We are only outwardly democratic just now, and
don't seem to know that men are worth more than millionaires. We have let
them get their grip on our industries, and too much of our land, until
what would feed a thousand buys canvas-backs, and wines from Europe for
one. Isn't what we raise in California good enough for Americans?"
Miss Torrance's eyes twinkled. "Some of it isn't very nice, and they don't
live on canvas-backs," she said. "Still, it seems to me that other men
have talked like that quite a thousand years ago; and, while I don't know
anyone better at breaking a broncho or cutting out a steer, straightening
these affairs out is too big a contract for you."
The man laughed pleasantly. "That's all right, but I can do a little in
the place I belong to, and the change is beginning there. Is it good for
this country that one man should get rich feeding his cattle on leagues of
prairie where a hundred families could make a living growing wheat?"
"Now," said the girl drily, "I know why you and my father haven't got on.
Your opinions wouldn't please him, Larry."
"No," said the man, with a trace of embarrassment, "I don't think they
would; and that's just why we've got to convince him and the others that
what we want to do is for the good of the country."
Hetty Torrance laughed. "It's going to be hard. No man wants to believe
anything is good when he sees it will take quite a pile of dollars out of
his pocket."
The man said nothing, and Hetty fancied he was not desirous of following
up the topic, while as they sat silent a big locomotive backed another
great train of emigrant cars in. Then the tramp of feet commenced again,
and once more a frowsy host of outcasts from the overcrowded lands poured
into the depot. Wagons piled with baggage had preceded them, but many
dragged their pitiful belongings along with them, and the murmur of their
alien voices rang through the bustle of the station. Hetty Torrance was
not unduly fanciful, but those footsteps caused her, as she afterwards
remembered, a vague concern. She believed, as her father did, that America
was made for the Americans; but it was evident that in a few more years
every unit of those incoming legions would be a citizen of the Republic,
with rights equal to those enjoyed by Torrance of Cedar Range. She had
seen that as yet the constitution gave no man more than he could by his
own hand obtain; but it seemed not unlikely that some, at least, of those
dejected, unkempt men had struck for the rights of humanity that were
denied them in the older lands with dynamite and rifle.
Then, as the first long train of grimy cars rolled out close packed with
their frowsy human freight, a train of another kind came in, and two young
women in light dresses swung themselves down from the platform of a car
that was sumptuous with polished woods and gilding. Miss Torrance rose as
she saw them, and touched her companion.
"Come along, Larry, and I'll show you two of the nicest girls you ever
met," she said.
The man laughed. "They would have been nicer if they hadn't come quite so
soon," he said.
He followed his companion and was duly presented to Miss Flora and Miss
Caroline Schuyler. "Larry Grant of Fremont Ranch," said Miss Torrance.
"Larry is a great friend of mine."
The Misses Schuyler were pretty. Carolina, the younger, pale, blue-eyed,
fair-haired and vivacious; her sister equally blonde, but a trifle
quieter. Although they were gracious to him, Grant fancied that one
flashed a questioning glance at the other when there was a halt in the
conversation. Then, as if by tacit agreement, they left him alone a moment
with their companion, and Hetty Torrance smiled as she held out her hand.
"I can't keep them waiting, but you'll come and see me," she said.
"I am going home to-morrow," said the man. "When are you coming, Hetty?"
The girl smiled curiously, and there was a trace of wistfulness in her
eyes. "I don't quite know. Just now I fancy I may not come at all, but you
will not forget me, Larry."
The man looked at her very gravely, and Hetty Torrance appeared to find
something disconcerting in his gaze, for she turned her head away.
"No," he said, and there was a little tremor in his voice, "I don't think
I shall forget you. Well, if ever you grow tired of the cities you will
remember the lonely folks who are longing to have you home again back
there on the prairie."
Hetty Torrance felt her fingers quiver under his grasp, but the next
moment he had turned away, and her companions noticed there was a faint
pink tinge in her cheeks when she rejoined them. But being wise young
women, they restrained their natural inquisitiveness, and asked no
questions then.
In the meanwhile Grant, who watched them until the last glimpse of their
light dresses was lost in the crowd, stood beside the second emigrant
train vacantly glancing at the aliens who thronged about it. His bronzed
face was a trifle weary, and his lips were set, but at last he
straightened his shoulders with a little resolute movement and turned
away.
"I have my work," he said, "and it's going to be quite enough for me."
II
HETTY TAKES HEED
It was evening when Hetty Torrance sat alone in a room of Mrs. Schuyler's
house at Hastings-on-the-Hudson. The room was pretty, though its adornment
was garish and somewhat miscellaneous, consisting as it did of the
trophies of Miss Schuyler's European tour. A Parisian clock, rich in
gilded scroll work to the verge of barbarity, contrasted with the artistic
severity of one or two good Italian marbles, while these in turn stood
quaintly upon choice examples of time-mellowed English cabinet-work. There
was taste in them all, but they suffered from the juxtaposition, which,
however, was somewhat characteristic of the country. Still, Miss Schuyler
had not spoiled the splendid parquetrie floor of American timber.
The windows were open wide, and when a little breeze from the darkening
river came up across the lawn, Hetty languidly raised her head. The
coolness was grateful, the silken cushions she reclined amidst luxurious,
but the girl's eyes grew thoughtful as they wandered round the room, for
that evening the suggestion of wealth in all she saw jarred upon her mood.
The great city lay not very far away, sweltering with its crowded tenement
houses under stifling heat; and she could picture the toilers who herded
there, gasping for air. Then her fancy fled further, following the long
emigrant train as it crawled west from side-track to side-track, close
packed with humanity that was much less cared for than her father's
cattle.
She had often before seen the dusty cars roll into a wayside depot to wait
until the luxurious limited passed, and the grimy faces at the windows,
pale and pinched, cunning, or coarsely brutal, after the fashion of their
kind, had roused no more than a passing pity. It was, however, different
that night, for Grant's words had roused her to thought, and she wondered
with a vague apprehension whether the tramp of weary feet she had listened
to would once more break in upon her sheltered life. Larry had foreseen
changes, and he was usually right. Then she brushed these fancies into the
background, for she had still a decision to make. Captain Cheyne would
shortly arrive, and she knew what he came to ask. He was also a personable
man, and, so far as the Schuylers knew, without reproach, while Hetty had
seen a good deal of him during the past twelve months. She admitted a
liking for him, but now that the time had come to decide, she was not
certain that she would care to spend her life with him. As a companion, he
left nothing to be desired, but, as had happened already with another man
with whom Miss Torrance had been pleased, that position did not appear to
content him; and she had misgivings about contracting a more permanent
bond. It was almost a relief when Miss Schuyler came in.
"Stand up, Hetty. I want to look at you," she said.
Miss Torrance obeyed and stood before her, girlishly slender in her long
dress, though there was an indefinite suggestion of imperiousness in her
dark eyes.
"Will I pass?" she asked.
Flora Schuyler surveyed her critically and then laughed. "Yes," she said.
"You're pretty enough to please anybody, and there's a style about you
that makes it quite plain you were of some importance out there on the
prairie. Now you can sit down again, because I want to talk to you. Who's
Larry Grant?"
"Tell me what you think of him."
Miss Schuyler pursed her lips reflectively. "Well," she said, "he's not
New York. Quite a good-looking man, with a good deal in him, but I'd like
to see him on horseback. Been in the cavalry? You're fond of them, you
know."
"No," said Hetty, "but he knows more about horses than any cavalry
officer. Larry's a cattle-baron."
"I never quite knew what the cattle-barons were, except that your father's
one, and they're mostly rich," said Miss Schuyler.
Hetty's eyes twinkled. "I don't think Larry's very rich. They're the men
or the sons of them, who went west when the prairie belonged to the
Indians and the Blackfeet, Crows, and Crees made them lots of trouble.
Still, they held the land they settled on, and covered it with cattle,
until the Government gave it to them, 'most as much as you could ride
across in a day, to each big rancher."
"Gave it to them?"
Hetty nodded. "A lease of it. It means the same thing. A few of them,
though I think it wasn't quite permitted, bought other leases in, and out
there a cattle-baron is a bigger man than a railroad king. You see, he
makes the law--all there is--as well as supports the industry, for there's
not a sheriff in the country dares question him. The cattle-boys are his
retainers, and we've a squadron of them at the Range. They'd do just what
Torrance of Cedar told them, whatever it was, and there are few men who
could ride with them in the U. S. Cavalry."
"Then," said Flora Schuyler, "if the Government ever encouraged
homesteading in their country they'd make trouble."
Hetty laughed. "Yes," she said drily, "I guess they would, but no
government dares meddle with us."
"Well," said Flora Schuyler, "you haven't told us yet who Larry is. You
know quite well what I mean."
Hetty smiled. "I called him my partner when I was home. Larry held me on
my first pony, and has done 'most whatever I wanted him ever since.
Fremont isn't very far from the Range, and when I wanted to ride anywhere,
or to have a new horse broken, Larry was handy."
Miss Schuyler appeared reflective, but there was a bond of confidence
between the two, and the reserve that characterizes the Briton is much
less usual in that country.
"It always seemed to me, my dear, that an arrangement of that kind is a
little rough on the man, and I think this one is too good to spoil," she
said.
Hetty coloured a trifle, but she smiled. "It is all right with Larry. He
never expected anything."
"No?" said Flora Schuyler. "He never tried to make love to you?"
The tinge of colour grew a trifle deeper in Hetty's cheek. "Only once, and
I scarcely think he meant it. It was quite a long while ago, and I told
him he must never do it again."
"And since then he has tamed your horses, and bought you all the latest
songs and books--good editions in English art bindings. It was Larry who
sent you those flowers when we could scarcely get one?"
Hetty for some reason turned away her head. "Don't you get things of that
kind?"
A trace of gravity crept into Flora Schuyler's blue eyes, which were
unusually attractive ones. "When they come too often I send them back,"
she said. "Oh, I know I'm careless now and then, but one has to do the
square thing, and I wouldn't let any man do all that for me unless I was
so fond of him that I meant to marry him. Now I'm going to talk quite
straight to you, Hetty. You'll have to give up Larry by and by, but if you
find that's going to hurt you, send the other man away."
"You don't understand," and there was a little flash in Hetty's dark eyes.
"Larry's kind to everyone--he can't help it; but he doesn't want me."
Flora Schuyler gravely patted her companion's arm. "My dear, we don't want
to quarrel, but you'll be careful--to please me. Jake Cheyne is coming,
and you might be sorry ever after if you made a mistake to-night."
Hetty made no answer, and there was silence for a space while the light
grew dimmer, until the sound of voices rose from without, and she felt her
heart beat a trifle faster than usual, when somebody said, "Captain
Cheyne!"
Then there was a rustle of draperies and Mrs. Schuyler, thin, angular, and
considerably more silent than is customary with women of her race, came
in, with her younger daughter and a man in her train. The latter bore the
stamp of the soldier plainly, but there was a distinction in his pose that
was not the result of a military training. Then as he shook hands with
Flora Schuyler the fading light from the window fell upon his face,
showing it clean cut from the broad forehead to the solid chin, and
reposeful instead of nervously mobile. His even, low-pitched voice was
also in keeping with it, for Jackson Cheyne was an unostentatious American
of culture widened by travel, and, though they are not always to be found
in the forefront in their own country, unless it has need of them, men of
his type have little to fear from comparison with those to be met with in
any other one.
He spoke when there was occasion, and was listened to, but some time had
passed before he turned to Mrs. Schuyler. "I wonder if it would be too
great a liberty if I asked Miss Torrance to give us some music," he said.
"I am going away to-morrow to a desolate outpost in New Mexico, and it
will be the last time for months that I shall have a treat of that kind."
Flora Schuyler opened the piano, and Hetty smiled at Cheyne as she took
her place; but the man made a little gesture of negation when Mrs.
Schuyler would have rung for lights.
"Wouldn't it be nicer as it is?" he said.
Hetty nodded, and there was silence before the first chords rang softly
through the room. Though it may have been that the absence of necessity to
strive and stain her daintiness amidst the press was responsible for much,
Hetty Torrance's voice had failed to win her fame; but she sang and played
better than most well-trained amateurs. Thus there was no rustle of
drapery or restless movements until the last low notes sank into the
stillness. Then the girl glanced at the man who had unobtrusively managed
to find a place close beside her.
"You know what that is?" she said.
Carolina Schuyler laughed. "Jake knows everything!"
"Yes," said the man quietly. "A nocturne. You were thinking of something
when you played it."
"The sea," said Flora Schuyler, "when the moon is on it. Was that it,
Hetty?"
"No," said Miss Torrance, who afterwards wondered whether it would have
made a great difference if she had not chosen that nocturne. "It was the
prairie when the stars are coming out over Cedar Range. Then it seems
bigger and more solemn than the sea. I can see it now, wide and grey and
shadowy, and so still that you feel afraid to hear yourself breathing,
with the last smoky flush burning on its northern rim. Now, you may laugh
at me, for you couldn't understand. When you have been born there, you
always love the prairie."
Then with a little deprecatory gesture she touched the keys again. "It
will be different this time."
Cheyne glanced up sharply during the prelude, and then, feeling that the
girl's eyes were upon him, nodded as out of the swelling harmonies there
crept the theme. It suggested the tramp of marching feet, but there was a
curious unevenness in its rhythm, and the crescendo one of the listeners
looked for never came. The room was almost dark now, but none of those who
sat there seemed to notice it as they listened to the listless tramp of
marching feet. Then the harmonies drowned it again, and Hetty looked at
Cheyne.
"Now," she said, "can you tell me what that means?"
Cheyne's voice seemed a trifle strained, as though the music had troubled
him. "I know the march, but the composer never wrote what you have played
to-night," he said. "It was--may mine be defended from it!--the shuffle of
beaten men. How could you have felt what you put into the music?"
"No," said Hetty. "Your men could never march like that. It was footsteps
going west, and I could not have originated their dragging beat. I have
heard it."
There was a little silence, until Cheyne said softly, "One more."
"Then," said Hetty, "you will recognize this."
The chords rang under her fingers until they swelled into confused and
conflicting harmonies that clashed and jarred upon the theme. Their burden
was strife and struggle and the anguish of strain, until at last, in the
high clear note of victory, the theme rose supreme.
"Yes," said Flora Schuyler, "we know that. We heard it with the Kaiser in
Berlin. Only one man could have written it; but his own countrymen could
not play it better than you do. A little overwhelming. How did you get
down to the spirit of it, Hetty?"
Lights were brought in just then, and they showed that the girl's face was
a trifle paler than usual, as closing the piano, she turned, with a little
laugh, upon the music-stool.
"Oh!" she said, "I don't quite know, and until to-night it always cheated
me. I got it at the depot--no, I didn't. It was there I felt the marching,
and Larry brought the prairie back to me; but I couldn't have seen what
was in the last music, because it hasn't happened yet."
"It will come?" said Flora.
"Yes," said Hetty, "wherever those weary men are going to."
"And to every one of us," said Cheyne, with a curious graveness they
afterwards remembered. "That is, the stress and strain--it is the triumph
at the end of it only the few attain."
Once more there was silence, and it was a relief when the unemotional Mrs.
Schuyler rose.
"Now," she said, and her voice, at least, had in it the twang of the
country, "you young folks have been solemn quite long enough. Can't you
talk something kind of lively?"
They did what they could, and--for Cheyne could on occasion display a
polished wit--light laughter filled the room, until Caroline Schuyler,
perhaps not without a motive, suggested a stroll on the lawn. If there was
dew upon the grass none of them heeded it, and it was but seldom anyone
enjoyed the privilege of pacing that sod when Mr. Schuyler was at home.
Every foot had cost him many dollars, and it remained but an imperfect
imitation of an English lawn. There was on the one side a fringe of
maples, and it was perhaps by Mrs. Schuyler's contrivance that eventually
Hetty found herself alone with Cheyne in their deeper shadow. It was not,
however, a surprise to her, for she had seen the man's desire and tacitly
fallen in with it. Miss Torrance had discovered that one seldom gains
anything by endeavouring to avoid the inevitable.
"Hetty," he said quietly, "I think you know why I have come to-night?"
The girl stood very still and silent for a space of seconds, and
afterwards wondered whether she made the decision then, or what she had
seen and heard since she entered the depot had formed it for her.
"Yes," she said slowly. "I am so sorry!"
Cheyne laid his hand upon her arm, and his voice trembled a little. "Don't
be too hasty, Hetty," he said. "I would not ask you for very much just
now, but I had ventured to fancy you could in time grow fond of me. I know
I should have waited, but I am going away to-morrow, and I only want you
to give me a promise to take away with me."
It was with a visible effort the girl lifted her head and looked at him.
"I feel horribly mean, Jake, but I can't," she said. "I ought to have made
you realize that long ago, but I liked you, and, you see, I didn't quite
know. I thought if I waited a little I might be more sure of what I felt
for you!"
"Then," said the man, a trifle hoarsely, "give me what you can now and I
will be patient."
Hetty turned half way from him and closed one hand. The man was pleasant
to look upon, in character and disposition all she could desire, and she
had found a curious content in his company. Had that day passed as other
days had done, she might have yielded to him, but she had been stirred to
the depths of her nature during the last few hours, and Flora Schuyler's
warning had been opportune. She had, as she had told him, a liking for
Jackson Cheyne, but that, she saw very clearly now, was insufficient.
Destiny had sent Larry Grant, with the associations that clung about him,
into the depot.
"No," she said, with a little tremble in her voice, "it wouldn't be honest
or fair to you. I am not half good enough for you."
The man smiled somewhat mirthlessly, but his voice was reproachful. "You
always speak the truth, Hetty. My dear, knowing what the best of us are, I
wonder how I dared to venture to ask you to share your life with me."
Hetty checked him with a little gesture. "Can't you understand?" she said.
"The girl who sang to you now and then isn't me. I am selfish,
discontented, and shallow, and if you hadn't heard me sing or play you
would never have thought of me. There are people who sing divinely, and
are--you see, I have met them with the mask off--just horrible."
"Hetty," said Cheyne, "I can't allow anyone to malign you, even if it's
yourself, and if you have any faults, my dear, I'll take them with the
rest. In fact, I would be glad of one or two. They would only bring you a
little nearer to me."
The girl lifted her hand and silenced him. "Jake," she said appealingly,
"please take your answer and go away. If I could only be fond of you in
the right way I would, but I can't, you see. It is not my fault--it isn't
in me."
The man recognized the finality in her tone, but, feeling that it was
useless, made a last endeavour.
"I'm going away to-morrow," he said. "You might think differently when I
come back again."
The girl's voice quivered a little. "No," she said. "I have to be
straightforward now, and I know you will try to make it easier for me,
even if I'm hurting you. It's no use. I shall think the same, and by and
by you'll get over this fancy, and wonder what you ever saw in me."
The man smiled curiously. "I am afraid it will take me a lifetime," he
said.
In another moment he had gone, and Hetty turned, a trifle flushed in face,
towards the house across the lawn.
"He took it very well--and I shall never find anyone half so nice again,"
she said.
It was half an hour later, and Miss Torrance had recovered at least her
outward serenity, when one of Mrs. Schuyler's neighbours arrived. She
brought one or two young women, and a man, with her. The latter she
presented to Mrs. Schuyler.
"Mr. Reginald Clavering," she said. "He's from the prairie where Miss
Torrance's father lives, and is staying a day or two with us. When I heard
he knew Hetty I ventured to bring him over."
Mrs. Schuyler expressed her pleasure, and--for they had gone back to the
lighted room now--Hetty presently found herself seated face to face with
the stranger. He was a tall, well-favoured man, slender, and lithe in
movement, with dark eyes and hair, and a slightly sallow face that
suggested that he was from the South. It also seemed fitting that he was
immaculately dressed, for there was a curious gracefulness about him that
still had in it a trace of insolence. No one would have mistaken him for a
Northerner.
"It was only an hour ago I found we were so near, and I insisted upon
coming across at once," he said. "You have changed a good deal since you
left the prairie."
"Yes," said the girl drily. "Is it very astonishing? You see, we don't
spend half our time on horseback here. You didn't expect to find me a
sharp-tongued Amazon still?"
Clavering laughed as he looked at her, but the approval of what he saw was
a trifle too evident in his black eyes.
"Well," he said languidly, "you were our Princess then, and there was only
one of your subjects' homage you never took kindly to. That was rough on
him, because he was at least as devoted as the rest."
"That," said the girl, with a trace of acerbity, "was because he tried to
patronize me. Even if I haven't the right to it, I like respect."
Clavering made a little gesture, and the deference in it was at least half
sincere. "You command it, and I must try to make amends. Now, don't you
want to hear about your father and the Range?"
"No," said Hetty. "I had a talk with Larry to-day."
"In New York?"
"Yes. At the depot. He is going back to-morrow. You seem astonished?"
Clavering appeared thoughtful. "Well, it's Chicago he usually goes to."
"Usually?" said Hetty. "I scarcely remember him leaving Fremont once in
three years."
Clavering laughed. "Then he leaves it a good deal more often now. A man
must have a little diversion when he lives as we do, and no doubt Larry
feels lonely. You are here, and Heloise Durand has gone away."
Hetty understood the implication, for she had some notion how the men who
spent months together in the solitude of the prairie amused themselves in
the cities. Nor had she and most of her neighbours wholly approved of the
liberal views held by Heloise Durand. She had, however, an unquestioning
belief in Larry, and none in the man beside her.
"I scarcely think you need have been jealous of him," she said. "Larry
wasn't Miss Durand's kind, and he couldn't be lonely. Everybody was fond
of him."
Clavering nodded. "Of course! Still, Larry hasn't quite so many friends
lately."
"Now," said Hetty with a little flash in her eyes, "when you've told me
that you have got to tell the rest. What has he been doing?"
"Ploughing!" said Clavering drily. "I did what I could to restrain him,
but nobody ever could argue with Larry."
Hetty laughed, though she felt a little dismay. It was then a serious
affair to drive the wheat furrow in a cattle country, and the man who did
it was apt to be regarded as an iconoclast. Nevertheless, she would not
show that she recognized it.
"Well," she said, "that isn't very dreadful. The plough is supreme in the
Dakotas and Minnesota now. Sooner or later it has got to find a place in
our country."
"Still, that's not going to happen while your father lives."
The girl realized the truth of this, but she shook her head. "We're not
here to talk wheat and cattle, and I see Flo Schuyler looking at us," she
said. "Go across and make yourself agreeable to the others for the honour
of the prairie."
Clavering went; but he had left an unpleasant impression behind him, as he
had perhaps intended, while soon after he took his departure Flora
Schuyler found her friend alone.
"So you sent Jake away!" she said.
"Yes," said Hetty. "I don't know what made me, but I felt I had to. I
almost meant to take him."
Flora Schuyler nodded gravely. "But it wasn't because of that man
Clavering?"
"It was not," said Hetty, with a little laugh. "Don't you like him? He is
rather a famous man back there on the prairie."
Flora Schuyler shook her head. "No," she said; "he reminded me of that
Florentine filigree thing. It's very pretty, and I bought it for silver,
but it isn't."
"You think he's that kind of man?"
"Yes," said Miss Schuyler. "I wouldn't take him at face value. The
silver's all on top. I don't know what is underneath it, and would sooner
somebody else found out."
III
THE CATTLE-BARONS
It was a still, hot evening when a somewhat silent company of bronze-faced
men assembled in the big living room of Cedar Range. It was built of birch
trunks, and had once, with its narrow windows and loopholes for rifle
fire, resembled a fortalice; but now cedar panelling covered the logs, and
the great double casements were filled with the finest glass. They were
open wide that evening. Around this room had grown up a straggling wooden
building of dressed lumber with pillars and scroll-work, and, as it stood
then, flanked by its stores and stables, barns and cattle-boys' barracks,
there was no homestead on a hundred leagues of prairie that might compare
with it.
Outside, on the one hand, the prairie rolled away in long billowy rises, a
vast sea of silvery grey, for the grass that had been green a month or two
was turning white again, and here and there a stockrider showed
silhouetted, a dusky mounted figure against the paling flicker of saffron
that still lingered upon the horizon. On the other, a birch bluff dipped
to the Cedar River, which came down faintly chilled with the Rockies' snow
from the pine forests of the foothills. There was a bridge four miles
away, but the river could be forded beneath the Range for a few months
each year. At other seasons it swirled by, frothing in green-stained
flood, swollen by the drainage of snowfield and glacier, and there was no
stockrider at the Range who dared swim his horse across.
Sun and wind had their will with the homestead, for there was little
shelter from icy blizzard and scorching heat at Cedar; but though here and
there the frame-boarding gaped and the roof-shingles were rent, no man
accustomed to that country could fail to notice the signs of careful
management and prosperity. Corrals, barns, and stables were the best of
their kind; and, though the character of all of them was not beyond
exception, in physique and fitness for their work it would have been hard
to match the sinewy men in blue shirts, wide hats, and long boots, then
watering their horses at the ford. They were as daring and irresponsible
swashbucklers as ever rode out on mediæval foray, and, having once sold
their allegiance to Torrance of Cedar, and recognized that he was not to
be trifled with, were ready to do without compunction anything he bade
them.
In the meanwhile Torrance sat at the head of the long table, with
Clavering of Beauregard at his right hand. His face was bronzed and
resolute, and the stamp of command sat plainly upon him. There was grey in
his dark hair, and his eyes were keen and black, with a little glint in
them; but, vigorous as he still seemed, the hand on the table was smooth
and but slightly tinted by the sun, for Torrance was one who, in the
language of that country, did his work, which was usually arduous, with
his gloves on. He was dressed in white shirt and broadcloth, and a diamond
of price gleamed in the front of the former.
His guests were for the most part younger, and Clavering was scarcely half
his age: but when they met in conclave something usually happened, for the
seat of the legislature was far away, and their will considerably more
potent thereabouts than the law of the land. Sheriff, postmaster, railroad
agent, and petty politician carried out their wishes, and as yet no man
had succeeded in living in that region unless he did homage to the
cattle-barons. They were Republicans, admitting in the abstract the rights
of man, so long as no venturesome citizen demanded too much of them; but
they had discovered that in practice liberty is usually the prerogative of
the strong. Still, they had done their nation good service, for they had
found the land a wilderness and covered it with cattle, so that its
commerce fed the railroads and supported busy wooden towns. Some of the
older men had disputed possession with the Indian, and most of them in the
early days, enduring thirst and loneliness and unwearying toil, had held
on stubbornly in the face of ruin by frost and drought and hail. It was
not astonishing that as they had made that land--so they phrased it--they
regarded it as theirs.
There were eight of them present, and for a time they talked of horses and
cattle as they sipped their wine, which was the choicest that France could
send them; and it is also probable that no better cigars ever came from
Cuba than those they smoked. By and by, however, Torrance laid his aside.
"It's time we got down to work," he said. "I sent for ten of you, and
eight have come. One sent valid excuses, and one made no answer."
"Larry Grant," said Clavering. "I guess he was too busy at the depot
bringing a fat Dutchman and a crowd of hard-faced Dakota ploughboys in."
There was a little murmur of astonishment which, had the men been
different, would not have been quite free from consternation, for it was
significant news.
"You're quite sure?" asked Torrance, and his face was stern.
"Well," said Clavering languidly, "I saw him, and bantered him a little on
his prepossessing friends. Asked him why, when he was at it, he didn't go
to Manitoba for Canadians. Larry didn't take it nicely."
"I'm sorry," said one of the older men. "Larry is one of us, and the last
man I'd figure on committing that kind of meanness would be the son of
Fremont Grant. Quite sure it's not a fit of temper? You have not been
worrying him, Torrance?"
Torrance closed one hand. "Grant of Fremont was my best friend, and when
he died I 'most brought the lad up as a son. When he got hold of his
foolish notions it hurt me considerably, and I did what I could to talk
him out of them."
There was a little smile in the faces of some of the men, for Torrance's
draconic fashion of arguing was known to them.
"You put it a little too straight, and he told you something that riled
you," said one.
"He did," said Torrance grimly. "Still, for 'most two years I kept a curb
on my temper. Then one evening I told him he had to choose right then
between his fancies and me. I could have no dealings with any man who
talked as he did."
"Do you remember any of it?" asked another man.
"Yes," said Torrance. "His father's friends were standing in the way of
progress. Land that would feed a thousand families was keeping us in
luxury no American was entitled to. This was going to be the poor man's
country, and the plough was bound to come!"
Clavering laughed softly, and there were traces of ironical amusement in
the faces of the rest. Very similar predictions had more than once been
flung at them, and their possessions were still, they fancied, secure to
them. They, however, became grave again, and it was evident that Larry
Grant had hitherto been esteemed by them.
"If it had been any one else, we could have put our thumb on him right
now," said one. "Still, I don't quite figure it would work with Larry.
There are too many folks who would stand in with him."
There was a little murmur of approbation, and Clavering laughed. "Buy him
off," he said tentatively. "We have laid out a few thousand dollars in
that way before."
Some of the men made gestures of decided negation, and Torrance looked at
the speaker a trifle sternly.
"No, sir," he said. "Larry may be foolish, but he's one of us."
"Then," said somebody, "we've got to give him time. Let it pass. You have
something to tell us, Torrance?"
Torrance signed to one of them. "You had better tell them, Allonby."
A grey-haired man stood up, and his fingers shook a little on the table.
"My lease has fallen in, and the Bureau will not renew it," he said. "I'm
not going to moan about my wrongs, but some of you know what it cost me to
break in that place of mine. You have lived on the bitter water and the
saleratus bread, but none of you has seen his wife die for the want of the
few things he couldn't give her, as I did. I gave the nation my two boys
when the good times came, and they're dead--buried in their uniform both
of them--and now, when I'd laid out my last dollar on the ranch, that the
one girl I've left me might have something when I'd gone, the Government
will take it away from me. Gentlemen, is it my duty to sit down quietly?"
There was a murmur, and the men looked at one another with an ominous
question in their eyes, until Torrance raised his hand.
"The land's not open to location. I guess they're afraid of us, and
Allonby's there on toleration yet," he said. "Gentlemen, we mean to keep
him just where he is, because when he pulls out we will have to go too.
But this thing has to be done quietly. When the official machinery moves
down here it's because we pull the strings, and we have got to have the
law upon our side as far as we can. Well, that's going to cost us money,
and we want a campaign fund. I'll give Allonby a cheque for five hundred
dollars in the meanwhile, if he'll be treasurer; but as we may all be
fixed as he is presently, we'll want a good deal more before we're
through. Who will follow me?"
Each of them promised five hundred, and then looked at Clavering, who had
not spoken. One of them also fancied that there was for a moment a trace
of embarrassment in his face; but he smiled carelessly.
"The fact is, dollars are rather tight with me just now," he said. "You'll
have to wait a little if I'm to do as much as the rest of you. I am,
however, quite willing."
"I'll lend you them," said Torrance. "Allonby, I'll make that cheque a
thousand. You have got it down?"
Allonby accepted office, and one of the other men rose up. "Now it seems
to me that Torrance is right, and with our leases expired or running out,
we're all in the same tight place," he said. "The first move is to get
every man holding cattle land from here to the barren country to stand in,
and then, one way or another, we'll freeze out the homesteaders. Well,
then, we'll constitute ourselves a committee, with Torrance as head
executive, and as we want to know just what the others are doing, my
notion is that he should start off to-morrow and ride round the country.
If there are any organizations ready, it might suit us to affiliate with
them."
It was agreed to, and Clavering said, "It seems to me, sir, that the first
question is, 'Could we depend upon the boys if we wanted them?'"
Torrance strode to an open window and blew a silver whistle. Its shrill
note had scarcely died away when a mounted man came up at a gallop, and a
band of others in haste on foot. They stopped in front of the window,
picturesque in blue shirts and long boots, sinewy, generously fed, and
irresponsibly daring.
"Boys," he said, "you've been told there's a change coming, and by and by
this country will have no more use for you. Now, if any folks came here
and pulled our boundaries up to let the mean whites from back east in,
what are you going to do?"
There was a burst of hoarse laughter. "Ride them down," said one retainer,
with the soft blue eyes of a girl and a figure of almost matchless
symmetry.
"Grow feathers on them," said another. "Ride them back to the railroad on
a rail."
"I scarcely think that would be necessary," said Torrance quietly. "Still,
you'd stand behind the men who pay you?"
There was a murmur that expressed a good deal, though it was inarticulate,
and a man stood forward.
"You've heard them, sir," he said. "Well, we'll do just what you want us
to. This is the cattle-baron's country, and we're here. It's good enough
for us, and if it means lots of trouble we're going to stay here."
Torrance raised his hand, and when the men moved away turned with a little
grim smile to his guests. "They'll be quite as good as their word," he
said.
Then he led them back to the table, and when the decanter had gone round,
one of the younger men stood up.
"We want a constitution, gentlemen, and I'll give you one," he said. "The
Cedar District Stockraisers' Committee incorporated to-day with for sole
object the defence of our rights as American citizens!"
Clavering rose with the others, but there was a little ironical smile in
his eyes as he said, "If necessary against any unlawful encroachments made
by the legislature!"
Torrance turned upon him sternly. "No, sir!" he said. "By whatever means
may appear expedient!"
The glasses were lifted high, and when they had laid them down the men
rode away, though only one or two of them realized the momentous issues
which they and others had raised at about much the same time. They had
not, however, met in conclave too soon, for any step that man makes
forward towards a wider life is usually marked by strife, and the shadow
of coming trouble was already upon the land. It had deepened little by
little, and the cattle-barons had closed their eyes, as other men who have
held the reins have done since the beginning, until the lean hands of the
toilers fastened upon them, and fresh horrors added to an ancient wrong
were the price of liberty that was lost again. They had done good service
to their nation, with profit to themselves, and would not see that the
times were changing and that the nation had no longer need of them.
Other men, however, at least suspected it, and there was an expectant
gathering one hot afternoon in the railroad depot of a little wooden town
where Grant stood waiting for the west-bound train. There was little to
please the eye about the station, and still less about the town. Straight
out of the great white levels ran the glistening track, and an unsightly
building of wood and iron rose from the side of it, flanked by a towering
water-tank. A pump rattled under it, and the smell of creosote was
everywhere. Cattle corrals ran back from the track, and beyond them
sun-rent frame houses roofed with cedar shingles straggled away on the one
hand, paintless, crude, and square. On the other, a smear of trail led the
dazzled vision back across the parched levels to the glancing refraction
on the horizon, and the figure of a single horseman showing dimly through
a dust cloud emphasized their loneliness. The town was hot and dusty, its
one green fringe of willows defiled by the garbage the citizens deposited
there, and the most lenient stranger could have seen no grace or beauty in
it. Yet, like many another place of the kind, it was destined to rise to
prosperity and fame.
The depot was thronged that afternoon. Store and hotel keeper, citizens in
white shirts and broadcloth, jostled blue-shirted cattle men, while here
and there a petty politician consulted with the representative of a
Western paper. The smoke of cigars drifted everywhere, and the listless
heat was stirred by the hum of voices eager and strident. It was evident
that the assembly was in an expectant mood, and there was a murmur of
approbation when one newspaper man laid hold of Grant.
"I couldn't light on you earlier, but ten minutes will see us through," he
said. "We'll make a half-page of it if you'll let me have your views. New
epoch in the country's history! The small farmer the coming king! A
wood-cut of the man who brought the first plough in."
Larry Grant laughed a little. "There are quite a few ahead of me, and if
you spread my views the barons would put their thumb on you and squeeze
you flat," he said. "On the other hand, it wouldn't suit me if you sent
them anything I told you to publish."
The man appeared a trifle embarrassed. "The rights of the Press are sacred
in a free country, sir," he said.
"Well," said Grant drily, "although I hope it will be, this country isn't
quite free yet. I surmise that you don't know that the office of your
contemporary farther east was broken into a few hours ago, and an article
written by a friend of mine pulled out of the press. The proprietor was
quietly held down upon the floor when he objected. You will hear whether I
am right or wrong to-morrow."
What the man would have answered did not appear, for just then somebody
shouted, and a trail of smoke swept up above the rim of the prairie. It
rose higher and whiter, something that flashed dazzlingly grew into shape
beneath it, and there was a curious silence when the dusty cars rolled
into the little station. It was followed by a murmur as an elderly man in
broad white hat and plain store clothing, and a plump, blue-eyed young
woman, came out upon the platform of a car. He wore a pair of spectacles
and gazed about him in placid inquiry, until Grant stepped forward. Then
he helped the young woman down, and held out a big, hard hand.
"Mr. Grant?" he said.
Grant nodded, and raised his hat to the girl. "Yes," he said. "Mr.
Muller?"
"Ja," said the other man. "Also der fräulein Muller."
There was a little ironical laughter from the crowd. "A Dutchman," said
somebody, "from Chicago. They raise them there in the sausage machine. The
hogs go in at one end, and they rake the Dutchmen out of the other."
Muller looked round inquiringly, but apparently failed to discover the
speaker.
"Dot," he said, "is der chestnut. I him have heard before."
There was good-humoured laughter--for even when it has an animus an
American crowd is usually fair; and in the meanwhile five or six other men
got down from a car. They were lean and brown, with somewhat grim faces,
and were dressed in blue shirts and jean.
"Well," said one of them, "we're Americans. Got any objections to us
getting off here, boys?"
Some of the men in store clothing nodded a greeting, but there were others
in wide hats, and long boots with spurs, who jeered.
"Brought your plough-cows along?" said one, and the taunt had its meaning,
for it is usually only the indigent and incapable who plough with oxen.
"No," said one of the newcomers. "We have horses back yonder. When we want
mules or cowsteerers, I guess we'll find them here. You seem to have quite
a few of them around."
A man stepped forward, jingling his spurs, with his jacket of embroidered
deerskin flung open to show, though this was as yet unusual, that he wore
a bandolier. Rolling back one loose sleeve he displayed a brown arm with
the letters "C. R." tattooed within a garter upon it. "See this. You've
heard of that mark before?" he said.
"Cash required!" said the newcomer, with a grin. "Well, I guess that's not
astonishing. It would be a blame foolish man who gave you credit."
"No, sir," said the stockrider. "It's Cedar Range, and there's twenty boys
and more cattle than you could count in a long day carrying that brand. It
will be a cold day when you and the rest of the Dakotas start kicking
against that outfit."
There was laughter and acclamation, in the midst of which the cars rolled
on; but in the meanwhile Grant had seized the opportunity to get a
gang-plough previously unloaded from a freight-car into a wagon. The sight
of it raised a demonstration, and there were hoots, and cries of
approbation, while a man with a flushed face was hoisted to the top of a
kerosene-barrel.
"Boys," he said, "there's no use howling. We're Americans. Nobody can stop
us, and we're going on. You might as well kick against a railroad; and
because the plough and the small farmer will do more for you than even the
locomotive did, they have got to come. Well, now, some of you are keeping
stores, and one or two I see here baking bread and making clothes. Which
is going to do the most for your trade and you, a handful of rich men, who
wouldn't eat or wear the things you have to sell, owning the whole
country, or a family farming on every quarter section? A town ten times
this size wouldn't be much use to them. Well, you've had your
cattle-barons, gentlemen most of them; but even a man of that kind has to
step out of the track and make room when the nation's moving on."
He probably said more, but Grant did not hear him, for he had as
unostentatiously as possible conveyed Muller and the fräulein into a
wagon, and had horses led up for the Dakota men. They had some difficulty
in mounting, and the crowd laughed good-humouredly, though here and there
a man flung jibes at them; while one, jolting in his saddle as his broncho
reared, turned to Grant with a little deprecatory gesture.
"In our country we mostly drive in wagons, but I'll ride by the stirrup
and get down when nobody sees me," he said. "The beast wouldn't try to
climb out this way if there wasn't something kind of prickly under his
saddle."
Grant's face was a trifle grim when he saw that more of the horses were
inclined to behave similarly, but he flicked his team with the whip, and
there was cheering and derision when, with a drumming of hoofs and rattle
of wheels, wagons and horsemen swept away into the dust-cloud that rolled
about the trail.
"This," he said, "is only a little joke of theirs, and they'll go a good
deal further when they get their blood up. Still, I tried to warn you what
you might expect."
"So!" said Muller, with a placid grin. "It is noding to der franc tireurs.
I was in der chase of Menotti among der Vosges. Also at Paris."
"Well," said Grant drily, "I'm 'most afraid that by and by you'll go
through very much the same kind of thing again. What you saw at the depot
is going on wherever the railroad is bringing the farmers in, and we've
got men in this country who'd make first-grade franc tireurs."
IV
MULLER STANDS FAST
The windows of Fremont homestead were open wide, and Larry Grant sat by
one of them in a state of quiet contentment after a long day's ride.
Outside, the prairie, fading from grey to purple, ran back to the dusky
east, and the little cool breeze that came up out of the silence and
flowed into the room had in it the qualities of snow-chilled wine. A star
hung low to the westward in a field of palest green, and a shaded lamp
burned dimly at one end of the great bare room.
By it the Fräulein Muller, flaxen-haired, plump, and blue-eyed, sat
knitting, and Larry's eyes grew a trifle wistful when he glanced at her.
It was a very long while since any woman had crossed his threshold, and
the red-cheeked fräulein gave the comfortless bachelor dwelling a
curiously homelike appearance. Nevertheless, it was not the recollection
of its usual dreariness that called up the sigh, for Larry Grant had had
his dreams like other men, and Miss Muller was not the woman he had now
and then daringly pictured sitting there. Her father, perhaps from force
of habit, sat with a big meerschaum in hand, by the empty stove, and if
his face expressed anything at all it was phlegmatic content. Opposite him
sat Breckenridge, a young Englishman, lately arrived from Minnesota.
"What do you think of the land, now you've seen it?" asked Grant.
Muller nodded reflectively. "Der land is good. It is der first-grade hard
wheat she will grow. I three hundred and twenty acres buy."
"Well," said Grant, "I'm willing to let you have it; but I usually try to
do the square thing, and you may have trouble before you get your first
crop in."
"Und," said Muller, "so you want to sell?"
Grant laughed. "Not quite; and I can't sell that land outright. I'll let
it to you while my lease runs, and when that falls in you'll have the same
right to homestead a quarter or half section for nothing as any other man.
In the meanwhile, I and one or two others are going to start wheat-growing
on land that is ours outright, and take our share of the trouble."
"Ja," said Muller, "but dere is much dot is not clear to me. Why you der
trouble like?"
"Well," said Grant, "as I've tried to tell you, it works out very much
like this. It was known that this land was specially adapted to mixed
farming quite a few years ago, but the men who ran their cattle over it
never drove a plough. You want to know why? Well, I guess it was for much
the same reason that an association of our big manufacturers bought up the
patents of an improved process, and for a long while never made an ounce
of material under them, or let any one else try. We had to pay more than
it was worth for an inferior article that hampered some of the most
important industries in the country, and they piled up the dollars in the
old-time way."
"Und," said Muller, "dot is democratic America!"
"Yes," said Grant. "That is the America we mean to alter. Well, where one
man feeds his cattle, fifty could plough and make a living raising stock
on a smaller scale, and the time's quite close upon us when they will; but
the cattle-men have got the country, and it will hurt them to let go. It's
not their land, and was only lent them. Now I'm no fonder of trouble than
any other man, but this country fed and taught me, and kept me two years
in Europe looking round, and I'd feel mean if I took everything and gave
it nothing back. Muller will understand me. Do you, Breckenridge?"
The English lad laughed. "Oh, yes; though I don't know that any similar
obligation was laid on myself. The country I came from had apparently no
use for a younger son at all, and it was kicks and snubs it usually
bestowed on me; but if there's a row on hand I'm quite willing to stand by
you and see it through. My folks will, however, be mildly astonished when
they hear I've turned reformer."
Grant nodded good-humouredly, for he was not a fanatic, but an American
with a firm belief in the greatness of his country's destiny, who,
however, realized that faith alone was scarcely sufficient.
"Well," he said, "if it's trouble you're anxious for, it's quite likely
you'll find it here. Nobody ever got anything worth having unless he
fought for it, and we've taken on a tolerably big contract. We're going to
open up this state for any man who will work for it to make a living in,
and substitute its constitution for the law of the cattle-barons."
"Der progress," said Muller, "she is irresistible."
Breckenridge laughed. "From what I was taught, it seems to me that she
moves round in rings. You start with the luxury of the few, oppression,
and brutality, then comes revolution, and worse things than you had
before, progress growing out of it that lasts for a few generations until
the few fittest get more than their fair share of wealth and control, and
you come back to the same point again."
Muller shook his head. "No," he said, "it is nod der ring, but der elastic
spiral. Der progress she march, it is true, round und round, but she is
arrive always der one turn higher, und der pressure on der volute is nod
constant."
"On the top?" said Breckenridge. "Principalities and powers, traditional
and aristocratic, or monetary. Well, it seems to me they squeeze progress
down tolerably flat between them occasionally. Take our old cathedral
cities and some of your German ones, and, if you demand it, I'll throw
their ghettos in. Then put the New York tenements or most of the smaller
western towns beside them, and see what you've arrived at."
"No," said Muller tranquilly. "Weight above she is necessary while der
civilization is incomblete, but der force is from der bottom. It is all
time positive and primitive, for it was make when man was make at der
beginning."
Grant nodded. "Well," he said, "our work's waiting right here. What other
men have done in the Dakotas and Minnesota we are going to do. Nature has
been storing us food for the wheat plant for thousands of years, and
there's more gold in our black soil than was ever dug out of Mexico or
California. Still, you have to get it out by ploughing, and not by making
theories. Breckenridge, you will stay with me; but you'll want a house to
live in, Muller."
Muller drew a roll of papers out of his pocket, and Grant, who took them
from him, stared in wonder. They were drawings and calculations relating
to building with undressed lumber, made with Teutonic precision and
accuracy.
"I have," said Muller, "der observation make how you build der homestead
in this country."
"Then we'll start you in to-morrow," said Grant. "You'll get all the
lumber you want in the birch bluff, and I'll lend you one or two of the
boys I brought in from Michigan. There's nobody on this continent handier
with the axe."
Muller nodded and refilled his pipe, and save for the click of the
fräulein's needles there was once more silence in the bare room. She had
not spoken, for the knitting and the baking were her share, and the men
whose part was the conflict must be clothed and fed. They knew it could
not be evaded, and, springing from the same colonizing stock, placid
Teuton with his visions and precision in everyday details, eager American,
and adventurous Englishman, each made ready for it in his own fashion.
Free as yet from passion, or desire for fame, they were willing to take up
the burden that was to be laid upon them; but only the one who knew the
least awaited it joyously. Others had also the same thoughts up and down
that lonely land, and the dusty cars were already bringing the vanguard of
the homeless host in. They were for the most part quiet and resolute men,
who asked no more than leave to till a few acres of the wilderness, and to
eat what they had sown; but there were among them others of a different
kind--fanatics, outcasts, men with wrongs--and behind them the human
vultures who fatten on rapine. As yet, the latter found no occupation
waiting them, but their sight was keen, and they knew their time would
come.
It was a week later, and a hot afternoon, when Muller laid the big
crosscut saw down on the log he was severing and slowly straightened his
back. Then he stood up, red and very damp in face, a burly,
square-shouldered man, and, having mislaid his spectacles, blinked about
him. On three sides of him the prairie, swelling in billowy rises, ran
back to the horizon; but on the fourth a dusky wall of foliage followed
the crest of a ravine, and the murmur of water came up faintly from the
creek in the hollow. Between himself and its slender birches lay piled
amidst the parched and dusty grass, and the first courses of a wooden
building, rank with the smell of sappy timber, already stood in front of
him. There was no notch in the framing that had not been made and pinned
with an exact precision. In its scanty shadow his daughter sat knitting
beside a smouldering fire over which somebody had suspended a big
blackened kettle. The crash of the last falling trunk had died away, and
there was silence in the bluff; but a drumming of hoofs rose in a sharp
staccato from the prairie.
"Now," said Muller quietly, "I think the chasseurs come."
The girl looked up a moment, noticed the four mounted figures that swung
over the crest of a rise, and then went on with her knitting again. Still,
there was for a second a little flash in her pale blue eyes.
The horsemen came on, the dust floating in long wisps behind them, until,
with a jingle of bridle and stirrup, they pulled up before the building.
Three of them were bronzed and dusty, in weather-stained blue shirts, wide
hats, and knee-boots that fitted them like gloves; and there was ironical
amusement in their faces. Each sat his horse as if he had never known any
other seat than the saddle; but the fourth was different from the rest. He
wore a jacket of richly embroidered deerskin, and the shirt under it was
white; while he sat with one hand in a big leather glove resting on his
hip. His face was sallow and his eyes were dark.
"Hallo, Hamburg!" he said, and his voice had a little commanding ring.
"You seem kind of busy."
Muller blinked at him. He had apparently not yet found his spectacles, but
he had in the meanwhile come upon his axe, and now stood very straight,
with the long haft reaching to his waist.
"Ja," he said. "Mine house I build."
"Well," said the man in the embroidered jacket, "I fancy you're wasting
time. Asked anybody's leave to cut that lumber, or put it up?"
"Mine friend," said Muller, smiling, "when it is nod necessary I ask
nodings of any man."
"Then," said the horseman drily, as he turned to his companions, "I fancy
that's where you're wrong. Boys, we'll take him along in case Torrance
would like to see him. I guess you'll have to walk home, Jim."
A man dismounted and led forward his horse with a wrench upon the bridle
that sent it plunging. "Get your foot in the stirrup, Hamburg, and I'll
hoist you up," he said.
Muller stood motionless, and the horseman in deerskin glancing round in
his direction saw his daughter for the first time. He laughed; but there
was something in his black eyes that caused the Teuton's fingers to close
a trifle upon the haft of the axe.
"You'll have to get down, Charlie, as well as Jim," he said. "Torrance has
his notions, or Coyote might have carried Miss Hamburg that far as well.
Sorry to hurry you, Hamburg, but I don't like waiting."
Muller stepped back a pace, and the axe-head flashed as he moved his hand;
while, dazzled by the beam it cast, the half-tamed broncho rose with hoofs
in the air. Its owner smote it on the nostrils with his fist, and the pair
sidled round each other--the man with his arm drawn back, the beast with
laid-back ears--for almost a minute before they came to a standstill.
"Mine friend," said Muller, "other day I der pleasure have. I mine house
have to build."
"Get up," said the stockrider. "Ever seen anybody fire off a gun?"
Muller laughed softly, and glanced at the leader. "Der rifle," he said
drily. "I was at Sedan. To-day it is not convenient that I come."
"Hoist him up!" said the leader, and once more, while the other man moved
forward, Muller stepped back; but this time there was an answering flash
in his blue eyes as the big axe-head flashed in the sun.
"I guess we'd better hold on," said another man. "Look there, Mr.
Clavering."
He pointed to the bluff, and the leader's face darkened as he gazed, for
four men with axes were running down the slope, and they were lean and
wiry, with very grim faces. They were also apparently small farmers or
lumbermen from the bush of Michigan, and Clavering knew such men usually
possessed a terrible proficiency with the keen-edged weapon, and
stubbornness was native in them. Two others, one of whom he knew, came
behind them. The foremost stopped, and stood silent when the man Clavering
recognized signed to them, but not before each had posted himself
strategically within reach of a horseman's bridle.
"You might explain, Clavering, what you and your cow-boys are doing here,"
he said.
Clavering laughed. "We are going to take your Teutonic friend up to the
Range. He is cutting our fuel timber with nobody's permission."
"No," said Grant drily; "he has mine. The bluff is on my run."
"Did you take out timber rights with your lease?" asked Clavering.
"No, I hadn't much use for them. None of my neighbours hold any either.
But the bluff is big enough, and I've no objection to their cutting what
billets they want. Still, I can't have them driving out any other friends
of mine."
Clavering smiled ironically. "You have been picking up some curious
acquaintances, Larry; but don't you think you had better leave this thing
to Torrance? The fact is, the cattle-men are not disposed to encourage
strangers building houses in their country just now."
"I had a notion it belonged to this State. It's not an unusual one," said
Grant.
Clavering shrugged his shoulders. "Of course, it sounds better that way.
Have it so. Still, it will scarcely pay you to make yourself unpopular
with us, Larry."
"Well," said Grant drily, "it seems to me I'm tolerably unpopular already.
But that's not quite the point. Take your boys away."
Clavering flung his hand up in half-ironical salutation, but as he was
about to wheel his horse a young Englishman whose nationality was plainly
stamped upon him seized his bridle.
"Not quite so fast!" he said. "It would be more fitting if you got down
and expressed your regrets to the fräulein. You haven't heard Muller's
story yet, Larry."
"Let go," said Clavering, raising the switch he held. "Drop my bridle or
take care of yourself!"
"Come down," said Breckenridge.
The switch went up and descended hissing upon part of an averted face; but
the lad sprang as it fell, and the next moment the horse rose almost
upright with two men clinging to it; one of them, whose sallow cheeks were
livid now, swaying in the saddle. Then Grant grasped the bridle that fell
from the rider's hands, and hurled his comrade backwards, while some of
the stockriders pushed their horses nearer, and the axe-men closed in
about them.
Hoarse cries went up. "Horses back! Pull him off! Give the Britisher a
show! Leave them to it!"
It was evident that a blunder would have unpleasant results, for
Clavering, with switch raised, had tightened his left hand on the bridle
Grant had loosed again, while a wicked smile crept into his eyes, and the
lad stood tense and still, with hands clenched in front of him, and a weal
on his young face. Grant, however, stepped in between them.
"We've had sufficient fooling, Breckenridge," he said. "Clavering, I'll
give you a minute to get your men away, and if you can't do it in that
time you'll take the consequences."
Clavering wheeled his horse. "The odds are with you, Larry," he said. "You
have made a big blunder, but I guess you know your own business best."
He nodded, including the fräulein, with an easy insolence that yet became
him, touched the horse with his heel, and in another moment he and his
cow-boys were swinging at a gallop across the prairie. Then, as they
dipped behind a rise, those who were left glanced at one another.
Breckenridge was very pale, and one of his hands was bleeding where
Clavering's spur had torn it.
"It seems that we have made a beginning," he said hoarsely. "It's first
blood to them, but this will take a lot of forgetting, and the rest may be
different."
Grant made no answer, but turned and looked at Muller, who stood very
straight and square, with a curious brightness in his eyes.
"Are you going on with the contract? There is the girl to consider," said
Grant.
[Illustration: "COME DOWN!"--Page 47.]
"Ja," said the Teuton. "I was in der Vosges, and der girl is also Fräulein
Muller."
"Boys," said Grant to the men from Michigan, "you have seen what's in
front of you, and you'll probably have to use more than axes before you're
through. Still, you have the chance of clearing out right now. I only want
willing men behind me."
One of the big axe-men laughed scornfully, and there was a little sardonic
grin in the faces of the rest.
"There's more room for us here than there was in Michigan, and now we've
got our foot down here we're not going back again," he said. "That's about
all there is to it. But when our time comes, the other men aren't going to
find us slacker than the Dutchman."
Grant nodded gravely. "Well," he said very simply, "I guess the Lord who
made this country will know who's in the right and help them. They'll need
it. There's a big fight coming."
Then they went back to their hewing in the bluff, and the Fräulein Muller
went on with her knitting.
V
HETTY COMES HOME
It was an afternoon of the Indian summer, sunny and cool, and the maples
about the Schuyler villa flamed gold and crimson against a sky of softest
blue, when Hetty Torrance sat reflectively silent on the lawn. Flora
Schuyler sat near her, with a book upside down upon her knee.
"You have been worrying about something the last few weeks," she said.
"Is that quite unusual?" asked Hetty. "Haven't a good many folks to worry
all the time?"
Flora Schuyler smiled. "Just finding it out, Hetty? Well, I have noticed a
change, and it began the day you waited for us at the depot. And it wasn't
because of Jake Cheyne."
"No," said Hetty reflectively. "I suppose it should have been. Have you
heard from him since he went away?"
"Lily Cheyne had a letter with some photographs, and she showed it to me.
It's a desolate place in the sage bush he's living in, and there's not a
white man, except the boys he can't talk to, within miles of him, while
from the picture I saw of his adobe room I scarcely think folks would have
it down here to keep hogs in. Jake Cheyne was fastidious, too, and there
was a forced cheerfulness about his letter which had its meaning, though,
of course, he never mentioned you."
Hetty flushed a trifle. "Flo, I'm sorry. Still, you can't blame me."
"No," said Miss Schuyler, "though there was a time when I wished I could.
You can't help being pretty, but it ought to make you careful when you see
another of them going that way again."
Hetty made a little impatient gesture. "If there ever is another, he'll be
pulled up quite sharp. You don't think their foolishness, which spoils
everything, is any pleasure to me. It's too humiliating. Can't one be
friends with a nice man without falling in love with him?"
"Well," said Miss Schuyler drily, "it depends a good deal on how you're
made; but it's generally risky for one or the other. Still, perhaps you
might, for I have a fancy there's something short in you. Now, I'm going
to ask you a question. Is it thinking of the other man that has made you
restless? I mean the one we saw at the depot?"
Hetty laughed outright. "Larry? Why, as I tried to tell you, he has always
been just like a cousin or a brother to me, and doesn't want anything but
his horses and cattle and his books on political economy. Larry's quite
happy with his ranching, and his dreams of the new America. Of course,
they'll never come to anything; but when you can start him talking they're
quite nice to listen to."
Flora Schuyler shook her head. "I wouldn't be too sure. That man is in
earnest, and the dreams of an earnest American have a way of coming true.
You have known him a long while, and I've only seen him once, but that man
will do more than talk if he ever has the opportunity. He has the quiet
grit one finds in the best of us--not the kind that make the speeches--and
some Englishmen, in him. You can see it in his eyes."
"Then," said Hetty, with a little laugh, "come back with me to Cedar, and
if you're good you shall have him. It isn't everybody I'd give Larry to."
There was a trace of indignation in Flora Schuyler's face. "I fancy he
would not appreciate your generosity, and there's a good deal you have got
to find out, Hetty," she said drily. "It may hurt you when you do. But you
haven't told me yet what has been worrying you."
"No," said Hetty, with a little wistful smile. "Well, I'm going to. It's
hard to own to, but I'm a failure. I fancied I could make everybody listen
to my singing, and I would come here. Well, I came, and found out that my
voice would never bring me fame, and for a time it hurt me horribly.
Still, I couldn't go back just then, and when you and your mother pressed
me I stayed. I knew what you expected, and I disappointed you. Perhaps I
was too fastidious, but there were none of them that really pleased me.
Then I began to see that I was only spoiling nicer girls' chances and
trying the patience of everybody."
"Hetty!" said Flora Schuyler, but Miss Torrance checked her.
"Wait until I'm through. Then it became plain to me that while I'd been
wasting my time here the work I was meant for was waiting at Cedar. The
old man who gave me everything is very lonely there, and he and Larry have
been toiling on while I flung 'most what a ranch would cost away on
lessons and dresses and fripperies, which will never be any good to me.
Still, I'm an American, too, and now, when there's trouble coming, I'm
going back to the place I belong to."
"You are doing the right thing now," said Flora Schuyler.
Hetty smiled somewhat mirthlessly. "Well," she said, "because it's hard, I
guess I am; but there's one thing would make it easier. You will come and
stay with me. You don't know how much I want you; and New York in winter
doesn't suit you. You're pale already. Come and try our clear, dry cold."
Eventually Miss Schuyler promised, and Hetty rose. "Then it's fixed," she
said. "I'll write the old man a dutiful letter now, while I feel like
doing it well."
The letter was duly written, and, as it happened, reached Torrance as he
sat alone one evening in his great bare room at Cedar Range. Among the
papers on the table in front of him were letters from the cattle-men's
committees, which had sprung into existence every here and there, and
Torrance apparently did not find them reassuring, for there was care in
his face. It had become evident that the big ranchers' rights were mostly
traditional, and already, in scattered detachments, the vanguard of the
homesteaders' host was filing in. Here and there they had made their
footing good; more often, by means not wholly constitutional, their
outposts had been driven in; but it was noticeable that Torrance and his
neighbours still believed them no more than detachments, and had not heard
the footsteps of the rest. Three years' residence in that land had changed
the aliens into American citizens, but a lifetime of prosperity could
scarcely efface the bitterness they had brought with them from the east,
while some, in spite of their crude socialistic aspirations, were drilled
men who had herded the imperial legions like driven cattle into Sedan.
More of native birth, helots of the cities, and hired hands of the plains,
were also turning desiring eyes upon the wide spaces of the cattle
country, where there was room for all.
Torrance opened his letter and smiled somewhat drily. It was affectionate
and not without its faint pathos, for Hetty had been stirred when she
wrote; but the grim old widower felt no great desire for the gentle
attentions of a dutiful daughter just then.
"We shall be at Cedar soon after you get this," he read among the rest. "I
know if I had told you earlier you would have protested you didn't want
me, just because you foolishly fancied I should be lonely at the Range;
but I have been very selfish, and you must have been horribly lonely too;
and one of the nicest girls you ever saw is coming to amuse you. You can't
help liking Flo. Of course I had to bring a maid; but you will have to
make the best of us, because you couldn't stop us now if you wanted to."
It was noticeable that Torrance took the pains to confirm this fact by
reference to a railroad schedule, and, finding it incontrovertible, shook
his head.
"Three of them," he said.
Then he sat still with the letter in his hand, while a trace of tenderness
crept into his face, which, however, grew grave again, until there was a
tapping at the door, and Clavering came in.
"You seem a trifle worried, sir, and if you're busy I needn't keep you
long," he said. "I just wanted to hand you a cheque for the subscription
you paid for me."
"Sit down," said Torrance. "Where did you get the dollars from?"
Clavering appeared almost uneasy for a moment, but he laughed. "I've been
thinning out my cattle."
"That's not a policy I approve of just now. We'll have the rabble down
upon us as soon as we show any sign of weakening."
Clavering made a little deprecatory gesture. "It wasn't a question of
policy. I had to have the dollars. Still, you haven't told me if you have
heard anything unpleasant from the other committees."
Torrance appeared thoughtful. He suspected that Clavering's ranch was
embarrassed, and the explanation was plausible.
"No," he said. "It was something else. Hetty is on her way home, and she
is bringing another young woman and a maid with her. They will be here
before I can stop them. Still, I could, if it was necessary, send them
back."
Clavering did not answer for a moment, though Torrance saw the faint gleam
in his dark eyes, and watched him narrowly. Then he said, "You will find a
change in Miss Torrance, sir. She has grown into a beautiful young woman,
and has, I fancy, been taught to think for herself in the city; you could
not expect her to come back as she left the prairie. And if anything has
induced her to decide that her place is here, she will probably stay."
"You're not quite plain. What could induce her?"
Clavering smiled, though he saw that the shot had told. "It was
astonishing that Miss Torrance did not honour me with her confidence. A
sense of duty, perhaps, although one notices that the motives of young
women are usually a trifle involved. It, however, appears to me that if
Miss Torrance makes up her mind to stay, we are still quite capable of
guarding our women from anxiety or molestation."
"Yes," said Torrance grimly. "Of course. Still, we may have to do things
we would sooner they didn't hear about or see. Well, you have some news?"
Clavering nodded. "I was in at the railroad, and fifty Dakota men came in
on the cars. I went round to the hotel with the committee, and, though it
cost some dollars to fix the thing, they wouldn't take them in. The boys,
who got kind of savage, found a pole and drove the door in, but we turned
the Sheriff, who had already sworn some of us in, loose on them. Four or
five men were nastily clubbed, and one of James's boys was shot through
the arm, while I have a fancy that the citizens would have stood in with
the other crowd; but seeing they were not going to get anything to eat
there, they held up a store, and as we told the man who kept it how their
friends had sacked Regent, he fired at them. The consequence is that the
Sheriff has some of them in jail, and the rest are camped down on the
prairie. We hold the town."
"Through the Sheriff?"
Clavering laughed. "He'll earn his pay. Has it struck you that this
campaign is going to cost us a good deal? Allonby hasn't much left in hand
already."
"Oh, yes," said the older man, with a little grim smile. "If it's wanted
I'll throw my last dollar in. Beaten now and we're beaten for ever. We
have got to win."
Clavering said nothing further, though he realized, perhaps more clearly
than his leader, that it was only by the downfall of the cattle-men the
small farmer could establish himself, and, when he had handed a cheque to
Torrance, went out.
It was three days later when Hetty Torrance rose from her seat in a big
vestibule car as the long train slackened speed outside a little Western
station. She laughed as she swept her glance round the car.
"Look at it, Flo," she said; "gilding and velvet and nickel, all quite in
keeping with the luxury of the East. You are environed by civilization
still; but once you step off the platform there will be a difference."
Flora Schuyler, who noticed the little flush in her companion's face,
glanced out of the dusty window, for the interior of the gently-rocking
car, with its lavish decoration and upholstery, was not new to her, and
the first thing that caught her eye was the miscellaneous deposit of
rubbish, old boots, and discarded clothing, amidst the willows that slowly
flitted by. Then she saw a towering water-tank, wooden houses that rose
through a haze of blowing dust, hideous in their unadornment, against a
crystalline sky, and a row of close-packed stock-cars which announced that
they were in the station.
It seemed to be thronged with the populace, and there was a murmur,
apparently of disappointed expectancy, when, as the cars stopped, the
three women alone appeared on the platform. Then there was a shout for the
conductor, and somebody said, "You've no rustlers aboard for us?"
"No," said the grinning official who leaned out from the door of the
baggage-car. "The next crowd are waiting until they can buy rifles to whip
you with."
Hoarse laughter followed, and somebody said, "Boys, your friends aren't
coming. You can take your band home again."
Then out of the clamour came the roll of a drum, and, clear and musical,
the ringing of bugles blown by men who had marched with Grant and Sherman
when they were young. The effect was stirring, and a cheer went up, for
there were other men present in whom the spirit which, underlying
immediate issues, had roused the North to arms was living yet; but it
broke off into laughter when, one by one, discordant instruments and
beaten pans joined in. The din, however, ceased suddenly, when somebody
said, "Hadn't you better let up, boys, or Torrance will figure you sent
the band for him?"
Miss Schuyler appeared a trifle bewildered, the maid frightened; but
Hetty's cheeks were glowing.
"Flo," she said, "aren't you glad you came? The boys are taking the trail.
We'll show you how we stir the prairie up by and by!"
Miss Schuyler was very doubtful as to whether the prospect afforded her
any pleasure; but just then a grey-haired man, dressed immaculately in
white shirt and city clothes, kissed her companion, and then, taking off
his hat, handed her down from the platform with ceremonious courtesy. He
had a grim, forceful face, with pride and command in it, and Miss
Schuyler, who felt half afraid of him then, never quite overcame the
feeling. She noticed, however, that he paid equal attention to the
terrified maid.
"It would be a duty to do our best for any of Hetty's friends who have
been so kind to her in the city, but in this case it's going to be a
privilege, too," he said. "Well, you will be tired, and they have a meal
waiting you at the hotel. This place is a little noisy to-day, but we'll
start on the first stage of your journey when you're ready."
He gave Miss Schuyler his arm, and moved towards the thickest of the
crowd, which, though apparently slightly hostile, made way for him. Here
and there a man drove his fellows back, and one, catching up a loose
plank, laid it down for the party to cross the rail switches on. Torrance
turned to thank him, but the man swept his hat off with a laugh.
"I wouldn't worry; it wasn't for you," he said. "It's a long while since
we've seen anything so pretty as Miss Torrance and the other one."
Flora Schuyler flushed a little, but Hetty turned to the speaker with a
sparkle in her eyes.
"Now," she said, "that was 'most worth a dollar, and if I didn't know what
kind of man you were, I'd give it you. But what about Clarkson's Lou?"
There was a laugh from the assembly, and the man appeared embarrassed.
"Well," he said slowly, "she went off with Jo."
Miss Torrance nodded sympathetically. "Still, if she knew no better than
that, I wouldn't worry. Jo had a cast in his eye."
The crowd laughed again, and Flora Schuyler glanced at her companion with
some astonishment as she asked, "Do you always talk to them that way?"
"Of course," said Hetty. "They're our boys--grown right here. Aren't they
splendid?"
Miss Schuyler once more appeared dubious, and made no answer; but she
noticed that the man now preceded them, and raised his hand when they came
up with the band, which had apparently halted to indulge in retort or
badinage with some of those who followed them.
"Hold on a few minutes, boys, and down with that flag," he said.
Then a tawdry banner was lowered suddenly between two poles, but not
before Miss Torrance had seen part of the blazoned legend. Its unvarnished
forcefulness brought a flush to her companion's cheek.
"Dad," she asked more gravely, "what is it all about?"
Torrance laughed a little. "That," he said, "is a tolerably big question.
It would take quite a long while to answer it."
They had a street to traverse, and Hetty saw that it was filled with
little knots of men, some of whom stared at her father, though as she
passed their hats came off. Miss Schuyler, on her part, noticed that most
of the stores were shut, and felt that she had left New York a long way
behind as she glanced at the bare wooden houses cracked by frost and sun,
rickety plank walks, whirling wisps of dust, and groups of men, splendid
in their lean, muscular symmetry and picturesque apparel. There was a
boldness in their carriage, and a grace that approached the statuesque in
every poise. Still, she started when they passed one wooden building where
blue-shirted figures with rifles stood motionless in the verandah.
"The jail," said Torrance, quietly. "The Sheriff has one or two rioters
safe inside there."
They found an indifferent meal ready at the wooden hotel, and when they
descended in riding dress a wagon with their baggage was waiting outside
the door, while a few mounted men with wide hats and bandoliers came up
with three saddle-horses. Torrance bestowed the maid in the light wagon,
and, when the two girls were mounted, swung himself into the saddle. Then,
as they trotted down the unpaved street, Hetty glanced at him and pointed
to the dusty horsemen.
"What are the boys for?" she asked.
Torrance smiled grimly. "I told you we had our troubles. It seemed better
to bring them, in case we had any difficulty with Larry's friends."
"Larry's friends?" asked Hetty, almost indignantly.
Torrance nodded. "Yes," he said. "You have seen a few of them. They were
carrying the flag with the inscription at the depot."
Hetty asked nothing further, but Flora Schuyler noticed the little flash
in her eyes, and as they crossed the railroad track the clear notes of the
bugles rose again and were followed by a tramp of feet. Glancing over
their shoulders the girls could see men moving in a body, with the flag
they carried tossing amidst the dust. They were coming on in open fours,
and when the bugles ceased deep voices sent a marching song ringing across
the wooden town.
Hetty's eyes sparkled; the stockriders seemed to swing more lightly in
their saddles, and Flora Schuyler felt a little quiver run through her.
Something that jingling rhythm and the simple words expressed but
inarticulately stirred her blood, as she remembered that in her nation's
last great struggle the long battalions had limped on, ragged and
footsore, singing that song.
"Listen," said Hetty, while the colour crept into her face. "Oh, I know
it's scarcely music, and the crudest verse; but it served its purpose, and
is there any nation on earth could put more swing and spirit into the
grandest theme?"
Torrance smiled somewhat drily, but there was a curious expression in his
face. "Some of those men are drawing their pension, but they're not with
us," he said. "It's only because we have sent in all the boys we can spare
that the Sheriff, who has their partners in his jail, can hold the town."
A somewhat impressive silence followed this, and Flora Schuyler glanced at
Hetty when they rode out into the white prairie with two dusty men with
bandoliers on either flank.
VI
THE INCENDIARY
Events of no apparent moment have extensive issues now and then, and while
cattle-man and homesteader braced themselves for the conflict which they
felt would come, the truce might have lasted longer but for the fact that
one night Muller slept indifferently in the new house he had built. He was
never quite sure what made him restless, or prompted him to open and lean
out of his window; and, when he had done this, he saw and heard nothing
unusual for a while.
On one hand the birch bluff rose, a dusky wall, against the indigo of the
sky, and in front of him the prairie rolled away, silent and shadowy.
There was scarcely a sound but the low ripple of the creek, until,
somewhere far off in the distance, a coyote howled. The drawn-out wail had
in it something unearthly, and Muller, who was by no means an imaginative
man, shivered a little. The deep silence of the great empty land
emphasized by the sound reacted upon him and increased his restlessness.
Scarcely knowing why he did so, except that he felt he could not sleep, he
slipped on a few garments, and moved softly to the door, that he might not
disturb his daughter. There was no moon when he went out, but the stars
shone clearly in the great vault of blue, and the barns and stables he had
built rose black against the sky. Though Grant had lent him assistance and
he had hewn the lumber on the spot, one cannot build a homestead and equip
it for nothing, and when he had provided himself with working horses,
Muller had sunk the last of his scanty capital in the venture. It was
perhaps this fact which induced him to approach the stable, moving
noiselessly in his slippers, and glance within.
The interior was black and shadowy, but there was no doubting the fact
that the beasts were moving restlessly. Muller went in, holding his breath
as he peered about him, and one broncho backed away as he approached its
stall. Muller patted it on the flank, and the horse stood still, as though
reassured, when it recognized him, which was not without its meaning. He
listened, but hearing nothing groped round the stable, and taking a
hayfork went out as softly as he had entered, and took up his post in the
deepest shadow, where he commanded outbuildings and house. There was, he
knew, nobody but Grant dwelling within several leagues of him, and as yet
property was at least as safe in that country as it was in Chicago or New
York; but as he leaned, impassively watchful, against the wall, he
remembered an episode which had happened a few weeks earlier.
He had been overtaken by a band of stockriders when fording the creek with
his daughter, and one who loitered behind them reined his horse in and
spoke to the girl. Muller never knew what his words had been; but he saw
the sudden colour in the fräulein's face, and seized the man's bridle. An
altercation ensued, and when the man rejoined his comrades, who apparently
did not sympathize with him, his bridle hand hung limp and the farmer was
smiling as he swung a stick. Muller attached no especial importance to the
affair; but Grant, who did not tell him so, differed in this when he heard
of it. He knew that the cattle-rider is usually rather chivalrous than
addicted to distasteful gallantries.
In any case, Muller heard nothing for a while, and felt tempted to return
to his bed when he grew chilly. He had, however, spent bitter nights
stalking the franc tireurs in the snow, and the vigilance taught and
demanded by an inflexible discipline had not quite deserted him, though he
was considerably older and less nimble now. At last, however, a dim,
moving shadow appeared round a corner of the building, stopped a moment,
and then slid on again towards the door. So noiseless was it that Muller
could almost have believed his eyes had deceived him until he heard the
hasp rattle. Still, he waited until the figure passed into the stable, and
then very cautiously crept along the wall. Muller was not so vigorous as
he had been when proficiency in the use of the bayonet had been drilled
into him; but while his fingers tightened on the haft of the fork he
fancied that he had still strength enough to serve his purpose. He had
also been taught to use it to the best advantage.
He straightened himself a little when he stood in the entrance and looked
about him. There was a gleam of light in the stable now, for a lantern
stood upon a manger and revealed by its uncertain glimmer a pile of
prairie hay, with a kerosene-can upon it, laid against the logs. Muller
was not wholly astonished, but he was looking for more than that, and the
next moment he saw a shadowy object apparently loosing the nearest horse's
halter. It was doubtless a merciful deed, but it was to cost the
incendiary dear; for when, perhaps warned by some faint sound, he looked
up suddenly, he saw a black figure between him and the door.
On the instant he dropped the halter, and the hand that had held it
towards his belt; but, as it happened, the horse pinned him against the
stall, and his opportunity had passed when it moved again. Muller had
drawn his right leg back with his knee bent a trifle, and there was a
rattle as he brought the long fork down to the charge. Thus, when the man
was free the deadly points twinkled in a ray from the lantern within a
foot of his breast. It was also unpleasantly evident that a heave of the
farmer's shoulder would bury them in the quivering flesh.
"Hands oop!" a stern voice said.
The man delayed a second. The butt of the pistol that would equalize the
affair was almost within his grasp, and Muller stood in the light, but he
saw an ominous glint in the pale blue eyes and the farmer's fingers
tighten on the haft. There was also a suggestive raising of one shoulder;
and his hands went up above his head. Muller advanced the points an inch
or two, stiffening his right leg, and smiled grimly. The other man stared
straight in front of him with dilated eyes, and a little grey patch
growing larger in either cheek.
"Are you going to murder me, you condemned Dutchman?" he said.
"Yes," said Muller tranquilly, "if you der movement make. So! It is done
without der trouble when you have der bayonet exercise make."
The points gleamed as they swung forward, and the man gasped; but they
stopped at the right second, and Muller, who had hove his burly form a
trifle more upright, sank back again, bringing his foot down with a stamp.
The little demonstration was more convincing than an hour of argument.
"Well," said the man hoarsely, "I'm corralled. Throw that thing away, and
I'll give you my pistol."
Muller laughed, and then raised his great voice in what was to the other
an unknown tongue. "Lotta," he said, "Come quick, and bring the American
rifle."
There was silence for perhaps five minutes, and the men watched each
other, one white in the face and quivering a little, his adversary
impassive as a statue, but quietly observant. Then there was a patter of
hasty footsteps, and the fräulein stood in the lantern light with a
flushed, plump face and somewhat scanty dress. She apparently recognized
the man, and her colour deepened, but that was the only sign of confusion
she showed; and it was evident that the discipline of the fatherland had
not been neglected in Muller's household.
"Lotta," he said in English, "open der little slide. You feel der
cartridge? Now, der butt to der shoulder, und der eye on der sight, as I
have teach you. Der middle of him is der best place. I shout, und you
press quite steady."
He spoke with a quiet precision that had its effect; and, whatever the
girl felt, she obeyed each command in rotation. There was, however, one
danger which the stranger realized, and that was that with an involuntary
contraction of the forefinger she might anticipate the last one.
"She'll shoot me before she means to," he said, with a little gasp. "Come
and take the condemned pistol."
"Der middle of him!" said Muller tranquilly. "No movement make, you!"
Dropping the fork he moved forward, not in front of the man, but to his
side, and whipped the pistol from his belt.
"One turn make," he said. "So! Your hand behind you. Lotta, you will now a
halter get."
The girl's loose bodice rose and fell as she laid down the rifle, but she
was swift, and in less than another minute Muller had bound his captive's
hands securely behind his back and cross-lashed them from wrist to elbow.
He inspected the work critically and then nodded, as if contented.
[Illustration: "SHE'LL SHOOT ME BEFORE SHE MEANS TO."--Page 66.]
"Lotta," he said, "put der saddle on der broncho horse. Then in der house
you der cordial find, und of it one large spoonful mit der water take. My
pipe you bring me also, und then you ride for Mr. Grant."
The girl obeyed him; and when the drumming of horse-hoofs died away Muller
sat down in front of his prisoner, who now lay upon a pile of prairie hay,
and with his usual slow precision lighted his big meerschaum. The American
watched him for a minute or two, and then grew red in the face as a fit of
passion shook him.
"You condemned Dutchman!" he said.
Muller laughed. "Der combliment," he said, "is nod of much use to-night."
It was an hour later when Grant and several horsemen arrived, and he
nodded as he glanced at the prisoner.
"I figured it was you. There's not another man on the prairie mean enough
for this kind of work," he said, pointing to the kerosene-can. "You didn't
even know enough to do it decently, and you're about the only American
who'd have let an old man tie his hands."
The prisoner winced perceptibly. "Well," he said hoarsely, glancing
towards the hayfork, rifle, and pistol, which still lay at Muller's feet,
"if you're astonished, look at the blamed Dutchman's armoury."
"I've one thing to ask you," Grant said sternly. "It's going to pay you to
be quite straight with me. Who hired you?"
There was defiance in the incendiary's eyes, but Grant was right in his
surmise that he was resolute only because that of the two fears which
oppressed him he preferred to bear the least.
"You can ask till you get sick of it, but you'll get nothing out of me,"
he said.
"Take him out," said Grant. "Put him on to the led horse. If you'll come
round to my place for breakfast, I'll be glad to see you, Muller."
"I come," said Muller. "Mit der franc tireur it is finish quicker, but
here in der Republic we reverence have for der law."
Grant laughed a little. "Well," he said drily, "I'm not quite sure."
He swung himself to the saddle, swept off his hat to the girl, who stood
with the lantern light upon her in the doorway, smiling but flushed, and
shook his bridle. Then there was a jingle that was lost in the thud of
hoofs, and the men vanished into the shadowy prairie. Half an hour later
the homestead was once more dark and silent; but three men sent out by
Grant were riding at a reckless gallop across the great dusky levels, and
breakfast was not finished when those whom they had summoned reached
Fremont ranch.
They were young men for the most part, and Americans, though there were a
few who had only just become so among them, and two or three whose grim
faces and grey hair told of a long struggle with adversity. They were clad
in blue shirts and jean, and the hard brown hands of most betokened a
close acquaintance with plough stilt, axe, and bridle, though here and
there one had from his appearance evidently lived delicately. All appeared
quietly resolute, for they knew that the law which had given them the
right to build their homes upon that prairie as yet left them to bear the
risks attached to the doing of it. Hitherto, the fact that the great
ranchers had made their own laws and enforced them had been ignored or
tacitly accepted by the State.
When they were seated, one of the men deputed to question the prisoner,
stood up. "You can take it that there's nothing to be got out of him," he
said.
"Still," said another, "we know he is one of Clavering's boys."
There was a little murmur, for of all the cattle-barons Clavering was the
only man who had as yet earned his adversaries' individual dislike. They
were prepared to pull down the others because their interests, which they
had little difficulty in fancying coincided with those of their country,
demanded it; but Clavering, with his graceful insolence, ironical contempt
of them, and thinly-veiled pride, was a type of all their democracy
anathematized. More than one of them had winced under his soft laugh and
lightly spoken jibes, which rankled more than a downright injury.
"The question is what we're going to do with him," said a third speaker.
Again the low voices murmured, until a man stood up. "There's one cure for
his complaint, and that's a sure one, but I'm not going to urge it now,"
he said. "Boys, we don't want to be the first to take up the rifle, and it
would make our intentions quite as plain if we dressed him in a coat of
tar and rode him round the town. Nobody would have any use for him after
that, and it would be a bigger slap in Clavering's face than anything else
we could do to him."
Some of the men appeared relieved, for it was evident they had no great
liking for the sterner alternative; and there was acclamation until Grant
rose quietly at the head of the table.
"I've got to move a negative," he said. "It would be better if you handed
him to the Sheriff."
There was astonishment in most of the faces, and somebody said, "The
Sheriff! He'd let him go right off. The cattle-men have got the screw on
him."
"Well," said Larry quietly, "he has done his duty so far, and may do it
again. I figure we ought to give him the chance."
Exclamations of dissent followed, and a man with a grim, lean face stood
up. He spoke tolerable English, but his accent differed from that of the
rest.
"The first man put it straight when he told you there was only one
cure--the one they found out in France a hundred years ago," he said. "You
don't quite realize it yet. You haven't lived as we did back there across
the sea, and seen your women thrust off the pavement into the gutter to
make room for an officer, or been struck with the sword-hilt if you
resented an insult before your fellow citizens. Will you take off your
hats to the rich men who are trampling on you, you republicans, and, while
they leave you the right of speech, beg them to respect your rights and
liberties? Do that, and sit still a little, and they'll fasten the yoke
we've groaned under on your necks."
"I don't know that it isn't eloquent, but it isn't business," said
somebody.
The man laughed sardonically. "That's where you're wrong," he said. "I'm
trying to show you that if you want your liberties you've got to fight for
them, and your leader doesn't seem to know when, by hanging one man, he
can save a hundred from misery. It's not the man who laid the kindling
you're striking at, but, through him, those who employed him. Let them see
you'll take your rights without leave of them. They've sent you warning
that if you stay here they'll burn your homesteads down, and they're
waiting your answer. Hang their firebug where everyone can see him, in the
middle of the town."
It was evident that the men were wavering. They had come there with the
law behind them, but, from their youth up, some following visions that
could never be realized, had hated the bureaucrat, and the rest, crippled
by the want of dollars, had fought with frost and drought and hail. It was
also plain that they felt the capture of the incendiary had given them an
opportunity. Then, when a word would have turned the scale, Grant stood up
at the head of the table, very resolute in face.
"I still move a negative and an amendment, boys," he said. "First, though
that's not the most important, because I've a natural shrinking from
butchering an unarmed man. Secondly, it was not the cattle-men who sent
him, but one of them, and just because he meant to draw you on it would be
the blamedest bad policy to humour him. Would Torrance, or Allonby, or the
others, have done this thing? They're hard men, but they believe they're
right, as we do, and they're Americans. Now for the third reason: when
Clavering meant to burn Muller's homestead, he struck at me, guessing that
some of you would stand behind me. He knew your temper, and he'd have
laughed at us as hot-blooded rabble--you know how he can do it--when he'd
put us in the wrong. Well, this time we'll give the law a show."
There was discussion, but Larry sat still, saying nothing further, with a
curious gravity in his face, until a man stood up again.
"We think you're right," he said. "Still, there's a question. What are you
going to do if they try again?"
"Strike," said Larry quietly. "I'll go with you to the hanging of the next
one."
Nothing more was said, and the men rode away with relief in their faces,
though three of them, girt with rifle and bandolier, trotted behind the
wagon in which the prisoner sat.
VII
LARRY PROVES INTRACTABLE
It was some little time after her arrival at Cedar Range when Miss
Torrance, who took Flora Schuyler with her, rode out across the prairie.
There were a good many things she desired to investigate personally, and,
though a somewhat independent young woman, she was glad that the
opportunity of informing Torrance of her intention was not afforded her,
since he had ridden off somewhere earlier in the day. It also happened
that although the days were growing colder she arrayed herself
fastidiously in a long, light skirt, which she had not worn since she left
Cedar, and which with the white hat that matched it became her better than
the conventional riding attire. Miss Schuyler naturally noticed this.
"Is it a garden party we are going to?" she asked.
Hetty laughed. "We may meet some of our neighbours, and after staying with
you all that while in New York I don't want to go back on you. I had the
thing specially made in Chicago for riding in."
Miss Schuyler was not quite satisfied, but she made no further comment,
and there was much to occupy her attention. The bleached plain was bright
with sunshine and rolled back into the distance under an arch of cloudless
blue, while the crisp, clear air stirred her blood like an elixir. They
swept up a rise and down it, the colour mantling in their faces, over the
long hollow, and up a slope again, until, as the white grass rolled behind
her, Flora Schuyler yielded to the exhilaration of swift motion, and,
flinging off the constraint of the city, rejoiced in the springy rush of
the mettlesome beast beneath her. Streaming white levels, the blue of the
sliding sky, the kiss of the wind on her hot cheek, and the roar of hoofs,
all reacted upon her until she laughed aloud when she hurled her half-wild
broncho down a slope.
"This is surely the finest country in the world," she said.
The words were blown behind her, but Hetty caught some of them, and, when
at last she drew bridle where a rise ran steep and seamed with
badger-holes against the sky, nodded with a little air of pride.
"Oh, yes, and it's ours. All of it," she said. "Worth fighting for, isn't
it?"
Flora Schuyler laughed a little, but she shook her head. "It's a pity one
couldn't leave that out. You would stay here with your men folk if there
was trouble?"
Hetty looked at her with a little flash in her eyes. "Why, of course! It's
our country. We made it, and I'd go around in rags and groom the boys'
horses if it would help them to whip out the men who want to take it from
us."
Flora Schuyler smiled a trifle drily. "The trouble is that when we fall
out, one is apt to find as good Americans as we are, and sometimes the men
we like the most, standing in with the opposition. It has happened quite
often since the war."
Hetty shook her bridle impatiently. "Then, of course, one would not like
them any longer," she said.
Nothing more was said until they crossed the ridge above them, when Hetty
pulled her horse up. Across the wide levels before her advanced a line of
dusty teams, the sunlight twinkling on the great breaker ploughs they
hauled, while the black loam rolled in softly gleaming waves behind them.
They came on with slow precision, and in the forefront rolled a great
machine that seamed and rent the prairie into triple furrows.
"What are they doing there? Do they belong to you?" asked Miss Schuyler.
The flush the wind had brought there turned to a deeper crimson in Hetty's
usually colourless face. "To us!" she said, and her voice had a thrill of
scorn. "They're homesteaders. Ride down. I want to see who's leading
them."
She led the way with one little gloved hand clenched on the dainty switch
she held; but before she reached the foremost team the man who pulled it
up sprang down from the driving-seat of the big machine. A tall wire
fence, with a notice attached to it, barred his way. The other ploughs
stopped behind him, somebody brought an axe, and Hetty set her lips when
the glistening blade whirled high and fell. Thrice it flashed in the
sunlight, swung by sinewy arms, and then, as the fence went down, a low,
half-articulate cry rose from the waiting men. It was not exultant, but
there was in it the suggestion of a steadfast purpose.
Hetty sat still and looked at them, a little sparkle in her dark eyes, and
a crimson spot in either cheek, while the laces that hung from her neck
across the bodice of the white dress rose and fell. It occurred to Flora
Schuyler that she had never seen her companion look half so well, and she
waited with strained expectancy for what should follow, realizing, with
the dramatic instinct most women have, who the man with the axe must be.
He turned slowly, straightening his back and stood for a moment erect and
statuesque, with the blue shirt open at his bronzed neck and the great axe
gleaming in his hand; and Hetty gasped. Miss Schuyler's surmise was
verified, for it was Larry Grant.
"Larry," said her companion, and her voice had a curious ring, "what are
you doing here?"
The man, who appeared to ignore the question, swung off his wide hat.
"Aren't you and Miss Schuyler rather far from home?" he asked.
Flora Schuyler understood him when, glancing round, she noticed the figure
of a mounted man forced up against the skyline here and there. Hetty,
however, had evidently not seen them.
"I want an answer, please," she said.
"Well," said Larry gravely, "I was cutting down that fence."
"Why were you cutting it down?" persisted Miss Torrance.
"It was in the way."
"Of what?"
Grant turned and pointed to the men, sturdy toilers starved out of bleak
Dakota and axe-men farmers from the forests of Michigan. "Of these, and
the rest who are coming by and by," he said. "Still, I don't want to go
into that; and you seem angry. You haven't offered to shake hands with me,
Hetty."
Miss Torrance sat very still, one hand on the switch, and another on the
bridle, looking at him with a little scornful smile on her lips. Then she
glanced at the prairie beyond the severed fence.
"That land belongs to my friends," she said.
Grant's face grew a trifle wistful, but his voice was grave. "They have
had the use of it, but it belongs to the United States, and other people
have the right to farm there now. Still, that needn't make any trouble
between you and me."
"No?" said the girl, with a curious hardness in her inflection; but her
face softened suddenly. "Larry, while you only talked we didn't mind; but
no one fancied you would have done this. Yes, I'm angry with you. I have
been home 'most a month, and you never rode over to see me; while now you
want to talk politics."
Grant smiled a trifle wearily. "I would sooner talk about anything else;
and if you ask him, your father will tell you why I have not been to the
range. I don't want to make you angry, Hetty."
"Then you will give up this foolishness and make friends with us again,"
said the girl, very graciously. "It can't come to anything, Larry, and you
are one of us. You couldn't want to take away our land and give it to this
rabble?"
Hetty was wholly bewitching, as even Flora Schuyler, who fancied she
understood the grimness in the man's face, felt just then. He, however,
looked away across the prairie, and the movement had its significance to
one of the company, who, having less at stake, was the more observant.
When he turned again, however, he seemed to stand very straight.
"I'm afraid I can't," he said.
"No?" said Hetty, still graciously. "Not even when I ask you?"
Grant shook his head. "They have my word, and you wouldn't like me to go
back upon what I feel is right," he said.
Hetty laughed. "If you will think a little, you can't help seeing that you
are very wrong."
Again the little weary smile crept into Grant's face. "One naturally
thinks a good deal before starting in with this kind of thing, and I have
to go through. I can't stop now, even to please you. But can't we still be
friends?"
For a moment there was astonishment in the girl's face, then it flushed,
and as her lips hardened and every line in her slight figure seemed to
grow rigid, she reminded Miss Schuyler of the autocrat of Cedar Range.
"You ask me that?" she said. "You, an American, turning Dutchmen and these
bush-choppers loose upon the people you belong to. Can't you see what the
answer must be?"
Grant did apparently, for he mutely bent his head; but there was a shout
just then, and when one of the vedettes on the skyline suddenly moved
forward he seized Miss Torrance's bridle and wheeled her horse.
"Ride back to the Range," he said sharply, "as straight as you can. Tell
your father that you met me. Let your horse go, Miss Schuyler."
As he spoke he brought his hand down upon the beast's flank and it went
forward with a bound. The one Flora Schuyler rode flung up its head, and
in another moment they were sweeping at a gallop across the prairie. A
mile had been left behind before Hetty could pull her half-broken horse
up; but the struggle that taxed every sinew had been beneficial, and she
laughed a trifle breathlessly.
"I'm afraid I lost my temper; and I'm angry yet," she said. "It's the
first time Larry wouldn't do what I asked him, and it was mean of him to
send us off like that, just when one wanted to put on all one's dignity."
Miss Schuyler appeared thoughtful. "I fancy he did it because it was
necessary. Didn't it strike you that you were hurting him? That is a good
man and an honest one, though, of course, he may be mistaken."
"He must be," said Hetty. "Now I used to think ever so much of Larry, and
that is why I got angry with him. It isn't nice to feel one has been
fooled. How can he be good when he wants to take our land from us?"
Flora Schuyler laughed. "You are quite delightful, Hetty, now and then.
You have read a little, and been taught history. Can't you remember any?"
"Oh yes," said Hetty, with a little thoughtful nod. "Still, the men who
made the trouble in those old days were usually buried before anyone was
quite sure whether they were right or not. Try to put yourself in my
place. What would you do?"
There was a somewhat curious look in Miss Schuyler's blue eyes. "I think
if I had known a man like that one as long as you have done, I should
believe in him--whatever he did."
"Well," said Hetty gravely, "if you had, just as long as you could
remember, seen your father and his friends taking no pleasure, but working
every day, and putting most of every dollar they made back into the ranch,
you would find it quite difficult to believe that the man who meant to
take it from them now they were getting old and wanted to rest and enjoy
what they had worked for was doing good."
Flora Schuyler nodded. "Yes," she said, "I would. It's quite an old
trouble. There are two ways of looking at everything, and other folks have
had to worry over them right back to the beginning."
Then she suddenly tightened her grasp on the bridle, for the ringing of a
rifle rose, sharp and portentous, from beyond the rise. The colour faded
in her cheek, and Hetty leaned forward a trifle in her saddle, with lips
slightly parted, as though in strained expectancy. No sound now reached
them from beyond the low, white ridge that hemmed in their vision but a
faint drumming of hoofs. Then Flora Schuyler answered the question in her
companion's eyes.
"I think it was only a warning," she said.
She wheeled her horse and they rode on slowly, hearing nothing further,
until the Range rose from behind the big birch bluff. Torrance had
returned when they reached it, and Hetty found him in his office room.
"I met Larry on the prairie, and of course I talked to him," she said. "I
asked him why he had not been to the Range, and he seemed to think it
would be better if he did not come."
Torrance smiled drily. "Then I guess he showed quite commendable taste as
well as good sense. You are still decided not to go back to New York,
Hetty?"
"Yes," said the girl, with a little resolute nod. "You see, I can't help
being young and just a little good-looking, but I'm Miss Torrance of Cedar
all the time."
Torrance's face was usually grim, but it grew a trifle softer then.
"Hetty," he said, "they taught you a good many things I never heard of at
that Boston school, but I'm not sure you know that all trade and industry
is built upon just this fact: what a man has made and worked hard for is
his own. Would anyone put up houses or raise cattle if he thought his
neighbours could take them from him? Now there's going to be trouble over
that question here, and, though it isn't likely, your father may be beaten
down. He may have to do things that wouldn't seem quite nice to a dainty
young woman, and folks may denounce him; but it's quite plain that if you
stay here you will have to stand in with somebody."
The girl, who was touched by the unusual tenderness in his eyes, sat down
upon the table, and slipped an arm about his neck.
"Who would I stand in with but you?" she said. "We'll whip the rustlers
out of the country, and, whether it sounds nice at the time or not, you
couldn't do anything but the square thing."
Torrance kissed her gravely, but he sighed and his face grew stern again
when she slipped out of the room.
"There will not be many who will come through this trouble with hands
quite clean," he said.
It was during the afternoon, and Torrance had driven off again, when, as
the two girls were sitting in the little room which was set apart for
them, a horseman rode up to the Range, and Flora Schuyler, who was nearest
the window, drew back the curtain.
"That man should sit on horseback always," she said; "he's quite a
picture."
Hetty nodded. "Yes," she said. "Still, you told me you didn't like him.
It's Clavering. Now, I wonder what he put those things on for--he doesn't
wear them very often--and whether he knew my father wasn't here."
Clavering would probably have attracted the attention of most young women
just then, for he had dressed himself in the fashion the prairie
stockriders were addicted to, as he did occasionally, perhaps because he
knew it suited him. He had artistic perceptions, and could adapt himself
harmoniously to his surroundings, and he knew Hetty's appreciation of the
picturesque. His sallow face showed clean cut almost to feminine
refinement under the wide hat, and the blue shirt which clung about him
displayed his slender symmetry. It was, however, not made of flannel, but
apparently of silk, and the embroidered deerskin jacket which showed the
squareness of his shoulders, was not only daintily wrought, but had
evidently cost a good many dollars. His loose trousers and silver spurs
were made in Mexican fashion: but the boldness of the dark eyes, and the
pride that revealed itself in the very pose of the man, redeemed him from
any taint of vanity.
He sat still until a hired man came up, then swung himself from the
saddle, and in another few moments had entered the room with his wide hat
in his hand.
"You find us alone," said Hetty. "Are you astonished?"
"I am content," said Clavering. "Why do you ask me?"
"Well," said Hetty naïvely, "I fancied you must have seen my father on the
prairie, and could have stopped him if you had wanted to."
There was a little flash in Clavering's dark eyes that was very eloquent.
"The fact is, I did. Still, I was afraid he would want to take me along
with him."
Hetty laughed. "I am growing up," she said. "Three years ago you wouldn't
have wasted those speeches on me. Well, you can sit down and talk to
Flora."
Clavering did as he was bidden. "It's a time-honoured question," he said.
"How do you like this country?"
"There's something in its bigness that gets hold of one," said Miss
Schuyler. "One feels free out here on these wide levels in the wind and
sun."
Clavering nodded, and Flora Schuyler fancied from his alertness that he
had been waiting for an opportunity. "It would be wise to enjoy it while
you can," he said. "In another year or two the freedom may be gone, and
the prairie shut off in little squares by wire fences. Then one will be
permitted to ride along a trail between rows of squalid homesteads flanked
by piles of old boots and provision-cans. We will have exchanged the
stockrider for the slouching farmer with a swarm of unkempt children and a
slatternly, scolding wife then."
"You believe that will come about?" asked Miss Schuyler, giving him the
lead she felt he was waiting for.
Clavering looked thoughtful. "It would never come if we stood loyally
together, but--and it is painful to admit it--one or two of our people
seem quite willing to destroy their friends to gain cheap popularity by
truckling to the rabble. Of course, we could spare those men quite well,
but they know our weak points, and can do a good deal of harm by betraying
them."
"Now," said Hetty, with a sparkle in her eyes, "you know quite well that
if some of them are mistaken they will do nothing mean. Can't they have
their notions and be straight men?"
"It is quite difficult to believe it," said Clavering. "I will tell you
what one or two of them did. There was trouble down at Gordon's place
fifty miles west, and his cow-boys whipped off a band of Dutchmen who
wanted to pull his fences down. Well, they came back a night or two later
with a mob of Americans, and laid hands on the homestead. We are proud of
the respect we pay women in this country, Miss Schuyler, but that night
Mrs. Gordon's and her daughters' rooms were broken into, and the girls
turned out on the prairie. It was raining, and I believe they were not
even allowed to provide themselves with suitable clothing. Of course,
nothing of that kind could happen here, or I would not have told you."
Hetty's voice was curiously quiet as she asked, "Was nothing done to
provoke them?"
"Yes," said Clavering, with a dry smile, "Gordon shot one of them; but is
it astonishing? What would you expect of an American if a horde of rabble
who held nothing sacred poured into his house at night? Oh, yes, he shot
one of them, and would have given them the magazine, only that somebody
felled him with an axe. The Dutchman was only grazed, but Gordon is lying
senseless still."
There was an impressive silence, and the man sat still with the veins on
his forehead a trifle swollen and a glow in his eyes. His story was also
accurate, so far as it went; but he had, with a purpose, not told the
whole of it.
"You are sure there were Americans among them?" asked Hetty, very
quietly.
"They were led by Americans. You know one or two of them."
"No," said Hetty, almost fiercely. "I don't know. But Larry wasn't
there?"
Clavering shook his head, but there was a curious incisiveness in his
tone. "Still, we found out that his committee was consulted and
countenanced the affair."
"Then Larry wasn't at the meeting," said Miss Torrance. "He couldn't have
been."
Clavering made her a little and very graceful inclination. "One would
respect such faith as yours."
Miss Schuyler, who was a young woman of some penetration, deftly changed
the topic, and Clavering came near to pleasing her, but he did not quite
succeed, before he took his departure. Then Hetty glanced inquiringly at
her companion.
Flora Schuyler nodded. "I know just what you mean, and I was mistaken."
"Yes?" said Hetty. "Then you like him?"
Miss Schuyler shook her head. "No. I fancied he was clever, and he didn't
come up to my expectations. You see, he was too obvious."
"About Larry?"
"Yes. Are you not just a little inconsistent, Hetty?"
Miss Torrance laughed. "I don't know," she said. "I am, of course, quite
angry with Larry, but nobody else has a right to abuse him."
Flora Schuyler said nothing further, and while she sat in thoughtful
silence Clavering walked down the hall with Hetty's maid. He was a
well-favoured man, and the girl was vain. She blushed when he looked down
on her with a trace of admiration in his smile.
"You like the prairie?" he said.
She admitted that she was pleased with what she had seen of it, and
Clavering's assumed admiration became bolder.
"Well, it's a good country, and different from the East," he said. "There
are a good many more dollars to be picked up here, and pretty women are
quite scarce. They usually get married right off to a rancher. Now I guess
you came out to better yourself. It takes quite a long time to get rich
down East."
The girl blushed again, and when she informed him that she had a crippled
sister who was a charge on the family, Clavering smiled as he drew on a
leather glove.
"You'll find you have struck the right place," he said. "Now I wonder if
you could fix a pin or something in this button shank. It's coming off,
you see."
The girl did it, and when he went out found a bill lying on the table
where he had been standing. The value of it somewhat astonished her, but
after a little deliberation she put it in her pocket.
"If he doesn't ask for it when he comes back I'll know he meant me to keep
it," she said.
VIII
THE SHERIFF
Miss Schuyler had conjectured correctly respecting the rifle-shot which
announced the arrival of a messenger; a few minutes after the puff of
white smoke on the crest of the rise had drifted away, a mounted man rode
up to Grant at a gallop. His horse was white with dust and spume, but his
spurs were red.
"Railroad district executive sent me on to let you know the Sheriff had
lost your man," he said.
"Lost him," said Grant.
"Well," said the horseman, "put it as it pleases you, but, as he had him
in the jail, it seems quite likely he let him go."
There was a growl from the teamsters who had clustered round, and Grant's
face grew stern. "He was able to hold the two homesteaders Clavering's
boys brought him."
"Oh, yes," said the other, "he has them tight enough. You'll remember one
of the cattle-boys and a storekeeper got hurt during the trouble, and our
men are not going to have much show at the trial Torrance and the Sheriff
are fixing up!"
"Then," said Grant wearily, "we'll stop that trial. You will get a fresh
horse in my stable and tell your executive I'm going to take our men out
of jail, and if it suits them to stand in they can meet us at the trail
forks, Thursday, ten at night."
The man nodded. "I'm tolerably played out, but I'll start back right now,"
he said.
He rode off towards the homestead, and Grant turned to the rest. "Jake,
you'll take the eastern round; Charley, you'll ride west. Give them the
handful of oats at every shanty to show it's urgent. They're to be at
Fremont in riding order at nine to-morrow night."
In another ten minutes the men were riding hard across the prairie, and
Grant, with a sigh, went on with his ploughing. It would be next year
before he could sow, and whether he would ever reap the crop was more than
any man in that region would have ventured to predict. He worked however,
until the stars were out that night and commenced again when the red sun
crept up above the prairie rim the next day; but soon after dusk mounted
men rode up one by one to Fremont ranch. They rode good horses, and each
carried a Winchester rifle slung behind him when they assembled, silent
and grim, in the big living-room.
"Boys," said Grant quietly, "we have borne a good deal, and tried to keep
the law, but it is plain that the cattle-men, who bought it up, have left
none for us. Now, the Sheriff, who has the two homesteaders safe, has let
the man we sent him go."
There was an ominous murmur and Grant went on. "The homesteaders, who only
wanted to buy food and raised no trouble until they were fired on, will be
tried by the cattle-men, and I needn't tell you what kind of chance
they'll get. We pledged ourselves to see they had fair play when they came
in, and there's only one means of getting it. We are going to take them
from the Sheriff, but there will be no fighting. We'll ride in strong
enough to leave no use for that. Now, before we start, are you all willing
to ride with me?"
Again a hoarse murmur answered him, and Grant, glancing down the row of
set faces under the big lamps, was satisfied.
"Then we'll have supper," he said quietly. "It may be a long while before
any of us gets a meal again."
It was a silent repast. As yet the homesteaders, at least in that
district, had met contumely with patience and resisted passively each
attempt to dislodge them, though it had cost their leader a strenuous
effort to restrain the more ardent from the excesses some of their
comrades farther east had already committed; but at last the most peaceful
of them felt that the time to strike in turn had come. They mounted when
supper was over and rode in silence past willow bluff and dusky rise
across the desolate waste. The badger heard the jingle of their bridles,
and now and then a lonely coyote, startled by the soft drumming of the
hoofs, rose with bristling fur and howled; but no cow-boy heard their
passage, or saw them wind in and out through devious hollows when daylight
came. Still, here and there an anxious woman stood, with hazy eyes, in the
door of a lonely shanty, wondering whether the man she had sent out to
strike for the home he had built her would ever ride back again. For they,
too, had their part in the struggle, and it was perhaps the hardest one.
It was late at night when they rode into the wooden town. Here and there a
window was flung open; but the night was thick and dark, and there was
little to see but the dust that whirled about the dimly flitting forms.
That, however, was nothing unusual, for of late squadrons of stockriders
and droves of weary cattle had passed into the town; and a long row of
shadowy frame houses had been left behind before the fears of any citizen
were aroused. It was, perhaps, their silent haste that betrayed the
horsemen, for they rode in ordered ranks without a word, as men who have
grim business in hand, until a hoarse shout went up. Then a pistol flashed
in the darkness in front of them, doors were flung open, lights began to
blink, and a half-seen horseman came on at a gallop down the shadowy
street. He pulled his horse up within a pistol-shot from the homesteaders,
and sat still in his saddle staring at them.
"You'll have to get down, boys, or tell me what you want," he said. "You
can't ride through here at night without a permit."
There was a little ironical laughter, and somebody asked, "Who's going to
stop us?"
"The Sheriff's guard," said the horseman. "Stop right where you are until
I bring them."
"Keep clear," said Grant sternly, "or we'll ride over you. Forward,
boys!"
There was a jingle of bridles, and the other man wheeled his horse as the
heels went home. Quick as he was, the foremost riders were almost upon
him, and as he went down the street at a gallop the wooden houses flung
back a roar of hoofs. Every door was open now and the citizens peering
out. Lights flashed in the windows, and somebody cried, "The rustler boys
are coming!"
Other voices took up the cry; hoots of derision mingled with shouts of
greeting, but still, without an answer, the men from the prairie rode on,
Grant peering into the darkness as he swung in his saddle at the head of
them. He saw one or two mounted men wheel their horses, and more on foot
spring clear of the hoofs, and then the flash of a rifle beneath the black
front of a building. A flagstaff ran up into the night above it, and there
were shadowy objects upon the verandah. Grant threw up a hand.
"We're here, boys," he said.
Then it became evident that every man's part had been allotted him, for
while the hindmost wheeled their horses, and then sat still, with rifles
across their saddles, barring the road by which they had come, the
foremost pressed on, until, pulling up, they left a space behind them and
commanded the street in front. The rest dismounted, and while one man
stood at the heads of every pair of horses, the rest clustered round Grant
in the middle of the open space. The jail rose dark and silent before
them, and for the space of a moment or two there was an impressive
stillness. It was broken by a shout from one of the rearguard.
"There's quite a crowd rolling up. Get through as quick as you can!"
Grant stood forward. "We'll give you half a minute to send somebody out to
talk to us, and then we're coming in," he said.
The time was almost up before a voice rose from the building: "Who are
you, any way, and what do you want?"
"Homesteaders," was the answer. "We want the Sheriff."
"Well," said somebody, "I'll tell him."
Except for a growing clamour in the street behind there was silence until
Breckenridge, who stood near Grant touched him,
"I don't want to meddle, but aren't we giving them an opportunity of
securing their prisoners or making their defences good?" he said.
"That's sense, any way," said another man. "It would be 'way better to go
right in now, while we can."
Grant shook his head. "You have left this thing to me, and I want to put
it through without losing a man. Men don't usually back down when the
shooting begins."
Then a voice rose from the building: "You wanted the Sheriff. Here he
is."
A shadowy figure appeared at a window, and there was a murmur from Grant's
men.
"He needn't be bashful," said one of them. "Nobody's going to hurt him.
Can't you bring a light, so we can see him?"
A burst of laughter followed, and Grant held up his hand. "It would be
better, Sheriff; and you have my word that we'll give you notice before we
do anything if we can't come to terms."
It seemed from the delay that the Sheriff was undecided, but at last a
light was brought, and the men below saw him standing at the window with
an anxious face, and behind him two men with rifles, whose dress
proclaimed them stockriders. He could also see the horsemen below, as
Grant, who waited until the sight had made its due impression, had
intended that he should. There were a good many of them, and the effect of
their silence and the twinkling of light on their rifles was greater than
that of any uproar would have been.
"Now you can see me, you needn't keep me waiting," said the Sheriff, with
an attempt at jauntiness which betrayed his anxiety. "What do you want?"
"Two of your prisoners," said Grant.
"I'm sorry you can't have them," said the Sheriff. "Hadn't you better ride
home again before I turn the boys loose on you?"
But his voice was not quite in keeping with his words, and it would have
been wiser if he had turned his face aside.
"It's a little too far to ride back without getting what we came for,"
said Grant quietly. "Now, we have no great use for talking. We want two
homesteaders, and we mean to get them; but that will satisfy us."
"You want nobody else?"
"No. You can keep your criminals, or let them go, just as it suits you."
There was a laugh from some of the horsemen, which was taken up by the
crowd and swelled into a storm of cries. Some expressed approval, others
anger, and the Sheriff stepped backwards.
"Then," he said hoarsely, "if you want your friends, you must take them."
The next moment the window shut with a bang, and the light died out,
leaving the building once more in darkness.
"Get to work," said Grant. "Forward, those who are going to cover the
axe-men!"
There was a flash from the verandah, apparently in protest and without
intent to hurt, for the next moment a few half-seen objects flung
themselves over the balustrade as the men with the axes came up, and
others with rifles took their places a few paces behind them. Then one of
the horsemen shouted a question.
"Let them pass," said Grant.
The door was solid and braced with iron, but those who assailed it had
swung the axe since they had the strength to lift it, and in the hands of
such men it is a very effective implement. The door shook and rattled as
the great blades whirled and fell, each one dropping into the notch the
other had made; the men panted as they smote; the splinters flew in
showers.
"Holding out still!" gasped one of them. "There's iron here. Get some of
the boys to chop that redwood pillar, and we'll drive it down."
There was an approving murmur, but Grant grasped the man by the shoulder.
"No," he said. "We haven't come to wreck the town. I've another plan if
you're more than two minutes getting in."
The axes whirled faster, and at last a man turned breathlessly. "Get
ready, boys," he said. "One more on the bolt head, Jake, and we're in!"
A brawny man twice whirled the hissing blade about his head, and as he
swung forward with both hands on the haft with a dull crash the wedge of
tempered steel clove the softer metal. The great door tilted and went
down, and Breckenridge sprang past the axe-men through the opening. His
voice came back exultantly out of the shadowy building. "It was the old
country sent you the first man in!"
The men's answer was a shout as they followed him, with a great trampling
down the corridor, but the rest of the building was very silent, and
nobody disputed their passage until at last a man with grey hair appeared
with a lantern behind an iron grille.
"Open that thing," said somebody.
The man smiled drily. "I couldn't do it if I wanted to. I've given my keys
away."
One or two of the homesteaders glanced a trifle anxiously behind them. The
corridor was filling up, and it dawned upon them that if anything barred
their egress they would be helpless.
"Then what are you stopping for?" asked somebody.
"It's in my contract," said the jailer quietly. "I was raised in Kentucky.
You don't figure I'm scared of you?"
"No use for talking," said a man. "You can't argue with him. Go ahead with
your axes and beat the blamed thing in."
It cost them twenty minutes' strenuous toil; but the grille went down, and
two of the foremost seized the jailer.
"Let him go," said Grant quietly. "Now, we can't fool time away with you.
Where's the Sheriff?"
"I don't quite know," said the jailer, and the contempt in his voice
answered the question.
Grant laughed a little. "Well," he said, "I guess he's sensible. Now, what
you have got to do is to bring out the two homesteaders as quick as you
can."
"I told you I couldn't do it," said the other man.
"You listen to me. We are going to take those men out, if we have to pull
this place to pieces until we find them. That, it's quite plain, would let
the others go, and you would lose the whole of your prisoners instead of
two of them. Tell us where you put them, and you can keep the rest."
"That's square?"
"Oh, yes," said Grant. "There are quite enough men of their kind loose in
this country already."
"Straight on," said the jailer. "First door."
They went on in silence, but there was a shout when somebody answered
their questions from behind a door, which a few minutes later tottered and
fell beneath the axes. Then, amidst acclamation, they led two men out, and
showed them to the jailer.
"You know them?" said Grant. "Well, you can tell your Sheriff there wasn't
a cartridge in the rifles of the men who opened his jail. He'll come back
when the trouble's over, but it seems to me the cattle-men have wasted a
pile of dollars over him."
He laughed when a question met them as they once more trampled into the
verandah.
"Yes," he said. "The boys are bringing them!"
Two horses were led forward, and the released men swung themselves into
the saddle. There was a hasty mounting, and when the men swung into open
fours a shout went up from the surging crowd.
"They have taken the homesteaders out. The Sheriff has backed down."
A roar followed that expressed approbation and disgust; it was evident
that the sympathies of the citizens were divided. In the momentary silence
Grant's voice rang out:
"Sling rifles! Keep your order and distance! Forward, boys!"
Again a hoarse cry went up, but there was only applause in it now, for the
crowd recognized the boldness of the command and opened out, pressing back
against the houses as the little band rode forward. Their silence was
impressive, but the leader knew his countrymen, for, while taunts and
display would have courted an onset, nobody seemed anxious to obstruct the
men who sat unconcernedly in their saddles, with the rifles which alone
warranted their daring disdainfully slung behind them.
On they went past clusters of wondering citizens, shouting sympathizers,
and silent cattle-men, until there was a hoot of derision, and, perhaps in
the hope of provoking a conflict in which the rest would join, a knot of
men pushed out into the street from the verandah of the wooden hotel.
Grant realized that a rash blow might unloose a storm of passion and rouse
to fury men who were already regretting their supineness.
"Keep your pace and distance!" he commanded.
Looking straight in front of them, shadowy and silent, the leading four
rode on, and once more the crowd melted from in front of them. As the last
of the band passed through the opening that was made for them a man
laughed as he turned in his saddle.
"We can't stay any longer, boys, but it wasn't your fault. It's a man you
want for Sheriff," he said.
"No talking there! Gallop!" said Grant, and the horsemen flitted across
the railroad track, and with a sinking thud of hoofs melted into the
prairie. They had accomplished their purpose, and the cattle-men, going
back disgustedly to remonstrate with the Sheriff, for a while failed to
find him.
IX
THE PRISONER
The prairie was shining white in the moonlight with the first frost when
Torrance, Hetty, and Miss Schuyler drove up to Allonby's ranch. They were
late in arriving and found a company of neighbours already assembled in
the big general room. It was panelled with cedar from the Pacific slope,
and about the doors and windows were rich hangings of tapestry, but the
dust was thick upon them and their beauty had been wasted by the moth.
Tarnished silver candlesticks and lamps which might have come from England
a century ago, and a scarred piano littered with tattered music, were in
keeping with the tapestry; for signs of taste were balanced by those of
neglect, while here and there a roughly patched piece of furniture
conveyed a plainer hint that dollars were scanty with Allonby. He was from
the South, a spare, grey-haired man, with a stamp of old-fashioned
dignity, and in his face a sadness not far removed from apathy and which,
perhaps, accounted for the condition of his property.
His guests, among whom were a number of young men and women, were,
however, apparently light-hearted, and had whiled away an hour or two with
song and badinage. A little removed from them, in a corner with the great
dusty curtain of a window behind her, sat Hetty Torrance with Allonby's
nephew and daughter. Miss Allonby was pale and slight and silent; but her
cousin united the vivacity of the Northerner with the distinction that is
still common in the South, and--for he was very young--Hetty found a
mischievous pleasure in noticing his almost too open admiration for Flora
Schuyler, who sat close beside them. A girl was singing indifferently, and
when she stopped, Miss Allonby raised her head as a rhythmical sound
became audible through the closing chords of the piano.
"Somebody riding here in a hurry!" she said.
It was significant that the hum of voices which followed the music ceased
as the drumming of hoofs grew louder; the women looked anxious and the men
glanced at one another. Tidings brought in haste were usually of moment
then. Torrance, however, stood up and smiled at the assembly.
"I guess some of those rascally rustlers have been driving off a steer
again," he said. "Can't you sing us something, Clavering?"
Clavering understood him, and it was a rollicking ballad he trolled out
with verve and spirit; but still, though none of the guests now showed it
openly, the anxious suspense did not abate, and by and by Miss Allonby
smiled at the lad beside her somewhat drily.
"Never mind the story, Chris. I guess we know the rest. That man is riding
hard, and you are as anxious as any of us," she said.
A minute or two later there was a murmur of voices below, and Allonby went
out. Nobody appeared to notice this, but the hum of somewhat meaningless
talk which followed and the strained look in one or two of the women's
faces had its meaning. Every eye was turned towards the doorway until
Allonby came back and spoke with Torrance apart. Then he smiled
reassuringly upon his guests.
"You will be pleased to hear that some of our comrades have laid hands
upon one of the leaders in the attack upon the jail," he said. "They want
to lodge him here until they can send for the Sheriff's posse, and of
course I could only agree. Though the State seems bent on treating us
somewhat meanly, we are, I believe, still loyal citizens, and I feel quite
sure you will overlook any trifling inconvenience the arrival of the
prisoner may cause you."
"Doesn't he put it just a little curiously?" suggested Flora Schuyler.
"Well," said Christopher Allonby, "it really isn't nice to have one of our
few pleasant evenings spoiled by this kind of thing."
"You don't understand. I am quite pleased with your uncle, but there's
something that amuses me in the idea of jailing one's adversary from
patriotic duty."
Christopher Allonby smiled. "There's a good deal of human nature in most
of us, and it's about time we got even with one or two of them."
"Find out about it, Chris," said Miss Allonby; "then come straight back
and tell us."
The young man approached a group of his elders who were talking together,
and returned by and by.
"It was done quite smartly," he said. "One of the homestead boys who had
fallen out with Larry came over to us, and I fancy it was Clavering fixed
the thing up with him. The boys didn't know he had deserted them, and the
man he took the oats to believed in him."
"I can't remember you telling a tale so one could understand it, Chris,"
said Miss Allonby. "Why did he take the oats to him?"
The lad laughed. "They have their committees and executives, and when a
man has to do anything they send a few grains of oats to him. One can't
see much use in it, and we know 'most everything about them; but it makes
the thing kind of impressive, and the rustler fancied our boy was square
when he got them. He was to ride over alone and meet somebody from one of
the other executives at night in a bluff. He went, and found a band of
cattle-boys waiting for him. I believe he hadn't a show at all, for the
man who went up to talk to him grabbed his rifle, but it seems he managed
to damage one or two of them."
"You don't know who he is?" asked Miss Allonby; and Flora Schuyler noticed
a sudden intentness in Hetty's eyes.
"No," said the lad, "but the boys will be here with him by and by, and I'm
glad they made quite sure of him, any way."
Hetty's eyes sparkled. "You can't be proud of them! It wasn't very
American."
"Well, we can't afford to be too particular, considering what we have at
stake; though it might have sounded nicer if they had managed it
differently. You don't sympathize with the homestead boys, Miss
Torrance?"
"Of course not!" said Hetty, with a little impatient gesture. "Still, that
kind of meanness does not appeal to me. Even the men we don't like would
despise it. They rode into the town without a cartridge in their rifles,
and took out their friends in spite of the Sheriff, while the crowd looked
on."
"It was Larry Grant fixed that, and 'tisn't every day you can find a man
like him. It 'most made me sick when I heard he had gone over to the
rabble."
"You were a friend of his?" asked Flora Schuyler.
"Oh, yes;" and a little shadow crept into Allonby's face. "But, that's
over now. When a man goes back on his own folks there's only one way of
treating him, and it's not going to be nice for Larry if we can catch him.
We're in too tight a place to show the man who can hurt us most much
consideration."
Hetty turned her head a moment, and then changed the subject, but not
before Flora Schuyler noticed the little flush in her cheek. The music,
laughter, and gay talk began again, and if anyone remembered that while
they chased their cares away grim men who desired their downfall toiled
and planned, no sign of the fact was visible.
Twenty minutes passed, and then the thud of hoofs once more rose from the
prairie. It swelled into a drumming that jarred harsh and portentous
through the music, and Hetty's attention to the observations of her
companions became visibly less marked. One by one the voices also seemed
to sink, and it was evidently a relief to the listeners when a girl rose
and closed the piano. Somebody made an effort to secure attention to a
witty story, and there was general laughter, but it also ceased, and an
impressive silence followed. Out of it came the jingle of bridles and
trampling of hoofs, as the men outside pulled up, followed by voices in
the hall, and once more Allonby went out.
"They're right under this window," said his nephew. "Slip quietly behind
the curtains, and I think you can see them."
Flora Schuyler drew the tapestry back, the rest followed her and
Christopher Allonby flung it behind them, so that it shut out the light.
In a moment or two their eyes had become accustomed to the change, and
they saw a little group of mounted men close beneath. Two of them
dismounted, and appeared to be speaking to some one at the door, but the
rest sat with their rifles across their saddles and a prisoner in front of
them. His hat was crushed and battered, his jacket rent, and Flora
Schuyler fancied there was a red trickle down his cheek; but his face was
turned partly away from the window, and he sat very still, apparently with
his arms bound loosely at the wrists.
"All these to make sure of one man, and they have tied his hands!" she
said.
Hetty noticed the ring in her companion's voice, and Allonby made a little
deprecatory gesture.
"It's quite evident they had too much trouble getting him to take any
chances of losing him," he said. "I wish the fellow would turn his head. I
fancy I should know him."
A tremor ran through Hetty for she also felt she recognized that tattered
figure. Then one of the horsemen seized the captive's bridle, and the man
made a slight indignant gesture as the jerk flung off his hands. Flora
Schuyler closed her fingers tight.
"If I were a man I should go down and talk quite straight to them," she
said.
The prisoner was sitting stiffly now, but he swayed in the saddle when one
of the cattle-men struck his horse and it plunged. He turned his head as
he did so, and the moonlight shone into his face. It was very white, and
there was a red smear on his forehead. Hetty gasped, and Flora Schuyler
felt her fingers close almost cruelly upon her arm.
"It's Larry!" she said.
Christopher Allonby nodded. "Yes, we have him at last," he said. "Of
course, one feels sorry; but he brought it on himself. They're going to
put him into the stable."
The men rode forward, and when they passed out of sight Hetty slipped back
from behind the curtain, and, sat down, shivering as she looked up at Miss
Schuyler.
"I can't help it, Flo. If one could only make them let him go!"
"You need not let any of them see it," said Miss Schuyler, sharply. "Sit
quite still here and talk to me. Now, what right had those men to arrest
him?"
The warning was sufficient. Hetty shook out her dress and laughed, though
her voice was not steady.
"It's quite simple," she said. "The Sheriff can call out any citizen to
help him or send any man off after a criminal in an emergency. Of course,
being a responsible man he stands in with us, and in times like these the
arrangement suits everybody. We do what seems the right thing, and the
Sheriff is quite pleased when we tell him."
Flora Schuyler smiled drily. "Yes. It's delightfully simple. Still,
wouldn't it make the thing more square if the other men had a good-natured
Sheriff, too?"
"Now you are laughing at me. The difference is that we are in the right."
"And Larry, of course, must be quite wrong!"
"No," said Hetty, "he is mistaken. Flo, you have got to help me--I'm going
to do something for him. Try to be nice to Chris Allonby. They'll send him
to take care of Larry."
Miss Schuyler looked steadily at her companion. "You tried to make me
believe you didn't care for the man."
A flush stole into Hetty's cheek, and a sparkle to her eyes. "Can't you do
a nice thing without asking questions? Larry was very good to me for
years, and--I'm sorry for him. Any way, it's so easy. Chris is young, and
you could fool any man with those big blue eyes if he let you look at
him."
Flora Schuyler made a half-impatient gesture, and then, sweeping her dress
aside, made room for Christopher Allonby. She also succeeded so well with
him that when the guests had departed and the girls came out into the
corral where he was pacing up and down, he flung his cigar away and
forsook his duty to join them. It was a long ride to Cedar Range, and
Torrance had decided to stay with Allonby until morning.
"It was very hot inside--they would put so much wood in the stove," said
Hetty. "Besides, Flo's fond of the moonlight."
"Well," said Allonby, "it's quite nice out here, and I guess Miss Schuyler
ought to like the moonlight. It's kind to her."
Flora Schuyler laughed as they walked past the end of the great wooden
stable together. "If you look at it in one sense, that wasn't pretty. You
are guarding the prisoner?"
"Yes," said the lad, with evident diffidence. "The boys who brought him
here had 'bout enough of him, and they're resting, while ours are out on
the range. I'm here for two hours any way. It's not quite pleasant to
remember I'm watching Larry."
"Of course!" and Miss Schuyler nodded sympathetically. "Now, couldn't you
just let us talk to him? The boys have cut his forehead, and Hetty wanted
to bring him some balsam. I believe he used to be kind to her."
Allonby looked doubtful, but Miss Schuyler glanced at him appealingly--and
she knew how to use her eyes--while Hetty said:
"Now, don't be foolish, Chris. Of course, we had just to ask your uncle,
but he would have wanted to come with us and would have asked so many
questions, while we knew you would tell nobody anything. You know I can't
help being sorry for Larry, and he has done quite a few nice things for
you, too."
"Miss Schuyler is going with you?"
"Of course," and Hetty smiled mischievously as she glanced at her
companion. "Still, you needn't be jealous, Chris. I'll take the best care
she doesn't make love to him."
Flora Schuyler looked away across the prairie, which was not quite what
one would have expected from a young woman of her capacities; but the
laughing answer served to banish the lad's suspicions, and he walked with
them towards the door. Then he stopped, and when he drew a key from an
inner pocket Hetty saw something twinkle in the moonlight at his belt.
"Chris," she said, "stand still for a minute and shut your eyes quite
tight."
The lad did as he was bidden, for a few years ago he had been the
complaisant victim of Hetty's pleasantries, and felt a light touch on his
lips. Then, there was a pluck at his belt, and Hetty was several yards
away when he made a step forward with his eyes wide open. She was laughing
at him, but there was a pistol in her hand.
"It was only my fingers, Chris, and Flo wasn't the least nearer than she
is now," she said. "If you dared to think anything else, you would make me
too angry. We'll bring this thing back to you in five minutes, but you
wouldn't have us go in there quite defenceless. Now you walk across the
corral, and wait until we tell you."
Allonby was very young, and somewhat susceptible. Hetty was also very
pretty, and, he fancied, Miss Schuyler even prettier still; but he had a
few misgivings, and when they went in closed the lower half of the door
and set his back to it.
"No," he said decisively, "I'm staying right here."
The girls made no demur, but when they had crossed a portion of the long
building Miss Schuyler touched her companion. "I'll wait where I am," she
said drily, "you will not want me."
Hetty went on until she came to where the light of a lantern shone faintly
in a stall. A man sat there with his hands still bound and a wide red
smear upon his forehead. His face flushed suddenly as he glanced at her,
but he said nothing.
"I'm ever so sorry, Larry," said the girl.
The man smiled, though it was evident to Hetty, whose heart beat fast,
that it was only by an effort he retained his self-control.
"Well," he said, "it can't be helped, and it was my fault. Still, I never
suspected that kind of thing."
Hetty coloured. "Larry, you mustn't be bitter--but it was horribly mean. I
couldn't help coming--I was afraid you would fancy I was proud of them."
"No," he said, sternly. "I couldn't have fancied that. There was nothing
else?"
"Your head. It is horribly cut. We saw you from the window, and I fancied
I could tie it up for you. You wouldn't mind if I tried, Larry? I have
some balsam here, and I only want a little water."
For a moment Grant's face was very expressive, but once more he seemed to
put a check upon himself, and his voice was almost too even as he pointed
to the pitcher beside him. "There is some ready. Your friends don't treat
their prisoners very well."
The girl winced a little, but dipping her handkerchief in the pitcher she
laved his forehead, and then would have laid the dressing on it; but he
caught her hand.
"No," he said, "take mine instead."
"You needn't be quite too horrid, Larry," and there was a quiver in her
voice. "It wouldn't hurt you very much to take a little thing like that
from me."
Grant smiled very gravely. "I think you had better take mine. If they
found a lady's handkerchief round my head, Allonby's folks would wonder
how it got there."
Hetty did as he suggested, and felt a curious chagrin when he failed to
look at her. "I used to wonder, Larry, how you were able to think of
everything," she said. "Now I have brought you something else; but you
must promise not to hurt anybody belonging to Allonby with it."
Grant laughed softly, partly to hide his astonishment, when he saw a
pistol laid beside him.
"I haven't grown bloodthirsty, Hetty," he said. "Where did you get it?"
"It was Chris Allonby's. Flo and I fooled him and took it away. It was so
delightfully easy. But you will keep it?"
He shook his head. "Just try to think, Hetty."
Hetty's cheeks flushed. "You are horribly unkind. Can't you take anything
from me? Still--you--have got to think now. If I let you go, you will
promise not to make any more trouble for my father and Allonby, or
anybody?"
Grant only looked at her with an odd little smile, but the crimson grew
deeper in Hetty's cheek. "Oh, of course you couldn't. I was sorry the last
time I asked you," she said. "Larry, you make me feel horribly mean; but
you would not do anything that would hurt them, unless it was quite
necessary?"
"No," said the man drily, "I don't think I'm going to have an
opportunity."
"You are. I came to let you go. It will be quite easy. Chris is quite
foolish about Flo."
Grant shook his head. "Doesn't it strike you that it would be very rough
on Chris?"
Hetty would not look at him, and her voice was very low. "If anyone must
be hurt, I would sooner it was Chris than you."
He did not answer for a moment, and the girl, watching him in sidelong
fashion, saw the grim restraint in his face, which grew almost grey in
patches.
"It is no use, Hetty," he said very quietly. "Chris would tell them
nothing. There is no meanness in his father or him; but that wouldn't stop
him thinking. Now, you will know I was right to-morrow. Take him back his
pistol."
"Larry," said the girl, with a little quiver in her voice, "you are right
again--I don't quite know why you were friends with me."
Grant smiled at her. "I haven't yet seen the man who was fit to brush the
dust off your little shoes; but you don't look at these things quite as we
do. Now Chris will be getting impatient. You must go."
Hetty turned away from him, and while the man felt his heart throbbing
painfully and wondered whether his resolution would support him much
longer, stood very still with one hand clenched. Then she moved back
towards him swiftly, with a little smile.
"There is a window above the beams, where they pitch the grain-bags
through," she said. "Chris will go away in an hour or so, and the other
man will only watch the door. There are horses in the corral behind the
barn, and I've seen you ride the wickedest broncho without a saddle."
She whisked away before the man, who felt a little, almost caressing,
touch upon his arm; and heard something drop close beside him with a
rattle, could answer, and in less than a minute later smiling at Chris
Allonby gave him back his pistol.
"Do you know I was 'most afraid you were going to make trouble for me?" he
said.
"But if I had you wouldn't have told."
The lad coloured. "You have known me quite a long time, Hetty."
Hetty laughed, but there was a thrill in her voice as she turned to Miss
Schuyler. "Now," she said, "you know the kind of men we raise on the
prairie."
As they moved away together, Flora Schuyler cast a steady, scrutinizing
glance at her companion. "I could have told you, Hetty," she said.
"Yes," said Hetty, with a little nod. "He wouldn't go, and I feel so mean
that I'm not fit to talk to you or anybody. But wait. You'll hear
something before to-morrow."
It was not quite daylight when Miss Schuyler was awakened by a murmur of
voices and a tramp of feet on the frozen sod. Almost at the same moment
the door of her room opened, and a slim, white figure glided towards the
window. Flora Schuyler stood beside it in another second or two, and felt
that the girl whose arm she touched was trembling. The voices below grew
louder, and they could see two men come running from the stable, while one
or two others were flinging saddles upon the horses brought out in haste.
"He must have got away an hour ago," said somebody. "The best horse
Allonby had in the corral isn't there now."
Then Hetty sat down laughing excitedly, and let her head fall back on
Flora Schuyler's shoulder when she felt the warm girdling of her arm. In
another moment she was crying and gasping painfully.
"He has got away. The best horse in the corral! Ten times as many of them
couldn't bring him back," she said.
"Hetty," said Miss Schuyler decisively, "you are shivering all through. Go
back at once. He is all right now."
The girl gasped again, and clung closer to her companion. "Of course," she
said. "You don't know Larry. If they had all the Cedar boys, too, he would
ride straight through them."
X
ON THE TRAIL
Grant and Breckenridge sat together over their evening meal. Outside the
frost was almost arctic, but there was wood in plenty round Fremont ranch,
and the great stove diffused a stuffy heat. The two men had made the round
of the small homesteads that were springing up, with difficulty, for the
snow was too loose and powdery to bear a sleigh, and now they were content
to lounge in the tranquil enjoyment of the rest and warmth that followed
exposure to the stinging frost.
At last Breckenridge pushed his plate aside, and took out his pipe.
"You must have put a good many dollars into your ploughing, Larry, and the
few I had have gone in the same way," he said. "You see, it's a long while
until harvest comes round, and a good many unexpected things seem to
happen in this country. To be quite straight, is there much probability of
our getting any of those dollars back?"
Grant smiled. "I think there is, though I can't be sure. The legislature
must do something for us sooner or later, while the fact that the
cattle-men and the Sheriff have left us alone of late shows that they
don't feel too secure. Still, there may be trouble. A good many hard cases
have been coming in."
"The cattle-men would get them. It's dollars they're wanting, and the
other men have a good many more than we have. By the way, shouldn't the
man with the money you are waiting for turn up to-night?"
Grant nodded. A number of almost indigent men--small farmers ruined by
frost in Dakota, and axe-men from Michigan with growing families--had
settled on the land in his neighbourhood, and as every hand and voice
might be wanted, levies had been made on the richer homesteaders, and
subscribed to here and there in the cities, for the purpose of enabling
them to continue the struggle.
"We want the dollars badly," he said. "The cattle-men have cut off our
credit at the railroad stores, and there are two or three of the
Englishmen who have very little left to eat at the hollow. You have seen
what we have sent out from Fremont, and Muller has been feeding quite a
few of the Dutchmen."
He stopped abruptly, and Breckenridge drew back his chair. "Hallo!" he
said. "You heard it, Larry?"
Grant had heard the windows jar, and a sound that resembled a faint tap.
"Yes," he said quietly. "I may have been mistaken, but it was quite like a
rifle shot."
They were at the door in another moment, shivering as the bitter cold met
them in the face; but there was now no sound from the prairie, which
rolled away before them white and silent under the moonlight. Then,
Breckenridge flung the door to, and crossed over to the rack where a
Marlin rifle and two Winchesters hung. He pressed back the magazine slide
of one of them, and smiled somewhat grimly at Grant.
"Well," he said, "we can only hope you're wrong. Where did you put the
book I was reading?"
Grant, who told him, took out some accounts, and they lounged in big hide
chairs beside the stove for at least half an hour, though it was
significant that every now and then one of them would turn his head as
though listening, and become suddenly intent upon his task again when he
fancied his companion noticed him. At last Breckenridge laughed.
"It's all right, Larry. There--is--somebody coming. It will be the man
with dollars, and I don't mind admitting that I'll be glad to see him."
Five minutes later the door opened and Muller came in. He looked round him
inquiringly.
"Quilter is not come? I his horse in der stable have not seen," he said.
"No," said Grant sharply. "He would pass your place."
Muller nodded. "He come in und der supper take. Why is he not here? I, who
ride by der hollow, one hour after him start make."
Breckenridge glanced at Grant, and both sat silent for a second or two.
Then the former said, "I'm half afraid we'll have to do without those
dollars, Mr. Muller. Shall I go round and roll the boys up, Larry?"
Grant only nodded, and, while Breckenridge, dragging on his fur coat, made
for the stable, took down two of the rifles and handed one to Muller.
"So!" said the Teuton quietly. "We der trail pick up?"
In less than five minutes the two were riding across the prairie towards
Muller's homestead at the fastest pace attainable in the loose, dusty
snow, while Breckenridge rode from shanty to shanty to call out the men of
the little community which had grown up not far away. It was some time
later when he and those who followed him came up with his comrade and
Muller. The moon still hung in the western sky and showed the blue-grey
smear where horse-hoofs had scattered the snow. It led straight towards a
birch bluff across the whitened prairie, and Breckenridge stooped in his
saddle and looked at it.
"Larry," he said sharply, "there were two of them."
"Yes," said Grant. "Only one left Muller's."
Breckenridge asked nothing further, but it was not the first time that
night he felt a shiver run through him. He fell behind, but he heard one
of the rest answer a question Grant put to him.
"Yes," he said. "The last man was riding a good deal harder than the other
fellow."
Then there was silence, save for the soft trampling of hoofs, and
Breckenridge fancied the others were gazing expectantly towards the
shadowy blurr of the bluff, which rose a trifle clearer now against the
skyline. He felt, with instinctive shrinking, that their search would be
rewarded there in the blackness beneath the trees. The pace grew faster.
Men glanced at their neighbours now and then as well as ahead, and
Breckenridge felt the silence grow oppressive as the bluff rose higher.
The snow dulled the beat of hoofs, and the flitting figures that rode with
him passed on almost as noiselessly as the long black shadows that
followed them. His heart beat faster than usual when, as they reached the
birches, Grant raised his hand.
"Ride wide and behind me," he said. "We're going to find one of them
inside of five minutes."
There was an occasional crackle as a rotten twig or branch snapped beneath
the hoofs. Slender trees slid athwart the moonlight, closed on one
another, and opened out, and still, though the snow was scanty and in
places swept away, Grant and a big Michigan bushman rode straight on.
Breckenridge, who was young, felt the tension grow almost unendurable. At
last, when even the horses seemed to feel their masters' uneasiness, the
leader pulled up, and with a floundering of hoofs and jingle of bridles
the line of shadowy figures came to a standstill.
"Get down, boys, and light the lantern. Quilter's here," he said.
Breckenridge dismounting, looped his bridle round a bough, and by and by
stood peering over the shoulders of the clustering men in front of him.
The moonlight shone in between the birches, and something dusky and rigid
lay athwart it in the snow. One man was lighting a lantern, and though his
hands were mittened he seemed singularly clumsy. At last, however, a pale
light blinked out, and under it Breckenridge saw a white face and shadowy
head, from which the fur cap had fallen.
"Yes," said somebody, with a suspicion of hoarseness, "that's Quilter.
It's not going to be much use; but you had better go through his pockets,
Larry!"
Grant knelt down, and his face also showed colourless in the lantern light
as, with the help of another man, he gently moved the rigid form. Then,
opening the big fur-coat he laid his hand on a brown smear on the deerskin
jacket under it.
"One shot," he said. "Couldn't have been more than two or three yards
off."
"Get through," said the bushman grimly. "The man who did it can't have
more than an hour's start of us, any way, and from the trail he left his
horse is played out."
In a minute or two Grant stood up with a little shiver. "You have got to
bring out a sledge for him somehow, Muller," he said. "Boys, the man who
shot him has left nothing, and the instructions from our other executives
would be worth more to the cattle-men than a good many dollars."
[Illustration: A WHITE FACE AND SHADOWY HEAD, FROM WHICH
THE FUR CAP HAD FALLEN.--Page 114.]
"Well," said the big bushman, "we're going to get that man if we have to
pull down Cedar Range or Clavering's place before we do it. Here's his
trail. That one was made by Quilter's horse."
It scarcely seemed appropriate, and the whole scene was singularly
undramatic, and in a curious fashion almost unimpressive; but
Breckenridge, who came of a reticent stock, understood. Unlike the
Americans of the cities, these men were not addicted to improving the
occasion, and only a slight hardening of their grim faces suggested what
they felt. They were almost as immobile in the faint moonlight as that
frozen one with the lantern flickering beside it in the snow. Yet
Breckenridge long afterwards remembered them.
Two men went back with Muller and the rest swung themselves into the
saddle, and reckless of the risk to beast and man brushed through the
bluff. Dry twigs crackled beneath them, rotten bough and withered bush
went down, and a murmur went up when they rode out into the snow again. It
sounded more ominous to Breckenridge than any clamorous shout. Then,
bridles were shaken and heels went home as somebody found the trail, and
the line tailed out farther and farther as blood and weight began to tell.
The men were riding so fiercely now, that a squadron of United States
cavalry would scarcely have turned them from the trail. Breckenridge
laughed harshly as he and Grant floundered down into a hollow, stirrup by
stirrup and neck to neck.
"I should be very sorry for any of the cattle-boys we came upon to-night,"
he said.
Grant only nodded, and just then a shout went up from the head of the
straggling line, and a man waved his hand.
"Heading for the river!" he said. "We'll find him in the timber. He can't
cross the ice."
The line divided, and Grant and Breckenridge rode on with the smaller
portion, while the rest swung wide to the right. In front of them the
Cedar flowed through its birch-lined gully as yet but lightly bound with
ice, and Breckenridge guessed that the men who had left them purposed
cutting off the fugitive from the bridge. It was long before the first dim
birches rose up against the sky, and the white wilderness was very still
and the frost intense when they floundered into the gloom of the bluff at
the hour that man's vitality sinks to its lowest. Every crackle of a
brittle branch rang with horrible distinctness, and now and then a man
turned in his saddle and glanced at his neighbour when from the shadowy
hollow beneath them rose the sound of rending ice. The stream ran fast
just there, and there had been but a few days' frost.
They rode at a venture, looking about them with strained intentness, for
they had left the guiding trail behind them now. Suddenly a faint cry came
out of the silence followed by a beat of hoofs that grew louder every
second, until it seemed to swell into a roar. Either there was clearer
ground in the bluff, or the rider took his chances blindly so long as he
made haste.
The men spread out at a low command, and Breckenridge smiled mirthlessly
as he remembered the restrained eagerness with which he had waited outside
English covers when the quarry was a fox. He could feel his heart thumping
furiously, and his mittened hands would tremble on the bridle. It seemed
that the fugitive kept them waiting a horribly long while.
Then, there was a shout close by him, Grant's horse shot forward and he
saw a shadowy object flash by amidst the trees. Hand and heel moved
together, and the former grew steady again as he felt the spring of the
beast under him and the bitter draught upon his cheek. His horse had
rested, and the fugitive's was spent. Where he was going he scarcely
noticed, save that it was down hill, for the birches seemed flying up to
him, and the beast stumbled now and then. He was only sure that he was
closing with the flying form in front of him.
The trees grew blurred together; he had to lean forward to evade the
thrashing branches. His horse was blundering horribly, the slope grew
steeper still, the ground beneath the dusty snow and fallen leaves was
granite hard; but he was scarcely a length away, a few paces more would
bring him level, and his right hand was stretched out for a grip of the
stranger's bridle.
A hoarse shout came ringing after him, and Breckenridge fancied it was a
warning. The river was close in front and only thinly frozen yet, but he
drove his heels home again. If the fugitive could risk the passage of the
ice, he could risk it, too. There was another sound that jarred across the
hammering of the hoofs, a crash, and Breckenridge was alone, struggling
with his horse. They reeled, smashing through withered bushes and striking
slender trees, but at last he gained the mastery, and swung himself down
from the saddle. Already several mounted men were clustered about
something, while just before he joined them there was another crash, and a
little thin smoke drifted among the trees. Then, he saw one of them snap a
cartridge out of his rifle, and that a horse lay quivering at his feet. A
man stood beside it, and Grant was speaking to him, but Breckenridge
scarcely recognized his voice.
"We want everything you took from Quilter, the papers first," he said.
"Light that lantern, Jake, and then the rest stand round. I want you to
notice what he gives me."
The man, saying nothing, handed him a crumpled packet, and Grant, tearing
it open, passed the cover to the rest.
"You know that writing?" he said.
There was a murmur of assent, and Grant took a paper from those in his
hand, and gave it to a man who held it up in the blinking light of the
lantern. "Now," he said, "we want to make sure the dollars he took from
Quilter agree with it. Hand them over."
The prisoner took a wallet from his pocket and passed it across. "I guess
there's no use in me objecting. You'll find them there," he said.
"Count them," said Grant to the other man. "Two of you look over his
shoulder and tell me if he's right."
It took some little time, for the man passed the roll of bills to a
comrade, who, after turning them over, replaced them in the wallet.
"Yes, that's right, boys; it's quite plain, even if we hadn't followed up
his trail. Those dollars and documents were handed Quilter."
Grant touched Breckenridge. "Get up and ride," he said. "They'll send us
six men from each of the two committees. We'll be waiting for them at
Boston's when they get there. Now, there's just another thing. Look at the
magazine of that fellow's rifle."
A man took up the rifle, and snapped out the cartridges into his hand.
"Usual 44 Winchester. One of them gone," he said. "He wouldn't have
started out after Quilter without his magazine full."
The man rubbed the fringe of his deerskin jacket upon the muzzle, and then
held it up by the lantern where the rest could see the smear of the
fouling upon it.
"I guess that's convincing, but we'll bring the rifle along," he said.
Grant nodded and turned to the prisoner as a man led up a horse. "Get up,"
he said. "You'll have a fair trial, but if you have any defence to make
you had better think it over. You'll walk back to Hanson's, Jake."
The prisoner mounted, and they slowly rode away into the darkness which,
now the moon had sunk, preceded the coming day.
It was two days later when Breckenridge, who had ridden a long way in the
meanwhile, rejoined them at a lonely ranch within a day's journey of the
railroad. Twelve men, whose bronzed faces showed very intent and grave
under the light of the big lamp, sat round the long bare room, and the
prisoner at the foot of a table. Grant stood at the head of it, with a
roll of dollar bills and a rifle in front of him.
"Now," he said, "you have heard the testimony. Have you anything to tell
us?"
"Well," said the prisoner, "I guess it wouldn't be much use. Hadn't you
better get through with it? I don't like a fuss."
Grant signed to the men, who silently filed out, and returned within a
minute. "The thing's quite plain," said one of them. "He killed Quilter."
Grant turned to the prisoner. "There's nothing that would warrant our
showing any mercy, but if you have anything to urge we'll listen now. It's
your last opportunity. You were heading for one of the cattle-men's
homesteads?"
The man smiled sardonically. "I'm not going to talk," he said. "I guess I
can see your faces, and that's enough for me."
Grant stood up and signed to a man, who led the prisoner away. Then, he
looked at the others questioningly, and a Michigan axe-man nodded.
"Only one thing," he said. "It has to be done."
There was an approving murmur, and Grant glanced along the row of stern
faces. "Yes," he said, "the law will do nothing for us--the cattle-men
have bought it up; but this work must be stopped. Well, I guess you like
what lies before us as little as I do, but if it warns off the others--and
there are more of his kind coming in--it's the most merciful thing."
Once more the low murmur ran through the silence of the room; Grant raised
his hand and a man brought in the prisoner. He looked at the set faces,
and made a little gesture of comprehension.
"I guess you needn't tell me," he said. "When is it to be?"
"To-morrow," said Grant, and it seemed to Breckenridge that his voice came
from far away. "At the town--as soon as there is light enough to see by."
The prisoner turned without a word, and when he had gone the men, as if
prompted by one impulse, hastened out of the room, leaving Grant and
Breckenridge alone. The former sat very still at the head of the table,
until Breckenridge laid his hand on his shoulder.
"Shake it off, Larry. You couldn't have done anything else," he said.
"No," said Grant, with a groan. "Still, I could have wished this duty had
not been laid on me."
When they next stood side by side the early daylight was creeping across
the little railroad town, and Breckenridge, whose young face was white,
shivered with more than the bitter cold. He never wished to recall it, but
the details of that scene would return to him--the square frame houses
under the driving snow-cloud, the white waste they rose from, the grim,
silent horsemen with the rifles across their saddles, and the intent faces
beyond them in the close-packed street. He saw the prisoner standing
rigidly erect in a wagon drawn up beside a towering telegraph-pole, and
heard a voice reading hoarsely.
A man raised his hand, somebody lashed the horses, the wagon lurched away,
a dusky object cut against the sky, and Breckenridge turned his eyes away.
A sound that might have been a groan or murmur broke from the crowd and
the momentary silence that followed it was rent by the crackle of riflery.
After that, Breckenridge only recollected riding across the prairie amidst
a group of silent men, and feeling very cold.
In the meanwhile the citizens were gazing at a board nailed to the
telegraph-pole: "For murder and robbery. Take warning! Anyone offending in
the same way will be treated similarly!"
XI
LARRY'S ACQUITTAL
A warm wind from the Pacific, which had swept down through the Rockies'
passes, had mitigated the Arctic cold, and the snow lay no more than
thinly sprinkled upon the prairie. Hetty Torrance and Miss Schuyler were
riding up through the birch bluff from the bridge of the Cedar. It was dim
among the trees, for dusk was closing in, the trail was rough and steep,
and Hetty drew bridle at a turn of it.
"I quite fancied we would have been home before it was dark, and my father
would be just savage if he knew we were out alone," she said. "Of course,
he wouldn't have let us go if he had been at Cedar."
Flora Schuyler looked about her with a shiver. The wind that shook the
birches had grown perceptibly colder: the gloom beneath them deepened
rapidly, and there was a doleful wailing amidst the swinging boughs.
Beyond the bluff the white wilderness, sinking into dimness now, ran back,
waste and empty, to the horizon. Miss Schuyler was from the cities, and
the loneliness of the prairie is most impressive when night is closing
down.
"Then one could have wished he had been at home," she said.
Perhaps Hetty did not hear her plainly, for the branches thrashed above
them just then. "Oh, that's quite right. Folks are not apt to worry much
over the things they don't know about," she said.
"It was not your father I was sorry for," Flora Schuyler said sharply.
"The sod is too hard for fast riding, and it will be 'most an hour yet
before we get home. I wish we were not alone, Hetty."
Hetty sighed. "It was so convenient once!" she said. "Whenever I wanted to
ride out I had only to send for Larry. It's quite different now."
"I have no doubt Mr. Clavering would have come," said Miss Schuyler.
"Oh, yes," Hetty agreed. "Still, I'm beginning to fancy you were right
about that man. Like a good many more of them, he's quite nice at a
distance; but there are men who should never let anyone get too close to
them."
"You have had quite a few opportunities of observing him at a short
distance lately."
Hetty laughed, but there was a trace of uneasiness in her voice. "I could
wish my father didn't seem quite so fond of him. Oh--there's somebody
coming!"
Instinctively she wheeled her horse into the deeper shadow of the birches
and Miss Schuyler followed. There was no habitation within a league of
them, and though the frost, which put a period to the homesteaders'
activities, lessened the necessity for the cattle-barons' watchfulness,
unpleasant results had once or twice attended a chance encounter between
their partisans. It was also certain that somebody was coming, and Hetty
felt her heart beat as she made out the tramp of three horses. The
vultures the struggle had attracted had, she knew, much less consideration
for women than the homesteaders or cattle-boys.
"Hadn't we better ride on?" asked Miss Schuyler.
"No," said Hetty; "they would most certainly see us out on the prairie.
Back your horse quite close to mine. If we keep quiet they might pass us
here."
Her voice betrayed what she was feeling, and Flora Schuyler felt
unpleasantly apprehensive as she urged her horse farther into the gloom.
The trampling came nearer, and by and by a man's voice reached her.
"Hadn't you better pull up and get down?" it said. "I'm not much use at
tracking, but somebody has been along here a little while ago. You see,
there are only three of us!"
"They're homesteaders, and they've found our trail," exclaimed Hetty, with
a little gasp of dismay.
There was scarcely an opening one could ride through between the birches
behind them, and it was evident that the horsemen could scarcely fail to
see them the moment they left their shelter. One of them had already
dismounted, and was apparently stooping beside the prints the horse-hoofs
had left where a little snow had sifted down upon the trail. Hetty heard
his laugh, and it brought her a great relief.
"I don't think you need worry, Breckenridge. There were only two of
them."
Hetty wheeled her horse. "It's Larry," she said.
A minute later he saw them, and, pulling up, took off his hat; but Flora
Schuyler noticed that he ventured on no more than this.
"It is late for you to be out alone. You are riding home?" he said.
"Of course!" said Hetty with, Miss Schuyler fancied, a chilliness which
contrasted curiously with the relief she had shown a minute or two
earlier.
"Well," said Grant quietly, "I'm afraid you will have to put up with our
company. There are one or two men I have no great opinion of somewhere
about this prairie. This is Mr. Breckenridge, and as the trail is rough
and narrow, he will follow with Miss Schuyler. I presume you don't mind
ridin
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