Kitabı oku: «The Trail of The Badger: A Story of the Colorado Border Thirty Years Ago», sayfa 14
CHAPTER XX
The Memorable Twenty-Ninth
Though we had intended to get off about sunrise we failed to do so, for we found that Galvez was on the lookout for us. No sooner had we started than we saw the three men ride out from the Casa with the evident intention of cutting us off, so, not wishing to get into a fight if it could be avoided, we turned back again.
Thereupon, the enemy also turned back; but, watching their movements, we saw that soon after they had entered the house, the figure of one of them appeared again on the roof, and there remained – a sentinel. Plainly, they were not going to let us get away if they could help it.
At midday, however, we saw the sentinel go down, presumably to get his dinner, when we thought we would try again. Pedro therefore went off to get our horses for us, but he had hardly been gone a minute when we were startled to see him coming back with them, running as fast as his short legs would permit.
"What's the matter, Pedro?" cried Dick. "What's wrong?"
"I see the Señor Arturo coming!" shouted the Mexican.
"What!" cried Dick, and, "Where?" cried I, both turning to look out over the plain.
That man, Pedro, must have had eyes like telescopes to pretend to distinguish any one at such a distance, but on examining the little black speck through the glass I made out that it was a horseman, and after watching him for a few seconds I concluded that it was indeed our friend, Arthur, returning.
"Frank!" cried my partner. "We must ride out to meet him at once! Pedro, you stay here and watch the Casa. If those three men come out, make a big smoke here so that we may know whether we have to hurry or not."
"It is good," replied the Mexican; and seeing that he might be relied upon to give us timely warning – for he at once began to collect materials for his fire – away we went.
Riding briskly, though without haste, we had left the mountain and were crossing a wide depression in the plain, when, on its further edge, there suddenly appeared the solitary horseman, riding toward us at a hard gallop. Dick turned in his saddle and cast a glance behind him.
"The smoke!" he cried; and without another word we clapped our heels into our ponies' ribs and dashed forward.
As Arthur approached – for we could now clearly see that it was he – we observed that he kept looking back over his left shoulder, and just as we arrived within hailing distance three other horsemen came in sight over the southern rim of the depression, riding at a furious pace, their bodies bent forward over their horses' necks. Each of the three carried a rifle, we noticed, and one of the three was Galvez.
At sight of us, the pursuers, seemingly taken aback at finding themselves confronted by three of us, when they had expected to find only one, abruptly pulled up. This brief pause gave time to Arthur to join us, when Dick, slipping down from his horse, advanced a few steps toward the enemy, kneeled down, and ostentatiously cocked his rifle.
Whether the padron's quick ears caught the sound of the cocking of the rifle – which seemed hardly likely, though in that clear, still atmosphere the sharp click-click would carry a surprisingly long distance – I do not know; but whatever the cause, the result was as unexpected as it was satisfactory. Galvez uttered a sharp exclamation, whirled his horse round, and away they all went again as fast as they had come.
"See that!" cried Arthur. "What did I tell you, Dick? We have to thank that locoed steer for that."
"I expect we have," replied Dick.
"Not a doubt of it," said I. "I was sure that Galvez was much impressed by the way that steer went over, and now I'm surer. Lucky he was, too, for those three fellows meant mischief, if I'm not mistaken."
"That's pretty certain, I think," responded Arthur. "And it was another piece of good fortune that you turned up just when you did. How did it happen?"
We explained the circumstances, but we had no more than done so, when Arthur exclaimed:
"Why, here comes old Pedro now! At a gallop, too! Everybody seems to be riding at a gallop this morning."
Looking toward the mountain, we saw the Mexican on his burro coming down at a great pace, but we had hardly caught sight of him when he suddenly stopped. He was on a little elevation, from which, evidently, he could see Galvez and his friends careering homeward, and observing that the affair was over and that his assistance was not needed, he forthwith halted, and, with a mercifulness not too common among Mexicans, jumped to the ground in order to ease his steed of his weight.
There he stood, nearly two miles away, with his hand on the burro's shoulders, watching the retreating enemy, while we three rode toward him at a leisurely pace.
As will be readily imagined, there was great rejoicing among us over the safe return of our friend and partner, and a great shaking of hands all round, when, hardly giving him time to get his breath again, Dick and I plunged head-first into the relation of all we had done since we saw him last: the finding of the head-gate and the building of the flume; triumphantly concluding our story with the recovery of the patent the night before.
"Well, that was a great stroke, sure enough!" exclaimed Arthur. "That will settle the business. The 'stupid peon' got ahead of the padron that time, all right. But before we talk about anything else, Dick," he went on, "I have something I want to tell you about, something in my opinion – and the professor thinks so too – even more important – to you – than the title to the Hermanos Grant."
"What's that?" cried my partner, alarmed by his serious manner. "Nothing wrong, is there?"
"No, there's nothing wrong, I'm glad to say. Quite the contrary, in fact. I'm half afraid to mention it, old man, for fear I should be mistaken after all, and should stir you up all for nothing, but – why didn't you tell me, Dick, that your name was Stanley?"
"Why, I did!" cried Dick.
"No, you didn't, old fellow. If you remember, you were going to do so that first day we met, down there in the cañon by the opening of the King Philip mine, when Pedro interrupted you by remarking that the darkness would catch us if we stayed there any longer."
"I remember. Yes, that's so. Ah! I see. That was why you addressed your letters to the professor instead of to me."
"Yes, that was the reason. It didn't occur to me till I came to write to you that I didn't know your name."
"That was rather funny, wasn't it?" said Dick, laughing. "But I don't see that it made much difference in the end: I got your letters all right."
My partner spoke rather lightly, but Arthur on the other hand looked so serious, not to say solemn, that Dick's levity died out.
"What is it, old man?" he asked. "What difference does it make whether my name is Stanley or anything else?"
"It makes a great difference, Dick," replied Arthur. "I believe" – he paused, hesitating, and then went on, "I'm half afraid to tell you, for fear there might be some mistake after all, but – well – I believe, Dick, that I've found out who you are and where you came from!"
It was Dick's turn to look serious. His face turned a little pale under its sunburn.
"Go on," said he, briefly.
"You remember, perhaps," Arthur continued, "how I told you that one reason why I had to go back by way of Santa Fé was because I had some inquiries to make on behalf of my mother. Well, as it turned out, Santa Fé was the wrong place. The place for me to go to was Mosby, and the man for me to ask was – the professor!
"When I reached Mosby yesterday," he continued, "I rode straight on up to his house, when the kindly old gentleman, as soon as I had explained who I was, made me more than welcome. We were sitting last evening talking, when I happened to cast my eye on the professor's book shelf, and there I saw something which brought me out of my chair like a shot. It was a volume of Shakespeare, one of a set, volume two – that book which the professor found in the wagon-bed when he found you. I knew the book in a moment – for we have the rest of the set at home, Dick!"
Dick stopped his horse and sat silent for a moment, staring at Arthur. Then, "Go on," said he once more.
"I pulled the book down from the shelf," Arthur went on, "and looked at the fly-leaf. There was an inscription there – I knew there would be – 'Richard Livingstone Stanley, from Anna.'"
"Well," said Dick. His voice was husky and his face was pale enough now.
"Dick," replied Arthur, reaching out and grasping my partner's arm, "my mother's name was Anna Stanley, and she gave that set of Shakespeare to her brother, Richard, on his twenty-first birthday!"
For a time Dick sat there without a word, not at first comprehending, apparently, the significance of these facts – that he and Arthur must be first cousins – while the latter quickly related to us the rest of the story.
Dick's mother having died, his father determined to leave Scotland and seek his fortune in the new territory of Colorado, whose fame was then making some stir in the world. In company, then, with a friend, David Scott – the "Uncle" David whom Dick faintly remembered – he set out, taking the boy with him.
From the little town of Pueblo, on the Arkansas, Richard Stanley had written that he intended going down to Santa Fé, and that was the last ever heard of him. At that time – the year '64 – everything westward from the foot of the mountains was practically wilderness. Into this wilderness Richard Stanley had plunged, and there, it was supposed, he and his son and his friend had perished.
As for Dick, he seemed to be dazed – and no wonder. For a boy who had never had any relatives that he knew of to be told suddenly that the young fellow sitting there with his hand on his arm was his own cousin, was naturally a good deal of a shock.
If it needed a counter-shock to jolt his faculties back into place, he had it, and it was I who provided it.
In order to give the pair an opportunity to get used to their new relationship, I was about to ride forward to join Pedro, when I saw the Mexican suddenly commence cutting up all sorts of queer antics, jumping about and waving his arms in a frantic manner.
"What's the matter with Pedro?" I called out. "Look there, you fellows! What's the matter with Pedro?"
"Something wrong!" cried Dick. "Get up!"
Away we went at a gallop, keeping a sharp lookout in all directions lest those three men should bob up again from somewhere, while the Mexican himself, jumping upon his burro, rode down to meet us.
"What's up, Pedro?" Dick shouted, as soon as we had come within hearing. "Anything the matter?"
"Señores," cried Pedro, speaking with eager rapidity, "those men come hunting us. I watch them ride back almost to the Casa, and then of a sudden they change their minds and turn up into the mountain. They think to catch us, but" – he stretched out his great hand and shut it tight, his black eyes gleaming with excitement – "if the señores will give me leave, we will catch them!"
If his surmise was right, if those men were indeed coming after us as he believed, there was no question that if any of us could beat them at that game, Pedro was the one. Dick was a fine woodsman, but Pedro was a finer – my partner himself would have been the first to acknowledge it – and it was Dick in fact who promptly replied:
"Go ahead, Pedro! You're captain to-day! Take the lead; we'll follow!"
"'Sta bueno!" cried the Mexican, greatly pleased. "Come, then!"
Turning his burro, he rode quickly back to camp, and there, at his direction, having unsaddled and turned loose our horses, we followed him to the flume, taking with us nothing but our rifles.
There had been a little thunder-storm the day before, and the soil near the flume was muddy. Through this mud, by Pedro's direction, we tramped; crossed the flume on the gangway we had laid for the purpose, leaving muddy tracks as we went; jumped down at the other end and set off hot-foot up the gully to the little new-made lake and thence on up to the old lake; in several soft places purposely leaving footmarks which could not escape notice.
"What's all this for, Pedro?" asked Dick. "What's your scheme?"
"The padron will see our tracks crossing the flume," replied Pedro. "He will think you take Señor Arturo up to show him all the work you have done, and he will follow. If he does so, we have him! When he is safe across, we slip back, and then I hide me among the rocks on the other side and guard the flume. Without my leave they cannot cross back again. Thus I hold them on the wrong side, while you ride away at your ease to Mosby. Now, come quick with me!"
So saying, Pedro turned at right angles to the line of the ditch, climbed a short distance up the hillside, and then, under cover of the trees, started back at a run, until presently he brought us to a point whence we could look down upon the flume, its approaches at both ends, and the line of the ditch up to the head of the little lake.
Hitherto it had been all bustle and activity, but now we were called upon to exercise a new virtue, one always difficult to fellows of our age – patience.
It must have been nearly an hour that we had lain there, sometimes talking together in whispers, but more often keeping silence, when Dick, pulling out his watch, said in a low voice:
"If those fellows are coming, I wish they'd come. It's twenty minutes past two; and we're in for a thunder-storm, I'm afraid. Do you notice how dark it's getting?"
"Yes," whispered Arthur. "And such a queer darkness. I'm afraid it's a forest fire and not a thunder-storm that is making it."
"I believe you're right," replied Dick. "It is a queer-colored light, isn't it?"
We could not see the sun on account of a high cliff at the foot of which we were lying, and if we had had any thought of getting up to look at it, we were stopped by Pedro, who at this moment whispered sharply to us to keep quiet. His quick eyes had detected a movement on the far side of the cañon.
Intently we watched, and presently the figure of a man stepped out from among the trees. Advancing cautiously to the end of the flume, he examined the tracks in the mud, climbed up to the gang-plank, inspected the tracks again, and turning, made a sign with his hand; whereupon two other men stepped out from among the trees. The three then crossed the flume, jumped down, and set off up the gully.
We watched them as they followed the ditch up to the new lake, and thence to the draw which led up to the old lake. At the mouth of the draw they paused for some time, hesitating, doubtless, whether they should trust themselves in that deep, narrow crevice – a veritable trap, for all they knew.
Presumably, however, they made up their minds to risk it, for on they went, and a few minutes later were lost to sight.
By this time the darkness had so increased that the men were hardly distinguishable, though they, themselves, seemed to take no notice of it. The sun was behind them, and so intent were they in following our tracks and keeping watch ahead, that they never thought to cast a glance upward to see what was coming.
"Pedro," whispered Dick, as soon as the men had vanished, "let us get out of here. Either the woods are on fire or there'll be a tremendous storm down on us directly."
Pedro, however, requested us to wait another five minutes, when, jumping to his feet, he cried:
"Come, then! Let us get back! We have them safe now!"
Down we ran, but no sooner had we got clear of the trees than Pedro stopped short. In a frightened voice – the first and only time I ever knew him to show fear – he ejaculated:
"Look there! Look there!"
Following his pointing finger, we looked up. The uncanny darkness was accounted for: – a great semi-circular piece seemed to have been bitten out of the sun!
"The eclipse!" cried Arthur. "I'd forgotten all about it. This is the twenty-ninth of July. The newspapers were full of it, but I'd forgotten all about it!"
"A total eclipse, isn't it?" asked Dick, quickly.
"Yes, total."
"Then it will be a great deal darker presently. We'd better get out of this, and cross the flume while we can see."
In fact, it was already so dark that the small birds, thinking it was night, were busily going to bed; the night-hawks had come out, the curious whir of their wings sounding above our heads; and then – a sound which made us all start – there came the long-drawn howl of a wolf!
"Run!" shouted Dick. "They'll be after us directly!"
Undoubtedly, the wolves, too, were deceived into the belief that night was approaching, for even as Dick spoke we heard in three or four different directions the hunting-cry of the packs. Wasting no time, as will be imagined, away we went, scrambled up on the gang-plank of the flume, and there stopped to listen.
"I hope those men" – Dick began; when, from the direction of the draw above there arose a fearful clamor of howling. There was a shot! Another and another, in quick succession! And then, piercing through and rising above all other sounds, there went up a cry so dreadful that it turned us sick to hear it. What had happened?
The hour that followed was the worst I ever endured, as we crouched there in the darkness and the silence, not knowing what had occurred up above.
At length the shadow moved across the face of the sun, it was brilliant day once more, when, the moment we thought it safe to venture, down we jumped and set off up the line of the ditch. We had not gone a quarter-mile when we saw two men coming down, running frantically. In a few seconds they had reached the spot where we stood waiting for them, not knowing exactly what we were to expect of them.
Never have I seen such panic terror as these men exhibited; they were white and trembling and speechless. For two or three minutes we could get nothing out of them, but at length one of them recovered himself enough to tell us what had happened.
The wolves had caught them in that narrow, precipitous arroyo, coming from both ends at once. The two men, themselves, had succeeded in scrambling up to a safe place, but Galvez, attempting to do the same, had lost his hold and fallen back. Before he could recover his feet the wolves were upon him, and then – !
Well – no wonder those men were sick and pale and trembling!
That the padron's designs against us had been evil there could be no doubt – in fact, his shivering henchmen admitted as much – but, quite unsuspicious of the coming of the midday darkness, and knowing nothing of the fierce nature of these "island" wolves, he had run himself into that fatal trap. It was truly a dreadful ending.
Does any one wonder now that the date of the eclipse of '78 should be so indelibly stamped on our memories?
There being now nothing to interfere with us, we went down to Hermanos and took possession of the Casa, and from that time forward the work on our irrigation system moved along without let or hindrance from anything but the seasons.
But though it was now plain sailing, and though we eventually got together a force of twenty Mexicans to do the digging, the amount of work was so great that we had not nearly finished that part of the ditch which wound over the foothills when frost came and stopped us. We at once moved everything down to the village and began again at that end, keeping hard at it until frost stopped us once more, and finally for that year.
In fact, it was not until the spring of '80 that we at last turned in the water – a moderate amount at first – but since then the quantity has been increased year by year, until now we are supplying at an easy rental a great number of small farms, many of them cultivated by Mexicans, but the majority by Americans.
The largest of the farms is that run by the two cousins and myself, and its management, together with the supervision and maintenance of the water-supply keeps us all three on the jump.
As for old Pedro, he stuck to his mountain until just lately, when we persuaded him to come down and take up his residence on the ranch; though even now, every fall he goes off for a three-months' hunt and we see nothing of him till the first snow sends him down again.
He is a privileged character, allowed to go and come as he pleases; for we do not forget his great services in turning this worthless desert into a flourishing community of busy wheat-farmers and fruit-growers; nor do we forget that it was really he who started the whole business.
As to that, though, we are not likely to forget it, for we have on hand a constant reminder.
Above the fireplace in our house there hangs, plain to be seen, a relic with which we would not part at any price – the "indicator" which pointed the way for us when we first set out on this enterprise – the original copper-headed arrow!
