CHAPTER III
THE LAUNCHING OF THE BOLT
Then came a voice that startled the two priests, for it seemed that afourth man had entered the room, so changed was it from the musicalvoice of Pierre.
"Father Victor, the roan is a strong horse. May I take him?"
"Pierre!" and the priest reached out his bony hands.
But the boy did not seem to notice or to understand.
"It is a long journey, and I will need a strong horse. It must beeight hundred miles to that town."
"Pierre, what claim has he upon you? What debt have you to repay?"
And Pierre le Rouge answered: "He loved my mother."
He raised his face a little higher and smiled upon them.
"It is a beautiful name, is it not--Irene?"
There was no voice from Jean Paul Victor, so he turned to FatherAnthony.
"It is a charming name, Pierre."
"I would give my revolver with the pearl handle, and my skates, and theengraven knife of old Canole just for one glimpse of her."
"You are going?"
The boy asked in astonishment: "Would you not have me go, Father?"
And Jean Paul Victor could not meet the sorrowful blue eyes.
He bowed his head and answered: "My child, I would have you go. Butpromise with your hand in mine that you will come back to me when yourfather is buried."
The lean fingers caught the extended hand of Pierre and froze about it.
"But first I have a second duty in the southland."
"A second?"
"You taught me to shoot and to use a knife. Once you said: 'An eye foran eye, and a tooth for a tooth.' Father Victor, my father was killedby another man."
"Pierre, dear lad, swear to me here on this cross that you will notraise your hands against the murderer. 'Vengeance is mine, saith theLord.'"
"He must have an instrument for his wrath. He shall work through me inthis."
"Pierre, you blaspheme."
"'An eye for an eye, and a tooth for a tooth.'"
"It was a demon in me that quoted that in your hearing, and not myself."
"The horse, Father Victor--may I have the roan?"
"Pierre, I command you--"
The light in the blue eyes was as cold and steady as that in thestarved eyes of Jean Paul Victor.
"Hush!" he said calmly. "For the sake of the love that I bear for you,do not command me."
"Pierre, I have prayed God for you night and morning, and for the sakeof those prayers which are dearer than gold in heaven, stay with me!"
"Dear Father Victor, you also hope for hands that love you to closeyour eyes at the end."
And the stern priest dropped his head. He said at last: "I havenothing saving one great and terrible treasure which I see waspredestined to you. It is the cross of Father Meilan. You have wornit before. You shall wear it hereafter as your own."
He took from his own neck a silver cross suspended by a slender silverchain, and the boy, with startled eyes, dropped to his knees andreceived the gift.
"It has brought good to all who possessed it, but for every good thingthat it works for you it will work evil on some other. Great is itsblessing and great is its burden. I, alas, know; but you also haveheard of its history. Do you accept it, Pierre?"
"Dear Father, with all my heart."
The colorless hands touched the dark-red hair, and the prophet eyes ofthe priest went up.
"God pardon the sins you shall commit."
Pierre crushed the hand of Jean Paul Victor against his lips and rushedfrom the room, while the tall priest, staring down at the fingers whichhad been kissed, pronounced:
"It is better that he should commit murder with his hands than to slayin his evil thoughts."
"Can you resign him like this?"
"I have forged a thunderbolt. Father Gabrielle, you are a prophet. Itis too great for my hand. Listen!"
And they heard clearly the sharp clang of a horse's hoofs on thehard-packed snow, loud at first, but fading rapidly away. The wind,increasing suddenly, shook the house furiously about them.
It was a north wind, and traveled south before the rider of the strongroan. Over a thousand miles of plain and hills it passed, and downinto the cattle country of the mountain-desert which the Rockies hem onone side and the tall Sierras on the other.
It was a trail to try even the endurance of Pierre and the strong roan,but the boy clung to it doggedly. On a trail that led down from theedges of the northern mountain the roan crashed to the ground in aplunging fall, hitting heavily on his knees. He was dead before theboy had freed his feet from the stirrups.
Pierre threw the saddle over his shoulder and walked eight miles to thenearest ranchhouse, where he spent practically the last cent of hismoney on another horse, and drove on south once more.
There was little hope in him as day after day slipped past. Only theghost of a chance remained that Martin Ryder could fight away death foranother fortnight; yet Pierre had seen many a man from themountain-desert stave off the end through weeks and weeks of thebitterest suffering. His father must be a man of the same hard durablemetal, and upon that Pierre staked all his hopes.
And always he carried the picture of the dying man alone with his twowolf-eyed sons who waited for his eyes to weaken. Whenever he thoughtof that he touched his horse with the spurs and rode fiercely for atime. They were his flesh and blood, the man, and even the twowolf-eyed sons.
So he came at last to a gap in the hills and looked down on Morgantownin the hollow, twoscore unpainted houses sprawling along a singlestreet. The snow was everywhere white and pure, and the town was likea stain on the landscape with wisps of smoke rising and trailing acrossthe hilltops.
Down to the edge of the town he rode, left his cow-pony standing withhanging head outside a saloon, strode through the swinging doors, andasked of the bartender the way to the house of Martin Ryder.
The bartender stopped in his labor of rubbing down the surface of hisbar and stared at the black-serge robe of the stranger, with curiosityrather than criticism, for women, madmen, and clergymen have theright-of-way in the mountain-desert.
He said: "Well, I'll be damned!--askin' your pardon. So old Mart Ryderhas come down to this, eh? Partner, you're sure going to have a roughride getting Mart to heaven. Better send a posse along with him,because some first-class angels are going to get considerable riledwhen they sight him coming. Ha, ha, ha! Sure I'll show you the way.Take the northwest road out of town and go five miles till you see abroken-backed shack lyin' over to the right. That's Mart Ryder'splace."
Out to the broken-backed shack rode Pierre le Rouge, Pierre the Red, asevery one in the north country knew him. His second horse, staunchcow-pony that it was, stumbled on with sagging knees and hanging head,but Pierre rode upright, at ease, for his mind was untired.
Broken-backed indeed was the house before which he dismounted. Theroof sagged from end to end, and the stove pipe chimney leaned at adrunken angle. Nature itself was withered beside that house; beforethe door stood a great cottonwood, gashed and scarred by lightning,with the limbs almost entirely stripped away from one side. Under thisbroken monster Pierre stepped and through the door. Two growls likethe snarls of watch-dogs greeted him, and two tall, unshaven men barredhis way.
Behind them, from the bed in the corner, a feeble voice called: "Who'sthere?"
"In the name of God," said the boy gravely, for he saw a hollow-eyedspecter staring toward him from the bed in the corner, "let me pass! Iam his son!"
It was not that which made them give back, but a shrill, faint cry oftriumph from the sick man toward which they turned. Pierre slippedpast them and stood above Martin Ryder. He was wasted beyondbelief--only the monster hand showed what he had been.
"Son?" he queried with yearning and uncertainty.
"Pierre, your son."
And he slipped to his knees beside the bed. The heavy hand fell uponhis hair and stroked it.
"There ain't no ways of doubting it. It's red silk, like the hair ofIrene. Seein' you, boy, it ain't so hard to die. Look up! So!Pierre, my son! Are you scared of me, boy?"
"I'm not afraid."
"Not with them eyes you ain't. Now that you're here, pay the coyotesand let 'em go off to gnaw the bones."
He dragged out a small canvas bag from beneath the blankets andgestured toward the two lurkers in the corner.
"Take it, and be damned to you!"
A dirty, yellow hand seized the bag; there was a chortle of exultation,and the two scurried out of the room.
"Three weeks they've watched an' waited for me to go out, Pierre.Three weeks they've waited an' sneaked up to my bed an' sneaked awayagin, seein' my eyes open."
Looking into their fierce fever brightness, Pierre understood why theyhad quailed. For the man, though wrecked beyond hope of living, wasterrible still. The thick, gray stubble on his face could not hidealtogether the hard lines of mouth and jaw, and on the wasted arm thehand was grotesquely huge. It was horror that widened the eyes ofPierre as he looked at Martin Ryder; it was a grim happiness that madehis lips almost smile.
"You've taken holy orders, lad?"
"No."
"But the black dress?"
"I'm only a novice. I've sworn no vows."
"And you don't hate me--you hold no grudge against me for the sake ofyour mother, Pierre?"
He took the heavy hand.
"Are you not my father? And my mother was happy with you. For hersake I love you."
"The good Father Victor. He sent you to me."
"I came of my own will. He would not have let me go."
"He--he would have kept my flesh and blood away from me?"
"Do not reproach him. He would have kept me from a sin."
"Sin? By God, boy, no matter what I've done, is it sin for my son tocome to me? What sin?"
"The sin of murder!"
"Ha!"
"I have come to find McGurk."