CHAPTER XXX
THE VOICE OF BLACK BART
Her father lay propped high with pillows among which his head lolledback. The only light in the room was near the bed and it cast a glowupon the face of Joe Cumberland and on the white linen, the white hair,the white, pointed beard. All the rest of the room swam in darkness. Thechairs were blotches, indistinct, uncertain; even the foot of the bedtrailed off to nothingness. It was like one of those impressionistic,very modern paintings, where the artist centres upon one point andthrows the rest of his canvas into dull oblivion. The focus here was theface of the old cattleman. The bedclothes, never stirred, lay in foldssharply cut out with black shadows, and they had a solid seeming, as themort-cloth rendered in marble over the effigy. That suggested weightexaggerated the frailty of the body beneath the clothes. Exhausted bythat burden, the old man lay in the arms of a deadly languor, so thatthere was a kinship of more than blood between him and Kate at thismoment. She stepped to the side of the bed and stood staring down athim, and there was little gentleness in her expression. So cold wasthat settled gaze that her father stirred, at length, shivered, andwithout opening his eyes, fumbled at the bed-spread and drew it a littlemore closely about his shoulders. Even that did not give him rest; andpresently the wrinkled eyelids opened and he looked up at his daughter.A film of weariness heavier than sleep at first obscured his sight, butthis in turn cleared away; he frowned a little to clear his vision, andthen wagged his head slowly from side to side.
"Kate," he said feebly, "I done my best. It simply wasn't good enough."
She answered in a voice as low as his, but steadier: "What could havehappened? Dad, what happened to make you give up every hold on Dan? Whatwas it? You were the last power that could keep him here. You knew it.Why did you tell him he could go?"
The monotone was more deadly than any emphasis of a raised word.
"If you'd been here," pleaded Joe Cumberland, "you'd have done what Idone. I couldn't help it. There he sat on the foot of the bed--see wherethem covers still kind of sag down--after he told me that he hadsomething to do away from the ranch and that he wanted to go now thatBlack Bart was well enough to travel in short spells. He asked me if Istill needed him."
"And you told him no?" she cried. "Oh Dad, you know it means everythingto me--but you told him no?" He raised a shaking hand to ward off theoutburst and stop it.
"Not at first, honey. Gimme a chance to talk, Kate. At first I told himthat I needed him--and God knows that I _do_ need him. I dunno why--noteven Doc Byrne knows what there is about Dan that helps me. I told Danall them things. And he didn't say nothin', but jest sat still on thefoot of the bed and looked at me.
"It ain't easy to bear his eyes, Kate. I lay here and tried at first tosmile at him and talk about other things--but it ain't easy to bear hiseyes. You take a dog, Kate. It ain't supposed to be able to look you inthe eye for long; but s'pose you met up with a dog that could. It'd makeyou feel sort of queer inside. Which I felt that way while Dan waslookin' at me. Not that he was threatenin' me. No, it wasn't that. Hewas only thoughtful, but I kept gettin' more nervous and more fidgety. Ifelt after a while like I couldn't stand it. I had to crawl out of bedand begin walkin' up and down till I got quieter. But I seen thatwouldn't do.
"Then I begun to think. I thought of near everything in a little while.I thought of what would happen s'pose Dan should stay here. Maybe youand him would get to like each other again. Maybe you'd get married.Then what would happen?
"I thought of the wild geese flyin' north in the spring o' the year andthe wild geese flyin' south in the fall o' the year. And I thought ofDan with his heart followin' the wild geese--God knows why!--and I seena picture of him standin' and watchin' them, with you nearby and notable to get one look out of him. I seen that, and it made my bloodchilly, like the air on a frosty night.
"Kate, they's something like the power of prophecy that comes to a dyin'man!"
"Dad!" she cried. "What are you saying?"
She slipped to her knees beside the bed and drew his cold hands towardsher, but Joe Cumberland shook his head and mildly drew one hand away. Heraised it, with extended forefinger--a sign of infinite warning; andwith the glow of the lamp full upon his face, the eyes were pits ofshadow with stirring orbs of fire in the depths.
"No, I ain't dead now," he said, "but I ain't far away from it. Maybedays, maybe weeks, maybe whole months. But I've passed the top of thehill, and I know I'm ridin' down the slope. Pretty soon I'll finish thetrail. But what little time I've got left is worth more'n everythingthat went before. I can see my life behind me and the things before likea cold mornin' light was over it all--you know before the sun begins tobeat up the waves of heat and the mist gets tanglin' in front of youreyes? You know when you can look right across a thirty mile valley andname the trees, a'most the other side? That's the way I can see now.They ain't no feelin' about it. My body is all plumb paralyzed. I jestsee and know--that's all.
"And what I see of you and Dan--if you ever marry--is plain--hell! Loveain't the only thing they is between a man and a woman. They's somethingelse. I dunno what it is. But it's a sort of a common purpose; it'shavin' both pairs of feet steppin' out on the same path. That's what itis. But your trail would go one way and Dan's would go another, andpretty soon your love wouldn't be nothin' but a big wind blowin' betweentwo mountains--and all it would do would be to freeze up the blood inyour hearts."
"I seen all that, while Dan was sittin' at the foot of the bed. Not thatI don't want him here. When I see him I see the world the way it waswhen I was under thirty. When there wasn't nothin' I wouldn't try once,when all I wanted was a gun and a hoss and a song to keep me fromtradin' with kings. No, it ain't goin' to be easy for me when Dan goesaway. But what's my tag-end of life compared with yours? You got to begiven a chance; you got to be kept away from Dan. That's why I told him,finally, that I thought I could get along without him."
"Whether or not you save me," she answered, "you signed a death warrantfor at least two men when you told him that."
"Two men? They's only one he's after--and Buck Daniel has had a longstart. He can't be caught!"
"That Marshal Calkins is here to-night. He saw Buck at Rafferty's, andhe talked about it in the hearing of Dan at the table. I watched Dan'sface. You may read the past and see the future, Dad, but I know Dan'sface. I can read it as the sailor reads the sea. Before to-morrow nightBuck Daniels will be dead; and Dan's hands will be red."
She dropped her head against the bedclothes and clasped her fingers overthe bright hair.
When she could speak again she raised her head and went on in the sameswift, low monotone: "And besides, Black Bart has found the trail of theman who fired the barn and shot him. And the body of Buck won't be coldbefore Dan will be on the heels of the other man. Oh, Dad, two lives layin the hollow of your hand. You could have saved them by merely askingDan to stay with you; but you've thrown them away."
"Buck Daniels!" repeated the old man, the horror of the thing dawning onhim only slowly. "Why didn't he get farther away? Why didn't he ridenight and day after he left us? He's got to be warned that Dan iscoming!"
"I've thought of that. I'm going into my room now to write a note andsend it to Buck by one of our men. But at the most he'll have less thana day's start--and what is a day to Satan and Dan Barry?"
"I thought it was for the best," muttered old Joe. "I couldn't see howit was wrong. But I can send for Dan and tell him that I've changed mymind." He broke off in a groan. "No, that wouldn't be no good. He's sethis mind on going by this time, and nothing can keep him back. But--Kate, maybe I can delay him. Has he gone up to his room yet?"
"He's in there now. Talk softly or he'll hear us. He's walking up anddown, now."
"Ay, ay, ay!" nodded old Joe, his eyes widening with horror, "and hisfootfall is like the padding of a big cat. I could tell it out of athousand steps. And I know what's going on inside his mind!"
"Yes, yes; he's thinking of the blow Buck Daniels struck him; he'
sthinking of the man who shot down Bart. God save them both!"
"Listen!" whispered the cattleman. "He's raised the window. I heard therattle of the weights. He's standing there in front of the window,letting the wind of the night blow in his face!"
The wind from the window, indeed, struck against the door communicatingwith Joe Cumberland's room, and shook it as if a hand were rattling atthe knob.
The girl began to speak again, as swiftly as before, her voice thebarely audible rushing of a whisper: "The law will trail him, but Iwon't give him up. Dad, I'm going to fight once more to keep himhere--and if I fail, I'll follow him around the world." Such wordsshould have come loudly, ringing. Spoken so softly, they gave a terribleeffect; like the ravings of delirium, or the monotone of insanity. Andwith the white light against her face she was more awe-inspiring thanbeautiful. "He loved me once; and the fire must still be in him; suchfire _can't_ go out, and I'll fan it back to life, and then if it burnsme--if it burns us both--the fire itself cannot be more torture than tolive on like this!"
"Hush, lass!" murmured her father. "Listen to what's coming!"
It was a moan, very low pitched, and then rising slowly, and gaining involume, rising up the scale with a dizzy speed, till it burst and rangthrough the house--the long-drawn wail of a wolf when it hunts on afresh trail.