Chapter XVIII. Concerning The Strength Of Women
There were three things discussed by Lee Haines and Buck Daniels in thedreary days which followed. The first was to keep on their way acrossthe mountains and cut themselves away from the sorrow of that cabin. Thesecond was to strike the trail of Barry and hunt until they found hisrefuge and attempt to lead him back to his family. The third wassimply to stay on and where they found the opportunity, help Kate. Theydiscarded the first idea without much talk; it would be yellow, theydecided, and the debt they owed to the Dan Barry of the old days was toogreat to be shouldered off so easily: they cast away the second thoughtstill more quickly, for the trail which baffled the shrewd sheriff, asthey knew, would be too much for them. It remained to stay with Kate,making excursions through the mountains from day to day to maintain thepretence of carrying on their own business, and always at hand in timeof need.
It was no easy part to play, for in the house they found Kate more andmore silent, more and more thoughtful, never speaking of her trouble,but behind her eyes a ghost of waiting that haunted them. If the windshrilled down the pass, if a horse neighed from the corral, there wasalways the start in her, the thrill of hope, and afterwards the pitifuldeadening of her smile. She was not less beautiful they thought, as shegrew paler, but the terrible silence of the place drove them away timeand again. Even Joan no longer pattered about the house, and when theycame down out of the mountains they never heard her shrill laughter. Shesat cross-legged by the hearth in her old place during the evenings withher chin resting on one hand and her eyes fixed wistfully upon the fire;and sometimes they found her on the little hillock behind the house,from the top of which she could view every approach to the cabin. Of Danand even of Black Bart, her playmate she soon learned not to speak,for the mention of them made her mother shrink and whiten. Indeed, thesaddest thing in that house was the quiet in which the child waited,waited, waited, and never spoke.
"She ain't more'n a baby," said Buck Daniels, "and you can leave it totime to make her forget."
"But," growled Lee Haines, "Kate isn't a baby. Buck, it drives me damnnear crazy to see her fade this way."
"Now you lay to this," answered Buck. "She'll pull through. She'll neverforget, maybe, but she'll go on livin' for the sake of the kid."
"You know a hell of a lot about women, don't you?" said Haines.
"I know enough, son," nodded Buck.
He had, in fact, reduced women to a few distinct categories, and heonly waited to place a girl in her particular class before he felt quiteintimate acquaintance with her entire mind and soul.
"It'll kill her," pronounced Lee Haines. "Why, she's like a flower,Buck, and sorrow will cut her off at the root. Think of a girl like thatthrown away in these damned deserts! It makes me sick--sick! She oughtto have nothing but velvet to touch--nothing but a millionaire for ahusband, and never a worry in her life." He grew excited. "But here'sthe flower thrown away and the heel crushing it without mercy."
Buck Daniels regarded him with pity.
"I feel kind of sorry for you, Lee, when I hear you talk about girls. Nowonder they make a fool of you. A flower crushed under the foot, eh? Youjust listen to me, my boy. You and me figure to be pretty hard, don'twe? Well, soft pine stacked up agin' quartzite, is what we are comparedto Kate."
Lee Haines gaped at him, too astonished to be angry. He suggestedsoftening of the brain to Buck, but the latter waved aside theimplications.
"Now, supposin' Kate was one of these dark girls with eyes like blackdiamonds and a lot of snap and zip to her. If she was like that I s'poseyou'd figure her to forget all about Dan inside of a month--and maybemarry you?"
"You be damned!"
"Maybe I am. Them hard, snappy lookin' girls are the ones that smash.They're brittle, that's why; but you take a soft lookin' girl like Kate,maybe she ain't a diamond point to cut glass, but she's tempered steelthat'll bend, and bend, and bend, and then when you wait for it to breakit flips up and knocks you down. That's Kate."
Lee Haines rolled a cigarette in silence. He was too disgusted toanswer, until his first puff of smoke dissolved Buck in a cloud of thinblue.
"You ought to sing to a congregation instead of to cows, Buck. You havethe tune, and you might get by in a church; but cows have sense."
"Kate will buckle and bend and fade for a while," went on Buck, whollyunperturbed, "but just when you go out to pick daisies for her you'llcome back and find her singing to the stove. Her strength is down deep,like some of these outlaw hosses that got a filmy, sleepy lookin' eye.They save their hell till you sink the spurs in 'em. You think she lovesDan, don't you?"
"I have a faint suspicion of it," sneered Haines. "I suppose I'm wrong?"
"You are."
"Buck, I may have slipped a nickel into you, but you're playing thewrong tune. Knock off and talk sense, will you?"
"When you grow up, son, you'll understand some of the things I'm tryin'to explain in words of one syllable.
"She don't love Dan. She thinks she does, but down deep they ain't adamned thing in the world she gives a rap about exceptin' Joan. Men?What are they to her? Marriage? That's simply an accident that's neededso she can have a baby. Delicate, shrinkin' flower, is she? I tell you,my boy, if it was necessary for Joan she'd tear out your heart and mineand send Dan plumb to hell. You fasten on to them words, because they'regospel."
It was late afternoon while they talked, and they were swinging slowlydown a gulch towards the home cabin. At that very time Kate, from thedoor of the house where she sat, saw a dark form slink from rock torock at the rim of the little plateau, a motion so swift that it flickedthrough the corner of her eye, a thing to be sensed rather than seen.She set up very stiff, her lips white as chalk, but nothing morestirred. A few minutes later, when her heart was beating almost atnormal she heard Joan scream from behind the house, not in terror,or pain, as her keen mother-ear knew perfectly well, but with a wilddelight. She whipped about the corner of the house and there she sawJoan with her pudgy arms around the neck of Black Bart.
"Bart! Dear old Bart! Has he come? Has he come?"
And she strained her eyes against the familiar mountains around her asif she would force her vision through rock. There was no trace of Dan,no sign or sound when she would even have welcomed the eerie whistle.The wolf-dog was already at play with Joan. She was on his back and hedarted off in an effortless gallop, winding to and fro among the rocks.Most children would have toppled among the stones at the first of hisswerves, but Joan clung like a burr, both hands dug into his hair,shrieking with excitement. Sometimes she reeled and almost slid at oneof those lightning turns, for the game was to almost unseat her, butjust as she was sliding off Bart would slacken his pace and let her finda firm seat once more. They wound farther and farther away, and suddenlyKate cried, terror-stricken: "Joan! Come back!"
A tug at the ear of the wolf-dog swung them around; then as theyapproached, the fear left the mind of the mother and a new thought camein its place. She coaxed Joan from Bart--they could play later on, shepromised, to their heart's desire--and led her into the house. BlackBart followed to the door, but not all their entreaty or scolding couldmake him cross the threshold. He merely snarled at Kate, and even Joan'stugging at his ears could not budge him. He stood canting his head andwatching them wistfully while Kate changed Joan's clothes.
She dressed her as if for a festival, with a blue bonnet that let theyellow hair curl out from the edges, and a little blue cloak, and shinyboots incredibly small, and around the bonnet she laid a wreathof yellow wild flowers. Then she wrote her letter, closed it in anenvelope, and fastened it securely in the pocket of the cloak.
She drew Joan in front of her and held her by both hands.
"Joan, darling," she said, "munner wants you to go with Bart up throughthe mountains. Will you be afraid?"
A very decided shake of the head answered her, for Joan's eyes werealready over her shoulder looking towards the big dog. And she was alittle sullen at these unnece
ssary words.
"It might grow dark," she said. "You wouldn't care?"
Here Joan became a little dubious, but a whine from Bart seemed toreassure her.
"Bart will keep Joan," she said.
"He will. And he'll take you up through the rocks to Daddy Dan."
The face of the child grew brilliant.
"Daddy Dan?" she whispered.
"And when you get to him, take this little paper out of your pocket andgive it to him. You won't forget?"
"Give the paper to Daddy Dan," repeated Joan solemnly.
Kate dropped to her knees and gathered the little close, close,until Joan cried out, but when she was eased the child reached up anastonished hand, touched the face of Kate with awe, and then stared ather finger tips.
A moment later, Joan stood in front of Black Bart, with the head of thewolf-dog seized firmly between her hands while she frowned intently intohis face.
"Take Joan to Daddy Dan," she ordered.
At the name, the sharp ears pricked; a speaking intelligence grew up inhis eyes.
"Giddap," commanded Joan, when she was in position on the back of Bart.And she thumped her heels against the furry ribs.
Towards Kate, who stood trembling in the door, Bart cast the departingfavor of a throat-tearing growl, and then shambled across the meadowwith that smooth trot which wears down all other four-footed creatures.He was already on the far side of the meadow, and beginning the ascentof the first slope when the glint of the sun on the yellow wild flowersflashed on the eye of Kate. It had all seemed natural until that moment,the only possible thing to do, but now she felt suddenly that Joan wasthrown away thought of the darkness which would soon come--rememberedthe yellow terror which sometimes gleamed in the eyes of Black Bartafter nightfall.
She cried out, but the wolf-dog kept swiftly on his way. She began torun, still calling, but rapidly as she went, Black Bart slid steadilyaway from her, and when she reached the shoulder of the mountain, shesaw the dark form of Bart with the blue patch above it drifting up thewall of the opposite ravine.
She knew where they were going now; it was the old cave upon which sheand Dan had come one day in their rides, and Dan had prowled for a longtime through the shadowy recesses.