Rim o' the World
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
LANCE RIDES ANOTHER TRAIL
With a two-days' growth of beard on his chin and jaws, a new, hardlook in his eyes and the general appearance of a man who has beenriding long and has slept in all his clothes, Lance rode quietly up tothe corral gate and dismounted. A certain stiffness was in his walkwhen he led Coaley inside and turned a stirrup up over the saddlehorn, his gloved fingers dropping to the latigo. Lance was tired--anyone could see that at a glance. That he was preoccupied, and that hispreoccupation was not pleasant, was also evident to the leastobserving eye.
Tom, coming out of the bunk house, studied him with narrowed lids ashe came walking leisurely down to the corral. Tom's movements alsobetrayed a slight stiffness of the muscles, as though he had riddenhard and long. He did not hurry. Lance had pulled off the saddle andthe sweaty blanket and the bridle, and had turned Coaley into thecorral before he knew that some one was coming. Even then he did notturn to look. He was staring hard at a half-dozen horses grouped inthe farther corner of the corral,--horses with gaunt flanks and thewet imprint of saddles. They were hungrily nosing fresh piles of hay,and scarcely looked up when Coaley trotted eagerly up to join them.Six of them--a little more than half of the outfit that had riddenaway the other night.
"Well! I see you helped yourself to a new saddle horse," Tom observedsignificantly, coming up behind Lance.
"Yes. Coaley acted lonesome, shut up in the box stall. Thought alittle riding would do him good." Lance's eyes met Tom's calmly,almost as if the two were mere acquaintances.
"You give him a plenty, looks like. Where yuh been?"
"I? Oh--just riding around." Lance stooped indifferently to untie hisslicker and blanket from the saddle.
"Thought I'd like to use him myself. Thinking some of riding into townthis afternoon," Tom said, still studying Lance.
"Well, if you want to ride Coaley, he's good for it. I'd say he hasmore miles in him yet than any of that bunch over there." With slickerand blanket roll Lance started for the house.
Tom did not say anything. He was scowling thoughtfully after Lancewhen Belle, coming from the chicken house with a late hatching offluffy little chicks in her hat, looked at him inquiringly. To herTom turned with more harshness than he had shown for many a long day.
"Schoolin' don't seem to set good on a Lorrigan," he said. "How long'she goin' to stay this time?"
"Why, honey, don't you _want_ Lance home? He rode Coaley--but that'sno crime. Lance wouldn't hurt him, he's too good a rider and he neverwas hard on horses. And Coaley just goes _wild_ when he has to standshut up all day--"
"Oh, it ain't riding Coaley, altogether. He can ride Coaley and bedarned. It's the new airs he's putting on that don't set good with me,Belle. You wanted to make something of Lance, and now, by Henry,you'll have to name the job you've made of him--I'd hate to!"
Belle put a hand into the cheeping huddle in her hat, lifted out achick and held it to her cheek. "Why, you're just imagining that Lanceis different," she contended, stifling her own recognition of thechange. "He'll settle right down amongst the boys--"
"The boys ain't cryin' to have him, Belle. Black Rimmers had ought tostay Black Rimmers, or get out and stay out. Lance ain't either onething or the other."
"Why, Tom Lorrigan!" Belle dropped the chick into her hat and tuckedthe hat under her arm. Her eyes began to sparkle a little. "I don'tthink Lance liked it about the piano, but he's the same Lance healways was. I've watched him, and he hasn't said a thing or done athing outa the way--he's just the _dearest_ great big fellow! And Ican't for the life of me see why you and the whole outfit hang backfrom him like he was a stranger. Education ain't catching, Tom. AndLance don't put on any airs at all, so why in the name of heaven youall--"
"Well, well, don't get all excited, Belle. But if education wasketching, a lot of the boys would be rollin' their beds. I'm going totown. Anything yuh want brought out?"
Belle did not answer. She went away to the house with her hatful ofchicks, and put them into a box close to the stove until the motherhen made sure whether the four other eggs were anything more than juststale eggs. It would have been hard for Belle to explain just what theheaviness in her heart portended. Certainly it was not in her natureto worry over trifles,--yet these were apparent trifles that worriedher. On the surface of the Devil's Tooth life only faint ripplesstirred, but Belle felt somehow as though she were floating in a frailboat over a quiet pool from whose depths some unspeakable monstermight presently thrust an ominous head and drag her under.
In the crude yet wholly adequate bathroom she heard a great splashing,and guessed that it was Lance, refreshing himself after his trip.That, she supposed, was another point that set him apart from theother boys. From June to September, whenever any of the maleinhabitants of the Devil's Tooth felt the need of ablutions beyond thescope of a blue enamel wash basin, he took a limp towel and rode downacross the pasture to the creek, and swam for half an hour or so in acertain deep pool. Sometimes all of the boys went, at sundown, andfilled the pool with their splashings. Only Lance availed himself oftub and soap and clean towels, and shaved every morning beforebreakfast.
She heard him moving about in his room, heard him go into the kitchenand ask Riley what the chances were for something to eat. She did notfollow him, but she waited, expecting that he would come into theliving room afterwards. She went to the piano and drummed a few barsof a new dance hit Lance had brought home for her, and with her headturned sidewise listened to the sound of his footsteps in the nextroom, his occasional, pleasantly throaty tones answering Riley'shigh-pitched, nasal twang.
Her eyes blurred with unreasoning tears. He was her youngest. He wasso big, so handsome, so like Tom,--yet so different! She did notbelieve that Tom could really see anything to cavil at in Lance'spresence, in his changed personality. Tom, she thought, was secretlyas proud of Lance as she was, and only pretended to sneer at him tohide that pride. The constraint would soon wear off, and Lance wouldbe one of the boys again.
The screen door slammed. With a lump in her throat, Belle went to awindow and looked out. Lance, in his new Stetson and a fresh shirt andgray trousers tucked into his riding boots, was on his way to thestable again. She watched him pick up a rope and go into the farcorral where a few extra saddle horses dozed through the hotafternoon. She saw him return, leading a chunky little roan. Saw himthrow his saddle on the horse. Saw him ride off--the handsomest youngfellow in all the Black Rim--but with apparently never a thought thathis mother might like a word with him, since he had been gone for twodays without any explanation or any excuse. Which was not like Lance,who had always before remembered to be nice to Belle.
Up the Slide trail Lance rode, perhaps two hours behind Tom. The marksof Coaley's hoofs were still fresh in the trail, but Lance did notappear to see them at all. He let the roan scramble over the shale ashe would, let him take his own pace among the boulders and up throughthe Slide. At the top he put him into an easy lope which did notslacken until he reached the descent on the other side of the Ridge.
Presently, because the roan was an ambitious young horse and eager toreach the end of the trail, and Lance was too preoccupied to carewhat pace he traveled, they arrived at Cottonwood Spring, circled thewire fence and whipped in through the open gate at a gallop.
The little schoolhouse was deserted. Lance dismounted and looked in,saw it still dismal with the disorder of the last unfortunate dance.It was evident that there had been no school since the Fourth ofJuly.
Then he remembered that Mary Hope's father had been sick all of theweek, and it was now only two days since the funeral. She would not beteaching school so soon after his death.
He closed the door and remounted, his face somber. He had wanted tosee Mary Hope. Since the morning after Scotty died he had fought avague, disquieting sense of her need of him. There had been times whenit seemed almost as though she had called to him across the distance;that she wished to see him. To-day he had obeyed the wordless call. Hestill felt h
er need of him, but since she was not at the school hehesitated. The schoolhouse was in a measure neutral ground. Ridingover to the Douglas ranch was another matter entirely. Too keenly hadhe felt the cold animosity of Mother Douglas, the wild, impotent hateof old Scotty mouthing threats and accusations and vague prophecies offuture disaster to the Lorrigans. He rode slowly out through the gateand took the trail made by the Devil's Tooth team when they hauleddown the materials for the schoolhouse. The chunky roan climbedbriskly, contentedly rolling the cricket in his bit. The littleburring sound of it fitted itself somehow to the thought reiteratingthrough Lance's tired brain. "She wouldn't want me--to come. Shewouldn't--want me--to come."
The roan squatted and ducked sidewise, and Lance raised his head. Downthe rough trail rode a big cowpuncher with sun-reddened face and anair of great weariness. His horse plodded wearily, thin-flanked, hisblack hair sweat-roughened and dingy. The rider looked at Lance withred-veined eyes, the inflamed lids showing sleepless nights.
"How'r yuh?" he greeted perfunctorily, as they passed each other.
"Howdy," said Lance imperturbably, and rode on.
Lance's eyebrows pulled together. He had no need of looking back; hehad seen a great deal in the one glance he had given the stranger. Hescrutinized the trail, measured with his eyes the size and the shapeof the horse's footprints.
After a little he left the wagon road and put the roan to the steepclimb up the trail to the great Tooth of the ridge. He still frowned,still rode with bent head, his eyes on the trail. But now he wasalert, conscious of his surroundings, thinking of every yard of groundthey covered.
At a little distance from the base of the Tooth he dismounted, tyingthe restive roan to a bush to prevent him from wandering around,nibbling investigatingly at weeds, bushes, all the things thatinterest a young horse.
Slowly, walking carefully on rocks, Lance approached the Tooth. A newlook was in his face now,--a look half tender, half angry because ofthe tenderness. Several times he had met Mary Hope here at the Tooth,when he was just a long-legged youth with a fondness for teasing, andshe was a slim, wide-eyed little thing in short skirts and sunbonnet.Always the meetings had pretended to be accidental, and always MaryHope had seemed very much interested in the magnificent outlook andvery slightly interested in him.
From the signs, some one else was much interested in the view. Lancecame upon a place where a man had slipped with one foot and left thedeep mark of his boot in the loose, gravelly soil. Sitting on aboulder, he made a leisurely survey of the place and counted threecigarette stubs that had fallen short of the crevice toward which theyhad evidently been flung. How many had gone into the crevice he couldnot tell. He slid off the boulder and, walking on a rock shelf thatjutted out from the huge upthrust rock, examined the place verythoroughly.
At a certain spot where Mary Hope had been fond of sitting on the rockshelf with her straight little back against the Tooth's smooth side,a splendid view of the Devil's Tooth ranch was to be had. The houseitself was hidden in a cottonwood grove that Belle had planted whenshe was a bride, but the corrals, the pastures, the road up the Ridgewas plainly visible. And in the shallow crack in the rock was anothercigarette end, economically smoked down to a three-quarter-inch stub.
Lance returned by way of the shelf to the outcropping of rocks thatwould leave no trace of his passing. He untied and mounted the roanand circled the vicinity cautiously. Two hundred yards away, down theslope and on a small level place where the brush grew thick, he foundwhere a horse had stood for hours. He looked at the hoofprints, turnedback and rode down the schoolhouse trail again, following the tracksof the fagged black horse.
When another fifty yards would bring the basin in sight, Lance turnedoff the trail and dismounted, tied the roan again and went forwardslowly, his eyes intent on the tops of the trees around CottonwoodSpring. A rattler buzzed suddenly, and he stopped, looked to see wherethe snake was coiled, saw it withdraw its mottled gray body from undera rabbit weed and drag sinuously away, its ugly head lifted a little,eyes watching him venomously. An unwritten law of the West he broke byletting the snake go. Again he moved forward, from bush to bush, fromboulder to boulder. When all of the basin and the grove were revealedto him, he stopped, removed his gray range hat and hung it on anear-by bush. He took his small field glasses from his pocket, dustedthe lenses deliberately and, leaning forward across a rock with hiselbows steadied on the stone and the glasses to his eyes, he sweptfoot by foot the grove.
He was some minutes in discovering a black horse well within the outerfringe of the cottonwoods, switching mechanically at the flies andmosquitoes that infested the place, and throwing his head impatientlyto his side now and then when the sting was too sharp to ignore. Withthe glasses he could see the sweat-roughened hide ripple convulsivelyto dislodge the pestering insects, could see the flaring nostrils asthe horse blew out the dust gathered from his hungry nosing amongstthe coarse grass and weeds. The man Lance did not at once discover,but after a little he saw him rolled in canvas to protect himself fromthe mosquitoes. He seemed already fast asleep.
"He needs it," said Lance grimly, with his twisted smile, and wentback to the roan.