X
THE SMOKE OF THE BURNING
The reader will observe that the forest ranger's job is that of a man anda patriot, and such a ranger was Cavanagh, notwithstanding his foreignbirth. He could ride all day in the saddle and fight fire all night. Whilenot a trained forester, he was naturally a reader, and thoroughlyunderstood the theories of the department. As a practical ranger he stoodhalf-way between the cowboy (who was at first the only available material)and the trained expert who is being educated to follow him.
He was loyal with the loyalty of a soldier, and his hero was the colonelof the Rough-riders, under whom he had campaigned. The second of hisadmirations was the Chief Forester of the department.
The most of us are getting so thin-skinned, so dependent upon steam-heatand goloshes, that the actions of a man like this riding forth upon histrail at all hours of the day and night self-sufficing and serene, seemlike the doings of an epic, and so indeed they are.
On the physical side the plainsman, the cowboy, the poacher, are alladmirable, but Cavanagh went far beyond their physical hardihood. Hedreamed, as he rode, of his responsibilities. The care of the poor Basqueshepherd he had accepted as a matter of routine without Wetherford'srevelation of himself, which complicated an exceedingly pitiful case. Hecould not forget that it was Lee Virginia's father who stood in danger ofcontracting the deadly disease, and as he imagined him dying far up thereon that bleak slope, his heart pinched with the tragedy of the old man'slife. In such wise the days of the ranger were smouldering to this end.
On the backward trail he turned aside to stamp out a smoking log beside adeserted camp-fire, and again he made a detour into a lovely little parkto visit a fisherman and to warn him of the danger of fire. He was theforest guardian, alert to every sign, and yet all the time he was beingdrawn on toward his temptation. Why not resign and go East, taking thegirl with him? "After all, the life up here is a lonely and hard one, inno sense a vocation for an ambitious man. Suppose I am promoted to ForestSupervisor? That only means a little more salary and life in a small cityrather than here. District Supervisor would be better, but can I hope tosecure such a position?"
Up to this month he had taken the matter of his promotion easily; it wassomething to come along in the natural course of things. "There is nohaste; I can wait." Now haste seemed imperative. "I am no longer so youngas I was," he admitted.
Once back at his cabin he laid aside his less tangible problems, and sethimself to cooking some food to take back with him to the peak. He broughtin his pack-horse, and burdened him with camp outfit and utensils, andextra clothing. He filled his pockets with such medicines as he possessed,and so at last, just as night was falling, he started back over hisdifficult trail.
The sky was black as the roof of a cavern, for the stars were hid by aroof of cloud which hung just above his head, and the ranger was obligedto feel his way through the first quarter of his journey. The world grewlighter after he left the canon and entered the dead timber of the glacialvalley, but even in the open the going was wearisome and the horsesproceeded with sullen caution.
"The Basque is a poor, worthless little peasant, but he is a human being,and to leave him to die up there would be monstrous," he insisted, as thehorses stumbled upward over the rocks of a vast lateral moraine toward thesummit, blinded by the clouds through which they were forced to pass. Hewas dismounted now and picking his way with a small lantern, whose feebleray (like that of a firefly) illuminated for a small space the drippingrocks; all else was tangible yellow mist which possessed a sulphurous odorand clung to everything it touched. The wind had died out entirely, andthe mountain-side was as silent as the moon.
Foot by foot he struggled up the slope, hoping each moment to breakthrough this blanket of vapor into the clear air. He knew from manyprevious experiences that the open sky existed a little way above, thatthis was but a roof.
At last he parted the layer of mist and burst into the moonlit heightsabove. He drew a deep breath of awe as he turned and looked about him.Overhead the sky was sparkling with innumerable stars, and the crescentmoon was shining like burnished silver, while level with his breast rolleda limitless, silent, and mystical ocean of cloud which broke against thedark peaks in soundless surf, and spread away to the east in ever-wideningshimmer. All the lesser hills were covered; only the lords of the rangetowered above the flood in sullen and unmoved majesty.
For a long time Cavanagh stood beside his weary horses, filling his soulwith the beauty of this world, so familiar yet so transformed. He wishedfor his love; she would feel and know and rejoice with him. It was suchexperiences as these that made him content with his work. For the rangerNature plays her profoundest dramas--sometimes with the rush of winds, thecrash of thunder; sometimes like this, in silence so deep that the act ofbreathing seems a harsh, discordant note.
Slowly the mystic waters fell away, sinking with slightly rolling actioninto the valleys, and out of the wool-white waves sudden sharp dark formsupthrust like strange masters of the deep. Towers took shape and islandsupheaved, crowned with dark fortresses. To the west a vast and inky-blackGibraltar magically appeared. Soon the sea was but a prodigious riverflowing within the high walls of an ancient glacier, a ghost of the icystream that once ground its slow way between these iron cliffs.
With a shudder of awe the ranger turned from the intolerable beauty ofthis combination of night, cloud, and mountain-crest, and resumed hisclimb. Such scenes, by their majesty, their swift impermanency, theircolossal and heedless haste, made his heart ache with indefinable regret.Again and again he looked back, longing for some power which would enablehim to record and reproduce for the eyes of his love some part of thisstupendous and noiseless epic. He was no longer content to enjoy Nature'ssplendors alone.
On the cold and silent side of the great divide the faint light of theshepherd's teepee shone, and with a returning sense of his duty to hisfellows on the roof of the continent, Cavanagh pushed onward.
Wetherford met him at the door, no longer the poor old tramp, but apriest, one who has devoted himself to Christ's service.
"How is he?" asked the ranger.
"Delirious," replied the herder. "I've had to hold him to his bed. I'mglad you've come. It's lonesome up here. Don't come too near. Set yourtent down there by the trees. I can't have you infected. Keep clear of meand this camp."
"I've got some food and some extra clothing for you."
"Put 'em down here, and in the morning drive these sheep away. That noisedisturbs the dago, and I don't like it myself; they sound lonesome andhelpless. That dog took 'em away for a while, but brought 'em back again;poor devil, he don't know what to think of it all."
Ross did as Wetherford commanded him to do, and withdrew a little way downthe slope; and without putting up his tent, rolled himself in his blanketsand went to sleep.
The sun rose gloriously. With mountain fickleness the wind blew gentlyfrom the east, the air was precisely like late March, and the short andtender grass, the small flowers in the sheltered corners of the rocks, andthe multitudinous bleatings of the lambs were all in keeping. It wasspring in the world and it was spring in the heart of the ranger, in spiteof all his perplexities. The Basque would recover, the heroic ex-convictwould not be stricken, and all would be well. Of such resiliency is theheart of youth.
His first duty was to feed the faithful collie, and to send him forth withthe flock. His next was to build a fire and cook some breakfast forWetherford, and as he put it down beside the tent door he heard the wildpleading of the Basque, who was struggling with his nurse--doubtless inthe belief that he was being kept a prisoner. Only a few words like "gohome" and "sheep" were intelligible to either the nurse or the ranger.
"Keep quiet now--quiet, boy! It's all right. I'm here to take care ofyou," Wetherford repeated, endlessly.
Cavanagh waited till a silence came; then called, softly: "Here's yourbreakfast, Wetherford."
"Move away," retorted the man within. "Keep your distance."
Ross walked away a little space and Wetherford came to the door. "The dagois sure sick, there's no two ways about that. How far is it to the nearestdoctor?"
"I could reach one by 'phone from the Kettle Ranch, about twenty milesbelow here."
"If he don't get better to-day I reckon we'll have to have a doctor." Helooked so white and old that Cavanagh said:
"You need rest. Now I _think_ I've had the smallpox--I know I've beenvaccinated, and if you go to bed--"
"If you're saying all that preliminary to offering to come in here, you'rewasting your breath. I don't intend to let you come any nearer than youare. There is work for you to do. Besides, there's my girl; you'redetailed to look after her."
"Would a doctor come?" asked Ross, huskily, moved by Wetherford's words."It's a hard climb. Would they think the dago worth it?"
Wetherford's face darkened with a look of doubt. "It _is_ a hard trip fora city man, but maybe he would come for you--for the Government."
"I doubt it, even if I were to offer my next month's salary as a fee.These hills are very remote to the townsfolk, and one dago more or less ofno importance, but I'll see what I can do."
Ross was really more concerned for Wetherford himself than for the Basque."If the fever is something malignant, we must have medical aid," he said,and went slowly back to his own camp to ponder his puzzling problem.
One thing could certainly be done, and that was to inform Gregg and Murphyof their herder's illness; surely they would come to the rescue of thecollie and his flock. To reach a telephone involved either a ride overinto Deer Creek or a return to the Fork. He was tempted to ride all theway to the Fork, for to do so would permit another meeting with Lee; butto do this would require many hours longer, and half a day's delay mightprove fatal to the Basque, and, besides, each hour of loneliness and toilrendered Wetherford just so much more open to the deadly attack of thedisease.
Here was the tragic side of the wilderness. At such moments even the Forkseemed a haven. The mountains offer a splendid camping-place for the youngand the vigorous, but they are implacable foes to the disabled man or theaged. They do not give loathsome diseases like pox, but they do not aid indefence of the sick. Coldly aloof, its clouds sail by. The night windsbite. Its rains fall remorselessly. Sheltering rocks there are, to besure, but their comfort is small to the man smitten with the scourge ofthe crowded city. In such heights man is of no more value than the wolf orthe cony.
It was hard to leave an old and broken man in such a drear andwind-contested spot, and yet it had to be done. So fastening his tentsecurely behind a clump of junipers, Cavanagh mounted his horse and rodeaway across the boundary of the forest into the Deer Creek Basin, whichhad been the bone of much contention for nearly four years.
It was a high, park-like expanse, sparsely wooded, beautiful in summer,but cold and bleak in winter. The summers were short, and frost fellalmost every week even in July and August. It had once been a part of theforest, but under pressure the President had permitted it to be restoredto the public lands open for entry. It was not "agricultural grounds," ascertain ranchers claimed, but it was excellent summer pasture, and thesheepmen and cattle-men had leaped at once into warfare to possess it.Sheep were beaten to death with clubs by hundreds, herders were hustledout of the park with ropes about their necks and their outfitsdestroyed--and all this within a few miles of the forest boundary, whereone small sentinel kept effective watch and ward.
Cavanagh had never been over this trail but once, and he was trying tolocate the cliff from which a flock of sheep had been hurled by cattle-mensome years before, when he perceived a thin column of smoke rising from arocky hillside. With habitual watchfulness as to fire, he raised his glassto his eyes and studied the spot. It was evidently a camp-fire andsmouldering dangerously, and turning his horse's head he rode toward it tostamp it out. It was not upon his patrol; but that did not matter, hisduty was clear.
As he drew near he began to perceive signs of a broken camp; the groundwas littered with utensils. It was not an ordinary camp-fire, and theranger's heart quickened. "Another sheep-herder has been driven out, andhis tent and provisions burned!" he exclaimed, wrathfully.
His horse snorted and shied as he rode nearer, and then a shudder passedthrough the ranger's heart as he perceived in the edge of the smoulderingembers a boot heel, and then--_a charred hand!_ In the smoke of that firewas the reek of human flesh.
For a long time the ranger sat on his horse, peering down into those ashesuntil at last it became evident to his eyes that at least twosheep-herders had been sacrificed on the cattle-man's altar of hate andgreed.
All about on the sod the story was written, all too plain. Two men,possibly three, had been murdered--cut to pieces and burned--not manyhours before. There stood the bloody spade with which the bodies had beendismembered, and there lay an empty can whose oil had been poured upon themingled camp utensils, tent, and wagon of the herders, in the attempt toincinerate the hacked and dismembered limbs of the victims. Thelawlessness of the range had culminated. The ferocity of the herder hadgone beyond the savage. Here in the sweet autumn air the reek of thecattle-man's vengeance rose like some hideous vapor, poisonous andobscene.
The ranger sickened as the bloody tale unfolded itself before him. Then afierce hate of such warfare flamed in his heart. Could this enormity becommitted under any other civilized flag? Would any other Governmentintermingle so foolishly, so childishly its State and Federal authority asto permit such diabolism?
Here lay the legitimate fruit of the State's essential hoodlumism. Herewas the answer to local self-government--to democracy. Such a thing couldnot happen in Australia or Canada; only in America could lynch law becomea dramatic pastime, a jest, an instrument of private vengeance. The Southand the West were alike stained with the blood of the lynched, and thewhole nation was covered with shame.
In his horror, his sense of revolt, he cursed the State of which he was acitizen. He would have resigned his commission at the moment, so intensewas his resentment of the supine, careless, jovial, slattern Governmentunder which he was serving.
"By the Lord!" he breathed, with solemn intensity, "if this does not shamethe people of this State into revolt, if these fiends are not hounded andhung, I will myself harry them. I cannot live and do my duty here unlessthis crime is avenged by law."
It did not matter to him that these herders were poor Basques; it was theutter, horrifying, destructive disregard of law which raised such tumultin his blood. His English education, his soldier's training, his nativerefinement--all were outraged. Then, too, he loved the West. He hadsurrendered his citizenship under the British flag--for this!
Chilled, shaking, and numb, he set spurs to his horse and rode furiouslydown the trail toward the nearest town, so eager to spread the alarm thathe could scarcely breathe a deep breath. On the steep slopes he was forcedto walk, and his horse led so badly, that his agony of impatience wasdeepened. He had a vision of the murderers riding fast into far countries.Each hour made their apprehension progressively the more difficult.
"Who were they?" he asked himself, again and again. "What kind of man didthis thing? Was the leader a man like Ballard? Even so, he was hired. Bywhom? By ranchers covetous of the range; that was absolutely certain."
It was long after noon before he came to the end of the telephone-line ina little store and post-office at the upper falls of Deer Creek. Thetelephone had a booth fortunately, and he soon had Redfield's ear, but hisvoice was so strained and unnatural that his chief did not recognize it.
"Is that you, Ross? What's the matter? Your voice sounds hoarse."
Ross composed himself, and told his story briefly. "I'm at Kettle Ranchpost-office. Now listen. The limit of the cattle-man's ferocity has beenreached. As I rode down here, to get into communication with a doctor fora sick herder, I came upon the scene of another murder and burning. Thefire is still smouldering; at least two bodies are in the embers."
At last, bit by bit, from hurried speech, the superv
isor derived the fact,the location, the hour, and directed the herder to ride back and guard theremains till the sheriff arrived.
"Keep it all quiet," warned Ross, "and get the sheriff and a doctor tocome up here as quick as you can. What in the name of God is this countrycoming to?" he cried, in despair. "Will this deed go unpunished, like therest?"
Redfield's voice had lost its optimistic ring. "I don't know; I am stunnedby it all. Don't do anything rash, Ross. Wait till I come. Perhaps this isthe turning-point out here. I'll be up at the earliest moment."
The embittered and disheartened ranger then called up Lee Virginia, andthe sound of her sweet voice turned his thoughts to other and, in a sense,more important matters; for when she heard his name she cried out withsuch eager longing and appeal that his heart leaped. "Oh, I wish you werehere! Mother has been worse to-day. She is asking for you. Can't you comedown and see us? She wants to tell you something."
"I can't--I can't!" he stammered. "I--I--I'm a long way off, and I haveimportant work to do. Tell her I will come to-morrow."
Her voice was filled with disappointment and fear as she said: "Oh, I needyou so! Can't you come?"
"Yes, I will come as soon as I can. I will try to reach you by daylightto-morrow. My heart is with you. Call up the Redfields; they will helpyou."
"Mother wants _you_. She says she _must_ see you. Come as soon as you can.I don't know what she wants to tell you--but I do know we need you."
Her meaning was as clear as if she said: "I need you, for I love you. Cometo me." And her prayer filled him with pain as well as pleasure. He was asoldier and under orders from his chief, therefore he said: "Dear girl,there is a sick man far up on the mountain-side with no one to care forhim but a poor old herder who is in danger of falling sick himself. I mustgo back to them; but, believe me, I will come just as soon as my dutieswill let me. You understand me, don't you?"
Her voice was fainter as she said: "Yes, but I--it seems hard to wait."
"I know. Your voice has helped me. I was in a black mood when I came here.I'm going back now to do my work, and then I will come to you. Good-bye."
Strangely beautiful and very subtle was the vibrant stir of that wire asit conveyed back to his ear the little sigh with which she made answer tohis plea. He took his way upward in a mood which was meditative but nolonger bitter.