CHAPTER XXI
BACK AT SOBRANTE
For an hour and a half they rode swiftly along a comparatively leveltrail, though to Ninian Sharp's untrained eyes there was no roadvisible. How Samson managed to pick his way so undeviatingly over thedried herbage and sandy soil was a mystery; but neither the guide norJessica found anything strange in this. Those who live in wide solitudesgrow keen of sight and hearing, and there were tiny roughnesses here andthere which clearly marked to these experienced ranch people whereother feet had passed that way.
Presently the roughness increased, and the trail climbed steadily towarda mesa, which seemed to the reporter but ten rods distant, yet was, inreality, as many miles.
"We turn here, captain. Shall I ride ahead?"
"Yes, Samson, but slowly. Scruff's been so idle all these weeks andgrown so lazy he'll hardly move."
"He'll get over that as soon as he meets up with the tackers. My, butthey've led Aunt Sally a life! And taken more medicine than was due'em during the natural course of their lives. Say, Sharp, do you enjoypicra?"
"Never tasted the stuff."
"And 'never too late to mend.' Here, take this vial, I present it toyou with my compliments. With the captain's respect. With the good willof the whole outfit."
"But, beg pardon, I have no use for--picra."
"Don't delude yourself. You'll have to have it, outside or in. I'm afriend. I give you this bottle. Then, when Aunt Sally appears with herlittle dish and spoon, produce this from your pistol pocket and knockher plumb speechless. It's your only salvation. Now or never."
"All right. Thanks. A case of forearmed, I suppose."
"Exactly. Now--there she is!"
Samson rose in his stirrups and pointed forward with his crop. Upona barren, wide-stretching tableland stood a cluster of adobe huts. Behindthem a clump of live oaks, beside them a sandy, curving streak, anarroyo, lighter in hue than the surrounding soil, but parched and dryas if part of the desert itself; behind them, three mighty, jagged,upward-pointing rocks.
"There she is. The weirdest, lonesomest, God-for-sakenest habitationthat fools ever made or lived in, quoted the joker, giving Samson's handa cordial grasp. Hello! What's up captain?"
For Jessica had also caught sight of the desolate homestead and, havingtoo low stirrups for standing, had sprung to Scruff's back and poisedthus on his saddle, was straining her eager, excited gaze toward thedistant El Desierto.
"My dream! The spot! For once he told the truth! Follow, follow me,quick!"
"Land of love! She has gone queer, and that's a fact. Does the mitethink that there little donkey can outrun your horse or mine? After her,stranger, lest she do some harm to herself."
Ninian smiled softly and touched Nimrod lightly, and in a moment allthree were again racing over the mesa, side by side, the girl foremost,and the men reining in their horses lest they should forestall her of thegoal to which she aspired. The reporter, as eager and almost as wiseas she, but good Samson completely in the dark and growing a trifle angryover the fact.
When they came up to it the place seemed utterly deserted. The doorsopened to the touch and in all but one of the three small buildings thewindows were broken. The third was in better repair and was evidentlysometimes still used by somebody. There was a bed, or cot, spread withblankets, a coal-oil stove, some canned meats and biscuits, and awell-wrapped gun.
But Jessica's attention passed these details over.
"The rocks! They are the very same as in my dream and he told me of themwhen he drew the map. Is that in your pocket, Mr. Sharp? Oh! is it?"
"Sure." He drew it forth and held it so that Samson, too, could see.
"Come! In the dream there was a little cave beneath the rocks and in thecave a box. You know it, Samson, the black tin box in which the valuablepapers were kept. We could find it nowhere, mother nor I, but I shallfind it here and in it--oh! in it--there will be that title deed! Youlook, 'boys,' I can't, I tremble so."
Samson forced his great length downward and inward under the bowldersand found, as Jessica had felt sure, a small but perfectly dry andwell-protected cave. The rocks and live oaks screened it from the sightof those who did not know it existed, and it would never have beensuspected that there was aught but solid ground beneath those jaggedstones.
The horses and Scruff were willing to stand without tying, and Ninianwas, in any case, too excited now to have remembered them. He saw thatLady Jess was trembling, indeed, and trembled himself. If this shouldprove a disappointment, how would she bear it?
But it was not to be that. From the little cave there presently issued amighty shout. That is it would have been mighty had the space been largeenough to give it vent. As it was, it came like the subdued roar of awild animal, and it was almost surprising to see the soles of Samson'sboots emerge from the opening instead of furry feet.
When he had crawled outward so far that he could lift himself upright,the sailor leaped so high that Ninian felt as if he were the one whohad gone "queer" instead of Jessica, suspected. But this reason wasobvious; for there in his hand was the veritable black tin box familiarto the girl from her earliest memory, and seen often enough by the herderto be instantly recognized.
When, at last, the box was in her own hands Jessica became very quiet,though her voice still trembled as she said:
"This belongs to my mother. It is for her to open it."
"No, captain."
"Not so, Jessica. If the deed for which she looked were not there itwould be but a fresh distress to her. You look. It is your interest aswell as hers, and if it is not there you can save her, at least, onedisappointment on this day of your return."
The opinions of her two friends prevailed; and, since they had no key,Samson's great knife forced the lock, and stored within were papers andvouchers of great value to Sobrante, which the faithless manager hadcarried away for his own purposes.
The deed? Ah, yes. There it lay at the very bottom of the pile, andJessica knew it at once for the queer paper which her father had shownher on the night before his death.
For a time she could only weep over it and caress it, remembering thedear hands which had held it before her, and the unforgotten voice whichhad explained its value and all about the necessary "recording" whichmust be made. Then she rallied, remembering, also, that other preciousparent, alive and waiting for her and it.
"Keep you the box, Samson. I, myself, must keep and carry this."
She fastened it within her blouse and kept one hand upon it all the restof the way. A brief and happy way, which ended in a mother's arms and inthe wild welcome of every dweller at Sobrante. And when the mother'sarms set their recovered treasure free for a moment there were all the"boys" ready and waiting to seize and carry her from point to point,telling how careful had been each one's stewardship and how they wouldnever let her go again. Never.
As for Ninian Sharp he did not recognize himself in the hero they allmade of him, nor did even Aunt Sally presume to offer him, so wonderfula man, a nauseous dose. But she was overheard to remark to Wun Lung, whohad also joined the company unforbidden by his arch enemy:
"I do believe, Wun Lungy, that if ever that there handsome young manshould go and get married I'd set him up in my fifty-five thousand fivehundred and fifty-five piece bedquilt. I did lay out to bequeath it toJessica, but, la! I can piece her another, just as willin' as not. Whatyou say, Wun Lungy?"
"I slay, fool woman!"
For a time joy and surprise turned Ned and Luis speechless; yet theywere sent to bed late that night, each hugging a sharp-edged train oftin cars and breathing, "Choo! choo!" as if a railway were a commonsight instead of an unknown one.
But there came at last a quiet hour for mother and child, when they satin close embrace, telling all that had befallen each during the days ofseparation.
"Oh! if dear Ephraim were only here, mother! I said it should not bea month before that title deed was found, and the month will not be upuntil to-morrow. Poor Ephraim! It was bitter hard to le
ave him alone inthat hospital, well-liked and cared for though he is. If it hadn't beenfor him I could never have gone. And the 'boys' would have made such ahero of him. Even as they did of Mr. Sharp. Can't you guess how proudthey'd have been of him, mother?"
When Mrs. Trent did not reply, Jessica looked up quickly and saw thatdear face so near her own still clouded by a shadow of trouble.
"Why, mother! What is it? You look as if you were not perfectly,absolutely happy, and yet how can you be else--to-night?"
"Yes, darling, I am happy. So glad and thankful that I cannot put itinto words. But Ephraim? My darling, at present, not for some days,if I were you I would not talk about Ephraim. You will be happier so.No. He is alive and getting well, so far as I know. There has been nolater news than yours. Don't look so alarmed. Only this: the 'boys'have taken some queer notion about our 'Forty-niner,' and so I say heis probably happier just where he is to-night than if he were back atSobrante."
"Oh! mother! Another mystery? and about such a simple, honest, splendidold fellow as my Ephraim? Well, never mind. I seem to be sent into theworld to solve other people's 'mysteries,' and I'll solve his."
Eventually she did. But how and when cannot be told here. This is a storywhich must be related another time. But for the time Jessica was happyand all went well.
THE END
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