CHAPTER XXXI
DE SPAIN RIDES ALONE
He had ridden the trail but a short time when it led him in a wideangle backward and around toward Calabasas, and he found, presently,that the men he was riding after were apparently heading for the stagebarns. In the north the rising curtain had darkened. Toward Sleepy Catthe landscape was already obliterated. In the south the sun shone, butthe air had grown suddenly cold, and in the sharp drop de Spainrealized what was coming. His first thought was of the southernstages, which must be warned, and as he galloped up to the big barn,with this thought in mind he saw, standing in the doorway, Bull Page.
De Spain regarded him with astonishment. "How did you get here?" washis sharp question.
Page grinned. "Got what I was after, and c'm' back sooner'n Iexpected. Half-way over to the Gap, I met Duke and the young gal onhorseback, headed for Calabasas. They pulled up. I pulled up. Old Dukelooked kind o' ga'nted, and it seemed like Nan was in a considerablehurry to get to Sleepy Cat with him, and he couldn't stand thesaddle. Anyway, they was heading for Calabasas to get a rig fromMcAlpin. I knowed McAlpin would never give old Duke a rig, not if hewas a-dyin' in the saddle."
"They've got your rig!" cried de Spain.
"The gal asked me if I'd mind accommodatin' 'em," explained Bulldeprecatingly, "to save time."
"They headed north!" exclaimed de Spain. The light from thefast-changing sky fell copper-colored across his horse and figure.McAlpin, followed by a hostler, appeared at the barn door.
Bull nodded to de Spain. "Said they wanted to get there quick. Shefig'erd on savin' a few miles by strikin' the hill trail in. So Itakes their horses and lets on I was headin' in for the Gap. When theygot out of sight, I turned 'round----"
Even as he spoke, the swift-rolling curtain of mist overhead blottedthe sun out of the sky.
De Spain sprang from his saddle with a ringing order to McAlpin. "Getup a fresh saddle-horse!"
"A horse!" cried the startled barn boss, whirling on the hostler. "Thestrongest legs in the stable, and don't lose a second! Lady Jane; upwith her!" he yelled, bellowing his orders into the echoing barn withhis hands to his mouth. "Up with her for Mr. de Spain in a second!Marmon! Becker! Lanzon! What in hell are you all doing?" he roared,rushing back with a fusillade of oaths. "Look alive, everybody!"
"Coming!" yelled one voice after another from the depths of thedistant stalls.
De Spain ran into the office. Page caught his horse, stripped therifle from its holster, and hurriedly began uncinching. Hostlersrunning through the barn called shrilly back and forth, and de Spainspringing up the stairs to his room provided what he wanted for hishurried flight. When he dashed down with coats on his arm the hoofs ofLady Jane were clattering down the long gangway. A stable-boy slidfrom her back on one side as Bull Page threw the saddle across herfrom the other; hostlers caught at the cinches, while others hurriedlyrubbed the legs of the quivering mare. De Spain, his hand on McAlpin'sshoulder, was giving his parting injunctions, and the barn boss, headcocked down, and eyes cast furtively on the scattering snowflakesoutside, was listening with an attention that recorded indelibly everyuttered syllable.
Once only, he interrupted: "Henry, you're ridin' out into this thingalone--don't do it."
"I can't help it," snapped de Spain impatiently,
"It's a man killer."
"I can't help it."
"Bob Scott, if he w's here, 'ud never let you do it. I'll ride wi' yemyself, Henry. I worked for your father----"
"You're too old a man, Jim----"
"Henry----"
"Don't talk to me! Do as I tell you!" thundered de Spain.
McAlpin bowed his head.
"Ready!" yelled Page, buckling the rifle holster in place. Stilltalking, and with McAlpin glued to his elbow, de Spain vaulted intothe saddle, caught the lines from Bull's hands, and steadied the Ladyas she sidestepped nervously--McAlpin following close and dodging thedancing hoofs as he looked earnestly up to catch the last word. DeSpain touched the horse with the lines. She leaped through the doorwayand he raised a backward hand to those behind. Running outside thedoor, they yelled a chorus of cries after the swift-moving horsemanand, clustered in an excited group, watched the Lady with a dozengreat strides round the Calabasas trail and disappear with her riderinto the whirling snow.
She fell at once into an easy reaching step, and de Spain, busy withhis reflections, hardly gave thought to what she was doing, and littlemore to what was going on about him.
No moving figure reflects the impassive more than a horseman of themountains, on a long ride. Though never so swift-borne, the man,looking neither to the right nor to the left, moving evenly andstatue-like against the sky, a part of the wiry beast under him,presents the very picture of indifference to the world around him. Thegreat swift wind spreading over the desert emptied on it snow-ladenpuffs that whirled and wrapped a cloud of flakes about horse and riderin the symbol of a shroud. De Spain gave no heed to these skirmishingeddies, but he knew what was behind them, and for the wind, he onlywished it might keep the snow in the air till he caught sight of Nan.
The even reach of the horse brought him to the point where Nan hadchanged to the stage wagon. Without a break in her long stride, LadyJane took the hint of her swerving rider, put her nose into the wind,and headed north. De Spain, alive to the difficulties of his venture,set his hat lower and bent forward to follow the wagon along the sand.With the first of the white flurries passed, he found himself in asnowless pocket, as it were, of the advancing storm. He hoped fornothing from the prospect ahead; but every moment of respite from theblinding whirl was a gain, and with his eyes close on the trail thathad carried Nan into danger, he urged the Lady on.
When the snow again closed down about him he calculated from theroughness of the country that he should be within a mile of the roadthat Nan was trying to reach, from the Gap to Sleepy Cat. But thebroken ground straight ahead would prevent her from driving directlyto it. He knew she must hold to the right, and her curving track, nowbecoming difficult to trail, confirmed his conclusion.
A fresh drive of the wind buffeted him as he turned directly north.Only at intervals could he see any trace of the wagon wheels. Thedriving snow compelled him more than once to dismount and search forthe trail. Each time he lost it the effort to regain it was moreprolonged. At times he was compelled to ride the desert in widecircles to find the tracks, and this cost time when minutes might meanlife. But as long as he could he clung to the struggle to track herexactly. He saw almost where the storm had struck the two wayfarers.Neither, he knew, was insensible to its dangers. What amazed him wasthat a man like Duke Morgan should be out in it. He found a spot wherethey had halted and, with a start that checked the beating of hisheart, his eyes fell on her footprint not yet obliterated, beside thewagon track.
The sight of it was an electric shock. Throwing himself from hishorse, he knelt over it in the storm, oblivious for an instant ofeverything but that this tracery meant her presence, where he nowbent, hardly half an hour before. He swung, after a moment's keenscrutiny, into his saddle, with fresh resolve. Pressed by the risingfury of the wind, the wayfarers had become from this point, de Spainsaw too plainly, hardly more than fugitives. Good ground to the left,where their hope of safety lay, had been overlooked. Their trackswandered on the open desert like those who, losing courage, lose theircourse in the confusion and fear of the impending peril.
And with this increasing uncertainty in their direction vanished deSpain's last hopes of tracking them. The wind swept the desert now asa hurricane sweeps the open sea, snatching the fallen snow from theface of the earth as the sea-gale, flattening the face of the waters,rips the foam from the frantic waves to drive it in wild, scuddingfragments across them.
De Spain, urging his horse forward, unbuckled his rifle holster, threwaway the scabbard, and holding the weapon up in one hand, fired shotafter shot at measured intervals to attract the attention of the twohe sought. He exhausted his rifle ammunition without eliciting any
answer. The wind drove with a roar against which even a rifle reportcould hardly carry, and the snow swept down the Sinks in a mad blast.Flakes torn by the fury of the gale were stiffened by the bitter windinto powdered ice that stung horse and rider. Casting away theuseless carbine, and pressing his horse to the limit of her strengthand endurance, the unyielding pursuer rode in great coiling circlesinto the storm, to cut in, if possible, ahead of its victims, firingshot upon shot from his revolver, and putting his ear intently againstthe wind for the faint hope of an answer.
Suddenly the Lady stumbled and, as he cruelly reined her, slidhelpless and scrambling along the face of a flat rock. De Spain,leaping from her back, steadied her trembling and looked underfoot.The mare had struck the rock of the upper lava bed. Drawing hisrevolver, he fired signal shots from where he stood. It could not befar, he knew, from the junction of the two great desert trails--theCalabasas road and the Gap road. He felt sure Nan could not have gotmuch north of this, for he had ridden in desperation to get abreast ofor beyond her, and if she were south, where, he asked, in the name ofGod, could she be?
He climbed again into the saddle--the cold was gripping hislimbs--and, watching the rocky landmarks narrowly, tried to circle thedead waste of the half-buried flow. With chilled, awkward fingers hefilled the revolver again and rode on, discharging it every minute,and listening--hoping against hope for an answer. It was when he hadalmost completed, as well as he could compute, the wide circuit he hadset out on, that a faint shot answered his continuing signals.
With the sound of that shot and those that followed it his courage allcame back. But he had yet to trace through the confusion of the windand the blinding snow the direction of the answering reports.
Hither and thither he rode, this way and that, testing out thelocation of the slowly repeated shots, and signalling at intervals inreturn. Slowly and doggedly he kept on, shooting, listening, wheeling,and advancing until, as he raised his revolver to fire it again, a cryclose at hand came out of the storm. It was a woman's voice borne onthe wind. Riding swiftly to the left, a horse's outline revealeditself at moments in the driving snow ahead.
De Spain cried out, and from behind the furious curtain heard hisname, loudly called. He pushed his stumbling horse on. The dim outlineof a second horse, the background of a wagon, a storm-beaten man--allthis passed his eyes unheeded. They were bent on a girlish figurerunning toward him as he slid stiffly from the saddle. The nextinstant Nan was in his arms.