"So he has talked about me some?" said the Virginian.
"It's the whiskey," Scipio explained.
"I expect," said McLean, "he'd run a mile if he was in a state to appreciate his insinuations."
"Which we are careful not to mention to yu'," said Wiggin, "unless yu' inquire for 'em."
Some of the fools present had drawn closer to hear this interesting conversation. In gatherings of more than six there will generally be at least one fool; and this company must have numbered twenty men.
"This country knows well enough," said one fool, who hungered to be important, "that you don't brand no calves that ain't your own."
The saturnine Virginian looked at him. "Thank yu'," said he, gravely, "for your indorsement of my character." The fool felt flattered. The Virginian turned to his friends. His hand slowly pushed his hat back, and he rubbed his black head in thought.
"Glad to see yu've got your gun with you," continued the happy fool. "You know what Trampas claims about that affair of yours in the Tetons? He claims that if everything was known about the killing of Shorty—"
"Take one on the house," suggested the proprietor to him, amiably. "Your news will be fresher." And he pushed him the bottle. The fool felt less important.
"This talk had went the rounds before it got to us," said Scipio, "or we'd have headed it off. He has got friends in town."
Perplexity knotted the Virginian's brows. This community knew that a man had implied he was a thief and a murderer; it also knew that he knew it. But the case was one of peculiar circumstances, assuredly. Could he avoid meeting the man? Soon the stage would be starting south for the railroad. He had already to-day proposed to his sweetheart that they should take it. Could he for her sake leave unanswered a talking enemy upon the field? His own ears had not heard the enemy.
Into these reflections the fool stepped once more. "Of course this country don't believe Trampas," said he. "This country—"
But he contributed no further thoughts. From somewhere in the rear of the building, where it opened upon the tin cans and the hinder purlieus of the town, came a movement, and Trampas was among them, courageous with whiskey.
All the fools now made themselves conspicuous. One lay on the floor, knocked there by the Virginian, whose arm he had attempted to hold. Others struggled with Trampas, and his bullet smashed the ceiling before they could drag the pistol from him. "There now! there now!" they interposed; "you don't want to talk like that," for he was pouring out a tide of hate and vilification. Yet the Virginian stood quiet by the bar, and many an eye of astonishment was turned upon him. "I'd not stand half that language," some muttered to each other. Still the Virginian waited quietly, while the fools reasoned with Trampas. But no earthly foot can step between a man and his destiny. Trampas broke suddenly free.
"Your friends have saved your life," he rang out, with obscene epithets. "I'll give you till sundown to leave town."
There was total silence instantly.
"Trampas," spoke the Virginian, "I don't want trouble with you."
"He never has wanted it," Trampas sneered to the bystanders. "He has been dodging it five years. But I've got him coralled."
Some of the Trampas faction smiled.
"Trampas," said the Virginian again, "are yu' sure yu' really mean that?"
The whiskey bottle flew through the air, hurled by Trampas, and crashed through the saloon window behind the Virginian.
"That was surplusage, Trampas," said he, "if yu' mean the other."
"Get out by sundown, that's all," said Trampas. And wheeling, he went out of the saloon by the rear, as he had entered.
"Gentlemen," said the Virginian, "I know you will all oblige me."
"Sure!" exclaimed the proprietor, heartily, "We'll see that everybody lets this thing alone."
The Virginian gave a general nod to the company, and walked out into the street.
"It's a turruble shame," sighed Scipio, "that he couldn't have postponed it."
The Virginian walked in the open air with thoughts disturbed. "I am of two minds about one thing," he said to himself uneasily.
Gossip ran in advance of him; but as he came by, the talk fell away until he had passed. Then they looked after him, and their words again rose audibly. Thus everywhere a little eddy of silence accompanied his steps.
"It don't trouble him much," one said, having read nothing in the Virginian's face.
"It may trouble his girl some," said another.
"She'll not know," said a third, "until it's over."
"He'll not tell her?"
"I wouldn't. It's no woman's business."
"Maybe that's so. Well, it would have suited me to have Trampas die sooner."
"How would it suit you to have him live longer?" inquired a member of the opposite faction, suspected of being himself a cattle thief.
"I could answer your question, if I had other folks' calves I wanted to brand." This raised both a laugh and a silence.
Thus the town talked, filling in the time before sunset.
The Virginian, still walking aloof in the open air, paused at the edge of the town. "I'd sooner have a sickness than be undecided this way," he said, and he looked up and down. Then a grim smile came at his own expense. "I reckon it would make me sick—but there's not time."
Over there in the hotel sat his sweetheart alone, away from her mother, her friends, her home, waiting his return, knowing nothing. He looked into the west. Between the sun and the bright ridges of the mountains was still a space of sky; but the shadow from the mountains' feet had drawn halfway toward the town. "About forty minutes more," he said aloud. "She has been raised so different." And he sighed as he turned back. As he went slowly, he did not know how great was his own unhappiness. "She has been raised so different," he said again.
Opposite the post-office the bishop of Wyoming met him and greeted him. His lonely heart throbbed at the warm, firm grasp of this friend's hand. The bishop saw his eyes glow suddenly, as if tears were close. But none came, and no word more open than, "I'm glad to see you."
But gossip had reached the bishop, and he was sorely troubled also. "What is all this?" said he, coming straight to it.
The Virginian looked at the clergyman frankly. "Yu' know just as much about it as I do," he said. "And I'll tell yu' anything yu' ask."
"Have you told Miss Wood?" inquired the bishop.
The eyes of the bridegroom fell, and the bishop's face grew at once more keen and more troubled. Then the bridegroom raised his eyes again, and the bishop almost loved him. He touched his arm, like a brother. "This is hard luck," he said.
The bridegroom could scarce keep his voice steady. "I want to do right to-day more than any day I have ever lived," said he.
"Then go and tell her at once."
"It will just do nothing but scare her."
"Go and tell her at once."
"I expected you was going to tell me to run away from Trampas. I can't do that, yu' know."
The bishop did know. Never before in all his wilderness work had he faced such a thing. He knew that Trampas was an evil in the country, and that the Virginian was a good. He knew that the cattle thieves—the rustlers—were gaining, in numbers and audacity; that they led many weak young fellows to ruin; that they elected their men to office, and controlled juries; that they were a staring menace to Wyoming. His heart was with the Virginian. But there was his Gospel, that he preached, and believed, and tried to live. He stood looking at the ground and drawing a finger along his eyebrow. He wished that he might have heard nothing about all this. But he was not one to blink his responsibility as a Christian server of the church militant.
"Am I right," he now slowly asked, "in believing that you think I am a sincere man?"
"I don't believe anything about it. I know it."
"I should run away from Trampas," said the bishop.
"That ain't quite fair, seh. We all understand you have got to do the things you tell other folks to do. And you do them, s
eh. You never talk like anything but a man, and you never set yourself above others. You can saddle your own horses. And I saw yu' walk unarmed into that White River excitement when those two other parsons was a-foggin' and a-fannin' for their own safety. Damn scoundrels!"
The bishop instantly rebuked such language about brothers of his cloth, even though he disapproved both of them and their doctrines. "Every one may be an instrument of Providence," he concluded.
"Well," said the Virginian, "if that is so, then Providence makes use of instruments I'd not touch with a ten-foot pole. Now if you was me, seh, and not a bishop, would you run away from Trampas?"
"That's not quite fair, either!" exclaimed the bishop, with a smile. "Because you are asking me to take another man's convictions, and yet remain myself."
"Yes, seh. I am. That's so. That don't get at it. I reckon you and I can't get at it."
"If the Bible," said the bishop, "which I believe to be God's word, was anything to you—"
"It is something to me, seh. I have found fine truths in it."
"'Thou shalt not kill,'" quoted the bishop. "That is plain."
The Virginian took his turn at smiling. "Mighty plain to me, seh. Make it plain to Trampas, and there'll be no killin'. We can't get at it that way."
Once more the bishop quoted earnestly. "'Vengeance is mine, I will repay, saith the Lord.'"
"How about instruments of Providence, seh? Why, we can't get at it that way. If you start usin' the Bible that way, it will mix you up mighty quick, seh."
"My friend," the bishop urged, and all his good, warm heart was in it, "my dear fellow—go away for the one night. He'll change his mind."
The Virginian shook his head. "He cannot change his word, seh. Or at least I must stay around till he does. Why, I have given him the say-so. He's got the choice. Most men would not have took what I took from him in the saloon. Why don't you ask him to leave town?"
The good bishop was at a standstill. Of all kicking against the pricks none is so hard as this kick of a professing Christian against the whole instinct of human man.
"But you have helped me some," said the Virginian. "I will go and tell her. At least, if I think it will be good for her, I will tell her."
The bishop thought that he saw one last chance to move him.
"You're twenty-nine," he began.
"And a little over," said the Virginian.
"And you were fourteen when you ran away from your family."
"Well, I was weary, yu' know, of havin' elder brothers lay down my law night and mawnin'."
"Yes, I know. So that your life has been your own for fifteen years. But it is not your own now. You have given it to a woman."
"Yes; I have given it to her. But my life's not the whole of me. I'd give her twice my life—fifty—a thousand of 'em. But I can't give her—her nor anybody in heaven or earth—I can't give my—my—we'll never get at it, seh! There's no good in words. Good-by." The Virginian wrung the bishop's hand and left him.
"God bless him!" said the bishop. "God bless him!"
The Virginian unlocked the room in the hotel where he kept stored his tent, his blankets, his pack-saddles, and his many accoutrements for the bridal journey in the mountains. Out of the window he saw the mountains blue in shadow, but some cottonwoods distant in the flat between were still bright green in the sun. From among his possessions he took quickly a pistol, wiping and loading it. Then from its holster he removed the pistol which he had tried and made sure of in the morning. This, according to his wont when going into a risk, he shoved between his trousers and his shirt in front. The untried weapon he placed in the holster, letting it hang visibly at his hip. He glanced out of the window again, and saw the mountains of the same deep blue. But the cottonwoods were no longer in the sunlight. The shadow had come past them, nearer the town; for fifteen of the forty minutes were gone. "The bishop is wrong," he said. "There is no sense in telling her." And he turned to the door, just as she came to it herself.
"Oh!" she cried out at once, and rushed to him.
He swore as he held her close. "The fools!" he said. "The fools!"
"It has been so frightful waiting for you," said she, leaning her head against him.
"Who had to tell you this?" he demanded.
"I don't know. Somebody just came and said it."
"This is mean luck," he murmured, patting her. "This is mean luck."
She went on: "I wanted to run out and find you; but I didn't! I didn't! I stayed quiet in my room till they said you had come back."
"It is mean luck. Mighty mean," he repeated.
"How could you be so long?" she asked. "Never mind, I've got you now. It is over."
Anger and sorrow filled him. "I might have known some fool would tell you," he said.
"It's all over. Never mind." Her arms tightened their hold of him. Then she let him go. "What shall we do?" she said. "What now?"
"Now?" he answered. "Nothing now."
She looked at him without understanding.
"I know it is a heap worse for you," he pursued, speaking slowly. "I knew it would be."
"But it is over!" she exclaimed again.
He did not understand her now. He kissed her. "Did you think it was over?" he said simply. "There is some waiting still before us. I wish you did not have to wait alone. But it will not be long." He was looking down, and did not see the happiness grow chilled upon her face, and then fade into bewildered fear. "I did my best," he went on. "I think I did. I know I tried. I let him say to me before them all what no man has ever said, or ever will again. I kept thinking hard of you—with all my might, or I reckon I'd have killed him right there. And I gave him a show to change his mind. I gave it to him twice. I spoke as quiet as I am speaking to you now. But he stood to it. And I expect he knows he went too far in the hearing of others to go back on his threat. He will have to go on to the finish now."
"The finish?" she echoed, almost voiceless.
"Yes," he answered very gently.
Her dilated eves were fixed upon him. "But—" she could scarce form utterance, "but you?"
"I have got myself ready," he said. "Did you think—why, what did you think?"
She recoiled a step. "What are you going—" She put her two hands to her head. "Oh, God!" she almost shrieked, "you are going—" He made a step, and would have put his arm round her, but she backed against the wall, staring speechless at him.
"I am not going to let him shoot me," he said quietly.
"You mean—you mean—but you can come away!" she cried. "It's not too late yet. You can take yourself out of his reach. Everybody knows that you are brave. What is he to you? You can leave him in this place. I'll go with you anywhere. To any house, to the mountains, to anywhere away. We'll leave this horrible place together and—and—oh, won't you listen to me?" She stretched her hands to him. "Won't you listen?"
He took her hands. "I must stay here."
Her hands clung to his. "No, no, no. There's something else. There's something better than shedding blood in cold blood. Only think what it means! Only think of having to remember such a thing! Why, it's what they hang people for! It's murder!"
He dropped her hands. "Don't call it that name," he said sternly.
"When there was the choice!" she exclaimed, half to herself, like a person stunned and speaking to the air. "To get ready for it when you have the choice!"
"He did the choosing," answered the Virginian. "Listen to me. Are you listening?" he asked, for her gaze was dull.
She nodded.
"I work hyeh. I belong hyeh. It's my life. If folks came to think I was a coward—"
"Who would think you were a coward?"
"Everybody. My friends would be sorry and ashamed, and my enemies would walk around saying they had always said so. I could not hold up my head again among enemies or friends."
"When it was explained—"
"There'd be nothing to explain. There'd just be the fact." He was nearly angry.
"T
here is a higher courage than fear of outside opinion," said the New England girl.
Her Southern lover looked at her. "Cert'nly there is. That's what I'm showing in going against yours."
"But if you know that you are brave, and if I know that you are brave, oh, my dear, my dear! what difference does the world make? How much higher courage to go your own course—"
"I am goin' my own course," he broke in. "Can't yu' see how it must be about a man? It's not for their benefit, friends or enemies, that I have got this thing to do. If any man happened to say I was a thief and I heard about it, would I let him go on spreadin' such a thing of me? Don't I owe my own honesty something better than that? Would I sit down in a corner rubbin' my honesty and whisperin' to it, 'There! there! I know you ain't a thief?' No, seh; not a little bit! What men say about my nature is not just merely an outside thing. For the fact that I let 'em keep on sayin' it is a proof I don't value my nature enough to shield it from their slander and give them their punishment. And that's being a poor sort of a jay."
She had grown very white.
"Can't yu' see how it must be about a man?" he repeated.
"I cannot," she answered, in a voice that scarcely seemed her own. "If I ought to, I cannot. To shed blood in cold blood. When I heard about that last fall,—about the killing of those cattle thieves,—I kept saying to myself: 'He had to do it. It was a public duty.' And lying sleepless I got used to Wyoming being different from Vermont. But this—" she gave a shudder—"when I think of to-morrow, of you and me, and of—If you do this, there can be no to-morrow for you and me."
At these words he also turned white.
"Do you mean—" he asked, and could go no farther.
Nor could she answer him, but turned her head away.
"This would be the end?" he asked.
Her head faintly moved to signify yes.
He stood still, his hand shaking a little. "Will you look at me and say that?" he murmured at length. She did not move. "Can you do it?" he said.
His sweetness made her turn, but could not pierce her frozen resolve. She gazed at him across the great distance of her despair.
"Then it is really so?" he said.
Her lips tried to form words, but failed.