Desert Gold

Z >> Zane Grey >> Desert Gold

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But that strange, speaking flash of eyes remained to haunt and
torment Gale. It was indescribably sweet, and provocative of
thoughts that he believed were wild without warrant. Something
within him danced for very joy, and the next instant he was
conscious of wistful doubt, a gravity that he could not understand.
It dawned upon him that for the brief instant when Nell had met
his gaze she had lost her shyness. It was a woman's questioning eyes
that had pierced through him.

During the rest of the day Gale was content to lie still on his bed
thinking and dreaming, dozing at intervals, and watching the
lights change upon the mountain peaks, feeling the warm, fragrant
desert wind that blew in upon him. He seemed to have lost the
faculty of estimating time. A long while, strong in its effect
upon him, appeared to have passed since he had met Thorne. He
accepted things as he felt them, and repudiated his intelligence.
His old inquisitive habit of mind returned. did he love Nell?
Was he only attracted for the moment? What was the use of worrying
about her or himself? He refused to answer, and deliberately gave
himself up to dreams of her sweet face and of that last dark-blue glance.

Next day he believed he was well enough to leave his room; but Mrs.
Belding would not permit him to do so. She was kind, soft-handed,
motherly, and she was always coming in to minister to his comfort.
This attention was sincere, not in the least forced; yet Gale felt
that the friendliness so manifest in the others of the household
did not extend to her. He was conscious of something that a
little thought persuaded him was antagonism. It surprised and
hurt him. He had never been much of a success with girls and
young married women, but their mothers and old people had generally
been fond of him. Still, though Mrs. Belding's hair was snow-white,
she did not impress him as being old. He reflected that there
might come a time when it would be desirable, far beyond any
ground of every-day friendly kindliness, to have Mrs. Belding be
well disposed toward him. So he thought about her, and pondered
how to make her like him. It did not take very long for Dick to
discover that he liked her. Her face, except when she smiled,
was thoughtful and sad. It was a face to make one serious. Like
a haunting shadow, like a phantom of happier years, the
sweetness of Nell's face was there, and infinitely more of beauty
than had been transmitted to the daughter. Dick believed Mrs.
Belding's friendship and motherly love were worth striving to win,
entirely aside from any more selfish motive. He decided both would
be hard to get. Often he felt her deep, penetrating gaze upon
him; and, though this in no wise embarrassed him--for he had no
shameful secrets of past or present--it showed him how useless it
would be to try to conceal anything from her. Naturally, on first
impulse, he wanted to hide his interest in the daughter; but he
resolved to be absolutely frank and true, and through that win or
lose. Moreover, if Mrs. Belding asked him any questions about his
home, his family, his connections, he would not avoid direct and
truthful answers.

Toward evening Gale heard the tramp of horses and Belding's hearty
voice. Presently the rancher strode in upon Gale, shaking the
gray dust from his broad shoulders and waving a letter.

"Hello, Dick! Good news and bad!" he said, putting the letter in
Dick's hand. "Had no trouble finding your friend Thorne. Looked
like he'd been drunk for a week! Say, he nearly threw a fit. I
never saw a fellow so wild with joy. He made sure you and Mercedes
were lost in the desert. He wrote two letters which I brought.
Don't mistake me, boy, it was some fun with Mercedes just now.
I teased her, wouldn't give her the letter. You ought to have seen
her eyes. If ever you see a black-and-white desert hawk swoop
down upon a quail, then you'll know how Mercedes pounced upon
her letter...Well, Casita is one hell of a place these days. I
tried to get your baggage, and I think I made a mistake. We're
going to see travel toward Forlorn River. The federal garrison
got reinforcements from somewhere, and is holding out. There's
been fighting for three days. The rebels have a string of flat
railroad cars, all iron, and they ran this up within range of the
barricades. They've got some machine guns, and they're going to lick
the federals sure. There are dead soldiers in the ditches, Mexican
non-combatants lying dead in the streets--and buzzards everywhere!
It's reported that Campo, the rebel leader, is on the way up from Sinaloa,
and Huerta, a federal general, is coming to relieve the garrison.
I don't take much stock in reports. But there's hell in Casita, all right."

"Do you think we'll have trouble out here?" asked Dick, excitedly.

"Sure. Some kind of trouble sooner or later," replied Belding,
gloomily. "Why, you can stand on my ranch and step over into
Mexico. Laddy says we'll lose horses and other stock in night raids.
Jim Lash doesn't look for any worse. But Jim isn't as well
acquainted with Greasers as I am. Anyway, my boy, as soon as you
can hold a bridle and a gun you'll be on the job, don't mistake me."

"With Laddy and Jim?" asked Dick, trying to be cool.

"Sure. With them and me, and by yourself."

Dick drew a deep breath, and even after Belding had departed he
forgot for a moment about the letter in his hand. Then he unfolded
the paper and read:

Dear Dick,--You've more than saved my life. To the end of my
days you'll be the one man to whom I owe everything. Words fail
to express my feelings.

This must be a brief note. Belding is waiting, and I used up most
of the time writing to Mercedes. I like Belding. He was not
unknown to me, though I never met or saw him before. You'll be
interested to learn that he's the unadulterated article, the real
Western goods. I've heard of some of his stunts, and they made
my hair curl. Dick, your luck is staggering. The way Belding spoke
of you was great. But you deserve it, old man.

I'm leaving Mercedes in your charge, subject, of course, to advice
from Belding. Take care of her, Dick, for my life is wrapped up
in her. By all means keep her from being seen by Mexicans. We
are sitting tight here--nothing doing. If some action doesn't come
soon, it'll be darned strange. Things are centering this way.
There's scrapping right along, and people have begun to move.
We're still patrolling the line eastward of Casita. It'll be
impossible to keep any tab on the line west of Casita, for it's
too rough. That cactus desert is awful. Cowboys or rangers
with desert-bred horses might keep raiders and smugglers from crossing.
But if cavalrymen could stand that waterless wilderness, which I doubt much,
their horses would drop under them.

If things do quiet down before my commission expires, I'll get
leave of absence, run out to Forlorn River, marry my beautiful
Spanish princess, and take her to a civilized country, where, I
opine, every son of a gun who sees her will lose his head, and
drive me mad. It's my great luck, old pal, that you are a fellow
who never seemed to care about pretty girls. So you won't give
me the double cross and run off with Mercedes--carry her off,
like the villain in the play, I mean.

That reminds me of Rojas. Oh, Dick, it was glorious! You didn't
do anything to the Dandy Rebel! Not at all! You merely caressed
him--gently moved him to one side. Dick, harken to these glad
words: Rojas is in the hospital. I was interested to inquire.
He had a smashed finger, a dislocated collar bone, three broken
ribs, and a fearful gash on his face. He'll be in the hospital for
a month. Dick, when I meet that pig-headed dad of yours I'm
going to give him the surprise of his life.

Send me a line whenever any one comes in from F. R., and inclose
Mercedes's letter in yours. Take care of her, Dick, and may the
future hold in store for you some of the sweetness I know now!

Faithfully yours,
Thorne.

Dick reread the letter, then folded it and placed it under his pillow.

"Never cared for pretty girls, huh?" he soliloquized.

"George, I never saw any till I struck Southern Arizona! Guess
I'd better make up for lost time."

While he was eating his supper, with appetite rapidly returning
to normal, Ladd and Jim cam in, bowing their tall heads to enter
the door. Their friendly advances were singularly welcome to
Gale, but he was still backward. He allowed himself to show that
he was glad to see them, and he listened. Jim Lash had heard from
Belding the result of the mauling given to Rojas by Dick. And Jim
talked about what a grand thing that was. Ladd had a good deal
to say about Belding's horses. It took no keen judge of human
nature to see that horses constituted Ladd's ruling passion.

"I've had wimmen go back on me, but never no hoss!" declared
Ladd, and manifestly that was a controlling truth with him.

"Shore it's a cinch Beldin' is agoin' to lose some of them hosses,"
he said. "you can search me if I don't think there'll be more
doin' on the border here than along the Rio Grande. We're just
the same as on Greaser soil. Mebbe we don't stand no such chance
of bein' shot up as we would across the line. but who's goin' to
give up his hosses without a fight? Half the time when Beldin's
stock is out of the alfalfa it's grazin' over the line. He thinks
he's careful about them hosses, but he ain't."

"Look a-here, Laddy; you cain't believe all you hear," replied
Jim, seriously. "I reckon we mightn't have any trouble."

"Back up, Jim. Shore you're standin' on your bridle. I ain't goin'
much on reports. Remember that American we met in Casita,
the prospector who'd just gotten out of Sonora? He had some
story, he had. Swore he'd killed seventeen Greasers breakin'
through the rebel line round the mine where he an' other Americans
were corralled. The next day when I met him again, he was drunk,
an' then he told me he'd shot thirty Greasers. The chances are
he did kill some. But reports are exaggerated. There are miners
fightin' for life down in Sonora, you can gamble on that. An' the
truth is bad enough. Take Rojas's harryin' of the Senorita, for
instance. Can you beat that? Shore, Jim, there's more doin' than
the raidin' of a few hosses. An' Forlorn River is goin' to get hers!"

Another dawn found Gale so much recovered that he arose and looked
after himself, not, however, without considerable difficulty and
rather disheartening twinges of pain.

Some time during the morning he heard the girls in the patio and
called to ask if he might join them. He received one response,
a mellow, "Si, Senor." It was not as much as he wanted,
but considering that it was enough, he went out. He had not
as yet visited the patio, and surprise and delight were in store
for him. He found himself lost in a labyrinth of green and
rose-bordered walks. He strolled around, discovering that the
patio was a courtyard, open at an end; but he failed to discover
the young ladies. So he called again. the answer cam from the
center of the square. After stooping to get under shrubs and
wading through bushes he entered an open sandy circle, full of
magnificent and murderous cactus plants, strange to him. On the
other side, in the shade of a beautiful tree, he found the girls.
Mercedes sitting in a hammock, Nell upon a blanket.

"What a beautiful tree!" he exclaimed. "I never saw one like
that. What is it?"

"Palo verde," replied Nell.

"Senor, palo verde means 'green tree,'" added Mercedes.

This desert tree, which had struck Dick as so new and strange
and beautiful, was not striking on account of size, for it was
small, scarcely reaching higher than the roof; but rather because
of its exquisite color of green, trunk and branch alike, and owing
to the odd fact that it seemed not to possess leaves. All the tree
from ground to tiny flat twigs was a soft polished green. It bore
no thorns.

Right then and there began Dick's education in desert growths;
and he felt that even if he had not had such charming teachers
he would still have been absorbed. For the patio was full of
desert wonders. A twisting-trunked tree with full foliage of
small gray leaves Nell called a mesquite. Then Dick remembered
the name, and now he saw where the desert got its pale-gray color.
A huge, lofty, fluted column of green was a saguaro, or giant
cactus. Another oddshaped cactus, resembling the legs of an
inverted devil-fish, bore the name ocatillo. Each branch
rose high and symmetrical, furnished with sharp blades
that seemed to be at once leaves and thorns. Yet another
cactus interested Gale, and it looked like a huge, low
barrel covered with green-ribbed cloth and long thorns. This was
the bisnaga, or barrel cactus. According to Nell and Mercedes,
this plant was a happy exception to its desert neighbors, for it
secreted water which had many times saved the lives of men. Last
of the cacti to attract Gale, and the one to make him shiver, was
a low plant, consisting of stem and many rounded protuberances of
a frosty, steely white, and covered with long murderous spikes.
From this plant the desert got its frosty glitter. It was as
stiff, as unyielding as steel, and bore the name choya.

Dick's enthusiasm was contagious, and his earnest desire to learn
was flattering to his teachers. When it came to assimilating
Spanish, however, he did not appear to be so apt a pupil. He
managed, after many trials, to acquire "buenos dias" and "buenos
tardes," and "senorita" and "gracias," and a few other short terms.
Dick was indeed eager to get a little smattering of Spanish, and
perhaps he was not really quite so stupid as he pretended to be.
It was delightful to be taught by a beautiful Spaniard who was so
gracious and intense and magnetic of personality, and by a sweet
American girl who moment by moment forgot her shyness. Gale
wished to prolong the lessons.

So that was the beginning of many afternoons in which he learned
desert lore and Spanish verbs, and something else that he dared
not name.

Nell Burton had never shown to Gale that daring side of her
character which had been so suggestively defined in Belding's
terse description and Ladd's encomiums, and in her own audacious
speech and merry laugh and flashing eye of that never-to-be-forgotten
first meeting. She might have been an entirely different girl.
But Gale remembered; and when the ice had been somewhat broken
between them, he was always trying to surprise her into her real self.
There were moments that fairly made him tingle with expectation.
Yet he saw little more than a ghost of her vivacity, and never
a gleam of that individuality which Belding had called a devil.
On the few occasions that Dick had been left alone with her
in the patio Nell had grown suddenly unresponsive and
restrained, or she had left him on some transparent pretext.
On the last occasion Mercedes returned to find Dick staring
disconsolately at the rose-bordered path, where Nell had evidently
vanished. The Spanish girl was wonderful in her divination.

"Senor Dick!" she cried.

Dick looked at her, soberly nodded his head, and then he laughed.
Mercedes had seen through him in one swift glance. Her white hand
touched his in wordless sympathy and thrilled him. This Spanish
girl was all fire and passion and love. She understood him, she
was his friend, she pledged him what he felt would be the most
subtle and powerful influence.

Little by little he learned details of Nell's varied life. She had
lived in many places. As a child she remembered moving from
town to town, of going to school among schoolmates whom she
never had time to know. Lawrence, Kansas, where she studied for
several years, was the later exception to this changeful nature
of her schooling. Then she moved to Stillwater, Oklahoma, from
there to Austin, Texas, and on to Waco, where her mother met and
married Belding. They lived in New Mexico awhile, in Tucson,
Arizona, in Douglas, and finally had come to lonely Forlorn River.

"Mother could never live in one place any length of time,"
said Nell. "And since we've been in the Southwest she has never
ceased trying to find some trace of her father. He was last heard
of in Nogales fourteen years ago. She thinks grandfather was lost
in the Sonora Desert....And every place we go is worse. Oh, I love
the desert. But I'd like to go back to Lawrence--or to see
Chicago or New York--some of the places Mr. Gale speaks of....
I remember the college at Lawrence, though I was only twelve.
I saw races--and once real football. Since then I've read magazines
and papers about big football games, and I was always fascinated
....Mr. Gale, of course, you've seen games?

"Yes, a few," replied Dick; and he laughed a little. It was on
his lips then to tell her about some of the famous games in which
he had participated. But he refrained from exploiting himself.
There was little, however, of the color and sound and cheer, of
the violent action and rush and battle incidental to a big college
football game that he did not succeed in making Mercedes and Nell
feel just as if they had been there. They hung breathless and
wide-eyed upon his words.

Some one else was present at the latter part of Dick's narrative.
The moment he became aware of Mrs. Belding's presence he remembered
fancying he had heard her call, and now he was certain she had
done so. Mercedes and Nell, however, had been and still were
oblivious to everything except Dick's recital. He saw Mrs. Belding
cast a strange, intent glance upon Nell, then turn and go silently
through the patio. Dick concluded his talk, but the brilliant
beginning was not sustained.

Dick was haunted by the strange expression he had caught on Mrs.
Belding's face, especially the look in her eyes. It had been one
of repressed pain liberated in a flash of certainty. The mother
had seen just as quickly as Mercedes how far he had gone on the
road of love. Perhaps she had seen more--even more than he dared
hope. The incident roused Gale. He could not understand Mrs.
Belding, nor why that look of hers, that seeming baffled, hopeless
look of a woman who saw the inevitable forces of life and could
not thwart them, should cause him perplexity and distress. He
wanted to go to her and tell her how he felt about Nell, but fear
of absolute destruction of his hopes held him back. He would wait.

Nevertheless, an instinct that was perhaps akin to self-preservation
prompted him to want to let Nell know the state of his mind.
Words crowded his brain seeking utterance. Who and what he was,
how he loved her, the work he expected to take up soon, his longings,
hopes, and plans--there was all this and more. But something checked
him. And the repression made him so thoughtful and quiet, even
melancholy, that he went outdoors to try to throw off the mood.
The sun was yet high, and a dazzling white light enveloped valleys
and peaks. He felt that the wonderful sunshine was the dominant
feature of that arid region. It was like white gold. It had
burned its color in a face he knew. It was going to warm his blood
and brown his skin. A hot, languid breeze, so dry that he felt his
lips shrink with its contact, came from the desert; and it seemed
to smell of wide-open, untainted places where sand blew and strange,
pungent plants gave a bitter-sweet tang to the air.

When he returned to the house, some hours later, his room had been
put in order. In the middle of the white coverlet on his table
lay a fresh red rose. Nell had dropped it there. Dick picked it
up, feeling a throb in his breast. It was a bud just beginning
to open, to show between its petals a dark-red, unfolding heart.
How fragrant it was, how exquisitely delicate, how beautiful
its inner hue of red, deep and dark, the crimson of life blood!

Had Nell left it there by accident or by intent? Was it merely
kindness or a girl's subtlety? Was it a message couched elusively,
a symbol, a hope in a half-blown desert rose?

VI

The Yaqui

Toward evening of a lowering December day, some fifty miles west
of Forlorn River, a horseman rode along an old, dimly defined trail.
From time to time he halted to study the lay of the land ahead.
It was bare, somber, ridgy desert, covered with dun-colored
greasewood and stunted prickly pear. Distant mountains hemmed
in the valley, raising black spurs above the round lomas and the
square-walled mesas.

This lonely horseman bestrode a steed of magnificent build,
perfectly white except for a dark bar of color running down the
noble head from ears to nose. Sweatcaked dust stained the long
flanks. The horse had been running. His mane and tail were laced
and knotted to keep their length out of reach of grasping cactus
and brush. Clumsy home-made leather shields covered the front
of his forelegs and ran up well to his wide breast. What otherwise
would have been muscular symmetry of limb was marred by many a
scar and many a lump. He was lean, gaunt, worn, a huge machine
of muscle and bone, beautiful only in head and mane, a weight-carrier,
a horse strong and fierce like the desert that had bred him.

The rider fitted the horse as he fitted the saddle. He was a young
man of exceedingly powerful physique, wide-shouldered, long-armed,
big-legged. His lean face, where it was not red, blistered and peeling,
was the hue of bronze. He had a dark eye, a falcon gaze, roving
and keen. His jaw was prominent and set, mastiff-like; his lips
were stern. It was youth with its softness not yet quite burned
and hardened away that kept the whole cast of his face from being
ruthless.

This young man was Dick Gale, but not the listless traveler, nor the
lounging wanderer who, two months before, had by chance dropped
into Casita. Friendship, chivalry, love--the deep-seated, unplumbed
emotions that had been stirred into being with all their incalculable
power for spiritual change, had rendered different the meaning of
life. In the moment almost of their realization the desert had
claimed Gale, and had drawn him into its crucible. The desert
had multiplied weeks into years. Heat, thirst, hunger, loneliness,
toil, fear, ferocity, pain--he knew them all. He had felt them
all--the white sun, with its glazed, coalescing, lurid fire; the
caked split lips and rasping, dry-puffed tongue; the sickening
ache in the pit of his stomach; the insupportable silence, the
empty space, the utter desolation, the contempt of life; the weary
ride, the long climb, the plod in sand, the search, search, search
for water; the sleepless night alone, the watch and wait, the
dread of ambush, the swift flight; the fierce pursuit of men wild
as Bedouins and as fleet, the willingness to deal sudden death,
the pain of poison thorn, the stinging tear of lead through flesh;
and that strange paradox of the burning desert, the cold at night,
the piercing icy wind, the dew that penetrated to the marrow, the
numbing desert cold of the dawn.

Beyond any dream of adventure he had ever had, beyond any wild
story he had every read, had been his experience with those
hard-riding rangers, Ladd and Lash. Then he had traveled alone
the hundred miles of desert between Forlorn River and the Sonoyta
Oasis. Ladd's prophecy of trouble on the border had been mild
compared to what had become the actuality. With rebel occupancy
of the garrison at Casita, outlaws, bandits, raiders in rioting
bands had spread westward. Like troops of Arabs, magnificently
mounted, they were here, there, everywhere along the line; and if
murder and worse were confined to the Mexican side, pillage and raiding
were perpetrated across the border. Many a dark-skinned raider bestrode
one of Belding's fast horses, and indeed all except his selected white
thoroughbreds had been stolen. So the job of the rangers had
become more than a patrolling of the boundary line to keep Japanese
and Chinese from being smuggled into the United States. Belding
kept close at home to protect his family and to hold his property.
But the three rangers, in fulfilling their duty had incurred risks
on their own side of the line, had been outraged, robbed, pursued,
and injured on the other. Some of the few waterholes that had
to be reached lay far across the border in Mexican territory.
Horses had to drink, men had to drink; and Ladd and Lash were not
of the stripe that forsook a task because of danger. Slow to
wrath at first, as became men who had long lived peaceful lives,
they had at length revolted; and desert vultures could have told
a gruesome story. Made a comrade and ally of these bordermen,
Dick Gale had leaped at the desert action and strife with an
intensity of heart and a rare physical ability which accounted for
the remarkable fact that he had not yet fallen by the way.

On this December afternoon the three rangers, as often, were
separated. Lash was far to the westward of Sonoyta, somewhere
along Camino del Diablo, that terrible Devil's Road, where many
desert wayfarers had perished. Ladd had long been overdue in a
prearranged meeting with Gale. The fact that Ladd had not shown
up miles west of the Papago Well was significant.

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