The Call of the Canyon
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Zane Grey >> The Call of the Canyon
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All the time that she dressed and thought, her very being seemed to be
permeated by that soft murmuring sound of falling water. No moment of
waking life there at Lolomi Lodge, or perhaps of slumber hours, could be
wholly free of that sound. It vaguely tormented Carley, yet was not
uncomfortable. She went out upon the porch. The small alcove space held a
bed and a rustic chair. Above her the peeled poles of the roof descended to
within a few feet of her head. She had to lean over the rail of the porch
to look up. The green and red rock wall sheered ponderously near. The
waterfall showed first at the notch of a fissure, where the cliff split;
and down over smooth places the water gleamed, to narrow in a crack with
little drops, and suddenly to leap into a thin white sheet.
Out from the porch the view was restricted to glimpses between the pines,
and beyond to the opposite wall of the canyon. How shut-in, how walled in
this home!
"In summer it might be good to spend a couple of weeks here," soliloquized
Carley. "But to live here? Heavens! A person might as well be buried."
Heavy footsteps upon the porch below accompanied by a man's voice quickened
Carley's pulse. Did they belong to Glenn? After a strained second she
decided not. Nevertheless, the acceleration of her blood and an unwonted
glow of excitement, long a stranger to her, persisted as she left the porch
and entered the boarded hall. How gray and barn-like this upper part of the
house! From the head of the stairway, however, the big living room
presented a cheerful contrast. There were warm colors, some comfortable
rockers, a lamp that shed a bright light, and an open fire which alone
would have dispelled the raw gloom of the day.
A large man in corduroys and top boots advanced to meet Carley. He had a
clean-shaven face that might have been hard and stern but for his smile,
and one look into his eyes revealed their resemblance to Flo's.
"I'm Tom Hutter, an' I'm shore glad to welcome you to Lolomi, Miss Carley,"
he said. His voice was deep and slow. There were ease and force in his
presence, and the grip he gave Carley's hand was that of a man who made no
distinction in hand-shaking. Carley, quick in her perceptions, instantly
liked him and sensed in him a strong personality. She greeted him in turn
and expressed her thanks for his goodness to Glenn. Naturally Carley
expected him to say something about her fiance, but he did not.
"Well, Miss Carley, if you don't mind, I'll say you're prettier than your
picture," said Hutter. "An' that is shore sayin' a lot. All the sheep
herders in the country have taken a peep at your picture. Without
permission, you understand."
"I'm greatly flattered," laughed Carley.
"We're glad you've come," replied Hutter, simply. "I just got back from the
East myself. Chicago an' Kansas City. I came to Arizona from Illinois over
thirty years ago. An' this was my first trip since. Reckon I've not got
back my breath yet. Times have changed, Miss Carley. Times an' people!"
Mrs. Hutter bustled in from the kitchen, where manifestly she had been
importantly engaged. "For the land's sakes!" she exclaimed, fervently, as
she threw up her hands at sight of Carley. Her expression was indeed a
compliment, but there was a suggestion of shock in it. Then Flo came in.
She wore a simple gray gown that reached the top of her high shoes.
"Carley, don't mind mother," said Flo. "She means your dress is lovely.
Which is my say, too. . . . But, listen. I just saw Glenn comin' up the
road."
Carley ran to the open door with more haste than dignity. She saw a tall
man striding along. Something about him appeared familiar. It was his
walk--an erect swift carriage, with a swing of the march still visible. She
recognized Glenn. And all within her seemed to become unstable. She watched
him cross the road, face the house. How changed! No--this was not Glenn
Kilbourne. This was a bronzed man, wide of shoulder, roughly garbed, heavy
limbed, quite different from the Glenn she remembered. He mounted the porch
steps. And Carley, still unseen herself, saw his face. Yes--Glenn! Hot
blood seemed to be tingling liberated in her veins. Wheeling away, she
backed against the wall behind the door and held up a warning finger to
Flo, who stood nearest. Strange and disturbing then, to see something in
Flo Hutter's eyes that could be read by a woman in only one way!
A tall form darkened the doorway. It strode in and halted.
"Flo!--who--where?" he began, breathlessly.
His voice, so well remembered, yet deeper, huskier, fell upon Carley's ears
as something unconsciously longed for. His frame had so filled out that she
did not recognize it. His face, too, had unbelievably changed--not in the
regularity of feature that had been its chief charm, but in contour of
cheek and vanishing of pallid hue and tragic line. Carley's heart swelled
with joy. Beyond all else she had hoped to see the sad fixed hopelessness,
the havoc, gone from his face. Therefore the restraint and nonchalance upon
which Carley prided herself sustained eclipse.
"Glenn! Look--who's--here!" she called, in voice she could not have
steadied to save her life. This meeting was more than she had anticipated.
Glenn whirled with an inarticulate cry. He saw Carley. Then--no matter how
unreasonable or exacting had been Carley's longings, they were satisfied.
"You!" he cried, and leaped at her with radiant face.
Carley not only did not care about the spectators of this meeting, but
forgot them utterly. More than the joy of seeing Glenn, more than the all-
satisfying assurance to her woman's heart that she was still beloved,
welled up a deep, strange, profound something that shook her to her depths.
It was beyond selfishness. It was gratitude to God and to the West that had
restored him.
"Carley! I couldn't believe it was you," he declared, releasing her from
his close embrace, yet still holding her.
"Yes, Glenn--it's I--all you've left of me," she replied, tremulously, and
she sought with unsteady hands to put up her dishevelled hair. "You--you big
sheep herder! You Goliath!"
"I never was so knocked off my pins," he said. "A lady to see me--from New
York! . . . Of course it had to be you. But I couldn't believe. Carley, you
were good to come."
Somehow the soft, warm look of his dark eyes hurt her. New and strange
indeed it was to her, as were other things about him. Why had she not come
West sooner? She disengaged herself from his hold and moved away, striving
for the composure habitual with her. Flo Hutter was standing before the
fire, looking down. Mrs. Hutter beamed upon Carley.
"Now let's have supper," she said.
"Reckon Miss Carley can't eat now, after that hug Glenn gave her," drawled
Tom Hutter. "I was some worried. You see Glenn has gained seventy pounds in
six months. An' he doesn't know his strength."
"Seventy pounds!" exclaimed Carley, gayly. "I thought it was more."
"Carley, you must excuse my violence," said Glenn. "I've been hugging
sheep. That is, when I shear a sheep I have to hold him."
They all laughed, and so the moment of readjustment passed. Presently
Carley found herself sitting at table, directly across from Flo. A pearly
whiteness was slowly warming out of the girl's face. Her frank clear eyes
met Carley's and they had nothing to hide. Carley's first requisite for
character in a woman was that she be a thoroughbred. She lacked it often
enough herself to admire it greatly in another woman. And that moment saw a
birth of respect and sincere liking in her for this Western girl. If Flo
Hutter ever was a rival she would be an honest one.
Not long after supper Tom Hutter winked at Carley and said he "reckoned on
general principles it was his hunch to go to bed." Mrs. Hutter suddenly
discovered tasks to perform elsewhere. And Flo said in her cool sweet
drawl, somehow audacious and tantalizing, "Shore you two will want to
spoon."
"Now, Flo, Eastern girls are no longer old-fashioned enough for that,"
declared Glenn.
"Too bad! Reckon I can't see how love could ever be old-fashioned. Good
night, Glenn. Good night, Carley."
Flo stood an instant at the foot of the dark stairway where the light from
the lamp fell upon her face. It seemed sweet and earnest to Carley. It
expressed unconscious longing, but no envy. Then she ran up the stairs to
disappear.
"Glenn, is that girl in love with you?" asked Carley, bluntly.
To her amaze, Glenn laughed. When had she heard him laugh? It thrilled her,
yet nettled her a little.
"If that isn't like you!" he ejaculated. "Your very first words after we
are left alone! It brings back the East, Carley."
"Probably recall to memory will be good for you," returned Carley. "But
tell me. Is she in love with you?"
"Why, no, certainly not!" replied Glenn. "Anyway, how could I answer such a
question? It just made me laugh, that's all."
"Humph! I can remember when you were not above making love to a pretty
girl. You certainly had me worn to a frazzle--before we became engaged,"
said Carley.
"Old times! How long ago they seem! . . . Carley, it's sure wonderful to
see you."
"How do you like my gown?" asked Carley, pirouetting for his benefit.
"Well, what little there is of it is beautiful," he replied, with a slow
smile. "I always liked you best in white. Did you remember?"
"Yes. I got the gown for you. And I'll never wear it except for you."
"Same old coquette--same old eternal feminine," he said, half sadly. "You
know when you look stunning. . . . But, Carley, the cut of that--or rather
the abbreviation of it--inclines me to think that style for women's clothes
has not changed for the better. In fact, it's worse than two years ago in
Paris and later in New York. Where will you women draw the line?"
"Women are slaves to the prevailing mode," rejoined Carley. "I don't
imagine women who dress would ever draw a line, if fashion went on
dictating."
"But would they care so much--if they had to work--plenty of work--and
children?" inquired Glenn, wistfully.
"Glenn! Work and children for modern women? Why, you are dreaming!" said
Carley, with a laugh.
She saw him gaze thoughtfully into the glowing embers of the fire, and as
she watched him her quick intuition grasped a subtle change in his mood. It
brought a sternness to his face. She could hardly realize she was looking
at the Glenn Kilbourne of old.
"Come close to the fire," he said, and pulled up a chair for her. Then he
threw more wood upon the red coals. "You must be careful not to catch cold
out here. The altitude makes a cold dangerous. And that gown is no
protection."
"Glenn, one chair used to be enough for us," she said, archly, standing
beside him.
But he did not respond to her hint, and, a little affronted, she accepted
the proffered chair. Then he began to ask questions rapidly. He was eager
for news from home--from his people--from old friends. However he did not
inquire of Carley about her friends. She talked unremittingly for an hour,
before she satisfied his hunger. But when her turn came to ask questions
she found him reticent.
He had fallen upon rather hard days at first out here in the West; then his
health had begun to improve; and as soon as he was able to work his
condition rapidly changed for the better; and now he was getting along
pretty well. Carley felt hurt at his apparent disinclination to confide in
her. The strong cast of his face, as if it had been chiseled in bronze; the
stern set of his lips and the jaw that protruded lean and square cut; the
quiet masked light of his eyes; the coarse roughness of his brown hands,
mute evidence of strenuous labors--these all gave a different impression
from his brief remarks about himself. Lastly there was a little gray in the
light-brown hair over his temples. Glenn was only twenty-seven, yet he
looked ten years older. Studying him so, with the memory of earlier years
in her mind, she was forced to admit that she liked him infinitely more as
he was now. He seemed proven. Something had made him a man. Had it been
his love for her, or the army service, or the war in France, or the
struggle for life and health afterwards? Or had it been this rugged,
uncouth West? Carley felt insidious jealousy of this last possibility. She
feared this West. She was going to hate it. She had womanly intuition
enough to see in Flo Hutter a girl somehow to be reckoned with. Still,
Carley would not acknowledge to herself that his simple, unsophisticated
Western girl could possibly be a rival. Carley did not need to consider the
fact that she had been spoiled by the attention of men. It was not her
vanity that precluded Flo Hutter as a rival.
Gradually the conversation drew to a lapse, and it suited Carley to let it
be so. She watched Glenn as he gazed thoughtfully into the amber depths of
the fire. What was going on in his mind? Carley's old perplexity suddenly
had rebirth. And with it came an unfamiliar fear which she could not
smother. Every moment that she sat there beside Glenn she was realizing
more and more a yearning, passionate love for him. The unmistakable
manifestation of his joy at sight of her, the strong, almost rude
expression of his love, had called to some responsive, but hitherto unplumbed deeps of
her. If it had not been for these undeniable facts Carley would have been
panic-stricken. They reassured her, yet only made her state of mind more dissatisfied.
"Carley, do you still go in for dancing?" Glenn asked, presently, with his
thoughtful eyes turning to her.
"Of course. I like dancing, and it's about all the exercise I get," she
replied.
"Have the dances changed--again?"
"It's the music, perhaps, that changes the dancing. Jazz is becoming
popular. And about all the crowd dances now is an infinite variation of
fox-trot."
"No waltzing?"
"I don't believe I waltzed once this winter."
"Jazz? That's a sort of tinpanning, jiggly stuff, isn't it?"
"Glenn, it's the fever of the public pulse," replied Carley. "The graceful
waltz, like the stately minuet, flourished back in the days when people
rested rather than raced."
"More's the pity," said Glenn. Then after a moment, in which his gaze
returned to the fire, he inquired rather too casually, "Does Morrison still
chase after you?"
"Glenn, I'm neither old--nor married," she replied, laughing.
"No, that's true. But if you were married it wouldn't make any difference
to Morrison."
Carley could not detect bitterness or jealousy in his voice. She would not
have been averse to hearing either. She gathered from his remark, however,
that he was going to be harder than ever to understand. What had she said
or done to make him retreat within himself, aloof, impersonal, unfamiliar?
He did not impress her as loverlike. What irony of fate was this that held
her there yearning for his kisses and caresses as never before, while he
watched the fire, and talked as to a mere acquaintance, and seemed sad and
far away? Or did she merely imagine that? Only one thing could she be sure
of at that moment, and it was that pride would never be her ally.
"Glenn, look here," she said, sliding her chair close to his and holding
out her left hand, slim and white, with its glittering diamond on the
third finger.
He took her hand in his and pressed it, and smiled at her. "Yes, Carley,
it's a beautiful, soft little hand. But I think I'd like it better if it
were strong and brown, and coarse on the inside--from useful work."
"Like Flo Hutter's?" queried Carley.
"Yes."
Carley looked proudly into his eyes. "People are born in different
stations. I respect your little Western friend, Glenn, but could I wash and
sweep, milk cows and chop wood, and all that sort of thing?"
"I suppose you couldn't," he admitted, with a blunt little laugh.
"Would you want me to?" she asked.
"Well, that's hard to say," he replied, knitting his brows. "I hardly know.
I think it depends on you. . . . But if you did do such work wouldn't you
be happier?"
"Happier! Why Glenn, I'd be miserable! ... But listen. It wasn't my
beautiful and useless hand I wanted you to see. It was my engagement ring."
"Oh!--Well?" he went on, slowly.
"I've never had it off since you left New York," she said, softly. "You
gave it to me four years ago. Do you remember? It was on my twenty-second
birthday. You said it would take two months' salary to pay the bill."
"It sure did," he retorted, with a hint of humor.
"Glenn, during the war it was not so--so very hard to wear this ring as an
engagement ring should be worn," said Carley, growing more earnest. "But
after the war--especially after your departure West it was terribly hard to
be true to the significance of this betrothal ring. There was a let-down in
all women. Oh, no one need tell me! There was. And men were affected by
that and the chaotic condition of the times. New York was wild during the
year of your absence. Prohibition was a joke.--Well, I gadded, danced,
dressed, drank, smoked, motored, just the same as the other women in our
crowd. Something drove me to. I never rested. Excitement seemed to be
happiness--Glenn, I am not making any plea to excuse all that. But I want
you to know--how under trying circumstances--I was absolutely true to you.
Understand me. I mean true as regards love. Through it all I loved you
just the same. And now I'm with you, it seems, oh, so much more! . . . Your
last letter hurt me. I don't know just how. But I came West to see you--to
tell you this--and to ask you. . . . Do you want this ring back?"
"Certainly not," he replied, forcibly, with a dark flush spreading over his
face.
"Then--you love me?" she whispered.
"Yes--I love you," he returned, deliberately. "And in spite of all you
say--very probably more than you love me. . . . But you, like all women,
make love and its expression the sole object of life. Carley, I have been
concerned with keeping my body from the grave and my soul from hell."
"But--dear--you're well now?" she returned, with trembling lips.
"Yes, I've almost pulled out."
"Then what is wrong?"
"Wrong?--With me or you," he queried, with keen, enigmatical glance upon
her.
"What is wrong between us? There is something."
"Carley, a man who has been on the verge--as I have been--seldom or never
comes back to happiness. But perhaps--"
"You frighten me," cried Carley, and, rising, she sat upon the arm of his
chair and encircled his neck with her arms. "How can I help if I do not
understand? Am I so miserably little? . . . Glenn, must I tell you? No
woman can live without love. I need to be loved. That's all that's wrong
with me."
"Carley, you are still an imperious, mushy girl," replied Glenn, taking her
into his arms. "I need to be loved, too. But that's not what is wrong with
me. You'll have to find it out yourself."
"You're a dear old Sphinx," she retorted.
"Listen, Carley," he said, earnestly. "About this love-making stuff. Please
don't misunderstand me. I love you. I'm starved for your kisses. But--is it
right to ask them?"
"Right! Aren't we engaged? And don't I want to give them?"
"If I were only sure we'd be married!" he said, in low, tense voice, as if
speaking more to himself.
"Married!" cried Carley, convulsively clasping him. "Of course we'll be
married. Glenn, you wouldn't jilt me?"
"Carley, what I mean is that you might never really marry me," he answered,
seriously.
"Oh, if that's all you need be sure of, Glenn Kilbourne, you may begin to
make love to me now."
It was late when Carley went up to her room. And she was in such a softened
mood, so happy and excited and yet disturbed in mind, that the coldness and
the darkness did not matter in the least. She undressed in pitchy
blackness, stumbling over chair and bed, feeling for what she needed. And
in her mood this unusual proceeding was fun. When ready for bed she opened
the door to take a peep out. Through the dense blackness the waterfall
showed dimly opaque. Carley felt a soft mist wet her face. The low roar of
the falling water seemed to envelop her. Under the cliff wall brooded
impenetrable gloom. But out above the treetops shone great stars,
wonderfully white and radiant and cold, with a piercing contrast to the
deep clear blue of sky. The waterfall hummed into an absolutely dead
silence. It emphasized the silence. Not only cold was it that made Carley
shudder. How lonely, how lost, how hidden this canyon!
Then she hurried to bed, grateful for the warm woolly blankets. Relaxation
and thought brought consciousness of the heat of her blood, the beat and
throb and swell of her heart, of the tumult within her. In the lonely
darkness of her room she might have faced the truth of her strangely
renewed and augmented love for Glenn Kilbourne. But she was more concerned
with her happiness. She had won him back. Her presence, her love had
overcome his restraint. She thrilled in the sweet consciousness of her
woman's conquest. How splendid he was! To hold back physical tenderness,
the simple expressions of love, because he had feared they might unduly
influence her! He had grown in many ways. She must be careful to reach up
to his ideals. That about Flo Hutter's toil-hardened hands! Was that
significance somehow connected with the rift in the lute? For Carley
admitted to herself that there was something amiss, something
incomprehensible, something intangible that obtruded its menace into her
dream of future happiness. Still, what had she to fear, so long as she
could be with Glenn?
And yet there were forced upon her, insistent and perplexing, the
questions--was her love selfish? was she considering him? was she blind to
something he could see? Tomorrow and next day and the days to come held
promise of joyous companionship with Glenn, yet likewise they seemed full
of a portent of trouble for her, or fight and ordeal, of lessons that would
make life significant for her.
CHAPTER III
Carley was awakened by rattling sounds in her room. The raising of sleepy
eyelids disclosed Flo on her knees before the little stove, in the act of
lighting a fire.
"Mawnin', Carley," she drawled. "It's shore cold. Reckon it'll snow today,
worse luck, just because you're here. Take my hunch and stay in bed till
the fire burns up."
"I shall do no such thing," declared Carley, heroically.
"We're afraid you'll take cold," said Flo. "This is desert country with
high altitude. Spring is here when the sun shines. But it's only shinin' in
streaks these days. That means winter, really. Please be good."
"Well, it doesn't require much self-denial to stay here awhile longer,"
replied Carley, lazily.
Flo left with a parting admonition not to let the stove get red-hot. And
Carley lay snuggled in the warm blankets, dreading the ordeal of getting
out into that cold bare room. Her nose was cold. When her nose grew cold,
it being a faithful barometer as to temperature, Carley knew there was
frost in the air. She preferred summer. Steam-heated rooms with hothouse
flowers lending their perfume had certainly not trained Carley for
primitive conditions. She had a spirit, however, that was waxing a little
rebellious to all this intimation as to her susceptibility to colds and her
probable weakness under privation. Carley got up. Her bare feet landed upon
the board floor instead of the Navajo rug, and she thought she had
encountered cold stone. Stove and hot water notwithstanding, by the time
she was half dressed she was also half frozen. "Some actor fellow once said
w-when you w-went West you were c-camping out," chattered Carley. "Believe
me, he said something."
The fact was Carley had never camped out. Her set played golf, rode
horseback, motored and house-boated, but they had never gone in for
uncomfortable trips. The camps and hotels in the Adirondacks were as warm
and luxurious as Carley's own home. Carley now missed many things. And
assuredly her flesh was weak. It cost her effort of will and real pain to
finish lacing her boots. As she had made an engagement with Glenn to visit
his cabin, she had donned an outdoor suit. She wondered if the cold had
anything to do with the perceptible diminishing of the sound of the
waterfall. Perhaps some of the water had frozen, like her fingers.
Carley went downstairs to the living room, and made no effort to resist a
rush to the open fire. Flo and her mother were amused at Carley's
impetuosity. "You'll like that stingin' of the air after you get used to
it," said Mrs. Hutter. Carley had her doubts. When she was thoroughly
thawed out she discovered an appetite quite unusual for her, and she
enjoyed her breakfast. Then it was time to sally forth to meet Glenn.
"It's pretty sharp this mawnin'," said Flo. "You'll need gloves and
sweater."
Having fortified herself with these, Carley asked how to find West Fork
Canyon.
"It's down the road a little way," replied Flo. "A great narrow canyon
opening on the right side. You can't miss it."
Flo accompanied her as far as the porch steps. A queer-looking individual
was slouching along with ax over his shoulder.
"There's Charley," said Flo. "He'll show you." Then she whispered: "He's
sort of dotty sometimes. A horse kicked him once. But mostly he's
sensible."
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