Desert Dust Part 27

But somebody already had drawn fresh attention. Daniel Adams was standing between her and her husband.

"Say, Mister, will yu fight?" he drawled, breathing hard, his broad nostrils quivering.

A silence fell. Singularly, the circle parted right and left in a jostle and a scramble.

Montoyo surveyed him.

"Why?"

"For her, o' course."

The gambler smiled--a slow, contemptuous smile while his gray eyes focused watchfully.

"It's a case where I have nothing to gain," said he. "And you've nothing to lose. I never bet in the teeth of a pat hand. Sabe? Besides, my young Mormon cub, when did you enter this game? Where's your ante? For the sport of it, now, what do you think of putting up, to make it interesting? One of your mammies? Tut, tut!"

Daniel's freckled bovine face flushed muddy red; in the midst of it his faulty eyes were more p.r.o.nounced than ever--beady, twinkling, and so at cross purposes that they apparently did not center upon the gambler at all. But his right hand had stiffened at his side--extended there flat and tremulous like the vibrant tail of a rattlesnake. He blurted harshly:

"I 'laow to kill yu for that. Draw, yu----!"

We caught breath. Montoyo's hand had darted down, and up, with motion too smooth and elusive for the eye, particularly when our eyes had to be upon both. His revolver poised half-way out of the scabbard, held there rigidly, frozen in mid course; for Daniel had laughed loudly over leveled barrel.

How he had achieved so quickly no man of us knew. Yet there it was--his Colt's, out, c.o.c.ked, wicked and yearning and ready.

He whirled it with tempting carelessness, b.u.t.t first, muzzle first, his discolored teeth set in a yellow grin. The breath of the spectators vented in a sigh.

"Haow'll yu take it, Mister?" he gibed. "I could l'arn an old caow to beat yu on the draw. Aw, shucks! I 'laow yu'd better go back to yore pasteboards. Naow git!"

Montoyo, his eyes steady, scarcely changed expression. He let his revolver slip down into its scabbard. Then he smiled.

"You have a pretty trick," he commented, relaxing. "Some day I'd like to test it out again. Just now I pa.s.s. Madam, are you coming?"

"You know I'm not," she uttered clearly.

"Your choice of company is hardly to your credit," he sneered. "Or, I should say, to your education. Saintliness does not set well upon you, madam. Your clothes are ill-fitting already. Of your two champions----"

And here I realized that I was standing out, one foot advanced, my fists foolishly doubled, my presence a useless factor.

"--I recommend the gentleman from New York as more to your tastes. But you are going of your own free will. You will always be my wife. You can't get away from that, you devil. I shall expect you in Benton, for I have the hunch that your little flight will fetch you back pretty well tamed, to the place where damaged goods are not so heavily discounted." He ignored Daniel and turned upon me. "As for you," he said, "I warn you you are playing against a marked deck. You will find fists a poor hand. Ladies and gentlemen, good-morning." With that he strode straight for his horse, climbed aboard (a trifle awkwardly by reason of his one arm disabled) and galloped, granting us not another glance.

Card shark and desperado that he was, his consummate aplomb n.o.body could deny, except Daniel, now capering and swaggering and twirling his revolver.

"I showed him. I made him take water. I 'laow I'm 'bout the best man with a six-shooter in these hyar parts."

"Ketch up and stretch out," Captain Adams ordered, disregarding. "We've no more time for foolery."

My eyes met My Lady's. She smiled a little ruefully, and I responded, shamed by the poor role I had borne. With that still jubilating lout to the fore, certainly I cut small figure.

This night we made camp at Rawlins' Springs, some twelve miles on. The day's march had been, so to speak, rather pensive; for while there were the rough jokes and the talking back and forth, it seemed as though the scene of early morning lingered in our vista. The words of Montoyo had scored deeply, and the presence of our supernumerary laid a kind of incubus, like an omen of ill luck, upon us. Indeed the prophecies darkly uttered showed the current of thought.

"It's a she Jonah we got. Sure a woman the likes o' her hain't no place in a freightin' outfit. We're off on the wrong fut," an Irishman declared to wagging of heads. "Faith, she's enough to set the saints above an' the saints below both by the ears." He paused to light his dudeen. "There'll be a Donnybrook Fair in Utah, if belike we don't have it along the way."

"No Mormon'll need another wife if he takes her," laughed somebody else.

"She'll be promised to Dan'l 'fore ever we cross the Wasatch." And they all in the group looked slyly at me. "Acts as if she'd been sealed to him already, he does."

This had occurred at our nooning hour, amidst the dust and the heat, while the animals drooped and dozed and panted and in the scant shade of the hooded wagons we drank our coffee and crunched our hardtack. Throughout the morning My Lady had ridden upon the seat of Daniel's wagon, with him sometimes trudging beside, in pride of new ownership, cracking his whip, and again planted sidewise upon one of the wheel animals, facing backward to leer at her.

Why I should now have especially detested him I would not admit to myself.

At any rate the dislike dated before her arrival. That was one sop to conscience when I remembered that she was a wife.

Friend Jenks must have read my thoughts, inasmuch as during the course of the afternoon he had uttered abruptly:

"These Mormons don't exactly recognize Gentile marriages. Did you know that?" He flung me a look from beneath s.h.a.ggy brows.

"What?" I exclaimed. "How so?"

"Meanin' to say that layin' on of hands by the Lord's an'inted is necessary to reel j'inin' in marriage."

"But that's monstrous!" I stammered.

"Dare say," said he. "It's the way white gospelers look at Injuns, ain't it? Anyhow, to convert her out of sin, as they'd call it, and put her over into the company of the saints wouldn't be no bad deal, by their kind o'

thinkin'. It's been done before, I reckon. Jest thought I'd warn you.

She's made her own bed and if it's a Mormon bed she's well quit of Montoyo, that's sartin. Did you ever see the beat of that young feller on the draw?"

"No," I admitted. "I never did."

"And you never will."

"He says his name's Bonnie Bravo. Where did he find that?"

"Haw haw." Friend Jenks spat. "Must ha' heard it in a play-house or got it read to him out a book. Sounds to him like he was some punkins. Anyhow, if you've any feelin's in the matter keep 'em under your hat. I don't know what there's been between you and her, but the Mormon church is between you now and it's got the dead-wood on you. It's either that for her, or Montoyo. He knows; he's no fool and he'll take his time. So you'd better stick to mule-whacking and sowbelly."

Still it was only decent that I should inquire after her. No Daniel and no "Bonnie Bravo" was going to shut me from my duty. Therefore this evening after we had formed corral, watered our animals at the one good-water spring, staked them out in the bottoms of the ravine here, and eaten our supper, I went with clean hands and face and, I resolved, a clean heart, to pay my respects at the Hyrum Adams fire.

A cheery sight it was, too, for one bred as I had been to the company of women. Whereas during the day and somewhat in the evenings we Gentiles and the Mormon men fraternized without conflict of sect save by long-winded arguments, at nightfall the main Mormon gathering centered about the Adams quarters, where the men and women sang hymns in praise of their pretensions, and listened to homilies by Hyrum himself.

They were singing now, as I approached--every woman busy also with her hands. The words were destined to be familiar to me, being from their favorite lines:

Cheer, saints, cheer! We're bound for peaceful Zion!

Cheer, saints, cheer! For that free and happy land!

Cheer, saints, cheer! We'll Israel's G.o.d rely on; We will be led by the power of His hand.

Away, far away to the everlasting mountains, Away, far away to the valley in the West; Away, far away to yonder gushing fountains, Where all the faithful in the latter days are blest.

Into this domestic circle I civilly entered just as they had finished their hymn. She was seated beside the sleek-haired Rachael, with Daniel upon her other hand. I sensed her quickly ready smile; and with the same a surly stare from him, disclosing that by one person at least I was not welcomed.

"Anything special wanted, stranger?" Hyrum demanded.