Over the Border Part 13

"Maybe his own!" Again Gordon felt the p.r.i.c.kling hair-in fact, as they rattled and jerked along there was scarcely a mile of the road that failed to produce it. Here it was a station, sacked, and burned, with a few miserable _peonas_, ragged and half-starved, begging for _centavos_.

There a huddle of bones, residue of a hanged wire-thief, at the foot of a telegraph-pole. A broken rifle-b.u.t.t, rusted cartridge-clip, empty bra.s.s sh.e.l.l, told with eloquent tongues stories of which Bull supplied the details.

Somewhere between these two stations a Mexican general, a prisoner of war, had been thrust down between two cars and ground under the wheels!

That great adobe house with black windows staring like empty eye sockets from the fire-scarred walls had been the home of a Spanish _hacendado_ whose three lovely daughters had been carried off by raiders. Death and torture, ravishments, farms laid waste, lives maimed and ruined, the full tale of fire and sword belonged in the landscape.

Yet to youth, egotistic masculine youth, even horrors may be romantic.

Awed pleasure inhered in the thought that he, so lately from Princeton, the spoiled son of a wealthy father, was a possible subject for bandit tortures!

He found it all so fascinating that the day pa.s.sed like an hour. Before he was aware of it the sun's great red orb sank behind a huge black mountain. The desert faded once more to gray, violet, purple. For a while the oil smoke from the laboring locomotive laid miles of soft dark pennon against a crimson sky. Then this also faded and left them rattling along through heated dusk. Sprawled at length on the running-board, the young fellow gazed up at the fiery desert stars, in a luxury of content. He was lost to the world when the train stopped at the station at midnight.

"We'd better go right on," Bull said. "We'd get no sleep here for the fleas, an' desert travel is easiest at night. By morning we'll be into the gra.s.s country an' kin take a nap while the animals graze."

With an additional horse hired from the Mexican station agent they moved off at once and had pa.s.sed into the range country before day broke over its long gra.s.sy rolls. Breakfast, a nap, then three hours' more travel brought them to the shallow valley where the Three first saw Lee and Carleton charging the Colorados. Indeed, Bull was telling of it when, just as on that other day, she came galloping over the opposite rise in chase of a runaway mare with a colt at its side. _Riata_ swinging in rhythm with her beast's stride, she shot down the slope, made her cast, took a turn around the saddle-horn and brought the captive up skilfully as any _vaquero_.

"Pretty neat!" Gordon exclaimed. "That boy can ride!"

"You bet you!" Eyes sparkling with pride, Bull slyly added, "Sliver himself, that was born with a rope in his han', don't throw a better loop than Miss Lee."

"_What?_" As, sighting them just then, Lee swung her hat, emitting a clear cowman's yell, her knotted hair fell down on her shoulders, Gordon exclaimed, "Why, it-it _is_ a girl! In this country do they usually wear-"

"No more 'n they do in the Eastern States," Bull dryly filled in the hiatus. "On one thing the Maine Methodist jines hands with the Mexican Catholic-they both cover their weemen from chin to toe-p'ints. Ever sence the revolution, Miss Lee's been doing vaquero's work, an' what kind of a job d'you reckon she'd make of it going 'round in skirts? If you don't mind, I'll ride on an' help her with that critter."

The light that had flashed over the girl's face at the sight of Bull spread into an illumination that included white teeth, mouth, and sparkling eyes when he rode up. She thrust out her hand with an impulsive feeling.

"Oh, I'm _so_ glad you have come home! I missed you dreadfully."

"_Home!_" And she was happy because he, "Bull" Perrin, the notorious rustler, had returned _home_! Earth held no terror that could have sent that tremble through his huge frame. It was with difficulty that he controlled his voice.

"Anything wrong? Sliver or Jake been misbehaving?"

"Indeed, no!" She laughed, merrily. "They're like two old hens 'tending an orphan chick. But-well, you know a girl, even as independent as I, must have some one to lean on, and I was uneasy while you were gone."

A dew of moisture quenched the brown fire in the giant's eyes. His sudden seriousness issued from a vivid memory of his late debauch.

Whereas for twenty years past they had been matters of course to be forgotten with the pa.s.sing of the morning head, he now felt convicted of sin. The shadow marked a resolution.

He spoke very gently. "I hope that you'll allus feel that way." Then, with mock sternness that covered deep emotion, he went on: "But what are you doing out here on your lonely? Some one will get a wigging for this."

She laughed saucily up in his face. "Then it is due to me. I gave them the slip. Who is-" She nodded toward Gordon, who had almost caught up.

Bull briefly sketched his history. "Young chap I found dead broke in El Paso. He's the right sort." Perhaps because he divined the probable effect on her feminine psychology, he added: "He's from the East-college man-wealthy family-turned out because he refused to marry a fortune. I tol' him you'd likely hire him."

"I would in ordinary times." She looked at Gordon, who had now reined in. "But I cannot pay regular wages just now."

"He's willing to wait, like us," Bull began. "He's-"

"-out for experience," Gordon put in. "To tell the truth, Miss Carleton, I am absolutely green. I doubt whether you'll find me worth my board."

He had doffed his hat and the att.i.tude of respect accentuated the quiet reserve of his tone and manner. After a thoughtful pause, during which she took him in from top to toe in a quick, feminine survey, she broke out with a comical little laugh. "If it wasn't so nice, it would be ridiculous. While the gringos on other haciendas are simply streaking for the border, you men insist on working here for nothing. Whatever is the matter with you?"

She may have read the answer in Gordon's eyes and resented the indignity it offered her independence. Or the feeling underneath her sudden stiffening may have rooted deeper. Be a young man ever so comely, a girl ever so pretty, there will flash between them on first meeting the subtle challenge of s.e.x; instinctive defiance based through love's history to the far time when every girl ran like a deer from a possible lover and only gave in after he had proved his manhood by carrying her off. It pa.s.sed in a flash, for, noticing her stiffen, Gordon reduced his gaze to respectful attention.

Subtle as it was, Bull had still noticed the by-play. "Looks like she'd taken a down on him."

But even as the doubt formed in his mind it was removed by her laughing comment: "I suppose I'll have to stand for it. But you must be starving.

Let us get on to the house."

As they rode along, moreover, Bull noted certain swift, stealthy glances with which she took complete census of Gordon's clean profile, strong jaw, deep chest, flat flanks; signs of a secret and healthy curiosity.

"She's a-setting up an' taking notice." He winked, as it were, at himself. "I reckon, Bull, you kin leave the rest to natur'."

XII: THE RECRUIT IS TRIED OUT-IN SEVERAL WAYS

"Well, what do you-all think of him?"

Bull's question emerged from the thick tobacco reek which invariably mitigated the severity of their evening deliberations.

It pertained, of course, to the new recruit, concerning whose merits or demerits Jake and Sliver had reserved judgment during this, his first week. When they had come from supper straight to the bunk-house, Gordon had taken his pipe and gone for a stroll around the compound, which was never more interesting than when clothed in the mystery of a hot brown dusk. The lights and fires, like golden or scarlet blossoms; the soft brown faces glimpsed in cavernous interiors by the rich glow of a _brasero_; the women's subdued chatter; laughter wild and musical as the cooing of wood-pigeons-all had for him perpetual fascination; and while he sauntered here and there, looking, listening, the Three held session on his case.

"What do we think of him?" Jake slowly repeated the question. "It's a bit soon to jedge, but if he's half as good as he looks, he orter do."

Sliver, however, was more critical. "Too darned nice-looking fer me. I hain't got much use for these pretty boys."

"_Pretty_ yourself!" Bull swelled like a huge toad with indignation. "He ain't no pretty boy! You-all orter ha' seen him clan up that hotel lobby in El Paso."

"A _ho_-tel clerk, an' some bell-hops!" Sliver sneered. "Why, a good cowman 'u'd jest about as soon think of hitting a lady. 'Fore I allow him even a look-in with Lady-girl, he's gotter show me. If you-all ain't afraid he'll spoil, jest send him an' me out together to-morrow."

"All right, senor, he's your meat." Bull's grin, provoked by a sudden memory of the thwack with which the hotel clerk had hit the lobby floor, was veiled by tobacco reek that reigned beyond the lamp's golden glimmer. "Only, don't chew him. Kain't afford to have his scenery damaged."

"Nary a chew," Sliver agreed. "Twon't be necessary. I'll take him in two swallows."

In this wise was Gordon apprenticed to Sliver for the period of one day, to learn, in course thereof, such lessons in cow and other kinds of punching as it might bring forth. When they two rode out, armed cap-a-pie as it were, with rifles, saddle _machetes_, and a brace of Colt automatics, in addition to the usual cowman's fixings, it is doubtful whether North America held a happier young man than he. Out of the thousand and one lovers who had awakened to the knowledge that this was their wedding-day, some might have been equally happy. But none more so, for Gordon was also espoused-to Adventure, the sweetest bride of real men. It may be safely stated that no bride ever surveyed her trousseau with more satisfaction than Gordon displayed in his "chaps,"

spurs, guns, and _riata_.

This enthusiasm, however, he cloaked with a becoming nonchalance. He wasn't in any hurry to tell all he knew. His few questions were to the point, and between them he maintained a decent reserve. Also he adapted himself quickly to new requirements. Sliver observed with satisfaction that, after one telling, his pupil abandoned the Eastern, high-trotting, park fashion in riding and settled down to a cowman's lope. In fact, so quiet and biddable was he, Sliver began to feel secret qualms at the course he had marked out for himself; had to steel his resolution with thoughts of Lee.

"'Twon't do to have no pretty boys p.u.s.s.y-footing around her," he told himself. "He's gotter show me, an' if he don't-out he goes."

Opportunity soon presented itself in the shape of a momentary relapse, on Gordon's part, into the old habit of riding. Sliver seized it with brutal roughness.

"Hey! that milk-shake business may go with missies in pants that ride the parks back East, but if you-all expect to work this range you'll have to try an' look like a man."

Gordon stared. It wasn't so much the words as the accent that established the insult. Just as Bull had seen in El Paso, his hazel eyes were suddenly trans.m.u.ted into hard blue steel flecked with hot brown specks. Sliver felt sure he was going to strike; experienced sudden disappointment when he rode on.

"_Santa Maria Marrissima Me!_" He swore to himself in sudden alarm. "Is he a-going to swallow it?" But the next moment brought relief. Gordon was rising in his stirrups with the regularity of a machine.