The Long Dim Trail Part 31

"You shall not take him from me," Katherine spoke pa.s.sionately as she rose and faced her husband, who had also risen. "He is mine! For his sake I have endured the isolation of this place, the curses and abuse you have heaped upon me, the degradation that I saw facing you. I have not been blind to the cla.s.s of men you a.s.sociate with now, but I struggled to keep you from sinking lower, just because you were the father of my boy. The last eight years of my life have been continual mental starvation and moral crucifixion. Donnie has given me the strength to bear it, now he will give me the strength to keep you from robbing me of him!"

"You may as well stop your hysterical ranting," Glendon shouted furiously. "The law gives the boy to me, and I say he shall go to father next week."

"The law gives the child to the father," her voice quivered with indignation, "No matter what that father may be; while the mother, who goes down to death to give the child life, has no right! Oh, it is infamous! Why, even the wild animals recognize a mother's rights. Men who frame such a law and enforce it are worse than brutes!"

Glendon seized her arm roughly and glared into her white, defiant face, his own was livid with rage. "Nothing on G.o.d's earth can prevent Donnie from going."

"He shall not go!" her voice became suddenly quiet and determined, and her eyes met Glendon's without flinching. "You owe him to me in return for the things of which you have robbed us both. He has never had a father, never dared to laugh like other children do, because he was afraid of you. I will not never give him up to you or any one else. He is mine!"

Glendon thrust her away from him with such violence that she staggered.

"I have the law back of me and I'll do what I say, if I have to walk over your dead body to do it!"

He flung himself into the house, knocking over a chair as he pa.s.sed it; then a bottle clinked against a gla.s.s.

The leaves of the magazine at the woman's feet, fluttered in the breeze while she stared with despairing eyes at the grim mountains that walled her like a prison.

CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

The next morning was Wednesday, and Glendon announced that he would start East with Donnie on Sat.u.r.day of the following week.

Katherine made no reply, uttered no protest. He supposed the silence of despair meant submission, as he and Juan started for Allan Flats, half way to Willc.o.x, to be gone several days.

"I'll be home Sunday night," were his last words as he spurred his horse and headed it toward the road leading out of the canon. Juan lingered a few seconds to say "Adios" to the mother and child. The old Mexican carried a heavy heart, for no one but the child was ignorant of the impending separation.

The day pa.s.sed happily for Donnie, while his mother devoted her entire time to him. They strolled down the canon, picking wild-flowers, then returning home, decorated the rooms and discovered that Juan had made a chocolate layer cake for their enjoyment. After supper they sat talking of the wonderful things Donnie was to do when he was grown. Then followed an hour in the dining-room with the beloved Galahad.

The next morning at breakfast, Donnie asked, "What are we going to do today, Marmee?"

"Just whatever you wish," she answered with smiling lips, but sad eyes.

"Can't we go on a picnic, Marmee?"

"Yes, dear," was her reply. "I'll fix a lunch and saddle the ponies and we'll be adventurers riding out to discover a new country, and we won't come home till the stars are out."

Donnie waited happily as his mother prepared the lunch. With practised fingers she saddled their ponies; on the boy's saddle, tied a canteen of water and the flour-sack containing lunch, while on her own was fastened a roll of Navajo blankets.

Katherine determined to s.n.a.t.c.h all the happiness possible for the child and herself during her husband's absence. Today she would forget that there must be a tomorrow; today the child was her own, despite his father, despite the laws of the Territory which said she had no right to her boy. So her smile met the child's laughter as they mounted their ponies and rode down the slope of the canon to the place where the trail struck up the divide leading to Jackson Flats.

It was a tortuous trail. At times, going up the brushy mountain sides, where cat-claw, mesquite, cacti and mescal struggled between immense rocks. Disturbed quail, rabbits, an enormous lizard--the harmless brother of the poisonous Gila Monster--dashed across the trail. Each tiny incident was food for animated conversation between the two riders; a new flower, a change of view as they reached a certain point. In places there was hardly room for their sure-footed ponies to travel single file. One side of the trail was a high, rocky cliff, while the other side dropped a thousand feet below. A displaced rock clattered down the gully, startling a mountain-lion which leaped from a freshly killed calf and skulked away. A coyote appeared between boulders on the opposite side of the canon, squatted down and watched the riders curiously.

Half way up the mountain they rode into a cave that was large enough to shelter twenty horses and men. The domed roof rose forty feet and the sides of the cave were painted with curious emblems of a dead and unknown people. The floor was strewn with bits of broken earthen pottery, decorated with the same characters as the walls. A few arrowheads of green and black flint were scattered among the fragments of pottery; all that was left to tell the history of those who had loved, hated, laughed and wept--then died.

It had been a favourite ride for the mother and child, and the relics had made foundation for many games and stories. So the boy gathered pieces of the pottery and amused himself trying to match them together, in emulation of his mother. As they worked she told him the history of those who had lived in this cave and fashioned the earthen jars. After a couple of hours the novelty wore off, and Donnie wanted to ride further.

"We can go to the top of the Box," said his mother. "You've never been there yet; but it will be a hard climb."

The child begged to try it, for she had told him that when they reached the top of the mountain they could see far across other hill-tops, beyond the San Pedro River--an unknown world to him.

After she had tightened the cinches of the saddles and they were mounted, she instructed the boy, "Lean well forward in your saddle and hold the horn tightly, dear. Give Pet a loose rein and you will not have any trouble at all. He will follow Fox. It is a hard climb, and if you jerk on the reins you will make Pet fall back."

The horses headed what appeared almost a perpendicular wall. Donnie saw Fox stretch his body like a greyhound and fairly hurl himself in leaps at the steep incline, scattering stones in every direction. Pet stood a moment, undecided, then with a shrill whinny started after Fox. Donnie grasped the horn of the saddle and clung to it desperately, leaning forward and shutting his eyes. His back jerked, his head wouldn't keep still, his heart beat violently.

"If Pet would only keep still a minute," thought the child. "Suppose Fox were to fall with Marmee, what would I do?"

He pulled on the reins, but Pet, watching Fox, fought the bit, and lunged ahead.

As if in answer to Donnie's thoughts, his mother's voice drifted cheerily back to him: "Almost there, dear. Tired?"

"Just a little bit," he replied, trying to be brave, but wishing he could ride up beside her and hold her hand a minute. Then he remembered Galahad had ridden alone, and knights were not afraid of anything. He pretended that the trail led to the castle of an enemy and he was going to rescue those held prisoners, so with bolstered courage, he kept his eyes open and fixed on the horse ahead of him.

They reached a sharp knoll that formed the apex of the mountain; and after slipping from the ponies and tying them to a stunted bit of scrub oak, Katherine clasped Donnie's hand in her own, and together they approached the edge of the cliff, and peered cautiously over.

Two thousand feet below was the canon, but where they gazed, four solid walls arose like a gigantic box without a cover. There was no entrance or exit. The Mexicans called the place El Cajon, or the Box. Gra.s.s, flowers, trees and a trickling stream from a spring lay at the bottom of the Box, but nothing living could reach there. The walls were as straight and sheer as the name of the place implied.

They drew back from inspecting it, and at Katherine's suggestion Donnie gathered wild flowers to decorate the table on which she spread the lunch. The mother made a pretense at eating, but the memory of the impending separation thrust itself on her despite her determination to forget it this one day. Neither she nor Glendon had told the child, so no shadow of tragedy spoiled his enjoyment.

The ride had tired him, and after lunch was over, she arranged the Navajo blankets. He stretched out lazily, watching his mother draw his favourite book from her saddlebag. Then he curled up with a sigh of ecstasy.

"Where shall I read?" she asked, smiling down at him.

"How Sir Galahad was made a knight," he answered, "and about the Siege Perilous."

So she read until the brown head nodded and the eyes closed slowly, then seeing the boy slept, she laid the book aside, sitting motionless and watching him with miserable eyes.

A white-winged b.u.t.terfly flitted past her and hovered over the boy's hand, finally settling lightly on it then darting on its way. She recalled the story of the baby Galahad in his mother's arms and the white dove that had flown through the window, and the words of the maiden who bore the Sangreal, "And he shall be a much better knight than his father."

A mother-quail with her tiny brood slipped from the brush, peering about as she came forward. Fearing nothing from the sleeping child or the mother who did not move, the quail called her little ones about her and shared with them the discovery of some crumbs. Katherine watched them enviously; then her eyes strayed to the child. Rebellion against the law, against her husband, his father, and life itself, overwhelmed her.

The quail had more right to its brood than she had to her child.

The shadows lengthened as she sat fighting her battle, all the training and beliefs of years falling from her.

What was the use of fighting any longer? She looked at the Box. It was so quiet down there; no one could take Donnie away from her. Just a step, and they would be safe together.

Her lips grew tense, and smoothing a piece of paper that had been wrapped about the lunch, she searched the saddle pocket until she found a stump of pencil, with which she wrote:

_Jim:_

I could not give up my boy to have him learn that money was the only thing worth-while--to be cruel and self-indulgent as your father wants him to be. I told you that you owed him to me in payment of your debt. The law refuses my child to me; you, too, would rob me of him, even though you know it will break his heart and mine.

I prayed G.o.d to aid me, and He will not answer my prayers. When you read this, Donnie and I will be together at the bottom of the Box.

I did the best I could for you, and failed; but I will not fail with the boy.

KATHERINE.