Frederick Palmer

“ If there is joy or pain in the breaking, either one must be glittering and immeasurable.
"But Little Rivers is best," she added after a time, speaking not to him, but devoutly to the oasis of green.
In the crystal air Little Rivers seemed so near that one could touch the roofs of the houses with the fingertips of an extended arm, and yet so diminutive in the spacious bosom of the plateau that it might be set in the palm of the hand.
Jack was as one afraid of his own power of speech. A misplaced word might send her away as oblivious of him as a globule of mercury rolling free from the grasp. ”

“ He, with six notches on his gun-handle, had been trifled with by a grinning tenderfoot. Rage mounted red to his brow. No man who had humiliated him should live. He would have shot Jack in the back if it had not been for Jim Galway, lean as a lath, lantern-jawed, with deep-set blue eyes, his bearing different from that of the other loungers. Jim had not joined in the laugh over Pete's explanation; he had remained impassive through the whole scene; but the readiness with which he knocked Leddy's revolver down showed that this immovability had let nothing escape his quiet observation. ”

“ In the big darkness, before we crawl down to the water-hole, he call out to Leddy to make quits. He almost beg Leddy. But Leddy, he say: 'I never quit and I get you!' 'Sorry,' says Señor Jack, with the devil out again, 'sorry—and we'll see!' No, Señor Jack no like to fight till you make him fight and the devil is out. He fight for water; he fight for peace. He no want just to win and kill, but—but—" bringing his story to an end, Firio looked hard at the father, his velvety eyes shot with a comprehending gleam as he shrugged his shoulders—"but you no understand, you and the mole!" ”

“ Mary recalled Leddy's leer at her on the pass, with its intent of something more horrible than murder. Savagery rose in her heart. It was right that he should be killed. He deserved his fate. But no sooner was the savagery born—born, she felt, of the very hypnosis of that carved face—than she cast it out shudderingly in the realization that she had wished the death of a fellow human being! She looked away from Jack; and then it occurred to her that he must be bleeding. He was again a companion of the trail, his strength ebbing away. Her impulse was retarded by no fear of the gallery now. ”

“ While Jack studied the picture, his father studied Jack, whose face and whose manner of blissful challenge to all comers in the unconcern of easy fatality and ready blade seemed to grow more and more like that of the first John Wingfield. At length, Jack passed over to the other side of the mantel and turned on the reflector over the portrait of his mother; and, in turn, standing silently before her all his militancy was gone and in its place came the dreamy softness with which he would watch the Eternal Painter cloud-rolling on the horizon. ”

“ And Jack was back at his station, with the bright sunlight heightening the colors of his play cowboy attire, his weight on the ball of his right foot thrown well ahead of the other, his head up, but the whole effect languid, even deferential. He seemed about to take off his hat to the joyous sky of a fair day in May. His shadow expressed the same feeling as his pose, that of tranquil youth with its eyes on the horizon. Leddy had the peculiar slouch of the desperado, which is associated with the spread of pioneering civilization by the raucous criers of red-blooded individualism. ”

“ But sometimes I did long for the centres of civilization; to touch elbows with their activities; to feel the flow of the current of humanity in great streets. Not that I wanted to give up Little Rivers, but I wanted to go forth to fill the mind with argosies which I could enjoy here at my leisure. And Mary was young. The longing that she concealed must be far more powerful than mine. I saw the supreme selfishness of shutting her up on the desert, without any glimpse of the outer world. I sensed the call that sent her on her lonely rides to the pass. ”

“ The Doge saw the glow of a thousand happy, eager thoughts in Jack's face. He hesitated again on the brink of speech, before, with a toss of his leonine head as if he were veritably leaving fate's affairs to fate, he turned to go; and Jack mechanically touched P.D.'s rein, while he gazed toward the pass. P.D. had not gone many steps when Jack heard the same sonorous call that had greeted him that first night when he stopped before the door of the Ewolds; the call of a great, infectious fellowship between men:
"Luck, Sir Chaps! I defy you to wear your spurs up the Avenue! ”

“ The thrall of a likeness, which more and more possessed him, made him hasten to draw near for a more satisfying glimpse.
The young woman turned her head to glance into a shop-window and then there could be no mistaking that cheek and chin and the peculiar relation of the long lashes to the brow. It was the profile whose imprint had become indelible on his mind when he had come round an elbow of rock on Galeria. The Jack of wild, tumultuous pleading who had parted from Mary Ewold on the pass became a Jack elate with the glad, swimming joy of May sunshine at seeing and speaking to her again. ”

“ Now the metal was soft with the heat of the shame of the moment when Jack had called to Leddy, "I am going to kill you!" and of the moment when he saw Pedro Nogales's limp, broken arm and ghastly face.
"No, no!" Jack gasped. "I want no fight! I never want to draw a bead on a man again! I never want to have a revolver in my hand again!"
He was shuddering, half leaning against the desk for support. His father waited in observant comprehension. Convulsively, Jack straightened with desperation and all the impassioned pleading to Mary on the pass was in his eyes. ”

“ John Wingfield, Sr. clasped his fingers together tightly. "Yes, and the finish of the fight—how was that?"
"Sometimes, when there no firing, Señor Jack and Leddy call out to each other. Leddy he swear hard, like he fight. Señor Jack he sing back his answers cheerful, like he fight. Toward morning we both wounded and only Leddy and one other man alive on his side. When a cloud slip over the moon and the big darkness before morning come, we creep down from the ridge and with first light we bang-bang quick—and I no remember any more." ”

“ Then he flushed as he had at sight of the figure in the drawing-room doorway. His look plainly said: "How much longer do you mean to harass me?" as if Jack's features were now no less the image of a hard and bitter memory than those of John Wingfield, Sr. Jack drew back hurt and dumb, in face of this anger turned on himself. At length, the Doge mustered his rallying smile, which was that of a man who carries into his declining years a burden of disappointments which he fears may, in his bad moments, get the better of his personal system of philosophy. ”

“ I wanted to see how cool I, the weakling whom the millions scorned, could be in battle. After Leddy's shot in the arroyo I found that strength had discovered something else in me—something that had lain dormant in boyhood and had not awakened to any consciousness of itself in the five years on the desert—something of which all my boyhood training made me no less afraid than of the shadows, born of the blood, born of the very strength I had won. It seemed to run counter to books and gardens and peace itself—a lawless, devil-like creature! ”

“ Yes—if we don't lose our Little Rivers; and we must not lose it!"
The silvery face of the moon grew fainter with the coming of a ruddier light; the shadows of the mountains were being etched definitely on the plateaus that stretched out like vast floors under the developing glow of sunrise; and the full splendor of day had come, with its majestic spread of vision.
"When Joe sees that he will feel so strong he will want to get out and carry the Pullman," Jack thought. "But Mamie will not let him for fear that he will overdo!" ”

“ Have you any excuse?"
"Yes, an overwhelming one!" exclaimed Jack in a voice that was high-pitched and determined, while his eyes burned and no trace of humor remained on lips that were as firm as the outline of his chin. "Yes, one that thrills me from head to foot with the steady ardor of the soldier who makes a siege!"
"I—I—you are beyond me! Then you will stay? You are not coming home?"
"Yes," Jack answered, in another mood, but one equally rigid. "I am coming at once. That was all settled last night under the stars. I have found the courage!"
"The courage to go to twenty millions!" ”

“ The date of each rancher's settlement was fairly indicated by the size of the quick-growing umbrella and pepper-trees which had been planted for shade. Thus all the mass of foliage rose like a mound of gentle slope toward the centre of the town, where Jack saw vaguely the outlines of a rambling bungalow, more spacious if no more pretentious than its neighbors in its architecture. At a cement bridge over the ditch, leading to a broad veranda under the soft illumination of a big, wrought-iron lantern, Mary drew rein. ”

“ She turned quickly, with a sudden, winsome vivacity, the glow of a great satisfaction in her eyes and smiling a comradeship which made her old attitude over the wall a thing of dross and yet far more intimate. Her hand went out to meet his.
"Jack, we have had good times together," she said. "We were never mawkish; we were just good citizens of Little Rivers, weren't we? And, Jack, every mortal of us is partly what he is born and the rest is what he can do to bend inheritance to his will. But we can never quite transform our inheritance and if we stifle it, some day it will break loose. ”

“ Jack was arguing quietly, as if he would thrash out the subject. "There are other things than money in this world."
"There's nothing much money won't do!" said Prather.
"It will not give one self-respect or courage or moral fibre; it will not bring the gift of poetry, music, or painting; or turn a lie into truth; or bring back virtue to a woman who has been defiled; or make the courage to face death calmly."
"It will do all I want!" Prather answered. "Father not having been true to his agreement by keeping you in New York, why should I keep his secret? He breaks faith; I break faith. ”

“ The father's face beamed a serene delight. This Jack accepted as the expression of sympathy and understanding which he had craved. It was to him an inspiration of fellowship that set the well of his inner being in overflow and the force of his personality, which the father had felt uncannily before the mother's picture, became something persuasive in its radiance rather than something held in leash as a threatening and volcanic element. Now he could talk as freely and happily of the desert to his father as to Burleigh and Mathewson. He told of the long rides; of Firio and Wrath of God. ”

“ It was already noon when he saw Galeria from the far end of the long basin that he had crossed, with the V as the compass of his bearings, on the ride that brought him to the top to meet Mary and Pete Leddy.
Then the V was lost while the train wound around the range that formed one side of the basin's rim. The blaze of midday had passed before it entered the reaches of the best valley yet in the judgment of a connoisseur in valleys; and under the Eternal Painter's canopy a spot of green quivered in the heat-rays of the horizon. His Majesty was in a dreamy mood. ”

“ Time! time! The boy would never fall heir to undivided responsibility before he was forty. John Wingfield, Sr. was pleased with himself; pleased over a good sign; and he could not deny that he was pleased at the sudden change in Jack. For he saw Jack's eyes sparkling into his own; sparkling with comradeship and spontaneous gratification. Was the boy to be his in thought and purpose, after all? Yes, of course; yes, inevitably, with the approach of maturity. Gradually the flightiness of his upbringing would wear off down to the steel, the hard-tempered, paternal steel. ”

“ He leaned on the windowsill, his black eyes shining with ingenuous and flattering appeal: "I will broil you a quail on a spit," he whispered. "It's better than stove cooking."
"Don't talk of that!" Jack exclaimed, almost sharply. The suggestion brought a swift change to sadness over his face and drew a veil of vagueness over his eyes. "No, Firio, and I'll tell you why: the odor of a quail broiled on a spit belongs at the end of a day's journey, when you camp in sight of no habitation. You should sit on a dusty blanket-roll; you should eat by the light of the embers or a guttering candle. ”

“ As Jack listened, the fragrance of flowers was in his nostrils and in intervals between Jasper Ewold's sentences he seemed to hear the rustle of borning leaf-fronds breaking the silence. But the narrative was not an idyll. Toil and patience had been the handmaidens of the fecundity of the soil. Prosperity had brought an entail of problems. Jasper Ewold mentioned them briefly, as if he would not ask a guest to share the shadows which they brought to his brow.
"The honey of our prosperity brings us something besides the bees. ”

“ Father does not like to think that any other man was ever quite as great as he is. I confess that is the way I feel, too. That is what life is, after all—it is yourself. Yes, I saw the store as mine—surely mine, with time!"
Prather's reins lay across the pommel of the saddle drawn taut by the drooping head of his horse, which was barely dragging one foot after another. He gave Jack a glance of flashing resentment and then, in his first impulse of real emotion, made a fist of one hand and drove it angrily into the palm of the other before continuing. ”

“ Here time is everything; here man has done his mightiest in contriving masses to imitate the architectural chaos of genesis. A mantle of chill, smoky mist formed the dome of heaven, in which a pale, suffused, yellowish spot alone bespoke the existence of a sun in the universe.
In keeping with his promise to Dr. Bennington he had wired to his father, naming his train; and in a few minutes Wingfield, Sr. and Wingfield, Jr. would meet for the first time in five years. Jack was conscious of a faster beating of his heart and a feeling of awesome expectancy as the crowd debouched from the ferryboat. ”

“ He wheeled around distractedly and stood still, his head bowed, his fingers working nervously before his hands parted in a shrugging, outspread gesture of relief; then, his head rising, his body stiffening, once more his arbitrary self, he started up the stairs with the firm yet elastic step with which he mounted the flights of the store.
If Jack remained where he was they would meet. What purpose in questions now? The answer to all might be as false as to one. He was no more in a mood to trust himself with a word to his father than he had been to trust himself with a word to John Prather. ”

“ But, Jack, when my steps sounded so firm the day I left you at Versailles it was the firmness of force of will fighting to accept the inevitable. For I had seen your face. It was like mine, and yet I had to give you up! I had to give you up knowing that I might not see you again; knowing that this tragic, incomprehensible fatality had set you against me; knowing that any further efforts to see you meant only pain for Alice and for me. Whatever happiness she knew came from you, and that she should have. And remember, Jack, that out of all this tragedy I, too, had my point of view. ”

“ In a bower, amazed, he was meeting the world of Little Rivers and its wife. Men of all ages; men with foreign accent; men born and bred as farmers; men to whom the effect of indoor occupation clung; men still weak, but with red corpuscles singing a song of returning health in their arteries—strapping, vigorous men, all with hands hardened by manual labor and in their eyes the far distances of the desert, in contrast to the sparkle of oasis intimacy. ”

“ At least, he would fare forth for a while on the broad asphalt trail that begins under the arch of the little park and runs to the entrance of the great park. Even as the desert has its spell of overawing stillness in an uninhabited land, so this trail had its spell of congested human movement in the heart of habitations. A broad, luminous blade lay across the west side of the street and left the other in shade; and all the world that loved sunshine and had no errands on the east side kept to the west side. ”

“ He picked up his crutches and went out to the three steeds of trail memory:
"And you care—you care!" he repeated to them.
He drew a lugubrious grimace in mockery at Wrath of God. He tickled the sliver of the donkey's ear, whereat Jag Ear wiggled the sliver in blissful unconsciousness that he had lost any of the ornamental equipment of his tribe.
"You are like most of us; we don't see our deformities, Jag Ear," Jack told him. "And if others were also blind to them, why, we should all be good-looking!" ”

“ All that my father has ever said about you and your father and your relations to us was the night after I returned from the pass ahead of you, when you had descended into the canyon to frighten me with the risk you were taking."
"I did not mean to frighten you!" he interjected. "I only followed an impulse."
"Yes, one of your impulses, Jack," she remarked, comprehendingly. "Father and I have been so much together—indeed, we have never been apart—that there is more than filial sympathy of feeling between us. There is something akin to telepathy. We often divine each other's thoughts. ”

“ An interrogation had taken the place of his confident "Sí, sí" of desert understanding of the mind of his patron. Jack had broken camp with the precipitancy of one who was eager to be quit of the trail and back at the ranch; yet he gave his young trees only a passing glance before entering the house. He had not wanted coffee on the road, yet coffee served with the crisp odor of bacon accompanying its aroma, after his bath and return to ranch clothes, found no appetite. He was as a man whose mind cannot hold fast to anything that he is doing. ”