Tharon

“ He tossed his handsome head and his eyes were bright as stars set in his silver face. Life was at high tide in him, flowing magnificently. Tharon, her cheeks whipped into pulsing colour by the wind and the 39 bounding speed, her tawny mane loosed from its bands and flying in a cloud behind her, smoothed back from her face, looked wild as an Indian. As she drew up and sat watching the work of the evening, she smiled for the first time in many days, and Jack Masters, passing, felt his heart leap with gladness. ”

“ Tharon and Billy let the horses run. Golden was a racer himself, though he could not hold a candle to the silver king, and the two young creatures atop were free as the summer winds, as buoyant and filled with joy of being. So they shot down along the levels, Tharon holding El Rey up a bit, though it was a man-size job to do so, and Billy’s rein swinging loose on Golden’s neck. ”

“ What was Courtrey doing?
He rode straight up at last, like an Indian showing, and his bleeding left hand swung at his side. With the other he had swept off his wide 292 hat, so that his handsome iron-grey head was bare to the summer sun. His keen hawk face was lifted. He made a spectacular figure––like a warrior, unarmed, waiting his end with courage.
Unarmed!
That it was which struck Tharon like a hand across her face. ”

“ Tharon had found hers in Kenset.
But where would he ever find his? The boy shook his fair head hopelessly at the sliding floors. For all perfection there must be sacrifice. He was the sacrifice for Tharon’s perfection––a willing one, so help him!
That they had found the Secret Way across False Ridge was perfectly plain, for here in the living rock before them were marks, the first marks they had found in the Cañons. Thin, small crosses, cut in the stone of the walls, began to lead upward from the last liftings cut straight up the Rockface of False Ridge itself. ”

“ Now he held a gun woman’s hand in the thin shade of a willow clump in the heart of Lost Valley––and the blood surged in his ears, the levels and slopes danced before his vision.
“Miss Tharon,” he said, for the first time using her given name, “I beg your pardon. You are strong, simple, serene. You know your land and its ways. I am an alien, an interloper––but I can’t bear to think of you as waiting for the time to kill a man––or to be killed in the killing. It sickens me.”
Tharon snatched her hand from his and leaped to her feet. ”

“ The riders stirred. Sympathy ached in their hearts, but not a man had speech to comfort her. It was Billy, the impulsive, who reached a hand to her shoulder and gripped it hard. Tharon reached up and touched the hand in gratitude.
It was about this time, when the master of Last’s Holding had lain a month beneath the staring mound under the pine tree out to the east where they had buried Harkness, that José finished a work of art. For many days he had laboured secretly in a calf-shed out behind the small corrals, and in his slim dark fingers there was beauty unleashed. ”

“ The thing in hand now was to placate Tharon, the mistress of Last’s, to play the overwhelming lover.
Courtrey knew better than to go near the Holding. Bully that he was he yet had sense enough to know that no fear of him dwelt in the huge old house under the cottonwoods. If Tharon herself did not shoot him, one––or all––of her riders would. The day of the armed band riding down to take her was, if not past, passing fast. He recalled the look of the settlers––poor spawn that he hated––whirling their solid column behind her to face him that day from the Cup Rim’s floor. ”

“ There was no other horse in Lost Valley like the great king! Neither Redbuck nor Golden nor Drumfire! Neither Sweetheart nor Westwind! No, nor any Ironwood Bay that came down from Courtrey’s Stronghold, Bolt and Arrow not excepted.
Tharon laughed and stroked the king’s neck, thewed like steel beneath her hands. She had no fear of Courtrey and his hired killers. Sooner or later the issue would come, of course. Then she would kill the man as she had promised Jim Last, without a thought. ”

“ For five years he had lived at Last’s, under master and mistress, content, happy. The half-remembered world of below had never called him. The light on the table under the swinging lamp with Tharon’s face therein, the murmur of the stream through her garden, the whisper of the cottonwoods, these had been sufficient. He had, subconsciously, thanked his Maker for these things, had served them with a whole heart. They had been his all, his life. Now the cottonwoods seemed far away, remote, the life of the deep ranch house a thing of long ago. ”

“ And there, almost directly under the marked way leading down, lay a tiny camp––the ashes of a dead fire, a gun against a tree, and––here Tharon leaned far out and looked as if her very spirit would penetrate 270 the distance––a blanket spread on the level earth, on which there lay the body of a man!
It was a trim body, they could see from where they stood, clad in dark garments of olive drab that hugged the lean limbs close.
“Kenset!” whispered Tharon with paling lips. “Kenset of th’ foothills,––an’––he––looks,” she wet those ashy lips, “he––looks like he is dead.” ”

“ She was always so when El Rey ran beneath her. And this stranger spoke of rest! Tharon Last could ride all day without a thought of rest.
“Sure,” she said, “I’ll help you if I can. But what’s this thing?”
“A sort of picture,” replied Kenset quickly, “a picture woven in cloth. But first, if you’ll be so kind, I want you to break bread with me. You said we would not be friends. I’m not so sure of that. There is nothing like a man’s bread and salt for the refutation of logic.”
He slipped off the desk with a lithe rippling of his body, but Tharon was first on her feet. ”

“ Tharon Last, her hair beating on her shoulders, her face pale as ashes, her breast heaving, looked back toward the opening in the trees, and saw Courtrey swing in a wide arc and circle past to disappear toward the north.
After him swept his two lieutenants, to fade swiftly from sight behind the shielding forest.
A grim expression spread over the face of the man at the step as he, too, beheld the end of the vital play. ”

“ And Tharon frowned in the darkness and drew her hands from under those pressing ones.
“Mr. Kenset,” she said steadily, “you’re always tryin’ to make me weak, to break me down with words an’ looks an’ touches. These hands o’ yours,––damn ’em, they do make me weak! Don’t put ’em on me again!”
And with a sudden, sharp savagery she struck his hands off his breast, whirled away in the darkness and was gone. ”

“ When the meal, a trifle silent in deference to Tharon’s silence, was done, the men rose awkwardly. They stood a moment, looking about, undecided.
Conford picked them up with his eyes and nodded out. He felt that just maybe the girl 14 would rather be alone. But Tharon stopped the reluctant egress.
“Don’t go, boys,” she said, “come on in th’ room. There’s no moon tonight.” But she did not play on the melodeon. Instead she sat in the deep window that looked over the rolling uplands and was quiet, listening.
“Turn out th’ light, Bent,” she said, “somehow I feel like shadows tonight.” ”

“ Quick as a flash Tharon Last lifted the rifle that lay ready on her pommel and sent a shot whining toward him.
“Just to show we mean business,” she muttered to herself.
The cowboy caught the warning and drew his running horse up to slide ten feet on its haunches.
He had meant to warn his boss, but a chance was one thing, certainty another.
“Dixon––Dement,” called Tharon rising in her stirrups, “when we get to work you pick out as near as you can, cattle that look like yours, an’ th’ same amount––not a head more.” ”

“ He nodded, then:
"A Mohican Sagamore insults a dirty priest of Amochol! I do you honour by offering you battle, with knife, with hatchet, with rifle, with naked hands! Choose, spawn of Atensi—still-born kitten of Iuskeha, choose! Not one soul except myself will raise hand against you. By Tharon, I swear it! Choose! And the victor passes freely and whither he wills!"
The Erie mocked him from his high perch:
"Squirrels talk! Long since has your Tharon been hurled headlong into Biskoonah by Atensi and her flaming grandson!" ”

“ Then she whirled into the house and her young voice pealed out a call––Billy, Conford, Bent––she drew them to her running through the deep house––to point to the silent messenger and question them with wide blue eyes where fear rose up like a living thing.
Billy at her shoulder, looked not at Captain, but at her.
A sigh lifted his breast, but he stifled it at birth and turned with the others back toward the corrals. Tharon, running toward the deep room where the Virgin stood in Her everlasting beauty, unfastened her soft white dress as she ran. ”

“ You know I’ve never et an ounce of Anita’s puddin’s since. No, I think,” he finished judiciously as he mounted Golden, “that I’ve caught somethin’, Tharon––caught somethin’ from that feller of th’ red-beet badge. Leastways I’ve felt it ever sence I left th’ clearin’.”
And as they swung away from the spring toward the Holding, far ahead under its cottonwoods, he let out the young horse for another stretch.
“Bet Golden can beat El Rey up home,” he said over his shoulder.
“Beat th’ king?” cried Tharon aghast, “you’re foolin’, Billy, an’ I don’t want to run nohow. I’ve run enough this day.” ”

“ She thought how bright the spotted cattle looked, how lithe and graceful the men, and then her eyes lighted as they always did when she beheld the horses of Last’s Holding––the horses of the Finger Marks.
Billy rode Redbuck, Curly Drumfire, and they were princes of a royal blood, albeit Nature’s 12 strain alone. Slim, spirited, wiry, eager heads up, manes flying, bright hoofs flashing in the late sunlight, they came home to Last’s after a long day’s work, fresh as when they went out at dawn.
“Nothin’ ever floors them,” Tharon said aloud to herself. “Wonderful creatures.” ”

“ I know––but I’ll prove. We hain’t no assassins, Jim Last an’ me. Some day I’ll draw––an’ my father’s killer must beat me to it.”
Without another word Tharon backed out on the porch, the door swung to at the pull of an unseen hand on the iron strap by the hinge.
There was again the rattle and creak, the whirl 28 of hoofs, and in the breathless stillness that lasted for a few seconds, there came to the strained ears in the Golden Cloud the clip-clap of a singlefooter as the great El Rey led out of town. ”

“ She felt in her heart with a profound conviction that some day she would kill Courtrey. She thought of his wife, Ellen, a pale flower of a woman, white as milk, with hair the colour of unripe maize, and wondered if she loved the man who made her life hell, so the Valley whispered. Tharon wondered how it would seem to love a man, as women who were wives must love their men––if the agony of loss to Ellen could be as acute and terrifying as hers had been ever since that soft night in spring when her best friend, Jim Last, had come home on El Rey. ”

“ They shot through them, up along the sharply lifting skirts of the hills, in between the guarding pines that formed the gateway to the little glade where the singing stream went 225 down and the cabin stood at the head. Tharon’s throat was tight, as if a hand pressed hard upon it. The high tops of the pines seemed to cut the sky grotesquely. There was no light at the dim log house, no sound in the silent glade. Off to the right they heard the low of the little red cow which served the forest man with milk. ”

“ He paused a moment, unhappily, and the mistress of Last’s drooped more heavily against the old adobe wall.
“Nor for Golden here,” went on the rider, “we’ll be pals as long as we both live––nor fer-fer––” he stopped again, hesitated, looked yearningly at the quivering cheek against the curving arm, and went on to the finish.
“Nor fer that one kiss, Tharon––it’s my one treasure for life, so help me, God––that you give me that night. An’ over all I want to thank you fer––fer––killin’ th’ Pomo half-breed in th’ Cup o’ God––fer you done that trick fer me! ”

“ And not alone to Anita was she entirely lovely.
There was not a full grown man in Lost Valley who would not go many a mile to look upon her––with varying desires. Few voiced their longings, however, for Jim Last was notorious with his guns and could protect his daughter. He had protected her for twenty years, come full summer, and he asked no odds of any. His eyes were like Tharon’s––blue and changing, with odd little lines that crinkled about them at the corners, elongating them in appearance. He was a big man, vital and quiet. ”

“ In fact Courtrey had been known to stop and chat with such a one, smiling his evil smile and enjoying the helpless chagrin of his victim.
“Insolent ruffian!” muttered Tharon this day, frowning above her daddy’s pipes on the desk top. “He’s goin’ t’ get one run for his money 59 from now till one of us is whipped. It may be me, but I’ll leave my mark on him, so help me!
“Straight killin’s too good for him. I want to smash him first.”
“Tharon, mi Corazon,” said Anita, stopping soft-foot beside her, “it is bad for one to talk so, to himself. The Evil One works on the mind that way.” ”

“ Slowly Tharon knelt down beside him and put a tender arm across his shoulders. Her face was shining––like Billy’s heart.
“Mr. Kenset,” she said softly, “I told you once that I was afraid you was soft––like a woman––that you wouldn’t shoot if you had a gun. ”

“ Tharon Last looked at her with wide eyes. She had forgotten all about this woman in the passionate hatred of Courtrey and the desire to pin his crimes upon him. Now she wet her lips and looked at Ellen long and silently. The pale lips were quivering, the long arm shook as it held the gun.
“God!” whispered the girl, watching, “she loves him! Like I loved Jim Last! Th’ pain’s in her heart, an’ no mistake!”
Then, as if something strong within her folded its iron arm upon itself, she began to back El Rey. “Back out!” she called, “we ain’t no woman-killers!” ”