Wayland

“ Wayland was considerate. Her horse was only permitted to walk, and she was taken off as soon as she was weary. Confidence increased rapidly, and eventually she became fearless and almost tireless. The beach was like a smooth, hard road-bed, and before the summer was over she thought little of a gallop of ten miles, with the breath of the Pacific fanning her cheek. When Mr. Wayland drove with his wife up through Mission and Hot Springs cañons, or eight miles away to the exquisitely beautiful Bartlett Cañon and the fine adjacent ranches, she accompanied them on horseback. ”

“ The Ranger stooped and pressed his lips to the blood-blotched back of the faithful shrivelled old hand. He did not shed a tear. We weep only when we are half hurt.
Wayland seized the Service axe and uncased his own rifle. Then in words that were not worshipful, not bending his knees, but standing with his hat off, he uttered what may have been a prayer, or may have been blasphemy. I leave you to judge: "By God, if there is a God, why doesn't He waken up? If there is a God, does He stand for right? Is there such a thing as Right; or is Right the dream of fools? I want to know! ”

“ The pine needles clicked pixy castanets; and the moon beams sifted through the trees a silver dust.
"Why do you? Why do you keep on the job?" asked the old man.
"Hanged if I know," answered Wayland uncomfortably.
"A saw a man on the job to-day risk his life twice and think no more about it than if he had been out for a walk. If a man in England, if a man in Germany, if a man in Italy, yes by thunder, Wayland, if a man on the job in pagan Turkey had done what you did to-day, he'd be given a V. C. accordin' to the Turk, and a title and a pension for life." ”

“ Here is the key, and in the name of the gods I will swear not to betray you.'
The brothers took the key, and opened the chest that stood by Wayland, which was still half full of gold. It dazzled their eyes, and they both stooped down so as to see it better. This was what Wayland had waited for, and, seizing his sword, he cut off their heads, which fell into the chest. He then shut down the lid, and dug a grave for the bodies in the floor of his dungeon. Afterwards he dried the skulls in the sun, and made them into two drinking cups wrought with gold. ”

“ At the sight Wayland's heart beat high, for he thought of the lump of gold set with jewels which he and his brothers had found in the mountain so long ago. Fairies fluttered round them, mermaids rose from the depths of the sea to welcome them, and as Freya and her maidens entered the prison Wayland saw that she who wore the red garment was really Alvilda. 'Wayland,' said the goddess, 'your time of woe is past. ”

“ The mule and the broncho stood pointing their ears forward. Wayland's mare, which he had bought at one of the irrigation farms, lifted up her neck and whinnied. It was at that irrigation farm operated by a retired newspaper man from Chicago—they had got a reading of the first newspaper seen since leaving the Valley and learned that the bodies of the two remaining fugitive outlaws had been found by the railway navvies. Wayland thoughtfully removed his Forest Service medallion. Men do not question each other over much in the West. ”

“ They sat late listening to the gurgle and trill and tinkle of the water slipping over the stones. Neither man said anything more, nor mouthed, nor kneeled, nor amened, nor did save as men among men do and say: but somehow Wayland had never felt so sure of the God, who was Love and whose Love washed men clean, being, as he told himself, 'on the job.' It may not have been religion ”

“ That's what I wanted to talk about to Wayland. He's the winning horse! We haven't either of us got anything left to lose but some frayed convictions, and by God," (this time, he did not notice he had said it) , "we'd invest 'em in an independent for all we're worth! I'm hot; and I've an idea Wayland isn't just at milk and water temperature; and the public isn't; and we'd have them! We'd force the other crowd to yell at the top of their voices for reform inside of six months. There's a lot about that Rim Rocks affair even the owners of the sheep don't know ”

“ The old man had been like the storm wind of the mountains hurling off the dead leaves of thought. Wayland paused in his pacing. The opal peak emerged from pearl gray cloud wrack; a silver cross, translucent, unreal, luminous, a thing of dreams winged with silver light beneath a solitary star, eternal as God. And the night wind through the pines, that had sounded so doleful but a moment before, became the jubilant clicking of countless castanets, the castanets of the long pine needles, sounding a triumphant chant to the touch of invisible hands. ”

“ Wayland punched both fists in the jacket pockets of his sage-green Service suit, and kicked a log back to the camp fire that smouldered in front of his cabin. If she had been his wife he would have explained what a fool-thing it was to argue that all a man had to do was fight. ”

“ Wayland laid one hand on the sleeve of his uniform and laughed.
"I was a writer. But there are only soldiers in the world now."
"Quite so ... This is an odd place for an American to live in."
"My father bought it years ago. He was [pg 87] a painter of peasant life." He added, lowering his voice, although Marie-Josephine understood no English: "This old peasant woman was his model many years ago. She also kept house for him. He lived here; I was born here."
"Really?"
"Yes, but my father desired that I grow up a good Yankee. I was at school in America when he—died." ”

“ You can see for yourself that all birds rise against the wind and alight in the same way. I am going home to my own country, but first I must have a few words with Nidung. And, remember, if he bids you shoot me, shoot under the left wing, for there I have fastened a bladder filled with blood.”
With these words Wayland flew to the highest tower of the king's castle and called to the king as he passed with his courtiers. ”

“ No one in Bury had ever seen the shape of Wayland, but all believed in him devoutly, for this was told of him, and truly: that any one coming to the ferry with an unshod steed had only to lay a penny on the ground and cry aloud, "Wayland Smith, shoe me my horse!" and so withdraw. And on coming again he would find his horse shod with a craft unknown to human hands, and his penny gone. ”

“ Towards three in the morning, the soft velvet pansy blue Desert dark broke to a sulphur mist. Wayland saddled horses and mule and wakened the old frontiersman.
"Eh, where's this?" He came to himself heavily. "Wayland, is this hell-broth of a sulphur stew doin' me? Has y'r Desert got me, Wayland?"
"No, sir, when the Desert gets you, it gets you raving mad with fever. Chains won't hold you! This soggy sleep is all right. Long as you sleep, you'll keep your head!"
All the same, the Ranger noticed that the old man ate scarcely any breakfast. ”

“ The mule stood munching near. The old frontiersman slept heavily, his face troubled and upturned to the sky. Wayland noticed the livid tinge of the lips, the shadows round the eye sockets, the protuberance of veins on the backs of the old man's hands. The sky seemed to come down lower as the red twilight darkened; and he could hear not a sound but the crunch of the grazing mule and the slow drop, drop, drop of the water seeping from the terra cotta ledge. The stars were beginning to prick through the indigo darkness. In another hour, it would be bright enough to travel by starlight ”

“ The smart fellows who knew so much more than Wayland ran the whole thing into the ground. The brethren had hardly kicked Wayland out before they began to kick each other out. The master-hand and the master-mind being absent, the small men quarreled among themselves, and chaos ensued. The Ruskin Colony went to pieces, and one of the remnants strayed into South Georgia. ”

“ Do you think a Silenus would hesitate and stickle and scruple over a point of honor; though some of us have seen Silenus blunder into a paradise which he promptly transformed into a sty? And do you think the descendant of the Man of the Iron Hand thought anything less of her lover for refusing to accept renunciation as his right? If Wayland could have trusted himself to look at her, he would have seen that she was riding with a whimsical smile. They came to a bend in the upward climbing trail that overlooked the Valley and faced the opal shining peak. ”

“ Truly you must, John Wayland, and for my sake as well as your own. I am comparatively safe here,—safe at least from actual physical harm, so long as the savages dream that the sparing of my life will yield them profit. You have no right to remain in such peril as surrounds you here, when by so doing you benefit no one. You have father and mother awaiting in prayer your safe return to them yonder on the Maumee ”

“ Wayland, who was riding with his hat in his hand because he could not make it cover his bump, held it up as if to keep the wind from his face, and so defeated the round-eyed, owl-like stare of the inquisitive rancher, who brought his team to a full stop in order to peer after them, muttering in a stupor of resentment and surprise.
“He’ll worry himself sick over us,” predicted Berrie. “He’ll wonder where we’re going and what was under that blanket till the end of summer. He is as curious as a fool hen.” ”

“ A guessed that much when y'r Indian woman sent me the wrong road from the Ridge trail, that night! She doesn't even know who that Indian woman is."
"You came—for her?" repeated Wayland slowly. The night on the Ridge came back to him! Calamity's fear when the old frontiersman arrived; Bat's threat to expose something; Eleanor's perturbed letter; the father's half furtive defiant existence. He was too proud to ask more than the other cared to tell, too loyal to pry into any part of her life that she could not willingly share with him. ”

“ On the instant, the hollow chasm of the canyon split to the crash of a rifle shot that rocketted and quaked and repeated in splintering echoes; and a bullet pinged at Wayland's feet.
"That's splitting the air for you—Wayland."
"Drop down, Sir," urged the Ranger, pulling the old frontiersman to shelter of the upper rocks. "They have come out above. They have heard that cursed stone. That's only a chance shot to learn where we are. They can't come behind. ”

“ Something in the music of this speech, and something in the look of the ranger’s eyes, caused Wayland to wonder if here were not still another of Berrie’s subjects. He became certain of it as the young officer went on, with pleasing frankness, and it was not long before he had conveyed to Wayland his cause for sadness. “She’s engaged to a man that is not her equal. In a certain sense no man is her equal; but Belden is a pretty hard type, and I believe, although I can’t prove it, that he is part owner of the saloon over there.” ”

“ From the top of the sand bank, the Ranger looked down to see the old man lying with his face to the sky, his head pillowed on the saddle blankets, sound asleep. He looked across the Desert. The sun had sunk behind the azure strip of the mountain sky line. The billows of lava, black and glazed, the ashy silt pink-tinged to the sun-glow, the heaving orange sands . . . lay palpitating infinite almost with a oneness that was of God. Wayland was not given to prayers. Perhaps, like all men of action, he tried to make his life a prayer. ”

“ As for Wayland, the nights in the camp by the lake, and, indeed, all the experiences of his trip in the high places were becoming each moment more remote, more unreal. Camp life at timber-line did not seem to him subject to ordinary conventional laws of human conduct, and the fact that he and Berrie had shared the same tent under the stress of cold and snow, now seemed so far away as to be only a complication in a splendid mountain drama. Surely no blame could attach to the frank and generous girl, even though the jealous assault of Cliff Belden should throw the valley into a fever of chatter. ”

“ It was the first word of religion the Ranger had heard him utter. Wayland had really come to wonder when the old preacher prayed. When he came to know him better, he realized that a good man may pray standing on his feet, or striding to duty, readily as on prone knees.
"'Tis like the water o' life, Wayland! Men laugh at that phrase to-day! Oh, A know vera well, we've no time for an old or a new dispensation nowdays. We're too busy wi' the golden calf, an' the painted woman, an' th' market place, an' th' den o' thieves; an' when th' vision faileth, the people perish! ”

“ A've headed them off from the South trail. We've got them, Wayland, the low dastard scoundrels! We've got them trapped like rats in a trap! They're in the Pass if you've a man in the Valley with spirit enough to get out with a gun!" He stopped for breath as the two horses floundered together.
"We haven't," answered Wayland.
"They jumped the gully! Man alive, y' ought t' seen them jump the gully! A slammed them right down into the bottom of it. A would to God 't had been to the bottomless pit. The same gentry A saw that night under your Ridge, saving his High Mightiness. ”

“ The mule no longer ambled ahead with ears pointed. He shuffled through the ash with dragging steps; and the sage brush crackled brittle where the trail led out from the silt across the baked earth. The heat waves writhed and throbbed through the atmosphere, a flame through a sieve, with a scorch of burning from the ground and clouds of dust like smoke.
"I think I'll get off and walk," said Wayland, suiting the action to the word. "I hope those blackguards are counting on camping at a spring to-night." ”