CHAPTER XI
WHERE PRIMITIVE JUSTICE REIGNS
Roger had thought he had seen a few varieties of cacti in the AmargosaDesert, but as he stepped off the train at Aragon, he realized that allhis previous ideas had fallen far short. To the eye unfamiliar withcacti, their cumbrous ungainliness looked unnatural and forced, andstanding by the little shanty which was dignified with the name ofstation, the boy looked over a dusty plain wherein fantastic and thornyshapes ran riot. If the Grand Canyon was a bizarre dream of rocks, thenthe cacti of the Arizona plains looked to Roger the nightmare of thevegetable world.
But the boy, arrived at the point where he must strike off for theparty, realized that the time for delay was over, and turning to thestation agent, who had been eyeing him curiously, he asked forinformation about the government surveyors. There was no difficulty infinding out roughly the direction in which the party had traveled, butthe description of the route over the apparently interminable cactusplains somewhat perturbed Roger, accustomed though he now felt himselfto be to find his way over the faintest trails. But he was a boy, justthe same, and the cacti looked forbidding and menacing, and the ladwished profoundly that the old frontiersman, who had been his companionon the first ride to Death Valley, were with him now. But there was nohelp for it, he had to join his party no matter what the trail was likeor whither it led.
His next question, implying the desire to buy a good mule and theability to pay for it, aroused considerably more interest, and thestation agent so bestirred himself in the matter that Roger felt sure hehad a commission in view. It was but a short time before three muleswere brought for his inspection, all sound beasts so far as the boycould judge, and he counted himself fortunate to strike an agreementwith the owner of the mule, whereby, for a little extra payment, one ofthe herders should accompany him on the trail to the Survey camp.
The ride was long and dry, and the boy was amazed to learn from hiscompanion that a few years before these arid plains had been a grazingcountry.
"Where has all the grass gone?" he queried.
"Senor," replied the Mexican, "it was thisa way. Alla the grass has beeneaten. There wasa too moocha the cattle on the land, they eata the grassmoocha too short, and the grass cannot maka the seed."
"But," objected Roger, "aren't the roots still there?"
The herder shook his head.
"No, Senor," he answered, with a sweeping gesture; "if the grass getmoocha short, the rain not soaka in but runa right away, the ground allsame as dust, and wind blowa the earth away from the roots and alla dryup."
"I see," said Roger thoughtfully. "Then putting too much cattle on landis like cutting the forests on the mountains too heavily. Deforest themountains and the water floods the streams and is wasted, crop theplains and they become a desert. I see."
The distance to the Survey camp was not great, being but little overtwenty miles, but the country was not conducive to rapid traveling, andas the boy allowed his companion to set the pace it was almost eveningwhen they arrived. The party had just come in from the day's work, andRoger immediately presented his letter to Mr. Barrs, by whom he waswarmly welcomed.
Roger's new chief was a quiet man, as indeed most of his leaders hadbeen, but Mr. Barrs bubbled over continually with a certain sedatehumor. He promptly put the lad through a catechism with reference to hiswork and experience since he joined the Survey, and little by little,drew out from Roger almost the entire story of his adventures up to andincluding the incident of the rattlesnake-bitten girl on the train theprevious day.
"That, my son," said Barrs, "is a fitting prelude to your stay here.This is the first and only original headquarters of the snake, spider,and insect tribe, and anything with the usual number of legs is out ofplace."
"And are they all poisonous, Mr. Barrs?" asked the boy.
"Not especially," was the cheerful reply. "At least I've managed to keepalive a whole lot. No, half these stories you hear about venomousreptiles are imaginary and superstitious."
"But if you geta the trantler bite," put in the Mexican herder, who hadbeen listening, "you willa the dance until you drop down dead."
"Nonsense, Jose," answered the chief of the party, "that's just an oldstory. The tarantula's bite may be bad, as far as that goes, but I'venever heard of any one having been bitten. Have you?"
"No, Senor, not myself have I seen it. But I have hearda of moocha theplenty, and they all die in the dance. There was Juarez Alvinero on thefesta Sant' Antonio two years ago, Senor; he dance and dance in thePlaza until he droppa down dead, and when they runa to picka him up, atrantler let go his hand and run away, and there was two moocha largebites. Si, Senor."
"Probably frightened himself to death. Lots of these low vitality racesdo that."
"Yet you have seen plenty of tarantulas, Mr. Barrs?" queried Roger,"although you know of no one suffering from their bites."
"Yes, lots of them. Why, the boys often use them for entertainment, sortof a prize-fight business. It is a good betting proposition, for theyare inveterate fighters."
"You mean, fight each other?"
"Yes, of course. If you get hold of two tarantulas and put them down ona large sheet of paper, they will try to run away until they catch sightof each other, and then you couldn't make them run. Neither will attemptto escape, but they will crawl close till just about six inches fromeach other, and will then circle slowly, looking for an opening."
"Sort of sparring for wind," commented the boy.
"That's it. Then, suddenly, one or the other will spring, and eitherwill sink his mandibles in the body of the other, or will meet with alike fate himself. Whichever gets the hold, it is fatal, but I couldn'ttell you whether it is due to poison, or just to the strength of thebite."
"It's just like a regular duel," exclaimed Roger in surprise. "I neverheard of anything like that."
"And what's more," continued the chief, "I have heard of a man who had apet tarantula, with which he used to visit places and organize fights,just as people do at a cocking main, but I can't say that I ever saw itdone. It may be true, just as the dancing story may be true, but if itwere I should have heard of some cases of it."
"But how did the creatures get the reputation?" asked Roger. "Surelythere must have been some cause for it."
"There is, I believe," answered the chief. "So far as I can learn aconvulsive twitching follows a tarantula bite, and as the best thing todo in all poison cases is to walk the sufferer up and down until he isready to drop, the twitching at such a time might resemble St. Vitus'sdance. This was exaggerated, as most travelers' tales were in the earlydays, but I don't think at worst, that it is much more dangerous thanthe sting of a black hornet."
"Then you have scorpions down here too, haven't you? Are they as bad asthey are supposed to be?"
"The main trouble with a scorpion is his vicious make-up," was thereply. "He's about the wickedest-looking proposition that ever came downthe pike, but his bite is not fatal. One of the fellows with me one yearhad a little experience with a scorpion that made me think they are notas bad as they look.
"You know the way they love to creep into the folds of cloth? Well, myassistant had just taken up his flannel shirt from the ground where hehad been drying it in the sun, and after shaking it well and examiningit thoroughly to see that nothing had crept into it, he laid it on thetable a minute before putting it on. Then he slipped it over hisshoulders and suddenly gave a yell, ripping the shirt off as he did so,and there across his chest ran a full-grown scorpion, which, as itpassed above the region of the heart brought his devilish sting over hishead and struck three times.
"Of course, I felt sure that the poor fellow was gone, because I knewnothing of scorpions then, except by reputation, and the place of thestings was so near the heart that I didn't care to try to cut them outor cauterize or anything of that sort. Well, the three places puffed upthe size of pigeon eggs, and for a few hours the pain was veryconsiderable, but they went down by night, and there were noafter-effects.
"
"Why, Mr. Barrs," said Roger, "you are making out all these dangerousand venomous creatures to be comparatively harmless. I thought you saidthere were such a lot of them down here."
"Well," replied the older man, "there are enough. Leaving the snakes outof the question, there are several varieties of ants that it is wise togive a wide berth, and the centipede is a creature to leave strictlyalone."
"Is their bite fatal?" asked the boy.
"They don't bite."
"Their sting, then."
"They haven't any sting," responded Barrs, smiling at the boy'sbewilderment.
"Then what have they got?"
"They've got feet!"
"I know that," said the boy, a little scornfully. "That's what the namecentipede means, isn't it, a hundred feet?"
"Yes, and some of them can beat out their name."
"But they can't sting with their feet."
"They do, just the same," replied the older man. "You see the feet of acentipede are like the paws of a cat, all furnished with claws, whichare drawn in while the creature is walking about, but which can beextended and fixed firmly if disturbed. For example, if a centipede iswalking over your hand and you go to brush him off, no matter how fastyou strike, the moment your other hand has touched the little hairs allover his body that very instant all those little claws in each of hishundred feet sink deep into your skin, and Mr. Centipede can't be priedoff with anything short of a crowbar.
"As a matter of fact, if you try to tear him off, the chances are thatyou will pull until you break the claws off, leaving them in theskin--for he will never let go--and then you will have an awful time. Idon't know for sure if there are little poison sacs at the base of theclaws or whether it is just blood poisoning that sets in, due to thefact that the centipede lives on decaying flesh, and his claws arecovered with germs, but I do know that if the claws are broken in, itmeans trouble. If you leave the thing alone, however, and can keep fromtrying to annoy him, if there is no need for him to stick his claws intoyou, it is no worse than having a caterpillar crawl over your hand."
"But is it fatal if he gets his claws in?" asked the boy.
"I wouldn't say that it was. It often means the amputation of a limbthough, and I suppose if it was on the body it might end in a case ofblood poisoning that might prove fatal. But at best it makes a deepsloughing sore, which gets bigger and bigger all the time, the skinseeming to die about the edges. Of course, injury from a centipede iscomparatively rare, as he is generally found about carrion, and in thiskind of climate no one keeps carrion any nearer to the camp than he hasto."
"Then there's the Gila monster," suggested the boy, "they were tellingstories about them on the train coming down."
"He looks ugly, and I have been told some very bad things about him,"said the chief gravely, "but so far as I am concerned, I have seen nowarrant for them. I can hardly see how so lazy and sluggish a creatureas a Gila monster can be called dangerous. I have tried to provoke themby shoving sticks down their throats in order to find out how theybehaved when angry, but I have never been able to make them show fight."
"Only just the some times," put in the Mexican, who had followed theconversation with intense interest, "there is justa the five, six daysin eacha year, the Gila is moocha bad, other times, nothing at all."
"That's possible," said Barrs, "but I guess I never struck those days.But I mustn't keep blatherskiting here all night, come along to the restof the fellows. You want to get acquainted, I reckon, and you'll findthem a mighty lively set of boys."
Most of the men had put in their time in the Southwest, and Roger heardmore stories of the old days before wire fences were instituted and whenthe whole prairie was open to their herds than he had ever dreamed couldbe found out of books. It seemed good to the boy to be back in theharness again, after the lapse of a couple of months since he sawMasseth and the party ride away along the edge of the Canyon, and he wasglad to find that he could take his place as a man and do a man's work,even in a new environment.
The agent's warning about the dangers of the Pecos country and thestories told in the evening of times past, however, never seemed real toRoger, any more real than the tales of history, until suddenly they weremade grimly lifelike. One evening, sitting in Barrs' tent, talking withhim, Roger suddenly heard a sharp report and a bullet came tearingthrough the cloth of the tent not eighteen inches above his head. Almostsimultaneously, it seemed to the boy, Barrs had thrown down the lamp andput it out, grasped his revolver and leaped from the tent. The other manwho had been sitting near by was lying prone, working his way along theground to the other tent.
Roger had not seen him drop to cover, the whole had happened so quickly,but as soon as he realized, he lost no time in following suit. As he didso, and his ear came close to the ground, the boy could hear the soundof hoofs galloping at topmost speed and receding into the distance.Suddenly, from far off, came the sound of voices, like to a challengeand response, and then a fusillade of shots broken by a shriek.
"Jones!" called Barrs.
The man called stepped forward promptly.
"Follow the trail in the direction that man went, and see if you canfind out who fired those shots we heard. I'll overtake you in a moment.Wilkins, take Doughty with you and follow the trail to the north, to seeif you can find out from any one who passed there a few minutes before.The rest can look after the camp."
Within three minutes all were scattered, and Roger found himself ridingbeside Wilkins with his gun ready in the event of further trouble. Theyhad not far to ride. The very first house they came to was lighted upfor a festivity, and there were sounds of merry-making within.
"Doughty," said Wilkins, "I'm going in here. You take the horses andturn them so that my beast is close to the door, with his nigh sidehandy. I may need to mount in a hurry. If I do, you wheel sharp as Itouch stirrup and I'll cover the retreat."
He leaped from his horse, and seeing that his gun was handy, Wilkinsgave a cheery shout and walked in. Roger waited excitedly, his heartbeating like a trip-hammer. But there was no trouble, and a few momentslater Wilkins came out, chatting with the host.
"It was Crooked Antonio who left here," he said to Doughty, as theycantered back on the homeward trail, "it appears he had been nearingtrouble there and got a hint that his room was a whole lot moredesirable than his company. We had trouble with him before. I'm sorryfor Antonio, for he's gone so far now that Barrs will see he gets allthat's coming to him."
Taking the road quietly, Wilkins and the boy reached camp just at thesame time as Barrs and his assistant, save that the assistant waswalking beside his horse, holding on the saddle a stranger who evidentlyhad been wounded.
"They seem to think at Volaccio's that it must have been CrookedAntonio," said Wilkins as soon as he caught sight of the chief.
"Yes," answered Barrs, "that's who it was. Well, he's put this fellowinto pretty bad shape, and it's lucky he didn't pot some of us."
"But what was it all about?" asked Roger of his companion.
"I don't know, son," was the ready reply. "Guess he was feeling a littlegood, any way, and then he thinks he has a grudge against the Surveyover some cattle mix-up with a party that was here a couple of yearsago."
"And what did this fellow have to do with it, Mr. Barrs," the boycontinued, seeing that the chief was listening to Wilkins.
"Nothing at all, Doughty, so far as I can find out, except that he wouldmake an awkward witness. You see, when Antonio shot at us, he probablythought that he had potted some one sure. Then, as he galloped away,this chap happened to be beside the trail and hearing the shot reinedup, and seeing who was coming, said to him, 'What's up, Antonio?' Thenthe hunchback, seeing that he was recognized, gave his broncho a cutwith the whip and fired. This fellow replied, but in the end Antoniogot him in the knee, making a mighty painful wound."
"But will they catch him?"
"They will, unless he takes to the mountains and becomes outlawed. Thereare lots of those fellows a
round the border."
"But don't they get after them?"
"Not often. They don't do much, you know, and then if they get introuble on the American side they skip across the line and _vice versa_,so that, as it would be pretty difficult to get both countries to takeaction at the same time, they are kept down by the simple method ofshooting any of them at sight. You see, every one is known about here,and one of those chaps has no chance of getting away unobserved."
The wounded man having been sent to the nearest town, and the incidentbeing closed, Roger settled down quietly to the routine work of thecamp. He found Barrs very willing to help him, and as the country theywere surveying presented no great difficulties for the rodman, the boywas not too tired to take up with interest the theoretical andmathematical side of the work, and in a few weeks his help was a factor.
The daily round of the camp life was comparatively simple, but it madea long day. The men were called at half-past five and usually work wasbegun by seven o'clock. Sometimes the party took lunch along, sometimesthe men returned to the camp, but little time was wasted until theevening, when a number of miles had been traversed and a host ofcalculations made and recorded on the plane-table by the topographer.
It was near the close of the boy's stay with the party when the camp wasstartled during the noon spell by a stranger, who rode in excitedly,crying:
"Is there a justice of the peace here?"
All the men looked at Barrs, who replied quietly:
"I am in charge of this government party, not a justice of the peace.What is the trouble?"
"There was a gang came down from the mountains and shot up a ranch aboutthree miles north. But the boys fought 'em off, and though one of theranch hands is dead and another dying, they caught one of the gang.They'll probably shoot him anyhow, but the old boss of the ranch wantsit done legally. It don't matter much if you ain't a justice of thepeace, it's just as good."
Barrs thought for a moment.
"You haven't any right to shoot that man without a trial," he said. "Ofcourse if he was downed during the fight, that's all right and couldn'tbe helped. But now that it's all over, why you can't just go to work andshoot him. I'm no justice of the peace. You'll have to send him to ElPaso, or somewhere."
"And who's goin' to tote him eighty miles to a railroad? I'd like toknow. Not on your life. Either you come and give him a fair trial, orhe'll take a short cut to the next world."
The chief of the party shrugged his shoulders.
"Well," he said, "if you put it that way, I suppose I'll have to go,that is, if it's to prevent murder being done."
So picking out three members of the party to accompany him, of whomRoger was one, Barrs rode over to the ranch. They found the man who hadbeen caught tied to a fence-post in the blazing sun, while every oneelse was in the house. Barrs had the man brought in, and after the storyhad been told over three or four times, each in a different way, it wasseen that a possible defense could have been put up. The man admittedthat he was aware that the gang came to shoot up the ranch, but no onecould swear that he had seen the captured man fire until shots had beenexchanged, by which time, any gun-play could have been called inself-defense. The captive admitted, however, that he had shot the manwho was fatally wounded, but denied the slaying of the rancher who laydead.
A long and somewhat heated discussion followed, Barrs standing outagainst the application of lynch law, mainly because he felt as arepresentative of the government he could take no other attitude, but herefused positively to take up the question of moving the prisoner to therailroad or of getting entangled in the matter in any official way. Thematter was debated pro and con for a long time, and then the brother ofthe man who had been fatally wounded, finding that it would be difficultfor him to get legal vengeance, suggested that they go back to the oldrule of the plainsmen, and cut off the first and second fingers of eachof the man's hands, so that he would not be able to handle triggeragain. This, after considerable wrangling, was done, and the man, withblood dripping from both his mutilated hands, was set on a horse andstarted along the trail to pursue his fate, wherever that might leadhim.
In the meantime, though events of that fairly rough and ready characterwere happening about them constantly down in that wild Pecos country,the party itself was singularly free from mishaps. Roger, however, had anarrow escape from what might have been a serious accident, the periloccurring in a very simple manner. He was galloping along at a fairspeed when he saw immediately in front of him a couple of bad patches oflow bisnaga cactus. The boy turned his mule sharply, when the animal puthis foot in a hole and Roger went flying over his head, shooting notmore than a couple of feet above those barbed spines, and striking theground just beyond them. Barrs was seriously alarmed, and showed greatrelief on finding that the boy was unhurt.
"One of my men," he said, "once fell from his horse in just some suchway as you did, and put out one hand--on which he chanced to have noglove--as though to save himself, and he went down with his whole weighton one hand into a bisnaga cactus. I took one hundred and thirty spinesout of his hand."
"And was he permanently injured?" said Roger, realizing that he himselfmight have been very seriously hurt.
"Not a bit of it," was the reply. "He was back at work in about fourdays, and within two weeks after his hand had bothered him very little.But he certainly had scars enough afterward."
About a week after this narrow escape, Barrs told Roger that in a day ortwo the work on the quadrangle they were engaged on would be completedand that they would upstake two days later and strike for the nextsection to the westward, where the first mapping of the contour had yetto be made. Then Barrs turned to Roger.
"I don't quite know," he said, "whether that letter you brought me meansthat you are to stay as long as you like, or as long as I want you, orwhat. You have not received a recall, of course, but as for the next fewweeks, we will simply be getting a general view of the country, I shallnot need an extra man, and I think you ought to report in Washington. Ifyou are really going to Alaska next year, I don't know what time theyintend to start, and you ought to have a rest first. Don't think I'mdriving you away, but it is better so, that is, if Rivers is reallygoing to take you as you seem to think."
"As I hope," the boy corrected.
"Well, as you hope, then. You ought to be in pretty good trim for it,Doughty; you've had a fairly wide experience, and you don't seem tohave grown thin under it. What's more, I've taught you a few of thethings you will need to know in the theoretical side of the work, sothat you can be some help to a topographic assistant, and Masseth hasgiven you a start in geology. So, I think the best thing I can do is togive you a letter to Mr. Herold, and wish you good luck on yourjourney."
This farewell message, the boy thought, would be his last word in thePecos country, but riding in to Marfa, the town on the railroad nearestto the point where the camp had broken up, he found great excitement. Sofar as he could gather, it was the winding up of a feud which had begunsome two or three months before.
The prisoner, it seemed, some months ago had been shot in the knee by aman who was almost a stranger to him, and as a result of the shot hadbecome paralyzed from the waist down. The man who had shot him had gotaway. Whereupon the wounded man, certain that the would-be murderer mustreturn to his home some time, had rigged up a little tent in a cactusgrove near the man's house, and although semi-paralyzed, had lain therefor seven weeks, waiting for the time when his foe should pass alongthe trail. At last, late one evening, he heard horse's hoofs, andlooking out, saw his enemy approaching. As he passed, the half-paralyzedman emptied his revolver almost at point-blank distance, and the otherdropped from his horse, dead.
The story was so like scores of others that Roger had heard that he paidno special attention until the words "Crooked Antonio" struck his ears,and on inquiry, learned that this was the man who had been killed.Immediately the boy forced himself into the little adobe building, andfound that the case was going hard against the prisoner be
cause he couldnot give any reason why "Crooked Antonio" had become his enemy and shotat him in the first place. It made a sensation when Roger spoke from thespectators.
"Please your honor," he said, "I know something about this case," andthe crowd gave way for him. Then, showing his credentials, he told thestory of the manner in which Crooked Antonio had fired into the Surveytent, and later had shot at the prisoner to remove a possible witness.It was the only point needed, and as it was obvious that Crooked Antoniohad been killed, the prisoner could not be acquitted. He was foundguilty and fined one cent, that justice might be done, and five minuteslater Roger was receiving the effusive thanks of the erstwhile prisoner.
"Well," said Roger to himself, as they parted, "helping a chap to hisliberty isn't such a bad record to leave as your last act in the Pecoscountry."