SALVATION GAP
After cutting the Gazelle's throat, Drylyn had gone out of her tent,secure and happy in choosing the skilful moment. They would think it wasthe other man--the unknown one. There were his boot-prints this finemorning, marking his way from the tent down the hill into the trees. Hewas not an inhabitant of the camp. This was his first visit, cautiouslymade, and nobody had seen him come or go except Drylyn.
The woman was proprietor of the dance-hall at Salvation Gap, and onaccount of her beauty and habits had been named the American BeerGazelle by a travelling naturalist who had education, and was interestedin the wild animals of all countries. Drylyn's relations with theGazelle were colored with sentiment. The sentiment on his part wasgenuine; so genuine that the shrewd noticing camp joked Drylyn, tellinghim he had grown to look young again under the elixir of romance. One ofthe prospectors had remarked fancifully that Drylyn's "rusted mustachehad livened up; same ez flow'rs ye've kerried a long ways when yer girlputs 'em in a pitcher o' water." Being the sentiment of a placer miner,the lover's feeling took no offence or wound at any conduct of theGazelle's that was purely official; it was for him that she personallycared. He never thought of suspecting anything when, after one of hertrips to Folsom, she began to send away some of the profits--gold,coined sometimes, sometimes raw dust--that her hall of entertainmentearned for her. She mentioned to him that her mother in San Anton'needed it, and simple-minded Drylyn believed. It did not occur to him toask, or even wonder, how it came that this mother had never needed moneyuntil so lately, or why the trips to Folsom became so constant. Countingher middle-aged adorer a fool, the humorous Gazelle had actually once,on being prevented from taking the journey herself, asked him to carrythe package to Folsom for her, and deliver it there to a certainshot-gun messenger of the express company, who would see that it went tothe right place. A woman's name and an address at San Antonio werecertainly scrawled on the parcel. The faithful Drylyn waited till thestage came in, and handed over his treasure to the messenger, who gavehim one amazed look that he did not notice. He ought to have seen thatyoung man awhile afterwards, the package torn open, a bag of dust on hisknee, laughing almost to tears over a letter he had found with the goldinside the wrapping. But Drylyn was on the road up to Salvation Gap atthat time. The shot-gun messenger was twenty-three; Drylyn wasforty-five. Gazelles are apt to do this sort of thing. After all,though, it was silly, just for the sake of a laugh, to let the old loverlearn the face of his secret rival. It was one of those early unimaginednails people sometimes drive in their own coffins. An ancient series ofevents followed: continued abject faith and passion on the miner's part;continued presents of dust from him to the lady; on her part continuedtrips to Folsom, a lessened caution, and a brag of manner based upon hervery just popularity at the Gap; next, Drylyn's first sickening dawn ofdoubt, jealousy equipping him with a new and alien slyness; the finalaccident of his seeing the shot-gun messenger on his very first visit tothe Gap come out of the Gazelle's tent so early in the morning; theinstant blaze of truth and fury that turned Drylyn to a clever,calculating wild beast. So now her throat was cut, and she was good anddead. He had managed well. The whole game had shown instantly like apicture on his brain, complete at a stroke, with every move clear. Hehad let the man go down the hill--just for the present. The camp had gotup, eaten its breakfast, and gone out to the ditches, Drylyn along withthe rest. Owing to its situation, neighbors could not see him presentlyleave his claim and walk back quickly to the Gap at an hour when thedance-hall was likely to be lonely. He had ready what to say if theother women should be there; but they were away at the creek below,washing, and the luxurious, unsuspecting Gazelle was in bed in her owntent, not yet disturbed. The quiet wild beast walked through thedeserted front entrance of the hall in the most natural manner, and sobehind among the empty bottles, and along the plank into the tent; then,after a while, out again. She would never be disturbed now, and the wildbeast was back at his claim, knee-deep, and busy among the digging andthe wetness, in another pair of overalls just like the ones that werenow under some stones at the bottom of a mud-puddle. And then one verybad long scream came up to the ditches, and Drylyn knew the women hadreturned from their washing.
He raised his head mechanically to listen. He had never been a bad man;had never wished to hurt anybody in his life before that he couldremember; but as he pondered upon it in his slow, sure brain, he knewthat he was glad he had done this, and was going to do more. He wasgoing to follow those tracks pretty soon, and finish the whole job withhis own hand. They had fooled him, and had taken trouble to do it; goneout of their way, made game of him to the quick; and when he remembered,for the twentieth time this morning, that day he had carried the packageof gold-dust--some of it very likely his own--to the smooth-facedmessenger at Folsom, Drylyn's stolid body trembled from head to foot,and he spoke blind, inarticulate words.
But down below there the screams were sounding. A brother miner camerunning by. Drylyn realized that he ought to be running too, of course,and so he ran. All the men were running from their various scatteredclaims, and Salvation Gap grew noisy and full of people at once. Therewas the sheriff also, come up last evening on the track of somestage-robbers, and quite opportune for this, he thought. He liked thingsto be done legally. The turmoil of execration and fierce curiositythrashed about for the right man to pitch on for this crime. Themurdered woman had been so good company, so hearty a wit, such a robustsongstress, so tireless a dancer, so thoroughly everybody's friend, thatit was inconceivable to the mind of Salvation Gap that anybody there haddone it. The women were crying and wringing their hands--the Gazelle hadbeen good to them too; the men were talking and cursing, all but Drylynthere among them, serious and strange-looking; so silent that thesheriff eyed him once or twice, though he knew nothing of the miner'sinfatuation. And then some woman shrieked out the name of Drylyn, andthe crowd had him gripped in a second, to let him go the next, laughingat the preposterous idea. Saying nothing? Of course he didn't feel liketalking. To be sure he looked dazed. It was hard luck on him. They toldthe sheriff about him and the Gazelle. They explained that Drylyn was"sort of loony, anyway," and the sheriff said, "Oh!" and began to wonderand surmise in this half-minute they had been now gathered, whensuddenly the inevitable boot-prints behind the tent down the hill werefound. The shout of discovery startled Drylyn as genuinely as if he hadnever known, and he joined the wild rush of people to the hill. Nor wasthis acting. The violence he had set going, and in which he swam like astraw, made him forget, or for the moment drift away from, his arrangedthoughts, and the tracks on the hill had gone clean out of his head. Hewas become a mere blank spectator in the storm, incapable ofcalculation. His own handiwork had stunned him, for he had not foreseenthat consequences were going to rise and burst like this. The next thinghe knew he was in a pursuit, with pine-trees passing, and the hurryingsheriff remarking to the band that he proposed to maintain order. Drylynheard his neighbor, a true Californian, whose words were lightest whenhis purpose was most serious, telling the sheriff that order wascertainly Heaven's first law, and an elegant thing anywhere. But theanxious officer made no retort in kind, and only said thatirregularities were damaging to the county's good name, and would keepsettlers from moving in. So the neighbor turned to Drylyn and asked himwhen he was intending to wake up, as sleep-walking was considered to beunhealthy. Drylyn gave a queer, almost wistful, smile, and so they wentalong; the chatty neighbor spoke low to another man, and said he hadnever sized up the true state of Drylyn's feeling for the Gazelle, andthat the sheriff might persuade some people to keep regular, when theyfound the man they were hunting, but he doubted if the sheriff would bepersuading enough for Drylyn. They came out on a road, and thesleep-walker recognized a rock and knew how far they had gone, and thatthis was the stage-road between Folsom and Surprise Springs. Theyfollowed the road, and round a bend came on the man. He had been takingit easily, being in no hurry. He had come to this point by the stage thenight before, and now he was waiting for its r
eturn to take him back toFolsom. He had been lunching, and was seated on a stone by a smallcreek. He looked up and saw them, and their gait, and ominouscompactness. What he did was not the thing for him to do. He leaped intocover and drew his revolver. This attempt at defence and escape wasreally for the sake of the gold-dust he had in his pocket. But when herecognized the sheriff's voice, telling him it would go better with himif he did not try to kill any more people, he was greatly relieved thatit was not highwaymen after him and his little gold, and he put up hispistol and waited for them, smiling, secure in his identity; and whenthey drew nearer he asked them how many people he had killed already.They came up and caught him and found the gold in a moment, ripping itfrom his pocket; and the yell they gave at that stopped his smilingentirely. When he found himself in irons and hurried along, he began toexplain that there was some mistake, and was told by the chatty neighborthat maybe killing a woman was always a mistake, certainly one thistime. As they walked him among them they gave small notice to hisgrowing fright and bewilderment, but when he appealed to the sheriff onthe score of old acquaintanceship, and pitifully begged to know whatthey supposed he had done, the miners laughed curiously. That broughthis entreating back to them, and he assured them, looking in theirfaces, that he truly did need to be told why they wanted him. So theyheld up the gold and asked him whose that had been, and he made awretched hesitation in answering. If anything was needed to clinch theircertainty, that did. They could not know that the young successful loverhad recognized Drylyn's strange face, and did not want to tell the truthbefore him, and hence was telling an unskilful lie instead. A rattle ofwheels sounded among the pines ahead, and the stage came up and stopped.Only the driver and a friend were on it, and both of them knew theshot-gun messenger and the sheriff, and they asked in some astonishmentwhat the trouble was. It had been stage-robbers the sheriff had startedafter, the driver thought. And--as he commented in friendly tones--toturn up with Wells and Fargo's messenger was the neatest practical jokethat had occurred in the county for some time. The always serious andanxious sheriff told the driver the accusation, and it was a genuine cryof horror that the young lover gave at hearing the truth at last, and atfeeling the ghastly chain of probability that had wound itself abouthim.
The sheriff wondered if there were a true ring in the man's voice. Itcertainly sounded so. He was talking with rapid agony, and it was thewhole true story that was coming out now. But the chatty neighbor nudgedanother neighbor at the new explanation about the gold-dust. That therewas no great quantity of it, after all, weighed little against thisdouble accounting for one simple fact; moreover, the new version did notdo the messenger credit in the estimation of the miners, but gave them astill worse opinion of him. It is scarcely fair to disbelieve what a mansays he did, and at the same time despise him for having done it.Miners, however, are rational rather than logical; while the listeningsheriff grew more determined there should be a proper trial, thedeputation from the Gap made up its mind more inexorably the other way.It had even been in the miners' heads to finish the business here on theFolsom road, and get home for supper; pine-trees were handy, and therewas rope in the stage. They were not much moved by the sheriff's pleathat something further might have turned up at the Gap; but at thedriver's more forcible suggestion that the Gap would feel disappointedat being left out, they consented to take the man back there. Drylynnever offered any opinion, or spoke at all. It was not necessary that heshould, and they forgot about him. It was time to be getting along, theysaid. What was the good in standing in the road here? They noddedgood-day to the stage-driver, and took themselves and the prisoner intothe pines. Once the sheriff had looked at the driver and his friendperched on the halted stage, but he immediately saw too much risk in hishalf-formed notion of an alliance with them to gallop off with theprisoner; his part must come later, if at all.
But the driver had perfectly understood the sheriff's glance, andhe was on the sheriff's side, though he showed no sign. As he drovealong he began thinking about the way the prisoner had cried out justnow, and the inconsiderable value of the dust, and it became clear inhis mind that this was a matter for a court and twelve quiet men. Thefriend beside him was also intent upon his own thoughts, and neithersaid a word to the other upon the lonely road. The horses soon knewthat they were not being driven any more, and they slackened theirpace, and finding no reproof came for this, they fell to a comfortablewalk. Presently several had snatched a branch in passing, and it wavedfrom their mouths as they nibbled. After that they gave up allpretence at being stage-horses, and the driver noticed them. Fromhabit he whipped them up into shape and gait, and the next momentpulled them in short, at the thought that had come to him. Theprisoner must be got away from the Gap. The sheriff was toosingle-handed among such a crowd as that, and the driver put aquestion to his friend. It could be managed by taking a slight libertywith other people's horses; but Wells and Fargo would not find faultwith this when the case was one of their own servants, hitherto sowell thought of. The stage, being empty and light, could spare twohorses and go on, while those two horses, handled with discretion andtimeliness, might be very useful at the Gap. The driver had best notdepart from rule so far as to leave his post and duty; one man wouldbe enough. The friend thought well of this plan, and they climbed downinto the road from opposite sides and took out the wheelers. To besure these animals were heavy, and not of the best sort for escapingon, but better than walking; and timeliness and discretion can do agreat deal. So in a little while the driver and his stage were goneon their way, the friend with the two horses had disappeared in thewood, and the road was altogether lonely.
THE SHOT-GUN MESSENGER]
The sheriff's brain was hard at work, and he made no protest now as hewalked along, passive in the company of the miners and their prisoner.The prisoner had said all that he had to say, and his man's firmness,which the first shock and amazement had wrenched from him, had come tohis help again, bringing a certain shame at having let his reserve andbearing fall to pieces, and at having made himself a show; so he spokeno more than his grim captors did, as they took him swiftly through thewood. The sheriff was glad it was some miles they had to go; for thoughthey went very fast, the distance and the time, and even the becomingtired in body, might incline their minds to more deliberation. He couldthink yet of nothing new to urge. He had seen and heard only the samethings that all had, and his present hopes lay upon the Gap and whatmore might have come to light there since his departure. He looked atDrylyn, but the miner's serious and massive face gave him no suggestion;and the sheriff's reason again destroyed the germ of suspicion thatsomething plainly against reason had several times put in his thoughts.Yet it stuck with him that they had hold of the wrong man.
When they reached the Gap, and he found the people there as he had leftthem, and things the same way, with nothing new turned up to help histheory, the sheriff once more looked round; but Drylyn was not in thecrowd. He had gone, they told him, to look at _her_; he had set a heapof store by her, they repeated.
"A heap of store," said the sheriff, thinking. "Where is she now?"
"On her bed," said a woman, "same as ever, only we've fixed her upsome."
"Then I'll take a look at her--and him. You boys won't do anything tillI come back, will you?"
"Why, if ye're so anxious to see us do it, sheriff," said the chattyneighbor, "I guess we can wait that long fer ye."
The officer walked to the tent. Drylyn was standing over the body, quietand dumb. He was safe for the present, the sheriff knew, and so he lefthim without speaking and returned to the prisoner and his guard in frontof the dance-hall. He found them duly waiting; the only change was thatthey had a rope there.
"Once upon a time," said the sheriff, "there was a man in Arkansaw thathad no judgment."
"They raise 'em that way in Arkansaw," said the chatty neighbor, as thecompany made a circle to hear the story--a tight, cautious circle--withthe prisoner and the officer beside him standing in the centre.
"T
he man's wife had good judgment," continued the narrator, "but shewent and died on him."
"Well, I guess that _was_ good judgment," said the neighbor.
"So the man, he had to run the farm alone. Now they raised poultry,which his wife had always attended to. And he knew she had a habit ofsetting hens on duck eggs. He had never inquired her reasons, beingshiftless, but that fact he knew. Well, come to investigate thehen-house, there was duck eggs, and hens on 'em, and also a heap ofhens' eggs, but no more hens wishing to set. So the man, having nojudgment, persuaded a duck to stay with those eggs. Now it's her I'mchiefly interested in. She was a good enough duck, but hasty. When theeggs hatched out, she didn't stop to notice, but up and takes them downto the pond, and gets mad with them, and shoves them in, and theydrowns. Next day or two a lot of the young ducks, they hatched out andcome down with the hen and got in the water all right, and the duckfigured out she'd made some mistake, and she felt distressed. But thechickens were in heaven."
The sheriff studied his audience, and saw that he had lulled their ragea little. "Now," said he, "ain't you boys just a trifle like that duck?I don't know as I can say much to you more than what I have said, and Idon't know as I can do anything, fixed as I am. This thing looks bad forhim we've got here. Why, I can see that as well as you. But, boys! it'san awful thing to kill an innocent man! I saw that done once, and--Godforgive me!--I was one of them. I'll tell you how that was. He lookedenough like the man we wanted. We were certainly on the right trail. Wecame on a cabin we'd never known of before, pretty far up in thehills--a strange cabin, you see. That seemed just right; just where aman would hide. We were mad at the crime committed, and took no thought.We knew we had caught him--that's the way we felt. So we got our gunsready, and crept up close through the trees, and surrounded that cabin.We called him to come out, and he came with a book in his hands he'dbeen reading. He did look like the man, and boys!--we gave him no time!He never knew why we fired. He was a harmless old prospector who had gottired of poor luck and knocking around, and over his door he had paintedsome words: 'Where the wicked cease from troubling.' He had figuredthat up there by that mountain stream the world would let him alone. Andever since then I have thought my life belonged to him first, and mesecond. Now this afternoon I'm alone here. You know I can't do much. AndI'm going to ask you to help me respect the law. I don't say that inthis big country there may not be places, and there may not be times,when the law is too young or else too rotten to take care of itself, andwhen the American citizen must go back to bed-rock principles. But isthat so in our valley? Why, if this prisoner is guilty, you can't nameme one man of your acquaintance who would want him to live. And thatbeing so, don't we owe him the chance to clear himself if he can? I cansee that prospector now at his door, old, harmless, coming fearless atour call, because he had no guilt upon his conscience--and we shot himdown without a word. Boys! he has the call on me now; and if youinsist--"
The sheriff paused, satisfied with what he saw on the faces around him.Some of the men knew the story of the prospector--it had been in thepapers--but of his part in it they had not known. They understood quitewell the sacrifice he stood ready to make now in defending the prisoner.The favorable silence was broken by the sound of horses. Timeliness anddiscretion were coming up the hill. Drylyn at the same moment came outof the dead woman's tent, and, looking down, realized the intendedrescue. With his mind waked suddenly from its dull dream and opened witha human impulse, he ran to help; but the sheriff saw him, and thought hewas trying to escape.
"That's the man!" he shouted savagely to the ring.
Some of the Gap ran to the edge of the hill, and, seeing the hurryingDrylyn and the horses below, also realized the rescue. Putting the wrongtwo and two together, they instantly saw in all this a well-devisedscheme of delay and collusion. They came back, running through thedance-hall to the front, and the sheriff was pinioned from behind,thrown down, and held.
"So ye were alone, were ye?" said the chatty neighbor. "Well, ye made agood talk. Keep quiet--we don't want to hurt ye."
At this supposed perfidy the Gap's rage was at white-heat again; the menmassed together, and fierce and quick as lightning the messenger's fatewas wrought. The work of adjusting the rope and noose was complete anddeath going on in the air when Drylyn, meaning to look the ground overfor the rescue, came cautiously back up the hill and saw the body, blackagainst the clear sunset sky. At his outcry they made ready for him, andwhen he blindly rushed among them they held him, and paid no attentionto his ravings. Then, when the rope had finished its work, they let himgo, and the sheriff too. The driver's friend had left his horses amongthe pines, and had come up to see what was going on at the Gap. He nowjoined the crowd.
"You meant well," the sheriff said to him. "I wish you would tell theboys how you come to be here. They're thinking I lied to them."
"Maybe I can change their minds." It was Drylyn's deep voice. "I am theman you were hunting," he said.
"'I'D LIKE TO HAVE IT OVER'"]
They looked at him seriously, as one looks at a friend whom an illnesshas seized. The storm of feeling had spent itself, the mood of the Gapwas relaxed and torpid, and the serenity of coming dusk began to fillthe mountain air.
"You boys think I'm touched in the head," said Drylyn, and paused. "Thisknife done it," said he. "This one I'm showing you."
They looked at the knife in his hand.
"He come between me and her," Drylyn pursued. "I was aiming to give himhis punishment myself. That would have been square." He turned the knifeover in his hand, and, glancing up from it, caught the look in theireyes. "You don't believe me!" he exclaimed, savagely. "Well, I'm goingto make you. Sheriff, I'll bring you some evidence."
He walked to the creek, and they stood idle and dull till he returned.Then they fell back from him and his evidence, leaving him standingbeneath the dead man.
"Does them look like being touched in the head?" inquired Drylyn, and hethrew down the overalls, which fell with a damp slap on the ground. "Idon't seem to mind telling you," he said. "I feel as quiet--as quiet asthem tall pines the sun's just quittin' for the night." He looked at themen expectantly, but none of them stirred. "I'd like to have it over,"said he.
Still no one moved.
"I have a right to ask it shall be quick," he repeated. "You were quickenough with him." And Drylyn lifted his hand towards the messenger.
They followed his gesture, staring up at the wrong man, then down at theright one. The chatty neighbor shook his head. "Seems curious," hesaid, slowly. "It ought to be done. But I couldn't no more do it--gosh!how _can_ a man fire his gun right after it's been discharged?"
The heavy Drylyn looked at his comrades of the Gap. "You won't?" hesaid.
"You better quit us," suggested the neighbor. "Go somewheres else."
Drylyn's eyes ran painfully over ditch and diggings, the near cabins andthe distant hills, then returned to the messenger. "Him and me," hemuttered. "It ain't square. Him and me--" Suddenly he broke out, "Idon't choose him to think I was that kind of man!"
Before they could catch him he fell, and the wet knife slid from hisfingers. "Sheriff," he began, but his tone changed. "I'm overtakin'him!" he said. "He's going to know now. Lay me alongside--"
And so they did.