XX
Before the gray dawn one Sunday morning Bob, happening to awaken, hearda strange, rumbling, distant sound to the west. His first thought wasthat the power dam had been opened and was discharging its waters, butas his senses came to him, he realized that this could not be so. Hestretched himself idly. A mocking bird uttered a phrase outside. Nodregs of drowsiness remained in him, so he dressed and walked out intothe freshness of the new morning. Here the rumbling sound, which he hadconcluded had been an effect of his half-conscious imagination, cameclearer to his ears. He listened for a moment, then walked rapidly tothe Lone Pine Hill from whose slight elevation he could see abroad overthe low mountains to the west. The gray light before sunrise was nowstrengthening every moment. By the time Bob had reached the summit ofthe knoll it had illuminated the world.
A wandering suction of air toward the higher peaks brought with it themurmur of a multitude. Bob topped the hill and turned his eyes to thewest. A great cloud of dust arose from among the chaparral and oaks,drifting slowly but certainly toward the Ranges. Bob could now make outthe bawling, shouting, lowing of great herds on the march. In spite ofpledges and promises, in spite of California John's reports, of Thorne'srecommendations, of Plant's assurances, Simeon Wright's cattle wereagain coming in!
Bob shook his head sadly, and his clear-cut young face was grave. No oneknew better than himself what this must mean to the mountain people,for his late spring and early fall work had brought him much in contactwith them. He walked thoughtfully down the hill.
When just on the outskirts of the little village he was overtaken byGeorge Pollock on horseback. The mountaineer was jogging along at a footpace, his spurs jingling, his bridle hand high after the Westernfashion. When he saw Bob he reined in, nodding a good morning. Bobnoticed that he had strapped on a blanket and slicker, and wore hissix-shooter.
"You look as though you were going on a journey," remarked Bob.
"Thinking of it," said Pollock. Bob glanced up quickly at the tone ofhis voice, which somehow grated unusually on the young man's ear, butthe mountaineer's face was placid under the brim of his floppy old hat."Might as well," continued the cattleman after a moment. "Nothin'special to keep me."
"I'm glad Mrs. Pollock is better," ventured Bob.
"She's dead," stated Pollock without emotion. "Died this morning abouttwo o'clock."
Bob cried out at the utterly unexpected shock of this statement. Pollocklooked down on him as though from a great height.
"I sort of expected it," he answered Bob's exclamation. "I reckon wewon't talk of it. 'Spose you see that Wright's cattle is coming inagain? I'm sorry on account of Jim and the other boys. It wipes me out,of course, but it don't matter as far as I'm concerned, because I'mgoing away, anyway."
Bob laid his hand on the man's stirrup leather and walked alongside,thinking rapidly. He did not know how to take hold of the situation.
"Where are you thinking of going?" he asked.
Pollock looked down at him.
"What's that to you?" he demanded roughly.
"Why--nothing--I was simply interested," gasped Bob in astonishment.
The mountaineer's eyes bored him through and through. Finally the mandropped his gaze.
"I'll tell you," said he at last, "'cause you and Jim are the onlysquare ones I know. I'm going to Mexico. I never been there. I'm goingby Vermilion Valley, and Mono Pass. If they ask you, you can tell 'emdifferent. I want you to do something for me."
"Gladly," said Bob. "What is it?"
"Just hold my horse for me," requested Pollock, dismounting. "He standsfine tied to the ground, but there's a few things he's plumb afraid of,and I don't want to take chances on his getting away. He goes plumb offthe grade for freight teams; he can't stand the crack of their whips.Sounds like a gun to him, I reckon. He won't stand for shootingneither."
While talking the mountaineer handed the end of his hair rope into Bob'skeeping.
"Hang on to him," he said, turning away.
George Pollock sauntered easily down the street. At Supervisor Plant'sfront gate, he turned and passed within. Bob saw him walk rapidly up thefront walk, and pound on Plant's bedroom door. This, as usual in themountains, opened directly out on the verandah. With an exclamation Bobsprang forward, dropping the hair rope. He was in time to see thebedroom door snatched open from within, and Plant's huge figure,white-robed, appear in the doorway. The Supervisor was evidently angry.
"What in hell do you want?" he demanded.
"You," said the mountaineer.
He dropped his hand quite deliberately to his holster, flipped theforty-five out to the level of his hip, and fired twice, without lookingat the weapon. Plant's expression changed; turned blank. For anappreciable instant he tottered upright, then his knees gave out beneathhim and he fell forward with a crash. George Pollock leaned over him.Apparently satisfied after a moment's inspection, the mountaineerstraightened, dropped his weapon into the holster, and turned away.
All this took place in so short a space of time that Bob had not movedfive feet from the moment he guessed Pollock's intention to the end ofthe tragedy. As the first shot rang out, Bob turned and seized again thehair rope attached to Pollock's horse. His habit of rapid decision andcool judgment showed him in a flash that he was too late to interfere,and revealed to him what he must do.
Pollock, looking neither to the right nor the left, took the rope Bobhanded him and swung into the saddle. His calm had fallen from him. Hiseyes burned and his face worked. With a muffled cry of pain he struckspurs to his horse and disappeared.
Considerably shaken, Bob stood still, considering what he must do. Itwas manifestly his duty to raise the alarm. If he did so, however, hewould have to bear witness to what he knew; and this, for GeorgePollock's sake, he desired to avoid. He was the only one who could knowpositively and directly and immediately how Plant had died. The sound ofthe shots had not aroused the village. If they had been heard, no onewould have paid any attention to them; the discharge of firearms was toocommon an occurrence to attract special notice. It was better to let thediscovery come in the natural course of events.
However, Bob was neither a coward nor a fool. He wanted to save GeorgePollock if he could, but he had no intention of abandoning another plainduty in the matter. Without the slightest hesitation he opened Plant'sgate and walked to the verandah where the huge, unlovely hulk huddled inthe doorway. There, with some loathing, he determined the fact that theman was indeed dead. Convinced as to this point, he returned to thestreet, and looked carefully up and down it. It was still quitedeserted.
His mind in a whirl of horror, pity, and an unconfessed, hiddensatisfaction, he returned to Auntie Belle's. The customary daylightbreakfast for the teamsters had been omitted on account of the Sabbath.A thin curl of smoke was just beginning to rise straight up from thekitchen stovepipe. Bob, his mouth suddenly dry and sticky, went aroundto the back porch, where a huge _olla_ hung always full of spring water.He rounded the corner to run plump against Oldham, tilted back in achair smoking the butt of a cigar.
In his agitation of mind, Bob had no stomach for casual conversation. Byan effort he smoothed out his manner and collected his thoughts.
"How are you, Mr. Oldham?" he greeted the older man; "when did you getin?"
"About an hour ago," replied Oldham. His spare figure in the graybusiness suit did not stir from its lazy posture, nor did the expressionof his thin sardonic face change, but somehow, after swallowing hisdrink, Bob decided to revise his first intention of escaping to hisroom.
"An hour ago," he repeated, when the import of the words finallyfiltered through his mental turmoil. "You travelled up at night then?"
"Yes. It's getting hot on the plains."
"Got in just before daylight, then?"
"Just before. I'd have made it sooner, but I had to work my way throughthe cattle."
"Where's your team?"
"I left it down at the Company's stables; thought you wouldn't mind."
"Su
re not," said Bob.
The Company's stables were at the other end of the village. Oldham musthave walked the length of the street. He had said it was beforedaylight; but the look of the man's eyes was quizzical and cold behindthe glasses. Still, it was always quizzical and cold. Bob called himselfa panicky fool. Just the same, he wished now he had looked forfootprints in the dust of the street. While his brain was thus busy withswift conjecture and the weighing of probabilities, his tongue wasmaking random conversation, and his vacant eye was taking in andreporting to his intelligence the most trivial things. Generallyspeaking, his intelligence did not catch the significance of what hiseyes reported until after an appreciable interval. Thus he noted thatOldham had smoked his cigar down to a short butt. This unimportant factmeant nothing, until his belated mind told him that never before had heseen the man actually smoking. Oldham always held a cigar between hislips, but he contented himself with merely chewing it or rolling itabout. And this was very early, before breakfast.
"Never saw you smoke before," he remarked abruptly, as this bubble ofirrelevant thought came to the surface.
"No?" said Oldham, politely.
"It would make me woozy all day to smoke before I ate," said Bob, hisvoice trailing away, as his inner ear once more took up its listeningfor the hubbub that must soon break.
As the moments went by, the suspense of this waiting became almostunbearable. A small portion of him kept up its semblance of conversationwith Oldham; another small portion of him made minute and careful notesof trivial things; all the rest of him, body and soul, was listening, inthe hope that soon, very soon, a scream would break the suspense. Fromtime to time he felt that Oldham was looking at him queerly, and herallied his faculties to the task of seeming natural.
"Aren't you feeling well?" asked the older man at last. "You're mightypale. You want to watch out where you drink water around some of theseplaces."
Bob came to with a snap.
"Didn't sleep well," said he, once more himself.
"Well, that wouldn't trouble me," yawned Oldham; "if it hadn't been forcigars I'd have dropped asleep in this chair an hour ago. You said youcouldn't smoke before breakfast; neither can I ordinarily. This isn'tbefore breakfast for me, it's after supper; and I've smoked two just tokeep awake."
"Why keep awake?" asked Bob.
"When I pass away, it'll be for all day. I want to eat first."
There, at last, it had come! A man down the street shouted. Therefollowed a pounding at doors, and then the murmur of exclamations,questions and replies.
"It sounds like some excitement," yawned Oldham, bringing his chair downwith a thump. "They haven't even rung the first bell yet; let's wanderout and stretch our legs."
He sauntered off the wide back porch toward the front of the house. Bobfollowed. When near the gate Bob's mind grasped the significance of oneof the trivial details that his eyes had reported to it some momentsbefore. He uttered an exclamation, and returned hurriedly to the backporch to verify his impressions. They had been correct. Oldham hadstated definitely that he had arrived before daylight, that he had beensitting in his chair for over an hour; that during that time he hadsmoked two cigars through.
_Neither on the broad porch, nor on the ground near it, nor in anypossible receptacle were there any cigar ashes._