CHAPTER XVII
THE ANSWER
The rumbling up the canyon was hardly a noise; it was a tremulousshudder of earth and air like the grinding that accompanies anearthquake. But Wunpost knew, and the Campbells knew, what it meant andwhat was to follow; and as it increased to a growl they threw down thecorral bars and rushed the stock up to the high ground. They waited, andWunpost ran back to get his dog, and then the dammed waters broke loose.A great spray of yellow mud splashed out from Corkscrew Gorge and apinon-trunk was snapped high into the air; and while all the earthtrembled the dam of mud burst forth, forced on by the weight ofbacked-up waters. Then more trees came smashing through, followed bymuddy tides of driftwood, and as suddenly the debacle ceased.
There was quiet, except for the hoarse rumble of boulders as they groundtheir way down through the Gorge; and for the muffled crack of submergedtree-trunks, straining and breaking beneath the ever-mounting jamb. Itrose up and overflowed in a gush of turbid waters, rose still higher andoverflowed again; and then it broke loose in a crash like imminentthunder--the cloudburst had conquered the Gorge. It went through it andover it, spreading out on its sloping sides; and when the worst crushseemed over it washed higher yet and came through with an all-devouringsurge. In a flash the whole creekbed was a mass of mud and driftwood,which swashed about and swayed drunkenly on; and, as great tree-bolescame battering through, the jamb broke abruptly and spewed out a sea ofyellow water.
The fugitives climbed up higher, followed by the cat and dog, and theburros which had been left in the corrals; but the flood bore swiftlyon, leaving the ranch unsullied by its burden of brush and mud. The jambbroke down again, letting out a second gush of water which crept upamong the lower trees, but just as the Gorge opened up for the thirdtime the flood-crest struck the lower gorge and stopped. Once more thetrees and logs which had formed the jamb above bobbed and floated on thesurface of a pond; and while the Campbells gazed and wept the turbidflood swung back swiftly, inundating their ranch with its mud.
First the orchard was overflowed, then the garden above the road, thenthe corrals and the flowers by the gate; and as they ran aboutdistracted the water crept up towards the house and out over the verdantalfalfa. But just when it seemed as if the whole ranch would bedestroyed there was a smash from the lower point; the jamb went out,draining the waters quickly away and rushing on towards the Sink. Thegreat mass of mud and boulders which had been brought down by the floodceased to spread out and cover their fields, and as the millrace ofwaters continued to pour down the canyon it began to dig a new streambedin the debris. Then the thunder of its roaring subsided by degrees andby sundown the cloudburst was past.
Where the creek had been before there was a wider and deeper creek, itssides cumbered with huge boulders and tree-trunks; and the mixture ofsilt and gravel which formed its cut banks already had set like cement.It _was_ cement, the same natural concrete which Nature combineseverywhere on the desert--gravel and lime and bone-dry clay, sluiced andmixed by the passing cloudburst and piled up to set into pudding-stone.And all the mud which had overlaid the garden and orchard was settinglike a concrete pavement. The ancient figs and peach-trees, half buriedin the slime, rose up stiffly from the fertile soil beneath; and theJail Canyon Ranch, once so flamboyantly green, was now shore-lined witha blotch of dirty gray. Only the alfalfa patch remained, and the houseon the hill--everything else was either washed away or covered withgravel and dirt. And the road--it was washed away too.
Wunpost worked late and hard, shoveling the muck away from the trees andclearing a section of the corral; but not until Cole Campbell came downthe next day was the Stinging Lizard road even mentioned. It was gone,they all knew that, and all their prayers and tears could not bring backone rock from its grade; and yet somehow Wunpost felt guilty, as if hisimpious words had brought down this disaster upon his friends. He rushedfeverishly about in the blazing sun, trying to undo the most imminentdamage; and Billy and Mrs. Campbell, half divining his futile regrets,went about their own tasks in silence. But when Campbell came down overthe mountain-sheep trail and beheld what the cloudburst had done hespoke what came first into his mind.
"Ah, my road," he moaned, talking half to himself after the manner ofthe lonely and deaf, "and I let it lie idle six weeks! All my ore stillsacked and waiting on the dump, and now my road is gone."
He bowed his head and gave way to tears, for he had lost ten years' workin a day, and then Mrs. Campbell forgot. She had remained silent before,not wishing to seem unkind, but now she spoke from her heart.
"It's a visitation!" she wailed; "the Lord has punished us for our sins.We should never have used the road."
"And why not?" demanded Campbell, rousing up from his brooding, and hesaw Wunpost turning guiltily away. "Ah, I knew it!" he burst out; "Imisdoubted it all the time, but you thought you could keep it from me.But when I came down from Panamint, to see where the waterspout hadstruck, and found it tearing in from Woodpecker Canyon, I said: 'It isthe hand of God!' We had not come by our road quite honestly."
"No," sobbed Mrs. Campbell, "and I hate to say it, but I'm glad the roadis destroyed. What you built we came by honestly, but the rest wasobtained by fraud, and now it has all been destroyed. You have workedlong and hard, Cole, and I'm sorry this had to happen; but God is notmocked, we know that. I tried to keep it from you, and to keep myselffrom knowing; but he told me himself that he salted the mine on purpose,so that Eells would build us a road!"
"Aha!" nodded Campbell, and looked out from under his eyebrows at theman who had befriended him by fraud. But he was a man of few words, andhis silence spoke for him--Wunpost scuffled his feet and withdrew.
"Well I'm going," he announced to Billy as he threw on his packs; "thisis getting too rough for me. So I crabbed the whole play, eh, andfetched that cloudburst down Woodpecker? And it washed out your father'sroad! It's a wonder Divine Providence didn't ketch _me_ up thecanyon, and wipe me off the footstool, too!"
"Perhaps He spared you," suggested Billy, whose eyes were big with awe,"so you could repent and be forgiven of your sins."
"I bet ye!" scoffed Wunpost; "but you can't tell _me_ that GodAlmighty was steering that waterspout. It just hit in Woodpecker Canyon,same as one hit Hanaupah last week and another one washed out downbelow. They're falling every day, but I'm going up into them hills, anddo you reckon one will drop on me? Don't you think it--God Almighty hasgot more important business than following me around through the hills.I'm going to take my little dog, so I'll be sure to have Good Luck; andif I don't come back you'll know somebody has got me, that's all."
He tightened his lash ropes viciously, mounted his horse and took thelead, followed by Old Walker and the other mules, packed; and when hewhistled for Good Luck, to Billy's surprise the little terrier wentbounding off after him. She waved at him furtively and tried to toll himback, but his devotion to his master was still just as strong as it hadbeen when he had adopted him in Los Angeles. When he had been prostratedby the heat he had stayed with Billy gladly, but now that he was strongand accustomed to the climate he raced along after the mules. Wunpostlooked back and grinned, then he reached down a hand and swooped his dogup into the saddle.
"You can't steal him!" he hooted, and Billy bit her lip, for she thoughtshe had weaned him from his master. And Wunpost--she had thought he wastamed to her hand, but he too had gone off and left her. He was still aswild and ruthless as on the day they had first met, when he had beenchasing Dusty Rhodes with a stone; and now he was heading off into thehigh places he was so fond of, to play hide-and-seek with his pursuers.Several had come up already, ostensibly to view the ruin but undoubtedlyto keep Wunpost in sight; and if he continued his lawless strife shedoubted if the good Lord would preserve him, as He had from thecloudburst.
Time and again he had mounted to go and each time she had held him back,for she had sensed some imminent disaster; and now, as he rode off, shefelt the prompting again to run after him and call him back. But hewould not come back, he was h
eadstrong and unrepentant, making light ofwhat others held sacred; and as she watched him out of sight somethingtold her again that he was going out to meet his doom. Some greatpunishment was hanging over him, to chastise him for his sins and bringhim, perhaps, to repentance; but she could no more stop his going, orturn him aside from his purpose, than she could control the rush of acloudburst. He was like a force of nature--a rude, fighting creature whobeat down opposition as the flood struck down bushes, rushing on to seeknew worlds to conquer.