chanted the cowboy, switching to an out-and-out bad one; and then, swaying his body on his cracker box, he plunged unctuously into the chorus.
"_She"s got a dark and rolling eye, boys; She"s got a dark and rolling eye._"
He stopped there and leapt to his feet anxiously. The mighty bulk of the _rodeo_ boss came plunging back at him through the darkness; his bruising fist shot out and the frontier troubadour went sprawling among the pack saddles.
It was the first time Creede had ever struck one of his own kind,--men with guns were considered dangerous,--but this time he laid on unmercifully.
"You"ve had that comin" to you for quite a while, Bill Lightfoot," he said, striking Bill"s ineffectual gun aside, "and more too. Now maybe you"ll keep shut about "your girl"!"
He turned on his heel after administering this rebuke and went to the house, leaving his enemy prostrate in the dirt.
"The big, hulkin" brute," blubbered Lightfoot, sitting up and aggrievedly feeling of his front teeth, "jumpin" on a little feller like me--an" he never give me no warnin", neither. You jest wait, I"ll--"
"Aw, shut up!" growled Old Man Reavis, whose soul had long been harrowed by Lightfoot"s festive ways. "He give you plenty of warnin", if you"d only listen. Some people have to swallow a few front teeth before they kin learn anythin"."
"Well, what call did he have to jump on me like that?" protested Lightfoot. "I wasn"t doin" nothin"."
"No, nothin" but singin" bawdy songs about his girl," sneered Reavis sarcastically.
"His girl, rats!" retorted the cowboy, vainglorious even in defeat, "she"s my girl, if she"s anybody"s!"
"Well, about _your_ girl then, you dirty brute!" snarled the old man, suddenly a.s.suming a high moral plane for his utter annihilation.
"You"re a disgrace to the outfit, Bill Lightfoot," he added, with conviction. "I"m ashamed of ye."
"That"s right," chimed in the Clark boys, whose sensibilities had likewise been hara.s.sed; and with all the world against him Bill Lightfoot retired in a huff to his blankets. So the _rodeo_ ended as it had begun, in disaster, bickering, and bad blood, and no man rightly knew from whence their misfortune came. Perhaps the planets in their spheres had cast a malign influence upon them, or maybe the bell mare had cast a shoe. Anyhow they had started off the wrong foot and, whatever the cause, the times were certainly not auspicious for matters of importance, love-making, or the bringing together of the estranged. Let whatsoever high-priced astrologer cast his horoscope for good, Saturn was swinging low above the earth and dealing especial misery to the Four Peaks; and on top of it all the word came that old Bill Johnson, after shooting up the sheep camps, had gone crazy and taken to the hills.
For a week, Creede and Hardy dawdled about the place, patching up the gates and fences and cursing the very name of sheep. A spirit of unrest hovered over the place, a brooding silence which spoke only of Tommy and those who were gone, and the two partners eyed each other furtively, each deep in his own thoughts. At last when he could stand it no longer Creede went over to the corner, and dug up his money.
"I"m goin" to town," he said briefly.
"All right," responded Hardy; and then, after meditating a while, he added: "I"ll send down some letters by you."
Late that evening, after he had written a long letter to Lucy and a short one to his father, he sat at the desk where he had found their letters, and his thoughts turned back to Kitty. There lay the little book which had held their letters, just as he had thrust it aside. He picked it up, idly, and glanced at the t.i.tle-page: "Sonnets from the Portuguese." How dim and far away it all seemed now, this world of the poets in which he had once lived and dreamed, where sweetness and beauty were enshrined as twin G.o.ddesses of light, and gentleness brooded over all her children. What a world that had been, with its graceful, smiling women, its refinements of thought and speech, its aspirations and sympathies--and Kitty! He opened the book slowly, wondering from whence it had come, and from the deckled leaves a pressed forget-me-not fell into his hand. That was all--there was no mark, no word, no sign but this, and as he gazed his numbed mind groped through the past for a forget-me-not. Ah yes, he remembered!
But how far away it seemed now, the bright morning when he had met his love on the mountain peak and the flowers had fallen from her hair--and what an inferno of strife and turmoil had followed since! He opened to the place where the imprint of the dainty flower lay and read reverently:
"If thou must love me, let it be for nought Except for love"s sake only. Do not say "I love her for her smile--her look--her way Of speaking gently--for a trick of thought That falls in well with mine, and certes brought A sense of pleasant ease on such a day"-- For these things in themselves, Beloved, may Be changed, or change for thee--and love, so wrought, May be unwrought so. Neither love me for Thine own dear pity"s wiping my cheek dry-- A creature might forget to weep, who bore Thy comfort long, and lose thy love thereby!
But love me for love"s sake, that evermore Thou mayst love on, through love"s eternity."
The spell of the words laid hold upon as he read and he turned page after page, following the cycle of that other woman"s love--a love which waited for years to be claimed by the master hand, never faltering to the end. Then impulsively he reached for a fair sheet of paper to begin a letter to Kitty, a letter which should breathe the old gentleness and love, yet "for love"s sake only." But while he sat dreaming, thinking with what words to begin, his partner lounged in, and Hardy put aside his pen and waited, while the big man hung around and fidgeted.
"Well, I"ll be in town to-morrer," he said, drearily.
"Aha," a.s.sented Hardy.
"What ye got there?" inquired Creede, after a long silence. He picked up the book, griming the dainty pages as he turned them with his rough fingers, glancing at the headings.
"Um-huh," he grunted, ""Sonnets from the Portegees," eh? I never thought them Dagos could write--what I"ve seen of "em was mostly drivin" fish-wagons or swampin" around some slaughterhouse. How does she go, now," he continued, as his schooling came back to him, "see if I can make sense out of it." He bent down and mumbled over the first sonnet, spelling out the long words doubtfully.
"I thought once how The-o-crite-us had sung Of the sweet years, the dear and wished-for years, Who each one in a gracious hand appears To bear a gift for mortals, old or young: And as I mused it in his an--"
"Well say, what"s he drivin" at, anyway?" demanded the rugged cowboy.
"Is that Dago talk, or is he jest mixed in his mind? Perfectly clear, eh? Well, maybe so, but I fail to see it. Wish I could git aholt of some _good_ po"try." He paused, waiting for Hardy to respond.
"Say," he said, at last, "do me a favor, will ye, Rufe?"
The tone of his voice, now soft and diffident, startled Hardy out of his dream.
"Why sure, Jeff," he said, "if I can."
"No, no "ifs" and "ands" about it!" persisted Creede. "A lucky feller like you with everythin" comin" his way ought to be able to say "Yes"
once in a while without hangin" a pull-back on it."
"Huh," grunted Hardy suspiciously, "you better tell me first what you want."
"Well, I want you to write me a letter," blurted out Creede. "I can keep a tally book and order up the grub from Bender; but, durn the luck, when it comes to makin" love on paper I"d rather wrastle a bear.
Course you know who it is, and you savvy how them things is done.
Throw in a little po"try, will you, and--and--say, Rufe, for G.o.d"s sake, help me out on this!"
He laid one hand appealingly upon his partner"s shoulder, but the little man squirmed out from under it impatiently.
"Who is it?" he asked doggedly. "Sallie Winship?"
"Aw, say," protested Creede, "don"t throw it into a feller like that--Sal went back on me years ago. You know who I mean--Kitty Bonnair."
"Kitty Bonnair!" Hardy had known it, but he had tried to keep her name unspoken. Battle as he would he could not endure to hear it, even from Jeff.
"What do you want to tell Miss Bonnair?" he inquired, schooling his voice to a cold quietness.
"Tell her?" echoed Creede ecstatically. "W"y, tell her I"m lonely as h.e.l.l now she"s gone--tell her--well, there"s where I bog down, but I"d trade my best horse for another kiss like that one she give me, and throw in the saddle for _pelon_. Now, say, Rufe, don"t leave me in a hole like this. You"ve made your winnin", and here"s your nice long letter to Miss Lucy. My hands are as stiff as a burnt rawhide and I can"t think out them nice things to say; but I love Kitty jest as much as you love Miss Lucy--mebbe more--and--and I wanter tell her so!"
He ended abjectly, gazing with pleading eyes at the stubborn face of his partner whose lips were drawn tight.
"We--every man has to--no, I can"t do it, Jeff," he stammered, choking. "I"d--I"d help you if I could, Jeff--but she"d know my style.
Yes, that"s it. If I"d write the letter she"d know it was from me--women are quick that way. I"m sorry, but that"s the way it is--every man has to fight out his own battle, in love."
He paused and fumbled with his papers.
"Here"s a good pen," he said, "and--and here"s the paper." He shoved out the fair sheet upon which he had intended to write and rose up dumbly from the table.
"I"m going to bed," he said, and slipped quietly out of the room. As he lay in his blankets he could see the gleam of light from the barred window and hear Jeff sc.r.a.ping his boots uneasily on the floor. True indeed, his hands were like burnt rawhide from gripping at ropes and irons, his clothes were greasy and his boots smelled of the corral, and yet--she had given him a kiss! He tried to picture it in his mind: Kitty smiling--or startled, perhaps--Jeff masterful, triumphant, laughing. Ah G.o.d, it was the same kiss she had offered him, and he had run away!
In the morning, there was a division between them, a barrier which could not be overcome. Creede lingered by the door a minute, awkwardly, and then rode away. Hardy sc.r.a.ped up the greasy dishes and washed them moodily. Then the great silence settled down upon Hidden Water and he sat alone in the shadow of the _ramada_, gazing away at the barren hills.
CHAPTER XIX
THE BIG DRUNK