Before them the Meadows stretched between two ranges of low, rocky hills, narrow at first but widening gradually from the gap through which they had come. But the ground where the long, rich gra.s.s had once grown was now barren, gray and ugly in the moonlight, cut into deep gullies and naked of all but a scant growth of sage-brush which the moon was silvering, and a few clumps of shadowy scrub-oak along the base of the hills on either side.
Instinctively they stopped, speaking in low tones. And then there came to them out of the night"s silence a strange, weird beating; hollow, m.u.f.fled, slow, and rhythmic, but penetrating and curiously exciting, like another pulse cunningly playing upon their own to make them beat more rapidly. The girl pulled her horse close in by his, but he rea.s.sured her.
"It"s Indians--they must be holding the funeral of some chief. But no matter--these Indians aren"t any more account than prairie-dogs."
They rode on slowly, the funeral-drum sounding nearer as they went.
Then far up the meadow by the roadside they could see the hard, square lines of the cross in the moonlight. Slower still they went, while the drumbeats became louder, until they seemed to fall upon their own ear-drums.
"Could he have come to this dreadful place?" she asked, almost in a whisper.
"We haven"t pa.s.sed him, that"s sure; and I"ve got a notion he did. I"ve heard him talk about this cross off and on--it"s been a good deal in his mind--and maybe he was a little out of his head. But we"ll soon see."
They walked their horses up a little ascent, and the cross stood out more clearly against the sky. They approached it slowly, leaning forward to peer all about it; but the shadows lay heavy at its base, and from a little distance they could distinguish no outline.
But at last they were close by and could pierce the gloom, and there at the foot of the cross, beside the cairn of stones that helped to support it, was a little huddled bit of blackness. It moved as they looked, and they knew the voice that came from it.
"O G.o.d, I am tired and ready! Take me and burn me!"
She was off her horse and quickly at his side. Follett, to let them be alone, led the horses to the spring below. It was almost gone now, only the feeblest trickle of a rivulet remaining. The once green meadows had behaved, indeed, as if a curse were put upon them. Hardly had gra.s.s grown or water run through it since the day that Israel wrought there.
When he had tied the horses he heard Prudence calling him.
"I"m afraid he"s delirous," she said, when he reached her side. "He keeps hearing cries and shots, and sees a woman"s hair waving before him, and he"s afraid of something back of him. What can we do?"
At the foot of the cross the little man was again sounding his endless prayer.
"Bow me, bend me, break me, for I have been soul-proud. Burn me out--"
She knelt by his side, trying to soothe him.
"Father--it"s all right--it"s Prudence--"
But at her name he uttered a cry with such terror in it that she shuddered and was still. Then he began to mutter incoherently, and she heard her own name repeated many times.
"If that awful beating would only stop," she said to Follett, who had now brought water in the curled brim of his hat. She tried to have the little man drink. He swallowed some of the water from the hat-brim, shivering as he did so.
"We ought to have a fire," she said. Follett began to gather twigs and sage-brush, and presently had a blaze in front of them.
In the light of the fire the little man could see their faces, and he became suddenly coherent, smiling at them in the old way.
"Why have you come so far in the night?" he asked Prudence, taking one of her cool hands between his own that burned.
"But, you poor little father! Why have _you_ come, when you should be home in bed? You are burning with fever."
"Yes, yes, dear, but it"s over now. This is the end. I came here--to be here--I came to say my last prayer in the body. And they will come to find me here. You must go before they come."
"Who will find you?"
"They from the Church. I didn"t mean to do it, but when I was on my feet something forced it out of me. I knew what they would do, but I was ready to die, and I hoped I could awaken some of them."
"But no one shall hurt you."
"Don"t tempt me to stay any longer, dear, even if they would let me. Oh, you don"t know, you don"t know--and that Devil"s drumming over there to madden me as on that other night. But it"s just--my G.o.d, how just!"
"Come away, then. Ruel will find your horse, and we"ll ride home."
"It"s too late--don"t ask me to leave my h.e.l.l now. It would only follow me. It was this way that night--the night before--the beating got into my blood and hammered on my brain till I didn"t know. Prudence, I must tell you--everything--"
He glanced at Follett appealingly, as he had looked at the others when he left the platform that day, beseeching some expression of friendliness.
"Yes, I must tell you--everything." But his face lighted as Follett interrupted him.
"You tell her," said Follett, doggedly, "how you saved her that day and kept her like your own and brought her up to be a good woman--that"s what you tell her." The grat.i.tude in the little man"s eyes had grown with each word.
"Yes, yes, dear, I have loved you like my own little child, but your father and mother were killed here that day--and I found you and loved you--such a dear, forlorn little girl--will you hate me now?" he broke off anxiously. She had both his hands in her own.
"But why, how _could_ I hate you? You are my dear little sorry father--all I"ve known. I shall always love you."
"That will be good to take with me," he said, smiling again. "It"s all I"ve got to take--it"s all I"ve had since the day I found you. You are good," he said, turning to Follett.
"Oh, shucks!" answered Follett.
A smile of rare contentment played over the little man"s face.
In the silence that followed, the funeral-drum came booming in upon them over the ridge, and once they saw an Indian from the encampment standing on top of the hill to look down at their fire. Then the little man spoke again.
"You will go with him," he said to Prudence. "He will take you out of here and back to your mother"s people."
"She"s going to marry me," said Follett. The little man smiled at this.
"It is right--the Gentile has come to take you away. The Lord is cunning in His vengeance. I felt it must be so when I saw you together."
After this he was so quiet for a time that they thought he was sleeping.
But presently he grew restless again, and said to Follett:--
"I want you to have me buried here. Up there to the north, three hundred yards from here on the right, is a dwarf cedar standing alone.
Straight over the ridge from that and half-way down the other side is another cedar growing at the foot of a ledge. Below that ledge is a grave. There are stones piled flat, and a cross cut in the one toward the cedar. Make a grave beside that one, and put me in it--just as I am.
Remember that--_uncoffined_. It must be that way, remember. There"s a little book here in this pocket. Let it stay with me--but surely uncoffined, remember, as--as the rest of them were."
"But, father, why talk so? You are going home with us."
"There, dear, it"s all right, and you"ll feel kind about me always when you remember me?"
"Don"t,--don"t talk so."
"If that beating would only stay out of my brain--the thing is crawling behind me again! Oh, no, not yet--not yet! Say this with me, dear:--
"_"The Lord is my Shepherd; I shall not want.