Collected Works of Zane Grey, page 864
“Huh! Bring what back?” flashed Nevada, stung in an instant.
“The cold, hard facts,” moaned Ben. “I’m the unluckiest, poor, damn miserable beggar on earth. I want to get a horrible drunk, but I can’t — I can’t.”
Nevada’s keen scrutiny lost its edge and something like relief replaced it. For a long moment he gazed down upon Ben.
“Shore you can’t get drunk, you locoed fool,” he declared, shortly. “That’s past for you an’ me. What’d you do in town?”
“Aw — it was bad going in, but hell coming back,” groaned Ben.
“Find your mother — well?” asked Nevada.
“Pretty well. Better than I expected. I cheered her up. Oh, Lord, the things I swore to. Nevada, I’ll never be able to live up to them. But I’ll have to!”
“Shore. I savvy. An’ how aboot Hettie?” rejoined the cowboy, eagerly.
“You could have knocked me over with a feather,” declared Ben. “She’s grown that tall. And a good-looker, too. But what struck me most was her cheerfulness and faith. Why, she seemed almost happy to see me.”
“Funny, now, ain’t it?” drawled Nevada “Wal, did you run into the old man?
“No, thank goodness.”
“Or anybody else who thinks you’re a low-down hoss thief?”
“No, I was lucky that way. Not even in Hammell. Met Strobel, the sheriff, and I swear I believe he’s my friend.”
“Good! Wal, then, what’s all this hollerin’ aboot? Looks to me you’ve no call to be down in the mouth.”
At that Ben dropped his head in shameful recollection. The momentary glow of hope and satisfaction faded away in a mounting tide of incredible disaster. To awaken to that awful trouble, and find that the night had only augmented it, was more than Ben could bear “Ben, I reckon you seen your sweetheart,” declared Nevada, as if enlightenment had come to him.
“Who — what?” stammered Ben, jerking up.
“Your kid sweetheart, as Hettie called her,” drawled Nevada, deliberately “This young college dame who’s goin’ to be worth a million dollars. The girl them Hammell cowboys call the peach from Tule Lake Ranch.”
“Shut up, or I’ll soak you over the head with a chunk of firewood,” yelled Ben, frantically.
“Lord! you must have it bad!” ejaculated Nevada, shaking. “You’re shore full of gratitude. Say, if you go drivin’ me off, who’s goin’ to handle this heah love affair for you?”
Ben groaned and writhed. “Nevada, it’s terrible to hear you speak out — so — so — cold-blooded — as if — as if—”
“But, pard, you’re up in the air an’ I’ve got it figgered,” declared the cowboy, persuasively. “You did see Ina Blaine? Now confess up.”
“Yes. That’s what ails me,” rejoined Ben, abjectly.
“Aw, she wasn’t changed — stuck up like the rest of them Blaines? Don’t tell me Hettie made a mistake,” implored Nevada.
Ben straightened up suddenly as if goaded to expression of something that it was impossible to place credence in.
“Nevada, I did meet Ina Blaine. Twice, once at Hammell, and last night at home. She greeted me on the main street of Hammell, before her friends and lots of the other people — just as if nothing had happened.... Then last night when I was with Hettie in the yard Ina came. We were alone — I don’t know how long. It seems like a dream. But I’m not quite crazy. I remember facts.... She was sweet. Oh! she was wonderful! She set me on fire with her faith — her — her — I don’t dare think what. But she’s on my side, just as Hettie said. She’d already had a fight with her father in front of Less Setter, whom she heard call me a horse thief.... And, oh, she said so many things. We were interrupted before she’d said all she wanted to. My father came driving in and I had to run.... But I felt her hands on my shoulders — I saw her eyes in the moonlight... and Nevada, I may be mad, but I believe Ina cares for me still.”
“Ahuh! An’ you fell in love with her all over again, deeper an’ a million times wuss?”
“That must be it,” whispered Ben, drawing his breath hard.
Nevada reacted to that confession in a manner totally unfamiliar to Ben. After all, Ben did not know this cowboy so very well. Nevada seemed to be accepting a responsibility that entailed grave things only he could vision “Get up, you big baby,” he said, coolly, with a light in his eyes not meant for Ben. “You’ve got a fight on your hands. Cut this misery stuff! You can love your girl as she deserves an’ break your heart over her. But that’ll only make you more of a man. The hunch I had grows stronger every day. We’re goin’ to gamble, Ben Ide, with all we’ve got — with love an’ life itself. I know this man Setter. He’s got some deep game, an’ blackin’ your name is part of it. Reckon I’ve a hunch why, too. Setter wouldn’t let anythin’ stand in his way, Ben.”
“Come to remember, Nevada, I’ve worse than that against him,” asserted Ben, darkly.
Nevada leaned over with quick, tense action that thrilled Ben.
“Ahuh! An’ what is it?”
“I’m half afraid to tell you.”
“But you can’t hold it back nor.”
“Nevada, my sister Hettie confessed that Setter had tried to get too — too familiar with her,” rejoined Ben, gravely.
Instantly Ben felt himself clutched by an iron hand and jerked upright of! the bed. Nevada glared at him with eyes of black fire.
“Say, have you got that straight?” he queried, in a voice which cut.
“Sure. Hettie can be depended upon, Nevada. She’s not given to exaggeration. I didn’t ask for any details. She just said he’d tried to get too familiar with her.”
“I’ll kill him!” rasped out Nevada, letting go of Ben so suddenly that he sat back upon the bed.
“I’m pretty sore myself, Nevada, but it doesn’t call for killing. You just cool off. I don’t want you going to jail even for my sister.”
“Wal, you’ll sing another tune when you know Less Setter as well as I do,” returned Nevada, grimly. “Let’s eat. Then we’ve got lots to figger on, pard, an’ you shore can bet on that.”
Ben found that despite the poignancy of his emotional state he was drawn into the current of Nevada’s keen energy and spirit. Always Ben had been the dominating factor in this partnership: nevertheless, at this turn of their fortunes Nevada took the upper hand.
“All this talk about buying out Sims and his neighbours, catching another string of wild horses, and Lord knows what else, yet you haven’t said a word about what you and Modoc found out,” protested Ben.
“Wal, pard, fact is I don’t want you to fork your fastest hoss an’ leave us heah with all the work,” drawled Nevada.
“You don’t trust me?”
“When a fellar’s in love he ain’t reliable.”
“See here, Nevada, I believe you’re in love, too. With my sister! That’s what has changed you from a lazy, good-humoured, don’t care cowboy to a regular devil with highfalutin hunches.”
Nevada’s face turned a dusky red and he halted at his task of packing to bend a piercing dark gaze on Ben. His lean hand shook as he held it out in a gesture of unconscious appeal.
“An’ suppose I am in love with Hettie?” he asked, with effort.
“Suppose you are! Why, it’s plain as your nose, which is pretty long. What do you mean?”
“Pard, I’m not fit to wipe the dust off Hettie’s little boots. I’m tellin’ you. But meetin’ her has changed me.”
“Nevada, I don’t believe you’ve been so darn bad,” said Bea, frankly. “Anyway, I’d trust Hettie with you. I told her so.”
“You did? My Gawd!” cried Nevada, huskily. “An’ what’d she do?”
“Hettie got as red as a rose,” laughed Ben. “And she said, ‘Why, Ben, I’m only sixteen!’... If you want a hunch from me, Nevada, here it is. My sister likes you pretty well. That’s sure We Ides are queer. But if we love anybody it’s for ever. Of course, my father would horsewhip you off the ranch if he caught you hanging round.”
“Reckon that’ll do. I’ll say you’re my kind of a man, Ben Ide. I owe you more’n I can ever pay.”
“We’re square, Nevada.”
“Wal, on that we’ll never agree. But lookin’ things plumb in the face, heah we are two ragamuffin hoss-wranglers, outcasts if not outlaws, so all-fired crazy as to love the daughters of the richest an’ hard-headedest ranchers in northern California. Funny, ain’t it — aboot as funny as gettin’ kicked in the gizzard by a mean hoss?”
“Nevada, it’d look funny to other people, especially to guys like Mr. Sewell McAdam. But it’s not funny to us. It’s great and terrible. Maybe it’ll be the saving of us.”
“Ahuh! You’re comin’ around to sense. Cinch that tight, Ben.... An’ now enough of this mushy gab. Shake hands on this, Ben. We’ll make good, or die!”
Nevada’s ringing harsh words, his lean, working, white face, the passionate fire in his eyes, swayed Ben utterly. Their hands met in a grip of iron.
“Now, Ben, we’re shore goin’ to gamble,” said Nevada, his cool, easy drawl returning.
“Are we?” queried Ben, ironically, yet with a thrill.
“How many hosses have you got in that river pasture?”
“Forty head. What of it?”
“How much are they worth?”
“I wouldn’t sell them.”
“You shore will. You’ll have to. What’ll they fetch, quick, at Klamath?”
“A hundred dollars a head, maybe more. Any horse dealer could see they’re worth two hundred.”
“Good. I reckoned so, but I wasn’t shore. Now, Ben, how many haid of that bunch can you let go?”
“Not a darn one!” yelled Ben.
“Boy, calm yourself. Listen. This heah card is the first you’re playin’ in the deal for Ina Blaine.”
Something shot like a bolt through Ben, a sensation that was both thrill and pang. Nevada was inexorable and irresistible. He held the mastery here and he knew it.
“All right, Nevada. How many horses do you want?” returned Ben, as if the words were wrung from him.
“Thirty haid. That’ll be three thousand dollars, enough to buy out these three homesteaders an’ to spare. I saw Sims yesterday an’ asked him if he’d sell. He thought I was razzin’ him. He’d almost give that hundred an’ sixty acres away, just to get out. He’s been there three years, an’ this is the sixth dry year. He’s ruined, an’ so are his neighbours. They can’t stick it out. Wal, we’ll not drive any hard deals, Ben. It’s a cinch Less Setter has his eyes on them homesteads. He’s buyin’ up for Hart Blaine. They aim to buy for a few hundred. I heard at Hammell that Blaine had bought a dozen ranches heah aboots, ‘most for nothin’.”
“Pretty tough on these little ranchers, caught at the end of this long drought. I don’t think much of Hart Blaine.”
“Wal, Blaine has lost his head. He was always poor. Then he got rich quick. Like a drunken cowboy with money! An’ don’t overlook that he’s fallen under the influence of Less Setter.”
“Heigho! it’s a great world,” sighed Ben. “Let’s get this horse deal over quick, unless you want to kill me. Thirty of my last and best horses! That leaves me ten. Ten! I wonder what ones I’ll keep.”
“Wal, let me pick out ten for you,” suggested Nevada, grinning.
“I should say not. Let’s see. Gray and Knockeye, of course, Juniper, Brushy, Modoc Black, Gander. That’s my six favourites. I’d starve to death before I’d part with them. Now to choose between Sandy and Bess, Simple Simon and Blue Boy—”
“Aw, say, Ben, you’re not hesitatin’ aboot Sandy, are you?
I love that hoss. Shore you never gave him to me, but—”
“For Heaven’s sake, take Sandy now. He’s yours,” burst out Ben wildly, stamping up and down the little cabin room. “You see for yourself how hard it is.”
“Shore it’s hard, Ben. But you mustn’t be silly. Keep the hosses you love best. So will I. That’ll be aboot a dozen haid in all. An’ that’s plenty. We’ve got to ketch another string, an’ say, if we happen — excuse me, pard — when we happen to ketch California Red, are you goin’ to get stuck on him an’ keep him?”
“I’ll never keep him. I’ll give him to Ina secretly, then sell him to her dad. That’d tickle her, I’ll bet. Oh, she’s a thoroughbred.”
“Ahuh! I’m shore anxious to get a look at that girl.... Wal, let’s throw these packs on a hoss an’ rustle out to the pasture an’ get the dirty deed done.”
Modoc, the Indian, had been standing outside with two pack animals. When these were ready he led them away toward the barn while Ben and Nevada mounted their horses and rode at a brisk trot along the river trail to the pasture.
Ben had fenced about one hundred acres of his land, a long strip five acres deep bordering the river. It was a piece of low land, covered with sage and grass, and near the edge of the water still fertile enough to take care of his horses.
Never had Forlorn River so deserved its name as now. It appeared to be a pale, discoloured, stagnant lane of water, covered with green scum and bordered by sun-dried rushes, winding away between the grey sage hills. Every day the water lowered an inch or two.
“Dryin’ up,” said Nevada. “Another month like this an’ the river above heah will be a mud hole. Ben, it shore was lucky when you found that spring heah.”
Nevada pointed down the bank to a green spot and a little willow-shaded cove that cut somewhat into the bank. Here at the lowest stage of water ever known in the country a spring of cold running water, remarkable in volume considering the six dry years, had been discovered. Not even an Indian had ever suspected its presence, because heretofore it had been covered by the river. It belonged to Ben and was indeed a priceless possession. If both lake and river dried up he would still have that spring. Both Ben and Nevada believed the water came from the high back range to the south. They knew every foot of that country, and it was waterless. Here then must be the outlet of water stored in the mountains.
“Pard, that’s why we can afford to gamble,” asserted Nevada. “That gurglin’ little spring hole is a gold mine.”
“Nevada, guess our luck has turned,” replied Ben, soberly. “I swear I forgot about this spring.”
“Ahuh! Now, Ben, I’ll cut out these hosses. You ride on down an’ open the pasture gate. I’ll leave your favourites an’ a couple of mine.”
Ben did as he was bidden, reconciled now and strangely glad the die had been cast. Indecision, love of horses, had always kept him from concluding profitable deals. Here was an end to his vacillation. He dared not think openly of Nevada’s curt statement that the deal was the first for Ina Blaine, yet Ben could not deceive himself. The romance of it was at the back of his mind, like a muffled song, barely distinguishable. He gazed around him, with dreamy eyes of vision, at the dry waste of sage and the lonely little river, at the majestic round hills, almost yellow in the sunlight. There would always be beauty and solitude here, even in that mythical future when this wild country was settled by prosperous ranchers. Ben had a doubt that was father to his hope. It was a desert and sage country with one wandering little river to supply nourishment.
Ben assisted Nevada to drive a string of spirited horses across the grey barren, between the sage slopes, to a wide basin called Mule Deer Flat. In fertile seasons this was a beautiful and wonderful country. After six years of drought, however, it was a dusty, sordid bowl with a yellow water hole in the centre and gradual slopes of scant sage and grazed-off grass. A few gaunt cattle stood here and there. Bleached bones and dried carcases were not wanting in that scene of a rancher’s failure.
The three homesteads Nevada and Ben intended to purchase comprised the whole basin and part of the higher slopes. Ben had not passed by there for a year. What a deplorable change! This lake region was one of the finest bits of ranching ground in all the country. But the lake was surface water, from snow and rain, and as there had been practically no precipitation for six years it was all gone except a patch of yellow filthy water that would soon kill any stock which drank it.
Ben and Nevada drove their horses into the pole-fenced corral and went on to the little log cabin, where Modoc had stopped with the pack-horses. Sims lived there. He was a fine specimen of cowboy turned rancher, a lean, rangy fellow, clear-eyed and bronze-faced. He looked worn, and his person and surroundings had the appearance of hard times.
“Get down an’ come in,” was his cordial greeting. “Whar you goin’ with all thet fine stock? Say, how on earth do you keep them hosses alive?”
“Nevada, let me do the talking.” said Ben, as Nevada assumed a very important air “Sims, we’re here to buy you out. Do you and your partners want to sell?”
“Man alive! Do we?” ejaculated the rancher. “Ide, we come in hyar on a shoestring, an’ if we’d had rain we’d made a success of it. But this terrible drought has ruined us. I’m tellin’ you thet these three homesteads are the poorest buys in northern California. Moore’s place is as bad as this, an’ Nagel’s is burned black.”
“Will these fellows sell?”
“They’d break their necks takin’ what they could get,” replied Sims, abruptly.
“All right. What do you want?”
“But, Ide, you ain’t really serious, are you?”
“Yes, Nevada and I are going to gamble,” said Ben, frankly.
“I wish I could afford to. But I’m stone broke an’ no credit. Our mistake in the first place homesteadin’ hyar without allowin’ for dry seasons. We knew Mule Lake was surface water. A big reservoir would have saved us. An’ there’s a canyon on Moore’s land where a good cement dam would have done the trick. It’d take money.”
“Shore we’ll build the dam,” interposed Nevada, complacently.
“What’s the lowest you’ll take?” demanded Ben.
“Wal — would say — eight hundred dollars be too much?” hesitatingly returned Sims.
“It’s too little,” replied Ben. “I’ll make it a thousand. Get Moore and Nagel over here pronto. I’ve thirty head of fine horses out there in your corral. You can sell them to-morrow at Klamath for a hundred dollars each. And if you hang on to them a little you can get two hundred. What do you say?”
