Part 38 (1/2)
”Your arm won't trouble you. Jest a flesh wound. There's nothin' better than axle grease. And you, ma'am?”
”Perfectly well, thank you.”
”You're the coolest of the lot, and no mistake,” he praised admiringly.
”Wall, there'll be no more fracas to-night. Anyhow, the boys'll be on guard ag'in it; they're out now. You two can eat and rest a bit, whilst gettin' good and ready; and if you set out 'fore moon-up you can easy get cl'ar, with what help we give you. We'll furnish mounts, grub, anything you need. I'll make s.h.i.+ft without Frank.”
”Mounts!” I blurted, with a start that waked my arm to throbbing. ”'Set out,' you say? Why? And where?”
”Anywhar. The stage road south'ard is your best bet. You didn't think to stay, did you? Not after that--after you'd plugged a Mormon, the son of the old man, besides! We reckoned you two had it arranged, by this time.”
”No! Never!” I protested. ”You're crazy, man. I've never dreamed of any such thing; nor Mrs. Montoyo, either. You mean that I--we--should run away? I'll not leave the train and neither shall she, until the proper time. Or do I understand that you disown us; turn your backs upon us; deliver us over?”
”Hold on,” Jenks bade. ”You're barkin' up the wrong tree. 'Tain't a question of disownin' you. h.e.l.l, we'd fight for you and proud to do it, for you're white. But I tell you, you've killed one o' that party ahead, you've killed the wagon boss's son; and Hyrum, he's consider'ble of a man himself. He stands well up, in the church. But lettin' that alone, he's captain of this train, he's got a dozen and more men back of him; and when he comes in the mornin' demandin' of you for trial by his Mormons, what can we do? Might fight him off; yes. Not forever, though. He's nearest to the water, sech as it is, and our casks are half empty, critters dry. We sha'n't surrender you; if we break with him we break ourselves and likely lose our scalps into the bargain. Why, we hadn't any idee but that you and her were all primed to light out, with our help. For if you stay you won't be safe anywhere betwixt here and Salt Lake; and over in Utah they'll vigilant you, sh.o.r.e as kingdom. As for you, ma'am,” he bluntly addressed, ”we'd protect you to the best of ability, o' course; but you can see for yourself that Hyrum won't feel none too kindly toward you, and that if you'll pull out along with Beeson as soon as convenient you'll avoid a heap of unpleasantness. We'll take the chance on sneakin' you both away, and facin' the old man.”
”Mr. Beeson should go,” she said. ”But I shall return to the Adams camp. I am not afraid, sir.”
”Tut, tut!” he rapped. ”I know you're not afraid; nevertheless we won't let you do it.”
”They wouldn't lay hands on me.”
”Um-m,” he mused. ”Mebbe not. No, reckon they wouldn't. I'll say that much. But by thunder they'd make you wish they did. They'd claim you trapped Dan'l. You'd suffer for that, and in place of this boy, and a-plenty. Better foller your new man, lady, and let him stow you in safety. Better go back to Benton.”
”Never to Benton,” she declared. ”And he's not my 'new man.' I apologize to him for that, from you, sir.”
”If you stay, I stay, then,” said I. ”But I think we'd best go. It's the only way.” And it was. We were twain in menace to the outfit and to each other but inseparable. We were yoked. The fact appalled. It gripped me coldly. I seemed to have bargained for her with word and fist and bullet, and won her; now I should appear to carry her off as my booty: a wife and a gambler's wife. Yet such must be.
”You shall go without me.”
”I shall not.”
With a little sob she buried her face in her hands.
”If you don't hate me now you soon will,” she uttered. ”The cards don't fall right--they don't, they don't. They've been against me from the first. I'm always forcing the play.”
Whereupon I knew that go together we should, or I was no man.
”Pshaw, pshaw,” Jenks soothed. ”Matters ain't so bad. We'll fix ye out and cover your trail. Moon'll be up in a couple o' hours. I'd advise you to take an hour's start of it, so as to get away easier. If you travel straight south'ard you'll strike the stage road sometime in the mornin'.
When you reach a station you'll have ch'ice either way.”
”I have money,” she said; and sat erect.
CHAPTER XVIII
VOICES IN THE VOID
The directions had been plain. With the North Star and the moon as our guides we scarcely could fail to strike the stage road where it bore off from the mountains northward into the desert.
For the first half mile we rode without a word from either of us to violate the truce that swathed us like the night. What her thoughts were I might not know, but they sat heavy upon her, closing her throat with the torture of vain self-reproach. That much I sensed. But I could not rea.s.sure her; could not volunteer to her that I welcomed her company, that she was blameless, that I had only defended my honor, that affairs would have reduced to pistol work without impulse from her--that, in short, the responsibility had been wholly Daniel's. My own thoughts were so grievous as to crush me with aching woe that forebade civil utterance.