Dorn Of The Mountains (4 page)

Helen Rayner had been on the westbound overland train fully twenty-four hours before she made an alarming discovery.

Accompanied by her sister Bo, a precocious girl of sixteen, Helen had left St. Joseph with a heart saddened by farewells to loved ones at home, yet full of thrilling and vivid anticipations of new strange life in the far West. All her people had the pioneer spirit: love of change, action, adventure was in her blood. Then duty to a widowed mother with large and growing family had called to Helen to accept this rich uncle’s offer. She had taught school and also her little brothers and sisters; she had helped along in other ways. And now, although the tearing up the roots of old loved ties was hard, this opportunity was irresistible in its call. The prayer of her dreams had been answered. To bring good fortune to her family, to take care of this beautiful wild little sister, to live on a wonderful ranch that was someday to be her own, to have fulfilled a deep instinctive and undeveloped love of horses, cattle, sheep, of desert and mountains, of trees and brooks and wildflowers—all this was the sum of her most passionate longings, now in some marvelous fairy-like way to come true.

A check to her happy anticipations, a blank sickening dash of cold water upon her warm and intimate dreams had been the discovery that Harve Riggs was on the train. His presence could mean only one thing—that he had followed her. Riggs had been the worst of many sore trials back there in St. Joseph. He had possessed some claim or some undue influence upon her mother, who favored his offer of marriage to Helen; he was neither attractive, nor good, or industrious, or anything that interested her; he was the boastful strutting adventurer not genuinely Western, and he affected long hair and guns and notoriety. Helen had suspected the veracity of the many fights he claimed had been his, and also she suspected that he was not really big enough to be bad—as Western men were bad. But on the train, in the station at La Junta, one glimpse of him, manifestly spying upon her while trying to keep out of her sight, warned Helen that she now might have to deal with a villain.

The recognition sobered her. All was not to be a road of roses to this new home in the West. Riggs would follow her, if he could not accompany her, and to gain his own ends he would stoop to anything. Helen felt the startling realization of being cast upon her own resources, and then a numbing discouragement and loneliness and helplessness. But these feelings did not long persist in the quick pride and flash of her temper. Opportunity knocked at her door and she meant to be at home to it. She would not have been Al Auchincloss’s niece if she had faltered. And when temper succeeded to genuine anger, she could have laughed to scorn this Harve Riggs and his schemes, what ever they were. Once and for all she dismissed fear of him. When she left St. Joseph, she had faced the West with a beating heart and a high resolve to be worthy of that West. Homes had to be made out there in that far country, so Uncle Al had written, and women were needed to make homes. She meant to be one of these women and to make of her sister another. And with the thought that she would know definitely what to say to Riggs when he approached her sooner or later, Helen dismissed him from mind.

While the train was in motion, enabling Helen to watch the ever-changing scenery, and resting her from the strenuous task of keeping Bo well in hand at stations, she lapsed again into dreamy gaze at the pine forests and the red rocky gullies and the dim bold mountains.

She saw the sun set over distant ranges of New Mexico—a golden blaze of glory, as new to her as the strange fancies born in her, thrilling and fleeting by. Bo’s raptures were not silent, and, the instant the sun sank and the color faded, she just as rapturously importuned Helen to get out the huge basket of food they had brought from home.

They had two seats, facing each other, at the end of the coach, and piled there, with the basket on top, was baggage that constituted all the girls owned in the world. Indeed it was very much more than they had ever owned before, because their mother, in her care for them and desire to have them look well in the eyes of this rich uncle, had spent money and pains to give them pretty and serviceable clothes.

The girls sat together, with the heavy basket upon their knees, and ate while they gazed out at the cool dark ridges. The train
clattered
slowly on, apparently over a road that was all curves. And it was suppertime for everybody in that crowded coach. If Helen had not been so absorbed by the great wild mountain land, she would have had more interest in the passengers. As it was, she saw them and was amused and thoughtful at the men and women and a few children in the car, all middle-class people, poor and hopeful, traveling out there to the new West to find houses. It was splendid and beautiful, this fact, yet it inspired a brief and inexplicable sadness. From the train window that world of forest and crag, with its long bare reaches between, seemed so lonely, so wild, so unlivable. How endless the distance! For hours and miles upon miles no house, no hut, no Indian teepee! It was amazing the length and breadth of this beautiful land. And Helen, who loved brooks and running streams, saw no water at all.

The darkness settled down over this slow-moving panorama; a cool night wind blew in at the window; white stars began to blink out of the blue. The sisters, with hands clasped and heads nestled together, went to sleep under a heavy cloak.

Early the next morning, while the girls were again delving into their apparently bottomless basket, the train stopped at Las Vegas.

“Look! Look!” cried Bo in thrilling voice. “
Cowboys!
Oh, Nell, look!”

Helen, laughing, looked first at her sister and thought how best of all she was good to look at. Bo was little, instinct with pulsating life, and she had chestnut hair and dark blue eyes. These eyes were flashing, roguish, and they drew like magnets.

Outside on the rude platform were railroad men, Mexicans, and a group of lounging cowboys. Long lean bowlegged fellows they were, with young frank faces and intent eyes. One of them seemed particularly attractive with his superb build, his red-bronze face and bright red scarf, his swinging gun, and the huge long curved spurs. Evidently he caught Bo’s admiring gaze for, with a word to his companions, he sauntered toward the window where the girls sat. His gait was singular, almost awkward, as if he was not accustomed to walking. The long spurs
jingled
musically. He removed his sombrero and stood at ease, frank, cool, smiling. Helen liked him on sight, and, looking to see what effect he had on Bo, she found that young lady staring, frightened, stiff.

“Good mawnin’,” drawled the cowboy with slow good-humored smile. “Now where might you-all be travelin’?”

The sound of his voice, the clean-cut and droll geniality seemed new and delightful to Helen.

“We go to Magdalena…then take stage for the White Mountains,” replied Helen.

The cowboy’s still intent eyes showed surprise. “Apache country, miss,” he said. “I reckon I’m sorry. Thet’s shore no place for you-all…. Beggin’ your pawdin…you ain’t Mormons?”

“No. We’re nieces of Al Auchincloss,” rejoined Helen.

“Wal, you don’t say! I’ve been down Magdalena way an’ heerd of Al…. Reckon you’re goin’ a-visitin’?”

“It’s to be home for us.”

“Shore thet’s fine! The West needs girls…. Yes, I’ve heered of Al. An old Arizona cattleman in a sheep country! Thet’s bad…. Now I’m wonderin’…if I’d drift down there an’ ask him for a job ridin’ for him…would I get it?”

His lazy smile was infectious and his meaning was as clear as crystal water. The gaze he bent upon Bo somehow pleased Helen. The last year or two, since Bo had grown prettier all the time, she had been a magnet for admiring glances. This one of the cowboys inspired respect and liking, as well as amusement. It certainly was not lost upon Bo.

“My uncle once said in a letter that he never had enough men to run his ranch,” replied Helen, smiling.

“Shore, I’ll go. I reckon I’d jest naturally drift thet way…now.”

He seemed so laconic, so easy, so nice that he could not be taken seriously, yet Helen’s quick perceptions registered a daring, a something that was both sudden and inevitable in him. His last word was as clear as the soft look he fixed upon Bo.

Helen had a mischievous trait, which, subdue it as she would, occasionally cropped out, and Bo, who once in her willful life had been rendered speechless, offered such a temptation.

“Maybe my little sister will put in a good word for you…to Uncle Al,” said Helen.

Just then the train jerked and started slowly. The cowboy took two long strides beside the car, his heated boyish face almost on a level with the window, his eyes, now shy and a little wistful, yet bold, fixed upon Bo.

“Good bye…
sweetheart!
” he called. He halted—was lost to view.

“Well!” ejaculated Helen contritely, half sorry and half amused. “What a sudden young gentleman!”

Bo had blushed beautifully. “Nell, wasn’t he glorious?” she burst out, with eyes shining.

“I’d hardly call him that, but he was…nice,” replied Helen, much relieved that Bo had apparently not taken offense at her.

It appeared plain that Bo resisted a frantic desire to look out of the window and to wave her hand. But she only peeped out, manifestly to her disappointment.

“Do you think he…he’ll come to Uncle Al’s?” asked Bo.

“Child, he was only in fun.”

“Nell, I’ll bet you he comes…. Oh, it’d be great! I’m going to love cowboys. They don’t look like that Harve Riggs who ran after you so.”

Helen sighed, partly because of the reminder of her odious suitor, and partly because Bo’s future already called mysteriously to the child. Helen had to be at once a mother and a protector to a girl of intense and willful spirit.

One of the train men directed the girls’ attention to a green sloping mountain rising to bold blunt bluff of bare rock, and, calling it Starvation Peak, he told a story of how Indians had once driven Spaniards up there and starved them. Bo was intensely interested, and thereafter she watched more keenly than ever, and always had a question for a passing train man. The adobe houses of the Mexicans pleased her, and when the train got into Indian country, where pueblos appeared near the track and Indians with their bright colors and shaggy wild mustangs—then she was enraptured.

“But these Indians are peaceful!” she exclaimed once, regretfully.

“Gracious, child! You don’t want to see hostile Indians, do you?” queried Helen.

“I do, you bet,” was the frank rejoinder.

“Well,
I’ll
bet that I’ll be sorry I didn’t leave you with Mother.”

“Nell…you never will!”

They reached Albuquerque about noon, and this important station, where they had to change trains, had been the first dreaded anticipation of the journey. It certainly was a busy place—full of jabbering Mexicans, stalking red-faced wicked-looking cowboys, lolling Indians. In the confusion Helen would have been hard put to it to preserve calmness, with Bo to watch, and all that baggage to carry, and the other train to find, but the kindly train man who had been attentive to them now helped them off the train into the other—a ser vice for which Helen was very grateful.

“Albuquerque’s a hard place,” confided the train man. “Better stay in the car…and don’t hang out the windows…. Good luck to you!”

Only a few passengers were in the car and they were Mexicans at the forward end. This branch train consisted of the one passenger coach, with a baggage car, attached to a string of freight cars. Helen told herself, somewhat grimly, that soon she would know surely whether or not her suspicions of Harve Riggs had warrant. If he was going on to Magdalena on that day, he must go in this coach. Presently Bo, who was not obeying admonitions, drew her head out of the window. Her eyes were wide in amaze, her mouth open.

“Nell! I saw that man Riggs,” she whispered. “He’s going to get on this train.”

“Bo, I saw him yesterday,” replied Helen soberly.

“He’s followed you…the…the….”

“Now, Bo, don’t get excited,” remonstrated Helen. “We’ve left home now. We’ve got to take things as they come. Never mind if Riggs has followed me. I’ll settle him.”

“Oh! Then you won’t speak…have anything to do with him?”

“I won’t if I can help it.”

Other passengers boarded the train, dusty uncouth rugged men, and some hard-featured, poorly clad women, marked by toil, and several more Mexicans. With bustle and loud talk they found their several seats.

Then Helen saw Harve Riggs enter, burdened with much luggage. He was a man of about medium height, of dark flashy appearance, cultivating long black mustache and hair. His apparel was striking, as it consisted of black frock coat, black trousers stuffed in high fancy tipped boots, an embroidered vest and flowing tie, and a black sombrero. His belt and gun were prominent. It was significant that he excited comment among the other passengers.

When he had deposited his pieces of luggage, he seemed to square himself and, turning abruptly, approached the seat occupied by the girls. When he reached it, he sat down upon the arm of the one opposite, took off his sombrero, and deliberately looked at Helen. His eyes were light, glinting with hard restless quiver, and his mouth was coarse and arrogant. Helen had never seen him detached from her home surroundings, and now the difference struck coldly upon her heart. Here was a character whose badness even she had underestimated.

“Hello, Nell,” he said. “Surprised to see me?”

“No,” she replied coldly.

“I’ll gamble you are.”

“Harve Riggs, I told you the day before I left home that nothing you could do or say mattered to me.”

“Reckon that ain’t so, Nell. Any woman I keep track of has reason to think. An’ you know it.”

“Then you followed me…out here?” demanded Helen, and her voice, despite her control, quivered with anger.

“I sure did,” he replied, and there was as much thought of himself in the act as there was of her.

“Why? Why? It’s useless…hopeless.”

“I swore I’d have you or nobody else would,” he replied, and here, in the passion of his voice, there sounded egotism, rather than hunger for a woman’s love. “But, I reckon, I’d have struck West anyhow, sooner or later.”