The Man of the Forest by Zane Grey (fb2 epub reader .txt) 📕

nor was there news of him to

be had. The last known of him had been late the afternoon of

the preceding day, when a sheep-herder had seen him far out

on the north range, headed for the hills. The Beemans

reported that Roy’s condition had improved, and also that

there was a subdued excitement of suspense down in the

village.

 

This second lonely night was almost unendurable for Helen.

When she slept it was to dream horrible dreams; when she lay

awake it was to have her heart leap to her throat at a

rustle of leaves near the window, and to be in torture of

imagination as to poor Bo’s plight. A thousand times Helen

said to herself that Beasley could have had the ranch and

welcome, if only Bo had been spared. Helen absolutely

connected her enemy with her sister’s disappearance. Riggs

might have been a means to it.

 

Daylight was not attended by so many fears; there were

things to do that demanded attention. And thus it was that

the next morning, shortly before noon, she was recalled to

her perplexities by a shouting out at the corrals and a

galloping of horses somewhere near. From the window she saw

a big smoke.

 

“Fire! That must be one of the barns — the old one,

farthest out,” she said, gazing out of the window. “Some

careless Mexican with his everlasting cigarette!”

 

Helen resisted an impulse to go out and see what had

happened. She had decided to stay in the house. But when

footsteps sounded on the porch and a rap on the door, she

unhesitatingly opened it. Four Mexicans stood close. One of

them, quick as thought, flashed a hand in to grasp her, and

in a single motion pulled her across the threshold.

 

“No hurt, Senora,” he said, and pointed — making motions

she must go.

 

Helen did not need to be told what this visit meant. Many as

her conjectures had been, however, she had not thought of

Beasley subjecting her to this outrage. And her blood

boiled.

 

“How dare you!” she said, trembling in her effort to control

her temper. But class, authority, voice availed nothing with

these swarthy Mexicans. They grinned. Another laid hold of

Helen with dirty, brown hand. She shrank from the contact.

 

“Let go!” she burst out, furiously. And instinctively she

began to struggle to free herself. Then they all took hold

of her. Helen’s dignity might never have been! A burning,

choking rush of blood was her first acquaintance with the

terrible passion of anger that was her inheritance from the

Auchinclosses. She who had resolved never to lay herself

open to indignity now fought like a tigress. The Mexicans,

jabbering in their excitement, had all they could do, until

they lifted her bodily from the porch. They handled her as

if she had been a half-empty sack of corn. One holding each

hand and foot they packed her, with dress disarranged and

half torn off, down the path to the lane and down the lane

to the road. There they stood upright and pushed her off her

property.

 

Through half-blind eyes Helen saw them guarding the gateway,

ready to prevent her entrance. She staggered down the road

to the village. It seemed she made her way through a red

dimness — that there was a congestion in her brain — that

the distance to Mrs. Cass’s cottage was insurmountable. But

she got there, to stagger up the path, to hear the old

woman’s cry. Dizzy, faint, sick, with a blackness enveloping

all she looked at, Helen felt herself led into the

sitting-room and placed in the big chair.

 

Presently sight and clearness of mind returned to her. She

saw Roy, white as a sheet, questioning her with terrible

eyes. The old woman hung murmuring over her, trying to

comfort her as well as fasten the disordered dress.

 

“Four greasers — packed me down — the hill — threw me off

my ranch — into the road!” panted Helen.

 

She seemed to tell this also to her own consciousness and to

realize the mighty wave of danger that shook her whole body.

 

“If I’d known — I would have killed them!”

 

She exclaimed that, full-voiced and hard, with dry, hot eyes

on her friends. Roy reached out to take her hand, speaking

huskily. Helen did not distinguish what he said. The

frightened old woman knelt, with unsteady fingers fumbling

over the rents in Helen’s dress. The moment came when

Helen’s quivering began to subside, when her blood quieted

to let her reason sway, when she began to do battle with her

rage, and slowly to take fearful stock of this consuming

peril that had been a sleeping tigress in her veins.

 

“Oh, Miss Helen, you looked so turrible, I made sure you was

hurted,” the old woman was saying.

 

Helen gazed strangely at her bruised wrists, at the one

stocking that hung down over her shoe-top, at the rent

which had bared her shoulder to the profane gaze of those

grinning, beady-eyed Mexicans.

 

“My body’s — not hurt,” she whispered.

 

Roy had lost some of his whiteness, and where his eyes had

been fierce they were now kind.

 

“Wal, Miss Nell, it’s lucky no harm’s done… . Now if

you’ll only see this whole deal clear! … Not let it

spoil your sweet way of lookin’ an’ hopin’! If you can only

see what’s raw in this West — an’ love it jest the same!”

 

Helen only half divined his meaning, but that was enough for

a future reflection. The West was beautiful, but hard. In

the faces of these friends she began to see the meaning of

the keen, sloping lines, and shadows of pain, of a lean,

naked truth, cut as from marble.

 

“For the land’s sakes, tell us all about it,” importuned

Mrs. Cass.

 

Whereupon Helen shut her eyes and told the brief narrative

of her expulsion from her home.

 

“Shore we-all expected thet,” said Roy. “An’ it’s jest as

well you’re here with a whole skin. Beasley’s in possession

now an’ I reckon we’d all sooner hev you away from thet

ranch.”

 

“But, Roy, I won’t let Beasley stay there,” cried Helen.

 

“Miss Nell, shore by the time this here Pine has growed big

enough fer law you’ll hev gray in thet pretty hair. You

can’t put Beasley off with your honest an’ rightful claim.

Al Auchincloss was a hard driver. He made enemies an’ he

made some he didn’t kill. The evil men do lives after them.

An’ you’ve got to suffer fer Al’s sins, though Al was as

good as any man who ever prospered in these parts.”

 

“Oh, what can I do? I won’t give up. I’ve been robbed. Can’t

the people help me? Must I meekly sit with my hands crossed

while that half-breed thief — Oh, it’s unbelievable!”

 

“I reckon you’ll jest hev to be patient fer a few days,”

said Roy, calmly. “It’ll all come right in the end.”

 

“Roy! You’ve had this deal, as you call it, all worked out

in mind for a long time!” exclaimed Helen.

 

“Shore, an’ I ‘ain’t missed a reckonin’ yet.”

 

“Then what will happen — in a few days?”

 

“Nell Rayner, are you goin’ to hev some spunk an’ not lose

your nerve again or go wild out of your head?”

 

“I’ll try to be brave, but — but I must be prepared,” she

replied, tremulously.

 

“Wal, there’s Dale an’ Las Vegas an’ me fer Beasley to

reckon with. An’, Miss Nell, his chances fer long life are

as pore as his chances fer heaven!”

 

“But, Roy, I don’t believe in deliberate taking of life,”

replied Helen, shuddering. “That’s against my religion. I

won’t allow it… . And — then — think, Dale, all of you

— in danger!”

 

“Girl, how ‘re you ever goin’ to help yourself? Shore you

might hold Dale back, if you love him, an’ swear you won’t

give yourself to him… . An’ I reckon I’d respect your

religion, if you was goin’ to suffer through me… . But

not Dale nor you — nor Bo — nor love or heaven or hell can

ever stop thet cowboy Las Vegas!”

 

“Oh, if Dale brings Bo back to me — what will I care for my

ranch?” murmured Helen.

 

“Reckon you’ll only begin to care when thet happens. Your

big hunter has got to be put to work,” replied Roy, with his

keen smile.

 

Before noon that day the baggage Helen had packed at home

was left on the porch of Widow Cass’s cottage, and Helen’s

anxious need of the hour was satisfied. She was made

comfortable in the old woman’s one spare room, and she set

herself the task of fortitude and endurance.

 

To her surprise, many of Mrs. Cass’s neighbors came

unobtrusively to the back door of the little cottage and

made sympathetic inquiries. They appeared a subdued and

apprehensive group, and whispered to one another as they

left. Helen gathered from their visits a conviction that the

wives of the men dominated by Beasley believed no good could

come of this high-handed taking over of the ranch. Indeed,

Helen found at the end of the day that a strength had been

borne of her misfortune.

 

The next day Roy informed her that his brother John had come

down the preceding night with the news of Beasley’s descent

upon the ranch. Not a shot had been fired, and the only

damage done was that of the burning of a hay-filled barn.

This had been set on fire to attract Helen’s men to one

spot, where Beasley had ridden down upon them with three

times their number. He had boldly ordered them off the land,

unless they wanted to acknowledge him boss and remain there

in his service. The three Beemans had stayed, having planned

that just in this event they might be valuable to Helen’s

interests. Beasley had ridden down into Pine the same as

upon any other day. Roy reported also news which had come in

that morning, how Beasley’s crowd had celebrated late the

night before.

 

The second and third and fourth days endlessly wore away,

and Helen believed they had made her old. At night she lay

awake most of the time, thinking and praying, but during the

afternoon she got some sleep. She could think of nothing and

talk of nothing except her sister, and Dale’s chances of

saving her.

 

“Well, shore you pay Dale a pore compliment,” finally

protested the patient Roy. “I tell you — Milt Dale can do

anythin’ he wants to do in the woods. You can believe thet.

… But I reckon he’ll run chances after he comes back.”

 

This significant speech thrilled Helen with its assurance of

hope, and made her blood curdle at the implied peril

awaiting the hunter.

 

On the afternoon of the fifth day Helen was abruptly

awakened from her nap. The sun had almost set. She heard

voices — the shrill, cackling notes of old Mrs. Cass, high

in excitement, a deep voice that made Helen tingle all over,

a girl’s laugh, broken but happy. There were footsteps and

stamping of hoofs. Dale had brought Bo back! Helen knew it.

She grew very weak, and had to force herself to stand erect.

Her heart began to pound in her very ears. A sweet and

perfect joy suddenly flooded her soul. She thanked God her

prayers had been answered. Then suddenly alive with sheer

mad physical gladness, she rushed out.

 

She was just in time to see Roy Beeman stalk out as if he

had never been shot, and with a yell greet a big, gray-clad,