Judith of the Godless Valley Part 65

"I've got grub for a week, thanks!" exclaimed Douglas. Then he asked Elijah, hesitatingly, "Will you tell me why you are so kind to me?"

"As I said, it's my religion."

Douglas stared at his host's kindly face. "I'm dog sorry," he said, "for what I called you. But, how was I to know? I've been brought up to hate Mormons."

Elijah nodded. "I guess we're square. What kind of a man is Fowler?"

"I like him. But I don't know whether he's the man for the job I set him, or not. But he's going to stay," lips tightening. "I'll see to that! Have you always been a Mormon, Mr. Nelson?"

"Brought up in it. And I've brought my children up in it. Judith told us about the rotten trick they did you over in Lost Chief. What are you going to do about it?"

"Get them!" replied Douglas. "That is, after I find Judith. I think I know the men who did it, and the sooner they get out of our valley, the more comfortable they'll be and so will I."

"But where is that poor old man?" cried Nelson. "Have you looked for him?"

"I was trying to get a line on him from Scott Parsons when her mother brought word Judith was gone." Douglas paused and gave Elijah a straight look. "I wouldn't stop to look for any one on earth, if Judith needed me."

"Judith can take care of herself better than that old man," insisted Elijah.

"Nothing to it!" grunted Douglas. "He's been in the cow country forty years. Not but what I know it was a frightful thing to leave him. But it can't be helped."

"What shall you do about a church now?" asked Mr. Nelson.

"Build it again for the hounds to burn again! If I believed in a G.o.d I'd say he was off his job as far as I'm concerned."

"Humph!" exclaimed Elijah. "If I don't miss my guess, the Almighty is directing your business these days as he never has before. You are just about doing what He says and flattering yourself it's your own plan. G.o.d moves in a mysterious way, His wonders to perform."

"I wish I could believe it," muttered Douglas, starting for the door.

"Now, I s.h.i.+fted saddle and pack for you to two horses of mine!" said Elijah. "If you find that girl, bring her back here. I want to have some talk with you both. You can pay me rent for 'em, so don't waste your breath arguing."

"Well, whether you are a Sioux or a Mormon," exclaimed Douglas, "you sure are white!"

Elijah grinned broadly. "Well, that's a real concession for a Gentile!

Be sure you stop here on the way out."

It was Douglas' turn to grin. "We'll sure be glad to head straight for here. But I'll warn you now. You can't make Mormons of us!"

"I'm not a-going to try. But I want to say a few things to you. No harm in that, is there?"

"None at all!" Douglas shook hands with his host, then turned to Mrs.

Nelson. "I'm sure obliged to you," he said.

"That's nothing. But look, Mr. Spencer, don't you be too sure you're going to bring that girl back with you, even if you overtake her."

Douglas nodded. "I know," he agreed huskily, "I've got my work cut out for me." Then he went out into the starlight.

Elijah followed. "The moon will be up by the time you need it. Follow trail up to the timber line. Skirt the timber line till you reach the first shoulder of Black Devil. After that, G.o.d help you! The horse you are on is named Tom. If you aren't back in five days, I'll go over to Lost Chief and get help to look for you."

"Thanks," said Douglas, and he rode away.

Warmed, refreshed, and with hope shadowing his anxiety, Douglas turned the horses southward. Tom horse was a big, broad-hoofed brute, hard-bitted and not at all enthusiastic about his prospective trip. But --he was a stronger animal than Justus and Douglas pushed him sharply through the snow.

The trail through the fields for three or four miles was easy to find in the starlight. The valley narrowed as it rose and finally Lost Chief and Black Devil thrust foot to foot in a narrow canyon. Douglas did not enter the canyon but twined upward to the right along the timber line that clothed the ankles of Black Devil. The moon had not yet risen when the timber disappeared at the foot of the first shoulder. Douglas pulled up the panting horses, turned back to the wind and rested for a few moments, then put Tom to the climb. The snow was without crust but it was knee-deep and Tom didn't like it. He floundered and snorted, but Douglas spurred him relentlessly and they crested the shoulder without pause. Here, however, Doug decided to wait for the moon.

He moved into the shelter of a rock heap, for the wind was huge, and, beating his arms across his chest, waited with what patience he could muster. Where was she now? Could even her splendid courage stand up against the eerie loneliness. If only he could see her now, returning defeated, though still defiant. But he knew that he would not meet her so. She would not give up while she had strength to pursue the adventure.

There was no view of the peak from this spot. Before him lifted a dark, shadowy wall, sloping interminably to the remote heavens. To the east, Lost Chief Range was silhouetted against a faint glow that told of the coming moon. To the west was a chaos of unfamiliar peaks. When the dusk of the mountain-slope before him turned to radiant silver, Douglas started the horses on and spurred Tom relentlessly. And if he had known how to pray, he told himself, he would have asked the Almighty to give him strength for the tremendous venture which lay before him.

CHAPTER XVII

BLACK DEVIL Pa.s.s

"They can stand the curse of being women, but they're revolting against men's being stupid."

_--The Mormon's Wife_.

Douglas spurred Tom relentlessly until the snow was belly-deep and both animals began to fight obstinately to turn back. Douglas dismounted and fastened the horses to a scrub cedar. Then he wallowed forward afoot to break trail. The wind increased constantly with the elevation, but even higher than its eerie note sounded the wild call of a solitary coyote.

Douglas heard the call but remotely. His mind was fastened on Judith fighting as he was fighting. He beat trail until his lungs protested, then he brought the horses forward, halted, and beat trail again. His nose was bleeding slightly when he at last won to the crest of the first shoulder.

This was blown clear of snow and he mounted and rode well up on the second shoulder before the horses again balked. Lost Chief Range now had dropped so that dimly beyond he could glimpse the Indian peaks. The strange peaks to the right were subsiding to be dwarfed by still other peaks against which the stars floated, pendulous and brilliant. And still Black Devil's top was invisible beyond the terraced ridge that opposed the little cavalcade.

When, after infinite effort, Douglas surmounted the third shoulder, he paused, appalled by the loneliness and danger of the position. The ridge had narrowed until its top offered barely a foothold, with sides dropping to unthinkable depths. The snow had blown clear and the wind was almost insupportable. A cedar stood before them like a sentinal guarding the eternal loneliness beyond. Tom made for this as if it were his last hope. As the horses brought up in the shelter of the tree, Douglas gave a hoa.r.s.e cry of relief and dismounted. Some charred sticks and the remains of a cottontail had not yet blown away. Douglas examined the traces of the hasty camp, then chuckled.

"Safe so far! Some girl, my Judith!"

Then his jaw stiffened and he set the horses to the last shoulder below the Pa.s.s. Groaning, trembling, b.l.o.o.d.y flanks heaving, fighting constantly to turn, Tom, when Douglas sought to force him through the drift that topped the shoulder, deliberately lay down. Douglas freed himself from the stirrups and jerked the horse to his feet.

"I wouldn't own an ornery, unwilling brute like you, for a ranch!" he panted. "Do you think I'm enjoying this, that we are a bunch of dudes on a summer outing? I'll get angry at you in a moment, fellow!"

The pack-horse had embraced the opportunity to fall asleep. Tom, violently affronted by Doug's tirade, did his not inconsiderable best to kick his mate. Then he snapped at Douglas, who promptly cuffed him on the nose. Tom reared, fell, and began to roll down the terrible slope.

The pack-horse did not waken nor stir. Doug flung himself after Tom.

Slipping, falling, rolling, he finally caught the reins, and though Tom dragged him fifty yards on downward, he at last braced his spurs against a boulder, the reins held and Tom brought up, trembling and coughing.

And now horse and man could only stand for a long time struggling for breath. When his numbing hands gave warning that his rest period must cease, Douglas, with the reins caught over his elbow, began a fight back to the crest of the ridge, a fight to which the previous portion of the trip had been as nothing. When they reached the led horse, still sleeping with his nose between his fore legs, there was no more fight left in Tom, and Douglas dropped into the snow to rest.

The moon was setting when he led his little train through the gigantic drift to the long slope which lifted to the Pa.s.s. There was no snow here. The slope, as far as Doug could discern in the failing light, was a glare of rough ice. Over this he dared not urge the horses until daylight. He looked at his watch. It was nearly five o'clock. He fastened the horses to the only cedar in sight, then stood in the wind debating with himself.

He was very much exhausted and the rare air and the intense cold were giving him no chance to recoup. This was no place to make camp. The tiny cedar offered neither shelter from the wind nor an adequate amount of fuel. And up here, in this hostile loneliness, his anxiety over Judith returned threefold. Strong as she was, clever as she was, she was as open to accidents as he. Supposing her horses had slipped on this ice and had gone over the black edge! Douglas dropped to his hands and knees and crept out upon the gla.s.sy surface. A hundred yards of this and he brought to pause before a giant boulder beside which grew several dwarf cedars. He drew his ax from its sheath and after long effort with his stiffened fingers, he got the green wood to burning. Dawn, about seven, found him napping against the warm face of the rock. He brought the horses up to the camp, fed them and himself, and as the sun shot over the Indian Range, then prepared to lead the horses onward.

The crest of Black Devil now lifted immediately above him. Just below the crest, a ledge broad enough for a pack team led straight into the blue of the sky. To the right the dark wall of the crest. To the left a sheer drop where the canyon between Lost Chief Range and Black Devil yawned hideously. This ledge, this narrow, painful crossing, made the Pa.s.s.

Douglas drew his ax and prepared to roughen a trail over the ice for the horses. But to his unspeakable delight, he had not gone far when he discovered that another ax and other horses had gone over the ice before him. He was grinning cheerfully as he sheathed his ax and took Tom's reins in hand.

It was noon when he reached the Pa.s.s. Sheer red walls to the right, rising to the hovering top of Black Devil. Still the sickening canyon depths to the left. To the south, myriad peaks, a whole world of peaks, snow-covered, serene. Far, far below, a blurred green valley, with a tiny white spot in its center. Johnson's Basin. The slope south from the Pa.s.s was very steep and deep with snow, but Douglas saw Judith's trail zig-zagging to a low shoulder round which it disappeared.