Chapter 13. The Wagon

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_ CHAPTER XIII. THE WAGON

Herrick stopped before they had gone a dozen yards from the house.

"Go on and find the women," he said, curtly. "I have something to do before they come."

"Something----" Scott stared at the little man uncomprehendingly.

"So. Do you want them to see those ugly bodies?" he pointed to the two dead Yaquis, stretched ghastly and plain in the moonlight. "I shall pull them into the shadow of the bushes."

"Well, he's nervy for a piano player, ain't he?" murmured Scott, as he and Hard turned the corner of the house.

"I think, myself, that there's a lot of rot talked about the artistic temperament," replied Hard, drily. "The war showed us that poets could fight as courageously as plumbers, and I've always thought that when you got the real unadulterated article in artistic temperament, you usually got with it a distinctly cruel streak. I believe that you and I hated killing those Indians a lot more than Herrick did, though he'll probably throw a nervous chill over it after a while and compose a piece about it."

"Well, maybe so," assented Scott. "He's the only artistic chap I ever got real close to and I don't mind admitting he's mighty queer--but he ain't yellow. I'll say that for him after to-night."

They were passing a clump of bushes as he spoke and two dark figures started forth. Scott instinctively put his hand on his gun.

"Oh," gasped the shorter figure, "what has happened? Are you shot? Who is running away--you or they?" She seized Scott's wrists with a clutching hold.

Scott laughed. "That's how you obey orders, is it? Where are the horses?"

"I don't know. We stayed right here," faltered Polly. "I want to know if you're hurt!"

"No, not if I know it, and I usually recognize bullets when they hit me."

"What happened?" insisted the other woman. "Have they gone?"

"They're fighting somebody over in the hills--we don't know who it is," replied Hard. "Probably Angel Gonzales. These fellows were evidently an advance guard."

"We ought to get out of here before they come back," said Scott. "You can't tell how long that will last--and whoever licks, we don't want to be hanging around here."

"They'll burn the place, I suppose," said Mrs. Conrad, wearily. "May I go back and get some things?"

Scott hesitated. "I think we ought to get away," he said. "But one of us will have to go back to get Herrick and the saddles--if you can hurry--go with her, Hard, and I'll go after the horses."

"Saddles?" Polly spoke suddenly. "Weren't they in the barn?"

"No; luckily I put them in the wagon when I was tinkering with it," said Scott. "We've only two horses, you know, and I want you women to ride them."

"By--by ourselves?" Mrs. Conrad's usually cheerful voice sounded a little frightened. "I couldn't find that trail in the dark; I'm not Li Yow, you know."

"The horses will take you."

"Oh, please let's keep together!" pleaded Polly. "Why can't we all go in the wagon the way you planned?"

"Well, for one reason, the harness was in the barn and was burned," said Scott, with some irritation.

"Herrick has a lot of old junk of that sort in his storeroom," volunteered Hard. "I believe you could patch up one. Those sounds have died away--the fight's over," he added. "Let's go back and have a look, and see what Herrick says."

There was a pause and the two men consulted anxiously together. It was very still--not a sound from the direction of the hills. It really did look as though the attack had been followed by flight. Scott, against what he afterward called his better judgment, but what was really only a disinclination to change his mind, gave in, and the two men walked on ahead.

"If we're going in the wagon, Hard, we've got to go by the road, and I don't stir a step on that road till I know whether this deviltry is over for the night or not. We'll camp down here for a few hours, and start by daybreak."

"Why not? The horses need the rest and so do we. I say camp, by all means."

Everything seemed harmless at the ranch house. Herrick, who had performed his unpleasant task, was studying the extent of the damage, which seemed to be confined to broken windows. When consulted, he approved of the idea of an early morning start in the wagon and believed that out of the odds and ends of harness in the storeroom something could be patched up and made to do.

"All right then." Scott's voice was emphatic. "I'll fix the wagon first thing in the morning. And now, let's all turn in and catch a few winks before daybreak."

"I don't believe I'll sleep a minute," said Polly, as the two women were left alone in the room which Clara Conrad had been occupying. "I'll throw my cloak around me and lie down on the couch. I feel awfully strung up, don't you?"

"Yes," said the older woman. "But I'm going to try to sleep, and so must you."

As a matter of fact, Clara did not expect to sleep. The meeting with Henry Hard had brought up old memories--memories both happy and sad. He had changed little, the tall, thin, sandy-haired man. It was good, oh so good, to have something back again from the old life! As she closed her eyes and put away from her the events of the day, old scenes came back with a clearness that they had not worn for many years. The old houses; the quiet, cultured, elderly men and women, the gayer young ones, herself and Hard among them; the dinners, dances, concerts; the summer days on the water, and the rides--all came back as though they had been but yesterday, and all on account of this one man who had played so important a part in them.

She realized, as she lay there in the darkness, that without putting the thought clearly, she had had deeply imbedded in her mind the idea that she would see him or hear something about him when she went back to Boston. She was not in love with him, but she had never forgotten him and she would never feel about him as she did about so many of the others who had played parts in her old life. Soothed by the thought, she drifted into a calm and restful sleep.

Polly, however, was too unskilled in the management of her thoughts to be able to relax at will. She lay quietly, so as not to disturb the other woman, but her mind was whirling. She lived again each event of the past two days; the raid on the mine, the ride with Pachuca, his escape, the trip to Casa Grande, and the growing companionship with Scott--the look she had surprised in his eyes only an hour ago when she had stood with him on the veranda, looking at the distant mountains; and then the dreadful minutes spent behind the bushes, listening to the guns of the attacking Yaquis.

"And I thought a golf tournament was exciting!" she said, smiling in the dark. Softly she rose and crept to the window. It was very beautiful out there; mountains, hills, bushes, all a study in absolute stillness. The only sound that came to her ears was the howl of a wolf in the distance.

"Coming in at just the right moment," smiled the girl. "What a country for effects! Oh dear, I believe I could sleep out there in the hammock if it wasn't too chilly."

Taking the couch cover over her arm she crept softly out of the door and out on to the veranda where the hammock swayed gently in the breeze. Polly adjusted herself in it with care; a fall would bring all the occupants of the house out with a bound.

"First they'd bound and then they'd fuss," she said to herself. "I don't want to be fussed at, I just want to snatch a few winks out under this gorgeous sky. I don't understand how when skies and stars and mountains are all laid out for them, artists want to do the red and green futurist horrors that they love so. Now, what's that noise?"

A queer kind of noise it was. Polly sat up quite suddenly. It seemed to come from behind a clump of bushes some distance to the right. It was a pounding, scraping sort of noise, not very loud, but distinctly disconcerting. You got the impression that whoever was doing it was trying not to make any more noise than he could help. Polly's heart beat rapidly. She must call one of the men. She rose unsteadily and at the same moment the noise stopped. A tall figure stepped out from behind the bushes and came toward the house.

Polly stepped back into the shadow of the porch. She was about to dive into the open window when another sound caught her ear. The man was whistling softly--whistling the Slumber Motif from Die Walkuere! Polly laughed aloud. She had taken Henry Hard for a bandit.

"Hello, what are you doing up on deck?" he said, whimsically. "I thought we'd sent the passengers below and battened down the hatches."

"I couldn't sleep, so I came out here. What are you doing with that pick? Was it you I heard digging?"

"Scott and me. I came up for a match."

"But what can you be digging for at this time of night? Not buried treasure?" eagerly.

"My dear child, I hate to disappoint you, knowing your feelings on the subject. If you must know, we killed a couple of Yaquis and we're burying them on what we'd call at home 'the lawn.' It's rather awful, but we can't help it."

"Killed them!" Polly's eyes were wide with horror.

"It's a rotten business, if you ask me, both killing and burying. I'm just beginning to form a faint idea of the sort of thing the youngsters we sent abroad had to face. I was keeping up my courage by whistling. Won't you go to bed like a nice girl?"

"No. I couldn't stand it in there in the dark. It doesn't seem so bad out here. Go on--don't bother about me."

After Hard had got his match and joined Scott again behind the bushes, Polly sat and listened to the ominous sounds, her pleasant reflections quite at an end.

"That's how it always goes. You begin to feel comfortable and pleased with your philosophy and yourself and then reality comes along and swats you one in the eye. I will not think of those Indians! I'll think of Bob and Emma. Wonder what kind of a nurse Emma makes? Not that she'll have a chance to try, poor lamb. Those trained ones will shoo her off and flirt with Bob themselves."

It was some time before the two men finished their ugly job. Polly saw them come out from behind the bushes and go into the house by the back door. She stretched herself sleepily--it was beginning to be a bit chilly, even when wrapped in a coat and a serape. Perhaps it would be wiser to go in. She folded the serape and started for the door, only to stop midway as Scott came out.

"Oh," she said, "I thought you'd all gone to bed."

"And you know you ought to," said he. "I don't blame you for not wanting to. Those mountains get one, don't they?"

They were standing exactly where they had stood so short a time ago, but so much had happened since that it seemed hours gone by. It wasn't to be expected, the girl thought, that they could go on from where they had left off. She looked up. He was staring at the mountains. She felt a ridiculous mixture of relief and disappointment.

"They get me," she answered. "I never knew I was so fond of mountains."

"It's the mystery of them. You have the feeling that things are going on in and about them that you don't know--that nobody'll ever know. I remember the first time I climbed a big mountain--up in Colorado. When I was about three-quarters of the way up I looked down on one of those little mountain lakes--just as blue as that ring of yours--set in the brown of the mountain. It made me feel as if I'd struck gold. I couldn't believe that anybody but the Indians and I had ever seen that lake."

Scott was leaning against the post of the veranda, still looking at the mountains. Suddenly he turned.

"Little girl, I think you'd better be going in and getting a few hours of sleep," he said. "Four o'clock comes along awfully early in the morning."

Polly said nothing. She picked up the serape again and turned to go. Then she came back again, holding out her hand.

"Mr. Scott, I haven't said a word to show that I'm grateful for what you did to-night. You saved my life, didn't you?"

Scott took the hand and smiled down into the serious eyes.

"I wouldn't go that far," he said. "Those fellows who horned into our fight did that, I reckon. I sure tried to, though, if you'd like to shake hands on that."

"You risked your own life, anyhow, so please don't spoil my story."

"Well, put it that I'll be delighted to save your life any time you say, even if I get my hide full of holes for doing it. How's that?"

"That's all right," agreed Polly, heartily. "You may call me at twenty minutes of four, if you please," and she disappeared into the house.

Scott stood a moment after she was gone, an odd little smile on his lips.

"I wonder if she'd care--or would it be another case of Joyce Henderson?" he said. "Well, serve me right for a fool if it was!" He kicked a stick out of his way as he made for the wagon. "What have you got to offer a girl, anyhow?" He took a pocket torch out and examined the wheel of the wagon. "I've seen better looking wheels and then again I've seen worse," he decided, pessimistically. "If our luck holds we'll make it. Doggone it, being civilized makes an awful idiot of a man. I'm going to dream of those poor Yaquis we've just buried, sure as shoe leather."

Four o'clock does indeed come along early when you have not closed your eyes before midnight. It also comes along chilly and dark and generally uncomfortable. The women were awakened by Hard, who had to knock loudly on their door in order to accomplish it. They tumbled to their feet and performed the necessary dressing operations in the dark, except for a candle which Clara lighted cautiously.

"And to think that people once lived by candlelight!" murmured Polly, sleepily. "Were born, married, and finally died by it. Well, the race has come up a peg, I'll say that for it."

Mrs. Conrad was ready first. She was very rapid, in a quiet, unhurried fashion. In her corduroy skirt and jacket, she looked very girlish. Polly mentally took five years off her estimate of her new acquaintance's age.

"Awfully natural looking woman, too," she commented, silently. "Most of the pretty women I know at home are always doing things to themselves--fussing over their looks; but she just seems to keep herself fresh and neat and let it go at that, and she manages to look young and handsome. As for me, I'm a rag and I look it, but perhaps as there are no tremendous beauties around, I'll pass."

She followed Mrs. Conrad into the kitchen, where she found her busy with Herrick over the breakfast. The pleasant odors of burning wood and boiling coffee had already made themselves noticed. Scott, in a corner of the kitchen, was working over the harness which he was getting into a condition possible for use. He looked up and nodded as Polly entered.

"Your gentleman friend left a few things; we won't have to starve on the road," he said, drily. "There's a side of bacon--wonder why he left that?"

"Perhaps he didn't see it," suggested Polly, sweetly.

"I guess that's the answer. There, I reckon that harness will take us as far as Athens, if we have a bit of luck. If you'll bring out what you want to take, Mrs. Conrad, we'll pack it in the wagon."

"I've only a couple of suitcases. My trunks went by rail to the border--that is, they started."

"How about you, Herrick? Afraid we can't take the piano."

Herrick looked up in some surprise. "Me?" he said. "I am not going with you, my friend."

"Not going with us? But, Victor, you can't stay here alone." Mrs. Conrad's voice had real solicitude in it.

"Why not? Li will return and you shall send him first to Conejo to buy provisions. When things settle down, my men will come back and we shall go to work again."

"You're going to stick by the ranch?" demanded Scott.

"It is my home. What else have I?" The little man's voice was sad.

"Well, maybe you're right," said Scott, after a moment. "The best way to hang on to property just now is to sit down on it. We'll send Li over to Conejo with the wagon and he can load up. If you get into trouble, remember you've got friends in this country." And the two men shook hands heartily as Scott tramped off to the wagon.

Polly did not see the parting between the musician and Clara Conrad, but the latter looked, when she came out of the house, as though she had been crying, and the little man looked more pathetic than ever as he stood alone in the doorway waving them good-bye.

"Do you think he ought to say there?" demanded Polly, as Scott helped her into the wagon.

"No, I don't, but he's obstinate and you can't move him once he makes up his mind. There's a lot of the woman in every artistic man, I believe," grunted Scott, disgustedly.

A little later, with the two Athens horses hitched to the mountain wagon, the party started out, Hard driving. The road led out through the hills where the fighting had been only a few hours ago. There was no sign of what had happened. It was a poor road, narrow, rough and little used. There were ruts in it and chuck-holes, turns and an occasional arroyo. It was rather ghostly, too, driving at this hour; the chill, early morning feel of the air, the fading moon, the faint pinkness hanging over the mountains suggesting the coming dawn.

"One thing you miss around here is the cattle," said Scott. "Up in New Mexico you'd be starting out this time in the morning and you'd see the range cattle looking at you, sort of surprised to see folks around so early in the morning; some of 'em still lying down and napping. Around here raising cattle hasn't been very popular the last few years--too hazardous."

"Miss Polly, I want you to notice that funny little house over there," said Hard, pointing to his right.

"Where?"

Indeed, there was reason for the question. The little cabin had been built tightly against a hill, with the hill scooped out to make the back part. A closer look revealed a burro standing on the roof beside the chimney.

"Well, that's the first time I ever saw a burro on a roof!" declared Polly. "Who lives there?"

"A Mexican family named Soria," replied Hard. "I'll go over and see if they know anything about the fighting last night."

"You won't need to," said Scott. "Here comes the whole population."

So it seemed. There was an old woman--very old, very thin and very brown; a younger one, half a dozen youngsters, several dogs and finally the burro. The family were clad in every sort of decrepit garment. Polly thought she had rarely seen so pitiful an assemblage; and yet they did not look particularly unhappy, except the younger woman, who hung back and seemed to have been crying. They had seen the wagon and had come out to find out what was going on. The older woman came directly to the wagon, while the younger one stood a little way off, a baby in her arms, and the other children hanging around her. She was rather a pretty woman, or would have been with half a chance. It is difficult to be pretty when your hair hangs in straggling locks, your too plump figure festoons itself around you in bags, and your clothes look as though you had never had them off since you first became acquainted with them. Poor things, they lead an awful life.

"I'll let you speak to her, Clara," Hard said, with a smile. "I think your Spanish is in better working order than mine. Ask after the daughter's husband; he's in the army and it may open the way for a little information."

Mrs. Conrad spoke in rapid and soft-sounding Spanish to the old woman who stood listening, her wrinkled face set in the monotony of hopelessness.

"How beautifully she speaks Spanish!" thought Polly, enviously. "I don't understand a word of it, but even I can tell the difference between hers and the kind that both the men speak."

"Good-morning, my friend." Clara's voice was cheerful and pleasant. "How is the family?"

"Badly, senora, very badly. My son Manuel joined the army last night and with him his wife and two little ones. Now we have no man in the house--we shall starve."

"But your daughter's husband?"

"Francisco was killed last week in a fight. The soldiers brought the news. Carlotta has four little ones now and no man."

"That is very bad. I am sorry. What soldiers do you mean?"

"Last night. The soldiers who came from the north."

"D'you mean that the crowd that was fighting up here in the hills were soldiers?" broke in Scott, eagerly. "Federal soldiers?"

"No, no, the soldiers of the revolution--Sonora troops. They march south against Sinaloa." Carlotta had crept nearer and was taking part in the conversation.

"I don't get you. Who was doing the fighting?" demanded Scott.

The old woman burst into rapid speech, leaving Scott in the lurch immediately. Clara came to his rescue.

"The poor old thing is more Indian than Mexican and she doesn't talk very clearly," she said. "She says that the party which came along the road last night was a regiment of cavalry from up north. They saw the barn burning and thought that the bandits were on the march; so they started over that way. They fell in with the stragglers of the Yaqui crowd and started to fight. As near as I can tell, each party seems to have thought that the other was Angel Gonzales' band. The Yaquis had been rooted out of their village by Gonzales and were on the warpath, poor creatures.

"Fortunately, there were a lot of Yaquis in the troop and by the time the fellows who were trying to loot us came along they began to understand the situation and the lot of them joined the troops. This old lady's son, Manuel, joined too, and his wife and babies went along. That explains why they let us alone last night."

"It does," said Scott. "And it shows that Angel is around somewhere bent on deviltry. Here, old lady, is something to buy chow for the babies for a few days--better luck to you!" He handed her some money and they drove away amid loud thanks and happy smiles.

"What in the world do you mean by the wife and babies going, too?" demanded Polly, excitedly.

"Why, here in Mexico war is a family affair," replied Scott. "There's no such thing as the girl I left behind me. The Missus goes along and so do the youngsters. She does most of the foraging for food on the march."

"The Mexican believes in equality of the sexes," said Hard. "He believes that the woman has just as much right to do manual labor, to provide a living for the family, to fight, and to perform all the other unpleasant functions of living as he has. If there are not enough to go around, he generously allows her to do his share."

"It's great to be a wife in Mexico," observed Scott, drily. "Think of that, Miss Polly, next time you meet a fascinating Spaniard."

"Don't be disagreeable," said Mrs. Conrad, "and don't tell fibs. It's the women of the lower classes who have the hard time down here just as they do in every country."

"Except the U. S. A.," replied Scott, stoutly. "A woman may have hard luck in our country because she's sick or poor or married to a no-account; but not because the general opinion of the female sex is so darned low that any loafer who comes along feels that he's got a right to treat her as he pleases."

"How you like to argue every point, don't you?" observed Polly. "Were you born like that or did it grow on you? Oh!"

The "oh" was literally jolted out of her. Turning rather a sudden curve at a pretty good clip, the wagon slipped over the edge of a chuck-hole a little deeper than the ordinary. Happening as it did in just the right place, it caught the weakened wheel and wrenched it off as neatly and as suddenly as a dentist wrenches a tooth out of the jaw of an unwilling patient.

There was a crash and a jar as the wagon sank on its side, and the frightened horses struggling to pull the dragging load, snapped the harness where Scott had patched it. The occupants were jumbled into the bottom of the wagon, except Hard, who was pitched out into the road. Scott was out in a minute and at the horses' heads; the women righted themselves just in time to see Hard pull himself to his feet, staggering as he did so.

"Hurt, Henry?" asked Scott, who was trying to calm the horses.

"No, just bent my knee under me."

"Here, hold these critturs while I pull the ladies out!"

"We're all right--that is, I'm all right. Look after Mrs. Conrad," said Polly, as Scott lifted her from the debris. "What was it? The wheel?"

Mrs. Conrad gladly availed herself of Scott's ready arm. "What did Henry do?" she said. By this time, Scott was loosing the horses from the harness and Hard had hobbled over to the edge of the road, where he sat down.

"It's my bad knee," he explained. "I did this once, only much worse, playing football in college. Fell, you know, with it doubled under me. I was laid up for six months."

"Oh, Henry!"

"Oh, I shan't be this time. It always lames me for a few hours, though, when I do anything to it. Knees are great chaps for bearing malice."

"Well, you certainly shan't walk to Athens," said Polly, with decision. "You must ride one horse and Mrs. Conrad the other, while Mr. Scott and I walk. I'd love to!"

"Dear child, you couldn't," exclaimed Clara. "Could you ride, Henry, do you think? You and Polly could ride to Athens and send somebody back for us with the other wagon."

"I could," said Hard, "but I'd rather not. I'd like to rest it for a couple of hours if I could. Scott, suppose you walk and let them ride and leave me here. There's a shady-looking spot over in those cottonwoods and I'll just rest there till I'm able to hobble back to the Soria place. You can send for me there."

"There's a trail just above here that goes over and strikes the one we came on about eight miles from Athens," said Scott, doubtfully. "I've never traveled it, but Gomez told me about it last year. Rough, he said, but navigable. I guess that's what we'd better do, Hard, leave you here and I'll walk."

"How far is it?" asked Mrs. Conrad.

"Oh, twenty miles, maybe. It cuts off a good deal."

"You shan't walk twenty miles on a rough trail, my dear man, if I can prevent it," said Clara, firmly. "You and Polly must ride, and I'll stay here with Henry. Now, please! I'm at home in this country and I'm not afraid." There was a pause, then Scott said:

"I guess she's right, Hard. They don't either of 'em ride well enough to tackle a strange trail alone, and if I walk it will delay sending back for you. One of us had better ride the trail with Polly, while the other stays at Soria's with Mrs. Conrad."

After a little more discussion it was decided that Scott and Polly should go, while the other two returned, after Hard had rested a bit, to the Soria place. Scott moved the suitcases which Clara had brought over to the little nook made by the cottonwoods, where they could be left until someone came with the Athens wagon, and helped Hard to hobble over there. Then, feeling rather as though they had deserted their friends, and yet not knowing what else to do, Scott and Polly rode away. _

Read next: Chapter 14. The Trail

Read previous: Chapter 12. A Night Ride

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