Riders of the Purple Sage Page 4

  CHAPTER IV. DECEPTION PASS

  The rider thundered up and almost threw his foam-flecked horse in thesudden stop. He was a giant form, and with fearless eyes.

  "Judkins, you're all bloody!" cried Jane, in affright. "Oh, you've beenshot!"

  "Nothin' much Miss Withersteen. I got a nick in the shoulder. I'm somewet an' the hoss's been throwin' lather, so all this ain't blood."

  "What's up?" queried Venters, sharply.

  "Rustlers sloped off with the red herd."

  "Where are my riders?" demanded Jane.

  "Miss Withersteen, I was alone all night with the herd. At daylight thismornin' the rustlers rode down. They began to shoot at me on sight. Theychased me hard an' far, burnin' powder all the time, but I got away."

  "Jud, they meant to kill you," declared Venters.

  "Now I wonder," returned Judkins. "They wanted me bad. An' it ain'tregular for rustlers to waste time chasin' one rider."

  "Thank heaven you got away," said Jane. "But my riders--where are they?"

  "I don't know. The night-riders weren't there last night when I rodedown, en' this mornin' I met no day-riders."

  "Judkins! Bern, they've been set upon--killed by Oldring's men!"

  "I don't think so," replied Venters, decidedly. "Jane, your ridershaven't gone out in the sage."

  "Bern, what do you mean?" Jane Withersteen turned deathly pale.

  "You remember what I said about the unseen hand?"

  "Oh!... Impossible!"

  "I hope so. But I fear--" Venters finished, with a shake of his head.

  "Bern, you're bitter; but that's only natural. We'll wait to see what'shappened to my riders. Judkins, come to the house with me. Your woundmust be attended to."

  "Jane, I'll find out where Oldring drives the herd," vowed Venters.

  "No, no! Bern, don't risk it now--when the rustlers are in such shootingmood."

  "I'm going. Jud, how many cattle in that red herd?"

  "Twenty-five hundred head."

  "Whew! What on earth can Oldring do with so many cattle? Why, a hundredhead is a big steal. I've got to find out."

  "Don't go," implored Jane.

  "Bern, you want a hoss thet can run. Miss Withersteen, if it's not toobold of me to advise, make him take a fast hoss or don't let him go."

  "Yes, yes, Judkins. He must ride a horse that can't be caught. Whichone--Black Star--Night?"

  "Jane, I won't take either," said Venters, emphatically. "I wouldn'trisk losing one of your favorites."

  "Wrangle, then?"

  "Thet's the hoss," replied Judkins. "Wrangle can outrun Black Star an'Night. You'd never believe it, Miss Withersteen, but I know. Wrangle'sthe biggest en' fastest hoss on the sage."

  "Oh no, Wrangle can't beat Black Star. But, Bern, take Wrangle if youwill go. Ask Jerd for anything you need. Oh, be watchful, careful.... Godspeed you."

  She clasped his hand, turned quickly away, and went down a lane with therider.

  Venters rode to the barn, and, leaping off, shouted for Jerd. The boycame running. Venters sent him for meat, bread, and dried fruits, tobe packed in saddlebags. His own horse he turned loose into the nearestcorral. Then he went for Wrangle. The giant sorrel had earned his namefor a trait the opposite of amiability. He came readily out of the barn,but once in the yard he broke from Venters, and plunged about with earslaid back. Venters had to rope him, and then he kicked down a sectionof fence, stood on his hind legs, crashed down and fought the rope. Jerdreturned to lend a hand.

  "Wrangle don't git enough work," said Jerd, as the big saddle went on."He's unruly when he's corralled, an' wants to run. Wait till he smellsthe sage!"

  "Jerd, this horse is an iron-jawed devil. I never straddled him butonce. Run? Say, he's swift as wind!"

  When Venters's boot touched the stirrup the sorrel bolted, giving himthe rider's flying mount. The swing of this fiery horse recalled toVenters days that were not really long past, when he rode into the sageas the leader of Jane Withersteen's riders. Wrangle pulled hard on atight rein. He galloped out of the lane, down the shady border ofthe grove, and hauled up at the watering-trough, where he pranced andchamped his bit. Venters got off and filled his canteen while the horsedrank. The dogs, Ring and Whitie, came trotting up for their drink. ThenVenters remounted and turned Wrangle toward the sage.

  A wide, white trail wound away down the slope. One keen, sweeping glancetold Venters that there was neither man nor horse nor steer within thelimit of his vision, unless they were lying down in the sage. Ring lopedin the lead and Whitie loped in the rear. Wrangle settled gradually intoan easy swinging canter, and Venters's thoughts, now that the rush andflurry of the start were past, and the long miles stretched before him,reverted to a calm reckoning of late singular coincidences.

  There was the night ride of Tull's, which, viewed in the light ofsubsequent events, had a look of his covert machinations; Oldring andhis Masked Rider and his rustlers riding muffled horses; the reportthat Tull had ridden out that morning with his man Jerry on the trailto Glaze, the strange disappearance of Jane Withersteen's riders,the unusually determined attempt to kill the one Gentile still in heremploy, an intention frustrated, no doubt, only by Judkin's magnificentriding of her racer, and lastly the driving of the red herd. Theseevents, to Venters's color of mind, had a dark relationship. RememberingJane's accusation of bitterness, he tried hard to put aside his rancorin judging Tull. But it was bitter knowledge that made him see thetruth. He had felt the shadow of an unseen hand; he had watched till hesaw its dim outline, and then he had traced it to a man's hate, tothe rivalry of a Mormon Elder, to the power of a Bishop, to the long,far-reaching arm of a terrible creed. That unseen hand had made itsfirst move against Jane Withersteen. Her riders had been called in,leaving her without help to drive seven thousand head of cattle. But toVenters it seemed extraordinary that the power which had called in theseriders had left so many cattle to be driven by rustlers and harried bywolves. For hand in glove with that power was an insatiate greed; theywere one and the same.

  "What can Oldring do with twenty-five hundred head of cattle?" mutteredVenters. "Is he a Mormon? Did he meet Tull last night? It looks likea black plot to me. But Tull and his churchmen wouldn't ruin JaneWithersteen unless the Church was to profit by that ruin. Where doesOldring come in? I'm going to find out about these things."

  Wrangle did the twenty-five miles in three hours and walked little ofthe way. When he had gotten warmed up he had been allowed to choose hisown gait. The afternoon had well advanced when Venters struck the trailof the red herd and found where it had grazed the night before. ThenVenters rested the horse and used his eyes. Near at hand were a cowand a calf and several yearlings, and farther out in the sage somestraggling steers. He caught a glimpse of coyotes skulking near thecattle. The slow sweeping gaze of the rider failed to find other livingthings within the field of sight. The sage about him was breast-high tohis horse, oversweet with its warm, fragrant breath, gray where itwaved to the light, darker where the wind left it still, and beyond thewonderful haze-purple lent by distance. Far across that wide waste beganthe slow lift of uplands through which Deception Pass cut its tortuousmany-canyoned way.

  Venters raised the bridle of his horse and followed the broad cattletrail. The crushed sage resembled the path of a monster snake. In a fewmiles of travel he passed several cows and calves that had escaped thedrive. Then he stood on the last high bench of the slope with the floorof the valley beneath. The opening of the canyon showed in a break ofthe sage, and the cattle trail paralleled it as far as he could see.That trail led to an undiscovered point where Oldring drove cattleinto the pass, and many a rider who had followed it had never returned.Venters satisfied himself that the rustlers had not deviated from theirusual course, and then he turned at right angles off the cattle trailand made for the head of the pass.

  The sun lost its heat and wore down to the western horizon, where itchanged from white to gold and rested like a huge ball about to roll onits golden shadows down t
he slope. Venters watched the lengthening ofthe rays and bars, and marveled at his own league-long shadow. The sunsank. There was instant shading of brightness about him, and he saw akind of cold purple bloom creep ahead of him to cross the canyon, tomount the opposite slope and chase and darken and bury the last goldenflare of sunlight.

  Venters rode into a trail that he always took to get down into thecanyon. He dismounted and found no tracks but his own made daysprevious. Nevertheless he sent the dog Ring ahead and waited. In alittle while Ring returned. Whereupon Venters led his horse on to thebreak in the ground.

  The opening into Deception Pass was one of the remarkable naturalphenomena in a country remarkable for vast slopes of sage, uplandsinsulated by gigantic red walls, and deep canyons of mysterious sourceand outlet. Here the valley floor was level, and here opened a narrowchasm, a ragged vent in yellow walls of stone. The trail down the fivehundred feet of sheer depth always tested Venters's nerve. It wasbad going for even a burro. But Wrangle, as Venters led him, snorteddefiance or disgust rather than fear, and, like a hobbled horse on thejump, lifted his ponderous iron-shod fore hoofs and crashed down overthe first rough step. Venters warmed to greater admiration of thesorrel; and, giving him a loose bridle, he stepped down foot by foot.Oftentimes the stones and shale started by Wrangle buried Venters tohis knees; again he was hard put to it to dodge a rolling boulder, therewere times when he could not see Wrangle for dust, and once he and thehorse rode a sliding shelf of yellow, weathered cliff. It was a trailon which there could be no stops, and, therefore, if perilous, it was atleast one that did not take long in the descent.

  Venters breathed lighter when that was over, and felt a sudden assurancein the success of his enterprise. For at first it had been a recklessdetermination to achieve something at any cost, and now it resolveditself into an adventure worthy of all his reason and cunning, andkeenness of eye and ear.

  Pinyon pines clustered in little clumps along the level floor of thepass. Twilight had gathered under the walls. Venters rode into the trailand up the canyon. Gradually the trees and caves and objects low downturned black, and this blackness moved up the walls till night enfoldedthe pass, while day still lingered above. The sky darkened; and starsbegan to show, at first pale and then bright. Sharp notches of therim-wall, biting like teeth into the blue, were landmarks by whichVenters knew where his camping site lay. He had to feel his way througha thicket of slender oaks to a spring where he watered Wrangle and drankhimself. Here he unsaddled and turned Wrangle loose, having no fear thatthe horse would leave the thick, cool grass adjacent to the spring. Nexthe satisfied his own hunger, fed Ring and Whitie and, with them curledbeside him, composed himself to await sleep.

  There had been a time when night in the high altitude of these Utahuplands had been satisfying to Venters. But that was before theoppression of enemies had made the change in his mind. As a riderguarding the herd he had never thought of the night's wildness andloneliness; as an outcast, now when the full silence set in, and thedeep darkness, and trains of radiant stars shone cold and calm, helay with an ache in his heart. For a year he had lived as a black fox,driven from his kind. He longed for the sound of a voice, the touch ofa hand. In the daytime there was riding from place to place, and thegun practice to which something drove him, and other tasks that at leastnecessitated action, at night, before he won sleep, there was strife inhis soul. He yearned to leave the endless sage slopes, the wildernessof canyons, and it was in the lonely night that this yearning grewunbearable. It was then that he reached forth to feel Ring or Whitie,immeasurably grateful for the love and companionship of two dogs.

  On this night the same old loneliness beset Venters, the old habitof sad thought and burning unquiet had its way. But from it evolved aconviction that his useless life had undergone a subtle change. He hadsensed it first when Wrangle swung him up to the high saddle, he knewit now when he lay in the gateway of Deception Pass. He had no thrill ofadventure, rather a gloomy perception of great hazard, perhaps death. Hemeant to find Oldring's retreat. The rustlers had fast horses, but nonethat could catch Wrangle. Venters knew no rustler could creep upon himat night when Ring and Whitie guarded his hiding-place. For the rest, hehad eyes and ears, and a long rifle and an unerring aim, which he meantto use. Strangely his foreshadowing of change did not hold a thoughtof the killing of Tull. It related only to what was to happen to him inDeception Pass; and he could no more lift the veil of that mystery thantell where the trails led to in that unexplored canyon. Moreover, he didnot care. And at length, tired out by stress of thought, he fell asleep.

  When his eyes unclosed, day had come again, and he saw the rim of theopposite wall tipped with the gold of sunrise. A few moments sufficedfor the morning's simple camp duties. Near at hand he found Wrangle,and to his surprise the horse came to him. Wrangle was one of the horsesthat left his viciousness in the home corral. What he wanted was to befree of mules and burros and steers, to roll in dust-patches, and thento run down the wide, open, windy sage-plains, and at night browse andsleep in the cool wet grass of a springhole. Jerd knew the sorrel whenhe said of him, "Wait till he smells the sage!"

  Venters saddled and led him out of the oak thicket, and, leapingastride, rode up the canyon, with Ring and Whitie trotting behind. Anold grass-grown trail followed the course of a shallow wash where floweda thin stream of water. The canyon was a hundred rods wide, its yellowwalls were perpendicular; it had abundant sage and a scant growth of oakand pinon. For five miles it held to a comparatively straight bearing,and then began a heightening of rugged walls and a deepening of thefloor. Beyond this point of sudden change in the character of thecanyon Venters had never explored, and here was the real door to theintricacies of Deception Pass.

  He reined Wrangle to a walk, halted now and then to listen, and thenproceeded cautiously with shifting and alert gaze. The canyon assumedproportions that dwarfed those of its first ten miles. Venters rode onand on, not losing in the interest of his wide surroundings any of hiscaution or keen search for tracks or sight of living thing. If thereever had been a trail here, he could not find it. He rode through sageand clumps of pinon trees and grassy plots where long-petaled purplelilies bloomed. He rode through a dark constriction of the pass no widerthan the lane in the grove at Cottonwoods. And he came out into a greatamphitheater into which jutted huge towering corners of a confluence ofintersecting canyons.

  Venters sat his horse, and, with a rider's eye, studied this wildcross-cut of huge stone gullies. Then he went on, guided by the courseof running water. If it had not been for the main stream of waterflowing north he would never have been able to tell which of those manyopenings was a continuation of the pass. In crossing this amphitheaterhe went by the mouths of five canyons, fording little streams thatflowed into the larger one. Gaining the outlet which he took to be thepass, he rode on again under over hanging walls. One side was dark inshade, the other light in sun. This narrow passageway turned and twistedand opened into a valley that amazed Venters.

  Here again was a sweep of purple sage, richer than upon the higherlevels. The valley was miles long, several wide, and inclosed byunscalable walls. But it was the background of this valley that soforcibly struck him. Across the sage-flat rose a strange up-flinging ofyellow rocks. He could not tell which were close and which were distant.Scrawled mounds of stone, like mountain waves, seemed to roll up tosteep bare slopes and towers.

  In this plain of sage Venters flushed birds and rabbits, and when he hadproceeded about a mile he caught sight of the bobbing white tails ofa herd of running antelope. He rode along the edge of the stream whichwound toward the western end of the slowly looming mounds of stone.The high slope retreated out of sight behind the nearer protection.To Venters the valley appeared to have been filled in by a mountain ofmelted stone that had hardened in strange shapes of rounded outline.He followed the stream till he lost it in a deep cut. Therefore Ventersquit the dark slit which baffled further search in that direction, androde out along the curved edge of stone where it m
et the sage. It wasnot long before he came to a low place, and here Wrangle readily climbedup.

  All about him was ridgy roll of wind-smoothed, rain-washed rock. Not atuft of grass or a bunch of sage colored the dull rust-yellow. He sawwhere, to the right, this uneven flow of stone ended in a blunt wall.Leftward, from the hollow that lay at his feet, mounted a gradualslow-swelling slope to a great height topped by leaning, cracked,and ruined crags. Not for some time did he grasp the wonder of thatacclivity. It was no less than a mountain-side, glistening in the sunlike polished granite, with cedar-trees springing as if by magic out ofthe denuded surface. Winds had swept it clear of weathered shale, andrains had washed it free of dust. Far up the curved slope its beautifullines broke to meet the vertical rim-wall, to lose its grace in adifferent order and color of rock, a stained yellow cliff of cracks andcaves and seamed crags. And straight before Venters was a scene lessstriking but more significant to his keen survey. For beyond a mileof the bare, hummocky rock began the valley of sage, and the mouths ofcanyons, one of which surely was another gateway into the pass.

  He got off his horse, and, giving the bridle to Ring to hold, hecommenced a search for the cleft where the stream ran. He was notsuccessful and concluded the water dropped into an underground passage.Then he returned to where he had left Wrangle, and led him down off thestone to the sage. It was a short ride to the opening canyons. There wasno reason for a choice of which one to enter. The one he rode into was aclear, sharp shaft in yellow stone a thousand feet deep, with wonderfulwind-worn caves low down and high above buttressed and turretedramparts. Farther on Venters came into a region where deep indentationsmarked the line of canyon walls. These were huge, cove-like blindpockets extending back to a sharp corner with a dense growth ofunderbrush and trees.

  Venters penetrated into one of these offshoots, and, as he had hoped, hefound abundant grass. He had to bend the oak saplings to get his horsethrough. Deciding to make this a hiding-place if he could find water, heworked back to the limit of the shelving walls. In a little cluster ofsilver spruces he found a spring. This inclosed nook seemed an idealplace to leave his horse and to camp at night, and from which to makestealthy trips on foot. The thick grass hid his trail; the dense growthof oaks in the opening would serve as a barrier to keep Wrangle in, if,indeed, the luxuriant browse would not suffice for that. So Venters,leaving Whitie with the horse, called Ring to his side, and, rifle inhand, worked his way out to the open. A careful photographing in mindof the formation of the bold outlines of rimrock assured him he would beable to return to his retreat even in the dark.

  Bunches of scattered sage covered the center of the canyon, and amongthese Venters threaded his way with the step of an Indian. At intervalshe put his hand on the dog and stopped to listen. There was a drowsyhum of insects, but no other sound disturbed the warm midday stillness.Venters saw ahead a turn, more abrupt than any yet. Warily he roundedthis corner, once again to halt bewildered.

  The canyon opened fan-shaped into a great oval of green and graygrowths. It was the hub of an oblong wheel, and from it, at regulardistances, like spokes, ran the outgoing canyons. Here a dull red colorpredominated over the fading yellow. The corners of wall bluntly rose,scarred and scrawled, to taper into towers and serrated peaks andpinnacled domes.

  Venters pushed on more heedfully than ever. Toward the center of thiscircle the sage-brush grew smaller and farther apart He was about tosheer off to the right, where thickets and jumbles of fallen rock wouldafford him cover, when he ran right upon a broad cattle trail. Like aroad it was, more than a trail, and the cattle tracks were fresh. Whatsurprised him more, they were wet! He pondered over this feature. Ithad not rained. The only solution to this puzzle was that the cattle hadbeen driven through water, and water deep enough to wet their legs.

  Suddenly Ring growled low. Venters rose cautiously and looked over thesage. A band of straggling horsemen were riding across the oval. Hesank down, startled and trembling. "Rustlers!" he muttered. Hurriedlyhe glanced about for a place to hide. Near at hand there wasnothing but sage-brush. He dared not risk crossing the openpatches to reach the rocks. Again he peeped over the sage. Therustlers--four--five--seven--eight in all, were approaching, but notdirectly in line with him. That was relief for a cold deadness whichseemed to be creeping inward along his veins. He crouched down withbated breath and held the bristling dog.

  He heard the click of iron-shod hoofs on stone, the coarse laughter ofmen, and then voices gradually dying away. Long moments passed. Then herose. The rustlers were riding into a canyon. Their horses were tired,and they had several pack animals; evidently they had traveled far.Venters doubted that they were the rustlers who had driven the red herd.Olding's band had split. Venters watched these horsemen disappear undera bold canyon wall.

  The rustlers had come from the northwest side of the oval. Venters kepta steady gaze in that direction, hoping, if there were more, to seefrom what canyon they rode. A quarter of an hour went by. Reward for hisvigilance came when he descried three more mounted men, far over to thenorth. But out of what canyon they had ridden it was too late to tell.He watched the three ride across the oval and round the jutting redcorner where the others had gone.

  "Up that canyon!" exclaimed Venters. "Oldring's den! I've found it!"

  A knotty point for Venters was the fact that the cattle tracks allpointed west. The broad trail came from the direction of the canyoninto which the rustlers had ridden, and undoubtedly the cattle had beendriven out of it across the oval. There were no tracks pointing theother way. It had been in his mind that Oldring had driven the red herdtoward the rendezvous, and not from it. Where did that broad trail comedown into the pass, and where did it lead? Venters knew he wastedtime in pondering the question, but it held a fascination not easilydispelled. For many years Oldring's mysterious entrance and exit toDeception Pass had been all-absorbing topics to sage-riders.

  All at once the dog put an end to Venters's pondering. Ring sniffed theair, turned slowly in his tracks with a whine, and then growled. Venterswheeled. Two horsemen were within a hundred yards, coming straight athim. One, lagging behind the other, was Oldring's Masked Rider.

  Venters cunningly sank, slowly trying to merge into sage-brush. But,guarded as his action was, the first horse detected it. He stoppedshort, snorted, and shot up his ears. The rustler bent forward, as ifkeenly peering ahead. Then, with a swift sweep, he jerked a gun from itssheath and fired.

  The bullet zipped through the sage-brush. Flying bits of wood struckVenters, and the hot, stinging pain seemed to lift him in one leap.Like a flash the blue barrel of his rifle gleamed level and he shotonce--twice.

  The foremost rustler dropped his weapon and toppled from his saddle, tofall with his foot catching in a stirrup. The horse snorted wildly andplunged away, dragging the rustler through the sage.

  The Masked Rider huddled over his pommel slowly swaying to one side, andthen, with a faint, strange cry, slipped out of the saddle.