That was why he ran straight ahead, but presently the last of his breath came groaning from his lips, for the ravine that had commenced in such a narrow gorge now opened up suddenly into a considerable valley floor, with heap of rock like the beginning, or the wreckage, of a small hill in the middle of it.
He slowed to a dogtrot, despairing, and on top of that despair he heard the crashing of iron-shod hoofs on the rocks at the entrance of the gorge.
The world spun around him and over him. He seemed to be running with the blue of the sky under his feet. There was only one way for him to head, and that was straight at the heap of great rocks in the middle of the valley, and that was, accordingly, his goal.
He reached it with bullets all around him. Over his shoulder he saw that they had entered his own part of the canyon, and were fanning out, firing as they galloped. Behind the first rock he sank down and waited for death.
XVII—SILVER’S DECISION
LOVELL WENT BACK toward the camp of Jim Silver, whining all the way—whining and snarling. Sometimes the passion of his shame, hate, and rage so overcame him that he had to pause. His body stiffened. He writhed in stiff little convulsions before he could walk on again. He cursed the slippery pine needles under his feet, the horse that pulled back on the reins against his tied hands, the blue of the sky over him he cursed, because it had seen him humbled this day.
When he got to the camp, Silver was not there; neither was Parade.
But the quarters of a deer hung from a low branch of a pine tree, where Silver must have placed the meat not long before, and under the dripping venison lay Frosty. He gave no sign of seeing the man approach, but kept his big head down on his paws. He lay as still as a bullet could ever have laid him, with the wind ruffling in the gray of his mane now and then. There was only one point of life, and that was the eye, half shut, but open enough to reveal a glimmering green. But he used them not even with a glance to mark Lovell.
Jimmy Lovell paused, released his mustang, and cursed the wolf. Not that he wanted any of the venison, but because he knew perfectly well that Frosty lay still in the hope that Lovell would try to get at that meat and give the wolf a chance to sink his teeth in the man. Silver’s control over the beast was not sufficient to make it like Lovell or accept the new man in the camp. Frosty would endure the stranger, and that was all. K they encountered face to face in moving about the camp, the wolf halted and would not give way an inch. So Lovell hated the big brute with all his heart, for Frosty was to the bandit a continual reminder of the superiority of Silver.
When he had finished cursing the wolf, he turned his attention to Silver, and cursed him in turn for being away from the camp. Silver had promised him ten days of protection on Iron Mountain; at least, Silver had permitted him to stay at the camp during that interval, and it would go hard, Lovell felt, if he could not induce that famous man to take the trail of Wayland and recover the lost treasure.
But there was no sign of Silver for a long time. For hours, Lovell had nothing to do but roam around the camp, groaning, trying to chafe through the rope that confined his wrists, and it was late in the afternoon before Silver appeared.
As usual, there was no sign of his approach. At one moment there was not a trace of him near the camp, except that Frosty sat up suddenly and yawned his red mouth open, and showed Lovell the pearly whiteness of his teeth. And a moment after that Silver was standing inside the circle of the trees, with Parade a little behind.
The silence of those comings and goings of Silver always annoyed Lovell. He knew that there were no idle tricks in Silver, and that the man acted merely as nature bade him; his secrecy of movement was a necessity, when there were so many rascals in the world eager to put a knife between his ribs, or a bullet through his brain. Nevertheless, Lovell hated all his ways, and his quiet stealth above all things. He could not look at Silver without feeling that the big man was an example of human nature as God intended it to be. In the gentle and fearless face of Silver he was able to see his own wretched meanness of soul. The more obligations were piled upon him, the more he detested his benefactor.
When at last Silver came into the camp with his noiseless step, and Parade like a great, brilliant, drifting ghost behind him, Lovell was sitting on a fallen log, his hands still bound behind his back, and his head bowed. He gave Silver no greeting, and waited for an exclamation, for an expression of concern. His heart swelled with rage when Silver spoke not a word, but, stepping behind him, drew a knife and cut the rope that had Lovell helpless.
Silver slipped the hunting knife back into its sheath, leaned against a tree, and made a cigarette.
That was all. He permitted no questions to escape his lips.
Frosty glided to him, looked up into his face, and then disappeared among the trees.
The anger and grief in the heart of Lovell swelled higher than ever. There seemed to be a silent language by which the man and the wolf communicated with one another, shutting him out, making him a futile eavesdropper in that camp. No doubt Frosty had asked permission to go off hunting on his own, and his master, with some imperceptible gesture, had let him go.
“Well,” said Lovell, “you don’t care. I might ‘a’ known you wouldn’t!”
Silver said nothing at all. His calm eyes considered Lovell with favor or distaste. There seemed to be no passion in Silver. He was like a rock that could not be budged. At least, Lovell never had been able to move him —and yet he knew that this was the man who had raged like a storm on the trail of Barry Christian and other great criminals.
Silver took off his hat and dropped it on top of a small shrub. He put back his head and let the wind go ruffling through his hair. The content of the wilderness and the free life was in his eyes.
“I’m the fool of the world!” groaned Lovell suddenly. “Here I been trusting everything to you—and I’ve been robbed! Robbed right here under the nose of the great Jim Silver! I’ve been hawked at right under the nose of the eagle, and he sits on his perch and blinks and doesn’t care!”
“I’m sorry,” said Silver calmly.
“No,” declared Lovell, “you ain’t sorry. If you were sorry, you’d do something about it. If I was Taxi, or one of your friends, you’d be raging along on the trail of the thug that grabbed me. You’d be right after him this minute. But you don’t care. What’s a promise to you?”
“Promise?” said Silver, startled.
“Aye, you promised that you’d keep me safe for ten days on Iron Mountain.”
“I don’t remember that.”
“Sure you don’t. Nobody remembers what they want to forget!”
“I told you that you were welcome to stay with me as long as I was on Iron Mountain. That was all.”
“You think that was all, but I remember different,” lied Lovell. “You told me that I’d be safe here with you. That’s what you said. For ten days I wouldn’t have to worry. Well, that’s the way it turns out, too. Before the ten days are over, I’m not worrying. No! Because I’ve got nothing left to worry about.”
“Did I promise that I’d take care of you?” asked Silver.
“Did you? Of course you did! Why else would I ‘a’ been hanging around here? To admire the wolf, maybe, or listen to the silence?”
He saw the mouth of Silver pinch a little in profound distaste. But Lovell did not care. He wanted to spur the big man into action, and he did not care how deep he roweled the hero, if only he could start him moving.
“A saddlebag was taken away from you,” said Silver finally.