Voice of the Intangible: The Way of the Transgressor

Voice of the Intangible

I!Y ALBERT R. LYMAN

Chapter XIX — The Way of the Transgressor

The yellow cottonwood leaves of Castle Gulch fluttered in crooked lines to the sand, and assembled in heaps and ridges against cliff and bank before the autumn wind, as Ben and Juan made camp at Greenwater, enroute to Pagahrit. Juan rode his double-action pintos, and sang his everlasting "Chili con came," with the same everlasting addle-pated good-will and willingness that always made him a good fellow to have around. Something in his wanton disregard of danger and hard work won its way to Ben's approbation, and he often found himself gaping with dropped jaw at the hump-shouldered, roman-nosed, figure who made the lash-ropes sing back and forth as the packs went on and off. Juan's ambidexterity with the diamond hitch amounted almost to a slight-of-hand performance.

So we see that wiry little greaser would work and sweat, and sing smilingly about the came and the lechc con pan, till every man and horse was completly fagged, and thus give strength to the weary and hope to the dying. Ben resolved, if possible, to ap- propriate this concentrated essence of New Mexico to his own business, at forty dollars a month, or more if necessary.

"Did you never got to saw nothing of dat Flossy mare no more?" asked Rido, as they sat down to supper at Greenwater.

"I've never seen a sign of her since last fall," answered Ben. cudgeling his brain to discover why he had associated her disap- pearance with old Spy's dried-up cackle on the morning of the st impede in the rain.

"I tink some dem speerit swiped her away from us," phil- osophized the Mexican, looking up with a half-apologetic face for a superstition which he nevertheless- believed sincerely.

"I can't prove that you're wrong," smiled young Rojer. "But say, as we came up, I saw cow-tracks at the pond, and it strikes me they're the bunch that got away from us last spring. We ought to see 'em."

"What yu say we round 'em up tomorrow"."

It was agreed to ride Horse Canyon the following day, and sunrise, found the two cowboys examining the tracks on its sand- hills, and following the direction of the dry waterway northward

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from Castle Gulch. Cow-tracks in the sand may appear old in an hour, or fresh in three weeks, and five miles north of the gulch, the indications of cattle were as strong as anywhere else. Two miles farther north all the tracks petered out, and not a cow in sight.

The two riders had crossed the divide between Horse Can- yon and a similar canyon leading off to the north. They saw neither water nor tracks, but a new country into which Ben fan- cied a white man had never been. It may be that the new coun- try stimulated his curiosity, but certain it is that something led him and his Mexican on and on — out through a side branch of the canyon into which they had gone, and down another sandy slope to the north.

They may have been eighteen miles from Castle Gulch when they rode out on the "brow of a high, broken cliff. A deep, wide gulch lay below them, with apparently no trail leading to the bot- tom. It may have been a branch of what is called Red Canyon, or it may have found its way independently to the Colorado River.

Whether the gulch was named or nameless, young Rojer resolved to go down into it. He had a vague idea of finding grass and water, but greater than that, he felt the ticklish spur of curiosity — a desire to discover some mysterious treasure which might lay unclaimed in the unexplored. What could it be — a cliff-house, mummies and dishes and plunder? Those things could be there for all of the superstitious Pahutes. No differ- ence, it was something, and it called to Ben from the rock-bound valley to come down and hunt it out.

They prospected the broken rim in both directions, and began to wonder whether they really did want to go down, when a horse came in sight on the hills below them. That settled it. They would reach the bottom if they had to go on foot, and slide over their lasso ropes down the first ledge. The rope plan was unnecessary, for Juan sang his thirsty self into the head of an old Indian trail, and the two horsemen covered its winding length down the rough hillside.

It brought them out a mile below the horse, and having no excuse other than the lone brute to lead them on, they turned promptly up the canyon, coming at once upon a beaten trail and fresh horse tracks. Their raging thirst interpreted the trail to mean water, so across the gulch and into a cove they followed it, and there by a pool stood the ghost of what used to be a dog. He half-threatened and half-welcomed them ; he frisked towards them and then ran growling away.

"By George! that's Spy's dog," blurted Ben, at the same time wondering if the dreadful artillery might boom forth from behind some rock. They took barely time to drink and water their horses before turning enquiringly upon the ghastly little quadru-

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ped, to learn all that his dumb tongue did not hinder him from telling. He had moped half way up a trail on the hillside, and sat there on his haunches with his woe-begone eyes upon them.

Then Rido's black eyes made a discovery: at the top of the trail, a cave had been transformed into a veritable Robinsun Crusoe house. Both cowboys dropped the reins and started for it afoot. The dog still protested uncertainly, till Ben placed a re- assuring hand on his withered head, and the two became friends on the spot. Juan, without thought of being bombarded, bolted up the trail, leaving his employer to study those sorrowful dog eyes, and listen to the silent, piteous tale of poverty and woe told in the dog-language learned years ago from old Bowse.

But lightning on a limb ! Down that hill, as from a catapult came Juan Rido, covering no less than ten feet at a step. "El diablo! El diablo!" he shouted, stampeding Ben and the dog and the horses all at the same time. Young Rojer wouldn't have given ten cents for his chances ; he felt sure that a projectile would splash through him before he could reach cover — but it didn't.

That skeleton of a dog stayed devotedly near while he crouched behind a rock, and showed no desire to leave him while he hunted Juan and the horses, and corrected the general disor- der of the headlong retreat.

For some time the frightened Rido could do nothing but quake and shake his head saying, "El diablo! El diablo!" How- ever, he consented at length to follow if Ben would lead, and up that hill they marched, reinforced by the superannuated puppy. How carefully the leader peeped in, while his wide-eyed follower would have bolted at the drop of a hat.

At first young Rojer saw nothing in the dark, windowless room, though a sickening smell oozed out through the rude, ax- hewn, cedar doorway. With eyes more accustomed to the shade, he traced the outline of a rude bunk, and on it old Spy, either dead or asleep. The old man was no poorer nor more weazened than he had been for years past, and the socket of his jaw showed no plainer than at other times. But his dried-up eyes — Ugh ! no wonder Juan stampeded ; "El diablo" himself could show no more frightful face to save his tail from the knife.-

The miserable cooking utensils around the wretched old fire- place had been idle a long time, and the precious tubacker lay on a dirty ledge of the wall, covered with dust. No coyote, or rat, or beast or insect of any kind in that canyon had minced at the old hermit's tobacco, or his tobacco-soaked being. The half plug and the pickled remains of Charley Spy would dry there un- molested forever.

Whether the old man had suffered or not no one knew, and Ben had no stomach to touch the greasy old pocket-book on the dead man's breast. It might have told something of Kentucky

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and a life of crime and exile, but the two cowboys bolted for the fresh air, leaving the book and its contents to rot together. They didn't touch the dreadful six-shooter, peeping from under a more dreadful pillow, nor the cannon-Winchester leaning against the wall at the head of the bed. It was a place and a face never to be lost from mind, and glancing back over his shoulder, as he went down the hill, Ben mused to himself, "The way of the transgressor is hard."

That ghost of a dog, which used to be Mike, followed his newly-found master out into the canyon and up to the lone horse. There were three horses : the sorrowful sorrel, now fat and sleek, a gray mare and Flossy. "By George!" gasped Ben.

"El diablo vie jo!" echoed the astonished Rido.

It was late that night when the camp-fire blazed up at Green- water, and later still when the pacing mare had been safely hob- bled with the other horses, and Mike had eaten his first square meal for a long time.

Since they started for camp with Flossy, late in the afternoon, Juan had been unusually meditative. When he sat down cross- legged by the frying-pan to help eat the meal, which would have been supper five hours earlier in the evening, he seemed to have matured his philosophy to the talking point. "How did he got dat mare away, and don't leave no tracks ?" he demanded, point blank.

"Oh, he led her around on the rock," explained Ben. "Any- body could do that."

But Juan preferred to believe differently, and asked by his incredulous smile, "Didn't I told you it was a speerit?"

The cattle from Horse Canyon came up to the pond early in the morning, and Ben branded two calves and moved his outfit on to Pagahrit that day.

The trip was not intended as a round-up, and the two cow- boys made the usual rides, branded the long-cared calves, and started home two weeks from the time they reached the lake. With his liberal rations of beef, Mike became a new dog, and doubly devoted to his new master. Flossy was not new at all, but the same bird-like conveyance she had ever been, carrying young Roi'er over the sand with an ease which made riding a keen delight.

While camped at the lake, Ben visited his cave with the same devotion that he would have paid to the old log meetinghouse if he had been at home. He reported to the dry, echoing walls that lie was nearer alone than ever before ; he told them that "his spirit was willing, but his flesh was desperately weak," as he found himself nearer to the evil day when a fell shape would appear in the distance. He halted on the rock-knolls with a heavy heart, and listened to the ever-constant whispering from the wilds all around.

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With a far-away look he sang his homemade song', and dwelt with tear-dimmed eyes on the line :

"Watching and waiting, and hoping with fear."

Chapter XX— A Half -Bushel of Oats

As Hen and his Mexican returned from that fall ride they passed an Indian camp four miles east of Rincone. Tt presented no unusual appearance— simply two clusters of wickiups crown- ing two sand-knolls, and a bunch of cayuses standing wearily near in saddle and bridle. Besides that, a little swarm of papooses romped with big din on the sand, and what appeared to be a heated game of cards occupied the shady side of one wickiup. The game seemed to be between Pahutes and Navajos, the latter hav- ing probably come over from the reservation for that purpose.

Neither of the returning cowboys took much notice, however, being at the time absorbed in one of Juan's thrilling ghost stories. Half a mile on to the east, in the bottom of a swale, they dis- covered an Tndian coming towards them as fast as he could whip. The same glance which caught sight of him, caught his wild signal to them to stop where they stood till he reached them. On he came, full drive, a tall, broad man, riding a wiry black mustang ; and as he sped out of the dimness of distance, behold he was Jimmy. He thrust forth his sinewy hand with that old salutation which dates from the race and the wrestle on day-herd at Rin- cone.

"A Pahute has your mare," he began hurriedly to explain in his own language. "The Pahute's boy is coming on the mare from town ; the Pahute is running down there along the river to pass you and tell the boy to hide. You hurry ; meet the boy ; get the mare."

Navajo may not be literally translated to English, but this is substantially what young Rojer's brother said, and then motioned Ben to hurry, nor stop to say thanks or anything else.

Flossy carried the boss of the Rojer outfit that afternoon, and when she felt a slack rein and a rattle of spurs, she took the hint and began to leave the trail behind at a dizzy clip. The anxious father, racing along the river bank, must have fallen hopelessly to the rear, for he made no appearance at all.

Four miles ahead Ben met a youthful Pahute, whom he rec- ognized as one of the smaller fry that used to stand half-clad around the fire at Peavine, seven years before. The boy rode Alec's mother, a mare which, though good to ride, had been ex- cused from all hard work so long as she raised a valuable colt each year. She had evidently been some time in the service of the Soorowits family, for her flesh was woefully lean, and a veritable pudding of a sore bloomed on her back.

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To say the sight made Ren Rojer angry would be a very weak statement of facts ; but he recalled some features of the past, nor forgot a dread forecast of the future. With as much mild firmness as posisble, he put the boy and his butcher-knife saddle afoot on the sand ; and tieing his lasso around the poor old mare's neck, waited by the trail for Juan and the packs.

"Where's this mare's colt?" he demanded of the unhorsed Pahute, but that enterprising descendant of a horse-thief had fallen into a profound case of Pahute sulks, and pushed his sullen lips out so far that Ben fairly itched to slap them back into place No doubt he would have done it, presto, but for a boding and whispering which held him constantly back. The colt, like his ill-fated brother, a promising bay, was likely being jostled and starved about with the sickly snarl of sore-backed cayuses dragged along with the Soorowits camp.

The men of the town regarded Ben's old mare with scowls- of honest protest, but no one seemed at all eager to make trouble for Soorowits, nor to take anv action which would possiblv incur his testy displeasure. He might easily have fled to Pagahrit, Nav- ajo Mountain, or some other safe retreat, and he probably would have gone without delay, but for the winkerless wench who told him what to do and when to refrain.

This winkerless woman brought him to town next morning. and stimulated him to take the mare from the stable. He tried it, but at the door he met voung Rojer looking the stern senti- ment which needed no further expression. Next he repaired to the village store and breathed out wicked threats, among other things declaring that Ben would disappear from the earth if the animal in question were not returned to him at once.

When he had gone cursing and fuming to camp, the wise men of the town began to recognize the case as a matter not to be winked at, for all of the peace policy to which they adhered. After having Ben swear out a complaint they hunted up a deputy sheriff', and providing themselves with firearms, followed the storming redman to his wickiup.

When they came up, Mrs. Soorowits looked slowly and hiss- ingly around, exactly like a snake getting ready to strike. Her winkerless eyes rested spitefully on the posse in general and each one in particular, but at Ben she looked all the venom of the whole serpent family.

The deputy sheriff had planned for part of the men to stand guard outside, while the others crowded into the frail house where, bv quick action and main force, he hoped to land his man without firing a gun.

Six wickiups made up the camp. Buhhre smilingly occupied one of them, for he had made two or three matrimonial ventures, but always with the understanding that the bride was only a pro-

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bationer — that she must be discarded the moment she became dis- obedient or offensive to Lady Soorowits.

The deputy sheriff's plans carried famously. No sooner did the long-nailed female fingers grip a Winchester than someone wrested it violently from them ; and the sullen form of Soorowits went to earth rather ungracefully under three husky boys who forced his wrists together and clicked the handcuffs.

The snake-eyed lady fairly foamed at the mouth, and boiled over with poison. She cursed in Pahute and Navajo, she cursed in Mexican and English ; she writhed and twisted and kicked, and finally succeeded in settling three of her infected claws in the back of a young fellow's hand. Her two children ran howling away like the terrified whelps of a fighting tigress.

Tf there is such a thing as a female satan, she must have found satisfactory expression in the Pahute gorgon who went •perforce with the deputy sheriff's posse and Soorowits to town.

Buhhre followed smilingly after them, carrying a Colt's .45 and a rifle of big bore. He was accompanied by four other bucks, all of them as well armed but for the smiles.

On the frontier it often happens that no one knows how to give the machinery of law a proper or sufficient start, to make it grind the varied offenses which turn ripe for grinding. The lack of this very knowledge made Soorowits wait two days for a preliminary hearing, during all of which time he fretted under a close guard in town ; but his morbific consort, being released, spent the time plotting in the hills and among the willows, with his anarchistic followers.

At length the prosecuting attorney sent word that he could not be present, but that the county would pay Ben to prosecute the case in the justice's court. This suggested to young Rojer a brilliant idea : Trouble with Soorowits had been foreshadowed that it might be avoided ; it could be avoided by prosecuting the old Pahute to the full extent of the law, and placing him safely under lock and key.

Ben Rojer had never followed a track nor a clue with more scowl-faced determination than that with which he dug into the laws of Utah, in the few hours yet remaining before the opening of court. He arranged his evidence with all possible care, and nnveled himself up to the task like a teamster flogs his lazy horse a half-mile before the steep hill comes in sight.

The justice held court in a schoolhouse. The place was jammed full. Many black eyes looked curiously out of dusky faces— Pahute and Navajo faces. Also the men and boys of the town turned out en masse. In the center of a bench, counsel mi one side and guard on the other, sat Soorowits, looking daggers and hatchets at the whole proceeding. Buhhre stood bv the wall.

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heavily armed, and exactly the thing- Shakespeare would call a "smiling damned villain." The snake-eyed snorter slid in along the bench, as near to her devoted husband as she dared to go, and took a frowning scrutiny of every white man present, all the time digging and scratching absent-mindedly in her snaky hair. If an old swill-barrel ever looked more sour or a slimy salamander more repulsive, young Rojer had failed to appreciate it.

During the taking of evidence, Soorowits' vengeful look fol- lowed Ben through every move. And then, in the summary of it all, when the cowboy lawyer talked with all the fervor which the love of peace and safety inspires, those three pairs of black eyes passed awful judgment upon him. He felt them fairly growl their hatred from under their brows, though one of them still smiled.

When the justice stood up in front of that blackboard, and spreading his written decision out on a school desk before him, bound the case over to appear in the district court, Ben heaved a great sigh of relief. He felt fully paid for his trouble, even if the county had forever forgotten the half-bushel of oats which, for this service, it bestowed upon him three months later.

The deputy sheriff's intentions were no doubt good, but he slouched through business with the ease and grace of an old shoe turned over at the heel. Instead of hustling his dusky pris- oner to a cage, he left him in care of first one and then another, till at length he became the charge of a man who wore slippers. a linen collar and a gold ring.

He of the collar and the ring had a pistol of small calibre, and when he became the brave custodian of the Pahute offender, he put his popgun in his upper vest pocket. Soorowits silently took stock of the pretty toy, and apprised his plotting household.

It was easy to wheedle those slippered feet into a race — easy to insist that the inaction of being closely guarded had become tiresome in the extreme, and when that race came off, after ten seconds of discussion, the man of the hills found no trouble in leaving his gold-ringed competitor far behind in the road.

Even at this ridiculous stage of the performance the man with the collar suspicioned nothing till a black-haired horseman darted out of the willows, and bore the prisoner away behind him. Then the gold-wearing guard became stern and bold, and fired three shots in the direction of the doubly-loaded cayuse. In spite of those shots the cayuse disappeared in the edge of the willows, from which arose a muffled shout of exultation.

The three armed horsemen who followed in hot pursuit as soon as the alarm was given, came back without one glimpse of the fleeing outlaw. Two days later a Pahute brought word that one of the shots had taken effect — that Soorowits lay in a critical condition at a certain place in the rocks, but no one believed it. Even if the pea-shooter had really bounced one of its pellets

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against the escaping horse-thief, he was too busy to notice it, and had no way of finding it out afterwards

No one took this slovenly piece of business so much to heart as did Ben Rojer. Some folks even insisted that the escape was exactly right — that by it they would be shut of further trouble ; and further trouble would be unnecessary, since Soorowits had seen enough severity to frighten him into a more righteous life.

To Ben, however, it was exactly wrong, an unjustifiable blunder. It had the appearance of a dreaded shape in the distance — a shape which would no doubt come to him with blood-thirsty vengeance.

He supplied himself with a saddle-gun and a good revolver, but somehow they failed to hang right, and gave more trouble than comfort from the very first. He couldn't adjust the rifle satisfactorily under his knee, and the belt with its weighted scab- bard dangled always in the way like a first-class nuisance. Be- sides that, they were, in some strange way, a contradiction to the Ben Rojer of Pagahrit Cave. Still, he clung to them as a neces- sary evil, and hoped and feared for the meeting with the distant shape !

(to be continued)

Plates of the Tuckabatches. — The Era has been handed a clipping, from the Talilcquah Democrat, by Mr. Lorenzo D. Creel, special agent for scattered bands of Indians in Utah. The clipping reads as follows: "When the Creek or Muskogee Indians adopted into their tribe the remnants of other tribes which were nearly extinct, many superstitions were found among them. One of these tribes was the Tuckabatches. The legends of the Creeks state that the Tuckabatches brought with them seven plates, the origin and object of which have puzzled scien- tific men for centuries. The Tuckabatches claim that these plates were given them by their ancestors. They were not to be handled by all persons — only by particular men, and those chosen by the chief or Micco of the tribe. Five of the plates were of copper and two of brass. The copper plates were about 18 inches long and seven inches wide; the brass ones being round and 18 inches in diameter, having two char- acters on them similar to the letters A and E connected. The plate> were kept buried under the house of the chief and are believed to be still in existence. The superstitions of the Tuckabatches became a fixed ceremony of a large part of the Creek tribe. Many of the Creeks, who are descendants of those who were never reconciled to the admission of the Tuckabatches, always had a superstitious dread of the brass plates, and this dread took the form of a belief that contact with them meant death or disaster — and that aboriginal belief has not wholly de- parted."