LITMIR.BIZ

CHAPTER III

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FLIGHT

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      Brick Willock, galloping toward the Southeast, frequently looked back. He saw the desperadoes leap upon their horses, wheel about in short circles that brought the animals upright, then spring forward in pursuit. He heard the shouting which, though far away, sounded the unmistakable accent of ungovernable fury. In the glaring moonlight, he distinguished plainly the cloud of dust and sand raised by the horses, which the wind lifted in white shapes against the deep blue of the sky. And looking beyond his pursuers toward the rude cabin where the highwaymen had so long held their rendezvous, he knew, because no animate forms appeared against the horizon, that the Kimball brothers lay where he had stretched them—one, senseless from the crashing blow on his head, the other, lifeless from the bullet in his breast.

      The little girl and her stepfather had vanished from the smooth open page of the Texas Panhandle—and Brick Willock rejoiced, with a joy new to him, that these escaped prisoners had not been pursued. It was himself that the band meant to subject to their savage vengeance, and himself alone. The murder of the child was abhorrent to their hearts which had not attained the hardened insensibility of their leader's conscience, and they were willing for the supposed spy to escape, since it spared them the embarrassment of disposing of the little girl.

      But Brick Willock had been one of them and he had killed their leader, and their leader's brother, or at least had brought them to the verge of death. If Red Kimball revived, he would doubtless right his own wrongs, should Willock live to be punished. In the meantime, it was for them to treat with the traitor—this giant of a Texan, huge-whiskered, slow of speech, who had ever been first to throw himself into the thick of danger but who had always hung back from deeds of cruelty. He had plundered coaches and wagon-trains with them, he had fought with them against strong bodies of emigrants, he had killed and burned—in the eyes of the world his deeds made him one of them, and his aspect marked him as the most dangerous of the band. But they had always felt the difference—and now they meant to kill him not only because he had overpowered their leader but because of this difference.

      As their bullets pursued him, Willock lay along the body of the broncho, feeling his steed very small, and himself very large—and yet, despite the rain of lead, his pleasure over the escape of the child warmed his heart. The sand was plowed up by his side from the peppering of bullets—but he seemed to feel that innocent unconscious arm about his great neck; the yells of rage were in his ears, but he heard the soft breathing of the little one fast asleep in the midst of her dangers.

      He had selected for himself, and for Gledware, ponies that had often been run against each other, and which no others of all Red Kimball's corral could surpass in speed. Gledware and the child were on the pony that Kimball had once staked against the swiftest animal the Indians could produce—and Willock rode the pride of the Indian band, which had almost won the prize. The ponies had been staked on the issue of that encounter—and the highwaymen had retained, by right of craft and force, what the government would not permit its wards to barter or sell.

      The race was long but always unequal. The ruffians who had dashed from the scene of the cabin almost in an even line, scattered and straggled unevenly; now only two were able to send bullets whistling about Willock's head; now only one found it possible to cover the distance. At last even he fell out of range. The Indian pony, apparently tireless, shot on like an arrow driven into the teeth of the wind, sending up behind a cloud of dust that stretched backward toward the baffled pursuers, a long wavering ribbon like a clew left to guide the band into the mysterious depths of the Great American Desert.

      When the last of the pursuers found further effort useless, he checked his horse. Willock now sat erect on the broncho's bare back, lightly clasping the halter. Looking behind, he saw seven horsemen in varying degrees of remoteness, motionless, doubtless fixing their wolfish eyes on his fleeing form. As long as he could distinguish these specks against the sky, they remained stationary. To his excited imagination they represented a living wall drawn up between him and the abode of men. Should he ever venture back to that world, he fancied those seven avengers would be waiting to receive him with taunts and drawn weapons.

      And his conscience told him that the taunts would be merited, for he had turned traitor, he had failed in the only virtue on which his fellow criminals prided themselves. Yes, he was a traitor; and by the only justice he acknowledged, he deserved to die. But the child who had lain so trustingly upon his wild bosom, who had clung to him as to a father—she was safe! An unwonted smile crept under the bristling beard of the fugitive, as he urged the pony forward in unrelaxing speed. Should he seek refuge among civilized communities, his crimes would hang over his head—if not discovered, the fear of discovery would be his, day and night. To venture into his old haunts in No-Man's Land would be to expose his back to the assassin's knife, or his breast to ambushed murderers. He dared not seek asylum among the Indians, for while bands of white men were safe enough in the Territory, single white men were at the mercy of the moment's caprice—and certainly, if found astride that Indian pony which the agent had ordered restored to its owner, his life would not be worth a thought.

      These were desperate reflections, and the future seemed framed in solitude, yet Brick Willock rode on with that odd smile about the grim lips. The smile was unlike him—but, the whole affair was such an experience as had never entered his most daring fancy. Never before in his life had he held a child in his arms, still less had he felt the sweet embrace of peaceful slumber. To another man it might have meant nothing; but to this great rough fellow, the very sight of whom had often struck terror to the heart, that experience seemed worth all the privations he foresaw.

      The sun had risen when the pony, after a few tottering steps, suddenly sank to earth. Willock unfastened the halter from its neck, tied it with the lariat about his waist, and without pause, set out afoot. If the pony died from the terrible strain of that unremitting flight, doubtless the roving Indians of the plains would find it and try to follow his trail; if it survived he would be safer if not found near it. In either case, swift flight was still imperative, and the shifting sand, beaten out of shape by the constant wind, promised not to retain his footprints.

      Though stiff from long riding, the change of motion soon brought renewed vigor. Willock had grown thirsty, and as the sun rose higher and beat down on him from an unclouded sky, his eyes searched the plains eagerly for some shelter that promised water. He did not look in vain. Against the horizon rose the low blue shapes of the Wichita Mountains, looking at first like flat sheets of cardboard, cut out by a careless hand and set upright in the sand.

      As he toiled toward this refuge, not a living form appeared to dispute his sovereignty of the desert world. His feet sank deep in the sand, then trod lightly over vast stretches of short sun-burned mesquit, then again traversed hot shifting reaches of naked sand. The mountains seemed to recede as he advanced, and at times stifling dust and relentless heat threatened to overpower him. With dogged determination he told himself that he might be forced to drop from utter exhaustion, but it would not be yet—not yet—one more mile, or, at least, another half-mile. So he advanced, growing weaker, breathing with more difficulty, but still muttering,

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