CHAPTER XITHE REAL WEST
Roy’s idea of a camp at night included a smouldering fire in front of a tent wherein, on fragrant spruce boughs, carefully sheltered from the wind and the chill, one went to bed wrapped in blankets. When Sink Weston scattered the last coals of the little cook fire and pointed to the sand under the freight wagon as a “likely place to bunk,” the boy felt a little disappointment. It was one of a number of new things he learned that summer about life in the “open.”
Another one was, that riding all day on a lively cow pony when you are not used to it, does not exactly limber up your limbs. When the boy attempted to jump up early the next morning, he found his legs bent almost like hoops. The result was, when a breakfast of salt pork, crackers and coffee had been eaten, Roy complied with Sink’s good-natured orders and climbed up on the wagon seat along with Dan Doolin. His pony was tied to the tail board.
The day was perfect. The party was in sterile country—land that could hardly be called desert, although at that point, it was without water. There was mesquite and sage, rocks here and there—and now and then a jack rabbit. The misty blue mountains of New Mexico greeted them over the top of the gray Mesa Verde; peaks of the far Rockies, white-capped and cold, lay behind, while in front, beyond pink-tipped Ute mountains, rose the wall of the Utah Desert.
Before Weston could gallop on ahead, Roy begged of him the mysterious sheet of hieroglyphics. He wanted to see it in the daylight. Since he had heard the tale of the Lost Indians, he was able to think of little else. Sink Weston’s story had taken possession of the boy. He had told Weston all he knew of his great uncle, and where the Mormon had once lived. But they had both decided that it availed little to know that the disciple of Nauvoo had once lived in Parowan.
Even if Willard Banks left children or other relatives, it was certain that these would know nothing of the hidden Sink Hole. Weston was positive in his belief that the indecipherable words formed a key describing the location ofthe secret Indian city. And he was almost as positive that the words were beyond reading by any one but their writer. He had long since ascribed the existence of the paper to the fact that, before the Mormon elder visited the Lost Indians, he had learned their secret, probably from other Indians with whom he had lived in his missionary work. Not trusting to his memory, he had made a record of his secret in cipher.
As Roy took the paper and Weston rode on, old Dan Doolin smiled grimly.
“So ye got it, too, hev ye?” he said, chuckling.
Roy opened the paper and pointed to the name on it.
“I suppose you’re like the rest of ’em,” the boy answered, with some satisfaction. “Well, you’ve all laughed too soon. Therewasa Willard Banks, and he was mygreat uncle!”
Old Doolin started to smile, but, changing his mind, he turned and exclaimed:
“W’ot’s that?”
“There was such a man as Willard Banks,” continued Roy, with spirit. “He was my great uncle. He was a Mormon elder, and he lived at Parowan.”
“Wal, by hokey!” exclaimed old Doolin, straightening up. “Ef that’s right, I reckon I been a laughin’ out o’ the wrong side o’ my face. Say, Kid,” he continued, after a moment’s hard thinking, “I seen fellers ’at had seen ships asailin’ in the desert. Likewise I seen many a dockymint o’ them Spanish sharps locatin’ mines an’ sich—mines as ain’t no one kin find. I never set no more store on Sink’s ramblin’s an’ I do on Injun tales. An’ nobody else, I reckon. But you listen to me! Ef thar was a live man o’ that name o’ Banks,” and he shook his head slowly, “thar’s a many ’at have been makin’ fools o’ theirselves, an’ Sink ain’t one uv ’em.”
“Did you ever see anything like this?” asked Roy, smiling and opening the paper on his knee.
“I never did and never expec’ to agin. Ain’t no more sense to it ’an a snake’s trail in the sand. That writin’ ain’t fur nuthin’, but I reckon mebbe, ef what you say’s right, Sink seen the hole in the ground. Mebbe he seen a white man thar—I’ll even stand fur that, now,” continued the grizzled teamster, “an’ mebbe he seen some dishes o’ copper er clay er say they wuz even gold and silver; fer argymint sake, I’ll stand fur that, too, seein’ ye know thar wasa man o’ that name. Fur asthemthings goes, I’ll take off my hat to Sink; but one thing I won’t stand fur, not even if the old Mormon was hyar and jined Sink in a affedavit—that’s them bald-headed Injuns. They ain’t no sich a thing. They cain’t be. Injuns ain’t made that way.”
The boy laughed outright.
“But what, after all,” he said, “if theredidhappen to be such a place and just such Indians?”
“Bald-headed?” snorted the veteran teamster, cracking his whip as if to emphasize his contempt. “Tell me them plates is studded with diments an’ I’ll swaller it, but I draw the line at bald-headed Injuns.”
For a long time, Roy studied the enigmatic words while the wagon bumped along the rough and rocky trail. But it was no use. The first line had in it ten characters or signs; the second seven; the last eight. Not one of them resembled a letter of any alphabet that Roy knew. Some of them seemed patterned after certain Greek letters, and a few were not dissimilar to “shorthand” or stenographic marks. But neither of these were familiar to Roy. Naturally, they did not suggest Greek or “shorthand” to Weston. The arrow might mean anything;death, the chase, or, as was generally agreed by those who had studied the writing, a point of the compass, which would be south.
When the party stopped at noon, Roy returned the paper to Weston.
“I give it up,” he said, “but if I ever get near Parowan, and I hope to be there before I go back, I’ll send you word of all that I learn about my relative.”
Secretly, he was longing for the guide to make some overtures to him regarding a sort of partnership in a new quest for the Sink Hole. Of course, that could not be at once, but he was a boy, and as full of the spirit of adventure as he was of energy.
“Are you going to make any more attempts to find your Lost Indians?” he asked, while Doolin was preparing the noonday meal.
“Well,” answered Weston, with a peculiar smile, “I promised my wife I wouldn’t. I promised her purty strong, too. That is, I jist told her positive I wouldn’t lessen somepin happened wharby I kin read that writin’.”
“Maybe we could find the Sink Hole with the aeroplane,” suggested Roy, voicing an idea that he had been nursing all day.
Weston shook his head.
“I don’t know much about yer sky machines,” he replied, “but ye could look down into them sink holes all over Utah, an’ ye wouldn’t knowmysink hole frum a thousan’ others. I done that aplenty. No, sir. Ye got to read it right thar on the paper. Ain’t no other way, as I kin see.”
That afternoon Roy mustered up courage to return to his mount. And as the hours went by and they came nearer the mountains lying to the south, the tale of the Lost Indians began to drift into the background. They were hastening through a corner of the Ute Indian reservation, where the trail ran, and this was excuse enough for the opening of Weston’s book of reminiscences. The guide had Indian tales of all kinds—narratives covering their lives and crimes.
Toward dusk, Weston, riding not far ahead of the wagon, called Roy’s attention to a dark mark ahead. It was the unmarked chasm of the San Juan River. And on the banks of this swift stream, flowing at the bottom of its open tunnel bed, the second camp was made. A place had been selected where an Indian trail afforded access to the water below. And after the horses were cared for Doolin celebrated the crossing ofthe Utah line by making a batch of biscuits baked in a skillet.
“The advantage o’ them biscuits over woman’s bread,” explained old Dan, smiling, “is ’at they’ll stick to yer innards. Ye won’t need no more uv ’em till ye git to Bluff.”
“An’ not then,” said Weston, without a smile, “ef I kin get kitchen bread.”
That evening, despite what Weston had told the boy about Doolin’s habit of never sitting by the campfire, Roy noted that the teamster did not leave the camp. On the contrary, he turned in and was snoring long before the boy was sleepy. The next day he was told the reason. They were camping on the Ute Indian land. To a Ute horse stealing is a minor crime. Doolin slept until one o’clock and Weston kept watch. Then the guide turned in and Doolin kept an eye open for unannounced visitors.
Just when the stars began to show the next evening, the aeroplane cavalcade raised the lights of Bluff, and at ten o’clock entered the town. Roy was tired but happy. So far no accident had marred his expectation. Because of the lateness of the hour, Roy had planned to stop at a boarding house frequented by Weston at times and to report to Mr. Cook, of the DevelopmentCompany, in the morning. The wagon, therefore, did not proceed to the center of the town, but was stopped at the “San Juan Stables.” The “stables” were little more than a horse corral. There being no one in charge, Doolin was left with the wagon, the teamster and cook appropriating horse provender with western freedom. When Weston and the boy left him, he was preparing to make a fire and boil some coffee, after which he was to sleep near the wagon and its valuable freight.
Unencumbered with baggage, Roy and his companion made their way along the main street toward the center of the wilderness city. The boy discovered at once that the brilliant lights came, not from stores, but from a dozen or more saloons. Adobe sidewalks soon gave way to a board passageway—timber swept down the San Juan from the far away mountains—and in the center of the town these were covered by roofs reaching to the street.
For what would have been a block, had there been any cross streets, each door under the wooden awning on each side of the street opened into either a saloon or a gambling resort. And each door was wide open as were the windows. Men were coming and going at each place, butfew were loafing on the walk. Among them Weston and the boy strode without attracting a great deal of attention and speaking to none.
Near the end of the row, Weston slackened his pace and said: “Ye don’t mind, do ye, ef I stop at the ‘Crater’ fur a drink? Ye kin see I don’t drink but a little—ain’t had a drop sence I left home.”
Roy hesitated. He had been in saloons—out of curiosity. But his curiosity had been satisfied. In his own town and in the drinking resorts he knew, the only persons to be found therein were those who should have been somewhere else, or loafers and drunkards. But, while he hesitated, he decided that circumstances were different. In that community of rough men, cut off, almost, from all civilization and refinement, saloons were common meeting points.
“I’ll wait for you,” answered Roy, stepping just inside the door. Instantly he was sorry he had done so. The place was aglow with light from a half dozen oil chandeliers; the air was heavy with tobacco smoke and odors from the sloppy bar, and the room was well filled with men. Almost tempted to return to the street, for his companion at once hurried toward thebar, Roy was held for a moment by the fascinating picture afforded by the occupants of the place.
Above all rose the clink of spurs. Here at last was the “real thing.” Almost lost in the desert and hanging on the precipitous banks of the deep San Juan as if to prevent being swept away and buried in the sandy plains, the town of Bluff, the last echo of civilization, was the rendezvous of miner, prospector, cow puncher, sheep herder and outcast. And within Roy’s sight were examples of each.
Confused, bewildered, and wholly out of place, Roy attempted to withdraw. But something seemed to hold him—the silver bands on an Indian, the gaudy color of a cowboy’s handkerchief, the set angle of another’s hat and everywhere the oaths, the racy slang of the plains and the always present, swaying firearms. Here were the men of whom he had read, whose freedom—as a boy—he had often envied.
In the moment that Roy hesitated there was a familiar “E yawp!” and a half dozen answering yells. The boy knew at once that Sink Weston had found old friends. Then he made out Weston’s big, black, dust-covered hat making its way toward the bar in the midst of a group ofwhite sombreros, and he turned and left. At the door, an arm intercepted him. He drew back somewhat alarmed. It was a man who had lunged forward from the end of the bar near the door.
“Fur the love o’ God, Kid, buy me a drink.”
The mumbling speaker was a man who might have been eighty years old. Age and whisky had wrecked him. An unkempt, white beard, covered a worn, red flannel shirt. His ragged boots, into which greasy pants were stuffed, were not those of a horseman, and his gnarled, trembling fingers fell on the boy’s arm like talons. His hair, dropping from under a limp, grease-banded, ragged hat, lay on his shoulders in yellow-white, knotted locks. Almost toothless, he repeated, huskily:
“Jist one, Kid, jist one!”
Roy was shocked, and attempted to pass on. But the man, almost in collapse, held to him and dragged himself to the walk outside.
“Jist one drink’ll brace me up fur to-night. Mebbe to-morrer, I won’t need none.”
“Won’t anything else help you?” said Roy, at last. “Are you hungry?”
“Hungry?” almost moaned the broken being.“Yes, I’m hungry. But I got to hev liquor er die.”
“Why don’t you try eatin’ first?” asked the boy, not knowing what else to say. “I’ll buy you food.”
“Gimme a drink an’ I’ll eat. I ain’t et in two days.”
The boy was puzzled. His sympathetic heart was touched. Next door to the “Crater,” the usual saloon sign was surmounted by the words, “Joe’s Imperial Palace Restaurant.” In the window was a display of canned goods: sardines, asparagus, pepper sauce and bologna sausage. Grasping the old man by the shoulder, he half led and half pushed him into the eating resort. A man at the bar scowled at sight of the decrepit man, but smiled as he saw the brisk looking lad.
Three tables were lined up on one side of the room. Leading the whisky supplicant to one of these, Roy almost dropped him into a chair and then stepped over to the bar. Handing a two-dollar bill to the barkeeper, he said:
“The old man wants whisky. Looks to me as is he needs something to eat a good deal worse.”
The barkeeper grunted:
“To be decent he’d orter to eat, sure. But, as fur liquor, he’ll sartin die without it.”
“Well,” said Roy, “fill him up with somethin’ to eat. Then, give him his drink.”
The old man was stumbling toward the bar as Roy hurried from the place. Outside the “Crater” he waited some minutes for Weston. Apparently, more than one drink was demanding the Colorado man’s attention. And the boy grew nervous. From time to time he peered into the glaring resort, and at last had about concluded to make his way to the corral and spend the night with Doolin when the waited-for Weston suddenly appeared.
“That’s part o’ the game out here, Son,” he began by way of apology, “but I’m sorry to keep ye waitin’. Now we’ll turn in.”
They had scarcely started along the walk when there was a sudden commotion in the adjoining restaurant. With what seemed to be the crash of chairs overturning, there was an oath and a scuffle and a shrunken figure was hurled across the plank walk. Instantly, a dozen men seemed to spring up. Several hands grasped a senseless red-shirted body and straightened it out on the dust-covered walk. A smear of red covered the prostrate man’s yellow-white uncoveredhair. His eyes were closed and he was breathing heavily.
“Humph,” exclaimed Weston, as he pushed Roy around the onlookers. “Old Utah Banning—an’ all in.”