第30章 VIII THE BREAKER OF WILD MUSTANGS(1)

FOR a few days after the capture of Silvermane, a time full to the brim of excitement for Hare, he had no word with Mescal, save for morning and evening greetings. When he did come to seek her, with a purpose which had grown more impelling since August Naab's arrival, he learned to his bewilderment that she avoided him. She gave him no chance to speak with her alone; her accustomed resting-place on the rim at sunset knew her no more; early after supper she retired to her tent.

Hare nursed a grievance for forty-eight hours, and then, taking advantage of Piute's absence on an errand down to the farm, and of the Naabs' strenuous day with four vicious wild horses in the corral at one time, he walked out to the pasture where Mescal shepherded the flock.

"Mescal, why are you avoiding me?" he asked. "What has happened?"She looked tired and unhappy, and her gaze, instead of meeting his, wandered to the crags.

"Nothing," she replied.

"But there must be something. You have given me no chance to talk to you, and I wanted to know if you'd let me speak to Father Naab.""To Father Naab? Why--what about?"

"About you, of course--and me--that I love you and want to marry you."She turned white. "No--no!"

Hare paused blankly, not so much at her refusal as at the unmistakable fear in her face.

"Why--not?" he asked presently, with an odd sense of trouble. There was more here than Mescal's habitual shyness.

"Because he'll be terribly angry."

"Angry--I don't understand. Why angry?"

The girl did not answer, and looked so forlorn that Hare attempted to take her in his arms. She resisted and broke from him.

"You must never--never do that again."

Hare drew back sharply.

"Why not? What's wrong? You must tell me, Mescal.""I remembered." She hung her head.

"Remembered--what?"

"I am pledged to marry Father Naab's eldest son."For a moment Hare did not understand. He stared at her unbelievingly.

"What did you say?" he asked, slowly.

Mescal repeated her words in a whisper.

"But--but Mescal--I love you. You let me kiss you," said Hare stupidly, as if he did not grasp her meaning. "You let me kiss you," he repeated.

"Oh, Jack, I forgot," she wailed. "It was so new, so strange, to have you up here. It was like a kind of dream. And after--after you kissed me I--I found out--""What, Mescal?"

Her silence answered him.

"But, Mescal, if you really love me you can't marry any one else," said Hare. It was the simple persistence of a simple swain.

"Oh, you don't know, you don't know. It's impossible!""Impossible!" Hare's anger flared up. "You let me believe I had won you.

What kind of a girl are you? You were not true. Your actions were lies.""Not lies," she faltered, and turned her face from him.

With no gentle hand he grasped her arm and forced her to look at him.

But the misery in her eyes overcame him, and he roughly threw his arms around her and held her close.

"It can't be a lie. You do care for me--love me. Look at me." He drew her head back from his breast. Her face was pale and drawn; her eyes closed tight, with tears forcing a way out under the long lashes; her lips were parted. He bowed to their sweet nearness; he kissed them again and again, while the shade of the cedars seemed to whirl about him. "Ilove you, Mescal. You are mine--I will have you--I will keep you--I will not let him have you!"She vibrated to that like a keen strung wire under a strong touch. All in a flash the trembling, shame-stricken girl was transformed. She leaned back in his arms, supple, pliant with quivering life, and for the first time gave him wide-open level eyes, in which there were now no tears, no shyness, no fear, but a dark smouldering fire.

"You do love me, Mescal?"

"I--I couldn't help it."

There was a pause, tense with feeling.

"Mescal, tell me--about your being pledged," he said, at last.

"I gave him my promise because there was nothing else to do. I was pledged to--to him in the church at White Sage. It can't be changed.

I've got to marry--Father Naab's eldest son.""Eldest son?" echoed Jack, suddenly mindful of the implication. "Why! that's Snap Naab. Ah! I begin to see light. That--Mescal--""I hate him."

"You hate him and you're pledged to marry him! ... God! Mescal, I'd utterly forgotten Snap Naab already has a wife.""You've also forgotten that we're Mormons."

"Are you a Mormon?" he queried bluntly.

"I've been raised as one."

"That's not an answer. Are you one? Do you believe any man under God's sky ought to have more than one wife at a time?""No. But I've been taught that it gave woman greater glory in heaven.

There have been men here before you, men who talked to me, and I doubted before I ever saw you. And afterward--I knew.""Would not Father Naab release you?"

"Release me? Why, he would have taken me as a wife for himself but for Mother Mary. She hates me. So he pledged me to Snap.""Does August Naab love you?"

"Love me? No. Not in the way you mean--perhaps as a daughter. But Mormons teach duty to church first, and say such love comes--to the wives--afterward. But it doesn't--not in the women I've seen. There's Mother Ruth--her heart is broken. She loves me, and I can tell.""When was this--this marriage to be?"

"I don't know. Father Naab promised me to his son when he came home from the Navajo range. It would be soon if they found out that you and I--Jack, Snap Naab would kill you!"

The sudden thought startled the girl. Her eyes betrayed her terror.

"I mightn't be so easy to kill," said Hare, darkly. The words came unbidden, his first answer to the wild influences about him. "Mescal, I'm sorry--maybe I've brought you unhappiness.

"No. No. To be with you has been like sitting there on the rim watching the desert, the greatest happiness I have ever known. I used to love to be with the children, but Mother Mary forbade. When I am down there, which is seldom, I'm not allowed to play with the children any more.'

"What can I do?" asked Hare, passionately.

"Don't speak to Father Naab. Don't let him guess. Don't leave me here alone," she answered low. It was not the Navajo speaking in her now.