Wildfire Part 17

"He has been a proud, wild stallion," mused Lucy. "And he's now broken--terribly broken--all but ruined."

Then she walked up to him naturally and spoke softly, and reached a hand for his shoulder.

"Whoa, Reddy. Whoa now.... There. That's a good fellow. Why, I wouldn't rope you or hit you. I'm only a girl."

He drew up, made a single effort to jump, which she prevented, and then he stood quivering, eying her, while she talked soothingly, and patted him and looked at him in the way she had found infallible with most horses. Lucy believed horses were like people, or easier to get along with. Presently she gently pulled out one of the cactus spikes. The horse flinched, but he stood. Lucy was slow, careful, patient, and dexterous. The cactus needles were loose and easily removed or brushed off. At length she got him free of them, and was almost as proud as she was glad. The horse had gradually dropped his head; he was tired and his spirit was broken.

"Now, what shall I do?" she queried. "I'll take the back trail of these horses. They certainly hadn't been here long before I saw them. And the rider may be close. If not I'll take the horses home."

She slipped the noose from the stallion's head, leaving the hackamore, and, coiling the loose la.s.so, she hung it over the pommel of the black's saddle. Then she took up his bridle.

"Come on," she called.

The black followed her, and the stallion, still fast to him by the la.s.so Lucy had left tied, trooped behind with bowed head. Lucy was elated. But Sage King did not like the matter at all. Lucy had to drop the black's bridle and catch the King, and then ride back to lead the other again.

A broad trail marked the way the two horses had come, and it led off to the left, toward where the monuments were thickest, and where the great sections of wall stood, broken and battlemented. Lucy was hard put to it to hold Sage King, but the horses behind plodded along. The black horse struck Lucy as being an ugly, but a faithful and wonderful animal. He understood everything. Presently she tied the bridle she was leading him by to the end of her own la.s.so, and thus let him drop back a few yards, which lessened the King's fretting.

Intent on the trail, Lucy failed to note time or distance till the looming and frowning monuments stood aloft before her. What weird effect they had! Each might have been a colossal statue left there to mark the work of the ages. Lucy realized that the whole vast valley had once been solid rock, just like the monuments, and through the millions of years the softer parts had eroded and weathered and blown away--gone with the great sea that had once been there. But the beauty, the solemnity, the majesty of these monuments fascinated her most. She pa.s.sed the first one, a huge square b.u.t.te, and then the second, a ragged, thin, double shaft, and then went between two much alike, reaching skyward in the shape of monstrous mittens. She watched and watched them, sparing a moment now and then to attend to the trail. She noticed that she was coming into a region of gra.s.s, and faint signs of water in the draws. She was getting high again, not many miles now from the wall of rock.

All at once Sage King s.h.i.+ed, and Lucy looked down to see a man lying on the ground. He lay inert. But his eyes were open--dark, staring eyes.

They moved. And he called. But Lucy could not understand him.

In a flash she leaped off the King. She ran to the prostrate man--dropped to her knees.

"Oh!" she cried. His face was ghastly. "Oh! are you--you badly hurt?"

"Lift me--my head," he said, faintly.

She raised his head. What a strained, pa.s.sionate, terrible gaze he bent upon the horses.

"Boy, they're mine--the black an' the red!" he cried.

"They surely must be," replied Lucy. "Oh! tell me. Are you hurt?"

"Boy! did you catch them--fetch them back--lookin' for me?"

"I sure did."

"You caught-that red devil--an' fetched him--back to me?" went on the wondering, faint voice. "Boy--oh--boy!"

He lifted a long, ragged arm and pulled Lucy down. The action amazed her equally as his pa.s.sion of grat.i.tude. He might have been injured, but he had an arm of iron. Lucy was powerless. She felt her face against his--and her breast against his. The pounding of his heart was like blows. The first instant she wanted to laugh, despite her pity.

Then the powerful arm--the contact affected her as nothing ever before.

Suppose this crippled rider had taken her for a boy--She was not a boy!

She could not help being herself. And no man had ever put a hand on her. Consciousness of this brought shame and anger. She struggled so violently that she freed herself. And he lay back.

"See here--that's no way to act--to hug--a person," she cried, with flaming cheeks.

"Boy, I--"

"I'm NOT a boy. I'm a girl."

"What!"

Lucy tore off her sombrero, which had been pulled far forward, and this revealed her face fully, and her hair came tumbling down. The rider gazed, stupefied. Then a faint tinge of red colored his ghastly cheeks.

"A girl! ... Why--why 'scuse me, miss. I--I took you--for a boy."

He seemed so astounded, he looked so ashamed, so scared, and withal, so haggard and weak, that Lucy immediately recovered her equanimity.

"Sure I'm a girl. But that's no matter.... You've been thrown. Are you hurt?"

He smiled a weak a.s.sent.

"Badly?" she queried. She did not like the way he lay--so limp, so motionless.

"I'm afraid so. I can't move."

"Oh! ... What shall I do?"

"Can you--get me water?" he whispered, with dry lips.

Lucy flew to her horse to get the small canteen she always carried. But that had been left on her saddle, and she had ridden Van's. Then she gazed around. The wash she had crossed several times ran near where the rider lay. Green gra.s.s and willows bordered it. She ran down and, hurrying along, searched for water. There was water in places, yet she had to go a long way before she found water that was drinkable. Filling her sombrero, she hurried back to the side of the rider. It was difficult to give him a drink.

"Thanks, miss," he said, gratefully. His voice was stronger and less hoa.r.s.e.

"Have you any broken bones?" asked Lucy.

"I don't know. I can't feel much."

"Are you in pain?"

"Hardly. I feel sort of thick."

Lucy, being an intelligent girl, born in the desert and used to its needs, had not often encountered a situation with which she was unable to cope.

"Let me feel if you have any broken bones.... THAT arm isn't broken, I'm positive."

The rider smiled faintly again. How he stared with his strained, dark eyes! His face showed ghastly through the thin, soft beard and the tan.

Lucy found his right arm badly bruised, but not broken. She made sure his collar-bones and shoulder-blades were intact. Broken ribs were harder to locate; still, as he did not feel pain from pressure, she concluded there were no fractures there. With her a.s.sistance he moved his legs, proving no broken bones there.

"I'm afraid it's my--spine," he said.

"But you raised your head once," she replied. "If your back was--was broken or injured you couldn't raise your head."

"So I couldn't. I guess I'm just knocked out. I was--pretty weak before Wildfire knocked me--off Nagger."

"Wildfire?"