Down the Mother Lode Part 6

"Hush, this is the last. She is singing, 'Home, Sweet Home'."

"Yes, 'Home,' for these wanderers from all over the earth. See how silently they file out."

"There is many a tear among them. They will lie, tonight on memory's couch of sad dreams."

"You are wrong, my friend," said d.i.c.k bitterly; "they are more like to hasten down to the gambling h.e.l.ls to kill the visions memory would recall."

"Sweet Bird, you cannot believe this thing of me!" The Singer-Lady raised her bright head from d.i.c.k's shoulder, and met, steadfastly, his pa.s.sionately adoring eyes.

"Richard, how can you for one moment doubt me? I know you to be good and true. Were you not exonerated from the last accusation of which you informed me before you asked for my hand in marriage. And do we not know that this man is actuated by the motive of jealousy?"

"The Mormon beast! He knows well that I did not steal his mule."

"No' naughty boy," tapping him playfully with her fan, "'Twas something else you stole from Master Crow the woman he wanted. Often have I noticed on the streets how all women, every one, turn to look after you."

"I cared not for her." He shook his tall and beautiful head, impatient of the silky black lock which fell across his forehead.

"Perhaps then 'tis your magnificent carriage they would admire," laughed the girl, teasingly.

d.i.c.k swept her close to his heart. "My golden-throated dove, I cannot join in your sweet laughter, for I have a boding heart, this day. I have enemies. They will use my past record. The courts are new, and judgments swift and cold. If they should send me again to the penitentiary I--"

"Dearest I should know you to be innocent, and I should wait for you."

He kissed her tenderly on cheeks, and eyes, and mouth. He took her hands from his shoulders, slipping off the little silken mitts and putting them in an inner pocket, and kissed the soft, pink palms.

"Ah, Lady-Bird, if I should not return you'll remember me?"

"Always."

"My own pure love! No breath of shame shall ever sully your fair name through me."

"Right well I know that, Richard. G.o.d bless you. I will pray for you every hour."

At evening George Taylor brought her a note from d.i.c.k.

"Oh, George," she wailed, "they have sentenced him?"

"Two years in prison."

"But he was innocent!"

"Yes, and some day it will be proven." He looked at her strangely, "I must tell you--d.i.c.k has broken jail and fled north to Shasta county, where he will begin life anew. Then, if you still wish it, he will come to you."

After four years the Singer-Lady returned for a concert at the little Opera House in Rattlesnake. She went to her old quarters at the Widow Miller's, on the edge of town.

"Eh, Dearie," cried the good woman, "what have they been doing to ye, so to dim your bright youth, and to bring the sad lines to your mouth?"

"Mrs. Miller, where is he?"

"Ah--so that's the answer." The girl's eyes filled with tears.

"Four years--and for the last two, no word. I must find George Taylor.

Perhaps he--"

"Dearie, George Taylor is with d.i.c.k, and the Skinners and Cherokee Bob and Lame Jim Driscoll. They say, too, that at times d.i.c.k rides with Tom Bell's gang."

"Ah, he tried with all a strong man's power to win a new name for himself--and for you--but Fate was too strong. His false record followed him up and down the state from every idle throat, casting a blight over all he sought to, do. Every sheriff hounded him on. Each unproven crime was laid at his door."

"But why did he not come to me? Oh, he had my whole heart, and he knew it."

"He did come to you two years ago, to ask if you would return to Canada with him, hoping that it was too far for tales from California to travel. As soon as he reached San Francisco he was recognized by one of the authorities and 'shown up' by the Vigilante Committee in the Plaza, as they put up all dangerous characters for the police and the people to see.

"And whilst he was there you pa.s.sed, walking with another man, and looked him in the eyes and knew him not. 'Twas that which broke his heart and made him the reckless and brilliant devil that he is today."

"But--but," cried the Singer-Lady, recovering from the daze these words had placed upon her, "I did not pa.s.s. Oh, I should have fallen at his feet--lost to all maidenly reserve--there before the people. It must have been my sister, who had but lately come from Boston and so would not know him," and she broke into uncontrollable weeping.

"There, child, dry your tears. Try to be brave. You care for him still?"

"Always. I have never ceased to pray for him. If I cannot become his, I shall go lonely to my grave. Tell me everything, kind Mrs. Miller."

"He robs the stages of the Wells-Fargo box, but lets the pa.s.sengers go free, and he has never been known to take anything from a woman. He says that since all the world is against him, his hand is against the world.

"His den is now at Folsom, they say, but he ranges far afield. He robs the sluices, and the bullion trains, but he does not take horses or mules except to get away with his booty. No cell can hold him. He has escaped from every jail in the northern mines. He has been known to say, 'I shall never rot in a prison as long as a revolver can keep me out."'

"Oh, would he--"

"He would, indeed, Dearie, for the sake of his family name and the love he bears you. His last big raid was upon George Barstow's Wells-Fargo train from Yreka. They held them up on Trinity Mountain. Eighty thousand dollars in bullion, they got, even with twenty men guarding it."

Mrs. Miller tiptoed to the window and looked out. Coming back to the girl she whispered, "The guards are tied to trees, and the gang is waiting for d.i.c.k and Cy Skinner to get back with new mules, as the Wells-Fargo mules all are branded and would give them away, but if he finds out that you are here he may--"

The Singer-Lady sprang to her feet! From the trees behind the house floated a s.n.a.t.c.h of song in a clear baritone.

"When coldness or deceit shall slight the beauty now they prize; When hollow hearts shall wear a mask, 'twill break your own to see. At such a moment I but ask that you'll remember me, you'll--"

By this time the girl was sobbing in d.i.c.k's arms, and the misunderstandings of four years were soon explained.

The Singer-Lady lifted her head at last to the sound of galloping horses. d.i.c.k was looking calmly in their direction. Terror seized her.

"What is that?"

"You must return to the house. They must not see you here."

She clung to him with the wail of a breaking heart.