Part 17
“And then something in the back of my head woke up and howled: ‘You won—it’s yours—a chance for life—fair play—he’d go if you lost—he’d go!’ And there was a roaring in my head and the flaming night whirled ’round, and the bitter words stung me, and my heart hardened—and—I—went.
“I found the Kid’s horse saddled and bridled. I cut the lariat and leaped astride. I jabbed the spike spurs into the frightened brute till he roared with pain. I had forgotten everything. I was a Fear without a body flying through a darkness that coughed smoke and spit light. And then at last things quit whirling, and I felt the steady _lift, lift, lift_ of the good brute racing with all the devils down a heart-breaking stretch for the river.
“I turned about in the saddle. Half the sky had turned into an open furnace! Above me a great stormy ocean of blood rolled on into the twilight of the east! Blood!—a seething, billowy sea of red blood, with great, red, purring cat-tongues lapping it greedily! Gaudy giant flowers—purple, yellow, red, green—bloomed for a moment in a strange garden of dreams, and nodded in the wind and fell and bloomed again and fell! The infernal beauty of the thing fascinated me for a moment. Then I heard the rumbling—the unceasing thunder. It was louder than before. I thought of the ten thousand sharp hoofs gaining, gaining, with whips of fire lashing them in the rear. And then I thought of the Kid back there.
“My heart sickened. The hot wind that scorched my face accused me; the choking air accused me. I could see him lying on his face even then with the mad hoofs beating him into a pulp; I could see the writhing of his body as the heat increased; I could smell the stench of his sizzling flesh!
“I reeled in the saddle, yet the mad wish to live lashed my hands to the pommel. But this was only for a moment. The meanest worm that ever wriggled in a dunghill holds fast to his life. I forgot the Kid again; I remembered only myself and that I must ride to win. I pulled the horse down and held him steady. Never did I throw a leg across a better horse than the Kid’s—honest, rangy, clean-limbed and deep in the chest! My heart leaped with joy when I heard his long even breathing. I had a great delirious love for the big-hearted brute as I felt his long, even reach, the tireless rhythmic stride that throws the miles behind. The drifting red sea of smoke above cast the wild glare down upon the prairie and made the footing sure. I threw my guns away; I stripped off my coat and gave it to the wind. I knew what an extra pound might mean.
“An elk forged slowly past, his wide antlers tipped with light. An antelope sprang up and bounded away into the twilight ahead. A coyote leaped from a shoe-string clump; he cowered and whined like a whipped dog with his tail between his legs, then raced away down the wind. Snorting shadows began to move to right and left in the further gloom and disappear in the smoke-drift. I was now a part of the ragged edge of the flotsam tossed up by the approaching lip of the flood. I gave my horse another inch of rein and held him steady. The thunder in the rear grew louder; I could hear dimly the wild confusion of animal cries. I was the fox hearing the yelp of the hounds and racing for cover.
“Years and years of flight with the breath of an oven to breathe! Years and years of rising and falling, rising and falling, and my throat was tight with the driving smoke. The good brute began to wheeze and cough. I felt the tremor of his wearying muscles, the slight unsteadiness of the knees. I prayed for the river—prayed like a kid at his mother’s knee. I begged the brute to keep his legs; I cursed him when he tottered; I called him baby names and damned him in a breath.
“And after years the day began—a sneaking shadow of a day, shamed out by the howling western dawn that met it on the run. A storm of sound was all about me. Neck and neck I raced with a buffalo bull that led the herd; his swollen tongue hung from his foaming mouth; his breath rumbled in his throat. Wheezing steers toiled up about me. Deer and elk raced side by side, slowly forging into the van. Grey wolves bounded past, whining and yelping. And my good brute beat away bravely at the few remaining miles. I felt the dry rasp of his lungs and the breaking of his big, strong heart. He stumbled—I gave him the spur to the heel; he gave no sign of pain. He was dying on his feet.
“And the cheap, dirty day crept in through the smoke—and I thought of the Kid, and lost heart and cared no more about the race. But by and by I saw the river ahead, and we plunged in—a howling, panting flood of beasts, struggling for the farther shore.
“The sky and the river whirled about me. I felt my horse totter up a sandbank and fall. Then the day went out, and I forgot.
“O God! I wish I’d never waked up! Why didn’t the buffalo and the steers beat me into the sand? Why did I wake up?”
Frenchy covered his face with his hands and the tears trickled through his fingers.
“But the dead horse parted the herd, and I woke up and the fire was dead and the sun looked like a moon through the smoke. Three aching years ago, it was; and I’ve dragged my carcass about and tried to look like a man. But night and day the deuces have followed me and tortured me. They burn holes in the dark whenever I shut my eyes; four pairs of devils dance before me all day in the sunlight till my head whirls.”
Frenchy picked up the four deuces and held them tremblingly before the staring crowd.
“Look at ’em! Let ’em burn through your hides into your souls! There’s the blood of the Kid on ’em. The damned dirty deuces! They’ve got me in the last ditch! I’m done!”
Frenchy crushed the cards and dashed them to the floor. He arose unsteadily to his feet, took his guns and staggered out of the barroom of the “Big 6.”
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Transcriber’s note:
—Obvious errors were corrected.