Riders of the Purple Sage, Zane Grey [best classic novels TXT] 📗

but this was the awfulest. I remember I closed my eyes, an’ fer a minute I thought of the strangest things, out of place there, such as you’d never dream would come to mind. I saw the sage, an’ runnin’ hosses⁠—an’ thet’s the beautfulest sight to me⁠—an’ I saw dim things in the dark, an’ there was a kind of hummin’ in my ears. An’ I remember distinctly⁠—fer it was what made all these things whirl out of my mind an’ opened my eyes⁠—I remember distinctly it was the smell of gunpowder.

“The court had about adjourned fer thet judge. He was on his knees, en’ he wasn’t prayin’. He was gaspin’ an’ tryin’ to press his big, floppin’, crippled hands over his body. Lassiter had sent all those last thunderin’ shots through his body. Thet was Lassiter’s way.

“An’ Lassiter spoke, en’ if I ever forgit his words I’ll never forgit the sound of his voice.

“ ‘Proselyter, I reckon you’d better call quick on thet God who reveals Hisself to you on earth, because He won’t be visitin’ the place you’re goin’ to!”

“An’ then I seen Dyer look at his big, hangin’ hands thet wasn’t big enough fer the last work he set them to. An’ he looked up at Lassiter. An’ then he stared horrible at somethin’ thet wasn’t Lassiter, nor anyone there, nor the room, nor the branches of purple sage peepin’ into the winder. Whatever he seen, it was with the look of a man who discovers somethin’ too late. Thet’s a terrible look!⁠ ⁠… An’ with a horrible understandin’ cry he slid forrard on his face.”

Judkins paused in his narrative, breathing heavily while he wiped his perspiring brow.

“Thet’s about all,” he concluded. “Lassiter left the meetin’-house an’ I hurried to catch up with him. He was bleedin’ from three gunshots, none of them much to bother him. An’ we come right up here. I found you layin’ in the hall, an’ I hed to work some over you.”

Jane Withersteen offered up no prayer for Dyer’s soul.

Lassiter’s step sounded in the hall⁠—the familiar soft, silver-clinking step⁠—and she heard it with thrilling new emotions in which was a vague joy in her very fear of him. The door opened, and she saw him, the old Lassiter, slow, easy, gentle, cool, yet not exactly the same Lassiter. She rose, and for a moment her eyes blurred and swam in tears.

“Are you⁠—all⁠—all right?” she asked, tremulously.

“I reckon.”

“Lassiter, I’ll ride away with you. Hide me till danger is past⁠—till we are forgotten⁠—then take me where you will. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God!”

He kissed her hand with the quaint grace and courtesy that came to him in rare moments.

“Black Star an’ Night are ready,” he said, simply.

His quiet mention of the black racers spurred Jane to action. Hurrying to her room, she changed to her rider’s suit, packed her jewelry, and the gold that was left, and all the woman’s apparel for which there was space in the saddlebags, and then returned to the hall. Black Star stamped his iron-shod hoofs and tossed his beautiful head, and eyed her with knowing eyes.

“Judkins, I give Bells to you,” said Jane. “I hope you will always keep him and be good to him.”

Judkins mumbled thanks that he could not speak fluently, and his eyes flashed.

Lassiter strapped Jane’s saddlebags upon Black Star, and led the racers out into the court.

“Judkins, you ride with Jane out into the sage. If you see any riders comin’ shout quick twice. An’, Jane, don’t look back! I’ll catch up soon. We’ll get to the break into the Pass before midnight, an’ then wait until mornin’ to go down.”

Black Star bent his graceful neck and bowed his noble head, and his broad shoulders yielded as he knelt for Jane to mount.

She rode out of the court beside Judkins, through the grove, across the wide lane into the sage, and she realized that she was leaving Withersteen House forever, and she did not look back. A strange, dreamy, calm peace pervaded her soul. Her doom had fallen upon her, but, instead of finding life no longer worth living she found it doubly significant, full of sweetness as the western breeze, beautiful and unknown as the sage-slope stretching its purple sunset shadows before her. She became aware of Judkins’s hand touching hers; she heard him speak a husky goodbye; then into the place of Bells shot the dead-black, keen, racy nose of Night, and she knew Lassiter rode beside her.

“Don’t⁠—look⁠—back!” he said, and his voice, too, was not clear.

Facing straight ahead, seeing only the waving, shadowy sage, Jane held out her gauntleted hand, to feel it enclosed in strong clasp. So she rode on without a backward glance at the beautiful grove of Cottonwoods. She did not seem to think of the past of what she left forever, but of the color and mystery and wildness of the sage-slope leading down to Deception Pass, and of the future. She watched the shadows lengthen down the slope; she felt the cool west wind sweeping by from the rear; and she wondered at low, yellow clouds sailing swiftly over her and beyond.

“Don’t look⁠—back!” said Lassiter.

Thick-driving belts of smoke traveled by on the wind, and with it came a strong, pungent odor of burning wood.

Lassiter had fired Withersteen House! But Jane did not look back.

A misty veil obscured the clear, searching gaze she had kept steadfastly upon the purple slope and the dim lines of canyons. It passed, as passed the rolling clouds of smoke, and she saw the valley deepening into the shades of twilight. Night came on, swift as the fleet racers, and stars peeped out to brighten and grow, and the huge, windy, eastern heave of sage-level paled under a rising moon and turned to silver. Blanched in moonlight, the sage yet seemed to hold its hue of purple and was infinitely more wild and lonely. So the night hours wore on, and Jane Withersteen never once looked back.