A boy was stirring up the dust of the street, enjoying its heat with his bare toes, and the same old man was bunched in his chair in front of the store. During the two days Elizabeth had been in town on her cattle- buying trip, she had never see him alter his position. But she was accustomed to the West, and this advent4 of sleep in the town did not satisfy her. A drowsy5 town, like a drowsy-looking cow-puncher, might be capable of unexpected things.
"Vance," she said, "there's trouble starting."
"Somebody shooting at a target," he answered.
As if to mock him, he had no sooner spoken than a dozen voices yelled down the street in a wailing6 chorus cut short by the rapid chattering7 of revolvers. Vance ran to the window. Just below the hotel the street made an elbow-turn for no particular reason except that the original cattle- trail had made exactly the same turn before Garrison8 City was built. Toward the corner ran the hubbub9 at the pace of a running horse. Shouts, shrill10, trailing curses, and the muffled11 beat of hoofs12 in the dust. A rider plunged13 into view now, his horse leaning far in to take the sharp angle, and the dust skidding14 out and away from his sliding hoofs. The rider gave easily and gracefully15 to the wrench16 of his mount.
And he seemed to have a perfect trust in his horse, for he rode with the reins17 hanging over the horns of his saddle. His hands were occupied by a pair of revolvers, and he was turned in the saddle.
The head of the pursuing crowd lurched around the elbow-turn; fire spat18 twice from the mouth of each gun. Two men dropped, one rolling over and over in the dust, and the other sitting down and clasping his leg in a ludicrous fashion. But the crowd was checked and fell back.
By this time the racing19 horse of the fugitive20 had carried him close to the hotel, and now he faced the front, a handsome fellow with long black hair blowing about his face. He wore a black silk shirt which accentuated21 the pallor of his face and the flaring22 crimson23 of his bandanna24. And he laughed joyously25, and the watchers from the hotel window heard him call: "Go it, Mary. Feed 'em dust, girl!"
The pursuers had apparently26 realized that it was useless to chase. Another gust27 of revolver shots barked from the turning of the street, and among them a different and more sinister28 sound like the striking of two great hammers face on face, so that there was a cold ring of metal after the explosion—at least one man had brought a rifle to bear. Now, as the wild rider darted29 past the hotel, his hat was jerked from his head by an invisible hand. He whirled again in the saddle and his guns raised. As he turned, Elizabeth Cornish saw something glint across the street. It was the gleam of light on the barrel of a rifle that was thrust out through the window of the store.
That long line of light wobbled, steadied, and fire jetted from the mouth of the gun. The black-haired rider spilled sidewise out of the saddle; his feet came clear of the stirrups, and his right leg caught on the cantle. He was flung rolling in the dust, his arms flying weirdly30. The rifle disappeared from the window and a boy's set face looked out. But before the limp body of the fugitive had stopped rolling, Elizabeth Cornish dropped into a chair, sick of face. Her brother turned his back on the mob that closed over the dead man and looked at Elizabeth in alarm.
It was not the first time he had seen the result of a gunplay, and for that matter it was not the first time for Elizabeth. Her emotion upset him more than the roar of a hundred guns. He managed to bring her a glass of water, but she brushed it away so that half of the contents spilled on the red carpet of the room.
"He isn't dead, Vance. He isn't dead!" she kept saying.
"Dead before he left the saddle," replied Vance, with his usual calm. "And if the bullet hadn't finished him, the fall would have broken his neck. But—what in the world! Did you know the fellow?"
He blinked at her, his amazement31 growing. The capable hands of Elizabeth were pressed to her breast, and out of the thirty-five years of spinsterhood which had starved her face he became aware of eyes young and dark, and full of spirit; by no means the keen, quiet eyes of Elizabeth Cornish.
"Do something," she cried. "Go down, and—if they've murdered him—"
All the time she was seeing nothing, but she would never forget what she had seen, no matter how long she lived. Subconsciously33 she was fighting to keep the street voices out of her mind. They were saying things she did not wish to hear, things she would not hear. Finally, she recovered enough to stand up and shut the window. That brought her a terrible temptation to look down into the mass of men in the street—and women, too!
But she resisted and looked up. The forms of the street remained obscurely in the bottom of her vision, and made her think of something she had seen in the woods—a colony of ants around a dead beetle34. Presently the door opened and Vance came back. He still seemed very worried, but she forced herself to smile at him, and at once his concern disappeared; it was plain that he had been troubled about her and not in the slightest by the fate of the strange rider. She kept on smiling, but for the first time in her life she really looked at Vance without sisterly prejudice in his favor. She saw a good-natured face, handsome, with the cheeks growing a bit blocky, though Vance was only twenty-five. He had a glorious forehead and fine eyes, but one would never look twice at Vance in a crowd. She knew suddenly that her brother was simply a well-mannered mediocrity.
"Thank the Lord you're yourself again, Elizabeth," her brother said first of all. "I thought for a moment—I don't know what!"
"Just the shock, Vance," she said. Ordinarily she was well-nigh brutally35 frank. Now she found it easy to lie and keep on smiling. "It was such a horrible thing to see!"
"I suppose so. Caught you off balance. But I never knew you to lose your grip so easily. Well, do you know what you've seen?"
"He's dead, then?"
"Oh, dead as a doornail, Elizabeth. Very neat shot. Youngster that dropped him; boy named Joe Minter. Six thousand dollars for Joe. Nice little nest egg to build a fortune on, eh?"
"Six thousand dollars! What do you mean, Vance?"
"But—this is only a boy, Vance. He couldn't have been more than twenty- five years old."
"That's all."
"But I've heard of him for ten years, very nearly. And always as a man- killer40. It can't be Black Jack."
"I said the same thing, but it's Black Jack, well enough. He started out when he was sixteen, they say, and he's been raising the devil ever since. You should have seen them pick him up—as if he were asleep, and not dead. What a body! Lithe41 as a panther. No larger than I am, but they say he was a giant with his hands."
He was lighting his cigarette as he said this, and consequently he did not see her eyes close tightly. A moment later she was able to make her expression as calm as ever.
"Came into town to see his baby," went on Vance through the smoke.
"Little year-old beggar!"
"Think of the mother," murmured Elizabeth Cornish. "I want to do something for her."
"You can't," replied her brother, with unnecessary brutality42. "Because she's dead. A little after the youngster was born. I believe Black Jack broke her heart, and a very pleasant sort of girl she was, they tell me."
"What will become of the baby?"
"It will live and grow up," he said carelessly. "They always do, somehow. Make another like his father, I suppose. A few years of fame in the mountain saloons, and then a knife in the back."
The meager43 body of Elizabeth stiffened44. She was finding it less easy to maintain her nonchalant smile.
"Why?"
"Why? Blood will out, like murder, sis."
"Nonsense! All a matter of environment."
"Have you ever read the story of the Jukes family?"
"An accident. Take a son out of the best family in the world and raise him like a thief—he'll be a thief. And the thief's son can be raised to an honest manhood. I know it!"
She was seeing Black Jack, as he had raced down the street with the black hair blowing about his face. Of such stuff, she felt, the knights45 of another age had been made. Vance was raising a forefinger46 in an authoritative47 way he had.
"My dear, before that baby is twenty-five—that was his father's age—he'll have shot a man. Bet you on it!"
"I'll take your bet!"
The retort came with such a ring of her voice that he was startled.
Before he could recover, she went on: "Go out and get that baby for me,
Vance. I want it."
He tossed his cigarette out of the window.
"Don't drop into one of your headstrong moods, sis. This is nonsense."
"That's why I want to do it. I'm tired of playing the man. I've had enough to fill my mind. I want something to fill my arms and my heart."
She drew up her hands with a peculiar48 gesture toward her shallow, barren bosom49, and then her brother found himself silenced. At the same time he was a little irritated, for there was an imputation50 in her speech that she had been carrying the burden which his own shoulders should have supported. Which was so true that he could not answer, and therefore he cast about for some way of stinging her.
"I thought you were going to escape the sentimental51 period, Elizabeth.
But sooner or later I suppose a woman has to pass through it."
A spot of color came in her sallow cheek.
"That's sufficiently52 disagreeable, Vance."
"I'm going to take you at your word, sis. I'm going out to get that baby.
He went deliberately56 to the door and laid his hand on the knob. He had a rather vicious pleasure in calling her bluff57, but to his amazement she did not call him back. He opened the door slowly. Still she did not speak. He slammed it behind him and stepped into the hall.
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1
uproar
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| n.骚动，喧嚣，鼎沸 | |
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lighting
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| n.照明，光线的明暗，舞台灯光 | |
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lull
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| v.使安静，使入睡，缓和，哄骗；n.暂停，间歇 | |
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advent
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| n.(重要事件等的)到来，来临 | |
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drowsy
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| adj.昏昏欲睡的，令人发困的 | |
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wailing
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| v.哭叫，哀号( wail的现在分词 )；沱 | |
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chattering
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| n. （机器振动发出的）咔嗒声，(鸟等)鸣，啁啾 adj. 喋喋不休的，啾啾声的 动词chatter的现在分词形式 | |
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8
garrison
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| n.卫戍部队；驻地，卫戍区；vt.派(兵)驻防 | |
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9
hubbub
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| n.嘈杂；骚乱 | |
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shrill
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| adj.尖声的；刺耳的；v尖叫 | |
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muffled
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| adj.（声音）被隔的；听不太清的；（衣服）裹严的；蒙住的v.压抑，捂住( muffle的过去式和过去分词 )；用厚厚的衣帽包着（自己） | |
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12
hoofs
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| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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13
plunged
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| v.颠簸( plunge的过去式和过去分词 )；暴跌；骤降；突降 | |
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14
skidding
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| n.曳出，集材v.（通常指车辆） 侧滑( skid的现在分词 )；打滑；滑行；（住在）贫民区 | |
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15
gracefully
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| ad.大大方方地；优美地 | |
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wrench
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| v.猛拧；挣脱；使扭伤；n.扳手；痛苦，难受 | |
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17
reins
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| 感情，激情； 缰( rein的名词复数 )； 控制手段； 掌管； （成人带着幼儿走路以防其走失时用的）保护带 | |
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18
spat
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| n.口角，掌击；v.发出呼噜呼噜声 | |
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racing
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| n.竞赛，赛马；adj.竞赛用的，赛马用的 | |
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fugitive
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| adj.逃亡的，易逝的；n.逃犯，逃亡者 | |
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accentuated
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| v.重读( accentuate的过去式和过去分词 )；使突出；使恶化；加重音符号于 | |
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flaring
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| a.火焰摇曳的，过份艳丽的 | |
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crimson
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| n./adj.深(绯)红色(的)；vi.脸变绯红色 | |
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24
bandanna
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| n.大手帕 | |
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25
joyously
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| ad.快乐地, 高兴地 | |
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apparently
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| adv.显然地；表面上，似乎 | |
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gust
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| n.阵风，突然一阵（雨、烟等），（感情的）迸发 | |
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28
sinister
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| adj.不吉利的，凶恶的，左边的 | |
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29
darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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weirdly
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| 古怪地 | |
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amazement
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| n.惊奇，惊讶 | |
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literally
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| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
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subconsciously
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| ad.下意识地，潜意识地 | |
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34
beetle
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| n.甲虫，近视眼的人 | |
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brutally
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| adv.残忍地，野蛮地，冷酷无情地 | |
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tremor
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| n.震动，颤动，战栗，兴奋，地震 | |
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37
unevenness
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| n. 不平坦，不平衡，不匀性 | |
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38
jack
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| n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克 | |
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39
celebrated
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| adj.有名的，声誉卓著的 | |
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40
killer
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| n.杀人者，杀人犯，杀手，屠杀者 | |
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41
lithe
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| adj.(指人、身体)柔软的，易弯的 | |
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42
brutality
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| n.野蛮的行为，残忍，野蛮 | |
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43
meager
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| adj.缺乏的，不足的，瘦的 | |
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44
stiffened
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| 加强的 | |
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45
knights
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| 骑士； （中古时代的）武士( knight的名词复数 )； 骑士； 爵士； （国际象棋中）马 | |
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46
forefinger
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| n.食指 | |
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47
authoritative
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| adj.有权威的，可相信的；命令式的；官方的 | |
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48
peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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49
bosom
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| n.胸，胸部；胸怀；内心；adj.亲密的 | |
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50
imputation
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| n.归罪，责难 | |
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51
sentimental
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| adj.多愁善感的，感伤的 | |
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52
sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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53
cowardice
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| n.胆小，怯懦 | |
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54
conceal
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| v.隐藏，隐瞒，隐蔽 | |
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55
calf
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| n.小牛，犊，幼仔，小牛皮 | |
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56
deliberately
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| adv.审慎地；蓄意地；故意地 | |
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57
bluff
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| v.虚张声势，用假象骗人；n.虚张声势，欺骗 | |
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