The Twins of Suffering Creek

She could see the crowded corrals from where she stood. She could hear the bellowing of the restless cattle as they pushed and horned each other in their forceful, bovine desire to get out to the succulent grass of their beloved pastures. All the men were astir, preparing for their lawless expedition. The saddle-horses, ready for the trail, were hitched to the corral fences. Through the open window she could hear her lover ordering and hectoring, as was his way of dealing with the ruffians who served under his leadership; and a thrill of excitement, a subtle sympathy, stirred her. She moved to the window, leaving her beautiful hair flowing in the bright air, and stood watching for the departure.

Then came that hideous thing which was to shadow all her future life. It came almost without warning. In a flash, it seemed, the last tinge of romance was swept from her thoughts, and the hideous skeleton of reality was laid bare.

The men had tightened up the cinchas of their saddles, and passed the reins over their horses’ heads, ready to mount. She watched them all with something very like admiration in her blinded eyes. Their hard, desperate faces did not appear so to her. These things, in her foolish mind, were the hall-mark of reckless courage, of strong, virile manhood. They were men who feared nothing, who cared no more for their own lives than they would care for the life of an enemy. And somehow this seemed to her just as it should be.

She waited to see them mount their raw-boned bronchos. But somehow there was a delay; and in this delay a change came over the scene. The men drifted away from their horses and gathered into groups. They stood whispering together with faces averted from their leader. A feeling of apprehension somehow caught hold of her. She did not understand why, but she felt that all was not right. She turned to James, and saw that he was moving round his horse all unconcernedly, and she wondered if he were aware of the change in his men.

But all further speculation was abruptly checked, for at that moment she heard the leader issue one of his sharp orders. She did not quite catch his words, but she noticed that no one moved or attempted to comply. Only talk ceased instantly. Then she saw the handsome face of her lover flush, as he glanced about him at this unusual phenomenon, and in a moment she recognized the sudden savage anger that flashed into his eyes. Simultaneously his hand dropped to the butt of one of his guns.

Then she heard his words, as they were shouted to the accompaniment of a string of vicious oaths.

“Ho, you, Ned, an’ you, too, Sully!” he cried fiercely, “get your ears flappin’. Huyk that rotten skunk Conroy out. I ain’t tellin’ you again.”

The woman had thrilled at his words. There was such command, such fearlessness in them, in his whole poise. She felt, too, that there was trouble looming. There was rebellion in the air. Her excitement rose, and her sympathies were all for this one man.

The two men indicated suddenly bestirred themselves, and moved off under their leader’s eye. The rest drifted together–eight of them, she found herself counting. And as they drew together a murmur arose.

Instantly James’ gun flew from its holster; and he stood, the personification of cold authority.

“Another word an’ I empty this into your lousy hides!” she heard him cry. And instantly the murmur died out.

But the threatening weapon did not return to its holster. James stood there waiting. And presently she beheld the two men he had despatched returning, bringing in their custody, tottering awkwardly between them, the man Abe Conroy, with his arms tightly fastened behind his back, and a pair of horse-hobbles securing his ankles. They came slowly, for the hobbles allowed but little play, and halted less than five yards away from their leader.

As they paused the woman shivered. Some premonition of what was about to happen got hold of her, and struck terror to her heart. She stood staring now, unable to move. A hideous fascination seemed to paralyze her.

The next thing that reached her comprehension was that James was speaking in a harsh metallic voice. She had never heard him speak like that before, and her fears swiftly increased as his words floated in through the open window.

“Now, you skunk,” he was saying, “you guess you’re man enough to run this lay-out. You guess you’re a bigger man than me. You guess you got me squealin’ around like a suckin’ kid. You! An’ I took you out o’ jail, wher’ they was goin’ to set you swingin’. Gee! I could tell you a heap, but I ain’t no time talkin’ to bastards of your kidney. Swingin’s too good fer sech as you. Anyway, when I got work to do I do it myself. Here, you, Ned, an’ you, Sully, stand aside!”

She saw the two men withdraw. She wanted to scream, without quite knowing why. But no sound came. Her eyes were starting out of her head with the horror of what she knew to be about to happen. But she had no power to stir hand or foot.

She saw James move forward. She saw the bloodless, horror-stricken face of the prisoner. She saw him stumble as he attempted to move away. There was no escape.

James moved forward with body crouching, and strides that covered the intervening space with almost feline stealth.

He came right up to the man, his gun leading. She heard a report and one dreadful cry of terror and pain. She saw Conroy crumple and fall writhing upon the ground. She saw the blood streaming from his stomach. Then the further horror came to her staring eyes as she saw James stand over his victim and fire shot after shot into the hideous, writhing heap.

But the limit was reached. With one wild scream she turned away and flung herself upon her bed; and the next moment everything mercifully became a blank to her.

That was on the Sunday morning. She saw nothing of what followed. She knew nothing until she awoke some two hours later to the haunting vision of the scene she had witnessed. And ever since it had clung to her–clung like an obsession, a mental parasite sapping her nerve, her very reason. Nor had she power to disassociate herself from it.

And now she was waiting in an agony of mind for the murderer’s return. Not only was she waiting for his return, but she expected to see him bearing in his arms one of her own innocent children. The thought of little Vada in his arms drove her frantic. Her innocent little Vada in the arms of this cold-blooded assassin!

She knew him now for all he was. The scales had fallen from her foolish eyes. All the romance of his hideous calling had passed in a flash, and she saw it as it was. She had no words to express her feelings of horror and revolting. In her weakness and wickedness she had torn herself out of the life of a good man to fling herself upon the bosom of this black-hearted villain. She loathed him; she loathed his very name. But more than all else she loathed herself. Her punishment was terrible. She was so helpless, so powerless. She knew it, and the knowledge paralyzed her thought. What could she do? She knew she was watched, and any move to get away would be at once frustrated. She could do nothing–nothing.

No longer able to remain in her room, she had come out to breathe air which she vainly hoped was less contaminated with the crimes of the man whose home she had elected to share. But inside or out it made no difference. The haunting was not of the place. It was in her mind; it had enveloped her whole consciousness.

But through it all there was one longing, one yearning for all that she had lost, all she had wantonly thrown away. Suffering Creek, with its poverty-stricken home on the dumps, suggested paradise to her now. She yearned as only a mother can yearn for the warm caresses of her children. She longed for the honest love of the little man whom, in the days of her arrogant womanhood, she had so mercilessly despised. All his patient kindliness came back to her now. All his tremendous, if misdirected, effort on her behalf, his never-failing loyalty and courage, were things which to her, in her misery, were the most blessed of all blessings. She wanted home–home. And in that one bitter cry of her heart was expressed the awakening of her real womanhood.

But it had come too late–too late. There was no home now for her but the home of this man. There was no husband for her, only the illicit love of this man. Her children–she could only obtain them by a theft. And as this last thought came to her she remembered who it was who must commit the theft.

The thought brought a fresh terror. How would he accomplish his end? Had not Scipio tacitly refused to yield up her children? Then how–how? She shivered. She knew the means James would readily, probably only too gladly, adopt. Her husband, the little harmless man who had always loved her, would be swept aside like anyone else who stood in the way. James would shoot him down as he had shot Conroy down; even, she fancied, he would shoot him down for the wanton amusement of destroying his life.

Oh no, no! It was too horrible. He was her husband, the first man she had ever cared for. She thought of all they had been to each other. Her mind sped swiftly over past scenes which had so long been forgotten. She remembered his gentleness, his kindly thought for her, his self-effacement where her personal comforts were in question, his devotion both to herself and her children. Every detail of their disastrous married life sped swiftly before her straining mental vision, leaving the man standing out something greater than a hero to her yearning heart. And she had flung it all away in a moment of passion. She had blinded herself in the arrogance of her woman’s vanity. Gone, gone. And now she was the mistress of a common assassin.

So she lashed herself with the torture of repentance and regret as the darkness fell. She did not stir from her post. The damp of the mist was unnoticed, the chill of the air. She was waiting for that return which was to claim her to an earthly hell, than which she could conceive no greater–waiting like the condemned prisoner, numb, helpless, fearful lest the end should come unobserved.

The ranch wardens waited, too. The man cursed his charge with all the hatred of an evil nature, as the damp penetrated to his mean bones. The dog, too, grew restless, but where his master was, there was his place. He had long since learned that–to his cost.

The night crept on, and there was no change in the position, except that the man sought the sheltering doorway of one of the barns, and covered his damp shirt with a jacket. But the woman did not move. She was beyond all conception of time. She was beyond any thought of personal comfort or fatigue. All she knew was that she must wait–wait for the coming of her now hated lover, that at least she might snatch her child from his contaminating arms. And after that–well, after that–She had no power to think of the afterwards.

The moon rose amidst the obscurity of the fog. It mounted, and at last reached a height where its silvery light could no longer be denied by the low-lying mists. But its reign was brief. Its cold splendor rapidly began to shrink before the pink dawn, and in less than two hours it was but a dim white circle set in the azure of the new-born day.

Still the woman remained at her post, her dark eyes straining with her vigil. She was drenched to the skin with the night-mists, but the chill of her body was nothing to the chill of her heart. The spy was still at his post in the barn doorway, but he was slumbering, as was his canine servitor, lying curled up at his feet. The sun rose, the mists cleared. And now the warming of day stirred the cattle in the corrals.

Suddenly the waiting woman started. Her attention had never once relaxed. She moved out with stiffened joints, and, shading her eyes with her hand, stared into the gleaming sunlight. Her ears had caught the distant thud of horses’ hoofs, and now her eyes confirmed. Away down the valley she could see the dim outline of a number of horsemen riding towards the ranch.

Her heart began to thump in her bosom, and her limbs quaked under her. What could she do? What must she do? Every thought, every idea that her long vigil had suggested was swept from her mind. A blank helplessness held her in its grip. She could only wait for what was to come.

The pounding of hoofs grew louder, the figures grew bigger. They were riding out of the sun, and her eyes were almost blinded as she looked for that which she trembled to behold. She could not be certain of anything yet, except that the return of her lover was at hand.

Nearer, nearer they came. Nearer, nearer still. Then suddenly a sharp exclamation broke from the watcher. It was a cry which had in it a strange thrill. It might have been the gasp of the condemned man at the sound of the word “reprieve.” It might have been the cry of one momentarily relieved from years of suffering.

She could see them plainly. For now the figures were no longer silhouetted against the sun. They had changed their course as they neared the ranch, and the rising sun was well clear. She could even recognize them by their horses. She counted. There were ten of them. One was missing. Who? But her interest was only momentary. She recognized the leader, and after that nothing else concerned her.

She could not mistake him. He sat his dark brown horse differently to anybody else. He looked to be part of it. But there was no admiration in her eyes. And yet there was an expression in them that had not been in them since his departure. There was hope in her eyes, and something akin to joy in her whole attitude. James was riding empty-handed!

Hence her cry. But now she glanced swiftly at each horseman, to be sure that they, too, were empty-handed. Yes, each man was riding with the loose swinging arms of the prairie man. And with a sigh that contained in it every expression of an unbounded relief she turned and vanished into the house. For the time, at least, Vada was safe.