Judith of the Godless Valley/Chapter 19
CHAPTER XIX
HOME
DOUGLAS was half blinded by snow-glare and wind, so it was several minutes before he observed an old man sitting eagerly erect on one of the beds. Doug started to his feet.
"Where'd you come from, Mr. Fowler!"
"From Lost Chief Peak. Get warm and rested, Doug, before you try to talk."
"I was starting out after you when I found that Judith—" began Doug. "And then—"
"Judith," interrupted Mr. Fowler, "needed you more than I did."
"Did they hurt you?" insisted Douglas.
"No. Don't try to talk till you are rested, my boy."
"That won't take long!" croaked Douglas.
But, as a matter of fact, it was morning before he heard the preacher's story or told his own. He was warmed and fed enormously and rolled into a feather bed. And he knew nothing more until the smell of coffee and the sound of women's voices roused him.
The living-room was flooded with sunlight. The preacher was thrusting wood into the red-hot stove.
"Where's Judith?" asked Douglas.
"Helping Mrs. Nelson get breakfast. How are you?"
"Fine! Do you suppose I can shave before breakfast?"
The preacher nodded toward a washstand in the corner and Douglas began to make his toilet. Mr. Fowler made no attempt to talk during this process but stood before the fire, watching the young man with somber, wistful eyes.
It was an exceedingly well-groomed young rider who appeared at Elijah's long breakfast table a half-hour later. Judith, snow-burned, but otherwise a very fit young person, gave him an appreciative look and smile, and left him to the others while she went on with her breakfast.
They sat long at the table. The children were sent off to school. The adventure up and down Black Devil Peak was thoroughly discussed. Then Douglas turned to the preacher.
"And what did they do to you, Mr. Fowler?"
The old man smiled grimly. "That won't take long to tell. Old Johnny and I went to sleep soon after you left, and the first thing I knew I was being gagged and blind-folded by a couple of fellows in masks. They carried me out to the corral and fastened me onto a horse. I didn't put up a fight, Doug. I'm too old. One of the men then led my horse off at a gallop. What became of the other man and Johnny, I can only surmise from what Mr. Nelson has told me."
"Who were the men?" demanded Douglas.
"I don't know. Of course, I suspect Charleton Falkner and Scott Parsons. I suppose it was Scott Parsons, though I couldn't prove it. I suppose he took me along the trail Nelson has kept open past the old Government corral to get to Scott's trail when he goes for his mail. Anyhow, he locked me into that old cabin, up in the Government corral. There was fuel and matches, so he didn't want me to freeze to death. I think he intended to come back the next day and take me somewhere else before I freed myself or some one found me. But his plan must have miscarried for he didn't come back. It was so very cold and I was so lightly clad that at first I didn't dare to start out even after I'd broken the door open. But two days of hunger made me desperate. The trail was fairly well snowed in but I headed for what I thought would be Nelson's ranch. But in an hour or so I was all in. If Elijah hadn't found me, I'd have died of the cold up there on the mountainside."
"I was riding over to Lost Trail for news," explained Elijah.
"You were riding for God, I'd say," cried Mr. Fowler. "And if I'd been a Mormon bishop I couldn't have been made more welcome than I have been here."
"A preacher's a preacher," said Elijah. "Well, Douglas, what's next on your program?"
Douglas looked at Judith. "I've promised to take Judith up to Mountain City. She's going to get a job up there, and I am too!"
Judith put down her coffee-cup and her great eyes blazed. "Why, Douglas Spencer! You are going to do nothing of the sort!"
"What is Lost Chief to me without you?" asked Douglas, coolly and entirely ignoring the eager-eyed audience.
Judith's face expressed entire disapproval. "I never thought you'd let them run you out, Doug!" She turned to Mr. Fowler. "Don't let him be a quitter, Mr. Fowler."
Mr. Fowler was watching Douglas with troubled eyes. "I don't know," he said, "that I blame Douglas. It seems to me that Lost Chief will have to become conscious of its needs before it can be helped. I love Douglas very much. I'd not be sorry to see him get out into the world where there's a bigger chance for his abilities than in that godless valley."
Judith turned from the preacher impatiently. "Douglas Spencer! You know you'll never be happy anywhere else. Lost Chief is your home and the home of all your people before you."
"How about its being home to you?" asked Douglas.
"No place can be home to me that doesn't need all that's in me," replied Judith. "Lost Chief is no place for me. It's not a woman's country."
"It ought to be made fit for women and for little children!" cried Mr. Fowler, with sudden vehemence. "I should have done it. But I failed there as I have everywhere. I didn't bring God to Lost Chief, nor to Judith, nor worst of all, to Douglas."
"Don't you two young people believe in God?" demanded Elijah Nelson.
They stared at him without replying.
"Who guided Judith over the Pass?" asked the Mormon. "Her own smartness, I suppose, or chance, anything but the hand of the Almighty!"
"It was Destiny. All of it has been Destiny," said Douglas suddenly.
"And what is Destiny but God?" asked Elijah.
No one spoke for a moment. Then Elijah went on, with Mr. Fowler's own vehemence:
"You folks over in Lost Chief have seen fit to treat us Mormons as if we were a pack of coyotes bedding down too near your herds. Did you ever try to find out what kind of people we really are and why we stay and win out when we settle in a place? I'll tell you. The church makes our settlements for us. When she calls us to settle in the wild she says, Go, five families, or ten, or twenty, and settle in such a place. Take with you your wives and babies. Put your roots deep in the soil. Build for the future generations. Make a community deep fertilized by the idea of Mormonism, train your children in it, cling one family to the other in helpfulness and to the church in faith. Co-operate with each other and with the church, and the church will stand by you and loan you money, give you advice, be your very fountain of life.
"And the church does stand by us and we by it. And we are building up God-fearing communities all over the West, just like the Puritans once built up in the East. Why? Because we pioneer, inspired by our church and the love of God! What Gentile church is doing this, answering the economic needs of its people as well as the spiritual? Why should a settlement like yours prosper? Why, the most promising young man in it is deserting it to chase after a flighty girl! It has no church. It has no minister. Ha! As long as you Gentiles are so, the Mormons can ride over you and crowd you out!"
"You can't do anything of the kind!" declared Judith.
"Why not?" asked Douglas bitterly. "Of course they can! Nelson is dead right."
Elijah gave Judith a scornful glance. "You ought to be satisfied, Judith. You'll be getting your own way, no matter what becomes of Douglas. He ought never to leave Lost Chief. Though it will be better for us Mormons if he does."
Douglas was following his own line of thought. "The Mormons are right," he said. "It's the families that count. A man can't do real pioneering without a woman and Lost Chief is still pioneering. The right kind of a woman could do more for Lost Chief than a man."
Judith looked at him with gathering intentness. "How could she, Doug?"
"Why, look at the influence Inez has! She's thought it worth while to influence people, so's to justify her way of living. She's beautiful and she's bad. If a woman who was beautiful and good made up her mind to make Lost Chief the paradise it ought to be, nothing could stop her."
"If she had the church to back her," said Elijah Nelson.
Douglas nodded; then, his face aflame, he jumped to his feet. "If Jude and I could work together in Lost Chief we'd— My God, do you know what I'd do? I'd rebuild the cabin and I'd rebuild the chapel. And we'd bring Mr. Fowler back. And Judith and I would go to church to him and we'd hunt for God till we found Him! And when we found Him, we'd go out and bring the children of the Valley to the church. It's the children that count. We'd dish all this discussion with the grown folks. All the Scotts and Charletons and Inez Rodmans in the Valley wouldn't count if the children would be sure of God." He turned to Judith. "You'll admit, won't you, Jude, that if you and I had had faith, our childhood would have been a finer thing?"
"Yes, I think that's true," admitted Judith. "Do you think there's a job there for me, Mr. Fowler, all faithless as I am?"
Mr. Fowler nodded. "Yes, I do. Lost Chief offers a full-sized job to a woman with a brain and the right kind of a vision. She could, indeed, help to make it a very paradise for children."
"If the church didn't hamper her too much." Mrs. Nelson spoke for the first time. "The church and God are both males."
Judith gave the Mormon wife a sudden appreciative smile. Douglas, watching the girl's kindling face, said in his gentle way, "I've often thought if anybody could get the right kind of a moral hold on the kids of Lost Chief, the greatest horsemanship in the world could be developed in that old valley."
"You are dreaming dreams!" exclaimed Nelson. "All this takes time, and you Lost Chief folks want to realize that the Mormons are coming!"
Judith eyed her host keenly; then she turned to Douglas with overwhelming interest welling to her eyes. "This is the first time," she cried, "that you've ever suggested any kind of a future to me that made a demand on my intelligence. Mr. Nelson, have you really got your eyes on Lost Chief Valley, or are you just trying to bluff Douglas into going back because you like him?"
The Mormon's eyes narrowed and his jaw set. "I like him, yes, but the church says we are to take Lost Chief Valley, and we are going to take it when the time is ripe. I can afford to be as kind as I want to be to Douglas and Fowler. Nothing can stop us when we cross into your valley with the church behind us. You folks hang together by habit. We Mormons are knit together by a divine idea that takes care of every moment of our lives. Do you think a man like Scott Parsons can guard your gates? And Douglas is running away!"
Judith jumped to her feet, indignation flashing from her eyes.
"He is not! If your Mormon religion can do all you claim for you, then our religion can do as much for us as it did for our ancestors. I never did believe there was a God. But that's not saying He's not to be found if you really hunt for Him."
"'If with all your hearts ye truly seek me, ye shall ever surely find me,' " said Mr. Fowler quietly.
Judith gave him a quick look. "That isn't the kind of a God we young folks are looking for," she said.
"What is your idea?" asked Mr. Fowler.
Judith lifted her chin.
"A fire mist and a planet,
A crystal and a cell,
A jelly-fish and a saurian
And caves where cave-men dwell.
Then a sense of law and beauty,
And a face turned from the clod,
Some call it Evolution
And others call it God."
There was quiet in the warm, homely kitchen. Douglas watched Judith with his heart in his eyes.
Elijah Nelson cleared his throat. "Nevertheless, Judith," he said, "this is a fair warning that I'm going to put the Book of Mormon into Lost Chief."
Judith flushed, her lips tightened, and she walked deliberately around the table and took the preacher's hand. "Come, Mr. Fowler, let's go home with Douglas and get to work!"
Douglas drew a long breath.
The preacher rose with alacrity. "Where shall we go?" he asked.
Douglas answered. "To Peters until I can rebuild the cabin."
Elijah Nelson smiled grimly.
"Let's get started!" urged Judith.
The breakfast party broke up. The men went out to attend to the horses. Judith and Mrs. Nelson turned to the dishes. Douglas from the corral watched the backdoor attentively, and when Mrs. Nelson appeared he signaled to her to wait for him to speak to her.
"Send Jude into the living-room for something," he whispered, "and then keep the folks out while I talk to her for a little while."
Mrs. Nelson smiled understandingly, and a few moments later Douglas was standing with his back to the living-room stove, both of his arms about Judith.
"I had to thank you," he said, "and you were too stupid to make the chance. Judith! Judith! You've made the world into heaven for me!"
"I'm not exactly unhappy, myself!" Judith's eyes glowed as she returned Doug's look.
"Judith," he exclaimed, "let's ask Mr. Fowler to marry us now, before we start home!"
Judith whitened a little. "O Douglas, you are crowding me, my dear!"
"But why wait, Judith? Isn't it the only thing to do? Neither of us will ever go back to Dad's ranch again. We can be married and camp with Peter until we get the cabin rebuilt. That's won't take a month. O, Judith, please!"
"It's—it's too soon!"
"Too soon for what? We've been caring a long, long time, and we need each other so!"
Judith freed herself from Douglas' arms and walked over to the window, from which one could see Black Devil Peak glowering in the morning sun. She stood a long time, it seemed to Douglas. He wondered what thoughts were passing in that fine head outlined against the snowy fields. What sense of sacrifice, he thought, must a girl like Jude have, in giving up her life to a man? Then he smiled, half grimly, half tenderly. Judith would never be any man's really, to know and to hold. Her fiery charm was a thing ever to pursue, never fully to overtake. "Forever would he love and she be fair!" He waited silently, his heart thudding heavily. At last she turned from the window and came slowly toward him with a look in her eyes he could not pretend to read to its depths. He only knew that there was faith in him there and a passionate affection. What more, he was willing to trust to the future. She came and leaned against him and he knew that at last the long struggle was ended.
They were married a few moments later, standing before the window, with Douglas' hair a halo of gold above his steady eyes and Judith's fine head held high. The Reverend Mr. Fowler performed the rites with a trembling voice. When he had finished he said to Elijah and his wife:
"In all my long experience I have never joined together a couple with such infinite satisfaction as this."
"That's good," said Mrs. Nelson, wiping her eyes, "seeing that you're going on the wedding-journey with them!"
That afternoon, as the -shadows on the plains east of the post-office grew long and blue-black, Judith, Douglas and Mr. Fowler jingled up to Peter's door. They slung their saddles on the buck fence, turned their horses into his corral, and went in. Peter was standing by the stove, dressed for a cold ride.
"Judith! You are safe!" he gasped, taking both her hands in his, his sallow face suddenly glowing. "Where did you find her, Doug?"
"Just the other side of Black Devil Pass!"
Peter whistled, stared, then turned to the preacher. "And where did you come from, Fowler?"
"Elijah Nelson rescued me from the west side of Lost Chief Peak."
Judith was pulling off her mackinaw and her beaver cap. "We'll tell you a wonderful story if you'll feed us, Peter."
Peter undid the silk handkerchief from his ears. "I was outfitting to follow Doug's trail. We buried poor little old Johnny this morning."
The quick tears sprang to Judith's eyes; but she said nothing, and Peter went on, "I got your father home on Monday. My guess is that he is ashamed enough of himself to last the rest of his life. That's about the extent of my stories. Have you any casualties to report?"
"Only poor Buster. He lies in a snowdrift up on the other side of Black Devil. We put in last night at Elijah Nelson's, where we found Mr. Fowler. Can we stay with you for a while, Peter?"
"You sure can. We can use those rooms upstairs for sleeping. Fine! I'll be glad to have you. You too, Fowler."
"Where's Scott Parsons?" asked Douglas.
"He's still with Inez. Seems like you gave him a bad knock-out. He's having rough going, I can tell you. Inez has turned against him and Grandma Brown had to go over there and take care of him. And she is in no frame of mind to stand anything from anybody." Peter chuckled, then went on. "Charleton says he was in bed and asleep by eleven o'clock Saturday night, and nobody has been able to prove that he wasn't. I don't think there is a doubt in the world that it was Scott and Charleton did the dirty work, but it's going to be hard to prove."
Peter set a kettle of beans on the stove and Judith prepared a pot of coffee.
"Take off your spurs, Fowler," Peter nodded genially at the preacher. "All's well that ends well. I hope that nothing more than your feelings got hurt."
To Peter's utter astonishment Mr. Fowler suddenly laughed heartily.
"My feelings, Peter," he exclaimed, "were never in better trim than they are this minute."
"Nor mine!" agreed Douglas.
"Nor mine!" added Judith.
Peter stared from one face to another. "It sort of looks," he said finally, "as if I had sweated blood for nothing."
"No, you haven't, Peter!" exclaimed Douglas. "Tragedy certainly stalked our tracks."
"Let me have the story," begged the postmaster. "Jude, after you left John and old Johnny, what happened? You evidently went plumb crazy. Begin at that point. And don't leave out anything!"
He lighted his pipe and sat down. Judith, swinging her spurred boots as she sat on the table, began obediently. She took Peter along every hour of her trip until she fell into that dreadful sleep on the south slope of Black Devil. Douglas took up his story there and when he had finished, Mr. Fowler repeated the account of his adventure.
Peter heaved a great sigh. "Some adventure! Lord! Lord! What a narrow squeak! Well, and what did our Mormon friends have to say to all these doings?"
Judith and Douglas smiled at each other. Peter, catching that smile, started forward in his chair, then turned to Fowler. The preacher smiled broadly. "Let me tell that part of it," he begged. Douglas and Judith nodded, and the old man plunged with great enjoyment into the account of the happenings that morning at Nelson's ranch.
When he finished with the wedding, Peter rose, his face working. He walked over to Judith and looked deep into her eyes, and without a word kissed her on, the cheek. Then he wrung Douglas' hand.
"Hang it all!" he said. "There is something startlingly right the way life works out if you give it a chance!"
Nobody answered. Douglas and Judith were smiling at each other and the preacher was engrossed in watching them. Peter cleared his throat.
"What are you happy idiots going to do about Scott and Charleton?"
"I had planned to get even with them and run them out of the Valley," said Douglas; "but, after all, I owe them a debt of gratitude. Even if they didn't mean it that way!"
"We'd better not start our new life in the Valley with a fight," Judith nodded. "Anyhow we've agreed that we aren't concerned right now with the grown-ups."
Peter scratched his head. "I guess you are sensible. But I think pressure can be brought to bear to make Charleton and Scott rebuild the cabin and chapel for you."
Mr. Fowler shook his head vehemently. "I wouldn't let their hands desecrate the chapel! Douglas and I are going to build it."
"And I wouldn't let them desecrate the cabin," declared Judith. "So I guess they are out of it. We're going to give them a thorough drubbing but quite in another way."
Peter chuckled with huge enjoyment. "What are you going to do about Elijah Nelson's threat to take Lost Chief Valley over for the Mormons?"
"I don't know yet," said Douglas; "but we're not going to let him do it, are we, Judith?"
"We certainly are not! That's one reason I want to keep Scott in the Valley. If Scott could get the idea of fighting with his mind instead of his gun, he'd be a good citizen."
Peter grinned at Fowler. "The infants are running the Valley already! Well, why not? They are the new generation."
"Peter," demanded Judith, "aren't those beans ready yet?"
The postmaster started to his feet. "I suppose you folks are hungry. Judith, you set the table. Doug, did you feed the horses well? It's going to be a bitter-cold night."
"Yes, we took care of them," replied Douglas, absent-mindedly, his eyes on Judith.
"Did you?" Peter turned to Fowler. "I sha'n't take Doug's word about anything that's happened subsequent to the ceremony."
"I think you're wise," nodded the preacher. "But as a matter of fact, we did feed them. Shall I put the chairs up?"
"Go ahead," said Peter, setting the pot of beans in the middle of the table.
Then, as they gathered around the table, the preacher hesitated, looked from one face to another, and asked, "Do you mind if I say grace?"
"No," replied Peter firmly, "we don't mind. You can say grace, make signs, or do anything else that will help you hang on in the big fight you've got ahead of you. I'll say it too, if it will strengthen your hands."
Mr. Fowler shook his head, smiled, and covering his eyes, poured out his heart to the Almighty.
THE END