Spawn of the Desert/Chapter 3

E’VE got a home,” said Duke Steele dubiously, as he leaned against the rough stone doorway, squinting in the reflected light from the desert sun; “but when we got there the cupboard was bare.”

“Yes,” nodded the Saint, “but how long have we fasted, Duke? Since breakfast.” He pointed at the hills above them, dotted with tunnels, where a host of men drove into the bowels of the earth. Came the dull jar of blasting, the rattle of falling rock from the ever-growing dumps.

“Men are toiling up there, Duke; while down on the street another group of non-toilers are planning to get the fruits of that labor, without toil. You and I do not toil; therefore we must use our brains to devise ways and means to get the necessary provender.”

“Just about how?” queried Duke.

The Saint unrolled some of his meager belongings on the stone floor, and in the center of it all was a small package. The Saint picked this up and got to his feet.

“Duke, it has been seldom that I have had to stoop to their use, but when I am forced to such an extremity they never fail.”

“Meaning what?” smiled Duke.

The Saint unrolled the small package and held in his hand two halves of a walnut; empty of all meat, and polished to a mahogany finish. In one of the halves was a polished black object, about the size of a garden pea.

“The tools of a cheap gambler,” said the Saint, studying Duke’s dubious expression. “Yet one must be dexterous and have the courage of his calling.”

“Where does the game come in?” asked Duke.

The Saint knelt down on a blanket, smoothed it out and placed the two shells open side down. He slipped the black pea under one of the shells, and with a rapid twist of his hand and fingers, shuffled the shells for a moment.

“Which one is it under, Duke?” he asked.

Duke indicated the one and the Saint lifted the shell. There was no pea under it. The Saint repeated the process slower this time, and Duke Steele was willing to bet his neck on picking the right shell, but he was mistaken.

“Is it under the other shell, Saint?” he asked.

“That is hardly a fair question, Duke. Just supposing I had opened my game, and a bettor had picked the other shell. Would it be good policy to have the pea under that shell? In our financial condition we cannot afford to take any great chances, and I know of no smaller chances of losing than by operating the two little walnut shells.”

Duke nodded shortly. “I reckon that’s right, Saint. Looks to me like Sleed has this place under his thumb. I suppose he’s got every gunman working for him, which makes it a poor place for us.”

The Saint placed the two shells in his pocket and came to the doorway. The setting sun slanted against the expanse of Ruby Hill, bringing out a myriad of colors, until the whole land seemed to be a vast drop-curtain of fantastic shades. The voices of men drifted down to them as clear cut as the tinkling of bells. The rasp of a pick, the clank of hammer on steel seemed to come from the air above them and at no great distance.

And like the dimming of a great light the sun moved its rays swiftly up the side of the mountain, leaving in its track a misty softness, almost as blue as moonlight. Blast after blast seemed to jar the world, as the last shots of the afternoon were fired. A few moments later, like ants coming from their burrows, the men came from their tunnels and down the steep hillside, while from Sunshine Alley the supper fires sent up long, straight streamers of smoke to signal them home.

“Men will always toil,” said the Saint, as though talking to himself. “Toil day after day until their span of life is done, and after them their sons will take up the toil and carry it on. And what does it all mean? Will the work that these men are doing amount to anything in the final scheme of things? Will the sweat of their brows and the callouses on their hands mean anything?”

“Is there a reason for things, I wonder, Duke?” He turned and put his hand on Steele’s shoulder. “I have no conscience, no morals. I have killed, like the wolf kills, and yet I have no fear of death—only wonder.

“I have studied men from the frozen North to the tropics. I know their different breeds, languages, customs. I have seen a Cree chief die, and I have seen the passing of a Yaqui brave. I have seen the mystery of the unknown come into the eyes of a learned man, and I have held the wrist of a dying degenerate. They all die alike, Duke. Never have I seen a man who did not fight against the death, and I have never seen one pass into the borderland with a smile of welcome. Always that mystery.

“Sometimes I wonder if death is a punishment. The fear of death is punishment to most men, no matter who they are. A minister of the Gospel fights against the hand of death as strongly as the worst sinner ever bred, and why? The hereafter is a mystery—life is just as great a mystery.”

Duke nodded, solemnly. “I reckon you’re right, Saint. I kinda feel sorry for Sleed’s girl.”

The Saint looked down at the rocky floor and smiled in his great beard.

“Life is no mystery to youth, and you are only thirty years of age, Duke. But don’t feel sorry for Sleed’s girl. In the first place, she is Sleed’s girl; in the second place, you are Duke Steele.”

Duke swung away from the doorway and looked up the hill toward the town. He turned and looked at the Saint.

“I—I reckon you’re right, Saint. I kinda forgot.”