The Arrow-Point Estate/Chapter 1

HEY lifted Burkell up a little so that he could breathe easier, and told him to buck up and that the wagon would be along pretty quick now. And Burkell smiled grimly in a way that went to the heart of them, it was so characteristic of the man; smiled in a way that said he was not to be fooled, that he knew the wagon would not come in time. In fact, after a minute of lips shut straight against a groan, he spoke what he knew they were thinking.

“It'll come—but the old boy with the long scythe’ll beat ’em to it. I’m all in, and yuh don’t need to lie about it just to keep up my nerve, boys; Daddy Death has put in his bill, and I ain’t going to whine about paying up.” He moved his head restlessly, and Burns, against whom he was leaning, shifted his shoulders solicitously and shut his teeth tight together; he knew it was the truth Burkell spoke, and it maddened him to think that death is an enemy one cannot fight with a six-shooter, but must stand by and helplessly watch its merciless approach.

In a minute Burkell began again, and they noticed that he paused longer between sentences; which made “Rhody”—so-called because he claimed Rhode Island for his birth- place—turn his eyes frowningly to the place on the horizon where the wagon they were waiting for would first appear.

“Dig up my brand-book out uh my inside—pocket, Burns. Never made a will—but I guess it’s time I did. Can't frame up one—like a lawyer—but I guess it'll pass.”

The eyes of Burns and Rhody met, seeking the solace that comes of mutual sympathy. On his pay-roll they were, and had been for long; they took it hardly that John Burkell should die like this, afar on the prairie, before help came. Though they had known, even when they dragged him from beneath his horse and saw how his gaunt form was crushed and battered, that there was no help for him, it seemed incredible that big John Burkell, the hardest worker and the kindest employer in all that country, was going out by the long trail, and in such fashion as this.

“Hurry up,” commanded Burkell, in something like his old, masterful tone. “Think Daddy Death is going to stand around all day, waitin’ on you bone-heads? I ain’t got—forever.” It was sheer nerve and the power of an unyielding will that was holding him to life; that they could see in the gray face of him.

Rhody stooped and got him the little, red book with its long record of brands and stock—the gleanings of many a round-up, and Greek to any but a stockman. Burkell, gathering the strength that was fast going, took the book in his unsteady fingers and turned the leaves lingeringly. Perhaps he hated to let go the life he knew and loved—the life of the range-land. Perhaps the fact of his going seemed incredible to him, also; for he muttered as he turned the leaves: “She’s about filled up—and I always hate to start in on a new book, somehow.”

Then he seemed to remember that he would not need a new book, and glanced furtively up at his companions to see if they had heard the remark. But they, with the fine tact which comes only as a birthright to a favored minority of men, appeared to have heard nothing, so he breathed relief and pulled himself together again.

When he came at last to two blank pages, he stopped, gripped the pencil Burns placed in his fingers, and showed that he was mentally his old self, a man who never overlooked small things. For first of all he wrote his name firmly on the second page, that what went before, be it much or little, should not lack his signature and so be legally of no worth.

“You'll both sign as witnesses,” he observed. “And I want yuh to see that it goes.”

Then, rapidly, as if he knew the minutes were short and few, he wrote:

The last word was a scrawl. He dropped the pencil—his fingers had mutinied against him and obeyed the new master, whose coming was close—and looked up pitifully into the face of Burns.

“Howard—tell Lorrie—Howard” He gasped dumbly, seemed to realize that his message was perforce finished, made a last struggle and got out one word: “Sign.” He looked at them both intently, almost fiercely, as if he would stamp his thought into their brains without aid of speech. He was a strong man, was John Burkell, and death did not conquer him without a struggle.

They eased him gently down upon the crisp, brown grass of the prairie he loved, and looked at him in silence, their heads bared. Then they signed their names to the will he could not finish before he went.

Burns, looking up after he had put the book back into the dead man’s pocket, saw the wagon coming rapidly toward them. With the keen sight of a range-dweller he knew at once just who were in the rig.

“Lorrie’s coming along,” he announced uneasily. “They no business to uh let her come. Can’t we get some uh the blood off his face? I don’t reckon we can keep her away from him”

“Sure not, if she takes a notion. Lord! it’s going to be fierce, having her see him like this. She thought a lot uh him.”

Burns made no reply, other than to straighten the limbs and the garments of the dead and wipe the dust and blood from the face with his handkerchief. Then Rhody, twitching the white silk neckerchief from his throat, shook out the wrinkles and spread it carefully over the features of John Burkell.

“We won’t have to tell her he’s dead,” was his muttered explanation. “She’ll know, when she sees that.”

The wagon, rattling over the rough sod, stopped and a girl—Lorena Burkell—jumped down almost before the horses came to a stand and ran to the long, quiet figure in the grass with the two men standing bareheaded beside it. If they looked for weeping they were mistaken; the girl said nothing at all, and only knelt and took the silken covering from the face of her father and laid her cheek tenderly against his. And there was that in the movement more pitiful than loud lamentation, so that Burns turned his face away and blinked rapidly, and Rhody swallowed and bit his lip painfully.

Those in the wagon came hurrying up and stood around helplessly watching the girl. Then Burns, meeting the eyes of one, straightened.

“Seeing you’re his brother,” he said stiffly, “I guess you take charge uh things.”

At this the girl looked up at them. “He’s my—father,” she said quietly. “He would want me to do—to take ” Her head went down again till her cheek rested against the face of her dead.

Howard Burkell went over and laid a hand on her shoulder. “Come away, Lorrie. You can’t do any good, and you must lean on me now. He has gone, and it’s the Lord’s will. Don’t grieve so, little girl—you know I loved him, too.”

Lorrie shook her shoulder free of his touch. “Maybe you did—but you needn’t preach now. Go away.” There was no mistaking her tone; if she wanted sympathy it was clearly not the sympathy of her Uncle Howard. And though it was evident that her grief was great, it was also evident that she was one of those self-controlled persons who resent the platitudes common to such occasions, and would much prefer to be left alone.

Her uncle turned to Burns and Rhody. “Did John leave any message—or anything to show his wishes? If not, I shall of course take charge of things.”

Rhody and Burns glanced briefly at each other. “He didn’t live but a little while,’ Burns answered briefly. “And he didn’t make no funeral arrangements.” This last in a tone not intended to reach the ears of the girl.

“Well, take him up, boys—we must get him home. Come away, Lorrie.” He touched her again gently. “Poor girl, you shouldn’t have come at all. Come, Lorrie!”

“Oh, do go away!” Lorrie moved impatiently without taking her arms from her father; her attitude seemed to imply that she was trying to shield him from something. Her voice was unemotional and hard—the hardness of first grief that must realize its loss before weeping.

Burns it was who leaned over her and spoke persuasively. “We've got to get him home, yuh see. You'd better take my horse and ride on ahead and—and tell the kid, yuh know. And here” he slipped his hand inside the dead man’s coat and drew out what was in the pocket—“yuh better take these yourself. They’re—ah—liable to get lost, or something.”

“I don’t think anything ought to be touched,” said Howard. “The coroner”

“The coroner won’t need his brand-book and them letters to find the cause uh the—accident,” Burns retorted, and put them into the hands of Lorrie, who took them mechanically. “Now, yuh better just let us put him in the wagon,” he persuaded her, “and take him home; you can ride my horse or go with him, just as yuh please. But I reckon,” he added diplomatically, “it’d be better to ride the horse—on account uh the kid; yuh don’t want to scare him. yuh tell him first, yourself, see”

Lorrie kissed her father lingeringly and stood up, with Burns to steady her. “Yes, I must tell Skookum myself.” She shut her hands into white-knuckled fists and gazed, wide-eyed, down at her father. “He’s dead,” she said dully, as if it were a lesson she could not comprehend, but one she must learn. “He’s dead—father is; and now there’s only just Skookum and me.”

“And me, Lorrie; and your Aunt Margaret,” Howard reminded her gently. “You must look to us”

“Oh, hush!” Lorrie never turned her eyes toward him.

Howard looked at her reproachfully, and would have remonstrated but for the coming of a stranger who caught the attention at once of all save Lorrie.

He rode quietly up on a tall, rangy gray that was sweat-roughened and stiff from hard galloping. The man himself looked still more hardly used; for his face was dust-blackened and streaked with blood from a place on his forehead where the hair was matted stickily. His hat showed two suggestive, round holes, and one arm swung in his neckerchief which he had fashioned into a sling. All in all, he struck one as. being a proper candidate for a hospital, though he sat straight-backed in the saddle and gazed calmly down at the staring group.

When he glimpsed the quiet figure stretched in their midst, he eyed it sharply and impersonally; but when he spoke his voice was lowered in deference to its presence.

“Looks like things have been going wrong here,” he remarked slowly. “Sorry to see yuh in trouble, boys. I’m looking for John Burkell. Can you tell me where his outfit is working.”

Burns stooped and lifted the white square he had dropped over the face of the dead when Lorrie rose. The stranger looked, made a quick, half-conscious movement that twisted the reins around his saddle-horn, and then lifted his free hand, and raised his hat. And Lorrie, glancing at him for the first time, saw the act and liked him for it.

“A good man has gone out,” was the stranger’s simple tribute. “I was coming to work for him. As it is—can you tell me how to get to the nearest town?”

Howard it was who directed him to Fallen Rock, eighteen miles to the north of them.

“Thanks.” The man smiled dryly. “I reckon I'll blow in there some time to-morrow—my horse is so fresh, and such a drifter! You’re a hospitable bunch—I don’t think. John Burkell must ’a’ had fine neighbors.” He unwound his reins and turned to ride away imperturbably; only that he looked again at the quiet figure, as one looks at a dead friend, and lifted his hat again as he started.

Lorrie, stirred out of her apathy, called to him sharply, so that he looked back, then stopped and waited, half-turned in his saddle.

“If you were father’s friend,” she said, “he wouldn’t let you go away like that. He’d make you come to the ranch and stay. He—he can’t ask you—but I can. You'll be quite welcome.”

“Thanks.” But this time he spoke in a tone quite different. And since he waited further, they took it that he meant to accept.

They lifted John Burkell up and placed him gently in the wagon upon the round-up bed they had sent for, not believing him fatally hurt. As Burns held his horse for Lorrie to mount, he said cautiously:

“Take care uh that brand-book, Lorrie. He wrote his will in it just before he—he went out; and Rhody and I signed as witnesses.”

But Lorrie had returned to her stony, apathetic manner and made no sign that she heard, and Burns, looking up at her wistfully a moment, released the bridle-rein and let her go.