The Spook Hills Mystery/Chapter 16

When a man has spent nearly all his life in the midst of great, open spaces, certain of his faculties attain a high state of development—unless he is one of those incompetents who never does grow up to the requirements of his vocation. Spider was not an incompetent; he had learned to see a great deal in a short space of time, and to rise instinctively to an emergency. Though he had lost Vida in the cañon it was because he had not suspected her of deliberately trying to evade him and so had kept to the logical course, which was up the main ravine. He had not been greatly concerned over her immediate welfare—he had too great a confidence in her ability to take care of herself, and he believed himself to be within shouting distance of her; indeed, he had been until she turned up the side gulch and so widened the distance between them.

But even if he did not worry very much about her he kept his eyes open and let no living thing move unseen within his range of vision. He saw Vida the instant she came out upon the crest of the ridge, and he saw that she was running from something. Instinctively he knew what that something was, and he dug the spurs into his horse and charged the bluff as if he were leading an army against some puny breastwork. The slope was steep there, and the half sterile soil was baked hard between the grass tufts. His horse went lunging up to where he was stopped by the broken rim of lava rock which tops two-thirds of the desert bluffs and makes hill traveling so laborious.

Spider jumped off and scrambled up the rocks much as Vida had done upon the other side of the ridge, but with better progress. Once, when he was feeling for a handhold above him where the ledge was almost straight above his head, he heard a shout on the level above. It sounded like Burney's high-pitched voice raised in a command to some one. It seemed odd that Burney should be up there with Vida. He had believed that Burney was riding off the other way, toward the river.

He clutched a splinter of rock, pulled himself up half his length, and looked over the ledge upon baked soil that still sloped steeply up to the crest. He drew himself up by sheer muscular strength over the smooth, black rim and ran up the bluff on his toes until another ledge blocked the way and he must climb again, foot by foot, clinging with his hands and his feet to the face of the rock. Had there been time he might have found a crevice and gone up more easily, but there was not time; at least, it was not for him to take for granted anything save the girl's dire need of him.

He was still a few feet from the rim of the ledge when he heard her scream somewhere above him. And close upon the sound of that came the hoarse bellowing cry that once before he had heard and had never been able wholly to forget. His breath caught in his throat, but he went on, climbing now like a madman to reach the girl in time.

It seemed to him hours that he spent on that ledge, toiling upward with Vida's scream and that other horrible cry ringing still in his ears. It seemed to him that he made no headway at all, but climbed and climbed in one spot. Yet he presently found himself somehow on the top, running up the bare crest of the ridge toward a titanic struggle of some sort; what he could not at first determine. He did not see Vida anywhere, and when he realized that she was not a part of the struggle he drew his breath sharply and slowed a little, conscious of his exhaustion.

Then, just when he was steadying a little from that nightmare of fear for the girl, he saw her lying on the stunted grass, all crumpled in a heap where she had fallen. Close beside her they were straining and struggling—two giants of men whose breath came in great gasps while they fought.

Panting, dazed to blank uncomprehension, Spider drew near and watched the amazing spectacle. There was Burney fighting doggedly, silently—fighting for his life. And there was another huge human, and yet not all human, fighting with little, harsh snarls of sheer animal rage and the lust for killing—fighting not for his own life, but for the lives of these others. He was dressed in Burney's old clothes—Spider remembered the gray-striped trousers which Burney had worn a year or so ago; tattered now, torn short off at the hairy knees of the giant. He was like Burney in size and general outline of face and figure, and yet his face was the face of an animal, with its protruding jaw and receding forehead and broad, flat nostrils. His eyes were little and twinkling and set deep under his bushy brows. His arms were hairy, his legs were hairy, his feet, which were bare, were huge, misshapen things with queer-looking toes.

While he stared, Spider began to understand many things that had been muffled in mystery. Here was the answer to the puzzle: the thing that had followed them through the desert in the dark; the maker of the "bear" tracks which had so excited Shelton; the killer of sheep and dogs—and of Jake Williams; the monstrous shape that had tried to get in the wagon that night, and could not because the door was too small—a wave of physical nausea swept over Spider at the thought of this great savage trying to get at Vida. It passed, and a spasm of terror seized him as he realized suddenly that she was lying there almost within reach of the Thing, in deadly danger still except for Burney's straining strength.

Spider darted forward, lifted Vida in his arms, and ran with her to a huddle of great bowlders with bushes growing between. In the shade of a buckbush he laid her down, and stood at bay between her and the Thing, his gun in his hand ready to shoot at the first menacing movement.

It came sooner than even his strained nerves expected. For, though Burney's strength was prodigious, the strength of this other was something monstrous. Burney was being beaten back step by step, inch by inch; he was being borne down. Great sweat drops stood on his face. His teeth were clenched in a frozen snarl of supreme physical effort. His knees were bending slowly, slowly—his back was yielding. The huge, hairy hands of the Thing were reaching, reaching—the great talonlike fingers were spread and tensed for the death clutch. The snarl broke suddenly into a scream to freeze one's blood; the scream which Spider had heard behind him in the dark—the scream that had terrified Shelton in the cave. And on the echoes of that scream came a groan, wrenched from Burney in agony.

Spider sprang forward, leveling his big forty-five and pulling the trigger as instinctively as he would have shut his eyes in the face of a blow. The Thing recoiled, swayed on his great, hairy limbs, and sank to his knees; swayed there and toppled over, struggled uncertainly to rise, and then lay still.

Burney removed the gripping hands—relaxed now and harmless—and staggered to his feet, wiping the sweat from his forehead with a trembling palm as he stared stupidly down. He looked up, when the Thing had ceased to move, and took a tottering step toward Spider.

"'S the girl all right?" he mumbled dazedly, his high-pitched voice trembling a little. "I seen 'em—and I run my horse—and got here just" He looked down at the dead giant, and his face clouded.

"Come over here and sit down," Spider suggested shakily. "You're about all in." He turned back and knelt beside Vida, and felt her small, brown hands and laid his fingers gently against her tanned cheek. She lay as she had lain the day before, lightly breathing, deeply unconscious. He began to chafe her hand, changed his purpose, and put it softly down at her side. She had recovered from the other faulting fit with no permanent ill effect. Better let her remain unconscious for a while—until they could get her away from here, he thought. His eyes, tender and full of pity, dwelt for a minute longer on her face. Then he rose and found himself a level place on the rock and sat down, looking curiously from Burney to that other giant.

"You must 'a' knowed all the time about him," he said abruptly, jerking his head toward the trampled battle scene. "He's got on your pants."

Burney lifted his chin from his heaving chest, and stared somberly at the dead. "Sure, I knowed about him," he admitted dismally. "I never knowed he was dangerous, though—till he commenced killin' sheep. Even then I didn't think he'd—tackle a human being. He's—always been harmless. Just—simple-minded and wantin' to live around in caves like an animal. He never hurt nobody—before. It must 'a' just growed on him, kinda, from killin' them—sheep." He heaved a great sigh, took his handkerchief from his pocket, wiped his face, and then shook it out and went over and spread it over the dead face that was still snarling, and came back and sat down heavily.

"I wisht we could keep this thing quiet," he said gloomily, after a silence. "A-course he wasn't responsible fer what he done, and he wasn't hardly human, but he" His face flushed darkly. "I s'pose you'd call him a half brother of mine," he said with a certain sullen defiance of the fact. "My dad was a squaw man up in Montana. That was when I was just a kid. Him and his squaw got mixed up with a grizzly—and my old man was hurt so he died. The kid that was born afterward was—him." He nodded toward the inert heap. "He wasn't right from the very first. Soon as he could walk he had the ways of an animal more'n a human. Yuh see his feet—a good deal like a bear's. Old Mary—that's the squaw—she just about worshiped him. And when he growed up and took to the hills, she went with him and lived the way he lived and took care of him."

Spider glanced toward the dead, shuddered, and looked away. It is no light thing to take the life of a human—even a half human such as that Thing was. He looked at Burney strangely, and wondered what were his thoughts, whether he felt any stirring impulse of regret or sorrow or resentment toward the killer of his kin. Burney glanced up and met Spider's eyes, and answered the unspoken questions.

"Maybe I hadn't ought to be, but I'm glad he's gone," he said soberly. "He's always hung over my head like a—a disgrace. A Thing like that oughtn't to be left alive. I always felt that way about it ever since he was born. He couldn't talk—not words you could understand. The squaw, she could understand what he wanted. There was something about him always give me the shivers. But I took as good care of 'em both as I could. I used to send money up to a feller in the Bitter Root that knew where they hung out and used to pack grub and clothes out to 'em. He"—Burney nodded toward the corpse—"never showed up in daytime, so nobody knowed about him except this man that used to be my old man's pardner.

"He died a couple-a years ago, and Mary she struck out with—him—and come on down here. Traveled nights, she said, and there didn't nobody see him. Mary never wanted him seen. It made her sore to have folks know he was—different. She used to hide him like a deer hides her fawn when anybody come around. So they located here in these hills, and I packed grub to 'em myself nights." Burney sighed heavily, as though the burden had taxed all his strength and patience.

"Us fellows would 'a' stood right by yuh if you'd told us about it," Spider said with grave sympathy. "We could a' helped, instead of yawping around about a spook. We'd 'a' kept our faces shut if we'd had any idee"

"I know yuh would. But it wasn't a thing a feller would want to tell unless he was obliged to. I never thought he'd harm any one. I dunno what made him start in killin' sheep fer Williams—he must 'a' got a notion they was enemies. I tried to git Williams to move back, away from here. I s'pose I'd oughta told him why—but I didn't, and so I'm responsible fer a man's death." He humped forward, brooding over the tragedy.

"I tried to git Mary to pull out," he went on as though he was pleading the case with his conscience sitting in judgment. "I told her he was gittin' to act queer—when he commenced follerin' you boys—and wasn't safe. I told her the sheriff'd take 'im and shut him up if he took to botherin' anybody. But she wouldn't budge, and she wouldn't do a thing. Well," he added justly, "there wasn't much she could do. She couldn't keep him from running around nights, and she couldn't foller him and keep him outa mischief. I guess she done all she could do.

"I was in Pocatello to see a doctor and try and find out what could be done fer him—I'd heard about operations on the brain that'd change a person, and I didn't know but what something could be done with him to make him quieter and keep him from wantin' to kill. I got uneasy when he commenced killin' sheep. Well, I didn't go soon enough. I'd oughta had him tended to when I first growed up and seen what he was like. But he seemed so harmless—and it would 'a' been hell to cage him up—and I hated to have folks know about him. It's bad enough," he said doggedly, "to be so big you're pointed at on the streets like you was a side show broke loose; and to feel you're different, and to have folks think you're a whole lot more different than what you are. They don't consider that I'm just a man—just like everybody else—and just being bigger don't make any difference in my feelings. If folks knowed I was related to a Thing like that—they'd think I was some kinda beast myself. I tried to do what was right by him, but I wanted some kinda fair show myself."

"Well, you've sure got it coming, if anybody has," said Spider, after a thoughtful silence. "You'll git it from me. If we could do something with the body," he ventured tentatively without looking at Burney at all, "I don't see why anybody'd need to know there'd ever been such a—person."

Burney lifted his bent head, and looked at Spider almost eagerly. Then his face dulled again. "There's the girl," he said.

"Well—her, maybe. But you can bank on that little girl, Burney. She's the real goods. You needn't be afraid of her. If we can just manage to—to bury him on the quiet."

"His cave's just down below," Burney said. "One of 'em, anyway. We could put him in there. That kid started out to foller me back; I met him down in the foothills. I guess I throwed him off the trail, but I ain't sure. We better hurry if we're going to do anything; if you think we can, and it would be right. There's that murder"

"Well, there won't be no more. And it won't be the only killin' that never was accounted for. We'll tell the girl about it, so she won't worry no more or be scared. And what the rest of the country don't know about it won't hurt 'em any." He stood up, patently eager to do his part. "How'll we git him down?" he asked, not because he did not know, but with an impulse toward speech that would make the thing less horrible.

"I can carry him. You look after the girl. You better stay here and kinda keep a lookout for the kid. And if Mary—the squaw—shows up, don't try to tell her anything about it. I'll 'tend to her. She ain't right in her mind, and she packs a knife. She might" He did not feel that it was necessary to finish that sentence.

Spider stood sober-eyed, and watched Burney gather into his huge arms that monstrous shape of a man, and go staggering to the edge of the rock huddle. He watched him part the bushes in a certain place with one hand, pause a minute there to make sure of his footing, and go down slowly, surely, like a man feeling his way down a crude stairway, bearing the limp Thing with the frozen snarl on its beastlike face.

Then Spider turned and knelt beside Vida, and began to chafe her little, sun-browned hands pityingly, tenderly, and to watch her face for the first quiver of an eyelash that would tell how close she was to returning consciousness.