And so, here he was at thirty, a failure. It was better to acknowledge it now: to admit that the fault was his; to go on into some mining camp and lose himself than to drag on making a fool of himself at the Sun Plant. He would rest a little longer, then start on in the moonlight.
Once more Roger stretched himself out on his bed of sand. As he did so, Peter brayed again. Roger jumped to his feet, the cold sweat starting from his forehead. Felicia's little burro! What devil could have entered into him that he could treat a dumb brute so! He tore off his clothing and jumped into the water. It was not easy to breast the current, he was so tired. But he made the bank and staggering up to the mesquite tree, he untied Peter.
"There, old man," he said gently, "go back to your friends."
Then he turned to cross the river. He was carried far below his camp this time and for some minutes after he landed he lay naked and exhausted before he could urge himself back to the cottonwood log and climb into his clothing.
He was in a state now of utter despair. No grief, no anger can bring to the human mind the depth of suffering that self-loathing can. Roger lay with his forehead pillowed on his arm, for the first time in his life facing his own weaknesses. Just in the degree that his brain was clearer, his mind more honest, his nerves more highly strung than other men's, just in that degree did he suffer more.
Perhaps, after a time, he slipped into a half doze. But it seemed to him that the touch on his forehead was his mother's. No, it was Felicia's or was it Charley's? Again Charley and Felicia merged in his mind. Felicia was looking at him with adoring eyes. Thank God once more that she could never grow up to know the truth about him. But she had grown up and was stooping over him with a gentle hand on his forehead as if she understood him and forgave him a thousand times over.
It was Charley, of course, Charley with the great heart and the seeing mind. What an awful thing for him to have brought another failure to the valley! Charley had had a sad life. Perhaps she had had dreams of her own, before she merged her destiny with Dick's. Dick was a poor weakling. But Felicia's death had saved him. Dick was a man now. If Felicia had seen him attack Ernest, she would have run away to her death, just as she had for Dick's frenzy. Potentially, he was a murderer too. But now he was a failure and as far as his red devil was concerned, Felicia had died in vain.
Roger's heart seemed to stop beating with the horror of this thought. Try as he would he could not get away from the idea that potentially he shared Dick's guilt. And Felicia had been sacrificed in vain. Suddenly he clenched his fists. No, by heaven, this should not be!
Roger pulled himself to his knees beside the cottonwood log and lifted his ravished face to the stars.
"Listen, God!" he shouted. "It was not in vain! I'm going back! I'm going back to Felicia and Charley and prove myself a man. I don't know why Ernest did it. But that doesn't matter. I'm going back. Listen to me, God!"