CHAPTER XII
WITHIN THE CONQUEROR'S OWN COUNTRY
It was the day set for the wedding, the eighteenth since the girl had left, the sixteenth since a new mound had arisen on the bare lot adjoining that beneath which rested Landman Bud Smith, the twelfth since How Landor had arrived to haunt the tiny railway terminus. The one train from the East was due at 8:10 of the morning. It was now eight o'clock. Within the shambling, ill-kept hotel, with its weather-stained exterior and its wind-twisted sign, the best room, paid for in advance and freshly dusted for the occasion, awaited an occupant. In a stall of the single livery, a pair of half-wild bronchos, fed and harnessed according to directions, were passively waiting. An old surrey, recently oiled and tightened in all its senile joints, was drawn up conveniently to the door. In a tiny room, designated the study, of the Methodist parsonage, on the straggling outskirts of the town, the only minister the settlement boasted sat staring at the unpapered wall opposite. He was a mild-featured young man of the name of Mitchell, recently graduated from a school of theology, and for that reason selected as a sacrifice to the frontier. In front of him on the desk lay a duly prepared marriage licence, and upon it a bright gold half eagle. From time to time he glanced thereat peculiarly, and in sympathy from it to the tiny fast-ticking clock at its side. He did so now, and frowned unconsciously.
At the station the crowd of loafers that always preceded the arrival or departure of a train were congregated. In some way suggestions of the unusual had passed about, and this day their number was greatly augmented. Just what they anticipated they did not know; they did not care. Restless, athirst for excitement, they had dumbly responded to the influence in the air and come. In the foreground, where a solitary Indian stood motionless, waiting, there was being repeated the same puerile pantomime and horse-play of a former occasion. At intervals, from the rear, sounded the war whoop travesty. It was all the same as that afternoon eighteen days before, when the girl had left, similar even to the cloud of black smoke in the distance lifting lazily into the sky; only now the trail, instead of growing thinner and lighter, became denser and blacker minute by minute. In sympathy, the humorists on the platform redoubled their efforts. The instinct of anticipation, of Anglo-Saxon love of excitement that had brought them there, urged them on. Not one throat but many underwent simultaneous pantomimic bisection. A half dozen voices caught up the war whoop, passed it on from throat to throat. Almost before they realised what they were doing, the thing became a contagion, an orgy. Many who had not taken part before, who had come from mere curiosity, took part now. The crowd pressed closer and closer about the alien, the centre of attraction. When he moved farther along the platform to avoid them, they followed. Heretofore passive, the innate racial hostility became active. One youth with a dare-devil air jostled him—and disappeared precipitately. There was no response, no retaliation, and another followed his example. The confusion redoubled, drowned the roar of the approaching train. Spectators in the rear began mounting trucks and empty barrels the better to see. Within the station itself the shirt-sleeved agent surreptitiously locked the door to the ticket-room and sprung the combination of the safe. Beginning harmless ly, the incident was taking on a sinister aspect, and he had lived too long in this semi-lawless land to take any chances. Re-turning to his place of observation at the window, he was just in time to see a decayed turnip come hurtling over the heads of the crowd and, with enviable accuracy, catch the Indian behind the ear. Simultaneously, with a roar and a puff of displaced air, the light train drew into the station, on time.
Through it all the Indian had not spoken a word. Save to move twice farther away along the platform, he had not stirred. Unbelievable as it may seem, even when the missile had struck him, though it had left a great red welt, he gave no sign of feeling. For a space following the arrival of the train there was a lull, and in it, as though nothing had happened, he approached the single coach and stood waiting.
It was the last of the week and travel was very light.
A dapper commercial salesman with an imitation alligator grip descended first, looked about him apprehensively, and disappeared with speed. A big rancher with great curling moustaches and a vest open save at the bottom button followed. He likewise took stock of the surroundings, and discreetly withdrew. Following him there was a pause; then of a sudden onto the platform, fair into view of the crowd, appeared one for whom apparently they had been looking, one who on the instant caused the confusion, temporarily stilled, to break forth anew: the figure of a dainty brown girl with sensitive eyes and a soft oval chin, of Elizabeth Landor returned alone!
"Ah, there she is," shouted a voice, an united voice, the refound voice of the expectant crowd.
"Yes, there she is," repeated the intrepid youth who had introduced the jostle. "Go to, redskin. Kiss her again. Kiss her; we don't mind."