the Desert Of Wheat (2001) Read online

  "Kurt, this is a terrible hour for both of us," she said, "but, thank Heaven, you have confessed to me. Now I will confess to you."

  "Confess?... You?... What nonsense!" he exclaimed. But in his surprise he lifted his head from his hands to look at her.

  "When we came in here my mind was made up to make you stay home. Father begged me to do it, and I had my own selfish motive. It was love. Oh, I do love you, Kurt, more than you can dream of!... I justified my resolve. I told you that. But I wanted you. I wanted your love--your presence. I longed for a home with you as husband--master--father to my babies. I dreamed of all. It filled me with terror to think of you going to war. You might be crippled--mangled--murdered.... Oh, my dear, I could not bear the thought!... So I meant to overcome you. I had it all planned. I meant to love you--to beg you--to kiss you--to make you stay--"

  "Lenore, what are you saying?" he cried, in shocked amaze.

  She flung her arms round his neck. "Oh, I could--I could have kept you!" she answered, low voiced and triumphant. "It fills me with joy.... Tell me I could have kept you--tell me."

  "Yes. I've no power to resist you. But I might have hated--"

  "Hush!... It's all might have.... I've risen above myself."

  "Lenore, you distress me. A little while ago you bewildered me with your sweetness and love.... Now--you look like an angel or a goddess.... Oh, to have your face like this--always with me! Yet it distresses me--so terrible in purpose. What are you about to tell me? I see something--"

  "Listen," she broke in. "I meant to make you weak. I implore you now to be strong. You must go to war! But with all my heart and soul I beg you to go with a changed spirit.... You were about to do a terrible thing.

  You hated the German in you and meant to kill it by violence. You despised the German blood and you meant to spill it. Like a wild man you would have rushed to fight, to stab and beat, to murder--and you would have left your breast open for a bayonet-thrust.... Oh, I know it!...

  Kurt, you are horribly wrong. That is no way to go to war.... War is a terrible business, but men don't wage it for motives such as yours. We Americans all have different strains of blood--English--French--German.

  One is as good as another. You are obsessed--you are out of your head on this German question. You must kill that idea--kill it with one bayonet-thrust of sense.... You must go to war as my soldier--with my ideal. Your country has called you to help uphold its honor, its pledged word. You must fight to conquer an enemy who threatens to destroy freedom.... You must be brave, faithful, merciful, clean--an American soldier!... You are only one of a million. You have no personal need for war. You are as good, as fine, as noble as any man--my choice, sir, of all the men in the world!... I am sending you. I am giving you up....

  Oh, my darling--you will never know how hard it is!... But go! Your life has been sad. You have lost so much. I feel in my woman's heart what will be--if only you'll change--if you see God in this as I see. Promise me. Love that which you hated. Prove for yourself what I believe. Trust me--promise me... Then--oh, I know God will send you back to me!"

  He fell upon his knees before her to bury his face in her lap. His whole frame shook. His hands plucked at her dress. A low sob escaped him.

  "Lenore," he whispered, brokenly, "I can't see God in this--for me!... I can't promise!"

  Chapter XXI

  Thirty masked men sat around a long harvest mess-table. Two lanterns furnished light enough to show a bare barnlike structure, the rough-garbed plotters, the grim set of hard lips below the half-masks, and big hands spread out, ready to draw from the hat that was passing.

  The talk was low and serious. No names were spoken. A heavy man, at the head of the table, said: "We thirty, picked men, represent the country.

  Let each member here write on his slip of paper his choice of punishment for the I. W. W.'s--death or deportation...."

  The members of the band bent their masked faces and wrote in a dead silence. A noiseless wind blew through the place. The lanterns flickered; huge shadows moved on the walls. When the papers had been passed back to the leader he read them.

  "Deportation," he announced. "So much for the I. W. W. men.... Now for the leader.... But before we vote on what to do with Glidden let me read an extract from one of his speeches. This is authentic. It has been furnished by the detective lately active in our interest. Also it has been published. I read it because I want to bring home to you all an issue that goes beyond our own personal fortunes here."

  Leaning toward the flickering flare of the lantern, the leader read from a slip of paper: "If the militia are sent out here to hinder the I. W. W. we will make it so damned hot for the government that no troops will be able to go to France.... I don't give a damn what this country is fighting for.... I am fighting for the rights of labor.... American soldiers are Uncle Sam's scabs in disguise."

  The deep, impressive voice ended. The leader's huge fist descended upon the table with a crash. He gazed up and down the rows of sinister masked figures. "Have you anything to say?"

  "No," replied one.

  "Pass the slips," said another.

  And then a man, evidently on in years, for his hair was gray and he looked bent, got up. "Neighbors," he began "I lived here in the early days. For the last few years I've been apologizing for my home town. I don't want to apologize for it any longer."

  He sat down. And a current seemed to wave from him around that dark square of figures. The leader cleared his throat as if he had much to say, but he did not speak. Instead he passed the hat. Each man drew forth a slip of paper and wrote upon it. The action was not slow.

  Presently the hat returned round the table to the leader. He spilled its contents, and with steady hand picked up the first slip of paper.

  "Death!" he read, sonorously, and laid it down to pick up another. Again he spoke that grim word. The third brought forth the same, and likewise the next, and all, until the verdict had been called out thirty times.

  "At daylight we'll meet," boomed out that heavy voice. "Instruct Glidden's guards to make a show of resistance.... We'll hang Glidden to the railroad bridge. Then each of you get your gangs together. Round up all the I. W. W.'s. Drive them to the railroad yard. There we'll put them aboard a railroad train of empty cars. And that train will pass under the bridge where Glidden will be hanging.... We'll escort them out of the country."

  * * * * *

  That August dawn was gray and cool, with gold and pink beginning to break over the dark eastern ranges. The town had not yet awakened. It slept unaware of the stealthy forms passing down the gray road and of the distant hum of motor-cars and trot of hoofs.

  Glidden's place of confinement was a square warehouse, near the edge of town. Before the improvised jail guards paced up and down, strangely alert.

  Daylight had just cleared away the gray when a crowd of masked men appeared as if by magic and bore down upon the guards. There was an apparent desperate resistance, but, significantly, no cries or shots.

  The guards were overpowered and bound.

  The door of the jail yielded to heavy blows of an ax. In the corner of a dim, bare room groveled Glidden, bound so that he had little use of his body. But he was terribly awake. When six men entered he asked, hoarsely: "What're you--after?... What--you mean?"

  They jerked him erect. They cut the bonds from his legs. They dragged him out into the light of breaking day.

  When he saw the masked and armed force he cried: "My God!... What'll you--do with me?"

  Ghastly, working, sweating, his face betrayed his terror.

  "You're to be hanged by the neck," spoke a heavy, solemn voice.

  The man would have collapsed but for the strong hands that upheld him.

  "What--for?" he gasped.

  "For I. W. W. crimes--for treason--for speeches no American can stand in days like these." Then this deep-voiced man read to Glidden words of his own.

  "Do you recognize that?"

  Glidden saw how he had spoken hi
s own doom. "Yes, I said that," he had nerve left to say. "But--I insist on arrest--trial--justice!... I'm no criminal.... I've big interests behind me.... You'll suffer--"

  A loop of a lasso, slung over his head and jerked tight, choked off his intelligible utterance. But as the silent, ruthless men dragged him away he gave vent to terrible, half-strangled cries.

  The sun rose red over the fertile valley--over the harvest fields and the pastures and the orchards, and over the many towns that appeared lost in the green and gold of luxuriance.

  In the harvest districts west of the river all the towns were visited by swift-flying motor-cars that halted long enough for a warning to be shouted to the citizens, "Keep off the streets!"

  Simultaneously armed forces of men, on foot and on horseback, too numerous to count, appeared in the roads and the harvest fields.

  They accosted every man they met. If he were recognized or gave proof of an honest identity he was allowed to go; otherwise he was marched along under arrest. These armed forces were thorough in their search, and in the country districts they had an especial interest in likely camping-places, and around old barns and straw-stacks. In the towns they searched every corner that was big enough to hide a man.

  So it happened that many motley groups of men were driven toward the railroad line, where they were held until a freight-train of empty cattle-cars came along. This train halted long enough to have the I. W. W. contingent driven aboard, with its special armed guard following, and then it proceeded on to the next station. As stations were many, so were the halts, and news of the train with its strange freight flashed ahead.

  Crowds lined the railroad tracks. Many boys and men in these crowds carried rifles and pistols which they leveled at the I. W. W. prisoners as the train passed. Jeers and taunts and threats accompanied this presentation of guns.

  Before the last station of that wheat district was reached full three hundred members of the I. W. W., or otherwise suspicious characters, were packed into the open cars. At the last stop the number was greatly augmented, and the armed forces were cut down to the few guards who were to see the I. W. W. deported from the country. Here provisions and drinking-water were put into the cars. And amid a hurrahing roar of thousands the train with its strange load slowly pulled out.

  It did not at once gather headway. The engine whistled a prolonged blast--a signal or warning not lost on many of its passengers.

  From the front cars rose shrill cries that alarmed the prisoners in the rear. The reason soon became manifest. Arms pointed and eyes stared at the figure of a man hanging from a rope fastened to the center of a high bridge span under which the engine was about to pass.

  The figure swayed in the wind. It turned half-way round, disclosing a ghastly, distorted face, and a huge printed placard on the breast, then it turned back again. Slowly the engine drew one car-load after another past the suspended body of the dead man. There were no more cries. All were silent in that slow-moving train. All faces were pale, all eyes transfixed.

  The placard on the hanged man's breast bore in glaring red a strange message: _Last warning_. 3-7-77.

  The figures were the ones used in the frontier days by vigilantes.

  Chapter XXII

  A dusty motor-car climbed the long road leading up to the Neuman ranch.

  It was not far from Wade, a small hamlet of the wheat-growing section, and the slopes of the hills, bare and yellow with waving grain, bore some semblance to the Bend country. Four men--a driver and three cowboys--were in the automobile.

  A big stone gate marked the entrance to Neuman's ranch. Cars and vehicles lined the roadside. Men were passing in and out. Neuman's home was unpretentious, but his barns and granaries and stock-houses were built on a large scale.

  "Bill, are you goin' in with me after this pard of the Kaiser's?" inquired Jake, leisurely stretching himself as the car halted. He opened the door and stiffly got out. "Gimme a hoss any day fer gittin' places!"

  "Jake, my regard fer your rep as Anderson's foreman makes me want to hug the background," replied Bill. "I've done a hell of a lot these last forty-eight hours."

  "Wal, I reckon you have, Bill, an' no mistake.... But I was figgerin' on you wantin' to see the fun."

  "Fun!... Jake, it 'll be fun enough fer me to sit hyar an' smoke in the shade, an' watch fer you to come a-runnin' from thet big German devil.... Pard, they say he's a bad man!"

  "Sure. I know thet. All them Germans is bad."

  "If the boss hadn't been so dog-gone strict about gun-play I'd love to go with you," responded Bill. "But he didn't give me no orders. You're the whole outfit this round-up."

  "Bill, you'd have to take orders from me," said Jake, coolly.

  "Sure. Thet's why I come with Andy."

  The other cowboy, called Andy, manifested uneasiness, and he said: "Aw, now, Jake, you ain't a-goin' to ask me to go in there?... An' me hatin'

  Germans the way I do!"

  "Nope. I guess I'll order Bill to go in an' fetch Neuman out," replied Jake, complacently, as he made as if to re-enter the car.

  Bill collapsed in his seat. "Jake," he expostulated, weakly, "this job was given you because of your rep fer deploomacy.... Sure I haven't none of thet.... An' you, Jake, why you're the smoothest an' slickest talker thet ever come to the Northwest."

  Evidently Jake had a vulnerable point. He straightened up with a little swagger. "Wal, you watch me," he said. "I'll fetch the big Dutchman eatin' out of my hand.... An' say, when we git him in the car an' start back let's scare the daylights out of him."

  "Thet'd be powerful fine. But how?"

  "You fellers take a hunch from me," replied Jake. And he strode off up the lane toward the ranch-house.

  Jake had been commissioned to acquaint Neuman with the fact that recent developments demanded his immediate presence at "Many Waters." The cowboy really had a liking for the job, though he pretended not to.

  Neuman had not yet begun harvesting. There were signs to Jake's experienced eye that the harvest-hands were expected this very day. Jake fancied he knew why the rancher had put off his harvesting. And also he knew that the extra force of harvest-hands would not appear. He was regarded with curiosity by the women members of the Neuman household, and rather enjoyed it. There were several comely girls in evidence. Jake did not look a typical Northwest foreman and laborer. Booted and spurred, with his gun swinging visibly, and his big sombrero and gaudy scarf, he looked exactly what he was, a cowman of the open ranges.

  His inquiries elicited the fact that Neuman was out in the fields, waiting for the harvest-hands.

  "Wal, if he's expectin' thet outfit of I. W. W.'s he'll never harvest," said Jake, "for some of them is hanged an' the rest run out of the country."

  Jake did not wait to see the effect of his news. He strode back toward the fields, and with the eye of a farmer he appraised the barns and corrals, and the fields beyond. Neuman raised much wheat, and enough alfalfa to feed his stock. His place was large and valuable, but not comparable to "Many Waters."

  Out in the wheat-fields were engines with steam already up, with combines and threshers and wagons waiting for the word to start. Jake enjoyed the keen curiosity roused by his approach. Neuman strode out from a group of waiting men. He was huge of build, ruddy-faced and bearded, with deep-set eyes.

  "Are you Neuman?" inquired Jake.

  "That's me," gruffly came the reply.

  "I'm Anderson's foreman. I've been sent over to tell you thet you're wanted pretty bad at 'Many Waters.'"

  The man stared incredulously. "What?... Who wants me?"

  "Anderson. An' I reckon there's more--though I ain't informed."

  Neuman rumbled a curse. Amaze dominated him. "Anderson!... Well, I don't want to see him," he replied.

  "I reckon you don't," was the cowboy's cool reply.

  The rancher looked him up and down. However familiar his type was to Anderson, it was strange to Neuman. The cowboy breathed a potential force. The least significant thing about
his appearance was that swinging gun. He seemed cool and easy, with hard, keen eyes. Neuman's face took a shade off color.

  "But I'm going to harvest to-day," he said. "I'm late. I've a hundred hands coming."

  "Nope. You haven't none comin'," asserted Jake.

  "What!" ejaculated Neuman.

  "Reckon it's near ten o'clock," said the cowboy. "We run over here powerful fast."

  "Yes, it's near ten," bellowed Neuman, on the verge of a rage.... "I haven't harvest-hands coming!... What's this talk?"

  "Wal, about nine-thirty I seen all your damned I. W. W.'s, except what was shot an' hanged, loaded in a cattlecar an' started out of the country."

  A blow could not have hit harder than the cowboy's biting speech.

  Astonishment and fear shook Neuman before he recovered control of himself.

  "If it's true, what's that to me?" he bluffed, in hoarse accents.

  "Neuman, I didn't come to answer questions," said the cowboy, curtly.

  "My boss jest sent me fer you, an' if you bucked on comin', then I was to say it was your only chance to avoid publicity an' bein' run out of the country."

  Neuman was livid of face now and shaking all over his huge frame.

  "Anderson threatens me!" he shouted. "Anderson suspicions me!... _Gott in Himmel_!... Me he always cheated! An' now he insults--"

  "Say, it ain't healthy to talk like thet about my boss," interrupted Jake, forcibly. "An' we're wastin' time. If you don't go with me we'll be comin' back--the whole outfit of us!... Anderson means you're to face his man!"

  "What man?"

  "Dorn. Young Dorn, son of old Chris Dorn of the Bend.... Dorn has some things to tell you thet you won't want made public.... Anderson's givin' you a square deal. If it wasn't fer thet I'd sling my gun on you!... Do you git my hunch?"

  The name of Dorn made a slack figure of the aggressive Neuman.