the Desert Of Wheat (2001) Read online

  Black-bread days of the Middle Ages, when crude grinding made impure flour, were the days of the oppressed peasant and the rich landowner, dark days of toil and poverty and war, of blight and drought and famine; when common man in his wretchedness and hunger cried out, "Bread or blood!"

  But with the spreading of wheat came the dawn of a higher civilization; and the story of wheat down to modern times showed the development of man. Wheat-fields of many lands, surrounding homes of prosperous farmers; fruitful toil of happy peoples; the miller and his humming mill!

  When wheat crossed the ocean to America it came to strange and wonderful fulfilment of its destiny. America, fresh, vast, and free, with its sturdy pioneers ever spreading the golden grain westward; with the advancing years when railroad lines kept pace with the indomitable wheat-sowers; with unprecedented harvests yielding records to each succeeding year; with boundless fields tilled and planted and harvested by machines that were mechanical wonders; with enormous floor-mills, humming and whirring, each grinding daily ten thousand barrels of flour, pouring like a white stream from the steel rolls, pure, clean, and sweet, the whitest and finest in the world!

  America, the new county, became in 1918 the salvation of starving Belgium, the mainstay of England, the hope of France! Wheat for the world! Wheat--that was to say food, strength, fighting life for the armies opposed to the black, hideous, medieval horde of Huns! America to succor and to save, to sacrifice and to sow, rising out of its peaceful slumber to a mighty wrath, magnificent and unquenchable, throwing its vast resources of soil, its endless streams of wheat, into the gulf of war! It was an exalted destiny for a people. Its truth was a blazing affront in the face of age-old autocracy. Fields and toil and grains of wheat, first and last, the salvation of mankind, the freedom and the food of the world!

  * * * * *

  Far up the slow-rising bulge of valley slope above the gleaming river two cars climbed leisurely and rolled on over the height into what seemed a bare and lonely land of green.

  It was a day in June, filled with a rich, thick, amber light, with a fragrant warm wind blowing out of the west.

  At a certain point on this road, where Anderson always felt compelled to halt, he stopped the car this day and awaited the other that contained Lenore and Dorn.

  Lenore's joy in the ride was reflected in her face. Dorn rested comfortably beside her, upon an improvised couch. As he lay half propped up by pillows he could see out across the treeless land that he knew.

  His eyes held a look of the returned soldier who had never expected to see his native land again. Lenore, sensitive to every phase of his feeling, watched him with her heart mounting high.

  Anderson got out of his car, followed by Kathleen, who looked glad and mischievous and pretty as a wild rose.

  "I just never can get by this place," explained the rancher, as he came and stood so that he could put a hand on Dorn's knee. "Look, son--an'

  Lenore, don't you miss this."

  "Never fear, dad," replied Lenore, "it was I who first told you to look here."

  "Terrible big and bare, but grand!" exclaimed Kathleen.

  Lenore looked first at Dorn's face as he gazed away across the length and breadth of land. Could that land mean as much to him as it did before he went to war? Infinitely more, she saw, and rejoiced. Her faith was coming home to her in verities. Then she thrilled at the wide prospect before her.

  It was a scene that she knew could not be duplicated in the world. Low, slow-sloping, billowy green hills, bare and smooth with square brown patches, stretched away to what seemed infinite distance. Valleys and hills, with less fallow ground than ever before, significant and striking: lost the meager details of clumps of trees and dots of houses in a green immensity. A million shadows out of the west came waving over the wheat. They were ripples of an ocean of grain. No dust-clouds, no bleached roads, no yellow hills to-day! June, and the desert found its analogy only in the sweep and reach! A thousand hills billowing away toward that blue haze of mountain range where rolled the Oregon. Acreage and mileage seemed insignificant. All was green--green, the fresh and hopeful color, strangely serene and sweet and endless under the azure sky. Beautiful and lonely hills they were, eloquent of toil, expressive with the brown squares in the green, the lowly homes of men, the long lines of roads running everywhither, overwhelmingly pregnant with meaning--wheat--wheat--wheat--nothing but wheat, a staggering visual manifestation of vital need, of noble promise.

  "That--that!" rolled out Anderson, waving his big hand, as if words were useless. "Only a corner of the great old U. S.!... What would the Germans say if they could look out over this?... What do _you_ say, Lenore?"

  "Beautiful!" she replied, softly. "Like the rainbow in the sky--God's promise of life!"

  "An', Kathie, what do _you_ say?" went on Anderson.

  "Some wheat-fields!" replied Kathleen, with an air of woman's wisdom.

  "Fetch on your young wheat-sowers, dad, and I'll pick out a husband."

  "An' _you_, son?" finished Anderson, as if wistfully, yet heartily playing his last card. He was remembering Jim--the wild but beloved son--the dead soldier. He was fearful for the crowning hope of his years.

  "As ye sow--so shall ye reap!" was Dorn's reply, strong and thrilling.

  And Lenore felt her father's strange, heart-satisfying content.

  * * * * *

  Twilight crept down around the old home on the hill.

  Dorn was alone, leaning at the window. He had just strength to lean there, with uplifted head. Lenore had left him alone, divining his wish.

  As she left him there came a sudden familiar happening in his brain, like a snap-back, and the contending tide of gray forms--the Huns--rushed upon him. He leaned there at the window, but just the same he awaited the shock on the ramparts of the trench. A ferocious and terrible storm of brain, that used to have its reaction in outward violence, now worked inside him, like a hot wind that drove his blood.

  During the spell he fought out his great fight--again for the thousandth time he rekilled his foes. That storm passed through him without an outward quiver.

  His Huns--charged again--bayoneted again--and he felt acute pain in the left arm that was gone. He felt the closing of the hand which was not there. His Huns lay in the shadow, stark and shapeless, with white faces upward--a line of dead foes, remorseless and abhorrent to him, forever damned by his ruthless spirit. He saw the boy slide off his bayonet, beyond recall, murdered by some evil of which Dorn had been the motion.

  Then the prone, gray forms vanished in the black gulf of Dorn's brain.

  "Lenore will never know--how my Huns come back to me," he whispered.

  Night with its trains of stars! Softly the darkness unfolded down over the dim hills, lonely, tranquil, sweet. A night-bird caroled. The song of insects, very faint and low, came to him like a still, sad music of humanity, from over the hills, far away, in the strife-ridden world. The world of men was there and life was incessant, monstrous, and inconceivable. This old home of his--the old house seemed full of well-remembered sounds of mouse and cricket and leaf against the roof and soft night wind at the eaves--sounds that brought his boyhood back, his bare feet on the stairs, his father's aloofness, his mother's love.

  * * * * *

  Then clearly floated to him a slow sweeping rustle of the wheat.

  Breast-high it stood down there, outside his window, a moving body, higher than the gloom. That rustle was a voice of childhood, youth, and manhood, whispering to him, thrilling as never before. It was a growing rustle, different from that when the wheat had matured. It seemed to change and grow in volume, in meaning. The night wind bore it, but life--bursting life was behind it, and behind that seemed to come a driving and a mighty spirit. Beyond the growth of the wheat, beyond its life and perennial gift, was something measureless and obscure, infinite and universal. Suddenly Dorn saw that something as the breath and the blood and the spirit of wheat--and of man. Dust and to dust returned they might be, but this p
hysical form was only the fleeting inscrutable moment on earth, springing up, giving birth to seed, dying out for that ever-increasing purpose which ran through the ages.

  A soft footfall sounded on the stairs. Lenore came. She leaned over him and the starlight fell upon her face, sweet, luminous, beautiful. In the sense of her compelling presence, in the tender touch of her hands, in the whisper of woman's love, Dorn felt uplifted high above the dark pale of the present with its war and pain and clouded mind to wheat--to the fertile fields of a golden age to come.

  End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Desert of Wheat, by Zane Grey *** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DESERT OF WHEAT ***

  ***** This file should be named 10201.txt or 10201.zip *****

  This and all associated files of various formats will be found in:

  http://www.gutenberg.net/1/0/2/0/10201/

  Produced by Suzanne Shell, David Kline and PG Distributed Proofreaders Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will be renamed.

  Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is subject to the trademark license, especially commercial redistribution.

  *** START: FULL LICENSE ***

  THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE

  PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK

  To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work (or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at http://gutenberg.net/license).

  Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works 1. A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property (trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession.

  If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1. E.8.

  1. B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See paragraph 1. C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. See paragraph 1. E below.

  1. C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others.

  1. D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United States.

  1. E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg:

  1. E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, copied or distributed:

  This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.net 1. E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1. E.1 through 1. E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1. E.8 or 1. E.9.

  1. E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution must comply with both paragraphs 1. E.1 through 1. E.7 and any additional terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work.

  1. E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm.

  1. E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1. E.1 with active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project Gutenberg-tm License.

  1. E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.net), you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm License as specified in paragraph 1. E.1.

  1. E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to,
viewing, displaying, performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works unless you comply with paragraph 1. E.8 or 1. E.9.

  1. E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided that - You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation."

  - You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm License. You must require such a user to return or destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of Project Gutenberg-tm works.

  - You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1. F.3, a full refund of any money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days of receipt of the work.

  - You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works.

  1. E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below.

  1. F.