Street awoke the second time to the smell of chicken broth and toast. He sat up, and this time the pain in his head was less. The girl, Rose Healy, propped pillows behind him, then brought basin and water and firmly and wordlessly washed his face and hands.
Her face was somber, her lips unsoftened by any smile. Street spoke with some embarrassment, “I think I owe you a great deal for taking care of me. I hope I’ll have a chance to repay it.”
Rose frowned. She said stiffly, “It was not done with the thought of repayment.” She sat down beside the bed, picked up a bowl, and put a spoonful of scalding broth in his mouth.
Street said, “You don’t like me, do you?”
Her eyes met his briefly. “How could I know whether I like you or not? You have been unconscious.” She was withdrawn, cool. Street, having known but one woman, could not know that her coolness was a defense. Not knowing this, aware that all she knew of him was what he might have babbled in his delirium, he said, “Then it is possible that you don’t like what I am … what I stand for.”
“What do you stand for?” Her gaze, so steady and still, was disconcerting. He had a suddenly overwhelming desire to make this girl understand.
He said, “When I was sixteen, I caught a man stealing a horse from my father’s pasture. I was hunting at the time. I was carrying a rifle. I yelled at him to stop, and when he didn’t, I fired.”
“Was that the first man you killed?” Her voice completely lacked expression.
“Yes. And I didn’t mean to kill him. I think it must have been almost automatic, my shooting at him.”
The girl said, “You needn’t have made a career of it.”
“No, I guess not.” He was angered by her calm hostility. He shrugged. “I won’t bore you with the rest.”
“No. I’d like to hear it. I’d like to know how a gunfighter is made.”
Street scowled at her. On the point of refusing, he changed his mind. Perhaps his need for understanding was greater than he had realized. In brief, uncolored narrative, he told her the rest of it. He told her of the past two years, of his putting aside the gun. He told her of Rawlins’ attack on the stage out of Montezuma. As he talked, he stared beyond her, out the window at the rolling grassland of Chain. When he had finished, he looked at her face.
Her eyes were wide. Her lower lip was full and trembling. She blinked and looked away. She murmured, “I think you must love Verona very much. Are you quite sure she deserves it?”
Street failed to answer that.
Rose said, “Yes. You’re very sure, aren’t you?”
Street nodded.
There was a silence in the room for a long while. At last Rose said, looking down at the floor, “And if you discover you have been wrong, what will you do then? Will you slip back into your old ways? Will you take out your anger and disillusion on the world in general?”
But she did not wait for his reply. Hastily gathering up the tray of half-eaten food, she hurried out of the room, closing the door firmly behind her.
Street was puzzled by her behavior. He was puzzled and upset. Had he known that she was crying bitterly as she carried the tray to the kitchen, he would have been even more disturbed. For he might have understood then what she had been trying to tell him all along. That Verona today was not the Verona he had known two years ago. That Verona had changed. Not knowing, he simply thought, I’ve got to get out of here. I’ve got to leave and I’ve got to see her. The longer I stay in this country the harder it’s going to be.
Experimentally he swung his legs over the side of the bed. But he did not stand up. For dizziness claimed him and he knew that if he did, he would fall down. He lay back on the bed. Reflectively he rubbed his jaw, was surprised to find it clean-shaven, at least where there were no scabbed wounds. He thought, Why, good Lord, she’s even been shaving me. And suddenly the full weight of his obligation struck him. Except for this girl, for Chain, he would be dead. If he’d almost died with her care, he’d undoubtedly have died without it. Yet this obligation was one he would have to ignore. Because he knew that to pay it would be to lose Verona forever. Chain was at war with Gunhammer. Perhaps no shots had been fired as yet, but it was war all the same. Street, nominally owner of the Rawlins spread, stood in the middle. If he sold to Gunhammer, they would move in on Chain, would steal the major part of this fabulous kingdom of grass. If he did not sell to Gunhammer, he would have to fight. And if he fought, he would lose Verona, assuming of course that he had not already lost her.
Street closed his eyes. Impatience gnawed at him. But he was wise enough to know that he could not leave Chain yet. He also knew that the quickest way to regain strength, to heal, is to sleep and rest. He rested. But already he was planning, was yearning for the time when he could leave the haven of Chain and ride back to Escalante. We’ll go away together, he thought. We’ll get the fresh start we’ve both waited so long for.
It was fortunate, perhaps, that Street did not know Gunhammer had no intention of letting him leave. It was also fortunate that he did not know that Frank Jagger even now was heading toward Escalante, one thousand dollars in his poke and triumph in his heart.
* * * * *
The next morning, Rose permitted Street to get out of bed. She provided him with Levi’s, faded from many washings, and a plaid flannel shirt, which Street judged belonged to her father. She brought him his boots that had been cleaned and polished. She left the room while he got dressed, although Street realized with a sudden heat of embarrassment that he had no privacy left where Rose was concerned. She had cared for him three days and nights.
Afterward, feeling weak and dizzy and only partially recovered from his embarrassment, he made his way through the house and out to the veranda where Rose was waiting. More tired than he would have liked to admit, he sank gratefully into a wicker rocker. Perhaps the vast impatience he felt with his own weakness showed in his face, for Rose said, “Don’t be so intolerant with yourself. Even a strong body takes time to mend.”
Street gave her a meager smile. He said, “Two years of waiting make a man impatient. Hell, I’ve been here four days and I haven’t even talked to Verona yet.”
Rose stared at the horizon. Silence fell between them, silence that became increasingly awkward. Street wondered why Rose did not like Verona. The girl seemed above feminine jealousy, but what else could her dislike be? He fished automatically in his shirt pocket for tobacco, failing to find it. Rose got up wordlessly and went into the house, returning shortly with sack tobacco, papers, and matches. Street fashioned a cigarette and lit it.
He was painfully aware of this girl beside him, was also aware that she disapproved either of him, of Verona, or of both of them. It puzzled him until he thought, It’s the way I’ve lived that she disapproves. Yet with Rose he felt, in spite of that, a deep sense of companionship such as he had never known with Verona. His life with Verona had been tempestuous and full of fire, always. There had been no moments of peace and understanding. Moodily he stared out at the land that was Chain. Peace and understanding lay ahead, down the years. Youth was the time for fire. Yet why could not the two go hand in hand?
Perhaps Rose thought he was noticing Chain, for she said, “We put up no hay on Chain, as you’ve probably noticed. There is shelter in the timber over there for the cattle during winter storms. And grass aplenty when the storms are over. Cattle winter fat on Chain. They always have.” There was unconscious pride in her voice.
Street followed the direction of her gesture with his glance. Chain, the whole length of it, lay nestled like a lover against the plateau rim and was sheltered by it. There was a strip of hilly, timbered country between the foot of the rim and the open grassland. Street’s eyes wandered across the bench to the other side where the grass ended abruptly at the cañon drop off.
Rose murmured, “Chain is a cowman’s dream, Mister Street … fenced by nature with the rim on one side, with the cañon on the other. Except at roundup time in the fall and branding in the spring, we don’t even need a crew. All the cattle need is to be let alone, for there’s grass and water everywhere.”
Street said, “No wonder Gunhammer wants it. Will they leave you anything at all?”
Rose Healy made a small, bitter laugh. “Oh, yes. They’re being very generous. They won’t bother our home, because it stands on patented land. The Laceys own Sheriff Coe, but they’re terrified of doing anything that would bring in a US marshal. So they won’t bother our patented land.”
“How about graze?”
“They’ll take all of that. They have offered to let us run three hundred head of cattle on a pool arrangement. I won’t even have to hire riders. Gunhammer will do my branding, my roundup work, my shipping.” Rose’s lovely face was bitter.
“Just like a pension … or a handout. Take what they give you and be grateful.” Street was angry. He asked, “What are you going to do about it?”
She made a pathetic shrug. “What can we do? My father is an invalid, confined to his bed or to a wheelchair. For a while Will Rawlins stood between Gunhammer and Chain, but he only did it in hope of profit. He was asking Gunhammer ten thousand dollars for that little hundred and sixty acres down there. So you see, he was only using our misfortune as a lever to pry money out of Gunhammer.”
“What happened to him?”
Again Rose shrugged helplessly. “Some things you know but cannot prove. He was found dead in Escalante’s shack town, a knife in his back. There was a bottle beside him and signs that a woman had been with him. And likely Max Bauer wielded the knife.”
“So now nothing stands between Gunhammer and you. Nothing but a man who doesn’t even own the name he carries.” Street had a dark suspicion, which was that Rose had brought him here and cared for him in the hope of using him as a buffer. It must have been a great shock to her to discover he was Street and not Rawlins.
Rose looked at him steadily. “I know what you’re thinking. It isn’t true, though I can’t ask you to believe it. It does look bad, doesn’t it, bringing you here and caring for you, and you a total stranger?”
Street smiled wryly. “I’ve considered the possibility that you wanted my help.”
Rose flushed. She said, “We’re beyond the help of any one man. And you’re not to let it worry you. We’ll continue to live, even after Gunhammer takes over. It’s not your problem at all. You’ve troubles enough of your own, which are worse because of us.”
“Ever think of fighting for Chain?” Street asked dryly.
“Of course we’ve thought of it. But we have also realized that we cannot win. Gunhammer is too big, and they’re ruthless, which we could never be. The only thing we might gain by fighting would be delay, and the cost would be too great. Men would be killed. Children would be orphaned, women widowed. Is a little delay worth that?”
Street’s admiration for this girl grew. He suddenly wanted to pitch in and help her himself. Then he thought of Verona again and remained silent.