Rather, the fire was the thing which he kept chiefly in the center of
his vision, but his glances went everywhere, to all sides, up, and down.
Hal Dozier had hunted him hotly down the valley of the Little Silver
River, but near the village of Los Toros the fagged posse and Hal
himself had dropped back and once more given up the chase. No doubt they
would rest for a few hours in the town, change horses, and then come
after him again.
It was a new Andrew Lanning that sat there by the fire. He had left
Martindale a clear-faced boy; the months that followed had changed him
to a man; the boyhood had been literally burned out of him. The skin of
his face, indeed, refused to tan, but now, instead of a healthy and
crisp white it was a colorless sallow. The rounded cheeks were now
straight and sank in sharply beneath his cheek bones, with a sharply
incised line beside the mouth. And his expression at all times was one
of quivering alertness--the mouth a little compressed and straight, the
nostrils seeming a trifle distended, and the eyes as restless as the
eyes of a hungry wolf.
Moreover, all of Andrew's actions had come to bear out this same
expression of his face. If he sat down his legs were gathered, and he
seemed about to stand up. If he walked he went with a nervous step,
rising a little on his toes as though he were about to break into a run
or as though he were poising himself to whirl at any alarm. He sat in
this manner even now, under that dead gray sky of sheeted clouds, and in
the middle of that great rolling plain, lifeless and colorless--lifeless
except for the wind that hummed across it, pointed with cold. Andrew,
looking from the dull glimmer of his fire to that dead waste, sighed. He
whistled, and Sally came instantly to the call and dropped her head
beside his own. She, at least, had not changed in the long pursuits and
the hard life. It had made her gaunt. It had hardened and matured her
muscles, but her head was the same, and her changeable, human eyes, the
eyes of a pet, had not altered.
She stood there with her head down, silently; and Andrew, his hands
locked around his knees, neither spoke to her nor stirred. But by
degrees the pain and the hunger went out of his face, and, as though she
knew that she was no longer needed, Sally tipped his sombrero over his
eyes with a toss of her head, and, having given this signal of disgust
at being called without a purpose, she went back to her work of cropping
the gramma grass, which of all grasses a horse loves best. Andrew
straightened his hat and cast one glance after her.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Elsewhere in the archive
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account