Charles M. Sheldon
The High Calling
When the story was finished, Miss Gray started a hymn, "The Ninety and Nine." She sang with a low soft voice, almost talking the words, but old Peshlekietsetti sitting by Mr. Clifford bent over his knees gravely watching the singer's face and listening intently for every word, and when she was through, he asked a question of Mr. Masters.
"The old man wants to know," said Masters after one or two more questions had been asked, "how it happened that the sheep got lost and if it was its own fault or the fault of someone who should have been looking after it. That isn't a bad question to come from the old fellow. His theology isn't half so much at fault as that of some theological seminary professors I know, who teach that sin is nothing but a disease and that nobody in particular is to blame for it. If he had to live out here awhile instead of in his little upholstered study at the seminary, he would change his definition."
The evening was spent about the fire with songs and conversation, largely between Paul and Mr. Masters concerning the Navajo characteristics. The last thing Bauer could remember as he lay under his rug looking up at the stars, was the sight of old Peshlekietsetti throwing a handful of dry roots on the fire as he sat bowed over his knees, the fire flame gleaming red on his grave and dignified face.
He wakened early, as he had of late been doing, and sat up, noting the sleeping figures in a circle about the ashes of the fire, and as his look travelled on past them he noted out by the edge of the Black Gorge through which they were to travel that day, a solitary figure sitting on one of the curious rocks that framed a sort of gateway to the diminutive canyon. Even at that distance he could distinguish the form of Elijah Clifford, although he had already noticed that Clifford's rug and rubber blanket, which had been spread out by his own, had been folded up and tied ready for the day's trip.
Before the rest of the sleepers had stirred, Clifford came back to the spot and began with the noiseless rapidity of an Indian to build the fire in the sand preparatory to the breakfast, talking in a soft voice to Bauer, as if Bauer had asked him a question, although Bauer had not said a word except "Good-morning," when Clifford cheerfully greeted him.
"You see, I used to work on a daily paper in Kansas City before I was converted and it seems to me now that I spend most of my time trying to catch up with the day after to-morrow. I never had any leisure, never went to church, never opened a Bible and never talked with myself. Since I came out here I've had the time of my life in not only talking with myself but–" He glanced at Bauer wistfully as he put some stones around the hole and set his coffee pot down on the sand, "but I never saw such a place as a desert to find God. It seems as if this was the place to find him. You know Moses and Elijah and David and Paul and John and lots of men found God in the wilderness. I suppose you could find him while working for a daily paper, but He didn't seem to have much to do with the one I was on. At any rate I never found Him there. That's the reason I like to get up early. There's a time in the morning between four and five out here, when it appears to me God has more time to tend to individuals. Most everybody is asleep soundest about that time and He can pay attention better to the comparatively few folks that don't need so much rest."—Elijah said it as if to apologise for the habits of the rest of the party and Bauer could not help smiling at his note of evident haste not to take too much credit to himself for early rising. "I thought maybe you might kind of wonder at my ways, and think maybe I got up to write poetry or some such stuff. I believe you understand, eh?"
"I believe I do," said Bauer gravely. "And I appreciate your confidence. I know what it means to try to find God in a crowd. I think that is one reason Jesus had to leave the multitude and go out into the desert places."
"Yes," said Clifford, sitting down on the sand and putting his coffee pot on a stone. "I didn't mention Him. I thought you would remember that yourself."
This little glimpse into Elijah Clifford's personality did Bauer a world of good and strengthened a growing liking for him which led in the process of time, as this story goes on, to some very important results in Bauer's life.
The day promised to be unusually hot and it was Masters's plan to get through the Black Gorge canyon early, as it was famous for its stifling heat and dust storms later in the day. So camp was broken immediately after breakfast and the wagons were soon loaded with the bedding and dishes and the journey resumed in the same order, so far as the travellers were concerned, as before. Mr. Masters, who knew the trail at the other end of the gorge better than anyone else, went first with Mrs. Masters, Miss Clifford, Miss Gray and Walter and Clifford with Mr. Douglas, Mrs. Douglas, Helen, and Bauer followed, Peshlekietsetti and the heavy wagon trailing along in the rear.
Just as they were entering the Gorge, Clifford turned and looked back towards the camp. Out across the Red Rock elevation he pointed out three black specks. Looking at them through the mission field glass, a former gift from Mr. Douglas, he announced them to be probably three wagons with tourists from Canyon Diablo bound for the snake dance.
"May be your friend from Pittsburgh, Van Shaw, is in that outfit," he said to Bauer.
Bauer did not reply. He hoped Van Shaw would not meet Walter or any of their party. There was no reason why he should, but every time he thought of Van Shaw he felt uncomfortable, something in him rose up nearest to a feeling of hate and disgust he had ever known.
Clifford faced around and resumed the driving. He noted as he turned into the opening that Peshlekietsetti had stopped just outside to strap on one of the water barrels more securely, but seeing that he did not ask for any help he drove on into the Gorge.
The Gorge was weirdly irregular and the windings of the road were so many that very soon the wagons were all separated from view of one another.
In this volcanic land one could not account for the fantastic and even monstrous shapes of cliff and ledge and overhanging rock masses without calling up some gigantic upheaval of all nature's vast play of forces; earthquakes, fire, volcano, flood, wind, sand spouts of enormous height and velocity, one after the other all these elemental storms must have rocked and heaved and rent and tortured the earth and after all had passed by, the hurricane of volcanic fire and missiles must have scattered the debris of high mountains twisted into lumps of matter, varying in size from a sky scraper to a comma.
It began and ended abruptly, as if in a freak of the upheaval a tornado had picked up the end of a canyon somewhere, turned it over several times in transit and finally dropped it bottom side up on the desert, breaking it open when it fell and letting the fragments bump around like the pounded rock in a concrete mixer.
In among these boulders Elijah Clifford guided the team, exercising all his skill, for one of the horses was partly mustang, full of unused energy, and Mr. Masters had chosen the trip to Oraibi to give the animal some necessary training, trusting in Clifford's love of horses and his special characteristic of carefulness to avoid any accidents. And all would have gone well if the unforeseen and unavoidable had not occurred.
They were almost out of the gorge and Clifford had started to reply to a question of Paul's concerning the nature of the rocks which were different in colour on one side of the canyon from the other, when the mustang shied in a perfectly excusable manner at a cedar stump which hung out from a ledge so close that it almost scraped the frightened animal. Before Clifford could get the team back into the narrow road the front wheel struck a big stone. The jolt flung the pole with a jerk against the mustang. He reared up and slewed around, unhitching one of his tugs. Even then Clifford might have saved the situation if one of the reins had not broken. But when that snapped it was a hopeless task. Before any of the party knew what to do the now maddened team was thrashing up the gorge. The result was only a question of the law, if there is any, of accidents. Nobody ever knew just what did happen in detail. Paul and Esther said afterwards that they jumped, although they had always said they never would jump out of a runaway wagon. Helen clung terrified to her seat until the hind wheel on her side of the wagon was splintered and the wagon box fell down and she found herself flung up against the bank. Clifford jumped for one of the horse's backs, hoping to stop them by reaching their bridles, but his foot caught on the dashboard and he fell, just missing the wheels as he rolled down the trail. Bauer was the only one to remain in the wagon. Just as Clifford made his unsuccessful leap the tongue snapped. The horses tore themselves loose from the wrecked wagon and swept in a frenzy of fear through the gorge, banging the fragments of tongue, whiffletrees and harness about them, and what was left of the wagon came to a stop between two big boulders, with Bauer clinging to the front seat with white strained face wondering if the rest of them were all killed.
Clifford picked himself up and came limping along to where Paul and Esther were sitting. He was all right himself excepting a few minor bruises and was overjoyed to find that Mr. and Mrs. Douglas had escaped serious injury. But when the three of them came to Helen they found her almost in a swoon.
"I think I sprained my ankle," she said with a faint attempt at a smile.
"Thank God we are not all killed!" exclaimed Esther, but before she could say another word Helen had fainted. Her father and mother were busy over her, Bauer had run up with a water canteen and Clifford was ruefully regarding the wreck of the wagon when the sound of wheels was heard.
"There's Peshlekietsetti," he said. "We'll have to put Miss Helen in the chuck wagon. But how on earth are we going to get to Oraibi now?"
A large wagon turned the bend and the driver pulled up sharply. It was not Peshlekietsetti, but the tourist party from Canyon Diablo. Bauer, as he anxiously stood by Mrs. Douglas trying to restore Helen, was conscious that a group of astonished and interested tourists had climbed down from the wagon and had come up to the scene of the accident. As he looked up he saw Van Shaw and heard him say, "Why, hello, Bauer! Didn't expect to see you here. Had bad accident, haven't you? Anything we can do to help?"
CHAPTER XIV
"IT'S very kind of you, and–" Mr. Douglas began. It is astonishing how commonplace most people are in moments of accident. Paul had never seen Van Shaw, did not know him in the least and simply saw a good-looking young man dressed in a serviceable camping suit, who had appeared at a moment when help of some kind was imperatively needed. "You seem to be acquainted, Felix. One of your classmates at Burrton? Oh, you're the Pittsburgh party?"
Felix hesitated and Van Shaw saved him the trouble of an introduction.
"Yes, I'm Van Shaw, you know. Our outfit can take care of everything without any trouble. Mr. Douglas of Milton? You're with the Tolchaco party, aren't you? Yes, we'll be glad to be of service."
Van Shaw's glance travelled to Helen, who after a brave effort to keep from fainting again, had finally succumbed and lay back against the bank. Her mother was calm, and although this was the first time in all Helen's life that she had ever shown any such physical yielding to pain, Esther accepted the situation, and with Paul's help did the only thing obvious and soon had the girl resting, after the fainting spell, in one of the chuck wagons belonging to Van Shaw's party.
After that, events seemed to follow in a natural sequence, that could not reasonably have occurred in any other way. The frightened horses soon overtook and ran into the wagon in front. Masters and Walter caught them and as soon as possible came running back up the gorge, panting and fearful. Their surprise and relief when they learned that no one was seriously injured were great. The broken wagon was, however, such a wreck, that not even Elijah Clifford's ingenuity could repair it sufficiently for use, and with the exception of a few serviceable pieces, it was left behind. The two parties brought together by the quick process of accident, at last continued the journey in company, but for Felix Bauer a cloud had come up over the clear sky of his pleasure. He had never been able to endure Van Shaw, and it was exasperating to him and annoying to Walter to be under any obligations to one who, back in the old school, had moved in another circle and lived according to other moral codes.
Van Shaw on meeting Walter had simply said, "Hello, Douglas! Great place this old desert, hey?" He did not wait for Walter to say anything but rattled on. "This snake dance we're going to is said to be a corker. It's a beastly old distance to come to see it. I don't mind. But the camp grub gets the mater pretty bad."
The other members in the Pittsburgh party were Van Shaw's mother, just referred to as "mater," his aunt, a Mrs. Waldron, two young men, friends of Van Shaw, Mrs. Waldron's two nieces, and a cook and three drivers. They had fitted out at Canyon Diablo and crossed the Little Colorado at the upper ford, several hours after the Tolchaco party had passed, but owing to better equipment in the matter of horses and wagons they had overtaken the latter just as Touchiniteel and his two Indians had entered the gorge.
By noon the wagons were all out of the gorge and in full view of the Crested Buttes. Helen was resting as well as could be expected but was evidently in great pain. Masters, who was something of a doctor and surgeon, did the best he could with the simple remedies he carried, but declared the sprain to be a very serious one, and at a little consultation held at lunch time, the feasibility of abandoning the trip and turning back to Tolchaco on account of Helen's condition was discussed.
When Helen heard of it she emphatically objected.
"I won't listen to such a thing. I'm very comfortable. I don't want the rest of you to lose the enjoyment of the trip on my account. The only thing that worries me is the fear I am causing trouble to these other people."
The "other people," represented by Van Shaw and the young men friends, were near the chuck wagon when Helen made this last remark. Van Shaw hastened to assure her that no one was put out in the least by her presence there.
"I don't feel sure of that. It seems to me that more than one person must have been 'put out' of here when I was put in. I take up a great deal of room and I am sure there were some seats in this wagon."
Van Shaw protested that his party had two extra saddle horses and that as for himself he preferred to walk. He needed the exercise.
The other young men joined in gallantly. Miss Douglas was free to ride in any or all of the wagons as long as she chose.
Helen smiled at all of them impartially and expressed her thanks to Van Shaw in particular. Felix Bauer who with Walter was standing in the group with the rest during this little conversation, wondered for the first time in his life if Helen Douglas was a coquette. If she knew Van Shaw as well as he and Walter knew him would she smile so sweetly at him, and on such brief acquaintance? To Felix Bauer the whole thing was incomprehensible. Even allowing something for the swiftness with which acquaintances can be made in the desert during a camping experience, especially under circumstances favoured by such an accident as had occurred, it still was not seemly that a girl like Helen Douglas should even in the slightest degree encourage the attention of fellows like Van Shaw.
Felix was so disturbed by his own feelings over the affair that during the whole of the afternoon he avoided the wagon where Helen was. Once, however, as he looked back, to his indignant surprise he noted Van Shaw driving the team and turning about from time to time as if to converse with Helen, who was lying on a camp bed under the canopy cover which had been pulled back, on account of the heat, so as to allow Helen a glance now and then of some passing point of interest. Once Felix was sure he heard her laugh at some remark made by Van Shaw in comment perhaps on Touchiniteel's curious sailor made costume.
As soon as he could get a chance to speak to Walter, Felix gave voice to his feelings, for the time being entirely forgetful of the very important fact that up to this time he had never by word or look betrayed to Walter his feeling for his sister.
"Do you see that?" he spoke to Walter as they walked along together a little distance from the wagons. The men had nearly all got down to walk over a piece of particularly hard going for the teams.
Walter looked over in the direction of Helen where Bauer was looking as he spoke, and shrugged his shoulders.
"Yes, but what of it?"
"You know Van Shaw?"
"Well, I don't like it, of course, but Helen is old enough to look out for herself."
"Do you mean that you are willing to have her become friendly with him?" said Felix, his simple clean mind horrified at the apparent indifference of Walter to Van Shaw's general looseness of moral habits as they knew him in Burrton.
"Well, what can I do?" said Walter with some show of irritation. "Do you want me to go back there, politely ask Van Shaw to stop the team, and say to Helen in his hearing: 'Dear sister, the young man who is amusing you so finely this afternoon is the son of the greatest and most notorious railroad wrecker in America. He himself is known in the school at Burrton as the fastest and most vulgar youth in the institution. He drinks, he gambles, he is famous for the number of indecent stories he can tell, he has his rooms adorned with pictures of variety actresses, he has no high aims in life and never earned a cent since he was born, although he spends several thousands of dollars every year which his father makes for him by ruining other people. In short, sister, he is the last young man in all the universe with whom I, your brother, would desire you to become acquainted. Therefore, I am going to ask Mr. Van Shaw to wait until with the help of Mr. Bauer who knows all these facts about Mr. Van Shaw as well as I do, we transfer you from this wagon to one of ours, although owing to our comparative poverty as measured by this Pittsburgh outfit our wagons are not at all fitted to carry beautiful young ladies who have sustained severe ankle sprains.' Do you want me to go over to Van Shaw and get off a speech like that in order to save Helen?"
Bauer stared at Walter in solemn surprise. Then to Walter's surprise he said curtly:
"Every word of it is true."
"Yes, but you can't always say everything that's true. I wish for the life of me that Van Shaw had never put in an appearance. It has spoiled the trip for me. Besides, you never can tell what a girl will do. They're all romantic and above all, unreasonable. Van Shaw is good looking and he's got money coming to him like the sand of this desert. And I don't forget a story Clifford was telling us this morning. It was about some American girl very much like Helen, in a book, who said to another girl that all she wanted of a husband in New York was a man to go down town in the morning to earn enough money for her to spend up town in the afternoon."
"You don't mean to say that your sister has any such ambition as that, do you?" asked Felix even slower than usual.
Walter looked at him curiously.
"You don't know Helen very well. She is very ambitious, and she has great respect for wealth. She thinks money can do most anything in this old world. There's no telling what Helen will do when it comes to marrying. I can't imagine her marrying a poor man."
"I would rather see her married to Touchiniteel than to Van Shaw!" said Bauer with a savage outburst that accelerated his speech and changed his entire countenance.
Walter looked at Felix again, with the same curious regard.
"You seem to be a good deal disturbed over the matter, old man. What difference does it make to you whether Helen marries Van Shaw or Touchiniteel?"
Bauer turned his face toward Walter with a look Walter never forgot.
They were walking near one of the old ruins of an abandoned village.
Pieces of broken pottery and grinders were littered over the ground.
Felix motioned to Walter to go farther up into the mound where these ruins were scattered.
"We can catch up with the teams. The folks will think we are looking for specimens," he said. Walter anticipated Bauer's story as he sat down by him and in the midst of an ancient cliff dwellers century old debris of a home, heard his chum's simple story. After it was told in Bauer's slow but in this case intense manner, Walter said:
"I'm awfully sorry, old man; but I don't believe you stand a ghost of a chance with Helen."
"I don't suppose I do," assented Bauer humbly. "But you can see now why I feel as I do and what it means to me to see a fellow like Van Shaw with her. It is not only torture to me. I think some one ought to tell her."
"Tell her what?"
"About Van Shaw. Such men have no business to make love to pure girls like Helen."
Walter remonstrated.
"It's absurd, Felix. He isn't making love to her. Nonsense."
"He is!" said Bauer with a passionate burst that astonished Walter. "You do not know him as well as I do. I am acquainted with Van Shaw's history through the Raines-Bracken affair. You were not at Burrton when that happened. Nothing but the fear of losing some of old Van Shaw's legacies to the school prevented young Van Shaw's expulsion at the time. I can't go into the affair, Walter, but it gave me a loathing for Van Shaw that I never can overcome. It isn't because I feel holier than thou or anything like that; God knows I am in need of his great forgiveness; but it seems as wrong for us to leave your sister unacquainted with the real character of Van Shaw as it would to let her play with one of these rattlesnakes we are going to see in Oraibi the day after to-morrow, not knowing how deadly they were."
"Who'll tell her? Will you?"
"I? How can I do it. No. But it would seem quite the thing for you or your mother–"
"Mother doesn't know him," Walter interrupted somewhat curtly. "I don't see how I can say anything," Walter went on, with the caution many school boys feel about telling on others. "I really believe Helen is capable of protecting herself. And one of the quickest ways to get a girl interested in a man is to hint that he is not as good as he might be."
"That's your philosophy imbibed from your six best sellers," retorted Felix. Walter was a constant novel reader. "I am going to have a talk with your mother about the whole affair. She will know what to do."
"Will you tell her how you feel about Helen?"
Felix winced.
"She knows already."
"Oh, you have told her."
"No, she knows without my telling."
"Have you spoken to Helen?"
The colour swept up over Bauer's face.
"No, and I never will."
"Does she know?" Walter persisted.
"I looked at her once," faltered Bauer, and for the soul of him Walter could not help roaring out at him.
As they rose to make their way to the wagons which had halted in a group to wait for them and others who had fallen behind, Walter smote Bauer on the back.
"Courage, old man. The case is not all hopeless. If you have got as far as a look, that's progress. What did Helen do?"
But Bauer drew into his reserve at this point and gravely refused to talk any more, and Walter did not venture to insist. Only, as they were going to their wagons Bauer simply said, "I shall tell your mother. It would not be right not to let her know."
"I don't know what mother can do about it," Walter replied dubiously.
"Mrs. Douglas is very wise." said Bauer. To that Walter made no answer, and they joined the rest of the party without further words.
That night the two camps were pitched close together, and two fires burned like red specks in the holes dug for the sagebrush and cedar roots. The chuck wagon in which Helen had been riding was left standing close by the tent pitched for her mother and Mrs. Masters. She seemed unusually cheerful and in answer to many inquiries assured all that she was resting easily and was nearly free from pain.
After the camp meal was over and the desert grey of the soft night had begun to wrap itself like an enveloping cloak about the two camps, as quietly and without warning of their presence natives of that weird tract of earth began to appear. When the camp was made there was not a hogan or any form of human habitation to be seen. But as Paul came back to the fire circle after helping Masters pitch the last of the tents he was astonished to see a dozen Indians, mostly young men, sitting on the sand close by. Masters spoke a word to them when he came up to the fire and one of the men answered briefly.
"They have come all the way from Leupp," he said to Paul. "Walked the entire distance of sixty-seven miles since sunrise."
"Do you know any of them?" Paul asked curiously.
"Yes, I have met one of the young men at Shungapavi. They are all going up to see the snake dance. It's the only feature about the Hopi that appeals to them."
Miss Gray began to sing; it seemed to Walter who was sitting on the Navajo blanket near her that he had never heard a voice of just that particular quality. It fitted into the surroundings wonderfully. The dusky faces with the inevitable head-cloth of red or white were intent on hers, and when the song ceased and Walter looked up and around he saw the members of the other camp had come over and were standing or sitting about. Among the faces that were most noticeable to Walter was Van Shaw's. He was standing almost directly opposite Miss Gray staring at her with a strange look as if he were in doubt of the reality of Miss Gray's presence in this group. It seemed to Walter that he was about to ask a question, but Masters, who at campfire was always intent on bringing his Gospel message to the miscellaneous audience he might not see again in many months, began to speak softly and affectionately.
The visitors from the outside world, including the party from Pittsburgh, could not understand one word. It was not that that moved them. But Masters was gifted with a splendid voice in full control. After he had been speaking ten minutes the figures about the little fire crept closer up and narrowed the circle. Masters's face was eloquent. Tears rolled down his cheeks. His gestures were wide and conveyed tender invitation. He spoke only a few moments more and ended abruptly. Old Peshlekietsetti gently dropped a root of dowegie bush on the almost extinct fire. The coals burst into a new flame and the light flared up again, showing to Felix, Helen's wondering face framed in the opening fold of the wagon cover, while Mrs. Douglas close by her was listening with sympathetic attention deepened into reverent surprise when Elijah Clifford with his hands over his knees, his head bowed, prayed the evening prayer in a spirit that seemed to proclaim another man from the one they had known during the day. And then another hymn in which all were asked by Miss Gray to join. It all smote Felix with a feeling of wonder, it was so new and unusual to his experience. But to Masters and Miss Gray and Clifford it was the regular daily habit of their lives, as common and necessary to them as it was for the tourist crowd looking on to close the day's life with a heavy dinner of seven courses and bridge whist into the next morning. The last glimpse Walter had of Van Shaw as he moved off towards his own wagons was the look he cast at Miss Gray again and then transferred to the canvas that covered the chuck wagon where Helen and her mother sat talking over the strange events of the day and its strange ending.
The next day was a severe experience for old desert travellers. The wind blew almost a gale. The sand drifted like snow and the mid day meal was taken standing, everyone eating as best he could, standing up, and making no attempt at the setting of a table or the formality of a regular meal.
Late in the afternoon the grey rock of Oraibi showed through the whistling sand storm. The wagons halted a little while by the Oraibi Wash before making the last miles through the difficult sand hillocks at the foot of the cliff. And it was during this resting period that word came to Masters from one of the Hopis who had a corn field on the Wash that recent rains at Oraibi had so damaged the wagon trial leading to the top that it would be impossible to drive up. All visitors and tourists must walk up the foot trail.
"That means that Helen can't get to the village. It will be a great disappointment," said Mrs. Douglas.
It was on the tongue of Felix Bauer to suggest a plan for carrying Helen up the trail on one of the camp cots when Van Shaw struck in.
"Pardon me, Mrs. Douglas, but it will be an easy thing to carry Miss Douglas up the trail on a camp cot. Four of us can do it easily. Just put some tent poles under the sides and let the two behind rest the poles on their shoulders and the two in front carry lower. In that way I'm sure we can get Miss Douglas to the top without any inconvenience to her. It would be a shame to come all this distance and eat all this dirt and miss the real thing after all."
"I don't want to miss it, of course," Helen faltered, looking at the group of young men, Walter, Felix, Van Shaw and his two friends. "But I'm giving a lot of trouble and I'm afraid I'm a nuisance."
"Then we will abate it by carrying you up there," said Van Shaw smiling, and Helen smiled back at him, to Felix Bauer's rage. The whole thing was getting to be torture to him. And it all intensified his determination to have a plain talk with Mrs. Douglas. The opportunity for it was not easy. Mrs. Douglas was close by Helen nearly every moment. The camp duties were many and the little company was of necessity grouped close together during the march. But Bauer with his regular stock of dogged patience bided his time, sure it would come.
