the Desert Of Wheat (2001) (32 page)

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 his 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.

"All right--I go," he said, gruffly, and without a word to his men he started off.

Jake followed him. Neuman made a short cut to the gate, thus avoiding a meeting with any of his family. At the road, however, some men observed him and called in surprise, but he waved them back.

"Bill, you an' Andy collect yourselves an' give Mr. Neuman a seat," said Jake, as he opened the door to allow the farmer to enter.

The two cowboys gave Neuman the whole of the back seat, and they occupied the smaller side seats. Jake took his place beside the driver.

"Burn her up!" was his order.

The speed of the car made conversation impossible until the limits of a town necessitated slowing down. Then the cowboys talked. For all the attention they paid to Neuman, he might as well not have been present.

Before long the driver turned into a road that followed a railroad track for several miles and then crossed it to enter a good-sized town. The streets were crowded with people and the car had to be driven slowly. At this juncture Jake suggested.

"Let's go down by the bridge."

"Sure," agreed his allies.

Then the driver turned down a still more peopled street that sloped a little and evidently overlooked the railroad tracks. Presently they came in sight of a railroad bridge, around which there appeared to be an excited yet awestruck throng. All faces were turned up toward the swaying form of a man hanging by a rope tied to the high span of the bridge.

"Wal, Glidden's hangin' there yet," remarked Jake, cheerfully.

With a violent start Neuman looked out to see the ghastly placarded figure, and then he sank slowly back in his seat. The cowboys apparently took no notice of him. They seemed to have forgotten his presence.

"Funny they'd cut all the other I. W. W.'s down an' leave Glidden hangin' there," observed Bill.

"Them vigilantes sure did it up brown," added Andy. "I was dyin' to join the band. But they didn't ask me."

"Nor me," replied Jake, regretfully. "An' I can't understand why, onless it was they was afeared I couldn't keep a secret."

"Who is them vigilantes, anyhow?" asked Bill, curiously.