Zane Grey - Riders of the Purple Sage

“Lassiter! … My dear friend! … It’s impossible for us to marry!”

“Why – as Fay says?” inquired Lassiter, with gentle persistence.

“Why! I never thought why. But it’s not possible. I am Jane, daughter of Withersteen. My father would rise out of his grave. I’m of Mormon birth. I’m being broken. But I’m still a Mormon woman. And you – you are Lassiter!”

“Mebbe I’m not so much Lassiter as I used to be.”

“What was it you said? Habit of years is strong as life itself! You can’t change the one habit – the purpose of your life. For you still pack those black guns! You still nurse your passion for blood.”

A smile, like a shadow, flickered across his face.

“No.”

“Lassiter, I lied to you. But I beg of you – don’t you lie to me. I’ve great respect for you. I believe you’re softened toward most, perhaps all, my people except – But when I speak of your purpose, your hate, your guns, I have only him in mind. I don’t believe you’ve changed.”

For answer he unbuckled the heavy cartridge-belt, and laid it with the heavy, swing gun-sheaths in her lap.

“Lassiter!” Jane whispered, as she gazed from him to the black, cold guns. Without them he appeared shorn of strength, defenseless, a smaller man. Was she Delilah? Swiftly, conscious of only one motive – refusal to see this man called craven by his enemies – she rose, and with blundering fingers buckled the belt round his waist where it belonged.

“Lassiter, I am a coward.”

“Come with me out of Utah – where I can put away my guns an’ be a man,” he said. “I reckon I’ll prove it to you then! Come! You’ve got Black Star back, an’ Night an’ Bells. Let’s take the racers an’ little Fay, an’ race out of Utah. The hosses an’ the child are all you have left. Come!”

“No, no, Lassiter. I’ll never leave Utah. What would I do in the world with my broken fortunes and my broken heart? Ill never leave these purple slopes I love so well.”

“I reckon I ought to’ve knowed that. Presently you’ll be livin’ down here in a hovel, an’ presently Jane Withersteen will be a memory. I only wanted to have a chance to show you how a man – any man – can be better ’n he was. If we left Utah I could prove – I reckon I could prove this thing you call love. It’s strange, an’ hell an’ heaven at once, Jane Withersteen. ’Pears to me that you’ve thrown away your big heart on love – love of religion an’ duty an’ churchmen, an’ riders an’ poor families an’ poor children! Yet you can’t see what love is – how it changes a person! … Listen, an’ in tellin’ you Milly Erne’s story I’ll show you how love changed her.

“Milly an’ me was children when our family moved from Missouri to Texas, an’ we growed up in Texas ways same as if we’d been born there. We had been poor, an’ there we prospered. In time the little village where we went became a town, an’ strangers an’ new families kept movin’ in. Milly was the belle them days. I can see her now, a little girl no bigger ’n a bird, an’ as pretty. She had the finest eyes, dark blue-black when she was excited, an’ beautiful all the time. You remember Milly’s eyes! An’ she had light-brown hair with streaks of gold, an’ a mouth that every feller wanted to kiss.

“An’ about the time Milly was the prettiest an’ the sweetest, along came a young minister who began to ride some of a race with the other fellers for Milly. An’ he won. Milly had always been strong on religion, an’ when she met Frank Erne she went in heart an’ soul for the salvation of souls. Fact was, Milly, through study of the Bible an’ attendin’ church an’ revivals, went a little out of her head. It didn’t worry the old folks none, an’ the only worry to me was Milly’s everlastin’ prayin’ an’ workin’ to save my soul. She never converted me, but we was the best of comrades, an’ I reckon no brother an’ sister ever loved each other better. Well, Frank Erne an’ me hit up a great friendship. He was a strappin’ feller, good to look at, an’ had the most pleasin’ ways. His religion never bothered me, for he could hunt an’ fish an’ ride an’ be a good feller. After buffalo once, he come pretty near to savin’ my life. We got to be thick as brothers, an’ he was the only man I ever seen who I thought was good enough for Milly. An’ the day they were married I got drunk for the only time in my life.

“Soon after that I left home – it seems Milly was the only one who could keep me home – an’ I went to the bad, as to prosperin’ I saw some pretty hard life in the Pan Handle, an’ then I went North. In them days Kansas an’ Nebraska was as bad, come to think of it, as these days right here on the border of Utah. I got to be pretty handy with guns. An’ there wasn’t many riders as could beat me ridin’. An’ I can say all modest-like that I never seen the white man who could track a hoss or a steer or a man with me. Afore I knowed it two years slipped by, an’ all at once I got homesick, an’ pulled a bridle south.

“Things at home had changed. I never got over that homecomin’. Mother was dead an’ in her grave. Father was a silent, broken man, killed already on his feet. Frank Erne was a ghost of his old self, through with workin’, through with preachin’, almost through with livin’, an’ Milly was gone! … It was a long time before I got the story. Father had no mind left, an’ Frank Erne was afraid to talk. So I had to pick up what ‘d happened from different people.

“It ’pears that soon after I left home another preacher come to the little town. An’ he an’ Frank become rivals. This feller was different from Frank. He preached some other kind of religion, and he was quick an’ passionate, where Frank was slow an’ mild. He went after people, women specially. In looks he couldn’t compare to Frank Erne, but he had power over women. He had a voice, an’ he talked an’ talked an’ preached an’ preached. Milly fell under his influence. She became mightily interested in his religion. Frank had patience with her, as was his way, an’ let her be as interested as she liked. All religions were devoted to one God, he said, an’ it wouldn’t hurt Milly none to study a different point of view. So the new preacher often called on Milly, an’ sometimes in Frank’s absence. Frank was a cattle-man between Sundays.

“Along about this time an incident come off that I couldn’t get much light on. A stranger come to town, an’ was seen with the preacher. This stranger was a big man with an eye like blue ice, an’ a beard of gold. He had money, an’ he ’peared a man of mystery, an’ the town went to buzzin’ when he disappeared about the same time as a young woman known to be mightily interested in the new preacher’s religion. Then, presently, along comes a man from somewheres in Illinois, an’ he up an’ spots this preacher as a famous Mormon proselyter. That riled Frank Erne as nothin’ ever before, an’ from rivals they come to be bitter enemies. An’ it ended in Frank goin’ to the meetin’-house where Milly was listenin’, an’ before her an’ everybody else he called that preacher – called him, well, almost as hard as Venters called Tull here sometime back. An’ Frank followed up that call with a hosswhippin’, an’ he drove the proselyter out of town.

“People noticed, so ’twas said, that Milly’s sweet disposition changed. Some said it was because she would soon become a mother, an’ others said she was pinin’ after the new religion. An’ there was women who said right out that she was pinin’ after the Mormon. Anyway, one mornin’ Frank rode in from one of his trips, to find Milly gone. He had no real near neighbors – livin’ a little out of town – but those who was nearest said a wagon had gone by in the night, an’ they though it stopped at her door. Well, tracks always tell, an’ there was the wagon tracks an’ hoss tracks an’ man tracks. The news spread like wildfire that Milly had run off from her husband. Everybody but Frank believed it an’ wasn’t slow in tellin’ why she run off. Mother had always hated that strange streak of Milly’s, takin’ up with the new religion as she had, an’ she believed Milly ran off with the Mormon. That hastened mother’s death, an’ she died unforgivin’. Father wasn’t the kind to bow down under disgrace or misfortune but he had surpassin’ love for Milly, an’ the loss of her broke him.