He was hungry, and he had not thought to bring food with him. But he did not want to go back now. There was too much to think about, too much to decide. And he did not know what awaited him back at the ranch … Ben Janish might have returned, and it was Ben Janish who had tried to kill him.
He swung his horse around, returned to the trail, and turned the dun up the mountain. After a dozen quick, tight turns they began to wind through the forest, climbing steadily. The mountain was steep, but the deer had found a way to the meadows below. There were no horse tracks on the trail, only those of deer.
He kept on, studying the country as he rode. The growth was so thick that only occasionally could he see the ranch or the valley below him. He followed the dim, narrow trail back and forth up the steep scarp until suddenly a notch in the mountain, invisible from below, opened before him.
The dun went forward slowly, ears pricked with curiosity. The notch opened after some hundred yards into a long trough down which a stream ran. It was high grassland, the slopes covered with pines, and about a quarter of a mile away he could see a small cabin, perched on a shelf among the trees.
There was no sound, nor any sign of life there.
Above on the mountain a rock cropped out, bare and cold against the sky; below it only a few straggling pines, wind-torn and twisted, stretched black, thin arms against the sky.
It was a lonely place where the shadows came early and where cold winds blew off the ridges. Who had found this spot? Above all, who had thought to build here, under the bleak sky? On any cloudy day the place must be rilled with damp, clinging gray clouds, and thunder must roll down this narrow valley, leaving the air charged and smelling of brimstone. It was a place of bitter solitude .. . yet somehow it appealed to him, somehow he knew this was his place, where he belonged.
The only sound was that of the dun’s hoofs in the tall grass, and occasionally the click of a hoof against stone.
He went up the trail to the shelf and stopped before the cabin.
It was built against a wall of rock, sheltered half beneath the overhang, and was of native stone, the cold gray rocks gathered from the foot of the cliff. It had been built a long time ago.
No mortar had been used, only stone wedded to stone, but cunningly, skillfully done by the hands of a master. The stones had taken on the patina of years, and the heavy wooden bench made of a split log was polished as if from much use. A stable backed against the wall where the fireplace stood so heat from the fire would help to warm the stable. A passage led from the house into the stable, and a stack of wood stood high against the stable walls.
Dismounting, he tied the dun to a post and went up to the door. It opened under his hand, and he stepped in.
He had expected nothing like this. The floor was carpeted with skins, the skins of bear and mountain lion. There was a wall of books, a writing table, and a gunrack holding a dozen rifles and shotguns.
In another smaller room there was a store of canned goods and other supplies. These things had never arrived over the trail by which he had come; therefore there must be another and better route.
Somebody had lived here, perhaps lived here still, and that somebody was probably Ruble Noon, for this must be the cabin deeded to Noon by the document he carried.
He walked to the windows. The view from them covered all the valley below. The only blind spot lay on the steep mountainside above the cabin, a place from which one might come to the cabin unseen. Otherwise the only access to it was by coming up from the front.
After studying the view he sat down in the chair at the desk. It was a comfortable chair and felt right to him, and the cabin felt right, too. In the winter this valley would be snowed in, closed off to the world, but in the summer it was a haven, a secure place.
He got up suddenly. He must be getting back. In actual distance he was not far from the Rafter D, but at the pace he would have to travel it would probably take almost two hours to return.
But first he must discover the other way into the high valley. A careful search proved only one thing: there was no easy way out of the valley, and in fact no way at all that he could find. Yet there had to be such a route. Nothing that was in the cabin could have been brought up the way he had come.
For the first time he stood back and studied the rock-built cabin itself. Immediately he was aware that a part of it was much older than the rest. The stable and part of the cabin had been added at a later date, but that part of the stable that adjoined the house was older.
But he realized that he could spend no more time here at present. Mounting his horse, he went back the way he had come, pondering the problem of the access route. When he had once more come to the bottom of the steep mountainside he remained under cover for some time, studying the surrounding area to be sure that nobody saw him emerge from the trees. Then he swung down and carefully removed as many traces of his passage as possible.
The moon was up and supper was long past when he rode into the ranch yard. As he dismounted he saw a man stand up and go into the bunkhouse. Was it Kissling, watching for him?
He stripped the gear from his horse and turned the dun into the corral, then went up to the ranch house. The Chinese cook had finished washing up and showed no pleasure at seeing him.
“Supper all finish,” the cook said. “What you want?”
“Coffee will do-just coffee.”
Fan appeared in the door from the study. “You go ahead, Wing. I’ll find something for him.”
Grumbling, Wing went off to his quarters, and Fan brought some bread, cold beef, and cheese from the cupboard. “There’s some frijoles, too,” she said. “Do you want them?”
“Please ”
“Have a nice ride?”
His way of answering was to say, “You’ve got some cattle that must be shipped. I’d say four or five hundred head, but there might be twice that many.”
“We haven’t shipped any cattle since pa died. Even since before he died.”
“You’re overstocked. The range is in good shape because you had plenty of rain and snow. But it won’t be good next year until you get rid of some older stock.”
“I don’t know whether Ben Janish will let us.” He glanced at her. “The hell with him.”
“That is easy to say. We would have to have extra hands … most of these boys don’t dare appear where the law can see them. Word would get out, and this place would be ruined for them.”
“Did you ever hear of a man named Matherbee?” he asked.
“No.”
“How about Ruble Noon?”
“Everybody knows about him.”
For a few moments then they sat in silence while he ate. She refilled his cup.
“Apparently I have forgotten much,” he said. “Or perhaps there was much I never knew. Put yourself in my place. I do not know what kind of man I have been, nor how I should react. I know that men were wanting to kill me, but I do not know if they were a mob or the law. I sometimes think that I should go away from here, lose myself in the mountains, and stay there until my memory comes back and I know who and what I am.”
“I would miss you,” she said suddenly, without thinking.
“Those are the first kind words anyone has said to me, but don’t think them. Neither of us knows what I was, nor what I will be if my memory returns. I am a haunted man – haunted by the ghosts of what I may have been.”
“Then make a decision to start over,” she said. “No matter what you have been, you can always become something else.”
“Is it that simple? Is a man ruled by his own free will, or is he a composite of all his experiences, his education and heredity? I may not know what I am, but my flesh and blood do know, and they react the way they have been conditioned to react. My conscious mind was born only a few days ago, but the habit patterns built into my muscles have forgotten nothing.”