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(Excerpt)
WE lay low in the grass on the broad plain levels, | |
| Old Revels and I, and my stolen brown bride; | |
| And the heavens of blue and the harvest of brown | |
| And beautiful clover were welded as one, | |
| To the right and the left, in the light of the sun. | 5 |
| “Forty full miles if a foot to ride, | |
| Forty full miles if a foot, and the devils | |
| Of red Camanches are hot on the track | |
| When once they strike it. Let the sun go down | |
| Soon, very soon,” muttered bearded old Revels | 10 |
| As he peered at the sun, lying low on his back, | |
| Holding fast to his lasso. Then he jerked at his steed | |
| And he sprang to his feet, and glanced swiftly around, | |
| And then dropped, as if shot, with his ear to the ground; | |
| Then again to his feet, and to me, to my bride, | 15 |
| While his eyes were like fire, his face like a shroud, | |
| His form like a king, and his beard like a cloud, | |
| And his voice loud and shrill, as if blown from a reed,— | |
| “Pull, pull in your lassos, and bridle to steed, | |
| And speed you if ever for life you would speed, | 20 |
| And ride for your lives, for your lives you must ride! | |
| For the plain is aflame, the prairie on fire, | |
| And feet of wild horses hard flying before | |
| I hear like a sea breaking high on the shore, | |
| While the buffalo come like a surge of the sea, | 25 |
| Driven far by the flame, driving fast on us three | |
| As a hurricane comes, crushing palms in his ire.” | |
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| We drew in the lassos, seized saddle and rein, | |
| Threw them on, sinched them on, sinched them over again, | |
| And again drew the girth, cast aside the macheers, | 30 |
| Cut away tapidaros, loosed the sash from its fold, | |
| Cast aside the catenas red-spangled with gold, | |
| And gold-mounted Colt’s, the companions of years, | |
| Cast the silken serapes to the wind in a breath, | |
| And so bared to the skin sprang all haste to the horse,— | 35 |
| As bare as when born, as when new from the hand | |
| Of God,—without word, or one word of command. | |
| Turned head to the Brazos in a red race with death, | |
| Turned head to the Brazos with a breath in the hair | |
| Blowing hot from a king leaving death in his course; | 40 |
| Turned head to the Brazos with a sound in the air | |
| Like the rush of an army, and a flash in the eye | |
| Of a red wall of fire reaching up to the sky, | |
| Stretching fierce in pursuit of a black rolling sea | |
| Rushing fast upon us, as the wind sweeping free | 45 |
| And afar from the desert blew hollow and hoarse. | |
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| Not a word, not a wail from a lip was let fall, | |
| Not a kiss from my bride, not a look nor low call | |
| Of love-note or courage; but on o’er the plain | |
| So steady and still, leaning low to the mane, | 50 |
| With the heel to the flank and the hand to the rein, | |
| Rode we on, rode we three, rode we nose and gray nose, | |
| Reaching long, breathing loud, as a creviced wind blows: | |
| Yet we broke not a whisper, we breathed not a prayer, | |
| There was work to be done, there was death in the air, | 55 |
| And the chance was as one to a thousand for all. | |
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| Gray nose to gray nose, and each steady mustang | |
| Stretched neck and stretched nerve till the arid earth rang, | |
| And the foam from the flank and the croup and the neck | |
| Flew around like the spray on a storm-driven deck. | 60 |
| Twenty miles!… thirty miles!… a dim distant speck … | |
| Then a long reaching line, and the Brazos in sight, | |
| And I rose in my seat with a shout of delight, | |
| I stood in my stirrup and looked to my right— | |
| But Revels was gone; I glanced by my shoulder | 65 |
| And saw his horse stagger; I saw his head drooping | |
| Hard down on his breast, and his naked breast stooping | |
| Low down to the mane, as so swifter and bolder | |
| Ran reaching out for us the red-footed fire. | |
| To right and to left the black buffalo came, | 70 |
| A terrible surf on a red sea of flame | |
| Rushing on in the rear, reaching high, reaching higher. | |
| And he rode neck to neck to a buffalo bull, | |
| The monarch of millions, with shaggy mane full | |
| Of smoke and of dust, and it shook with desire | 75 |
| Of battle, with rage and with bellowings loud | |
| And unearthly, and up through its lowering cloud | |
| Came the flash of his eyes like a half-hidden fire, | |
| While his keen crooked horns, through the storm of his mane, | |
| Like black lances lifted and lifted again; | 80 |
| And I looked but this once, for the fire licked through, | |
| And he fell and was lost, as we rode two and two. | |
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| I looked to my left then,—and nose, neck, and shoulder | |
| Sank slowly, sank surely, till back to my thighs; | |
| And up through the black blowing veil of her hair | 85 |
| Did beam full in mine her two marvellous eyes, | |
| With a longing and love, yet a look of despair | |
| And of pity for me, as she felt the smoke fold her, | |
| And flames reaching far for her glorious hair. | |
| Her sinking steed faltered, his eager ears fell | 90 |
| To and fro and unsteady, and all the neck’s swell | |
| Did subside and recede, and the nerves fall as dead. | |
| Then she saw sturdy Pachè still lorded his head, | |
| With a look of delight; for nor courage nor bribe, | |
| Nor naught but my bride, could have brought him to me. | 95 |
| For he was her father’s, and at South Santafee | |
| Had once won a whole herd, sweeping everything down | |
| In a race where the world came to run for the crown. | |
| And so when I won the true heart of my bride,— | |
| My neighbor’s and deadliest enemy’s child, | 100 |
| And child of the kingly war-chief of his tribe,— | |
| She brought me this steed to the border the night | |
| She met Revels and me in her perilous flight | |
| From the lodge of the chief to the North Brazos side; | |
| And said, so half guessing of ill as she smiled, | 105 |
| As if jesting, that I, and I only, should ride | |
| The fleet-footed Pachè, so if kin should pursue | |
| I should surely escape without other ado | |
| Than to ride, without blood, to the North Brazos side, | |
| And await her,—and wait till the next hollow moon | 110 |
| Hung her horn in the palms, when surely and soon | |
| And swift she would join me, and all would be well | |
| Without bloodshed or word. And now as she fell | |
| From the front, and went down in the ocean of fire, | |
| The last that I saw was a look of delight | 115 |
| That I should escape—a love—a desire— | |
| Yet never a word, not one look of appeal, | |
| Lest I should reach hand, should stay hand or stay heel | |
| One instant for her in my terrible flight. | |
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| Then the rushing of fire around me and under, | 120 |
| And the howling of beasts and a sound as of thunder,— | |
| Beasts burning and blind and forced onward and over, | |
| As the passionate flame reached around them, and wove her | |
| Red hands in their hair, and kissed hot till they died,— | |
| Till they died with a wild and a desolate moan, | 125 |
| As a sea heart-broken on the hard brown stone … | |
| And into the Brazos … I rode all alone,— | |
| All alone, save only a horse long-limbed, | |
| And blind and bare and burnt to the skin. | |
| Then just as the terrible sea came in | 130 |
| And tumbled its thousands hot into the tide | |
| Till the tide blocked up and the swift stream brimmed | |
| In eddies, we struck on the opposite side. * * * * *
THE END. | |
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