Читать книгу Pillar Mountain - Frederick Schiller Faust - Страница 3

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Loafer was a big dog who looked like a buffalo wolf; he was gray against one background and pale yellow against another; like a buffalo wolf, he had a great leonine body covered with a loose hide which humped in a wave above his shoulders at every lurch of his gallop. Strangers always said “Wolf!” when they saw him (there were four bullet scars upon him), and no one said “Good dog!” except his master. However, he was too busy most of the time to be bothered by human opinions which, also, seldom came to his ears. On this morning he was hunting on the broad breast of Pillar Mountain not for food but for revenge; his enemy was a lop-eared rabbit.

There never was a time when wolf or wolfish dog could match speed with a Western jack rabbit; but in brains the difference lay on the other side and, since puppyhood, Loafer had been certain that no rabbit could live a week in his domain save by permission. The little darting idiots always could be scared into the waiting teeth. At least, that was his opinion until he encountered Lop-ear; and after that the life of Loafer was poisoned.

Lop-ear was a perfect Achilles among jack rabbits, and he was an Odysseus, also; nothing stirred on the mountains or on the broad desert that he could not outrun, and there was very little that he could not outthink. Above all, he was familiar with Pillar Mountain, and he grew up to a splendid maturity under the nose of Loafer. They sharpened their wits on one another, like scimitar on scimitar, and each grew great because the other was a proper metal. Yet, victor of a thousand contests with the big dog, swelled with the pride of his own fame, Lop-ear on this morning made a serious mistake. He had filled his belly with newly sprouted twigs, flavored with keen spice, rich with juice, tender as watercress; and now he sat in the sun with his head drawn back upon his shoulders, his eyes a mere glimmering black thread of watchfulness, and his ears fallen flat on his back.

They should have been erect like two towers of watchfulness, drinking in all sound, tenfold more watchful because the south wind was cutting straight up the side of the mountain and blowing away the scent of all who hunted down the slope. Also, the eyes of Lop-ear should have been wide open, so that he could have seen the big stalker, approaching like a great yellow ball of thistledown, soundless, drifting with speed and infinite cunning straight into the eye of the wind.

To Lop-ear, it was like rousing from a nightmare and finding that it is not a dream! When the gray-yellow bolt sprang, Lop-ear hugged the ground one dreadful instant; then with a scream he leaped straight under the head of Loafer. A side rip of those flashing teeth sliced the hip of the rabbit, but he went down the first little cañon so fast that the rocks blurred as they flew past. For once in his life he had forgotten that he was Lop-ear, and a king, and he consented to take refuge in the common strength of his race—sheer, blinding speed. So he ran like mad, putting in not one spy-hop in twenty, and quite forgot that the cañon traveled in a precise little semicircle.

Loafer did not forget; he had never forgotten, since the day a mountain lion taught him that it is dangerous to sleep even in the broad light of noon on the threshold of the master’s house. Now he cantered across the arc of the semicircle and Lop-ear, after a tremendous burst of sprinting, found himself running down the very jaws of his foe. He dodged with a speed that would have made the most famous halfback faint with envy, but the white steel of Loafer’s teeth clipped the air just in front of his nose, and therefore he doubled and headed up a difficult slope of broken rock.

That winded him more than ever, and as Lop-ear flung himself down the mountainside, he knew that he was not half a hop, half a thought beyond the reach of death. He cleared the brook from bank to bank at a single glorious bound, but as he landed the teeth clicked at his tail again, and the mind of Lop-ear went black and dizzy, like blown mist at night. The yawning door of the hut seemed to him, at first, some sort of a haven, but it was reeking with the terrible scent of man, so Lop-ear swerved to the side and almost perished again because he did so. Then, knowing that his wind was gone—for he had burned it up like a fool, rather than a wise king—he did the one thing that remained to him: he dived into a hole that showed under the edge of a jagged rock.

There, in the black depths, he cuddled small and smaller into the moist darkness and prayed to the God who cares for all good rabbits.

Loafer lay down and hung a forepaw as big as the hand of a man into the mouth of the hole. He laughed as he lay, and the wrinkles of laughter made his big hazel eyes small and wicked with delight. For he knew all about that hole. He had known about it ever since he was a little puppy, when he himself had been small enough to escape from the wrathful hand of the master and dodge into this haven. It ran straight down, for a bit, then straightened ahead; and there were two things worth knowing—one was that it filled with water only after the very heaviest rains—the other was that the hole could not be driven deeper, because it ended against solid stone.

So Loafer laughed, and withdrawing his paw, he put his muzzle at the entrance and inhaled the sweet fragrance of steaming rabbit—rabbit steamed in fear, and spiced with the delicately familiar and long-hated scent of Lop-ear himself.

Even children know that good things should be enjoyed slowly, and Loafer was no child. He began first by enlarging the mouth of the hole. Then he inserted his arm to the shoulder, and heard a squeak of terror; the sound went electrically through the body of Loafer; it went sweetly through his soul.

Listening again, he heard frantic scratching. But he knew all about that hole and the consistency of its walls; therefore he laughed again, and when Lop-ear heard the almost soundless laughter, the scratching stopped. Dreadful, waiting silence began.

After this, with leisure and with system, Loafer enlarged the hole. The whole upper level was porous sand and gravel which he could rip away with his strong claws, and having done that, how simple it would be to reach in and paw out the rabbit! Now and again he paused to listen, but the silence of despair continued in that death-hole; only from the house he heard the young voice of the master singing. How far, how faint, how utterly dim and unreal are the joys of mankind, thought Loafer, and bent afresh to his task.

With both forepaws he labored and the hole ripped wide; then he lay down and his whole shoulder fitted into the aperture, his elbow came to the bottom of the downward shaft, and his right paw touched Lop-ear.

That paw began to tremble with the thundering heartbeats of the victim. He reached farther. He felt the shrinking shoulder and the soft throat of the king of rabbits, but just as he was about to scoop Lop-ear out of the hole he heard a grinding sound, the big rock settled, and drove a sharp stone into his forearm.

He lurched back, but the hole had collapsed, and his arm was held as by a glove. The edged stone worked into his flesh like a tooth; his whole shoulder was being crushed.

Then Loafer forgot the rabbit, and his mind flashed back to the master as an electric torch picks something from the night. He barked; he whined with pain and fear; and the master stood suddenly above him, leaning with kind, thoughtful face.

“I’ll get something for a lever,” said the master.

Loafer groaned.

“By heaven,” said the master, “it’s breaking his leg!”

And he bestrode the jagged rock.

It was as black as iron and almost as heavy. Deeply rooted, massive, it defied his strength. Mightily he heaved, and Loafer saw the feet of the man thrust ankle deep in the yielding gravel. He heard the creak of grinding joints, the snapping of tendons drawn with a merciless power, and then the groan of the master in the full agony of his effort.

The burden which crushed the leg of the dog was lightened. He snatched out his leg. But still the man persisted in his labor as though he did not know the work was done; Loafer limped around and stood before him, looking up into his face, which was mixed red and purple, and running with perspiration. His whole body shook; his breathing was a succession of groans; but the stone began to rise.

That Loafer himself had been saved was one thing; but vaguely the dog understood that something of infinitely more importance now was going on. Lop-ear ventured from the hole and fled away unheeded; only from the corner of his eye the dog watched his old enemy flee; but in this mighty work of the raising of the stone, whatever its meaning, he wished to assist. The roots of the rock worked loose with a sucking sound; the black, wet belly of the stone came slowly up to view; it was poised; it swung to the side and fell, crushing a dozen smaller stones to bits in its fall.

Then the master sank down, also. He lay at full length, moaning, his eyes closed, his body shaken with spasms, and Loafer was filled with terror and amazement. This man was the center of the universe. At his bidding, beyond doubt, the wind blew and the sun rose. He killed afar and gave food to his humble companion. In the blast of summer heat, his hut was cool, and in the winter his red magic gave the house warmth to which Loafer was welcomed. Yet now he lay sick and stricken. When Loafer licked his face he neither spoke nor turned away. When Loafer licked his trembling hands, they made no response, and for the first time the caress of the dog was unreturned.

He crowded close to the youth as though winter cold made him seek for warmth, and lifting his great wrinkled head, Loafer called aloud to the old gods of his people.

There was an immediate response; an arm passed around his neck, and while he whined with joy, the master dragged himself to his knees, to his feet. He stood wavering, and yet he began to laugh.

“I’ve done it!” he said over and over again; “I’ve done it.”

Then he went into the hut and slumped heavily on to a bunk. Loafer sat beside him, on guard. His mane bristled when he considered what dreadful deeds he would perform for the sake of his master.