The white-haired Ladd, gaunt, old, bent, looked up at the maelstrom
of clouds, and he said, softly, "Shore we'll get in the hosses,
an' pack light, an' hit the trail, an' make night marches!"
Then up out of the gulf of the west swept a bellowing wind and a
black pall and terrible flashes of lightning and thunder like the
end of the world--fury, blackness, chaos, the desert storm.
XVII
THE WHISTLE OF A HORSE
AT the ranch-house at Forlorn River Belding stood alone in his
darkened room. It was quiet there and quiet outside; the sickening
midsummer heat, like a hot heavy blanket, lay upon the house.
He took up the gun belt from his table and with slow hands buckled
it around his waist. He seemed to feel something familiar and
comfortable and inspiring in the weight of the big gun against
his hip. He faced the door as if to go out, but hesitated, and
then began a slow, plodding walk up and down the length of the
room. Presently he halted at the table, and with reluctant hands
he unbuckled the gun belt and laid it down.
The action did not have an air of finality, and Belding knew it.
He had seen border life in Texas in the early days; he had been
a sheriff when the law in the West depended on a quickness of
wrist; he had seen many a man lay down his gun for good and all.
His own action was not final. Of late he had done the same thing
many times and this last time it seemed a little harder to do, a
little more indicative of vacillation.
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