To The Last Man

CHAPTER I

At the end of a dry, uphill ride over barren country Jean Isbel
unpacked to camp at the edge of the cedars where a little rocky canyon
green with willow and cottonwood, promised water and grass.

His animals were tired, especially the pack mule that had carried a
heavy load; and with slow heave of relief they knelt and rolled in the
dust. Jean experienced something of relief himself as he threw off his
chaps. He had not been used to hot, dusty, glaring days on the barren
lands. Stretching his long length beside a tiny rill of clear water
that tinkled over the red stones, he drank thirstily. The water was
cool, but it had an acrid taste--an alkali bite that he did not like.
Not since he had left Oregon had he tasted clear, sweet, cold water;
and he missed it just as he longed for the stately shady forests he had
loved. This wild, endless Arizona land bade fair to earn his hatred.

By the time he had leisurely completed his tasks twilight had fallen
and coyotes had begun their barking. Jean listened to the yelps and to
the moan of the cool wind in the cedars with a sense of satisfaction
that these lonely sounds were familiar. This cedar wood burned into a
pretty fire and the smell of its smoke was newly pleasant.

"Reckon maybe I'll learn to like Arizona," he mused, half aloud. "But
I've a hankerin' for waterfalls an' dark-green forests. Must be the
Indian in me.... Anyway, dad needs me bad, an' I reckon I'm here for
keeps."

Jean threw some cedar branches on the fire, in the light of which he
opened his father's letter, hoping by repeated reading to grasp more of
its strange portent. It had been two months in reaching him, coming by
traveler, by stage and train, and then by boat, and finally by stage
again. Written in lead pencil on a leaf torn from an old ledger, it
would have been hard to read even if the writing had been more legible.

"Dad's writin' was always bad, but I never saw it so shaky," said Jean,
thinking aloud.


GRASS VALLY, ARIZONA.