Nancy MacIntyre | Page 8

Sat the elder MacIntyre.
[Illustration: "Resting calm in fancied safety Sat the elder MacIntyre."]
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"You! Why, Billy, where d'you come from? What new game you playing now? If you're out on posse business By the gods, jest start your row! What you saying? You are friendly? Wal, I'm glad to hear it's so; And I s'pose you made the journey Way out here to let me know! Oh! you're talking 'bout our Nancy! Now I just begin to see. Set down, Billy; you are askin' Something that sure puzzles me. Nancy ain't like other women-- What I say may hit you queer, But it's jest as well to tell you-- That there girl--she isn't here.
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"Don't stampede your words, now, Billy. Slow 'em down and let 'em walk. Lord a'mighty, man! keep quiet! Never heard such crazy talk! Where's the girl? Wal, let me tell you-- T'aint no use to take on so-- Where is Nancy? P'r'aps in heaven; I can't tell yer,--I don't know. When we left last spring from Kansas, Travelin' mostly in the night, We was chased up by a posse; Fourth day out we had a fight. We had jest unhitched the hosses, Making camp at Old Man's Creek-- Gimme some o' that tobacker, I've been out for more'n a week.
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"We had jest unhitched the hosses, Nance was riding Kelly's mare, When we heard them all a-comin'-- They had seen us pull in there. Nancy said,' I'll hold 'em, daddie, Get the outfit over here, And I'll trail you in the mornin'; I will see they don't get near.' It was in that heavy timber-- Growing dark and spittin' rain-- Where the creek runs to the eastward, Makes that loop, and back again. We was in a reg'lar pocket; Creek banks made a kind of bluff All around us, so it looked like We was trapped there, sure enough.
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"Wal, we had a time in movin'; Things got mixed up in the rush; Lead team broke a piece of harness Pulling through the underbrush. Then the wagon turned clean over, But we drug her plumb across, Hitched with ropes and other fixin's, Usin' every extra hoss. Wal, you never heard such shootin', Bullets whizzin' everywhere; Pumped 'em on us till it sounded Like they had an army there. Nancy stayed and cracked it to 'em, Kind o' circlin' round and round; I could tell the two six-shooters She was usin', by the sound.
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"You can bet we did some trav'lin' All that night and all next day; I could still a-hear the shootin' After we was miles away. I supposed we'd see the girl come Ridin' up to us 'fore long, That is--I was jest a-thinkin'-- If there wasn't somethin' wrong. But, in spite of all our lookin', Sometimes slackin' up our gait, Always thinkin' we should see her Every time we'd stop and wait. We have never seen her, Billy, And I own I'm balked a bit, Fur I know that she's a critter Made of nothin' else but grit.
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"I wish I could go and find her, But 'twould be too hot for me; Long before I got back that fur I'd be strung up to a tree. So I've been a kind o' thinkin', Since I see what's both'rin' you, 'Bout a thing--I hate to ask it-- That I'd like for you to do. I don't think that girl has ever-- It sure hurts me, what I say-- But I'm sure that in the scrimmage Nancy never got away. Billy, you go back and find her; You are all I've got to send, You can sort o' fix things decent, Where she is--in Old Man's Bend."

THE RETURN
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Every life is but a journey-- Trav'ling on from place to place-- Starting from the point God gave us With an ever-varying pace. Outward, onward, spurred by motives In our wand'rings here and there, Sometimes led by hope alluring, Sometimes halted by despair; But the life that travels farthest On that deeper strength depends, For with love, there is no turning; When love dies the journey ends.
2
Back across the broken foothills, With a courage none can feel Till the burning pangs of sorrow Turn the heart-strings into steel; Back across the winter's playground, Tracing out the paths he trod, With each muttered execration Ending in a prayer to God. Blasts that howled with fiendish laughter, By their loud derisive cry Seemed to mock his labored progress As they passed him swiftly by; Icy, blizzard-driven snowflakes Into ghost-like fancies whirled, Painting on the barren canvas, Gaunt Death battling for the world.
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Back across the snow-strewn desert, Fighting famine face to face, Trusting to his horse to take him To each former camping place. Once Zeb stopped beside a snowdrift With a loud and startling neigh; Tried to tell his half-dazed master Where his mate, old