T all happened years ago. Before there was any railroad; even before there were any overland stages crossing the plains. Only the emigrant teams winding slowly down the valley on the road stretching westward.
Some there were, though, that had worked their way back from the Western sea, to stop at those Nevada cañons where there was silver to be had for the delving.
The cañons were beautiful with dashing, dancing streams, and blossoming shrubbery, and thick-leafed trees; and there grew up in the midst of these, tiny towns that called themselves “cities,” where the miners lived who came in with the return tide from the West.
There in one of the busiest, prettiest mining camps on a great mountain’s side, in one of the stone cabins set at the left of the single long street, dwelt Tony and his cousin Bruno—Italians, both. Bruno worked in the mines; but Tony, owning an ox team, hauled loads for the miners to and from the other settlements. A dangerous calling it was in those days, because an Indian in ambush had ever to be watched for when a White Man came down from the cañons to travel alone through the valley.
Tony was willing, however, to take risks. Teaming brought him more money than anything else he could do; and the more he earned, the sooner he could go back to Nanna—to Nanna waiting for him away on the other side of the world.
He and Bruno both loved her—had loved her ever since the days when, long ago, in their childhood, they had played at being lovers down among the fishing boats drawn up on the beach of their beloved Italian home. Black-browed Bruno had then quarreled with him in jealous hatred time and again; but the little Nanna (who loved peace, and to whom both playfellows were dear) would kiss each and say:
“Come! Let us play that you are my twin brothers, and I your only sister!” And so harmony would be restored.
Thus it went on, and at last they were no longer little children, but men who love a woman as men may love. And Bruno’s parents came to the father and mother of Nanna and settled that their children should be man and wife; so in that way Bruno was made glad, and no longer jealous of Tony—poor Tony, who had not a single small coin that he could call his own. Yet it was Tony whom Nanna loved—Tony whose wife she wanted to be. But what can a young girl do when the one she loves is poor, and there is another whom her parents have chosen for her who has a little farm promised him by his father the day he shall bring home the wife they would have him marry? Nanna neither resisted nor rebelled; but only went to Tony who was as helpless as herself, and there against his breast wept her heart out.
It was only when Bruno declared that he was going to America to make a great deal of money (saying that the farm was not enough—that when he and Nanna were married he wanted they should be rich) that a ray of hope shone for Tony.
“I, too, will go to America,” Tony whispered to Nanna, “and perhaps there I also may find a fortune. Then—when I come back—I may marry thee; may I not, little dear one?”
And for answer, the little Nanna lifted her arms to his neck and her lips to his own.
The night before the two men sailed away to the strange, far-off land, Nanna and Tony walked together under the oaks and ilexes.
“Thou wilt miss me, little one, but thou wilt be true, I know. I shall think of thee all the time—every hour. Thou wilt long for me, as I for thee. Thou wilt miss my kisses; is it not so? But I——! Ah, Nanna! Nanna! Here——” And bowing over her hand he pressed kiss after kiss in the upturned little brown palm, closing her fingers tightly upon them as he raised his head and smiled in her eyes.
“There! These I give thee, sweet one, so that when I am gone it shall be that thy Tony’s kisses are with thee, and are thine whenever thou wilt.”
All the morrow, when the ship had sailed away, Nanna lay on her cot up in the little whitewashed bedroom under the eaves, and with lips pressed close upon the palm that Tony’s lips had touched, sobbed her grief out, till she sank into exhausted slumber.
One year; two years; three, came and went. Tony off in America was making money, and soon he could go home and they would be married in spite of her parents or Bruno. The fourth year he wrote her how the sum had grown—it was almost enough. Then she began checking off the months ere he would return to her. Eighteen—sixteen—fourteen—now only twelve months more! A year, and Tony would be with her! Then half that year was gone. Six months, only, to wait! Happy little Nanna! And Tony was not less happy, away off there in his little stone cabin in the mountains, or hauling goods for the miners across the valley. His heart was so full of her that—almost—he forgot to think of the Indians when he was traveling along the road.
“Thou art a fool,” said Bruno to him over and over again. “Thou art a fool, indeed. It is more money—this hauling—yes! But some day—ping!—and it is the arrow of an Indian. Then what good is it, the money? Thou art a fool, I say. As for me, I will work here with the many in the mines.”
Bruno had just said this to him for the hundredth time, as Tony was yoking his oxen for the long journey up the wide valley to the North. And his answer had been as always, that the saints would protect him. Yet, should he not return the thirteenth day, then indeed might Bruno think all was not well with him, and could send some of the men from the mines to go to him. He was not afraid, though. Had not the saints protected him for nearly five years? He was soon to go back to Italy, and (he whispered to himself) to Nanna! So with a light heart, and a laugh on his lip, he went down the cañon beside the oxen, cracking his whip as he warbled a song he and Nanna had sung together when they had played by the boats and among the fishing nets in the long, long ago.
The wagon jolted and rattled on its way down the rocky road to the plain; and Tony’s big, beautiful St. Bernard dog, Bono, followed in the dust sent skyward by the heavy wheels as they came upon the softer earth of the lowlands.
Everyone was Tony’s friend in the little mining town. Therefore everyone was anxious when the thirteenth day came, yet not Tony. With few words (at such times such men do not say much) they selected a dozen from among the town’s bravest and best, and with heavy hearts set out on their journey that was to follow Tony’s trail till they should find him.
Down into the hot valley—a-quiver under the summer heat, over a road of powdered alkali, along the Humboldt’s banks—through mile after mile of sagebrush and greasewood—under the glaring, white sun, they rode two and two. And so riding they spoke seldom.
When they were nearing the place they knew Tony must have reached the third day out (now more than ten days gone) they saw outlined against the blue—high, high in the air—circling spots of black. Dark things that swept with a majesty of motion that was appalling. Round and round, in great curves half a mile wide, they swam through the ether, and dipped and tilted without so much as the quiver of a wing or other motion than that given by their marvelous self-poise; sailing through mid-air as only a vulture can.
They swept and circled over a spot that was awful in its silence under the metallic brightness of the hot August sun. The men looked at each other; looked without speaking—for they understood. So without speech they rode on to the place where the warped irons from the burned wagon lay, and where a gaunt, nearly starved St. Bernard howled over something that had once been his master. He had guarded the dead man through ten hot days—through ten long nights. Bono’s wail sounded long and mournful through the narrow pass where the whistling arrows had found them. Tony had never been neglectful before, and the dog could not understand it.
Alas, poor Tony!
When Bruno went back to Italy that fall he told Nanna that Tony was dead. And Nanna who came of a race more or less stoical in time of stress did not cry out, but simply shut her sorrow up close in her heart where the others could not see. It had been their secret—hers and Tony’s—and they had guarded it well. Henceforth it would be hers alone. So she gave no sign except such as she might for an old playmate’s death.
By and by she married Bruno. What would you? Her father and mother wished it; Bruno loved her; he had money now to provide well for a wife; and there was the little farm that his parents would give him the day when he should bring home his bride. So, after the manner of her kind, she finally yielded to his wooing; and one day they were wed in the little church on the hill where they had both been christened when babies.
She bore him children, and was a good mother—a good wife. She lived to be an old woman, and her hair grew streaked with gray; yet to the last day of her life she had a way of falling asleep with the fingers of her left hand slipped under her cheek, and her lips touching the upturned palm.
It was her one disloyalty to Bruno.
And so it was they found her lying on that morning that she did not waken.
