The Boss of the Lazy Y | Page 3

timber that fringed the
river--going over it all again and nothing stirred in his heart--no
pleasure, no joy, no satisfaction, no emotion whatever. If he felt any
curiosity he was entirely unconscious of it; it was dormant if it existed
at all. As he was able to consider her dispassionately he knew that he
had not come to look at his mother's grave. She had been nothing to
him, his heart did not beat a bit faster when he thought of her.
Then, why had he come? He did not know or care. Had he been a
psychologist he might have attempted to frame reasons, building them
from foundations of high-sounding phrases, but he was a materialist,
and the science of mental phenomena had no place in his brain.
Something had impelled him to come and here he was, and that was
reason enough for him. And because he had no motive in coming he
was taking his time. He figured on reaching the Lazy Y about dusk. He
would see his father, perhaps quarrel with him, and then he would ride
away, to return no more. Strange as it may seem, the prospect of a
quarrel with his father brought him a thrill of joy, the first emotion he
had felt since beginning his homeward journey.
When he reached the bottom of the valley he urged his pony on a little
way, pulling it to a halt on the flat, rock-strewn top of an isolated
excrescence of earth surrounded by a sea of sagebrush, dried bunch
grass, and sand. Dismounting he stretched his legs to disperse the
saddle weariness. He stifled a yawn, lazily plunged a hand into a pocket
of his trousers, produced tobacco and paper and rolled a cigarette.
Lighting it he puffed slowly and deeply at it, exhaling the smoke
lingeringly through his nostrils. Then he sat down on a rock, leaned an
elbow in the sand, pulled his hat brim well down over his eyes and with

the cigarette held loosely between his lips, gave himself over to
retrospection.
It all came to him, as he sat there on the rock, his gaze on the basking
valley, his thoughts centered on that youth which had been an abiding
nightmare. The question was: What influence had made him a hardened,
embittered, merciless demon of a man whose passions threatened
always to wash away the dam of his self-control? A man whose evil
nature caused other men to shun him; a man who scoffed at virtue; who
saw no good in anything?
Not once during his voluntary exile had he applied his mind to the
subject in the hope of stumbling on a solution. To be sure, he had had a
slight glimmering of the truth; he had realized in a sort of vague,
general way that he had not been treated fairly at home, but he had not
been able to provide a definite and final explanation, perhaps because
he had never considered it necessary. But his return home, the review
of the army of memories, had brought him a solution--the solution. And
he saw its ruthless logic.
He was what his parents had made him. Without being able to think it
out in scientific terms he was able to expound the why of like. It was
one of the inexorable rules of heredity. To his parents he owed
everything and nothing. He reflected on this paradox until it became
perfectly clear to him. They--his parents--had given him life, and that
was all. He owed them thanks for that, or he would have owed them
thanks if he considered his life to be worth anything. But he owed them
nothing because they had spoiled the life they had given him, had
spoiled it by depriving him of everything he had a right to expect from
them--love, sympathy, decent treatment. They had given him instead,
blows, kicks, curses, hatred. Hatred!
Yes, they had hated him; they had told him that; he was convinced of it.
The reason for their hatred had always been a mystery to him and, for
all he cared, would remain a mystery.
When he was fifteen his mother died. On the day when the neighbors
laid her away in a quiet spot at the edge of the wood near the far end of

the corral fence, he stood beside her body as it lay in the rough pine
box which some of them had knocked together, looking at her for the
last time. He was neither glad or sorry; he felt no emotion whatever.
When one of the neighbors spoke to him, asking him if he felt no grief,
he cursed and stormed out of the house. Later, after the neighbors
departed, his father came upon him in the stable and beat him
unmercifully. He