赞恩·格雷《紫艾灌丛中的骑士们》.pdf

Riders of the
Purple Sage
by Zane Grey
作者简介
格雷赞恩( ), 的笔
名,小说家,生于俄亥俄州赞斯维尔。初为牙医,但年去西部
游历后即开始写作描述西部的故事。他的部作品中最著名者为
《紫艾灌丛中的骑士们》(),
售出近万册。他还写有关于钓大鱼和其他户外消遣的作品。
Riders of the Purple Sage 1
CHAPTER 1
LASSITER
A sharp clip-crop of iron-shod hoofs deadened and died away, and clouds
of yellow dust drifted from under the cottonwoods out over the sage.
Jane Withersteen gazed down the wide purple slope with dreamy and
troubled eyes. A rider had just left her and it was his message that held her
thoughtful and almost sad, awaiting the churchmen who ing to
resent and attack her right to befriend a Gentile.
She wondered if the unrest and strife that had e to the little
village of Cottonwoods was to involve her. And then she sighed, remem-
bering that her father had founded this remotest border settlement of south-
ern Utah and that he had left it to her. She owned all the ground and many
of the cottages. Withersteen House was hers, and the great ranch, with its
thousands of cattle, and the swiftest horses of the sage. To her belonged
Amber Spring, the water which gave verdure and beauty to the village and
made living possible on that wild purple upland waste. She could not es-
cape being involved by whatever befell Cottonwoods.
That year, 1871, had marked a change which had been ing
in the lives of the peace-loving Mormons of the border. Glaze Stone Bridge
Sterling, villages to the north, had risen against the invasion of Gentile
settlers and the forays of rustlers. There had been opposition to the one and
fighting with the other. And now Cottonwoods had begun to wake and
bestir itself and grown hard.
Jane prayed that the tranquillity and sweetness of her life would not be
permanently disrupted. She meant to do so much more for her people than
she had done. She wanted the sleepy quiet pastoral days to last always.
Trouble between the Mormons and the Gentiles of munity would
make her unhappy. She was Mormon-born, and she was a friend to