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Title: The Law-Breakers
Author: Cullum, Ridgwell, 1867-1943
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Law-Breakers" ***
THE
LAW-BREAKERS
By RIDGWELL CULLUM
AUTHOR OF
"The Story of the Foss River Ranch," "In the Brooding
Wild," "The Way of the Strong," Etc.
With Frontispiece in Colors
A. L. BURT COMPANY
Publishers New York
Published by Arrangement with GEORGE W. JACOBS & CO.
COPYRIGHT, 1914, BY
GEORGE W. JACOBS & COMPANY
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
PRINTED IN U. S. A.
BY THE SAME AUTHOR
THE WAY OF THE STRONG
THE TWINS OF SUFFERING CREEK
THE NIGHT-RIDERS
THE ONE-WAY TRAIL
THE TRAIL OF THE AXE
THE SHERIFF OF DYKE HOLE
THE WATCHERS OF THE PLAINS
[Illustration: "WHAT IS THIS MAN TO YOU?" HE DEMANDED
_The Law-Breakers._ _Frontispiece._]
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I WATCHING THE LINE 1
II WHITE POINT 5
III THE HOLD-UP 11
IV AT THE FOOT OF AN AGED PINE 18
V BOUND FOR THE SOUTHERN TRAIL 25
VI THE MAN-HUNTERS 35
VII CHARLIE BRYANT 43
VIII THE SOUL-SAVERS 53
IX THE "STRAY"-HUNTER 64
X THE BROTHERS 73
XI THE UNREGENERATE 79
XII THE DISCOMFITURE OF HELEN 91
XIII LIGHT-HEARTED SOULS 100
XIV THE HOUSE OF DIRTY O'BRIEN 110
XV ADVENTURES IN THE NIGHT 120
XVI FURTHER ADVENTURES 128
XVII BILL PEEPS UNDER THE SURFACE 137
XVIII THE ARM OUTREACHING 142
XIX BILL MAKES THREE DISCOVERIES 155
XX IN THE FAR REACHES 166
XXI WORD FROM HEADQUARTERS 176
XXII MOVES IN THE GAME OF LOVE 184
XXIII STORM CLOUDS 195
XXIV THE SOUL OF A MAN 206
XXV THE BROKEN CHAIN 215
XXVI ROCKY SPRINGS HEARS THE NEWS 221
XXVII AT THE HIDDEN CORRAL 235
XXVIII A WAGER 241
XXIX BILL'S FRESH BLUNDERING 256
XXX THE COMMITTEE DECIDE 261
XXXI ANTAGONISTS 265
XXXII TREACHERY 272
XXXIII PLAYING THE GAME 278
XXXIV AN ENCOUNTER 286
XXXV ON MONDAY NIGHT 296
XXXVI STILL MONDAY NIGHT 299
XXXVII THE NIGHT TRAIL 307
XXXVIII THE FALL OF THE OLD PINE 315
XXXIX FROM THE ASHES 327
XL THE DAWN 335
THE LAW-BREAKERS
CHAPTER I
WATCHING THE LINE
There was no shade anywhere. The terrible glare of the summer sun beat
down upon the whole length of the wooden platform at Amberley. Hot as
was the dry, bracing air, it was incomparable with the blistering
intensity of heat reflected from the planking, which burned through
to the soles of the feet of the uniformed man who paced its length,
slowly, patiently.
This sunburnt, gray-eyed man, with his loose, broad shoulders,
his powerful, easy-moving limbs, seemed quite indifferent to the
irritating climatic conditions of the moment. Even the droning of the
worrying mosquitoes had no power to disturb him. Like everything else
unpleasant in this distant northwestern land, he accepted these things
as they came, and brushed them aside for the more important affairs he
was engaged upon.
He gazed out across the wide monotony of prairie with its undulating
wavelets, a tawny green beneath the scorching summer sun. He was
thinking deeply; perhaps dreaming, although dreaming had small enough
place in his busy life. His lot was a stern fight against crime, and,
in a land so vast, so new, where crime flourished upon virgin soil, it
left him little time for the more pleasant avenues of thought.
Inspector Stanley Fyles came to a halt at the eastern end of the long
platform. Miles of railroad track stretched away in a dead straight
line toward the distant, shimmering horizon. For miles ahead the road
was unbroken by a single moving object, and, after a long, keen
survey, the man abruptly turned his back upon it.
In a moment he became aware of a hollow-chested man hurrying toward
him. He was coming from the direction of the only building upon the
platform--the railroad office, or, as it was grandiloquently called,
the "booking hall."
Fyles recognized the man as the railroad agent, Huntly, who controlled
the affairs of his company in this half-fledged prairie town.
He came up in a flurry of unusual excitement.
"She's past New Camp, inspector," he cried. "Guess she's in the Broken
Hills, an' gettin' near White Point. I'd say she'd be along in an
hour--sure."
"Damn!"
For once in his life Stanley Fyles's patience gave way.
The man grinned.
"It ain't no use cussin'," he protested, with a suggestion of
malicious delight. "Y'see, she's just a bum freight. Ain't even a
'through.' I tell you, these sort have emptied a pepper box of gray
around my head. Yes, sir, there's more gray to my head by reason of
their sort than a hired man could hoe out in half a year."
"Twenty minutes ago you told me she'd be in in half an hour."
There was resentment as well as distrust in the officer's protest.
"Sure," the man responded glibly. "That was accordin' to schedule.
Guess Ananias must have been the fellow who invented schedules for
local freights."
The toe of Fyles's well-polished riding-boot tapped the superheated
platform.
His gray eyes suddenly fixed and held the ironical eyes of the other.
"See here, Huntly," he said at last, in that tone of quiet authority
which never deserted him for long. "I can rely on that? There's
nothing to stop her by the way--now? Nothing at all?"
But the agent shook his head, and his eyes still shone with their
ironical light.
"I'd say the prophet business petered out miser'bly nigh two thousand
years ago. I wouldn't say this dogone prairie 'ud be the best place
to start resurrectin' it. No, sir! There's too many chances for
that--seein' we're on a branch line. There's the track--it might give
way. You never can tell on a branch line. The locomotive might drop
dead of senile decay. Maybe the train crew's got drunk, and is
raisin' hell at some wayside city. You never can tell on a branch
line. Then there's that cargo of liquor you're yearnin' to----"
"Cut it out, man," broke in the officer sharply. "You are sure about
the train? You know what you're talking about?"
The agent grinned harder than ever.
"This is a prohibition territory----" he began.
But again Fyles cut him short. The man's irrepressible love of
fooling, half good-humored, half malicious, had gone far enough.
"Anyway you don't usually get drunk before sundown, so I guess I'll
have to take your word for it."
Then Inspector Fyles smiled back into the other's face, which had
abruptly taken on a look of resentment at the charge.
"I tell you what it is," he went on. "You boys get mighty close to
the wind swilling prohibited liquor. It's against the spirit of the
law--anyway."
But the agent's good humor warmed again under the officer's admission
of his difficulties. He was an irrepressible fellow when opportunity
offered. Usually he lived in a condition of utter boredom. In fact,
there were only two things that made life tolerable for him in
Amberley. These were the doings of the Mounted Police, and the doings
of those who made their existence a necessity in the country.
Even while weighted down with the oppressive routine of his work, it
was an inspiriting thing to watch the war between law and lawlessness.
Here in Amberley, situated in the heart of the Canadian prairie lands,
was a handful of highly trained men pitted against almost a world of
crime. Perhaps the lightest of their duties was the enforcing of the
prohibition laws, formulated by a dear, grandmotherly government in an
excess of senile zeal for the welfare of the health and morals of
those far better able to think for themselves.
The laws of prohibition! The words stuck with Mr. Huntly as they stuck
with every full-grown man and woman in the country outside the narrow
circle of temperance advocates. The law was anathema to him. Under its
influence the bettering, the purification of life in the Northwestern
Territories had received a setback, which optimistic antagonists
of the law declared was little less than a quarter of a century.
Drunkenness had increased about one hundred per cent, since human
nature had been forbidden the importation and consumption of alcohol
in any form stronger than four per cent. beer.
Huntly knew that Inspector Fyles was almost solely at work upon the
capture of contraband liquor. Also he knew, and hated the fact, that
his own duty required that he must give any information concerning
this traffic upon his railroad which the police might require.
Therefore there was an added vehemence in his reply to the officer's
warning.
"Sakes, man! What 'ud you have us do?" he cried, with a laugh that was
more than half angry. "Do you think we're goin' to sit around this
darned diagram of a town readin' temperance tracts, just because
somebody guesses we haven't the right to souse liquor? Think we're
goin' to suck milk out of a kid's feeder, just because you boys in red
coats figure that way? No, sir. Guess that ain't doin'--anyway. I'm
sousing all the liquor I can get my hooks on, an' it's all the sweeter
because of you boys. Outside my duty to the railroad company I
wouldn't raise a finger to stop a gallon of good rye comin' into town,
no, not if the penitentiary was yearnin' to swallow me right up."
Fyles's purposeful eyes surveyed the man with a thoughtful smile.
"Just so," he said coolly. "That clause about 'duty' squares the rest.
You'll need to do your duty about these things. That's all we want.
That's all we intend to have. Do you get me? I'm right here to see
that duty done. The first trip, my friend, and you won't talk of
penitentiary so--easily." The quietness with which he spoke did not
rob his words of their significance. Then he went on, just a shade
more sharply. "Now, see here. When that freight gets in I hold you
responsible that the hindmost car--next the caboose--is dropped here,
and the seals are intact. It's billed loaded with barrels of cube
sugar, for Calford. Get me? That's your duty just now. See you do it."
Huntly understood Fyles. Everybody in Amberley understood him. And the
majority recognized the deliberate purpose lying behind his calmest
assurance. The agent knew that his protest had touched the limit,
consequently there was nothing left him but to carry out instructions
to the letter. He hated the position.
His face twisted into a wry grin.
"Guess you don't leave much to the imagination, inspector," he said
sourly.
Fyles was moving away. He replied over his shoulder.
"No. Just the local color of the particular penitentiary," he said,
with a laugh.
CHAPTER II
WHITE POINT
Mr. Moss was the sole employe of the railroad company at White Point
flag station. His official hours were long. They extended round the
dial of the clock twice daily. Curiously enough, his leisure extended
to practically the same limits. The truth was, in summer, anyway, he
had no duties that could seriously claim him. Thus the long summer
days were spent chiefly among his vegetables, and the bits of flowers
at the back of the shanty, which was at once his home and his office,
in short, White Point.
Jack Huntly at Amberley grumbled at the unenlivening conditions of his
existence, but compared with those of Mr. Moss he lived in a perfect
whirlwind of gaiety.
There was no police station at White Point. There were no farms in the
neighborhood. There was not even a half-breed camp, with its
picturesque squalor, to break up the deadly drear of the surrounding
plains. The only human diversion that ever marred the calm serenity of
the neighborhood was the rare visit of some lodge of Indians, straying
from the reservation, some sixty miles to the south, on a hunting
pass.
But if White Point lacked interest from human associations its setting
at least was curiously arresting. Nature's whim was the inspiration
which had brought the station into existence. To the north, south, and
west the prairie stretched away in the distance for untold miles; but
immediately to the east quite another aspect prevailed. Here lay the
reason of White Point station.
Almost from the very foot of the walls of Mr. Moss's shanty the land
rose up with, as it were, a jolt. Great forest-clad hills reared their
torn and barren crests to enormous heights out of the dead level of
the prairie. A tumbled sea of Nature's wreckage lay strewn about
unaccountably, for a distance of something like two miles, east and
west, and double that distance from north to south. It was an oasis of
natural splendor in the heart of a calm sea of green grass.
These strange hills necessitated a watchful eye upon the railroad
track, which pierced their heart, in winter and spring. In summer
there was nothing to exercise the mind of Mr. Moss. But in winter the
track was constantly becoming blocked with snow, while during the
spring thaw there was always the dread of a "wash-out" to disturb his
nightly dreams. At such times these things kept the agent far more
alive than he cared about.
Just now, however, it was the height of summer, and no such anxieties
prevailed. Therefore Mr. Moss fell back upon the less exciting pastime
of a perspiry afternoon among his potatoes and other vegetable
luxuries.
He was hoeing the rows of potatoes with a sort of dogged determination
to find interest in the work. He believed that physical effort was the
only safety-valve for healthy feelings all too long bottled up. Even
the streaming sweat suggested to him a feeling that it was at least
hygienic, although the moist mixture of muddy consistency upon his
face, merging with the growth of three days' beard, left his
appearance something more than a blot upon the general view.
Just now he had nothing to disturb the blank of his mind. The only
possible interruption to the work in hand, of an official character,
was the passing of a local freight train. However, a local freight was
a matter of no importance whatever. It might come to-day, or it might
come to-morrow. He would signal it through in due course, after that
he didn't much care what happened to it.
The potatoes fully occupied him, and as he came to the end of each row
he took the opportunity of straightening out the crick in his back,
and gazing upon his handiwork with the look of a man who feels he has
surely earned his own admiration.
Once he varied this procedure by glancing up while still in the middle
of a row. His glance was sharp and startled. He had heard an
unaccustomed sound, distinct but distant. It seemed to him that a
horse had neighed. There came an answering neigh. It was quite
disturbing.
A long and careful scrutiny of the plains in every direction, however,
left him with a feeling of doubt. There was no horse in sight
anywhere, and the great hills adjacent offered no inducement
whatsoever for any straying quadruped. He assured himself that the
solitude of his life was rendering him fanciful, and forthwith
returned to his work.
For some time the measured stroke of his hoe clanked upon the baking
soil, and later on he paused to fill and light his pipe. He had just
cut the flakes of tobacco from his plug, and was rolling them in the
palms of his hands, when the thought occurred to him to glance at the
time. His great coin-silver timepiece pointed the hour when he felt he
might safely signal the freight train through.
Lounging round to the front of the station building he walked down the
track to the foot of the semaphore, and flung the rusty lever over.
His action expressed something of the contempt in which he held all
"local freights." Then he sauntered back to his work with his pipe
under full blast.
But his day has yet surprises in store. In half an hour's time he
received his second start. A distant rumble and grinding warned him
that the freight was approaching through the hills. He smiled at the
sound, and his smile was largely satirical. He glanced up once, but
promptly continued his work. But it was only for a few moments. The
sound which had been growing had almost died out and was being
replaced by the hammering of the cars as they closed up against each
other. The train was stopping.
He was looking up now full of interest, and one hand went up to his
head, and its fingers raked among the roots of his hair. Suddenly the
engine bell began to clang violently. There was distinctly a note of
protest in the sound. Something was wrong. He swung round and looked
at his signal. Say--was he dreaming? What on earth----? Half an hour
ago he had lowered the semaphore, at least he had set the lever over,
and now--now it was set against the train!
For a second he stared at the offending arm, then, as the bell clanged
still more violently, he dashed across the intervening space to remedy
his mistake.
But now incident crowded upon him. He was quite right. The lever was
set as it should be set. His practiced eye glanced rapidly down the
connecting rod to discover the source of the trouble, and further
amazement waited upon him. The explanation of the mystery lay before
his eyes. There at the triangular junction, where the connecting rod
linked with the down-haul of the semaphore, the bolt had fallen out,
and the whole thing was disconnected. The bolt with its screw nut and
washer were lying on the ground, where, apparently, they had fallen.
The furious clanging of the engine bell, where the head of the train
stood just in view round the bend of the track where it entered the
hills, left him no time for consideration of the mishap. The
protesting train must be passed on without further delay. Therefore,
with deft hands, he quickly readjusted the bolt, and once again set
the lever. This time the arm of the signal dropped.
It was not until these things were accomplished that he had time to
study the cause of the disconnection. Then, at once, a curious feeling
of incredulity swept over him. It was an impossibility for the thing
to have happened. The bolt fitted horizontally, and the washered nut
had full two inches to unscrew! Besides this, the whole thing was well
rusted with years of exposure. Yet the impossible had happened!
He stood gazing at the bolt with a sort of uncanny feeling stirring
within him. The engine at the head of its long string of box cars
approached. It passed him, and he heard its driver hurl some
uncomplimentary remark at him as the rattling old kettle clanked by.
Then, as the last car passed him, and rapidly grew smaller as the
distance swallowed it up, he turned back to his vegetable patch with
the mystery still unsolved.
* * * * *
The journey through the hills was nearly over, and White Point was but
a short distance ahead. The conductor and crew of the local freight
were lounging comfortably in the caboose.
The brakeman's life is full of risk and little comfort, and such
moments as these were all too few. When they came they were more than
gratefully received. Now the men were spread out in various attitudes
of repose, and, for the most part, were half asleep.
Suddenly, without the least warning, they were startled into full
wakefulness by the familiar clatter, beginning at the head of the
train and passing rapidly down its full length, as the cars closed up
on each other. The resting men knew that the locomotive was either
stopping, or had already come to a halt.
The conductor, or head brakeman, sat up with a jolt.
"Hey, you, Jack!" he cried peevishly. "Get up aloft an' get a peek
out. Say, we sure ain't goin' to get held up at a bum flag layout."
His contempt was no less for the flag station than Mr. Moss's for a
local freight.
The man addressed as "Jack" sprang alertly to the roof of the caboose.
A moment later his voice echoed through the car below him.
"Can't see a thing," he cried. "We're on the last bend, just outside
White Point. She's stopped--dead sure. Guess the flag has got us held
up." With a few added curses he clambered down into the car again.
* * * * *
As the brakeman left the roof of the caboose the enactment of a
strange scene began at the fore part of the car immediately in front
of it.
A glance down at the coupling would have revealed the cautious
appearance of a shock of rough hair covering a man's head from under
the last box car. Slowly it twisted round till a grimy, dust-covered
face was turned upward, and a pair of expectant eyes peered up at the
tops of the two cars.
Apparently the preliminary survey was satisfactory, for, in a moment,
the head was withdrawn, only to be replaced by an outstretched bare
hand and forearm. The hand reached up and caught the iron foot rail,
gripping it firmly. Then another hand appeared, and with it came the
same head again and part of a man's body. The second hand reached
toward the coupling-pin, which, with a dexterous movement, was slowly
and noiselessly removed. The pin was lowered to the length of its
chain. Then, once more the hand reached toward the coupling. This time
it seized the great iron link. This, without a moment's delay, was
lifted from its hook and noiselessly lowered till it swung suspended
from the car in front. Then both arms, head, and body vanished once
more under the car, beneath which the man must have traveled for
miles.
* * * * *
A few moments later the welcome jolting of couplings reached the crew
in the caboose, who promptly settled themselves down to await the next
call of duty. The conductor's relief at the brevity of the delay was
expressed in smiling contempt at the expense of all flag stations.
"Trust a darned outfit like that to hold you up," he cried
witheringly. "They got to act fresh, or the company 'ud get wise they
ain't no sort o' use on the line. Say----"
But he broke off listening.
The jolting had ceased. The grinding of wheels of the moving train was
plainly heard. But--the caboose remained stationary.
He leaped to his feet.
"Hell!" he cried. "What the----"
But the brakeman, Jack, was on his feet, too. With a bound he sprang
at the door of the caboose. But instantly he fell back with a cry.
Four gun muzzles were leveled at his body, and, behind them, stood the
figures of two masked men.
One of the two spoke in the slow easy drawl of the West, which lacked
nothing in conviction.
"Jest keep dead still--all o' you," he said. "Don't move--nor nothin',
or we'll blow holes through your figgers that'll cause a hell of a
draught. We ain't yearning to make no sort o' mess in this yer
caboose. But we're going to do it--'cep' you keep quite still, an'
don't worry any."
The conductor was a man of wide experience on the railroad. He had
seen many "hold-ups." So many, he was almost used to them. But without
being absolutely sure of the purpose of these men he thanked his
genius of good luck that he had not seen the "pay train" for nearly a
month. He was quite ready to obey. For all he cared the raiders could
take locomotive, train, caboose and all, provided he was left with a
whole skin.
CHAPTER III
THE HOLD-UP
Just beyond the flag station at White Point, where the forest-clad
slopes of the great hills crowded in upon the railroad track, a scene
of utter lawlessness was being silently enacted.
The spot was a lonely one, lonely with that oppressive solitude always
to be found where the great hills of ages rear their towering heads.
It was utterly cut off, too, from the outer world, by a monstrous
abutment of hill which left the track a mere ribbon, like the track of
some invertebrate, laboriously making its way through surroundings all
uncongenial and antagonistic. Yet the station was but a few hundred
yards beyond this point, where it lay open to the sweep of at least
three of the four winds of Heaven. But even so, the two places were as
effectually separated as though miles, and not yards, intervened.
No breath of air stirred the generous spruce and darkening pinewoods.
The drooping, westering sun, already athwart the barren crown of the
hill tops, left a false, velvety suggestion of twilight in the heart
of the valley, while a depressing superheat enervated all life, except
the profusion of vegetation which beautified the rugged slopes. For
the most part the stillness was profound, only the most trifling
sounds disturbing it. There was an uneasy shuffle of moving feet;
there was the occasional crisp clip of a driven axe; then, too,
weighty articles being dropped into the bottom of a heavy wagon sent
up their dull boom at long intervals.
The outlaws worked swiftly, but without apparent haste. The success of
their efforts depended upon rapidity of execution, that and the most
exact care for the detail of their organization. Provided these things
were held foremost in their minds there was small enough chance of
interruption. Had not the train, with its all unconscious driver,
passed upon its rumbling way toward Amberley? Had not all suspicion
been lulled in the mind of the bucolic agent, who was even now
laboriously expending a maximum of energy for a minimum return of
culinary delicacies in his vegetable patch? What was there to
interfere? Nothing. These men well knew that except for the flag
station there was not a habitation within ten miles, and the
ruggedness of the hills barred them to every form of traffic except
the irresistible impulse of railroad enterprise.
Three men carried out the work of unloading the box car, while the two
others held the train crew at bay. All were masked with one exception,
and he, from his evident authority and mode of dress, was obviously
the leader of the gang.
He was a slight, dark man, of somewhat remarkable refinement of
appearance. He was good looking, and almost boyish in the lack of hair
upon his face. But this was more than counterbalanced by the
determined set of his features, and the keen, calculating glance of
his eyes. The latter, particularly, were darkly luminous and lit with
an expression of lawless exhilaration as the work proceeded. Compared
with his fellows, who were of the well-known type of ruffian, in whom
the remoter prairie lands abound, he looked wholly out of place in
such a transaction. His air was that of a town-bred man, and his
clothing, too, suggested a refinement of tailoring, particularly the
rather loose cord riding breeches he affected. The others, masked as
they were, with their coatless bodies, and loose, unclean shirts,
their leather chapps, and the guns they wore upon their hips--well,
they made an exquisite picture of that ruffianism which bows to no law
of civilization, but that which they carry in the leather holsters
hanging at their waists.
The trackside was strewn with disemboweled whitewood barrels. The
wreckage was grotesque. The ground was strewn in every direction with
a litter of white cube sugar, like the wind-swept drifts of a summer
snowfall. Barrels were still being dragged out of the car and dropped
roughly to the ground, where the sharp stroke of an axe ripped out the
head, revealing within the neatly packed keg of spirit, embedded so
carefully in its setting of sugar. The cargo had been well shipped by
men skilled in the subtle art of contraband. It was billed, and the
barrels were addressed, to a firm in Calford whose reputation for
integrity was quite unimpeachable. Herein was the cunning of the
smugglers. The sugar barrels were never intended to reach Calford.
They were not robbing the consignees in this raid upon the freight
train. They were simply possessing themselves, in unorthodox fashion,
of an illicit cargo that belonged to their leader.
Fifteen kegs of spirit had been removed and bestowed in the wagon.
There were still five more to complete the tally.
The leader, in easy tones, urged his men to greater speed.
"Get a hustle, boys," he said, in a deep, steady voice, while he
strove with his somewhat delicate hands to lift a keg into the wagon.
The effort was too great for him single-handed, and one of his
assistants came to his aid.
"There's no time to spare," he went on a moment later, breathing hard
from his exertion. "Maybe the loco driver'll whistle for brakes." He
laughed with a pleasant, half humorous chuckle. "If that happens,
why--why I guess the train'll be chasing back on its tracks to pick up
its lost tail."
He spoke with a refined accent of the West. The man nearest him
guffawed immoderately.
"Gee!" he exclaimed delightedly. "This game's a cinch. Guess Fyles'll
kick thirteen holes in himself when that train gets in."
"Thirteen?" inquired the leader smilingly.
"Sure. Guess most folks reckon that figure unlucky."
The third man snorted as he shouldered a keg and moved toward the
Wagon.
"Holes? Thirteen?" he cried, as he dropped his burden into the
vehicle. Then he hawked and spat. "When that blamed train gets around
Amberley he'll hate hisself wuss'n a bank clerk with his belly awash
wi' boardin' house wet hash."
Again came the leader's dark smile. But he had nothing to add.
Presently the last keg was hoisted into the wagon. The leader of the
enterprise sighed.
It was a sigh of pent feeling, the sigh of a man laboring under great
stress. Yet it was not wholly an expression of relief. If anything,
there was regret in it, regret that work he delighted in was finished.
One of the men was removing his mask, and he watched him. Then, as the
face of the man who had been concealed under the car was revealed, he
signed to him.
"Get busy on the wagon," he said.
The man promptly mounted to the driving seat, and gathered up the
reins.
"Hit the south trail for the temporary cache," the leader went on.
"Guess we'll need to ride hard if Fyles is feeling as worried as you
fellows--hope."
The man winked abundantly.
"That's all right, all right. He'll need to hop some when we get busy.
Ho, boys!" And he chirrupped his horses out of the shallow cutting,
and the wagon crushed its way into the smaller bush.
The leader stood for a moment looking after it. Then he turned to the
other man, still awaiting orders.
"Get the other boys' horses up," he said sharply. "Then stand by on
horseback, and hold the train crew while they tumble into the saddle.
Then make for the cache."
The man hurried to obey. There were no questions asked when this man
gave his orders. Long experience had taught these men that there was
no necessity to question. Hardy ruffians as they were they knew well
enough that if they had the bodies for this work, he had a head that
was far cleverer even than that of Inspector Fyles himself.
Meanwhile the leader had moved out into the center of the track, and
his eyes were turned westward, toward the bend round the great hill.
They were pensive eyes, almost regretful, and somehow his whole face
had changed from its look of daring to match them. The exhilaration
had gone out of it; the command, even the determination had merged
into something like weakness. His look was soft--even tender.
He stood there while the final details of his enterprise were
completed. He heard the horses come up; he heard the two men clamber
from the caboose and get into the saddle. Then, at last, he turned,
and moved off the track.
Once more the old look of reckless daring was shining in his luminous
eyes. He dashed off into the bush to mount his horse, leaving his
softer mood somewhere behind him--in the West.
There was a clatter and rattle of speeding hoofs, which rapidly died
out. Then again the hills returned to their brooding silence.
The withdrawal of the outlaws was the cue for absurd activity on the
part of the train crew. A whirlwind of heated blasphemy set in, which
might well have scorched the wooden sides of the car. They cursed
everybody and everything, but most of all they cursed the bucolic
agent at White Point.
Then came a cautious reconnoitering beyond the door. This was promptly
followed by a pell-mell dash for the open. In a moment they were
crowding the trackside, staring with stupid eyes and mouths agape at
the miniature snowfall of sugar, and the wreckage of whitewood
barrels.
The conductor was the first to gather his scattered faculties.
"The lousy bums!" he cried fiercely. Then he added, with less ferocity
and more regret, "The--lousy--bums!"
A moment later he turned upon his comrades in the aggrieved fashion of
one who would like to accuse.
"'Taint no use in gawkin' around here," he cried sharply. "We're up
agin it. That's how it is." Then his face went scarlet, as a memory
occurred to him. "Say, White Point's around the corner. And that's
where we'll find that hop-headed agent--if he ain't done up. Anyways,
if he ain't--why, I guess we'll just set him playin' a miser-arey over
his miser'ble wires, that'll set 'em diggin' out a funeral hearse and
mournin' coaches in that dogasted prairie sepulcher--Amberley."
* * * * *
Mr. Moss was disentangling the crick in his back for the last time
that day. His stomach had forced on him the conviction that his
evening meal was a necessity not lightly to be denied.
His back eased, he shouldered his hoe and moved off toward his shanty
with the dispirited air of the man who must prepare his own meal. As
he passed the lean-to, where his kindling and fuel were kept, he flung
the implements inside it, as though glad to be rid of the burden of
his labors. Then he passed on round to the front of the building with
the lagging step of indifference. There was little enough in his life
to encourage hopeful anticipation.
At the door he paused. Such was his habit that his eyes wandered to
the track which had somehow become the highway of his life, and he
glanced up and down it. The far-reaching plains to the west offered
him too wide a focus. There was nothing to hold him in its breadth of
outlook. But as his gaze came in contact with the frowning crags to
the east, a sudden light of interest, even apprehension, leaped into
his eyes. In a moment he became a creature transformed. His bucolic
calm had gone. The metamorphosis was magical.
In one bound he leaped within the hut. Then, in a moment, he was back
at the door again, his tensely poised figure filling up the opening.
His powerful hands were gripping his Winchester, and he stood ready.
The farmer in him had disappeared. His eyes were alight with the
impulse of battle.
Along the track, from out of the hills, ran four unkempt human
figures. They were rushing for the flag station, gesticulating as they
came. In the loneliness of the spot there was only one interpretation
of their attitude for the waiting man.
Mr. Moss's voice rang out violently, and caught the echo of the hills.
"What in hell----?" he shouted, raising the deadly Winchester swiftly
to his shoulder. "Hold up!" he went on, "or I'll let daylight into
some of you."
The effect of this challenge was instantaneous and almost ludicrous.
The oncoming figures stopped, and nearly fell over each other in their
haste to thrust their hands above their heads. Then the eager, anxious
shout of the gray-headed brakeman came back to him.
"Fer Gawd's sake don't shoot!" he cried, in terrified tones. "We're
the train crew! The freight crew! We bin held up! Say----!"
But the lowering of the threatening gun saved him further explanation
at such a distance.
The light of battle had entirely died out of Mr. Moss's eyes, but it
was the brakeman's uniform, rather than his explanation, that had
inspired the white flag of peace.
The man came hastily up.
"What the----?" began the agent. But he was permitted to proceed no
further.
The angry eyes of the brakeman snapped, and his blasphemous tongue
poured out its protesting story as rapidly as his stormy feelings
could drive him. Then, with an added violence, he came to his final
charge of the agent himself.
"What in hell did you flag us for?" he cried. "You, on this bum
layout? Do you stand in with these 'hold-ups'? I tell you right here
this thing's goin' to be just as red-hot for you as I can make it.
That train was flagged _without official reason_," he went on with
rising heat. "Get me? An' you're responsible."
Having delivered himself of his threat, he assumed the hectoring air
which the moral support of his companions afforded him.
"Now, you just start right in and get busy on the wires. You can just
hammer seven sorts of hell into your instruments and call up Amberley
quick. You're goin' to put 'em wise right away. Macinaw! When I'm done
with this thing you're goin' to hate White Point wuss'n hell, an' wish
to Gawd they'd cut 'flag station' right out o' the conversation of the
whole durned American continent."
Mr. Moss had listened in a perfect daze. It was his blank acceptance
of the brakeman's hectoring which had so encouraged that individual.
But now that all had been told, and the man's harsh tones ceased to
disturb the peace of their surroundings, his mind cleared, and hot
resentment leaped to his tongue.
He sat down at his instrument and pounded the key, calling up
Amberley; and as the Morse sign clacked its metallic, broken note he
verbally replied to his accuser.
"You've talked a whole heap that sounds to me like hot air," he cried,
with bitter feeling. "Maybe you're old, so it don't amount to
anything. As for your bum freight it was late--as usual. It wasn't my
duty to pass it through till you shouted for signals. There ain't any
schedule for bum freights. When they're late it's up to them."
But for all Mr. Moss's contempt, and righteous indignation, the
brakeman's charge had had its effect. Well enough he remembered the
disjointed connecting rod, and he wondered how these "hold-ups" had
contrived it under his very nose. In his own phraseology, he felt
"sore." But his ill humor was not alone due to the brakeman's abuse.
He was thinking of something far more vital. He knew well enough that
his explanation would never satisfy the heads of his department. Then,
too, always hovering somewhere in the background, was the, to him,
sinister figure of Inspector Fyles of the Mounted Police.
CHAPTER IV
AT THE FOOT OF AN AGED PINE
Waiting for word from the agent, Huntly, Inspector Fyles had retreated
to the insignificant wooden shack which served the police as a Town
Station in Amberley. It consisted of two rooms and a loft in the pitch
of the roof. Its furniture was reduced to a minimum, and everything,
except the loft above where the two troopers and the corporal in
charge slept, was a matter of bare boards and bare wooden chairs.
The officer sat in the smaller inner room where the telephone was
close to his hand, while the non-commissioned officer and his men
occupied the outer room.
Fyles faced the window with his hard Windsor chair close beside the
office table. His elbow rested upon its chipped and discolored
surface, and his chin was supported on the palm of his hand. Just now
his busy thoughts were free to wander whithersoever they listed. This
was an interim of waiting, when all preparations were made for the
work in hand, and there was nothing to do but await developments. So
used was he to this work of seizing contraband spirits that its
contemplation had not power enough to quicken one single beat of his
pulse. And in this, too, he displayed that wondrous patience which was
so much a part of his nature.
Stanley Fyles's reputation in these wild regions was decidedly unique.
Scarcely a day passed but what some strenuous emergency arose
demanding quick thought and quicker action, where life, frequently his
own, hung in the balance. Yet the most strenuous of them found him
always easy, always deliberate, and, as his subordinates loved to
declare, he always managed to "beat the game by a second."
There were people outside, civilians, who confidently and
contemptuously declared him to be a bungler; a patient, hard-working
bungler. These were the men who saw few of his successes, and always
contrived to smell out his failures. These people were those who had
no understanding of the difficulties of a handful of men pitted
against a country eaten up with every form of criminal disease. There
were others, again, who insisted that far more crime slipped through
his well "oiled" hands than ever was held by them. These were the
people who sneered at his reputation for stern discipline, and
declared it to be a mere pose to cover his tracks, while he patiently
piled up a fortune through the shady channels of "graft." A small
minority admitted his ability, but averred that his patience erred on
the side of slackness, which was one of the causes that the flood of
prohibited liquor in the country showed no abatement.
Nevertheless, one and all admitted his patience, whether it was in
bungling, in harvesting his graft, or whether it was a form of
slackness. Nor could they help doing so, for patience, a wonderful
purposeful patience, was his greatest characteristic. Every other
feature of his personality was subservient to it, and so it was that
the most hardened criminals began at once a nervous scrutiny of their
tracks the moment the news reached them that the lean nose of Stanley
Fyles had caught their scent.
Those who knew Fyles best ignored the patience which caught the public
mind so readily. They saw something more beneath it, something much
more to their liking. His patience only masked a keen, swift-moving,
scheming brain, packed to the uttermost with a wonderful instinct for
detection. He worked on no rule-of-thumb method as so many of his
comrades did. He was the fortunate possessor of an imagination, and,
long since, he had learned its value in his crusade against crime.
But this man was by no means a mere detection machine. He was full of
ambition. Police work was merely serving its purpose in his scheme of
things. He saw advancement in it--advancement in the right direction.
In five years he had raised himself from the lowest rung of the police
ladder to a commissioned rank, and from this rank he knew he could
reach out in any of the directions in which he required to proceed.
There were several directions in which his ambitious eyes gazed. There
were politics, with their multifarious opportunities for fortune and
place. There was the land, crying aloud of the fortunes lying hidden
within its bosom. There was official service upon higher planes, from
which so many names were drawn to fill the roll of fame to be handed
down to an adoring posterity. He was not yet thirty years of age, and
he felt that any one of these things lay well within the focus his
present position presented.
But the time for his next move was not yet; and herein was the real
man. In his mind there were still purposes which required complete
fulfilment before that further upward movement began. It was the more
human side of the man dictating its will upon him, that will which can
never be denied when once it rouses from its slumbers amid the living
fires which course through the veins of healthy manhood.
Just now, as he leaned back in his unyielding chair, luxuriating in a
comfort which only a man as hard as he could have extracted from it,
the hot, living fires were stirring in his veins. His mind had gone
back to a picture, one of the many pictures which so often held him in
his scant leisure, that represented the first waking of those dormant
fires of manhood.
The scene was a memory forming the starting point of a long series of
other pictures, which aways came with a rush, changing and changing
with kaleidoscopic rapidity till they developed into a stream of
swiftly flowing thought.
It was the picture of a quaint, straggling prairie village, half
hidden in the multi-hued foliage of a deep valley, as viewed from his
saddle where his horse stood upon the shoulder of land which dropped
away at his feet. It was one of those wondrous fairy scenes with which
the prairie, in her friendlier moods, delights to charm the eye.
Perhaps "mock" would better express her whim, for many of these fair
settlements in the days of the Prohibition Laws were veritable
sepulchers of crime, only whitewashed by the humorous mood of nature.
Ten yards below him an aged pine reared its hoary, time-worn head
toward the gleaming azure of a noonday summer sky. It was a landmark
known throughout the land; it was the landmark which had guided him to
this obscure village of Rocky Springs. It had been in his eye all the
morning as he rode toward it, and as he drew near curiosity had
impelled him to leave the trail he was on and examine more closely
this wonderful specimen of a far, far distant age.
But his inspection was never fully made. Instead, his interest was
abruptly diverted to that which he beheld reposing beneath its
shadow. A girl was sitting, half reclining, against the dark old
trunk, with a sewing basket at her side, and a perfect maze of white
needlework in her lap.
She was not sewing, however, as he drew near. She was gazing out over
the village below, with a pair of eyes so deep and darkly beautiful
that the man caught his breath. Just for one unconscious moment
Stanley Fyles had followed the direction of her gaze, then his own
eyes came back to her face and riveted themselves upon it.
She was very, very beautiful. Her hair was abundant and dark. Yet it
was quite devoid of that suggestion of great weight so often found in
very dark hair. There was a melting luster in the velvet softness of
her deeply fringed eyes. Her features were sufficiently irregular to
escape the accusation of classic form, and possessed a firmness and
decision quite remarkable. At that moment the solitary horseman
decided in his mind that here was the most beautiful creature he had
ever looked upon.
She was dressed in a light summer frock, through the delicate texture
of which peeped the warm tint of beautifully rounded arms and
shoulders. She was hatless, too, in spite of the summer blaze. To his
fired imagination she belonged to a canvas painted by some old master
whose portrayals suggested a strength and depth of character rarely
seen in life. Even the beautiful olive of her complexion suggested
those southern climes whence alone, he had always been led to believe,
old masters hailed.
To him it was the face of a woman whose heart and mind were crowding
with a yearning for something--something unattainable. Such was her
look of strength and virility that he almost regretted them, fearing
that her character might belie her wondrous femininity.
But in a moment he had denial forced upon him. The girl turned slowly,
and gazed up into his face with smiling frankness. Her eyes took him
in from his prairie hat to his well-booted feet. They passed swiftly
over his dark patrol jacket, with its star upon its shoulder, and down
the yellow stripe of his riding breeches. There was nothing left him
but to salute, which he did as her voice broke the silence.
"You're Inspector Stanley Fyles?" she said, with a rising inflection
in her deep musical voice.
The man answered bluntly. He was taken aback at the unconventional
greeting.
"Yes----" He cleared his throat in his momentary confusion. Then he
responded to her still smiling eyes. "And--that's Rocky Springs?" he
inquired, pointing down the valley. The information was quite
unnecessary.
The girl nodded.
"Yes," she said, "a prairie village that's full of everything
interesting--except, perhaps, honesty."
The man smiled broadly.
"That's why I'm here."
The girl laughed a merry, rippling laugh.
"Sure," she nodded. "We heard you were coming. You're going to fix a
police station here, aren't you?" Then, as he nodded, her smile died
out and her eyes became almost earnest. "It's surely time," she
declared. "I've heard of bad places, I've read of them, I guess. But
all I've heard of, or read of, are heavens of righteousness compared
with this place. Look," she cried, rising from the ground and reaching
out one beautifully rounded arm in the direction of the nestling
houses, amid their setting of green woods, with the silvery gleam of
the river peeping up as it wound its sluggish summer way through the
heart of the valley. "Was there ever such a mockery? The sweetest
picture human eyes could rest on. Fair--far, far fairer than any
artist's fancy could paint it. It's a fit resting place for everything
that's good, and true, and beautiful in life, and--and yet--I'd say
that Rocky Springs, very nearly to a man, is--against the law."
For a moment Fyles had no reply. He was thinking of the charm of the
picture she made standing there silhouetted against the green slope of
the far side of the valley. Then, as she suddenly dropped her arm, and
began to gather up the sewing she had tumbled upon the ground when she
stood up, he pulled himself together. He beamed an unusually genial
smile.
"Guess there are things we police need to be thankful for, and places
like Rocky Springs are among 'em," he said, cheerfully. "I'd say if it
wasn't for your Rocky Springs, and its like, we should be chasing
around as uselessly as hungry coyotes in winter. The Government
wouldn't fancy paying us for nothing."
By the time he had finished speaking the girl's work was gathered in
her arms.
"That's the trail," she said abruptly, pointing at the path which
Fyles had left for his inspection of the tree. "It goes right on down
to the saloon. You see," she added slyly, "the saloon's about the most
important building in the town. Good-bye."
Without another word she walked off down the slope, and, in a moment,
was lost among the generous growth of shrubs.
This was the scene to which his mind always reverted. But there were
others, many of them, and in each this beautiful girl's presence was
always the center of his focus. He had seen and spoken to her many
times since then, for his duty frequently took him into the
neighborhood of that aged pine. But in spite of her frankness at their
first meeting she quickly proved far more elusive than he would have
believed possible, and consequently his intimacy with her had
progressed very little.
The result was a natural one. The man's interest in her was still
further whetted, till, in time, he finally realized that the long
anticipated move upwards, which he was preparing for, could no longer
be made--alone.
These were the thoughts occupying him now as he stared out through the
dusty window at the scattered houses which lined Amberley's main
street. These were the thoughts which conjured on his bronzed, strong
features, that pleasant half-smile of satisfaction. He wanted her very
much. He wanted her so much that all impulse to rush headlong and make
her his was thrust aside. He must wait--wait with the same patience
which he applied to all that which was important in his life, and,
when opportunity offered, when the moment was ripe, he would make the
great effort upon which he knew so much of his future happiness
depended.
Thus he was dreaming on pleasantly, hopefully, and yet not without
doubts, when a sharp knock at his door banished the last vestige of
romance from his mind. In an instant he was on his feet, alert and
waiting.
"Come!"
His summons was promptly answered, and the tall figure of the corporal
stood framed in the doorway.
"Well?"
The question came with the sharp ring of authority.
"It's Huntly, sir," the man explained briefly. "He's got a message.
There's been a 'hold-up' of the freight, just beyond White Point. The
'jumpers' have dropped off the two hindermost cars and held the crew
prisoners. Seems the train was flagged on the bend out of the hills
and then allowed to pass. While it was standing the cars were cut
loose. Then the train came on without them. She's in sight now.
Huntly's outside."
The Inspector gave no sign while his subordinate talked. His eyes were
lowered at a point of interest on the floor. At the conclusion of the
man's brief outline he glanced up.
"Has Huntly got the message with him?"
"Yes, sir."
Fyles made a move, and the other stepped back to let him pass out.
The agent was waiting in the outer office. His eyes were wide with
excitement.
"Well? Where's the message?" the officer demanded.
Huntly thrust a paper into his hand.
"It just came through."
Fyles took it, and his strong brows drew together as he read the long
story of the "hold-up" which the man had taken down from his
instrument.
A deep silence prevailed while the officer read the news which so
completely frustrated all his plans.
At last he looked up. Favoring the man Huntly with one inquiring
glance, he turned to the corporal.
"It says here the brakeman heard the leader tell his men to make for
the south trail. That was either bluff--or a mistake. They sometimes
make mistakes, and that's how we get our chances. The south trail is
the road into Rocky Springs. Rocky Springs is twenty-two miles from
White Point. They've probably had an hour's start with a heavily
loaded wagon. Rocky Springs is twenty-six from here by trail. Good.
Say, tell the boys to get on the move quick. They'll strike the south
trail about seven miles northeast of Rocky Springs. If they ride hard
they should cut them off, or, any way, hit their trail close behind
them."
"Yes, sir."
As Fyles turned back to the inner room and picked up the telephone,
ignoring the still waiting agent, the corporal hurried away.
In a moment the telephone bell rang out and the officer was speaking.
"Yes, sir, Fyles. Yes, at the Town Station. I'm coming up to barracks
right away. It's most important. I must see you. The whisky-runners
have--doubled on us."
CHAPTER V
BOUND FOR THE SOUTHERN TRAIL
Three uniformed men rode hard across the tawny plains. They rode
abreast. Their horses were a-lather; their lean sides tuckered, but
their gait remained unslackening. It was a gait they would keep as
long as daylight lasted.
Sergeant McBain's horse kept its nose just ahead of the others. It was
as though the big, rawboned animal appreciated its rider's rank.
Quite abruptly the non-commissioned officer raised an arm and pointed.
"Yon's the Cypress Hills, boys," he cried. "See, they're getting up
out of the heat haze on the skyline. We're heading too far south."
He spoke without for a moment withdrawing the steady gaze of his hard
blue eyes.
One of the troopers answered him.
"Sure, sergeant," he agreed. "We need to head away to the left."
The horses swung off the line, beating the sun-scorched grass with
their iron-shod hoofs with a vigor that felt good to the riders.
The bronzed faces of the men were eager. Their widely gazing eyes were
alert and watchful. They were trailing a hot scent, a pastime as well
as a work that was their life. They needed no greater incentive to put
forth the best efforts of bodily and mental energies.
The uniform of these riders of the western plains was unassuming.
Their brown canvas tunics, their prairie hats, their black, hard
serge breeches, with broad, yellow stripes down the thighs, possessed
a businesslike appearance not to be found in a modern soldier's
uniform. These things were for sheer hard service.
The life of these men was made up of hard service. It was demanded of
them by the Government; it was also demanded of them by the conditions
of the country. Lawlessness prevailed on these fair, sunlit plains;
lawlessness of man, lawlessness of Nature. Between the two they were
left with scarce a breathing space for those comforts which only found
existence in dreams that were all too brief and transitory.
Nominally, these men were military police, yet their methods were far
enough removed from all matters martial. Theirs it was to obey orders,
but all similarity ended there. Each man was left free to think and
act for himself. Brief orders, with little detail, were hurled at him.
For the rest his superiors demanded one result--achievement. A crime
was committed; a criminal was at large; information of a contemplated
breach of the peace was to hand. Then go--and see to it. Investigate
and arrest. The individual must plan and carry out, whatever the odds.
Success would meet with cool approval; failure would be promptly
rewarded with the utmost rigor of the penal code governing the force.
The work might take days, weeks, months. It mattered not. Nor did it
matter the expense, provided success crowned the effort. But with
failure resulting--ah, there must be no failure. The prestige of the
force could not stand failure, for its seven hundred men were required
to dominate and cleanse a territory in which half a dozen European
countries could be comfortably lost.
Presently Sergeant McBain spoke again. His steady eyes were still
fixed upon the horizon.
"Say, that's her," he said. "There she is. Coming right up like a mop
head. That's the pine at Rocky Springs. Further away to the left
still, boys."
He turned his horse, and the race against time was continued.
Somewhere ahead, on the southern trail, a gang of whisky smugglers
were plying their trade. Inspector Fyles had said, "Go, and--round
them up."
The odds were all against these men, yet no one considered the
matter. Each, with eyes and brain alert, was ready to do all of which
human effort was capable.
Now that definite direction over those wastes of grass had been
finally located, the sergeant, a rough, hard-faced Scot, relaxed his
vigilance. His mind drifted to the purpose in hand, and a dry humor
lit his eyes.
"Eh, man, but it's a shameful waste, spilling good spirit," he said,
addressing no one in particular. "Governments are always
prodigal--except with pay."
One of the troopers sniggered.
"Guess we could spill some of it, sergeant," he declared meaningly.
"Spill it!" The sergeant grinned. "That isn't the word, boy. Spill
don't describe the warm trickle of good liquor down a man's throat.
Say, I mind----"
The other trooper broke in.
"Fyles 'ud spill champagne," he cried in disgust. "A man like that
needs seeing to."
The sergeant shook his head.
"Fyles would spill anything or anybody that required spilling, so he
gets his nose to windward of the game. He's right, too, in this
God-forgotten land. If we didn't spill, we'd be right down and out,
and our lives wouldn't be worth a second's purchase. No, boys, it
breaks our hearts to spill--but we got to do it--or be spilt
ourselves."
The man shook his reins and bustled the great sorrel under him. The
animal's response was a lengthening of stride which left his
companions hard put to it to keep pace.
The brief talk was closed. It had been a moment of relaxed tension.
Now, once more, every eye was fixed on the shimmering skyline. They
were eagerly looking out for the southern trail.
Half an hour later its yellow, sandy surface lay beneath their feet,
an open book for the reading.
All three leaped from the saddle and began a close examination of it,
while their sweating horses promptly regaled themselves with the ripe,
tufty grass at the trail side.
Sergeant McBain narrowly scrutinized the wheel tracks, estimating the
speed at which the last vehicle to pass had been traveling. The
blurred hoofmarks of the horses warned him they had been driven hard.
"We're behind 'em, boys," he declared promptly, "an' their gait says
they're taking no chances."
Further down the trail one of the troopers answered him:
"There's four saddle horses with 'em," he said thoughtfully. "Two
shod, and two shod on the forefeet only. Guess, with the teamster,
that makes five men. Prairie toughs, I'd guess."
The sergeant concurred, while they continued their examination.
Then the third man exclaimed sharply--
"Here!" he cried, picking something up at the side of the trail.
The others joined him at once.
He was quietly tearing open a half-burned cigarette, the tobacco
inside of which was still moist.
"Prairie toughs don't smoke _made_ cigarettes around here. It's a
Caporal. Get it? That's bought in a town."
"Ay," said McBain quickly. "Rocky Springs, I'd say. It's the Rocky
Springs gang, sure as hell. It's the foulest hole of crime in the
northwest. Come on, boys. We need to get busy."
Two minutes later a moving cloud of dust marked their progress down
the trail in the direction of Rocky Springs. Presently, however, the
dust subsided. The astute riders of the plains were giving no chances
away; they had left the tell-tale trail and rode on over the grass at
its edge.
* * * * *
The westering sun was low on the horizon. The air was still. Not a
cloud was visible anywhere in the sky. The world was silent. The
drowsing birds, even, had finished their evensong.
Low bush-grown hills lined the trail where it entered the wide valley
of Leaping Creek, which, six miles further on, ran through the heart
of the hamlet of Rocky Springs.
It was a beauty spot of no mean order. The smaller hills were broken
and profuse, with dark woodland gorges splitting them in every
direction, crowded with such a density of foliage as to be almost
impassable. Farther on, as the valley widened and deepened, its aspect
became more rugged. The land rose to greater heights, the lighter
vegetation gave way to heavier growths of spruce and blue gum and
maple. These too, in turn, became sprinkled with the darker and
taller pines. Then, as the distance gained, a still further change met
the eye. Vast patches of virgin pine woods, with their mournful,
tattered crowns, toned the brighter greens to the somber grandeur of
more mountainous regions.
The breathless hush of evening lay upon the valley. There was even a
sense of awe in the silence. It was peace, a wonderful natural peace,
when all nature seems at rest, nor could the chastened atmosphere of a
cloister have conveyed more perfectly the sense of repose.
But the human contradiction lay in the heart of the valley. It was the
abiding place of the hamlet of Rocky Springs, and Rocky Springs was
accredited with being the very breeding ground of prairie crime.
Just now, however, the chastened atmosphere was perfect. Rocky
Springs, so far away, was powerless to affect it. Even the song of the
tumbling creek, which coursed through the heart of the valley, was
powerless to awaken discordant echoes. Its music was low and soft. It
was like the drone of the stirring insects, part of that which went to
make up the atmosphere of perfect peace.
The sun dropped lower in the western sky. A velvet twilight seemed to
rise out of the heart of the valley. Slowly the glowing light vanished
behind a bluff of woodland. In a few minutes the trees and undergrowth
were lit up as though a mighty conflagration were devouring them. Then
the fire died down, and the sun sank.
But as the sun sank, a low, deep note grew softly out of the distance.
For a time it blended musically with the murmuring of the bustling
creek and the wakeful insect life. Then it dominated both, and its
music lessened. Its note changed rapidly, so rapidly that its softer
tone was at once forgotten, and only the harshness it now assumed
remained in the mind. Louder and harsher it grew till from a mere
rumble it jumped to a rattle and clatter which suggested speed,
violence, and a dozen conflicting emotions.
Almost immediately came a further change, and one which left no doubt
remaining. The clatter broke up into distinct and separate sounds. The
swift beat of speeding hoofs mingled with the fierce rattle of light
wheels, racing over the surface of a hard road.
All sense of peace vanished from the valley. Almost it seemed as if
its very aspect had changed. A sense of human strife had suddenly
possessed it, and left its painful mark indelibly set upon the whole
scene.
The climax was reached as a hard driven team and wagon, escorted by
four mounted men, precipitated themselves into the picture. They came
over the shoulder of the valley and plunged headlong down the
dangerous slope, regardless of all consequences, regardless both of
life and limb. The teamster was leaning forward in his seat, his arms
outstretched, grasping a rein in each hand. He was urging his horses
to their utmost. In his face was that stern, desperate expression that
told of perfect cognizance of his position. It said as plainly as
possible, however great the danger he saw before him, it must be
chanced for the greater danger behind.
Two of the horsemen detached themselves from the escort and remained
hidden behind some bush at the shoulder of the hill. They were there
to watch the approach to the valley. The others kept pace with the
racing vehicle as the surefooted team tore down the slope.
Rocking and swaying and skidding, the vehicle seemed literally to
precipitate itself to the depths below, and, as the horses, with necks
outstretched and mouths beginning to gape, with ears flattened and
streaming flanks, reached the bottom, the desperate nature of the
journey became even more apparent. There was neither wavering nor
mercy in the eyes of the teamster and his escort as they pressed on
down the valley.
One of the escort called sharply to the teamster.
"Can we make it?" he shouted.
"Got to," came back the answer through clenched jaws. "If we got
twenty minutes on the gorl darned p'lice they won't see us for dust.
Heh!"
The man's final exclamation came as one of his horses stumbled. But he
kept the straining beast on its legs by the sheer physical strength of
his hands upon the reins. The check was barely an instant, but he
picked up the rawhide whip lying in the wagon and plied it
mercilessly.
The exhausted beasts responded and the vehicle flew down the trail,
swaying and yawing the whole breadth of the road. The dust in its wake
rose up in a dense cloud. Into this the escort plunged and quickly
became lost to view behind the bush which lined the sharply twisting
trail.
Faster and faster the horses sped under the iron hand of the teamster,
till distance took hold of the clatter and finally diminished it to a
rumble. In a few minutes even the rising cloud of dust, like smoke
above the tree tops, thinned and finally melted away, and so, once
more, peace returned to the twilit valley.
* * * * *
A wagon was lumbering slowly toward Rocky Springs. It was less than a
mile beyond the outskirts of the village, and already an occasional
flash of white paint through the trees revealed the sides of some
outlying house in the distance ahead.
The horses were dejected-looking creatures, and their flanks were
streaked with gray lines of caking sweat. They were walking, and the
teamster on the wagon sat huddled down in the driving seat, an
exquisite picture of unclean ease.
He was a hard-faced, unwashed creature, whose swarthy features were
ingrained with sweat and dirt. He was clad in typical prairie costume,
his loose cotton shirt well matching the unclean condition of his
face. One cheek was bulging with a big chew of tobacco, while the
other sank in over the hollows left by absent back teeth.
He certainly was unprepossessing. Even his contented smile only added
to the evil of his expression. His contentment, however, was by no
means his whole atmosphere. In fact, it was rather studied, for his
eyes were alight and watchful with the furtive watchfulness so easy to
detect in those of partial color. They suggested that his ears, too,
were no less alert, and now and again this suggestion received
confirmation in the quick turn of the head in a direction which said
plainly he was listening for any unusual sound from behind him.
One of these turns of the head remained longer than usual. Then, with
quite a sharp movement of the body, he swung one of the great pistols
hanging at his waist, so that its barrel rested across his thigh, and
its butt was ready to his hand. Then, with a malicious chuckle, he
took a firmer grip of his reins, and his jaded horses raised their
drooping heads.
The object of his change of attitude quickly became apparent, for, a
few moments later, the distant sound of hoof-beats, far behind him,
echoed through the still valley.
He checked his horses still more, and it became evident that he wished
those who were behind him to come up before he reached the village.
The smile on his evil face became more humorous, and he spat out a
stream of tobacco juice with great enjoyment.
The sounds grew louder, and he turned about and peered down the
darkening valley. There was nothing and no one in sight yet amid the
woodland shadows. Only the clatter of hoofs was growing with each
moment. He finally turned back and resettled himself. His attitude now
became one of even more studied indifference, but his gun remained
close to his hand.
The sounds behind him were drawing nearer. His tired horses pricked
their ears. They, too, seemed to become interested. The pursuers came
on. They were less than a hundred yards behind. In a few moments they
were directly behind. Then the man lazily turned his head. For some
moments he stared stupidly at the three uniformed figures who had
descended upon him. Then he suddenly sat up and brought his horses to
a standstill. The policemen were surrounding his wagon.
Sergeant McBain was abreast of him on one side, one trooper drew up
his horse at the other side, while the third came to a halt at the
rear of the wagon and peered into it.
"Evenin', sergeant," cried the teamster, with deliberate cheeriness.
"Makin' Rocky Springs?"
McBain's hard blue eyes looked straight into the half-breed's face. He
was endeavoring to fix and hold those dark, furtive eyes. But it was
not easy.
"Maybe," he said curtly.
Then he glanced swiftly over the outfit. The sweat-streaked horses
interested him. The nature of the wagon. Then, finally, the contents
of the wagon covered with a light canvas protection against the dust.
"Where you from?" he demanded peremptorily.
"Just got through from Myrtle," replied the man, quite undisturbed by
the other's manner.
"Fourteen miles," said McBain sharply. "Guess your plugs sweated
some. What's your name, and who do you work for?"
"Guess I'm Pete Clancy, an' I'm Kate Seton's 'hired' man. Been across
to Myrtle for fixin's for her."
"Fixings?"
The sergeant's eyes at last compelled the other's. There was something
like insolence in the way Pete Clancy returned his stare. There was
also humor.
"Sure," he returned easily. "Guess you'll find 'em in the wagon ef you
raise that cover. There's one of them fakes fer sewin' with. There's a
deal o' fancy canned truck, an' say, the leddy's death on notions. Get
a peek at the colors o' them silk duds. On'y keep dirty hands off'n
'em, or she'll cuss me to hell for a fust-class hog."
McBain signed to the trooper at the rear of the wagon and the man
stripped the cover off. The first thing the officer beheld was a
sewing machine in its shining walnut case. Beside this was an open
packing case filled with canned fruits and meats, and a large supply
of groceries. In another box, packed under layers of paper, were
materials for dressmaking, and a roll of white lawn for other articles
of a woman's apparel.
With obvious disgust he signed again to the trooper to replace the
cover. Then Clancy broke in.
"Say," he cried ironically, "ain't they dandy? I tell you, sergeant,
when it comes to fancy things, women ha' got us skinned to death.
Fancy us wearin' skirts an' things made o' them flimsies! We'd fall
right through 'em an' break our dirty necks. An' the colors, too.
Guess they'd shame a dago wench, an' set a three-year old stud bull
shakin' his sides with a puffic tempest of indignation. But when it
comes to canned truck, well, say, prairie hash ain't nothin' to it,
an' if I hadn't been raised in a Bible class, an' had the feel o' the
cold water o' righteousness in my bones, I'd never ha' hauled them all
this way without gettin' a peek into them cans. I----"
"Cut it out, man," cried the officer sharply. "I need a straight word
with you. Get me? Straight. Your bluff'll do for other folks. You
haven't been to Myrtle. You come from White Point, where you helped
hold up a freight. You ran a big cargo of liquor in this wagon, which
is why your plugs are tuckered out. You've cached that liquor in this
valley, at the place you gathered up this truck. I don't say you
aren't 'hired man' to Miss Seton in Rocky Springs, but you're playing
a double game. You fetched her goods and dumped 'em at the cache, only
to pick 'em up when you were through with your other game."
The man laughed insolently.
"Gee! I must be a ter'ble bad feller, sergeant," he cried. "Me, as was
raised in a Bible class." His eyes twinkled as he went on. "An' I done
all that? All that you sed, sergeant? Say, I'm a real bright feller.
Guess I'll get a drink o' that liquor, won't I? It 'ud be a bum
trick----"
The sergeant's eyes snapped.
"You'll get the penitentiary before we're through with you. You and
the boys with you. We've followed your trail all the way, and that
trail ends right here. We're wise to you----"
"But you ain't wise where the liquor's cached," retorted the man with
a chuckle.
Then he looked straight into the officer's eyes.
"Say," he cried with his big laugh. "You can talk penitentiary till
you're sick. Ther' ain't no liquor in my wagon, an' if there ever has
been any, as you kind o' fancy, it's right up to you to locate it, and
spill it, an' not set right there keepin' me from my work."
As he finished speaking, with elaborate display, he shook his reins
and shouted at his horses, which promptly moved on.
As the wagon rolled away he turned his head and spoke over his
shoulder.
"You can't spill canned truck an' sewin' machines, sergeant," he
called back derisively. "That penitentiary racket don't fizz nothin'.
Guess you best think again."
The officer's chagrin was complete. It was the start the outlaws had
had that had beaten him. This was the wagon; this was one of the men.
Of these things he was convinced. There were others in it, too, but
they----. He turned to his troopers.
"I'd give a month's pay to get bracelets on that feller," he said with
a grin that had no mirth in it. Then he added grimly, as he gazed
after the receding wagon: "And I'm a Scotchman."
CHAPTER VI
THE MAN-HUNTERS
The girl's handsome face was turned toward the valley below her. She
was staring with eyes of dreaming, half regretful, yet not without a
faint light of humor, at the nestling village in the lap of the
woodlands, which crowded the heart of the valley, where the silvery
thread of river wound its way.
The wide foliage of the maple tree, beneath which she sat, sheltered
her bare head from the burning noonday sun. And here, so high up on
the shoulder of the valley, she felt there was at least air to
breathe.
The book on the ground beside her had only just been laid there; its
pages, wide open, had been turned face downward upon the dry,
grassless patch surrounding the tree trunk.
Only a few feet away another girl, slight and fair-haired, was nimbly
plying her needle upon a pile of white lawn, as to the object of which
there could be small enough doubt. She was working with the care and
obvious appreciation which most women display toward the manufacture
of delicate underclothing.
As her companion laid her book aside and turned toward the valley, the
pretty needlewoman raised a pair of gray, speculative eyes. But almost
at once they dropped again to her work. It was only for a moment,
however. She reached the end of her seam and began to fold the
material up, and, as she did so, her eyes were once more raised in the
direction of her sister, only now they were full of laughter.
"Kate," she said, in a tone in which mirth would not be denied, "do
you know, it's five years to-day since we first came to Rocky Springs?
Five years." She breathed a profound sigh, which was full of mockery.
"You were twenty-three when we came. You are twenty-eight now, and I
am twenty-two. We'll soon be old maids. The folks down there," she
went on, nodding at the village below, "will soon be speaking of us as
'them two old guys,' or 'them funny old dears, the Seton sisters.'
Isn't it awful to think of? We came out West to find husbands for
ourselves, and here we are very nearly--old maids."
Kate Seton's eyes wore a responsive twinkle, but she did not turn.
"You're a bit of a joke, Hel," she replied, in the slow musical
fashion of a deep contralto voice.
"But I'm not a joke," protested the other, with pretended severity.
"And I won't be called 'Hel,' just because my name's Helen. It--it
sounds like the way Pete and Nick swear at each other when they've
been spending their pay at Dirty O'Brien's. Besides, it doesn't alter
facts at all. It won't take much more climbing to find ourselves right
on the shelf, among the frying pans and other cooking utensils.
I'm--I'm tired of it--I--really am. It's no use talking. I'm a woman,
and I'd sooner see a pair of trousers walking around my house than
another bunch of skirts--even if they belong to my beloved sister.
Trousers go every time--with me."
Kate withdrew her gaze from the village below and looked into her
sister's pretty face with smiling, indulgent eyes.
"Well?" she said.
The other shook her fair head. Her eyes were still laughing, but their
expression did not hide the seriousness which lay behind them.
"It's not 'well' at all," she cried. She drew herself up from the
ground into a kneeling position, which left her sitting on the heels
of shoes that could never have been bought in Rocky Springs. "Now,
listen to me," she went on, holding up a warning finger. "I'm just
going to state my case right here and now, and--and you've got to
listen to me. Five years ago, Kate Seton, aged twenty-three, and her
sister, Helen Seton, were left orphans, with the sum of two thousand
dollars equally divided between them. You get that?"
Her sister nodded amusedly. "Well," the girl went on deliberately.
"Kate Seton was no ordinary sort of girl. Oh, no. She was most
_un_ordinary, as Nick would say. She was a sort of headstrong girl
with an absurd notion of woman's independence. I--I don't mean she was
masculine, or any horror like that. But she believed that when it came
to doing the things she wanted to do she could do them just as well,
and deliberately, as any man. That she could think as well as any man.
In fact, she didn't believe in the superiority of the male sex over
hers. The only superiority she did acknowledge was that a man could
ask a woman to marry, while the privilege of asking a man was denied
to Kate's sex. But even in acknowledging this she reserved to herself
an alternative. She believed that every woman had the right to make a
man ask her."
The patient Kate mildly protested. "You're making me out a perfectly
awful creature," she said, without the least umbrage. "Hadn't I better
stand up for the--arraignment?"
But her sister's mock seriousness remained quite undisturbed.
"There's no necessity," she said, airily. "Besides, you'll be tired
when I'm through. Now listen. Kate Seton is a very kind and lovable
creature--really. Only--only she suffers from--notions."
The dark-eyed Kate, with her handsome face so full of decision and
character, eyed her sister with the indulgence of a mother.
"You do talk, child," was all she said.
Helen nodded. "I like talking. It makes me feel clever."
"Ye--es. People are like that," returned the other ironically. "Go
on."
Helen folded her hands in her lap, and for a moment gazed
speculatively at the sister she knew she adored.
"Well," she went on presently. "Let us keep to the charge. Five years
ago this spirit of independence and adventure was very strong in Kate
Seton. Far, far stronger than it is now. That's by the way. Say,
anyhow, it was so strong then that when these two found themselves
alone in the world with their money, it was her idea to break through
all convention, leave her little village in New England, go out west,
and seek 'live' men and fortune on the rolling plains of Canada. The
last part of that's put in for effect."
The girl paused, watching her sister as she turned again toward the
valley below.
With a sigh of resignation Helen was forced to proceed. "That's five
years--ago," she said. Then, dropping her voice to a note of pathos,
and with the pretense of a sob: "Five long years ago two lonely girls,
orphans, set out from their conventional home in a New England
village, after having sold it out--the home, not the village--and
turned wistful faces toward the wild green plains of the western
wilderness, the home of the broncho, the gopher, and the merciless
mosquito."
"Oh, do get on," Kate's smile was good to see.
"It's emotion," said Helen, pretending to dab her eyes. "It's emotion
mussing up the whole blamed business, as Nick would say."
"Never mind Nick," cried her sister. "Anyway, I don't think he swears
nearly as much as you make out. I'll soon have to go and get the
Meeting House ready for to-morrow's service. So----"
"Ah, that's just it," broke in Helen, with a great display of triumph
in her laughing eyes. "Five years ago Kate Seton would never have said
that. She'd have said, 'bother the old Meeting House, and all the old
cats who go there to slander each other in--in the name of religion.'
That's what she'd have said. It's all different now. Gone is her love
of adventure; gone is her defiance of convention; gone is--is her
independence. What is she now? A mere farmer, a drudging female,
spinster farmer, growing cabbages and things, and getting her
manicured hands all mussed up, and freckles on her otherwise handsome
face."
"A successful--female, spinster farmer," put in Kate, in her deep,
soft voice.
Helen nodded, and there was a sort of helplessness in her admission.
"Yes," she sighed, "and that's the worst of it. We came to find
husbands--'live' husbands, and we only find--cabbages. The
man-hunters. That's what we called ourselves. It sounded--uncommon,
and so we used the expression." Suddenly she scrambled to her feet in
undignified haste, and shook a small, clenched fist in her sister's
direction. "Kate Seton," she cried, "you're a fraud. An
unmitigated--fraud. Yes, you are. Don't glare at me. 'Live' men!
Adventure! Poof! You're as tame as any village cat, and just
as--dozy."
Kate had risen, too. She was not glaring. She was laughing. Her dark,
handsome face was alight with merriment at her sister's characteristic
attack. She loved her irresponsible chatter, just as she loved the
loyal heart that beat within the girl's slight, shapely body. Now she
came over and laid a caressing hand upon the girl's shoulder. In a
moment it dropped to the slim waist about which her arm was quickly
placed.
"I wish I could get cross with you, Helen," she said happily. "But I
simply--can't. You know you get very near the mark in your funny
fashion--in some things. Say, I wonder. Do you know we have more than
our original capital in the bank? Our farm is a flourishing concern.
We employ labor. Two creatures that call themselves men, and who
possess the characters of--hogs, or tigers, or something pretty
dreadful. We can afford to buy our clothes direct from New York or
Montreal. Think of that. Isn't that due to independence? I admit the
villagy business. I seem to love Rocky Springs. It's such a whited
sepulcher, and its inhabitants are such blackguards with great big
hearts. Yes, I love even the unconventional conventions of the place.
But the spirit of adventure. Well, somehow I don't think that has
really gone."
"Just got mired--among the cabbages," said Helen, slyly. Then she
released herself from her sister's embrace and stood off at arm's
length, assuming an absurdly accusing air. "But wait a moment, Kate
Seton. This is all wrong. I'm making the charge, and you're doing all
the talking. There's no defense in the case. You've--you've just got
to listen, and--accept the sentence. Guess this isn't a court of
men--just women. Now, we're man-hunters. That's how we started, and
that's what I am--still. We've been five years at it, with what
result? I'll just tell you. I've been proposed to by everything
available in trousers in the village--generally when the 'thing' is
drunk. The only objects that haven't asked me to marry are our two
hired men, Nick and Pete, and that's only because their wages aren't
sufficient to get them drunk enough. As for you, most of the boys sort
of stand in awe of you, wouldn't dare talk marrying to you even in the
height of delirium tremens. The only men who have ever had courage to
make any display in that direction are Inspector Fyles, when his duty
brings him in the neighborhood of Rocky Springs, and a dypsomaniac
rancher and artist, to wit, Charlie Bryant. And how do you take it?
You--a man-hunter? Why, you run like a rabbit from Fyles. Courage?
Oh, dear. The mention of his name is enough to send you into
convulsions of trepidation and maidenly confusion. And all the time
you secretly admire him. As for the other, you have turned yourself
into a sort of hospital nurse and temperance reformer. You've taken
him up as a sort of hobby, until, in his lucid intervals, he takes
advantage of your reforming process to acquire the added disease of
love, which has reduced him to a condition of imbecile infatuation
with your charming self."
Kate was about to break in with a laughing protest, but Helen stayed
her with a gesture of denial.
"Wait," she cried, grandly. "Hear the whole charge. Look at your
village life, which you plead guilty to. You, a high-spirited woman of
independence and daring. You are no better than a sort of hired
cleaner to a Meeting House you have adopted, and which is otherwise
run by a lot of cut-throats and pirates, whose wives and offspring are
no better than themselves. You attend the village social functions
with as much appreciation of them as any village mother with an
unwashed but growing family. You gossip with them and scandalize as
badly as any of them, and, in your friendliness and charity toward
them, I verily believe, for two cents, you'd go among the said
unwashed offspring with a scrub-brush. What--what is coming to you,
Kate? You--a man-hunter? No--no," she went on, with a hopeless shake
of her pretty head, "'tis no use talking. The big, big spirit of early
womanhood has somehow failed you. It's failed us both. We are no
longer man-hunters. The soaring Kate, bearing her less brave sister in
her arms, has fallen. They have both tumbled to the ground. The early
seed, so full of promise, has germinated and grown--but it's come up
cabbages. And--and they're getting old. There you are, I can't help
it. I've tripped over the agricultural furrow we've ploughed, and----.
There!"
She flung out an arm dramatically, pointing down at the slight figure
of a man coming toward them, slowly toiling up the slope of the
valley.
"There he is," she cried. "Your artist-patient. Your dypsomaniac
rancher. A symbol, a symbol of the bonds which are crushing the brave
spirits of our--ahem!--young hearts."
But Kate ignored the approaching man. She had eyes only for the bright
face before her.
"You're a great child," she declared warmly. "I ought to be angry. I
ought to be just mad with you. I believe I really am. But--but the
cabbage business has broken up the storm of my feelings. Cabbage? Oh,
dear." She laughed softly. "You, with your soft, wavy hair, dressed as
though we had a New York hairdresser in the village. You, with your
great gray eyes, your charming little nose and cupid mouth. You, with
your beautiful new frock, only arrived from New York two days ago, and
which, by the way, I don't think you ought to wear sprawling upon
dusty ground. You--a cabbage! It just robs all you've said of, I won't
say truth, but--sense. There, child, you've said your say. But you
needn't worry about me. I'm not changed--really. Maybe I do many
things that seem strange to you, but--but--I know what I'm doing. Poor
old Charlie. Look at him. I often wonder what'll be the end of him."
Kate Seton sighed. It seemed as though there were a great depth of
motherly tenderness in her heart, and just now that tenderness was
directed toward the man approaching them.
But the lighter-minded Helen was less easily stirred. She smiled
amusedly in her sister's direction. Then her bright eyes glanced
swiftly down at the man.
"If all we hear is true, his end will be the penitentiary," she
declared with decision.
Kate glanced round quickly, and her eyes suddenly became quite hard.
"Penitentiary?" she questioned sharply.
Helen shrugged.
"Everybody says he's the biggest whisky smuggler in the country,
and--and his habits don't make things look much--different. Say, Kate,
O'Brien told me the other day that the police had him marked down.
They were only waiting to get him--red-handed."
The hardness abruptly died out of Kate's eyes. A faint sigh, perhaps
of relief, escaped her.
"They'll never do that," she declared firmly. "Everybody's making a
mistake about Charlie. I'm--sure. With all his failings Charlie's no
whisky-runner. He's too gentle. He's too--too honest to descend to
such a traffic."
Suddenly her eyes lit. She came close to Helen, and one firm hand
grasped the soft flesh of the girl's arm, and closed tightly upon it.
"Say, child," she went on, in a deep, thrilling tone, "do you know
what these whisky-runners risk? Do you? No. Of course you don't. They
risk life as well as liberty. They're threatened every moment of their
lives. The penalty is heavy, and when a man becomes a whisky-runner he
has no intention of being taken--alive. Think of all that, and see
where your imagination carries you. Then think of Charlie--as we know
him. An artist. A warm-hearted, gentle creature, whose only sins
are--against himself."
But the younger girl's face displayed skepticism.
"Yes--as we know him," she replied quickly. "I've thought of it while
he's been giving me lessons in painting, when I've watched him with
you, with that wonderful look of dog-like devotion in his eyes, while
hanging on every word you uttered. I've thought of it all. And always
running through my mind was the title of a book I once read--'Dr.
Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.' You are sure, and I--I only wonder."
Kate's hand relaxed its hold upon her sister's arm. Her whole
expression changed with a suddenness which, had she observed it, must
have startled the other. Her eyes were cold, very cold, as she
surveyed the sister to whom she was so devoted, and who could find it
in her heart to think so harshly of one whom she regarded as a sick
and ailing creature, needing the utmost support from natures morally
stronger than his own.
"You must think as you will, Helen," she said coldly. "I know. I know
Charlie. I understand the gentle heart that guides his every action,
and I warn you you are wrong--utterly wrong. Everybody is wrong, the
police--everybody."
She turned away and moved a few steps down the slope toward the
approaching figure.
CHAPTER VII
CHARLIE BRYANT
As Kate stood out from the shadow of the trees, the man approaching,
looking up, beheld her, and his dark eyes gladdened with a smile of
delight. His greeting came up to her on the still air in a tone
thrilling with warmth and deep feeling.
"Ho, Kate," he cried, in his deeply musical voice. "I saw you and
Helen making this way, and guessed I'd just get around."
He was breathing hard as he came up the hill, his slight figure was
bending forward with the effort of his climb. Kate watched him, much
as an anxious mother might watch, with doubtful eyes, some effort of
her ailing child. He reached her level and stood breathing heavily
before her.
"I was around watching the boys at work down there on the new church,"
he went on. His handsome boyish face was flushing. The delicate,
smooth, whiskerless skin was almost womanish in its texture, and
betrayed almost every emotion stirring behind it. "Allan Dy came along
with my mail. When I'd read it I felt I had to come and tell you the
news right away. You see, I had to tell someone, and wanted you--two
to be the first to hear it."
Kate's eyes were full of a smiling tender amusement at the
ingenuousness of the man. Helen was looking on with less tenderness
than amusement. He had not come to tell her the news--only Kate. The
Kate whom she knew he worshipped, and who was the only rival in his
life to his passionate craving for drink.
She surveyed the man now with searching eyes. What was it that
inspired in her such mixed feeling? She knew she had a dislike and
liking for him, all in the same moment. There was something
fascinating about him. Yes, there certainly was. He was darkly
handsome. Unusually so. He had big, soft, almost womanish eyes, full
of passionate possibilities. The delicate moulding of his features was
certainly beautiful. They were too delicate. Ah, that was it. They
were womanish. Yes, he was womanish, and nothing womanish in a man
could ever appeal to the essentially feminine heart of Helen. His
figure was slight, but perfectly proportioned, and quite lacking in
any suggestion of mannish strength. Again the thought of it brought
Helen a feeling of repugnance. She hated effeminacy in a man. And yet,
how could she associate effeminacy with a man of his known character?
Was he not the most lawless of this lawless village? Then there was
his outward seeming of gentleness. Yes, she had never known him
otherwise, even in his moments of dreadful drunkenness, and she had
witnessed those frequently enough during the past few years.
The whole personality of the man was an enigma to her. Nor was it
altogether a pleasant enigma. She felt that somehow there was an ugly
streak in him which her sister had utterly missed, and she only half
guessed at. Furthermore, somehow in the back of her mind, she knew
that she was not without fear of him.
In spite of Kate's denial, when the man came under discussion between
them, her conviction always remained. She knew she liked him, and she
knew she disliked him. She knew she despised him, and she knew she
feared him. And through it all she looked on with eyes of amusement at
the absurd, dog-like devotion he yielded to her strong, reliant,
big-hearted, handsome sister.
"What's your news, Charlie?" she demanded, as Kate remained silent,
waiting for him to continue. "Good, I'll bet five dollars, or you
wouldn't come rushing to us."
The man turned to her as though it were an effort to withdraw his gaze
from the face of the woman he loved.
"Good? Why, yes," he said quickly. "I'd surely hate to bring you two
anything but good news." Then a shadow of doubt crossed his smiling
features. "Maybe it won't be of much account to you, though," he went
on, almost apologetically. "You see, it's just my brother. My big
brother Bill. He's coming along out here to--to join me. He--he wants
to ranch, so--he's coming here, and going to put all his money into my
ranch, and suggests we run it together." Then he laughed shortly. "He
says I've got experience and he's got dollars, and between us we ought
to make things hum. He's a hustler, is Bill. Say, he's as much sense
as a two-year-old bull, and just about as much strength. He can't see
the difference between a sharp and a saint. They're all the same to
him. He just loves everybody to death, till they kick him on the
shins, then he hits out, and something's going to break. He's just the
bulliest feller this side of life."
Kate was still smiling at the man's enthusiasm, but she had no answer
for him. It was Helen who did the talking now, as she generally did,
while Kate listened.
"Oh, Charlie," Helen cried impulsively, "you will let me see him,
won't you? He's big--and--and manly? Is he good looking? But then he
must be if he's your--I'm just dying to see this Big Brother Bill,"
she added hastily.
Charlie shook his head, laughing in his silent fashion.
"Oh, you'll see him all right. This village'll just be filled right up
with him." Then his dark eyes became serious, and a hopeless shadow
crept into them. "I'm glad he's coming," he went on, adding simply,
"maybe he'll keep me straight."
Kate's smile died out in an instant. "Don't talk like that Charlie,"
she cried almost sharply. "Do you know what your words imply? Oh, it's
too dreadful, and--and I won't have it. You don't need anybody's
support. You can fight yourself. You can conquer yourself. I know it."
The man's eyes came back to the face he loved, and, for a moment, they
looked into it as though he would read all that which lay hidden
behind.
"You think so?" he questioned presently.
"I'm sure; sure as--as Fate," Kate cried impulsively.
"You think that all--all weakness can be conquered?"
Kate nodded. "If the desire to conquer lies behind it."
"Ah, yes."
The man's eyes had become even more thoughtful. There was a look in
them which suggested to Helen that he was not wholly thinking of the
thing Kate had in her mind.
"If the desire to conquer is there," he went on, "I suppose the
habits--diseases of years, even--could be beaten. But--but----"
"But what?" Kate's demand came almost roughly.
Charlie shrugged his slim shoulders. "Nothing," he said. "I--I was
just thinking. That's all."
"But it isn't all," cried Kate, in real distress.
Helen saw Charlie smile in a half-hearted fashion. For some moments
his patience remained. Then, as Kate still waited for him to speak,
his eyes abruptly lit with the deep fire of passion.
"Why? Why?" he cried suddenly. "Why must we conquer and fight with
ourselves? Why beat down the nature given to us by a power beyond our
control? Why not indulge the senses that demand indulgence, when, in
such indulgence, we injure no one else? Oh, I argue it all with
myself, and I try to reason, too. I try to see it all from the
wholesome point of view from which you look at it, Kate. And I can't
see it. I just can't see it. All I know is that the only thing that
makes me attempt to deny myself is that I want your good opinion. Did
I not want that I should slide down the road to hell, which I am told
I am on, with all the delight of a child on a toboggan slide. Yes, I
would. I surely would, Kate. I'm a drunkard, I know. A drunkard by
nature. I have not the smallest desire to be otherwise, from any moral
scruple. It's you that makes me want to straighten up, and you only.
When I'm sober I'd be glad if I weren't. And when I'm not sober I'd
hate being otherwise. Why should I be sober, when in such moments I
suffer agonies of craving? Is it worth it? What does it matter if
drink eases the craving, and lends me moments of peace which I am
otherwise denied? These are the things I think all the time, and these
are the thoughts which send me tumbling headlong--sometimes. But I
know--yes, I know I am all wrong. I know that I would rather suffer
all the tortures of hell than forfeit your--good will."
Kate sighed. She had no answer. She knew all that lay behind the man's
passionate appeal. She knew, too, that he spoke the truth. She knew
that the only reason he made any effort at all was because his
devotion to herself was something just a shade stronger than this
awful disease with which he was afflicted.
The hopelessness of the position for a moment almost overwhelmed her.
She knew that she had no love--love such as he required--to give him
in return. And when that finally became patent to him away would go
the last vestige of self-restraint, and his fall would be headlong.
She knew his early story, and it was a pitiful one. She knew he was
born of good parents, rich parents, in New York, that he was well
educated. He had been brought up to become an artist, and therein had
lain the secret of his fall. In Paris, and Rome, and other European
cities, he had first tasted the dregs of youthful debauchery, and
disaster had promptly set in. Then, after his student days, had come
the final break. His parents abandoned him as a ne'er-do-well, and,
setting him up as a rancher in a small way, had sent him out west,
another victim of that over-indulgence which helps to populate the
fringes of civilization.
The moment was a painful one, and Helen was quick to perceive her
sister's distress. She came to her rescue with an effort at lightness.
But her pretty eyes had become very gentle.
She turned to the man who had just taken a letter from his pocket.
"Tell us some more about Big Brother Bill," she said, with the
pretense of a sigh. Then, with a little daring in her manner: "Do you
think he'll like me? Because if he don't I'll sure go into mourning,
and order my coffin, and bury me on the hillside with my face to the
beautiful east--where I come from."
The man's moment of passionate discontent had passed, and he smiled
into the girl's questioning eyes in his gentle fashion.
"He'll just be crazy about you, Helen," he said. "Say, when he gets
his big, silly blue eyes on to you in that swell suit, why, he'll just
hustle you right off to the parson, and you'll be married before you
get a notion there's such a whirlwind around Rocky Springs."
"Is he--such a whirlwind?" the girl demanded with appreciation.
"He surely is," the man asserted definitely.
Helen sighed with relief. "I'm glad," she said. "You see, a
whirlwind's a sort of summer storm. All sunshine--and--and well, a
whirlwind don't suggest the cold, vicious, stormy gales of the folks
in this village, nor the dozy summer zephyrs of the women in this
valley. Yes, I'd like a whirlwind. His eyes are blue, and--silly?"
Charlie smiled more broadly as he nodded again. "His eyes are blue.
And big. The other's a sort of term of endearment. You see, he's my
big brother Bill, and I'm kind of fond of him."
Helen laughed joyously. "I'm real glad he's not silly," she cried.
"Let's see. He's big. He's got blue eyes. He's good looking.
He's--he's like a whirlwind. He's got lots of money." She counted the
attractions off on her fingers. "Guess I'll sure have to marry him,"
she finished up with a little nod of finality.
Kate turned a flushed face in her direction.
"For goodness sake, Helen!" she cried in horror.
Helen's gray eyes opened to their fullest extent.
"Why, whatever's the matter, Kate?" she exclaimed. "Of course, I'll
have to marry Big Brother Bill. Why, his very name appeals to me. May
I, Charlie?" she went on, turning to the smiling man. "Would you like
me for--a--a sister? I'm not a bad sort, am I, Kate?" she appealed
mischievously. "I can sew, and cook, and--and darn. No, I don't mean
curse words. I leave that to Kate's hired men. They're just dreadful.
Really, I wasn't thinking of anything worse than Big Brother Bill's
socks. When'll he be getting around? Oh, dear, I hope it won't be
long. 'Specially if he's a--whirlwind."
Charlie was scanning the open pages of his letter.
"No. Guess he won't be long," he said, amusedly. "He says he'll be
right along here the 16th. That's the day after to-morrow."
Helen ran to her sister's side, and shook her by the arm.
"Say, Kate," she cried, her eyes sparkling with pretended excitement.
"Isn't that just great? Big Brother Bill's coming along day after
to-morrow. Isn't it lucky I've just got my new suits? They'll last me
three months, and by the time I have to get my fall suits he'll have
to marry me." Then the dancing light in her eyes sobered. "Now, where
shall we live?" she went on, with a pretense of deep consideration.
"Shall we go east, or--or shall we live at Charlie's ranch? Oh, dear.
It's so important not to make any mistake. And yet--you see, Charlie's
ranch wants some one _capable_ to look after it, doesn't it? It's kind
of mousy. Big Brother Bill is sure to be particular--coming from the
east."
Her audience were smiling broadly. Kate understood now that her
irresponsible sister was simply letting her bubbling spirits overflow.
Charlie had no other feelings than frank amusement at the girl's
gaiety.
"Oh, he's most particular," he said readily. "You see, he's accustomed
to Broadway restaurants."
Helen pulled a long face.
"I'm afraid your shack wouldn't make much of a Broadway restaurant."
She shook her head with quaint solemnity. "Guess I never could get you
right. Here you run a ranch, and make quite big with it, yet you never
eat off a china plate, or spread your table with anything better than
a newspaper. True, Charlie, you've got me beaten to death. Why, how
you manage to run a ranch and make it pay is a riddle that 'ud put the
poor old Sphinx's nose plump out of joint. I----"
Kate suddenly turned a pair of darkly frowning eyes upon her sister.
"You're talking a whole heap of nonsense," she declared severely.
"What has the care of a home to do with making a ranch pay?"
Helen's eyes opened wide with mischief.
"Say, Kate," she cried with a great air of patronage, "you have a
whole heap to learn. Big Brother Bill's coming right along from
Broadway, with money and--notions. He's just bursting with them.
Charlie's a prosperous rancher. What does B. B. B. expect? Why, he'll
get around with fancy clothes and suitcases and trunks. He'll dream of
rides over the boundless plains, of cow-punchers with guns and things.
He'll have visions of big shoots, and any old sport, of a
well-appointed ranch house, with proper fixings, and baths, and swell
dinners and servants. But they're all visions. He'll blow in to Rocky
Springs--he's a whirlwind, mind--and he'll find a prosperous rancher
living in a tumbled-down shanty that hasn't been swept this side of
five years, a blanket-covered bunk, and a table made of packing cases
with the remains of last week's meals on it. That's what he'll find.
Prosperous rancher, indeed. Say, Charlie," she finished up with fine
scorn, "you know as much about living as Kate's two hired men, and
dear knows they only exist." Suddenly she broke out into a rippling
laugh. "And this is what my future husband is coming to. It's--it's an
insult to me."
The girl paused, looking from one to the other with dancing eyes. But
the more sober-minded Kate slipped her arm about her waist and began
to move down the hill.
"Come along, dear," she said. "I must get right on down to the
Meeting House. I--have work to do. You would chatter on all day if I
let you."
In a moment Helen was all indignant protest.
"I like that. Say, did you hear, Charlie? She's accusing me, and all
the time it's you doing the talking. But there, I'm always
misjudged--always. She'll accuse me of trying to trap your
brother--next. Anyway, I've got work to do, too. I've got to be at
Mrs. John's for the new church meeting. So Kate isn't everybody. Come
along."
Helen's laughter was good to hear as she dashed off in an attempt to
drag her elder sister down the hill at a run. The man looked on
happily as he kept pace with them. Helen was always privileged. Her
sister adored her, and the whole village of Rocky Springs yielded her
a measure of popularity which made her its greatest favorite. Even the
women had nothing but smiles for her merry irresponsibility, and, as
for the men, there was not one who would not willingly have sacrificed
even his crooked ways for her smile.
Halfway down to the village Charlie again reverted to his news.
"Helen put the rest of it out of my head," he said, and his manner of
speaking had lost the enjoyment of his earlier announcement. "It's
about the police. They're going to set a station here. A corporal and
two men. Fyles is coming, too. Inspector Fyles." His eyes were
studying Kate's face as he made the announcement. Helen, too, was
looking at her with quizzical eyes. "It's over that whisky-running a
week ago. They're going to clean the place up. Fyles has sworn to do
it. O'Brien told me this morning."
For some moments after his announcement neither of the women spoke.
Kate was thinking deeply. Nor, from her expression, would it have been
possible to have guessed the trend of her thoughts.
Helen, watching her, was far more expressive. She was thinking of her
sister's admiration for the officer. She was speculating as to what
might happen with Fyles stationed here in Rocky Springs. Would her
beautiful sister finally yield to his very evident admiration, or
would she still keep that barrier of aloofness against him? She
wondered. And, wondering, there came the memory of what Fyles's coming
would mean to Charlie Bryant.
To her mind there was no doubt but that the law would quickly direct
its energies against him. But she was also wondering what would happen
to him should time, and a man's persistence, finally succeed in
breaking down the barrier Kate had set up against the officer. Quite
suddenly this belated news assumed proportions far more significant
than the coming of Big Brother Bill.
Her tongue could not remain silent for long, however. Something of her
doubt had to find an outlet.
"I knew it would come sooner or later," she declared hopelessly.
She glanced quickly at Charlie, across her sister, beside whom he was
walking. The man was staring out down at the village with gloomy eyes.
She read into his expression a great dread of this officer's coming to
Rocky Springs. She knew she was witnessing the outward signs of a
guilty conscience. Suddenly she made up her mind.
"What--ever is to be done?" she cried, half eagerly, half fearfully.
"Say, I just can't bear to think of it. All these men, men we've
known, men we've got accustomed to, even--men we like, to be herded to
the penitentiary. It's awful. There's some I shouldn't be sorry to see
put away. They're scallywags, anyway. They aren't clean, and they chew
tobacco, and--and curse like railroaders. But they aren't all
like--that--are they, Kate?" She paused. Then, in a desperate appeal,
"Kate, I'd fire your two boys, Nick and Pete. They're mixed up in
whisky-running, I know. When Stanley Fyles gets around they'll be
corralled, sure, and I'd hate him to think we employed such men. Don't
you think that, Charlie?" she demanded, turning sharply and looking
into the man's serious face.
Then, quite suddenly, she changed her tone and relapsed into her less
responsible manner, and laughed as though something humorous had
presented itself to her cheerful fancy.
"Guess I'd have to laugh seeing those two boys doing the chores around
a penitentiary for--five years. They'd be cleaner then. Guess they get
bathed once a week. Then the funny striped clothes they wear. Can't
you see Nick, with his long black hair all cut short, and his vulture
neck sticking out of the top end of his clothes, like--like a thread
of sewing cotton in a darning needle? Wouldn't he look queer? And the
work, too! Say, it would just break his heart. My, but they get most
killed by the warders. And then for drink. Five years without tasting
a drop of liquor. No--they'd go mad. Anybody would. And all for the
sake of making a few odd dollars against the law. I wouldn't do it. I
wouldn't do it, not if I'd got to starve--else."
The man made no answer. His eyes remained upon the village below, and
their expression had become lost to the anxious Helen. She was talking
at him. But she was thinking not of him so much as her sister. She
knew how much it would mean to Kate if Charlie Bryant were brought
into direct conflict with the police. So she was offering her warning.
Kate turned to her quietly. She ignored the reference to her hired
men. She knew at whom her sister's remarks were directed. She shook
her head.
"Why worry about things, Sis?" she said, in her deliberate fashion.
"Lawbreakers need to be cleverer folks than those who live within the
law. I guess there won't be much whisky run into Rocky Springs with
Fyles around, and the police can do nothing unless they catch the boys
at it. You're too nervous about things." She laughed quietly. "Why,
the sight of a red coat scares you worse than getting chased by a
mouse."
The sound of Kate's voice seemed to rouse Charlie from his gloomy
contemplation of the village. He turned his eyes on the woman at his
side--and encountered the half-satirical smile of hers--which were as
dark as his own.
"Maybe Helen's right, though," he said. "Maybe you'd do well to fire
your boys." He spoke deliberately, but with a shade of anxiety in his
voice. "They're known whisky-runners."
Kate drew Helen to her side as though for moral support. "And what of
the other folks who are known--or believed--to be whisky-runners--with
whom we associate. Are they to be turned down, too? No, Charlie," she
went on determinedly, "I stand by my boys. I'll stand by my friends,
too. Maybe they'll need all the help I can give them. Then it's up to
me to give it them. Fyles must do his duty as he sees it. Our duty is
by our friends here, in Rocky Springs. Whatever happens in the crusade
against this place, I am against Fyles. I'm only a woman, and, maybe,
women don't count much with the police," she said, with a confident
smile, "but such as I am, I am loyal to all those who have helped me
in my life here in Rocky Springs, and to my--friends."
The man drew a deep breath. Nor was it easy to fathom its meaning.
Helen, eyeing her well-loved sister, could have thrown her young arms
about her neck in enthusiasm. This was the bold sister whom she had so
willingly followed to the western wilds. This was the spirit she had
deplored the waning of. All her apprehensions for Charlie Bryant
vanished, merged in a newly awakened confidence, since her brave
sister was ready to help and defend him.
She felt that Fyles's coming to Rocky Springs was no longer to be
feared. Only was it a source of excitement and interest. She felt that
though, perhaps, he might never have met his match during the long
years of his duties as a police officer, he had yet to pit himself
against Rocky Springs--with her wonderful sister living in the
village.
CHAPTER VIII
THE SOUL-SAVERS
Helen parted from her sister at the little old Meeting House. But
first she characteristically admonished her for offering herself a
sacrifice on the altar of the moral welfare of a village which reveled
in every form of iniquity within its reach. Furthermore, she threw in
a brief homily on the subject of the outrageous absurdity of turning
herself into a sort of "hired woman" in the interests of a sepulcher
whose whitewash was so obviously besmirched.
With the departure of the easy-going Kate, Charlie Bryant suddenly
awoke to the claims of the work at his ranch. He must return at once,
or disaster would surely follow.
Helen smiled at his sudden access of zeal, and welcomed his going
without protest. Truth to tell, she never failed to experience a
measure of relief at the avoidance of being alone with him.
Left to herself she moved on down toward the village without haste.
Her enthusiasm for the new church meeting at the house of Mrs. John
Day, who was the leading woman in the village, and, incidentally, the
wife of its chief citizen, who also owned a small lumber yard, was of
a lukewarm character. She had much more interest in the building
itself, and the motley collection of individuals in whose hands its
practical construction lay.
She possessed none of her sister's interest in Rocky Springs. Her
humor denied her serious contemplation of anything in it but the
opposite sex. And even here it frequently trapped her into pitfalls
which demanded the utmost exercise of her ready wit to extricate her
from. No, serious contemplation of her surroundings would have
certainly bored her, had it been possible to shadow her sunny nature.
Fortunately, the latter was beyond the reach of the sordid life in the
midst of which she found herself, and she never failed to laugh her
merry way to those plains of delight belonging to an essentially happy
disposition.
As she walked down the narrow trail, with the depths of green woods
lining it upon either hand, she remembered how beautiful the valley
really was. Of course, it was beautiful. She knew it. Was she not
always being told it? She was never allowed to forget it. Sometimes
she wished she could.
Down the trail a perfect vista of riotous foliage opened out before
her eyes. There, too, in the distance, peeping through the trees, were
scattered profiles of oddly designed houses, possessing a wonderful
picturesqueness to which they had no real claims. They borrowed their
beauty from the wealth of the valley, she told herself. Like the
people who lived in them, they had no claims to anything bordering on
the refinements or virtues of life. No, they were mockeries, just as
was the pretense of virtue which inspired the building of the new
church by a gathering of men and women, who, if they had their
deserts, would be attending divine service within the four walls of
the penitentiary.
She laughed. Really it was absurdly laughable. Life in this wonderful
valley was something in the nature of a tragic farce. The worst thing
was that the farce of it all could only be detected by the looker-on.
There was no real farce in these people, only tragedy--a very painful
and hideous tragedy.
On her way down she passed the great pine which for years had served
as a beacon marking the village. It was higher up on the slope of the
valley, but its vast trunk and towering crest would not be denied.
Helen gazed up at it, wondering, as many times she had gazed and
wondered before. It was a marvelous survival of primæval life. It was
so vast, so forbidding. Its torn crown, so sparse and weary looking,
its barren trunk, too, dark and forbidding against the dwarfed
surroundings of green, were they not a fit beacon for the village
below? It suggested to her imagination a giant, mouldering skeleton of
some dreadfully evil creature. How could virtue maintain in its
vicinity?
She laughed again as she thought. She knew there was some weird old
legend associated with it, some old Indian folklore. But that left no
impression of awe upon her laughter-loving nature.
Farther on the new church came into view. It was in the course of
construction, and at once her attention became absorbed. Here was a
scene which thoroughly appealed to her. Here was movement, and--life.
Here was food for her most appreciative observation.
It was a Church. Not a Meeting House. Not even a Chapel. She felt
quite sure, had the villagers had their way, it would have been called
a Cathedral. There was nothing half-hearted about these people. They
recognized the necessity of giving their souls a lift up, with a view
to an after life, and they meant to do it thoroughly.
They had no intention of mending their ways. They had no thought of
abandoning any of their pursuits or pleasures, be they never so
deplorable. But they felt that something had better be done toward
assurance of their futures. A Meeting House suggested something too
inadequate to meet their special case. It was right enough as far as
it went, but it didn't go far enough. They realized the journey might
be very long and the ultimate destination uncertain. A Chapel had its
claims in their minds, but Church seemed much stronger, bigger, more
powerful to help them in those realms of darkness to which they must
all eventually descend. Of course, Cathedral would have been _the_
thing. With a cathedral in Rocky Springs they would have felt certain
of their hereafter. But the difficulties of laying hands on a bishop,
and claiming him for their own, seemed too overwhelming. So they
accepted Church as being the best they could do under the
circumstances.
Quite a number of men were standing idly around the structure,
watching others at work. It was a weakness of the citizens of Rocky
Springs to watch others work. They had no desire to help. They rarely
were beset with any desire to help anybody. They simply clustered
together in small groups, chewing tobacco, or smoking, and, to a man,
their hands were indolently thrust into the tops of their trousers,
which, in every case, were girdled with a well-laden ammunition belt,
from which was suspended at least one considerable revolver.
There was no doubt in Helen's mind but that these weapons were loaded
in every chamber, and the thought set her merry eyes dancing again.
These men wanted a church, and were there to see they had it. Woe
betide--but, was there ever such a gathering of unclean, unholy
humanity? She thought not.
Helen knew that every man and woman in the village had had some voice
in the erection of the new church. There was not a citizen--they all
possessed the courtesy title of "citizens"--in Rocky Springs, who had
not contributed something toward it. Those who had wherewithal to give
in money or kind, had given. Those who had nothing else to give gave
their labor. She guessed the present onlookers had already done their
share of giving, and were now there to see that their less fortunate
brethren did not attempt to shirk their responsibilities.
For a moment, as the girl drew near, she abandoned her study of the
men for a rapid survey of the building itself, and, in a way, it held
her flattering attention. As yet there was no roof on it, but the
walls were up, and the picturesqueness of the design of the building
was fully apparent. Then she remembered that Charlie Bryant had
designed the building, and somehow the thought lessened her interest.
The whole thing was constructed of lateral, raw pine logs, carefully
dovetailed, with the ends protruding at the angles. There was no great
originality of design, merely the delightful picturesqueness which
unstripped logs never fail to yield. She knew that every detail of the
building was to be carried out in the same way. The roof, the spire,
the porches, even the fence which was ultimately to enclose the
churchyard.
Then the inside was to be lined throughout with polished red pine.
There was not a brick or stone to be used in the whole construction,
except in the granite foundations, which did not appear above ground.
The lumber was hewn in the valley and milled in John Day's yard. The
entire labor of hauling and building was to be done by the citizens of
Rocky Springs. The draperies, necessary for the interior, would be
made by the busy needles of the women of the village, and the
materials would be supplied by Billy Unguin, the dry goods
storekeeper. As for the stipend of the officiating parson, that would
be scrambled together in cash and kind from similar sources.
The church was to be a monument, a tribute to a holy zeal, which the
methods of life in Rocky Springs denied. Its erection was an attempt
to steal absolution for the sins of its citizens. It was the pouring
of a flood of oil upon the turbulent waters of an after life which
Rocky Springs knew was waiting to engulf its little craft laden with
tattered souls. It was a practical bribe to the Deity its people had
so long outraged, were still outraging, and had every intention of
continuing to outrage.
Helen's merry eyes glanced from group to group of the men, until they
finally came to rest upon an individual standing apart from the rest.
She walked on toward him.
He was a forbidding-looking creature, with a hard face, divided in its
expression between evil thoughts and a malicious humor. His general
appearance was much that of the rest of the men, with the exception
that he made no display of offensive weapons. It was not this,
however, that drew Helen in his direction, for she well enough knew
that, in fact, he was a perfect gunpark of concealed firearms. She
liked him because he never failed to amuse her.
"Good morning, Dirty," she greeted him cheerfully, as she came up,
smiling into his bearded face.
Dirty O'Brien turned. In a moment his wicked eyes were smiling. With
an adept twist of the tongue his chew of tobacco ceased to bulge one
cheek, and promptly distended the other.
"Howdy," he retorted, with as much amiability as it was possible for
him to display.
The girl nodded in the direction of the other onlookers.
"It's wonderful the interest you all take in the building of this
church."
"Int'rest?" The man's eyes opened wide. Then a gleam of scorn replaced
the surprise in them. "Guess you'd be mighty int'rested if you was
sittin' on a roof with the house afire under you, an' you just got a
peek of a ladder wagon comin' along, an' was guessin' if it 'ud get
around in time."
Helen's eyes twinkled.
"I s'pose I should," she admitted.
"S'pose nuthin'." The saloonkeeper laughed a short, hard laugh. "It's
dead sure. But most of them boys are feelin' mighty good. You see, the
ladders mostly fixed for 'em. I'd say they reckon that fire's as good
as out."
The interest of the onlookers was purely passive. They displayed none
of the enthusiasm one might have expected in men who considered that
the safety of their souls was assured. Helen remarked upon the fact.
"Their enthusiasm's wonderful," she declared, with a satirical laugh.
"Do you think they'll ever be able to use swear words again?"
Dirty O'Brien grinned till his discolored teeth parted the hair upon
his face.
"Say, I don't reckon to set myself up as a prophet at most things," he
replied, "but I'd like to say right here, the fixin' of that all-fired
chu'ch is jest about the limit fer the morals of this doggone city.
Standin' right here I seem to sort o' see a vision o' things comin' on
like a pernicious fever. I seem to see all them boys--good boys, mind
you, as far as they go--only they don't travel more'n 'bout an
inch--lyin', an' slanderin', an' thievin', an' shootin', an'--an'
committin' every blamed sin ever invented since Pharo's daughter got
busy makin' up fairy yarns 'bout them bulrushes----"
"I don't think you ought to talk like that," Helen protested hastily.
"There's no necessity to make----"
But Dirty O'Brien was not to be denied. He promptly cut her short
without the least scruple.
"No necessity?" he cried, with a sarcasm that left the girl
speechless. "How in hell would you have me talk standin' around a
swell chu'ch like that? I tell you what, Miss Helen, you ain't got
this thing right. Within a month this durned city'll all be that
mussed up with itself an' religion, the folks'll grow a crop o' wings
enough to stock a chicken farm, an' the boys'll get scratchin' around
for worms, same as any other feathered fowl. They'll get that out o'
hand with their own glory, they'll get shootin' up creation in the
name of religion by way o' pastime, and robbin' the stages an'
smugglin' liquor fer the fun o' gettin' around this blamed church an'
braggin' of it to the parson. Say, if I know anything o' the boys, in
a week they'll be shootin' craps with the parson fer his wages, an',
in a month, they'll set up tables around in the body o' the chu'ch so
they ken play 'draw' while the old man argues the shortest cut to
everlastin' glory. You ain't got the boys in this city right, miss.
Indeed, you ain't. Chu'ch? Why they got as much notion how to act
around a chu'ch as an unborn babe has of shellin' peanuts. Folks needs
eddicatin' to a chu'ch like that. Eddicatin'? An' that's a word as
ain't a cuss word, and as the boys of this yer city ain't wise to."
"It seems rather hopeless, doesn't it?" said Helen, stifling a violent
inclination to laugh outright.
Dirty O'Brien was less scrupulous. He laughed with a vicious snort.
"Hopeless?--well, say, hopeless ain't a circumstance. Guess you've
never seen a 'Jonah-man' buckin' a faro bank run by a Chinaman sharp?"
Helen shook her head while the saloonkeeper spat out his chew of
tobacco with all the violence of his outraged feelings.
"He surely is a gilt-edged winner beside it," he finally admitted
impressively, before clipping off a fresh chew from his plug with his
strong teeth.
Helen turned away, partly to hide the laugh that would no longer be
denied, and partly to watch the approach of a team of horses hauling a
load of logs. In a moment swift anger shone in her pretty eyes.
"Why!" she cried, pointing at them. "Look, Dirty! That's our team; and
Pete Clancy is driving it."
The man followed the direction in which she was pointing.
"Sure," he agreed indifferently.
"Sure? Of course it's sure," retorted Helen sharply; "but
what--what--impertinence!"
Dirty O'Brien saw nothing remarkable in the matter, and his face
displayed a waning interest.
"Don't he most gener'ly drive your team?" he inquired without
enthusiasm.
"Of course he does. But he's s'posed to be right out in the hay
sloughs--cutting. I heard Kate tell him this morning."
O'Brien's eyes twinkled, and a deep chuckle came from somewhere in the
depths of his beard.
"Ken you beat it?" he inquired, with cordial appreciation. "Do you get
his play?"
"Play?" The girl turned a pair of angry, bewildered eyes upon her
companion. "Impertinence!"
The man nodded significantly.
"Sure. Them two scallywags of yours ain't got nothin' to give to the
building of the chu'ch. Which means they'll need to get busy workin'
on it. Guess work never did come welcome to Mister Peter Clancy and
Nick. They hate work worse'n washin'--an' that's some. Guess they
borrowed your team to do a bit o' haulin', which--kind o' squares
their account. They're bright boys."
"Bright? They're impertinent rascals and--and--oh!"
Helen's exasperation left her almost speechless.
"Which is mighty nigh a compliment to them," observed the man.
But Helen's sense of humor utterly failed her now.
"It's--too bad, Dirty," she cried. "And poor Kate thinks they're out
cutting our winter hay. I begged of her only this morning to 'fire'
them both. I'm--I'm sure they're going to get us into trouble
when--when the police come here. I hate the sight of them both. Last
time Pete got drunk he--he very nearly asked me to marry him. I
believe he would have, only I had a bucket of boiling water in my
hand."
Again came the man's curious chuckle.
"It won't be you folks they get into trouble," he declared
enigmatically. "An' I guess it ain't goin' to be 'emselves, neither.
But when the p'lice get hot after 'em, why, they'll shift the
scent--sure."
Helen's eyes had suddenly become anxious.
"You mean--Charlie Bryant," she half whispered.
The man nodded.
"Sure. An' anybody else, so--_they_ get clear." O'Brien's eyes
hardened as they contemplated the distant teamster. "Say," he went on,
after a brief pause, "there are some low-down bums in this city.
There's Shorty Solon, the Jew boy. He's wanted across the border fer
shootin' up a bank manager, and gettin' off with the cash. Ther's
Crank Heufer, the squarehead stage robber, shot up more folks, women,
too, in Montana than 'ud populate a full-sized city. Ther's Kid
Blaney, the faro sharp, who broke penitentiary in Dakota twelve months
back. Ther's Macaddo, the train 'hold-up,' mighty badly wanted in
Minnesota. Ther's Stormy Longton, full of scalps to his gun, a bad man
by nature. Ther's Holy Dick, over there," he went on, pointing at a
gray-bearded, mild-looking man, sitting on a log beside a small group
of lounging spectators. "He owes the States Government seven good
years for robbing a church. Ther's Danny Jarvis and Fighting Mike,
both of 'em dodgin' the law, an' would shoot their own fathers up fer
fi' cents. It's a dandy tally of crooks, but they ain't a circumstance
beside them two boys of yours. They're bred bad 'uns, an' they
couldn't play even the crook's game right. I'd sure say they'd be a
fortune to Fyles, when he gets busy cleaning up this place. They'd
give Satan away if they see things gettin' busy their way."
The anxiety deepened in Helen's eyes as the man denounced the two men
who were her sister's hired help. She knew that all he said of them
was true. She had known it for months. Now she was thinking of Charlie
Bryant and Kate. If Fyles ever got hold of Charlie it would break poor
Kate's heart.
"You think they'd give--any one away?"
The man shook his head.
"I don't think. Guess I know." Then, after a pause, he went on,
speaking rapidly and earnestly. "See here, Miss Helen, I don't hold no
brief fer nobody but myself, an' I guess that brief needs a hell of a
piece of studyin' right. There's things in it I don't need to shout
about, and anyway I don't fancy Fyles's long nose smudging the ink on
it. You an' Miss Kate are jest about two o' the most wholesome bits
o' women in this township, an' there ain't many of us as wouldn't fix
ourselves up clean an' neat to pay our respec's to either of you. Wal,
Miss Kate's got a hell of a notion for that drunken bum, Charlie
Bryant. That bein' so, tell her to keep a swift eye on her two boys.
They're in with him, sure, an' they'll put him away if it suits 'em.
Savee? Tell her I said so--since Fyles is goin' to butt in around
here. I don't want to see Charlie Bryant in a stripe soot,
penitentiary way. I need him. An' I need the liquor he runs."
The man turned away abruptly. He had broken the unwritten law of Rocky
Springs, where it was understood that no man spoke of another man's
past, or questioned his present doings, or even admitted knowledge of
them. But like all the rest of the male portion of Rocky Springs, he
possessed a soft spot in his vicious heart for the two sisters, who,
in the mire of iniquity which flooded the township, contrived a clean,
wholesome living out of the soil, and were womanly enough to find
interest, and even pleasure, in their sordid surroundings. Now, he
hurried off down to his saloon, much in the manner of a man who fears
the consequences of feelings which have been allowed to run away with
him.
Left to herself, Helen only remained long enough to pass a few cheery
greetings with the rest of the onlookers; then she, too, took her
departure.
For some moments she certainly was troubled by the direct warning of a
man like Dirty O'Brien. With all the many criminal attainments of the
other citizens of Rocky Springs, she knew him to be the shrewdest man
in the place. A warning from him was more than significant. What
should she do? Tell her sister? Certainly she would do that, but she
felt it to be well-nigh useless. Kate was the gentlest soul in the
world. She was the essence of kindliness, of sympathy, of loyalty to
her friends, but she was determined to a degree. She saw always with
her own eyes, and would go the way she saw.
Had she not warned her herself before? Had she not endeavored to
persuade her a dozen times? It was all quite useless. Kate was
something of an enigma, a contradiction. For all her gentleness Helen
knew she could be as hard as iron.
Finally, with a sigh, she dismissed the matter from her mind until
such time as opportunity served. Meanwhile she must put in an
appearance at Mrs. John Day's house. Mrs. John Day was the social
pivot of Rocky Springs, and, to disobey her summons, Helen knew would
be to risk a displeasure which would find reflection in every woman in
the place.
That was a catastrophe she had no desire to face. It was enough for
her to remember that she had imprisoned herself in such a place. She
had no desire to earn the ill-will of the wardresses.
She laughed to herself. But she really felt that it was very dreadful
that her life must be passed among these people. She wanted to be
free--to live all these good years of her life. She wanted to attend
parties, and--and dances among those people amid whom she had been
brought up. She craved for the society of cultured folks--of men. Yes,
she admitted it, she wanted all those things which make a young girl's
life enjoyable--theatres, dances, skating, hockey and--and, yes,
flirtations. Instead of those things what had she--what was she? That
was it. What was she? She had been planted in the furrows of life a
decorative flower, and some terrible botanical disaster had brought
her up a--cabbage.
She laughed outright, and in the midst of her laugh, looking out
across the valley, she beheld her sister leaving the Meeting House,
which stood almost in the shadow of the great pine, far up on the
distant slope.
Her laugh sobered. Her thoughts passed from herself to Kate with a
feeling which was almost resentment. Her high-spirited,
adventure-loving, handsome sister. What of her? It was terrible. So
full of promise, so full of possibilities. Look at her. She was clad
in a big gingham apron. No doubt her beautiful, artistic hands were
all messed up with the stains of scrubbing out a Meeting House, which,
in turn, right back to the miserable Indian days, had served the
purposes of saloon, a trader's store, the home of a bloodthirsty
badman, and before that goodness knows what. Now it was a house of
worship for people, beside whom the scum of the earth was as the froth
of whipped cream. It was--outrageous. It was so terrible to her that
she felt as if she must cry, or--or laugh.
The issue remained in doubt for some moments. Then, just as she
reached the pretentious portals of Mrs. John Day's home, her real
nature asserted itself, and a radiant smile lit her pretty face as she
passed within.
CHAPTER IX
THE "STRAY"-HUNTER
The real man is nearest the surface after a long period of idle
solitude.
So it was with Stanley Fyles, riding over the even, sandy trail of the
prairies which stretched away south of the Assiniboine River. His
sunburnt face was sternly reposeful, and in his usually keen gray eyes
was that open staring light which belongs to the man who gropes his
way over Nature's trackless wastes, and whose mind is ever asking the
question of direction. But there was no question of such a nature in
his mind now. His look was the look of habit, when the call of the
trail is heard.
He sat his horse with the easy grace of a man whose life is mostly
spent in the saddle. His loose shoulders and powerful frame swayed
with that magical rhythm which gives most ease to both horse and
rider. His was the seat of a horseman whose poise is the poise of
perfect balance rather than the set attitude of the riding school.
The bit hung lightly in the horse's mouth, but lightly as the reins
were held in the man's hand there was a firmness and decision in the
feeling of them that communicated the necessary confidence between
horse and rider.
Stanley Fyles was as nearly a perfect horseman as the prairie could
produce.
Just now the man beneath the officer's habit was revealed. His
military training was set aside, perhaps all thought of it had been
left behind with his uniform, and just the "man" was reassumed with
the simple prairie kit he had adopted for the work in hand.
To look at him now he might have been a ranch hand out on the work of
the spring round-up. He was dressed in plain leather chapps over his
black cloth riding breeches, and, from his waist up, his clothing was
a gray flannel shirt, over which he wore an open waistcoat of ordinary
civilian make. About his neck was tied a silk handkerchief of modest
hue, and about his waist was strapped a revolver belt. The only
visible detail that could have marked him as a police officer was the
glimpse of military spurs beneath his chapps.
His thoughts and feelings as he covered the dreary miles of grass were
of a conflicting nature, and, roaming at will, they centered, as
thoughts so roaming will center, chiefly upon those things which
concerned his most cherished ambitions.
At first a feeling of something bordering on anxious resentment pretty
fully occupied him. There was still in his mind the memory of an
interview he had had with his immediate superior, Superintendent
Jason, just before the time of his setting out. It had been an
uncomfortable half-hour spent listening to the sharp criticisms of his
chief, whose mind was saturated with the spirit of his official
capacity, almost to the exclusion of common sense.
Superintendent Jason was still angry at the manner in which the great
whisky-running coup had been effected, and of the manner in which the
perpetrators of it had slipped through the official fingers. He blamed
everybody, and particularly Inspector Fyles, in whose hands the case
had been placed.
Nor had he been wholly appeased by the inspector's final offer. Goaded
by the merciless pin-prick of his superior's tongue, Fyles had finally
offered to set out for Rocky Springs, the place, both were fully
agreed, whence the trouble emanated, and bring all those concerned in
the smuggling to book.
At first Jason had been inclined to sneer, nor was it until Fyles
unfolded something of his scheme that he began to take it seriously.
Finally, however, the younger man had had his way, and the necessary
permission was granted. Then the superintendent dealt with the matter
as the cold discipline of police methods demanded.
Fyles remembered his words well. They meant far more to him than they
expressed. They were full of a cold threat, which, to a man of his
experience, could not be mistaken.
The picture remained in his mind for many a long day. It was doubtful
if he would ever forget it. It was a moment of crisis in his official
life, a crisis when it became necessary to back himself against all
odds--or ultimately sacrifice his position.
He was standing beside the superintendent, and both men were bending
over one of those secret official charts of the district surrounding
Rocky Springs. They were alone in Jason's bare, even mean office.
Fyles's long, firm forefinger was pointing along a trail, and his
sharp, incisive words were explaining something of his convictions as
his finger moved. The other was listening without interruption. At
last, as the quiet, confident tones ceased, the superintendent
straightened himself up, and his small, quick-moving, dark eyes shot
their gleam of cold authority into his companion's.
"It's up to you," he said, with a callous upraising of his shoulders.
"You've talked a good deal to me here, and you've made your talk sound
right. But talk doesn't put these men in the penitentiary. You've made
a mess of this job so far. Guess it's up to you to make good. You've
got your chance now. See you don't miss it. The authorities don't
stand for two mistakes on one job, not even when they're made by
Inspector Fyles. You get me? You've _got_ to make good."
Fyles left the office fully aware that sentence had been passed on
him, just as surely as though he had stood before the Commissioner, a
prisoner.
Thus, at the outset of his journey, his feelings had been scarcely
pleasant, but, as the distance between him and headquarters increased,
his confidence and sense of responsibility returned, and the shadow of
threat retreated into the background. His plans were carefully laid,
and all the support he could need was arranged for. This time the work
before him was no mere capture of whisky-runners, but to make all
whisky-running, as associated with Rocky Springs, impossible, and to
break up the gang who had for so long defied the law. Yes, he felt
confident in the result, and, as the long miles were put behind him,
his thoughts wandered into more pleasant channels.
Rocky Springs certainly offered him inducement. And curiously enough
he found himself wondering how much he was influenced by that
inducement in accepting the odds against him in cleaning up the place,
and dusting the cobwebs of crime from its corners.
Kate Seton. He had not seen her for something running into weeks. The
thought that he was to renew an acquaintance, which, though almost
slight, still had extraordinary power to hold him, was a delightful
one. Sometimes he had found himself wondering at the phenomenon of her
attraction for him. But he was incapable of analyzing his feelings
closely. His life had been spent on these fringes of civilization so
long, and the generality of the women he had come into contact with
had been so much a part of the life of the country, that their appeal
had been weakened almost to the vanishing point.
Then here, in Rocky Springs, where he might reasonably expect to find
only the dregs of society, he suddenly discovered a woman obviously
belonging to an utterly different and more cultured life. A woman of
uncommon beauty and distinction; a woman, who, to his mind, fulfilled
some essentially mannish ideal, an ideal that, in idle moments, had
stolen in upon a wholly reposeful mind. A woman who----
But the thread of his pleasant reflections was suddenly broken, and
his mechanically watchful eyes warned him that a horseman was riding
along the trail ahead of him, and that he was rapidly overtaking this
stranger.
In a moment all other interests were forgotten. To the solitary rider
of the plains a fellow-creature ever becomes a matter of considerable
moment. In Fyles's case he possessed the added interest of a possible
giver of information.
As he gently urged his horse to lengthen its stride, his keen eyes
took in the details of the man's figure, and the points of the horse
he was riding. The man was of unusual stature, so unusual, in fact,
that his horse, although a big raking creature, became dwarfed under
him. Even from that distance the officer obtained a suggestion of fair
hair beneath the brim of the prairie hat, which was tilted forward at
an unusual angle. The great square shoulders of the stranger were clad
in a tweed jacket, and, from what he could make out, he wore no
chapps.
Just for a moment Fyles guessed he might be some farmer, and the tweed
jacket suggested he was out to pay a visit to friends. Then, quite
abruptly, he changed his mind, and further increased his pace. He had
detected the city-fashioned top-boots the man was wearing.
Without further speculation he pressed on to overtake the stranger,
whom, presently, he saw turn round and look back. Evidently he had
become aware of the approach. Equally evidently he either welcomed or
resented the intrusion upon his solitude. For he reined in his horse,
and waited for the officer to come up.
The greeting between the men was widely different. The stranger's face
was abeam with smiling good nature. His big blue eyes were wide with
frank welcome.
"I've been just bursting with a painful longing for the sight of a
living man with two arms and two legs, and anything else that goes to
make up a human companion," he said delightedly. "Say, how far do you
guess a fellow could ride by himself without needing to be sent into a
home to be looked after?"
Fyles's manner was more guarded. The police officer was uppermost in
him now, but he smiled a certain cordiality at the other's frankly
unconventional greeting.
"That mostly depends on how many things there are chasing around in
his brain-box to keep the works busy," he said gently.
The stranger's smile broadened into a laugh.
"That don't offer much hope," he replied dryly. "I've been riding
around this eternal grass for nigh a week. God knows where I haven't
been during that time. Nobody ever did brag about the ideas I've got
in my head, not even my mother, and any I have got have just been
chewed right up to death till there isn't a blamed thing left to chew.
For the past ten miles I've been reviewing the attractions of every
nursing home I've ever heard of, with a view to becoming an inmate. I
think I've almost decided on one I know of in Toronto. You see there
are a few human beings there."
Fyles's eyes had taken in the stranger from head to foot. Even the
horse did not escape his closest attention. He recognized this man as
being a stranger in the country. He was obviously direct from some
eastern city, though not aggressively so. Furthermore, the beautiful
chestnut horse he was riding was no prairie-bred animal, and
suggested, in combination with the man's general get-up, the
possession of ample means.
"A week riding about--trying to find yourself?"
Fyles's question was one of amused speculation.
"Sure," the man nodded, with a buoyant amusement in his eyes. "That,
and finding some forgotten hole of a place called Rocky Springs."
Fyles lifted his reins and his horse moved on.
"We'd best ride together. I'm going to Rocky Springs, and--you've
certainly hit the trail at last."
The fair-haired giant jumped at the suggestion, and even his horse
seemed to welcome the companionship, for it ambled on in the
friendliest manner by the side of the police horse.
"How did you manage to--lose yourself?" Fyles inquired presently. "Did
you start out from Amberley?"
The stranger's look of chagrin was almost comical. He shook his head.
"That's where I ought to've started from," he said. Then he shrugged
his great shoulders. "Here, I'll tell you. I come from down East, and
I'm on my way to join a brother of mine at Rocky Springs. He's a
rancher. Sort of artist, too. His name's Charlie Bryant. My name's
Bill--Bill Bryant. Well, I ought to have got off at Black Cross, and
changed trains for the Amberley branch. Instead of that I was sleeping
peacefully in the car and went right on to a place called Moosemin.
Well, some torn fool told me if I got off at Moosemin I would get
across country to Amberley, and thus get on to the Rocky Springs road.
Maybe he was right enough, if the feller getting off had got any horse
sense. But I guess they forgot to hand any out my way. Anyhow, I kind
of took to the idea. Guessed I'd make a break that way and get used to
the country. So I just bought the best horse I could find in the town
from the worst thief that ever dodged penitentiary, and since then
have spent seven whole days getting on intimate terms with every blade
of grass in the country, and trying to convince various settlers that
I wasn't a murderer or horse thief, and didn't want to shoot 'em in
their beds, but just needed food and sleep, all of which I was ready
to pay for at any fancy prices they liked to ask. How I eventually got
here I don't know, and haven't a desire to know, and I'll stake my
oath you won't find any two people in the country with the same ideas
of direction. And I want to say that I hate grass worse than poison,
and as for sun it's an abomination. Horse riding's overrated, and
tailors don't know a thing about making pants that are comfortable
riding. I could write a book on the subject of boils and saddle
chafes, and when I get off this blamed saddle I don't intend to sit
down for a week. I think a rancher's life is just the dandiest thing
to read about I ever knew, and beans--those things the shape of an
immature egg and as hard as rocks--are most nourishing; and I don't
think I shall need nourishing ever again. Also the West is the
greatest country ever forgotten by God or men, but the remark applies
only to its size. The best thing I know of, just now, is a full-sized
human being going the same way I am."
Bill Bryant finished up with a great laugh of the happiest good
nature, which quite robbed Fyles of his last shadow of aloofness. No
one could have looked into the man's humorously smiling eyes, or
listened to the frank admissions of his own blundering, and felt it
necessary to entertain the least question as to his perfect honesty.
Fyles accepted the introduction in the spirit in which it was made.
"My name's Fyles--Stanley Fyles," he said cordially. "Glad to meet
you, Mr. Bryant."
"Bill Bryant," corrected the other, grasping and wringing the
policeman's proffered hand with painful cordiality. "That's a good
name--Fyles," he went on, releasing the other's hand. "Suggests all
sorts of things--nails, chisels--something in the hardware line. Good
name for this country, too." Then his big blue eyes scanned the
officer's outfit. "Rancher?" he suggested.
Fyles smiled, shaking his head.
"Hardly a--rancher," he deprecated.
"Ah. I know. Cowpuncher. You're dressed that way. I've read about 'em.
Chasing cattle. Rounding 'em up. Branding, and all that sort of thing.
Fine. Exciting."
Fyles shook his head again.
"My job's not just that, either," he said, his smile broadening. "You
see, I just round up 'strays,' and send 'em to their right homes. I'm
out after 'strays' now."
Bill nodded with ready understanding.
"I get it," he cried. "They just break out in spring, and go chasing
after fancy grass. Then they get lost, or mussed up with ether cattle,
and--and need sorting out. Must be a mighty lonesome job--always
hunting 'strays.'"
Inspector Fyles's eyes twinkled, but his sunburned face remained
serious.
"Yes, I'd say it's lonesome--at times. You see, it isn't easy locating
their tracks. And when you do locate 'em maybe you've got a long piece
to travel before you come up with 'em. They get mighty wild running
loose that way, and, hate being rounded up. Some of 'em show fight,
and things get busy. No, it's not dead easy--and it doesn't do making
mistakes. Guess a mistake is liable to snuff your light out when
you're up against 'strays.'"
A sudden enthusiasm lit Bill Bryant's interested eyes.
"That sounds better than ranching," he said quickly. "You see, I've
lived a soft sort of life, and it kind of seems good to get upsides
with things. I've got a notion that it's better to hand a feller a
nasty bunch of knuckles, square on the most prominent part of his
face, than taking dollars out of him to pay legal chin waggers. That's
how I've always felt, but living in luxury in a city makes you act
otherwise. I've quit it though, now, and, in consequence, I'm just
busting to hand some fellow that bunch of knuckles." He raised one
great clenched fist and examined it with a sort of mild enthusiasm.
"I'm going to ranch," he went on simply, while the police officer
surveyed him as he might some big, boisterous child. "My brother's got
a ranch at Rocky Springs. He's done pretty well, I guess--for an
artist fellow. He's making money--oh, yes, he's making good money, and
seems to like the life.
"The fact is," he went on eagerly, "Charlie was a bit of a bad
boy--he's a dandy good fellow, really he is; but I guess he got gay
when he was an art student, and the old man got rattled over it and
sent him along out here to raise cattle and wheat. Well, when dad died
he left me most of his dollars. There were plenty, and it's made me
feel sick he forgot Charlie's existence. So I took a big think over
things. You see it makes a fellow think, when he finds himself with a
lot of dollars that ought to be shared with another fellow.
"Well, I don't often think hard," he went on ingenuously. "But I did
that time, and it's queer how easy it is to think right when you
really try--hard. Guess you don't need to think much in your work--but
maybe sometimes you'll have to, and then you'll find how easy it
comes."
He turned abruptly in the saddle and looked straight into the
officer's interested face. His eyes were alight, and he emitted a
deep-throated guffaw.
"Say," he went on, "it came to me all of a sudden. It was in the
middle of the night. I woke up thinking it. I was saying it to myself.
Why not go out West? Join Charlie. Put all your money into his ranch.
Turn it into a swell affair, and run it together. That way it'll seem
as if you were doing it for yourself. That way Charlie'll never know
you're handing him a fortune. Can you beat it?" he finished up
triumphantly.
Stanley Fyles had not often met men in the course of his sordid work
with whom he really wanted to shake hands. But somehow this great,
soft-hearted, simple giant made him feel as he had never felt before.
He abruptly thrust out a hand, forgetful of the previous handshakes he
had endured, and, in a moment, it was seized in a second vice-like
grip.
"It's fine," he said. Then as an afterthought: "No, you can't beat
it."
The unconscious Bill beamed his satisfaction.
"That's how I thought," he said enthusiastically. "And I'll be mighty
useful to him, myself, too--in a way. Don't guess I know much about
wheat or cattle, but I can ride anything with hair on it, and I've
never seen the feller I couldn't pound to a mush with the gloves on.
That's useful, seeing Charlie's sort of small, and--and mild."
Suddenly he pointed out ahead. "What's that standing right up there?
See, over there. A tree--or--something."
Fyles abruptly awoke to their whereabouts. Bill Bryant was pointing at
the great pine marking Rocky Springs.
"That's the landmark of Rocky Springs," he told him. This stranger had
so interested and amused him that he had quite lost reckoning of the
distance they had ridden together.
"I don't see any town," complained his companion.
"It's in the valley. You see, that tree is on the shoulder of the
valley of Leaping Creek."
Bill's eyes widened.
"Oh, that's a valley, eh? And Charlie's ranch is down below. I see."
The man's eyes became thoughtful, and he relapsed into silence as they
drew on toward the aged signpost. He was thinking--perhaps hard--of
that brother whom he had not seen for years. Maybe, now that the time
had come for the meeting, some feeling of nervousness was growing.
Perhaps he was wondering if he would be as welcome as he hoped. Had
Charlie changed much? Would his coming be deemed an impertinence?
Charlie had not answered his letter. He forgot his brother had not had
time to answer his impulsive epistle.
As they drew near the valley his eyes lost their enthusiastic light.
His great, honest face was grave, almost to the point of anxiety.
Fyles, watching him furtively, observed every change of expression,
and the meaning of each was plain enough to him. He, too, was
wondering about that meeting. It would have interested him to have
witnessed it. He was thinking about that brother in Rocky Springs. He
knew him slightly, and knew his reputation better, and, in
consequence, the two words "drunkard" and "crook" drifted through his
mind, and left him regretfully wondering. Somehow he felt sorry,
inexpressibly sorry, for this great big babe of a man whom he found
himself unusually glad to have met.
CHAPTER X
THE BROTHERS
The valley of Leaping Creek gaped at Bill Bryant's feet and the man's
ready delight bubbled over.
"Say," he demanded of his guide, "and this is where my brother's ranch
is? Gee," he went on, while Fyles nodded a smiling affirmative, "it
surely is the dandiest ditch this side of creation. It makes me want
to holler."
As Fyles offered no further comment they rode on down the hill in
silence, while Bill Bryant's shining eyes drank in the beauties which
opened out in every direction.
The police officer, by virtue of his knowledge of the valley, led the
way. Nor was he altogether sorry to do so. He felt that the moment for
answering questions had passed. Any form of cross-examination now
might lead him into imparting information that might hurt this
stranger, and he had no desire to be the one to cast a shadow upon his
introduction to the country he intended to make his home.
However, beyond this first expression of delight, Bill Bryant made no
further attempt at speech. Once more doubt had settled upon his mind,
and he was thinking--hard.
Ten minutes later the village came into view. Then it was that Bill
was abruptly aroused from his somewhat troubled thought. They were
just approaching the site of the new church, and sounds of activity
broke the sylvan peace of the valley. But these things were of a
lesser interest. A pedestrian, evidently leaving the neighborhood of
the new building, was coming toward them along the trail. It was a
girl--a girl clad in a smart tailored costume, which caught and held
the stranger's most ardent attention.
She came on, and as they drew abreast of her, just for one brief
instant the girl's smiling gray eyes were raised to the face of the
stranger. The smile was probably unconscious, but it was nevertheless
pronounced. In a moment, off came Bill's hat in a respectful salute,
and only by the greatest effort could he refrain from a verbal
greeting. Then, in another moment, as she passed like a ray of April
sun, he had drawn up beside his guide.
"Say," he cried, with a deep breath of enthusiasm, "did you get that
pretty girl?" Then with a burst of impetuosity: "Are they all like
that in--this place? If so, I'm surely up to my neck in the valley of
Leaping Creek. Who is she? How did she get here? I'll bet a thousand
dollars to a bad nickel this place didn't raise her."
The officer's reply to the volley of questions came with
characteristic directness.
"That's Miss Seton, Miss Helen Seton, sister of the one they
call--Kate. They're sort of farmers, in a small way. Been here five
years."
"Farmers?" Bill's scorn was tremendous. "Why, that girl might have
stepped off Broadway, New York, yesterday. Farmers!"
"Nevertheless they _are_ farmers," replied Fyles, "and they've been
farming here five years."
"Five years! They've been here five years, and that girl--with her
pretty face and dandy eyes--not married? Say, the boys of this place
need seeing to. They ought to be lynched plumb out of hand."
Fyles smiled as he drew his horse up at the point where the trail
merged into the main road of the village.
"Maybe it's not--their fault," he said dryly.
But Bill's indignation was sweeping him on.
"Then I'd like to know whose it is."
Fyles laughed aloud.
"Maybe she's particular. Maybe she knows them. They surely do need
lynching--most of 'em--but not for that. When you know 'em better
you'll understand."
He shrugged his shoulders and pointed down the trail, away from the
village.
"That's your way," he went on, "along west. Just keep right along the
trail for nearly half a mile till you come to a cattle track on the
right, going up the hill again."
Then he shifted the direction of his pointing finger to a distant
house on the hillside, which stood in full view.
"The track'll take you to that shanty there, with the veranda facing
this way. That's Charlie Bryant's place, and, unless I'm mistaken,
that's your brother standing right there on the veranda looking out
this way. For a rancher--he don't seem busy. Guess I'm going right on
down to the saloon. I'll see you again some time. So long."
The police officer swung his horse round, and set off at a sharp
canter before Bill could give expression to any of the dozen questions
which leaped to his lips. The truth was Fyles had anticipated them,
and wished to avoid them.
* * * * *
Charlie Bryant was standing on the veranda of his little house up on
the hillside. He was watching with eyes of anxious longing for the
sight of a familiar figure emerging from a house, almost as diminutive
as his own, standing across the river on the far side of the valley.
There was never any question as to the longing in his dark eyes when
they were turned upon the house of Kate Seton, but the anxiety in them
now was less understandable.
It was his almost constant habit to watch for her appearance leaving
her home each morning. But to-day she had remained invisible. He
wondered why. It was her custom to be abroad early, and here it was
long past mid-day, and, so far, there had been no sign of her going.
He wondered was she ill. Helen had long since made her appearance. He
knew well enough that the new church building, and the many other
small activities of the village, usually claimed Helen's morning. That
was the difference, one of the many differences between the sisters.
Helen must always be a looker on at life--the village life. Kate--Kate
was part of it.
He sighed, and a look of almost desperate worry crossed his dark,
good-looking face. His thoughts seemed to disturb him painfully. Ever
since he had heard of Inspector Fyles's coming to the village a sort
of depression had settled like a cloud upon him--a depression he could
not shake off. Fyles was the last man he wished to see in Rocky
Springs--for several reasons.
He was reluctantly about to turn away, and pass on down to his
corrals, which were situated on the slope beside the house. There was
work to be done there, some repairs, which he had intended to start
early that morning. They had been neglected so long, as were many
things to do with his ranch.
With this intention he moved toward the end of the veranda, but his
progress was abruptly arrested by the sight of two horsemen in the
distance making their way down toward the village. For awhile he only
caught odd glimpses of them through the trees, but at last they
reached the main road of the village, and halted in full, though
somewhat distant, view of his house.
In a moment the identity of one of the men became certain in his mind.
In spite of the man's civilian clothing he recognized the easy poise
in the saddle of Inspector Fyles. He had seen him so many times at
comparatively close range that he was sure he could not be mistaken.
The sight of the police officer banished all his interest in the
identity of the second horseman. A dark look of bitter, anxious
resentment crept into his eyes, and all the mildness, all the
gentleness vanished out of his expressive features. They had suddenly
grown hard and cold. He knew that trouble was knocking at the door of
Rocky Springs. He knew that his own peace of mind could never be
restored so long as the shadow of Stanley Fyles hovered over the
village.
Presently he saw the two horsemen part. Fyles rode on down toward the
village while the other turned westwards, but the now hot eyes of the
watching man followed only the figure of the unwelcome policeman until
it was lost to view beyond the intervening bush.
As the officer disappeared the rancher made a gesture of fierce anger.
"Kate, Kate," he cried, raising his clenched fists as though about to
strike the unconscious horseman, "if I lose you through him,
I'll--I'll kill him."
Now he hurried away down to the corrals with the air of a man who is
endeavoring to escape from himself. He suddenly realized the necessity
of a vent for his feelings.
But his work had yet to suffer a further delay. He had scarcely
reached the scene of operations when the sound of galloping hoofs
caught and held his attention. He had quite forgotten the second
horseman in his bitter interest in the policeman. Now he remembered
that he had turned westward, which was in the direction of his ranch.
The sounds were rapidly approaching up the track toward him. His eyes
grew cold and almost vicious as he thought. Was this another of the
police force? The force to which Fyles belonged?
He stood waiting at the head of the trail. And the look in his eyes
augured ill for the welcome of the newcomer.
The sounds grew louder. Then he heard a voice, a somewhat familiar
voice. It was big, and cheerful, and full of a cordial good humor.
"By Judas! he was a thief, and an outrageous robber, but you can go,
my four-footed monument to a blasted rogue's perfidy. Five hundred
good dollars--now, at it for a final spurt."
Charlie Bryant understood. The man was talking to his horse. Had he
needed evidence it came forthwith, for, with a rush, at a headlong
gallop, a horseman dashed from amid the bushes and drew up with a jolt
almost on top of him.
"Charlie!"
"Bill! Good old--Bill!"
The greetings came simultaneously. The next instant Big Brother Bill
flung out of the saddle, and stood wringing his brother's hand with
great force.
"Gee! It's good to see you, Charlie," he cried joyously.
"Good? Why, it's great, and--and I took you for one of the damned
p'lice."
Charlie's face was wreathed in such a smile of welcome and relief,
that all Big Brother Bill's doubts in that direction were flung
pell-mell to the winds.
Charlie caught something of the other's beaming enthusiasm.
"Why, I've been expecting you for days, old boy. Thought maybe you'd
changed your mind. Say, where's your baggage? Coming on behind? You
haven't lost it?" he added anxiously, as Bill's face suddenly fell.
"I forgot. Say, was there ever such a tom-fool trick?" Bill cried,
with a great laugh at his own folly. "Why, I left it checked at
Moosemin--without instructions."
Charlie's smiling eyes suddenly widened.
"Moosemin? What in the name of all that's----?"
"I'll have to tell you about it later," Bill broke in hastily. "I've
had one awful journey. If it hadn't been for a feller I met on the
road I don't know when I'd have landed here."
Charlie nodded, and the smile died out of his eyes.
"I saw him. You certainly were traveling in good company."
Bill nodded, towering like some good-natured St. Bernard over a
mild-eyed water spaniel.
"Good company's a specialty with me. But I didn't come alongside any
of it, since I set out to make here 'cross country from Moosemin on
the advice of the only bigger fool than myself I've ever met, until I
ran into him. Say, Charlie, I s'pose its necessary to have a deal of
grass around to run a ranch on?"
Charlie's eyes lit with the warmest amusement. This great brother of
his was the brightest landmark in his memory of the world he had said
good-bye to years ago.
"You can't graze cattle on bare ground," he replied watchfully. "Why?"
Bill's shoulders went up to the accompaniment of a chuckle.
"Nothing--only I hate grass. I seem to have gone over as much grass
in the last week as a boarding-house spring lamb. But for that feller,
I surely guess I'd still be chasing over it, like those 'strays' he
spends his life rounding-up."
A quick look of inquiry flashed in the rancher's eyes.
"Strays?" he inquired.
Bill nodded gravely. "Yes, he's something in the ranching line. Rounds
up 'strays,' and herds 'em to their right homes. His name's
Fyles--Stanley Fyles."
Just for an instant Charlie's face struggled with the more bitter
feelings Fyles's name inspired. Then he gave way to the appeal of a
sort of desperate humor, and broke into an uncontrolled fit of
laughter.
Bill looked on wondering, his great blue eyes widely open. Then he
caught the infection, and began to laugh, too, but without knowing
why.
After some moments, however, Charlie sobered and choked back a final
gurgle.
"Oh, dear!" he exclaimed. "You've done me a heap of good, Bill. That's
the best laugh I've had in weeks. That fellow a rancher?
Fyles--Stanley Fyles a--rancher? Well, p'raps you're right. That's his
job all right--rounding up 'strays,' and herding 'em to their right
homes. But the 'strays' are 'crooks,' and their homes the
penitentiary. That's Inspector Stanley Fyles, of the Mounted Police,
and just about the smartest man in the force. He's come out here to
start his ranching operations on Rocky Springs, which has the
reputation of being the busiest hive of crooks in Western Canada.
You're going to see things hum, Bill--you've just got around in time."
CHAPTER XI
THE UNREGENERATE
Later in the afternoon the two brothers found themselves seated on the
veranda talking together, as only devoted relationship will permit
after years of separation.
They had just returned from a brief inspection of the little ranch for
Bill's edification. The big man's enthusiasm had demanded immediate
satisfaction. His headlong nature impelled him to the earliest
possible digestion of the life he was about to enter. So he had
insisted on a tour of inspection.
The inspection was of necessity brief. There was so little to be seen
in the way of an outward display of the prosperity his elder brother
claimed. In consequence, as it proceeded, the newcomer's spirits fell.
His radiant dreams of a rancher's life tumbled about his big
unfortunate head, and, for the moment, left him staggered.
His first visit was to the barn, where Kid Blaney, his brother's
ranchman, was rubbing down two well saddle-marked cow-ponies, after
his morning out on the fences. It was a crazy sort of a shanty, built
of sod walls with a still more crazy door frame, and a thatched roof
more than a foot thick. It was half a dug-out on the hillside, and
suggested as much care as a hog pen. The floor was a mire of
accumulations of manure and rotted bedding, and the low roof gave the
place a hovelish suggestion such as Bill could never have imagined in
the breezy life of a rancher, as he understood it.
There were one or two other buildings of a similar nature. One was
used for a few unhealthy looking fowls; another, by the smell and
noise that emanated therefrom, housed a number of pigs. Then there was
a small grain storehouse. These were the buildings which comprised the
ranch. They were just dotted about in the neighborhood of the house,
at points most convenient for their primitive construction.
The corrals, further down the slope, offered more hope. There were
three of them, all well enough built and roomy. There was one with a
branding "pinch," outside which stood a small hand forge and a number
of branding irons. At the sight of these things Bill's spirit
improved.
When questioned as to pastures and grazing, Charlie led him along a
cattle track, through the bush up the slope, to the prairie level
above. Here there were three big pastures running into a hundred acres
or more, all well fenced, and the wire in perfect order. Bill's
improving spirits received a further fillip. The grazing, Charlie told
him, lay behind these limits upon the open plains, over which the
newcomer had spent so much time riding.
"You see, Bill," he said, half apologetically, "I'm only a very small
rancher. The land I own is this on which the house stands, and these
pastures, and another pasture or two further up the valley. For
grazing, I simply rent rights from the Government. It answers well
enough, and I only have to keep one regular boy in consequence. Spring
and fall I hire extra hands for round-up. It pays me better that way."
Bill nodded with increasing understanding. His original dreams had
received a bad jolt, but he was beginning a readjustment of focus.
Besides, his simple mind was already formulating fresh plans, and he
began to talk of them with that whole-hearted enthusiasm which seemed
to be the foundation of his nature.
"Sure," he said cordially. "And--and you've done a big heap, Charlie.
Say, how much did dad start you out with? Five thousand dollars? Yes,
I remember, five thousand, and our mother gave you another two
thousand five hundred. It was all she had. She'd saved it up in years.
It wasn't much to turn bare land into a money-making proposition,
specially when you'd had no experience. But we're going to alter all
that. We're going to own our grazing, if it can be bought. Yes, sir,
we're going to own a lot more, and I've got nearly one hundred
thousand dollars to do it with. We're going to turn these barns into
barns, and we're going to run horses as well as cattle. We're going to
grow wheat, too. That's the coming game. All the boys say so down
East--that is, the real bright boys. We're just going to get busy, you
and me, Charlie. We're going to have a deed of partnership drawn up
all square and legal, and I'm going to blow my stuff in it against
what you've got already, and what you know. That's what I'm here for."
By the aid of his big voice and aggressive bulk Bill strove to conceal
his obvious desire to benefit his brother under an exterior of strong
business methods. And he felt the result to be all he could desire. He
told himself that a man of Charlie's unbusiness-like nature was quite
easy to impress. When it came to a proper understanding of business he
was much his brother's superior.
Charlie, however, was in no way deceived, but such was his regard for
this simple-minded creature that his protest was of the mildest.
"Of course we could do a great deal with your money, Bill, but--but
it's all you've got, and----"
His protest was hastily thrust aside.
"See here, Charlie, boy, that's right up to me," Bill cried, with a
buoyant laugh. "I'm out here to ranch. That's what I've come for,
that's what I've worn my skin to the bone for on the most outrageously
uncomfortable saddle I've ever thrown a leg over. That's why I took
the trouble to keep on chasing up this place when my brain got plumb
addled at the sight of so much grass. That's why I didn't go back to
find the feller--and shoot him--for advising me to get off at Moosemin
instead of hitting back on my tracks for the right place to change
trains. You see, maybe I haven't all the horse sense in some things
you have, but I've got my back teeth into the idea of this ranching
racket, and my dollars are going to talk all they know. I tell you,
when my mind's made up, I can't be budged an inch. It's no use your
trying. I know you, Charlie. You're scared to death I'll lose my
money--well, I'm ready to lose it, if things go that way. Meanwhile,
I've a commercial proposition. I'm out to make good, and I'm looking
for you to help me."
Charlie looked into the earnest, good-natured face with eyes that read
deep down into the open heart beneath. A great regret lay behind them,
a regret which made him hate and despise himself in a way he had never
felt before. He was thinking whither his own follies had driven him;
he was thinking of his own utter failure as a man, a strong,
big-principled man. He was wondering, too, what this kindly soul would
think and feel when he realized how little he was changed from the
contemptible creature his father had turned out of doors, and when he
finally learned of the horrors of degradation his life really
concealed.
He had no alternative but to acquiesce before the strong determination
of his brother, and though his words were cordial, his fears, his
qualms of conscience underlying them, were none the less.
So they came back to the house, and finally foregathered on two
uncomfortable, rawhide-seated, home-made chairs, while Bill enlarged
upon his plans. It was not until these were completely exhausted that
their talk drifted to more personal matters. Then it was that Charlie
himself opened up the way, with a bitter reference to the reasons
that saved him from completely going under when their father shipped
him out to this forlorn spot to regenerate.
He talked earnestly, leaning forward in his chair. His delicate hands
were tightly clasped, as his eyes gazed out across the valley at a
spot where Kate Seton's house stood beyond the river.
Bill sat listening. He wanted Charlie to talk. He wanted to learn all
those little things, sometimes even very big things, which can only be
read between the lines when the tongue runs on unguardedly. He knew
his brother's many weaknesses, and it was his ardent desire to
discover those signs of betterment and strengthening he fondly hoped
had taken place in the passing of years.
He lolled back with the luxury of an utterly saddle-weary man. His
heavy bent pipe hung loosely from the corner of his mouth. His big
blue eyes were steady and earnest.
"Yes," Charlie went on, after a moment's thought, "I'm glad, mighty
glad, I came here when I did." He gave a short mirthless laugh. "I
doubt if my satisfaction is inspired by any moral scruple," he added
hastily, as the other nodded. "Say, can you understand how I feel when
I say I believe all moral scruple has somehow decayed, rotted, died in
me? I don't mean that I don't want to be decent. I do; but that's
because decency appeals to me from some sort of artistic feelings
which have survived the wreck I made of life years ago. No, moral
scruples were killed stone dead when I was chasing through Europe
hunting Art, searching for it with eyes too young to gaze upon
anything more beautiful than a harsh life of strict discipline.
"Now I have to follow inclinations that have somehow got the better of
all the best qualities in me. That's how I'm fixed now. And, queer as
it may seem, that's been my salvation--if you can call it salvation.
When I first came here I was ready to drift any old way. I did drift
into every muck-hole that appealed to me. I didn't care. As I said,
moral scruples were dead in me. Then this same self-indulgence did me
a good turn. The only good turn it's ever done me."
The eyes gazing across the valley grew very soft.
"Say, Bill," he began again, after a brief, reflective pause, "I came
here, and--and found a woman. The greatest, the best woman God ever
created. She was strong, big-spirited, beautiful. She'd come out here
to earn a living with her sister. She'd left the East for no better
reason than her big spirit of independence, and a desire to live
beyond the narrow confines of convention. Say, I think I went crazy
about that woman."
The man was smiling very softly. All Bill's senses were alert. His
slow brain was groping for the subtle comprehension which he felt was
needed for a full understanding.
"That woman came near to saving me--from myself," Charlie went on,
with a tenderness he was unaware of. "And it was through that very
weakness of self-indulgence. I love her that bad it's bigger than
anything else in my life. Say, I'd rather have her good opinion,
and--and liking--than anything in life. It's more to me than any of
those desires that have always claimed me. But there are times when
even her influence isn't quite big enough. There are times when even
she can't hold me up. There are things back of my head I can't
beat--even through her--at times. That's why I say she's come near
saving me. Not quite--but near.
"Bill, guess you can't understand. Guess no one can. I fight, fight,
fight. She fights, too. She fights without knowing it, too, because
always in my mind is a picture of her handsome face, and eyes of
disapproval. That picture wins most times--but not always. Wait till
you see Kate, Bill, then you'll understand. I just love her to
death--and that's all there is to it. She only likes me. She'll never
feel for me same as I do for her. How can she?--I'm--but I guess you
know what I am. Everybody who knows me knows that I'm a hopeless
drunkard."
The man's final admission came without any self-pity or bitterness. It
is doubtful if there was any shame in him at the acknowledgment. Bill
marveled. He could not understand. He tried to picture himself making
such an admission, and to estimate his feelings at it. Shame,
unutterable shame, was all he could think of, and his good-natured
face flushed with shame for his brother, who had somehow so squandered
all his better feelings.
Charlie saw the flush, and the tenderness died out of his eyes. He
shook his head.
"Don't feel that way about it," he cried bitterly. "I'm not worth it.
Besides, I can't stand it from--you. Only--from Kate. I know what
you're thinking. You're bound to think that way. You were born with a
man's body--a big, strong man's body. I was born weak and puny. I was
born all wrong. I don't say it in excuse. I merely state a fact. Look
at me beside you, both children of the same parents. I'm like a woman,
I can't even grow the hair of a man on my face. My mother reveled in
what she regarded as the artistic beauty of my features, my hands"--he
held out his thin hands with their long tapering fingers--"and my love
for all those softer things of life that should only be found in
female nature. She gloried in those things and fostered them. She did
her best, all unknowingly, bless her, to kill the last vestige of
manhood in me. And all the time it was crying out, crying out
bitterly. It was growing stronger and stronger, as my physique
remained undeveloped. Finally it became too great to withstand. Then,
when it turned loose, I was without power to check it. My moral
strength was not equal to the tide, and all my passions swayed me
whithersoever they chose. Again I say this is no excuse; it is merely
fact as I see it. I was powerless to resist temptation. The woman who
once looses her hold on her moral nature can never recover herself.
That is nature--her nature--and, by the curse of fate, it is also
mine."
For the moment Bill had no answer. He sat with his eyes averted. All
his affection for his erring brother was uppermost, all his sympathy
and pity. But he dared not display them. All that Charlie had said was
true. His whole appearance was effeminate. He was a man without the
physical support belonging to his sex. As he said, he was left
powerless by nature and upbringing to fight a man's battle on the
plains of moral integrity. His fall had been drink, with its
accompanying vices, and Bill realized now, after five years' absence,
how hopeless his brother's reformation had become. If his love for
this woman could not save him, then surely nothing on earth could. For
Bill, in his simple fashion, believed that such an appeal was above
all in its claims upon any real man.
He groped for something to say, for something that might show Charlie
that his affection remained utterly unaltered, but he had no great
cleverness, and the right thing refused to come to his aid. As the
silence lengthened between them his groping thoughts took their own
course, which led him to the name, "Kate," which the other had used.
He remembered he had heard it that day once before.
"Kate?" he inquired lamely. "Kate--who?"
"Kate Seton."
In an instant Bill's whole attitude underwent a change. He sat up,
and, removing his pipe, dashed the charred ashes from its bowl.
"Why, that's the sister of--Helen Seton."
Charlie nodded, his eyes lighting with a sharp question.
"Sure. But--you don't know--Helen?"
Bill's face beamed.
"Met her on the trail," he cried triumphantly. "No end of a pretty
girl. Gray eyes and fair hair. Might have been walking on Broadway,
New York--from her style. Fyles told me about her."
"Fyles?"
Charlie's eyes suddenly darkened with resentment. He rose abruptly
from his chair, and began to pace the veranda. Then he halted, and
looked coldly down into his brother's eyes.
"What did he say?" he demanded shortly.
Bill's eyes answered him with question for question.
"Just told me who Helen was. Said she had a sister--Kate. Said they
were farmers--of a sort. Said they'd been here five years. Why?"
Charlie ignored the question.
"That's all?" he demanded.
"Sure." Bill nodded.
Then the hardness died out of Charlie's eyes to be replaced once more
by his usual gentle smile.
"I'm glad. You see, I don't want him--around Kate. Say----" he
hesitated. Then he moved toward the door of the house. "Guess I'll get
supper. I forgot, you must be starving."
* * * * *
Kate Seton had spent the whole morning at home. The work of her little
farm had claimed her. She had been out with her two disreputable boys
around the grain, now rapidly turning from its fresh green to that
delicate tint of yellow so welcome to the farmer. It was a
comparatively anxious time, for the cattle grazing at large upon the
prairie loved the sweet flavor of the growing grain, and had no
scruples at breaking their way through the carelessly constructed
barbed wire fencing, and wrecking all that came within their reach.
The fences needed "top railing," and Kate could not trust the work to
her two men without supervision. So she spent the morning in their
company.
After the mid-day meal, as soon as Helen had left the house on a
journey to Billy Unguin's drapery store, she sat herself down at a
small bureau in their kitchen-parlor and drew a couple of books,
suspiciously like account books, from one of its locked drawers, and
settled herself for an hour's work upon them.
The room, though not large, was comfortable. It was full of odd,
feminine knick-knacks contrived by Helen's busy hands. The walls were
dotted with a number of unframed water colors, also the work of the
younger of the two women. There were three comfortable rockers, so
dear to the heart of the women of the country. Besides these, there
was a biggish dining table, and, in one corner of the room, beside a
china and store cupboard, a square iron cook stove stood out, on which
a tin kettle of water was pleasantly simmering.
It was a homely room which had been gradually furnished into its
present atmosphere of comfort by two pairs of busy hands, and both
Kate and Helen loved it far more, in consequence, than if it had borne
the hall-mark of lavish expenditure.
But Kate, as she sat before her bureau, had no thought of these things
just now. She was anxious to complete her work before Helen returned.
It was always impossible to deal with figures while her sister was in
the room. And her figures now needed careful attention.
She opened her books, and soon her busy pen was at work. From a pocket
in her underskirt she drew a number of papers, and these she carefully
sorted out.
Having arranged them to her satisfaction the task of entering figures
in her book was resumed. Finally she performed the operation of many
sums, the accurate working out of which took considerable time and
pains. Then, from the same pocket, she drew a bundle of notes which
she carefully counted and checked by the figures in the books.
This work completed she sat back idly in her chair with a thoughtful,
ironical smile in her dark eyes, and the holder of her pen poised in
the grip of her even white teeth.
She was thinking pleasantly, with a half humorous vein running through
her thought. She was dreaming, day-dreaming, of many things dear to
her woman's heart. Now and again her look changed. Now a quick flash
leaped into her slumberous eyes, only to die out almost immediately,
hidden under that softer gleam which had so much humor in it. At
another time a grave look replaced all other expression; then, again,
a quick frown would occasionally mar the fair, smooth brow. But always
the dominating note of humorous thoughtfulness would return, as if
this were her chief characteristic.
Her day-dreaming did not last long, however. It was abruptly
dispelled, as such moods generally are. The sound of hurrying feet
brought a quick look that was one almost of anxiety into her usually
confident eyes. With one comprehensive movement she scrambled her
books and papers together and heaped them into the still open drawer.
Then she gathered up the money, and flung it in after the other
things.
As the door burst open and Helen ran into the room, her eyes bright
with excitement, and her breathing hurried and short from her run,
Kate was in the act of locking the drawer.
Helen halted as she came abreast of the table, and her dancing eyes
challenged her sister.
"At your Bluebeard's chamber again, Kate?" she cried, in mock
reproval. Then she raised a warning finger. "One of these days--mind,
one of these days, I surely will have a duplicate key made and get a
peek into that drawer, which you never open in my presence. I believe
you're carrying on an intrigue with some man. Maybe it's full of
letters from--Dirty O'Brien."
Kate straightened herself up laughing.
"Dirty O'Brien? Well, he's all sorts of a sport anyway, and I like
'sports,'" she said lightly.
Helen took up the challenge.
"'Sports'? Why, yes, there are plenty of 'sports'--of a kind--in this
place. I'll have to see if I can find one who can make skeleton keys.
I'd surely say that sort of 'sport' should be going round the village
all right, all right."
She nodded her threat at her sister, who was in no way disconcerted.
She only laughed.
"What's brought you back on the run?" she inquired.
"Why, what d'you s'pose?"
Kate shrugged, still smiling.
"I'd say the only thing that could fix you that way was a--man."
"Right. Right in once. A man, Kate, not a mouse," Helen declared,
"although I allow they're both motive forces calculated to set me
running. The only thing is, one attracts, and the other repels. This
is distinctly a matter of attraction."
"Who's the man?" demanded the practical Kate, with a look of real
interest in her handsome eyes.
"Why, Big Brother Bill, of course, the man I promised you all I'd
marry."
Helen suddenly dashed at her sister and caught her by the arm in
pretended excitement.
"I've seen him, Kate, seen him!" she cried. "And--and he raised his
hat to me. He's big--ever so big, and he's got the loveliest, most
foolish blue eyes I've ever seen. That's how I knew him. Say, and when
I saw him with Inspector Fyles, I remembered what Charlie said about
him having no sense, and I had to laugh, and I think he thought I was
grinning at him, and that's why he raised his hat to me. It seemed so
comical--looked just as if he was being brought in charge of a
policeman for fear he'd lose himself, and would never find himself
again. He's surely a real live man, and I've fallen in love with him
right away, and, if you don't find something to send me up to see
Charlie about right away, I'll--I'll go crazy--or--or faint, or do
something equally foolish."
Kate's amusement culminated in a peal of laughter. She knew Helen so
well, and was so used to her wild outbursts of enthusiasm, which
generally lasted for five minutes, finally dying out in some whimsical
admission of her own irresponsibility.
She promptly entered into the spirit of the thing.
"Let's see," she cried, gazing thoughtfully about the room, while
Helen still clung to her arm. "An excuse--an excuse."
"No, no," cried the impetuous Helen. "Not an excuse. I never make any
excuse for wanting to be in a man's company. Besides----"
"Hush, child," retorted Kate. "How can I think with you chattering?
I've got to find you an excuse for going across to Charlie's place.
Now what shall it be? I know," she cried, suddenly darting across the
room, followed by the clinging Helen. "I've got it."
"Got what?" cried the other, with difficulty retaining her hold.
"Why, the excuse, of course," cried Kate, grabbing up two books from a
chair under the window. "Here, I promised to send these to Charlie
days ago. That's it," she went on. "Take these, and," she added
mischievously, "I'll write a note telling him to be sure and introduce
you to Big Brother Bill, as you're dying to--to make love to him!"
"Don't you dare, Kate Seton, don't you ever dare," cried Helen
threateningly. "I'll shoot you clean up to death with one of your own
big guns if you do. I never heard such a thing, never. How dare you
say I want to make love to him? I--I don't think I even want to see
him now--I'm sure I don't. Still, I'll take the books up if
you--really want Charlie to have them. You see, I sure don't mind what
I do to--to help you out."
Kate's eyes opened wide. Then, in a moment, she stood convulsed.
"Well, of all the sauce," she cried. "Helen, you're a perfect--imp.
Now for your pains you shan't take those books till after supper."
Helen's merry eyes sobered, and her face fell.
"Kate--I----"
"No," returned the other, with pretended severity. "It's no use
apologizing. It's too late. After supper."
Helen promptly left her side, and, with a laugh, ran to the wall where
a pair of revolvers were hanging suspended from an ammunition belt.
She seized one of the weapons by the butt, and was about to withdraw
it from its holster. But, in a flash, Kate was at her side.
"Don't Helen!" she cried, in real alarm. "Let go of that gun. They're
both loaded."
Helen withdrew her hand in a panic, her pretty face blanching.
"My, Kate!" she cried horrified. "They're--loaded?"
The other nodded.
"Whatever do you keep them loaded for? I--I never knew. You--you
wouldn't dare to--use them?"
Kate's dark eyes were smiling, but the smile was forced.
"Wouldn't I?" she said, with a curious set to her firm lips. Then she
added in a lighter tone: "They're all that stand between us and--the
ruffians of Rocky Springs."
For a moment Helen looked into her sister's eyes as though searching
for something she had lost.
"I--I thought you'd changed, Kate," she said at last, almost
apologetically. "I thought you'd forgotten all--that. I--thought you'd
become a sort of 'hired girl' in this village. Guess I'll have to wait
until after supper--seeing you want me to."
CHAPTER XII
THE DISCOMFITURE OF HELEN
It was well past six o'clock in the evening when the two brothers
completed the discussion of their future plans. It had been a great
day for Bill. A day such as one may look forward to in long
anticipatory moments of dreaming, but the ultimate realization of
which often falls so desperately short of the anticipation. In the
present instance, however, no such calamity had befallen. He felt that
his weary journeyings, with their many discomforts and trials, had not
proved vain. Many of his hopes had been fully realized.
The unselfishness of the man was supreme. He wanted nothing for
himself, but the delight of sharing in the life of his less fortunate
brother, and changing the course of that fortune into the happier
channels wherein his own lay. And Charlie seemed to accept the
position. He certainly offered no opposition, and, if his manner of
acceptance was undemonstrative, even to an excess of reserve, at least
it was sufficiently cordial to satisfy the unsuspicious mind of Big
Brother Bill.
Had the big man's wide, blue eyes been less ready to accept all they
beheld, had his mind been more versed in the study of human nature,
and those shadowy, inexpressible feelings glancing furtively out of
eyes intended only to express carefully controlled thoughts, then Bill
must have detected reluctance in his brother. There were moments, too,
when only a half-heartedness found vent in the man's verbal acceptance
of his brother's proposals, which should have been significant, and
certainly invited investigation.
But even if he observed these things Bill undoubtedly misread them. He
had no reason to doubt that his presence, and all his enthusiastic
plans were welcome, and so he was left blinded to any other feelings
on the part of his brother than those which he verbally expressed.
That Charlie delighted in his presence there could be no doubt, but as
to those other things, well, a close observer might well have been
forgiven had he felt sorry for the bigger man's single-minded
generosity. To the end Bill felt confident, and remained quite
undisturbed.
There were still fully two hours of daylight left when Charlie finally
rose from his seat upon the veranda.
He smiled down at the big figure of the brother he so affectionately
regarded.
"We'll need to set about getting your baggage sent through from
Moosemin to-morrow," he said. Then he added with a quizzical gleam in
his eyes: "Guess you've got the checks all right?"
Bill nodded with profound gravity, and dived into one of his pockets.
"Sure," he replied, dragging forth a bunch of metal discs on a strap.
"Five pieces."
"Good." Charlie nodded. His brother's unconsciousness amused him.
Then, after a moment, his gaze drifted across the valley, and came to
rest on the little home of the Setons, and he went on reflectively, "I
need to get around a piece before dark," he said. Then with an
unmistakable question in his dark eyes: "Maybe you'll fancy a walk
around--meantime?"
Bill's eyes lit good humoredly.
"Which means I'm not wanted," he said with a laugh.
Then he, too, rose. He stretched himself like some great contented
dog.
"I've a notion to get a peek at the village," he said. "I'll call
along down at the saloon and hunt Fyles up. Guess I owe him a drink
for--finding me."
At the mention of Fyles's name a curious look changed the expression
of his brother's regard. A short laugh that had no mirth in it was the
prompt reply.
"You can't buy Fyles a drink in Rocky Springs," Charlie exclaimed.
"Maybe you can buy all the drink _you_ want. But there's not a
saloonkeeper in the Northwest Territories would hand you one for
Fyles. This is prohibition territory, and I guess Fyles is hated to
death--hereabouts."
For a moment Bill's eyes looked absurdly serious.
"I see," he demurred. "You--hate him--too?"
Charlie nodded.
"For--that?" suggested Bill.
Charlie shrugged. "I certainly have no use for Inspector Fyles," he
declared. "Maybe it's for his work, maybe it isn't. It don't matter
either way."
The manner of Charlie's reply reminded his brother that his question
had been unnecessarily pointed, and he hastened to make amends.
"I'm kind of sorry, Charlie," he said, his face flushing with
contrition. "I didn't think. You see, I hadn't----"
But the other waved his regret aside.
"Don't worry," he said quickly. "Guess you can't hurt me that way. I
was thinking on other lines. What does matter, and matters pretty
badly, is that some day, if you stop around Rocky Springs, you'll find
it up to you to take sides between Fyles and----"
"And?" Bill's interest had become suddenly absorbed as his brother
paused, his gaze once more drifting away beyond the river. Finally,
Charlie turned back to him.
"Me," he said quietly. And the two stood facing each other, eye to
eye.
It was some moments before Bill's slow-moving wit came to his aid. He
was so startled that it was even slower than usual.
"You and--Fyles?" he said at last, his eyes full of absurd wonder. "I
don't understand. You--you are not against the law?"
Bill's wonder had changed to apprehension, and the sight of it
distracted his brother's more serious mood.
"Does a fellow always need to be against the law to get up against a
police officer?" he inquired, with a smile of amusement. Then his
smile died out, and he went on enigmatically. "Men can scrap about
most anything," he said slowly. "Men who _are_ men. I may be a poor
example, but----Say, when Fyles takes hold of things in Rocky Springs,
I guess he isn't likely to feel kindly disposed my way. That being so,
you'll surely be fixed one way or the other. Get me, Bill?"
Bill nodded dubiously.
"I get that, but--I don't understand----" he began.
But Charlie gave him no time to finish.
"Don't worry to," he said quickly. Then he gripped the other's
muscular arm affectionately. "See you later," he added, smiling
whimsically up into the troubled blue eyes as he moved off the
veranda.
Bill was left puzzled. He was thinking very hard and very slowly as he
looked after the departing man. He watched him till he reached the
barn and disappeared within it to get his horse. Then he, too, moved
away, but it was in the direction of the trail which led ultimately to
the village.
Bill's nature was too recklessly happy to long remain a prey to
disquieting thoughts. Once the avenue of spruce trees swallowed him up
he abandoned all further contemplation of his disquietude, and gave
himself up to the full enjoyment of his new surroundings.
* * * * *
It was in the gayest possible mood and highest spirits that Helen,
with her "two-book" excuse tucked under her arm, set out for Charlie
Bryant's ranch.
When she appeared at supper time Kate's dark eyes shone with
admiration and a lurking mischief. At the sight of Helen she clapped
her hands delightedly. The younger girl's smart, tailored suit had
made way for the daintiest of summer frocks, diaphanous, seductive,
and wholly fascinating.
"A vision of fluffy whiteness," cried Kate delightedly, as Helen sat
down at the table. "Helen," she went on, mischievously, "as a man
hunter you are just too dreadful. Poor Big Brother Bill, why, he
hasn't the chance of a rat in a corner. He surely is as good as
engaged, married, and--done for."
Helen's eyebrows went up in lofty resentment.
"Katherine Seton, I--don't understand you--thank goodness. If I did I
should want to box your ears," she added, in mild scorn. "You're a
perfectly ridiculous woman, and of no account at all."
Kate's amusement was good to see.
"Oh, Hel----" she cried.
But her sister cut her short.
"Don't use bad language, please. My name's 'Helen'--unless you've got
something pleasant to say."
Kate poured out the coffee, and helped herself to cold meat. The
supper was the characteristic evening meal of the village. Cakes, and
sweets, and cold meat.
"How could I have anything but something pleasant to say, with you
looking such a vision?" Kate went on, quite undisturbed. "Why, I
hadn't a notion you had such a pretty frock."
Helen's attitude modified, as she helped herself to home-made scones
and butter.
"I've been saving it up," she deigned to explain. "Do I look all
right? How's my hair?"
She beamed on her sister, waiting for an expected compliment.
"Lovely!" exclaimed Kate. Then with added mischief: "And your hair is
simply as fluffy as--as a feather duster."
Helen laughed. Her eyes were dancing with that merriment she could
never long restrain.
"I--I simply hate you, Kate," she cried. "I'm so upset I can't eat a
thing. Feather duster indeed. Well, it's better than the mop Pete
swabs up the floors with. If you'd said that, I'd sure have gone
straight off into a trance, and--and got buried alive. But your
appetite's awful, Kate, and I can't sit here forever. I'd say food's
mighty important, but it's nothing beside a _man_ waiting for you
somewhere, and you don't know where. Guess I'll have something to eat
before I go to bed. Please, Kate--please may I go?"
The humility of the final request was quite too much for Kate, who
laughed immoderately while she gave the required permission.
"Yes, off with you, bless your heart," she cried joyously. "And don't
you dare come back here without bringing your future husband with
you. Remember, I want to see him, too, and--and if you're not mighty
good, and nice to me, I'll see what I can do cutting you out.
Remember, too, I'm not quite on the shelf yet--in spite of what folks
may say. Off with you!"
Helen needed no second bidding. She snatched up her books, took a
swift glance at herself in the small mirror on the wall, and hastened
out of the house.
"So long, Kitty," she cried lightly; "my nets are spread for the big
fish, my dear. He's there, slumbering peacefully in the shady pool,
waiting to be caught. Do you think he's ever been fished before? I
hope he's not wily. You see, I'm so out of practice. That's the worst
of living in a place where men have to get drunk before they have the
courage to become attentive. And, Kitty, dear----"
"Off with you, you man hunter," cried Kate, from her place at the
table, "and don't you dare ever to call me 'Kitty' again. I----"
But the door was closed, and further expostulation was useless. The
next moment Kate beheld a waving hand through the window. She
responded, and, a moment later, as her sister passed from view, the
smile died out of her eyes.
She sat on at the table, although her meal was finished. And somehow
all her gaiety had dropped like a mask from her face, leaving her
handsome eyes strangely thoughtful and something hard.
* * * * *
Meanwhile Helen crossed the river by the quaint log footbridge which
had been one of the first efforts at construction upon which Kate had
embarked on arrival at Rocky Springs. It was stout, and, from a
distance, picturesque. Close to it was a trap for the unwary. For the
two sisters, and their hired men, it was a simple matter for
negotiation. They were used to its pitfalls, which increased with
every spring flood.
Beyond this the track wound through the bush on its way to the village
main trail, but Helen had no thought of adopting such a circuitous
route when the bush offered her a far more direct one. She vanished
into the wood like a flitting shadow, nor did she reappear until half
the slope up to Charlie Bryant's house had been negotiated.
Her reappearance was in the midst of a small clearing, whence she had
an uninterrupted view of Charlie's house, and a less clear view of the
winding track leading up to it.
Somehow, by the time she reached this spot, a marked change had come
over her. Her pretty, even brows were slightly drawn together in an
odd, thoughtful pucker. Her usually merry eyes were watchful and
sober. It may have been the gradient of the hills, but somehow her
gait had lost something of its buoyancy. Her steps were lagging, even
hesitating, and, when she finally halted, it was almost with an air of
relief.
There were several fallen tree trunks about, and, though they must
have been sufficiently inviting if she were weary with her effort, she
quite ignored them. She stood quite still, looking first ahead at her
goal, and then back over the valley toward the little house where her
sister was probably still watching her. Her eyes slowly became
expressive of doubt and indecision. It seemed as though she found it
hard to make up her mind about something.
After a moment or two she removed the two books from under her arm,
and idly read their titles. She knew them quite well, and promptly
returned them to their place with an impatient sigh.
Again her look had changed. Now her cheeks suddenly flushed a burning,
shamefaced crimson. Then they paled, and something like a panic grew
in her eyes. But this, too, passed, all but the panic, and, with a
little vicious stamp of her foot, she half determinedly faced the
ranch house on the hill. Her determination, however, was evidently
insufficient, for she did not move on, and, presently, she laughed a
short mirthless laugh. It was her belated sense of humor mocking her.
Her courage, she knew, had failed her. She could not live up to her
boasted claims as a man hunter.
But her laugh died almost at its birth. Something moving down the hill
among the trees caught her troubled eyes. Then, too, the sound of a
whistle reached her. Some one was approaching from the direction of
Charlie's house, whistling a tune which somehow seemed familiar. She
promptly warned herself it could not be Charlie. She never remembered
to have heard Charlie whistling so blithe an air.
Now she distinctly heard the sound of heavy, rapid footsteps drawing
nearer. The panic in her eyes deepened. They were staring intently at
the surrounding bush, searching for a definite sight of the intruder.
Nor had she to wait long. The path was just beyond the clearing, and
she had fixed her gaze upon a narrow gap in the foliage. She felt
almost safe in doing so, for the stranger must pass that way if he
were on the path, and the gap was so narrow that it would probably
escape his notice.
The whistling came nearer, so, too, the rapid footsteps. Then followed
realization. A figure passed the gap. She saw it quite plainly. The
big, broad-shouldered figure of a man with fair hair and blue eyes. It
was Big Brother Bill. Instinctively she drew back, entirely forgetful
of the fallen tree trunks. Then tragedy came upon her.
How it happened she didn't know. She afterward felt she never wanted
to know. Something seemed to hit her sharply at the back of the knees.
She remembered that they bent under her. Then, in a second, she found
herself sitting upon the ground with her feet sticking up in the air
in a perfectly ridiculous manner, and, by some horribly mysterious
means, with the support of a fallen sapling pine holding them there.
At the moment of impact she was too paralyzed with fear to move, then
as a sharp exclamation in a man's deep voice reached her, a wild
terror seized upon her, and, with a violent effort she rolled herself
clear of the log, scrambled to her feet, her dainty frock stained and
torn with her tumble, and fled for dear life down the hill.
Faster and faster she ran, breaking her way through all obstructing
foliage utterly regardless of the rents she was making in the soft
material of her frock. She felt she dared not pause for anything with
that man behind her. She felt that she hated him worse than anybody in
the world. To think that he must have witnessed her discomfiture, and
worse than all her two absurd feet sticking up in the air like--like
signposts. It was too awful to contemplate.
She did not pause for breath until she reached the footbridge. Then a
fresh panic set in. She had left the books behind. They were at the
place where she had fallen.
Oh dear, oh dear! He would find them. He would find her name in them.
He would take them back to Charlie, and her last hope would be gone.
She would undoubtedly be recognized!
She wanted to burst into tears, then and there, but something inside
her would not permit her such relief. Instead a whimsical humor came
to her aid and she laughed.
At first her laugh was pathetically near to tears, but the moment of
doubt passed, and the whole humor of the situation took hold of her.
She hurried on home, laughing as she went; and, desperately near
hysterics, she at last burst into her sister's presence.
Kate was on her feet in an instant.
"Oh, Kate," she cried, with a wild sort of laughter. "Behold the man
hunter--hunted!" Then she flung herself into a chair, gasping for
breath.
Kate's anxious eyes took in something of the situation at a glance.
"Stop that laughing," she cried severely.
Helen's laugh died out, and she sighed deeply. The next moment she
stood up, and began to smooth out her tattered frock.
"I'm--all right now--Kate," she said almost humbly. "But----"
Again Kate took charge of the situation.
"Go and change your frock before you tell me anything," she said
decidedly.
Helen was about to protest, but the quiet command of her sister had
its effect. She moved toward the door, and Kate's serious tones
further composed her.
"Take your time," she said. "You can tell me later."
Helen left the room, and Kate remained gazing after her at the closed
door.
But it was only for a few moments. The sound of footsteps approaching
the house startled her. She remembered the torn condition of her
sister's dress. The poor girl had been on the verge of hysterics. "The
man hunter hunted!" she had cried.
Kate glanced at her revolvers hanging on the wall. Then, with a shrug,
she flung open the door.
Big Brother Bill was standing outside it. He had removed his hat, and
the evening light was shining on his good-looking fair head. His wide
blue eyes were smiling their most persuasive smile as he held two
books out toward her.
"I'm fearfully sorry to trouble you, but I was just coming along down
from up there," he pointed back across the river, "and saw a--a lady
suddenly jump up as though she was scared some, and run on down the
hill toward this house. I guessed it must have been a--a rattler
or--or maybe a bear, or something had scared her, so I jumped in
to--to find it. I was too late, however. Couldn't find it. Only found
these two books instead. I just followed the lady on down here,
and--well, I brought 'em along."
The man's manner was so frankly ingenuous, and his whole air so
hopelessly that of a tenderfoot that Kate recognized him at once.
Instantly she held out her hand with a smile.
"Thanks, Mr. Bryant. They're my sister's. She was taking them up to
your brother. It's very kind of you to take so much trouble. Won't you
come in, and let her thank you herself? You see, we're great friends
of your brother's. I am Kate Seton, and--the lady you so gallantly
sought to help is my sister--Helen."
CHAPTER XIII
LIGHT-HEARTED SOULS
A pair of gray eyes were struggling to glare coldly into a pair of
amiably smiling blue eyes. It was a battle of one against an opponent
who had no idea battle was intended. From the vantage ground of only
partial understanding a pair of dark eyes looked on, smiling with the
wisdom which is ever the claim of the onlooker.
"This is my sister, Helen, Mr. Bryant," Kate said, with quiet
enjoyment, as her sister, perfectly composed once more, but still
angry with the world in general, abruptly entered the room from that
part of the house where her bedroom was situated.
As the words fell upon her ears, and she looked into the good-looking,
cheerful face of the man, all Helen's feelings underwent a shock, as
though a mighty seismological upheaval were going on inside her.
The man who had witnessed her discomfiture--the man who had dared to
be within one hundred miles of her when her daintily shod feet, with
a display of diaphanous stocking, had been waving in the air like two
wobbly semaphores celebrating Dominion Day or the Fourth of July,
or--or something. Those silly looking prying eyes had seen. How dared
he? What right had he to be walking down that particular trail at that
particular moment? How dared he whistle, any way? What right had he in
Rocky Springs? Why--why was he on earth at all?
At that moment Helen felt that if there was one combination in the
world she disliked more than another it was blue eyes and fair hair.
Yes, and long noses were hateful, too; they were always poking
themselves into other people's business. Big men were always clumsy.
If this man hadn't been clumsy he--he--wouldn't have been there to
see. Yes, she hated this man, and she hated her sister for standing
there looking on, grinning like--like a Cheshire cat. She didn't know
what a Cheshire cat was like, but she was certain it resembled Kate at
that moment.
"How d'you do?"
The frigidity of Helen's greeting was a source of dismay to the man,
who had suddenly become aware that she was again dressed in the
tailored suit which had so caught his fancy earlier in the day. His
dismay became evident to Kate, the onlooker. Helen, too, noted the
effect in his sobering eyes, and was resentfully glad.
"It was a lucky chance my coming along," Bill blundered. "You see, if
the dew had got on these books they'd have got all mussed. Must have
been a sort of fate about my being around, and--and finding 'em for
you."
"Fate?" sniffed Helen, with the light of battle in her eyes, while
Kate began to laugh.
"Why, sure," said Bill eagerly. "Don't you believe in fate? I do.
Say," he went on, gaining confidence from the sound of his own voice,
"it was like this. Charlie and I had been talking a piece, and then he
had to go off, and didn't want me. If he had, I should have gone with
him. Instead, I set off by myself, making toward the village. Being a
sort of feller who never sees much but what's straight ahead of him,
it didn't occur to me to look around at things. That's how it was I
didn't see you till I caught sight of your----"
"You needn't go into details," broke in Helen icily. "I just think it
was hateful your standing there looking on while I fell over that tree
trunk."
Bill's eyes took on a sudden blank look of bewilderment, which raised
a belated hope in Helen's broken heart, and set Kate chuckling
audibly.
"Tree trunk?" he exclaimed. "Did you fall? Say, I'm real sorry,
Miss Helen. I surely am. You see, I just caught sight of"--again
came Helen's warning glance, but the man went on without
understanding--"somebody in white, disappearing through the bushes,
on the run. I guessed a rattler, or a bear, or--or something had
got busy scaring you to death. So I jumped right in to fix him.
That's how I found these books," he finished up rather regretfully.
"And I was just feeling good enough to scrap a--a house."
A thaw had abruptly set in in Helen's frozen feelings. The memory of
those unfortunate feet of hers no longer waved before her mind's eye.
It was fading--fading rapidly. _He had not seen--them._ And as the
frozen particles melted, she could not help noticing what splendidly
cut features the man really had. His nose was really beautifully
shaped. She was glad, too, that his eyes were blue; it was her
favorite color, and went so well with fair hair, especially when it
was slightly wavy.
She smiled.
"Won't you sit down awhile?" she inquired, with a sudden access of
graciousness. "You see, we're very unconventional here, and your
brother's a great friend of ours." Then, out of the corners of her
eyes she detected Kate's satirically smiling eyes. She promptly
resolved to get even with her. "Especially Kate's, and--I'll let you
into a secret. A great secret, mind. We knew you were coming
to-day--had arrived, in fact--and Kate's been dying to see you all
day. Said she really couldn't rest till she'd seen Charlie's brother.
Truth."
Bill lumbered heavily into an ample rocker, and Helen propped herself
upon the table, while Kate, upon whom had descended an avalanche of
displeasure, suddenly bestirred herself.
"How dare you, Helen?" she cried, in an outraged tone. "You--mustn't
take any notice of her, Mr. Bryant. You see, she isn't
altogether--responsible. She has a naturally truth-loving nature, but
she has somehow become corrupted by contamination with this--this
dreadful village. I--I feel very sorry for her at times," she added,
laughing. "But really it can't be helped. She keeps awful company."
"Well, I like that," protested Helen, now thoroughly restored to good
humor by the conviction that Big Brother Bill had not witnessed her
shameful trouble. "Mr. Bryant will soon know which of us to believe,
after a statement like that."
"I always believe everybody." The man laughed heartily. "It saves an
awful lot of trouble."
"Does it?" inquired Kate, as she slipped quietly into the other
rocker.
Helen shook her head decidedly.
"Not when you're living in this 'dump' of a village. Say, Mr. Bryant,
you've heard of Mr. Ananias in the Bible? If you haven't you ought to
have. Well, the people who wrote about him never guessed there was
such a place as Rocky Springs, or they'd sure have choked rather than
have written about such a milk-and-water sort of liar as Mr. Ananias.
Truth, he's not a--circumstance. All you need to believe in Rocky
Springs is what you come up against, and then you don't need to be too
sure you haven't got--visions."
"Yes, and generally mighty unpleasant--visions," chimed in Kate, with
a laugh.
Bill's smiling eyes refused to become serious under the portent of
these warnings.
"Guess I've been around Rocky Springs about five hours, and the
visions I've had, so far, don't seem to worry me a thing," he said.
Helen smiled. She remembered her first meeting with this man.
"What were you doing with Fyles to-day?" she inquired unguardedly.
Bill suddenly brought his fist down on the arm of his rocker.
"There," he cried, as though he had suddenly made a great discovery.
"I knew it was you I saw on the trail. Why," he added, with guileful
simplicity, "you were wearing that very suit you have on now. Say,
was there ever such a fool, not recognizing you before?"
Helen was deceived--and so easily.
"I didn't think you really saw me," she said, without the least shame.
"You were so busy with the--sights." Bill nodded.
"Yes, we'd just come along down past that mighty big pine. Fyles had
told me it was the landmark. I--I was just thinking about things."
"Thinking about the old pine?" inquired Helen.
"Well, not exactly," replied Bill. "Though it's worth it. I mean
thinking about----. You see, a fellow like me don't need to waste many
big thinks. Guess I haven't got 'em to waste," he added deprecatingly.
Helen shook her head, but her laughing eyes belied the seriousness of
her denial.
"That's not a bit fair to--yourself," she said. "I just don't believe
you haven't got any big 'thinks.'"
Bill's manner warmed.
"Say, that makes me feel sort of glad, Miss Helen. You see, I'm not
such a duffer really. I think an awful lot, and it don't come hard
either. But folks have always told me I'm such a fool, that I've kind
of got into the way of believing it. Now, when I saw that pine and
the valley I felt sort of queer. It struck me then it was sort of
mysterious. Just as though the hand of Fate was groping around and
trying to grab me."
He reached out one big hand to illustrate his words, and significantly
pawed the air.
Helen's face wreathed itself in smiles.
"I know," she declared. "You felt your fate was somehow linked with it
all."
Kate was gently rocking herself, listening to the light-hearted
inconsequent talk of these two. Now she checked the movement of the
rocker and leaned forward.
Her eyes were smiling, but her manner was half serious.
"It's not at all strange to me that that old pine inspired you
with--superstitious feelings," she said. "It has the same effect on
most folks--right back to the old Indian days. You know, there's a
legend attached to it. I don't know where it comes from. Maybe it's
really Indian. Maybe it belongs to the time when King Fisher used to
live in the old Meeting House, before it was a--saloon. I don't know."
Helen suddenly raised herself to a seat upon the table. Her eyes lit,
and Big Brother Bill, watching her, reveled in the picture she made.
Now he knew her, his first feelings at sight of her on the trail had
received ample confirmation. She surely was one of the most delightful
creatures he had ever met.
"Oh, Kate, a legend," cried the girl, as she settled herself on the
table. "However did you know about it? You--you never told me."
Kate shook her head indulgently.
"I don't tell you everything," she said with mock severity. "You're
too imaginative, too young--too altogether irresponsible. Besides, you
might have nightmare. Anyway most folk know it in the village."
"Oh, Kate!"
"Say, tell us, Miss Seton," cried Bill, his big eyes alight with
interest. "If there's one thing I'm crazy on it is legends. I just
love 'em to death."
"I don't think I ought to tell it in front of Helen," Kate said
mischievously. "She's----"
Helen sprang from her seat and stood threateningly before her sister.
"Kate Seton," she cried, "I demand your story." Then she went on
melodramatically, "You've said too much or too little. You've got to
tell it right here and now, or--or I'll never speak to you
again--never," she finished up feebly.
Kate smiled.
"What a dreadful threat!" Then she turned to Bill. "Mr. Bryant, I
s'pose I'll have to tell her. You don't know what an awful tempered
woman it is. I really believe it would actually carry out its threat
for--five minutes."
Bill's good-natured guffaw came readily.
"I'll back Miss Helen up," he declared promptly. "If you don't tell us
we'll both refrain from speech for--five minutes."
Kate sighed.
"Oh, dear. Then I'll have to tell. It's bullying. That's what it is.
But--here goes."
Helen beamed upon Bill, and the man's blue eyes beamed back again.
While he settled himself in his chair Helen returned to her less
dignified seat upon the table.
"Let's see," began Kate thoughtfully. "Now, just where does it begin?
Oh, I know. There's a longish rhyme about it, but I can't remember
that. The story of it goes like this.
"Somewhere away back, a young chief broke away from his
tribe with a number of braves. The young chief had fallen in
love with the squaw of the chief of the tribe, and she with
him. Well, they decided to elope together, and the young
chief's followers decided to go with them, taking their
squaws with them, too. It was decided at their council that
they would break away from the old chief and form themselves
into a sort of nomadic tribe, and wander over the plains,
fighting their way through, until they conquered enough
territory on which to settle, and found a new great race.
"Well, I guess the young chief was a great warrior, and so
were his braves, and, for awhile, wherever they went they
were victorious, devastating the country by massacre too
terrible to think of. But the chief of the tribe, from which
these warriors had broken away, was also a great and savage
warrior, and when he discovered that his wife was faithless
and had eloped with another, stealing all his best war paint
and fancy bead work, he rose up and used dreadful language,
and gathered his braves together. They set out in pursuit of
the absconders, determined to kill both the wife and her
paramour.
"To follow the young chief's trail was an easy matter, for
it was a trail of blood and fire, and, after long days of
desperate riding, the pursuers came within striking
distance. Then came the first pitched battle. Both sides
lost heavily, but the fight was indecisive. The result of
it, however, showed the pursuers that they had no light task
before them. The chief harangued his braves, and prepared to
follow up the attack next day. The fugitives, though their
losses had been only proportionate with those of their
pursuers, were not in such good case. Their original numbers
were less than half of their opponents.
"However, they were great fighters, and took no heed, but
got ready at once for more battle. The young chief, however,
had a streak of caution in him. Maybe he saw what the braves
all missed. If in a fight he lost as many men as his
opponents, and the opponents persisted, why, by the process
of elimination, he would be quietly but surely wiped out.
"Now, it so happened, he had long since made up his mind to
make his permanent home in the valley of Leaping Creek. He
knew it by repute, and where it lay, and he felt that once
in the dense bush of the valley he would have a great
advantage over the attacks of all pursuers.
"Therefore, all that night, leaving his dead and wounded
upon the plains, he and his men rode hard for the valley. At
daybreak he saw the great pine that stood up on the horizon,
and he knew that he was within sight of his goal, and, in
consequence, he and his men felt good.
"But daybreak showed him something else, not so pleasant. He
had by no means stolen a march upon his pursuers. They, too,
had traveled all night, and the second battle began at
sunrise.
"Again was the fight indecisive, and the young chief was
buoyant, and full of hope. He told himself that that night
should see him and his squaw and his braves safely housed in
the sheltering bush of the valley. But when he came to count
up his survivors he was not so pleased. He had lost nearly
three-quarters of his original numbers, and still there
seemed to be hordes of the pursuers.
"However, with the remnant of his followers, he set out for
the final ride to the valley that night. Hard on his heels
came the pursuers. Then came the tragedy. Daylight showed
them the elusive pine still far away on the horizon, and his
men and horses were exhausted. He was too great a warrior
not to realize what this meant. There were his pursuers
making ready for the attack, seemingly hundreds of them.
Disaster was hard upon him.
"So, before the battle began, he took his paramour, and,
before all eyes, he slew her so that his enemy should not
wholly triumph, and incidentally torture her. Then he rose
up, and, in a loud voice, cursed the pine and the valley of
the pine. He called down his gods and spirits to witness
that never, so long as the pine stood, should there be peace
in the valley. Forever it should be the emblem of crime and
disaster beneath its shadow. There should be no happiness,
no prosperity, no peace. So, too, with its final fall should
go the lives of many of those who lived beneath its shadow,
and only with their blood should the valley be purified and
its people washed clean.
"By the time his curse was finished his enemies had
performed a great enveloping movement. When the circle was
duly completed, then, like vultures swooping down upon their
prey, the attacking Indians fell upon their victims and
completed the massacre.
"There!" Kate exclaimed. "That's about as I remember it. And a pretty
parlor story it is, isn't it?"
"I like that feller," declared Bill, with wholesome appreciation. "He
was good grit. A bit of a mean cuss--but good grit."
But Helen promptly crushed him.
"I don't think he was at all nice," she cried scornfully. "He deserved
all he got, and--and the woman, too. And anyway, I don't think his
curse amounts to small peas. A man like that--not even his heathen
gods would take any notice of."
Kate rose from her chair laughing.
"Tell the boys of this village that. Ask them what they think of the
pine."
"I've heard Dirty O'Brien say he loves it," protested Helen
obstinately. "Doesn't know how he could get on without it."
"There, Mr. Bryant, didn't I tell you she kept bad company? Dirty
O'Brien! What a name." Kate looked at the clock. "Good gracious, it's
nearly eight o'clock, and I have--to go out."
Bill was on his feet in a moment.
"And all the time I'm supposed to be investigating the village and
making the acquaintance of this very Dirty O'Brien," he said. "You
see, Charlie had to go out, as I told you. He didn't say when he'd
get back. So----." He held out his hand to the elder sister.
"Did Charlie say--where he was going?" she inquired quickly, as she
shook hands.
Bill laughed, and shook his head.
"No," he replied. "And somehow he didn't invite me to ask--either."
Helen had slid herself off the table.
"That's what I never can understand about men. If Kate were going
out--and told me she was going, why--I should just demand to know
where, when, how, and why, and every other old thing a curious
feminine mind could think of in the way of cross-examination. But
there, men surely are queer folks."
"Good-bye, Mr. Bryant," said Kate. She had suddenly lost something of
her lightness. Her dark eyes had become very thoughtful.
Helen, on the contrary, was bubbling over with high spirits, and was
loath to part from their new acquaintance.
"I hated your coming, Mr. Bryant," she explained radiantly. "I tell
you so frankly. Some day, when I know you a heap better, I'll tell you
why," she added mysteriously. "But I'm glad now you came. And thank
you for bringing the books. You'll like Dirty O'Brien. He's an awful
scallywag, but he's--well, he's so quaint. I like him--and his
language is simply awful. Good night."
"Good night."
Bill held the girl's hand a moment or two longer than was necessary.
It was such a little brown hand, and seemed almost swamped in his
great palm. He released it at last, however, and smiled into her sunny
gray eyes.
"I'm glad you feel that way. You know I have a sort of sneaking regard
for the feller who can forget good talk, and--and explode a bit. I--I
can do it myself--at times."
Helen stood at the door as the man took his departure. The evening was
still quite light, and Bill, looking back to wave a farewell, fell
further as a victim to the picture she made in the framing of the
doorway.
Helen turned back as he passed from view.
"You going out, Kate, dear?" she asked quickly.
Kate nodded.
"Where?"
"Out."
And somehow Helen forgot all the other inquiries she might have made.
CHAPTER XIV
THE HOUSE OF DIRTY O'BRIEN
It was late at night. The yellow lamplight left hard faces almost
repulsive under the fantastic shadows it so fitfully impressed upon
them. The low-ceiled room, too, gained in its sordid aspect. An
atmosphere of moral degradation looked out from every shadowy corner,
claiming the features of everybody who came within the dull radiance
of the two cheap oil lamps swinging from the rafters.
Dirty O'Brien's saloon was a fitting setting for a proprietor with
such a name. Crime of every sort was suggested in its atmosphere at
all time; but at night, when the two oil lamps, with their smoky
chimneys, were burning, when drink was flowing, when the room was full
of rough bechapped men belonging to the valley, with their long hair,
their unwashed skins, their frowsy garments, and the firearms adorning
their persons, when strident voices kept up an almost continual
babel of coarse oaths, interlarded with rough laughter, or deadly
quarrelings, when the permeation of alcohol had done its work and left
its victims in a condition when self-control, at all times weak enough
in these untamed citizens, was at its lowest ebb, then indeed the
stranger, unaccustomed to such sights and sounds, might well feel that
at last a cesspool of civilization had been reached.
The room was large in floor space, but the bark-covered rafters,
frowsy with cobwebs, were scarcely more than two feet above the head
of a six-foot man. The roof was on a gradual, flat slope from the bar
to the front door, which was flanked by windows on either side of it.
So low were the latter set, and so small were they, that a well-grown
man must have stooped low to peer through the befouled glass panes.
The walls of the building were of heavy lateral logs bare as the day
they were set up, except for a coating of whitewash which must have
stood the wear of at least ten years.
The evening had been a long and noisy one; longer and noisier than
usual. For a note of alarm had swept through the town--an alarm
which, in natures as savage and unscrupulous as those of the citizens
of the valley, promptly aroused the desperate fighting spirit always
pretty near the surface.
The gathering was pretty well representative of the place. The bar had
been crowded all night. Some of the men were plain townsmen belonging
to the purely commercial side of the place, and these were clad as
became citizens of any little western township. But they were the very
small minority, and had no particularly elevating effect upon the
aspect of the gathering. Far and away the majority were of the
prairie, men from outlying farms and ranches, whose hard, bronzed
features and toil-stained kits, marked them out as legitimate workers
who found their recreation in the foul purlieus of this drinking
booth merely from lack of anything more enticing. Then, too, a few
dusky-visaged, lank-haired creatures wearing the semi-barbaric costume
of the prairie half-breed found a place in the gathering.
But none of these were the loud-voiced, hard-swearing complainants.
That was left to a section of the citizens of the town who had
everything in the world to lose by the coming of the police. As the
evening wore on these gradually drew everybody's interest in the
matter, until the stirring of passions raised the babel of tongues to
an almost intolerable clamor.
Dirty O'Brien, sinister and cynical, stood behind his bar serving
every customer with a rapidity and nonchalance which the presence of
the police in the place could never disturb. But the situation was
well within his grasp. On this particular night his mandate had gone
forth, and, in his own bar, he was an absolute autocrat. Each drink
served must be devoured at once, and the empty glass promptly passed
back across the counter. These were hastily borne off by an assistant
to an adjoining room, where, in secret cupboards let into the sod
partition wall, the kegs of smuggled spirit were secreted. All drinks
were poured out in this room, and, on the first alarm, the secret
cupboards could be hidden up, and all sign of the traffic concealed.
Then there was nothing left to be seen but the musty display of
temperance drinks on the shelves behind the bar, and a barrel of four
per cent. beer, for the dispensing of which the existence of these
prohibition saloons was tolerated and licensed by the Government.
Dirty O'Brien knew the law to the last word. He only came up against
it when caught in the act of selling spirits. This was scarcely likely
to happen. He was far too astute. His only danger was a trap customer,
and the difficulties and dangers of attempting such a course, even the
most foolhardy would scarcely dare to risk in a place as untamed as
Rocky Springs.
Even the wildest spirits, however, were bound to reach their limit
of protest against this new move of the authorities, and by midnight
the majority of the customers had taken their departure from Dirty
O'Brien's booth. Thus, when the small hours crept on, only a trifling
gathering of his regular patrons still remained behind.
The air of the place was utterly foul. The stench of tobacco smoke
blending with the fumes of liquor left it nauseating. In the farthest
corner of the room, just beside one of the windows, a group of four
men were playing draw poker, and with these were Kate's two hired men,
Nick Devereux, with his vulture head and long lean neck, and Pete
Clancy, the half-breed, whose cadaverous cheeks and furtive eye marked
him out as a man of desperate purpose.
At another table Kid Blaney was amusing himself with a pack of cards,
betting on the turn-up with the well-known badman, Stormy Longton. For
the rest there was a group of citizens lounging against the bar, still
discussing with the proprietor the possibilities of the newly created
situation. These were the postmaster, Allan Dy, and Billy Unguin, the
dry-goods man, and the patriarch church robber known as Holy Dick. The
only other occupant of the bar was Charlie Bryant.
He had come there earlier in the evening for no other purpose than to
hear how the town was taking the arrival of the police, and to glean,
if possible, any news of the contemplated movements of Stanley Fyles.
This had been his purpose, and for some time he had resisted all other
temptation. Nor, apart from his weakness, was he without considerable
added temptation. Dirty O'Brien displayed a marked geniality toward
him the moment he came in, and, by every consummate art of which he
was master, sought to break through the man's resolve.
Charlie fell. Of course he fell, as in the end O'Brien knew he would.
And, once having fallen, he lingered on and on, drinking all that came
his way with that insatiable craving, which, once indulged, never left
him a moment's peace.
Now, silent, resentful, but only partially under the influence of
liquor, he was sitting upon the edge of the wooden coal box which
stood against the wall at the end of the counter. His legs were
outspread along the top of its side, and his back was resting against
the counter itself. His eyes were bright with that peculiar luster
inspired by a brain artificially stimulated. They were slightly
puffed, but otherwise his boyish features bore no sign of his
libations. One peculiarity, however, suggested a change in him. The
womanish delicacy of his lips had somehow gone, and now they protruded
sensually as he sucked at a cheap cigarette.
Although these were only slight changes in Charlie's appearance, they
nevertheless possessed a strangely brutalizing effect upon the
refinement of his handsome face. And, added to them was an air of
moroseness, of cold reserve, that suggested nothing so much as
impotent resentment at the conditions under which he found himself.
Without any appearance of interest he was listening to the talk of
those at the bar. And somehow, though his back was turned toward him,
O'Brien, judging by the frequency with which his quick-moving eyes
flashed in his direction, was aware of his real interest, and was
looking for some sign whereby he might draw him into the talk. But the
sign did not come, and the saloonkeeper was left without the least
encouragement.
Finally, however, O'Brien made a direct attempt. He was standing a
round of drinks and included in his invitation the man on the coal
box. He passed him a glass of whisky.
"Have another," he said, in his short way. Then he added: "On me."
Charlie thanked him curtly, and took the drink. He drank it at a gulp
and passed the glass back. But his general attitude underwent no
change. His eyes remained morosely fixed upon the poker players.
Billy Unguin winked significantly at O'Brien and glanced at Charlie.
"Queer cuss," he said, under his breath. Then he turned to Allen Dy,
as though imparting news: "Drinks alone--always alone."
Dy nodded comprehendingly.
"Sure sign of a drunkard," he returned wisely, in a similar undertone.
O'Brien smiled. He was about to give vent to one of his coldest
cynicisms, when Nick Devereux looked over from the card table and
claimed him.
"Say, Dirty," he drawled, in his rather musical southern accent,
"wher' in hell is Fyles located anyhow? There's been a mighty piece
of big talk goin' on, but none of us ain't seen him. Big talk makes
me sick." He spat on the floor as though to emphasize his disgust.
"He's around anyways," O'Brien returned coldly. "I've seen him right
here. After that he rode east. One of the boys see him pick up
Sergeant McBain an' two troopers. Will that do you?" he inquired
sarcastically.
Nick picked up a fresh hand of cards.
"Have to--till I see him," he said savagely.
"Oh, you'll see him all right--all right," O'Brien returned with a
laugh, while the men at the bar grinned over at the card players.
"Guess you boys'll see him later--all you need." Then his eyes flashed
in Charlie's direction, and he winked at those near him. "Maybe some
folks around here'll hate the sight of him before long."
Pete looked up, turning his cruel eyes with a malicious grin on
O'Brien.
"Guess there's more than us boys goin' to see him if there's trouble
busy. Say, I don't guess there's a heap of folk 'ud fancy Fyles
sittin' around their winter stoves in this city."
"Or summer stoves either," chuckled Holy Dick, craning round so that
his gray hair revealed the dirty collar on his soft shirt.
Stormy Longton glanced over quickly, while the kid shuffled the cards.
"Who cares a curse for red-coats?" he snorted fiercely, his keen,
scarred face flushing violently, his steel-gray eyes shining like
silver tinsel. "If Fyles and his boys butt in there'll be a dandy
bunch of lead flying around Rocky Springs. Maybe it won't drop from
the sky neither. There's fools who reckon when it comes to shooting
that fair play's a jewel. Wal, when I'm up against police butters-in,
or any vermin like that, I leave my jewelry right home."
O'Brien chuckled voicelessly.
"Gas," he cried, in his cutting way. "Hot air, an'--gas. I tell you
right here, Fyles and his crowd have got crooks beat to death in this
country. I'll tell you more, it's only because this country's so
mighty wide and big, crooks have got any chance of dodging the
penitentiary at all. I tell you, you folks ain't got an eye open at
all, if you can't see how things are. If I was handing advice, I'd say
to crooks, quit your ways an' run straight awhiles, if you don't fancy
a striped suit. The red-coats are jest runnin' this country through a
sieve, and when they're done they'll grab the odd rock, which are the
crooks, and hide 'em away a few years. You can't beat 'em, and Fyles
is the daddy of the outfit. No, sir, crooks are beat--beat to death."
Then his eyes shot a furtive look in Charlie's direction.
"The sharps ain't in such bad case," he went on. "I'd say it's the
sharps are worrying the p'lice about now. The prohibition law has got
'em plumb on edge. The other things are dead easy to 'em. You see, a
feller shoots up another and they're after him, red hot on his trail.
They'll get him sure--in the end, because he's wanted at any time or
place. It's different running whisky. They got to get the fellow in
the act o' running it. They can't touch him five minutes after he's
cached it safe--not if they know he's run it. If they find his cache
they can spill the liquor, but still they can't touch him. That's
where the sharps ha' got Fyles beat."
He chuckled sardonically.
"Guess I'd sooner be a whisky-running sharp than be a crook with Fyles
on my trail," he added as an afterthought.
"An' he's after the sharps most now," suggested Holy Dick, with a
contemplative eye on Charlie.
A laugh came from the poker table. Holy Dick glanced round as a harsh
voice commented----
"Feelin' glad, ain't you, Holy?" it said.
Holy Dick spat.
"I'd feel gladder, Pete Clancy, if I could put him wise to some o' the
whisky sharps," said the old man vindictively. "Maybe it would sheer
him off Rocky Springs."
The man's eyes were snapping for all the mildness of his words.
O'Brien replied before Pete could summon his angry retort.
"There's a good many sharps in the game in this town, and I don't
guess it would be a gay day for the feller that put any of 'em away.
Not that I think anybody could, by reason of the feller that runs the
gang. Look at that train 'hold-up' at White Point. Was there ever such
a bright play? I tell you, whoever runs that gang is a wise guy. He's
ten points flyer than Master Stanley Fyles. Say, Fyles was waiting for
that cargo at Amberley, and here are you boys, drinking some of it
right here, and with him around the town, too. Say, the boss of that
gang is a bright boy."
He sighed as though regretful that so much cleverness should have
passed him by in favor of another, and again his gaze wandered in
Charlie's direction.
"Well, I'm glad I'm not a--sharp," said Billy Unguin, preparing to
depart. "Come on, Allan," he went on to the postmaster. "It's past
midnight and----"
O'Brien chuckled.
"There's the old woman waiting."
Billy nodded good-naturedly, and the two passed out with a brief "good
night."
When they had gone Holy Dick leaned across the bar confidentially.
"Who'd _you_ guess is the boss of the gang?" he inquired.
O'Brien shook his head.
"Can't say," he said, with a knowing wink. "All I know is I can lay
hands on all the liquor I need right here in this town, and I'm
dealing direct with the boss. When the money's up right, the liquor's
laid any place you select. He don't give himself away to any customer.
He's the smartest guy this side of hell. He's right here all the time,
jest one of the boys, and we don't know who he is."
"No one's ever seen him--except his gang," murmured Holy, with a
smile. "Guess they wouldn't give him away neither."
Stormy Longton and the Kid arose from their table and demanded a final
drink. O'Brien served them and they took their departure.
"I sort of fancy I saw him once," said O'Brien, in answer to Holy
Dick's remark.
He spoke loudly, and his eyes again took in the silent Charlie in
their roving glance. At that instant the poker game broke up, and the
men gathered at the bar.
"What's he like?" demanded Nick derisively.
"Guess he's a hell of a man," laughed Pete sarcastically.
O'Brien eyed his interlocutors coldly. He had no liking for men with
color in them. They always roused the worst side of his none too easy
nature.
"Wal," he said frigidly, "I ain't sure. But, if I'm right, he ain't
such a hell of a feller. He ain't a giant. Kind o' small. All his
smartness wrapped in a little bundle. Sort o' refined-looking. Make a
dandy fine angel--to look at. Bit of a swell sharp. Got education bad.
But he ain't got swells around him. Not by a sight. His gang are the
lowest down bums I ever heard tell of. Say, they're that low I'd hate
to drink out of the same glass as any one of them." He picked up
Pete's glass and dipped it in water, and began to wipe it. "It 'ud
need to be mighty well cleaned first--like I'm doing this one."
His manner and action were a studied insult, which neither Pete nor
Nick attempted to take up. But Holy Dick's grin drew threatening
glances. Somehow, however, even in his direction neither made any
more aggressive movement. Toughs as they were, these two men fully
appreciated the company they were in. Holy Dick was one of the most
desperate men in Rocky Springs, and, as for O'Brien, well, no one had
ever been known to get "gay" with Dirty O'Brien and come off best.
Pete strove to grin the insult aside.
"Wal," he said, with a yawn, "I guess Fyles has 'some' feller to
handle, if your yarn's right, Dirty. Blankets fer mine and--right now.
Comin', Nick? An' you boys? Nick an' me are hayin' bright an' early
to-morrer mornin'," he added with a laugh, as he moved toward the
door.
The others slouched after him and with them went the cold voice of
O'Brien.
"You an' Nick hayin' is good--mighty good," he said, with a sneer.
"Nigh as good as Satin poppin' corn at a Sunday School tea."
"Or Dirty O'Brien handin' out scripture readin's in the same layout,"
retorted Pete, as he followed his companions out of the door.
Holy Dick ordered a "night-cap."
"Them two fellers make me hot as hell," cried O'Brien fiercely, as he
dashed the whisky into Holy's glass from a bottle under the counter.
"Ther', Holy, drink up, and git. I'm quittin' right now," he added.
"Say, I'm just sick to death handin' out drinks this day."
Holy Dick grinned, his bloodshot eyes twinkling with an evil leer,
which was never far from their expression.
"With things sportin' busy as they done to-day, guess you won't need
to keep at it long. Say, Fyles has brought you dollars an' dollars."
The old rascal gulped down his drink and slouched out of the bar
chuckling. He was always an amiable villain--until roused.
As the door closed behind him O'Brien leaned on his bar, and looked
over at the back view of the still recumbent figure of Charlie Bryant.
"I was thinkin' of closin' down, Charlie," he said quietly.
Charlie looked around. Then, when he became aware that the room was
entirely empty, he sprang up with a sudden start.
He looked dazed. But, after a moment, his confusion slowly faded out,
and he looked into the grinning eyes of probably the shrewdest man in
the valley.
"Feelin' good?" suggested the saloonkeeper. "Have a 'night-cap'?"
Charlie raised one delicate hand and passed it wearily across his
forehead. As it passed once more that eager craving lit his eyes. His
reply came almost roughly.
"Hell--yes," he cried. Then he laughed idiotically.
O'Brien poured out a double drink and passed it across to him. He took
a drink himself. He watched the other as he greedily swallowed the
spirit. Then he drank his more slowly. It was only the second drink he
had taken that day.
"Say, I'm runnin' out of rye and brandy," he said, setting his glass
in the bucket under the counter, and picking up Charlie's. "Guess I
need 10 brandy and 20 rye--right away."
He was wiping the glasses deliberately, and paused as though in some
doubt before he went on. But Charlie made no effort to encourage him.
Only in his eyes was a faint, growing smile, the meaning of which was
not quite apparent.
"I left the order--with the dollars--same place," O'Brien went on
presently. "Same old spot," he added with a grin.
Charlie's smile had broadened. A whimsical humor was peeping out of
his half-drunken eyes.
"Sure," he nodded. "Same old spot."
O'Brien set his glasses aside.
"I need it right away. I'd like it laid in my barn, 'stead of
the--usual spot. I wrote that on my order. Makes it easier--with Fyles
around."
Again Charlie nodded.
"Sure," he agreed briefly.
O'Brien found himself responding to the other's smile.
These whisky-runners meant everything to him, and he felt it incumbent
upon him to display his most amiable side.
"Say," he chuckled, "the bark of the old tree's held some dollars of
mine in its time. It's a hell of a good thing that tree has a yarn to
it. The folks 'ud sure fetch it down for the new church if it hadn't.
I'd say it would be awkward. We'd need a new cache for our orders
and--dollars."
Charlie shook his head.
"Guess they won't cut it down," he said easily. "They're scared of the
superstition."
O'Brien abandoned his smile and became confidential.
"Ain't you--worried some, Fyles gettin' around?"
For a moment Charlie made no answer. The smile abruptly died out of
his eyes, and a marked change came over his whole expression. He
suddenly seemed to be making an effort to throw off the effects of the
whisky he had consumed. He straightened himself up, and his mouth
hardened. The cigarette lolling between his lips became firmly
gripped. O'Brien, watching the change in him, suddenly saw his hands
clench at his sides, and understood the sudden access of resentment
which the mention of Fyles's name stirred in the man. He read into
what he beheld something of the real character of the "sharp," as he
understood it.
Charlie's reply came at last. It came briefly and coldly, and O'Brien
felt the sting of the rebuff.
"Guess I can look after myself," he said.
Then, without another word, he turned away, and walked out of the
saloon.
CHAPTER XV
ADVENTURES IN THE NIGHT
Big Brother Bill changed his mind after all. He did not go to
O'Brien's saloon. At least not when he left the Seton's house. Truth
to tell, his unanticipated visit to Helen Seton's home had inspired
him with a distaste for exploring the less savory corners of this
beautiful valley. For the time, at least, it had become a sort of
Garden of Eden, in which he had discovered his Eve, and he had no
desire to dispel the illusion by unnecessary contact with a grade of
creatures whose existence therein could only mar the beauties and
delights of his dream.
So, instead of carrying out his original intention, full of pleasant
dreaming, he made his way back toward his brother's home, hoping to
find him returned so that he could pour out his enthusiastic feelings
for the benefit of ears he felt would be sympathetic.
As he came to the clearing where he had first discovered Helen,
however, his purpose underwent a further modification. His sentimental
feelings getting the better of him, he sat down upon the very log over
which the girl had fallen, and turned his face toward where the little
home of the girls, with its single twinkling light, was rapidly losing
itself in the deep of the gathering twilight.
He had no thought for the elder girl as he sat there. Her bolder
beauty had no attraction for him, her big, dark eyes, so full of
reliant spirit were scarcely the type he admired. She might be
everything a woman should be, strong, sympathetic, generous, big in
spirit, and of unusual courage; she might be all these and more, but,
even so, she was incomparable to the fair delight of Helen's bright,
inconsequent prettiness. No, serious-minded people did not appeal to
him, and, in his blundering way, he told himself that life itself was
far too serious to be taken seriously.
Now Helen was full to the brim of a flippant, girlish humor that
appealed to him monstrously. He felt that it was a man's place to
think seriously, if serious thought were needed. And he intended when
he married to do the thinking. His wife must be wholly delightful and
feminine, in fact, just as Helen was. Pretty, laughing, smartly
dressed, and always preferring to lean on his decisions rather than
indulge in the manufacture of wrinkles on her pretty forehead striving
to find them for herself.
He felt sure that Helen would make a perfect wife for a man like
himself. Particularly now, as she was used to the life of the valley.
And, furthermore, he felt that a wife such as she would be essential
to him, since he had definitely come to live as a rancher.
She certainly would be an ideal rancher's wife. He could picture her
quite well mounted upon a high-spirited prairie-bred horse, riding
over the plains, or round the fences, since that seemed necessary, at
his side. He would listen to her merry chatter as he inspected the
work that was going forward, while she, simply bubbling with the joy
of living, looked on with a perfect sense of humor for those things
which her more sober-minded sister would have regarded as matters only
for serious consideration.
Thus he went on dreaming, his eyes fixed upon the distant, lamp-lit
window, all utterly regardless of the fall of night, and the passing
of the hours. Nor was it until he suddenly awoke to the chill of the
falling dew that he remembered that he was on his way home to tell
Charlie of all his pleasant adventures.
Stirring with that swift impulse which always seemed to actuate him,
he rose from his seat on the log and stumbled across the clearing,
floundering among the fallen logs with a desperate energy that cost
him many more bruises than were necessary, even in the profound
darkness of the, as yet, moonless night.
Finally, however, he reached the track which led up to the house and
hurried on.
A few minutes later he was wandering through the house searching in
the darkened rooms for his brother. It was characteristic of him that
he did not confine his search to the house, but sought the missing man
in every unlikely spot his vigorous and errant imagination could
suggest. He visited the corrals, he visited the barn, he visited the
hog pens and the chicken roosts. Then he brought up to a final halt
upon the veranda and sought to solve the problem by thought.
There was, of course, an obvious solution which did not occur to
him. He might reasonably have sought his bed, and waited until
morning--since Charlie had survived five years of life in the valley.
That was not his way, however. Instead, a great inspiration came to
him. It was an inspiration which he viewed with profound admiration.
Of course, he ought to have gone at once to the village, as he had
intended, and have visited O'Brien's saloon.
Forthwith he once more set out, and this time, his purpose being
really definite, after much unnecessary wandering he finally achieved
it.
He reached the saloon as O'Brien was in the act of turning out the two
swing lamps. Already one of them was turned low, and the saloonkeeper,
with distended cheeks, was in the act of putting an end to its
flickering life when Bill flung open the door.
O'Brien turned abruptly. He turned with that air which is never far
from his class, living on the fringe of civilization. His whole look,
his attitude, was a truculent demand, and had it found its equivalent
in words he would have asked sharply: "What in hell d'you want here?"
But the significance of his attitude quite passed Big Brother Bill by.
Had he understood it, it would have made no difference to him
whatever. But that was his way. He never saw much more than a single
purpose ahead of him, and possessed an indestructible conviction of
his ability to carry it out, even in the face of superlative or even
overwhelming odds.
He walked into the meanly lighted saloon, while O'Brien reluctantly
turned up the light again. For a moment the saloonkeeper's shrewd eyes
surveyed the newcomer, and, as they did so, a quiet, derisive contempt
slowly curled his thin lips.
"Wal?" he inquired, in the harsh drawl Bill was beginning to get
accustomed to since he had traveled so far from his eastern home.
Bill laughed. He always seemed ready to laugh.
"Guess I don't seem to have come along at the best time," he said,
glancing at the lamp above O'Brien. "Say, I'm sorry to have troubled
you. I thought maybe my brother was down here. I'm Bill Bryant, and
I'm looking for Charlie--my brother. Has--has he been along here
to-night?"
The man's big blue eyes glanced swiftly around the squalid, empty
interior. It was the first time he had been inside a western saloon of
this class, and he was interested.
Meanwhile O'Brien had taken him in from head to foot, and the growing
smile in his eyes expressed his opinion of what he beheld.
"You're Charlie Bryant's brother, eh?" he said contemplatively. "Guess
I sure heard you was around. Wal, since you're lookin' fer Charlie,
you'd better go lookin' a bit farther. He was around, but he's quit
half an hour since. I'd surely say ef you ain't built in the natur' of
a cat, or you ain't a walkin' microscope, you best wait till daylight
to find Charlie. There's more folks than you'd like to find Charlie at
night, but most of 'em ain't gifted with second sight. Say, seein'
you're his brother, an' ain't one of them other folk, I'll admit
you're more likely to find him somewhere around the old pine just now
than anywhere else. And, likewise, seein' you're his brother, you'd
better not open your face wider than Providence makes necessary--till
you've found him."
O'Brien's manner rather pleased the simple easterner, for his unspoken
contempt was beyond the reach of the latter's understanding. He smiled
his perfect amiability.
"Thanks," he cried readily. "I've got to go that way back, so I'll
chase around there." He half turned away, as though about to depart,
but turned again immediately. "It's that pine up on the side of the
valley, isn't it?" he questioned doubtfully.
"There's only one pine in this valley--yes."
O'Brien's hand was again raised toward the lamp.
"I see." Bill nodded. Then, "What's he doing there?" he asked sharply.
A thought had occurred to him. It was one which contained a faint
suspicion.
The other looked him squarely in the eyes. Then a sort of voiceless
chuckle shook his broad shoulders.
"Doin'? Wal, I guess he ain't sparkin' any lady friend, and I don't
calc'late he's holdin' any conversazione with Fyles and his crew."
O'Brien's amusement had spread to his features, and Bill found himself
wondering as to what internal trouble he was suffering from. "Charlie
Bryant, bein' a rancher, guess he's roundin' up a bunch of 'strays.'
Y'see, he's got a few greenback stock he's mighty pertickler about.
They was last seen around that pine."
Bill stared.
"Greenbacked--cattle?" he exclaimed incredulously.
O'Brien laughed outright, and Bill was no longer left in doubt as to
his malady.
"They're a fancy breed," the saloonkeeper declared, "and kind of rare
hereabouts. They come from Ottawa way. The States breed 'em, too.
Guess I'll say good night."
Bill was left with no alternative but to take his departure, for
O'Brien, with scant courtesy, extinguished the light overhead and
crossed to the second lamp. His visitor made for the door, and, as he
reached it, a flash of inspiration came to him. This man was making
fun of him, of his inexperience. Of course. He was half inclined to
get angry, but changed his mind, and, instead, turned with a
good-natured laugh as he reached the door.
"I see," he cried. "You mean dollars, eh? Charlie's collecting some
dollars--some one owes him? For the moment I thought you were talking
of cattle--greenbacked cattle. Guess you surely have the laugh on me."
O'Brien nodded.
"That's so," he admitted, and Bill closed the door behind him as the
saloonkeeper extinguished the second lamp.
Big Brother Bill hurried away in the darkness. He swung along with
long, powerful strides that roused dull echoes as he moved down the
wide, wood-lined trail. It seemed to him that he had been wandering
around the village for hours, the place was growing so ridiculously
familiar.
Nor was it until he reached the spot where the trail divided that
he realized what a perfect fool the saloonkeeper had made of him.
It always took a long time for such things to filter through his
good-natured brain. Now, however, he grew angry--really very angry,
and, for a moment, even considered the advisability of turning back to
tell the man what he thought of him.
After a few moments' consideration better counsel prevailed, and he
continued on his way, his thoughts filled with a great pity for a mind
so small as to delight in such a cheap sort of humor. No doubt it was
his own fault. Somehow or other he generally managed to impress people
with the conviction that he was a fool. But he wasn't a fool by any
means. No, not by any means. What was more, before he had done with
Rocky Springs he would show some of them. He would show Mr. O'Brien.
Greenbacked cattle! The thought thoroughly annoyed him.
But, as he clambered up the hill toward the pine, his heat moderated,
and his thoughts turned upon Charlie again. He remembered that he was
collecting money, and quite suddenly it occurred to him as strange
that he should be doing so as this time of night, and in the
neighborhood of the pine. In the light of greenbacked cattle, that,
too, seemed like perfect nonsense, unless, of course, some one were
living in the neighborhood of the tree. He could not remember to have
seen a house there. Wait a minute. Yes, there was. A smallish log
building, not far from the new church.
Of course. That was it. Why hadn't that fool O'Brien said so right out
instead of leaving him guessing? Yes, he would call at that house
on----. Hallo, what was that?
A great dull yellow light was gleaming through the foliage ahead. A
beautiful golden light. Bill laughed abruptly. It was the full moon
just appearing on the horizon. For the moment he had not recognized
it.
Now it held his attention completely. What a beautiful scene it made,
lighting up the shadowy foliage. His mind went back to the Biblical
story of the burning bush. He found himself wondering if it were like
that. Much brighter, of course. But how green it looked, and how
intensely it threw the thinner foliage into relief. What a pity Helen
Seton wasn't there to see it! It would appeal to her, he was sure.
Pretty name, Helen Seton.
From this point, as he toiled up the hill, his thoughts became
engrossed with the girl who had been so angry with him at first. He
wished he could find some excuse for seeing her again that night. But,
of course, that was----
He suddenly stopped dead, and his train of thought ended. There was
the great pine ahead of him right in the back of the moonlight.
There, too, was the figure of a man standing silhouetted against the
great ball of golden light as it rose slowly above the horizon.
Charlie! Yes, of course it was Charlie. There could be no doubt. The
slight figure was unmistakable. Even at that distance he was certain
he could make out his dark hair.
In a moment he was hailing the distant figure.
"Ho, Charlie!" he cried.
But his greeting met with an unexpected result. The figure vanished as
if by magic, and he was left at a loss to understand.
Then further astonishment came to him. There was a sharp rustling of
bush, and breaking of twigs close by, and the sound of heavy, plodding
hoofs. The next moment two horsemen broke from the dense cover about
him, and flung out of the saddle.
"Darnation take it, what in blazes are you shouting around for at this
hour of the night?"
Inspector Fyles stood confronting the astounded man. Beside him stood
another man in uniform, with three gold stripes on his arm. It was
Sergeant McBain.
In spite of his recognition of the Inspector, Bill's anger rose
swiftly, and his great muscles were set tingling at the man's words
and tone.
"'Struth!" he cried in exasperation. "This is a free country, isn't
it? If I need to shout it's none of your damn business. What in the
name of all that's holy has it got to do with you? I saw my brother
ahead, and was hailing him. Well?"
Bill's eyes were fiercely alight. He and Fyles stood eye to eye for a
moment. Then the latter's resentment seemed to suddenly die out.
"Say, I'm sorry, Mr. Bryant," he apologized. "I just didn't recognize
you in the darkness. Guess I thought you were some tough from the
saloon. That was your brother--ahead?"
Fyles's calm, clean-cut features were in strong contrast to his
subordinate's. He was smiling slightly, too. Sergeant McBain was
wholly grim.
Bill glanced from one to the other.
"Of course it was my brother," he said, promptly, mollified by the
officer's expression of regret. "I've been chasing him half the night.
You see, O'Brien told me he was up this way, and when I sighted him
yonder by the pine, I----"
He broke off. He had suddenly remembered O'Brien's warning. He had an
uncomfortable feeling that he had opened his mouth very wide. Far
wider than Providence had made necessary.
"You----?"
Fyles was distinctly smiling as he urged him.
But Bill had no intention of blundering further. He laughed, but
without his usual buoyancy.
"Say, what are _you_ doing up here?" he demanded, seeking to turn the
tables on the officer. "Rounding up 'strays'?"
At that moment a black cloud swept swiftly across the face of the
moon. And though Fyles's smile had broadened at the other's clumsy
attempt at subterfuge, it was quite lost upon Bill in the darkness.
Fyles glanced quickly at the sky.
"Storm," he said. Then he turned back to his questioner. "Why, I guess
I'm always chasing 'strays.' They're toughs mostly--pretty bad 'uns,
too." Then he laughed audibly. "Makes me laugh," he went on. "I've
been tracking the fellow for quite a piece. And all the time he's your
brother. You're sure?"
Bill nodded. He was still feeling uncomfortable.
"I'm glad you saw him," Fyles went on at once. "It's put us wise. We
don't need to waste any more time. It's lucky, with a storm coming on.
Guess we'll get right back, McBain," he added, turning to his
companion.
Fyles had no more difficulty in fooling the guileless Bill than
O'Brien had.
"Going home?" Bill inquired of the officer as the latter turned to his
horse.
"Sure."
"Me, too."
Fyles leaped into the saddle. McBain, too, had mounted.
"Best hurry," said Fyles, with another quick glance at the sky. "We
get sharpish storms hereabouts in summer. You'll be drowned else. So
long."
Bill moved away.
"So long," he cried, relieved at the parting. "I haven't far to go,
but since you reckon a storm's getting busy I'll take a cut through
the bush. It'll be quicker that way."
As he thrust his way into the bush he glanced back at the two
policemen. They were both in the saddle watching him. Neither made any
attempt at the hasty departure the Inspector had suggested.
However, their attitudes gave him no uneasiness. Truth to tell, he did
not realize any significance. The one thing that did concern him and
trouble him was that he somehow felt convinced that he had committed
the very indiscretion O'Brien had warned him against.
The whole thing was very disquieting. An air of mystery seemed to have
suddenly surrounded him, and he hated mystery. Why should there be any
mystery? If there was one thing he delighted in more than another, it
was the thought that his life was all in the open. The broad daylight
could search the innermost corners of his every action. He had nothing
in the world to hide. Why then should he suddenly find himself
actively concerned with this atmosphere of mystery which had suddenly
closed about him?
But Bill had not done with the mistakes of the evening. He made
another one now--in leaving the trail.
Within five minutes of leaving the two police officers he found
himself blindly floundering his way through an inky forest. The sky
was jet black. The moon had long since switched off her light. The
last star had concealed its twinkle behind the banking clouds of the
summer storm. Now great warm splashes of rain had begun to fall.
CHAPTER XVI
FURTHER ADVENTURES
Half an hour later tragedy befell.
Drenched to the skin, blinded by the deluge of torrential rain,
thoroughly confused beyond all recognition of his whereabouts in the
tangle of bush through which he was thrusting his way, all his senses
dazed by the fierce overhead detonations, and the streams of blazing
fire splitting the black vault above, Big Brother Bill beat his way
along the path of least resistance by sheer physical might.
All idea of direction had left him. Up hill or down hill had become
one and the same to him. He felt he must keep moving, must press on,
and, in the end, he would reach his destination.
At last, almost wearied out by his efforts, he came to a definite halt
in a bush that seemed to afford no outlet whatsoever. Even the way he
had entered it was lost, for the heavy foliaged boughs had closed in
behind him in the darkness, utterly cutting off his retreat.
For a moment he stood like an infuriated steer at bay, caught in the
narrow branding "pinch." He waited for a revealing flash of lightning
in the hope that it would show him a way out. He should have realized
the futility of his hope, but, if he were soaked by the downpour, his
spirit of optimism was as yet by no means drowned.
The flash he awaited came. The whole valley seemed to be lit from end
to end. Then it was gone as swiftly as it had come, leaving a pitchy
blackness behind it. But in that brief flash Bill told himself he had
seen the trail just beyond the clump of bush in the midst of which he
stood. Summoning all his strength he hurled himself to thrust his way
toward it. He fought the resisting boughs with all his great strength,
backed by every ounce of his buoyant spirits. Then, in a moment, Fate
stepped in, and--released him.
His sensations were brief but tumultuous. He had a feeling that an
earthquake had opened the ground at his feet. With all his might he
sought to save himself from the yawning chasm. But the sudden jolt of
his great weight was more than his muscles could withstand. His hands
relaxed their grip upon the foliage and he fell with a great
splash--into the river.
He had driven his way through the overhanging foliage of the river.
Big Brother Bill was not easily disconcerted by any physical
catastrophe to himself. Nor did his sudden immersion now add one
single pulse beat. The obvious thing, being a strong swimmer, was to
strike out and get clear of the dripping trees, which he promptly
proceeded to do, and, reaching the middle of the stream, and
discovering that the rain had ceased, he philosophically consoled
himself with the thought that, at least, he knew where he was.
Five minutes later he climbed up the opposite bank out of the water.
His first object at once became the ascertaining of his bearings. With
a serious effort of argument he finally concluded he was on the wrong
side of the river, which meant, of course, that the matter must be put
right without delay. Seeing that the water was cold, in spite of the
warmth of the summer evening, he was reminded of the footbridge
opposite the Setons' house. Consequently, the further problem became
the whereabouts of that bridge.
Glancing up at the sky, possibilities presented themselves. The clouds
were breaking almost as rapidly as they had gathered, and, with great
decision, he concluded that the best thing to do would be to await the
return of the moonlight, and occupy the interim by wringing some of
the uncomfortable moisture out of his clothes.
Ten minutes later his patience was rewarded. The moon shone out upon
the stream at his feet, and there, less than one hundred yards to the
west of him, the ghostly outline of the bridge loomed up. He really
felt that Fate, at last, was doing her best.
He set off at once at as swinging a gait as his damp condition would
permit, and he even found it possible to whistle an air as he moved
along, to the accompanying squelch of his water-logged boots.
But, as the footbridge was approached, his purpose received a setback.
The home of the Setons loomed up in the moonlight and promptly
absorbed his attention. The moon was at its full once more, and the
last clouds of the summer storm had passed away, leaving the
wonderful, velvety night sky a-shimmer with twinkling diamonds.
The front of the house was in full light, so pale, so distinct, that
no detail of it escaped his interested eyes. There was the door with
its rain-water barrel, there was the shingle roof. The lateral logs of
its walls were most picturesque. The only thing that struck him as
ordinary was, perhaps, the window----. Hallo! What was that at the
window?
He paused abruptly, and stared hard.
He started. It was a woman! A woman sitting on the sill of the open
window! Of all the----. Well, if that wasn't luck he felt he would
like to know what was. He wondered which of the sisters it was--Kate
or Helen. He was confident it was one of them. He would soon find out.
With a tumultuously beating heart he promptly diverged from his
course, and set off straight for the house. It was always his way to
act on impulse. Rarely did he give things a second thought where his
inclinations were concerned.
As he drew near, Kate Seton's deep voice greeted him. Its tone was
velvety in its richness, nor was there the least inflection of
astonishment in its tone.
"That you, Mr. Bryant?" she said, without stirring from her attitude
of luxurious enjoyment.
Bill came up hurriedly.
"I s'pose it is," he said with a laugh. "All that the river hasn't
washed away. Say," he went on, with amiable inconsequence, "there's
just two things puzzling my fool head, Miss Seton: Why Fate takes a
particular delight in handing me so many pleasant moments with so many
unpleasant kicks? And what wild streak of good luck finds you sitting
in the moonlight this hour of the night? It surely was a scurvy trick
of Fate dumping me in the creek, when there's a bridge to walk over,
just to land me right here, where you're handing up fancy dreams to a
very chilly but beautiful moon. Guess I'm kind of spoiling the picture
for you though. I may be some picture to look at, but I wouldn't say
it's worth framing--would you?"
Kate smiled up at him. His dripping condition was obvious enough. Nor
could she help her amusement. Knowing something of the man, he became
doubly grotesque in her eyes.
"It needs courage to put things nicely under such adverse conditions,"
she said, with a laugh. "And I like courage." Then she went on in her
easy, pleasant way: "It was the storm fetched me out of bed. I never
can resist a storm. So I just had to dress and come right out here to
watch it. Why are you around, anyway? Tell me about--about the river,
and how you got into it."
Bill laughed joyously.
"Guess that's an easy one," he said lightly. "I was on my way home
when I met that policeman, Fyles. He put me wise to the storm coming
up--which I guessed was bright and friendly of him. You see, I hadn't
located it. It was up to me to make Charlie's place quick, so I got
busy on a short cut. Say, did you ever take a short cut--in a hurry?
Don't ever do it. 'Tisn't worth it--if you're in a hurry. Of course, I
lost myself in the storm, and Fate began handing me one or two. Fate's
always tricky. She likes to wait till she gets you by the back of the
neck, so you can't do a thing, and then passes you all that's coming
to you. Guess she's had me by the neck quite awhile now, what with one
thing and another. However, I mustn't blame her too much. You see, I
lost myself, and it was she who found me, though I don't think
anything of the way she did it. I was boosting through what I thought
was a reasonable sort of bush, and found it wasn't. It was the
overhang of the river, and when I dropped through I found myself in
the water. Still, I knew that water was the river, and I knew where
the river was. I'm grateful, in a way, but I can't help feeling Fate's
got a dirty side to her nature, and bridges are fool things anyway,
for always being where they aren't wanted."
Kate's laugh was one of whole-hearted amusement. Big Brother Bill's
whimsical manner appealed to her.
"Maybe Fate thought you were out later than you ought to be," she
said. "You--a stranger."
But the girl's remark had a different effect upon Bill than might have
been expected. His smile died out, and all his lightness vanished.
Once more he was feeling that atmosphere of mystery closing about him.
It had oppressed him before, and now again it was oppressing him.
For a moment he made no answer. He was debating with himself in his
blundering way. Finally, with a quick, reckless plunge, he made up his
mind.
"I--was looking for Charlie," he said. "I've been trying to find him
ever since I left here."
The girl's smile had passed, too. A growing trouble was in her eyes.
"Charlie--is still out?" she demanded sharply. "And Fyles--where did
you meet Inspector Fyles?"
The dark eyes were full of anxiety now. Kate's voice had lost its
softness. Nor could Bill help noticing the wonderful strength that
seemed to lie behind it.
"I can't say where Charlie is now," the man went on, a little
helplessly. "I saw Fyles close by that big pine tree."
"Close by the pine tree?" Kate repeated the words after him, and her
repetition of them suddenly endowed them with a strange significance
for Bill.
With an air of having suddenly abandoned all prudence, all caution,
Bill flung out his arms.
"Say, Miss Seton," he said, in a sort of desperation, "I'm
troubled--troubled to death. I can't tell the top-side from the
bottom-side of anything, it seems to me. There's things I can't
understand hereabouts, a sort of mystery that gets me by the neck and
nearly chokes me. Maybe you can help me. It seems different, too,
talking to you. I don't seem to be opening my mouth too wide--as I've
been warned not to."
"Who warned you?"
The question came sharp and direct.
"Why, O'Brien. You see, I went down to the saloon after I'd searched
the ranch for Charlie, and asked if he had been there. O'Brien was
shutting up. He said he had been there, but had gone. Then he told me
where I'd be likely to find him, but warned me not to open my mouth
wide--till I'd found him. Said I'd likely find him somewhere around
that pine. Said he'd likely be collecting some money around there.
"Well, I set out to make the pine, and I didn't wonder at things for
awhile. It wasn't till I got near it, and I saw the moon get up, and,
in its light, saw Charlie in the distance near the pine, that this
mystery thing got hold of me. It came on me when I hollered to him,
and, as a result of it, saw him vanish like a ghost. But----"
"You called to him?"
The girl's question again came sharply, but this time with an air of
deep contemplation.
"Yes. But I didn't get time to think about it. Just as I'd shouted two
horsemen scrambled out of the bush beside me. One of 'em was Fyles.
The other I didn't know. He'd got three stripes on his arm."
"Sergeant McBain," put in the woman quietly.
"You know him?"
Kate shrugged.
"We all know him about here."
Bill nodded.
"Fyles cursed me for a fool for hollering out. Said he'd been watching
that 'tough,' and didn't want to lose sight of him. I got riled. I
told him a few things, and said I'd a right to hail my brother any old
time. Then he changed around and said he was sorry, and asked me if I
was sure it was my brother. When I told him 'yes,' he thanked me for
putting him wise, and said I'd saved him a deal of unnecessary
trouble. Said there was no more need to watch him--seeing he was my
brother. That's when he told me about the storm, and I hit my short
cut, and, finally, reached--the river. Now, what was he watching for,
and who did he mistake Charlie for? What's the meaning of the whole
thing? Why did O'Brien warn me? These are the things that get me
puzzled to death. Maybe you can tell me--can help me out?"
He waited, confidently expecting an explanation that would clear up
all the mystery, but none was forthcoming. Instead, when Kate finally
replied, there was an almost peevish complaint in her tone.
"I wish you had taken O'Brien's warning more to heart," she said.
"Maybe you've done a lot of harm to-night. I can't tell--not yet."
"Harm?" Bill stood aghast.
"Yes--harm, man, harm." Kate's whole manner had suddenly undergone
a change. She seemed to be laboring under an apprehension that
almost unnerved her. "Don't you know who Fyles is after? He's after
whisky-runners. Don't you know why O'Brien warned you? Because he
believes, as pretty nearly everybody believes--Fyles, too--that your
brother Charlie is the head of a big gang of them. Mystery? Mystery?
There is no mystery at all--only danger, danger for your brother,
Charlie, while Fyles is on his track. You don't know Fyles. We, in
this valley, do. It is his whole career to bring whisky-runners under
the hammer of the law. If he can fix this thing on Charlie he will do
it."
The girl sprang from her seat in her agitation, and began to pace the
wet ground.
"Charlie? Though he's your brother, I tell you Charlie's the most
impossible creature alive. Everything he does, or is, somehow fosters
the conviction that he is against the law. He drinks. Oh, how he
drinks! And at night he's always on the prowl. His associates are
known whisky-runners, men whom the police, everybody, knows have not
the wit to inspire the schemes that are carried out under the very
noses of the authorities. What is the result? The police look for the
brain behind them. Charlie is clever, unusually clever; he drinks, his
movements are suspicious. He's asking for trouble, and God knows he's
going to find it."
A sudden panic was swiftly overwhelming Big Brother Bill. Though he
knew no fear for himself it was altogether a different matter where
his brother was concerned. He ran the great fingers of one hand
through his wet, fair hair, an action that expressed to the full his
utter helplessness.
"Say," he cried desperately, "Charlie's no crook. By God, I'll swear
it! He's just a weak, helpless babe, with a heart as big as a house.
Charlie a crook? Say, Miss Seton, you don't believe it, do you?"
Kate shook her head.
"I know he's not," she said gently. Then in a moment all her fierce
agitation returned. "But what's the use? Tell the folks in the valley
he isn't, and they'll laugh at you. Tell that to Fyles." She laughed
wildly. "Man, man, there's only one thing can save Charlie from this
stigma, from Fyles. Let him leave the valley. It's the only way." She
sighed and then went on, her manner becoming suddenly subdued and
rather hopeless. "But nothing on earth could move him from here,
unless it were a police escort taking him to the penitentiary."
She returned to her seat in the window, and when she spoke again her
whole manner had undergone a further change. It was full of that
womanly gentleness which fitted her so well.
"Mr. Bryant," she said, with a pathetic smile lighting her handsome
features, and softening them to an almost maternal tenderness, "I'm
fonder of Charlie than any creature in the world--except Helen. Don't
make any mistake. I'm not in love with him. He's just a dear, dear,
erring, ailing brother to me. He can't, or won't help himself. What
can we do to save him? Oh, I'm glad you've come here. It's taken a
load from my heart. What--what can we do?"
Again the big fingers raked through the man's wet hair.
"I--wish I knew," Bill lamented helplessly. But a moment later a
quick, bright look lit his big blue eyes. "I know," he almost shouted.
"Let's hunt this gang down--ourselves."
Kate's gaze had been steadily fixed upon the far side of the valley,
where Charlie Bryant's house stood. Now, in response to the man's wild
suggestion, it came slowly back to his face.
"I hadn't thought of--that," she said, after a pause.
In a wild burst of enthusiasm Bill warmed to his inspiration.
"No," he cried. "Of course not. That's because you aren't used to
scrapping." He laughed. "But why not? I'll do the scrapping, and
you--you just do the thinking. See? We'll share up. It's dead easy."
"Yes--it would be dead easy," Kate demurred.
"Easy? Of course it's easy. I'm pretty hot when it comes to a scrap,"
Bill ran on with added confidence. "And a bunch of whisky-runners
don't amount to a heap anyway."
Suddenly Kate rose from her seat. She moved a step toward him and laid
one brown hand gently on his arm. She was smiling as she had smiled at
the thought of her regard for this man's brother. There was something
almost motherly now in her whole attitude.
"You're a big, brave soul, and like all brave souls you're ready at
all times to act--act first and think afterwards," she said very
gently. "You said I was to think. Let me think now. You see, I know
this place. I know this class of man. It's the life of the police to
deal with these whisky-runners, and they--they can do nothing against
them. Then what are we, you, with your brave inexperience, I, with my
woman's helplessness, going to do against them? Believe me, the men
who carry on this traffic are absolutely desperate creatures who would
give their lives at any moment rather than go to the penitentiary.
Life to them, their own and their enemy's, means nothing. They set
no value on it whatsoever. The trade is profitable, and"--she
sighed--"against the law. Those engaged in it live for the excitement
of fighting the law. That's one of the reasons which makes it
impossible that Charlie could be one of them. No, Mr. Bryant, I guess
it's not for us to do this thing. We just couldn't do a thing. But we
must think of Charlie, and, when we've thought, and the time comes,
why, then--we'll act. Fyles is a brave man, and a just man," she went
on, with a slight warmth. "He's a man of unusual capacity, and worth
admiration. But he is a police officer," she added regretfully. "In
saving Charlie from him we shall prevent one good man wronging
another, and I guess that should be good service. Let's content
ourselves with that. Will you help?"
Big Brother Bill had no hesitation at any time. He was carried away by
the enthusiasm Kate's words inspired. He thrust out one great hand and
crushed the woman's in its palm.
"Sure I'll help. I've just got two hands and a straight eye, and when
fight's around I don't care if it snows. My head's the weak spot. But,
anyway, what you say goes. We'll save Charlie, or--or--Say, a real
bright woman's just about the grandest thing God ever made."
Kate winced under the crushing force of his handshake, but she smiled
bravely and thankfully up into his face as she bade him "good night."
CHAPTER XVII
BILL PEEPS UNDER THE SURFACE
The surprises of the night were not yet over for Big Brother Bill. It
almost seemed as if a lifetime of surprises were to be crowded into
his first night in the valley of Leaping Creek.
Still thoroughly moist, he finally reached home to find his brother
there, waiting for him.
Of course, the big man promptly blundered.
Charlie was in the living room, sitting in a dilapidated rocking
chair. An unopen book was in his lap, and his dark, clever face was
turned toward the single window the room possessed, as the heavy tread
of Bill sounded on the veranda.
It was obvious he was still laboring under the influence of the
drink; it was also obvious, though less apparent, that he was laboring
under an emotion, which unusually disturbed him. His eyes were shining
with a gleaming light which might have expressed anger, excitement,
or even simply the effect of his libations. Whatever it was, Bill
recognized, without appreciating its meaning, a definite change from
the man he had so cordially greeted earlier in the day; a recognition
which made his blundering now, more hopelessly than ever, an
expression of his utter lack of discretion.
"Say, Charlie, boy," he cried, as he entered the little room, filling
it almost to overflowing with his robust personality, "I've chased
half over the valley looking for you. Then I saw you at the old pine
and shouted, and you sort of faded away. I thought I'd 'got' 'em. What
with that, and then falling into the river, and one or two minor, but
more or less unpleasant accidents, I've had one awful time. Say, this
valley's got me beat to death."
The simplicity of the man was monumental. No one else could have
looked upon that slight figure, huddled down in the big old rocker,
without having experienced a feeling of restraint; no one could have
observed the drawn, frowning brows, and the hard lines about the still
somewhat sensual mouth, without using an added caution in approaching
him. There were fires stirring behind Charlie's dark eyes which were
certainly ominous.
Now, as he listened to his brother's greeting, swift anger leaped into
them. His words came sharply, and almost without restraint. Big
Brother Bill was confronted by another side of his nature, a side of
which he had no knowledge whatever.
"You always were a damned fool," Charlie cried, starting heatedly
forward in his chair. "I told you I was going out. If you had any sort
of horse sense you'd have understood I wasn't in need of a wet-nurse.
What the devil do you want smelling out my trail as if you were one of
the police?" Then he suddenly broke into an unpleasant laugh. "You
came here in Fyles's company. Maybe you caught the police infection
from him."
Bill stared in wide-eyed astonishment at the harsh injustice of the
attack. For one second his blood ran hot, and a wild desire to
retaliate leaped. But the moment passed. Though he was not fully aware
of Charlie's condition, something of it now forced itself upon him,
and his big-hearted regret saved him from his more rampant feelings.
He sat himself on the edge of the table.
"Easy, Charlie," he said quietly, "you're kind of talking recklessly.
I'm no wet-nurse to anybody. Certainly it's not my wish to interfere
with you. I'm--sorry if I've hurt you. I just looked around to tell
you my adventures, I'm no--spy."
Charlie rose from his seat. He stood swaying slightly. The sight of
this outward sign of his drunken condition smote the good-natured Bill
to the heart. It was nothing new to him in his erring brother. He had
seen it all before, years ago, so many, many times. But through all
these years apart he had hoped for that belated reforming which meant
so much. He had hoped and believed it had set in. Now he knew, and his
last hopes were dashed. Kate Seton had warned him, but her warning had
not touched him as the exhibition he now beheld did. Why, why had
Charlie done this thing, and done it to-night--their first night
together in the new world? He could have cried out in his bitterness
of disappointment.
As he looked upon the man's unsteady poise he felt as though he could
have picked him up in his two strong hands and shaken sober senses
into him.
But Charlie's mood had changed at the sound of the big man's regrets.
They had penetrated the mists of alcohol, and stirred a belated
contrition.
"I don't want any apologies from you, Bill," he said thickly. "Guess
I'm not worth it. You couldn't spy on a soul. It's not that----." He
broke off, and it became evident to the other that he was making a
supreme effort at concentration. "You saw me at the pine?" he suddenly
inquired.
Bill nodded. He had no desire to say anything more now. He felt sick
with himself, with everything. He almost regretted his own coming to
the valley at all. For a moment his optimism was utterly obscured.
Added to what he now beheld, all that Kate Seton had said was
revolving in his brain, an oppressive cloud depriving him of every joy
the reunion with his brother had inspired. The two thoughts paramount,
and all pervading, were suggested by the words "drunkard" and "crook."
Nor, in that moment of terrible disappointment, would they be denied.
Charlie sat down in his chair again, and, to the onlooker, his
movement was almost involuntary.
"I was there," he said, a moment later, passing one hand across his
frowning brows as though to clear away the cobwebs impeding the
machinery of his thought. "Why--why didn't you come and speak to me? I
was just--around."
Again Bill's eyes opened to their fullest extent.
"I hollered to you," he said. "When you heard me you just--vanished."
Again Charlie smoothed his brow.
"Yes--I'd forgotten. It was you hollered, eh! You see, I didn't know
it was you."
Bill sat swinging one leg thoughtfully. A sort of bewilderment was
getting hold of him.
"You didn't recognize my voice?" he asked. Then he added thoughtfully,
"No--and it might have been Fyles, or the other policemen. They were
there."
Charlie suddenly sat up. His hands were grasping the arms of the
rocker.
"The police were there--with you?" he demanded. "What--what were they
doing there--with you?"
The sharp questions, flung at him so quickly, so soberly, suddenly
lifted Bill out of his vain and moody regrets.
In spite of all Kate had told him, in spite of her assurance that
Fyles, and all the valley, believed Charlie to be the head of the
smuggling gang, the full significance of Fyles's presence in the
neighborhood of the pine had not penetrated to his slow understanding
before. Now an added light was thrown upon the matter in a flash of
greater understanding. Fyles was not watching any chance crook. He was
watching Charlie, and he knew it was Charlie, and the assurance of
Charlie's identity extracted from him, Bill, had been a simple blind.
What a fool he had made of himself. Kate was right. The harm he had
done now became appalling.
He promptly became absorbed in a strongly restrained excitement. He
leaned forward and talked rapidly. He had forgotten Charlie's
condition, he had forgotten everything but the danger threatening.
"Here, Charlie," he cried, "I'll tell you just all that happened after
I left here, when you went out. Guess it's a long yarn, but I think
you need to know it for your own safety."
Charlie leaned back in his chair and nodded.
"Go ahead," he said. Then he closed his eyes as Bill rushed into his
narrative.
The big man told it all as far as it concerned his first meeting with
the Setons, his subsequent visit to the saloon, and, afterwards, his
meeting with Fyles. The only thing he kept to himself was his final
meeting with Kate Seton.
At the end of this story Charlie reopened his eyes, and, to any one
more observant than Big Brother Bill, it was plain that his condition
had improved. A keen light was shining in them, a light of interest
and perfectly clear understanding.
"Thanks, Bill," he said, "I'm glad you've told me all that." Then he
rose from his chair, and his movements had become more certain, more
definite. "Guess I'll get off to bed. It's no use discussing all this.
It can lead nowhere. Still, there is one thing I'd like to say before
we quit. I'm glad, I'm so mighty glad you've come along out here to
join me I can't just say it all to you. I'm ready to tumble headlong
into any schemes you've got in your head. But there's things in my
life I've got to work out in my own way. Things I can't and don't want
to talk about. Maybe I'll often be doing things that seem queer to
you. But I want to do 'em, and intend to do 'em. Drink is not one
of 'em. You'll find I'm a night bird, too. But, again, my night
wanderings are my own. You'll hear folks say all sorts of things about
me. You'll see Fyles very busy. Well, it's up to you to listen or not.
All I say is don't fight my battles. I can fight them in my own way.
Two of us are liable to mess them all up. Get me? I live my life, and
you can share as much in it as you like, except in that--well, that
part of it I need to keep to myself. There's just one thing I promise
you, Fyles'll never get me inside any penitentiary. I promise you
that, sure, because I know from your manner that's the trouble in the
back of your silly old head. Good night."
He passed out of the room without giving the astonished Bill any
opportunity to do more than respond to his "good night." Anyway, the
latter had nothing else to say. He was too taken aback, too painfully
startled at the tacit admission to all the charges he had been warned
the people and police of Leaping Creek were making against his
brother. What could he say? What could he do? Nothing--simply nothing.
He remained where he was against the table. He had forgotten his wet
clothes. He had forgotten everything in the overwhelming nature of
his painful feelings. His own beliefs, Kate's loyally expressed
convictions, had been utterly negatived. It was all true. All
painfully, dreadfully true. Charlie was not only a drunkard still, but
the "crook" he was supposed to be. He was a whisky-runner. He was
against the law. His ultimate goal was the penitentiary. Good God, the
thought was appalling! This was where drink had led him. This was the
end of his spoiled and wayward brother's career. What a cruel waste of
a promising life. His good-natured, gentle-hearted brother. The boy he
had always admired and loved in those early days. It was cruel,
terrible. By his own admission he was against the law, a "crook,"
and--the penitentiary was looming.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE ARM OUTREACHING
The morning was gloriously fine. It was aglow with the fulness of
summer. Far as the eye could see the valley was bathed in a golden
light which the myriad shades of green made intoxicating to senses
drinking in this glory of nature's splendor. Leaping Creek gamboled
its tortuous way through the heart of a perfect garden.
A veritable Eden thought Stanley Fyles--complete to the last detail.
But his thought was without cynicism. He had no time for cynicism.
Besides, the goal of his career lay yet before him.
His thought drifted further. His whole fate had suddenly become bound
up in that valley. Nor was the fact without a certain irony. For him
it was the valley of destiny. Within its spacious confines lay the
two great factors of life--his life--love and duty. They were
confronting him. They were standing there waiting for him to possess
himself of his victorious hold.
Stanley Fyles felt rather like a ticket-of-leave criminal, instead of
a law officer, as he gazed out from the doorway of the frame hut,
which formed the temporary quarters of the police, far out on the
western reaches of the valley, five miles above the village of Rocky
Springs. He knew he was there to prove himself. His mistakes, or his
bad luck, of the past must be remedied before he could return to his
superiors with a clean sheet. His hands were free, he knew. But in
that freedom he was more surely a prisoner on parole than any man on
his given word. He was pitting himself like the gambler against the
final throw. It was all, or--ruin. To leave the valley with the work
undone, with another mistake to his credit, and his present career
must terminate.
Then there was that other side. That wonderful--other side. The human
nature in him made the valley more surely his destiny than any charges
of his superior officer. The woman was there. The Eve in his Eden.
More than all else the thought of her inspired him to the big effort
of his life.
He was thinking of Kate Seton now as his gaze roamed at will over the
ravishing summer tints. He was thinking wholly of her when his mind
might well have been contemplating the terms of the despatches he had
just written, the orders he had sent to his troopers, even the events
and clues he had obtained on the previous night, pointing the work he
had in hand.
A door opened and closed behind him. He was aware of it, but did not
turn. A voice addressed him. It was the cold voice of Sergeant McBain.
"The men are saddled up, sir."
Fyles glanced around without changing his position.
"The despatches are on the table," he replied, with a sharp
inclination of the head in the direction.
"Any other instructions, sir?"
Fyles thought a moment.
"Yes," he said at last. "When they return here it must be after dark.
The patrol and horses they bring with 'em are to be camped over at
Winter's Crossing, five miles higher up the valley. This before they
come in to report. That's all."
"Very good, sir."
Sergeant McBain departed, and presently the clatter of hoofs told the
officer that the two troopers had ridden away. As they went he drew
out a pipe and began to fill it.
When McBain re-entered the room Fyles bestirred himself. He turned
back and flung himself into an uncomfortable, rawhide-seated,
home-made chair, and lit his pipe. McBain took up a position at the
small table which served the purpose of a desk.
McBain and his men had taken up their quarters here several weeks ago.
It was a mere shed, possibly an implement shed on an abandoned farm.
It was a frame, weather-boarded shanty with a dilapidated shingle
roof. Quite a reasonable shelter till it chanced to rain. The
handiness of the troopers had made it comparatively habitable with
oddments of furnishing, and a partition, which left an inner room for
sleeping quarters. There was a partial wooden lining covering the
timbers supporting the roof, which was an open pitch, without any
ceiling. There were several wooden brackets projecting from the walls,
which had probably, at one time, been used to support harness. Now
they served the purpose of carrying police saddles and uniform
overcoats.
There was obviously no attempt at establishing a permanent station
there. These men were, as was their custom, merely utilizing the
chance finding as an added comfort in their strenuous lives.
Fyles lit his pipe, and, for some moments, smoked thoughtfully, while
McBain's pen scratched a series of entries in his diary.
Fyles watched him through a cloud of smoke, and when his subordinate
returned his pen to the home-made rack on the table, he began to talk.
"There's two things puzzling me about that tree, McBain," he said,
following out his train of thought. "Your reckoning has justification
all right. We saw enough last night for that. Besides, you have seen
the same sort of thing several times before. It surely has a big play
in the affairs of these 'runners.' But I can't get a focus of that
play. Suppose that the tree is in some mysterious way a sort of means
of communication, why is it necessary? And, why in thunder, when
everybody knows who the boss of the gang is, don't they deal direct
with him?"
Fyles smiled into the grim face of McBain, and sat back waiting to
hear the Scot's reply. His keen face was alight with expectancy. He
wanted this shrewd man's ideas as well as his facts obtained by
observation.
The sergeant's face was obstinately set. He had already asserted
certain convictions about the old pine, and now he detected skepticism
in his superior.
"Three times in the last two weeks I have seen the same figure in the
shadow of that tree late at night. It hasn't needed any guessing to
locate his identity. Very well, starting with the supposition that the
village folk are right, and Charlie Bryant is our man, then his
movements about that tree at that hour of the night become more than
suspicious. Especially since we know he's run a big cargo in lately.
But while I figger on that tree there's something else, as I've told
you. I've tracked him into the neighborhood of the old Meeting House
and back again to the tree. Now, I've seen this play three times, and
would have seen the whole of it again last night if that damned coyote
of a tenderfoot hadn't butted in. That's that, sir."
Fyles nodded. The older man's earnestness was not without its weight.
But to a man like Fyles, definite proof, or reasonable probabilities,
were necessary. Clearing his throat, McBain went on.
"Let's come to another argument, sir," he said, setting himself with
his arms on the table. "Every man or woman in the place reckons this
tough, Charlie Bryant, runs the gang. They can lay their tongues to
the names of the men who form the gang. Guess this is the list, and a
certain one sure, knowing the men. There's Pete Clancy, Nick Devereux,
both hired men to Miss Seton. There's Kid Blaney, hired to Bryant
himself. There's Stormy Longton, the gambler and--murderer. Then
there's another I believe to be Macaddo, the train hold-up, and the
fellow they call "Holy" Dick. That's the gang with Bryant at their
head, but there may be more of them. I've got the names indirectly
from the village folk. But this is my point. Never a soul in the
village has seen them at work. Never a soul has seen them buy, or
sell, or handle, one drop of drink, except what they buy in the saloon
to consume. The gang don't do one single thing to give itself away,
and there's not a man or woman could give them away in the village,
except from their talk when they're drunk."
The man was making his point, and Fyles remained interested.
"Now, this is the argument, an' you'll admit, sir, experience carries
a lot of it out. Crooks are scared to death of each other, you know
that, sir, better than I do. It's the basis of their methods. They've
got to make safe. To do this they have to resort to schemes which hide
their identity. They'll trust each other engaged in the crime because
all are involved. But they daren't trust those who're under no
penalty. What do they do? They've got to blind the outside world, the
police, and they do it by making a mystery. Now, in this case, the
pine is the heart of their mystery. It must give the key to the cache.
It must lead us to getting the lot red-handed--running a cargo. That's
what I know and feel, and it's up to you, sir, to show us the way.
I've worked on the lines you gave me, sir, and I've done all a man can
do. I've had the whole village watched, and worked inquiry by a farmer
outlying the valley. But now we're plumb at a deadlock till they run
another cargo, which I'm calculating, at the rate liquor's consumed,
they'll soon have to do. Maybe that'll give us a week or so for fixing
our plans. I've watched each member of the gang, and we've got their
movements written down here, from the time we missed that cargo on the
trail. Maybe you'll read my notes on them."
Fyles took the diary the man held out.
"It's a tough proposition, McBain," he said with a sigh, which had no
weakening in it. "But I think we'll make good this time, if only we
can get the news of the shipment when it comes along well ahead.
Superintendent Jason is in communication with every local police force
east, and should get it all right. If we get that, the rest should be
easy. Rocky Springs only has three roads, and it's a small place. I've
got a pretty wide scheme ready for them when we get word. In the
meantime our present work must be to endeavor to locate their cache.
That discovered, and left alone, our work will be simple pie. I'll
read these notes now. Then I'm going into the village. Later on I've
a notion to see just how busy Master Bryant is on his--ranch."
* * * * *
Kate gave a final glance round at the walls of green logs, and noted
with appreciation the picturesque dovetailing of every angle.
"Well," she declared, after a moment's thought, "all I can say is that
the design's working out in truly elegant fashion. Charlie's done his
work well--and so have the boys." She beamed pleasantly upon her
audience, two men balancing themselves upon the open floor joists of
the new church. "It's a real work of art. It's going to be swell, and
the folks should be just proud of it."
Billy Unguin smiled confidently.
"Oh, the folks'll be proud of it all right, all right," he said.
"They'll yap about this place, and how they built it, till you'll wish
it was swallowed up by that kingdom they guess they're going to get
boosted into by means of it. They'll have one hell of a burst at the
saloon when the work's done, and every feller'll be guessin' he could
have done the other feller's job better than he could have done it
himself, and the women folk'll just say what elegant critturs their
men are, till they get home sossled. Then they'll beat hell out of
'em. They'll sure be proud of it, but I don't guess the church'll be
proud of them. It'll have hard work helpin' most of 'em into the
kingdom. Ain't that so, Allan?"
Billy asked for confirmation of his opinions merely as a matter of
form. But Allan Dy displayed little interest in them. He had some of
his own.
"Guess so," he murmured indifferently.
"Course it's so," said Billy sharply.
"Dessay you're right," replied Dy, with still less interest. "But
I ain't got time thinking conundrums. I get too many, running the
mail. Still, I'd like to say right here this doggone church ain't
architecture. Maybe it's art, as Miss Kate says. But it ain't
architecture. That's what it ain't," he finished up, with decided
emphasis.
Kate smiled upon him. She was interested in what lay behind the
remark.
"How--how do you make that out, Allan?" she inquired.
The postmaster felt sorry for her and showed it.
"It's easy," he declared. Then he gathered his opinions in a bunch,
and metaphorically hurled them at her. "Where's the steel girders an'
stone masonry?" he demanded. "It's just wood--pine. Wher's the figures
an' measurements? Who knows the breakin' strain o' them green logs?
Maybe it's art, but it ain't architecture. I ain't so sure about the
art, neither. It's to be lined with red pine. Ther' ain't no art to
red pine. Now maple--bird's-eye maple, an' we got forests of it.
Ther's art in bird's-eye maple. It's mighty pleasing to the eye. It
'ud make the folks feel good. Red pine? Red?" He shook his head
ominously. "Not in this city. You see, red's a shoutin' color. Sets
folk gropin' fer trouble. But white's different. It--it sort o' sets
folks thinking o' them days when their little souls was white enough,
even if their bodies wasn't rid of a month's dirt. I tell you, Rocky
Springs 'ud get pious right away under the influence of bird's-eye
maple. Maybe they'd be fighting drunk later, but that don't cut no
ice. You see, it's sort o' natural to 'em. Still, the church would
have done 'em some good if only it kept 'em a few seconds from doing
somebody or something a personal injury."
Billy was chafing at his friend's monopoly of the talk and promptly
seized the opportunity of belittling his opinions.
"What's the use," he cried. "I'm with Miss Kate. Charlie's done right
in fixing on red pine lining. Art's art, an' if you're goin' to be
artistic, why, you just got to match things same as you'd match a team
of horses, same as a woman does her fixings. 'Tain't good to mix
anything. Not even drinks. Red pine goes with raw logs. Say, there's
art in everything. Beans goes with pork; cabbage with corned beef. But
you don't never eat ice cream with sowbelly. Everybody hates winter.
Why for do folks fix 'emselves like funeral mutes in winter? It's just
the artistic mind in 'em. They'd hate flying in the face of Providence
by cheerin' themselves up with a bit of color. Art is art, Dy, my boy;
maybe art ain't in your line, seein' you're a Government servant.
Ther' ain't nothin' but red pine for the inside of that church, or all
art's bust to hell. Start the folks in this city off on notions
inspired by anemic woodwork, an' the sight o' so much purity would set
'em off sniveling on their women-folk's bosoms, and give 'emselves
internal chills shoutin' fer ice water at O'Brien's bar. You'd set
the boys so all-fired good-natured they'd give 'emselves up fer the
crimes they never committed, or they'd be startin' up a weekly funeral
club so as to be sure of a Christian burial anyway. You'd upset the
harmony o' Rocky Springs something terrible. Bird's-eye
maple--nothin'. Ain't that so, Miss Kate?"
Kate laughed outright.
"I can't quite follow all the arguments," she said, cautiously.
"But--but--it sounds all right."
"Sure," agreed Billy, complacently.
But Dy was not yet defeated.
"I'm arguin' architecture," he said doggedly. "Here," he indicated
the length of the main building, "I don't care a cuss about your art.
What about this? Where's the tree grown hereabouts tall enough to
give us a ridge pole for this roof? It means a join in the ridge
pole. That's what it means. And that ain't architecture, Master
Billy--smarty--Unguin."
Kate ran her eye over the offending length. The man's point seemed
obvious.
"It certainly looks like a join," she admitted unwillingly.
For a moment Billy was disconcerted. But his inventive faculties
quickly supplied him with a way out. Anyway, he could break up the
other's argument.
"Isn't nothin'!" he cried, with fine scorn. "That don't need to worry
you. Ain't we got the tallest pine in creation right here on the
spot?"
The postmaster's eyes widened. Even Kate was startled at the
suggestion.
"You'd cut down the old tree?" she inquired.
"Wher's your sense?" demanded Dy roughly. "Cut down the old pine?
Who's goin to do it? Who's got the grit?"
"It don't need grit to saw that tree--only a saw," smiled Billy,
provokingly.
But Dy had no sense of humor at the moment.
"Pshaw! What about the Indian cuss on it?" he demanded. "Ther' ain't
a boy in this valley 'ud drive a saw into that tree. You're talking
foolish."
Billy grew very red.
"Am I?" he cried, angrily. "Well, I ain't no sawyer, but I'll say
right here if the church needs that pine I'll fetch it down if it's
only to show you that Charlie Bryant's notions are better than yours.
I'll do it if the work kills me."
"Which it surely will," said Dy significantly.
But Kate had no liking for the turn the conversation had taken, and
attempted to divert it.
"No, no," she cried, with a laugh that was a trifle forced. "That's
the worst of you men when you begin to argue. You generally get
spiteful. Just like women. Art or architecture, it doesn't matter a
bit. We're all proud of this lovely little church. But I must be off.
I've a committee meeting to attend. Then there's a church sewing bee.
See you again."
She turned away and began to pick her way from joist to joist toward
the doorway in the wall. Her progress occupied all her attention and
careful balance. Thus she was left wholly unaware of the man who was
standing framed in the opening watching her. Her first realization
came with the sound of his voice. And so startling was its effect that
she lost her balance, and must have taken an undignified fall between
the joists, had not a pair of strong hands been thrust out to save
her.
"I'm sorry, Miss Kate," cried Fyles earnestly, as, aided by his
supporting arms, she regained her balance. "I thought you knew I was
here--had seen me."
Kate freed herself as quickly as she could. Her action was almost a
rebuff, and suggested small enough thanks. Probably none of the
villagers would have met with similar treatment.
She felt angry. She did not know why, and her words of thanks had no
thanks in their tone.
"Thank you," she said coldly. Then she looked up into the keen face
before her and beheld its easy confident smile. "It was real stupid
of me. But--you see, I didn't guess anybody was there."
"No."
Kate stepped down through the doorway, and stood beside the officer,
whose horse was grazing a few yards away upon a trifling patch of
weedy grass. Her annoyance was passing.
"I'd heard you'd come into Rocky Springs," she said. "Everybody is--is
excited about it."
Inspector Fyles was still smiling as he returned her glance. He was
thinking, at that moment, that the passing of time only added to Kate
Seton's attractiveness. His quick eyes took in the simplicity of her
costume, while he realized its comparative costliness for a village
like Rocky Springs.
"I don't guess there's much to be excited about--yet," he said. "Maybe
that'll come later, for--some of them. I'm going to be around for
quite a while."
Kate was looking ahead down the trail. She was half-heartedly seeking
an excuse for leaving him. Perhaps the man read something of her
thought, for he abruptly nodded in the direction of the village.
"You're going on down?" he inquired casually.
"Yes. I've a church committee to attend. I am rather late."
"Then maybe I may walk with you?"
The man's manner was perfectly deferential, and something about it
pleased his companion more than she would have admitted. Somehow she
resented him and liked him at the same time. She was half afraid of
him, too. But her fear was wholly sub-conscious, and would certainly
have been promptly denied had she been made aware of it.
"Your horse?" she protested. "You--you are riding."
But Fyles only shook his head.
"We needn't bother about him," he declared easily. "You see, he'll
just walk right on."
They moved on toward the mouth of the trail at the edge of the
clearing, and Kate, watching the horse, saw it suddenly throw up its
head and begin to follow in that indifferent manner so truly equine,
picking at the blades of grass as it came.
"What a dear creature," she exclaimed impulsively. "Did--did you train
him that way?"
Fyles smilingly shook his head.
"Taught himself," he said. "Poor Peter's a first-class baby. He hates
to be left alone. Guess if I went on walking miles he'd never be more
than ten yards behind me."
They walked on. Kate for the most part seemed interested only in the
horse following so close behind, while Fyles made small secret of his
interest in her. But for awhile talk seemed difficult.
Finally it was Kate who was forced to take the initiative with this
big, loose-limbed man of the plains. She searched her brains for an
appropriate subject, and, finally, blundered into the very matter she
had intended to avoid.
"I suppose there's going to be a very busy time about here, now you've
come around?" she said. "I suppose the lawlessness of this place will
receive a check that's liable to make some folks pretty
uncomfortable?"
She smiled up at her companion with just a suspicion of irony in her
dark eyes, and the man who had to rely on his wits so much in his
life's work found it necessary to think hard before replying.
The result of his thought was less than he could have hoped, for he
had already learned, with some misgiving, of her friendliness with
Charlie Bryant. However, the opportunity seemed a suitable one, so he
added a gravity of tone to his reply.
"There are people in this valley to whom my presence will make no
difference. There are others--well, others whose company is worth
avoiding. Say, Miss Kate, maybe you haven't a notion of a policeman's
work--and penalties. Maybe you know nothing of the meaning of crime,
as we understand it. Maybe you think us just paid machines, without
feelings, without sentiment, cold, ruthless creatures who are here to
run down criminals, as the old-time Indians ran down the buffalo, in
a wanton love of destroying life. Believe me, it isn't so. We're
particularly humane, and would far rather see folks well within the
law and prospering, the same as we want to prosper ourselves. We don't
fancy the work of shutting up our fellow creatures from all enjoyment
of the life about us, or curtailing that life for them by so much as a
second. Still, if folks obstinately refuse to come within the law of
their own free will, then, for the sake of all other law-abiding folk,
they must be forced to do so, or be made to suffer. Yes, I am here to
do certain work, and what's more, I don't quit till it's done. It may
cost me nothing but a deal of work, and some regret, it may cost me my
life, it may cost other lives. But the work will go on till it is
finished, and though I may not see that finish, there will be others
to take my place. That is the work of the police in this country. It
has always been so, and, finally, we always achieve our purpose. In
the end a criminal hasn't a dog's chance of escape."
The man's calmly spoken words were not without their effect. The irony
in Kate's glance had merged into a gravity of expression that was
not without admiration for the speaker. Furtively she took in the
clean-cut profile, the square jaw, the strongly marked brows of the
man under his prairie hat, then his powerful active frame. He was
strikingly powerful in his suggestion of manhood.
"It seems all different when you put it that way," she said
thoughtfully. "Yes, I guess you're right, we folks sort of get other
ideas of the police. Maybe it's living among a people who are
notoriously--well, human. You don't hear nice things about the police
in this valley, and I s'pose one gets in the same way of thinking.
But----"
Kate broke off, and her dark eyes gazed half wistfully out over the
valley.
"But?"
Fyles urged her. Nor did his manner suggest any of his official
capacity. He was interested. He simply wanted her to go on talking.
It was pleasant to listen to her rich thrilling voice, it was more
pleasant than he could have believed possible.
Kate laughed quietly.
"Maybe what I was going to say will--will hurt you," she said. "And I
don't want to hurt you."
Fyles shook his head.
"We police don't consider our official feelings. They, and any damage
done to them, are simply part of our work."
They had reached the main village trail. The girl deliberately halted
and stood facing him.
"I was thinking it a pity you came here in--time of peace," she said
quickly. "I was thinking how much better it would have been to wait
until a cargo of liquor was being run, and then get the culprits
red-handed. You see," she went on naively, "you've got time to look
around you now, and--and listen to the gossip of the village, and form
opinions which--which may put you on a false scent. Believe me," she
cried, with sudden warmth, "I'd be glad to see you measure your wits
against the real culprits. Maybe you'd be successful. Who can say?
Anyway, you'd get a sound idea of whom you were after, and would not
be chasing a phantom, as you are likely to be now, if you listen to
the talk of this place. Believe me, I hold no brief for wrongdoers.
They must take their chances. If they are discovered and captured they
must pay the penalty. But I know how deceptive appearances may be in
this valley, and--and it would break my heart if--a great wrong were
done, however inadvertently."
The wide reaches of the valley were spread out before them. Kate was
gazing away out westward, where, high up on the hillside, Charlie
Bryant's house was perched like an eagle's eyrie. Even at that
distance two figures could be seen standing on the veranda, and
neither she nor Fyles, who was following the direction of her gaze,
needed a second thought as to their identity.
"You're thinking of Charlie Bryant," the man said after a pause.
"You're warning me--off him."
"Maybe I am."
Kate's eyes challenged the officer fearlessly.
"Why?"
The man's searching eyes were not seeking those secrets which might
help his official capacity. Other feelings were stirring.
"Why? Because Charlie is a weak, sick creature, deserving all the pity
and help the strong can give him. Because he is a gentle, ailing man
who has only contrived to earn the contempt of most, for his weakness,
and the blame of those who are strong enough to help. Because he is,
for all his weaknesses, an--honest man."
Fyles gazed up at the house on the hillside again, and Kate's anxious
eyes watched him.
"Is that all?" he inquired presently. Nor could there be any mistake
as to the thought behind the question.
A dash of recklessness, that recklessness which her sister had
deplored the absence of, now drove Kate headlong.
"No. It is not all," she cried. "For five years I have been striving
to help him to escape from the demon which possesses him. Oh, and I
know how hopeless it has all been. I love Charlie, Mr. Fyles. I love
him as though he were my brother, or even my own son. I would do
anything in the world to save him, and I tell you frankly, openly, if
the police seek to fix any crime this valley is accused of upon him, I
will strive, by every possible means, whether right or wrong, to
defeat their ends."
The woman's face was aglow with reckless courage. Her eyes were
shining with an enthusiasm which the man before her delighted in. All
her defiance of him, of the law, only made her appeal the more surely.
But he was not thinking of her words. He was thinking of her beauty,
her courage, while he repeated her words mechanically.
"Your brother--or even your own son?"
"Yes, yes," Kate cried. Then she caught a sharp breath, and a deep
flush suffused her cheeks and brow. The significance of the man's
thoughtful words and tone had come home to her. She knew he was not
thinking of anything else she had said. Only of her regard for that
other man.
She abruptly held out her hand and Stanley Fyles took it. Her good-bye
came with a curtness that might well have inspired consternation. But
the policeman replied to it without any such feeling, and passed on
with his faithful Peter trailing leisurely behind him.
CHAPTER XIX
BILL MAKES THREE DISCOVERIES
It was Big Brother Bill's third morning in the valley of Leaping
Creek, and in that brief time his optimism and enthusiasm for the
affairs of life in general had suffered shocks from which, at the
moment, recovery seemed altogether doubtful.
Like all simple natures, once mental disquiet set in it was not
easily shaken off. So, about nine o'clock in the morning, he found
himself sitting on the sill of the barn doorway, his broad back
propped against the casing, hugging his troubles to himself, and,
incidentally, smoking like a miniature smoke-stack.
The place was quite still under the blazing morning sun; a
collar-chain rattled inside the barn where a few horses stood
impatiently swishing off the attacks of troublesome flies with their
long tails; a hen, somewhere nearby, clucked to her brood of wandering
chicks; an occasional grunt, and curious snuffing, came from the
regions of the dilapidated hog pen. These were the only signs of
life about the place. For Charlie, after displaying an unusual
taciturnity, had taken himself off for the day, upon work which he had
declared to be imperative, and Kid Blaney, after feeding and watering
his horses, had done the same thing, on a similar excuse.
Now, Bill felt he must do one of those very big "thinks," which, on
occasion, he had been known to achieve. He felt that the time had come
when something must really be done to ease the pressure upon his
mental endurance.
The previous night had furnished the climax, a painful climax, to all
he had learned of his brother's doings, of his brother's guilt. Yes,
he no longer shrank from using that hideous word. All suspected
Charlie, the police, everybody, except Kate Seton, and Charlie had
practically admitted his guilt to him personally, without any apparent
shame or regret. But since then, since Bill had listened to the loyal
defense of Kate, he had seen for himself the smugglers and their chief
at work upon their nefarious trade, and thus further proof was no
longer necessary.
All mystery was banished. The whole thing, in spite of Kate's denial,
was as plain as daylight. Charlie was a whisky-runner. The head of
the gang. His little "one-eyed" ranch was the merest blind. His
prosperity, if prosperity he possessed at all, was the prosperity of
successful defiance of the law. To the simple brother this realization
was a terrible one. Charlie, the brother to whom he had always been so
devoted, was a crook, a mere common crook.
His discovery of the previous evening had come as a far greater shock
than might have been expected, considering all Bill had heard and
witnessed of his brother's doings. But then it is the way of things to
make the witnessing of a disaster far more terrible than listening to
the story told in language however lurid. Last night he had watched
his brother supplying contraband liquor to the saloonkeeper.
It had happened in this way. After his first experiences on the night
of his arrival he had been determined to avoid so unpleasant a
sequence of occurrences on the second. Charlie had ridden off directly
after supper, and Bill took the opportunity of paying an evening call
upon Kate and Helen Seton. The chance he had deemed too good to miss.
At least there was nothing of mystery and suspicion there, and he
desired more than anything to breathe a wholesome air of frank
honesty. These girls, particularly Helen, were the one bright spot in
this crime-shadowed valley. To his mind Helen was a perfect ray of
sunshine, which made the shadows in the place something more than
possible of endurance.
His call was welcomed in a manner that was obvious, even to his
simple mind. And never in his life had he spent an evening of more
whole-hearted enjoyment than he did with Helen, while her less
volatile sister considerately kept herself more or less out of the
way.
Had his evening ended there his peace of mind might have suffered no
further shock, but, as it was, the comparatively natural desire to
celebrate his successful evening with a drink at O'Brien's sent him
off in the direction of the village.
Proceeding rapidly along the trail, full of happy thoughts of Helen,
with her ready wit and gaiety, he was dreaming pleasantly all those
delightful dreams, which every man at some time in his life, finds
running through his head. Then suddenly he was aroused to the scene
about him by the yellow light of a back window of O'Brien's saloon,
just ahead of him.
He was approaching the saloon from the rear! How had this happened?
Then he discovered that, by some strange chance, he had left the main
trail, and was proceeding up a wagon track, which evidently led to the
barn behind the saloon.
He turned off to seek a way round to the front of the building, and
soon became so involved that he finally drew up at a low wire fence,
enclosing the rear buildings, with the lamp-lit window still directly
ahead of him. He was about to step over the wire when a movement, and
the sound of hushed voices, caught and held his attention.
He stood quite still. It was still fairly early, and the moon had not
yet risen. The outbuildings rose up in shadowy outline against the
starlit sky, and only the lamplight in the window made anything clear
at all. It was this window, and the shaft of light it threw across the
intervening space that held his attention, for it was somewhere in the
shadow, to the right of it, he heard the movement and the voices.
The movement continued, and then, quite suddenly, a figure stepped
into the light. Bill drew back farther into the shadow. It was a
man's figure, tall and lean. He was carrying something on his
shoulder, which the watcher had no difficulty in recognizing as a
small barrel. Close behind him followed a second man. He, too, was
tall and spare, and he, too, was burdened with a keg upon his
shoulder. In a moment Bill knew he was witnessing a transaction in
contraband liquor between the whisky-runners and the saloonkeeper.
His interest became absorbed. He had recognized neither of the men,
and a wild hope stirred within him that perhaps he was to gain
definite proof that Kate Seton's belief was right, and that Charlie
had nothing to do with these people. His excitement and hope became
intense.
For the moment the men had vanished through the darkened doorway of
the barn. Their voices were still hoarsely whispering, and though he
could not catch a word of what was said, he felt that they were merely
discussing their work. He waited for them to reappear. It was his
anxious desire to finally assure himself that Charlie was not with
them.
He had not long to wait. The voices drew nearer. First one man emerged
from the barn. It was one of the two he had seen go in. Then the other
followed. They crossed the light once more. He was absolutely certain
now, and a great thankfulness swept over him.
But his relief was short-lived. A third man now appeared from the
barn. He was smaller, much smaller, and very slight. His face and hair
were undistinguishable beneath his prairie hat, but his dark jacket,
and loose riding breeches were plain enough to the onlooker. In a
moment Bill's heart sank. Even in that dim light he knew he was gazing
upon the figure he had seen the night before at the old pine. There
could be no mistake. Though he could not see the man's face, his
figure was sufficient. He felt convinced that it was his brother. Kate
was wrong, and everybody else was right. Charlie was indeed the
whisky-runner whom the police were after.
Any purpose he had had before was promptly abandoned. He hurried away,
sick at heart, and hastily returned to the ranch to find
Charlie--still out.
After what he had witnessed he had no desire to meet Charlie that
night, so he went straight to bed, but not to sleep. For a long time
he lay awake thinking, thinking of his discovery. Then at last,
thoroughly weary with thinking, he fell into a troubled sleep and
dreamed that Inspector Fyles and his men were pursuing him over a
plain, upon which there was no cover, and over which he made no
progress whatsoever.
Now, as he sat at the door of the barn, brooding over all he had seen
and discovered, he felt that there were but two courses open to him.
He must either, in his own phraseology, "get out or go on." And by
that he meant he must either renounce all his affection for his erring
brother, and leave him to his fate, or, like Kate, he must stand by to
help him in the time of trouble, and do all in his power to save him
from himself. There was not much doubt as to which direction his
inclinations took, but he felt it was no time for permitting his
feelings to rule him. He must think a big "think," and adopt its
verdict.
But the "think" would not come. Only would his inclinations obtrude.
There was nothing mean or petty in this big creature. He loved his
brother frankly and freely, and his absurd heart would not permit him
to thrust those feelings aside.
Groping and struggling, and undecided, yet convinced, he finally rose
from his seat and stretched and shook himself like some great dog.
Then he looked about rather helplessly. At that moment his eyes came
to rest on the distant house of the Setons', and, as he beheld a woman
emerge from its door, a great inspiration came to him.
In a moment his dilemma disentangled itself. He laughed in very
triumph as the idea swept through his brain. It permeated his whole
being with a sense of delight. He only wondered he had not thought of
it before. It was the very thing. How the devil had he managed to miss
it? Helen was as full of plain wisdom and sense, as her pretty gray
eyes were full of laughter. She was tremendously clever. She was
always reading books. Hadn't he picked them up? Why, of course. He
would go and catch her up, and--do a big powwow and "think" with her.
His enthusiasm once more at high pressure, Big Brother Bill set off
hot foot to intercept the girl he had seen just leaving her home. She
would have to cross the bridge, that was certain--then----Ah, yes,
the church. The new church. She generally took that in on her way to
the village. She had told him that. Well, that was quite easy. He
would cut across to the old pine, he couldn't lose himself doing that,
then the trail would run right on down by the church.
For once he made no mistake in taking a short cut. He reached the
old pine safely, and felt like congratulating himself. Then a
disconcerting thought occurred to him as he contemplated the trail
down which he must proceed. The girl had a long way to go, and he had
hurried desperately. She wouldn't be up at the church for some time
yet. He felt annoyed with himself for always doing things in such a
hurry. It was quite absurd. Now he would have either to remain where
he was, kicking his heels about, or go on down to the church, and make
it look as though he were purposely lying in wait for her.
He felt that would be a mistake. She might resent it. She might regard
it as an impertinence. He couldn't afford to offend her, he was much
too anxious for her approval. He remembered her resentment at their
first meeting, and--laughed. But he told himself she was quite right.
She thought he had been spying on her. If he had been it would have
been a low-down trick. Anyway he would take no chance now. He would
wait right there, and----
A sudden commotion in the scrub beside him abruptly changed the trend
of his thought. He was startled. The commotion went on. Then with a
rush and whirr of wings, and a hoarse-throated squawk, a large bird
flew up, clutching the ruffled body of a lesser one in its fierce
claws, its great flapping wings brushing his sleeve as it swept on
past him.
His wondering blue eyes followed the bird's flight until it passed
beyond the tree tops, and became hidden by the trunk of the old pine.
Then he looked down into the bush, searching for the nest of
fledglings he felt sure the hawk had robbed of a mother.
He was absurdly grieved that his gun was still with his missing
baggage. It would have delighted him to have brought the lawless
pirate to book, and restored the mother to her panic stricken chicks.
He peered into the bush searching for the nest, but the foliage was
dense, and though he groped the boughs aside he could discover no
signs of it. Still, the thought of those motherless chicks had stirred
him, and he persisted.
Breaking his way in among the boughs he searched more carefully.
But at last, after wasting nearly a quarter of an hour upon his
tender-hearted sympathy, he finally decided that he must be wrong.
There was no nest of fledglings. He really felt quite disappointed.
Just as he was about to abandon his search something fluttered at the
very roots of the bush. It was of a grayish blue. With a lunge he made
a grab, caught it, and stood up. It was a ball of paper, loosely
crumpled.
With an exclamation of disgust he made his way out of the bush and
found himself confronted by the laughing gray eyes of Helen Seton.
"For goodness' sake, Mr. Bryant!" the girl exclaimed, "whatever are
you playing at? Is it Injuns, or--or are you busy on one of your short
cuts? I'm nearly scared to death. I surely am."
Bill looked into that laughing face, and slowly one great hand went up
to his perspiring brow. It was the action of a man at a loss.
"Guess you aren't half as scared as I am," he blurted out. "I've just
had the life scared right out of me. It was a pirate hawk. A big one
flapped up out of that bush, with a small bird in its claws. I--I was
looking for the little feller's fledglings, and the nest. Sort of
birds' nesting. You see, I guessed they'd need feeding--with their
mother gone."
Helen looked into the eyes of this absurd creature, and--wondered. Was
there--was there ever a man quite so simple and--soft hearted? Her
eyes became very gentle.
"And did you--find them?" she asked quietly.
Bill shook his head, and looked ruefully down at the paper in his
hand.
"Only this," he said, almost dejectedly.
His air was too much for the girl's sense of humor. She laughed as she
shifted the folded easel, and japanned tin box she was carrying, from
one hand to the other.
"Oh, dear, oh, dear," she cried, stifling her mirth. "And--and I do so
hate hawks. They're such villains, and--and the valley's full of them.
But there, the valley is full of everything bad--isn't it?"
Bill was smoothing out the paper absent mindedly. Helen's reference
had reminded him of his purpose. Her presence somehow made it
difficult.
But Helen went on without apparently noticing his awkwardness.
"Tell me, Mr. Bryant, what was it brought you out this way, when you
ought to be worrying around getting wise to--to the ranching
business?" she demanded.
Bill flung back his broad shoulders, and, with the movement, seemed to
fling off every care. He laughed cordially.
"Say, you make me laugh," he cried. "Now if I was to tell you what
had brought me this way, you'd sure get mad." Then he discovered the
things she was carrying for the first time. "Say, can't I carry those
things?" he cried, reaching out and possessing himself of them without
ceremony. "Why, it's a paint box, and--and easel," he cried in
awe-struck tones. "I didn't guess you--painted."
Helen was frankly delighted with him, but she promptly denied the
charge.
"Paint? 'Daub,' you mean. Guess Charlie tried to knock painting into
my--my thick head. But he had to quit it after I reached the daubing
stage. I don't think he guesses I'll ever win prizes at it," she went
on, moving up toward the pine. "Still, I might sell some of my daubs
among the worst drinking cases in the village."
But Bill felt the outrage of such possibilities.
"I'll buy 'em all," he cried. "Just name your price, I'd--I'd like to
collect works of art," he added enthusiastically.
Helen turned abruptly and glared.
"How dare you laugh at me?" she cried, in mock anger. "I--I might have
paid you to take one away, but I just won't--now. So there. Works of
art! How dare you? And what are you hugging that old piece of paper to
death for? Give it to me. Perhaps it's somebody's love letter. Though
folks don't generally write love letters on blue paper. It suggests
something too legal."
Bill yielded up the paper with a good-natured smile.
"It's all mussed and dirty," he said, in a sort of apology.
"That's up to me," cried Helen. "Anyway a woman's curiosity don't mind
dirt."
She smoothed the paper carefully as she paused at the foot of the
pine. Bill looked around.
"Is this where you paint?" he asked.
Helen nodded. She was busy with the paper. Bill occupied himself by
thoroughly entangling the legs of the folded easel, in an endeavor to
set it up for her. He tried it every way without success, and finally
desisted with a regretful sigh.
"Was there ever----?" he began.
But Helen broke in with a sharp exclamation, which promptly drew him
to her side.
"This--this isn't a love letter at all," she cried amazedly.
"It's--it's--listen! 'Please have ten gallons of Brandy and twenty
Rye laid in the manger in my barn. Money enclosed. O'B!'"
Helen looked up at the man beside her. All her laughter had gone.
There was something like tragedy in her serious eyes.
Bill was staring at the paper.
"Why that's--that's an order for--liquor from O'Brien," he said, with
the air of having made a discovery.
His brilliancy passed the girl by. She merely nodded.
"How--how did it get there?" she ejaculated.
"Why, some one must have thrown it there," Bill declared deliberately.
Again the man's shrewdness lacked an appreciative audience. The girl
made no answer. She was thinking. She moved aside and leaned against
the rough trunk of the mighty pine. She was still staring at the
paper.
But her movement caught the man's attention, and the sudden
realization of the proximity of the pine recalled many things to his
mind. The pine. That was where he had seen Charlie, his first night in
the valley. That was where the police were watching him. That was
where he vanished. It was at the pine that O'Brien had warned him
Charlie had gone to collect "greenbacks"--dollars. That was O'Brien's
order, money enclosed. Charlie had found the order and money. Then,
when he was interrupted by his, Bill's, shout he had thrown the order
away.
The realization was like a douche of cold water, in spite of all he
had seen and knew. Then he did a thing he hardly understood the reason
of. It was the result of impulse--a sort of sub-conscious impulse. He
reached out and took the weather-stained paper from the girl's
yielding hands and deliberately tore it up.
"Why--why are you doing that?" Helen asked sharply.
Bill forced himself to a smile, and shrugged his shoulders.
"I don't know," he said. Then, after a pause: "I guess that order has
been filled." A bitterness found expression in the quality of his
smile. "I saw the liquor delivered at O'Brien's last night. I saw the
'runners' at work. Charlie was with them. Say, where d'you paint from?
Right here?"
Helen looked up into the man's face. The last vestige of levity had
passed from her. Her cheeks had paled, and she was striving
desperately to read behind the ill-fitting smile she beheld. Bill
knew. Bill knew all that everybody believed in the valley. He had
done what nobody else had done. He had seen Charlie at his work. A
desperate feeling of tragedy was tugging at her heart. This great big
soul had received the full force of the blow, and somehow she felt
that it had been a staggering blow.
All her sympathy went out to him. Now she utterly ignored his
question. She sat down at the foot of the tree and signed to him.
"Sit here," she said soberly. "Sit here, and--talk to me. You came out
here this morning because--because you wanted to find some one to talk
to. Well?"
Bill obeyed her. There was no question in his mind. She had fathomed
his purpose, and he was glad. He replied to her challenge without
hesitation, and strove to speak lightly. But as he went on all
lightness passed out of his manner, and the girl was left with a full
view of those stirring feelings which he had not the wit nor
inclination to secrete for long.
"Say," he began, "you asked what I was doing here, and guessed
right--first time. Only, maybe you didn't guess it was you I came out
to find. I saw you leave your house, and figured you'd make the new
church. I was going right on down to the new church. Yes, I wanted to
talk--to you. You see, I came here full of a--a sort of hope, and--and
in two days I find the arm of the law reaching out to grab up my
brother. I've given up everything to come and--join. Now I'm up
against it, and I can't just think right. I sort of need some one to
help me think--right. You see, I guessed you could do it."
The man was sitting with his arms clasped about his knees. His big
blue eyes were staring out over the valley. But he saw nothing of it.
Helen, watching him, remained quite unconscious of the tribute to
herself. She was touched. She was filled with a tender feeling she had
never known before. She found herself longing to reach out and take
hold of one of those big, strong hands, and clasp it tightly and
protectingly in her own. She longed to tell him that she understood
his grief, and was yearning to share it with him, that she might
lighten the burden which had fallen upon him. But she did neither of
these things. She just waited for him to continue.
"You see," he went on, slowly, with almost painful deliberation, "I
kind of feel we can think two ways. One with our heads, and the other
with our hearts. That's how I seem to be thinking now. And between the
two I'm all mussed up."
The girl nodded.
"I--I think I know," she said quietly.
The man's face lit for a moment.
"I knew you would," he cried, in a burst of enthusiasm. Then the light
died out of his eyes again, and he shook his head. "But you can't," he
said hopelessly. "Nobody can, but--me. I love old Charlie."
"What does your head say?" asked Helen abruptly.
"My head?" The man released his knees and pushed back his hat, as
though for her to read for herself. "Guess my head says I best get
aboard a train quick, and get right back East where I came from,
and--stop there."
"And leave Charlie to his--fate?" suggested the girl.
The man nodded.
"That's what my head says."
"And your heart?"
Helen's gray eyes were very tender as they looked into the troubled
face beside her.
Bill's broad shoulders lifted, with the essence of nonchalance.
"Oh, that says get right up, and shut off the life of every feller at
the main who tries to do Charlie any hurt."
A sudden emotion stirred the girl at his side, and she turned her head
away lest he should see that which her eyes betrayed.
"The head is the wisest," she said without conviction.
But she was wholly unprepared for the explosion her words invoked.
"Then the head can be--damned!" Bill cried fiercely. And in a moment
the shadows seemed to fall from about him. He suddenly sprang up and
stood towering before her. "I knew if I talked to you about things
you'd fix me right," he cried, with passionate enthusiasm. "I tell you
my head's just a fool thing that generally butts in all wrong. You've
just made me see right. You're that wise and clever. And--and when I
get fixed like I've been, I'll always need to come to you. Say, there
isn't another girl in all the world as bright as you. I'm going to
stop right here, and I'll smash every blamed policeman to a pulp if he
lays hands on Charlie. Charlie may be what he is. I don't care. If he
needs help I'm here to give it. I tell you if Charlie goes to the
penitentiary I go with him. If they hang him, they'll hang me, too.
That's how your sister feels. That's how I feel. That's how----"
"I feel, too," put in Helen quickly. "Oh, you great Big Brother Bill,"
she went on, in her sudden joy and enthusiasm. "You're the loyalest
and best thing I ever knew. And--and if you aren't careful I'll--I'll
give you one of my daubs after all. Come along. Let's go and look at
the new church. Let's go and see how all the pious, whited sepulchers
of this valley are getting on with their soul-saving business. I--I
couldn't paint a thing to-day."
CHAPTER XX
IN THE FAR REACHES
Charlie Bryant's horse was a good one, far better than a rancher of
his class might have been expected to ride. It was a big, compact
animal with the long sloping pasterns of a horse bred for speed. It
possessed those wonderful rounded ribs, which seemed to run right up
to quarters let down like those of a racehorse. It was a beautiful
creature, and as it chafed under the gentle, restraining hand of its
rider its full veins stood out like ropes, and its shoulders and
flanks were a-lather of sweat.
They were traveling over a broken country a few miles up the valley.
There was no road of any sort, only cattle tracks, which, amid the
wild tangle of bush, made progress difficult and slow.
The man's eyes were brooding, and his effeminate face was overcast as
he rode. The wild scene about him went for nothing, even to his artist
eyes. His thoughts were full to the brim with things that held them
concentrated to the exclusion of all else. And, for all he thought,
or saw, or felt, of his surroundings, he might have been footing the
superheated plains of a tropical desert.
He was thinking of a woman. She was never really out of his thoughts,
and his heart was torn with the hopelessness of the passion consuming
him. No overshadowing threat could give him the least disquiet, no
physical fear ever seemed to touch him. But every thought of the one
woman whose image was forever before him could sear and lacerate his
heart almost beyond endurance.
He had no blame for her at any time. He had no protest to offer that
her love, the love of a wife for a husband, was utterly beyond his
reach. How could it be otherwise? He knew himself so well for what he
was, he had so subtle an appreciation of all he must lack in the eyes
of a big spirited, human woman, that, to his troubled mind, the
situation as it was had almost become inevitable.
Now as he rode, he thought, too, of his newly arrived brother, and the
hatefulness of personal comparison made him almost cringe beneath
their flagellations. Bill, so big of heart and body, so lacking in the
many abilities which go to make up the man in men's eyes, but which
count for so little in a woman's, so strong in the buoyancy and
fearlessness that was his. He felt he could almost hate him for these
things. Bill had not one ugly thought or feeling in the whole of his
nature. Temptation? He barely understood the word, because he was so
naturally wholesome.
But more than these things it was the memory of that which, since his
earliest youth, had looked back at him out of the mirror, that robbed
Charlie Bryant of so much peace now. That, and the weakness which
seemed to fit the vision so well. Whereas Bill, this child of the same
parents, was all that might be, his own form and manner made him
shudder as he thought of them. Then there was that devil haunting him,
and from whom there seemed to be no escape.
How could he ever hope that Kate Seton would do more than lend her
strong, pitying affection for his support? How could she ever look to
him for support and guidance? His sense of proportion was far too
acute to permit so grievous an error.
In some perverse way his mentality was abnormally acute. He saw
with eyes which were inspired by a brain capable of vast achievement,
but which possessed none of that equipoise so necessary for a
well-balanced manhood. And it told him all that, and forced conviction
upon him. It told him so much of that which no man should believe
until it be thrust upon him overwhelmingly by the bitter experiences
of life. His whole brain was permeated by a pessimism forced upon him
by a morbid introspection, resulting from an undue appreciation of his
own physical and moral shortcomings.
Yet with it all he bore no resentment except against the perversity of
such a lot as his. And in this lay the germ of a self-pity, which is a
specter to be dreaded more than anything else in life. While deploring
the conditions under which he must live, robbed, as he believed he was
robbed, of the possibility of winning for himself all those things
which belong to the manhood really existing beneath his exterior of
denial, he yet felt he would rather have his bread divided than be
denied that trifling food which made it possible for him to go on
living.
Kate's tender pity, Kate's warmth of affection, an affection she might
even bestow upon some pet animal, was preferable to that she should
shut him entirely out of her life. It left him free to drink in the
dregs of happiness, although the nectar itself was denied him.
He could accept such conditions. Yes, he could almost be satisfied
with them, since he believed no others to be forthcoming. But, and a
dark fury of jealousy flooded his heart as he thought, he could not
witness another drinking the nectar while he was condemned to the
dregs. He felt that that way lay madness. That way was more than could
be endured. He could endure all else, whatever life had in store for
him, but the thought that he must stand by while Kate be given to
another was more than his fate, for all its perversity, could expect
of him.
From his veranda that morning, as on the morning before, Charlie had
seen Kate and Stanley Fyles walking together. More than that he had
heard from Kate herself of her admiration of the police officer. And,
in these things, so trifling perhaps, so commonplace, he had read the
forecast of a mind naturally dreading, and eaten up by suspicion. He
would have been ready to suspect his own brother, had not a merciful
providence made it plain to him that Bill possessed interest solely in
the laughing gray eyes of Kate's sister.
Now, as he rode along, he saw dull visions of a future in which Kate
no longer played a part. A demon of jealousy was driving him. He
longed impotently for the power to rob the man of the possibility of
winning that which was dearest to him. In the momentary madness which
his jealousy invoked he felt that the death of this man, his life
crushed out between his own lean hands, would be something approaching
a joy worth living for.
But such murderous thoughts were merely passing. They fled again
before the pessimism so long his habit. It would not help him one
iota. It would rob Kate of a happiness which he felt was her due,
which he desired for her; it would rob him of the last vestige of even
her pitying regard.
Then he laughed to himself, a laugh full of a hatefulness that somehow
did not seem to fit him. It was inspired by the thought of how easy it
would be to shoot the heart out of the man he deemed his rival. Others
had done such things, he told himself. Then, with a world of
bitterness, he added, far better men than himself.
But he knew that no such intention was really his. He knew that
beneath all his bitterness of feeling, and before all things, he
desired Kate's happiness and security. A strange magnanimity, in a
nature so morally weak, so lacking in all that the world regards as
the signs of true manhood, was his. Even his life, he felt, would be
small enough price to pay for the happiness and security of the only
woman who had ever held out the strong arm of support and affection
for him to lean upon, the only woman he had ever truly loved.
So a nightmare of thought teemed through his brain as he rode. Now he
would fall into a sweat of panic as fantastic specters of hideous
possibilities arose and confronted him, now only a world of grief
would overwhelm him. Again a passion of jealousy would drive him to
the verge of madness, only to be followed swiftly by that lurking
self-pity which robbed him of the wholesome human instincts inspired
by the spirit of battle in affairs of life. Then would come that
overwhelming depression, bred of the long sapping of his moral
strength, while through it all, a natural gentleness strove to soar
above the ashes of baser fires.
It was with a sigh of relief, as his horse finally cleared a close
growing bush, he emerged upon a small clearing. In the midst of this
stood a corral. But, for the moment, he passed this by, and rode
toward a log hut of ancient construction and design.
He drew the restive creature up and dismounted. Then he flung the
reins over one of the posts of the old corral. The place was beyond
the boundary of his homestead and belonged to a time when the valley
knew few inhabitants beyond half-breeds and Indians. He had discovered
it, and had turned it into the service of a storage for those things
which were required only rarely upon his ranch, and at the more remote
parts of it.
Inside the corral stood a wagon. It was an ordinary box wagon, but
nearby stood a hay-rack, which signified its uses. Then there was a
mower, and horse rake. There were other odds and ends, too, but it
appeared obvious that haying operations were carried on in this
direction, and this old corral so found its uses.
After glancing casually in the direction of these things Charlie
passed round to the door of the hut. And herein his purpose became
more obscure.
The place was heavily thatched and suggested long disuse. Its air was
less of dilapidation than desertion, and lichen and fungus played a
large part in such an aspect. The walls were low, and the heavy roof
was flat and sloping. As the man drew near a flight of birds streamed
from its eaves, screaming their resentment at such intrusion.
Charlie appeared not to notice them, so intent was he upon his
purpose. He walked hurriedly, and finally paused at the doorway. For a
moment he almost seemed in doubt. Then, with a thrust, he pushed the
door, the hinges of which creaked protestingly as it opened inwards.
Another fluttering of wings, another chorus of harsh screams, and a
further flight of birds poured from within and rushed headlong into
the brilliant sunshine.
The place was certainly very old. A dreadful mustiness pervaded the
atmosphere. The dirt, too, the heavy deposit of guano upon the floor,
made it almost revolting. There was no furniture of any sort, while
yet it conveyed the suggestion that, at some remote period, it had
been the habitation of man.
A rough boarding lined the walls of logs very nearly up to the sloping
roof. Rusty nails protruded here and there, suggesting hangers for
utensils. A circular aperture in the roof denoted the presence, at one
time, of a stove, possibly a cooking stove. And these things might
well have raised in the mind a picture of a lean, black-haired,
cadaverous man of low type, living a secret life amid the wilderness
of this valley, with crime, crime against the laws of both God and Man
as his object. Just such a man as is the notorious half-breed cattle
thief.
Stepping over to the far end of the room, where the light shone down
through the stovepipe hole in the roof, Charlie halted before the
rough boarding at the angle of the wall. Then he reached out and
caught the upper edge of the wooden lining, which, here, was much
lower than at any other point, and exerted some strength. Four of the
upright plankings slid upward together in a sort of rough panel, and
revealed a shallow cupboard hewn out of the old logs behind them.
Within this opening a number of garments were hanging. There were
several pairs of riding breeches, and an odd coat or two, besides
other articles of man's outer attire. Added to these were two
ammunition belts with holsters and revolvers.
Charlie stood gazing at the contents of the cupboard for some moments.
Then he examined them, pulling each article aside as though to assure
himself that nothing was missing. Each revolver, too, he withdrew from
its holster and examined closely. The chambers were fully loaded. And
having satisfied himself of these things he slid the boards back
into their place. As they dropped back his expression was one of
appreciation. No one could possibly have guessed, even from a narrow
examination, what lay behind those rough, time-worn boards. Their fit
was in perfect keeping with the rest of the wall lining.
He stood back and gave a final glance about him. Then he turned toward
the door.
As he did so the sound of a soft whinny reached him. It came from his
horse outside. A quick, startled light leaped into his dark eyes, and
the next moment his movements became almost electrical. He reached the
door on the run and looked out. His horse was standing with head held
high and ears pricked. The creature was gazing fixedly in the
direction from which it had approached the clearing.
Charlie needed nothing more. Something was approaching. Probably
another horse. If so there was equally the probability of a rider upon
its back.
He closed the door quickly and carefully behind him, and hurried
toward the corral. He threw down the poles that barred it, and made
his way to the side of the wagon. Then his movements became more
leisurely.
Opening the wagon box he drew out a jack and a tin of grease. Then,
still with an easy, leisurely air he jacked up one wheel and removed
an axle cap.
He was intent upon his work now--curiously intent. He removed the
wheel and smeared the inside of the hub with the filthy looking
grease. His horse beyond the fence gave another whinny, which ended in
a welcoming neigh. The man did not even look up. He replaced the wheel
and spun it round. Then he examined the felloes which had shrunk in
the summer heat. An answering neigh, and a final equine duet still
failed to draw his attention. Nor, until a voice beyond the fence
greeted him, did he look up.
"Getting ready for a journey?" said the voice casually.
Charlie looked round into the keen face of Stanley Fyles. He smiled
pleasantly.
"Not exactly a journey," he said. Then he glanced quickly at the
hay-rack standing on its side. "Say, doing anything?" he cried, and
his smile was not without derision.
"Nothing particular," replied the police officer, "unless you reckon
getting familiar with the geography of the valley particular."
Charlie nodded.
"I'd say that's particular for--a police officer." His rich voice was
at curious variance with his appearance. It was not unlike a terrier
with the bay of a bloodhound.
The phenomenon was not lost upon Fyles. He was studying this meager
specimen of a prairie "crook." He had never before met one quite like
him. He felt that here was a case of brain rather than physical
outlawry. It might be harder to deal with than the savage, illiterate
toughs he was used to.
"Yes," returned Fyles, "we need to learn things."
"Sure."
Charlie pointed at the hay-rack.
"Guess you don't feel like giving us a hand tipping that on to the
wagon? I'm going haying to-morrow."
"Sure," cried Fyles, with an easy smile, as he leaped out of the
saddle. He passed into the old corral and his quick eyes took in
every detail at a glance. They came to rest on the slight figure of
the man and noted his costume. Charlie Bryant was clad in loose riding
breeches, but was coatless. Nor did he display any firearms. "Two-man
job, isn't it?" he said lightly. "And you guessed to do it--single?"
Charlie's smile was blandly disarming.
"No. I hadn't thought to get it on to-day. The Kid'll be with me
to-morrow, or maybe my brother, Bill."
"Ah. Brother Bill could about eat that rack on his own," Fyles
declared, as the two men set about the task.
It was a far lighter affair than it looked, and, in less than five
minutes was resting perfectly balanced in its place on the wagon.
Fyles looked on while Charlie went round and bolted the rack securely
in its place.
"Your wagon?" the officer observed casually, while his sharp eyes took
in its last details.
Charlie nodded.
"Yes. Folks borrow it some. You see, I don't need it a heap, except at
hay time."
"No, I don't guess you need it a heap. Say, this is a queer place
tucked away up here. Old cattle station, I guess."
Fyles's remarks had no question in them. But he intended them to
elicit a response. Charlie appeared to have nothing to conceal.
"Well, of a sort, I'd say," he replied. "You see, this was King
Fisher's corral. There's others around the valley, though I don't know
just where. King Fisher reigned nearly twenty years ago. He lived in
the building the folks in Rocky Springs use as a Meeting House. He was
pretty tough. One of the worst badmen ever hit this part. Had a
signboard set up on the trail down from the prairie. He wrote it.
'This is King Fisher's trail, take any other old trail.' I believe
most folks used to take 'any other old trail.' There was one feller
didn't though. And that was the end of King Fisher's reign. These
secret corrals have always been used by toughs."
Fyles was smiling.
"Yes."
Charlie laughed and pointed at the hut beyond the corral.
"I'd awfully like to know some of the games that went on in there.
Birds and things nest in its roof now. I guess they didn't come within
a mile of it one time. They say King Fisher was mad--blood mad. If
that's so, I daresay this place could tell a few yarns."
Again came Fyles's monosyllabic agreement.
Charlie turned to his wagon and went on with his greasing. And while
he worked and listened to the other's talk, the memory of having seen
him with Kate gathered stormily in his mind. But he still smiled when
he looked up. He still replied in the light-hearted fashion in which
he had accepted the police officer's coming. He was perfectly aware of
the reason of the man's presence there. And, equally, he was
indifferent to it.
"Where are you haying now?" Fyles inquired presently.
Charlie answered without turning from his work.
"Half a mile down stream. Guess we all hay that way. There's no other
sloughs handy on the west side of the village."
"That's why the wagon's kept here?"
"Sure. Saves the horses. They'll come out here to-morrow, and stop
right here till we quit."
Charlie spun the last wheel round after replacing the cap.
"Where are you stopping with your men?" he demanded abruptly, as he
let the jack down.
"Just around," said Fyles evasively.
"I see. On the prowl." Charlie smiled up into the man's shrewd,
good-looking face. "You need to do some prowling around this valley if
you're going to clean things up. Yes, and I'd say you need a mighty
big broom."
"We've got the broom, and I guess we'll do the work," replied Fyles
nodding. "We generally do--in the end."
Charlie's eyes had become thoughtful.
"Yes," he agreed. "I s'pose you do. Guess I'll have to be moving."
He returned the grease and jack to the wagon box, and moved toward the
gate of the corral.
"Coming my way?" he asked casually.
"Not just now. I'm looking around--some."
Charlie laughed.
"Ah. I'd forgotten that broom."
"Most folks do," replied Fyles, "--until they fall over it."
Charlie had reached his horse's side. He unhooked the reins from the
fence, and flung them over its head. Then, with an agility quite
remarkable, he vaulted into the saddle.
"Well, I hope that broom won't come my way," he laughed. "I'd hate
falling around."
"I hope it won't," said Fyles, in the same light manner, as he
followed out of the corral. "That's a dandy plug of yours," he said
with admiration, as his appreciative eyes noted the chestnut's points.
"He surely is," returned Charlie. "He can go some, too. I'll give you
a run one day--if you fancy yours."
Fyles was hooking his reins over the post Charlie had vacated.
"Mine?" he said. "Peter's the quickest thing west of Winnipeg. He'll
sure give you a run when--the time comes."
Charlie laughed. The drift of the talk, its hidden meaning, amused
him.
"We'll have to make a time, eh?"
"Sure," said Fyles, looking him squarely in the eyes.
Charlie moved his horse away.
"Well, so long, for the present. Guess I'll remember that challenge.
Thanks for helping me with the rack. You're stopping?"
Fyles nodded.
"Yes--for awhile."
Charlie rode away with the air of a man with not a care in the world.
But he was thinking swiftly, and his thoughts were of that hidden
cupboard, and what it contained. Hope and fear struggled for paramount
place in his heart. Was the secret of that hiding place sufficiently
simple to defy Stanley Fyles, or was it not? Was he the man he
was reputed to be, or was he merely a clever man backed by a big
authority? In the end he abandoned the troublesome point. Time alone
would give him his answer.
CHAPTER XXI
WORD FROM HEADQUARTERS
Two horses ambled complacently, side by side, down the village trail.
Each was ridden by the man it knew best, and was most willing to
serve. Peter's affection for Stanley Fyles was probably little less
than his master's affection for him. The same thing applied to
Sergeant McBain, whose hard face suggested little enough of the
tenderer emotions. But both men belonged to the prairie, and the long
prairie trail inspires a wonderful sympathy between man and beast.
The men were talking earnestly in low voices, but their outward
seeming had no suggestion of anything beyond ordinary interest.
"He's surely leaving a trail all over the valley," said Sergeant
McBain, after listening to his superior's talk for some moments. "It's
a clear trail, too--but it don't ever seem to lead anywhere--definite.
You've made nothing of that corral place, sir?"
Fyles's eyes roamed over the scene about him in the quick, uneasy
fashion of a groping mind.
"I don't know yet," he said slowly, "I've got to windward of that
haying business. The fellow's haying all right. He's got a permit for
cutting, and he generally puts up fifty tons. Maybe he keeps that
wagon out there all the time for convenience. I can't say. But even if
he doesn't I can't see where it points."
"We can watch the place," said McBain quickly.
"That's better than speculation, but--it's clumsy."
"How, sir?"
"Why, man alive," replied Fyles sharply. "Do you think we're going to
fool a crook like him by just watching? Besides----"
"Yes, sir?"
Fyles had broken off. A woman was moving down the trail ahead of them.
She was a good distance away, but he had recognized the easy gait and
trim figure of Kate Seton. After a moment's pause he withdrew his gaze
and went on.
"I've got all I need out of that place--for the present. You've seen
the wagon and--recognized it. It's the wagon they ran that last cargo
in. The man who drove it was Pete Clancy. Clancy is one of Charlie
Bryant's gang. I don't think we need any more--yet. We've centralized
the running of that last cargo. The rest of the work is for the
future. My plans are all ready. The patrol comes in from Amberley
to-night. It will be ample reinforcement. We're just one move ahead of
these boys, here, and we've got to keep that way. You can get right
back to quarters, and wait for my return. I'm going in to the mail
office to run my eye over local mail. The envelopes of a local mail
make good reading--when a man's used to it."
McBain grinned in a manner that seemed to give his hard face pain.
"You get more out of the ad-dress on an envelope than any one I ever
see, sir," he observed shrewdly.
Fyles shrugged, not ill pleased at the compliment.
"It's practice, and--imagination. Those things, and--a good memory for
handwriting, also postmarks. Say, who's that coming down the southern
trail? Looks like----"
He broke off, shading his eyes from the burning sunlight of the
valley.
McBain needed no such protection. His mahogany face screwed itself up
until his eyes were mere slits.
"It ain't part of the patrol?" he said questioningly. "Yet it's one of
our fellers. Maybe it's a--despatch."
Fyles's brows drew sharply together in a frown of annoyance.
"If the chief's sent me the word I'm waiting for that way he's--a damn
fool. I asked him for cipher mail."
"Mr. Jason don't ever reckon on what those who do the work want. If
that feller's riding despatch, the whole valley will know it."
McBain's disgust was no less than that of Fyles. His hard face was
coldly set, and the despatch rider, if he were one, seemed likely to
get a rough reception.
"He'll make for the mail office," said Fyles shortly. "We'll go and
meet him."
He lifted Peter's reins, and the horse responded at a jump. In a
moment the two men were galloping down to Dy's office. Fyles was the
first out of the saddle, and the two stood waiting in silence for the
arrival of the horseman.
There was not much doubt as to the publicity of the man's arrival.
As if by magic a number of men, and as many women, appeared in the
vicinity of the saloon, farther down the trail. They, too, had seen
the newcomer, and they, too, were consumed with interest, though it
was based on quite a different point of view from that of Stanley
Fyles and Sergeant McBain.
To them a despatch rider meant important news, and probable action on
the part of the authorities. Important action meant, to their minds,
something detrimental to the shady side of their village life. Every
man was searching his brain for an explanation, a reason for the man's
coming, and every woman, sparing herself mental effort, was asking
pointed questions of those who should think for her.
The man rode into the village at full gallop, and, seeing the two
police horses outside the mail office, came straight on toward them.
He flung out of the saddle and saluted the inspector. Then he began
fumbling in an inner pocket. Fyles understood his intention and
sharply warned him.
"Not here. Now, in one word. Is it news from down East?"
The man nodded.
"Yes, sir. I believe so."
"You believe so?"
"Yes, sir. Mr. Jason told me I'd to make here to-day--mid-day. Said
you were waiting for this letter to act. He also said I was to avoid
speaking to any one in the place till I'd delivered the despatch into
your hands. He also said I was to remain here under your orders."
"Damnation! And we've had letters through the mail every day."
"Beg pardon, sir----"
McBain made a sign for silence, and the man broke off. But Fyles bade
him go on.
"Mr. Jason warned me to be very careful, as it was a despatch he could
not trust to the mail."
Fyles gave a short laugh.
"That'll do. Now, get mounted, and ride back the way you came into the
valley. When you get out of it keep along the edge of it westwards.
You'll come to our camp five miles out. It's in a bluff. It's a shack
on an abandoned farm. I can't direct you better, except it's just
under the shoulder in the valley, and is approached by a cattle track.
You'll have to ride around till you locate it. McBain will be coming
back soon. Maybe he'll pick you up. Avoid questions, and still
more--answers. Keep the letter till McBain gets in."
"Very good, sir."
The man remounted and rode away. His coming had been so sudden, his
stay so brief, and his departure so rapid, that Fyles had achieved
something of his purpose in repairing any damage Superintendent Jason
had done to his plans in acting contrary to his subordinate's wishes.
The sharp-eyed villagers had witnessed the interview with suspicions
lulled. There had been no despatch delivered, and the man was off
again the way he had come. Surely nothing very significant had taken
place. Possibly, after all, the man was merely a patrol from some
outlying station.
Fyles turned to his lieutenant.
"We're going to get busy," he said, with a shadowy smile.
The older man could not conceal his appreciation.
"Looks that way, sir."
"I'll look over the mail myself," Fyles went on. "You best get back to
camp, and see to that letter. Guess you'll wait for me to take action.
You can get out across the valley south. Ride on west and ford the
river up at the crossing--Winter's Crossing. See if the patrol's in.
Then make camp--and keep an eye skinned for that boy. I'll get along
later."
The sergeant saluted and sprang into the saddle. Fyles passed into the
mail office as the man rode off.
Allan Dy was used to these visits of the inspector. There were very
few country postmasters who were not used to such visits. It was a
process of espionage which was never acknowledged, yet one that was
carried on extensively in suspected districts. There was never any
verbal demand, or acquiescence, in the manner in which it was carried
out. When the police officer appeared the day's mail was usually in
the process of being sorted, and was generally to be found spread out
lying in full view of the searching eyes.
Fyles walked in. Passed the time of day. Collected his own mail and
that of the men under him. Chatted pleasantly with the subservient
official, and started to pass out again. In those brief moments he had
seen all he wanted to see, which on this occasion was little enough.
There were only four letters from the East, The rest were all of local
origin. One of the eastern letters was for O'Brien, and it carried an
insurance firm's superscription. There were two letters for Kate
Seton, both from New York, and both carrying the firm styles of
well-known retail traders in women's clothing. The fourth was
addressed to Charlie Bryant, and bore no trader's imprint.
As he neared the door of the little office he had to stand aside as
Kate Seton made her way in.
Fyles felt that his luck was certainly in. The news he had awaited
with so much impatience had been received at last, and now--well, his
quick appreciative eyes took in the delightfully fresh, wholesome
appearance of this woman, who had made such inroads upon his usually
unemotional heart. There was not a detail escaped him. The rounded
figure suggesting virility and physical well-being. Her delightful,
purposeful face full of a wide intelligence and strength. Those
wonderful dark eyes of such passionate, tender depth, which yet held
possibilities for every emotion which finds its place in the depth of
a strong heart.
She was clad, too, so differently from the general run of the
villagers. Like her sister, though in a lesser degree, she breathed
the air of a city--a city far from these western regions, a city where
refinement and culture inspires a careful regard for outward
appearance.
She smiled upon him as he stood aside. Somehow the shyness which her
sister had accused her of seemed to have gone. Her whole atmosphere
was that of a cordial welcome.
"You're early down for your mail, Mr. Fyles," she said, after greeting
him. "I'm generally right on the spot before Allan Dy is through.
Still, I dare say your mail is more important, and stands for no
delay."
"It's the red tape of our business, Miss Seton," Fyles replied, with a
light shrug. "We're always getting orders that should rightly be
executed before they can possibly reach us. It's up to us to get them
the moment they arrive."
Kate's smile was good to see. There was just that dash of ironical
challenge in her eyes which Fyles was beginning to associate with her.
"Still working out impossible problems which don't really--exist?"
The man returned her smile.
"Still working out problems," he said. Then he added slyly, "Problems
which must be solved, in spite of assurances of their non-existence."
"You mean--what I said to you the other day?"
Fyles nodded.
Kate's eyes sobered, and the change in their expression came near to
melting the officer's heart.
"I'm sorry," she said simply. Then she sighed. "But I s'pose you must
see things your own way." She glanced at the mail counter. "You had a
despatch rider in this morning. I saw him coming down the trail.
Everybody saw him."
Just for a moment Fyles's strong brows drew together. He was reluctant
to deliberately lie to this woman. He felt that to do so was not
worthy. He felt that a lie to her was a thing to be despised.
"We had a patrol in," he said guardedly.
Kate smiled.
"A patrol from--Amberley?"
Again was that ironical challenge in Kate's eyes. Fyles's responsive
smile was that of the fencer.
"You are too well informed."
But the woman shook her head.
"Not so well informed as I could wish," she said. Then she laughed as
her merry sister might have laughed, and the policeman wanted to join
in it by reason of its very infection. "There's a whole heap of things
I'd like to know. I'd like to know why a government of the people
makes a law nobody wants, and spends the public's money in enforcing
it. Also I'd like to know why they take a vicious delight in striving
to make criminals of honest enough people in the process. Also I'd
like to know how your people intend to trip up certain people for a
crime which they have never committed, and don't intend to commit,
and, anyway, before they can be punished must be caught red-handed.
You've got your problems sure enough, and--and these are some of the
simplest of mine. Oh, dear--it almost makes my head whirl when I think
of them. But I must do so, because," her smile died out, and the man
watched the sudden determined setting of her lips, "I'm against you as
long as you are--against him. Good-bye. I must get my mail."
* * * * *
It was a long circuitous route which took Stanley Fyles back to his
camp. But it seemed short enough on the back of the faithful,
fleet-footed Peter. Then, too, the man's thoughts were more than
merely pleasant. Satisfaction that his news was awaiting him at the
camp left him free to indulge in the happy memory of his brief passage
of arms with Kate Seton.
What a staunch creature she was! He wondered if the day would ever
come when she would exercise the same loyalty and staunchness on his
behalf. To him it seemed an extraordinary, womanish perversity that
made her cling to a poor creature so obviously a wrongdoer. Was she
truly blind to his doings, or was she merely blinding herself to them?
She was not in love with Charlie Bryant, he felt sure. Her avowal of
regard had been too open and sincere to have been of any other nature
than the one she had claimed for it. Yes, he could understand that
attitude in her. Anything he had ever seen of her pointed the big
woman nature in her. She felt herself strong, and, like other strong
people, it was a passion with her to help the weak and erring.
Fyles's knowledge of women was slight enough, but he had that keen
observation which told him many things instinctively. And all the best
and truest that was in him had been turned upon this woman from the
very first time he had seen her.
He told himself warmly, now, that she was the most lovable creature on
earth, and nothing but marriage with her could ever bring him the
necessary peace of mind that would permit him to continue his work
with that zeal and hope of achievement with which he had set about a
career.
He saw so many things now, through the eyes of a great passion, that
seemed utterly different, rendered transcendentally attractive through
the glamor of a strong, deep love. They were things which, before, had
always been viewed dispassionately, almost coldly, yet not without
satisfaction. They had always been part of his scheme, but had no
greater attraction than the mere fact that they were integral parts of
one great whole. Now they became oases, restful shades in the sunlight
of his effort.
He had always contemplated marriage as an ultimately necessary adjunct
to the main purpose. No man, he felt, could succeed adequately, after
a certain measure had been achieved, without a woman at his side, a
woman's influence to keep the social side of a career in balance with
the side which depended upon his direct effort. Now he saw there was
more in it than that. Something more human. Something which made
success a thousand times more pleasing to contemplate. He felt that
with Kate at his side giant's work would become all too easy. Her
ravishing smile of encouragement would be a gentle spur to the most
jaded energies. The delight of bearing her upon his broad shoulders in
his upward career, would be bliss beyond words, and, in the interim of
his great efforts, the care and happiness of her loyally courageous
heart would be a delight almost too good to be true.
His keen mind and straining energies were bathed in the wonderful
fount of love. He was looking for the first time into the magic mirror
which every human creature must, at some time, gaze into. He was
discovering all those pictures which had been discovered countless
millions of times before, and which other coming countless millions
had yet to discover for themselves.
So he rode on dreaming to the rhythmic beat of Peter's willing hoofs.
So he came at last to the distant camp of his subordinate comrades.
He was greeted by the harsh voice and hard, weather-stained features
of McBain wreathed in a smile which was a mere distortion, yet which
augured well.
"I haven't opened the letters, sir," he said, "but I've questioned
Jones close. I guess it's right, all right."
Fyles was once more the man of business. He nodded as he flung off his
horse and handed it over to a waiting trooper.
"Where's the despatch?" he demanded sharply.
McBain produced a long, official envelope. The other tore it open
hastily. He ran his eyes over its contents, and passed it back to the
sergeant.
"Good," he exclaimed. "There's a cargo left Fort Allerton, on the
American side, bound for Rocky Springs by trail. It's a big cargo of
rye whisky. We'll have to get busy."
CHAPTER XXII
MOVES IN THE GAME OF LOVE
Stanley Fyles's extreme satisfaction was less enduring than might have
been expected. Success, and the prospect of success, were matters
calculated to affect him more nearly than anything else in his life.
That was the man, as he always had been; that was the man, who, in so
brief a time, had raised himself to the commissioned ranks of his
profession. But, somehow, just now a slight undercurrent of thought
and feeling had set in. It was scarcely perceptible at first, but
growing rapidly, it quickly robbed the tide of his satisfaction of
quite half its strength, and came near to reducing it to the condition
of slack water.
McBain was in the quarters attending to the detail which fell to his
lot. A messenger from Winter's Crossing had come in announcing the
arrival, at that camp, of the reinforcing patrol. This was the
culminating point of Fyles's satisfaction. From that moment the
undercurrent set in.
The inspector had moved out of the bluff, which screened the temporary
quarters from chance observation, and had taken up a position on the
shoulder of the valley, where he sat himself upon a fallen fence post
to consider the many details of the work he had in mind.
The sun was setting in a ruddy cauldron of summer cloud, and, already,
the evening mists were rising from the heart of the superheated
valley. The wonderful peace of the scene might well have been a
sedative to the stream of rapid thought pouring through his busy
brain.
But its soothing powers seemed to have lost virtue, and, as his almost
unconscious gaze took in the beauties spread out before it, a curious
look of unrest replaced the satisfaction in his keen eyes. His brows
drew together in a peevish frown. A discontent set the corners of
his tightly compressed lips drooping, and once or twice he stirred
impatiently, as though his irritation of mind had communicated itself
to his physical nerves.
Once more the image of Kate Seton had risen up before his mind's eye,
and, for the first time it brought him no satisfaction. For the first
time he had associated the probable object of his plans with her.
Charlie Bryant was no longer a mere offender against the law in his
mind. In concentrating his official efforts against him he realized
the jeopardy in which his own regard for Kate Seton placed him. He saw
that his success now in ridding the district of the whisky-runner
would, at the same time, rob him of all possible chance of ever
obtaining the regard of this woman he loved. It meant an ostracism
based upon the strongest antipathy--the antipathy of a woman wounded
in her tenderest emotions, that wonderful natural instinct which is
perhaps beyond everything else in her life.
The more than pity of it. Kate's interest in Charlie Bryant had
assumed proportions which threatened to overwhelm his whole purpose.
It became almost a tragedy. Pondering upon this ominous realization a
sort of panic came near to taking hold of him. Apart from his own
position, the pain and suffering he knew he must inflict upon her set
him flinching.
Her protestations of Charlie's innocence were very nearly absurd. To
a mind trained like his there was little enough doubt of the man's
offense. He was a rank "waster," but, as in the case of all such
creatures, there was a woman ready to believe in him with all the
might of feminine faith. It was a bitter thought that in this case
Kate Seton should be the woman. She did believe. He was convinced of
her honesty in her declaration. She believed from the bottom of her
heart, she, a woman of such keen sense and intelligence. It was--yes,
it was maddening. Through it all he saw his duty lying plainly before
him. His whole career was at stake, that career for which only he had
hitherto lived, and which, eventually, he had hoped to lay at Kate's
feet.
What could he do? There was no other way. He--must--go--on. His dream
was wrecking. It was being demolished before his eyes. It was not
being sent crushing at one mighty stroke, but was being torn to shreds
and destroyed piecemeal.
He strove to stiffen himself before the blow, and his very attitude
expressed something of his effort. He told himself a dozen times that
he must accept the verdict, and carry his duty through, his duty to
himself as well as to his superiors. But conviction was lacking. The
human nature in him was rebelling. For all his discipline it would not
be denied. And with each passing moment it was gaining in its power to
make itself felt and heard.
Its promptings came swiftly, and in a direction hardly conceivable in
a man of his balance of mind. But the more sure the strength of the
man, the more sure the strength of the old savage lurking beneath the
sanest thought. The savage rose up in him now in a reckless challenge
to all that was best and most noble in him. A cruel suspicion swept
through his mind and quickly permeated his whole outlook. What if he
had read Kate's regard for the man Bryant wrong? What if he had read
it as she intended him to read it, seeking to blind him to the true
facts? He knew her for a clever woman, a shrewd woman, even a daring
woman. What if she had read through his evident regard for her, and
had determined to turn it to account in saving her lover from
disaster, by posing with a maternal, or sisterly regard for his
welfare? Such things he felt had been done. He was to be a tool, a
mere tool in her hands, the poor dupe whose love had betrayed him.
He sprang from his seat.
No, a thousand times no, he told himself. His memory of her beautiful,
dark, fearless eyes was too plainly in his mind for that. The honesty
of her concern and regard for the man was too simply plain to hold
any trace of the perfidy which his thought suggested. He told
himself these things. He told himself again and again, and--remained
unconvinced. The savage in him, the human nature was gaining an
ascendancy that would not be denied, and from the astute, disciplined
man he really was, at a leap, he became the veriest doubting lover.
He threw his powerful arms out, and stretched himself. His movements
were the movements of unconcern, but there was no unconcern within
him. A teeming, harassing thought was urging him, driving him to the
only possible course whereby he could hope to obtain a resumption of
his broken peace of mind.
He must see Kate. He must see her again, without delay.
* * * * *
Kate Seton was sitting in the northern shadow of her little house the
following morning when Stanley Fyles rode down the southern slope of
the valley toward the old footbridge. She had just dispatched Big
Brother Bill on an errand to the village, and, with feminine tact, had
requested him to discover Helen's whereabouts, and send her, or bring
her home. She had no particular desire that Helen should return home.
In fact, she would rather she didn't until mid-day dinner. But she
felt she was giving the man the excuse he evidently needed.
As a matter of fact, she had a good deal of work to do. And the first
hour after Bill had taken his departure she was fully occupied with
her two villainous hired men. After that she returned to the house,
and wrote several letters, and, finally, took up her position in the
shade, and devoted herself to a basket of long-neglected sewing.
At the sound of the approaching horseman she looked up with a start.
She had no expectation of a visitor, she had no desire for one just
now. Nevertheless, when she discovered the officer's identity, she
displayed no surprise, and more interest, than might have been
expected.
She did not disguise from herself the feelings this man inspired. On
the contrary she rather reveled in them, especially as, in a way, just
now, all her actions must be in direct antagonism to his efforts.
She felt that a battle, a big battle, must be fought and won between
them. It was a battle to be fought out openly and frankly. It was her
determination that this man should not wrong himself by committing a
great wrong upon Charlie Bryant.
Kate was very busy at the moment Fyles rode up. She was intent upon
fitting a piece of lace, obviously too small, upon a delicate white
garment of her sister's, which was obviously too big.
For a moment, as she did not look up, Fyles sat leaning forward in the
saddle with his arms resting upon its horn. He was watching her with
a smiling interest which was not without anxiety.
"There's surely not a dandier picture in the world than a girl sitting
in the shade sewing--white things," he said at last, by way of
greeting.
Kate glanced up for the briefest of smiling glances. Then her dark
head bent over her sewing again.
"And there's surely nothing calculated to upset things more than a man
butting in, where the same girl's fragment of brain is worrying to fit
something that doesn't fit anyway."
"Meaning me?"
Fyles smiled in his confident way.
"Seeing there's no one else around, I must have meant some other
fellow."
Kate laid the lace aside, and looked up with a sigh. A gentle
amusement shone in her fine dark eyes.
"Have you ever tried to make things fit that--just won't?" she
demanded.
Fyles shook his head.
"Maybe I can help, though," he hazarded.
"Help?" Kate's amusement merged into a laugh. "Say, when it comes to
fitting things that don't fit, two heads generally muss things right
up. All my life I've been trying to fit things that don't fit, and I
find, if you're to succeed, you've got to do it to yourself, and by
yourself. It always takes a big lot of thinking which nobody else can
follow. Maybe your way of thinking is different from other folks, and
so they can't understand, and that's why they can't follow it. Now
here's a bit of lace, and there's a sleeve. The lace is short by an
inch. Still there's ways and ways of fixing it, but only one right
way. If I make the sleeve smaller the lace will fit, but poor Helen
won't get her arm through it. If I tack on a bit more lace it'll muss
the job, and make it look bad. Then there's other ways, too,
but--there's only one right way." She dropped the lace in her basket
and began to fold the garment. "I'll get some new lace that does fit,"
she declared emphatically.
Fyles nodded, but the amusement died out of his eyes.
"All of which is sound sense," he said seriously, "and is leading us
toward controversial--er--subjects. Eh?"
Kate raised a pair of shoulders with pretended indifference. But her
eyes were smiling that challenge which Stanley Fyles always associated
with her.
"Not a bad thing when the police are getting so very busy, and--you
are their chief in the district," she said.
"I must once more remark, you are well informed," smiled Fyles.
"And I must once more remark not as well informed as I could wish,"
retorted Kate quickly.
Fyles had permitted his gaze to wander down the wooded course of the
river. Kate was watching him closely, speculatively. And curious
enough she was thinking more of the man than his work at that moment.
The man's eyes came back abruptly to her face, and her expression was
instantly changed to one of smiling irony.
"Well?" she demanded.
Fyles shook his head.
"It isn't," he said. "May I ask how you know we are--so very busy?"
"Sure," cried Kate, with a frank laugh. "You see, I have two of the
worst scamps in the valley working for me, and they seem to think it
more than necessary that they keep themselves posted as to--your
movements."
"I see." Fyles's lighter mood had entirely passed, and with its going
Kate's became more marked. "I s'pose they spy out everything for the
benefit of their--chief."
Kate clapped her hands.
"What reasoning. I s'pose they have a chief?" she added slyly.
A frown of irritation crossed the policeman's brow.
"Must we open up that old sore, Miss Kate?" he, asked almost sharply.
"They are known to be--when not occupied with the work of your
farm--assisting Charlie Bryant in his whisky-running schemes. They are
two of his lieutenants."
"And so, because they are so known among the village people here, you
are prosecuting this campaign against a man whom you hope to catch
red-handed."
"I have sufficient personal evidence to--prosecute my campaign," said
Fyles quickly. "As you said just now, we are not idle."
"Yes, I know," Kate sighed, and her gaze was turned upon the western
reaches of the valley. "Your camp out there is full of activity. So
is Winter's Crossing. And the care with which you mask your coming and
going is known to everybody. It is a case of the hunter being hunted.
Yes, I say it without resentment, I am glad of these things, because
I--must know."
"If we are against each other--it is only natural you should wish to
know."
Kate's eyes opened wider.
"Of course we are against each other, as long as you are against
Charlie. But only in our--official capacities." A whimsical smile
stole into the woman's eyes. "Oh, you are so--so obstinate," she cried
in mock despair. "In this valley it is no trouble for me to watch your
every move, and, in Charlie's interests, to endeavor to frustrate
them. But the worst of it is I'd--I'd like to see you win out. Instead
of that I know you won't. You've had some news. You had it yesterday,
I suppose, by that patrol. Maybe it's news of another cargo coming in,
and you are getting ready to capture it, and--Charlie. I'm not here to
give any one away, I'm not here to tell you all I know, must know,
living in the valley, but you are doomed, utterly doomed to failure,
if you count the capture of Charlie success."
In spite of the lightness of Kate's manner her words were not without
their effect upon Fyles. There was a ring of sincerity in them that
would not be denied. But its effect upon him was not that which she
could have wished. His face set almost sternly. The challenge of the
woman had stirred him out of his calm assurance, but it was in a
direction which she could scarcely have expected. He thrust his
sunburned face forward more aggressively, and challenged her in
return.
"What is this man to you?" he demanded, his square jaws seeming to
clip his question the more shortly.
In a moment Kate's face was flushing her resentment. Her dark eyes
were sparkling with a sudden leaping anger.
"You have no right to--ask me that," she cried. But Fyles had
committed himself. Nor would he draw back.
"Haven't I?" he laughed harshly. "All's fair in love and--war. We are
at war--officially."
The woman's flushing cheeks remained, but the sparkle of her eyes had
changed again to an ironical light.
"War--yes. Perhaps you're right. The only courtesies recognized in war
are observed in the prize ring, and in international warfare. Our
warfare must be less exalted, and permits hitting--below the belt.
I've told you what Charlie is to me, and I have told you truly. I am
trying to defend an innocent man, who is no more to me than a brother,
or--or son. I am doing so because of his peculiar ailments which make
him well-nigh incapable of helping himself. You see, he does not care.
His own safety, his own welfare, are nothing to him. It is for that
reason, for the way he acts in consequence of these things, that all
men believe him a rogue, and a--a waster. I tell you he is neither."
She finished up a little breathlessly. She had permitted her loyalty
and anxiety to carry her beyond the calm fencing she had intended.
But Fyles remained unmoved, except that the harshness had gone out of
his manner.
"It is not I who am obstinate," he said soberly. "It is you, Miss
Kate. What if I told you I had irrefutable circumstantial evidence
against him? Would that turn you from your faith in him?"
The woman shook her head.
"It would be merely circumstantial evidence," she said. "God knows how
circumstance has filled our penitentiaries wrongfully," she added
bitterly.
"And but for circumstance our population of wrongdoers at large would
be greater by a thousand per cent.," retorted the officer.
"That is supposition," smiled Kate.
"Which does not rob it of its possibility in fact."
The two sat looking at each other, silently defiant. Kate was smiling.
A great excitement was thrilling her, and she liked this man all the
better for his blunt readiness for combat, even with her.
Fyles was wondering at this woman, half angry, half pleased. Her
strength and readiness appealed to him as a wonderful display.
He was the first to speak, and, in doing so, he felt he was
acknowledging his worsting in the encounter.
"It's--it's impossible to fight like this," he said lamely. "I am not
accustomed to fight with women."
"Does it matter, so long as a woman can fight?" Kate cried quickly.
"Chivalry?" she went on contemptuously. "That's surely a survival of
ages when the old curfew rang, and a lot of other stupid notions
filled folks' minds. I--I just love to fight."
Her smile was so frankly infectious that Fyles found himself
responding. He heaved a sigh.
"It's no good," he said almost hopelessly. "You must stick to your
belief, and I to mine. All I hope, Miss Kate, is that when I've done
with this matter the pain I've inflicted on you will not be
unforgivable."
The woman's eyes were turned away. They had become very soft as she
gazed over at the distant view of Charlie's house.
"I don't think it will be," she said gently. Then with a quick return
to her earlier manner: "You see, you will never get the chance of
hurting Charlie." A moment later she inquired naively: "When is the
cargo coming in?"
But Fyles's exasperation was complete.
"When?" he cried. "Why, when this scamp is ready for it. It's--it's no
use, Miss Kate. I can't stop, or--or I'll be forgetting you are a
woman, and say 'Damn!' I admit you have bested me, but--young Bryant
hasn't. I----" he broke off, laughing in spite of his annoyance, and
Kate cordially joined in.
"But he will," she cried, as Peter began to move away. "Good-bye, Mr.
Fyles," she added, in her ironical fashion as she picked up her
sewing. "I can get on with these important matters--now."
The man's farewell was no less cordial, and his better sense told him
that in accepting his defeat at her hands he had won a good deal in
another direction where he hoped to finally achieve her capitulation.
* * * * *
While the skirmish between Stanley Fyles and Kate Seton was going on,
the object of it was discussing the doings of the police and the
prospect of the coming struggle with Big Brother Bill on the veranda
of his house.
He was leaning against one of its posts while Bill reposed on the hard
seat of a Windsor chair, seeking what comfort he could find in the
tremendous heat by abandoning all superfluous outer garments.
Charlie's face was darkly troubled. His air was peevishly irritable.
"Bill," he said, with a deep thrill of earnestness in his voice, as he
thrust his brown, delicate hands into the tops of his trousers. "All
the trouble in the world's just about to start, if I'm a judge of the
signs of things. There's a whole crowd of the police in the valley
now. They're camped higher up. They think we don't know, but we
do--all of us. I wonder what they think they're going to do?"
His manner became more excited, and his voice grew deeper and deeper.
"They think they're going to get a big haul of liquor. They think
they're going to get me. I tell you, Bill, that for men trained to
smelling things out, they're blunderers. Their methods are clumsy as
hell. I could almost laugh, if--if I didn't feel sick at their coming
around."
Bill stirred uneasily.
"If there were no whisky-running here they wouldn't be around," he
said pointedly.
Charlie eyed him curiously.
"No," he said. Then he added, "And if there were no whisky-running
there'd be no village here. If there were no village here we shouldn't
be here. Kate and her sister wouldn't be here. Nothing would be here,
but the old pine--that goes on forever. This village lives on the
prohibition law. Fyles may have a reputation, but he's clumsy--damned
clumsy. I'd like to see ahead--the next few days."
"He's smelling a cargo--coming in, isn't he?" Bill's tact was holding
him tight.
Again Charlie looked at him curiously before he replied.
"That's how they reckon," he said guardedly, at last.
Bill had turned away, vainly searching his unready wit for the best
means of carrying on the discussion. Suddenly his eyes lit, and he
pointed across at the Seton's house.
"Say, who's that--on that horse? Isn't it Fyles? He's talking to some
one. Looks like----"
He broke off. Charlie was staring out in the direction indicated, and,
in a moment, his excitement passed, swallowed up in a frowning,
brooding light that had suddenly taken possession of his dark eyes.
Bill finally broke the uncomfortable silence.
"It's--Fyles?" he said.
"Yes, it's Fyles," said Charlie, with a sudden suppressed fury. "It's
Fyles--curse him, and he's talking to--Kate."
At the sound of his brother's tone, even Bill realized his blundering.
He knew he had fired a train of passion that was to be deplored, even
dreaded in his brother. He blamed himself bitterly for his lack of
forethought, his absurd want of discretion.
But the mischief was done. Charlie had forgotten everything else.
Bill stirred again in his chair.
"What does he want down there?" he demanded, for lack of something
better to say.
"What does he want?" Charlie laughed. It was an unpleasant laugh, a
savage laugh. It was a laugh that spoke of sore heart, and feelings
crowding with bitterness. "I guess he wants something he'll never
get--while I'm alive."
He relapsed into moody silence, and a new expression grew in his eyes
till it even dominated that which had shone in them before. Bill
thought he recognized it. The word "funk" flashed through his mind,
and left him wondering. What could Charlie have to fear from Fyles
talking to Kate? Did he believe that Kate would let the officer pump
her with regard to his, Charlie's, movements!
Yes, that must be it.
"He won't get more than five cents for his dollar out of her," he
said, in an effort to console.
Charlie was round on him in a flash.
"Five cents for a dollar? No," he cried, "nor one cent, nor a fraction
of a cent. Fyles is dealing with the cleverest, keenest woman I've
ever met in all my life. I'm not thinking that way. I'm thinking how
almighty easy it is for a man walking a broken trail to trip and
smash himself right up. The more sure he is the worse is his fall,
because--he takes big chances, and big chances mean big falls. You've
hit it, Bill, I'm scared--scared to death just now. If I know Fyles
there's going to be one hell of a time around here, and, if you value
your future, get clear while you can. I'm scared, Bill, scared and
mad. I can't stand to watch that man talking to Kate. I'm not scared
of man or devil, but I'm scared--scared to death when I see that. I
must get out of this. I must get away, or----"
He moved off the veranda in a frantic state of nervous passion.
Bill sprang from his seat and was at his brother's side in two great
strides, and his big hand fell with no little force upon the latter's
arm and held it.
"What do you mean?" he cried apprehensively. "Where--where are you
going?"
With surprising strength Charlie flung him off. He turned, facing him
with angry eyes and flushed face.
"Don't you dare lay hand on me like that again, Bill," he cried
dangerously. "I don't stand for that from--anybody. I'm going down the
village, since you want to know. I'm going down to O'Brien's. And you
can get it right now that I wouldn't stand the devil himself butting
in to stop me."
CHAPTER XXIII
STORM CLOUDS
A dispirited creature made its way down to the Setons' house that same
evening. Big Brother Bill felt there was not one single clear thought
in his troubled head, at least, not one worth thinking. He was
weighted down by a hazy conception of the position of things, in a
manner that came near to destroying the very root of his optimism.
One or two things settled upon his mind much in the manner of mental
vampires. He knew that Charlie was threatened, and he knew that
Charlie knew it, and made no attempt to protect himself. He knew that
Charlie was also scared--frightened out of all control of himself in a
manner that was absurdly contradictory. He knew that he was now at the
saloon for the purpose of drowning his hopeless feelings in the
maddening spirit O'Brien dispensed. He knew that his own baggage had
at last arrived from Heaven only knew where, and he wished it hadn't,
for it left him feeling even more burdened than ever with the
responsibilities of the pestilential valley. He knew that he was
beginning to hate the police, and Fyles, almost as much as Charlie
did. He knew that if prevailing conditions weren't careful he would
lose his temper with them, and make things hot for somebody or
something. But, more than all else, he knew that Helen Seton was more
than worth all the worry and anxiety he was enduring.
In consequence of all this he arrayed himself in a light tweed suit, a
clean, boiled shirt and collar, a tie, that might well have startled
the natives of his home city, and a panama hat which he felt was
necessary to improve the tropical appearance of his burnt and
perspiring features, and hastened to Helen's presence for comfort and
support.
The girl had been waiting for him. She looked the picture of
diaphanous coolness in the shade of the house, lounging in an old
wicker chair, with its fellow, empty, drawn up beside her. There were
no feminine eyes to witness her little schemes, and Bill?--why, Bill
was delighted beyond words that she was there, also the empty chair,
also, that, as he believed, while she was wholly unconscious of the
fact, the girl's attitude and costume were the most innocently
pleasing things he had ever beheld with his two big, blue,
appreciative eyes.
He promptly told her so.
"Say, Hel," he cried, "you don't mind me calling you 'Hel,' do
you?--you see, everything delightful seems to be associated with
'Hell' nowadays. If you could see yourself and the dandy picture
you make you'd kind of understand how I feel just about now."
The girl smiled her delight.
"Maybe I do understand," she said. "You see, I don't always sit around
in this sort of fancy frock. Then, no girl of sense musses herself
into an awkward pose when six foot odd of manhood's getting around her
way. No, no Big Brother Bill. That chair didn't get there by itself.
Two carefully manicured hands put it there, after their owner had
satisfied herself that her mirror hadn't made a mistake, and that she
was looking quite her most attractive. You see, you'd promised to come
to see me this evening, and--well, I'm woman enough to be very
pleased. That's all."
Bill's sun-scorched face deepened its ruddy hue with youthful delight.
"Say, you did all this for--for me?"
Helen laughed.
"Why, yes, and told you the various details to be appreciated, because
I was scared to death you wouldn't get them right."
Bill sat himself down, and set the chair creaking as he turned it
about facing her. He held out his hands.
"I haven't seen the manicuring racket right, yet," he laughed.
Helen stretched out her two hands toward him for inspection. He
promptly seized them in his, and pretended to examine them.
"The prettiest, softest, jolliest----"
But the girl snatched them away.
"That's not inspection. That's----"
"Sure it's not," retorted Bill easily. "It's true."
"And absurd."
"What--the truth?"
Bill's blue eyes were widely inquiring.
"Sometimes."
The smile died out of the man's eyes, and his big face became doleful.
"Yes, I s'pose it is."
Helen set up.
"What's gone wrong--now? What truth is--absurd?" she demanded.
The man shrugged.
"Oh, everything. Say, have you ever heard of a disease of the--the
brain called 'partly hatched'?"
The girl's eyes twinkled.
"I don't kind of remember it."
"No, I don't s'pose you do. I don't think anybody ever has it but me.
I've got it bad. This valley's given it me, and--and if it isn't
careful it's going to get fatal."
Helen looked around at him in pretended sympathy.
"What's the symptoms? Nothing outward? I mean that tie--that's not a
symptom, is it?"
Bill shook his head. He was smiling, but beneath his smile there was a
certain seriousness.
"No. There's no outward signs--yet. I got it through thinking too--too
young. You see, I've done so much thinking in the last week. If it had
been spread over, say six months, the hatching might have got fixed
right. But it's been too quick, and things have got addled. You see,
if a hen turned on too much pressure of heat her eggs would get
fried--or addled. That's how my brain is. It's addled."
Helen nodded with a great show of seriousness which the twitching
corners of her pretty mouth belied.
"I always thought you'd got a trouble back of your--head. But you'd
best tell me. You see, I don't get enough pressure of thinking to
hatch anything. Maybe between us we can fix your mental eggs right."
Bill's big eyes lit with relief and hope.
"That's bright of you. You surely are the cutest girl ever. You must
have got a heap of brain to spare."
Helen could no longer restrain her laughter.
"It's mostly all--spare. Now, then, tell me all your troubles."
The great creature at her side looked doubtful and puzzled.
"I don't know just where to begin. There's such a heap, and I've
worried thinking about it, till--till----"
Helen sat up and propped her chin in her hands with her elbows on her
knees.
"When you don't know where to begin just start with the first thought
in your head, and--and--ramble."
Bill brightened up.
"Sure that's best?"
"Sure."
The man sighed in relief.
"That's made a heap of difference," he cried. Then he took a
handkerchief from his pocket, removed his panama and mopped his
forehead. He gave a big gulp in the midst of the process, and spoke as
though he were defying an enemy. "Will you marry me?" he demanded, and
sat up glaring at her, with his hat and handkerchief poised in either
hand.
The girl gave him a quick look. Then she flung herself back in her
chair and laughed.
"We--we are talking of troubles," she protested.
Bill replaced his hat, and restored his handkerchief to its pocket.
"Troubles? Troubles? Isn't that trouble enough to start with?
It's--it's the root of it all," he declared. "I'm--I'm just crazy
about you. And every time I try to think about Charlie and the police,
and--and the scallywags of the valley, I--I find you mixed up with it
all, and get so tangled up that I don't know where I am, or--or why.
Say, have you ever been crazy about anybody? Some feller, for
instance? It's the worst worrying muddle ever happened. First you're
pleased--then you cuss them. Then you sort of sit dreaming all sorts
of fool things that haven't any sense at all. Then you want to make
rhymes and things about eyes, and flowers, and moons, and feet, and
laces and bits. You feel all over that everything else has got no
sense to it, and is just so much waste of time thinking about it. You
sort of feel that all men are fools but yourself, and other females
aren't women, but just images. You sort of get the notion the world's
on a pivot, and that pivot's just yourself, and if you weren't there
there'd be a bust up, and most everything would get chasing glory, and
you don't care a darn, anyway, if they did. Say, when you get clean
crazy about anybody, same as I am about you, you find yourself hating
everybody that comes near them. You get notions that every man is
conspiring to tell the girl what a perfect fool you are, that they're
worrying to boost you right out with her. You hate her, because you
think she thinks you are a simpleton, and can't see your good points,
which are so obvious to yourself. You hate yourself, you hate life,
you hate the sunlight and the trees, and your food, and--and
everything. And you wouldn't have things different, or stop making
such a fool of yourself, no--not if hell froze over. Will--will you
marry me?"
Helen's humor suddenly burst the bonds of all restraint. She sat there
laughing until she nearly choked.
Bill waited with a patience that seemed inexhaustible. Then, as the
girl's mirth began to lessen, he put his question again with dogged
persistence.
"Will you marry me?"
"Oh, dear! Oh, dear! Of all the----"
"Will you marry me?" the man persisted, his great face flushing.
Helen abruptly sobered. The masterful tone somehow sent a delighted
thrill through her nerves.
She nodded.
"Of course I will. I--intended to from the first moment I saw your
big, funny face with Stanley----"
"You mean that, Hel? You really--meant to marry me? You did?"
The man's happy excitement was something not easily to be forgotten.
He sprang from his chair, reached out his powerful hands, caught the
girl about the waist, and picked her up in his arms as he might have
picked up a child. His great bear-like hug was a monstrous thing to
endure, but Helen was more than willing to endure it, as also his
kisses, which he rained upon her happy, laughing face.
But the girl's sense of the fitness of things soon came to her rescue.
The ridiculousness, the undignified figure she must appear, held in
her great lover's arms, set her struggling to free herself, and, in a
few moments, he set her once more upon her feet, and stood laughing
down into her blushing face.
"Say," he cried, with a great laugh, "I don't care a cuss if my brains
never hatch out. You're going to be my wife. You, the girl I'm crazy
to death about. Fyles and all the rest can go hang. Gee!"
Helen looked up at him. Then she smoothed out her ruffled frock, and
patted her hair into its place.
"Well," she cried, with a happy laugh, "I've heard some queer
proposals from the boys of this valley when they were drunk, but for a
sober, educated man, I think you've made the funniest proposal that
any one ever listened to. Oh, Bill, Bill, you've done a foolish thing.
I'm a shameless man-hunter. I came out west to find a husband, and
I've found one. I wanted to marry you all along. I meant to marry
you."
Bill's laugh rang out in a great guffaw.
"Bully!" he cried. "What's the use of marrying a girl who doesn't want
to marry you?"
"But she ought to pretend--at first."
"Not on your life. No pretense for me, Hel. Give me the girl who's
honest enough to love me, and let me know it."
"Bill! How--dare you? How dare you say I loved you and told you so?
I've--I've a good mind not to marry----Say, Bill, you are a--joke.
Now, sit right down, and tell me all about those--those other things
worrying you."
In a moment a shadow crossed the man's cheerful face. But he
obediently resumed his seat, and somehow, when Helen sat down, their
chairs were as close together as their manufacturer had made possible.
"It's Charlie--Charlie, and the police," said Bill, in a despondent
tone. "And Kate, too. I don't know. Say, Hel, what's--what's going to
happen? Fyles is hot after Charlie. Charlie don't care a curse. But
there's something scaring him that bad he's nearly crazy. Then there's
Kate. He saw Kate talking to Fyles, and he got madder than--hell. And
now he's gone off to O'Brien's, and it don't even take any thinking to
guess what for. I tell you he's so queer I can't do a thing with him.
I'm not smart enough. I could just break him in my two hands if I took
hold of him to keep him home and out of trouble, but what's the use?
He's crazy about Kate, he's crazy about drink, he's crazy about
everything, but keeping clear of the law. That's what I came to tell
you about--that, and to fix up about getting married."
The man's words left a momentary dilemma in the girl's mind. For a
moment she was at a loss how to answer him. It seemed impossible to
accept seriously his tale of anxiety and worry, and yet----. The same
tale from any other would have seemed different. But coming from Bill,
and just when she was so full of an almost childish happiness at the
thought that this great creature loved her, and wanted to marry her,
it took her some moments to reduce herself to a condition of judicial
calm, sufficient to obtain the full significance of his anxious
complaint.
When at last she spoke her eyes were serious, so serious that Bill
wondered at it. He had never seen them like that before.
"It's dreadful," she said in a low tone. "Dreadful."
Bill jumped at the word.
"Dreadful? My God, it's awful when you think he's my brother, and--and
Kate's your sister. I can't see ahead. I can't see where things
are--are drifting. That's the devil of it. I wish to goodness they'd
given me less beef and more brain," he finished up helplessly.
Helen displayed no inclination to laugh. Somehow now that this simple
man was here, now that the responsibility of him had devolved upon
her, a delightful feeling of gentle motherliness toward him rose up in
her heart, and made her yearn to help him. It was becoming quite easy
to take him seriously.
"P'r'aps it's a good thing you've got all that--beef. P'r'aps it's for
the best, you're so--so strong, and so ready to help. You can't see
ahead. Neither can I. Maybe no one can, but--Fyles. Suppose you and
I were standing at the foot of a cliff--a big, high cliff, very
dangerous, very dreadful, and some one we both loved was climbing its
face, and we saw them reach a point where it looked impossible to go
on, or turn back. What could we do? I'll tell you. We could remain
standing there looking on, praying to Providence that they might get
through, and holding ourselves ready to bear a hand when opportunity
offered, and, failing that, do our utmost to _break their fall_."
Bill's appreciation suddenly illuminated his ingenuous face.
"Say," he cried admiringly. "You've hit it. Sure, we can't climb up
and help. It would mean disaster to both, with no one left to help.
Say, I'm glad I'm big and strong. That's it, we'll stand--by. You'll
think, and I'll do what you tell me. By Jing! That's made everything
different. We'll stand by, and break their fall. I could never have
thought of that--I couldn't, sure."
It was Helen's turn to display enthusiasm. It was an enthusiasm
inspired by her lover's acceptance of her suggestion.
"But we're not going to just watch and watch and do nothing. We must
keep on Fyles's trail. We must keep close behind Charlie, and when we
see the fall coming on we must be ready to thrust out a hand. You
never know, we may beat the whole game in spite of Charlie. We may be
able to save him in spite of himself. No harm must come to Kate
through him. I can't see where it can come, except--that he is mad
about her, and she is mad about--some one else."
"Fyles?" Bill hazarded.
Helen looked around at him in amused admiration. She nodded.
"You're getting too clever for me. You will be thinking for us both
soon."
Bill denied the accusation enthusiastically.
"Never," he exclaimed. And after that he drifted into a lover's
rhapsody of his own inferiority and unworthiness.
Thus, for a while, the more serious cares were set aside for that
brief lover's paradise when two people find their focus filled to
overflowing with that precious Self, which we are told always to deny.
Fortunately human nature does not readily yield to such behests, and
so life is not robbed of its mainspring, and the whole machinery of
human nature is not reduced to a chaotic bundle of useless wheels.
For all Helen's boasted scheming, for all Bill's lack of brilliancy,
these two were just a pair of simple creatures, loyal and honest, and
deeply in love. So they dallied as all true lovers must dally with
those first precious moments which a Divine Providence permits to flow
in full tide but once in a lifetime.
* * * * *
Charlie Bryant was standing at the bar of O'Brien's saloon. One hand
rested on the edge of the counter as though to steady himself. His
eyes were bloodshot, a strange pallor left his features ghastly, and
the combination imparted a subtle appearance of terror which the
shrewd saloonkeeper interpreted in his own fashion as he unfolded his
information, and its deductions.
The bar was quite empty otherwise, and the opportunity had been too
good for O'Brien to miss.
"Say, I was mighty glad to get them kegs the other night safely. But
I'm takin' no more chances. It'll see me through for awhile," he said,
as he refilled Charlie's glass at his own expense. "There's a big play
coming right now, and, if you'll take advice, you'll lie low--desprit
low."
"You mean Fyles--as usual," said Charlie thickly. Then he added as an
afterthought: "To hell with Fyles, and all his damned red-coats."
O'Brien's quick eyes surveyed his half-drunken customer with a shrewd,
contemptuous speculation.
"That sounds like bluff. Hot air never yet beat the p'lice. It needs a
darnation clear head, and big acts, to best Fyles. A half-soused bluff
ain't worth hell room."
Charlie appeared to take no umbrage. His bloodshot eyes were still
fixed upon O'Brien's hard face as he raised his glass with a shaking
hand and drained it.
"I don't need to bluff with no one around worth bluffing," he said,
setting the empty glass down on the counter.
O'Brien's response was to fold his arms aggressively, and lean forward
upon the counter, peering into the delicate, pale face before him.
"See here," he cried, "a fellow mostly bluffs when he's scared, or
he's in a corner--like a rat. See? Now it's to my interest to see
Fyles beat clean out of Rocky Springs. It's that set me gassin'. Get
me? So just keep easy, and take what I got to hand out. I'm wise to
the game. It's my business to keep wise. Those two crooks of yours,
Pete and Nick, were in this morning, and I heard 'em talkin'. Then I
got 'em yarning to me. They've got every move Fyles is making dead
right. They're smartish guys, and I feel they're too smart for you by
a sight. If things go their way you're safe. If there's a chance of
trouble for them you're up against it."
Charlie licked his dry lips as the saloonkeeper paused. Then he
replaced the sodden end of his cigarette between them. But he remained
silent.
"I've warned you of them boys before," O'Brien went on. "But that's by
the way. Now, see here, Fyles has got your play. The boys know that,
and in turn have got his play. Fyles knows that to-morrow night you're
running in a big cargo of liquor. The only thing he don't know is
where you cache it. Anyways, he's got a big force of boys around, and
Rocky Springs'll have a complete chain of patrols around it, to-morrow
night. Each man's got a signal, and when that signal's given it means
he's located the cargo. Then the others'll crowd in, and your gang's
to be overwhelmed. Get it? You'll all be taken--red-handed. I'm
guessin' you know all this all right, all right, and I'm only telling
it so you can get the rest clear. How you and your boys get these
things I'm not guessing. It's smart. But here's the bad stuff. It's my
way to watch folks and draw 'em when I want to get wise. I drew them
boys. They're reckonin' things are getting hot for 'emselves. They're
scared. They're reckonin' the game's played out, and ain't worth hell
room, with Fyles smelling around. Those boys'll put you away to Fyles,
if they see the pinch coming. And that's where my interests come in.
They'll put you away sure as death."
If O'Brien were looking for the effect of his solemn warning he was
disappointed. Charlie's expression remained unchanged. The ghastly
white of his features suggested fear, but it was not added to by so
much as a flicker of an eyelid.
"That all?" he asked, with a deliberate pause between the words to
obtain clear diction.
O'Brien shrugged, but his eyes snapped angrily at this lack of
appreciation.
"Ain't it enough? Say," his manner had become almost threatening, "I'm
not doing things for hoss-play. The folks around can build any old
church to ease their souls and make a show. Rocky Springs ain't the
end of all things for me. I'm out after the stuff. I'll soothe my soul
with dollars. That's why I'm around telling you, because your game's
the thing that's to give 'em to me. When your game's played I hit the
trail, but as long as you make good Rocky Springs is for me. If you
can't handle your proposition right then I quit you."
Charlie suddenly shifted his position, and leaned his body against
the counter. The saloonkeeper looked for that sign which was to
re-establish his confidence. It was not forthcoming. For a moment
the half-drunken man leaned his head upon one hand, and his face
was turned from the other behind the bar.
O'Brien became impatient.
"Wal?" he demanded.
His persistence was rewarded at last. But it was rewarded with a shock
which left him startled beyond retort.
Charlie suddenly brought a clenched fist down upon the counter with a
force that set the glasses ringing.
"Fyles!" he cried fiercely, "Fyles! It's always Fyles! God's truth, am
I never to hear, or see, the last of him? Say, you know. You think you
know. But you don't. Damn you, you don't!"
Before the astonished saloonkeeper could recover himself and formulate
the angry retort which rose to his lips, Charlie staggered out of the
place.
CHAPTER XXIV
THE SOUL OF A MAN
It was growing dark. Away in the west a pale stream of light was
fading smoothly out, absorbed by the velvet softness of the summer
night. There was no moon, but the starlit vault shone dazzlingly upon
the shadowed valley. Already among the trees the yellow oil lamps were
shining within the half-hidden houses.
From within a dense clump of trees, high up the northern slope of the
valley, a man's slight figure made its way. His movements were slow,
deliberate, even furtive. For some moments he stood peering out at a
point below where a woman's figure was rapidly making its way up the
steep trail toward the old Meeting House.
The man's eyes were straining in the darkness for the outline of the
woman's figure was indistinct, only just discernible in the starlight.
She came on, and he could distinctly hear her voice humming an old,
familiar air. She evidently had no thought of the possibility that her
movements could be of any interest to anybody but herself.
She reached the Meeting House and paused. Then the watching man heard
the rattle of a key in the lock. The humming had ceased. The next
moment there was the sound of a turning handle, and a tight-fitting
door being thrust open. The woman's figure had disappeared within the
building.
The man left the sheltering bush and moved out on to the trail. He
passed one thin hand across his brow, as though to clear the thoughts
behind of their last murkiness after a drunken slumber. He stretched
himself wearily as though stiff from his unyielding bed of sun-baked
earth. Then he moved down the trail toward the Meeting House,
selecting the scorched grass at the side of it to muffle the sound of
his footsteps.
His weariness seemed to have entirely passed now, and all his
attention was fixed upon the rough exterior of the old building, which
had passed through such strange vicissitudes to finally become the
house of worship it now was. With its old, heavy-plastered walls, and
its long, reed-thatched roof, so heavy and vastly thick, it was a
curiosity; the survival of days when men and beasts met upon a common
arena and played out the game of life and death, each as it suited
him, with none but the victor in the game to say him nay.
The man felt something of the influence of the place now as he drew
near. Nor could he help feeling that the game that went on about it
now had changed little enough in its purpose. The rules may have
received modification, but the spirit was still the same. Men were
still struggling for victory over some one else, and beneath the
veneer of a growing civilization, passions, just as untamed, raged and
worked their will upon their ill-starred possessors.
Reaching the building, he moved cautiously around the walls till he
came to a window. It was closed, and a curtain was drawn across it. He
passed on till he came to another window. It was partially open, and,
though the curtain was drawn across it, the opening had disarranged
the curtain, and a beam of light shone through.
He pressed his face toward the opening so that his mouth was at its
level. Then he spoke softly, in a voice that was little more than a
whisper----
"Kate!" he called. "Kate! It is I--Charlie. I've--I've been waiting
for you, and want to speak to you."
For answer there was a sound of hurrying footsteps across the floor of
the room. The next moment the curtain was pulled aside. Kate stood at
the other side of the window in the dim lamplight. Her handsome eyes
were startled and full of inquiry, and her rounded bosom rose and fell
quickly. When she saw the pale face peering in at her a gentle smile
crept into her eyes.
"You scared the life out of me," she said calmly. Then, with a quick
look into his bloodshot eyes, she went on: "Why did you wait for
me--here?"
Charlie lowered his eyes. "I--guessed you'd be along some time this
evening. I wanted to speak to you--alone."
Kate studied him for a moment. His averted, almost shifty, eyes seemed
to hold her attention. She was thinking rapidly.
Presently his eyes came back to her face; a deep passion was shining
in them.
"Can I come around to the door?"
There was just the smallest hesitation before Kate replied.
"Yes, if you must see me here."
Charlie waited for no more. The door was on the other side of the
building, overlooking the village below. He hurried thither, and when
he thrust it open the place was in darkness.
Kate's voice greeted him promptly. "The draught has blown the lamp
out. Have you a match?"
Charlie closed the door behind him, and produced and struck a match.
The lamp flared up and Kate replaced the glass chimney. Then she moved
over to the wall and placed the lamp in its bracket.
It was a curious interior. In their unevenness the white kalsomined
walls displayed their primitive workmanship. The windows were small,
framed, and set deep in the ponderous walls. They looked almost like
the arrow slits in a mediæval fortress. The long, pitched roof was
supported, and collared, by heavy, untrimmed logs, which, at some
time, had formed the floor-supports of a sort of loft. This had been
done away with since, for the purpose of giving air to the suppliants
at a prayer meeting below.
At the far end of the room were two reading desks and a sort of
communion table. While in one corner, behind one of the reading desks,
was a cheap-looking harmonium. Here and there, upon the rough walls,
were nailed cardboard streamers, conveying, amid a wealth of
illumination, sundry appropriate texts of a non-committal religious
flavor, and down the narrow body of the building were stretched rows
of hard-seated, hard-backed benches for the accommodation of the
congregation.
One swift glance sufficed for Charlie, and his eyes came back to the
woman's smiling face. Her good looks were undoubted, but to him they
were of an almost celestial order. There was no creature in the whole
wide world to compare with her.
His eyes devoured every detail of her expression, of her personality,
with the hungry greed of a soul-starved man. It was almost an
impossibility for him to seize upon and hold the thoughts that so
swiftly poured through his brain. So the moments passed and Kate found
her patience ebbing.
"Well?" she demanded, her smile slowly fading.
The man breathed a sigh, and swallowed as with a dry throat. The spell
of her charm had been broken.
"I had to come," he cried, with a nervous rush. "I had to find you. I
had to speak to you--to tell you."
The woman's eyes, so steadily fixed upon his face, were wearing an
almost hard look.
"Was it necessary to stimulate your nerve to come, and--speak to me?
Charlie, Charlie," Kate went on more gently, her fine eyes softening,
"when is this all to cease? Why must you drink? It seems so hopeless.
Oh, man, where is your backbone, your grit. You tell me you long to be
free of your curse, yet you plunge headlong the moment you are
disturbed."
Her moment of passionate remonstrance passed and a subtle coolness
superseded it, as the scarlet flushed into the man's pale cheeks.
"Tell it me all," she went on, "tell me what it is you had to see me
about. Remember, to-morrow is Sunday, and this place must be put in
order for meeting. As it is, I am late. I was kept."
The flush of shame died out of the man's face, and his eyes became
questioning. But his manner was almost humble.
"I know," he said. "I knew I had no right to disturb you--now. I knew
you would resent it. But I had to see you--while I had the chance.
To-morrow it might be too late."
"Too late?"
The woman's question came with a sharp, rising inflection.
"Oh, Kate, Kate, won't you understand what has brought me? Can't you
understand all that I feel now that the shadow of the law is so
threatening here in this valley? All the time I'm thinking of you;
thinking of all you mean in my life; thinking of the love which would
make it a happiness to lay down my life for you, the love which to me
is the whole, whole world."
He ceased speaking with a curious abruptness. It was as though there
were much more to be said, but he feared to give it expression.
Kate seized upon his pause to remonstrate.
"Hush, Charlie," she cried almost vehemently, "you mustn't tell me all
this. You mustn't. I am not worthy of such a love from any man.
Besides," she went on, with a sigh, "it is all so useless. I have no
love to return you. You know that. You have known it so long. Our
friendship has been precious to me. It will always be precious. I
feel, somehow, that you belong to me, are part of me, but not in the
way you would have it. Oh, Charlie, the one thought in my mind, the
one desire in my heart, is for your welfare. I desire that more than I
could ever desire the love of any man. You love me, and yet by every
act of yours that jeopardizes that welfare you stab me to the heart
as surely as you add another nail to the coffin of your moral and
physical well-being. You come here to tell me of these things,
straight from one of your mad debauches, the signs of which are even
now in your eyes, and in your shaking, nervous hands. Oh, Charlie, why
must it all be? What madness is it with which you are possessed?"
The man looked into her big eyes, so full of strength and courage. The
yellow lamplight left them shining darkly. He sought in them something
that always seemed to baffle. Something he knew was there, but which
ever eluded him. And the while he cried out in bitterness at her
challenge.
"What does it matter--these things?" he said hoarsely. "What does it
matter what I am if--I can't be anything to you?"
Then his bitterness was redoubled, and an almost savage light shone in
his usually gentle eyes.
"Oh, God, I know I can never be anything to you but a sort of puling
weakling, who must be nursed, and petted, and cared for. I know," he
went on, his words coming with a rush in the height of his protesting
passion, "if your thoughts, your secret thoughts and feelings, were
put into words, I know what they would say of me, must say of me. Do I
need to tell you? No, I think not. Look at me. It is sufficient."
He paused, his great dark eyes alight as Kate had never seen them
before. Then he went on, and his tone had become subdued, and its rich
note thrilled with the depths of passion stirring him.
"But for all that I am a man, Kate. For all my weakness I have
strength to feel, to love, to fight. I have all that, besides, which
goes to make a man, just as surely as has the man, Fyles, whom you
love. I know, Kate. Denial would be useless, and in denying, you would
be untrue to yourself. Fyles is the man for you, and no one knows it
better than I. Fyles! The irony of it. The man who represents the law
is the man who stands between me and all I desire on earth. I have
seen it. I have watched. Nothing that concerns your life escapes me.
How could it, when my whole thought is for you--you? But the agony of
mind I suffer is no less. I cannot help it, Kate. The knowledge and
sight of things drives me nearly crazy, and I suffer the tortures of
hell. But even so, if your happiness lies at Fyles's side, then--I
would have it so. If I were sure--sure that this happiness were
awaiting you. Is it, Kate? Think. Think of it in--every aspect. Is it?
Happiness with this--Fyles?"
It was some moments before Kate made any reply. Her eyes were fixed
upon the old Communion Table, so shadowy in the single lamplight. She
was asking herself many questions; almost as many as he could have
asked her. She had permitted herself to drift on the tide of her
feelings. Whither? She knew she was beyond her depth. Her life was in
the hands of a Providence which would inevitably work its will. All
she knew was that she loved. She had known it from the first. She
loved, and rejoiced that it was so. Again, there were moments when she
feared as cordially. She knew the work that lay before this lover of
hers. She knew in what direction it pointed. And in obedience to her
thoughts her eyes came back to the drunkard's eager face.
"You--you came to tell me--all this?" she said, in a low tone. "You
came to assure yourself of my--happiness?" Then she shook her head.
"Tell me the rest."
It was Charlie's turn to hesitate now. The demand had robbed him of
the small enough confidence he possessed.
But Kate was waiting and he had no power to deny her anything.
"I came to tell you of--things, while I still have the chance.
To-morrow? Who knows what to-morrow may bring forth?"
A keen, hard light suddenly flashed into the woman's eyes.
"What of--to-morrow?" she demanded sharply, while she studied the
man's pale features, with their boyish good looks.
For answer Charlie reached out and caught one of her hands in both of
his. She strove to release it, but he clung to it despairingly.
"No, no, Kate. Don't take it away," he cried passionately. "It is for
the last--the very last time. Tell me, dear, is--is there no hope for
me? None? Kate, I love you so. I do--dear. I will give up everything
for you, dear, everything. I can do it. I will do it. I swear it,
if--only you'll love me. Tell me. Is there----?"
Kate shook her head, and the man dropped her hand with a gesture of
utter hopelessness.
"My love is given, Charlie. Believe me, I have not given it. It--it is
simply gone from me."
Kate sighed. Then her mood changed again. That sharp alert look came
into her eyes once more.
"Tell me--of to-morrow," she urged him.
The second demand had a pronounced effect upon Charlie. The air of the
suppliant fell from him, even the signs of his recent debauch seemed
to give way before a startling alertness of mentality. In his curious
way he seemed suddenly to have become the man of action, full of a
keenness of perception and shrewdness which might well have carried an
added conviction to Stanley Fyles, had he witnessed the display.
"Listen," he said, with a thrill of excitement. "Maybe it's not
necessary to tell you. Maybe it's stale news. Anyway, to-morrow is to
be the day of Fyles's coup." He paused, watching for the effect of his
words.
Just for an instant the woman's eyes flashed, but whether in fear, or
merely excited interest, it would have been impossible to say.
"Go on," she said.
"To-morrow the village is to be surrounded by a chain of police
patrols. Every entry will be closely watched for the incoming cargo of
whisky. Fyles reckons to get me red-handed."
"You?"
Kate's eyes flashed again.
"Sure. That's how he reckons."
They looked into each other's eyes steadily. Charlie's were lit by a
curious baffling irony.
It was finally Charlie who spoke.
"Fyles's plans are not likely to disconcert--anybody. There is no fear
of legitimate capture. It is treachery--that is to be feared."
Kate started.
"Treachery?"
The man nodded. And the woman gave a sharp exclamation of disgust.
"Treachery! I hate it. I despise it. I--I could kill a traitor.
You--fear treachery?"
"I have been warned of it. That's all," he said, in a hard biting
voice. "It is because of this I've come to you to-night. Who can tell
the outcome of to-morrow if there's treachery? So I came to you to
make my--last appeal." In a moment his passion was blazing forth
again. "Say the word, dear. Forget this man. Give me one little grain
of hope. We can leave this place, and all the treachery in the world
doesn't matter. We can leave that, and everything else, behind
us--forever."
Kate shook her head. It almost seemed as though his pleading had
passed her by.
"It can't be," she said, almost coldly. "It's too late."
"Too late?"
The woman nodded, but her thoughts seemed far away.
"Tell me," she said, after a pause, while she avoided the man's
despairing eyes, "where does the treachery--lie?"
The man turned away. His slim shoulders lifted with seeming
indifference.
"Pete Clancy and Nick Devereux--your two boys. But I don't know yet.
I'm not sure."
Suddenly Kate moved toward him. The coldness had passed out of her
manner. Her eyes had softened, and a smile, a tender smile, shone in
their depths. She held out her two hands.
"Charlie, boy," she said, "you needn't fear for treachery for
to-morrow. Leave Pete and Nick to me. I can deal with them. I promise
you Fyles will gain nothing in the game he's playing, through them.
Now, you must go. Give up all thought of me. We cannot help things. We
can never be anything to each other, more than we are now, so why
endure the pain and misery of a hope than can never be fulfilled. As
long as I live I shall pray for your welfare. So long as I can I shall
strive for it. It is for you to be strong. You must set your heart
upon living down this old past, and--forgetting me. I am not worth
the love you give me. Indeed--indeed I am not."
But her outstretched hands were ignored. Charlie made a slight,
impatient movement, and turned toward the door. Finally he looked
back, and, for a moment, his gaze encountered the appeal in Kate's
eyes. Then he passed on swiftly as though he could not endure the
sight of all that which he knew to be slipping from beyond his reach.
One hand reached the door handle, then he hunched his shoulders
obstinately.
"I give up nothing, Kate. Nothing," he said doggedly. "I love you, and
I shall go on loving you to--the end."
* * * * *
It was late when Kate returned to her home. The house was in darkness,
and the moon brought it out in silvery, frigid relief. Thrusting the
front door open, she paused for a moment upon the threshold. She might
have been listening; she might merely have been thinking. Finally she
sat down and removed her shoes and gently tip-toed to her sister's
room.
Helen's door was ajar, and she pushed it open and looked in. The
moonlight was shining across her sister's fair features, and the mass
of loose fair hair which framed them. She was sound asleep in that
wonderful dreamless land of rest, far from the turbulent little world
in which her waking hours were spent.
Kate as softly withdrew. Now she made her way back to the familiar
kitchen parlor, and, in the dark, took up her position at the open
window. Her whole attention was centered upon the ranch house of
Charlie Bryant across the valley, which stood out in the moonlight
almost as clearly as in daylight. A light was shining in one of its
windows.
She sat there waiting with infinite patience, and at last the light
was extinguished. Then she rose, and, going to her bureau, picked up a
pair of night glasses. She leveled these at the distant house and
continued her watch.
Her vigil, however, did not last long. In a few minutes she distinctly
beheld a figure move out on to the veranda. Its identity, at that
distance, she was left to conjecture. But she saw it leave the veranda
and make its way round to the barn. A few minutes later, again, it
reappeared, this time mounted upon a horse.
She sighed. It was a sigh of impatience, it was also a sigh of
resignation. Then she rose from her seat, and returned her night
glasses to the bureau. Again she looked out of the window, but this
time she remained standing. Nor were her eyes turned upon the distant
ranch house. Her whole attitude was one of deep pensiveness.
At last, however, she stirred, and, quite suddenly, her movements
became quick and decided. It almost seemed as though she had finally
reached a definite resolve.
She passed out of the room, and then out of the house through the back
way. The little barn was within a hundred yards of the house. She was
still in the shadow of the house when she became aware of figures
moving just outside the barn. In a moment she recognized them. They
were her two hired men in the act of riding away on their horses.
She let them get well away. Then she drew the door close after her and
crossed over to the barn.
The door was open and she went in. Passing the two empty stalls where
the men's horses were kept, she went on to another, where her own
horse, hearing her approach, set its collar chains rattling and
greeted her with a suppressed whinny.
It was the work of but a few minutes to saddle him and bring him out
into the moonlight. Then she mounted him and rode off in the wake of
those who had gone on before.
CHAPTER XXV
THE BROKEN CHAIN
The peace of Sunday evening merged into the calm of night. Service was
long since over in the old Meeting House. The traveling parson had
come and gone. He had done his duty. He had read the service to the
lounging, unkempt congregation, he had prayed over them, he had
preached at them. He had done all these things because it was his duty
to do so, but he had done them without the least hope of improving the
morals of his unworthy flock, or of penetrating one single fraction
through their crime-stained armor of self-satisfaction. Rocky Springs
was one of the shadowed corners upon his tour, into which, he felt,
it was beyond his power to impart light.
There were those in the valley who viewed the Sabbath calm with a
derisive smile. There were those who sat upon their little verandas
and smoked, and talked in hushed voices, lest listening ears might
catch the ominous purport of their words. There were others who went
to their beds with a shrug of pretended indifference, feeling glad
that for once, at least, their homes were a haven of safety for
themselves.
Rocky Springs as a whole knew that something was afoot--some play in
which some one was to be worsted, in which, maybe, a life or two would
be lost. Anyway, the players were Law _versus_ Outlaw, and those who
were not actually concerned with the game felt glad that they still
had another night under their own roofs.
It was truly extraordinary how unspoken news spread. It was
extraordinary the scent of battle, the scent of a struggle against the
law, that was possessed by this people. Everybody seemed to know that
to-night something like history was to be made in the annals of the
crime of the valley.
So the peace of the valley was almost remarkable. An undoubted air of
studied indifference prevailed, but surely it was carefully studied.
Neither Fyles nor any of his police had been seen the whole day. None
of them had attended divine service. It was almost as if they had
entirely vanished from the precincts of the valley.
So the sun sank, and the ruddy clouds rose up from the west like the
fiery splash of the molten contents of the cauldron into which the
great ball of fire had plunged. They rose up, and then dispersed,
vanishing into thin air, and making way for the soft sheen of a myriad
stars, and leaving clear a perfect night for the great summer moon to
illuminate.
* * * * *
Two by two a large number of horsemen rode out of the valley of
Leaping Creek. Once away from the starting point, their movements,
their figures became elusive and shadowy. They passed out from among
the trees, on to the wide plains above, and each couple split up,
taking their individual ways with a certainty which displayed their
perfect prairie craft.
Far out into the night they rode, each with clear instructions filling
his mind, each with the certainty that one or more of their number
must be brought face to face with a crisis before morning, which would
need all their nerve and wit to bring to a successful issue.
The moon rose up, a great golden globe, slowly changing to a cold
silvery light as it mounted the starlit vault. Then came a change.
Instead of leaving a starry track behind it, a bank of cloud followed
hard upon its heels, threatening to overtake it and hide its splendor
behind a pall of summer storm.
Stanley Fyles watched with satisfaction the signs of the night.
* * * * *
A solitary horseman sat leaning forward upon the horn of his saddle,
his eyes searching, searching, with aching intensity, that dim,
shadowed skyline now almost lost against its backing of cloud. He was
half-hidden in the shadow of a small bluff of spruce, with the depths
of the valley hard behind him.
Not only were his eyes searching with an almost unblinking
watchfulness, but his ears, too, were busy with that intense,
nerve-racking straining which leaves them ever ready to carry the
phantom sounds of imagination to the impatient brain above.
It was a long, intense vigil, and a hundred times the waiting man saw
movements and heard sounds which set him ready to give the final
signal which was to complete the carefully laid plans of his chief.
But, in each case, he was spared the false alarm to which tricks of
imagination so nearly drove him.
Midnight came and passed. The sky grew more threatening. The man's
eyes were upon that distant, southern upland which marked the skyline.
Something seemed to be moving in the hazy distance, but as yet there
was no sound accompanying the movement.
Was there not? Hark, what was that?
The man sighed. It was the rustle of the trees about him, stirred
by a gentle rising breeze. But was it? Hark! That sounded like a
footfall. But a footfall was not wanted. It was the sound of wheels
for which his ears were straining. Ah, that was surely the wind.
And--yes--listen. A rumble. It might be the wheels at last, or was it
thunder? He sat up. The strain was hard to bear. It was thunder. And
his eyes, for a moment, left the horizon for the clouds above. He
regretted the absence of the moon. It left his work doubly difficult.
He wondered----
But his wonder ceased, and he fell like a stone out of the saddle. He
struggled fiercely, but his arms were held to his sides immovable. He
had a vague recollection of a swift whirring sound, but that was all.
Then he found himself struggling furiously on the ground with his
horse vanished.
* * * * *
Inspector Fyles was thinking of many things. His post was at a point
overlooking the Fort Alberton trail, which wound its way in the wide
trough of two great, still waves of prairieland directly in front of
him. Nothing could pass that way and remain unobserved, excepting
under cover of the storm which seemed to be gathering.
He patted Peter's arched neck, and the well-mannered, amiable creature
responded by champing its bit impatiently. Fyles smiled. He knew that
Peter loved to be traveling far and fast.
He turned his eyes skywards. Perhaps it was not a storm. There were
breaks here and there, and occasionally a star peeped out and twinkled
mockingly at him. Still, he must hope for the best. A storm would
favor his quarry, besides being----. Hark!
A shot rang out in the distance, away to the east. One--two! Wait. A
third! There it was. To the east. They were coming on over the
southern trail, and that was in McBain's section!
He lifted his reins, and Peter promptly laid his swift heels to the
ground. Three shots. Fyles hoped the fourth would not be fired until
he was within striking distance of the spot.
* * * * *
Four horsemen were converging upon the bluff whence the shots had
proceeded. Each of the four had heard the three shots fired, each was
executing the tactical arrangement agreed upon, and each was waiting
as he rode, laboring under a high nervous tension, for the fourth
shot, which was to confirm the alarm and notify the definite discovery
of the contraband.
It was withheld.
Fyles was the first to reach the bluff, but, almost at the same
moment, McBain's great horse drew up with a jolt. The inspector saw
the approach of his subordinate while his eyes were still searching
the skirts of the bluff for the patrol who had given the signal.
"He should be on the southeast side," said McBain, and rode off in
that direction. Fyles followed hard upon his heels.
They had gone less than two hundred yards when the officer saw the
shadowy form of the Scot throw itself back in the saddle, and pull his
great horse back upon its haunches. Fyles swept up on the swift-footed
Peter. He, too, reined up with a jolt and leaped out of the saddle.
McBain was on his knees beside the prostrate form of the sentry. The
man was bound hand and foot, and a heavy gag was secured in his widely
forced open mouth.
At that moment two troopers dashed up. And the sounds of others
foregathering could be plainly heard.
As Fyles regarded the prostrate man he realized that once more he had
been defeated. He did not require to wait for the gag to be removed.
He understood.
He leaped into the saddle, as McBain cut the gag from the man's mouth.
A sharp inquiry broke the silence.
"Say, did you fire that--alarm?" Fyles cried almost fiercely.
The man had struggled to a sitting posture, and began to explain.
"No, sir. I was dragged----"
"Never mind what happened. You didn't give the alarm?"
"No, sir."
"Quick, McBain!" Fyles almost shouted. "They've done us. Cut him
loose, and follow me. They're on the Fort Allerton trail--or my
name's not Fyles."
* * * * *
Peter led the race for the Fort Allerton trail. The dark night clouds
were breaking when they reached the spot where the inspector had
originally stationed himself. They passed on, and a glimmer of
moonlight peeped out at them as they reached the trail side.
Fyles and McBain leaped from their saddles and examined the sandy
surface of it. Two of the troopers joined them.
At length the officer spoke, and his voice had lost something of its
sharp tone of authority.
"They've beaten us, McBain," he cried. "God's curse on them, they've
played us at our own game, and--beaten us. A wagon and team's passed
here less than five minutes ago. Look at the dust track they've left."
Fyles stood up. Then he started, and an angry glitter shone in his
gray eyes. A horseman was silently looking on at the group of
dismounted men, deliberately watching their movements. In the heat of
the hunt no one had heard his approach. He sat there looking on in
absolute silence.
Fyles moved clear of his men and strode up to the horseman. He halted
within a yard of him, while the rest of the party looked on in
amazement. McBain was the only one to make any move. He followed hard
on his chief's heels.
Fyles looked up into the horseman's face. The sky had cleared and the
moon was shining once more. A sudden fury leaped to the officer's
brain, and, for a moment, all discretion was very nearly flung to the
winds. By a great effort, however, he checked his mad impulse.
"What are you doing here, Mr. Bryant?" he demanded sharply.
Charlie Bryant leaned forward upon the horn of his saddle. His dark
eyes were smiling, but it was not a pleasant smile.
"Why, wondering what you fellows are doing here," he said calmly.
Fyles stared, and again his fury nearly got the better of him.
"That's no answer to my question," he snapped.
"Isn't it?" A subtle change was in Charlie Bryant's manner. His smile
remained, but it was full of a burning dislike, and even insolence.
"Guess it's all you'll get from a free citizen. I've as much right
here looking on at the escapades of the police, as they have
to--indulge in 'em. Guess I've had a mighty long day and need to get
home. Say, I'm tired. So long."
He urged his horse forward and passed on down the trail. And as he
went a trooper followed him, with orders to track him till daylight.
CHAPTER XXVI
ROCKY SPRINGS HEARS THE NEWS
The news which greeted early morning ears in Rocky Springs was of a
quality calculated to upset the entire affairs of the day, and bring
a perfect surfeit of grist to O'Brien's insatiable mill. It even
jeopardized the all-important church affairs. No one was inclined to
work at all, let alone voluntarily work.
Then, too, there were the difficulties of gathering together a quorum
of the Church Construction Committee, and Mrs. John Day, full of
righteous indignation and outraged pride, as president, felt and
declared that it was a scandal that the degraded doings of a parcel of
low-down whisky-runners should be allowed to interfere with the noble
cause which the hearts of the valley were set upon. But, being a woman
of considerable energy, she by no means yielded to circumstances.
However, her difficulties were considerable. The percolation of the
news of the police failure had reduced the male population to the
condition of a joyful desire to celebrate in contraband drink. The
female population became obsessed with a love of their own doorsteps,
whence they could greet each other and exchange loud-voiced opinions
with their neighbors, while their household "chores" awaited their
later convenience. The children, too, were robbed of their delight in
more familiar mischief, and turned their inventive faculties toward
something newer and more in keeping with prevailing conditions and
sentiments. Thus, a new game was swiftly arranged, and some brighter
soul among them christened it the D. I. F. game. The initials were
popularly believed to represent "Done is Fyles," but the enlightened
among the boys understood that they stood for "Damn Idjut Fyles," an
interpretation quite in keeping with the general opinion of the people
of the valley.
Certainly the atmosphere of the village that morning must have been
intolerable to Inspector Fyles, had he permitted himself to dwell upon
the indications, the derisive glances, the quiet laugh of men as he
chanced to pass. But public opinion and feeling were things he had
long since schooled himself to ignore. He was concerned with his
superiors, and his superiors only. At all times they were more than
sufficient to trouble with, and his whole anxiety was turned in their
direction now, in view of his terrible failure of the night before.
Thus he was forced to witness the signs about him, and content himself
with the knowledge that he had been bluffed, while he cast about in
his troubled mind for a means of appeasing his superior's official
wrath.
The church committee was to assemble at Mrs. John Day's house at ten
o'clock, and the hour passed without a shadow of a quorum being
formed. Kate Seton, the honorary secretary, was the only member,
besides the president, who put in an appearance at the appointed hour.
So Mrs. Day thrust on her bonnet, and, with every artificial flower in
its crown shaking with indignation, set out to "round-up" the members.
O'Brien was impossible. His trade was too overwhelming to be left in
the hands of a mere bartender, but there was less excuse for Billy
Unguin and Allan Dy, who were merely drinkers in the place. She
possessed herself of their persons and marched them off, and gathered
up two or three women friends of hers on the way home. Thus, by eleven
o'clock, she had the door of her parlor closed upon a more or less
efficient quorum.
Then she sat her bulk down with a sigh of enforced content. Her florid
face was beaded with perspiration as a result of her efforts.
She turned autocratically to her secretary.
"We'll dispense with the reading of the minutes of the last meeting,"
she declared half-defiantly. "We'll take 'em as read and passed. This
liquor business is driving us all to perdition, as well as wasting our
time, which is more important in Rocky Springs. I've never seen the
like of this place." She glared directly at the two men. "And the
men--well, say, I s'pose they are men, these fellows who stand around
decorating that villain O'Brien's saloon. If it was a christening,
they'd drink; if it was a wedding, they'd drink; if it was a funeral,
they'd drink; if they were going to stand before their Maker right
away, they'd call for rye first."
After which few opening remarks, given with all the scornful dignity
of one who knows she holds the leading position among her sex in the
village, she proceeded with the work in hand with a capacity for
detail that quite worried the absent minds of the only two male
members of the committee present.
Such was the general yearning for a termination of the meeting, so
that its members might once more return to the gossip outside, that
Mrs. John Day was permitted to carry all her plans in her scheme of
salvation before her, with little or no discussion. And, in
consequence, her good nature quickly reasserted itself, and she became
more and more inclined to look leniently upon the defects of the
majority of her committee.
The president disposed of several lesser complaints against the
construction of the church to her own satisfaction. The list of them
was an accumulation of opinions sent in by people who felt that it was
due to the community, and themselves, particularly, that the elected
committee were sufficiently harrassed by pin pricks, lest it became
too high-handed and autocratic.
Mrs. Day's methods of dealing with these was characteristic of her
social rule in the village. She rose with a look of contemptuous
defiance upon her fiery features. It was Helen who had once declared
that Mrs. John always reminded her of one of those very red-combed
old hens who never failed to cluck themselves very nearly into an
apoplectic fit over a helpless worm, and demanded that all eyes should
watch her marvelous display of prowess in its slaughter. A slip of
paper had been thrust into her hands by the undisturbed honorary
secretary.
"I guess I'm not going to worry you folks with debating these fool
complaints sent in by some of the glory-seekers in this village," she
began with enthusiastic heat. "I've settled them all myself. I'll read
you the complaints and what I've done in each case. First, there's a
kick from Mrs. Morgan, upon the hill. She's no account anyway, and
hasn't given a bean toward the church--yet. Guess I'll have to see to
that later. She says she saw two of the boys working on log hauling,
sitting around in the shade of the church wall, after doing their
work, swilling whisky out of the neck of a bottle, and guessed it
wasn't decent. I've written her asking her to send two boys to do the
work in their place. Guess she hasn't replied. Katherine L. Sherman,
who guesses she's related to the real Shermans, and has had twins
twice in three years, writes: 'When are we goin' to arrange for a
christening font?' I handed her this. 'When folks needing it see their
way clear to unrolling their bank wads.' Then there's Mrs. Andy
Carlton, who's felt high-toned ever since she bought that second-hand
top buggy from Mary Porson. She guesses we need a bell. I told her
that if the people of Rocky Springs tried ringing their way to glory,
it would be liable to alarm folks there. Best way would be to try and
sneak in, and not shout they were coming. Then I heard from Mary
Porson, herself. She wants to know who's to keep the boys who're drunk
out of service, and wouldn't it be better to hold Meeting on Monday,
so's the boys could get over the Saturday night souse in comfort. I
told her she seemed to have a wrong idea of the folks of this village.
I guessed if any feller got around to Meeting with liquor under his
belt, there was liable to be a lynching right away. The boys wouldn't
stand for any ungentlemanly conduct at Meeting. Then there's Mrs.
Annerly-Jones. Having a hyphen to her name, she's all for white
surplices and organized singing. She figures to start up a full choir,
and sing the solos herself. I hinted that the choir racket wasn't to
be despised, but solo work was liable to cause ill-feeling in the
village by making folks think the singer was getting the start of them
in the chase for glory. And, anyway, the old harmonium wasn't a match
for her voice. Then there's a suggestion for cuspidors for each bench,
and I must say, right here, I'm in favor of them. I'm not one to
interfere with the disgusting ways of men. Men are just men, and can't
help it, anyway, and if they contract filthy habits, it's not for
woman to put 'em right. But she's got the right to refuse having her
skirts turned into floor swabs. I've fixed all these things right, so
we don't need to vote on 'em. But there's one little matter that needs
discussing right here and now, seeing that the folks are present
who've brought it up."
The president paused and glared at the two men through her big,
steel-rimmed glasses, and Billy Unguin and Allan Dy found themselves
uncomfortably interested in various parts of well-varnished
appointments of the lady's parlor.
Kate Seton eyed the two men with some amusement. She felt that the
recent discussion, which took place in the new church itself, was
liable to assume a different complexion here. Besides, she knew these
two men, and felt it was best to have the suggestion of felling the
old pine, as a ridge pole for the church, definitely negatived by the
present meeting.
Mrs. John Day was always a difficult woman, of very strong opinions.
Therefore it was not policy to suggest her course of action. So Kate
had merely warned her that the suggestion had been made.
"It's been said," Mrs. Day went on, with an aggressive look in her hot
eyes, "that the design of the building is all wrong. That the main
body is too long, and that the ridge pole of the roof will have to be
joined in several places. This means a great weakness that'll have to
be supported by central columns, which will obstruct the central
gangway and the general view. I'd like Mr. Unguin and Mr. Dy to
discuss the matter before the meeting."
Thus challenged, Allan Dy sprang to his feet.
"It's just as you say, ma'm," he cried. "And I say right here that
ridge pole should be in one piece. It's bad. In a few years' time
we'll surely have to rebuild that roof."
He sat down with a jolt, and glared fiercely at his friend beside him.
Billy Unguin was on his feet in a moment.
"I want to say right here that my friend's been sorting mail so long
he's got nervous. Furthermore, I'd add he don't need to worry a thing.
It's my opinion the new church is an elegant proposition which
reflects credit upon Rocky Springs, and our charming president more
than anybody. And, if there's any liberties taken with the science of
architecture, the matter can be got over dead easy. If joining the
ridge pole means weakening the structure, then don't join it. That
don't beat us a little bit. With such a head as our president has for
the management of big affairs I'm sure she'll see a way out of the
trouble, 'specially when I draw her attention to the old pine, which
is tall enough to cut two ridge poles out of it for our church."
Like his friend, he sat down with a jolt. But he was smiling with
anticipated triumph. He felt that his long experience as a salesman of
dry goods had taught him how to reach the most vulnerable point in
feminine armor. When it came to winning over Mrs. John Day to his side
Allan Dy hadn't an earthly chance with him.
But his smile slowly disappeared when the honorary secretary promptly
rose to her feet.
Kate Seton turned and addressed herself to the president.
"I should like to put in a word of protest," she began, while Allan Dy
smiled and breathed his thankfulness that he was not to remain
unsupported.
Instantly Billy Unguin broke in.
"Miss Seton, as secretary, is only ex-officio," he cried.
Mrs. Day shot a withering glance at him.
"Miss Seton is _honorary_ secretary."
Allan Dy smiled more broadly as the president promptly nodded for Kate
to proceed.
"I wish to protest against the old pine being felled," she said, with
some warmth. "It means disaster to Rocky Springs. There is the old
legend. There is a curse on the felling of that tree."
Her announcement was greeted by a murmur of approval from the women
present, all except Mrs. Day. Dy beamed. But Kate was less pleased.
She knew her president. She would always listen to the men, but when
her own sex ventured on thinking for themselves she was liable to
become restive.
The president glanced round the room with a swift challenge shining
through her glasses, and her hard mouth closed tightly. Then she
turned sharply to the woman at her side.
"I'm--I'm--astonished, Kate," she cried, with difficulty suppressing
her inclination to domineer. "The matter is most simple. It is said
the best interests of the church are being jeopardized. There is the
obvious necessity of altering the design of the roof of our beautiful
building. You--whom I have always regarded as the essence of sanity,
and my chief support in the arduous work which has been flung upon my
shoulders, and which Mr. Unguin has been pleased to say I'm not
incapable of carrying out--you would sacrifice those interests for a
lot of old Indian fool talk. I never would have believed it. Never!
Say," she turned to the others, and her eyes challenged the rest of
the women, "This surely is a more serious matter than I thought. It
must be looked into. I'll look into it myself. If things are as Mr. Dy
says, and it's necessary, as Mr. Unguin points out, to cut down that
tree to fix our church right--why, it's going to be cut down. That's
all."
She paused dramatically, but not long enough for anybody to interrupt
her. Then, with a wave of her fat arm, which, to the women, became a
threat, and to the men appeared to be something like the gesticulation
of an animated sausage, she proceeded to terminate the debate.
"Those in favor of _my_ proposition will signify the same in the usual
manner," she cried, with an air that brooked no sort of denial.
Up went every right hand in the room except those of Kate and Allan
Dy. Then the "no's" were taken. After which the result was announced
with all the triumph of Mrs. Day's domineering personality.
"Carried," she cried.
Then she turned upon her secretary without the least sympathy or
kindliness in her manner.
"You'll enter that resolution in the minutes of the meeting," she
snapped.
* * * * *
Some half-hour later the quorum dissolved itself and trickled out of
the oppressive precincts of Mrs. John Day's highly polished parlor.
The trickling process only lasted until the front door was gained.
Then came a rush which had neither dignity nor politeness in it.
The two men set off for the saloon without attempting to disguise
their purpose. The women hastily tripped off in the various directions
whither they knew their favorite gossips would be found. Even Kate
Seton failed to wait to exchange her usual few final words with the
president. Truth to tell, she was both disgusted and depressed, and
felt that somehow she had made a mess of things. She felt that she had
contrived to turn an unimportant matter into something of the first
magnitude. The question of felling the old pine had merely been one
of those subjects for bickering between Billy and Allan Dy, who had
never been known to agree on any subject, and now, through bringing
their dispute before the committee, she knew that she had changed it
into a question upon which the whole village would take sides. She
only trusted that superstition would prevail, and the aged landmark
would be left standing. She somehow felt doubtful, however, now that
Mrs. Day had taken sides against her, and she hurried off to avoid
further discussion.
Billy Unguin arrived at the saloon alone. Allan Dy's course was
diverted when he came within sight of his post office. As he reached
the main trail of the village, he saw Inspector Fyles and Sergeant
McBain riding down from the west, and the sight of them reminded him
of his mail. So, leaving his friend to continue his way to the saloon
alone, he went on to his little office, arriving in time to take down
a telegraphic message from Amberley, and hand it, with his mail, to
the police officer.
He rubbed his hands delightedly as he read the message over to himself
a second time before placing it in its envelope. It was from the
police headquarters, and its wording was full of significance in the
light of last night's events. Allan Dy was glad he had not gone on to
the saloon.
The message was desperately curt.
"Wagon returned to Fort Allerton empty. Report. Jason."
The postmaster had just placed the message with the officers' mail
when the two policemen entered. Fyles's expression was morose, and his
manner repellent. McBain was grim and silent.
"There's a goodish mail, Mr. Fyles," said Dy, without a trace of his
real feelings, as he held out the bulky packet of letters. "That
message has just come along over the wire." He pointed at the tinted
envelope enclosing the telegram.
While Fyles took his mail, McBain's keen eyes were at work upon the
letters spread out on the counter.
Fyles's silent manner induced the curious official to go a step
further.
"It's from headquarters--Superintendent Jason," he said, covertly
watching the policeman's face.
But the effect was not quite as satisfactory as he hoped. Fyles
smiled.
"Thanks. I was expecting it."
Then he turned away, and, followed by McBain, passed out of the
building.
Once outside, however, it was quite another matter. The officer tore
open the message and glanced at its contents. Then he passed it on to
McBain with a brief comment.
"They're wise," he said. "Guess the band's going to start
playing--right away."
McBain read the message. "We're up against it, sir," was his dry
comment.
"Up against it, man?" Fyles cried, with sudden heat. "I tell you
that's very nearly our sentence. We've failed--failed, do you
understand? And it's not our first failure. Do you need me to tell you
anything? We may just as well stand right here and cut off the badges
of our various ranks. That's what we may as well do," he added
bitterly. "There's no mercy in Jason, and devilish little reason."
But the Scot seemed to have very little sympathy for the other's
feelings. He seemed to care less for his rank than something else,
and, in his next words, the real man shone out.
"I don't care a curse for my rank, sir," he exclaimed. "We've been
bluffed and beaten like two babes in the game our lives are spent in
playing. That's what hurts me. Have you seen 'em, sir? All the way
along as we came down here just now. We passed five or six women at
the doors of their miserable shacks, and they smiled as they saw us.
We passed four men, and their greeting was maddening in its jeer. Even
the damned kids looked up and grinned like the apes they are. They've
bluffed and beaten us, and I--hate 'em all."
For some moments Stanley Fyles made no answer. He was gazing out down
the village trail, and his eyes were on a small group of people
standing some way off talking together. He had recognized them. They
were Kate and Helen Seton, and with them was young Bryant, the
ingenuous brother of Charlie. He guessed, as well he might, the
subject of their talk. His failure. Was not everybody talking of it?
And were not most of them, probably all of them, rejoicing? His
bitterness grew, and at last he turned on his subordinate.
"Bluffed, but not beaten," he said, with a fierce oath which did the
Scot's heart good. "We're not beaten," he reiterated, "if only Jason
will leave us alone, and trust us further. I've got to convince him.
I've got to tell him all that's happened, and I've got to persuade him
to leave us here. We've got to go on. He can recommend my resignation,
he can do what he damn well pleases, so long as he leaves me here to
finish this work. I tell you, I've got to break up this gang of
hoodlums."
McBain's eyes glittered.
"That's how I feel, sir."
"Feel? We've just got to do it--or clear out of the country. Man,
I'd give a thousand dollars to know how they got possession of our
signals. Those shots, that bluffed us, were fired by some of the gang.
How did they learn it? It's been done by spying, but--say, get on back
to camp, and prepare the report of last night. Hold it up for me, and
I'll enclose a private letter to Mr. Jason. I'll be along later."
McBain nodded.
"You fix it, sir, so we don't get transferred back. We need another
chance badly. Maybe they won't bluff us next time."
He swung himself into the saddle and rode away, while Fyles, linking
his arm through the faithful Peter's reins, strolled leisurely on down
the track toward the group which included Kate Seton.
As he drew near they ceased talking, and watched his approach. Their
attitude was such that Fyles could not refrain from a half-bitter,
half-laughing comment as he came up.
"It doesn't take much guessing to locate the subject of your talk,
Miss Kate," he cried.
Kate's dark eyes had no smile in them as she replied to his challenge.
"How's that?" she inquired, while Bill and Helen watched his face.
Fyles shrugged.
"You stopped talking when you saw I was coming your way." He laughed.
"However, I guess it's only to be expected. The boys bluffed us all
right last night. It was a smartish trick. Still," he added
thoughtfully, "it's given us an elegant lever--when the time comes."
Kate made no answer. She was studying the man's face, and there was a
certain regret and even pity in the depths of her regard. Bill and
Helen had no such feelings for him. They were frankly rejoiced at his
failure.
Helen replied. "That's so, Mr. Fyles," she said, almost tartly, "but I
guess that lever needs to help them into your traps to do any real
good."
The officer's smile was quite good-humored, in spite of the sharpness
of the girl's reminder. What he really felt he was not likely to
display here.
"Sure," he said. "The spider weaves his web and it's not worth a cent
if the flies aren't foolish enough to make mistakes. The spider is a
student of winged insect nature, and he lays his plans accordingly.
The flies always come to him--in the end."
Bill laughed good-humoredly.
"That's dandy," he cried. "There's always fool flies around. But
sometimes that spider's web gets all mussed up and broken. I've broke
'em myself--rather than see the fool things caught."
Kate's eyes were turned on the great bulk of Charlie's brother. Even
Helen looked up with bright admiration for her lover.
Fyles's gaze was leveled directly into the innocent looking blue eyes
laughing into his.
"Yes, I dare say you and other folks have broken those things up,
often--but the spiders thrive and multiply. You see, when one net is
busted they--make another. They don't seem to starve ever, do they?
Ever seen a spider dead of starvation?"
"Can't say I have." Bill shook his great head. "But maybe they'd get a
bad time if they set their traps for any special flies--or fly."
Fyles raised his powerful shoulders coldly.
"Guess the spider business doesn't go far enough," he said, talking
directly at Big Brother Bill. "When I spoke of that lever just now,
maybe you didn't get my meaning quite clearly. That gang, who ran the
liquor in last night, put themselves further up against the law than
maybe they think. It was an armed attack on the police, which is
quite a different thing to just simple whisky-running. Get me? The
police are always glad when crooks do that. It pays them better--when
the time comes."
Bill had no reply. He suddenly experienced the chill of the cold steel
of police methods. A series of painful pictures rose up before his
mind's eye, which held his tongue silent. Helen quickly came to his
rescue.
"But who's to say who did it?" she demanded.
Fyles smiled down into her pretty face.
"Those who want to save their skins--when the time comes."
It was Helen's turn to realize something of the irresistible nature of
the work of the police. Somehow she felt that the defeat of the police
last night was but a shadowy success after all, for those concerned in
the whisky-running. Her thought flew at once to Charlie, and she
shuddered at the suggested possibilities in Fyles's words.
She turned away.
"Well, all I can say is, I--I hate it all, and wish it was all over
and done with. Everybody's talking, everybody's gloating, and--and it
just makes me feel scared to death." Then she turned again to Bill.
"Let's go on," she cried, a little desperately. "We'll finish our
shopping, and--and get away from it all. It just makes me real ill."
She waved a farewell to Kate and moved away, and Bill, like some
faithful watchdog, followed at her heels. Fyles looked after them both
with serious, earnest eyes. Kate watched them smiling.
Presently Fyles turned back to her.
"Well?" he demanded.
Kate's eyes were slowly raised to his.
"Well?" she echoed. "So----"
She broke off. Her generous nature checked her in time. She had been
about to twit him with his defeat. She sympathized with his feelings
at the thought of his broken hopes.
"Better say it," said Fyles, with a smile, in which chagrin and
tenderness struggled for place. "You were going to say I have been
defeated, as you told me I should be defeated."
"I s'pose I was." Kate glanced quickly up into his face, but the
feeling she beheld there made her turn her eyes away so that they
followed Bill and Helen moving down the trail. "Women are usually
ungenerous to--an adversary." Then her whole manner changed to one of
kindly frankness. "Do you know my feelings are sort of mixed about
your--defeat----"
"Not defeat," put in Fyles. "Check."
Kate smiled.
"Well, then, 'check.' I am glad--delighted--since you direct all your
suspicions against Charlie. Then I am full of regret for you,
because--because I know the rigor of police discipline. In the eyes of
the authorities you have failed--twice. Oh, if you would only attack
this thing with an open mind, and not start prejudiced against
Charlie. I wish you had never listened to local gossip. If that were
so I could be on your side, and--and with true sportsmanship, wish you
well. Besides that, I might be able to tell you things. You see, I
learn many things in the village that others do not--hear."
Fyles was studying the woman's face closely as she spoke. And
something he beheld there robbed his defeat of a good deal of its
sting. Her words were the words of partisanship, and her partisanship
was for another as well as himself. Had this not been so, had her
partisanship been for him alone, he could well have abandoned himself
to an open mind, as she desired. As it was, she drove him to a dogged
pursuit of the man he was convinced was the real culprit.
"Don't let us reopen the old subject," he said, with a shade of
irritability. "I have evidence you know nothing of, and I should be
mad indeed if I changed my objective at your desire, for the sake of
the unsupported belief and regard you have for this man. Let us be
content to be adversaries, each working out our little campaign as we
think best. Don't waste regrets at my failures. I know the price I
have to pay for them--only too well. I know, and I tell you frankly,
but only you, that my career in the police may terminate in
consequence. That's all right. The prestige of the force cannot be
maintained by--failures. The prestige of the force is very dear to me.
If you have anything to tell me that may lead me in the direction of
the real culprit, then tell me. If not--why let us be friends
until--until my work has made that impossible. I--I want your
friendship very much."
Kate's eyes were turned from him. The deep light in them was very
soft.
"Do you?" she smiled. "Well--perhaps you have it, in spite of our
temporary antagonism. Oh, dear--it's all so absurd."
Fyles laughed.
"Isn't it? But, then, anything out of the ordinary is generally
absurd, until we get used to it. Somehow, it doesn't seem absurd that
I want your--friendship. At least, not to me."
Kate smiled up into his face.
"And yet it is--absurd."
The man's eyes suddenly became serious.
"Why?"
Kate shrugged.
"That's surely explained. We are--antagonists."
Again that look of impatience crossed the man's keen features. As he
offered no reply, Kate went on.
"About the armed attack on the police. You said it made all the
difference. What is the difference?"
"Anything between twelve months in the penitentiary and twenty
years--when the gang is landed."
"Twenty years!" The woman gave a slight gasp.
The man nodded.
"And do you know the logical consequence of it all?" he inquired.
"No." Kate's eyes were horrified.
"Why, when next we come into conflict there will be shooting if these
people are pressed. They will have to shoot to save themselves. Then
there may be murder added to their list of--delinquencies. These
things follow in sequence. It is the normal progress of those who put
themselves on the side of crime."
CHAPTER XXVII
AT THE HIDDEN CORRAL
Charlie Bryant urged his horse at a dangerous pace along the narrow,
winding cattle tracks which threaded the upper reaches of the valley.
He gave no heed to anything--the lacerating thorns, the great, knotty
roots, with which the paths were studded, the overhanging boughs. His
sole object seemed to be a desperate desire to reach his destination.
His horse often floundered and tripped, the man's own clothes were
frequently ripped by the thorns, and the bleeding flesh beneath laid
bare, while it seemed a miracle that he successfully dodged the
threatening boughs overhead.
There was a hunted look in his dark eyes, too. It was a look of
concern, almost of terror. His gaze was alert and roving. Now, he was
looking ahead, straining with anxiety, now he was turning this way and
that in response to the mysterious woodland sounds which greeted his
ears. Again, with a nervous jerk, he would rein in his horse and sit
listening, with eyes staring back over the way he had come, as though
fearing pursuit.
Once he thrust a hand into an inside pocket as though to reassure
himself that something was there which he valued and feared to lose,
and with every movement, every look of his eyes, every turn of the
head, he displayed an unusual nervousness and apprehension.
At last his horse swept into the clearing of the hidden corral, and he
reined it up with a jerk, and leaped from the saddle. Then he stood
listening, and the apprehension in his eyes deepened. But presently it
lessened, and he moved forward, and flung his reins over one of the
corral fence posts. Every woodland sound, every discordant note from
the heart of the valley was accounted for in his mind, so he hurried
toward the flat-roofed hut, that mysterious relic of a bygone age.
He thrust the creaking door open and waited while the flight of birds
swarmed past him. Then he made his way within. Once inside he paused
again with that painful look of expectancy and fear in his eyes. Again
this passed, and he went on quickly to the far corner of the room,
and laid his hands upon the wooden lining of the wall. Then he
abruptly seemed to change his mind. He removed his hands, and withdrew
a largish, morocco pocketbook from an inner pocket.
It was a rather fine case, bound in embossed silver, and ornamented
with a silver monogram. For some moments he looked at it as though in
doubt. He seemed to be definitely making up his mind, and his whole
attitude suggested his desire for its safety.
While he was still gazing at it a startled look leaped into his eyes,
and his head turned as though at some suspicious sound. A moment later
he reached out and slid the wooden lining of the wall up, revealing
the cavity behind it, which still contained its odd assortment of
garments. Without hesitation he reached up to a dark jacket and thrust
the pocketbook into an inner pocket. Then, with a swift movement, he
replaced the paneling and turned about.
It was the work of a moment, and as he turned about his right hand was
gripping the butt of a revolver, ready and pointing at the door.
"Charlie!"
The revolver was slipped back into the man's pocket, and Charlie
Bryant's furious face was turned toward the window opening, which now
framed the features of his great blundering brother.
"You, Bill?" he cried angrily. "What in hell are you doing here?"
But Bill ignored the challenge, he ignored the tone of it. His big
eyes were full of excitement.
"Come out of there--quick!" he cried sharply.
Charlie's dark eyes had lost some of their anger in the inquiry now
replacing it.
"Why?" But he moved toward the doorway.
"Why? Because Fyles is behind me. I've seen him in the distance."
Charlie came around the corner of the building with the door firmly
closed behind him. Bill left the window and moved across to his horse,
which was standing beside that of his brother. Charlie followed him.
Neither spoke again until the horses were reached, and Bill had
unhitched his reins from the corral fence. Then he turned his great
blue eyes, so full of trouble, upon the small figure beside him, and
he answered the other's half-angry, half-curious challenge with a
question.
"What's this place?" he demanded. Then he added, "And what's that
cupboard in there?" He jerked his head in the direction of the hut, "I
saw you close it."
Charlie seemed to have recovered from the apprehension which had
caused him to obey his brother unquestioningly. There was an angry
sparkle in his eyes as he gazed steadily into Bill's face.
"That's none of your damn business," he said, in a low tone of surly
truculence. "I'm not here to answer any questions till you tell me the
reason why you've had the impertinence to hunt me down. How did you
know where to find me?"
Just for one moment a hot retort leaped to the other's lips. But he
checked his rising temper. His journey in pursuit of his brother had
been taken after deep reflection and consultation with Helen. But the
mystery of that hut, that cupboard, did more to keep him calm than
anything else. His curiosity was aroused. Not mere idle curiosity, but
these things, this place, were a big link in the chain of evidence
that had been forged about his brother, and he felt he was on the
verge of a discovery. Then there was Fyles somewhere nearby in the
neighborhood. This last thought, and all it portended, destroyed his
feelings of resentment.
"I s'pose you think I followed you for sheer curiosity. Guess I might
well enough do so, seeing we bear the same name, and that name's
liable to stink--through you. But I didn't, anyway. I came out here to
tell you something I heard this morning, and it's about--last night.
Fyles says that the result of last night is that the gang, their
leader, is now wanted for an armed attack on the police, and that the
penalty is--anything up to twenty years in the penitentiary."
Charlie's intense regard never wavered for one moment.
"Who told you I was here?" he demanded angrily.
"No one."
There was a sting in the sharpness of Bill's reply. The big blue eyes
were growing hot again.
"Then how did you know where to find me?" Charlie's deep voice was
full of suppressed fury.
"I didn't know just where to find you," Bill protested, with rising
heat. "The kid told me you'd gone up the valley, but didn't say where.
I set out blindly and stumbled on your horse's tracks. I chanced those
tracks, and they led me here. Will that satisfy you?"
Charlie's eyes were still glittering.
"Not quite. I'll ask you to get out of my ranch. And remember this,
you've seen me at this shack, and you've seen that cupboard. If you'd
been anybody but my brother I'd have shot you down in your tracks.
Fyles--anybody. That cupboard is my secret, and if anyone learns of it
through you--well, I'll forget you're my brother and treat you as
though you were--Fyles."
A sudden blaze of wrath flared up in the bigger man's eyes. But,
almost as it kindled, it died out and he laughed. However, when he
spoke there was no mirth in his voice.
"My God, Charlie," he cried, holding out his big hands, "I could
almost take you in these two hands and--and wring your foolish,
obstinate, wicked neck. You stand there talking blasted melodrama like
a born actor on the one-night stands. Your fool talk don't scare me a
little. What in the name of all that's sacred do you think I want to
send you to the penitentiary for? Haven't I come here to warn you?
Man, the rye whisky's turned you crazy. I'm here to help, help, do you
understand? Just four letters, 'help,' a verb which means 'support,'
not 'destroy.'"
Charlie's cold regard never wavered.
"When will you clear out of--my ranch?"
Bill started. The brothers' eyes met in a long and desperate exchange
of regard. Then the big man brought his fist down upon the high cantle
of his saddle with startling force.
"When I choose, not before," he cried fiercely. "Do you understand?
Here, you foolish man. I know what I'm up against. I know what you're
up against, and I tell you right here that if Fyles is going to hunt
you into the penitentiary he can hunt me, too. I'm not smart, like
you, on these crook games, but I'm determined that the man who lags
you will get it good and plenty. I sort of hate you, you foolish man.
I hate you and like you. You've got grit, and, by God, I like you for
it, and I don't stand to see you go down for any twenty years--alone.
If Fyles gets you that way, you're the last man he ever will get. Damn
you!"
Charlie drew a deep breath. It was a sigh of pent feeling. He averted
his gaze, and it wandered over the old corral inside which the wagon
with its hay-rack was still standing, though its position was changed
slightly. His eyes rested upon it, and passed on to the hut, about
which the birds were once more gathering. They paused for some silent
moments in this direction. Then they came back to the angry, waiting
brother.
"I wish you weren't such a blunderer, Bill," he said, and his manner
had become peevishly gentle. "Can't you see I've got to play my own
game in my own way? You don't know all that's back of my head. You
don't know a thing. All you know is that Fyles wants to send me down,
by way of cleaning up this valley. I want him to--if he can. But he
can't. Not as long as the grass grows. He's beaten--beaten before he
starts. I don't want help. I don't want help from anybody. Now, for
God's sake, can't you leave me alone?"
The tension between the two was relaxed. Bill gave an exclamation of
impatience.
"You want him to--send you down?"
The warp of this man was too much for his common sense.
"If he can."
Charlie smiled now. It was a smile of perfect confidence. Bill threw
up his hands.
"Well, you've got me beat to a rag. I----"
"The same as I have Fyles. But say----"
Charlie broke off, and his smile vanished.
"Maybe I'm a crook. Maybe I'm anything you, or anybody else likes to
call me. There's one thing I'm not. I'm no bluff. You know of that
cupboard in that shack. The thought's poison to me. If any other man
had found it, he wouldn't be alive now to listen to me. Do you
understand me? Forget it. Forget you ever saw it. If you dream of it,
fancy it's a nightmare and--turn over. Bill, I solemnly swear that
I'll shoot the man dead, on sight, who gives that away, or dares to
look inside it. Now, we'll get away from here."
He sprang into the saddle and waited while his brother mounted. Then
he held out his hand.
"Do you get me?" he asked.
Bill nodded, and took the outstretched hand in solemn compact.
"What you say goes," he said easily. "But your threat of shooting
doesn't worry me a little bit."
He gathered up his reins and the two men rode out of the clearing.
* * * * *
The last sound of speeding hoofs died away, and the clearing settled
once more to its mysterious quiet. Only the twittering of the swarming
birds on the thatched roof of the hut disturbed the silence, but,
somehow, even their chattering voices seemed really to intensify it.
Thus a few minutes passed.
Then a breaking of bush and rustling of leaves gave warning of a fresh
approach. A man's head and shoulders were thrust forward, out from
amid the boughs of a wild cherry bush.
His dark face peered cautiously around, and his keen eyes took in a
comprehensive survey of both corral and hut. A moment later he stood
clear of the bush altogether.
Stanley Fyles swiftly crossed the intervening space and entered the
corral. He strode up to the wagon and examined it closely, studying
its position and the wheel tracks, with a minuteness that left him in
possession of every available fact. Having satisfied himself in this
direction, he passed out of the corral and went over to the hut.
The screaming birds promptly protested, and flew once more from their
nesting quarters in panicky dudgeon. Fyles watched them go with
thoughtful eyes. Then he passed around to the door of the building and
thrust it open. Another rush of birds swept past him, and he passed
within. Again his searching eyes were brought into play. Not a detail
of that interior escaped him. But ten minutes later he left the
half-lit room for the broad light of day outside--disappointed.
For a long time he moved around the building, examining the walls,
their bases and foundations. His disappointment remained, however,
and, finally, with strong discontent in his expression, and an
unmistakable shrug of his shoulders, he moved away.
Finally, he paused and gave a long, low whistle. He repeated it at
intervals, three times, and, after awhile, for answer, the wise face
of Peter appeared from among the bushes. The creature solemnly
contemplated the scene. It was almost as if he were assuring himself
of the safety of revealing himself. Then, with measured gait, he made
his way slowly toward his master.
CHAPTER XXVIII
A WAGER
The wild outbreak of excitement in Rocky Springs died out swiftly.
After all, whisky-running was a mere traffic. It was a general traffic
throughout the country. The successful "running" of a cargo of alcohol
was by no means an epoch-making event. But just now, in Rocky Springs,
it was a matter of more than usual interest, in that the police had
expressed their intention of "cleaning" the little township up. So
the excitement at their outwitting. So, more than ever, the excited
rejoicing became a cordial expression of delight at the fooling of the
purpose of a generally hated act.
This sentiment was expressed by O'Brien before his bar full of men,
among whom were many of those responsible for the defeat of the
police. He addressed himself personally to Stormy Longton with the
certainty of absolute sympathy.
"Guess when the boys here have done with the p'lice they'll have the
prohibition law wiped out of the statute book, Stormy," he said, with
a knowing wink. "Ther's fellers o' grit around this valley, eh? Good
boys and gritty. Guess it ain't fer us to open our mouths wide, 'cep'
to swallow prohibition liquor, but there'll be some tales to tell of
these days later, eh, Stormy? An'," he added slyly, "guess you'll be
able to tell some of 'em."
The badman displayed no enthusiasm at the personality. He considered
carefully before replying. When he did reply, however, he set the
saloonkeeper re-sorting some of his convictions, mixing them with a
doubt which had never occurred to him before.
"Sure," said Stormy, with a contemptuous shrug, "and I guess you, with
the rest, will do some of the listenin'. You're all wise guys
hereabouts--mostly as wise as the p'lice. Best hand the company a
round of drinks. I've got money to burn."
He laughed, but no amount of questioning could elicit anything more of
interest to the curious minds about him.
It was on the second day after the whisky-running that Kate Seton was
returning home after an arduous morning in the village. She was
feeling unusually depressed, and her handsome face was pathetically
lacking in the high spirits and delight of living usual to it. It was
not her way to indulge in the self-pitying joys of depression. On the
contrary, her buoyancy, her spirit, were such as to attract the weaker
at all times to lean on her for support.
She was tired, too, physically tired. The day had been one of
sweltering heat, one of those sultry, oppressive days, which are
fortunately few enough in the brilliant Canadian summer.
As she reached the wooden bridge across the river she paused and
leaned herself against the handrail, and, propping her elbow upon it,
leaned her chin upon the palm of her hand and abandoned herself to a
long train of troubled thought. It may have been chance; it may have
been that her thought inspired the direction of her gaze. It may have
been that her attitude had nothing whatsoever to do with her thought.
Certain it is, however, that her brooding eyes were turned, as they
were so often turned, upon that little ranch house perched so high up
on the valley slope.
She remained thus for a while, her eyes almost unseeing in their
far-away gaze, but, later, without shifting her attitude, they glanced
off to the right in the direction of the old pine, rearing its
vagabond head high above the surrounding wealth of by no means
insignificant foliage.
It was a splendid sight, and, to her imagination, it looked the
personification of the rascality of the village she had so come to
love. Look at it. Its trunk, naked as the supports of a scarecrow,
suggesting mighty strength, indolence and poverty. There, above, its
ragged garments--unwholesome, dirty, like the garments of some
tramping, villainous, degraded loafer. And yet, with it all, the old
tree looked so mighty, so wise.
To her it seemed like some ages-old creature looking down from its
immense height, and out of its experience of centuries, upon a world
of struggling beings, with the pitying contempt of a wisdom beyond the
understanding of man. It seemed to her the embodiment of evil, yet
withal of wisdom, too. And somehow she loved it. Its evil meant
nothing to her, nothing more than the evil of the life amid which she
lived. It was no mere passing sentiment with her. Her nature was too
strong for the softer, womanish sentiments, stirred in a moment and as
easily set aside. For her to yield her affections to any creature or
object, was to yield herself to a bondage more certain than any life
of slavery. To think of this valley without----
Her thoughts were abruptly cut short as the sound of a cry reached her
from the direction of her house.
She turned, and, for a moment, stared hard and alertly in the
direction whence it came. Her ears were straining, too. In a moment
she became aware of a faint confusion of sounds which she had no power
of interpreting. But somehow they conveyed an ominous suggestion to
her keen mind.
She bestirred herself. She set off at a run for her home. The distance
was less than a hundred yards, and she covered it quickly. As she came
nearer the sounds grew, and became even more ominous. They proceeded
from somewhere in the direction of the barn behind the house.
She darted into the house, and, after one comprehensive glance around
the sitting room, where she found the rocker upset, and a china
ornament fallen from its place on the table, and smashed in fragments
upon the floor, as though someone had knocked it down in a hasty
departure, she snatched a revolver from its holster upon the wall, and
rushed out of the house through the back door.
She was not mistaken. Her hearing had accurately conveyed to her the
meaning of those sounds.
Nevertheless she was wholly unprepared for the sight which actually
greeted her as she turned the angle of the barn where the building
faced away from the house.
She stood stock still, her big eyes wide with wonder and swift rising
anger. Twisting, struggling, writhing, cursing, two men lay upon the
ground held in a fierce embrace, much in the manner of two wildcats.
Beyond them, huddled upon the ground, her face covered with her hands,
a picture of abject terror, crouched her younger sister, Helen.
All this she beheld at the first glance. Then, keeping clear of the
fighters she darted around to the terrified girl. With a cry Helen
scrambled to her feet and clung to her sister's arm, and began to pour
out a stream of hysterical thankfulness.
"Oh, stop them," she cried. "Oh, thank God, thank God! Stop them, or
they'll kill each other. Pete will kill him. He----"
But Kate had no time for such feminine weakness. She dragged the girl
away out of sight, and left her while she returned to the affray.
Once in full view of it she made no effort to stop it. She stood
looking on with the critical eye of an interested spectator, but her
hand was grasping her revolver, nor was her forefinger far from the
trigger of it.
The men rolled this way and that, while deep-throated curses came up
from their midst with a breathless, muttered force. But through the
tangle of sprawling bodies and waving limbs Kate's quick eyes
discovered all she required to satisfy herself. She saw no real life
and death struggle here. Maybe, had the circumstances been changed, it
would have been so, but one of the combatants was far too experienced
a rough and tumble fighter for those circumstances to mature.
The man on top at the moment had the other in a vice-like grip by the
right wrist, keeping the heavy revolver, which the underman had in his
hand, from becoming a serious danger. With the other hand he was
dealing his adversary careful, well-timed smashes upon his bruised and
battered face, with the object of warding off a fierce attack of
strong, yellow teeth.
The man on top had his adversary's measure to a fraction. He was
dealing with him almost as he chose, and the onlooker knew that it
could only be moments before the other finally "squealed," and
dropped the murderous weapon from his hand.
Down came the fist, a great, white fist, with a soggy sound upon the
man's pulpy features, its force increased a hundred per cent. by the
resistance of the hard ground on which his adversary lay. A fierce
curse was the response, and a wild upward slash at the big face above.
Then the big fist went up again.
"Drop it, you son-of-a-moose," Kate heard, in Big Brother Bill's
fiercest tones. "Drop it, or I'll kill you!"
Down came his fist with a fearful smash on the other's gaping mouth.
A splutter of oaths was his reply, and an even greater effort to throw
the white man off.
But the effort was unavailing. Then Kate saw something happen. The big
white man changed his tactics. He desisted quite suddenly from
belaboring his victim. He made no attempt to defend himself. He
reached out his disengaged hand and added a second grip upon the man's
revolver arm. Then, with a terrific jolt, he flung himself backwards,
so that he was left in a kneeling position upon the other's middle.
Then, in a second, with an agility absolutely staggering, he was on
his feet. The next moment the other was jerked to his feet with his
revolver arm twisted behind his back and nearly dislocated.
With a frantic yell of agony the half-breed's hand relaxed its grip
upon his revolver, and the weapon fell to the ground. The fight was
over. With a mighty throw Pete Clancy was hurled headlong, and fell
sprawling upon the ground at the foot of the barn wall, and his impact
was like the result of a shot from a catapult.
"Lie there, you dirty dog!" cried Big Brother Bill, in a fury of
breathless indignation. "That'll maybe learn you a lesson not to get
drinking rot gut, and, if you do, not to insult a white girl. You
damnation nigger, for two beans I'd kick the life out of you where you
lay."
The man was scrambling to his feet, glaring an eternity of hatred at
his white victor.
"Did he insult--Helen?"
Bill swung around with almost ludicrous abruptness. He had been
utterly unaware of Kate's presence.
He stared. Then, with a rush of passionate anger----
"Yes; but by God, he'll think some before he does it again."
Kate's eyes were coldly commanding.
"Go around to Helen, and--take that gun," she said authoritatively.
"Leave Pete to me."
"Leave him----?" Bill's protest remained uncompleted.
"Do as I tell you--please."
"But he'll----"
Again Kate cut him short.
"Please!" She pointed in the direction of the house.
Bill was left with no alternative but to obey. He moved away, but his
movements were grudging, and he looked back as he went, ready to hurl
himself to Kate's succor at the slightest sign.
Ten minutes later Kate entered the sitting room. Her handsome face was
pale, and her eyes were shining. The spirit of the woman was stirred.
There was no fear in her--only a sort of hard resentment that left her
expression one of cold determination.
Helen ran to her at once. But, for perhaps the first time in her life,
she encountered something in the nature of a rebuff. Kate looked
straight into her sister's eyes as she flung herself into a chair, and
laid her loaded revolver upon the table.
"Tell me about it. Just the plain facts," she said, and waited.
Bill started up from his place in the rocker, but Kate signed him to
be silent.
"Helen can tell me," she said coldly.
Helen, leaning against the table, glanced across at Bill. Her sister's
attitude troubled her. She felt the resentment underlying it. She was
at a loss to understand it. After a moment's hesitation she began to
explain. Nor could she quite keep the sharp edge of feeling out of her
tone.
"It was my fault," she began. "At least, I s'pose it was. I s'pose I
was doing a fool thing interfering, but I didn't just think you'd
mind, seeing you'd ordered him to do work he hadn't done. You see, he
hadn't touched those potatoes you'd told him to dig. He's been
drinking instead."
Suddenly her sense of humor got the better of her resentful feelings,
and she began to laugh.
"Well, I had to go and be severe with him. I tried to bully him, and
stamped my foot at him, and--and called him a drunken brute. I took a
chance. Being drunk, he might have proposed to me. Well, he didn't
this time. It was far worse. He told me to go--to hell, first of all.
But, as I didn't show signs of obeying him, he got sort of funny and
tried to kiss me."
"The swine!" muttered Bill, but was silenced by a look from Helen's
humorous eyes.
"That's what I thought--first," she said. Then, her eyes widening:
"But he meant doing it, and I got scared to death. Oh, dear, I was
frightened. Being a coward, I shouted for help. And Bill responded
like--like a great angry steer. Then I got worse scared, for, directly
Pete saw Bill coming, he pulled a gun, and there surely was murder in
his eye."
She breathed a deep sigh, and her eyes had changed their expression to
one of delight and pride.
"But he hadn't a dog's chance of putting Bill's lights out. He hadn't,
true. Say, Kate, Bill was just like--like a whirlwind. Same as Charlie
said. He was so quick I hardly know how it happened. Bill dropped Pete
like a--a sack of wheat. He--he was on him like a tiger. Then I was
just worse scared than ever, and--and began to cry."
The girl's mouth drooped, but her eyes were laughing. Then, as Kate
still remained quiet, she inquired:
"Wasn't I a fool?"
Kate suddenly looked up from the brown study into which she had
fallen. Her big eyes looked straight across at Bill, and she ignored
Helen's final remark.
"Thanks, Bill," she said quietly. And her last suggestion of
displeasure seemed to pass with her expression of gratitude. "I'm glad
you were here, and"--she smiled--"you can fight. You nearly killed
him." Then, after a pause: "It's been a lesson to me. I--shan't forget
it."
"What have you--done to him?" cried Helen suddenly.
But Kate shook her head.
"Let's talk of something else. There's things far more important
than--him. Anyway, he won't do _that_ again."
She rose from her seat and moved to the window, where she stood
looking out. But she had no interest in what she beheld. She was
thinking moodily of other things.
Bill stirred in his chair. He was glad enough to put the episode
behind him.
"Yes," he said, taking up Kate's remark at once. "There certainly are
troubles enough to go around." He was thinking of his scene of the
previous day with his brother. "But--but what's gone wrong with you,
Kate? What are the more important things?"
"You haven't fallen out with Mrs. Day?" Helen put in quickly.
Kate shook her head.
"No one falls out with Mrs. Day," she said quietly. "Mrs. Day does the
falling out. It isn't only Mrs. Day, it's--it's everybody. I think the
whole village is--is mad." She turned back from the window and
returned to her seat. But she did not sit down. She stood resting her
folded arms on its back and leaned upon it. "They're all mad.
Everybody. I'm mad." She glanced from one to the other, smiling in the
sanest fashion, but behind her smile was obvious anxiety and trouble.
"They've practically decided to cut down the old pine."
Bill sat up. He laughed at the tone of her announcement.
But Helen gasped.
"The old pine?" She had caught some of her sister's alarm.
Kate nodded.
"You can laugh, Bill," she cried. "That's what they're all doing.
They're laughing at--the old superstition. But--it's not a laughing
matter to folks who think right along the lines of the essence of our
human natures, which is superstition. The worst of it is I've brought
it about. I told the meeting about a stupid argument about the
building of the church which Billy and Dy had. Billy wants the tree
for a ridge pole, because the church is disproportionately long. Well,
I told the folks because I thought they wouldn't hear of the tree
being cut. But Mrs. Day rounded on me, and the meeting followed her
like a flock of sheep. Still, I wasn't done by that. I've been
canvassing the village since, and, would you believe it, they all say
it's a good job to cut the tree down. Maybe it'll rid the place of
its evil influence, and so rid us of the attentions of the police. I
tell you, Billy and Dy are perfect fools, and the folks are all mad.
And I'm the greatest idiot ever escaped a home for imbeciles. There!
That's how I feel. It's--it's scandalous."
Bill laughed good-naturedly.
"Say, cheer up, Kate," he cried. "You surely don't need to worry any.
It can't hurt you. Besides----." He broke off abruptly, and, sitting
up, looked out of the window. "Say, here comes Fyles." He almost
leaped out of his seat.
"What's the matter?" demanded Kate sharply. Then she looked around at
her sister, who had moved away from the table.
Bill laughed again in his inconsequent fashion.
"Matter?" he cried. "Nothin's the matter, only--only----. Say, did you
ever have folks get on your nerves?"
"Plenty in Rocky Springs," said Kate bitterly.
Bill nodded.
"That's it. Say, I've just remembered I've got an appointment that was
never made with somebody who don't exist. I'm going to keep it."
Helen laughed, and clapped her hands.
"Say, that's really funny. And I've just remembered something I'd
never forgotten, that's too late to do anyway. Come on, Bill, let's go
and see about these things, and," she added slyly, "leave Kate to
settle Fyles--by herself."
"Helen!"
But Kate's remonstrance fell upon empty air. The lovers had fled
through the open doorway, and out the back way. Nor had she time to
call them back, for, at that moment, Fyles's horse drew up at the
front door, and she heard the officer leap out of the saddle.
* * * * *
"Have you made your peace with--headquarters?"
Kate and Stanley Fyles were standing out in the warm shade of the
house. The woman's hand was gently caressing the velvety muzzle of
Peter's long, fiddle face. It was a different woman talking to the
police officer from the bitter, discontented creature of a few
minutes ago. For the time, at least, all regrets, all thoughts of
an unpleasant nature seemed to have been lost in the delight of a
woman wholesomely in love.
As she put her question her big eyes looked up into the man's keen
face with just the faintest suspicion of raillery in their glowing
depths. But her rich tones were full of a genuine eagerness that
belied the look.
The man was good to look upon. The strength of his face appealed to
her, as did the big, loose shoulders and limbs, as strength must
always appeal to a real woman. Her love inspired a subtle tenderness,
even anxiety.
"I hope so, but--I don't know yet."
Fyles made no attempt to conceal his doubts. Somehow the official side
of the man was becoming less and less sustained before this woman, who
had come to occupy such a big portion of his life.
"You mean you've sent in your report, and are now awaiting
the--verdict?"
Fyles nodded.
"Like so many of the criminals I have brought before the courts," he
said, bitterly.
"And the chances?"
"About equal to those of a convicted felon."
The smile died out of Kate's eyes. They were full of regretful
sympathy.
"It's pretty tough," she said, turning from him. "It isn't as if you
had made a mistake, or neglected your duty."
"No, I was beaten."
The man turned away coldly. But his coldness was not for her.
"Is there no hope?" Kate asked presently, in a low tone.
Fyles shrugged.
"There might be if I had something definite to promise for the future.
I mean a chance of--redeeming myself."
Kate made no answer. The whole thing to her mind seemed impossible if
it depended upon that. The thought of this strong man being broken
through the police system, for no particular fault of his own, seemed
very hard. Harder now than ever. She strove desperately to find a
gleam of light in the darkness of his future. She would have given
worlds to discover some light, and show him the way. But one thing
seemed impossible, and he--well, he only made it harder. His very
decision and obstinacy, she considered, were his chief undoing.
"If you could reasonably hold out a prospect to them," she said, her
dark eyes full of thought--strong and earnest thought. "Can't you?"
She watched him closely. She saw him suddenly straighten himself up,
throwing back his powerful shoulders as though to rid himself of the
burden which had been oppressing him so long.
He drew a step nearer. Kate's heart beat fast. Then her eyes drooped
before the passion shining in his.
"Maybe you don't realize why I am here, Kate," he said, in a low
thrilling voice, while a warm smile grew in his eyes. "You see, weeks
ago I made a mistake, a bad mistake--just such as I have made here.
The liquor was run under my nose, while I--well, I just stood around
looking on like some fool babe. That liquor was--for this place. After
that I asked the chief to give me a free hand, and to allow me to come
right along, and round this place up. My object was twofold. I knew I
had to make good, and--I knew you were here. Guess you don't remember
our first meeting? I do. It was up on the hillside, near the old pine.
I've always wanted to get back here--ever since then. Well, I've had
my wish. I'm here, sure. But I've not made good. The folks, here, have
beaten me, and you--why, I've just contrived to make you my sworn
adversary. Failure, eh? Failure in my work, and in my--love."
For an instant the woman's eyes were raised to his face. She was
trembling as no physical fear could have made her tremble. Peter
nuzzled the palm of her hand with his velvety nose, and she quickly
lowered her gaze, and appeared to watch his efforts.
After a moment's pause the man went on in a voice full of a great
passionate love. All the official side of him had gone utterly. He
stood before the woman he loved baring his soul. For the moment he had
put his other failures behind him. He wanted only her.
"I came here because I loved you, Kate. I came here dreaming all those
dreams which we smile at in others. I dreamed of a life at your side,
with you ever before me to spur me on to the greater heights which I
have thought about, dreamed about. And all my work, all my striving,
was to be for you. I saw visions of the days, when, together, we might
fill high office in our country's affairs, with an ambition ever
growing, as, together, we mounted the ladder of success. Vain enough
thought, eh? Guess it was not long before I brought the roof of my
castle crashing about my ears. I have failed in my work a second time,
and only succeeded in making you my enemy."
Kate's eyes were shining. A great light of happiness was in them. But
she kept them turned from him.
"Not enemy--only adversary," she said, in a low voice.
The man shook his head.
"It is such a small distinction," he said bitterly. "Antagonists. How
can I ever hope that you can care for me? Kate, Kate," he burst out
passionately, "if you would marry me, none of the rest would matter. I
love you so, dear. If you would marry me I should not care what the
answer from headquarters might be. Why should I? I should then have
all I cared for in the world, and the world itself would still be
before us. I have money saved. All we should need to start us. My God,
the very thought of it fills me with the lust of conquest. There would
be nothing too great to aspire to. Kate, Kate!" He held his arms out
toward her in supplication.
The woman shook her head, but offered no verbal refusal. The man's
arms dropped once more to his sides, and, for a moment, the silence
was only broken by the champing of Peter's bit. Then once more the
man's eyes lit.
"Tell me," he cried, almost fiercely. "Tell me, had we not come into
conflict over this man, Bryant, would--would it--could it have been
different?" Then his voice grew soft and persuasive. "I know you don't
dislike me, Kate." He smiled. "I know it, and you must forgive
my--vanity. I have watched, and studied you, and--convinced myself. I
felt I had the right to hope. The right of every decently honest man.
Our one disagreement has been this man, Bryant. I had thought maybe
you loved him, but that you have denied. You do not? There is no one
else?"
Again Kate silently shook her head. The man was pressing her hard. All
her woman's soul was crying out for her to fling every consideration
to the winds, and yield to the impulse of the love stirring within
her. But something held her back, something so strong as to be quite
irresistible.
The man went on. He was fighting that last forlorn hope amid what, to
him, seemed to be a sea of disaster.
"No. You have told me that before," he said, almost to himself. "Then
why," he went on, his voice rising with the intensity of his feelings.
"Why--why----? But no, it's absurd. You tell me you don't--you can't
love me."
For one brief instant Kate's eyes were shyly raised to his. They
dropped again at once to the brown head of the horse beside her.
"I have told you nothing--yet," she said, in a low voice.
The man snatched a brief hope.
"You mean----?"
Kate looked up again, fearlessly now.
"I mean just what I say."
"You have told me nothing--yet," the man repeated. "Then you have
something--to tell me?"
Kate nodded and pushed Peter's head aside almost roughly.
"The man I can care for, the man I marry must have no thought of hurt
for Charlie Bryant in his mind."
"Then you----"
Kate made a movement of impatience.
"Again, I mean just what I say--no more, no less."
But it was Fyles's turn to become impatient.
"Bryant--Charlie Bryant? It is always Charlie Bryant--before all
things!"
Kate's eyes looked steadily into his.
"Yes--before even myself."
The man returned her look.
"Yet you do not love him as--I would have you love me?"
"Yet I do not love him, as you would have me love you."
The man thrust out his arms.
"Then, for God's sake, tell me some more."
The insistent Peter claimed Kate once more. His long face was once
more thrust against her arm, and his soft lips began to nibble at the
wrist frill of her sleeve. She turned to him with a laugh, and placed
an arm about his crested neck.
"Oh, Peter, Peter," she said smiling, and gently caressing the
friendly creature. "He wants me to tell him some more. Shall I? Shall
I tell him something of the many things I manage to learn in this
valley? Shall I try and explain that I contrive to get hold of secrets
that the police, with all their cleverness, can never hope to get hold
of? Shall I tell him, that, if only he will put Charlie out of his
mind, and leave him alone, and not try to fix this--this crime on him,
I can put him on the track of the real criminal? Shall I point out to
him the absurdity of fixing on this one man when there are such men as
O'Brien, and Stormy Longton, and my two boys, and Holy Dick, and Kid
Blaney in the place? Shall I? Shall I tell him of the things I've
found out? Yes, Peter, I will, if he'll promise me to put Charlie out
of his mind. But not unless. Eh? Not unless."
The man shook his head.
"You make the condition impossible," he cried. "You have faith in that
man. Good. I have overwhelming evidence that he is the man we are
after. Until he is caught the whisky-running in this place will never
cease."
Kate refused to display impatience. She went on talking to the horse.
"Isn't he obstinate? Isn't he? And here am I offering to show him how
he can get the real criminals."
Fyles suddenly broke into a laugh. It was not a joyous laugh. It was
cynical, almost bitter.
"You are seeking to defend Bryant, and yet you can, and will, put me
on the track of the whisky-runners. It's farcical. You would be
closing the door of the penitentiary upon your--friend."
Kate's eyes flashed.
"Should I? I don't think so. The others I don't care that for." She
flicked her fingers. "They must look to themselves. I promise you I
shall not be risking Charlie's liberty."
"I'll wager if you show me how I can get these people, and I
succeed--you will."
The angry sparkle in the woman's eyes died out, to be replaced with a
sudden light of inspiration.
"You'll wager?" she cried, with an excited laugh. "You will?"
The policeman nodded.
"Yes--anything you like."
Kate's laugh died out, and she stood considering.
"But you said my conditions were--impossible. You will leave Charlie
alone until you capture him running the whisky? You will call your
men off his track--until you catch him red-handed? You will accept
that condition, if I show you how you can--make good with
your--headquarters?"
The man suddenly found himself caught in the spirit of Kate's mood.
"But the conditions must not be all with you," he cried, with a short
laugh. "You are too generous to make it that way. If I accept your
conditions, against my better judgment, will you allow me to make
one?"
"But I am conferring the benefit," Kate protested.
"All of it? What about your desire to protect Bryant?"
Kate nodded.
"What is your condition?"
Fyles drew a deep breath.
"Will you marry me after I have caught the leader of the gang, if he
be this man, Bryant? That must be your payment--for being wrong."
In a moment all Kate's lightness vanished. She stared at him for some
wide-eyed moments. Then, again, all in a moment, she began to laugh.
"Done!" she cried. "I accept, and you accept! It's a wager!"
But her ready acceptance of his offer for the first time made the
police officer doubt his own convictions as to the identity of the
head of the gang.
"You are accepting my condition because you believe Bryant is not the
man, and so you hope to escape marrying me," he said almost roughly.
"I accept your condition," cried Kate staunchly.
Slowly a deep flush mounted to the man's cheeks and spread over his
brow. His eyes lit, and his strong mouth set firmly.
"But you will marry me," he cried, with sudden force. "Whatever lies
behind your condition, Kate, you'll marry me, as a result of this. The
conditions are agreed. I take your wager. I shall get the man Bryant,
and he'll get no mercy from me. He's stood in my way long enough. I'm
going to win out, Kate," he cried; "I know it, I feel it. Because I
want you. I'd go through hell itself to do that. Quick. Tell me. Show
me how I can get these people, and I promise you they shan't escape me
this time."
But Kate displayed no haste. Now that the wager was made she seemed
less delighted. After a moment's thought, however, she gave him the
information he required.
"I've learned definitely that on Monday next, that's nearly a week
to-day, there's a cargo coming in along the river trail, from the
east. The gang will set out to meet it at midnight, and will bring it
into the village about two o'clock in the morning. How, I can't say."
Fyles's desperate eyes seemed literally to bore their way through her.
"That's--the truth?"
"True as--death."
CHAPTER XXIX
BILL'S FRESH BLUNDERING
The change in the man that rode away from Kate Seton's home as
compared with the man who had arrived there less than an hour earlier
was so remarkable as to be almost absurd in a man of Stanley Fyles's
reputation for stern discipline and uncompromising methods. There was
an almost boyish light of excited anticipation and hope in the usually
cold eyes that looked out down the valley as he rode away. There was
no doubt, no question. His look suggested the confidence of the
victor. And so Charlie Bryant read it as he passed him on the trail.
Charlie was in a discontented mood. He had seen Fyles approach Kate's
home from his eyrie on the valley slope, and that hopeless impulse
belonging to a weakly nature, that self-pitying desire to further
lacerate his own feelings, had sent him seeking to intercept the man
whom he felt in his inmost heart was his successful rival for all that
which he most desired on earth.
So he walked past Fyles, who was on the back of his faithful Peter,
and hungrily read the expression of his face, that he might further
assure himself of the truth of his convictions.
The men passed each other without the exchange of a word. Fyles eyed
the slight figure with contempt and dislike. Nor could he help such
feelings for one whom he knew possessed so much of Kate's warmest
sympathy and liking. Besides, was he not a man whose doings placed him
against the law, in the administration of which it was his duty to
share?
Charlie's eyes were full of an undisguised hatred. His interpretation
of the officer's expression left him no room for doubting. Delight,
victory, were hall-marked all over it. And victory for Fyles could
only mean defeat for him.
He passed on. His way took him along the main village trail, and,
presently, he encountered two people whom he would willingly have
avoided. Helen and his brother were returning toward the house across
the river.
Helen's quick eyes saw him at once, and she pointed him out to the big
man at her side.
"It's Charlie," she cried, "let's hurry, or he'll give us the slip. I
must tell him."
"Tell him what?"
But Helen deigned no answer. She hurried on, and called to the
dejected figure, which, to her imagination, seemed to shuffle rather
than walk along the trail.
Charlie Bryant had no alternative. He came up. He felt a desperate
desire to curse their evident happiness in each other's society. Why
should these two know nothing but the joys of life, while he--he was
forbidden even a shadow of the happiness for which he yearned?
But Helen gave him little enough chance to further castigate himself
with self-pity. She was full of her desire to impart her news, and her
desire promptly set her tongue rattling out her story.
"Oh, Charlie," she cried, "I've had such a shock. Say, did you ever
have a cyclone strike you when--when there wasn't a cyclone within a
hundred miles of you?" Then she laughed. "That surely don't sound
right, does it? It's--it's kind of mixed metaphor. Anyway, you know
what I mean. I had that to-day. Bill's nearly killed one of our
boys--Pete Clancy. Say, I once saw a dog fight. It was a terrier, and
one of those heavy, slow British bulldogs. Well, I guess when he
starts the bully is greased lightning. Bill's that bully. That's all.
Pete tried to kiss me. He was drunk. They're always drunk when they
get gay like that. Bill guessed he wasn't going to succeed, and now I
sort of fancy he's sitting back there by our barn trying to sort out
his face. My, Bill nearly killed him!"
But the girl's dancing-eyed enjoyment found no reflection in Bill's
brother. In a moment Charlie's whole manner underwent a change, and
his dark eyes stared incredulously up into Bill's face, which, surely
enough, still bore the marks of his encounter.
"You--thrashed Pete?" he inquired slowly, in the manner of a man
painfully digesting unpleasant facts.
But Bill was in no mood to accept any sort of chiding on the point.
"I wish I'd--killed him," he retorted fiercely.
Charlie's eyes turned slowly from the contemplation of his brother's
war-scarred features.
"I guess he deserved it--all right," he said thoughtfully.
Helen protested indignantly.
"Deserved it? My word, he deserved--anything," she cried. Then her
indignation merged again into her usual laughter. "Say," she went on.
"I--I don't believe you're a bit glad, a bit thankful to Bill. I--I
don't believe you mind that--that I was insulted. Oh, but if you'd
only seen it you'd have been proud of Big Brother Bill. He--he was
just greased lightning. I don't think I'd be scared of anything with
him around."
But her praise was too much for the modest Bill. He flushed as he
clumsily endeavored to change the subject.
"Where are you going, Charlie?" he inquired. "We're going on over the
river. Kate's there. You coming?"
Just for a moment a look of hesitation crept into his brother's eyes.
He glanced across the river as though he were yearning to accept the
invitation. But, a moment later, his eyes came back to his brother
with a look of almost cold decision.
"I'm afraid I can't," he said. Then he added, "I've got something to
see to--in the village."
Bill made no attempt to question him further, and Helen had no desire
to. She felt that she had somehow blundered, and her busy mind was
speculating as to how.
They parted. And as Charlie moved on he called back to Bill.
"I'll be back soon. Will you be home?"
"I can be. In an hour?"
Charlie nodded and went on.
The moment they were out of earshot Helen turned to her lover.
"Say, Bill," she exclaimed. "What have I done wrong?"
The laughter had gone out of her eyes and left them full of anxiety.
Bill shrugged gloomily.
"Nothing," he said. "It's me--again." Then he added, still more
gloomily, "Pete's one of the whisky gang, and--I'm Charlie's brother.
Say," he finished up with a ponderous sigh. "I've mussed
things--surely."
* * * * *
"I'm sorry for that scrap, Bill."
Charlie Bryant was leaning against a veranda post with his hands in
his pockets, and his gaze, as usual, fixed on the far side of the
valley. Bill completely filled a chair, where he basked in the evening
sunlight.
"So am I--now, Charlie."
The big man's agreement brought the other's eyes to his battered face.
"Why?" he demanded quickly.
Bill looked up into the dark eyes above him, and his own were full of
concern.
"Why? Is there need to ask that?"
A shadowy smile spread slowly over the other's face.
"No, I don't guess _you_ need to ask why."
There was just the slightest emphasis on the pronoun.
"You've remembered he's one of the gang--my gang. You sort of feel
there's danger ahead--in consequence. Yes, there is danger. That's why
I'm sorry. But--somehow I wouldn't have had you act different--even
though there's danger. I'm glad it was you, and not me, though. You
could hammer him with your two big fists. I couldn't. I should have
shot him--dead."
Bill stared incredulously at the other's boyish face. His brother's
tone had carried such cold conviction.
"Charlie," he cried, "you get me beat every time. I wouldn't have
guessed you felt that way."
The other smiled bitterly.
"No," he said. Then he shifted his position. "I'm afraid there's going
to be trouble. I've thought a heap since Helen told me."
"Trouble--through me?" said Bill, sharply. "Say, there's been nothing
but blundering through me ever since I came here. I'd best pull up
stakes and get out. I'm too big and foolish. I'm the worst blundering
idiot out. I wish I'd shot him up. But," he added plaintively, "I
hadn't got a gun. Say, I'm too foolishly civilized for this country. I
sure best get back to the parlors of the East where I came from."
Charlie shook his head, and his smile was affectionate.
"Best stop around, Bill," he said. "You haven't blundered. You've
acted as--honesty demanded. If there's trouble comes through it, it's
no blame to you. There's no blame to you anyway. You're honest. Maybe
I've cursed you some, but it's me who's wrong--always. Do you get me?
It don't make any difference to my real feelings. You just stop around
all you need, and don't you act different from what you are doing."
Bill stirred his bulk uneasily.
"But this trouble? Say, Charlie, boy," he cried, his big face flushing
painfully, "it don't matter to me a curse what you are. You're my
brother. See? I wouldn't do you a hurt intentionally. I'd--I'd chop my
own fool head off first. Can't anything be done? Can't I do anything
to fix things right?"
The other had turned away. A grave anxiety was written all over his
youthful face.
"Maybe," he said.
"How? Just tell me right now," cried Bill eagerly.
"Why----" Charlie broke off. His pause was one of deep consideration.
"It don't matter what it is, Charlie," cried Bill, suddenly stirred to
a big pitch of enthusiasm. "Just count me on your side, and--and if
you need to have Fyles shot up, why--I'm your man."
Charlie shook his head.
"Don't worry that way," he cried. "Just stop around. You needn't ask a
whole heap of questions. Just stop around, and maybe you can bear a
hand--some day. I shan't ask you to do any dirty work. But if there's
anything an honest man may do--why, I'll ask you--sure."
CHAPTER XXX
THE COMMITTEE DECIDE
The earlier days of summer were passing rapidly. And with their
passage Kate Seton's variations of mood became remarkable. There were
times when her excited cheerfulness astounded her sister, and there
were times when her depression caused her the greatest anxiety. Kate
was displaying a variableness and uncertainty to which Helen was quite
unaccustomed, and it left the girl laboring under a great strain of
worry.
She strove very hard to, as she termed it, localize her sister's
changes of mood, and in this she was not without a measure of success.
Whenever the doings of the church committee were discussed Kate's mood
dropped to zero, and sometimes below that point. It was obvious that
the decision to demolish the old landmark in the service of the church
was causing her an alarm and anxiety which would far better have
fitted one of the old village wives, eaten up with superstition, than
a woman of Kate's high-spirited courage. Then, too, the work of her
little farm seemed to worry her. Her attention to it in these days
became almost feverish. Whereas, until recently, all her available
time was given to church affairs, now these were almost entirely
neglected in favor of the farm. Kate was almost always to be found in
company of her two hired men, working with a zest that ill suited the
methods of her male helpers.
On one occasion Helen ventured to remark upon it in her inconsequent
fashion, a fashion often used to disguise her real feelings, her real
interest.
Kate had just returned from a long morning out on the wheat land. She
was weary, and dusty, and thirsty. And she had just thirstily drained
a huge glass of barley water.
"For the Lord's sake, Kate!" Helen cried in pretended dismay. "When I
see you drink like that I kind of feel I'm growing fins all over me."
Kate smiled, but without lightness.
"Get right out in this July sun and try to shame your hired men into
doing a man's work, and see how you feel then," she retorted.
"Fins?--why, you'd give right up walking, and grow a full-sized tail,
and an uncomfortable crop of scales."
Helen shook her head.
"I wouldn't work that way. Say, you're always chasing the boys up. Are
they slacking worse than usual? Are they on the 'buck'?"
Kate shot a swift glance into the gray eyes fixed on her so shrewdly.
"No," she said quite soberly. "Only--only work's good for folks,
sometimes. The boys are all right. It just does me good to work.
Besides, I like to know what Pete's doing."
"You mean----?"
"Oh, it doesn't matter what I mean," Kate retorted, with a sudden
impatience. "Where's dinner?"
This was something of her sister's mood more or less all the time, and
Helen found it very trying. But she made every allowance for it, also
the more readily as she watched the affairs of the church, and
understood how surely they were upsetting to her sister through her
belief in the old Indian legend of the fateful pine.
But Kate's occasional outbursts of delirious excitement were far more
difficult of understanding. Helen read them in the only way she
understood. Her observation warned her that they generally followed
talk of the doings of Inspector Fyles, or a distant view of him.
As the days went by Kate seemed more and more wrapped up in the work
of the police. Every little item of news of them she hungrily
devoured. And frequently she went out on long solitary rides, which
Helen concluded were for the purpose of interested observation of
their doings.
But all this display of interest was somewhat nullified by another
curious phase in her sister. It quickly became obvious that she was
endeavoring by every artifice to avoid coming into actual contact with
Stanley Fyles. Somehow this did not seem to fit in with Helen's idea
of love, and again she found herself at a loss.
Thus poor Helen found herself passing many troubled hours. Things
seemed to be going peculiarly awry, and, for the life of her, she
could not follow their trend with any certainty of whither it was
leading. Even Bill was worse than of no assistance to her. Whenever
she poured out her long list of anxieties to him, he assumed a
perfectly absurd air of caution and denial that left her laboring
under the belief that he really was "one big fool," or else he knew
something, and had the audacity to keep it from her. In Bill's case,
however, the truth was he felt he had blundered so much already in his
brother's interests that he was not prepared to take any more chances,
even with Helen.
Then came one memorable and painful day for Helen. It was a Saturday
morning. She had just returned from a church committee meeting. Kate
had deliberately absented herself from her post as honorary secretary
ever since the decision to fell the old pine had been arrived at. It
was her method of protest against the outrage. But Mrs. John Day,
quite undisturbed, had appointed a fresh secretary, and Kate's
defection had been allowed to pass as a matter of no great importance.
The noon meal was on the table when Helen came in. Kate was at her
little bureau writing. The moment her sister entered the room she
closed the desk and locked it. Helen saw the action and almost
listlessly remarked upon it.
"It's all right, Kate," she said. "Bluebeard's chamber doesn't
interest me--to-day."
Kate started up at the other's depressed tone. She looked sharply into
the gray eyes, in which there was no longer any sign of their usual
laughter.
"What's the matter, dear?" she asked, with affectionate concern. "Mrs.
John?"
Helen nodded. Then at once she shook her head.
"Yes--no. Oh, I don't know. No, I don't think it's Mrs. John.
It's--it's everybody."
Kate had moved to the head of the table, and stood with her hands
gripping the back of her chair.
"Everybody?" she said, with a quiet look of understanding in her big
eyes. "You mean--the tree?"
Helen nodded. She was very near tears.
But Kate rose to the occasion. She knew. She pointed at Helen's chair.
"Sit down, dear. We'll have food," she said, quietly. "I'm as hungry
as any coyote."
Helen obeyed. She was feeling so miserable for her sister, that she
had lost all inclination to eat. But Kate seemed to have entirely
risen above any of the feelings she had so lately displayed. She
laughed, and, with gentle insistence, forced the other to eat her
dinner. Strangely enough her manner had become that which Helen seemed
to have lost sight of for so long. All her actions, all her words,
were full of confident assurance, and quiet command.
Gradually, under this new influence, the anxiety began to die out
of Helen's eyes, and the watchful Kate beheld the change with
satisfaction. Then, when the girl had done full justice to the
simple meal, she pushed her own plate aside, planted her elbows
upon the table, and sat with her strong brown hands clasped.
"Now tell me," she commanded gently.
In a moment Helen's anxiety returned, and her lips trembled. The next
she was telling her story--in a confused sort of rush.
"Oh, I don't know," she cried. "It's--it's too bad. You see, Kate, I
didn't sort of think about it, or trouble anything, until you let me
know how you felt over that--that old story. It didn't seem to me that
old tree mattered at all. It didn't seem to me it could hurt cutting
it down, any more than any other. And now--now it just seems as if--as
if the world'll come to an end when they cut it down. I believe I'm
more frightened than you are."
"Frightened?"
Kate smiled. But the smile scarcely disguised her true feelings.
"Yes, I'm scared--to death--now," Helen went on, "because they're
going to cut it down. They've fixed the time and--day."
"They've fixed the time--and day," repeated Kate dully. "When?"
Her smile had completely gone now. Her dark eyes were fixed on her
sister's face with a curious straining.
"Tuesday morning at--daybreak."
"Tuesday--daybreak? Go on. Tell me some more."
"There's no more to tell, only--only there's to be a ceremony. The
whole village is going to turn out and assist. Mrs. Day is going to
make an ad-dress. She said if she'd known there was a legend and curse
to that pine she's have had it down at the start of building the
church. She'd have had it down 'in the name of religion, honesty and
righteousness'--those were her words--'as a fitting tribute at the
laying of the foundations of the new church.' Again, in her own words,
she said, 'It's presence in the valley is a cloud obscuring the sun of
our civilization, a stumbling block to the progress of righteousness.'
And--and they all agreed that she was right--all of them."
Kate was no longer looking at her sister. She was gazing out
straight ahead of her. It is doubtful even if she had listened
to the pronouncements of Mrs. John Day, with her self-satisfied
dictatorship of the village social and religious affairs. She was
thinking--thinking. And something almost like panic seemed suddenly
to have taken hold of her.
"Tuesday--at daybreak," she muttered. Then, in a moment, her eyes
flashed, and she sprang from her chair. "Daybreak? Why, that--that's
practically Monday night! Do you hear? Monday night!"
Helen was on her feet in a moment.
"I--I don't understand," she stammered.
"Understand? No, of course you don't. Nobody understands but me," Kate
cried fiercely. "I understand, and I tell you they're all mad.
Hopelessly mad." She laughed wildly. "Disaster? Oh, blind, blind,
fools. There'll be disaster, sure enough. The old Indian curse will be
fulfilled. Oh, Helen, I could weep for the purblind skepticism of this
wretched people, this consequential old fool, Mrs. Day. And I--I am
the idiot who has brought it all about."
CHAPTER XXXI
ANTAGONISTS
Fyles endured perhaps the most anxious time that had ever fallen to
his lot, during the few days following his momentous interview with
Kate. An infinitesimal beam of daylight had lit up the black horizon
of his threatened future. It was a question, a painfully doubtful
question, as to whether it would mature and develop into a glorious
sunlight, or whether the threatening clouds would overwhelm it, and
thrust it back into the obscurity whence it had sprung.
He dared not attempt to answer the question himself. Everything hung
upon that insecure thread of official amenability. Such was his own
experience that he was beset by the gravest doubts. His only hope lay
in the long record of exceptional work he possessed to his credit in
the books of the police. This, and the story he had to tell them of
future possibilities in the valley of Leaping Creek.
Would Jason listen? Would he turn up the records, and count the
excellence of Inspector Fyles's past work? Or would he, with that
callous severity of police regulations, only regard the failures, and
turn a deaf official ear to the promise of the future? Supersession
was so simple in the force, it was the usual routine. Would the
superintendent in charge interest himself sufficiently to get away
from it?
These were some of the doubts with which the police officer was
assailed. These were some of the endless pros and cons he debated with
his lieutenant, Sergeant McBain, when they sat together planning their
next campaign, while awaiting Amberley's reply to both the report of
failure, and plea for the future.
But Fyles's anxieties were far deeper than McBain's, who was equally
involved in the failure. He had far more at stake. For one thing he
belonged to the commissioned ranks, and his fall, in conjunction with
his greater and wider reputation, would be far more disastrous. For
McBain, reduction in rank was of lesser magnitude. His rank could be
regained. For Fyles there was no such redemption. Resignation from the
force was his alternative to being dismissed, and from resignation
there was no recovery of rank.
At one time this would have been his paramount, almost sole anxiety.
It would have meant the loss of all he had achieved in the past. Now,
curiously enough, it took a second place in his thoughts. A greater
factor than ambition had entered into his life, a factor to which he
had promptly become enslaved. Far above all thoughts of ambition, of
place, of power, of all sense of duty, the figure of a handsome
dark-eyed woman rose before his mind's eye. Kate Seton had become his
whole world, the idol of all his thoughts and ambitions, and longings,
which left every other consideration lost in the remotest shadows far
below.
His earlier love for her had suddenly burst into a passionate flame
that seemed to be devouring his very soul. And he had a chance of
winning her. A chance. It seemed absurd--a mere chance. It was not his
way in life to wait for chances. It was for him to set out on a
purpose, and achieve or fail. Here--here, where his love was
concerned, he was committing himself to accepting chances, the
slightest chances, when the winning of Kate for his wife had become
the essence of all his hopes and ambitions.
Chance? Yes, it was all chance. The decision of Superintendent Jason.
The leadership of this gang. His success in capturing the man, when
the time came. In a moment his whole life seemed to have become a
plaything to be tossed about at the whim of chance.
So the days passed, swallowed up by feverish work and preparation.
It was work that might well be all thrown away should his recall be
insisted upon at Amberley, or, at best, might only pave the way to his
successor's more fortunate endeavors. It was all very trying, very
unsatisfactory, yet he dared not relax his efforts, with the knowledge
which he now possessed, and the thought of Kate always before him.
Several times, during those anxious days, he sought to salve his
troubled feelings by stealing precious moments of delight in the
presence of this woman he loved. But somehow Fate seemed to have
assumed a further perverseness, and appeared bent on robbing him of
even this slight satisfaction.
At such times Kate was never to be found. Small as was that little
world in the valley, it seemed to Fyles that she had a knack of
vanishing from his sight as though she had been literally spirited
away. Nor for some time could he bring himself to realize that she was
deliberately avoiding him.
She was never at home when he rode up to the house on the back of his
faithful Peter. And, furthermore, at such times as he found Helen
there, she never by any chance knew where her sister was. Even when he
chanced to discover Kate in the distance, on his rare visits to the
village, she was never to be found by the time he reached the spot at
which he had seen her. She was as elusive as a will-o'-th'-wisp.
But this could not go on forever, and, after one memorable visit to
the postoffice, where he found a letter awaiting him from
headquarters, Fyles determined to be denied no longer.
His task was less easy than he supposed, and it was not until evening
that he finally achieved his purpose.
It was nearly eight o'clock in the evening. Up to that time his search
had been utterly unavailing, and he found himself riding down the
village trail at a loss, and in a fiercely impatient mood.
He had just reached the point where the trail split in two. The one
way traveling due west, and the other up to the new church, and on,
beyond, to the Meeting House.
The inspiration came to him as Peter, of his own accord, turned off up
the hill in the direction of the church. Then he remembered that the
day was Saturday, and on Saturday evening it was Kate's custom to put
the Meeting House in order for the next day's service.
In a moment he bustled his faithful horse, and, taking the grassy side
of the trail for it, to muffle his approach, hurried on toward the
quaint old building.
To his utmost delight he realized that, for once, Fate had decided to
be kind to him. There was a light in one of the windows, and he knew
that nobody but Kate had access to the place at times other than the
hours of service.
In that moment of pleasant anticipation he was suddenly seized by an
almost childish desire to take her unawares. The thought appealed to
him strongly after his long and futile search, and, with this object,
he steadied his horse's gait lest the sound of its plodding hoofs
should betray his approach. Twenty yards from the building he drew up
and dismounted.
Once on foot he made his way across the intervening space and reached
the window. A thin curtain, however, was drawn across it, and, though
the light shone through, the interior remained hidden. So he pressed
on toward the door.
Here he paused. And as he did so the sound of something heavy falling
reached him from within. Kate was evidently moving the heavy benches.
He hesitated only for an instant, then he placed his hand cautiously
on the latch and raised it. In spite of his precautions the heavy old
iron rattled noisily, and again he hesitated. Then, with a thrust, he
pushed the aged door open and passed within.
He stood still, his eyes smiling. Kate was at the far end of the room
on her knees. She was looking round at him with a curious, startled
look in her eyes, which had somehow caught the reflection of the light
from the oil bracket lamp on the floor beside her, and set them
glowing a dull, golden copper. The long strip of coco-matting was
rolled back from the floor, and she seemed to be in the act of
resetting it in its place.
Just for a moment they remained staring at each other. Then Kate
turned back to her work, and finished rolling out the matting.
"I'll be glad, mighty glad, when--when we discontinue service in this
place," she said. "The dirt's just--fierce."
Fyles moved up toward her. The matting was in its place.
"Is it?" he said. Then, as he came to a halt, "Say, I've been chasing
the village through half the day to find you, Kate. Then Peter led me
here, and I remembered it was Saturday. I guessed I'd have a surprise
on you, and I thought I'd succeeded. But you don't 'surprise' worth a
cent. Say, I'm to remain here till--after Monday."
Kate slowly rose to her feet. She was clad in a white shirtwaist and
old tailored skirt. She made a perfect figure of robust health and
vigorous purpose. Her eyes, too, were shining, and full of those
subtle depths of fire which held the man enthralled.
"Monday?" she said. Then in a curiously reflective way she repeated
the word, "Monday."
Fyles waited, and, in a moment, Kate's thought seemed to pass. She
looked fearlessly up into the man's eyes, but there was no smile in
response to his.
"I'm--going away until after--Monday," she said.
"Going away?"
The man's disappointment was too evident to be mistaken. "Why?" he
asked, after a moment's pause.
Quite suddenly the woman flung her arms out in a gesture of
helplessness, which somehow did not seem to fit her.
"I can't--bear the strain of waiting here," she said, with an
impatient shrug. "It's--it's on my nerves."
The man began to smile again. "A wager like ours takes nerve to make,
but a bigger nerve to carry through. Still, say, I can't see how
running from it's going to help any. You'll still be thinking.
Thoughts take a heap of getting clear of. Best stop around. It'll be
exciting--some. I'm going to win out," he went on, with confidence,
"and I guess it'll be a game worth watching, even if you--lose."
Kate stooped and picked up the lamp. As she straightened up she sighed
and shook her head. It seemed to the man that a grave trouble was in
her handsome eyes.
"It's not that," she cried, suddenly. "Lose my wager? I'm not going to
lose, but even if I were--I would pay up like a sportsman. No, it's
not that. It's these foolish folk here. It's these stupid creatures
who're just ready to fly at the throat of Providence and defy all--all
superstition. Oh, yes, I know," she hurried on, as the man raised his
strongly marked brows in astonishment. "You'll maybe think me a fool,
a silly, credulous fool. But I know--I feel it here." She placed her
hands upon her bosom with a world of dramatic sincerity.
"What--what's troubling you, Kate? I don't seem to get your meaning."
It was the woman's turn to express surprise.
"Why, you know what they're going to do here, practically on Monday
night. You've heard? Why, the whole village is talking of it. It's the
tree. The old pine. They're going to cut it down." Then she laughed
mirthlessly. "They'll use it as a ridge pole for the new church. That
wicked old, cursed pine."
"Wicked--cursed? I don't understand," Fyles said perplexed. "I heard
about the felling of it all right--but, the other I don't understand."
Kate set the lamp down on one of the benches.
"Listen. I'll tell you," she cried. "Then maybe you'll understand my
feelings--since making my wager with you. Oh, the old story wouldn't
matter so much to me, only--only for that wager. Listen."
Then she hurriedly told him the outline of the curse upon the tree,
and further added an analysis of the situation in conjunction with the
matter which stood between themselves. At the finish she pointed her
argument.
"Need I say any more? Need I tell you that no logic or reason of any
kind can put the conviction out of my mind that here, and now, we are
to be faced with some dreadful tragedy as the price we must pay for
the--the felling of that tree? I can't help it--I know calamity will
befall us."
Fyles shook his head. The woman's obvious convictions left him quite
untouched. Had it been any other who spoke of it he would have derided
the whole idea. But since it was Kate's distress, Kate's belief in the
old legend, he refrained.
"The only calamity that can affect you, Kate, is a calamity for young
Bryant," he said seriously. "And yet you refuse to believe him
concerned with the affairs of--Monday night. Surely you can have no
misgivings on that score?"
Kate shook her head.
"Then what do you fear?" Fyles went on patiently.
Quite slowly the woman raised her big eyes to her companion's face.
For some moments they steadily looked into his. Then slowly into her
gaze there crept an inscrutable expression that was not wholly without
a shadow of a smile.
"It is your reason against my--superstition," she said slowly. "On
Monday night you will capture, or fail to capture, the gang you are
after. Maybe it will be within an hour of the cutting down of that
tree. Disaster will occur. Blood will flow. Death! Any, or all of
these things. For whom? I cannot--will not--wait to see. I shall leave
to-morrow morning after service--for Myrtle."
* * * * *
Kate locked the door of the Meeting House behind them. Then she held
out her hand. Fyles took it and pressed it tenderly.
"Why," he asked gently, almost humbly, "have you so deliberately
avoided me lately?"
The woman stroked Peter's brown head as it was pushed forward beside
the man's shoulder.
"Why?" she echoed. Then she smiled up into the man's face. "Because we
are--antagonists--until after Monday. Good-bye."
CHAPTER XXXII
TREACHERY
On his westward journey to camp Stanley Fyles did a good deal of
thinking. Generally speaking he was of that practical turn which has
no time for indulgence in the luxury of visions, and signs. Long
experience had made him almost severe in his practice.
But, as he rode along pondering upon the few pleasant moments spent in
Kate's presence, his imagination slowly began to stir, and he found
himself wondering; wondering, at first, at her credulity, and,
presently, wondering if it were really possible that an old curse,
uttered in the height of impotent human passion, could, by any occult
process, possess a real effect.
He definitely and promptly denied it. He told himself more. He
believed that only women, highly emotional women, or creatures of
weaker intellect, could possibly put faith in such things. Kate
belonged to neither of these sections of her sex. Then how did this
strange belief come in a woman so keenly sensible, so full of
practical courage?
Maybe it was the result of living so closely in touch with the soil.
Maybe the narrow life of such a village as Rocky Springs had had its
effect.
However, her belief, so strong, so passionate, had left an
uncomfortable effect upon him. It was absurd, of course, but somehow
he wished he had not heard the story of the old pine. At least not
till after Monday. Kate had said they were to fell that tree at dawn.
It was certainly a curious coincidence that they should have selected,
as Kate had said, practically Monday night. The night of the
whisky-running.
He smiled. However, the omen was surely in favor of his success.
According to the legend the felling of the tree meant the end of crime
in the valley, and the end of crime meant his----But blood would flow.
Death. Whose blood? Whose--death?
His smile died out.
In these contingencies it meant a--hand to hand conflict. It
meant----Who's death did she dread? Surely she was not thinking of the
police? They always carried their lives in their hands. It was part
of their profession. She denied Charlie Bryant's leadership, so----But
in her own secret mind did she deny it? He wondered.
So he rode on probing the problem. Later he smiled again. She was
thinking of himself. The vanity of the thought amused him, and he
found himself shaking his head. Not likely. It was not her regard for
him. He was certain in his mind that her wager was made in the full
conviction that he would not win, and, consequently, she would not
have to marry him. She certainly was a strange creature,
and--charming.
However, she was concerned that somebody was to meet death, and she
dreaded it. Furthermore, now he came to think of it, a similar belief,
without the accompanying dread, was growing in him. He pulled himself
together. The old superstition must not get hold of him. That would
indeed be the height of folly.
But once the seed had been sown in his imagination the roots quickly
strove to possess themselves of all the fertility such a rich soil
afforded. He could not shake clear of their tendrils. Maybe it was
the effect of his sympathy and regard for the woman. Maybe he was
discovering that he, too, deep down beneath the veneer in which his
work armored him, was possessed of that strange superstition which
seems to possess all human life. He hated the thought, and still more
hated the feeling the thought inspired.
He touched Peter's flank with his heels, and the unaccustomed spur
sent the highly strung beast plunging into a headlong gallop.
He was far beyond the village now, and more than half way to the camp,
and presently he slowed down to that steady canter which eats up
distance so rapidly without undue exertion for either man or beast.
He strove to turn the course of his thoughts. He pondered upon the
ungracious official letter of his superior, begrudging, but yielding
to his persuasions. Things certainly were "coming his way." At last he
was to be given his final chance, and it was something to obtain such
clemency in a force which existed simply by reason of its unfailing
success. He had much to be thankful for. McBain would have fresh heart
put into him. It would be something like a taste of hell for McBain to
find himself reduced to the rank of trooper again, after all his
years of successful service. Yes, he was glad for McBain's----
Suddenly he checked the willing Peter, and drew him down to a walk.
There was a horseman on the trail, some thirty or forty yards ahead.
He had just caught sight of his dim outline against the starlit sky
line. It was only for a moment. But it was sufficient for his trained
eyes. He had detected the upper part of the man's body, and the
shadowy outline of a wide-brimmed prairie hat.
Now, as Peter moved at that shuffling, restful amble which all prairie
horses acquire, he leaned down over the horn of his saddle and peered
ahead. The man was sitting stock still upon his horse.
Instinctively Fyles's hand went to his revolver, and remained there.
When a man waits upon a western trail at night, it is as well that the
traveler take no undue chances, particularly when he be one of the
none too well loved red coats.
The policeman kept on. He displayed no hesitation. Finally he drew his
horse to a standstill with its nose almost touching the shoulder of
the stranger's horse.
Fyles was peering forward in the darkness, and his revolver was in
that position which, all unseen, kept its muzzle directly leveled at
the horseman's middle.
"Kind of lonesome sitting around here at night," he said, with a
keenly satirical inflection.
"You can put up your darn gun, inspector," came the startling
response. "Guess I had you covered from way back there, if I'd had a
notion to shoot. Guess I ain't in the 'hold-up' bizness. But I've been
waiting for you--anyway."
The man's assurance had no effect upon the policeman. The latter
pressed his horse up closer, and peered into the other's face. The
face he beheld startled him, although he gave no outward sign.
"Ah, Pete--Pete Clancy," he said quietly. "Guess my gun's always
pretty handy. It won't hurt where it is, unless I want it to. It's
liable to be more effective than your's would have been--way back
there."
The man seemed to resign himself.
"Guess it don't pay shootin' up red coats," he said, with a rough
laugh.
"No." Then in a moment Fyles put a sharp question. "You are waiting
for--me? Why?"
Pete laughed, but his laugh was uneasy.
"Because I'm sick to death being agin the law."
"Ah. Been taking a hand building the church back there?" The sarcasm
was unmistakable, but it passed the other by.
"Ben takin' a hand in most things--back there."
"Sure. Find some of 'em don't pay?"
The man shook his head.
"Guess they pay--mostly. 'Tain't that."
"What then?"
"Sort o' feel it's time to quit--bizness."
"Oh. So you waited around for--me?"
Fyles understood the type of man he was dealing with. The half-breed
was a life study of his. In the great West he was always of more
interest to the police than any white man.
"We mostly wait around for the p'lice when we want to get out of
business," the man replied with meaning.
"Yes, some folks find it difficult getting out of business without the
help of the police."
"Sure," returned Pete easily. "They need to do it right. They need to
make things square."
"For themselves?"
"Jest so--for 'emselves."
The half-breed leaned over his horse's shoulder and spat. Then he
ostentatiously returned the gun he was holding to its holster.
"Maybe I'll need him no more," he said, with an obviously insincere
sigh.
Fyles was quite undeceived.
"Surely--if you're going out of business. What's your--business?"
The man laughed.
"I used to be runnin' whisky." Then he chuckled softly. "Y'see, that
chu'ch has got a hold on me. I'm feelin' that pious I can't bear the
thought of runnin' whisky--an' I can't bear the thought of--other folk
runnin' it. No, I'm quittin' that bizness. I'm jest goin' in fer
straight buyin' and sellin'--inside the law."
Fyles was watching the man closely in the dim night light. He knew
exactly what the man was there for now. Furthermore he knew precisely
how to deal with him. He was weighing in his mind the extent to which
he could trust him. His detestation of the race increased, while yet
every nerve was alert to miss no chance.
"Straight buying and selling is good when you've found a buyer, and
got--something to sell," he said.
The man shrugged.
"I sure got something to sell, an' I guess you ought to be the buyer."
Fyles nodded.
"I mostly buy--what I need. What's your line?"
Again the man laughed. His uneasiness had passed. He felt they
understood each other.
"Mostly hot air," he said carelessly.
Fyles hated the man's contemplated treachery. However, his duty was
plain.
"Well, I might buy hot air--if it's right, and the price is right."
The man turned with an alert look and peered into the police officer's
face.
"They're both right," he said sharply. Then his manner changed
abruptly to one of hot intensity. "Here let's quit talkin' fool stuff.
I can tell you what you're needin' to know. And I'll tell you, if
you'll pass me over, and let me quit clear without a question. I need
to get across the border--an' I don't want to see the inside of no
penitentiary, nor come up before any court. I want to get right away
quick. See? I can tell you just how a big cargo's comin' into Rocky
Springs. I know, because I'm one of 'em bringing it in. See? And when
I've told you I've still got to bring it in, or those who're running
it with me would guess things, and get busy after me, or--or change
their plans. See? Give us your word of a free run for the border, an'
I'll put you wise. A free run clear, on your honor, in the name of the
Government."
"Why are you doing this?" demanded Fyles sharply.
"That's up to me."
"Why are you doing this?" Fyles insisted. "I need to know before I
make any deal."
"Do you?"
Pete thought for some moments, and Fyles waited. At last the man
looked up, and his evil face was full of the venom of his words.
"I want to give 'em away," he cried with bitter hatred. "I want to see
the boss pass on to the penitentiary. See? I want to see the boss rot
there for five good, dandy years."
"Who's the boss?" demanded Fyles sharply.
The man's eyes grinned cunningly.
"Why, the feller you're going to get Monday night, with fifty gallons
of good rye."
Fyles sat up.
"Monday night?" Then he went on. "Say, why do you want to put him
away?"
"Ah."
"Well?"
Again the half-breed hesitated. Then with a sudden exclamation of
impatience his desire for revenge urged him on.
"Tcha! What's the use?" he cried fiercely. "Say, have you ever had
hell smashed out of your features by a lousy dude? No. Well, I owe a
bit--a hell of a bit--to some one, and I guess I don't owe nothing in
this world else but money. Debts o' this sort I generally pay when I
get the chance. You're goin' to give me that chance."
Fyles had satisfied himself. The man sickened him. Now he wanted to be
done with him.
"What's your story? I'll pay you the price," he cried, with utter
contempt.
But the man wanted added assurance.
"Sure?" he cried eagerly. "You're goin' to get me with the rest?
Savee? You're goin' to get me, an' when you get me, you're goin' to
give me twenty-four hours' free run for the border?"
"If I get you you can go free--for twenty-four hours."
The man's face lit with a devilish grin of cruelty.
"Good. You'll shake on it?" He held out his hand.
Fyles shook his hand.
"Guess it's not necessary. My word goes. You've got to take my word,
as I've got to take yours. Come on. I've no more time to waste."
Pete withdrew his hand. He understood. His venom against the white
race was only the further increased.
"Say," he growled, his eyes lighting with added ferocity. "That cargo
is to be run down the river on Monday night about midnight. There'll
be a big rack of hay come in by trail--the river trail--and most of
the gang'll be with it. If you locate it they calculate you'll get
busy unloading to find the liquor. Meanwhile the cargo'll slip through
on the river, in a small boat. Savee? Guess there'll be jest one
feller with that boat, an'--he'll be the feller that's--that's had you
red coats skinned a mile all these months an' years."
Fyles gathered up his reins.
"Just one word," he said coldly. "I hate a traitor worse than poison,
but I'm paid to get these people. So my word goes, if your story's
true. If it isn't--well, take my advice and get out quick, or--you
won't have time."
Before the half-breed had time to reply Peter threw up his head, and
set off at the touch of his master's spurs.
CHAPTER XXXIII
PLAYING THE GAME
For some moments the two men faced each other in a sort of grim
silence. It was already daylight. Sunday morning was breaking under a
cloudless sky.
At last McBain rose from his seat at the deal table which served him
for a desk. He reached out and turned out the lamp. Its light was no
longer needed. Then he stretched himself and yawned.
"Had enough of it?" inquired Fyles, catching the infection and
stifling a yawn.
"Just what you might notice, sir." A shadowy smile played about the
Scot's hard mouth, but it was gone in a moment.
Fyles nodded.
"So have I," he agreed. "But we've broke the back of things.
And--you'll be kept busy all day to--I was going to say to-morrow. I
mean to-day."
McBain sat down again.
"Yes, sir. A couple of hours' sleep'll do me, though. We daren't spare
ourselves. It's sort of life and death to us."
Fyles shot a keen look into the other's face.
"I shouldn't be surprised if it were literally so."
"You think, sir----?"
McBain's voice was sharply questioning.
But Fyles only laughed. There was no mirth in his expression, and
McBain understood.
"Never mind," the officer went on, with a careless shrug. "Best turn
in. We'll know all about it when the time comes."
He rose from his seat, and McBain, with a brief "Good night, sir,"
disappeared into the inner room.
But Fyles did not follow his example for a few moments. He went to the
door and flung it open. Then he stood for awhile gazing out at the
wonderful morning daylight, and drinking in the pure prairie air.
While he stood thus his thoughts were busy, and a half smile was in
his eyes. He was thinking of the irony of the fact that Kate Seton's
superstition had completely taken possession of him.
* * * * *
Two hours after sunrise McBain and his superior were at work again.
They had snatched their brief sleep, but it was sufficient for these
hardy riders of the plains. The camp was full of activity. Each man of
the patrol had to be interviewed, and given minute instructions, also
instructions for the arising of unforeseen circumstances, where
individual initiative would require to be displayed. Then there were
rations to be served out, and, finally, messengers must be sent to the
supernumerary camp higher up the valley. But there was no undue bustle
or haste. It was simply activity.
At ten o'clock Stanley Fyles left the camp. McBain would continue the
work, which, by this time, had returned to conditions of ordinary
routine.
Peter ambled gently down the valley. His rider seemed in no hurry.
There was no need for hurry. The village was five miles away, and he
had no desire to reach it until just before eleven. So he could take
his leisure, sparing both himself and his horse for the great effort
of the morrow.
Just for one brief moment he contemplated a divergence from his
course. It was at the moment when he left the cattle track which led
to his camp and joined the old Indian trail to the village. He reached
the branching cattle track on the other side of it which would have
led him to the mysterious corral, which was possessed of so much
interest and suspicion. But he remembered that a visit thither would
violate the conditions of his wager with Kate. The place belonged to
Charlie Bryant. So he pushed on.
As he rode he thought of Kate Seton's determination to absent herself
during the critical events about to happen in the village. On the
whole he was pleased with her decision. Somehow he felt he understood
her feelings. The grip of her superstition had left him more
understanding of her desire to get away.
Then, too, he would rather she were away when his own big effort came.
Should he fail again, which now he believed impossible, he would
rather she were not there to witness that failure. He knew, only too
well, from bitter experience, how easy it was for the most complete
plans to go awry when made against the genius of crime. No, he did not
want her to witness his failure. Nor would he care to flaunt the
success he anticipated, and consequently the error she had fallen
into, before her distressed eyes. He felt very tender toward her. She
was so loyal, so courageous in her beliefs, such a great little
sportswoman. No, he must spare her all he could when he had won that
wager. He would not demand his pound of flesh. He would release her
from her debt, and just appeal to her through his love. And, somehow,
when he had caught this man, Bryant, and so proved how utterly
unworthy he was of her regard, he felt that possibly he would not have
to appeal in vain.
He reached the old Meeting House as the earliest of the village folk
were gathering for service. He did not ride up, but left Peter, much
to that creature's disquiet, tied in the bush some fifty yards from
the place.
His interest became at once absorbed. He chatted pleasantly for a few
moments with Mr. Blundell, the traveling Methodist minister, and
greeted those of the villagers whom he had come to know personally.
But all the while his eyes and ears were fully alert for the things
concerning his purpose. He noted carefully all those who were present,
but the absentees were his greatest interest. Not one of those who
constituted the gang of smugglers was present, and particularly he
noted Charlie Bryant's absence.
Among the last to arrive were Big Brother Bill and Helen, and Fyles
smiled as he beheld the careful toilet of the big city man. Helen, as
usual, was clad in her best tailored suit, and looked particularly
bright and smart when he greeted her.
"Miss Kate not at--service?" he inquired, as they paused at the door
of the building.
Helen shook her head, and her face fell.
"No. She's preparing for her journey to Myrtle," said the girl. "How
she can do with that noisy old creature Mrs. Radley I--I--well,
she gets me beat every time. But Kate's just as obstinate as a
fifty-year-old mule. She's crazy to get away from here, and--and I
left her about to dope the wheels of the wretched old wagon she's
going to drive this afternoon. Oh, dear! But come along, Bill, they're
beginning service."
A moment later the police officer was left alone outside the building.
It was not his way to take long arriving at a decision. He walked
briskly away, and vanished amid the bush. A minute later he was once
more in the saddle, heading for the bridge in front of Kate's house.
Kate was still at her wagon when Fyles arrived. At the sound of his
approach she straightened herself up with a smiling, half-embarrassed
welcome shining in her eyes.
"Don't you come too near," she exclaimed. "I'm all over axle dope. It
truly is the messiest job ever. But what are you to do when the boys
clear out, and--and play you such a scurvy trick? I've been relying on
Nick to drive me out and bring the wagon back. Now I'll have to drive
myself, and keep the wagon there, unless I can hire some one to bring
it back, so Charlie can haul his last hay to-morrow."
The policeman ran his eyes over the wagon. At the mention of Charlie
Bryant's name, his manner seemed to freeze up. He recognized the
vehicle at once.
"It's Bryant's wagon?" he said shortly.
Kate nodded.
"Sure. He always lends it me when I want one. I haven't one of my
own."
"I see."
Fyles's manner became more easy. Then he went on.
"Where are your boys? Where's Pete?"
Kate's eyes widened.
"Gracious goodness only knows," she said, in sheer exasperation. "I
only hope Nick turns up to drive me. I surely will have to get rid of
them both. I've had enough of Pete since he got drunk and insulted
Helen. Still, he got his med'cine from Bill all right. And he got the
rough side of my tongue, too. Yes, I shall certainly get rid of both.
Charlie's always urging me to." She wiped her hands on a cloth.
"There, thank goodness I've finished that messy job."
She released the jack under the axle, and the wheel dropped to the
ground.
"Now I can load up my grips," she exclaimed.
Fyles looked up from the brown study into which he had fallen.
"This Bill--this Big Brother Bill hammered master Pete to a--pulp?" he
inquired, with a smile of interest.
"He certainly did," laughed Kate. "And when he'd done with him I'm
afraid my tongue completed the--good work. That's why this has
happened." She indicated the wagon with a humorous look of dismay.
Fyles laughed. Then he sobered almost at once.
"I came here for two reasons," he said curiously. "I came
to--well--because I couldn't stay away, for one thing. You see, I'm
not nearly so much of a police officer as I am a mere human creature.
So I came to see you before you went away. You see, so many things may
happen on--Monday. The other reason was to tell you I've had a
wonderful slice of--hateful good luck."
"Hateful good luck?"
Kate raised a pair of wondering eyes to his face.
"Yes, hateful." The man's emphasis left no sort of doubt as to his
feelings. "Of course," he went on, "it's ridiculous that sort of
attitude in a policeman, but I can admire a loyal crook. Yes, I could
have a friendly feeling for him. A traitor turns me sick in the
stomach. One of the gang has turned traitor. He's told me that detail
you couldn't give me. I've got their complete plan of campaign."
The wonder in Kate's eyes had become one steady look of inquiry.
"Their complete plan of campaign?" she echoed. Then in a moment a
great excitement seemed to rise up in her. It found expression in the
rapidity of her words.
"Then you know that--Charlie is innocent? You know now how wrong you
were? You know that I have been right all the way through, and that
you have been wrong? Tell me! Tell me!" she cried.
Stanley Fyles shook his head.
"I'm sorry. The man had the grace to refuse me the leader's identity.
I only got their plan--but it's more than enough."
Kate breathed a sigh as of regret.
"That's too bad," she cried. "If he'd only told you that, it might--it
might have cleared up everything. We should have had no more of this
wretched suspicion of an innocent man. It might have altered your
whole plan of campaign. As it is----"
"It leaves me more than ever convinced I am on a red-hot scent which
must now inevitably lead me to success."
For a few moments Kate looked into the man's face as though waiting
for him to continue. Then, at last, she smiled, and the man thought he
had never beheld so alluring a picture of feminine persuasion.
"Am I to--know any more?" she pleaded.
The appeal became irresistible.
"There can be no harm in telling you," he said. "You gave me the first
help. It is to you I shall largely owe my success. Yes, you may as
well know, and I know I can rely on your discretion. You were able to
tell me of the coming of the liquor, but you could not tell me exactly
how it was coming. The man could tell me that--and did. It is coming
in down the river in a small boat. One man will bring it--the man who
runs the gang. While this is being done a load of hay, accompanied by
the whole gang, will come into the town as a blind. It is obvious to
me they will come in on the run, hoping to draw us. Then, when caught,
they rely on our search of the wagon to delay us--while the boat slips
through. It's pretty smart, and," he added ruefully, "would probably
have been successful--had I not been warned. Now it is different. Our
first attention will be that boat."
Kate's eyes were alight with the warmest interest. She became further
excited.
"It's smart," she cried enthusiastically. "They're--they're a clever
set of rascals." Then, for a moment, she thought. "Of course, you must
get that boat. What a sell for them when you let the wagon go free.
Say, it's--it's the greatest fun ever."
Fyles smilingly agreed. This woman's delight in the upsetting of the
"runners" plans was very pleasant to him. There could be no doubt as
to her sympathies being with him. If only she weren't concerned for
Bryant he could have enjoyed the situation to the full.
Suddenly she looked up into his face with just a shade of anxiety.
"But this--informer," she said earnestly. "They'll--kill him."
Fyles laughed.
"He'll be over the border before they're wise, and they'll be held
safe--anyway."
Kate agreed.
"I'd forgotten that," she said thoughtfully. Then she gave a shiver of
disgust. "I--I loathe an informer."
"Everybody with any sense of honor--must," agreed Fyles. "Informer?
I'd sooner shake hands with a murderer. And yet we have to deal and
bargain with them--in our work."
"I was just wondering," said Kate, after another pause, "who he could
be. I--I'm not going to ask his name. But--do I know him?"
The policeman laughingly shook his head.
"I must play the game, even--with an informer. Say, there's an old saw
in our force, 'No names, no pack-drill.' It fits the case now. When
the feller's skipped the border, maybe you'll know who he is by his
absence from the village."
Suddenly Kate turned to her wagon. She gazed at it for some moments.
Then she turned about, and, with a pathetic smile, gave vent to her
feelings.
"Oh, dear," she cried. "I--I wish it was after dinner. I should be
away then. I feel as if I never--never wanted to see this valley
again--ever. It all seems wrong. It all seems like a nightmare now. I
feel as if at any moment the ground might open up, and--and swallow me
right up. I--I feel like a dizzy creature standing at the edge of a
precipice. I--I feel as if I must fall, as if I wanted to fall. I
shall be so glad to get away."
"But you'll come back," the man cried urgently. "It's--only till
after Monday." Then he steadied himself, and smiled whimsically.
"Remember, we have our wager. Remember, in the end you either have
to--laugh at me, or--marry me. It's a big stake for us both. For me
especially. Your mocking laughter would be hard to bear in conjunction
with losing you. Oh, Kate, we entered on this in a spirit of
antagonism, but--but I sort of think it'll break my heart to--lose.
You see, if I lose, I lose you. You, I suppose, will feel glad--if you
win. It's hard." His eyes grew dark with the contemplation of his
possible failure. "If I could only hope it would be otherwise. If I
could only feel that you cared, in however slight a degree. It would
not seem so bad. If I win I have only won you. I have not won your
love. The whole thing is absurd, utterly ridiculous, and mad. I want
your love, not--not--just you."
Kate made no answer, and the man went on.
"Do you know, Kate, as the days go on in this place, as the moment of
crisis approaches, I am growing less and less of a policeman. I'm even
beginning to repent of my wager with you, and but for the chance of
winning you, I should be glad to abandon it. Love has been a hidden
chapter in the book of life to me up till now, and now, reading it, it
quite overwhelms me. Do you know I've always despised people who've
put true love before all other considerations? I thought them weak
imbeciles, and quite unfit. Now I am realizing how much I had to learn
all the while, and have since learned."
He paused, and, after a moment's thought, went on again.
"Do you know a curious thought, desire, has grown up in me since our
compact. I know it's utterly--utterly mad, but I can't help it.
Believing now, as I do, that Bryant is no more to you than you say, I
feel that when I get him--I feel I cannot, dare not keep him. I feel a
crazy longing to let him go free. Do you know what that means to me?
It means giving up all I have struggled for all these years. Do you
know why I want to do it? Because I believe it would make you happy."
Kate's eyes were turned from him. They were full of a great burning
joy and love. And the love was all for this man, so recklessly
desirous of her happiness.
She shook her head without turning to him.
"You must not," she said, in deep thrilling tones. "You must not
forego the duty you owe yourself. If you capture Charlie he must pay
the price. No thought of me must influence you. And I--I am ready to
pay the forfeit. I made the wager with my eyes wide open--wide, wide."
Fyles stirred uneasily. He meant every word he had said, and somehow
he felt he was still beyond the barrier, still outside the citadel he
was striving to reduce.
"Yes, I know," he said almost bitterly. "It is just a wager--a wager
between us. It is a wager whereby we can force our convictions upon
each other."
Kate nodded, and the warm light of her eyes had changed to a look of
anxiety.
"There is a whole day and more before the--settlement, a day and night
which may be fraught with a world of disaster. Let us leave it at
that--for the present." Then, with an effort, she banished the
seriousness from her manner. "But I am delaying. I must pack my grip,
and harness my team. You see, I must leave directly after dinner."
Fyles accepted his dismissal. He turned to his horse and prepared to
mount. Kate followed his every movement with a forlorn little smile.
She would have given anything if he could have stayed. But----.
"Good luck," she cried, in a low tone.
"Good luck? Do you know what that means?" Fyles turned abruptly. "It
means my winning the wager, Kate."
"Does it?" Kate smiled tenderly across at him. "Well, good luck
anyway."
CHAPTER XXXIV
AN ENCOUNTER
Service was still proceeding at the Meeting House. The valley was
quiet. Scarcely a sound broke the perfect peace of the Sabbath
morning. The sun blazed down, a blistering fragrant heat, and the
laden atmosphere of the valley suggested only the rusticity, the
simple innocence of a pastoral world.
At Kate Seton's homestead a profound quiet reigned. There was the
occasional rattle of a collar chain to be heard proceeding from the
barn; the clucking of a foolish hen, fussing over a well-discovered
worm of plump proportions, sounded musically upon the air, and in
perfect harmony with the radiant, ripening sunlight. A stupid mongrel
pup stretched itself luxuriantly upon the ground in the shade of the
barn, and drowsily watched the busy hens, with one eye half open.
Another, evidently the brother of the former, was more actively
inclined. He was snuffing at the splashes of axle "dope" on the ground
beneath the wagon. He was young enough to eat, and appreciate,
anything he could get his baby teeth into.
There was scarcely a sign of life about the place otherwise. The whole
valley was enjoying that perfect, almost holy, calm, to be found
pretty well all the world over, yielded by man to the hours of
worship.
Inside the house there was greater activity. Kate Seton was in her
homely parlor. She was at her desk. That Bluebeard's chamber, which
roused so much curiosity in her sister, was open. The drawers were
unlocked, and Kate was sorting out papers, and collecting the loose
paper money she kept there.
She was very busy and profoundly occupied. But none of her movements
were hurried, or suggested anything but the simple preparations of one
about to leave home.
Her work did not take her long. All the loose money was collected into
a pocketbook, bearing her initials in silver on its outer cover. This
she bestowed in the bosom of her dress. Then, very deliberately, she
tore up a lot of letters and loose papers, thrust them in the
cookstove, and watched them burn in the fragment of fire smouldering
there. Next she passed across to the wall where her loaded revolvers
were hanging, and took one of them from its nail. Then, with an air of
perfect calm and assurance, she passed out of the room to her bedroom,
where a grip lay open on the simple white coverlet of her bed.
Her packing was proceeded with leisurely. Yet the precision of her
movements and the certainty with which she understood her needs made
the process rapid.
Everything was completed. The grip was full to overflowing. She stood
looking at it speculatively. She was assuring herself that nothing
was forgotten for her few days' sojourn away from home.
In the midst of her contemplation she abruptly raised her eyes to the
window and inclined her head in an attitude of listening. A sound had
reached her, a sound which had nothing to do with the two puppies,
or the hens, outside. It was a sound that brought a swift, alert
expression into her handsome eyes, the look of one who belongs to a
world where the unusual is generally looked upon with suspicion.
A moment later she was peering out of the window into the radiant
sunlight. The sound was plainer now, and she had recognized it. It was
the sound of a horse galloping, and approaching her home.
Still the doubtful questioning was in her eyes.
She left the window and passed out of the room. The next moment she
was standing in the doorway at the back of the house, and in front of
her stood the wagon that was to bear her to Myrtle. The slumberous pup
was on its feet standing alertly defiant. Its brother was already
yapping truculently in its baby fashion. The old hen had abandoned its
search for more delectable provender, and had fled incontinently.
A horseman dashed up to the house. He had ignored the front door and
made straight for the barn. He drew up with a jerk, and sat looking at
the wagon standing there. Then, with an excited, impatient
ejaculation, he flung out of the saddle.
The next moment he became aware of Kate's presence in the doorway.
With eyes alight and half-angry, half-impatient, Charlie Bryant turned
upon her.
"Why have you taken this wagon, Kate?" he demanded, going to the point
of his concern without preamble.
The woman drew a sharp breath. It was as though she realized that a
vital moment had arrived, a moment when she must grip the situation,
and use all her power of domination over the questioner.
"You've placed it at my disposal at all times," she said, smiling into
his excited eyes.
The man rushed on.
"Yes, yes, I know; but why have you taken it now? You say you are
going to Myrtle. You don't need it. You could ride to Myrtle--in the
ordinary way. You are welcome to the wagon at all times. To anything I
have. But why are you taking it now? I only found out it had gone this
morning. I--" he averted his gaze--"I only happened to go over to the
corral this morning--and I found it--gone."
Quick as a shot Kate's answer was formulated and fired at him.
"Why did you go to the corral--this morning?"
The man's reply was slow in coming. His cheeks flushed, and it looked
as though he were seeking excuse.
"I had to go there. I--needed my wagon for to-morrow's work."
Kate smiled. She was feeling more confident.
"For hauling your hay? Won't it wait? You see, I can't carry a grip on
the saddle."
Great beads of sweat were standing on Charlie's youthful face. He
raised one nervous hand and brushed it across his forehead. He cleared
his throat.
"Say, why--why must you go now, Kate? What is this absurd talk I have
heard? You going away because--because of that tree business? Kate,
Kate, such an idea isn't worthy of you. You going? You flying from
superstition? No, no, it's not worthy of you. Kate----" he paused.
Then, with a gulp: "You can't have the wagon. I refuse to--lend it
you. I simply must have it."
Kate was leaning against the door casing. She made no move. Her smile
deepened, that was all. She understood all that lay behind the man's
desperate manner, and--she had no intention of yielding.
"If you must have it, you must," she said, in her deep voice, so like
his own. "You had better send for it, but--" her look suddenly
hardened--"don't ever speak to me again. That is all I have to say."
The man's determination wavered before the woman's coldness. He looked
into her dark eyes desperately. They were cold and hard. They had
never looked at him like that before.
"D'you mean that, Kate?" he demanded desperately. "Do you mean that if
I take that wagon you have--done with me forever? Do you?"
"I meant precisely what I said." Kate suddenly bestirred herself. The
coldness in her eyes turned to anger, a swift, hot anger, to which
the man was unused, and he shrank before it. "If you are sane you
will leave that wagon to me. You _do not_ want it for your haying
to-morrow. Anyway, your haying excuse is far too thin for me. I know
why you want it. If you take it I wash my hands of you entirely. You
must choose now between these things, once and for all. I am in no
trifling mood. You must choose now--at once. And your choice must
stand for all time."
Kate watched the effect of every word she spoke, and she knew, long
before she finished speaking, she was to have her way. It was always
so. This man had no power to refuse her anything. It was only in her
absence, when his weakness overwhelmed him, that her influence lost
power over him.
All the excitement had died out of his eyes. Anger gave way to
despair, decision to weakness and yielding. And through it all a great
despair and hopelessness sounded in his voice.
"Oh, Kate," he cried, "I can't believe this is you--I can't--I can't.
You are cruel--crueller than ever I would have believed. You know why
I want to keep the wagon just now. I implore you not to do this thing.
I will do most anything else you ask me, but--leave that wagon."
Kate shook her head in cold decision.
"My mind is quite made up," she said. "There is nothing more to be
said. You must choose here--and now."
The man hesitated. Just for a moment a gleam of anger flashed into his
eyes, but it died almost at its birth, and he made a gesture of
something like despair.
"You must do as you see fit," he said, yielding. Then, in a moment,
his weakness was further displayed in an impotent obstinacy. "You must
do as you see fit, and I shall do the same. My mind, too, is made up.
I shall carry out the plans I have already made, and if harm
comes--blame yourself."
He turned away abruptly. He refused even to look in her direction
again. He sprang into the saddle with remarkable agility and galloped
off.
* * * * *
Charlie Bryant raced back to his house. For the moment a sort of
frenzy was upon him. He flung out of the saddle, and left his horse
at the veranda. He rushed into his sitting room, and, in a sort of
impotent excitement and anger, he paced the floor.
He went through the little house without object or reason. At the
kitchen door he stood staring out, lost in a troubled sea of racing
thought. Presently he returned to the sitting room. He was about to
pass out on to the veranda, but abruptly paused. With a gesture of
impatient defiance he returned to his bedroom and drew a black bottle
of rye whisky from beneath the mattress of his bed. Without waiting to
procure a glass he withdrew the cork, and, thrusting the neck of the
bottle into his mouth, took a long "pull" at the contents. After a
moment he removed it, and gasped with the scorch of the powerful
liquor. Then he took another long drink. Finally he replaced the cork
and returned the bottle to its hiding place.
A few moments later he was on the veranda again looking out over the
village with brooding eyes. For a long while he stood thus, his
stimulated thought rushing madly through his brain. Then, later, he
became aware of movement down there in the direction of the Meeting
House. He realized that service was over. In a few moments Bill would
return for the mid-day meal which was all unprepared.
With a short, hard laugh he left the veranda and mounted his patient
horse. Then, at another headlong gallop, he raced down toward the
village.
* * * * *
It was sundown the following day. A horse stood grazing in the midst
of a small grass patch surrounded by a thick bush of spruce, and
maple, and blue gums. A velvet twilight was gathering over all, and
the sky above was melting to the softer hues of evening.
The horse hobbled about in that eager equine fashion when in the midst
of a generous feed of sweet grass. Its saddle was slightly awry upon
its back, and its forelegs were through the bridle reins, which
trailed upon the ground. The creature seemed more than content with
its lot, and the saddle disturbed it not at all.
Once or twice it looked up from its occupation. Then it went on
grazing. Then, quite suddenly, it raised its head with a start, and
the movement caused it to raise a foreleg caught in the trailing
reins. Something was moving in the bushes.
It stood thus for some moments. Its gaze was apprehensively fixed upon
the recumbent figure of a man just within the bush. The figure had
rolled over, and a pair of arms were raised above its head in the act
of stretching.
Presently the figure sat up and stared stupidly about it.
Charlie Bryant had awakened with a parching thirst, and a head racked
and bursting with pain. It was some minutes before his faculties took
in the meaning of his surroundings. Some minutes before they took in
anything but the certainty of his parched throat and racking head.
He stared around him stupidly. Then, with a dazed sort of movement, he
rubbed his bloodshot eyes with the knuckles of his clenched fists.
After that he scrambled to his feet and stood swaying upon his aching
limbs. Then he moved uncertainly out into the open. He felt stiff, and
sore, and his head was aching maddeningly.
Now he beheld his horse, and the animal's wistful eyes were steadily
fixed upon him. Every moment now his mind was growing clearer. He was
striving to recollect. Striving to remember what had happened. He
remembered going to the saloon. Yes, he had stayed there all day. That
he was certain of, for he could recall the lamps being lit--and yet
now it was daylight.
For a moment his dazed condition left him puzzled. How did this come
about? Then, all in a flash he understood. This must be Monday. He
must have left the saloon--drunk, blind drunk. He must have
ridden--where? Ah, yes, now it was all plain. He must have ridden till
he fell off his horse, and then slept where he fell. Monday--Monday.
He seemed to remember something about Monday. What was it--ah!
In a moment the cobwebs of his debauch began to fall from him, and he
became alert. He felt ill--desperately ill--but the swift action of
his brain left him no time to dwell upon it. He moved across to his
horse, and set the saddle straight upon its back. Then he disentangled
the reins from about its feet, and threw them over its head. The next
moment he was in the saddle and riding away.
It was some moments before he could make up his mind as to his exact
whereabouts. He knew he was in the valley, but----. At that instant he
struck a cattle track and promptly followed it. It must lead
somewhere, and, sooner or later, he knew that he would definitely
locate his position.
He rode on down the track, pondering upon all that must have occurred
to him. He must have slept for eighteen hours at least. He knew full
well he was not likely to have left O'Brien's until the place was
closed, and now it was sundown--the next day. Sundown on Monday. He
quickened his pace. His nerves were shaking, and--he wondered in what
direction the river lay. He was consumed with a fierce thirst.
Suddenly his horse threw up its head and pricked its ears. Charlie sat
up, startled, and peered out ahead. The next moment he had reduced his
horse's gait to a walk. He knew where he was, and--he heard a sound
like a distant neigh.
In a moment he was out of the saddle. He tied his horse just inside
the bush and then proceeded on foot. The old corral lay ahead of him.
That corral where he usually kept his wagon, and where the old hut
stood.
He moved rapidly forward, and, as he neared the clearing, he left the
cattle track and took to the bush. That tell-tale sound, his horse's
pricked ears, had aroused his suspicions.
A few moments later he reached the fringe of the clearing. Keeping
himself well hidden, he pressed to the very edge, and peered out from
amid the bush. As he did so he breathed a sigh of thankfulness. Two
horses were tied to the corral fence, and the door of the little old
shack was wide open.
One of the horses he recognized as belonging to Inspector Fyles--the
other didn't matter. So he waited breathlessly, while one hand went to
his coat pocket, an unconscious movement, and rested on the revolver
it found there.
He had not long to wait. The sound of voices reached him presently.
Then they grew louder. And presently he beheld two men appear from
within the hut. Inspector Fyles came first, closely followed by a
half-breed whom he recognized at once. It was Pete--Pete Clancy.
In a moment the waiting man understood. A sort of blind fury mounted
to his brain and set his head swimming. Now, too, his right hand was
withdrawn from his gun pocket, and the weapon was gripped tightly, and
his finger was around the trigger.
But the men were talking, and the watcher strained to catch their
words. He felt he must know. He must know what treachery was afoot,
and how far it affected----
"The game's a pretty bright one," Pete was saying; and the waiting man
ground his teeth as he realized the swagger in the man's tones, and
the grin of triumph on his still scarred features. "Maybe it ain't a
new sort of play, but I guess it ain't none the worse for that. Y'see,
that wagon is kept here right along. It's allers my work runnin' it
back here, and fetchin' it along when it's needed. That's how I know
about things here," he added, with a jerk of the head in the direction
of the hut. "It's far enough from the village for folks not to know
when it's here or not. Then the feller runnin' this layout keeps other
things here. Y'see, when a job's on he don't fancy folks gettin' to
know him. So he keeps an outfit o' stuff back in the hut there as 'ud
hide up a Dago ice-cream seller. Maybe he has other uses for that
shack. I ain't wise. But that hidin' hole I located dead easy. Guess
he figgers it's a dead secret--but it ain't."
Then Fyles's voice, sharply imperious, carried to the listening man.
"Who is he?" he demanded, turning suddenly upon his companion as they
reached the horses.
The grin left the half-breed's face, and Charlie held his breath.
The half-breed halted. An ironical light possessed his discolored
eyes.
"Why, the feller you're getting to-night--in the boat."
Fyles eyed his man sternly.
"That's the second time you've answered me in that way. I'm not to be
played with. Who is this man?"
A curious truculence grew in the half-breed's face.
"I've told you all I'm going to tell you. Guess you'll be askin' me to
lay hands on him for you, next. I've earned my freedom, and when you
get these folks I'll be square with the game. You can't bluff me on
this game. No, sir. I got the law clear. You can't touch me for a
thing. It's up to you to get your man. I showed you the way."
Charlie breathed again, though his fury at the miserable traitor was
no less.
Fyles swung himself into the saddle. He bent down, and his voice was
harshly commanding.
"Maybe I can't touch you--now," he cried. "But see you play the game
to-night. You get your free run, only if I get the man I'm after. The
rest of the gang don't count a lot, nor the liquor. It's the boss of
the gang I need. If you've lied to me you'll get short shrift."
"You'll get him all right."
The half-breed grinned insolently up into the officer's face. Then
Fyles rode away, and, from the moment his horse began to move until it
vanished down the cattle track, the muzzle of Charlie Bryant's gun was
covering him. His impulse was homicidal. To bring this man down might
be the best means of nullifying the effect of Pete's treachery. Then,
in time, he remembered that there were others to replace him, and, in
all probability, they knew already the story Pete had told their
chief. There was one thing certain, however, that liquor must not be
run to-night.
Urgent as was the moment Charlie had not yet finished here. The moment
Stanley Fyles had disappeared he turned back to the half-breed. He saw
Pete take his horse and lead it on to the grass some distance from the
corral fence, and his gun held him covered. Then he watched him go
back to the hut and carefully close the door. After that he watched
him disturb his own footmarks and those of the policeman in the
neighborhood of the doorway.
Charlie moved. The bushes parted, and he made his way into the open.
The half-breed's back was turned. Then, quite suddenly, a deep, harsh
challenge rang out, breaking up entirely the sylvan peace.
"You damned traitor!"
With a leap the half-breed swung about. As he did so the gleaming
barrel of his gun flashed with a sharp report. A bullet whistled
through Charlie Bryant's hat, another tore its way through the sleeve
of his jacket. But before a third could find a vital spot in his body
his own gun spat out certain death. The half-breed flung up his hands,
and, with a sharp oath, his knees crumpled up under him, and he fell
in a heap on the ground.
His face livid with passion, Charlie hurried across the intervening
space. For one moment he stood gazing down upon the fallen man. Then
he aimed a kick of spurning at the dead man's body and moved away.
It was some minutes before he left the precincts of the old corral
with its evil history. He went into the hut and opened the secret
cupboard. It was quite empty, and he closed it again. Then he passed
out, and removed the saddle and bridle from the half-breed's horse,
and turned it loose. Then, after one last look of hatred and loathing
at the dead man, he moved away and vanished among the trees.
CHAPTER XXXV
ON MONDAY NIGHT
Big Brother Bill, after an evening of considerable worry, had retired
to his little lean-to bedroom with its low, camp bedstead. It was
useless sitting up any longer attempting one of those big worrying
"thinks" which, usually, he was rather proud of achieving.
On this occasion thinking led him nowhither. His worries had come
swiftly and significantly. In the first place, on Sunday afternoon he
had been seriously concerned about Helen. It was not until Kate's
going that either he or Helen had realized the girl's lonely position
in the house on the river bank. It came home to them both as they
returned thither at about sundown, to find that neither of the hired
men had shown up again, and the work, even to the "chores" of the
homestead, was at a standstill.
He really became angry in his anxiety. Angry with Kate, angry with the
men. However, his displeasure was not likely to help matters, so he
and Helen turned to and fed the few livestock, made them snug for the
night, and then proceeded to consider Helen's position. After some
debate it was decided to appeal to Mrs. John Day. This was promptly
done, and the leading citizeness, after a closer cross-examination,
consented to take the girl under her brusque wing, and lodged her in
her own rather resplendent house.
This was comparatively satisfactory, and Bill breathed his relief. But
hard upon this came the more alarming realization that Charlie did not
return home on Sunday night. Not only that, but nothing was heard of
him the whole of Monday. All the alarmed brother was able to discover
was the fact that Charlie had left the saloon at the time O'Brien
closed it, about midnight on Sunday, in a hopelessly drunken
condition.
So, what with assisting Helen with the work of her homestead, and
searching for his defaulting brother, Bill's day was an anxious one.
Then, at nightfall, a further concern added fresh trouble to his
thought. Kid Blaney had defected as well, and, in consequence, the
work of Charlie's little ranch had been completely at a standstill the
whole day.
In the end, quite wearied out with his unusual exertions, Bill
abandoned all further attempt to get a grip on the situation and went
to bed. He knew he must be up early in the morning, at daylight, in
fact, for he had promised Helen to be at the ceremony of the felling
of the pine tree, for which all preparations had been duly made under
the watchful and triumphant eye of Mrs. John Day.
Sleep, however, was long in coming. His brain was too busy, a sign he
was secretly pleased at. He felt that during the last two days he had
more than proved his ability in emergency. So, lying awake, waiting
patiently for sleep to come, he rather felt like a general in action,
perfectly assured of his own capacity to meet every situation
successfully.
It was nearly midnight when he finally dropped off into a light and
rather disturbed slumber. How long he had slept, or even if he really
had slept at all, he was never quite sure, for, quite suddenly, he was
aroused, and wide awake, by the sound of his own name being called in
the darkness.
"Bill! Bill!"
At the second pronouncement of his name he was sitting up with his
bare feet on the bare floor, and his great pajamaed body foolishly
alert.
"Who in----" he began. But in a moment Charlie's voice cut him short.
"You there? Thank God! Where's the lamp? Quick, light it."
To Bill's credit it must be admitted he offered no further attempt at
a blasphemous protest, but leaned over toward the Windsor chair on
which the lamp stood, and fumbled for the matches.
The next moment he had struck a light, and the lamp was lit. He stood
up and looked across the room. Charlie's slight figure was just inside
the doorway. His face was ghastly in the yellow lamplight. His clothes
were in a filthy condition, and, altogether, in Bill's own words, he
looked like a priceless antique of some forgotten race.
However, the hunted look in the man's eyes smote his brother's
generous heart, and a swift, anxious inquiry sprang to his lips.
"What's--what's up, Charlie?" he cried, gathering his clothes
together, and beginning to dress himself.
Charlie's eyes glowed with a reflection of the lamplight.
"The game's up, Bill," he cried hoarsely. "My God, it's been given
away. Pete Clancy, the feller you hammered, has turned informer. I--I
shot him dead. Say, the gang's out to-night. They're coming in with a
cargo of liquor. Fyles is wise to their play, and knows just how it's
coming in. They'll be trapped to a man."
"You--shot Pete--dead?"
In the overwhelming rush of his brother's information, the death of
the informer at his, Charlie's, hands seemed alone to penetrate
Bill's, as yet, none too alert faculties.
"Yes, yes," cried the other impatiently. "I'd have shot him, or--or
anybody else for such treachery, but--but--it's the other that
matters. I've got to get out and stop that cargo. It's midnight now,
and--God! If the police get----"
Bill's brain was working more rapidly, and so were his hands. He was
almost dressed now.
"But you, Charlie," he cried, all his concern for his brother
uppermost. "They'll get you. And--and they'll hang you for killing
Pete--sure."
Suddenly a peal of hysterical laughter, which ended in a furious
curse, rang through the room.
"God Almighty!" Charlie cried fiercely, "don't stand there yapping
about me. Hang me? What in hell do I care what they do to me? I
haven't come here about myself. Nothing that concerns me matters.
Here, it's midnight. I've time to reach 'em and give 'em the word.
See, that's why I'm here. I don't know what's happened by now, or what
may happen. You offered to help. Will you help me now? Bill, I've got
to get there, and warn 'em. The police will try and stop us. If there
are two of us, one may get through--will you----?"
Bill crushed his hat on his head. His eyes, big and blue, were
gleaming with the light of battle.
"Give me a gun, and come on," he cried. "I don't understand it all,
but that don't matter. I'll think it out later. You're up against it,
and that's good enough for me. Somebody's going to have to look bright
if he lays hands on you, if it's Fyles, or McBain, or the devil knows
who. Come on."
Picking up the lamp, Bill took the lead. Here, in action, he had no
doubts or difficulties, Charlie was in trouble; Charlie was
threatened; Charlie, his foolish, but well-loved brother.
Five minutes later two horsemen, regardless of rousing the
inhabitants, regardless of who might see and recognize them, galloped
headlong through the heart of the village.
CHAPTER XXXVI
STILL MONDAY NIGHT
The little river wound its silvery way through the heart of the
valley. The broken summer clouds strove to shut out the brilliant
light of the moon, and signally failed. The swift-moving currents of
air kept them stirring, and breaking. So the tattered breaks through
which peeped the radiant lamp of night, illuminated each fringe of
mist with the sheen of burnished steel.
In spite of the high wind above, the night was still in the heart of
the valley. So still. High up above, the racing wind kept up the
constant movement, but not a breath below disturbed one single
sun-scorched leaf. It was warm. The night air was heavy with the
fragrance of ripening vegetation, and the busy droning sounds of
stirring insect life chorused joyously and seductively with the
murmuring of speeding waters.
The very stillness thrilled. It was the hush of portent, the hush of
watchfulness, the hush of a threatening tension.
In the wide heart of the valley the waters of the river laughed, and
sang, and frollicked on their way, while under cover of the deep
night-shadows lurking figures waited, with nerves set, and weapons of
destruction ready to fulfill their deadly mission. Strife loomed heavy
amid the reigning peace, the ruthless, savage strife which seems ever
to center the purpose of all sentient life.
So the moments passed. Minutes grew. With every passing minute the
threat weighed heavier and heavier, until it seemed, at last, that
only the smallest spark was needed to fire the train.
The racing clouds melted. They gathered again. Again and again the
changes came and went. It was like one great, prolonged conflict
wherein the darkening veil strove to hide the criminal secrets upon
the earth below from the searching gaze.
For awhile the moon held sway. The river lit, a perfect mirror. Only
the shadowed banks remained. Round the bend came a trifling object,
small, uncertain in its outline. A sigh of relief went up from many
lips. The tension was relaxed.
Caught in the dazzling light the object shot across the water to the
sheltering bank. Then the clouds obscured the moonlight, and eyes
strove vainly to penetrate the shadow.
The moments passed. Again the moon shone out. Again was the object
caught in the revealing light. Now it was closer, and as it raced once
more for the wood-lined bank the watching eyes made out a deep-laden
canoe, low in the water, with a solitary figure plying a skillful
paddle.
It crept on under the bank. With a wonderful dexterity the man at the
paddle steered his course beneath the green of drooping foliage, while
now and then his narrow, evil, humorous eyes surveyed the heavy cargo
at his feet with a smile of satisfaction.
But the shadows could not claim him for long. The full stream lay
beyond in the middle of the river. His cargo was heavy, and the
sluggish water under the bank made his progress slow and arduous.
Again he sought the stream, and the lesser effort, and the little
craft raced on.
Then, of a sudden, the peace of the night was broken. A chorus of
night cries awoke to the sharp crack of a carbine. A voice shouted a
swift command, and the canoe was turned head on to the hither bank. In
a moment a ring of metal was thrust into the face of the man with the
paddle, and the hard voice of Sergeant McBain bade him throw up his
hands.
The boatman glanced swiftly about him. His evil eyes lit with a smile
of appreciation as he dropped his paddle and thrust his hands high
above his head. There were ten or twelve police troopers upon the
bank--and he was only one.
"Haul him out o' that, boys, and yank the boat up out o' water. We're
needin' his cargo bad."
The man was dragged unceremoniously from the boat, and stood before
the hard-faced sergeant.
"Name?" he snapped.
"Holy Dick," chuckled the prisoner.
The sergeant peered into his face. At the moment the clouds had
obscured the moon.
Was this the man they were waiting for? He made out the gray hair, the
smiling, evil eyes. He knew and recognized the features.
The officer struggled with himself for a moment. Then his authority
returned.
"You're under arrest for--running this cargo of liquor," he said
sharply.
Holy Dick's smile broadened.
"But----"
"If you're going to make a statement I'm here to listen, but--it'll be
used against you."
Sergeant McBain rapped out his formula without regard for the letter
of it. Then, while one of the troopers placed handcuffs upon the
prisoner's wrists, he turned to those at the canoe.
"How many kegs?" he demanded.
For a moment there was no reply. Holy Dick sniggered. McBain glared
furiously, and his impatience rose.
"How many?" he cried again, more sharply.
One of the troopers approached him and spoke in a low voice.
"None, sergeant," he said, vainly striving to avoid the sharp ears of
their prisoner. "The boat's loaded heavy with loose rocks. It's----"
A cunning laugh interrupted him. Holy Dick was holding out his
manacled arms.
"Guess you'd best grab these off, Sergeant; maybe you'll need 'em for
someone else."
But the policeman's reply became lost. A rattle of firearms far off on
the other side of the river left it unspoken. Something was happening
away over there, something they had not calculated upon. The rest of
the patrol, with Fyles, was divided between the other bank and the
more distant trail. He turned to his men.
"Loose him and get into the saddle sharp!" he cried. "They've fooled
us. By God, they've fooled us--again!"
* * * * *
The uncertain moonlight revealed to Stanley Fyles a movement on the
distant rise of ground where the trail first mounted, and, beyond,
finally disappeared. His night glasses made out a rapidly oncoming
vehicle, accompanied by a small band of horsemen.
The sight rejoiced him. Things were working out well. The man Pete had
not lied. McBain held the river. No boat could pass him. He would take
these men as part of the gang, working in conjunction with the boat.
All was well, and his spirits rose. A sharp order was passed back to
his men, ambushed in the bluff where he had taken up his position. The
thing would be simple as daylight. There would be no bloodshed. A few
shots fired to hold the gang up. Then the arrest.
He waited. Then he backed into the ambush out of sight. The wagon came
on. Through his leafy screen he watched for the details of the
vehicle, the entire convoy. It would not be Bryant's wagon; that he
knew would be elsewhere. It would probably be some hired conveyance
which did not belong to the village.
Nearer drew the little convoy, nearer and nearer. It was less than
one hundred yards away. In the uncertain moonlight its pace seemed
leisurely, and he could hear the voices of the men escorting it. He
wanted it nearer. He wanted it under the very muzzles of his men's
carbines. The rattle of wheels, the plod of horses' hoofs were almost
abreast. A few seconds more, then----
Half-a-dozen shots rang out, the bullets whistling across in front of
the wagon, and above the horses' heads. The teamster reined up,
throwing his horses upon their haunches. Then, like a log, he fell
headlong from his driving seat.
Fyles turned with a bitter curse upon his lips for the criminal
carelessness of his men. But he was given no time to vent it. A cry
went up from the wagon's escort, and a hail of bullets rained upon the
ambush.
In a second the troopers charged the wagon, while two of their horses,
with empty saddles, raced from the cover, and vanished down the trail.
Then the fight waged furiously.
It lasted but a few moments. These savage men about the wagon had been
goaded beyond the power of their restraint, at no time great, by the
fall of their comrade. A wild fury at the wanton killing by the
troopers had fired the train of their passions. Retaliation had been
certain--certain as death itself.
But, after that first furious assault, these untamed prairie souls
realized the inevitable result of their action. They broke and fled,
scattering across country, vanishing like shadows in the night. The
next moment, acting on a sharp command, the police were in red-hot
pursuit, like hounds breaking from leash. Only Fyles and three men
stayed behind with the fallen teamster and his one other dead comrade.
But at the moment of the flight and pursuit, the sound of racing
wheels some distance away caught the officer's ears. In a moment he
was at the wagon side. His men were close upon his heels. The wagon
was empty. It was the blind he had anticipated, but--that sound of
speeding wheels.
He shouted to his men and set off across country in the direction.
Nothing must be left to chance. There was no doubt about the peculiar
rattle which sounded so plainly. It was a buckboard being driven at a
racing speed. Why?
* * * * *
As his horse ploughed through the low scrub his men followed hard upon
his heels. Farther on the country was open, and a wide stretch of
prairie grass spread out without cover of any sort. It was over this
the buckboard was racing.
He strove to estimate its distance away, the start it had of him,
by the sound. It could not be much over a mile. A light buckboard
and team could travel very fast under the hands of a skilful
teamster. It would take a distance of five miles to overhaul it. The
direction--yes, it was the direction of the village. The buckboard
might get there ahead of them.
Fyles rammed both spurs into the flanks of the faithful Peter, and, as
he did so, he saw a party of horsemen converging on him from the left.
They drew on, and, in a moment, he recognized McBain and his men.
He called out to the Scot as they came together.
"You get the boat?"
McBain shouted his reply.
"Sure, but--there was nothing doing. It was loaded down with rocks."
Just for one brief instant a bitter imprecation hovered on the
officer's lips. Then, in a wave of inspiration, he shouted his
conviction.
"By God, then we're on the right trail now. It's the buckboard ahead.
We must get it. That's the cargo, sure as fate. Come on!"
* * * * *
A light buckboard was moving leisurely over the open prairie. It was
just an ordinary, spidery buckboard drawn by an unusually fine team of
horses, and driven by a slightish man clad in a dark jacket and cord
riding-breeches, with a wide prairie hat drawn firmly down upon his
dark head, its brim deeply shading his boyish, good-looking face.
Running beside his team, tied to the neck yoke of the near-side
driver, was a saddle horse. It was a fine beast, with racehorse
quarters, and a shoulder laid back for speed.
The buckboard was well loaded. Nor was its load disguised. It
consisted of a number of the small wooden kegs adopted for the purpose
of transporting contraband liquor.
But though the vehicle moved over the rough grass in such a leisurely
fashion, the man's eyes were alert and watchful. His ears, too, were
sharply set, and lost no sound, as his eyes lost no sight, in the
distant prospect of the country through which he was traveling.
His gait was by no means the result of any reposeful sense. It was the
well-calculated result of caution. There was caution in his whole
poise. In the quick turn of the head at any predominating sound. In
the sharp glance of his dark eyes at any of the more fantastic shadows
cast by the searching moonlight. Then, too, a tight hand was upon the
reins, and there was an alert searching for those badger and gopher
holes so perilous for horses in the uncertain light of the moon.
He was traveling in a parallel, a mile to the south of the river
trail, and, far ahead, to the right, he could see the bush which
marked the winding course of the river.
Now he was listening to the faint rumble of a wagon moving along the
trail, and, with which, though so far away, he was carefully keeping
pace. This was his whole object--to keep pace, almost step for step,
with the rumbling movement of the distant wagon.
At his present gait his wheels gave out practically no sound. They
gently, almost silently, crushed their way over the tufted grass, and
the sound of his horses' hoofs suggested a muffling.
So he made his way, stealthily, secretly. His was the brain which had
planned, and this vital work of convoying his smuggled liquor could be
entrusted to no other hand. The work he demanded of others was simple;
it was the background to his central purpose. He had no desire to risk
his helpers. His must be the risk, as, too, his must be the chief
profit.
With all his caution he yet had time to think of those other things
which frequently brought a smile to his dark eyes. Why not? There was
a wild exhilaration in this work. He reveled in the thought of his
risk. He reveled in laying plans which could beat all the best brains
among the law officers. The excitement of the chances was as the
breath of life to him, and the cargo once safely secreted he could
feel that he had not lived in vain.
He knew full well that the penitentiary doors were wide open waiting
to greet him, but he meant them to remain open, and spend their whole
time in a yearning which he vowed should never be fulfilled. Five
years. He smiled. Five years--wearing a striped----
What was that?
A shot! One single shot! Far away, there, by the river. Ah, yes. That
big bluff. Holy Dick was probably busy. Holy Dick in his boat. He
smiled. But all unconsciously he eased his hand upon the lines, and
his horses quickened their gait. It was just the slight, nervous
quickening as the critical moment of his effort drew near.
The buckboard was less silent. The wheels began to rattle over the
hummocky surface of the prairie grass. He listened even more acutely
for the rumble of the wagon on the trail. He must definitely assure
himself he was still abreast of it. That was all important.
He could plainly hear it. Was he abreast? For the moment he was not
quite sure. Therefore, he further permitted his horses to quicken
their pace. It was better to----
He sat up, and a look of alarm peered out from under the brim of his
hat. The sound of a volley being fired over there on the trail
suddenly disconcerted him. This was something he had not reckoned on.
This was something he had wished to----
Hark! Again! An answering volley! The first was the heavier. The
latter was the familiar note of revolvers. A definite alarm took hold
of him. What was the meaning of it? An attack? Were the men on the
trail resisting the police? He had warned them. He----. Listen! The
shouting! Now he could distinctly hear the sound of galloping horses.
He leaned forward and grabbed the whip from its socket on the
dashboard, and brought it smartly down upon his horses' backs.
In an instant they leaped into a gallop, and he was racing over the
rough grass at a perilous pace.
The fools. The mad, idiotic fools. Resisting the police. An armed
attack on the police. If they killed any of them----. Great God, was
there ever such a pack of fools and madmen? It was no longer simple
contraband. It was no longer playing up a ridiculous law. It was----
Again he brought his whip down upon his horses. He must get through
now. He must get to the cache with the liquor, and trust to the luck
of the reckless to get away. Further concealment was out of the
question.
Hark, what was that?
Horsemen coming his way. Yes--horsemen. There could be no doubt of it.
The racing hoof-beats were unmistakable. Down came the whip again, and
the great team, with the saddle horse beside them, raced with bellies
low to the ground.
Now he had no thought but for getting away. His mind ran over the
possibilities. If only he could get clear with the liquor there might
yet be a chance of his comrades' and his own escape. He had no
knowledge of what had happened to the others, except that there was
shooting and pursuit. The only comfort to be drawn was from the
certainty in his mind that the first shooting he had heard was the
heavy firing of police carbines.
Hark! Yes, there was no doubt of the pursuit. Furthermore, the pursuit
was hard behind him. Why? The police must have heard the buckboard. He
flogged his horses to a greater effort. They were the speediest team
in the country, and he had only three miles to go. They----
"Hold up, you beast," he cried, his deep voice hoarse with excitement.
One of the horses lunged forward, stumbling in a badger hole. The
buckboard jolted terrifically. The driver was nearly thrown from his
seat. Under his firm hands, however, the beast managed to recover
itself. Then, as though he saw the gates of the penitentiary closing
upon him, a feeling of unutterable horror shivered through the man's
body and settled upon his heart. The horse was dead lame.
But there was no time now for feeling, no time for regrets. The
pursuers had found his trail, and were hard upon his heels. The cargo
must go. Everything must go. Personal safety was the only thing to be
considered. From the confidence of victory now he had fallen to the
zero of certain failure.
He pulled his sweating team up and sprang to the ground. He ran up to
the saddle horse, and, casting the neck-rope loose from the neck yoke,
looped it over the horn of the saddle. The next moment he was in the
saddle and racing over the grassland in the direction of the village.
CHAPTER XXXVII
THE NIGHT TRAIL
The trail declined over a long, gradual slope. At the bottom of it
was a broad, almost dried-out slough. A wooden culvert spanned the
reed-grown watercourse. Then the trail made a sharpish ascent beyond,
and lost itself behind a distant bush, beyond which again stretched
out a broad expanse of grass.
Two horsemen were speeding down the longer slope. Their horses were
fresh and full of speed. There was no speech passing between them.
Eyes and ears were alert, and their grimly set faces gave warning of
the anxious thought teeming through their brains.
The indications of the night were nothing to them. The trail might
ring with the beat of their horses' hoofs, or only reply with the soft
thud of a deep, sandy surface. They were not out to consider either
their horses or themselves. Each knew that his journey was one of
desperate emergency, and one of them, at least, cared nothing what
might be his sacrifice, even if it were life itself.
The horses came down the hill with a headlong rush. Loose reins told
of the men's feelings, and the creatures, themselves, as though imbued
with something of their riders' spirits, abandoned themselves to the
race with equal recklessness.
Halfway down the hill the foremost of the two, the smaller and
slighter, abruptly flung a word across his shoulder to his companion
behind.
"Someone coming," he said, in a deep, hoarse voice.
The second man beat his horse's flanks with his heels, and drew
abreast.
"I can't see," he replied, shading his eyes from the light of the
moon, which, at that moment, shone out from behind a cloud.
The other pointed beyond the culvert.
"There. Riding like hell. Gee! Look--it's--trouble."
Bill Bryant now discerned the hazy outline of a moving figure. It
seemed to him that whoever, or whatever it was, it was aware of their
approach and desirous of avoiding them. The moving object had suddenly
left the trail. It had taken to the grass, and was heading straight
for the miry slough.
"The fool. The madman," muttered Charlie. "Does he know what he's
making for?"
"Is it--a stream, Charlie?"
Bill's question seemed to irritate his brother.
"Stream?--Damn it, it's mire. His horse'll throw himself. Who----?"
He leaned forward in the saddle searching the distance for the
identity of the oncoming horseman. His horse shot forward, and Bill's
was hard put to it to keep pace.
"Can't we shout a warning?" cried Bill, caught in his brother's
anxious excitement.
"Warning be damned," snapped Charlie over his shoulder. "This is no
time to be shouting around. We don't----Hallo! He's realized where
he's heading. He's----. Oh, the hopeless, seven sorts of damned idiot.
Look! Look at that! There he goes. Poor devil, what a smash. Hurry
up!"
The two men made a further call upon their horses, urged by the sight
of the horseman beyond the slough. He had crashed headlong into the
half-dry watercourse at the very edge of the culvert.
The man's disaster was quite plain, even at that distance. He had
evidently been unaware of his danger in leaving the trail for a
cross-country run to avoid those he saw approaching him. As he came
down to the slough, all too late he had realized whither he was
heading. Then, instead of keeping on, and taking his chances of
getting through the mire, he had made a frantic effort to swing his
horse aside and regain the culvert. His reckless speed had been his
undoing. His impetus had been so great that the poor beast under him
had only the more surely plunged to disaster, from the very magnitude
of its effort to avoid it.
Charlie was the first to reach the culvert. In a moment he was out of
the saddle.
The stranger's floundering horse struggled, and finally scrambled to
its feet. The rider was close beside it, but lay quite still where he
had fallen. To Charlie's critical eye there was little doubt as to
what had happened. The adjacency of the edge of the culvert warned him
of what had befallen. The rider must have struck it as he fell.
As Bill dismounted he pointed at the stranger's horse.
"Grab it," cried Charlie. The next moment was kneeling beside the
fallen man.
Then, in a moment, the wondering Bill, looking on, beheld a sight he
would never forget.
Charlie bent down over the silent figure. He reached out and placed an
arm under the man's body and turned him over. The next instant a cry,
half-stifled in his throat, a cry as of some dumb creature mortally
wounded, a cry full of hopeless, dreadful pain rose from the kneeling
man, and its agony smote the sympathetic brother as though with a
mortal blow.
Then came words, a rush of words, imploring, agonized.
"Kate! Kate! Oh, Kate, why did you do it? Why? Oh, God, she's dead!
Kate! Kate! Speak to me. For God's sake speak to me. You're not dead.
No, no. Not dead. It can't be."
The man's hand caressed the soft pale cheek under it. He had thrust
back the prairie hat which still retained its position, pressed low
upon the head, and a mass of dark, luxuriant hair fell away from its
place, coiled tightly about the small head.
At that moment the horrified voice of Bill broke in.
"Charlie! Charlie! I can hear horses galloping in the distance!" he
cried, alarmed, without actually realizing why. And some sort of
desperate instinct made him thrust his hand into his revolver pocket.
For an instant only Charlie looked up at him in a dazed, only
half-understanding. Then his eyes lit with a stirring alarm as he
turned a listening ear to windward.
The next moment his arms were flung about the body of the disguised
woman at his feet, and, with a great effort, he lifted her and
struggled to his feet.
Bill stared in stupid wonderment when he beheld the figure of Kate
Seton clad in man's clothing, but he continued to hold on to the
horses, and, with a hand on his revolver, awaited his brother's
commands.
At that moment Kate opened her eyes and gazed into the dark face above
her. In a moment the ardent eyes of Charlie smiled down at her. Then
the injured woman's lips opened, and, as they formulated her halting
words, his smile gave place to something like panic. She was still in
a fainting condition, but power was vouchsafed her to impart a story
which drove him to something like a frenzy of activity.
"It's the police," she gasped. "It's--it's shooting. They're--behind.
They're right after me--O-oh!"
She had fainted again with her last word, and the dead weight in the
man's arms became almost unsupportable.
But now there was no longer any uncertainty. Kate was alive. The
police were behind. At all costs--the woman he loved must be saved.
Charlie looked up at Bill, and his voice became harshly commanding.
"Quick! On your horse, man," he cried, almost fiercely. "That's it,"
as Bill flung himself into the saddle without question. "Here, now
take her. You're strong. Get her across your saddle in front of you.
There, that's it--lift. So. Gently. Get her right across your lap.
That's it. Now take my horse and lead it. So."
Bill obeyed like a well-disciplined child, and with equal enthusiasm.
He leaned down from the saddle and lifted the fainting woman out of
his brother's arms. She was like a babe in his powerful arms. He laid
her across his knee. Then, as his brother passed the reins of his own
horse up to him, he took them and slung them over his supporting arm.
The command died out of Charlie's tones, and his whole attitude became
an irresistible appeal.
"Now, Bill," he cried, urgently. "Down there, along the bank of the
slough." He pointed away southwards. "Along there, into that bush. Get
into hiding and remain till the coast is clear. Then get her back to
her home. Leave the police to me, and--and remember she's all I care
for--in the world."
Bill waited no further word. Once he understood what was required of
him he could do it--he would do it--with all his might. He moved off
with all the confident air of his simple, purposeful nature.
Charlie watched him go. He saw him vanish amid the shadows of the
bush. Then he turned to Kate's horse and sprang into the saddle.
For a moment he sat there watching and listening. But his purpose was
not quite clear. It had not been clear to Bill, who had asked no
question, feeling such to be superfluous at the moment.
But his own purpose was clear enough to Charlie's devoted mind. There
must be no chance of Kate's discovery by the police. Whatever had
happened before, there must be no chance of harm to her now. His mind
was quite clear. His thought flowed swiftly and keenly.
The distant sound of galloping horses was growing. The summit of the
rising ground over which they must come was not more than two hundred
yards behind him.
He waited. The clatter of hoofs was growing louder with each passing
second. The police must certainly be near the top of the rise now.
Bill was well away. He was well in the bush by this time.
Hark! Yes. There they were. The moon was hidden just now, but even so
Charlie could see the bobbing figures at the hilltop.
Suddenly he rammed his heels into his horse's flanks and dashed off up
the slope which he had so recently descended. As he went he drew his
revolver and fired two shots in swift succession in the direction of
the horsemen approaching. Well enough he knew, as he raced on toward
the village, that the police were beyond his range, but his purpose
was that there should be no doubt in their minds that he--he was their
quarry--that he was the man they had already been pursuing so far.
* * * * *
Ten men made up the tally of the pursuers riding with Inspector Fyles.
McBain was not among them. He had remained with the abandoned
buckboard while the rest of the police were scouring the neighborhood
for the fugitives from the first encounter.
As Fyles came over the rise, and beheld the culvert below him, and
heard the two defiant shots hurled in his direction, a thrill of
satisfaction swept through him. The man was less than three hundred
yards ahead of him with a long hill to climb, and something over a
mile to go before the village, and the possibility of safety, was
reached.
There was no match in the country for Peter when it came to a long,
uphill chase. He told himself the man hadn't a dog's chance with Peter
hard on his heels.
"We've got him, boys," he cried to his men, in his moment of
exuberance. "He ought to have been half a mile on by the start he got.
It's the poor devil of a horse playing out. He's beat--beat to death.
Now, boys, hard on my heels for a spurt."
Peter leaped ahead under the sharp reminder of the spur, and, in a few
moments, the clatter of iron-shod hoofs left the wooden culvert behind
it, and the race up the hill began.
The moon now blazed out, as though at last it had definitely decided
to throw its weight in against the fugitive. The summer clouds were
lifting and vanishing with that wonderful rapidity with which, once
the brilliant moon gains sway, she seems to sweep all obstruction from
her chilly path.
The steely light poured down upon the slim back of the fugitive, and
left both horse and rider sharply outlined. The distance diminished
under the terrific spurt of the police horses, and a confident look
began to dawn in the eyes of their riders.
They were gaining so rapidly that it seemed hardly necessary to press
their bronchos so hard. The top of the hill was still a quarter of a
mile away. The fugitive's evidently wearying beast could never make
that last final incline. The man would be forced to turn and defend
himself or yield for very helplessness. The whole thing was too easy.
It was absurdly easy. Nor could there be any sort of a "scrap." They
were ten to one. It was disappointing. These riders of the plains
reveled in a genuine fight.
But Fyles's contentment suddenly received a disconcerting shock. Peter
was stretching out like a greyhound. The pace at which they pursued
the hunted hare was terrific. But now, although they were, if
anything, traveling faster, they seemed to be no longer gaining. The
three hundred yards intervening had, in that first rush, been reduced
to nearly one hundred. But, somehow, to his disquiet Fyles now
realized that there was no further encroachment.
He shook Peter up and left his companions behind. But it quickly
became evident he could make no further impression. If anything, his
quarry was gaining. An unpleasant conviction began to make itself felt
in the mind of the policeman. The man had been foxing. He had been
saving his horse up for that hill, calculating to a fraction the
distance he had yet to go.
He called to his men to race for it.
They came up on his heels. The man nearest to him was a corporal.
"We're not done with him yet, corporal," he said grimly. "I wanted to
get him without trouble. Guess we'll have to bail him up. Once over
the top of that hill, he runs into the bush on the outskirts of the
village. We daren't risk it."
The corporal's eyes lit.
"Shall we open out and give him a round, sir?"
Fyles nodded.
"Let 'em fire low. Bring his horse down."
The corporal turned back to his men, and gave the necessary order.
"Open out!" he cried. "It's just over a hundred yards. Fire low, and
get his horse. We'll be on him before he can pick himself up."
"There's fifty dollars between you if you can bring him down and keep
his skin whole," added Fyles.
Still keeping their pace, the men spread out from the trail,
withdrawing the carbines from their leather buckets as they rode. Then
came the ominous clicking of the breeches as cartridges were thrust
home. Fyles, with Corporal Mooney, kept to the trail.
A moment passed. Then the first carbine spat out its vicious pellet.
Fyles, watching, fancied that the fugitive had begun to flog his
horse. Now, in swift succession, the other carbines added their
chorus. There was no check in the pace of the pursuers. The
well-trained horses were used to the work.
The first volley seemed ineffective. The men had not yet got their
sights. The fugitive had another fifty yards before he reached the top
of the long incline.
The distance to the top of the hill was lessening rapidly. Fyles was
becoming anxious. It had become a matter of seconds before the man
would clear the ridge.
"Keep low," cried the corporal, warningly, in the excitement of the
moment. "A ricochet--anything will do. Get his horse."
The horseman was twenty yards from the crest of the hill. Fifteen. The
carbines again rattled out their hurried fire.
Ten yards--in a moment he would be----
A cloud of dust arose suddenly among the feet of the fugitive's horse.
It cleared. Fyles gave a sigh of relief and raced Peter forward. The
man's horse had crashed to the ground.
* * * * *
Fyles was gazing down upon the body of the fallen man. The horse was
lying a few yards away, struggling to rise. A great welter of blood
flooded the sandy track all about it.
A trooper walked up to the horse. He placed the muzzle of his carbine
close behind the poor creature's ear. The next moment there was a
sharp report. The head dropped heavily to the ground and remained
quite still.
The corporal looked up at his superior. He was kneeling beside the
body of Charlie Bryant.
"I'm afraid it's all up with him, sir," he said seriously. "But he
wasn't hit. I can't find a sign of a hit. I--think his neck's
broken--or--or something. It was the fall. He's dead, sir--sure."
The officer's face never changed its stern expression. But the
suspicion of a sigh escaped him. He was by no means an unfeeling man,
but he had his duty to do. In this case there was more than his duty
concerned. Hence the sigh. Hence any lack of appreciation.
"It's the man I expected," he said. "A foolish fellow, but--a smart
man. You're sure he's dead? Sure?"
The corporal nodded.
"Yes, sir."
"Poor devil. I'm sorry."
CHAPTER XXXVIII
THE FALL OF THE OLD PINE
The gray of dawn was slowly gladdening toward the warmer hue of day.
The eastern skies lit with that pallid yellow which precedes the gold
and amber of the rising sun. Somewhere, far below the horizon, the
great day god was marching onward, ever onward, shedding its splendor
upon a refreshed and waking world.
The valley of Leaping Creek was stirring.
Whatever the shortcomings of the citizens of Rocky Springs, morning
activity was not one of them. But they knew, on this day of days, a
fresh era in the history of the village was about to begin. Every man
knew this. Every woman. Even every child who had power to understand
anything at all.
So, as the golden light spread upward toward the vault of the eastern
heavens, the spirals of smoke curled up from among the trees on the
breathless air. Every cookstove in the village was lit by the
unwillingly busy hands of the men-folk, while the women bedecked
themselves and their offspring, as befitted the occasion and their
position.
Breakfast ensued. It was not the leisurely breakfast of every day,
when men required an ample foundation to sustain their daily routine
of laborious indolence, but a meal at which coffee was drunk in
scalding gulps, and bread and butter, and some homely preserve,
replaced the more substantial fare of chops and steak, or bacon and
cereals.
Then came the real business of the day. Doors opened and men looked
out. Children, with big bow ties upon their heads and sashes at their
waists, scuttled through, about the legs of their parents, and reached
the open. Neighborly voices hailed each other with a cheery greeting,
and the tone was unusual. It was the tone of those who anticipate
pleasantly, or are stirred by the excitement of uncertainty.
Minutes later the footpaths and unpaved tracks lost their deserted
appearance. Solitary figures and groups lounged along them. Men
accompanied by their well-starched womenfolk, women striving vainly to
control their legions of offspring. They all began to move abroad, and
their ways were convergent. They were all moving upon a common goal,
as though drawn thither by the irresistible attraction of a magnet.
From the lower reaches of the village, toward the eastern river, that
better class residential quarter, where the houses, four in number, of
Mrs. John Day, of Billy Unguin, of Allan Dy, and the local blacksmith
were located, an extremely decorous cortege emerged. Here there was
neither bustle nor levity. These were the chief folk of Rocky Springs,
and their position, as examples to their brethren of lesser degree,
weighed heavily upon them.
Mrs. John was the light about which all social moths fluttered. The
women supporting her formed a bodyguard sufficiently impressive and
substantial. The men-folk were allowed no nearer than the fringe of
their bristling skirts. It was like the slow and stately progress of a
swollen, vastly overfed queen bee, moving on her round of the cells to
deposit her eggs. The women were the attendant bees, the men were the
guarding drones, whose habits in real life in no way detracted from
the analogy, while Mrs. John--well, Mrs. John would have made a fine
specimen of a queen bee, except, perhaps, for the egg-laying business.
They, too, were being drawn to the magnet point, but, as the distance
they had to travel was greater than that of the other villagers, they
would certainly be the last to arrive. This had been well calculated
by Mrs. John, who was nothing if not important. She had well seen to
it that the ceremony, so shortly to take place, was on no account to
begin until her august word had been given. To further insure this
trifling piece of self-aggrandizement she was defraying the whole of
the expenses for the demolishment of the aged landmark of the valley.
The saloonkeeper, O'Brien, coldly cynical, but eager to miss nothing
of the doings of his fellow citizens, took up his position at an early
hour with two of the most faithful adherents of his business house.
It was his way to observe. It was his way to watch, and read the signs
going on about him. This valley, and all that belonged to it, had
little enough attraction for him beyond its possibilities of profit to
himself. Therefore the signs about him were at all times important.
And the signs of the doings of the forthcoming day more particularly
so.
Those who accompanied him were Danny Jarvis and "fighting" Mike. They
were entirely after his own heart, and, perhaps, if opportunity ever
chanced to offer, after his pocket as well. They accompanied him
because he insisted upon it, and with a more than tacit protest. As
yet they had not sufficiently slept off the fumes of their overnight
indulgence in rye whisky. But O'Brien, when it suited him, was quite
irresistible to his customers.
Having roused these two inebriates from their drunken slumbers on the
hay in his barn with a healthy kick, he proceeded to herd them out
into the daylight with a whole-hearted enthusiasm.
"Out you get, you lousy souses," he enjoined them. "There's a big
play up at the old tree goin' to happen right away. Guess that old
crow bait, Ma Day'll need all the youth an' beauty o' Rocky Springs
around to get eyes on her glory. I can't say either o' you boys fit
in with these things, but if you don't git too near hoss soap and
cold water mebbe you'll pass for the picturesque."
After a brief interval of blasphemous upbraiding and protest, after
these two men had exhausted their complimentary vocabulary on the
subject of the charms of the lumber merchant's wife, to all of which
O'Brien turned a more or less deaf ear, the three set out for the
scene of action, and took up an obscure position whence they could
watch every detail of the proceedings without, themselves, being too
closely observed.
As O'Brien looked out upon the preparations already made, and while
his two friends stood chewing the silent cud of angry discontent, with
a diluting of black plug tobacco, he had to admit that the moment
certainly was a moment, and the scene had assumed a fascination which
even contrived to take possession of his now somewhat rusty
imagination.
There, in the center of all, stood the villainous old pine, clothed in
all its atmosphere of unconscionable evil. It stood out quite by
itself in the midst of a clearing, which had been carefully prepared.
Every tree and every bush had been cut away, so that nothing should
interfere with the impressive fall of the aged giant.
O'Brien studied the position closely. His eye was measuring, and he
was forced to admit that the setting was impressive. More than that,
he felt constrained to appreciate the imagination of Mrs. John Day.
With a view to possibilities the approximate height of the tree had
been taken, and a corresponding radius had been cleared of all lesser
growths. This was excellent. But--and he contrived to find one
objection--the old Meeting House was well within the radius. It was
the preparation for its defense to which he took exception. He scorned
the surrounding of lesser trees which had been left to guard it from
the crushing impact should the tree fall that way. Nor was he slow to
air his opinions.
He eyed the discontented features of his companions, and snorted
violently.
"Say," he cried, forcefully. "Look at that, you two bokays o' beauty."
He pointed at the Meeting House. "There--right there. If that
darnation stack o' kindlin' was to fall that aways, why, I guess them
vegetables wouldn't amount to a mush o' cabbige."
Fighting Mike deliberately spat.
"An' who in hell cares?" he snarled.
O'Brien turned on the other for a sign of interest. But Danny's
stomach was in bad case.
"Oh, hell!" he cried, and promptly turned his gaze in another
direction.
O'Brien looked from one to the other, torn by feelings of pity and
anger, with a desire for bodily assault uppermost.
"You sure are bright boys," he said at last, a sort of sardonic humor
getting the better of his harsher feelings.
He had no intention of having his enjoyment spoiled by what he termed
"bad bile," so he yielded his full attention to the tree itself. It
certainly was a magnificent piece of Nature's handiwork. Somehow he
regretted that he had never studied it carefully before. From the tree
he turned to a mild appreciation of the other preparations for its
fall. Long guide ropes had been set in place, high up the vast, bare
trunk. These, four of them in number, had been secured at the four
points of the compass to other trees of stout growth on the fringe of
the clearing. They were new ropes provided for the purpose. Then
again, a heavy cable chain had been girded about the lower trunk, and
to this, well out of range of the fall of the tree, were hitched two
teams of heavy draught horses. It was obvious that they were to haul
as the tree, steadied by the guides, began to fall.
He summed up the result of his observations for the benefit of his
companions, in a pleasantly conversational manner.
"Makes a dandy picture," he said doubtfully, "but I guess there's a
whole heap o' things women don't understand. Hand 'em a baby, an' they
got men beat a mile, an' they most gener'ly don't forget to say so.
That's all right, an' we ain't kickin' a thing. Guess we ain't
yearnin' to share that glory--none of us. But babies and fellin' trees
ain't got a spark o' resemblance far as I kin see, 'cep' it is an axe
is a mighty useful thing dealing with 'em when they ain't needed. What
I was comin' to was this old sawdust bag, Ma Day'll have a hell of a
mouthful to chew when that tree gets busy. These guides ain't a
circumstance. They won't hold nothin'. An' I guess I don't get a step
nearer things than I am now."
Mike gazed around on the speaker with billious scorn.
"Don't guess that'll hurt nothin'," he sneered.
Danny was beginning to revive.
"Ain't you goin' to hand the leddy compliments?" he inquired
sarcastically. "You got an elegant tank o' hot air laid on."
O'Brien remained quite unruffled.
"She'll hand herself all the compliments she's yearnin' for. Women
like her can't do without bokays, an' they don't care a cuss how they
get 'em. Say----"
He gazed up at the tattered crest of the tree. But the immensity of
its height, looking so directly up, turned him dizzy, and he was glad
to bring his gaze back to the unattractive faces of his companions.
"----I'm gettin' clear on to higher ground. You boys stop right ther'.
If the old tree gets busy your ways it won't matter nothin'. Guess
your score's overrun down at the saloon, but I lose that without a
kick. You're too bright for me."
He turned away, and, moving up the hill, took up a fresh position.
Here he had a better view. He had abandoned the pleasure of listening
to any speeches which he felt sure would be made, but his safety more
than compensated him. Without the distractions of his companions'
society he was better able to concentrate his attention upon details.
He observed that the tree was already sawn more than half way through,
and he congratulated himself that he had not discovered it before.
Also he saw a number of huge, hardwood wedges lying on the ground, and
beside them two heavy wooden mauls.
Their purpose was obvious, and he wondered who were the men who would
handle them. And, wondering, he cast an interested eye up at the sky
with the thought of wind in his mind. The possibility of such a
tragedy as the sudden rising of a breeze to upset calculations, and,
incidentally, the half-sawn tree, had no effect upon him. He was out
of range. Those gathering about the tree in the open were welcome to
their belief in the strength of the guide ropes.
In a few moments all his interest was centered about the gathering of
the villagers. He knew them all, and watched them with the keenest
interest. He could hear the babel of tongues from his security. Nor
could he help feeling how much these people resembled a flock of
silly, curious sheep.
His eyes quickly searched for those whom he felt were really the more
important in the concern of the tree. Where were Charlie Bryant, and
those men who were concerned in his exploits? His eyes scanned every
face, and then, when his search was completed, something like
excitement took possession of him.
Charlie Bryant was absent. So were his associates, Kid Blaney, Stormy
Longton, Holy Dick, and Cranky Herefer. Where were Pete Clancy and
Nick Devereux, Kate Seton's hired men? They were all absent. So was
Kate herself. Ah, yes, he had heard she had gone to Myrtle. Anyway,
her sister, Helen, was there--with Mrs. John Day. Where was her
beau--Charlie Bryant's brother?
His excitement rose. The coincidence of these absences suggested
possibilities. The possibilities brought a fresh train of thought. He
suddenly realized that not a single policeman was present. This, of
course, might easily be accounted for on the score of duty. But their
absence, taken in conjunction with the absence of the others,
certainly was remarkable.
But now the ceremony was beginning. Mrs. John Day had assumed command,
and, surrounded by her select bodyguard, she was haranguing the
villagers, and enjoying herself tremendously. Yes, there was no manner
of doubt about her enjoyment. O'Brien's maliciously humorous eyes
watched her expression of smiling self-satisfaction, and estimated it
at its true worth. Her face was very red, and her arms swung about
like flails, beating the air in her efforts to carry conviction upon
an indifferent audience. He felt that the glory of that moment was
something she must have lived for for days, and a feeling of awful
anticipation swept over him as he considered her possible verbal and
physical antics at such time as the new church should be opened. He
felt that it would really be necessary to take a holiday on that
occasion.
However, the speech terminated, as speeches sometimes do, and a chorus
of applause dutifully followed, as such choruses generally do. And now
the great interest of the day was to begin.
Menfolk began to press the crowd back beyond the safety line, and two
of Mrs. Day's lumbermen, evidently sent down for the occasion by her
husband from his camp, picked up the two wooden mauls. At the same
time a man took his place at each guide rope.
O'Brien rubbed his hands. Now for the fun, and he thought of the old
legend. He wondered which of those silly-looking sheep, gazing in
open-mouthed expectation, were to be the victims of the old Indian
curse. And curiously enough, hard-headed, callous as he was, O'Brien
was convinced someone was to pay the penalty.
The great wedges were placed in position, and the heavy stroke of one
of the mauls resounded through the valley. A second wedge was placed,
and a second stroke fell. Then several strokes in swift succession,
and the men stood clear, and gazed upward with measuring eye.
O'Brien, too, looked up. The tree had begun to lean, and two of the
guides were straining taut. He wondered. He wondered if the men at the
guides were used to the work. Now, for the first time, he realized
that the crest of the tree had a vast overhang of foliage on one side,
and mighty misshapen limbs. He regarded it speculatively.
Then he glanced at the lumbermen. They were still looking up at the
lean of the tree. Suddenly he found himself expressing his opinions
aloud, as he ominously shook his head.
"They're raw hands, or--jest mill hands," he muttered. "They sure
ain't sawyers."
And again his eyes lifted to the ominous overhang.
A further scrutiny enlightened him. They were endeavoring to fell the
tree so that its crest should drop somewhere on or near the trail
toward the new church. This made its fall in the direction of, but to
the south of, the old Meeting House. This was obviously for the
purpose of simplifying haulage. Good enough--if all went well.
The lumbermen seemed satisfied and turned again to their wedges. As
they did so a gleam of smiling irony began to grow in O'Brien's eyes.
He had detected a slight swing in the overhang of the crest, and the
strain on the two guides was unequally distributed. The greater strain
was on the _wrong_ guide.
The swing of the tree was slightly out of its calculated direction,
and inclining a degree or two nearer the direction of the Meeting
House.
As the heavy strokes of the mauls fell he glanced over the faces of
the onlookers. What a picture of expectancy, what idiotic delight he
saw there!
A crack, sharp and loud, echoed over the clearing. The double team
were straining mightily on their heavy tugs. The lumbermen had stood
clear. The strain on the _wrong_ guide had increased.
O'Brien looked up. The swing had changed several more degrees, further
out of its direction.
The expression of the upturned faces had changed, too. Now it was
evident that others had realized what O'Brien had discovered already.
Loud voices began to point it out, and the lumbermen stared stupidly
upward. The tree was in the balance, and slowly moving, bearing all
its crushing weight upon that single _wrong_ guide.
There was a rapid movement near O'Brien, and Mike and Danny Jarvis
joined him hurriedly.
"Say," cried the latter, "the blamed galoots'll bust up the whole
durned shootin' match."
Which remark warned O'Brien that Danny had awakened to the threatening
danger to the Meeting House.
"They done it," returned O'Brien calmly, his eyes riveted upon the
leaning tree.
Mike thrust his hands into the tops of his trousers.
"It sure was time to quit," he said with satisfaction.
The saloonkeeper's only comment was to rub his hands in a sort of
malicious glee. Then in a moment, he pointed at the straining guide.
"It's got way," he cried. "Look, she's spinning. The rope. She'll part
in half a tick. Get it? Say, might as well try to hold a house with
pure rubber, as a new rope. It's got such a spring. It's give the old
tree way. Now it's----. Gee!"
His final exclamation came as a terrific rending and cracking, far
louder than heavy gunshots, came from the base of the tree. There was
a vision of the lumbermen running clear. The next instant the
straining guide parted with a report that echoed far down the valley.
Then, caught by the other restraining guide, the whole tree swung
around, pivoting on its base, and fell with a roar of splitting and
rending, and a mighty final boom, along the whole length of the roof
of the Meeting House.
All O'Brien had anticipated had come to pass. Furthermore, the mush of
"vegetables" surrounding the house was more than fulfilled. The vast
trunk cut its way through the building, everything, like a knife
passing through butter, and finally came to rest upon the ruined
flooring inside.
With the final crash an awful silence prevailed. Not a voice was
raised among the onlookers. The old superstitions were fully stirring.
Was this the beginning of some further disaster to come? Was this the
work of that old-time curse? Was this only a part of the evil
connected with that tree? It was not the destruction of the house
alone that filled them with awe. It was the character of the house
that had been destroyed.
But in a moment the spell was broken, and O'Brien was the first to
help to break it. The tree had fallen. It lay there quite still, like
some great, dead, evil giant. Now his callous mind demanded to know
the full extent of the damage done.
He left his post, followed closely by his companions, and ran down
toward the wrecked building. With his movement a rush came from other
directions among the spectators, and, in the twinkling of an eye, the
ruined Meeting House was swarmed with an eager, curious throng of men
and women clambering over the wreckage.
What a gladdening result for the sensation-loving minds of the
callous! O'Brien and his companions were among the first to reach the
scene.
There lay the fallen giant, the greater part of its colossal crest far
beyond the extreme end of the demolished building. Only a few of the
lower, bare branches, just beneath the foliage, had caught the house,
these and the trunk. But the wreckage was complete. The walls had
fallen as though they had been made of loose sand, walls that had
withstood the storms of years, and the old, heavy-timbered roof was
torn to shreds, and lay strewn about like matchwood.
As the eager crowd swarmed over the _debris_ an extraordinary sight
awaited them. The weight of the tree, and the falling roof timbers,
had almost completely destroyed the flooring, and there, in its place,
gaped an open cavity extending the length of the building. The place
was undermined by one huge cellar, divided by now crushed and broken
cross-supporting walls.
The searching eyes of the saloonkeeper and his companions lost no
detail. Nor did the prevailing astonishment at the discovery seem to
concern them. With some care they clambered among the _debris_ to add
further to the discovery, if such additions were to be made. And their
efforts were rewarded without stint. The all-unsuspected and unknown
cellar was no simple relic of a bygone age, but displayed every sign
of recent usage. Furthermore, it was stocked with more than a hundred
liquor kegs, many of which were empty, but, also, many of which were
full of smuggled rye whisky.
Within five minutes the entire village, from Mrs. John Day down to the
youngest child, knew that the cache of the whisky-runners had been
laid bare by the fall of the old pine.
The wave of sentimental superstition again broke out and fastened
itself upon the minds of the people, and the miracle of it was spoken
of among them with almost bated breath.
But O'Brien had no time to waste upon any such thought. He clambered
round through the cellars with eyes and wits alert. And he chuckled
delightedly, as, groping in the half-light among the kegs, he
discovered and recognized his own markings upon many of the empty
kegs.
The whole thing amused him vastly, and he dilated upon his various
discoveries to those who accompanied him.
"Say, Danny, boy, don't it beat hell?" he cried gleefully. "While all
them psalm-smiters were busy to death sweepin' the cobwebs out o'
their muddy souls upstairs, the old wash-tub o' sins was full to the
bung o' good wholesome rye underneath 'em. Was it a bright notion?
Well, I'd smile. If it don't beat the whole blamed circus. Is there a
p'liceman in the country 'ud chase up a Meetin' House for liquor? Not
on your life. That dope was as safe right there from discovery as if
it was stored in the United States Treasury. Say, them guys was smart.
Smart? Hell--say--what's that?"
Excited voices were talking and calling loudly beyond the walls of the
ruined building. Even amid the dark surroundings of the cellars
O'Brien and his companions detected the words "police" and "patrol."
Ready for any fresh interest forthcoming, the saloonkeeper clambered
hurriedly out of the cellar with the other men close behind him. They
mounted the broken walls and looked out upon the crowd.
All eyes were turned along the trail coming up from the village, and
O'Brien followed the direction of their gaze. A half-spring police
wagon, followed closely by a wagon, which many recognized as that of
Charlie Bryant, were coming up the trail, escorted by Inspector Fyles
and a patrol of police troopers. The horses were walking slowly, and
as they approached a hush fell upon the crowd of spectators.
Suddenly Stanley Fyles urged his horse forward, and came on at a rapid
canter. He pulled up at the ruined building and looked about him,
first at the wreckage and then at the silent throng. Then, as he
beheld O'Brien standing on the wall, he pointed at the ruins.
"An--accident?" he inquired sharply.
O'Brien's eyes twinkled.
"A damn piece of foolish play by folks who orter know better," he
said. "They tried wreckin' this durned old tree an' succeeded in
wreckin' the soul laundry o' this yer village. Mebbe, too, you'll find
things down under it to interest you, inspector. I don't guess you'd
be lookin' for whisky an' religion goin' hand in hand, so to speak."
The officer's eyes were sharply questioning.
"How's that?"
"Why, the cellars are full o' kegs of good rye--some full, some empty.
Gee, but I'd hate spilling it."
The wagons had come up, and now it was to be seen that coarse police
blankets were laid out over them, the soft material displaying
something of the ominous figures hidden under them.
"Say----" cried the startled saloonkeeper, and paused, as his quick
eyes observed these signs. Then, in an excited voice, he went on.
"Say, them--wagons--are loaded some."
Fyles nodded.
"I was bringing 'em along to have them laid out here--in the Meeting
House, before--burial."
"Burial?"
O'Brien's eyes opened wide. A sort of gasp went through the silent
crowd of onlookers, hanging on the police officer's words.
"Yes, it was a brush with--the runners," Fyles said seriously. "We
got them red-handed last night. It was a case of shooting, too. Two
of our boys were shot up. They're in the wagons. There's three of the
gang--dead, and the boss of it, Charlie Bryant. They're all in the
wagons. The rest are across the border by now. Guess there'll be no
more whisky run in this valley."
The hush which followed his announcement was far more eloquent than
words.
It was O'Brien whose temerity was strong enough to break it.
"That's so," he remarked thoughtfully. Then he sighed a world of
genuine regret, and his eyes glanced along the vast timber of the old
pine. "Guess the old cuss has worked out," he went on. "No, there'll
be no more whisky-running." Then he climbed slowly down from the wall.
"I'll have to get--moving on."
CHAPTER XXXIX
FROM THE ASHES
The nine days' wonder had come and passed. Never again could the
valley of Leaping Creek return to the conditions which had for so long
prevailed there. And strangely enough the victory won was far more a
moral than a physical one. True, one or two lives had paid for the
victory, but this was less than nothing compared with the effect
achieved.
Within three weeks a process of emigration had set in which left the
police with scarcely an excuse for their presence in the valley at
all. All those who, for long years, had sought sanctuary within the
shelter of the vast, forest-clad slopes of the valley, began to
realize that the immunity which they had enjoyed for so long was
rapidly becoming doubtful. The forces of the police suddenly seemed to
have become possessed of a too-intimate knowledge of the shortcomings
which had driven them to shelter. In fact, the limelight of government
authority was shining altogether too brightly, searching out the
shadowed corners in the lives of the citizens, and yielding up secrets
so long and so carefully hidden.
The first definite result of the police raid apparent was the "moving
on" of Dirty O'Brien. It came quite suddenly, and unexpectedly. Rocky
Springs one morning awoke to find that the old saloon was closed.
Inquiry soon elicited the true facts. O'Brien had vanished. The barn
was empty. His team and spring wagon had gone, and the house, and bar,
had been stripped of everything worth taking. The night before O'Brien
had served his customers up to the usual hour, and there was nothing
unusual to be observed. Therefore, the removal must have been effected
swiftly and silently in the dead of night, performed as the result of
careful, well-laid plans.
This was the first result of the definite establishment of police
authority. Evidently the future of Rocky Springs no longer appealed to
the shrewd saloonkeeper, and so he "moved on."
This was the cue for further goings. With the saloon closed, and the
police authority established, Rocky Springs was Rocky Springs no
longer. So, one by one, silently, without the least ostentation, men
began to yield up their claims as citizens, and, vanishing over the
distant horizon, were heard of no more.
The sledgehammer of police methods had penetrated through the
case-hardening of the village, and the place became hopelessly
impossible for its population of undesirables.
For Helen Seton those first three weeks left her with a dull,
apathetic feeling that quite suddenly her whole world had been turned
upside down. That somehow a complete wreckage of all the life about
her, her new life, had been consummated. Nor did she understand why,
or how. It seemed to her she was living in a new world where all was
misery and depression. Her usually bubbling spirit was weighted down
as with an avalanche of responsibility and unhappiness.
For her the change had begun with almost the very moment of the
felling of the old pine, and, somehow, it seemed to her as if that
wicked, mischievous monument of bygone crimes were responsible.
With the yielding up of the secrets of the Meeting House had started a
succession of shocks, each one harder than its predecessor to bear,
until she was left almost paralyzed and quite powerless to resist
them.
With Stanley Fyles heading the procession of death, with the man's
brief outline of the circumstances attending his raid, her heart
seemed suddenly to have turned to stone. Her thought turned at once to
her sister. That sister, even now away from home, waiting in dreading
unconsciousness for the completion of the disaster she so terribly
feared. To Helen's sympathetic heart the horror of the position was
magnified an hundredfold. Kate had been right. Kate had understood
where they had all been blind, and Kate, loyal, strong, brave Kate,
must learn that the very disaster she had prophesied had come, and, in
coming, had overtaken the one man they had all so earnestly desired to
shield--Charlie Bryant.
Without waiting another moment she left the scene. She had blindly
rushed from the proximity of that gaping, awe-stricken, curious crowd.
And her way had taken her straight home. She had no thought for any
object. How could she? Her mind and heart were overflowing with fear
and concern, and a world of sympathy for Kate--the absent Kate.
Charlie was dead. Charlie had been caught red-handed. Charlie, that
poor, helpless, besotted drunkard. He--he--after all their faith in
his integrity, after all Kate's lavish affection, he was the real
criminal, and--Fyles had run him to his death. She had no thought now
of Bill's absence from her side. She had no thought of anything but
this one overwhelming disaster.
So she ran on home. Nor did she pause till she flung herself upon the
coverlet of her little white bed in a passionate storm of weeping.
How long she lay there she never knew. A merciful Providence finally
sent sleep to her weary brain and heart. And when she ultimately awoke
it was to start up dazedly, and find herself staring into the solemn,
dreadful eyes of her sister, Kate, who was standing just beyond the
open doorway of her bedroom, gazing in upon her.
Then followed a scene never likely to be wholly forgotten.
She sprang from her bed and ran toward that ominous figure. She was
prepared to fling herself upon that strong support which had never yet
failed her. But, for once, no such support was forthcoming. Long
before she reached her side Kate had stepped into the room and seemed
to collapse into the rocker beside the dressing bureau. The brave
Kate was reduced to a pitiful outburst of tearless sobs.
For one brief instant Helen was again on the verge of tears, but she
remembered. With a great effort she forced them back, and held herself
in a strong grip. Then, slowly, a change began to creep over her. It
was not she who must look for support from Kate. It was she who must
yield support, and the memory of all those years when Kate, never by
word or act had failed her, came to her aid.
But though she sought by every means in her power to comfort the
heartbroken woman, her efforts were wholly unavailing. They were
perhaps worse than unavailing. For Kate proved as unreasonable as any
weak, hysterical girl, and, rebuffing her at every turn, finally broke
into such a storm of bitter self-reviling as to leave her sister
helpless.
"Leave me, Helen," she cried, through her grievous sobs. "Don't come
near me. Go, go. Don't look at me; don't come near. I'm not fit to
live. I'm a--murderess. It's I--I who've killed him. Oh, God, was
there ever such punishment. No--no. Go away--go away. I--I can't bear
it."
Horrified beyond words, stunned and confused, poor Helen knew not
where to turn, or what to do. She stood silently by--wondering. Then,
without reasoning or understanding, something came to her help just as
she was about to yield to her own woman's weakness once more.
She moved out of the room, nor did she know for what reason. Nor was
her next action any impulse of her own. Mechanically she set about the
housework of her home.
It was her salvation, the salvation of the situation. She worked, and
gradually a great calm settled upon her. Thought began to flow.
Practical, helpful thought. And as she worked she saw all those things
she must do for poor Kate's well-being.
It was a long and terrible day. And when night fell she was utterly
wearied out in mind and body. She had already prepared a meal for
Kate, which had been left untouched, and now, as evening came, she
prepared another.
But this, like the first, was never partaken of by her sister. When
she went into her own bedroom, where Kate had remained, to make her
second attempt, she found to her relief and joy that her sister was
lying on her bed sound asleep.
She stole out and closed up the house for the night.
Nor was Helen prepared for the miracle of the next morning. When she
arose it was to find her bedroom empty, and her bed made up. She
hurriedly set out in search of her sister. She was nowhere in the
house. In rapidly rising dismay she hurried out to search the barn,
fearing she knew not what. But instant relief awaited her. Kate was
outside doing all those little necessary duties by the livestock of
her homestead, which she was accustomed to do, in the calm unruffled
fashion in which she always went about her work.
Helen stared. She could scarcely believe her eyes. The miracle was
altogether beyond her comprehension. But her delight and relief were
profound. She greeted her sister and spoke. Then it was that she
realized that here was no longer the old Kate, but a changed, utterly
changed woman. The big eyes, so darkly ringed, no longer smiled. They
looked out at her so full of unutterable pain, as full of dull aching
regrets. There was such a depth of yearning and misery in them that
her greeting suddenly seemed to jar upon her own ears, and come back
to her in bitter mockery. In a moment, however, understanding came.
Intuitively she felt that her sister's grief was her own, into which
she could never pry. She must ask no questions, she must offer no
sympathy. For the moment her sister's mantle had fallen upon her
shoulders. Hers had suddenly become the strength, and it was for her
to use it in Kate's support.
So the days wore on, long dreary days of many heartaches and bitter
speculation. Kate remained the dark, brooding figure she had displayed
herself on that first morning after her return. She was utterly
unapproachable in those first days, while yet at the greatest pains to
conceal the sorrow she was enduring. No questions or explanations
passed between the two women, and Helen was left without the faintest
suspicion of the truth.
Sometimes, Helen, in the long silent days, strove to solve the meaning
of everything for herself. She thought and thought till her poor head
ached. But she always began and ended with the same thought. It was
Charlie's capture, Charlie's death which had wrought this havoc in her
sister, and she felt that time alone could remove the shadow which had
settled itself so hopelessly upon her.
Then she began to wonder and worry at the prolonged absence of
her--Bill.
* * * * *
Kate had just finished removing the remains of the evening meal. Helen
had curled herself up in the old rocker. She was reading through the
numerous pages of a long letter, for perhaps the twentieth time. She
was tired, bodily and mentally, and her pretty face looked drawn under
its tanning.
Her sister watched her, moving silently about, returning the various
articles to the cupboards where they belonged. Her eyes were shadowed.
The old assurance seemed to have gone entirely out of her. Her whole
manner was inclined to a curious air of humility, which, even now,
seemed to fit her so ill.
She watched the girl turn page after page. Then she heard her draw a
long sigh as she turned the last page.
Helen looked up and caught the eyes so yearningly regarding her.
"I--I feel better now," she declared, with a pathetic little smile.
"And--please--please don't worry about me, Kate, dear. I'm tired.
We're both tired. Tired to death. But--there's no help for it. We
surely must keep going, and--and we've no one now to help us." She
glanced down at the letter in her lap. Then she abruptly raised her
eyes, and went on quickly. "Say, Kate, I s'pose we'll never see Nick
or Pete again? Shall we always have to do the work of our little patch
ourselves?" Then she smiled and something of her old lightness peeped
out of her pretty eyes. "Look at me," she cried. "I--I haven't put on
one of my nice suits since--since that day. I'm--a tramp."
Kate's returning smile was of the most shadowy description. She shook
her head.
"Maybe we'll get some hired men soon," she said, quietly. Then she
sighed. "I don't know. I hope so. I guess we'll never see Nick again.
He got away--I believe--across the border. As for Pete," she
shuddered, "he was found by the police--shot dead."
Helen sat up.
"You never told me," she cried.
Kate shook her head.
"I didn't want to distress you--any more." Just for one moment she
averted her eyes. Then they came back to Helen's face in an inquiry.
"When--when is--Bill coming back?"
"Bill?" Helen's eyes lighted up, and a warm smile shone in them as she
glanced down at her letter again. "He says he'll be through with
Charlie's affairs soon. He's in Amberley. He's had to see to things
through the police. He's coming right on here the moment he's through.
He's--he's going to wire me when he starts. Kate?"
"Yes, dear."
Kate turned from the cook stove at the abruptness of her sister's
tone. Helen began to speak rapidly, and as she talked she kept her
gaze fixed upon the window.
"It's--it's a long while now, since--that day. We were both feeling
mighty bad 'bout things then. We," she smiled whimsically, "sort of
didn't know whether it was Rocky Springs, or Broadway, did we? And
there was such a lot I didn't know or understand. And I never asked a
question. Did I?"
Kate winced visibly. The moment she had always dreaded had come. She
had realized that it must eventually come, and for days she had
wondered vaguely how she would be able to meet it. The smile which
strove to reach her eyes was a failure, and, for a moment, a hunted
look threatened. In the end, however, she forced herself to perfect
calmness.
"I don't think I could have answered them then if you had," she said
gently. "I don't know that I can answer many now--for both our sakes."
Helen thought for some moments. Then she appeared to have arrived at a
determination.
"How did you--come home that day--and why? I didn't expect you until
the next day."
Kate drew a deep breath.
"I came back--riding," she said. "I came back because--because I had
to."
"Why?"
"Because of the--disaster out there."
"You knew?"
Kate nodded.
"Pretty well everything. That is all I can tell you, dear." Kate
crossed the room, and stood beside her sister's chair. She laid one
gentle hand upon her shoulder. "Don't ask me any more about that.
It--it is like--like searing my very soul with red-hot irons. That
must be my secret, and you must forgive me for keeping it from you.
Ask me anything else, and I will tell you--but leave that alone. It
can do nobody any good."
Helen leaned her head on one side till her soft cheek rested
caressingly upon her sister's hand.
"Forgive me, Kate," she said. "I didn't mean to hurt you. I'll never
mention it again--never."
For some moments neither spoke. But Kate was waiting. She knew there
were other questions that must be asked and answered.
"Was it because of the felling of that tree you went away?" Helen
asked presently.
Kate shook her head.
"No."
Helen started up.
"I knew it wasn't. Oh, Kate, I knew it wasn't. It was so unlike you. I
know why you went. Listen," she went on, almost excitedly. "You always
defended Charlie. You pretended to believe him straight. You--you
stuck to him through thick and thin. You flouted every charge made
against him. It was because of him you went away. You went to try and
help him--save him. All the time you knew he was against the law.
That's why you went. Oh, Kate, I knew it--I knew it."
Helen was looking up into her sister's shadowed face with loyal
enthusiasm shining in her admiring eyes.
Kate gravely shook her head.
"I believed every word I said of Charlie. As God is my witness I
believed it. And I tell you now, Helen, that as long as I live my
heart will be bowed down beneath a terrible weight of grief and
remorse at the death of a brave, honest, and loyal gentleman. I have
no more to say. I never shall have--on the subject. I love you, Helen,
and shall always love you. My one thought in life now is your welfare.
If you love me, dear, then leave those things. Leave them as part of a
cruel, evil, shadowed time, which must be put behind us. All I want
you to ever remember of it--when you are the happy wife of your Big
Brother Bill--is that Charlie was all we believed him, in spite of
all appearances, and he died the noblest, the most heroic death that
man ever died."
Kate bent down and tenderly kissed the beautiful head of fair, wavy
hair. Then, without waiting for the astonished sister's reply, she
moved across to the door.
"Some day," she said, pausing with her hand on the catch, and, turning
back, smiling gently through the gathering tears, "Bill will tell you
it all. He knows it all--everything. Just now he is bound to secrecy,
but he will be released from that some day, and then--he will tell
you."
CHAPTER XL
THE DAWN
A girl was leaning against a solitary post, a hundred yards or so from
where the descent into the valley of Leaping Creek began. All about
her stretched the vast plains of grass, which seemed to know no end.
The wide flat trail, so bare and hard, passed her by, and vanished
into the valley behind her. In the opposite direction, at long
intervals, it showed up in sections as it passed over the rises in the
prairie ocean, until the limits of her vision were reached.
Not a single object stood out to relieve the monotony of that desert
of grass. Any dwelling of man within reach of the searching eye must
have been hidden in the troughs between the crests of summer grass. It
was all so wide, so vast, so dreadful in its unspeakable solitude.
Helen's eyes were upon the last section of the trail, away to the
northwest, just as far as her bright eyes could see. She was
searching, searching. Her heart was beating with a great and buoyant
hope, and every little detail she beheld in that far-off distance she
searched, and sought to mould into the figure of the horseman she was
waiting for.
The sun was hot. It's relentless rays, freed from the wealth of shade
in the valley below, beat down upon the parching land with a fiery
intensity which must have been insupportable to unaccustomed human
life. But to Helen it meant nothing, nothing but the fact that its
brilliant light was in keeping with every beat of the warm, thrilling
heart within her bosom.
He was on the road. Bill--her Big Brother Bill. He was on the road,
and must be somewhere near now, for the telegram in her hand warned
her that he hoped to reach the valley by sundown.
Four long weeks since the dreadful day. Four long weeks in which her
aching heart and weary thought had left her in wretched unhappiness.
Four weeks of doubt and trouble, in which her sister seemed to have
shut herself out of her life, leaving her to face all her doubts and
fears alone.
Bill was away on his dead brother's affairs. Loyal Bill, seeking by
every means in his lumbering power to shield the memory of the dead
man from the effects of the manner of his death. Helen honored her
lover for it. He was just the good, loyal soul she had believed. And
now, as she stood with the tinted paper message, announcing his return
in her hand, she smiled, and wondered tenderly what blunders he would
contrive in the process.
Sundown. Sundown would not be for at least two hours. Two hours. Two
hours meant some fourteen or sixteen miles by horse upon the trail.
She told herself she could not see for sixteen miles, nor even for
eight. It was absurd waiting there. She had already been waiting there
over an hour. Then she smiled, laughing at herself for her absurd
yearning for this lover of hers. He was so big, so foolish, so honest
and loyal--and, he was just hers.
She sat down again on the ground, as already she had seated herself
many times. She would restrain her impatience. She would not just get
up at every----
She was on her feet again at the very moment of making her resolve.
This time her eyes were straining and wide open. Every nerve in her
body was at a tension. Some one was on the trail this time. Certain.
It was a horseman, too. There was no mistake, but he was near, quite
near, comparatively. How had she come to miss him in the far distance?
She saw the figure as it came over a rising ground. She watched it
closely. Then she saw it was not on the trail, but was making for
it--across country. Now she knew. Now she was certain, and she laughed
and clapped her hands. It must be Bill, and--of course he had lost
himself, and now, at last, had found his way.
The horseman came on at a great pace.
As he drew nearer a frown of doubt crossed the girl's face. He did not
appear big enough--somehow.
He dropped down into a hollow, and mounted the next crest. In a
moment, as he came into view, Helen felt like bursting into tears of
disappointment.
The next moment, however, all thought of tears passed away and a
steady coldness grew in her eyes. She felt like hiding herself back
there in the valley. She had recognized the man. Without a doubt it
was Stanley Fyles. But he wore no uniform. He was clad in a civilian
costume, which pronouncedly smacked of the prairie.
It was too late to hide. Besides, to hide would be undignified. What
was he coming to the valley for? Helen's eyes hardened. Nor did she
know quite why she felt resentful at the sight of him. Yes, she did.
It was for poor Charlie, Bill's brother. And Kate had sworn that
Charlie was innocent.
She stood thinking, thinking, and then a further change came over her.
She remembered this man's work. She remembered his duty. Ought she to
feel badly toward him?
And Kate? What of Kate? Would she----What on earth brought him to the
valley--now?
It was too late to avoid him now, if she had wanted to. And, somehow,
on reflection, she was not sure she did want to. So she stood her
ground as he came up.
He reined Peter in as he came abreast, and his dark eyes expressed his
surprise at sight of the waiting girl.
"Why--Miss Helen, this----" He broke off abruptly, and, turning in his
saddle, looked back over the long, long trail. When his eyes came back
to the girl's face they were smiling. "It's kind of hot out here,"
he said. "Aren't you afraid of the sun?" Then he became silent
altogether, while he interpreted to himself the somewhat stony regard
in her eyes.
In a moment something of the awkwardness of the encounter occurred to
him. His mind was full of other things, which before he had missed the
possibility of.
"I don't mind the sun, Mr. Fyles," said Helen coldly. "Besides, I
guess I'm not standing around here for--fun. I'm waiting for some
one."
Fyles glanced back over the trail. Then he nodded. "He's coming
along," he said quietly. "Guess he started out from Amberley before
me. Say, he's a bully feller, sure enough, and I like him. I've seen a
good deal of him in Amberley. But I guessed he wouldn't be thanking me
for my company on the trail, so I came another way, and passed on
ahead. You see--I, well, I had to do my duty--here, and--well, he's a
bully feller, Miss Helen, and--you'll surely be happy with him."
While he was talking, just for a moment, a wild impulse stirred Helen
to some frigid and hateful retort. But the man's evident sincerity won
the day and the girl's eyes lit with a radiant smile.
"He's--on the trail?" she cried, banishing her last shadow of
coldness. "He is? Say, tell me where, and when he'll get in. I--I had
this message which said he'd be here by sundown, and--and I thought
I'd just come right along and meet him. Have--have you seen him?
And--and----"
Fyles shook his head. "Not until just now," he said kindly. "He's
about four miles back. Say," he added, with less assurance, "maybe
your sister's home?"
For a moment Helen stared incredulously. "Yes," she answered slowly.
Then in agitation: "You're not going to----?"
The man nodded, but his smile had died out. "Yes. That's why I've come
along," he said seriously. "Is--is she well? Is she----?"
But Helen left him no time to finish his apprehensive inquiries. At
that moment she caught sight of a distant figure on the trail. It was
the figure of a big man--so big, and her woman's heart cried out in
love and thankfulness.
"Oh, look! It's Bill--my Bill! Here he comes. Oh, thank God."
Stanley Fyles flung a glance over his shoulder. Then without a word he
lifted Peter's reins. Then he seemed to glide off in the direction of
the setting sun.
As he went he drew a long sigh. He was wondering--wondering if all the
happiness in the world lay there, behind him, in the warm heart of the
girl who was waiting to embrace her lover.
* * * * *
Kate Seton was standing at the window of her parlor. Her back was
turned upon the room, upon the powerful, loose-limbed figure of
Stanley Fyles.
Her face was hidden, she wanted it to remain hidden--from him. She
felt that he must not see all that his sudden visit, without warning,
meant to her.
The man was near the center table. One knee was resting upon the hard,
tilted seat of a Windsor chair, and his folded arms leaned upon the
back of it. His eyes were full of a deep fire as he gazed upon the
woman's erect, graceful figure. A great longing was in him to seize
her, and crush her in arms that were ready to claim and hold her
against all the world.
All the atmosphere of his calling seemed to have fallen from him. He
stood there just a plain, strong man of no great eloquence, facing a
position in which he might well expect certain defeat, but from which
there was no thought of shrinking.
Silence had fallen since their first greeting. That painful silence
when realization of that which lies between them drives each to search
for a way to cross the barrier.
It was Kate who finally spoke. She moved slightly. It was a movement
which might have suggested many things, among them uncertainty of
mind, perhaps of decision. Her voice came low and gentle. But it was
full of a great weariness and regret, even of pain.
"Why--why did you come--now?" she asked plaintively. "It seems as
though I've lived through years in the last few weeks. I've tried to
forget so much. And now--you come here to remind me--to stir once more
the shadows which have nearly driven me crazy. Is it merciful--to do
that?"
The woman's tone was baffling. Fyles searched for its meaning.
Resentment he had anticipated. He had been prepared for it, and to
resist it, and break it down by the ardor of his appeal. That dreary
regret was more than he could bear, and he hastened to protest.
"Say, Kate," he cried, his sun-tanned features flushing with a quick
shame. "Don't think I've come here to remind you. Don't think I've
come along to taunt you with the loss of our--our mad wager. I want to
forget it. It became a gamble on a man's life, and--and I hate the
thought. You're free of it, and I wish to God it had never been made."
The bitter sincerity of his final words was not without its effect.
Kate stirred. Then she turned. Her beautiful eyes, so full of pathos,
so full of remorse, looked straight into his.
"Then--why did you come here?" she asked.
The man started up. The chair dropped back on to its four legs with a
clatter. His arms were outstretched, and the passionate fire of his
eyes blazed up as the quick, hot words escaped his lips.
"Why? Why?" he demanded, his eyes widening, his whole body vibrant
with a consuming passion. "Don't you know? Kate, Kate, I came because
I couldn't stay away. I came because there's just nothing in the world
worth living for but you. I came because I just love you to death,
and--there's nothing else. Say, listen. I went right back from here
with one fixed purpose. Maybe it won't tell you a thing. Maybe you
won't understand. I went back to get quit of the force--honorably. I'd
made my peace with them. Oh, yes, I'd done that. Then I demanded leave
of absence pending my resignation. They had to grant it. I am never
going back. Oh, yes, I knew what I was up against. I wanted you. I
wanted you so that I couldn't see a thing else in any other direction.
There is no other direction. So I came straight here to--to ask you to
forget. I came here to tell you all I feel about--the work I had to do
here. I came here with a wild sort of forlorn hope you could forgive.
You see, I even believed that but for--for that--there was just a
shadow of hope for me. Kate----!"
The woman suddenly held up her hand. And when she spoke there was
nothing of the Kate he had always known in the humility of her tone.
"It is not I who must forgive," she said quickly. "If there is any
forgiveness on this earth it is I who need it."
"You? Forgiveness?"
The man's face wore blank incredulity.
Kate sighed. It was the sigh of a broken-hearted woman.
"Yes. If there is any forgiveness I pray that it may come my way. I
need it all--all. I can never forgive myself. It was I who caused
Charlie's death."
Quite suddenly her whole manner changed. The humility, the sadness of
her tone rose quickly to a passionate self-denunciation.
"Yes, yes. I will tell you now. Oh, man, man. Your words--every one
of them, have only stabbed me more and more surely to the heart. You
don't understand. You can't, because you do not know what I mean. Oh,
yes," she went on desperately, "why shouldn't I admit it? I love you.
I always have loved you. Let me admit everything fully and freely."
"Kate!" The man stepped forward, his eyes alight with a world of
happiness, of overwhelming joy. But she waved him back.
"No, no," she cried, almost harshly. "I have told you that just to
show you how your words have well nigh crazed me. I can be nothing to
you. I can be nothing to anybody. It was I who brought about Charlie's
death. He, the bravest, the loyalest man I ever knew, gave his life to
save me from the police, who were hunting me down. Oh," she went on,
at sight of Fyles's incredulous expression, "you don't need to take my
word alone. Ask Charlie's brother. Ask Bill. He was there. He, too,
shared in the sacrifice, although he did not understand that which lay
in the depths of his brother's brave heart. And now--now I must live
on with the knowledge of what my wild folly has brought about. For
weeks the burden of thought and remorse has been almost insupportable,
and now you come to torture me further. Oh, God, I have paid for my
wanton folly and wickedness. Oh, God!"
Kate buried her face in her hands, and abruptly flung herself into the
rocker close behind her.
Fyles looked down upon her in amazed helplessness. He watched the
woman's heaving shoulders as great, dry, hard sobs broke from her in
tearless agony. He waited, feeling for the moment that nothing he
could say or do but must add to her despair, to her pain. Her
self-accusation had so far left him untouched. He could not realize
all she meant. All that was plain to him was her suffering, and he
longed to comfort her, and help her, and defend her against herself.
The moments slipped away, heavy moments of intense feeling and bitter
grief.
Presently the grief-stricken woman's sobs grew less, and with
something like a gesture of impatience she snatched her hands from her
face, and raised a pair of agonized eyes to his.
"Leave me," she cried. "Go, please go. I--I can't bear it."
Her appeal was so helpless. Again the impulse to take her in his arms
was almost too strong for the man, but with an effort he overcame it.
"Won't you--go on?" he said, in the gentlest possible tone. "It will
help you. And--you would rather tell me."
The firmness of his manner, the gentleness, had a heartbreaking
effect. In a moment the woman's eyes were flooded with tears, which
coursed down her cheeks. It was the relief that her poor troubled
brain and nerves demanded, and so Fyles understood.
He waited patiently until the passion of weeping was over. Then again
he urged his demand.
"Now tell me, Kate. Tell me all. And remember I'm not here as your
judge. I am here to help--because--I love you."
The look from the woman's eyes thanked him. Then she bowed her head
lest the sight of him should leave her afraid.
* * * * *
"Must I tell it all?"
Kate's tone was firmer. There was a ring in it that reminded the other
of the woman he used to know.
"Tell me just what you wish. No more--no less. You are telling it for
your own sake, remember. To me--it makes no difference."
"There's no use in telling it you from the start. The things that led
up to it," she began. "I have been smuggling whisky for nearly five
years. It's a pretty admission, isn't it? Yes, you may well be
horrified," she went on, as Fyles started.
But the man denied.
"I am not horrified," he said. "It is--the wonder of it."
"The wonder? It isn't wonderful. It was so simple. A little ingenuity,
a little nerve and recklessness. The law itself makes it easy. You
cannot arrest on suspicion." Kate sighed, and her eyes had become
reflective, so that their calmness satisfied the waiting man. "I must
tell you this," she went on quickly. "My reasons were twofold. Helen
and I came here to farm. We came here because I was crazy for
adventure. We had money, but I soon found that we, two women, could
never make our farm pay. We were here surrounded by outlaws, who were
already smuggling liquor, and their trade appealed to me. I was just
crazy to take a hand in it for the excitement of it, and--to replenish
our diminishing capital."
"Helen knows nothing about it," she went on, her voice hardening as
though the shameful story she was about to tell were forcing the iron
deeper and deeper into her soul. "She has never guessed, or suspected,
and I could almost hope she never will. It didn't take me long to make
up my mind. This was about the time Charlie came to the valley," she
sighed. "Well, I quickly contrived to get at the men I wanted. I
talked to them carefully, and finally unfolded to them a plan I had
worked out to smuggle whisky on a large and profitable scale. It
doesn't matter about the details. They all came in at once. It pleased
their sense of humor to be run by a woman. I was to disguise myself as
a man, which nature made easy for me, and my real personality was to
be our chief safeguard. No one would suspect unless we were caught
red-handed. And that--well, that was not a great chance, anyway, in
those days. I was responsible. I was to purchase cargoes across the
border. The others were only my helpers, under my absolute orders. And
I ruled them sharply."
The man nodded without other comment.
"But Charlie had arrived, and very soon his coming began to complicate
matters," Kate went on, after the briefest of pauses. "He came out
here to ranch. He was turned out of his home. And I--I just pitied
him, and strove to turn him from his drunken habits. This is where the
mischief was done. I liked him. I sort of felt like a mother to him.
He was so gentle and kind-hearted. He was clever, too--very clever.
Yes, I looked upon him as a son, or brother--but he didn't look on me
in the same way. I don't know. I suppose I didn't think. I was
foolish. Anyway, Charlie asked me to marry him. I refused him, and he
drank himself into delirium tremens."
Again came a long-drawn sigh at the memory of that poor, wasted life.
"Well, I nursed him, and finally he got better, and again I went on
with my work. Then, one day, I received a shock. Charlie came to me
and told me he'd found a mysterious old corral, away up, hidden in
the higher reaches of the valley. He begged me to let him show it me.
Feeling that I owed him something, I consented to go with him. So we
rode out. You know the place. But maybe you don't know its secret."
Fyles nodded.
"Yes--you mean the--cupboard in the lining of the wall."
"You know it?" Kate's surprise was marked. However, she went on
rapidly. "Well, while we were there he showed it to me, and then,
looking me straight in the eyes, he said, 'Wouldn't it be a dandy
hiding place for things? Suppose I was a big whisky smuggler. Suppose
I wanted to disguise myself. I could keep my disguise here. No chance
of its being found by police or any one. It would be a great place.'
Then he went on, enlarging enthusiastically upon his idea. He said, 'A
feller wants to do things right if he's going to beat the law. If I
were running liquor I'd take no chances. I'd run it on a big scale,
and I'd cache my stuff in the cellars under the Meeting House. No one
knows of 'em. I only lit on 'em by chance.
"'Not a soul even suspects they're there. Guess they were used for
caches in the old days. Now, I'd take on the job of looking after the
place, keeping it clean, and all that. That would let me be seen there
without anybody getting suspicious.' All this time his eyes were
watching me shrewdly, speculatively. Then, still pretending, he went
off in another direction. He told me he'd bought a good wagon. He
said, 'I'd keep it here in the corral. It would be better than a
buckboard.' Then I knew for certain that he was aware of my doings.
For I used a buckboard. It was a desperate moment. I waited. All of a
sudden he dropped his mask of lightness, and became serious. I can
never forget his poor, dear face as he gave me his final warning.
'Kate,' he said, 'if there was anybody I--liked, and was anxious
about, running whisky in this place, I'd show them the corral and tell
them what I've told you. You see,' he added ingenuously, 'I'd give my
life for those I like, then how readily would I help them like this.
This is the safest scheme I can think of. And I'm rather proud of it.
Anyways, it's better than keeping disguises kicking around for any one
to find, and caching liquor under bushes.' He had discovered all my
secret. All--how? The thought set me nearly crazy."
"Did you--question him?" The man's voice cut sharply into the
momentary silence.
Kate shook her head.
"No. I couldn't. I don't know why, but I couldn't." She drew a deep
breath. "The next thing I knew was that I was shadowed in all my work,
and I knew that shadow was--Charlie. Here came a memorable day. I
think the devil was in me that day. I remember Charlie came to me. He
smiled in his gentle, boyish fashion. He said, 'No one's adopted my
scheme yet--and I've left the wagon down at the old corral, too.' It
was too much. I laughed. I told him that now no one could ever use his
scheme for I had secured the work--voluntarily--of seeing to the
Meeting House. His response was deadly serious. 'I'm glad,' he said.
'That will end temptation for--others.'"
"He thought of using it--on your behalf--himself!"
"I fancy so." Kate paused. Then, with an effort, she seemed to spur
herself to her task. "There seems so much of it. Such a long, dreary
story. I must skip to the time you came on the scene. It was then that
serious trouble began. Danger really increased. But I was used to it
by then. I loved it. I didn't care. I was pleased to think I was
pitted against the police. You remember White Point? Like all the
rest, I planned that. I was there. We beat your men on the trail, too.
We contrived to temporarily cache the cargo, and afterward remove it
to the Meeting House. Then later. You remember the night that you
found Bill by the pine tree, which, by the way, served me as a mail
office for orders from my local customers? They placed money and
orders in one of the old crevices under the bark. You see, I never
came into personal contact with them. It was I you saw there. I had
just been there to get an order from O'Brien. Bill saw me--and mistook
me for Charlie. Charlie was probably there, but it was I you saw drop
down into hiding. That night was a great shock to me. I discovered
that, disguised as a man, by some evil chance I became the double of
Charlie. You can imagine my distress. In a flash I was made aware of
the reason that he was bearing the blame for all my doings. This
brought me another realization, too. My personality had been
discovered. People must have seen me before. I was known by, perhaps
distant, sight, and Charlie was blamed for all my doings. It left me
with a resolve to defend him to my utmost, all the more so that I was
convinced in my mind that he was doing his utmost to divert suspicion
from me to himself. Even his own brother believed in his guilt.
"When you opened your campaign against him, my cup of bitterness was
full. Then it was I resolved to run cargo after cargo in the wild hope
that some chance would reveal to you that Charlie was not your man. I
resolved this, knowing you--and--and liking you, and being aware that
every time I succeeded I was further helping to ruin you with your
superiors, and in your career. It had to be. I had to sacrifice all my
own feelings to--save Charlie."
The shining eyes of the man gazed admiringly on the sad face of the
loyal woman.
"I think I see," he said.
Kate raised her shoulders.
"I hardly expected any one would see, or understand, what I felt, and
the way I reasoned. You remember the cargo from Fort Allerton? It was
my two boys, acting under my command, who bound and gagged your
patrol, and fired the alarm. Pete brought me word of your plans. He
had spied on you in your camp. But there was very nearly disaster in
that affair. I dropped my pocketbook on the trail. It was full of
incriminating papers. I did not discover my loss till I returned my
disguise to the secret hut. You can imagine my horror at such a
discovery. It meant everything. I waited desperately, expecting it
to have been found by your men. Two days later, in a fever of
apprehension, I went to search my clothes again at the corral. I felt
it was useless. It could not be there. But my guardian angel had been
at work. It was in its place in my coat pocket. Then I knew that
Charlie was still watching over me. He had found it, and--returned
it."
Fyles nodded.
"He was on the trail that night--I saw him."
"Do you want to know the rest?" Kate went on. "Is it necessary? The
heartless game I played on you. Do you understand it now? Oh, it was a
cruel thing to do. But you drove me crazy with your suspicions, your
obstinate suspicions, of Charlie. I was determined to pursue my
ruthless course in his defense to the end. It was my only hope of
relieving Charlie of suspicion--without betraying myself. But there
were things I had not calculated on. Two things happened after I had
offered you my challenge. I made my plans, and ordered my cargo, after
telling you when and where it was to arrive. Then the two things
happened. First? Bill ran foul of Pete. Pete was drunk and insulted
Helen. Bill was there, and thrashed him soundly, and I was glad. But I
feared for mischief. He knew my plans. I talked to him, and quickly
realized my fears were well-founded. There was no help for it. I
promptly changed my plans. The cargo was to come in by water. The
escorted empty wagon by trail. I left that disposition, except that I
decided the boat should be empty, too, and, unknown to any one but
Holy Dick, I should bring in the cargo on a buckboard myself. You see,
it left me free of any chance of treachery. When you told me of Pete's
treachery I knew I had done well. Then the second thing happened,
which served me with an excuse for leaving the village, which had
become imperative to complete my change of plans. You remember. It was
the tree. You remember I feared the old superstition, and I went
to--Myrtle.
"The rest. Yes, let me tell it quickly, while I still have the
courage. You must fill in the gaps which I leave for yourself. Before
I left, Charlie came here. He tried to stop me. I know why. He had
some premonition of disaster. I, too, had the same premonition, but--I
was quite reckless. He refused me his wagon, but I took it in spite of
him. I had to have it. We quarreled for the first time. He left me in
anger, and--I went. Everything was carried through successfully. I was
in the road on Monday night with the cargo. I was keeping abreast of
the wagon, in my buckboard, away to the south of it. I intended to
make a quiet dash while you were busy with the boat and wagon. But my
star was not in the ascendant.
"While I was waiting for the moment to arrive I suddenly heard the
firing, and I knew at once that the game was up. It was no longer
simply smuggling. To me such shooting meant killing--and that----" she
shuddered. "Perhaps I lost my head. I don't know. I raced for it. You
came after me. One of my horses stumbled, and when it recovered I
found it was dead lame. I had a saddle horse with me. You were hard
on my heels by then. I abandoned the buckboard and cargo, and took to
the saddle. I was keeping well ahead of you, and was only a short
distance from the village. I raced down the hill to the culvert over
the hay slough. As I did so I saw two horsemen coming in the opposite
direction. I believed them to be police. I swung out to the south,
intending to take the slough at a jump, and get away toward the
border. Too late I realized the slough's miry state. I tried to get
back to the culvert, but my horse failed me. The troubled beast
floundered, then he fell, and my head struck the culvert."
Kate was breathing quickly. The horror of it all was getting hold of
her. But she went on in broken jerky sentences.
"When I opened my eyes, Charlie was bending over me. I told him what
had happened. Then he passed me over to Bill, and I fainted again.
When I awoke I was here--at home. Bill had brought me here, and I know
now what Charlie must have done."
Fyles nodded.
"He took your place, and drew us after him," he said. Then, after a
pause. "Say, he did a big thing, Kate, and--he did it with his eyes
wide open."
But Kate was not listening. Tears were coursing down her cheeks, and
she sat a poor, suffering, bowed creature whose spirit could no longer
support the strain of her remorse. Her confession was complete, and
again the horrors of her earlier sufferings were assailing her
weakened spirit.
Fyles waited for the storm to lessen. He no longer had doubts. His
pity was for the reckless heart so hopelessly crushed. He had no
blame, only pity, and--love. He knew now that all he had hoped and
longed for was to be his. Kate cared for him. She had loved him from
the start. His were the arms that would shelter her. His were the
caresses that must woo that warm, palpitating spirit back to its
confidence and strength.
What was her past recklessness to him? He passed it by, and thanked
God that, for all its wrong against the laws, she assessed a courage
so fearless, and a brain so keen. There was no evil in her. She was a
woman to love and live for. To work, and--to die for. And his
feelings he knew had been shared by another.
He rose from his chair and passed behind Kate's rocker. He leaned down
and kissed her masses of beautiful dark hair.
"Look up, Kate. Look up, dear. The old pine has fallen at last, and
now--now there is to be peace in the valley for all time. Peace for
you. Peace for me. We will go away together now, dear. And presently,
please God, we'll come back to our--home."
* * * * *
Two days later Stanley Fyles and Big Brother Bill were standing at the
doorway of Kate's house. It was evening, and four saddle horses were
tied together in a bunch, ready saddled for the road.
Bill stood chewing his thumb in silence. His thoughtful, blue eyes
were gazing out across the valley at the little ranch house on the
hill.
Fyles was equally thoughtfully filling his pipe.
"We haven't talked much about things before," he said, pressing the
tobacco firmly into the bowl of his pipe with his little finger.
"Guess there wasn't much room for talk between--you and me. But we had
to say things sooner or later, on--account of--the girls. It's bad
med'cine starting out brothers with any trouble sticking out between
us. That's why I've started talking now--with the horses waiting
saddled."
Bill nodded.
"I was desperate sore," he said, his blue eyes coming back to the
other's face. "You see, I couldn't think right at first, back there in
Amberley, and I blamed you to death. Still, I've done a big think
since then. Yes, a huge big think. And--do you know I'm kind of sure
now Charlie was just glad to do what he did." Then his voice dropped
to an awed undertone. "It's queer how thinking makes you see things
right. I kind of feel now, if Charlie was here, he'd tell us right
away he's gladder he is where he is than ever he was--here. I'm just
certain of it. That's the best of thinking hard. You sort of
understand things better. I'm going to shake hands with you. Guess
Charlie 'ud like me to--now. And it'll be a mighty hard shake, so
you'll know I've thought hard, and--and just understood."
Fyles winced under the giant's grip. But he smiled and nodded. Bill
smiled and nodded, too, and then released the injured limb. It was the
way of two men who understand.
A sound came from within the house. It was the jingle of a spur and a
swish of skirts.
Fyles indicated the direction with his pipe.
"Best quit talking now," he said. "It's--it's the girls."
Bill wagged a sapient head, and moved over to the horses.
"Right ho, Stanley."
"Right ho, Bill."
The big blue eyes met the steady brown eyes in a final, smiling glance
of mutual understanding as Kate and Helen appeared in the doorway.
Popular Copyright Novels
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=Adventures of Jimmie Dale, The.= By Frank L. Packard.
=Adventures of Sherlock Holmes.= By A. Conan Doyle.
=After House, The.= By Mary Roberts Rinehart.
=Ailsa Paige.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Alton of Somasco.= By Harold Bindloss.
=Amateur Gentleman, The.= By Jeffery Farnol.
=Anna, the Adventuress.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Anne's House of Dreams.= By L. M. Montgomery.
=Around Old Chester.= By Margaret Deland.
=Athalie.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=At the Mercy of Tiberius.= By Augusta Evans Wilson.
=Auction Block, The.= By Rex Beach.
=Aunt Jane of Kentucky.= By Eliza C. Hall.
=Awakening of Helena Richie.= By Margaret Deland.
=Bab: a Sub-Deb.= By Mary Roberts Rinehart.
=Barrier, The.= By Rex Beach.
=Barbarians.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Bargain True, The.= By Nalbro Bartley.
=Bar 20.= By Clarence E. Mulford.
=Bar 20 Days.= By Clarence E. Mulford.
=Bars of Iron, The.= By Ethel M. Dell.
=Beasts of Tarzan, The.= By Edgar Rice Burroughs.
=Beloved Traitor, The.= By Frank L. Packard.
=Beltane the Smith.= By Jeffery Farnol.
=Betrayal, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Beyond the Frontier.= By Randall Parrish.
=Big Timber.= By Bertrand W. Sinclair.
=Black Is White.= By George Barr McCutcheon.
=Blind Man's Eyes, The.= By Wm. MacHarg and Edwin Balmer.
=Bob, Son of Battle.= By Alfred Ollivant.
=Boston Blackie.= By Jack Boyle.
=Boy with Wings, The.= By Berta Ruck.
=Brandon of the Engineers.= By Harold Bindloss.
=Broad Highway, The.= By Jeffery Farnol.
=Brown Study, The.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Bruce of the Circle A.= By Harold Titus.
=Buck Peters, Ranchman.= By Clarence E. Mulford.
=Business of Life, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Cabbages and Kings.= By O. Henry.
=Cabin Fever.= By B. M. Bower.
=Calling of Dan Matthews, The.= By Harold Bell Wright.
=Cape Cod Stories.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Cap'n Abe, Storekeeper.= By James A. Cooper.
=Cap'n Dan's Daughter.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Cap'n Eri.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Cap'n Jonah's Fortune.= By James A. Cooper.
=Cap'n Warren's Wards.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Chain of Evidence, A.= By Carolyn Wells.
=Chief Legatee, The.= By Anna Katharine Green.
=Cinderella Jane.= By Marjorie B. Cooke.
=Cinema Murder, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=City of Masks, The.= By George Barr McCutcheon.
=Cleek of Scotland Yard.= By T. W. Hanshew.
=Cleek, The Man of Forty Faces.= By Thomas W. Hanshew.
=Cleek's Government Cases.= By Thomas W. Hanshew.
=Clipped Wings.= By Rupert Hughes.
=Clue, The.= By Carolyn Wells.
=Clutch of Circumstance, The.= By Marjorie Benton Cooke.
=Coast of Adventure, The.= By Harold Bindloss.
=Coming of Cassidy, The.= By Clarence E. Mulford.
=Coming of the Law, The.= By Chas. A. Seltzer.
=Conquest of Canaan, The.= By Booth Tarkington.
=Conspirators, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Court of Inquiry, A.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Cow Puncher, The.= By Robert J. C. Stead.
=Crimson Gardenia, The, and Other Tales of Adventure.= By Rex Beach.
=Cross Currents.= By Author of "Pollyanna."
=Cry in the Wilderness, A.= By Mary E. Waller.
=Danger, And Other Stories.= By A. Conan Doyle.
=Dark Hollow, The.= By Anna Katharine Green.
=Dark Star, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Daughter Pays, The.= By Mrs. Baillie Reynolds.
=Day of Days, The.= By Louis Joseph Vance.
=Depot Master, The.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Desired Woman, The.= By Will N. Harben.
=Destroying Angel, The.= By Louis Jos. Vance.
=Devil's Own, The.= By Randall Parrish.
=Double Traitor=, The. By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Empty Pockets.= By Rupert Hughes.
=Eyes of the Blind=, The. By Arthur Somers Roche.
=Eye of Dread, The.= By Payne Erskine.
=Eyes of the World, The.= By Harold Bell Wright.
=Extricating Obadiah.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Felix O'Day.= By F. Hopkinson Smith.
=54-40 or Fight.= By Emerson Hough.
=Fighting Chance, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Fighting Shepherdess, The.= By Caroline Lockhart.
=Financier, The.= By Theodore Dreiser.
=Flame, The.= By Olive Wadsley.
=Flamsted Quarries.= By Mary E. Wallar.
=Forfeit, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Four Million, The.= By O. Henry.
=Fruitful Vine, The.= By Robert Hichens.
=Further Adventures of Jimmie Dale, The.= By Frank L. Packard.
=Girl of the Blue Ridge, A.= By Payne Erskine.
=Girl from Keller's, The.= By Harold Bindloss.
=Girl Philippa, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Girls at His Billet, The.= By Berta Ruck.
=God's Country and the Woman.= By James Oliver Curwood.
=Going Some.= By Rex Beach.
=Golden Slipper, The.= By Anna Katharine Green.
=Golden Woman, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Greater Love Hath No Man.= By Frank L. Packard.
=Greyfriars Bobby.= By Eleanor Atkinson.
=Gun Brand, The.= By James B. Hendryx.
=Halcyone.= By Elinor Glyn.
=Hand of Fu-Manchu=, The. By Sax Rohmer.
=Havoc.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Heart of the Desert=, The. By Honoré Willsie.
=Heart of the Hills, The.= By John Fox, Jr.
=Heart of the Sunset.= By Rex Beach.
=Heart of Thunder Mountain, The.= By Edfrid A. Bingham.
=Her Weight in Gold.= By Geo. B. McCutcheon.
=Hidden Children, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Hidden Spring, The.= By Clarence B. Kelland.
=Hillman, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Hills of Refuge, The.= By Will N. Harben.
=His Official Fiancee.= By Berta Ruck.
=Honor of the Big Snows.= By James Oliver Curwood.
=Hopalong Cassidy.= By Clarence E. Mulford.
=Hound from the North, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=House of the Whispering Pines, The.= By Anna Katharine Green.
=Hugh Wynne, Free Quaker.= By S. Weir Mitchell, M.D.
=I Conquered.= By Harold Titus.
=Illustrious Prince, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=In Another Girl's Shoes.= By Berta Ruck.
=Indifference of Juliet, The.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Infelice.= By Augusta Evans Wilson.
=Initials Only.= By Anna Katharine Green.
=Inner Law, The.= By Will N. Harben.
=Innocent.= By Marie Corelli.
=Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu, The.= By Sax Rohmer.
=In the Brooding Wild.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Intriguers, The.= By Harold Bindloss.
=Iron Trail, The.= By Rex Beach.
=Iron Woman, The.= By Margaret Deland.
=I Spy.= By Natalie Sumner Lincoln.
=Japonette.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Jean of the Lazy A.= By B. M. Bower.
=Jeanne of the Marshes.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Jennie Gerhardt.= By Theodore Dreiser.
=Judgment House, The.= By Gilbert Parker.
=Keeper of the Door, The.= By Ethel M. Dell.
=Keith of the Border.= By Randall Parrish.
=Kent Knowles: Ouahaug.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Kingdom of the Blind. The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=King Spruce.= By Holman Day.
=King's Widow, The.= By Mrs. Baillie Reynolds.
=Knave of Diamonds, The.= By Ethel M. Dell.
=Ladder of Swords.= By Gilbert Parker.
=Lady Betty Across the Water.= By C. N. & A. M. Williamson.
=Land-Girl's Love Story, A.= By Berta Ruck.
=Landloper, The.= By Holman Day.
=Land of Long Ago, The.= By Eliza Calvert Hall.
=Land of Strong Men, The.= By A. M. Chisholm.
=Last Trail, The.= By Zane Grey.
=Laugh and Live.= By Douglas Fairbanks.
=Laughing Bill Hyde.= By Rex Beach.
=Laughing Girl, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Law Breakers, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Lifted Veil, The.= By Basil King.
=Lighted Way, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Lin McLean.= By Owen Wister.
=Lonesome Land.= By B. M. Bower.
=Lone Wolf, The.= By Louis Joseph Vance.
=Long Ever Ago.= By Rupert Hughes.
=Lonely Stronghold, The.= By Mrs. Baillie Reynolds.
=Long Live the King.= By Mary Roberts Rinehart.
=Long Roll, The.= By Mary Johnston.
=Lord Tony's Wife.= By Baroness Orczy.
=Lost Ambassador.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Lost Prince, The.= By Frances Hodgson Burnett.
=Lydia of the Pines.= By Honoré Willsie.
=Maid of the Forest, The.= By Randall Parrish.
=Maid of the Whispering Hills, The.= By Vingie E. Roe.
=Maids of Paradise, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Major, The.= By Ralph Connor.
=Maker of History, A.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Malefactor, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Man from Bar 20, The.= By Clarence E. Mulford.
=Man in Grey, The.= By Baroness Orczy.
=Man Trail, The.= By Henry Oyen.
=Man Who Couldn't Sleep, The.= By Arthur Stringer.
=Man with the Club Foot, The.= By Valentine Williams.
=Mary-'Gusta.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Mary Moreland.= By Marie Van Vorst.
=Mary Regan.= By Leroy Scott.
=Master Mummer, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes.= By A. Conan Doyle.
=Men Who Wrought, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Mischief Maker, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Missioner, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Miss Million's Maid.= By Berta Ruck.
=Molly McDonald.= By Randall Parrish.
=Money Master, The.= By Gilbert Parker.
=Money Moon, The.= By Jeffery Farnol.
=Mountain Girl, The.= By Payne Erskine.
=Moving Finger, The.= By Natalie Sumner Lincoln.
=Mr. Bingle.= By George Barr McCutcheon.
=Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Mr. Pratt.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Mr. Pratt's Patients.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Mrs. Belfame.= By Gertrude Atherton.
=Mrs. Red Pepper.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=My Lady Caprice.= By Jeffrey Farnol.
=My Lady of the North.= By Randall Parrish.
=My Lady of the South.= By Randall Parrish.
=Mystery of the Hasty Arrow, The.= By Anna K. Green.
=Nameless Man, The.= By Natalie Sumner Lincoln.
=Ne'er-Do-Well, The.= By Rex Beach.
=Nest Builders, The.= By Beatrice Forbes-Robertson Hale.
=Net, The.= By Rex Beach.
=New Clarion.= By Will N. Harben.
=Night Operator, The.= By Frank L. Packard.
=Night Riders, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Nobody.= By Louis Joseph Vance.
=Okewood of the Secret Service.= By the Author of "The Man with the
Club Foot."
=One Way Trail, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Open, Sesame.= By Mrs. Baillie Reynolds.
=Otherwise Phyllis.= By Meredith Nicholson.
=Outlaw, The.= By Jackson Gregory.
=Paradise Auction.= By Nalbro Bartley.
=Pardners.= By Rex Beach.
=Parrot & Co.= By Harold MacGrath.
=Partners of the Night.= By Leroy Scott.
=Partners of the Tide.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Passionate Friends, The.= By H. G. Wells.
=Patrol of the Sun Dance Trail, The.= By Ralph Connor.
=Paul Anthony, Christian.= By Hiram W. Hays.
=Pawns Count, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=People's Man, A.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Perch of the Devil.= By Gertrude Atherton.
=Peter Ruff and the Double Four.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Pidgin Island.= By Harold MacGrath.
=Place of Honeymoon, The.= By Harold MacGrath.
=Pool of Flame, The.= By Louis Joseph Vance.
=Postmaster, The.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Prairie Wife, The.= By Arthur Stringer.
=Price of the Prairie, The.= By Margaret Hill McCarter.
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=Promise, The.= By J. B. Hendryx.
=Proof of the Pudding, The.= By Meredith Nicholson.
=Rainbow's End, The.= By Rex Beach.
=Ranch at the Wolverine, The.= By B. M. Bower.
=Ranching for Sylvia.= By Harold Bindloss.
=Ransom.= By Arthur Somers Roche.
=Reason Why, The.= By Elinor Glyn.
=Reclaimers, The.= By Margaret Hill McCarter.
=Red Mist, The.= By Randall Parrish.
=Red Pepper Burns.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Red Pepper's Patients.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary, The.= By Anne Warner.
=Restless Sex, The.= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu, The.= By Sax Rohmer.
=Return of Tarzan, The.= By Edgar Rice Burroughs.
=Riddle of Night, The.= By Thomas W. Hanshew.
=Rim of the Desert, The.= By Ada Woodruff Anderson.
=Rise of Roscoe Paine, The.= By J. C. Lincoln.
=Rising Tide, The.= By Margaret Deland.
=Rocks of Valpré, The.= By Ethel M. Dell.
=Rogue by Compulsion, A.= By Victor Bridges.
=Room Number 3.= By Anna Katharine Green.
=Rose in the Ring, The.= By George Barr McCutcheon.
=Rose of Old Harpeth, The.= By Maria Thompson Daviess.
=Round the Corner in Gay Street.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Second Choice.= By Will N. Harben.
=Second Violin, The.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Secret History.= By C. N. & A. M. Williamson.
=Secret of the Reef, The.= By Harold Bindloss.
=Seven Darlings, The.= By Gouverneur Morris.
=Shavings.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Shepherd of the Hills, The.= By Harold Bell Wright.
=Sheriff of Dyke Hole, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Sherry.= By George Barr McCutcheon.
=Side of the Angels, The.= By Basil King.
=Silver Horde, The.= By Rex Beach.
=Sin That Was His, The.= By Frank L. Packard.
=Sixty-first Second, The.= By Owen Johnson.
=Soldier of the Legion, A.= By C. N. & A. M. Williamson.
=Son of His Father, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Son of Tarzan, The.= By Edgar Rice Burroughs.
=Source, The.= By Clarence Buddington Kelland.
=Speckled Bird, A.= By Augusta Evans Wilson.
=Spirit in Prison, A.= By Robert Hichens.
=Spirit of the Border, The.= (New Edition.) By Zane Grey.
=Spoilers, The.= By Rex Beach.
=Steele of the Royal Mounted.= By James Oliver Curwood.
=Still Jim.= By Honoré Willsie.
=Story of Foss River Ranch, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Story of Marco, The.= By Eleanor H. Porter.
=Strange Case of Cavendish, The.= By Randall Parrish.
=Strawberry Acres.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Sudden Jim.= By Clarence B. Kelland.
=Tales of Sherlock Holmes.= By A. Conan Doyle.
=Tarzan of the Apes.= By Edgar R. Burroughs.
=Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar.= By Edgar Rice Burroughs.
=Tempting of Tavernake, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Tess of the D'Urbervilles.= By Thos. Hardy.
=Thankful's Inheritance.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=That Affair Next Door.= By Anna Katharine Green.
=That Printer of Udell's.= By Harold Bell Wright.
=Their Yesterdays.= By Harold Bell Wright.
=Thirteenth Commandment, The.= By Rupert Hughes.
=Three of Hearts, The.= By Berta Ruck.
=Three Strings, The.= By Natalie Sumner Lincoln.
=Threshold, The.= By Marjorie Benton Cooke.
=Throwback, The.= By Alfred Henry Lewis.
=Tish.= By Mary Roberts Rinehart.
=To M. L. G.; or, He Who Passed.= Anon.
=Trail of the Axe, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Trail to Yesterday, The.= By Chas. A. Seltzer.
=Treasure of Heaven, The.= By Marie Corelli.
=Triumph, The.= By Will N. Harben.
=T. Tembarom.= By Frances Hodgson Burnett.
=Turn of the Tide.= By Author of "Pollyanna."
=Twenty-fourth of June, The.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Twins of Suffering Creek, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Two-Gun Man, The.= By Chas. A. Seltzer.
=Uncle William.= By Jeannette Lee.
=Under Handicap.= By Jackson Gregory.
=Under the Country Sky.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Unforgiving Offender, The.= By John Reed Scott.
=Unknown Mr. Kent, The.= By Roy Norton.
=Unpardonable Sin, The.= By Major Rupert Hughes.
=Up From Slavery.= By Booker T. Washington.
=Valiants of Virginia, The.= By Hallie Ermine Rives.
=Valley of Fear, The.= By Sir A. Conan Doyle.
=Vanished Messenger, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=Vanguards of the Plains.= By Margaret Hill McCarter.
=Vashti.= By Augusta Evans Wilson.
=Virtuous Wives.= By Owen Johnson.
=Visioning, The.= By Susan Glaspell.
=Waif-o'-the-Sea.= By Cyrus Townsend Brady.
=Wall of Men, A.= By Margaret H. McCarter.
=Watchers of the Plans, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Way Home, The.= By Basil King.
=Way of an Eagle, The.= By E. M. Dell.
=Way of the Strong, The.= By Ridgwell Cullum.
=Way of These Women, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
=We Can't Have Everything.= By Major Rupert Hughes.
=Weavers, The.= By Gilbert Parker.
=When a Man's a Man.= By Harold Bell Wright.
=When Wilderness Was King.= By Randall Parrish.
=Where the Trail Divides.= By Will Lillibridge.
=Where There's a Will.= By Mary R. Rinehart.
=White Sister, The.= By Marion Crawford.
=Who Goes There?= By Robert W. Chambers.
=Why Not.= By Margaret Widdemer.
=Window at the White Cat, The.= By Mary Roberts Rinehart.
=Winds of Chance, The.= By Rex Beach.
=Wings of Youth, The.= By Elizabeth Jordan.
=Winning of Barbara Worth, The.= By Harold Bell Wright.
=Wire Devils, The.= By Frank L. Packard.
=Winning the Wilderness.= By Margaret Hill McCarter.
=Wishing Ring Man, The.= By Margaret Widdemer.
=With Juliet in England.= By Grace S. Richmond.
=Wolves of the Sea.= By Randall Parrish.
=Woman Gives, The.= By Owen Johnson.
=Woman Haters, The.= By Joseph C. Lincoln.
=Woman in Question, The.= By John Reed Scott.
=Woman Thou Gavest Me, The.= By Hall Caine.
=Woodcarver of 'Lympus, The.= By Mary E. Waller.
=Wooing of Rosamond Fayre, The.= By Berta Ruck.
=World for Sale, The.= By Gilbert-Parker.
=Years for Rachel, The.= By Berta Ruck.
=Yellow Claw, The.= By Sax Rohmer.
=You Never Know Your Luck.= By Gilbert Parker.
=Zeppelin's Passenger, The.= By E. Phillips Oppenheim.
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES:
1. Minor changes have been made to correct typesetter's errors;
otherwise every effort has been made to remain true to the author's
words and intent.
2. In the advertising listing at the end of the book, the = has been
used to indicate that the book titles were typeset in bold in the
original book.
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The Law-Breakers" ***
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