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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/19166-8.txt b/19166-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..06edc8e --- /dev/null +++ b/19166-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6842 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Quirt, by B.M. Bower + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Quirt + +Author: B.M. Bower + +Illustrator: Anton Otto Fischer + +Release Date: September 3, 2006 [EBook #19166] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE QUIRT *** + + + + +Produced by Kathryn Lybarger, Joseph R. Hauser and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + +[Illustration: Cover] + + + + +THE QUIRT + + + + +=By B.M. Bower= + + GOOD INDIAN + + LONESOME LAND + + THE UPHILL CLIMB + + THE GRINGOS + + THE RANCH AT THE WOLVERINE + + THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND + + JEAN OF THE LAZY A + + THE PHANTOM HERD + + THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX + + STARR, OF THE DESERT + + THE LOOKOUT MAN + + CABIN FEVER + + SKYRIDER + + THE THUNDER BIRD + + RIM O' THE WORLD + + THE QUIRT + + + + +[Illustration: Al's gun spoke, and Warfield sagged at the knees and the +shoulders, and slumped to the ground. + FRONTISPIECE. _See page 294._] + + + +THE QUIRT + + +BY +B.M. BOWER + + + +WITH FRONTISPIECE BY +ANTON OTTO FISCHER + + + +[Illustration] + + + +BOSTON +LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY +1920 + + + + +_Copyright, 1920,_ + +BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. + + * * * * + +_All rights reserved_ + +Published May, 1920 +Reprinted, May, 1920 +Reprinted, July, 1920 +Reprinted, October, 1920 + + + + +CONTENTS + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I. LITTLE FISH 1 + + II. THE ENCHANTMENT OF LONG DISTANCE 12 + + III. REALITY IS WEIGHED AND FOUND WANTING 22 + + IV. "SHE'S A GOOD GIRL WHEN SHE AIN'T CRAZY" 38 + + V. A DEATH "BY ACCIDENT" 54 + + VI. LONE ADVISES SILENCE 68 + + VII. THE MAN AT WHISPER 85 + + VIII. "IT TAKES NERVE JUST TO HANG ON" 100 + + IX. THE EVIL EYE OF THE SAWTOOTH 115 + + X. ANOTHER SAWTOOTH "ACCIDENT" 126 + + XI. SWAN TALKS WITH HIS THOUGHTS 144 + + XII. THE QUIRT PARRIES THE FIRST BLOW 158 + + XIII. LONE TAKES HIS STAND 168 + + XIV. "FRANK'S DEAD" 178 + + XV. SWAN TRAILS A COYOTE 192 + + XVI. THE SAWTOOTH SHOWS ITS HAND 200 + + XVII. YACK DON'T LIE 216 + + XVIII. "I THINK AL WOODRUFF'S GOT HER" 233 + + XIX. SWAN CALLS FOR HELP 245 + + XX. KIDNAPPED 255 + + XXI. "OH, I COULD KILL YOU!" 264 + + XXII. "YACK, I LICK YOU GOOD IF YOU BARK" 277 + + XXIII. "I COULDA LOVED THIS LITTLE GIRL" 284 + + XXIV. ANOTHER STORY BEGINS 296 + + + + +THE QUIRT + + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +LITTLE FISH + + +Quirt Creek flowed sluggishly between willows which sagged none too +gracefully across its deeper pools, or languished beside the rocky +stretches that were bone dry from July to October, with a narrow channel +in the center where what water there was hurried along to the pools +below. For a mile or more, where the land lay fairly level in a +platter-like valley set in the lower hills, the mud that rimmed the +pools was scored deep with the tracks of the "TJ up-and-down" cattle, as +the double monogram of Hunter and Johnson was called. + +A hard brand to work, a cattleman would tell you. Yet the TJ up-and-down +herd never seemed to increase beyond a niggardly three hundred or so, +though the Quirt ranch was older than its lordly neighbors, the Sawtooth +Cattle Company, who numbered their cattle by tens of thousands and +whose riders must have strings of fifteen horses apiece to keep them +going; older too than many a modest ranch that had flourished awhile and +had finished as line-camps of the Sawtooth when the Sawtooth bought +ranch and brand for a lump sum that looked big to the rancher, who +immediately departed to make himself a new home elsewhere: older than +others which had somehow gone to pieces when the rancher died or went to +the penitentiary under the stigma of a long sentence as a cattle thief. +There were many such, for the Sawtooth, powerful and stern against +outlawry, tolerated no pilfering from their thousands. + +The less you have, the more careful you are of your possessions. Hunter +and Johnson owned exactly a section and a half of land, and for a mile +and a half Quirt Creek was fenced upon either side. They hired two men, +cut what hay they could from a field which they irrigated, fed their +cattle through the cold weather, watched them zealously through the +summer, and managed to ship enough beef each fall to pay their grocery +bill and their men's wages and have a balance sufficient to buy what +clothes they needed, and perhaps pay a doctor if one of them fell ill. +Which frequently happened, since Brit was becoming a prey to rheumatism +that sometimes kept him in bed, and Frank occasionally indulged himself +in a gallon or so of bad whisky and suffered afterwards from a badly +deranged digestion. + +Their house was a two-room log cabin, built when logs were easier to get +than lumber. That the cabin contained two rooms was the result of +circumstances rather than design. Brit had hauled from the mountain-side +logs long and logs short, and it had seemed a shame to cut the long ones +any shorter. Later, when the outside world had crept a little closer to +their wilderness--as, go where you will, the outside world has a way of +doing--he had built a lean-to shed against the cabin from what lumber +there was left after building a cowshed against the log barn. + +In the early days, Brit had had a wife and two children, but the wife +could not endure the loneliness of the ranch nor the inconvenience of +living in a two-room log cabin. She was continually worrying over +rattlesnakes and diphtheria and pneumonia, and begging Brit to sell out +and live in town. She had married him because he was a cowboy, and +because he was a nimble dancer and rode gallantly with silver-shanked +spurs ajingle on his heels and a snakeskin band around his hat, and +because a ranch away out on Quirt Creek had sounded exactly like a story +in a book. + +Adventure, picturesqueness, even romance, are recognized and appreciated +only at a distance. Mrs. Hunter lost the perspective of romance and +adventure, and shed tears because there was sufficient mineral in the +water to yellow her week's washing, and for various other causes which +she had never foreseen and to which she refused to resign herself. + +Came a time when she delivered a shrill-voiced, tear-blurred ultimatum +to Brit. Either he must sell out and move to town, or she would take the +children and leave him. Of towns Brit knew nothing except the +post-office, saloon, cheap restaurant side,--and a barber shop where a +fellow could get a shave and hair-cut before he went to see his girl. +Brit could not imagine himself actually _living_, day after day, in a +town. Three or four days had always been his limit. It was in a +restaurant that he had first met his wife. He had stayed three days when +he had meant to finish his business in one, because there was an +awfully nice girl waiting on table in the Palace, and because there was +going to be a dance on Saturday night, and he wanted his acquaintance +with her to develop to the point where he might ask her to go with him, +and be reasonably certain of a favorable answer. + +Brit would not sell his ranch. In this Frank Johnson, old-time friend +and neighbor, who had taken all the land the government would allow one +man to hold, and whose lines joined Brit's, profanely upheld him. They +had planned to run cattle together, had their brand already recorded, +and had scraped together enough money to buy a dozen young cows. +Luckily, Brit had "proven up" on his homestead, so that when the irate +Mrs. Hunter deserted him she did not jeopardize his right to the land. + +Brit was philosophical, thinking that a year or so of town life would be +a cure. If he missed the children, he was free from tears and nagging +complaints, so that his content balanced his loneliness. Frank proved up +and came down to live with him, and the partnership began to wear into +permanency. Share and share alike, they lived and worked and wrangled +together like brothers. + +For months Brit's wife was too angry and spiteful to write. Then she +wrote acrimoniously, reminding Brit of his duty to his children. Royal +was old enough for school and needed clothes. She was slaving for them +as she had never thought to slave when Brit promised to honor and +protect her, but the fact remained that he was their father even if he +did not act like one. She needed at least ten dollars. + +Brit showed the letter to Frank, and the two talked it over solemnly +while they sat on inverted feed buckets beside the stable, facing the +unearthly beauty of a cloud-piled Idaho sunset. They did not feel that +they could afford to sell a cow, and two-year-old steers were out of the +question. They decided to sell an unbroken colt that a cow-puncher +fancied. In a week Brit wrote a brief, matter-of-fact letter to Minnie +and enclosed a much-worn ten-dollar banknote. With the two dollars and a +half which remained of his share of the sale, Brit sent to a mail-order +house for a mackinaw coat, and felt cheated afterwards because the coat +was not "wind and water proof" as advertised in the catalogue. + +More months passed, and Brit received, by registered mail, a notice that +he was being sued for divorce on the ground of non-support. He felt +hurt, because, as he pointed out to Frank, he was perfectly willing to +support Minnie and the kids if they came back where he could have a +chance. He wrote this painstakingly to the lawyer and received no reply. +Later he learned from Minnie that she had freed herself from him, and +that she was keeping boarders and asking no odds of him. + +To come at once to the end of Brit's matrimonial affairs, he heard from +the children once in a year, perhaps, after they were old enough to +write. He did not send them money, because he seemed never to have any +money to send, and because they did not ask for any. Dumbly he sensed, +as their handwriting and their spelling improved, that his children were +growing up. But when he thought of them they seemed remote, prattling +youngsters whom Minnie was forever worrying over and who seemed to have +been always under the heels of his horse, or under the wheels of his +wagon, or playing with the pitchfork, or wandering off into the sage +while he and their distracted mother searched for them. For a long +while--how many years Brit could not remember--they had been living in +Los Angeles. Prospering, too, Brit understood. The girl, +Lorraine--Minnie had wanted fancy names for the kids, and Brit +apologized whenever he spoke of them, which was seldom--Lorraine had +written that "Mamma has an apartment house." That had sounded +prosperous, even at the beginning. And as the years passed and their +address remained the same, Brit became fixed in the belief that the Casa +Grande was all that its name implied, and perhaps more. Minnie must be +getting rich. She had a picture of the place on the stationery which +Lorraine used when she wrote him. There were two palm trees in front, +with bay windows behind them, and pillars. Brit used to study these +magnificences and thank God that Minnie was doing so well. He never +could have given her a home like that. Brit sometimes added that he had +never been cut out for a married man, anyway. + +Old-timers forgot that Brit had ever been married, and late comers never +heard of it. To all intents the owners of the Quirt outfit were old +bachelors who kept pretty much to themselves, went to town only when +they needed supplies, rode old, narrow-fork saddles and grinned +scornfully at "swell-forks" and "buckin'-rolls," and listened to all the +range gossip without adding so much as an opinion. They never talked +politics nor told which candidates received their two votes. They kept +the same two men season after season,--leathery old range hands with +eyes that saw whatever came within their field of vision, and with the +gift of silence, which is rare. + +If you know anything at all about cattlemen, you will know that the +Quirt was a poor man's ranch, when I tell you that Hunter and Johnson +milked three cows and made butter, fed a few pigs on the skim milk and +the alfalfa stalks which the saddle horses and the cows disdained to +eat, kept a flock of chickens, and sold what butter, eggs and pork they +did not need for themselves. Cattlemen seldom do that. More often they +buy milk in small tin cans, butter in "squares," and do without eggs. + +Four of a kind were the men of the TJ up-and-down, and even Bill +Warfield--president and general manager of the Sawtooth Cattle Company, +and of the Federal Reclamation Company and several other companies, +State senator and general benefactor of the Sawtooth country--even the +great Bill Warfield lifted his hat to the owners of the Quirt when he +met them, and spoke of them as "the finest specimens of our old, +fast-vanishing type of range men." Senator Warfield himself represented +the modern type of range man and was proud of his progressiveness. Never +a scheme for the country's development was hatched but you would find +Senator Warfield closely allied with it, his voice the deciding one when +policies and progress were being discussed. + +As to the Sawtooth, forty thousand acres comprised their holdings under +patents, deeds and long-time leases from the government. Another twenty +thousand acres they had access to through the grace of the owners, and +there was forest-reserve grazing besides, which the Sawtooth could have +if it chose to pay the nominal rental sum. The Quirt ranch was almost +surrounded by Sawtooth land of one sort or another, though there was +scant grazing in the early spring on the sagebrush wilderness to the +south. This needed Quirt Creek for accessible water, and Quirt Creek, +save where it ran through cut-bank hills, was fenced within the section +and a half of the TJ up-and-down. + +So there they were, small fish making shift to live precariously with +other small fish in a pool where big fish swam lazily. If one small fish +now and then disappeared with mysterious abruptness, the other small +fish would perhaps scurry here and there for a time, but few would leave +the pool for the safe shallows beyond. + +This is a tale of the little fishes. + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +THE ENCHANTMENT OF LONG DISTANCE + + +Lorraine Hunter always maintained that she was a Western girl. If she +reached the point of furnishing details she would tell you that she had +ridden horses from the time that she could walk, and that her father was +a cattle-king of Idaho, whose cattle fed upon a thousand hills. When she +was twelve she told her playmates exciting tales about rattlesnakes. +When she was fifteen she sat breathless in the movies and watched +picturesque horsemen careering up and down and around the thousand +hills, and believed in her heart that half the Western pictures were +taken on or near her father's ranch. She seemed to remember certain +landmarks, and would point them out to her companions and whisper a +desultory lecture on the cattle industry as illustrated by the picture. +She was much inclined to criticism of the costuming and the acting. + +At eighteen she knew definitely that she hated the very name Casa +Grande. She hated the narrow, half-lighted hallway with its "tree" +where no one ever hung a hat, and the seat beneath where no one ever sat +down. She hated the row of key-and-mail boxes on the wall, with the bell +buttons above each apartment number. She hated the jangling of the hall +telephone, the scurrying to answer, the prodding of whichever bell +button would summon the tenant asked for by the caller. She hated the +meek little Filipino boy who swept that ugly hall every morning. She +hated the scrubby palms in front. She hated the pillars where the paint +was peeling badly. She hated the conflicting odors that seeped into the +atmosphere at certain hours of the day. She hated the three old maids on +the third floor and the frowsy woman on the first, who sat on the front +steps in her soiled breakfast cap and bungalow apron. She hated the +nervous tenant who occupied the apartment just over her mother's +three-room-and-bath, and pounded with a broom handle on the floor when +Lorraine practised overtime on chromatic scales. + +At eighteen Lorraine managed somehow to obtain work in a Western +picture, and being unusually pretty she so far distinguished herself +that she was given a small part in the next production. Her glorious +duty it was to ride madly through the little cow-town "set" to the +post-office where the sheriff's posse lounged conspicuously, and there +pull her horse to an abrupt stand and point excitedly to the distant +hills. Also she danced quite close to the camera in the "Typical Cowboy +Dance" which was a feature of this particular production. + +Lorraine thereby earned enough money to buy her fall suit and coat and +cheap furs, and learned to ride a horse at a gallop and to dance what +passed in pictures as a "square dance." + +At nineteen years of age Lorraine Hunter, daughter of old Brit Hunter of +the TJ up-and-down, became a real "range-bred girl" with a real Stetson +hat of her own, a green corduroy riding skirt, gray flannel shirt, +brilliant neckerchief, boots and spurs. A third picture gave her further +practice in riding a real horse,--albeit an extremely docile animal +called Mouse with good reason. She became known on the lot as a real +cattle-king's daughter, though she did not know the name of her father's +brand and in all her life had seen no herd larger than the thirty head +of tame cattle which were chased past the camera again and again to make +them look like ten thousand, and which were so thoroughly "camera +broke" that they stopped when they were out of the scene, turned and +were ready to repeat the performance _ad lib_. + +Had she lived her life on the Quirt ranch she would have known a great +deal more about horseback riding and cattle and range dances. She would +have known a great deal less about the romance of the West, however, and +she would probably never have seen a sheriff's posse riding twenty +strong and bunched like bird-shot when it leaves the muzzle of the gun. +Indeed, I am very sure she would not. Killings such as her father heard +of with his lips drawn tight and the cords standing out on the sides of +his skinny neck she would have considered the grim tragedies they were, +without once thinking of the "picture value" of the crime. + +As it was, her West was filled with men who died suddenly in gobs of red +paint and girls who rode loose-haired and panting with hand held over +the heart, hurrying for doctors, and cowboys and parsons and such. She +had seen many a man whip pistol from holster and dare a mob with lips +drawn back in a wolfish grin over his white, even teeth, and kidnappings +were the inevitable accompaniment of youth and beauty. + +Lorraine learned rapidly. In three years she thrilled to more +blood-curdling adventure than all the Bad Men in all the West could have +furnished had they lived to be old and worked hard at being bad all +their lives. For in that third year she worked her way enthusiastically +through a sixteen-episode movie serial called "The Terror of the Range." +She was past mistress of romance by that time. She knew her West. + +It was just after the "Terror of the Range" was finished that a great +revulsion in the management of this particular company stopped +production with a stunning completeness that left actors and actresses +feeling very much as if the studio roof had fallen upon them. Lorraine's +West vanished. The little cow-town "set" was being torn down to make +room for something else quite different. The cowboys appeared in +tailored suits and drifted away. Lorraine went home to the Casa Grande, +hating it more than ever she had hated it in her life. + +Some one up-stairs was frying liver and onions, which was in flagrant +defiance of Rule Four which mentioned cabbage, onions and fried fish as +undesirable foodstuffs. Outside, the palm leaves were dripping in the +night fog that had swept soggily in from the ocean. Her mother was +trying to collect a gas bill from the dressmaker down the hall, who +protested shrilly that she distinctly remembered having paid that gas +bill once and had no intention of paying it twice. + +Lorraine opened the door marked LANDLADY, and closed it with a slam +intended to remind her mother that bickerings in the hall were less +desirable than the odor of fried onions. She had often spoken to her +mother about the vulgarity of arguing in public with the tenants, but +her mother never seemed to see things as Lorraine saw them. + +In the apartment sat a man who had been too frequent a visitor, as +Lorraine judged him. He was an oldish man with the lines of failure in +his face and on his lean form the sprightly clothing of youth. He had +been a reporter,--was still, he maintained. But Lorraine suspected +shrewdly that he scarcely made a living for himself, and that he was +home-hunting in more ways than one when he came to visit her mother. + +The affair had progressed appreciably in her absence, it would appear. +He greeted her with, a fatherly "Hello, kiddie," and would have kissed +her had Lorraine not evaded him skilfully. + +Her mother came in then and complained intimately to the man, and +declared that the dressmaker would have to pay that bill or have her gas +turned off. He offered sympathy, assistance in the turning off of the +gas, and a kiss which was perfectly audible to Lorraine in the next +room. The affair had indeed progressed! + +"L'raine, d'you know you've got a new papa?" her mother called out in +the peculiar, chirpy tone she used when she was exuberantly happy. "I +knew you'd be surprised!" + +"I am," Lorraine agreed, pulling aside the cheap green portières and +looked in upon the two. Her tone was unenthusiastic. "A superfluous gift +of doubtful value. I do not feel the need of a papa, thank you. If you +want him for a husband, mother, that is entirely your own affair. I hope +you'll be very happy." + +"The kid don't want a papa; husbands are what means the most in her +young life," chuckled the groom, restraining his bride when she would +have risen from his knee. + +"I hope you'll both be very happy indeed," said Lorraine gravely. "Now +you won't mind, mother, when I tell you that I am going to dad's ranch +in Idaho. I really meant it for a vacation, but since you won't be +alone, I may stay with dad permanently. I'm leaving to-morrow or the +next day--just as soon as I can pack my trunk and get a Pullman berth." + +She did not wait to see the relief in her mother's face contradicting +the expostulations on her lips. She went out to the telephone in the +hall, remembered suddenly that her business would be overheard by half +the tenants, and decided to use the public telephone in a hotel farther +down the street. Her decision to go to her dad had been born with the +words on her lips. But it was a lusty, full-voiced young decision, and +it was growing at an amazing rate. + +Of course she would go to her dad in Idaho! She was astonished that the +idea had never before crystallized into action. Why should she feed her +imagination upon a mimic West, when the great, glorious real West was +there? What if her dad had not written a word for more than a year? He +must be alive; they would surely have heard of his death, for she and +Royal were his sole heirs, and his partner would have their address. + +She walked fast and arrived at the telephone booth so breathless that +she was compelled to wait a few minutes before she could call her +number. She inquired about trains and rates to Echo, Idaho. + +Echo, Idaho! While she waited for the information clerk to look it up +the very words conjured visions of wide horizons and clean winds and +high adventure. If she pictured Echo, Idaho, as being a replica of the +"set" used in the movie serial, can you wonder? If she saw herself, the +beloved queen of her father's cowboys, dashing into Echo, Idaho, on a +crimply-maned broncho that pirouetted gaily before the post-office while +handsome young men in chaps and spurs and "big four" Stetsons watched +her yearningly, she was merely living mentally the only West that she +knew. + +From that beatific vision Lorraine floated into others more entrancing. +All the hairbreadth escapes of the heroine of the movie serial were +hers, adapted by her native logic to fit within the bounds of +possibility,--though I must admit they bulged here and there and +threatened to overlap and to encroach upon the impossible. Over the +hills where her father's vast herds grazed, sleek and wild and +long-horned and prone to stampede, galloped the Lorraine of Lorraine's +dreams, on horses sure-footed and swift. With her galloped strong men +whose faces limned the features of her favorite Western "lead." + +That for all her three years of intermittent intimacy with a +disillusioning world of mimicry, her dreams were pure romance, proved +that Lorraine had still the unclouded innocence of her girlhood +unspoiled. + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +REALITY IS WEIGHED AND FOUND WANTING + + +Still dreaming her dreams, still featuring herself as the star of many +adventures, Lorraine followed the brakeman out of the dusty day coach +and down the car steps to the platform of the place called Echo, Idaho. +I can only guess at what she expected to find there in the person of a +cattle-king father, but whatever it was she did not find it. No father, +of any type whatever, came forward to claim her. In spite of her +"Western" experience she looked about her for a taxi, or at least a +street car. Even in the wilds of Western melodrama one could hear the +clang of street-car gongs warning careless autoists off the track. + +After the train had hooted and gone on around an absolutely +uninteresting low hill of yellow barrenness dotted with stunted sage, it +was the silence that first impressed Lorraine disagreeably. Echo, Idaho, +was a very poor imitation of all the Western sets she had ever seen. +True, it had the straggling row of square-fronted, one-story buildings, +with hitch rails, but the signs painted across the fronts were +absolutely common. Any director she had ever obeyed would have sent for +his assistant director and would have used language which a lady must +not listen to. Behind the store and the post-office and the blacksmith +shop, on the brow of the low hill around whose point the train had +disappeared, were houses with bay windows and porches absolutely out of +keeping with the West. So far as Lorraine could see, there was not a log +cabin in the whole place. + +The hitch rails were empty, and there was not a cowboy in sight. Before +the post-office a terribly grimy touring car stood with its +running-boards loaded with canvas-covered suitcases. Three goggled, +sunburned women in ugly khaki suits were disconsolately drinking soda +water from bottles without straws, and a goggled, red-faced, +angry-looking man was jerking impatiently at the hood of the machine. +Lorraine and her suitcase apparently excited no interest whatever in +Echo, Idaho. + +The station agent was carrying two boxes of oranges and a crate of +California cabbages in out of the sun, and a limp individual in blue +gingham shirt and dirty overalls had shouldered the mail sack and was +making his way across the dusty, rut-scored street to the post-office. + +Two questions and two brief answers convinced her that the station agent +did not know Britton Hunter,--which was strange, unless this happened to +be a very new agent. Lorraine left him to his cabbages and followed the +man with the mail sack. + +At the post-office the anemic clerk came forward, eyeing her with +admiring curiosity. Lorraine had seen anemic young men all her life, and +the last three years had made her perfectly familiar with that look in a +young man's eyes. She met it with impatient disfavor founded chiefly +upon the young man's need of a decent hair-cut, a less flowery tie and a +tailored suit. When he confessed that he did not know Mr. Britton Hunter +by sight he ceased to exist so far as Lorraine was concerned. She +decided that he also was new to the place and therefore perfectly +useless to her. + +The postmaster himself--Lorraine was cheered by his spectacles, his +shirt sleeves, and his chin whiskers, which made him look the part--was +better informed. He, too, eyed her curiously when she said "My father, +Mr. Britton Hunter," but he made no comment on the relationship. He gave +her a telegram and a letter from the General Delivery. The telegram, she +suspected, was the one she had sent to her dad announcing the date of +her arrival. The postmaster advised her to get a "livery rig" and drive +out to the ranch, since it might be a week or two before any one came in +from the Quirt. Lorraine thanked him graciously and departed for the +livery stable. + +The man in charge there chewed tobacco meditatively and told her that +his teams were all out. If she was a mind to wait over a day or two, he +said, he might maybe be able to make the trip. Lorraine took a long look +at the structure which he indicated as the hotel. + +"I think I'll walk," she said calmly. + +"_Walk_?" The stableman stopped chewing and stared at her. "It's some +consider'ble of a walk. It's all of eighteen mile--I dunno but twenty, +time y'get to the house." + +"I have frequently walked twenty-five or thirty miles. I am a member of +the Sierra Club in Los Angeles. We seldom take hikes of less than +twenty miles. If you will kindly tell me which road I must take----" + +"There she is," the man stated flatly, and pointed across the railroad +track to where a sandy road drew a yellowish line through the sage, +evidently making for the hills showing hazily violet in the distance. +Those hills formed the only break in the monotonous gray landscape, and +Lorraine was glad that her journey would take her close to them. + +"Thank you so much," she said coldly and returned to the station. In the +small lavatory of the depot waiting room she exchanged her slippers for +a pair of moderately low-heeled shoes which she had at the last minute +of packing tucked into her suitcase, put a few extra articles into her +rather smart traveling bag, left the suitcase in the telegraph office +and started. Not another question would she ask of Echo, Idaho, which +was flatter and more insipid than the drinking water in the tin "cooler" +in the waiting room. The station agent stood with his hands on his hips +and watched her cross the track and start down the road, pardonably +astonished to see a young woman walk down a road that led only to the +hills twenty miles away, carrying her luggage exactly as if her trip was +a matter of a block or two at most. + +The bag was rather heavy and as she went on it became heavier. She meant +to carry it slung across her shoulder on a stick as soon as she was well +away from the prying eyes of Echo's inhabitants. Later, if she felt +tired, she could easily hide it behind a bush along the road and send +one of her father's cowboys after it. The road was very dusty and +carried the wind-blown traces of automobile tires. Some one would surely +overtake her and give her a ride before she walked very far. + +For the first half hour she believed that she was walking on level +ground, but when she looked back there was no sign of any town behind +her. Echo had disappeared as completely as if it had been swallowed. +Even the unseemly bay-windowed houses on the hill had gone under. She +walked for another half hour and saw only the gray sage stretching all +around her. The hills looked farther away than when she started. Still, +that beaten road must lead somewhere. Two hours later she began to +wonder why this particular road should be so unending and so empty. +Never in her life before had she walked for two hours without seeming to +get anywhere, or without seeing any living human. + +Both shoulders were sore from the weight of the bag on the stick, but +the sagebushes looked so exactly alike that she feared she could not +describe the particular spot where the cowboys would find her bag, +wherefore she carried it still. She was beginning to change hands very +often when the wind came. + +Just where or how that wind sprang up she did not know. Suddenly it was +whooping across the sage and flinging up clouds of dust from the road. +To Lorraine, softened by years of southern California weather, it seemed +to blow straight off an ice field, it was so cold. + +After an interminable time which measured three hours on her watch, she +came to an abrupt descent into a creek bed, down the middle of which the +creek itself was flowing swiftly. Here the road forked, a rough, +little-used trail keeping on up the creek, the better traveled road +crossing and climbing the farther bank. Lorraine scarcely hesitated +before she chose the main trail which crossed the creek. + +From the creek the trail she followed kept climbing until Lorraine +wondered if there would ever be a top. The wind whipped her narrow +skirts and impeded her, tugged at her hat, tingled her nose and watered +her eyes. But she kept on doggedly, disgustedly, the West, which she had +seen through the glamour of swift-blooded Romance, sinking lower and +lower in her estimation. Nothing but jack rabbits and little, twittery +birds moved through the sage, though she watched hungrily for horsemen. + +Quite suddenly the gray landscape glowed with a palpitating radiance, +unreal, beautiful beyond expression. She stopped, turned to face the +west and stared awestruck at one of those flaming sunsets which makes +the desert land seem but a gateway into the ineffable glory beyond the +earth. That the high-piled, gorgeous cloud-bank presaged a thunderstorm +she never guessed; and that a thunderstorm may be a deadly, terrifying +peril she never had quite believed. Her mother had told of people being +struck by lightning, but Lorraine could not associate lightning with +death, especially in the West, where men usually died by shooting, +lynching, or by pitching over a cliff. + +The wind hushed as suddenly as it had whooped. Warned by the twinkling +lights far behind her--lights which must be the small part at last +visible of Echo, Idaho--Lorraine went on. She had been walking steadily +for four hours, and she must surely have come nearly twenty miles. If +she ever reached the top of the hill, she believed that she would see +her father's ranch just beyond. + +The afterglow had deepened to dusk when she came at last to the highest +point of that long grade. Far ahead loomed a cluster of square, black +objects which must be the ranch buildings of the Quirt, and Lorraine's +spirits lightened a little. What a surprise her father and all his +cowboys would have when she walked in upon them! It was almost worth the +walk, she told herself hearteningly. She hoped that dad had a good cook. +He would wear a flour-sack apron, naturally, and would be tall and lean, +or else very fat. He would be a comedy character, but she hoped he would +not be the grouchy kind, which, though very funny when he rampages +around on the screen, might be rather uncomfortable to meet when one is +tired and hungry and out of sorts. But of course the crankiest of comedy +cooks would be decently civil to _her_. Men always were, except +directors who are paid for their incivility. + +A hollow into which she walked in complete darkness and in silence, save +the gurgling of another stream, hid from sight the shadowy semblance of +houses and barns and sheds. Their disappearance slumped her spirits +again, for without them she was no more than a solitary speck in the +vast loneliness. Their actual nearness could not comfort her. She was +seized with a reasonless, panicky fear that by the time she crossed the +stream and climbed the hill beyond they would no longer be there where +she had seen them. She was lifting her skirts to wade the creek when the +click of hoofs striking against rocks sent her scurrying to cover in a +senseless fear. + +"I learned this act from the jack rabbits," she rallied herself shakily, +when she was safely hidden behind a sagebush whose pungency made her +horribly afraid that she might sneeze, which would be too ridiculous. + +"Some of dad's cowboys, probably, but still they _may_ be bandits." + +If they were bandits they could scarcely be out banditting, for the two +horsemen were talking in ordinary, conversational tones as they rode +leisurely down to the ford. When they passed Lorraine, the horse nearest +her shied against the other and was sworn at parenthetically for a fool. +Against the skyline Lorraine saw the rider's form bulk squatty and +ungraceful, reminding her of an actor whom she knew and did not like. It +was that resemblance perhaps which held her quiet instead of following +her first impulse to speak to them and ask them to carry her grip to the +house. + +The horses stopped with their forefeet in the water and drooped heads to +drink thirstily. The riders continued their conversation. + +"--and as I says time and again, they ain't big enough to fight the +outfit, and the quicker they git out the less lead they'll carry under +their hides when they do go. What they want to try an' hang on for, +beats me. Why, it's like setting into a poker game with a five-cent +piece! They ain't got my sympathy. I ain't got any use for a damn fool, +no way yuh look at it." + +"Well, there's the TJ--they been here a long while, and they ain't +packin' any lead, and they ain't getting out." + +"Well, say, lemme tell yuh something. The TJ'll git theirs and git it +right. Drink all night, would yuh?" He swore long and fluently at his +horse, spurred him through the shallows, and the two rode on up the +hill, their voices still mingled in desultory argument, with now and +then an oath rising clearly above the jumble of words. + +They may have been law-abiding citizens riding home to families that +were waiting supper for them, but Lorraine crept out from behind her +sagebush, sneezing and thanking her imitation of the jack rabbits. +Whoever they were, she was not sorry she had let them ride on. They +might be her father's men, and they might have been very polite and +chivalrous to her. But their voices and their manner of speaking had +been rough; and it is one thing, Lorraine reflected, to mingle with +made-up villains--even to be waylaid and kidnapped and tied to trees and +threatened with death--but it is quite different to accost +rough-speaking men in the dark when you know that they are not being +rough to suit the director of the scene. + +She was so absorbed in trying to construct a range war or something +equally thrilling from the scrap of conversation she had heard that she +reached the hilltop in what seemed a very few minutes of climbing. The +sky was becoming overcast. Already the stars to the west were blotted +out, and the absolute stillness of the atmosphere frightened her more +than the big, dark wilderness itself. It seemed to her exactly as though +the earth was holding its breath and waiting for something terrible to +happen. The vague bulk of buildings was still some distance ahead, and +when a rumble like the deepest notes of a pipe organ began to fill all +the air, Lorraine thrust her grip under a bush and began to run, her +soggy shoes squashing unpleasantly on the rough places in the road. + +Lorraine had seen many stage storms and had thrilled ecstatically to the +mimic lightning, knowing just how it was made. But when that huge +blackness behind and to the left of her began to open and show a +terrible brilliance within, and to close abruptly, leaving the world ink +black, she was terrified. She wanted to hide as she had hidden from +those two men; but from that stupendous monster, a real thunderstorm, +sagebrush formed no protection whatever. She must reach the substantial +shelter of buildings, the comforting presence of men and women. + +She ran, and as she ran she wept aloud like a child and called for her +father. The deep rumble grew louder, nearer. The revealed brilliance +became swift sword-thrusts of blinding light that seemed to stab deep +the earth. Lorraine ran awkwardly, her hands over her ears, crying out +at each lightning flash, her voice drowned in the thunder that followed +it close. Then, as she neared the somber group of buildings, the clouds +above them split with a terrific, rending crash, and the whole place +stood pitilessly revealed to her, as if a spotlight had been turned on. +Lorraine stood aghast. The buildings were not buildings at all. They +were rocks, great, black, forbidding boulders standing there on a narrow +ridge, having a diabolic likeness to houses. + +The human mind is wonderfully resilient, but readjustment comes slowly +after a shock. Dumbly, refusing to admit the significance of what she +had seen, Lorraine went forward. Not until she had reached and had +touched the first grotesque caricature of habitation did she wholly +grasp the fact that she was lost, and that shelter might be miles away. +She stood and looked at the orderly group of boulders as the lightning +intermittently revealed them. She saw where the road ran on, between +two square-faced rocks. She would have to follow the road, for after all +it must lead _somewhere_,--to her father's ranch, probably. She wondered +irrelevantly why her mother had never mentioned these queer rocks, and +she wondered vaguely if any of them had caves or ledges where she could +be safe from the lightning. + +She was on the point of stepping out into the road again when a horseman +rode into sight between the two rocks. In the same instant of his +appearance she heard the unmistakable crack of a gun, saw the rider jerk +backward in the saddle, throw up one hand,--and then the darkness +dropped between them. + +Lorraine crouched behind a juniper bush close against the rock and +waited. The next flash, came within a half-minute. It showed a man at +the horse's head, holding it by the bridle. The horse was rearing. +Lorraine tried to scream that the man on the ground would be trampled, +but something went wrong with her voice, so that she could only whisper. + +When the light came again the man who had been shot was not altogether +on the ground. The other, working swiftly, had thrust the injured man's +foot through the stirrup. Lorraine saw him stand back and lift his quirt +to slash the horse across the rump. Even through the crash of thunder +Lorraine heard the horse go past her down the hill, galloping furiously. +When she could see again she glimpsed him running, while something +bounced along on the ground beside him. + +She saw the other man, with a dry branch in his hand, dragging it across +the road where it ran between the two rocks. Then Lorraine Hunter, +hardened to the sight of crimes committed for picture values only, +realized sickeningly that she had just looked upon a real murder,--the +cold-blooded killing of a man. She felt very sick. Queer little red +sparks squirmed and danced before her eyes. She crumpled down quietly +behind the juniper bush and did not know when the rain came, though it +drenched her in the first two or three minutes of downpour. + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +"SHE'S A GOOD GIRL WHEN SHE AIN'T CRAZY" + + +When the sun has been up just long enough to take the before-dawn chill +from the air without having swallowed all the diamonds that spangle bush +and twig and grass-blade after a night's soaking rain, it is good to +ride over the hills of Idaho and feel oneself a king,--and never mind +the crown and the scepter. Lone Morgan, riding early to the Sawtooth to +see the foreman about getting a man for a few days to help replace a +bridge carried fifty yards downstream by a local cloudburst, would not +have changed places with a millionaire. The horse he rode was the horse +he loved, the horse he talked to like a pal when they were by +themselves. The ridge gave him a wide outlook to the four corners of the +earth. Far to the north the Sawtooth range showed blue, the nearer +mountains pansy purple where the pine trees stood, the foothills shaded +delicately where canyons swept down to the gray plain. To the south was +the sagebrush, a soft, gray-green carpet under the sun. The sky was +blue, the clouds were handfuls of clean cotton floating lazily. Of the +night's storm remained no trace save slippery mud when his horse struck +a patch of clay, which was not often, and the packed sand still wet and +soggy from the beating rain. + +Rock City showed black and inhospitable even in the sunlight. The rock +walls rose sheer, the roofs slanted rakishly, the signs scratched on the +rock by facetious riders were pointless and inane. Lone picked his way +through the crooked defile that was marked MAIN STREET on the corner of +the first huge boulder and came abruptly into the road. Here he turned +north and shook his horse into a trot. + +A hundred yards or so down the slope beyond Rock City he pulled up short +with a "What the hell!" that did not sound profane, but merely amazed. +In the sodden road were the unmistakable footprints of a woman. Lone did +not hesitate in naming the sex, for the wet sand held the imprint +cleanly, daintily. Too shapely for a boy, too small for any one but a +child or a woman with little feet, and with the point at the toes +proclaiming the fashion of the towns, Lone guessed at once that she was +a town girl, a stranger, probably,--and that she had passed since the +rain; which meant since daylight. + +He swung his horse and rode back, wondering where she could have spent +the night. Halfway through Rock City the footprints ended abruptly, and +Lone turned back, riding down the trail at a lope. She couldn't have +gone far, he reasoned, and if she had been out all night in the rain, +with no better shelter than Rock City afforded, she would need +help,--"and lots of it, and pretty darn quick," he added to John Doe, +which was the ambiguous name of his horse. + +Half a mile farther on he overtook her. Rather, he sighted her in the +trail, saw her duck in amongst the rocks and scattered brush of a small +ravine, and spurred after her. It was precarious footing for his horse +when he left the road, but John Doe was accustomed to that. He jumped +boulders, shied around buckthorn, crashed through sagebrush and so +brought the girl to bay against a wet bank, where she stood shivering. +The terror in her face and her wide eyes would have made her famous in +the movies. It made Lone afraid she was crazy. + +Lone swung off and went up to her guardedly, not knowing just what an +insane woman might do when cornered. "There, now, I'm not going to hurt +yuh at all," he soothed. "I guess maybe you're lost. What made you run +away from me when you saw me coming?" + +Lorraine continued to stare at him. + +"I'm going to the ranch, and if you'd like a ride, I'll lend you my +horse. He'll be gentle if I lead him. It's a right smart walk from +here." Lone smiled, meaning to reassure her. + +"Are you the man I saw shoot that man and then fasten him to the stirrup +of the saddle so the horse dragged him down the road? If you are, +I--I----" + +"No--oh, no, I'm not the man," Lone said gently. "I just now came from +home. Better let me take you in to the ranch." + +"I was going to the ranch--did you see him shoot that man and make the +horse drag him--_make_ the horse--he _slashed_ that horse with the +quirt--and he went tearing down the road dragging--it--it +was--_horrible_!" + +"Yes--yes, don't worry about it. We'll fix him. You come and get on John +Doe and let me take you to the ranch. Come on--you're wet as a ducked +pup." + +"That man was just riding along--I saw him when it lightened. And he +shot him--oh, can't you _do_ something?" + +"Yes, yes, they're after him right now. Here. Just put your foot in the +stirrup--I'll help you up. Why, you're soaked!" Perseveringly Lone urged +her to the horse. "You're soaking wet!" he exclaimed again. + +"It rained," she muttered confusedly. "I thought it was the ranch--but +they were rocks. Just rocks. Did you _see_ him shoot that man? Why--why +it shouldn't be allowed! He ought to be arrested right away--I'd have +called a policeman but--isn't thunder and lightning just perfectly +_awful_? And that horse--going down the road dragging---- + +"You'd better get some one to double for me in this scene," she said +irrelevantly. "I--I don't know this horse, and if he starts running the +boys might not catch him in time. It isn't safe, is it?" + +"It's safe," said Lone pityingly. "You won't be dragged. You just get on +and ride. I'll lead him. John Doe's gentle as a dog." + +"Just straight riding?" Lorraine considered the matter gravely. +"Wel-ll--but I saw a man dragged, once. He'd been shot first. It--it +was awful!" + +"I'll bet it was. How'd you come to be walking so far?" + +Lorraine looked at him suspiciously. Lone thought her eyes were the most +wonderful eyes--and the most terrible--that he had ever seen. +Almond-shaped they were, the irises a clear, dark gray, the eyeballs +blue-white like a healthy baby's. That was the wonder of them. But their +glassy shine made them terrible. Her lids lifted in a sudden stare. + +"You're not the man, are you? I--I think he was taller than you. And his +hat was brown. He's a brute--a _beast_! To shoot a man just riding +along---- It rained," she added plaintively. "My bag is back there +somewhere under a bush. I think I could find the bush--it was where a +rabbit was sitting--but he's probably gone by this time. A rabbit," she +told him impressively, "wouldn't sit out in the rain all night, would +he? He'd get wet. And a rabbit would feel horrid when he was wet--such +thick fur he never _would_ get dried out. Where do they go when it +rains? They have holes in the ground, don't they?" + +"Yes. Sure, they do. I'll _show_ you one, down the road here a little +piece. Come on--it ain't far." + +To see a rabbit hole in the ground, Lorraine consented to mount and ride +while Lone walked beside her, agreeing with everything she said that +needed agreement. When she had gone a few rods, however, she began to +call him Charlie and to criticize the direction of the picture. They +should not, she declared, mix murders and thunderstorms in the same +scene. While the storm effect was perfectly _wonderful_, she thought it +rather detracted from the killing. She did not believe in lumping big +stuff together like that. Why not have the killing done by moonlight, +and use the storm when the murderer was getting away, or something like +that? And as for taking them out on location and making all those storm +scenes without telling them in advance so that they could have dry +clothes afterwards, she thought it a perfect outrage! If it were not for +spoiling the picture, she would quit, she asserted indignantly. She +thought the director had better go back to driving a laundry wagon, +which was probably where he came from. + +Lone agreed with her, even though he did not know what she was talking +about. He walked as fast as he could, but even so he could not travel +the six miles to the ranch very quickly. He could see that the girl was +burning up with fever, and he could hear her voice growing husky,--could +hear, too, the painful laboring of her breath. When she was not mumbling +incoherent nonsense she was laughing hoarsely at the plight she was in, +and after that she would hold both hands to her chest and moan in a way +that made Lone grind his teeth. + +When he lifted her off his horse at the foreman's cottage she was +whispering things no one could understand. Three cowpunchers came +running and hindered him a good deal in carrying her into the house, and +the foreman's wife ran excitedly from one room to the other, asking +questions and demanding that some one do something "for pity's sake, she +may be dying for all you know, while you stand there gawping like +fool-hens." + +"She was out all night in the rain--got lost, somehow. She said she was +coming here, so I brought her on. She's down with a cold, Mrs. Hawkins. +Better take off them wet clothes and put hot blankets around her. And a +poultice or something on her chest, I reckon." Lone turned to the door, +stopped to roll a cigarette, and watched Mrs. Hawkins hurrying to +Lorraine with a whisky toddy the cook had mixed for her. + +"A sweat's awful good for a cold like she's got," he volunteered +practically. "She's out of her head--or she was when I found her. But I +reckon that's mostly scare, from being lost all night. Give her a good +sweat, why don't you?" He reached the doorstep and then turned back to +add, "She left a grip back somewhere along the road. I'll go hunt it up, +I reckon." + +He mounted John Doe and rode down to the corral, where two or three +riders were killing time on various pretexts while they waited for +details of Lone's adventure. Delirious young women of the silk-stocking +class did not arrive at the Sawtooth every morning, and it was rumored +already amongst the men that she was some looker, which naturally +whetted their interest in her. + +"I'll bet it's one of Bob's girls, come trailin' him up. Mebby another +of them heart-ballum cases of Bob's," hazarded Pop Bridgers, who read +nothing unless it was printed on pink paper, and who refused to believe +that any good could come out of a city. "Ain't that right, Loney? +Hain't she a heart-ballum girl of Bob's?" + +From the saddle Lone stared down impassively at Pop and Pop's +companions. "I don't know a thing about her," he stated emphatically. +"She said she was coming to the ranch, and she was scared of the thunder +and lightning. That's every word of sense I could get outa her. She +ain't altogether ignorant--she knows how to climb on a horse, anyway, +and she kicked about having to ride sideways on account of her skirts. +She was plumb out of her head, and talked wild, but she handled her +reins like a rider. And she never mentioned Bob, nor anybody else +excepting some fellow she called Charlie. She thought I was him, but she +only talked to me friendly. She didn't pull any love talk at all." + +"Charlie?" Pop ruminated over a fresh quid of tobacco. "Charlie! Mebby +Bob, he stakes himself to a different name now and then. There ain't any +Charlie, except Charlie Werner; she wouldn't mean him, do yuh s'pose?" + +"Charlie Werner? Hunh! Say, Pop, she ain't no squaw--is she, Loney?" Sid +Sterling remonstrated. + +"If I can read brands," Lone testified, "she's no girl of Bob's. She's +a good, honest girl when she ain't crazy." + +"And no good, honest girl who is not crazy could possibly be a girl of +mine! Is that the idea, Lone?" + +Lone turned unhurriedly and looked at young Bob Warfield standing in the +stable door with his hands in his trousers pockets and his pipe in his +mouth. + +"That ain't the argument. Pop, here, was wondering if she was another +heart-ballum girl of yours," Lone grinned unabashed. "I don't know such +a hell of a lot about heart-balm ladies, Bob. I ain't a millionaire. I'm +just making a guess at their brand--and it ain't the brand this little +lady carries." + +Bob removed one hand from his pocket and cuddled the bowl of his pipe. +"If she's a woman, she's a heart-balmer if she gets the chance. They all +are, down deep in their tricky hearts. There isn't a woman on earth that +won't sell a man's soul out of his body if she happens to think it's +worth her while--and she can get away with it. But don't for any sake +call her _my_ heart-balmer." + +"That was Pop," drawled Lone. "It don't strike me as being any subject +for you fellows to make remarks about, anyway," he advised Pop firmly. +"She's a right nice little girl, and she's pretty darn sick." He touched +John Doe with the spurs and rode away, stopping at the foreman's gate to +finish his business with Hawkins. He was a conscientious young man, and +since he had charge of Elk Spring camp, he set its interests above his +own, which was more than some of the Sawtooth men would have done in his +place. + +Having reported the damage to the bridge and made his suggestions about +the repairs, he touched up John Doe again and loped away on a purely +personal matter, which had to do with finding the bag which the girl had +told him was under a bush where a rabbit had been sitting. + +If she had not been so very sick, Lone would have laughed at her naïve +method of identifying the spot. But he was too sorry for her to be +amused at the vagaries of her sick brain. He did not believe anything +she had said, except that she had been coming to the ranch and had left +her bag under a bush beside the road. It should not be difficult to find +it, if he followed the road and watched closely the bushes on either +side. + +Until he reached the place where he had first sighted her, Lone rode +swiftly, anxious to be through with the business and go his way. But +when he came upon her footprints again, he pulled up and held John Doe +to a walk, scanning each bush and boulder as he passed. + +It seemed probable that she had left the grip at Rock City where she +must have spent the night. She had spoken of being deceived into +thinking the place was the Sawtooth ranch until she had come into it and +found it "just rocks." Then, he reasoned, the storm had broken, and her +fright had held her there. When daylight came she had either forgotten +the bag or had left it deliberately. + +At Rock City, then, Lone stopped to examine the base of every rock, even +riding around those nearest the road. The girl, he guessed shrewdly, had +not wandered off the main highway, else she would not have been able to +find it again. Rock City was confusing unless one was perfectly familiar +with its curious, winding lanes. + +It was when he was riding slowly around the boulder marked "Palace +Hotel, Rates Reasnible," that he came upon the place where a horse had +stood, on the side best sheltered from the storm. Deep hoof marks +closely overlapping, an over-turned stone here and there gave proof +enough, and the rain-beaten soil that blurred the hoofprints farthest +from the rock told him more. Lone backed away, dismounted, and, stepping +carefully, went close. He could see no reason why a horse should have +stood there with his head toward the road ten feet away, unless his +rider was waiting for something--or some one. There were other boulders +near which offered more shelter from rain. + +Next the rock he discovered a boot track, evidently made when the rider +dismounted. He thought of the wild statement of the girl about seeing +some one shoot a man and wondered briefly if there could be a basis of +truth in what she said. But the road showed no sign of a struggle, +though there were, here and there, hoofprints half washed out with the +rain. + +Lone went back to his horse and rode on, still looking for the bag. His +search was thorough and, being a keen-eyed young man, he discovered the +place where Lorraine had crouched down by a rock. She must have stayed +there all night, for the scuffed soil was dry where her body had rested, +and her purse, caught in the juniper bush close by, was sodden with +rain. + +"The poor little kid!" he muttered, and with, a sudden impulse he turned +and looked toward the rock behind which the horse had stood. Help had +been that close, and she had not known it, unless---- + +"If anything happened there last night, she could have seen it from +here," he decided, and immediately put the thought away from him. + +"But nothing happened," he added, "unless maybe she saw him ride out and +go on down the road. She was out of her head and just imagined things." + +He slipped the soaked purse into his coat pocket, remounted and rode on +slowly, looking for the grip and half-believing she had not been +carrying one, but had dreamed it just as she had dreamed that a man had +been shot. + +He rode past the bag without seeing it, for Lorraine had thrust it far +back under a stocky bush whose scraggly branches nearly touched the +ground. So he came at last to the creek, swollen with the night's storm +so that it was swift and dangerous. Lone was turning back when John Doe +threw up his head, stared up the creek for a moment and whinnied +shrilly. Lone stood in the stirrups and looked. + +A blaze-faced horse was standing a short rifle-shot away, bridled and +with an empty saddle. Whether he was tied or not Lone could not tell at +that distance, but he knew the horse by its banged forelock and its +white face and sorrel ears, and he knew the owner of the horse. He rode +toward it slowly. + +"Whoa, you rattle-headed fool," he admonished, when the horse snorted +and backed a step or two as he approached. He saw the bridle-reins +dangling, broken, where the horse had stepped on them in running. "Broke +loose and run off again," he said, as he took down his rope and widened +the loop. "I'll bet Thurman would sell you for a bent nickel, this +morning." + +The horse squatted and jumped when he cast the loop, and then stood +quivering and snorting while Lone dismounted and started toward him. Ten +steps from the horse Lone stopped short, staring. For down in the bushes +on the farther side half lay, half hung the limp form of a man. + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +A DEATH "BY ACCIDENT" + + +Lone Morgan was a Virginian by birth, though few of his acquaintances +knew it. Lone never talked of himself except as his personal history +touched a common interest with his fellows. But until he was seventeen +he had lived very close to the center of one of the deadliest feuds of +the Blue Ridge. That he had been neutral was merely an accident of +birth, perhaps. And that he had not become involved in the quarrel that +raged among his neighbors was the direct result of a genius for holding +his tongue. He had attended the funerals of men shot down in their own +dooryards, he had witnessed the trials of the killers. He had grown up +with the settled conviction that other men's quarrels did not concern +him so long as he was not directly involved, and that what did not +concern him he had no right to discuss. If he stood aside and let +violence stalk by unhindered, he was merely doing what he had been +taught to do from the time he could walk. "Mind your own business and +let other folks do the same," had been the family slogan in Lone's home. +There had been nothing in Lone's later life to convince him that minding +his own business was not a very good habit. It had grown to be second +nature,--and it had made him a good man for the Sawtooth Cattle Company +to have on its pay roll. + +Just now Lone was stirred beyond his usual depth of emotion, and it was +not altogether the sight of Fred Thurman's battered body that unnerved +him. He wanted to believe that Thurman's death was purely an +accident,--the accident it appeared. But Lorraine and the telltale +hoofprints by the rock compelled him to believe that it was not an +accident. He knew that if he examined carefully enough Fred Thurman's +body he would find the mark of a bullet. He was tempted to look, and yet +he did not want to know. It was no business of his; it would be foolish +to let it become his business. + +"He's too dead to care now how it happened--and it would only stir up +trouble," he finally decided and turned his eyes away. + +He pulled the twisted foot from the stirrup, left the body where it lay, +and led the blaze-faced horse to a tree and tied it securely. He took +off his coat and spread it over the head and shoulders of the dead man, +weighted the edges with rocks and rode away. + +Halfway up the hill he left the road and took a narrow trail through the +sage, a short-cut that would save him a couple of miles. + +The trail crossed the ridge half a mile beyond Rock City, dipping into +the lower end of the small gulch where he had overtaken the girl. The +place recalled with fresh vividness, her first words to him: "Are _you_ +the man I saw shoot that other man and fasten his foot in the stirrup?" +Lone shivered and threw away the cigarette he had just lighted. + +"My God, that girl mustn't tell that to any one else!" he exclaimed +apprehensively. "No matter who she is or what she is, she mustn't tell +that!" + +"Hello! Who you talking to? I heard somebody talking----" The bushes +parted above a low, rocky ledge and a face peered out, smiling +good-humoredly. Lone started a little and pulled up. + +"Oh, hello, Swan. I was just telling this horse of mine all I was going +to do to him. Say, you're a chancey bird, Swan, yelling from the brush, +like that. Some folks woulda taken a shot at you." + +"Then they'd hit me, sure," Swan observed, letting himself down into the +trail. He, too, was wet from his hat crown to his shoes, that squelched +when he landed lightly on his toes. "Anybody would be ashamed to shoot +at a mark so large as I am. I'd say they're poor shooters." And he added +irrelevantly, as he held up a grayish pelt, "I got that coyote I been +chasing for two weeks. He was sure smart. He had me guessing. But I made +him guess some, maybe. He guessed wrong this time." + +Lone's eyes narrowed while he looked Swan over. "You must have been out +all night," he said. "You're crazier about hunting than I am." + +"Wet bushes," Swan corrected carelessly. "I been tramping since +daylight. It's my work to hunt, like it's your work to ride." He had +swung into the trail ahead of John Doe and was walking with long +strides,--the tallest, straightest, limberest young Swede in all the +country. He had the bluest eyes, the readiest smile, the healthiest +color, the sunniest hair and disposition the Sawtooth country had seen +for many a day. He had homesteaded an eighty-acre claim on the south +side of Bear Top and had by that means gained possession of two living +springs and the only accessible portion of Wilder Creek where it crossed +the meadow called Skyline before it plunged into a gulch too narrow for +cattle to water with any safety. + +The Sawtooth Cattle Company had for years "covered" that eighty-acre +patch of government land, never dreaming that any one would ever file on +it. Swan Vjolmar was there and had his log cabin roofed and ready for +the door and windows before the Sawtooth discovered his presence. Now, +nearly a year afterwards, he was accepted in a tolerant, half-friendly +spirit. He had not objected to the Sawtooth cattle which still watered +at Skyline Meadow. He was a "Government hunter" and he had killed many +coyotes and lynx and even a mountain lion or two. Lone wondered +sometimes what the Sawtooth meant to do about the Swede, but so far the +Sawtooth seemed inclined to do nothing at all, evidently thinking his +war on animal pests more than atoned for his effrontery in taking +Skyline as a homestead. When he had proven up on his claim they would +probably buy him out and have the water still. + +"Well, what do you know?" Swan turned his head to inquire abruptly. +"You're pretty quiet." + +Lone roused himself. "Fred Thurman's been dragged to death by that +damned flighty horse of his," he said. "I found him in the brush this +side of Granite Creek. Had his foot caught in the stirrup. I thought I'd +best leave him there till the coroner can view him." + +Swan stopped short in the trail and turned facing Lone. "Last night my +dog Yack whines to go out. He went and sat in a place where he looks +down on the walley, and he howled for half an hour. I said then that +somebody in the walley has died. That dog is something queer about it. +He knows things." + +"I'm going to the Sawtooth," Lone told him. "I can telephone to the +coroner from there. Anybody at Thurman's place, do you know?" + +Swan shook his head and started again down the winding, steep trail. "I +don't hunt over that way for maybe a week. That's too bad he's killed. I +like Fred Thurman. He's a fine man, you bet." + +"He was," said Lone soberly. "It's a damn shame he had to go--like +that." + +Swan glanced back at him, studied Lone's face for an instant and turned +into a tributary gully where a stream trickled down over water-worn +rocks. "Here I leave you," he volunteered, as Lone came abreast of him. +"A coyote's crossed up there, and I maybe find his tracks. I could go do +chores for Fred Thurman if nobody's there. Should I do that? What you +say, Lone?" + +"You might drift around by there if it ain't too much out of your way, +and see if he's got a man on the ranch," Lone suggested. "But you better +not touch anything in the house, Swan. The coroner'll likely appoint +somebody to look around and see if he's got any folks to send his stuff +to. Just feed any stock that's kept up, if nobody's there." + +"All right," Swan agreed readily. "I'll do that, Lone. Good-by." + +Lone nodded and watched him climb the steep slope of the gulch on the +side toward Thurman's ranch. Swan climbed swiftly, seeming to take no +thought of where he put his feet, yet never once slipping or slowing. In +two minutes he was out of sight, and Lone rode on moodily, trying not +to think of Fred Thurman, trying to shut from his mind the things that +wild-eyed, hoarse-voiced girl had told him. + +"Lone, you mind your own business," he advised himself once. "You don't +know anything that's going to do any one any good, and what you don't +know there's no good guessing. But that girl--she mustn't talk like +that!" + +Of Swan he scarcely gave a thought after the Swede had disappeared, yet +Swan was worth a thought or two, even from a man who was bent on minding +his own business. Swan had no sooner climbed the gulch toward Thurman's +claim than he proceeded to descend rather carefully to the bottom again, +walk along on the rocks for some distance and climb to the ridge whose +farther slope led down to Granite Creek. He did not follow the trail, +but struck straight across an outcropping ledge, descended to Granite +Creek and strode along next the hill where the soil was gravelly and +barren. When he had gone some distance, he sat down and took from under +his coat two huge, crudely made moccasins of coyote skin. These he +pulled on over his shoes, tied them around his ankles and went on, still +keeping close under the hill. + +He reached the place where Fred Thurman lay, stood well away from the +body and studied every detail closely. Then, stepping carefully on +trampled brush and rocks, he approached and cautiously lifted Lone's +coat. It was not a pretty sight, but Swan's interest held him there for +perhaps ten minutes, his eyes leaving the body only when the blaze-faced +horse moved. Then Swan would look up quickly at the horse, seem +reassured when he saw that the animal was not watching anything at a +distance, and return to his curious task. Finally he drew the coat back +over the head and shoulders, placed each stone exactly as he had found +it and went up to the horse, examining the saddle rather closely. After +that he retreated as carefully as he had approached. When he had gone +half a mile or so upstream he found a place where he could wash his +hands without wetting his moccasins, returned to the rocky hillside and +took off the clumsy footgear and stowed them away under his coat. Then +with long strides that covered the ground as fast as a horse could do +without loping, Swan headed as straight as might be for the Thurman +ranch. + +About noon Swan approached the crowd of men and a few women who stood +at a little distance and whispered together, with their faces averted +from the body around which the men stood grouped. The news had spread as +such news will, even in a country so sparsely settled as the Sawtooth. +Swan counted forty men,--he did not bother with the women. Fred Thurman +had been known to every one of them. Some one had spread a piece of +canvas over the corpse, and Swan did not go very near. The blaze-faced +horse had been led farther away and tied to a cottonwood, where some one +had thrown down a bundle of hay. The Sawtooth country was rather +punctilious in its duty toward the law, and it was generally believed +that the coroner would want to see the horse that had caused the +tragedy. + +Half an hour after Swan arrived, the coroner came in a machine, and with +him came the sheriff. The coroner, an important little man, examined the +body, the horse and the saddle, and there was the usual formula of +swearing in a jury. The inquest was rather short, since there was only +one witness to testify, and Lone merely told how he had discovered the +horse there by the creek, and that the body had not been moved from +where he found it. + +Swan went over to where Lone, anxious to get away from the place, was +untying his horse after the jury had officially named the death an +accident. + +"I guess those horses could be turned loose," he began without prelude. +"What you think, Lone? I been to Thurman's ranch, and I don't find +anybody. Some horses in a corral, and pigs in a pen, and chickens. I +guess Thurman was living alone. Should I tell the coroner that?" + +"I dunno," Lone replied shortly. "You might speak to the sheriff. I +reckon he's the man to take charge of things." + +"It's bad business, getting killed," Swan said vaguely. "It makes me +feel damn sorry when I go to that ranch. There's the horses waiting for +breakfast--and Thurman, he's dead over here and can't feed his pigs and +his chickens. It's a white cat over there that comes to meet me and rubs +my leg and purrs like it's lonesome. That's a nice ranch he's got, too. +Now what becomes of that ranch? What you think, Lone?" + +"Hell, how should I know?" Lone scowled at him from the saddle and rode +away, leaving Swan standing there staring after him. He turned away to +find the sheriff and almost collided with Brit Hunter, who was glancing +speculatively from him to Lone Morgan. Swan stopped and put out his hand +to shake. + +"Lone says I should tell the sheriff I could look after Fred Thurman's +ranch. What you think, Mr. Hunter?" + +"Good idea, I guess. Somebody'll have to. They can't----" He checked +himself. "You got a horse? I'll ride over with yuh, maybe." + +"I got legs," Swan returned laconically. "They don't get scared, Mr. +Hunter, and maybe kill me sometime. You could tell the sheriff I'm +government hunter and honest man, and I take good care of things. You +could do that, please?" + +"Sure," said Brit and rode over to where the sheriff was standing. + +The sheriff listened, nodded, beckoned to Swan. "The court'll have to +settle up the estate and find his heirs, if he's got any. But you look +after things--what's your name? Vjolmar--how yuh spell it? I'll swear +you in as a deputy. Good Lord, you're a husky son-of-a-gun!" The +sheriff's eyes went up to Swan's hat crown, descended to his shoulders +and lingered there admiringly for a moment, traveled down his flat, +hard-muscled body and his straight legs. "I'll bet you could put up +some fight, if you had to," he commented. + +Swan grinned good-humoredly, glanced conscience-stricken at the covered +figure on the ground and straightened his face decorously. + +"I could lick you good," he admitted in a stage whisper. "I'm a +son-off-a-gun all right--only I don't never get mad at somebody." + +Brit Hunter smiled at that, it was so like Swan Vjolmar. But when they +were halfway to Thurman's ranch--Brit on horseback and Swan striding +easily along beside him, leading the blaze-faced horse, he glanced down +at Swan's face and wondered if Swan had not lied a little. + +"What's on your mind, Swan?" he asked abruptly. + +Swan started and looked up at him, glanced at the empty hills on either +side, and stopped still in the trail. + +"Mr. Hunter, you been longer in the country than I have been. You seen +some good riding, I bet. Maybe you see some men ride backwards on a +horse?" + +Brit looked at him uncomprehendingly. "Backwards?" + +Swan led up the blaze-faced horse and pointed to the right stirrup. +"Spurs would scratch like that if you jerk your foot, maybe. You're a +good rider, Mr. Hunter, you can tell. That's a right stirrup, ain't it? +Fred Thurman, he's got his left foot twist around, all broke from +jerking in his stirrup. Left foot in right stirrup----" He pushed back +his hat and rumpled his yellow hair, looking up into Brit's face +inquiringly. "Left foot in right stirrup is riding backwards. That's a +damn good rider to ride like that--what you think, Mr. Hunter?" + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +LONE ADVISES SILENCE + + +Twice in the next week Lone found an excuse for riding over to the +Sawtooth. During his first visit, the foreman's wife told him that the +young lady was still too sick to talk much. The second time he went, Pop +Bridgers spied him first and cackled over his coming to see the girl. +Lone grinned and dissembled as best he could, knowing that Pop Bridgers +fed his imagination upon denials and argument and remonstrance and was +likely to build gossip that might spread beyond the Sawtooth. Wherefore +he did not go near the foreman's house that day, but contented himself +with gathering from Pop's talk that the girl was still there. + +After that he rode here and there, wherever he would be likely to meet a +Sawtooth rider, and so at last he came upon Al Woodruff loping along the +crest of Juniper Ridge. Al at first displayed no intention of stopping, +but pulled up when he saw John Doe slowing down significantly. Lone +would have preferred a chat with some one else, for this was a +sharp-eyed, sharp-tongued man; but Al Woodruff stayed at the ranch and +would know all the news, and even though he might give it an ill-natured +twist, Lone would at least know what was going on. Al hailed him with a +laughing epithet. + +"Say, you sure enough played hell all around, bringin' Brit Hunter's +girl to the Sawtooth!" he began, chuckling as if he had some secret +joke. "Where'd you pick her up, Lone? She claims you found her at Rock +City. That right?" + +"No, it ain't right," Lone denied promptly, his dark eyes meeting Al's +glance steadily. "I found her in that gulch away this side. She was in +amongst the rocks where she was trying to keep outa the rain. Brit +Hunter's girl, is she? She told me she was going to the Sawtooth. She'd +have made it, too, if it hadn't been for the storm. She got as far as +the gulch, and the lightning scared her from going any farther." He +offered Al his tobacco sack and fumbled for a match. "I never knew Brit +Hunter had a girl." + +"Nor me," Al said and sifted tobacco into a cigarette paper. "Bob, he +drove her over there yesterday. Took him close to all day to make the +trip--and Bob, he claims to hate women!" + +"So would I, if I'd got stung for fifty thousand. She ain't that kind. +She's a nice girl, far as I could tell. She got well, all right, did +she?" + +"Yeah--only she was still coughing some when she left the ranch. She +like to of had pneumonia, I guess. Queer how she claimed she spent the +night in Rock City, ain't it?" + +"No," Lone answered judicially, "I don't know as it's so queer. She +never realized how far she'd walked, I reckon. She was plumb crazy when +I found her. You couldn't take any stock in what she said. Say, you +didn't see that bay I was halter-breaking, did yuh, Al? He jumped the +fence and got away on me, day before yesterday. I'd like to catch him up +again. He'll make a good horse." + +Al had not seen the bay, and the talk tapered off desultorily to a final +"So-long, see yuh later." Lone rode on, careful not to look back. So she +was Brit Hunter's girl! Lone whistled softly to himself while he studied +this new angle of the problem,--for a problem he was beginning to +consider it. She was Brit Hunter's girl, and she had told them at the +Sawtooth that she had spent the night at Rock City. He wondered how +much else she had told; how much she remembered of what she had told +him. + +He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a round leather purse +with a chain handle. It was soiled and shrunken with its wetting, and +the clasp had flecks of rust upon it. What it contained Lone did not +know. Virginia had taught him that a man must not be curious about the +personal belongings of a woman. Now he turned the purse over, tried to +rub out the stiffness of the leather, and smiled a little as he dropped +it back into his pocket. + +"I've got my calling card," he said softly to John Doe. "I reckon I had +the right hunch when I didn't turn it over to Mrs. Hawkins. I'll ask her +again about that grip she said she hid under a bush. I never heard about +any of the boys finding it." + +His thoughts returned to Al Woodruff and stopped there. Determined still +to attend strictly to his own affairs, his thoughts persisted in playing +truant and in straying to a subject he much preferred not to think of at +all. Why should Al Woodruff be interested in the exact spot where Brit +Hunter's daughter had spent the night of the storm? Why should Lone +instinctively discount her statement and lie whole-heartedly about it? + +"Now if Al catches me up in that, he'll think I know a lot I don't know, +or else----" He halted his thoughts there, for that, too, was a +forbidden subject. + +Forbidden subjects are like other forbidden things: they have a way of +making themselves very conspicuous. Lone was heading for the Quirt ranch +by the most direct route, fearing, perhaps, that if he waited he would +lose his nerve and would not go at all. Yet it was important that he +should go; he must return the girl's purse! + +The most direct route to the Quirt took him down Juniper Ridge and +across Granite Creek near the Thurman ranch. Indeed, if he followed the +trail up Granite Creek and across the hilly country to Quirt Creek, he +must pass within fifty yards of the Thurman cabin. Lone's time was +limited, yet he took the direct route rather reluctantly. He did not +want to be reminded too sharply of Fred Thurman as a man who had lived +his life in his own way and had died so horribly. + +"Well, he didn't have it coming to him--but it's done and over with, +now, so it's no use thinking about it," he reflected, when the roofs of +the Thurman ranch buildings began to show now and then through the thin +ranks of the cottonwoods along the creek. + +But his face sobered as he rode along. It seemed to him that the sleepy +little meadows, the quiet murmuring of the creek, even the soft rustling +of the cottonwood leaves breathed a new loneliness, an emptiness where +the man who had called this place home, who had clung to it in the face +of opposition that was growing into open warfare, had lived and had left +life suddenly--unwarrantably, Lone knew in his heart. It might be of no +use to think about it, but the vivid memory of Fred Thurman was with him +when he rode up the trail to the stable and the small corrals. He had to +think, whether he would or no. + +At the corral he came unexpectedly in sight of the Swede, who grinned a +guileless welcome and came toward him, so that Lone could not ride on +unless he would advertise his dislike of the place. John Doe, plainly +glad to find an excuse to stop, slowed and came to where Swan waited by +the gate. + +"By golly, this is lonesome here," Swan complained, heaving a great +sigh. "That judge don't get busy pretty quick, I'm maybe jumping my job. +Lone, what you think? You believe in ghosts?" + +"Naw. What's on your chest, Swan?" Lone slipped sidewise in the saddle, +resting his muscles. "You been seeing things?" + +"No--I don't be seeing things, Lone. But sometimes I been--like I _feel_ +something." He stared at Lone questioningly. "What you think, Lone, if +you be sitting down eating your supper, maybe, and you feel something +say words in your brain? Like you know something talks to you and then +quits." + +Lone gave Swan a long, measuring look, and Swan laughed uneasily. + +"That sounds crazy. But it's true, what something tells me in my brain. +I go and look, and by golly, it's there just like the words tell me." + +Lone straightened in the saddle. "You better come clean, Swan, and tell +the whole thing. What was it? Don't talk in circles. What words did you +feel--in your brain?" In spite of himself, Lone felt as he had when the +girl had talked to him and called him Charlie. + +Swan closed the gate behind him with steady hands. His lips were pressed +firmly together, as if he had definitely made up his mind to something. +Lone was impressed somehow with Swan's perfect control of his speech, +his thoughts, his actions. But he was puzzled rather than anything else, +and when Swan turned, facing him, Lone's bewilderment did not lessen. + +"I'll tell you. It's when I'm sitting down to eat my supper. I'm just +reaching out my hand like this, to get my coffee. And something says in +my head, 'It's a lie. I don't ride backwards. Go look at my saddle. +There's blood----' And that's all. It's like the words go far away so I +can't hear any more. So I eat my supper, and then I get the lantern and +I go look. You come with me, Lone. I'll show you." + +Without a word Lone dismounted and followed Swan into a small shed +beside the stable, where a worn stock saddle hung suspended from a +crosspiece, a rawhide string looped over the horn. Lone did not ask +whose saddle it was, nor did Swan name the owner. There was no need. + +Swan took the saddle and swung it around so that the right side was +toward them. It was what is called a full-stamped saddle, with the +popular wild-rose design on skirts and cantle. Much hard use and +occasional oilings had darkened the leather to a rich, red brown, marred +with old scars and scratches and the stains of many storms. + +"Blood is hard to find when it's raining all night," Swan observed, +speaking low as one does in the presence of death. "But if somebody is +bleeding and falls off a horse slow, and catches hold of things and +tries like hell to hang on----" He lifted the small flap that covered +the cinch ring and revealed a reddish, flaked stain. Phlegmatically he +wetted his finger tip on his tongue, rubbed the stain and held up his +finger for Lone to see. "That's a damn funny place for blood, when a man +is dragging on the ground," he commented drily. "And something else is +damn funny, Lone." + +He lifted the wooden stirrup and touched with his finger the rowel +marks. "That is on the front part," he said. "I could swear in court +that Fred's left foot was twisted--that's damn funny, Lone. I don't see +men ride backwards, much." + +Lone turned on him and struck the stirrup from his hand. "I think you +better forget it," he said fiercely. "He's dead--it can't help him any +to----" He stopped and pulled himself together. "Swan, you take a fool's +advice and don't tell anybody else about feeling words talk in your +head. They'll have you in the bug-house at Blackfoot, sure as you live." +He looked at the saddle, hesitated, looked again at Swan, who was +watching him. "That blood most likely got there when Fred was packing a +deer in from the hills. And marks on them old oxbow stirrups don't mean +a damn thing but the need of a new pair, maybe." He forced a laugh and +stepped outside the shed. "Just shows you, Swan, that imagination and +being alone all the time can raise Cain with a fellow. You want to watch +yourself." + +Swan followed him out, closing the door carefully behind him. "By golly, +I'm watching out now," he assented thoughtfully. "You don't tell +anybody, Lone." + +"No, I won't tell anybody--and I'd advise you not to," Lone repeated +grimly. "Just keep those thoughts outa your head, Swan. They're bad +medicine." + +He mounted John Doe and rode away, his eyes downcast, his quirt slapping +absently the weeds along the trail. It was not his business, and +yet---- Lone shook himself together and put John Doe into a lope. He had +warned Swan, and he could do no more. + +Halfway to the Quirt he met Lorraine riding along the trail. She would +have passed him with no sign of recognition, but Lone lifted his hat and +stopped. Lorraine looked at him, rode on a few steps and turned. "Did +you wish to speak about something?" she asked impersonally. + +Lone felt the flush in his cheeks, which angered him to the point of +speaking curtly. "Yes. I found your purse where you dropped it that +night you were lost. I was bringing it over to you. My name's Morgan. +I'm the man that found you and took you in to the ranch." + +"Oh." Lorraine looked at him steadily. "You're the one they call Loney?" + +"When they're feeling good toward me. I'm Lone Morgan. I went back to +find your grip--you said you left it under a bush, but the world's plumb +full of bushes. I found your purse, though." + +"Thank you so much. I must have been an awful nuisance, but I was so +scared--and things were terribly mixed in my mind. I didn't even have +sense enough to tell you what ranch I was trying to find, did I? So you +took me to the wrong one, and I was a week there before I found it out. +And then they were perfectly lovely about it and brought me--home." She +turned the purse over and over in her hands, looking at it without much +interest. She seemed in no hurry to ride on, which gave Lone courage. + +"There's something I'd like to say," he began, groping for words that +would make his meaning plain without telling too much. "I hope you won't +mind my telling you. You were kinda out of your head when I found you, +and you said something about seeing a man shot and----" + +"Oh!" Lorraine looked up at him, looked through him, he thought, with +those brilliant eyes of hers. "Then I did tell----" + +"I just wanted to say," Lone interrupted her, "that I knew all the time +it was just a nightmare. I never mentioned it to anybody, and you'll +forget all about it, I hope. You didn't tell any one else, did you?" + +He looked up at her again and found her studying him curiously. "You're +not the man I saw," she said, as if she were satisfying herself on that +point. "I've wondered since--but I was sure, too, that I had seen it. +Why mustn't I tell any one?" + +Lone did not reply at once. The girl's eyes were disconcertingly direct, +her voice and her manner disturbed him with their judicial calmness, so +at variance with the wildness he remembered. + +"Well, it's hard to explain," he said at last. "You're strange to this +country, and you don't know all the ins and outs of--things. It wouldn't +do any good to you or anybody else, and it might do a lot of harm." His +eyes nicked her face with a wistful glance. "You don't know me--I really +haven't got any right to ask or expect you to trust me. But I wish you +would, to the extent of forgetting that you saw--or thought you +saw--anything that night in Rock City." + +Lorraine shivered and covered her eyes swiftly with one hand. His words +had brought back too sharply that scene. But she shook off the emotion +and faced him again. + +"I saw a man murdered," she cried. "I wasn't sure afterwards; sometimes +I thought I had dreamed it. But I was sure I saw it. I saw the horse go +by, running--and you want me to keep still about that? What harm could +it do to tell? Perhaps it's true--perhaps I did see it all. I might +think you were trying to cover up something--only, you're not the man I +saw--or thought I saw." + +"No, of course I'm not. You dreamed the whole thing, and the way you +talked to me was so wild, folks would say you're crazy if they heard you +tell it. You're a stranger here, Miss Hunter, and--your father is not as +popular in this country as he might be. He's got enemies that would be +glad of the chance to stir up trouble for him. You--just dreamed all +that. I'm asking you to forget a bad dream, that's all, and not go +telling it to other folks." + +For some time Lorraine did not answer. The horses conversed with sundry +nose-rubbings, nibbled idly at convenient brush tips, and wondered no +doubt why their riders were so silent. Lone tried to think of some +stronger argument, some appeal that would reach the girl without +frightening her or causing her to distrust him. But he did not know what +more he could say without telling her what must not be told. + +"Just how would it make trouble for my father?" Lorraine asked at last. +"I can't believe you'd ask me to help cover up a crime, but it seems +hard to believe that a nightmare would cause any great commotion. And +why is my father unpopular?" + +"Well, you don't know this country," Lone parried inexpertly. "It's all +right in some ways, and in some ways it could be a lot improved. Folks +haven't got much to talk about. They go around gabbling their heads off +about every little thing, and adding onto it until you can't recognize +your own remarks after they've been peddled for a week. You've maybe +seen places like that." + +"Oh, yes." Lorraine's eyes lighted with a smile. "Take a movie studio, +for instance." + +"Yes. Well, you being a stranger, you would get all the worst of it. I +just thought I'd tell you; I'd hate to see you misunderstood by folks +around here. I--I feel kinda responsible for you; I'm the one that found +you." + +Lorraine's eyes twinkled. "Well, I'm glad to know one person in the +country who doesn't gabble his head off. You haven't answered any of my +questions, and you've made me feel as if you'd found a dangerous, wild +woman that morning. It isn't very flattering, but I think you're honest, +anyway." + +Lone smiled for the first time, and she found his smile pleasant. "I'm +no angel," he disclaimed modestly, "and most folks think I could be +improved on a whole lot. But I'm honest in one way. I'm thinking about +what's best for you, this time." + +"I'm terribly grateful," Lorraine laughed. "I shall take great care not +to go all around the country telling people my dreams. I can see that it +wouldn't make me awfully popular." Then she sobered. "Mr. Morgan, that +was a _horrible_ kind of--nightmare. Why, even last night I woke up +shivering, just imagining it all over again." + +"It was sure horrible the way you talked about it," Lone assured her. +"It's because you were sick, I reckon. I wish you'd tell me as close as +you can where you left that grip of yours. You said it was under a bush +where a rabbit was sitting. I'd like to find the grip--but I'm afraid +that rabbit has done moved!" + +"Oh, Mr. Warfield and I found it, thank you. The rabbit had moved, but I +sort of remembered how the road had looked along there, and we hunted +until we discovered the place. Dad has driven in after my other luggage +to-day--and I believe I must be getting home. I was only out for a +little ride." + +She thanked him again for the trouble he had taken and rode away. Lone +turned off the trail and, picking his way around rough outcroppings of +rock, and across unexpected little gullies, headed straight for the ford +across Granite Creek and home. Brit Hunter's girl, he was thinking, was +even nicer than he had pictured her. And that she could believe in the +nightmare was a vast relief. + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +THE MAN AT WHISPER + + +Brit Hunter finished washing the breakfast dishes and put a stick of +wood into the broken old cook-stove that had served him and Frank for +fifteen years and was feeling its age. Lorraine's breakfast was in the +oven, keeping warm. Brit looked in, tested the heat with his gnarled +hand to make sure that the sour-dough biscuits would not be dried to +crusts, and closed the door upon them and the bacon and fried potatoes. +Frank Johnson had the horses saddled and it was time to go, yet Brit +lingered, uneasily conscious that his habitation was lacking in many +things which a beautiful young woman might consider absolute +necessities. He had seen in Lorraine's eyes, as they glanced here and +there about the grimy walls, a certain disparagement of her +surroundings. The look had made him wince, though he could not quite +decide what it was that displeased her. Maybe she wanted lace curtains, +or something. + +He set the four chairs in a row against the wall, swept up the bits of +bark and ashes beside the stove, made sure that the water bucket was +standing full on its bench beside the door, sent another critical glance +around the room, and tiptoed over to the dish cupboard and let down the +flowered calico curtain that had been looped up over a nail for +convenience. The sun sent a bright, wide bar of yellow light across the +room to rest on the shelf behind the stove where stood the salt can, the +soda, the teapot, a box of matches and two pepper cans, one empty and +the other full. Brit always meant to throw out that empty pepper can and +always neglected to do so. Just now he remembered picking up the empty +one and shaking it over the potatoes futilely and then changing it for +the full one. But he did not take it away; in the wilderness one learns +to save useless things in the faint hope that some day they may become +useful. The shelves were cluttered with fit companions to that empty +pepper can. Brit thought that he would have "cleaned out" had he known +that Lorraine was coming. Since she was here, it scarcely seemed worth +while. + +He walked on his boot-toes to the door of the second room of the cabin, +listened there for a minute, heard no sound and took a tablet and pencil +off another shelf littered with useless things. The note which he wrote +painstakingly, lest she might think him lacking in education, he laid +upon the table beside Lorraine's plate; then went out, closing the door +behind him as quietly as a squeaking door can be made to close. + +Lorraine, in the other room, heard the squeak and sat up. Her wrist +watch, on the chair beside her bed, said that it was fifteen minutes +past six, which she considered an unearthly hour for rising. She pulled +up the covers and tried to sleep again. The day would be long enough, at +best. There was nothing to do, unless she took that queer old horse with +withers like the breastbone of a lean Christmas turkey and hips that +reminded her of the little roofs over dormer windows, and went for a +ride. And if she did that, there was nowhere to go and nothing to do +when she arrived there. + +In a very few days Lorraine had exhausted the sights of Quirt Creek and +vicinity. If she rode south she would eventually come to the top of a +hill whence she could look down upon further stretches of barrenness. If +she rode east she would come eventually to the road along which she had +walked from Echo, Idaho. Lorraine had had enough of that road. If she +went north she would--well, she would not meet Mr. Lone Morgan again, +for she had tried it twice, and had turned back because there seemed no +end to the trail twisting through the sage and rocks. West she had not +gone, but she had no doubt that it would be the same dreary monotony of +dull gray landscape. + +Monotony of landscape was one thing which Lorraine could not endure, +unless it had a foreground of riders hurtling here and there, and of +perspiring men around a camera tripod. At the Sawtooth ranch, after she +was able to be up, she had seen cowboys, but they had lacked the dash +and the picturesque costuming of the West she knew. They were mostly +commonplace young men, jogging past the house on horseback, or loitering +down by the corrals. They had offered absolutely no interest or "color" +to the place, and the owner's son, Bob Warfield, had driven her over to +the Quirt in a Ford and had seemed exactly like any other big, +good-looking young man who thought well of himself. Lorraine was not +susceptible to mere good looks, three years with the "movies" having +disillusioned her quite thoroughly. Too many young men of Bob Warfield's +general type had attempted to make love to her--lightly and not too +well--for Lorraine to be greatly impressed. + +She yawned, looked at her watch again, found that she had spent exactly +six minutes in meditating upon her immediate surroundings, and fell to +wondering why it was that the real West was so terribly commonplace. +Why, yesterday she had been brought to such a pass of sheer loneliness +that she had actually been driven to reading an old horse-doctor book! +She had learned the symptoms of epizoötic--whatever that was--and +poll-evil and stringhalt, and had gone from that to making a shopping +tour through a Montgomery Ward catalogue. There was nothing else in the +house to read, except a half dozen old copies of the _Boise News_. + +There was nothing to do, nothing to see, no one to talk to. Her dad and +the big, heavy-set man whom he called Frank, seemed uncomfortably aware +of their deficiencies and were pitiably anxious to make her feel +welcome,--and failed. They called her "Raine." The other two men did not +call her anything at all. They were both sandy-complexioned and they +both chewed tobacco quite noticeably, and when they sat down in their +shirt sleeves to eat, Lorraine had seen irregular humps in their hip +pockets which must be six-guns; though why they should carry them in +their pockets instead of in holster belts buckled properly around their +bodies and sagging savagely down at one side and swinging ferociously +when they walked, Lorraine could not imagine. They did not wear chaps, +either, and their spurs were just spurs, without so much as a silver +concho anywhere. Cowboys in overalls and blue gingham shirts and faded +old coats whose lapels lay in wrinkles and whose pockets were torn down +at the corners! If Lorraine had not been positive that this was actually +a cattle ranch in Idaho, she never would have believed that they were +anything but day laborers. + +"It's a comedy part for the cattle-queen's daughter," she admitted, +putting out a hand to stroke the lean, gray cat that jumped upon her bed +from the open window. "Ket, it's a _scream_! I'll take my West before +the camera, thank you; or I would, if I hadn't jumped right into the +middle of this trick West before I knew what I was doing. Ket, what do +you do to pass away the time? I don't see how you can have the nerve to +live in an empty space like this and purr!" + +She got up then, looked into the kitchen and saw the paper on the table. +This was new and vaguely promised some sort of break in the deadly +monotony which she saw stretching endlessly before her. Carrying the +nameless cat in her arms, Lorraine went in her bare feet across the +grimy, bare floor to the table and picked up the note. It read simply: + + "Your brekfast is in the oven we wont be back till dark maby. Don't + leave the ranch today. Yr loveing father." + +Lorraine hugged the cat so violently that she choked off a purr in the +middle. "'Don't leave the ranch to-day!' Ket, I believe it's going to be +dangerous or something, after all." + +She dressed quickly and went outside into the sunlight, the cat at her +heels, the thrill of that one command filling the gray monotone of the +hills with wonderful possibilities of adventure. Her father had made no +objection before when she went for a ride. He had merely instructed her +to keep to the trails, and if she didn't know the way home, to let the +reins lie loose on Yellowjacket's neck and he would bring her to the +gate. + +Yellowjacket's instinct for direction had not been working that day, +however. Lorraine had no sooner left the ranch out of sight behind her +than she pretended that she was lost. Yellowjacket had thereupon walked +a few rods farther and stopped, patiently indifferent to the location of +his oats box. Lorraine had waited until his head began to droop lower +and lower, and his switching at flies had become purely automatic. +Yellowjacket was going to sleep without making any effort to find the +way home. But since Lorraine had not told her father anything about it, +his injunction could not have anything to do with the unreliability of +the horse. + +"Now," she said to the cat, "if three or four bandits would appear on +the ridge, over there, and come tearing down into the immediate +foreground, jump the gate and surround the house, I'd know this was the +real thing. They'd want to make me tell where dad kept his gold or +whatever it was they wanted, and they'd have me tied to a chair--and +then, cut to Lone Morgan (that's a perfectly _wonderful_ name for the +lead!) hearing shots and coming on a dead run to the rescue." She +picked up the cat and walked slowly down the hard-trodden path to the +stable. "But there aren't any bandits, and dad hasn't any gold or +anything else worth stealing--Ket, if dad isn't a miser, he's _poor_! +And Lone Morgan is merely ashamed of the way I talked to him, and afraid +I'll queer myself with the neighbors. No Western lead that _I_ ever saw +would act like that. Why, he didn't even want to ride home with me, that +day. + +"And Bob Warfield and his Ford are incidents of the past, and not one +soul at the Sawtooth seems to give a darn whether I'm in the country or +out of it. Soon as they found out where I belonged, they brought me over +here and dropped me and forgot all about me. And that, I suppose, is +what they call in fiction the Western spirit! + +"Dad looked exactly as if he'd opened the door to a book agent when I +came. He--he _tolerates_ my presence, Ket! And Frank Johnson's pipe +smells to high heaven, and I hate him in the house and 'the boys'--hmhm! +The _boys_--Ket, it would be terribly funny, if I didn't have to stay +here." + +She had reached the corral and stood balancing the cat on a warped top +rail, staring disconsolately at Yellowjacket, who stood in a far corner +switching at flies and shamelessly displaying all the angularity of his +bones under a yellowish hide with roughened hair that was shedding +dreadfully, as Lorraine had discovered to her dismay when she removed +her green corduroy skirt after riding him. Yellowjacket's lower lip +sagged with senility or lack of spirit, Lorraine could not tell which. + +"You look like the frontispiece in that horse-doctor book," she +remarked, eyeing him with disfavor. "I can't say that comedy hide you've +got improves your appearance. You'd be better peeled, I believe." + +She heard a chuckle behind her and turned quickly, palm up to shield her +eyes from the straight, bright rays of the sun. Now here was a live man, +after all, with his hat tilted down over his forehead, a cigarette in +one hand and his reins in the other, looking at her and smiling. + +"Why don't you peel him, just on a chance?" His smile broadened to a +grin, but when Lorraine continued to look at him with a neutral +expression in her eyes, he threw away his cigarette and abandoned with +it his free-and-easy manner. + +"You're Miss Hunter, aren't you? I rode over to see your father. Thought +I'd find him somewhere around the corral, maybe." + +"You won't, because he's gone for the day. No, I don't know where." + +"I--see. Is Mr. Johnson anywhere about?" + +"No, I don't believe any one is anywhere about. They were all gone when +I got up, a little while ago." Then, remembering that she did not know +this man, and that she was a long way from neighbors, she added, "If +you'll leave a message I can tell dad when he comes home." + +"No-o--I'll ride over to-morrow or next day. I'm the man at Whisper. You +can tell him I called, and that I'll call again." + +Still he did not go, and Lorraine waited. Some instinct warned her that +the man had not yet stated his real reason for coming, and she wondered +a little what it could be. He seemed to be watching her covertly, yet +she failed to catch any telltale admiration for her in his scrutiny. She +decided that his forehead was too narrow to please her, and that his +eyes were too close together, and that the lines around his mouth were +cruel lines and gave the lie to his smile, which was pleasant enough if +you just looked at the smile and paid no attention to anything else in +his face. + +"You had quite an experience getting out here, they tell me," he +observed carelessly; too carelessly, thought Lorraine, who was well +schooled in the circumlocutions of delinquent tenants, agents of various +sorts and those who crave small gossip of their neighbors. "Heard you +were lost up in Rock City all night." + +Lorraine looked up at him, startled. "I caught a terrible cold," she +said, laughing nervously. "I'm not used to the climate," she added +guardedly. + +The man fumbled in his pocket and produced smoking material. "Do you +mind if I smoke?" he asked perfunctorily. + +"Why, no. It doesn't concern me in the slightest degree." Why, she +thought confusedly, must she _always_ be reminded of that horrible place +of rocks? What was it to this man where she had been lost? + +"You must of got there about the time the storm broke," the man hazarded +after a silence. "It's sure a bad place in a thunderstorm. Them rocks +draw lightning. Pretty bad, wasn't it?" + +"Lightning is always bad, isn't it?" Lorraine tried to hold her voice +steady. "I don't know much about it. We don't have thunderstorms to +amount to anything, in Los Angeles. It sometimes does thunder there in +the winter, but it is very mild." + +With hands that trembled she picked the cat off the rail and started +toward the house. "I'll tell dad what you said," she told him, glancing +back over her shoulder. When she saw that he had turned his horse and +was frankly following her to the house, her heart jumped wildly into her +throat,--judging by the feel of it. + +"I'm plumb out of matches. I wonder if you can let me have some," he +said, still speaking too carelessly to reassure her. "So you stuck it +out in Rock City all through that storm! That's more than what I'd want +to do." + +She did not answer that, but once on the doorstep Lorraine turned and +faced him. Quite suddenly it came to her--the knowledge of why she did +not like this man. She stared at him, her eyes wide and bright. + +"Your hat's brown!" she exclaimed unguardedly. "I--I saw a man with a +brown hat----" + +He laughed suddenly. "If you stay around here long you'll see a good +many," he said, taking off his hat and turning it on his hand before +her. "This here hat I traded for yesterday. I had a gray one, but it +didn't suit me. Too narrow in the brim. Brown hats are getting to be the +style. If I can borrow half a dozen matches, Miss Hunter, I'll be +going." + +Lorraine looked at him again doubtfully and went after the matches. He +thanked her, smiling down at her quizzically. "A man can get along +without lots of things, but he's plumb lost without matches. You've +maybe saved my life, Miss Hunter, if you only knew it." + +She watched him as he rode away, opening the gate and letting himself +through without dismounting. He disappeared finally around a small spur +of the hill, and Lorraine found her knees trembling under her. + +"Ket, you're an awful fool," she exclaimed fiercely. "Why did you let me +give myself away to that man? I--I believe he _was_ the man. And if I +really did see him, it wasn't my imagination at all. He saw me there, +perhaps. Ket, I'm scared! I'm not going to stay on this ranch all alone. +I'm going to saddle the family skeleton, and I'm going to ride till +dark. There's something queer about that man from Whisper. I'm afraid +of him." + +After awhile, when she had finished her breakfast and was putting up a +lunch, Lorraine picked up the nameless gray cat and holding its head +between her slim fingers, looked at it steadily. "Ket, you're the +humanest thing I've seen since I left home," she said wistfully. "I +_hate_ a country where horrible things happen under the surface and the +top is just gray and quiet and so dull it makes you want to scream. Lone +Morgan lied to me. He lied--he lied!" She hugged the cat impulsively and +rubbed her cheek absently against it, so that it began purring +immediately. + +"Ket--I'm afraid of that man at Whisper!" she breathed miserably against +its fur. + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +"IT TAKES NERVE JUST TO HANG ON" + + +Brit was smoking his pipe after supper and staring at nothing, though +his face was turned toward the closed door. Lorraine had washed the +dishes and was tidying the room and looking at her father now and then +in a troubled, questioning way of which Brit was quite oblivious. + +"Dad," she said abruptly, "who is the man at Whisper?" + +Brit turned his eyes slowly to her face as if he had not grasped her +meaning and was waiting for her to repeat the question. It was evident +that his thoughts had pulled away from something that meant a good deal +to him. + +"Why?" + +"A man came this morning, and said he was the man at Whisper, and that +he would come again to see you." + +Brit took his pipe from his mouth, looked at it and crowded down the +tobacco with a forefinger. "He seen me ride away from the ranch, this +morning," he said. "He was coming down the Whisper trail as I was taking +the fork over to Sugar Spring, Frank and me. What did he say he wanted +to see me about?" + +"He didn't say. He asked for you and Frank." Lorraine sat down and +folded her arms on the oilcloth-covered table. "Dad, what _is_ Whisper?" + +"Whisper's a camp up against a cliff, over west of here. It belongs to +the Sawtooth. Is that all he said? Just that he wanted to see me?" + +"He--talked a little," Lorraine admitted, her eyebrows pulled down. "If +he saw you leave, I shouldn't think he'd come here and ask for you." + +"He knowed I was gone," Brit stated briefly. + +With a finger nail Lorraine traced the ugly, brown pattern on the +oilcloth. It was not easy to talk to this silent man who was her father, +but she had done a great deal of thinking during that long, empty day, +and she had reached the point where she was afraid not to speak. + +"Dad!" + +"What do you want, Raine?" + +"Dad, was--has any one around here died, lately?" + +"Died? Nobody but Fred Thurman, over here on Granite. He was drug with a +horse and killed." + +Lorraine caught her breath, saw Brit looking at her curiously and moved +closer to him. She wanted to be near somebody just then, and after all, +Brit was her father, and his silence was not the inertia of a dull mind, +she knew. He seemed bottled-up, somehow, and bitter. She caught his hand +and held it, feeling its roughness between her two soft palms. + +"Dad, I've got to tell you. I feel trapped, somehow. Did his horse have +a white face, dad?" + +"Yes, he's a blaze-faced roan. Why?" Brit moved uncomfortably, but he +did not take his hand away from her. "What do you know about it, Raine?" + +"I saw a man shoot Fred Thurman and push his foot through the stirrup. +And, dad, I believe it was that man at Whisper. The one I saw had on a +brown hat, and this man wears a brown hat--and I was advised not to tell +any one I had been at that place they call Rock City, when the storm +came. Dad, would an innocent man--one that didn't have anything to do +with a crime--would he try to cover it up afterwards?" + +Brit's hand shook when he removed the pipe from his mouth and laid it on +the table. His face had turned gray while Lorraine watched him +fearfully. He laid his hand on her shoulder, pressing down hard--and at +last his eyes met her big, searching ones. + +"If he wanted to _live_--in this country--he'd have to. Leastways, he'd +have to keep his mouth shut," he said grimly. + +"And he'd try to shut the mouths of others----" + +"If he cared anything about them, he would. You ain't told anybody what +you saw, have yuh?" + +Lorraine hid her face against his arm. "Just Lone Morgan, and he thought +I was crazy and imagined it. That was in the morning, when he found me. +And he--he wanted me to go on thinking it was just a nightmare--that I'd +imagined the whole thing. And I did, for awhile. But this man at Whisper +tried to find out where I was that night----" + +Brit pulled abruptly away from her, got up and opened the door. He +stood there for a time, looking out into the gloom of early nightfall. +He seemed to be listening, Lorraine thought. When he came back to her +his voice was lower, his manner intangibly furtive. + +"You didn't tell him anything, did you?" he asked, as if there had been +no pause in their talk. + +"No--I made him believe I wasn't there. Or I tried to. And dad! As I was +going to cross that creek just before you come to Rock City, two men +came along on horseback, and I hid before they saw me. They stopped to +water their horses, and they were talking. They said something about the +TJ had been here a long time, but they would get theirs, and it was like +sitting into a poker game with a nickel. They said the little ones +aren't big enough to fight the Sawtooth, and they'd carry lead under +their hides if they didn't leave. Dad, isn't your brand the TJ? That's +what it looks like on Yellowjacket." + +Brit did not answer, and when Lorraine was sure that he did not mean to +do so, she asked another question. "Dad, why didn't you want me to leave +the ranch to-day? I was nervous after that man was here, and I did go." + +"I didn't want you riding around the country unless I knew where you +went," Brit said. "My brand is the TJ up-and-down. We never call it just +the TJ." + +"Oh," said Lorraine, relieved. "They weren't talking about you, then. +But dad--it's horrible! We simply _can't_ let that murder go and not do +anything. Because I know that man was shot. I heard the shot fired, and +I saw him start to fall off his horse. And the next flash of lightning I +saw----" + +"Look here, Raine. I don't want you talking about what you saw. I don't +want you _thinkin'_ about it. What's the use? Thurman's dead and buried. +The cor'ner come and held an inquest, and the jury agreed it was an +accident. I was on the jury. The sheriff's took charge of his property. +You couldn't prove what you saw, even if you was to try." He looked at +her very much as Lone Morgan had looked at her. His next words were very +nearly what Lone Morgan had said, Lorraine remembered. "You don't know +this country like I know it. Folks live in it mainly because they don't +go around blatting everything they see and hear and think." + +"You have laws, don't you, dad? You spoke about the sheriff----" + +"The sheriff!" Brit laughed harshly. "Yes, we got a sheriff, and we got +a jail, and a judge--all the makin's of law. But we ain't got one thing +that goes with it, and that's justice. You'd best make up your mind like +the cor'ner's jury done, that Fred Thurman was drug to death by his +horse. That's all that'll ever be proved, and if you can't prove nothing +else you better keep your mouth shut." + +Lorraine sprang up and stood facing her father, every nerve taut with +protest. "You don't mean to tell me, dad, that you and Frank Johnson and +Lone Morgan and--everybody in the country are _cowards_, do you?" + +Brit looked at her patiently. "No," he said in the tone of acknowledged +defeat, "we ain't cowards, Raine. A man ain't a coward when he stands +with his hands over his head. Most generally it's because some one's got +the drop on 'im." + +Lorraine would not accept that. "You think so, because you don't fight," +she cried hotly. "No one is holding a gun at your head. Dad! I thought +Westerners never quit. It's fight to the finish, always. Why, I've seen +one man fight a whole outfit and win. He couldn't be beaten because he +wouldn't give up. Why----" + +Brit gave her a tolerant glance. "Where'd you see all that, Raine?" He +moved to the table picked up his pipe and knocked out the ashes on the +stove hearth. His movements were those of an aging man,--yet Brit Hunter +was not old, as age is reckoned. + +"Well--in stories--but it was reasonable and logical and possible, just +the same. If you use your brains you can outwit them, and if you have +any nerve----" + +Brit made a sound somewhat like a snort. "These days, when politics is +played by the big fellows, and the law is used to make money for 'em, it +takes nerve just to hang on," he said. "Nobody but a dang fool would +fight." Slow anger grew within him. He turned upon Lorraine almost +fiercely. "D'yuh think me and Frank could fight the Sawtooth and get +anything out of it but a coffin apiece, maybe?" he demanded harshly. +"Don't the Sawtooth _own_ this country? Warfield's got the sheriff in +his pocket, and the cor'ner, and the judge, and the stock +inspector--he's _Senator_ Warfield, and what he wants he gets. He gets +it through the law that you was talking about a little while ago. What +you goin' to do about it? If I had the money and the land and the +political pull he's got, mebby I'd have me a sheriff and a judge, too. + +"Fred Thurman tried to fight the Sawtooth over a water right he owned +and they wanted. They had the case runnin' in court till they like to of +took the last dollar he had. He got bull-headed. That water right meant +the hull ranch--everything he owned. You can't run a ranch without +water. And when he'd took the case up and up till it got to the Supreme +Court, and he stood some show of winnin' out--he had an accident. He was +drug to death by his horse." + +Brit stooped and opened the stove door, seeking a live coal; found none +and turned again to Lorraine, shaking his pipe at her for emphasis. + +"We try to prove Fred was murdered, and what's the result? Something +happens: to me, mebby, or Frank, or both of us. And you can't say, +'Here, I know the Sawtooth had a hand in that.' You got to _prove_ it! +And when you've proved it," he added bitterly, "you got to have officers +that'll carry out the law instead of using it to hog-tie yuh." + +His futile, dull anger surged up again. "You call us cowards because we +don't git up on our hind legs and fight the Sawtooth. A lot _you_ know +about courage! You've read stories, and you've saw moving pictures, and +you think that's the West--that's the way they do it. One man hold off a +hunderd with his gun--and on the other hand, a hunderd men, mebby, +ridin' hell-whoopin' after one. You think that's it--that's the way they +do it. Hunh!" He lifted the lid of the stove, spat into it as if he were +spitting in the face of an enemy, and turned again to Lorraine. + +"What you seen--what you say you seen--that was done at night when there +wasn't no audience. All the fighting the Sawtooth does is done under +cover. _You_ won't see none of it--they ain't such fools. And what us +small fellers do, we do it quiet, too. We ain't ridin' up and down the +trail, flourishin' our six-shooters and yellin' to the Sawtooth to come +on and we'll clean 'em up!" + +"But you're fighting just the same, aren't you, dad? You're not letting +them----" + +"We're makin' out to live here--and we've been doin' it for twenty-five +year," Brit told her, with a certain grim dignity. "We've still got a +few head uh stock left--enough to live on. Playin' poker with a nickel, +mebby--but we manage to ante, every hand so fur." His mind returned to +the grisly thing Lorraine had seen. + +"We can't run down the man that got Fred Thurman, supposin' he was +killed, as you say. That's what the law is paid to do. If Lone Morgan +told you not to talk about it, he told you right. He was talking for +your own good. What about Al--the man from Whisper? You didn't tell +_him_, did you?" + +His tone, the suppressed violence of his manner, frightened Lorraine. +She moved farther away from him. + +"I didn't tell him anything. He was curious but--I only said I knew him +because he was wearing a brown hat, and the man that shot Mr. Thurman +had a brown hat. I didn't say all that. I just mentioned the hat. And he +said there were lots of brown hats in the country. He said he had traded +for that one, just yesterday. He said his own hat was gray." + +Brit stared at her, his jaw sagging a little, his eyes growing vacant +with the thoughts he hid deep in his mind. He slumped down into his +chair and leaned forward, his arms resting on his knees, his fingers +clasped loosely. After a little he tilted his head and looked up at +her. + +"You better go to bed," he told her stolidly. "And if you're going to +live at the Quirt, Raine, you'll have to learn to keep your mouth shut. +I ain't blaming you--but you told too much to Al Woodruff. Don't talk to +him no more, if he comes here when I'm gone." He put out a hand, +beckoning her to him, sorry for his harshness. Lorraine went to him and +knelt beside him, slipping an arm around his neck while she hid her face +on his shoulder. + +"I won't be a nuisance, dad--really, I won't," she said. "I--I can shoot +a gun. I never shot one with bullets in, but I could. And I learned to +do lots of things when I was working in that play West I thought was +real. It isn't like I thought. There's no picture stuff in the real +West, I guess; they don't do things that way. But--what I want you to +know is that if they're fighting you they'll have to fight me, too. + +"I don't mean movie stuff, honestly I don't. I'm in this thing now, and +you'll have to count me, same as you count Jim and Sorry. Won't you +please feel that I'm one more in the game, dad, and not just another +responsibility? I'll herd cattle, or do whatever there is to do. And +I'll keep my mouth shut, too. I can't stay here, day after day, doing +nothing but sweep and dust two rooms and fry potatoes and bacon for you +at night. Dad, I'll go _crazy_ if you don't let me into your life! + +"Dad, if you knew the stunts I've done in the last three years! It was +make-believe West, but I learned things just the same." She kissed him +on the unshaven cheek nearest her,--and thought of the kisses she had +breathed upon the cheeks of story fathers with due care for the make-up +on her lips. Just because this was real, she kissed him again with the +frank vigor of a child. + +"Dad," she said wheedlingly, "I think you might scare up something that +I can really ride. Yellowjacket is safe, but--but you have real _live_ +horses on the ranch, haven't you? You must _not_ go judging me by the +palms and the bay windows of the Casa Grande. That's where I've slept, +the last few years when I wasn't off on location--but it's just as +sensible to think I don't know anything else, as it would be for me to +think you can't do anything but skim milk and fry bacon and make +sour-dough bread, just because I've seen you do it!" + +Brit laughed and patted her awkwardly on the back. "If you was a boy, +I'd set you up as a lawyer," he said with an attempt at playfulness. "I +kinda thought you could ride. I seen how you piled onto old Yellowjacket +and the way you held your reins. It runs in the blood, I guess. I'll see +what I can do in the way of a horse. Ole Yellowjacket used to be a real +rim-rider, but he's gitting old; gitting old--same as me." + +"You're not! You're just letting yourself _feel_ old. And am I one of +the outfit, dad?" + +"I guess so--only there ain't going to be any of this hell-whoopin' +stuff, Raine. You can't travel these trails at a long lope with yore +hair flyin' out behind and--and all that damn foolishness. I've saw 'em +in the movin' pitchers----" + +Lorraine blushed, and was thankful that her dad had not watched her work +in that serial. For that matter, she hoped that Lone Morgan would never +stray into a movie where any of her pictures were being shown. + +"I'm serious, dad. I don't want to make a show of myself. But if you'll +feel that I can be a help instead of a handicap, that's what I want. And +if it comes to fighting----" + +Brit pushed her from him impatiently. "There yuh go--fight--fight--and I +told yuh there ain't any fighting going on. Nothing more'n a fight to +hang on and make a living. That means straight, hard work and mindin' +your own business. If you want to help at that----" + +"I do," said Raine quietly, getting to her feet. Her legacy of +stubbornness set her lips firmly together. "That's exactly what I mean. +Good night, dad." + +Brit answered her noncommittally, apparently sunk already in his own +musings. But his lips drew in to suppress a smile when he saw, from the +corner of his eyes, that Lorraine was winding the alarm on the cheap +kitchen clock, and that she set the hand carefully and took the clock +with her to bed. + + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +THE EVIL EYE OF THE SAWTOOTH + + +Oppression is a growth that flourishes best in the soil of opportunity. +It seldom springs into full power at once. The Sawtooth Cattle Company +had begun much as its neighbors had begun: with a tract of land, cattle, +and the ambition for prospering. Senator Warfield had then been plain +Bill Warfield, manager of the outfit, who rode with his men and saw how +his herds increased,--saw too how they might increase faster under +certain conditions. At the outset he was not, perhaps, more unscrupulous +than some of his neighbors. True, if a homesteader left his claim for a +longer time than the law allowed him, Bill Warfield would choose one of +his own men to file a contest on that claim. The man's wages would be +paid. Witnesses were never lacking to swear to the improvements he had +made, and after the patent had been granted the homesteader (for the +contestant always won, in that country) the Sawtooth, would pay him for +the land. Frequently a Sawtooth man would file upon land before any +other man had claimed it. Sometimes a Sawtooth man would purchase a +relinquishment from some poor devil of a claim-holder who seemed always +to have bad luck, and so became discouraged and ready to sell. An +intelligent man like Bill Warfield could acquire much land in this +manner, give him time enough. + +In much the same manner his herds increased. He bought out small +ranchers who were crowded to the selling point in one way or another. +They would find themselves fenced off from water, the Sawtooth having +acquired the water rights to creek or spring. Or they would be hemmed in +with fenced fields and would find it next to impossible to make use of +the law which gave them the right to "condemn" a road through. They +would not be openly assailed,--Bill Warfield was an intelligent man. A +dozen brands were recorded in the name of the Sawtooth Cattle Company, +and if a small rancher found his calf crop shorter than it should be, he +might think as he pleased, but he would have no tangible proof that his +calves wore a Sawtooth brand. + +Inevitably it became necessary now and then to stop a mouth that was +ready to speak unwelcome truths. But if a Sawtooth man were known to +have committed violence, the Sawtooth itself was the first to put the +sheriff on his trail. If the man successfully dodged the sheriff and +made his way to parts unknown, the Sawtooth could shrug its shoulders +and wash its hands of him. + +Then whispers were heard that the Sawtooth had on its pay roll men who +were paid to kill and to leave no trace. So many heedless ones crossed +the Sawtooth's path to riches! Fred Thurman had been one; a "bull-headed +cuss" who had the temerity to fight back when the Sawtooth calmly laid +claim to the first water rights to Granite Creek, having bought it, they +said, with the placer claim of an old miner who had prospected along the +headwaters of Granite at the base of Bear Top. + +By that time the Sawtooth had grown to a power no poor man could hope to +defeat. Bill Warfield was Senator Warfield, and Senator Warfield was a +power in the political world that immediately surrounded him. Since his +neighboring ranchmen had not been able to prevent his steady climbing to +the position he now held, they had small hope of pulling him down. Brit +was right. They did well to hang on and continue living in that +country. + +An open killing, one that would attract the attention of the outside +world, might be avenged. The man who committed the crime might be +punished,--if public opinion were sufficiently massed against him. In +that case Senator Warfield would cry loudest for justice. But it would +take a stronger man than the country held to raise the question of Fred +Thurman's death and take even the first steps toward proving it a +murder. + +"It ain't that they can _do_ anything, Mr. Warfield," the man from +Whisper said guardedly, urging his horse close to the machine that stood +in the trail from Echo. It was broad day--a sun-scorched day to +boot--and Senator Warfield perspired behind the wheel of his car. "It's +the talk they may get started." + +"What have they said? The girl was at the ranch for several days. She +didn't talk there, or Hawkins would have told me." + +"She was sick. I saw her the other day at the Quirt, and she more'n half +recognized me. Hell! How'd _I_ know she was in there among them rocks? +Everybody that was apt to be riding through was accounted for, and I +knew there wasn't any one coming horseback or with a rig. My hearing's +pretty good." + +Warfield moved the spark lever up and down on the wheel while he +thought. "Well," he said carefully at last, "if you're falling down in +your work, what are you whining about it to me for? What do you want?" + +Al moistened his lips with his tongue. "I want to know how far I can go. +It's been hands off the Quirt, up to now. And the Quirt's beginning to +think it can get away with most anything. They've throwed a fence across +the pass through from Sugar Spring to Whisper. That sends us away around +by Three Creek. You can't trail stock across Granite Ridge, nor them +lava ledges. If it's going to be hands off, I want to know it. There's +other places I'd rather live in, if the Quirt's going to raise talk +about Fred Thurman." + +Senator Warfield pulled at his collar and tie as if they choked him. +"The Quirt has made no trouble," he said. "Of course, if they begin +throwing fences across our stock trails and peddling gossip, that is +another story. I expect you to protect our interests, of course. And I +have never made a practice of dictating to you. In this case"--he sent a +sharp glance at Al--"it seems to me your interests are involved more +than ours. As to Fred Thurman, I don't know anything about it. I was not +here when he died, and I have never seen this girl of Brit's who seems +to worry you. She doesn't interest me, one way or the other." + +"She seems to interest Bob a whole lot," Al said maliciously. "He rode +over to see her yesterday. She wasn't home, though." + +Senator Warfield seemed unmoved by this bit of news, wherefore Al +returned to the main issue. + +"Do I get a free hand, or don't I?" he insisted. "They can't be let +peddle talk--not if I stay around here." + +Senator Warfield considered the matter. + +"The girl's got the only line on me," Al went on. "The inquest was as +clean as I ever saw. Everything all straight--and then, here she comes +up----" + +"If you know how to stop a woman's mouth, Al, you can make a million a +month telling other men." Senator Warfield smiled at him. Then he leaned +across the front seat and added impressively, "Bear one thing in mind, +Al. The Sawtooth cannot permit itself to become involved in any scandal, +nor in any killing cases. We're just at the most crucial point with our +reclamation project, over here on the flat. The legislature is willing +to make an appropriation for the building of the canal, and in two or +three months at the latest we should begin selling agricultural tracts +to the public. The State will also throw open the land it had withdrawn +from settlement, pending the floating of this canal project. More than +ever the integrity of the Sawtooth Cattle Company must be preserved, +since it has come out openly as a backer of the irrigation company. +Nothing--_nothing_ must be permitted to stand in the way." + +He removed his thin driving cap and wiped his perspiring forehead. "I'm +sorry this all happened--as it has turned out," he said, with real +regret in his tone. "But since it did happen, I must rely upon you +to--to--er----" + +"I guess I understand," Al grinned sardonically. "I just wanted you to +know how things is building up. The Quirt's kinda overreached itself. I +didn't want you comin' back on me for trying to keep their feet outa the +trough. I want you to know things is pretty damn ticklish right now, and +it's going to take careful steppin'." + +"Well, don't let your foot slip, Al," Senator Warfield warned him. "The +Sawtooth would hate to lose you; you're a good man." + +"Oh, I get yuh," Al retorted. "My foot ain't going to slip---- If it +did, the Sawtooth would be the first to pile onto my back!" The last +sentence was not meant for the senator's ears. Al had backed his horse, +and Senator Warfield was stepping on the starter. But it would not have +mattered greatly if he had heard, for this was a point quite thoroughly +understood by them both. + +The Warfield car went on, lurching over the inequalities of the narrow +road. Al shook his horse into a shambling trot, picking his way +carelessly through the scattered sage. + +His horse traveled easily, now and then lifting a foot high to avoid +rock or exposed root, or swerving sharply around obstacles too high to +step over. Al very seldom traveled along the beaten trails, though there +was nothing to deter him now save an inherent tendency toward +secretiveness of his motives, destinations and whereabouts. If the +country was open, you would see Al Woodruff riding at some distance from +the trail--or you would not see him at all, if there were gullies in +which he could conceal himself. He was always "line-riding," or hunting +stray stock--horses, usually--or striking across to some line-camp of +the Sawtooth, on business which he was perfectly willing to state. + +But you will long ago have guessed that he was the evil eye of the +Sawtooth Company. He took no orders save such general ones as Senator +Warfield had just given him. He gave none. Whatever he did he did alone, +and he took no man into his confidence. It is more than probable that +Senator Warfield would never have known to a certainty that Al was +responsible for Thurman's death, if Al had not been worried over the +Quirt's possible knowledge of the crime and anxious to know just how far +his power might go. + +Ostensibly he was in charge of the camp at Whisper, a place far enough +off the beaten trails to free him from chance visitors. The Sawtooth +kept many such camps occupied by men whose duty it was to look after the +Sawtooth cattle that grazed near; to see that stock did not "bog down" +in the tricky sand of the adjacent water holes and die before help came, +and to fend off any encroachments of the smaller cattle owners,--though +these were growing fewer year by year, thanks to the weeding-out policy +of the Sawtooth and the cunning activities of such as Al Woodruff. + +It may sound strange to say that the Sawtooth country had not had a real +"killing" for years, though accidental deaths had been rather frequent. +One man, for instance, had fallen over a ledge and broken his neck, +presumably while drunk. Another had bought a few sticks of dynamite to +open up a spring on his ranch, and at the inquest which followed the +jury had returned a verdict of "death caused by being blown up by the +accidental discharge of dynamite." A sheepman was struck by lightning, +according to the coroner, and his widow had been glad to sell ranch and +sheep very cheaply to the Sawtooth and return to her relatives in +Montana. The Sawtooth had shipped the sheep within a month and turned +the ranch into another line-camp. + +You will see that Senator Warfield had every reason to be sincere when +he called Al Woodruff a good man; good for the Sawtooth interests, that +means. You will also see that Brit Hunter had reasons for believing that +the business of ranching in the Sawtooth country might be classed as +extra hazardous, and for saying that it took nerve just to hang on. + +That is why Al rode oblivious to his surroundings, meditating no doubt +upon the best means of preserving the "integrity" of the Sawtooth and at +the same time soothing effectively the ticklishness of the situation of +which he had complained. It was his business to find the best means. It +was for just such work that the Sawtooth paid him--secretly, to be +sure--better wages than the foreman, Hawkins, received. Al was +conscientious and did his best to earn his wages; not because he +particularly loved killing and spying as a sport, but because the +Sawtooth had bought his loyalty for a price, and so long as he felt that +he was getting a square deal from them, he would turn his hand against +any man that stood in their way. He was a Sawtooth man, and he fought +the enemies of the Sawtooth as matter-of-factly as a soldier will fight +for his country. To his unimaginative mind there was sufficient +justification in that attitude. As for the ease with which he planned to +kill and cover his killing under the semblance of accident, he would +have said, if you could make him speak of it, that he was not squeamish. +They'd all have to die some day, anyway. + + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +ANOTHER SAWTOOTH "ACCIDENT" + + +Frank Johnson rose from the breakfast table, shaved a splinter off the +edge of the water bench for a toothpick and sharpened it carefully while +he looked at Brit. + +"You goin' after them posts, or shall I?" he inquired glumly, which, by +the way, was his normal tone. "Jim and Sorry oughta git the post holes +all dug to-day. One of us better take a look through that young stock in +the lower field, too, and see if there's any more sign uh blackleg. +Which you ruther do?" + +Brit tilted his chair backward so that he could reach the coffeepot on +the stove hearth. "I'll haul down the posts," he decided carelessly. +"They're easy loaded, and I guess my back's as good as yourn." + +"All you got to do is skid 'em down off'n the bank onto the wagon," +Frank said. "I wisht you'd go on up where we cut them last ones and git +my sweater, Brit. I musta left it hanging on a bush right close to where +I was workin'." + +Brit's grunt signified assent, and Frank went out. Jim and Sorry, the +two unpicturesque cowboys of whom Lorraine had complained to the cat had +already departed with pick and shovel to their unromantic task of +digging post holes. Each carried a most unattractive lunch tied in a +flour sack behind the cantle of his saddle. Lorraine had done her +conscientious best, but with lumpy, sour-dough bread, cold bacon and +currant jelly of that kind which is packed in wooden kegs, one can't do +much with a cold lunch. Lorraine wondered how much worse it would look +after it had been tied on the saddle for half a day; wondered too what +those two silent ones got out of life,--what they looked forward to, +what was their final goal. For that matter she frequently wondered what +there was in life for any of them, shut into that deadly monotony of +sagebrush and rocks interspersed with little, grassy meadows where the +cattle fed listlessly. + +Even the sinister undercurrent of antagonism against the Quirt could not +whip her emotions feeling that she was doing anything more than live +the restricted, sordid little life of a poorly equipped ranch. She had +ridden once with Frank Johnson to look through a bunch of cattle, but it +had been nothing more than a hot, thirsty, dull ride, with a wind that +blew her hat off in spite of pins and tied veil, and with a companion +who spoke only when he was spoken to and then as briefly as possible. + +Her father would not talk again as he had talked that night. She had +tried to make him tell her more about the Sawtooth and had gotten +nothing out of him. The man from Whisper, whom Brit had spoken of as Al, +had not returned. Nor had the promised saddle horse materialized. The +boys were too busy to run in any horses, her father had told her shortly +when she reminded him of his promise. When the fence was done, maybe he +could rustle her another horse,--and then he had added that he didn't +see what ailed Yellowjacket, for all the riding she was likely to do. + +"Straight hard work and minding your own business," her father had said, +and it seemed to Lorraine after three or four days of it that he had +summed up the life of a cattleman's daughter in a masterly manner which +ought to be recorded among Famous Sayings like "War is hell" and "Don't +give up the ship." + +On this particular morning Lorraine's spirits were at their lowest ebb. +If it were not for the new stepfather, she would return to the Casa +Grande, she told herself disgustedly. And if it were not for the belief +among all her acquaintances that she was queening it over the +cattle-king's vast domain, she would return and find work again in +motion pictures. But she could not bring herself to the point of facing +the curiosity and the petty gossip of the studios. She would be expected +to explain satisfactorily why she had left the real West for the mimic +West of Hollywood. She did not acknowledge to herself that she also +could not face the admission of failure to carry out what she had begun. + +She had told her dad that she wanted to fight with him, even though +"fighting" in this case meant washing the coarse clothing of her father +and Frank, scrubbing the rough, warped boards of the cabin floor, and +frying ranch-cured bacon for every meal, and in making butter to sell, +and counting the eggs every night and being careful to use only the +cracked ones for cooking. + +She hated every detail of this crude housekeeping, from the chipped +enamel dishpan to the broom that was all one-sided, and the pillow slips +which were nothing more nor less than sugar sacks. She hated it even +more than she had hated the Casa Grande and her mother's frowsy +mentality. But because she could see that she made life a little more +comfortable for her dad, because she felt that he needed her, she would +stay and assure herself over and over that she was staying merely +because she was too proud to go back to the old life and own the West a +failure. + +She was sweeping the doorstep with the one-sided broom when Brit drove +out through the gate and up the trail which she knew led eventually to +Sugar Spring. The horses, sleek in their new hair and skittish with the +change from hay to new grass, danced over the rough ground so that the +running gear of the wagon, with its looped log-chain, which would later +do duty as a brake on the long grade down from timber line on the side +of Spirit Canyon, rattled and banged over the rocks with a clatter that +could be heard for half a mile. Lorraine looked after her father +enviously. If she were a boy she would be riding on that sack of hay +tied to the "hounds" for a seat. But, being a girl, it had never +occurred to Brit that she might like to go,--might even be useful to +him on the trip. + +"I suppose if I told dad I could drive that team as well as he can, he'd +just look at me and think I was crazy," she thought resentfully and gave +the broom a spiteful fling toward a presumptuous hen that had approached +too closely. "If I'd asked him to let me go along he'd have made some +excuse--oh, I'm beginning to know dad! He thinks a woman's place is in +the house--preferably the kitchen. And here I've thought all my life +that cowgirls did nothing but ride around and warn people about stage +holdups and everything! I'd just like to know how a girl would ever have +a chance to know what was going on in the country, unless she heard the +men talking while she poured their coffee. Only this bunch don't talk at +all. They just gobble and go." + +She went in then and shut the door with a slam. Up on the ridge Al +Woodruff lowered his small binocular and eased away from the spot where +he had been crouching behind a bush. Every one on the Quirt ranch was +accounted for. As well as if he had sat at their breakfast table Al knew +where each man's work would take him that day. As for the girl, she was +safe at the ranch for the day, probably. If she did take a ride later +on, it would probably be up the ridge between the Quirt and Thurman's +ranch, and sit for an hour or so just looking. That ride was beginning +to be a habit of hers, Al had observed, so that he considered her +accounted for also. + +He made his way along the side hill to where his horse was tied to a +bush, mounted and rode away with his mind pretty much at ease. Much more +at ease than it would have been had he read what was in Lorraine's mind +when, she slammed that door. + +Up above Sugar Spring was timber. By applying to the nearest Forest +Supervisor a certain amount could be had for ranch improvements upon +paying a small sum for the "stumpage." The Quirt had permission to cut +posts for their new fence which Al Woodruff had reported to his boss. + +As he drove up the trail, which was in places barely passable for a +wagon, Brit was thinking of that fence. The Sawtooth would object to it, +he knew, since it cut off one of their stock trails and sent them around +through rougher country. Just what form their objection would take, +Brit did not know. Deep in his intrepid soul he hoped that the Sawtooth +would at last show its hand openly. He had liked Fred Thurman, and what +Lorraine had told him went much deeper than she knew. He wanted to bring +them into the open where he could fight with some show of winning. + +"I'll git Bill Warfield yet--and git him right," was the gist of his +musings. "He's bound to show his head, give him time enough. Him and his +killers can't always keep under cover. Let 'em come at me about that +fence! It's on my land--the Quirt's got a right to fence every foot of +land that belongs to 'em." + +All the way over the ridge and across the flat and up the steep, narrow +road along the edge of Spirit Canyon, Brit dwelt upon the probable moves +of the Sawtooth. They would wait, he thought, until the fence was +completed and they had made a trail around through the lava rocks. They +would not risk any move at present; they would wait and tacitly accept +the fence, or pretend to accept it, as a natural inconvenience. But Brit +did not deceive himself that they would remain passive. That it had been +"hands off the Quirt" he did not know, but attributed the Quirt's +immunity to careful habits and the fact that they had never come to the +point where their interests actually clashed with the Sawtooth. + +It never occurred to him therefore that he was slated for an accident +that day if the details could be conveniently arranged. + +It was a long trail to Sugar Spring, and from there up Spirit Canyon the +climb was so tedious and steep that Brit took a full hour for the trip, +resting the team often because they were soft from the new grass diet +and sweated easily. They lost none of their spirit, however, and when +the road was steepest nagged at each other with head-shakings and bared +teeth, and ducked against each other in pretended fright at every +unusual rock or bush. + +At the top he was forced to drive a full half mile beyond the piled +posts to a flat large enough to turn around. All this took time, +especially since Caroline, the brown mare, would rather travel ten miles +straight ahead than go backward ten feet. Brit was obliged to "take it +out of her" with the rein ends and his full repertoire of opprobrious +epithets before he could cramp the wagon and head them down the trail +again. + +At the post pile he unhitched the team for safety's sake and tied them +to trees, where he fed them a little grain in nose bags. He was absorbed +now in his work and thought no more about the Sawtooth. He fastened the +log chain to the rear wheels to brake the wagon on the long grade down +the canyon, loaded the wagon with posts, bound them fast with a lighter +chain he had brought for the purpose, ate his own lunch and decided +that, since he had made fair time and would arrive home too early to do +the chores and too late to start any other job, he would cruise farther +up the mountain side and see what was the prospect of getting out logs +enough for an addition to the cabin. + +Now that Raine was going to live with him, two rooms were not enough. +Brit wanted to make her as happy as he could, in his limited fashion. He +had for some days been planning a "settin' room and bedroom" for her. +She would be having beaux after awhile when she got acquainted, he +supposed. He could not deny her the privilege; she was young and she +was, in Brit's opinion, the best looking girl he had ever seen, not even +excepting Minnie, her mother. But he hoped she wouldn't go off and get +married the first thing she did,--and one good way to prevent that, he +reasoned, was to make her comfortable with him. He had noticed how +pleased she was that their cabin was of logs. She had even remarked that +she could not understand how a rancher would ever want to build a board +shack if there was any timber to be had. Well, timber was to be had, and +she should have her log house, though the hauling was not going to be +any sunshine, in Brit's opinion. With his axe he walked through the +timber, craning upward for straight tree trunks and lightly blazing the +ones he would want, the occasional axe strokes sounding distinctly in +the quiet air. + +Lorraine heard them as she rode old Yellowjacket puffing up the grade, +following the wagon marks, and knew that she was nearing the end of her +journey,--for which Yellowjacket, she supposed, would be thankful. She +had started not more than an hour later than her father, but the team +had trotted along more briskly than her poor old nag would travel, so +that she did not overtake her dad as she had hoped. + +She was topping the last climb when she saw the team tied to the trees, +and at the same moment she caught a glimpse of a man who crawled out +from under the load of posts and climbed the slope farther on. She was +on the point of calling out to him, thinking that he was her dad, when +he disappeared into the brush. At the same moment she heard the stroke +of an axe over to the right of where the man was climbing. + +She was riding past the team when Caroline humped her back and kicked +viciously at Yellowjacket, who plunged straight down off the trail +without waiting to see whether Caroline's aim was exact. He slid into a +juniper thicket and sat down looking very perplexed and very permanently +placed there. Lorraine stepped off on the uphill side of him, thanked +her lucky stars she had not broken a leg, and tried to reassure +Yellowjacket and to persuade him that no real harm had been done him. +Straightway she discovered that Yellowjacket had a mind of his own and +that a pessimistic mind. He refused to scramble back into the trail, +preferring to sit where he was, or since Lorraine made that too +uncomfortable, to stand where he had been sitting. Yellowjacket, I may +explain, owned a Roman nose, a pendulous lower lip and drooping eyelids. +Those who know horses will understand. + +By the time Lorraine had bullied and cajoled him into making a somewhat +circuitous route to the road, where he finally appeared some distance +above the point of his descent, Brit was there, hitching the team to the +wagon. + +"What yuh doing up there?" he wanted to know, looking up with some +astonishment. + +Lorraine furnished him with details and her opinion of both Caroline and +Yellow jacket. "I simply refuse to ride this comedy animal another +mile," she declared with some heat. "I'll drive the team and you can +ride him home, or he can be tied on behind the wagon." + +"He won't lead," Brit objected. "Yeller's all right if you make up your +mind to a few failin's. You go ahead and ride him home. You sure can't +drive this team." + +"I can!" Lorraine contended. "I've driven four horses--I guess I can +drive two, all right." + +"Well, you ain't going to," Brit stated with a flat finality that +abruptly ended the argument. + +Lorraine had never before been really angry with her father. She struck +Yellowjacket with her quirt and sent him sidling past the wagon and the +tricky Caroline, too stubborn to answer her dad when he called after her +that she had better ride behind the load. She went on, making +Yellowjacket trot when he did not want to trot down hill. + +Behind her she heard the chuck-chuck of the loaded wagon. Far ahead she +heard some one whistling a high, sweet melody which had the queer, minor +strains of some old folk song. For just a few bars she heard it, and +then it was stilled, and the road dipping steeply before her seemed very +lonely, its emptiness cooling her brief anger to a depression that had +held her too often in its grip since that terrible night of the storm. +For the first time she looked back at her father lurching along on the +load and at the team looking so funny with the collars pushed up on +their necks with the weight of the load behind. + +With a quick impulse of penitence she waved her hand to Brit, who waved +back at her. Then she went on, feeling a bit less alone in the world. +After all, he was her dad, and his life had been hard. If he failed to +understand her and her mental hunger for real companionship, perhaps she +also failed to understand him. + +They had left the timber line now and had come to the lip of the canyon +itself. Lorraine looked down its steep, rock-roughened sides and +thought how her old director would have raved over its possibilities in +the way of "stunts." Yellow jacket, she noticed, kept circumspectly to +the center of the trail and eyed the canyon with frank disfavor. + +She did not know at just what moment she became aware of trouble behind +her. It may have been Yellowjacket, turning his head sidewise and +abruptly quickening his pace that warned her. It may have been the +difference in the sound of the wagon and the impact of the horses' hoofs +on the rocky trail. She turned and saw that something had gone wrong. +They were coming down upon her at a sharp trot, stepping high, the wagon +tongue thrust up between their heads as they tried to hold back the +load. + +Brit yelled to her then to get out of the way, and his voice was harsh +and insistent. Lorraine looked at the steep bank to the right, knew +instinctively that Yellowjacket would never have time to climb it before +the team was upon them, and urged him to a lope. She glanced back again, +saw that the team was not running away, that they were trying to hold +the wagon, and that it was gaining momentum in spite of them. + +"Jump, dad!" she called and got no answer. Brit was sitting braced with +his feet far apart, holding and guiding the team. "He won't jump--he +wouldn't jump--any more than I would," she chattered to herself, sick +with fear for him, while she lashed her own horse to keep out of their +way. + +The next she knew, the team was running, their eyeballs staring, their +front feet flung high as they lunged panic-stricken down the trail. The +load was rocking along behind them. Brit was still braced and clinging +to the reins. + +Panic seized Yellowjacket. He, too, went lunging down that trail, his +head thrown from side to side that he might watch the thing that menaced +him, heedless of the fact that danger might lie ahead of him also. +Lorraine knew that he was running senselessly, that he might leave the +trail at any bend and go rolling into the canyon. + +A sense of unreality seized her. It could not be deadly earnest, she +thought. It was so exactly like some movie thrill, planned carefully in +advance, rehearsed perhaps under the critical eye of the director, and +done now with the camera man turning calmly the little crank and +counting the number of film feet the scene would take. A little farther +and she would be out of the scene, and men stationed ahead would ride up +and stop her horse for her and tell her how well she had "put it over." + +She looked over her shoulder and saw them still coming. It was real. It +was terribly real, the way that team was fleeing down the grade. She had +never seen anything like that before, never seen horses so frantically +trying to run from the swaying load behind them. Always, she had been +accustomed to moderation in the pace and a slowed camera to speed up the +action on the screen. Yellowjacket, too--she had never ridden at that +terrific speed down hill. Twice she lost a stirrup and grabbed the +saddle horn to save herself from going over his head. + +They neared a sharp turn, and it took all her strength to pull her horse +to the inside and save him from plunging off down the canyon's side. The +nose of the hill hid for a moment her dad, and in that moment she heard +a crash and knew what had happened. But she could not stop; Yellowjacket +had his ears laid back flat on his senseless head, and the bit clamped +tight in his teeth. + +She heard the crash repeated in diminuendo farther down in the canyon. +There was no longer the rattle of the wagon coming down the trail, the +sharp staccato of pounding hoofs. + + + + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +SWAN TALKS WITH HIS THOUGHTS + + +Lorraine, following instinct rather than thought, pulled Yellowjacket +into the first opening that presented itself. This was a narrow, rather +precipitous gully that seamed the slope just beyond the bend. The bushes +there whipped her head and shoulders cruelly as the horse forged in +among them, but they trapped him effectually where the gully narrowed to +a point. He stopped perforce, and Lorraine was out of the saddle and +running down to the trail before she quite realized what she was doing. + +At the bend she looked down, saw the marks where the wagon had gone +over, scraping rocks and bushes from its path. Fence posts were strewn +at all angles down the incline, and far down a horse was standing with +part of the harness on him and with his head drooping dispiritedly. Her +father she could not see, nor the other horse, nor the wagon. A clump +of young trees hid the lower declivity. Lorraine did not stop to think +of what she would find down there. Sliding, running, she followed the +traces of the wreck to where the horse was standing. It was Caroline, +looking very dejected but apparently unhurt, save for skinned patches +here and there where she had rolled over rocks. + +A little farther, just beyond the point of the grove which they seemed +to have missed altogether, lay the other horse and what was left of the +wagon. Brit she did not see at all. She searched the bushes, looked +under the wagon, and called and called. + +A full-voiced shout answered her from farther up the canyon, and she ran +stumbling toward the sound, too agonized to shed tears or to think very +clearly. It was not her father's voice; she knew that beyond all doubt. +It was no voice that she had ever heard before. It had a clear resonance +that once heard would not have been easily forgotten. When she saw them +finally, her father was being propped up in a half-sitting position, and +the strange man was holding something to his lips. + +"Just a little water. I carry me a bottle of water always in my pocket," +said Swan, glancing up at her when she had reached them. "It sometimes +makes a man's head think better when he has been hurt, if he can drink a +little water or something." + +Brit swallowed and turned his face away from the tilted bottle. "I +jumped--but I didn't jump quick enough," he muttered thickly. "The chain +pulled loose. Where's the horses, Raine?" + +"They're all right. Caroline's standing over there. Are you hurt much, +dad?" It was a futile question, because Brit was already going off into +unconsciousness. + +"He's hurt pretty bad," Swan declared honestly, looking up at her with +his eyes grown serious. "I was across the walley and I saw him coming +down the road like rolling rocks down a hill. I came quick. Now we make +stretcher, I think, and carry him home. I could take him on my back, but +that is hurting him too much." He looked at her--through her, it seemed +to Lorraine. In spite of her fear, in spite of her grief, she felt that +Swan was reading her very soul, and she backed away from him. + +"I could help your father very much," he said soberly, "but I should +tell you a secret if I do that. I should maybe ask that you tell a lie +if somebody asks questions. Could you do that, Miss?" + +"Lie?" Lorraine laughed uncertainly. "I'd _kill_!--if that would help +dad." + +Swan was folding his coat very carefully and placing it under Brit's +head. "My mother I love like that," he said, without looking up. "My +mother I love so well that I talk with my thoughts to her sometimes. You +believe people can talk with their thoughts?" + +"I don't know--what's that got to do with helping dad?" Lorraine knelt +beside Brit and began stroking his forehead softly, as is the soothing +way of women with their sick. + +"I could send my thought to my mother. I could say to her that a man is +hurt and that a doctor must come very quickly to the Quirt ranch. I +could do that, Miss, but I should not like it if people knew that I did +it. They would maybe say that I am crazy. They would laugh at me, and it +is not right to laugh at those things." + +"I'm not laughing. If you can do it, for heaven's sake go ahead! I don't +believe it, but I won't tell any one, if that's what you want." + +"If some neighbors should ask, 'How did that doctor come so quick?'----" + +"I'd rather lie and say I sent for him, than say that you or any one +else sent a telepathic message. That would sound more like a lie than a +lie would. How are we going to make a stretcher? We've got to get him +home, somehow----" + +"At my cabin is blankets," Swan told her briskly. "I can climb the +hill--it is up there. In a little while I will come back." + +He started off without waiting to see what Lorraine would have to say +about it, and with some misgivings she watched him run down to the +canyon's bottom and go forging up the opposite side with a most amazing +speed and certainty. In travel pictures she had seen mountain sheep +climb like that, and she likened him now to one of them. It seemed a +shame that he was a bit crazy, she thought; and immediately she recalled +his perfect assurance when he told her of sending thought messages to +his mother. She had heard of such things, she had even read a little on +the subject, but it had never seemed to her a practical means of +communicating. Calling a doctor, for instance, seemed to Lorraine +rather far-fetched an application of what was at best but a debatable +theory. + +Considering the distance, he was back in a surprisingly short time with +two blankets, a couple of light poles and a flask of brandy. He seemed +as fresh and unwinded as if he had gone no farther than the grove, and +he wore, more than ever, his air of cheerful assurance. + +"The doctor will be there," he remarked, just as if it were the simplest +thing in the world. "We can carry him to Fred Thurman's. There I can get +horses and a wagon, and you will not have to carry so far. And when we +get to your ranch the doctor will be there, I think. He is starting now. +We will hurry. I will fix it so you need not carry much. It is just to +make it steady for me." + +While he talked he was working on the stretcher. He had a rope, and he +was knotting it in a long loop to the poles. Lorraine wondered why, +until he had lifted her father and placed him on the stretcher and +placed the loop over his own head and under one arm, as a ploughman +holds the reins, so that his hands may be free. + +"If you will carry the front," said Swan politely, "it will not be +heavy for you like this. But you will help me keep it steady." + +Lorraine was past discussing anything. She obeyed him silently, lifting +the end of the stretcher and leading the way down to the canyon's +bottom, where Swan assured her they could walk quite easily and would +save many détours which the road above must take. At the bottom Swan +stopped her so that he might shorten the rope and take more of the +weight on his shoulders. She protested half-heartedly, but Swan only +laughed. + +"I am strong like a mule," he said. "You should see me wrestle with +somebody. Clear over my head--I can carry a man in my hands. This is so +you can walk fast. Three miles straight down we come to Thurman's ranch, +where I get the horses. It's funny how hills make a road far around. +Just three miles--that's all. I have walked many times." + +Lorraine did not answer him. She felt that he was talking merely to keep +her from worrying, and she was fairly sick with anxiety and did not hear +half of what he was saying. She was nervously careful about choosing her +steps so that she would not stumble and jolt her father. She did not +believe that he was wholly unconscious, for she had seen his eyelids +tighten and his lips twitch several times, when she was waiting for +Swan. He had seemed to be in pain and to be trying to hide the fact from +her. She felt that Swan knew it, else he would have talked of her dad, +would at least have tried to reassure her. But it is difficult to speak +of a person who hears what you are saying, and Swan was talking of +everything, it seemed to her, except the man they were carrying. + +She wondered if it were really true that Swan had sent a call through +space for a doctor; straightway she would call herself crazy for even +considering for a moment its possibility. If he could do that--but of +course he couldn't. He must just imagine it. + +Many times Swan had her lower the stretcher to the ground, and would +make a great show of rubbing his arms and easing his shoulder muscles. +Whenever Lorraine looked full into his face he would grin at her as +though nothing was wrong, and when they came to a clear-running stream +he emptied the water bottle, dipped up a little fresh water, added +brandy, and lifted Brit's head very gently and gave him a drink. Brit +opened his eyes and looked at Swan, and from him to Lorraine, but he did +not say anything. He still had that tightened look around his mouth +which spelled pain. + +"Pretty quick now we get you fixed up good," Swan told him cheerfully. +"One mile more is all, and we get the horses and I make a good bed for +you." He looked a signal, and Lorraine once more took up the stretcher. + +Another mile seemed a long way, light though Swan had made the load for +her. She thought once that he must have some clairvoyant power, because +whenever she felt as if her arms were breaking, Swan would tell her to +stop a minute. + +"How do you know a doctor will come?" she asked Swan suddenly, when they +were resting with the Thurman ranch in view half a mile below them. + +Swan did not look at her directly, as had been his custom. She saw a +darker shade of red creep up into his cheeks. "My mother says she would +send a doctor quick," he replied hesitatingly. "You will see. It is +because--your father he is not like other men in this country. Your +father is a good man. That is why a doctor comes." + +Lorraine looked at him strangely and stooped again to her burden. She +did not speak again until they were passing the Thurman fence where it +ran up into the mouth of the canyon. A few horses were grazing there, +the sun striking their sides with the sheen of satin. They stared +curiously at the little procession, snorted and started to run, heads +and tails held high. But one wheeled suddenly and came galloping toward +them, stopped when he was quite close, ducked and went thundering past +to the head of the field. Lorraine gave a sharp little scream and set +down the stretcher with a lurch, staring after the horse wide-eyed, her +face white. + +"They do it for play," Swan said reassuringly. "They don't hurt you. The +fence is between, and they don't hurt you anyway." + +"That horse with the white face--I saw it--and when the man struck it +with his quirt it went past me, running like that and dragging--_oh-h_!" +She leaned against the bluff side, her face covered with her two palms. + +Swan glanced down at Brit, saw that his eyes were closed, ducked his +head from under the looped rope and went to Lorraine. + +"The man that struck that horse--do you know that man?" he asked, all +the good nature gone from his voice. + +"No--I don't know--I saw him twice, by the lightning flashes. He +shot--and then I saw him----" She stopped abruptly, stood for a minute +longer with her eyes covered, then dropped her hands limply to her +sides. But when the horse came circling back with a great flourish, she +shivered and her hands closed into the fists of a fighter. + +"Are you a Sawtooth man?" she demanded suddenly, looking up at Swan +defiantly. "It was a nightmare. I--I dreamed once about a horse--like +that." + +Swan's wide-open eyes softened a little. "The Sawtooth calls me that +damn Swede on Bear Top," he explained. "I took a homestead up there and +some day they will want to buy my place or they will want to make a +fight with me to get the water. Could you know that man again?" + +"Raine!" Brit's voice held a warning, and Lorraine shivered again as she +turned toward him. "Raine, you----" + +He closed his eyes again, and she could get no further speech from him. +But she thought she understood. He did not want her to talk about Fred +Thurman. She went to her end of the stretcher and waited there while +Swan put the rope over his head. They went on, Lorraine walking with her +head averted, trying not to see the blaze-faced roan, trying to shut out +the memory of him dashing past her with his terrible burden, that night. + +Swan did not speak of the matter again. With Lorraine's assistance he +carried Brit into Thurman's cabin, laid him, stretcher and all, on the +bed and hurried out to catch and harness the team of work horses. +Lorraine waited beside her father, helpless and miserable. There was +nothing to do but wait, yet waiting seemed to her the one thing she +could not do. + +"Raine!" Brit's voice was very weak, but Lorraine jumped as though a +trumpet had bellowed suddenly in her ear. "Swan--he's all right. But +don't go telling--all yuh know and some besides. He ain't--Sawtooth, +but--he might let out----" + +"I know. I won't, dad. It was that horse----" + +Brit turned his face to the wall as if no more was to be said on the +subject. Lorraine wandered around the cabin, which was no larger than +her father's place. The rooms were scrupulously clean--neater than the +Quirt, she observed guiltily. Not one article, however small and +unimportant, seemed to be out of its place, and the floors of both rooms +were scrubbed whiter than any floors she had ever seen. Swan's +housekeeping qualities made her ashamed of her own imperfections; and +when, thinking that Swan must be hungry and that the least she could do +was to set out food for him, she opened the cupboard, she had a swift, +embarrassed vision of her own culinary imperfections. She could cook +better food than her dad had been content to eat and to set before +others, but Swan's bread was a triumph in sour dough. Biscuits tall and +light as bread can be she found, covered neatly with a cloth. Prunes +stewed so that there was not one single wrinkle in them--Lorraine could +scarcely believe they were prunes until she tasted them. She was +investigating a pot of beans when Swan came in. + +"Food I am thinking of, Miss," he grinned at her. "We shall hurry, but +it is not good to go hungry. Milk is outside in a cupboard. It is +quicker than to make coffee." + +"It will be dark before we can get him home," said Lorraine uneasily. +"And by the time a doctor can get out there----" + +"A doctor will be there, I think. You don't believe, but that is no +difference to his coming just the same." + +He brought the milk, poured off the creamy top into a pitcher, stirred +it, and quietly insisted that she drink two glasses. Lorraine observed +that Swan himself ate very little, bolting down a biscuit in great +mouthfuls while he carried a mattress and blankets out to spread in the +wagon. It was like his pretense of weariness on the long carry down the +canyon, she thought. It was for her more than for himself that he was +thinking. + + + + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +THE QUIRT PARRIES THE FIRST BLOW + + +A car with dimmed lights stood in front of the Quirt cabin when Swan +drove around the last low ridge and down to the gate. The rattle of the +wagon must have been heard, for the door opened suddenly and Frank stood +revealed in the yellow light of the kerosene lamp on the table within. +Behind Frank, Lorraine saw Jim and Sorry standing in their shirt sleeves +looking out into the dark. Another, shorter figure she glimpsed as Frank +and the two men stepped out and came striding hastily toward them. +Lorraine jumped out and ran to meet them, hoping and fearing that her +hope was foolish. That car might easily be only Bob Warfield on some +errand of no importance. Still, she hoped. + +"That you, Raine? Where's Brit? What's all this about Brit being hurt? A +doctor from Shoshone----" + +"A _doctor_? Oh, did a doctor come, then? Oh, help Swan carry dad in! +I'm--oh, I'm afraid he's awfully injured!" + +"Yes-s--but how'n hell did a doctor know about it?" Sorry, the silent, +blurted unexpectedly. + +"Oh,--never mind--but get dad in. I'll----" She ran past them without +finishing her sentence and burst incoherently into the presence of an +extremely calm little man with gray whiskers and dust on the shoulders +of his coat. These details, I may add, formed the sum of Lorraine's +first impression of him. + +"Well! Well!" he remonstrated with a professional briskness, when she +nearly bowled him over. "We seem to be in something of a hurry! Is this +the patient I was sent to examine?" + +"No!" Lorraine flashed impatiently over her shoulder as she rushed into +her own room and began turning down the covers. "It's dad, of +course--and you'd better get your coat off and get ready to go to work, +because I expect he's just one mass of broken bones!" + +The doctor smiled behind his whiskers and returned to the doorway to +direct the carrying in of his patient. His sharp eyes went immediately +to Brit's face, pallid under the leathery tan, his fingers went to +Brit's hairy, corded wrist. The doctor smiled no more that evening. + +"No, he is not a mass of broken bones, I am happy to say," he reported +gravely to Lorraine afterwards. "He has a sufficient number, however. +The left scapula is fractured, likewise the clavicle, and there is a +compound fracture of the femur. There is some injury to the head, the +exact extent of which I cannot as yet determine. He should be removed to +a hospital, unless you are prepared to have a nurse here for some time, +or to assume the burden of a long and tedious illness." He looked at her +thoughtfully. "The journey to Shoshone would be a considerable strain on +the patient in his present condition. He has a splendid amount of +constitutional vitality, or he would scarcely have survived his injuries +so long without medical attendance. Can you tell me just how the +accident occurred?" + +"Excuse me, doctor--and Miss," Swan diffidently interrupted. "I could +ask you to take a look on my shoulder, if you please. If you are done +setting bones in Mr. Hunter. I have a great pain on my shoulder from +carrying so long." + +"You never mentioned it!" Lorraine reproached him quickly. "Of course +it must be looked after right away. And then, Doctor, I'd like to talk +to you, if you don't mind." She watched them retreat to the bunk-house +together, Swan's big form towering above the doctor's slighter figure. +Swan was talking earnestly, the mumble of his voice reaching Lorraine +without the enunciation of any particular word to give a clue to what he +was saying. But it struck her that his voice did not sound quite +natural; not so Swedish, not so careful. + +Frank came tiptoeing out of the room where Brit lay bandaged and +unconscious and stood close to Lorraine, looking down at her solemnly. + +"How 'n 'ell did he git here--the doctor?" he demanded, making a great +effort to hold his voice down to a whisper, and forgetting now and then. +"How'd _he_ know Brit rolled off'n the grade? Us here, _we_ never knowed +it, and I was tryin' to send him back when you came. He said somebody +telephoned there was a man hurt in a runaway. There ain't a telephone +closer'n the Sawtooth, and that there's a good twenty mile and more from +where Brit was hurt. It's damn funny." + +"Yes, it is," Lorraine admitted uncomfortably. "I don't know any more +than you do about it." + +"Well, how'n 'ell did it happen? Brit, he oughta know enough to +rough-lock down that hill. An' that team ain't a runaway team. _I_ never +had no trouble with 'em--they're good at holdin' a load. They'll set +down an' slide but what they'll hold 'er. What become of the horses?" + +"Why--they're over there yet. We forgot all about the horses, I think. +Caroline was standing up, all right. The other horse may be killed. I +don't know--it was lying down. And Yellowjacket was up that little gully +just this side of the wreck, when I left him. They did try to hold the +load, Frank. Something must have happened to the brake. I saw dad +crawling out from under the wagon just before I got to where the load +was standing. Or some one did. I think it was dad. But Caroline kicked +my horse down off the road, and I only saw him a minute--but it _must_ +have been dad. And then, a little way down the hill, something went +wrong." + +Frank seemed trying to reconstruct the accident from Lorraine's +description. "He'd no business to start down if his rough-lock wasn't +all right," he said. "It ain't like him. Brit's careful about them +things--little men most always are. I don't see how 'n 'ell it worked +loose. It's a damn queer layout all around; and this here doctor gitting +here ahead of you folks, that there is the queerest. What's he say about +Brit? Think he'll pull through?" + +The doctor himself, coming up just then, answered the question. Of +course the patient would pull through! What were doctors for? As to his +reason for coming, he referred them to Mr. Vjolmar, whom he thought +could better explain the matter. + +The three of them waited,--five of them, since Jim and Sorry had come +up, anxious to hear the doctor's opinion and anything else pertaining to +the affair. Swan was coming slowly from the bunk-house, buttoning his +coat. He seemed to feel that they were waiting for him and to know why. +His manner was diffident, deprecating even. + +"We may as well go in out of the mosquitoes," the doctor suggested. "And +I wish you would tell these people what you told me, young man. Don't be +afraid to speak frankly; it is rather amazing but not at all +impossible, as I can testify. In fact," he added dryly, "my presence +here ought to settle any doubt of that. Just tell them, young man, about +your mother." + +Swan was the last to enter the kitchen, and he stood leaning against the +closed door, turning his old hat round and round, his eyes going swiftly +from face to face. They were watching him, and Swan blushed a deep red +while he told them about his mother in Boise, and how he could talk to +her with his thoughts. He explained laboriously how the thoughts from +her came like his mother speaking in his head, and that his thoughts +reached her in the same way. He said that since he was a little boy they +could talk together with their thoughts, but people laughed and some +called them crazy, so that now he did not like to have somebody know +that he could do it. + +"But Brit Hunter's hurt bad, so a doctor must come quick, or I think he +maybe will die. It takes too long to ride a horse to Echo from this +ranch, so I call on my mother, and I tell my mother a doctor must come +quick to this ranch. So my mother sends a telephone to this doctor in +Shoshone, and he comes. That is all. But I would not like it if +everybody maybe finds it out that I do that, and makes talk about it." + +He looked straight at Jim and Sorry, and those two unprepossessing ones +looked at each other and at Swan and at the doctor and at each other +again, and headed for the door. But Swan was leaning against it, and his +eyes were on them. "I would like it if you say somebody rides to get the +doctor," he hinted quietly. + +Sorry looked at Jim. "I rode like hell," he stated heavily. "I leave it +to Jim." + +"You shore'n hell did!" Jim agreed, and Swan removed his big form from +the door. + +"You boys goin' over t' Spirit Canyon?" Frank wanted to know. + +"Yeah," said Sorry, answering for them both, and they went out, giving +Swan a sidelong look of utter bafflement as they passed him. Talking by +the thought route from Spirit Canyon to Boise City was evidently a bit +too much for even their phlegmatic souls to contemplate with perfect +calm. + +"They'll keep it to theirselves, whether they believe it or not," Frank +assured Swan in his labored whisper. "It don't go down with me. I ain't +supe'stitious enough fer that." + +"The doctor he comes, don't he?" Swan retorted. "I shall go back now and +milk the cows and do chores." + +"But if your shoulder is lame, Swan, how can you?" Lorraine asked in her +unexpected fashion. + +Swan swallowed and looked helplessly at the doctor, who stood smoothing +his chin. "The muscle strain is not serious," he said calmly. "A little +gentle exercise will prevent further trouble, I think." Whereupon he +turned abruptly to the door of the other room, glanced in at Brit and +beckoned Lorraine with an upraised finger. + +"You have had a hard time of it yourself, young lady," he told her. "You +needn't worry about Swan. He is not suffering appreciably. I shall mix +you a very unpleasant dose of medicine, and then I want you to go to bed +and sleep. I shall stay with your father to-night; not that it is +necessary, but because I prefer daylight for the trip back to town. So +there is no reason why you should sit up and wear yourself out. You will +have plenty of time to do that while your father's bones mend." + +He proceeded to mix the unpleasant dose, which Lorraine swallowed and +straightway forgot, in the muddle of thoughts that whirled confusingly +in her brain. Little things distressed her oddly, while her father's +desperate state left her numb. She lay down on the cot in the farther +corner of the kitchen where her father had slept just last night--it +seemed so long ago!--and almost immediately, as her senses recorded it, +bright sunlight was shining into the room. + + + + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +LONE TAKES HIS STAND + + +Lone Morgan, over at Elk Spring camp, was just sitting down to eat his +midday meal when some one shouted outside. Lone stiffened in his chair, +felt under his coat, and then got up with some deliberation and looked +out of the window before he went to the door. All this was a matter of +habit, bred of Lone's youth in the feud country, and had nothing +whatever to do with his conscience. + +"Hello!" he called, standing in the doorway and grinning a welcome to +Swan, who stood with one arm resting on the board gate. "She's on the +table--come on in." + +"I don't know if you're home with the door shut like that," Swan +explained, coming up to the cabin. "I chased a coyote from Rock City to +here, and by golly, he's going yet! I'll get him sometime, maybe. He's +smart, but you can beat anything with thinking if you don't stop +thinking. Always the other feller stops sometimes, and then you get +him. You believe that?" + +"It most generally works out that way," Lone admitted, getting another +plate and cup from the cupboard, which was merely a box nailed with its +bottom to the wall, and a flour sack tacked across the front for a +curtain. "Even a coyote slips up now and then, I reckon." + +Swan sat down, smoothing his tousled yellow hair with both hands as he +did so. "By golly, my shoulder is sore yet from carrying Brit Hunter," +he remarked carelessly, flexing his muscles and grimacing a little. + +Lone was pouring the coffee, and he ran Swan's cup over before he +noticed what he was doing. Swan looked up at him and looked away again, +reaching for a cloth to wipe the spilled coffee from the table. + +"How was that?" Lone asked, turning away to the stove. "What-all +happened to Brit Hunter?" + +Swan, with his plate filled and his coffee well sweetened, proceeded to +relate with much detail the story of Brit's misfortune. "By golly, I +don't see how he don't get killed," he finished, helping himself to +another biscuit. "By _golly_, I don't. Falling into Spirit Canyon is +like getting dragged by a horse. It should kill a man. What you think, +Lone?" + +"It didn't, you say." Lone's eyes were turned to his coffee cup. + +"It don't kill Brit Hunter--not yet. I think maybe he dies with all his +bones broke, like that. By golly, that shows you what could happen if a +man don't think. Brit should look at that chain on his wheel before he +starts down that road." + +"Oh. His brake didn't hold, eh?" + +"I look at that wagon," Swan answered carefully. "It is something funny +about that chain. I worked hauling logs in the mountains, once. It is +something damn funny about that chain, the way it's fixed." + +Lone did not ask him for particulars, as perhaps Swan expected. He did +not speak at all for awhile, but presently pushed back his plate as if +his appetite were gone. + +"It's like Fred Thurman," Swan continued moralizing. "If Fred don't ride +backwards, I bet he don't get killed--like that." + +"Where's Brit now?" Lone asked, getting up and putting on his hat. "At +the ranch?" + +"Or heaven, maybe," Swan responded sententiously. "But my dog Yack, he +don't howl yet. I guess Brit's at the ranch." + +"Sorry I'm busy to-day," said Lone, opening the door. "You stay as long +as you like, Swan. I've got some riding to do." + +"I'll wash the dishes, and then I maybe will think quicker than that +coyote. I'm after him, by golly, till I get him." + +Lone muttered something and went out. Within five minutes Swan, hearing +hoofbeats, looked out through a crack in the door and saw Lone riding at +a gallop along the trail to Rock City. "Good bait. He swallows the +hook," he commented to himself, and his good-natured grin was not +brightening his face while he washed the dishes and tidied the cabin. + +With Lone rode bitterness of soul and a sick fear that had nothing to do +with his own destiny. How long ago Brit had been hurled into the canyon +Lone did not know; he had not asked. But he judged that it must have +been very recently. Swan had not told him of anything but the runaway, +and of helping to carry Brit home--and of the "damn funny thing about +the chain"--the rough-lock, he must have meant. Too well Lone +understood the sinister meaning that probably lay behind that phrase. + +"They've started on the Quirt now," he told himself with foreboding. +"She's been telling her father----" + +Lone fell into bitter argument with himself. Just how far was it +justifiable to mind his own business? And if he did not mind it, what +possible chance had he against a power so ruthless and so cunning? An +accident to a man driving a loaded wagon down the Spirit Canyon grade +had a diabolic plausibility that no man in the country could question. +Brit, he reasoned, could not have known before he started that his +rough-lock had been tampered with, else he would have fixed it. Neither +was Brit the man to forget the brake on his load. If Brit lived, he +might talk as much as he pleased, but he could never prove that his +accident had been deliberately staged with murderous intent. + +Lone lifted his head and looked away across the empty miles of sageland +to the quiet blue of the mountains beyond. Peace--the peace of +untroubled wilderness--brooded over the land. Far in the distance, +against the rim of rugged hills, was an irregular splotch of brown which +was the headquarters of the Sawtooth. Lone turned his wrist to the +right, and John Doe, obeying the rein signal, left the trail and began +picking his way stiff-legged down the steep slope of the ridge, heading +directly toward the home ranch. + +John Doe was streaked with sweat and his flanks were palpitating with +fatigue when Lone rode up to the corral and dismounted. Pop Bridgers saw +him and came bow-legging eagerly forward with gossip titillating on his +meddlesome tongue, but Lone stalked by him with only a surly nod. Bob +Warfield he saw at a distance and gave no sign of recognition. He met +Hawkins coming down from his house and stopped in the trail. + +"Have you got time to go back to the office and fix up my time, +Hawkins?" he asked without prelude. "I'm quitting to-day." + +Hawkins stared and named the Biblical place of torment. "What yuh +quittin' for, Lone?" he added incredulously. "All you boys got a raise +last month; ain't that good enough?" + +"Plenty good enough, so long as I work for the outfit." + +"Well, what's wrong? You've been with us five years, Lone, and it's +suited you all right so far----" + +Lone looked at him. "Say, I never set out to _marry_ the Sawtooth," he +stated calmly. "And if I have married you-all by accident, you can get a +bill of divorce for desertion. This ain't the first time a man ever quit +yuh, is it, Hawkins?" + +"No--and there ain't a man on the pay roll we can't do without," Hawkins +retorted, his neck stiffening with resentment. "It's a kinda rusty +trick, though, Lone, quittin' without notice and leaving a camp empty." + +"Elk Spring won't run away," Lone assured him without emotion. "She's +been left alone a week or two at a time during roundups. I don't reckon +the outfit'll bust up before you get a man down there." + +The foreman looked at him curiously, for this was not like Lone, whose +tone had always been soft and friendly, and whose manner had no hint of +brusqueness. There was a light, too, in Lone's eyes that had not been +there before. But Hawkins would not question him further. If Lone Morgan +or any other man wanted to quit, that was his privilege,--providing, of +course, that his leaving was not likely to menace the peace and +security of the Sawtooth. Lone had made it a point to mind his own +business, always. He had never asked questions, he had never surmised or +gossiped. So Hawkins gave him a check for his wages and let him go with +no more than a foreman's natural reluctance to lose a trustworthy man. + +By hard riding along short cuts, Lone reached the Quirt ranch and +dropped reins at the doorstep, not much past mid-afternoon. + +"I rode over to see if there's anything I can do," he said, when +Lorraine opened the door to him. He did not like to ask about her +father, fearing that the news would be bad. + +"Why, thank you for coming." Lorraine stepped back, tacitly inviting him +to enter. "Dad knows us to-day, but of course he's terribly hurt and +can't talk much. We do need some one to go to town for things. Frank +helps me with dad, and Jim and Sorry are trying to keep things going on +the ranch. And Swan does what he can, of course, but----" + +"I just thought you maybe needed somebody right bad," said Lone quietly, +meaning a great deal more than Lorraine dreamed that he meant. "I'm not +doing anything at all, right now, so I can just as well help out as +not. I can go to town right away, if I can borrow a horse. John Doe, +he's pretty tired. I been pushing him right through--not knowing there +was a town trip ahead of him." + +Lorraine found her eyes going misty. He was so quiet, and so reassuring +in his quiet. Half her burden seemed to slip from her shoulders while +she looked at him. She turned away, groping for the door latch. + +"You may see dad, if you like, while I get the list of things the doctor +ordered. He left only a little while ago, and I was waiting for one of +the boys to come back so I could send him to town." + +It was on Lone's tongue to ask why the doctor had not taken in the order +himself and instructed some one to bring out the things; but he +remembered how very busy with its own affairs was Echo and decided that +the doctor was wise. + +He tiptoed in to the bed and saw a sallow face covered with stubbly gray +whiskers and framed with white bandages. Brit opened his eyes and moved +his thin lips in some kind of greeting, and Lone sat down on the edge of +a chair, feeling as miserably guilty as if he himself had brought the +old man to this pass. It seemed to him that Brit must know more of the +accident than Swan had told, and the thought did not add to his comfort. +He waited until Brit opened his eyes again, and then he leaned forward, +holding Brit's wandering glance with his own intent gaze. + +"I ain't working now," he said, lowering his voice so that Lorraine +could not hear. "So I'm going to stay here and help see you through with +this. I've quit the Sawtooth." + +Brit's eyes cleared and studied Lone's face. "D'you know--anything?" + +"No, I don't." Lone's face hardened a little. "But I wanted you to know +that I'm--with the Quirt, now." + +"Frank hire yuh?" + +"No. I ain't hired at all. I'm just--_with_ yuh." + +"We--need yuh," said Brit grimly, looking Lone straight in the eyes. + + + + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + +"FRANK'S DEAD" + + +"Frank come yet?" The peevish impatience of an invalid whose horizon has +narrowed to his own personal welfare and wants was in Brit's voice. Two +weeks he had been sick, and his temper had not sweetened with the pain +of his broken bones and the enforced idleness. Brit was the type of man +who is never quiet unless he is asleep or too ill to get out of bed. + +Lorraine came to the doorway and looked in at him. Two weeks had set +their mark on her also. She seemed older, quieter in her ways; there +were shadows in her eyes and a new seriousness in the set of her mouth. +She had had her burdens, and she had borne them with more patience than +many an older woman would have done, but what she thought of those +burdens she did not say. + +"No, dad--but I thought I heard a wagon a little while ago. He must be +coming," she said. + +"Where's Lone at?" Brit moved restlessly on the pillow and twisted his +face at the pain. + +"Lone isn't back, either." + +"He ain't? Where'd he go?" + +Lorraine came to the bedside and, lifting Brit's head carefully, +arranged the pillow as she knew he liked it. "I don't know where he +went," she said dully. "He rode off just after dinner. Do you want your +supper now? Or would you rather wait until Frank brings the fruit?" + +"I'd ruther wait--if Frank don't take all night," Brit grumbled. "I hope +he ain't connected up with that Echo booze. If he has----" + +"Oh, no, dad! Don't borrow trouble. Frank was anxious to get home as +soon as he could. He'll be coming any minute, now. I'll go listen for +the wagon." + +"No use listenin'. You couldn't hear it in that sand--not till he gits +to the gate. I don't see where Lone goes to, all the time. Where's Jim +and Sorry, then?" + +"Oh, they've had their supper and gone to the bunk-house. Do you want +them?" + +"No! What'd I want 'em fur? Not to look at, that's sure. I want to know +how things is going on this ranch. And from all I can make out, they +ain't goin' at all," Brit fretted. "What was you 'n Lone talkin' so long +about, out in the kitchen last night? Seems to me you 'n' him have got +a lot to say to each other, Raine." + +"Why, nothing in particular. We were just--talking. We're all human +beings, dad; we have to talk sometimes. There's nothing else to do." + +"Well, I caught something about the Sawtooth. I don't want you talking +to Lone or anybody else about that outfit, Raine. I told yuh so once. +He's all right--I ain't saying anything against Lone--but the less you +have to say the more you'll have to be thankful fur, mebby." + +"I was wondering if Swan could have gotten word somehow to the Sawtooth +and had them telephone out that you were hurt. And Lone was drawing a +map of the trails and showing me how far it was from the canyon to the +Sawtooth ranch. And he was asking me just how it happened that the brake +didn't hold, and I said it must have been all right, because I saw you +come out from under the wagon just before you hitched up. I thought you +were fixing the chain on them." + +"Huh?" Brit lifted his head off the pillow and let it drop back again, +because of the pain in his shoulder. "You never seen me crawl out from +under no wagon. I come straight down the hill to the team." + +"Well, I saw some one. He went up into the brush. I thought it was you." +Lorraine turned in the doorway and stood looking at him perplexedly. "We +shouldn't be talking about it, dad--the doctor said we mustn't. But are +you _sure_ it wasn't you? Because I certainly saw a man crawl out from +under the wagon and start up the hill. Then the horses acted up, and I +couldn't see him after Yellowjacket jumped off the road." + +Brit lay staring up at the ceiling, apparently unheeding her +explanation. Lorraine watched him for a minute and returned to the +kitchen door, peering out and listening for Frank to come from Echo with +supplies and the mail and, more important just now, fresh fruit for her +father. + +"I think he's coming, dad," she called in to her father. "I just heard +something down by the gate." + +She could save a few minutes, she thought, by running down to the corral +where Frank would probably stop and unload the few sacks of grain he was +bringing, before he drove up to the house. Frank was very methodical in +a fussy, purposeless way, she had observed. Twice he had driven to Echo +since her father had been hurt, and each time he had stopped at the +corral on his way to the house. So she closed the screen door behind +her, careful that it should not slam, and ran down the path in the heavy +dusk wherein crickets were rasping a strident chorus. + +"Oh! It's you, is it, Lone?" she exclaimed, when she neared the vague +figure of a man unsaddling a horse. "You didn't see Frank coming +anywhere, did you? Dad won't have his supper until Frank comes with the +things I sent for. He's late." + +Lone was lifting the saddle off the back of John Doe, which he had +bought from the Sawtooth because he was fond of the horse. He hesitated +and replaced the saddle, pulling the blanket straight under it. + +"I saw him coming an hour ago," he said. "I was back up on the ridge, +and I saw a team turn into the Quirt trail from the ford. It couldn't be +anybody but Frank. I'll ride out and meet him." + +He was mounted and gone before she realized that he was ready. She heard +the sharp staccato of John Doe's hoofbeats and wondered why Lone had not +waited for another word from her. It was as if she had told him that +Frank was in some terrible danger,--yet she had merely complained that +he was late. The bunk-house door opened, and Sorry came out on the +doorstep, stood there a minute and came slowly to meet her as she +retraced her steps to the house. + +"Where'd Lone go so sudden?" he asked, when she came close to him in the +dusk. "That was him, wasn't it?" + +Lorraine stopped and stood looking at him without speaking. A vague +terror had seized her. She wanted to scream, and yet she could think of +nothing to scream over. It was Lone's haste, she told herself +impatiently. Her nerves were ragged from nursing her dad and from +worrying over things she must not talk about,--that forbidden subject +which never left her mind for long. + +"Wasn't that him?" Sorry repeated uneasily. "What took him off again in +such a rush?" + +"Oh, I don't know! He said Frank should have been here long ago. He went +to look for him. Sorry," she cried suddenly, "what _is_ the matter with +this place? I feel as if something horrible was just ready to jump out +at us all. I--I want my back against something solid, all the time, so +that nothing can creep up behind. Nothing," she added desperately, +"could happen to Frank between here and the turn-off at the ford, could +it? Lone saw him turn into our trail over an hour ago, he said." + +Sorry, his fingers thrust into his overalls pockets, his thumbs hooked +over the waistband, spat into the sand beside the path. "Well, he +started off with a cracked doubletree," he said slowly. "He mighta +busted 'er pullin' through that sand hollow. She was wired up pretty +good, though, and there was more wire in the rig. I don't know of +anything else that'd be liable to happen, unless----" + +"Unless what?" Lorraine prompted sharply. "There's too much that isn't +talked about, on this ranch. What else could happen?" + +Sorry edged away from her. "Well--I dunno as anything would be liable to +happen," he said uncomfortably. "'Taint likely him 'n' Brit 'd both have +accidents--not right hand-runnin'." + +"_Accidents_?" Lorraine felt her throat squeeze together. "Sorry, you +don't mean--Sawtooth accidents?" she blurted. + +She surprised a grunt out of Sorry, who looked over his shoulder as if +he feared eavesdroppers. "Where'd you git that idee?" he demanded. "I +dunno what you mean. Ain't that yore dad callin' yuh?" + +Lorraine ignored the hint. "You _do_ know what I mean. Why did you say +they wouldn't both be likely to have accidents hand-running? And why +don't you _do_ something? Why does every one just keep still and let +things happen, and not say a word? If there's any chance of Frank having +an--an _accident_, I should think you'd be out looking after him, and +not standing there with your hands in your pockets just waiting to see +if he shows up or if he doesn't show up. You're all just like these +rabbits out in the sage. You'll hide under a bush and wait until you're +almost stepped on before you so much as wiggle an ear! I'm getting good +and tired of this meek business!" + +"We-ell," Sorry drawled amiably as she went past him, "playin' +rabbit-under-a-bush mebby don't look purty, but it's dern good life +insurance." + +"A coward's policy," Lorraine taunted him over her shoulder, and went to +see what her father wanted. When he, too, wanted to know why Lone had +come and gone again in such a hurry, Lorraine felt all the courage go +out of her at once. Their very uneasiness seemed to prove that there +was more than enough cause for it. Yet, when she forced herself to stop +and think, it was all about nothing. Frank had driven to Echo and had +not returned exactly on time, though a dozen things might have detained +him. + +She was listening at the door when Swan appeared unexpectedly before +her, having walked over from the Thurman ranch after doing the chores. +To him she observed that Frank was an hour late, and Swan, whistling +softly to Jack--Lorraine was surprised to hear how closely the call +resembled the chirp of a bird--strode away without so much as a pretense +at excuse. Lorraine stared after him wide-eyed, wondering and yet not +daring to wonder. + +Her father called to her fretfully, and she went in to him again and +told him what Sorry had said about the cracked doubletree, and persuaded +him to let her bring his supper at once, and to have the fruit later +when Frank arrived. Brit did not say much, but she sensed his +uneasiness, and her own increased in proportion. Later she saw two tiny, +glowing points down by the corral and knew that Sorry and Jim were down +there, waiting and listening, ready to do whatever was needed of them; +although what that would be she could not even conjecture. + +She made her father comfortable, chattered aimlessly to combat her +understanding of his moody silence, and listened and waited and tried +her pitiful best not to think that anything could be wrong. The subdued +chuckling of the wagon in the sand outside the gate startled her with +its unmistakable reality after so many false impressions that she heard +it. + +"Frank's coming, dad," she announced relievedly, "and I'll go and get +the mail and the fruit." + +She ran down the path again, almost light-hearted in her relief from +that vague terror which had held her for the past hour. From the corral +Sorry and Jim came walking up the path to meet the wagon which was +making straight for the bunk-house instead of going first to the stable. +One man rode on the seat, driving the team which walked slowly, oddly, +reminding Lorraine of a funeral procession. Beside the wagon rode Lone, +his head drooped a little in the starlight. It was not until the team +stopped before the bunk-house that Lorraine knew what it was that gave +her that strange, creepy feeling of disaster. It was not Frank Johnson, +but Swan Vjolmar who climbed limberly down from the seat without +speaking and turned toward the back of the wagon. + +"Why, where's Frank?" she asked, going up to where Lone was dismounting +in silence. + +"He's there--in the wagon. We picked him up back here about +three-quarters of a mile or so." + +"What's the matter? Is he drunk?" This was Sorry who came up to Swan and +stood ready to lend a hand. + +"He's so drunk he falls out of wagon down the road, but he don't have +whisky smell by his face," was Swan's ambiguous reply. + +"He's not hurt, is he?" Lorraine pressed close, and felt a hand on her +arm pulling her gently away. + +"He's hurt," Lone said, just behind her. "We'll take him into the +bunk-house and bring him to. Run along to the house and don't worry--and +don't say anything to your dad, either. There's no need to bother him +about it. We'll look after Frank." + +Already Swan and Sorry and Jim were lifting Frank's limp form from the +rear of the wagon. It sagged in their arms like a dead thing, and +Lorraine stepped back shuddering as they passed her. A minute later she +followed them inside, where Jim was lighting the lamp with shaking +fingers. By the glow of the match Lorraine saw how sober Jim looked, how +his chin was trembling under the drooping, sandy mustache. She stared at +him, hating to read the emotion in his heavy face that she had always +thought so utterly void of feeling. + +"It isn't--he isn't----" she began, and turned upon Swan, who was beside +the bunk, looking down at Frank's upturned face. "Swan, if it's serious +enough for a doctor, can't you send another thought message to your +mother?" she asked. "He looks--oh, Lone! He isn't _dead_, is he?" + +Swan turned his head and stared down at her, and from her face his +glance went sharply to Lone's downcast face. He looked again at +Lorraine. + +"To-night I can't talk with my mind," Swan told her bluntly. "Not always +I can do that. I could ask Lone how can a man be drunk so he falls off +the wagon when no whisky smell is on his breath." + +"Breath? Hell! There ain't no breath to smell," Sorry exclaimed as +unexpectedly as his speeches usually were. "If he's breathin' I can't +tell it on him." + +"He's got to be breathing!" Lone declared with a suppressed fierceness +that made them all look at him. "I found a half bottle of whisky in his +pocket--but Swan's right. There wasn't a smell of it on his breath--I +tell you now, boys, that he was lying in the sand between two +sagebushes, on his face. And there is where he got the blow--_behind his +ear_. It's one of them accidents that you've got to figure out for +yourself." + +"Oh, do something!" Lorraine cried distractedly. "Never mind now how it +happened, or whether he was drunk or not--bring him to his senses first, +and let him explain. If there's whisky, wouldn't that help if he +swallowed some now? And there's medicine for dad's bruises in the house. +I'll get it. And Swan! Won't you _please_ talk to your mother and tell +her we need the doctor?" + +Swan drew back. "I can't," he said shortly. "Better you send to Echo for +telegraph. And if you have medicine, it should be on his head quick." + +Lone was standing with his fingers pressed on Frank's wrist. He looked +up, hesitated, drew out his knife and opened the small blade. He moved +so that his back was to Lorraine, and still holding the wrist he made a +small, clean cut in the flesh. The three others stooped, stared with +tightened lips at the bloodless incision, straightened and looked at one +another dumbly. + +"I'd like to lie to you," Lone told Lorraine, speaking over his +shoulder. "But I won't. You're too game and too square. Go and stay with +your dad, but don't let him know--get him to sleep. We don't need that +medicine, nor a doctor either. Frank's dead. I reckon he was dead when +he hit the ground." + + + + +CHAPTER FIFTEEN + +SWAN TRAILS A COYOTE + + +At daybreak Swan was striding toward the place where Frank Johnson had +been found. Lone, his face moody, his eyes clouded with thought, rode +beside him, while Jack trotted loose-jointedly at Swan's heels. Swan had +his rifle, and Lone's six-shooter showed now and then under his coat +when the wind flipped back a corner. Neither had spoken since they left +the ranch, where Jim was wandering dismally here and there, trying to do +the chores when his heart was heavy with a sense of personal loss and +grim foreboding. None save Brit had slept during the night--and Brit had +slept only because Lorraine had prudently given him a full dose of the +sedative left by the doctor for that very purpose. Sorry had gone to +Echo to send a telegram to the coroner, and he was likely to return now +at any time. Wherefore Swan and Lone were going to look over the ground +before others had trampled out what evidence there might be in the +shape of footprints. + +They reached the spot where the team had stopped of its own accord in +crossing a little, green meadow, and had gone to feeding. Lone pulled up +and half turned in the saddle, looking at Swan questioningly. + +"Is that dog of yours any good at trailing?" he asked abruptly. "I've +got a theory that somebody was in that wagon with Frank, and drove on a +ways before he jumped out. I believe if you'd put that dog on the +trail----" + +"If I put that dog on the trail he stays on the trail all day, maybe," +Swan averred with some pride. "By golly, he follows a coyote till he +drops." + +"Well, it's a coyote we're after now," said Lone. "A sheep-killer that +has made his last killin'. Right here's where I rode up and caught the +team, last night. We better take a look along here for tracks." + +Swan stared at him curiously, but he did not speak, and the two went on +more slowly, their glances roving here and there along the trail edge, +looking for footprints. Once the dog Jack swung off the trail into the +brush, and Swan followed him while Lone stopped and awaited the result. +Swan came back presently, with Jack sulking at his heels. + +"Yack, he take up the trail of a coyote," Swan explained, "but it's got +the four legs, and Yack, he don't understand me when I don't follow. He +thinks I'm crazy this morning." + +"I reckon the team came on toward home after the fellow jumped out," +Lone observed. "He'd plan that way, seems to me. I know I would." + +"I guess that's right. I don't have experience in killing somebody," +Swan returned blandly, and Lone was too preoccupied to wonder at the +unaccustomed sarcasm. + +A little farther along Swan swooped down upon a blue dotted handkerchief +of the kind which men find so useful where laundries are but a name. +Again Lone stopped and bent to examine it as Swan spread it out in his +hands. A few tiny grains of sandstone rattled out, and in the center was +a small blood spot. Swan looked up straight into Lone's dark, brooding +eyes. + +"By golly, Lone, you would do that, too, if you kill somebody," he began +in a new tone,--the tone which Lorraine had heard indistinctly in the +bunk-house when Swan was talking to the doctor. "Do you think I'm a +damn fool, just because I'm a Swede? You are smart--you think out every +little thing. But you make a big mistake if you don't think some one +else may be using his brain, too. This handkerchief I have seen you pull +from your pocket too many times. And it had a rock in it last night, and +the blood shows that it was used to hit Frank behind the ear. You think +it all out--but maybe I've been thinking too. Now you're under arrest. +Just stay on your horse--he can't run faster than a bullet, and I don't +miss coyotes when I shoot them on the run." + +"The hell you say!" Lone stared at him. "Where's your authority, Swan?" + +Swan lifted the rifle to a comfortable, firing position, the muzzle +pointing straight at Lone's chest. With his left hand he turned back his +coat and disclosed a badge pinned to the lining. + +"I'm a United States Marshal, that's all; a government hunter," he +stated. "I'm hot on the trail of coyotes--all kinds. Throw that +six-shooter over there in the brush, will you?" + +"I hate to get the barrel all sanded up," Lone objected mildly. "You can +pack it, can't you?" He grinned a little as he handed out the gun, +muzzle toward himself. "You're playing safe, Swan, but if that dog of +yours is any good, you'll have a change of heart pretty quick. Isn't +that a man's track, just beside that flat rock? Put the dog on, why +don't you?" + +"Yack is on already," Swan pointed out. "Ride ahead of me, Lone." + +With a shrug of his shoulders Lone obeyed, following the dog as it +trotted through the brush on the trail of a man's footprints which Swan +had shown it. A man might have had some trouble in keeping to the trail, +but Jack trotted easily along and never once seemed at fault. In a very +few minutes he stopped in a rocky depression where a horse had been +tied, and waited for Swan, wagging his tail and showing his teeth in a +panting smile. The man he had trailed had mounted and ridden toward the +ridge to the west. Swan examined the tracks, and Lone sat on his horse +watching him. + +Jack picked up the trail where the horseman had walked away toward the +road, and Swan followed him, motioning Lone to ride ahead. + +"You could tell me about this, I think, but I can find out for myself," +he observed, glancing at Lone briefly. + +"Sure, you can find out, if you use your eyes and do a little +thinking," Lone replied. "I hope you do lay the evidence on the right +doorstep." + +"I will," Swan promised, looking ahead to where Jack was nosing his way +through the sagebrush. + +They brought up at the edge of the road nearly a quarter of a mile +nearer Echo than the place where Frank's body had been found. They saw +where the man had climbed into the wagon, and followed to where they had +found Frank beside the road, lying just as he had pitched forward from +the wagon seat. + +"I think," said Swan quietly, "we will go now and find out where that +horse went last night." + +"A good idea," Lone agreed. "Do you see how it was done, Swan? When he +saw the team coming, away back toward Echo, he rode down into that wash +and tied his horse. He was walking when Frank overtook him, I +reckon--maybe claiming his horse had broke away from him. He had a rock +in his handkerchief. Frank stopped and gave him a lift, and he used the +rock first chance he got. Then I reckon he stuck the whisky bottle in +Frank's pocket and heaved him out. He dropped the handkerchief out of +his hip pocket when he jumped out of the rig. It's right simple, and if +folks didn't get to wondering about it, it'd be safe as any killing can +be. As safe," he added meaningly, "as dragging Fred Thurman, or +unhooking Brit's chain-lock before he started down the canyon with his +load of posts." + +Swan did not answer, but turned back to where the horse had been left +tied and took up the trail from there. As before, the dog trotted along, +Lone riding close behind him and Swan striding after. They did not +really need the dog, for the hoofprints were easily followed for the +greater part of the way. + +They had gone perhaps four miles when Lone turned, resting a hand on the +cantle of his saddle while he looked back at Swan. "You see where he was +headed for, don't yuh, Swan?" he asked, his tone as friendly as though +he was not under arrest as a murderer. "If he didn't go to Whisper, I'll +eat my hat." + +"You're the man to know," Swan retorted grimly. And then, because Lone's +horse had slowed in a long climb over a ridge, he came up even with a +stirrup. "Lone, I hate to do it. I'd like you, if you don't kill for a +living. But for that I could shoot you quick as a coyote. You're +smart--but not smart enough. You gave yourself away when I showed you +Fred's saddle. After that I knew who was the Sawtooth killer that I came +here to find." + +"You thought you knew," Lone corrected calmly. + +"You don't have to lie," Swan informed him bluntly. "You don't have to +tell anything. I find out for myself if I make mistake." + +"Go to it," Lone advised him coldly. "It don't make a darn bit of +difference to me whether I ride in front of you or behind. I'm so glad +you're here on the job, Swan, that I'm plumb willing to be tied hand and +foot if it'll help you any." + +"When a man's too damn willing to be my prisoner," Swan observed +seriously, "he gets tied, all right. Put out your hands, Lone. You look +good to me with bracelets on, when you talk so willing to go to jail for +murder." + +He had slipped the rifle butt to the ground, and before Lone quite +realized what he was doing Swan had a short, wicked-looking automatic +pistol in one hand and a pair of handcuffs in the other. Lone flushed, +but there was nothing to do but hold out his hands. + + + + +CHAPTER SIXTEEN + +THE SAWTOOTH SHOWS ITS HAND + + +In her fictitious West Lorraine had long since come to look upon +violence as a synonym for picturesqueness; murder and mystery were +inevitably an accompaniment of chaps and spurs. But when a man she had +cooked breakfast for, had talked with just a few hours ago, lay dead in +the bunk-house, she forgot that it was merely an expected incident of +Western life. She lay in her bed shaking with nervous dread, and the +shrill rasping of the crickets and tree-toads was unendurable. + +After the first shock had passed a deep, fighting rage filled her, made +her long for day so that she might fight back somehow. Who was the +Sawtooth Company, that they could sweep human beings from their path so +ruthlessly and never be called to account? Not once did she doubt that +this was the doing of the Sawtooth, another carefully planned +"accident" calculated to rid the country of another man who in some +fashion had become inimical to their interests. + +From Lone she had learned a good deal about the new irrigation project +which lay very close to the Sawtooth's heart. She could see how the +Quirt ranch, with its water rights and its big, fertile meadows and its +fences and silent disapprobation of the Sawtooth's methods, might be +looked upon as an obstacle which they would be glad to remove. + +That her father had been sent down that grade with a brake deliberately +made useless was a horrible thought which she could not put from her +mind. She had thought and thought until it seemed to her that she knew +exactly how and why the killer's plans had gone awry. She was certain +that she and Swan had prevented him from climbing down into the canyon +and making sure that her dad did not live to tell what mischance had +overtaken him. He had probably been watching while she and Swan made +that stretcher and carried her dad away out of his reach. He would not +shoot _her_,--he would not dare. Nor would he dare come to the cabin and +finish the job he had begun. But he had managed to kill Frank--poor old +Frank, who would never grumble and argue over little things again. + +There was nothing picturesque, nothing adventurous about it. It was just +straight, heart-breaking tragedy, that had its sordid side too. Her dad +was a querulous sick man absorbed by his sufferings and not yet out of +danger, if she read the doctor's face aright. Jim and Sorry had taken +orders all their life, and they would not be able to handle the ranch +work alone; yet how else would it be done? There was Lone,--instinctively +she turned her thoughts to him for comfort. Lone would stay and help, +and somehow it would be managed. + +But to think that these things could be done without fear of +retribution. Jim and Sorry, Swan and Lone had not attempted to hide +their belief that the Sawtooth was responsible for Frank's death, yet +not one of them had hinted at the possibility of calling the sheriff, or +placing the blame where it belonged. They seemed brow-beaten into the +belief that it would be useless to fight back. They seemed to look upon +the doings of the Sawtooth as an act of Providence, like being struck by +lightning or freezing to death, as men sometimes did in that country. + +To Lorraine that passive submission was the most intolerable part, the +one thing she could not, would not endure. Had she lived all of her life +on the Quirt, she probably would never have thought of fighting back and +would have accepted conditions just as her dad seemed to accept them. +But her mimic West had taught her that women sometimes dared where the +men had hesitated. It never occurred to her that she should submit to +the inevitable just because the men appeared to do so. + +Wherefore it was a new Lorraine who rose at daybreak and silently cooked +breakfast for the men, learned from Jim that Sorry was not back from +Echo, and that Swan and Lone had gone down to the place where Frank had +been found. She poured Jim's coffee and went on her tiptoes to see if +her father still slept. She dreaded his awakening and the moment when +she must tell him about Frank, and she had an unreasonable hope that the +news might be kept from him until the doctor came again. + +Brit was awake, and the look in his eyes frightened Lorraine so that she +stopped in the middle of the room, staring at him fascinated. + +"Well," he said flatly, "who is it this time? Lone, or--Frank?" + +"Why--who is what?" Lorraine parried awkwardly. "I don't----" + +"Did they git Frank, las' night?" Brit's eyes seemed to bore into her +soul, searching pitilessly for the truth. "Don't lie to me, Raine--it +ain't going to help any. Was it Frank or Lone? They's a dead man laid +out on this ranch. Who is it?" + +"F-frank," Lorraine stammered, backing away from him. "H-how did you +know?" + +"How did it happen?" Brit's eyes were terrible. + +Lorraine shuddered while she told him. + +"Rabbits in a trap," Brit muttered, staring at the low ceiling. "Can't +prove nothing--couldn't convict anybody if we could prove it. Bill +Warfield's got this county under his thumb. Rabbits in a trap. Raine, +you better pack up and go home to your mother. There's goin' to be hell +a-poppin' if I live to git outa this bed." + +Lorraine stooped over him, and her eyes were almost as terrible as were +Brit's. "Let it pop. We aren't quitters, are we, dad? I'm going to stay +with you." Then she saw tears spilling over Brit's eyelids and left the +room hurriedly, fighting back a storm of weeping. She herself could not +mourn for Frank with any sense of great personal loss, but it was +different with her dad. He and Frank had lived together for so many +years that his loyal heart ached with grief for that surly, faithful old +partner of his. + +But Lorraine's fighting blood was up, and she could not waste time in +weeping. She drank a cup of coffee, went out and called Jim, and told +him that she was going to take a ride, and that she wanted a decent +horse. + +"You can take mine," Jim offered. "He's gentle and easy-gaited. I'll go +saddle up. When do you want to go?" + +"Right now, as soon as I'm ready. I'll fix dad's breakfast, and you can +look after him until Lone and Swan come back. One of them will stay with +him then. I may be gone for three or four hours. I'll go crazy if I stay +here any longer." + +Jim eyed her while he bit off a chew of tobacco. "It'd be a good thing +if you had some neighbor woman come in and stay with yuh," he said +slowly. "But there ain't any I can think of that'd be much force. You +take Snake and ride around close and forget things for awhile." He +hesitated, his hand moving slowly back to his pocket. "If yuh feel like +you want a gun----" + +Lorraine laughed bitterly. "You don't think any accident would happen to +_me_, do you?" + +"Well, no--er I wouldn't advise yuh to go ridin'," Jim said +thoughtfully. "This here gun's kinda techy, anyway, unless you're used +to a quick trigger. Yuh might be safer without it than with it." + +By the time she was ready, Jim was tying his horse, Snake, to the +corral. Lorraine walked slowly past the bunk-house with her face turned +from it and her thoughts dwelling terrifiedly upon what lay within. Once +she was past she began running, as if she were trying to outrun her +thoughts. Jim watched her gravely, untied Snake and stood at his head +while she mounted, then walked ahead of her to the gate and opened it +for her. + +"Yore nerves are sure shot to hell," he blurted sympathetically as she +rode past him. "I guess you need a ride, all right. Snake's plumb safe, +so yuh got no call to worry about him. Take it easy, Raine, on the +worrying. That's about the worst thing you can do." + +Lorraine gave him a grateful glance and a faint attempt at a smile, and +rode up the trail she always took,--the trail where she had met Lone +that day when he returned her purse, the trail that led to Fred +Thurman's ranch and to Sugar Spring and, if you took a certain turn at a +certain place, to Granite Ridge and beyond. + +Up on the ridge nearest the house Al Woodruff shifted his position so +that he could watch her go. He had been watching Lone and Swan and the +dog, trailing certain tracks through the sagebrush down below, and when +Lorraine rode away from the Quirt they were in the wagon road, fussing +around the place where Frank had been found. + +"They can't pin nothing on _me_," Al tried to comfort himself. "If that +damn girl would keep her mouth shut I could stand a trial, even. They +ain't got any evidence whatever, unless she saw me at Rock City that +night." He turned and looked again toward the two men down on the road +and tilted his mouth down at the corners in a sour grin. + +"Go to it and be damned to you!" he muttered. "You haven't got the dope, +and you can't git it, either. Trail that horse if you want to--I'd like +to see yuh amuse yourselves that way!" + +He turned again to stare after Lorraine, meditating deeply. If she had +only been a man, he would have known exactly how to still her tongue, +but he had never before been called upon to deal with the problem of +keeping a woman quiet. He saw that she was taking the trail toward Fred +Thurman's, and that she was riding swiftly, as if she had some errand in +that direction, something urgent. Al was very adept at reading men's +moods and intentions from small details in their behavior. He had seen +Lorraine start on several leisurely, purposeless rides, and her changed +manner held a significance which he did not attempt to belittle. + +He led his horse down the side of the ridge opposite the road and the +house, mounted there and rode away after Lorraine, keeping parallel with +the trail but never using it, as was his habit. He made no attempt to +overtake her, and not once did Lorraine glimpse him or suspect that she +was being followed. Al knew well the art of concealing his movements and +his proximity from the inquisitive eyes of another man's saddle horse, +and Snake had no more suspicion than his rider that they were not +altogether alone that morning. + +Lorraine sent him over the trail at a pace which Jim had long since +reserved for emergencies. But Snake appeared perfectly able and willing +to hold it and never stumbled or slowed unexpectedly as did +Yellowjacket, wherefore Lorraine rode faster than she would have done +had she known more about horses. + +Still, Snake held his own better than even Jim would have believed, and +carried Lorraine up over Granite Ridge and down into the Sawtooth flat +almost as quickly as Lorraine expected him to do. She came up to the +Sawtooth ranch-houses with Snake in a lather of sweat and with her own +determination unweakened to carry the war into the camp of her enemy. It +was, she firmly believed, what should have been done long ago; what +would have curbed effectually the arrogant powers of the Sawtooth. + +She glanced at the foreman's cottage only to make sure that Hawkins was +nowhere in sight there, and rode on toward the corrals, intercepting +Hawkins and a large, well-groomed, smooth-faced man whom she knew at +once must be Senator Warfield himself. Unconsciously Lorraine mentally +fitted herself into a dramatic movie "scene" and plunged straight into +the subject. + +"There has been," she said tensely, "another Sawtooth accident. It +worked better than the last one, when my father was sent over the grade +into Spirit Canyon. Frank Johnson is _dead_. I am here to discover what +you are going to do about it?" Her eyes were flashing, her chest was +rising and falling rapidly when she had finished. She looked straight +into Senator Warfield's face, her own full in the sunlight, so that, had +there been a camera "shooting" the scene, her expression would have been +fully revealed--though she did not realize all that. + +Senator Warfield looked her over calmly (just as a director would have +wished him to do) and turned to Hawkins. "Who is this girl?" he asked. +"Is she the one who came here temporarily--deranged?" + +"She's the girl," Hawkins affirmed, his eyes everywhere but on +Lorraine's face. "Brit Hunter's daughter--they say." + +"They _say_? I _am_ his daughter! How dare you take that tone, Mr. +Hawkins? My home is at the Quirt. When you strike at the Quirt you +strike at me. When you strike at me I am going to strike back. Since I +came here two men have been killed and my father has been nearly killed. +He may die yet--I don't know what effect this shock will have upon him. +But I know that Frank is dead, and that it's up to me now to see that +justice is done. You--you cowards! You will kill a man for the sake of a +few dollars, but you kill in the dark. You cover your murders under the +pretense of accidents. I want to tell you this: Of all the men you have +murdered, Frank Johnson will be avenged. You are going to answer for +that. I shall see that you _do_ answer for it! There is justice in this +country, there _must_ be. I'm going to demand that justice shall be +measured out to you. I----" + +"Was she violent, before?" Senator Warfield asked Hawkins in an +undertone which Lorraine heard distinctly. "You're a deputy, Hawkins. If +this keeps on, I'm afraid you will have to take her in and have her +committed for insanity. It's a shame, poor thing. At her age it is +pitiful. Look how she has ridden that horse! Another mile would have +finished him." + +"Do you mean to say you think I'm crazy? What an idea! It seems to me, +Senator Warfield, that you are crazy yourself, to imagine that you can +go on killing people and thinking you will never have to pay the +penalty. You _will_ pay. There is law in this land, even if----" + +"This is pathetic," said Senator Warfield, still speaking to Hawkins. +"Her father--if he is her father--is sick and not able to take care of +her. We'll have to assume the responsibility ourselves, I'm afraid, +Hawkins. She may harm herself, or----" + +Lorraine turned white. She had never seen just such a situation arise in +a screen story, but she knew what danger might lie in being accused of +insanity. While Warfield was speaking, she had a swift vision of the +evidence they could bring against her; how she had arrived there +delirious after having walked out from Echo,--why, they would call even +that a symptom of insanity! Lone had warned her of what people would say +if she told any one of what she saw in Rock City, perhaps really +believing that she had imagined it all. Lone might even think that she +had some mental twist! Her world was reeling around her. + +She whirled Snake on his hind feet, struck him sharply with the quirt +and was galloping back over the trail past the Hawkins house before +Senator Warfield had finished advising Hawkins. She saw Mrs. Hawkins +standing in the door, staring at her, but she did not stop. They would +take her to the asylum; she felt that the Sawtooth had the power, that +she had played directly into their hands, and that they would be as +ruthless in dealing with her as they had been with the nesters whom they +had killed. She knew it, she had read it in the inscrutable, level look +of Senator Warfield, in the half cringing, wholly subservient manner of +Hawkins when he listened to his master. + +"They're fiends!" she cried aloud once, while she urged Snake up the +slope of Granite Ridge. "I believe they'd kill me if they were sure they +could get away with it. But they could frame an insanity charge and put +me--my God, what fiends they are!" + +At the Sawtooth, Senator Warfield was talking with Mrs. Hawkins while +her husband saddled two horses. Mrs. Hawkins lived within her four walls +and called that, her "spere," and spoke of her husband as "he." You know +the type of woman. That Senator Warfield was anything less than a +godlike man who stood very high on the ladder of Fame, she would never +believe. So she related garrulously certain incoherent, aimless +utterances of Lorraine's, and cried a little, and thought it was +perfectly awful that a sweet, pretty girl like that should be crazy. She +would have made an ideal witness against Lorraine, her very sympathy +carrying conviction of Lorraine's need of it. That she did not convince +Senator Warfield of Lorraine's mental derangement was a mere detail. +Senator Warfield had reasons for knowing that Lorraine was merely +afflicted with a dangerous amount of knowledge and was using it without +discretion. + +"You mustn't let her run loose and maybe kill herself or somebody else!" +Mrs. Hawkins exclaimed. "Oh, Senator, it's awful to think of! When she +went past the house I knew the poor thing wasn't right----" + +"We'll overtake her," Senator Warfield assured her comfortingly. "She +can't go very far on that horse. She'd ridden him half to death, getting +here. He won't hold out--he can't. She came here, I suppose, because she +had been here before. A sanitarium may be able to restore her to a +normal condition. I can't believe it's anything more than some nervous +disorder. Now don't worry, my good woman. Just have a room ready, so +that she will be comfortable here until we can get her to a sanitarium. +It isn't hopeless, I assure you--but I'm mighty glad I happened to be +here so that I can take charge of the case. Now here comes Hawkins. +We'll bring her back--don't you worry." + +"Well, take her away as quick as you can, Senator. I'm scared of crazy +people. His brother went crazy in our house and----" + +"Yes, yes--we'll take care of her. Poor girl, I wish that I had been +here when she first came," said the senator, as he went to meet Hawkins, +who was riding up from the corrals leading two horses--one for Lorraine, +which shows what was his opinion of Snake. + + + + +CHAPTER SEVENTEEN + +YACK DON'T LIE + + +For a time the trail seemed to lead toward Whisper. Then it turned away +and seemed about to end abruptly on a flat outcropping of rock two miles +from Whisper camp. Lone frowned and stared at the ground, and Swan spoke +sharply to Jack, who was nosing back and forth, at fault if ever a dog +was. But presently he took up the scent and led them down a barren slope +and into grassy ground where a bunch of horses grazed contentedly. Jack +singled out one and ran toward it silently, as he had done all his +trailing that morning. The horse looked up, stared and went galloping +down the little valley, stampeding the others with him. + +"That's about where I thought we'd wind up--in a saddle bunch," Lone +observed disgustedly. "If I had the evidence you're carrying in your +pocket, Swan, I'd put that darn dog on the scent of the man, not the +horse." + +"The man I've got," Swan retorted. "I don't have to trail him." + +"Well, now, you _think_ you've got him. Here's good, level ground--I +couldn't get outa sight in less than ten minutes, afoot. Let me walk out +a ways, and you see if that handkerchief's mine. Oh, search me all you +want to, first," he added, when he read the suspicion in Swan's eyes. +"Make yourself safe as yuh please, but give me a fair show. You've made +up your mind I'm the killer, and you've been fitting the evidence to +me--or trying to." + +"It fits," Swan pointed out drily. + +"You see if it does. The dog'll tell you all about it in about two +minutes if you give him a chance." + +Swan looked at him. "Yack don't lie. By golly, I raised that dog to +trail, and he _trails_, you bet! He's cocker spaniel and bloodhound, and +he knows things, that dog. All right, Lone, you walk over to that black +rock and set down. If you think you frame something, maybe, I pack a +dead man to the Quirt again." + +"You can, for all me," Lone replied quietly. "I'd about as soon go that +way as the way I am now." + +Swan watched him until he was seated on the rock as directed, his +manacled hands resting on his knees, his face turned toward the horses. +Then Swan took the blue handkerchief from his pocket, called Jack to him +and muttered something in Swedish while the dog sniffed at the cloth. +"Find him, Yack," said Swan, standing straight again. + +Jack went sniffing obediently in wide circles, crossing unconcernedly +Lone's footprints while he trotted back and forth. He hesitated once on +the trail of the horse he had followed, stopped and looked at Swan +inquiringly, and whined. Swan whistled the dog to him with a peculiar, +birdlike note and called to Lone. + +"You come back, Lone, and let Yack take a damn good smell of you. By +golly, if that dog lies to me this time, I lick him good!" + +Lone came back, grinning a little. "All right, now maybe you'll listen +to reason. I ain't the kind to tell all I know and some besides, Swan. +I've been a Sawtooth man, and a fellow kinda hates to throw down his +outfit deliberate. But they're going too strong for any white man to +stand for. I quit them when they tried to get Brit Hunter. I don't +_know_ so much, Swan, but I'm pretty good at guessing. So if you'll +come with me to Whisper, your dog may show yuh who owns that +handkerchief. If he don't, then I'm making a mistake, and I'd like to be +set right." + +"Somebody rode that horse," Swan meditated aloud. "Yack don't make a +mistake like that, and I don't think I'm blind. Where's the man that was +on the horse? What you think, Lone?" + +"_Me_? I think there was another horse somewhere close to that +outcropping, tied to a bush, maybe. I think the man you're after changed +horses there, just on a chance that somebody might trail him from the +road. You put your dog on the trail of that one particular horse, and he +showed yuh where it was feeding with the bunch. It looks to me like it +was turned loose, back there, and come on alone. Your man went to +Whisper; I'll bank money on that. Anyway, your dog'll know if he's been +there." + +Swan thought it over, his eyes moving here and there to every hint of +movement between the skyline and himself. Suddenly he turned to Lone, +his face flushing with honest shame. + +"Loney, take a damn Swede and give him something he believes, and you +could pull his teeth before you pull that notion from his thick head. +You acted funny, that day Fred Thurman was killed, and you gave yourself +away at the stable when I showed you that saddle. So I think you're the +killer, and I keep on thinking that, and I've been trying to catch you +with evidence. I'm a Swede, all right! Square head. Built of wood two +inches thick. Loney, you kick me good. You don't have time to ride over +here, get some other horse and ride back to the Quirt after Frank was +killed. You got there before I did, last night. We know Frank was dead +not much more than one hour when we get him to the bunk-house. Yack, he +gives you a good alibi." + +"I sure am glad we took the time to trail that horse, then," Lone +remarked, while Swan was removing the handcuffs. "You're all right, +Swan. Nothing like sticking to an idea till you know it's wrong. Now, +let's stick to mine for awhile. Let's go on to Whisper. It ain't far." + +They returned to the rocky hillside where the trail had been covered, +and searched here and there for the tracks of another horse; found the +trail and followed it easily enough to Whisper. Swan put Jack once more +on the scent of the handkerchief, and if actions meant anything, Jack +proved conclusively that he found the Whisper camp reeking with the +scent. + +But that was all,--since Al was at that moment trailing Lorraine toward +the Sawtooth. + +"We may as well eat," Swan suggested. "We'll get him, by golly, but we +don't have to starve ourselves." + +"He wouldn't know we're after him," Lone agreed. "He'll stick around so +as not to raise suspicion. And he might come back, most any time. If he +does, we'll say I'm out with you after coyotes, and we stopped here for +a meal. That's good enough to satisfy him--till you get the drop on him. +But I want to tell yuh, Swan, you can't take Al Woodruff as easy as you +took me. And you couldn't have taken me so easy if I'd been the man you +wanted. Al would kill you as easy as you kill coyotes. Give him a +reason, and you won't need to give him a chance along with it. He'll +find the chance himself." + +Because they thought it likely that Al would soon return, they did not +hurry. They were hungry, and they cooked enough food for four men and +ate it leisurely. Jim was at the ranch, Sorry had undoubtedly returned +before now, and the coroner would probably not arrive before noon, at +the earliest. + +Swan wanted to take Al Woodruff back with him in irons. He wanted to +confront the coroner with the evidence he had found and the testimony +which Lone could give. There had been too many killings already, he +asserted in his naïve way; the sooner Al Woodruff was locked up, the +safer the country would be. + +He discussed with Lone the possibility of making Al talk,--the chance of +his implicating the Sawtooth. Lone did not hope for much and said so. + +"If Al was a talker he wouldn't be holding the job he's got," Lone +argued. "Don't get the wrong idea again, Swan. Yuh may pin this on to +Al, but that won't let the Sawtooth in. The Sawtooth's too slick for +that. They'd be more likely to make up a lynching party right in the +outfit and hang Al as an example than they would try to shield him. He's +played a lone hand, Swan, right from the start, unless I'm badly +mistaken. The Sawtooth's paid him for playing it, that's all." + +"Warfield, he's the man I want," Swan confided. "It's for more than +killing these men. It goes into politics, Loney, and it goes deep. He's +bad for the government. Getting Warfield for having men killed is +getting Warfield without telling secrets of politics. Warfield, he's a +smart man, by golly. He knows some one is after him in politics, but he +don't know some one is after him at home. So the big Swede has got to be +smart enough to get the evidence against him for killing." + +"Well, I wish yuh luck, Swan, but I can't say you're going at it right. +Al won't talk, I tell yuh." + +Swan did not believe that. He waited another hour and made a mental +inventory of everything in camp while he waited. Then, chiefly because +Lone's impatience finally influenced him, he set out to see where Al had +gone. + +According to Jack, Al had gone to the corral. From there they put Jack +on the freshest hoofprints leaving the place, and were led here and +there in an apparently aimless journey to nowhere until, after Jack had +been at fault in another rock patch, the trail took them straight away +to the ridge overlooking the Quirt ranch. The two men looked at one +another. + +"That's like Al," Lone commented drily. "Coyotes are foolish, alongside +him, and you'll find it out. I'll bet he's been watching this place +since daybreak." + +"Where he goes, Yack will follow," Swan grinned cheerfully. "And I +follow Yack. We'll get him, Lone. That dog, he never quits till I say +quit." + +"You better go down and get a horse, then," Lone advised. "They're all +gentle. Al's mounted, remember. He's maybe gone over to the Sawtooth, +and that's farther than you can walk." + +"I can walk all day and all night, when I need to go like that. I can +take short cuts that a horse can't take. I think I shall go on my own +legs." + +"Well, I'm going down to the house first. I know them two men riding +down to the gate. I want to see what the boss and Hawkins have got to +say about this last 'accident.' Better come on down, Swan. You might +pick up something. They're heading for the ranch, all right. Going to +make a play at being neighborly, I reckon." + +"You bet I want to see Warfield," Swan assented rather eagerly and +called Jack, who had nosed around the spot where Al had waited so long +and was now trotting along the ridge on the next lap of Al's journey. + +They reached the gate in time to meet Warfield and Hawkins face to face. +Hawkins gave Lone a quick, questioning look and nodded carelessly to +Swan. Warfield, having a delicate errand to perform and knowing how much +depended upon first impressions, pulled up eagerly when he recognized +Lone. + +"Has the girl arrived safely, Lone?" he asked anxiously. + +"What girl?" Lone looked at him noncommittally. + +"Miss--ah--Hunter. Have you been away all the forenoon? The girl came to +the ranch in such a condition that I was afraid she might do herself or +some one else an injury. Has she been unbalanced for long?" + +"If you mean Lorraine Hunter, she was all right last time I saw her, and +that was last night." Lone's eyes narrowed a little as he watched the +two. "You say she went to the Sawtooth?" + +"She came pelting over there crazier than when you brought her in," +Hawkins broke in gruffly. "She ain't safe going around alone like +that." + +Senator Warfield glanced at him impatiently. "Is there any truth in her +declaring that Frank Johnson is dead? She seemed to have had a shock of +some kind. She was raving crazy, and in her rambling talk she said +something about Frank Johnson having died last night." + +Lone glanced back as he led the way through the gate which Swan was +holding open. "He didn't die--he got killed last night," he corrected. + +"Killed! And how did that happen? It was impossible to get two coherent +sentences out of the girl." Senator Warfield rode through just behind +Lone and reined close, lowering his voice. "No use in letting this get +out," he said confidentially. "It may be that the girl's dementia is +some curable nervous disorder, and you know what an injustice it would +be if it became noised around that the girl is crazy. How much English +does that Swede know?" + +"Not any more than he needs to get along on," Lone answered, +instinctively on guard. "He's all right--just a good-natured kinda cuss +that wouldn't harm anybody." + +He glanced uneasily at the house, hoping that Lorraine was safe inside, +yet fearing that she would not be safe anywhere. Sane or insane, she was +in danger if Senator Warfield considered her of sufficient importance to +bring him out on horseback to the Quirt ranch. Lone knew how seldom the +owner of the Sawtooth rode on horseback since he had high-powered cars +to carry him in soft comfort. + +"I'll go see if she's home," Lone explained, and reined John Doe toward +the house. + +"I'll go with you," Senator Warfield offered suavely and kept alongside. +"Frank Johnson was killed, you say? How did it happen?" + +"Fell off his wagon and broke his neck," Lone told him laconically. +"Brit's pretty sick yet; I don't guess you'd better go inside. There's +been a lot of excitement already for the old man. He only sees folks +he's used to having around." + +With that he dismounted and went into the house, leaving Senator +Warfield without an excuse for following. Swan and Hawkins came up and +waited with him, and Jim opened the door of the bunk-house and looked +out at them without showing enough interest to come forward and speak to +them. + +In a few minutes Lone returned, to find Senator Warfield trying to +glean information from Swan, who seemed willing enough to give it if +only he could find enough English words to form a complete sentence. +Swan, then, had availed himself of Lone's belittlement of him and was +living down to it. But Lone gave him scant attention just then. + +"She hasn't come back. Brit's worked himself up into a fever, and I +didn't dare tell him she wasn't with me. I said she's all tired out and +sick and wanted to stay up by the spring awhile, where it's cool. I said +she was with me, and the sun was too much for her, and she sent him word +that Jim would take care of him awhile longer. So you better move down +this way, or he'll hear us talking and want to know what's up." + +"You're sure she isn't here?" Senator Warfield's voice held suspicion. + +"You can ask Jim, over here. He's been on hand right along. And if you +can't take his word for it, you can go look in the shack--but in that +case Brit's liable to take a shot at yuh, Senator. He's on the warpath +right, and he's got his gun right handy." + +"It is not necessary to search the cabin," Senator Warfield answered +stiffly. "Unless she is in a stupor we'd have heard her yelling long +ago. The girl was a raving maniac when she appeared at the Sawtooth. +It's for her good that I'm thinking." + +Jim stepped out of the doorway and came slowly toward them, eyeing the +two from the Sawtooth curiously while he chewed tobacco. His hands +rested on his hips, his thumbs hooked inside his overalls; a gawky pose +that fitted well his colorless personality,--and left his right hand +close to his six-shooter. + +"Cor'ner comin'?" he asked, nodding at the two who were almost strangers +to him. "Sorry, he got back two hours ago, and he said the cor'ner would +be right out. But he ain't showed up yet." + +Senator Warfield said that he felt sure the coroner would be prompt and +then questioned Jim artfully about "Miss Hunter." + +"Raine? She went fer a ride. I loaned her my horse, and she ain't back +yet. I told her to take a good long ride and settle her nerves. She +acted kinda edgy." + +Senator Warfield and his foreman exchanged glances for which Lone could +have killed them. + +"You noticed, then, that she was not quite--herself?" Senator Warfield +used his friendly, confidential tone on Jim. + +"We-ell--yes, I did. I thought a ride would do her good, mebby. She's +been sticking here on the job purty close. And Frank getting killed +kinda--upset her, I guess." + +"That's it--that's what I was saying. Disordered nerves, which rest and +proper medical care will soon remedy." He looked at Lone. "Her horse was +worn out when she reached the ranch. Does she know this country well? +She started this way, and she should have been here some time ago. We +thought it best to ride after her, but there was some delay in getting +started. Hawkins' horse broke away and gave us some trouble catching +him, so the girl had quite a start. But with her horse fagged as it was, +we had no idea that we would fail to get even a sight of her. She may +have wandered off on some other trail, in which case her life as well as +her reason is in danger." + +Lone did not answer at once. It had occurred to him that Senator +Warfield knew where Lorraine was at that minute, and that he might be +showing this concern for the effect it would have on his hearers. He +looked at him speculatively. + +"Do you think we ought to get out and hunt for her?" he asked. + +"I certainly think some one ought to. We can't let her wander around the +country in that condition. If she is not here, she is somewhere in the +hills, and she should be found." + +"She sure ain't here," Jim asserted convincingly. "I been watching for +the last two hours, expecting every minute she'd show up. I'd a been +kinda oneasy, myself, but Snake's dead gentle, and she's a purty fair +rider fer a girl." + +"Then we'll have to find her. Lone, can you come and help?" + +"The Swede and me'll both help," Lone volunteered. "Jim and Sorry can +wait here for the coroner. We ought to find her without any trouble, +much. Swan, I'll get you that tobacco first and see if Brit needs +anything." + +He started to the house, and Swan followed him aimlessly, his long +strides bringing him close to Lone before they reached the door. + +"What do you make of this new play?" Lone muttered cautiously when he +saw Swan's shadow move close to his own. + +"By golly, it's something funny about it. You stick with them, Loney, +and find out. I'm taking Al's trail with Yack. You fix it." And he +added whimsically, "Not so much tobacco, Lone. I don't eat it or smoke +it ever in my life." + +His voice was very Swedish, which was fortunate, because Senator +Warfield appeared softly behind him and went into the house. Swan was +startled, but he hadn't much time to worry over the possibility of +having been overheard. Brit's voice rose in a furious denunciation of +Bill Warfield, punctuated by two shots and followed almost immediately +by the senator. + +"My God, the whole family's crazy!" Warfield exclaimed, when he had +reached the safety of the open air. "You're right, Lone. I thought I'd +be neighborly enough to ask what I could do for him, and he tried to +kill me!" + +Lone merely grunted and gave Swan the tobacco. + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHTEEN + +"I THINK AL WOODRUFF'S GOT HER" + + +There was no opportunity for further conference. Senator Warfield showed +no especial interest in Swan, and the Swede was permitted without +comment to take his dog and strike off up the ridge. Jim and Sorry were +sent to look after Brit, who was still shouting vain threats against the +Sawtooth, and the three men rode away together. Warfield did not suggest +separating, though Lone expected him to do so, since one man on a trail +was as good as three in a search of this kind. + +He was still inclined to doubt the whole story. He did not believe that +Lorraine had been to the Sawtooth, or that she had raved about anything. +She had probably gone off by herself to cry and to worry over her +troubles,--hurt, too, perhaps, because Lone had left the ranch that +morning without a word with her first. He believed the story of her +being insane had been carefully planned, and that Warfield had perhaps +ridden over in the hope that they would find her alone; though with +Frank dead on the ranch that would be unlikely. But to offset that, +Lone's reason told him that Warfield had probably not known that Frank +was dead. That had been news to him--or had it? He tried to remember +whether Warfield had mentioned it first and could not. Too many +disturbing emotions had held him lately; Lone was beginning to feel the +need of a long, quiet pondering over his problems. He did not feel sure +of anything except the fact that the Quirt was like a drowning man +struggling vainly against the whirlpool that is sucking him slowly +under. + +One thing he knew, and that was his determination to stay with these two +of the Sawtooth until he had some definite information; until he saw +Lorraine or knew that she was safe from them. Like a weight pressing +harder and harder until one is crushed beneath it, their talk of +Lorraine's insanity forced fear into his soul. They could do just what +they had talked of doing. He himself had placed that weapon in their +hands when he took her to the Sawtooth delirious and told of wilder +words and actions. Hawkins and his wife would swear away her sanity if +they were told to do it, and there were witnesses in plenty who had +heard him call her crazy that first morning. + +They could do it; they could have her committed to an asylum, or at +least to a sanitarium. He did not underestimate the influence of Senator +Warfield. And what could the Quirt do to prevent the outrage? Frank +Johnson was dead; Brit was out of the fight for the time being; Jim and +Sorry were the doggedly faithful sort who must have a leader before they +can be counted upon to do much. + +Swan,--Lone lifted his head and glanced toward the ridge when he thought +of Swan. There, indeed, he might hope for help. But Swan was out here, +away from reinforcements. He was trailing Al Woodruff, and when he found +him,--that might be the end of Swan. If not, Warfield could hurry +Lorraine away before Swan could act in the matter. A whimsical thought +of Swan's telepathic miracle crossed his mind and was dismissed as an +unseemly bit of foolery in a matter so grave as Lorraine's safety. And +yet--the doctor _had_ received a message that he was wanted at the +Quirt, and he had arrived before his patient. There was no getting +around that, however impossible it might be. No one could have foreseen +Brit's accident; no one save the man who had prepared it for him, and he +would be the last person to call for help. + +"We followed the girl's horse-tracks almost to Thurman's place and lost +the trail there." Warfield turned in the saddle to look at Lone riding +behind him. "We made no particular effort to trace her from there, +because we were sure she would come on home. I'm going back that far, +and we'll pick up the trail, unless we find her at the ranch. She may +have hidden herself away. You can't," he added, "be sure of anything +where a demented person is concerned. They never act according to logic +or reason, and it is impossible to make any deductions as to their +probable movements." + +Lone nodded, not daring to trust his tongue with speech just then. If he +were to protect Lorraine later on, he knew that he must not defend her +now. + +"Hawkins told me she had some sort of hallucination that she had seen a +man killed at Rock City, when she was wandering around in that storm," +Warfield went on in a careless, gossipy tone. "Just what was that +about, Lone? You're the one who found her and took her in to the ranch, +I believe. She somehow mixed her delusion up with Fred Thurman, didn't +she?" + +Lone made a swift decision. He was afraid to appear to hesitate, so he +laughed his quiet little chuckle while he scrambled mentally for a +plausible lie. + +"I don't know as she done that, quite," he drawled humorously. "She was +out of her head, all right, and talking wild, but I laid it to her being +sick and scared. She said a man was shot, and that she saw it happen. +And right on top of that she said she didn't think they ought to stage a +murder and a thunderstorm in the same scene, and thought they ought to +save the thunder and lightning for the murderer to make his getaway by. +She used to work for the moving pictures, and she was going on about +some wild-west picture she thought she was acting a part in. + +"Afterwards I told her what she'd been saying, and she seemed to kinda +remember it, like a bad dream she'd had. She told me she thought the +villain in one of the plays she acted in had pulled off a stage murder +in them rocks. We figured it out together that the first crack of +thunder had sounded like shooting, and that's what started her off. She +hadn't ever been in a real thunderstorm before, and she's scared of +them. I know that one we had the other day like to of scared her into +hysterics. I laughed at her and joshed her out of it." + +"Didn't she ever say anything about Fred Thurman, then?" Warfield +persisted. + +"Not to me, she didn't. Fred was dragged that night, and if she heard +about a man being killed during that same storm, she might have said +something about it. She might have wondered if that was what she saw. I +don't know. She's pretty sensible--when she ain't crazy." + +Warfield turned his horse, as if by accident, so that he was brought +face to face with Lone. His eyes searched Lone's face pitilessly. + +"Lone, you know how ugly a story can grow if it's left alone. Do _you_ +believe that girl actually saw a man shot? Or do you think she was +crazy?" + +Lone met Warfield's eyes fairly. "I think she was plumb out of her +head," he answered. And he added with just the right degree of +hesitation: "I don't think she's what you'd call right crazy, Mr. +Warfield. Lots of folks go outa their heads and talk crazy when they +get a touch of fever, and they get over it again." + +"Let's have a fair understanding," Warfield insisted. "Do you think I am +justified in the course I am taking, or don't you?" + +"Hunting her up? Sure, I do! If you and Hawkins rode on home, I'd keep +on hunting till I located her. If she's been raving around like you say, +she's in no shape to be riding these hills alone. She's got to be taken +care of." + +Warfield gave him another sharp scrutiny and rode on. "I always prefer +to deal in the open with every one," he averred. "It may not be my +affair, strictly speaking. The Quirt and the Sawtooth aren't very +intimate. But the Quirt's having trouble enough to warrant any one in +lending a hand; and common humanity demands that I take charge of the +girl until she is herself again." + +"I don't know as any one would question that," Lone assented and ground +his teeth afterwards because he must yield even the appearance of +approval. He knew that Warfield must feel himself in rather a desperate +position, else he would never trouble to make his motives so clear to +one of his men. Indeed, Warfield had protested his unselfishness in the +matter too much and too often to have deceived the dullest man who owned +the slightest suspicion of him. Lone could have smiled at the sight of +Senator Warfield betraying himself so, had smiling been possible to him +then. + +He dropped behind the two at the first rough bit of trail and felt +stealthily to test the hanging of his six-shooter, which he might need +in a hurry. Those two men would never lay their hands on Lorraine Hunter +while he lived to prevent it. He did not swear it to himself; he had no +need. + +They rode on to Fred Thurman's ranch, dismounted at Warfield's +suggestion--which amounted to a command--and began a careful search of +the premises. If Warfield had felt any doubt of Lone's loyalty he +appeared to have dismissed it from his mind, for he sent Lone to the +stable to search there, while he and Hawkins went into the house. Lone +guessed that the two felt the need of a private conference after their +visit to the Quirt, but he could see no way to slip unobserved to the +house and eavesdrop, so he looked perfunctorily through all the sheds +and around the depleted haystacks,--wherever a person could find a +hiding place. He was letting himself down through the manhole in the +stable loft when Swan's voice, lowered almost to a whisper, startled +him. + +"What the hell!" Lone ejaculated under his breath. "I thought you were +on another trail!" + +"That trail leads here, Lone. Did you find Raine yet?" + +"Not a sign of her. Swan, I don't know what to make of it. I did think +them two were stalling. I thought they either hadn't seen her at all, or +had got hold of her and were trying to square themselves on the insanity +dodge. But if they know where she is, they're acting damn queer, Swan. +They _want_ her. They haven't got her yet." + +"They're in the house," Swan reassured Lone. "I heard them walking. You +don't think they've got her there, Lone?" + +"If they have," gritted Lone, "they made the biggest blunder of their +lives bringing me over here. No, I could see they wanted to get off +alone and hold a powwow. They expected she'd be at the Quirt." + +"I think Al Woodruff, he's maybe got her, then," Swan declared, after +studying the matter briefly. "All the way he follows the trail over +here, Lone. I could see you sometimes in the trail. He was keeping hid +from the trail--I think because Raine was riding along, this morning, +and he's following. The tracks are that old." + +"They said they had trailed Raine this far, coming from the Sawtooth," +Lone told him worriedly. "What do you think Al would want----" + +"Don't she see him shoot Fred Thurman? By golly, I'm scared for that +girl, Loney!" + +Lone stared at him. "He wouldn't dare!" + +"A coward is a brave man when you scare him bad enough," Swan stated +flatly. "I'm careful always when I corner a coward." + +"Al ain't a coward. You've got him wrong." + +"Maybe, but he kills like a coward would kill, and he's scared he will +be caught. Warfield, he's scared, too. You watch him, Lone. + +"Now I tell you what I do. Yack, he picks up the trail from here to +where you can follow easy. We know two places where he didn't go with +her, and from here is two more trails he could take. But one goes to the +main road, and he don't take that one, I bet you. I think he takes that +girl up Spirit Canyon, maybe. It's woods and wild country in a few +miles, and plenty of places to hide, and good chances for getting out +over the top of the divide. + +"I'm going to my cabin, and you don't say anything when I leave. +Warfield, he don't want the damn Swede hanging around. So you go with +them, Loney. This is to what you call a show-down." + +"We'll want the dog," Lone told him, but Swan shook his head. Hawkins +and Warfield had come from the house and were approaching the stable. +Swan looked at Lone, and Lone went forward to meet them. + +"The Swede followed along on the ridge, and he didn't see anything," he +volunteered, before Warfield could question him. "We might put his dog +on the trail and see which way she went from here." + +Warfield thought that a good idea. He was so sure that Lorraine must be +somewhere within a mile or two of the place that he seemed to think the +search was practically over when Jack, nosing out the trail of Al +Woodruff, went trotting toward Spirit Canyon. + +"Took the wrong turn after she left the corrals here," Warfield +commented relievedly. "She wouldn't get far, up this way." + +"There's the track of two horses," Hawkins said abruptly. "That there is +the girl's horse, all right--there's a hind shoe missing. We saw where +her horse had cast a shoe, coming over Juniper Ridge. But there's +another horse track." + +Lone bit his lip. It was the other horse that Jack had been trailing so +long. "There was a loose horse hanging around Thurman's place," he said +casually. "It's him, tagging along, I reckon." + +"Oh," said Hawkins. "That accounts for it." + + + + +CHAPTER NINETEEN + +SWAN CALLS FOR HELP + + +Past the field where the horses were grazing and up the canyon on the +side toward Skyline Meadow, that lay on a shoulder of Bear Top, the dog +nosed unfalteringly along the trail. Now and then he was balked when the +hoofprints led him to the bank of Granite Creek, but not for long. Jack +appeared to understand why his trailing was interrupted and sniffed the +bank until he picked up the scent again. + +"Wonder if she changed off and rode that loose horse," Hawkins said +once, when the tracks were plain in the soft soil of the creek bank. +"She might, and lead that horse she was on." + +"She wouldn't know enough. She's a city girl," Lone replied, his heart +heavy with fear for Lorraine. + +"Well, she ain't far off then," Hawkins comforted himself. "Her horse +acted about played out when she hit the ranch. She had him wet from his +ears to his tail, and he was breathin' like that Ford at the ranch. If +that's a sample of her riding, she ain't far off." + +"Crazy--to ride up here. Keep your eyes open, boys. We must find her, +whatever we do." Warfield gazed apprehensively at the rugged steeps on +either hand and at the timber line above them. "From here on she +couldn't turn back without meeting us--if I remember this country +correctly. Could she, Hawkins?" + +"Not unless she turned off, up here a mile or two, into that gulch that +heads into Skyline," said Hawkins. "There's a stock trail part way down +from the top where it swings off from the divide to Wilder Creek." + +Swan, walking just behind Hawkins, moved up a pace. + +"I could go on Skyline with Yack, and I could come down by those trail," +he suggested diffidently, Swedishly, yet with a certain compelling +confidence. "What you think?" + +"I think that's a damned good idea for a square head," Hawkins told him, +and repeated it to Warfield, who was riding ahead. + +"Why, yes. We don't need the dog, or the man either. Go up to the head +of the gulch and keep your eyes open, Swan. We'll meet you up here. You +know the girl, don't you?" + +"Yas, Ay know her pretty good," grinned Swan. + +"Well, don't frighten her. Don't let her see that you think anything is +wrong--and don't say anything about us. We made the mistake of +discussing her condition within her hearing, and it is possible that she +understood enough of what we were saying to take alarm. You understand? +Don't tell girl she's crazy." He tapped his head to make his meaning +plainer. "Don't tell girl we're looking for her. You understand?" + +"Yas, Ay know English pretty good. Ay don't tell too moch." His cheerful +smile brought a faint response from Senator Warfield. At Lone he did not +look at all. "I go quick. I'm good climber like a sheep," he boasted, +and whistling to Jack, he began working his way up a rough, +brush-scattered ledge to the slope above. + +Lone watched him miserably, wishing that Swan was not quite so matter of +fact in his man-chasing. If Al Woodruff, for some reason which Lone +could not fathom, had taken Lorraine and forced her to go with him into +the wilderness, Warfield and Hawkins would be his allies the moment +they came up with him. Lone was no coward, but neither was he a fool. +Hawkins had never distinguished himself as a fighter, but Lone had +gleaned here and there a great deal of information about Senator +Warfield in the old days when he had been plain Bill. When Lorraine and +Al were overtaken, then Lone would need to show the stuff that was in +him. He only hoped he would have time, and that luck would be with him. + +"If they get me, it'll be all off with her," he worried, as he followed +the two up the canyon. "Swan would have been a help. But he thinks more +of catching Al than he does of helping Raine." + +He looked up and saw that already Swan was halfway up the canyon's steep +side, making his way through the brush with more speed than Lone could +have shown on foot in the open, unless he ran. The sight heartened Lone +a little. Swan might have some plan of his own,--an ambush, possibly. If +he would only keep along within rifle shot and remain hidden, he would +show real brains, Lone thought. But Swan, when Lone looked up again, was +climbing straight away from the little searching party; and even though +he seemed tireless on foot, he could not perform miracles. + +Swan, however, was not troubling himself over what Lone would think, or +even what Warfield was thinking. Contrary to Lone's idea of him, Swan +was tired, and he was thinking a great deal about Lorraine, and very +little about Al Woodruff, except as Al was concerned with Lorraine's +welfare. Swan had made a mistake, and he was humiliated over his +blunder. Al had kept himself so successfully in the background while +Lone's peculiar actions had held his attention, that Swan had never +considered Al Woodruff as the killer. Now he blamed himself for Frank's +death. He had been watching Lone, had been baffled by Lone's consistent +kindness toward the Quirt, by the force of his personality which held +none of the elements of cold-blooded murder. He had believed that he had +the Sawtooth killer under observation, and he had been watching and +waiting for evidence that would impress a grand jury. And all the while +he had let Al Woodruff ride free and unsuspected. + +The one stupid thing, in Swan's opinion, which he had not done was to +let Lone go on holding his tongue. He had forced the issue that +morning. He had wanted to make Lone talk, had hoped for a weakening +and a confession. Instead he had learned a good deal which he should +have known before. + +As he forged up the slope across the ridged lip of the canyon, his one +immediate object was speed. Up the canyon and over the divide on the +west shoulder of Bear Top was a trail to the open country beyond. It was +perfectly passable, as Swan knew; he had packed in by that trail when he +located his homestead on Bear Top. That is why he had his cabin up and +was living in it before the Sawtooth discovered his presence. + +Al, he believed, was making for Bear Top Pass. Once down the other side +he would find friends to lend him fresh horses. Swan had learned +something of these friends of the Sawtooth, and he could guess pretty +accurately how far some of them would go in their service. Fresh horses +for Al, food--perhaps even a cabin where he could hide Lorraine +away--were to be expected from any one of them, once Al was over the +divide. + +Swan glanced up at the sun, saw that it was dropping to late afternoon +and started in at a long, loose-jointed trot across the mountain meadow +called Skyline. A few pines, with scattered clumps of juniper and fir, +dotted the long, irregular stretch of grassland which formed the meadow. +Range cattle were feeding here and there, so wild they lifted heads to +stare at the man and dog, then came trotting forward, their curiosity +unabated by the fact that they had seen these two before. + +Jack looked up at his master, looked at the cattle and took his place at +Swan's heels. Swan shouted and flung his arms, and the cattle ducked, +turned and galloped awkwardly away. Swan's trot did not slacken. His +rifle swung rhythmically in his right hand, the muzzle tilted downward. +Beads of perspiration on his forehead had merged into tiny rivulets on +his cheeks and dripped off his clean-lined, square jaw. Still he ran, +his breath unlabored yet coming in whispery aspirations from his great +lungs. + +The full length of Skyline Meadow he ran, jumping the small beginning of +Wilder Creek with one great leap that scarcely interrupted the beautiful +rhythm of his stride. At the far end of the clearing, snuggled between +two great pines that reached high into the blue, his squatty cabin +showed red-brown against the precipitous shoulder of Bear Top peak, +covered thick with brush and scraggy timber whipped incessantly by the +wind that blew over the mountain's crest. + +At the door Swan stopped and examined the crude fastening of the door; +made himself certain, by private marks of his own, that none had entered +in his absence, and went in with a great sigh of satisfaction. It was +still broad daylight, though the sun's rays slanted in through the +window; but Swan lighted a lantern that hung on a nail behind the door, +carried it across the neat little room, and set it down on the floor +beside the usual pioneer cupboard made simply of clean boxes nailed +bottom against the wall. Swan had furnished a few extra frills to his +cupboard, for the ends of the boxes were fastened to hewn slabs standing +upright and just clearing the floor. Near the upper shelf a row of nails +held Swan's coffee cups,--four of them, thick and white, such as cheap +restaurants use. + +Swan hooked a finger over the nail that held a cracked cup and glanced +over his shoulder at Jack, sitting in the doorway with his keen nose to +the world. + +"You watch out now, Yack. I shall talk to my mother with my thoughts," +he said, drawing a hand across his forehead and speaking in breathless +gasps. "You watch." + +For answer Jack thumped his tail on the dirt floor and sniffed the +breeze, taking in his overlapping tongue while he did so. He licked his +lips, looked over his shoulder at Swan, and draped his pink tongue down +over his lower jaw again. + +"All right, now I talk," said Swan and pulled upon the nail in his +fingers. + +The cupboard swung toward him bodily, end slabs and all. He picked up +the lantern, stepped over the log sill and pulled the cupboard door into +place again. + +Inside the dugout Swan set the lantern on a table, dropped wearily upon +a rough bench before it and looked at the jars beside him, lifted his +hand and opened a compact, but thoroughly efficient field wireless +"set." His right fingers dropped to the key, and the whining drone of +the wireless rose higher and higher as he tuned up. He reached for his +receivers, ducked his head and adjusted them with one hand, and sent a +call spitting tiny blue sparks from the key under his fingers. + +He waited, repeating the call. His blue eyes clouded with anxiety and +he fumbled the adjustments, coaxing the current into perfect action +before he called again. Answer came, and Swan bent over the table, +listening, his eyes fixed vacantly upon the opposite wall of the dugout. +Then, his fingers flexing delicately, swiftly, he sent the message that +told how completely his big heart matched the big body: + + "Send doctor and trained nurse to Quirt ranch at once. Send men to + Bear Top Pass, intercept man with young woman, or come to rescue if + he don't cross. Have three men here with evidence to convict if we + can save the girl who is valuable witness. Girl being abducted in + fear of what she can tell. They plan to charge her with insanity. + Urgent. Hurry. Come ready to fight. + + "S.V." + +Swan had a code, but codes require a little time in the composition of a +message, and time was the one thing he could not waste. He heard the +gist of the message repeated to him, told the man at the other station +that lives were at stake, and threw off the current. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY + +KIDNAPPED + + +Lorraine had once had a nasty fall from riding down hill at a gallop. +She remembered that accident and permitted Snake to descend Granite +Ridge at a walk, which was fortunate, since it gave the horse a chance +to recover a little from the strain of the terrific pace at which she +had ridden him that morning. At first it had been fighting fury that had +impelled her to hurry; now it was fear that drove her homeward where +Lone was, and Swan, and that stolid, faithful Jim. She felt that Senator +Warfield would never dare to carry out his covert threat, once she +reached home. Nevertheless, the threat haunted her, made her glance +often over her shoulder. + +At the Thurman ranch, which she was passing with a sickening memory of +the night when she and Swan had carried her father there, Al Woodruff +rode out suddenly from behind the stable and blocked the trail, his +six-shooter in his hand, his face stony with determination. Lorraine +afterwards decided that he must have seen or heard her coming down the +ridge and had waited for her there. He smiled with his lips when she +pulled up Snake with a startled look. + +"You're in such a hurry this morning that I thought the only way to get +a chance to talk to you was to hold you up," he said, in much the same +tone he had used that day at the ranch. + +"I don't see why you want to talk to me," Lorraine retorted, not in the +least frightened at the gun, which was too much like her movie West to +impress her much. But her eyes widened at the look in his face, and she +tried to edge away from him without seeming to do so. + +Al stopped her by the simple method of reaching out his left hand and +catching Snake by the cheek-piece of the bridle. "You don't have to see +why," he said. "I've been thinking a lot about you lately. I've made up +my mind that I've got to have you with me--always. This is kinda sudden, +maybe, but that's the way the game runs, sometimes. Now, I want to tell +yuh one or two things that's for your own good. One is that I'll have my +way, or die getting it. Don't be scared; I won't hurt you. But if you +try to break away, I'll shoot you, that's all. I'm going to marry you, +see, first. Then I'll make love to you afterwards. I ain't asking you if +you'll marry me. You're going to do it, or I'll kill you." + +Lorraine gazed at him fascinated, too astonished to attempt any move +toward escape. Al's hand slipped from the bridle down to the reins, and +still holding Snake, still holding the gun muzzle toward her, still +looking her straight in the eyes, he threw his right leg over the cantle +of his saddle and stepped off his horse. + +"Put your other hand on the saddle horn," he directed. "I ain't going to +hurt you if you're good." + +He twitched his neckerchief off--Lorraine saw that it was untied, and +that he must have planned all this--and with it he tied her wrists to +the saddle horn. She gave Snake a kick in the ribs, but Al checked the +horse's first start and Snake was too tired to dispute a command to +stand still. Al put up his gun, pulled a hunting knife from a little +scabbard in his boot, sliced two pairs of saddle strings from Lorraine's +saddle, calmly caught and held her foot when she tried to kick him, +pushed the foot back into the stirrup and tied it there with one of the +leather strings. Just as if he were engaged in an everyday proceeding, +he walked around Snake and tied Lorraine's right foot; then, to prevent +her from foolishly throwing herself from the horse and getting hurt, he +tied the stirrups together under the horse's belly. + +"Now, if you'll be a good girl, I'll untie your hands," he said, +glancing up into her face. He freed her hands, and Lorraine immediately +slapped him in the face and reached for his gun. But Al was too quick +for her. He stepped back, picked up Snake's reins and mounted his own +horse. He looked back at her appraisingly, saw her glare of hatred and +grinned at it, while he touched his horse with the spurs and rode away, +leading Snake behind him. + +Lorraine said nothing until Al, riding at a lope, passed the field at +the mouth of Spirit Canyon where the blaze-faced roan still fed with the +others. They were feeding along the creek quite close to the fence, and +the roan walked toward them. The sight of it stirred Lorraine out of her +dumb horror. + +"You killed Fred Thurman! I saw you," she cried suddenly. + +"Well, you ain't going to holler it all over the country," Al flung +back at her over his shoulder. "When you're married to me, you'll come +mighty close to keeping your mouth shut about it." + +"I'll never marry you! You--you fiend! Do you think I'd marry a +cold-blooded murderer like you?" + +Al turned in the saddle and looked at her intently. "If I'm all that," +he told her coolly, "you can figure out about what'll happen to you if +you _don't_ marry me. If you saw what I done to Fred Thurman, what do +you reckon I'd do to _you_?" He looked at her for a minute, shrugged his +shoulders and rode on, crossing the creek and taking a trail which +Lorraine did not know. Much of the time they traveled in the water, +though it slowed their pace. Where the trail was rocky, they took it and +made better time. + +Snake lagged a little on the upgrades, but he was well trained to lead +and gave little trouble. Lorraine thought longingly of Yellowjacket and +his stubbornness and tried to devise some way of escape. She could not +believe that fate would permit Al Woodruff to carry out such a plan. +Lone would overtake them, perhaps,--and then she remembered that Lone +would have no means of knowing which way she had gone. If Hawkins and +Senator Warfield came after them, her plight would be worse than ever. +Still, she decided that she must risk that danger and give Lone a clue. + +She dropped a glove beside the trail, where it lay in plain sight of any +one following them. But presently Al looked over his shoulder, saw that +one of her hands was bare, and tied Snake's reins to his saddle and his +own horse to a bush. Then he went back down the trail until he found the +glove. He put it into his pocket, came silently up to Lorraine and +pulled off her other glove. Without a word he took her wrists in a firm +clasp, tied them together again to the saddle horn, pulled off her tie, +her hat, and the pins from her hair. + +"I guess you don't know me yet," he remarked dryly, when he had +confiscated every small article which she could let fall as she rode. "I +was trying to treat yuh white, but you don't seem to appreciate it. Now +you can ride hobbled, young lady." + +"Oh, I could _kill_ you!" Lorraine whispered between set teeth. + +"You mean you'd like to. Well, I ain't going to give you a chance." His +eyes rested on her face with a new expression; an awakening desire for +her, an admiration for the spirit that would not let her weep and plead +with him. + +"Say! you ain't going to be a bit hard to marry," he observed, his eyes +lighting with what was probably his nearest approach to tenderness. "I +kinda wish you liked me, now I've got you." + +He shook her arm and laughed when she turned her face away from him, +then remounted his horse. Snake moved reluctantly when Al started on. +Lorraine felt hope slipping from her. With her hands tied, she could do +nothing at all save sit there and ride wherever Al Woodruff chose to +lead her horse. He seemed to be making for the head of Spirit Canyon, on +the side toward Bear Top. + +As they climbed higher, she could catch glimpses of the road down which +her father had driven almost to his death. She studied Al's back as he +rode before her and wondered if he could really be cold-blooded enough +to kill without compunction whoever he was told to kill, whether he had +any personal quarrel with his victim or not. Certainly he had had no +quarrel with her father, or with Frank. + +It was long past noon, and she was terribly hungry and very thirsty, but +she would not tell Al her wants if she starved. She tried to guess at +his plans and at his motive for taking her away like this. He had no +camping outfit, a bulkily rolled slicker forming his only burden. He +could not, then, be planning to take her much farther into the +wilderness; yet if he did not hide her away, how could he expect to keep +her? His motive for marrying her was rather mystifying. He did not seem +sufficiently in love with her to warrant an abduction, and he was too +cool for such a headlong action, unless driven by necessity. She +wondered what he was thinking about as he rode. Not about her, she +guessed, except when some bad place in the trail made it necessary for +him to stop, tie Snake to the nearest bush, lead his own horse past the +obstruction and come back after her. Several times this was necessary. +Once he took the time to examine the thongs on her ankles, apparently +wishing to make sure that she was not uncomfortable. Once he looked up +into her sullenly distressed face and said, "Tired?" in a humanly +sympathetic tone that made her blink back the tears. She shook her head +and would not look at him. Al regarded her in silence for a minute, led +Snake to his own horse, mounted and rode on. + +He was a murderer; he had undoubtedly killed many men. He would kill her +if she attempted to escape--"and he could not catch me," Lorraine was +just enough to add. Yet she felt baffled; cheated of the full horror of +being kidnapped. + +She had no knowledge of a bad man who was human in spots without being +repentant. For love of a girl, she had been taught to believe, the worst +outlaw would weep over his past misdeeds, straighten his shoulders, look +to heaven for help and become a self-sacrificing hero for whom audiences +might be counted upon to shed furtive tears. + +Al Woodruff, however, did not love her. His eyes had once or twice +softened to friendliness, but love was not there. Neither was repentance +there. He seemed quite satisfied with himself, quite ready to commit +further crimes for sake of his own safety or desire. He was hard, she +decided, but he was not unnecessarily harsh; cruel, without being +wantonly brutal. He was, in short, the strangest man she had ever seen. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE + +"OH, I COULD KILL YOU!" + + +Before sundown they reached the timberland on Bear Top. The horses +slipped on the pine needles when Al left the trail and rode up a gentle +incline where the trees grew large and there was little underbrush. It +was very beautiful, with the slanting sun-rays painting broad yellow +bars across the gloom of the forest. In a little while they reached the +crest of that slope, and Lorraine, looking back, could only guess at +where the trail wound on among the trees lower down. + +Birds called companionably from the high branches above them. A nesting +grouse flew chuttering out from under a juniper bush, alighted a short +distance away and went limping and dragging one wing before them, +cheeping piteously. + +While Lorraine was wondering if the poor thing had hurt a leg in +lighting, Al clipped its head off neatly with a bullet from his +six-shooter, though Lorraine had not seen him pull the gun and did not +know he meant to shoot. The bird's mate whirred up and away through the +trees, and Lorraine was glad that it had escaped. + +Al slid the gun back into his holster, leaned from his saddle and picked +up the dead grouse as unconcernedly as he would have dismounted, pulled +his knife from his boot and drew the bird neatly, flinging the crop and +entrails from him. + +"Them juniper berries tastes the meat if you don't clean 'em out right +away," he remarked casually to Lorraine, as he wiped the knife on his +trousers and thrust it back into the boot-scabbard before he tied the +grouse to the saddle by its blue, scaley little feet. + +When he was ready to go on, Snake refused to budge. Tough as he was, he +had at last reached the limit of his energy and ambition. Al yanked hard +on the bridle reins, then rode back and struck him sharply with his +quirt before Snake would rouse himself enough to move forward. He went +stiffly, reluctantly, pulling back until his head was held straight out +before him. Al dragged him so for a rod or two, lost patience and +returned to whip him forward again. + +"What a brute you are!" Lorraine exclaimed indignantly. "Can't you see +now tired he is?" + +Al glanced at her from under his eyebrows. "He's all in, but he's got to +make it," he said. "I've been that way myself--and made it. What I can +do, a horse can do. Come on, you yella-livered bonehead!" + +Snake went on, urged now and then by Al's quirt. Every blow made +Lorraine wince, and she made the wincing perfectly apparent to Al, in +the hope that he would take some notice of it and give her a chance to +tell him what she thought of him without opening the conversation +herself. + +But Al did not say anything. When the time came--as even Lorraine saw +that it must--when Snake refused to attempt a steep slope, Al still said +nothing. He untied her ankles from the stirrups and her hands from the +saddle horn, carried her in his arms to his own horse and compelled her +to mount. Then he retied her exactly as she had been tied on Snake. + +"Skinner knows this trail," he told Lorraine. "And I'm behind yuh with a +gun. Don't forget that, Miss Spitfire. You let Skinner go to suit +himself--and if he goes wrong, you pay, because it'll be you reining +him wrong. Get along there, Skinner!" + +Skinner got along in a businesslike way that told why Al Woodruff had +chosen to ride him on this trip. He seemed to be a perfectly dependable +saddle horse for a bandit to own. He wound in and out among the trees +and boulders, stepping carefully over fallen logs; he thrust his nose +out straight and laid back his ears and pushed his way through thickets +of young pines; he went circumspectly along the edge of a deep gulch, +climbed over a ridge and worked his way down the precipitous slope on +the farther side, made his way around a thick clump of spruces and +stopped in a little, grassy glade no bigger than a city lot, but with a +spring gurgling somewhere near. Then he swung his head around and looked +over his shoulder inquiringly at Al, who was coming behind, leading +Snake. + +Lorraine looked at him also, but Al did not say anything to her or to +the horse. He let them stand there and wait while he unsaddled Snake, +put a drag rope on him and led him to the best grazing. Then, coming +back, he very matter-of-factly untied Lorraine and helped her off the +horse. Lorraine was all prepared to fight, but she did not quite know +how to struggle with a man who did not take hold of her or touch her, +except to steady her in dismounting. Unconsciously she waited for a cue, +and the cue was not given. + +Al's mind seemed intent upon making Skinner comfortable. Still, he kept +an eye on Lorraine, and he did not turn his back to her. Lorraine looked +over to where Snake, too exhausted to eat, stood with drooping head and +all four legs braced like sticks under him. It flashed across her mind +that not even her old director would order her to make a run for that +horse and try to get away on him. Snake looked as if he would never move +from that position until he toppled over. + +Al pulled the bridle off Skinner, gave him a half-affectionate slap on +the rump, and watched him go off, switching his tail and nosing the +ground for a likable place to roll. Al's glance went on to Snake, and +from him to Lorraine. + +"You sure do know how to ride hell out of a horse," he remarked. "Now +he'll be stiff and sore to-morrow--and we've got quite a ride to make." + +His tone of disapproval sent a guilty feeling through Lorraine, until +she remembered that a slow horse might save her from this man who was +all bad,--except, perhaps, just on the surface which was not altogether +repellent. She looked around at the tiny basin set like a saucer among +the pines. Already the dusk was painting deep shadows in the woods +across the opening, and turning the sky a darker blue. Skinner rolled +over twice, got up and shook himself with a satisfied snort and went +away to feed. She might, if she were patient, run to the horse when Al's +back was turned, she thought. Once in the woods she might have some +chance of eluding him, and perhaps Skinner would show as much wisdom +going as he had in coming, and take her down to the sageland. + +But Skinner walked to the farther edge of the meadow before he stopped, +and Al Woodruff never turned his back to a foe. An owl hooted +unexpectedly, and Lorraine edged closer to her captor, who was gathering +dead branches one by one and throwing them toward a certain spot which +he had evidently selected for a campfire. He looked at her keenly, even +suspiciously, and pointed with the stick in his left hand. + +"You might go over there by the saddle and set down till I get a fire +going," he said. "Don't go wandering around aimless, like a hen turkey, +watching a chance to duck into the brush. There's bear in there and lion +and lynx, and I'd hate to see you chawed. They never clean their +toe-nails, and blood poison generally sets in where they leave a +scratch. Go and set down." + +Lorraine did not know how much of his talk was truth, but she went and +sat down by his saddle and began braiding her hair in two tight braids +like a squaw. If she did get a chance to run, she thought, she did not +want her hair flying loose to catch on bushes and briars. She had once +fled through a brush patch in Griffith Park with her hair flowing loose, +and she had not liked the experience, though it had looked very nice on +the screen. + +Before she had finished the braiding, Al came over to the saddle and +untied his slicker roll and the grouse. + +"Come on over to the fire," he said. "I'll learn yuh a trick or two +about camp cooking. If I'm goin' to keep yuh with me, you might just as +well learn how to cook. We'll be on the trail the biggest part of our +time, I expect." + +He took her by the arm, just as any man might have done, and led her to +the fire that was beginning to crackle cheerfully. He set her down on +the side where the smoke would be least likely to blow her way and +proceeded to dress the grouse, stripping off skin and feathers together. +He unrolled the slicker and laid out a piece of bacon, a package of +coffee, a small coffeepot, bannock and salt. The coffeepot and the +grouse he took in one hand--his left, Lorraine observed--and started +toward the spring which she could hear gurgling in the shadows amongst +the trees. + +Lorraine watched him sidelong. He seemed to take it for granted now that +she would stay where she was. The woods were dark, the firelight and the +warmth enticed her. The sight of the supper preparations made her +hungrier than she had ever been in her life before. When one has +breakfasted on one cup of coffee at dawn and has ridden all day with +nothing to eat, running away from food, even though that food is in the +hands of one's captor, requires courage. Lorraine was terribly tempted +to stay, at least until she had eaten. But Al might not give her another +chance like this. She crept on her knees to the slicker and seized one +piece of bannock, crawled out of the firelight stealthily, then sprang +to her feet and began running straight across the meadow toward Skinner. + +Twenty yards she covered when a bullet sang over her head. Lorraine +ducked, stumbled and fell headfirst over a hummock, not quite sure that +she had not been shot. + +"Thought maybe I could trust yuh to play square," Al said disgustedly, +pulling her to her feet, the gun still smoking in his hands. "You little +fool, what do you think you'd do in these hills alone? You sure enough +belittle me, if you think you'd have a chance in a million of getting +away from me!" + +She fought him, then, with a great, inner relief that the situation was +at last swinging around to a normal kidnapping. Still, Al Woodruff +seemed unable to play his part realistically. He failed to fill her with +fear and repulsion. She had to think back, to remember that he had +killed men, in order to realize her own danger. Now, for instance, he +merely forced her back to the campfire, pulled the saddle strings from +his pocket and tied her feet together, using a complicated knot which he +told her she might work on all she darn pleased, for all he cared. Then +he went calmly to work cooking their supper. + +This was simple. He divided the grouse so that one part had the meaty +breast and legs, and the other the back and wings. The meaty part he +larded neatly with strips of bacon, using his hunting knife,--which +Lorraine watched fascinatedly, wondering if it had ever taken the life +of a man. He skewered the meat on a green, forked stick and gave it to +her to broil for herself over the hottest coals of the fire, while he +made the coffee and prepared his own portion of the grouse. + +Lorraine was hungry. She broiled the grouse carefully and ate it, with +the exception of one leg, which she surprised herself by offering to Al, +who was picking the bones of his own share down to the last shred of +meat. She drank a cup of coffee, black, and returned the cup to the +killer, who unconcernedly drank from it without any previous rinsing. +She ate bannock with her meat and secretly thought what an adventure it +would be if only it were not real,--if only she were not threatened with +a forced marriage to this man. The primitive camp appealed to her; she +who had prided herself upon being an outdoor girl saw how she had always +played at being primitive. This was real. She would have loved it if +only the man opposite were Lone, or Swan, or some one else whom she knew +and trusted. + +She watched the firelight dancing on Al's somber face, softening its +hardness, making it almost wistful when he gazed thoughtfully into the +coals. She thrilled when she saw how watchful he was, how he lifted his +head and listened to every little night sound. She was afraid of him as +she feared the lightning; she feared his pitiless attitude toward human +life. She would find some way to outwit him when it came to the point of +marrying him, she thought. She would escape him if she could without too +great a risk of being shot. She felt absolutely certain that he would +shoot her with as little compunction as he would marry her by +force,--and it seemed to Lorraine that he would not greatly care which +he did. + +"I guess you're tired," Al said suddenly, rousing himself from deep +study and looking at her imperturbably. "I'll fix yuh so you can +sleep--and that's about all yuh can do." + +He went over to his saddle, took the blanket and unfolded it until +Lorraine saw that it was a full-size bed blanket of heavy gray wool. +The man's ingenuity seemed endless. Without seeming to have any extra +luggage, he had nevertheless carried a very efficient camp outfit with +him. He took his hunting knife, went to the spruce grove and cut many +small, green branches, returning with all he could hold in his arms. She +watched him lay them tips up for a mattress, and was secretly glad that +she knew this much at least of camp comfort. He spread the blanket over +them and then, without a word, came over to her and untied her feet. + +"Go and lay down on the blanket," he commanded. + +"I'll do nothing of the kind!" Lorraine set her mouth stubbornly. + +"Well, then I'll have to lay you down," said Al, lifting her to her +feet. "If you get balky, I'm liable to get rough." + +Lorraine drew away from him as far as she could and looked at him for a +full minute. Al stared back into her eyes. "Oh, I could _kill_ you!" +cried Lorraine for the second time that day and threw herself down on +the bed, sobbing like an angry child. + +Al said nothing. The man's capacity for keeping still was amazing. He +knelt beside her, folded the blanket over her from the two sides, and +tied the corners around her neck snugly, the knot at the back. In the +same way he tied her ankles. Lorraine found herself in a sleeping bag +from which she had small hope of extricating herself. He took his coat, +folded it compactly and pushed it under her head for a pillow; then he +brought her own saddle blanket and spread it over her for extra warmth. + +"Now stop your bawling and go to sleep," he advised her calmly. "You +ain't hurt, and you ain't going to be as long as you gentle down and +behave yourself." + +She saw him draw the slicker over his shoulders and move back where the +shadows were deep and she could not see him. She heard some animal +squall in the woods behind them. She looked up at the stars,--millions +of them, and brighter than she had ever seen them before. Insensibly she +quieted, watching the stars, listening to the night noises, catching now +and then a whiff of smoke from Al Woodruff's cigarette. Before she knew +that she was sleepy, she slept. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO + +"YACK, I LICK YOU GOOD IF YOU BARK" + + +Swan cooked himself a hasty meal while he studied the various +possibilities of the case and waited for further word from headquarters. +He wanted to be sure that help had started and to be able to estimate +within an hour or two the probable time of its arrival, before he left +the wireless. Jack he fed and left on watch outside the cabin, so that +he could without risk keep open the door to the dugout. + +His instrument was not a large one, and the dugout door was thick,--as a +precaution against discovery if he should be called when some visitor +chanced to be in the cabin. Not often did a man ride that way, though +occasionally some one stopped for a meal if he knew that the cabin was +there and had ever tasted Swan's sour-dough biscuits. His aerial was +cleverly camouflaged between the two pine trees, and he had no fear of +discovery there; Jack was a faithful guardian and would give warning if +any one approached the place. Swan could therefore give his whole +attention to the business at hand. + +He was not yet supplied with evidence enough to warrant arresting +Warfield and Hawkins, but he hoped to get it when the real crisis came. +They could not have known of Al Woodruff's intentions toward Lorraine, +else they would have kept themselves in the background and would not +have risked the failure of their own plan. + +On the other hand, Al must have been wholly ignorant of Warfield's +scheme to try and prove Lorraine crazy. It looked to Swan very much like +a muddling of the Sawtooth affairs through over-anxiety to avoid +trouble. They were afraid of what Lorraine knew. They wanted to +eliminate her, and they had made the blunder of working independently to +that end. + +Lone's anxiety he did not even consider. He believed that Lone would be +equal to any immediate emergency and would do whatever the circumstances +seemed to require of him. Warfield counted him a Sawtooth man. Al +Woodruff, if the four men met unexpectedly, would also take it for +granted that he was one of them. They would probably talk to Lone +without reserve,--Swan counted on that. Whereas, if he were present, +they would be on their guard, at least. + +Swan's plan was to wait at the cabin until he knew that deputies were +headed toward the Pass. Then, with Jack, it would be a simple matter to +follow Warfield to where he overtook Al,--supposing he did overtake him. +If he did not, then Swan meant to be present when the meeting occurred. +The dog would trail Al anywhere, since the scent would be less than +twenty-four hours old. Swan would locate Warfield and lead him straight +to Al Woodruff, and then make his arrests. But he wanted to have the +deputies there. + +At dusk he got his call. He learned that four picked men had started for +the Pass, and that they would reach the divide by daybreak. Others were +on their way to intercept Al Woodruff if he crossed before then. + +It was all that Swan could have hoped for,--more than he had dared to +expect on such short notice. He notified the operator that he would not +be there to receive anything else, until he returned to report that he +had got his men. + +"Don't count your chickens till they're hatched," came facetiously out +of the blue. + +"By golly, I can hear them holler in the shell," Swan sent back, +grinning to himself as he rattled the key. "That irrigation graft is +killed now. You tell the boss Swan says so. He's right. The way to catch +a fox is to watch his den." + +He switched off the current, closed the case and went out, making sure +that the cupboard-camouflaged door looked perfectly innocent on the +outside. With a bannock stuffed into one pocket, a chunk of bacon in the +other, he left the cabin and swung off again in that long, tireless +stride of his, Jack following contentedly at his heels. + +At the farther end of Skyline Meadow he stopped, took a tough leather +leash from his pocket and fastened it to Jack's collar. + +"We don't go running to paw nobody's stomach and say, 'Wow-wow! Here we +are back again!'" he told the dog, pulling its ears affectionately. +"Maybe we get shot or something like that. We trail, and we keep our +mouth still, Yack. One bark, and I lick you good!" + +Jack flashed out a pink tongue and licked his master's chin to show how +little he was worried over the threat, and went racing along at the end +of the leash, taking Swan's trail and his own back to where they had +climbed out of the canyon. + +At the bottom Swan spoke to the dog in an undertone, and Jack obediently +started up the canyon on the trail of the five horses who had passed +that way since noon. It was starlight now, and Swan did not hurry. He +was taking it for granted that Warfield and Hawkins would stop when it +became too dark to follow the hoofprints, and without Jack to show them +the way they would perforce remain where they were until daybreak. + +They would do that, he reasoned, if they were sincere in wanting to +overtake Lorraine and in their ignorance that they were also following +Al Woodruff. And try as he would, he could not see the object of so +foolish a plan as this abduction carried out in collusion with two men +of unknown sentiments in the party. They had shown no suspicion of Al's +part in the affair, and Swan grinned when he thought of the mutual +surprise when they met. + +He was not disappointed. They reached timber line, following the seldom +used trail that wound over the divide to Bear Top Pass and so, by a +difficult route which he did not believe Al would attempt after dark, +to the country beyond the mountain. Where dark overtook them, they +stopped in a sheltered nook to wait, just as Swan had expected they +would. They were close to the trail, where no one could pass without +their knowledge. + +In the belief that it was only Lorraine they were following, and that +she would be frightened and would come to the cheer of a campfire, they +had a fine, inviting blaze. Swan made his way as close as he dared, +without being discovered, and sat down to wait. He could see nothing of +the men until Lone appeared and fed the flames more wood, and sat down +where the light shone on his face. Swan grinned again. Warfield had +probably decided that Lorraine would be less afraid of Lone than of them +and had ordered him into the firelight as a sort of decoy. And Lone, +knowing that Al Woodruff might be within shooting distance, was probably +much more uncomfortable than he looked. + +He sat with his legs crossed in true range fashion and stared into the +fire while he smoked. He was a fair mark for an enemy who might be +lurking out there in the dark, but he gave no sign that he realized the +danger of his position. Neither did he wear any air of expectancy. +Warfield and Hawkins might wait and listen and hope that Lorraine, +wide-eyed and weary, would steal up to the warmth of the fire; but not +Lone. + +Swan, sitting on a rotting log, became uneasy at the fine target which +Lone made by the fire, and drew Al Woodruff's blue bandanna from his +pocket. He held it to Jack's nose and whispered, "You find him, +Yack--and I lick you good if you bark." Jack sniffed, dropped his nose +to the ground and began tugging at the leash. Swan got up and, moving +stealthily, followed the dog. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE + +"I COULDA LOVED THIS LITTLE GIRL" + + +A chill wind that hurried over Bear Top ahead of the dawn brought Swan +and Jack clattering up the trail that dipped into Spirit Canyon. +Warfield rose stiffly from the one-sided warmth of the fire and walked a +few paces to meet him, shrugging his wide shoulders at the cold and +rubbing his thigh muscles that protested against movement. Much riding +upon upholstered cushions had not helped Senator Warfield to retain the +tough muscles of hard-riding Bill Warfield. The senator was saddle-sore +as well as hungry, and his temper showed in his blood-shot eyes. He +would have quarreled with his best-beloved woman that morning, and he +began on Swan. + +Why hadn't he come back down the gulch yesterday and helped track the +girl, as he was told to do? (The senator had quite unpleasant opinions +of Swedes, and crazy women, and dogs that were never around when they +were wanted, and he expressed them fluently.) + +Swan explained with a great deal of labor that he had not thought he was +wanted, and that he had to sleep on his claim sometimes or the law would +take it from him, maybe. Also he virtuously pointed out that he had come +with Yack before daylight to the canyon to see if they had found Miss +Hunter and gone home, or if they were still hunting for her. + +"If you like to find that jong lady, I put Yack on the trail quick," he +offered placatingly. "I bet you Yack finds her in one-half an hour." + +With much unnecessary language, Senator Warfield told him to get to +work, and the three tightened cinches, mounted their horses and prepared +to follow Swan's lead. Swan watched his chance and gave Lone a chunk of +bannock as a substitute for breakfast, and Lone, I may add, dropped +behind his companions and ate every crumb of it, in spite of his worry +over Lorraine. + +Indeed, Swan eased that worry too, when they were climbing the pine +slope where Al had killed the grouse. Lone had forged ahead on John Doe, +and Swan stopped suddenly, pointing to the spot where a few bloody +feathers and a boot-print showed. The other evidence Jack had eaten in +the night. + +"Raine's all right, Lone. Got men coming. Keep your gun handy," he +murmured and turned away as the others rode up, eager for whatever news +Swan had to offer. + +"Something killed a bird," Swan explained politely, planting one of his +own big feet over the track, which did not in the least resemble +Lorraine's. "Yack! you find that jong lady quick!" + +From there on Swan walked carefully, putting his foot wherever a print +of Al's boot was visible. Since he was much bigger than Al, with a +correspondingly longer stride, his gait puzzled Lone until he saw just +what Swan was doing. Then his eyes lightened with amused appreciation of +the Swede's cunning. + +"We ought to have some hot drink, or whisky, when we find that girl," +Hawkins muttered unexpectedly, riding up beside Lone as they crossed an +open space. "She'll be half-dead with cold--if we find her alive." + +Before Lone could answer, Swan looked back at the two and raised his +hand for them to stop. + +"Better if you leave the horses here," he suggested. "From Yack I know +we get close pretty quick. That jong lady's horse maybe smells these +horse and makes a noise, and crazy folks run from noise." + +Without objection the three dismounted and tied their horses securely to +trees. Then, with Swan and Jack leading the way, they climbed over the +ridge and descended into the hollow by way of the ledge which Skinner +had negotiated so carefully the night before. Without the dog they never +would have guessed that any one had passed this way, but as it was they +made good progress and reached the nearest edge of the spruce thicket +just as the sun was making ready to push up over the skyline. + +Jack stopped and looked up at his master inquiringly, lifting his lip at +the sides and showing his teeth. But he made no sound; nor did Swan, +when he dropped his fingers to the dog's head and patted him +approvingly. + +They heard a horse sneeze, beyond the spruce grove, and Warfield stepped +forward authoritatively, waving Swan back. This, his manner said +plainly, was first and foremost his affair, and from now on he would +take charge of the situation. At his heels went Hawkins, and Swan sent +an oblique glance of satisfaction toward Lone, who answered it with his +half-smile. Swan himself could not have planned the approach more to his +liking. + +The smell of bacon cooking watered their mouths and made Warfield and +Hawkins look at one another inquiringly. Crazy young women would hardly +be expected to carry a camping outfit. But Swan and Lone were treading +close on their heels, and their own curiosity pulled them forward. They +went carefully around the thicket, guided by the pungent odor of burning +pine wood, and halted so abruptly that Swan and Lone bumped into them +from behind. A man had risen up from the campfire and faced them, his +hands rising slowly, palms outward. + +"Warfield, by----!" Al blurted in his outraged astonishment. "Trailing +me with a bunch, are yuh? I knew you'd double-cross your own father--but +I never thought you had it in you to do it in the open. Damn yuh, what +d'yuh want that you expect to get?" + +Warfield stared at him, slack-jawed. He glanced furtively behind him at +Swan, and found that guileless youth ready to poke him in the back with +the muzzle of a gun. Lone, he observed, had another. He looked back at +Al, whose eyes were ablaze with resentment. With an effort he smiled his +disarming, senatorial smile, but Al's next words froze it on his face. + +"I think I know the play you're making, but it won't get you anything, +Bill Warfield. You think I slipped up--and you told me not to let my +foot slip; said you'd hate to lose me. Well, you're the one that +slipped, you damned, rotten coward. I was watching out for leaks. I +stopped two, and this one----" + +He glanced down at Lorraine, who sat beside the fire, a blanket tied +tightly around her waist and her ankles, so that, while comfortably +free, she could make no move to escape. + +"I was fixing to stop _her_ from telling all she knew," he added +harshly. "By to-night I'd have had her married to me, you damned fool. +And here you've blocked everything for me, afraid I was falling down on +my job! + +"Now folks, lemme just tell you a few little things. I know my +limit--you've got me dead to rights. I ain't complaining about that; a +man in my game expects to get his, some day. But I ain't going to let +the man go that paid me my wages and a bonus of five hundred dollars +for every man I killed that he wanted outa the way. + +"Hawkins knows that's a fact. He's foreman of the Sawtooth, and he knows +the agreement. I've got to say for Hawkins that aside from stealing +cattle off the nesters and helping make evidence against some that's in +jail, Hawkins never done any dirty work. He didn't have to. They paid +_me_ for that end of the business. + +"I killed Fred Thurman--this girl, here, saw me shoot him. And it was +when I told Warfield I was afraid she might set folks talking that he +began to get cold feet. Up to then everything was lovely, but Warfield +began to crawfish a little. We figured--_we_ figured, emphasize the +_we_, folks,--that the Quirt would have to be put outa business. We knew +if the girl told Brit and Frank, they'd maybe get the nerve to try and +pin something on us. We've stole 'em blind for years, and they wouldn't +cry if we got hung. Besides, they was friendly with Fred. + +"The girl and the Swede got in the way when I tried to bump Brit off. +I'd have gone into the canyon and finished him with a rock, but they +beat me to it. The girl herself I couldn't get at very well and make it +look accidental--and anyway, I never did kill a woman, and I'd hate it +like hell. I figured if her dad got killed, she'd leave. + +"And let me tell you, folks, Warfield raised hell with me because Brit +Hunter wasn't killed when he pitched over the grade. He held out on me +for that job--so I'm collecting five hundred dollars' worth of fun right +now. He did say he'd pay me after Brit was dead, but it looks like he's +going to pull through, so I ain't counting much on getting my money outa +Warfield. + +"Frank I got, and made a clean job of it. And yesterday morning the girl +played into my hands. She rode over to the Sawtooth, and I got her at +Thurman's place, on her way home, and figured I'd marry her and take a +chance on keeping her quiet afterwards. I'd have been down the Pass in +another two hours and heading for the nearest county seat. She'd have +married me, too. She knows I'd have killed her if she didn't--which I +would. I've been square with her--she'll tell you that. I told her, when +I took her, just what I was going to do with her. So that's all +straight. She's been scared, I guess, but she ain't gone hungry, and +she ain't suffered, except in her mind. I don't fight women, and I'll +say right now, to her and to you, that I've got all the respect in the +world for this little girl, and if I'd married her I'd have been as good +to her as I know how, and as she'd let me be. + +"Now I want to tell you folks a few more things about Bill Warfield. If +you want to stop the damnest steal in the country, tie a can onto that +irrigation scheme of his. He's out to hold up the State for all he can +get, and bleed the poor devils of farmers white, that buys land under +that canal. It may look good, but it ain't good--not by a damn sight. + +"Yuh know what he's figuring on doing? Get water in the canal, sell land +under a contract that lets him out if the ditch breaks, or something so +he _can't_ supply water at any time. And when them poor suckers gets +their crops all in, and at the point where they've got to have water or +lose out, something'll happen to the supply. Folks, I _know_! I'm a +reliable man, and I've rode with a rope around my neck for over five +years, and Warfield offered me the same old five hundred every time I +monkeyed with the water supply as ordered. He'd have done it slick; +don't worry none about that. The biggest band of thieves he could get +together is that company. So if you folks have got any sense, you'll +bust it up right now. + +"Bill Warfield, what I've got to say to _you_ won't take long. You +thought you'd make a grand-stand play with the law, and at the same time +put me outa the way. You figured I'd resist arrest, and you'd have a +chance to shoot me down. I know your rotten mind better than you do. You +wanted to bump me off, but you wanted to do it in a way that'd put you +in right with the public. Killing me for kidnapping this girl would +sound damn romantic in the newspapers, and it wouldn't have a thing to +do with Thurman or Frank Johnson, or any of the rest that I've sent over +the trail for you. + +"Right now you're figuring how you'll get around this bawling-out I'm +giving you. There's nobody to take down what I say, and I'm just a mean, +ornery outlaw and killer, talking for spite. With your pull you expect +to get this smoothed over and hushed up, and have me at a hanging bee, +and everything all right for Bill! Well----" + +His eyes left Warfield's face and went beyond the staring group. His +face darkened, a sneer twisted his lips. + +"Who're them others?" he cried harshly. "Was you afraid four wouldn't be +enough to take me?" + +The four turned heads to look. Bill Warfield never looked back, for Al's +gun spoke, and Warfield sagged at the knees and the shoulders, and he +slumped to the ground at the instant when Al's gun spoke again. + +"That's for you, Lone Morgan," Al cried, as he fired again. "She talked +about you in her sleep last night. She called you Loney, and she wanted +you to come and get her. I was going to kill you first chance I got. I +coulda loved this little girl. I--could----" + +He was down, bleeding and coughing and trying to talk. Swan had shot +him, and two of the deputies who had been there through half of Al's +bitter talk. Lorraine, unable to get up and run, too sturdy of soul to +faint, had rolled over and away from him, her lips held tightly +together, her eyes wide with horror. Al crawled after her, his eyes +pleading. + +"Little Spitfire--I shot your Loney--but I'd have been good to you, +girl. I watched yuh all night--and I couldn't help loving yuh. +I--couldn't----" That was all. Within three feet of her, his face toward +her and his eyes agonizing to meet hers, he died. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR + +ANOTHER STORY BEGINS + + +This chapter is very much like a preface: it is not absolutely +necessary, although many persons will read it and a few will be glad +that it was written. + +The story itself is ended. To go on would be to begin another story; to +tell of the building up of the Quirt outfit, with Lone and Lone's +savings playing a very important part, and with Brit a semi-invalided, +retired stockman who smoked his pipe and told the young couple what they +should do and how they should do it. + +Frank he mourned for and seldom mentioned. The Sawtooth, under the +management of a greatly chastened young Bob Warfield, was slowly winning +its way back to the respect of its neighbors. + +For certain personal reasons there was no real neighborliness between +the Quirt and the Sawtooth. There could not be, so long as Brit's memory +remained clear, and Bob was every day reminded of the crimes his father +had paid a man to commit. Moreover, Southerners are jealous of their +women,--it is their especial prerogative. And Lone suspected that, given +the opportunity, Bob Warfield would have fallen in love with Lorraine. +Indeed, he suspected that any man in the country would have done that. +Al Woodruff had, and he was noted for his indifference to women and his +implacable hardness toward men. + +But you are not to accuse Lone of being a jealous husband. He was not, +and I am merely pointing out the fact that he might have been, had he +been given any cause. + +Oh, by the way, Swan "proved up" as soon as possible on his homestead +and sold out to the Quirt. Lone managed to buy the Thurman ranch also, +and the TJ up-and-down is on its feet again as a cattle ranch. Sorry and +Jim will ride for the Quirt, I suppose, as long as they can crawl into a +saddle, but there are younger men now to ride the Skyline Meadow range. + +Some one asked about Yellowjacket, having, I suppose, a sneaking regard +for his infirmities. He hasn't been peeled yet--or he hadn't, the last I +heard of him. Lone and Lorraine told me they were trying to save him for +the "Little Feller" to practise on when he is able to sit up without a +cushion behind his back, and to hold something besides a rubber rattle. +And--oh, do you know how Lone is teaching the Little Feller to sit up on +the floor? He took a horse collar and scrubbed it until he nearly wore +out the leather. Then he brought it to the cabin, put it on the floor +and set the Little Feller inside it. + +They sent me a snap-shot of the event, but it is not very good. The film +was under-exposed, and nothing was to be seen of the Little Feller +except a hazy spot which I judged was a hand, holding a black object I +guessed was the ridgy, rubber rattle with the whistle gone out of the +end,--down the Little Feller's throat, they are afraid. And there was +his smile, and a glimpse of his eyes. + +Aren't you envious as sin, and glad they're so happy? + + +THE END + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +NOVELS BY B.M. BOWER + + * * * * * + + +=THE RANCH AT THE WOLVERINE= + + A ringing tale full of exhilarating cowboy atmosphere, abundantly + and absorbingly illustrating the outstanding feature of that + alluring ranch life that is fast vanishing.--_Chicago Tribune_. + + +=JEAN OF THE LAZY A= + +A spirited novel of ranch life in which the fascinating heroine poses +for film pictures that she may make money necessary to prove her father +innocent of a crime for which he has been convicted. + + It possesses all the popular ingredients--a quick-action plot, + color and picturesqueness aplenty, and an unflagging interest--to + be found in Bower's earlier successes.--_Philadelphia Public + Ledger_. + + +=THE PHANTOM HERD= + +Another western tale in which the Happy Family become real "movie" +actors. + + There has been so much truck written in the last few years about + motion pictures, that it is a positive relief to find a book by an + author who knows exactly what to talk about in an entertaining + manner with a knowledge of actual conditions as they + exist.--_Boston Post_. + + +=THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX= + +A Flying U story in which the Happy Family get mixed up in a robbery +faked for film purposes. + + Altogether a rattling story, that is better in conception and + expression than the conventional thriller on account of its touches + of real humanity in characterization.--_Philadelphia Public + Ledger_. + + +=RIM O' THE WORLD= + +An engrossing tale of a ranch-feud between "gun-fighters" in Idaho. + + +=THE LOOKOUT MAN= + +A tale of action, excitement and love, full of the charm of the great +outdoors, in which the story of the life at a Forest Reserve Station on +top of a California mountain is vividly portrayed. + + The signature of B.M. Bower is a valuable trade-mark. It stands for + fiction filled with the spirit of ranch life in the + northwest.--_Boston Herald_. + + +=CABIN FEVER= + +How Bud Moore and his wife, Marie, fared through their attack of "cabin +fever" is the theme of this B.M. Bower story. + + The author has put some real sentiment into a story that gives a + rapidly filmed "movie" of Western life.--_Philadelphia Public + Ledger_. + + +=STARR, OF THE DESERT= + +A story of mystery, love and adventure, which has a Mexican revolt as +its main theme. + + The tale is well written, with the fine art of artlessness, and of + unflagging interest; a book worth the reading which it is sure to + get from every one who begins it.--_New York Tribune_. + + +=THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND= + +What happened when a company of school teachers and farmers encamped on +the grounds of the Flying U Ranch. + + The Northwestern cattle country has never had a better chronicler + in fiction of its deeds and its people than B.M. Bower.--_New York + Times_. + + +=GOOD INDIAN= + +A story named for its half-breed hero, who dominates this stirring +Western romance. + + There is excitement and action on every page.... A somewhat unusual + love story runs through the book.--_Boston Transcript_. + + +=THE UPHILL CLIMB= + +How a cowboy fought the hardest of all battles--a fight against himself. + + Bower knows the West of the cowboys, as do few writers to-day.... + The word pictures of Western life are realistic, and strongly + suffused with local color.--_Philadelphia North American_. + + +=LONESOME LAND= + +A story of modern Montana, giving a wholly different phase of life among +the ranches. + + Montana described as it really is, is the "lonesome land" of this + new Bower story. A prairie fire and the death of the worthless + husband are especially well handled.--_A. L. A. Booklist_. + + +=SKYRIDER= + +A cowboy who becomes an aviator is the hero of this new story of Western +ranch life. + + An engrossing ranch story with a new note of interest woven into + its breezy texture.--_Philadelphia Public Ledger_. + + +=THE THUNDER BIRD= + +Further aeronautic adventures of "Skyrider" Johnnie Jewel. + + "A good story with numberless thrills and a humorous quality + throughout its pages."--_New York Sun_. + + * * * * * + +LITTLE, BROWN & CO., Publishers, Boston, Mass. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Quirt, by B.M. Bower + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE QUIRT *** + +***** This file should be named 19166-8.txt or 19166-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/1/6/19166/ + +Produced by Kathryn Lybarger, Joseph R. 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Bower + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + color: black; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + + table { width:70%; padding: 2em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + .tocch {text-align: right; width: 5%;} + .tocpg {text-align: right; width: 5%;} + .tocname {text-align: left; font-variant: small-caps; padding-left: 3em;} + .illo {text-align: left;} + + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + background-color: white; + } + + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + } /* page numbers */ + + .linenum {position: absolute; top: auto; left: 4%;} /* poetry number */ + .blockquot{margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + .sidenote {width: 20%; padding-bottom: .5em; padding-top: .5em; + padding-left: .5em; padding-right: .5em; margin-left: 1em; + float: right; clear: right; margin-top: 1em; + font-size: smaller; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: dashed 1px;} + + .bbox {border: solid 2px; width: 40%; border-color: black; } + + .center {text-align: center;} + .center2 {text-align: center; font-size: x-large; font-weight: bold;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + .caption {font-weight: bold; text-align: center;} + + .figcenter {margin: auto; text-align: center;} + + .figleft {float: left; clear: left; margin-left: 0; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-top: + 1em; margin-right: 1em; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + .figright {float: right; clear: right; margin-left: 1em; margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-top: 1em; margin-right: 0; padding: 0; text-align: center;} + + + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Quirt, by B.M. Bower + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Quirt + +Author: B.M. Bower + +Illustrator: Anton Otto Fischer + +Release Date: September 3, 2006 [EBook #19166] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE QUIRT *** + + + + +Produced by Kathryn Lybarger, Joseph R. Hauser and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/cover3.jpg" alt = "Book Cover" /> +</div> + +<h1>THE QUIRT</h1> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + + +<table summary="" class="bbox"> + <tr> + <td class="center2">By B. M. Bower</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">Good Indian</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">Lonesome Land</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Uphill Climb</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Gringos</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Ranch at the Wolverine</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Flying U's Last Stand</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">Jean of the Lazy A</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Phantom Herd</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Heritage of the Sioux</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">Starr, of the Desert</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Lookout Man</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">Cabin Fever</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">Skyrider</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Thunder Bird</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">Rim o' the World</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td><span class="smcap">The Quirt</span></td> + </tr> +</table> + + +<hr style = "width: 65%;" /> + + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/image1.png" alt = "Frontspiece illustration" /> +</div> +<div class="caption">Al's gun spoke, and Warfield sagged at the knees and the<br /> +shoulders, and slumped to the ground.<br /> +Frontispiece. <a href="#Page_294">See page 294.</a> +</div> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h1>THE QUIRT</h1> + +<p><br /></p> + +<h5>BY</h5> +<h4>B. M. BOWER</h4> + +<p><br /></p> + +<h6>WITH FRONTISPIECE BY</h6> +<h5>ANTON OTTO FISCHER</h5> + +<p><br /></p> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/image2.png" alt="Title Page logo" /> +</div> + +<p><br /></p> + +<h5>BOSTON</h5> +<h4>LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY</h4> +<h5>1920</h5> + +<p><br /><br /><br /><br /></p> + +<h6><i>Copyright, 1920,</i></h6> +<h6><span class="smcap">By Little, Brown, and Company.</span></h6> + +<hr /> + +<h6><i>All rights reserved</i></h6> + +<h6>Published May, 1920</h6> +<h6>Reprinted, May, 1920</h6> +<h6>Reprinted, July, 1920</h6> +<h6>Reprinted, October, 1920</h6> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[Pg v]</a></span></p> + +<h2><a name="CONTENTS" id="CONTENTS"></a>CONTENTS</h2> + + +<table summary="CONTENTS" > + <tr> + <td class="tocch"><span class="smcap">chapter</span></td> + <td></td> + <td class="tocch"><span class="smcap">page</span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">I</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_ONE">Little Fish</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">1</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">II</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_TWO">The Enchantment of Long Distance</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">12</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">III</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_THREE">Reality is Weighed and Found Wanting</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">22</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">IV</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_FOUR">"She's a Good Girl When She Ain't Crazy"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">38</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">V</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_FIVE">A Death "By Accident"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">54</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">VI</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_SIX">Lone Advises Silence</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">68</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">VII</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_SEVEN">The Man at Whisper</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">85</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">VIII</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_EIGHT">"It Takes Nerve Just to Hang On"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">100</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">IX</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_NINE">The Evil Eye of the Sawtooth</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">115</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">X</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_TEN">Another Sawtooth "Accident"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">126</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XI</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_ELEVEN">Swan Talks With His Thoughts</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">144</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XII</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_TWELVE">The Quirt Parries the First Blow</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">158</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XIII</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_THIRTEEN">Lone Takes His Stand</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">168</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XIV</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_FOURTEEN">"Frank's Dead"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">178</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XV</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_FIFTEEN">Swan Trails a Coyote</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">192</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XVI</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_SIXTEEN">The Sawtooth Shows Its Hand</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">200</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XVII</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_SEVENTEEN">Yack Don't Lie</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">216</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XVIII</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_EIGHTEEN">"I Think Al Woodruff's Got Her"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">233</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XIX</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_NINETEEN">Swan Calls For Help</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">245<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[pg vi]</a></span></td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XX</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_TWENTY">Kidnapped</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">255</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XXI</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_TWENTY-ONE">"Oh, I Could Kill You!"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">264</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XXII</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_TWENTY-TWO">"Yack, I Lick You Good if You Bark"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">277</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XXIII</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_TWENTY-THREE">"I Coulda Loved This Little Girl"</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">284</td> + </tr> + <tr> + <td class="tocch">XXIV</td> + <td class="tocname"><a href="#CHAPTER_TWENTY-FOUR">Another Story Begins</a></td> + <td class="tocpg">296</td> + </tr> +</table> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_QUIRT" id="THE_QUIRT"></a>THE QUIRT</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> +<h2>THE QUIRT</h2> +<h3><a name="CHAPTER_ONE" id="CHAPTER_ONE"></a>CHAPTER ONE</h3> + +<h4>LITTLE FISH</h4> + + +<p>Quirt Creek flowed sluggishly between willows which sagged none too +gracefully across its deeper pools, or languished beside the rocky +stretches that were bone dry from July to October, with a narrow channel +in the center where what water there was hurried along to the pools +below. For a mile or more, where the land lay fairly level in a +platter-like valley set in the lower hills, the mud that rimmed the +pools was scored deep with the tracks of the "TJ up-and-down" cattle, as +the double monogram of Hunter and Johnson was called.</p> + +<p>A hard brand to work, a cattleman would tell you. Yet the TJ up-and-down +herd never seemed to increase beyond a niggardly three hundred or so, +though the Quirt ranch was older than its lordly neighbors, the Sawtooth +Cattle Company,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> who numbered their cattle by tens of thousands and +whose riders must have strings of fifteen horses apiece to keep them +going; older too than many a modest ranch that had flourished awhile and +had finished as line-camps of the Sawtooth when the Sawtooth bought +ranch and brand for a lump sum that looked big to the rancher, who +immediately departed to make himself a new home elsewhere: older than +others which had somehow gone to pieces when the rancher died or went to +the penitentiary under the stigma of a long sentence as a cattle thief. +There were many such, for the Sawtooth, powerful and stern against +outlawry, tolerated no pilfering from their thousands.</p> + +<p>The less you have, the more careful you are of your possessions. Hunter +and Johnson owned exactly a section and a half of land, and for a mile +and a half Quirt Creek was fenced upon either side. They hired two men, +cut what hay they could from a field which they irrigated, fed their +cattle through the cold weather, watched them zealously through the +summer, and managed to ship enough beef each fall to pay their grocery +bill and their men's wages and have a balance sufficient to buy what +clothes they<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> needed, and perhaps pay a doctor if one of them fell ill. +Which frequently happened, since Brit was becoming a prey to rheumatism +that sometimes kept him in bed, and Frank occasionally indulged himself +in a gallon or so of bad whisky and suffered afterwards from a badly +deranged digestion.</p> + +<p>Their house was a two-room log cabin, built when logs were easier to get +than lumber. That the cabin contained two rooms was the result of +circumstances rather than design. Brit had hauled from the mountain-side +logs long and logs short, and it had seemed a shame to cut the long ones +any shorter. Later, when the outside world had crept a little closer to +their wilderness—as, go where you will, the outside world has a way of +doing—he had built a lean-to shed against the cabin from what lumber +there was left after building a cowshed against the log barn.</p> + +<p>In the early days, Brit had had a wife and two children, but the wife +could not endure the loneliness of the ranch nor the inconvenience of +living in a two-room log cabin. She was continually worrying over +rattlesnakes and diphtheria and pneumonia, and begging Brit to sell out +and live in town. She had married him because he was a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> cowboy, and +because he was a nimble dancer and rode gallantly with silver-shanked +spurs ajingle on his heels and a snakeskin band around his hat, and +because a ranch away out on Quirt Creek had sounded exactly like a story +in a book.</p> + +<p>Adventure, picturesqueness, even romance, are recognized and appreciated +only at a distance. Mrs. Hunter lost the perspective of romance and +adventure, and shed tears because there was sufficient mineral in the +water to yellow her week's washing, and for various other causes which +she had never foreseen and to which she refused to resign herself.</p> + +<p>Came a time when she delivered a shrill-voiced, tear-blurred ultimatum +to Brit. Either he must sell out and move to town, or she would take the +children and leave him. Of towns Brit knew nothing except the +post-office, saloon, cheap restaurant side,—and a barber shop where a +fellow could get a shave and hair-cut before he went to see his girl. +Brit could not imagine himself actually <i>living</i>, day after day, in a +town. Three or four days had always been his limit. It was in a +restaurant that he had first met his wife. He had stayed three days when +he had meant to finish his business in one, because there was an<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> +awfully nice girl waiting on table in the Palace, and because there was +going to be a dance on Saturday night, and he wanted his acquaintance +with her to develop to the point where he might ask her to go with him, +and be reasonably certain of a favorable answer.</p> + +<p>Brit would not sell his ranch. In this Frank Johnson, old-time friend +and neighbor, who had taken all the land the government would allow one +man to hold, and whose lines joined Brit's, profanely upheld him. They +had planned to run cattle together, had their brand already recorded, +and had scraped together enough money to buy a dozen young cows. +Luckily, Brit had "proven up" on his homestead, so that when the irate +Mrs. Hunter deserted him she did not jeopardize his right to the land.</p> + +<p>Brit was philosophical, thinking that a year or so of town life would be +a cure. If he missed the children, he was free from tears and nagging +complaints, so that his content balanced his loneliness. Frank proved up +and came down to live with him, and the partnership began to wear into +permanency. Share and share alike, they lived and worked and wrangled +together like brothers.</p> + +<p>For months Brit's wife was too angry and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span> spiteful to write. Then she +wrote acrimoniously, reminding Brit of his duty to his children. Royal +was old enough for school and needed clothes. She was slaving for them +as she had never thought to slave when Brit promised to honor and +protect her, but the fact remained that he was their father even if he +did not act like one. She needed at least ten dollars.</p> + +<p>Brit showed the letter to Frank, and the two talked it over solemnly +while they sat on inverted feed buckets beside the stable, facing the +unearthly beauty of a cloud-piled Idaho sunset. They did not feel that +they could afford to sell a cow, and two-year-old steers were out of the +question. They decided to sell an unbroken colt that a cow-puncher +fancied. In a week Brit wrote a brief, matter-of-fact letter to Minnie +and enclosed a much-worn ten-dollar banknote. With the two dollars and a +half which remained of his share of the sale, Brit sent to a mail-order +house for a mackinaw coat, and felt cheated afterwards because the coat +was not "wind and water proof" as advertised in the catalogue.</p> + +<p>More months passed, and Brit received, by registered mail, a notice that +he was being sued for divorce on the ground of non-support. He<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> felt +hurt, because, as he pointed out to Frank, he was perfectly willing to +support Minnie and the kids if they came back where he could have a +chance. He wrote this painstakingly to the lawyer and received no reply. +Later he learned from Minnie that she had freed herself from him, and +that she was keeping boarders and asking no odds of him.</p> + +<p>To come at once to the end of Brit's matrimonial affairs, he heard from +the children once in a year, perhaps, after they were old enough to +write. He did not send them money, because he seemed never to have any +money to send, and because they did not ask for any. Dumbly he sensed, +as their handwriting and their spelling improved, that his children were +growing up. But when he thought of them they seemed remote, prattling +youngsters whom Minnie was forever worrying over and who seemed to have +been always under the heels of his horse, or under the wheels of his +wagon, or playing with the pitchfork, or wandering off into the sage +while he and their distracted mother searched for them. For a long +while—how many years Brit could not remember—they had been living in +Los Angeles. Prospering, too, Brit understood. The girl, +Lor<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span>raine—Minnie had wanted fancy names for the kids, and Brit +apologized whenever he spoke of them, which was seldom—Lorraine had +written that "Mamma has an apartment house." That had sounded +prosperous, even at the beginning. And as the years passed and their +address remained the same, Brit became fixed in the belief that the Casa +Grande was all that its name implied, and perhaps more. Minnie must be +getting rich. She had a picture of the place on the stationery which +Lorraine used when she wrote him. There were two palm trees in front, +with bay windows behind them, and pillars. Brit used to study these +magnificences and thank God that Minnie was doing so well. He never +could have given her a home like that. Brit sometimes added that he had +never been cut out for a married man, anyway.</p> + +<p>Old-timers forgot that Brit had ever been married, and late comers never +heard of it. To all intents the owners of the Quirt outfit were old +bachelors who kept pretty much to themselves, went to town only when +they needed supplies, rode old, narrow-fork saddles and grinned +scornfully at "swell-forks" and "buckin'-rolls," and listened to all the +range gossip without adding<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> so much as an opinion. They never talked +politics nor told which candidates received their two votes. They kept +the same two men season after season,—leathery old range hands with +eyes that saw whatever came within their field of vision, and with the +gift of silence, which is rare.</p> + +<p>If you know anything at all about cattlemen, you will know that the +Quirt was a poor man's ranch, when I tell you that Hunter and Johnson +milked three cows and made butter, fed a few pigs on the skim milk and +the alfalfa stalks which the saddle horses and the cows disdained to +eat, kept a flock of chickens, and sold what butter, eggs and pork they +did not need for themselves. Cattlemen seldom do that. More often they +buy milk in small tin cans, butter in "squares," and do without eggs.</p> + +<p>Four of a kind were the men of the TJ up-and-down, and even Bill +Warfield—president and general manager of the Sawtooth Cattle Company, +and of the Federal Reclamation Company and several other companies, +State senator and general benefactor of the Sawtooth country—even the +great Bill Warfield lifted his hat to the owners of the Quirt when he +met them, and spoke of them as "the finest specimens of our old, +fast-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span>vanishing type of range men." Senator Warfield himself represented +the modern type of range man and was proud of his progressiveness. Never +a scheme for the country's development was hatched but you would find +Senator Warfield closely allied with it, his voice the deciding one when +policies and progress were being discussed.</p> + +<p>As to the Sawtooth, forty thousand acres comprised their holdings under +patents, deeds and long-time leases from the government. Another twenty +thousand acres they had access to through the grace of the owners, and +there was forest-reserve grazing besides, which the Sawtooth could have +if it chose to pay the nominal rental sum. The Quirt ranch was almost +surrounded by Sawtooth land of one sort or another, though there was +scant grazing in the early spring on the sagebrush wilderness to the +south. This needed Quirt Creek for accessible water, and Quirt Creek, +save where it ran through cut-bank hills, was fenced within the section +and a half of the TJ up-and-down.</p> + +<p>So there they were, small fish making shift to live precariously with +other small fish in a pool where big fish swam lazily. If one small fish +now and then disappeared with mysterious ab<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>ruptness, the other small +fish would perhaps scurry here and there for a time, but few would leave +the pool for the safe shallows beyond.</p> + +<p>This is a tale of the little fishes.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_TWO" id="CHAPTER_TWO"></a>CHAPTER TWO</h2> + +<h4>THE ENCHANTMENT OF LONG DISTANCE</h4> + + +<p>Lorraine Hunter always maintained that she was a Western girl. If she +reached the point of furnishing details she would tell you that she had +ridden horses from the time that she could walk, and that her father was +a cattle-king of Idaho, whose cattle fed upon a thousand hills. When she +was twelve she told her playmates exciting tales about rattlesnakes. +When she was fifteen she sat breathless in the movies and watched +picturesque horsemen careering up and down and around the thousand +hills, and believed in her heart that half the Western pictures were +taken on or near her father's ranch. She seemed to remember certain +landmarks, and would point them out to her companions and whisper a +desultory lecture on the cattle industry as illustrated by the picture. +She was much inclined to criticism of the costuming and the acting.</p> + +<p>At eighteen she knew definitely that she hated the very name Casa +Grande. She hated the narrow, half-lighted hallway with its "tree"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> +where no one ever hung a hat, and the seat beneath where no one ever sat +down. She hated the row of key-and-mail boxes on the wall, with the bell +buttons above each apartment number. She hated the jangling of the hall +telephone, the scurrying to answer, the prodding of whichever bell +button would summon the tenant asked for by the caller. She hated the +meek little Filipino boy who swept that ugly hall every morning. She +hated the scrubby palms in front. She hated the pillars where the paint +was peeling badly. She hated the conflicting odors that seeped into the +atmosphere at certain hours of the day. She hated the three old maids on +the third floor and the frowsy woman on the first, who sat on the front +steps in her soiled breakfast cap and bungalow apron. She hated the +nervous tenant who occupied the apartment just over her mother's +three-room-and-bath, and pounded with a broom handle on the floor when +Lorraine practised overtime on chromatic scales.</p> + +<p>At eighteen Lorraine managed somehow to obtain work in a Western +picture, and being unusually pretty she so far distinguished herself +that she was given a small part in the next production. Her glorious +duty it was to ride madly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span> through the little cow-town "set" to the +post-office where the sheriff's posse lounged conspicuously, and there +pull her horse to an abrupt stand and point excitedly to the distant +hills. Also she danced quite close to the camera in the "Typical Cowboy +Dance" which was a feature of this particular production.</p> + +<p>Lorraine thereby earned enough money to buy her fall suit and coat and +cheap furs, and learned to ride a horse at a gallop and to dance what +passed in pictures as a "square dance."</p> + +<p>At nineteen years of age Lorraine Hunter, daughter of old Brit Hunter of +the TJ up-and-down, became a real "range-bred girl" with a real Stetson +hat of her own, a green corduroy riding skirt, gray flannel shirt, +brilliant neckerchief, boots and spurs. A third picture gave her further +practice in riding a real horse,—albeit an extremely docile animal +called Mouse with good reason. She became known on the lot as a real +cattle-king's daughter, though she did not know the name of her father's +brand and in all her life had seen no herd larger than the thirty head +of tame cattle which were chased past the camera again and again to make +them look like ten thousand, and which were so thoroughly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> "camera +broke" that they stopped when they were out of the scene, turned and +were ready to repeat the performance <i>ad lib</i>.</p> + +<p>Had she lived her life on the Quirt ranch she would have known a great +deal more about horseback riding and cattle and range dances. She would +have known a great deal less about the romance of the West, however, and +she would probably never have seen a sheriff's posse riding twenty +strong and bunched like bird-shot when it leaves the muzzle of the gun. +Indeed, I am very sure she would not. Killings such as her father heard +of with his lips drawn tight and the cords standing out on the sides of +his skinny neck she would have considered the grim tragedies they were, +without once thinking of the "picture value" of the crime.</p> + +<p>As it was, her West was filled with men who died suddenly in gobs of red +paint and girls who rode loose-haired and panting with hand held over +the heart, hurrying for doctors, and cowboys and parsons and such. She +had seen many a man whip pistol from holster and dare a mob with lips +drawn back in a wolfish grin over his white, even teeth, and kidnappings +were the inevitable accompaniment of youth and beauty.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span>Lorraine learned rapidly. In three years she thrilled to more +blood-curdling adventure than all the Bad Men in all the West could have +furnished had they lived to be old and worked hard at being bad all +their lives. For in that third year she worked her way enthusiastically +through a sixteen-episode movie serial called "The Terror of the Range." +She was past mistress of romance by that time. She knew her West.</p> + +<p>It was just after the "Terror of the Range" was finished that a great +revulsion in the management of this particular company stopped +production with a stunning completeness that left actors and actresses +feeling very much as if the studio roof had fallen upon them. Lorraine's +West vanished. The little cow-town "set" was being torn down to make +room for something else quite different. The cowboys appeared in +tailored suits and drifted away. Lorraine went home to the Casa Grande, +hating it more than ever she had hated it in her life.</p> + +<p>Some one up-stairs was frying liver and onions, which was in flagrant +defiance of Rule Four which mentioned cabbage, onions and fried fish as +undesirable foodstuffs. Outside, the palm leaves were dripping in the +night fog that had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> swept soggily in from the ocean. Her mother was +trying to collect a gas bill from the dressmaker down the hall, who +protested shrilly that she distinctly remembered having paid that gas +bill once and had no intention of paying it twice.</p> + +<p>Lorraine opened the door marked <span class="smcap">Landlady</span>, and closed it with a slam +intended to remind her mother that bickerings in the hall were less +desirable than the odor of fried onions. She had often spoken to her +mother about the vulgarity of arguing in public with the tenants, but +her mother never seemed to see things as Lorraine saw them.</p> + +<p>In the apartment sat a man who had been too frequent a visitor, as +Lorraine judged him. He was an oldish man with the lines of failure in +his face and on his lean form the sprightly clothing of youth. He had +been a reporter,—was still, he maintained. But Lorraine suspected +shrewdly that he scarcely made a living for himself, and that he was +home-hunting in more ways than one when he came to visit her mother.</p> + +<p>The affair had progressed appreciably in her absence, it would appear. +He greeted her with, a fatherly "Hello, kiddie," and would have kissed +her had Lorraine not evaded him skilfully.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span>Her mother came in then and complained intimately to the man, and +declared that the dressmaker would have to pay that bill or have her gas +turned off. He offered sympathy, assistance in the turning off of the +gas, and a kiss which was perfectly audible to Lorraine in the next +room. The affair had indeed progressed!</p> + +<p>"L'raine, d'you know you've got a new papa?" her mother called out in +the peculiar, chirpy tone she used when she was exuberantly happy. "I +knew you'd be surprised!"</p> + +<p>"I am," Lorraine agreed, pulling aside the cheap green portières and +looked in upon the two. Her tone was unenthusiastic. "A superfluous gift +of doubtful value. I do not feel the need of a papa, thank you. If you +want him for a husband, mother, that is entirely your own affair. I hope +you'll be very happy."</p> + +<p>"The kid don't want a papa; husbands are what means the most in her +young life," chuckled the groom, restraining his bride when she would +have risen from his knee.</p> + +<p>"I hope you'll both be very happy indeed," said Lorraine gravely. "Now +you won't mind, mother, when I tell you that I am going to dad's ranch +in Idaho. I really meant it for a vacation,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> but since you won't be +alone, I may stay with dad permanently. I'm leaving to-morrow or the +next day—just as soon as I can pack my trunk and get a Pullman berth."</p> + +<p>She did not wait to see the relief in her mother's face contradicting +the expostulations on her lips. She went out to the telephone in the +hall, remembered suddenly that her business would be overheard by half +the tenants, and decided to use the public telephone in a hotel farther +down the street. Her decision to go to her dad had been born with the +words on her lips. But it was a lusty, full-voiced young decision, and +it was growing at an amazing rate.</p> + +<p>Of course she would go to her dad in Idaho! She was astonished that the +idea had never before crystallized into action. Why should she feed her +imagination upon a mimic West, when the great, glorious real West was +there? What if her dad had not written a word for more than a year? He +must be alive; they would surely have heard of his death, for she and +Royal were his sole heirs, and his partner would have their address.</p> + +<p>She walked fast and arrived at the telephone booth so breathless that +she was compelled to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> wait a few minutes before she could call her +number. She inquired about trains and rates to Echo, Idaho.</p> + +<p>Echo, Idaho! While she waited for the information clerk to look it up +the very words conjured visions of wide horizons and clean winds and +high adventure. If she pictured Echo, Idaho, as being a replica of the +"set" used in the movie serial, can you wonder? If she saw herself, the +beloved queen of her father's cowboys, dashing into Echo, Idaho, on a +crimply-maned broncho that pirouetted gaily before the post-office while +handsome young men in chaps and spurs and "big four" Stetsons watched +her yearningly, she was merely living mentally the only West that she +knew.</p> + +<p>From that beatific vision Lorraine floated into others more entrancing. +All the hairbreadth escapes of the heroine of the movie serial were +hers, adapted by her native logic to fit within the bounds of +possibility,—though I must admit they bulged here and there and +threatened to overlap and to encroach upon the impossible. Over the +hills where her father's vast herds grazed, sleek and wild and +long-horned and prone to stampede, galloped the Lorraine of Lorraine's +dreams, on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span> horses sure-footed and swift. With her galloped strong men +whose faces limned the features of her favorite Western "lead."</p> + +<p>That for all her three years of intermittent intimacy with a +disillusioning world of mimicry, her dreams were pure romance, proved +that Lorraine had still the unclouded innocence of her girlhood +unspoiled.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_THREE" id="CHAPTER_THREE"></a>CHAPTER THREE</h2> + +<h4>REALITY IS WEIGHED AND FOUND WANTING</h4> + + +<p>Still dreaming her dreams, still featuring herself as the star of many +adventures, Lorraine followed the brakeman out of the dusty day coach +and down the car steps to the platform of the place called Echo, Idaho. +I can only guess at what she expected to find there in the person of a +cattle-king father, but whatever it was she did not find it. No father, +of any type whatever, came forward to claim her. In spite of her +"Western" experience she looked about her for a taxi, or at least a +street car. Even in the wilds of Western melodrama one could hear the +clang of street-car gongs warning careless autoists off the track.</p> + +<p>After the train had hooted and gone on around an absolutely +uninteresting low hill of yellow barrenness dotted with stunted sage, it +was the silence that first impressed Lorraine disagreeably. Echo, Idaho, +was a very poor imitation<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> of all the Western sets she had ever seen. +True, it had the straggling row of square-fronted, one-story buildings, +with hitch rails, but the signs painted across the fronts were +absolutely common. Any director she had ever obeyed would have sent for +his assistant director and would have used language which a lady must +not listen to. Behind the store and the post-office and the blacksmith +shop, on the brow of the low hill around whose point the train had +disappeared, were houses with bay windows and porches absolutely out of +keeping with the West. So far as Lorraine could see, there was not a log +cabin in the whole place.</p> + +<p>The hitch rails were empty, and there was not a cowboy in sight. Before +the post-office a terribly grimy touring car stood with its +running-boards loaded with canvas-covered suitcases. Three goggled, +sunburned women in ugly khaki suits were disconsolately drinking soda +water from bottles without straws, and a goggled, red-faced, +angry-looking man was jerking impatiently at the hood of the machine. +Lorraine and her suitcase apparently excited no interest whatever in +Echo, Idaho.</p> + +<p>The station agent was carrying two boxes of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> oranges and a crate of +California cabbages in out of the sun, and a limp individual in blue +gingham shirt and dirty overalls had shouldered the mail sack and was +making his way across the dusty, rut-scored street to the post-office.</p> + +<p>Two questions and two brief answers convinced her that the station agent +did not know Britton Hunter,—which was strange, unless this happened to +be a very new agent. Lorraine left him to his cabbages and followed the +man with the mail sack.</p> + +<p>At the post-office the anemic clerk came forward, eyeing her with +admiring curiosity. Lorraine had seen anemic young men all her life, and +the last three years had made her perfectly familiar with that look in a +young man's eyes. She met it with impatient disfavor founded chiefly +upon the young man's need of a decent hair-cut, a less flowery tie and a +tailored suit. When he confessed that he did not know Mr. Britton Hunter +by sight he ceased to exist so far as Lorraine was concerned. She +decided that he also was new to the place and therefore perfectly +useless to her.</p> + +<p>The postmaster himself—Lorraine was cheered by his spectacles, his +shirt sleeves, and his chin<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> whiskers, which made him look the part—was +better informed. He, too, eyed her curiously when she said "My father, +Mr. Britton Hunter," but he made no comment on the relationship. He gave +her a telegram and a letter from the General Delivery. The telegram, she +suspected, was the one she had sent to her dad announcing the date of +her arrival. The postmaster advised her to get a "livery rig" and drive +out to the ranch, since it might be a week or two before any one came in +from the Quirt. Lorraine thanked him graciously and departed for the +livery stable.</p> + +<p>The man in charge there chewed tobacco meditatively and told her that +his teams were all out. If she was a mind to wait over a day or two, he +said, he might maybe be able to make the trip. Lorraine took a long look +at the structure which he indicated as the hotel.</p> + +<p>"I think I'll walk," she said calmly.</p> + +<p>"<i>Walk</i>?" The stableman stopped chewing and stared at her. "It's some +consider'ble of a walk. It's all of eighteen mile—I dunno but twenty, +time y'get to the house."</p> + +<p>"I have frequently walked twenty-five or thirty miles. I am a member of +the Sierra Club<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> in Los Angeles. We seldom take hikes of less than +twenty miles. If you will kindly tell me which road I must take——"</p> + +<p>"There she is," the man stated flatly, and pointed across the railroad +track to where a sandy road drew a yellowish line through the sage, +evidently making for the hills showing hazily violet in the distance. +Those hills formed the only break in the monotonous gray landscape, and +Lorraine was glad that her journey would take her close to them.</p> + +<p>"Thank you so much," she said coldly and returned to the station. In the +small lavatory of the depot waiting room she exchanged her slippers for +a pair of moderately low-heeled shoes which she had at the last minute +of packing tucked into her suitcase, put a few extra articles into her +rather smart traveling bag, left the suitcase in the telegraph office +and started. Not another question would she ask of Echo, Idaho, which +was flatter and more insipid than the drinking water in the tin "cooler" +in the waiting room. The station agent stood with his hands on his hips +and watched her cross the track and start down the road, pardonably +astonished to see a young woman walk down a road that led<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> only to the +hills twenty miles away, carrying her luggage exactly as if her trip was +a matter of a block or two at most.</p> + +<p>The bag was rather heavy and as she went on it became heavier. She meant +to carry it slung across her shoulder on a stick as soon as she was well +away from the prying eyes of Echo's inhabitants. Later, if she felt +tired, she could easily hide it behind a bush along the road and send +one of her father's cowboys after it. The road was very dusty and +carried the wind-blown traces of automobile tires. Some one would surely +overtake her and give her a ride before she walked very far.</p> + +<p>For the first half hour she believed that she was walking on level +ground, but when she looked back there was no sign of any town behind +her. Echo had disappeared as completely as if it had been swallowed. +Even the unseemly bay-windowed houses on the hill had gone under. She +walked for another half hour and saw only the gray sage stretching all +around her. The hills looked farther away than when she started. Still, +that beaten road must lead somewhere. Two hours later she began to +wonder why this particular road should be so unending and so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> empty. +Never in her life before had she walked for two hours without seeming to +get anywhere, or without seeing any living human.</p> + +<p>Both shoulders were sore from the weight of the bag on the stick, but +the sagebushes looked so exactly alike that she feared she could not +describe the particular spot where the cowboys would find her bag, +wherefore she carried it still. She was beginning to change hands very +often when the wind came.</p> + +<p>Just where or how that wind sprang up she did not know. Suddenly it was +whooping across the sage and flinging up clouds of dust from the road. +To Lorraine, softened by years of southern California weather, it seemed +to blow straight off an ice field, it was so cold.</p> + +<p>After an interminable time which measured three hours on her watch, she +came to an abrupt descent into a creek bed, down the middle of which the +creek itself was flowing swiftly. Here the road forked, a rough, +little-used trail keeping on up the creek, the better traveled road +crossing and climbing the farther bank. Lorraine scarcely hesitated +before she chose the main trail which crossed the creek.</p> + +<p>From the creek the trail she followed kept<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> climbing until Lorraine +wondered if there would ever be a top. The wind whipped her narrow +skirts and impeded her, tugged at her hat, tingled her nose and watered +her eyes. But she kept on doggedly, disgustedly, the West, which she had +seen through the glamour of swift-blooded Romance, sinking lower and +lower in her estimation. Nothing but jack rabbits and little, twittery +birds moved through the sage, though she watched hungrily for horsemen.</p> + +<p>Quite suddenly the gray landscape glowed with a palpitating radiance, +unreal, beautiful beyond expression. She stopped, turned to face the +west and stared awestruck at one of those flaming sunsets which makes +the desert land seem but a gateway into the ineffable glory beyond the +earth. That the high-piled, gorgeous cloud-bank presaged a thunderstorm +she never guessed; and that a thunderstorm may be a deadly, terrifying +peril she never had quite believed. Her mother had told of people being +struck by lightning, but Lorraine could not associate lightning with +death, especially in the West, where men usually died by shooting, +lynching, or by pitching over a cliff.</p> + +<p>The wind hushed as suddenly as it had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> whooped. Warned by the twinkling +lights far behind her—lights which must be the small part at last +visible of Echo, Idaho—Lorraine went on. She had been walking steadily +for four hours, and she must surely have come nearly twenty miles. If +she ever reached the top of the hill, she believed that she would see +her father's ranch just beyond.</p> + +<p>The afterglow had deepened to dusk when she came at last to the highest +point of that long grade. Far ahead loomed a cluster of square, black +objects which must be the ranch buildings of the Quirt, and Lorraine's +spirits lightened a little. What a surprise her father and all his +cowboys would have when she walked in upon them! It was almost worth the +walk, she told herself hearteningly. She hoped that dad had a good cook. +He would wear a flour-sack apron, naturally, and would be tall and lean, +or else very fat. He would be a comedy character, but she hoped he would +not be the grouchy kind, which, though very funny when he rampages +around on the screen, might be rather uncomfortable to meet when one is +tired and hungry and out of sorts. But of course the crankiest of comedy +cooks would be decently civil to <i>her</i>.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span> Men always were, except +directors who are paid for their incivility.</p> + +<p>A hollow into which she walked in complete darkness and in silence, save +the gurgling of another stream, hid from sight the shadowy semblance of +houses and barns and sheds. Their disappearance slumped her spirits +again, for without them she was no more than a solitary speck in the +vast loneliness. Their actual nearness could not comfort her. She was +seized with a reasonless, panicky fear that by the time she crossed the +stream and climbed the hill beyond they would no longer be there where +she had seen them. She was lifting her skirts to wade the creek when the +click of hoofs striking against rocks sent her scurrying to cover in a +senseless fear.</p> + +<p>"I learned this act from the jack rabbits," she rallied herself shakily, +when she was safely hidden behind a sagebush whose pungency made her +horribly afraid that she might sneeze, which would be too ridiculous.</p> + +<p>"Some of dad's cowboys, probably, but still they <i>may</i> be bandits."</p> + +<p>If they were bandits they could scarcely be out banditting, for the two +horsemen were talking in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span> ordinary, conversational tones as they rode +leisurely down to the ford. When they passed Lorraine, the horse nearest +her shied against the other and was sworn at parenthetically for a fool. +Against the skyline Lorraine saw the rider's form bulk squatty and +ungraceful, reminding her of an actor whom she knew and did not like. It +was that resemblance perhaps which held her quiet instead of following +her first impulse to speak to them and ask them to carry her grip to the +house.</p> + +<p>The horses stopped with their forefeet in the water and drooped heads to +drink thirstily. The riders continued their conversation.</p> + +<p>"—and as I says time and again, they ain't big enough to fight the +outfit, and the quicker they git out the less lead they'll carry under +their hides when they do go. What they want to try an' hang on for, +beats me. Why, it's like setting into a poker game with a five-cent +piece! They ain't got my sympathy. I ain't got any use for a damn fool, +no way yuh look at it."</p> + +<p>"Well, there's the TJ—they been here a long while, and they ain't +packin' any lead, and they ain't getting out."</p> + +<p>"Well, say, lemme tell yuh something.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> The TJ'll git theirs and git it +right. Drink all night, would yuh?" He swore long and fluently at his +horse, spurred him through the shallows, and the two rode on up the +hill, their voices still mingled in desultory argument, with now and +then an oath rising clearly above the jumble of words.</p> + +<p>They may have been law-abiding citizens riding home to families that +were waiting supper for them, but Lorraine crept out from behind her +sagebush, sneezing and thanking her imitation of the jack rabbits. +Whoever they were, she was not sorry she had let them ride on. They +might be her father's men, and they might have been very polite and +chivalrous to her. But their voices and their manner of speaking had +been rough; and it is one thing, Lorraine reflected, to mingle with +made-up villains—even to be waylaid and kidnapped and tied to trees and +threatened with death—but it is quite different to accost +rough-speaking men in the dark when you know that they are not being +rough to suit the director of the scene.</p> + +<p>She was so absorbed in trying to construct a range war or something +equally thrilling from the scrap of conversation she had heard that she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> +reached the hilltop in what seemed a very few minutes of climbing. The +sky was becoming overcast. Already the stars to the west were blotted +out, and the absolute stillness of the atmosphere frightened her more +than the big, dark wilderness itself. It seemed to her exactly as though +the earth was holding its breath and waiting for something terrible to +happen. The vague bulk of buildings was still some distance ahead, and +when a rumble like the deepest notes of a pipe organ began to fill all +the air, Lorraine thrust her grip under a bush and began to run, her +soggy shoes squashing unpleasantly on the rough places in the road.</p> + +<p>Lorraine had seen many stage storms and had thrilled ecstatically to the +mimic lightning, knowing just how it was made. But when that huge +blackness behind and to the left of her began to open and show a +terrible brilliance within, and to close abruptly, leaving the world ink +black, she was terrified. She wanted to hide as she had hidden from +those two men; but from that stupendous monster, a real thunderstorm, +sagebrush formed no protection whatever. She must reach the substantial +shelter of buildings, the comforting presence of men and women.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span>She ran, and as she ran she wept aloud like a child and called for her +father. The deep rumble grew louder, nearer. The revealed brilliance +became swift sword-thrusts of blinding light that seemed to stab deep +the earth. Lorraine ran awkwardly, her hands over her ears, crying out +at each lightning flash, her voice drowned in the thunder that followed +it close. Then, as she neared the somber group of buildings, the clouds +above them split with a terrific, rending crash, and the whole place +stood pitilessly revealed to her, as if a spotlight had been turned on. +Lorraine stood aghast. The buildings were not buildings at all. They +were rocks, great, black, forbidding boulders standing there on a narrow +ridge, having a diabolic likeness to houses.</p> + +<p>The human mind is wonderfully resilient, but readjustment comes slowly +after a shock. Dumbly, refusing to admit the significance of what she +had seen, Lorraine went forward. Not until she had reached and had +touched the first grotesque caricature of habitation did she wholly +grasp the fact that she was lost, and that shelter might be miles away. +She stood and looked at the orderly group of boulders as the lightning +intermittently revealed them. She saw where the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> road ran on, between +two square-faced rocks. She would have to follow the road, for after all +it must lead <i>somewhere</i>,—to her father's ranch, probably. She wondered +irrelevantly why her mother had never mentioned these queer rocks, and +she wondered vaguely if any of them had caves or ledges where she could +be safe from the lightning.</p> + +<p>She was on the point of stepping out into the road again when a horseman +rode into sight between the two rocks. In the same instant of his +appearance she heard the unmistakable crack of a gun, saw the rider jerk +backward in the saddle, throw up one hand,—and then the darkness +dropped between them.</p> + +<p>Lorraine crouched behind a juniper bush close against the rock and +waited. The next flash, came within a half-minute. It showed a man at +the horse's head, holding it by the bridle. The horse was rearing. +Lorraine tried to scream that the man on the ground would be trampled, +but something went wrong with her voice, so that she could only whisper.</p> + +<p>When the light came again the man who had been shot was not altogether +on the ground. The other, working swiftly, had thrust the in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span>jured man's +foot through the stirrup. Lorraine saw him stand back and lift his quirt +to slash the horse across the rump. Even through the crash of thunder +Lorraine heard the horse go past her down the hill, galloping furiously. +When she could see again she glimpsed him running, while something +bounced along on the ground beside him.</p> + +<p>She saw the other man, with a dry branch in his hand, dragging it across +the road where it ran between the two rocks. Then Lorraine Hunter, +hardened to the sight of crimes committed for picture values only, +realized sickeningly that she had just looked upon a real murder,—the +cold-blooded killing of a man. She felt very sick. Queer little red +sparks squirmed and danced before her eyes. She crumpled down quietly +behind the juniper bush and did not know when the rain came, though it +drenched her in the first two or three minutes of downpour.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_FOUR" id="CHAPTER_FOUR"></a>CHAPTER FOUR</h2> + +<h4>"SHE'S A GOOD GIRL WHEN SHE AIN'T CRAZY"</h4> + + +<p>When the sun has been up just long enough to take the before-dawn chill +from the air without having swallowed all the diamonds that spangle bush +and twig and grass-blade after a night's soaking rain, it is good to +ride over the hills of Idaho and feel oneself a king,—and never mind +the crown and the scepter. Lone Morgan, riding early to the Sawtooth to +see the foreman about getting a man for a few days to help replace a +bridge carried fifty yards downstream by a local cloudburst, would not +have changed places with a millionaire. The horse he rode was the horse +he loved, the horse he talked to like a pal when they were by +themselves. The ridge gave him a wide outlook to the four corners of the +earth. Far to the north the Sawtooth range showed blue, the nearer +mountains pansy purple where the pine trees stood, the foothills shaded +delicately where canyons swept down to the gray plain. To the south was +the sagebrush, a soft,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> gray-green carpet under the sun. The sky was +blue, the clouds were handfuls of clean cotton floating lazily. Of the +night's storm remained no trace save slippery mud when his horse struck +a patch of clay, which was not often, and the packed sand still wet and +soggy from the beating rain.</p> + +<p>Rock City showed black and inhospitable even in the sunlight. The rock +walls rose sheer, the roofs slanted rakishly, the signs scratched on the +rock by facetious riders were pointless and inane. Lone picked his way +through the crooked defile that was marked <span class="smcap">Main Street</span> on the corner of +the first huge boulder and came abruptly into the road. Here he turned +north and shook his horse into a trot.</p> + +<p>A hundred yards or so down the slope beyond Rock City he pulled up short +with a "What the hell!" that did not sound profane, but merely amazed. +In the sodden road were the unmistakable footprints of a woman. Lone did +not hesitate in naming the sex, for the wet sand held the imprint +cleanly, daintily. Too shapely for a boy, too small for any one but a +child or a woman with little feet, and with the point at the toes +proclaiming the fashion of the towns, Lone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> guessed at once that she was +a town girl, a stranger, probably,—and that she had passed since the +rain; which meant since daylight.</p> + +<p>He swung his horse and rode back, wondering where she could have spent +the night. Halfway through Rock City the footprints ended abruptly, and +Lone turned back, riding down the trail at a lope. She couldn't have +gone far, he reasoned, and if she had been out all night in the rain, +with no better shelter than Rock City afforded, she would need +help,—"and lots of it, and pretty darn quick," he added to John Doe, +which was the ambiguous name of his horse.</p> + +<p>Half a mile farther on he overtook her. Rather, he sighted her in the +trail, saw her duck in amongst the rocks and scattered brush of a small +ravine, and spurred after her. It was precarious footing for his horse +when he left the road, but John Doe was accustomed to that. He jumped +boulders, shied around buckthorn, crashed through sagebrush and so +brought the girl to bay against a wet bank, where she stood shivering. +The terror in her face and her wide eyes would have made her famous in +the movies. It made Lone afraid she was crazy.</p> + +<p>Lone swung off and went up to her guardedly,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> not knowing just what an +insane woman might do when cornered. "There, now, I'm not going to hurt +yuh at all," he soothed. "I guess maybe you're lost. What made you run +away from me when you saw me coming?"</p> + +<p>Lorraine continued to stare at him.</p> + +<p>"I'm going to the ranch, and if you'd like a ride, I'll lend you my +horse. He'll be gentle if I lead him. It's a right smart walk from +here." Lone smiled, meaning to reassure her.</p> + +<p>"Are you the man I saw shoot that man and then fasten him to the stirrup +of the saddle so the horse dragged him down the road? If you are, +I—I——"</p> + +<p>"No—oh, no, I'm not the man," Lone said gently. "I just now came from +home. Better let me take you in to the ranch."</p> + +<p>"I was going to the ranch—did you see him shoot that man and make the +horse drag him—<i>make</i> the horse—he <i>slashed</i> that horse with the +quirt—and he went tearing down the road dragging—it—it +was—<i>horrible</i>!"</p> + +<p>"Yes—yes, don't worry about it. We'll fix him. You come and get on John +Doe and let me take you to the ranch. Come on—you're wet as a ducked +pup."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span>"That man was just riding along—I saw him when it lightened. And he +shot him—oh, can't you <i>do</i> something?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, they're after him right now. Here. Just put your foot in the +stirrup—I'll help you up. Why, you're soaked!" Perseveringly Lone urged +her to the horse. "You're soaking wet!" he exclaimed again.</p> + +<p>"It rained," she muttered confusedly. "I thought it was the ranch—but +they were rocks. Just rocks. Did you <i>see</i> him shoot that man? Why—why +it shouldn't be allowed! He ought to be arrested right away—I'd have +called a policeman but—isn't thunder and lightning just perfectly +<i>awful</i>? And that horse—going down the road dragging——</p> + +<p>"You'd better get some one to double for me in this scene," she said +irrelevantly. "I—I don't know this horse, and if he starts running the +boys might not catch him in time. It isn't safe, is it?"</p> + +<p>"It's safe," said Lone pityingly. "You won't be dragged. You just get on +and ride. I'll lead him. John Doe's gentle as a dog."</p> + +<p>"Just straight riding?" Lorraine considered the matter gravely. +"Wel-ll—but I saw a man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span> dragged, once. He'd been shot first. It—it +was awful!"</p> + +<p>"I'll bet it was. How'd you come to be walking so far?"</p> + +<p>Lorraine looked at him suspiciously. Lone thought her eyes were the most +wonderful eyes—and the most terrible—that he had ever seen. +Almond-shaped they were, the irises a clear, dark gray, the eyeballs +blue-white like a healthy baby's. That was the wonder of them. But their +glassy shine made them terrible. Her lids lifted in a sudden stare.</p> + +<p>"You're not the man, are you? I—I think he was taller than you. And his +hat was brown. He's a brute—a <i>beast</i>! To shoot a man just riding +along—— It rained," she added plaintively. "My bag is back there +somewhere under a bush. I think I could find the bush—it was where a +rabbit was sitting—but he's probably gone by this time. A rabbit," she +told him impressively, "wouldn't sit out in the rain all night, would +he? He'd get wet. And a rabbit would feel horrid when he was wet—such +thick fur he never <i>would</i> get dried out. Where do they go when it +rains? They have holes in the ground, don't they?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span>"Yes. Sure, they do. I'll <i>show</i> you one, down the road here a little +piece. Come on—it ain't far."</p> + +<p>To see a rabbit hole in the ground, Lorraine consented to mount and ride +while Lone walked beside her, agreeing with everything she said that +needed agreement. When she had gone a few rods, however, she began to +call him Charlie and to criticize the direction of the picture. They +should not, she declared, mix murders and thunderstorms in the same +scene. While the storm effect was perfectly <i>wonderful</i>, she thought it +rather detracted from the killing. She did not believe in lumping big +stuff together like that. Why not have the killing done by moonlight, +and use the storm when the murderer was getting away, or something like +that? And as for taking them out on location and making all those storm +scenes without telling them in advance so that they could have dry +clothes afterwards, she thought it a perfect outrage! If it were not for +spoiling the picture, she would quit, she asserted indignantly. She +thought the director had better go back to driving a laundry wagon, +which was probably where he came from.</p> + +<p>Lone agreed with her, even though he did not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> know what she was talking +about. He walked as fast as he could, but even so he could not travel +the six miles to the ranch very quickly. He could see that the girl was +burning up with fever, and he could hear her voice growing husky,—could +hear, too, the painful laboring of her breath. When she was not mumbling +incoherent nonsense she was laughing hoarsely at the plight she was in, +and after that she would hold both hands to her chest and moan in a way +that made Lone grind his teeth.</p> + +<p>When he lifted her off his horse at the foreman's cottage she was +whispering things no one could understand. Three cowpunchers came +running and hindered him a good deal in carrying her into the house, and +the foreman's wife ran excitedly from one room to the other, asking +questions and demanding that some one do something "for pity's sake, she +may be dying for all you know, while you stand there gawping like +fool-hens."</p> + +<p>"She was out all night in the rain—got lost, somehow. She said she was +coming here, so I brought her on. She's down with a cold, Mrs. Hawkins. +Better take off them wet clothes and put hot blankets around her. And a +poultice or<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> something on her chest, I reckon." Lone turned to the door, +stopped to roll a cigarette, and watched Mrs. Hawkins hurrying to +Lorraine with a whisky toddy the cook had mixed for her.</p> + +<p>"A sweat's awful good for a cold like she's got," he volunteered +practically. "She's out of her head—or she was when I found her. But I +reckon that's mostly scare, from being lost all night. Give her a good +sweat, why don't you?" He reached the doorstep and then turned back to +add, "She left a grip back somewhere along the road. I'll go hunt it up, +I reckon."</p> + +<p>He mounted John Doe and rode down to the corral, where two or three +riders were killing time on various pretexts while they waited for +details of Lone's adventure. Delirious young women of the silk-stocking +class did not arrive at the Sawtooth every morning, and it was rumored +already amongst the men that she was some looker, which naturally +whetted their interest in her.</p> + +<p>"I'll bet it's one of Bob's girls, come trailin' him up. Mebby another +of them heart-ballum cases of Bob's," hazarded Pop Bridgers, who read +nothing unless it was printed on pink paper, and who refused to believe +that any good could come<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> out of a city. "Ain't that right, Loney? +Hain't she a heart-ballum girl of Bob's?"</p> + +<p>From the saddle Lone stared down impassively at Pop and Pop's +companions. "I don't know a thing about her," he stated emphatically. +"She said she was coming to the ranch, and she was scared of the thunder +and lightning. That's every word of sense I could get outa her. She +ain't altogether ignorant—she knows how to climb on a horse, anyway, +and she kicked about having to ride sideways on account of her skirts. +She was plumb out of her head, and talked wild, but she handled her +reins like a rider. And she never mentioned Bob, nor anybody else +excepting some fellow she called Charlie. She thought I was him, but she +only talked to me friendly. She didn't pull any love talk at all."</p> + +<p>"Charlie?" Pop ruminated over a fresh quid of tobacco. "Charlie! Mebby +Bob, he stakes himself to a different name now and then. There ain't any +Charlie, except Charlie Werner; she wouldn't mean him, do yuh s'pose?"</p> + +<p>"Charlie Werner? Hunh! Say, Pop, she ain't no squaw—is she, Loney?" Sid +Sterling remonstrated.</p> + +<p>"If I can read brands," Lone testified, "she's<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> no girl of Bob's. She's +a good, honest girl when she ain't crazy."</p> + +<p>"And no good, honest girl who is not crazy could possibly be a girl of +mine! Is that the idea, Lone?"</p> + +<p>Lone turned unhurriedly and looked at young Bob Warfield standing in the +stable door with his hands in his trousers pockets and his pipe in his +mouth.</p> + +<p>"That ain't the argument. Pop, here, was wondering if she was another +heart-ballum girl of yours," Lone grinned unabashed. "I don't know such +a hell of a lot about heart-balm ladies, Bob. I ain't a millionaire. I'm +just making a guess at their brand—and it ain't the brand this little +lady carries."</p> + +<p>Bob removed one hand from his pocket and cuddled the bowl of his pipe. +"If she's a woman, she's a heart-balmer if she gets the chance. They all +are, down deep in their tricky hearts. There isn't a woman on earth that +won't sell a man's soul out of his body if she happens to think it's +worth her while—and she can get away with it. But don't for any sake +call her <i>my</i> heart-balmer."</p> + +<p>"That was Pop," drawled Lone. "It don't strike me as being any subject +for you fellows to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> make remarks about, anyway," he advised Pop firmly. +"She's a right nice little girl, and she's pretty darn sick." He touched +John Doe with the spurs and rode away, stopping at the foreman's gate to +finish his business with Hawkins. He was a conscientious young man, and +since he had charge of Elk Spring camp, he set its interests above his +own, which was more than some of the Sawtooth men would have done in his +place.</p> + +<p>Having reported the damage to the bridge and made his suggestions about +the repairs, he touched up John Doe again and loped away on a purely +personal matter, which had to do with finding the bag which the girl had +told him was under a bush where a rabbit had been sitting.</p> + +<p>If she had not been so very sick, Lone would have laughed at her naïve +method of identifying the spot. But he was too sorry for her to be +amused at the vagaries of her sick brain. He did not believe anything +she had said, except that she had been coming to the ranch and had left +her bag under a bush beside the road. It should not be difficult to find +it, if he followed the road and watched closely the bushes on either +side.</p> + +<p>Until he reached the place where he had first<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> sighted her, Lone rode +swiftly, anxious to be through with the business and go his way. But +when he came upon her footprints again, he pulled up and held John Doe +to a walk, scanning each bush and boulder as he passed.</p> + +<p>It seemed probable that she had left the grip at Rock City where she +must have spent the night. She had spoken of being deceived into +thinking the place was the Sawtooth ranch until she had come into it and +found it "just rocks." Then, he reasoned, the storm had broken, and her +fright had held her there. When daylight came she had either forgotten +the bag or had left it deliberately.</p> + +<p>At Rock City, then, Lone stopped to examine the base of every rock, even +riding around those nearest the road. The girl, he guessed shrewdly, had +not wandered off the main highway, else she would not have been able to +find it again. Rock City was confusing unless one was perfectly familiar +with its curious, winding lanes.</p> + +<p>It was when he was riding slowly around the boulder marked "Palace +Hotel, Rates Reasnible," that he came upon the place where a horse had +stood, on the side best sheltered from the storm. Deep hoof marks +closely overlapping, an over-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span>turned stone here and there gave proof +enough, and the rain-beaten soil that blurred the hoofprints farthest +from the rock told him more. Lone backed away, dismounted, and, stepping +carefully, went close. He could see no reason why a horse should have +stood there with his head toward the road ten feet away, unless his +rider was waiting for something—or some one. There were other boulders +near which offered more shelter from rain.</p> + +<p>Next the rock he discovered a boot track, evidently made when the rider +dismounted. He thought of the wild statement of the girl about seeing +some one shoot a man and wondered briefly if there could be a basis of +truth in what she said. But the road showed no sign of a struggle, +though there were, here and there, hoofprints half washed out with the +rain.</p> + +<p>Lone went back to his horse and rode on, still looking for the bag. His +search was thorough and, being a keen-eyed young man, he discovered the +place where Lorraine had crouched down by a rock. She must have stayed +there all night, for the scuffed soil was dry where her body had rested, +and her purse, caught in the juniper bush close by, was sodden with +rain.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span>"The poor little kid!" he muttered, and with, a sudden impulse he turned +and looked toward the rock behind which the horse had stood. Help had +been that close, and she had not known it, unless——</p> + +<p>"If anything happened there last night, she could have seen it from +here," he decided, and immediately put the thought away from him.</p> + +<p>"But nothing happened," he added, "unless maybe she saw him ride out and +go on down the road. She was out of her head and just imagined things."</p> + +<p>He slipped the soaked purse into his coat pocket, remounted and rode on +slowly, looking for the grip and half-believing she had not been +carrying one, but had dreamed it just as she had dreamed that a man had +been shot.</p> + +<p>He rode past the bag without seeing it, for Lorraine had thrust it far +back under a stocky bush whose scraggly branches nearly touched the +ground. So he came at last to the creek, swollen with the night's storm +so that it was swift and dangerous. Lone was turning back when John Doe +threw up his head, stared up the creek for a moment and whinnied +shrilly. Lone stood in the stirrups and looked.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span>A blaze-faced horse was standing a short rifle-shot away, bridled and +with an empty saddle. Whether he was tied or not Lone could not tell at +that distance, but he knew the horse by its banged forelock and its +white face and sorrel ears, and he knew the owner of the horse. He rode +toward it slowly.</p> + +<p>"Whoa, you rattle-headed fool," he admonished, when the horse snorted +and backed a step or two as he approached. He saw the bridle-reins +dangling, broken, where the horse had stepped on them in running. "Broke +loose and run off again," he said, as he took down his rope and widened +the loop. "I'll bet Thurman would sell you for a bent nickel, this +morning."</p> + +<p>The horse squatted and jumped when he cast the loop, and then stood +quivering and snorting while Lone dismounted and started toward him. Ten +steps from the horse Lone stopped short, staring. For down in the bushes +on the farther side half lay, half hung the limp form of a man.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_FIVE" id="CHAPTER_FIVE"></a>CHAPTER FIVE</h2> + +<h4>A DEATH "BY ACCIDENT"</h4> + + +<p>Lone Morgan was a Virginian by birth, though few of his acquaintances +knew it. Lone never talked of himself except as his personal history +touched a common interest with his fellows. But until he was seventeen +he had lived very close to the center of one of the deadliest feuds of +the Blue Ridge. That he had been neutral was merely an accident of +birth, perhaps. And that he had not become involved in the quarrel that +raged among his neighbors was the direct result of a genius for holding +his tongue. He had attended the funerals of men shot down in their own +dooryards, he had witnessed the trials of the killers. He had grown up +with the settled conviction that other men's quarrels did not concern +him so long as he was not directly involved, and that what did not +concern him he had no right to discuss. If he stood aside and let +violence stalk by unhindered, he was merely doing what he had been +taught to do from the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> time he could walk. "Mind your own business and +let other folks do the same," had been the family slogan in Lone's home. +There had been nothing in Lone's later life to convince him that minding +his own business was not a very good habit. It had grown to be second +nature,—and it had made him a good man for the Sawtooth Cattle Company +to have on its pay roll.</p> + +<p>Just now Lone was stirred beyond his usual depth of emotion, and it was +not altogether the sight of Fred Thurman's battered body that unnerved +him. He wanted to believe that Thurman's death was purely an +accident,—the accident it appeared. But Lorraine and the telltale +hoofprints by the rock compelled him to believe that it was not an +accident. He knew that if he examined carefully enough Fred Thurman's +body he would find the mark of a bullet. He was tempted to look, and yet +he did not want to know. It was no business of his; it would be foolish +to let it become his business.</p> + +<p>"He's too dead to care now how it happened—and it would only stir up +trouble," he finally decided and turned his eyes away.</p> + +<p>He pulled the twisted foot from the stirrup, left the body where it lay, +and led the blaze-faced<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> horse to a tree and tied it securely. He took +off his coat and spread it over the head and shoulders of the dead man, +weighted the edges with rocks and rode away.</p> + +<p>Halfway up the hill he left the road and took a narrow trail through the +sage, a short-cut that would save him a couple of miles.</p> + +<p>The trail crossed the ridge half a mile beyond Rock City, dipping into +the lower end of the small gulch where he had overtaken the girl. The +place recalled with fresh vividness, her first words to him: "Are <i>you</i> +the man I saw shoot that other man and fasten his foot in the stirrup?" +Lone shivered and threw away the cigarette he had just lighted.</p> + +<p>"My God, that girl mustn't tell that to any one else!" he exclaimed +apprehensively. "No matter who she is or what she is, she mustn't tell +that!"</p> + +<p>"Hello! Who you talking to? I heard somebody talking——" The bushes +parted above a low, rocky ledge and a face peered out, smiling +good-humoredly. Lone started a little and pulled up.</p> + +<p>"Oh, hello, Swan. I was just telling this horse of mine all I was going +to do to him. Say,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> you're a chancey bird, Swan, yelling from the brush, +like that. Some folks woulda taken a shot at you."</p> + +<p>"Then they'd hit me, sure," Swan observed, letting himself down into the +trail. He, too, was wet from his hat crown to his shoes, that squelched +when he landed lightly on his toes. "Anybody would be ashamed to shoot +at a mark so large as I am. I'd say they're poor shooters." And he added +irrelevantly, as he held up a grayish pelt, "I got that coyote I been +chasing for two weeks. He was sure smart. He had me guessing. But I made +him guess some, maybe. He guessed wrong this time."</p> + +<p>Lone's eyes narrowed while he looked Swan over. "You must have been out +all night," he said. "You're crazier about hunting than I am."</p> + +<p>"Wet bushes," Swan corrected carelessly. "I been tramping since +daylight. It's my work to hunt, like it's your work to ride." He had +swung into the trail ahead of John Doe and was walking with long +strides,—the tallest, straightest, limberest young Swede in all the +country. He had the bluest eyes, the readiest smile, the healthiest +color, the sunniest hair and disposition the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span> Sawtooth country had seen +for many a day. He had homesteaded an eighty-acre claim on the south +side of Bear Top and had by that means gained possession of two living +springs and the only accessible portion of Wilder Creek where it crossed +the meadow called Skyline before it plunged into a gulch too narrow for +cattle to water with any safety.</p> + +<p>The Sawtooth Cattle Company had for years "covered" that eighty-acre +patch of government land, never dreaming that any one would ever file on +it. Swan Vjolmar was there and had his log cabin roofed and ready for +the door and windows before the Sawtooth discovered his presence. Now, +nearly a year afterwards, he was accepted in a tolerant, half-friendly +spirit. He had not objected to the Sawtooth cattle which still watered +at Skyline Meadow. He was a "Government hunter" and he had killed many +coyotes and lynx and even a mountain lion or two. Lone wondered +sometimes what the Sawtooth meant to do about the Swede, but so far the +Sawtooth seemed inclined to do nothing at all, evidently thinking his +war on animal pests more than atoned for his effrontery in taking +Skyline as a homestead. When he had proven up on his claim<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> they would +probably buy him out and have the water still.</p> + +<p>"Well, what do you know?" Swan turned his head to inquire abruptly. +"You're pretty quiet."</p> + +<p>Lone roused himself. "Fred Thurman's been dragged to death by that +damned flighty horse of his," he said. "I found him in the brush this +side of Granite Creek. Had his foot caught in the stirrup. I thought I'd +best leave him there till the coroner can view him."</p> + +<p>Swan stopped short in the trail and turned facing Lone. "Last night my +dog Yack whines to go out. He went and sat in a place where he looks +down on the walley, and he howled for half an hour. I said then that +somebody in the walley has died. That dog is something queer about it. +He knows things."</p> + +<p>"I'm going to the Sawtooth," Lone told him. "I can telephone to the +coroner from there. Anybody at Thurman's place, do you know?"</p> + +<p>Swan shook his head and started again down the winding, steep trail. "I +don't hunt over that way for maybe a week. That's too bad he's killed. I +like Fred Thurman. He's a fine man, you bet."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span>"He was," said Lone soberly. "It's a damn shame he had to go—like +that."</p> + +<p>Swan glanced back at him, studied Lone's face for an instant and turned +into a tributary gully where a stream trickled down over water-worn +rocks. "Here I leave you," he volunteered, as Lone came abreast of him. +"A coyote's crossed up there, and I maybe find his tracks. I could go do +chores for Fred Thurman if nobody's there. Should I do that? What you +say, Lone?"</p> + +<p>"You might drift around by there if it ain't too much out of your way, +and see if he's got a man on the ranch," Lone suggested. "But you better +not touch anything in the house, Swan. The coroner'll likely appoint +somebody to look around and see if he's got any folks to send his stuff +to. Just feed any stock that's kept up, if nobody's there."</p> + +<p>"All right," Swan agreed readily. "I'll do that, Lone. Good-by."</p> + +<p>Lone nodded and watched him climb the steep slope of the gulch on the +side toward Thurman's ranch. Swan climbed swiftly, seeming to take no +thought of where he put his feet, yet never once slipping or slowing. In +two minutes he was out of sight, and Lone rode on moodily, trying not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> +to think of Fred Thurman, trying to shut from his mind the things that +wild-eyed, hoarse-voiced girl had told him.</p> + +<p>"Lone, you mind your own business," he advised himself once. "You don't +know anything that's going to do any one any good, and what you don't +know there's no good guessing. But that girl—she mustn't talk like +that!"</p> + +<p>Of Swan he scarcely gave a thought after the Swede had disappeared, yet +Swan was worth a thought or two, even from a man who was bent on minding +his own business. Swan had no sooner climbed the gulch toward Thurman's +claim than he proceeded to descend rather carefully to the bottom again, +walk along on the rocks for some distance and climb to the ridge whose +farther slope led down to Granite Creek. He did not follow the trail, +but struck straight across an outcropping ledge, descended to Granite +Creek and strode along next the hill where the soil was gravelly and +barren. When he had gone some distance, he sat down and took from under +his coat two huge, crudely made moccasins of coyote skin. These he +pulled on over his shoes, tied them around his ankles and went on, still +keeping close under the hill.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span>He reached the place where Fred Thurman lay, stood well away from the +body and studied every detail closely. Then, stepping carefully on +trampled brush and rocks, he approached and cautiously lifted Lone's +coat. It was not a pretty sight, but Swan's interest held him there for +perhaps ten minutes, his eyes leaving the body only when the blaze-faced +horse moved. Then Swan would look up quickly at the horse, seem +reassured when he saw that the animal was not watching anything at a +distance, and return to his curious task. Finally he drew the coat back +over the head and shoulders, placed each stone exactly as he had found +it and went up to the horse, examining the saddle rather closely. After +that he retreated as carefully as he had approached. When he had gone +half a mile or so upstream he found a place where he could wash his +hands without wetting his moccasins, returned to the rocky hillside and +took off the clumsy footgear and stowed them away under his coat. Then +with long strides that covered the ground as fast as a horse could do +without loping, Swan headed as straight as might be for the Thurman +ranch.</p> + +<p>About noon Swan approached the crowd of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span> men and a few women who stood +at a little distance and whispered together, with their faces averted +from the body around which the men stood grouped. The news had spread as +such news will, even in a country so sparsely settled as the Sawtooth. +Swan counted forty men,—he did not bother with the women. Fred Thurman +had been known to every one of them. Some one had spread a piece of +canvas over the corpse, and Swan did not go very near. The blaze-faced +horse had been led farther away and tied to a cottonwood, where some one +had thrown down a bundle of hay. The Sawtooth country was rather +punctilious in its duty toward the law, and it was generally believed +that the coroner would want to see the horse that had caused the +tragedy.</p> + +<p>Half an hour after Swan arrived, the coroner came in a machine, and with +him came the sheriff. The coroner, an important little man, examined the +body, the horse and the saddle, and there was the usual formula of +swearing in a jury. The inquest was rather short, since there was only +one witness to testify, and Lone merely told how he had discovered the +horse there by the creek, and that the body had not been moved from +where he found it.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span>Swan went over to where Lone, anxious to get away from the place, was +untying his horse after the jury had officially named the death an +accident.</p> + +<p>"I guess those horses could be turned loose," he began without prelude. +"What you think, Lone? I been to Thurman's ranch, and I don't find +anybody. Some horses in a corral, and pigs in a pen, and chickens. I +guess Thurman was living alone. Should I tell the coroner that?"</p> + +<p>"I dunno," Lone replied shortly. "You might speak to the sheriff. I +reckon he's the man to take charge of things."</p> + +<p>"It's bad business, getting killed," Swan said vaguely. "It makes me +feel damn sorry when I go to that ranch. There's the horses waiting for +breakfast—and Thurman, he's dead over here and can't feed his pigs and +his chickens. It's a white cat over there that comes to meet me and rubs +my leg and purrs like it's lonesome. That's a nice ranch he's got, too. +Now what becomes of that ranch? What you think, Lone?"</p> + +<p>"Hell, how should I know?" Lone scowled at him from the saddle and rode +away, leaving Swan standing there staring after him. He turned away to +find the sheriff and almost col<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span>lided with Brit Hunter, who was glancing +speculatively from him to Lone Morgan. Swan stopped and put out his hand +to shake.</p> + +<p>"Lone says I should tell the sheriff I could look after Fred Thurman's +ranch. What you think, Mr. Hunter?"</p> + +<p>"Good idea, I guess. Somebody'll have to. They can't——" He checked +himself. "You got a horse? I'll ride over with yuh, maybe."</p> + +<p>"I got legs," Swan returned laconically. "They don't get scared, Mr. +Hunter, and maybe kill me sometime. You could tell the sheriff I'm +government hunter and honest man, and I take good care of things. You +could do that, please?"</p> + +<p>"Sure," said Brit and rode over to where the sheriff was standing.</p> + +<p>The sheriff listened, nodded, beckoned to Swan. "The court'll have to +settle up the estate and find his heirs, if he's got any. But you look +after things—what's your name? Vjolmar—how yuh spell it? I'll swear +you in as a deputy. Good Lord, you're a husky son-of-a-gun!" The +sheriff's eyes went up to Swan's hat crown, descended to his shoulders +and lingered there admiringly for a moment, traveled down his flat, +hard-muscled body and his straight legs. "I'll bet you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span> could put up +some fight, if you had to," he commented.</p> + +<p>Swan grinned good-humoredly, glanced conscience-stricken at the covered +figure on the ground and straightened his face decorously.</p> + +<p>"I could lick you good," he admitted in a stage whisper. "I'm a +son-off-a-gun all right—only I don't never get mad at somebody."</p> + +<p>Brit Hunter smiled at that, it was so like Swan Vjolmar. But when they +were halfway to Thurman's ranch—Brit on horseback and Swan striding +easily along beside him, leading the blaze-faced horse, he glanced down +at Swan's face and wondered if Swan had not lied a little.</p> + +<p>"What's on your mind, Swan?" he asked abruptly.</p> + +<p>Swan started and looked up at him, glanced at the empty hills on either +side, and stopped still in the trail.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Hunter, you been longer in the country than I have been. You seen +some good riding, I bet. Maybe you see some men ride backwards on a +horse?"</p> + +<p>Brit looked at him uncomprehendingly. "Backwards?"</p> + +<p>Swan led up the blaze-faced horse and pointed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span> to the right stirrup. +"Spurs would scratch like that if you jerk your foot, maybe. You're a +good rider, Mr. Hunter, you can tell. That's a right stirrup, ain't it? +Fred Thurman, he's got his left foot twist around, all broke from +jerking in his stirrup. Left foot in right stirrup——" He pushed back +his hat and rumpled his yellow hair, looking up into Brit's face +inquiringly. "Left foot in right stirrup is riding backwards. That's a +damn good rider to ride like that—what you think, Mr. Hunter?"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_SIX" id="CHAPTER_SIX"></a>CHAPTER SIX</h2> + +<h4>LONE ADVISES SILENCE</h4> + + +<p>Twice in the next week Lone found an excuse for riding over to the +Sawtooth. During his first visit, the foreman's wife told him that the +young lady was still too sick to talk much. The second time he went, Pop +Bridgers spied him first and cackled over his coming to see the girl. +Lone grinned and dissembled as best he could, knowing that Pop Bridgers +fed his imagination upon denials and argument and remonstrance and was +likely to build gossip that might spread beyond the Sawtooth. Wherefore +he did not go near the foreman's house that day, but contented himself +with gathering from Pop's talk that the girl was still there.</p> + +<p>After that he rode here and there, wherever he would be likely to meet a +Sawtooth rider, and so at last he came upon Al Woodruff loping along the +crest of Juniper Ridge. Al at first displayed no intention of stopping, +but pulled up when he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> saw John Doe slowing down significantly. Lone +would have preferred a chat with some one else, for this was a +sharp-eyed, sharp-tongued man; but Al Woodruff stayed at the ranch and +would know all the news, and even though he might give it an ill-natured +twist, Lone would at least know what was going on. Al hailed him with a +laughing epithet.</p> + +<p>"Say, you sure enough played hell all around, bringin' Brit Hunter's +girl to the Sawtooth!" he began, chuckling as if he had some secret +joke. "Where'd you pick her up, Lone? She claims you found her at Rock +City. That right?"</p> + +<p>"No, it ain't right," Lone denied promptly, his dark eyes meeting Al's +glance steadily. "I found her in that gulch away this side. She was in +amongst the rocks where she was trying to keep outa the rain. Brit +Hunter's girl, is she? She told me she was going to the Sawtooth. She'd +have made it, too, if it hadn't been for the storm. She got as far as +the gulch, and the lightning scared her from going any farther." He +offered Al his tobacco sack and fumbled for a match. "I never knew Brit +Hunter had a girl."</p> + +<p>"Nor me," Al said and sifted tobacco into a cigarette paper. "Bob, he +drove her over there<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span> yesterday. Took him close to all day to make the +trip—and Bob, he claims to hate women!"</p> + +<p>"So would I, if I'd got stung for fifty thousand. She ain't that kind. +She's a nice girl, far as I could tell. She got well, all right, did +she?"</p> + +<p>"Yeah—only she was still coughing some when she left the ranch. She +like to of had pneumonia, I guess. Queer how she claimed she spent the +night in Rock City, ain't it?"</p> + +<p>"No," Lone answered judicially, "I don't know as it's so queer. She +never realized how far she'd walked, I reckon. She was plumb crazy when +I found her. You couldn't take any stock in what she said. Say, you +didn't see that bay I was halter-breaking, did yuh, Al? He jumped the +fence and got away on me, day before yesterday. I'd like to catch him up +again. He'll make a good horse."</p> + +<p>Al had not seen the bay, and the talk tapered off desultorily to a final +"So-long, see yuh later." Lone rode on, careful not to look back. So she +was Brit Hunter's girl! Lone whistled softly to himself while he studied +this new angle of the problem,—for a problem he was beginning to +consider it. She was Brit Hunter's girl, and she had told them at the +Sawtooth that she had spent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> the night at Rock City. He wondered how +much else she had told; how much she remembered of what she had told +him.</p> + +<p>He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a round leather purse +with a chain handle. It was soiled and shrunken with its wetting, and +the clasp had flecks of rust upon it. What it contained Lone did not +know. Virginia had taught him that a man must not be curious about the +personal belongings of a woman. Now he turned the purse over, tried to +rub out the stiffness of the leather, and smiled a little as he dropped +it back into his pocket.</p> + +<p>"I've got my calling card," he said softly to John Doe. "I reckon I had +the right hunch when I didn't turn it over to Mrs. Hawkins. I'll ask her +again about that grip she said she hid under a bush. I never heard about +any of the boys finding it."</p> + +<p>His thoughts returned to Al Woodruff and stopped there. Determined still +to attend strictly to his own affairs, his thoughts persisted in playing +truant and in straying to a subject he much preferred not to think of at +all. Why should Al Woodruff be interested in the exact spot where Brit +Hunter's daughter had spent the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> night of the storm? Why should Lone +instinctively discount her statement and lie whole-heartedly about it?</p> + +<p>"Now if Al catches me up in that, he'll think I know a lot I don't know, +or else——" He halted his thoughts there, for that, too, was a +forbidden subject.</p> + +<p>Forbidden subjects are like other forbidden things: they have a way of +making themselves very conspicuous. Lone was heading for the Quirt ranch +by the most direct route, fearing, perhaps, that if he waited he would +lose his nerve and would not go at all. Yet it was important that he +should go; he must return the girl's purse!</p> + +<p>The most direct route to the Quirt took him down Juniper Ridge and +across Granite Creek near the Thurman ranch. Indeed, if he followed the +trail up Granite Creek and across the hilly country to Quirt Creek, he +must pass within fifty yards of the Thurman cabin. Lone's time was +limited, yet he took the direct route rather reluctantly. He did not +want to be reminded too sharply of Fred Thurman as a man who had lived +his life in his own way and had died so horribly.</p> + +<p>"Well, he didn't have it coming to him—but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span> it's done and over with, +now, so it's no use thinking about it," he reflected, when the roofs of +the Thurman ranch buildings began to show now and then through the thin +ranks of the cottonwoods along the creek.</p> + +<p>But his face sobered as he rode along. It seemed to him that the sleepy +little meadows, the quiet murmuring of the creek, even the soft rustling +of the cottonwood leaves breathed a new loneliness, an emptiness where +the man who had called this place home, who had clung to it in the face +of opposition that was growing into open warfare, had lived and had left +life suddenly—unwarrantably, Lone knew in his heart. It might be of no +use to think about it, but the vivid memory of Fred Thurman was with him +when he rode up the trail to the stable and the small corrals. He had to +think, whether he would or no.</p> + +<p>At the corral he came unexpectedly in sight of the Swede, who grinned a +guileless welcome and came toward him, so that Lone could not ride on +unless he would advertise his dislike of the place. John Doe, plainly +glad to find an excuse to stop, slowed and came to where Swan waited by +the gate.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span>"By golly, this is lonesome here," Swan complained, heaving a great +sigh. "That judge don't get busy pretty quick, I'm maybe jumping my job. +Lone, what you think? You believe in ghosts?"</p> + +<p>"Naw. What's on your chest, Swan?" Lone slipped sidewise in the saddle, +resting his muscles. "You been seeing things?"</p> + +<p>"No—I don't be seeing things, Lone. But sometimes I been—like I <i>feel</i> +something." He stared at Lone questioningly. "What you think, Lone, if +you be sitting down eating your supper, maybe, and you feel something +say words in your brain? Like you know something talks to you and then +quits."</p> + +<p>Lone gave Swan a long, measuring look, and Swan laughed uneasily.</p> + +<p>"That sounds crazy. But it's true, what something tells me in my brain. +I go and look, and by golly, it's there just like the words tell me."</p> + +<p>Lone straightened in the saddle. "You better come clean, Swan, and tell +the whole thing. What was it? Don't talk in circles. What words did you +feel—in your brain?" In spite of himself, Lone felt as he had when the +girl had talked to him and called him Charlie.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span>Swan closed the gate behind him with steady hands. His lips were pressed +firmly together, as if he had definitely made up his mind to something. +Lone was impressed somehow with Swan's perfect control of his speech, +his thoughts, his actions. But he was puzzled rather than anything else, +and when Swan turned, facing him, Lone's bewilderment did not lessen.</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you. It's when I'm sitting down to eat my supper. I'm just +reaching out my hand like this, to get my coffee. And something says in +my head, 'It's a lie. I don't ride backwards. Go look at my saddle. +There's blood——' And that's all. It's like the words go far away so I +can't hear any more. So I eat my supper, and then I get the lantern and +I go look. You come with me, Lone. I'll show you."</p> + +<p>Without a word Lone dismounted and followed Swan into a small shed +beside the stable, where a worn stock saddle hung suspended from a +crosspiece, a rawhide string looped over the horn. Lone did not ask +whose saddle it was, nor did Swan name the owner. There was no need.</p> + +<p>Swan took the saddle and swung it around so that the right side was +toward them. It was what is called a full-stamped saddle, with the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> +popular wild-rose design on skirts and cantle. Much hard use and +occasional oilings had darkened the leather to a rich, red brown, marred +with old scars and scratches and the stains of many storms.</p> + +<p>"Blood is hard to find when it's raining all night," Swan observed, +speaking low as one does in the presence of death. "But if somebody is +bleeding and falls off a horse slow, and catches hold of things and +tries like hell to hang on——" He lifted the small flap that covered +the cinch ring and revealed a reddish, flaked stain. Phlegmatically he +wetted his finger tip on his tongue, rubbed the stain and held up his +finger for Lone to see. "That's a damn funny place for blood, when a man +is dragging on the ground," he commented drily. "And something else is +damn funny, Lone."</p> + +<p>He lifted the wooden stirrup and touched with his finger the rowel +marks. "That is on the front part," he said. "I could swear in court +that Fred's left foot was twisted—that's damn funny, Lone. I don't see +men ride backwards, much."</p> + +<p>Lone turned on him and struck the stirrup from his hand. "I think you +better forget it,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span> he said fiercely. "He's dead—it can't help him any +to——" He stopped and pulled himself together. "Swan, you take a fool's +advice and don't tell anybody else about feeling words talk in your +head. They'll have you in the bug-house at Blackfoot, sure as you live." +He looked at the saddle, hesitated, looked again at Swan, who was +watching him. "That blood most likely got there when Fred was packing a +deer in from the hills. And marks on them old oxbow stirrups don't mean +a damn thing but the need of a new pair, maybe." He forced a laugh and +stepped outside the shed. "Just shows you, Swan, that imagination and +being alone all the time can raise Cain with a fellow. You want to watch +yourself."</p> + +<p>Swan followed him out, closing the door carefully behind him. "By golly, +I'm watching out now," he assented thoughtfully. "You don't tell +anybody, Lone."</p> + +<p>"No, I won't tell anybody—and I'd advise you not to," Lone repeated +grimly. "Just keep those thoughts outa your head, Swan. They're bad +medicine."</p> + +<p>He mounted John Doe and rode away, his eyes downcast, his quirt slapping +absently the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> weeds along the trail. It was not his business, and +yet—— Lone shook himself together and put John Doe into a lope. He had +warned Swan, and he could do no more.</p> + +<p>Halfway to the Quirt he met Lorraine riding along the trail. She would +have passed him with no sign of recognition, but Lone lifted his hat and +stopped. Lorraine looked at him, rode on a few steps and turned. "Did +you wish to speak about something?" she asked impersonally.</p> + +<p>Lone felt the flush in his cheeks, which angered him to the point of +speaking curtly. "Yes. I found your purse where you dropped it that +night you were lost. I was bringing it over to you. My name's Morgan. +I'm the man that found you and took you in to the ranch."</p> + +<p>"Oh." Lorraine looked at him steadily. "You're the one they call Loney?"</p> + +<p>"When they're feeling good toward me. I'm Lone Morgan. I went back to +find your grip—you said you left it under a bush, but the world's plumb +full of bushes. I found your purse, though."</p> + +<p>"Thank you so much. I must have been an awful nuisance, but I was so +scared—and things were terribly mixed in my mind. I didn't even<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> have +sense enough to tell you what ranch I was trying to find, did I? So you +took me to the wrong one, and I was a week there before I found it out. +And then they were perfectly lovely about it and brought me—home." She +turned the purse over and over in her hands, looking at it without much +interest. She seemed in no hurry to ride on, which gave Lone courage.</p> + +<p>"There's something I'd like to say," he began, groping for words that +would make his meaning plain without telling too much. "I hope you won't +mind my telling you. You were kinda out of your head when I found you, +and you said something about seeing a man shot and——"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" Lorraine looked up at him, looked through him, he thought, with +those brilliant eyes of hers. "Then I did tell——"</p> + +<p>"I just wanted to say," Lone interrupted her, "that I knew all the time +it was just a nightmare. I never mentioned it to anybody, and you'll +forget all about it, I hope. You didn't tell any one else, did you?"</p> + +<p>He looked up at her again and found her studying him curiously. "You're +not the man I saw," she said, as if she were satisfying herself on that +point. "I've wondered since—but I was sure,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span> too, that I had seen it. +Why mustn't I tell any one?"</p> + +<p>Lone did not reply at once. The girl's eyes were disconcertingly direct, +her voice and her manner disturbed him with their judicial calmness, so +at variance with the wildness he remembered.</p> + +<p>"Well, it's hard to explain," he said at last. "You're strange to this +country, and you don't know all the ins and outs of—things. It wouldn't +do any good to you or anybody else, and it might do a lot of harm." His +eyes nicked her face with a wistful glance. "You don't know me—I really +haven't got any right to ask or expect you to trust me. But I wish you +would, to the extent of forgetting that you saw—or thought you +saw—anything that night in Rock City."</p> + +<p>Lorraine shivered and covered her eyes swiftly with one hand. His words +had brought back too sharply that scene. But she shook off the emotion +and faced him again.</p> + +<p>"I saw a man murdered," she cried. "I wasn't sure afterwards; sometimes +I thought I had dreamed it. But I was sure I saw it. I saw the horse go +by, running—and you want me to keep still about that? What harm could +it do to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span> tell? Perhaps it's true—perhaps I did see it all. I might +think you were trying to cover up something—only, you're not the man I +saw—or thought I saw."</p> + +<p>"No, of course I'm not. You dreamed the whole thing, and the way you +talked to me was so wild, folks would say you're crazy if they heard you +tell it. You're a stranger here, Miss Hunter, and—your father is not as +popular in this country as he might be. He's got enemies that would be +glad of the chance to stir up trouble for him. You—just dreamed all +that. I'm asking you to forget a bad dream, that's all, and not go +telling it to other folks."</p> + +<p>For some time Lorraine did not answer. The horses conversed with sundry +nose-rubbings, nibbled idly at convenient brush tips, and wondered no +doubt why their riders were so silent. Lone tried to think of some +stronger argument, some appeal that would reach the girl without +frightening her or causing her to distrust him. But he did not know what +more he could say without telling her what must not be told.</p> + +<p>"Just how would it make trouble for my father?" Lorraine asked at last. +"I can't believe you'd ask me to help cover up a crime, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> it seems +hard to believe that a nightmare would cause any great commotion. And +why is my father unpopular?"</p> + +<p>"Well, you don't know this country," Lone parried inexpertly. "It's all +right in some ways, and in some ways it could be a lot improved. Folks +haven't got much to talk about. They go around gabbling their heads off +about every little thing, and adding onto it until you can't recognize +your own remarks after they've been peddled for a week. You've maybe +seen places like that."</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes." Lorraine's eyes lighted with a smile. "Take a movie studio, +for instance."</p> + +<p>"Yes. Well, you being a stranger, you would get all the worst of it. I +just thought I'd tell you; I'd hate to see you misunderstood by folks +around here. I—I feel kinda responsible for you; I'm the one that found +you."</p> + +<p>Lorraine's eyes twinkled. "Well, I'm glad to know one person in the +country who doesn't gabble his head off. You haven't answered any of my +questions, and you've made me feel as if you'd found a dangerous, wild +woman that morning. It isn't very flattering, but I think you're honest, +anyway."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span>Lone smiled for the first time, and she found his smile pleasant. "I'm +no angel," he disclaimed modestly, "and most folks think I could be +improved on a whole lot. But I'm honest in one way. I'm thinking about +what's best for you, this time."</p> + +<p>"I'm terribly grateful," Lorraine laughed. "I shall take great care not +to go all around the country telling people my dreams. I can see that it +wouldn't make me awfully popular." Then she sobered. "Mr. Morgan, that +was a <i>horrible</i> kind of—nightmare. Why, even last night I woke up +shivering, just imagining it all over again."</p> + +<p>"It was sure horrible the way you talked about it," Lone assured her. +"It's because you were sick, I reckon. I wish you'd tell me as close as +you can where you left that grip of yours. You said it was under a bush +where a rabbit was sitting. I'd like to find the grip—but I'm afraid +that rabbit has done moved!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mr. Warfield and I found it, thank you. The rabbit had moved, but I +sort of remembered how the road had looked along there, and we hunted +until we discovered the place. Dad has driven in after my other luggage +to-day—and I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> believe I must be getting home. I was only out for a +little ride."</p> + +<p>She thanked him again for the trouble he had taken and rode away. Lone +turned off the trail and, picking his way around rough outcroppings of +rock, and across unexpected little gullies, headed straight for the ford +across Granite Creek and home. Brit Hunter's girl, he was thinking, was +even nicer than he had pictured her. And that she could believe in the +nightmare was a vast relief.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_SEVEN" id="CHAPTER_SEVEN"></a>CHAPTER SEVEN</h2> + +<h4>THE MAN AT WHISPER</h4> + + +<p>Brit Hunter finished washing the breakfast dishes and put a stick of +wood into the broken old cook-stove that had served him and Frank for +fifteen years and was feeling its age. Lorraine's breakfast was in the +oven, keeping warm. Brit looked in, tested the heat with his gnarled +hand to make sure that the sour-dough biscuits would not be dried to +crusts, and closed the door upon them and the bacon and fried potatoes. +Frank Johnson had the horses saddled and it was time to go, yet Brit +lingered, uneasily conscious that his habitation was lacking in many +things which a beautiful young woman might consider absolute +necessities. He had seen in Lorraine's eyes, as they glanced here and +there about the grimy walls, a certain disparagement of her +surroundings. The look had made him wince, though he could not quite +decide what it was that displeased her. Maybe she wanted lace curtains, +or something.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span>He set the four chairs in a row against the wall, swept up the bits of +bark and ashes beside the stove, made sure that the water bucket was +standing full on its bench beside the door, sent another critical glance +around the room, and tiptoed over to the dish cupboard and let down the +flowered calico curtain that had been looped up over a nail for +convenience. The sun sent a bright, wide bar of yellow light across the +room to rest on the shelf behind the stove where stood the salt can, the +soda, the teapot, a box of matches and two pepper cans, one empty and +the other full. Brit always meant to throw out that empty pepper can and +always neglected to do so. Just now he remembered picking up the empty +one and shaking it over the potatoes futilely and then changing it for +the full one. But he did not take it away; in the wilderness one learns +to save useless things in the faint hope that some day they may become +useful. The shelves were cluttered with fit companions to that empty +pepper can. Brit thought that he would have "cleaned out" had he known +that Lorraine was coming. Since she was here, it scarcely seemed worth +while.</p> + +<p>He walked on his boot-toes to the door of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> second room of the cabin, +listened there for a minute, heard no sound and took a tablet and pencil +off another shelf littered with useless things. The note which he wrote +painstakingly, lest she might think him lacking in education, he laid +upon the table beside Lorraine's plate; then went out, closing the door +behind him as quietly as a squeaking door can be made to close.</p> + +<p>Lorraine, in the other room, heard the squeak and sat up. Her wrist +watch, on the chair beside her bed, said that it was fifteen minutes +past six, which she considered an unearthly hour for rising. She pulled +up the covers and tried to sleep again. The day would be long enough, at +best. There was nothing to do, unless she took that queer old horse with +withers like the breastbone of a lean Christmas turkey and hips that +reminded her of the little roofs over dormer windows, and went for a +ride. And if she did that, there was nowhere to go and nothing to do +when she arrived there.</p> + +<p>In a very few days Lorraine had exhausted the sights of Quirt Creek and +vicinity. If she rode south she would eventually come to the top of a +hill whence she could look down upon further stretches of barrenness. If +she rode east she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> would come eventually to the road along which she had +walked from Echo, Idaho. Lorraine had had enough of that road. If she +went north she would—well, she would not meet Mr. Lone Morgan again, +for she had tried it twice, and had turned back because there seemed no +end to the trail twisting through the sage and rocks. West she had not +gone, but she had no doubt that it would be the same dreary monotony of +dull gray landscape.</p> + +<p>Monotony of landscape was one thing which Lorraine could not endure, +unless it had a foreground of riders hurtling here and there, and of +perspiring men around a camera tripod. At the Sawtooth ranch, after she +was able to be up, she had seen cowboys, but they had lacked the dash +and the picturesque costuming of the West she knew. They were mostly +commonplace young men, jogging past the house on horseback, or loitering +down by the corrals. They had offered absolutely no interest or "color" +to the place, and the owner's son, Bob Warfield, had driven her over to +the Quirt in a Ford and had seemed exactly like any other big, +good-looking young man who thought well of himself. Lorraine was not +susceptible to mere good looks, three years<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> with the "movies" having +disillusioned her quite thoroughly. Too many young men of Bob Warfield's +general type had attempted to make love to her—lightly and not too +well—for Lorraine to be greatly impressed.</p> + +<p>She yawned, looked at her watch again, found that she had spent exactly +six minutes in meditating upon her immediate surroundings, and fell to +wondering why it was that the real West was so terribly commonplace. +Why, yesterday she had been brought to such a pass of sheer loneliness +that she had actually been driven to reading an old horse-doctor book! +She had learned the symptoms of epizoötic—whatever that was—and +poll-evil and stringhalt, and had gone from that to making a shopping +tour through a Montgomery Ward catalogue. There was nothing else in the +house to read, except a half dozen old copies of the <i>Boise News</i>.</p> + +<p>There was nothing to do, nothing to see, no one to talk to. Her dad and +the big, heavy-set man whom he called Frank, seemed uncomfortably aware +of their deficiencies and were pitiably anxious to make her feel +welcome,—and failed. They called her "Raine." The other two men did not +call her anything at all. They were both<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> sandy-complexioned and they +both chewed tobacco quite noticeably, and when they sat down in their +shirt sleeves to eat, Lorraine had seen irregular humps in their hip +pockets which must be six-guns; though why they should carry them in +their pockets instead of in holster belts buckled properly around their +bodies and sagging savagely down at one side and swinging ferociously +when they walked, Lorraine could not imagine. They did not wear chaps, +either, and their spurs were just spurs, without so much as a silver +concho anywhere. Cowboys in overalls and blue gingham shirts and faded +old coats whose lapels lay in wrinkles and whose pockets were torn down +at the corners! If Lorraine had not been positive that this was actually +a cattle ranch in Idaho, she never would have believed that they were +anything but day laborers.</p> + +<p>"It's a comedy part for the cattle-queen's daughter," she admitted, +putting out a hand to stroke the lean, gray cat that jumped upon her bed +from the open window. "Ket, it's a <i>scream</i>! I'll take my West before +the camera, thank you; or I would, if I hadn't jumped right into the +middle of this trick West before I knew what I was doing. Ket, what do +you do to pass away the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> time? I don't see how you can have the nerve to +live in an empty space like this and purr!"</p> + +<p>She got up then, looked into the kitchen and saw the paper on the table. +This was new and vaguely promised some sort of break in the deadly +monotony which she saw stretching endlessly before her. Carrying the +nameless cat in her arms, Lorraine went in her bare feet across the +grimy, bare floor to the table and picked up the note. It read simply:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Your brekfast is in the oven we wont be back till dark maby. Don't +leave the ranch today. Yr loveing father."</p></div> + +<p>Lorraine hugged the cat so violently that she choked off a purr in the +middle. "'Don't leave the ranch to-day!' Ket, I believe it's going to be +dangerous or something, after all."</p> + +<p>She dressed quickly and went outside into the sunlight, the cat at her +heels, the thrill of that one command filling the gray monotone of the +hills with wonderful possibilities of adventure. Her father had made no +objection before when she went for a ride. He had merely instructed her +to keep to the trails, and if she didn't know the way home, to let the +reins lie loose on Yellow<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span>jacket's neck and he would bring her to the +gate.</p> + +<p>Yellowjacket's instinct for direction had not been working that day, +however. Lorraine had no sooner left the ranch out of sight behind her +than she pretended that she was lost. Yellowjacket had thereupon walked +a few rods farther and stopped, patiently indifferent to the location of +his oats box. Lorraine had waited until his head began to droop lower +and lower, and his switching at flies had become purely automatic. +Yellowjacket was going to sleep without making any effort to find the +way home. But since Lorraine had not told her father anything about it, +his injunction could not have anything to do with the unreliability of +the horse.</p> + +<p>"Now," she said to the cat, "if three or four bandits would appear on +the ridge, over there, and come tearing down into the immediate +foreground, jump the gate and surround the house, I'd know this was the +real thing. They'd want to make me tell where dad kept his gold or +whatever it was they wanted, and they'd have me tied to a chair—and +then, cut to Lone Morgan (that's a perfectly <i>wonderful</i> name for the +lead!) hearing shots and coming on a dead run to the res<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span>cue." She +picked up the cat and walked slowly down the hard-trodden path to the +stable. "But there aren't any bandits, and dad hasn't any gold or +anything else worth stealing—Ket, if dad isn't a miser, he's <i>poor</i>! +And Lone Morgan is merely ashamed of the way I talked to him, and afraid +I'll queer myself with the neighbors. No Western lead that <i>I</i> ever saw +would act like that. Why, he didn't even want to ride home with me, that +day.</p> + +<p>"And Bob Warfield and his Ford are incidents of the past, and not one +soul at the Sawtooth seems to give a darn whether I'm in the country or +out of it. Soon as they found out where I belonged, they brought me over +here and dropped me and forgot all about me. And that, I suppose, is +what they call in fiction the Western spirit!</p> + +<p>"Dad looked exactly as if he'd opened the door to a book agent when I +came. He—he <i>tolerates</i> my presence, Ket! And Frank Johnson's pipe +smells to high heaven, and I hate him in the house and 'the boys'—hmhm! +The <i>boys</i>—Ket, it would be terribly funny, if I didn't have to stay +here."</p> + +<p>She had reached the corral and stood balancing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> the cat on a warped top +rail, staring disconsolately at Yellowjacket, who stood in a far corner +switching at flies and shamelessly displaying all the angularity of his +bones under a yellowish hide with roughened hair that was shedding +dreadfully, as Lorraine had discovered to her dismay when she removed +her green corduroy skirt after riding him. Yellowjacket's lower lip +sagged with senility or lack of spirit, Lorraine could not tell which.</p> + +<p>"You look like the frontispiece in that horse-doctor book," she +remarked, eyeing him with disfavor. "I can't say that comedy hide you've +got improves your appearance. You'd be better peeled, I believe."</p> + +<p>She heard a chuckle behind her and turned quickly, palm up to shield her +eyes from the straight, bright rays of the sun. Now here was a live man, +after all, with his hat tilted down over his forehead, a cigarette in +one hand and his reins in the other, looking at her and smiling.</p> + +<p>"Why don't you peel him, just on a chance?" His smile broadened to a +grin, but when Lorraine continued to look at him with a neutral +expression in her eyes, he threw away his cigarette and abandoned with +it his free-and-easy manner.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span>"You're Miss Hunter, aren't you? I rode over to see your father. Thought +I'd find him somewhere around the corral, maybe."</p> + +<p>"You won't, because he's gone for the day. No, I don't know where."</p> + +<p>"I—see. Is Mr. Johnson anywhere about?"</p> + +<p>"No, I don't believe any one is anywhere about. They were all gone when +I got up, a little while ago." Then, remembering that she did not know +this man, and that she was a long way from neighbors, she added, "If +you'll leave a message I can tell dad when he comes home."</p> + +<p>"No-o—I'll ride over to-morrow or next day. I'm the man at Whisper. You +can tell him I called, and that I'll call again."</p> + +<p>Still he did not go, and Lorraine waited. Some instinct warned her that +the man had not yet stated his real reason for coming, and she wondered +a little what it could be. He seemed to be watching her covertly, yet +she failed to catch any telltale admiration for her in his scrutiny. She +decided that his forehead was too narrow to please her, and that his +eyes were too close together, and that the lines around his mouth were +cruel lines and gave the lie to his smile, which was pleasant enough if +you just looked at the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> smile and paid no attention to anything else in +his face.</p> + +<p>"You had quite an experience getting out here, they tell me," he +observed carelessly; too carelessly, thought Lorraine, who was well +schooled in the circumlocutions of delinquent tenants, agents of various +sorts and those who crave small gossip of their neighbors. "Heard you +were lost up in Rock City all night."</p> + +<p>Lorraine looked up at him, startled. "I caught a terrible cold," she +said, laughing nervously. "I'm not used to the climate," she added +guardedly.</p> + +<p>The man fumbled in his pocket and produced smoking material. "Do you +mind if I smoke?" he asked perfunctorily.</p> + +<p>"Why, no. It doesn't concern me in the slightest degree." Why, she +thought confusedly, must she <i>always</i> be reminded of that horrible place +of rocks? What was it to this man where she had been lost?</p> + +<p>"You must of got there about the time the storm broke," the man hazarded +after a silence. "It's sure a bad place in a thunderstorm. Them rocks +draw lightning. Pretty bad, wasn't it?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span>"Lightning is always bad, isn't it?" Lorraine tried to hold her voice +steady. "I don't know much about it. We don't have thunderstorms to +amount to anything, in Los Angeles. It sometimes does thunder there in +the winter, but it is very mild."</p> + +<p>With hands that trembled she picked the cat off the rail and started +toward the house. "I'll tell dad what you said," she told him, glancing +back over her shoulder. When she saw that he had turned his horse and +was frankly following her to the house, her heart jumped wildly into her +throat,—judging by the feel of it.</p> + +<p>"I'm plumb out of matches. I wonder if you can let me have some," he +said, still speaking too carelessly to reassure her. "So you stuck it +out in Rock City all through that storm! That's more than what I'd want +to do."</p> + +<p>She did not answer that, but once on the doorstep Lorraine turned and +faced him. Quite suddenly it came to her—the knowledge of why she did +not like this man. She stared at him, her eyes wide and bright.</p> + +<p>"Your hat's brown!" she exclaimed unguardedly. "I—I saw a man with a +brown hat——"</p> + +<p>He laughed suddenly. "If you stay around<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> here long you'll see a good +many," he said, taking off his hat and turning it on his hand before +her. "This here hat I traded for yesterday. I had a gray one, but it +didn't suit me. Too narrow in the brim. Brown hats are getting to be the +style. If I can borrow half a dozen matches, Miss Hunter, I'll be +going."</p> + +<p>Lorraine looked at him again doubtfully and went after the matches. He +thanked her, smiling down at her quizzically. "A man can get along +without lots of things, but he's plumb lost without matches. You've +maybe saved my life, Miss Hunter, if you only knew it."</p> + +<p>She watched him as he rode away, opening the gate and letting himself +through without dismounting. He disappeared finally around a small spur +of the hill, and Lorraine found her knees trembling under her.</p> + +<p>"Ket, you're an awful fool," she exclaimed fiercely. "Why did you let me +give myself away to that man? I—I believe he <i>was</i> the man. And if I +really did see him, it wasn't my imagination at all. He saw me there, +perhaps. Ket, I'm scared! I'm not going to stay on this ranch all alone. +I'm going to saddle the family skeleton, and I'm going to ride till +dark. There's some<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span>thing queer about that man from Whisper. I'm afraid +of him."</p> + +<p>After awhile, when she had finished her breakfast and was putting up a +lunch, Lorraine picked up the nameless gray cat and holding its head +between her slim fingers, looked at it steadily. "Ket, you're the +humanest thing I've seen since I left home," she said wistfully. "I +<i>hate</i> a country where horrible things happen under the surface and the +top is just gray and quiet and so dull it makes you want to scream. Lone +Morgan lied to me. He lied—he lied!" She hugged the cat impulsively and +rubbed her cheek absently against it, so that it began purring +immediately.</p> + +<p>"Ket—I'm afraid of that man at Whisper!" she breathed miserably against +its fur.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_EIGHT" id="CHAPTER_EIGHT"></a>CHAPTER EIGHT</h2> + +<h4>"IT TAKES NERVE JUST TO HANG ON"</h4> + + +<p>Brit was smoking his pipe after supper and staring at nothing, though +his face was turned toward the closed door. Lorraine had washed the +dishes and was tidying the room and looking at her father now and then +in a troubled, questioning way of which Brit was quite oblivious.</p> + +<p>"Dad," she said abruptly, "who is the man at Whisper?"</p> + +<p>Brit turned his eyes slowly to her face as if he had not grasped her +meaning and was waiting for her to repeat the question. It was evident +that his thoughts had pulled away from something that meant a good deal +to him.</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"A man came this morning, and said he was the man at Whisper, and that +he would come again to see you."</p> + +<p>Brit took his pipe from his mouth, looked at it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> and crowded down the +tobacco with a forefinger. "He seen me ride away from the ranch, this +morning," he said. "He was coming down the Whisper trail as I was taking +the fork over to Sugar Spring, Frank and me. What did he say he wanted +to see me about?"</p> + +<p>"He didn't say. He asked for you and Frank." Lorraine sat down and +folded her arms on the oilcloth-covered table. "Dad, what <i>is</i> Whisper?"</p> + +<p>"Whisper's a camp up against a cliff, over west of here. It belongs to +the Sawtooth. Is that all he said? Just that he wanted to see me?"</p> + +<p>"He—talked a little," Lorraine admitted, her eyebrows pulled down. "If +he saw you leave, I shouldn't think he'd come here and ask for you."</p> + +<p>"He knowed I was gone," Brit stated briefly.</p> + +<p>With a finger nail Lorraine traced the ugly, brown pattern on the +oilcloth. It was not easy to talk to this silent man who was her father, +but she had done a great deal of thinking during that long, empty day, +and she had reached the point where she was afraid not to speak.</p> + +<p>"Dad!"</p> + +<p>"What do you want, Raine?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span>"Dad, was—has any one around here died, lately?"</p> + +<p>"Died? Nobody but Fred Thurman, over here on Granite. He was drug with a +horse and killed."</p> + +<p>Lorraine caught her breath, saw Brit looking at her curiously and moved +closer to him. She wanted to be near somebody just then, and after all, +Brit was her father, and his silence was not the inertia of a dull mind, +she knew. He seemed bottled-up, somehow, and bitter. She caught his hand +and held it, feeling its roughness between her two soft palms.</p> + +<p>"Dad, I've got to tell you. I feel trapped, somehow. Did his horse have +a white face, dad?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, he's a blaze-faced roan. Why?" Brit moved uncomfortably, but he +did not take his hand away from her. "What do you know about it, Raine?"</p> + +<p>"I saw a man shoot Fred Thurman and push his foot through the stirrup. +And, dad, I believe it was that man at Whisper. The one I saw had on a +brown hat, and this man wears a brown hat—and I was advised not to tell +any one I had been at that place they call Rock City, when the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span> storm +came. Dad, would an innocent man—one that didn't have anything to do +with a crime—would he try to cover it up afterwards?"</p> + +<p>Brit's hand shook when he removed the pipe from his mouth and laid it on +the table. His face had turned gray while Lorraine watched him +fearfully. He laid his hand on her shoulder, pressing down hard—and at +last his eyes met her big, searching ones.</p> + +<p>"If he wanted to <i>live</i>—in this country—he'd have to. Leastways, he'd +have to keep his mouth shut," he said grimly.</p> + +<p>"And he'd try to shut the mouths of others——"</p> + +<p>"If he cared anything about them, he would. You ain't told anybody what +you saw, have yuh?"</p> + +<p>Lorraine hid her face against his arm. "Just Lone Morgan, and he thought +I was crazy and imagined it. That was in the morning, when he found me. +And he—he wanted me to go on thinking it was just a nightmare—that I'd +imagined the whole thing. And I did, for awhile. But this man at Whisper +tried to find out where I was that night——"</p> + +<p>Brit pulled abruptly away from her, got up<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span> and opened the door. He +stood there for a time, looking out into the gloom of early nightfall. +He seemed to be listening, Lorraine thought. When he came back to her +his voice was lower, his manner intangibly furtive.</p> + +<p>"You didn't tell him anything, did you?" he asked, as if there had been +no pause in their talk.</p> + +<p>"No—I made him believe I wasn't there. Or I tried to. And dad! As I was +going to cross that creek just before you come to Rock City, two men +came along on horseback, and I hid before they saw me. They stopped to +water their horses, and they were talking. They said something about the +TJ had been here a long time, but they would get theirs, and it was like +sitting into a poker game with a nickel. They said the little ones +aren't big enough to fight the Sawtooth, and they'd carry lead under +their hides if they didn't leave. Dad, isn't your brand the TJ? That's +what it looks like on Yellowjacket."</p> + +<p>Brit did not answer, and when Lorraine was sure that he did not mean to +do so, she asked another question. "Dad, why didn't you want me to leave +the ranch to-day? I was nervous after that man was here, and I did go."</p> + +<p>"I didn't want you riding around the country<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> unless I knew where you +went," Brit said. "My brand is the TJ up-and-down. We never call it just +the TJ."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Lorraine, relieved. "They weren't talking about you, then. +But dad—it's horrible! We simply <i>can't</i> let that murder go and not do +anything. Because I know that man was shot. I heard the shot fired, and +I saw him start to fall off his horse. And the next flash of lightning I +saw——"</p> + +<p>"Look here, Raine. I don't want you talking about what you saw. I don't +want you <i>thinkin'</i> about it. What's the use? Thurman's dead and buried. +The cor'ner come and held an inquest, and the jury agreed it was an +accident. I was on the jury. The sheriff's took charge of his property. +You couldn't prove what you saw, even if you was to try." He looked at +her very much as Lone Morgan had looked at her. His next words were very +nearly what Lone Morgan had said, Lorraine remembered. "You don't know +this country like I know it. Folks live in it mainly because they don't +go around blatting everything they see and hear and think."</p> + +<p>"You have laws, don't you, dad? You spoke about the sheriff——"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span>"The sheriff!" Brit laughed harshly. "Yes, we got a sheriff, and we got +a jail, and a judge—all the makin's of law. But we ain't got one thing +that goes with it, and that's justice. You'd best make up your mind like +the cor'ner's jury done, that Fred Thurman was drug to death by his +horse. That's all that'll ever be proved, and if you can't prove nothing +else you better keep your mouth shut."</p> + +<p>Lorraine sprang up and stood facing her father, every nerve taut with +protest. "You don't mean to tell me, dad, that you and Frank Johnson and +Lone Morgan and—everybody in the country are <i>cowards</i>, do you?"</p> + +<p>Brit looked at her patiently. "No," he said in the tone of acknowledged +defeat, "we ain't cowards, Raine. A man ain't a coward when he stands +with his hands over his head. Most generally it's because some one's got +the drop on 'im."</p> + +<p>Lorraine would not accept that. "You think so, because you don't fight," +she cried hotly. "No one is holding a gun at your head. Dad! I thought +Westerners never quit. It's fight to the finish, always. Why, I've seen +one man fight a whole outfit and win. He couldn't be beaten because he +wouldn't give up. Why——"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span>Brit gave her a tolerant glance. "Where'd you see all that, Raine?" He +moved to the table picked up his pipe and knocked out the ashes on the +stove hearth. His movements were those of an aging man,—yet Brit Hunter +was not old, as age is reckoned.</p> + +<p>"Well—in stories—but it was reasonable and logical and possible, just +the same. If you use your brains you can outwit them, and if you have +any nerve——"</p> + +<p>Brit made a sound somewhat like a snort. "These days, when politics is +played by the big fellows, and the law is used to make money for 'em, it +takes nerve just to hang on," he said. "Nobody but a dang fool would +fight." Slow anger grew within him. He turned upon Lorraine almost +fiercely. "D'yuh think me and Frank could fight the Sawtooth and get +anything out of it but a coffin apiece, maybe?" he demanded harshly. +"Don't the Sawtooth <i>own</i> this country? Warfield's got the sheriff in +his pocket, and the cor'ner, and the judge, and the stock +inspector—he's <i>Senator</i> Warfield, and what he wants he gets. He gets +it through the law that you was talking about a little while ago. What +you goin' to do about it? If I had the money and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> the land and the +political pull he's got, mebby I'd have me a sheriff and a judge, too.</p> + +<p>"Fred Thurman tried to fight the Sawtooth over a water right he owned +and they wanted. They had the case runnin' in court till they like to of +took the last dollar he had. He got bull-headed. That water right meant +the hull ranch—everything he owned. You can't run a ranch without +water. And when he'd took the case up and up till it got to the Supreme +Court, and he stood some show of winnin' out—he had an accident. He was +drug to death by his horse."</p> + +<p>Brit stooped and opened the stove door, seeking a live coal; found none +and turned again to Lorraine, shaking his pipe at her for emphasis.</p> + +<p>"We try to prove Fred was murdered, and what's the result? Something +happens: to me, mebby, or Frank, or both of us. And you can't say, +'Here, I know the Sawtooth had a hand in that.' You got to <i>prove</i> it! +And when you've proved it," he added bitterly, "you got to have officers +that'll carry out the law instead of using it to hog-tie yuh."</p> + +<p>His futile, dull anger surged up again. "You call us cowards because we +don't git up on our hind legs and fight the Sawtooth. A lot <i>you</i><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> know +about courage! You've read stories, and you've saw moving pictures, and +you think that's the West—that's the way they do it. One man hold off a +hunderd with his gun—and on the other hand, a hunderd men, mebby, +ridin' hell-whoopin' after one. You think that's it—that's the way they +do it. Hunh!" He lifted the lid of the stove, spat into it as if he were +spitting in the face of an enemy, and turned again to Lorraine.</p> + +<p>"What you seen—what you say you seen—that was done at night when there +wasn't no audience. All the fighting the Sawtooth does is done under +cover. <i>You</i> won't see none of it—they ain't such fools. And what us +small fellers do, we do it quiet, too. We ain't ridin' up and down the +trail, flourishin' our six-shooters and yellin' to the Sawtooth to come +on and we'll clean 'em up!"</p> + +<p>"But you're fighting just the same, aren't you, dad? You're not letting +them——"</p> + +<p>"We're makin' out to live here—and we've been doin' it for twenty-five +year," Brit told her, with a certain grim dignity. "We've still got a +few head uh stock left—enough to live on. Playin' poker with a nickel, +mebby—but we man<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span>age to ante, every hand so fur." His mind returned to +the grisly thing Lorraine had seen.</p> + +<p>"We can't run down the man that got Fred Thurman, supposin' he was +killed, as you say. That's what the law is paid to do. If Lone Morgan +told you not to talk about it, he told you right. He was talking for +your own good. What about Al—the man from Whisper? You didn't tell +<i>him</i>, did you?"</p> + +<p>His tone, the suppressed violence of his manner, frightened Lorraine. +She moved farther away from him.</p> + +<p>"I didn't tell him anything. He was curious but—I only said I knew him +because he was wearing a brown hat, and the man that shot Mr. Thurman +had a brown hat. I didn't say all that. I just mentioned the hat. And he +said there were lots of brown hats in the country. He said he had traded +for that one, just yesterday. He said his own hat was gray."</p> + +<p>Brit stared at her, his jaw sagging a little, his eyes growing vacant +with the thoughts he hid deep in his mind. He slumped down into his +chair and leaned forward, his arms resting on his knees, his fingers +clasped loosely. After a little he tilted his head and looked up at +her.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span>"You better go to bed," he told her stolidly. "And if you're going to +live at the Quirt, Raine, you'll have to learn to keep your mouth shut. +I ain't blaming you—but you told too much to Al Woodruff. Don't talk to +him no more, if he comes here when I'm gone." He put out a hand, +beckoning her to him, sorry for his harshness. Lorraine went to him and +knelt beside him, slipping an arm around his neck while she hid her face +on his shoulder.</p> + +<p>"I won't be a nuisance, dad—really, I won't," she said. "I—I can shoot +a gun. I never shot one with bullets in, but I could. And I learned to +do lots of things when I was working in that play West I thought was +real. It isn't like I thought. There's no picture stuff in the real +West, I guess; they don't do things that way. But—what I want you to +know is that if they're fighting you they'll have to fight me, too.</p> + +<p>"I don't mean movie stuff, honestly I don't. I'm in this thing now, and +you'll have to count me, same as you count Jim and Sorry. Won't you +please feel that I'm one more in the game, dad, and not just another +responsibility? I'll herd cattle, or do whatever there is to do. And +I'll keep my mouth shut, too. I can't stay here,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> day after day, doing +nothing but sweep and dust two rooms and fry potatoes and bacon for you +at night. Dad, I'll go <i>crazy</i> if you don't let me into your life!</p> + +<p>"Dad, if you knew the stunts I've done in the last three years! It was +make-believe West, but I learned things just the same." She kissed him +on the unshaven cheek nearest her,—and thought of the kisses she had +breathed upon the cheeks of story fathers with due care for the make-up +on her lips. Just because this was real, she kissed him again with the +frank vigor of a child.</p> + +<p>"Dad," she said wheedlingly, "I think you might scare up something that +I can really ride. Yellowjacket is safe, but—but you have real <i>live</i> +horses on the ranch, haven't you? You must <i>not</i> go judging me by the +palms and the bay windows of the Casa Grande. That's where I've slept, +the last few years when I wasn't off on location—but it's just as +sensible to think I don't know anything else, as it would be for me to +think you can't do anything but skim milk and fry bacon and make +sour-dough bread, just because I've seen you do it!"</p> + +<p>Brit laughed and patted her awkwardly on the back. "If you was a boy, +I'd set you up as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> lawyer," he said with an attempt at playfulness. "I +kinda thought you could ride. I seen how you piled onto old Yellowjacket +and the way you held your reins. It runs in the blood, I guess. I'll see +what I can do in the way of a horse. Ole Yellowjacket used to be a real +rim-rider, but he's gitting old; gitting old—same as me."</p> + +<p>"You're not! You're just letting yourself <i>feel</i> old. And am I one of +the outfit, dad?"</p> + +<p>"I guess so—only there ain't going to be any of this hell-whoopin' +stuff, Raine. You can't travel these trails at a long lope with yore +hair flyin' out behind and—and all that damn foolishness. I've saw 'em +in the movin' pitchers——"</p> + +<p>Lorraine blushed, and was thankful that her dad had not watched her work +in that serial. For that matter, she hoped that Lone Morgan would never +stray into a movie where any of her pictures were being shown.</p> + +<p>"I'm serious, dad. I don't want to make a show of myself. But if you'll +feel that I can be a help instead of a handicap, that's what I want. And +if it comes to fighting——"</p> + +<p>Brit pushed her from him impatiently. "There yuh go—fight—fight—and I +told yuh there ain't any fighting going on. Nothing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> more'n a fight to +hang on and make a living. That means straight, hard work and mindin' +your own business. If you want to help at that——"</p> + +<p>"I do," said Raine quietly, getting to her feet. Her legacy of +stubbornness set her lips firmly together. "That's exactly what I mean. +Good night, dad."</p> + +<p>Brit answered her noncommittally, apparently sunk already in his own +musings. But his lips drew in to suppress a smile when he saw, from the +corner of his eyes, that Lorraine was winding the alarm on the cheap +kitchen clock, and that she set the hand carefully and took the clock +with her to bed.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_NINE" id="CHAPTER_NINE"></a>CHAPTER NINE</h2> + +<h4>THE EVIL EYE OF THE SAWTOOTH</h4> + + +<p>Oppression is a growth that flourishes best in the soil of opportunity. +It seldom springs into full power at once. The Sawtooth Cattle Company +had begun much as its neighbors had begun: with a tract of land, cattle, +and the ambition for prospering. Senator Warfield had then been plain +Bill Warfield, manager of the outfit, who rode with his men and saw how +his herds increased,—saw too how they might increase faster under +certain conditions. At the outset he was not, perhaps, more unscrupulous +than some of his neighbors. True, if a homesteader left his claim for a +longer time than the law allowed him, Bill Warfield would choose one of +his own men to file a contest on that claim. The man's wages would be +paid. Witnesses were never lacking to swear to the improvements he had +made, and after the patent had been granted the homesteader (for the +contestant always won,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> in that country) the Sawtooth, would pay him for +the land. Frequently a Sawtooth man would file upon land before any +other man had claimed it. Sometimes a Sawtooth man would purchase a +relinquishment from some poor devil of a claim-holder who seemed always +to have bad luck, and so became discouraged and ready to sell. An +intelligent man like Bill Warfield could acquire much land in this +manner, give him time enough.</p> + +<p>In much the same manner his herds increased. He bought out small +ranchers who were crowded to the selling point in one way or another. +They would find themselves fenced off from water, the Sawtooth having +acquired the water rights to creek or spring. Or they would be hemmed in +with fenced fields and would find it next to impossible to make use of +the law which gave them the right to "condemn" a road through. They +would not be openly assailed,—Bill Warfield was an intelligent man. A +dozen brands were recorded in the name of the Sawtooth Cattle Company, +and if a small rancher found his calf crop shorter than it should be, he +might think as he pleased, but he would have no tangible proof that his +calves wore a Sawtooth brand.</p> + +<p>Inevitably it became necessary now and then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> to stop a mouth that was +ready to speak unwelcome truths. But if a Sawtooth man were known to +have committed violence, the Sawtooth itself was the first to put the +sheriff on his trail. If the man successfully dodged the sheriff and +made his way to parts unknown, the Sawtooth could shrug its shoulders +and wash its hands of him.</p> + +<p>Then whispers were heard that the Sawtooth had on its pay roll men who +were paid to kill and to leave no trace. So many heedless ones crossed +the Sawtooth's path to riches! Fred Thurman had been one; a "bull-headed +cuss" who had the temerity to fight back when the Sawtooth calmly laid +claim to the first water rights to Granite Creek, having bought it, they +said, with the placer claim of an old miner who had prospected along the +headwaters of Granite at the base of Bear Top.</p> + +<p>By that time the Sawtooth had grown to a power no poor man could hope to +defeat. Bill Warfield was Senator Warfield, and Senator Warfield was a +power in the political world that immediately surrounded him. Since his +neighboring ranchmen had not been able to prevent his steady climbing to +the position he now held, they had small hope of pulling him down. Brit +was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span> right. They did well to hang on and continue living in that +country.</p> + +<p>An open killing, one that would attract the attention of the outside +world, might be avenged. The man who committed the crime might be +punished,—if public opinion were sufficiently massed against him. In +that case Senator Warfield would cry loudest for justice. But it would +take a stronger man than the country held to raise the question of Fred +Thurman's death and take even the first steps toward proving it a +murder.</p> + +<p>"It ain't that they can <i>do</i> anything, Mr. Warfield," the man from +Whisper said guardedly, urging his horse close to the machine that stood +in the trail from Echo. It was broad day—a sun-scorched day to +boot—and Senator Warfield perspired behind the wheel of his car. "It's +the talk they may get started."</p> + +<p>"What have they said? The girl was at the ranch for several days. She +didn't talk there, or Hawkins would have told me."</p> + +<p>"She was sick. I saw her the other day at the Quirt, and she more'n half +recognized me. Hell! How'd <i>I</i> know she was in there among them rocks? +Everybody that was apt to be riding through was accounted for, and I +knew there<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span> wasn't any one coming horseback or with a rig. My hearing's +pretty good."</p> + +<p>Warfield moved the spark lever up and down on the wheel while he +thought. "Well," he said carefully at last, "if you're falling down in +your work, what are you whining about it to me for? What do you want?"</p> + +<p>Al moistened his lips with his tongue. "I want to know how far I can go. +It's been hands off the Quirt, up to now. And the Quirt's beginning to +think it can get away with most anything. They've throwed a fence across +the pass through from Sugar Spring to Whisper. That sends us away around +by Three Creek. You can't trail stock across Granite Ridge, nor them +lava ledges. If it's going to be hands off, I want to know it. There's +other places I'd rather live in, if the Quirt's going to raise talk +about Fred Thurman."</p> + +<p>Senator Warfield pulled at his collar and tie as if they choked him. +"The Quirt has made no trouble," he said. "Of course, if they begin +throwing fences across our stock trails and peddling gossip, that is +another story. I expect you to protect our interests, of course. And I +have never made a practice of dictating to you. In this case"—he sent a +sharp glance at Al—"it<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> seems to me your interests are involved more +than ours. As to Fred Thurman, I don't know anything about it. I was not +here when he died, and I have never seen this girl of Brit's who seems +to worry you. She doesn't interest me, one way or the other."</p> + +<p>"She seems to interest Bob a whole lot," Al said maliciously. "He rode +over to see her yesterday. She wasn't home, though."</p> + +<p>Senator Warfield seemed unmoved by this bit of news, wherefore Al +returned to the main issue.</p> + +<p>"Do I get a free hand, or don't I?" he insisted. "They can't be let +peddle talk—not if I stay around here."</p> + +<p>Senator Warfield considered the matter.</p> + +<p>"The girl's got the only line on me," Al went on. "The inquest was as +clean as I ever saw. Everything all straight—and then, here she comes +up——"</p> + +<p>"If you know how to stop a woman's mouth, Al, you can make a million a +month telling other men." Senator Warfield smiled at him. Then he leaned +across the front seat and added impressively, "Bear one thing in mind, +Al. The Sawtooth cannot permit itself to become involved in any scandal, +nor in any killing cases. We're<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span> just at the most crucial point with our +reclamation project, over here on the flat. The legislature is willing +to make an appropriation for the building of the canal, and in two or +three months at the latest we should begin selling agricultural tracts +to the public. The State will also throw open the land it had withdrawn +from settlement, pending the floating of this canal project. More than +ever the integrity of the Sawtooth Cattle Company must be preserved, +since it has come out openly as a backer of the irrigation company. +Nothing—<i>nothing</i> must be permitted to stand in the way."</p> + +<p>He removed his thin driving cap and wiped his perspiring forehead. "I'm +sorry this all happened—as it has turned out," he said, with real +regret in his tone. "But since it did happen, I must rely upon you +to—to—er——"</p> + +<p>"I guess I understand," Al grinned sardonically. "I just wanted you to +know how things is building up. The Quirt's kinda overreached itself. I +didn't want you comin' back on me for trying to keep their feet outa the +trough. I want you to know things is pretty damn ticklish right now, and +it's going to take careful steppin'."</p> + +<p>"Well, don't let your foot slip, Al," Senator<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span> Warfield warned him. "The +Sawtooth would hate to lose you; you're a good man."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I get yuh," Al retorted. "My foot ain't going to slip—— If it +did, the Sawtooth would be the first to pile onto my back!" The last +sentence was not meant for the senator's ears. Al had backed his horse, +and Senator Warfield was stepping on the starter. But it would not have +mattered greatly if he had heard, for this was a point quite thoroughly +understood by them both.</p> + +<p>The Warfield car went on, lurching over the inequalities of the narrow +road. Al shook his horse into a shambling trot, picking his way +carelessly through the scattered sage.</p> + +<p>His horse traveled easily, now and then lifting a foot high to avoid +rock or exposed root, or swerving sharply around obstacles too high to +step over. Al very seldom traveled along the beaten trails, though there +was nothing to deter him now save an inherent tendency toward +secretiveness of his motives, destinations and whereabouts. If the +country was open, you would see Al Woodruff riding at some distance from +the trail—or you would not see him at all, if there were gullies in +which he could conceal himself. He was always "line-riding," or hunt<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span>ing +stray stock—horses, usually—or striking across to some line-camp of +the Sawtooth, on business which he was perfectly willing to state.</p> + +<p>But you will long ago have guessed that he was the evil eye of the +Sawtooth Company. He took no orders save such general ones as Senator +Warfield had just given him. He gave none. Whatever he did he did alone, +and he took no man into his confidence. It is more than probable that +Senator Warfield would never have known to a certainty that Al was +responsible for Thurman's death, if Al had not been worried over the +Quirt's possible knowledge of the crime and anxious to know just how far +his power might go.</p> + +<p>Ostensibly he was in charge of the camp at Whisper, a place far enough +off the beaten trails to free him from chance visitors. The Sawtooth +kept many such camps occupied by men whose duty it was to look after the +Sawtooth cattle that grazed near; to see that stock did not "bog down" +in the tricky sand of the adjacent water holes and die before help came, +and to fend off any encroachments of the smaller cattle owners,—though +these were growing fewer year by year, thanks to the weeding-out policy +of the Sawtooth<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> and the cunning activities of such as Al Woodruff.</p> + +<p>It may sound strange to say that the Sawtooth country had not had a real +"killing" for years, though accidental deaths had been rather frequent. +One man, for instance, had fallen over a ledge and broken his neck, +presumably while drunk. Another had bought a few sticks of dynamite to +open up a spring on his ranch, and at the inquest which followed the +jury had returned a verdict of "death caused by being blown up by the +accidental discharge of dynamite." A sheepman was struck by lightning, +according to the coroner, and his widow had been glad to sell ranch and +sheep very cheaply to the Sawtooth and return to her relatives in +Montana. The Sawtooth had shipped the sheep within a month and turned +the ranch into another line-camp.</p> + +<p>You will see that Senator Warfield had every reason to be sincere when +he called Al Woodruff a good man; good for the Sawtooth interests, that +means. You will also see that Brit Hunter had reasons for believing that +the business of ranching in the Sawtooth country might be classed as +extra hazardous, and for saying that it took nerve just to hang on.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span>That is why Al rode oblivious to his surroundings, meditating no doubt +upon the best means of preserving the "integrity" of the Sawtooth and at +the same time soothing effectively the ticklishness of the situation of +which he had complained. It was his business to find the best means. It +was for just such work that the Sawtooth paid him—secretly, to be +sure—better wages than the foreman, Hawkins, received. Al was +conscientious and did his best to earn his wages; not because he +particularly loved killing and spying as a sport, but because the +Sawtooth had bought his loyalty for a price, and so long as he felt that +he was getting a square deal from them, he would turn his hand against +any man that stood in their way. He was a Sawtooth man, and he fought +the enemies of the Sawtooth as matter-of-factly as a soldier will fight +for his country. To his unimaginative mind there was sufficient +justification in that attitude. As for the ease with which he planned to +kill and cover his killing under the semblance of accident, he would +have said, if you could make him speak of it, that he was not squeamish. +They'd all have to die some day, anyway.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_TEN" id="CHAPTER_TEN"></a>CHAPTER TEN</h2> + +<h4>ANOTHER SAWTOOTH "ACCIDENT"</h4> + + +<p>Frank Johnson rose from the breakfast table, shaved a splinter off the +edge of the water bench for a toothpick and sharpened it carefully while +he looked at Brit.</p> + +<p>"You goin' after them posts, or shall I?" he inquired glumly, which, by +the way, was his normal tone. "Jim and Sorry oughta git the post holes +all dug to-day. One of us better take a look through that young stock in +the lower field, too, and see if there's any more sign uh blackleg. +Which you ruther do?"</p> + +<p>Brit tilted his chair backward so that he could reach the coffeepot on +the stove hearth. "I'll haul down the posts," he decided carelessly. +"They're easy loaded, and I guess my back's as good as yourn."</p> + +<p>"All you got to do is skid 'em down off'n the bank onto the wagon," +Frank said. "I wisht<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> you'd go on up where we cut them last ones and git +my sweater, Brit. I musta left it hanging on a bush right close to where +I was workin'."</p> + +<p>Brit's grunt signified assent, and Frank went out. Jim and Sorry, the +two unpicturesque cowboys of whom Lorraine had complained to the cat had +already departed with pick and shovel to their unromantic task of +digging post holes. Each carried a most unattractive lunch tied in a +flour sack behind the cantle of his saddle. Lorraine had done her +conscientious best, but with lumpy, sour-dough bread, cold bacon and +currant jelly of that kind which is packed in wooden kegs, one can't do +much with a cold lunch. Lorraine wondered how much worse it would look +after it had been tied on the saddle for half a day; wondered too what +those two silent ones got out of life,—what they looked forward to, +what was their final goal. For that matter she frequently wondered what +there was in life for any of them, shut into that deadly monotony of +sagebrush and rocks interspersed with little, grassy meadows where the +cattle fed listlessly.</p> + +<p>Even the sinister undercurrent of antagonism against the Quirt could not +whip her emotions feeling that she was doing anything more<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> than live +the restricted, sordid little life of a poorly equipped ranch. She had +ridden once with Frank Johnson to look through a bunch of cattle, but it +had been nothing more than a hot, thirsty, dull ride, with a wind that +blew her hat off in spite of pins and tied veil, and with a companion +who spoke only when he was spoken to and then as briefly as possible.</p> + +<p>Her father would not talk again as he had talked that night. She had +tried to make him tell her more about the Sawtooth and had gotten +nothing out of him. The man from Whisper, whom Brit had spoken of as Al, +had not returned. Nor had the promised saddle horse materialized. The +boys were too busy to run in any horses, her father had told her shortly +when she reminded him of his promise. When the fence was done, maybe he +could rustle her another horse,—and then he had added that he didn't +see what ailed Yellowjacket, for all the riding she was likely to do.</p> + +<p>"Straight hard work and minding your own business," her father had said, +and it seemed to Lorraine after three or four days of it that he had +summed up the life of a cattleman's daughter in a masterly manner which +ought to be<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span> recorded among Famous Sayings like "War is hell" and "Don't +give up the ship."</p> + +<p>On this particular morning Lorraine's spirits were at their lowest ebb. +If it were not for the new stepfather, she would return to the Casa +Grande, she told herself disgustedly. And if it were not for the belief +among all her acquaintances that she was queening it over the +cattle-king's vast domain, she would return and find work again in +motion pictures. But she could not bring herself to the point of facing +the curiosity and the petty gossip of the studios. She would be expected +to explain satisfactorily why she had left the real West for the mimic +West of Hollywood. She did not acknowledge to herself that she also +could not face the admission of failure to carry out what she had begun.</p> + +<p>She had told her dad that she wanted to fight with him, even though +"fighting" in this case meant washing the coarse clothing of her father +and Frank, scrubbing the rough, warped boards of the cabin floor, and +frying ranch-cured bacon for every meal, and in making butter to sell, +and counting the eggs every night and being careful to use only the +cracked ones for cooking.</p> + +<p>She hated every detail of this crude house<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span>keeping, from the chipped +enamel dishpan to the broom that was all one-sided, and the pillow slips +which were nothing more nor less than sugar sacks. She hated it even +more than she had hated the Casa Grande and her mother's frowsy +mentality. But because she could see that she made life a little more +comfortable for her dad, because she felt that he needed her, she would +stay and assure herself over and over that she was staying merely +because she was too proud to go back to the old life and own the West a +failure.</p> + +<p>She was sweeping the doorstep with the one-sided broom when Brit drove +out through the gate and up the trail which she knew led eventually to +Sugar Spring. The horses, sleek in their new hair and skittish with the +change from hay to new grass, danced over the rough ground so that the +running gear of the wagon, with its looped log-chain, which would later +do duty as a brake on the long grade down from timber line on the side +of Spirit Canyon, rattled and banged over the rocks with a clatter that +could be heard for half a mile. Lorraine looked after her father +enviously. If she were a boy she would be riding on that sack of hay +tied to the "hounds" for a seat. But, being a girl, it had never +occurred<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> to Brit that she might like to go,—might even be useful to +him on the trip.</p> + +<p>"I suppose if I told dad I could drive that team as well as he can, he'd +just look at me and think I was crazy," she thought resentfully and gave +the broom a spiteful fling toward a presumptuous hen that had approached +too closely. "If I'd asked him to let me go along he'd have made some +excuse—oh, I'm beginning to know dad! He thinks a woman's place is in +the house—preferably the kitchen. And here I've thought all my life +that cowgirls did nothing but ride around and warn people about stage +holdups and everything! I'd just like to know how a girl would ever have +a chance to know what was going on in the country, unless she heard the +men talking while she poured their coffee. Only this bunch don't talk at +all. They just gobble and go."</p> + +<p>She went in then and shut the door with a slam. Up on the ridge Al +Woodruff lowered his small binocular and eased away from the spot where +he had been crouching behind a bush. Every one on the Quirt ranch was +accounted for. As well as if he had sat at their breakfast table Al knew +where each man's work would take him<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> that day. As for the girl, she was +safe at the ranch for the day, probably. If she did take a ride later +on, it would probably be up the ridge between the Quirt and Thurman's +ranch, and sit for an hour or so just looking. That ride was beginning +to be a habit of hers, Al had observed, so that he considered her +accounted for also.</p> + +<p>He made his way along the side hill to where his horse was tied to a +bush, mounted and rode away with his mind pretty much at ease. Much more +at ease than it would have been had he read what was in Lorraine's mind +when, she slammed that door.</p> + +<p>Up above Sugar Spring was timber. By applying to the nearest Forest +Supervisor a certain amount could be had for ranch improvements upon +paying a small sum for the "stumpage." The Quirt had permission to cut +posts for their new fence which Al Woodruff had reported to his boss.</p> + +<p>As he drove up the trail, which was in places barely passable for a +wagon, Brit was thinking of that fence. The Sawtooth would object to it, +he knew, since it cut off one of their stock trails and sent them around +through rougher country. Just what form their objection would take, +Brit<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> did not know. Deep in his intrepid soul he hoped that the Sawtooth +would at last show its hand openly. He had liked Fred Thurman, and what +Lorraine had told him went much deeper than she knew. He wanted to bring +them into the open where he could fight with some show of winning.</p> + +<p>"I'll git Bill Warfield yet—and git him right," was the gist of his +musings. "He's bound to show his head, give him time enough. Him and his +killers can't always keep under cover. Let 'em come at me about that +fence! It's on my land—the Quirt's got a right to fence every foot of +land that belongs to 'em."</p> + +<p>All the way over the ridge and across the flat and up the steep, narrow +road along the edge of Spirit Canyon, Brit dwelt upon the probable moves +of the Sawtooth. They would wait, he thought, until the fence was +completed and they had made a trail around through the lava rocks. They +would not risk any move at present; they would wait and tacitly accept +the fence, or pretend to accept it, as a natural inconvenience. But Brit +did not deceive himself that they would remain passive. That it had been +"hands off the Quirt" he did not know, but attributed the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> Quirt's +immunity to careful habits and the fact that they had never come to the +point where their interests actually clashed with the Sawtooth.</p> + +<p>It never occurred to him therefore that he was slated for an accident +that day if the details could be conveniently arranged.</p> + +<p>It was a long trail to Sugar Spring, and from there up Spirit Canyon the +climb was so tedious and steep that Brit took a full hour for the trip, +resting the team often because they were soft from the new grass diet +and sweated easily. They lost none of their spirit, however, and when +the road was steepest nagged at each other with head-shakings and bared +teeth, and ducked against each other in pretended fright at every +unusual rock or bush.</p> + +<p>At the top he was forced to drive a full half mile beyond the piled +posts to a flat large enough to turn around. All this took time, +especially since Caroline, the brown mare, would rather travel ten miles +straight ahead than go backward ten feet. Brit was obliged to "take it +out of her" with the rein ends and his full repertoire of opprobrious +epithets before he could cramp the wagon and head them down the trail +again.</p> + +<p>At the post pile he unhitched the team for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> safety's sake and tied them +to trees, where he fed them a little grain in nose bags. He was absorbed +now in his work and thought no more about the Sawtooth. He fastened the +log chain to the rear wheels to brake the wagon on the long grade down +the canyon, loaded the wagon with posts, bound them fast with a lighter +chain he had brought for the purpose, ate his own lunch and decided +that, since he had made fair time and would arrive home too early to do +the chores and too late to start any other job, he would cruise farther +up the mountain side and see what was the prospect of getting out logs +enough for an addition to the cabin.</p> + +<p>Now that Raine was going to live with him, two rooms were not enough. +Brit wanted to make her as happy as he could, in his limited fashion. He +had for some days been planning a "settin' room and bedroom" for her. +She would be having beaux after awhile when she got acquainted, he +supposed. He could not deny her the privilege; she was young and she +was, in Brit's opinion, the best looking girl he had ever seen, not even +excepting Minnie, her mother. But he hoped she wouldn't go off and get +married the first thing she did,—and one good way<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> to prevent that, he +reasoned, was to make her comfortable with him. He had noticed how +pleased she was that their cabin was of logs. She had even remarked that +she could not understand how a rancher would ever want to build a board +shack if there was any timber to be had. Well, timber was to be had, and +she should have her log house, though the hauling was not going to be +any sunshine, in Brit's opinion. With his axe he walked through the +timber, craning upward for straight tree trunks and lightly blazing the +ones he would want, the occasional axe strokes sounding distinctly in +the quiet air.</p> + +<p>Lorraine heard them as she rode old Yellowjacket puffing up the grade, +following the wagon marks, and knew that she was nearing the end of her +journey,—for which Yellowjacket, she supposed, would be thankful. She +had started not more than an hour later than her father, but the team +had trotted along more briskly than her poor old nag would travel, so +that she did not overtake her dad as she had hoped.</p> + +<p>She was topping the last climb when she saw the team tied to the trees, +and at the same moment she caught a glimpse of a man who crawled out +from under the load of posts and climbed the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> slope farther on. She was +on the point of calling out to him, thinking that he was her dad, when +he disappeared into the brush. At the same moment she heard the stroke +of an axe over to the right of where the man was climbing.</p> + +<p>She was riding past the team when Caroline humped her back and kicked +viciously at Yellowjacket, who plunged straight down off the trail +without waiting to see whether Caroline's aim was exact. He slid into a +juniper thicket and sat down looking very perplexed and very permanently +placed there. Lorraine stepped off on the uphill side of him, thanked +her lucky stars she had not broken a leg, and tried to reassure +Yellowjacket and to persuade him that no real harm had been done him. +Straightway she discovered that Yellowjacket had a mind of his own and +that a pessimistic mind. He refused to scramble back into the trail, +preferring to sit where he was, or since Lorraine made that too +uncomfortable, to stand where he had been sitting. Yellowjacket, I may +explain, owned a Roman nose, a pendulous lower lip and drooping eyelids. +Those who know horses will understand.</p> + +<p>By the time Lorraine had bullied and cajoled<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> him into making a somewhat +circuitous route to the road, where he finally appeared some distance +above the point of his descent, Brit was there, hitching the team to the +wagon.</p> + +<p>"What yuh doing up there?" he wanted to know, looking up with some +astonishment.</p> + +<p>Lorraine furnished him with details and her opinion of both Caroline and +Yellow jacket. "I simply refuse to ride this comedy animal another +mile," she declared with some heat. "I'll drive the team and you can +ride him home, or he can be tied on behind the wagon."</p> + +<p>"He won't lead," Brit objected. "Yeller's all right if you make up your +mind to a few failin's. You go ahead and ride him home. You sure can't +drive this team."</p> + +<p>"I can!" Lorraine contended. "I've driven four horses—I guess I can +drive two, all right."</p> + +<p>"Well, you ain't going to," Brit stated with a flat finality that +abruptly ended the argument.</p> + +<p>Lorraine had never before been really angry with her father. She struck +Yellowjacket with her quirt and sent him sidling past the wagon and the +tricky Caroline, too stubborn to answer her dad when he called after her +that she had better ride behind the load. She went on, mak<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span>ing +Yellowjacket trot when he did not want to trot down hill.</p> + +<p>Behind her she heard the chuck-chuck of the loaded wagon. Far ahead she +heard some one whistling a high, sweet melody which had the queer, minor +strains of some old folk song. For just a few bars she heard it, and +then it was stilled, and the road dipping steeply before her seemed very +lonely, its emptiness cooling her brief anger to a depression that had +held her too often in its grip since that terrible night of the storm. +For the first time she looked back at her father lurching along on the +load and at the team looking so funny with the collars pushed up on +their necks with the weight of the load behind.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span>With a quick impulse of penitence she waved her hand to Brit, who waved +back at her. Then she went on, feeling a bit less alone in the world. +After all, he was her dad, and his life had been hard. If he failed to +understand her and her mental hunger for real companionship, perhaps she +also failed to understand him.</p> + +<p>They had left the timber line now and had come to the lip of the canyon +itself. Lorraine looked down its steep, rock-roughened sides and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span> +thought how her old director would have raved over its possibilities in +the way of "stunts." Yellow jacket, she noticed, kept circumspectly to +the center of the trail and eyed the canyon with frank disfavor.</p> + +<p>She did not know at just what moment she became aware of trouble behind +her. It may have been Yellowjacket, turning his head sidewise and +abruptly quickening his pace that warned her. It may have been the +difference in the sound of the wagon and the impact of the horses' hoofs +on the rocky trail. She turned and saw that something had gone wrong. +They were coming down upon her at a sharp trot, stepping high, the wagon +tongue thrust up between their heads as they tried to hold back the +load.</p> + +<p>Brit yelled to her then to get out of the way, and his voice was harsh +and insistent. Lorraine looked at the steep bank to the right, knew +instinctively that Yellowjacket would never have time to climb it before +the team was upon them, and urged him to a lope. She glanced back again, +saw that the team was not running away, that they were trying to hold +the wagon, and that it was gaining momentum in spite of them.</p> + +<p>"Jump, dad!" she called and got no answer. Brit was sitting braced with +his feet far apart, holding and guiding the team. "He won't jump—he +wouldn't jump—any more than I would," she chattered to herself, sick +with fear for him, while she lashed her own horse to keep out of their +way.</p> + +<p>The next she knew, the team was running, their eyeballs staring, their +front feet flung high as they lunged panic-stricken down the trail. The +load was rocking along behind them. Brit was still braced and clinging +to the reins.</p> + +<p>Panic seized Yellowjacket. He, too, went lunging down that trail, his +head thrown from side to side that he might watch the thing that menaced +him, heedless of the fact that danger might lie ahead of him also. +Lorraine knew that he was running senselessly, that he might leave the +trail at any bend and go rolling into the canyon.</p> + +<p>A sense of unreality seized her. It could not be deadly earnest, she +thought. It was so exactly like some movie thrill, planned carefully in +advance, rehearsed perhaps under the critical eye of the director, and +done now with the camera man turning calmly the little crank and +counting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span> the number of film feet the scene would take. A little farther +and she would be out of the scene, and men stationed ahead would ride up +and stop her horse for her and tell her how well she had "put it over."</p> + +<p>She looked over her shoulder and saw them still coming. It was real. It +was terribly real, the way that team was fleeing down the grade. She had +never seen anything like that before, never seen horses so frantically +trying to run from the swaying load behind them. Always, she had been +accustomed to moderation in the pace and a slowed camera to speed up the +action on the screen. Yellowjacket, too—she had never ridden at that +terrific speed down hill. Twice she lost a stirrup and grabbed the +saddle horn to save herself from going over his head.</p> + +<p>They neared a sharp turn, and it took all her strength to pull her horse +to the inside and save him from plunging off down the canyon's side. The +nose of the hill hid for a moment her dad, and in that moment she heard +a crash and knew what had happened. But she could not stop; Yellowjacket +had his ears laid back flat on his senseless head, and the bit clamped +tight in his teeth.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span>She heard the crash repeated in diminuendo farther down in the canyon. +There was no longer the rattle of the wagon coming down the trail, the +sharp staccato of pounding hoofs.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_ELEVEN" id="CHAPTER_ELEVEN"></a>CHAPTER ELEVEN</h2> + +<h4>SWAN TALKS WITH HIS THOUGHTS</h4> + + +<p>Lorraine, following instinct rather than thought, pulled Yellowjacket +into the first opening that presented itself. This was a narrow, rather +precipitous gully that seamed the slope just beyond the bend. The bushes +there whipped her head and shoulders cruelly as the horse forged in +among them, but they trapped him effectually where the gully narrowed to +a point. He stopped perforce, and Lorraine was out of the saddle and +running down to the trail before she quite realized what she was doing.</p> + +<p>At the bend she looked down, saw the marks where the wagon had gone +over, scraping rocks and bushes from its path. Fence posts were strewn +at all angles down the incline, and far down a horse was standing with +part of the harness on him and with his head drooping dispiritedly. Her +father she could not see, nor the other horse, nor the wagon. A clump +of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> young trees hid the lower declivity. Lorraine did not stop to think +of what she would find down there. Sliding, running, she followed the +traces of the wreck to where the horse was standing. It was Caroline, +looking very dejected but apparently unhurt, save for skinned patches +here and there where she had rolled over rocks.</p> + +<p>A little farther, just beyond the point of the grove which they seemed +to have missed altogether, lay the other horse and what was left of the +wagon. Brit she did not see at all. She searched the bushes, looked +under the wagon, and called and called.</p> + +<p>A full-voiced shout answered her from farther up the canyon, and she ran +stumbling toward the sound, too agonized to shed tears or to think very +clearly. It was not her father's voice; she knew that beyond all doubt. +It was no voice that she had ever heard before. It had a clear resonance +that once heard would not have been easily forgotten. When she saw them +finally, her father was being propped up in a half-sitting position, and +the strange man was holding something to his lips.</p> + +<p>"Just a little water. I carry me a bottle of water always in my pocket," +said Swan, glancing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> up at her when she had reached them. "It sometimes +makes a man's head think better when he has been hurt, if he can drink a +little water or something."</p> + +<p>Brit swallowed and turned his face away from the tilted bottle. "I +jumped—but I didn't jump quick enough," he muttered thickly. "The chain +pulled loose. Where's the horses, Raine?"</p> + +<p>"They're all right. Caroline's standing over there. Are you hurt much, +dad?" It was a futile question, because Brit was already going off into +unconsciousness.</p> + +<p>"He's hurt pretty bad," Swan declared honestly, looking up at her with +his eyes grown serious. "I was across the walley and I saw him coming +down the road like rolling rocks down a hill. I came quick. Now we make +stretcher, I think, and carry him home. I could take him on my back, but +that is hurting him too much." He looked at her—through her, it seemed +to Lorraine. In spite of her fear, in spite of her grief, she felt that +Swan was reading her very soul, and she backed away from him.</p> + +<p>"I could help your father very much," he said soberly, "but I should +tell you a secret if I do<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> that. I should maybe ask that you tell a lie +if somebody asks questions. Could you do that, Miss?"</p> + +<p>"Lie?" Lorraine laughed uncertainly. "I'd <i>kill</i>!—if that would help +dad."</p> + +<p>Swan was folding his coat very carefully and placing it under Brit's +head. "My mother I love like that," he said, without looking up. "My +mother I love so well that I talk with my thoughts to her sometimes. You +believe people can talk with their thoughts?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know—what's that got to do with helping dad?" Lorraine knelt +beside Brit and began stroking his forehead softly, as is the soothing +way of women with their sick.</p> + +<p>"I could send my thought to my mother. I could say to her that a man is +hurt and that a doctor must come very quickly to the Quirt ranch. I +could do that, Miss, but I should not like it if people knew that I did +it. They would maybe say that I am crazy. They would laugh at me, and it +is not right to laugh at those things."</p> + +<p>"I'm not laughing. If you can do it, for heaven's sake go ahead! I don't +believe it, but I won't tell any one, if that's what you want."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span>"If some neighbors should ask, 'How did that doctor come so quick?'——"</p> + +<p>"I'd rather lie and say I sent for him, than say that you or any one +else sent a telepathic message. That would sound more like a lie than a +lie would. How are we going to make a stretcher? We've got to get him +home, somehow——"</p> + +<p>"At my cabin is blankets," Swan told her briskly. "I can climb the +hill—it is up there. In a little while I will come back."</p> + +<p>He started off without waiting to see what Lorraine would have to say +about it, and with some misgivings she watched him run down to the +canyon's bottom and go forging up the opposite side with a most amazing +speed and certainty. In travel pictures she had seen mountain sheep +climb like that, and she likened him now to one of them. It seemed a +shame that he was a bit crazy, she thought; and immediately she recalled +his perfect assurance when he told her of sending thought messages to +his mother. She had heard of such things, she had even read a little on +the subject, but it had never seemed to her a practical means of +communicating. Calling a doctor, for instance, seemed to Lorraine<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> +rather far-fetched an application of what was at best but a debatable +theory.</p> + +<p>Considering the distance, he was back in a surprisingly short time with +two blankets, a couple of light poles and a flask of brandy. He seemed +as fresh and unwinded as if he had gone no farther than the grove, and +he wore, more than ever, his air of cheerful assurance.</p> + +<p>"The doctor will be there," he remarked, just as if it were the simplest +thing in the world. "We can carry him to Fred Thurman's. There I can get +horses and a wagon, and you will not have to carry so far. And when we +get to your ranch the doctor will be there, I think. He is starting now. +We will hurry. I will fix it so you need not carry much. It is just to +make it steady for me."</p> + +<p>While he talked he was working on the stretcher. He had a rope, and he +was knotting it in a long loop to the poles. Lorraine wondered why, +until he had lifted her father and placed him on the stretcher and +placed the loop over his own head and under one arm, as a ploughman +holds the reins, so that his hands may be free.</p> + +<p>"If you will carry the front," said Swan<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> politely, "it will not be +heavy for you like this. But you will help me keep it steady."</p> + +<p>Lorraine was past discussing anything. She obeyed him silently, lifting +the end of the stretcher and leading the way down to the canyon's +bottom, where Swan assured her they could walk quite easily and would +save many détours which the road above must take. At the bottom Swan +stopped her so that he might shorten the rope and take more of the +weight on his shoulders. She protested half-heartedly, but Swan only +laughed.</p> + +<p>"I am strong like a mule," he said. "You should see me wrestle with +somebody. Clear over my head—I can carry a man in my hands. This is so +you can walk fast. Three miles straight down we come to Thurman's ranch, +where I get the horses. It's funny how hills make a road far around. +Just three miles—that's all. I have walked many times."</p> + +<p>Lorraine did not answer him. She felt that he was talking merely to keep +her from worrying, and she was fairly sick with anxiety and did not hear +half of what he was saying. She was nervously careful about choosing her +steps so that she would not stumble and jolt her father.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> She did not +believe that he was wholly unconscious, for she had seen his eyelids +tighten and his lips twitch several times, when she was waiting for +Swan. He had seemed to be in pain and to be trying to hide the fact from +her. She felt that Swan knew it, else he would have talked of her dad, +would at least have tried to reassure her. But it is difficult to speak +of a person who hears what you are saying, and Swan was talking of +everything, it seemed to her, except the man they were carrying.</p> + +<p>She wondered if it were really true that Swan had sent a call through +space for a doctor; straightway she would call herself crazy for even +considering for a moment its possibility. If he could do that—but of +course he couldn't. He must just imagine it.</p> + +<p>Many times Swan had her lower the stretcher to the ground, and would +make a great show of rubbing his arms and easing his shoulder muscles. +Whenever Lorraine looked full into his face he would grin at her as +though nothing was wrong, and when they came to a clear-running stream +he emptied the water bottle, dipped up a little fresh water, added +brandy, and lifted Brit's head very gently and gave him<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> a drink. Brit +opened his eyes and looked at Swan, and from him to Lorraine, but he did +not say anything. He still had that tightened look around his mouth +which spelled pain.</p> + +<p>"Pretty quick now we get you fixed up good," Swan told him cheerfully. +"One mile more is all, and we get the horses and I make a good bed for +you." He looked a signal, and Lorraine once more took up the stretcher.</p> + +<p>Another mile seemed a long way, light though Swan had made the load for +her. She thought once that he must have some clairvoyant power, because +whenever she felt as if her arms were breaking, Swan would tell her to +stop a minute.</p> + +<p>"How do you know a doctor will come?" she asked Swan suddenly, when they +were resting with the Thurman ranch in view half a mile below them.</p> + +<p>Swan did not look at her directly, as had been his custom. She saw a +darker shade of red creep up into his cheeks. "My mother says she would +send a doctor quick," he replied hesitatingly. "You will see. It is +because—your father he is not like other men in this country. Your +father is a good man. That is why a doctor comes."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span>Lorraine looked at him strangely and stooped again to her burden. She +did not speak again until they were passing the Thurman fence where it +ran up into the mouth of the canyon. A few horses were grazing there, +the sun striking their sides with the sheen of satin. They stared +curiously at the little procession, snorted and started to run, heads +and tails held high. But one wheeled suddenly and came galloping toward +them, stopped when he was quite close, ducked and went thundering past +to the head of the field. Lorraine gave a sharp little scream and set +down the stretcher with a lurch, staring after the horse wide-eyed, her +face white.</p> + +<p>"They do it for play," Swan said reassuringly. "They don't hurt you. The +fence is between, and they don't hurt you anyway."</p> + +<p>"That horse with the white face—I saw it—and when the man struck it +with his quirt it went past me, running like that and dragging—<i>oh-h</i>!" +She leaned against the bluff side, her face covered with her two palms.</p> + +<p>Swan glanced down at Brit, saw that his eyes were closed, ducked his +head from under the looped rope and went to Lorraine.</p> + +<p>"The man that struck that horse—do you<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> know that man?" he asked, all +the good nature gone from his voice.</p> + +<p>"No—I don't know—I saw him twice, by the lightning flashes. He +shot—and then I saw him——" She stopped abruptly, stood for a minute +longer with her eyes covered, then dropped her hands limply to her +sides. But when the horse came circling back with a great flourish, she +shivered and her hands closed into the fists of a fighter.</p> + +<p>"Are you a Sawtooth man?" she demanded suddenly, looking up at Swan +defiantly. "It was a nightmare. I—I dreamed once about a horse—like +that."</p> + +<p>Swan's wide-open eyes softened a little. "The Sawtooth calls me that +damn Swede on Bear Top," he explained. "I took a homestead up there and +some day they will want to buy my place or they will want to make a +fight with me to get the water. Could you know that man again?"</p> + +<p>"Raine!" Brit's voice held a warning, and Lorraine shivered again as she +turned toward him. "Raine, you——"</p> + +<p>He closed his eyes again, and she could get no further speech from him. +But she thought she<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> understood. He did not want her to talk about Fred +Thurman. She went to her end of the stretcher and waited there while +Swan put the rope over his head. They went on, Lorraine walking with her +head averted, trying not to see the blaze-faced roan, trying to shut out +the memory of him dashing past her with his terrible burden, that night.</p> + +<p>Swan did not speak of the matter again. With Lorraine's assistance he +carried Brit into Thurman's cabin, laid him, stretcher and all, on the +bed and hurried out to catch and harness the team of work horses. +Lorraine waited beside her father, helpless and miserable. There was +nothing to do but wait, yet waiting seemed to her the one thing she +could not do.</p> + +<p>"Raine!" Brit's voice was very weak, but Lorraine jumped as though a +trumpet had bellowed suddenly in her ear. "Swan—he's all right. But +don't go telling—all yuh know and some besides. He ain't—Sawtooth, +but—he might let out——"</p> + +<p>"I know. I won't, dad. It was that horse——"</p> + +<p>Brit turned his face to the wall as if no more was to be said on the +subject. Lorraine wandered around the cabin, which was no larger than<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> +her father's place. The rooms were scrupulously clean—neater than the +Quirt, she observed guiltily. Not one article, however small and +unimportant, seemed to be out of its place, and the floors of both rooms +were scrubbed whiter than any floors she had ever seen. Swan's +housekeeping qualities made her ashamed of her own imperfections; and +when, thinking that Swan must be hungry and that the least she could do +was to set out food for him, she opened the cupboard, she had a swift, +embarrassed vision of her own culinary imperfections. She could cook +better food than her dad had been content to eat and to set before +others, but Swan's bread was a triumph in sour dough. Biscuits tall and +light as bread can be she found, covered neatly with a cloth. Prunes +stewed so that there was not one single wrinkle in them—Lorraine could +scarcely believe they were prunes until she tasted them. She was +investigating a pot of beans when Swan came in.</p> + +<p>"Food I am thinking of, Miss," he grinned at her. "We shall hurry, but +it is not good to go hungry. Milk is outside in a cupboard. It is +quicker than to make coffee."</p> + +<p>"It will be dark before we can get him home,"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> said Lorraine uneasily. +"And by the time a doctor can get out there——"</p> + +<p>"A doctor will be there, I think. You don't believe, but that is no +difference to his coming just the same."</p> + +<p>He brought the milk, poured off the creamy top into a pitcher, stirred +it, and quietly insisted that she drink two glasses. Lorraine observed +that Swan himself ate very little, bolting down a biscuit in great +mouthfuls while he carried a mattress and blankets out to spread in the +wagon. It was like his pretense of weariness on the long carry down the +canyon, she thought. It was for her more than for himself that he was +thinking.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_TWELVE" id="CHAPTER_TWELVE"></a>CHAPTER TWELVE</h2> + +<h4>THE QUIRT PARRIES THE FIRST BLOW</h4> + + +<p>A car with dimmed lights stood in front of the Quirt cabin when Swan +drove around the last low ridge and down to the gate. The rattle of the +wagon must have been heard, for the door opened suddenly and Frank stood +revealed in the yellow light of the kerosene lamp on the table within. +Behind Frank, Lorraine saw Jim and Sorry standing in their shirt sleeves +looking out into the dark. Another, shorter figure she glimpsed as Frank +and the two men stepped out and came striding hastily toward them. +Lorraine jumped out and ran to meet them, hoping and fearing that her +hope was foolish. That car might easily be only Bob Warfield on some +errand of no importance. Still, she hoped.</p> + +<p>"That you, Raine? Where's Brit? What's all this about Brit being hurt? A +doctor from Shoshone——"</p> + +<p>"A <i>doctor</i>? Oh, did a doctor come, then?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span> Oh, help Swan carry dad in! +I'm—oh, I'm afraid he's awfully injured!"</p> + +<p>"Yes-s—but how'n hell did a doctor know about it?" Sorry, the silent, +blurted unexpectedly.</p> + +<p>"Oh,—never mind—but get dad in. I'll——" She ran past them without +finishing her sentence and burst incoherently into the presence of an +extremely calm little man with gray whiskers and dust on the shoulders +of his coat. These details, I may add, formed the sum of Lorraine's +first impression of him.</p> + +<p>"Well! Well!" he remonstrated with a professional briskness, when she +nearly bowled him over. "We seem to be in something of a hurry! Is this +the patient I was sent to examine?"</p> + +<p>"No!" Lorraine flashed impatiently over her shoulder as she rushed into +her own room and began turning down the covers. "It's dad, of +course—and you'd better get your coat off and get ready to go to work, +because I expect he's just one mass of broken bones!"</p> + +<p>The doctor smiled behind his whiskers and returned to the doorway to +direct the carrying in of his patient. His sharp eyes went immediately +to Brit's face, pallid under the leathery tan, his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> fingers went to +Brit's hairy, corded wrist. The doctor smiled no more that evening.</p> + +<p>"No, he is not a mass of broken bones, I am happy to say," he reported +gravely to Lorraine afterwards. "He has a sufficient number, however. +The left scapula is fractured, likewise the clavicle, and there is a +compound fracture of the femur. There is some injury to the head, the +exact extent of which I cannot as yet determine. He should be removed to +a hospital, unless you are prepared to have a nurse here for some time, +or to assume the burden of a long and tedious illness." He looked at her +thoughtfully. "The journey to Shoshone would be a considerable strain on +the patient in his present condition. He has a splendid amount of +constitutional vitality, or he would scarcely have survived his injuries +so long without medical attendance. Can you tell me just how the +accident occurred?"</p> + +<p>"Excuse me, doctor—and Miss," Swan diffidently interrupted. "I could +ask you to take a look on my shoulder, if you please. If you are done +setting bones in Mr. Hunter. I have a great pain on my shoulder from +carrying so long."</p> + +<p>"You never mentioned it!" Lorraine re<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span>proached him quickly. "Of course +it must be looked after right away. And then, Doctor, I'd like to talk +to you, if you don't mind." She watched them retreat to the bunk-house +together, Swan's big form towering above the doctor's slighter figure. +Swan was talking earnestly, the mumble of his voice reaching Lorraine +without the enunciation of any particular word to give a clue to what he +was saying. But it struck her that his voice did not sound quite +natural; not so Swedish, not so careful.</p> + +<p>Frank came tiptoeing out of the room where Brit lay bandaged and +unconscious and stood close to Lorraine, looking down at her solemnly.</p> + +<p>"How 'n 'ell did he git here—the doctor?" he demanded, making a great +effort to hold his voice down to a whisper, and forgetting now and then. +"How'd <i>he</i> know Brit rolled off'n the grade? Us here, <i>we</i> never knowed +it, and I was tryin' to send him back when you came. He said somebody +telephoned there was a man hurt in a runaway. There ain't a telephone +closer'n the Sawtooth, and that there's a good twenty mile and more from +where Brit was hurt. It's damn funny."</p> + +<p>"Yes, it is," Lorraine admitted uncomfortably.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> "I don't know any more +than you do about it."</p> + +<p>"Well, how'n 'ell did it happen? Brit, he oughta know enough to +rough-lock down that hill. An' that team ain't a runaway team. <i>I</i> never +had no trouble with 'em—they're good at holdin' a load. They'll set +down an' slide but what they'll hold 'er. What become of the horses?"</p> + +<p>"Why—they're over there yet. We forgot all about the horses, I think. +Caroline was standing up, all right. The other horse may be killed. I +don't know—it was lying down. And Yellowjacket was up that little gully +just this side of the wreck, when I left him. They did try to hold the +load, Frank. Something must have happened to the brake. I saw dad +crawling out from under the wagon just before I got to where the load +was standing. Or some one did. I think it was dad. But Caroline kicked +my horse down off the road, and I only saw him a minute—but it <i>must</i> +have been dad. And then, a little way down the hill, something went +wrong."</p> + +<p>Frank seemed trying to reconstruct the accident from Lorraine's +description. "He'd no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> business to start down if his rough-lock wasn't +all right," he said. "It ain't like him. Brit's careful about them +things—little men most always are. I don't see how 'n 'ell it worked +loose. It's a damn queer layout all around; and this here doctor gitting +here ahead of you folks, that there is the queerest. What's he say about +Brit? Think he'll pull through?"</p> + +<p>The doctor himself, coming up just then, answered the question. Of +course the patient would pull through! What were doctors for? As to his +reason for coming, he referred them to Mr. Vjolmar, whom he thought +could better explain the matter.</p> + +<p>The three of them waited,—five of them, since Jim and Sorry had come +up, anxious to hear the doctor's opinion and anything else pertaining to +the affair. Swan was coming slowly from the bunk-house, buttoning his +coat. He seemed to feel that they were waiting for him and to know why. +His manner was diffident, deprecating even.</p> + +<p>"We may as well go in out of the mosquitoes," the doctor suggested. "And +I wish you would tell these people what you told me, young man. Don't be +afraid to speak frankly; it is rather<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> amazing but not at all +impossible, as I can testify. In fact," he added dryly, "my presence +here ought to settle any doubt of that. Just tell them, young man, about +your mother."</p> + +<p>Swan was the last to enter the kitchen, and he stood leaning against the +closed door, turning his old hat round and round, his eyes going swiftly +from face to face. They were watching him, and Swan blushed a deep red +while he told them about his mother in Boise, and how he could talk to +her with his thoughts. He explained laboriously how the thoughts from +her came like his mother speaking in his head, and that his thoughts +reached her in the same way. He said that since he was a little boy they +could talk together with their thoughts, but people laughed and some +called them crazy, so that now he did not like to have somebody know +that he could do it.</p> + +<p>"But Brit Hunter's hurt bad, so a doctor must come quick, or I think he +maybe will die. It takes too long to ride a horse to Echo from this +ranch, so I call on my mother, and I tell my mother a doctor must come +quick to this ranch. So my mother sends a telephone to this doctor in +Shoshone, and he comes. That is all. But I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> would not like it if +everybody maybe finds it out that I do that, and makes talk about it."</p> + +<p>He looked straight at Jim and Sorry, and those two unprepossessing ones +looked at each other and at Swan and at the doctor and at each other +again, and headed for the door. But Swan was leaning against it, and his +eyes were on them. "I would like it if you say somebody rides to get the +doctor," he hinted quietly.</p> + +<p>Sorry looked at Jim. "I rode like hell," he stated heavily. "I leave it +to Jim."</p> + +<p>"You shore'n hell did!" Jim agreed, and Swan removed his big form from +the door.</p> + +<p>"You boys goin' over t' Spirit Canyon?" Frank wanted to know.</p> + +<p>"Yeah," said Sorry, answering for them both, and they went out, giving +Swan a sidelong look of utter bafflement as they passed him. Talking by +the thought route from Spirit Canyon to Boise City was evidently a bit +too much for even their phlegmatic souls to contemplate with perfect +calm.</p> + +<p>"They'll keep it to theirselves, whether they believe it or not," Frank +assured Swan in his labored whisper. "It don't go down with me. I ain't +supe'stitious enough fer that."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span>"The doctor he comes, don't he?" Swan retorted. "I shall go back now and +milk the cows and do chores."</p> + +<p>"But if your shoulder is lame, Swan, how can you?" Lorraine asked in her +unexpected fashion.</p> + +<p>Swan swallowed and looked helplessly at the doctor, who stood smoothing +his chin. "The muscle strain is not serious," he said calmly. "A little +gentle exercise will prevent further trouble, I think." Whereupon he +turned abruptly to the door of the other room, glanced in at Brit and +beckoned Lorraine with an upraised finger.</p> + +<p>"You have had a hard time of it yourself, young lady," he told her. "You +needn't worry about Swan. He is not suffering appreciably. I shall mix +you a very unpleasant dose of medicine, and then I want you to go to bed +and sleep. I shall stay with your father to-night; not that it is +necessary, but because I prefer daylight for the trip back to town. So +there is no reason why you should sit up and wear yourself out. You will +have plenty of time to do that while your father's bones mend."</p> + +<p>He proceeded to mix the unpleasant dose, which Lorraine swallowed and +straightway for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span>got, in the muddle of thoughts that whirled confusingly +in her brain. Little things distressed her oddly, while her father's +desperate state left her numb. She lay down on the cot in the farther +corner of the kitchen where her father had slept just last night—it +seemed so long ago!—and almost immediately, as her senses recorded it, +bright sunlight was shining into the room.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_THIRTEEN" id="CHAPTER_THIRTEEN"></a>CHAPTER THIRTEEN</h2> + +<h4>LONE TAKES HIS STAND</h4> + + +<p>Lone Morgan, over at Elk Spring camp, was just sitting down to eat his +midday meal when some one shouted outside. Lone stiffened in his chair, +felt under his coat, and then got up with some deliberation and looked +out of the window before he went to the door. All this was a matter of +habit, bred of Lone's youth in the feud country, and had nothing +whatever to do with his conscience.</p> + +<p>"Hello!" he called, standing in the doorway and grinning a welcome to +Swan, who stood with one arm resting on the board gate. "She's on the +table—come on in."</p> + +<p>"I don't know if you're home with the door shut like that," Swan +explained, coming up to the cabin. "I chased a coyote from Rock City to +here, and by golly, he's going yet! I'll get him sometime, maybe. He's +smart, but you can beat anything with thinking if you don't stop +think<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span>ing. Always the other feller stops sometimes, and then you get +him. You believe that?"</p> + +<p>"It most generally works out that way," Lone admitted, getting another +plate and cup from the cupboard, which was merely a box nailed with its +bottom to the wall, and a flour sack tacked across the front for a +curtain. "Even a coyote slips up now and then, I reckon."</p> + +<p>Swan sat down, smoothing his tousled yellow hair with both hands as he +did so. "By golly, my shoulder is sore yet from carrying Brit Hunter," +he remarked carelessly, flexing his muscles and grimacing a little.</p> + +<p>Lone was pouring the coffee, and he ran Swan's cup over before he +noticed what he was doing. Swan looked up at him and looked away again, +reaching for a cloth to wipe the spilled coffee from the table.</p> + +<p>"How was that?" Lone asked, turning away to the stove. "What-all +happened to Brit Hunter?"</p> + +<p>Swan, with his plate filled and his coffee well sweetened, proceeded to +relate with much detail the story of Brit's misfortune. "By golly, I +don't see how he don't get killed," he finished, helping himself to +another biscuit. "By <i>golly</i>,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> I don't. Falling into Spirit Canyon is +like getting dragged by a horse. It should kill a man. What you think, +Lone?"</p> + +<p>"It didn't, you say." Lone's eyes were turned to his coffee cup.</p> + +<p>"It don't kill Brit Hunter—not yet. I think maybe he dies with all his +bones broke, like that. By golly, that shows you what could happen if a +man don't think. Brit should look at that chain on his wheel before he +starts down that road."</p> + +<p>"Oh. His brake didn't hold, eh?"</p> + +<p>"I look at that wagon," Swan answered carefully. "It is something funny +about that chain. I worked hauling logs in the mountains, once. It is +something damn funny about that chain, the way it's fixed."</p> + +<p>Lone did not ask him for particulars, as perhaps Swan expected. He did +not speak at all for awhile, but presently pushed back his plate as if +his appetite were gone.</p> + +<p>"It's like Fred Thurman," Swan continued moralizing. "If Fred don't ride +backwards, I bet he don't get killed—like that."</p> + +<p>"Where's Brit now?" Lone asked, getting up and putting on his hat. "At +the ranch?"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span>"Or heaven, maybe," Swan responded sententiously. "But my dog Yack, he +don't howl yet. I guess Brit's at the ranch."</p> + +<p>"Sorry I'm busy to-day," said Lone, opening the door. "You stay as long +as you like, Swan. I've got some riding to do."</p> + +<p>"I'll wash the dishes, and then I maybe will think quicker than that +coyote. I'm after him, by golly, till I get him."</p> + +<p>Lone muttered something and went out. Within five minutes Swan, hearing +hoofbeats, looked out through a crack in the door and saw Lone riding at +a gallop along the trail to Rock City. "Good bait. He swallows the +hook," he commented to himself, and his good-natured grin was not +brightening his face while he washed the dishes and tidied the cabin.</p> + +<p>With Lone rode bitterness of soul and a sick fear that had nothing to do +with his own destiny. How long ago Brit had been hurled into the canyon +Lone did not know; he had not asked. But he judged that it must have +been very recently. Swan had not told him of anything but the runaway, +and of helping to carry Brit home—and of the "damn funny thing about +the chain"—the rough-lock, he must have meant.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span> Too well Lone +understood the sinister meaning that probably lay behind that phrase.</p> + +<p>"They've started on the Quirt now," he told himself with foreboding. +"She's been telling her father——"</p> + +<p>Lone fell into bitter argument with himself. Just how far was it +justifiable to mind his own business? And if he did not mind it, what +possible chance had he against a power so ruthless and so cunning? An +accident to a man driving a loaded wagon down the Spirit Canyon grade +had a diabolic plausibility that no man in the country could question. +Brit, he reasoned, could not have known before he started that his +rough-lock had been tampered with, else he would have fixed it. Neither +was Brit the man to forget the brake on his load. If Brit lived, he +might talk as much as he pleased, but he could never prove that his +accident had been deliberately staged with murderous intent.</p> + +<p>Lone lifted his head and looked away across the empty miles of sageland +to the quiet blue of the mountains beyond. Peace—the peace of +untroubled wilderness—brooded over the land. Far in the distance, +against the rim of rugged hills, was an irregular splotch of brown which +was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> the headquarters of the Sawtooth. Lone turned his wrist to the +right, and John Doe, obeying the rein signal, left the trail and began +picking his way stiff-legged down the steep slope of the ridge, heading +directly toward the home ranch.</p> + +<p>John Doe was streaked with sweat and his flanks were palpitating with +fatigue when Lone rode up to the corral and dismounted. Pop Bridgers saw +him and came bow-legging eagerly forward with gossip titillating on his +meddlesome tongue, but Lone stalked by him with only a surly nod. Bob +Warfield he saw at a distance and gave no sign of recognition. He met +Hawkins coming down from his house and stopped in the trail.</p> + +<p>"Have you got time to go back to the office and fix up my time, +Hawkins?" he asked without prelude. "I'm quitting to-day."</p> + +<p>Hawkins stared and named the Biblical place of torment. "What yuh +quittin' for, Lone?" he added incredulously. "All you boys got a raise +last month; ain't that good enough?"</p> + +<p>"Plenty good enough, so long as I work for the outfit."</p> + +<p>"Well, what's wrong? You've been with us<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> five years, Lone, and it's +suited you all right so far——"</p> + +<p>Lone looked at him. "Say, I never set out to <i>marry</i> the Sawtooth," he +stated calmly. "And if I have married you-all by accident, you can get a +bill of divorce for desertion. This ain't the first time a man ever quit +yuh, is it, Hawkins?"</p> + +<p>"No—and there ain't a man on the pay roll we can't do without," Hawkins +retorted, his neck stiffening with resentment. "It's a kinda rusty +trick, though, Lone, quittin' without notice and leaving a camp empty."</p> + +<p>"Elk Spring won't run away," Lone assured him without emotion. "She's +been left alone a week or two at a time during roundups. I don't reckon +the outfit'll bust up before you get a man down there."</p> + +<p>The foreman looked at him curiously, for this was not like Lone, whose +tone had always been soft and friendly, and whose manner had no hint of +brusqueness. There was a light, too, in Lone's eyes that had not been +there before. But Hawkins would not question him further. If Lone Morgan +or any other man wanted to quit, that was his privilege,—providing, of +course, that his leaving was not likely to menace the peace<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span> and +security of the Sawtooth. Lone had made it a point to mind his own +business, always. He had never asked questions, he had never surmised or +gossiped. So Hawkins gave him a check for his wages and let him go with +no more than a foreman's natural reluctance to lose a trustworthy man.</p> + +<p>By hard riding along short cuts, Lone reached the Quirt ranch and +dropped reins at the doorstep, not much past mid-afternoon.</p> + +<p>"I rode over to see if there's anything I can do," he said, when +Lorraine opened the door to him. He did not like to ask about her +father, fearing that the news would be bad.</p> + +<p>"Why, thank you for coming." Lorraine stepped back, tacitly inviting him +to enter. "Dad knows us to-day, but of course he's terribly hurt and +can't talk much. We do need some one to go to town for things. Frank +helps me with dad, and Jim and Sorry are trying to keep things going on +the ranch. And Swan does what he can, of course, but——"</p> + +<p>"I just thought you maybe needed somebody right bad," said Lone quietly, +meaning a great deal more than Lorraine dreamed that he meant. "I'm not +doing anything at all, right now, so I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span> can just as well help out as +not. I can go to town right away, if I can borrow a horse. John Doe, +he's pretty tired. I been pushing him right through—not knowing there +was a town trip ahead of him."</p> + +<p>Lorraine found her eyes going misty. He was so quiet, and so reassuring +in his quiet. Half her burden seemed to slip from her shoulders while +she looked at him. She turned away, groping for the door latch.</p> + +<p>"You may see dad, if you like, while I get the list of things the doctor +ordered. He left only a little while ago, and I was waiting for one of +the boys to come back so I could send him to town."</p> + +<p>It was on Lone's tongue to ask why the doctor had not taken in the order +himself and instructed some one to bring out the things; but he +remembered how very busy with its own affairs was Echo and decided that +the doctor was wise.</p> + +<p>He tiptoed in to the bed and saw a sallow face covered with stubbly gray +whiskers and framed with white bandages. Brit opened his eyes and moved +his thin lips in some kind of greeting, and Lone sat down on the edge of +a chair, feeling as miserably guilty as if he himself had brought the +old man to this pass. It seemed to him that Brit<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span> must know more of the +accident than Swan had told, and the thought did not add to his comfort. +He waited until Brit opened his eyes again, and then he leaned forward, +holding Brit's wandering glance with his own intent gaze.</p> + +<p>"I ain't working now," he said, lowering his voice so that Lorraine +could not hear. "So I'm going to stay here and help see you through with +this. I've quit the Sawtooth."</p> + +<p>Brit's eyes cleared and studied Lone's face. "D'you know—anything?"</p> + +<p>"No, I don't." Lone's face hardened a little. "But I wanted you to know +that I'm—with the Quirt, now."</p> + +<p>"Frank hire yuh?"</p> + +<p>"No. I ain't hired at all. I'm just—<i>with</i> yuh."</p> + +<p>"We—need yuh," said Brit grimly, looking Lone straight in the eyes.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_FOURTEEN" id="CHAPTER_FOURTEEN"></a>CHAPTER FOURTEEN</h2> + +<h4>"FRANK'S DEAD"</h4> + + +<p>"Frank come yet?" The peevish impatience of an invalid whose horizon has +narrowed to his own personal welfare and wants was in Brit's voice. Two +weeks he had been sick, and his temper had not sweetened with the pain +of his broken bones and the enforced idleness. Brit was the type of man +who is never quiet unless he is asleep or too ill to get out of bed.</p> + +<p>Lorraine came to the doorway and looked in at him. Two weeks had set +their mark on her also. She seemed older, quieter in her ways; there +were shadows in her eyes and a new seriousness in the set of her mouth. +She had had her burdens, and she had borne them with more patience than +many an older woman would have done, but what she thought of those +burdens she did not say.</p> + +<p>"No, dad—but I thought I heard a wagon a little while ago. He must be +coming," she said.</p> + +<p>"Where's Lone at?" Brit moved restlessly on the pillow and twisted his +face at the pain.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span>"Lone isn't back, either."</p> + +<p>"He ain't? Where'd he go?"</p> + +<p>Lorraine came to the bedside and, lifting Brit's head carefully, +arranged the pillow as she knew he liked it. "I don't know where he +went," she said dully. "He rode off just after dinner. Do you want your +supper now? Or would you rather wait until Frank brings the fruit?"</p> + +<p>"I'd ruther wait—if Frank don't take all night," Brit grumbled. "I hope +he ain't connected up with that Echo booze. If he has——"</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, dad! Don't borrow trouble. Frank was anxious to get home as +soon as he could. He'll be coming any minute, now. I'll go listen for +the wagon."</p> + +<p>"No use listenin'. You couldn't hear it in that sand—not till he gits +to the gate. I don't see where Lone goes to, all the time. Where's Jim +and Sorry, then?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, they've had their supper and gone to the bunk-house. Do you want +them?"</p> + +<p>"No! What'd I want 'em fur? Not to look at, that's sure. I want to know +how things is going on this ranch. And from all I can make out, they +ain't goin' at all," Brit fretted. "What was you 'n Lone talkin' so long +about, out in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> kitchen last night? Seems to me you 'n' him have got +a lot to say to each other, Raine."</p> + +<p>"Why, nothing in particular. We were just—talking. We're all human +beings, dad; we have to talk sometimes. There's nothing else to do."</p> + +<p>"Well, I caught something about the Sawtooth. I don't want you talking +to Lone or anybody else about that outfit, Raine. I told yuh so once. +He's all right—I ain't saying anything against Lone—but the less you +have to say the more you'll have to be thankful fur, mebby."</p> + +<p>"I was wondering if Swan could have gotten word somehow to the Sawtooth +and had them telephone out that you were hurt. And Lone was drawing a +map of the trails and showing me how far it was from the canyon to the +Sawtooth ranch. And he was asking me just how it happened that the brake +didn't hold, and I said it must have been all right, because I saw you +come out from under the wagon just before you hitched up. I thought you +were fixing the chain on them."</p> + +<p>"Huh?" Brit lifted his head off the pillow and let it drop back again, +because of the pain in his shoulder. "You never seen me crawl out<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> from +under no wagon. I come straight down the hill to the team."</p> + +<p>"Well, I saw some one. He went up into the brush. I thought it was you." +Lorraine turned in the doorway and stood looking at him perplexedly. "We +shouldn't be talking about it, dad—the doctor said we mustn't. But are +you <i>sure</i> it wasn't you? Because I certainly saw a man crawl out from +under the wagon and start up the hill. Then the horses acted up, and I +couldn't see him after Yellowjacket jumped off the road."</p> + +<p>Brit lay staring up at the ceiling, apparently unheeding her +explanation. Lorraine watched him for a minute and returned to the +kitchen door, peering out and listening for Frank to come from Echo with +supplies and the mail and, more important just now, fresh fruit for her +father.</p> + +<p>"I think he's coming, dad," she called in to her father. "I just heard +something down by the gate."</p> + +<p>She could save a few minutes, she thought, by running down to the corral +where Frank would probably stop and unload the few sacks of grain he was +bringing, before he drove up to the house. Frank was very methodical in +a fussy, purposeless way, she had observed. Twice he had driven<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> to Echo +since her father had been hurt, and each time he had stopped at the +corral on his way to the house. So she closed the screen door behind +her, careful that it should not slam, and ran down the path in the heavy +dusk wherein crickets were rasping a strident chorus.</p> + +<p>"Oh! It's you, is it, Lone?" she exclaimed, when she neared the vague +figure of a man unsaddling a horse. "You didn't see Frank coming +anywhere, did you? Dad won't have his supper until Frank comes with the +things I sent for. He's late."</p> + +<p>Lone was lifting the saddle off the back of John Doe, which he had +bought from the Sawtooth because he was fond of the horse. He hesitated +and replaced the saddle, pulling the blanket straight under it.</p> + +<p>"I saw him coming an hour ago," he said. "I was back up on the ridge, +and I saw a team turn into the Quirt trail from the ford. It couldn't be +anybody but Frank. I'll ride out and meet him."</p> + +<p>He was mounted and gone before she realized that he was ready. She heard +the sharp staccato of John Doe's hoofbeats and wondered why Lone had not +waited for another word from her. It was as if she had told him that +Frank was in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> some terrible danger,—yet she had merely complained that +he was late. The bunk-house door opened, and Sorry came out on the +doorstep, stood there a minute and came slowly to meet her as she +retraced her steps to the house.</p> + +<p>"Where'd Lone go so sudden?" he asked, when she came close to him in the +dusk. "That was him, wasn't it?"</p> + +<p>Lorraine stopped and stood looking at him without speaking. A vague +terror had seized her. She wanted to scream, and yet she could think of +nothing to scream over. It was Lone's haste, she told herself +impatiently. Her nerves were ragged from nursing her dad and from +worrying over things she must not talk about,—that forbidden subject +which never left her mind for long.</p> + +<p>"Wasn't that him?" Sorry repeated uneasily. "What took him off again in +such a rush?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't know! He said Frank should have been here long ago. He went +to look for him. Sorry," she cried suddenly, "what <i>is</i> the matter with +this place? I feel as if something horrible was just ready to jump out +at us all. I—I want my back against something solid, all the time, so +that nothing can creep up behind.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> Nothing," she added desperately, +"could happen to Frank between here and the turn-off at the ford, could +it? Lone saw him turn into our trail over an hour ago, he said."</p> + +<p>Sorry, his fingers thrust into his overalls pockets, his thumbs hooked +over the waistband, spat into the sand beside the path. "Well, he +started off with a cracked doubletree," he said slowly. "He mighta +busted 'er pullin' through that sand hollow. She was wired up pretty +good, though, and there was more wire in the rig. I don't know of +anything else that'd be liable to happen, unless——"</p> + +<p>"Unless what?" Lorraine prompted sharply. "There's too much that isn't +talked about, on this ranch. What else could happen?"</p> + +<p>Sorry edged away from her. "Well—I dunno as anything would be liable to +happen," he said uncomfortably. "'Taint likely him 'n' Brit 'd both have +accidents—not right hand-runnin'."</p> + +<p>"<i>Accidents</i>?" Lorraine felt her throat squeeze together. "Sorry, you +don't mean—Sawtooth accidents?" she blurted.</p> + +<p>She surprised a grunt out of Sorry, who looked over his shoulder as if +he feared eavesdroppers. "Where'd you git that idee?" he demanded. "I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> +dunno what you mean. Ain't that yore dad callin' yuh?"</p> + +<p>Lorraine ignored the hint. "You <i>do</i> know what I mean. Why did you say +they wouldn't both be likely to have accidents hand-running? And why +don't you <i>do</i> something? Why does every one just keep still and let +things happen, and not say a word? If there's any chance of Frank having +an—an <i>accident</i>, I should think you'd be out looking after him, and +not standing there with your hands in your pockets just waiting to see +if he shows up or if he doesn't show up. You're all just like these +rabbits out in the sage. You'll hide under a bush and wait until you're +almost stepped on before you so much as wiggle an ear! I'm getting good +and tired of this meek business!"</p> + +<p>"We-ell," Sorry drawled amiably as she went past him, "playin' +rabbit-under-a-bush mebby don't look purty, but it's dern good life +insurance."</p> + +<p>"A coward's policy," Lorraine taunted him over her shoulder, and went to +see what her father wanted. When he, too, wanted to know why Lone had +come and gone again in such a hurry, Lorraine felt all the courage go +out of her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span> at once. Their very uneasiness seemed to prove that there +was more than enough cause for it. Yet, when she forced herself to stop +and think, it was all about nothing. Frank had driven to Echo and had +not returned exactly on time, though a dozen things might have detained +him.</p> + +<p>She was listening at the door when Swan appeared unexpectedly before +her, having walked over from the Thurman ranch after doing the chores. +To him she observed that Frank was an hour late, and Swan, whistling +softly to Jack—Lorraine was surprised to hear how closely the call +resembled the chirp of a bird—strode away without so much as a pretense +at excuse. Lorraine stared after him wide-eyed, wondering and yet not +daring to wonder.</p> + +<p>Her father called to her fretfully, and she went in to him again and +told him what Sorry had said about the cracked doubletree, and persuaded +him to let her bring his supper at once, and to have the fruit later +when Frank arrived. Brit did not say much, but she sensed his +uneasiness, and her own increased in proportion. Later she saw two tiny, +glowing points down by the corral and knew that Sorry and Jim were down +there, waiting and listening, ready to do whatever was needed of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> them; +although what that would be she could not even conjecture.</p> + +<p>She made her father comfortable, chattered aimlessly to combat her +understanding of his moody silence, and listened and waited and tried +her pitiful best not to think that anything could be wrong. The subdued +chuckling of the wagon in the sand outside the gate startled her with +its unmistakable reality after so many false impressions that she heard +it.</p> + +<p>"Frank's coming, dad," she announced relievedly, "and I'll go and get +the mail and the fruit."</p> + +<p>She ran down the path again, almost light-hearted in her relief from +that vague terror which had held her for the past hour. From the corral +Sorry and Jim came walking up the path to meet the wagon which was +making straight for the bunk-house instead of going first to the stable. +One man rode on the seat, driving the team which walked slowly, oddly, +reminding Lorraine of a funeral procession. Beside the wagon rode Lone, +his head drooped a little in the starlight. It was not until the team +stopped before the bunk-house that Lorraine knew what it was that gave +her that strange, creepy feeling of disaster. It was not Frank Johnson, +but Swan Vjolmar who<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> climbed limberly down from the seat without +speaking and turned toward the back of the wagon.</p> + +<p>"Why, where's Frank?" she asked, going up to where Lone was dismounting +in silence.</p> + +<p>"He's there—in the wagon. We picked him up back here about +three-quarters of a mile or so."</p> + +<p>"What's the matter? Is he drunk?" This was Sorry who came up to Swan and +stood ready to lend a hand.</p> + +<p>"He's so drunk he falls out of wagon down the road, but he don't have +whisky smell by his face," was Swan's ambiguous reply.</p> + +<p>"He's not hurt, is he?" Lorraine pressed close, and felt a hand on her +arm pulling her gently away.</p> + +<p>"He's hurt," Lone said, just behind her. "We'll take him into the +bunk-house and bring him to. Run along to the house and don't worry—and +don't say anything to your dad, either. There's no need to bother him +about it. We'll look after Frank."</p> + +<p>Already Swan and Sorry and Jim were lifting Frank's limp form from the +rear of the wagon. It sagged in their arms like a dead thing, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> +Lorraine stepped back shuddering as they passed her. A minute later she +followed them inside, where Jim was lighting the lamp with shaking +fingers. By the glow of the match Lorraine saw how sober Jim looked, how +his chin was trembling under the drooping, sandy mustache. She stared at +him, hating to read the emotion in his heavy face that she had always +thought so utterly void of feeling.</p> + +<p>"It isn't—he isn't——" she began, and turned upon Swan, who was beside +the bunk, looking down at Frank's upturned face. "Swan, if it's serious +enough for a doctor, can't you send another thought message to your +mother?" she asked. "He looks—oh, Lone! He isn't <i>dead</i>, is he?"</p> + +<p>Swan turned his head and stared down at her, and from her face his +glance went sharply to Lone's downcast face. He looked again at +Lorraine.</p> + +<p>"To-night I can't talk with my mind," Swan told her bluntly. "Not always +I can do that. I could ask Lone how can a man be drunk so he falls off +the wagon when no whisky smell is on his breath."</p> + +<p>"Breath? Hell! There ain't no breath to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span> smell," Sorry exclaimed as +unexpectedly as his speeches usually were. "If he's breathin' I can't +tell it on him."</p> + +<p>"He's got to be breathing!" Lone declared with a suppressed fierceness +that made them all look at him. "I found a half bottle of whisky in his +pocket—but Swan's right. There wasn't a smell of it on his breath—I +tell you now, boys, that he was lying in the sand between two +sagebushes, on his face. And there is where he got the blow—<i>behind his +ear</i>. It's one of them accidents that you've got to figure out for +yourself."</p> + +<p>"Oh, do something!" Lorraine cried distractedly. "Never mind now how it +happened, or whether he was drunk or not—bring him to his senses first, +and let him explain. If there's whisky, wouldn't that help if he +swallowed some now? And there's medicine for dad's bruises in the house. +I'll get it. And Swan! Won't you <i>please</i> talk to your mother and tell +her we need the doctor?"</p> + +<p>Swan drew back. "I can't," he said shortly. "Better you send to Echo for +telegraph. And if you have medicine, it should be on his head quick."</p> + +<p>Lone was standing with his fingers pressed on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> Frank's wrist. He looked +up, hesitated, drew out his knife and opened the small blade. He moved +so that his back was to Lorraine, and still holding the wrist he made a +small, clean cut in the flesh. The three others stooped, stared with +tightened lips at the bloodless incision, straightened and looked at one +another dumbly.</p> + +<p>"I'd like to lie to you," Lone told Lorraine, speaking over his +shoulder. "But I won't. You're too game and too square. Go and stay with +your dad, but don't let him know—get him to sleep. We don't need that +medicine, nor a doctor either. Frank's dead. I reckon he was dead when +he hit the ground."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_FIFTEEN" id="CHAPTER_FIFTEEN"></a>CHAPTER FIFTEEN</h2> + +<h4>SWAN TRAILS A COYOTE</h4> + + +<p>At daybreak Swan was striding toward the place where Frank Johnson had +been found. Lone, his face moody, his eyes clouded with thought, rode +beside him, while Jack trotted loose-jointedly at Swan's heels. Swan had +his rifle, and Lone's six-shooter showed now and then under his coat +when the wind flipped back a corner. Neither had spoken since they left +the ranch, where Jim was wandering dismally here and there, trying to do +the chores when his heart was heavy with a sense of personal loss and +grim foreboding. None save Brit had slept during the night—and Brit had +slept only because Lorraine had prudently given him a full dose of the +sedative left by the doctor for that very purpose. Sorry had gone to +Echo to send a telegram to the coroner, and he was likely to return now +at any time. Wherefore Swan and Lone were going to look over the ground +before others had trampled<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> out what evidence there might be in the +shape of footprints.</p> + +<p>They reached the spot where the team had stopped of its own accord in +crossing a little, green meadow, and had gone to feeding. Lone pulled up +and half turned in the saddle, looking at Swan questioningly.</p> + +<p>"Is that dog of yours any good at trailing?" he asked abruptly. "I've +got a theory that somebody was in that wagon with Frank, and drove on a +ways before he jumped out. I believe if you'd put that dog on the +trail——"</p> + +<p>"If I put that dog on the trail he stays on the trail all day, maybe," +Swan averred with some pride. "By golly, he follows a coyote till he +drops."</p> + +<p>"Well, it's a coyote we're after now," said Lone. "A sheep-killer that +has made his last killin'. Right here's where I rode up and caught the +team, last night. We better take a look along here for tracks."</p> + +<p>Swan stared at him curiously, but he did not speak, and the two went on +more slowly, their glances roving here and there along the trail edge, +looking for footprints. Once the dog Jack swung off the trail into the +brush, and Swan fol<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span>lowed him while Lone stopped and awaited the result. +Swan came back presently, with Jack sulking at his heels.</p> + +<p>"Yack, he take up the trail of a coyote," Swan explained, "but it's got +the four legs, and Yack, he don't understand me when I don't follow. He +thinks I'm crazy this morning."</p> + +<p>"I reckon the team came on toward home after the fellow jumped out," +Lone observed. "He'd plan that way, seems to me. I know I would."</p> + +<p>"I guess that's right. I don't have experience in killing somebody," +Swan returned blandly, and Lone was too preoccupied to wonder at the +unaccustomed sarcasm.</p> + +<p>A little farther along Swan swooped down upon a blue dotted handkerchief +of the kind which men find so useful where laundries are but a name. +Again Lone stopped and bent to examine it as Swan spread it out in his +hands. A few tiny grains of sandstone rattled out, and in the center was +a small blood spot. Swan looked up straight into Lone's dark, brooding +eyes.</p> + +<p>"By golly, Lone, you would do that, too, if you kill somebody," he began +in a new tone,—the tone which Lorraine had heard indistinctly in the +bunk-house when Swan was talking to the doctor.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> "Do you think I'm a +damn fool, just because I'm a Swede? You are smart—you think out every +little thing. But you make a big mistake if you don't think some one +else may be using his brain, too. This handkerchief I have seen you pull +from your pocket too many times. And it had a rock in it last night, and +the blood shows that it was used to hit Frank behind the ear. You think +it all out—but maybe I've been thinking too. Now you're under arrest. +Just stay on your horse—he can't run faster than a bullet, and I don't +miss coyotes when I shoot them on the run."</p> + +<p>"The hell you say!" Lone stared at him. "Where's your authority, Swan?"</p> + +<p>Swan lifted the rifle to a comfortable, firing position, the muzzle +pointing straight at Lone's chest. With his left hand he turned back his +coat and disclosed a badge pinned to the lining.</p> + +<p>"I'm a United States Marshal, that's all; a government hunter," he +stated. "I'm hot on the trail of coyotes—all kinds. Throw that +six-shooter over there in the brush, will you?"</p> + +<p>"I hate to get the barrel all sanded up," Lone objected mildly. "You can +pack it, can't you?" He grinned a little as he handed out the gun, +muzzle toward himself. "You're playing safe,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> Swan, but if that dog of +yours is any good, you'll have a change of heart pretty quick. Isn't +that a man's track, just beside that flat rock? Put the dog on, why +don't you?"</p> + +<p>"Yack is on already," Swan pointed out. "Ride ahead of me, Lone."</p> + +<p>With a shrug of his shoulders Lone obeyed, following the dog as it +trotted through the brush on the trail of a man's footprints which Swan +had shown it. A man might have had some trouble in keeping to the trail, +but Jack trotted easily along and never once seemed at fault. In a very +few minutes he stopped in a rocky depression where a horse had been +tied, and waited for Swan, wagging his tail and showing his teeth in a +panting smile. The man he had trailed had mounted and ridden toward the +ridge to the west. Swan examined the tracks, and Lone sat on his horse +watching him.</p> + +<p>Jack picked up the trail where the horseman had walked away toward the +road, and Swan followed him, motioning Lone to ride ahead.</p> + +<p>"You could tell me about this, I think, but I can find out for myself," +he observed, glancing at Lone briefly.</p> + +<p>"Sure, you can find out, if you use your eyes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> and do a little +thinking," Lone replied. "I hope you do lay the evidence on the right +doorstep."</p> + +<p>"I will," Swan promised, looking ahead to where Jack was nosing his way +through the sagebrush.</p> + +<p>They brought up at the edge of the road nearly a quarter of a mile +nearer Echo than the place where Frank's body had been found. They saw +where the man had climbed into the wagon, and followed to where they had +found Frank beside the road, lying just as he had pitched forward from +the wagon seat.</p> + +<p>"I think," said Swan quietly, "we will go now and find out where that +horse went last night."</p> + +<p>"A good idea," Lone agreed. "Do you see how it was done, Swan? When he +saw the team coming, away back toward Echo, he rode down into that wash +and tied his horse. He was walking when Frank overtook him, I +reckon—maybe claiming his horse had broke away from him. He had a rock +in his handkerchief. Frank stopped and gave him a lift, and he used the +rock first chance he got. Then I reckon he stuck the whisky bottle in +Frank's pocket and heaved him out. He dropped the handkerchief out of +his hip pocket when he jumped out of the rig. It's right<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> simple, and if +folks didn't get to wondering about it, it'd be safe as any killing can +be. As safe," he added meaningly, "as dragging Fred Thurman, or +unhooking Brit's chain-lock before he started down the canyon with his +load of posts."</p> + +<p>Swan did not answer, but turned back to where the horse had been left +tied and took up the trail from there. As before, the dog trotted along, +Lone riding close behind him and Swan striding after. They did not +really need the dog, for the hoofprints were easily followed for the +greater part of the way.</p> + +<p>They had gone perhaps four miles when Lone turned, resting a hand on the +cantle of his saddle while he looked back at Swan. "You see where he was +headed for, don't yuh, Swan?" he asked, his tone as friendly as though +he was not under arrest as a murderer. "If he didn't go to Whisper, I'll +eat my hat."</p> + +<p>"You're the man to know," Swan retorted grimly. And then, because Lone's +horse had slowed in a long climb over a ridge, he came up even with a +stirrup. "Lone, I hate to do it. I'd like you, if you don't kill for a +living. But for that I could shoot you quick as a coyote. You're +smart—but not smart enough. You gave your<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span>self away when I showed you +Fred's saddle. After that I knew who was the Sawtooth killer that I came +here to find."</p> + +<p>"You thought you knew," Lone corrected calmly.</p> + +<p>"You don't have to lie," Swan informed him bluntly. "You don't have to +tell anything. I find out for myself if I make mistake."</p> + +<p>"Go to it," Lone advised him coldly. "It don't make a darn bit of +difference to me whether I ride in front of you or behind. I'm so glad +you're here on the job, Swan, that I'm plumb willing to be tied hand and +foot if it'll help you any."</p> + +<p>"When a man's too damn willing to be my prisoner," Swan observed +seriously, "he gets tied, all right. Put out your hands, Lone. You look +good to me with bracelets on, when you talk so willing to go to jail for +murder."</p> + +<p>He had slipped the rifle butt to the ground, and before Lone quite +realized what he was doing Swan had a short, wicked-looking automatic +pistol in one hand and a pair of handcuffs in the other. Lone flushed, +but there was nothing to do but hold out his hands.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_SIXTEEN" id="CHAPTER_SIXTEEN"></a>CHAPTER SIXTEEN</h2> + +<h4>THE SAWTOOTH SHOWS ITS HAND</h4> + + +<p>In her fictitious West Lorraine had long since come to look upon +violence as a synonym for picturesqueness; murder and mystery were +inevitably an accompaniment of chaps and spurs. But when a man she had +cooked breakfast for, had talked with just a few hours ago, lay dead in +the bunk-house, she forgot that it was merely an expected incident of +Western life. She lay in her bed shaking with nervous dread, and the +shrill rasping of the crickets and tree-toads was unendurable.</p> + +<p>After the first shock had passed a deep, fighting rage filled her, made +her long for day so that she might fight back somehow. Who was the +Sawtooth Company, that they could sweep human beings from their path so +ruthlessly and never be called to account? Not once did she doubt that +this was the doing of the Sawtooth,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> another carefully planned +"accident" calculated to rid the country of another man who in some +fashion had become inimical to their interests.</p> + +<p>From Lone she had learned a good deal about the new irrigation project +which lay very close to the Sawtooth's heart. She could see how the +Quirt ranch, with its water rights and its big, fertile meadows and its +fences and silent disapprobation of the Sawtooth's methods, might be +looked upon as an obstacle which they would be glad to remove.</p> + +<p>That her father had been sent down that grade with a brake deliberately +made useless was a horrible thought which she could not put from her +mind. She had thought and thought until it seemed to her that she knew +exactly how and why the killer's plans had gone awry. She was certain +that she and Swan had prevented him from climbing down into the canyon +and making sure that her dad did not live to tell what mischance had +overtaken him. He had probably been watching while she and Swan made +that stretcher and carried her dad away out of his reach. He would not +shoot <i>her</i>,—he would not dare. Nor would he dare come to the cabin and +finish the job he had begun. But he had managed to kill Frank<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span>—poor old +Frank, who would never grumble and argue over little things again.</p> + +<p>There was nothing picturesque, nothing adventurous about it. It was just +straight, heart-breaking tragedy, that had its sordid side too. Her dad +was a querulous sick man absorbed by his sufferings and not yet out of +danger, if she read the doctor's face aright. Jim and Sorry had taken +orders all their life, and they would not be able to handle the ranch +work alone; yet how else would it be done? There was +Lone,—instinctively she turned her thoughts to him for comfort. Lone +would stay and help, and somehow it would be managed.</p> + +<p>But to think that these things could be done without fear of +retribution. Jim and Sorry, Swan and Lone had not attempted to hide +their belief that the Sawtooth was responsible for Frank's death, yet +not one of them had hinted at the possibility of calling the sheriff, or +placing the blame where it belonged. They seemed brow-beaten into the +belief that it would be useless to fight back. They seemed to look upon +the doings of the Sawtooth as an act of Providence, like being struck by +lightning or freezing to death, as men sometimes did in that country.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span>To Lorraine that passive submission was the most intolerable part, the +one thing she could not, would not endure. Had she lived all of her life +on the Quirt, she probably would never have thought of fighting back and +would have accepted conditions just as her dad seemed to accept them. +But her mimic West had taught her that women sometimes dared where the +men had hesitated. It never occurred to her that she should submit to +the inevitable just because the men appeared to do so.</p> + +<p>Wherefore it was a new Lorraine who rose at daybreak and silently cooked +breakfast for the men, learned from Jim that Sorry was not back from +Echo, and that Swan and Lone had gone down to the place where Frank had +been found. She poured Jim's coffee and went on her tiptoes to see if +her father still slept. She dreaded his awakening and the moment when +she must tell him about Frank, and she had an unreasonable hope that the +news might be kept from him until the doctor came again.</p> + +<p>Brit was awake, and the look in his eyes frightened Lorraine so that she +stopped in the middle of the room, staring at him fascinated.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span>"Well," he said flatly, "who is it this time? Lone, or—Frank?"</p> + +<p>"Why—who is what?" Lorraine parried awkwardly. "I don't——"</p> + +<p>"Did they git Frank, las' night?" Brit's eyes seemed to bore into her +soul, searching pitilessly for the truth. "Don't lie to me, Raine—it +ain't going to help any. Was it Frank or Lone? They's a dead man laid +out on this ranch. Who is it?"</p> + +<p>"F-frank," Lorraine stammered, backing away from him. "H-how did you +know?"</p> + +<p>"How did it happen?" Brit's eyes were terrible.</p> + +<p>Lorraine shuddered while she told him.</p> + +<p>"Rabbits in a trap," Brit muttered, staring at the low ceiling. "Can't +prove nothing—couldn't convict anybody if we could prove it. Bill +Warfield's got this county under his thumb. Rabbits in a trap. Raine, +you better pack up and go home to your mother. There's goin' to be hell +a-poppin' if I live to git outa this bed."</p> + +<p>Lorraine stooped over him, and her eyes were almost as terrible as were +Brit's. "Let it pop. We aren't quitters, are we, dad? I'm going to stay +with you." Then she saw tears spilling over<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> Brit's eyelids and left the +room hurriedly, fighting back a storm of weeping. She herself could not +mourn for Frank with any sense of great personal loss, but it was +different with her dad. He and Frank had lived together for so many +years that his loyal heart ached with grief for that surly, faithful old +partner of his.</p> + +<p>But Lorraine's fighting blood was up, and she could not waste time in +weeping. She drank a cup of coffee, went out and called Jim, and told +him that she was going to take a ride, and that she wanted a decent +horse.</p> + +<p>"You can take mine," Jim offered. "He's gentle and easy-gaited. I'll go +saddle up. When do you want to go?"</p> + +<p>"Right now, as soon as I'm ready. I'll fix dad's breakfast, and you can +look after him until Lone and Swan come back. One of them will stay with +him then. I may be gone for three or four hours. I'll go crazy if I stay +here any longer."</p> + +<p>Jim eyed her while he bit off a chew of tobacco. "It'd be a good thing +if you had some neighbor woman come in and stay with yuh," he said +slowly. "But there ain't any I can think of that'd be much force. You +take Snake and ride<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span> around close and forget things for awhile." He +hesitated, his hand moving slowly back to his pocket. "If yuh feel like +you want a gun——"</p> + +<p>Lorraine laughed bitterly. "You don't think any accident would happen to +<i>me</i>, do you?"</p> + +<p>"Well, no—er I wouldn't advise yuh to go ridin'," Jim said +thoughtfully. "This here gun's kinda techy, anyway, unless you're used +to a quick trigger. Yuh might be safer without it than with it."</p> + +<p>By the time she was ready, Jim was tying his horse, Snake, to the +corral. Lorraine walked slowly past the bunk-house with her face turned +from it and her thoughts dwelling terrifiedly upon what lay within. Once +she was past she began running, as if she were trying to outrun her +thoughts. Jim watched her gravely, untied Snake and stood at his head +while she mounted, then walked ahead of her to the gate and opened it +for her.</p> + +<p>"Yore nerves are sure shot to hell," he blurted sympathetically as she +rode past him. "I guess you need a ride, all right. Snake's plumb safe, +so yuh got no call to worry about him. Take it easy, Raine, on the +worrying. That's about the worst thing you can do."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span>Lorraine gave him a grateful glance and a faint attempt at a smile, and +rode up the trail she always took,—the trail where she had met Lone +that day when he returned her purse, the trail that led to Fred +Thurman's ranch and to Sugar Spring and, if you took a certain turn at a +certain place, to Granite Ridge and beyond.</p> + +<p>Up on the ridge nearest the house Al Woodruff shifted his position so +that he could watch her go. He had been watching Lone and Swan and the +dog, trailing certain tracks through the sagebrush down below, and when +Lorraine rode away from the Quirt they were in the wagon road, fussing +around the place where Frank had been found.</p> + +<p>"They can't pin nothing on <i>me</i>," Al tried to comfort himself. "If that +damn girl would keep her mouth shut I could stand a trial, even. They +ain't got any evidence whatever, unless she saw me at Rock City that +night." He turned and looked again toward the two men down on the road +and tilted his mouth down at the corners in a sour grin.</p> + +<p>"Go to it and be damned to you!" he muttered. "You haven't got the dope, +and you can't git it,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> either. Trail that horse if you want to—I'd like +to see yuh amuse yourselves that way!"</p> + +<p>He turned again to stare after Lorraine, meditating deeply. If she had +only been a man, he would have known exactly how to still her tongue, +but he had never before been called upon to deal with the problem of +keeping a woman quiet. He saw that she was taking the trail toward Fred +Thurman's, and that she was riding swiftly, as if she had some errand in +that direction, something urgent. Al was very adept at reading men's +moods and intentions from small details in their behavior. He had seen +Lorraine start on several leisurely, purposeless rides, and her changed +manner held a significance which he did not attempt to belittle.</p> + +<p>He led his horse down the side of the ridge opposite the road and the +house, mounted there and rode away after Lorraine, keeping parallel with +the trail but never using it, as was his habit. He made no attempt to +overtake her, and not once did Lorraine glimpse him or suspect that she +was being followed. Al knew well the art of concealing his movements and +his proximity from the inquisitive eyes of another man's saddle horse, +and Snake had no more suspicion than his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> rider that they were not +altogether alone that morning.</p> + +<p>Lorraine sent him over the trail at a pace which Jim had long since +reserved for emergencies. But Snake appeared perfectly able and willing +to hold it and never stumbled or slowed unexpectedly as did +Yellowjacket, wherefore Lorraine rode faster than she would have done +had she known more about horses.</p> + +<p>Still, Snake held his own better than even Jim would have believed, and +carried Lorraine up over Granite Ridge and down into the Sawtooth flat +almost as quickly as Lorraine expected him to do. She came up to the +Sawtooth ranch-houses with Snake in a lather of sweat and with her own +determination unweakened to carry the war into the camp of her enemy. It +was, she firmly believed, what should have been done long ago; what +would have curbed effectually the arrogant powers of the Sawtooth.</p> + +<p>She glanced at the foreman's cottage only to make sure that Hawkins was +nowhere in sight there, and rode on toward the corrals, intercepting +Hawkins and a large, well-groomed, smooth-faced man whom she knew at +once must be Senator Warfield himself. Unconsciously Lorraine<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span> mentally +fitted herself into a dramatic movie "scene" and plunged straight into +the subject.</p> + +<p>"There has been," she said tensely, "another Sawtooth accident. It +worked better than the last one, when my father was sent over the grade +into Spirit Canyon. Frank Johnson is <i>dead</i>. I am here to discover what +you are going to do about it?" Her eyes were flashing, her chest was +rising and falling rapidly when she had finished. She looked straight +into Senator Warfield's face, her own full in the sunlight, so that, had +there been a camera "shooting" the scene, her expression would have been +fully revealed—though she did not realize all that.</p> + +<p>Senator Warfield looked her over calmly (just as a director would have +wished him to do) and turned to Hawkins. "Who is this girl?" he asked. +"Is she the one who came here temporarily—deranged?"</p> + +<p>"She's the girl," Hawkins affirmed, his eyes everywhere but on +Lorraine's face. "Brit Hunter's daughter—they say."</p> + +<p>"They <i>say</i>? I <i>am</i> his daughter! How dare you take that tone, Mr. +Hawkins? My home is at the Quirt. When you strike at the Quirt you +strike at me. When you strike at me I am going<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> to strike back. Since I +came here two men have been killed and my father has been nearly killed. +He may die yet—I don't know what effect this shock will have upon him. +But I know that Frank is dead, and that it's up to me now to see that +justice is done. You—you cowards! You will kill a man for the sake of a +few dollars, but you kill in the dark. You cover your murders under the +pretense of accidents. I want to tell you this: Of all the men you have +murdered, Frank Johnson will be avenged. You are going to answer for +that. I shall see that you <i>do</i> answer for it! There is justice in this +country, there <i>must</i> be. I'm going to demand that justice shall be +measured out to you. I——"</p> + +<p>"Was she violent, before?" Senator Warfield asked Hawkins in an +undertone which Lorraine heard distinctly. "You're a deputy, Hawkins. If +this keeps on, I'm afraid you will have to take her in and have her +committed for insanity. It's a shame, poor thing. At her age it is +pitiful. Look how she has ridden that horse! Another mile would have +finished him."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to say you think I'm crazy? What an idea! It seems to me, +Senator Warfield, that you are crazy yourself, to imagine that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> you can +go on killing people and thinking you will never have to pay the +penalty. You <i>will</i> pay. There is law in this land, even if——"</p> + +<p>"This is pathetic," said Senator Warfield, still speaking to Hawkins. +"Her father—if he is her father—is sick and not able to take care of +her. We'll have to assume the responsibility ourselves, I'm afraid, +Hawkins. She may harm herself, or——"</p> + +<p>Lorraine turned white. She had never seen just such a situation arise in +a screen story, but she knew what danger might lie in being accused of +insanity. While Warfield was speaking, she had a swift vision of the +evidence they could bring against her; how she had arrived there +delirious after having walked out from Echo,—why, they would call even +that a symptom of insanity! Lone had warned her of what people would say +if she told any one of what she saw in Rock City, perhaps really +believing that she had imagined it all. Lone might even think that she +had some mental twist! Her world was reeling around her.</p> + +<p>She whirled Snake on his hind feet, struck him sharply with the quirt +and was galloping back over the trail past the Hawkins house before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> +Senator Warfield had finished advising Hawkins. She saw Mrs. Hawkins +standing in the door, staring at her, but she did not stop. They would +take her to the asylum; she felt that the Sawtooth had the power, that +she had played directly into their hands, and that they would be as +ruthless in dealing with her as they had been with the nesters whom they +had killed. She knew it, she had read it in the inscrutable, level look +of Senator Warfield, in the half cringing, wholly subservient manner of +Hawkins when he listened to his master.</p> + +<p>"They're fiends!" she cried aloud once, while she urged Snake up the +slope of Granite Ridge. "I believe they'd kill me if they were sure they +could get away with it. But they could frame an insanity charge and put +me—my God, what fiends they are!"</p> + +<p>At the Sawtooth, Senator Warfield was talking with Mrs. Hawkins while +her husband saddled two horses. Mrs. Hawkins lived within her four walls +and called that, her "spere," and spoke of her husband as "he." You know +the type of woman. That Senator Warfield was anything less than a +godlike man who stood very high on the ladder of Fame, she would never +believe. So<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> she related garrulously certain incoherent, aimless +utterances of Lorraine's, and cried a little, and thought it was +perfectly awful that a sweet, pretty girl like that should be crazy. She +would have made an ideal witness against Lorraine, her very sympathy +carrying conviction of Lorraine's need of it. That she did not convince +Senator Warfield of Lorraine's mental derangement was a mere detail. +Senator Warfield had reasons for knowing that Lorraine was merely +afflicted with a dangerous amount of knowledge and was using it without +discretion.</p> + +<p>"You mustn't let her run loose and maybe kill herself or somebody else!" +Mrs. Hawkins exclaimed. "Oh, Senator, it's awful to think of! When she +went past the house I knew the poor thing wasn't right——"</p> + +<p>"We'll overtake her," Senator Warfield assured her comfortingly. "She +can't go very far on that horse. She'd ridden him half to death, getting +here. He won't hold out—he can't. She came here, I suppose, because she +had been here before. A sanitarium may be able to restore her to a +normal condition. I can't believe it's anything more than some nervous +disorder. Now don't worry, my good woman. Just have a room<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> ready, so +that she will be comfortable here until we can get her to a sanitarium. +It isn't hopeless, I assure you—but I'm mighty glad I happened to be +here so that I can take charge of the case. Now here comes Hawkins. +We'll bring her back—don't you worry."</p> + +<p>"Well, take her away as quick as you can, Senator. I'm scared of crazy +people. His brother went crazy in our house and——"</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes—we'll take care of her. Poor girl, I wish that I had been +here when she first came," said the senator, as he went to meet Hawkins, +who was riding up from the corrals leading two horses—one for Lorraine, +which shows what was his opinion of Snake.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_SEVENTEEN" id="CHAPTER_SEVENTEEN"></a>CHAPTER SEVENTEEN</h2> + +<h4>YACK DON'T LIE</h4> + + +<p>For a time the trail seemed to lead toward Whisper. Then it turned away +and seemed about to end abruptly on a flat outcropping of rock two miles +from Whisper camp. Lone frowned and stared at the ground, and Swan spoke +sharply to Jack, who was nosing back and forth, at fault if ever a dog +was. But presently he took up the scent and led them down a barren slope +and into grassy ground where a bunch of horses grazed contentedly. Jack +singled out one and ran toward it silently, as he had done all his +trailing that morning. The horse looked up, stared and went galloping +down the little valley, stampeding the others with him.</p> + +<p>"That's about where I thought we'd wind up—in a saddle bunch," Lone +observed disgustedly. "If I had the evidence you're carrying in your +pocket, Swan, I'd put that darn dog on the scent of the man, not the +horse."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span>"The man I've got," Swan retorted. "I don't have to trail him."</p> + +<p>"Well, now, you <i>think</i> you've got him. Here's good, level ground—I +couldn't get outa sight in less than ten minutes, afoot. Let me walk out +a ways, and you see if that handkerchief's mine. Oh, search me all you +want to, first," he added, when he read the suspicion in Swan's eyes. +"Make yourself safe as yuh please, but give me a fair show. You've made +up your mind I'm the killer, and you've been fitting the evidence to +me—or trying to."</p> + +<p>"It fits," Swan pointed out drily.</p> + +<p>"You see if it does. The dog'll tell you all about it in about two +minutes if you give him a chance."</p> + +<p>Swan looked at him. "Yack don't lie. By golly, I raised that dog to +trail, and he <i>trails</i>, you bet! He's cocker spaniel and bloodhound, and +he knows things, that dog. All right, Lone, you walk over to that black +rock and set down. If you think you frame something, maybe, I pack a +dead man to the Quirt again."</p> + +<p>"You can, for all me," Lone replied quietly. "I'd about as soon go that +way as the way I am now."</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span>Swan watched him until he was seated on the rock as directed, his +manacled hands resting on his knees, his face turned toward the horses. +Then Swan took the blue handkerchief from his pocket, called Jack to him +and muttered something in Swedish while the dog sniffed at the cloth. +"Find him, Yack," said Swan, standing straight again.</p> + +<p>Jack went sniffing obediently in wide circles, crossing unconcernedly +Lone's footprints while he trotted back and forth. He hesitated once on +the trail of the horse he had followed, stopped and looked at Swan +inquiringly, and whined. Swan whistled the dog to him with a peculiar, +birdlike note and called to Lone.</p> + +<p>"You come back, Lone, and let Yack take a damn good smell of you. By +golly, if that dog lies to me this time, I lick him good!"</p> + +<p>Lone came back, grinning a little. "All right, now maybe you'll listen +to reason. I ain't the kind to tell all I know and some besides, Swan. +I've been a Sawtooth man, and a fellow kinda hates to throw down his +outfit deliberate. But they're going too strong for any white man to +stand for. I quit them when they tried to get Brit Hunter. I don't +<i>know</i> so much, Swan, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> I'm pretty good at guessing. So if you'll +come with me to Whisper, your dog may show yuh who owns that +handkerchief. If he don't, then I'm making a mistake, and I'd like to be +set right."</p> + +<p>"Somebody rode that horse," Swan meditated aloud. "Yack don't make a +mistake like that, and I don't think I'm blind. Where's the man that was +on the horse? What you think, Lone?"</p> + +<p>"<i>Me</i>? I think there was another horse somewhere close to that +outcropping, tied to a bush, maybe. I think the man you're after changed +horses there, just on a chance that somebody might trail him from the +road. You put your dog on the trail of that one particular horse, and he +showed yuh where it was feeding with the bunch. It looks to me like it +was turned loose, back there, and come on alone. Your man went to +Whisper; I'll bank money on that. Anyway, your dog'll know if he's been +there."</p> + +<p>Swan thought it over, his eyes moving here and there to every hint of +movement between the skyline and himself. Suddenly he turned to Lone, +his face flushing with honest shame.</p> + +<p>"Loney, take a damn Swede and give him something he believes, and you +could pull his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> teeth before you pull that notion from his thick head. +You acted funny, that day Fred Thurman was killed, and you gave yourself +away at the stable when I showed you that saddle. So I think you're the +killer, and I keep on thinking that, and I've been trying to catch you +with evidence. I'm a Swede, all right! Square head. Built of wood two +inches thick. Loney, you kick me good. You don't have time to ride over +here, get some other horse and ride back to the Quirt after Frank was +killed. You got there before I did, last night. We know Frank was dead +not much more than one hour when we get him to the bunk-house. Yack, he +gives you a good alibi."</p> + +<p>"I sure am glad we took the time to trail that horse, then," Lone +remarked, while Swan was removing the handcuffs. "You're all right, +Swan. Nothing like sticking to an idea till you know it's wrong. Now, +let's stick to mine for awhile. Let's go on to Whisper. It ain't far."</p> + +<p>They returned to the rocky hillside where the trail had been covered, +and searched here and there for the tracks of another horse; found the +trail and followed it easily enough to Whisper. Swan put Jack once more +on the scent of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> the handkerchief, and if actions meant anything, Jack +proved conclusively that he found the Whisper camp reeking with the +scent.</p> + +<p>But that was all,—since Al was at that moment trailing Lorraine toward +the Sawtooth.</p> + +<p>"We may as well eat," Swan suggested. "We'll get him, by golly, but we +don't have to starve ourselves."</p> + +<p>"He wouldn't know we're after him," Lone agreed. "He'll stick around so +as not to raise suspicion. And he might come back, most any time. If he +does, we'll say I'm out with you after coyotes, and we stopped here for +a meal. That's good enough to satisfy him—till you get the drop on him. +But I want to tell yuh, Swan, you can't take Al Woodruff as easy as you +took me. And you couldn't have taken me so easy if I'd been the man you +wanted. Al would kill you as easy as you kill coyotes. Give him a +reason, and you won't need to give him a chance along with it. He'll +find the chance himself."</p> + +<p>Because they thought it likely that Al would soon return, they did not +hurry. They were hungry, and they cooked enough food for four men and +ate it leisurely. Jim was at the ranch,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> Sorry had undoubtedly returned +before now, and the coroner would probably not arrive before noon, at +the earliest.</p> + +<p>Swan wanted to take Al Woodruff back with him in irons. He wanted to +confront the coroner with the evidence he had found and the testimony +which Lone could give. There had been too many killings already, he +asserted in his naïve way; the sooner Al Woodruff was locked up, the +safer the country would be.</p> + +<p>He discussed with Lone the possibility of making Al talk,—the chance of +his implicating the Sawtooth. Lone did not hope for much and said so.</p> + +<p>"If Al was a talker he wouldn't be holding the job he's got," Lone +argued. "Don't get the wrong idea again, Swan. Yuh may pin this on to +Al, but that won't let the Sawtooth in. The Sawtooth's too slick for +that. They'd be more likely to make up a lynching party right in the +outfit and hang Al as an example than they would try to shield him. He's +played a lone hand, Swan, right from the start, unless I'm badly +mistaken. The Sawtooth's paid him for playing it, that's all."</p> + +<p>"Warfield, he's the man I want," Swan con<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span>fided. "It's for more than +killing these men. It goes into politics, Loney, and it goes deep. He's +bad for the government. Getting Warfield for having men killed is +getting Warfield without telling secrets of politics. Warfield, he's a +smart man, by golly. He knows some one is after him in politics, but he +don't know some one is after him at home. So the big Swede has got to be +smart enough to get the evidence against him for killing."</p> + +<p>"Well, I wish yuh luck, Swan, but I can't say you're going at it right. +Al won't talk, I tell yuh."</p> + +<p>Swan did not believe that. He waited another hour and made a mental +inventory of everything in camp while he waited. Then, chiefly because +Lone's impatience finally influenced him, he set out to see where Al had +gone.</p> + +<p>According to Jack, Al had gone to the corral. From there they put Jack +on the freshest hoofprints leaving the place, and were led here and +there in an apparently aimless journey to nowhere until, after Jack had +been at fault in another rock patch, the trail took them straight away +to the ridge overlooking the Quirt ranch. The two men looked at one +another.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span>"That's like Al," Lone commented drily. "Coyotes are foolish, alongside +him, and you'll find it out. I'll bet he's been watching this place +since daybreak."</p> + +<p>"Where he goes, Yack will follow," Swan grinned cheerfully. "And I +follow Yack. We'll get him, Lone. That dog, he never quits till I say +quit."</p> + +<p>"You better go down and get a horse, then," Lone advised. "They're all +gentle. Al's mounted, remember. He's maybe gone over to the Sawtooth, +and that's farther than you can walk."</p> + +<p>"I can walk all day and all night, when I need to go like that. I can +take short cuts that a horse can't take. I think I shall go on my own +legs."</p> + +<p>"Well, I'm going down to the house first. I know them two men riding +down to the gate. I want to see what the boss and Hawkins have got to +say about this last 'accident.' Better come on down, Swan. You might +pick up something. They're heading for the ranch, all right. Going to +make a play at being neighborly, I reckon."</p> + +<p>"You bet I want to see Warfield," Swan assented rather eagerly and +called Jack, who had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> nosed around the spot where Al had waited so long +and was now trotting along the ridge on the next lap of Al's journey.</p> + +<p>They reached the gate in time to meet Warfield and Hawkins face to face. +Hawkins gave Lone a quick, questioning look and nodded carelessly to +Swan. Warfield, having a delicate errand to perform and knowing how much +depended upon first impressions, pulled up eagerly when he recognized +Lone.</p> + +<p>"Has the girl arrived safely, Lone?" he asked anxiously.</p> + +<p>"What girl?" Lone looked at him noncommittally.</p> + +<p>"Miss—ah—Hunter. Have you been away all the forenoon? The girl came to +the ranch in such a condition that I was afraid she might do herself or +some one else an injury. Has she been unbalanced for long?"</p> + +<p>"If you mean Lorraine Hunter, she was all right last time I saw her, and +that was last night." Lone's eyes narrowed a little as he watched the +two. "You say she went to the Sawtooth?"</p> + +<p>"She came pelting over there crazier than when you brought her in," +Hawkins broke in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> gruffly. "She ain't safe going around alone like +that."</p> + +<p>Senator Warfield glanced at him impatiently. "Is there any truth in her +declaring that Frank Johnson is dead? She seemed to have had a shock of +some kind. She was raving crazy, and in her rambling talk she said +something about Frank Johnson having died last night."</p> + +<p>Lone glanced back as he led the way through the gate which Swan was +holding open. "He didn't die—he got killed last night," he corrected.</p> + +<p>"Killed! And how did that happen? It was impossible to get two coherent +sentences out of the girl." Senator Warfield rode through just behind +Lone and reined close, lowering his voice. "No use in letting this get +out," he said confidentially. "It may be that the girl's dementia is +some curable nervous disorder, and you know what an injustice it would +be if it became noised around that the girl is crazy. How much English +does that Swede know?"</p> + +<p>"Not any more than he needs to get along on," Lone answered, +instinctively on guard. "He's all right—just a good-natured kinda cuss +that wouldn't harm anybody."</p> + +<p>He glanced uneasily at the house, hoping that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> Lorraine was safe inside, +yet fearing that she would not be safe anywhere. Sane or insane, she was +in danger if Senator Warfield considered her of sufficient importance to +bring him out on horseback to the Quirt ranch. Lone knew how seldom the +owner of the Sawtooth rode on horseback since he had high-powered cars +to carry him in soft comfort.</p> + +<p>"I'll go see if she's home," Lone explained, and reined John Doe toward +the house.</p> + +<p>"I'll go with you," Senator Warfield offered suavely and kept alongside. +"Frank Johnson was killed, you say? How did it happen?"</p> + +<p>"Fell off his wagon and broke his neck," Lone told him laconically. +"Brit's pretty sick yet; I don't guess you'd better go inside. There's +been a lot of excitement already for the old man. He only sees folks +he's used to having around."</p> + +<p>With that he dismounted and went into the house, leaving Senator +Warfield without an excuse for following. Swan and Hawkins came up and +waited with him, and Jim opened the door of the bunk-house and looked +out at them without showing enough interest to come forward and speak to +them.</p> + +<p>In a few minutes Lone returned, to find Sen<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span>ator Warfield trying to +glean information from Swan, who seemed willing enough to give it if +only he could find enough English words to form a complete sentence. +Swan, then, had availed himself of Lone's belittlement of him and was +living down to it. But Lone gave him scant attention just then.</p> + +<p>"She hasn't come back. Brit's worked himself up into a fever, and I +didn't dare tell him she wasn't with me. I said she's all tired out and +sick and wanted to stay up by the spring awhile, where it's cool. I said +she was with me, and the sun was too much for her, and she sent him word +that Jim would take care of him awhile longer. So you better move down +this way, or he'll hear us talking and want to know what's up."</p> + +<p>"You're sure she isn't here?" Senator Warfield's voice held suspicion.</p> + +<p>"You can ask Jim, over here. He's been on hand right along. And if you +can't take his word for it, you can go look in the shack—but in that +case Brit's liable to take a shot at yuh, Senator. He's on the warpath +right, and he's got his gun right handy."</p> + +<p>"It is not necessary to search the cabin," Senator Warfield answered +stiffly. "Unless she is<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> in a stupor we'd have heard her yelling long +ago. The girl was a raving maniac when she appeared at the Sawtooth. +It's for her good that I'm thinking."</p> + +<p>Jim stepped out of the doorway and came slowly toward them, eyeing the +two from the Sawtooth curiously while he chewed tobacco. His hands +rested on his hips, his thumbs hooked inside his overalls; a gawky pose +that fitted well his colorless personality,—and left his right hand +close to his six-shooter.</p> + +<p>"Cor'ner comin'?" he asked, nodding at the two who were almost strangers +to him. "Sorry, he got back two hours ago, and he said the cor'ner would +be right out. But he ain't showed up yet."</p> + +<p>Senator Warfield said that he felt sure the coroner would be prompt and +then questioned Jim artfully about "Miss Hunter."</p> + +<p>"Raine? She went fer a ride. I loaned her my horse, and she ain't back +yet. I told her to take a good long ride and settle her nerves. She +acted kinda edgy."</p> + +<p>Senator Warfield and his foreman exchanged glances for which Lone could +have killed them.</p> + +<p>"You noticed, then, that she was not quite<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span>—herself?" Senator Warfield +used his friendly, confidential tone on Jim.</p> + +<p>"We-ell—yes, I did. I thought a ride would do her good, mebby. She's +been sticking here on the job purty close. And Frank getting killed +kinda—upset her, I guess."</p> + +<p>"That's it—that's what I was saying. Disordered nerves, which rest and +proper medical care will soon remedy." He looked at Lone. "Her horse was +worn out when she reached the ranch. Does she know this country well? +She started this way, and she should have been here some time ago. We +thought it best to ride after her, but there was some delay in getting +started. Hawkins' horse broke away and gave us some trouble catching +him, so the girl had quite a start. But with her horse fagged as it was, +we had no idea that we would fail to get even a sight of her. She may +have wandered off on some other trail, in which case her life as well as +her reason is in danger."</p> + +<p>Lone did not answer at once. It had occurred to him that Senator +Warfield knew where Lorraine was at that minute, and that he might be +showing this concern for the effect it would have on his hearers. He +looked at him speculatively.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span>"Do you think we ought to get out and hunt for her?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"I certainly think some one ought to. We can't let her wander around the +country in that condition. If she is not here, she is somewhere in the +hills, and she should be found."</p> + +<p>"She sure ain't here," Jim asserted convincingly. "I been watching for +the last two hours, expecting every minute she'd show up. I'd a been +kinda oneasy, myself, but Snake's dead gentle, and she's a purty fair +rider fer a girl."</p> + +<p>"Then we'll have to find her. Lone, can you come and help?"</p> + +<p>"The Swede and me'll both help," Lone volunteered. "Jim and Sorry can +wait here for the coroner. We ought to find her without any trouble, +much. Swan, I'll get you that tobacco first and see if Brit needs +anything."</p> + +<p>He started to the house, and Swan followed him aimlessly, his long +strides bringing him close to Lone before they reached the door.</p> + +<p>"What do you make of this new play?" Lone muttered cautiously when he +saw Swan's shadow move close to his own.</p> + +<p>"By golly, it's something funny about it. You stick with them, Loney, +and find out. I'm taking<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> Al's trail with Yack. You fix it." And he +added whimsically, "Not so much tobacco, Lone. I don't eat it or smoke +it ever in my life."</p> + +<p>His voice was very Swedish, which was fortunate, because Senator +Warfield appeared softly behind him and went into the house. Swan was +startled, but he hadn't much time to worry over the possibility of +having been overheard. Brit's voice rose in a furious denunciation of +Bill Warfield, punctuated by two shots and followed almost immediately +by the senator.</p> + +<p>"My God, the whole family's crazy!" Warfield exclaimed, when he had +reached the safety of the open air. "You're right, Lone. I thought I'd +be neighborly enough to ask what I could do for him, and he tried to +kill me!"</p> + +<p>Lone merely grunted and gave Swan the tobacco.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_EIGHTEEN" id="CHAPTER_EIGHTEEN"></a>CHAPTER EIGHTEEN</h2> + +<h4>"I THINK AL WOODRUFF'S GOT HER"</h4> + + +<p>There was no opportunity for further conference. Senator Warfield showed +no especial interest in Swan, and the Swede was permitted without +comment to take his dog and strike off up the ridge. Jim and Sorry were +sent to look after Brit, who was still shouting vain threats against the +Sawtooth, and the three men rode away together. Warfield did not suggest +separating, though Lone expected him to do so, since one man on a trail +was as good as three in a search of this kind.</p> + +<p>He was still inclined to doubt the whole story. He did not believe that +Lorraine had been to the Sawtooth, or that she had raved about anything. +She had probably gone off by herself to cry and to worry over her +troubles,—hurt, too, perhaps, because Lone had left the ranch that +morning without a word with her first. He believed the story of her +being insane had been carefully<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> planned, and that Warfield had perhaps +ridden over in the hope that they would find her alone; though with +Frank dead on the ranch that would be unlikely. But to offset that, +Lone's reason told him that Warfield had probably not known that Frank +was dead. That had been news to him—or had it? He tried to remember +whether Warfield had mentioned it first and could not. Too many +disturbing emotions had held him lately; Lone was beginning to feel the +need of a long, quiet pondering over his problems. He did not feel sure +of anything except the fact that the Quirt was like a drowning man +struggling vainly against the whirlpool that is sucking him slowly +under.</p> + +<p>One thing he knew, and that was his determination to stay with these two +of the Sawtooth until he had some definite information; until he saw +Lorraine or knew that she was safe from them. Like a weight pressing +harder and harder until one is crushed beneath it, their talk of +Lorraine's insanity forced fear into his soul. They could do just what +they had talked of doing. He himself had placed that weapon in their +hands when he took her to the Sawtooth delirious and told of wilder +words and actions. Hawkins and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> his wife would swear away her sanity if +they were told to do it, and there were witnesses in plenty who had +heard him call her crazy that first morning.</p> + +<p>They could do it; they could have her committed to an asylum, or at +least to a sanitarium. He did not underestimate the influence of Senator +Warfield. And what could the Quirt do to prevent the outrage? Frank +Johnson was dead; Brit was out of the fight for the time being; Jim and +Sorry were the doggedly faithful sort who must have a leader before they +can be counted upon to do much.</p> + +<p>Swan,—Lone lifted his head and glanced toward the ridge when he thought +of Swan. There, indeed, he might hope for help. But Swan was out here, +away from reinforcements. He was trailing Al Woodruff, and when he found +him,—that might be the end of Swan. If not, Warfield could hurry +Lorraine away before Swan could act in the matter. A whimsical thought +of Swan's telepathic miracle crossed his mind and was dismissed as an +unseemly bit of foolery in a matter so grave as Lorraine's safety. And +yet—the doctor <i>had</i> received a message that he was wanted at the +Quirt, and he had arrived before<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span> his patient. There was no getting +around that, however impossible it might be. No one could have foreseen +Brit's accident; no one save the man who had prepared it for him, and he +would be the last person to call for help.</p> + +<p>"We followed the girl's horse-tracks almost to Thurman's place and lost +the trail there." Warfield turned in the saddle to look at Lone riding +behind him. "We made no particular effort to trace her from there, +because we were sure she would come on home. I'm going back that far, +and we'll pick up the trail, unless we find her at the ranch. She may +have hidden herself away. You can't," he added, "be sure of anything +where a demented person is concerned. They never act according to logic +or reason, and it is impossible to make any deductions as to their +probable movements."</p> + +<p>Lone nodded, not daring to trust his tongue with speech just then. If he +were to protect Lorraine later on, he knew that he must not defend her +now.</p> + +<p>"Hawkins told me she had some sort of hallucination that she had seen a +man killed at Rock City, when she was wandering around in that storm," +Warfield went on in a careless, gossipy<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> tone. "Just what was that +about, Lone? You're the one who found her and took her in to the ranch, +I believe. She somehow mixed her delusion up with Fred Thurman, didn't +she?"</p> + +<p>Lone made a swift decision. He was afraid to appear to hesitate, so he +laughed his quiet little chuckle while he scrambled mentally for a +plausible lie.</p> + +<p>"I don't know as she done that, quite," he drawled humorously. "She was +out of her head, all right, and talking wild, but I laid it to her being +sick and scared. She said a man was shot, and that she saw it happen. +And right on top of that she said she didn't think they ought to stage a +murder and a thunderstorm in the same scene, and thought they ought to +save the thunder and lightning for the murderer to make his getaway by. +She used to work for the moving pictures, and she was going on about +some wild-west picture she thought she was acting a part in.</p> + +<p>"Afterwards I told her what she'd been saying, and she seemed to kinda +remember it, like a bad dream she'd had. She told me she thought the +villain in one of the plays she acted in had pulled off a stage murder +in them rocks. We figured it out together that the first crack of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> +thunder had sounded like shooting, and that's what started her off. She +hadn't ever been in a real thunderstorm before, and she's scared of +them. I know that one we had the other day like to of scared her into +hysterics. I laughed at her and joshed her out of it."</p> + +<p>"Didn't she ever say anything about Fred Thurman, then?" Warfield +persisted.</p> + +<p>"Not to me, she didn't. Fred was dragged that night, and if she heard +about a man being killed during that same storm, she might have said +something about it. She might have wondered if that was what she saw. I +don't know. She's pretty sensible—when she ain't crazy."</p> + +<p>Warfield turned his horse, as if by accident, so that he was brought +face to face with Lone. His eyes searched Lone's face pitilessly.</p> + +<p>"Lone, you know how ugly a story can grow if it's left alone. Do <i>you</i> +believe that girl actually saw a man shot? Or do you think she was +crazy?"</p> + +<p>Lone met Warfield's eyes fairly. "I think she was plumb out of her +head," he answered. And he added with just the right degree of +hesitation: "I don't think she's what you'd call right crazy, Mr. +Warfield. Lots of folks go outa their heads<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> and talk crazy when they +get a touch of fever, and they get over it again."</p> + +<p>"Let's have a fair understanding," Warfield insisted. "Do you think I am +justified in the course I am taking, or don't you?"</p> + +<p>"Hunting her up? Sure, I do! If you and Hawkins rode on home, I'd keep +on hunting till I located her. If she's been raving around like you say, +she's in no shape to be riding these hills alone. She's got to be taken +care of."</p> + +<p>Warfield gave him another sharp scrutiny and rode on. "I always prefer +to deal in the open with every one," he averred. "It may not be my +affair, strictly speaking. The Quirt and the Sawtooth aren't very +intimate. But the Quirt's having trouble enough to warrant any one in +lending a hand; and common humanity demands that I take charge of the +girl until she is herself again."</p> + +<p>"I don't know as any one would question that," Lone assented and ground +his teeth afterwards because he must yield even the appearance of +approval. He knew that Warfield must feel himself in rather a desperate +position, else he would never trouble to make his motives so clear to +one of his men. Indeed, Warfield had pro<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span>tested his unselfishness in the +matter too much and too often to have deceived the dullest man who owned +the slightest suspicion of him. Lone could have smiled at the sight of +Senator Warfield betraying himself so, had smiling been possible to him +then.</p> + +<p>He dropped behind the two at the first rough bit of trail and felt +stealthily to test the hanging of his six-shooter, which he might need +in a hurry. Those two men would never lay their hands on Lorraine Hunter +while he lived to prevent it. He did not swear it to himself; he had no +need.</p> + +<p>They rode on to Fred Thurman's ranch, dismounted at Warfield's +suggestion—which amounted to a command—and began a careful search of +the premises. If Warfield had felt any doubt of Lone's loyalty he +appeared to have dismissed it from his mind, for he sent Lone to the +stable to search there, while he and Hawkins went into the house. Lone +guessed that the two felt the need of a private conference after their +visit to the Quirt, but he could see no way to slip unobserved to the +house and eavesdrop, so he looked perfunctorily through all the sheds +and around the depleted haystacks,—wherever a per<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span>son could find a +hiding place. He was letting himself down through the manhole in the +stable loft when Swan's voice, lowered almost to a whisper, startled +him.</p> + +<p>"What the hell!" Lone ejaculated under his breath. "I thought you were +on another trail!"</p> + +<p>"That trail leads here, Lone. Did you find Raine yet?"</p> + +<p>"Not a sign of her. Swan, I don't know what to make of it. I did think +them two were stalling. I thought they either hadn't seen her at all, or +had got hold of her and were trying to square themselves on the insanity +dodge. But if they know where she is, they're acting damn queer, Swan. +They <i>want</i> her. They haven't got her yet."</p> + +<p>"They're in the house," Swan reassured Lone. "I heard them walking. You +don't think they've got her there, Lone?"</p> + +<p>"If they have," gritted Lone, "they made the biggest blunder of their +lives bringing me over here. No, I could see they wanted to get off +alone and hold a powwow. They expected she'd be at the Quirt."</p> + +<p>"I think Al Woodruff, he's maybe got her,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> then," Swan declared, after +studying the matter briefly. "All the way he follows the trail over +here, Lone. I could see you sometimes in the trail. He was keeping hid +from the trail—I think because Raine was riding along, this morning, +and he's following. The tracks are that old."</p> + +<p>"They said they had trailed Raine this far, coming from the Sawtooth," +Lone told him worriedly. "What do you think Al would want——"</p> + +<p>"Don't she see him shoot Fred Thurman? By golly, I'm scared for that +girl, Loney!"</p> + +<p>Lone stared at him. "He wouldn't dare!"</p> + +<p>"A coward is a brave man when you scare him bad enough," Swan stated +flatly. "I'm careful always when I corner a coward."</p> + +<p>"Al ain't a coward. You've got him wrong."</p> + +<p>"Maybe, but he kills like a coward would kill, and he's scared he will +be caught. Warfield, he's scared, too. You watch him, Lone.</p> + +<p>"Now I tell you what I do. Yack, he picks up the trail from here to +where you can follow easy. We know two places where he didn't go with +her, and from here is two more trails he could take. But one goes to the +main road, and he don't take that one, I bet you. I think he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> takes that +girl up Spirit Canyon, maybe. It's woods and wild country in a few +miles, and plenty of places to hide, and good chances for getting out +over the top of the divide.</p> + +<p>"I'm going to my cabin, and you don't say anything when I leave. +Warfield, he don't want the damn Swede hanging around. So you go with +them, Loney. This is to what you call a show-down."</p> + +<p>"We'll want the dog," Lone told him, but Swan shook his head. Hawkins +and Warfield had come from the house and were approaching the stable. +Swan looked at Lone, and Lone went forward to meet them.</p> + +<p>"The Swede followed along on the ridge, and he didn't see anything," he +volunteered, before Warfield could question him. "We might put his dog +on the trail and see which way she went from here."</p> + +<p>Warfield thought that a good idea. He was so sure that Lorraine must be +somewhere within a mile or two of the place that he seemed to think the +search was practically over when Jack, nosing out the trail of Al +Woodruff, went trotting toward Spirit Canyon.</p> + +<p>"Took the wrong turn after she left the corrals<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> here," Warfield +commented relievedly. "She wouldn't get far, up this way."</p> + +<p>"There's the track of two horses," Hawkins said abruptly. "That there is +the girl's horse, all right—there's a hind shoe missing. We saw where +her horse had cast a shoe, coming over Juniper Ridge. But there's +another horse track."</p> + +<p>Lone bit his lip. It was the other horse that Jack had been trailing so +long. "There was a loose horse hanging around Thurman's place," he said +casually. "It's him, tagging along, I reckon."</p> + +<p>"Oh," said Hawkins. "That accounts for it."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_NINETEEN" id="CHAPTER_NINETEEN"></a>CHAPTER NINETEEN</h2> + +<h4>SWAN CALLS FOR HELP</h4> + + +<p>Past the field where the horses were grazing and up the canyon on the +side toward Skyline Meadow, that lay on a shoulder of Bear Top, the dog +nosed unfalteringly along the trail. Now and then he was balked when the +hoofprints led him to the bank of Granite Creek, but not for long. Jack +appeared to understand why his trailing was interrupted and sniffed the +bank until he picked up the scent again.</p> + +<p>"Wonder if she changed off and rode that loose horse," Hawkins said +once, when the tracks were plain in the soft soil of the creek bank. +"She might, and lead that horse she was on."</p> + +<p>"She wouldn't know enough. She's a city girl," Lone replied, his heart +heavy with fear for Lorraine.</p> + +<p>"Well, she ain't far off then," Hawkins comforted himself. "Her horse +acted about played out when she hit the ranch. She had him wet<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> from his +ears to his tail, and he was breathin' like that Ford at the ranch. If +that's a sample of her riding, she ain't far off."</p> + +<p>"Crazy—to ride up here. Keep your eyes open, boys. We must find her, +whatever we do." Warfield gazed apprehensively at the rugged steeps on +either hand and at the timber line above them. "From here on she +couldn't turn back without meeting us—if I remember this country +correctly. Could she, Hawkins?"</p> + +<p>"Not unless she turned off, up here a mile or two, into that gulch that +heads into Skyline," said Hawkins. "There's a stock trail part way down +from the top where it swings off from the divide to Wilder Creek."</p> + +<p>Swan, walking just behind Hawkins, moved up a pace.</p> + +<p>"I could go on Skyline with Yack, and I could come down by those trail," +he suggested diffidently, Swedishly, yet with a certain compelling +confidence. "What you think?"</p> + +<p>"I think that's a damned good idea for a square head," Hawkins told him, +and repeated it to Warfield, who was riding ahead.</p> + +<p>"Why, yes. We don't need the dog, or the man either. Go up to the head +of the gulch and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> keep your eyes open, Swan. We'll meet you up here. You +know the girl, don't you?"</p> + +<p>"Yas, Ay know her pretty good," grinned Swan.</p> + +<p>"Well, don't frighten her. Don't let her see that you think anything is +wrong—and don't say anything about us. We made the mistake of +discussing her condition within her hearing, and it is possible that she +understood enough of what we were saying to take alarm. You understand? +Don't tell girl she's crazy." He tapped his head to make his meaning +plainer. "Don't tell girl we're looking for her. You understand?"</p> + +<p>"Yas, Ay know English pretty good. Ay don't tell too moch." His cheerful +smile brought a faint response from Senator Warfield. At Lone he did not +look at all. "I go quick. I'm good climber like a sheep," he boasted, +and whistling to Jack, he began working his way up a rough, +brush-scattered ledge to the slope above.</p> + +<p>Lone watched him miserably, wishing that Swan was not quite so matter of +fact in his man-chasing. If Al Woodruff, for some reason which Lone +could not fathom, had taken Lorraine and forced her to go with him into +the wilderness, Warfield and Hawkins would be his allies the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> moment +they came up with him. Lone was no coward, but neither was he a fool. +Hawkins had never distinguished himself as a fighter, but Lone had +gleaned here and there a great deal of information about Senator +Warfield in the old days when he had been plain Bill. When Lorraine and +Al were overtaken, then Lone would need to show the stuff that was in +him. He only hoped he would have time, and that luck would be with him.</p> + +<p>"If they get me, it'll be all off with her," he worried, as he followed +the two up the canyon. "Swan would have been a help. But he thinks more +of catching Al than he does of helping Raine."</p> + +<p>He looked up and saw that already Swan was halfway up the canyon's steep +side, making his way through the brush with more speed than Lone could +have shown on foot in the open, unless he ran. The sight heartened Lone +a little. Swan might have some plan of his own,—an ambush, possibly. If +he would only keep along within rifle shot and remain hidden, he would +show real brains, Lone thought. But Swan, when Lone looked up again, was +climbing straight away from the little searching party;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> and even though +he seemed tireless on foot, he could not perform miracles.</p> + +<p>Swan, however, was not troubling himself over what Lone would think, or +even what Warfield was thinking. Contrary to Lone's idea of him, Swan +was tired, and he was thinking a great deal about Lorraine, and very +little about Al Woodruff, except as Al was concerned with Lorraine's +welfare. Swan had made a mistake, and he was humiliated over his +blunder. Al had kept himself so successfully in the background while +Lone's peculiar actions had held his attention, that Swan had never +considered Al Woodruff as the killer. Now he blamed himself for Frank's +death. He had been watching Lone, had been baffled by Lone's consistent +kindness toward the Quirt, by the force of his personality which held +none of the elements of cold-blooded murder. He had believed that he had +the Sawtooth killer under observation, and he had been watching and +waiting for evidence that would impress a grand jury. And all the while +he had let Al Woodruff ride free and unsuspected.</p> + +<p>The one stupid thing, in Swan's opinion, which he had not done was to +let Lone go on holding his tongue. He had forced the issue that +morn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span>ing. He had wanted to make Lone talk, had hoped for a weakening +and a confession. Instead he had learned a good deal which he should +have known before.</p> + +<p>As he forged up the slope across the ridged lip of the canyon, his one +immediate object was speed. Up the canyon and over the divide on the +west shoulder of Bear Top was a trail to the open country beyond. It was +perfectly passable, as Swan knew; he had packed in by that trail when he +located his homestead on Bear Top. That is why he had his cabin up and +was living in it before the Sawtooth discovered his presence.</p> + +<p>Al, he believed, was making for Bear Top Pass. Once down the other side +he would find friends to lend him fresh horses. Swan had learned +something of these friends of the Sawtooth, and he could guess pretty +accurately how far some of them would go in their service. Fresh horses +for Al, food—perhaps even a cabin where he could hide Lorraine +away—were to be expected from any one of them, once Al was over the +divide.</p> + +<p>Swan glanced up at the sun, saw that it was dropping to late afternoon +and started in at a long, loose-jointed trot across the mountain<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span> meadow +called Skyline. A few pines, with scattered clumps of juniper and fir, +dotted the long, irregular stretch of grassland which formed the meadow. +Range cattle were feeding here and there, so wild they lifted heads to +stare at the man and dog, then came trotting forward, their curiosity +unabated by the fact that they had seen these two before.</p> + +<p>Jack looked up at his master, looked at the cattle and took his place at +Swan's heels. Swan shouted and flung his arms, and the cattle ducked, +turned and galloped awkwardly away. Swan's trot did not slacken. His +rifle swung rhythmically in his right hand, the muzzle tilted downward. +Beads of perspiration on his forehead had merged into tiny rivulets on +his cheeks and dripped off his clean-lined, square jaw. Still he ran, +his breath unlabored yet coming in whispery aspirations from his great +lungs.</p> + +<p>The full length of Skyline Meadow he ran, jumping the small beginning of +Wilder Creek with one great leap that scarcely interrupted the beautiful +rhythm of his stride. At the far end of the clearing, snuggled between +two great pines that reached high into the blue, his squatty cabin +showed red-brown against the precipitous shoul<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span>der of Bear Top peak, +covered thick with brush and scraggy timber whipped incessantly by the +wind that blew over the mountain's crest.</p> + +<p>At the door Swan stopped and examined the crude fastening of the door; +made himself certain, by private marks of his own, that none had entered +in his absence, and went in with a great sigh of satisfaction. It was +still broad daylight, though the sun's rays slanted in through the +window; but Swan lighted a lantern that hung on a nail behind the door, +carried it across the neat little room, and set it down on the floor +beside the usual pioneer cupboard made simply of clean boxes nailed +bottom against the wall. Swan had furnished a few extra frills to his +cupboard, for the ends of the boxes were fastened to hewn slabs standing +upright and just clearing the floor. Near the upper shelf a row of nails +held Swan's coffee cups,—four of them, thick and white, such as cheap +restaurants use.</p> + +<p>Swan hooked a finger over the nail that held a cracked cup and glanced +over his shoulder at Jack, sitting in the doorway with his keen nose to +the world.</p> + +<p>"You watch out now, Yack. I shall talk to my mother with my thoughts," +he said, drawing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> a hand across his forehead and speaking in breathless +gasps. "You watch."</p> + +<p>For answer Jack thumped his tail on the dirt floor and sniffed the +breeze, taking in his overlapping tongue while he did so. He licked his +lips, looked over his shoulder at Swan, and draped his pink tongue down +over his lower jaw again.</p> + +<p>"All right, now I talk," said Swan and pulled upon the nail in his +fingers.</p> + +<p>The cupboard swung toward him bodily, end slabs and all. He picked up +the lantern, stepped over the log sill and pulled the cupboard door into +place again.</p> + +<p>Inside the dugout Swan set the lantern on a table, dropped wearily upon +a rough bench before it and looked at the jars beside him, lifted his +hand and opened a compact, but thoroughly efficient field wireless +"set." His right fingers dropped to the key, and the whining drone of +the wireless rose higher and higher as he tuned up. He reached for his +receivers, ducked his head and adjusted them with one hand, and sent a +call spitting tiny blue sparks from the key under his fingers.</p> + +<p>He waited, repeating the call. His blue eyes<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> clouded with anxiety and +he fumbled the adjustments, coaxing the current into perfect action +before he called again. Answer came, and Swan bent over the table, +listening, his eyes fixed vacantly upon the opposite wall of the dugout. +Then, his fingers flexing delicately, swiftly, he sent the message that +told how completely his big heart matched the big body:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Send doctor and trained nurse to Quirt ranch at once. Send men to +Bear Top Pass, intercept man with young woman, or come to rescue if +he don't cross. Have three men here with evidence to convict if we +can save the girl who is valuable witness. Girl being abducted in +fear of what she can tell. They plan to charge her with insanity. +Urgent. Hurry. Come ready to fight.</p> + +<p>"S.V."</p></div> + +<p>Swan had a code, but codes require a little time in the composition of a +message, and time was the one thing he could not waste. He heard the +gist of the message repeated to him, told the man at the other station +that lives were at stake, and threw off the current.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_TWENTY" id="CHAPTER_TWENTY"></a>CHAPTER TWENTY</h2> + +<h4>KIDNAPPED</h4> + + +<p>Lorraine had once had a nasty fall from riding down hill at a gallop. +She remembered that accident and permitted Snake to descend Granite +Ridge at a walk, which was fortunate, since it gave the horse a chance +to recover a little from the strain of the terrific pace at which she +had ridden him that morning. At first it had been fighting fury that had +impelled her to hurry; now it was fear that drove her homeward where +Lone was, and Swan, and that stolid, faithful Jim. She felt that Senator +Warfield would never dare to carry out his covert threat, once she +reached home. Nevertheless, the threat haunted her, made her glance +often over her shoulder.</p> + +<p>At the Thurman ranch, which she was passing with a sickening memory of +the night when she and Swan had carried her father there, Al Woodruff +rode out suddenly from behind the stable and blocked the trail, his +six-shooter in his hand,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span> his face stony with determination. Lorraine +afterwards decided that he must have seen or heard her coming down the +ridge and had waited for her there. He smiled with his lips when she +pulled up Snake with a startled look.</p> + +<p>"You're in such a hurry this morning that I thought the only way to get +a chance to talk to you was to hold you up," he said, in much the same +tone he had used that day at the ranch.</p> + +<p>"I don't see why you want to talk to me," Lorraine retorted, not in the +least frightened at the gun, which was too much like her movie West to +impress her much. But her eyes widened at the look in his face, and she +tried to edge away from him without seeming to do so.</p> + +<p>Al stopped her by the simple method of reaching out his left hand and +catching Snake by the cheek-piece of the bridle. "You don't have to see +why," he said. "I've been thinking a lot about you lately. I've made up +my mind that I've got to have you with me—always. This is kinda sudden, +maybe, but that's the way the game runs, sometimes. Now, I want to tell +yuh one or two things that's for your own good. One is that I'll have my +way, or die getting it. Don't be scared; I won't hurt you. But if you +try to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> break away, I'll shoot you, that's all. I'm going to marry you, +see, first. Then I'll make love to you afterwards. I ain't asking you if +you'll marry me. You're going to do it, or I'll kill you."</p> + +<p>Lorraine gazed at him fascinated, too astonished to attempt any move +toward escape. Al's hand slipped from the bridle down to the reins, and +still holding Snake, still holding the gun muzzle toward her, still +looking her straight in the eyes, he threw his right leg over the cantle +of his saddle and stepped off his horse.</p> + +<p>"Put your other hand on the saddle horn," he directed. "I ain't going to +hurt you if you're good."</p> + +<p>He twitched his neckerchief off—Lorraine saw that it was untied, and +that he must have planned all this—and with it he tied her wrists to +the saddle horn. She gave Snake a kick in the ribs, but Al checked the +horse's first start and Snake was too tired to dispute a command to +stand still. Al put up his gun, pulled a hunting knife from a little +scabbard in his boot, sliced two pairs of saddle strings from Lorraine's +saddle, calmly caught and held her foot when she tried to kick him, +pushed the foot back into the stirrup and tied it there with one of the +leather strings.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> Just as if he were engaged in an everyday proceeding, +he walked around Snake and tied Lorraine's right foot; then, to prevent +her from foolishly throwing herself from the horse and getting hurt, he +tied the stirrups together under the horse's belly.</p> + +<p>"Now, if you'll be a good girl, I'll untie your hands," he said, +glancing up into her face. He freed her hands, and Lorraine immediately +slapped him in the face and reached for his gun. But Al was too quick +for her. He stepped back, picked up Snake's reins and mounted his own +horse. He looked back at her appraisingly, saw her glare of hatred and +grinned at it, while he touched his horse with the spurs and rode away, +leading Snake behind him.</p> + +<p>Lorraine said nothing until Al, riding at a lope, passed the field at +the mouth of Spirit Canyon where the blaze-faced roan still fed with the +others. They were feeding along the creek quite close to the fence, and +the roan walked toward them. The sight of it stirred Lorraine out of her +dumb horror.</p> + +<p>"You killed Fred Thurman! I saw you," she cried suddenly.</p> + +<p>"Well, you ain't going to holler it all over the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> country," Al flung +back at her over his shoulder. "When you're married to me, you'll come +mighty close to keeping your mouth shut about it."</p> + +<p>"I'll never marry you! You—you fiend! Do you think I'd marry a +cold-blooded murderer like you?"</p> + +<p>Al turned in the saddle and looked at her intently. "If I'm all that," +he told her coolly, "you can figure out about what'll happen to you if +you <i>don't</i> marry me. If you saw what I done to Fred Thurman, what do +you reckon I'd do to <i>you</i>?" He looked at her for a minute, shrugged his +shoulders and rode on, crossing the creek and taking a trail which +Lorraine did not know. Much of the time they traveled in the water, +though it slowed their pace. Where the trail was rocky, they took it and +made better time.</p> + +<p>Snake lagged a little on the upgrades, but he was well trained to lead +and gave little trouble. Lorraine thought longingly of Yellowjacket and +his stubbornness and tried to devise some way of escape. She could not +believe that fate would permit Al Woodruff to carry out such a plan. +Lone would overtake them, perhaps,—and then she remembered that Lone +would have no means of knowing which way she had gone. If<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> Hawkins and +Senator Warfield came after them, her plight would be worse than ever. +Still, she decided that she must risk that danger and give Lone a clue.</p> + +<p>She dropped a glove beside the trail, where it lay in plain sight of any +one following them. But presently Al looked over his shoulder, saw that +one of her hands was bare, and tied Snake's reins to his saddle and his +own horse to a bush. Then he went back down the trail until he found the +glove. He put it into his pocket, came silently up to Lorraine and +pulled off her other glove. Without a word he took her wrists in a firm +clasp, tied them together again to the saddle horn, pulled off her tie, +her hat, and the pins from her hair.</p> + +<p>"I guess you don't know me yet," he remarked dryly, when he had +confiscated every small article which she could let fall as she rode. "I +was trying to treat yuh white, but you don't seem to appreciate it. Now +you can ride hobbled, young lady."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I could <i>kill</i> you!" Lorraine whispered between set teeth.</p> + +<p>"You mean you'd like to. Well, I ain't going to give you a chance." His +eyes rested on her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> face with a new expression; an awakening desire for +her, an admiration for the spirit that would not let her weep and plead +with him.</p> + +<p>"Say! you ain't going to be a bit hard to marry," he observed, his eyes +lighting with what was probably his nearest approach to tenderness. "I +kinda wish you liked me, now I've got you."</p> + +<p>He shook her arm and laughed when she turned her face away from him, +then remounted his horse. Snake moved reluctantly when Al started on. +Lorraine felt hope slipping from her. With her hands tied, she could do +nothing at all save sit there and ride wherever Al Woodruff chose to +lead her horse. He seemed to be making for the head of Spirit Canyon, on +the side toward Bear Top.</p> + +<p>As they climbed higher, she could catch glimpses of the road down which +her father had driven almost to his death. She studied Al's back as he +rode before her and wondered if he could really be cold-blooded enough +to kill without compunction whoever he was told to kill, whether he had +any personal quarrel with his victim or not. Certainly he had had no +quarrel with her father, or with Frank.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span>It was long past noon, and she was terribly hungry and very thirsty, but +she would not tell Al her wants if she starved. She tried to guess at +his plans and at his motive for taking her away like this. He had no +camping outfit, a bulkily rolled slicker forming his only burden. He +could not, then, be planning to take her much farther into the +wilderness; yet if he did not hide her away, how could he expect to keep +her? His motive for marrying her was rather mystifying. He did not seem +sufficiently in love with her to warrant an abduction, and he was too +cool for such a headlong action, unless driven by necessity. She +wondered what he was thinking about as he rode. Not about her, she +guessed, except when some bad place in the trail made it necessary for +him to stop, tie Snake to the nearest bush, lead his own horse past the +obstruction and come back after her. Several times this was necessary. +Once he took the time to examine the thongs on her ankles, apparently +wishing to make sure that she was not uncomfortable. Once he looked up +into her sullenly distressed face and said, "Tired?" in a humanly +sympathetic tone that made her blink back the tears. She shook her head +and would not look at him. Al re<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span>garded her in silence for a minute, led +Snake to his own horse, mounted and rode on.</p> + +<p>He was a murderer; he had undoubtedly killed many men. He would kill her +if she attempted to escape—"and he could not catch me," Lorraine was +just enough to add. Yet she felt baffled; cheated of the full horror of +being kidnapped.</p> + +<p>She had no knowledge of a bad man who was human in spots without being +repentant. For love of a girl, she had been taught to believe, the worst +outlaw would weep over his past misdeeds, straighten his shoulders, look +to heaven for help and become a self-sacrificing hero for whom audiences +might be counted upon to shed furtive tears.</p> + +<p>Al Woodruff, however, did not love her. His eyes had once or twice +softened to friendliness, but love was not there. Neither was repentance +there. He seemed quite satisfied with himself, quite ready to commit +further crimes for sake of his own safety or desire. He was hard, she +decided, but he was not unnecessarily harsh; cruel, without being +wantonly brutal. He was, in short, the strangest man she had ever seen.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_TWENTY-ONE" id="CHAPTER_TWENTY-ONE"></a>CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE</h2> + +<h4>"OH, I COULD KILL YOU!"</h4> + + +<p>Before sundown they reached the timberland on Bear Top. The horses +slipped on the pine needles when Al left the trail and rode up a gentle +incline where the trees grew large and there was little underbrush. It +was very beautiful, with the slanting sun-rays painting broad yellow +bars across the gloom of the forest. In a little while they reached the +crest of that slope, and Lorraine, looking back, could only guess at +where the trail wound on among the trees lower down.</p> + +<p>Birds called companionably from the high branches above them. A nesting +grouse flew chuttering out from under a juniper bush, alighted a short +distance away and went limping and dragging one wing before them, +cheeping piteously.</p> + +<p>While Lorraine was wondering if the poor thing had hurt a leg in +lighting, Al clipped its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> head off neatly with a bullet from his +six-shooter, though Lorraine had not seen him pull the gun and did not +know he meant to shoot. The bird's mate whirred up and away through the +trees, and Lorraine was glad that it had escaped.</p> + +<p>Al slid the gun back into his holster, leaned from his saddle and picked +up the dead grouse as unconcernedly as he would have dismounted, pulled +his knife from his boot and drew the bird neatly, flinging the crop and +entrails from him.</p> + +<p>"Them juniper berries tastes the meat if you don't clean 'em out right +away," he remarked casually to Lorraine, as he wiped the knife on his +trousers and thrust it back into the boot-scabbard before he tied the +grouse to the saddle by its blue, scaley little feet.</p> + +<p>When he was ready to go on, Snake refused to budge. Tough as he was, he +had at last reached the limit of his energy and ambition. Al yanked hard +on the bridle reins, then rode back and struck him sharply with his +quirt before Snake would rouse himself enough to move forward. He went +stiffly, reluctantly, pulling back until his head was held straight out +before him. Al dragged him so for a rod or two, lost patience and +returned to whip him forward again.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span>"What a brute you are!" Lorraine exclaimed indignantly. "Can't you see +now tired he is?"</p> + +<p>Al glanced at her from under his eyebrows. "He's all in, but he's got to +make it," he said. "I've been that way myself—and made it. What I can +do, a horse can do. Come on, you yella-livered bonehead!"</p> + +<p>Snake went on, urged now and then by Al's quirt. Every blow made +Lorraine wince, and she made the wincing perfectly apparent to Al, in +the hope that he would take some notice of it and give her a chance to +tell him what she thought of him without opening the conversation +herself.</p> + +<p>But Al did not say anything. When the time came—as even Lorraine saw +that it must—when Snake refused to attempt a steep slope, Al still said +nothing. He untied her ankles from the stirrups and her hands from the +saddle horn, carried her in his arms to his own horse and compelled her +to mount. Then he retied her exactly as she had been tied on Snake.</p> + +<p>"Skinner knows this trail," he told Lorraine. "And I'm behind yuh with a +gun. Don't forget that, Miss Spitfire. You let Skinner go to suit +himself—and if he goes wrong, you pay, because<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> it'll be you reining +him wrong. Get along there, Skinner!"</p> + +<p>Skinner got along in a businesslike way that told why Al Woodruff had +chosen to ride him on this trip. He seemed to be a perfectly dependable +saddle horse for a bandit to own. He wound in and out among the trees +and boulders, stepping carefully over fallen logs; he thrust his nose +out straight and laid back his ears and pushed his way through thickets +of young pines; he went circumspectly along the edge of a deep gulch, +climbed over a ridge and worked his way down the precipitous slope on +the farther side, made his way around a thick clump of spruces and +stopped in a little, grassy glade no bigger than a city lot, but with a +spring gurgling somewhere near. Then he swung his head around and looked +over his shoulder inquiringly at Al, who was coming behind, leading +Snake.</p> + +<p>Lorraine looked at him also, but Al did not say anything to her or to +the horse. He let them stand there and wait while he unsaddled Snake, +put a drag rope on him and led him to the best grazing. Then, coming +back, he very matter-of-factly untied Lorraine and helped her off the +horse. Lorraine was all prepared to fight, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> she did not quite know +how to struggle with a man who did not take hold of her or touch her, +except to steady her in dismounting. Unconsciously she waited for a cue, +and the cue was not given.</p> + +<p>Al's mind seemed intent upon making Skinner comfortable. Still, he kept +an eye on Lorraine, and he did not turn his back to her. Lorraine looked +over to where Snake, too exhausted to eat, stood with drooping head and +all four legs braced like sticks under him. It flashed across her mind +that not even her old director would order her to make a run for that +horse and try to get away on him. Snake looked as if he would never move +from that position until he toppled over.</p> + +<p>Al pulled the bridle off Skinner, gave him a half-affectionate slap on +the rump, and watched him go off, switching his tail and nosing the +ground for a likable place to roll. Al's glance went on to Snake, and +from him to Lorraine.</p> + +<p>"You sure do know how to ride hell out of a horse," he remarked. "Now +he'll be stiff and sore to-morrow—and we've got quite a ride to make."</p> + +<p>His tone of disapproval sent a guilty feeling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> through Lorraine, until +she remembered that a slow horse might save her from this man who was +all bad,—except, perhaps, just on the surface which was not altogether +repellent. She looked around at the tiny basin set like a saucer among +the pines. Already the dusk was painting deep shadows in the woods +across the opening, and turning the sky a darker blue. Skinner rolled +over twice, got up and shook himself with a satisfied snort and went +away to feed. She might, if she were patient, run to the horse when Al's +back was turned, she thought. Once in the woods she might have some +chance of eluding him, and perhaps Skinner would show as much wisdom +going as he had in coming, and take her down to the sageland.</p> + +<p>But Skinner walked to the farther edge of the meadow before he stopped, +and Al Woodruff never turned his back to a foe. An owl hooted +unexpectedly, and Lorraine edged closer to her captor, who was gathering +dead branches one by one and throwing them toward a certain spot which +he had evidently selected for a campfire. He looked at her keenly, even +suspiciously, and pointed with the stick in his left hand.</p> + +<p>"You might go over there by the saddle and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span> set down till I get a fire +going," he said. "Don't go wandering around aimless, like a hen turkey, +watching a chance to duck into the brush. There's bear in there and lion +and lynx, and I'd hate to see you chawed. They never clean their +toe-nails, and blood poison generally sets in where they leave a +scratch. Go and set down."</p> + +<p>Lorraine did not know how much of his talk was truth, but she went and +sat down by his saddle and began braiding her hair in two tight braids +like a squaw. If she did get a chance to run, she thought, she did not +want her hair flying loose to catch on bushes and briars. She had once +fled through a brush patch in Griffith Park with her hair flowing loose, +and she had not liked the experience, though it had looked very nice on +the screen.</p> + +<p>Before she had finished the braiding, Al came over to the saddle and +untied his slicker roll and the grouse.</p> + +<p>"Come on over to the fire," he said. "I'll learn yuh a trick or two +about camp cooking. If I'm goin' to keep yuh with me, you might just as +well learn how to cook. We'll be on the trail the biggest part of our +time, I expect."</p> + +<p>He took her by the arm, just as any man might<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> have done, and led her to +the fire that was beginning to crackle cheerfully. He set her down on +the side where the smoke would be least likely to blow her way and +proceeded to dress the grouse, stripping off skin and feathers together. +He unrolled the slicker and laid out a piece of bacon, a package of +coffee, a small coffeepot, bannock and salt. The coffeepot and the +grouse he took in one hand—his left, Lorraine observed—and started +toward the spring which she could hear gurgling in the shadows amongst +the trees.</p> + +<p>Lorraine watched him sidelong. He seemed to take it for granted now that +she would stay where she was. The woods were dark, the firelight and the +warmth enticed her. The sight of the supper preparations made her +hungrier than she had ever been in her life before. When one has +breakfasted on one cup of coffee at dawn and has ridden all day with +nothing to eat, running away from food, even though that food is in the +hands of one's captor, requires courage. Lorraine was terribly tempted +to stay, at least until she had eaten. But Al might not give her another +chance like this. She crept on her knees to the slicker and seized one +piece of bannock, crawled out of the firelight stealthily, then<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> sprang +to her feet and began running straight across the meadow toward Skinner.</p> + +<p>Twenty yards she covered when a bullet sang over her head. Lorraine +ducked, stumbled and fell headfirst over a hummock, not quite sure that +she had not been shot.</p> + +<p>"Thought maybe I could trust yuh to play square," Al said disgustedly, +pulling her to her feet, the gun still smoking in his hands. "You little +fool, what do you think you'd do in these hills alone? You sure enough +belittle me, if you think you'd have a chance in a million of getting +away from me!"</p> + +<p>She fought him, then, with a great, inner relief that the situation was +at last swinging around to a normal kidnapping. Still, Al Woodruff +seemed unable to play his part realistically. He failed to fill her with +fear and repulsion. She had to think back, to remember that he had +killed men, in order to realize her own danger. Now, for instance, he +merely forced her back to the campfire, pulled the saddle strings from +his pocket and tied her feet together, using a complicated knot which he +told her she might work on all she darn pleased, for all he cared. Then +he went calmly to work cooking their supper.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span>This was simple. He divided the grouse so that one part had the meaty +breast and legs, and the other the back and wings. The meaty part he +larded neatly with strips of bacon, using his hunting knife,—which +Lorraine watched fascinatedly, wondering if it had ever taken the life +of a man. He skewered the meat on a green, forked stick and gave it to +her to broil for herself over the hottest coals of the fire, while he +made the coffee and prepared his own portion of the grouse.</p> + +<p>Lorraine was hungry. She broiled the grouse carefully and ate it, with +the exception of one leg, which she surprised herself by offering to Al, +who was picking the bones of his own share down to the last shred of +meat. She drank a cup of coffee, black, and returned the cup to the +killer, who unconcernedly drank from it without any previous rinsing. +She ate bannock with her meat and secretly thought what an adventure it +would be if only it were not real,—if only she were not threatened with +a forced marriage to this man. The primitive camp appealed to her; she +who had prided herself upon being an outdoor girl saw how she had always +played at being primitive. This was real. She would have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> loved it if +only the man opposite were Lone, or Swan, or some one else whom she knew +and trusted.</p> + +<p>She watched the firelight dancing on Al's somber face, softening its +hardness, making it almost wistful when he gazed thoughtfully into the +coals. She thrilled when she saw how watchful he was, how he lifted his +head and listened to every little night sound. She was afraid of him as +she feared the lightning; she feared his pitiless attitude toward human +life. She would find some way to outwit him when it came to the point of +marrying him, she thought. She would escape him if she could without too +great a risk of being shot. She felt absolutely certain that he would +shoot her with as little compunction as he would marry her by +force,—and it seemed to Lorraine that he would not greatly care which +he did.</p> + +<p>"I guess you're tired," Al said suddenly, rousing himself from deep +study and looking at her imperturbably. "I'll fix yuh so you can +sleep—and that's about all yuh can do."</p> + +<p>He went over to his saddle, took the blanket and unfolded it until +Lorraine saw that it was a full-size bed blanket of heavy gray wool. +The<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> man's ingenuity seemed endless. Without seeming to have any extra +luggage, he had nevertheless carried a very efficient camp outfit with +him. He took his hunting knife, went to the spruce grove and cut many +small, green branches, returning with all he could hold in his arms. She +watched him lay them tips up for a mattress, and was secretly glad that +she knew this much at least of camp comfort. He spread the blanket over +them and then, without a word, came over to her and untied her feet.</p> + +<p>"Go and lay down on the blanket," he commanded.</p> + +<p>"I'll do nothing of the kind!" Lorraine set her mouth stubbornly.</p> + +<p>"Well, then I'll have to lay you down," said Al, lifting her to her +feet. "If you get balky, I'm liable to get rough."</p> + +<p>Lorraine drew away from him as far as she could and looked at him for a +full minute. Al stared back into her eyes. "Oh, I could <i>kill</i> you!" +cried Lorraine for the second time that day and threw herself down on +the bed, sobbing like an angry child.</p> + +<p>Al said nothing. The man's capacity for keeping still was amazing. He +knelt beside her,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span> folded the blanket over her from the two sides, and +tied the corners around her neck snugly, the knot at the back. In the +same way he tied her ankles. Lorraine found herself in a sleeping bag +from which she had small hope of extricating herself. He took his coat, +folded it compactly and pushed it under her head for a pillow; then he +brought her own saddle blanket and spread it over her for extra warmth.</p> + +<p>"Now stop your bawling and go to sleep," he advised her calmly. "You +ain't hurt, and you ain't going to be as long as you gentle down and +behave yourself."</p> + +<p>She saw him draw the slicker over his shoulders and move back where the +shadows were deep and she could not see him. She heard some animal +squall in the woods behind them. She looked up at the stars,—millions +of them, and brighter than she had ever seen them before. Insensibly she +quieted, watching the stars, listening to the night noises, catching now +and then a whiff of smoke from Al Woodruff's cigarette. Before she knew +that she was sleepy, she slept.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_TWENTY-TWO" id="CHAPTER_TWENTY-TWO"></a>CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO</h2> + +<h4>"YACK, I LICK YOU GOOD IF YOU BARK"</h4> + + +<p>Swan cooked himself a hasty meal while he studied the various +possibilities of the case and waited for further word from headquarters. +He wanted to be sure that help had started and to be able to estimate +within an hour or two the probable time of its arrival, before he left +the wireless. Jack he fed and left on watch outside the cabin, so that +he could without risk keep open the door to the dugout.</p> + +<p>His instrument was not a large one, and the dugout door was thick,—as a +precaution against discovery if he should be called when some visitor +chanced to be in the cabin. Not often did a man ride that way, though +occasionally some one stopped for a meal if he knew that the cabin was +there and had ever tasted Swan's sour-dough biscuits. His aerial was +cleverly camouflaged between the two pine trees, and he had no fear of +discovery there; Jack was a faithful<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span> guardian and would give warning if +any one approached the place. Swan could therefore give his whole +attention to the business at hand.</p> + +<p>He was not yet supplied with evidence enough to warrant arresting +Warfield and Hawkins, but he hoped to get it when the real crisis came. +They could not have known of Al Woodruff's intentions toward Lorraine, +else they would have kept themselves in the background and would not +have risked the failure of their own plan.</p> + +<p>On the other hand, Al must have been wholly ignorant of Warfield's +scheme to try and prove Lorraine crazy. It looked to Swan very much like +a muddling of the Sawtooth affairs through over-anxiety to avoid +trouble. They were afraid of what Lorraine knew. They wanted to +eliminate her, and they had made the blunder of working independently to +that end.</p> + +<p>Lone's anxiety he did not even consider. He believed that Lone would be +equal to any immediate emergency and would do whatever the circumstances +seemed to require of him. Warfield counted him a Sawtooth man. Al +Woodruff, if the four men met unexpectedly, would also take it for +granted that he was one of them. They would probably talk to Lone +without reserve,—Swan<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span> counted on that. Whereas, if he were present, +they would be on their guard, at least.</p> + +<p>Swan's plan was to wait at the cabin until he knew that deputies were +headed toward the Pass. Then, with Jack, it would be a simple matter to +follow Warfield to where he overtook Al,—supposing he did overtake him. +If he did not, then Swan meant to be present when the meeting occurred. +The dog would trail Al anywhere, since the scent would be less than +twenty-four hours old. Swan would locate Warfield and lead him straight +to Al Woodruff, and then make his arrests. But he wanted to have the +deputies there.</p> + +<p>At dusk he got his call. He learned that four picked men had started for +the Pass, and that they would reach the divide by daybreak. Others were +on their way to intercept Al Woodruff if he crossed before then.</p> + +<p>It was all that Swan could have hoped for,—more than he had dared to +expect on such short notice. He notified the operator that he would not +be there to receive anything else, until he returned to report that he +had got his men.</p> + +<p>"Don't count your chickens till they're hatched," came facetiously out +of the blue.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span>"By golly, I can hear them holler in the shell," Swan sent back, +grinning to himself as he rattled the key. "That irrigation graft is +killed now. You tell the boss Swan says so. He's right. The way to catch +a fox is to watch his den."</p> + +<p>He switched off the current, closed the case and went out, making sure +that the cupboard-camouflaged door looked perfectly innocent on the +outside. With a bannock stuffed into one pocket, a chunk of bacon in the +other, he left the cabin and swung off again in that long, tireless +stride of his, Jack following contentedly at his heels.</p> + +<p>At the farther end of Skyline Meadow he stopped, took a tough leather +leash from his pocket and fastened it to Jack's collar.</p> + +<p>"We don't go running to paw nobody's stomach and say, 'Wow-wow! Here we +are back again!'" he told the dog, pulling its ears affectionately. +"Maybe we get shot or something like that. We trail, and we keep our +mouth still, Yack. One bark, and I lick you good!"</p> + +<p>Jack flashed out a pink tongue and licked his master's chin to show how +little he was worried over the threat, and went racing along at the end +of the leash, taking Swan's trail and his own<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> back to where they had +climbed out of the canyon.</p> + +<p>At the bottom Swan spoke to the dog in an undertone, and Jack obediently +started up the canyon on the trail of the five horses who had passed +that way since noon. It was starlight now, and Swan did not hurry. He +was taking it for granted that Warfield and Hawkins would stop when it +became too dark to follow the hoofprints, and without Jack to show them +the way they would perforce remain where they were until daybreak.</p> + +<p>They would do that, he reasoned, if they were sincere in wanting to +overtake Lorraine and in their ignorance that they were also following +Al Woodruff. And try as he would, he could not see the object of so +foolish a plan as this abduction carried out in collusion with two men +of unknown sentiments in the party. They had shown no suspicion of Al's +part in the affair, and Swan grinned when he thought of the mutual +surprise when they met.</p> + +<p>He was not disappointed. They reached timber line, following the seldom +used trail that wound over the divide to Bear Top Pass and so, by a +difficult route which he did not believe Al<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> would attempt after dark, +to the country beyond the mountain. Where dark overtook them, they +stopped in a sheltered nook to wait, just as Swan had expected they +would. They were close to the trail, where no one could pass without +their knowledge.</p> + +<p>In the belief that it was only Lorraine they were following, and that +she would be frightened and would come to the cheer of a campfire, they +had a fine, inviting blaze. Swan made his way as close as he dared, +without being discovered, and sat down to wait. He could see nothing of +the men until Lone appeared and fed the flames more wood, and sat down +where the light shone on his face. Swan grinned again. Warfield had +probably decided that Lorraine would be less afraid of Lone than of them +and had ordered him into the firelight as a sort of decoy. And Lone, +knowing that Al Woodruff might be within shooting distance, was probably +much more uncomfortable than he looked.</p> + +<p>He sat with his legs crossed in true range fashion and stared into the +fire while he smoked. He was a fair mark for an enemy who might be +lurking out there in the dark, but he gave no sign that he realized the +danger of his position.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> Neither did he wear any air of expectancy. +Warfield and Hawkins might wait and listen and hope that Lorraine, +wide-eyed and weary, would steal up to the warmth of the fire; but not +Lone.</p> + +<p>Swan, sitting on a rotting log, became uneasy at the fine target which +Lone made by the fire, and drew Al Woodruff's blue bandanna from his +pocket. He held it to Jack's nose and whispered, "You find him, +Yack—and I lick you good if you bark." Jack sniffed, dropped his nose +to the ground and began tugging at the leash. Swan got up and, moving +stealthily, followed the dog.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_TWENTY-THREE" id="CHAPTER_TWENTY-THREE"></a>CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE</h2> + +<h4>"I COULDA LOVED THIS LITTLE GIRL"</h4> + + +<p>A chill wind that hurried over Bear Top ahead of the dawn brought Swan +and Jack clattering up the trail that dipped into Spirit Canyon. +Warfield rose stiffly from the one-sided warmth of the fire and walked a +few paces to meet him, shrugging his wide shoulders at the cold and +rubbing his thigh muscles that protested against movement. Much riding +upon upholstered cushions had not helped Senator Warfield to retain the +tough muscles of hard-riding Bill Warfield. The senator was saddle-sore +as well as hungry, and his temper showed in his blood-shot eyes. He +would have quarreled with his best-beloved woman that morning, and he +began on Swan.</p> + +<p>Why hadn't he come back down the gulch yesterday and helped track the +girl, as he was told to do? (The senator had quite unpleasant opinions +of Swedes, and crazy women, and dogs<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> that were never around when they +were wanted, and he expressed them fluently.)</p> + +<p>Swan explained with a great deal of labor that he had not thought he was +wanted, and that he had to sleep on his claim sometimes or the law would +take it from him, maybe. Also he virtuously pointed out that he had come +with Yack before daylight to the canyon to see if they had found Miss +Hunter and gone home, or if they were still hunting for her.</p> + +<p>"If you like to find that jong lady, I put Yack on the trail quick," he +offered placatingly. "I bet you Yack finds her in one-half an hour."</p> + +<p>With much unnecessary language, Senator Warfield told him to get to +work, and the three tightened cinches, mounted their horses and prepared +to follow Swan's lead. Swan watched his chance and gave Lone a chunk of +bannock as a substitute for breakfast, and Lone, I may add, dropped +behind his companions and ate every crumb of it, in spite of his worry +over Lorraine.</p> + +<p>Indeed, Swan eased that worry too, when they were climbing the pine +slope where Al had killed the grouse. Lone had forged ahead on John Doe, +and Swan stopped suddenly, pointing to the spot<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> where a few bloody +feathers and a boot-print showed. The other evidence Jack had eaten in +the night.</p> + +<p>"Raine's all right, Lone. Got men coming. Keep your gun handy," he +murmured and turned away as the others rode up, eager for whatever news +Swan had to offer.</p> + +<p>"Something killed a bird," Swan explained politely, planting one of his +own big feet over the track, which did not in the least resemble +Lorraine's. "Yack! you find that jong lady quick!"</p> + +<p>From there on Swan walked carefully, putting his foot wherever a print +of Al's boot was visible. Since he was much bigger than Al, with a +correspondingly longer stride, his gait puzzled Lone until he saw just +what Swan was doing. Then his eyes lightened with amused appreciation of +the Swede's cunning.</p> + +<p>"We ought to have some hot drink, or whisky, when we find that girl," +Hawkins muttered unexpectedly, riding up beside Lone as they crossed an +open space. "She'll be half-dead with cold—if we find her alive."</p> + +<p>Before Lone could answer, Swan looked back at the two and raised his +hand for them to stop.</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span>"Better if you leave the horses here," he suggested. "From Yack I know +we get close pretty quick. That jong lady's horse maybe smells these +horse and makes a noise, and crazy folks run from noise."</p> + +<p>Without objection the three dismounted and tied their horses securely to +trees. Then, with Swan and Jack leading the way, they climbed over the +ridge and descended into the hollow by way of the ledge which Skinner +had negotiated so carefully the night before. Without the dog they never +would have guessed that any one had passed this way, but as it was they +made good progress and reached the nearest edge of the spruce thicket +just as the sun was making ready to push up over the skyline.</p> + +<p>Jack stopped and looked up at his master inquiringly, lifting his lip at +the sides and showing his teeth. But he made no sound; nor did Swan, +when he dropped his fingers to the dog's head and patted him +approvingly.</p> + +<p>They heard a horse sneeze, beyond the spruce grove, and Warfield stepped +forward authoritatively, waving Swan back. This, his manner said +plainly, was first and foremost his affair, and from now on he would +take charge of the situa<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span>tion. At his heels went Hawkins, and Swan sent +an oblique glance of satisfaction toward Lone, who answered it with his +half-smile. Swan himself could not have planned the approach more to his +liking.</p> + +<p>The smell of bacon cooking watered their mouths and made Warfield and +Hawkins look at one another inquiringly. Crazy young women would hardly +be expected to carry a camping outfit. But Swan and Lone were treading +close on their heels, and their own curiosity pulled them forward. They +went carefully around the thicket, guided by the pungent odor of burning +pine wood, and halted so abruptly that Swan and Lone bumped into them +from behind. A man had risen up from the campfire and faced them, his +hands rising slowly, palms outward.</p> + +<p>"Warfield, by——!" Al blurted in his outraged astonishment. "Trailing +me with a bunch, are yuh? I knew you'd double-cross your own father—but +I never thought you had it in you to do it in the open. Damn yuh, what +d'yuh want that you expect to get?"</p> + +<p>Warfield stared at him, slack-jawed. He glanced furtively behind him at +Swan, and found that guileless youth ready to poke him in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> back with +the muzzle of a gun. Lone, he observed, had another. He looked back at +Al, whose eyes were ablaze with resentment. With an effort he smiled his +disarming, senatorial smile, but Al's next words froze it on his face.</p> + +<p>"I think I know the play you're making, but it won't get you anything, +Bill Warfield. You think I slipped up—and you told me not to let my +foot slip; said you'd hate to lose me. Well, you're the one that +slipped, you damned, rotten coward. I was watching out for leaks. I +stopped two, and this one——"</p> + +<p>He glanced down at Lorraine, who sat beside the fire, a blanket tied +tightly around her waist and her ankles, so that, while comfortably +free, she could make no move to escape.</p> + +<p>"I was fixing to stop <i>her</i> from telling all she knew," he added +harshly. "By to-night I'd have had her married to me, you damned fool. +And here you've blocked everything for me, afraid I was falling down on +my job!</p> + +<p>"Now folks, lemme just tell you a few little things. I know my +limit—you've got me dead to rights. I ain't complaining about that; a +man in my game expects to get his, some day. But I ain't going to let +the man go that paid me my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> wages and a bonus of five hundred dollars +for every man I killed that he wanted outa the way.</p> + +<p>"Hawkins knows that's a fact. He's foreman of the Sawtooth, and he knows +the agreement. I've got to say for Hawkins that aside from stealing +cattle off the nesters and helping make evidence against some that's in +jail, Hawkins never done any dirty work. He didn't have to. They paid +<i>me</i> for that end of the business.</p> + +<p>"I killed Fred Thurman—this girl, here, saw me shoot him. And it was +when I told Warfield I was afraid she might set folks talking that he +began to get cold feet. Up to then everything was lovely, but Warfield +began to crawfish a little. We figured—<i>we</i> figured, emphasize the +<i>we</i>, folks,—that the Quirt would have to be put outa business. We knew +if the girl told Brit and Frank, they'd maybe get the nerve to try and +pin something on us. We've stole 'em blind for years, and they wouldn't +cry if we got hung. Besides, they was friendly with Fred.</p> + +<p>"The girl and the Swede got in the way when I tried to bump Brit off. +I'd have gone into the canyon and finished him with a rock, but they +beat me to it. The girl herself I couldn't get at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> very well and make it +look accidental—and anyway, I never did kill a woman, and I'd hate it +like hell. I figured if her dad got killed, she'd leave.</p> + +<p>"And let me tell you, folks, Warfield raised hell with me because Brit +Hunter wasn't killed when he pitched over the grade. He held out on me +for that job—so I'm collecting five hundred dollars' worth of fun right +now. He did say he'd pay me after Brit was dead, but it looks like he's +going to pull through, so I ain't counting much on getting my money outa +Warfield.</p> + +<p>"Frank I got, and made a clean job of it. And yesterday morning the girl +played into my hands. She rode over to the Sawtooth, and I got her at +Thurman's place, on her way home, and figured I'd marry her and take a +chance on keeping her quiet afterwards. I'd have been down the Pass in +another two hours and heading for the nearest county seat. She'd have +married me, too. She knows I'd have killed her if she didn't—which I +would. I've been square with her—she'll tell you that. I told her, when +I took her, just what I was going to do with her. So that's all +straight. She's been scared, I guess, but she ain't gone<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> hungry, and +she ain't suffered, except in her mind. I don't fight women, and I'll +say right now, to her and to you, that I've got all the respect in the +world for this little girl, and if I'd married her I'd have been as good +to her as I know how, and as she'd let me be.</p> + +<p>"Now I want to tell you folks a few more things about Bill Warfield. If +you want to stop the damnest steal in the country, tie a can onto that +irrigation scheme of his. He's out to hold up the State for all he can +get, and bleed the poor devils of farmers white, that buys land under +that canal. It may look good, but it ain't good—not by a damn sight.</p> + +<p>"Yuh know what he's figuring on doing? Get water in the canal, sell land +under a contract that lets him out if the ditch breaks, or something so +he <i>can't</i> supply water at any time. And when them poor suckers gets +their crops all in, and at the point where they've got to have water or +lose out, something'll happen to the supply. Folks, I <i>know</i>! I'm a +reliable man, and I've rode with a rope around my neck for over five +years, and Warfield offered me the same old five hundred every time I +monkeyed with the water supply as ordered. He'd have done it slick;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span> +don't worry none about that. The biggest band of thieves he could get +together is that company. So if you folks have got any sense, you'll +bust it up right now.</p> + +<p>"Bill Warfield, what I've got to say to <i>you</i> won't take long. You +thought you'd make a grand-stand play with the law, and at the same time +put me outa the way. You figured I'd resist arrest, and you'd have a +chance to shoot me down. I know your rotten mind better than you do. You +wanted to bump me off, but you wanted to do it in a way that'd put you +in right with the public. Killing me for kidnapping this girl would +sound damn romantic in the newspapers, and it wouldn't have a thing to +do with Thurman or Frank Johnson, or any of the rest that I've sent over +the trail for you.</p> + +<p>"Right now you're figuring how you'll get around this bawling-out I'm +giving you. There's nobody to take down what I say, and I'm just a mean, +ornery outlaw and killer, talking for spite. With your pull you expect +to get this smoothed over and hushed up, and have me at a hanging bee, +and everything all right for Bill! Well——"</p> + +<p>His eyes left Warfield's face and went beyond<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> the staring group. His +face darkened, a sneer twisted his lips.</p> + +<p>"Who're them others?" he cried harshly. "Was you afraid four wouldn't be +enough to take me?"</p> + +<p>The four turned heads to look. Bill Warfield never looked back, for Al's +gun spoke, and Warfield sagged at the knees and the shoulders, and he +slumped to the ground at the instant when Al's gun spoke again.</p> + +<p>"That's for you, Lone Morgan," Al cried, as he fired again. "She talked +about you in her sleep last night. She called you Loney, and she wanted +you to come and get her. I was going to kill you first chance I got. I +coulda loved this little girl. I—could——"</p> + +<p>He was down, bleeding and coughing and trying to talk. Swan had shot +him, and two of the deputies who had been there through half of Al's +bitter talk. Lorraine, unable to get up and run, too sturdy of soul to +faint, had rolled over and away from him, her lips held tightly +together, her eyes wide with horror. Al crawled after her, his eyes +pleading.</p> + +<p>"Little Spitfire—I shot your Loney—but I'd have been good to you, +girl. I watched yuh all<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span> night—and I couldn't help loving yuh. +I—couldn't——" That was all. Within three feet of her, his face toward +her and his eyes agonizing to meet hers, he died.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_TWENTY-FOUR" id="CHAPTER_TWENTY-FOUR"></a>CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR</h2> + +<h4>ANOTHER STORY BEGINS</h4> + + +<p>This chapter is very much like a preface: it is not absolutely +necessary, although many persons will read it and a few will be glad +that it was written.</p> + +<p>The story itself is ended. To go on would be to begin another story; to +tell of the building up of the Quirt outfit, with Lone and Lone's +savings playing a very important part, and with Brit a semi-invalided, +retired stockman who smoked his pipe and told the young couple what they +should do and how they should do it.</p> + +<p>Frank he mourned for and seldom mentioned. The Sawtooth, under the +management of a greatly chastened young Bob Warfield, was slowly winning +its way back to the respect of its neighbors.</p> + +<p>For certain personal reasons there was no real neighborliness between +the Quirt and the Sawtooth. There could not be, so long as Brit's memory +remained clear, and Bob was every day<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span> reminded of the crimes his father +had paid a man to commit. Moreover, Southerners are jealous of their +women,—it is their especial prerogative. And Lone suspected that, given +the opportunity, Bob Warfield would have fallen in love with Lorraine. +Indeed, he suspected that any man in the country would have done that. +Al Woodruff had, and he was noted for his indifference to women and his +implacable hardness toward men.</p> + +<p>But you are not to accuse Lone of being a jealous husband. He was not, +and I am merely pointing out the fact that he might have been, had he +been given any cause.</p> + +<p>Oh, by the way, Swan "proved up" as soon as possible on his homestead +and sold out to the Quirt. Lone managed to buy the Thurman ranch also, +and the TJ up-and-down is on its feet again as a cattle ranch. Sorry and +Jim will ride for the Quirt, I suppose, as long as they can crawl into a +saddle, but there are younger men now to ride the Skyline Meadow range.</p> + +<p>Some one asked about Yellowjacket, having, I suppose, a sneaking regard +for his infirmities. He hasn't been peeled yet—or he hadn't, the last I +heard of him. Lone and Lorraine told me they were trying to save him for +the "Little Feller" to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> practise on when he is able to sit up without a +cushion behind his back, and to hold something besides a rubber rattle. +And—oh, do you know how Lone is teaching the Little Feller to sit up on +the floor? He took a horse collar and scrubbed it until he nearly wore +out the leather. Then he brought it to the cabin, put it on the floor +and set the Little Feller inside it.</p> + +<p>They sent me a snap-shot of the event, but it is not very good. The film +was under-exposed, and nothing was to be seen of the Little Feller +except a hazy spot which I judged was a hand, holding a black object I +guessed was the ridgy, rubber rattle with the whistle gone out of the +end,—down the Little Feller's throat, they are afraid. And there was +his smile, and a glimpse of his eyes.</p> + +<p>Aren't you envious as sin, and glad they're so happy?</p> + + +<h4>THE END</h4> + + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/image2.png" alt="[Illustration]" /> +</div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2>NOVELS BY B. M. BOWER</h2> + + + +<p><b>THE RANCH AT THE WOLVERINE</b></p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>A ringing tale full of exhilarating cowboy atmosphere, abundantly +and absorbingly illustrating the outstanding feature of that +alluring ranch life that is fast vanishing.—<i>Chicago Tribune</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>JEAN OF THE LAZY A</b></p> + +<p>A spirited novel of ranch life in which the fascinating heroine poses +for film pictures that she may make money necessary to prove her father +innocent of a crime for which he has been convicted.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>It possesses all the popular ingredients—a quick-action plot, +color and picturesqueness aplenty, and an unflagging interest—to +be found in Bower's earlier successes.—<i>Philadelphia Public +Ledger</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>THE PHANTOM HERD</b></p> + +<p>Another western tale in which the Happy Family become real "movie" +actors.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>There has been so much truck written in the last few years about +motion pictures, that it is a positive relief to find a book by an +author who knows exactly what to talk about in an entertaining +manner with a knowledge of actual conditions as they +exist.—<i>Boston Post</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX</b></p> + +<p>A Flying U story in which the Happy Family get mixed up in a robbery +faked for film purposes.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>Altogether a rattling story, that is better in conception and +expression than the conventional thriller on account of its touches +of real humanity in characterization.—<i>Philadelphia Public +Ledger</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>RIM O' THE WORLD</b></p> + +<p>An engrossing tale of a ranch-feud between "gun-fighters" in Idaho.</p> + + +<p><b>THE LOOKOUT MAN</b></p> + +<p>A tale of action, excitement and love, full of the charm of the great +outdoors, in which the story of the life at a Forest Reserve Station on +top of a California mountain is vividly portrayed.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>The signature of B.M. Bower is a valuable trade-mark. It stands for +fiction filled with the spirit of ranch life in the +northwest.—<i>Boston Herald</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>CABIN FEVER</b></p> + +<p>How Bud Moore and his wife, Marie, fared through their attack of "cabin +fever" is the theme of this B.M. Bower story.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>The author has put some real sentiment into a story that gives a +rapidly filmed "movie" of Western life.—<i>Philadelphia Public +Ledger</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>STARR, OF THE DESERT</b></p> + +<p>A story of mystery, love and adventure, which has a Mexican revolt as +its main theme.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>The tale is well written, with the fine art of artlessness, and of +unflagging interest; a book worth the reading which it is sure to +get from every one who begins it.—<i>New York Tribune</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND</b></p> + +<p>What happened when a company of school teachers and farmers encamped on +the grounds of the Flying U Ranch.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>The Northwestern cattle country has never had a better chronicler +in fiction of its deeds and its people than B.M. Bower.—<i>New York +Times</i>.</p></div> + +<p><b>GOOD INDIAN</b></p> + +<p>A story named for its half-breed hero, who dominates this stirring +Western romance.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>There is excitement and action on every page.... A somewhat unusual +love story runs through the book.—<i>Boston Transcript</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>THE UPHILL CLIMB</b></p> + +<p>How a cowboy fought the hardest of all battles—a fight against himself.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>Bower knows the West of the cowboys, as do few writers to-day.... +The word pictures of Western life are realistic, and strongly +suffused with local color.—<i>Philadelphia North American</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>LONESOME LAND</b></p> + +<p>A story of modern Montana, giving a wholly different phase of life among +the ranches.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>Montana described as it really is, is the "lonesome land" of this +new Bower story. A prairie fire and the death of the worthless +husband are especially well handled.—<i>A. L. A. Booklist</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>SKYRIDER</b></p> + +<p>A cowboy who becomes an aviator is the hero of this new story of Western +ranch life.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>An engrossing ranch story with a new note of interest woven into +its breezy texture.—<i>Philadelphia Public Ledger</i>.</p></div> + + +<p><b>THE THUNDER BIRD</b></p> + +<p>Further aeronautic adventures of "Skyrider" Johnnie Jewel.</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"A good story with numberless thrills and a humorous quality +throughout its pages."—<i>New York Sun</i>.</p></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<p class="figcenter"><b>LITTLE, BROWN & CO., Publishers, Boston, Mass.</b></p> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Quirt, by B.M. 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Bower + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Quirt + +Author: B.M. Bower + +Illustrator: Anton Otto Fischer + +Release Date: September 3, 2006 [EBook #19166] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE QUIRT *** + + + + +Produced by Kathryn Lybarger, Joseph R. Hauser and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + +[Illustration: Cover] + + + + +THE QUIRT + + + + +=By B.M. Bower= + + GOOD INDIAN + + LONESOME LAND + + THE UPHILL CLIMB + + THE GRINGOS + + THE RANCH AT THE WOLVERINE + + THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND + + JEAN OF THE LAZY A + + THE PHANTOM HERD + + THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX + + STARR, OF THE DESERT + + THE LOOKOUT MAN + + CABIN FEVER + + SKYRIDER + + THE THUNDER BIRD + + RIM O' THE WORLD + + THE QUIRT + + + + +[Illustration: Al's gun spoke, and Warfield sagged at the knees and the +shoulders, and slumped to the ground. + FRONTISPIECE. _See page 294._] + + + +THE QUIRT + + +BY +B.M. BOWER + + + +WITH FRONTISPIECE BY +ANTON OTTO FISCHER + + + +[Illustration] + + + +BOSTON +LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY +1920 + + + + +_Copyright, 1920,_ + +BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. + + * * * * + +_All rights reserved_ + +Published May, 1920 +Reprinted, May, 1920 +Reprinted, July, 1920 +Reprinted, October, 1920 + + + + +CONTENTS + + CHAPTER PAGE + + I. LITTLE FISH 1 + + II. THE ENCHANTMENT OF LONG DISTANCE 12 + + III. REALITY IS WEIGHED AND FOUND WANTING 22 + + IV. "SHE'S A GOOD GIRL WHEN SHE AIN'T CRAZY" 38 + + V. A DEATH "BY ACCIDENT" 54 + + VI. LONE ADVISES SILENCE 68 + + VII. THE MAN AT WHISPER 85 + + VIII. "IT TAKES NERVE JUST TO HANG ON" 100 + + IX. THE EVIL EYE OF THE SAWTOOTH 115 + + X. ANOTHER SAWTOOTH "ACCIDENT" 126 + + XI. SWAN TALKS WITH HIS THOUGHTS 144 + + XII. THE QUIRT PARRIES THE FIRST BLOW 158 + + XIII. LONE TAKES HIS STAND 168 + + XIV. "FRANK'S DEAD" 178 + + XV. SWAN TRAILS A COYOTE 192 + + XVI. THE SAWTOOTH SHOWS ITS HAND 200 + + XVII. YACK DON'T LIE 216 + + XVIII. "I THINK AL WOODRUFF'S GOT HER" 233 + + XIX. SWAN CALLS FOR HELP 245 + + XX. KIDNAPPED 255 + + XXI. "OH, I COULD KILL YOU!" 264 + + XXII. "YACK, I LICK YOU GOOD IF YOU BARK" 277 + + XXIII. "I COULDA LOVED THIS LITTLE GIRL" 284 + + XXIV. ANOTHER STORY BEGINS 296 + + + + +THE QUIRT + + + + +CHAPTER ONE + +LITTLE FISH + + +Quirt Creek flowed sluggishly between willows which sagged none too +gracefully across its deeper pools, or languished beside the rocky +stretches that were bone dry from July to October, with a narrow channel +in the center where what water there was hurried along to the pools +below. For a mile or more, where the land lay fairly level in a +platter-like valley set in the lower hills, the mud that rimmed the +pools was scored deep with the tracks of the "TJ up-and-down" cattle, as +the double monogram of Hunter and Johnson was called. + +A hard brand to work, a cattleman would tell you. Yet the TJ up-and-down +herd never seemed to increase beyond a niggardly three hundred or so, +though the Quirt ranch was older than its lordly neighbors, the Sawtooth +Cattle Company, who numbered their cattle by tens of thousands and +whose riders must have strings of fifteen horses apiece to keep them +going; older too than many a modest ranch that had flourished awhile and +had finished as line-camps of the Sawtooth when the Sawtooth bought +ranch and brand for a lump sum that looked big to the rancher, who +immediately departed to make himself a new home elsewhere: older than +others which had somehow gone to pieces when the rancher died or went to +the penitentiary under the stigma of a long sentence as a cattle thief. +There were many such, for the Sawtooth, powerful and stern against +outlawry, tolerated no pilfering from their thousands. + +The less you have, the more careful you are of your possessions. Hunter +and Johnson owned exactly a section and a half of land, and for a mile +and a half Quirt Creek was fenced upon either side. They hired two men, +cut what hay they could from a field which they irrigated, fed their +cattle through the cold weather, watched them zealously through the +summer, and managed to ship enough beef each fall to pay their grocery +bill and their men's wages and have a balance sufficient to buy what +clothes they needed, and perhaps pay a doctor if one of them fell ill. +Which frequently happened, since Brit was becoming a prey to rheumatism +that sometimes kept him in bed, and Frank occasionally indulged himself +in a gallon or so of bad whisky and suffered afterwards from a badly +deranged digestion. + +Their house was a two-room log cabin, built when logs were easier to get +than lumber. That the cabin contained two rooms was the result of +circumstances rather than design. Brit had hauled from the mountain-side +logs long and logs short, and it had seemed a shame to cut the long ones +any shorter. Later, when the outside world had crept a little closer to +their wilderness--as, go where you will, the outside world has a way of +doing--he had built a lean-to shed against the cabin from what lumber +there was left after building a cowshed against the log barn. + +In the early days, Brit had had a wife and two children, but the wife +could not endure the loneliness of the ranch nor the inconvenience of +living in a two-room log cabin. She was continually worrying over +rattlesnakes and diphtheria and pneumonia, and begging Brit to sell out +and live in town. She had married him because he was a cowboy, and +because he was a nimble dancer and rode gallantly with silver-shanked +spurs ajingle on his heels and a snakeskin band around his hat, and +because a ranch away out on Quirt Creek had sounded exactly like a story +in a book. + +Adventure, picturesqueness, even romance, are recognized and appreciated +only at a distance. Mrs. Hunter lost the perspective of romance and +adventure, and shed tears because there was sufficient mineral in the +water to yellow her week's washing, and for various other causes which +she had never foreseen and to which she refused to resign herself. + +Came a time when she delivered a shrill-voiced, tear-blurred ultimatum +to Brit. Either he must sell out and move to town, or she would take the +children and leave him. Of towns Brit knew nothing except the +post-office, saloon, cheap restaurant side,--and a barber shop where a +fellow could get a shave and hair-cut before he went to see his girl. +Brit could not imagine himself actually _living_, day after day, in a +town. Three or four days had always been his limit. It was in a +restaurant that he had first met his wife. He had stayed three days when +he had meant to finish his business in one, because there was an +awfully nice girl waiting on table in the Palace, and because there was +going to be a dance on Saturday night, and he wanted his acquaintance +with her to develop to the point where he might ask her to go with him, +and be reasonably certain of a favorable answer. + +Brit would not sell his ranch. In this Frank Johnson, old-time friend +and neighbor, who had taken all the land the government would allow one +man to hold, and whose lines joined Brit's, profanely upheld him. They +had planned to run cattle together, had their brand already recorded, +and had scraped together enough money to buy a dozen young cows. +Luckily, Brit had "proven up" on his homestead, so that when the irate +Mrs. Hunter deserted him she did not jeopardize his right to the land. + +Brit was philosophical, thinking that a year or so of town life would be +a cure. If he missed the children, he was free from tears and nagging +complaints, so that his content balanced his loneliness. Frank proved up +and came down to live with him, and the partnership began to wear into +permanency. Share and share alike, they lived and worked and wrangled +together like brothers. + +For months Brit's wife was too angry and spiteful to write. Then she +wrote acrimoniously, reminding Brit of his duty to his children. Royal +was old enough for school and needed clothes. She was slaving for them +as she had never thought to slave when Brit promised to honor and +protect her, but the fact remained that he was their father even if he +did not act like one. She needed at least ten dollars. + +Brit showed the letter to Frank, and the two talked it over solemnly +while they sat on inverted feed buckets beside the stable, facing the +unearthly beauty of a cloud-piled Idaho sunset. They did not feel that +they could afford to sell a cow, and two-year-old steers were out of the +question. They decided to sell an unbroken colt that a cow-puncher +fancied. In a week Brit wrote a brief, matter-of-fact letter to Minnie +and enclosed a much-worn ten-dollar banknote. With the two dollars and a +half which remained of his share of the sale, Brit sent to a mail-order +house for a mackinaw coat, and felt cheated afterwards because the coat +was not "wind and water proof" as advertised in the catalogue. + +More months passed, and Brit received, by registered mail, a notice that +he was being sued for divorce on the ground of non-support. He felt +hurt, because, as he pointed out to Frank, he was perfectly willing to +support Minnie and the kids if they came back where he could have a +chance. He wrote this painstakingly to the lawyer and received no reply. +Later he learned from Minnie that she had freed herself from him, and +that she was keeping boarders and asking no odds of him. + +To come at once to the end of Brit's matrimonial affairs, he heard from +the children once in a year, perhaps, after they were old enough to +write. He did not send them money, because he seemed never to have any +money to send, and because they did not ask for any. Dumbly he sensed, +as their handwriting and their spelling improved, that his children were +growing up. But when he thought of them they seemed remote, prattling +youngsters whom Minnie was forever worrying over and who seemed to have +been always under the heels of his horse, or under the wheels of his +wagon, or playing with the pitchfork, or wandering off into the sage +while he and their distracted mother searched for them. For a long +while--how many years Brit could not remember--they had been living in +Los Angeles. Prospering, too, Brit understood. The girl, +Lorraine--Minnie had wanted fancy names for the kids, and Brit +apologized whenever he spoke of them, which was seldom--Lorraine had +written that "Mamma has an apartment house." That had sounded +prosperous, even at the beginning. And as the years passed and their +address remained the same, Brit became fixed in the belief that the Casa +Grande was all that its name implied, and perhaps more. Minnie must be +getting rich. She had a picture of the place on the stationery which +Lorraine used when she wrote him. There were two palm trees in front, +with bay windows behind them, and pillars. Brit used to study these +magnificences and thank God that Minnie was doing so well. He never +could have given her a home like that. Brit sometimes added that he had +never been cut out for a married man, anyway. + +Old-timers forgot that Brit had ever been married, and late comers never +heard of it. To all intents the owners of the Quirt outfit were old +bachelors who kept pretty much to themselves, went to town only when +they needed supplies, rode old, narrow-fork saddles and grinned +scornfully at "swell-forks" and "buckin'-rolls," and listened to all the +range gossip without adding so much as an opinion. They never talked +politics nor told which candidates received their two votes. They kept +the same two men season after season,--leathery old range hands with +eyes that saw whatever came within their field of vision, and with the +gift of silence, which is rare. + +If you know anything at all about cattlemen, you will know that the +Quirt was a poor man's ranch, when I tell you that Hunter and Johnson +milked three cows and made butter, fed a few pigs on the skim milk and +the alfalfa stalks which the saddle horses and the cows disdained to +eat, kept a flock of chickens, and sold what butter, eggs and pork they +did not need for themselves. Cattlemen seldom do that. More often they +buy milk in small tin cans, butter in "squares," and do without eggs. + +Four of a kind were the men of the TJ up-and-down, and even Bill +Warfield--president and general manager of the Sawtooth Cattle Company, +and of the Federal Reclamation Company and several other companies, +State senator and general benefactor of the Sawtooth country--even the +great Bill Warfield lifted his hat to the owners of the Quirt when he +met them, and spoke of them as "the finest specimens of our old, +fast-vanishing type of range men." Senator Warfield himself represented +the modern type of range man and was proud of his progressiveness. Never +a scheme for the country's development was hatched but you would find +Senator Warfield closely allied with it, his voice the deciding one when +policies and progress were being discussed. + +As to the Sawtooth, forty thousand acres comprised their holdings under +patents, deeds and long-time leases from the government. Another twenty +thousand acres they had access to through the grace of the owners, and +there was forest-reserve grazing besides, which the Sawtooth could have +if it chose to pay the nominal rental sum. The Quirt ranch was almost +surrounded by Sawtooth land of one sort or another, though there was +scant grazing in the early spring on the sagebrush wilderness to the +south. This needed Quirt Creek for accessible water, and Quirt Creek, +save where it ran through cut-bank hills, was fenced within the section +and a half of the TJ up-and-down. + +So there they were, small fish making shift to live precariously with +other small fish in a pool where big fish swam lazily. If one small fish +now and then disappeared with mysterious abruptness, the other small +fish would perhaps scurry here and there for a time, but few would leave +the pool for the safe shallows beyond. + +This is a tale of the little fishes. + + + + +CHAPTER TWO + +THE ENCHANTMENT OF LONG DISTANCE + + +Lorraine Hunter always maintained that she was a Western girl. If she +reached the point of furnishing details she would tell you that she had +ridden horses from the time that she could walk, and that her father was +a cattle-king of Idaho, whose cattle fed upon a thousand hills. When she +was twelve she told her playmates exciting tales about rattlesnakes. +When she was fifteen she sat breathless in the movies and watched +picturesque horsemen careering up and down and around the thousand +hills, and believed in her heart that half the Western pictures were +taken on or near her father's ranch. She seemed to remember certain +landmarks, and would point them out to her companions and whisper a +desultory lecture on the cattle industry as illustrated by the picture. +She was much inclined to criticism of the costuming and the acting. + +At eighteen she knew definitely that she hated the very name Casa +Grande. She hated the narrow, half-lighted hallway with its "tree" +where no one ever hung a hat, and the seat beneath where no one ever sat +down. She hated the row of key-and-mail boxes on the wall, with the bell +buttons above each apartment number. She hated the jangling of the hall +telephone, the scurrying to answer, the prodding of whichever bell +button would summon the tenant asked for by the caller. She hated the +meek little Filipino boy who swept that ugly hall every morning. She +hated the scrubby palms in front. She hated the pillars where the paint +was peeling badly. She hated the conflicting odors that seeped into the +atmosphere at certain hours of the day. She hated the three old maids on +the third floor and the frowsy woman on the first, who sat on the front +steps in her soiled breakfast cap and bungalow apron. She hated the +nervous tenant who occupied the apartment just over her mother's +three-room-and-bath, and pounded with a broom handle on the floor when +Lorraine practised overtime on chromatic scales. + +At eighteen Lorraine managed somehow to obtain work in a Western +picture, and being unusually pretty she so far distinguished herself +that she was given a small part in the next production. Her glorious +duty it was to ride madly through the little cow-town "set" to the +post-office where the sheriff's posse lounged conspicuously, and there +pull her horse to an abrupt stand and point excitedly to the distant +hills. Also she danced quite close to the camera in the "Typical Cowboy +Dance" which was a feature of this particular production. + +Lorraine thereby earned enough money to buy her fall suit and coat and +cheap furs, and learned to ride a horse at a gallop and to dance what +passed in pictures as a "square dance." + +At nineteen years of age Lorraine Hunter, daughter of old Brit Hunter of +the TJ up-and-down, became a real "range-bred girl" with a real Stetson +hat of her own, a green corduroy riding skirt, gray flannel shirt, +brilliant neckerchief, boots and spurs. A third picture gave her further +practice in riding a real horse,--albeit an extremely docile animal +called Mouse with good reason. She became known on the lot as a real +cattle-king's daughter, though she did not know the name of her father's +brand and in all her life had seen no herd larger than the thirty head +of tame cattle which were chased past the camera again and again to make +them look like ten thousand, and which were so thoroughly "camera +broke" that they stopped when they were out of the scene, turned and +were ready to repeat the performance _ad lib_. + +Had she lived her life on the Quirt ranch she would have known a great +deal more about horseback riding and cattle and range dances. She would +have known a great deal less about the romance of the West, however, and +she would probably never have seen a sheriff's posse riding twenty +strong and bunched like bird-shot when it leaves the muzzle of the gun. +Indeed, I am very sure she would not. Killings such as her father heard +of with his lips drawn tight and the cords standing out on the sides of +his skinny neck she would have considered the grim tragedies they were, +without once thinking of the "picture value" of the crime. + +As it was, her West was filled with men who died suddenly in gobs of red +paint and girls who rode loose-haired and panting with hand held over +the heart, hurrying for doctors, and cowboys and parsons and such. She +had seen many a man whip pistol from holster and dare a mob with lips +drawn back in a wolfish grin over his white, even teeth, and kidnappings +were the inevitable accompaniment of youth and beauty. + +Lorraine learned rapidly. In three years she thrilled to more +blood-curdling adventure than all the Bad Men in all the West could have +furnished had they lived to be old and worked hard at being bad all +their lives. For in that third year she worked her way enthusiastically +through a sixteen-episode movie serial called "The Terror of the Range." +She was past mistress of romance by that time. She knew her West. + +It was just after the "Terror of the Range" was finished that a great +revulsion in the management of this particular company stopped +production with a stunning completeness that left actors and actresses +feeling very much as if the studio roof had fallen upon them. Lorraine's +West vanished. The little cow-town "set" was being torn down to make +room for something else quite different. The cowboys appeared in +tailored suits and drifted away. Lorraine went home to the Casa Grande, +hating it more than ever she had hated it in her life. + +Some one up-stairs was frying liver and onions, which was in flagrant +defiance of Rule Four which mentioned cabbage, onions and fried fish as +undesirable foodstuffs. Outside, the palm leaves were dripping in the +night fog that had swept soggily in from the ocean. Her mother was +trying to collect a gas bill from the dressmaker down the hall, who +protested shrilly that she distinctly remembered having paid that gas +bill once and had no intention of paying it twice. + +Lorraine opened the door marked LANDLADY, and closed it with a slam +intended to remind her mother that bickerings in the hall were less +desirable than the odor of fried onions. She had often spoken to her +mother about the vulgarity of arguing in public with the tenants, but +her mother never seemed to see things as Lorraine saw them. + +In the apartment sat a man who had been too frequent a visitor, as +Lorraine judged him. He was an oldish man with the lines of failure in +his face and on his lean form the sprightly clothing of youth. He had +been a reporter,--was still, he maintained. But Lorraine suspected +shrewdly that he scarcely made a living for himself, and that he was +home-hunting in more ways than one when he came to visit her mother. + +The affair had progressed appreciably in her absence, it would appear. +He greeted her with, a fatherly "Hello, kiddie," and would have kissed +her had Lorraine not evaded him skilfully. + +Her mother came in then and complained intimately to the man, and +declared that the dressmaker would have to pay that bill or have her gas +turned off. He offered sympathy, assistance in the turning off of the +gas, and a kiss which was perfectly audible to Lorraine in the next +room. The affair had indeed progressed! + +"L'raine, d'you know you've got a new papa?" her mother called out in +the peculiar, chirpy tone she used when she was exuberantly happy. "I +knew you'd be surprised!" + +"I am," Lorraine agreed, pulling aside the cheap green portieres and +looked in upon the two. Her tone was unenthusiastic. "A superfluous gift +of doubtful value. I do not feel the need of a papa, thank you. If you +want him for a husband, mother, that is entirely your own affair. I hope +you'll be very happy." + +"The kid don't want a papa; husbands are what means the most in her +young life," chuckled the groom, restraining his bride when she would +have risen from his knee. + +"I hope you'll both be very happy indeed," said Lorraine gravely. "Now +you won't mind, mother, when I tell you that I am going to dad's ranch +in Idaho. I really meant it for a vacation, but since you won't be +alone, I may stay with dad permanently. I'm leaving to-morrow or the +next day--just as soon as I can pack my trunk and get a Pullman berth." + +She did not wait to see the relief in her mother's face contradicting +the expostulations on her lips. She went out to the telephone in the +hall, remembered suddenly that her business would be overheard by half +the tenants, and decided to use the public telephone in a hotel farther +down the street. Her decision to go to her dad had been born with the +words on her lips. But it was a lusty, full-voiced young decision, and +it was growing at an amazing rate. + +Of course she would go to her dad in Idaho! She was astonished that the +idea had never before crystallized into action. Why should she feed her +imagination upon a mimic West, when the great, glorious real West was +there? What if her dad had not written a word for more than a year? He +must be alive; they would surely have heard of his death, for she and +Royal were his sole heirs, and his partner would have their address. + +She walked fast and arrived at the telephone booth so breathless that +she was compelled to wait a few minutes before she could call her +number. She inquired about trains and rates to Echo, Idaho. + +Echo, Idaho! While she waited for the information clerk to look it up +the very words conjured visions of wide horizons and clean winds and +high adventure. If she pictured Echo, Idaho, as being a replica of the +"set" used in the movie serial, can you wonder? If she saw herself, the +beloved queen of her father's cowboys, dashing into Echo, Idaho, on a +crimply-maned broncho that pirouetted gaily before the post-office while +handsome young men in chaps and spurs and "big four" Stetsons watched +her yearningly, she was merely living mentally the only West that she +knew. + +From that beatific vision Lorraine floated into others more entrancing. +All the hairbreadth escapes of the heroine of the movie serial were +hers, adapted by her native logic to fit within the bounds of +possibility,--though I must admit they bulged here and there and +threatened to overlap and to encroach upon the impossible. Over the +hills where her father's vast herds grazed, sleek and wild and +long-horned and prone to stampede, galloped the Lorraine of Lorraine's +dreams, on horses sure-footed and swift. With her galloped strong men +whose faces limned the features of her favorite Western "lead." + +That for all her three years of intermittent intimacy with a +disillusioning world of mimicry, her dreams were pure romance, proved +that Lorraine had still the unclouded innocence of her girlhood +unspoiled. + + + + +CHAPTER THREE + +REALITY IS WEIGHED AND FOUND WANTING + + +Still dreaming her dreams, still featuring herself as the star of many +adventures, Lorraine followed the brakeman out of the dusty day coach +and down the car steps to the platform of the place called Echo, Idaho. +I can only guess at what she expected to find there in the person of a +cattle-king father, but whatever it was she did not find it. No father, +of any type whatever, came forward to claim her. In spite of her +"Western" experience she looked about her for a taxi, or at least a +street car. Even in the wilds of Western melodrama one could hear the +clang of street-car gongs warning careless autoists off the track. + +After the train had hooted and gone on around an absolutely +uninteresting low hill of yellow barrenness dotted with stunted sage, it +was the silence that first impressed Lorraine disagreeably. Echo, Idaho, +was a very poor imitation of all the Western sets she had ever seen. +True, it had the straggling row of square-fronted, one-story buildings, +with hitch rails, but the signs painted across the fronts were +absolutely common. Any director she had ever obeyed would have sent for +his assistant director and would have used language which a lady must +not listen to. Behind the store and the post-office and the blacksmith +shop, on the brow of the low hill around whose point the train had +disappeared, were houses with bay windows and porches absolutely out of +keeping with the West. So far as Lorraine could see, there was not a log +cabin in the whole place. + +The hitch rails were empty, and there was not a cowboy in sight. Before +the post-office a terribly grimy touring car stood with its +running-boards loaded with canvas-covered suitcases. Three goggled, +sunburned women in ugly khaki suits were disconsolately drinking soda +water from bottles without straws, and a goggled, red-faced, +angry-looking man was jerking impatiently at the hood of the machine. +Lorraine and her suitcase apparently excited no interest whatever in +Echo, Idaho. + +The station agent was carrying two boxes of oranges and a crate of +California cabbages in out of the sun, and a limp individual in blue +gingham shirt and dirty overalls had shouldered the mail sack and was +making his way across the dusty, rut-scored street to the post-office. + +Two questions and two brief answers convinced her that the station agent +did not know Britton Hunter,--which was strange, unless this happened to +be a very new agent. Lorraine left him to his cabbages and followed the +man with the mail sack. + +At the post-office the anemic clerk came forward, eyeing her with +admiring curiosity. Lorraine had seen anemic young men all her life, and +the last three years had made her perfectly familiar with that look in a +young man's eyes. She met it with impatient disfavor founded chiefly +upon the young man's need of a decent hair-cut, a less flowery tie and a +tailored suit. When he confessed that he did not know Mr. Britton Hunter +by sight he ceased to exist so far as Lorraine was concerned. She +decided that he also was new to the place and therefore perfectly +useless to her. + +The postmaster himself--Lorraine was cheered by his spectacles, his +shirt sleeves, and his chin whiskers, which made him look the part--was +better informed. He, too, eyed her curiously when she said "My father, +Mr. Britton Hunter," but he made no comment on the relationship. He gave +her a telegram and a letter from the General Delivery. The telegram, she +suspected, was the one she had sent to her dad announcing the date of +her arrival. The postmaster advised her to get a "livery rig" and drive +out to the ranch, since it might be a week or two before any one came in +from the Quirt. Lorraine thanked him graciously and departed for the +livery stable. + +The man in charge there chewed tobacco meditatively and told her that +his teams were all out. If she was a mind to wait over a day or two, he +said, he might maybe be able to make the trip. Lorraine took a long look +at the structure which he indicated as the hotel. + +"I think I'll walk," she said calmly. + +"_Walk_?" The stableman stopped chewing and stared at her. "It's some +consider'ble of a walk. It's all of eighteen mile--I dunno but twenty, +time y'get to the house." + +"I have frequently walked twenty-five or thirty miles. I am a member of +the Sierra Club in Los Angeles. We seldom take hikes of less than +twenty miles. If you will kindly tell me which road I must take----" + +"There she is," the man stated flatly, and pointed across the railroad +track to where a sandy road drew a yellowish line through the sage, +evidently making for the hills showing hazily violet in the distance. +Those hills formed the only break in the monotonous gray landscape, and +Lorraine was glad that her journey would take her close to them. + +"Thank you so much," she said coldly and returned to the station. In the +small lavatory of the depot waiting room she exchanged her slippers for +a pair of moderately low-heeled shoes which she had at the last minute +of packing tucked into her suitcase, put a few extra articles into her +rather smart traveling bag, left the suitcase in the telegraph office +and started. Not another question would she ask of Echo, Idaho, which +was flatter and more insipid than the drinking water in the tin "cooler" +in the waiting room. The station agent stood with his hands on his hips +and watched her cross the track and start down the road, pardonably +astonished to see a young woman walk down a road that led only to the +hills twenty miles away, carrying her luggage exactly as if her trip was +a matter of a block or two at most. + +The bag was rather heavy and as she went on it became heavier. She meant +to carry it slung across her shoulder on a stick as soon as she was well +away from the prying eyes of Echo's inhabitants. Later, if she felt +tired, she could easily hide it behind a bush along the road and send +one of her father's cowboys after it. The road was very dusty and +carried the wind-blown traces of automobile tires. Some one would surely +overtake her and give her a ride before she walked very far. + +For the first half hour she believed that she was walking on level +ground, but when she looked back there was no sign of any town behind +her. Echo had disappeared as completely as if it had been swallowed. +Even the unseemly bay-windowed houses on the hill had gone under. She +walked for another half hour and saw only the gray sage stretching all +around her. The hills looked farther away than when she started. Still, +that beaten road must lead somewhere. Two hours later she began to +wonder why this particular road should be so unending and so empty. +Never in her life before had she walked for two hours without seeming to +get anywhere, or without seeing any living human. + +Both shoulders were sore from the weight of the bag on the stick, but +the sagebushes looked so exactly alike that she feared she could not +describe the particular spot where the cowboys would find her bag, +wherefore she carried it still. She was beginning to change hands very +often when the wind came. + +Just where or how that wind sprang up she did not know. Suddenly it was +whooping across the sage and flinging up clouds of dust from the road. +To Lorraine, softened by years of southern California weather, it seemed +to blow straight off an ice field, it was so cold. + +After an interminable time which measured three hours on her watch, she +came to an abrupt descent into a creek bed, down the middle of which the +creek itself was flowing swiftly. Here the road forked, a rough, +little-used trail keeping on up the creek, the better traveled road +crossing and climbing the farther bank. Lorraine scarcely hesitated +before she chose the main trail which crossed the creek. + +From the creek the trail she followed kept climbing until Lorraine +wondered if there would ever be a top. The wind whipped her narrow +skirts and impeded her, tugged at her hat, tingled her nose and watered +her eyes. But she kept on doggedly, disgustedly, the West, which she had +seen through the glamour of swift-blooded Romance, sinking lower and +lower in her estimation. Nothing but jack rabbits and little, twittery +birds moved through the sage, though she watched hungrily for horsemen. + +Quite suddenly the gray landscape glowed with a palpitating radiance, +unreal, beautiful beyond expression. She stopped, turned to face the +west and stared awestruck at one of those flaming sunsets which makes +the desert land seem but a gateway into the ineffable glory beyond the +earth. That the high-piled, gorgeous cloud-bank presaged a thunderstorm +she never guessed; and that a thunderstorm may be a deadly, terrifying +peril she never had quite believed. Her mother had told of people being +struck by lightning, but Lorraine could not associate lightning with +death, especially in the West, where men usually died by shooting, +lynching, or by pitching over a cliff. + +The wind hushed as suddenly as it had whooped. Warned by the twinkling +lights far behind her--lights which must be the small part at last +visible of Echo, Idaho--Lorraine went on. She had been walking steadily +for four hours, and she must surely have come nearly twenty miles. If +she ever reached the top of the hill, she believed that she would see +her father's ranch just beyond. + +The afterglow had deepened to dusk when she came at last to the highest +point of that long grade. Far ahead loomed a cluster of square, black +objects which must be the ranch buildings of the Quirt, and Lorraine's +spirits lightened a little. What a surprise her father and all his +cowboys would have when she walked in upon them! It was almost worth the +walk, she told herself hearteningly. She hoped that dad had a good cook. +He would wear a flour-sack apron, naturally, and would be tall and lean, +or else very fat. He would be a comedy character, but she hoped he would +not be the grouchy kind, which, though very funny when he rampages +around on the screen, might be rather uncomfortable to meet when one is +tired and hungry and out of sorts. But of course the crankiest of comedy +cooks would be decently civil to _her_. Men always were, except +directors who are paid for their incivility. + +A hollow into which she walked in complete darkness and in silence, save +the gurgling of another stream, hid from sight the shadowy semblance of +houses and barns and sheds. Their disappearance slumped her spirits +again, for without them she was no more than a solitary speck in the +vast loneliness. Their actual nearness could not comfort her. She was +seized with a reasonless, panicky fear that by the time she crossed the +stream and climbed the hill beyond they would no longer be there where +she had seen them. She was lifting her skirts to wade the creek when the +click of hoofs striking against rocks sent her scurrying to cover in a +senseless fear. + +"I learned this act from the jack rabbits," she rallied herself shakily, +when she was safely hidden behind a sagebush whose pungency made her +horribly afraid that she might sneeze, which would be too ridiculous. + +"Some of dad's cowboys, probably, but still they _may_ be bandits." + +If they were bandits they could scarcely be out banditting, for the two +horsemen were talking in ordinary, conversational tones as they rode +leisurely down to the ford. When they passed Lorraine, the horse nearest +her shied against the other and was sworn at parenthetically for a fool. +Against the skyline Lorraine saw the rider's form bulk squatty and +ungraceful, reminding her of an actor whom she knew and did not like. It +was that resemblance perhaps which held her quiet instead of following +her first impulse to speak to them and ask them to carry her grip to the +house. + +The horses stopped with their forefeet in the water and drooped heads to +drink thirstily. The riders continued their conversation. + +"--and as I says time and again, they ain't big enough to fight the +outfit, and the quicker they git out the less lead they'll carry under +their hides when they do go. What they want to try an' hang on for, +beats me. Why, it's like setting into a poker game with a five-cent +piece! They ain't got my sympathy. I ain't got any use for a damn fool, +no way yuh look at it." + +"Well, there's the TJ--they been here a long while, and they ain't +packin' any lead, and they ain't getting out." + +"Well, say, lemme tell yuh something. The TJ'll git theirs and git it +right. Drink all night, would yuh?" He swore long and fluently at his +horse, spurred him through the shallows, and the two rode on up the +hill, their voices still mingled in desultory argument, with now and +then an oath rising clearly above the jumble of words. + +They may have been law-abiding citizens riding home to families that +were waiting supper for them, but Lorraine crept out from behind her +sagebush, sneezing and thanking her imitation of the jack rabbits. +Whoever they were, she was not sorry she had let them ride on. They +might be her father's men, and they might have been very polite and +chivalrous to her. But their voices and their manner of speaking had +been rough; and it is one thing, Lorraine reflected, to mingle with +made-up villains--even to be waylaid and kidnapped and tied to trees and +threatened with death--but it is quite different to accost +rough-speaking men in the dark when you know that they are not being +rough to suit the director of the scene. + +She was so absorbed in trying to construct a range war or something +equally thrilling from the scrap of conversation she had heard that she +reached the hilltop in what seemed a very few minutes of climbing. The +sky was becoming overcast. Already the stars to the west were blotted +out, and the absolute stillness of the atmosphere frightened her more +than the big, dark wilderness itself. It seemed to her exactly as though +the earth was holding its breath and waiting for something terrible to +happen. The vague bulk of buildings was still some distance ahead, and +when a rumble like the deepest notes of a pipe organ began to fill all +the air, Lorraine thrust her grip under a bush and began to run, her +soggy shoes squashing unpleasantly on the rough places in the road. + +Lorraine had seen many stage storms and had thrilled ecstatically to the +mimic lightning, knowing just how it was made. But when that huge +blackness behind and to the left of her began to open and show a +terrible brilliance within, and to close abruptly, leaving the world ink +black, she was terrified. She wanted to hide as she had hidden from +those two men; but from that stupendous monster, a real thunderstorm, +sagebrush formed no protection whatever. She must reach the substantial +shelter of buildings, the comforting presence of men and women. + +She ran, and as she ran she wept aloud like a child and called for her +father. The deep rumble grew louder, nearer. The revealed brilliance +became swift sword-thrusts of blinding light that seemed to stab deep +the earth. Lorraine ran awkwardly, her hands over her ears, crying out +at each lightning flash, her voice drowned in the thunder that followed +it close. Then, as she neared the somber group of buildings, the clouds +above them split with a terrific, rending crash, and the whole place +stood pitilessly revealed to her, as if a spotlight had been turned on. +Lorraine stood aghast. The buildings were not buildings at all. They +were rocks, great, black, forbidding boulders standing there on a narrow +ridge, having a diabolic likeness to houses. + +The human mind is wonderfully resilient, but readjustment comes slowly +after a shock. Dumbly, refusing to admit the significance of what she +had seen, Lorraine went forward. Not until she had reached and had +touched the first grotesque caricature of habitation did she wholly +grasp the fact that she was lost, and that shelter might be miles away. +She stood and looked at the orderly group of boulders as the lightning +intermittently revealed them. She saw where the road ran on, between +two square-faced rocks. She would have to follow the road, for after all +it must lead _somewhere_,--to her father's ranch, probably. She wondered +irrelevantly why her mother had never mentioned these queer rocks, and +she wondered vaguely if any of them had caves or ledges where she could +be safe from the lightning. + +She was on the point of stepping out into the road again when a horseman +rode into sight between the two rocks. In the same instant of his +appearance she heard the unmistakable crack of a gun, saw the rider jerk +backward in the saddle, throw up one hand,--and then the darkness +dropped between them. + +Lorraine crouched behind a juniper bush close against the rock and +waited. The next flash, came within a half-minute. It showed a man at +the horse's head, holding it by the bridle. The horse was rearing. +Lorraine tried to scream that the man on the ground would be trampled, +but something went wrong with her voice, so that she could only whisper. + +When the light came again the man who had been shot was not altogether +on the ground. The other, working swiftly, had thrust the injured man's +foot through the stirrup. Lorraine saw him stand back and lift his quirt +to slash the horse across the rump. Even through the crash of thunder +Lorraine heard the horse go past her down the hill, galloping furiously. +When she could see again she glimpsed him running, while something +bounced along on the ground beside him. + +She saw the other man, with a dry branch in his hand, dragging it across +the road where it ran between the two rocks. Then Lorraine Hunter, +hardened to the sight of crimes committed for picture values only, +realized sickeningly that she had just looked upon a real murder,--the +cold-blooded killing of a man. She felt very sick. Queer little red +sparks squirmed and danced before her eyes. She crumpled down quietly +behind the juniper bush and did not know when the rain came, though it +drenched her in the first two or three minutes of downpour. + + + + +CHAPTER FOUR + +"SHE'S A GOOD GIRL WHEN SHE AIN'T CRAZY" + + +When the sun has been up just long enough to take the before-dawn chill +from the air without having swallowed all the diamonds that spangle bush +and twig and grass-blade after a night's soaking rain, it is good to +ride over the hills of Idaho and feel oneself a king,--and never mind +the crown and the scepter. Lone Morgan, riding early to the Sawtooth to +see the foreman about getting a man for a few days to help replace a +bridge carried fifty yards downstream by a local cloudburst, would not +have changed places with a millionaire. The horse he rode was the horse +he loved, the horse he talked to like a pal when they were by +themselves. The ridge gave him a wide outlook to the four corners of the +earth. Far to the north the Sawtooth range showed blue, the nearer +mountains pansy purple where the pine trees stood, the foothills shaded +delicately where canyons swept down to the gray plain. To the south was +the sagebrush, a soft, gray-green carpet under the sun. The sky was +blue, the clouds were handfuls of clean cotton floating lazily. Of the +night's storm remained no trace save slippery mud when his horse struck +a patch of clay, which was not often, and the packed sand still wet and +soggy from the beating rain. + +Rock City showed black and inhospitable even in the sunlight. The rock +walls rose sheer, the roofs slanted rakishly, the signs scratched on the +rock by facetious riders were pointless and inane. Lone picked his way +through the crooked defile that was marked MAIN STREET on the corner of +the first huge boulder and came abruptly into the road. Here he turned +north and shook his horse into a trot. + +A hundred yards or so down the slope beyond Rock City he pulled up short +with a "What the hell!" that did not sound profane, but merely amazed. +In the sodden road were the unmistakable footprints of a woman. Lone did +not hesitate in naming the sex, for the wet sand held the imprint +cleanly, daintily. Too shapely for a boy, too small for any one but a +child or a woman with little feet, and with the point at the toes +proclaiming the fashion of the towns, Lone guessed at once that she was +a town girl, a stranger, probably,--and that she had passed since the +rain; which meant since daylight. + +He swung his horse and rode back, wondering where she could have spent +the night. Halfway through Rock City the footprints ended abruptly, and +Lone turned back, riding down the trail at a lope. She couldn't have +gone far, he reasoned, and if she had been out all night in the rain, +with no better shelter than Rock City afforded, she would need +help,--"and lots of it, and pretty darn quick," he added to John Doe, +which was the ambiguous name of his horse. + +Half a mile farther on he overtook her. Rather, he sighted her in the +trail, saw her duck in amongst the rocks and scattered brush of a small +ravine, and spurred after her. It was precarious footing for his horse +when he left the road, but John Doe was accustomed to that. He jumped +boulders, shied around buckthorn, crashed through sagebrush and so +brought the girl to bay against a wet bank, where she stood shivering. +The terror in her face and her wide eyes would have made her famous in +the movies. It made Lone afraid she was crazy. + +Lone swung off and went up to her guardedly, not knowing just what an +insane woman might do when cornered. "There, now, I'm not going to hurt +yuh at all," he soothed. "I guess maybe you're lost. What made you run +away from me when you saw me coming?" + +Lorraine continued to stare at him. + +"I'm going to the ranch, and if you'd like a ride, I'll lend you my +horse. He'll be gentle if I lead him. It's a right smart walk from +here." Lone smiled, meaning to reassure her. + +"Are you the man I saw shoot that man and then fasten him to the stirrup +of the saddle so the horse dragged him down the road? If you are, +I--I----" + +"No--oh, no, I'm not the man," Lone said gently. "I just now came from +home. Better let me take you in to the ranch." + +"I was going to the ranch--did you see him shoot that man and make the +horse drag him--_make_ the horse--he _slashed_ that horse with the +quirt--and he went tearing down the road dragging--it--it +was--_horrible_!" + +"Yes--yes, don't worry about it. We'll fix him. You come and get on John +Doe and let me take you to the ranch. Come on--you're wet as a ducked +pup." + +"That man was just riding along--I saw him when it lightened. And he +shot him--oh, can't you _do_ something?" + +"Yes, yes, they're after him right now. Here. Just put your foot in the +stirrup--I'll help you up. Why, you're soaked!" Perseveringly Lone urged +her to the horse. "You're soaking wet!" he exclaimed again. + +"It rained," she muttered confusedly. "I thought it was the ranch--but +they were rocks. Just rocks. Did you _see_ him shoot that man? Why--why +it shouldn't be allowed! He ought to be arrested right away--I'd have +called a policeman but--isn't thunder and lightning just perfectly +_awful_? And that horse--going down the road dragging---- + +"You'd better get some one to double for me in this scene," she said +irrelevantly. "I--I don't know this horse, and if he starts running the +boys might not catch him in time. It isn't safe, is it?" + +"It's safe," said Lone pityingly. "You won't be dragged. You just get on +and ride. I'll lead him. John Doe's gentle as a dog." + +"Just straight riding?" Lorraine considered the matter gravely. +"Wel-ll--but I saw a man dragged, once. He'd been shot first. It--it +was awful!" + +"I'll bet it was. How'd you come to be walking so far?" + +Lorraine looked at him suspiciously. Lone thought her eyes were the most +wonderful eyes--and the most terrible--that he had ever seen. +Almond-shaped they were, the irises a clear, dark gray, the eyeballs +blue-white like a healthy baby's. That was the wonder of them. But their +glassy shine made them terrible. Her lids lifted in a sudden stare. + +"You're not the man, are you? I--I think he was taller than you. And his +hat was brown. He's a brute--a _beast_! To shoot a man just riding +along---- It rained," she added plaintively. "My bag is back there +somewhere under a bush. I think I could find the bush--it was where a +rabbit was sitting--but he's probably gone by this time. A rabbit," she +told him impressively, "wouldn't sit out in the rain all night, would +he? He'd get wet. And a rabbit would feel horrid when he was wet--such +thick fur he never _would_ get dried out. Where do they go when it +rains? They have holes in the ground, don't they?" + +"Yes. Sure, they do. I'll _show_ you one, down the road here a little +piece. Come on--it ain't far." + +To see a rabbit hole in the ground, Lorraine consented to mount and ride +while Lone walked beside her, agreeing with everything she said that +needed agreement. When she had gone a few rods, however, she began to +call him Charlie and to criticize the direction of the picture. They +should not, she declared, mix murders and thunderstorms in the same +scene. While the storm effect was perfectly _wonderful_, she thought it +rather detracted from the killing. She did not believe in lumping big +stuff together like that. Why not have the killing done by moonlight, +and use the storm when the murderer was getting away, or something like +that? And as for taking them out on location and making all those storm +scenes without telling them in advance so that they could have dry +clothes afterwards, she thought it a perfect outrage! If it were not for +spoiling the picture, she would quit, she asserted indignantly. She +thought the director had better go back to driving a laundry wagon, +which was probably where he came from. + +Lone agreed with her, even though he did not know what she was talking +about. He walked as fast as he could, but even so he could not travel +the six miles to the ranch very quickly. He could see that the girl was +burning up with fever, and he could hear her voice growing husky,--could +hear, too, the painful laboring of her breath. When she was not mumbling +incoherent nonsense she was laughing hoarsely at the plight she was in, +and after that she would hold both hands to her chest and moan in a way +that made Lone grind his teeth. + +When he lifted her off his horse at the foreman's cottage she was +whispering things no one could understand. Three cowpunchers came +running and hindered him a good deal in carrying her into the house, and +the foreman's wife ran excitedly from one room to the other, asking +questions and demanding that some one do something "for pity's sake, she +may be dying for all you know, while you stand there gawping like +fool-hens." + +"She was out all night in the rain--got lost, somehow. She said she was +coming here, so I brought her on. She's down with a cold, Mrs. Hawkins. +Better take off them wet clothes and put hot blankets around her. And a +poultice or something on her chest, I reckon." Lone turned to the door, +stopped to roll a cigarette, and watched Mrs. Hawkins hurrying to +Lorraine with a whisky toddy the cook had mixed for her. + +"A sweat's awful good for a cold like she's got," he volunteered +practically. "She's out of her head--or she was when I found her. But I +reckon that's mostly scare, from being lost all night. Give her a good +sweat, why don't you?" He reached the doorstep and then turned back to +add, "She left a grip back somewhere along the road. I'll go hunt it up, +I reckon." + +He mounted John Doe and rode down to the corral, where two or three +riders were killing time on various pretexts while they waited for +details of Lone's adventure. Delirious young women of the silk-stocking +class did not arrive at the Sawtooth every morning, and it was rumored +already amongst the men that she was some looker, which naturally +whetted their interest in her. + +"I'll bet it's one of Bob's girls, come trailin' him up. Mebby another +of them heart-ballum cases of Bob's," hazarded Pop Bridgers, who read +nothing unless it was printed on pink paper, and who refused to believe +that any good could come out of a city. "Ain't that right, Loney? +Hain't she a heart-ballum girl of Bob's?" + +From the saddle Lone stared down impassively at Pop and Pop's +companions. "I don't know a thing about her," he stated emphatically. +"She said she was coming to the ranch, and she was scared of the thunder +and lightning. That's every word of sense I could get outa her. She +ain't altogether ignorant--she knows how to climb on a horse, anyway, +and she kicked about having to ride sideways on account of her skirts. +She was plumb out of her head, and talked wild, but she handled her +reins like a rider. And she never mentioned Bob, nor anybody else +excepting some fellow she called Charlie. She thought I was him, but she +only talked to me friendly. She didn't pull any love talk at all." + +"Charlie?" Pop ruminated over a fresh quid of tobacco. "Charlie! Mebby +Bob, he stakes himself to a different name now and then. There ain't any +Charlie, except Charlie Werner; she wouldn't mean him, do yuh s'pose?" + +"Charlie Werner? Hunh! Say, Pop, she ain't no squaw--is she, Loney?" Sid +Sterling remonstrated. + +"If I can read brands," Lone testified, "she's no girl of Bob's. She's +a good, honest girl when she ain't crazy." + +"And no good, honest girl who is not crazy could possibly be a girl of +mine! Is that the idea, Lone?" + +Lone turned unhurriedly and looked at young Bob Warfield standing in the +stable door with his hands in his trousers pockets and his pipe in his +mouth. + +"That ain't the argument. Pop, here, was wondering if she was another +heart-ballum girl of yours," Lone grinned unabashed. "I don't know such +a hell of a lot about heart-balm ladies, Bob. I ain't a millionaire. I'm +just making a guess at their brand--and it ain't the brand this little +lady carries." + +Bob removed one hand from his pocket and cuddled the bowl of his pipe. +"If she's a woman, she's a heart-balmer if she gets the chance. They all +are, down deep in their tricky hearts. There isn't a woman on earth that +won't sell a man's soul out of his body if she happens to think it's +worth her while--and she can get away with it. But don't for any sake +call her _my_ heart-balmer." + +"That was Pop," drawled Lone. "It don't strike me as being any subject +for you fellows to make remarks about, anyway," he advised Pop firmly. +"She's a right nice little girl, and she's pretty darn sick." He touched +John Doe with the spurs and rode away, stopping at the foreman's gate to +finish his business with Hawkins. He was a conscientious young man, and +since he had charge of Elk Spring camp, he set its interests above his +own, which was more than some of the Sawtooth men would have done in his +place. + +Having reported the damage to the bridge and made his suggestions about +the repairs, he touched up John Doe again and loped away on a purely +personal matter, which had to do with finding the bag which the girl had +told him was under a bush where a rabbit had been sitting. + +If she had not been so very sick, Lone would have laughed at her naive +method of identifying the spot. But he was too sorry for her to be +amused at the vagaries of her sick brain. He did not believe anything +she had said, except that she had been coming to the ranch and had left +her bag under a bush beside the road. It should not be difficult to find +it, if he followed the road and watched closely the bushes on either +side. + +Until he reached the place where he had first sighted her, Lone rode +swiftly, anxious to be through with the business and go his way. But +when he came upon her footprints again, he pulled up and held John Doe +to a walk, scanning each bush and boulder as he passed. + +It seemed probable that she had left the grip at Rock City where she +must have spent the night. She had spoken of being deceived into +thinking the place was the Sawtooth ranch until she had come into it and +found it "just rocks." Then, he reasoned, the storm had broken, and her +fright had held her there. When daylight came she had either forgotten +the bag or had left it deliberately. + +At Rock City, then, Lone stopped to examine the base of every rock, even +riding around those nearest the road. The girl, he guessed shrewdly, had +not wandered off the main highway, else she would not have been able to +find it again. Rock City was confusing unless one was perfectly familiar +with its curious, winding lanes. + +It was when he was riding slowly around the boulder marked "Palace +Hotel, Rates Reasnible," that he came upon the place where a horse had +stood, on the side best sheltered from the storm. Deep hoof marks +closely overlapping, an over-turned stone here and there gave proof +enough, and the rain-beaten soil that blurred the hoofprints farthest +from the rock told him more. Lone backed away, dismounted, and, stepping +carefully, went close. He could see no reason why a horse should have +stood there with his head toward the road ten feet away, unless his +rider was waiting for something--or some one. There were other boulders +near which offered more shelter from rain. + +Next the rock he discovered a boot track, evidently made when the rider +dismounted. He thought of the wild statement of the girl about seeing +some one shoot a man and wondered briefly if there could be a basis of +truth in what she said. But the road showed no sign of a struggle, +though there were, here and there, hoofprints half washed out with the +rain. + +Lone went back to his horse and rode on, still looking for the bag. His +search was thorough and, being a keen-eyed young man, he discovered the +place where Lorraine had crouched down by a rock. She must have stayed +there all night, for the scuffed soil was dry where her body had rested, +and her purse, caught in the juniper bush close by, was sodden with +rain. + +"The poor little kid!" he muttered, and with, a sudden impulse he turned +and looked toward the rock behind which the horse had stood. Help had +been that close, and she had not known it, unless---- + +"If anything happened there last night, she could have seen it from +here," he decided, and immediately put the thought away from him. + +"But nothing happened," he added, "unless maybe she saw him ride out and +go on down the road. She was out of her head and just imagined things." + +He slipped the soaked purse into his coat pocket, remounted and rode on +slowly, looking for the grip and half-believing she had not been +carrying one, but had dreamed it just as she had dreamed that a man had +been shot. + +He rode past the bag without seeing it, for Lorraine had thrust it far +back under a stocky bush whose scraggly branches nearly touched the +ground. So he came at last to the creek, swollen with the night's storm +so that it was swift and dangerous. Lone was turning back when John Doe +threw up his head, stared up the creek for a moment and whinnied +shrilly. Lone stood in the stirrups and looked. + +A blaze-faced horse was standing a short rifle-shot away, bridled and +with an empty saddle. Whether he was tied or not Lone could not tell at +that distance, but he knew the horse by its banged forelock and its +white face and sorrel ears, and he knew the owner of the horse. He rode +toward it slowly. + +"Whoa, you rattle-headed fool," he admonished, when the horse snorted +and backed a step or two as he approached. He saw the bridle-reins +dangling, broken, where the horse had stepped on them in running. "Broke +loose and run off again," he said, as he took down his rope and widened +the loop. "I'll bet Thurman would sell you for a bent nickel, this +morning." + +The horse squatted and jumped when he cast the loop, and then stood +quivering and snorting while Lone dismounted and started toward him. Ten +steps from the horse Lone stopped short, staring. For down in the bushes +on the farther side half lay, half hung the limp form of a man. + + + + +CHAPTER FIVE + +A DEATH "BY ACCIDENT" + + +Lone Morgan was a Virginian by birth, though few of his acquaintances +knew it. Lone never talked of himself except as his personal history +touched a common interest with his fellows. But until he was seventeen +he had lived very close to the center of one of the deadliest feuds of +the Blue Ridge. That he had been neutral was merely an accident of +birth, perhaps. And that he had not become involved in the quarrel that +raged among his neighbors was the direct result of a genius for holding +his tongue. He had attended the funerals of men shot down in their own +dooryards, he had witnessed the trials of the killers. He had grown up +with the settled conviction that other men's quarrels did not concern +him so long as he was not directly involved, and that what did not +concern him he had no right to discuss. If he stood aside and let +violence stalk by unhindered, he was merely doing what he had been +taught to do from the time he could walk. "Mind your own business and +let other folks do the same," had been the family slogan in Lone's home. +There had been nothing in Lone's later life to convince him that minding +his own business was not a very good habit. It had grown to be second +nature,--and it had made him a good man for the Sawtooth Cattle Company +to have on its pay roll. + +Just now Lone was stirred beyond his usual depth of emotion, and it was +not altogether the sight of Fred Thurman's battered body that unnerved +him. He wanted to believe that Thurman's death was purely an +accident,--the accident it appeared. But Lorraine and the telltale +hoofprints by the rock compelled him to believe that it was not an +accident. He knew that if he examined carefully enough Fred Thurman's +body he would find the mark of a bullet. He was tempted to look, and yet +he did not want to know. It was no business of his; it would be foolish +to let it become his business. + +"He's too dead to care now how it happened--and it would only stir up +trouble," he finally decided and turned his eyes away. + +He pulled the twisted foot from the stirrup, left the body where it lay, +and led the blaze-faced horse to a tree and tied it securely. He took +off his coat and spread it over the head and shoulders of the dead man, +weighted the edges with rocks and rode away. + +Halfway up the hill he left the road and took a narrow trail through the +sage, a short-cut that would save him a couple of miles. + +The trail crossed the ridge half a mile beyond Rock City, dipping into +the lower end of the small gulch where he had overtaken the girl. The +place recalled with fresh vividness, her first words to him: "Are _you_ +the man I saw shoot that other man and fasten his foot in the stirrup?" +Lone shivered and threw away the cigarette he had just lighted. + +"My God, that girl mustn't tell that to any one else!" he exclaimed +apprehensively. "No matter who she is or what she is, she mustn't tell +that!" + +"Hello! Who you talking to? I heard somebody talking----" The bushes +parted above a low, rocky ledge and a face peered out, smiling +good-humoredly. Lone started a little and pulled up. + +"Oh, hello, Swan. I was just telling this horse of mine all I was going +to do to him. Say, you're a chancey bird, Swan, yelling from the brush, +like that. Some folks woulda taken a shot at you." + +"Then they'd hit me, sure," Swan observed, letting himself down into the +trail. He, too, was wet from his hat crown to his shoes, that squelched +when he landed lightly on his toes. "Anybody would be ashamed to shoot +at a mark so large as I am. I'd say they're poor shooters." And he added +irrelevantly, as he held up a grayish pelt, "I got that coyote I been +chasing for two weeks. He was sure smart. He had me guessing. But I made +him guess some, maybe. He guessed wrong this time." + +Lone's eyes narrowed while he looked Swan over. "You must have been out +all night," he said. "You're crazier about hunting than I am." + +"Wet bushes," Swan corrected carelessly. "I been tramping since +daylight. It's my work to hunt, like it's your work to ride." He had +swung into the trail ahead of John Doe and was walking with long +strides,--the tallest, straightest, limberest young Swede in all the +country. He had the bluest eyes, the readiest smile, the healthiest +color, the sunniest hair and disposition the Sawtooth country had seen +for many a day. He had homesteaded an eighty-acre claim on the south +side of Bear Top and had by that means gained possession of two living +springs and the only accessible portion of Wilder Creek where it crossed +the meadow called Skyline before it plunged into a gulch too narrow for +cattle to water with any safety. + +The Sawtooth Cattle Company had for years "covered" that eighty-acre +patch of government land, never dreaming that any one would ever file on +it. Swan Vjolmar was there and had his log cabin roofed and ready for +the door and windows before the Sawtooth discovered his presence. Now, +nearly a year afterwards, he was accepted in a tolerant, half-friendly +spirit. He had not objected to the Sawtooth cattle which still watered +at Skyline Meadow. He was a "Government hunter" and he had killed many +coyotes and lynx and even a mountain lion or two. Lone wondered +sometimes what the Sawtooth meant to do about the Swede, but so far the +Sawtooth seemed inclined to do nothing at all, evidently thinking his +war on animal pests more than atoned for his effrontery in taking +Skyline as a homestead. When he had proven up on his claim they would +probably buy him out and have the water still. + +"Well, what do you know?" Swan turned his head to inquire abruptly. +"You're pretty quiet." + +Lone roused himself. "Fred Thurman's been dragged to death by that +damned flighty horse of his," he said. "I found him in the brush this +side of Granite Creek. Had his foot caught in the stirrup. I thought I'd +best leave him there till the coroner can view him." + +Swan stopped short in the trail and turned facing Lone. "Last night my +dog Yack whines to go out. He went and sat in a place where he looks +down on the walley, and he howled for half an hour. I said then that +somebody in the walley has died. That dog is something queer about it. +He knows things." + +"I'm going to the Sawtooth," Lone told him. "I can telephone to the +coroner from there. Anybody at Thurman's place, do you know?" + +Swan shook his head and started again down the winding, steep trail. "I +don't hunt over that way for maybe a week. That's too bad he's killed. I +like Fred Thurman. He's a fine man, you bet." + +"He was," said Lone soberly. "It's a damn shame he had to go--like +that." + +Swan glanced back at him, studied Lone's face for an instant and turned +into a tributary gully where a stream trickled down over water-worn +rocks. "Here I leave you," he volunteered, as Lone came abreast of him. +"A coyote's crossed up there, and I maybe find his tracks. I could go do +chores for Fred Thurman if nobody's there. Should I do that? What you +say, Lone?" + +"You might drift around by there if it ain't too much out of your way, +and see if he's got a man on the ranch," Lone suggested. "But you better +not touch anything in the house, Swan. The coroner'll likely appoint +somebody to look around and see if he's got any folks to send his stuff +to. Just feed any stock that's kept up, if nobody's there." + +"All right," Swan agreed readily. "I'll do that, Lone. Good-by." + +Lone nodded and watched him climb the steep slope of the gulch on the +side toward Thurman's ranch. Swan climbed swiftly, seeming to take no +thought of where he put his feet, yet never once slipping or slowing. In +two minutes he was out of sight, and Lone rode on moodily, trying not +to think of Fred Thurman, trying to shut from his mind the things that +wild-eyed, hoarse-voiced girl had told him. + +"Lone, you mind your own business," he advised himself once. "You don't +know anything that's going to do any one any good, and what you don't +know there's no good guessing. But that girl--she mustn't talk like +that!" + +Of Swan he scarcely gave a thought after the Swede had disappeared, yet +Swan was worth a thought or two, even from a man who was bent on minding +his own business. Swan had no sooner climbed the gulch toward Thurman's +claim than he proceeded to descend rather carefully to the bottom again, +walk along on the rocks for some distance and climb to the ridge whose +farther slope led down to Granite Creek. He did not follow the trail, +but struck straight across an outcropping ledge, descended to Granite +Creek and strode along next the hill where the soil was gravelly and +barren. When he had gone some distance, he sat down and took from under +his coat two huge, crudely made moccasins of coyote skin. These he +pulled on over his shoes, tied them around his ankles and went on, still +keeping close under the hill. + +He reached the place where Fred Thurman lay, stood well away from the +body and studied every detail closely. Then, stepping carefully on +trampled brush and rocks, he approached and cautiously lifted Lone's +coat. It was not a pretty sight, but Swan's interest held him there for +perhaps ten minutes, his eyes leaving the body only when the blaze-faced +horse moved. Then Swan would look up quickly at the horse, seem +reassured when he saw that the animal was not watching anything at a +distance, and return to his curious task. Finally he drew the coat back +over the head and shoulders, placed each stone exactly as he had found +it and went up to the horse, examining the saddle rather closely. After +that he retreated as carefully as he had approached. When he had gone +half a mile or so upstream he found a place where he could wash his +hands without wetting his moccasins, returned to the rocky hillside and +took off the clumsy footgear and stowed them away under his coat. Then +with long strides that covered the ground as fast as a horse could do +without loping, Swan headed as straight as might be for the Thurman +ranch. + +About noon Swan approached the crowd of men and a few women who stood +at a little distance and whispered together, with their faces averted +from the body around which the men stood grouped. The news had spread as +such news will, even in a country so sparsely settled as the Sawtooth. +Swan counted forty men,--he did not bother with the women. Fred Thurman +had been known to every one of them. Some one had spread a piece of +canvas over the corpse, and Swan did not go very near. The blaze-faced +horse had been led farther away and tied to a cottonwood, where some one +had thrown down a bundle of hay. The Sawtooth country was rather +punctilious in its duty toward the law, and it was generally believed +that the coroner would want to see the horse that had caused the +tragedy. + +Half an hour after Swan arrived, the coroner came in a machine, and with +him came the sheriff. The coroner, an important little man, examined the +body, the horse and the saddle, and there was the usual formula of +swearing in a jury. The inquest was rather short, since there was only +one witness to testify, and Lone merely told how he had discovered the +horse there by the creek, and that the body had not been moved from +where he found it. + +Swan went over to where Lone, anxious to get away from the place, was +untying his horse after the jury had officially named the death an +accident. + +"I guess those horses could be turned loose," he began without prelude. +"What you think, Lone? I been to Thurman's ranch, and I don't find +anybody. Some horses in a corral, and pigs in a pen, and chickens. I +guess Thurman was living alone. Should I tell the coroner that?" + +"I dunno," Lone replied shortly. "You might speak to the sheriff. I +reckon he's the man to take charge of things." + +"It's bad business, getting killed," Swan said vaguely. "It makes me +feel damn sorry when I go to that ranch. There's the horses waiting for +breakfast--and Thurman, he's dead over here and can't feed his pigs and +his chickens. It's a white cat over there that comes to meet me and rubs +my leg and purrs like it's lonesome. That's a nice ranch he's got, too. +Now what becomes of that ranch? What you think, Lone?" + +"Hell, how should I know?" Lone scowled at him from the saddle and rode +away, leaving Swan standing there staring after him. He turned away to +find the sheriff and almost collided with Brit Hunter, who was glancing +speculatively from him to Lone Morgan. Swan stopped and put out his hand +to shake. + +"Lone says I should tell the sheriff I could look after Fred Thurman's +ranch. What you think, Mr. Hunter?" + +"Good idea, I guess. Somebody'll have to. They can't----" He checked +himself. "You got a horse? I'll ride over with yuh, maybe." + +"I got legs," Swan returned laconically. "They don't get scared, Mr. +Hunter, and maybe kill me sometime. You could tell the sheriff I'm +government hunter and honest man, and I take good care of things. You +could do that, please?" + +"Sure," said Brit and rode over to where the sheriff was standing. + +The sheriff listened, nodded, beckoned to Swan. "The court'll have to +settle up the estate and find his heirs, if he's got any. But you look +after things--what's your name? Vjolmar--how yuh spell it? I'll swear +you in as a deputy. Good Lord, you're a husky son-of-a-gun!" The +sheriff's eyes went up to Swan's hat crown, descended to his shoulders +and lingered there admiringly for a moment, traveled down his flat, +hard-muscled body and his straight legs. "I'll bet you could put up +some fight, if you had to," he commented. + +Swan grinned good-humoredly, glanced conscience-stricken at the covered +figure on the ground and straightened his face decorously. + +"I could lick you good," he admitted in a stage whisper. "I'm a +son-off-a-gun all right--only I don't never get mad at somebody." + +Brit Hunter smiled at that, it was so like Swan Vjolmar. But when they +were halfway to Thurman's ranch--Brit on horseback and Swan striding +easily along beside him, leading the blaze-faced horse, he glanced down +at Swan's face and wondered if Swan had not lied a little. + +"What's on your mind, Swan?" he asked abruptly. + +Swan started and looked up at him, glanced at the empty hills on either +side, and stopped still in the trail. + +"Mr. Hunter, you been longer in the country than I have been. You seen +some good riding, I bet. Maybe you see some men ride backwards on a +horse?" + +Brit looked at him uncomprehendingly. "Backwards?" + +Swan led up the blaze-faced horse and pointed to the right stirrup. +"Spurs would scratch like that if you jerk your foot, maybe. You're a +good rider, Mr. Hunter, you can tell. That's a right stirrup, ain't it? +Fred Thurman, he's got his left foot twist around, all broke from +jerking in his stirrup. Left foot in right stirrup----" He pushed back +his hat and rumpled his yellow hair, looking up into Brit's face +inquiringly. "Left foot in right stirrup is riding backwards. That's a +damn good rider to ride like that--what you think, Mr. Hunter?" + + + + +CHAPTER SIX + +LONE ADVISES SILENCE + + +Twice in the next week Lone found an excuse for riding over to the +Sawtooth. During his first visit, the foreman's wife told him that the +young lady was still too sick to talk much. The second time he went, Pop +Bridgers spied him first and cackled over his coming to see the girl. +Lone grinned and dissembled as best he could, knowing that Pop Bridgers +fed his imagination upon denials and argument and remonstrance and was +likely to build gossip that might spread beyond the Sawtooth. Wherefore +he did not go near the foreman's house that day, but contented himself +with gathering from Pop's talk that the girl was still there. + +After that he rode here and there, wherever he would be likely to meet a +Sawtooth rider, and so at last he came upon Al Woodruff loping along the +crest of Juniper Ridge. Al at first displayed no intention of stopping, +but pulled up when he saw John Doe slowing down significantly. Lone +would have preferred a chat with some one else, for this was a +sharp-eyed, sharp-tongued man; but Al Woodruff stayed at the ranch and +would know all the news, and even though he might give it an ill-natured +twist, Lone would at least know what was going on. Al hailed him with a +laughing epithet. + +"Say, you sure enough played hell all around, bringin' Brit Hunter's +girl to the Sawtooth!" he began, chuckling as if he had some secret +joke. "Where'd you pick her up, Lone? She claims you found her at Rock +City. That right?" + +"No, it ain't right," Lone denied promptly, his dark eyes meeting Al's +glance steadily. "I found her in that gulch away this side. She was in +amongst the rocks where she was trying to keep outa the rain. Brit +Hunter's girl, is she? She told me she was going to the Sawtooth. She'd +have made it, too, if it hadn't been for the storm. She got as far as +the gulch, and the lightning scared her from going any farther." He +offered Al his tobacco sack and fumbled for a match. "I never knew Brit +Hunter had a girl." + +"Nor me," Al said and sifted tobacco into a cigarette paper. "Bob, he +drove her over there yesterday. Took him close to all day to make the +trip--and Bob, he claims to hate women!" + +"So would I, if I'd got stung for fifty thousand. She ain't that kind. +She's a nice girl, far as I could tell. She got well, all right, did +she?" + +"Yeah--only she was still coughing some when she left the ranch. She +like to of had pneumonia, I guess. Queer how she claimed she spent the +night in Rock City, ain't it?" + +"No," Lone answered judicially, "I don't know as it's so queer. She +never realized how far she'd walked, I reckon. She was plumb crazy when +I found her. You couldn't take any stock in what she said. Say, you +didn't see that bay I was halter-breaking, did yuh, Al? He jumped the +fence and got away on me, day before yesterday. I'd like to catch him up +again. He'll make a good horse." + +Al had not seen the bay, and the talk tapered off desultorily to a final +"So-long, see yuh later." Lone rode on, careful not to look back. So she +was Brit Hunter's girl! Lone whistled softly to himself while he studied +this new angle of the problem,--for a problem he was beginning to +consider it. She was Brit Hunter's girl, and she had told them at the +Sawtooth that she had spent the night at Rock City. He wondered how +much else she had told; how much she remembered of what she had told +him. + +He reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a round leather purse +with a chain handle. It was soiled and shrunken with its wetting, and +the clasp had flecks of rust upon it. What it contained Lone did not +know. Virginia had taught him that a man must not be curious about the +personal belongings of a woman. Now he turned the purse over, tried to +rub out the stiffness of the leather, and smiled a little as he dropped +it back into his pocket. + +"I've got my calling card," he said softly to John Doe. "I reckon I had +the right hunch when I didn't turn it over to Mrs. Hawkins. I'll ask her +again about that grip she said she hid under a bush. I never heard about +any of the boys finding it." + +His thoughts returned to Al Woodruff and stopped there. Determined still +to attend strictly to his own affairs, his thoughts persisted in playing +truant and in straying to a subject he much preferred not to think of at +all. Why should Al Woodruff be interested in the exact spot where Brit +Hunter's daughter had spent the night of the storm? Why should Lone +instinctively discount her statement and lie whole-heartedly about it? + +"Now if Al catches me up in that, he'll think I know a lot I don't know, +or else----" He halted his thoughts there, for that, too, was a +forbidden subject. + +Forbidden subjects are like other forbidden things: they have a way of +making themselves very conspicuous. Lone was heading for the Quirt ranch +by the most direct route, fearing, perhaps, that if he waited he would +lose his nerve and would not go at all. Yet it was important that he +should go; he must return the girl's purse! + +The most direct route to the Quirt took him down Juniper Ridge and +across Granite Creek near the Thurman ranch. Indeed, if he followed the +trail up Granite Creek and across the hilly country to Quirt Creek, he +must pass within fifty yards of the Thurman cabin. Lone's time was +limited, yet he took the direct route rather reluctantly. He did not +want to be reminded too sharply of Fred Thurman as a man who had lived +his life in his own way and had died so horribly. + +"Well, he didn't have it coming to him--but it's done and over with, +now, so it's no use thinking about it," he reflected, when the roofs of +the Thurman ranch buildings began to show now and then through the thin +ranks of the cottonwoods along the creek. + +But his face sobered as he rode along. It seemed to him that the sleepy +little meadows, the quiet murmuring of the creek, even the soft rustling +of the cottonwood leaves breathed a new loneliness, an emptiness where +the man who had called this place home, who had clung to it in the face +of opposition that was growing into open warfare, had lived and had left +life suddenly--unwarrantably, Lone knew in his heart. It might be of no +use to think about it, but the vivid memory of Fred Thurman was with him +when he rode up the trail to the stable and the small corrals. He had to +think, whether he would or no. + +At the corral he came unexpectedly in sight of the Swede, who grinned a +guileless welcome and came toward him, so that Lone could not ride on +unless he would advertise his dislike of the place. John Doe, plainly +glad to find an excuse to stop, slowed and came to where Swan waited by +the gate. + +"By golly, this is lonesome here," Swan complained, heaving a great +sigh. "That judge don't get busy pretty quick, I'm maybe jumping my job. +Lone, what you think? You believe in ghosts?" + +"Naw. What's on your chest, Swan?" Lone slipped sidewise in the saddle, +resting his muscles. "You been seeing things?" + +"No--I don't be seeing things, Lone. But sometimes I been--like I _feel_ +something." He stared at Lone questioningly. "What you think, Lone, if +you be sitting down eating your supper, maybe, and you feel something +say words in your brain? Like you know something talks to you and then +quits." + +Lone gave Swan a long, measuring look, and Swan laughed uneasily. + +"That sounds crazy. But it's true, what something tells me in my brain. +I go and look, and by golly, it's there just like the words tell me." + +Lone straightened in the saddle. "You better come clean, Swan, and tell +the whole thing. What was it? Don't talk in circles. What words did you +feel--in your brain?" In spite of himself, Lone felt as he had when the +girl had talked to him and called him Charlie. + +Swan closed the gate behind him with steady hands. His lips were pressed +firmly together, as if he had definitely made up his mind to something. +Lone was impressed somehow with Swan's perfect control of his speech, +his thoughts, his actions. But he was puzzled rather than anything else, +and when Swan turned, facing him, Lone's bewilderment did not lessen. + +"I'll tell you. It's when I'm sitting down to eat my supper. I'm just +reaching out my hand like this, to get my coffee. And something says in +my head, 'It's a lie. I don't ride backwards. Go look at my saddle. +There's blood----' And that's all. It's like the words go far away so I +can't hear any more. So I eat my supper, and then I get the lantern and +I go look. You come with me, Lone. I'll show you." + +Without a word Lone dismounted and followed Swan into a small shed +beside the stable, where a worn stock saddle hung suspended from a +crosspiece, a rawhide string looped over the horn. Lone did not ask +whose saddle it was, nor did Swan name the owner. There was no need. + +Swan took the saddle and swung it around so that the right side was +toward them. It was what is called a full-stamped saddle, with the +popular wild-rose design on skirts and cantle. Much hard use and +occasional oilings had darkened the leather to a rich, red brown, marred +with old scars and scratches and the stains of many storms. + +"Blood is hard to find when it's raining all night," Swan observed, +speaking low as one does in the presence of death. "But if somebody is +bleeding and falls off a horse slow, and catches hold of things and +tries like hell to hang on----" He lifted the small flap that covered +the cinch ring and revealed a reddish, flaked stain. Phlegmatically he +wetted his finger tip on his tongue, rubbed the stain and held up his +finger for Lone to see. "That's a damn funny place for blood, when a man +is dragging on the ground," he commented drily. "And something else is +damn funny, Lone." + +He lifted the wooden stirrup and touched with his finger the rowel +marks. "That is on the front part," he said. "I could swear in court +that Fred's left foot was twisted--that's damn funny, Lone. I don't see +men ride backwards, much." + +Lone turned on him and struck the stirrup from his hand. "I think you +better forget it," he said fiercely. "He's dead--it can't help him any +to----" He stopped and pulled himself together. "Swan, you take a fool's +advice and don't tell anybody else about feeling words talk in your +head. They'll have you in the bug-house at Blackfoot, sure as you live." +He looked at the saddle, hesitated, looked again at Swan, who was +watching him. "That blood most likely got there when Fred was packing a +deer in from the hills. And marks on them old oxbow stirrups don't mean +a damn thing but the need of a new pair, maybe." He forced a laugh and +stepped outside the shed. "Just shows you, Swan, that imagination and +being alone all the time can raise Cain with a fellow. You want to watch +yourself." + +Swan followed him out, closing the door carefully behind him. "By golly, +I'm watching out now," he assented thoughtfully. "You don't tell +anybody, Lone." + +"No, I won't tell anybody--and I'd advise you not to," Lone repeated +grimly. "Just keep those thoughts outa your head, Swan. They're bad +medicine." + +He mounted John Doe and rode away, his eyes downcast, his quirt slapping +absently the weeds along the trail. It was not his business, and +yet---- Lone shook himself together and put John Doe into a lope. He had +warned Swan, and he could do no more. + +Halfway to the Quirt he met Lorraine riding along the trail. She would +have passed him with no sign of recognition, but Lone lifted his hat and +stopped. Lorraine looked at him, rode on a few steps and turned. "Did +you wish to speak about something?" she asked impersonally. + +Lone felt the flush in his cheeks, which angered him to the point of +speaking curtly. "Yes. I found your purse where you dropped it that +night you were lost. I was bringing it over to you. My name's Morgan. +I'm the man that found you and took you in to the ranch." + +"Oh." Lorraine looked at him steadily. "You're the one they call Loney?" + +"When they're feeling good toward me. I'm Lone Morgan. I went back to +find your grip--you said you left it under a bush, but the world's plumb +full of bushes. I found your purse, though." + +"Thank you so much. I must have been an awful nuisance, but I was so +scared--and things were terribly mixed in my mind. I didn't even have +sense enough to tell you what ranch I was trying to find, did I? So you +took me to the wrong one, and I was a week there before I found it out. +And then they were perfectly lovely about it and brought me--home." She +turned the purse over and over in her hands, looking at it without much +interest. She seemed in no hurry to ride on, which gave Lone courage. + +"There's something I'd like to say," he began, groping for words that +would make his meaning plain without telling too much. "I hope you won't +mind my telling you. You were kinda out of your head when I found you, +and you said something about seeing a man shot and----" + +"Oh!" Lorraine looked up at him, looked through him, he thought, with +those brilliant eyes of hers. "Then I did tell----" + +"I just wanted to say," Lone interrupted her, "that I knew all the time +it was just a nightmare. I never mentioned it to anybody, and you'll +forget all about it, I hope. You didn't tell any one else, did you?" + +He looked up at her again and found her studying him curiously. "You're +not the man I saw," she said, as if she were satisfying herself on that +point. "I've wondered since--but I was sure, too, that I had seen it. +Why mustn't I tell any one?" + +Lone did not reply at once. The girl's eyes were disconcertingly direct, +her voice and her manner disturbed him with their judicial calmness, so +at variance with the wildness he remembered. + +"Well, it's hard to explain," he said at last. "You're strange to this +country, and you don't know all the ins and outs of--things. It wouldn't +do any good to you or anybody else, and it might do a lot of harm." His +eyes nicked her face with a wistful glance. "You don't know me--I really +haven't got any right to ask or expect you to trust me. But I wish you +would, to the extent of forgetting that you saw--or thought you +saw--anything that night in Rock City." + +Lorraine shivered and covered her eyes swiftly with one hand. His words +had brought back too sharply that scene. But she shook off the emotion +and faced him again. + +"I saw a man murdered," she cried. "I wasn't sure afterwards; sometimes +I thought I had dreamed it. But I was sure I saw it. I saw the horse go +by, running--and you want me to keep still about that? What harm could +it do to tell? Perhaps it's true--perhaps I did see it all. I might +think you were trying to cover up something--only, you're not the man I +saw--or thought I saw." + +"No, of course I'm not. You dreamed the whole thing, and the way you +talked to me was so wild, folks would say you're crazy if they heard you +tell it. You're a stranger here, Miss Hunter, and--your father is not as +popular in this country as he might be. He's got enemies that would be +glad of the chance to stir up trouble for him. You--just dreamed all +that. I'm asking you to forget a bad dream, that's all, and not go +telling it to other folks." + +For some time Lorraine did not answer. The horses conversed with sundry +nose-rubbings, nibbled idly at convenient brush tips, and wondered no +doubt why their riders were so silent. Lone tried to think of some +stronger argument, some appeal that would reach the girl without +frightening her or causing her to distrust him. But he did not know what +more he could say without telling her what must not be told. + +"Just how would it make trouble for my father?" Lorraine asked at last. +"I can't believe you'd ask me to help cover up a crime, but it seems +hard to believe that a nightmare would cause any great commotion. And +why is my father unpopular?" + +"Well, you don't know this country," Lone parried inexpertly. "It's all +right in some ways, and in some ways it could be a lot improved. Folks +haven't got much to talk about. They go around gabbling their heads off +about every little thing, and adding onto it until you can't recognize +your own remarks after they've been peddled for a week. You've maybe +seen places like that." + +"Oh, yes." Lorraine's eyes lighted with a smile. "Take a movie studio, +for instance." + +"Yes. Well, you being a stranger, you would get all the worst of it. I +just thought I'd tell you; I'd hate to see you misunderstood by folks +around here. I--I feel kinda responsible for you; I'm the one that found +you." + +Lorraine's eyes twinkled. "Well, I'm glad to know one person in the +country who doesn't gabble his head off. You haven't answered any of my +questions, and you've made me feel as if you'd found a dangerous, wild +woman that morning. It isn't very flattering, but I think you're honest, +anyway." + +Lone smiled for the first time, and she found his smile pleasant. "I'm +no angel," he disclaimed modestly, "and most folks think I could be +improved on a whole lot. But I'm honest in one way. I'm thinking about +what's best for you, this time." + +"I'm terribly grateful," Lorraine laughed. "I shall take great care not +to go all around the country telling people my dreams. I can see that it +wouldn't make me awfully popular." Then she sobered. "Mr. Morgan, that +was a _horrible_ kind of--nightmare. Why, even last night I woke up +shivering, just imagining it all over again." + +"It was sure horrible the way you talked about it," Lone assured her. +"It's because you were sick, I reckon. I wish you'd tell me as close as +you can where you left that grip of yours. You said it was under a bush +where a rabbit was sitting. I'd like to find the grip--but I'm afraid +that rabbit has done moved!" + +"Oh, Mr. Warfield and I found it, thank you. The rabbit had moved, but I +sort of remembered how the road had looked along there, and we hunted +until we discovered the place. Dad has driven in after my other luggage +to-day--and I believe I must be getting home. I was only out for a +little ride." + +She thanked him again for the trouble he had taken and rode away. Lone +turned off the trail and, picking his way around rough outcroppings of +rock, and across unexpected little gullies, headed straight for the ford +across Granite Creek and home. Brit Hunter's girl, he was thinking, was +even nicer than he had pictured her. And that she could believe in the +nightmare was a vast relief. + + + + +CHAPTER SEVEN + +THE MAN AT WHISPER + + +Brit Hunter finished washing the breakfast dishes and put a stick of +wood into the broken old cook-stove that had served him and Frank for +fifteen years and was feeling its age. Lorraine's breakfast was in the +oven, keeping warm. Brit looked in, tested the heat with his gnarled +hand to make sure that the sour-dough biscuits would not be dried to +crusts, and closed the door upon them and the bacon and fried potatoes. +Frank Johnson had the horses saddled and it was time to go, yet Brit +lingered, uneasily conscious that his habitation was lacking in many +things which a beautiful young woman might consider absolute +necessities. He had seen in Lorraine's eyes, as they glanced here and +there about the grimy walls, a certain disparagement of her +surroundings. The look had made him wince, though he could not quite +decide what it was that displeased her. Maybe she wanted lace curtains, +or something. + +He set the four chairs in a row against the wall, swept up the bits of +bark and ashes beside the stove, made sure that the water bucket was +standing full on its bench beside the door, sent another critical glance +around the room, and tiptoed over to the dish cupboard and let down the +flowered calico curtain that had been looped up over a nail for +convenience. The sun sent a bright, wide bar of yellow light across the +room to rest on the shelf behind the stove where stood the salt can, the +soda, the teapot, a box of matches and two pepper cans, one empty and +the other full. Brit always meant to throw out that empty pepper can and +always neglected to do so. Just now he remembered picking up the empty +one and shaking it over the potatoes futilely and then changing it for +the full one. But he did not take it away; in the wilderness one learns +to save useless things in the faint hope that some day they may become +useful. The shelves were cluttered with fit companions to that empty +pepper can. Brit thought that he would have "cleaned out" had he known +that Lorraine was coming. Since she was here, it scarcely seemed worth +while. + +He walked on his boot-toes to the door of the second room of the cabin, +listened there for a minute, heard no sound and took a tablet and pencil +off another shelf littered with useless things. The note which he wrote +painstakingly, lest she might think him lacking in education, he laid +upon the table beside Lorraine's plate; then went out, closing the door +behind him as quietly as a squeaking door can be made to close. + +Lorraine, in the other room, heard the squeak and sat up. Her wrist +watch, on the chair beside her bed, said that it was fifteen minutes +past six, which she considered an unearthly hour for rising. She pulled +up the covers and tried to sleep again. The day would be long enough, at +best. There was nothing to do, unless she took that queer old horse with +withers like the breastbone of a lean Christmas turkey and hips that +reminded her of the little roofs over dormer windows, and went for a +ride. And if she did that, there was nowhere to go and nothing to do +when she arrived there. + +In a very few days Lorraine had exhausted the sights of Quirt Creek and +vicinity. If she rode south she would eventually come to the top of a +hill whence she could look down upon further stretches of barrenness. If +she rode east she would come eventually to the road along which she had +walked from Echo, Idaho. Lorraine had had enough of that road. If she +went north she would--well, she would not meet Mr. Lone Morgan again, +for she had tried it twice, and had turned back because there seemed no +end to the trail twisting through the sage and rocks. West she had not +gone, but she had no doubt that it would be the same dreary monotony of +dull gray landscape. + +Monotony of landscape was one thing which Lorraine could not endure, +unless it had a foreground of riders hurtling here and there, and of +perspiring men around a camera tripod. At the Sawtooth ranch, after she +was able to be up, she had seen cowboys, but they had lacked the dash +and the picturesque costuming of the West she knew. They were mostly +commonplace young men, jogging past the house on horseback, or loitering +down by the corrals. They had offered absolutely no interest or "color" +to the place, and the owner's son, Bob Warfield, had driven her over to +the Quirt in a Ford and had seemed exactly like any other big, +good-looking young man who thought well of himself. Lorraine was not +susceptible to mere good looks, three years with the "movies" having +disillusioned her quite thoroughly. Too many young men of Bob Warfield's +general type had attempted to make love to her--lightly and not too +well--for Lorraine to be greatly impressed. + +She yawned, looked at her watch again, found that she had spent exactly +six minutes in meditating upon her immediate surroundings, and fell to +wondering why it was that the real West was so terribly commonplace. +Why, yesterday she had been brought to such a pass of sheer loneliness +that she had actually been driven to reading an old horse-doctor book! +She had learned the symptoms of epizooetic--whatever that was--and +poll-evil and stringhalt, and had gone from that to making a shopping +tour through a Montgomery Ward catalogue. There was nothing else in the +house to read, except a half dozen old copies of the _Boise News_. + +There was nothing to do, nothing to see, no one to talk to. Her dad and +the big, heavy-set man whom he called Frank, seemed uncomfortably aware +of their deficiencies and were pitiably anxious to make her feel +welcome,--and failed. They called her "Raine." The other two men did not +call her anything at all. They were both sandy-complexioned and they +both chewed tobacco quite noticeably, and when they sat down in their +shirt sleeves to eat, Lorraine had seen irregular humps in their hip +pockets which must be six-guns; though why they should carry them in +their pockets instead of in holster belts buckled properly around their +bodies and sagging savagely down at one side and swinging ferociously +when they walked, Lorraine could not imagine. They did not wear chaps, +either, and their spurs were just spurs, without so much as a silver +concho anywhere. Cowboys in overalls and blue gingham shirts and faded +old coats whose lapels lay in wrinkles and whose pockets were torn down +at the corners! If Lorraine had not been positive that this was actually +a cattle ranch in Idaho, she never would have believed that they were +anything but day laborers. + +"It's a comedy part for the cattle-queen's daughter," she admitted, +putting out a hand to stroke the lean, gray cat that jumped upon her bed +from the open window. "Ket, it's a _scream_! I'll take my West before +the camera, thank you; or I would, if I hadn't jumped right into the +middle of this trick West before I knew what I was doing. Ket, what do +you do to pass away the time? I don't see how you can have the nerve to +live in an empty space like this and purr!" + +She got up then, looked into the kitchen and saw the paper on the table. +This was new and vaguely promised some sort of break in the deadly +monotony which she saw stretching endlessly before her. Carrying the +nameless cat in her arms, Lorraine went in her bare feet across the +grimy, bare floor to the table and picked up the note. It read simply: + + "Your brekfast is in the oven we wont be back till dark maby. Don't + leave the ranch today. Yr loveing father." + +Lorraine hugged the cat so violently that she choked off a purr in the +middle. "'Don't leave the ranch to-day!' Ket, I believe it's going to be +dangerous or something, after all." + +She dressed quickly and went outside into the sunlight, the cat at her +heels, the thrill of that one command filling the gray monotone of the +hills with wonderful possibilities of adventure. Her father had made no +objection before when she went for a ride. He had merely instructed her +to keep to the trails, and if she didn't know the way home, to let the +reins lie loose on Yellowjacket's neck and he would bring her to the +gate. + +Yellowjacket's instinct for direction had not been working that day, +however. Lorraine had no sooner left the ranch out of sight behind her +than she pretended that she was lost. Yellowjacket had thereupon walked +a few rods farther and stopped, patiently indifferent to the location of +his oats box. Lorraine had waited until his head began to droop lower +and lower, and his switching at flies had become purely automatic. +Yellowjacket was going to sleep without making any effort to find the +way home. But since Lorraine had not told her father anything about it, +his injunction could not have anything to do with the unreliability of +the horse. + +"Now," she said to the cat, "if three or four bandits would appear on +the ridge, over there, and come tearing down into the immediate +foreground, jump the gate and surround the house, I'd know this was the +real thing. They'd want to make me tell where dad kept his gold or +whatever it was they wanted, and they'd have me tied to a chair--and +then, cut to Lone Morgan (that's a perfectly _wonderful_ name for the +lead!) hearing shots and coming on a dead run to the rescue." She +picked up the cat and walked slowly down the hard-trodden path to the +stable. "But there aren't any bandits, and dad hasn't any gold or +anything else worth stealing--Ket, if dad isn't a miser, he's _poor_! +And Lone Morgan is merely ashamed of the way I talked to him, and afraid +I'll queer myself with the neighbors. No Western lead that _I_ ever saw +would act like that. Why, he didn't even want to ride home with me, that +day. + +"And Bob Warfield and his Ford are incidents of the past, and not one +soul at the Sawtooth seems to give a darn whether I'm in the country or +out of it. Soon as they found out where I belonged, they brought me over +here and dropped me and forgot all about me. And that, I suppose, is +what they call in fiction the Western spirit! + +"Dad looked exactly as if he'd opened the door to a book agent when I +came. He--he _tolerates_ my presence, Ket! And Frank Johnson's pipe +smells to high heaven, and I hate him in the house and 'the boys'--hmhm! +The _boys_--Ket, it would be terribly funny, if I didn't have to stay +here." + +She had reached the corral and stood balancing the cat on a warped top +rail, staring disconsolately at Yellowjacket, who stood in a far corner +switching at flies and shamelessly displaying all the angularity of his +bones under a yellowish hide with roughened hair that was shedding +dreadfully, as Lorraine had discovered to her dismay when she removed +her green corduroy skirt after riding him. Yellowjacket's lower lip +sagged with senility or lack of spirit, Lorraine could not tell which. + +"You look like the frontispiece in that horse-doctor book," she +remarked, eyeing him with disfavor. "I can't say that comedy hide you've +got improves your appearance. You'd be better peeled, I believe." + +She heard a chuckle behind her and turned quickly, palm up to shield her +eyes from the straight, bright rays of the sun. Now here was a live man, +after all, with his hat tilted down over his forehead, a cigarette in +one hand and his reins in the other, looking at her and smiling. + +"Why don't you peel him, just on a chance?" His smile broadened to a +grin, but when Lorraine continued to look at him with a neutral +expression in her eyes, he threw away his cigarette and abandoned with +it his free-and-easy manner. + +"You're Miss Hunter, aren't you? I rode over to see your father. Thought +I'd find him somewhere around the corral, maybe." + +"You won't, because he's gone for the day. No, I don't know where." + +"I--see. Is Mr. Johnson anywhere about?" + +"No, I don't believe any one is anywhere about. They were all gone when +I got up, a little while ago." Then, remembering that she did not know +this man, and that she was a long way from neighbors, she added, "If +you'll leave a message I can tell dad when he comes home." + +"No-o--I'll ride over to-morrow or next day. I'm the man at Whisper. You +can tell him I called, and that I'll call again." + +Still he did not go, and Lorraine waited. Some instinct warned her that +the man had not yet stated his real reason for coming, and she wondered +a little what it could be. He seemed to be watching her covertly, yet +she failed to catch any telltale admiration for her in his scrutiny. She +decided that his forehead was too narrow to please her, and that his +eyes were too close together, and that the lines around his mouth were +cruel lines and gave the lie to his smile, which was pleasant enough if +you just looked at the smile and paid no attention to anything else in +his face. + +"You had quite an experience getting out here, they tell me," he +observed carelessly; too carelessly, thought Lorraine, who was well +schooled in the circumlocutions of delinquent tenants, agents of various +sorts and those who crave small gossip of their neighbors. "Heard you +were lost up in Rock City all night." + +Lorraine looked up at him, startled. "I caught a terrible cold," she +said, laughing nervously. "I'm not used to the climate," she added +guardedly. + +The man fumbled in his pocket and produced smoking material. "Do you +mind if I smoke?" he asked perfunctorily. + +"Why, no. It doesn't concern me in the slightest degree." Why, she +thought confusedly, must she _always_ be reminded of that horrible place +of rocks? What was it to this man where she had been lost? + +"You must of got there about the time the storm broke," the man hazarded +after a silence. "It's sure a bad place in a thunderstorm. Them rocks +draw lightning. Pretty bad, wasn't it?" + +"Lightning is always bad, isn't it?" Lorraine tried to hold her voice +steady. "I don't know much about it. We don't have thunderstorms to +amount to anything, in Los Angeles. It sometimes does thunder there in +the winter, but it is very mild." + +With hands that trembled she picked the cat off the rail and started +toward the house. "I'll tell dad what you said," she told him, glancing +back over her shoulder. When she saw that he had turned his horse and +was frankly following her to the house, her heart jumped wildly into her +throat,--judging by the feel of it. + +"I'm plumb out of matches. I wonder if you can let me have some," he +said, still speaking too carelessly to reassure her. "So you stuck it +out in Rock City all through that storm! That's more than what I'd want +to do." + +She did not answer that, but once on the doorstep Lorraine turned and +faced him. Quite suddenly it came to her--the knowledge of why she did +not like this man. She stared at him, her eyes wide and bright. + +"Your hat's brown!" she exclaimed unguardedly. "I--I saw a man with a +brown hat----" + +He laughed suddenly. "If you stay around here long you'll see a good +many," he said, taking off his hat and turning it on his hand before +her. "This here hat I traded for yesterday. I had a gray one, but it +didn't suit me. Too narrow in the brim. Brown hats are getting to be the +style. If I can borrow half a dozen matches, Miss Hunter, I'll be +going." + +Lorraine looked at him again doubtfully and went after the matches. He +thanked her, smiling down at her quizzically. "A man can get along +without lots of things, but he's plumb lost without matches. You've +maybe saved my life, Miss Hunter, if you only knew it." + +She watched him as he rode away, opening the gate and letting himself +through without dismounting. He disappeared finally around a small spur +of the hill, and Lorraine found her knees trembling under her. + +"Ket, you're an awful fool," she exclaimed fiercely. "Why did you let me +give myself away to that man? I--I believe he _was_ the man. And if I +really did see him, it wasn't my imagination at all. He saw me there, +perhaps. Ket, I'm scared! I'm not going to stay on this ranch all alone. +I'm going to saddle the family skeleton, and I'm going to ride till +dark. There's something queer about that man from Whisper. I'm afraid +of him." + +After awhile, when she had finished her breakfast and was putting up a +lunch, Lorraine picked up the nameless gray cat and holding its head +between her slim fingers, looked at it steadily. "Ket, you're the +humanest thing I've seen since I left home," she said wistfully. "I +_hate_ a country where horrible things happen under the surface and the +top is just gray and quiet and so dull it makes you want to scream. Lone +Morgan lied to me. He lied--he lied!" She hugged the cat impulsively and +rubbed her cheek absently against it, so that it began purring +immediately. + +"Ket--I'm afraid of that man at Whisper!" she breathed miserably against +its fur. + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHT + +"IT TAKES NERVE JUST TO HANG ON" + + +Brit was smoking his pipe after supper and staring at nothing, though +his face was turned toward the closed door. Lorraine had washed the +dishes and was tidying the room and looking at her father now and then +in a troubled, questioning way of which Brit was quite oblivious. + +"Dad," she said abruptly, "who is the man at Whisper?" + +Brit turned his eyes slowly to her face as if he had not grasped her +meaning and was waiting for her to repeat the question. It was evident +that his thoughts had pulled away from something that meant a good deal +to him. + +"Why?" + +"A man came this morning, and said he was the man at Whisper, and that +he would come again to see you." + +Brit took his pipe from his mouth, looked at it and crowded down the +tobacco with a forefinger. "He seen me ride away from the ranch, this +morning," he said. "He was coming down the Whisper trail as I was taking +the fork over to Sugar Spring, Frank and me. What did he say he wanted +to see me about?" + +"He didn't say. He asked for you and Frank." Lorraine sat down and +folded her arms on the oilcloth-covered table. "Dad, what _is_ Whisper?" + +"Whisper's a camp up against a cliff, over west of here. It belongs to +the Sawtooth. Is that all he said? Just that he wanted to see me?" + +"He--talked a little," Lorraine admitted, her eyebrows pulled down. "If +he saw you leave, I shouldn't think he'd come here and ask for you." + +"He knowed I was gone," Brit stated briefly. + +With a finger nail Lorraine traced the ugly, brown pattern on the +oilcloth. It was not easy to talk to this silent man who was her father, +but she had done a great deal of thinking during that long, empty day, +and she had reached the point where she was afraid not to speak. + +"Dad!" + +"What do you want, Raine?" + +"Dad, was--has any one around here died, lately?" + +"Died? Nobody but Fred Thurman, over here on Granite. He was drug with a +horse and killed." + +Lorraine caught her breath, saw Brit looking at her curiously and moved +closer to him. She wanted to be near somebody just then, and after all, +Brit was her father, and his silence was not the inertia of a dull mind, +she knew. He seemed bottled-up, somehow, and bitter. She caught his hand +and held it, feeling its roughness between her two soft palms. + +"Dad, I've got to tell you. I feel trapped, somehow. Did his horse have +a white face, dad?" + +"Yes, he's a blaze-faced roan. Why?" Brit moved uncomfortably, but he +did not take his hand away from her. "What do you know about it, Raine?" + +"I saw a man shoot Fred Thurman and push his foot through the stirrup. +And, dad, I believe it was that man at Whisper. The one I saw had on a +brown hat, and this man wears a brown hat--and I was advised not to tell +any one I had been at that place they call Rock City, when the storm +came. Dad, would an innocent man--one that didn't have anything to do +with a crime--would he try to cover it up afterwards?" + +Brit's hand shook when he removed the pipe from his mouth and laid it on +the table. His face had turned gray while Lorraine watched him +fearfully. He laid his hand on her shoulder, pressing down hard--and at +last his eyes met her big, searching ones. + +"If he wanted to _live_--in this country--he'd have to. Leastways, he'd +have to keep his mouth shut," he said grimly. + +"And he'd try to shut the mouths of others----" + +"If he cared anything about them, he would. You ain't told anybody what +you saw, have yuh?" + +Lorraine hid her face against his arm. "Just Lone Morgan, and he thought +I was crazy and imagined it. That was in the morning, when he found me. +And he--he wanted me to go on thinking it was just a nightmare--that I'd +imagined the whole thing. And I did, for awhile. But this man at Whisper +tried to find out where I was that night----" + +Brit pulled abruptly away from her, got up and opened the door. He +stood there for a time, looking out into the gloom of early nightfall. +He seemed to be listening, Lorraine thought. When he came back to her +his voice was lower, his manner intangibly furtive. + +"You didn't tell him anything, did you?" he asked, as if there had been +no pause in their talk. + +"No--I made him believe I wasn't there. Or I tried to. And dad! As I was +going to cross that creek just before you come to Rock City, two men +came along on horseback, and I hid before they saw me. They stopped to +water their horses, and they were talking. They said something about the +TJ had been here a long time, but they would get theirs, and it was like +sitting into a poker game with a nickel. They said the little ones +aren't big enough to fight the Sawtooth, and they'd carry lead under +their hides if they didn't leave. Dad, isn't your brand the TJ? That's +what it looks like on Yellowjacket." + +Brit did not answer, and when Lorraine was sure that he did not mean to +do so, she asked another question. "Dad, why didn't you want me to leave +the ranch to-day? I was nervous after that man was here, and I did go." + +"I didn't want you riding around the country unless I knew where you +went," Brit said. "My brand is the TJ up-and-down. We never call it just +the TJ." + +"Oh," said Lorraine, relieved. "They weren't talking about you, then. +But dad--it's horrible! We simply _can't_ let that murder go and not do +anything. Because I know that man was shot. I heard the shot fired, and +I saw him start to fall off his horse. And the next flash of lightning I +saw----" + +"Look here, Raine. I don't want you talking about what you saw. I don't +want you _thinkin'_ about it. What's the use? Thurman's dead and buried. +The cor'ner come and held an inquest, and the jury agreed it was an +accident. I was on the jury. The sheriff's took charge of his property. +You couldn't prove what you saw, even if you was to try." He looked at +her very much as Lone Morgan had looked at her. His next words were very +nearly what Lone Morgan had said, Lorraine remembered. "You don't know +this country like I know it. Folks live in it mainly because they don't +go around blatting everything they see and hear and think." + +"You have laws, don't you, dad? You spoke about the sheriff----" + +"The sheriff!" Brit laughed harshly. "Yes, we got a sheriff, and we got +a jail, and a judge--all the makin's of law. But we ain't got one thing +that goes with it, and that's justice. You'd best make up your mind like +the cor'ner's jury done, that Fred Thurman was drug to death by his +horse. That's all that'll ever be proved, and if you can't prove nothing +else you better keep your mouth shut." + +Lorraine sprang up and stood facing her father, every nerve taut with +protest. "You don't mean to tell me, dad, that you and Frank Johnson and +Lone Morgan and--everybody in the country are _cowards_, do you?" + +Brit looked at her patiently. "No," he said in the tone of acknowledged +defeat, "we ain't cowards, Raine. A man ain't a coward when he stands +with his hands over his head. Most generally it's because some one's got +the drop on 'im." + +Lorraine would not accept that. "You think so, because you don't fight," +she cried hotly. "No one is holding a gun at your head. Dad! I thought +Westerners never quit. It's fight to the finish, always. Why, I've seen +one man fight a whole outfit and win. He couldn't be beaten because he +wouldn't give up. Why----" + +Brit gave her a tolerant glance. "Where'd you see all that, Raine?" He +moved to the table picked up his pipe and knocked out the ashes on the +stove hearth. His movements were those of an aging man,--yet Brit Hunter +was not old, as age is reckoned. + +"Well--in stories--but it was reasonable and logical and possible, just +the same. If you use your brains you can outwit them, and if you have +any nerve----" + +Brit made a sound somewhat like a snort. "These days, when politics is +played by the big fellows, and the law is used to make money for 'em, it +takes nerve just to hang on," he said. "Nobody but a dang fool would +fight." Slow anger grew within him. He turned upon Lorraine almost +fiercely. "D'yuh think me and Frank could fight the Sawtooth and get +anything out of it but a coffin apiece, maybe?" he demanded harshly. +"Don't the Sawtooth _own_ this country? Warfield's got the sheriff in +his pocket, and the cor'ner, and the judge, and the stock +inspector--he's _Senator_ Warfield, and what he wants he gets. He gets +it through the law that you was talking about a little while ago. What +you goin' to do about it? If I had the money and the land and the +political pull he's got, mebby I'd have me a sheriff and a judge, too. + +"Fred Thurman tried to fight the Sawtooth over a water right he owned +and they wanted. They had the case runnin' in court till they like to of +took the last dollar he had. He got bull-headed. That water right meant +the hull ranch--everything he owned. You can't run a ranch without +water. And when he'd took the case up and up till it got to the Supreme +Court, and he stood some show of winnin' out--he had an accident. He was +drug to death by his horse." + +Brit stooped and opened the stove door, seeking a live coal; found none +and turned again to Lorraine, shaking his pipe at her for emphasis. + +"We try to prove Fred was murdered, and what's the result? Something +happens: to me, mebby, or Frank, or both of us. And you can't say, +'Here, I know the Sawtooth had a hand in that.' You got to _prove_ it! +And when you've proved it," he added bitterly, "you got to have officers +that'll carry out the law instead of using it to hog-tie yuh." + +His futile, dull anger surged up again. "You call us cowards because we +don't git up on our hind legs and fight the Sawtooth. A lot _you_ know +about courage! You've read stories, and you've saw moving pictures, and +you think that's the West--that's the way they do it. One man hold off a +hunderd with his gun--and on the other hand, a hunderd men, mebby, +ridin' hell-whoopin' after one. You think that's it--that's the way they +do it. Hunh!" He lifted the lid of the stove, spat into it as if he were +spitting in the face of an enemy, and turned again to Lorraine. + +"What you seen--what you say you seen--that was done at night when there +wasn't no audience. All the fighting the Sawtooth does is done under +cover. _You_ won't see none of it--they ain't such fools. And what us +small fellers do, we do it quiet, too. We ain't ridin' up and down the +trail, flourishin' our six-shooters and yellin' to the Sawtooth to come +on and we'll clean 'em up!" + +"But you're fighting just the same, aren't you, dad? You're not letting +them----" + +"We're makin' out to live here--and we've been doin' it for twenty-five +year," Brit told her, with a certain grim dignity. "We've still got a +few head uh stock left--enough to live on. Playin' poker with a nickel, +mebby--but we manage to ante, every hand so fur." His mind returned to +the grisly thing Lorraine had seen. + +"We can't run down the man that got Fred Thurman, supposin' he was +killed, as you say. That's what the law is paid to do. If Lone Morgan +told you not to talk about it, he told you right. He was talking for +your own good. What about Al--the man from Whisper? You didn't tell +_him_, did you?" + +His tone, the suppressed violence of his manner, frightened Lorraine. +She moved farther away from him. + +"I didn't tell him anything. He was curious but--I only said I knew him +because he was wearing a brown hat, and the man that shot Mr. Thurman +had a brown hat. I didn't say all that. I just mentioned the hat. And he +said there were lots of brown hats in the country. He said he had traded +for that one, just yesterday. He said his own hat was gray." + +Brit stared at her, his jaw sagging a little, his eyes growing vacant +with the thoughts he hid deep in his mind. He slumped down into his +chair and leaned forward, his arms resting on his knees, his fingers +clasped loosely. After a little he tilted his head and looked up at +her. + +"You better go to bed," he told her stolidly. "And if you're going to +live at the Quirt, Raine, you'll have to learn to keep your mouth shut. +I ain't blaming you--but you told too much to Al Woodruff. Don't talk to +him no more, if he comes here when I'm gone." He put out a hand, +beckoning her to him, sorry for his harshness. Lorraine went to him and +knelt beside him, slipping an arm around his neck while she hid her face +on his shoulder. + +"I won't be a nuisance, dad--really, I won't," she said. "I--I can shoot +a gun. I never shot one with bullets in, but I could. And I learned to +do lots of things when I was working in that play West I thought was +real. It isn't like I thought. There's no picture stuff in the real +West, I guess; they don't do things that way. But--what I want you to +know is that if they're fighting you they'll have to fight me, too. + +"I don't mean movie stuff, honestly I don't. I'm in this thing now, and +you'll have to count me, same as you count Jim and Sorry. Won't you +please feel that I'm one more in the game, dad, and not just another +responsibility? I'll herd cattle, or do whatever there is to do. And +I'll keep my mouth shut, too. I can't stay here, day after day, doing +nothing but sweep and dust two rooms and fry potatoes and bacon for you +at night. Dad, I'll go _crazy_ if you don't let me into your life! + +"Dad, if you knew the stunts I've done in the last three years! It was +make-believe West, but I learned things just the same." She kissed him +on the unshaven cheek nearest her,--and thought of the kisses she had +breathed upon the cheeks of story fathers with due care for the make-up +on her lips. Just because this was real, she kissed him again with the +frank vigor of a child. + +"Dad," she said wheedlingly, "I think you might scare up something that +I can really ride. Yellowjacket is safe, but--but you have real _live_ +horses on the ranch, haven't you? You must _not_ go judging me by the +palms and the bay windows of the Casa Grande. That's where I've slept, +the last few years when I wasn't off on location--but it's just as +sensible to think I don't know anything else, as it would be for me to +think you can't do anything but skim milk and fry bacon and make +sour-dough bread, just because I've seen you do it!" + +Brit laughed and patted her awkwardly on the back. "If you was a boy, +I'd set you up as a lawyer," he said with an attempt at playfulness. "I +kinda thought you could ride. I seen how you piled onto old Yellowjacket +and the way you held your reins. It runs in the blood, I guess. I'll see +what I can do in the way of a horse. Ole Yellowjacket used to be a real +rim-rider, but he's gitting old; gitting old--same as me." + +"You're not! You're just letting yourself _feel_ old. And am I one of +the outfit, dad?" + +"I guess so--only there ain't going to be any of this hell-whoopin' +stuff, Raine. You can't travel these trails at a long lope with yore +hair flyin' out behind and--and all that damn foolishness. I've saw 'em +in the movin' pitchers----" + +Lorraine blushed, and was thankful that her dad had not watched her work +in that serial. For that matter, she hoped that Lone Morgan would never +stray into a movie where any of her pictures were being shown. + +"I'm serious, dad. I don't want to make a show of myself. But if you'll +feel that I can be a help instead of a handicap, that's what I want. And +if it comes to fighting----" + +Brit pushed her from him impatiently. "There yuh go--fight--fight--and I +told yuh there ain't any fighting going on. Nothing more'n a fight to +hang on and make a living. That means straight, hard work and mindin' +your own business. If you want to help at that----" + +"I do," said Raine quietly, getting to her feet. Her legacy of +stubbornness set her lips firmly together. "That's exactly what I mean. +Good night, dad." + +Brit answered her noncommittally, apparently sunk already in his own +musings. But his lips drew in to suppress a smile when he saw, from the +corner of his eyes, that Lorraine was winding the alarm on the cheap +kitchen clock, and that she set the hand carefully and took the clock +with her to bed. + + + + +CHAPTER NINE + +THE EVIL EYE OF THE SAWTOOTH + + +Oppression is a growth that flourishes best in the soil of opportunity. +It seldom springs into full power at once. The Sawtooth Cattle Company +had begun much as its neighbors had begun: with a tract of land, cattle, +and the ambition for prospering. Senator Warfield had then been plain +Bill Warfield, manager of the outfit, who rode with his men and saw how +his herds increased,--saw too how they might increase faster under +certain conditions. At the outset he was not, perhaps, more unscrupulous +than some of his neighbors. True, if a homesteader left his claim for a +longer time than the law allowed him, Bill Warfield would choose one of +his own men to file a contest on that claim. The man's wages would be +paid. Witnesses were never lacking to swear to the improvements he had +made, and after the patent had been granted the homesteader (for the +contestant always won, in that country) the Sawtooth, would pay him for +the land. Frequently a Sawtooth man would file upon land before any +other man had claimed it. Sometimes a Sawtooth man would purchase a +relinquishment from some poor devil of a claim-holder who seemed always +to have bad luck, and so became discouraged and ready to sell. An +intelligent man like Bill Warfield could acquire much land in this +manner, give him time enough. + +In much the same manner his herds increased. He bought out small +ranchers who were crowded to the selling point in one way or another. +They would find themselves fenced off from water, the Sawtooth having +acquired the water rights to creek or spring. Or they would be hemmed in +with fenced fields and would find it next to impossible to make use of +the law which gave them the right to "condemn" a road through. They +would not be openly assailed,--Bill Warfield was an intelligent man. A +dozen brands were recorded in the name of the Sawtooth Cattle Company, +and if a small rancher found his calf crop shorter than it should be, he +might think as he pleased, but he would have no tangible proof that his +calves wore a Sawtooth brand. + +Inevitably it became necessary now and then to stop a mouth that was +ready to speak unwelcome truths. But if a Sawtooth man were known to +have committed violence, the Sawtooth itself was the first to put the +sheriff on his trail. If the man successfully dodged the sheriff and +made his way to parts unknown, the Sawtooth could shrug its shoulders +and wash its hands of him. + +Then whispers were heard that the Sawtooth had on its pay roll men who +were paid to kill and to leave no trace. So many heedless ones crossed +the Sawtooth's path to riches! Fred Thurman had been one; a "bull-headed +cuss" who had the temerity to fight back when the Sawtooth calmly laid +claim to the first water rights to Granite Creek, having bought it, they +said, with the placer claim of an old miner who had prospected along the +headwaters of Granite at the base of Bear Top. + +By that time the Sawtooth had grown to a power no poor man could hope to +defeat. Bill Warfield was Senator Warfield, and Senator Warfield was a +power in the political world that immediately surrounded him. Since his +neighboring ranchmen had not been able to prevent his steady climbing to +the position he now held, they had small hope of pulling him down. Brit +was right. They did well to hang on and continue living in that +country. + +An open killing, one that would attract the attention of the outside +world, might be avenged. The man who committed the crime might be +punished,--if public opinion were sufficiently massed against him. In +that case Senator Warfield would cry loudest for justice. But it would +take a stronger man than the country held to raise the question of Fred +Thurman's death and take even the first steps toward proving it a +murder. + +"It ain't that they can _do_ anything, Mr. Warfield," the man from +Whisper said guardedly, urging his horse close to the machine that stood +in the trail from Echo. It was broad day--a sun-scorched day to +boot--and Senator Warfield perspired behind the wheel of his car. "It's +the talk they may get started." + +"What have they said? The girl was at the ranch for several days. She +didn't talk there, or Hawkins would have told me." + +"She was sick. I saw her the other day at the Quirt, and she more'n half +recognized me. Hell! How'd _I_ know she was in there among them rocks? +Everybody that was apt to be riding through was accounted for, and I +knew there wasn't any one coming horseback or with a rig. My hearing's +pretty good." + +Warfield moved the spark lever up and down on the wheel while he +thought. "Well," he said carefully at last, "if you're falling down in +your work, what are you whining about it to me for? What do you want?" + +Al moistened his lips with his tongue. "I want to know how far I can go. +It's been hands off the Quirt, up to now. And the Quirt's beginning to +think it can get away with most anything. They've throwed a fence across +the pass through from Sugar Spring to Whisper. That sends us away around +by Three Creek. You can't trail stock across Granite Ridge, nor them +lava ledges. If it's going to be hands off, I want to know it. There's +other places I'd rather live in, if the Quirt's going to raise talk +about Fred Thurman." + +Senator Warfield pulled at his collar and tie as if they choked him. +"The Quirt has made no trouble," he said. "Of course, if they begin +throwing fences across our stock trails and peddling gossip, that is +another story. I expect you to protect our interests, of course. And I +have never made a practice of dictating to you. In this case"--he sent a +sharp glance at Al--"it seems to me your interests are involved more +than ours. As to Fred Thurman, I don't know anything about it. I was not +here when he died, and I have never seen this girl of Brit's who seems +to worry you. She doesn't interest me, one way or the other." + +"She seems to interest Bob a whole lot," Al said maliciously. "He rode +over to see her yesterday. She wasn't home, though." + +Senator Warfield seemed unmoved by this bit of news, wherefore Al +returned to the main issue. + +"Do I get a free hand, or don't I?" he insisted. "They can't be let +peddle talk--not if I stay around here." + +Senator Warfield considered the matter. + +"The girl's got the only line on me," Al went on. "The inquest was as +clean as I ever saw. Everything all straight--and then, here she comes +up----" + +"If you know how to stop a woman's mouth, Al, you can make a million a +month telling other men." Senator Warfield smiled at him. Then he leaned +across the front seat and added impressively, "Bear one thing in mind, +Al. The Sawtooth cannot permit itself to become involved in any scandal, +nor in any killing cases. We're just at the most crucial point with our +reclamation project, over here on the flat. The legislature is willing +to make an appropriation for the building of the canal, and in two or +three months at the latest we should begin selling agricultural tracts +to the public. The State will also throw open the land it had withdrawn +from settlement, pending the floating of this canal project. More than +ever the integrity of the Sawtooth Cattle Company must be preserved, +since it has come out openly as a backer of the irrigation company. +Nothing--_nothing_ must be permitted to stand in the way." + +He removed his thin driving cap and wiped his perspiring forehead. "I'm +sorry this all happened--as it has turned out," he said, with real +regret in his tone. "But since it did happen, I must rely upon you +to--to--er----" + +"I guess I understand," Al grinned sardonically. "I just wanted you to +know how things is building up. The Quirt's kinda overreached itself. I +didn't want you comin' back on me for trying to keep their feet outa the +trough. I want you to know things is pretty damn ticklish right now, and +it's going to take careful steppin'." + +"Well, don't let your foot slip, Al," Senator Warfield warned him. "The +Sawtooth would hate to lose you; you're a good man." + +"Oh, I get yuh," Al retorted. "My foot ain't going to slip---- If it +did, the Sawtooth would be the first to pile onto my back!" The last +sentence was not meant for the senator's ears. Al had backed his horse, +and Senator Warfield was stepping on the starter. But it would not have +mattered greatly if he had heard, for this was a point quite thoroughly +understood by them both. + +The Warfield car went on, lurching over the inequalities of the narrow +road. Al shook his horse into a shambling trot, picking his way +carelessly through the scattered sage. + +His horse traveled easily, now and then lifting a foot high to avoid +rock or exposed root, or swerving sharply around obstacles too high to +step over. Al very seldom traveled along the beaten trails, though there +was nothing to deter him now save an inherent tendency toward +secretiveness of his motives, destinations and whereabouts. If the +country was open, you would see Al Woodruff riding at some distance from +the trail--or you would not see him at all, if there were gullies in +which he could conceal himself. He was always "line-riding," or hunting +stray stock--horses, usually--or striking across to some line-camp of +the Sawtooth, on business which he was perfectly willing to state. + +But you will long ago have guessed that he was the evil eye of the +Sawtooth Company. He took no orders save such general ones as Senator +Warfield had just given him. He gave none. Whatever he did he did alone, +and he took no man into his confidence. It is more than probable that +Senator Warfield would never have known to a certainty that Al was +responsible for Thurman's death, if Al had not been worried over the +Quirt's possible knowledge of the crime and anxious to know just how far +his power might go. + +Ostensibly he was in charge of the camp at Whisper, a place far enough +off the beaten trails to free him from chance visitors. The Sawtooth +kept many such camps occupied by men whose duty it was to look after the +Sawtooth cattle that grazed near; to see that stock did not "bog down" +in the tricky sand of the adjacent water holes and die before help came, +and to fend off any encroachments of the smaller cattle owners,--though +these were growing fewer year by year, thanks to the weeding-out policy +of the Sawtooth and the cunning activities of such as Al Woodruff. + +It may sound strange to say that the Sawtooth country had not had a real +"killing" for years, though accidental deaths had been rather frequent. +One man, for instance, had fallen over a ledge and broken his neck, +presumably while drunk. Another had bought a few sticks of dynamite to +open up a spring on his ranch, and at the inquest which followed the +jury had returned a verdict of "death caused by being blown up by the +accidental discharge of dynamite." A sheepman was struck by lightning, +according to the coroner, and his widow had been glad to sell ranch and +sheep very cheaply to the Sawtooth and return to her relatives in +Montana. The Sawtooth had shipped the sheep within a month and turned +the ranch into another line-camp. + +You will see that Senator Warfield had every reason to be sincere when +he called Al Woodruff a good man; good for the Sawtooth interests, that +means. You will also see that Brit Hunter had reasons for believing that +the business of ranching in the Sawtooth country might be classed as +extra hazardous, and for saying that it took nerve just to hang on. + +That is why Al rode oblivious to his surroundings, meditating no doubt +upon the best means of preserving the "integrity" of the Sawtooth and at +the same time soothing effectively the ticklishness of the situation of +which he had complained. It was his business to find the best means. It +was for just such work that the Sawtooth paid him--secretly, to be +sure--better wages than the foreman, Hawkins, received. Al was +conscientious and did his best to earn his wages; not because he +particularly loved killing and spying as a sport, but because the +Sawtooth had bought his loyalty for a price, and so long as he felt that +he was getting a square deal from them, he would turn his hand against +any man that stood in their way. He was a Sawtooth man, and he fought +the enemies of the Sawtooth as matter-of-factly as a soldier will fight +for his country. To his unimaginative mind there was sufficient +justification in that attitude. As for the ease with which he planned to +kill and cover his killing under the semblance of accident, he would +have said, if you could make him speak of it, that he was not squeamish. +They'd all have to die some day, anyway. + + + + +CHAPTER TEN + +ANOTHER SAWTOOTH "ACCIDENT" + + +Frank Johnson rose from the breakfast table, shaved a splinter off the +edge of the water bench for a toothpick and sharpened it carefully while +he looked at Brit. + +"You goin' after them posts, or shall I?" he inquired glumly, which, by +the way, was his normal tone. "Jim and Sorry oughta git the post holes +all dug to-day. One of us better take a look through that young stock in +the lower field, too, and see if there's any more sign uh blackleg. +Which you ruther do?" + +Brit tilted his chair backward so that he could reach the coffeepot on +the stove hearth. "I'll haul down the posts," he decided carelessly. +"They're easy loaded, and I guess my back's as good as yourn." + +"All you got to do is skid 'em down off'n the bank onto the wagon," +Frank said. "I wisht you'd go on up where we cut them last ones and git +my sweater, Brit. I musta left it hanging on a bush right close to where +I was workin'." + +Brit's grunt signified assent, and Frank went out. Jim and Sorry, the +two unpicturesque cowboys of whom Lorraine had complained to the cat had +already departed with pick and shovel to their unromantic task of +digging post holes. Each carried a most unattractive lunch tied in a +flour sack behind the cantle of his saddle. Lorraine had done her +conscientious best, but with lumpy, sour-dough bread, cold bacon and +currant jelly of that kind which is packed in wooden kegs, one can't do +much with a cold lunch. Lorraine wondered how much worse it would look +after it had been tied on the saddle for half a day; wondered too what +those two silent ones got out of life,--what they looked forward to, +what was their final goal. For that matter she frequently wondered what +there was in life for any of them, shut into that deadly monotony of +sagebrush and rocks interspersed with little, grassy meadows where the +cattle fed listlessly. + +Even the sinister undercurrent of antagonism against the Quirt could not +whip her emotions feeling that she was doing anything more than live +the restricted, sordid little life of a poorly equipped ranch. She had +ridden once with Frank Johnson to look through a bunch of cattle, but it +had been nothing more than a hot, thirsty, dull ride, with a wind that +blew her hat off in spite of pins and tied veil, and with a companion +who spoke only when he was spoken to and then as briefly as possible. + +Her father would not talk again as he had talked that night. She had +tried to make him tell her more about the Sawtooth and had gotten +nothing out of him. The man from Whisper, whom Brit had spoken of as Al, +had not returned. Nor had the promised saddle horse materialized. The +boys were too busy to run in any horses, her father had told her shortly +when she reminded him of his promise. When the fence was done, maybe he +could rustle her another horse,--and then he had added that he didn't +see what ailed Yellowjacket, for all the riding she was likely to do. + +"Straight hard work and minding your own business," her father had said, +and it seemed to Lorraine after three or four days of it that he had +summed up the life of a cattleman's daughter in a masterly manner which +ought to be recorded among Famous Sayings like "War is hell" and "Don't +give up the ship." + +On this particular morning Lorraine's spirits were at their lowest ebb. +If it were not for the new stepfather, she would return to the Casa +Grande, she told herself disgustedly. And if it were not for the belief +among all her acquaintances that she was queening it over the +cattle-king's vast domain, she would return and find work again in +motion pictures. But she could not bring herself to the point of facing +the curiosity and the petty gossip of the studios. She would be expected +to explain satisfactorily why she had left the real West for the mimic +West of Hollywood. She did not acknowledge to herself that she also +could not face the admission of failure to carry out what she had begun. + +She had told her dad that she wanted to fight with him, even though +"fighting" in this case meant washing the coarse clothing of her father +and Frank, scrubbing the rough, warped boards of the cabin floor, and +frying ranch-cured bacon for every meal, and in making butter to sell, +and counting the eggs every night and being careful to use only the +cracked ones for cooking. + +She hated every detail of this crude housekeeping, from the chipped +enamel dishpan to the broom that was all one-sided, and the pillow slips +which were nothing more nor less than sugar sacks. She hated it even +more than she had hated the Casa Grande and her mother's frowsy +mentality. But because she could see that she made life a little more +comfortable for her dad, because she felt that he needed her, she would +stay and assure herself over and over that she was staying merely +because she was too proud to go back to the old life and own the West a +failure. + +She was sweeping the doorstep with the one-sided broom when Brit drove +out through the gate and up the trail which she knew led eventually to +Sugar Spring. The horses, sleek in their new hair and skittish with the +change from hay to new grass, danced over the rough ground so that the +running gear of the wagon, with its looped log-chain, which would later +do duty as a brake on the long grade down from timber line on the side +of Spirit Canyon, rattled and banged over the rocks with a clatter that +could be heard for half a mile. Lorraine looked after her father +enviously. If she were a boy she would be riding on that sack of hay +tied to the "hounds" for a seat. But, being a girl, it had never +occurred to Brit that she might like to go,--might even be useful to +him on the trip. + +"I suppose if I told dad I could drive that team as well as he can, he'd +just look at me and think I was crazy," she thought resentfully and gave +the broom a spiteful fling toward a presumptuous hen that had approached +too closely. "If I'd asked him to let me go along he'd have made some +excuse--oh, I'm beginning to know dad! He thinks a woman's place is in +the house--preferably the kitchen. And here I've thought all my life +that cowgirls did nothing but ride around and warn people about stage +holdups and everything! I'd just like to know how a girl would ever have +a chance to know what was going on in the country, unless she heard the +men talking while she poured their coffee. Only this bunch don't talk at +all. They just gobble and go." + +She went in then and shut the door with a slam. Up on the ridge Al +Woodruff lowered his small binocular and eased away from the spot where +he had been crouching behind a bush. Every one on the Quirt ranch was +accounted for. As well as if he had sat at their breakfast table Al knew +where each man's work would take him that day. As for the girl, she was +safe at the ranch for the day, probably. If she did take a ride later +on, it would probably be up the ridge between the Quirt and Thurman's +ranch, and sit for an hour or so just looking. That ride was beginning +to be a habit of hers, Al had observed, so that he considered her +accounted for also. + +He made his way along the side hill to where his horse was tied to a +bush, mounted and rode away with his mind pretty much at ease. Much more +at ease than it would have been had he read what was in Lorraine's mind +when, she slammed that door. + +Up above Sugar Spring was timber. By applying to the nearest Forest +Supervisor a certain amount could be had for ranch improvements upon +paying a small sum for the "stumpage." The Quirt had permission to cut +posts for their new fence which Al Woodruff had reported to his boss. + +As he drove up the trail, which was in places barely passable for a +wagon, Brit was thinking of that fence. The Sawtooth would object to it, +he knew, since it cut off one of their stock trails and sent them around +through rougher country. Just what form their objection would take, +Brit did not know. Deep in his intrepid soul he hoped that the Sawtooth +would at last show its hand openly. He had liked Fred Thurman, and what +Lorraine had told him went much deeper than she knew. He wanted to bring +them into the open where he could fight with some show of winning. + +"I'll git Bill Warfield yet--and git him right," was the gist of his +musings. "He's bound to show his head, give him time enough. Him and his +killers can't always keep under cover. Let 'em come at me about that +fence! It's on my land--the Quirt's got a right to fence every foot of +land that belongs to 'em." + +All the way over the ridge and across the flat and up the steep, narrow +road along the edge of Spirit Canyon, Brit dwelt upon the probable moves +of the Sawtooth. They would wait, he thought, until the fence was +completed and they had made a trail around through the lava rocks. They +would not risk any move at present; they would wait and tacitly accept +the fence, or pretend to accept it, as a natural inconvenience. But Brit +did not deceive himself that they would remain passive. That it had been +"hands off the Quirt" he did not know, but attributed the Quirt's +immunity to careful habits and the fact that they had never come to the +point where their interests actually clashed with the Sawtooth. + +It never occurred to him therefore that he was slated for an accident +that day if the details could be conveniently arranged. + +It was a long trail to Sugar Spring, and from there up Spirit Canyon the +climb was so tedious and steep that Brit took a full hour for the trip, +resting the team often because they were soft from the new grass diet +and sweated easily. They lost none of their spirit, however, and when +the road was steepest nagged at each other with head-shakings and bared +teeth, and ducked against each other in pretended fright at every +unusual rock or bush. + +At the top he was forced to drive a full half mile beyond the piled +posts to a flat large enough to turn around. All this took time, +especially since Caroline, the brown mare, would rather travel ten miles +straight ahead than go backward ten feet. Brit was obliged to "take it +out of her" with the rein ends and his full repertoire of opprobrious +epithets before he could cramp the wagon and head them down the trail +again. + +At the post pile he unhitched the team for safety's sake and tied them +to trees, where he fed them a little grain in nose bags. He was absorbed +now in his work and thought no more about the Sawtooth. He fastened the +log chain to the rear wheels to brake the wagon on the long grade down +the canyon, loaded the wagon with posts, bound them fast with a lighter +chain he had brought for the purpose, ate his own lunch and decided +that, since he had made fair time and would arrive home too early to do +the chores and too late to start any other job, he would cruise farther +up the mountain side and see what was the prospect of getting out logs +enough for an addition to the cabin. + +Now that Raine was going to live with him, two rooms were not enough. +Brit wanted to make her as happy as he could, in his limited fashion. He +had for some days been planning a "settin' room and bedroom" for her. +She would be having beaux after awhile when she got acquainted, he +supposed. He could not deny her the privilege; she was young and she +was, in Brit's opinion, the best looking girl he had ever seen, not even +excepting Minnie, her mother. But he hoped she wouldn't go off and get +married the first thing she did,--and one good way to prevent that, he +reasoned, was to make her comfortable with him. He had noticed how +pleased she was that their cabin was of logs. She had even remarked that +she could not understand how a rancher would ever want to build a board +shack if there was any timber to be had. Well, timber was to be had, and +she should have her log house, though the hauling was not going to be +any sunshine, in Brit's opinion. With his axe he walked through the +timber, craning upward for straight tree trunks and lightly blazing the +ones he would want, the occasional axe strokes sounding distinctly in +the quiet air. + +Lorraine heard them as she rode old Yellowjacket puffing up the grade, +following the wagon marks, and knew that she was nearing the end of her +journey,--for which Yellowjacket, she supposed, would be thankful. She +had started not more than an hour later than her father, but the team +had trotted along more briskly than her poor old nag would travel, so +that she did not overtake her dad as she had hoped. + +She was topping the last climb when she saw the team tied to the trees, +and at the same moment she caught a glimpse of a man who crawled out +from under the load of posts and climbed the slope farther on. She was +on the point of calling out to him, thinking that he was her dad, when +he disappeared into the brush. At the same moment she heard the stroke +of an axe over to the right of where the man was climbing. + +She was riding past the team when Caroline humped her back and kicked +viciously at Yellowjacket, who plunged straight down off the trail +without waiting to see whether Caroline's aim was exact. He slid into a +juniper thicket and sat down looking very perplexed and very permanently +placed there. Lorraine stepped off on the uphill side of him, thanked +her lucky stars she had not broken a leg, and tried to reassure +Yellowjacket and to persuade him that no real harm had been done him. +Straightway she discovered that Yellowjacket had a mind of his own and +that a pessimistic mind. He refused to scramble back into the trail, +preferring to sit where he was, or since Lorraine made that too +uncomfortable, to stand where he had been sitting. Yellowjacket, I may +explain, owned a Roman nose, a pendulous lower lip and drooping eyelids. +Those who know horses will understand. + +By the time Lorraine had bullied and cajoled him into making a somewhat +circuitous route to the road, where he finally appeared some distance +above the point of his descent, Brit was there, hitching the team to the +wagon. + +"What yuh doing up there?" he wanted to know, looking up with some +astonishment. + +Lorraine furnished him with details and her opinion of both Caroline and +Yellow jacket. "I simply refuse to ride this comedy animal another +mile," she declared with some heat. "I'll drive the team and you can +ride him home, or he can be tied on behind the wagon." + +"He won't lead," Brit objected. "Yeller's all right if you make up your +mind to a few failin's. You go ahead and ride him home. You sure can't +drive this team." + +"I can!" Lorraine contended. "I've driven four horses--I guess I can +drive two, all right." + +"Well, you ain't going to," Brit stated with a flat finality that +abruptly ended the argument. + +Lorraine had never before been really angry with her father. She struck +Yellowjacket with her quirt and sent him sidling past the wagon and the +tricky Caroline, too stubborn to answer her dad when he called after her +that she had better ride behind the load. She went on, making +Yellowjacket trot when he did not want to trot down hill. + +Behind her she heard the chuck-chuck of the loaded wagon. Far ahead she +heard some one whistling a high, sweet melody which had the queer, minor +strains of some old folk song. For just a few bars she heard it, and +then it was stilled, and the road dipping steeply before her seemed very +lonely, its emptiness cooling her brief anger to a depression that had +held her too often in its grip since that terrible night of the storm. +For the first time she looked back at her father lurching along on the +load and at the team looking so funny with the collars pushed up on +their necks with the weight of the load behind. + +With a quick impulse of penitence she waved her hand to Brit, who waved +back at her. Then she went on, feeling a bit less alone in the world. +After all, he was her dad, and his life had been hard. If he failed to +understand her and her mental hunger for real companionship, perhaps she +also failed to understand him. + +They had left the timber line now and had come to the lip of the canyon +itself. Lorraine looked down its steep, rock-roughened sides and +thought how her old director would have raved over its possibilities in +the way of "stunts." Yellow jacket, she noticed, kept circumspectly to +the center of the trail and eyed the canyon with frank disfavor. + +She did not know at just what moment she became aware of trouble behind +her. It may have been Yellowjacket, turning his head sidewise and +abruptly quickening his pace that warned her. It may have been the +difference in the sound of the wagon and the impact of the horses' hoofs +on the rocky trail. She turned and saw that something had gone wrong. +They were coming down upon her at a sharp trot, stepping high, the wagon +tongue thrust up between their heads as they tried to hold back the +load. + +Brit yelled to her then to get out of the way, and his voice was harsh +and insistent. Lorraine looked at the steep bank to the right, knew +instinctively that Yellowjacket would never have time to climb it before +the team was upon them, and urged him to a lope. She glanced back again, +saw that the team was not running away, that they were trying to hold +the wagon, and that it was gaining momentum in spite of them. + +"Jump, dad!" she called and got no answer. Brit was sitting braced with +his feet far apart, holding and guiding the team. "He won't jump--he +wouldn't jump--any more than I would," she chattered to herself, sick +with fear for him, while she lashed her own horse to keep out of their +way. + +The next she knew, the team was running, their eyeballs staring, their +front feet flung high as they lunged panic-stricken down the trail. The +load was rocking along behind them. Brit was still braced and clinging +to the reins. + +Panic seized Yellowjacket. He, too, went lunging down that trail, his +head thrown from side to side that he might watch the thing that menaced +him, heedless of the fact that danger might lie ahead of him also. +Lorraine knew that he was running senselessly, that he might leave the +trail at any bend and go rolling into the canyon. + +A sense of unreality seized her. It could not be deadly earnest, she +thought. It was so exactly like some movie thrill, planned carefully in +advance, rehearsed perhaps under the critical eye of the director, and +done now with the camera man turning calmly the little crank and +counting the number of film feet the scene would take. A little farther +and she would be out of the scene, and men stationed ahead would ride up +and stop her horse for her and tell her how well she had "put it over." + +She looked over her shoulder and saw them still coming. It was real. It +was terribly real, the way that team was fleeing down the grade. She had +never seen anything like that before, never seen horses so frantically +trying to run from the swaying load behind them. Always, she had been +accustomed to moderation in the pace and a slowed camera to speed up the +action on the screen. Yellowjacket, too--she had never ridden at that +terrific speed down hill. Twice she lost a stirrup and grabbed the +saddle horn to save herself from going over his head. + +They neared a sharp turn, and it took all her strength to pull her horse +to the inside and save him from plunging off down the canyon's side. The +nose of the hill hid for a moment her dad, and in that moment she heard +a crash and knew what had happened. But she could not stop; Yellowjacket +had his ears laid back flat on his senseless head, and the bit clamped +tight in his teeth. + +She heard the crash repeated in diminuendo farther down in the canyon. +There was no longer the rattle of the wagon coming down the trail, the +sharp staccato of pounding hoofs. + + + + +CHAPTER ELEVEN + +SWAN TALKS WITH HIS THOUGHTS + + +Lorraine, following instinct rather than thought, pulled Yellowjacket +into the first opening that presented itself. This was a narrow, rather +precipitous gully that seamed the slope just beyond the bend. The bushes +there whipped her head and shoulders cruelly as the horse forged in +among them, but they trapped him effectually where the gully narrowed to +a point. He stopped perforce, and Lorraine was out of the saddle and +running down to the trail before she quite realized what she was doing. + +At the bend she looked down, saw the marks where the wagon had gone +over, scraping rocks and bushes from its path. Fence posts were strewn +at all angles down the incline, and far down a horse was standing with +part of the harness on him and with his head drooping dispiritedly. Her +father she could not see, nor the other horse, nor the wagon. A clump +of young trees hid the lower declivity. Lorraine did not stop to think +of what she would find down there. Sliding, running, she followed the +traces of the wreck to where the horse was standing. It was Caroline, +looking very dejected but apparently unhurt, save for skinned patches +here and there where she had rolled over rocks. + +A little farther, just beyond the point of the grove which they seemed +to have missed altogether, lay the other horse and what was left of the +wagon. Brit she did not see at all. She searched the bushes, looked +under the wagon, and called and called. + +A full-voiced shout answered her from farther up the canyon, and she ran +stumbling toward the sound, too agonized to shed tears or to think very +clearly. It was not her father's voice; she knew that beyond all doubt. +It was no voice that she had ever heard before. It had a clear resonance +that once heard would not have been easily forgotten. When she saw them +finally, her father was being propped up in a half-sitting position, and +the strange man was holding something to his lips. + +"Just a little water. I carry me a bottle of water always in my pocket," +said Swan, glancing up at her when she had reached them. "It sometimes +makes a man's head think better when he has been hurt, if he can drink a +little water or something." + +Brit swallowed and turned his face away from the tilted bottle. "I +jumped--but I didn't jump quick enough," he muttered thickly. "The chain +pulled loose. Where's the horses, Raine?" + +"They're all right. Caroline's standing over there. Are you hurt much, +dad?" It was a futile question, because Brit was already going off into +unconsciousness. + +"He's hurt pretty bad," Swan declared honestly, looking up at her with +his eyes grown serious. "I was across the walley and I saw him coming +down the road like rolling rocks down a hill. I came quick. Now we make +stretcher, I think, and carry him home. I could take him on my back, but +that is hurting him too much." He looked at her--through her, it seemed +to Lorraine. In spite of her fear, in spite of her grief, she felt that +Swan was reading her very soul, and she backed away from him. + +"I could help your father very much," he said soberly, "but I should +tell you a secret if I do that. I should maybe ask that you tell a lie +if somebody asks questions. Could you do that, Miss?" + +"Lie?" Lorraine laughed uncertainly. "I'd _kill_!--if that would help +dad." + +Swan was folding his coat very carefully and placing it under Brit's +head. "My mother I love like that," he said, without looking up. "My +mother I love so well that I talk with my thoughts to her sometimes. You +believe people can talk with their thoughts?" + +"I don't know--what's that got to do with helping dad?" Lorraine knelt +beside Brit and began stroking his forehead softly, as is the soothing +way of women with their sick. + +"I could send my thought to my mother. I could say to her that a man is +hurt and that a doctor must come very quickly to the Quirt ranch. I +could do that, Miss, but I should not like it if people knew that I did +it. They would maybe say that I am crazy. They would laugh at me, and it +is not right to laugh at those things." + +"I'm not laughing. If you can do it, for heaven's sake go ahead! I don't +believe it, but I won't tell any one, if that's what you want." + +"If some neighbors should ask, 'How did that doctor come so quick?'----" + +"I'd rather lie and say I sent for him, than say that you or any one +else sent a telepathic message. That would sound more like a lie than a +lie would. How are we going to make a stretcher? We've got to get him +home, somehow----" + +"At my cabin is blankets," Swan told her briskly. "I can climb the +hill--it is up there. In a little while I will come back." + +He started off without waiting to see what Lorraine would have to say +about it, and with some misgivings she watched him run down to the +canyon's bottom and go forging up the opposite side with a most amazing +speed and certainty. In travel pictures she had seen mountain sheep +climb like that, and she likened him now to one of them. It seemed a +shame that he was a bit crazy, she thought; and immediately she recalled +his perfect assurance when he told her of sending thought messages to +his mother. She had heard of such things, she had even read a little on +the subject, but it had never seemed to her a practical means of +communicating. Calling a doctor, for instance, seemed to Lorraine +rather far-fetched an application of what was at best but a debatable +theory. + +Considering the distance, he was back in a surprisingly short time with +two blankets, a couple of light poles and a flask of brandy. He seemed +as fresh and unwinded as if he had gone no farther than the grove, and +he wore, more than ever, his air of cheerful assurance. + +"The doctor will be there," he remarked, just as if it were the simplest +thing in the world. "We can carry him to Fred Thurman's. There I can get +horses and a wagon, and you will not have to carry so far. And when we +get to your ranch the doctor will be there, I think. He is starting now. +We will hurry. I will fix it so you need not carry much. It is just to +make it steady for me." + +While he talked he was working on the stretcher. He had a rope, and he +was knotting it in a long loop to the poles. Lorraine wondered why, +until he had lifted her father and placed him on the stretcher and +placed the loop over his own head and under one arm, as a ploughman +holds the reins, so that his hands may be free. + +"If you will carry the front," said Swan politely, "it will not be +heavy for you like this. But you will help me keep it steady." + +Lorraine was past discussing anything. She obeyed him silently, lifting +the end of the stretcher and leading the way down to the canyon's +bottom, where Swan assured her they could walk quite easily and would +save many detours which the road above must take. At the bottom Swan +stopped her so that he might shorten the rope and take more of the +weight on his shoulders. She protested half-heartedly, but Swan only +laughed. + +"I am strong like a mule," he said. "You should see me wrestle with +somebody. Clear over my head--I can carry a man in my hands. This is so +you can walk fast. Three miles straight down we come to Thurman's ranch, +where I get the horses. It's funny how hills make a road far around. +Just three miles--that's all. I have walked many times." + +Lorraine did not answer him. She felt that he was talking merely to keep +her from worrying, and she was fairly sick with anxiety and did not hear +half of what he was saying. She was nervously careful about choosing her +steps so that she would not stumble and jolt her father. She did not +believe that he was wholly unconscious, for she had seen his eyelids +tighten and his lips twitch several times, when she was waiting for +Swan. He had seemed to be in pain and to be trying to hide the fact from +her. She felt that Swan knew it, else he would have talked of her dad, +would at least have tried to reassure her. But it is difficult to speak +of a person who hears what you are saying, and Swan was talking of +everything, it seemed to her, except the man they were carrying. + +She wondered if it were really true that Swan had sent a call through +space for a doctor; straightway she would call herself crazy for even +considering for a moment its possibility. If he could do that--but of +course he couldn't. He must just imagine it. + +Many times Swan had her lower the stretcher to the ground, and would +make a great show of rubbing his arms and easing his shoulder muscles. +Whenever Lorraine looked full into his face he would grin at her as +though nothing was wrong, and when they came to a clear-running stream +he emptied the water bottle, dipped up a little fresh water, added +brandy, and lifted Brit's head very gently and gave him a drink. Brit +opened his eyes and looked at Swan, and from him to Lorraine, but he did +not say anything. He still had that tightened look around his mouth +which spelled pain. + +"Pretty quick now we get you fixed up good," Swan told him cheerfully. +"One mile more is all, and we get the horses and I make a good bed for +you." He looked a signal, and Lorraine once more took up the stretcher. + +Another mile seemed a long way, light though Swan had made the load for +her. She thought once that he must have some clairvoyant power, because +whenever she felt as if her arms were breaking, Swan would tell her to +stop a minute. + +"How do you know a doctor will come?" she asked Swan suddenly, when they +were resting with the Thurman ranch in view half a mile below them. + +Swan did not look at her directly, as had been his custom. She saw a +darker shade of red creep up into his cheeks. "My mother says she would +send a doctor quick," he replied hesitatingly. "You will see. It is +because--your father he is not like other men in this country. Your +father is a good man. That is why a doctor comes." + +Lorraine looked at him strangely and stooped again to her burden. She +did not speak again until they were passing the Thurman fence where it +ran up into the mouth of the canyon. A few horses were grazing there, +the sun striking their sides with the sheen of satin. They stared +curiously at the little procession, snorted and started to run, heads +and tails held high. But one wheeled suddenly and came galloping toward +them, stopped when he was quite close, ducked and went thundering past +to the head of the field. Lorraine gave a sharp little scream and set +down the stretcher with a lurch, staring after the horse wide-eyed, her +face white. + +"They do it for play," Swan said reassuringly. "They don't hurt you. The +fence is between, and they don't hurt you anyway." + +"That horse with the white face--I saw it--and when the man struck it +with his quirt it went past me, running like that and dragging--_oh-h_!" +She leaned against the bluff side, her face covered with her two palms. + +Swan glanced down at Brit, saw that his eyes were closed, ducked his +head from under the looped rope and went to Lorraine. + +"The man that struck that horse--do you know that man?" he asked, all +the good nature gone from his voice. + +"No--I don't know--I saw him twice, by the lightning flashes. He +shot--and then I saw him----" She stopped abruptly, stood for a minute +longer with her eyes covered, then dropped her hands limply to her +sides. But when the horse came circling back with a great flourish, she +shivered and her hands closed into the fists of a fighter. + +"Are you a Sawtooth man?" she demanded suddenly, looking up at Swan +defiantly. "It was a nightmare. I--I dreamed once about a horse--like +that." + +Swan's wide-open eyes softened a little. "The Sawtooth calls me that +damn Swede on Bear Top," he explained. "I took a homestead up there and +some day they will want to buy my place or they will want to make a +fight with me to get the water. Could you know that man again?" + +"Raine!" Brit's voice held a warning, and Lorraine shivered again as she +turned toward him. "Raine, you----" + +He closed his eyes again, and she could get no further speech from him. +But she thought she understood. He did not want her to talk about Fred +Thurman. She went to her end of the stretcher and waited there while +Swan put the rope over his head. They went on, Lorraine walking with her +head averted, trying not to see the blaze-faced roan, trying to shut out +the memory of him dashing past her with his terrible burden, that night. + +Swan did not speak of the matter again. With Lorraine's assistance he +carried Brit into Thurman's cabin, laid him, stretcher and all, on the +bed and hurried out to catch and harness the team of work horses. +Lorraine waited beside her father, helpless and miserable. There was +nothing to do but wait, yet waiting seemed to her the one thing she +could not do. + +"Raine!" Brit's voice was very weak, but Lorraine jumped as though a +trumpet had bellowed suddenly in her ear. "Swan--he's all right. But +don't go telling--all yuh know and some besides. He ain't--Sawtooth, +but--he might let out----" + +"I know. I won't, dad. It was that horse----" + +Brit turned his face to the wall as if no more was to be said on the +subject. Lorraine wandered around the cabin, which was no larger than +her father's place. The rooms were scrupulously clean--neater than the +Quirt, she observed guiltily. Not one article, however small and +unimportant, seemed to be out of its place, and the floors of both rooms +were scrubbed whiter than any floors she had ever seen. Swan's +housekeeping qualities made her ashamed of her own imperfections; and +when, thinking that Swan must be hungry and that the least she could do +was to set out food for him, she opened the cupboard, she had a swift, +embarrassed vision of her own culinary imperfections. She could cook +better food than her dad had been content to eat and to set before +others, but Swan's bread was a triumph in sour dough. Biscuits tall and +light as bread can be she found, covered neatly with a cloth. Prunes +stewed so that there was not one single wrinkle in them--Lorraine could +scarcely believe they were prunes until she tasted them. She was +investigating a pot of beans when Swan came in. + +"Food I am thinking of, Miss," he grinned at her. "We shall hurry, but +it is not good to go hungry. Milk is outside in a cupboard. It is +quicker than to make coffee." + +"It will be dark before we can get him home," said Lorraine uneasily. +"And by the time a doctor can get out there----" + +"A doctor will be there, I think. You don't believe, but that is no +difference to his coming just the same." + +He brought the milk, poured off the creamy top into a pitcher, stirred +it, and quietly insisted that she drink two glasses. Lorraine observed +that Swan himself ate very little, bolting down a biscuit in great +mouthfuls while he carried a mattress and blankets out to spread in the +wagon. It was like his pretense of weariness on the long carry down the +canyon, she thought. It was for her more than for himself that he was +thinking. + + + + +CHAPTER TWELVE + +THE QUIRT PARRIES THE FIRST BLOW + + +A car with dimmed lights stood in front of the Quirt cabin when Swan +drove around the last low ridge and down to the gate. The rattle of the +wagon must have been heard, for the door opened suddenly and Frank stood +revealed in the yellow light of the kerosene lamp on the table within. +Behind Frank, Lorraine saw Jim and Sorry standing in their shirt sleeves +looking out into the dark. Another, shorter figure she glimpsed as Frank +and the two men stepped out and came striding hastily toward them. +Lorraine jumped out and ran to meet them, hoping and fearing that her +hope was foolish. That car might easily be only Bob Warfield on some +errand of no importance. Still, she hoped. + +"That you, Raine? Where's Brit? What's all this about Brit being hurt? A +doctor from Shoshone----" + +"A _doctor_? Oh, did a doctor come, then? Oh, help Swan carry dad in! +I'm--oh, I'm afraid he's awfully injured!" + +"Yes-s--but how'n hell did a doctor know about it?" Sorry, the silent, +blurted unexpectedly. + +"Oh,--never mind--but get dad in. I'll----" She ran past them without +finishing her sentence and burst incoherently into the presence of an +extremely calm little man with gray whiskers and dust on the shoulders +of his coat. These details, I may add, formed the sum of Lorraine's +first impression of him. + +"Well! Well!" he remonstrated with a professional briskness, when she +nearly bowled him over. "We seem to be in something of a hurry! Is this +the patient I was sent to examine?" + +"No!" Lorraine flashed impatiently over her shoulder as she rushed into +her own room and began turning down the covers. "It's dad, of +course--and you'd better get your coat off and get ready to go to work, +because I expect he's just one mass of broken bones!" + +The doctor smiled behind his whiskers and returned to the doorway to +direct the carrying in of his patient. His sharp eyes went immediately +to Brit's face, pallid under the leathery tan, his fingers went to +Brit's hairy, corded wrist. The doctor smiled no more that evening. + +"No, he is not a mass of broken bones, I am happy to say," he reported +gravely to Lorraine afterwards. "He has a sufficient number, however. +The left scapula is fractured, likewise the clavicle, and there is a +compound fracture of the femur. There is some injury to the head, the +exact extent of which I cannot as yet determine. He should be removed to +a hospital, unless you are prepared to have a nurse here for some time, +or to assume the burden of a long and tedious illness." He looked at her +thoughtfully. "The journey to Shoshone would be a considerable strain on +the patient in his present condition. He has a splendid amount of +constitutional vitality, or he would scarcely have survived his injuries +so long without medical attendance. Can you tell me just how the +accident occurred?" + +"Excuse me, doctor--and Miss," Swan diffidently interrupted. "I could +ask you to take a look on my shoulder, if you please. If you are done +setting bones in Mr. Hunter. I have a great pain on my shoulder from +carrying so long." + +"You never mentioned it!" Lorraine reproached him quickly. "Of course +it must be looked after right away. And then, Doctor, I'd like to talk +to you, if you don't mind." She watched them retreat to the bunk-house +together, Swan's big form towering above the doctor's slighter figure. +Swan was talking earnestly, the mumble of his voice reaching Lorraine +without the enunciation of any particular word to give a clue to what he +was saying. But it struck her that his voice did not sound quite +natural; not so Swedish, not so careful. + +Frank came tiptoeing out of the room where Brit lay bandaged and +unconscious and stood close to Lorraine, looking down at her solemnly. + +"How 'n 'ell did he git here--the doctor?" he demanded, making a great +effort to hold his voice down to a whisper, and forgetting now and then. +"How'd _he_ know Brit rolled off'n the grade? Us here, _we_ never knowed +it, and I was tryin' to send him back when you came. He said somebody +telephoned there was a man hurt in a runaway. There ain't a telephone +closer'n the Sawtooth, and that there's a good twenty mile and more from +where Brit was hurt. It's damn funny." + +"Yes, it is," Lorraine admitted uncomfortably. "I don't know any more +than you do about it." + +"Well, how'n 'ell did it happen? Brit, he oughta know enough to +rough-lock down that hill. An' that team ain't a runaway team. _I_ never +had no trouble with 'em--they're good at holdin' a load. They'll set +down an' slide but what they'll hold 'er. What become of the horses?" + +"Why--they're over there yet. We forgot all about the horses, I think. +Caroline was standing up, all right. The other horse may be killed. I +don't know--it was lying down. And Yellowjacket was up that little gully +just this side of the wreck, when I left him. They did try to hold the +load, Frank. Something must have happened to the brake. I saw dad +crawling out from under the wagon just before I got to where the load +was standing. Or some one did. I think it was dad. But Caroline kicked +my horse down off the road, and I only saw him a minute--but it _must_ +have been dad. And then, a little way down the hill, something went +wrong." + +Frank seemed trying to reconstruct the accident from Lorraine's +description. "He'd no business to start down if his rough-lock wasn't +all right," he said. "It ain't like him. Brit's careful about them +things--little men most always are. I don't see how 'n 'ell it worked +loose. It's a damn queer layout all around; and this here doctor gitting +here ahead of you folks, that there is the queerest. What's he say about +Brit? Think he'll pull through?" + +The doctor himself, coming up just then, answered the question. Of +course the patient would pull through! What were doctors for? As to his +reason for coming, he referred them to Mr. Vjolmar, whom he thought +could better explain the matter. + +The three of them waited,--five of them, since Jim and Sorry had come +up, anxious to hear the doctor's opinion and anything else pertaining to +the affair. Swan was coming slowly from the bunk-house, buttoning his +coat. He seemed to feel that they were waiting for him and to know why. +His manner was diffident, deprecating even. + +"We may as well go in out of the mosquitoes," the doctor suggested. "And +I wish you would tell these people what you told me, young man. Don't be +afraid to speak frankly; it is rather amazing but not at all +impossible, as I can testify. In fact," he added dryly, "my presence +here ought to settle any doubt of that. Just tell them, young man, about +your mother." + +Swan was the last to enter the kitchen, and he stood leaning against the +closed door, turning his old hat round and round, his eyes going swiftly +from face to face. They were watching him, and Swan blushed a deep red +while he told them about his mother in Boise, and how he could talk to +her with his thoughts. He explained laboriously how the thoughts from +her came like his mother speaking in his head, and that his thoughts +reached her in the same way. He said that since he was a little boy they +could talk together with their thoughts, but people laughed and some +called them crazy, so that now he did not like to have somebody know +that he could do it. + +"But Brit Hunter's hurt bad, so a doctor must come quick, or I think he +maybe will die. It takes too long to ride a horse to Echo from this +ranch, so I call on my mother, and I tell my mother a doctor must come +quick to this ranch. So my mother sends a telephone to this doctor in +Shoshone, and he comes. That is all. But I would not like it if +everybody maybe finds it out that I do that, and makes talk about it." + +He looked straight at Jim and Sorry, and those two unprepossessing ones +looked at each other and at Swan and at the doctor and at each other +again, and headed for the door. But Swan was leaning against it, and his +eyes were on them. "I would like it if you say somebody rides to get the +doctor," he hinted quietly. + +Sorry looked at Jim. "I rode like hell," he stated heavily. "I leave it +to Jim." + +"You shore'n hell did!" Jim agreed, and Swan removed his big form from +the door. + +"You boys goin' over t' Spirit Canyon?" Frank wanted to know. + +"Yeah," said Sorry, answering for them both, and they went out, giving +Swan a sidelong look of utter bafflement as they passed him. Talking by +the thought route from Spirit Canyon to Boise City was evidently a bit +too much for even their phlegmatic souls to contemplate with perfect +calm. + +"They'll keep it to theirselves, whether they believe it or not," Frank +assured Swan in his labored whisper. "It don't go down with me. I ain't +supe'stitious enough fer that." + +"The doctor he comes, don't he?" Swan retorted. "I shall go back now and +milk the cows and do chores." + +"But if your shoulder is lame, Swan, how can you?" Lorraine asked in her +unexpected fashion. + +Swan swallowed and looked helplessly at the doctor, who stood smoothing +his chin. "The muscle strain is not serious," he said calmly. "A little +gentle exercise will prevent further trouble, I think." Whereupon he +turned abruptly to the door of the other room, glanced in at Brit and +beckoned Lorraine with an upraised finger. + +"You have had a hard time of it yourself, young lady," he told her. "You +needn't worry about Swan. He is not suffering appreciably. I shall mix +you a very unpleasant dose of medicine, and then I want you to go to bed +and sleep. I shall stay with your father to-night; not that it is +necessary, but because I prefer daylight for the trip back to town. So +there is no reason why you should sit up and wear yourself out. You will +have plenty of time to do that while your father's bones mend." + +He proceeded to mix the unpleasant dose, which Lorraine swallowed and +straightway forgot, in the muddle of thoughts that whirled confusingly +in her brain. Little things distressed her oddly, while her father's +desperate state left her numb. She lay down on the cot in the farther +corner of the kitchen where her father had slept just last night--it +seemed so long ago!--and almost immediately, as her senses recorded it, +bright sunlight was shining into the room. + + + + +CHAPTER THIRTEEN + +LONE TAKES HIS STAND + + +Lone Morgan, over at Elk Spring camp, was just sitting down to eat his +midday meal when some one shouted outside. Lone stiffened in his chair, +felt under his coat, and then got up with some deliberation and looked +out of the window before he went to the door. All this was a matter of +habit, bred of Lone's youth in the feud country, and had nothing +whatever to do with his conscience. + +"Hello!" he called, standing in the doorway and grinning a welcome to +Swan, who stood with one arm resting on the board gate. "She's on the +table--come on in." + +"I don't know if you're home with the door shut like that," Swan +explained, coming up to the cabin. "I chased a coyote from Rock City to +here, and by golly, he's going yet! I'll get him sometime, maybe. He's +smart, but you can beat anything with thinking if you don't stop +thinking. Always the other feller stops sometimes, and then you get +him. You believe that?" + +"It most generally works out that way," Lone admitted, getting another +plate and cup from the cupboard, which was merely a box nailed with its +bottom to the wall, and a flour sack tacked across the front for a +curtain. "Even a coyote slips up now and then, I reckon." + +Swan sat down, smoothing his tousled yellow hair with both hands as he +did so. "By golly, my shoulder is sore yet from carrying Brit Hunter," +he remarked carelessly, flexing his muscles and grimacing a little. + +Lone was pouring the coffee, and he ran Swan's cup over before he +noticed what he was doing. Swan looked up at him and looked away again, +reaching for a cloth to wipe the spilled coffee from the table. + +"How was that?" Lone asked, turning away to the stove. "What-all +happened to Brit Hunter?" + +Swan, with his plate filled and his coffee well sweetened, proceeded to +relate with much detail the story of Brit's misfortune. "By golly, I +don't see how he don't get killed," he finished, helping himself to +another biscuit. "By _golly_, I don't. Falling into Spirit Canyon is +like getting dragged by a horse. It should kill a man. What you think, +Lone?" + +"It didn't, you say." Lone's eyes were turned to his coffee cup. + +"It don't kill Brit Hunter--not yet. I think maybe he dies with all his +bones broke, like that. By golly, that shows you what could happen if a +man don't think. Brit should look at that chain on his wheel before he +starts down that road." + +"Oh. His brake didn't hold, eh?" + +"I look at that wagon," Swan answered carefully. "It is something funny +about that chain. I worked hauling logs in the mountains, once. It is +something damn funny about that chain, the way it's fixed." + +Lone did not ask him for particulars, as perhaps Swan expected. He did +not speak at all for awhile, but presently pushed back his plate as if +his appetite were gone. + +"It's like Fred Thurman," Swan continued moralizing. "If Fred don't ride +backwards, I bet he don't get killed--like that." + +"Where's Brit now?" Lone asked, getting up and putting on his hat. "At +the ranch?" + +"Or heaven, maybe," Swan responded sententiously. "But my dog Yack, he +don't howl yet. I guess Brit's at the ranch." + +"Sorry I'm busy to-day," said Lone, opening the door. "You stay as long +as you like, Swan. I've got some riding to do." + +"I'll wash the dishes, and then I maybe will think quicker than that +coyote. I'm after him, by golly, till I get him." + +Lone muttered something and went out. Within five minutes Swan, hearing +hoofbeats, looked out through a crack in the door and saw Lone riding at +a gallop along the trail to Rock City. "Good bait. He swallows the +hook," he commented to himself, and his good-natured grin was not +brightening his face while he washed the dishes and tidied the cabin. + +With Lone rode bitterness of soul and a sick fear that had nothing to do +with his own destiny. How long ago Brit had been hurled into the canyon +Lone did not know; he had not asked. But he judged that it must have +been very recently. Swan had not told him of anything but the runaway, +and of helping to carry Brit home--and of the "damn funny thing about +the chain"--the rough-lock, he must have meant. Too well Lone +understood the sinister meaning that probably lay behind that phrase. + +"They've started on the Quirt now," he told himself with foreboding. +"She's been telling her father----" + +Lone fell into bitter argument with himself. Just how far was it +justifiable to mind his own business? And if he did not mind it, what +possible chance had he against a power so ruthless and so cunning? An +accident to a man driving a loaded wagon down the Spirit Canyon grade +had a diabolic plausibility that no man in the country could question. +Brit, he reasoned, could not have known before he started that his +rough-lock had been tampered with, else he would have fixed it. Neither +was Brit the man to forget the brake on his load. If Brit lived, he +might talk as much as he pleased, but he could never prove that his +accident had been deliberately staged with murderous intent. + +Lone lifted his head and looked away across the empty miles of sageland +to the quiet blue of the mountains beyond. Peace--the peace of +untroubled wilderness--brooded over the land. Far in the distance, +against the rim of rugged hills, was an irregular splotch of brown which +was the headquarters of the Sawtooth. Lone turned his wrist to the +right, and John Doe, obeying the rein signal, left the trail and began +picking his way stiff-legged down the steep slope of the ridge, heading +directly toward the home ranch. + +John Doe was streaked with sweat and his flanks were palpitating with +fatigue when Lone rode up to the corral and dismounted. Pop Bridgers saw +him and came bow-legging eagerly forward with gossip titillating on his +meddlesome tongue, but Lone stalked by him with only a surly nod. Bob +Warfield he saw at a distance and gave no sign of recognition. He met +Hawkins coming down from his house and stopped in the trail. + +"Have you got time to go back to the office and fix up my time, +Hawkins?" he asked without prelude. "I'm quitting to-day." + +Hawkins stared and named the Biblical place of torment. "What yuh +quittin' for, Lone?" he added incredulously. "All you boys got a raise +last month; ain't that good enough?" + +"Plenty good enough, so long as I work for the outfit." + +"Well, what's wrong? You've been with us five years, Lone, and it's +suited you all right so far----" + +Lone looked at him. "Say, I never set out to _marry_ the Sawtooth," he +stated calmly. "And if I have married you-all by accident, you can get a +bill of divorce for desertion. This ain't the first time a man ever quit +yuh, is it, Hawkins?" + +"No--and there ain't a man on the pay roll we can't do without," Hawkins +retorted, his neck stiffening with resentment. "It's a kinda rusty +trick, though, Lone, quittin' without notice and leaving a camp empty." + +"Elk Spring won't run away," Lone assured him without emotion. "She's +been left alone a week or two at a time during roundups. I don't reckon +the outfit'll bust up before you get a man down there." + +The foreman looked at him curiously, for this was not like Lone, whose +tone had always been soft and friendly, and whose manner had no hint of +brusqueness. There was a light, too, in Lone's eyes that had not been +there before. But Hawkins would not question him further. If Lone Morgan +or any other man wanted to quit, that was his privilege,--providing, of +course, that his leaving was not likely to menace the peace and +security of the Sawtooth. Lone had made it a point to mind his own +business, always. He had never asked questions, he had never surmised or +gossiped. So Hawkins gave him a check for his wages and let him go with +no more than a foreman's natural reluctance to lose a trustworthy man. + +By hard riding along short cuts, Lone reached the Quirt ranch and +dropped reins at the doorstep, not much past mid-afternoon. + +"I rode over to see if there's anything I can do," he said, when +Lorraine opened the door to him. He did not like to ask about her +father, fearing that the news would be bad. + +"Why, thank you for coming." Lorraine stepped back, tacitly inviting him +to enter. "Dad knows us to-day, but of course he's terribly hurt and +can't talk much. We do need some one to go to town for things. Frank +helps me with dad, and Jim and Sorry are trying to keep things going on +the ranch. And Swan does what he can, of course, but----" + +"I just thought you maybe needed somebody right bad," said Lone quietly, +meaning a great deal more than Lorraine dreamed that he meant. "I'm not +doing anything at all, right now, so I can just as well help out as +not. I can go to town right away, if I can borrow a horse. John Doe, +he's pretty tired. I been pushing him right through--not knowing there +was a town trip ahead of him." + +Lorraine found her eyes going misty. He was so quiet, and so reassuring +in his quiet. Half her burden seemed to slip from her shoulders while +she looked at him. She turned away, groping for the door latch. + +"You may see dad, if you like, while I get the list of things the doctor +ordered. He left only a little while ago, and I was waiting for one of +the boys to come back so I could send him to town." + +It was on Lone's tongue to ask why the doctor had not taken in the order +himself and instructed some one to bring out the things; but he +remembered how very busy with its own affairs was Echo and decided that +the doctor was wise. + +He tiptoed in to the bed and saw a sallow face covered with stubbly gray +whiskers and framed with white bandages. Brit opened his eyes and moved +his thin lips in some kind of greeting, and Lone sat down on the edge of +a chair, feeling as miserably guilty as if he himself had brought the +old man to this pass. It seemed to him that Brit must know more of the +accident than Swan had told, and the thought did not add to his comfort. +He waited until Brit opened his eyes again, and then he leaned forward, +holding Brit's wandering glance with his own intent gaze. + +"I ain't working now," he said, lowering his voice so that Lorraine +could not hear. "So I'm going to stay here and help see you through with +this. I've quit the Sawtooth." + +Brit's eyes cleared and studied Lone's face. "D'you know--anything?" + +"No, I don't." Lone's face hardened a little. "But I wanted you to know +that I'm--with the Quirt, now." + +"Frank hire yuh?" + +"No. I ain't hired at all. I'm just--_with_ yuh." + +"We--need yuh," said Brit grimly, looking Lone straight in the eyes. + + + + +CHAPTER FOURTEEN + +"FRANK'S DEAD" + + +"Frank come yet?" The peevish impatience of an invalid whose horizon has +narrowed to his own personal welfare and wants was in Brit's voice. Two +weeks he had been sick, and his temper had not sweetened with the pain +of his broken bones and the enforced idleness. Brit was the type of man +who is never quiet unless he is asleep or too ill to get out of bed. + +Lorraine came to the doorway and looked in at him. Two weeks had set +their mark on her also. She seemed older, quieter in her ways; there +were shadows in her eyes and a new seriousness in the set of her mouth. +She had had her burdens, and she had borne them with more patience than +many an older woman would have done, but what she thought of those +burdens she did not say. + +"No, dad--but I thought I heard a wagon a little while ago. He must be +coming," she said. + +"Where's Lone at?" Brit moved restlessly on the pillow and twisted his +face at the pain. + +"Lone isn't back, either." + +"He ain't? Where'd he go?" + +Lorraine came to the bedside and, lifting Brit's head carefully, +arranged the pillow as she knew he liked it. "I don't know where he +went," she said dully. "He rode off just after dinner. Do you want your +supper now? Or would you rather wait until Frank brings the fruit?" + +"I'd ruther wait--if Frank don't take all night," Brit grumbled. "I hope +he ain't connected up with that Echo booze. If he has----" + +"Oh, no, dad! Don't borrow trouble. Frank was anxious to get home as +soon as he could. He'll be coming any minute, now. I'll go listen for +the wagon." + +"No use listenin'. You couldn't hear it in that sand--not till he gits +to the gate. I don't see where Lone goes to, all the time. Where's Jim +and Sorry, then?" + +"Oh, they've had their supper and gone to the bunk-house. Do you want +them?" + +"No! What'd I want 'em fur? Not to look at, that's sure. I want to know +how things is going on this ranch. And from all I can make out, they +ain't goin' at all," Brit fretted. "What was you 'n Lone talkin' so long +about, out in the kitchen last night? Seems to me you 'n' him have got +a lot to say to each other, Raine." + +"Why, nothing in particular. We were just--talking. We're all human +beings, dad; we have to talk sometimes. There's nothing else to do." + +"Well, I caught something about the Sawtooth. I don't want you talking +to Lone or anybody else about that outfit, Raine. I told yuh so once. +He's all right--I ain't saying anything against Lone--but the less you +have to say the more you'll have to be thankful fur, mebby." + +"I was wondering if Swan could have gotten word somehow to the Sawtooth +and had them telephone out that you were hurt. And Lone was drawing a +map of the trails and showing me how far it was from the canyon to the +Sawtooth ranch. And he was asking me just how it happened that the brake +didn't hold, and I said it must have been all right, because I saw you +come out from under the wagon just before you hitched up. I thought you +were fixing the chain on them." + +"Huh?" Brit lifted his head off the pillow and let it drop back again, +because of the pain in his shoulder. "You never seen me crawl out from +under no wagon. I come straight down the hill to the team." + +"Well, I saw some one. He went up into the brush. I thought it was you." +Lorraine turned in the doorway and stood looking at him perplexedly. "We +shouldn't be talking about it, dad--the doctor said we mustn't. But are +you _sure_ it wasn't you? Because I certainly saw a man crawl out from +under the wagon and start up the hill. Then the horses acted up, and I +couldn't see him after Yellowjacket jumped off the road." + +Brit lay staring up at the ceiling, apparently unheeding her +explanation. Lorraine watched him for a minute and returned to the +kitchen door, peering out and listening for Frank to come from Echo with +supplies and the mail and, more important just now, fresh fruit for her +father. + +"I think he's coming, dad," she called in to her father. "I just heard +something down by the gate." + +She could save a few minutes, she thought, by running down to the corral +where Frank would probably stop and unload the few sacks of grain he was +bringing, before he drove up to the house. Frank was very methodical in +a fussy, purposeless way, she had observed. Twice he had driven to Echo +since her father had been hurt, and each time he had stopped at the +corral on his way to the house. So she closed the screen door behind +her, careful that it should not slam, and ran down the path in the heavy +dusk wherein crickets were rasping a strident chorus. + +"Oh! It's you, is it, Lone?" she exclaimed, when she neared the vague +figure of a man unsaddling a horse. "You didn't see Frank coming +anywhere, did you? Dad won't have his supper until Frank comes with the +things I sent for. He's late." + +Lone was lifting the saddle off the back of John Doe, which he had +bought from the Sawtooth because he was fond of the horse. He hesitated +and replaced the saddle, pulling the blanket straight under it. + +"I saw him coming an hour ago," he said. "I was back up on the ridge, +and I saw a team turn into the Quirt trail from the ford. It couldn't be +anybody but Frank. I'll ride out and meet him." + +He was mounted and gone before she realized that he was ready. She heard +the sharp staccato of John Doe's hoofbeats and wondered why Lone had not +waited for another word from her. It was as if she had told him that +Frank was in some terrible danger,--yet she had merely complained that +he was late. The bunk-house door opened, and Sorry came out on the +doorstep, stood there a minute and came slowly to meet her as she +retraced her steps to the house. + +"Where'd Lone go so sudden?" he asked, when she came close to him in the +dusk. "That was him, wasn't it?" + +Lorraine stopped and stood looking at him without speaking. A vague +terror had seized her. She wanted to scream, and yet she could think of +nothing to scream over. It was Lone's haste, she told herself +impatiently. Her nerves were ragged from nursing her dad and from +worrying over things she must not talk about,--that forbidden subject +which never left her mind for long. + +"Wasn't that him?" Sorry repeated uneasily. "What took him off again in +such a rush?" + +"Oh, I don't know! He said Frank should have been here long ago. He went +to look for him. Sorry," she cried suddenly, "what _is_ the matter with +this place? I feel as if something horrible was just ready to jump out +at us all. I--I want my back against something solid, all the time, so +that nothing can creep up behind. Nothing," she added desperately, +"could happen to Frank between here and the turn-off at the ford, could +it? Lone saw him turn into our trail over an hour ago, he said." + +Sorry, his fingers thrust into his overalls pockets, his thumbs hooked +over the waistband, spat into the sand beside the path. "Well, he +started off with a cracked doubletree," he said slowly. "He mighta +busted 'er pullin' through that sand hollow. She was wired up pretty +good, though, and there was more wire in the rig. I don't know of +anything else that'd be liable to happen, unless----" + +"Unless what?" Lorraine prompted sharply. "There's too much that isn't +talked about, on this ranch. What else could happen?" + +Sorry edged away from her. "Well--I dunno as anything would be liable to +happen," he said uncomfortably. "'Taint likely him 'n' Brit 'd both have +accidents--not right hand-runnin'." + +"_Accidents_?" Lorraine felt her throat squeeze together. "Sorry, you +don't mean--Sawtooth accidents?" she blurted. + +She surprised a grunt out of Sorry, who looked over his shoulder as if +he feared eavesdroppers. "Where'd you git that idee?" he demanded. "I +dunno what you mean. Ain't that yore dad callin' yuh?" + +Lorraine ignored the hint. "You _do_ know what I mean. Why did you say +they wouldn't both be likely to have accidents hand-running? And why +don't you _do_ something? Why does every one just keep still and let +things happen, and not say a word? If there's any chance of Frank having +an--an _accident_, I should think you'd be out looking after him, and +not standing there with your hands in your pockets just waiting to see +if he shows up or if he doesn't show up. You're all just like these +rabbits out in the sage. You'll hide under a bush and wait until you're +almost stepped on before you so much as wiggle an ear! I'm getting good +and tired of this meek business!" + +"We-ell," Sorry drawled amiably as she went past him, "playin' +rabbit-under-a-bush mebby don't look purty, but it's dern good life +insurance." + +"A coward's policy," Lorraine taunted him over her shoulder, and went to +see what her father wanted. When he, too, wanted to know why Lone had +come and gone again in such a hurry, Lorraine felt all the courage go +out of her at once. Their very uneasiness seemed to prove that there +was more than enough cause for it. Yet, when she forced herself to stop +and think, it was all about nothing. Frank had driven to Echo and had +not returned exactly on time, though a dozen things might have detained +him. + +She was listening at the door when Swan appeared unexpectedly before +her, having walked over from the Thurman ranch after doing the chores. +To him she observed that Frank was an hour late, and Swan, whistling +softly to Jack--Lorraine was surprised to hear how closely the call +resembled the chirp of a bird--strode away without so much as a pretense +at excuse. Lorraine stared after him wide-eyed, wondering and yet not +daring to wonder. + +Her father called to her fretfully, and she went in to him again and +told him what Sorry had said about the cracked doubletree, and persuaded +him to let her bring his supper at once, and to have the fruit later +when Frank arrived. Brit did not say much, but she sensed his +uneasiness, and her own increased in proportion. Later she saw two tiny, +glowing points down by the corral and knew that Sorry and Jim were down +there, waiting and listening, ready to do whatever was needed of them; +although what that would be she could not even conjecture. + +She made her father comfortable, chattered aimlessly to combat her +understanding of his moody silence, and listened and waited and tried +her pitiful best not to think that anything could be wrong. The subdued +chuckling of the wagon in the sand outside the gate startled her with +its unmistakable reality after so many false impressions that she heard +it. + +"Frank's coming, dad," she announced relievedly, "and I'll go and get +the mail and the fruit." + +She ran down the path again, almost light-hearted in her relief from +that vague terror which had held her for the past hour. From the corral +Sorry and Jim came walking up the path to meet the wagon which was +making straight for the bunk-house instead of going first to the stable. +One man rode on the seat, driving the team which walked slowly, oddly, +reminding Lorraine of a funeral procession. Beside the wagon rode Lone, +his head drooped a little in the starlight. It was not until the team +stopped before the bunk-house that Lorraine knew what it was that gave +her that strange, creepy feeling of disaster. It was not Frank Johnson, +but Swan Vjolmar who climbed limberly down from the seat without +speaking and turned toward the back of the wagon. + +"Why, where's Frank?" she asked, going up to where Lone was dismounting +in silence. + +"He's there--in the wagon. We picked him up back here about +three-quarters of a mile or so." + +"What's the matter? Is he drunk?" This was Sorry who came up to Swan and +stood ready to lend a hand. + +"He's so drunk he falls out of wagon down the road, but he don't have +whisky smell by his face," was Swan's ambiguous reply. + +"He's not hurt, is he?" Lorraine pressed close, and felt a hand on her +arm pulling her gently away. + +"He's hurt," Lone said, just behind her. "We'll take him into the +bunk-house and bring him to. Run along to the house and don't worry--and +don't say anything to your dad, either. There's no need to bother him +about it. We'll look after Frank." + +Already Swan and Sorry and Jim were lifting Frank's limp form from the +rear of the wagon. It sagged in their arms like a dead thing, and +Lorraine stepped back shuddering as they passed her. A minute later she +followed them inside, where Jim was lighting the lamp with shaking +fingers. By the glow of the match Lorraine saw how sober Jim looked, how +his chin was trembling under the drooping, sandy mustache. She stared at +him, hating to read the emotion in his heavy face that she had always +thought so utterly void of feeling. + +"It isn't--he isn't----" she began, and turned upon Swan, who was beside +the bunk, looking down at Frank's upturned face. "Swan, if it's serious +enough for a doctor, can't you send another thought message to your +mother?" she asked. "He looks--oh, Lone! He isn't _dead_, is he?" + +Swan turned his head and stared down at her, and from her face his +glance went sharply to Lone's downcast face. He looked again at +Lorraine. + +"To-night I can't talk with my mind," Swan told her bluntly. "Not always +I can do that. I could ask Lone how can a man be drunk so he falls off +the wagon when no whisky smell is on his breath." + +"Breath? Hell! There ain't no breath to smell," Sorry exclaimed as +unexpectedly as his speeches usually were. "If he's breathin' I can't +tell it on him." + +"He's got to be breathing!" Lone declared with a suppressed fierceness +that made them all look at him. "I found a half bottle of whisky in his +pocket--but Swan's right. There wasn't a smell of it on his breath--I +tell you now, boys, that he was lying in the sand between two +sagebushes, on his face. And there is where he got the blow--_behind his +ear_. It's one of them accidents that you've got to figure out for +yourself." + +"Oh, do something!" Lorraine cried distractedly. "Never mind now how it +happened, or whether he was drunk or not--bring him to his senses first, +and let him explain. If there's whisky, wouldn't that help if he +swallowed some now? And there's medicine for dad's bruises in the house. +I'll get it. And Swan! Won't you _please_ talk to your mother and tell +her we need the doctor?" + +Swan drew back. "I can't," he said shortly. "Better you send to Echo for +telegraph. And if you have medicine, it should be on his head quick." + +Lone was standing with his fingers pressed on Frank's wrist. He looked +up, hesitated, drew out his knife and opened the small blade. He moved +so that his back was to Lorraine, and still holding the wrist he made a +small, clean cut in the flesh. The three others stooped, stared with +tightened lips at the bloodless incision, straightened and looked at one +another dumbly. + +"I'd like to lie to you," Lone told Lorraine, speaking over his +shoulder. "But I won't. You're too game and too square. Go and stay with +your dad, but don't let him know--get him to sleep. We don't need that +medicine, nor a doctor either. Frank's dead. I reckon he was dead when +he hit the ground." + + + + +CHAPTER FIFTEEN + +SWAN TRAILS A COYOTE + + +At daybreak Swan was striding toward the place where Frank Johnson had +been found. Lone, his face moody, his eyes clouded with thought, rode +beside him, while Jack trotted loose-jointedly at Swan's heels. Swan had +his rifle, and Lone's six-shooter showed now and then under his coat +when the wind flipped back a corner. Neither had spoken since they left +the ranch, where Jim was wandering dismally here and there, trying to do +the chores when his heart was heavy with a sense of personal loss and +grim foreboding. None save Brit had slept during the night--and Brit had +slept only because Lorraine had prudently given him a full dose of the +sedative left by the doctor for that very purpose. Sorry had gone to +Echo to send a telegram to the coroner, and he was likely to return now +at any time. Wherefore Swan and Lone were going to look over the ground +before others had trampled out what evidence there might be in the +shape of footprints. + +They reached the spot where the team had stopped of its own accord in +crossing a little, green meadow, and had gone to feeding. Lone pulled up +and half turned in the saddle, looking at Swan questioningly. + +"Is that dog of yours any good at trailing?" he asked abruptly. "I've +got a theory that somebody was in that wagon with Frank, and drove on a +ways before he jumped out. I believe if you'd put that dog on the +trail----" + +"If I put that dog on the trail he stays on the trail all day, maybe," +Swan averred with some pride. "By golly, he follows a coyote till he +drops." + +"Well, it's a coyote we're after now," said Lone. "A sheep-killer that +has made his last killin'. Right here's where I rode up and caught the +team, last night. We better take a look along here for tracks." + +Swan stared at him curiously, but he did not speak, and the two went on +more slowly, their glances roving here and there along the trail edge, +looking for footprints. Once the dog Jack swung off the trail into the +brush, and Swan followed him while Lone stopped and awaited the result. +Swan came back presently, with Jack sulking at his heels. + +"Yack, he take up the trail of a coyote," Swan explained, "but it's got +the four legs, and Yack, he don't understand me when I don't follow. He +thinks I'm crazy this morning." + +"I reckon the team came on toward home after the fellow jumped out," +Lone observed. "He'd plan that way, seems to me. I know I would." + +"I guess that's right. I don't have experience in killing somebody," +Swan returned blandly, and Lone was too preoccupied to wonder at the +unaccustomed sarcasm. + +A little farther along Swan swooped down upon a blue dotted handkerchief +of the kind which men find so useful where laundries are but a name. +Again Lone stopped and bent to examine it as Swan spread it out in his +hands. A few tiny grains of sandstone rattled out, and in the center was +a small blood spot. Swan looked up straight into Lone's dark, brooding +eyes. + +"By golly, Lone, you would do that, too, if you kill somebody," he began +in a new tone,--the tone which Lorraine had heard indistinctly in the +bunk-house when Swan was talking to the doctor. "Do you think I'm a +damn fool, just because I'm a Swede? You are smart--you think out every +little thing. But you make a big mistake if you don't think some one +else may be using his brain, too. This handkerchief I have seen you pull +from your pocket too many times. And it had a rock in it last night, and +the blood shows that it was used to hit Frank behind the ear. You think +it all out--but maybe I've been thinking too. Now you're under arrest. +Just stay on your horse--he can't run faster than a bullet, and I don't +miss coyotes when I shoot them on the run." + +"The hell you say!" Lone stared at him. "Where's your authority, Swan?" + +Swan lifted the rifle to a comfortable, firing position, the muzzle +pointing straight at Lone's chest. With his left hand he turned back his +coat and disclosed a badge pinned to the lining. + +"I'm a United States Marshal, that's all; a government hunter," he +stated. "I'm hot on the trail of coyotes--all kinds. Throw that +six-shooter over there in the brush, will you?" + +"I hate to get the barrel all sanded up," Lone objected mildly. "You can +pack it, can't you?" He grinned a little as he handed out the gun, +muzzle toward himself. "You're playing safe, Swan, but if that dog of +yours is any good, you'll have a change of heart pretty quick. Isn't +that a man's track, just beside that flat rock? Put the dog on, why +don't you?" + +"Yack is on already," Swan pointed out. "Ride ahead of me, Lone." + +With a shrug of his shoulders Lone obeyed, following the dog as it +trotted through the brush on the trail of a man's footprints which Swan +had shown it. A man might have had some trouble in keeping to the trail, +but Jack trotted easily along and never once seemed at fault. In a very +few minutes he stopped in a rocky depression where a horse had been +tied, and waited for Swan, wagging his tail and showing his teeth in a +panting smile. The man he had trailed had mounted and ridden toward the +ridge to the west. Swan examined the tracks, and Lone sat on his horse +watching him. + +Jack picked up the trail where the horseman had walked away toward the +road, and Swan followed him, motioning Lone to ride ahead. + +"You could tell me about this, I think, but I can find out for myself," +he observed, glancing at Lone briefly. + +"Sure, you can find out, if you use your eyes and do a little +thinking," Lone replied. "I hope you do lay the evidence on the right +doorstep." + +"I will," Swan promised, looking ahead to where Jack was nosing his way +through the sagebrush. + +They brought up at the edge of the road nearly a quarter of a mile +nearer Echo than the place where Frank's body had been found. They saw +where the man had climbed into the wagon, and followed to where they had +found Frank beside the road, lying just as he had pitched forward from +the wagon seat. + +"I think," said Swan quietly, "we will go now and find out where that +horse went last night." + +"A good idea," Lone agreed. "Do you see how it was done, Swan? When he +saw the team coming, away back toward Echo, he rode down into that wash +and tied his horse. He was walking when Frank overtook him, I +reckon--maybe claiming his horse had broke away from him. He had a rock +in his handkerchief. Frank stopped and gave him a lift, and he used the +rock first chance he got. Then I reckon he stuck the whisky bottle in +Frank's pocket and heaved him out. He dropped the handkerchief out of +his hip pocket when he jumped out of the rig. It's right simple, and if +folks didn't get to wondering about it, it'd be safe as any killing can +be. As safe," he added meaningly, "as dragging Fred Thurman, or +unhooking Brit's chain-lock before he started down the canyon with his +load of posts." + +Swan did not answer, but turned back to where the horse had been left +tied and took up the trail from there. As before, the dog trotted along, +Lone riding close behind him and Swan striding after. They did not +really need the dog, for the hoofprints were easily followed for the +greater part of the way. + +They had gone perhaps four miles when Lone turned, resting a hand on the +cantle of his saddle while he looked back at Swan. "You see where he was +headed for, don't yuh, Swan?" he asked, his tone as friendly as though +he was not under arrest as a murderer. "If he didn't go to Whisper, I'll +eat my hat." + +"You're the man to know," Swan retorted grimly. And then, because Lone's +horse had slowed in a long climb over a ridge, he came up even with a +stirrup. "Lone, I hate to do it. I'd like you, if you don't kill for a +living. But for that I could shoot you quick as a coyote. You're +smart--but not smart enough. You gave yourself away when I showed you +Fred's saddle. After that I knew who was the Sawtooth killer that I came +here to find." + +"You thought you knew," Lone corrected calmly. + +"You don't have to lie," Swan informed him bluntly. "You don't have to +tell anything. I find out for myself if I make mistake." + +"Go to it," Lone advised him coldly. "It don't make a darn bit of +difference to me whether I ride in front of you or behind. I'm so glad +you're here on the job, Swan, that I'm plumb willing to be tied hand and +foot if it'll help you any." + +"When a man's too damn willing to be my prisoner," Swan observed +seriously, "he gets tied, all right. Put out your hands, Lone. You look +good to me with bracelets on, when you talk so willing to go to jail for +murder." + +He had slipped the rifle butt to the ground, and before Lone quite +realized what he was doing Swan had a short, wicked-looking automatic +pistol in one hand and a pair of handcuffs in the other. Lone flushed, +but there was nothing to do but hold out his hands. + + + + +CHAPTER SIXTEEN + +THE SAWTOOTH SHOWS ITS HAND + + +In her fictitious West Lorraine had long since come to look upon +violence as a synonym for picturesqueness; murder and mystery were +inevitably an accompaniment of chaps and spurs. But when a man she had +cooked breakfast for, had talked with just a few hours ago, lay dead in +the bunk-house, she forgot that it was merely an expected incident of +Western life. She lay in her bed shaking with nervous dread, and the +shrill rasping of the crickets and tree-toads was unendurable. + +After the first shock had passed a deep, fighting rage filled her, made +her long for day so that she might fight back somehow. Who was the +Sawtooth Company, that they could sweep human beings from their path so +ruthlessly and never be called to account? Not once did she doubt that +this was the doing of the Sawtooth, another carefully planned +"accident" calculated to rid the country of another man who in some +fashion had become inimical to their interests. + +From Lone she had learned a good deal about the new irrigation project +which lay very close to the Sawtooth's heart. She could see how the +Quirt ranch, with its water rights and its big, fertile meadows and its +fences and silent disapprobation of the Sawtooth's methods, might be +looked upon as an obstacle which they would be glad to remove. + +That her father had been sent down that grade with a brake deliberately +made useless was a horrible thought which she could not put from her +mind. She had thought and thought until it seemed to her that she knew +exactly how and why the killer's plans had gone awry. She was certain +that she and Swan had prevented him from climbing down into the canyon +and making sure that her dad did not live to tell what mischance had +overtaken him. He had probably been watching while she and Swan made +that stretcher and carried her dad away out of his reach. He would not +shoot _her_,--he would not dare. Nor would he dare come to the cabin and +finish the job he had begun. But he had managed to kill Frank--poor old +Frank, who would never grumble and argue over little things again. + +There was nothing picturesque, nothing adventurous about it. It was just +straight, heart-breaking tragedy, that had its sordid side too. Her dad +was a querulous sick man absorbed by his sufferings and not yet out of +danger, if she read the doctor's face aright. Jim and Sorry had taken +orders all their life, and they would not be able to handle the ranch +work alone; yet how else would it be done? There was Lone,--instinctively +she turned her thoughts to him for comfort. Lone would stay and help, +and somehow it would be managed. + +But to think that these things could be done without fear of +retribution. Jim and Sorry, Swan and Lone had not attempted to hide +their belief that the Sawtooth was responsible for Frank's death, yet +not one of them had hinted at the possibility of calling the sheriff, or +placing the blame where it belonged. They seemed brow-beaten into the +belief that it would be useless to fight back. They seemed to look upon +the doings of the Sawtooth as an act of Providence, like being struck by +lightning or freezing to death, as men sometimes did in that country. + +To Lorraine that passive submission was the most intolerable part, the +one thing she could not, would not endure. Had she lived all of her life +on the Quirt, she probably would never have thought of fighting back and +would have accepted conditions just as her dad seemed to accept them. +But her mimic West had taught her that women sometimes dared where the +men had hesitated. It never occurred to her that she should submit to +the inevitable just because the men appeared to do so. + +Wherefore it was a new Lorraine who rose at daybreak and silently cooked +breakfast for the men, learned from Jim that Sorry was not back from +Echo, and that Swan and Lone had gone down to the place where Frank had +been found. She poured Jim's coffee and went on her tiptoes to see if +her father still slept. She dreaded his awakening and the moment when +she must tell him about Frank, and she had an unreasonable hope that the +news might be kept from him until the doctor came again. + +Brit was awake, and the look in his eyes frightened Lorraine so that she +stopped in the middle of the room, staring at him fascinated. + +"Well," he said flatly, "who is it this time? Lone, or--Frank?" + +"Why--who is what?" Lorraine parried awkwardly. "I don't----" + +"Did they git Frank, las' night?" Brit's eyes seemed to bore into her +soul, searching pitilessly for the truth. "Don't lie to me, Raine--it +ain't going to help any. Was it Frank or Lone? They's a dead man laid +out on this ranch. Who is it?" + +"F-frank," Lorraine stammered, backing away from him. "H-how did you +know?" + +"How did it happen?" Brit's eyes were terrible. + +Lorraine shuddered while she told him. + +"Rabbits in a trap," Brit muttered, staring at the low ceiling. "Can't +prove nothing--couldn't convict anybody if we could prove it. Bill +Warfield's got this county under his thumb. Rabbits in a trap. Raine, +you better pack up and go home to your mother. There's goin' to be hell +a-poppin' if I live to git outa this bed." + +Lorraine stooped over him, and her eyes were almost as terrible as were +Brit's. "Let it pop. We aren't quitters, are we, dad? I'm going to stay +with you." Then she saw tears spilling over Brit's eyelids and left the +room hurriedly, fighting back a storm of weeping. She herself could not +mourn for Frank with any sense of great personal loss, but it was +different with her dad. He and Frank had lived together for so many +years that his loyal heart ached with grief for that surly, faithful old +partner of his. + +But Lorraine's fighting blood was up, and she could not waste time in +weeping. She drank a cup of coffee, went out and called Jim, and told +him that she was going to take a ride, and that she wanted a decent +horse. + +"You can take mine," Jim offered. "He's gentle and easy-gaited. I'll go +saddle up. When do you want to go?" + +"Right now, as soon as I'm ready. I'll fix dad's breakfast, and you can +look after him until Lone and Swan come back. One of them will stay with +him then. I may be gone for three or four hours. I'll go crazy if I stay +here any longer." + +Jim eyed her while he bit off a chew of tobacco. "It'd be a good thing +if you had some neighbor woman come in and stay with yuh," he said +slowly. "But there ain't any I can think of that'd be much force. You +take Snake and ride around close and forget things for awhile." He +hesitated, his hand moving slowly back to his pocket. "If yuh feel like +you want a gun----" + +Lorraine laughed bitterly. "You don't think any accident would happen to +_me_, do you?" + +"Well, no--er I wouldn't advise yuh to go ridin'," Jim said +thoughtfully. "This here gun's kinda techy, anyway, unless you're used +to a quick trigger. Yuh might be safer without it than with it." + +By the time she was ready, Jim was tying his horse, Snake, to the +corral. Lorraine walked slowly past the bunk-house with her face turned +from it and her thoughts dwelling terrifiedly upon what lay within. Once +she was past she began running, as if she were trying to outrun her +thoughts. Jim watched her gravely, untied Snake and stood at his head +while she mounted, then walked ahead of her to the gate and opened it +for her. + +"Yore nerves are sure shot to hell," he blurted sympathetically as she +rode past him. "I guess you need a ride, all right. Snake's plumb safe, +so yuh got no call to worry about him. Take it easy, Raine, on the +worrying. That's about the worst thing you can do." + +Lorraine gave him a grateful glance and a faint attempt at a smile, and +rode up the trail she always took,--the trail where she had met Lone +that day when he returned her purse, the trail that led to Fred +Thurman's ranch and to Sugar Spring and, if you took a certain turn at a +certain place, to Granite Ridge and beyond. + +Up on the ridge nearest the house Al Woodruff shifted his position so +that he could watch her go. He had been watching Lone and Swan and the +dog, trailing certain tracks through the sagebrush down below, and when +Lorraine rode away from the Quirt they were in the wagon road, fussing +around the place where Frank had been found. + +"They can't pin nothing on _me_," Al tried to comfort himself. "If that +damn girl would keep her mouth shut I could stand a trial, even. They +ain't got any evidence whatever, unless she saw me at Rock City that +night." He turned and looked again toward the two men down on the road +and tilted his mouth down at the corners in a sour grin. + +"Go to it and be damned to you!" he muttered. "You haven't got the dope, +and you can't git it, either. Trail that horse if you want to--I'd like +to see yuh amuse yourselves that way!" + +He turned again to stare after Lorraine, meditating deeply. If she had +only been a man, he would have known exactly how to still her tongue, +but he had never before been called upon to deal with the problem of +keeping a woman quiet. He saw that she was taking the trail toward Fred +Thurman's, and that she was riding swiftly, as if she had some errand in +that direction, something urgent. Al was very adept at reading men's +moods and intentions from small details in their behavior. He had seen +Lorraine start on several leisurely, purposeless rides, and her changed +manner held a significance which he did not attempt to belittle. + +He led his horse down the side of the ridge opposite the road and the +house, mounted there and rode away after Lorraine, keeping parallel with +the trail but never using it, as was his habit. He made no attempt to +overtake her, and not once did Lorraine glimpse him or suspect that she +was being followed. Al knew well the art of concealing his movements and +his proximity from the inquisitive eyes of another man's saddle horse, +and Snake had no more suspicion than his rider that they were not +altogether alone that morning. + +Lorraine sent him over the trail at a pace which Jim had long since +reserved for emergencies. But Snake appeared perfectly able and willing +to hold it and never stumbled or slowed unexpectedly as did +Yellowjacket, wherefore Lorraine rode faster than she would have done +had she known more about horses. + +Still, Snake held his own better than even Jim would have believed, and +carried Lorraine up over Granite Ridge and down into the Sawtooth flat +almost as quickly as Lorraine expected him to do. She came up to the +Sawtooth ranch-houses with Snake in a lather of sweat and with her own +determination unweakened to carry the war into the camp of her enemy. It +was, she firmly believed, what should have been done long ago; what +would have curbed effectually the arrogant powers of the Sawtooth. + +She glanced at the foreman's cottage only to make sure that Hawkins was +nowhere in sight there, and rode on toward the corrals, intercepting +Hawkins and a large, well-groomed, smooth-faced man whom she knew at +once must be Senator Warfield himself. Unconsciously Lorraine mentally +fitted herself into a dramatic movie "scene" and plunged straight into +the subject. + +"There has been," she said tensely, "another Sawtooth accident. It +worked better than the last one, when my father was sent over the grade +into Spirit Canyon. Frank Johnson is _dead_. I am here to discover what +you are going to do about it?" Her eyes were flashing, her chest was +rising and falling rapidly when she had finished. She looked straight +into Senator Warfield's face, her own full in the sunlight, so that, had +there been a camera "shooting" the scene, her expression would have been +fully revealed--though she did not realize all that. + +Senator Warfield looked her over calmly (just as a director would have +wished him to do) and turned to Hawkins. "Who is this girl?" he asked. +"Is she the one who came here temporarily--deranged?" + +"She's the girl," Hawkins affirmed, his eyes everywhere but on +Lorraine's face. "Brit Hunter's daughter--they say." + +"They _say_? I _am_ his daughter! How dare you take that tone, Mr. +Hawkins? My home is at the Quirt. When you strike at the Quirt you +strike at me. When you strike at me I am going to strike back. Since I +came here two men have been killed and my father has been nearly killed. +He may die yet--I don't know what effect this shock will have upon him. +But I know that Frank is dead, and that it's up to me now to see that +justice is done. You--you cowards! You will kill a man for the sake of a +few dollars, but you kill in the dark. You cover your murders under the +pretense of accidents. I want to tell you this: Of all the men you have +murdered, Frank Johnson will be avenged. You are going to answer for +that. I shall see that you _do_ answer for it! There is justice in this +country, there _must_ be. I'm going to demand that justice shall be +measured out to you. I----" + +"Was she violent, before?" Senator Warfield asked Hawkins in an +undertone which Lorraine heard distinctly. "You're a deputy, Hawkins. If +this keeps on, I'm afraid you will have to take her in and have her +committed for insanity. It's a shame, poor thing. At her age it is +pitiful. Look how she has ridden that horse! Another mile would have +finished him." + +"Do you mean to say you think I'm crazy? What an idea! It seems to me, +Senator Warfield, that you are crazy yourself, to imagine that you can +go on killing people and thinking you will never have to pay the +penalty. You _will_ pay. There is law in this land, even if----" + +"This is pathetic," said Senator Warfield, still speaking to Hawkins. +"Her father--if he is her father--is sick and not able to take care of +her. We'll have to assume the responsibility ourselves, I'm afraid, +Hawkins. She may harm herself, or----" + +Lorraine turned white. She had never seen just such a situation arise in +a screen story, but she knew what danger might lie in being accused of +insanity. While Warfield was speaking, she had a swift vision of the +evidence they could bring against her; how she had arrived there +delirious after having walked out from Echo,--why, they would call even +that a symptom of insanity! Lone had warned her of what people would say +if she told any one of what she saw in Rock City, perhaps really +believing that she had imagined it all. Lone might even think that she +had some mental twist! Her world was reeling around her. + +She whirled Snake on his hind feet, struck him sharply with the quirt +and was galloping back over the trail past the Hawkins house before +Senator Warfield had finished advising Hawkins. She saw Mrs. Hawkins +standing in the door, staring at her, but she did not stop. They would +take her to the asylum; she felt that the Sawtooth had the power, that +she had played directly into their hands, and that they would be as +ruthless in dealing with her as they had been with the nesters whom they +had killed. She knew it, she had read it in the inscrutable, level look +of Senator Warfield, in the half cringing, wholly subservient manner of +Hawkins when he listened to his master. + +"They're fiends!" she cried aloud once, while she urged Snake up the +slope of Granite Ridge. "I believe they'd kill me if they were sure they +could get away with it. But they could frame an insanity charge and put +me--my God, what fiends they are!" + +At the Sawtooth, Senator Warfield was talking with Mrs. Hawkins while +her husband saddled two horses. Mrs. Hawkins lived within her four walls +and called that, her "spere," and spoke of her husband as "he." You know +the type of woman. That Senator Warfield was anything less than a +godlike man who stood very high on the ladder of Fame, she would never +believe. So she related garrulously certain incoherent, aimless +utterances of Lorraine's, and cried a little, and thought it was +perfectly awful that a sweet, pretty girl like that should be crazy. She +would have made an ideal witness against Lorraine, her very sympathy +carrying conviction of Lorraine's need of it. That she did not convince +Senator Warfield of Lorraine's mental derangement was a mere detail. +Senator Warfield had reasons for knowing that Lorraine was merely +afflicted with a dangerous amount of knowledge and was using it without +discretion. + +"You mustn't let her run loose and maybe kill herself or somebody else!" +Mrs. Hawkins exclaimed. "Oh, Senator, it's awful to think of! When she +went past the house I knew the poor thing wasn't right----" + +"We'll overtake her," Senator Warfield assured her comfortingly. "She +can't go very far on that horse. She'd ridden him half to death, getting +here. He won't hold out--he can't. She came here, I suppose, because she +had been here before. A sanitarium may be able to restore her to a +normal condition. I can't believe it's anything more than some nervous +disorder. Now don't worry, my good woman. Just have a room ready, so +that she will be comfortable here until we can get her to a sanitarium. +It isn't hopeless, I assure you--but I'm mighty glad I happened to be +here so that I can take charge of the case. Now here comes Hawkins. +We'll bring her back--don't you worry." + +"Well, take her away as quick as you can, Senator. I'm scared of crazy +people. His brother went crazy in our house and----" + +"Yes, yes--we'll take care of her. Poor girl, I wish that I had been +here when she first came," said the senator, as he went to meet Hawkins, +who was riding up from the corrals leading two horses--one for Lorraine, +which shows what was his opinion of Snake. + + + + +CHAPTER SEVENTEEN + +YACK DON'T LIE + + +For a time the trail seemed to lead toward Whisper. Then it turned away +and seemed about to end abruptly on a flat outcropping of rock two miles +from Whisper camp. Lone frowned and stared at the ground, and Swan spoke +sharply to Jack, who was nosing back and forth, at fault if ever a dog +was. But presently he took up the scent and led them down a barren slope +and into grassy ground where a bunch of horses grazed contentedly. Jack +singled out one and ran toward it silently, as he had done all his +trailing that morning. The horse looked up, stared and went galloping +down the little valley, stampeding the others with him. + +"That's about where I thought we'd wind up--in a saddle bunch," Lone +observed disgustedly. "If I had the evidence you're carrying in your +pocket, Swan, I'd put that darn dog on the scent of the man, not the +horse." + +"The man I've got," Swan retorted. "I don't have to trail him." + +"Well, now, you _think_ you've got him. Here's good, level ground--I +couldn't get outa sight in less than ten minutes, afoot. Let me walk out +a ways, and you see if that handkerchief's mine. Oh, search me all you +want to, first," he added, when he read the suspicion in Swan's eyes. +"Make yourself safe as yuh please, but give me a fair show. You've made +up your mind I'm the killer, and you've been fitting the evidence to +me--or trying to." + +"It fits," Swan pointed out drily. + +"You see if it does. The dog'll tell you all about it in about two +minutes if you give him a chance." + +Swan looked at him. "Yack don't lie. By golly, I raised that dog to +trail, and he _trails_, you bet! He's cocker spaniel and bloodhound, and +he knows things, that dog. All right, Lone, you walk over to that black +rock and set down. If you think you frame something, maybe, I pack a +dead man to the Quirt again." + +"You can, for all me," Lone replied quietly. "I'd about as soon go that +way as the way I am now." + +Swan watched him until he was seated on the rock as directed, his +manacled hands resting on his knees, his face turned toward the horses. +Then Swan took the blue handkerchief from his pocket, called Jack to him +and muttered something in Swedish while the dog sniffed at the cloth. +"Find him, Yack," said Swan, standing straight again. + +Jack went sniffing obediently in wide circles, crossing unconcernedly +Lone's footprints while he trotted back and forth. He hesitated once on +the trail of the horse he had followed, stopped and looked at Swan +inquiringly, and whined. Swan whistled the dog to him with a peculiar, +birdlike note and called to Lone. + +"You come back, Lone, and let Yack take a damn good smell of you. By +golly, if that dog lies to me this time, I lick him good!" + +Lone came back, grinning a little. "All right, now maybe you'll listen +to reason. I ain't the kind to tell all I know and some besides, Swan. +I've been a Sawtooth man, and a fellow kinda hates to throw down his +outfit deliberate. But they're going too strong for any white man to +stand for. I quit them when they tried to get Brit Hunter. I don't +_know_ so much, Swan, but I'm pretty good at guessing. So if you'll +come with me to Whisper, your dog may show yuh who owns that +handkerchief. If he don't, then I'm making a mistake, and I'd like to be +set right." + +"Somebody rode that horse," Swan meditated aloud. "Yack don't make a +mistake like that, and I don't think I'm blind. Where's the man that was +on the horse? What you think, Lone?" + +"_Me_? I think there was another horse somewhere close to that +outcropping, tied to a bush, maybe. I think the man you're after changed +horses there, just on a chance that somebody might trail him from the +road. You put your dog on the trail of that one particular horse, and he +showed yuh where it was feeding with the bunch. It looks to me like it +was turned loose, back there, and come on alone. Your man went to +Whisper; I'll bank money on that. Anyway, your dog'll know if he's been +there." + +Swan thought it over, his eyes moving here and there to every hint of +movement between the skyline and himself. Suddenly he turned to Lone, +his face flushing with honest shame. + +"Loney, take a damn Swede and give him something he believes, and you +could pull his teeth before you pull that notion from his thick head. +You acted funny, that day Fred Thurman was killed, and you gave yourself +away at the stable when I showed you that saddle. So I think you're the +killer, and I keep on thinking that, and I've been trying to catch you +with evidence. I'm a Swede, all right! Square head. Built of wood two +inches thick. Loney, you kick me good. You don't have time to ride over +here, get some other horse and ride back to the Quirt after Frank was +killed. You got there before I did, last night. We know Frank was dead +not much more than one hour when we get him to the bunk-house. Yack, he +gives you a good alibi." + +"I sure am glad we took the time to trail that horse, then," Lone +remarked, while Swan was removing the handcuffs. "You're all right, +Swan. Nothing like sticking to an idea till you know it's wrong. Now, +let's stick to mine for awhile. Let's go on to Whisper. It ain't far." + +They returned to the rocky hillside where the trail had been covered, +and searched here and there for the tracks of another horse; found the +trail and followed it easily enough to Whisper. Swan put Jack once more +on the scent of the handkerchief, and if actions meant anything, Jack +proved conclusively that he found the Whisper camp reeking with the +scent. + +But that was all,--since Al was at that moment trailing Lorraine toward +the Sawtooth. + +"We may as well eat," Swan suggested. "We'll get him, by golly, but we +don't have to starve ourselves." + +"He wouldn't know we're after him," Lone agreed. "He'll stick around so +as not to raise suspicion. And he might come back, most any time. If he +does, we'll say I'm out with you after coyotes, and we stopped here for +a meal. That's good enough to satisfy him--till you get the drop on him. +But I want to tell yuh, Swan, you can't take Al Woodruff as easy as you +took me. And you couldn't have taken me so easy if I'd been the man you +wanted. Al would kill you as easy as you kill coyotes. Give him a +reason, and you won't need to give him a chance along with it. He'll +find the chance himself." + +Because they thought it likely that Al would soon return, they did not +hurry. They were hungry, and they cooked enough food for four men and +ate it leisurely. Jim was at the ranch, Sorry had undoubtedly returned +before now, and the coroner would probably not arrive before noon, at +the earliest. + +Swan wanted to take Al Woodruff back with him in irons. He wanted to +confront the coroner with the evidence he had found and the testimony +which Lone could give. There had been too many killings already, he +asserted in his naive way; the sooner Al Woodruff was locked up, the +safer the country would be. + +He discussed with Lone the possibility of making Al talk,--the chance of +his implicating the Sawtooth. Lone did not hope for much and said so. + +"If Al was a talker he wouldn't be holding the job he's got," Lone +argued. "Don't get the wrong idea again, Swan. Yuh may pin this on to +Al, but that won't let the Sawtooth in. The Sawtooth's too slick for +that. They'd be more likely to make up a lynching party right in the +outfit and hang Al as an example than they would try to shield him. He's +played a lone hand, Swan, right from the start, unless I'm badly +mistaken. The Sawtooth's paid him for playing it, that's all." + +"Warfield, he's the man I want," Swan confided. "It's for more than +killing these men. It goes into politics, Loney, and it goes deep. He's +bad for the government. Getting Warfield for having men killed is +getting Warfield without telling secrets of politics. Warfield, he's a +smart man, by golly. He knows some one is after him in politics, but he +don't know some one is after him at home. So the big Swede has got to be +smart enough to get the evidence against him for killing." + +"Well, I wish yuh luck, Swan, but I can't say you're going at it right. +Al won't talk, I tell yuh." + +Swan did not believe that. He waited another hour and made a mental +inventory of everything in camp while he waited. Then, chiefly because +Lone's impatience finally influenced him, he set out to see where Al had +gone. + +According to Jack, Al had gone to the corral. From there they put Jack +on the freshest hoofprints leaving the place, and were led here and +there in an apparently aimless journey to nowhere until, after Jack had +been at fault in another rock patch, the trail took them straight away +to the ridge overlooking the Quirt ranch. The two men looked at one +another. + +"That's like Al," Lone commented drily. "Coyotes are foolish, alongside +him, and you'll find it out. I'll bet he's been watching this place +since daybreak." + +"Where he goes, Yack will follow," Swan grinned cheerfully. "And I +follow Yack. We'll get him, Lone. That dog, he never quits till I say +quit." + +"You better go down and get a horse, then," Lone advised. "They're all +gentle. Al's mounted, remember. He's maybe gone over to the Sawtooth, +and that's farther than you can walk." + +"I can walk all day and all night, when I need to go like that. I can +take short cuts that a horse can't take. I think I shall go on my own +legs." + +"Well, I'm going down to the house first. I know them two men riding +down to the gate. I want to see what the boss and Hawkins have got to +say about this last 'accident.' Better come on down, Swan. You might +pick up something. They're heading for the ranch, all right. Going to +make a play at being neighborly, I reckon." + +"You bet I want to see Warfield," Swan assented rather eagerly and +called Jack, who had nosed around the spot where Al had waited so long +and was now trotting along the ridge on the next lap of Al's journey. + +They reached the gate in time to meet Warfield and Hawkins face to face. +Hawkins gave Lone a quick, questioning look and nodded carelessly to +Swan. Warfield, having a delicate errand to perform and knowing how much +depended upon first impressions, pulled up eagerly when he recognized +Lone. + +"Has the girl arrived safely, Lone?" he asked anxiously. + +"What girl?" Lone looked at him noncommittally. + +"Miss--ah--Hunter. Have you been away all the forenoon? The girl came to +the ranch in such a condition that I was afraid she might do herself or +some one else an injury. Has she been unbalanced for long?" + +"If you mean Lorraine Hunter, she was all right last time I saw her, and +that was last night." Lone's eyes narrowed a little as he watched the +two. "You say she went to the Sawtooth?" + +"She came pelting over there crazier than when you brought her in," +Hawkins broke in gruffly. "She ain't safe going around alone like +that." + +Senator Warfield glanced at him impatiently. "Is there any truth in her +declaring that Frank Johnson is dead? She seemed to have had a shock of +some kind. She was raving crazy, and in her rambling talk she said +something about Frank Johnson having died last night." + +Lone glanced back as he led the way through the gate which Swan was +holding open. "He didn't die--he got killed last night," he corrected. + +"Killed! And how did that happen? It was impossible to get two coherent +sentences out of the girl." Senator Warfield rode through just behind +Lone and reined close, lowering his voice. "No use in letting this get +out," he said confidentially. "It may be that the girl's dementia is +some curable nervous disorder, and you know what an injustice it would +be if it became noised around that the girl is crazy. How much English +does that Swede know?" + +"Not any more than he needs to get along on," Lone answered, +instinctively on guard. "He's all right--just a good-natured kinda cuss +that wouldn't harm anybody." + +He glanced uneasily at the house, hoping that Lorraine was safe inside, +yet fearing that she would not be safe anywhere. Sane or insane, she was +in danger if Senator Warfield considered her of sufficient importance to +bring him out on horseback to the Quirt ranch. Lone knew how seldom the +owner of the Sawtooth rode on horseback since he had high-powered cars +to carry him in soft comfort. + +"I'll go see if she's home," Lone explained, and reined John Doe toward +the house. + +"I'll go with you," Senator Warfield offered suavely and kept alongside. +"Frank Johnson was killed, you say? How did it happen?" + +"Fell off his wagon and broke his neck," Lone told him laconically. +"Brit's pretty sick yet; I don't guess you'd better go inside. There's +been a lot of excitement already for the old man. He only sees folks +he's used to having around." + +With that he dismounted and went into the house, leaving Senator +Warfield without an excuse for following. Swan and Hawkins came up and +waited with him, and Jim opened the door of the bunk-house and looked +out at them without showing enough interest to come forward and speak to +them. + +In a few minutes Lone returned, to find Senator Warfield trying to +glean information from Swan, who seemed willing enough to give it if +only he could find enough English words to form a complete sentence. +Swan, then, had availed himself of Lone's belittlement of him and was +living down to it. But Lone gave him scant attention just then. + +"She hasn't come back. Brit's worked himself up into a fever, and I +didn't dare tell him she wasn't with me. I said she's all tired out and +sick and wanted to stay up by the spring awhile, where it's cool. I said +she was with me, and the sun was too much for her, and she sent him word +that Jim would take care of him awhile longer. So you better move down +this way, or he'll hear us talking and want to know what's up." + +"You're sure she isn't here?" Senator Warfield's voice held suspicion. + +"You can ask Jim, over here. He's been on hand right along. And if you +can't take his word for it, you can go look in the shack--but in that +case Brit's liable to take a shot at yuh, Senator. He's on the warpath +right, and he's got his gun right handy." + +"It is not necessary to search the cabin," Senator Warfield answered +stiffly. "Unless she is in a stupor we'd have heard her yelling long +ago. The girl was a raving maniac when she appeared at the Sawtooth. +It's for her good that I'm thinking." + +Jim stepped out of the doorway and came slowly toward them, eyeing the +two from the Sawtooth curiously while he chewed tobacco. His hands +rested on his hips, his thumbs hooked inside his overalls; a gawky pose +that fitted well his colorless personality,--and left his right hand +close to his six-shooter. + +"Cor'ner comin'?" he asked, nodding at the two who were almost strangers +to him. "Sorry, he got back two hours ago, and he said the cor'ner would +be right out. But he ain't showed up yet." + +Senator Warfield said that he felt sure the coroner would be prompt and +then questioned Jim artfully about "Miss Hunter." + +"Raine? She went fer a ride. I loaned her my horse, and she ain't back +yet. I told her to take a good long ride and settle her nerves. She +acted kinda edgy." + +Senator Warfield and his foreman exchanged glances for which Lone could +have killed them. + +"You noticed, then, that she was not quite--herself?" Senator Warfield +used his friendly, confidential tone on Jim. + +"We-ell--yes, I did. I thought a ride would do her good, mebby. She's +been sticking here on the job purty close. And Frank getting killed +kinda--upset her, I guess." + +"That's it--that's what I was saying. Disordered nerves, which rest and +proper medical care will soon remedy." He looked at Lone. "Her horse was +worn out when she reached the ranch. Does she know this country well? +She started this way, and she should have been here some time ago. We +thought it best to ride after her, but there was some delay in getting +started. Hawkins' horse broke away and gave us some trouble catching +him, so the girl had quite a start. But with her horse fagged as it was, +we had no idea that we would fail to get even a sight of her. She may +have wandered off on some other trail, in which case her life as well as +her reason is in danger." + +Lone did not answer at once. It had occurred to him that Senator +Warfield knew where Lorraine was at that minute, and that he might be +showing this concern for the effect it would have on his hearers. He +looked at him speculatively. + +"Do you think we ought to get out and hunt for her?" he asked. + +"I certainly think some one ought to. We can't let her wander around the +country in that condition. If she is not here, she is somewhere in the +hills, and she should be found." + +"She sure ain't here," Jim asserted convincingly. "I been watching for +the last two hours, expecting every minute she'd show up. I'd a been +kinda oneasy, myself, but Snake's dead gentle, and she's a purty fair +rider fer a girl." + +"Then we'll have to find her. Lone, can you come and help?" + +"The Swede and me'll both help," Lone volunteered. "Jim and Sorry can +wait here for the coroner. We ought to find her without any trouble, +much. Swan, I'll get you that tobacco first and see if Brit needs +anything." + +He started to the house, and Swan followed him aimlessly, his long +strides bringing him close to Lone before they reached the door. + +"What do you make of this new play?" Lone muttered cautiously when he +saw Swan's shadow move close to his own. + +"By golly, it's something funny about it. You stick with them, Loney, +and find out. I'm taking Al's trail with Yack. You fix it." And he +added whimsically, "Not so much tobacco, Lone. I don't eat it or smoke +it ever in my life." + +His voice was very Swedish, which was fortunate, because Senator +Warfield appeared softly behind him and went into the house. Swan was +startled, but he hadn't much time to worry over the possibility of +having been overheard. Brit's voice rose in a furious denunciation of +Bill Warfield, punctuated by two shots and followed almost immediately +by the senator. + +"My God, the whole family's crazy!" Warfield exclaimed, when he had +reached the safety of the open air. "You're right, Lone. I thought I'd +be neighborly enough to ask what I could do for him, and he tried to +kill me!" + +Lone merely grunted and gave Swan the tobacco. + + + + +CHAPTER EIGHTEEN + +"I THINK AL WOODRUFF'S GOT HER" + + +There was no opportunity for further conference. Senator Warfield showed +no especial interest in Swan, and the Swede was permitted without +comment to take his dog and strike off up the ridge. Jim and Sorry were +sent to look after Brit, who was still shouting vain threats against the +Sawtooth, and the three men rode away together. Warfield did not suggest +separating, though Lone expected him to do so, since one man on a trail +was as good as three in a search of this kind. + +He was still inclined to doubt the whole story. He did not believe that +Lorraine had been to the Sawtooth, or that she had raved about anything. +She had probably gone off by herself to cry and to worry over her +troubles,--hurt, too, perhaps, because Lone had left the ranch that +morning without a word with her first. He believed the story of her +being insane had been carefully planned, and that Warfield had perhaps +ridden over in the hope that they would find her alone; though with +Frank dead on the ranch that would be unlikely. But to offset that, +Lone's reason told him that Warfield had probably not known that Frank +was dead. That had been news to him--or had it? He tried to remember +whether Warfield had mentioned it first and could not. Too many +disturbing emotions had held him lately; Lone was beginning to feel the +need of a long, quiet pondering over his problems. He did not feel sure +of anything except the fact that the Quirt was like a drowning man +struggling vainly against the whirlpool that is sucking him slowly +under. + +One thing he knew, and that was his determination to stay with these two +of the Sawtooth until he had some definite information; until he saw +Lorraine or knew that she was safe from them. Like a weight pressing +harder and harder until one is crushed beneath it, their talk of +Lorraine's insanity forced fear into his soul. They could do just what +they had talked of doing. He himself had placed that weapon in their +hands when he took her to the Sawtooth delirious and told of wilder +words and actions. Hawkins and his wife would swear away her sanity if +they were told to do it, and there were witnesses in plenty who had +heard him call her crazy that first morning. + +They could do it; they could have her committed to an asylum, or at +least to a sanitarium. He did not underestimate the influence of Senator +Warfield. And what could the Quirt do to prevent the outrage? Frank +Johnson was dead; Brit was out of the fight for the time being; Jim and +Sorry were the doggedly faithful sort who must have a leader before they +can be counted upon to do much. + +Swan,--Lone lifted his head and glanced toward the ridge when he thought +of Swan. There, indeed, he might hope for help. But Swan was out here, +away from reinforcements. He was trailing Al Woodruff, and when he found +him,--that might be the end of Swan. If not, Warfield could hurry +Lorraine away before Swan could act in the matter. A whimsical thought +of Swan's telepathic miracle crossed his mind and was dismissed as an +unseemly bit of foolery in a matter so grave as Lorraine's safety. And +yet--the doctor _had_ received a message that he was wanted at the +Quirt, and he had arrived before his patient. There was no getting +around that, however impossible it might be. No one could have foreseen +Brit's accident; no one save the man who had prepared it for him, and he +would be the last person to call for help. + +"We followed the girl's horse-tracks almost to Thurman's place and lost +the trail there." Warfield turned in the saddle to look at Lone riding +behind him. "We made no particular effort to trace her from there, +because we were sure she would come on home. I'm going back that far, +and we'll pick up the trail, unless we find her at the ranch. She may +have hidden herself away. You can't," he added, "be sure of anything +where a demented person is concerned. They never act according to logic +or reason, and it is impossible to make any deductions as to their +probable movements." + +Lone nodded, not daring to trust his tongue with speech just then. If he +were to protect Lorraine later on, he knew that he must not defend her +now. + +"Hawkins told me she had some sort of hallucination that she had seen a +man killed at Rock City, when she was wandering around in that storm," +Warfield went on in a careless, gossipy tone. "Just what was that +about, Lone? You're the one who found her and took her in to the ranch, +I believe. She somehow mixed her delusion up with Fred Thurman, didn't +she?" + +Lone made a swift decision. He was afraid to appear to hesitate, so he +laughed his quiet little chuckle while he scrambled mentally for a +plausible lie. + +"I don't know as she done that, quite," he drawled humorously. "She was +out of her head, all right, and talking wild, but I laid it to her being +sick and scared. She said a man was shot, and that she saw it happen. +And right on top of that she said she didn't think they ought to stage a +murder and a thunderstorm in the same scene, and thought they ought to +save the thunder and lightning for the murderer to make his getaway by. +She used to work for the moving pictures, and she was going on about +some wild-west picture she thought she was acting a part in. + +"Afterwards I told her what she'd been saying, and she seemed to kinda +remember it, like a bad dream she'd had. She told me she thought the +villain in one of the plays she acted in had pulled off a stage murder +in them rocks. We figured it out together that the first crack of +thunder had sounded like shooting, and that's what started her off. She +hadn't ever been in a real thunderstorm before, and she's scared of +them. I know that one we had the other day like to of scared her into +hysterics. I laughed at her and joshed her out of it." + +"Didn't she ever say anything about Fred Thurman, then?" Warfield +persisted. + +"Not to me, she didn't. Fred was dragged that night, and if she heard +about a man being killed during that same storm, she might have said +something about it. She might have wondered if that was what she saw. I +don't know. She's pretty sensible--when she ain't crazy." + +Warfield turned his horse, as if by accident, so that he was brought +face to face with Lone. His eyes searched Lone's face pitilessly. + +"Lone, you know how ugly a story can grow if it's left alone. Do _you_ +believe that girl actually saw a man shot? Or do you think she was +crazy?" + +Lone met Warfield's eyes fairly. "I think she was plumb out of her +head," he answered. And he added with just the right degree of +hesitation: "I don't think she's what you'd call right crazy, Mr. +Warfield. Lots of folks go outa their heads and talk crazy when they +get a touch of fever, and they get over it again." + +"Let's have a fair understanding," Warfield insisted. "Do you think I am +justified in the course I am taking, or don't you?" + +"Hunting her up? Sure, I do! If you and Hawkins rode on home, I'd keep +on hunting till I located her. If she's been raving around like you say, +she's in no shape to be riding these hills alone. She's got to be taken +care of." + +Warfield gave him another sharp scrutiny and rode on. "I always prefer +to deal in the open with every one," he averred. "It may not be my +affair, strictly speaking. The Quirt and the Sawtooth aren't very +intimate. But the Quirt's having trouble enough to warrant any one in +lending a hand; and common humanity demands that I take charge of the +girl until she is herself again." + +"I don't know as any one would question that," Lone assented and ground +his teeth afterwards because he must yield even the appearance of +approval. He knew that Warfield must feel himself in rather a desperate +position, else he would never trouble to make his motives so clear to +one of his men. Indeed, Warfield had protested his unselfishness in the +matter too much and too often to have deceived the dullest man who owned +the slightest suspicion of him. Lone could have smiled at the sight of +Senator Warfield betraying himself so, had smiling been possible to him +then. + +He dropped behind the two at the first rough bit of trail and felt +stealthily to test the hanging of his six-shooter, which he might need +in a hurry. Those two men would never lay their hands on Lorraine Hunter +while he lived to prevent it. He did not swear it to himself; he had no +need. + +They rode on to Fred Thurman's ranch, dismounted at Warfield's +suggestion--which amounted to a command--and began a careful search of +the premises. If Warfield had felt any doubt of Lone's loyalty he +appeared to have dismissed it from his mind, for he sent Lone to the +stable to search there, while he and Hawkins went into the house. Lone +guessed that the two felt the need of a private conference after their +visit to the Quirt, but he could see no way to slip unobserved to the +house and eavesdrop, so he looked perfunctorily through all the sheds +and around the depleted haystacks,--wherever a person could find a +hiding place. He was letting himself down through the manhole in the +stable loft when Swan's voice, lowered almost to a whisper, startled +him. + +"What the hell!" Lone ejaculated under his breath. "I thought you were +on another trail!" + +"That trail leads here, Lone. Did you find Raine yet?" + +"Not a sign of her. Swan, I don't know what to make of it. I did think +them two were stalling. I thought they either hadn't seen her at all, or +had got hold of her and were trying to square themselves on the insanity +dodge. But if they know where she is, they're acting damn queer, Swan. +They _want_ her. They haven't got her yet." + +"They're in the house," Swan reassured Lone. "I heard them walking. You +don't think they've got her there, Lone?" + +"If they have," gritted Lone, "they made the biggest blunder of their +lives bringing me over here. No, I could see they wanted to get off +alone and hold a powwow. They expected she'd be at the Quirt." + +"I think Al Woodruff, he's maybe got her, then," Swan declared, after +studying the matter briefly. "All the way he follows the trail over +here, Lone. I could see you sometimes in the trail. He was keeping hid +from the trail--I think because Raine was riding along, this morning, +and he's following. The tracks are that old." + +"They said they had trailed Raine this far, coming from the Sawtooth," +Lone told him worriedly. "What do you think Al would want----" + +"Don't she see him shoot Fred Thurman? By golly, I'm scared for that +girl, Loney!" + +Lone stared at him. "He wouldn't dare!" + +"A coward is a brave man when you scare him bad enough," Swan stated +flatly. "I'm careful always when I corner a coward." + +"Al ain't a coward. You've got him wrong." + +"Maybe, but he kills like a coward would kill, and he's scared he will +be caught. Warfield, he's scared, too. You watch him, Lone. + +"Now I tell you what I do. Yack, he picks up the trail from here to +where you can follow easy. We know two places where he didn't go with +her, and from here is two more trails he could take. But one goes to the +main road, and he don't take that one, I bet you. I think he takes that +girl up Spirit Canyon, maybe. It's woods and wild country in a few +miles, and plenty of places to hide, and good chances for getting out +over the top of the divide. + +"I'm going to my cabin, and you don't say anything when I leave. +Warfield, he don't want the damn Swede hanging around. So you go with +them, Loney. This is to what you call a show-down." + +"We'll want the dog," Lone told him, but Swan shook his head. Hawkins +and Warfield had come from the house and were approaching the stable. +Swan looked at Lone, and Lone went forward to meet them. + +"The Swede followed along on the ridge, and he didn't see anything," he +volunteered, before Warfield could question him. "We might put his dog +on the trail and see which way she went from here." + +Warfield thought that a good idea. He was so sure that Lorraine must be +somewhere within a mile or two of the place that he seemed to think the +search was practically over when Jack, nosing out the trail of Al +Woodruff, went trotting toward Spirit Canyon. + +"Took the wrong turn after she left the corrals here," Warfield +commented relievedly. "She wouldn't get far, up this way." + +"There's the track of two horses," Hawkins said abruptly. "That there is +the girl's horse, all right--there's a hind shoe missing. We saw where +her horse had cast a shoe, coming over Juniper Ridge. But there's +another horse track." + +Lone bit his lip. It was the other horse that Jack had been trailing so +long. "There was a loose horse hanging around Thurman's place," he said +casually. "It's him, tagging along, I reckon." + +"Oh," said Hawkins. "That accounts for it." + + + + +CHAPTER NINETEEN + +SWAN CALLS FOR HELP + + +Past the field where the horses were grazing and up the canyon on the +side toward Skyline Meadow, that lay on a shoulder of Bear Top, the dog +nosed unfalteringly along the trail. Now and then he was balked when the +hoofprints led him to the bank of Granite Creek, but not for long. Jack +appeared to understand why his trailing was interrupted and sniffed the +bank until he picked up the scent again. + +"Wonder if she changed off and rode that loose horse," Hawkins said +once, when the tracks were plain in the soft soil of the creek bank. +"She might, and lead that horse she was on." + +"She wouldn't know enough. She's a city girl," Lone replied, his heart +heavy with fear for Lorraine. + +"Well, she ain't far off then," Hawkins comforted himself. "Her horse +acted about played out when she hit the ranch. She had him wet from his +ears to his tail, and he was breathin' like that Ford at the ranch. If +that's a sample of her riding, she ain't far off." + +"Crazy--to ride up here. Keep your eyes open, boys. We must find her, +whatever we do." Warfield gazed apprehensively at the rugged steeps on +either hand and at the timber line above them. "From here on she +couldn't turn back without meeting us--if I remember this country +correctly. Could she, Hawkins?" + +"Not unless she turned off, up here a mile or two, into that gulch that +heads into Skyline," said Hawkins. "There's a stock trail part way down +from the top where it swings off from the divide to Wilder Creek." + +Swan, walking just behind Hawkins, moved up a pace. + +"I could go on Skyline with Yack, and I could come down by those trail," +he suggested diffidently, Swedishly, yet with a certain compelling +confidence. "What you think?" + +"I think that's a damned good idea for a square head," Hawkins told him, +and repeated it to Warfield, who was riding ahead. + +"Why, yes. We don't need the dog, or the man either. Go up to the head +of the gulch and keep your eyes open, Swan. We'll meet you up here. You +know the girl, don't you?" + +"Yas, Ay know her pretty good," grinned Swan. + +"Well, don't frighten her. Don't let her see that you think anything is +wrong--and don't say anything about us. We made the mistake of +discussing her condition within her hearing, and it is possible that she +understood enough of what we were saying to take alarm. You understand? +Don't tell girl she's crazy." He tapped his head to make his meaning +plainer. "Don't tell girl we're looking for her. You understand?" + +"Yas, Ay know English pretty good. Ay don't tell too moch." His cheerful +smile brought a faint response from Senator Warfield. At Lone he did not +look at all. "I go quick. I'm good climber like a sheep," he boasted, +and whistling to Jack, he began working his way up a rough, +brush-scattered ledge to the slope above. + +Lone watched him miserably, wishing that Swan was not quite so matter of +fact in his man-chasing. If Al Woodruff, for some reason which Lone +could not fathom, had taken Lorraine and forced her to go with him into +the wilderness, Warfield and Hawkins would be his allies the moment +they came up with him. Lone was no coward, but neither was he a fool. +Hawkins had never distinguished himself as a fighter, but Lone had +gleaned here and there a great deal of information about Senator +Warfield in the old days when he had been plain Bill. When Lorraine and +Al were overtaken, then Lone would need to show the stuff that was in +him. He only hoped he would have time, and that luck would be with him. + +"If they get me, it'll be all off with her," he worried, as he followed +the two up the canyon. "Swan would have been a help. But he thinks more +of catching Al than he does of helping Raine." + +He looked up and saw that already Swan was halfway up the canyon's steep +side, making his way through the brush with more speed than Lone could +have shown on foot in the open, unless he ran. The sight heartened Lone +a little. Swan might have some plan of his own,--an ambush, possibly. If +he would only keep along within rifle shot and remain hidden, he would +show real brains, Lone thought. But Swan, when Lone looked up again, was +climbing straight away from the little searching party; and even though +he seemed tireless on foot, he could not perform miracles. + +Swan, however, was not troubling himself over what Lone would think, or +even what Warfield was thinking. Contrary to Lone's idea of him, Swan +was tired, and he was thinking a great deal about Lorraine, and very +little about Al Woodruff, except as Al was concerned with Lorraine's +welfare. Swan had made a mistake, and he was humiliated over his +blunder. Al had kept himself so successfully in the background while +Lone's peculiar actions had held his attention, that Swan had never +considered Al Woodruff as the killer. Now he blamed himself for Frank's +death. He had been watching Lone, had been baffled by Lone's consistent +kindness toward the Quirt, by the force of his personality which held +none of the elements of cold-blooded murder. He had believed that he had +the Sawtooth killer under observation, and he had been watching and +waiting for evidence that would impress a grand jury. And all the while +he had let Al Woodruff ride free and unsuspected. + +The one stupid thing, in Swan's opinion, which he had not done was to +let Lone go on holding his tongue. He had forced the issue that +morning. He had wanted to make Lone talk, had hoped for a weakening +and a confession. Instead he had learned a good deal which he should +have known before. + +As he forged up the slope across the ridged lip of the canyon, his one +immediate object was speed. Up the canyon and over the divide on the +west shoulder of Bear Top was a trail to the open country beyond. It was +perfectly passable, as Swan knew; he had packed in by that trail when he +located his homestead on Bear Top. That is why he had his cabin up and +was living in it before the Sawtooth discovered his presence. + +Al, he believed, was making for Bear Top Pass. Once down the other side +he would find friends to lend him fresh horses. Swan had learned +something of these friends of the Sawtooth, and he could guess pretty +accurately how far some of them would go in their service. Fresh horses +for Al, food--perhaps even a cabin where he could hide Lorraine +away--were to be expected from any one of them, once Al was over the +divide. + +Swan glanced up at the sun, saw that it was dropping to late afternoon +and started in at a long, loose-jointed trot across the mountain meadow +called Skyline. A few pines, with scattered clumps of juniper and fir, +dotted the long, irregular stretch of grassland which formed the meadow. +Range cattle were feeding here and there, so wild they lifted heads to +stare at the man and dog, then came trotting forward, their curiosity +unabated by the fact that they had seen these two before. + +Jack looked up at his master, looked at the cattle and took his place at +Swan's heels. Swan shouted and flung his arms, and the cattle ducked, +turned and galloped awkwardly away. Swan's trot did not slacken. His +rifle swung rhythmically in his right hand, the muzzle tilted downward. +Beads of perspiration on his forehead had merged into tiny rivulets on +his cheeks and dripped off his clean-lined, square jaw. Still he ran, +his breath unlabored yet coming in whispery aspirations from his great +lungs. + +The full length of Skyline Meadow he ran, jumping the small beginning of +Wilder Creek with one great leap that scarcely interrupted the beautiful +rhythm of his stride. At the far end of the clearing, snuggled between +two great pines that reached high into the blue, his squatty cabin +showed red-brown against the precipitous shoulder of Bear Top peak, +covered thick with brush and scraggy timber whipped incessantly by the +wind that blew over the mountain's crest. + +At the door Swan stopped and examined the crude fastening of the door; +made himself certain, by private marks of his own, that none had entered +in his absence, and went in with a great sigh of satisfaction. It was +still broad daylight, though the sun's rays slanted in through the +window; but Swan lighted a lantern that hung on a nail behind the door, +carried it across the neat little room, and set it down on the floor +beside the usual pioneer cupboard made simply of clean boxes nailed +bottom against the wall. Swan had furnished a few extra frills to his +cupboard, for the ends of the boxes were fastened to hewn slabs standing +upright and just clearing the floor. Near the upper shelf a row of nails +held Swan's coffee cups,--four of them, thick and white, such as cheap +restaurants use. + +Swan hooked a finger over the nail that held a cracked cup and glanced +over his shoulder at Jack, sitting in the doorway with his keen nose to +the world. + +"You watch out now, Yack. I shall talk to my mother with my thoughts," +he said, drawing a hand across his forehead and speaking in breathless +gasps. "You watch." + +For answer Jack thumped his tail on the dirt floor and sniffed the +breeze, taking in his overlapping tongue while he did so. He licked his +lips, looked over his shoulder at Swan, and draped his pink tongue down +over his lower jaw again. + +"All right, now I talk," said Swan and pulled upon the nail in his +fingers. + +The cupboard swung toward him bodily, end slabs and all. He picked up +the lantern, stepped over the log sill and pulled the cupboard door into +place again. + +Inside the dugout Swan set the lantern on a table, dropped wearily upon +a rough bench before it and looked at the jars beside him, lifted his +hand and opened a compact, but thoroughly efficient field wireless +"set." His right fingers dropped to the key, and the whining drone of +the wireless rose higher and higher as he tuned up. He reached for his +receivers, ducked his head and adjusted them with one hand, and sent a +call spitting tiny blue sparks from the key under his fingers. + +He waited, repeating the call. His blue eyes clouded with anxiety and +he fumbled the adjustments, coaxing the current into perfect action +before he called again. Answer came, and Swan bent over the table, +listening, his eyes fixed vacantly upon the opposite wall of the dugout. +Then, his fingers flexing delicately, swiftly, he sent the message that +told how completely his big heart matched the big body: + + "Send doctor and trained nurse to Quirt ranch at once. Send men to + Bear Top Pass, intercept man with young woman, or come to rescue if + he don't cross. Have three men here with evidence to convict if we + can save the girl who is valuable witness. Girl being abducted in + fear of what she can tell. They plan to charge her with insanity. + Urgent. Hurry. Come ready to fight. + + "S.V." + +Swan had a code, but codes require a little time in the composition of a +message, and time was the one thing he could not waste. He heard the +gist of the message repeated to him, told the man at the other station +that lives were at stake, and threw off the current. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY + +KIDNAPPED + + +Lorraine had once had a nasty fall from riding down hill at a gallop. +She remembered that accident and permitted Snake to descend Granite +Ridge at a walk, which was fortunate, since it gave the horse a chance +to recover a little from the strain of the terrific pace at which she +had ridden him that morning. At first it had been fighting fury that had +impelled her to hurry; now it was fear that drove her homeward where +Lone was, and Swan, and that stolid, faithful Jim. She felt that Senator +Warfield would never dare to carry out his covert threat, once she +reached home. Nevertheless, the threat haunted her, made her glance +often over her shoulder. + +At the Thurman ranch, which she was passing with a sickening memory of +the night when she and Swan had carried her father there, Al Woodruff +rode out suddenly from behind the stable and blocked the trail, his +six-shooter in his hand, his face stony with determination. Lorraine +afterwards decided that he must have seen or heard her coming down the +ridge and had waited for her there. He smiled with his lips when she +pulled up Snake with a startled look. + +"You're in such a hurry this morning that I thought the only way to get +a chance to talk to you was to hold you up," he said, in much the same +tone he had used that day at the ranch. + +"I don't see why you want to talk to me," Lorraine retorted, not in the +least frightened at the gun, which was too much like her movie West to +impress her much. But her eyes widened at the look in his face, and she +tried to edge away from him without seeming to do so. + +Al stopped her by the simple method of reaching out his left hand and +catching Snake by the cheek-piece of the bridle. "You don't have to see +why," he said. "I've been thinking a lot about you lately. I've made up +my mind that I've got to have you with me--always. This is kinda sudden, +maybe, but that's the way the game runs, sometimes. Now, I want to tell +yuh one or two things that's for your own good. One is that I'll have my +way, or die getting it. Don't be scared; I won't hurt you. But if you +try to break away, I'll shoot you, that's all. I'm going to marry you, +see, first. Then I'll make love to you afterwards. I ain't asking you if +you'll marry me. You're going to do it, or I'll kill you." + +Lorraine gazed at him fascinated, too astonished to attempt any move +toward escape. Al's hand slipped from the bridle down to the reins, and +still holding Snake, still holding the gun muzzle toward her, still +looking her straight in the eyes, he threw his right leg over the cantle +of his saddle and stepped off his horse. + +"Put your other hand on the saddle horn," he directed. "I ain't going to +hurt you if you're good." + +He twitched his neckerchief off--Lorraine saw that it was untied, and +that he must have planned all this--and with it he tied her wrists to +the saddle horn. She gave Snake a kick in the ribs, but Al checked the +horse's first start and Snake was too tired to dispute a command to +stand still. Al put up his gun, pulled a hunting knife from a little +scabbard in his boot, sliced two pairs of saddle strings from Lorraine's +saddle, calmly caught and held her foot when she tried to kick him, +pushed the foot back into the stirrup and tied it there with one of the +leather strings. Just as if he were engaged in an everyday proceeding, +he walked around Snake and tied Lorraine's right foot; then, to prevent +her from foolishly throwing herself from the horse and getting hurt, he +tied the stirrups together under the horse's belly. + +"Now, if you'll be a good girl, I'll untie your hands," he said, +glancing up into her face. He freed her hands, and Lorraine immediately +slapped him in the face and reached for his gun. But Al was too quick +for her. He stepped back, picked up Snake's reins and mounted his own +horse. He looked back at her appraisingly, saw her glare of hatred and +grinned at it, while he touched his horse with the spurs and rode away, +leading Snake behind him. + +Lorraine said nothing until Al, riding at a lope, passed the field at +the mouth of Spirit Canyon where the blaze-faced roan still fed with the +others. They were feeding along the creek quite close to the fence, and +the roan walked toward them. The sight of it stirred Lorraine out of her +dumb horror. + +"You killed Fred Thurman! I saw you," she cried suddenly. + +"Well, you ain't going to holler it all over the country," Al flung +back at her over his shoulder. "When you're married to me, you'll come +mighty close to keeping your mouth shut about it." + +"I'll never marry you! You--you fiend! Do you think I'd marry a +cold-blooded murderer like you?" + +Al turned in the saddle and looked at her intently. "If I'm all that," +he told her coolly, "you can figure out about what'll happen to you if +you _don't_ marry me. If you saw what I done to Fred Thurman, what do +you reckon I'd do to _you_?" He looked at her for a minute, shrugged his +shoulders and rode on, crossing the creek and taking a trail which +Lorraine did not know. Much of the time they traveled in the water, +though it slowed their pace. Where the trail was rocky, they took it and +made better time. + +Snake lagged a little on the upgrades, but he was well trained to lead +and gave little trouble. Lorraine thought longingly of Yellowjacket and +his stubbornness and tried to devise some way of escape. She could not +believe that fate would permit Al Woodruff to carry out such a plan. +Lone would overtake them, perhaps,--and then she remembered that Lone +would have no means of knowing which way she had gone. If Hawkins and +Senator Warfield came after them, her plight would be worse than ever. +Still, she decided that she must risk that danger and give Lone a clue. + +She dropped a glove beside the trail, where it lay in plain sight of any +one following them. But presently Al looked over his shoulder, saw that +one of her hands was bare, and tied Snake's reins to his saddle and his +own horse to a bush. Then he went back down the trail until he found the +glove. He put it into his pocket, came silently up to Lorraine and +pulled off her other glove. Without a word he took her wrists in a firm +clasp, tied them together again to the saddle horn, pulled off her tie, +her hat, and the pins from her hair. + +"I guess you don't know me yet," he remarked dryly, when he had +confiscated every small article which she could let fall as she rode. "I +was trying to treat yuh white, but you don't seem to appreciate it. Now +you can ride hobbled, young lady." + +"Oh, I could _kill_ you!" Lorraine whispered between set teeth. + +"You mean you'd like to. Well, I ain't going to give you a chance." His +eyes rested on her face with a new expression; an awakening desire for +her, an admiration for the spirit that would not let her weep and plead +with him. + +"Say! you ain't going to be a bit hard to marry," he observed, his eyes +lighting with what was probably his nearest approach to tenderness. "I +kinda wish you liked me, now I've got you." + +He shook her arm and laughed when she turned her face away from him, +then remounted his horse. Snake moved reluctantly when Al started on. +Lorraine felt hope slipping from her. With her hands tied, she could do +nothing at all save sit there and ride wherever Al Woodruff chose to +lead her horse. He seemed to be making for the head of Spirit Canyon, on +the side toward Bear Top. + +As they climbed higher, she could catch glimpses of the road down which +her father had driven almost to his death. She studied Al's back as he +rode before her and wondered if he could really be cold-blooded enough +to kill without compunction whoever he was told to kill, whether he had +any personal quarrel with his victim or not. Certainly he had had no +quarrel with her father, or with Frank. + +It was long past noon, and she was terribly hungry and very thirsty, but +she would not tell Al her wants if she starved. She tried to guess at +his plans and at his motive for taking her away like this. He had no +camping outfit, a bulkily rolled slicker forming his only burden. He +could not, then, be planning to take her much farther into the +wilderness; yet if he did not hide her away, how could he expect to keep +her? His motive for marrying her was rather mystifying. He did not seem +sufficiently in love with her to warrant an abduction, and he was too +cool for such a headlong action, unless driven by necessity. She +wondered what he was thinking about as he rode. Not about her, she +guessed, except when some bad place in the trail made it necessary for +him to stop, tie Snake to the nearest bush, lead his own horse past the +obstruction and come back after her. Several times this was necessary. +Once he took the time to examine the thongs on her ankles, apparently +wishing to make sure that she was not uncomfortable. Once he looked up +into her sullenly distressed face and said, "Tired?" in a humanly +sympathetic tone that made her blink back the tears. She shook her head +and would not look at him. Al regarded her in silence for a minute, led +Snake to his own horse, mounted and rode on. + +He was a murderer; he had undoubtedly killed many men. He would kill her +if she attempted to escape--"and he could not catch me," Lorraine was +just enough to add. Yet she felt baffled; cheated of the full horror of +being kidnapped. + +She had no knowledge of a bad man who was human in spots without being +repentant. For love of a girl, she had been taught to believe, the worst +outlaw would weep over his past misdeeds, straighten his shoulders, look +to heaven for help and become a self-sacrificing hero for whom audiences +might be counted upon to shed furtive tears. + +Al Woodruff, however, did not love her. His eyes had once or twice +softened to friendliness, but love was not there. Neither was repentance +there. He seemed quite satisfied with himself, quite ready to commit +further crimes for sake of his own safety or desire. He was hard, she +decided, but he was not unnecessarily harsh; cruel, without being +wantonly brutal. He was, in short, the strangest man she had ever seen. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE + +"OH, I COULD KILL YOU!" + + +Before sundown they reached the timberland on Bear Top. The horses +slipped on the pine needles when Al left the trail and rode up a gentle +incline where the trees grew large and there was little underbrush. It +was very beautiful, with the slanting sun-rays painting broad yellow +bars across the gloom of the forest. In a little while they reached the +crest of that slope, and Lorraine, looking back, could only guess at +where the trail wound on among the trees lower down. + +Birds called companionably from the high branches above them. A nesting +grouse flew chuttering out from under a juniper bush, alighted a short +distance away and went limping and dragging one wing before them, +cheeping piteously. + +While Lorraine was wondering if the poor thing had hurt a leg in +lighting, Al clipped its head off neatly with a bullet from his +six-shooter, though Lorraine had not seen him pull the gun and did not +know he meant to shoot. The bird's mate whirred up and away through the +trees, and Lorraine was glad that it had escaped. + +Al slid the gun back into his holster, leaned from his saddle and picked +up the dead grouse as unconcernedly as he would have dismounted, pulled +his knife from his boot and drew the bird neatly, flinging the crop and +entrails from him. + +"Them juniper berries tastes the meat if you don't clean 'em out right +away," he remarked casually to Lorraine, as he wiped the knife on his +trousers and thrust it back into the boot-scabbard before he tied the +grouse to the saddle by its blue, scaley little feet. + +When he was ready to go on, Snake refused to budge. Tough as he was, he +had at last reached the limit of his energy and ambition. Al yanked hard +on the bridle reins, then rode back and struck him sharply with his +quirt before Snake would rouse himself enough to move forward. He went +stiffly, reluctantly, pulling back until his head was held straight out +before him. Al dragged him so for a rod or two, lost patience and +returned to whip him forward again. + +"What a brute you are!" Lorraine exclaimed indignantly. "Can't you see +now tired he is?" + +Al glanced at her from under his eyebrows. "He's all in, but he's got to +make it," he said. "I've been that way myself--and made it. What I can +do, a horse can do. Come on, you yella-livered bonehead!" + +Snake went on, urged now and then by Al's quirt. Every blow made +Lorraine wince, and she made the wincing perfectly apparent to Al, in +the hope that he would take some notice of it and give her a chance to +tell him what she thought of him without opening the conversation +herself. + +But Al did not say anything. When the time came--as even Lorraine saw +that it must--when Snake refused to attempt a steep slope, Al still said +nothing. He untied her ankles from the stirrups and her hands from the +saddle horn, carried her in his arms to his own horse and compelled her +to mount. Then he retied her exactly as she had been tied on Snake. + +"Skinner knows this trail," he told Lorraine. "And I'm behind yuh with a +gun. Don't forget that, Miss Spitfire. You let Skinner go to suit +himself--and if he goes wrong, you pay, because it'll be you reining +him wrong. Get along there, Skinner!" + +Skinner got along in a businesslike way that told why Al Woodruff had +chosen to ride him on this trip. He seemed to be a perfectly dependable +saddle horse for a bandit to own. He wound in and out among the trees +and boulders, stepping carefully over fallen logs; he thrust his nose +out straight and laid back his ears and pushed his way through thickets +of young pines; he went circumspectly along the edge of a deep gulch, +climbed over a ridge and worked his way down the precipitous slope on +the farther side, made his way around a thick clump of spruces and +stopped in a little, grassy glade no bigger than a city lot, but with a +spring gurgling somewhere near. Then he swung his head around and looked +over his shoulder inquiringly at Al, who was coming behind, leading +Snake. + +Lorraine looked at him also, but Al did not say anything to her or to +the horse. He let them stand there and wait while he unsaddled Snake, +put a drag rope on him and led him to the best grazing. Then, coming +back, he very matter-of-factly untied Lorraine and helped her off the +horse. Lorraine was all prepared to fight, but she did not quite know +how to struggle with a man who did not take hold of her or touch her, +except to steady her in dismounting. Unconsciously she waited for a cue, +and the cue was not given. + +Al's mind seemed intent upon making Skinner comfortable. Still, he kept +an eye on Lorraine, and he did not turn his back to her. Lorraine looked +over to where Snake, too exhausted to eat, stood with drooping head and +all four legs braced like sticks under him. It flashed across her mind +that not even her old director would order her to make a run for that +horse and try to get away on him. Snake looked as if he would never move +from that position until he toppled over. + +Al pulled the bridle off Skinner, gave him a half-affectionate slap on +the rump, and watched him go off, switching his tail and nosing the +ground for a likable place to roll. Al's glance went on to Snake, and +from him to Lorraine. + +"You sure do know how to ride hell out of a horse," he remarked. "Now +he'll be stiff and sore to-morrow--and we've got quite a ride to make." + +His tone of disapproval sent a guilty feeling through Lorraine, until +she remembered that a slow horse might save her from this man who was +all bad,--except, perhaps, just on the surface which was not altogether +repellent. She looked around at the tiny basin set like a saucer among +the pines. Already the dusk was painting deep shadows in the woods +across the opening, and turning the sky a darker blue. Skinner rolled +over twice, got up and shook himself with a satisfied snort and went +away to feed. She might, if she were patient, run to the horse when Al's +back was turned, she thought. Once in the woods she might have some +chance of eluding him, and perhaps Skinner would show as much wisdom +going as he had in coming, and take her down to the sageland. + +But Skinner walked to the farther edge of the meadow before he stopped, +and Al Woodruff never turned his back to a foe. An owl hooted +unexpectedly, and Lorraine edged closer to her captor, who was gathering +dead branches one by one and throwing them toward a certain spot which +he had evidently selected for a campfire. He looked at her keenly, even +suspiciously, and pointed with the stick in his left hand. + +"You might go over there by the saddle and set down till I get a fire +going," he said. "Don't go wandering around aimless, like a hen turkey, +watching a chance to duck into the brush. There's bear in there and lion +and lynx, and I'd hate to see you chawed. They never clean their +toe-nails, and blood poison generally sets in where they leave a +scratch. Go and set down." + +Lorraine did not know how much of his talk was truth, but she went and +sat down by his saddle and began braiding her hair in two tight braids +like a squaw. If she did get a chance to run, she thought, she did not +want her hair flying loose to catch on bushes and briars. She had once +fled through a brush patch in Griffith Park with her hair flowing loose, +and she had not liked the experience, though it had looked very nice on +the screen. + +Before she had finished the braiding, Al came over to the saddle and +untied his slicker roll and the grouse. + +"Come on over to the fire," he said. "I'll learn yuh a trick or two +about camp cooking. If I'm goin' to keep yuh with me, you might just as +well learn how to cook. We'll be on the trail the biggest part of our +time, I expect." + +He took her by the arm, just as any man might have done, and led her to +the fire that was beginning to crackle cheerfully. He set her down on +the side where the smoke would be least likely to blow her way and +proceeded to dress the grouse, stripping off skin and feathers together. +He unrolled the slicker and laid out a piece of bacon, a package of +coffee, a small coffeepot, bannock and salt. The coffeepot and the +grouse he took in one hand--his left, Lorraine observed--and started +toward the spring which she could hear gurgling in the shadows amongst +the trees. + +Lorraine watched him sidelong. He seemed to take it for granted now that +she would stay where she was. The woods were dark, the firelight and the +warmth enticed her. The sight of the supper preparations made her +hungrier than she had ever been in her life before. When one has +breakfasted on one cup of coffee at dawn and has ridden all day with +nothing to eat, running away from food, even though that food is in the +hands of one's captor, requires courage. Lorraine was terribly tempted +to stay, at least until she had eaten. But Al might not give her another +chance like this. She crept on her knees to the slicker and seized one +piece of bannock, crawled out of the firelight stealthily, then sprang +to her feet and began running straight across the meadow toward Skinner. + +Twenty yards she covered when a bullet sang over her head. Lorraine +ducked, stumbled and fell headfirst over a hummock, not quite sure that +she had not been shot. + +"Thought maybe I could trust yuh to play square," Al said disgustedly, +pulling her to her feet, the gun still smoking in his hands. "You little +fool, what do you think you'd do in these hills alone? You sure enough +belittle me, if you think you'd have a chance in a million of getting +away from me!" + +She fought him, then, with a great, inner relief that the situation was +at last swinging around to a normal kidnapping. Still, Al Woodruff +seemed unable to play his part realistically. He failed to fill her with +fear and repulsion. She had to think back, to remember that he had +killed men, in order to realize her own danger. Now, for instance, he +merely forced her back to the campfire, pulled the saddle strings from +his pocket and tied her feet together, using a complicated knot which he +told her she might work on all she darn pleased, for all he cared. Then +he went calmly to work cooking their supper. + +This was simple. He divided the grouse so that one part had the meaty +breast and legs, and the other the back and wings. The meaty part he +larded neatly with strips of bacon, using his hunting knife,--which +Lorraine watched fascinatedly, wondering if it had ever taken the life +of a man. He skewered the meat on a green, forked stick and gave it to +her to broil for herself over the hottest coals of the fire, while he +made the coffee and prepared his own portion of the grouse. + +Lorraine was hungry. She broiled the grouse carefully and ate it, with +the exception of one leg, which she surprised herself by offering to Al, +who was picking the bones of his own share down to the last shred of +meat. She drank a cup of coffee, black, and returned the cup to the +killer, who unconcernedly drank from it without any previous rinsing. +She ate bannock with her meat and secretly thought what an adventure it +would be if only it were not real,--if only she were not threatened with +a forced marriage to this man. The primitive camp appealed to her; she +who had prided herself upon being an outdoor girl saw how she had always +played at being primitive. This was real. She would have loved it if +only the man opposite were Lone, or Swan, or some one else whom she knew +and trusted. + +She watched the firelight dancing on Al's somber face, softening its +hardness, making it almost wistful when he gazed thoughtfully into the +coals. She thrilled when she saw how watchful he was, how he lifted his +head and listened to every little night sound. She was afraid of him as +she feared the lightning; she feared his pitiless attitude toward human +life. She would find some way to outwit him when it came to the point of +marrying him, she thought. She would escape him if she could without too +great a risk of being shot. She felt absolutely certain that he would +shoot her with as little compunction as he would marry her by +force,--and it seemed to Lorraine that he would not greatly care which +he did. + +"I guess you're tired," Al said suddenly, rousing himself from deep +study and looking at her imperturbably. "I'll fix yuh so you can +sleep--and that's about all yuh can do." + +He went over to his saddle, took the blanket and unfolded it until +Lorraine saw that it was a full-size bed blanket of heavy gray wool. +The man's ingenuity seemed endless. Without seeming to have any extra +luggage, he had nevertheless carried a very efficient camp outfit with +him. He took his hunting knife, went to the spruce grove and cut many +small, green branches, returning with all he could hold in his arms. She +watched him lay them tips up for a mattress, and was secretly glad that +she knew this much at least of camp comfort. He spread the blanket over +them and then, without a word, came over to her and untied her feet. + +"Go and lay down on the blanket," he commanded. + +"I'll do nothing of the kind!" Lorraine set her mouth stubbornly. + +"Well, then I'll have to lay you down," said Al, lifting her to her +feet. "If you get balky, I'm liable to get rough." + +Lorraine drew away from him as far as she could and looked at him for a +full minute. Al stared back into her eyes. "Oh, I could _kill_ you!" +cried Lorraine for the second time that day and threw herself down on +the bed, sobbing like an angry child. + +Al said nothing. The man's capacity for keeping still was amazing. He +knelt beside her, folded the blanket over her from the two sides, and +tied the corners around her neck snugly, the knot at the back. In the +same way he tied her ankles. Lorraine found herself in a sleeping bag +from which she had small hope of extricating herself. He took his coat, +folded it compactly and pushed it under her head for a pillow; then he +brought her own saddle blanket and spread it over her for extra warmth. + +"Now stop your bawling and go to sleep," he advised her calmly. "You +ain't hurt, and you ain't going to be as long as you gentle down and +behave yourself." + +She saw him draw the slicker over his shoulders and move back where the +shadows were deep and she could not see him. She heard some animal +squall in the woods behind them. She looked up at the stars,--millions +of them, and brighter than she had ever seen them before. Insensibly she +quieted, watching the stars, listening to the night noises, catching now +and then a whiff of smoke from Al Woodruff's cigarette. Before she knew +that she was sleepy, she slept. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO + +"YACK, I LICK YOU GOOD IF YOU BARK" + + +Swan cooked himself a hasty meal while he studied the various +possibilities of the case and waited for further word from headquarters. +He wanted to be sure that help had started and to be able to estimate +within an hour or two the probable time of its arrival, before he left +the wireless. Jack he fed and left on watch outside the cabin, so that +he could without risk keep open the door to the dugout. + +His instrument was not a large one, and the dugout door was thick,--as a +precaution against discovery if he should be called when some visitor +chanced to be in the cabin. Not often did a man ride that way, though +occasionally some one stopped for a meal if he knew that the cabin was +there and had ever tasted Swan's sour-dough biscuits. His aerial was +cleverly camouflaged between the two pine trees, and he had no fear of +discovery there; Jack was a faithful guardian and would give warning if +any one approached the place. Swan could therefore give his whole +attention to the business at hand. + +He was not yet supplied with evidence enough to warrant arresting +Warfield and Hawkins, but he hoped to get it when the real crisis came. +They could not have known of Al Woodruff's intentions toward Lorraine, +else they would have kept themselves in the background and would not +have risked the failure of their own plan. + +On the other hand, Al must have been wholly ignorant of Warfield's +scheme to try and prove Lorraine crazy. It looked to Swan very much like +a muddling of the Sawtooth affairs through over-anxiety to avoid +trouble. They were afraid of what Lorraine knew. They wanted to +eliminate her, and they had made the blunder of working independently to +that end. + +Lone's anxiety he did not even consider. He believed that Lone would be +equal to any immediate emergency and would do whatever the circumstances +seemed to require of him. Warfield counted him a Sawtooth man. Al +Woodruff, if the four men met unexpectedly, would also take it for +granted that he was one of them. They would probably talk to Lone +without reserve,--Swan counted on that. Whereas, if he were present, +they would be on their guard, at least. + +Swan's plan was to wait at the cabin until he knew that deputies were +headed toward the Pass. Then, with Jack, it would be a simple matter to +follow Warfield to where he overtook Al,--supposing he did overtake him. +If he did not, then Swan meant to be present when the meeting occurred. +The dog would trail Al anywhere, since the scent would be less than +twenty-four hours old. Swan would locate Warfield and lead him straight +to Al Woodruff, and then make his arrests. But he wanted to have the +deputies there. + +At dusk he got his call. He learned that four picked men had started for +the Pass, and that they would reach the divide by daybreak. Others were +on their way to intercept Al Woodruff if he crossed before then. + +It was all that Swan could have hoped for,--more than he had dared to +expect on such short notice. He notified the operator that he would not +be there to receive anything else, until he returned to report that he +had got his men. + +"Don't count your chickens till they're hatched," came facetiously out +of the blue. + +"By golly, I can hear them holler in the shell," Swan sent back, +grinning to himself as he rattled the key. "That irrigation graft is +killed now. You tell the boss Swan says so. He's right. The way to catch +a fox is to watch his den." + +He switched off the current, closed the case and went out, making sure +that the cupboard-camouflaged door looked perfectly innocent on the +outside. With a bannock stuffed into one pocket, a chunk of bacon in the +other, he left the cabin and swung off again in that long, tireless +stride of his, Jack following contentedly at his heels. + +At the farther end of Skyline Meadow he stopped, took a tough leather +leash from his pocket and fastened it to Jack's collar. + +"We don't go running to paw nobody's stomach and say, 'Wow-wow! Here we +are back again!'" he told the dog, pulling its ears affectionately. +"Maybe we get shot or something like that. We trail, and we keep our +mouth still, Yack. One bark, and I lick you good!" + +Jack flashed out a pink tongue and licked his master's chin to show how +little he was worried over the threat, and went racing along at the end +of the leash, taking Swan's trail and his own back to where they had +climbed out of the canyon. + +At the bottom Swan spoke to the dog in an undertone, and Jack obediently +started up the canyon on the trail of the five horses who had passed +that way since noon. It was starlight now, and Swan did not hurry. He +was taking it for granted that Warfield and Hawkins would stop when it +became too dark to follow the hoofprints, and without Jack to show them +the way they would perforce remain where they were until daybreak. + +They would do that, he reasoned, if they were sincere in wanting to +overtake Lorraine and in their ignorance that they were also following +Al Woodruff. And try as he would, he could not see the object of so +foolish a plan as this abduction carried out in collusion with two men +of unknown sentiments in the party. They had shown no suspicion of Al's +part in the affair, and Swan grinned when he thought of the mutual +surprise when they met. + +He was not disappointed. They reached timber line, following the seldom +used trail that wound over the divide to Bear Top Pass and so, by a +difficult route which he did not believe Al would attempt after dark, +to the country beyond the mountain. Where dark overtook them, they +stopped in a sheltered nook to wait, just as Swan had expected they +would. They were close to the trail, where no one could pass without +their knowledge. + +In the belief that it was only Lorraine they were following, and that +she would be frightened and would come to the cheer of a campfire, they +had a fine, inviting blaze. Swan made his way as close as he dared, +without being discovered, and sat down to wait. He could see nothing of +the men until Lone appeared and fed the flames more wood, and sat down +where the light shone on his face. Swan grinned again. Warfield had +probably decided that Lorraine would be less afraid of Lone than of them +and had ordered him into the firelight as a sort of decoy. And Lone, +knowing that Al Woodruff might be within shooting distance, was probably +much more uncomfortable than he looked. + +He sat with his legs crossed in true range fashion and stared into the +fire while he smoked. He was a fair mark for an enemy who might be +lurking out there in the dark, but he gave no sign that he realized the +danger of his position. Neither did he wear any air of expectancy. +Warfield and Hawkins might wait and listen and hope that Lorraine, +wide-eyed and weary, would steal up to the warmth of the fire; but not +Lone. + +Swan, sitting on a rotting log, became uneasy at the fine target which +Lone made by the fire, and drew Al Woodruff's blue bandanna from his +pocket. He held it to Jack's nose and whispered, "You find him, +Yack--and I lick you good if you bark." Jack sniffed, dropped his nose +to the ground and began tugging at the leash. Swan got up and, moving +stealthily, followed the dog. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE + +"I COULDA LOVED THIS LITTLE GIRL" + + +A chill wind that hurried over Bear Top ahead of the dawn brought Swan +and Jack clattering up the trail that dipped into Spirit Canyon. +Warfield rose stiffly from the one-sided warmth of the fire and walked a +few paces to meet him, shrugging his wide shoulders at the cold and +rubbing his thigh muscles that protested against movement. Much riding +upon upholstered cushions had not helped Senator Warfield to retain the +tough muscles of hard-riding Bill Warfield. The senator was saddle-sore +as well as hungry, and his temper showed in his blood-shot eyes. He +would have quarreled with his best-beloved woman that morning, and he +began on Swan. + +Why hadn't he come back down the gulch yesterday and helped track the +girl, as he was told to do? (The senator had quite unpleasant opinions +of Swedes, and crazy women, and dogs that were never around when they +were wanted, and he expressed them fluently.) + +Swan explained with a great deal of labor that he had not thought he was +wanted, and that he had to sleep on his claim sometimes or the law would +take it from him, maybe. Also he virtuously pointed out that he had come +with Yack before daylight to the canyon to see if they had found Miss +Hunter and gone home, or if they were still hunting for her. + +"If you like to find that jong lady, I put Yack on the trail quick," he +offered placatingly. "I bet you Yack finds her in one-half an hour." + +With much unnecessary language, Senator Warfield told him to get to +work, and the three tightened cinches, mounted their horses and prepared +to follow Swan's lead. Swan watched his chance and gave Lone a chunk of +bannock as a substitute for breakfast, and Lone, I may add, dropped +behind his companions and ate every crumb of it, in spite of his worry +over Lorraine. + +Indeed, Swan eased that worry too, when they were climbing the pine +slope where Al had killed the grouse. Lone had forged ahead on John Doe, +and Swan stopped suddenly, pointing to the spot where a few bloody +feathers and a boot-print showed. The other evidence Jack had eaten in +the night. + +"Raine's all right, Lone. Got men coming. Keep your gun handy," he +murmured and turned away as the others rode up, eager for whatever news +Swan had to offer. + +"Something killed a bird," Swan explained politely, planting one of his +own big feet over the track, which did not in the least resemble +Lorraine's. "Yack! you find that jong lady quick!" + +From there on Swan walked carefully, putting his foot wherever a print +of Al's boot was visible. Since he was much bigger than Al, with a +correspondingly longer stride, his gait puzzled Lone until he saw just +what Swan was doing. Then his eyes lightened with amused appreciation of +the Swede's cunning. + +"We ought to have some hot drink, or whisky, when we find that girl," +Hawkins muttered unexpectedly, riding up beside Lone as they crossed an +open space. "She'll be half-dead with cold--if we find her alive." + +Before Lone could answer, Swan looked back at the two and raised his +hand for them to stop. + +"Better if you leave the horses here," he suggested. "From Yack I know +we get close pretty quick. That jong lady's horse maybe smells these +horse and makes a noise, and crazy folks run from noise." + +Without objection the three dismounted and tied their horses securely to +trees. Then, with Swan and Jack leading the way, they climbed over the +ridge and descended into the hollow by way of the ledge which Skinner +had negotiated so carefully the night before. Without the dog they never +would have guessed that any one had passed this way, but as it was they +made good progress and reached the nearest edge of the spruce thicket +just as the sun was making ready to push up over the skyline. + +Jack stopped and looked up at his master inquiringly, lifting his lip at +the sides and showing his teeth. But he made no sound; nor did Swan, +when he dropped his fingers to the dog's head and patted him +approvingly. + +They heard a horse sneeze, beyond the spruce grove, and Warfield stepped +forward authoritatively, waving Swan back. This, his manner said +plainly, was first and foremost his affair, and from now on he would +take charge of the situation. At his heels went Hawkins, and Swan sent +an oblique glance of satisfaction toward Lone, who answered it with his +half-smile. Swan himself could not have planned the approach more to his +liking. + +The smell of bacon cooking watered their mouths and made Warfield and +Hawkins look at one another inquiringly. Crazy young women would hardly +be expected to carry a camping outfit. But Swan and Lone were treading +close on their heels, and their own curiosity pulled them forward. They +went carefully around the thicket, guided by the pungent odor of burning +pine wood, and halted so abruptly that Swan and Lone bumped into them +from behind. A man had risen up from the campfire and faced them, his +hands rising slowly, palms outward. + +"Warfield, by----!" Al blurted in his outraged astonishment. "Trailing +me with a bunch, are yuh? I knew you'd double-cross your own father--but +I never thought you had it in you to do it in the open. Damn yuh, what +d'yuh want that you expect to get?" + +Warfield stared at him, slack-jawed. He glanced furtively behind him at +Swan, and found that guileless youth ready to poke him in the back with +the muzzle of a gun. Lone, he observed, had another. He looked back at +Al, whose eyes were ablaze with resentment. With an effort he smiled his +disarming, senatorial smile, but Al's next words froze it on his face. + +"I think I know the play you're making, but it won't get you anything, +Bill Warfield. You think I slipped up--and you told me not to let my +foot slip; said you'd hate to lose me. Well, you're the one that +slipped, you damned, rotten coward. I was watching out for leaks. I +stopped two, and this one----" + +He glanced down at Lorraine, who sat beside the fire, a blanket tied +tightly around her waist and her ankles, so that, while comfortably +free, she could make no move to escape. + +"I was fixing to stop _her_ from telling all she knew," he added +harshly. "By to-night I'd have had her married to me, you damned fool. +And here you've blocked everything for me, afraid I was falling down on +my job! + +"Now folks, lemme just tell you a few little things. I know my +limit--you've got me dead to rights. I ain't complaining about that; a +man in my game expects to get his, some day. But I ain't going to let +the man go that paid me my wages and a bonus of five hundred dollars +for every man I killed that he wanted outa the way. + +"Hawkins knows that's a fact. He's foreman of the Sawtooth, and he knows +the agreement. I've got to say for Hawkins that aside from stealing +cattle off the nesters and helping make evidence against some that's in +jail, Hawkins never done any dirty work. He didn't have to. They paid +_me_ for that end of the business. + +"I killed Fred Thurman--this girl, here, saw me shoot him. And it was +when I told Warfield I was afraid she might set folks talking that he +began to get cold feet. Up to then everything was lovely, but Warfield +began to crawfish a little. We figured--_we_ figured, emphasize the +_we_, folks,--that the Quirt would have to be put outa business. We knew +if the girl told Brit and Frank, they'd maybe get the nerve to try and +pin something on us. We've stole 'em blind for years, and they wouldn't +cry if we got hung. Besides, they was friendly with Fred. + +"The girl and the Swede got in the way when I tried to bump Brit off. +I'd have gone into the canyon and finished him with a rock, but they +beat me to it. The girl herself I couldn't get at very well and make it +look accidental--and anyway, I never did kill a woman, and I'd hate it +like hell. I figured if her dad got killed, she'd leave. + +"And let me tell you, folks, Warfield raised hell with me because Brit +Hunter wasn't killed when he pitched over the grade. He held out on me +for that job--so I'm collecting five hundred dollars' worth of fun right +now. He did say he'd pay me after Brit was dead, but it looks like he's +going to pull through, so I ain't counting much on getting my money outa +Warfield. + +"Frank I got, and made a clean job of it. And yesterday morning the girl +played into my hands. She rode over to the Sawtooth, and I got her at +Thurman's place, on her way home, and figured I'd marry her and take a +chance on keeping her quiet afterwards. I'd have been down the Pass in +another two hours and heading for the nearest county seat. She'd have +married me, too. She knows I'd have killed her if she didn't--which I +would. I've been square with her--she'll tell you that. I told her, when +I took her, just what I was going to do with her. So that's all +straight. She's been scared, I guess, but she ain't gone hungry, and +she ain't suffered, except in her mind. I don't fight women, and I'll +say right now, to her and to you, that I've got all the respect in the +world for this little girl, and if I'd married her I'd have been as good +to her as I know how, and as she'd let me be. + +"Now I want to tell you folks a few more things about Bill Warfield. If +you want to stop the damnest steal in the country, tie a can onto that +irrigation scheme of his. He's out to hold up the State for all he can +get, and bleed the poor devils of farmers white, that buys land under +that canal. It may look good, but it ain't good--not by a damn sight. + +"Yuh know what he's figuring on doing? Get water in the canal, sell land +under a contract that lets him out if the ditch breaks, or something so +he _can't_ supply water at any time. And when them poor suckers gets +their crops all in, and at the point where they've got to have water or +lose out, something'll happen to the supply. Folks, I _know_! I'm a +reliable man, and I've rode with a rope around my neck for over five +years, and Warfield offered me the same old five hundred every time I +monkeyed with the water supply as ordered. He'd have done it slick; +don't worry none about that. The biggest band of thieves he could get +together is that company. So if you folks have got any sense, you'll +bust it up right now. + +"Bill Warfield, what I've got to say to _you_ won't take long. You +thought you'd make a grand-stand play with the law, and at the same time +put me outa the way. You figured I'd resist arrest, and you'd have a +chance to shoot me down. I know your rotten mind better than you do. You +wanted to bump me off, but you wanted to do it in a way that'd put you +in right with the public. Killing me for kidnapping this girl would +sound damn romantic in the newspapers, and it wouldn't have a thing to +do with Thurman or Frank Johnson, or any of the rest that I've sent over +the trail for you. + +"Right now you're figuring how you'll get around this bawling-out I'm +giving you. There's nobody to take down what I say, and I'm just a mean, +ornery outlaw and killer, talking for spite. With your pull you expect +to get this smoothed over and hushed up, and have me at a hanging bee, +and everything all right for Bill! Well----" + +His eyes left Warfield's face and went beyond the staring group. His +face darkened, a sneer twisted his lips. + +"Who're them others?" he cried harshly. "Was you afraid four wouldn't be +enough to take me?" + +The four turned heads to look. Bill Warfield never looked back, for Al's +gun spoke, and Warfield sagged at the knees and the shoulders, and he +slumped to the ground at the instant when Al's gun spoke again. + +"That's for you, Lone Morgan," Al cried, as he fired again. "She talked +about you in her sleep last night. She called you Loney, and she wanted +you to come and get her. I was going to kill you first chance I got. I +coulda loved this little girl. I--could----" + +He was down, bleeding and coughing and trying to talk. Swan had shot +him, and two of the deputies who had been there through half of Al's +bitter talk. Lorraine, unable to get up and run, too sturdy of soul to +faint, had rolled over and away from him, her lips held tightly +together, her eyes wide with horror. Al crawled after her, his eyes +pleading. + +"Little Spitfire--I shot your Loney--but I'd have been good to you, +girl. I watched yuh all night--and I couldn't help loving yuh. +I--couldn't----" That was all. Within three feet of her, his face toward +her and his eyes agonizing to meet hers, he died. + + + + +CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR + +ANOTHER STORY BEGINS + + +This chapter is very much like a preface: it is not absolutely +necessary, although many persons will read it and a few will be glad +that it was written. + +The story itself is ended. To go on would be to begin another story; to +tell of the building up of the Quirt outfit, with Lone and Lone's +savings playing a very important part, and with Brit a semi-invalided, +retired stockman who smoked his pipe and told the young couple what they +should do and how they should do it. + +Frank he mourned for and seldom mentioned. The Sawtooth, under the +management of a greatly chastened young Bob Warfield, was slowly winning +its way back to the respect of its neighbors. + +For certain personal reasons there was no real neighborliness between +the Quirt and the Sawtooth. There could not be, so long as Brit's memory +remained clear, and Bob was every day reminded of the crimes his father +had paid a man to commit. Moreover, Southerners are jealous of their +women,--it is their especial prerogative. And Lone suspected that, given +the opportunity, Bob Warfield would have fallen in love with Lorraine. +Indeed, he suspected that any man in the country would have done that. +Al Woodruff had, and he was noted for his indifference to women and his +implacable hardness toward men. + +But you are not to accuse Lone of being a jealous husband. He was not, +and I am merely pointing out the fact that he might have been, had he +been given any cause. + +Oh, by the way, Swan "proved up" as soon as possible on his homestead +and sold out to the Quirt. Lone managed to buy the Thurman ranch also, +and the TJ up-and-down is on its feet again as a cattle ranch. Sorry and +Jim will ride for the Quirt, I suppose, as long as they can crawl into a +saddle, but there are younger men now to ride the Skyline Meadow range. + +Some one asked about Yellowjacket, having, I suppose, a sneaking regard +for his infirmities. He hasn't been peeled yet--or he hadn't, the last I +heard of him. Lone and Lorraine told me they were trying to save him for +the "Little Feller" to practise on when he is able to sit up without a +cushion behind his back, and to hold something besides a rubber rattle. +And--oh, do you know how Lone is teaching the Little Feller to sit up on +the floor? He took a horse collar and scrubbed it until he nearly wore +out the leather. Then he brought it to the cabin, put it on the floor +and set the Little Feller inside it. + +They sent me a snap-shot of the event, but it is not very good. The film +was under-exposed, and nothing was to be seen of the Little Feller +except a hazy spot which I judged was a hand, holding a black object I +guessed was the ridgy, rubber rattle with the whistle gone out of the +end,--down the Little Feller's throat, they are afraid. And there was +his smile, and a glimpse of his eyes. + +Aren't you envious as sin, and glad they're so happy? + + +THE END + + + + +[Illustration] + + + + +NOVELS BY B.M. BOWER + + * * * * * + + +=THE RANCH AT THE WOLVERINE= + + A ringing tale full of exhilarating cowboy atmosphere, abundantly + and absorbingly illustrating the outstanding feature of that + alluring ranch life that is fast vanishing.--_Chicago Tribune_. + + +=JEAN OF THE LAZY A= + +A spirited novel of ranch life in which the fascinating heroine poses +for film pictures that she may make money necessary to prove her father +innocent of a crime for which he has been convicted. + + It possesses all the popular ingredients--a quick-action plot, + color and picturesqueness aplenty, and an unflagging interest--to + be found in Bower's earlier successes.--_Philadelphia Public + Ledger_. + + +=THE PHANTOM HERD= + +Another western tale in which the Happy Family become real "movie" +actors. + + There has been so much truck written in the last few years about + motion pictures, that it is a positive relief to find a book by an + author who knows exactly what to talk about in an entertaining + manner with a knowledge of actual conditions as they + exist.--_Boston Post_. + + +=THE HERITAGE OF THE SIOUX= + +A Flying U story in which the Happy Family get mixed up in a robbery +faked for film purposes. + + Altogether a rattling story, that is better in conception and + expression than the conventional thriller on account of its touches + of real humanity in characterization.--_Philadelphia Public + Ledger_. + + +=RIM O' THE WORLD= + +An engrossing tale of a ranch-feud between "gun-fighters" in Idaho. + + +=THE LOOKOUT MAN= + +A tale of action, excitement and love, full of the charm of the great +outdoors, in which the story of the life at a Forest Reserve Station on +top of a California mountain is vividly portrayed. + + The signature of B.M. Bower is a valuable trade-mark. It stands for + fiction filled with the spirit of ranch life in the + northwest.--_Boston Herald_. + + +=CABIN FEVER= + +How Bud Moore and his wife, Marie, fared through their attack of "cabin +fever" is the theme of this B.M. Bower story. + + The author has put some real sentiment into a story that gives a + rapidly filmed "movie" of Western life.--_Philadelphia Public + Ledger_. + + +=STARR, OF THE DESERT= + +A story of mystery, love and adventure, which has a Mexican revolt as +its main theme. + + The tale is well written, with the fine art of artlessness, and of + unflagging interest; a book worth the reading which it is sure to + get from every one who begins it.--_New York Tribune_. + + +=THE FLYING U'S LAST STAND= + +What happened when a company of school teachers and farmers encamped on +the grounds of the Flying U Ranch. + + The Northwestern cattle country has never had a better chronicler + in fiction of its deeds and its people than B.M. Bower.--_New York + Times_. + + +=GOOD INDIAN= + +A story named for its half-breed hero, who dominates this stirring +Western romance. + + There is excitement and action on every page.... A somewhat unusual + love story runs through the book.--_Boston Transcript_. + + +=THE UPHILL CLIMB= + +How a cowboy fought the hardest of all battles--a fight against himself. + + Bower knows the West of the cowboys, as do few writers to-day.... + The word pictures of Western life are realistic, and strongly + suffused with local color.--_Philadelphia North American_. + + +=LONESOME LAND= + +A story of modern Montana, giving a wholly different phase of life among +the ranches. + + Montana described as it really is, is the "lonesome land" of this + new Bower story. A prairie fire and the death of the worthless + husband are especially well handled.--_A. L. A. Booklist_. + + +=SKYRIDER= + +A cowboy who becomes an aviator is the hero of this new story of Western +ranch life. + + An engrossing ranch story with a new note of interest woven into + its breezy texture.--_Philadelphia Public Ledger_. + + +=THE THUNDER BIRD= + +Further aeronautic adventures of "Skyrider" Johnnie Jewel. + + "A good story with numberless thrills and a humorous quality + throughout its pages."--_New York Sun_. + + * * * * * + +LITTLE, BROWN & CO., Publishers, Boston, Mass. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Quirt, by B.M. Bower + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE QUIRT *** + +***** This file should be named 19166.txt or 19166.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/1/6/19166/ + +Produced by Kathryn Lybarger, Joseph R. 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