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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Brand Blotters, by William MacLeod Raine
+
+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: Brand Blotters
+
+Author: William MacLeod Raine
+
+Illustrator: Clarence Rowe
+
+Release Date: December 7, 2008 [EBook #27436]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BRAND BLOTTERS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "WHO ARE YOU?" "WATER!" HE GASPED. Page 20.]
+
+
+
+
+BRAND BLOTTERS
+
+By
+
+WILLIAM MacLEOD RAINE
+
+Author Of
+
+Wyoming, Bucky O'Connor, Mavericks,
+A Texas Ranger, Ridgway Of Montana, Etc.
+
+Illustrations By
+
+CLARENCE ROWE
+
+Grosset & Dunlap
+
+Publishers New York
+
+Made in the United States of America
+
+
+
+
+Copyright, 1909, by J. B. Lippincott Co.
+
+Copyright, 1911, by Street & Smith
+
+Copyright, 1912, by G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY
+
+Brand Blotters
+
+
+
+
+TO
+FRANK N. SPINDLER
+
+In Memory of Certain Sunday Afternoon Tramps
+Long Ago, During Which We Solved the
+Problems of the Nation
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+PART I
+
+MELISSY OF THE BAR DOUBLE G
+
+ CHAPTER                                            PAGE
+      I  A Crossed Trail                              11
+     II  Brand Blotting                               18
+    III  An Accusation                                35
+     IV  The Man with the Chihuahua Hat               49
+      V  The Tenderfoot Takes up a Claim              61
+     VI  "Hands Up"                                   75
+    VII  Watering Sheep                               98
+   VIII  The Boone-Bellamy Feud is Renewed           109
+     IX  The Danger Line                             121
+      X  Jack Goes to the Head of the Class          141
+     XI  A Conversation                              156
+    XII  The Tenderfoot Makes a Proposition          163
+   XIII  Old Acquaintances                           182
+    XIV  Concerning the Boone-Bellamy-Yarnell Feud   191
+
+PART II
+
+DEAD MAN'S CACHE
+
+ CHAPTER                                            PAGE
+      I  Kidnapped                                   199
+     II  A Capture                                   209
+    III  The Tables Turned                           217
+     IV  The Real Bucky and the False                231
+      V  A Photograph                                243
+     VI  In Dead Man's Cache                         255
+    VII  "Trapped!"                                  266
+   VIII  An Escape and a Capture                     276
+     IX  A Bargain                                   286
+      X  The Price                                   301
+     XI  Squire Latimer Takes a Hand                 306
+    XII  The Taking of the Cache                     322
+   XIII  Melissy Entertains                          334
+    XIV  Black MacQueen Cashes his Checks            340
+
+
+
+
+PART I
+
+MELISSY OF THE BAR DOUBLE G
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+A CROSSED TRAIL
+
+
+The tenderfoot rose from the ledge upon which he had been lying and
+stretched himself stiffly. The chill of the long night had set him
+shivering. His bones ached from the pressure of his body upon the rock
+where he had slept and waked and dozed again with troubled dreams. The
+sharpness of his hunger made him light-headed. Thirst tortured him. His
+throat was a lime-kiln, his tongue swollen till it filled his mouth.
+
+If the night had been bad, he knew the day would be a hundred times worse.
+Already a gray light was sifting into the hollow of the sky. The vague
+misty outlines of the mountains were growing sharper. Soon from a crotch
+of them would rise a red hot cannon ball to pour its heat into the parched
+desert.
+
+He was headed for the Sonora line, for the hills where he had heard a man
+might drop out of sight of the civilization that had once known him. There
+were reasons why he had started in a hurry, without a horse or food or a
+canteen, and these same reasons held good why he could not follow beaten
+tracks. All yesterday he had traveled without sighting a ranch or meeting
+a human being. But he knew he must get to water soon--if he were to reach
+it at all.
+
+A light breeze was stirring, and on it there was borne to him a faint
+rumble as of thunder. Instantly the man came to a rigid alertness. Thunder
+might mean rain, and rain would be salvation. But the sound did not die
+away. Instead, it deepened to a steady roar, growing every instant louder.
+His startled glance swept the cañon that drove like a sword cleft into the
+hills. Pouring down it, with the rush of a tidal wave, came a wall of
+cattle, a thousand backs tossing up and down as the swell of a troubled
+sea. Though he had never seen one before, the man on the lip of the gulch
+knew that he was watching a cattle stampede. Under the impact of the
+galloping hoofs the ground upon which he stood quaked.
+
+A cry diverted his attention. From the bed of the sandy wash a man had
+started up and was running for his life toward the cañon walls. Before he
+had taken half a dozen steps the avalanche was upon him, had cut him down,
+swept over him.
+
+The thud of the hoofs died away. Into the open desert the stampede had
+passed. A huddled mass lay motionless on the sand in the track of the
+avalanche.
+
+A long ragged breath whistled through the closed lips of the tenderfoot.
+He ran along the edge of the rock wall till he found a descent less sharp,
+lowered himself by means of jutting quartz and mesquit cropping out from
+the crevices, and so came through a little draw to the cañon.
+
+He dropped on a knee beside the sprawling, huddled figure. No second
+glance was needed to see that the man was dead. Life had been trampled out
+of him almost instantly and his features battered beyond any possible
+recognition. Unused to scenes of violence, the stranger stooping over him
+felt suddenly sick. It made him shudder to remember that if he could have
+found a way down in the darkness he, too, would have slept in the warm
+sand of the dry wash. If he had, the fate of this man would have been
+his.
+
+Under the doubled body was a canteen. The trembling fingers of the
+tenderfoot unscrewed the cork. Tipping the vessel, he drank avidly. One
+swallow, a second, then a few trickling drops. The canteen had been almost
+empty.
+
+Uncovering, he stood bareheaded before the inert body and spoke gently in
+the low, soft voice one instinctively uses in the presence of the dead.
+
+"Friend, I couldn't save your life, but your water has saved mine, I
+reckon. Anyhow, it gives me another chance to fight for it. I wish I could
+do something for you ... carry a message to your folks and tell them how
+it happened."
+
+He dropped down again beside the dead man and rifled the pockets. In them
+he found two letters addressed in an illiterate hand to James Diller,
+Cananea, Sonora, Mexico. An idea flashed into his brain and for a moment
+held him motionless while he worked it out. Why not? This man was about
+his size, dressed much like him, and so mutilated that identification was
+impossible.
+
+From his own pocket he took a leather bill book and a monogrammed
+cigarcase. With a sharp stone he scarred the former. The metal case he
+crushed out of shape beneath the heel of his boot. Having first taken one
+twenty dollar yellowback from the well-padded book, he slipped it and the
+cigarcase into the inner coat pocket of the dead man. Irregularly in a
+dozen places he gashed with his knife the derby hat he was wearing, ripped
+the band half loose, dragged it in the dust, and jumped on it till the hat
+was flat as a pancake. Finally he kicked it into the sand a dozen yards
+away.
+
+"The cattle would get it tangled in their hoofs and drag it that far with
+them," he surmised.
+
+The soft gray hat of the dead man he himself appropriated. Again he spoke
+to the lifeless body, lowering his voice to a murmur.
+
+"I reckon you wouldn't grudge me this if you knew. I'm up against it. If I
+get out of these hills alive I'll be lucky. But if I do--well, it won't do
+you any harm to be mistaken for me, and it will accommodate me mightily. I
+hate to leave you here alone, but it's what I've got to do to save
+myself."
+
+He turned away and plodded up the dry creek bed.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+The sun was at the meridian when three heavily armed riders drew up at the
+mouth of the cañon. They fell into the restful, negligent postures of
+horsemen accustomed to take their ease in the saddle.
+
+"Do you figure maybe he's working up to the headwaters of Dry Sandy?" one
+suggested.
+
+A squat, bandy-legged man with a face of tanned leather presently
+answered. "No, Tim, I expect not. The way I size him up Mr. Richard
+Bellamy wouldn't know Dry Sandy from an irrigation ditch. Mr. R. B. hopes
+he's hittin' the high spots for Sonora, but he ain't anyways sure. Right
+about now he's ridin' the grub line, unless he's made a strike
+somewhere."
+
+The third member of the party, a lean, wide-shouldered, sinewy youth, blue
+silk kerchief knotted loosely around his neck, broke in with a gesture
+that swept the sky. "Funny about all them buzzards. What are they doing
+here, sheriff?"
+
+The squat man opened his mouth to answer, but Tim took the word out of his
+mouth.
+
+"Look!" His arm had shot straight out toward the cañon. A coyote was
+disappearing on the lope. "Something lying there in the wash at the bend,
+Burke."
+
+Sheriff Burke slid his rifle from its scabbard. "We'll not take any
+chances, boys. Spread out far as you can. Tim, ride close to the left
+wall. You keep along the right one, Flatray. Me, I'll take the center.
+That's right."
+
+They rode forward cautiously. Once Flatray spoke.
+
+"By the tracks there has been a lot of cattle down here on the jump
+recently."
+
+"That's what," Tim agreed.
+
+Flatray swung from his saddle and stooped over the body lying at the bend
+of the wash.
+
+"Crushed to death in a cattle stampede, looks like," he called to the
+sheriff.
+
+"Search him, Jack," the sheriff ordered.
+
+The young man gave an exclamation of surprise. He was standing with a
+cigarcase in one hand and a billbook in the other. "It's the man we're
+after--it's Bellamy."
+
+Burke left his horse and came forward. "How do you know?"
+
+"Initials on the cigarcase, R. B. Same monogram on the billbook."
+
+The sheriff had stooped to pick up a battered hat as he moved toward the
+deputy. Now he showed the initials stamped on the sweat band. "R. B. here,
+too."
+
+"Suit of gray clothes, derby hat, size and weight about medium. We'll
+never know about the scar on the eyebrow, but I guess Mr. Bellamy is
+identified without that."
+
+"Must have camped here last night and while he was asleep the cattle
+stampeded down the cañon," Tim hazarded.
+
+"That guess is as good as any. They ce'tainly stomped the life out of him
+thorough. Anyhow, Bellamy has met up with his punishment. We'll have to
+pack the body back to town, boys," the sheriff told them.
+
+Half an hour later the party filed out to the creosote flats and struck
+across country toward Mesa. Flatray was riding pillion behind Tim. His own
+horse was being used as a pack saddle.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+BRAND BLOTTING
+
+
+The tenderfoot, slithering down a hillside of shale, caught at a
+greasewood bush and waited. The sound of a rifle shot had drifted across
+the ridge to him. Friend or foe, it made no difference to him now. He had
+reached the end of his tether, must get to water soon or give up the
+fight.
+
+No second shot broke the stillness. A swift zigzagged across the cattle
+trail he was following. Out of a blue sky the Arizona sun still beat down
+upon a land parched by æons of drought, a land still making its brave show
+of greenness against a dun background.
+
+Arrow straight the man made for the hill crest. Weak as a starved puppy,
+his knees bent under him as he climbed. Down and up again a dozen times,
+he pushed feverishly forward. All day he had been seeing things. Cool
+lakes had danced on the horizon line before his tortured vision. Strange
+fancies had passed in and out of his mind. He wondered if this, too, were
+a delusion. How long that stiff ascent took him he never knew, but at
+last he reached the summit and crept over its cactus-covered shoulder.
+
+He looked into a valley dressed in its young spring garb. Of all deserts
+this is the loveliest when the early rains have given rebirth to the hope
+that stirs within its bosom once a year. But the tenderfoot saw nothing of
+its pathetic promise, of its fragile beauty so soon to be blasted. His
+sunken eyes swept the scene and found at first only a desert waste in
+which lay death.
+
+"I lose," he said to himself out loud.
+
+With the words he gave up the long struggle and sank to the ground. For
+hours he had been exhausted to the limit of endurance, but the will to
+live had kept him going. Now the driving force within had run down. He
+would die where he lay.
+
+Another instant, and he was on his feet again eager, palpitant, tremulous.
+For plainly there had come to him the bleating of a calf.
+
+Moving to the left, he saw rising above the hill brow a thin curl of
+smoke. A dozen staggering steps brought him to the edge of a draw. There
+in the hollow below, almost within a stone's throw, was a young woman
+bending over a fire. He tried to call, but his swollen tongue and dry
+throat refused the service. Instead, he began to run toward her.
+
+Beyond the wash was a dead cow. Not far from it lay a calf on its side,
+all four feet tied together. From the fire the young woman took a red-hot
+running iron and moved toward the little bleater.
+
+The crackling of a twig brought her around as a sudden tight rein does a
+high-strung horse. The man had emerged from the prickly pears and was
+close upon her. His steps dragged. The sag of his shoulders indicated
+extreme fatigue. The dark hollows beneath the eyes told of days of
+torment.
+
+The girl stood before him slender and straight. She was pale to the lips.
+Her breath came fast and ragged as if she had been running.
+
+Abruptly she shot her challenge at him. "Who are you?"
+
+"Water," he gasped.
+
+One swift, searching look the girl gave him, then "Wait!" she ordered, and
+was off into the mesquit on the run. Three minutes later the tenderfoot
+heard her galloping through the brush. With a quick, tight rein she drew
+up, swung from the saddle expertly as a _vaquero_, and began to untie a
+canteen held by buckskin thongs to the side of the saddle.
+
+He drank long, draining the vessel to the last drop.
+
+From her saddle bags she brought two sandwiches wrapped in oiled paper.
+
+"You're hungry, too, I expect," she said, her eyes shining with tender
+pity.
+
+She observed that he did not wolf his food, voracious though he was. While
+he ate she returned to the fire with the running iron and heaped live
+coals around the end of it.
+
+"You've had a pretty tough time of it," she called across to him gently.
+
+"It hasn't been exactly a picnic, but I'm all right now."
+
+The girl liked the way he said it. Whatever else he was--and already faint
+doubts were beginning to stir in her--he was not a quitter.
+
+"You were about all in," she said, watching him.
+
+"Just about one little kick left in me," he smiled.
+
+"That's what I thought."
+
+She busied herself over the fire inspecting the iron. The man watched her
+curiously. What could it mean? A cow killed wantonly, a calf bawling with
+pain and fear, and this girl responsible for it. The tenderfoot could not
+down the suspicion stirring in his mind. He knew little of the cattle
+country. But he had read books and had spent a week in Mesa not entirely
+in vain. The dead cow with the little stain of red down its nose pointed
+surely to one thing. He was near enough to see a hole in the forehead just
+above the eyes. Instinctively his gaze passed to the rifle lying in the
+sand close to his hand. Her back was still turned to him. He leaned over,
+drew the gun to him, and threw out an empty shell from the barrel.
+
+At the click of the lever the girl swung around upon him.
+
+"What are you doing?" she demanded.
+
+He put the rifle down hurriedly. "Just seeing what make it is."
+
+"And what make is it?" she flashed.
+
+He was trapped. "I hadn't found out yet," he stammered.
+
+"No, but you found out there was an empty shell in it," she retorted
+quickly.
+
+Their eyes fastened. She was gray as ashes, but she did not flinch. By
+chance he had stumbled upon the crime of crimes in Cattleland, had caught
+a rustler redhanded at work. Looking into the fine face, nostrils
+delicately fashioned, eyes clear and deep, the thing was scarce credible
+of her. Why, she could not be a day more than twenty, and in every line of
+her was the look of pride, of good blood.
+
+"Yes, I happened to throw it out," he apologized.
+
+But she would have no evasion, would not let his doubts sleep. There was
+superb courage in the scornful ferocity with which she retorted.
+
+"Happened! And I suppose you _happened_ to notice that the brand on the
+cow is a Bar Double G, while that on the calf is different."
+
+"No, I haven't noticed that."
+
+"Plenty of time to see it yet." Then, with a swift blaze of feeling,
+"What's the use of pretending? I know what you think."
+
+"Then you know more than I do. My thoughts don't go any farther than this,
+that you have saved my life and I'm grateful for it."
+
+"I know better. You think I'm a rustler. But don't say it. Don't you dare
+say it."
+
+Brought up in an atmosphere of semi-barbaric traditions, silken-strong,
+with instincts unwarped by social pressure, she was what the sun and wind
+and freedom of Arizona had made her, a poetic creation far from
+commonplace. So he judged her, and in spite of the dastardly thing she had
+done he sensed an innate refinement strangely at variance with the
+circumstances.
+
+"All right. I won't," he answered, with a faint smile.
+
+"Now you've got to pay for your sandwiches by making yourself useful. I'm
+going to finish this job." She said it with an edge of self-scorn. He
+guessed her furious with self-contempt.
+
+Under her directions he knelt on the calf so as to hold it steady while
+she plied the hot iron. The odor of burnt hair and flesh was already acrid
+in his nostrils. Upon the red flank F was written in raw, seared flesh. He
+judged that the brand she wanted was not yet complete. Probably the iron
+had got too cold to finish the work, and she had been forced to reheat
+it.
+
+The little hand that held the running iron was trembling. Looking up, the
+tenderfoot saw that she was white enough to faint.
+
+"I can't do it. You'll have to let me hold him while you blur the brand,"
+she told him.
+
+They changed places. She set her teeth to it and held the calf steady,
+but the brander noticed that she had to look away when the red-hot iron
+came near the flesh of the victim.
+
+"Blur the brand right out. Do it quick, please," she urged.
+
+A sizzle of burning skin, a piteous wail from the tortured animal, an
+acrid pungent odor, and the thing was done. The girl got to her feet,
+quivering like an aspen.
+
+"Have you a knife?" she asked faintly.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Cut the rope."
+
+The calf staggered to all fours, shook itself together, and went bawling
+to the dead mother.
+
+The girl drew a deep breath. "They say it does not hurt except while it is
+being done."
+
+His bleak eyes met hers stonily. "And of course it will soon get used to
+doing without its mother. That is a mere detail."
+
+A shudder went through her.
+
+The whole thing was incomprehensible to him. Why under heaven had she done
+it? How could one so sensitive have done a wanton cruel thing like this?
+Her reason he could not fathom. The facts that confronted him were that
+she _had_ done it, and had meant to carry the crime through. Only
+detection had changed her purpose.
+
+She turned upon him, plainly sick of the whole business. "Let's get away
+from here. Where's your horse?"
+
+"I haven't any. I started on foot and got lost."
+
+"From where?"
+
+"From Mammoth."
+
+Sharply her keen eyes fixed him. How could a man have got lost near
+Mammoth and wandered here? He would have had to cross the range, and even
+a child would have known enough to turn back into the valley where the
+town lay.
+
+"How long ago?"
+
+"Day before yesterday." He added after a moment: "I was looking for a
+job."
+
+She took in the soft hands and the unweathered skin of the dark face.
+"What sort of a job?"
+
+"Anything I can do."
+
+"But what can you do?"
+
+"I can ride."
+
+She must take him home with her, of course, and feed and rest him. That
+went without saying. But what after that? He knew too much to be turned
+adrift with the story of what he had seen. If she could get a hold on
+him--whether of fear or of gratitude--so as to insure his silence, the
+truth might yet be kept quiet. At least she could try.
+
+"Did you ever ride the range?"
+
+"No."
+
+"What sort of work have you done?"
+
+After a scarcely noticeable pause, "Clerical work," he answered.
+
+"You're from the East?" she suggested, her eyes narrowing.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"My name is Melissy Lee," she told him, watching him very steadily.
+
+Once more the least of pauses. "Mine is Diller--James Diller."
+
+"That's funny. I know another man of that name. At least, I know him by
+sight."
+
+The man who had called himself Diller grew wary. "It's a common enough
+name."
+
+"Yes. If I find you work at my father's ranch would you be too particular
+about what it is?"
+
+"Try me."
+
+"And your memory--is it inconveniently good?" Her glance swept as by
+chance over the scene of her recent operations.
+
+"I've got a right good forgettery, too," he assured her.
+
+"You're not in the habit of talking much about the things you see." She
+put it in the form of a statement, but the rising inflection indicated the
+interrogative.
+
+His black eyes met hers steadily. "I can padlock my mouth when it is
+necessary," he answered, the suggestion of a Southern drawl in his
+intonation.
+
+She wanted an assurance more direct. "When _you_ think it necessary, I
+suppose."
+
+"That is what I meant to say."
+
+"Come. One good turn deserves another. What about this?" She nodded toward
+the dead cow.
+
+"I have not seen a thing I ought not to have seen."
+
+"Didn't you see me blot a brand on that calf?"
+
+He shook his head. "Can't recall it at all, Miss Lee."
+
+Swiftly her keen glance raked him again. Judged by his clothes, he was one
+of the world's ineffectives, flotsam tossed into the desert by the wash of
+fate; but there was that in the steadiness of his eye, in the set of his
+shoulders, in the carriage of his lean-loined, slim body that spoke of
+breeding. He was no booze-fighting grubliner. Disguised though he was in
+cheap slops, she judged him a man of parts. He would do to trust,
+especially since she could not help herself.
+
+"We'll be going. You take my horse," she ordered.
+
+"And let you walk?"
+
+"How long since you have eaten?" she asked brusquely.
+
+"About seven minutes," he smiled.
+
+"But before that?"
+
+"Two days."
+
+"Well, then. Anybody can see you're as weak as a kitten. Do as I say."
+
+"Why can't we both ride?"
+
+"We can as soon as we get across the pass. Until then I'll walk."
+
+Erect as a willow sapling, she took the hills with an elastic ease that
+showed her deep-bosomed in spite of her slenderness. The short corduroy
+riding skirt and high-laced boots were made for use, not grace, but the
+man in the saddle found even in her manner of walking the charm of her
+direct, young courage. Free of limb, as yet unconscious of sex, she had
+the look of a splendid boy. The descending sun was in her sparkling hair,
+on the lank, undulating grace of her changing lines.
+
+Active as a cat though it was, the cowpony found the steep pass with its
+loose rubble hard going. Melissy took the climb much easier. In the way
+she sped through the mesquit, evading the clutch of the cholla by supple
+dips to right and left, there was a kind of pantherine litheness.
+
+At the summit she waited for the horse to clamber up the shale after her.
+
+"Get down in your collar, you Buckskin," she urged, and when the pony was
+again beside her petted the animal with little love pats on the nose.
+
+Carelessly she flung at Diller a question. "From what part of the East did
+you say?"
+
+He was on the spot promptly this time. "From Keokuk."
+
+"Keokuk, Indiana?"
+
+"Iowa," he smiled.
+
+"Oh, is it Iowa?" He had sidestepped her little trap, but she did not give
+up. "Just arrived?"
+
+"I've been herding sheep for a month."
+
+"Oh, sheep-herding!" Her disdain implied that if he were fit for nothing
+better than sheep-herding, the West could find precious little use for
+him.
+
+"It was all I could get to do."
+
+"Where did you say you wrangled Mary's little lamb?"
+
+"In the Catalinas."
+
+"Whose outfit?"
+
+Question and answer were tossed back and forth lightly, but both were
+watching warily.
+
+"Outfit?" he repeated, puzzled.
+
+"Yes. Who were you working for?"
+
+"Don't remember his name. He was a Mexican."
+
+"Must have been one of the camps of Antonio Valdez."
+
+"Yes, that's it. That's the name."
+
+"Only he runs his sheep in the Galiuros," she demurred.
+
+"Is it the Galiuros? Those Spanish names! I can't keep them apart in my
+mind."
+
+She laughed with hard, young cruelty. "It is hard to remember what you
+never heard, isn't it?"
+
+The man was on the rack. Tiny beads of perspiration stood out on his
+forehead. But he got a lip smile into working order.
+
+"Just what do you mean, Miss Lee?"
+
+"You had better get your story more pat. I've punched a dozen holes in it
+already. First you tell me you are from the East, and even while you were
+telling me I knew you were a Southerner from the drawl. No man ever got
+lost from Mammoth. You gave a false name. You said you had been herding
+sheep, but you didn't know what an outfit is. You wobbled between the
+Galiuros and the Catalinas."
+
+"I'm not a native. I told you I couldn't remember Spanish names."
+
+"It wasn't necessary to tell me," she countered quickly. "A man that can't
+recall even the name of his boss!"
+
+"I'm not in the witness box, Miss Lee," he told her stiffly.
+
+"Not yet, but you're liable to be soon, I reckon."
+
+"In a cattle rustling case, I suppose you mean."
+
+"No, I don't." She went on with her indictment of his story, though his
+thrust had brought the color to her cheek. "When I offered you Antonio
+Valdez for an employer you jumped at him. If you want to know, he happens
+to be our herder. He doesn't own a sheep and never will."
+
+"You know all about it," he said with obvious sarcasm.
+
+"I know you're not who you say you are."
+
+"Perhaps you know who I am then."
+
+"I don't know or care. It's none of my business. But others may think it
+is theirs. You can't be so reckless with the truth without folks having
+notions. If I were you I'd get a story that will hang together."
+
+"You're such a good detective. Maybe I could get you to invent one for
+me," he suggested maliciously.
+
+Her indignation flashed. "I'm no such thing. But I'm not quite a fool. A
+babe in arms wouldn't swallow that fairy tale."
+
+Awkward as her knowledge might prove, he could not help admiring the
+resource and shrewdness of the girl. She had virtually served notice that
+if she had a secret that needed keeping so had he.
+
+They looked down over a desert green with bajadas, prickly pears, and
+mesquit. To the right, close to a spur of the hills, were the dwarfed
+houses of a ranch. The fans of a windmill caught the sun and flashed it
+back to the travelers.
+
+"The Bar Double G. My father owns it," Miss Lee explained.
+
+"Oh! Your father owns it." He reflected a moment while he studied her.
+"Let's understand each other, Miss Lee. I'm not what I claim to be, you
+say. We'll put it that you have guessed right. What do you intend to do
+about it? I'm willing to be made welcome at the Bar Double G, but I don't
+want to be too welcome."
+
+"I'm not going to do anything."
+
+"So long as I remember not to remember what I've seen."
+
+The blood burned in her cheeks beneath their Arizona tan. She did not look
+at him. "If you like to put it that way."
+
+He counted it to her credit that she was ashamed of the bargain in every
+honest fiber of her.
+
+"No matter what they say I've done. You'll keep faith?"
+
+"I don't care what you've done," she flung back bitterly. "It's none of my
+affair. I told you that before. Men come out here for all sorts of
+reasons. We don't ask for a bill of particulars."
+
+"Then I'll be right glad to go down to the Bar Double G with you, and say
+thanks for the chance."
+
+He had dismounted when they first reached the pass. Now she swung to the
+saddle and he climbed behind her. They reached presently one of the
+nomadic trails of the cattle country which wander leisurely around hills
+and over gulches along the line of least resistance. This brought them to
+a main traveled road leading to the ranch.
+
+They rode in silence until the pasture fence was passed.
+
+"What am I to tell them your name is?" she asked stiffly.
+
+He took his time to answer. "Tom Morse is a good name, don't you think?
+How would T. L. Morse do?"
+
+She offered no comment, but sat in front of him, unresponsive as the
+sphinx. The rigor of her flat back told him that, though she might have to
+keep his shameful secret for the sake of her own, he could not presume
+upon it the least in the world.
+
+Melissy turned the horse over to a little Mexican boy and they were just
+mounting the steps of the porch when a young man cantered up to the house.
+Lean and muscular and sunbaked, he looked out of cool, gray eyes upon a
+man's world that had often put him through the acid test. The plain,
+cactus-torn chaps, flannel shirt open at the sinewy throat, dusty,
+wide-brimmed hat, revolver peeping from its leather pocket on the thigh:
+every detail contributed to the impression of efficiency he created. Even
+the one touch of swagger about him, the blue silk kerchief knotted loosely
+around his neck, lent color to his virile competency.
+
+He dragged his horse to a standstill and leaped off at the same instant.
+"Evenin', 'Lissie."
+
+She was busy lacing her shoe and did not look up. He guessed that he was
+being snubbed and into his eyes came a gleam of fun. A day later than he
+had promised, Jack Flatray was of opinion that he was being punished for
+tardiness.
+
+Casually he explained. "Couldn't make it any sooner. Burke had a hurry-up
+job that took us into the hills. Fellow by the name of Bellamy, wanted for
+murder at Nemo, Arkansas, had been tracked to Mesa. A message came over
+the wires to arrest him. When Burke sent me to his room he had lit out,
+taken a swift hike into the hills. Must a-had some warning, for he didn't
+even wait for a horse."
+
+The dilated eyes of the girl went past the deputy to the man she had
+rescued. He was leaning against one of the porch posts, tense and rigid,
+on his face the look of the hunted brought to bay.
+
+"And did you find him?" she asked mechanically of the deputy.
+
+"We found him. He had been trampled to death by a cattle stampede."
+
+Her mind groped blindly for an explanation. Her woman's instinct told her
+that the man panting on the porch within six feet of the officer was the
+criminal wanted. There must be a mistake somewhere.
+
+"Did you identify him?"
+
+"I guess there is no doubt about it. His papers and belongings all showed
+he was our man."
+
+"Oh!" The excitement of his news had for a moment thawed her, but a
+dignified aloofness showed again in her manner. "If you want to see father
+you'll find him in the corral, Mr. Flatray."
+
+"Well, I don't know as I'm looking for him awful hard," the blue
+kerchiefed youth smiled genially. "Anyway, I can wait a few minutes if I
+have to."
+
+"Yes." She turned away indifferently. "I'll show you your room, Mr.
+Morse."
+
+The deputy watched them disappear into the house with astonishment printed
+on his face. He had ridden twenty-seven miles to see Melissy Lee and he
+had not quite expected this sort of a greeting.
+
+"If that don't beat the Dutch. Looks like I'll do my callin' on the old
+man after all, maybe," he murmured with a grin.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+AN ACCUSATION
+
+
+The rescued man ate, drank, and from sheer fatigue fell asleep within five
+minutes of the time he was shown his bedroom.
+
+Since he was not of the easily discouraged kind, the deputy stayed to
+supper on invitation of Lee. He sat opposite the daughter of his host, and
+that young woman treated him with the most frigid politeness. The owner of
+the Bar Double G was quite unaware of any change of temperature. Jack and
+his little girl had always been the best of friends. So now he discoursed
+on the price of cows, the good rains, the outrages of the rustlers, and
+kindred topics without suspecting that the attention of the young man was
+on more personal matters.
+
+Though born in Arizona, Melissy was of the South. Due westward rolls the
+tide of settlement, and Beauchamp Lee had migrated from Tennessee after
+the war, following the line of least resistance to the sunburned
+territory. Later he had married a woman a good deal younger than himself.
+She had borne him two children, the elder of whom was now a young man.
+Melissy was the younger, and while she was still a babe in arms the mother
+had died of typhoid and left her baby girl to grow up as best she might in
+a land where women were few and far. This tiny pledge of her mother's love
+Champ Lee had treasured as a gift from Heaven. He had tended her and
+nursed her through the ailments of childhood with a devotion the most pure
+of his reckless life. Given to heady gusts of passion, there had never
+been a moment when his voice had been other than gentle and tender to
+her.
+
+Inevitably Melissy had become the product of her inheritance and her
+environment. If she was the heiress of Beauchamp Lee's courage and
+generosity, his quick indignation against wrong and injustice, so, too,
+she was of his passionate lawlessness.
+
+After supper Melissy disappeared. She wanted very much to be alone and
+have a good cry. Wherefore she slipped out of the back door and ran up the
+Lone Tree trail in the darkness. Jack thought he saw a white skirt fly a
+traitorous signal, and at leisure he pursued.
+
+But Melissy was not aware of that. She reached Lone Tree rock and slipped
+down from boulder to boulder until she came to the pine which gave the
+place its name. For hours she had been forced to repress her emotions, to
+make necessary small talk, to arrange for breakfast and other household
+details. Now she was alone, and the floods of her bitterness were
+unloosed. She broke down and wept passionately, for she was facing her
+first great disillusionment. She had lost a friend, one in whom she had
+put great faith.
+
+The first gust of the storm was past when Melissy heard a step on the
+rocks above. She knew intuitively that Jack Flatray had come in search of
+her, and he was the last man on earth she wanted to meet just now.
+
+"'Lissie!" she heard him call softly; and again, "'Lissie!"
+
+Noiselessly she got to her feet, waiting to see what he would do. She knew
+he must be standing on the edge of the great rock, so directly above her
+that if he had kicked a pebble it would have landed beside her. Presently
+he began to clamber down.
+
+She tiptoed along the ledge and slipped into the trough at the farther end
+that led to the top. It was a climb she had taken several times, but never
+in the dark. The ascent was almost perpendicular, and it had to be made by
+clinging to projecting rocks and vegetation. Moreover, if she were to
+escape undetected it had to be done in silence.
+
+She was a daughter of the hills, as surefooted as a mountain goat. Handily
+she went up, making the most of the footholds that offered. In spite of
+the best she could do the rustling of bushes betrayed her.
+
+Jack came to the foot of the trough and looked up.
+
+"So you're there, are you?" he asked.
+
+Her foot loosened a stone and sent it rolling down.
+
+"If I were you I wouldn't try that at night, 'Liss," he advised.
+
+She made sure of the steadiness of her voice before she answered. "You
+don't need to try it."
+
+"I said if I were you, girl."
+
+"But you are not. Don't let me detain you here, Mr. Flatray," she told him
+in a manner of icy precision.
+
+The deputy began the climb too. "What's the use of being so hostile,
+little girl?" he drawled. "Me, I came as soon as I could, burning the
+wind, too."
+
+She set her teeth, determined to reach the top in time to get away before
+he could join her. In her eagerness she took a chance that proved her
+undoing. A rock gave beneath her foot and clattered down. Clinging by one
+hand and foot, she felt her body swing around. From her throat a little
+cry leaped. She knew herself slipping.
+
+"Jack!"
+
+In time, and just in time, he reached her, braced himself, and gave her
+his knee for a foot rest.
+
+"All right?" he asked, and "All right!" she answered promptly.
+
+"We'll go back," he told her.
+
+She made no protest. Indeed, she displayed a caution in lowering herself
+that surprised him. Every foothold she tested carefully with her weight.
+Once she asked him to place her shoe in the crevice for her. He had never
+seen her take so much time in making sure or be so fussy about her
+personal safety.
+
+Safely on the ledge again, she attempted a second time to dismiss him.
+"Thank you, Mr. Flatray. I won't take any more of your time."
+
+He looked at her steadily before he spoke. "You're mighty high-heeled,
+'Lissie. You know my name ain't Mr. Flatray to you. What's it all about?
+I've told you twice I couldn't get here any sooner."
+
+She flamed out at him in an upblaze of feminine ferocity. "And I tell
+_you_, that I don't care if you had never come. I don't want to see you or
+have anything to do with you."
+
+"Why not?" He asked it quietly, though he began to know that her charge
+against him was a serious one.
+
+"Because I know what you are now, because you have made us believe in you
+while all the time you were living a lie."
+
+"Meaning what?"
+
+"I was gathering poppies on the other side of Antelope Pass this
+afternoon."
+
+"What has that got to do with me being a liar and a scoundrel," he wanted
+to know.
+
+"Oh, you pretend," she scoffed. "But you know as well as I do."
+
+"I'm afraid I don't. Let's have the indictment."
+
+"If everybody in Papago County had told me I wouldn't have believed it,"
+she cried. "I had to see it with my own eyes before I could have been
+convinced."
+
+"Yes, well what is it you saw with your eyes?"
+
+"You needn't keep it up. I tell you I saw it all from the time you fired
+the shot."
+
+He laughed easily, but without mirth. "Kept tab on me, did you?"
+
+She wheeled from him, gave a catch of her breath, and caught at the rock
+wall to save herself from falling.
+
+He spoke sharply. "You hurt yourself in the trough."
+
+"I sprained my ankle a little, but it doesn't matter."
+
+He understood now why she had made so slow a descent and he suspected that
+the wrench was more than she admitted. The moon had come out from under a
+cloud and showed him a pale, tear-stained face, with a row of even, little
+teeth set firm against the lower lip. She was in pain and her pride was
+keeping it from him.
+
+"Let me look at your ankle."
+
+"No."
+
+"I say yes. You've hurt it seriously."
+
+"That is my business, I think," she told him with cold finality.
+
+"I'm going to make it mine. Think I don't know you, proud as Lucifer when
+you get set. You'll lame yourself for life if you're not careful."
+
+"I don't care to discuss it."
+
+"Fiddlesticks! If you've got anything against me we'll hear what it is
+afterward. Right now we'll give first aid to the injured. Sit down here."
+
+She had not meant to give way, but she did. Perhaps it was because of the
+faintness that stole over her, or because the pain was sharper than she
+could well endure. She found herself seated on the rock shelf, letting him
+cut the lace out of her shoe and slip it off. Ever so gently he worked,
+but he could tell by the catches of her breath that it was not pleasant to
+endure. From his neck he untied the silk kerchief and wrapped it tightly
+around the ankle.
+
+"That will have to do till I get you home."
+
+"I'll not trouble you, sir. If you'll stop and tell my father that is all
+I'll ask."
+
+"Different here," he retorted cheerfully. "Just so as to avoid any
+argument, I'll announce right now that Jack Flatray is going to see you
+home. It's his say-so."
+
+She rose. None knew better than she that he was a dominating man when he
+chose to be. She herself carried in her slim body a spirit capable of
+passion and of obstinacy, but to-night she had not the will to force the
+fighting.
+
+Setting her teeth, she took a step or two forward, her hand against the
+rock wall to help bear the weight. With narrowed eyes, he watched her
+closely, noting the catches of pain that shot through her breathing. Half
+way up the boulder bed he interposed brusquely.
+
+"This is plumb foolishness, girl. You've got no business putting your
+weight on that foot, and you're not going to do it."
+
+He slipped his arm around her waist in such a way as to support her all he
+could. With a quick turn of the body she tried to escape.
+
+"No use. I'm going through with this, 'Lissie. Someone has been lying to
+you about me, and just now you hate the ground I walk on. Good enough.
+That's got nothing to do with this. You're a woman that needs help, and
+any old time J. F. meets up with such a one he's on the job. You don't owe
+me 'Thank you,' but you've got to stand for me till you reach the house."
+
+"You're taking advantage of me because I can't help myself. Why don't you
+go and bring father," she flung out.
+
+"I'm younger than your father and abler to help. That's why?"
+
+They reached the top of the bluff and he made her sit down to rest. A pale
+moon suffused the country, and in that stage set to lowered lights her
+pallor was accented. From the colorless face shadowy, troubled eyes spoke
+the misery through which she was passing. The man divined that her pain
+was more than physical, and the knowledge went to him poignantly by the
+heart route.
+
+"What is it, 'Lissie? What have I done?" he asked gently.
+
+"You know. I don't want to talk about it."
+
+"But I don't know."
+
+"What's the use of keeping it up? I caught you this afternoon."
+
+"Caught me doing what?"
+
+"Caught you rustling, caught you branding a calf just after you had shot
+the cow."
+
+For an instant her charge struck him dumb. He stared at her as if he
+thought she had gone suddenly mad.
+
+"What's that? Say it again," he got out at last.
+
+"And the cow had the Bar Double G brand, belonged to my father, your best
+friend," she added passionately.
+
+He spoke very gently, but there was an edge to his voice that was new to
+her. "Suppose you tell me all about it."
+
+She threw out a hand in a gesture of despair. "What's the use? Nothing
+could have made me believe it but my own eyes. You needn't keep up a
+pretense. I saw you."
+
+"Yes, so you said before. Now begin at the start and tell your story."
+
+She had the odd feeling of being put on the defensive and it angered her.
+How dared he look at her with those cool, gray eyes that still appeared to
+bore a hole through treachery? Why did her heart convict her of having
+deserted a friend, when she knew that the desertion was his?
+
+"While I was gathering poppies I heard a shot. It was so close I walked to
+the edge of the draw and looked over. There I saw you."
+
+"What was I doing?"
+
+"You were hogtying a calf."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"I didn't understand at first. I thought to slip down and surprise you for
+fun. But as I got lower I saw the dead cow. Just then you began to brand
+the calf and I cried out to you."
+
+"What did I do?"
+
+"You know what you did," she answered wearily. "You broke for the brush
+where your horse was and galloped away."
+
+"Got a right good look at me, did you?"
+
+"Not at your face. But I knew. You were wearing this blue silk
+handkerchief." Her finger indicated the one bound around her ankle.
+
+"So on that evidence you decide I'm a rustler, and you've only known me
+thirteen years. You're a good friend, 'Lissie."
+
+Her eyes blazed on him like live coals. "Have you forgotten the calf you
+left with your brand on it?"
+
+She had startled him at last. "With my brand on it?" he repeated, his
+voice dangerously low and soft.
+
+"You know as well as I do. You had got the F just about finished when I
+called. You dropped the running iron and ran."
+
+"Dropped it and ran, did I? And what did you do?"
+
+"I reheated the iron and blurred the brand so that nobody could tell what
+it had been."
+
+He laughed harshly without mirth. "I see. I'm a waddy and a thief, but
+you're going to protect me for old times' sake. That's the play, is it? I
+ought to be much obliged to you and promise to reform, I reckon."
+
+His bitterness stung. She felt a tightening of the throat. "All I ask is
+that you go away and never come back to me," she cried with a sob.
+
+"Don't worry about that. I ain't likely to come back to a girl that thinks
+I'm the lowest thing that walks. You're not through with me a bit more
+than I am with you," he answered harshly.
+
+Her little hand beat upon the rock in her distress. "I never would have
+believed it. Nobody could have made me believe it. I--I--why, I trusted
+you like my own father," she lamented. "To think that you would take that
+way to stock your ranch--and with the cattle of my father, too."
+
+His face was hard as chiseled granite. "Distrust all your friends. That's
+the best way."
+
+"You haven't even denied it--not that it would do any good," she said
+miserably.
+
+There was a sound of hard, grim laughter in his throat. "No, and I ain't
+going to deny it. Are you ready to go yet?"
+
+His repulse of her little tentative advance was like a blow on the face to
+her.
+
+She made a movement to rise. While she was still on her knees he stooped,
+put his arms around her, and took her into them. Before she could utter
+her protest he had started down the trail toward the house.
+
+"How dare you? Let me go," she ordered.
+
+"You're not able to walk, and you'll go the way I say," he told her
+shortly in a flinty voice.
+
+Her anger was none the less because she realized her helplessness to get
+what she wanted. Her teeth set fast to keep back useless words. Into his
+stony eyes her angry ones burned. The quick, irregular rise and fall of
+her bosom against his heart told him how she was struggling with her
+passion.
+
+Once he spoke. "Tell me where it was you saw this rustler--the exact place
+near as you can locate it."
+
+She answered only by a look.
+
+The deputy strode into the living room of the ranch with her in his arms.
+Lee was reading a newspaper Jack had brought with him from Mesa. At sight
+of them he started up hurriedly.
+
+"Goddlemighty, what's the matter, Jack?"
+
+"Only a ricked ankle, Champ. Slipped on a stone," Flatray explained as he
+put Melissy down on the lounge.
+
+In two minutes the whole house was upset. Hop Ling was heating water to
+bathe the sprain. A rider from the bunkhouse was saddling to go for the
+doctor. Another was off in the opposite direction to buy some liniment at
+Mammoth.
+
+In the confusion Flatray ran up his horse from the pasture, slapped on the
+saddle, and melted into the night.
+
+An hour later Melissy asked her father what had become of him.
+
+"Doggone that boy, I don't know where he went. Reckon he thought he'd be
+in the way. Mighty funny he didn't give us a chanct to tell him to stay."
+
+"Probably he had business in Mesa," Melissy answered, turning her face to
+the wall.
+
+"Business nothing," retorted the exasperated rancher. "He figured we
+couldn't eat and sleep him without extra trouble. Ain't that a fine
+reputation for him to be giving the Bar Double G? I'll curl his hair for
+him onct I meet up with him again."
+
+"If you would put out the light, I think I could sleep, dad," she told him
+in the least of voices.
+
+"Sure, honey. Has the throbbing gone out of the ankle?" he asked
+anxiously.
+
+"Not entirely, but it's a good deal better. Good-night, dad."
+
+"If Doc comes I'll bring him in," Lee said after he had kissed her.
+
+"Do, please."
+
+But after she was left alone Melissy did not prepare herself for sleep.
+Her wide open eyes stared into the darkness, while her mind stormily
+reviewed the day. The man who for years had been her best friend was a
+scoundrel. She had proved him unworthy of her trust, and on top of that he
+had insulted her. Hot tears stung her eyes--tears of shame, of wounded
+self-love, of mortification, and of something more worthy than any of
+these.
+
+She grieved passionately for that which had gone out of her life, for the
+comradeship that had been so precious to her. If this man were a waddy,
+who of all her friends could she trust? She could have forgiven him had he
+done wrong in the heat of anger. But this premeditated evil was beyond
+forgiveness. To make it worse, he had come direct from the doing of it to
+meet her, with a brazen smile on his lips and a lie in his heart. She
+would never speak to him again--never so long as she lived.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE MAN WITH THE CHIHUAHUA HAT
+
+
+A little dust cloud was traveling up the trail toward the Bar Double G,
+the center of which presently defined itself as a rider moving at a road
+gait. He wore a Chihuahua hat and with it the picturesque trappings the
+Southwest borrows on occasion from across the border. Vanity disclosed
+itself in the gold-laced hat, in the silver conchos of the fringed chaps,
+in the fine workmanship of the saddle and bit. The man's finery was
+overdone, carried with it the suggestion of being on exhibition. But one
+look at the man himself, sleek and graceful, black-haired and
+white-toothed, exuding an effect of cold wariness in spite of the masked
+smiling face, would have been enough to give the lie to any charge of
+weakness. His fopperies could not conceal the silken strength of him. One
+meeting with the chill, deep-set eyes was certificate enough for most
+people.
+
+Melissy, sitting on the porch with her foot resting on a second chair,
+knew a slight quickening of the blood as she watched him approach.
+
+"Good evenin', Miss M'lissy," he cried, sweeping his sombrero as low as
+the stirrup.
+
+"_Buenos tardes_, _Señor_ Norris," she flung back gayly.
+
+Sitting at ease in the saddle, he leisurely looked her over with eyes that
+smoldered behind half-shuttered lids. To most of her world she was in
+spirit still more boy than woman, but before his bold, possessive gaze her
+long lashes wavered to the cheeks into which the warm blood was beating.
+Her long, free lines were still slender with the immaturity of youth, her
+soul still hesitating reluctantly to cross the border to womanhood toward
+which Nature was pushing her so relentlessly. From a fund of experience
+Philip Norris read her shrewdly, knew how to evoke the latent impulses
+which brought her eagerly to the sex duel.
+
+"Playing off for sick," he scoffed.
+
+"I'm not," she protested. "Never get sick. It's just a sprained ankle."
+
+"Sho! I guess you're Miss Make Believe; just harrowing the feelings of
+your beaux."
+
+"The way you talk! I haven't got any beaux. The boys are just my
+friends."
+
+"Oh, just friends! And no beaux. My, my! Not a single sweetheart in all
+this wide open country. Shall I go rope you one and bring him in,
+_compadre_?"
+
+"No!" she exploded. "I don't want any. I'm not old enough yet." Her
+dancing eyes belied the words.
+
+"Now I wouldn't have guessed it. You look to me most ready to be picked."
+He rested his weight on the farther stirrup and let his lazy smile mock
+her. "My estimate would be sixteen. I'll bet you're every day of that."
+
+"I only lack three months of being eighteen," she came back indignantly.
+
+"You don't say! You'll ce'tainly have to be advertising for a husband
+soon, Miss Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen. Maybe an ad in the Mesa paper
+would help. You ain't so awful bad looking."
+
+"I'll let you write it. What would you say?" she demanded, a patch of pink
+standing out near the curve of the cheek bone.
+
+He swung from the saddle and flung the reins to the ground. With jingling
+spurs he came up the steps and sat on the top one, his back against a
+pillar. Boldly his admiring eyes swept her.
+
+"_Nina_, I couldn't do the subject justice. Honest, I haven't got the
+vocabulary."
+
+"Oh, you!" Laughter was in the eyes that studied him with a side tilt of
+the chin. "That's a fine way to get out of it when your bluff is called."
+
+He leaned back against the post comfortably and absorbed the beauty of the
+western horizon. The sun had just set behind a saddle of the Galiuros in a
+splash of splendor. All the colors of the rainbow fought for supremacy in
+a brilliant-tinted sky that blazed above the fire-girt peaks. Soon dusk
+would slip down over the land and tone the hues to a softer harmony. A
+purple sea would flow over the hills, to be in turn displaced by a deep,
+soft violet. Then night, that night of mystery and romance which
+transforms the desert to a thing of incredible wonder!
+
+"Did your father buy this sunset with the ranch? And has he got a
+guarantee that it will perform every night?" he asked.
+
+"Did you ever see anything like it?" she cried. "I have looked at them all
+my life and I never get tired."
+
+He laughed softly, his indolent, sleepy look on her. "Some things I would
+never get tired of looking at either."
+
+Without speaking she nodded, still absorbing the sunset.
+
+"But it wouldn't be that kind of scenery," he added. "How tall are you,
+_muchacha_?"
+
+Her glance came around in surprise. "I don't know. About five foot five, I
+think. Why?"
+
+"I'm working on that ad. How would this do? 'Miss
+Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen wants to meet up with gentleman between
+eighteen and forty-eight. Object, matrimony. Description of lady: Slim,
+medium height, brunette, mop of blue-black hair, the prettiest dimple you
+ever saw----'"
+
+"Now I know you're making fun of me. I'm mad." And the dimple flashed into
+being.
+
+"'--mostly says the opposite of what she means, has a----'"
+
+"I don't. I don't"
+
+"'--has a spice of the devil in her, which----'"
+
+"Now, I _am_ mad," she interrupted, laughing.
+
+"'--which is excusable, since she has the reddest lips for kissing in
+Arizona.'"
+
+He had gone too far. Her innocence was in arms. Norris knew it by the
+swiftness with which the smile vanished from her face, by the flash of
+anger in the eyes.
+
+"I prefer to talk about something else, Mr. Norris," she said with all the
+prim stiffness of a schoolgirl.
+
+Her father relieved the tension by striding across from the stable. With
+him came a bowlegged young fellow in plain leathers. The youngster was
+Charley Hymer, one of the riders for the Bar Double G.
+
+"You're here at the right time, Norris," Lee said grimly. "Charley has
+just come down from Antelope Pass. He found one of my cows dead, with a
+bullet hole through the forehead. The ashes of a fire were there, and in
+the brush not far away a running iron."
+
+The eyes of Norris narrowed to slits. He was the cattle detective of the
+association and for a year now the rustlers had outgeneraled him. "I'll
+have you take me to the spot, Charley. Get a move on you and we'll get
+there soon as the moon is up."
+
+Melissy gripped the arms of her chair tightly with both hands. She was
+looking at Norris with a new expression, a kind of breathless fear. She
+knew him for a man who could not be swerved from the thing he wanted. For
+all his easy cynicism, he had the reputation of being a bloodhound on the
+trail. Moreover, she knew that he was no friend to Jack Flatray. Why had
+she left that running iron as evidence to convict its owner? What folly
+not to have removed it from the immediate scene of the crime!
+
+The cattle detective and her father had moved a few steps away and were
+talking in low tones. Melissy became aware of a footfall. The man who
+called himself Morse came around the corner of the house and stopped at
+the porch steps.
+
+"May I speak to you a moment, Miss Lee?" he said in a low voice.
+
+"Of course."
+
+The voice of Norris rose to an irritated snarl. "Tell you I've got
+evidence, Lee. Mebbe it's not enough to convict, but it satisfies me
+a-plenty that Jack Flatray's the man."
+
+Melissy was frozen to a tense attention. Her whole mind was on what passed
+between the detective and her father. Otherwise she would have noticed the
+swift change that transformed the tenderfoot.
+
+The rancher answered with impatient annoyance. "You're 'way off, Norris. I
+don't care anything about your evidence. The idea is plumb ridiculous.
+Twenty odd years I've known him. He's the best they make, a pure through
+and through. Not a crooked hair in his head. I've eat out of the same
+frying pan too often with that boy not to know what he is. You go bury
+those suspicions of yours immediate. There's nothing to them."
+
+Norris grumbled objections as they moved toward the stable. Melissy drew a
+long breath and brought herself back to the tenderfoot.
+
+He stood like a coiled spring, head thrust far forward from the shoulders.
+The look in his black eyes was something new to her experience. For hate,
+passion, caution were all mirrored there.
+
+"You know Mr. Norris," she said quickly.
+
+He started. "What did you say his name was?" he asked with an assumption
+of carelessness.
+
+"Norris--Philip Norris. He is a cattle detective."
+
+"Never heard of Mr. Norris before in my life," he answered, but it was
+observable that he still breathed deep.
+
+She did not believe him. Some tie in their buried past bound these two men
+together. They must have known each other in the South years ago, and one
+of them at least was an enemy of the other. There might come a day when
+she could use this knowledge to save Jack Flatray from the punishment
+dogging his heels. Melissy filed it away in her memory for future
+reference.
+
+"You wanted to speak to me," she suggested.
+
+"I'm going away."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"Because I'm not a hound. I can't blackmail a woman."
+
+"How do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that you've found work here for me because I saw what you did over
+by Antelope Pass. We made a bargain. Oh, not in words, but a bargain just
+the same! You were to keep my secret because I knew yours. I release you
+from your part of it. Give me up if you think it is your duty. I'll not
+tell what I know."
+
+"That wasn't how you talked the other day."
+
+"No. It's how I talk now. I'm a hunted man, wanted for murder. I make you
+a present of the information."
+
+"You make me a present of what I already know, Mr. Diller, alias Morse,
+alias Bellamy."
+
+"You guessed it the first day?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And meant to keep quiet about it?"
+
+"Yes, I meant to shelter you from the punishment you deserve." She added
+with a touch of bitter self-scorn: "I was doing what I had to do."
+
+"You don't have to do it any longer." He looked straight at her with his
+head up. "And how do you know what I deserve? Who made you a judge about
+these facts? Grant for the sake of argument I killed him. Do you know I
+wasn't justified?"
+
+His fierce boldness put her on the defense. "A man sure of his cause does
+not run away. The paper said this Shep Boone was shot from ambush.
+Nothing could justify such a thing. When you did that----"
+
+"I didn't. Don't believe it, Miss Lee."
+
+"He was shot from behind, the paper said."
+
+"Do I look like a man who would kill from ambush?"
+
+She admitted to herself that this clear-eyed Southerner did not look like
+an assassin. Life in the open had made her a judge of such men as she had
+been accustomed to meet, but for days she had been telling herself she
+could no longer trust her judgment. Her best friend was a rustler. By a
+woman's logic it followed that since Jack Flatray was a thief this man
+might have committed all the crimes in the calendar.
+
+"I don't know." Then, impulsively, "No, you don't, but you may be for all
+that."
+
+"I'm not asking anything for myself. You may do as you please after I've
+gone. Send for Mr. Flatray and tell him if you like."
+
+A horse cantered across the plaza toward the store. Bellamy turned quickly
+to go.
+
+"I'm not going to tell anyone," the girl called after him in a low voice.
+
+Norris swung from the saddle. "Who's our hurried friend?" he asked
+carelessly.
+
+"Oh, a new rider of ours. Name of Morse." She changed the subject. "Are
+you--do you think you know who the rustler is?"
+
+His cold, black eyes rested in hers. She read in them something cruel and
+sinister. It was as if he were walking over the grave of an enemy.
+
+"I'm gathering evidence, a little at a time."
+
+"Do I know him?"
+
+"Maybe you do."
+
+"Tell me."
+
+He shook his head. "Wait till I've got him cinched."
+
+"You told father," she accused.
+
+He laughed in a hard, mirthless fashion. "That cured me. The Lee family is
+from Missouri. When I talk next time I'll have the goods to show."
+
+"I know who you mean. You're making a mistake." Her voice seemed to plead
+with him.
+
+"Not on your life, I ain't. But we'll talk about that when the subject is
+riper. There will be a showdown some day, and don't you forget it. Well,
+Charley is calling me. So long, Miss Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen." He
+went jingling down the steps and swung to the saddle. "I'll not forget the
+ad, and when I find the right man I'll ce'tainly rope and bring him to
+you."
+
+"The rustler?" she asked innocently.
+
+"No, not the rustler, the gent between eighteen and forty-eight, object
+matrimony."
+
+"I don't want to trouble you," she flung at him with her gay smile.
+
+"No trouble at all. Fact is, I've got him in mind already," he assured her
+promptly.
+
+"Oh!" A pulse of excitement was beating in her throat.
+
+"You don't ask me who he is," suggested Norris boldly, crouched in the
+saddle with his weight on the far stirrup.
+
+She had brought it upon herself, but now she dodged the issue. "'Most
+anyone will do, and me going on eighteen."
+
+"You're wrong, girl. Only one out of a thousand will do for your master."
+
+"Master, indeed! If he comes to the Bar Double G he'll find he is at the
+wrong address. None wanted, thank you."
+
+"Most folks don't want what's best for them, I allow. But if they have
+luck it sometimes comes to them."
+
+"Luck!" she echoed, her chin in the air.
+
+"You heard me right. What you need is a man that ain't afraid of you, one
+to ride close herd on you so as to head off them stampede notions of
+yours. Now this lad is the very one. He is a black-haired guy, and when he
+says a thing----"
+
+Involuntarily she glanced at his sleek black head. Melissy felt a sudden
+clamor of the blood, a pounding of the pulses.
+
+"--he most generally means it. I've wrangled around a heap with him and
+there's no manner of doubt he's up to specifications. In appearance he
+looks like me. Point of fact, he's a dead ringer for me."
+
+She saw her chance and flashed out. "Now you're flattering him. There
+can't be two as--as fascinating as Señor Norris," she mocked.
+
+His smoldering eyes had the possessive insolence she resented and yet
+found so stimulating.
+
+"Did I say there were two?" he drawled.
+
+It was his parting shot. With a touch of the spur he was off, leaving her
+no time for an adequate answer.
+
+There were no elusions and inferences about Philip Norris when he wanted
+to be direct. He had fairly taken her breath away. Melissy's instinct told
+her there was something humiliating about such a wooing. But picturesque
+and unconventional conduct excuse themselves in a picturesque personality.
+And this man had that if nothing else.
+
+She told herself she was angry at him, that he took liberties far beyond
+those of any of the other young men. Yet, somehow, she went into the house
+smiling. A color born of excitement burned beneath her sparkling eyes. She
+had entered into her heritage of womanhood and the call of sex was
+summoning her to the adventure that is old as the garden where Eve met
+Adam.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE TENDERFOOT TAKES UP A CLAIM
+
+
+Mr. Diller, alias Morse, alias Bellamy, did not long remain at the Bar
+Double G as a rider. It developed that he had money, and, tenderfoot
+though he was, the man showed a shrewd judgment in his investments. He
+bought sheep and put them on the government forest reserve, much to the
+annoyance of the cattlemen of the district.
+
+Morse, as he now called himself, was not the first man who had brought
+sheep into the border country. Far up in the hills were several camps of
+them. But hitherto these had been there on sufferance, and it had been
+understood that they were to be kept far from the cattle range. The
+extension of the government reserves changed the equation. A good slice of
+the range was cut off and thrown open to sheep. When Morse leased this and
+put five thousand bleaters upon the feeding ground the sentiment against
+him grew very bitter.
+
+Lee had been spokesman of a committee appointed to remonstrate with him.
+Morse had met them pleasantly but firmly. This part of the reserve had
+been set aside for sheep. If it were not leased by him it would be by
+somebody else. Therefore, he declined to withdraw his flocks. Champ lost
+his temper and swore that he for one would never submit to yield the
+range. Sharp bitter words were passed. Next week masked men drove a small
+flock belonging to Morse over a precipice.
+
+The tenderfoot retaliated by jumping a mining claim staked out by Lee upon
+which the assessment work had not been kept up. The cattleman contested
+this in the courts, lost the decision, and promptly appealed. Meanwhile,
+he countered by leasing from the forest supervisor part of the run
+previously held by his opponent and putting sheep of his own upon it.
+
+"I reckon I'll play Mr. Morse's own game and see how he likes it," the
+angry cattleman told his friends.
+
+But the luck was all with Morse. Before he had been working his new claim
+a month the Monte Cristo (he had changed the name from its original one of
+Melissy) proved a bonanza. His men ran into a rich streak of dirt that
+started a stampede for the vicinity.
+
+Champ indulged in choice profanity. From his point of view he had been
+robbed, and he announced the fact freely to such acquaintances as dropped
+into the Bar Double G store.
+
+"Dad gum it, I was aimin' to do that assessment work and couldn't jest
+lay my hands on the time. I'd been a millionaire three years and didn't
+know it. Then this damned Morse butts in and euchres me out of the claim.
+Some day him and me'll have a settlement. If the law don't right me, I
+reckon I'm most man enough to 'tend to Mr. Morse."
+
+It was his daughter who had hitherto succeeded in keeping the peace. When
+the news of the relocation had reached Lee he had at once started to
+settle the matter with a Winchester, but Melissy, getting news of his
+intention, had caught up a horse and ridden bareback after him in time to
+avert by her entreaties a tragedy. For six months after this the men had
+not chanced to meet.
+
+Why the tenderfoot had first come West--to hide what wounds in the great
+baked desert--no man knew or asked. Melissy had guessed, but she did not
+breathe to a soul her knowledge. It was a first article of Arizona's creed
+that a man's past belonged to him alone, was a blotted book if he chose to
+have it so. No doubt many had private reasons for their untrumpeted
+migration to that kindly Southwest which buries identity, but no wise
+citizen busied himself with questions about antecedents. The present
+served to sift one, and by the way a man met it his neighbors judged him.
+
+And T. L. Morse met it competently. In every emergency with which he had
+to cope the man "stood the acid." Arizona approved him a man, without
+according him any popularity. He was too dogmatic to win liking, but he
+had a genius for success. Everything he touched turned to gold.
+
+The Bar Double G lies half way between Mammoth and Mesa. Its position
+makes it a central point for ranchers within a radius of fifteen miles.
+Out of the logical need for it was born the store which Beauchamp Lee ran
+to supply his neighbors with canned goods, coffee, tobacco, and other
+indispensables; also the eating house for stage passengers passing to and
+from the towns. Young as she was, Melissy was the competent manager of
+both of these.
+
+It was one afternoon during the hour the stage stopped to let the
+passengers dine that Melissy's wandering eye fell upon Morse seated at one
+of the tables. Anger mounted within her at the cool impudence of the man.
+She had half a mind to order him out, but saw he was nearly through dinner
+and did not want to make a scene. Unfortunately Beauchamp Lee happened to
+come into the store just as his enemy strolled out from the dining-room.
+
+The ranchman stiffened. "What you been doing in there, seh?" he demanded
+sharply.
+
+"I've been eating a very good dinner in a public café. Any objections?"
+
+"Plenty of 'em, seh. I don't aim to keep open house for Mr. Morse."
+
+"I understand this is a business proposition. I expect to pay seventy-five
+cents for my meal."
+
+The eyes of the older man gleamed wrathfully. "As for yo' six bits, if you
+offer it to me I'll take it as an insult. At the Bar Double G we're not
+doing friendly business with claim jumpers. Don't you evah set yo' legs
+under my table again, seh."
+
+Morse shrugged, turned away to the public desk, and addressed an envelope,
+the while Lee glared at him from under his heavy beetling brows. Melissy
+saw that her father was still of half a mind to throw out the intruder and
+she called him to her.
+
+"Dad, José wants you to look at the hoof of one of his wheelers. He asked
+if you would come as soon as you could."
+
+Beauchamp still frowned at Morse, rasping his unshaven chin with his hand.
+"Ce'tainly, honey. Glad to look at it."
+
+"Dad! Please."
+
+The ranchman went out, grumbling. Five minutes later Morse took his seat
+on the stage beside the driver, having first left seventy-five cents on
+the counter.
+
+The stage had scarce gone when the girl looked up from her bookkeeping to
+see the man with the Chihuahua hat.
+
+"_Buenos tardes, señorita_," he gave her with a flash of white teeth.
+
+"_Buenos_," she nodded coolly.
+
+But the dancing eyes of her could not deny their pleasure at sight of him.
+They had rested upon men as handsome, but upon none who stirred her blood
+so much.
+
+He was in the leather chaps of a cowpuncher, gray-shirted, and a polka dot
+kerchief circled the brown throat. Life rippled gloriously from every
+motion of him. Hermes himself might have envied the perfect grace of the
+man.
+
+She supplied his wants while they chatted.
+
+"Jogged off your range quite a bit, haven't you?" she suggested.
+
+"Some. I'll take two bits' worth of that smokin', _nina_."
+
+She shook her head. "I'm no little girl. Don't you know I'm now half past
+eighteen?"
+
+"My--my. That ad didn't do a mite of good, did it?"
+
+"Not a bit."
+
+"And you growing older every day."
+
+"Does my age show?" she wanted to know anxiously.
+
+The scarce veiled admiration of his smoldering eyes drew the blood to her
+dusky cheeks. Something vigilant lay crouched panther-like behind the
+laughter of his surface badinage.
+
+"You're standing it well, honey."
+
+The color beat into her face, less at the word than at the purring caress
+in his voice. A year ago she had been a child. But in the Southland
+flowers ripen fast. Adolescence steals hard upon the heels of infancy,
+and, though the girl had never wakened to love, Nature was pushing her
+relentlessly toward a womanhood for which her unschooled impulses but
+scantily safeguarded her.
+
+She turned toward the shelves. "How many air-tights did you say?"
+
+"I didn't say." He leaned forward across the counter. "What's the hurry,
+little girl?"
+
+"My name is Melissy Lee," she told him over her shoulder.
+
+"Mine is Phil Norris. Glad to give it to you, Melissy Lee," the man
+retorted glibly.
+
+"Can't use it, thank you," came her swift saucy answer.
+
+"Or to lend it to you--say, for a week or two."
+
+She flashed a look at him and passed quickly from behind the counter. Her
+father was just coming into the store.
+
+"Will you wait on Mr. Norris, dad? Hop wants to see me in the kitchen."
+
+Norris swore softly under his breath. The last thing he had wanted was to
+drive her away. It had been nearly a year since he had seen her last, but
+the picture of her had been in the coals of many a night camp fire.
+
+The cattle detective stayed to dinner and to supper. He and her father had
+their heads together for hours, their voices pitched to a murmur. Melissy
+wondered what business could have brought him, whether it could have
+anything to do with the renewed rustling that had of late annoyed the
+neighborhood. This brought her thoughts to Jack Flatray. He, too, had
+almost dropped from her world, though she heard of him now and again. Not
+once had he been to see her since the night she had sprained her ankle.
+
+Later, when Melissy was watering the roses beside the porch, she heard the
+name of Morse mentioned by the stock detective. He seemed to be urging
+upon her father some course of action at which the latter demurred. The
+girl knew a vague unrest. Lee did not need his anger against Morse
+incensed. For months she had been trying to allay rather than increase
+this. If Philip Norris had come to stir up smoldering fires, she would
+give him a piece of her mind.
+
+The men were still together when Melissy told her father good-night. If
+she had known that a whisky bottle passed back and forth a good many times
+in the course of the evening, the fears of the girl would not have been
+lightened. She knew that in the somber moods following a drinking bout the
+lawlessness of Beauchamp Lee was most likely to crop out.
+
+As for the girl, now night had fallen--that wondrous velvet night of
+Arizona, which blots out garish day with a cloak of violet, purple-edged
+where the hills rise vaguely in the distance, and softens magically all
+harsh details beneath the starry vault--she slipped out to the summit of
+the ridge in the big pasture, climbing lightly, with the springy ease
+born of the vigor her nineteen outdoor years had stored in the strong
+young body. She wanted to be alone, to puzzle out what the coming of this
+man meant to her. Had he intended anything by that last drawling remark of
+his in the store? Why was it that his careless, half insulting familiarity
+set the blood leaping through her like wine? He lured her to the sex duel,
+then trampled down her reserves roughshod. His bold assurance stung her to
+anger, but there was a something deeper than anger that left her flushed
+and tingling.
+
+Both men slept late, but Norris was down first. He found Melissy
+superintending a drive of sheep which old Antonio, the herder, was about
+to make to the trading-post at Three Pines. She was on her pony near the
+entrance to the corral, her slender, lithe figure sitting in a boy's
+saddle with a businesslike air he could not help but admire. The gate bars
+had been lifted and the dog was winding its way among the bleating gray
+mass, which began to stir uncertainly at its presence. The sheep dribbled
+from the corral by ones and twos until the procession swelled to a swollen
+stream that poured forth in a torrent. Behind them came Antonio in his
+sombrero and blanket, who smiled at his mistress, shouted an "_Adios,
+señorita_," and disappeared into the yellow dust cloud which the herd left
+in its wake.
+
+"How does Champ like being in the sheep business," Norris said to the
+girl.
+
+Melissy did not remove her eyes from the vanishing herd, but a slight
+frown puckered her forehead. She chose to take this as a criticism of her
+father and to resent it.
+
+"Why shouldn't he be?" she said quietly, answering the spirit of his
+remark.
+
+"I didn't mean it that way," he protested, with his frank laugh.
+
+"Then if you didn't mean it so, I shan't take it that way;" and her smile
+met his.
+
+"Here's how I look at this sheep business. Some ranges are better adapted
+for sheep than cattle, and you can't keep Mary's little lamb away from
+those places. No use for a man to buck against the thing that's bound to
+be. Better get into the band-wagon and ride."
+
+"That's what father thought," the girl confessed. "He never would have
+been the man to bring sheep in, but after they got into the country he saw
+it was a question of whether he was going to get the government reserve
+range for his sheep, or another man, some new-comer like Mr. Morse, for
+his. It was going to be sheep anyhow."
+
+"Well, I'm glad your father took the chance he saw." He added
+reminiscently: "We got to be right good friends again last night before we
+parted."
+
+She took the opening directly. "If you're so good a friend of his, you
+must not excite him about Mr. Morse. You know he's a Southerner, and he
+is likely to do something rash--something we shall all be sorry for
+afterward."
+
+"I reckon that will be all right," he said evasively.
+
+Her eyes swept to his. "You won't get father into trouble will you?"
+
+The warm, affectionate smile came back to his face, so that as he looked
+at her he seemed a sun-god. But again there was something in his gaze that
+was not the frankness of a comrade, some smoldering fire that strangely
+stirred her blood and yet left her uneasy.
+
+"I'm not liable to bring trouble to those you love, girl. I stand by my
+friends."
+
+Her pony began to move toward the house, and he strode beside, as debonair
+and gallant a figure as ever filled the eye and the heart of a woman. The
+morning sun glow irradiated him, found its sparkling reflection in the
+dark curls of his bare head, in the bloom of his tanned cheeks, made a fit
+setting for the graceful picture of lingering youth his slim, muscular
+figure and springy stride personified. Small wonder the untaught girl
+beside him found the merely physical charm of him fascinating. If her
+instinct sometimes warned her to beware, her generous heart was eager to
+pay small heed to the monition except so far as concerned her father.
+
+After breakfast he came into the office to see her before he left.
+
+"Good-by for a day or two," he said, offering his hand.
+
+"You're coming back again, are you?" she asked quietly, but not without a
+deeper dye in her cheeks.
+
+"Yes, I'm coming back. Will you be glad to see me?"
+
+"Why should I be glad? I hardly know you these days."
+
+"You'll know me better before we're through with each other."
+
+She would acknowledge no interest in him, the less because she knew it was
+there. "I may do that without liking you better."
+
+And suddenly his swift, winning smile flashed upon her. "But you've got to
+like me. I want you to."
+
+"Do you get everything you want?" she smiled back.
+
+"If I want it enough, I usually do."
+
+"Then since you get so much, you'll be better able to do without my
+liking."
+
+"I'm going to have it too."
+
+"Don't be too sure." She had a feeling that things were moving too fast,
+and she hailed the appearance of her father with relief. "Good morning,
+dad. Did you sleep well? Mr. Norris is just leaving."
+
+"Wait till I git a bite o' breakfast and I'll go with you, Phil," promised
+Lee. "I got to ride over to Mesa anyhow some time this week."
+
+The girl watched them ride away, taking the road gait so characteristic of
+the Southwest. As long as they were in sight her gaze followed them, and
+when she could see nothing but a wide cloud of dust travelling across the
+mesa she went up to her room and sat down to think it out. Something new
+had come into her life. What, she did not yet know, but she tried to face
+the fact with the elemental frankness that still made her more like a boy
+than a woman. Sitting there before the looking-glass, she played absently
+with the thick braid of heavy, blue-black hair which hung across her
+shoulder to the waist. It came to her for the first time to wonder if she
+was pretty, whether she was going to be one of the women that men desire.
+Without the least vanity she studied herself, appraised the soft brown
+cheeks framed with ebon hair, the steady, dark eyes so quick to passion
+and to gaiety, the bronzed throat full and rounded, the supple, flowing
+grace of the unrestrained body.
+
+Gradually a wave of color crept into her cheeks as she sat there with her
+chin on her little doubled hand. It was the charm of this Apollo of the
+plains that had set free such strange thoughts in her head. Why should she
+think of him? What did it matter whether she was good-looking? She shook
+herself resolutely together and went down to the business of the day.
+
+It was not long after midnight the next day that Champ Lee reached the
+ranch. His daughter came out from her room in her night-dress to meet
+him.
+
+"What kept you, Daddy?" she asked.
+
+But before he could answer she knew. She read the signs too clearly to
+doubt that he had been drinking.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+"HANDS UP"
+
+
+Melissy had been up the Cañ del Oro for wild poppies in her runabout and
+had just reached the ranch. She was disposing of her flowers in ollas when
+Jim Budd, waiter, chambermaid, and odd jobs man at the Bar Double G,
+appeared in the hall with a frightened, mysterious face.
+
+"What's the matter, Jim? You and Hop Ling been quarrelling again?" she
+asked carelessly.
+
+"No'm, that ain't it. It's wusser'n that. I got to tell you-all su'thin' I
+hearn yore paw say."
+
+The girl looked up quickly at him. "What do you mean, Jim?"
+
+"That Mistah Norris he come back whilst you wus away, and him and yore paw
+wus in that back room a-talkin' mighty confidential."
+
+"Yes, and you listened. Well?"
+
+Jim swelled with offended dignity. "No'm, I didn't listen neither. I des
+natcherally hearn, 'count of that hole fer the stovepipe what comes
+through the floor of my room."
+
+"But what was it you heard?" she interrupted impatiently.
+
+"I wus a-comin' to that. Plum proverdenshul, I draps into my room des as
+yore paw wus sayin', 'Twenty thousand dollars goin' down to the Fort on
+the stage to-day?' 'Cose I pricks up my ears then and tuk it all in. This
+yere Norris had foun' out that Mistah Morse was shippin' gold from his
+mine to-day on the Fort Allison stage, and he gits yore paw to go in with
+him an' hold it up. Yore paw cussed and said as how 't wus his gold anyhow
+by rights."
+
+The girl went white and gave a little broken cry. "Oh, Jim! Are you
+sure?"
+
+"Yas'm, 'cose I'm suah. Them's his ve'y words. Hope to die if they ain't.
+They wus drinkin', and when 't wus all fixed up that 't wus to be at the
+mouth of the Box Cañon they done tore an old black shirt you got for a
+dust-rag and made masks out of it and then rode away."
+
+"Which way did they go?"
+
+"Tow'ds the Box Cañon Miss M'lissy."
+
+A slender, pallid figure of despair, she leaned against the wall to
+support the faintness that had so suddenly stolen the strength from her
+limbs, trying desperately to think of some way to save her father from
+this madness. She was sure he would bungle it and be caught eventually,
+and she was equally sure he would never let himself be taken alive. Her
+helplessness groped for some way out. There must be some road of escape
+from this horrible situation, and as she sought blindly for it the path
+opened before her.
+
+"Where is Hop?" she asked quickly.
+
+"A-sleepin' in his room, ma'am."
+
+"Go to the store and tend it till I come back, Jim. I may be an hour, or
+mebbe two, but don't you move out of it for a moment. And don't ever speak
+of any of this, not a word, Jim."
+
+"No'm, 'cose I won't."
+
+His loyalty she did not doubt an instant, though she knew his simple wits
+might easily be led to indiscretion. But she did not stay to say more now,
+but flew upstairs to the room that had been her brother's before he left
+home. Scarce five minutes elapsed before she reappeared transformed. It
+was a slim youth garbed as a cowpuncher that now slipped along the passage
+to the rear, softly opened the door of the cook's room, noiselessly
+abstracted the key, closed the door again as gently, and locked it from
+the outside. She ran into her own room, strapped on her revolver belt, and
+took her empty rifle from its case. As she ran through the room below the
+one Jim occupied, she caught sight of a black rag thrown carelessly into
+the fireplace and stuffed it into her pocket.
+
+"That's just like Dad to leave evidence lying around," she said to
+herself, for even in the anxiety that was flooding her she kept her quiet
+commonsense.
+
+After searching the horizon carefully to see that nobody was in sight,
+she got into the rig and drove round the corral to the irrigating ditch.
+This was a wide lateral of the main canal, used to supply the whole lower
+valley with water, and just now it was empty. Melissy drove down into its
+sandy bed and followed its course as rapidly as she could. If she were
+only in time! If the stage had not yet passed! That was her only fear, the
+dread of being too late. Not once did the risk of the thing she intended
+occur to her. Physical fear had never been part of her. She had done the
+things her brother Dick had done. She was a reckless rider, a good shot,
+could tramp the hills or follow the round-up all day without knowing
+fatigue. If her flesh still held its girlish curves and softness, the
+muscles underneath were firm and compact. Often for her own amusement and
+that of her father she had donned her brother's chaps, his spurs,
+sombrero, and other paraphernalia, to masquerade about the house in them.
+She had learned to imitate the long roll of the vaquero's stride, the
+mannerisms common to his class, and even the heavy voice of a man. More
+than once she had passed muster as a young man in the shapeless garments
+she was now wearing. She felt confident that the very audacity of the
+thing would carry it off. There would be a guard for the treasure box, of
+course, but if all worked well he could be taken by surprise. Her rifle
+was not loaded, but the chances were a hundred to one that she would not
+need to use it.
+
+For the first time in his life the roan got the whip from his mistress.
+
+"Git up, Bob. We've got to hurry. It's for dad," she cried, as they raced
+through the sand and sent it flying from the wheels.
+
+The Fort Allison stage passed within three miles of the Lee ranch on its
+way to Mesa. Where the road met in intersection with the ditch she had
+chosen as the point for stopping it, and no veteran at the business could
+have selected more wisely, for a reason which will hereafter appear. Some
+fifty yards below this point of intersection the ditch ran through a grove
+of cottonwoods fringing the bank. Here the banks sloped down more
+gradually, and Melissy was able to drive up one side, turn her rig so that
+the horse faced the other way, and draw down into the ditch again in order
+that the runabout could not be seen from the road. Swiftly and skilfully
+she obliterated the track she had made in the sandy bank.
+
+She was just finishing this when the sound of wheels came to her. Rifle in
+hand, she ran back along the ditch, stooping to pass under the bridge, and
+waited at the farther side in a fringe of bushes for the coming of the
+stage.
+
+Even now fear had no place in the excitement which burned high in her. The
+girl's wits were fully alert, and just in time she remembered the need of
+a mask. Her searching fingers found the torn black shirt in a pocket and a
+knife in another. Hastily she ripped the linen in half, cut out eyeholes,
+and tied the mask about her head. With perfectly steady hands she picked
+up the rifle from the ground and pushed the muzzle of it through the
+bushes.
+
+Leisurely the stage rolled up-grade toward the crossing. The Mexican
+driver was half asleep and the "shotgun messenger" was indolently rolling
+a cigarette, his sawed-off gun between his knees. Alan McKinstra was the
+name of this last young gentleman. Only yesterday he had gone to work for
+Morse, and this was the first job that had been given him. The stage never
+had been held up since the "Monte Cristo" had struck its pay-streak, and
+there was no reason to suppose it would be. Nevertheless, Morse proposed
+to err on the side of caution.
+
+"I reckon the man that holds down this job don't earn his salt, José. It's
+what they call a sinecure," Alan was saying at the very instant the
+summons came.
+
+"Throw up your hands!"
+
+Sharp and crisp it fell on Alan's ears. He sat for a moment stunned, the
+half-rolled cigarette still between his fingers. The driver drew up his
+four horses with a jerk and brought them to a huddled halt.
+
+"Hands up!" came again the stinging imperative.
+
+Now, for the first time, it reached Alan's consciousness that the stage
+was actually being held up. He saw the sun shining on the barrel of a
+rifle and through the bushes the masked face of a hidden cowpuncher. His
+first swift instinct was to give battle, and he reached for the shotgun
+between his knees. Simultaneously the driver's foot gave it a push and
+sent the weapon clattering to the ground. José at least knew better than
+to let him draw the road agent's fire while he sat within a foot of the
+driver. His hands went into the air, and after his Alan's and those of the
+two passengers.
+
+"Throw down that box."
+
+Alan lowered his hands and did as directed.
+
+"Now reach for the stars again."
+
+McKinstra's arms went skyward. Without his weapon, he was helpless to do
+otherwise. The young man had an odd sense of unreality about the affair, a
+feeling that it was not in earnest. The timbre of the fresh young voice
+that came from the bushes struck a chord in his memory, though for the
+life of him he could not place its owner.
+
+"Drive on, José. Burn the wind and keep a-rollin' south."
+
+The Mexican's whip coiled over the head of the leaders and the broncos
+sprang forward with a jump. It was the summit of a long hill, on the edge
+of which wound the road. Until the stage reached the foot of it there
+would be no opportunity to turn back. Round a bend of the road it swung at
+a gallop, and the instant it disappeared Melissy leaped from the bushes,
+lifted the heavy box, and carried it to the edge of the ditch. She flew
+down the sandy bottom to the place where the rig stood, drove swiftly
+back again, and, though it took the last ounce of strength in her, managed
+to tumble the box into the trap.
+
+Back to the road she went, and from the place where the box had fallen
+made long strides back to the bushes where she had been standing at the
+moment of the hold-up. These tracks she purposely made deep and large,
+returning in her first ones to the same point, but from the marks where
+the falling treasure box had struck into the road she carefully
+obliterated with her hand the foot-marks leading to the irrigation ditch,
+sifting the sand in carefully so as to leave no impression. This took
+scarcely a minute. She was soon back in her runabout, driving homeward
+fast as whip and voice could urge the horse.
+
+She thought she could reason out what McKinstra and the stage-driver would
+do. Mesa was twenty-five miles distant, the "Monte Cristo" mine seventeen.
+Nearer than these points there was no telephone station except the one at
+the Lee ranch. Their first thought would be to communicate with Morse,
+with the officers at Mammoth, and with the sheriff of Mesa County. To do
+this as soon as possible they would turn aside and drive to the ranch
+after they reached the bottom of the hill and could make the turn. It was
+a long, steep hill, and Melissy estimated that this would give her a start
+of nearly twenty minutes. She would save about half a mile by following
+the ditch instead of the road, but at best she knew she was drawing it
+very fine.
+
+She never afterward liked to think of that drive home. It seemed to her
+that Bob crawled and that the heavy sand was interminable. Feverishly she
+plied the whip, and when at length she drew out of the ditch she sent her
+horse furiously round the big corral. Though she had planned everything to
+the last detail, she knew that any one of a hundred contingencies might
+spoil her plan. A cowpuncher lounging about the place would have ruined
+everything, or at best interfered greatly. But the windmill clicked over
+sunlit silence, empty of life. No stir or movement showed the presence of
+any human being.
+
+Melissy drove round to the side door, dumped out the treasure-box, ran
+into the house, and quickly returned with a hammer and some tacks, then
+fell swiftly to ripping the oilcloth that covered the box which stood
+against the wall to serve as a handy wash-stand for use by dusty
+travellers before dining. The two boxes were of the same size and shape,
+and she draped the treasure chest with the cloth, tacked it in place,
+restored to the top of it the tin basin, and tossed the former wash-stand
+among a pile of old boxes from the store, that were to be used for
+kindling. After this she ran upstairs, scudded softly along the corridor,
+and silently unlocked the cook's door, dropping the key on the floor to
+make it appear as if something had shaken it from the keyhole. Presently
+she was in her brother's room, doffing his clothes and dressing herself in
+her own.
+
+A glance out of the window sapped the color from her cheek, for she saw
+the stage breasting the hill scarce two hundred yards from the house. She
+hurried downstairs, pinning her belt as she ran, and flashed into the
+store, where Jim sat munching peanuts.
+
+"The stage is coming, Jim. Remember, you're not to know anything about it
+at all. If they ask for Dad, say he's out cutting trail of a bunch of hill
+cows. Tell them I started after the wild flowers about fifteen minutes
+ago. Don't talk much about it, though. I'll be back inside of an hour."
+
+With that she was gone, back to her trap, which she swung along a trail
+back of the house till it met the road a quarter of a mile above. Her
+actions must have surprised steady old Bob, for he certainly never before
+had seen his mistress in such a desperate hurry as she had been this day
+and still was. Nearly a mile above, a less well defined track deflected
+from the main road. Into this she turned, following it until she came to
+the head-gates of the lateral which ran through their place. The main
+canal was full of water, and after some effort she succeeded in opening
+the head-gates so as to let the water go pouring through.
+
+Returning to the runabout, the girl drove across a kind of natural meadow
+to a hillside not far distant, gathered a double handful of wild flowers,
+and turned homeward again. The stage was still there when she came in
+sight of the group of buildings at the ranch.
+
+As she drew up and dismounted with her armful of flowers, Alan McKinstra
+stepped from the store to the porch and came forward to assist her.
+
+"The Fort Allison stage has been robbed," he blurted out.
+
+"What nonsense! Who would want to rob it?" she retorted.
+
+"Morse had a gold shipment aboard," he explained in a low voice, and added
+in bitter self-condemnation: "He sent me along to guard it, and I never
+even fired a shot to save it."
+
+"But--do you mean that somebody held up the stage?" she gasped.
+
+"Yes. But whoever it was can't escape. I've 'phoned to Jack Flatray and to
+Morse. They'll be right out here. The sheriff of Mesa County has already
+started with a posse. They'll track him down. That's a cinch. He can't get
+away with the box without a rig. If he busts the box, he's got to carry it
+on a horse and a horse leaves tracks."
+
+"But who do you think it was?"
+
+"Don't know. One of the Roaring Fork bunch of bad men, likely. But I don't
+know."
+
+The young man was plainly very much excited and disturbed. He walked
+nervously up and down, jerking his sentences out piecemeal as he thought
+of them.
+
+"Was there only one man? And did you see him?" Melissy asked
+breathlessly.
+
+He scarcely noticed her excitement, or if he did, it seemed to him only
+natural under the circumstances.
+
+"I expect there were more, but we saw only one. Didn't see much of him. He
+was screened by the bushes and wore a black mask. So long as the stage was
+in sight he never moved from that place; just stood there and kept us
+covered."
+
+"But how could he rob you if he didn't come out?" she asked in wide-eyed
+innocence.
+
+"He didn't rob _us_ any. He must 'a' heard of the shipment of gold, and
+that's what he was after. After he'd got us to rights he made me throw the
+box down in the road. That's where it was when he ordered us to move on
+and keep agoing."
+
+"And you went?"
+
+"José handled the lines, but 't would 'a' been the same if I'd held them.
+That gun of his was a right powerful persuader." He stopped to shake a
+fist in impotent fury in the air. "I wish to God I could meet up with him
+some day when he didn't have the drop on me."
+
+"Maybe you will some time," she told him soothingly. "I don't think you're
+a bit to blame, Alan. Nobody could think so. Ever so many times I've heard
+Dad say that when a man gets the drop on you there's nothing to do but
+throw up your hands."
+
+"Do you honest think so, Melissy? Or are you just saying it to take the
+sting away? Looks like I ought to 'a' done something mor'n sit there like
+a bump on a log while he walked off with the gold."
+
+His cheerful self-satisfaction was under eclipse. The boyish pride of him
+was wounded. He had not "made good." All over Cattleland the news would be
+wafted on the wings of the wind that Alan McKinstra, while acting as
+shotgun messenger to a gold shipment, had let a road agent hold him up for
+the treasure he was guarding.
+
+"Very likely they'll catch him and get the gold back," she suggested.
+
+"That won't do me any good," he returned gloomily. "The only thing that
+can help me now is for me to git the fellow myself, and I might just as
+well look for a needle in a haystack."
+
+"You can't tell. The robber may be right round here now." Her eyes,
+shining with excitement, passed the crowd moving in and out of the store,
+for already the news of the hold-up had brought riders and ranchmen
+jogging in to learn the truth of the wild tale that had reached them.
+
+"More likely he's twenty miles away. But whoever he is, he knows this
+county. He made a slip and called José by his name."
+
+Melissy's gaze was turned to the dust whirl that advanced up the road that
+ran round the corral. "That doesn't prove anything, Alan. Everybody knows
+José. He's lived all over Arizona--at Tucson and Tombstone and Douglas."
+
+"That's right too," the lad admitted.
+
+The riders in advance of the dust cloud resolved themselves into the
+persons of her father and Norris. Her incautious admission was already
+troubling her.
+
+"But I'm sure you're right. No hold-up with any sense would stay around
+here and wait to be caught. He's probably gone up into the Galiuros to
+hide."
+
+"Unless he's cached the gold and is trying to throw off suspicion."
+
+The girl had moved forward to the end of the house with Alan to meet her
+father. At that instant, by the ironic humor of chance, her glance fell
+upon a certain improvised wash-stand covered with oilcloth. She shook her
+head decisively. "No, he won't risk waiting to do that. He'll make sure of
+his escape first."
+
+"I reckon."
+
+"Have you heard, Daddy?" Melissy called out eagerly. She knew she must
+play the part expected of her, that of a young girl much interested in
+this adventure which had occurred in the community.
+
+He nodded grimly, swinging from the saddle. She observed with surprise
+that his eye did not meet hers. This was not like him.
+
+"What do you think?"
+
+His gaze met that of Norris before he answered, and there was in it some
+hint of a great fear. "Beats me, 'Lissy."
+
+He had told the simple truth, but not the whole truth. The men had waited
+at the entrance to the Box Cañon for nearly two hours without the arrival
+of the stage. Deciding that something must have happened, they started
+back, and presently met a Mexican who stopped to tell them the news. To
+say that they were dazed is to put it mildly. To expect them to believe
+that somebody else had heard of the secret shipment and had held up the
+stage two miles from the place they had chosen, was to ask a credulity too
+simple. Yet this was the fact that confronted them.
+
+Arrived at the scene of the robbery both men had dismounted and had
+examined the ground thoroughly. What they saw tended still more to
+bewilder them. Neither of them was a tenderfoot, and the little table at
+the summit of the long hill told a very tangled tale to those who had eyes
+to read. Obvious tracks took them at once to the spot where the bandit had
+stood in the bushes, but there was something about them that struck both
+men as suspicious.
+
+"Looks like these are worked out on purpose," commented Lee. "The guy's
+leaving too easy a trail to follow, and it quits right abrupt in the
+bushes. Must 'a' took an airship from here, I 'low."
+
+"Does look funny. Hello! What's this?"
+
+Norris had picked up a piece of black cloth and was holding it out. A
+startled oath slipped from the lips of the Southerner. He caught the rag
+from the hands of his companion and studied it with a face of growing
+astonishment.
+
+"What's up?"
+
+Lee dived into his pocket and drew forth the mask he had been wearing.
+Silently he fitted it to the other. The pieces matched exactly, both in
+length and in the figure of the pattern.
+
+When the Southerner looked up his hands were shaking and his face ashen.
+
+"For God's sake, Phil, what does this mean?" he cried hoarsely.
+
+"Search me."
+
+"It must have been--looks like the hold-up was somebody--my God, man, we
+left this rag at the ranch when we started!" the rancher whispered.
+
+"That's right."
+
+"We planned this thing right under the nigger's room. He must 'a' heard
+and---- But it don't look like Jim Budd to do a thing like that."
+
+Norris had crossed the road again and was standing on the edge of the
+lateral.
+
+"Hello! This ditch is full of water. When we passed down it was empty," he
+said.
+
+Lee crossed over and stood by his side, a puzzled frown on his face.
+"There hadn't ought to be water running hyer now," he said, as if to
+himself. "I don't see how it could 'a' come hyer, for Bill Weston--he's
+the ditch rider--went to Mesa this mo'ning, and couldn't 'a' got back to
+turn it in."
+
+The younger man stooped and examined a foot-print at the edge of the
+ditch. It was the one Melissy had made just as she stepped into the rig.
+
+"Here's something new, Lee. We haven't seen this gentleman's track before.
+Looks like a boy's. It's right firm and deep in this soft ground. I'll bet
+a cooky your nigger never made that track."
+
+The Southerner crouched down beside him, and they looked at it together,
+head to head.
+
+"No, it ain't Jim's. I don't rightly _savez_ this thing at all," the old
+man muttered, troubled at this mystery which seemed to point to his
+household.
+
+"By Moses, I've got it! The guy who did the holding up had his horse down
+here. He loaded the sack on its back and drove off up the ditch. All we
+got to do is follow the ditch up or down till we come to the place where
+he climbed out and struck across country."
+
+"That's right, Phil. He must have had a pardner up at the head-gates. They
+had some kind of signal arranged, and when Mr. Hold-up was ready down come
+the water and washed out his tracks. It's a blame' smooth piece of
+business if you ask me."
+
+"The fellow made two bad breaks, though. That piece of shirt is one. This
+foot-print is another. They may land him in the pen yet."
+
+"I don't think it," returned the old man with composure, and as he spoke
+his foot erased the telltale print. "I 'low there won't anybody go to the
+pen for he'pin himself to Mr. Morse's gold dust. I don't give a cuss who
+it was."
+
+Norris laughed in his low, easy way. "I'm with you, Mr. Lee. We'll make a
+thorough job while we're at it and mess up these other tracks. After that
+we'll follow the ditch up and see if there's anything doing."
+
+They remounted their broncos and rode them across the tracks several
+times, then followed the lateral up, one on either side of the ditch,
+their eyes fastened to the ground to see any evidence of a horse having
+clambered over the bank. They drew in sight of the ranch house without
+discovering what they were looking for. Lee's heart was in his mouth, for
+he knew that he would see presently what his eye sought.
+
+"I reckon the fellow went down instead of up," suggested Norris.
+
+"No, he came up."
+
+Lee had stopped and was studying wheel tracks that ran up from the ditch
+to his ranch house. His face was very white and set. He pointed to them
+with a shaking finger.
+
+"There's where he went in the ditch, and there's where he came out."
+
+Norris forded the stream, cast a casual eye on the double track, and
+nodded. He was still in a fog of mystery, but the old man was already
+fearing the worst.
+
+He gulped out his fears tremblingly. For himself, he was of a flawless
+nerve, but this touched nearer home than his own danger.
+
+"Them wheel-tracks was made by my little gyurl's runabout, Phil."
+
+"Good heavens!" The younger man drew rein sharply and stared at him. "You
+don't think----"
+
+He broke off, recalling the sharp, firm little foot-print on the edge of
+the ditch some miles below.
+
+"I don't reckon I know what to think. If she was in this, she's got some
+good reason." A wave of passion suddenly swept the father. "By God! I'd
+like to see the man that dares mix her name up in this."
+
+Norris met this with his friendly smile. "You can't pick a row with me
+about that, old man. I'm with you till the cows come home. But that ain't
+quite the way to go at this business. First thing, we've got to wipe out
+these tracks. How? Why, sheep! There's a bunch of three hundred in that
+pasture. We'll drive the bunch down to the ditch and water them here.
+_Savez?_"
+
+"And wipe out the wheel-marks in the sand. Bully for you, Phil."
+
+"That's the idea. After twelve hundred chisel feet have been over this
+sand I reckon the wheel-tracks will be missing."
+
+They rode up to the house, and the first thing that met them was the
+candid question of the girl:
+
+"Have you heard, Daddy?"
+
+And out of his troubled heart he had answered, "Beats me, 'Lissie."
+
+"They've sent for the officers. Jack Flatray is on the way himself. So is
+Sheriff Burke," volunteered Alan gloomily.
+
+"Getting right busy, ain't they?" Norris sneered.
+
+Again Lee glanced quickly at Norris. "I reckon, Phil, we better drive that
+bunch of sheep down to water right away. I clean forgot them this
+mo'ning."
+
+"Sure." The younger man was not so easily shaken. He turned to McKinstra
+naturally. "How many of the hold-ups were there?"
+
+"I saw only one, and didn't see him very good. He was a slim fellow in a
+black mask."
+
+"You don't say. Were you the driver?"
+
+Alan felt the color suffuse his face. "No, I was the guard."
+
+"Oh, you were the guard."
+
+Alan felt the suave irony that covered this man's amusement, and he
+resented it impotently. When Melissy came to his support he was the more
+grateful.
+
+"And we all think he did just right in using his common sense, Mr.
+Norris," the girl flashed.
+
+"Oh, certainly."
+
+And with that he was gone after her father to help him water the sheep.
+
+"I don't see why those sheep have to be watered right now," she frowned
+to Alan. "Dad _did_ water them this morning. I helped him."
+
+Together they went into the store, where José was telling his story for
+the sixth time to a listening circle of plainsmen.
+
+"And right then he come at you and ree-quested yore whole outfit to poke a
+hole in the scenery with yore front feet?" old Dave Ellis asked just as
+Melissy entered.
+
+"_Si, Señor._"
+
+"One of MacQueen's Roaring Fork gang did it, I'll bet," Alan contributed
+sourly.
+
+"What kind of a lookin' guy was he?" spoke up a dark young man known as
+Bob Farnum.
+
+"A big man, _señor_, and looked a ruffian."
+
+"They're always that way until you run 'em down," grinned Ellis. "Never
+knew a hold-up wasn't eight foot high and then some--to the fellow at the
+wrong end of the gun."
+
+"If you mean to say, Dave Ellis, that I lay down to a bluff----" Alan was
+beginning hotly when the old frontiersman interrupted.
+
+"Keep your shirt on, McKinstra. I don't mean to say it. Nobody but a darn
+fool makes a gun-play when the cards are stacked that-a-way. Yore bad play
+was in reaching for the gun at all."
+
+"Well, Jack Flatray will git him. I'll bet a stack of blues on that,"
+contributed a fat ranchman wheezily.
+
+"Unless you mussed up the trail coming back," said Ellis to the
+stage-driver.
+
+"We didn't. I thought of that, and I had José drive clear round the place.
+Jack will find it all right unless there's too much travel before he gets
+here," said Alan.
+
+Farnum laughed malevolently. "Mebbe he'll get him and mebbe he won't.
+Jack's human, like the rest of us, if he is the best sheriff in Arizona.
+Here's hoping he don't get him. Any man that waltzes out of the cactus and
+appropriates twenty thousand dollars belonging to Mr. Morse is welcome to
+it for all of me. I don't care if he is one of MacQueen's bad men. I wish
+it had been forty thousand."
+
+Farnum did not need to explain the reasons for his sentiments. Everybody
+present knew that he was the leader of that bunch of cattlemen who had
+bunched themselves together to resist the encroachments of sheep upon the
+range. Among these the feeling against Morse was explosively dangerous. It
+had found expression in more than one raid upon his sheep. Many of them
+had been destroyed by one means or another, but Morse, with the obstinacy
+characteristic of him, had replaced them with others and continually
+increased his herds. There had been threats against his life, and one of
+his herders had been wounded. But the mine-owner went his way with quiet
+fearlessness and paid no attention to the animosity he had stirred up. The
+general feeling was that the trouble must soon come to a head. Nobody
+expected the rough and ready vaqueros, reckless and impulsive as they
+were, to submit to the loss of the range, which meant too the wiping out
+of their means of livelihood, without a bitter struggle that would be both
+lawless and bloody.
+
+Wherefore there was silence after Farnum had spoken, broken at length by
+the amiable voice of the fat ranchman, Baker.
+
+"Well, we'll see what we'll see," he wheezed complacently. "And anyways I
+got to have some horseshoe plug, Melissy."
+
+The girl laughed nervously as she reached for what he wanted. "You're a
+safe prophet, Mr. Baker," she said.
+
+"He'd be a safe one if he'd prophesy that Jack Flatray would have Mr.
+Hold-up in the calaboose inside of three days," put in a half-grown lad in
+leathers.
+
+"I ain't so sure about that. You'll have to show me, and so will Mr.
+Deputy Sheriff Flatray," retorted Farnum.
+
+A shadow darkened the doorway.
+
+"Good afternoon, gentlemen all--and Miss Lee," a pleasant voice drawled.
+
+The circle of eyes focused on the new-comer and saw a lean, muscular,
+young fellow of medium height, cool and alert, with the dust of the desert
+on every sunbaked inch of him.
+
+"I'm damned if it ain't Jack here already!" gasped Baker.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+WATERING SHEEP
+
+
+The deputy glanced quietly round, nodded here and there at sight of the
+familiar face of an acquaintance, and spoke to the driver.
+
+"Let's hear you say your little piece again, José."
+
+The Mexican now had it by heart, and he pattered off the thing from
+beginning to end without a pause. Melissy, behind the counter, leaned her
+elbows on it and fastened her eyes on the boyish face of the officer. In
+her heart she was troubled. How much did he know? What could he discover
+from the evidence she had left? He had the reputation of being the best
+trailer and the most fearless officer in Arizona. But surely she had
+covered her tracks safely.
+
+From José the ranger turned to Alan. "We'll hear your account of it now,
+seh," he said gently.
+
+While Alan talked, Jack's gaze drifted through the window to the flock of
+sheep that were being driven up from the ditch by Lee and Norris. That
+little pastoral scene had its significance for him. He had arrived at the
+locality of the hold-up a few minutes after they had left, and his keen
+intelligence had taken in some of the points they had observed. A rapid
+circuit of the spot at the distance of thirty yards had shown him no
+tracks leading from the place except those which ran up the lateral on
+either side of it. It was possible that these belonged to the horses of
+the robbers, but if so the fellows were singularly careless of detection.
+Moreover, the booty must be accounted for. They had not carried it with
+them, since no empty box remained to show that they had poured the gold
+into sacks, and it would have been impossible to take the box as it was on
+a horse. Nor had they buried it, unless at the bottom of the irrigating
+ditch, for some signs of their work must have remained.
+
+Balancing probabilities, it had seemed to Flatray that these might be the
+tracks of ranchmen who had arrived after the hold-up and were following
+the escaping bandits up the lateral. For unless these were the robber's,
+there was no way of escape except either up or down the bottom of the
+ditch. His search had eliminated the possibility of any other but the
+road, and this was travelled too frequently to admit of even a chance of
+escape by it without detection. Jack filed away one or two questions in
+his brain for future reference. The most important of these was to
+discover whether there had been any water in the ditch at the time of the
+hold-up.
+
+He had decided to follow the tracks leading up the ditch and found no
+difficulty in doing so at a fast walk. Without any hesitation they
+paralleled the edge of the lateral. Nor had the deputy travelled a quarter
+of a mile before he made a discovery. The rider on the right hand side of
+the stream had been chewing tobacco, and he had a habit of splashing his
+mark on boulders he passed in the form of tobacco juice. Half a dozen
+times before he reached the Lee ranch the ranger saw this signature of
+identity writ large on smooth rocks shining in the sun. The last place he
+saw it was at the point where the two riders deflected from the lateral
+toward the ranch house, following tracks which led up from the bottom of
+the ditch.
+
+An instant later Flatray had dodged back into the chaparral, for somebody
+was driving a flock of sheep down to the ditch. He made out that there
+were two riders behind them, and that they had no dog. For the present his
+curiosity was satisfied. He thought he knew why they were watering sheep
+in this odd fashion. Swiftly he had made a circuit, drawn rein in front of
+the store, and dropped in just in time to hear his name. Now, as with one
+ear he listened to Alan's account of the hold-up, with his subconscious
+mind he was with the sheep-herders who were driving the flock back into
+the pasture.
+
+"Looks like our friend the bad man was onto his job all right," was the
+deputy's only comment when Alan had finished.
+
+"I'll bet he's making his getaway into the hills mighty immediate,"
+chuckled Baker. "He can't find a bank in the mountainside to deposit that
+gold any too soon to suit him."
+
+"Sho! I'll bet he ain't worried a mite. He's got his arrangements all
+made, and likely they'll dovetail to suit him. He's put his brand on that
+gold to stay," answered Farnum confidently.
+
+Jack's mild blue eyes rested on him amiably. "Think so, Bob?"
+
+"I ain't knockin' you any, Jack. You're all right. But that's how I figure
+it out, and, by Gad! I'm hopin' it too," Farnum made answer recklessly.
+
+Flatray laughed and strolled from the crowded room to the big piazza. A
+man had just cantered up and flung himself from his saddle. The ranger,
+looking at him, thought he had never seen another so strikingly handsome
+an Apollo. Black eyes looked into his from a sun-tanned face perfectly
+modelled. The pose of the head and figure would have delighted a
+sculptor.
+
+There was a vigor, an unspoken hostility, in the gaze of both men.
+
+"Mo'nin", Mr. Deputy Sheriff, one said; and the other, "Same to you, Mr.
+Norris."
+
+"You're on the job quick," sneered the cattle detective.
+
+"The quicker the sooner, I expect."
+
+"And by night you'll have Mr. Hold-up roped and hog-tied?"
+
+"Not so you could notice it. Are you a sheep-herder these days, Mr.
+Norris?"
+
+The gentle irony of this was not lost on its object, for in the West a
+herder of sheep is the next remove from a dumb animal.
+
+"No, I'm riding for the Quarter Circle K Bar outfit. This is the first
+time I ever took the dust of a sheep in my life. I did it to oblige Mr.
+Lee."
+
+"Oh! To oblige Mr. Lee?"
+
+"He wanted to water them, and his herder wasn't here."
+
+"Must 'a' been wanting water mighty bad, I reckon," commented Jack
+amiably.
+
+"You bet! Lee feels better satisfied now he's watered them."
+
+"I don't doubt it."
+
+Norris changed the subject. "You must have burnt the wind getting here. I
+didn't expect to see you for some hours."
+
+"I happened to be down at Yeager's ranch, and one of the boys got me on
+the line from Mesa."
+
+"Picked up any clues yet?" asked the other carelessly, yet always with
+that hint of a sneer; and innocently Flatray answered, "They seem to be
+right seldom."
+
+"Didn't know but you'd happened on the fellow's trail."
+
+"I guess I'm as much at sea as you are," was the equivocal answer.
+
+Lee came over from the stable, still wearing spurs and gauntlets.
+
+"Howdy, Jack!" he nodded, not quite so much at his ease as usual. "Got
+hyer on the jump, didn't you?"
+
+"I kept movin'."
+
+"This shorely beats hell, don't it?" Lee glanced around, selected a smooth
+boulder, and fired his discharge of tobacco juice at it true to the inch.
+"Reminds me of the old days. You boys ain't old enough to recall them, but
+stage hold-ups were right numerous then."
+
+Blandly the deputy looked from one to the other. "I don't suppose either
+of you gentlemen happen to have been down and looked over the ground where
+the hold-up was? The tracks were right cut up before I got there."
+
+This center shot silenced Lee for an instant, but Norris was on the spot
+with smiling ease.
+
+"No, Mr. Lee and I have been hunting strays on the mesa. We didn't hear
+about it till a few minutes ago. We're at your service, though, Mr.
+Sheriff, to join any posses you want to send out."
+
+"Much obliged. I'm going to send one out toward the Galiuros in a few
+minutes now. I'll be right glad to have you take charge of it, Mr.
+Norris."
+
+The derisive humor in the newly appointed deputy's eyes did not quite
+reach the surface.
+
+"Sure. Whenever you want me."
+
+"I'm going to send Alan McKinstra along to guide you. He knows that
+country like a book. You want to head for the lower pass, swing up Diable
+Cañon, and work up in the headquarters of the Three Forks."
+
+Within a quarter of an hour the posse was in motion. Flatray watched it
+disappear in the dust of the road without a smile. He had sent them out
+merely to distract the attention of the public and to get rid of as many
+as possible of the crowd. For he was quite as well aware as the leader of
+the posse that this search in the Galiuros was a wild-goose chase.
+Somewhere within three hundred yards of the place he stood both the robber
+and his booty were in all probability to be found.
+
+Flatray was quite right in his surmise, since Melissy Lee, who had come
+out to see the posse off, was standing at the end of the porch with her
+dusky eyes fastened on him, the while he stood beside the house with one
+foot resting negligently on the oilcloth cover of the wash-stand.
+
+She had cast him out of her friendship because of his unworthiness, but
+there was a tumult in her heart at sight of him. No matter how her
+judgment condemned him as a villain, some instinct in her denied the
+possibility of it. She was torn in conflict between her liking for him and
+her conviction that he deserved only contempt. Somehow it hurt her too
+that he accepted without protest her verdict, appeared so willing to be a
+stranger to her.
+
+Now that the actual physical danger of her adventure was past, Melissy was
+aware too of a chill dread lurking at her heart. She was no longer buoyed
+up by the swiftness of action which had called for her utmost nerve. There
+was nothing she could do now but wait, and waiting was of all things the
+one most foreign to her impulsive temperament. She acknowledged too some
+fear of this quiet, soft-spoken frontiersman. All Arizona knew not only
+the daredevil spirit that fired his gentleness, but the competence with
+which he set about any task he assigned himself. She did not see how he
+_could_ unravel this mystery. She had left no clues behind her, she felt
+sure of that, and yet was troubled lest he guessed at her secret behind
+that mask of innocence he wore. He did not even remotely guess it as yet,
+but he was far closer to the truth than he pretended. The girl knew she
+should leave him and go about her work. Her rôle was to appear as
+inconspicuous as possible, but she could not resist the fascination of
+trying to probe his thoughts.
+
+"I suppose your posse will come back with the hold-ups in a few hours.
+Will it be worth while to wait for them?" she asked with amiable
+derision.
+
+The ranger had been absorbed in thought, his chin in his hand, but he
+brought his gaze back from the distance to meet hers. What emotion lay
+behind those cold eyes she could not guess.
+
+"You're more hopeful than I am, Miss Lee."
+
+"What are you sending them out for, then?"
+
+"Oh, well, the boys need to work off some of their energy, and there's
+always a show they might happen onto the robbers."
+
+"Do you think some of the Roaring Fork gang did it?"
+
+"Can't say."
+
+"I suppose you are staying here in the hope that they will drop in and
+deliver themselves to you."
+
+He looked at her out of an expressionless face. "That's about it, I
+reckon. But what I tell the public is that I'm staying so as to be within
+telephone connection. You see, Sheriff Burke is moving up to cut them off
+from the Catalinas, Jackson is riding out from Mammoth to haid them off
+that way, these anxious lads that have just pulled out from here are
+taking care of the Galiuros. I'm supposed to be sitting with my fingers on
+the keys as a sort of posse dispatcher."
+
+"Well, I hope you won't catch them," she told him bluntly.
+
+"That seems to be a prevailing sentiment round here. You say it right
+hearty too; couldn't be more certain of your feelings if it had been your
+own father."
+
+He said it carelessly, yet with his keen blue eyes fixed on her.
+Nevertheless, he was totally unprepared for the effect of his words. The
+color washed from her bronzed cheeks, and she stood staring at him with
+big, fear-filled eyes.
+
+"What--what do you mean?" she gasped. "How dare you say that?"
+
+"I ain't said anything so terrible. You don't need to take it to heart
+like that." He gave her a faint smile for an instant. "I'm not really
+expecting to arrest Mr. Lee for holding up that stage."
+
+The color beat back slowly into her face. She knew she had made a false
+move in taking so seriously his remark.
+
+"I don't think you ought to joke about a thing like that," she said
+stiffly.
+
+"All right. I'll not say it next time till I'm in earnest," he promised as
+he walked away.
+
+"I wonder if he really meant anything," the girl was thinking in terror,
+and he, "she knows something; now, I would like to know what."
+
+Melissy attended to her duties in the postoffice after the arrival of the
+stage, and looked after the dining-room as usual, but she was all the time
+uneasily aware that Jack Flatray had quietly disappeared. Where had he
+gone? And why? She found no answer to that question, but the ranger
+dropped in on his bronco in time for supper, imperturbable and
+self-contained as ever.
+
+"Think I'll stay all night if you have a room for me," he told her after
+he had eaten.
+
+"We have a room," she said. "What more have you heard about the stage
+robbery?"
+
+"Nothing, Miss Lee."
+
+"Oh, I thought maybe you had," she murmured tremulously, for his blue
+eyes were unwaveringly upon her and she could not know how much or how
+little he might mean.
+
+Later she saw him sitting on the fence, holding genial converse with Jim
+Budd. The waiter was flashing a double row of white teeth in deep laughter
+at something the deputy had told him. Evidently they were already friends.
+When she looked again, a few minutes later, she knew Jack had reached the
+point where he was pumping Jim and the latter was disseminating
+misinformation. That the negro was stanch enough, she knew, but she was on
+the anxious seat lest his sharp-witted inquisitor get what he wanted in
+spite of him. After he had finished with Budd the ranger drifted around to
+the kitchen in time to intercept Hop Ling casually as he came out after
+finishing his evening's work. The girl was satisfied Flatray could not
+have any suspicion of the truth. Nevertheless, she wished he would let the
+help alone. He might accidentally stumble on something that would set him
+on the right track.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE BOONE-BELLAMY FEUD IS RENEWED
+
+
+"Here's six bits on the counter under a seed catalogue. Did you leave it
+here, daddy?"
+
+Champ Lee, seated on the porch just outside the store door, took the pipe
+from his mouth and answered:
+
+"Why no, honey, I don't reckon I did, not to my ricollection."
+
+"That's queer. I know I didn't----"
+
+Melissy broke her sentence sharply. There had come into her eyes a spark
+of excitement, simultaneous with the brain-flash which told her who had
+left the money. No doubt the quarter and the half dollar had been lying
+there ever since the day last week when Morse had eaten at the Bar Double
+G. She addressed an envelope, dropped the money in, sealed the flap, and
+put the package beside a letter addressed to T. L. Morse.
+
+Lee, full of an unhappy restlessness which he could not control, presently
+got up and moved away to the stables. He was blaming himself bitterly for
+the events of the past few days.
+
+It was perhaps half an hour later that Melissy looked up to see the
+sturdy figure of Morse in the doorway. During the past year he had filled
+out, grown stronger and more rugged. His deep tan and heavy stride
+pronounced him an outdoor man no less surely than the corduroy suit and
+the high laced miners' boots.
+
+He came forward to the postoffice window without any sign of recognition.
+
+"Is Mr. Flatray still here?"
+
+"No!" Without further explanation Melissy took from the box the two
+letters addressed to Morse and handed them to him.
+
+The girl observed the puzzled look that stole over his face at sight of
+the silver in one envelope. A glance at the business address printed on
+the upper left hand corner enlightened him. He laid the money down in the
+stamp window.
+
+"This isn't mine."
+
+"You heard what my father said?"
+
+"That applies to next time, not to this."
+
+"I think it does apply to this time."
+
+"I can't see how you're going to make me take it back. I'm an obstinate
+man."
+
+"Just as you like."
+
+A sudden flush of anger swept her. She caught up the silver and flung it
+through the open window into the dusty road.
+
+His dark eyes met hers steadily and a dull color burned in his tanned
+cheeks. Without a word he turned away, and instantly she regretted what
+she had done. She had insulted him deliberately and put herself in the
+wrong. At bottom she was a tender-hearted child, even though her father
+and his friends had always spoiled her, and she could not but reproach
+herself for the hurt look she had brought into his strong, sad face. He
+was their enemy, of course, but even enemies have rights.
+
+Morse walked out of the office looking straight before him, his strong
+back teeth gripped so that the muscles stood out on his salient jaw.
+Impulsively the girl ran around the counter after him.
+
+He looked up from untying his horse to see her straight and supple figure
+running toward him. Her eager face was full of contrition and the color of
+pink rose petals came and went in it.
+
+"I'm sorry, Mr. Morse. I oughtn't to have done that. I hurt your
+feelings," she cried.
+
+At best he was never a handsome man, but now his deep, dark eyes lit with
+a glow that surprised her.
+
+"Thank you. Thank you very much," he said in a low voice.
+
+"I'm so tempery," she explained in apology, and added: "I suppose a nice
+girl wouldn't have done it."
+
+"A nice girl did do it," was all he could think to say.
+
+"You needn't take the trouble to say that. I know I've just scrambled up
+and am not ladylike and proper. Sometimes I don't care. I like to be able
+to do things like boys. But I suppose it's dreadful."
+
+"I don't think it is at all. None of your friends could think so. Not that
+I include myself among them," he hastened to disclaim. "I can't be both
+your friend and your enemy, can I?"
+
+The trace of a sardonic smile was in his eyes. For the moment as she
+looked at him she thought he might. But she answered:
+
+"I don't quite see how."
+
+"You hate me, I suppose," he blurted out bluntly.
+
+"I suppose so." And more briskly she added, with dimples playing near the
+corners of her mouth: "Of course I do."
+
+"That's frank. It's worth something to have so decent an enemy. I don't
+believe you would shoot me in the back."
+
+"Some of the others would. You should be more careful," she cried before
+she could stop herself.
+
+He shrugged. "I take my fighting chance."
+
+"It isn't much of a one. You'll be shot at from ambush some day."
+
+"It wouldn't be a new experience. I went through it last week."
+
+"Where?" she breathed.
+
+"Down by Willow Wash."
+
+"Who did it?"
+
+He laughed, without amusement. "I didn't have my rifle with me, so I
+didn't stay to inquire."
+
+"It must have been some of those wild vaqueros."
+
+"That was my guess."
+
+"But you have other enemies, too."
+
+"Miss Lee," he smiled.
+
+"I mean others that are dangerous."
+
+"Your father?" he asked.
+
+"Father would never do that except in a fair fight. I wasn't thinking of
+him."
+
+"I don't know whom you mean, but a few extras don't make much difference
+when one is so liberally supplied already," he said cynically.
+
+"I shouldn't make light of them if I were you," she cautioned.
+
+"Who do you mean?"
+
+"I've said all I'm going to, and more than I ought," she told him
+decisively. "Except this, that it's your own fault. You shouldn't be so
+stiff. Why don't you compromise? With the cattlemen, for instance. They
+have a good deal of right on their side. They _did_ have the range
+first."
+
+"You should tell that to your father, too."
+
+"Dad runs sheep on the range to protect himself. He doesn't drive out
+other people's cattle and take away their living."
+
+"Well, I might compromise, but not at the end of a gun."
+
+"No, of course not. Here comes dad now," she added hurriedly, aware for
+the first time that she had been holding an extended conversation with her
+father's foe.
+
+"We started enemies and we quit enemies. Will you shake hands on that,
+Miss Lee?" he asked.
+
+She held out her hand, then drew it swiftly back. "No, I can't. I forgot.
+There's another reason."
+
+"Another reason! You mean the Arkansas charge against me?" he asked
+quietly.
+
+"No. I can't tell you what it is." She felt herself suffused in a crimson
+glow. How could she explain that she could not touch hands with him
+because she had robbed him of twenty thousand dollars?
+
+Lee stopped at the steps, astonished to see his daughter and this man in
+talk together. Yesterday he would have resented it bitterly, but now the
+situation was changed. Something of so much greater magnitude had occurred
+that he was too perturbed to cherish his feud for the present. All night
+he had carried with him the dreadful secret he suspected. He could not
+look Melissy in the face, nor could he discuss the robbery with anybody.
+The one fact that overshadowed all others was that his little girl had
+gone out and held up a stage, that if she were discovered she would be
+liable to a term in the penitentiary. Laboriously his slow brain had
+worked it all out. A talk with Jim Budd had confirmed his conclusions. He
+knew that she had taken this risk in order to save him. He was bowed down
+with his unworthiness, with shame that he had dragged her into this
+horrible tangle. He was convinced that Jack Flatray would get at the
+truth, and already he was resolved to come forward and claim the whole
+affair as his work.
+
+"I've been apologizing to Mr. Morse for insulting him, dad," the girl said
+immediately.
+
+Her father passed a bony hand slowly across his unshaven chin. "That's
+right, honey. If you done him a meanness, you had ought to say so."
+
+"She has said so very handsomely, Mr. Lee," spoke up Morse.
+
+"I've been warning him, dad, that he ought to be more careful how he rides
+around alone, with the cattlemen feeling the way they do."
+
+"It's a fact they feel right hot under the collar. You're ce'tainly a
+temptation to them, Mr. Morse," the girl's father agreed.
+
+The mine owner shifted the subject of conversation. He was not a man of
+many impulses, but he yielded to one now.
+
+"Can't we straighten out this trouble between us, Mr. Lee? You think I've
+done you an injury. Perhaps I have. If we both mean what's right, we can
+get together and fix it up in a few minutes."
+
+The old Southerner stiffened and met him with an eye of jade. "I ain't
+asking any favors of you, Mr. Morse. We'll settle this matter some day,
+and settle it right. But you can't buy me off. I'll not take a bean from
+you."
+
+The miner's eyes hardened. "I'm not trying to buy you off. I made a fair
+offer of peace. Since you have rejected it, there is nothing more to be
+said." With that he bowed stiffly and walked away, leading his horse.
+
+Lee's gaze followed him and slowly the eyes under the beetled brows
+softened.
+
+"Mebbe I done wrong, honey. Mebbe I'd ought to have given in. I'm too
+proud to compromise when he's got me beat. That's what's ailin' with me.
+But I reckon I'd better have knuckled under."
+
+The girl slipped her arm through his. "Sometimes I'm just like that too,
+daddy. I've just _got_ to win before I make up. I don't blame you a mite,
+but, all the same, we should have let him fix it up."
+
+It was characteristic of them both that neither thought of reversing the
+decision he had made. It was done now, and they would abide by the
+results. But already both of them half regretted, though for very
+different reasons. Lee was thinking that for Melissy's sake he should have
+made a friend of the man he hated, since it was on the cards that within a
+few days she might be in his power. The girl's feeling, too, was
+unselfish. She could not forget the deep hunger for friendship that had
+shone in the man's eyes. He was alone in the world, a strong man
+surrounded by enemies who would probably destroy him in the end. There was
+stirring in her heart a sweet womanly pity and sympathy for the enemy
+whose proffer of friendship had been so cavalierly rejected.
+
+The sight of a horseman riding down the trail from the Flagstaff mine
+shook Melissy into alertness.
+
+"Look, dad. It's Mr. Norris," she cried.
+
+Morse, who had not yet recognized him, swung to the saddle, his heart full
+of bitterness. Every man's hand was against his, and every woman's. What
+was there in his nature that turned people against him so inevitably?
+There seemed to be some taint in him that corroded all natural human
+kindness.
+
+A startled oath brought him from his somber reflections. He looked up, to
+see the face of a man with whom in the dead years of the past he had been
+in bitter feud.
+
+Neither of them spoke. Morse looked at him with a face cold as chiselled
+marble and as hard. The devil's own passion burned in the storm-tossed one
+of the other.
+
+Norris was the first to break the silence.
+
+"So it was all a lie about your being killed, Dick Bellamy."
+
+The mine owner did not speak, but the rigor of his eyes did not relax.
+
+"Gave it out to throw me off your trail, did you? Knew mighty well I'd cut
+the heart out of the man who shot poor Shep." The voice of the cattle
+detective rang out in malignant triumph. "You guessed it c'rect, seh.
+Right here's where the Boone-Bellamy feud claims another victim."
+
+The men were sitting face to face, so close that their knees almost
+touched. As Norris jerked out his gun Bellamy caught his wrist. They
+struggled for an instant, the one to free his arm, the other to retain his
+grip. Bellamy spurred his horse closer. The more powerful of the two, he
+slowly twisted around the imprisoned wrist. Inch by inch the revolver
+swung in a jerky, spasmodic circle. There was a moment when it pointed
+directly at the mine owner's heart. His enemy's finger crooked on the
+trigger, eyes passionate with the stark lust to kill. But the pressure on
+the wrist had numbed the hand. The weapon jumped out of line, went
+clattering down into the dust from the palsied fingers.
+
+Lee ran forward and pushed between the men.
+
+"Here. Ain't you boys got ary bettah sense than to clinch like wildcats?"
+he demanded, jerking one of the horses away by the bridle. "No, you don't,
+Phil. I'll take keer of this gun for the present." It was noticeable that
+Beauchamp Lee's speech grew more after the manner of the plantations when
+he became excited.
+
+The cowpuncher, white with anger, glared at his enemy and poured curses at
+him, the while he nursed his strained wrist. For the moment he was
+impotent, but he promised himself vengeance in full when they should meet
+again.
+
+"That'll be enough from you now, Phil," said the old ex-Confederate
+good-naturedly, leading him toward the house and trying to soothe his
+malevolent chagrin.
+
+Bellamy turned and rode away. At the corner of the corral he met Jack
+Flatray riding up.
+
+"Been having a little difference of opinion with our friend, haven't you,
+seh?" the deputy asked pleasantly.
+
+"Yes." Bellamy gave him only the crisp monosyllable and changed the
+subject immediately. "What about this stage robbery? Have you been able to
+make anything of it, Mr. Flatray?"
+
+"Why, yes. I reckon we'll be able to land the miscreant mebbe, if things
+come our way," drawled the deputy. "Wouldn't it be a good idea to offer a
+reward, though, to keep things warm?"
+
+"I thought of that. I made it a thousand dollars. The posters ought to be
+out to-day on the stage."
+
+"Good enough!"
+
+"Whom do you suspect?"
+
+Jack looked at him with amiable imperturbability. "I reckon I better
+certify my suspicions, seh, before I go to shouting them out."
+
+"All right, sir. Since I'm paying the shot, it ought to entitle me to some
+confidence. But it's up to you. Get back the twenty thousand dollars,
+that's all I ask, except that you put the fellow behind the bars of the
+penitentiary for a few years."
+
+Flatray gave him an odd smile which he did not understand.
+
+"I hope to be able to accommodate you, seh, about this time to-morrow, so
+far as getting the gold goes. You'll have to wait a week or two before
+the rest of your expectations get gratified."
+
+"Any reasonable time. I want to see him there eventually. That's all."
+
+Jack laughed again, without giving any reason for his mirth. That ironic
+smile continued to decorate his face for some time. He seemed to have some
+inner source of mirth he did not care to disclose.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE DANGER LINE
+
+
+Though Champ Lee had business in Mesa next day that would not be denied,
+he was singularly loath to leave the ranch. He wanted to stay close to
+Melissy until the dénouement of the hunt for the stage robber. On the
+other hand, it was well known that his contest with Morse for the Monte
+Cristo was up for a hearing. To stay at home would have been a confession
+of his anxiety that he did not want to make. But it was only after
+repeated charges to his daughter to call him up by telephone immediately
+if anything happened that he could bring himself to ride away.
+
+He was scarcely out of sight when a Mexican vaquero rode in with the
+information that old Antonio, on his way to the post at Three Pines with a
+second drove of sheep, had twisted his ankle badly about fifteen miles
+from the ranch. After trying in vain to pick up a herder at Mesa by
+telephone, Melissy was driven to the only feasible course left her, to
+make the drive herself in place of Antonio. There were fifteen hundred
+sheep in the bunch, and they must be taken care of at once by somebody
+competent for the task. She knew she could handle them, for it had amused
+her to take charge of a herd often for an hour or two at a time. The long
+stretch over the desert would be wearisome and monotonous, but she had the
+slim, muscular tenacity of a half-grown boy. It did not matter what she
+wanted to do. The thing to which she came back always was that the sheep
+must be taken care of.
+
+She left directions with Jim for taking care of the place, changed to a
+khaki skirt and jacket, slapped a saddle on her bronco, and disappeared
+across country among the undulations of the sandhills. A tenderfoot would
+have been hopelessly lost in the sameness of these hills and washes, but
+Melissy knew them as a city dweller does his streets. Straight as an arrow
+she went to her mark. The tinkle of distant sheep-bells greeted her after
+some hours' travel, and soon the low, ceaseless bleating of the herd.
+
+The girl found Antonio propped against a piñon tree, solacing himself
+philosophically with cigarettes. He was surprised to see her, but made
+only a slight objection to her taking his place. His ankle was paining him
+a good deal, and he was very glad to get the chance to pull himself to her
+saddle and ride back to the ranch.
+
+A few quick words sent the dog Colin out among the sheep, by now
+scattered far and wide over the hill. They presently came pouring toward
+her, diverged westward, and massed at the base of a butte rising from a
+dry arroyo. The journey had begun, and hour after hour it continued
+through the hot day, always in a cloud of dust flung up by the sheep,
+sometimes through the heavy sand of a wash, often over slopes of shale,
+not seldom through thick cactus beds that shredded her skirt and tore like
+fierce, sharp fingers at her legging-protected ankles. The great gray
+desert still stretched before her to the horizon's edge, and still she
+flung the miles behind her with the long, rhythmic stride that was her
+birthright from the hills. A strong man, unused to it, would have been
+staggering with stiff fatigue, but this slender girl held the trail with
+light grace, her weight still carried springily on her small ankles.
+
+Once she rested for a few minutes, flinging herself down into the sand at
+length, her head thrown back from the full brown throat so that she could
+gaze into the unstained sky of blue. Presently the claims of this planet
+made themselves heard, for she, too, was elemental and a creature of
+instinct. The earth was awake and palpitating with life, the low,
+indefatigable life of creeping things and vegetation persisting even in
+this waste of rock and sand.
+
+But she could not rest long, for Diablo Cañon must be reached before dark.
+The sheep would be very thirsty by the time they arrived, and she could
+not risk letting them tear down the precipitous edge among the sharp rocks
+in the dark. Already over the sand stretches a peculiar liquid glow was
+flooding, so that the whole desert seemed afire. The burning sun had
+slipped behind a saddle of the purple peaks, leaving a brilliant horizon
+of many mingled shades.
+
+It was as she came forward to the cañon's edge in this luminous dusk that
+Melissy became aware of a distant figure on horseback, silhouetted for a
+moment against the skyline. One glance was all she got of it, for she was
+very busy with the sheep, working them leisurely toward the black chasm
+that seemed to yawn for them. High rock walls girt the cañon, gigantic and
+bottomless in the gloom. A dizzy trail zigzagged back and forth to the
+pool below, and along this she and the collie skilfully sent the eager,
+thirsty animals.
+
+The mass of the sheep were still huddled on the edge of the ravine when
+there came the thud of horses' hoofs and the crack of revolvers,
+accompanied by hoarse, triumphant yells and cries. Melissy knew instantly
+what it was--the attack of cattlemen upon her defenseless flock. They had
+waited until the sheep were on the edge of the precipice, and now they
+were going to drive the poor creatures down upon the rocks two hundred
+feet below. Her heart leaped to her throat, but scarce more quickly than
+she upon a huge boulder bordering the trail.
+
+"Back! Keep back!" she heard herself crying, and even as she spoke a
+bullet whistled through the rim of her felt hat.
+
+Standing there boldly, unconscious of danger, the wind draped and defined
+the long lines of her figure like those of the Winged Victory.
+
+The foremost rider galloped past, waving his sombrero and shooting into
+the frightened mass in front of him. Within a dozen feet of her he turned
+his revolver upon the girl, then, with an oath of recognition, dragged his
+pony back upon its haunches. Another horse slithered into it, and a
+third.
+
+"It's 'Lissie Lee!" a voice cried in astonishment; and another, with a
+startled oath, "You're right, Bob!"
+
+The first rider gave his pony the spur, swung it from the trail in a
+half-circle which brought it back at the very edge of the ravine, and
+blocked the forward pour of terror-stricken sheep. Twice his revolver rang
+out. The girl's heart stood still, for the man was Norris, and it seemed
+for an instant as if he must be swept over the precipice by the stampede.
+The leaders braced themselves to stop, but were slowly pushed forward
+toward the edge. One of the other riders had by this time joined the
+daring cowpuncher, and together they stemmed the tide. The pressure on the
+trail relaxed and the sheep began to mill around and around.
+
+It was many minutes before they were sufficiently quieted to trust upon
+the trail again, but at last the men got them safely to the bottom, with
+the exception of two or three killed in the descent.
+
+Her responsibility for the safety of the sheep gone, the girl began to
+crawl down the dark trail. She could not see a yard in front of her, and
+at each step the path seemed to end in a gulf of darkness. She could not
+be sure she was on the trail at all, and her nerve was shaken by the
+experience through which she had just passed. Presently she stopped and
+waited, for the first time in her life definitely and physically afraid.
+She stood there trembling, a long, long time it seemed to her, surrounded
+by the impenetrable blackness of night.
+
+Then a voice came to her.
+
+"Melissy!"
+
+She answered, and the voice came slowly nearer.
+
+"You're off the trail," it told her presently, just before a human figure
+defined itself in the gloom.
+
+"I'm afraid," she sobbed.
+
+A strong hand came from nowhere and caught hers. An arm slipped around her
+waist.
+
+"Don't be afraid, little girl. I'll see no harm comes to you," the man
+said to her with a quick, fierce tenderness.
+
+The comfort of his support was unspeakable. It stole into her heart like
+water to the roots of thirsty plants. To feel her head against his
+shoulder, to know he held her tight, meant safety and life. He had told
+her not to be afraid, and she was so no longer.
+
+"You shot at me," she murmured in reproach.
+
+"I didn't know. We thought it was Bellamy's herd. But it's true, God
+forgive me! I did."
+
+There was in his voice the warm throb of emotion, and in his eyes
+something she had never seen before in those of any human being. Like
+stars they were, swimming in light, glowing with the exultation of the
+triumph he was living. She was a splendid young animal, untaught of life,
+generous, passionate, tempestuous, and as her pliant, supple body lay
+against his some sex instinct old as creation stirred potently within her.
+She had found her mate. It came to her as innocently as the same impulse
+comes to the doe when the spring freshets are seeking the river, and as
+innocently her lips met his in their first kiss of surrender. Something
+irradiated her, softened her, warmed her. Was it love? She did not know,
+but as yet she was still happy in the glow of it.
+
+Slowly, hand in hand, they worked back to the trail and down it to the
+bottom of the cañon. The soft velvet night enwrapped them. It shut them
+from the world and left them one to one. From the meeting palms strange
+electric currents tingled through the girl and flushed her to an ecstasy
+of emotion.
+
+A camp fire was already burning cheerfully when they reached the base of
+the descent. A man came forward to meet them. He glanced curiously at the
+girl after she came within the circle of light. Her eyes were shining as
+from some inner glow, and she was warm with a soft color that vitalized
+her beauty. Then his gaze passed to take in with narrowed lids her
+companion.
+
+"I see you found her," he said dryly.
+
+"Yes, I found her, Bob."
+
+He answered the spirit of Farnum's words rather than the letter of them,
+nor could he keep out of his bearing and his handsome face the exultation
+that betrayed success.
+
+"H'mp!" Farnum turned from him and addressed the girl: "I suppose Norris
+has explained our mistake and eaten crow for all of us, Miss Lee. I don't
+see how come we to make such a blame' fool mistake. It was gitting dark,
+and we took your skirt for a greaser's blanket. It's ce'tainly on us."
+
+"Yes, he has explained."
+
+"Well, there won't any amount of explaining square the thing. We might 'a'
+done you a terrible injury, Miss Lee. It was gilt-edged luck for us that
+you thought to jump on that rock and holler."
+
+"I was thinking of the sheep," she said.
+
+"Well, you saved them, and I'm right glad of it. We ain't got any use for
+Mary's little trotter, but your father's square about his. He keeps them
+herded up on his own range. We may not like it, but we ce'tainly aren't
+going to the length of attackin' his herd." Farnum's gaze took in her
+slender girlishness, and he voiced the question in his mind. "How in time
+do you happen to be sheep-herding all by your lone a thousand miles from
+nowhere, Miss Lee?"
+
+She explained the circumstances after she had moved forward to warm
+herself by the fire. For already night was bringing a chill breeze with
+it. The man cooking the coffee looked up and nodded pleasantly, continuing
+his work. Norris dragged up a couple of saddle blankets and spread them on
+the ground for her to sit upon.
+
+"You don't have to do a thing but boss this outfit," he told her with his
+gay smile. "You're queen of the range to-night, and we're your herders or
+your punchers, whichever you want to call us. To-morrow morning two of us
+are going to drive these sheep on to the trading post for you, and the
+other one is going to see you safe back home. It's all arranged."
+
+They were as good as his word. She could not move from her place to help
+herself. It was their pleasure to wait upon her as if she had really been
+a queen and they her subjects. Melissy was very tired, but she enjoyed
+their deference greatly. She was still young enough to find delight in the
+fact that three young and more or less good-looking men were vying with
+each other to anticipate her needs.
+
+Like them, she ate and drank ravenously of the sandwiches and the strong
+coffee, though before the meal was over she found herself nodding
+drowsily. The tactful courtesy of these rough fellows was perfect. They
+got the best they had for her of their blankets, dragged a piñon root to
+feed the glowing coals, and with cheerful farewells of "_Buenos Noches_"
+retired around a bend in the cañon and lit another fire for themselves.
+
+The girl snuggled down into the warmth of the blankets and stretched her
+weary limbs in delicious rest. She did not mean to go to sleep for a long
+time. She had much to think about. So she looked up the black sheer cañon
+walls to the deep blue, starry sky above, and relived her day in memory.
+
+A strange excitement tingled through her, born of shame and shyness and
+fear, and of something else she did not understand, something which had
+lain banked in her nature like a fire since childhood and now threw forth
+its first flame of heat. What did it mean, that passionate fierceness with
+which her lips had clung to his? She liked him, of course, but surely
+liking would not explain the pulse that her first kiss had sent leaping
+through her blood like wine. Did she love him?
+
+Then why did she distrust him? Why was there fear in her sober second
+thought of him? Had she done wrong? For the moment all her maiden defenses
+had been wiped out and he had ridden roughshod over her reserves. But
+somewhere in her a bell of warning was ringing. The poignant sting of sex
+appeal had come home to her for the first time. Wherefore in this frank
+child of the wilderness had been born a shy shame, a vague trembling for
+herself that marked a change. At sunrise she had been still treading gayly
+the primrose path of childhood; at sunset she had entered upon her
+heritage of womanhood.
+
+The sun had climbed high and was peering down the walls of the gulch when
+she awoke. She did not at once realize where she was, but came presently
+to a blinking consciousness of her surroundings. The rock wall on one side
+was still shadowed, while the painted side of the other was warm with the
+light which poured upon it. The Gothic spires, the Moorish domes, the
+weird and mysterious caves, which last night had given more than a touch
+of awe to her majestic bedchamber, now looked a good deal less like the
+ruins of mediæval castles and the homes of elfin sprites and gnomes.
+
+"_Buenos dios, muchacha,_" a voice called cheerfully to her.
+
+She did not need to turn to know to whom it belonged. Among a thousand she
+would have recognized its tone of vibrant warmth.
+
+"_Buenos,_" she answered, and, rising hurriedly, she fled to rearrange her
+hair and dress.
+
+It was nearly a quarter of an hour later that she reappeared, her thick
+coils of ebon-hued tresses shining in the sun, her skirt smoothed to her
+satisfaction, and the effects of feminine touches otherwise visible upon
+her fresh, cool person.
+
+"Breakfast is served," Norris sang out.
+
+"Dinner would be nearer it," she laughed. "Why in the world didn't you
+boys waken me? What time is it, anyhow?"
+
+"It's not very late--a little past noon maybe. You were all tired out with
+your tramp yesterday. I didn't see why you shouldn't have your sleep
+out."
+
+He was pouring a cup of black coffee for her from the smoky pot, and she
+looked around expectantly for the others. Simultaneously she remembered
+that she had not heard the bleating of the sheep.
+
+"Where are the others--Mr. Farnum and Sam? And have you the sheep all
+gagged?" she laughed.
+
+He gave her that odd look of smoldering eyes behind half-shut lids.
+
+"The boys have gone on to finish the drive for you. They started before
+sun-up this morning. I'm elected to see you back home safely."
+
+"But----"
+
+Her protest died unspoken. She could not very well frame it in words, and
+before his bold, possessive eyes the girl's long, dark lashes wavered to
+the cheeks into which the hot blood was beating. Nevertheless, the feeling
+existed that she wished one of the others had stayed instead of him. It
+was born, no doubt, partly of the wave of shyness running through her,
+but partly too of instinctive maidenly resistance to something in his
+look, in the assurance of his manner, that seemed to claim too much. Last
+night he had taken her by storm and at advantage. Something of shame
+stirred in her that he had found her so easy a conquest, something too of
+a new vague fear of herself. She resented the fact that he could so move
+her, even though she still felt the charm of his personal presence. She
+meant to hold herself in abeyance, to make sure of herself and of him
+before she went further.
+
+But the cowpuncher had no intention of letting her regain so fully control
+of her emotions. Experience of more than one young woman had taught him
+that scruples were likely to assert themselves after reflection, and he
+purposed giving her no time for that to-day.
+
+He did not count in vain upon the intimacy of companionship forced upon
+them by the circumstances, nor upon the skill with which he knew how to
+make the most of his manifold attractions. His rôle was that of the
+comrade, gay with good spirits and warm with friendliness, solicitous of
+her needs, but not oppressively so. If her glimpse of him at breakfast had
+given the girl a vague alarm, she laughed her fears away later before his
+open good humor.
+
+There had been a time when he had been a part of that big world "back in
+the States," peopled so generously by her unfettered imagination. He knew
+how to talk, and entertainingly, of books and people, of events and
+places he had known. She had not knowledge enough of life to doubt his
+stories, nor did she resent it that he spoke of this her native section
+with the slighting manner of one who patronized it with his presence.
+Though she loved passionately her Arizona, she guessed its crudeness, and
+her fancy magnified the wonders of that southern civilization from which
+it was so far cut off.
+
+Farnum had left his horse for the girl, and after breakfast the cowpuncher
+saddled the broncos and brought them up. Melissy had washed the dishes,
+filled his canteen, and packed the saddle bags. Soon they were off,
+climbing slowly the trail that led up the cañon wall. She saw the carcass
+of a dead sheep lying on the rocks half way down the cliff, and had spoken
+of it before she could stop herself.
+
+"What is that? Isn't it----?"
+
+"Looks to me like a boulder," lied her escort unblushingly. There was no
+use, he judged, in recalling unpleasant memories.
+
+Nor did she long remember. The dry, exhilarating sunshine and the sting of
+gentle, wide-swept breezes, the pleasure of swift motion and the ring of
+that exultingly boyish voice beside her, combined to call the youth in her
+to rejoice. Firm in the saddle she rode, as graceful a picture of piquant
+girlhood as could be conceived, thrilling to the silent voices of the
+desert. They traveled in a sunlit sea of space, under a sky of blue, in
+which tenuous cloud lakes floated. Once they came on a small bunch of hill
+cattle which went flying like deer into the covert of a draw. A
+rattlesnake above a prairie dog's hole slid into the mesquit. A swift
+watched them from the top of a smooth rock, motionless so long as they
+could see. She loved it all, this immense, deserted world of space filled
+with its multitudinous dwellers.
+
+They unsaddled at Dead Cow Creek, hobbled the ponies, and ate supper.
+Norris seemed in no hurry to resaddle. He lay stretched carelessly at full
+length, his eyes upon her with veiled admiration. She sat upright, her
+gaze on the sunset with its splashes of topaz and crimson and saffron,
+watching the tints soften and mellow as dusk fell. Every minute now
+brought its swift quota of changing beauty. A violet haze enveloped the
+purple mountains, and in the crotch of the hills swam a lake of indigo.
+The raw, untempered glare of the sun was giving place to a limitless pour
+of silvery moonlight.
+
+Her eyes were full of the soft loveliness of the hour when she turned them
+upon her companion. He answered promptly her unspoken question.
+
+"You bet it is! A night for the gods--or for lovers."
+
+He said it in a murmur, his eyes full on hers, and his look wrenched her
+from her mood. The mask of comradeship was gone. He looked at her
+hungrily, as might a lover to whom all spiritual heights were denied.
+
+Her sooty lashes fell before this sinister spirit she had evoked, but were
+raised instantly at the sound of him drawing his body toward her.
+Inevitably there was a good deal of the young animal in her superbly
+healthy body. She had been close to nature all day, the riotous passion of
+spring flowing free in her as in the warm earth herself. But the magic of
+the mystic hills had lifted her beyond the merely personal. Some sense of
+grossness in him for the first time seared across her brain. She started
+up, and her face told him she had taken alarm.
+
+"We must be going," she cried.
+
+He got to his feet. "No hurry, sweetheart."
+
+The look in his face startled her. It was new to her in her experience of
+men. Never before had she met elemental lust.
+
+"You're near enough," she cautioned sharply.
+
+He cursed softly his maladroitness.
+
+"I was nearer last night, honey," he reminded her.
+
+"Last night isn't to-night."
+
+He hesitated. Should he rush her defenses, bury her protests in kisses? Or
+should he talk her out of this harsh mood? Last night she had been his.
+There were moments during the day when she had responded to him as a
+musical instrument does to skilled fingers. But for the moment his power
+over her was gone. And he was impatient of delay.
+
+"What's the matter with you?" he asked roughly.
+
+"We'll start at once."
+
+"No."
+
+"Yes."
+
+Frightened though she was, her gaze held steadily to his. It was the same
+instinct in her that makes one look a dangerous wild beast straight in the
+eye.
+
+"What's got into you?" he demanded sullenly.
+
+"I'm going home."
+
+"After a while."
+
+"Now."
+
+"I reckon not just yet. It's my say-so."
+
+"Don't you dare stop me."
+
+The passion in him warred with prudence. He temporized. "Why, honey! I'm
+the man that loves you."
+
+She would not see his outstretched hands.
+
+"Then saddle my horse."
+
+"By God, no! You're going to listen to me."
+
+His anger ripped out unexpectedly, even to him. Whatever fear she felt,
+the girl crushed down. He must not know her heart was drowned in terror.
+
+"I'll listen after we've started."
+
+He cursed her fickleness. "What's ailin' you, girl? I ain't a man to be
+put off this way."
+
+"Don't forget you're in Arizona," she warned.
+
+He understood what she meant. In the ranch country no man could with
+impunity insult a woman.
+
+Standing defiantly before him, her pliant form very straight, the
+underlying blood beating softly under the golden brown of her cheeks, one
+of the thick braids of her heavy, blue-black hair falling across the
+breast that rose and fell a little fast, she was no less than a challenge
+of Nature to him. He looked into a mobile face as daring and as passionate
+as his own, warm with the life of innocent youth, and the dark blood
+mantled his face.
+
+"Saddle the horses," she commanded.
+
+"When I get good and ready."
+
+"Now."
+
+"No, ma'am. We're going to have a talk first."
+
+She walked across to the place where her pony grazed, slipped on the
+bridle, and brought the animal back to the saddle. Norris watched her
+fitting the blankets and tightening the cinch without a word, his face
+growing blacker every moment. Before she could start he strode forward and
+caught the rein.
+
+"I've got something to say to you," he told her rudely. "You're not going
+now. So that's all about it."
+
+Her lips tightened. "Let go of my horse."
+
+"We'll talk first."
+
+"Do you think you can force me to stay here?"
+
+"You're going to hear what I've got to say."
+
+"You bully!"
+
+"I'll tell what I know--Miss Hold-up."
+
+"Tell it!" she cried.
+
+He laughed harshly, his narrowed eyes watching her closely. "If you throw
+me down now, I'll ce'tainly tell it. Be reasonable, girl."
+
+"Let go my rein!"
+
+"I've had enough of this. Tumble off that horse, or I'll pull you off."
+
+Her dark eyes flashed scorn of him. "You coward! Do you think I'm afraid
+of you? Stand back!"
+
+The man looked long at her, his teeth set; then caught at her strong
+little wrist. With a quick wrench she freed it, her eyes glowing like live
+coals.
+
+"You dare!" she panted.
+
+Her quirt rose and fell, the lash burning his wrist like a band of fire.
+With a furious oath he dropped his hand from the rein. Like a flash she
+was off, had dug her heels home, and was galloping into the moonlight
+recklessly as fast as she could send forward her pony. Stark terror had
+her by the throat. The fear of him flooded her whole being. Not till the
+drumming hoofs had carried her far did other emotions move her.
+
+She was furious with him, and with herself for having been imposed upon by
+him. His beauty, his grace, his debonair manner--they were all hateful to
+her now. She had thought him a god among men, and he was of common clay.
+It was her vanity that was wounded, not her heart. She scourged herself
+because she had been so easily deceived, because she had let herself
+become a victim of his good looks and his impudence. For that she had let
+him kiss her--yes, and had returned his kiss--she was heartily
+contemptuous of herself. Always she had held herself with an instinctive
+pride, but in her passion of abandonment the tears confessed now that this
+pride had been humbled to the dust.
+
+This gusty weather of the spirit, now of chastened pride and now of bitter
+anger, carried her even through the group of live-oaks which looked down
+upon the silent houses of the ranch, lying in a sea of splendid moon-beat.
+She was so much less confident of herself than usual that she made up her
+mind to tell her father the whole story of the hold-up and of what this
+man had threatened.
+
+This resolution comforted her, and it was with something approaching
+calmness that she rode past the corral fence and swung from the saddle in
+front of the house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+JACK GOES TO THE HEAD OF THE CLASS
+
+
+She trailed the bridle reins, went up the porch steps, and drew off her
+gauntlets. Her hand was outstretched to open the door when her gaze fell
+upon a large bill tacked to the wall. Swiftly she read it through, and,
+having read it, remained in suspended motion. For the first time she fully
+realized the danger and the penalty that confronted her.
+
+                          ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS
+                    Will Be Paid By Thomas L. Morse
+  For the arrest and conviction of each of the men who were implicated
+  in the robbery of the Fort Allison stage on April twenty-seventh
+  last. A further reward of $1000 will be paid for the recovery of the
+  bullion stolen.
+
+This was what she read, and her eye was running over it a second time when
+she heard the jingle of a spur approaching.
+
+"We're red-hot after them, you see, Miss Lee," a mocking voice drawled.
+"If you want to round up a thousand plunks, all you've got to do is to
+tell me who Mr. Hold-up is."
+
+He laughed quietly, as if it were a joke, but the girl answered with a
+flush. "Is that all?"
+
+"That's all."
+
+"If I knew, do you suppose I would tell for five thousand--or ten
+thousand?"
+
+For some reason this seemed to give him sardonic amusement. "No, I don't
+suppose you would."
+
+"You'll have to catch him yourself if you want him. I'm not in that
+business, Mr. Flatray."
+
+"I am. Sorry you don't like the business, Miss Lee." He added dryly: "But
+then you always were hard to please. You weren't satisfied when I was a
+rustler."
+
+Her eyes swept him with a look, whether of reproach or contempt he was not
+sure. But the hard derision of his gaze did not soften. Mentally as well
+as physically he was a product of the sun and the wind, as tough and
+unyielding as a greasewood sapling. For a friend he would go the limit,
+and he could not forgive her that she had distrusted him.
+
+"But mebbe you'd prefer it if I was rustling stages," he went on, looking
+straight at her.
+
+"What do you mean?" she asked breathlessly.
+
+"I want to have a talk with you."
+
+"What about?"
+
+"Suppose we step around to the side of the house. We'll be freer from
+interruption there."
+
+He led the way, taking her consent for granted. With him he carried a
+chair for her from the porch.
+
+"If you'll be as brief as possible, Mr. Flatray. I've been in the desert
+two days and want to change my clothes."
+
+"I'll not detain you. It's about this gold robbery."
+
+"Yes."
+
+She could not take her eyes from him. Something told her that he knew her
+secret, or part of it. Her heart was fluttering like a caged thrush.
+
+"Shall we begin at the beginning?"
+
+"If you like."
+
+"Or in the middle, say."
+
+"If only you'll begin anywhere," she said impatiently.
+
+"How will this do for a beginning, then? 'One thousand dollars will be
+paid by Thomas L. Morse for the arrest and conviction of each of the men
+who were implicated in the robbery of the Fort Allison stage on April
+twenty-seventh last.'"
+
+She was shaken, there was no denying it. He could see the ebb of blood
+from her cheeks, the sudden stiffening of the slender figure.
+
+She did not speak until she had control of her voice. "Dear me! What has
+all that to do with me?"
+
+"A good deal, I'm afraid. You know how much, better than I do."
+
+"Perhaps I'm stupid. You'll have to be a great deal clearer before I can
+understand you."
+
+"I've noticed that it's a lot easier to understand what you want to than
+what you don't want to."
+
+Sharply a thought smote her. "Have you seen Phil Norris lately?"
+
+"No, I haven't. Do you think it likely that he would confess?"
+
+"Confess?" she faltered.
+
+"I see I'll have to start at the beginning, after all. It's pretty hard to
+say just where that is. It might be when Morse got hold of your father's
+claim, or another fellow might say it was when the Boone-Bellamy feud
+began, and that is a mighty long time ago."
+
+"The Boone-Bellamy feud," echoed the girl.
+
+"Yes. The real name of our friend Norris is Dunc Boone."
+
+"He's no friend of mine." She flamed it out with such intensity that he
+was surprised.
+
+"Glad to hear it. I can tell you, then, that he's a bad lot. He was driven
+out of Arkansas after a suspected murder. It was a killing from ambush.
+They couldn't quite hang it on him, but he lit a shuck to save his skin
+from lynchers. At that time he was a boy. Couldn't have been more than
+seventeen."
+
+"Who did he kill?"
+
+"One of the Bellamy faction. The real name of T. L. Morse is----"
+
+"--Richard Bellamy."
+
+"How do you know that?" he asked in surprise.
+
+"I've known it since the first day I met him."
+
+"Known that he was wanted for murder in Arkansas?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you protected him?"
+
+"I had a reason." She did not explain that her reason was Jack Flatray,
+between whom and the consequences of his rustling she had stood.
+
+He pondered that a moment. "Well, Morse, or Bellamy, told me all about it.
+Now that Boone has recognized him, the game is up. He's ready to go back
+and stand trial if he must. I've communicated with the authorities in
+Arkansas and I'll hear from them in a day or two."
+
+"What has this to do with the hold-up?"
+
+"That's right, the hold-up. Well, this fellow Boone got your father to
+drinking, and then sprung it on him to rob the stage when the bullion was
+being shipped. Somehow Boone had got inside information about when this
+was to be. He had been nosing around up at the mine, and may have
+overheard something. O' course we know what your father would have done if
+he hadn't been drinking. He's straight as a string, even if he does go off
+like powder. But when a man's making a blue blotter of himself, things
+don't look the same to him. Anyhow he went in."
+
+"He didn't. I can prove he didn't," burst from Melissy's lips.
+
+"Be glad to hear your proof later. He ce'tainly planned the hold-up. Jim
+Budd overheard him."
+
+"Did Jim tell you that?"
+
+"Don't blame him for that. He didn't mean to tell, but I wound him up so
+he couldn't get away from it. I'll show you later why he couldn't."
+
+"I'm sure you must have been very busy, spying and everything," she told
+him bitterly.
+
+"I've kept moving. But to get back to the point. Your father and Boone
+were on the ground where the stage was robbed _either at the time or right
+after_. Their tracks were all over there. Then they got on their horses
+and rode up the lateral."
+
+"But they couldn't. The ditch was full," broke from the girl.
+
+"You're right it was. You must be some observing to know when that ditch
+is full and empty to an hour. I reckon you've got an almanac of tides," he
+said ironically.
+
+She bit her lip with chagrin. "I just happened to notice."
+
+"Some folks _are_ more noticing than others. But you're surely right. They
+came up the ditch one on each side. Now, why one on each side, do you
+reckon?"
+
+Melissy hid the dread that was flooding her heart. "I'm sure I don't
+know. You know everything else. I suppose you do that, too, if they really
+did."
+
+"They had their reasons, but we won't go into that now. First off when
+they reach the house they take a bunch of sheep down to the ditch to water
+them. Now, why?"
+
+"Why, unless because they needed water?"
+
+"We'll let that go into the discard too just now. Let's suppose your
+father and Boone dumped the gold box down into the creek somewhere after
+they had robbed the stage. Suppose they had a partner up at the
+head-gates. When the signal is given down comes the water, and the box is
+covered by it. Mebbe that night they take it away and bury it somewhere
+else."
+
+The girl began to breathe again. He knew a good deal, but he was still off
+the track in the main points.
+
+"And who is this partner up at the canal? Have you got him located too?"
+
+"I might guess."
+
+"Well?"--impatiently.
+
+"A young lady hailing from this _hacienda_ was out gathering flowers all
+mo'ning. She was in her runabout. The tracks led straight from here to the
+head-gates. I followed them through the sands. There's a little break in
+one of the rubber tires. You'll find that break mark every eight feet or
+so in the sand wash."
+
+"I opened the head-gates, then, did I?"
+
+"It looks that way, doesn't it?"
+
+"At a signal from father?"
+
+"I reckon."
+
+"And that's all the evidence you've got against him and me?" she demanded,
+still outwardly scornful, but very much afraid at heart.
+
+"Oh, no, that ain't all, Miss Lee. Somebody locked the Chink in during
+this play. He's still wondering why."
+
+"He dreamed it. Very likely he had been rolling a pill."
+
+"Did I dream this too?" From his coat pocket he drew the piece of black
+shirting she had used as a mask. "I found it in the room where your father
+put me up that first night I stayed here. It was your brother Dick's room,
+and this came from the pocket of a shirt hanging in the closet. Now, who
+do you reckon put it there?"
+
+For the first time in her life she knew what it was to feel faint. She
+tried to speak, but the words would not come from her parched throat. How
+could he be so hard and cruel, this man who had once been her best friend?
+How could he stand there so like a machine in his relentlessness?
+
+"We--we used to--to play at hold-up when he was a boy," she gasped.
+
+He shook his head. "No, I reckon that won't go. You see, I've found the
+piece this was torn from, _and I found it in your father's coat_. I went
+into his room on tiptoe that same hour. The coat was on the bed. He had
+gone downstairs for a minute and left it there. Likely he hadn't found a
+good chance to burn it yet." Taking the two pieces, he fitted them
+together and held them up. "They match exactly, you see. Did your father
+used to play with you too when he was a boy?"
+
+He asked this with what seemed to her tortured soul like silken cruelty.
+She had no answer, none at least that would avail. Desperately she
+snatched at a straw.
+
+"All this isn't proof. It's mere surmise. Some one's tracks were found by
+you. How do you know they were father's?"
+
+"I've got that cinched too. I took his boots and measured them."
+
+"Then where's the gold, if he took it? It must be somewhere. Where is
+it?"
+
+"Now I'm going up to the head of the class, ma'am. The gold--why, that's a
+dead easy one. _Near as I can make out, I'm sitting on it right now._"
+
+She gave a startled little cry that died in her throat.
+
+"Yes, it's ce'tainly a valuable wash-stand. Chippendale furniture ain't in
+it with this kind. I reckon the king of England's is ace high against a
+straight flush when it bucks up against yours."
+
+Melissy threw up her cards. "How did you find out?" she asked hoarsely.
+
+The deputy forced her to commit herself more definitely. "Find out what?"
+
+"Where I put the box."
+
+"I'll go back and answer some of those other questions first. I might as
+well own up that I knew all the time your father didn't hold up the
+stage."
+
+"You did?"
+
+"He's no fool. He wouldn't leave his tracks all over the place where he
+had just held up a stage. He might jest as well have left a signed note
+saying he had done it. No, that didn't look like Champ Lee to me. It
+seemed more likely he'd arrived after the show than before. It wouldn't be
+like him, either, to go plowing up the side of the ditch, with his partner
+on the other side, making a trail that a blind man could follow in the
+night. Soon as I knew Lee and Boone made those tracks, I had it cinched
+that they were following the lateral to see where the robber was going.
+They had come to the same conclusion I had, that there wasn't any way of
+escape _except by that empty lateral_, _assuming it had been empty_. The
+only point was to find out where the hold-up left the lateral. That's why
+they rode one on each side of it. They weren't missing any bets, you
+see."
+
+"And that's why they drove the sheep down to water--to hide the
+wheel-tracks. I couldn't understand that."
+
+"I must 'a' been right on their heels, for they were jest getting the
+trotters out of the corral when I reached the place where your rig left
+the water. 'Course I fell back into the brush and circled around so as to
+hit the store in front."
+
+"But if dad knew all the time, I don't see--surely, he wouldn't have come
+right after me and made plain the way I escaped."
+
+"That's the point. He didn't know. I reckon he was sort of guessing around
+in the dark, plumb puzzled; couldn't find the switch at all at first. Then
+it come to him, and he thought of the sheep to blind the trail. If I'd
+been half a hour later he would have got away with it too. No, if he had
+guessed that you were in the hold-up, him and Boone would have hiked right
+out on a false trail and led us into the Galiuros. Having no notion of it
+at first, he trails you down."
+
+"And the gold--how did you find that?"
+
+"I knew it was either right around the place or else you had taken it on
+with you when you went to the head-gates and buried it up there somewhere.
+Next day I followed your tracks and couldn't find any place where you
+might have left it. I knew how clever you were by the way you planned your
+getaway. Struck me as mighty likely that you had left it lying around in
+plain view somewhere. If you had dumped it out of the box into a sack, the
+box must be somewhere. You hadn't had time to burn it before the stage got
+back. I drifted back to your kindling pile, where all the old boxes from
+the store are lying. I happened to notice a brass tack in one near the
+end; then the marks of the tack heads where they had pressed against the
+wood. I figured you might have substituted one box for another, and inside
+of ten minutes I stumbled against your wash-stand and didn't budge it.
+Then I didn't have to look any further."
+
+"I've been trying to get a chance to move it and haven't ever found one.
+You were always coming around the corner on me," she explained.
+
+"Sorry I incommoded you," he laughed. "But it's too heavy for a lady to
+lift alone, anyhow. I don't see how you managed it this far."
+
+"I'm pretty strong," she said quietly.
+
+She had no hope of escape from the net of evidence in which he had
+entangled her. It was characteristic of her that she would not stoop to
+tricks to stir his pity. Deep in her heart she knew now that she had
+wronged him when she had suspected him of being a rustler. He _could_ not
+be. It was not in the man's character. But she would ask no mercy of him.
+All her pride rose to meet his. She would show him how game she could be.
+What she had sown she would reap. Nor would it have been any use to
+beseech him to spare her. He was a hard man, she told herself. Not even a
+fool could have read any weakness in the quiet gray eyes that looked so
+steadily into hers. In his voice and movements there was a certain
+deliberation, but this had nothing to do with indecision of character. He
+would do his duty as he saw it, regardless of whom it might affect.
+
+Melissy stood before him in the unconscious attitude of distinction she
+often fell into when she was moved, head thrown back so as to bare the
+rounded throat column, brown little hands folded in front of her, erectly
+graceful in all her slender lines.
+
+"What are you going to do with me?" she asked.
+
+His stone-cold eyes met hers steadily. "It ain't my say-so. I'm going to
+put it up to Bellamy. I don't know what he'll do."
+
+But, cold as his manner was, the heart of the man leaped to her courage.
+He saw her worn out, pathetically fearful, but she could face him with
+that still little smile of hers. He longed to take her in his arms, to
+tell her it would be all right--all right.
+
+"There's one thing that troubles me. I don't know how father will take
+this. You know how quick-tempered he is. I'm afraid he'll shoot somebody
+or do something rash when he finds out. You must let me be alone with him
+when I tell him."
+
+He nodded. "I been thinking of that myself. It ain't going to do him any
+good to make a gun-play. I have a notion mebbe this thing will unravel
+itself if we give it time. It will only make things worse for him to go
+off half-cocked."
+
+"How do you mean it may unravel itself?" she asked.
+
+"Bellamy is a whole lot better man than folks give him credit for being.
+I expect he won't be hard on you when he knows why you did it."
+
+"And why did I do it?" she asked quietly.
+
+"Sho! I know why you did it. Jim Budd told you what he had heard, and you
+figured you could save your father from doing it. You meant to give the
+money back, didn't you?"
+
+"Yes, but I can't prove that either in court or to Mr. Bellamy."
+
+"You don't need to prove it to me. If you say so, that's enough," he said
+in his unenthusiastic voice.
+
+"But you're not judge and jury, and you're certainly not Mr. Bellamy."
+
+"Scrape Arizona with a fine-tooth comb and you couldn't get a jury to
+convict when it's up against the facts in this case."
+
+At this she brightened. "Thank you, Mr. Flatray." And naïvely she added
+with a little laugh: "Are you ready to put the handcuffs on me yet?"
+
+He looked with a smile at her outstretched hands. "They wouldn't stay
+on."
+
+"Don't you carry them in sizes to fit all criminals?"
+
+"I'll have to put you on parole."
+
+"I'll break it and climb out the window. Then I'll run off with this."
+
+She indicated the box of treasure.
+
+"I need that wash-stand in my room. I'm going to take it up there
+to-night," he said.
+
+"This _isn't_ a very good safety deposit vault," she answered, and,
+nodding a careless good-night, she walked away in her slow-limbed,
+graceful Southern fashion.
+
+She had carried it off to the last without breaking down, but, once in her
+own room, the girl's face showed haggard in the moonlight. It was one
+thing to jest about it with him; it was another to face the facts as they
+stood. She was in the power of her father's enemy, the man whose proffer
+of friendship they had rejected with scorn. Her pride cried out that she
+could not endure mercy from him even if he wished to extend it. Surely
+there must be some other way out than the humiliation of begging him not
+to prosecute. She could see none but one, and that was infinitely worse.
+Yet she knew it would be her father's first impulsive instinct to seek to
+fight her out of her trouble, the more because it was through him that it
+had fallen upon her. At all hazards she must prevent this.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+A CONVERSATION
+
+
+Not five minutes after Melissy had left the deputy sheriff, another rider
+galloped up the road. Jack, returning from his room, where he had left the
+box of gold locked up, waited on the porch to see who this might be.
+
+The horseman proved to be the man Norris, or Boone, and in a thoroughly
+bad temper, as Jack soon found out.
+
+"Have you see anything of 'Lissie Lee?" he demanded immediately.
+
+"Miss Lee has just left me. She has gone to her room," answered Flatray
+quietly.
+
+"Well, I want to see her," said the other hoarsely.
+
+"I reckon you better postpone it to to-morrow. She's some played out and
+needs sleep."
+
+"Well, I'm going to see her now."
+
+Jack turned, still all gentleness, and called to Jim Budd, who was in the
+store.
+
+"Oh, Jim! Run upstairs and knock on Miss Melissy's door and tell her Mr.
+Norris is down here. Ask if she will see him to-night."
+
+"You're making a heap of formality out of this, Mr. Buttinsky," sneered
+the cowpuncher.
+
+Jack made no answer, unless it were one to whistle gently and look out
+into the night as if he were alone.
+
+"No, seh. She doan' wan' tuh see him to-night," announced Jim upon his
+return.
+
+"That seems to settle it, Mr. Norris," said Jack pleasantly.
+
+"Not by a hell of a sight. I've got something to say to her, and I'm going
+to say it."
+
+"To-morrow," amended the officer.
+
+"I said to-night."
+
+"But your say doesn't go here against hers. I reckon you'll wait."
+
+"Not so's you could notice it." The cowpuncher took a step forward toward
+the stairway, but Flatray was there before him.
+
+"Get out of the way, you. I don't stand for any butting-in," the cowboy
+blustered.
+
+"Don't be a goat, Norris. She's tired, and she says she don't want to see
+you. That's enough, ain't it?"
+
+Norris leaped back with an oath to draw his gun, but Jack had the quickest
+draw in Arizona. The puncher found himself looking into the business end
+of a revolver.
+
+"Better change your mind, seh," suggested the officer amiably. "I take it
+you've been drinking and you're some excited. If you were in condition to
+_savez_ the situation, you'd understand that the young lady doesn't care
+to see you now. Do you need a church to fall on you before you can take a
+hint?"
+
+"I reckon if you knew all about her, you wouldn't be so anxious to stand
+up for her," Norris said darkly.
+
+"I expect we cayn't any of us stand the great white light on all our acts;
+but if any one can, it's that little girl upstairs."
+
+"What would you say if I told you that she's liable to go to Yuma if I
+lift my hand?"
+
+"I'd say I was from Missouri and needed showing."
+
+"Put up that gun, come outside with me, and if I take a notion I'll show
+you all right."
+
+Jack laughed as his gun disappeared. "I'd be willing to bet high that
+there are a good many citizens around here haided straighter for Yuma than
+Miss Melissy."
+
+Without answering, Norris led the way out and stopped only when his arm
+rested on the fence of the corral.
+
+"Nobody can hear us now," he said brusquely, and the ranger got a whiff of
+his hot whisky breath. "You've put it up to me to make good. All right,
+I'll do it. That little girl in there, as you call her, is the bad man who
+held up the Fort Allison stage."
+
+The officer laughed tolerantly as he lit a cigarette.
+
+"I hear you say it, Norris."
+
+"I didn't expect you to believe it right away, but it's a fact just the
+same."
+
+Flatray climbed to the fence and rested his feet on a rail. "Fire ahead.
+I'm listenin'."
+
+"The first men on the ground after that hold-up were me and Lee. We
+covered the situation thorough and got hold of some points right away."
+
+"That's right funny too. When I asked you if you'd been down there you
+both denied it," commented the officer.
+
+"We were protecting the girl. Mind you, we didn't know who had done it
+then, but we had reasons to think the person had just come from this
+ranch."
+
+"What reasons?" briefly demanded Flatray.
+
+"We don't need to go into them. We had them, anyhow. Then I lit on a
+foot-print right on the edge of the ditch that no man ever made. We didn't
+know what to make of it, but we wiped it out and followed the ditch, one
+on each side. We'd figured that was the way he had gone. You see, though
+water was running in the ditch now, it hadn't been half an hour before."
+
+"You don't say!"
+
+"There wasn't a sign of anybody leaving the ditch till we got to the
+ranch; then we saw tracks going straight to the house."
+
+"So you got a bunch of sheep and drove them down there to muss things up
+some."
+
+Norris looked sharply at him. "You got there while we were driving them
+back. Well, that's right. We had to help her out."
+
+"You're helping her out now, ain't you?" Jack asked dryly.
+
+"That's my business. I've got my own reasons, Mr. Deputy. All you got to
+do is arrest her."
+
+"Just as soon as you give me the evidence, seh."
+
+"Haven't I given it to you? She was seen to drive away from the house in
+her rig. She left footprints down there. She came back up the ditch and
+then rode right up to the head-gates and turned on the water. Jim Little
+saw her cutting across country from the head-gates hell-to-split."
+
+"Far as I can make out, all the evidence you've given me ain't against
+her, but against you. She was out drivin' when it happened, you say, and
+you expect me to arrest her for it. It ain't against the law to go
+driving, seh. And as for that ditch fairy tale, on your own say-so you
+wiped out all chance to prove the story."
+
+"Then you won't arrest her?"
+
+"If you'll furnish the evidence, seh."
+
+"I tell you we know she did it. Her father knows it."
+
+"Is it worryin' his conscience? Did he ask you to lay an information
+against her?" asked the officer sarcastically.
+
+"That isn't the point."
+
+"You're right. Here's the point." Not by the faintest motion of the body
+had the officer's indolence been lifted, but the quiet ring of his voice
+showed it was gone. "You and Lee were overheard planning that robbery the
+day after you were seen hanging around the 'Monte Cristo.' You started out
+to hold up the stage. It was held up. By your own story you were the first
+men on the ground after the robbery. I tracked you straight from there
+here along the ditch. I found a black mask in Lee's coat. A dozen people
+saw you on that fool sheep-drive of yours. And to sum up, I found the
+stolen gold right here where you must have hidden it."
+
+"You found the gold? Where?"
+
+"That ain't the point either, seh. The point is that I've got you where I
+want you, Mr. Norris, alias Mr. Boone. You're wound up in a net you cayn't
+get away from. You're wanted back East, and you're wanted here. I'm onto
+your little game, sir. Think I don't know you've been trying to
+manufacture evidence against me as a rustler? Think I ain't wise to your
+whole record? You're arrested for robbing the Fort Allison stage."
+
+Norris, standing close in front of him, shot his right hand out and
+knocked the officer backward from the fence. Before the latter could get
+on his feet again the cowpuncher was scudding through the night. He
+reached his horse, flung himself on, and galloped away. Harmlessly a
+bullet or two zipped after him as he disappeared.
+
+The deputy climbed over the fence again and laughed softly to himself.
+"You did that right well, Jack. He'll always think he did that by his
+lone, never will know you was a partner in that escape. It's a fact,
+though, I could have railroaded him through on the evidence, but not
+without including the old man. No, there wasn't any way for it but that
+grandstand escape of Mr. Boone's."
+
+Still smiling, he dusted himself, put up his revolver, and returned to the
+house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE TENDERFOOT MAKES A PROPOSITION
+
+
+Melissy waited in dread expectancy to see what would happen. Of quick,
+warm sympathies, always ready to bear with courage her own and others'
+burdens, she had none of that passive endurance which age and experience
+bring. She was keyed to the heroism of an occasion, but not yet to that
+which life lays as a daily burden upon many without dramatic emphasis.
+
+All next day nothing took place. On the succeeding one her father returned
+with the news that the "Monte Cristo" contest had been continued to
+another term of court. Otherwise nothing unusual occurred. It was after
+mail time that she stepped to the porch for a breath of fresh air and
+noticed that the reward placard had been taken down.
+
+"Who did that?" she asked of Alan McKinstra, who was sitting on the steps,
+reading a newspaper and munching an apple.
+
+"Jack Flatray took it down. He said the offer of a reward had been
+withdrawn."
+
+"When did he do that?"
+
+"About an hour ago. Just before he rode off."
+
+"Rode off! Where did he go?"
+
+"Heard him say he was going to Mesa. He told your father that when he
+settled the bill."
+
+"He's gone for good, then?"
+
+"That's the way I took it. Say, Melissy, Farnum says Jack told him the
+gold had been found and turned back to Morse. Is that right?"
+
+"How should I know?"
+
+"Well, it looks blamed funny they could get the bullion back without
+getting the hold-up."
+
+"Maybe they'll get him yet," she consoled him.
+
+"I wish I could get a crack at him," the boy murmured vengefully.
+
+"You had one chance at him, didn't you?"
+
+"José spoiled it. Honest, I wasn't going to lie down, 'Lissie."
+
+Again the days followed each other uneventfully. Bellamy himself never
+came for his mail now, but sent one of the boys from the mine for it.
+Melissy wondered whether he despised her so much he did not ever want to
+see her again. Somehow she did not like to think this. Perhaps it might be
+delicacy on his part. He was going to drop the whole thing magnanimously
+and did not want to put upon her the obligation of thanking him by
+presenting himself to her eyes.
+
+But though he never appeared in person, he had never been so much in her
+mind. She could not rid herself of a growing sympathy and admiration for
+this man who was holding his own against many. A story which was being
+whispered about reached her ears and increased this. A bunch of his sheep
+had been found poisoned on their feeding ground, and certain cattle
+interests were suspected of having done the dastardly thing.
+
+When she could stand the silence no longer Melissy called up Jack Flatray
+on the telephone at Mesa.
+
+"You caught me just in time. I'm leaving for Phoenix to-night," he told
+her. "What can I do for you, Miss Lee?"
+
+"I want to know what's being done about that Fort Allison stage hold-up."
+
+"The money has been recovered."
+
+"I know that, but--what about the--the criminals?"
+
+"They made their getaway all right."
+
+"Aren't you looking for them?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Did Mr. Morse want you to drop it?"
+
+"Yes. He was very urgent about it."
+
+"Does he know who the criminals are?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And isn't going to prosecute?"
+
+"So he told me."
+
+"What did Mr. Morse say when you made your report?"
+
+"Said, 'Thank you.'"
+
+"Oh, yes, but--you know what I mean."
+
+"Not being a mind-reader----"
+
+"About the suspect. Did he say anything?"
+
+"Said he had private reasons for not pushing the case. I didn't ask him
+what they were."
+
+This was all she could get out of him. It was less than she had hoped.
+Still, it was something. She knew definitely what Bellamy had done.
+Wherefore she sat down to write him a note of thanks. It took her an hour
+and eight sheets of paper before she could complete it to her
+satisfaction. Even then the result was not what she wanted. She wished she
+knew how he felt about it, so that she could temper it to the right degree
+of warmth or coolness. Since she did not know, she erred on the side of
+stiffness and made her message formal.
+
+  "Mr. Thomas L. Morse,
+  "Monte Cristo Mine.
+  "Dear Sir:
+
+  "Father and I feel that we ought to thank you for your considerate
+  forbearance in a certain matter you know of. Believe me, sir, we are
+  grateful.
+
+                                               "Very respectfully,
+                                                        "Melissy Lee."
+She could not, however, keep herself from one touch of sympathy, and as a
+postscript she naïvely added:
+
+"I'm sorry about the sheep."
+
+Before mailing it she carried this letter to her father. Neither of them
+had ever referred to the other about what each knew of the affair of the
+robbery. More than once it had been on the tip of Champ Lee's tongue to
+speak of it, but it was not in his nature to talk out what he felt, and
+with a sigh he had given it up. Now Melissy came straight to the point.
+
+"I've been writing a letter to Mr. Morse, dad, thanking him for not having
+me arrested."
+
+Lee shot at her a glance of quick alarm.
+
+"Does he know about it, honey?"
+
+"Yes. Jack Flatray found out the whole thing and told him. He was very
+insistent on dropping it, Mr. Flatray says."
+
+"You say Jack found out all about it, honey?" repeated Lee in surprise.
+
+He was seated in a big chair on the porch, and she nestled on one arm of
+it, rumpled his gray hair as she had always done since she had been a
+little girl, kissed him, and plunged into her story.
+
+He heard her to the end without a word, but she noticed that he gripped
+the chair hard. When she had finished he swept her into his arms and broke
+down over her, calling her the pet names of her childhood.
+
+"Honey-bird ... Dad's little honey-bird ... I'm that ashamed of myse'f.
+'Twas the whisky did it, lambie. Long as I live I'll nevah touch it again.
+I'll sweah that befo' God. All week you been packin' the troubles I
+heaped on you, precious, and afteh you-all saved me from being a
+criminal...."
+
+So he went on, spending his tempestuous love in endearments and caresses,
+and so together they afterward talked it out and agreed to send the letter
+she had written.
+
+But Lee was not satisfied with her atonement. He could not rest to let it
+go at that, without expressing his own part in it to Bellamy. Next day he
+rode up to the mine, and found its owner in workman's slops just stepping
+from the cage. If Bellamy were surprised to see him, no sign of it reached
+his face.
+
+"If you'll wait a minute till I get these things off, I'll walk up to the
+cabin with you, Mr. Lee," he said.
+
+"I reckon you got my daughter's letter," said Lee abruptly as he strode up
+the mountainside with his host.
+
+"Yes, I got it an hour ago."
+
+"I be'n and studied it out, Mr. Morse. I couldn't let it go at that, and
+so I reckoned I'd jog along up hyer and tell you the whole story."
+
+"That's as you please, Mr. Lee. I'm quite satisfied as it is."
+
+The rancher went on as if he had not heard. "'Course I be'n holding a
+grudge at you evah since you took up this hyer claim. I expect that
+rankles with me most of the time, and when I take to drinking seems to me
+that mine still belongs to me. Well, I heerd tell of that shipment you was
+making, and I sets out to git it, for it ce'tainly did seem to belong to
+me. Understand, I wasn't drunk, but had be'n settin' pretty steady to the
+bottle for several days. Melissy finds it out, no matter how, and
+undertakes to keep me out of trouble. She's that full of sand, she nevah
+once thought of the danger or the consequences. Anyhow, she meant to git
+the bullion back to you afteh the thing had blown over."
+
+"I haven't doubted that a moment since I knew she did it," said Bellamy
+quietly.
+
+"Glad to hear it. I be'n misjudgin' you, seh, but you're a white man afteh
+all. Well, you know the rest of the story: how she held up the stage, how
+Jack drapped in befo' our tracks were covered, how smart he worked the
+whole thing out, and how my little gyurl confessed to him to save me."
+
+"Yes, I know all that."
+
+"What kind of a figure do I make in this? First off, I act like a durn
+fool, and she has to step in to save me. Then I let her tote the worry of
+it around while I ride off to Mesa. When Jack runs me down, she takes the
+blame again. To finish up with, she writes you a letter of thanks, jes' as
+if the whole fault was hers."
+
+The old soldier selected a smooth rock and splashed it with tobacco juice
+before he continued with rising indignation against himself.
+
+"I'm a fine father for a gyurl like that, ain't I? Up to date I always
+had an idee I was some sort of a man, but dad gum it! I cayn't see it
+hyer. To think of me lettin' my little gyurl stand the consequences of my
+meanness. No, Mr. Morse, that's one too much for Champ Lee. He's nevah
+going to touch another drop of whisky long as he lives."
+
+"Glad to hear it. That's a square amend to make, one she will
+appreciate."
+
+"So I took a _pasear_ up hyer to explain this, and to thank you for yore
+kindness. Fac' is, Mr. Morse, it would have jest about killed me if
+anything had happened to my little 'Lissie. I want to say that if you had
+a-be'n her brother you couldn't 'a' be'n more decent."
+
+"There was nothing else to do. It happens that I am in her debt. She saved
+my life once. Besides, I understood the motives for her action when she
+broke the law, and I honored them with all my heart. Flatray felt just as
+I did about it. So would any right-thinking man."
+
+"Well, you cayn't keep me from sayin' again that you're a white man, seh,"
+the other said with a laugh behind which the emotion of tears lay near.
+
+"That offer of a compromise is still open, Mr. Lee."
+
+The Southerner shook his grizzled head. "No, I reckon not, Mr. Morse.
+Understand, I got nothin' against you. The feud is wiped out, and I'll
+make you no mo' trouble. But it's yore mine, and I don't feel like taking
+charity. I got enough anyhow."
+
+"It wouldn't be charity. I've always felt as if you had a moral claim on
+an interest in the 'Monte Cristo.' If you won't take this yourself, why
+not let me make out the papers to Miss Lee? You would feel then that she
+was comfortably fixed, no matter what happened to you."
+
+"Well, I'll lay it befo' her. Anyhow, we're much obliged to you, Mr.
+Morse. I'll tell you what, seh," he added as an after-thought. "You come
+down and talk it over with 'Lissie. If you can make her see it that way,
+good enough."
+
+When Champ Lee turned his bronco's head homeward he was more at peace with
+the world than he had been for a long time. He felt that he would be able
+to look his little girl in the face again. For the first time in a week he
+felt at one with creation. He rode into the ranch plaza humming "Dixie."
+
+On the day following that of Lee's call, the mine-owner saddled his mare
+and took the trail to the half-way house. It was not until after the stage
+had come and gone that he found the chance for a word with Melissy alone.
+
+"Your father submitted my proposition, did he?" Bellamy said by way of
+introducing the subject.
+
+"Let's take a walk on it. I haven't been out of the house to-day," she
+answered with the boyish downrightness sometimes uppermost in her.
+
+Calling Jim, she left him in charge of the store, caught up a Mexican
+sombrero, and led the way up the trail to a grove of live-oaks perched on
+a bluff above. Below them stretched the plain, fold on fold to the blue
+horizon edge. Close at hand clumps of cactus, thickets of mesquit,
+together with the huddled adobe buildings of the ranch, made up the
+details of a scene possible only in the sunburnt territory. The
+palpitating heat quivered above the hot brown sand. No life stirred in the
+valley except a circling buzzard high in the sky, and the tiny moving
+speck with its wake of dust each knew to be the stage that had left the
+station an hour before.
+
+Melissy, unconscious of the charming picture she made, stood upon a rock
+and looked down on it all.
+
+"I suppose," she said at last slowly, "that most people would think this
+pretty desolate. But it's a part of me. It's all I know." She broke off
+and smiled at him. "I had a chance to be civilized. Dad wanted to send me
+East to school, but I couldn't leave him."
+
+"Where were you thinking of going?"
+
+"To Denver."
+
+Her conception of the East amused him. It was about as accurate as a New
+Yorker's of the West.
+
+"I'm glad you didn't. It would have spoiled you and sent you back just
+like every other young lady the schools grind out."
+
+She turned curiously toward him. "Am I not like other girls?"
+
+It was on his tongue tip to tell her that she was gloriously different
+from most girls he had known, but discretion sealed his lips. Instead, he
+told her of life in the city and what it means to society women, its
+emptiness and unsatisfaction.
+
+His condemnation was not proof positive to her. "I'd like to go there for
+myself some time and see. And anyhow it must be nice to have all the money
+you want with which to travel," she said.
+
+This gave him his opening. "It makes one independent. I think that's the
+best thing wealth can give--a sort of spaciousness." He waited perceptibly
+before he added: "I hope you have decided to be my partner in the mine."
+
+"I've decided not to."
+
+"I'm sorry. But why?"
+
+"It's your mine. It isn't ours."
+
+"That's nonsense. I always in my heart, recognized a moral claim you have.
+Besides, the case isn't finished yet. Perhaps your father may win his
+contest. I'm all for settling out of court."
+
+"You know we won't win."
+
+"I don't."
+
+She gave him applause from her dark eyes. "That's very fair of you, but
+Dad and I can't do it."
+
+"Then you still have a grudge at me," he smiled.
+
+"Not the least little bit of a one."
+
+"I shan't take no for an answer, then. I'll order the papers made out
+whether you want me to or not." Without giving her a chance to speak, he
+passed to another topic: "I've decided to go out of the sheep business."
+
+"I'm so glad!" she cried.
+
+"Those aren't my feelings," he answered ruefully. "I hate to quit under
+fire."
+
+"Of course you do, but your friends will know why you do it."
+
+"Why do I do it?"
+
+"Because you know it's right. The cattlemen had the range first. Their
+living is tied up in cattle, and your sheep are ruining the feed for them.
+Yesterday when I was out riding I counted the bones of eight dead cows."
+
+He nodded gravely. "Yes, in this country sheep are death to cows. I hate
+to be a quitter, but I hate worse to take the bread out of the mouths of a
+dozen families. Two days ago I had an offer for my whole bunch, and
+to-morrow I'm going to take the first instalment over the pass and drive
+them down to the railroad."
+
+"But you'll have to cross the dead line to get over the pass," she said
+quickly; for all Cattleland knew that a guard had been watching his herds
+to see they did not cross the pass.
+
+"Yes. I'm going to send Alan with a letter to Farnum. I don't think there
+will be any opposition to my crossing it when my object is understood," he
+smiled.
+
+Melissy watched him ride away, strong and rugged and ungraceful, from the
+head to the heel of him a man. Life had gone hard with him. She wondered
+whether that were the reason her heart went out to him so warmly.
+
+As she moved about her work that day and the next little snatches of song
+broke from her, bubbling forth like laughter, born of the quiet happiness
+within, for which she could give no reason.
+
+After the stage had gone she saddled her pony and rode toward the head of
+the pass. In an hour or two now the sheep would be pouring across the
+divide, and she wanted to get a photograph of them as they emerged from
+the pass. She was following an old cattle trail which ran into the main
+path just this side of the pass, and she was close to the junction when
+the sound of voices stopped her. Some instinct made her wait and listen.
+
+The speakers were in a dip of the trail just ahead of her, and the voice
+of the first she recognized as belonging to the man Boone. The tone of it
+was jubilantly cruel.
+
+"No, sir. You don't move a step of the way, not a step, Mr. Alan
+McKinstra. I've got him right where I want him, and I don't care if you
+talk till the cows come home."
+
+Alan's voice rang out indignantly, "It's murder then--just plain, low-down
+murder. If you hold me here and let Morse fall into a death trap without
+warning him, you're as responsible as if you shot him yourself."
+
+"All right. Suits me down to the ground. We'll let it go at that. I'm
+responsible. If you want the truth flat and plain, I don't mind telling
+you that I wouldn't be satisfied if I wasn't responsible. I'm evening up
+some little things with Mr. Morse to-day."
+
+Melissy needed to hear no more to understand the situation, but if she
+had, the next words of Boone would have cleared it up.
+
+"When I met up with you and happened on the news that you was taking a
+message to Farnum, and when I got onto the fact that Morse, as you call
+him, was moving his sheep across the dead line, _relying on you having got
+his letter to the cattlemen to make it safe_, it seemed luck too good to
+be true. All I had to do was to persuade you to stay right here with me,
+and Mr. Morse would walk into the pass and be wiped out. You get the
+beauty of it, my friend, don't you? _I'm_ responsible, but it will be
+Farnum and his friends that will bear the blame. There ain't but one flaw
+in the whole thing: Morse will never know that it's me that killed him."
+
+"You devil!" cried the boy, with impotent passion.
+
+"I've waited ten years for this day, and it's come at last. Don't you
+think for a moment I'm going to weaken. No, sir! You'll sit there with my
+gun poked in your face just as you've sat for six hours. It's my say-so
+to-day, sir," Boone retorted, malevolence riding triumph in his voice.
+
+Melissy's first impulse was to confront the man, her next to slip away
+without being discovered and then give the alarm.
+
+"Yes, sir," continued the cowpuncher; "I scored on Mr. Morse two or three
+nights ago, when I played hell with one of his sheep camps, and to-day I
+finish up with him. His sheep have been watched for weeks, and at the
+first move it's all up with him and them. Farnum's vaqueros will pay my
+debt in full. Just as soon as I'm right sure of it I'll be jogging along
+to Dead Man's Cache, and you can go order the coffin for your boss."
+
+The venom of the man was something to wonder at. It filled the listening
+girl with sick apprehension. She had not known that such hatred could live
+in the world.
+
+Quietly she led her pony back, mounted, and made a wide detour until she
+struck the trail above. Already she could hear the distant bleat of sheep
+which told her that the herd was entering the pass. Recklessly she urged
+her pony forward, galloping into the saddle between the peaks without
+regard to the roughness of the boulder-strewn path. A voice from above
+hailed her with a startled shout as she flew past. Again, a shot rang out,
+the bullet whistling close to her ear. But nothing could stop her till she
+reached the man she meant to save.
+
+And so it happened that Richard Bellamy, walking at the head of his herd,
+saw a horse gallop wildly round a bend almost into his bleating flock. The
+rider dragged the bronco to a halt and slipped to the ground. She stood
+there ashen-hued, clinging to the saddle-horn and swaying slightly.
+
+"I'm in time.... Thank God!... Thank God!" her parched lips murmured.
+
+"Miss Lee! You here?" he cried.
+
+They looked at each other, the man and the girl, while the wild fear in
+her heart began to still. The dust of the drive was thick on his boots,
+his clothes, his face, but the soil of travel could not obscure the power
+of his carriage, the strong lines of his shoulders, the set of his broad,
+flat back, any more than it could tarnish her rarity, the sweetness of
+blood in her that under his gaze beat faintly into her dusky cheeks. The
+still force of him somehow carried reassurance to her. Such virility of
+manhood could not be marked for extinction.
+
+She panted out her story, and his eyes never left her.
+
+"You have risked your life to save mine and my herders," he said very
+quietly.
+
+"You must go back," she replied irrelevantly.
+
+"I can't. The entrance is guarded."
+
+This startled her. "Then--what shall we do?"
+
+"You must ride forward at once. Tell the vaqueros that I am moving my
+sheep only to take them to the railroad. Explain to them how Alan is
+detained with the message I sent Farnum. In a few minutes we shall follow
+with the sheep."
+
+"And if they don't believe that you are going out of the sheep
+business--what then?"
+
+"I shall have to take my chance of that."
+
+She seemed about to speak, but changed her mind, nodded, swung to the
+saddle, and rode forward. After a few minutes Bellamy followed slowly. He
+was unarmed, not having doubted that his letter to the cattleman would
+make his journey safe. That he should have waited for an answer was now
+plain, but the contract called for an immediate delivery of the sheep, as
+he had carefully explained in his note to Farnum.
+
+Presently he heard again the clatter of a horse's hoofs in the loose shale
+and saw Melissy returning.
+
+"Well?" he asked as she drew up.
+
+"I've told them. I think they believe me, but I'm going through the gorge
+with you."
+
+He looked up quickly to protest, but did not. He knew that her thought was
+that her presence beside him would protect him from attack. The rough
+chivalry of Arizona takes its hat off to a woman, and Melissy Lee was a
+favorite of the whole countryside.
+
+So together they passed into the gulch, Bellamy walking by the side of her
+horse. Neither of them spoke. At their heels was the soft rustle of many
+thousands of padding feet.
+
+Once there came to them the sound of cheering, and they looked up to see
+a group of vaqueros waving their hats and shouting down. Melissy shook her
+handkerchief and laughed happily at them. It was a day to be remembered by
+these riders.
+
+They emerged into a roll of hill-tops upon which the setting sun had cast
+a weird afterglow of radiance in which the whole world burned. The cactus,
+the stunted shrubbery, the painted rocks, seemed all afire with some magic
+light that had touched their commonness to a new wonder.
+
+A sound came to them from below. A man, rifle in hand and leading a horse,
+was stealthily crossing the trail to disappear among the large boulders
+beyond.
+
+Melissy did not speak, scarce dared to draw breath, for the man beneath
+them was Boone. There was something furtive and lupine about him that
+suggested the wild beast stalking its kill. No doubt he had become
+impatient to see the end of his foe and had ridden forward. He had almost
+crossed the path before he looked up and caught sight of them standing
+together in the fireglow of the sunset.
+
+Abruptly he came to a standstill.
+
+"By God! you slipped through, did you?" he said in a low voice of
+concentrated bitterness.
+
+Bellamy did not answer, but he separated himself from the girl by a step
+or two. He knew quite well what was coming, and he looked down quietly
+with steady eyes upon his foe.
+
+From far below there came the faint sound of a horse breaking its way
+through brush. Boone paused to listen, but his eye never wandered from the
+bareheaded, motionless figure silhouetted against the skyline in the ruddy
+evening glow. He had shifted his rifle so that it lay in both hands, ready
+for immediate action.
+
+Melissy, horror-stricken, had sat silent, but now she found her voice.
+
+"He is unarmed!" she cried to the cowpuncher.
+
+He made no answer. Another sound in the brush, close at hand, was
+distracting his attention, though not his gaze.
+
+Just as he whipped up his rifle Melissy sprang forward. She heard the
+sound of the explosion fill the draw, saw Bellamy clutch at the air and
+slowly sink to the ground. Before the echoes had died away she had flung
+herself toward the inert body.
+
+The outlaw took a step or two forward, as if to make sure of his work, but
+at the sound of running footsteps he changed his mind, swung to the saddle
+and disappeared among the rocks.
+
+An instant later Bob Farnum burst into view.
+
+"What's up?" he demanded.
+
+Melissy looked up. Her face was perfectly ashen. "Phil Norris ... he shot
+Mr. Morse."
+
+Farnum stepped forward. "Hurt badly, Mr. Morse?"
+
+The wounded man grinned faintly. "Scared worse, I reckon. He got me in the
+fleshy part of the left arm."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+OLD ACQUAINTANCES
+
+
+"You wanted to see me?"
+
+The voice had the soft, slow intonation of the South, and it held some
+quality that haunted the memory. Or so Melissy thought afterward, but that
+may have been because of its owner's appeal to sympathy.
+
+"If you are Miss Yarnell."
+
+"Ferne Yarnell is my name."
+
+"Mr. Bellamy asked me to call on you. He sent this letter of
+introduction."
+
+A faint wave of color beat into the cheek of the stranger. "You know Mr.
+Bellamy then?"
+
+"Yes. He would have been here to meet you, but he met with an accident
+yesterday."
+
+"An accident!" There was a quick flash of alarm in the lifted face.
+
+"He told me to tell you that it was not serious. He was shot in the arm."
+
+"Shot. By whom?" She was ashen to the lips.
+
+"By a man called Duncan Boone."
+
+"I know him. He is a dangerous man."
+
+"Yes," Melissy nodded. "I don't think we know how very dangerous he is. We
+have all been deceived in him till recently."
+
+"Does he live here?"
+
+"Yes. The strange thing is that he and Mr. Bellamy had never met in this
+country until a few days ago. There used to be some kind of a feud between
+the families. But you must know more about that than I do."
+
+"Yes. My family is involved in the feud. Mr. Bellamy is a distant cousin
+of mine."
+
+"So he told me."
+
+"Have you known him long?"
+
+Melissy thought that there was a little more than curiosity in the quick
+look the young woman flung at her.
+
+"I met him when he first came here. He was lost on the desert and I found
+him. After that we became very unfriendly. He jumped a mining claim
+belonging to my father. But we've made it up and agreed to be friends."
+
+"He wrote about the young lady who saved his life."
+
+Melissy smiled. "Did he say that I was a cattle and a stage rustler?"
+
+"He said nothing that was not good."
+
+"I'm much obliged to him," the Western girl answered breezily. "And now do
+tell me, Miss Yarnell, that you and your people have made up your mind to
+stay permanently."
+
+"Father is still looking the ground over. He has almost decided to buy a
+store here. Yet he has been in the town only a day. So you see he must
+like it."
+
+Outside the open second story window of the hotel Melissy heard a voice
+that sounded familiar. She moved toward the window alcove, and at the same
+time a quick step was heard in the hall. Someone opened the door of the
+parlor and stood on the threshold. It was the man called Boone.
+
+Melissy, from the window, glanced round. Her first impulse was to speak;
+her second to remain silent. For the Arkansan was not looking at her. His
+mocking ribald gaze was upon Ferne Yarnell.
+
+That young woman looked up from the letter of introduction she was reading
+and a startled expression swept into her face.
+
+"Dunc Boone," she cried.
+
+The man doffed his hat with elaborate politeness. "Right glad to meet up
+with you again, Miss Ferne. You was in short dresses when I saw you last.
+My, but you've grown pretty. Was it because you heard I was in Arizona
+that you came here?"
+
+She rose, rejecting in every line of her erect figure his impudent
+geniality, his insolent pretense of friendliness.
+
+"My brother is in the hotel. If he learns you are here there will be
+trouble."
+
+A wicked malice lay in his smiling eyes. "Trouble for him or for me?" he
+inquired silkily.
+
+His lash flicked her on the raw. Hal Yarnell was a boy of nineteen. This
+man had a long record as a gunfighter to prove him a desperate man.
+Moreover, he knew how hopelessly heart sick she was of the feud that for
+many years had taken its toll of blood.
+
+"Haven't you done us enough harm, you and yours? Go away. Leave us alone.
+That's all I ask of you."
+
+He came in and closed the door. "But you see it ain't all I ask of you,
+Ferne Yarnell. I always did ask all I could get of a girl as pretty as
+you."
+
+"Will you leave me, sir?"
+
+"When I'm through."
+
+"Now."
+
+"No, I reckon not," he drawled between half shuttered eyes.
+
+She moved toward the door, but he was there before her. With a turn of his
+wrist he had locked it.
+
+"This interview quits at my say-so, honey. Think after so many years of
+absence-makes-the-heart-grow-fonder you're going to trample over me like I
+was a kid? Guess again."
+
+"Unlock that door," she ordered.
+
+"When I get good and ready. We'll have our talk out first."
+
+Her eyes blazed. She was white as paper though she faced him steadily. But
+her heart wavered. She dared not call out for fear her brother might hear
+and come to her assistance. This she must forestall at all costs.
+
+A heel clicked in the alcove. For the first time Norris, or Boone as the
+Southern girl had called him, became aware of a third party in the room.
+Melissy was leaning out of the window. She called down to a man standing
+on the street.
+
+"Jack, come up here quick. I want you."
+
+Boone took a step forward. "You here, 'Lissie Lee?"
+
+She laughed scornfully. "Yes, I'm here. An unexpected pleasure, isn't
+it?"
+
+"Do you know Ferne Yarnell?" he asked, for once taken aback.
+
+"It looks as if I do."
+
+His quick furtive eye fell upon an envelope on the floor. He picked it up.
+Upon it was written, "Miss Ferne Yarnell," and in the corner, "Introducing
+Miss Lee."
+
+A muscle twitched in his face. When he looked up there was an expression
+of devilish malignity on it.
+
+"Mr. Bellamy's handwriting, looks like." He turned to the Arizona girl.
+"Then I didn't put the fellow out of business."
+
+"No, you coward."
+
+The angry color crept to the roots of his hair. "Better luck next time."
+
+The door knob rattled. Someone outside was trying to get in. Those inside
+the room paid no obvious attention to him. The venomous face of the
+cattle detective held the women fascinated.
+
+"When Dick Bellamy ambushed Shep he made a hell of a bad play of it. My
+old mammy used to say that the Boones were born wolves. I can see where
+she was right. The man that killed my brother gets his one of these days
+and don't you forget it. You just stick around. We're due to shoot this
+thing out, him and me," the man continued, his deep-socketed eyes burning
+from the grim handsome face.
+
+"Open the door," ordered a voice from the hall, shaking the knob
+violently.
+
+"You don't know he killed your brother. Someone else may have done it. And
+it may have been done in self defence," the Arkansas girl said to Boone in
+a voice so low and reluctant that it appeared the words were wrung from
+her by torture.
+
+"Think I'm a buzzard head? Why for did he run away? Why did he jump for
+the sandhills soon as the word came to arrest him?" He snapped together
+his straight, thin-lipped mouth, much as a trap closes on its prey.
+
+A heavy weight hurtled against the door and shook it to the hinges.
+Melissy had been edging to the right. Now with a twist of her lissom body
+she had slipped past the furious man and turned the key.
+
+Jack Flatray came into the room. His glance swept the young women and
+fastened on the man. In the crossed eyes of the two was the thrust of
+rapiers, the grinding of steel on steel, that deadly searching for
+weakness in the other that duelists employ.
+
+The deputy spoke in a low soft drawl. "Mornin', Boone. Holding an
+executive session, are you?"
+
+The lids of the detective narrowed to slits. From the first there had been
+no pretense of friendship between these two. There are men who have only
+to look once at each other to know they will be foes. It had been that way
+with them. Causes of antagonism had arisen quickly enough. Both dominant
+personalities, they had waged silent unspoken warfare for the leadership
+of the range. Later over the favor of Melissy Lee this had grown more
+intense, still without having ever been put into words. Now they were face
+to face, masks off.
+
+"Why yes, until you butted in, Mr. Sheriff."
+
+"This isn't my busy day. I thought I'd just drop in to the meeting."
+
+"You've made a mistake. We're not holding a cattle rustlers' convention."
+
+"There are so many ladies present I can't hear you, but maybe if you said
+it outside I could," the deputy suggested gently, a gleam of steely anger
+in his eyes.
+
+"Say it anywhere to oblige a friend," sneered Boone.
+
+From the moment of meeting neither man had lowered his gaze by the
+fraction of an inch. Red tragedy was in the air. Melissy knew it. The
+girl from Arkansas guessed as much. Yet neither of them knew how to avert
+the calamity that appeared impending. One factor alone saved the situation
+for the moment. Flatray had not yet heard of the shooting of Bellamy. Had
+he known he would have arrested Boone on the spot and the latter would
+have drawn and fought it out.
+
+Into the room sauntered Lee. "Hello, 'Lissie. Been looking for you an
+hour, honey. Mornin', Norris. Howdy, Jack! Dad burn yore ornery hide, I
+ain't see you long enough for a good talk in a coon's age."
+
+Melissy seized on her father joyfully as an interposition of Providence.
+"Father, this is Miss Yarnell, the young lady I told you about."
+
+The ranchman buried her little hand in his big paw. "Right glad to meet up
+with you, Miss Yarnell. How do you like Arizona by this time? I reckon
+Melissy has introduced you to her friends. No? Make you acquainted with
+Mr. Flatray. Shake hands with Mr. Norris, Miss Yarnell. Where are you,
+Norris?"
+
+The owner of the Bar Double G swung round, to discover for the first time
+that harmony was not present. Boone stood back with a sullen vindictive
+expression on his face.
+
+"Why, what's up, boys?" the rancher asked, his glance passing from one to
+another.
+
+"You ain't in this, Lee," Boone informed him. Then, to Flatray: "See you
+later."
+
+The deputy nodded carelessly. "Any time you like."
+
+The lank old Confederate took a step forward to call Boone back, but
+Melissy caught him by the sleeve.
+
+"Let him go," she whispered emphatically.
+
+"I know my boss," returned Lee with a laugh.
+
+"If you're quite through with me, Miss Lee, I'll not intrude longer,"
+Flatray said.
+
+"But I'm not," spoke Melissy quickly.
+
+She did not intend to let him get away to settle his quarrel with Boone.
+
+"I'm rather busy," he suggested.
+
+"Your business will have to wait," she came back decisively.
+
+Lee laughed and clapped Jack on the shoulder. "Might as well know your
+boss too, boy."
+
+Melissy flushed with a flash of temper. "I'm nothing of the kind, dad."
+
+"Sho! A joke's a joke, girl. That's twice hand-runnin' I get a call-down.
+You're mighty high-heeled to-day, 'pears like."
+
+Jack smiled grimly. He understood some things that were hidden from Lee.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+CONCERNING THE BOONE-BELLAMY-YARNELL FEUD
+
+
+The story that Ferne Yarnell told them in the parlor of the hotel had its
+beginnings far back in the days before the great war. They had been
+neighbors, these three families, had settled side by side in this new land
+of Arkansas, had hunted and feasted together in amity. In an hour had
+arisen the rift between them that was to widen to a chasm into which much
+blood had since been spilt. It began with a quarrel between hotheaded
+young men. Forty years later it was still running its blind wasteful
+course.
+
+Even before the war the Boones had begun to go down hill rapidly. Cad
+Boone, dissipated and unprincipled, had found even the lax discipline of
+the Confederate army too rigid and had joined the guerrillas, that band of
+hangers-on which respected neither flag and developed a cruelty that was
+appalling. Falling into the hands of Captain Ransom Yarnell, he had been
+tried by drumhead courtmartial and executed within twenty four hours of
+his capture.
+
+The boast of the Boones was that they never forgot an injury. They might
+wait many years for the chance, but in the end they paid their debts.
+Twenty years after the war Sugden Boone shot down Colonel Yarnell as he
+was hitching his horse in front of the courthouse at Nemo. Next Christmas
+eve a brother of the murdered man--Captain Tom, as his old troopers still
+called him--met old Sugden in the postoffice and a revolver duel followed.
+From it Captain Tom emerged with a bullet in his arm. Sugden was carried
+out of the store feet first to a house of mourning.
+
+The Boones took their time. Another decade passed. Old Richard Bellamy,
+father of the young man, was shot through the uncurtained window of his
+living rooms while reading the paper one night. Though related to the
+Yarnells, he had never taken any part in the feud beyond that of
+expressing his opinion freely. The general opinion was that he had been
+killed by Dunc Boone, but there was no conclusive evidence to back it.
+Three weeks later another one of the same faction met his fate. Captain
+Tom was ambushed while riding from his plantation to town and left dead on
+the road. Dunc Boone had been seen lurking near the spot, and immediately
+after the killing he was met by two hunters as he was slipping through the
+underbrush for the swamps. There was no direct evidence against the young
+man, but Captain Tom had been the most popular man in the county. Reckless
+though he was, Duncan Boone had been forced to leave the country by the
+intensity of the popular feeling against him.
+
+Again the feud had slumbered. It was understood that the Yarnells and the
+Bellamys were ready to drop it. Only one of the opposite faction remained
+on the ground, a twin brother of Duncan. Shep Boone was a drunken
+ne'er-do-well, but since he now stood alone nothing more than empty
+threats was expected of him. He spent his time idly with a set of gambling
+loafers, but he lacked the quality of active malice so pronounced in
+Dunc.
+
+A small part of the old plantation, heavily mortgaged, still belonged to
+Shep and was rented by him to a tenant, Jess Munro. He announced one day
+that he was going to collect the rent due him. Having been drinking
+heavily, he was in an abusive frame of mind. As it chanced he met young
+Hal Yarnell, just going into the office of his kinsman Dick Bellamy, with
+whom he was about to arrange the details of a hunting trip they were
+starting upon. Shep emptied his spleen on the boy, harking back to the old
+feud and threatening vengeance at their next meeting. The boy was white
+with rage, but he shut his teeth and passed upstairs without saying a
+word.
+
+The body of Shep Boone was found next day by Munro among the blackberry
+bushes at the fence corner of his own place. No less than four witnesses
+had seen young Yarnell pass that way with a rifle in his hand about the
+same time that Shep was riding out from town. They had heard a shot, but
+had thought little of it. Munro had been hoeing cotton in the field and
+had seen the lad as he passed. Later he had heard excited voices, and
+presently a shot. Other circumstantial evidence wound a net around the
+boy. He was arrested. Before the coroner held an inquest a new development
+startled the community. Dick Bellamy fled on a night train, leaving a note
+to the coroner exonerating Hal. In it he practically admitted the crime,
+pleading self defence.
+
+This was the story that Ferne Yarnell told in the parlor of the Palace
+Hotel to Jack Flatray and the Lees.
+
+Melissy spoke first. "Did Mr. Bellamy kill the man to keep your brother
+from being killed?"
+
+"I don't know. It must have been that. It's all so horrible."
+
+The deputy's eyes gleamed. "Think of it another way, Miss Yarnell. Bellamy
+was up against it. Your brother is only a boy. He took his place. A friend
+couldn't have done more for another."
+
+The color beat into the face of the Arkansas girl as she looked at him.
+"No. He sacrificed his career for him. He did a thing he must have hated
+to do."
+
+"He's sure some man," Flatray pronounced.
+
+A young man, slight, quick of step, and erect as a willow sapling, walked
+into the room. He looked from one to another with clear level eyes. Miss
+Ferne introduced him as her brother.
+
+A thought crossed the mind of the deputy. Perhaps this boy had killed his
+enemy after all and Bellamy had shouldered the blame for him. If the mine
+owner were in love with Ferne Yarnell this was a hypothesis more than
+possible. In either case he acquitted the slayer of blame. In his pocket
+was a letter from the sheriff at Nemo, Arkansas, stating that his county
+was well rid of Shep Boone and that the universal opinion was that neither
+Bellamy nor young Yarnell had been to blame for the outcome of the
+difficulty. Unless there came to him an active demand for the return of
+Bellamy he intended to let sleeping dogs lie.
+
+No such demand came. Within a month the mystery was cleared. The renter
+Munro delivered himself to the sheriff at Nemo, admitting that he had
+killed Shep Boone in self defence. The dead man had been drinking and was
+exceedingly quarrelsome. He had abused his tenant and at last drawn on
+him. Whereupon Munro had shot him down. At first afraid of what might
+happen to him, he had stood aside and let the blame be shouldered upon
+young Yarnell. But later his conscience had forced him to a confession. It
+is enough here to say that he was later tried and acquitted, thus closing
+the chapter of the wastrel's tragic death.
+
+The day after the news of Munro's confession reached Arizona Richard
+Bellamy called upon Flatray to invite him to his wedding. As soon as his
+name was clear he had asked Ferne Yarnell to marry him.
+
+
+
+
+PART II
+
+DEAD MAN'S CACHE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+KIDNAPPED
+
+
+As a lake ripples beneath a summer breeze, so Mesa was stirred from its
+usual languor by the visit of Simon West. For the little Arizona town was
+dreaming dreams. Its imagination had been aroused; and it saw itself no
+longer a sleepy cow camp in the unfeatured desert, but a metropolis, in
+touch with twentieth-century life.
+
+The great Simon West, pirate of finance, empire builder, molder of the
+destinies of the mighty Southwestern Pacific system, was to touch the
+adobe village with his transforming wand and make of it a hive of
+industry. Rumors flew thick and fast.
+
+Mesa was to be the junction for the new spur that would run to the big
+Lincoln dam. The town would be a division point; the machine shops of the
+system would be located there. Its future, if still a trifle vague, was
+potentially immense. Thus, with cheerful optimism, did local opinion
+interpret the visit of the great man.
+
+Whatever Simon West may have thought of Mesa and its prospects, he kept
+behind his thin, close-shut lips. He was a dry, gray little man of
+fifty-five, with sharp, twinkling eyes that saw everything and told
+nothing. Certainly he wore none of the visible signs of greatness, yet at
+his nod Wall Street trembled. He had done more to change the map of
+industrial America than any other man, alive or dead. Wherefore, big
+Beauchamp Lee, mayor of Mesa, and the citizens on the reception committee
+did their very best to impress him with the future of the country, as they
+motored out to the dam.
+
+"Most promising spot on earth. Beats California a city block on oranges
+and citrons. Ever see an Arizona peach, Mr. West? It skins the world," the
+big cattleman ran on easily.
+
+The financier's eye took in the girl sitting beside the chauffeur in the
+front seat, and he nodded assent.
+
+Melissy Lee bloomed. She was vivid as a wild poppy on the hillsides past
+which they went flashing. But she had, too, a daintiness, a delicacy of
+coloring and contour, that suggested the fruit named by her father.
+
+"You bet we raise the best here," that simple gentleman bragged
+patriotically. "All we need is water, and the Lincoln dam assures us of
+plenty. Yes, sir! It certainly promises to be an Eden."
+
+West unlocked his lips long enough to say: "Any country can promise. I'm
+looking for one that will perform."
+
+"You're seeing it right now, seh," the mayor assured him, and launched
+into fluent statistics.
+
+West heard, saw the thing stripped of its enthusiasm, and made no comment
+either for or against. He had plenty of imagination, or he could never
+have accomplished the things he had done. However, before any proposition
+appealed to him he had to see money in the deal. Whether he saw it in this
+particular instance, nobody knew; and only one person had the courage to
+ask him point-blank what his intentions were. This was Melissy.
+
+Luncheon was served in the pleasant filtered sunlight, almost under the
+shadow of the great dam.
+
+On the way out Melissy had sat as demure and dovelike as it was possible
+for her to be. But now she showed herself to be another creature.
+
+Two or three young men hovered about her; notable among them was a young
+fellow of not many words, good-humored, strong, with a look of power about
+him which the railroad king appreciated. Jack Flatray they called him. He
+was the newly-elected sheriff of the county.
+
+The great man watched the girl without appearing to do so. He was rather
+at a loss to account for the exotic, flamelike beauty into which she had
+suddenly sparkled; but he was inclined to attribute it to the arrival of
+Flatray.
+
+Melissy sat on a flat rock beside West, swinging her foot occasionally
+with the sheer active joy of life, the while she munched sandwiches and
+pickles. The young men bantered her and each other, and she flashed back
+retorts which gave them alternately deep delight at the discomfiture of
+some other. Toward the close of luncheon, she turned her tilted chin from
+Flatray, as punishment for some audacity of his, and beamed upon the
+railroad magnate.
+
+"It's very good of you to notice me at last," he said, with his dry
+smile.
+
+"I was afraid of you," she confided cheerfully.
+
+"Am I so awesome?"
+
+"It's your reputation, you know. You're quite a dragon. I'm told you
+gobble a new railroad every morning for breakfast."
+
+"'Lissie," her father warned.
+
+"Let her alone," the great man laughed. "Miss Lee is going to give me the
+privilege of hearing the truth about myself."
+
+"But I'm asking. I don't know what the truth is," she protested.
+
+"Well, what you think is the truth."
+
+"It doesn't matter what we think about you. The important thing to know is
+what you think about us."
+
+"Am I to tell you what I think of you--with all these young men here?" he
+countered.
+
+She was excited by her own impudence. The pink had spilled over her creamy
+cheeks. She flashed a look of pretended disdain at her young men.
+Nevertheless, she made laughing protest.
+
+"It's not me, but Mesa, that counts," she answered ungrammatically. "Tell
+me that you're going to help us set orchards blossoming in these deserts,
+and we'll all love you."
+
+"You offer an inducement, Miss Lee. Come--let us walk up to the Point and
+see this wonderful country of yours."
+
+She clapped her hands. "Oh, let's! I'm tired of boys, anyhow. They know
+nothing but nonsense." She made a laughing moue at Flatray, and turned to
+join the railroad builder.
+
+The young sheriff arose and trailed to his pony. "My marching orders, I
+reckon."
+
+They walked up the hill together, the great man and the untutored girl. He
+still carried himself with the lightness of the spare, wiry man who has
+never felt his age. As for her, she moved as one on springs, her slender,
+willowy figure beautiful in motion.
+
+"You're loyal to Mesa. Born and brought up there?" West asked Melissy.
+
+"No. I was brought up on the Bar Double G ranch. Father sold it not long
+since. We're interested in the Monte Cristo mine, and it has done so well
+that we moved to town," she explained.
+
+At the first bend in the mountain road Jack had turned in his saddle to
+look at her as she climbed the steep. A quarter of a mile farther up there
+was another curve, which swept the trail within sight of the summit. Here
+Flatray pulled up and got out his field glasses. Leisurely the man and the
+maid came into sight from the timber on the shoulder of the hill, and
+topped the last ascent. Jack could discern Melissy gesturing here and
+there as she explained the lay of the land.
+
+Something else caught and held his glasses. Four riders had emerged from a
+little gulch of dense aspens which ran up the Point toward the summit. One
+of these had with him a led horse.
+
+"Now, I wonder what that means?" the sheriff mused aloud.
+
+He was not left long in doubt. The four men rode swiftly, straight toward
+the man and the girl above. One of them swung from the saddle and stepped
+forward. He spoke to West, who appeared to make urgent protest. The
+dismounted rider answered. Melissy began to run. Very faintly there came
+to Flatray her startled cry. Simultaneously he caught the flash of the sun
+on bright steel. The leader of the four had drawn a revolver and was
+covering West with it. Instantly the girl stopped running. Plainly the
+life of the railroad president had been threatened unless she stopped.
+
+The man behind the weapon swept a gesture in the direction of the led
+horse. Reluctantly West moved toward it, still protesting. He swung to the
+saddle, and four of the horses broke into a canter. Only the man with the
+drawn revolver remained on the ground with Melissy. He scabbarded his gun,
+took a step or two toward her, and made explanations. The girl stamped her
+foot, and half turned from him.
+
+He laughed, stepped still closer to her, and spoke again. Melissy, with
+tilted chin, seemed to be unaware that he existed. Another step brought
+him to her side. Once more he spoke. No stone wall could have given him
+less recognition. Then Jack let out a sudden fierce imprecation, and gave
+his pony the spur. For the man had bent forward swiftly, had kissed the
+girl on the lips once--twice--three times, had swept his hat off in a low,
+mocking bow, and had flung himself on his horse, and galloped off.
+
+Pebbles and shale went flying from the horse's hoofs as the sheriff tore
+down the trail toward Melissy. He cut off at an angle and dashed through
+cactus and over rain-washed gullies at breakneck speed, pounding up the
+stiff slope to the summit. He dragged his pony to a halt, and leaped off
+at the same instant.
+
+Melissy came to him with flashing eyes. "Why didn't you get here sooner?"
+she panted, as if she had been running; for the blind rage was strong in
+her.
+
+His anger burst out to meet hers. "I wish I had!" he cried, with a furious
+oath.
+
+"He insulted me. He laughed at me, and taunted me--and kissed me!"
+
+Jack nodded. "I saw. If I had only had my rifle with me! Who was he?"
+
+"He wore a mask. But I knew him. It was Dunc Boone."
+
+"With the Roaring Fork gang?"
+
+"I don't know. Is he one of them?"
+
+"I've been thinking so for years."
+
+"They must have known about our picnic. But what do they want with Mr.
+West?"
+
+"He's one of the world's richest men."
+
+"But he doesn't carry his money with him."
+
+"He carries his life."
+
+"They must mean to hold him for a ransom. Is that it?"
+
+"You've guessed it. That's the play." Jack considered, his eyes on the
+far-away hills. When he spoke again it was with sharp decision. "Hit the
+trail back to town with your motor. Don't lose a minute on the way. Send a
+dispatch to Bucky O'Connor. You'd ought to get him at Douglas. If not,
+some of his rangers will know where to reach him. Keep the wires hot till
+you're in touch with him. Better sign my name. I've been writing him about
+this outfit. This job is cut out for Bucky, and we've got to get him on
+it."
+
+"And what are _you_ going to do?"
+
+"I can't do much--I'm not armed. First time I've been caught that way
+since I've been sheriff. Came out to-day for a picnic and left my gun at
+home. But if they're the Roaring Fork outfit, they'll pass through the
+Elkhorn Cañon, heading for Dead Man's Cache. I'm going to cut around Old
+Baldy and try to beat them to it. Maybe I can recognize some of them."
+
+"But if they see you?"
+
+"I ain't aiming to let them see me."
+
+"Still, they may."
+
+His quiet eyes met hers steadily. "Yes, they may."
+
+They were friends again, though he had never fully forgiven her doubt of
+him. It might be on the cards that some day she would be more to him than
+a friend. Understanding perfectly the danger of what he proposed, she yet
+made no protest. The man who would storm her heart must be one who would
+go the limit, for her standards were those of the outdoor West. She, too,
+was "game" to the core; and she had never liked him better than she did at
+this moment. A man must be a man, and take his fighting chance.
+
+"All right, Jack."
+
+Not for years before had she called him by his first name. His heart
+leaped, but he did not let even his look tell what he was feeling.
+
+"I reckon I'll cut right down from here, Melissy. Better not lose any time
+getting to town. So-long!" And with that he had swung to the saddle and
+was off.
+
+Melissy ran swiftly down to the picnic party and cried out her news. It
+fell upon them like a bolt out of a June sky. Some exclaimed and wondered
+and deplored; but she was proud to see that her father took instant
+command, without an unnecessary word.
+
+"They've caught us in swimming, boys! We've got to burn the wind back to
+town for our guns. Dick, you ride around by the Powder Horn and gather up
+the boys on the ranch. Get Swain to swing around to the south and comb the
+lower gulches of the Roaring Fork. Tell him to get in touch with me soon
+as he can. I'll come through by Elkhorn."
+
+Lee helped his daughter into the machine, and took his place beside her.
+
+"Hit the high spots, Jim. I've got an engagement in the hills that won't
+wait, prior to which I've got to get back to town immediate," he told the
+chauffeur cheerfully; for he was beginning to enjoy himself as in the old
+days, when he had been the hard-riding sheriff of a border county which
+took the premium for bad men.
+
+The motor car leaped forward, fell into its pace, and began to hum its
+song of the road as it ate up swiftly the miles that lay between the dam
+and Mesa.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+A CAPTURE
+
+
+Flatray swung around Old Baldy through the sparse timber that edged its
+roots. He knew this country well; for he had run cattle here, and combed
+the draws and ridges on the annual spring and fall round-ups.
+
+There was no trail to follow. Often the lay of the land forced him to a
+detour; for it was rough with washes, with matted cactus, and with a thick
+growth of netted mesquite and underbrush. But true as the needle of a
+compass, he turned back always to the direction he was following. He had
+the instinct for direction, sharpened almost to infallibility by the
+experience his work had given him.
+
+So, hour after hour, he swung forward, pushing his horse over the ground
+in a sort of running walk, common to the plains. Sunset found him climbing
+from the foothills into the mountains beyond. Starlight came upon him in a
+saddle between the peaks, still plodding up by winding paths to the higher
+altitudes that make the ridge of the continent's backbone.
+
+The moon was up long before he struck a gulch spur that led to Elkhorn
+Cañon. Whether he would be in time or not--assuming that he had guessed
+aright as to the destination of the outlaws--he could not tell. It would
+be, at best, a near thing. For, though he had come more directly, they had
+followed a trail which made the going much faster. Fast as the cow pony
+could pick its way along the rock-strewn gulch, he descended, eye and ear
+alert to detect the presence of another human being in this waste of
+boulders, of moonlit, flickering shadows, of dark awesome peaks.
+
+His quick ear caught the faintest of sounds. He slipped from the saddle
+and stole swiftly forward to the point where the gulch joined the main
+cañon. Voices drifted to him--the sound of careless laughter, wafted by
+the light night wind. He had missed the outlaws by scarce a hundred yards.
+There was nothing for it but to follow cautiously. As he was turning to go
+back for his horse the moon emerged from behind a cloud and flooded the
+cañon with a cold, silvery light. It showed Jack a man and a horse
+standing scarce twenty yards from him. The man had his back to him. He had
+dismounted, and was tightening the cinches of his saddle.
+
+Flatray experienced a pang of disappointment. He was unarmed. His second
+thought sent him flying noiselessly back to his horse. Deftly he unloosed
+the rope which always hung coiled below the saddle horn. On tiptoe he ran
+back to the gulch mouth, bearing to the right, so as to come directly
+opposite the man he wanted. As he ran he arranged the lariat to his
+satisfaction, freeing the loop and making sure that the coil was not
+bound. Very cautiously he crept forward, taking advantage for cover of a
+boulder which rose from the bed of the gulch.
+
+The man had finished tightening the girth. His foot rose to the stirrup.
+He swung up from the ground, and his right leg swept across the flank of
+the pony. It did not reach the stirrup; for, even as he rose, Jack's
+lariat snaked forward and dropped over his head to his breast. It
+tightened sharply and dragged him back, pinioning his arms to his side.
+Before he could shake one of them free to reach the revolver in his chaps,
+he was lying on his back, with Flatray astride of him. The cattleman's
+left hand closed tightly upon his windpipe, while the right searched for
+and found the weapon in the holster of the prostrate man.
+
+Not until the steel rim of it pressed against the teeth of the man beneath
+him did Jack's fingers loosen. "Make a sound, and you're a dead man."
+
+The other choked and gurgled. He was not yet able to cry out, even had he
+any intention of so doing. But defiant eyes glared into those of the man
+who had unhorsed and captured him.
+
+"Where are your pals bound for?" Flatray demanded.
+
+He got no answer in words, but sullen eyes flung out an obstinate refusal
+to give away his associates.
+
+"I reckon you're one of the Roaring Fork outfit," Jack suggested.
+
+"You know so darn much I'll leave you to guess the rest," growled the
+prisoner.
+
+"The first thing I'll guess is that, if anything happens to Simon West,
+you'll hang for it, my friend."
+
+"You'll have to prove some things first."
+
+Flatray's hand slid into the man's coat pocket, and drew forth a piece of
+black cloth that had been used as a mask.
+
+"Here's exhibit A, to begin with."
+
+The man on the ground suddenly gave an upward heave, grasped at the
+weapon, and let out a yell for help that echoed back from the cliff, while
+the cattleman let the butt of the revolver crash heavily down upon his
+face. The heavy gun came down three times before the struggling outlaw
+would subside, and then not before blood streamed from ugly gashes into
+his eyes.
+
+"I've had enough, damn you!" the fellow muttered sullenly. "What do you
+want with me?"
+
+"You'll go along with me. Let out another sound, and I'll bump you off.
+Get a move on you."
+
+Jack got to his feet and dragged up his prisoner. The man was a heavy-set,
+bowlegged fellow of about forty, hard-faced, and shifty-eyed--a frontier
+miscreant, unless every line of the tough, leathery countenance told a
+falsehood. But he had made his experiment and failed. He knew what manner
+of man his captor was, and he had no mind for another lesson from him. He
+slouched to his horse, under propulsion of the revolver, and led the
+animal into the gulch.
+
+Both mounted, Jack keeping the captive covered every moment of the time;
+and they began to retrace the way by which the young cattleman had just
+come.
+
+After they had ridden about a quarter of a mile Flatray made a
+readjustment of the rope. He let the loop lie loosely about the neck of
+the outlaw, the other end of it being tied to the horn of his own saddle.
+Also, he tied the hands of the man in such a way that, though they were
+free to handle the bridle rein, he could not raise them from the saddle as
+high as his neck.
+
+"If you make any sudden moves, you'll be committing suicide. If you yell
+out, it will amount to about the same thing. It's up to you to be good,
+looks like."
+
+The man cursed softly. He knew that the least attempt to escape or to
+attract the attention of his confederates would mean his undoing.
+Something about this young man's cold eye and iron jaw told him that he
+would not hesitate to shoot, if necessary.
+
+Voices came to them from the cañon. Flatray guessed that a reconnaissance
+of the gulch would be made, and prepared himself for it by deflecting his
+course from the bed of the _arroyo_ at a point where the walls fell back
+to form a little valley. A little grove of aspens covered densely the
+shoulder of a hillock some fifty yards back, and here he took his stand.
+He dismounted, and made his prisoner do the same.
+
+"Sit down," he ordered crisply.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To keep me from blowing the top of your head off," answered Jack
+quietly.
+
+Without further discussion, the man sat down. His captor stood behind him,
+one hand on the shoulder of his prisoner, his eyes watching the point of
+the gulch at which the enemy would appear.
+
+Two mounted men showed presently in silhouette. Almost opposite the grove
+they drew up.
+
+"Mighty queer what has become of Hank," one of them said. "But I don't
+reckon there's any use looking any farther. You don't figure he's aiming
+to throw us down--do you, Buck?"
+
+"Nope. He'll stick, Hank will. But it sure looks darned strange. Here's
+him a-ridin' along with us, and suddenly he's missin'. We hear a yell, and
+go back to look for him. Nothin' doin'. You don't allow the devil could
+have come for him sudden--do you, Jeff?"
+
+It was said with a laugh, defiantly, but none the less Jack read
+uneasiness in the manner of the man. It seemed to him that both were eager
+to turn back. Giant boulders, carved to grotesque and ghostly shapes by a
+million years' wind and water, reared themselves aloft and threw shadows
+in the moonlight. The wind, caught in the gulch, rose and fell in
+unearthly, sibilant sounds. If ever fiends from below walk the earth, this
+time and place was a fitting one for them. Jack curved a hand around his
+mouth, and emitted a strange, mournful, low cry, which might have been the
+scream of a lost soul.
+
+Jeff clutched at the arm of his companion. "Did you hear that, Buck?"
+
+"What--what do you reckon it was, Jeff?"
+
+Again Jack let his cry curdle the night.
+
+The outlaws took counsel of their terror. They were hardy, desperate men,
+afraid of nothing mortal under the sun. But the dormant superstition in
+them rose to their throats. Fearfully they wheeled and gave their horses
+the spur. Flatray could hear them crashing through the brush.
+
+He listened while the rapid hoofbeats died away, until even the echoes
+fell silent. "We'll be moving," he announced to his prisoner.
+
+For a couple of hours they followed substantially the same way that Jack
+had taken, descending gradually toward the foothills and the plains. The
+stars went out, and the moon slid behind banked clouds, so that the
+darkness grew with the passing hours. At length Flatray had to call a
+halt.
+
+"We'll camp here till morning," he announced when they reached a grassy
+park.
+
+The horses were hobbled, and the men sat down opposite each other in the
+darkness. Presently the prisoner relaxed and fell asleep. But there was no
+sleep for his captor. The cattleman leaned against the trunk of a
+cottonwood and smoked his pipe. The night grew chill, but he dared not
+light a fire. At last the first streaks of gray dawn lightened the sky. A
+quarter of an hour later he shook his captive from slumber.
+
+"Time to hit the trail."
+
+The outlaw murmured sleepily, "How's that, Dunc? Twenty-five thousand
+apiece!"
+
+"Wake up! We've got to vamose out of here."
+
+Slowly the fellow shook the sleep from his brain. He looked at Flatray
+sullenly, without answering. But he climbed into the saddle which Jack had
+cinched for him. Dogged and wolfish as he was, the man knew his master,
+and was cowed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE TABLES TURNED
+
+
+From the local eastbound a man swung to the station platform at Mesa. He
+was a dark, slim, little man, wiry and supple, with restless black eyes
+which pierced one like bullets.
+
+The depot loungers made him a focus of inquiring looks. But, in spite of
+his careless ease, a shrewd observer would have read anxiety in his
+bearing. It was as if behind the veil of his indifference there rested a
+perpetual vigilance. The wariness of a beast of prey lay close to the
+surface.
+
+"Mornin', gentlemen," he drawled, sweeping the group with his eyes.
+
+"Mornin'," responded one of the loafers.
+
+"I presume some of you gentlemen can direct me to the house of Mayor
+Lee."
+
+"The mayor ain't to home," volunteered a lank, unshaven native in
+butternut jeans and boots.
+
+"I think it was his house I inquired for," suggested the stranger.
+
+"Fust house off the square on the yon side of the postoffice--a big
+two-story brick, with a gallery and po'ches all round it."
+
+Having thanked his informant, the stranger passed down the street. The
+curious saw him pass in at the mayor's gate and knock at the door. It
+opened presently, and disclosed a flash of white, which they knew to be
+the skirt of a girl.
+
+"I reckon that's Miss 'Lissie," the others were informed by the unshaven
+one. "She's let him in and shet the door."
+
+Inevitably there followed speculation as to who the arrival might be. That
+his coming had something to do with the affair of the West kidnapping, all
+were disposed to agree; but just what it might have to do with it, none of
+them could do more than guess. If they could have heard what passed
+between Melissy and the stranger, their curiosity would have been
+gratified.
+
+"Good mornin', miss. Is Mayor Lee at home?"
+
+"No--he isn't. He hasn't got back yet. Is there anything I can do for
+you?"
+
+Two rows of even white teeth flashed in a smile. "I thought maybe there
+was something I could do for you. You are Miss Lee, I take it?"
+
+"Yes. But I don't quite understand--unless you have news."
+
+"I have no news--yet."
+
+"You mean----" Her eager glance swept over him. The brown eyes, which had
+been full of questioning, flashed to understanding. "You are not
+Lieutenant O'Connor?"
+
+"Am I not?" he smiled.
+
+"I mean--are you?"
+
+"At your service, Miss Lee."
+
+She had heard for years of this lieutenant of rangers, who was the terror
+of all Arizona "bad men." Her father, Jack Flatray, the range riders whom
+she knew--game men all--hailed Bucky O'Connor as a wonder. For coolness
+under fire, for acumen, for sheer, unflawed nerve, and for his skill in
+that deadly game he played of hunting down desperadoes, they called him
+chief ungrudgingly. He was a daredevil, who had taken his life in his
+hands a hundred times. Yet always he came through smiling, and brought
+back with him the man he went after. The whisper ran that he bore a
+charmed life, so many had been his hairbreadth escapes.
+
+"Come in," the girl invited. "Father said, if you came, I was to keep you
+here until he got back or sent a messenger for you. He's hunting for the
+criminals in the Roaring Fork country. Of course, he didn't know when you
+would get here. At the time he left we hadn't been able to catch you on
+the wire. I signed Mr. Flatray's name at his suggestion, because he was in
+correspondence with you once about the Roaring Fork outlaws. He is out in
+the hills, too. He started half an hour after the kidnappers. But he isn't
+armed. I'm troubled about him."
+
+Again the young man's white-toothed smile flashed. "You'd better be.
+Anybody that goes hunting Black MacQueen unarmed ought to be right well
+insured."
+
+She nodded, a shadow in her eyes. "Yes--but he would go. He doesn't mean
+them to see him, if he can help it."
+
+"Black sees a heap he isn't expected to see. He has got eyes all over the
+hills, and they see by night as well as by day."
+
+"Yes--I know he has spies everywhere; and he has the hill people
+terrorized, they say. You think this is his work?"
+
+"It's a big thing--the kind of job he likes to tackle. Who else would dare
+do such a thing?"
+
+"That's what father thinks. If he had stolen the President of the United
+States, it wouldn't have stirred up a bigger fuss. Newspaper men and
+detectives are hurrying here from all directions. They are sure to catch
+him."
+
+"Are they?"
+
+She noticed a curious, derisive contempt in the man's voice, and laid it
+to his vanity. "I don't mean that _they_ are. I mean that _you_ are sure
+to get him," she hastened to add. "Father thinks you are wonderful."
+
+"I'm much obliged to him," said the man, with almost a sneer.
+
+He seemed to have so good an opinion of himself that he was above praise
+even. Melissy was coming to the decision that she did not like him--which
+was disappointing, since she had expected to like him immensely.
+
+"I didn't look for you till night. You wired you would be on number
+seven," she said. "I understood that was the earliest you could get
+here."
+
+His explanation of the change was brief, and invited no further
+discussion. "I found I could make an earlier train."
+
+"I'm glad you could. Father says it is always well to start on the trail
+while it is fresh."
+
+"Have you ever seen this MacQueen, Miss Lee?" he asked.
+
+"Not unless he was there when Mr. West was kidnapped."
+
+"Did you know any of the men?"
+
+She hesitated. "I thought one was Duncan Boone."
+
+"What made you think so?"
+
+"He was the leader, I think, moved the way he does." Her anger flashed for
+an instant. "And acted like him--detestably."
+
+"Was he violent to West? Injure him?"
+
+"No--he didn't do him any physical injury that I saw. I wasn't thinking
+about Mr. West."
+
+"Surely he didn't lay hands on _you_!"
+
+She looked up, in time to see the flicker of amusement sponged from his
+face. It stirred vague anger in her. "He was insolent and ungentlemanly."
+
+"As how?"
+
+"It doesn't matter how." Her manner specifically declined to
+particularize.
+
+"Would you recognize him again if you met him? Describe him, if you can."
+
+"Yes. I used to know him well--before he became known as an outlaw," she
+added after a perceptible hesitation. "There's something ravenous about
+him."
+
+"You mean that he is fierce and bloodthirsty?"
+
+"No--I don't mean that; though, for that matter, I don't think he would
+stick at anything. What I mean is that he is pantherine in his
+movements--more lithe and supple than most men are."
+
+"Is he a big man?"
+
+"No--medium size, and dark."
+
+"There were four of them, you say?"
+
+"Yes. Jack saw them, too, but at a distance."
+
+"He reached you after they were out of sight?"
+
+"They had been gone about five minutes when I saw him--five or ten. I
+couldn't be sure."
+
+"Boone offered no personal indignity to you?"
+
+"Why are you so sure?" she flashed.
+
+"The story is that he is quite the ladies' man."
+
+Melissy laughed scornfully.
+
+At his request, she went over again the story of the abduction, telling
+everything save the matter of the ravished kisses. This she kept to
+herself. She did not quite know why, except that there was something she
+did not like about this Bucky O'Connor. He had a trick of narrowing his
+eyes and gloating over her, as a cat gloats over its expected kill.
+
+However, his confidence impressed her. Cocksure he was, and before long
+she knew him boastful; but competence sat on him, none the less. She
+thought she could see why he was held to be the most deadly bloodhound on
+a trail that even Arizona could produce. That he was fearless she did not
+need to be told, any more than she needed a certificate that on occasion
+he could be merciless. On the other hand, he fitted very badly with the
+character of the young lieutenant of rangers, as Jack Flatray had sketched
+it for her. Her friend's description of his hero had been enthusiastic.
+She decided that the young cattleman was a bad judge of men--though, of
+course, he had never actually met O'Connor.
+
+"I reckon I'll not wait for your father's report, Miss Lee. I work
+independent of other men. That is how I get the wonderful results I do."
+
+His conceit nettled her; also, it stung her filial loyalty. "My father was
+the best sheriff this county ever had," she said stiffly.
+
+He smiled satirically. "Still, I reckon I'll handle this my own
+way--unless your father's daughter wants to go partners with me in it."
+
+She gave him a look intended to crush his impudence. "No, thank you."
+
+He ate a breakfast which she had the cook prepare hurriedly for him, and
+departed on the horse for which she had telephoned to the nearest livery
+stable. Melissy was a singularly fearless girl; yet she watched him go
+with a decided relief, for which she could not account. He rode, she
+observed, like a centaur--flat-backed, firm in the saddle with the easy
+negligence of a plainsman. He turned as he started, and waved a hand
+debonairly at her.
+
+"If I have any luck, I'll bring back one of the Roaring Fork bunch with
+me--a present for a good girl, Miss Melissy."
+
+She turned on her heel and went inside. Anger pulsed fiercely through her.
+He laughed at her, made fun of her, and yet called her by her first name.
+How dared he treat her so! Worst of all, she read admiration bold and
+unveiled in the eyes that mocked her.
+
+Half an hour later Flatray, riding toward town with his prisoner in front
+of him, heard a sudden sharp summons to throw up his hands. A man had
+risen from behind a boulder, and held him covered steadily.
+
+Jack looked at the fellow without complying. He needed no second glance to
+tell him that this man was not one to be trifled with. "Who are you?" he
+demanded quietly.
+
+"Never mind who I am. Reach for the sky."
+
+The captured outlaw had given a little whoop, and was now loosening the
+rope from his neck. "You're the goods, Cap! I knew the boys would pull it
+off for me, but I didn't reckon on it so durn soon."
+
+"Shut up!" ordered the man behind the gun, without moving his eyes from
+Flatray.
+
+"I'm a clam," retorted the other.
+
+"I'm waiting for those hands to go up; but I'll not wait long, seh."
+
+Jack's hands went up reluctantly. "You've got the call," he admitted.
+
+They led him a couple of hundred yards from the trail and tied him hand
+and foot. Before they left him the outlaw whom he had captured evened his
+score. Three times he struck Flatray on the head with the butt of his
+revolver. He was lying on the ground bleeding and senseless when they rode
+away toward the hills.
+
+Jack came to himself with a blinding headache. It was some time before he
+realized what had happened. As soon as he did he set about freeing
+himself. This was a matter of a few minutes. With the handkerchief that
+was around his neck he tied up his wounds. Fortunately his hair was very
+thick and this had saved him from a fractured skull. Dizzily he got to his
+feet, found his horse, and started toward Mesa.
+
+Not many people were on the streets when the sheriff passed through the
+suburbs of the little town, for it was about the breakfast hour. One stout
+old negro mammy stopped to stare in surprise at his bloody head.
+
+"Laws a mussy, Mistah Flatray, what they done be'n a-doin' to you-all?"
+she asked.
+
+The sheriff hardly saw her. He was chewing the bitter cud of defeat and
+was absorbed in his thoughts. He was still young enough to have counted on
+the effect upon Melissy of his return to town with one of the abductors as
+his prisoner.
+
+It happened that she was on the porch watering her flower boxes when he
+passed the house.
+
+"Jack!" she cried, and on the heels of her exclamation: "What's the matter
+with you? Been hurt?"
+
+A gray pallor had pushed through the tan of her cheeks. She knew her heart
+was beating fast.
+
+"Bumped into a piece of bad luck," he grinned, and told her briefly what
+had occurred.
+
+She took him into the house and washed his head for him. After she saw how
+serious the cuts were she insisted on sending for a doctor. When his
+wounds were dressed she fed him and made him lie down and sleep on her
+father's bed.
+
+The sun was sliding down the heavens to a crotch in the hills before he
+joined her again. She was in front of the house clipping her roses.
+
+"Is the invalid better?" she asked him.
+
+"He's a false alarm. But he did have a mighty thumping headache that has
+gone now."
+
+"I've been wondering why you didn't meet Lieutenant O'Connor. He must have
+taken the road you came in on."
+
+The young man's eyes lit. "Is Bucky here already?"
+
+"He was. He's gone. I was greatly disappointed in him. He's not half the
+man you think he is."
+
+"Oh, but he is. Everybody says so."
+
+"I never saw a more conceited man, or a more hateful one. There's
+something about him--oh, I don't know. But he isn't good. I'm sure of
+that."
+
+"His reputation isn't of that kind. They say he's devoted to his wife and
+kids."
+
+"His wife and children." Melissy recalled the smoldering admiration in his
+bold eyes. She laughed shortly. "That finishes him with me. He's married,
+is he? Well, I know the kind of husband he is."
+
+Jack flashed a quick look at her. He guessed what she meant. But this did
+not square at all with what his friends had told him of O'Connor.
+
+"Did he ask for me?"
+
+"No. He said he preferred to play a lone hand. His manner was unpleasant
+all the time. He knows it all. I could see that."
+
+"Anyhow, he's a crackerjack in his line. Have you heard from your father
+since he set out?"
+
+"Not yet."
+
+"Well, I'm going to start to-night with a posse for the Cache. If O'Connor
+comes back, tell him I'll follow the Roaring Fork."
+
+"You'll not go this time without a gun, Jack," she said with a ghost of a
+smile.
+
+"No. I want to make good this trip."
+
+"You did splendidly before. Not one man in a hundred would have done so
+well."
+
+"I'm a wonder," he admitted with a grin.
+
+"But you will take care of yourself--not be foolish."
+
+"I don't aim to take up residence in Boot Hill cemetery if I can help
+it."
+
+"Boone and his men are dangerous characters. They are playing for high
+stakes. They would snuff your life out as quick as they would wink. Don't
+forget that."
+
+"You don't want me to lie down before Dunc Boone, do you?"
+
+"No-o. Only don't be reckless. I told father the same."
+
+Her dear concern for him went to Jack's head, but he steadied himself
+before he answered. "I've got one real good reason for not being reckless.
+I'll tell you what it is some day."
+
+Her shy, alarmed eyes fled his at once. She began an account of how her
+father had gathered his posse and where she thought he must have gone.
+
+After dinner Jack went downtown. Melissy did some household tasks and
+presently moved out to the cool porch. She was just thinking about going
+back in when a barefoot boy ran past and whistled. From the next house a
+second youngster emerged.
+
+"That you, Jimmie?"
+
+"Betcherlife. Say, 've you heard about the sheriff?"
+
+"Who? Jack Flatray! Course I have. The Roaring Fork outfit ambushed him,
+beat him up, and made him hit the trail for town."
+
+"Aw! That ain't news. He's started back after them again. Left jes' a
+little while ago. I saw him go--him 'n' Farnum 'n' Charley Hymer 'n' Hal
+Yarnell 'n' Mr. Bellamy."
+
+"Bet they git 'em."
+
+"Bet they don't."
+
+"Aw, course they'll git 'em, Tom."
+
+The other youngster assumed an air of mystery. He swelled his chest and
+strutted a step or two nearer. Urbane condescension oozed from him.
+
+"Say, Jimmie. C'n you keep a secret?"
+
+"Sure. Course I can."
+
+"Won't ever snitch?"
+
+"Cross my heart."
+
+"Well, then--I'm Black MacQueen, the captain of the Roaring Fork bad
+men."
+
+"You!" Incredulity stared from Jimmie's bulging eyes.
+
+"You betcher. I'm him, here in disguise as a kid."
+
+The magnificent boldness of this claim stole Jimmie's breath for an
+instant. He was two years younger than his friend, but he did not quite
+know whether to applaud or to jeer. Before he could make up his mind a
+light laugh rippled to them from behind the vines on the Lee porch.
+
+The disguised outlaw and his friend were startled. Both fled swiftly, with
+all the pretense of desperate necessity young conspirators love to
+assume.
+
+Melissy went into the house and the laughter died from her lips. She knew
+that either her father's posse or that of Jack Flatray would come into
+touch with the outlaws eventually. When the clash came there would be a
+desperate battle. Men would be killed. She prayed it might not be one of
+those for whom she cared most.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE REAL BUCKY AND THE FALSE
+
+
+Number seven was churning its way furiously through brown Arizona. The day
+had been hot, with a palpitating heat which shimmered over the desert
+waste. Defiantly the sun had gone down beyond the horizon, a great ball of
+fire, leaving behind a brilliant splash of bold colors. Now this, too, had
+disappeared. Velvet night had transformed the land. Over the distant
+mountains had settled a smoke-blue film, which left them vague and
+indefinite.
+
+Only three passengers rode in the Pullman car. One was a commercial
+traveler, busy making up his weekly statement to the firm. Another was a
+Boston lady, in gold-rimmed glasses and a costume that helped the general
+effect of frigidity. The third looked out of the open window at the
+distant hills. He was a slender young fellow, tanned almost to a coffee
+brown, with eyes of Irish blue which sometimes bubbled with fun and
+sometimes were hard as chisel steel. Wide-shouldered and lean-flanked he
+was, with well-packed muscles, which rippled like those of a tiger.
+
+At Chiquita the train stopped, but took up again almost instantly its
+chant of the rail. Meanwhile, a man had swung himself to the platform of
+the smoker. He passed through that car, the two day coaches, and on to the
+sleeper; his keen, restless eyes inspected every passenger in the course
+of his transit. Opposite the young man in the Pullman he stopped.
+
+"May I ask if you are Lieutenant O'Connor?"
+
+"My name, seh."
+
+The young man in the seat had slewed his head around sharply, and made
+answer with a crisp, businesslike directness.
+
+The new-comer smiled. "I'll have to introduce myself, lieutenant. My name
+is Flatray. I've come to meet you."
+
+"Glad to meet you, Mr. Flatray. I hope that together we can work this
+thing out right. MacQueen has gathered a bunch that ought to be cleaned
+out, and I reckon now's the time to do it. I've been reading about him for
+a year. I've got a notion he's about the ablest thing in bad men this
+Territory has seen for a good many years."
+
+Flatray sat down on the seat opposite O'Connor. A smile flicked across his
+face, and vanished. "I'm of that opinion myself, lieutenant."
+
+"Tell me all about this affair of the West kidnapping," the ranger
+suggested.
+
+The other man told the story while O'Connor listened, alert to catch every
+point of the narrative.
+
+The face of the lieutenant of rangers was a boyish one--eager, genial, and
+frank; yet, none the less, strength lay in the close-gripped jaw and in
+the steady, watchful eye. His lithe, tense body was like a coiled spring;
+and that, too, though he seemed to be very much at ease.
+
+With every sentence that the other spoke, O'Connor was judging Flatray,
+appraising him for a fine specimen of a hard-bitten breed--a vigilant
+frontiersman, competent to the finger tips. Yet he was conscious that, in
+spite of the man's graceful ease and friendly smile, he did not like
+Flatray. He would not ask for a better man beside him in a tight pinch;
+but he could not deny that something sinister which breathed from his
+sardonic, devil-may-care face.
+
+"So that's how the land lies," the sheriff concluded. "My deputies have
+got the pass to the south blocked; Lee is closing in through Elkhorn; and
+Fox, with a strong posse, is combing the hills beyond Dead Man's Cache.
+There's only one way out for him, and that is over Powderhorn Pass. Word
+has just reached us that MacQueen is moving in that direction. He is
+evidently figuring to slip out over the hills during the night. I've
+arranged for us to be met at Barker's Tank by a couple of the boys, with
+horses. We'll drop off the train quietly when it slows up to water, so
+that none of his spies can get word of our movements to him. By hard
+riding we'd ought to reach Powderhorn in time to head him off."
+
+The ranger asked incisive questions, had the topography of the country
+explained to him with much detail, and decided at last that Flatray was
+right. If MacQueen were trying to slip out, they might trap him at the
+pass; if not, by closing it they would put the cork in the bottle that
+held him.
+
+"We'll try it, seh. Y'u know this country better than I do, and I'll give
+y'u a free hand. Unless there's a slip up in your calculations, you'd
+ought to be right."
+
+"Good enough, lieutenant. I'm betting on those plans myself," the other
+answered promptly, and added, as he looked out into the night: "By that
+notch in the hills, we'd ought to be close to the tank now. She's slowing
+up. I reckon we can slip out to the vestibule, and get off at the far side
+of the track without being noticed much."
+
+This they found easy enough. Five minutes later number seven was steaming
+away into the distant desert. Flatray gave a sharp, shrill whistle; and
+from behind some sand dunes emerged two men and four horses.
+
+"Anything new?" asked the sheriff as they came nearer.
+
+"Not a thing, cap," answered one of them.
+
+"Boys, shake hands with the famous Lieutenant O'Connor," said Flatray,
+with a sneer hid by the darkness. "Lieutenant, let me make you acquainted
+with Jeff Jackson and Buck Lane."
+
+"Much obliged to meet you," grinned Buck as he shook hands.
+
+They mounted and rode toward the notch in the hills that had been pointed
+out to the ranger. The moon was up; and a cold, silvery light flooded the
+plain. Seen in this setting, the great, painted desert held more of
+mystery, of beauty, and less of the dead monotony that glared endlessly
+from arid, barren reaches. The sky of stars stretched infinitely far, and
+added to the effect of magnitude.
+
+The miles slipped behind them as they moved forward, hour after hour,
+their horses holding to the running walk that is the peculiar gait of the
+cow country. They rode in silence, with the loose seat and straight back
+of the vaquero. Except the ranger, all were dressed for riding--Flatray in
+corduroys and half-knee laced boots; his men in overalls, chaps, flannel
+shirts, and the broad-brimmed sombrero of the Southwest. All four were
+young men; but there was an odd difference in the expressions of their
+faces.
+
+Jackson and Lane had the hard-lined faces, with something grim and stony
+in them, of men who ride far and hard with their lives in their hands. The
+others were of a higher type. Flatray's dark eyes were keen, bold, and
+restless. One might have guessed him a man of temperament, capable of any
+extremes of conduct--often the victim of his own ungovernable whims and
+passions. Just as he looked a picture of all the passions of youth run to
+seed, so the ranger seemed to show them in flower. There was something
+fine and strong and gallant in his debonair manner. His warm smile went
+out to a world that pleased him mightily.
+
+They rode steadily, untired and untiring. The light of dawn began to
+flicker from one notched summit to another. Out of the sandy waste they
+came to a water hole, paused for a drink, and passed on. For the delay of
+half an hour might mean the escape of their prey.
+
+They came into the country of crumbling mesas and painted cliffs, of
+hillsides where greasewood and giant cactus struggled from the parched
+earth. This they traversed until they came to plateaus, terminating in
+foothills, crevassed by gorges deep and narrow. The cañons grew steeper,
+rock ridges more frequent. Gradually the going became more difficult.
+
+Trails they seldom followed. Washes, with sides like walls, confronted
+them. The ponies dropped down and clambered up again like mountain goats.
+Gradually they were ascending into the upper country, which led to the
+wild stretches where the outlaws lurked. In these watersheds were heavy
+pine forests, rising from the gulches along the shoulders of the peaks.
+
+A maze of cañons, hopelessly lost in the hill tangle into which they had
+plunged, led deviously to a twisting pass, through which they defiled, to
+drop into a vista of rolling waves of forest-clad hills. Among these wound
+countless hidden gulches, known only to those who rode from out them on
+nefarious night errands.
+
+The ranger noted every landmark, and catalogued in his mind's map every
+gorge and peak; from what he saw, he guessed much of which he could not be
+sure. It would be hard to say when his suspicions first became aroused.
+But as they rode, without stopping, through what he knew must be
+Powderhorn Pass, as the men about him quietly grouped themselves so as to
+cut off any escape he might attempt, as they dropped farther and farther
+into the meshes of that forest-crowned net which he knew to be the Roaring
+Fork country, he did not need to be told he was in the power of MacQueen's
+gang.
+
+Yet he gave no sign of what he knew. As daylight came, so that they could
+see each other distinctly, his face showed no shadow of doubt. It was his
+cue to be a simple victim of credulity, and he played it to the finish.
+
+Without warning, through a narrow gulch which might have been sought in
+vain for ten years by a stranger, they passed into the rim of a
+bowl-shaped valley. Timber covered it from edge to edge, but over to the
+left a keen eye could see a thinning of the foliage. Toward this they
+went, following the sidehill and gradually dipping down through heavy
+underbrush. Before him the officer of rangers saw daylight, and presently
+a corral, low roofs, and grazing horses.
+
+"Looks like some one lives here," he remarked amiably.
+
+They were already riding into the open. In front of one of the log cabins
+the man who had called himself Flatray swung from his saddle.
+
+"Better 'light, lieutenant," he suggested carelessly. "We'll eat breakfast
+here."
+
+"Don't care if we do. I could eat a leather mail sack, I'm that hungry,"
+the ranger answered, as he, too, descended.
+
+His guide was looking at him with an expression of open, malevolent
+triumph. He could scarce keep it back long enough to get the effect he
+wanted.
+
+"Yes, we'll eat breakfast here--and dinner, and supper, and breakfast
+to-morrow, and then about two more breakfasts."
+
+"I reckon we'll be too busy to sit around here," laughed his prisoner.
+
+The other ignored his comment. "And after that, it ain't likely you'll do
+much more eating."
+
+"I don't quite get the point of that joke."
+
+"You'll get it soon enough! You'd _savez_ it now, if you weren't a
+muttonhead. As it is, I'll have to explain it. Do you remember capturing
+Tony Chaves two years ago, lieutenant?"
+
+The ranger nodded, with surprise in his round, innocent eyes.
+
+"What happened to him?" demanded the other. A child could have seen that
+he was ridden by a leering, savage triumph.
+
+"Killed trying to escape four days later."
+
+"Who killed him?"
+
+"I did. It was necessary. I regretted it."
+
+A sudden spasm of cruelty swept over the face of the man confronting him.
+"Tony was my partner."
+
+"Your partner?"
+
+"That's right. I've been wanting to say 'How d'ye do?' ever since,
+Lieutenant O'Connor. I'm right glad to meet you."
+
+"But--I don't understand." He did, however.
+
+"It'll soak through, by and by. Chew on this: You've got just ninety-six
+hours to live--exactly as long as Tony lived after you caught him! You'll
+be killed trying to escape. It will be necessary, just as you say it was
+with him; but I reckon I'll not do any regretting to speak of."
+
+"You would murder me?"
+
+"Well, I ain't particular about the word I use." MacQueen leaned against
+the side of his horse, his arm thrown across its neck, and laughed in slow
+maliciousness. "Execute is the word I use, though--if you want to know."
+
+He had made no motion toward his weapon, nor had O'Connor; but the latter
+knew without looking that he was covered vigilantly by both of the other
+men.
+
+"And who are you?" the ranger asked, though he was quite sure of the
+answer.
+
+"Men call me Black MacQueen," drawled the other.
+
+"MacQueen! But you said----"
+
+"That I was Flatray. Yep--I lied."
+
+O'Connor appeared to grope with this in amazement.
+
+"One has to stretch the truth sometimes in my profession," went on the
+outlaw smoothly. "It may interest you to know that yesterday I passed as
+Lieutenant O'Connor. When I was O'Connor I arrested Flatray; and now that
+I am Flatray I have arrested O'Connor. Turn about is fair play, you
+know."
+
+"Interesting, if true," O'Connor retorted easily.
+
+"You can bank on its truth, my friend."
+
+"And you're actually going to kill me in cold blood."
+
+The black eyes narrowed. "Just as I would a dog," said the outlaw, with
+savage emphasis.
+
+"I don't believe it. I've done you no harm."
+
+MacQueen glanced at him contemptuously. The famous Bucky O'Connor looked
+about as competent as a boy in the pimply age.
+
+"I thought you had better sense. Do you think I would have brought you to
+Dead Man's Cache if I had intended you to go away alive? I'm afraid,
+Lieutenant Bucky O'Connor, that you're a much overrated man. Your
+reputation sure would have blown up, if you had lived. You ought to thank
+me for preserving it."
+
+"Preserving it--how?"
+
+"By bumping you off before you've lost it."
+
+"Sho! You wouldn't do that," the ranger murmured ineffectively.
+
+"We'll see. Jeff, I put him in your charge. Search him, and take him to
+Hank's cabin. I hold you responsible for him. Bring me any papers you find
+on him. When I find time, I'll drop around and see that you're keeping him
+safe."
+
+Bucky was searched, and his weapons and papers removed. After being
+handcuffed, he was chained to a heavy staple, which had been driven into
+one of the log walls. He was left alone, and the door was locked; but he
+could hear Jeff moving about outside.
+
+With the closing of the door the vacuous look slipped from his face like a
+mask. The loose-lipped, lost-dog expression was gone. He looked once more
+alert, competent, fit for the emergency. It had been his cue to let his
+adversary underestimate him. During the long night ride he had had chances
+to escape, had he desired to do so. But this had been the last thing he
+wanted.
+
+The outlaws had chosen to take him to their fastness in the hills. He
+would back himself to use the knowledge they were thrusting upon him, to
+bring about their undoing. Only one factor in the case had come upon him
+as a surprise. He had not reckoned that they would have a personal grudge
+against him. And this was a factor that might upset all his calculations.
+
+It meant that he was playing against time, with the chances of the game
+all against him. He had forty-eight hours in which to escape--and he was
+handcuffed, chained, locked up, and guarded. Truly, the outlook was not
+radiant.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+A PHOTOGRAPH
+
+
+On the third morning Beauchamp Lee returned to Mesa--unshaven, dusty, and
+fagged with hard riding. He brought with him a handbill which he had
+picked up in the street. Melissy hung over him and ministered to his
+needs. While he was eating breakfast he talked.
+
+"No luck yet, honey. He's hiding in some pocket of the hills, I reckon;
+and likely there he'll stay till the hunt is past. They don't make them
+any slicker than Dunc, dad gum his ugly hide!"
+
+"What is that paper?" his daughter asked.
+
+Lee curbed a disposition toward bad language, as he viewed it with
+disgust. "This here is bulletin number one, girl. It's the cheekiest, most
+impudent thing I ever saw. MacQueen serves notice to all the people of
+this county to keep out of this fight. Also, he mentions me and Jack
+Flatray by name--warning us that, if we sit in the game, hell will be
+popping for us."
+
+"What will you do?"
+
+"Do? I'll get back to my boys fast as horseflesh will get me there, once
+I've had a talk with that beef buyer from Kansas City I made an
+appointment to see before this thing broke loose. You don't allow I'm
+going to let any rustler dictate to me what I'll do and what I won't--do
+you?"
+
+"Where do you reckon he had this printed?" she asked.
+
+"I don't reckon, I know. Late last night a masked man woke up Jim Snell.
+You know, he sleeps in a room at the back of the printing office. Well,
+this fellow made him dress, set up this bill, and run off five hundred
+copies while he stood over him. I'll swan I never heard of such cheek!"
+
+Melissy told what she had to tell--after which her father shaved, took a
+bath, and went out to meet the buyer from Kansas City. His business kept
+him until noon. After dinner Melissy's saddle horse was brought around,
+and she joined her father to ride back with him for a few miles.
+
+About three o'clock she kissed him good-bye, and turned homeward. After
+she had passed the point where the Silver Creek trail ran into the road
+she heard the sound of a galloping horse behind. A rider was coming along
+the trail toward town. He gained on her rapidly, and presently a voice
+hailed her gayly:
+
+"The top o' the mornin' to you, Miss 'Lissie."
+
+She drew up to wait for him. "My name is still Miss Lee," she told him
+mildly, by way of correction.
+
+"I'm glad it is, but we can change it in three minutes at any time, my
+dear," he laughed.
+
+She had been prepared to be more friendly toward him, but at this she
+froze again.
+
+"Did you leave Mrs. O'Connor and the children well?" she asked pointedly,
+looking directly at him.
+
+His smile vanished, and he stared at her in a very strange fashion. She
+had taken the wind completely out of his sails. It had not occurred to him
+that O'Connor might be a married man. Nor did he know but that it might be
+a trick to catch him. He did the only thing he could do--made answer in an
+ironic fashion, which might mean anything or nothing.
+
+"Very well, thank you."
+
+She saw at once that the topic did not allure him, and pushed home her
+advantage. "You must miss Mrs. O'Connor when you are away on duty."
+
+"Must I?"
+
+"And the children, too. By the way, what are their names?"
+
+"You're getting up a right smart interest in my family, all of a sudden,"
+he countered.
+
+"One can't talk about the weather all the time."
+
+He boldly decided to slay the illusion of domesticity. "If you want to
+know, I have neither wife nor children."
+
+"But I've heard about them all," she retorted.
+
+"You have heard of Mrs. O'Connor, no doubt; but she happens to be the
+wife of a cousin of mine."
+
+The look which she flashed at him held more than doubt.
+
+"You don't believe me?" he continued. "I give you my word that I'm not
+married."
+
+They had left the road, and were following a short cut which wound down
+toward Tonti, in and out among the great boulders. The town, dwarfed to
+microscopic size by distance, looked, in the glare of the sunlight, as if
+it were made of white chalk. Along the narrow trail they went singly,
+Melissy leading the way.
+
+She made no answer, but at the first opportunity he forced his horse to a
+level with hers.
+
+"Well--you heard what I said," he challenged.
+
+"The subject is of no importance to me," she said.
+
+"It's important to me. I'm not going to have you doing me an injustice. I
+tell you I'm not married. You've got to believe me."
+
+Her mind was again alive with suspicions. Jack had told her Bucky O'Connor
+was married, and he must have known what he was talking about.
+
+"I don't know whether you are married or not. I am of the opinion that
+Lieutenant O'Connor has a wife and three children. More than once I have
+been told so," she answered.
+
+"You seem to know a heap about the gentleman."
+
+"I know what I know."
+
+"More than I do, perhaps," he suggested.
+
+Her eyes dilated. He could see suspicion take hold of her.
+
+"Perhaps," she answered quietly.
+
+"Does that mean you think I'm not Bucky O'Connor?" He had pushed his pony
+forward so as to cut off her advance, and both had halted for the moment.
+
+She looked at him with level, fearless eyes. "I don't know who you are."
+
+"But you think I'm not Lieutenant O'Connor of the rangers?"
+
+"I don't know whether you are or not."
+
+"There is nothing like making sure. Just look over this letter, please."
+
+She did so. It was from the governor of the Territory to the ranger
+officer. While he was very complimentary as to past services, the governor
+made it plain that he thought O'Connor must at all hazards succeed in
+securing the release of Simon West. This would be necessary for the good
+name of the Territory. Otherwise, a widespread report would go out that
+Arizona was a lawless place in which to live.
+
+Melissy folded the letter and handed it back. "I beg your pardon,
+Lieutenant O'Connor. I see that I was wrong."
+
+"Forget it, my dear. We all make mistakes." He had that curious mocking
+smile which so often hovered about his lips. She felt as though he were
+deriding her--as though his words held some hidden irony which she could
+not understand.
+
+"The governor seems very anxious to have you succeed. It will be a black
+eye for Arizona if this band of outlaws is not apprehended. You don't
+think, do you, that they will do Mr. West any harm, if their price is not
+paid? They would never dare."
+
+He took this up almost as though he resented it. "They would dare
+anything. I reckon you'll have to get up early in the mornin' to find a
+gamer man than Black MacQueen."
+
+"I wouldn't call it game to hurt an old man whom he has in his power. But
+you mustn't let it come to that. You must save him. Are you making any
+progress? Have you run down any of the band? And while I think of it--have
+you seen to-day's paper?"
+
+"No--why?"
+
+"The biggest story on the front page is about the West case. It seems that
+this MacQueen wired to Chicago to Mr. Lucas, president of one of the lines
+on the Southwestern system, that they would release Mr. West for three
+hundred thousand dollars in gold. He told him a letter had been mailed to
+the agent at Mesa, telling under just what conditions the money was to be
+turned over; and he ended with a threat that, if steps were taken to
+capture the gang, or if the money were not handed over at the specified
+time, Mr. West would disappear forever."
+
+"Did the paper say whether the money would be turned over?"
+
+"It said that Mr. Lucas was going to get into touch with the outlaws at
+once, to effect the release of his chief."
+
+A gleam of triumph flashed in the eyes of the man. "That's sure the best
+way."
+
+"It won't help your reputation, will it?" she asked. "Won't people say
+that you failed on this case?"
+
+He laughed softly, as if at some hidden source of mirth. "I shouldn't
+wonder if they did say that Bucky O'Connor hadn't made good this time.
+They'll figure he tried to ride herd on a job too big for him."
+
+Her surprised eye brooded over this, too. Here he was defending the outlaw
+chief, and rejoicing at his own downfall. There seemed to be no end to the
+contradictions in this man. She was to run across another tangled thread
+of the puzzle a few minutes later.
+
+She had dismounted to let him tighten the saddle cinch. Owing to the heat,
+he had been carrying his coat in front of him. He tossed it on a boulder
+by the side of the trail, in such a way that the inside pocket hung down.
+From it slid some papers and a photograph. Melissy looked down at the
+picture, then instantly stooped and picked it up. For it was a photograph
+of a very charming woman and three children, and across the bottom of it
+was written a line.
+
+             "To Bucky, from his loving wife and children."
+
+The girl handed it to the man without a word, and looked him full in the
+face.
+
+"Bowled out, by ginger!" he said, with a light laugh.
+
+But as she continued to look at him--a man of promise, who had plainly
+traveled far on the road to ruin--the conviction grew on her that the
+sweet-faced woman in the photograph was no loving wife of his. He was a
+man who might easily take a woman's fancy, but not one to hold her love
+for years through the stress of life. Moreover, Bucky O'Connor held the
+respect of all men. She had heard him spoken of, and always with a meed of
+affection that is given to few men. Whoever this graceless scamp was, he
+was not the lieutenant of rangers.
+
+The words slipped out before she could stop them: "You're not Lieutenant
+O'Connor at all."
+
+"Playing on that string again, are you?" he jeered.
+
+"I'm sure of it this time."
+
+"Since you know who I'm not, perhaps you can tell me, too, who I am."
+
+In that instant before she spoke, while her steady eyes rested on him, she
+put together many things which had puzzled her. All of them pointed to
+one conclusion. Even now her courage did not fail her. She put it into
+words quietly:
+
+"You are that villain Black MacQueen."
+
+He stared at her in surprise. "By God, girl--you're right. I'm MacQueen,
+though I don't know how you guessed it."
+
+"I don't know how I kept from guessing it so long. I can see it, now, as
+plain as day, in all that you have done."
+
+After that they measured strength silently with their eyes. If the
+situation had clarified itself, with the added knowledge of the girl had
+come new problems. Let her return to Mesa, and he could no longer pose as
+O'Connor; and it was just the audacity of this double play that delighted
+him. He was the most reckless man on earth; he loved to take chances. He
+wanted to fool the officers to his heart's content, and then jeer at them
+afterward. Hitherto everything had come his way.
+
+But if this girl should go home, he could not show his face at Mesa; and
+the spice of the thing would be gone. He was greatly taken with her
+beauty, her daring, and the charm of high spirits which radiated from her.
+Again and again he had found himself drawn back to her. He was not in love
+with her in any legitimate sense; but he knew now that, if he could see
+her no more, life would be a savorless thing, at least until his fancy had
+spent itself. Moreover, her presence at Dead Man's Cache would be a
+safeguard. With her in his power, Lee and Flatray, the most persistent of
+his hunters, would not dare to move against the outlaws.
+
+Inclination and interest worked together. He decided to take her back with
+him to the country of hidden pockets and gulches. There, in time, he would
+win her love--so his vanity insisted. After that they would slip away from
+the scene of his crimes, and go back to the world from which he had years
+since vanished.
+
+The dream grew on him. It got hold of his imagination. For a moment he saw
+himself as the man he had been meant for--the man he might have been, if
+he had been able to subdue his evil nature. He saw himself respected, a
+power in the community, going down to a serene old age, with this woman
+and their children by his side. Then he laughed derisively, and brushed
+aside the vision.
+
+"Why didn't the real Lieutenant O'Connor arrive to expose you?" she
+asked.
+
+"The real Bucky is handcuffed and guarded at Dead Man's Cache. I don't
+think he's enjoying himself to-day."
+
+"You're getting quite a collection of prisoners. You'll be starting a
+penitentiary on your own account soon," she told him sharply.
+
+"That's right. And I'm taking another one back with me to-night."
+
+"Who is he?"
+
+"It's a lady this time--Miss Melissy Lee."
+
+His words shook her. An icy hand seemed to clamp upon her heart. The blood
+ebbed even from her lips, but her brave eyes never faltered from his.
+
+"So you war on women, too!"
+
+He gave her his most ironic bow. "I don't war on you, my dear. You shall
+have half of my kingdom, if you ask it--and all my heart."
+
+"I can't use either," she told him quietly. "But I'm only a girl. If you
+have a spark of manliness in you, surely you won't take me a prisoner
+among those wild, bad men of yours."
+
+"Those wild, bad men of mine are lambs when I give the word. They wouldn't
+lift a hand against you. And there is a woman there--the mother of one of
+my boys, who was shot. We'll have you chaperoned for fair."
+
+"And if I say I won't go?"
+
+"You'll go if I strap you to your saddle."
+
+It was characteristic of Melissy that she made no further resistance. The
+sudden, wolfish gleam in his eyes had told her that he meant what he said.
+It was like her, too, that she made no outcry; that she did not shed tears
+or plead with him. A gallant spirit inhabited that slim, girlish body; and
+she yielded to the inevitable with quiet dignity. This surprised him
+greatly, and stung his reluctant admiration. At the same time, it set her
+apart from him and hedged her with spiritual barriers. Her body might
+ride with him into captivity; she was still captain of her soul.
+
+"You're a game one," he told her, as he helped her to the saddle.
+
+She did not answer, but looked straightforward between her horse's ears,
+without seeing him, waiting for him to give the word to start.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+IN DEAD MAN'S CACHE
+
+
+Not since the start of their journey had Melissy broken silence, save to
+answer, in few words as possible, the questions put to her by the outlaw.
+Yet her silence had not been sullenness. It had been the barrier which she
+had set up between them--one which he could not break down short of actual
+roughness.
+
+Of this she could not accuse him. Indeed, he had been thoughtful of her
+comfort. At sunset they had stopped by a spring, and he had shared with
+her such food as he had. Moreover, he had insisted that she should rest
+for a while before they took up the last stretch of the way.
+
+It was midnight now, and they had been traveling for many hours over rough
+mountain trails. There was more strength than one would look for in so
+slender a figure, yet Melissy was drooping with fatigue.
+
+"It's not far now. We'll be there in a few minutes," MacQueen promised
+her.
+
+They were ascending a narrow trail which ran along the sidehill through
+the timber. Presently they topped the summit, and the ground fell away
+from their feet to a bowl-shaped valley, over which the silvery moonshine
+played so that the basin seemed to swim in a magic sea of light.
+
+"Welcome to the Cache," he said to her.
+
+She was surprised out of her silence. "Dead Man's Cache?"
+
+"It has been called that."
+
+"Why?"
+
+She knew, but she wanted to see if he would tell a story which showed so
+plainly his own ruthlessness.
+
+He hesitated, but only for a moment.
+
+"There was a man named Havens. He had a reputation as a bad man, and I
+reckon he deserved it--if brand blotting, mail rustling, and shooting
+citizens are the credentials to win that title. Hard pressed on account of
+some deviltry, he drifted into this country, and was made welcome by those
+living here. The best we had was his. He was fed, outfitted, and kept safe
+from the law that was looking for him.
+
+"You would figure he was under big obligations to the men that did this
+for him--wouldn't you? But he was born skunk. When his chance came he
+offered to betray these men to the law, in exchange for a pardon for his
+own sneaking hide. The letter was found, and it was proved he wrote it.
+What ought those men to have done to him, Miss 'Lissie?"
+
+"I don't know." She shuddered.
+
+"There's got to be law, even in a place like this. We make our own laws,
+and the men that stay here have got to abide by them. Our law said this
+man must die. He died."
+
+She did not ask him how. The story went that the outlaws whom the wretched
+man had tried to sell let him escape on purpose--that, just as he thought
+he was free of them, their mocking laughter came to him from the rocks all
+around. He was completely surrounded. They had merely let him run into a
+trap. He escaped again, wandered without food for days, and again
+discovered that they had been watching him all the time. Turn whichever
+way he would, their rifles warned him back. He stumbled on, growing weaker
+and weaker. They would neither capture him nor let him go.
+
+For nearly a week the cruel game went on. Frequently he heard their voices
+in the hills about him. Sometimes he would call out to them pitifully to
+put him out of his misery. Only their horrible laughter answered. When he
+had reached the limit of endurance he lay down and died.
+
+And the man who had engineered that heartless revenge was riding beside
+her. He had been ready to tell her the whole story, if she had asked for
+it, and equally ready to justify it. Nothing could have shown her more
+plainly the character of the villain into whose hands she had fallen.
+
+They descended into the valley, winding in and out until they came
+suddenly upon ranch houses and a corral in a cleared space.
+
+A man came out of the shadows into the moonlight to meet them. Instantly
+Melissy recognized his walk. It was Boone.
+
+"Oh, it's you," MacQueen said coldly. "Any of the rest of the boys up?"
+
+"No."
+
+Not a dozen words had passed between them, but the girl sensed hostility.
+She was not surprised. Dunc Boone was not the man to take second place in
+any company of riff-raff, nor was MacQueen one likely to yield the
+supremacy he had fought to gain.
+
+The latter swung from the saddle and lifted Melissy from hers. As her feet
+struck the ground her face for the first time came full into the
+moonlight.
+
+Boone stifled a startled oath.
+
+"Melissy Lee!" Like a swiftly reined horse he swung around upon his chief.
+"What devil's work is this?"
+
+"My business, Dunc!" the other retorted in suave insult.
+
+"By God, no! I make it mine. This young lady's a friend of mine--or used
+to be. _Sabe_?"
+
+"I _sabe_ you'd better not try to sit in at this game, my friend."
+
+Boone swung abruptly upon Melissy. "How come you here, girl? Tell me!"
+
+And in three sentences she explained.
+
+"What's your play? Whyfor did you bring her?" the Arkansan demanded of
+MacQueen.
+
+The latter stood balanced on his heels with his feet wide apart. There was
+a scornful grin on his face, but his eyes were fixed warily on the other
+man.
+
+"What was I to do with her, Mr. Buttinski? She found out who I was. Could
+I send her home? If I did how was I to fix it so I could go to Mesa when
+it's necessary till we get this ransom business arranged?"
+
+"All right. But you understand she's a friend of mine. I'll not have her
+hurt."
+
+"Oh, go to the devil! I'm not in the habit of hurting young ladies."
+
+MacQueen swung on his heel insolently and knocked on the door of a cabin
+near.
+
+"Don't forget that I'm here when you need me," Boone told Melissy in a low
+voice.
+
+"I'll not forget," the girl made answer in a murmur.
+
+The wrinkled face of a Mexican woman appeared presently at a window.
+MacQueen jabbered a sentence or two in her language. She looked at Melissy
+and answered.
+
+The girl had not lived in Southern Arizona for twenty years without having
+a working knowledge of Spanish. Wherefore, she knew that her captor had
+ordered his own room prepared for her.
+
+While they waited for this to be made ready MacQueen hummed a snatch of a
+popular song. It happened to be a love ditty. Boone ground his teeth and
+glared at him, which appeared to amuse the other ruffian immensely.
+
+"Don't stay up on our account," MacQueen suggested presently with a
+malicious laugh. "We're not needing a chaperone any to speak of."
+
+The Mexican woman announced that the bedroom was ready and MacQueen
+escorted Melissy to the door of the room. He stood aside with mock
+gallantry to let her pass.
+
+"Have to lock you in," he apologized airily. "Not that it would do you any
+good to escape. We'd have you again inside of twenty-four hours. This bit
+of the hills takes a heap of knowing. But we don't want you running away.
+You're too tired. So I lock the door and lie down on the porch under your
+window. _Adios, señorita._"
+
+Melissy heard the key turn in the lock, and was grateful for the respite
+given her by the night. She was glad, too, that Boone was here. She knew
+him for a villain, but she hoped he would stand between her and MacQueen
+if the latter proved unruly in his attentions. Her guess was that Boone
+was jealous of the other--of his authority with the gang to which they
+both belonged, and now of his relationship to her. Out of this division
+might come hope for her.
+
+So tired was she that, in spite of her alarms, sleep took her almost as
+soon as her head touched the pillow. When she awakened the sun was shining
+in at her window above the curtain strung across its lower half.
+
+Some one was knocking at the door. When she asked who was there, in a
+voice which could not conceal its tremors, the answer came in feminine
+tones:
+
+"'Tis I--Rosario Chaves."
+
+The Mexican woman was not communicative, nor did she appear to be
+sympathetic. The plight of this girl might have moved even an unresponsive
+heart, but Rosario showed a stolid face to her distress. What had to be
+said, she said. For the rest, she declined conversation absolutely.
+
+Breakfast was served Melissy in her room, after which Rosario led her
+outdoors. The woman gave her to understand that she might walk about the
+cleared space, but must not pass into the woods beyond. To point the need
+of obedience, Rosario seated herself on the porch, and began doing some
+drawn work upon which she was engaged.
+
+Melissy walked toward the corral, but did not reach it. An old hag was
+seated in a chair beside one of the log cabins. From the color of her skin
+the girl judged her to be an Indian squaw. She wore moccasins, a dirty and
+shapeless one-piece dress, and a big sunbonnet, in which her head was
+buried.
+
+Sitting on the floor of the porch, about fifteen feet from her, was a
+hard-faced customer, with stony eyes like those of a snake. He was sewing
+on a bridle that had given way. Melissy noticed that from the pocket of
+his chaps the butt of a revolver peeped. She judged it to be the custom in
+Dead Man's Cache to go garnished with weapons.
+
+Her curiosity led her to deflect toward the old woman. But she had not
+taken three steps toward the cabin before the man with the jade eyes
+stopped her.
+
+"That'll be near enough, ma'am," he said, civilly enough. "This old crone
+has a crazy spell whenever a stranger comes nigh. She's nutty. It ain't
+safe to come nearer--is it, old Sit-in-the-Sun?"
+
+The squaw grunted. Simultaneously, she looked up, and Miss Lee thought
+that she had never seen more piercing eyes.
+
+"Is Sit-in-the-Sun her name?" asked the girl curiously.
+
+"That's the English of it. The Navajo word is a jawbreaker."
+
+"Doesn't she understand English?"
+
+"No more'n you do Choctaw, miss."
+
+A quick step crunched the gravel behind Melissy. She did not need to look
+around to know that here was Black MacQueen.
+
+"What's this--what's this, Hank?" he demanded sharply.
+
+"The young lady started to come up and speak to old Sit-in-the-Sun. I was
+just explaining to her how crazy the old squaw is," Jeff answered with a
+grin.
+
+"Oh! Is that all?" MacQueen turned to Melissy.
+
+"She's plumb loony--dangerous, too. I don't want you to go near her."
+
+The girl's eyes flashed. "Very considerate of you. But if you want to
+protect me from the really dangerous people here, you had better send me
+home."
+
+"I tell you they do as I say, every man jack of them. I'd flay one alive
+if he insulted you."
+
+"It's a privilege you don't sublet then," she retorted swiftly.
+
+Admiration gleamed through his amusement. "Gad, you've got a sharp tongue.
+I'd pity the man you marry--unless he drove with a tight rein."
+
+"That's not what we're discussing, Mr. MacQueen. Are you going to send me
+home?"
+
+"Not till you've made us a nice long visit, my dear. You're quite safe
+here. My men are plumb gentle. They'll eat out of your hand. They don't
+insult ladies. I've taught 'em----"
+
+"Pity you couldn't teach their leader, too."
+
+He acknowledged the hit. "Come again, dearie. But what's your complaint?
+Haven't I treated you white so far?"
+
+"No. You insulted me grossly when you brought me here by force."
+
+"Did I lay a hand on you?"
+
+"If it had been necessary you would have."
+
+"You're right, I would," he nodded. "I've taken a fancy to you. You're a
+good-looking and a plucky little devil. I've a notion to fall in love with
+you."
+
+"Don't!"
+
+"Why not? Say I'm a villain and a bad lot. Wouldn't it be a good thing for
+me to tie up with a fine, straight-up young lady like you? Me, I like the
+way your eyes flash. You've got a devil of a temper, haven't you?"
+
+They had been walking toward a pile of rocks some little way from the
+cluster of cabins. Now he sat down and smiled impudently across at her.
+
+"That's my business," she flung back stormily.
+
+Genially he nodded. "So it is. Mine, too, when we trot in double
+harness."
+
+Her scornful eyes swept up and down him. "I wouldn't marry you if you were
+the last man on earth."
+
+"No. Well, I'm not partial to that game myself. I didn't mention
+matrimony, did I?"
+
+The meaning she read in his mocking, half-closed eyes startled the girl.
+Seeing this, he added with a shrug:
+
+"Just as you say about that. We'll make you Mrs. MacQueen on the level if
+you like."
+
+The passion in her surged up. "I'd rather lie dead at your feet--I'd
+rather starve in these hills--I'd rather put a knife in my heart!"
+
+He clapped his hands. "Fine! Fine! That Bernhardt woman hasn't got a
+thing on you when it comes to acting, my dear. You put that across bully.
+Never saw it done better."
+
+"You--coward!" Her voice broke and she turned to leave him.
+
+"Stop!" The ring of the word brought her feet to a halt. MacQueen padded
+across till he faced her. "Don't make any mistake, girl. You're mine. I
+don't care how. If it suits you to have a priest mumble words over us,
+good enough. But I'm the man you've got to get ready to love."
+
+"I hate you."
+
+"That's a good start, you little catamount."
+
+"I'd rather die--a thousand times rather."
+
+"Not you, my dear. You think you would right now, but inside of a week
+you'll be hunting for pet names to give me."
+
+She ran blindly toward the house where her room was. On the way she passed
+at a little distance Dunc Boone and did not see him. His hungry eyes
+followed her--a slender creature of white and russet and gold, vivid as a
+hillside poppy, compact of life and fire and grace. He, too, was a
+miscreant and a villain, lost to honor and truth, but just now she held
+his heart in the hollow of her tightly clenched little fist. Good men and
+bad, at bottom we are all made of the same stuff, once we are down to the
+primal emotions that go deeper than civilization's veneer.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+"TRAPPED!"
+
+
+Black MacQueen rolled a cigarette and sauntered toward the other outlaw.
+
+"I reckon you better saddle up and take a look over the Flattops, Dunc.
+The way I figure it Lee's posse must be somewhere over there. Swing around
+toward the Elkhorns and get back to report by to-morrow evening, say."
+
+Boone looked at him in an ugly manner. "Nothin' doing, MacQueen."
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"I'm no greaser, my friend. Orders don't go with me."
+
+"They don't, eh? Who's major domo of this outfit?"
+
+"I'm going to stay right here in this valley to-night. See?"
+
+"What's eatin' you, man?"
+
+"And every night so long as Melissy Lee stays."
+
+MacQueen watched him with steady, hostile eyes. "So it's the girl, is it?
+Want to cut in, do you? Oh, no, my friend. Two's company; three's a
+crowd. She's mine."
+
+"No."
+
+"Yes. And another thing, Mr. Boone. I don't stand for any interference in
+my plans. Make a break at it and you'll take a hurry up journey to kingdom
+come."
+
+"Or you will."
+
+"Don't bank on that off chance. The boys are with me. You're alone. If I
+give the word they'll bump you off. _Don't make a mistake, Boone._"
+
+The Arkansan hesitated. What MacQueen said was true enough. His
+overbearing disposition had made him unpopular. He knew the others would
+side against him and that if it came to a showdown they would snuff out
+his life as a man does the flame of a candle. The rage died out of his
+eyes and gave place to a look of cunning.
+
+"It's your say-so, Black. But there will be a day when it ain't. Don't
+forget that."
+
+"And in the meantime you'll ride the Flattops when I give the word?"
+
+Boone nodded sulkily. "I said you had the call, didn't I?"
+
+"Then ride 'em now, damn you. And don't show up in the Cache till
+to-morrow night."
+
+MacQueen turned on his heel and strutted away. He was elated at his easy
+victory. If he had seen the look that followed him he might not have been
+so quiet in his mind.
+
+But on the surface he had cinched his leadership. Boone saddled and rode
+out of the Cache without another word to anybody. Sullen and vindictive he
+might be, but cowed he certainly seemed. MacQueen celebrated by frequent
+trips to his sleeping quarters, where each time he resorted to a bottle
+and a glass. No man had ever seen him intoxicated, but there were times
+when he drank a good deal for a few days at a stretch. His dissipation
+would be followed by months of total abstinence.
+
+All day the man persecuted Melissy with his attentions. His passion was
+veiled under a manner of mock deference, of insolent assurance, but as the
+hours passed the fears of the girl grew upon her. There were moments when
+she turned sick with waves of dread. In the sunshine, under the open sky,
+she could hold her own, but under cover of the night's blackness ghastly
+horrors would creep toward her to destroy.
+
+Nor was there anybody to whom she might turn for help. Lane and Jackson
+were tools of their leader. The Mexican woman could do nothing even if she
+would. Boone alone might have helped her, and he had ridden away to save
+his own skin. So MacQueen told her to emphasize his triumph and her
+helplessness.
+
+To her fancy dusk fell over the valley like a pall. It brought with it the
+terrible night, under cover of which unthinkable things might be done.
+With no appetite, she sat down to supper opposite her captor. To see him
+gloat over her made her heart sink. Her courage was of no avail against
+the thing that threatened.
+
+Supper over, he made her sit with him on the porch for an hour to listen
+to his boasts of former conquests. And when he let her take her way to her
+room it was not "Good-night" but a mocking "Au revoir" he murmured as he
+bent to kiss her hand.
+
+Melissy found Rosario waiting for her, crouched in the darkness of the
+room that had been given the young woman. The Mexican spoke in her own
+language, softly, with many glances of alarm to make sure they were
+alone.
+
+"Hist, señorita. Here is a note. Read it. Destroy it. Swear not to betray
+Rosario."
+
+By the light of a match Melissy read:
+
+  "Behind the big rocks. In half an hour.
+
+                                                           "A Friend."
+What could it mean? Who could have sent it? Rosario would answer no
+questions. She snatched the note, tore it into fragments, chewed them into
+a pulp. Then, still shaking her head obstinately, hurriedly left the
+room.
+
+But at least it meant hope. Her mind flew from her father to Jack Flatray,
+Bellamy, young Yarnell. It might be any of them. Or it might be O'Connor,
+who, perhaps, had by some miracle escaped.
+
+The minutes were hours to her. Interminably they dragged. The fear rose in
+her that MacQueen might come in time to cut off her escape. At last, in
+her stocking feet, carrying her shoes in her hand, she stole into the
+hall, out to the porch, and from it to the shadows of the cottonwoods.
+
+It was a night of both moon and stars. She had to cross a space washed in
+silvery light, taking the chance that nobody would see her. But first she
+stooped in the shadows to slip the shoes upon her feet. Her heart beat
+against her side as she had once seen that of a frightened mouse do. It
+seemed impossible for her to cover all that moonlit open unseen. Every
+moment she expected an alarm to ring out in the silent night. But none
+came.
+
+Safely she reached the big rocks. A voice called to her softly. She
+answered, and came face to face with Boone. A drawn revolver was in his
+hand.
+
+"You made it," he panted, as a man might who had been running hard.
+
+"Yes," she whispered. "But they'll soon know. Let us get away."
+
+"If you hadn't come I was going in to kill him."
+
+She noticed the hard glitter in his eyes as he spoke, the crouched look of
+the padding tiger ready for its kill. The man was torn with hatred and
+jealousy.
+
+Already they were moving back through the rocks to a dry wash that ran
+through the valley. The bed of this they followed for nearly a mile.
+Deflecting from it they pushed across the valley toward what appeared to
+be a sheer rock wall. With a twist to the left they swung back of a face
+of rock, turned sharply to the right, and found themselves in a fissure
+Melissy had not at all expected. Here ran a little cañon known only to
+those few who rode up and down it on the nefarious business of their
+unwholesome lives.
+
+Boone spoke harshly, breaking for the first time in half an hour his moody
+silence.
+
+"Safe at last. By God, I've evened my score with Black MacQueen."
+
+And from the cliff above came the answer--a laugh full of mocking deviltry
+and malice.
+
+The Arkansan turned upon Melissy a startled face of agony, in which
+despair and hate stood out of a yellow pallor.
+
+"Trapped."
+
+It was his last word to her. He swept the girl back against the shelter of
+the wall and ran crouching toward the entrance.
+
+A bullet zipped--a second--a third. He stumbled, but did not fall.
+Turning, he came back, dodging like a hunted fox. As he passed her,
+Melissy saw that his face was ghastly. He ran with a limp.
+
+A second time she heard the cackle of laughter. Guns cracked. Still the
+doomed man pushed forward. He went down, struck in the body, but dragged
+himself to his feet and staggered on.
+
+All this time he had seen nobody at whom he could fire. Not a shot had
+come from his revolver. He sank behind a rock for shelter. The ping of a
+bullet on the shale beside him brought the tortured man to his feet. He
+looked wildly about him, the moon shining on his bare head, and plunged up
+the cañon.
+
+And now it appeared his unseen tormentors were afraid he might escape
+them. Half a dozen shots came close together. Boone sank to the ground,
+writhed like a crushed worm, and twisted over so that his face was to the
+moonlight.
+
+Melissy ran forward and knelt beside him.
+
+"They've got me ... in half a dozen places.... I'm going fast."
+
+"Oh, no ... no," the girl protested.
+
+"Yep.... Surest thing you know.... I did you dirt onct, girl. And I've
+been a bad lot--a wolf, a killer."
+
+"Never mind that now. You died to save me. Always I'll remember that."
+
+"Onct you 'most loved me.... But it wouldn't have done. I'm a wolf and
+you're a little white lamb. Is Flatray the man?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Thought so. Well, he's square. I rigged it up on him about the rustling.
+I was the man you liked to 'a' caught that day years ago."
+
+"You!"
+
+"Yep." He broke off abruptly. "I'm going, girl.... It's gittin' black.
+Hold my hand till--till----"
+
+He gave a shudder and seemed to fall together. He was dead.
+
+Melissy heard the sound of rubble slipping. Some one was lowering himself
+cautiously down the side of the cañon. A man dropped to the wash and
+strutted toward her. He kept his eyes fixed on the lifeless form, rifle
+ready for action at an instant's notice. When he reached his victim he
+pushed the body with his foot, made sure of no trap, and relaxed his
+alertness.
+
+"Dead as a hammer."
+
+The man was MacQueen. He turned to Melissy and nodded jauntily.
+
+"Good evening, my dear. Just taking a little stroll?" he asked
+ironically.
+
+The girl leaned against the cold wall and covered her face with her arm.
+She was sobbing hysterically.
+
+The outlaw seized her by the shoulders and swung her round. "Cut that out,
+girl," he ordered roughly.
+
+Melissy caught at her sobs and tried to check them.
+
+"He got what was coming to him, what he's been playing for a long time. I
+warned him, but the fool wouldn't see it."
+
+"How did you know?" she asked, getting out her question a word at a time.
+
+"Knew it all the time. Rosario brought his note to me. I told her to take
+it to you and keep her mouth shut."
+
+"You planned his death."
+
+"If you like to put it that way. Now we'll go home and forget this
+foolishness. Jeff, bring the horses round to the mouth of the gulch."
+
+Melissy felt suddenly very, very tired and old. Her feet dragged like
+those of an Indian squaw following her master. It was as though heavy
+irons weighted her ankles.
+
+MacQueen helped her to one of the horses Jackson brought to the lip of the
+gulch. Weariness rode on her shoulders all the way back. The soul of her
+was crushed beneath the misfortunes that oppressed her.
+
+Long before they reached the ranch houses Rosario came running to meet
+them. Plainly she was in great excitement.
+
+"The prisoners have escaped," she cried to MacQueen.
+
+"Escaped. How?" demanded Black.
+
+"Some one must have helped them. I heard a window smash and ran out. The
+young ranger and another man were coming out of the last cabin with the
+old man. I could do nothing. They ran."
+
+They had been talking in her own language. MacQueen jabbed another
+question at her.
+
+"Which way?"
+
+"Toward the Pass."
+
+The outlaw ripped out an oath. "We've got 'em. They can't reach it without
+horses as quick as we can with them." He whirled upon Melissy. "March into
+the house, girl. Don't you dare make a move. I'm leaving Buck here to
+watch you." Sharply he swung to the man Lane. "Buck, if she makes a break
+to get away, riddle her full of holes. You hear me."
+
+A minute later, from the place where she lay face down on the bed, Melissy
+heard him and his men gallop away.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+AN ESCAPE AND A CAPTURE
+
+
+Far up in the mountains, in that section where head the Roaring Fork, One
+Horse Creek, and the Del Oro, is a vast tract of wild, untraveled country
+known vaguely as the Bad Lands. Somewhere among the thousand and one
+cañons which cleft the huddled hills lay hidden Dead Man's Cache. Here
+Black MacQueen retreated on those rare occasions when the pursuit grew hot
+on his tracks. So the current report ran.
+
+Whether the abductors of Simon West were to be found in the Cache or at
+some other nest in the almost inaccessible ridges Jack Flatray had no
+means of knowing. His plan was to follow the Roaring Fork almost to its
+headquarters, and there establish a base for his hunt. It might take him a
+week to flush his game. It might take a month. He clamped his bulldog jaw
+to see the thing out to a finish.
+
+Jack did not make the mistake of underestimating his job. He had followed
+the trail of bad men often enough to know that, in a frontier country, no
+hunt is so desperate as the man-hunt. Such men are never easily taken,
+even if they do not have all the advantage in the deadly game of hide and
+seek that is played in the timber and the pockets of the hills.
+
+And here the odds all lay with the hunted. They knew every ravine and
+gulch. Day by day their scout looked down from mountain ledges to watch
+the progress of the posse.
+
+Moreover, Flatray could never tell at what moment his covey might be
+startled from its run. The greatest vigilance was necessary to make sure
+his own party would not be ambushed. Yet slowly he combed the arroyos and
+the ridges, drawing always closer to that net of gulches in which he knew
+Dead Man's Cache must be located.
+
+During the day the sheriff split his party into couples. Bellamy and Alan
+McKinstra, Farnum and Charlie Hymer, young Yarnell and the sheriff. So
+Jack had divided his posse, thus leaving at the head of each detail one
+old and wise head. Each night the parties met at the rendezvous appointed
+for the wranglers with the pack horses. From sunrise to sunset often no
+face was seen other than those of their own outfit. Sometimes a solitary
+sheep herder was discovered at his post. Always the work was hard,
+discouraging, and apparently futile. But the young sheriff never thought
+of quitting.
+
+The provisions gave out. Jack sent back Hal Yarnell and Hegler, the
+wrangler, to bring in a fresh supply. Meanwhile the young sheriff took a
+big chance and scouted alone. He parted from the young Arkansan at the
+head of a gulch which twisted snakelike into the mountains; Yarnell and
+the pack outfit to ride to Mammoth, Flatray to dive still deeper into the
+mesh of hills. He had the instinct of the scout to stick to the high
+places as much as he could. Whenever it was possible he followed ridges,
+so that no spy could look down upon him as he traveled. Sometimes the
+contour of the country drove him into the open or down into hollows. But
+in such places he advanced with the swift stealth of an Indian.
+
+It was on one of these occasions, when he had been driven into a dark and
+narrow cañon, that he came to a sudden halt. He was looking at an empty
+tomato can. Swinging down from his saddle, he picked it up without
+dismounting. A little juice dripped from the can to the ground.
+
+Flatray needed no explanation. In Arizona men on the range often carry a
+can of tomatoes instead of a water canteen. Nothing alleviates thirst like
+the juice of this acid fruit. Some one had opened this can within two
+hours. Otherwise the sun would have dried the moisture.
+
+Jack took his rifle from its place beneath his legs and set it across the
+saddle in front of him. Very carefully he continued on his way, watching
+every rock and bush ahead of him. Here and there in the sand were printed
+the signs of a horse going in the same direction as his.
+
+Up and down, in and out of a maze of crooked paths, working by ever so
+devious a way higher into the chain of mountains, Jack followed his
+leader. Now he would lose the hoofmarks; now he would pick them up again.
+And, at the last, they brought him to the rim of a basin, a bowl of wooded
+ravines, of twisted ridges, of bleak spurs jutting into late pastures
+almost green. It was now past sunset. Dusk was filtering down from the
+blue peaks. As he looked a star peeped out low on the horizon.
+
+But was it a star? He glimpsed it between trees. The conviction grew on
+him that what he saw was the light of a lamp. A tangle of rough country
+lay between him and that beacon, but there before him lay his destination.
+At last he had found his way into Dead Man's Cache.
+
+The sheriff lost no time, for he knew that if he should get lost in the
+darkness on one of these forest slopes he might wander all night. A rough
+trail led him down into the basin. Now he would lose sight of the light.
+Half an hour later, pushing to the summit of a hill, he might find it.
+After a time there twinkled a second beside the first. He was getting
+close to a settlement of some kind.
+
+Below him in the darkness lay a stretch of open meadow rising to the
+wooded foothills. Behind these a wall of rugged mountains encircled the
+valley like a gigantic crooked arm. Already he could make out faintly the
+outlines of the huddled buildings.
+
+Slipping from his horse, Jack went forward cautiously on foot. He was
+still a hundred yards from the nearest hut when dogs bayed warning of his
+approach. He waited, rifle in hand. No sign of human life showed except
+the two lights shining from as many windows. Flatray counted four other
+cabins as dark as Egypt.
+
+Very slowly he crept forward, always with one eye to his retreat. Why did
+nobody answer the barking of the dogs? Was he being watched all the time?
+But how could he be, since he was completely cloaked in darkness?
+
+So at last he came to the nearest cabin, crept to the window, and looked
+in. A man lay on a bed. His hands and feet were securely tied and a second
+rope wound round so as to bind him to the bunk.
+
+Flatray tapped softly on a pane. Instantly the head of the bound man
+slewed round.
+
+"Friend?"
+
+The prisoner asked it ever so gently, but the sheriff heard.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"The top part of the window is open. You can crawl over, I reckon."
+
+Jack climbed on the sill and from it through the window. Almost before he
+reached the floor his knife was out and he was slashing at the ropes.
+
+"Better put the light out, pardner," suggested the man he was freeing,
+and the officer noticed that there was no tremor in the cool, steady
+voice.
+
+"That's right. We'd make a fine mark through the window."
+
+And the light went out.
+
+"I'm Bucky O'Connor. Who are you?"
+
+"Jack Flatray."
+
+They spoke together in whispers. Though both were keyed to the highest
+pitch of excitement they were as steady as eight-day clocks. O'Connor
+stretched his limbs, flexing them this way and that, so that he might have
+perfect control of them. He worked especially over the forearm and fingers
+of his right arm.
+
+Flatray handed him a revolver.
+
+"Whenever you're ready, Lieutenant."
+
+"All right. It's the cabin next to this."
+
+They climbed out of the window noiselessly and crept to the next hut. The
+door was locked, the window closed.
+
+"We've got to smash the window. Nothing else for it," Flatray whispered.
+
+"Looks like it. That means we'll have to shoot our way out."
+
+With the butt of his rifle the sheriff shattered the woodwork of the
+window, driving the whole frame into the room.
+
+"What is it?" a frightened voice demanded.
+
+"Friends, Mr. West. Just a minute."
+
+It took them scarce longer than that to free him and to get him into the
+open. A Mexican woman came screaming out of an adjoining cabin.
+
+The young men caught each an arm of the capitalist and hurried him
+forward.
+
+"Hell'll be popping in a minute," Flatray explained.
+
+But they reached the shelter of the underbrush without a shot having been
+fired. Nor had a single man appeared to dispute their escape.
+
+"Looks like most of the family is away from home to-night," Bucky
+hazarded.
+
+"Maybe so, but they're liable to drop in any minute. We'll keep covering
+ground."
+
+They circled round toward the sheriff's horse. As soon as they reached it
+West, still stiff from want of circulation in his cramped limbs, was
+boosted into the saddle.
+
+"It's going to be a good deal of a guess to find our way out of the
+Cache," Jack explained. "Even in the daytime it would take a 'Pache, but
+at night--well, here's hoping the luck's good."
+
+They found it not so good as they had hoped. For hours they wandered in
+mesquit, dragged themselves through cactus, crossed washes, and climbed
+hills.
+
+"This will never do. We'd better give it up till daylight. We're not
+getting anywhere," the sheriff suggested.
+
+They did as he advised. As soon as a faint gray sifted into the sky they
+were on the move again. But whichever way they climbed it was always to
+come up against steep cliffs too precipitous to be scaled.
+
+The ranger officer pointed to a notch beyond a cowbacked hill. "I wouldn't
+be sure, but it looks like that was the way they brought me into the
+Cache. I could tell if I were up there. What's the matter with my going
+ahead and settling the thing? If I'm right I'll come back and let you
+know."
+
+Jack looked at West. The railroad man was tired and drawn. He was not used
+to galloping over the hills all night.
+
+"All right. We'll be here when you come back," Flatray said, and flung
+himself on the ground.
+
+West followed his example.
+
+It must have been half an hour later that Flatray heard a twig snap under
+an approaching foot. He had been scanning the valley with his glasses,
+having given West instructions to keep a lookout in the rear. He swung his
+head round sharply, and with it his rifle.
+
+"You're covered, you fool," cried the man who was strutting toward them.
+
+"Stop there. Not another step," Flatray called sharply.
+
+The man stopped, his rifle half raised. "We've got you on every side,
+man." He lifted his voice. "Jeff--Hank--Steve! Let him know you're
+alive."
+
+Three guns cracked and kicked up the dust close to the sheriff.
+
+"What do you want with us?" Flatray asked, sparring for time.
+
+"Drop your gun. If you don't we'll riddle you both."
+
+West spoke to Jack promptly. "Do as he says. It's MacQueen."
+
+Flatray hesitated. He could kill MacQueen probably, but almost certainly
+he and West would pay the penalty. He reluctantly put his rifle down. "All
+right. It's your call."
+
+"Where's O'Connor?"
+
+The sheriff looked straight at him. "Haven't you enough of us for one
+gather?"
+
+The outlaws were closing in on them cautiously.
+
+"Not without that smart man hunter. Where is he?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"The devil you don't."
+
+"We separated early this morning--thought it would give us a better chance
+for a getaway." Jack gave a sudden exclamation of surprise. "So it was
+Black MacQueen himself who posed as O'Connor down at Mesa."
+
+"Guessed it right, my friend. And I'll tell you one thing: you've made the
+mistake of your life butting into Dead Man's Cache. Your missing friend
+O'Connor was due to hand in his checks to-day. Since you've taken his
+place it will be you that crosses the divide, Mr. Sheriff. You'd better
+tell where he is, for if we don't get Mr. Bucky it will be God help J.
+Flatray."
+
+The dapper little villain exuded a smug, complacent cruelty. It was no use
+for the sheriff to remind himself that such things weren't done nowadays,
+that the times of Geronimo and the Apache Kid were past forever. Black
+MacQueen would go the limit in deviltry if he set his mind to it.
+
+Yet Flatray answered easily, without any perceptible hesitation: "I reckon
+I'll play my hand and let Bucky play his."
+
+"Suits me if it does you. Jeff, collect that hardware. Now, while you boys
+beat up the hills for O'Connor, I'll trail back to camp with these two
+all-night picnickers."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+A BARGAIN
+
+
+Melissy saw the two prisoners brought in, though she could not tell at
+that distance who they were. Her watch told her that it was four-thirty.
+She had slept scarcely at all during the night, but now she lay down on
+the bed in her clothes.
+
+The next she knew, Rosario was calling her to get up for breakfast. The
+girl dressed and followed Rosario to the adjoining cabin. MacQueen was not
+there, and Melissy ate alone. She was given to understand that she might
+walk up and down in front of the houses for a few minutes after breakfast.
+Naturally she made the most of the little liberty allowed her.
+
+The old squaw Sit-in-the-Sun squatted in front of the last hut, her back
+against the log wall. The man called Buck sat yawning on a rock a few
+yards away. What struck Melissy as strange was that the squaw was figuring
+on the back of an old envelope with the stub of a lead pencil.
+
+The young woman walked leisurely past the cabin for perhaps a dozen
+yards.
+
+"That'll be about far enough. You don't want to tire yourself, Miss Lee,"
+Buck Lane called, with a grin.
+
+Melissy stopped, stood looking at the mountains for a few minutes, and
+turned back. Sit-in-the-Sun looked quickly at her, and at the same moment
+she tore the paper in two and her fingers opened to release one piece of
+the envelope upon which she had been writing. A puff of wind carried it
+almost directly in front of the girl. Lane was still yawning sleepily, his
+gaze directed toward the spot where he presently expected Rosario to step
+out and call him to breakfast. Melissy dropped her handkerchief, stooped
+to pick it up, and gathered at the same time in a crumpled heap into her
+hand the fragment of an envelope. Without another glance at the squaw, the
+young woman kept on her way, sauntered to the porch, and lingered there as
+if in doubt.
+
+"I'm tired," she announced to Rosario, and turned to her rooms.
+
+"_Si, señorita,_" answered her attendant quietly.
+
+Once inside, Melissy lay down on her bed, with her back to the window, and
+smoothed out the torn envelope. On one side were some disjointed memoranda
+which she did not understand.
+
+                K. C. & T. 93
+                D. & R. B. 87
+                Float $10,000,000 Cortes for extension.
+
+That was all, but certainly a strange puzzle for a Navajo squaw to set
+her.
+
+She turned the paper over, to find the other side close-packed with
+writing.
+
+  Miss Lee:
+
+  In the last cabin but one is a prisoner, your friend Sheriff Flatray.
+  He is to be shot in an hour. I have offered any sum for his life and
+  been refused. For God's sake save him somehow.
+
+                                                           Simon West.
+Jack Flatray here, and about to be murdered! The thing was incredible. And
+yet--and yet---- Was it so impossible, after all? Some one had broken into
+the Cache and released the prisoners. Who more likely than Jack to have
+done this? And later they had captured him and condemned him for what he
+had done.
+
+Melissy reconstructed the scene in a flash. The Indian squaw was West. He
+had been rigged up in that paraphernalia to deceive any chance mountaineer
+who might drop into the valley by accident.
+
+No doubt, when he first saw Melissy, the railroad magnate had been passing
+his time in making notes about his plans for the system he controlled. But
+when he had caught sight of her, he had written the note, under the very
+eyes of the guard, had torn the envelope as if it were of no importance,
+and tossed the pieces away. He had taken the thousandth chance that his
+note might fall into the hands of the person to whom it was directed.
+
+All this she understood without giving it conscious thought. For her whole
+mind was filled with the horror of what she had learned. Jack Flatray, the
+man she loved, was to be killed. He was to be shot down in an hour.
+
+With the thought, she was at her door--only to find that it had been
+quietly locked while she lay on the bed. No doubt they had meant to keep
+her a close prisoner until the thing they were about to do was finished.
+She beat upon it, called to Rosario to let her out, wrung her hands in her
+desperation. Then she remembered the window. It was a cheap and flimsy
+case, and had been jammed so that her strength was not sufficient to raise
+it.
+
+Her eye searched the room for a weapon, and found an Indian tom-tom club.
+With this she smashed the panes and beat down the wooden cross bars of the
+sash. Agile as a forest fawn, she slipped through the opening she had made
+and ran toward the far cabin.
+
+A group of men surrounded the door; and, as she drew near, it opened to
+show three central figures. MacQueen was one, Rosario Chaves a second; but
+the most conspicuous was a bareheaded young man, with his hands tied
+behind him. He was going to his death, but a glance was enough to show
+that he went unconquered and unconquerable. His step did not drag. There
+was a faint, grave smile on his lips; and in his eye was the dynamic spark
+that proclaimed him still master of his fate. The woolen shirt had been
+unbuttoned and pulled back to make way for the rope that lay loosely about
+his neck, so that she could not miss the well-muscled slope of his fine
+shoulders, or the gallant set of the small head upon the brown throat.
+
+The man who first caught sight of Melissy spoke in a low voice to his
+chief. MacQueen turned his head sharply to see her, took a dozen steps
+toward her, then upbraided the Mexican woman, who had run out after
+Melissy.
+
+"I told you to lock her door--to make sure of it."
+
+"_Si, señor_--I did."
+
+"Then how----" He stopped, and looked to Miss Lee for an explanation.
+
+"I broke the window."
+
+The outlaw noticed then that her hand was bleeding. "Broke the window!
+Why?"
+
+"I had to get out! I had to stop you!"
+
+He attempted no denial of what he was about to do. "How did you know? Did
+Rosario tell you?" he asked curtly.
+
+"No--no! I found out--just by chance."
+
+"What chance?" He was plainly disconcerted that she had come to interfere,
+and as plainly eager to punish the person who had disclosed to her this
+thing, which he would have liked to do quietly, without her knowledge.
+
+"Never mind that. Nobody is to blame. Say I overheard a sentence. Thank
+God I did, and I am in time."
+
+There was no avoiding it now. He had to fight it out with her. "In time
+for what?" he wanted to know, his eyes narrowing to vicious pin points.
+
+"To save him."
+
+"No--no! He must die," cried the Mexican woman.
+
+Melissy was amazed at her vehemence, at the passion of hate that trembled
+in the voice of the old woman.
+
+MacQueen nodded. "It is out of my hands, you see. He has been condemned."
+
+"But why?"
+
+"Tell her, Rosario."
+
+The woman poured her story forth fluently in the native tongue. O'Connor
+had killed her son--did not deny that he had done it. And just because
+Tony had tried to escape. This man had freed the ranger. Very well. He
+should take O'Connor's place. Let him die the death. A life for a life.
+Was that not fair?
+
+Flatray turned his head and caught sight of Melissy. A startled cry died
+on his lips.
+
+"Jack!" She held out both hands to him as she ran toward him.
+
+The sheriff took her in his arms to console her. For the girl's face was
+working in a stress of emotion.
+
+"Oh, I'm in time--I'm in time. Thank God I'm in time."
+
+Jack waited a moment to steady his voice. "How came you here, Melissy?"
+
+"He brought me--Black MacQueen. I hated him for it, but now I'm glad--so
+glad--because I can save you."
+
+Jack winced. He looked over her shoulder at MacQueen, taking it all in
+with an air of pleasant politeness. And one look was enough to tell him
+that there was no hope for him. The outlaw had the complacent manner of a
+cat which has just got at the cream. That Melissy loved him would be an
+additional reason for wiping him off the map. And in that instant a fierce
+joy leaped up in Flatray and surged through him, an emotion stronger than
+the fear of death. She loved him. MacQueen could not take that away from
+him.
+
+"It's all a mistake," Melissy went on eagerly. "Of course they can't blame
+you for what Lieutenant O'Connor did. It is absurd--ridiculous."
+
+"Certainly." MacQueen tugged at his little black mustache and kept his
+black eyes on her constantly. "That's not what we're blaming him for. The
+indictment against your friend is that he interfered when it wasn't his
+business."
+
+"But it was his business. Don't you know he's sheriff? He had to do it."
+Melissy turned to the outlaw impetuously.
+
+"So. And I have to play my hand out, too. It wipes out Mr. Flatray. Sorry,
+but business is business."
+
+"But--but----" Melissy grew pale as the icy fear gripped her heart that
+the man meant to go on with the crime. "Don't you see? He's the sheriff?"
+
+"And I never did love sheriffs," drawled MacQueen.
+
+The girl repeated herself helplessly. "It was his sworn duty. That was how
+he looked at it."
+
+A ghost of an ironic smile flitted across the face of the outlaw chief.
+"Rosario's sworn duty is to avenge her son's death. That is how she looks
+at it. The rest of us swore the oath with her."
+
+"But Lieutenant O'Connor had the law back of him. This is murder!"
+
+"Not at all. It is the law of the valley--a life for a life."
+
+"But---- Oh, no--no--no!"
+
+"Yes."
+
+The finality of it appalled her. She felt as if she were butting her head
+against a stone wall. She knew that argument and entreaty were of no
+avail, yet she desperately besought first one and then another of them to
+save the prisoner. Each in turn shook his head. She could see that none of
+them, save Rosario, bore him a grudge; yet none would move to break the
+valley oath. At the last, she was through with her promises and her
+prayers. She had spent them all, and had come up against the wall of blank
+despair.
+
+Then Jack's grave smile thanked her. "You've done what you could,
+Melissy."
+
+She clung to him wildly. "Oh, no--no! I can't let you go, Jack. I can't. I
+can't."
+
+"I reckon it's got to be, dear," he told her gently.
+
+But her breaking heart could not stand that. There must somehow be a way
+to save him. She cast about desperately for one, and had not found it when
+she begged the outlaw chief to see her alone.
+
+"No use." He shook his head.
+
+"But just for five minutes! That can't do any harm, can it?"
+
+"And no good, either."
+
+"Yet I ask it. You might do that much for me," she pleaded.
+
+Her despair had moved him; for he was human, after all. That he was
+troubled about it annoyed him a good deal. Her arrival on the scene had
+made things unpleasant for everybody. Ungraciously he assented, as the
+easiest way out of the difficulty.
+
+The two moved off to the corral. It was perhaps thirty yards distant, and
+they reached it before either of them spoke. She was the first to break
+the silence.
+
+[Illustration: "OH, NO--NO! I CAN'T LET YOU GO, JACK. I CAN'T. I CAN'T."
+_Page 294._]
+
+"You won't do this dreadful thing--surely, you won't do it."
+
+"No use saying another word about it. I told you that," he answered
+doggedly.
+
+"But---- Oh, don't you see? It's one of those things no white man can do.
+Once it's done, you have put the bars up against decency for the rest of
+your life."
+
+"I reckon I'll have to risk that--and down in your heart you don't believe
+it, because you think I've had the bars up for years."
+
+She had come to an impasse already. She tried another turn. "And you said
+you cared for me! Yet you are willing to make me unhappy for the rest of
+my life."
+
+"Why, no! I'm willing to make you happy. There's fish in the sea just as
+good as any that ever were caught," he smirked.
+
+"But it would help you to free him. Don't you see? It's your chance. You
+can begin again, now. You can make him your friend."
+
+His eyes were hard and grim. "I don't want him for a friend, and you're
+dead wrong if you think I could make this a lever to square myself with
+the law. I couldn't. He wouldn't let me, for one thing--he isn't that
+kind."
+
+"And you said you cared for me!" she repeated helplessly, wringing her
+hands in her despair. "But at the first chance you fail me."
+
+"Can't you see it isn't a personal matter? I've got nothing against
+him--nothing to speak of. I'd give him to you, if I could. But it's not my
+say-so. The thing is out of my hands."
+
+"You could save him, if you set yourself to."
+
+"Sure, I could--if I would pay the price. But I won't pay."
+
+"That's it. You would have to give Rosario something--make some
+concession," she said eagerly.
+
+"And I'm not willing to pay the price," he told her. "His life's forfeit.
+Hasn't he been hunting us for a week?"
+
+"Let me pay it," she cried. "I have money in my own right--seven thousand
+dollars. I'll give it all to save him."
+
+He shook his head. "No use. We've turned down a big offer from West. Your
+seven thousand isn't a drop in the bucket."
+
+She beat her hands together wildly. "There must be some way to save him."
+
+The outlaw was looking at her with narrowed eyes. He saw a way, and was
+working it out in his mind. "You're willing to pay, are you?" he asked.
+
+"Yes--yes! All I have."
+
+He put his arms akimbo on the corral fence, and looked long at her.
+"Suppose the price can't be paid in money, Miss Lee."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Money isn't the only thing in this world. There are lots of things it
+won't buy that other things will," he said slowly.
+
+She groped for his meaning, her wide eyes fixed on his, and still did not
+find it. "Be plainer, please. What can I do to save him?"
+
+"You might marry me."
+
+"Never!"
+
+"Just as you say. You were looking for a way, and I suggested one. Anyhow,
+you're mine."
+
+"I won't do it!"
+
+"You wanted me to pay the price; but you don't want to pay yourself."
+
+"I couldn't do it. It would be horrible!" But she knew she could and
+must.
+
+"Why couldn't you? I'm ready to cut loose from this way of living. When I
+pull off this one big thing, I'll quit. We'll go somewhere and begin life
+again. You said I could. Well, I will. You'll help me to keep straight. It
+won't be only his life you are saving. It will be mine, too."
+
+"No--I don't love you! How could a girl marry a man she didn't care for
+and didn't respect?"
+
+"I'll make you do both before long. I'm the kind of man women love."
+
+"You're the kind I hate," she flashed bitterly.
+
+"I'll risk your hate, my dear," he laughed easily.
+
+She did not look at him. Her eyes were on the horizon line, where sky and
+pine tops met. He knew that she was fighting it out to a decision, and he
+did not speak again.
+
+After all, she was only a girl. Right and wrong were inextricably mixed in
+her mind. It was not right to marry this man. It was not right to let the
+sheriff die while she could save him. She was generous to the core. But
+there was something deeper than generosity. Her banked love for Flatray
+flooded her in a great cry of protest against his death. She loved him.
+She loved him. Much as she detested this man, revolting as she found the
+thought of being linked to him, the impulse to sacrifice herself was the
+stronger feeling of the two. Deep in her heart she knew that she could not
+let Jack go to his death so long as it was possible to prevent it.
+
+Her grave eyes came back to MacQueen. "I'll have to tell you one
+thing--I'll hate you worse than ever after this. Don't think I'll ever
+change my mind about that. I won't."
+
+He twirled his little mustache complacently.
+
+"I'll have to risk that, as I said."
+
+"You'll take me to Mesa to-day. As soon as we get there a justice of the
+peace will marry us. From his house we'll go directly to father's. You
+won't lie to me."
+
+"No. I'll play out the game square, if you do."
+
+"And after we're married, what then?"
+
+"You may stay at home until I get this ransom business settled. Then we'll
+go to Sonora."
+
+"How do you know I'll go?"
+
+"I'll trust you."
+
+"Then it's a bargain."
+
+Without another word, they turned back to rejoin the group by the cabin.
+Before they had gone a dozen steps she stopped.
+
+"What about Mr. Flatray? You will free him, of course."
+
+"Yes. I'll take him right out due north of here, about four miles. He'll
+be blindfolded. There we'll leave him, with instructions how to reach
+Mesa."
+
+"I'll go with you," she announced promptly.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To make sure that you do let him go--alive."
+
+He shrugged his shoulders. "All right. I told you I was going to play
+fair. I haven't many good points, but that is one of them. I don't give my
+word and then break it."
+
+"Still, I'll go."
+
+He laughed angrily. "That's your privilege."
+
+She turned on him passionately. "You've got no right to resent it, though
+I don't care a jackstraw whether you do or not. I'm not going into this
+because I want to, but to save this man from the den of wolves into which
+he has fallen. If you knew how I despise and hate you, how my whole soul
+loathes you, maybe you wouldn't be so eager to go on with it! You'll get
+nothing out of this but the pleasure of torturing a girl who can't defend
+herself."
+
+"We'll see about that," he answered doggedly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE PRICE
+
+
+MacQueen lost no time in announcing his new program.
+
+"Boys, the hanging's off. I've decided to accept West's offer for
+Flatray's life. It's too good to turn down."
+
+"That's what I told you all the time," growled Buck.
+
+"Well, I'm telling _you_ now. The money will be divided equally among you,
+except that Rosario will get my share as well as hers."
+
+Rosario Chaves broke into fierce protests. Finding these unheeded, she
+cursed the outlaws furiously and threatened vengeance upon them. She did
+not want money; she wanted this man's life. The men accepted this as a
+matter of course, and paid little attention to the ravings of the old
+woman.
+
+At the first news of his reprieve, Jack saw things through a haze for a
+moment. But he neither broke down nor showed undue exultation.
+
+His first thought was of relief, of profound comfort; his next of wonder
+and suspicion. How under heaven had Melissy won his life for him? He
+looked quickly at her, but the eyes of the girl did not meet his.
+
+"Melissy." Flatray spoke very gently, but something in the way he spoke
+compelled the young woman to meet his eyes.
+
+Almost instantly the long lashes went down to her pale cheeks again.
+
+MacQueen cut in suavely: "I reckon this is the time for announcements.
+Boys, Miss Lee has promised to marry me."
+
+Before the stir which this produced had died away, Flatray flashed a
+question: "In exchange for my life?"
+
+The chief of the outlaws looked at him with insolence smoldering in his
+black eyes. "Now, I wonder when you ever will learn to mind your own
+business, sheriff! Nobody invited you to sit into this game."
+
+"This _is_ my business. I make it mine. Give me a straight answer,
+Melissy. Am I right? Is it for my life?"
+
+"Yes." Her voice was so low he could hardly hear it.
+
+"Then I won't have it! The thing is infamous. I can't hide behind the
+skirts of a girl, least of all you. I can die, but, by God, I'll keep my
+self-respect."
+
+"It's all arranged," Melissy answered in a whisper.
+
+Flatray laughed harshly. "I guess not. You can't pay my debts by giving
+yourself to life-long misery."
+
+"You're right pessimistic, sheriff," sneered MacQueen.
+
+"What do you take me for? I won't have it. I won't have it." The sheriff's
+voice was rough and hoarse. "I'd rather die fifty times."
+
+"It's not up to you to choose, as it happens," the leader of the outlaws
+suggested suavely.
+
+"You villain! You damned white-livered coward!" The look of the young
+sheriff scorched.
+
+"Speaks right out in meeting, don't he?" grinned Lane.
+
+"I know what he is, Jack," Melissy cried. "And he knows I think he's the
+lowest thing that crawls. But I've got to save you. Don't you see, I've
+got to do it?"
+
+"No, I don't see it," Flatray answered hotly. "I can take what's coming to
+me, can't I? But if you save my life that way you make me as low a thing
+as he is. I say I'll not have it."
+
+Melissy could stand it no longer. She began to sob. "I--I--Oh, Jack, I've
+got to do it. Don't you see? Don't you see? _It won't make any difference
+with me if I don't._ No difference--except that you'll be--dead."
+
+She was in his embrace, her arms around his neck, whispering the horrible
+truth in his ear brokenly. And as he felt her dear young fragrance of
+hair in his nostrils, the warm, soft litheness of her body against his,
+the rage and terror in him flooded his veins. Could such things be? Was it
+possible a man like that could live? Not if he could help it.
+
+Gently he unfastened her arms from his neck. MacQueen was standing a dozen
+feet away, his hands behind his back and his legs wide apart. As Flatray
+swung around the outlaw read a warning in the blazing eyes. Just as Jack
+tore loose from his guards MacQueen reached for his revolver.
+
+The gun flashed. A red hot blaze scorched through Jack's arm. Next instant
+MacQueen lay flat on his back, the sheriff's fingers tight around his
+throat. If he could have had five seconds more the man's neck would have
+been broken. But they dragged him away, fighting like a wild cat. They
+flung him down and tied his hands behind him.
+
+Melissy caught a glimpse of his bleeding arm, his torn and dusty face, the
+appalling ferocity of the men who were hammering him into the ground. She
+took a step forward blindly. The mountains in front of her tilted into the
+sky. She moved forward another step, then stumbled and went down. She had
+fainted.
+
+"Just as well," MacQueen nodded. "Here, Rosario, look after the young
+lady. Lift Flatray to a horse, boys, after you've blindfolded him. Good
+enough. Oh, and one thing more, Flatray. You're covered by a rifle. If you
+lift a hand to slip that handkerchief from your eyes, you're giving the
+signal for Jeff to turn loose at you. We're going to take you away, but we
+don't aim to let you out of the Cache for a few days yet."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+MacQueen jeered at his prisoner openly. "I mean, Mr. Sheriff, that you'll
+stay with us till the girl does as she has promised. Understand?"
+
+"I think so, you hellhound. You're going to hold me against her so that
+she can't change her mind."
+
+"Exactly. So that she can't rue back. You've guessed it."
+
+They rode for hours, but in what direction it was impossible for Flatray
+to guess. He could tell when they were ascending, when dropping down hill,
+but in a country so rugged this meant nothing.
+
+When at last he dismounted and the kerchief was taken from his eyes he
+found himself in a little pocket of the hills in front of an old log
+cabin. Jeff stayed with him. The others rode away. But not till they had
+him safely tied to a heavy table leg within the hut.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+SQUIRE LATIMER TAKES A HAND
+
+
+"You're to make ready for a trip to town, _señorita_."
+
+"When?"
+
+"At once," Rosario answered. "By orders of _Señor_ MacQueen."
+
+"Then he is back?" the girl flashed.
+
+"Just back."
+
+"Tell him I want to see him--immediately."
+
+"I am to take you to him as soon as you are ready to ride."
+
+"Oh, very well."
+
+In a very few minutes the young woman was ready. Rosario led her to the
+cabin in front of which she had seen the old Indian squaw. In it were
+seated Simon West and Black MacQueen. Both of them rose at her entrance.
+
+"Please take a chair, Miss Lee. We have some business to talk over," the
+outlaw suggested.
+
+Melissy looked straight at him, her lips shut tight. "What have you done
+with Jack Flatray?" she presently demanded.
+
+"Left him to find his way back to his friends."
+
+"You didn't hurt him ... any more?"
+
+"No."
+
+"And you left him alone, wounded as he was."
+
+"We fixed up his wound," lied MacQueen.
+
+"Was it very bad?"
+
+"A scratch. I had to do it."
+
+"You needn't apologize to me."
+
+"I'm not apologizing, you little wild-cat."
+
+"What do you want with me? Why did you send for me?"
+
+"We're going to Mesa to see a parson. But before we start there's some
+business to fix up. Mr. West and I will need your help to fix up the
+negotiations for his release."
+
+"My help!" She looked at him in surprise. "How can I help?"
+
+"I've laid my demands before his friends. They'll come through with the
+money, sure. But I want them to understand the conditions right plainly,
+so there won't be any mistake. What they have got to get soaked into their
+heads is that, if they do make any mistakes, they will not see Simon West
+again alive. You put that up to them strong."
+
+"I'm not going to be your agent in robbing people of their money!" she
+told him swiftly.
+
+"You don't understand. Mr. West wants you to do it. He wants you to
+explain the facts to his friends, so they won't act rash and get off wrong
+foot first."
+
+"Oh! If Mr. West wishes it," she conceded.
+
+"I do wish it," the great man added.
+
+Though his face and hands were still stained with the dye that had been
+used on them, the railroad builder was now dressed in his own clothes. The
+girl thought that he looked haggard and anxious, and she was sure that her
+presence brought him relief. In his own way he was an indomitable fighter,
+but his experience had not included anything of this nature.
+
+Jack Flatray could look at death level-eyed, and with an even pulse,
+because for him it was all in the day's work; but the prospect of it shook
+West's high-strung nerves. Nevertheless, he took command of the
+explanations, because it had been his custom for years to lead.
+
+MacQueen, his sardonic smile in play, sat back and let West do most of the
+talking. Both men were working for the same end--to get the ransom paid as
+soon as possible--and the multimillionaire released; and the outlaw
+realized that Melissy would coöperate the more heartily if she felt she
+were working for West and not for himself.
+
+"This is Tuesday, Miss Lee. You will reach Mesa some time to-night. My
+friends ought to be on the ground already. I want you and your father to
+get in touch with them right away, and arrange the details along the line
+laid down by Mr. MacQueen. In case they agree to everything and understand
+fully, have the Stars and Stripes flying from your house all day
+to-morrow as a signal. Don't on any account omit this--because, if you do,
+my captors will have to hold me longer, pending further negotiations. I
+have written a letter to Mr. Lucas, exonerating you completely, Miss Lee;
+and I have ordered him to comply with all these demands without parley."
+
+"Our proposition seems to Mr. West very reasonable and fair," grinned
+MacQueen impishly, paring his finger nails.
+
+"At any rate, I think that my life is worth to this country a good deal
+more than three hundred thousand dollars," West corrected.
+
+"Besides being worth something to Simon West," the outlaw added
+carelessly.
+
+West plunged into the details of delivering the money. Once or twice the
+other man corrected him or amplified some statement. In order that there
+could be no mistake, a map of Sweetwater Cañon was handed to Melissy to be
+used by the man who would bring the money to the rendezvous at the Devil's
+Causeway.
+
+When it came to saying good-bye, the old man could scarce make up his mind
+to release the girl's hand. It seemed to him that she was the visible sign
+of his safety, and that with her departure went a safeguard from these
+desperate men. He could not forget that she had saved the life of the
+sheriff, even though he did not know what sacrifice she had made so to do.
+
+"I know you'll do your best for me," he said, with tears in his eyes.
+"Make Lucas see this thing right. Don't let any fool detectives bunco him
+into refusing to pay the ransom. Put it to him as strongly as you can,
+that it will be either my life or the money. I have ordered him to pay it,
+and I want it paid."
+
+Melissy nodded. "I'll tell him how it is, Mr. West. I know it will be all
+right. By Thursday afternoon we shall have you with us to dinner again.
+Trust us."
+
+"I do." He lowered his voice and glanced at MacQueen, who had been called
+aside to speak to one of his men. "And I'm glad you're going away from
+here. This is no place for you."
+
+"It isn't quite the place for you, either," she answered, with a faint,
+joyless smile.
+
+They started an hour before midday. Rosario had packed a lunch for both of
+them in MacQueen's saddlebags, for it was the intention of the latter to
+avoid ranches and traveled trails on the way down. He believed that the
+girl would go through with what she had pledged herself to do, but he did
+not mean to take chances of a rescue.
+
+In the middle of the afternoon they stopped for lunch at Round-up
+Spring--a water hole which had not dried up in a dozen years. It was a
+somber meal. Melissy's spirits had been sinking lower and lower with every
+mile that brought her nearer the destiny into which this man was forcing
+her. Food choked her, and she ate but little. Occasionally, with staring
+eyes, she would fall into a reverie, from which his least word would
+startle her to a shiver of apprehension. This she always controlled after
+the first instinctive shudder.
+
+"What's the matter with you, girl? I'm not going to hurt you any. I never
+hit a woman in my life," the man said once roughly.
+
+"Perhaps you may, after you're married. It's usually one's wife one beats.
+Don't be discouraged. You'll have the experience yet," she retorted, but
+without much spirit.
+
+"To hear you tell it, I'm a devil through and through! It's that kind of
+talk that drives a man to drink," he flung out angrily.
+
+"And to wife beating. Of course, I'm not your chattel yet, because the
+ceremony hasn't been read; but if you would like to anticipate a few hours
+and beat me, I don't suppose there is any reason you shouldn't."
+
+"Gad! How you hate me!"
+
+Her inveteracy discouraged him. His good looks, his debonair manner, the
+magnetic charm he knew how to exert--these, which had availed him with
+other women, did not seem to reach her at all. She really gave him no
+chance to prove himself. He was ready to be grave or gay--to be a
+light-hearted boy or a blasé man of the world--to adopt any rôle that
+would suit her. But how could one play up effectively to a chill silence
+which took no note of him, to a depression of the soul which would not
+let itself be lifted? He felt that she was living up to the barest letter
+of the law in fulfilling their contract, and because of it he steeled
+himself against her sufferings.
+
+There was one moment of their ride when she stood on the tiptoe of
+expectation and showed again the sparkle of eager life. MacQueen had
+resaddled after their luncheon, and they were climbing a long sidehill
+that looked over a dry valley. With a gesture, the outlaw checked her
+horse.
+
+"Look!"
+
+Some quarter of a mile from them two men were riding up a wash that ran
+through the valley. The mesquite and the cactus were thick, and it was for
+only an occasional moment that they could be seen. Black and the girl were
+screened from view by a live oak in front of them, so that there was no
+danger of being observed. The outlaw got out his field glasses and watched
+the men intently.
+
+Melissy could not contain the question that trembled on her lips: "Do you
+know them?"
+
+"I reckon not."
+
+"Perhaps----"
+
+"Well!"
+
+"May I look--please?"
+
+He handed her the glasses. She had to wait for the riders to reappear, but
+when they did she gave a little cry.
+
+"It's Mr. Bellamy!"
+
+"Oh, is it?"
+
+He looked at her steadily, ready to crush in her throat any call she might
+utter for help. But he soon saw that she had no intention of making her
+presence known. Her eyes were glued to the glasses. As long as the men
+were in sight she focused her gaze on them ravenously. At last a bend in
+the dry river bed hid them from view. She lowered the binoculars with a
+sigh.
+
+"Lucky they didn't see us," he said, with his easy, sinister laugh. "Lucky
+for them."
+
+She noticed for the first time that he had uncased his rifle and was
+holding it across the saddle-tree.
+
+Night slipped silently down from the hills--the soft, cool, velvet night
+of the Arizona uplands. The girl drooped in the saddle from sheer
+exhaustion. The past few days had been hard ones, and last night she had
+lost most of her sleep. She had ridden far on rough trails, had been
+subjected to a stress of emotion to which her placid maiden life had been
+unused. But she made no complaint. It was part of the creed she had
+unconsciously learned from her father to game out whatever had to be
+endured.
+
+The outlaw, though he saw her fatigue, would not heed it. She had chosen
+to set herself apart from him. Let her ask him to stop and rest, if she
+wanted to. It would do her pride good to be humbled. Yet in his heart he
+admired her the more, because she asked no favors of him and forbore the
+womanish appeal of tears.
+
+His watch showed eleven o'clock by the moon when the lights of Mesa
+glimmered in the valley below.
+
+"We'll be in now in half an hour," he said.
+
+She had no comment to make, and silence fell between them again until they
+reached the outskirts of the town.
+
+"We'll get off here and walk in," he ordered; and, after she had
+dismounted, he picketed the horses close to the road. "You can send for
+yours in the mornin'. Mine will be in the livery barn by that time."
+
+The streets were practically deserted in the residential part of the town.
+Only one man they saw, and at his approach MacQueen drew Melissy behind a
+large lilac bush.
+
+As the man drew near the outlaw's hand tightened on the shoulder of the
+girl. For the man was her father--dusty, hollow-eyed, and haggard. The two
+crouching behind the lilacs knew that this iron man was broken by his
+fears for his only child, the girl who was the apple of his eye.
+
+Not until he was out of hearing did Melissy open her lips to the stifled
+cry she had suppressed. Her arms went out to him, and the tears rolled
+down her cheeks. For herself she had not let herself break down, but for
+her father's grief her heart was like water.
+
+"All right. Don't break down now. You'll be with him inside of half an
+hour," the outlaw told her gruffly.
+
+They stopped at a house not much farther down the street, and he rang the
+bell. It took a second ring to bring a head out of the open window
+upstairs.
+
+"Well?" a sleepy voice demanded.
+
+"Is this Squire Latimer?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Come down. We want to get married."
+
+"Then why can't you come at a reasonable hour?--consarn it!"
+
+"Never mind that. There's a good fee in it. Hurry up!"
+
+Presently the door opened. "Come in. You can wait in the hall till I get a
+light."
+
+"No--I don't want a light. We'll step into this room, and be married at
+once," MacQueen told him crisply.
+
+"I don't know about that. I'm not marrying folks that can't be looked
+at."
+
+"You'll marry us, and at once. I'm Black MacQueen!"
+
+It was ludicrous to see how the justice of the peace fell back in terror
+before the redoubtable bad man of the hills.
+
+"Well, I don't know as a light is a legal necessity; but we got to have
+witnesses."
+
+"Have you any in the house?"
+
+"My daughter and a girl friend of hers are sleeping upstairs. I'll call
+them, Mr. Black--er--I mean Mr. MacQueen."
+
+The outlaw went with the squire to the foot of the stairs, whence Latimer
+wakened the girls and told them to dress at once, as quickly as possible.
+A few minutes later they came down--towsled, eyes heavy with sleep,
+giggling at each other in girlish fashion. But when they knew whose
+marriage they were witnessing, giggles and sleep fled together.
+
+They were due for another surprise later. MacQueen and his bride were
+standing in the heavy shadows, so that both bulked vaguely in mere
+outline. Hitherto, Melissy had not spoken a word. The time came when it
+was necessary for the justice to know the name of the girl whom he was
+marrying. Her answer came at once, in a low, scarcely audible voice:
+
+"Melissy Lee."
+
+An electric shock could scarce have startled them more. Of all the girls
+in Mesa none was so proud as Melissy Lee, none had been so far above
+criticism, such a queen in the frontier town. She had spent a year in
+school at Denver; she had always been a social leader. While she had
+always been friendly to the other girls, they had looked upon her with a
+touch of awe. She had all the things they craved, from beauty to money.
+And now she was marrying at midnight, in the dark, the most notorious bad
+man of Arizona!
+
+Here was a wonder of wonders to tell the other girls to-morrow. The only
+pity was that they could not see her face--and his. They had heard that he
+was handsome. No doubt that accounted for it. And what could be more
+romantic than a love match with such a fascinating villain? Probably he
+had stormed her heart irresistibly.
+
+The service proceeded. The responses of the man came clearly and
+triumphantly, those of the girl low but distinctly. It was the custom of
+the justice to join the hands of the parties he was marrying; but when he
+moved to do so this girl put both of hers quickly behind her. It was his
+custom also to kiss the bride after pronouncing them man and wife; but he
+omitted this, too, on the present occasion. Nor did the groom kiss her.
+
+The voice of the justice died away. They stood before him man and wife.
+The witnesses craned forward to see the outlaw embrace his bride. Instead,
+he reached into his pocket and handed Latimer a bill. The denomination of
+it was one hundred dollars, but the justice did not discover that until
+later.
+
+"I reckon that squares us," the bad man said unsentimentally. "Now, all of
+you back to bed."
+
+MacQueen and his bride passed out into the night. The girls noticed that
+she did not take his arm; that she even drew back, as if to avoid touching
+him as they crossed the threshold.
+
+Not until they reached the gate of her father's house did MacQueen speak.
+
+"I'm not all coyote, girl. I'll give you the three days I promised you.
+After that you'll join me wherever I say."
+
+"Yes," she answered without spirit.
+
+"You'll stand pat to our agreement. When they try to talk you out of it
+you won't give in?"
+
+"No."
+
+She was deadly weary, could scarce hold up her head.
+
+"If you lie to me I'll take it out on your folks. Don't forget that Jack
+Flatray will have to pay if you double-cross me."
+
+"No."
+
+"He'll have to pay in full."
+
+"You mean you'll capture him again."
+
+"I mean we won't have to do that. We haven't turned him loose yet."
+
+"Then you lied to me?" She stared at him with wide open eyes of horror.
+
+"I had to keep him to make sure of you."
+
+Her groan touched his vanity, or was it perhaps his pity?
+
+"I'm not going to hurt him--if you play fair. I tell you I'm no cur. Help
+me, girl, and I'll quit this hell raising and live decent."
+
+She laughed without joy, bitterly.
+
+"Oh, I know what you think," he continued. "I can't blame you. But what do
+you know about my life? What do you know about what I've had to fight
+against? All my life there has been some devil in me, strangling all the
+good. There has been nobody to give me a helping hand--none to hold me
+back. I was a dog with a bad name--good enough for hanging, and nothing
+else."
+
+He was holding the gate, and perforce she had to hear him out.
+
+"What do I care about that?" she cried, in a fierce gust of passion. "I
+see you are cur and coward! You lied to me. You didn't keep faith and free
+Jack Flatray. That is enough."
+
+She was the one person in the world who had power to wound him. Nor did it
+hurt the less that it was the truth. He drew back as if the lash of a whip
+had swept across his face.
+
+"No man alive can say that to me and live!" he told her. "Cur I may be;
+but you're my wife, 'Lissie MacQueen. Don't forget that."
+
+"Go! Go!" she choked. "I hope to God I'll never see your face again!"
+
+She flew along the grass-bordered walk, whipped open the front door, and
+disappeared within. She turned the key in the lock, and stood trembling in
+the darkness. She half expected him to follow, to attempt to regain
+possession of her.
+
+But the creak of his quick step on the porch did not come. Only her
+hammering heart stirred in the black silence. She drew a long breath of
+relief, and sank down on the stairs. It was over at last, the horrible
+nightmare through which she had been living.
+
+Gradually she fought down her fears and took hold of herself. She must
+find her father and relieve his anxiety. Quietly she opened the door of
+the hall into the living room.
+
+A man sat at the table, with his back to her, in an attitude of utter
+dejection. He was leaning forward, with his head buried in his arms. It
+was her father. She stepped forward, and put her hands on his bowed
+shoulders.
+
+"Daddy," she said softly.
+
+At her touch the haggard, hopeless, unshaven face was lifted toward her.
+For a moment Lee looked at her as if she had been a wraith. Then, with a
+hoarse cry, he arose and caught her in his arms.
+
+Neither of them could speak for emotion. He tried it twice before he could
+get out:
+
+"Baby! Honey!"
+
+He choked back the sobs in his throat. "Where did you come from? I thought
+sure MacQueen had you."
+
+"He had. He took me to Dead Man's Cache with him."
+
+"And you escaped. Praise the Lord, honey!"
+
+"No--he brought me back."
+
+"MacQueen did! Goddlemighty--he knows what's best for him!"
+
+"He brought me back to--to----" She broke down, and buried her head in his
+shoulder.
+
+Long, dry sobs racked her. The father divined with alarm that he did not
+know the worst.
+
+"Tell me--tell me, 'Lissie! Brought you back to do what, honey?" He held
+her back from him, his hands on her shoulders.
+
+"To marry me."
+
+"What!"
+
+"To marry me. And he did--fifteen minutes ago, I am Black MacQueen's
+wife."
+
+"Black MacQueen's wife! My God, girl!" Big Beauchamp Lee stared at her in
+a horror of incredulity.
+
+She told him the whole story, from beginning to end.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE TAKING OF THE CACHE
+
+
+It was understood that in the absence of the sheriff Richard Bellamy
+should have charge of the posse, and after the disappearance of Flatray he
+took command.
+
+With the passing years Bellamy had become a larger figure in the
+community. The Monte Cristo mine had made him independently wealthy, even
+though he had deeded one-third of it to Melissy Lee. Arizona had forgiven
+him his experiment at importing sheep and he was being spoken of as a
+territorial delegate to Congress, a place the mine owner by no means
+wanted. For his interests were now bound up in the Southwest. His home was
+there. Already a little toddler's soft fat fist was clinging to the skirt
+of Ferne.
+
+At first Bellamy, as well as Farnum, McKinstra, young Yarnell and the rest
+of the posse looked expectantly for the return of the sheriff. It was hard
+to believe that one so virile, so competent, so much a dominant factor of
+every situation he confronted, could have fallen a victim to the men he
+hunted. But as the days passed with no news of him the conviction grew
+that he had been waylaid and shot. The hunt went on, but the rule now was
+that no move should be made singly. Not even for an hour did the couples
+separate.
+
+One evening a woman drifted into camp just as they were getting ready to
+roll into their blankets. McKinstra was on sentry duty, but she got by him
+unobserved and startled Farnum into drawing his gun.
+
+Yet all she said was: "_Buenos tardes, señor_."
+
+The woman was a wrinkled Mexican with a close-shut, bitter mouth and
+bright, snappy eyes.
+
+Farnum stared at her in surprise. "Who in Arizona are you?"
+
+It was decidedly disturbing to think what might have happened if
+MacQueen's outfit had dropped in on them, instead of one lone old woman.
+
+"Rosario Chaves."
+
+"Glad to meet you, ma'am. Won't you sit down?"
+
+The others had by this time gathered around.
+
+Rosario spoke in Spanish, and Bob Farnum answered in the same language.
+"You want to find the way into Dead Man's Cache, señor?"
+
+"Do we? I reckon yes!"
+
+"Let me be your guide."
+
+"You know the way in?"
+
+"I live there."
+
+"Connected with MacQueen's outfit, maybe?"
+
+"I cook for him. My son was one of his men."
+
+"Was?"
+
+"Yes. He was killed--shot by Lieutenant O'Connor, the same man who was a
+prisoner at the Cache until yesterday morning."
+
+"Killed lately, ma'am?"
+
+"Two years ago. We swore revenge. MacQueen did not keep his oath, the oath
+we all swore together."
+
+Bellamy began to understand the situation. She wanted to get back at
+MacQueen, unless she were trying to lead them into a trap.
+
+"Let's get this straight. MacQueen turned O'Connor loose, did he?" Bellamy
+questioned.
+
+"No. He escaped. This man--what you call him?--the sheriff, helped him and
+Señor West to break away."
+
+The mine owner's eye met Farnum's. They were being told much news.
+
+"So they all escaped, did they?"
+
+"_Si, señor_, but MacQueen took West and the sheriff next morning. They
+could not find their way out of the valley."
+
+"But O'Connor escaped. Is that it?"
+
+Her eyes flashed hatred. "He escaped because the sheriff helped him. His
+life was forfeit to me. So then was the sheriff's. MacQueen he admit it.
+But when the girl promise to marry him he speak different."
+
+"What girl?"
+
+"_Señorita_ Lee."
+
+"Not Melissy Lee."
+
+"_Si, señor_."
+
+"My God! Melissy Lee a prisoner of that infernal villain. How did she come
+there?"
+
+The Mexican woman was surprised at the sudden change that had come over
+the men. They had grown tense and alert. Interest had flamed into a
+passionate eagerness.
+
+Rosario Chaves told the story from beginning to end, so far as she knew
+it; and every sentence of it wrung the big heart of these men. The pathos
+of it hit them hard. Their little comrade, the girl they had been fond of
+for years--the bravest, truest lass in Arizona--had fallen a victim to
+this intolerable fate! They could have wept with the agony of it if they
+had known how.
+
+"Are you sure they were married? Maybe the thing slipped up," Alan
+suggested, the hope father to the thought.
+
+But this hope was denied him; for the woman had brought with her a copy of
+the Mesa _Sentinel_, with an account of the marriage and the reason for
+it. This had been issued on the morning after the event, and MacQueen had
+brought it back with him to the Cache.
+
+Bellamy arranged with the Mexican woman a plan of attack upon the valley.
+Camp was struck at once, and she guided them through tortuous ravines and
+gulches deeper into the Roaring Fork country. She left them in a grove of
+aspens, just above the lip of the valley, on the side least frequented by
+the outlaws.
+
+They were to lie low until they should receive from her a signal that most
+of the gang had left to take West to the place appointed for the exchange.
+They were then to wait through the day until dusk, slip quietly down, and
+capture the ranch before the return of the party with the gold. In case
+anything should occur to delay the attack on the ranch, another signal was
+to be given by Rosario.
+
+The first signal was to be the hanging of washing upon the line. If this
+should be removed before nightfall, Bellamy was to wait until he should
+hear from her again.
+
+Bellamy believed that the Chaves woman was playing square with him, but he
+preferred to take no chances. As soon as she had left to return to the
+settlement of the outlaws he moved camp again to a point almost half a
+mile from the place where she had last seen them. If the whole thing were
+a "plant," and a night attack had been planned, he wanted to be where he
+and his men could ambush the ambushers, if necessary.
+
+But the night passed without any alarm. As the morning wore away the
+scheduled washing appeared on the line. Farnum crept down to the valley
+lip and trained his glasses on the ranch house. Occasionally he could
+discern somebody moving about, though there were not enough signs of
+activity to show the presence of many people. All day the wash hung
+drying on the line. Dusk came, the blankets still signaling that all was
+well.
+
+Bellamy led his men forward under cover, following the wooded ridge above
+the Cache so long as there was light enough by which they might be
+observed from the valley. With the growing darkness he began the descent
+into the bowl just behind the corral. A light shone in the larger cabin;
+and Bellamy knew that, unless Rosario were playing him false, the men
+would be at supper there. He left his men lying down behind the corral,
+while he crept forward to the window from which the light was coming.
+
+In the room were two men and the Mexican woman. The men, with elbows far
+apart, and knives and forks very busy, were giving strict attention to the
+business in hand. Rosario waited upon them, but with ear and eye guiltily
+alert to catch the least sound. The mine owner could even overhear
+fragments of the talk.
+
+"Ought to get back by midnight, don't you reckon? Pass the cow and the
+sugar, Buck. Keep a-coming with that coffee, Rosario. I ain't a mite
+afraid but what MacQueen will pull it off all right, you bet."
+
+"Sure, he will. Give that molasses a shove, Tom----"
+
+Bellamy drew his revolver and slipped around to the front door. He came in
+so quietly that neither of the men heard him. Both had their backs to the
+door.
+
+"Figure it up, and it makes a right good week's work. I reckon I'll go
+down to Chihuahua and break the bank at Miguel's," one of them was
+saying.
+
+"Better go to Yuma and break stones for a spell, Buck," suggested a voice
+from the doorway.
+
+Both men slewed their heads around as if they had been worked by the same
+lever. Their mouths opened, and their eyes bulged. A shining revolver
+covered them competently.
+
+"Now, don't you, Buck--nor you either, Tom!" This advice because of a
+tentative movement each had made with his right hand. "I'm awful careless
+about spilling lead, when I get excited. Better reach for the roof; then
+you won't have any temptations to suicide."
+
+The hard eyes of the outlaws swept swiftly over the cattleman. Had he
+shown any sign of indecision, they would have taken a chance and shot it
+out. But he was so easily master of himself that the impulse to "draw"
+died stillborn.
+
+Bellamy gave a sharp, shrill whistle. Footsteps came pounding across the
+open, and three armed men showed at the door.
+
+"Darn my skin if the old son of a gun hasn't hogged all the glory!" Bob
+Farnum complained joyfully. "Won't you introduce us to your friends,
+Bellamy?"
+
+"This gentleman with the biscuit in his hand is Buck; the one so partial
+to porterhouse steak is Tom," returned Bellamy gravely.
+
+"Glad to death to meet you, gents. Your hands seem so busy drilling for
+the ceiling, we won't shake right now. If it would be any kindness to you,
+I'll unload all this hardware, though. My! You tote enough with you to
+start a store, boys."
+
+"How did you find your way in?" growled Buck.
+
+"Jest drifted in on our automobiles and airships," Bob told him airily, as
+he unbuckled the revolver belt and handed it to one of his friends.
+
+The outlaws were bound, after which Rosario cooked the posse a dinner.
+This was eaten voraciously by all, for camp life had sharpened the
+appetite for a woman's cooking.
+
+One of the men kept watch to notify them when MacQueen and his gang should
+enter the valley, while the others played "pitch" to pass the time. In
+spite of this, the hours dragged. It was a good deal like waiting for a
+battle to begin. Bellamy and Farnum had no nerves, but the others became
+nervous and anxious.
+
+"I reckon something is keeping them," suggested Alan, after looking at his
+watch for the fifth time in half an hour. "Don't you reckon we better go
+up the trail a bit to meet them?"
+
+"I reckon we better wait here, Alan. Bid three," returned Farnum evenly.
+
+As he spoke, their scout came running in.
+
+"They're here, boys!"
+
+"Good enough! How many of them?"
+
+"Four of 'em, looked like. They were winding down the trail, and I
+couldn't make out how many."
+
+"All right, boys. Steady, now, till they get down from their horses. Hal,
+out with the light when I give the word."
+
+It was a minute to shake nerves of steel. They could hear the sound of
+voices, an echo of jubilant laughter, the sound of iron shoes striking
+stones in the trail. Then some one shouted:
+
+"Oh, you, Buck!"
+
+The program might have gone through as arranged, but for an unlooked-for
+factor in the proceedings. Buck let out a shout of warning to his trapped
+friends. Almost at the same instant the butt of Farnum's revolver smashed
+down on his head; but the damage was already done.
+
+Bellamy and his friends swarmed out like bees. The outlaws were waiting
+irresolutely--some mounted, others beside their horses. Among them were
+two pack horses.
+
+"Hands up!" ordered the mine owner sharply.
+
+The answer was a streak of fire from a rifle. Instantly there followed a
+fusillade. Flash after flash lit up the darkness. Staccato oaths, cries, a
+moan of pain, the trampling of frightened horses, filled the night with
+confusion.
+
+In spite of the shout of warning, the situation had come upon the bandits
+as a complete surprise. How many were against them, whether or not they
+were betrayed, the certainty that the law had at last taken them at a
+disadvantage--these things worked with the darkness for the posse. A man
+flung himself on his pony, lay low on its back, and galloped wildly into
+the night. A second wheeled and followed at his heels. Hank Irwin was
+down, with a bullet from a carbine through his jaw and the back of his
+head. A wild shot had brought down another. Of the outlaws only MacQueen,
+standing behind his horse as he fired, remained on the field uninjured.
+
+The cattlemen had scattered as the firing began, and had availed
+themselves of such cover as was to be had. Now they concentrated their
+fire on the leader of the outlaws. His horse staggered and went down,
+badly torn by a rifle bullet. A moment later the special thirty-two
+carbine he carried was knocked from his hands by another shot.
+
+He crouched and ran to Irwin's horse, flung himself to the saddle,
+deliberately emptied his revolver at his foes, and put spurs to the
+broncho. As he vanished into the hills Bob Farnum slowly sank to the
+ground.
+
+"I've got mine, Bellamy. Blamed if he ain't plumb bust my laig!"
+
+The mine owner covered the two wounded outlaws, while his men disarmed
+them. Then he walked across to his friend, laid down his rifle, and knelt
+beside him.
+
+"Did he get you bad, old man?"
+
+"Bad enough so I reckon I'll have a doc look at it one of these days." Bob
+grinned to keep down the pain.
+
+Once more there came the sound of hoofs beating the trail of decomposed
+granite. Bellamy looked up and grasped his rifle. A single rider loomed
+out of the darkness and dragged his horse to a halt, a dozen yards from
+the mine owner, in such a position that he was directly behind one of the
+pack horses.
+
+"Up with your hands!" ordered Bellamy on suspicion.
+
+Two hands went swiftly up from beside the saddle. The moonlight gleamed on
+something bright in the right hand. A flash rent the night. A jagged,
+red-hot pain tore through the shoulder of Hal Yarnell. He fired wildly,
+the shock having spoiled his aim.
+
+The attacker laughed exultantly, mockingly, as he swung his horse about.
+
+"A present from Black MacQueen," he jeered.
+
+With that, he was gone again, taking the pack animal with him. He had had
+the audacity to come back after his loot--and had got some of it, too.
+
+One of the unwounded cowpunchers gave pursuit, but half an hour later he
+returned ruefully.
+
+"I lost him somehow--darned if I know how. I seen him before me one
+minute; the next he was gone. Must 'a' known some trail that led off from
+the road, I reckon."
+
+Bellamy said nothing. He intended to take up the trail in person; but
+first the wounded had to be looked to, a man dispatched for a doctor, and
+things made safe against another possible but improbable attack. It was to
+be a busy night; for he had on hand three wounded men, as well as two
+prisoners who were sound. An examination showed him that neither of the
+two wounded outlaws nor Farnum nor Yarnell were fatally shot. All were
+hardy outdoors men, who had lived in the balsamic air of the hills; if
+complications did not ensue, they would recover beyond question.
+
+In this extremity Rosario was a first aid to the injured. She had betrayed
+the bandits without the least compunction, because they had ignored the
+oath of vengeance against the slayer of her son; but she nursed them all
+impartially and skillfully until the doctor arrived, late next day.
+
+Meanwhile Bellamy and McKinstra, guided by one of the outlaws, surprised
+Jeff and released Flatray, who returned with them to camp.
+
+With the doctor had come also four members of the Lee posse. To the deputy
+in charge Jack turned over his four prisoners and the gold recovered. As
+soon as the doctor had examined and dressed his wound he mounted and took
+the trail after MacQueen. With him rode Bellamy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+MELISSY ENTERTAINS
+
+
+The notes of Schumann's "Traümerei" died away. Melissy glanced over her
+music, and presently ran lightly into Chopin's "Valse Au Petit Chien." She
+was, after all, only a girl; and there were moments when she forgot to
+remember that she was wedded to the worst of unhanged villains. When she
+drowned herself fathoms deep in her music, she had the best chance of
+forgetting.
+
+Chaminade's "The Flatterer" followed. In the midst of this the door opened
+quietly and closed again. Melissy finished, fingered her music, and became
+somehow aware that she was not alone. She turned unhurriedly on the seat
+and met the smiling eyes of her husband.
+
+From his high-heeled boots to his black, glossy hair, Black MacQueen was
+dusty with travel. Beside him was a gunny sack, tied in the middle and
+filled at both ends. Picturesque he was and always would be, but his
+present costume scarce fitted the presence of a lady. Yet of this he gave
+no sign. He was leaning back in a morris chair, rakish, debonair, and at
+his ease. Evidently, he had been giving appreciative ear to the music, and
+more appreciative eye to the musician.
+
+"So it's you," said Melissy, white to the lips.
+
+MacQueen arose, recovered his dusty hat from the floor, and bowed
+theatrically. "Your long-lost husband, my dear."
+
+"What are you doing here?"
+
+"I'm visiting my wife. The explanation seems a trifle obvious."
+
+"What do you want?"
+
+"Have I said I wanted anything?"
+
+"Then you had better leave. I'll give you up if I get a chance."
+
+He looked at her with lazy derision. "I like you angry. Your eyes snap
+electricity, sweet."
+
+"Oh!" She gave a gesture of impatience. "Do you know that, if I were to
+step to that window and call out your name, the whole town would be in
+arms against you?"
+
+"Why don't you?"
+
+"I shall, if you don't go."
+
+"Are you alone in the house?"
+
+"Why do you ask?" Her heart was beating fast.
+
+"Because you must hide me till night. Is your father here?"
+
+"Not now. He is hunting you--to kill you if he finds you."
+
+"Servants?"
+
+"The cook is out for the afternoon. She will be back in an hour or two."
+
+"Good! Get me food."
+
+She did not rise. "I must know more. What is it? Are they hunting you?
+What have you done now?" A strong suppressed excitement beat in her
+pulses.
+
+"It is not what I have done, but what your friends have done. Yesterday I
+went to exchange West for the ransom money. Most of my men I had to take
+with me, to guard against foul play. We held the cañon from the flat tops,
+and everything went all right. The exchange was made. We took the ransom
+money back to the Cache. I don't know how it was--whether somebody played
+me false and sold us, or whether your friend Flatray got loose and his
+posse stumbled in by accident. But there they were in the Cache when we
+got back."
+
+"Yes?" The keenest agitation was in Melissy's voice.
+
+"They took us by surprise. We fought. Two of my men ran away. Two were
+shot down. I was alone."
+
+"And then?"
+
+The devil of torment moved in him. "Then I shot up one of your friend's
+outfit, rode away, changed my mind, and went back, shot your friend, and
+hiked off into the hills with a pack horse loaded with gold."
+
+Out of all this one thing stood out terribly to her. "You shot Jack
+Flatray--again!"
+
+He laughed. One lie more or less made no difference. "I sure did."
+
+She had to moisten her lips before she could ask the next question:
+"You--killed him?"
+
+"No--worse luck!"
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"He and another man were on the trail after me to-day. I saw them pass up
+Moose Creek from a ledge on which I was lying. If I had had a rifle, I
+would have finished the job; but my carbine was gone. It was too far for a
+six-gun."
+
+"But, if you wounded him last night, how could he be trailing you
+to-day?"
+
+"I reckon it was a flesh wound. His shoulder was tied up, I noticed."
+Impatiently he waved Flatray out of the conversation. "I didn't come here
+to tell you about him. I got to get out on tonight's train. This country
+has grown too hot for me. You're going with me?"
+
+"No!"
+
+"Yes, by God!"
+
+"I'll never go with you--never--never!" she cried passionately. "I'm free
+of the bargain. You broke faith. So shall I."
+
+She saw his jaw clamp. "So you're going to throw me down, are you?"
+
+Melissy stood before him, slim and straight, without yielding an inch. She
+was quite colorless, for he was a man with whose impulses she could not
+reckon. But one thing she knew. He could never take her away with him and
+escape. And she knew that he must know it, too.
+
+"If you want to call it that. You tricked me into marrying you. You meant
+to betray me all the time. Go, while there's still a chance. I don't want
+your blood on my hands."
+
+It was characteristic of him that he always wanted more what he could not
+get.
+
+"Don't answer so quick, girl. Listen to me. I've got enough in that sack
+to start us in the cattle business in Argentina. There's more buried in
+the hills, if we need it. Girl, I tell you I'm going to run straight from
+to-day!"
+
+She laughed scornfully. "And in the same breath you tell me how much you
+have stolen and are taking with you. If you were a Croesus, I wouldn't go
+with you." She flamed into sudden, fierce passion. "Will you never
+understand that I hate and detest you?"
+
+"You think you do, but you don't. You love me--only you won't let yourself
+believe it."
+
+"There's no arguing with such colossal conceit," she retorted, with hard
+laughter. "It's no use to tell you that I should like to see you dead at
+my feet."
+
+Swiftly he slid a revolver from its holster, and presented it to her, butt
+first. "You can have your wish right easy, if you mean it. Go to it.
+There's no danger. All you've got to give out is that I frightened you.
+You'll be a heroine, too."
+
+She looked at the weapon and at him, and the very thought of it made her
+sick. She saw the thing almost as if it were already done--the smoking
+revolver in her hand, and the man lying motionless before her.
+
+"Take it away," she said, with a shudder.
+
+"You see, you can't do it! You can't even go to the window there and shout
+out that Black MacQueen is with you in the house. You don't hate me at
+all, my dear."
+
+"Because I won't kill you with my own hand? You reason logically."
+
+"Then why don't you betray my presence? Why don't you call your friends in
+to take me?"
+
+"I'm not sure that I won't; but if I don't, it will be for their sakes,
+and not for yours. They could not take you without loss of life."
+
+"You're right there," he agreed, with a flash of his tigerish ferocity.
+"They couldn't take me alive at all, and I reckon before I checked in a
+few of them would."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+BLACK MACQUEEN CASHES HIS CHECKS
+
+
+It was part of his supreme audacity to trust her. While he was changing
+his dusty, travel-stained clothes for some that belonged to her brother
+she prepared a meal for him downstairs. A dozen times the impulse was on
+her to fly into the street and call out that Black MacQueen was in the
+house, but always she restrained herself. He was going to leave the
+country within a few hours. Better let him go without bloodshed.
+
+He came down to his dinner fresh from a bath and a shave, wearing a new
+tweed suit, which fitted him a trifle loosely, but was not unbecoming to
+his trim, lithe figure. No commercial traveler at a familiar hotel could
+have been more jauntily and blithely at home.
+
+"So you didn't run away!" He grinned.
+
+"Not yet. I'm going to later. I owe you a meal, and I wanted to pay it
+first."
+
+It was his very contempt of fear that had held her. To fool away half an
+hour in dressing, knowing that it was very likely she might be summoning
+men to kill him--to come down confident and unperturbed, possibly to meet
+his death--was such a piece of dare-deviltry as won reluctant admiration,
+in spite of her detestation of him. Even if she did not give him up, his
+situation was precarious in the extreme. All the trains were being
+watched; and in spite of this he had to walk boldly to the station, buy a
+ticket, and pass himself off for an ordinary traveler.
+
+Both knew that the chances were against him, but he gave no sign of
+concern or anxiety. Never had Melissy seen him so full of spirits. The
+situation would have depressed most men; him it merely stimulated. The
+excitement of it ran like wine through his blood. Driven from his hills,
+with every man's hand against him, with the avenues of escape apparently
+closed, he was in his glory. He would play his cards out to the end,
+without whining, no matter how the game might go.
+
+Melissy washed the dishes, in order that the cook might not know that she
+had had a guest for luncheon. The two returned to the living room. It was
+his whim to have her play for him; and she was glad to comply, because it
+interfered with his wooing. She was no longer greatly afraid of him, for
+she knew that he was on his good behavior to win her liking.
+
+Fortune favored her. For some time they had heard the cook moving about in
+the kitchen. Once she had poked her head in to know whether her young
+mistress would like the cherry pie for dinner.
+
+"I didn't know yez had company, Miss 'Lissie," she had apologized.
+
+"This gentleman will stay to dinner," Melissy had announced.
+
+At luncheon Melissy had not eaten with him; but at dinner it was
+necessary, on account of the cook, that she sit down, too. The meal had
+scarce begun when Kate came beaming in.
+
+"Shure, Miss 'Lissie, there's another young gentleman at the door. It's
+Mr. Bellamy. I tould him to come right in. He's washing his face first."
+
+Melissy rose, white as a sheet. "All right, Kate."
+
+But as soon as the cook had left the room she turned to the outlaw. "What
+shall I do? What shall I do?"
+
+Little whimsical imps of mischief shone in his eyes. "Have him in and
+introduce him to your husband, my dear."
+
+"You must go--quick. If I don't get rid of him, you'll be able to slip out
+the back way and get to the depot. He doesn't know you are here."
+
+MacQueen sat back and gave her his easy, reckless smile. "Guess again.
+Bellamy can't drive me out."
+
+She caught her hands together. "Oh, go--go! There will be trouble. You
+wouldn't kill him before my very eyes!"
+
+"Not unless he makes the first play. It's up to him." He laughed with the
+very delight of it. "I'd as lief settle my account with him right now.
+He's meddled too much in my affairs."
+
+She broke out in a cry of distress: "You wouldn't! I've treated you fair.
+I could have betrayed you, and I didn't. Aren't you going to play square
+with me?"
+
+He nodded. "All right. Show him in. He won't know me except as Lieutenant
+O'Connor. It was too dark last night to see my face."
+
+Bellamy came into the room.
+
+"How's Jack?" Melissy asked quickly as she caught his hand.
+
+"Good as new. And you?"
+
+"All right."
+
+The outlaw stirred uneasily in his seat. His vanity objected to another
+man holding the limelight while he was present.
+
+Melissy turned. "I think you have never met Lieutenant O'Connor, Mr.
+Bellamy. Lieutenant--Mr. Bellamy."
+
+They shook hands. MacQueen smiled. He was enjoying himself.
+
+"Glad to meet you, Mr. Bellamy. You and Flatray have won the honors
+surely. You beat us all to it, sir. As I rode in this mornin', everybody
+was telling how you rounded up the outlaws. Have you caught MacQueen
+himself?"
+
+"Not yet. We have reason to believe that he rode within ten miles of town
+this morning before he cut across to the railroad. The chances are that
+he will try to board a train at some water tank in the dark. We're having
+them all watched. I came in to telephone all stations to look out for
+him."
+
+"Where's Jack?" Melissy asked.
+
+"He'll be here presently. His arm was troubling him some, so he stopped to
+see the doctor. Then he has to talk with his deputy."
+
+"You're sure he isn't badly hurt?"
+
+"No, only a scratch, he calls it."
+
+"Did you happen on Dead Man's Cache by accident?" asked MacQueen with
+well-assumed carelessness.
+
+Bellamy had no intention of giving Rosario away to anybody. "You might
+call it that," he said evenly. "You know, I had been near there once when
+I was out hunting."
+
+"Do you expect to catch MacQueen?" the outlaw asked, a faint hint of irony
+in his amused voice.
+
+"I can't tell. That's what I'm hoping, lieutenant."
+
+"We hope for a heap of things we never get," returned the outlaw, in a
+gentle voice, his eyes half shuttered behind drooping lids.
+
+Melissy cut into the conversation hurriedly. "Lieutenant O'Connor is going
+on the seven-five this evening, Mr. Bellamy. He has business that will
+take him away for a while. It is time we were going. Won't you walk down
+to the train with us?"
+
+MacQueen swore softly under his breath, but there was nothing he could say
+in protest. He knew he could not take the girl with him. Now he had been
+cheated out of his good-byes by her woman's wit in dragging Bellamy to the
+depot with them. He could not but admire the adroitness with which she had
+utilized her friend to serve her end.
+
+They walked to the station three abreast, the outlaw carrying as lightly
+as he could the heavy suitcase that held his plunder. Melissy made small
+talk while they waited for the train. She was very nervous, and she was
+trying not to show it.
+
+"Next time you come, lieutenant, we'll have a fine stone depot to show
+you. Mr. West has promised to make Mesa the junction point, and we're sure
+to have a boom," she said.
+
+A young Mexican vaquero trailed softly behind them, the inevitable
+cigarette between his lips. From under his broad, silver-laced sombrero he
+looked keenly at each of the three as he passed.
+
+A whistle sounded clearly in the distance.
+
+The outlaw turned to the girl beside him. "I'm coming back some day soon.
+Be sure of that, Mrs. MacQueen."
+
+The audacity of the name used, designed as it was to stab her friend and
+to remind Melissy how things stood, made the girl gasp. She looked quickly
+at Bellamy and saw him crush the anger from his face.
+
+The train drew into the station. Presently the conductor's "All aboard!"
+served notice that it was starting. The outlaw shook hands with Melissy
+and then with the mine owner.
+
+"Good-bye. Don't forget that I'm coming back," he said, in a perfectly
+distinct, low tone.
+
+And with that he swung aboard the Pullman car with his heavy suitcase. An
+instant later the Mexican vaquero pulled himself to the vestibule of the
+smoking car ahead.
+
+MacQueen looked back from the end of the train at the two figures on the
+platform. A third figure had joined them. It was Jack Flatray. The girl
+and the sheriff were looking at each other. With a furious oath, he turned
+on his heel. For the evidence of his eyes had told him that they were
+lovers.
+
+MacQueen passed into the coach and flung himself down into his section
+discontentedly. The savor of his adventure was gone. He had made his
+escape with a large share of the plunder, in spite of spies and posses.
+But in his heart he knew that he had lost forever the girl whom he had
+forced to marry him. He was still thinking about it somberly when a figure
+appeared in the aisle at the end of the car.
+
+Instantly the outlaw came to alert attention, and his hand slipped to the
+butt of a revolver. The figure was that of the Mexican vaquero whom he had
+carelessly noted on the platform of the station. Vigilantly his gaze
+covered the approaching man. Surely in Arizona there were not two men with
+that elastic tread or that lithe, supple figure.
+
+His revolver flashed in the air. "Stand back, Bucky O'Connor--or, by God,
+I'll drill you!"
+
+The vaquero smiled. "Right guess, Black MacQueen. I arrest you in the name
+of the law."
+
+Black's revolver spat flame twice before the ranger's gun got into action,
+but the swaying of the train caused him to stagger as he rose to his
+feet.
+
+The first shot of Bucky's revolver went through the heart of the outlaw;
+but so relentless was the man that, even after that, his twitching fingers
+emptied the revolver. O'Connor fired only once. He watched his opponent
+crumple up, fling wild shots into the upholstery and through the roof, and
+sink into the silence from which there is no awakening on this side of the
+grave. Then he went forward and looked down at him.
+
+"I reckon that ends Black MacQueen," he said quietly. "And I reckon
+Melissy Lee is a widow."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jack Flatray had met O'Connor at his own office and the two had come down
+to the station on the off chance that MacQueen might try to make his
+getaway from Mesa in some disguise. But as soon as he saw Melissy the
+sheriff had eyes for nobody else except the girl he loved. One sleeve of
+his coat was empty, and his shoulder was bandaged. He looked very tired
+and drawn; for he had ridden hard more than sixteen hours with a painful
+wound. But the moment his gaze met hers she knew that his thoughts were
+all for her and her trouble.
+
+His free hand went out to meet hers. She forgot MacQueen and all the
+sorrow he had brought her. Her eyes were dewy with love and his answered
+eagerly. She knew now that she would love Jack Flatray for better or worse
+until death should part them. But she knew, too, that the shadow of
+MacQueen, her husband by law, was between them.
+
+Together they walked back from the depot. In the shadow of the vines on
+her father's porch they stopped. Jack caught her hands in his and looked
+down into her tired, haggard face all lit with love. Tears were in the
+eyes of both.
+
+"You're entitled to the truth, Jack," she told him. "I love you. I think I
+always have. And I know I always shall. But I'm another man's wife. It
+will have to be good-bye between us, Jack," she told him wistfully.
+
+He took her in his arms and kissed her. "You're my sweetheart. I'll not
+give you up. Don't think it."
+
+He spoke with such strength, such assurance, that she knew he would not
+yield without a struggle.
+
+"I'll never be anything to him--never. But he stands between us. Don't you
+see he does?"
+
+"No. Your marriage to him is empty words. We'll have it annulled. It will
+not stand in any court. I've won you and I'm going to keep you. There's no
+two ways about that."
+
+She broke down and began to sob quietly in a heartbroken fashion, while he
+tried to comfort her. It was not so easy as he thought. So long as
+MacQueen lived Flatray would walk in danger if she did as he wanted her to
+do.
+
+Neither of them knew that Bucky O'Connor's bullet had already annulled the
+marriage, that happiness was already on the wing to them.
+
+This hour was to be for their grief, the next for their joy.
+
+The End
+
+
+
+
+NOVELS OF FRONTIER LIFE BY
+
+WILLIAM MACLEOD RAINE
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+MAVERICKS
+
+A tale of the western frontier, where the "rustler" abounds. One of the
+sweetest love stories ever told.
+
+A TEXAS RANGER
+
+How a member of the border police saved the life of an innocent man,
+followed a fugitive to Wyoming, and then passed through deadly peril to
+ultimate happiness.
+
+WYOMING
+
+In this vivid story the author brings out the turbid life of the frontier
+with all its engaging dash and vigor.
+
+RIDGWAY OF MONTANA
+
+The scene is laid in the mining centers of Montana, where politics and
+mining industries are the religion of the country.
+
+BUCKY O'CONNOR
+
+Every chapter teems with wholesome, stirring adventures, replete with the
+dashing spirit of the border.
+
+CROOKED TRAILS AND STRAIGHT
+
+A story of Arizona; of swift-riding men and daring outlaws; of a bitter
+feud between cattlemen and sheep-herders.
+
+BRAND BLOTTERS
+
+A story of the turbid life of the frontier with a charming love interest
+running through its pages.
+
+STEVE YEAGER
+
+A story brimful of excitement, with enough gun-play and adventure to suit
+anyone.
+
+A DAUGHTER OF THE DONS
+
+A Western story of romance and adventure, comprising a vivacious and
+stirring tale.
+
+THE HIGHGRADER
+
+A breezy, pleasant and amusing love story of Western mining life.
+
+THE PIRATE OF PANAMA
+
+A tale of old-time pirates and of modern love, hate and adventure.
+
+THE YUKON TRAIL
+
+A crisply entertaining love story in the land where might makes right.
+
+THE VISION SPLENDID
+
+In which two cousins are contestants for the same prizes: political honors
+and the hand of a girl.
+
+THE SHERIFF'S SON
+
+The hero finally conquers both himself and his enemies and wins the love
+of a wonderful girl.
+
+Grosset & Dunlap, Publishers, New York
+
+
+
+
+JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD'S
+
+STORIES OF ADVENTURE
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+THE RIVER'S END
+
+A story of the Royal Mounted Police.
+
+THE GOLDEN SNARE
+
+Thrilling adventures in the Far Northland.
+
+NOMADS OF THE NORTH
+
+The story of a bear-cub and a dog.
+
+KAZAN
+
+The tale of a "quarter-strain wolf and three-quarters husky" torn between
+the call of the human and his wild mate.
+
+BAREE, SON OF KAZAN
+
+The story of the son of the blind Grey Wolf and the gallant part he played
+in the lives of a man and a woman.
+
+THE COURAGE OF CAPTAIN PLUM
+
+The story of the King of Beaver Island, a Mormon colony, and his battle
+with Captain Plum.
+
+THE DANGER TRAIL
+
+A tale of love, Indian vengeance, and a mystery of the North.
+
+THE HUNTED WOMAN
+
+A tale of a great fight in the "valley of gold" for a woman.
+
+THE FLOWER OF THE NORTH
+
+The story of Fort o' God, where the wild flavor of the wilderness is
+blended with the courtly atmosphere of France.
+
+THE GRIZZLY KING
+
+The story of Thor, the big grizzly.
+
+ISOBEL
+
+A love story of the Far North.
+
+THE WOLF HUNTERS
+
+A thrilling tale of adventure in the Canadian wilderness.
+
+THE GOLD HUNTERS
+
+The story of adventure in the Hudson Bay wilds.
+
+THE COURAGE OF MARGE O'DOONE
+
+Filled with exciting incidents in the land of strong men and women.
+
+BACK TO GOD'S COUNTRY
+
+A thrilling story of the Far North. The great Photoplay was made from this
+book.
+
+Grosset & Dunlap, Publishers, New York
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Brand Blotters, by William MacLeod Raine
+
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+"http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd">
+<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml">
+<head>
+<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" />
+<title>
+The Project Gutenberg eBook of Brand Blotters, by William MacLeod Raine.
+</title>
+
+<style type="text/css">
+/*<![CDATA[  XML blockout */
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+    p                 {margin-top: 0.5em; text-align: justify; margin-bottom: 0.5em;}
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+    @media screen     {
+      hr.ppg-pb       {margin:30px 0; width:100%; border:none;border-top:thin dashed silver;}
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+    }
+    @media print      {
+      hr.ppg-pb       {border:none;page-break-after: always;}
+      .pagenum        { display:none; }
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+    h3                {text-align:center; font-weight:normal; font-size: 1.2em;}
+    div.ce p          {text-align: center; margin: auto 0;}
+    .figcenter        {margin: 2em auto 2em auto; text-align: center;}
+    div.la p          {text-align: left; margin: auto 0;}
+    .caption          {font-size:.8em;}
+    table             {margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; clear: both;}
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+    hr.major          {width: 65%; margin-top: 2em; margin-bottom: 2em; border:none; border-bottom:1px solid black; clear:both;}
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+</head>
+<body>
+
+
+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Brand Blotters, by William MacLeod Raine
+
+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: Brand Blotters
+
+Author: William MacLeod Raine
+
+Illustrator: Clarence Rowe
+
+Release Date: December 7, 2008 [EBook #27436]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BRAND BLOTTERS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+</pre>
+
+
+<hr class='ppg-pb' />
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<img src='images/illus-fpc.jpg' alt='' title='' style='width: 345px; height: 544px;' /><br />
+<p class='caption' style='margin: 0 auto; text-align:center;width: 345px;'>
+&#8220;WHO ARE YOU?&#8221; &#8220;WATER!&#8221; HE GASPED. <i>Page 20.</i><br />
+</p>
+</div>
+
+<hr class='ppg-pb' />
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:2em; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:2em;'>BRAND BLOTTERS</p>
+<p>BY</p>
+<p style='font-size:1.4em; margin-bottom:3em;'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>WILLIAM MacLEOD RAINE</span></p>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em;'>AUTHOR OF</p>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em;'>WYOMING, BUCKY O&#8217;CONNOR, MAVERICKS,</p>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em;'>A TEXAS RANGER, RIDGWAY OF</p>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em; margin-bottom:4em;'>MONTANA, <span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Etc.</span></p>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em;'>ILLUSTRATIONS BY</p>
+<p style='margin-bottom:4em;'>CLARENCE ROWE</p>
+</div>
+
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<img src='images/illus-emb.jpg' alt='' title='' style='width: 62px; height: 33px;' /><br />
+</div>
+
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:1.2em;'>GROSSET &amp; DUNLAP</p>
+<p style='margin-bottom:2em;'>PUBLISHERS&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;NEW YORK</p>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em; margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:3em;'>Made in the United States of America</p>
+</div>
+
+<hr class='ppg-pb' />
+<div class='ce' style='font-size:0.8em;'>
+<p>Copyright, 1909, by <span style='font-variant: small-caps'>J. B. Lippincott Co.</span></p>
+<p style='margin-bottom:1em;'>Copyright, 1911, by <span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Street &amp; Smith</span></p>
+<p><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Copyright, 1912, by</span></p>
+<p style='margin-bottom:2em;'>G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY</p>
+<p><i>Brand Blotters</i></p>
+</div>
+
+<hr class='ppg-pb' />
+<div class='ce'>
+<p>TO</p>
+<p>FRANK N. SPINDLER</p>
+<div style='margin-top:1em'></div>
+<p>In Memory of Certain Sunday Afternoon Tramps</p>
+<p>Long Ago, During Which We Solved the</p>
+<p>Problems of the Nation</p>
+</div>
+
+<hr class='ppg-pb' />
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:1.4em; margin-bottom:1em;'>CONTENTS</p>
+</div>
+
+<table border='0' width='500' cellpadding='2' cellspacing='0' summary='Contents' style='margin:1em auto;'>
+	<tr>
+		<td colspan="3">
+			<p style='font-size:1.2em; margin-bottom:1em; text-align:center;'>PART I<br />MELISSY OF THE BAR DOUBLE G</p>
+			</td></tr>
+<tr>
+  <td align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'><span style='font-size:small;'>CHAPTER</span></td>
+  <td></td>
+  <td align='right'><span style='font-size:small;'>PAGE</span></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>I</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>A Crossed Trail</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#I_A_CROSSED_TRAIL'>11</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>II</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Brand Blotting</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#II_BRAND_BLOTTING'>18</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>III</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>An Accusation</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#III_AN_ACCUSATION'>35</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>IV</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Man with the Chihuahua Hat</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#IV_THE_MAN_WITH_THE_CHIHUAHUA_HAT'>49</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>V</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Tenderfoot Takes up a Claim</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#V_THE_TENDERFOOT_TAKES_UP_A_CLAIM'>61</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VI</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>&#8221;Hands Up&#8221;</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VI__HANDS_UP'>75</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VII</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Watering Sheep</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VII_WATERING_SHEEP'>98</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VIII</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Boone-Bellamy Feud is Renewed</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VIII_THE_BOONEBELLAMY_FEUD_IS_RENEWED'>109</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>IX</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Danger Line</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#IX_THE_DANGER_LINE'>121</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>X</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Jack Goes to the Head of the Class</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#X_JACK_GOES_TO_THE_HEAD_OF_THE_CLASS'>141</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XI</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>A Conversation</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XI_A_CONVERSATION'>156</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XII</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Tenderfoot Makes a Proposition</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XII_THE_TENDERFOOT_MAKES_A_PROPOSITION'>163</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XIII</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Old Acquaintances</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIII_OLD_ACQUAINTANCES'>182</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XIV</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Concerning the Boone-Bellamy-Yarnell Feud</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIV_CONCERNING_THE_BOONEBELLAMYYARNELL_FEUD'>191</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+	<td colspan="3">
+		<p style='font-size:1.2em; margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:1em; text-align:center;'>PART II<br />Dead MAN&#8217;S CACHE</p>
+		</td></tr>
+		<tr>
+		  <td align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'><span style='font-size:small;'>CHAPTER</span></td>
+		  <td></td>
+		  <td align='right'><span style='font-size:small;'>PAGE</span></td>
+		</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>I</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Kidnapped</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#I_KIDNAPPED'>199</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>II</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>A Capture</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#II_A_CAPTURE'>209</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>III</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Tables Turned</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#III_THE_TABLES_TURNED'>217</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>IV</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Real Bucky and the False</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#IV_THE_REAL_BUCKY_AND_THE_FALSE'>231</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>V</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>A Photograph</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#V_A_PHOTOGRAPH'>243</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VI</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>In Dead Man&#8217;s Cache</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VI_IN_DEAD_MAN_S_CACHE'>255</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VII</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>&#8220;Trapped!&#8221;</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VII__TRAPPED'>266</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>VIII</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>An Escape and a Capture</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#VIII_AN_ESCAPE_AND_A_CAPTURE'>276</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>IX</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>A Bargain</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#IX_A_BARGAIN'>286</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>X</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Price</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#X_THE_PRICE'>301</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XI</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Squire Latimer Takes a Hand</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XI_SQUIRE_LATIMER_TAKES_A_HAND'>306</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XII</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>The Taking of the Cache</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XII_THE_TAKING_OF_THE_CACHE'>322</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XIII</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Melissy Entertains</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIII_MELISSY_ENTERTAINS'>334</a></td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+  <td valign='top' align='right' style='padding-right:1em;'>XIV</td>
+  <td valign='top' align='left'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Black MacQueen Cashes his Checks</span>&nbsp;&nbsp;</td>
+  <td valign='bottom' align='right'><a href='#XIV_BLACK_MACQUEEN_CASHES_HIS_CHECKS'>340</a></td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+
+<hr class='ppg-pb' />
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:1.4em; margin-top:1em;'>PART I</p>
+<p style='font-size:1.4em; margin-bottom:1em;'>MELISSY OF THE BAR DOUBLE G</p>
+</div>
+
+<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_11' name='page_11'></a>11</span></div>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='I_A_CROSSED_TRAIL' id='I_A_CROSSED_TRAIL'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER I</h2>
+<h3>A CROSSED TRAIL</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>The tenderfoot rose from the ledge upon
+which he had been lying and stretched
+himself stiffly. The chill of the long night
+had set him shivering. His bones ached from the
+pressure of his body upon the rock where he had
+slept and waked and dozed again with troubled
+dreams. The sharpness of his hunger made him
+light-headed. Thirst tortured him. His throat
+was a lime-kiln, his tongue swollen till it filled his
+mouth.</p>
+<p>If the night had been bad, he knew the day would
+be a hundred times worse. Already a gray light
+was sifting into the hollow of the sky. The vague
+misty outlines of the mountains were growing
+sharper. Soon from a crotch of them would rise
+a red hot cannon ball to pour its heat into the
+parched desert.</p>
+<p>He was headed for the Sonora line, for the hills
+where he had heard a man might drop out of sight
+of the civilization that had once known him. There
+were reasons why he had started in a hurry, without
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_12' name='page_12'></a>12</span>
+a horse or food or a canteen, and these same
+reasons held good why he could not follow beaten
+tracks. All yesterday he had traveled without
+sighting a ranch or meeting a human being. But
+he knew he must get to water soon&mdash;if he were
+to reach it at all.</p>
+<p>A light breeze was stirring, and on it there was
+borne to him a faint rumble as of thunder. Instantly
+the man came to a rigid alertness. Thunder
+might mean rain, and rain would be salvation.
+But the sound did not die away. Instead, it deepened
+to a steady roar, growing every instant louder.
+His startled glance swept the cañon that drove like
+a sword cleft into the hills. Pouring down it, with
+the rush of a tidal wave, came a wall of cattle, a
+thousand backs tossing up and down as the swell
+of a troubled sea. Though he had never seen one
+before, the man on the lip of the gulch knew that
+he was watching a cattle stampede. Under the impact
+of the galloping hoofs the ground upon which
+he stood quaked.</p>
+<p>A cry diverted his attention. From the bed of
+the sandy wash a man had started up and was running
+for his life toward the cañon walls. Before
+he had taken half a dozen steps the avalanche was
+upon him, had cut him down, swept over him.</p>
+<p>The thud of the hoofs died away. Into the open
+desert the stampede had passed. A huddled mass
+lay motionless on the sand in the track of the avalanche.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_13' name='page_13'></a>13</span></p>
+<p>A long ragged breath whistled through the closed
+lips of the tenderfoot. He ran along the edge of
+the rock wall till he found a descent less sharp,
+lowered himself by means of jutting quartz and
+mesquit cropping out from the crevices, and so
+came through a little draw to the cañon.</p>
+<p>He dropped on a knee beside the sprawling, huddled
+figure. No second glance was needed to see
+that the man was dead. Life had been trampled
+out of him almost instantly and his features battered
+beyond any possible recognition. Unused to
+scenes of violence, the stranger stooping over him
+felt suddenly sick. It made him shudder to remember
+that if he could have found a way down
+in the darkness he, too, would have slept in the
+warm sand of the dry wash. If he had, the fate
+of this man would have been his.</p>
+<p>Under the doubled body was a canteen. The
+trembling fingers of the tenderfoot unscrewed the
+cork. Tipping the vessel, he drank avidly. One
+swallow, a second, then a few trickling drops. The
+canteen had been almost empty.</p>
+<p>Uncovering, he stood bareheaded before the inert
+body and spoke gently in the low, soft voice
+one instinctively uses in the presence of the dead.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Friend, I couldn&#8217;t save your life, but your water
+has saved mine, I reckon. Anyhow, it gives me
+another chance to fight for it. I wish I could do
+something for you ... carry a message to
+your folks and tell them how it happened.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_14' name='page_14'></a>14</span></p>
+<p>He dropped down again beside the dead man and
+rifled the pockets. In them he found two letters
+addressed in an illiterate hand to James Diller,
+Cananea, Sonora, Mexico. An idea flashed into his
+brain and for a moment held him motionless while
+he worked it out. Why not? This man was about
+his size, dressed much like him, and so mutilated
+that identification was impossible.</p>
+<p>From his own pocket he took a leather bill book
+and a monogrammed cigarcase. With a sharp stone
+he scarred the former. The metal case he crushed
+out of shape beneath the heel of his boot. Having
+first taken one twenty dollar yellowback from the
+well-padded book, he slipped it and the cigarcase
+into the inner coat pocket of the dead man. Irregularly
+in a dozen places he gashed with his knife
+the derby hat he was wearing, ripped the band half
+loose, dragged it in the dust, and jumped on it till
+the hat was flat as a pancake. Finally he kicked
+it into the sand a dozen yards away.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The cattle would get it tangled in their hoofs
+and drag it that far with them,&#8221; he surmised.</p>
+<p>The soft gray hat of the dead man he himself
+appropriated. Again he spoke to the lifeless body,
+lowering his voice to a murmur.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon you wouldn&#8217;t grudge me this if you
+knew. I&#8217;m up against it. If I get out of these
+hills alive I&#8217;ll be lucky. But if I do&mdash;well, it won&#8217;t
+do you any harm to be mistaken for me, and it
+will accommodate me mightily. I hate to leave you
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_15' name='page_15'></a>15</span>
+here alone, but it&#8217;s what I&#8217;ve got to do to save myself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He turned away and plodded up the dry creek
+bed.</p>
+<hr class='tb' />
+
+<p>The sun was at the meridian when three heavily
+armed riders drew up at the mouth of the cañon.
+They fell into the restful, negligent postures of
+horsemen accustomed to take their ease in the
+saddle.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you figure maybe he&#8217;s working up to the
+headwaters of Dry Sandy?&#8221; one suggested.</p>
+<p>A squat, bandy-legged man with a face of tanned
+leather presently answered. &#8220;No, Tim, I expect not.
+The way I size him up Mr. Richard Bellamy
+wouldn&#8217;t know Dry Sandy from an irrigation ditch.
+Mr. R. B. hopes he&#8217;s hittin&#8217; the high spots for
+Sonora, but he ain&#8217;t anyways sure. Right about
+now he&#8217;s ridin&#8217; the grub line, unless he&#8217;s made a
+strike somewhere.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The third member of the party, a lean, wide-shouldered,
+sinewy youth, blue silk kerchief knotted
+loosely around his neck, broke in with a gesture
+that swept the sky. &#8220;Funny about all them buzzards.
+What are they doing here, sheriff?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The squat man opened his mouth to answer, but
+Tim took the word out of his mouth.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look!&#8221; His arm had shot straight out toward
+the cañon. A coyote was disappearing on the lope.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_16' name='page_16'></a>16</span>
+&#8220;Something lying there in the wash at the bend,
+Burke.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Sheriff Burke slid his rifle from its scabbard.
+&#8220;We&#8217;ll not take any chances, boys. Spread out far
+as you can. Tim, ride close to the left wall. You
+keep along the right one, Flatray. Me, I&#8217;ll take the
+center. That&#8217;s right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They rode forward cautiously. Once Flatray
+spoke.</p>
+<p>&#8220;By the tracks there has been a lot of cattle down
+here on the jump recently.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s what,&#8221; Tim agreed.</p>
+<p>Flatray swung from his saddle and stooped over
+the body lying at the bend of the wash.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Crushed to death in a cattle stampede, looks
+like,&#8221; he called to the sheriff.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Search him, Jack,&#8221; the sheriff ordered.</p>
+<p>The young man gave an exclamation of surprise.
+He was standing with a cigarcase in one hand and
+a billbook in the other. &#8220;It&#8217;s the man we&#8217;re after&mdash;it&#8217;s
+Bellamy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Burke left his horse and came forward. &#8220;How
+do you know?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Initials on the cigarcase, R. B. Same monogram
+on the billbook.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The sheriff had stooped to pick up a battered hat
+as he moved toward the deputy. Now he showed
+the initials stamped on the sweat band. &#8220;R. B.
+here, too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Suit of gray clothes, derby hat, size and weight
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_17' name='page_17'></a>17</span>
+about medium. We&#8217;ll never know about the scar
+on the eyebrow, but I guess Mr. Bellamy is identified
+without that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Must have camped here last night and while
+he was asleep the cattle stampeded down the cañon,&#8221;
+Tim hazarded.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That guess is as good as any. They ce&#8217;tainly
+stomped the life out of him thorough. Anyhow,
+Bellamy has met up with his punishment. We&#8217;ll
+have to pack the body back to town, boys,&#8221; the
+sheriff told them.</p>
+<p>Half an hour later the party filed out to the creosote
+flats and struck across country toward Mesa.
+Flatray was riding pillion behind Tim. His own
+horse was being used as a pack saddle.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='II_BRAND_BLOTTING' id='II_BRAND_BLOTTING'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_18' name='page_18'></a>18</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER II</h2>
+<h3>BRAND BLOTTING</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>The tenderfoot, slithering down a hillside of
+shale, caught at a greasewood bush and
+waited. The sound of a rifle shot had
+drifted across the ridge to him. Friend or foe, it
+made no difference to him now. He had reached
+the end of his tether, must get to water soon or
+give up the fight.</p>
+<p>No second shot broke the stillness. A swift zigzagged
+across the cattle trail he was following.
+Out of a blue sky the Arizona sun still beat down
+upon a land parched by æons of drought, a land
+still making its brave show of greenness against a
+dun background.</p>
+<p>Arrow straight the man made for the hill crest.
+Weak as a starved puppy, his knees bent under him
+as he climbed. Down and up again a dozen times,
+he pushed feverishly forward. All day he had been
+seeing things. Cool lakes had danced on the horizon
+line before his tortured vision. Strange fancies
+had passed in and out of his mind. He wondered
+if this, too, were a delusion. How long that
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_19' name='page_19'></a>19</span>
+stiff ascent took him he never knew, but at last he
+reached the summit and crept over its cactus-covered
+shoulder.</p>
+<p>He looked into a valley dressed in its young
+spring garb. Of all deserts this is the loveliest
+when the early rains have given rebirth to the hope
+that stirs within its bosom once a year. But the
+tenderfoot saw nothing of its pathetic promise, of
+its fragile beauty so soon to be blasted. His sunken
+eyes swept the scene and found at first only a desert
+waste in which lay death.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I lose,&#8221; he said to himself out loud.</p>
+<p>With the words he gave up the long struggle and
+sank to the ground. For hours he had been exhausted
+to the limit of endurance, but the will to
+live had kept him going. Now the driving force
+within had run down. He would die where he lay.</p>
+<p>Another instant, and he was on his feet again
+eager, palpitant, tremulous. For plainly there had
+come to him the bleating of a calf.</p>
+<p>Moving to the left, he saw rising above the hill
+brow a thin curl of smoke. A dozen staggering
+steps brought him to the edge of a draw. There
+in the hollow below, almost within a stone&#8217;s throw,
+was a young woman bending over a fire. He tried
+to call, but his swollen tongue and dry throat refused
+the service. Instead, he began to run toward
+her.</p>
+<p>Beyond the wash was a dead cow. Not far from
+it lay a calf on its side, all four feet tied together.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_20' name='page_20'></a>20</span>
+From the fire the young woman took a red-hot running
+iron and moved toward the little bleater.</p>
+<p>The crackling of a twig brought her around as
+a sudden tight rein does a high-strung horse. The
+man had emerged from the prickly pears and was
+close upon her. His steps dragged. The sag of
+his shoulders indicated extreme fatigue. The dark
+hollows beneath the eyes told of days of torment.</p>
+<p>The girl stood before him slender and straight.
+She was pale to the lips. Her breath came fast
+and ragged as if she had been running.</p>
+<p>Abruptly she shot her challenge at him. &#8220;Who
+are you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Water,&#8221; he gasped.</p>
+<p>One swift, searching look the girl gave him, then
+&#8220;Wait!&#8221; she ordered, and was off into the mesquit
+on the run. Three minutes later the tenderfoot
+heard her galloping through the brush. With a
+quick, tight rein she drew up, swung from the saddle
+expertly as a <i>vaquero</i>, and began to untie a canteen
+held by buckskin thongs to the side of the
+saddle.</p>
+<p>He drank long, draining the vessel to the last
+drop.</p>
+<p>From her saddle bags she brought two sandwiches
+wrapped in oiled paper.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re hungry, too, I expect,&#8221; she said, her eyes
+shining with tender pity.</p>
+<p>She observed that he did not wolf his food, voracious
+though he was. While he ate she returned
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_21' name='page_21'></a>21</span>
+to the fire with the running iron and heaped live
+coals around the end of it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve had a pretty tough time of it,&#8221; she called
+across to him gently.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It hasn&#8217;t been exactly a picnic, but I&#8217;m all right
+now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl liked the way he said it. Whatever else
+he was&mdash;and already faint doubts were beginning
+to stir in her&mdash;he was not a quitter.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You were about all in,&#8221; she said, watching him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just about one little kick left in me,&#8221; he smiled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s what I thought.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She busied herself over the fire inspecting the
+iron. The man watched her curiously. What could
+it mean? A cow killed wantonly, a calf bawling
+with pain and fear, and this girl responsible for it.
+The tenderfoot could not down the suspicion stirring
+in his mind. He knew little of the cattle country.
+But he had read books and had spent a week
+in Mesa not entirely in vain. The dead cow with
+the little stain of red down its nose pointed surely
+to one thing. He was near enough to see a hole
+in the forehead just above the eyes. Instinctively
+his gaze passed to the rifle lying in the sand close
+to his hand. Her back was still turned to him. He
+leaned over, drew the gun to him, and threw out
+an empty shell from the barrel.</p>
+<p>At the click of the lever the girl swung around
+upon him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What are you doing?&#8221; she demanded.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_22' name='page_22'></a>22</span></p>
+<p>He put the rifle down hurriedly. &#8220;Just seeing
+what make it is.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And what make is it?&#8221; she flashed.</p>
+<p>He was trapped. &#8220;I hadn&#8217;t found out yet,&#8221; he
+stammered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, but you found out there was an empty shell
+in it,&#8221; she retorted quickly.</p>
+<p>Their eyes fastened. She was gray as ashes, but
+she did not flinch. By chance he had stumbled upon
+the crime of crimes in Cattleland, had caught a
+rustler redhanded at work. Looking into the fine
+face, nostrils delicately fashioned, eyes clear and
+deep, the thing was scarce credible of her. Why,
+she could not be a day more than twenty, and in
+every line of her was the look of pride, of good
+blood.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, I happened to throw it out,&#8221; he apologized.</p>
+<p>But she would have no evasion, would not let his
+doubts sleep. There was superb courage in the
+scornful ferocity with which she retorted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Happened! And I suppose you <i>happened</i> to notice
+that the brand on the cow is a Bar Double G,
+while that on the calf is different.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I haven&#8217;t noticed that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Plenty of time to see it yet.&#8221; Then, with a
+swift blaze of feeling, &#8220;What&#8217;s the use of pretending?
+I know what you think.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you know more than I do. My thoughts
+don&#8217;t go any farther than this, that you have saved
+my life and I&#8217;m grateful for it.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_23' name='page_23'></a>23</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I know better. You think I&#8217;m a rustler. But
+don&#8217;t say it. Don&#8217;t you dare say it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Brought up in an atmosphere of semi-barbaric
+traditions, silken-strong, with instincts unwarped
+by social pressure, she was what the sun and wind
+and freedom of Arizona had made her, a poetic
+creation far from commonplace. So he judged her,
+and in spite of the dastardly thing she had done he
+sensed an innate refinement strangely at variance
+with the circumstances.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. I won&#8217;t,&#8221; he answered, with a faint
+smile.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now you&#8217;ve got to pay for your sandwiches by
+making yourself useful. I&#8217;m going to finish this
+job.&#8221; She said it with an edge of self-scorn. He
+guessed her furious with self-contempt.</p>
+<p>Under her directions he knelt on the calf so as
+to hold it steady while she plied the hot iron. The
+odor of burnt hair and flesh was already acrid in
+his nostrils. Upon the red flank F was written in
+raw, seared flesh. He judged that the brand she
+wanted was not yet complete. Probably the iron
+had got too cold to finish the work, and she had
+been forced to reheat it.</p>
+<p>The little hand that held the running iron was
+trembling. Looking up, the tenderfoot saw that she
+was white enough to faint.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can&#8217;t do it. You&#8217;ll have to let me hold him
+while you blur the brand,&#8221; she told him.</p>
+<p>They changed places. She set her teeth to it and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_24' name='page_24'></a>24</span>
+held the calf steady, but the brander noticed that
+she had to look away when the red-hot iron came
+near the flesh of the victim.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Blur the brand right out. Do it quick, please,&#8221;
+she urged.</p>
+<p>A sizzle of burning skin, a piteous wail from the
+tortured animal, an acrid pungent odor, and the
+thing was done. The girl got to her feet, quivering
+like an aspen.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you a knife?&#8221; she asked faintly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Cut the rope.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The calf staggered to all fours, shook itself together,
+and went bawling to the dead mother.</p>
+<p>The girl drew a deep breath. &#8220;They say it does
+not hurt except while it is being done.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His bleak eyes met hers stonily. &#8220;And of course
+it will soon get used to doing without its mother.
+That is a mere detail.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A shudder went through her.</p>
+<p>The whole thing was incomprehensible to him.
+Why under heaven had she done it? How could
+one so sensitive have done a wanton cruel thing
+like this? Her reason he could not fathom. The
+facts that confronted him were that she <i>had</i> done it,
+and had meant to carry the crime through. Only
+detection had changed her purpose.</p>
+<p>She turned upon him, plainly sick of the whole
+business. &#8220;Let&#8217;s get away from here. Where&#8217;s
+your horse?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_25' name='page_25'></a>25</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I haven&#8217;t any. I started on foot and got lost.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;From where?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;From Mammoth.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Sharply her keen eyes fixed him. How could a
+man have got lost near Mammoth and wandered
+here? He would have had to cross the range, and
+even a child would have known enough to turn back
+into the valley where the town lay.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How long ago?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Day before yesterday.&#8221; He added after a moment:
+&#8220;I was looking for a job.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She took in the soft hands and the unweathered
+skin of the dark face. &#8220;What sort of a job?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Anything I can do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But what can you do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can ride.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She must take him home with her, of course,
+and feed and rest him. That went without saying.
+But what after that? He knew too much to be
+turned adrift with the story of what he had seen.
+If she could get a hold on him&mdash;whether of fear
+or of gratitude&mdash;so as to insure his silence, the
+truth might yet be kept quiet. At least she could
+try.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did you ever ride the range?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What sort of work have you done?&#8221;</p>
+<p>After a scarcely noticeable pause, &#8220;Clerical
+work,&#8221; he answered.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_26' name='page_26'></a>26</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re from the East?&#8221; she suggested, her eyes
+narrowing.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My name is Melissy Lee,&#8221; she told him, watching
+him very steadily.</p>
+<p>Once more the least of pauses. &#8220;Mine is Diller&mdash;James
+Diller.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s funny. I know another man of that
+name. At least, I know him by sight.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The man who had called himself Diller grew
+wary. &#8220;It&#8217;s a common enough name.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. If I find you work at my father&#8217;s ranch
+would you be too particular about what it is?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Try me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And your memory&mdash;is it inconveniently good?&#8221;
+Her glance swept as by chance over the scene of
+her recent operations.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve got a right good forgettery, too,&#8221; he assured
+her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re not in the habit of talking much about
+the things you see.&#8221; She put it in the form of a
+statement, but the rising inflection indicated the interrogative.</p>
+<p>His black eyes met hers steadily. &#8220;I can padlock
+my mouth when it is necessary,&#8221; he answered, the
+suggestion of a Southern drawl in his intonation.</p>
+<p>She wanted an assurance more direct. &#8220;When
+<i>you</i> think it necessary, I suppose.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That is what I meant to say.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_27' name='page_27'></a>27</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Come. One good turn deserves another. What
+about this?&#8221; She nodded toward the dead cow.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I have not seen a thing I ought not to have
+seen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Didn&#8217;t you see me blot a brand on that calf?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He shook his head. &#8220;Can&#8217;t recall it at all, Miss
+Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Swiftly her keen glance raked him again. Judged
+by his clothes, he was one of the world&#8217;s ineffectives,
+flotsam tossed into the desert by the wash of fate;
+but there was that in the steadiness of his eye, in
+the set of his shoulders, in the carriage of his lean-loined,
+slim body that spoke of breeding. He was
+no booze-fighting grubliner. Disguised though he
+was in cheap slops, she judged him a man of parts.
+He would do to trust, especially since she could not
+help herself.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll be going. You take my horse,&#8221; she
+ordered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And let you walk?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How long since you have eaten?&#8221; she asked
+brusquely.</p>
+<p>&#8220;About seven minutes,&#8221; he smiled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But before that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Two days.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, then. Anybody can see you&#8217;re as weak
+as a kitten. Do as I say.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why can&#8217;t we both ride?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We can as soon as we get across the pass. Until
+then I&#8217;ll walk.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_28' name='page_28'></a>28</span></p>
+<p>Erect as a willow sapling, she took the hills with
+an elastic ease that showed her deep-bosomed in
+spite of her slenderness. The short corduroy riding
+skirt and high-laced boots were made for use,
+not grace, but the man in the saddle found even
+in her manner of walking the charm of her direct,
+young courage. Free of limb, as yet unconscious
+of sex, she had the look of a splendid boy. The
+descending sun was in her sparkling hair, on the
+lank, undulating grace of her changing lines.</p>
+<p>Active as a cat though it was, the cowpony found
+the steep pass with its loose rubble hard going. Melissy
+took the climb much easier. In the way she
+sped through the mesquit, evading the clutch of the
+cholla by supple dips to right and left, there was a
+kind of pantherine litheness.</p>
+<p>At the summit she waited for the horse to clamber
+up the shale after her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Get down in your collar, you Buckskin,&#8221; she
+urged, and when the pony was again beside her
+petted the animal with little love pats on the nose.</p>
+<p>Carelessly she flung at Diller a question. &#8220;From
+what part of the East did you say?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He was on the spot promptly this time. &#8220;From
+Keokuk.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Keokuk, Indiana?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Iowa,&#8221; he smiled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, is it Iowa?&#8221; He had sidestepped her little
+trap, but she did not give up. &#8220;Just arrived?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been herding sheep for a month.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_29' name='page_29'></a>29</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, sheep-herding!&#8221; Her disdain implied that
+if he were fit for nothing better than sheep-herding,
+the West could find precious little use for him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It was all I could get to do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where did you say you wrangled Mary&#8217;s little
+lamb?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;In the Catalinas.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Whose outfit?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Question and answer were tossed back and forth
+lightly, but both were watching warily.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Outfit?&#8221; he repeated, puzzled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. Who were you working for?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t remember his name. He was a Mexican.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Must have been one of the camps of Antonio
+Valdez.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, that&#8217;s it. That&#8217;s the name.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Only he runs his sheep in the Galiuros,&#8221; she
+demurred.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is it the Galiuros? Those Spanish names! I
+can&#8217;t keep them apart in my mind.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She laughed with hard, young cruelty. &#8220;It is
+hard to remember what you never heard, isn&#8217;t it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The man was on the rack. Tiny beads of perspiration
+stood out on his forehead. But he got
+a lip smile into working order.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just what do you mean, Miss Lee?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You had better get your story more pat. I&#8217;ve
+punched a dozen holes in it already. First you tell
+me you are from the East, and even while you were
+telling me I knew you were a Southerner from the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_30' name='page_30'></a>30</span>
+drawl. No man ever got lost from Mammoth.
+You gave a false name. You said you had been
+herding sheep, but you didn&#8217;t know what an outfit
+is. You wobbled between the Galiuros and the
+Catalinas.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not a native. I told you I couldn&#8217;t remember
+Spanish names.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It wasn&#8217;t necessary to tell me,&#8221; she countered
+quickly. &#8220;A man that can&#8217;t recall even the name
+of his boss!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not in the witness box, Miss Lee,&#8221; he told
+her stiffly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not yet, but you&#8217;re liable to be soon, I reckon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;In a cattle rustling case, I suppose you mean.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I don&#8217;t.&#8221; She went on with her indictment
+of his story, though his thrust had brought the color
+to her cheek. &#8220;When I offered you Antonio Valdez
+for an employer you jumped at him. If you want
+to know, he happens to be our herder. He doesn&#8217;t
+own a sheep and never will.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know all about it,&#8221; he said with obvious
+sarcasm.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know you&#8217;re not who you say you are.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Perhaps you know who I am then.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know or care. It&#8217;s none of my business.
+But others may think it is theirs. You can&#8217;t be so
+reckless with the truth without folks having notions.
+If I were you I&#8217;d get a story that will hang together.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re such a good detective. Maybe I could
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_31' name='page_31'></a>31</span>
+get you to invent one for me,&#8221; he suggested
+maliciously.</p>
+<p>Her indignation flashed. &#8220;I&#8217;m no such thing.
+But I&#8217;m not quite a fool. A babe in arms wouldn&#8217;t
+swallow that fairy tale.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Awkward as her knowledge might prove, he
+could not help admiring the resource and shrewdness
+of the girl. She had virtually served notice
+that if she had a secret that needed keeping so
+had he.</p>
+<p>They looked down over a desert green with bajadas,
+prickly pears, and mesquit. To the right,
+close to a spur of the hills, were the dwarfed houses
+of a ranch. The fans of a windmill caught the sun
+and flashed it back to the travelers.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The Bar Double G. My father owns it,&#8221; Miss
+Lee explained.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh! Your father owns it.&#8221; He reflected a moment
+while he studied her. &#8220;Let&#8217;s understand each
+other, Miss Lee. I&#8217;m not what I claim to be,
+you say. We&#8217;ll put it that you have guessed right.
+What do you intend to do about it? I&#8217;m willing to
+be made welcome at the Bar Double G, but I don&#8217;t
+want to be too welcome.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not going to do anything.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So long as I remember not to remember what
+I&#8217;ve seen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The blood burned in her cheeks beneath their
+Arizona tan. She did not look at him. &#8220;If you
+like to put it that way.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_32' name='page_32'></a>32</span></p>
+<p>He counted it to her credit that she was ashamed
+of the bargain in every honest fiber of her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No matter what they say I&#8217;ve done. You&#8217;ll keep
+faith?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t care what you&#8217;ve done,&#8221; she flung back
+bitterly. &#8220;It&#8217;s none of my affair. I told you that
+before. Men come out here for all sorts of reasons.
+We don&#8217;t ask for a bill of particulars.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then I&#8217;ll be right glad to go down to the Bar
+Double G with you, and say thanks for the chance.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He had dismounted when they first reached the
+pass. Now she swung to the saddle and he climbed
+behind her. They reached presently one of the
+nomadic trails of the cattle country which wander
+leisurely around hills and over gulches along the
+line of least resistance. This brought them to a
+main traveled road leading to the ranch.</p>
+<p>They rode in silence until the pasture fence was
+passed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What am I to tell them your name is?&#8221; she
+asked stiffly.</p>
+<p>He took his time to answer. &#8220;Tom Morse is a
+good name, don&#8217;t you think? How would T. L.
+Morse do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She offered no comment, but sat in front of him,
+unresponsive as the sphinx. The rigor of her flat
+back told him that, though she might have to keep
+his shameful secret for the sake of her own, he
+could not presume upon it the least in the world.</p>
+<p>Melissy turned the horse over to a little Mexican
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_33' name='page_33'></a>33</span>
+boy and they were just mounting the steps of the
+porch when a young man cantered up to the house.
+Lean and muscular and sunbaked, he looked out
+of cool, gray eyes upon a man&#8217;s world that had
+often put him through the acid test. The plain,
+cactus-torn chaps, flannel shirt open at the sinewy
+throat, dusty, wide-brimmed hat, revolver peeping
+from its leather pocket on the thigh: every detail
+contributed to the impression of efficiency he created.
+Even the one touch of swagger about him, the blue
+silk kerchief knotted loosely around his neck, lent
+color to his virile competency.</p>
+<p>He dragged his horse to a standstill and leaped
+off at the same instant. &#8220;Evenin&#8217;, &#8217;Lissie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She was busy lacing her shoe and did not look
+up. He guessed that he was being snubbed and
+into his eyes came a gleam of fun. A day later
+than he had promised, Jack Flatray was of opinion
+that he was being punished for tardiness.</p>
+<p>Casually he explained. &#8220;Couldn&#8217;t make it any
+sooner. Burke had a hurry-up job that took us
+into the hills. Fellow by the name of Bellamy,
+wanted for murder at Nemo, Arkansas, had been
+tracked to Mesa. A message came over the wires
+to arrest him. When Burke sent me to his room
+he had lit out, taken a swift hike into the hills.
+Must a-had some warning, for he didn&#8217;t even wait
+for a horse.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The dilated eyes of the girl went past the deputy
+to the man she had rescued. He was leaning
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_34' name='page_34'></a>34</span>
+against one of the porch posts, tense and rigid, on
+his face the look of the hunted brought to bay.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And did you find him?&#8221; she asked mechanically
+of the deputy.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We found him. He had been trampled to death
+by a cattle stampede.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her mind groped blindly for an explanation.
+Her woman&#8217;s instinct told her that the man panting
+on the porch within six feet of the officer was
+the criminal wanted. There must be a mistake
+somewhere.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did you identify him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I guess there is no doubt about it. His papers
+and belongings all showed he was our man.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&#8221; The excitement of his news had for a
+moment thawed her, but a dignified aloofness
+showed again in her manner. &#8220;If you want to see
+father you&#8217;ll find him in the corral, Mr. Flatray.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I don&#8217;t know as I&#8217;m looking for him awful
+hard,&#8221; the blue kerchiefed youth smiled genially.
+&#8220;Anyway, I can wait a few minutes if I have to.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221; She turned away indifferently. &#8220;I&#8217;ll
+show you your room, Mr. Morse.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The deputy watched them disappear into the
+house with astonishment printed on his face. He
+had ridden twenty-seven miles to see Melissy Lee
+and he had not quite expected this sort of a greeting.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If that don&#8217;t beat the Dutch. Looks like I&#8217;ll
+do my callin&#8217; on the old man after all, maybe,&#8221; he
+murmured with a grin.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='III_AN_ACCUSATION' id='III_AN_ACCUSATION'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_35' name='page_35'></a>35</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER III</h2>
+<h3>AN ACCUSATION</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>The rescued man ate, drank, and from sheer
+fatigue fell asleep within five minutes of
+the time he was shown his bedroom.</p>
+<p>Since he was not of the easily discouraged kind,
+the deputy stayed to supper on invitation of Lee.
+He sat opposite the daughter of his host, and that
+young woman treated him with the most frigid
+politeness. The owner of the Bar Double G was
+quite unaware of any change of temperature. Jack
+and his little girl had always been the best of friends.
+So now he discoursed on the price of cows, the
+good rains, the outrages of the rustlers, and kindred
+topics without suspecting that the attention of
+the young man was on more personal matters.</p>
+<p>Though born in Arizona, Melissy was of the
+South. Due westward rolls the tide of settlement,
+and Beauchamp Lee had migrated from Tennessee
+after the war, following the line of least resistance
+to the sunburned territory. Later he had married
+a woman a good deal younger than himself. She
+had borne him two children, the elder of whom was
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_36' name='page_36'></a>36</span>
+now a young man. Melissy was the younger, and
+while she was still a babe in arms the mother had
+died of typhoid and left her baby girl to grow up
+as best she might in a land where women were few
+and far. This tiny pledge of her mother&#8217;s love
+Champ Lee had treasured as a gift from Heaven.
+He had tended her and nursed her through the ailments
+of childhood with a devotion the most pure
+of his reckless life. Given to heady gusts of passion,
+there had never been a moment when his voice
+had been other than gentle and tender to her.</p>
+<p>Inevitably Melissy had become the product of her
+inheritance and her environment. If she was the
+heiress of Beauchamp Lee&#8217;s courage and generosity,
+his quick indignation against wrong and injustice,
+so, too, she was of his passionate lawlessness.</p>
+<p>After supper Melissy disappeared. She wanted
+very much to be alone and have a good cry. Wherefore
+she slipped out of the back door and ran up
+the Lone Tree trail in the darkness. Jack thought
+he saw a white skirt fly a traitorous signal, and at
+leisure he pursued.</p>
+<p>But Melissy was not aware of that. She reached
+Lone Tree rock and slipped down from boulder
+to boulder until she came to the pine which gave
+the place its name. For hours she had been forced
+to repress her emotions, to make necessary small
+talk, to arrange for breakfast and other household
+details. Now she was alone, and the floods of her
+bitterness were unloosed. She broke down and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_37' name='page_37'></a>37</span>
+wept passionately, for she was facing her first great
+disillusionment. She had lost a friend, one in whom
+she had put great faith.</p>
+<p>The first gust of the storm was past when Melissy
+heard a step on the rocks above. She knew intuitively
+that Jack Flatray had come in search of her,
+and he was the last man on earth she wanted to
+meet just now.</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8217;Lissie!&#8221; she heard him call softly; and again,
+&#8220;&#8217;Lissie!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Noiselessly she got to her feet, waiting to see
+what he would do. She knew he must be standing
+on the edge of the great rock, so directly above her
+that if he had kicked a pebble it would have landed
+beside her. Presently he began to clamber down.</p>
+<p>She tiptoed along the ledge and slipped into the
+trough at the farther end that led to the top. It
+was a climb she had taken several times, but never
+in the dark. The ascent was almost perpendicular,
+and it had to be made by clinging to projecting
+rocks and vegetation. Moreover, if she were to escape
+undetected it had to be done in silence.</p>
+<p>She was a daughter of the hills, as surefooted
+as a mountain goat. Handily she went up, making
+the most of the footholds that offered. In spite
+of the best she could do the rustling of bushes betrayed
+her.</p>
+<p>Jack came to the foot of the trough and looked up.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So you&#8217;re there, are you?&#8221; he asked.</p>
+<p>Her foot loosened a stone and sent it rolling down.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_38' name='page_38'></a>38</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;If I were you I wouldn&#8217;t try that at night,
+&#8217;Liss,&#8221; he advised.</p>
+<p>She made sure of the steadiness of her voice before
+she answered. &#8220;You don&#8217;t need to try it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I said if I were you, girl.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you are not. Don&#8217;t let me detain you here,
+Mr. Flatray,&#8221; she told him in a manner of icy precision.</p>
+<p>The deputy began the climb too. &#8220;What&#8217;s the
+use of being so hostile, little girl?&#8221; he drawled.
+&#8220;Me, I came as soon as I could, burning the wind,
+too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She set her teeth, determined to reach the top
+in time to get away before he could join her. In
+her eagerness she took a chance that proved her undoing.
+A rock gave beneath her foot and clattered
+down. Clinging by one hand and foot, she felt her
+body swing around. From her throat a little cry
+leaped. She knew herself slipping.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jack!&#8221;</p>
+<p>In time, and just in time, he reached her, braced
+himself, and gave her his knee for a foot rest.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right?&#8221; he asked, and &#8220;All right!&#8221; she answered
+promptly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll go back,&#8221; he told her.</p>
+<p>She made no protest. Indeed, she displayed a
+caution in lowering herself that surprised him.
+Every foothold she tested carefully with her weight.
+Once she asked him to place her shoe in the crevice
+for her. He had never seen her take so much time
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_39' name='page_39'></a>39</span>
+in making sure or be so fussy about her personal
+safety.</p>
+<p>Safely on the ledge again, she attempted a second
+time to dismiss him. &#8220;Thank you, Mr. Flatray.
+I won&#8217;t take any more of your time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He looked at her steadily before he spoke.
+&#8220;You&#8217;re mighty high-heeled, &#8217;Lissie. You know
+my name ain&#8217;t Mr. Flatray to you. What&#8217;s it all
+about? I&#8217;ve told you twice I couldn&#8217;t get here any
+sooner.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She flamed out at him in an upblaze of feminine
+ferocity. &#8220;And I tell <i>you</i>, that I don&#8217;t care if you
+had never come. I don&#8217;t want to see you or have
+anything to do with you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why not?&#8221; He asked it quietly, though he began
+to know that her charge against him was a
+serious one.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because I know what you are now, because you
+have made us believe in you while all the time you
+were living a lie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Meaning what?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was gathering poppies on the other side of
+Antelope Pass this afternoon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What has that got to do with me being a liar
+and a scoundrel,&#8221; he wanted to know.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, you pretend,&#8221; she scoffed. &#8220;But you know
+as well as I do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m afraid I don&#8217;t. Let&#8217;s have the indictment.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If everybody in Papago County had told me
+I wouldn&#8217;t have believed it,&#8221; she cried. &#8220;I had to
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_40' name='page_40'></a>40</span>
+see it with my own eyes before I could have been
+convinced.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, well what is it you saw with your eyes?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You needn&#8217;t keep it up. I tell you I saw it all
+from the time you fired the shot.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He laughed easily, but without mirth. &#8220;Kept tab
+on me, did you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She wheeled from him, gave a catch of her
+breath, and caught at the rock wall to save herself
+from falling.</p>
+<p>He spoke sharply. &#8220;You hurt yourself in the
+trough.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I sprained my ankle a little, but it doesn&#8217;t
+matter.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He understood now why she had made so slow
+a descent and he suspected that the wrench was
+more than she admitted. The moon had come out
+from under a cloud and showed him a pale, tear-stained
+face, with a row of even, little teeth set
+firm against the lower lip. She was in pain and
+her pride was keeping it from him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let me look at your ankle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I say yes. You&#8217;ve hurt it seriously.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That is my business, I think,&#8221; she told him with
+cold finality.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m going to make it mine. Think I don&#8217;t know
+you, proud as Lucifer when you get set. You&#8217;ll
+lame yourself for life if you&#8217;re not careful.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t care to discuss it.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_41' name='page_41'></a>41</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Fiddlesticks! If you&#8217;ve got anything against
+me we&#8217;ll hear what it is afterward. Right now we&#8217;ll
+give first aid to the injured. Sit down here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She had not meant to give way, but she did. Perhaps
+it was because of the faintness that stole over
+her, or because the pain was sharper than she could
+well endure. She found herself seated on the rock
+shelf, letting him cut the lace out of her shoe and
+slip it off. Ever so gently he worked, but he could
+tell by the catches of her breath that it was not
+pleasant to endure. From his neck he untied the
+silk kerchief and wrapped it tightly around the
+ankle.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That will have to do till I get you home.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll not trouble you, sir. If you&#8217;ll stop and tell
+my father that is all I&#8217;ll ask.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Different here,&#8221; he retorted cheerfully. &#8220;Just so
+as to avoid any argument, I&#8217;ll announce right now
+that Jack Flatray is going to see you home. It&#8217;s
+his say-so.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She rose. None knew better than she that he was
+a dominating man when he chose to be. She herself
+carried in her slim body a spirit capable of passion
+and of obstinacy, but to-night she had not the
+will to force the fighting.</p>
+<p>Setting her teeth, she took a step or two forward,
+her hand against the rock wall to help bear the
+weight. With narrowed eyes, he watched her
+closely, noting the catches of pain that shot through
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_42' name='page_42'></a>42</span>
+her breathing. Half way up the boulder bed he interposed
+brusquely.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This is plumb foolishness, girl. You&#8217;ve got no
+business putting your weight on that foot, and
+you&#8217;re not going to do it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He slipped his arm around her waist in such a
+way as to support her all he could. With a quick
+turn of the body she tried to escape.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No use. I&#8217;m going through with this, &#8217;Lissie.
+Someone has been lying to you about me, and just
+now you hate the ground I walk on. Good enough.
+That&#8217;s got nothing to do with this. You&#8217;re a woman
+that needs help, and any old time J. F. meets up
+with such a one he&#8217;s on the job. You don&#8217;t owe
+me &#8217;Thank you,&#8217; but you&#8217;ve got to stand for me till
+you reach the house.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re taking advantage of me because I can&#8217;t
+help myself. Why don&#8217;t you go and bring father,&#8221;
+she flung out.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m younger than your father and abler to help.
+That&#8217;s why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>They reached the top of the bluff and he made
+her sit down to rest. A pale moon suffused the
+country, and in that stage set to lowered lights her
+pallor was accented. From the colorless face shadowy,
+troubled eyes spoke the misery through which
+she was passing. The man divined that her pain
+was more than physical, and the knowledge went
+to him poignantly by the heart route.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_43' name='page_43'></a>43</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;What is it, &#8217;Lissie? What have I done?&#8221; he
+asked gently.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know. I don&#8217;t want to talk about it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I don&#8217;t know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s the use of keeping it up? I caught you
+this afternoon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Caught me doing what?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Caught you rustling, caught you branding a
+calf just after you had shot the cow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>For an instant her charge struck him dumb. He
+stared at her as if he thought she had gone suddenly
+mad.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s that? Say it again,&#8221; he got out at last.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And the cow had the Bar Double G brand, belonged
+to my father, your best friend,&#8221; she added
+passionately.</p>
+<p>He spoke very gently, but there was an edge to
+his voice that was new to her. &#8220;Suppose you tell
+me all about it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She threw out a hand in a gesture of despair.
+&#8220;What&#8217;s the use? Nothing could have made me believe
+it but my own eyes. You needn&#8217;t keep up a
+pretense. I saw you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, so you said before. Now begin at the
+start and tell your story.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She had the odd feeling of being put on the defensive
+and it angered her. How dared he look at
+her with those cool, gray eyes that still appeared to
+bore a hole through treachery? Why did her heart
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_44' name='page_44'></a>44</span>
+convict her of having deserted a friend, when she
+knew that the desertion was his?</p>
+<p>&#8220;While I was gathering poppies I heard a shot.
+It was so close I walked to the edge of the draw
+and looked over. There I saw you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What was I doing?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You were hogtying a calf.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And then?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t understand at first. I thought to slip
+down and surprise you for fun. But as I got lower
+I saw the dead cow. Just then you began to brand
+the calf and I cried out to you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What did I do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know what you did,&#8221; she answered wearily.
+&#8220;You broke for the brush where your horse was
+and galloped away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Got a right good look at me, did you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not at your face. But I knew. You were wearing
+this blue silk handkerchief.&#8221; Her finger indicated
+the one bound around her ankle.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So on that evidence you decide I&#8217;m a rustler,
+and you&#8217;ve only known me thirteen years. You&#8217;re
+a good friend, &#8217;Lissie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her eyes blazed on him like live coals. &#8220;Have
+you forgotten the calf you left with your brand
+on it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She had startled him at last. &#8220;With my brand
+on it?&#8221; he repeated, his voice dangerously low and
+soft.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know as well as I do. You had got the F
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_45' name='page_45'></a>45</span>
+just about finished when I called. You dropped
+the running iron and ran.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dropped it and ran, did I? And what did
+you do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reheated the iron and blurred the brand so
+that nobody could tell what it had been.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He laughed harshly without mirth. &#8220;I see. I&#8217;m
+a waddy and a thief, but you&#8217;re going to protect
+me for old times&#8217; sake. That&#8217;s the play, is it? I
+ought to be much obliged to you and promise to
+reform, I reckon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His bitterness stung. She felt a tightening of the
+throat. &#8220;All I ask is that you go away and never
+come back to me,&#8221; she cried with a sob.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t worry about that. I ain&#8217;t likely to come
+back to a girl that thinks I&#8217;m the lowest thing that
+walks. You&#8217;re not through with me a bit more
+than I am with you,&#8221; he answered harshly.</p>
+<p>Her little hand beat upon the rock in her distress.
+&#8220;I never would have believed it. Nobody could
+have made me believe it. I&mdash;I&mdash;why, I trusted
+you like my own father,&#8221; she lamented. &#8220;To think
+that you would take that way to stock your ranch&mdash;and
+with the cattle of my father, too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His face was hard as chiseled granite. &#8220;Distrust
+all your friends. That&#8217;s the best way.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You haven&#8217;t even denied it&mdash;not that it would
+do any good,&#8221; she said miserably.</p>
+<p>There was a sound of hard, grim laughter in his
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_46' name='page_46'></a>46</span>
+throat. &#8220;No, and I ain&#8217;t going to deny it. Are
+you ready to go yet?&#8221;</p>
+<p>His repulse of her little tentative advance was
+like a blow on the face to her.</p>
+<p>She made a movement to rise. While she was
+still on her knees he stooped, put his arms around
+her, and took her into them. Before she could utter
+her protest he had started down the trail toward
+the house.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How dare you? Let me go,&#8221; she ordered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re not able to walk, and you&#8217;ll go the way
+I say,&#8221; he told her shortly in a flinty voice.</p>
+<p>Her anger was none the less because she realized
+her helplessness to get what she wanted. Her teeth
+set fast to keep back useless words. Into his stony
+eyes her angry ones burned. The quick, irregular
+rise and fall of her bosom against his heart told
+him how she was struggling with her passion.</p>
+<p>Once he spoke. &#8220;Tell me where it was you saw
+this rustler&mdash;the exact place near as you can locate
+it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She answered only by a look.</p>
+<p>The deputy strode into the living room of the
+ranch with her in his arms. Lee was reading a
+newspaper Jack had brought with him from Mesa.
+At sight of them he started up hurriedly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Goddlemighty, what&#8217;s the matter, Jack?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Only a ricked ankle, Champ. Slipped on a
+stone,&#8221; Flatray explained as he put Melissy down
+on the lounge.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_47' name='page_47'></a>47</span></p>
+<p>In two minutes the whole house was upset. Hop
+Ling was heating water to bathe the sprain. A
+rider from the bunkhouse was saddling to go for
+the doctor. Another was off in the opposite direction
+to buy some liniment at Mammoth.</p>
+<p>In the confusion Flatray ran up his horse from
+the pasture, slapped on the saddle, and melted into
+the night.</p>
+<p>An hour later Melissy asked her father what had
+become of him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Doggone that boy, I don&#8217;t know where he went.
+Reckon he thought he&#8217;d be in the way. Mighty
+funny he didn&#8217;t give us a chanct to tell him to stay.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Probably he had business in Mesa,&#8221; Melissy answered,
+turning her face to the wall.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Business nothing,&#8221; retorted the exasperated
+rancher. &#8220;He figured we couldn&#8217;t eat and sleep
+him without extra trouble. Ain&#8217;t that a fine reputation
+for him to be giving the Bar Double G? I&#8217;ll
+curl his hair for him onct I meet up with him
+again.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you would put out the light, I think I could
+sleep, dad,&#8221; she told him in the least of voices.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sure, honey. Has the throbbing gone out of
+the ankle?&#8221; he asked anxiously.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not entirely, but it&#8217;s a good deal better. Good-night,
+dad.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If Doc comes I&#8217;ll bring him in,&#8221; Lee said after
+he had kissed her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do, please.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_48' name='page_48'></a>48</span></p>
+<p>But after she was left alone Melissy did not prepare
+herself for sleep. Her wide open eyes stared
+into the darkness, while her mind stormily reviewed
+the day. The man who for years had been her best
+friend was a scoundrel. She had proved him unworthy
+of her trust, and on top of that he had
+insulted her. Hot tears stung her eyes&mdash;tears of
+shame, of wounded self-love, of mortification, and
+of something more worthy than any of these.</p>
+<p>She grieved passionately for that which had gone
+out of her life, for the comradeship that had been
+so precious to her. If this man were a waddy, who
+of all her friends could she trust? She could have
+forgiven him had he done wrong in the heat of
+anger. But this premeditated evil was beyond forgiveness.
+To make it worse, he had come direct
+from the doing of it to meet her, with a brazen
+smile on his lips and a lie in his heart. She would
+never speak to him again&mdash;never so long as she lived.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='IV_THE_MAN_WITH_THE_CHIHUAHUA_HAT' id='IV_THE_MAN_WITH_THE_CHIHUAHUA_HAT'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_49' name='page_49'></a>49</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+<h3>THE MAN WITH THE CHIHUAHUA HAT</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>A little dust cloud was traveling up the
+trail toward the Bar Double G, the center
+of which presently defined itself as a rider
+moving at a road gait. He wore a Chihuahua hat
+and with it the picturesque trappings the Southwest
+borrows on occasion from across the border. Vanity
+disclosed itself in the gold-laced hat, in the silver
+conchos of the fringed chaps, in the fine workmanship
+of the saddle and bit. The man&#8217;s finery was
+overdone, carried with it the suggestion of being
+on exhibition. But one look at the man himself,
+sleek and graceful, black-haired and white-toothed,
+exuding an effect of cold wariness in spite of the
+masked smiling face, would have been enough to
+give the lie to any charge of weakness. His fopperies
+could not conceal the silken strength of him.
+One meeting with the chill, deep-set eyes was certificate
+enough for most people.</p>
+<p>Melissy, sitting on the porch with her foot resting
+on a second chair, knew a slight quickening of
+the blood as she watched him approach.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good evenin&#8217;, Miss M&#8217;lissy,&#8221; he cried, sweeping
+his sombrero as low as the stirrup.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_50' name='page_50'></a>50</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Buenos tardes</i>, <i>Señor</i> Norris,&#8221; she flung back
+gayly.</p>
+<p>Sitting at ease in the saddle, he leisurely looked
+her over with eyes that smoldered behind half-shuttered
+lids. To most of her world she was in spirit
+still more boy than woman, but before his bold, possessive
+gaze her long lashes wavered to the cheeks
+into which the warm blood was beating. Her long,
+free lines were still slender with the immaturity
+of youth, her soul still hesitating reluctantly to
+cross the border to womanhood toward which Nature
+was pushing her so relentlessly. From a fund
+of experience Philip Norris read her shrewdly,
+knew how to evoke the latent impulses which
+brought her eagerly to the sex duel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Playing off for sick,&#8221; he scoffed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not,&#8221; she protested. &#8220;Never get sick. It&#8217;s
+just a sprained ankle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sho! I guess you&#8217;re Miss Make Believe; just
+harrowing the feelings of your beaux.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The way you talk! I haven&#8217;t got any beaux.
+The boys are just my friends.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, just friends! And no beaux. My, my!
+Not a single sweetheart in all this wide open country.
+Shall I go rope you one and bring him in,
+<i>compadre</i>?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No!&#8221; she exploded. &#8220;I don&#8217;t want any. I&#8217;m
+not old enough yet.&#8221; Her dancing eyes belied the
+words.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now I wouldn&#8217;t have guessed it. You look to
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_51' name='page_51'></a>51</span>
+me most ready to be picked.&#8221; He rested his weight
+on the farther stirrup and let his lazy smile mock
+her. &#8220;My estimate would be sixteen. I&#8217;ll bet you&#8217;re
+every day of that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I only lack three months of being eighteen,&#8221; she
+came back indignantly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t say! You&#8217;ll ce&#8217;tainly have to be advertising
+for a husband soon, Miss Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen.
+Maybe an ad in the Mesa paper
+would help. You ain&#8217;t so awful bad looking.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll let you write it. What would you say?&#8221;
+she demanded, a patch of pink standing out near
+the curve of the cheek bone.</p>
+<p>He swung from the saddle and flung the reins
+to the ground. With jingling spurs he came up
+the steps and sat on the top one, his back against
+a pillar. Boldly his admiring eyes swept her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Nina</i>, I couldn&#8217;t do the subject justice. Honest,
+I haven&#8217;t got the vocabulary.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, you!&#8221; Laughter was in the eyes that studied
+him with a side tilt of the chin. &#8220;That&#8217;s a fine
+way to get out of it when your bluff is called.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He leaned back against the post comfortably and
+absorbed the beauty of the western horizon. The
+sun had just set behind a saddle of the Galiuros in
+a splash of splendor. All the colors of the rainbow
+fought for supremacy in a brilliant-tinted sky that
+blazed above the fire-girt peaks. Soon dusk would
+slip down over the land and tone the hues to a
+softer harmony. A purple sea would flow over the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_52' name='page_52'></a>52</span>
+hills, to be in turn displaced by a deep, soft violet.
+Then night, that night of mystery and romance
+which transforms the desert to a thing of incredible
+wonder!</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did your father buy this sunset with the ranch?
+And has he got a guarantee that it will perform
+every night?&#8221; he asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did you ever see anything like it?&#8221; she cried.
+&#8220;I have looked at them all my life and I never get
+tired.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He laughed softly, his indolent, sleepy look on
+her. &#8220;Some things I would never get tired of looking
+at either.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Without speaking she nodded, still absorbing the
+sunset.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But it wouldn&#8217;t be that kind of scenery,&#8221; he
+added. &#8220;How tall are you, <i>muchacha</i>?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her glance came around in surprise. &#8220;I don&#8217;t
+know. About five foot five, I think. Why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m working on that ad. How would this do?
+&#8216;Miss Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen wants to meet
+up with gentleman between eighteen and forty-eight.
+Object, matrimony. Description of lady:
+Slim, medium height, brunette, mop of blue-black
+hair, the prettiest dimple you ever saw&mdash;&mdash;&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now I know you&#8217;re making fun of me. I&#8217;m
+mad.&#8221; And the dimple flashed into being.</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8216;&mdash;mostly says the opposite of what she means,
+has a&mdash;&mdash;&#8217;&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_53' name='page_53'></a>53</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t. I don&#8217;t&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8216;&mdash;has a spice of the devil in her, which&mdash;&mdash;&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, I <i>am</i> mad,&#8221; she interrupted, laughing.</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8216;&mdash;which is excusable, since she has the reddest
+lips for kissing in Arizona.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+<p>He had gone too far. Her innocence was in
+arms. Norris knew it by the swiftness with which
+the smile vanished from her face, by the flash of
+anger in the eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I prefer to talk about something else, Mr. Norris,&#8221;
+she said with all the prim stiffness of a schoolgirl.</p>
+<p>Her father relieved the tension by striding across
+from the stable. With him came a bowlegged young
+fellow in plain leathers. The youngster was Charley
+Hymer, one of the riders for the Bar Double G.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re here at the right time, Norris,&#8221; Lee said
+grimly. &#8220;Charley has just come down from Antelope
+Pass. He found one of my cows dead, with
+a bullet hole through the forehead. The ashes of
+a fire were there, and in the brush not far away a
+running iron.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The eyes of Norris narrowed to slits. He was
+the cattle detective of the association and for a year
+now the rustlers had outgeneraled him. &#8220;I&#8217;ll have
+you take me to the spot, Charley. Get a move on
+you and we&#8217;ll get there soon as the moon is up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy gripped the arms of her chair tightly
+with both hands. She was looking at Norris with
+a new expression, a kind of breathless fear. She
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_54' name='page_54'></a>54</span>
+knew him for a man who could not be swerved from
+the thing he wanted. For all his easy cynicism, he
+had the reputation of being a bloodhound on the
+trail. Moreover, she knew that he was no friend
+to Jack Flatray. Why had she left that running
+iron as evidence to convict its owner? What folly
+not to have removed it from the immediate scene of
+the crime!</p>
+<p>The cattle detective and her father had moved
+a few steps away and were talking in low tones.
+Melissy became aware of a footfall. The man who
+called himself Morse came around the corner of
+the house and stopped at the porch steps.</p>
+<p>&#8220;May I speak to you a moment, Miss Lee?&#8221; he
+said in a low voice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The voice of Norris rose to an irritated snarl.
+&#8220;Tell you I&#8217;ve got evidence, Lee. Mebbe it&#8217;s not
+enough to convict, but it satisfies me a-plenty that
+Jack Flatray&#8217;s the man.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy was frozen to a tense attention. Her
+whole mind was on what passed between the detective
+and her father. Otherwise she would have noticed
+the swift change that transformed the tenderfoot.</p>
+<p>The rancher answered with impatient annoyance.
+&#8220;You&#8217;re &#8217;way off, Norris. I don&#8217;t care anything
+about your evidence. The idea is plumb ridiculous.
+Twenty odd years I&#8217;ve known him. He&#8217;s the best
+they make, a pure through and through. Not a
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_55' name='page_55'></a>55</span>
+crooked hair in his head. I&#8217;ve eat out of the same
+frying pan too often with that boy not to know
+what he is. You go bury those suspicions of yours
+immediate. There&#8217;s nothing to them.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris grumbled objections as they moved toward
+the stable. Melissy drew a long breath and brought
+herself back to the tenderfoot.</p>
+<p>He stood like a coiled spring, head thrust far
+forward from the shoulders. The look in his black
+eyes was something new to her experience. For
+hate, passion, caution were all mirrored there.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know Mr. Norris,&#8221; she said quickly.</p>
+<p>He started. &#8220;What did you say his name was?&#8221;
+he asked with an assumption of carelessness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Norris&mdash;Philip Norris. He is a cattle detective.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Never heard of Mr. Norris before in my life,&#8221;
+he answered, but it was observable that he still
+breathed deep.</p>
+<p>She did not believe him. Some tie in their buried
+past bound these two men together. They must
+have known each other in the South years ago, and
+one of them at least was an enemy of the other.
+There might come a day when she could use this
+knowledge to save Jack Flatray from the punishment
+dogging his heels. Melissy filed it away in
+her memory for future reference.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You wanted to speak to me,&#8221; she suggested.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m going away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What for?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_56' name='page_56'></a>56</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Because I&#8217;m not a hound. I can&#8217;t blackmail a
+woman.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How do you mean?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I mean that you&#8217;ve found work here for me
+because I saw what you did over by Antelope Pass.
+We made a bargain. Oh, not in words, but a bargain
+just the same! You were to keep my secret
+because I knew yours. I release you from your part
+of it. Give me up if you think it is your duty.
+I&#8217;ll not tell what I know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That wasn&#8217;t how you talked the other day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. It&#8217;s how I talk now. I&#8217;m a hunted man,
+wanted for murder. I make you a present of the
+information.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You make me a present of what I already know,
+Mr. Diller, alias Morse, alias Bellamy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You guessed it the first day?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And meant to keep quiet about it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, I meant to shelter you from the punishment
+you deserve.&#8221; She added with a touch of bitter
+self-scorn: &#8220;I was doing what I had to do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t have to do it any longer.&#8221; He looked
+straight at her with his head up. &#8220;And how do you
+know what I deserve? Who made you a judge
+about these facts? Grant for the sake of argument
+I killed him. Do you know I wasn&#8217;t justified?&#8221;</p>
+<p>His fierce boldness put her on the defense. &#8220;A
+man sure of his cause does not run away. The
+paper said this Shep Boone was shot from ambush.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_57' name='page_57'></a>57</span>
+Nothing could justify such a thing. When you
+did that&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t. Don&#8217;t believe it, Miss Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He was shot from behind, the paper said.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do I look like a man who would kill from
+ambush?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She admitted to herself that this clear-eyed Southerner
+did not look like an assassin. Life in the open
+had made her a judge of such men as she had been
+accustomed to meet, but for days she had been telling
+herself she could no longer trust her judgment.
+Her best friend was a rustler. By a woman&#8217;s logic
+it followed that since Jack Flatray was a thief this
+man might have committed all the crimes in the
+calendar.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know.&#8221; Then, impulsively, &#8220;No, you
+don&#8217;t, but you may be for all that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not asking anything for myself. You may
+do as you please after I&#8217;ve gone. Send for Mr.
+Flatray and tell him if you like.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A horse cantered across the plaza toward the
+store. Bellamy turned quickly to go.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not going to tell anyone,&#8221; the girl called
+after him in a low voice.</p>
+<p>Norris swung from the saddle. &#8220;Who&#8217;s our hurried
+friend?&#8221; he asked carelessly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, a new rider of ours. Name of Morse.&#8221;
+She changed the subject. &#8220;Are you&mdash;do you think
+you know who the rustler is?&#8221;</p>
+<p>His cold, black eyes rested in hers. She read in
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_58' name='page_58'></a>58</span>
+them something cruel and sinister. It was as if he
+were walking over the grave of an enemy.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m gathering evidence, a little at a time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do I know him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Maybe you do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tell me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He shook his head. &#8220;Wait till I&#8217;ve got him
+cinched.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You told father,&#8221; she accused.</p>
+<p>He laughed in a hard, mirthless fashion. &#8220;That
+cured me. The Lee family is from Missouri. When
+I talk next time I&#8217;ll have the goods to show.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know who you mean. You&#8217;re making a mistake.&#8221;
+Her voice seemed to plead with him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not on your life, I ain&#8217;t. But we&#8217;ll talk about
+that when the subject is riper. There will be a
+showdown some day, and don&#8217;t you forget it. Well,
+Charley is calling me. So long, Miss Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen.&#8221;
+He went jingling down the
+steps and swung to the saddle. &#8220;I&#8217;ll not forget the
+ad, and when I find the right man I&#8217;ll ce&#8217;tainly rope
+and bring him to you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The rustler?&#8221; she asked innocently.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, not the rustler, the gent between eighteen
+and forty-eight, object matrimony.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t want to trouble you,&#8221; she flung at him
+with her gay smile.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No trouble at all. Fact is, I&#8217;ve got him in mind
+already,&#8221; he assured her promptly.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_59' name='page_59'></a>59</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&#8221; A pulse of excitement was beating in
+her throat.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t ask me who he is,&#8221; suggested Norris
+boldly, crouched in the saddle with his weight on
+the far stirrup.</p>
+<p>She had brought it upon herself, but now she
+dodged the issue. &#8220;&#8217;Most anyone will do, and me
+going on eighteen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re wrong, girl. Only one out of a thousand
+will do for your master.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Master, indeed! If he comes to the Bar
+Double G he&#8217;ll find he is at the wrong address.
+None wanted, thank you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Most folks don&#8217;t want what&#8217;s best for them, I
+allow. But if they have luck it sometimes comes
+to them.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Luck!&#8221; she echoed, her chin in the air.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You heard me right. What you need is a man
+that ain&#8217;t afraid of you, one to ride close herd on
+you so as to head off them stampede notions of
+yours. Now this lad is the very one. He is a
+black-haired guy, and when he says a thing&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>Involuntarily she glanced at his sleek black head.
+Melissy felt a sudden clamor of the blood, a pounding
+of the pulses.</p>
+<p>&#8220;&mdash;he most generally means it. I&#8217;ve wrangled
+around a heap with him and there&#8217;s no manner of
+doubt he&#8217;s up to specifications. In appearance he
+looks like me. Point of fact, he&#8217;s a dead ringer
+for me.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_60' name='page_60'></a>60</span></p>
+<p>She saw her chance and flashed out. &#8220;Now you&#8217;re
+flattering him. There can&#8217;t be two as&mdash;as fascinating
+as Señor Norris,&#8221; she mocked.</p>
+<p>His smoldering eyes had the possessive insolence
+she resented and yet found so stimulating.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did I say there were two?&#8221; he drawled.</p>
+<p>It was his parting shot. With a touch of the
+spur he was off, leaving her no time for an adequate
+answer.</p>
+<p>There were no elusions and inferences about
+Philip Norris when he wanted to be direct. He had
+fairly taken her breath away. Melissy&#8217;s instinct
+told her there was something humiliating about
+such a wooing. But picturesque and unconventional
+conduct excuse themselves in a picturesque personality.
+And this man had that if nothing else.</p>
+<p>She told herself she was angry at him, that he
+took liberties far beyond those of any of the other
+young men. Yet, somehow, she went into the house
+smiling. A color born of excitement burned beneath
+her sparkling eyes. She had entered into her
+heritage of womanhood and the call of sex was
+summoning her to the adventure that is old as the
+garden where Eve met Adam.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='V_THE_TENDERFOOT_TAKES_UP_A_CLAIM' id='V_THE_TENDERFOOT_TAKES_UP_A_CLAIM'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_61' name='page_61'></a>61</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER V</h2>
+<h3>THE TENDERFOOT TAKES UP A CLAIM</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Mr. Diller, alias Morse, alias Bellamy,
+did not long remain at the Bar Double G
+as a rider. It developed that he had
+money, and, tenderfoot though he was, the man
+showed a shrewd judgment in his investments. He
+bought sheep and put them on the government forest
+reserve, much to the annoyance of the cattlemen
+of the district.</p>
+<p>Morse, as he now called himself, was not the
+first man who had brought sheep into the border
+country. Far up in the hills were several camps
+of them. But hitherto these had been there on sufferance,
+and it had been understood that they were
+to be kept far from the cattle range. The extension
+of the government reserves changed the equation.
+A good slice of the range was cut off and
+thrown open to sheep. When Morse leased this
+and put five thousand bleaters upon the feeding
+ground the sentiment against him grew very bitter.</p>
+<p>Lee had been spokesman of a committee appointed
+to remonstrate with him. Morse had met them
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_62' name='page_62'></a>62</span>
+pleasantly but firmly. This part of the reserve had
+been set aside for sheep. If it were not leased by
+him it would be by somebody else. Therefore, he
+declined to withdraw his flocks. Champ lost his
+temper and swore that he for one would never submit
+to yield the range. Sharp bitter words were
+passed. Next week masked men drove a small
+flock belonging to Morse over a precipice.</p>
+<p>The tenderfoot retaliated by jumping a mining
+claim staked out by Lee upon which the assessment
+work had not been kept up. The cattleman contested
+this in the courts, lost the decision, and
+promptly appealed. Meanwhile, he countered by
+leasing from the forest supervisor part of the run
+previously held by his opponent and putting sheep
+of his own upon it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon I&#8217;ll play Mr. Morse&#8217;s own game and
+see how he likes it,&#8221; the angry cattleman told his
+friends.</p>
+<p>But the luck was all with Morse. Before he had
+been working his new claim a month the Monte
+Cristo (he had changed the name from its original
+one of Melissy) proved a bonanza. His men ran
+into a rich streak of dirt that started a stampede
+for the vicinity.</p>
+<p>Champ indulged in choice profanity. From his
+point of view he had been robbed, and he announced
+the fact freely to such acquaintances as dropped into
+the Bar Double G store.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dad gum it, I was aimin&#8217; to do that assessment
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_63' name='page_63'></a>63</span>
+work and couldn&#8217;t jest lay my hands on the time.
+I&#8217;d been a millionaire three years and didn&#8217;t know
+it. Then this damned Morse butts in and euchres
+me out of the claim. Some day him and me&#8217;ll have
+a settlement. If the law don&#8217;t right me, I reckon
+I&#8217;m most man enough to &#8217;tend to Mr. Morse.&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was his daughter who had hitherto succeeded
+in keeping the peace. When the news of the relocation
+had reached Lee he had at once started to settle
+the matter with a Winchester, but Melissy, getting
+news of his intention, had caught up a horse and
+ridden bareback after him in time to avert by her
+entreaties a tragedy. For six months after this
+the men had not chanced to meet.</p>
+<p>Why the tenderfoot had first come West&mdash;to hide
+what wounds in the great baked desert&mdash;no man
+knew or asked. Melissy had guessed, but she did
+not breathe to a soul her knowledge. It was a first
+article of Arizona&#8217;s creed that a man&#8217;s past belonged
+to him alone, was a blotted book if he chose
+to have it so. No doubt many had private reasons
+for their untrumpeted migration to that kindly
+Southwest which buries identity, but no wise citizen
+busied himself with questions about antecedents.
+The present served to sift one, and by the way a
+man met it his neighbors judged him.</p>
+<p>And T. L. Morse met it competently. In every
+emergency with which he had to cope the man
+&#8220;stood the acid.&#8221; Arizona approved him a man,
+without according him any popularity. He was too
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_64' name='page_64'></a>64</span>
+dogmatic to win liking, but he had a genius for success.
+Everything he touched turned to gold.</p>
+<p>The Bar Double G lies half way between Mammoth
+and Mesa. Its position makes it a central
+point for ranchers within a radius of fifteen miles.
+Out of the logical need for it was born the store
+which Beauchamp Lee ran to supply his neighbors
+with canned goods, coffee, tobacco, and other indispensables;
+also the eating house for stage passengers
+passing to and from the towns. Young as
+she was, Melissy was the competent manager of
+both of these.</p>
+<p>It was one afternoon during the hour the stage
+stopped to let the passengers dine that Melissy&#8217;s
+wandering eye fell upon Morse seated at one of the
+tables. Anger mounted within her at the cool impudence
+of the man. She had half a mind to order
+him out, but saw he was nearly through dinner
+and did not want to make a scene. Unfortunately
+Beauchamp Lee happened to come into the store
+just as his enemy strolled out from the dining-room.</p>
+<p>The ranchman stiffened. &#8220;What you been doing
+in there, seh?&#8221; he demanded sharply.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been eating a very good dinner in a public
+café. Any objections?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Plenty of &#8217;em, seh. I don&#8217;t aim to keep open
+house for Mr. Morse.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I understand this is a business proposition. I
+expect to pay seventy-five cents for my meal.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_65' name='page_65'></a>65</span></p>
+<p>The eyes of the older man gleamed wrathfully.
+&#8220;As for yo&#8217; six bits, if you offer it to me I&#8217;ll take
+it as an insult. At the Bar Double G we&#8217;re not
+doing friendly business with claim jumpers. Don&#8217;t
+you evah set yo&#8217; legs under my table again, seh.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Morse shrugged, turned away to the public desk,
+and addressed an envelope, the while Lee glared at
+him from under his heavy beetling brows. Melissy
+saw that her father was still of half a mind to
+throw out the intruder and she called him to her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dad, José wants you to look at the hoof of one
+of his wheelers. He asked if you would come as
+soon as you could.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Beauchamp still frowned at Morse, rasping his
+unshaven chin with his hand. &#8220;Ce&#8217;tainly, honey.
+Glad to look at it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dad! Please.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The ranchman went out, grumbling. Five minutes
+later Morse took his seat on the stage beside
+the driver, having first left seventy-five cents on
+the counter.</p>
+<p>The stage had scarce gone when the girl looked
+up from her bookkeeping to see the man with the
+Chihuahua hat.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Buenos tardes, señorita</i>,&#8221; he gave her with a
+flash of white teeth.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Buenos</i>,&#8221; she nodded coolly.</p>
+<p>But the dancing eyes of her could not deny their
+pleasure at sight of him. They had rested upon
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_66' name='page_66'></a>66</span>
+men as handsome, but upon none who stirred her
+blood so much.</p>
+<p>He was in the leather chaps of a cowpuncher,
+gray-shirted, and a polka dot kerchief circled the
+brown throat. Life rippled gloriously from every
+motion of him. Hermes himself might have envied
+the perfect grace of the man.</p>
+<p>She supplied his wants while they chatted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jogged off your range quite a bit, haven&#8217;t you?&#8221;
+she suggested.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Some. I&#8217;ll take two bits&#8217; worth of that smokin&#8217;,
+<i>nina</i>.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She shook her head. &#8220;I&#8217;m no little girl. Don&#8217;t
+you know I&#8217;m now half past eighteen?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My&mdash;my. That ad didn&#8217;t do a mite of good,
+did it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not a bit.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you growing older every day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Does my age show?&#8221; she wanted to know
+anxiously.</p>
+<p>The scarce veiled admiration of his smoldering
+eyes drew the blood to her dusky cheeks. Something
+vigilant lay crouched panther-like behind the
+laughter of his surface badinage.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re standing it well, honey.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The color beat into her face, less at the word
+than at the purring caress in his voice. A year ago
+she had been a child. But in the Southland flowers
+ripen fast. Adolescence steals hard upon the heels
+of infancy, and, though the girl had never wakened
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_67' name='page_67'></a>67</span>
+to love, Nature was pushing her relentlessly toward
+a womanhood for which her unschooled impulses
+but scantily safeguarded her.</p>
+<p>She turned toward the shelves. &#8220;How many air-tights
+did you say?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t say.&#8221; He leaned forward across the
+counter. &#8220;What&#8217;s the hurry, little girl?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My name is Melissy Lee,&#8221; she told him over
+her shoulder.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mine is Phil Norris. Glad to give it to you,
+Melissy Lee,&#8221; the man retorted glibly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t use it, thank you,&#8221; came her swift saucy
+answer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Or to lend it to you&mdash;say, for a week or two.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She flashed a look at him and passed quickly
+from behind the counter. Her father was just coming
+into the store.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Will you wait on Mr. Norris, dad? Hop wants
+to see me in the kitchen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris swore softly under his breath. The last
+thing he had wanted was to drive her away. It
+had been nearly a year since he had seen her last,
+but the picture of her had been in the coals of
+many a night camp fire.</p>
+<p>The cattle detective stayed to dinner and to supper.
+He and her father had their heads together
+for hours, their voices pitched to a murmur. Melissy
+wondered what business could have brought
+him, whether it could have anything to do with the
+renewed rustling that had of late annoyed the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_68' name='page_68'></a>68</span>
+neighborhood. This brought her thoughts to Jack
+Flatray. He, too, had almost dropped from her
+world, though she heard of him now and again.
+Not once had he been to see her since the night she
+had sprained her ankle.</p>
+<p>Later, when Melissy was watering the roses beside
+the porch, she heard the name of Morse mentioned
+by the stock detective. He seemed to be
+urging upon her father some course of action at
+which the latter demurred. The girl knew a vague
+unrest. Lee did not need his anger against Morse
+incensed. For months she had been trying to allay
+rather than increase this. If Philip Norris had come
+to stir up smoldering fires, she would give him a
+piece of her mind.</p>
+<p>The men were still together when Melissy told
+her father good-night. If she had known that a
+whisky bottle passed back and forth a good many
+times in the course of the evening, the fears of the
+girl would not have been lightened. She knew that
+in the somber moods following a drinking bout the
+lawlessness of Beauchamp Lee was most likely to
+crop out.</p>
+<p>As for the girl, now night had fallen&mdash;that wondrous
+velvet night of Arizona, which blots out garish
+day with a cloak of violet, purple-edged where
+the hills rise vaguely in the distance, and softens
+magically all harsh details beneath the starry vault&mdash;she
+slipped out to the summit of the ridge in the
+big pasture, climbing lightly, with the springy ease
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_69' name='page_69'></a>69</span>
+born of the vigor her nineteen outdoor years had
+stored in the strong young body. She wanted to
+be alone, to puzzle out what the coming of this man
+meant to her. Had he intended anything by that
+last drawling remark of his in the store? Why was
+it that his careless, half insulting familiarity set the
+blood leaping through her like wine? He lured her
+to the sex duel, then trampled down her reserves
+roughshod. His bold assurance stung her to anger,
+but there was a something deeper than anger that
+left her flushed and tingling.</p>
+<p>Both men slept late, but Norris was down first.
+He found Melissy superintending a drive of sheep
+which old Antonio, the herder, was about to make
+to the trading-post at Three Pines. She was on
+her pony near the entrance to the corral, her slender,
+lithe figure sitting in a boy&#8217;s saddle with a businesslike
+air he could not help but admire. The gate
+bars had been lifted and the dog was winding its
+way among the bleating gray mass, which began
+to stir uncertainly at its presence. The sheep dribbled
+from the corral by ones and twos until the
+procession swelled to a swollen stream that poured
+forth in a torrent. Behind them came Antonio in
+his sombrero and blanket, who smiled at his mistress,
+shouted an &#8220;<i>Adios, señorita</i>,&#8221; and disappeared
+into the yellow dust cloud which the herd left in its
+wake.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How does Champ like being in the sheep business,&#8221;
+Norris said to the girl.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_70' name='page_70'></a>70</span></p>
+<p>Melissy did not remove her eyes from the vanishing
+herd, but a slight frown puckered her forehead.
+She chose to take this as a criticism of her father
+and to resent it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why shouldn&#8217;t he be?&#8221; she said quietly,
+answering the spirit of his remark.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t mean it that way,&#8221; he protested, with
+his frank laugh.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then if you didn&#8217;t mean it so, I shan&#8217;t take it
+that way;&#8221; and her smile met his.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here&#8217;s how I look at this sheep business. Some
+ranges are better adapted for sheep than cattle, and
+you can&#8217;t keep Mary&#8217;s little lamb away from those
+places. No use for a man to buck against the thing
+that&#8217;s bound to be. Better get into the band-wagon
+and ride.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s what father thought,&#8221; the girl confessed.
+&#8220;He never would have been the man to bring sheep
+in, but after they got into the country he saw it was
+a question of whether he was going to get the government
+reserve range for his sheep, or another
+man, some new-comer like Mr. Morse, for his. It
+was going to be sheep anyhow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I&#8217;m glad your father took the chance he
+saw.&#8221; He added reminiscently: &#8220;We got to be
+right good friends again last night before we
+parted.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She took the opening directly. &#8220;If you&#8217;re so good
+a friend of his, you must not excite him about Mr.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_71' name='page_71'></a>71</span>
+Morse. You know he&#8217;s a Southerner, and he is
+likely to do something rash&mdash;something we shall
+all be sorry for afterward.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon that will be all right,&#8221; he said evasively.</p>
+<p>Her eyes swept to his. &#8220;You won&#8217;t get father
+into trouble will you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The warm, affectionate smile came back to his
+face, so that as he looked at her he seemed a sun-god.
+But again there was something in his gaze
+that was not the frankness of a comrade, some
+smoldering fire that strangely stirred her blood and
+yet left her uneasy.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not liable to bring trouble to those you love,
+girl. I stand by my friends.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her pony began to move toward the house, and
+he strode beside, as debonair and gallant a figure as
+ever filled the eye and the heart of a woman. The
+morning sun glow irradiated him, found its sparkling
+reflection in the dark curls of his bare head,
+in the bloom of his tanned cheeks, made a fit setting
+for the graceful picture of lingering youth his slim,
+muscular figure and springy stride personified.
+Small wonder the untaught girl beside him found
+the merely physical charm of him fascinating. If
+her instinct sometimes warned her to beware, her
+generous heart was eager to pay small heed to the
+monition except so far as concerned her father.</p>
+<p>After breakfast he came into the office to see her
+before he left.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_72' name='page_72'></a>72</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Good-by for a day or two,&#8221; he said, offering
+his hand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re coming back again, are you?&#8221; she asked
+quietly, but not without a deeper dye in her cheeks.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, I&#8217;m coming back. Will you be glad to see
+me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why should I be glad? I hardly know you
+these days.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll know me better before we&#8217;re through
+with each other.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She would acknowledge no interest in him, the
+less because she knew it was there. &#8220;I may do that
+without liking you better.&#8221;</p>
+<p>And suddenly his swift, winning smile flashed
+upon her. &#8220;But you&#8217;ve got to like me. I want
+you to.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you get everything you want?&#8221; she smiled
+back.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If I want it enough, I usually do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then since you get so much, you&#8217;ll be better able
+to do without my liking.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m going to have it too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t be too sure.&#8221; She had a feeling that
+things were moving too fast, and she hailed the
+appearance of her father with relief. &#8220;Good morning,
+dad. Did you sleep well? Mr. Norris is just
+leaving.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Wait till I git a bite o&#8217; breakfast and I&#8217;ll go with
+you, Phil,&#8221; promised Lee. &#8220;I got to ride over to
+Mesa anyhow some time this week.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_73' name='page_73'></a>73</span></p>
+<p>The girl watched them ride away, taking the road
+gait so characteristic of the Southwest. As long
+as they were in sight her gaze followed them, and
+when she could see nothing but a wide cloud of
+dust travelling across the mesa she went up to her
+room and sat down to think it out. Something new
+had come into her life. What, she did not yet know,
+but she tried to face the fact with the elemental
+frankness that still made her more like a boy than
+a woman. Sitting there before the looking-glass,
+she played absently with the thick braid of heavy,
+blue-black hair which hung across her shoulder to
+the waist. It came to her for the first time to
+wonder if she was pretty, whether she was going to
+be one of the women that men desire. Without the
+least vanity she studied herself, appraised the soft
+brown cheeks framed with ebon hair, the steady,
+dark eyes so quick to passion and to gaiety, the
+bronzed throat full and rounded, the supple, flowing
+grace of the unrestrained body.</p>
+<p>Gradually a wave of color crept into her cheeks
+as she sat there with her chin on her little doubled
+hand. It was the charm of this Apollo of the plains
+that had set free such strange thoughts in her head.
+Why should she think of him? What did it matter
+whether she was good-looking? She shook herself
+resolutely together and went down to the business
+of the day.</p>
+<p>It was not long after midnight the next day that
+Champ Lee reached the ranch. His daughter came
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_74' name='page_74'></a>74</span>
+out from her room in her night-dress to meet him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What kept you, Daddy?&#8221; she asked.</p>
+<p>But before he could answer she knew. She read
+the signs too clearly to doubt that he had been
+drinking.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='VI__HANDS_UP' id='VI__HANDS_UP'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_75' name='page_75'></a>75</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI</h2>
+<h3>&#8220;HANDS UP&#8221;</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Melissy had been up the Cañ del Oro
+for wild poppies in her runabout and had
+just reached the ranch. She was disposing
+of her flowers in ollas when Jim Budd, waiter,
+chambermaid, and odd jobs man at the Bar Double
+G, appeared in the hall with a frightened, mysterious
+face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s the matter, Jim? You and Hop Ling
+been quarrelling again?&#8221; she asked carelessly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&#8217;m, that ain&#8217;t it. It&#8217;s wusser&#8217;n that. I got
+to tell you-all su&#8217;thin&#8217; I hearn yore paw say.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl looked up quickly at him. &#8220;What do
+you mean, Jim?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That Mistah Norris he come back whilst you
+wus away, and him and yore paw wus in that back
+room a-talkin&#8217; mighty confidential.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, and you listened. Well?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jim swelled with offended dignity. &#8220;No&#8217;m, I
+didn&#8217;t listen neither. I des natcherally hearn, &#8217;count
+of that hole fer the stovepipe what comes through
+the floor of my room.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But what was it you heard?&#8221; she interrupted
+impatiently.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_76' name='page_76'></a>76</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I wus a-comin&#8217; to that. Plum proverdenshul, I
+draps into my room des as yore paw wus sayin&#8217;,
+&#8217;Twenty thousand dollars goin&#8217; down to the Fort
+on the stage to-day?&#8217; &#8217;Cose I pricks up my ears
+then and tuk it all in. This yere Norris had foun&#8217;
+out that Mistah Morse was shippin&#8217; gold from his
+mine to-day on the Fort Allison stage, and he gits
+yore paw to go in with him an&#8217; hold it up. Yore
+paw cussed and said as how &#8217;t wus his gold anyhow
+by rights.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl went white and gave a little broken cry.
+&#8220;Oh, Jim! Are you sure?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yas&#8217;m, &#8217;cose I&#8217;m suah. Them&#8217;s his ve&#8217;y words.
+Hope to die if they ain&#8217;t. They wus drinkin&#8217;, and
+when &#8217;t wus all fixed up that &#8217;t wus to be at the
+mouth of the Box Cañon they done tore an old
+black shirt you got for a dust-rag and made masks
+out of it and then rode away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Which way did they go?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tow&#8217;ds the Box Cañon Miss M&#8217;lissy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A slender, pallid figure of despair, she leaned
+against the wall to support the faintness that had
+so suddenly stolen the strength from her limbs,
+trying desperately to think of some way to save her
+father from this madness. She was sure he would
+bungle it and be caught eventually, and she was
+equally sure he would never let himself be taken
+alive. Her helplessness groped for some way out.
+There must be some road of escape from this horrible
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_77' name='page_77'></a>77</span>
+situation, and as she sought blindly for it the
+path opened before her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where is Hop?&#8221; she asked quickly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A-sleepin&#8217; in his room, ma&#8217;am.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Go to the store and tend it till I come back, Jim.
+I may be an hour, or mebbe two, but don&#8217;t you move
+out of it for a moment. And don&#8217;t ever speak of
+any of this, not a word, Jim.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&#8217;m, &#8217;cose I won&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His loyalty she did not doubt an instant, though
+she knew his simple wits might easily be led to
+indiscretion. But she did not stay to say more
+now, but flew upstairs to the room that had been
+her brother&#8217;s before he left home. Scarce five minutes
+elapsed before she reappeared transformed. It
+was a slim youth garbed as a cowpuncher that now
+slipped along the passage to the rear, softly opened
+the door of the cook&#8217;s room, noiselessly abstracted
+the key, closed the door again as gently, and locked
+it from the outside. She ran into her own room,
+strapped on her revolver belt, and took her empty
+rifle from its case. As she ran through the room
+below the one Jim occupied, she caught sight of a
+black rag thrown carelessly into the fireplace and
+stuffed it into her pocket.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s just like Dad to leave evidence lying
+around,&#8221; she said to herself, for even in the anxiety
+that was flooding her she kept her quiet commonsense.</p>
+<p>After searching the horizon carefully to see that
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_78' name='page_78'></a>78</span>
+nobody was in sight, she got into the rig and drove
+round the corral to the irrigating ditch. This was
+a wide lateral of the main canal, used to supply the
+whole lower valley with water, and just now it was
+empty. Melissy drove down into its sandy bed and
+followed its course as rapidly as she could. If she
+were only in time! If the stage had not yet passed!
+That was her only fear, the dread of being too late.
+Not once did the risk of the thing she intended
+occur to her. Physical fear had never been part of
+her. She had done the things her brother Dick had
+done. She was a reckless rider, a good shot, could
+tramp the hills or follow the round-up all day without
+knowing fatigue. If her flesh still held its girlish
+curves and softness, the muscles underneath
+were firm and compact. Often for her own amusement
+and that of her father she had donned her
+brother&#8217;s chaps, his spurs, sombrero, and other paraphernalia,
+to masquerade about the house in them.
+She had learned to imitate the long roll of the
+vaquero&#8217;s stride, the mannerisms common to his
+class, and even the heavy voice of a man. More
+than once she had passed muster as a young man
+in the shapeless garments she was now wearing.
+She felt confident that the very audacity of the thing
+would carry it off. There would be a guard for the
+treasure box, of course, but if all worked well he
+could be taken by surprise. Her rifle was not loaded,
+but the chances were a hundred to one that she
+would not need to use it.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_79' name='page_79'></a>79</span></p>
+<p>For the first time in his life the roan got the
+whip from his mistress.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Git up, Bob. We&#8217;ve got to hurry. It&#8217;s for
+dad,&#8221; she cried, as they raced through the sand
+and sent it flying from the wheels.</p>
+<p>The Fort Allison stage passed within three miles
+of the Lee ranch on its way to Mesa. Where the
+road met in intersection with the ditch she had
+chosen as the point for stopping it, and no veteran
+at the business could have selected more wisely, for
+a reason which will hereafter appear. Some fifty
+yards below this point of intersection the ditch ran
+through a grove of cottonwoods fringing the bank.
+Here the banks sloped down more gradually, and
+Melissy was able to drive up one side, turn her rig
+so that the horse faced the other way, and draw
+down into the ditch again in order that the runabout
+could not be seen from the road. Swiftly and skilfully
+she obliterated the track she had made in the
+sandy bank.</p>
+<p>She was just finishing this when the sound of
+wheels came to her. Rifle in hand, she ran back
+along the ditch, stooping to pass under the bridge,
+and waited at the farther side in a fringe of bushes
+for the coming of the stage.</p>
+<p>Even now fear had no place in the excitement
+which burned high in her. The girl&#8217;s wits were
+fully alert, and just in time she remembered the
+need of a mask. Her searching fingers found the
+torn black shirt in a pocket and a knife in another.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_80' name='page_80'></a>80</span>
+Hastily she ripped the linen in half, cut out eyeholes,
+and tied the mask about her head. With perfectly
+steady hands she picked up the rifle from the ground
+and pushed the muzzle of it through the bushes.</p>
+<p>Leisurely the stage rolled up-grade toward the
+crossing. The Mexican driver was half asleep and
+the &#8220;shotgun messenger&#8221; was indolently rolling a
+cigarette, his sawed-off gun between his knees.
+Alan McKinstra was the name of this last young
+gentleman. Only yesterday he had gone to work
+for Morse, and this was the first job that had been
+given him. The stage never had been held up since
+the &#8220;Monte Cristo&#8221; had struck its pay-streak, and
+there was no reason to suppose it would be. Nevertheless,
+Morse proposed to err on the side of caution.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon the man that holds down this job don&#8217;t
+earn his salt, José. It&#8217;s what they call a sinecure,&#8221;
+Alan was saying at the very instant the summons
+came.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Throw up your hands!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Sharp and crisp it fell on Alan&#8217;s ears. He sat for
+a moment stunned, the half-rolled cigarette still
+between his fingers. The driver drew up his four
+horses with a jerk and brought them to a huddled
+halt.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hands up!&#8221; came again the stinging imperative.</p>
+<p>Now, for the first time, it reached Alan&#8217;s consciousness
+that the stage was actually being held
+up. He saw the sun shining on the barrel of a rifle
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_81' name='page_81'></a>81</span>
+and through the bushes the masked face of a hidden
+cowpuncher. His first swift instinct was to give
+battle, and he reached for the shotgun between his
+knees. Simultaneously the driver&#8217;s foot gave it a
+push and sent the weapon clattering to the ground.
+José at least knew better than to let him draw the
+road agent&#8217;s fire while he sat within a foot of the
+driver. His hands went into the air, and after his
+Alan&#8217;s and those of the two passengers.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Throw down that box.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Alan lowered his hands and did as directed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now reach for the stars again.&#8221;</p>
+<p>McKinstra&#8217;s arms went skyward. Without his
+weapon, he was helpless to do otherwise. The
+young man had an odd sense of unreality about the
+affair, a feeling that it was not in earnest. The
+timbre of the fresh young voice that came from
+the bushes struck a chord in his memory, though
+for the life of him he could not place its owner.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Drive on, José. Burn the wind and keep a-rollin&#8217;
+south.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The Mexican&#8217;s whip coiled over the head of the
+leaders and the broncos sprang forward with a
+jump. It was the summit of a long hill, on the
+edge of which wound the road. Until the stage
+reached the foot of it there would be no opportunity
+to turn back. Round a bend of the road it swung
+at a gallop, and the instant it disappeared Melissy
+leaped from the bushes, lifted the heavy box, and
+carried it to the edge of the ditch. She flew down
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_82' name='page_82'></a>82</span>
+the sandy bottom to the place where the rig stood,
+drove swiftly back again, and, though it took the
+last ounce of strength in her, managed to tumble
+the box into the trap.</p>
+<p>Back to the road she went, and from the place
+where the box had fallen made long strides back
+to the bushes where she had been standing at the
+moment of the hold-up. These tracks she purposely
+made deep and large, returning in her first ones to
+the same point, but from the marks where the falling
+treasure box had struck into the road she carefully
+obliterated with her hand the foot-marks leading
+to the irrigation ditch, sifting the sand in carefully
+so as to leave no impression. This took scarcely
+a minute. She was soon back in her runabout,
+driving homeward fast as whip and voice could
+urge the horse.</p>
+<p>She thought she could reason out what McKinstra
+and the stage-driver would do. Mesa was twenty-five
+miles distant, the &#8220;Monte Cristo&#8221; mine seventeen.
+Nearer than these points there was no telephone
+station except the one at the Lee ranch. Their
+first thought would be to communicate with Morse,
+with the officers at Mammoth, and with the sheriff
+of Mesa County. To do this as soon as possible
+they would turn aside and drive to the ranch after
+they reached the bottom of the hill and could make
+the turn. It was a long, steep hill, and Melissy
+estimated that this would give her a start of nearly
+twenty minutes. She would save about half a mile
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_83' name='page_83'></a>83</span>
+by following the ditch instead of the road, but at
+best she knew she was drawing it very fine.</p>
+<p>She never afterward liked to think of that drive
+home. It seemed to her that Bob crawled and that
+the heavy sand was interminable. Feverishly she
+plied the whip, and when at length she drew out
+of the ditch she sent her horse furiously round the
+big corral. Though she had planned everything
+to the last detail, she knew that any one of a hundred
+contingencies might spoil her plan. A cowpuncher
+lounging about the place would have ruined everything,
+or at best interfered greatly. But the windmill
+clicked over sunlit silence, empty of life. No
+stir or movement showed the presence of any human
+being.</p>
+<p>Melissy drove round to the side door, dumped out
+the treasure-box, ran into the house, and quickly
+returned with a hammer and some tacks, then fell
+swiftly to ripping the oilcloth that covered the
+box which stood against the wall to serve as a handy
+wash-stand for use by dusty travellers before dining.
+The two boxes were of the same size and shape,
+and she draped the treasure chest with the cloth,
+tacked it in place, restored to the top of it the tin
+basin, and tossed the former wash-stand among a
+pile of old boxes from the store, that were to be
+used for kindling. After this she ran upstairs,
+scudded softly along the corridor, and silently
+unlocked the cook&#8217;s door, dropping the key on the
+floor to make it appear as if something had shaken
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_84' name='page_84'></a>84</span>
+it from the keyhole. Presently she was in her
+brother&#8217;s room, doffing his clothes and dressing
+herself in her own.</p>
+<p>A glance out of the window sapped the color
+from her cheek, for she saw the stage breasting the
+hill scarce two hundred yards from the house. She
+hurried downstairs, pinning her belt as she ran, and
+flashed into the store, where Jim sat munching
+peanuts.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The stage is coming, Jim. Remember, you&#8217;re
+not to know anything about it at all. If they ask
+for Dad, say he&#8217;s out cutting trail of a bunch of hill
+cows. Tell them I started after the wild flowers
+about fifteen minutes ago. Don&#8217;t talk much about it,
+though. I&#8217;ll be back inside of an hour.&#8221;</p>
+<p>With that she was gone, back to her trap, which
+she swung along a trail back of the house till it met
+the road a quarter of a mile above. Her actions
+must have surprised steady old Bob, for he certainly
+never before had seen his mistress in such a desperate
+hurry as she had been this day and still was.
+Nearly a mile above, a less well defined track
+deflected from the main road. Into this she turned,
+following it until she came to the head-gates of the
+lateral which ran through their place. The main
+canal was full of water, and after some effort she
+succeeded in opening the head-gates so as to let the
+water go pouring through.</p>
+<p>Returning to the runabout, the girl drove across
+a kind of natural meadow to a hillside not far distant,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_85' name='page_85'></a>85</span>
+gathered a double handful of wild flowers, and
+turned homeward again. The stage was still there
+when she came in sight of the group of buildings
+at the ranch.</p>
+<p>As she drew up and dismounted with her armful
+of flowers, Alan McKinstra stepped from the store
+to the porch and came forward to assist her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The Fort Allison stage has been robbed,&#8221; he
+blurted out.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What nonsense! Who would want to rob it?&#8221;
+she retorted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Morse had a gold shipment aboard,&#8221; he explained
+in a low voice, and added in bitter self-condemnation:
+&#8220;He sent me along to guard it, and I never
+even fired a shot to save it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&mdash;do you mean that somebody held up the
+stage?&#8221; she gasped.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. But whoever it was can&#8217;t escape. I&#8217;ve
+&#8217;phoned to Jack Flatray and to Morse. They&#8217;ll be
+right out here. The sheriff of Mesa County has
+already started with a posse. They&#8217;ll track him
+down. That&#8217;s a cinch. He can&#8217;t get away with
+the box without a rig. If he busts the box, he&#8217;s
+got to carry it on a horse and a horse leaves tracks.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But who do you think it was?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t know. One of the Roaring Fork bunch
+of bad men, likely. But I don&#8217;t know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The young man was plainly very much excited
+and disturbed. He walked nervously up and down,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_86' name='page_86'></a>86</span>
+jerking his sentences out piecemeal as he thought
+of them.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Was there only one man? And did you see
+him?&#8221; Melissy asked breathlessly.</p>
+<p>He scarcely noticed her excitement, or if he did,
+it seemed to him only natural under the circumstances.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I expect there were more, but we saw only one.
+Didn&#8217;t see much of him. He was screened by the
+bushes and wore a black mask. So long as the stage
+was in sight he never moved from that place; just
+stood there and kept us covered.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But how could he rob you if he didn&#8217;t come
+out?&#8221; she asked in wide-eyed innocence.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He didn&#8217;t rob <i>us</i> any. He must &#8217;a&#8217; heard of the
+shipment of gold, and that&#8217;s what he was after.
+After he&#8217;d got us to rights he made me throw the
+box down in the road. That&#8217;s where it was when
+he ordered us to move on and keep agoing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you went?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;José handled the lines, but &#8217;t would &#8217;a&#8217; been the
+same if I&#8217;d held them. That gun of his was a right
+powerful persuader.&#8221; He stopped to shake a fist
+in impotent fury in the air. &#8220;I wish to God I could
+meet up with him some day when he didn&#8217;t have
+the drop on me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Maybe you will some time,&#8221; she told him soothingly.
+&#8220;I don&#8217;t think you&#8217;re a bit to blame, Alan.
+Nobody could think so. Ever so many times I&#8217;ve
+heard Dad say that when a man gets the drop on
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_87' name='page_87'></a>87</span>
+you there&#8217;s nothing to do but throw up your hands.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you honest think so, Melissy? Or are you
+just saying it to take the sting away? Looks like
+I ought to &#8217;a&#8217; done something mor&#8217;n sit there like a
+bump on a log while he walked off with the gold.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His cheerful self-satisfaction was under eclipse.
+The boyish pride of him was wounded. He had
+not &#8220;made good.&#8221; All over Cattleland the news
+would be wafted on the wings of the wind that
+Alan McKinstra, while acting as shotgun messenger
+to a gold shipment, had let a road agent hold him
+up for the treasure he was guarding.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Very likely they&#8217;ll catch him and get the gold
+back,&#8221; she suggested.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That won&#8217;t do me any good,&#8221; he returned
+gloomily. &#8220;The only thing that can help me now
+is for me to git the fellow myself, and I might just
+as well look for a needle in a haystack.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You can&#8217;t tell. The robber may be right round
+here now.&#8221; Her eyes, shining with excitement,
+passed the crowd moving in and out of the store,
+for already the news of the hold-up had brought
+riders and ranchmen jogging in to learn the truth
+of the wild tale that had reached them.</p>
+<p>&#8220;More likely he&#8217;s twenty miles away. But whoever
+he is, he knows this county. He made a slip
+and called José by his name.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy&#8217;s gaze was turned to the dust whirl that
+advanced up the road that ran round the corral.
+&#8220;That doesn&#8217;t prove anything, Alan. Everybody
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_88' name='page_88'></a>88</span>
+knows José. He&#8217;s lived all over Arizona&mdash;at Tucson
+and Tombstone and Douglas.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right too,&#8221; the lad admitted.</p>
+<p>The riders in advance of the dust cloud resolved
+themselves into the persons of her father and
+Norris. Her incautious admission was already
+troubling her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I&#8217;m sure you&#8217;re right. No hold-up with
+any sense would stay around here and wait to be
+caught. He&#8217;s probably gone up into the Galiuros
+to hide.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Unless he&#8217;s cached the gold and is trying to
+throw off suspicion.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl had moved forward to the end of the
+house with Alan to meet her father. At that
+instant, by the ironic humor of chance, her glance
+fell upon a certain improvised wash-stand covered
+with oilcloth. She shook her head decisively. &#8220;No,
+he won&#8217;t risk waiting to do that. He&#8217;ll make sure
+of his escape first.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you heard, Daddy?&#8221; Melissy called out
+eagerly. She knew she must play the part expected
+of her, that of a young girl much interested in this
+adventure which had occurred in the community.</p>
+<p>He nodded grimly, swinging from the saddle.
+She observed with surprise that his eye did not meet
+hers. This was not like him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you think?&#8221;</p>
+<p>His gaze met that of Norris before he answered,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_89' name='page_89'></a>89</span>
+and there was in it some hint of a great fear.
+&#8220;Beats me, &#8217;Lissy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He had told the simple truth, but not the whole
+truth. The men had waited at the entrance to the
+Box Cañon for nearly two hours without the arrival
+of the stage. Deciding that something must have
+happened, they started back, and presently met a
+Mexican who stopped to tell them the news. To
+say that they were dazed is to put it mildly. To
+expect them to believe that somebody else had heard
+of the secret shipment and had held up the stage
+two miles from the place they had chosen, was to
+ask a credulity too simple. Yet this was the fact
+that confronted them.</p>
+<p>Arrived at the scene of the robbery both men
+had dismounted and had examined the ground
+thoroughly. What they saw tended still more to
+bewilder them. Neither of them was a tenderfoot,
+and the little table at the summit of the long hill
+told a very tangled tale to those who had eyes to
+read. Obvious tracks took them at once to the
+spot where the bandit had stood in the bushes, but
+there was something about them that struck both
+men as suspicious.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Looks like these are worked out on purpose,&#8221;
+commented Lee. &#8220;The guy&#8217;s leaving too easy a
+trail to follow, and it quits right abrupt in the
+bushes. Must &#8217;a&#8217; took an airship from here, I &#8217;low.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Does look funny. Hello! What&#8217;s this?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_90' name='page_90'></a>90</span></p>
+<p>Norris had picked up a piece of black cloth and
+was holding it out. A startled oath slipped from
+the lips of the Southerner. He caught the rag from
+the hands of his companion and studied it with a
+face of growing astonishment.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s up?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Lee dived into his pocket and drew forth the
+mask he had been wearing. Silently he fitted it to
+the other. The pieces matched exactly, both in
+length and in the figure of the pattern.</p>
+<p>When the Southerner looked up his hands were
+shaking and his face ashen.</p>
+<p>&#8220;For God&#8217;s sake, Phil, what does this mean?&#8221;
+he cried hoarsely.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Search me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It must have been&mdash;looks like the hold-up was
+somebody&mdash;my God, man, we left this rag at the
+ranch when we started!&#8221; the rancher whispered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We planned this thing right under the nigger&#8217;s
+room. He must &#8217;a&#8217; heard and&mdash;&mdash; But it don&#8217;t
+look like Jim Budd to do a thing like that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris had crossed the road again and was standing
+on the edge of the lateral.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hello! This ditch is full of water. When we
+passed down it was empty,&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>Lee crossed over and stood by his side, a puzzled
+frown on his face. &#8220;There hadn&#8217;t ought to be water
+running hyer now,&#8221; he said, as if to himself. &#8220;I
+don&#8217;t see how it could &#8217;a&#8217; come hyer, for Bill Weston&mdash;he&#8217;s
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_91' name='page_91'></a>91</span>
+the ditch rider&mdash;went to Mesa this mo&#8217;ning,
+and couldn&#8217;t &#8217;a&#8217; got back to turn it in.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The younger man stooped and examined a foot-print
+at the edge of the ditch. It was the one
+Melissy had made just as she stepped into the rig.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here&#8217;s something new, Lee. We haven&#8217;t seen
+this gentleman&#8217;s track before. Looks like a boy&#8217;s.
+It&#8217;s right firm and deep in this soft ground. I&#8217;ll
+bet a cooky your nigger never made that track.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The Southerner crouched down beside him, and
+they looked at it together, head to head.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, it ain&#8217;t Jim&#8217;s. I don&#8217;t rightly <i>savez</i> this
+thing at all,&#8221; the old man muttered, troubled at this
+mystery which seemed to point to his household.</p>
+<p>&#8220;By Moses, I&#8217;ve got it! The guy who did the
+holding up had his horse down here. He loaded the
+sack on its back and drove off up the ditch. All
+we got to do is follow the ditch up or down till we
+come to the place where he climbed out and struck
+across country.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right, Phil. He must have had a pardner
+up at the head-gates. They had some kind of signal
+arranged, and when Mr. Hold-up was ready down
+come the water and washed out his tracks. It&#8217;s a
+blame&#8217; smooth piece of business if you ask me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The fellow made two bad breaks, though. That
+piece of shirt is one. This foot-print is another.
+They may land him in the pen yet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t think it,&#8221; returned the old man with
+composure, and as he spoke his foot erased the telltale
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_92' name='page_92'></a>92</span>
+print. &#8220;I &#8217;low there won&#8217;t anybody go to the
+pen for he&#8217;pin himself to Mr. Morse&#8217;s gold dust.
+I don&#8217;t give a cuss who it was.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris laughed in his low, easy way. &#8220;I&#8217;m with
+you, Mr. Lee. We&#8217;ll make a thorough job while
+we&#8217;re at it and mess up these other tracks. After
+that we&#8217;ll follow the ditch up and see if there&#8217;s
+anything doing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They remounted their broncos and rode them
+across the tracks several times, then followed the
+lateral up, one on either side of the ditch, their
+eyes fastened to the ground to see any evidence of
+a horse having clambered over the bank. They
+drew in sight of the ranch house without discovering
+what they were looking for. Lee&#8217;s heart was
+in his mouth, for he knew that he would see presently
+what his eye sought.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon the fellow went down instead of up,&#8221;
+suggested Norris.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, he came up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Lee had stopped and was studying wheel tracks
+that ran up from the ditch to his ranch house. His
+face was very white and set. He pointed to them
+with a shaking finger.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s where he went in the ditch, and there&#8217;s
+where he came out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris forded the stream, cast a casual eye on
+the double track, and nodded. He was still in a
+fog of mystery, but the old man was already fearing
+the worst.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_93' name='page_93'></a>93</span></p>
+<p>He gulped out his fears tremblingly. For himself,
+he was of a flawless nerve, but this touched nearer
+home than his own danger.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Them wheel-tracks was made by my little
+gyurl&#8217;s runabout, Phil.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good heavens!&#8221; The younger man drew rein
+sharply and stared at him. &#8220;You don&#8217;t think&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>He broke off, recalling the sharp, firm little foot-print
+on the edge of the ditch some miles below.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t reckon I know what to think. If she
+was in this, she&#8217;s got some good reason.&#8221; A wave
+of passion suddenly swept the father. &#8220;By God!
+I&#8217;d like to see the man that dares mix her name
+up in this.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris met this with his friendly smile. &#8220;You
+can&#8217;t pick a row with me about that, old man. I&#8217;m
+with you till the cows come home. But that ain&#8217;t
+quite the way to go at this business. First thing,
+we&#8217;ve got to wipe out these tracks. How? Why,
+sheep! There&#8217;s a bunch of three hundred in that
+pasture. We&#8217;ll drive the bunch down to the ditch
+and water them here. <i>Savez?</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And wipe out the wheel-marks in the sand.
+Bully for you, Phil.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s the idea. After twelve hundred chisel
+feet have been over this sand I reckon the wheel-tracks
+will be missing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They rode up to the house, and the first thing
+that met them was the candid question of the girl:
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_94' name='page_94'></a>94</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you heard, Daddy?&#8221;</p>
+<p>And out of his troubled heart he had answered,
+&#8220;Beats me, &#8217;Lissie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They&#8217;ve sent for the officers. Jack Flatray is
+on the way himself. So is Sheriff Burke,&#8221; volunteered
+Alan gloomily.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Getting right busy, ain&#8217;t they?&#8221; Norris sneered.</p>
+<p>Again Lee glanced quickly at Norris. &#8220;I reckon,
+Phil, we better drive that bunch of sheep down to
+water right away. I clean forgot them this
+mo&#8217;ning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sure.&#8221; The younger man was not so easily
+shaken. He turned to McKinstra naturally. &#8220;How
+many of the hold-ups were there?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I saw only one, and didn&#8217;t see him very good.
+He was a slim fellow in a black mask.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t say. Were you the driver?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Alan felt the color suffuse his face. &#8220;No, I was
+the guard.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, you were the guard.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Alan felt the suave irony that covered this man&#8217;s
+amusement, and he resented it impotently. When
+Melissy came to his support he was the more
+grateful.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And we all think he did just right in using his
+common sense, Mr. Norris,&#8221; the girl flashed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, certainly.&#8221;</p>
+<p>And with that he was gone after her father to
+help him water the sheep.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t see why those sheep have to be watered
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_95' name='page_95'></a>95</span>
+right now,&#8221; she frowned to Alan. &#8220;Dad <i>did</i> water
+them this morning. I helped him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Together they went into the store, where José
+was telling his story for the sixth time to a listening
+circle of plainsmen.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And right then he come at you and ree-quested
+yore whole outfit to poke a hole in the scenery with
+yore front feet?&#8221; old Dave Ellis asked just as
+Melissy entered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Si, Señor.</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;One of MacQueen&#8217;s Roaring Fork gang did it,
+I&#8217;ll bet,&#8221; Alan contributed sourly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What kind of a lookin&#8217; guy was he?&#8221; spoke up
+a dark young man known as Bob Farnum.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A big man, <i>señor</i>, and looked a ruffian.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They&#8217;re always that way until you run &#8217;em
+down,&#8221; grinned Ellis. &#8220;Never knew a hold-up
+wasn&#8217;t eight foot high and then some&mdash;to the fellow
+at the wrong end of the gun.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you mean to say, Dave Ellis, that I lay down
+to a bluff&mdash;&mdash;&#8221; Alan was beginning hotly when the
+old frontiersman interrupted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Keep your shirt on, McKinstra. I don&#8217;t mean
+to say it. Nobody but a darn fool makes a gun-play
+when the cards are stacked that-a-way. Yore
+bad play was in reaching for the gun at all.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, Jack Flatray will git him. I&#8217;ll bet a stack
+of blues on that,&#8221; contributed a fat ranchman
+wheezily.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_96' name='page_96'></a>96</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Unless you mussed up the trail coming back,&#8221;
+said Ellis to the stage-driver.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We didn&#8217;t. I thought of that, and I had José
+drive clear round the place. Jack will find it all
+right unless there&#8217;s too much travel before he gets
+here,&#8221; said Alan.</p>
+<p>Farnum laughed malevolently. &#8220;Mebbe he&#8217;ll get
+him and mebbe he won&#8217;t. Jack&#8217;s human, like the
+rest of us, if he is the best sheriff in Arizona. Here&#8217;s
+hoping he don&#8217;t get him. Any man that waltzes out
+of the cactus and appropriates twenty thousand
+dollars belonging to Mr. Morse is welcome to it for
+all of me. I don&#8217;t care if he is one of MacQueen&#8217;s
+bad men. I wish it had been forty thousand.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Farnum did not need to explain the reasons for
+his sentiments. Everybody present knew that he
+was the leader of that bunch of cattlemen who had
+bunched themselves together to resist the encroachments
+of sheep upon the range. Among these the
+feeling against Morse was explosively dangerous.
+It had found expression in more than one raid upon
+his sheep. Many of them had been destroyed by
+one means or another, but Morse, with the obstinacy
+characteristic of him, had replaced them with others
+and continually increased his herds. There had
+been threats against his life, and one of his herders
+had been wounded. But the mine-owner went his
+way with quiet fearlessness and paid no attention to
+the animosity he had stirred up. The general feeling
+was that the trouble must soon come to a head.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_97' name='page_97'></a>97</span>
+Nobody expected the rough and ready vaqueros,
+reckless and impulsive as they were, to submit to the
+loss of the range, which meant too the wiping out
+of their means of livelihood, without a bitter struggle
+that would be both lawless and bloody.</p>
+<p>Wherefore there was silence after Farnum had
+spoken, broken at length by the amiable voice of
+the fat ranchman, Baker.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, we&#8217;ll see what we&#8217;ll see,&#8221; he wheezed
+complacently. &#8220;And anyways I got to have some
+horseshoe plug, Melissy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl laughed nervously as she reached for
+what he wanted. &#8220;You&#8217;re a safe prophet, Mr.
+Baker,&#8221; she said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;d be a safe one if he&#8217;d prophesy that Jack
+Flatray would have Mr. Hold-up in the calaboose
+inside of three days,&#8221; put in a half-grown lad in
+leathers.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I ain&#8217;t so sure about that. You&#8217;ll have to show
+me, and so will Mr. Deputy Sheriff Flatray,&#8221;
+retorted Farnum.</p>
+<p>A shadow darkened the doorway.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good afternoon, gentlemen all&mdash;and Miss Lee,&#8221;
+a pleasant voice drawled.</p>
+<p>The circle of eyes focused on the new-comer
+and saw a lean, muscular, young fellow of medium
+height, cool and alert, with the dust of the desert
+on every sunbaked inch of him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m damned if it ain&#8217;t Jack here already!&#8221; gasped
+Baker.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='VII_WATERING_SHEEP' id='VII_WATERING_SHEEP'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_98' name='page_98'></a>98</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII</h2>
+<h3>WATERING SHEEP</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>The deputy glanced quietly round, nodded
+here and there at sight of the familiar
+face of an acquaintance, and spoke to the
+driver.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let&#8217;s hear you say your little piece again, José.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The Mexican now had it by heart, and he pattered
+off the thing from beginning to end without a pause.
+Melissy, behind the counter, leaned her elbows on
+it and fastened her eyes on the boyish face of the
+officer. In her heart she was troubled. How much
+did he know? What could he discover from the
+evidence she had left? He had the reputation of
+being the best trailer and the most fearless officer
+in Arizona. But surely she had covered her tracks
+safely.</p>
+<p>From José the ranger turned to Alan. &#8220;We&#8217;ll
+hear your account of it now, seh,&#8221; he said gently.</p>
+<p>While Alan talked, Jack&#8217;s gaze drifted through
+the window to the flock of sheep that were being
+driven up from the ditch by Lee and Norris. That
+little pastoral scene had its significance for him. He
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_99' name='page_99'></a>99</span>
+had arrived at the locality of the hold-up a few minutes
+after they had left, and his keen intelligence had
+taken in some of the points they had observed. A
+rapid circuit of the spot at the distance of thirty
+yards had shown him no tracks leading from the
+place except those which ran up the lateral on either
+side of it. It was possible that these belonged to
+the horses of the robbers, but if so the fellows
+were singularly careless of detection. Moreover,
+the booty must be accounted for. They had not
+carried it with them, since no empty box remained
+to show that they had poured the gold into sacks,
+and it would have been impossible to take the box
+as it was on a horse. Nor had they buried it,
+unless at the bottom of the irrigating ditch, for
+some signs of their work must have remained.</p>
+<p>Balancing probabilities, it had seemed to Flatray
+that these might be the tracks of ranchmen who had
+arrived after the hold-up and were following the
+escaping bandits up the lateral. For unless these
+were the robber&#8217;s, there was no way of escape except
+either up or down the bottom of the ditch. His
+search had eliminated the possibility of any other
+but the road, and this was travelled too frequently
+to admit of even a chance of escape by it without
+detection. Jack filed away one or two questions in
+his brain for future reference. The most important
+of these was to discover whether there had been any
+water in the ditch at the time of the hold-up.</p>
+<p>He had decided to follow the tracks leading up
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_100' name='page_100'></a>100</span>
+the ditch and found no difficulty in doing so at a
+fast walk. Without any hesitation they paralleled
+the edge of the lateral. Nor had the deputy travelled
+a quarter of a mile before he made a discovery.
+The rider on the right hand side of the stream
+had been chewing tobacco, and he had a habit of
+splashing his mark on boulders he passed in the
+form of tobacco juice. Half a dozen times before
+he reached the Lee ranch the ranger saw this signature
+of identity writ large on smooth rocks shining
+in the sun. The last place he saw it was at the
+point where the two riders deflected from the lateral
+toward the ranch house, following tracks which led
+up from the bottom of the ditch.</p>
+<p>An instant later Flatray had dodged back into the
+chaparral, for somebody was driving a flock of
+sheep down to the ditch. He made out that there
+were two riders behind them, and that they had
+no dog. For the present his curiosity was satisfied.
+He thought he knew why they were watering sheep
+in this odd fashion. Swiftly he had made a circuit,
+drawn rein in front of the store, and dropped in
+just in time to hear his name. Now, as with one
+ear he listened to Alan&#8217;s account of the hold-up, with
+his subconscious mind he was with the sheep-herders
+who were driving the flock back into the pasture.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Looks like our friend the bad man was onto his
+job all right,&#8221; was the deputy&#8217;s only comment when
+Alan had finished.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll bet he&#8217;s making his getaway into the hills
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_101' name='page_101'></a>101</span>
+mighty immediate,&#8221; chuckled Baker. &#8220;He can&#8217;t
+find a bank in the mountainside to deposit that gold
+any too soon to suit him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sho! I&#8217;ll bet he ain&#8217;t worried a mite. He&#8217;s got
+his arrangements all made, and likely they&#8217;ll dovetail
+to suit him. He&#8217;s put his brand on that gold
+to stay,&#8221; answered Farnum confidently.</p>
+<p>Jack&#8217;s mild blue eyes rested on him amiably.
+&#8220;Think so, Bob?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I ain&#8217;t knockin&#8217; you any, Jack. You&#8217;re all right.
+But that&#8217;s how I figure it out, and, by Gad! I&#8217;m
+hopin&#8217; it too,&#8221; Farnum made answer recklessly.</p>
+<p>Flatray laughed and strolled from the crowded
+room to the big piazza. A man had just cantered
+up and flung himself from his saddle. The ranger,
+looking at him, thought he had never seen another
+so strikingly handsome an Apollo. Black eyes
+looked into his from a sun-tanned face perfectly
+modelled. The pose of the head and figure would
+have delighted a sculptor.</p>
+<p>There was a vigor, an unspoken hostility, in the
+gaze of both men.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mo&#8217;nin&#8221;, Mr. Deputy Sheriff, one said; and
+the other, &#8220;Same to you, Mr. Norris.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re on the job quick,&#8221; sneered the cattle
+detective.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The quicker the sooner, I expect.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And by night you&#8217;ll have Mr. Hold-up roped
+and hog-tied?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_102' name='page_102'></a>102</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Not so you could notice it. Are you a sheep-herder
+these days, Mr. Norris?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The gentle irony of this was not lost on its object,
+for in the West a herder of sheep is the next remove
+from a dumb animal.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I&#8217;m riding for the Quarter Circle K Bar
+outfit. This is the first time I ever took the dust
+of a sheep in my life. I did it to oblige Mr. Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh! To oblige Mr. Lee?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He wanted to water them, and his herder wasn&#8217;t
+here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Must &#8217;a&#8217; been wanting water mighty bad, I
+reckon,&#8221; commented Jack amiably.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You bet! Lee feels better satisfied now he&#8217;s
+watered them.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t doubt it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris changed the subject. &#8220;You must have
+burnt the wind getting here. I didn&#8217;t expect to see
+you for some hours.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I happened to be down at Yeager&#8217;s ranch, and
+one of the boys got me on the line from Mesa.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Picked up any clues yet?&#8221; asked the other carelessly,
+yet always with that hint of a sneer; and
+innocently Flatray answered, &#8220;They seem to be right
+seldom.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Didn&#8217;t know but you&#8217;d happened on the fellow&#8217;s
+trail.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I guess I&#8217;m as much at sea as you are,&#8221; was the
+equivocal answer.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_103' name='page_103'></a>103</span></p>
+<p>Lee came over from the stable, still wearing spurs
+and gauntlets.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Howdy, Jack!&#8221; he nodded, not quite so much
+at his ease as usual. &#8220;Got hyer on the jump,
+didn&#8217;t you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I kept movin&#8217;.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;This shorely beats hell, don&#8217;t it?&#8221; Lee glanced
+around, selected a smooth boulder, and fired his
+discharge of tobacco juice at it true to the inch.
+&#8220;Reminds me of the old days. You boys ain&#8217;t old
+enough to recall them, but stage hold-ups were right
+numerous then.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Blandly the deputy looked from one to the other.
+&#8220;I don&#8217;t suppose either of you gentlemen happen
+to have been down and looked over the ground
+where the hold-up was? The tracks were right
+cut up before I got there.&#8221;</p>
+<p>This center shot silenced Lee for an instant, but
+Norris was on the spot with smiling ease.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, Mr. Lee and I have been hunting strays
+on the mesa. We didn&#8217;t hear about it till a few
+minutes ago. We&#8217;re at your service, though, Mr.
+Sheriff, to join any posses you want to send out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Much obliged. I&#8217;m going to send one out
+toward the Galiuros in a few minutes now. I&#8217;ll
+be right glad to have you take charge of it, Mr.
+Norris.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The derisive humor in the newly appointed
+deputy&#8217;s eyes did not quite reach the surface.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sure. Whenever you want me.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_104' name='page_104'></a>104</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m going to send Alan McKinstra along to
+guide you. He knows that country like a book.
+You want to head for the lower pass, swing up
+Diable Cañon, and work up in the headquarters of
+the Three Forks.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Within a quarter of an hour the posse was in
+motion. Flatray watched it disappear in the dust
+of the road without a smile. He had sent them out
+merely to distract the attention of the public and
+to get rid of as many as possible of the crowd. For
+he was quite as well aware as the leader of the posse
+that this search in the Galiuros was a wild-goose
+chase. Somewhere within three hundred yards of
+the place he stood both the robber and his booty
+were in all probability to be found.</p>
+<p>Flatray was quite right in his surmise, since
+Melissy Lee, who had come out to see the posse off,
+was standing at the end of the porch with her dusky
+eyes fastened on him, the while he stood beside the
+house with one foot resting negligently on the oilcloth
+cover of the wash-stand.</p>
+<p>She had cast him out of her friendship because
+of his unworthiness, but there was a tumult in her
+heart at sight of him. No matter how her judgment
+condemned him as a villain, some instinct in
+her denied the possibility of it. She was torn in
+conflict between her liking for him and her conviction
+that he deserved only contempt. Somehow
+it hurt her too that he accepted without protest her
+verdict, appeared so willing to be a stranger to her.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_105' name='page_105'></a>105</span></p>
+<p>Now that the actual physical danger of her adventure
+was past, Melissy was aware too of a chill dread
+lurking at her heart. She was no longer buoyed
+up by the swiftness of action which had called for
+her utmost nerve. There was nothing she could
+do now but wait, and waiting was of all things the
+one most foreign to her impulsive temperament.
+She acknowledged too some fear of this quiet, soft-spoken
+frontiersman. All Arizona knew not only
+the daredevil spirit that fired his gentleness, but
+the competence with which he set about any task
+he assigned himself. She did not see how he <i>could</i>
+unravel this mystery. She had left no clues behind
+her, she felt sure of that, and yet was troubled lest
+he guessed at her secret behind that mask of innocence
+he wore. He did not even remotely guess it
+as yet, but he was far closer to the truth than he
+pretended. The girl knew she should leave him
+and go about her work. Her rôle was to appear
+as inconspicuous as possible, but she could not resist
+the fascination of trying to probe his thoughts.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I suppose your posse will come back with the
+hold-ups in a few hours. Will it be worth while
+to wait for them?&#8221; she asked with amiable derision.</p>
+<p>The ranger had been absorbed in thought, his
+chin in his hand, but he brought his gaze back
+from the distance to meet hers. What emotion lay
+behind those cold eyes she could not guess.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re more hopeful than I am, Miss Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What are you sending them out for, then?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_106' name='page_106'></a>106</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, well, the boys need to work off some of
+their energy, and there&#8217;s always a show they might
+happen onto the robbers.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you think some of the Roaring Fork gang
+did it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t say.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I suppose you are staying here in the hope that
+they will drop in and deliver themselves to you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He looked at her out of an expressionless face.
+&#8220;That&#8217;s about it, I reckon. But what I tell the public
+is that I&#8217;m staying so as to be within telephone connection.
+You see, Sheriff Burke is moving up to
+cut them off from the Catalinas, Jackson is riding
+out from Mammoth to haid them off that way,
+these anxious lads that have just pulled out from
+here are taking care of the Galiuros. I&#8217;m supposed
+to be sitting with my fingers on the keys as a sort
+of posse dispatcher.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I hope you won&#8217;t catch them,&#8221; she told
+him bluntly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That seems to be a prevailing sentiment round
+here. You say it right hearty too; couldn&#8217;t be more
+certain of your feelings if it had been your own
+father.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He said it carelessly, yet with his keen blue eyes
+fixed on her. Nevertheless, he was totally unprepared
+for the effect of his words. The color washed
+from her bronzed cheeks, and she stood staring at
+him with big, fear-filled eyes.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_107' name='page_107'></a>107</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;What&mdash;what do you mean?&#8221; she gasped. &#8220;How
+dare you say that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I ain&#8217;t said anything so terrible. You don&#8217;t need
+to take it to heart like that.&#8221; He gave her a faint
+smile for an instant. &#8220;I&#8217;m not really expecting to
+arrest Mr. Lee for holding up that stage.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The color beat back slowly into her face. She
+knew she had made a false move in taking so
+seriously his remark.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t think you ought to joke about a thing
+like that,&#8221; she said stiffly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. I&#8217;ll not say it next time till I&#8217;m in
+earnest,&#8221; he promised as he walked away.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I wonder if he really meant anything,&#8221; the girl
+was thinking in terror, and he, &#8220;she knows something;
+now, I would like to know what.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy attended to her duties in the postoffice
+after the arrival of the stage, and looked after the
+dining-room as usual, but she was all the time
+uneasily aware that Jack Flatray had quietly disappeared.
+Where had he gone? And why? She
+found no answer to that question, but the ranger
+dropped in on his bronco in time for supper, imperturbable
+and self-contained as ever.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Think I&#8217;ll stay all night if you have a room for
+me,&#8221; he told her after he had eaten.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We have a room,&#8221; she said. &#8220;What more have
+you heard about the stage robbery?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Nothing, Miss Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, I thought maybe you had,&#8221; she murmured
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_108' name='page_108'></a>108</span>
+tremulously, for his blue eyes were unwaveringly
+upon her and she could not know how much or
+how little he might mean.</p>
+<p>Later she saw him sitting on the fence, holding
+genial converse with Jim Budd. The waiter
+was flashing a double row of white teeth in deep
+laughter at something the deputy had told him.
+Evidently they were already friends. When she
+looked again, a few minutes later, she knew Jack
+had reached the point where he was pumping Jim
+and the latter was disseminating misinformation.
+That the negro was stanch enough, she knew, but
+she was on the anxious seat lest his sharp-witted
+inquisitor get what he wanted in spite of him.
+After he had finished with Budd the ranger drifted
+around to the kitchen in time to intercept Hop Ling
+casually as he came out after finishing his evening&#8217;s
+work. The girl was satisfied Flatray could not
+have any suspicion of the truth. Nevertheless, she
+wished he would let the help alone. He might accidentally
+stumble on something that would set him
+on the right track.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='VIII_THE_BOONEBELLAMY_FEUD_IS_RENEWED' id='VIII_THE_BOONEBELLAMY_FEUD_IS_RENEWED'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_109' name='page_109'></a>109</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII</h2>
+<h3>THE BOONE-BELLAMY FEUD IS RENEWED</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>&#8220;Here&#8217;s six bits on the counter under a seed
+catalogue. Did you leave it here, daddy?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Champ Lee, seated on the porch just
+outside the store door, took the pipe from his mouth
+and answered:</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why no, honey, I don&#8217;t reckon I did, not to my
+ricollection.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s queer. I know I didn&#8217;t&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy broke her sentence sharply. There had
+come into her eyes a spark of excitement, simultaneous
+with the brain-flash which told her who
+had left the money. No doubt the quarter and the
+half dollar had been lying there ever since the day
+last week when Morse had eaten at the Bar Double
+G. She addressed an envelope, dropped the money
+in, sealed the flap, and put the package beside a
+letter addressed to T. L. Morse.</p>
+<p>Lee, full of an unhappy restlessness which he
+could not control, presently got up and moved away
+to the stables. He was blaming himself bitterly
+for the events of the past few days.</p>
+<p>It was perhaps half an hour later that Melissy
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_110' name='page_110'></a>110</span>
+looked up to see the sturdy figure of Morse in the
+doorway. During the past year he had filled out,
+grown stronger and more rugged. His deep tan
+and heavy stride pronounced him an outdoor man
+no less surely than the corduroy suit and the high
+laced miners&#8217; boots.</p>
+<p>He came forward to the postoffice window without
+any sign of recognition.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is Mr. Flatray still here?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No!&#8221; Without further explanation Melissy
+took from the box the two letters addressed to
+Morse and handed them to him.</p>
+<p>The girl observed the puzzled look that stole over
+his face at sight of the silver in one envelope. A
+glance at the business address printed on the upper
+left hand corner enlightened him. He laid the
+money down in the stamp window.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This isn&#8217;t mine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You heard what my father said?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That applies to next time, not to this.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I think it does apply to this time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can&#8217;t see how you&#8217;re going to make me take
+it back. I&#8217;m an obstinate man.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just as you like.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A sudden flush of anger swept her. She caught
+up the silver and flung it through the open window
+into the dusty road.</p>
+<p>His dark eyes met hers steadily and a dull color
+burned in his tanned cheeks. Without a word he
+turned away, and instantly she regretted what she
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_111' name='page_111'></a>111</span>
+had done. She had insulted him deliberately and
+put herself in the wrong. At bottom she was a
+tender-hearted child, even though her father and his
+friends had always spoiled her, and she could not
+but reproach herself for the hurt look she had
+brought into his strong, sad face. He was their
+enemy, of course, but even enemies have rights.</p>
+<p>Morse walked out of the office looking straight
+before him, his strong back teeth gripped so that
+the muscles stood out on his salient jaw. Impulsively
+the girl ran around the counter after him.</p>
+<p>He looked up from untying his horse to see her
+straight and supple figure running toward him. Her
+eager face was full of contrition and the color of
+pink rose petals came and went in it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sorry, Mr. Morse. I oughtn&#8217;t to have done
+that. I hurt your feelings,&#8221; she cried.</p>
+<p>At best he was never a handsome man, but now
+his deep, dark eyes lit with a glow that surprised
+her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thank you. Thank you very much,&#8221; he said
+in a low voice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m so tempery,&#8221; she explained in apology, and
+added: &#8220;I suppose a nice girl wouldn&#8217;t have
+done it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A nice girl did do it,&#8221; was all he could think
+to say.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You needn&#8217;t take the trouble to say that. I know
+I&#8217;ve just scrambled up and am not ladylike and
+proper. Sometimes I don&#8217;t care. I like to be able
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_112' name='page_112'></a>112</span>
+to do things like boys. But I suppose it&#8217;s dreadful.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t think it is at all. None of your friends
+could think so. Not that I include myself among
+them,&#8221; he hastened to disclaim. &#8220;I can&#8217;t be both
+your friend and your enemy, can I?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The trace of a sardonic smile was in his eyes.
+For the moment as she looked at him she thought
+he might. But she answered:</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t quite see how.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You hate me, I suppose,&#8221; he blurted out bluntly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I suppose so.&#8221; And more briskly she added,
+with dimples playing near the corners of her mouth:
+&#8220;Of course I do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s frank. It&#8217;s worth something to have so
+decent an enemy. I don&#8217;t believe you would shoot
+me in the back.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Some of the others would. You should be more
+careful,&#8221; she cried before she could stop herself.</p>
+<p>He shrugged. &#8220;I take my fighting chance.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It isn&#8217;t much of a one. You&#8217;ll be shot at from
+ambush some day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It wouldn&#8217;t be a new experience. I went through
+it last week.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where?&#8221; she breathed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Down by Willow Wash.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Who did it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He laughed, without amusement. &#8220;I didn&#8217;t have
+my rifle with me, so I didn&#8217;t stay to inquire.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It must have been some of those wild vaqueros.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_113' name='page_113'></a>113</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;That was my guess.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you have other enemies, too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Miss Lee,&#8221; he smiled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I mean others that are dangerous.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your father?&#8221; he asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Father would never do that except in a fair
+fight. I wasn&#8217;t thinking of him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know whom you mean, but a few extras
+don&#8217;t make much difference when one is so liberally
+supplied already,&#8221; he said cynically.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shouldn&#8217;t make light of them if I were you,&#8221;
+she cautioned.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Who do you mean?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve said all I&#8217;m going to, and more than I
+ought,&#8221; she told him decisively. &#8220;Except this, that
+it&#8217;s your own fault. You shouldn&#8217;t be so stiff. Why
+don&#8217;t you compromise? With the cattlemen, for instance.
+They have a good deal of right on their
+side. They <i>did</i> have the range first.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You should tell that to your father, too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dad runs sheep on the range to protect himself.
+He doesn&#8217;t drive out other people&#8217;s cattle and take
+away their living.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I might compromise, but not at the end
+of a gun.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, of course not. Here comes dad now,&#8221; she
+added hurriedly, aware for the first time that she
+had been holding an extended conversation with
+her father&#8217;s foe.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_114' name='page_114'></a>114</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;We started enemies and we quit enemies. Will
+you shake hands on that, Miss Lee?&#8221; he asked.</p>
+<p>She held out her hand, then drew it swiftly back.
+&#8220;No, I can&#8217;t. I forgot. There&#8217;s another reason.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Another reason! You mean the Arkansas
+charge against me?&#8221; he asked quietly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. I can&#8217;t tell you what it is.&#8221; She felt herself
+suffused in a crimson glow. How could she
+explain that she could not touch hands with him
+because she had robbed him of twenty thousand
+dollars?</p>
+<p>Lee stopped at the steps, astonished to see his
+daughter and this man in talk together. Yesterday
+he would have resented it bitterly, but now the situation
+was changed. Something of so much greater
+magnitude had occurred that he was too perturbed
+to cherish his feud for the present. All night he
+had carried with him the dreadful secret he suspected.
+He could not look Melissy in the face, nor
+could he discuss the robbery with anybody. The
+one fact that overshadowed all others was that his
+little girl had gone out and held up a stage, that
+if she were discovered she would be liable to a term
+in the penitentiary. Laboriously his slow brain had
+worked it all out. A talk with Jim Budd had confirmed
+his conclusions. He knew that she had taken
+this risk in order to save him. He was bowed down
+with his unworthiness, with shame that he had
+dragged her into this horrible tangle. He was convinced
+that Jack Flatray would get at the truth,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_115' name='page_115'></a>115</span>
+and already he was resolved to come forward and
+claim the whole affair as his work.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been apologizing to Mr. Morse for insulting
+him, dad,&#8221; the girl said immediately.</p>
+<p>Her father passed a bony hand slowly across his
+unshaven chin. &#8220;That&#8217;s right, honey. If you done
+him a meanness, you had ought to say so.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;She has said so very handsomely, Mr. Lee,&#8221;
+spoke up Morse.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been warning him, dad, that he ought to
+be more careful how he rides around alone, with
+the cattlemen feeling the way they do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a fact they feel right hot under the collar.
+You&#8217;re ce&#8217;tainly a temptation to them, Mr. Morse,&#8221;
+the girl&#8217;s father agreed.</p>
+<p>The mine owner shifted the subject of conversation.
+He was not a man of many impulses, but he
+yielded to one now.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t we straighten out this trouble between us,
+Mr. Lee? You think I&#8217;ve done you an injury. Perhaps
+I have. If we both mean what&#8217;s right, we can
+get together and fix it up in a few minutes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The old Southerner stiffened and met him with
+an eye of jade. &#8220;I ain&#8217;t asking any favors of you,
+Mr. Morse. We&#8217;ll settle this matter some day, and
+settle it right. But you can&#8217;t buy me off. I&#8217;ll not
+take a bean from you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The miner&#8217;s eyes hardened. &#8220;I&#8217;m not trying to
+buy you off. I made a fair offer of peace. Since
+you have rejected it, there is nothing more to be
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_116' name='page_116'></a>116</span>
+said.&#8221; With that he bowed stiffly and walked away,
+leading his horse.</p>
+<p>Lee&#8217;s gaze followed him and slowly the eyes
+under the beetled brows softened.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mebbe I done wrong, honey. Mebbe I&#8217;d ought
+to have given in. I&#8217;m too proud to compromise
+when he&#8217;s got me beat. That&#8217;s what&#8217;s ailin&#8217; with
+me. But I reckon I&#8217;d better have knuckled under.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl slipped her arm through his. &#8220;Sometimes
+I&#8217;m just like that too, daddy. I&#8217;ve just <i>got</i>
+to win before I make up. I don&#8217;t blame you a mite,
+but, all the same, we should have let him fix it up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was characteristic of them both that neither
+thought of reversing the decision he had made. It
+was done now, and they would abide by the results.
+But already both of them half regretted, though
+for very different reasons. Lee was thinking that
+for Melissy&#8217;s sake he should have made a friend of
+the man he hated, since it was on the cards that
+within a few days she might be in his power. The
+girl&#8217;s feeling, too, was unselfish. She could not forget
+the deep hunger for friendship that had shone
+in the man&#8217;s eyes. He was alone in the world, a
+strong man surrounded by enemies who would
+probably destroy him in the end. There was stirring
+in her heart a sweet womanly pity and sympathy
+for the enemy whose proffer of friendship had
+been so cavalierly rejected.</p>
+<p>The sight of a horseman riding down the trail
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_117' name='page_117'></a>117</span>
+from the Flagstaff mine shook Melissy into alertness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look, dad. It&#8217;s Mr. Norris,&#8221; she cried.</p>
+<p>Morse, who had not yet recognized him, swung
+to the saddle, his heart full of bitterness. Every
+man&#8217;s hand was against his, and every woman&#8217;s.
+What was there in his nature that turned people
+against him so inevitably? There seemed to be some
+taint in him that corroded all natural human kindness.</p>
+<p>A startled oath brought him from his somber reflections.
+He looked up, to see the face of a man
+with whom in the dead years of the past he had
+been in bitter feud.</p>
+<p>Neither of them spoke. Morse looked at him
+with a face cold as chiselled marble and as hard.
+The devil&#8217;s own passion burned in the storm-tossed
+one of the other.</p>
+<p>Norris was the first to break the silence.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So it was all a lie about your being killed, Dick
+Bellamy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The mine owner did not speak, but the rigor of
+his eyes did not relax.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Gave it out to throw me off your trail, did you?
+Knew mighty well I&#8217;d cut the heart out of the man
+who shot poor Shep.&#8221; The voice of the cattle detective
+rang out in malignant triumph. &#8220;You
+guessed it c&#8217;rect, seh. Right here&#8217;s where the
+Boone-Bellamy feud claims another victim.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The men were sitting face to face, so close that
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_118' name='page_118'></a>118</span>
+their knees almost touched. As Norris jerked out
+his gun Bellamy caught his wrist. They struggled
+for an instant, the one to free his arm, the other to
+retain his grip. Bellamy spurred his horse closer.
+The more powerful of the two, he slowly twisted
+around the imprisoned wrist. Inch by inch the revolver
+swung in a jerky, spasmodic circle. There
+was a moment when it pointed directly at the mine
+owner&#8217;s heart. His enemy&#8217;s finger crooked on the
+trigger, eyes passionate with the stark lust to kill.
+But the pressure on the wrist had numbed the hand.
+The weapon jumped out of line, went clattering
+down into the dust from the palsied fingers.</p>
+<p>Lee ran forward and pushed between the men.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here. Ain&#8217;t you boys got ary bettah sense than
+to clinch like wildcats?&#8221; he demanded, jerking one
+of the horses away by the bridle. &#8220;No, you don&#8217;t,
+Phil. I&#8217;ll take keer of this gun for the present.&#8221;
+It was noticeable that Beauchamp Lee&#8217;s speech
+grew more after the manner of the plantations
+when he became excited.</p>
+<p>The cowpuncher, white with anger, glared at his
+enemy and poured curses at him, the while he
+nursed his strained wrist. For the moment he was
+impotent, but he promised himself vengeance in full
+when they should meet again.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;ll be enough from you now, Phil,&#8221; said
+the old ex-Confederate good-naturedly, leading him
+toward the house and trying to soothe his malevolent
+chagrin.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_119' name='page_119'></a>119</span></p>
+<p>Bellamy turned and rode away. At the corner
+of the corral he met Jack Flatray riding up.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Been having a little difference of opinion with
+our friend, haven&#8217;t you, seh?&#8221; the deputy asked
+pleasantly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221; Bellamy gave him only the crisp monosyllable
+and changed the subject immediately.
+&#8220;What about this stage robbery? Have you been
+able to make anything of it, Mr. Flatray?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, yes. I reckon we&#8217;ll be able to land the
+miscreant mebbe, if things come our way,&#8221; drawled
+the deputy. &#8220;Wouldn&#8217;t it be a good idea to offer
+a reward, though, to keep things warm?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I thought of that. I made it a thousand dollars.
+The posters ought to be out to-day on the stage.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good enough!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Whom do you suspect?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack looked at him with amiable imperturbability.
+&#8220;I reckon I better certify my suspicions, seh, before
+I go to shouting them out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right, sir. Since I&#8217;m paying the shot, it
+ought to entitle me to some confidence. But it&#8217;s up
+to you. Get back the twenty thousand dollars,
+that&#8217;s all I ask, except that you put the fellow behind
+the bars of the penitentiary for a few years.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Flatray gave him an odd smile which he did not
+understand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I hope to be able to accommodate you, seh, about
+this time to-morrow, so far as getting the gold
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_120' name='page_120'></a>120</span>
+goes. You&#8217;ll have to wait a week or two before
+the rest of your expectations get gratified.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Any reasonable time. I want to see him there
+eventually. That&#8217;s all.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack laughed again, without giving any reason
+for his mirth. That ironic smile continued to decorate
+his face for some time. He seemed to have
+some inner source of mirth he did not care to disclose.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='IX_THE_DANGER_LINE' id='IX_THE_DANGER_LINE'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_121' name='page_121'></a>121</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER IX</h2>
+<h3>THE DANGER LINE</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Though Champ Lee had business in Mesa
+next day that would not be denied, he was
+singularly loath to leave the ranch. He
+wanted to stay close to Melissy until the dénouement
+of the hunt for the stage robber. On the
+other hand, it was well known that his contest with
+Morse for the Monte Cristo was up for a hearing.
+To stay at home would have been a confession of
+his anxiety that he did not want to make. But it
+was only after repeated charges to his daughter to
+call him up by telephone immediately if anything
+happened that he could bring himself to ride away.</p>
+<p>He was scarcely out of sight when a Mexican
+vaquero rode in with the information that old Antonio,
+on his way to the post at Three Pines with
+a second drove of sheep, had twisted his ankle badly
+about fifteen miles from the ranch. After trying
+in vain to pick up a herder at Mesa by telephone,
+Melissy was driven to the only feasible course left
+her, to make the drive herself in place of Antonio.
+There were fifteen hundred sheep in the bunch, and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_122' name='page_122'></a>122</span>
+they must be taken care of at once by somebody
+competent for the task. She knew she could handle
+them, for it had amused her to take charge of a
+herd often for an hour or two at a time. The long
+stretch over the desert would be wearisome and
+monotonous, but she had the slim, muscular tenacity
+of a half-grown boy. It did not matter what
+she wanted to do. The thing to which she came
+back always was that the sheep must be taken
+care of.</p>
+<p>She left directions with Jim for taking care of
+the place, changed to a khaki skirt and jacket,
+slapped a saddle on her bronco, and disappeared
+across country among the undulations of the sandhills.
+A tenderfoot would have been hopelessly lost
+in the sameness of these hills and washes, but Melissy
+knew them as a city dweller does his streets.
+Straight as an arrow she went to her mark. The
+tinkle of distant sheep-bells greeted her after some
+hours&#8217; travel, and soon the low, ceaseless bleating
+of the herd.</p>
+<p>The girl found Antonio propped against a piñon
+tree, solacing himself philosophically with cigarettes.
+He was surprised to see her, but made only
+a slight objection to her taking his place. His
+ankle was paining him a good deal, and he was very
+glad to get the chance to pull himself to her saddle
+and ride back to the ranch.</p>
+<p>A few quick words sent the dog Colin out among
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_123' name='page_123'></a>123</span>
+the sheep, by now scattered far and wide over the
+hill. They presently came pouring toward her,
+diverged westward, and massed at the base of a
+butte rising from a dry arroyo. The journey had
+begun, and hour after hour it continued through
+the hot day, always in a cloud of dust flung up by
+the sheep, sometimes through the heavy sand of a
+wash, often over slopes of shale, not seldom through
+thick cactus beds that shredded her skirt and tore
+like fierce, sharp fingers at her legging-protected
+ankles. The great gray desert still stretched before
+her to the horizon&#8217;s edge, and still she flung the
+miles behind her with the long, rhythmic stride that
+was her birthright from the hills. A strong man,
+unused to it, would have been staggering with stiff
+fatigue, but this slender girl held the trail with
+light grace, her weight still carried springily on her
+small ankles.</p>
+<p>Once she rested for a few minutes, flinging herself
+down into the sand at length, her head thrown
+back from the full brown throat so that she could
+gaze into the unstained sky of blue. Presently the
+claims of this planet made themselves heard, for
+she, too, was elemental and a creature of instinct.
+The earth was awake and palpitating with life, the
+low, indefatigable life of creeping things and vegetation
+persisting even in this waste of rock and
+sand.</p>
+<p>But she could not rest long, for Diablo Cañon
+must be reached before dark. The sheep would be
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_124' name='page_124'></a>124</span>
+very thirsty by the time they arrived, and she could
+not risk letting them tear down the precipitous edge
+among the sharp rocks in the dark. Already over
+the sand stretches a peculiar liquid glow was flooding,
+so that the whole desert seemed afire. The
+burning sun had slipped behind a saddle of the purple
+peaks, leaving a brilliant horizon of many
+mingled shades.</p>
+<p>It was as she came forward to the cañon&#8217;s edge
+in this luminous dusk that Melissy became aware
+of a distant figure on horseback, silhouetted for a
+moment against the skyline. One glance was all
+she got of it, for she was very busy with the sheep,
+working them leisurely toward the black chasm that
+seemed to yawn for them. High rock walls girt
+the cañon, gigantic and bottomless in the gloom.
+A dizzy trail zigzagged back and forth to the pool
+below, and along this she and the collie skilfully
+sent the eager, thirsty animals.</p>
+<p>The mass of the sheep were still huddled on the
+edge of the ravine when there came the thud of
+horses&#8217; hoofs and the crack of revolvers, accompanied
+by hoarse, triumphant yells and cries. Melissy
+knew instantly what it was&mdash;the attack of cattlemen
+upon her defenseless flock. They had waited
+until the sheep were on the edge of the precipice,
+and now they were going to drive the poor creatures
+down upon the rocks two hundred feet below.
+Her heart leaped to her throat, but scarce more
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_125' name='page_125'></a>125</span>
+quickly than she upon a huge boulder bordering
+the trail.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Back! Keep back!&#8221; she heard herself crying,
+and even as she spoke a bullet whistled through the
+rim of her felt hat.</p>
+<p>Standing there boldly, unconscious of danger, the
+wind draped and defined the long lines of her figure
+like those of the Winged Victory.</p>
+<p>The foremost rider galloped past, waving his
+sombrero and shooting into the frightened mass in
+front of him. Within a dozen feet of her he turned
+his revolver upon the girl, then, with an oath of
+recognition, dragged his pony back upon its
+haunches. Another horse slithered into it, and a
+third.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s &#8217;Lissie Lee!&#8221; a voice cried in astonishment;
+and another, with a startled oath, &#8220;You&#8217;re right,
+Bob!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The first rider gave his pony the spur, swung it
+from the trail in a half-circle which brought it back
+at the very edge of the ravine, and blocked the forward
+pour of terror-stricken sheep. Twice his revolver
+rang out. The girl&#8217;s heart stood still, for
+the man was Norris, and it seemed for an instant
+as if he must be swept over the precipice by the
+stampede. The leaders braced themselves to
+stop, but were slowly pushed forward toward
+the edge. One of the other riders had by this
+time joined the daring cowpuncher, and together
+they stemmed the tide. The pressure on the trail
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_126' name='page_126'></a>126</span>
+relaxed and the sheep began to mill around and
+around.</p>
+<p>It was many minutes before they were sufficiently
+quieted to trust upon the trail again, but at last the
+men got them safely to the bottom, with the exception
+of two or three killed in the descent.</p>
+<p>Her responsibility for the safety of the sheep
+gone, the girl began to crawl down the dark trail.
+She could not see a yard in front of her, and at
+each step the path seemed to end in a gulf of darkness.
+She could not be sure she was on the trail
+at all, and her nerve was shaken by the experience
+through which she had just passed. Presently she
+stopped and waited, for the first time in her life
+definitely and physically afraid. She stood there
+trembling, a long, long time it seemed to her, surrounded
+by the impenetrable blackness of night.</p>
+<p>Then a voice came to her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Melissy!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She answered, and the voice came slowly nearer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re off the trail,&#8221; it told her presently, just
+before a human figure defined itself in the gloom.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m afraid,&#8221; she sobbed.</p>
+<p>A strong hand came from nowhere and caught
+hers. An arm slipped around her waist.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t be afraid, little girl. I&#8217;ll see no harm
+comes to you,&#8221; the man said to her with a quick,
+fierce tenderness.</p>
+<p>The comfort of his support was unspeakable. It
+stole into her heart like water to the roots of thirsty
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_127' name='page_127'></a>127</span>
+plants. To feel her head against his shoulder, to
+know he held her tight, meant safety and life. He
+had told her not to be afraid, and she was so no
+longer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You shot at me,&#8221; she murmured in reproach.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t know. We thought it was Bellamy&#8217;s
+herd. But it&#8217;s true, God forgive me! I did.&#8221;</p>
+<p>There was in his voice the warm throb of emotion,
+and in his eyes something she had never seen
+before in those of any human being. Like stars
+they were, swimming in light, glowing with the
+exultation of the triumph he was living. She was
+a splendid young animal, untaught of life, generous,
+passionate, tempestuous, and as her pliant, supple
+body lay against his some sex instinct old as
+creation stirred potently within her. She had found
+her mate. It came to her as innocently as the same
+impulse comes to the doe when the spring freshets
+are seeking the river, and as innocently her lips
+met his in their first kiss of surrender. Something
+irradiated her, softened her, warmed her. Was it
+love? She did not know, but as yet she was still
+happy in the glow of it.</p>
+<p>Slowly, hand in hand, they worked back to the
+trail and down it to the bottom of the cañon. The
+soft velvet night enwrapped them. It shut them
+from the world and left them one to one. From
+the meeting palms strange electric currents tingled
+through the girl and flushed her to an ecstasy of
+emotion.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_128' name='page_128'></a>128</span></p>
+<p>A camp fire was already burning cheerfully when
+they reached the base of the descent. A man came
+forward to meet them. He glanced curiously at
+the girl after she came within the circle of light.
+Her eyes were shining as from some inner glow,
+and she was warm with a soft color that vitalized
+her beauty. Then his gaze passed to take in with
+narrowed lids her companion.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I see you found her,&#8221; he said dryly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, I found her, Bob.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He answered the spirit of Farnum&#8217;s words rather
+than the letter of them, nor could he keep out of
+his bearing and his handsome face the exultation
+that betrayed success.</p>
+<p>&#8220;H&#8217;mp!&#8221; Farnum turned from him and addressed
+the girl: &#8220;I suppose Norris has explained
+our mistake and eaten crow for all of us, Miss Lee.
+I don&#8217;t see how come we to make such a blame&#8217;
+fool mistake. It was gitting dark, and we took
+your skirt for a greaser&#8217;s blanket. It&#8217;s ce&#8217;tainly
+on us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, he has explained.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, there won&#8217;t any amount of explaining
+square the thing. We might &#8217;a&#8217; done you a terrible
+injury, Miss Lee. It was gilt-edged luck for
+us that you thought to jump on that rock and
+holler.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was thinking of the sheep,&#8221; she said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, you saved them, and I&#8217;m right glad of it.
+We ain&#8217;t got any use for Mary&#8217;s little trotter, but
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_129' name='page_129'></a>129</span>
+your father&#8217;s square about his. He keeps them
+herded up on his own range. We may not like it,
+but we ce&#8217;tainly aren&#8217;t going to the length of attackin&#8217;
+his herd.&#8221; Farnum&#8217;s gaze took in her slender
+girlishness, and he voiced the question in his
+mind. &#8220;How in time do you happen to be sheep-herding
+all by your lone a thousand miles from nowhere,
+Miss Lee?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She explained the circumstances after she had
+moved forward to warm herself by the fire. For
+already night was bringing a chill breeze with it.
+The man cooking the coffee looked up and nodded
+pleasantly, continuing his work. Norris dragged
+up a couple of saddle blankets and spread them on
+the ground for her to sit upon.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t have to do a thing but boss this outfit,&#8221;
+he told her with his gay smile. &#8220;You&#8217;re queen
+of the range to-night, and we&#8217;re your herders or
+your punchers, whichever you want to call us. To-morrow
+morning two of us are going to drive these
+sheep on to the trading post for you, and the other
+one is going to see you safe back home. It&#8217;s all
+arranged.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They were as good as his word. She could not
+move from her place to help herself. It was their
+pleasure to wait upon her as if she had really been
+a queen and they her subjects. Melissy was very
+tired, but she enjoyed their deference greatly. She
+was still young enough to find delight in the fact
+that three young and more or less good-looking men
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_130' name='page_130'></a>130</span>
+were vying with each other to anticipate her needs.</p>
+<p>Like them, she ate and drank ravenously of the
+sandwiches and the strong coffee, though before the
+meal was over she found herself nodding drowsily.
+The tactful courtesy of these rough fellows was perfect.
+They got the best they had for her of their
+blankets, dragged a piñon root to feed the glowing
+coals, and with cheerful farewells of &#8220;<i>Buenos
+Noches</i>&#8221; retired around a bend in the cañon and
+lit another fire for themselves.</p>
+<p>The girl snuggled down into the warmth of the
+blankets and stretched her weary limbs in delicious
+rest. She did not mean to go to sleep for a long
+time. She had much to think about. So she looked
+up the black sheer cañon walls to the deep blue,
+starry sky above, and relived her day in memory.</p>
+<p>A strange excitement tingled through her, born
+of shame and shyness and fear, and of something
+else she did not understand, something which had
+lain banked in her nature like a fire since childhood
+and now threw forth its first flame of heat. What
+did it mean, that passionate fierceness with which
+her lips had clung to his? She liked him, of course,
+but surely liking would not explain the pulse that
+her first kiss had sent leaping through her blood
+like wine. Did she love him?</p>
+<p>Then why did she distrust him? Why was there
+fear in her sober second thought of him? Had
+she done wrong? For the moment all her maiden
+defenses had been wiped out and he had ridden
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_131' name='page_131'></a>131</span>
+roughshod over her reserves. But somewhere in
+her a bell of warning was ringing. The poignant
+sting of sex appeal had come home to her for the
+first time. Wherefore in this frank child of the
+wilderness had been born a shy shame, a vague
+trembling for herself that marked a change. At
+sunrise she had been still treading gayly the primrose
+path of childhood; at sunset she had entered
+upon her heritage of womanhood.</p>
+<p>The sun had climbed high and was peering down
+the walls of the gulch when she awoke. She did
+not at once realize where she was, but came presently
+to a blinking consciousness of her surroundings.
+The rock wall on one side was still shadowed,
+while the painted side of the other was warm with
+the light which poured upon it. The Gothic spires,
+the Moorish domes, the weird and mysterious caves,
+which last night had given more than a touch of
+awe to her majestic bedchamber, now looked a good
+deal less like the ruins of mediæval castles and the
+homes of elfin sprites and gnomes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Buenos dios, muchacha,</i>&#8221; a voice called cheerfully
+to her.</p>
+<p>She did not need to turn to know to whom it
+belonged. Among a thousand she would have recognized
+its tone of vibrant warmth.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Buenos,</i>&#8221; she answered, and, rising hurriedly,
+she fled to rearrange her hair and dress.</p>
+<p>It was nearly a quarter of an hour later that she
+reappeared, her thick coils of ebon-hued tresses shining
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_132' name='page_132'></a>132</span>
+in the sun, her skirt smoothed to her satisfaction,
+and the effects of feminine touches otherwise
+visible upon her fresh, cool person.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Breakfast is served,&#8221; Norris sang out.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dinner would be nearer it,&#8221; she laughed. &#8220;Why
+in the world didn&#8217;t you boys waken me? What
+time is it, anyhow?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s not very late&mdash;a little past noon maybe.
+You were all tired out with your tramp yesterday.
+I didn&#8217;t see why you shouldn&#8217;t have your sleep out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He was pouring a cup of black coffee for her
+from the smoky pot, and she looked around expectantly
+for the others. Simultaneously she remembered
+that she had not heard the bleating of the
+sheep.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where are the others&mdash;Mr. Farnum and Sam?
+And have you the sheep all gagged?&#8221; she laughed.</p>
+<p>He gave her that odd look of smoldering eyes
+behind half-shut lids.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The boys have gone on to finish the drive for
+you. They started before sun-up this morning.
+I&#8217;m elected to see you back home safely.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her protest died unspoken. She could not very
+well frame it in words, and before his bold, possessive
+eyes the girl&#8217;s long, dark lashes wavered to
+the cheeks into which the hot blood was beating.
+Nevertheless, the feeling existed that she wished
+one of the others had stayed instead of him. It
+was born, no doubt, partly of the wave of shyness
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_133' name='page_133'></a>133</span>
+running through her, but partly too of instinctive
+maidenly resistance to something in his look, in the
+assurance of his manner, that seemed to claim too
+much. Last night he had taken her by storm and
+at advantage. Something of shame stirred in her
+that he had found her so easy a conquest, something
+too of a new vague fear of herself. She resented
+the fact that he could so move her, even though
+she still felt the charm of his personal presence.
+She meant to hold herself in abeyance, to make
+sure of herself and of him before she went further.</p>
+<p>But the cowpuncher had no intention of letting
+her regain so fully control of her emotions. Experience
+of more than one young woman had taught
+him that scruples were likely to assert themselves
+after reflection, and he purposed giving her no time
+for that to-day.</p>
+<p>He did not count in vain upon the intimacy of
+companionship forced upon them by the circumstances,
+nor upon the skill with which he knew
+how to make the most of his manifold attractions.
+His rôle was that of the comrade, gay with good
+spirits and warm with friendliness, solicitous of her
+needs, but not oppressively so. If her glimpse of
+him at breakfast had given the girl a vague alarm,
+she laughed her fears away later before his open
+good humor.</p>
+<p>There had been a time when he had been a part
+of that big world &#8220;back in the States,&#8221; peopled so
+generously by her unfettered imagination. He knew
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_134' name='page_134'></a>134</span>
+how to talk, and entertainingly, of books and people,
+of events and places he had known. She had
+not knowledge enough of life to doubt his stories,
+nor did she resent it that he spoke of this her native
+section with the slighting manner of one who patronized
+it with his presence. Though she loved
+passionately her Arizona, she guessed its crudeness,
+and her fancy magnified the wonders of that southern
+civilization from which it was so far cut off.</p>
+<p>Farnum had left his horse for the girl, and after
+breakfast the cowpuncher saddled the broncos and
+brought them up. Melissy had washed the dishes,
+filled his canteen, and packed the saddle bags. Soon
+they were off, climbing slowly the trail that led up
+the cañon wall. She saw the carcass of a dead
+sheep lying on the rocks half way down the cliff,
+and had spoken of it before she could stop herself.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What is that? Isn&#8217;t it&mdash;&mdash;?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Looks to me like a boulder,&#8221; lied her escort unblushingly.
+There was no use, he judged, in recalling
+unpleasant memories.</p>
+<p>Nor did she long remember. The dry, exhilarating
+sunshine and the sting of gentle, wide-swept
+breezes, the pleasure of swift motion and the ring
+of that exultingly boyish voice beside her, combined
+to call the youth in her to rejoice. Firm in the saddle
+she rode, as graceful a picture of piquant girlhood
+as could be conceived, thrilling to the silent
+voices of the desert. They traveled in a sunlit sea
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_135' name='page_135'></a>135</span>
+of space, under a sky of blue, in which tenuous
+cloud lakes floated. Once they came on a small
+bunch of hill cattle which went flying like deer into
+the covert of a draw. A rattlesnake above a prairie
+dog&#8217;s hole slid into the mesquit. A swift watched
+them from the top of a smooth rock, motionless so
+long as they could see. She loved it all, this immense,
+deserted world of space filled with its multitudinous
+dwellers.</p>
+<p>They unsaddled at Dead Cow Creek, hobbled the
+ponies, and ate supper. Norris seemed in no hurry
+to resaddle. He lay stretched carelessly at full
+length, his eyes upon her with veiled admiration.
+She sat upright, her gaze on the sunset with its
+splashes of topaz and crimson and saffron, watching
+the tints soften and mellow as dusk fell. Every
+minute now brought its swift quota of changing
+beauty. A violet haze enveloped the purple mountains,
+and in the crotch of the hills swam a lake of
+indigo. The raw, untempered glare of the sun was
+giving place to a limitless pour of silvery moonlight.</p>
+<p>Her eyes were full of the soft loveliness of the
+hour when she turned them upon her companion.
+He answered promptly her unspoken question.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You bet it is! A night for the gods&mdash;or for
+lovers.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He said it in a murmur, his eyes full on hers,
+and his look wrenched her from her mood. The
+mask of comradeship was gone. He looked at her
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_136' name='page_136'></a>136</span>
+hungrily, as might a lover to whom all spiritual
+heights were denied.</p>
+<p>Her sooty lashes fell before this sinister spirit
+she had evoked, but were raised instantly at the
+sound of him drawing his body toward her. Inevitably
+there was a good deal of the young animal in
+her superbly healthy body. She had been close to
+nature all day, the riotous passion of spring flowing
+free in her as in the warm earth herself. But the
+magic of the mystic hills had lifted her beyond the
+merely personal. Some sense of grossness in him
+for the first time seared across her brain. She
+started up, and her face told him she had taken
+alarm.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We must be going,&#8221; she cried.</p>
+<p>He got to his feet. &#8220;No hurry, sweetheart.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The look in his face startled her. It was new
+to her in her experience of men. Never before had
+she met elemental lust.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re near enough,&#8221; she cautioned sharply.</p>
+<p>He cursed softly his maladroitness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was nearer last night, honey,&#8221; he reminded
+her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Last night isn&#8217;t to-night.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He hesitated. Should he rush her defenses, bury
+her protests in kisses? Or should he talk her out
+of this harsh mood? Last night she had been his.
+There were moments during the day when she had
+responded to him as a musical instrument does to
+skilled fingers. But for the moment his power
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_137' name='page_137'></a>137</span>
+over her was gone. And he was impatient of delay.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s the matter with you?&#8221; he asked roughly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll start at once.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Frightened though she was, her gaze held steadily
+to his. It was the same instinct in her that
+makes one look a dangerous wild beast straight in
+the eye.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s got into you?&#8221; he demanded sullenly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m going home.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;After a while.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon not just yet. It&#8217;s my say-so.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t you dare stop me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The passion in him warred with prudence. He
+temporized. &#8220;Why, honey! I&#8217;m the man that loves
+you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She would not see his outstretched hands.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then saddle my horse.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;By God, no! You&#8217;re going to listen to me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His anger ripped out unexpectedly, even to him.
+Whatever fear she felt, the girl crushed down. He
+must not know her heart was drowned in terror.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll listen after we&#8217;ve started.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He cursed her fickleness. &#8220;What&#8217;s ailin&#8217; you,
+girl? I ain&#8217;t a man to be put off this way.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t forget you&#8217;re in Arizona,&#8221; she warned.</p>
+<p>He understood what she meant. In the ranch
+country no man could with impunity insult a woman.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_138' name='page_138'></a>138</span></p>
+<p>Standing defiantly before him, her pliant form
+very straight, the underlying blood beating softly
+under the golden brown of her cheeks, one of the
+thick braids of her heavy, blue-black hair falling
+across the breast that rose and fell a little fast, she
+was no less than a challenge of Nature to him. He
+looked into a mobile face as daring and as passionate
+as his own, warm with the life of innocent
+youth, and the dark blood mantled his face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Saddle the horses,&#8221; she commanded.</p>
+<p>&#8220;When I get good and ready.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, ma&#8217;am. We&#8217;re going to have a talk first.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She walked across to the place where her pony
+grazed, slipped on the bridle, and brought the animal
+back to the saddle. Norris watched her fitting
+the blankets and tightening the cinch without a
+word, his face growing blacker every moment. Before
+she could start he strode forward and caught
+the rein.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve got something to say to you,&#8221; he told her
+rudely. &#8220;You&#8217;re not going now. So that&#8217;s all
+about it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her lips tightened. &#8220;Let go of my horse.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll talk first.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you think you can force me to stay here?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re going to hear what I&#8217;ve got to say.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You bully!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll tell what I know&mdash;Miss Hold-up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tell it!&#8221; she cried.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_139' name='page_139'></a>139</span></p>
+<p>He laughed harshly, his narrowed eyes watching
+her closely. &#8220;If you throw me down now, I&#8217;ll
+ce&#8217;tainly tell it. Be reasonable, girl.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let go my rein!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve had enough of this. Tumble off that horse,
+or I&#8217;ll pull you off.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her dark eyes flashed scorn of him. &#8220;You coward!
+Do you think I&#8217;m afraid of you? Stand
+back!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The man looked long at her, his teeth set; then
+caught at her strong little wrist. With a quick
+wrench she freed it, her eyes glowing like live
+coals.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You dare!&#8221; she panted.</p>
+<p>Her quirt rose and fell, the lash burning his wrist
+like a band of fire. With a furious oath he dropped
+his hand from the rein. Like a flash she was off,
+had dug her heels home, and was galloping into
+the moonlight recklessly as fast as she could send
+forward her pony. Stark terror had her by the
+throat. The fear of him flooded her whole being.
+Not till the drumming hoofs had carried her far
+did other emotions move her.</p>
+<p>She was furious with him, and with herself for
+having been imposed upon by him. His beauty, his
+grace, his debonair manner&mdash;they were all hateful
+to her now. She had thought him a god among
+men, and he was of common clay. It was her vanity
+that was wounded, not her heart. She scourged herself
+because she had been so easily deceived, because
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_140' name='page_140'></a>140</span>
+she had let herself become a victim of his good
+looks and his impudence. For that she had let him
+kiss her&mdash;yes, and had returned his kiss&mdash;she was
+heartily contemptuous of herself. Always she had
+held herself with an instinctive pride, but in her passion
+of abandonment the tears confessed now that
+this pride had been humbled to the dust.</p>
+<p>This gusty weather of the spirit, now of chastened
+pride and now of bitter anger, carried her
+even through the group of live-oaks which looked
+down upon the silent houses of the ranch, lying in
+a sea of splendid moon-beat. She was so much less
+confident of herself than usual that she made up her
+mind to tell her father the whole story of the hold-up
+and of what this man had threatened.</p>
+<p>This resolution comforted her, and it was with
+something approaching calmness that she rode past
+the corral fence and swung from the saddle in front
+of the house.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='X_JACK_GOES_TO_THE_HEAD_OF_THE_CLASS' id='X_JACK_GOES_TO_THE_HEAD_OF_THE_CLASS'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_141' name='page_141'></a>141</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER X</h2>
+<h3>JACK GOES TO THE HEAD OF THE CLASS</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>She trailed the bridle reins, went up the porch
+steps, and drew off her gauntlets. Her hand
+was outstretched to open the door when her
+gaze fell upon a large bill tacked to the wall.
+Swiftly she read it through, and, having read it,
+remained in suspended motion. For the first time
+she fully realized the danger and the penalty that
+confronted her.</p>
+<div class='ce'>
+<p>ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS</p>
+<p><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Will Be Paid By Thomas L. Morse</span></p>
+</div>
+
+<div class='blockquot'>
+<p>For the arrest and conviction of each of
+the men who were implicated in the robbery
+of the Fort Allison stage on April
+twenty-seventh last. A further reward of
+$1000 will be paid for the recovery of the
+bullion stolen.</p>
+</div>
+<p>This was what she read, and her eye was running
+over it a second time when she heard the
+jingle of a spur approaching.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;re red-hot after them, you see, Miss Lee,&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_142' name='page_142'></a>142</span>
+a mocking voice drawled. &#8220;If you want to round
+up a thousand plunks, all you&#8217;ve got to do is to tell
+me who Mr. Hold-up is.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He laughed quietly, as if it were a joke, but the
+girl answered with a flush. &#8220;Is that all?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s all.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If I knew, do you suppose I would tell for five
+thousand&mdash;or ten thousand?&#8221;</p>
+<p>For some reason this seemed to give him sardonic
+amusement. &#8220;No, I don&#8217;t suppose you
+would.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll have to catch him yourself if you want
+him. I&#8217;m not in that business, Mr. Flatray.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am. Sorry you don&#8217;t like the business, Miss
+Lee.&#8221; He added dryly: &#8220;But then you always
+were hard to please. You weren&#8217;t satisfied when
+I was a rustler.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her eyes swept him with a look, whether of reproach
+or contempt he was not sure. But the hard
+derision of his gaze did not soften. Mentally as
+well as physically he was a product of the sun and
+the wind, as tough and unyielding as a greasewood
+sapling. For a friend he would go the limit, and
+he could not forgive her that she had distrusted
+him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But mebbe you&#8217;d prefer it if I was rustling
+stages,&#8221; he went on, looking straight at her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you mean?&#8221; she asked breathlessly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I want to have a talk with you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What about?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_143' name='page_143'></a>143</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Suppose we step around to the side of the house.
+We&#8217;ll be freer from interruption there.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He led the way, taking her consent for granted.
+With him he carried a chair for her from the
+porch.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you&#8217;ll be as brief as possible, Mr. Flatray.
+I&#8217;ve been in the desert two days and want to change
+my clothes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll not detain you. It&#8217;s about this gold robbery.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She could not take her eyes from him. Something
+told her that he knew her secret, or part of
+it. Her heart was fluttering like a caged thrush.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shall we begin at the beginning?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you like.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Or in the middle, say.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If only you&#8217;ll begin anywhere,&#8221; she said impatiently.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How will this do for a beginning, then? &#8216;One
+thousand dollars will be paid by Thomas L. Morse
+for the arrest and conviction of each of the men
+who were implicated in the robbery of the Fort
+Allison stage on April twenty-seventh last.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+<p>She was shaken, there was no denying it. He
+could see the ebb of blood from her cheeks, the
+sudden stiffening of the slender figure.</p>
+<p>She did not speak until she had control of her
+voice. &#8220;Dear me! What has all that to do with
+me?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_144' name='page_144'></a>144</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;A good deal, I&#8217;m afraid. You know how much,
+better than I do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Perhaps I&#8217;m stupid. You&#8217;ll have to be a great
+deal clearer before I can understand you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve noticed that it&#8217;s a lot easier to understand
+what you want to than what you don&#8217;t want to.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Sharply a thought smote her. &#8220;Have you seen
+Phil Norris lately?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I haven&#8217;t. Do you think it likely that he
+would confess?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Confess?&#8221; she faltered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I see I&#8217;ll have to start at the beginning, after
+all. It&#8217;s pretty hard to say just where that is. It
+might be when Morse got hold of your father&#8217;s
+claim, or another fellow might say it was when
+the Boone-Bellamy feud began, and that is a mighty
+long time ago.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The Boone-Bellamy feud,&#8221; echoed the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. The real name of our friend Norris is
+Dunc Boone.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s no friend of mine.&#8221; She flamed it out
+with such intensity that he was surprised.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad to hear it. I can tell you, then, that he&#8217;s
+a bad lot. He was driven out of Arkansas after
+a suspected murder. It was a killing from ambush.
+They couldn&#8217;t quite hang it on him, but he lit a
+shuck to save his skin from lynchers. At that time
+he was a boy. Couldn&#8217;t have been more than seventeen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Who did he kill?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_145' name='page_145'></a>145</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;One of the Bellamy faction. The real name of
+T. L. Morse is&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;&mdash;Richard Bellamy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How do you know that?&#8221; he asked in surprise.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve known it since the first day I met him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Known that he was wanted for murder in Arkansas?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you protected him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I had a reason.&#8221; She did not explain that her
+reason was Jack Flatray, between whom and the
+consequences of his rustling she had stood.</p>
+<p>He pondered that a moment. &#8220;Well, Morse, or
+Bellamy, told me all about it. Now that Boone
+has recognized him, the game is up. He&#8217;s ready
+to go back and stand trial if he must. I&#8217;ve communicated
+with the authorities in Arkansas and
+I&#8217;ll hear from them in a day or two.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What has this to do with the hold-up?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right, the hold-up. Well, this fellow
+Boone got your father to drinking, and then sprung
+it on him to rob the stage when the bullion was
+being shipped. Somehow Boone had got inside information
+about when this was to be. He had been
+nosing around up at the mine, and may have overheard
+something. O&#8217; course we know what your
+father would have done if he hadn&#8217;t been drinking.
+He&#8217;s straight as a string, even if he does go off like
+powder. But when a man&#8217;s making a blue blotter
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_146' name='page_146'></a>146</span>
+of himself, things don&#8217;t look the same to him. Anyhow
+he went in.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He didn&#8217;t. I can prove he didn&#8217;t,&#8221; burst from
+Melissy&#8217;s lips.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Be glad to hear your proof later. He ce&#8217;tainly
+planned the hold-up. Jim Budd overheard him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did Jim tell you that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t blame him for that. He didn&#8217;t mean to
+tell, but I wound him up so he couldn&#8217;t get away
+from it. I&#8217;ll show you later why he couldn&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sure you must have been very busy, spying
+and everything,&#8221; she told him bitterly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve kept moving. But to get back to the point.
+Your father and Boone were on the ground where
+the stage was robbed <i>either at the time or right
+after</i>. Their tracks were all over there. Then they
+got on their horses and rode up the lateral.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But they couldn&#8217;t. The ditch was full,&#8221; broke
+from the girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re right it was. You must be some observing
+to know when that ditch is full and empty to
+an hour. I reckon you&#8217;ve got an almanac of tides,&#8221;
+he said ironically.</p>
+<p>She bit her lip with chagrin. &#8220;I just happened
+to notice.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Some folks <i>are</i> more noticing than others. But
+you&#8217;re surely right. They came up the ditch one on
+each side. Now, why one on each side, do you
+reckon?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy hid the dread that was flooding her heart.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_147' name='page_147'></a>147</span>
+&#8220;I&#8217;m sure I don&#8217;t know. You know everything
+else. I suppose you do that, too, if they really did.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They had their reasons, but we won&#8217;t go into
+that now. First off when they reach the house
+they take a bunch of sheep down to the ditch to
+water them. Now, why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, unless because they needed water?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll let that go into the discard too just now.
+Let&#8217;s suppose your father and Boone dumped the
+gold box down into the creek somewhere after they
+had robbed the stage. Suppose they had a partner
+up at the head-gates. When the signal is given
+down comes the water, and the box is covered by
+it. Mebbe that night they take it away and bury
+it somewhere else.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl began to breathe again. He knew a
+good deal, but he was still off the track in the main
+points.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And who is this partner up at the canal? Have
+you got him located too?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I might guess.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well?&#8221;&mdash;impatiently.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A young lady hailing from this <i>hacienda</i> was
+out gathering flowers all mo&#8217;ning. She was in her
+runabout. The tracks led straight from here to
+the head-gates. I followed them through the sands.
+There&#8217;s a little break in one of the rubber tires.
+You&#8217;ll find that break mark every eight feet or so
+in the sand wash.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I opened the head-gates, then, did I?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_148' name='page_148'></a>148</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;It looks that way, doesn&#8217;t it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;At a signal from father?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And that&#8217;s all the evidence you&#8217;ve got against
+him and me?&#8221; she demanded, still outwardly scornful,
+but very much afraid at heart.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, no, that ain&#8217;t all, Miss Lee. Somebody
+locked the Chink in during this play. He&#8217;s still
+wondering why.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He dreamed it. Very likely he had been rolling
+a pill.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did I dream this too?&#8221; From his coat pocket
+he drew the piece of black shirting she had used as
+a mask. &#8220;I found it in the room where your father
+put me up that first night I stayed here. It was
+your brother Dick&#8217;s room, and this came from the
+pocket of a shirt hanging in the closet. Now, who
+do you reckon put it there?&#8221;</p>
+<p>For the first time in her life she knew what it
+was to feel faint. She tried to speak, but the words
+would not come from her parched throat. How
+could he be so hard and cruel, this man who had
+once been her best friend? How could he stand
+there so like a machine in his relentlessness?</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&mdash;we used to&mdash;to play at hold-up when he
+was a boy,&#8221; she gasped.</p>
+<p>He shook his head. &#8220;No, I reckon that won&#8217;t go.
+You see, I&#8217;ve found the piece this was torn from,
+<i>and I found it in your father&#8217;s coat</i>. I went into
+his room on tiptoe that same hour. The coat was
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_149' name='page_149'></a>149</span>
+on the bed. He had gone downstairs for a minute
+and left it there. Likely he hadn&#8217;t found a good
+chance to burn it yet.&#8221; Taking the two pieces, he
+fitted them together and held them up. &#8220;They
+match exactly, you see. Did your father used to
+play with you too when he was a boy?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He asked this with what seemed to her tortured
+soul like silken cruelty. She had no answer, none
+at least that would avail. Desperately she snatched
+at a straw.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All this isn&#8217;t proof. It&#8217;s mere surmise. Some
+one&#8217;s tracks were found by you. How do you know
+they were father&#8217;s?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve got that cinched too. I took his boots and
+measured them.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then where&#8217;s the gold, if he took it? It must
+be somewhere. Where is it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now I&#8217;m going up to the head of the class,
+ma&#8217;am. The gold&mdash;why, that&#8217;s a dead easy one.
+<i>Near as I can make out, I&#8217;m sitting on it right now.</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>She gave a startled little cry that died in her
+throat.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, it&#8217;s ce&#8217;tainly a valuable wash-stand. Chippendale
+furniture ain&#8217;t in it with this kind. I reckon
+the king of England&#8217;s is ace high against a straight
+flush when it bucks up against yours.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy threw up her cards. &#8220;How did you find
+out?&#8221; she asked hoarsely.</p>
+<p>The deputy forced her to commit herself more
+definitely. &#8220;Find out what?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_150' name='page_150'></a>150</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Where I put the box.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll go back and answer some of those other
+questions first. I might as well own up that I knew
+all the time your father didn&#8217;t hold up the stage.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You did?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s no fool. He wouldn&#8217;t leave his tracks all
+over the place where he had just held up a stage.
+He might jest as well have left a signed note saying
+he had done it. No, that didn&#8217;t look like Champ
+Lee to me. It seemed more likely he&#8217;d arrived after
+the show than before. It wouldn&#8217;t be like him,
+either, to go plowing up the side of the ditch, with
+his partner on the other side, making a trail that
+a blind man could follow in the night. Soon as I
+knew Lee and Boone made those tracks, I had it
+cinched that they were following the lateral to see
+where the robber was going. They had come to
+the same conclusion I had, that there wasn&#8217;t any
+way of escape <i>except by that empty lateral</i>, <i>assuming
+it had been empty</i>. The only point was to find
+out where the hold-up left the lateral. That&#8217;s why
+they rode one on each side of it. They weren&#8217;t
+missing any bets, you see.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And that&#8217;s why they drove the sheep down to
+water&mdash;to hide the wheel-tracks. I couldn&#8217;t understand
+that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I must &#8217;a&#8217; been right on their heels, for they
+were jest getting the trotters out of the corral when
+I reached the place where your rig left the water.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_151' name='page_151'></a>151</span>
+&#8217;Course I fell back into the brush and circled around
+so as to hit the store in front.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But if dad knew all the time, I don&#8217;t see&mdash;surely,
+he wouldn&#8217;t have come right after me and made
+plain the way I escaped.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s the point. He didn&#8217;t know. I reckon
+he was sort of guessing around in the dark, plumb
+puzzled; couldn&#8217;t find the switch at all at first. Then
+it come to him, and he thought of the sheep to
+blind the trail. If I&#8217;d been half a hour later he
+would have got away with it too. No, if he had
+guessed that you were in the hold-up, him and
+Boone would have hiked right out on a false trail
+and led us into the Galiuros. Having no notion of
+it at first, he trails you down.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And the gold&mdash;how did you find that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I knew it was either right around the place or
+else you had taken it on with you when you went
+to the head-gates and buried it up there somewhere.
+Next day I followed your tracks and couldn&#8217;t find
+any place where you might have left it. I knew
+how clever you were by the way you planned your
+getaway. Struck me as mighty likely that you had
+left it lying around in plain view somewhere. If
+you had dumped it out of the box into a sack, the
+box must be somewhere. You hadn&#8217;t had time to
+burn it before the stage got back. I drifted back
+to your kindling pile, where all the old boxes from
+the store are lying. I happened to notice a brass
+tack in one near the end; then the marks of the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_152' name='page_152'></a>152</span>
+tack heads where they had pressed against the wood.
+I figured you might have substituted one box for
+another, and inside of ten minutes I stumbled
+against your wash-stand and didn&#8217;t budge it. Then
+I didn&#8217;t have to look any further.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been trying to get a chance to move it and
+haven&#8217;t ever found one. You were always coming
+around the corner on me,&#8221; she explained.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sorry I incommoded you,&#8221; he laughed. &#8220;But
+it&#8217;s too heavy for a lady to lift alone, anyhow. I
+don&#8217;t see how you managed it this far.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m pretty strong,&#8221; she said quietly.</p>
+<p>She had no hope of escape from the net of evidence
+in which he had entangled her. It was characteristic
+of her that she would not stoop to tricks
+to stir his pity. Deep in her heart she knew now
+that she had wronged him when she had suspected
+him of being a rustler. He <i>could</i> not be. It was
+not in the man&#8217;s character. But she would ask no
+mercy of him. All her pride rose to meet his. She
+would show him how game she could be. What
+she had sown she would reap. Nor would it have
+been any use to beseech him to spare her. He was
+a hard man, she told herself. Not even a fool
+could have read any weakness in the quiet gray
+eyes that looked so steadily into hers. In his voice
+and movements there was a certain deliberation, but
+this had nothing to do with indecision of character.
+He would do his duty as he saw it, regardless
+of whom it might affect.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_153' name='page_153'></a>153</span></p>
+<p>Melissy stood before him in the unconscious attitude
+of distinction she often fell into when she
+was moved, head thrown back so as to bare the
+rounded throat column, brown little hands folded
+in front of her, erectly graceful in all her slender
+lines.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What are you going to do with me?&#8221; she asked.</p>
+<p>His stone-cold eyes met hers steadily. &#8220;It ain&#8217;t
+my say-so. I&#8217;m going to put it up to Bellamy. I
+don&#8217;t know what he&#8217;ll do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>But, cold as his manner was, the heart of the
+man leaped to her courage. He saw her worn out,
+pathetically fearful, but she could face him with
+that still little smile of hers. He longed to take
+her in his arms, to tell her it would be all right&mdash;all
+right.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s one thing that troubles me. I don&#8217;t
+know how father will take this. You know how
+quick-tempered he is. I&#8217;m afraid he&#8217;ll shoot somebody
+or do something rash when he finds out. You
+must let me be alone with him when I tell him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He nodded. &#8220;I been thinking of that myself.
+It ain&#8217;t going to do him any good to make a gun-play.
+I have a notion mebbe this thing will unravel
+itself if we give it time. It will only make things
+worse for him to go off half-cocked.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How do you mean it may unravel itself?&#8221; she
+asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bellamy is a whole lot better man than folks
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_154' name='page_154'></a>154</span>
+give him credit for being. I expect he won&#8217;t be
+hard on you when he knows why you did it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And why did I do it?&#8221; she asked quietly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sho! I know why you did it. Jim Budd told
+you what he had heard, and you figured you could
+save your father from doing it. You meant to
+give the money back, didn&#8217;t you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, but I can&#8217;t prove that either in court or
+to Mr. Bellamy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t need to prove it to me. If you say
+so, that&#8217;s enough,&#8221; he said in his unenthusiastic
+voice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you&#8217;re not judge and jury, and you&#8217;re certainly
+not Mr. Bellamy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Scrape Arizona with a fine-tooth comb and you
+couldn&#8217;t get a jury to convict when it&#8217;s up against
+the facts in this case.&#8221;</p>
+<p>At this she brightened. &#8220;Thank you, Mr. Flatray.&#8221;
+And naïvely she added with a little laugh:
+&#8220;Are you ready to put the handcuffs on me yet?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He looked with a smile at her outstretched hands.
+&#8220;They wouldn&#8217;t stay on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t you carry them in sizes to fit all
+criminals?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll have to put you on parole.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll break it and climb out the window. Then
+I&#8217;ll run off with this.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She indicated the box of treasure.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I need that wash-stand in my room. I&#8217;m going
+to take it up there to-night,&#8221; he said.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_155' name='page_155'></a>155</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;This <i>isn&#8217;t</i> a very good safety deposit vault,&#8221;
+she answered, and, nodding a careless good-night,
+she walked away in her slow-limbed, graceful
+Southern fashion.</p>
+<p>She had carried it off to the last without breaking
+down, but, once in her own room, the girl&#8217;s face
+showed haggard in the moonlight. It was one thing
+to jest about it with him; it was another to face the
+facts as they stood. She was in the power of her
+father&#8217;s enemy, the man whose proffer of friendship
+they had rejected with scorn. Her pride cried
+out that she could not endure mercy from him even
+if he wished to extend it. Surely there must be
+some other way out than the humiliation of begging
+him not to prosecute. She could see none but one,
+and that was infinitely worse. Yet she knew it
+would be her father&#8217;s first impulsive instinct to seek
+to fight her out of her trouble, the more because it
+was through him that it had fallen upon her. At
+all hazards she must prevent this.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='XI_A_CONVERSATION' id='XI_A_CONVERSATION'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_156' name='page_156'></a>156</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER XI</h2>
+<h3>A CONVERSATION</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Not five minutes after Melissy had left the
+deputy sheriff, another rider galloped up
+the road. Jack, returning from his room,
+where he had left the box of gold locked up, waited
+on the porch to see who this might be.</p>
+<p>The horseman proved to be the man Norris, or
+Boone, and in a thoroughly bad temper, as Jack
+soon found out.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you see anything of &#8217;Lissie Lee?&#8221; he demanded
+immediately.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Miss Lee has just left me. She has gone to
+her room,&#8221; answered Flatray quietly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I want to see her,&#8221; said the other hoarsely.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon you better postpone it to to-morrow.
+She&#8217;s some played out and needs sleep.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I&#8217;m going to see her now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack turned, still all gentleness, and called to Jim
+Budd, who was in the store.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, Jim! Run upstairs and knock on Miss Melissy&#8217;s
+door and tell her Mr. Norris is down here.
+Ask if she will see him to-night.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re making a heap of formality out of this,
+Mr. Buttinsky,&#8221; sneered the cowpuncher.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_157' name='page_157'></a>157</span></p>
+<p>Jack made no answer, unless it were one to
+whistle gently and look out into the night as if
+he were alone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, seh. She doan&#8217; wan&#8217; tuh see him to-night,&#8221;
+announced Jim upon his return.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That seems to settle it, Mr. Norris,&#8221; said Jack
+pleasantly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not by a hell of a sight. I&#8217;ve got something
+to say to her, and I&#8217;m going to say it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;To-morrow,&#8221; amended the officer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I said to-night.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But your say doesn&#8217;t go here against hers. I
+reckon you&#8217;ll wait.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not so&#8217;s you could notice it.&#8221; The cowpuncher
+took a step forward toward the stairway, but Flatray
+was there before him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Get out of the way, you. I don&#8217;t stand for any
+butting-in,&#8221; the cowboy blustered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t be a goat, Norris. She&#8217;s tired, and she
+says she don&#8217;t want to see you. That&#8217;s enough,
+ain&#8217;t it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris leaped back with an oath to draw his gun,
+but Jack had the quickest draw in Arizona. The
+puncher found himself looking into the business
+end of a revolver.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Better change your mind, seh,&#8221; suggested the
+officer amiably. &#8220;I take it you&#8217;ve been drinking
+and you&#8217;re some excited. If you were in condition
+to <i>savez</i> the situation, you&#8217;d understand that the
+young lady doesn&#8217;t care to see you now. Do you
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_158' name='page_158'></a>158</span>
+need a church to fall on you before you can take
+a hint?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon if you knew all about her, you wouldn&#8217;t
+be so anxious to stand up for her,&#8221; Norris said
+darkly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I expect we cayn&#8217;t any of us stand the great
+white light on all our acts; but if any one can, it&#8217;s
+that little girl upstairs.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What would you say if I told you that she&#8217;s
+liable to go to Yuma if I lift my hand?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;d say I was from Missouri and needed
+showing.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Put up that gun, come outside with me, and if
+I take a notion I&#8217;ll show you all right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack laughed as his gun disappeared. &#8220;I&#8217;d be
+willing to bet high that there are a good many citizens
+around here haided straighter for Yuma than
+Miss Melissy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Without answering, Norris led the way out and
+stopped only when his arm rested on the fence of
+the corral.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Nobody can hear us now,&#8221; he said brusquely,
+and the ranger got a whiff of his hot whisky breath.
+&#8220;You&#8217;ve put it up to me to make good. All right,
+I&#8217;ll do it. That little girl in there, as you call
+her, is the bad man who held up the Fort Allison
+stage.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The officer laughed tolerantly as he lit a
+cigarette.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I hear you say it, Norris.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_159' name='page_159'></a>159</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t expect you to believe it right away, but
+it&#8217;s a fact just the same.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Flatray climbed to the fence and rested his feet
+on a rail. &#8220;Fire ahead. I&#8217;m listenin&#8217;.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The first men on the ground after that hold-up
+were me and Lee. We covered the situation
+thorough and got hold of some points right away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right funny too. When I asked you if
+you&#8217;d been down there you both denied it,&#8221; commented
+the officer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We were protecting the girl. Mind you, we
+didn&#8217;t know who had done it then, but we had reasons
+to think the person had just come from this
+ranch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What reasons?&#8221; briefly demanded Flatray.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We don&#8217;t need to go into them. We had them,
+anyhow. Then I lit on a foot-print right on the
+edge of the ditch that no man ever made. We
+didn&#8217;t know what to make of it, but we wiped it
+out and followed the ditch, one on each side. We&#8217;d
+figured that was the way he had gone. You see,
+though water was running in the ditch now, it
+hadn&#8217;t been half an hour before.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t say!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There wasn&#8217;t a sign of anybody leaving the
+ditch till we got to the ranch; then we saw tracks
+going straight to the house.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So you got a bunch of sheep and drove them
+down there to muss things up some.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris looked sharply at him. &#8220;You got there
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_160' name='page_160'></a>160</span>
+while we were driving them back. Well, that&#8217;s
+right. We had to help her out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re helping her out now, ain&#8217;t you?&#8221; Jack
+asked dryly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s my business. I&#8217;ve got my own reasons,
+Mr. Deputy. All you got to do is arrest her.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just as soon as you give me the evidence, seh.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Haven&#8217;t I given it to you? She was seen to
+drive away from the house in her rig. She left footprints
+down there. She came back up the ditch and
+then rode right up to the head-gates and turned on
+the water. Jim Little saw her cutting across country
+from the head-gates hell-to-split.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Far as I can make out, all the evidence you&#8217;ve
+given me ain&#8217;t against her, but against you. She
+was out drivin&#8217; when it happened, you say, and you
+expect me to arrest her for it. It ain&#8217;t against the
+law to go driving, seh. And as for that ditch fairy
+tale, on your own say-so you wiped out all chance
+to prove the story.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you won&#8217;t arrest her?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you&#8217;ll furnish the evidence, seh.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I tell you we know she did it. Her father
+knows it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is it worryin&#8217; his conscience? Did he ask you
+to lay an information against her?&#8221; asked the officer
+sarcastically.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That isn&#8217;t the point.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re right. Here&#8217;s the point.&#8221; Not by the
+faintest motion of the body had the officer&#8217;s indolence
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_161' name='page_161'></a>161</span>
+been lifted, but the quiet ring of his voice
+showed it was gone. &#8220;You and Lee were overheard
+planning that robbery the day after you were seen
+hanging around the &#8217;Monte Cristo.&#8217; You started
+out to hold up the stage. It was held up. By your
+own story you were the first men on the ground
+after the robbery. I tracked you straight from
+there here along the ditch. I found a black mask
+in Lee&#8217;s coat. A dozen people saw you on that
+fool sheep-drive of yours. And to sum up, I found
+the stolen gold right here where you must have
+hidden it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You found the gold? Where?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That ain&#8217;t the point either, seh. The point is
+that I&#8217;ve got you where I want you, Mr. Norris,
+alias Mr. Boone. You&#8217;re wound up in a net you
+cayn&#8217;t get away from. You&#8217;re wanted back East,
+and you&#8217;re wanted here. I&#8217;m onto your little game,
+sir. Think I don&#8217;t know you&#8217;ve been trying to
+manufacture evidence against me as a rustler?
+Think I ain&#8217;t wise to your whole record? You&#8217;re
+arrested for robbing the Fort Allison stage.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Norris, standing close in front of him, shot his
+right hand out and knocked the officer backward
+from the fence. Before the latter could get on his
+feet again the cowpuncher was scudding through
+the night. He reached his horse, flung himself on,
+and galloped away. Harmlessly a bullet or two
+zipped after him as he disappeared.</p>
+<p>The deputy climbed over the fence again and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_162' name='page_162'></a>162</span>
+laughed softly to himself. &#8220;You did that right
+well, Jack. He&#8217;ll always think he did that by his
+lone, never will know you was a partner in that
+escape. It&#8217;s a fact, though, I could have railroaded
+him through on the evidence, but not without including
+the old man. No, there wasn&#8217;t any way
+for it but that grandstand escape of Mr. Boone&#8217;s.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Still smiling, he dusted himself, put up his revolver,
+and returned to the house.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='XII_THE_TENDERFOOT_MAKES_A_PROPOSITION' id='XII_THE_TENDERFOOT_MAKES_A_PROPOSITION'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_163' name='page_163'></a>163</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER XII</h2>
+<h3>THE TENDERFOOT MAKES A PROPOSITION</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Melissy waited in dread expectancy to see
+what would happen. Of quick, warm
+sympathies, always ready to bear with
+courage her own and others&#8217; burdens, she had none
+of that passive endurance which age and experience
+bring. She was keyed to the heroism of an occasion,
+but not yet to that which life lays as a daily
+burden upon many without dramatic emphasis.</p>
+<p>All next day nothing took place. On the succeeding
+one her father returned with the news that
+the &#8220;Monte Cristo&#8221; contest had been continued to
+another term of court. Otherwise nothing unusual
+occurred. It was after mail time that she stepped
+to the porch for a breath of fresh air and noticed
+that the reward placard had been taken down.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Who did that?&#8221; she asked of Alan McKinstra,
+who was sitting on the steps, reading a newspaper
+and munching an apple.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jack Flatray took it down. He said the offer
+of a reward had been withdrawn.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;When did he do that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;About an hour ago. Just before he rode off.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_164' name='page_164'></a>164</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Rode off! Where did he go?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Heard him say he was going to Mesa. He told
+your father that when he settled the bill.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s gone for good, then?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s the way I took it. Say, Melissy, Farnum
+says Jack told him the gold had been found and
+turned back to Morse. Is that right?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How should I know?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, it looks blamed funny they could get the
+bullion back without getting the hold-up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Maybe they&#8217;ll get him yet,&#8221; she consoled him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I wish I could get a crack at him,&#8221; the boy
+murmured vengefully.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You had one chance at him, didn&#8217;t you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;José spoiled it. Honest, I wasn&#8217;t going to lie
+down, &#8217;Lissie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Again the days followed each other uneventfully.
+Bellamy himself never came for his mail now, but
+sent one of the boys from the mine for it. Melissy
+wondered whether he despised her so much he did
+not ever want to see her again. Somehow she did
+not like to think this. Perhaps it might be delicacy
+on his part. He was going to drop the whole thing
+magnanimously and did not want to put upon her
+the obligation of thanking him by presenting himself
+to her eyes.</p>
+<p>But though he never appeared in person, he had
+never been so much in her mind. She could not rid
+herself of a growing sympathy and admiration for
+this man who was holding his own against many.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_165' name='page_165'></a>165</span>
+A story which was being whispered about reached
+her ears and increased this. A bunch of his sheep
+had been found poisoned on their feeding ground,
+and certain cattle interests were suspected of having
+done the dastardly thing.</p>
+<p>When she could stand the silence no longer Melissy
+called up Jack Flatray on the telephone at
+Mesa.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You caught me just in time. I&#8217;m leaving for
+Phoenix to-night,&#8221; he told her. &#8220;What can I do
+for you, Miss Lee?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I want to know what&#8217;s being done about that
+Fort Allison stage hold-up.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The money has been recovered.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know that, but&mdash;what about the&mdash;the criminals?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They made their getaway all right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Aren&#8217;t you looking for them?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did Mr. Morse want you to drop it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. He was very urgent about it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Does he know who the criminals are?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And isn&#8217;t going to prosecute?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So he told me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What did Mr. Morse say when you made your
+report?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Said, &#8216;Thank you.&#8217;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, yes, but&mdash;you know what I mean.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not being a mind-reader&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_166' name='page_166'></a>166</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;About the suspect. Did he say anything?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Said he had private reasons for not pushing the
+case. I didn&#8217;t ask him what they were.&#8221;</p>
+<p>This was all she could get out of him. It was
+less than she had hoped. Still, it was something.
+She knew definitely what Bellamy had done.
+Wherefore she sat down to write him a note of
+thanks. It took her an hour and eight sheets of
+paper before she could complete it to her satisfaction.
+Even then the result was not what she wanted.
+She wished she knew how he felt about it, so that
+she could temper it to the right degree of warmth
+or coolness. Since she did not know, she erred
+on the side of stiffness and made her message
+formal.</p>
+<div class='blockquot'>
+<div class='la'>
+<p>&#8220;<span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Mr. Thomas L. Morse,</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Monte Cristo Mine.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p>&#8220;<span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Dear Sir:</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Father and I feel that we ought to thank
+you for your considerate forbearance in a certain
+matter you know of. Believe me, sir,
+we are grateful.</p>
+<div class='ra'>
+<p style='margin-right:4em;'>&#8220;Very respectfully,</p>
+<p>&#8220;<span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Melissy Lee.</span>&#8221;</p>
+</div>
+
+</div>
+<p>She could not, however, keep herself from one
+touch of sympathy, and as a postscript she naïvely
+added:</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sorry about the sheep.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_167' name='page_167'></a>167</span></p>
+<p>Before mailing it she carried this letter to her
+father. Neither of them had ever referred to the
+other about what each knew of the affair of the
+robbery. More than once it had been on the tip
+of Champ Lee&#8217;s tongue to speak of it, but it was
+not in his nature to talk out what he felt, and with
+a sigh he had given it up. Now Melissy came
+straight to the point.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been writing a letter to Mr. Morse, dad,
+thanking him for not having me arrested.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Lee shot at her a glance of quick alarm.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Does he know about it, honey?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. Jack Flatray found out the whole thing
+and told him. He was very insistent on dropping
+it, Mr. Flatray says.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You say Jack found out all about it, honey?&#8221;
+repeated Lee in surprise.</p>
+<p>He was seated in a big chair on the porch, and
+she nestled on one arm of it, rumpled his gray hair
+as she had always done since she had been a little
+girl, kissed him, and plunged into her story.</p>
+<p>He heard her to the end without a word, but she
+noticed that he gripped the chair hard. When she
+had finished he swept her into his arms and broke
+down over her, calling her the pet names of her
+childhood.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Honey-bird ... Dad&#8217;s little honey-bird ...
+I&#8217;m that ashamed of myse&#8217;f. &#8217;Twas the whisky
+did it, lambie. Long as I live I&#8217;ll nevah touch
+it again. I&#8217;ll sweah that befo&#8217; God. All week
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_168' name='page_168'></a>168</span>
+you been packin&#8217; the troubles I heaped on you, precious,
+and afteh you-all saved me from being a
+criminal....&#8221;</p>
+<p>So he went on, spending his tempestuous love in
+endearments and caresses, and so together they
+afterward talked it out and agreed to send the letter
+she had written.</p>
+<p>But Lee was not satisfied with her atonement.
+He could not rest to let it go at that, without expressing
+his own part in it to Bellamy. Next day
+he rode up to the mine, and found its owner in
+workman&#8217;s slops just stepping from the cage. If
+Bellamy were surprised to see him, no sign of it
+reached his face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you&#8217;ll wait a minute till I get these things
+off, I&#8217;ll walk up to the cabin with you, Mr. Lee,&#8221;
+he said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon you got my daughter&#8217;s letter,&#8221; said
+Lee abruptly as he strode up the mountainside with
+his host.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, I got it an hour ago.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I be&#8217;n and studied it out, Mr. Morse. I couldn&#8217;t
+let it go at that, and so I reckoned I&#8217;d jog along
+up hyer and tell you the whole story.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s as you please, Mr. Lee. I&#8217;m quite satisfied
+as it is.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The rancher went on as if he had not heard.
+&#8220;&#8217;Course I be&#8217;n holding a grudge at you evah since
+you took up this hyer claim. I expect that rankles
+with me most of the time, and when I take to
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_169' name='page_169'></a>169</span>
+drinking seems to me that mine still belongs to me.
+Well, I heerd tell of that shipment you was making,
+and I sets out to git it, for it ce&#8217;tainly did seem to
+belong to me. Understand, I wasn&#8217;t drunk, but
+had be&#8217;n settin&#8217; pretty steady to the bottle for several
+days. Melissy finds it out, no matter how, and
+undertakes to keep me out of trouble. She&#8217;s that
+full of sand, she nevah once thought of the danger
+or the consequences. Anyhow, she meant to git the
+bullion back to you afteh the thing had blown over.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I haven&#8217;t doubted that a moment since I knew
+she did it,&#8221; said Bellamy quietly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad to hear it. I be&#8217;n misjudgin&#8217; you, seh,
+but you&#8217;re a white man afteh all. Well, you know
+the rest of the story: how she held up the stage,
+how Jack drapped in befo&#8217; our tracks were covered,
+how smart he worked the whole thing out, and how
+my little gyurl confessed to him to save me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, I know all that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What kind of a figure do I make in this? First
+off, I act like a durn fool, and she has to step in
+to save me. Then I let her tote the worry of it
+around while I ride off to Mesa. When Jack runs
+me down, she takes the blame again. To finish
+up with, she writes you a letter of thanks, jes&#8217; as
+if the whole fault was hers.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The old soldier selected a smooth rock and
+splashed it with tobacco juice before he continued
+with rising indignation against himself.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m a fine father for a gyurl like that, ain&#8217;t I?
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_170' name='page_170'></a>170</span>
+Up to date I always had an idee I was some sort
+of a man, but dad gum it! I cayn&#8217;t see it hyer.
+To think of me lettin&#8217; my little gyurl stand the consequences
+of my meanness. No, Mr. Morse, that&#8217;s
+one too much for Champ Lee. He&#8217;s nevah going to
+touch another drop of whisky long as he lives.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad to hear it. That&#8217;s a square amend to make,
+one she will appreciate.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So I took a <i>pasear</i> up hyer to explain this, and
+to thank you for yore kindness. Fac&#8217; is, Mr.
+Morse, it would have jest about killed me if anything
+had happened to my little &#8217;Lissie. I want to
+say that if you had a-be&#8217;n her brother you couldn&#8217;t
+&#8217;a&#8217; be&#8217;n more decent.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There was nothing else to do. It happens that
+I am in her debt. She saved my life once. Besides,
+I understood the motives for her action when she
+broke the law, and I honored them with all my
+heart. Flatray felt just as I did about it. So
+would any right-thinking man.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, you cayn&#8217;t keep me from sayin&#8217; again
+that you&#8217;re a white man, seh,&#8221; the other said with
+a laugh behind which the emotion of tears lay
+near.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That offer of a compromise is still open, Mr.
+Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The Southerner shook his grizzled head. &#8220;No, I
+reckon not, Mr. Morse. Understand, I got nothin&#8217;
+against you. The feud is wiped out, and I&#8217;ll make
+you no mo&#8217; trouble. But it&#8217;s yore mine, and I
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_171' name='page_171'></a>171</span>
+don&#8217;t feel like taking charity. I got enough anyhow.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It wouldn&#8217;t be charity. I&#8217;ve always felt as if
+you had a moral claim on an interest in the &#8216;Monte
+Cristo.&#8217; If you won&#8217;t take this yourself, why not
+let me make out the papers to Miss Lee? You
+would feel then that she was comfortably fixed, no
+matter what happened to you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I&#8217;ll lay it befo&#8217; her. Anyhow, we&#8217;re
+much obliged to you, Mr. Morse. I&#8217;ll tell you
+what, seh,&#8221; he added as an after-thought. &#8220;You
+come down and talk it over with &#8217;Lissie. If you
+can make her see it that way, good enough.&#8221;</p>
+<p>When Champ Lee turned his bronco&#8217;s head homeward
+he was more at peace with the world than he
+had been for a long time. He felt that he would
+be able to look his little girl in the face again. For
+the first time in a week he felt at one with creation.
+He rode into the ranch plaza humming &#8220;Dixie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>On the day following that of Lee&#8217;s call, the mine-owner
+saddled his mare and took the trail to the
+half-way house. It was not until after the stage
+had come and gone that he found the chance for a
+word with Melissy alone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your father submitted my proposition, did he?&#8221;
+Bellamy said by way of introducing the subject.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let&#8217;s take a walk on it. I haven&#8217;t been out of
+the house to-day,&#8221; she answered with the boyish
+downrightness sometimes uppermost in her.</p>
+<p>Calling Jim, she left him in charge of the store,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_172' name='page_172'></a>172</span>
+caught up a Mexican sombrero, and led the way
+up the trail to a grove of live-oaks perched on a
+bluff above. Below them stretched the plain, fold
+on fold to the blue horizon edge. Close at hand
+clumps of cactus, thickets of mesquit, together with
+the huddled adobe buildings of the ranch, made up
+the details of a scene possible only in the sunburnt
+territory. The palpitating heat quivered above the
+hot brown sand. No life stirred in the valley except
+a circling buzzard high in the sky, and the
+tiny moving speck with its wake of dust each knew
+to be the stage that had left the station an hour
+before.</p>
+<p>Melissy, unconscious of the charming picture she
+made, stood upon a rock and looked down on it all.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I suppose,&#8221; she said at last slowly, &#8220;that most
+people would think this pretty desolate. But it&#8217;s
+a part of me. It&#8217;s all I know.&#8221; She broke off and
+smiled at him. &#8220;I had a chance to be civilized.
+Dad wanted to send me East to school, but I
+couldn&#8217;t leave him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where were you thinking of going?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;To Denver.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her conception of the East amused him. It
+was about as accurate as a New Yorker&#8217;s of the
+West.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m glad you didn&#8217;t. It would have spoiled you
+and sent you back just like every other young lady
+the schools grind out.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_173' name='page_173'></a>173</span></p>
+<p>She turned curiously toward him. &#8220;Am I not
+like other girls?&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was on his tongue tip to tell her that she was
+gloriously different from most girls he had known,
+but discretion sealed his lips. Instead, he told her
+of life in the city and what it means to society
+women, its emptiness and unsatisfaction.</p>
+<p>His condemnation was not proof positive to her.
+&#8220;I&#8217;d like to go there for myself some time and see.
+And anyhow it must be nice to have all the money
+you want with which to travel,&#8221; she said.</p>
+<p>This gave him his opening. &#8220;It makes one independent.
+I think that&#8217;s the best thing wealth
+can give&mdash;a sort of spaciousness.&#8221; He waited
+perceptibly before he added: &#8220;I hope you have
+decided to be my partner in the mine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve decided not to.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sorry. But why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s your mine. It isn&#8217;t ours.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s nonsense. I always in my heart, recognized
+a moral claim you have. Besides, the case
+isn&#8217;t finished yet. Perhaps your father may win
+his contest. I&#8217;m all for settling out of court.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know we won&#8217;t win.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She gave him applause from her dark eyes.
+&#8220;That&#8217;s very fair of you, but Dad and I can&#8217;t do it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you still have a grudge at me,&#8221; he smiled.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not the least little bit of a one.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shan&#8217;t take no for an answer, then. I&#8217;ll order
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_174' name='page_174'></a>174</span>
+the papers made out whether you want me to or
+not.&#8221; Without giving her a chance to speak, he
+passed to another topic: &#8220;I&#8217;ve decided to go out
+of the sheep business.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m so glad!&#8221; she cried.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Those aren&#8217;t my feelings,&#8221; he answered ruefully.
+&#8220;I hate to quit under fire.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Of course you do, but your friends will know
+why you do it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why do I do it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because you know it&#8217;s right. The cattlemen
+had the range first. Their living is tied up in cattle,
+and your sheep are ruining the feed for them.
+Yesterday when I was out riding I counted the
+bones of eight dead cows.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He nodded gravely. &#8220;Yes, in this country sheep
+are death to cows. I hate to be a quitter, but I
+hate worse to take the bread out of the mouths of a
+dozen families. Two days ago I had an offer for
+my whole bunch, and to-morrow I&#8217;m going to take
+the first instalment over the pass and drive them
+down to the railroad.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you&#8217;ll have to cross the dead line to get
+over the pass,&#8221; she said quickly; for all Cattleland
+knew that a guard had been watching his herds to
+see they did not cross the pass.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. I&#8217;m going to send Alan with a letter to
+Farnum. I don&#8217;t think there will be any opposition
+to my crossing it when my object is understood,&#8221;
+he smiled.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_175' name='page_175'></a>175</span></p>
+<p>Melissy watched him ride away, strong and rugged
+and ungraceful, from the head to the heel of
+him a man. Life had gone hard with him. She
+wondered whether that were the reason her heart
+went out to him so warmly.</p>
+<p>As she moved about her work that day and the
+next little snatches of song broke from her, bubbling
+forth like laughter, born of the quiet happiness
+within, for which she could give no reason.</p>
+<p>After the stage had gone she saddled her pony
+and rode toward the head of the pass. In an hour
+or two now the sheep would be pouring across the
+divide, and she wanted to get a photograph of
+them as they emerged from the pass. She was following
+an old cattle trail which ran into the main
+path just this side of the pass, and she was close
+to the junction when the sound of voices stopped
+her. Some instinct made her wait and listen.</p>
+<p>The speakers were in a dip of the trail just ahead
+of her, and the voice of the first she recognized as
+belonging to the man Boone. The tone of it was
+jubilantly cruel.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, sir. You don&#8217;t move a step of the way,
+not a step, Mr. Alan McKinstra. I&#8217;ve got him
+right where I want him, and I don&#8217;t care if you
+talk till the cows come home.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Alan&#8217;s voice rang out indignantly, &#8220;It&#8217;s murder
+then&mdash;just plain, low-down murder. If you hold
+me here and let Morse fall into a death trap without
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_176' name='page_176'></a>176</span>
+warning him, you&#8217;re as responsible as if you
+shot him yourself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. Suits me down to the ground. We&#8217;ll
+let it go at that. I&#8217;m responsible. If you want
+the truth flat and plain, I don&#8217;t mind telling you
+that I wouldn&#8217;t be satisfied if I wasn&#8217;t responsible.
+I&#8217;m evening up some little things with Mr. Morse
+to-day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy needed to hear no more to understand
+the situation, but if she had, the next words of
+Boone would have cleared it up.</p>
+<p>&#8220;When I met up with you and happened on the
+news that you was taking a message to Farnum,
+and when I got onto the fact that Morse, as you
+call him, was moving his sheep across the dead
+line, <i>relying on you having got his letter to the
+cattlemen to make it safe</i>, it seemed luck too good
+to be true. All I had to do was to persuade you
+to stay right here with me, and Mr. Morse would
+walk into the pass and be wiped out. You get the
+beauty of it, my friend, don&#8217;t you? <i>I&#8217;m</i> responsible,
+but it will be Farnum and his friends that will
+bear the blame. There ain&#8217;t but one flaw in the
+whole thing: Morse will never know that it&#8217;s me
+that killed him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You devil!&#8221; cried the boy, with impotent passion.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve waited ten years for this day, and it&#8217;s come
+at last. Don&#8217;t you think for a moment I&#8217;m going
+to weaken. No, sir! You&#8217;ll sit there with my
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_177' name='page_177'></a>177</span>
+gun poked in your face just as you&#8217;ve sat for six
+hours. It&#8217;s my say-so to-day, sir,&#8221; Boone retorted,
+malevolence riding triumph in his voice.</p>
+<p>Melissy&#8217;s first impulse was to confront the man,
+her next to slip away without being discovered and
+then give the alarm.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, sir,&#8221; continued the cowpuncher; &#8220;I scored
+on Mr. Morse two or three nights ago, when I
+played hell with one of his sheep camps, and to-day
+I finish up with him. His sheep have been
+watched for weeks, and at the first move it&#8217;s all up
+with him and them. Farnum&#8217;s vaqueros will pay
+my debt in full. Just as soon as I&#8217;m right sure
+of it I&#8217;ll be jogging along to Dead Man&#8217;s Cache,
+and you can go order the coffin for your boss.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The venom of the man was something to wonder
+at. It filled the listening girl with sick apprehension.
+She had not known that such hatred could
+live in the world.</p>
+<p>Quietly she led her pony back, mounted, and
+made a wide detour until she struck the trail above.
+Already she could hear the distant bleat of sheep
+which told her that the herd was entering the pass.
+Recklessly she urged her pony forward, galloping
+into the saddle between the peaks without regard to
+the roughness of the boulder-strewn path. A voice
+from above hailed her with a startled shout as she
+flew past. Again, a shot rang out, the bullet whistling
+close to her ear. But nothing could stop her
+till she reached the man she meant to save.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_178' name='page_178'></a>178</span></p>
+<p>And so it happened that Richard Bellamy, walking
+at the head of his herd, saw a horse gallop
+wildly round a bend almost into his bleating flock.
+The rider dragged the bronco to a halt and slipped
+to the ground. She stood there ashen-hued, clinging
+to the saddle-horn and swaying slightly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m in time.... Thank God!...
+Thank God!&#8221; her parched lips murmured.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Miss Lee! You here?&#8221; he cried.</p>
+<p>They looked at each other, the man and the girl,
+while the wild fear in her heart began to still. The
+dust of the drive was thick on his boots, his clothes,
+his face, but the soil of travel could not obscure
+the power of his carriage, the strong lines of his
+shoulders, the set of his broad, flat back, any more
+than it could tarnish her rarity, the sweetness of
+blood in her that under his gaze beat faintly into
+her dusky cheeks. The still force of him somehow
+carried reassurance to her. Such virility of manhood
+could not be marked for extinction.</p>
+<p>She panted out her story, and his eyes never
+left her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You have risked your life to save mine and
+my herders,&#8221; he said very quietly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You must go back,&#8221; she replied irrelevantly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can&#8217;t. The entrance is guarded.&#8221;</p>
+<p>This startled her. &#8220;Then&mdash;what shall we do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You must ride forward at once. Tell the vaqueros
+that I am moving my sheep only to take
+them to the railroad. Explain to them how Alan is
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_179' name='page_179'></a>179</span>
+detained with the message I sent Farnum. In a
+few minutes we shall follow with the sheep.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And if they don&#8217;t believe that you are going
+out of the sheep business&mdash;what then?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall have to take my chance of that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She seemed about to speak, but changed her mind,
+nodded, swung to the saddle, and rode forward.
+After a few minutes Bellamy followed slowly. He
+was unarmed, not having doubted that his letter
+to the cattleman would make his journey safe.
+That he should have waited for an answer was now
+plain, but the contract called for an immediate delivery
+of the sheep, as he had carefully explained
+in his note to Farnum.</p>
+<p>Presently he heard again the clatter of a horse&#8217;s
+hoofs in the loose shale and saw Melissy returning.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well?&#8221; he asked as she drew up.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve told them. I think they believe me, but
+I&#8217;m going through the gorge with you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He looked up quickly to protest, but did not.
+He knew that her thought was that her presence
+beside him would protect him from attack. The
+rough chivalry of Arizona takes its hat off to a
+woman, and Melissy Lee was a favorite of the
+whole countryside.</p>
+<p>So together they passed into the gulch, Bellamy
+walking by the side of her horse. Neither of them
+spoke. At their heels was the soft rustle of many
+thousands of padding feet.</p>
+<p>Once there came to them the sound of cheering,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_180' name='page_180'></a>180</span>
+and they looked up to see a group of vaqueros waving
+their hats and shouting down. Melissy shook
+her handkerchief and laughed happily at them. It
+was a day to be remembered by these riders.</p>
+<p>They emerged into a roll of hill-tops upon which
+the setting sun had cast a weird afterglow of radiance
+in which the whole world burned. The cactus,
+the stunted shrubbery, the painted rocks, seemed
+all afire with some magic light that had touched
+their commonness to a new wonder.</p>
+<p>A sound came to them from below. A man,
+rifle in hand and leading a horse, was stealthily
+crossing the trail to disappear among the large
+boulders beyond.</p>
+<p>Melissy did not speak, scarce dared to draw
+breath, for the man beneath them was Boone.
+There was something furtive and lupine about him
+that suggested the wild beast stalking its kill. No
+doubt he had become impatient to see the end of
+his foe and had ridden forward. He had almost
+crossed the path before he looked up and caught
+sight of them standing together in the fireglow of
+the sunset.</p>
+<p>Abruptly he came to a standstill.</p>
+<p>&#8220;By God! you slipped through, did you?&#8221; he
+said in a low voice of concentrated bitterness.</p>
+<p>Bellamy did not answer, but he separated himself
+from the girl by a step or two. He knew quite
+well what was coming, and he looked down quietly
+with steady eyes upon his foe.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_181' name='page_181'></a>181</span></p>
+<p>From far below there came the faint sound of a
+horse breaking its way through brush. Boone
+paused to listen, but his eye never wandered from
+the bareheaded, motionless figure silhouetted against
+the skyline in the ruddy evening glow. He had
+shifted his rifle so that it lay in both hands, ready
+for immediate action.</p>
+<p>Melissy, horror-stricken, had sat silent, but now
+she found her voice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He is unarmed!&#8221; she cried to the cowpuncher.</p>
+<p>He made no answer. Another sound in the
+brush, close at hand, was distracting his attention,
+though not his gaze.</p>
+<p>Just as he whipped up his rifle Melissy sprang
+forward. She heard the sound of the explosion fill
+the draw, saw Bellamy clutch at the air and slowly
+sink to the ground. Before the echoes had died
+away she had flung herself toward the inert body.</p>
+<p>The outlaw took a step or two forward, as if to
+make sure of his work, but at the sound of running
+footsteps he changed his mind, swung to the saddle
+and disappeared among the rocks.</p>
+<p>An instant later Bob Farnum burst into view.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s up?&#8221; he demanded.</p>
+<p>Melissy looked up. Her face was perfectly ashen.
+&#8220;Phil Norris ... he shot Mr. Morse.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Farnum stepped forward. &#8220;Hurt badly, Mr.
+Morse?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The wounded man grinned faintly. &#8220;Scared
+worse, I reckon. He got me in the fleshy part of
+the left arm.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='XIII_OLD_ACQUAINTANCES' id='XIII_OLD_ACQUAINTANCES'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_182' name='page_182'></a>182</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIII</h2>
+<h3>OLD ACQUAINTANCES</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>&#8220;You wanted to see me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The voice had the soft, slow intonation
+of the South, and it held some quality that
+haunted the memory. Or so Melissy thought afterward,
+but that may have been because of its owner&#8217;s
+appeal to sympathy.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you are Miss Yarnell.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ferne Yarnell is my name.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Bellamy asked me to call on you. He
+sent this letter of introduction.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A faint wave of color beat into the cheek of the
+stranger. &#8220;You know Mr. Bellamy then?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. He would have been here to meet you,
+but he met with an accident yesterday.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;An accident!&#8221; There was a quick flash of
+alarm in the lifted face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He told me to tell you that it was not serious.
+He was shot in the arm.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shot. By whom?&#8221; She was ashen to the
+lips.</p>
+<p>&#8220;By a man called Duncan Boone.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know him. He is a dangerous man.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_183' name='page_183'></a>183</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; Melissy nodded. &#8220;I don&#8217;t think we know
+how very dangerous he is. We have all been deceived
+in him till recently.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Does he live here?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. The strange thing is that he and Mr.
+Bellamy had never met in this country until a few
+days ago. There used to be some kind of a feud
+between the families. But you must know more
+about that than I do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. My family is involved in the feud. Mr.
+Bellamy is a distant cousin of mine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;So he told me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you known him long?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy thought that there was a little more than
+curiosity in the quick look the young woman flung
+at her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I met him when he first came here. He was
+lost on the desert and I found him. After that
+we became very unfriendly. He jumped a mining
+claim belonging to my father. But we&#8217;ve made it
+up and agreed to be friends.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He wrote about the young lady who saved his
+life.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy smiled. &#8220;Did he say that I was a cattle
+and a stage rustler?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He said nothing that was not good.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m much obliged to him,&#8221; the Western girl
+answered breezily. &#8220;And now do tell me, Miss
+Yarnell, that you and your people have made up
+your mind to stay permanently.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_184' name='page_184'></a>184</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Father is still looking the ground over. He
+has almost decided to buy a store here. Yet he
+has been in the town only a day. So you see he
+must like it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Outside the open second story window of the
+hotel Melissy heard a voice that sounded familiar.
+She moved toward the window alcove, and at the
+same time a quick step was heard in the hall. Someone
+opened the door of the parlor and stood on the
+threshold. It was the man called Boone.</p>
+<p>Melissy, from the window, glanced round. Her
+first impulse was to speak; her second to remain
+silent. For the Arkansan was not looking at her.
+His mocking ribald gaze was upon Ferne Yarnell.</p>
+<p>That young woman looked up from the letter of
+introduction she was reading and a startled expression
+swept into her face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dunc Boone,&#8221; she cried.</p>
+<p>The man doffed his hat with elaborate politeness.
+&#8220;Right glad to meet up with you again, Miss Ferne.
+You was in short dresses when I saw you last.
+My, but you&#8217;ve grown pretty. Was it because you
+heard I was in Arizona that you came here?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She rose, rejecting in every line of her erect
+figure his impudent geniality, his insolent pretense
+of friendliness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;My brother is in the hotel. If he learns you
+are here there will be trouble.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A wicked malice lay in his smiling eyes. &#8220;Trouble
+for him or for me?&#8221; he inquired silkily.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_185' name='page_185'></a>185</span></p>
+<p>His lash flicked her on the raw. Hal Yarnell was
+a boy of nineteen. This man had a long record as
+a gunfighter to prove him a desperate man. Moreover,
+he knew how hopelessly heart sick she was of
+the feud that for many years had taken its toll of
+blood.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Haven&#8217;t you done us enough harm, you and
+yours? Go away. Leave us alone. That&#8217;s all
+I ask of you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He came in and closed the door. &#8220;But you see
+it ain&#8217;t all I ask of you, Ferne Yarnell. I always
+did ask all I could get of a girl as pretty as you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Will you leave me, sir?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;When I&#8217;m through.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I reckon not,&#8221; he drawled between half
+shuttered eyes.</p>
+<p>She moved toward the door, but he was there
+before her. With a turn of his wrist he had
+locked it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This interview quits at my say-so, honey.
+Think after so many years of absence-makes-the-heart-grow-fonder
+you&#8217;re going to trample over me
+like I was a kid? Guess again.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Unlock that door,&#8221; she ordered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;When I get good and ready. We&#8217;ll have our
+talk out first.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her eyes blazed. She was white as paper though
+she faced him steadily. But her heart wavered.
+She dared not call out for fear her brother might
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_186' name='page_186'></a>186</span>
+hear and come to her assistance. This she must
+forestall at all costs.</p>
+<p>A heel clicked in the alcove. For the first time
+Norris, or Boone as the Southern girl had called
+him, became aware of a third party in the room.
+Melissy was leaning out of the window. She called
+down to a man standing on the street.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jack, come up here quick. I want you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Boone took a step forward. &#8220;You here, &#8217;Lissie
+Lee?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She laughed scornfully. &#8220;Yes, I&#8217;m here. An
+unexpected pleasure, isn&#8217;t it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you know Ferne Yarnell?&#8221; he asked, for
+once taken aback.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It looks as if I do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His quick furtive eye fell upon an envelope on
+the floor. He picked it up. Upon it was written,
+&#8220;Miss Ferne Yarnell,&#8221; and in the corner, &#8220;Introducing
+Miss Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A muscle twitched in his face. When he looked
+up there was an expression of devilish malignity
+on it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mr. Bellamy&#8217;s handwriting, looks like.&#8221; He
+turned to the Arizona girl. &#8220;Then I didn&#8217;t put the
+fellow out of business.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, you coward.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The angry color crept to the roots of his hair.
+&#8220;Better luck next time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The door knob rattled. Someone outside was
+trying to get in. Those inside the room paid no
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_187' name='page_187'></a>187</span>
+obvious attention to him. The venomous face of
+the cattle detective held the women fascinated.</p>
+<p>&#8220;When Dick Bellamy ambushed Shep he made
+a hell of a bad play of it. My old mammy used
+to say that the Boones were born wolves. I can
+see where she was right. The man that killed my
+brother gets his one of these days and don&#8217;t you
+forget it. You just stick around. We&#8217;re due to
+shoot this thing out, him and me,&#8221; the man continued,
+his deep-socketed eyes burning from the
+grim handsome face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Open the door,&#8221; ordered a voice from the hall,
+shaking the knob violently.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t know he killed your brother. Someone
+else may have done it. And it may have been
+done in self defence,&#8221; the Arkansas girl said to
+Boone in a voice so low and reluctant that it appeared
+the words were wrung from her by torture.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Think I&#8217;m a buzzard head? Why for did he
+run away? Why did he jump for the sandhills
+soon as the word came to arrest him?&#8221; He
+snapped together his straight, thin-lipped mouth,
+much as a trap closes on its prey.</p>
+<p>A heavy weight hurtled against the door and
+shook it to the hinges. Melissy had been edging
+to the right. Now with a twist of her lissom body
+she had slipped past the furious man and turned
+the key.</p>
+<p>Jack Flatray came into the room. His glance
+swept the young women and fastened on the man.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_188' name='page_188'></a>188</span>
+In the crossed eyes of the two was the thrust of
+rapiers, the grinding of steel on steel, that deadly
+searching for weakness in the other that duelists
+employ.</p>
+<p>The deputy spoke in a low soft drawl. &#8220;Mornin&#8217;,
+Boone. Holding an executive session, are you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The lids of the detective narrowed to slits. From
+the first there had been no pretense of friendship
+between these two. There are men who have only
+to look once at each other to know they will be
+foes. It had been that way with them. Causes of
+antagonism had arisen quickly enough. Both dominant
+personalities, they had waged silent unspoken
+warfare for the leadership of the range. Later
+over the favor of Melissy Lee this had grown more
+intense, still without having ever been put into
+words. Now they were face to face, masks off.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why yes, until you butted in, Mr. Sheriff.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;This isn&#8217;t my busy day. I thought I&#8217;d just drop
+in to the meeting.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve made a mistake. We&#8217;re not holding
+a cattle rustlers&#8217; convention.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There are so many ladies present I can&#8217;t hear
+you, but maybe if you said it outside I could,&#8221; the
+deputy suggested gently, a gleam of steely anger in
+his eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Say it anywhere to oblige a friend,&#8221; sneered
+Boone.</p>
+<p>From the moment of meeting neither man had
+lowered his gaze by the fraction of an inch. Red
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_189' name='page_189'></a>189</span>
+tragedy was in the air. Melissy knew it. The girl
+from Arkansas guessed as much. Yet neither of
+them knew how to avert the calamity that appeared
+impending. One factor alone saved the situation
+for the moment. Flatray had not yet heard of the
+shooting of Bellamy. Had he known he would
+have arrested Boone on the spot and the latter
+would have drawn and fought it out.</p>
+<p>Into the room sauntered Lee. &#8220;Hello, &#8217;Lissie.
+Been looking for you an hour, honey. Mornin&#8217;,
+Norris. Howdy, Jack! Dad burn yore ornery hide,
+I ain&#8217;t see you long enough for a good talk in a
+coon&#8217;s age.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy seized on her father joyfully as an interposition
+of Providence. &#8220;Father, this is Miss
+Yarnell, the young lady I told you about.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The ranchman buried her little hand in his big
+paw. &#8220;Right glad to meet up with you, Miss
+Yarnell. How do you like Arizona by this time?
+I reckon Melissy has introduced you to her friends.
+No? Make you acquainted with Mr. Flatray.
+Shake hands with Mr. Norris, Miss Yarnell.
+Where are you, Norris?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The owner of the Bar Double G swung round,
+to discover for the first time that harmony was not
+present. Boone stood back with a sullen vindictive
+expression on his face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, what&#8217;s up, boys?&#8221; the rancher asked, his
+glance passing from one to another.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_190' name='page_190'></a>190</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You ain&#8217;t in this, Lee,&#8221; Boone informed him.
+Then, to Flatray: &#8220;See you later.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The deputy nodded carelessly. &#8220;Any time you
+like.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The lank old Confederate took a step forward
+to call Boone back, but Melissy caught him by the
+sleeve.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let him go,&#8221; she whispered emphatically.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know my boss,&#8221; returned Lee with a laugh.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you&#8217;re quite through with me, Miss Lee, I&#8217;ll
+not intrude longer,&#8221; Flatray said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I&#8217;m not,&#8221; spoke Melissy quickly.</p>
+<p>She did not intend to let him get away to settle
+his quarrel with Boone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m rather busy,&#8221; he suggested.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your business will have to wait,&#8221; she came
+back decisively.</p>
+<p>Lee laughed and clapped Jack on the shoulder.
+&#8220;Might as well know your boss too, boy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy flushed with a flash of temper. &#8220;I&#8217;m
+nothing of the kind, dad.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sho! A joke&#8217;s a joke, girl. That&#8217;s twice hand-runnin&#8217;
+I get a call-down. You&#8217;re mighty high-heeled
+to-day, &#8217;pears like.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack smiled grimly. He understood some things
+that were hidden from Lee.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='XIV_CONCERNING_THE_BOONEBELLAMYYARNELL_FEUD' id='XIV_CONCERNING_THE_BOONEBELLAMYYARNELL_FEUD'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_191' name='page_191'></a>191</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIV</h2>
+<h3>CONCERNING THE BOONE-BELLAMY-YARNELL FEUD</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>The story that Ferne Yarnell told them in
+the parlor of the hotel had its beginnings
+far back in the days before the great war.
+They had been neighbors, these three families, had
+settled side by side in this new land of Arkansas,
+had hunted and feasted together in amity. In an
+hour had arisen the rift between them that was to
+widen to a chasm into which much blood had since
+been spilt. It began with a quarrel between hotheaded
+young men. Forty years later it was still
+running its blind wasteful course.</p>
+<p>Even before the war the Boones had begun to
+go down hill rapidly. Cad Boone, dissipated and
+unprincipled, had found even the lax discipline of
+the Confederate army too rigid and had joined the
+guerrillas, that band of hangers-on which respected
+neither flag and developed a cruelty that was appalling.
+Falling into the hands of Captain Ransom
+Yarnell, he had been tried by drumhead courtmartial
+and executed within twenty four hours of his
+capture.</p>
+<p>The boast of the Boones was that they never
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_192' name='page_192'></a>192</span>
+forgot an injury. They might wait many years for
+the chance, but in the end they paid their debts.
+Twenty years after the war Sugden Boone shot
+down Colonel Yarnell as he was hitching his horse
+in front of the courthouse at Nemo. Next Christmas
+eve a brother of the murdered man&mdash;Captain
+Tom, as his old troopers still called him&mdash;met old
+Sugden in the postoffice and a revolver duel followed.
+From it Captain Tom emerged with a
+bullet in his arm. Sugden was carried out of the
+store feet first to a house of mourning.</p>
+<p>The Boones took their time. Another decade
+passed. Old Richard Bellamy, father of the young
+man, was shot through the uncurtained window of
+his living rooms while reading the paper one night.
+Though related to the Yarnells, he had never taken
+any part in the feud beyond that of expressing his
+opinion freely. The general opinion was that he
+had been killed by Dunc Boone, but there was no
+conclusive evidence to back it. Three weeks later
+another one of the same faction met his fate.
+Captain Tom was ambushed while riding from his
+plantation to town and left dead on the road. Dunc
+Boone had been seen lurking near the spot, and
+immediately after the killing he was met by two
+hunters as he was slipping through the underbrush
+for the swamps. There was no direct evidence
+against the young man, but Captain Tom had been
+the most popular man in the county. Reckless
+though he was, Duncan Boone had been forced
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_193' name='page_193'></a>193</span>
+to leave the country by the intensity of the popular
+feeling against him.</p>
+<p>Again the feud had slumbered. It was understood
+that the Yarnells and the Bellamys were ready
+to drop it. Only one of the opposite faction remained
+on the ground, a twin brother of Duncan.
+Shep Boone was a drunken ne&#8217;er-do-well, but since
+he now stood alone nothing more than empty
+threats was expected of him. He spent his time
+idly with a set of gambling loafers, but he lacked the
+quality of active malice so pronounced in Dunc.</p>
+<p>A small part of the old plantation, heavily mortgaged,
+still belonged to Shep and was rented by
+him to a tenant, Jess Munro. He announced one
+day that he was going to collect the rent due him.
+Having been drinking heavily, he was in an abusive
+frame of mind. As it chanced he met young Hal
+Yarnell, just going into the office of his kinsman
+Dick Bellamy, with whom he was about to arrange
+the details of a hunting trip they were starting
+upon. Shep emptied his spleen on the boy, harking
+back to the old feud and threatening vengeance at
+their next meeting. The boy was white with rage,
+but he shut his teeth and passed upstairs without
+saying a word.</p>
+<p>The body of Shep Boone was found next day
+by Munro among the blackberry bushes at the fence
+corner of his own place. No less than four witnesses
+had seen young Yarnell pass that way with
+a rifle in his hand about the same time that Shep
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_194' name='page_194'></a>194</span>
+was riding out from town. They had heard a shot,
+but had thought little of it. Munro had been hoeing
+cotton in the field and had seen the lad as he
+passed. Later he had heard excited voices, and
+presently a shot. Other circumstantial evidence
+wound a net around the boy. He was arrested.
+Before the coroner held an inquest a new development
+startled the community. Dick Bellamy fled
+on a night train, leaving a note to the coroner exonerating
+Hal. In it he practically admitted the
+crime, pleading self defence.</p>
+<p>This was the story that Ferne Yarnell told in
+the parlor of the Palace Hotel to Jack Flatray and
+the Lees.</p>
+<p>Melissy spoke first. &#8220;Did Mr. Bellamy kill the
+man to keep your brother from being killed?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know. It must have been that. It&#8217;s
+all so horrible.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The deputy&#8217;s eyes gleamed. &#8220;Think of it another
+way, Miss Yarnell. Bellamy was up against it.
+Your brother is only a boy. He took his place. A
+friend couldn&#8217;t have done more for another.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The color beat into the face of the Arkansas girl
+as she looked at him. &#8220;No. He sacrificed his
+career for him. He did a thing he must have hated
+to do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s sure some man,&#8221; Flatray pronounced.</p>
+<p>A young man, slight, quick of step, and erect as
+a willow sapling, walked into the room. He looked
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_195' name='page_195'></a>195</span>
+from one to another with clear level eyes. Miss
+Ferne introduced him as her brother.</p>
+<p>A thought crossed the mind of the deputy. Perhaps
+this boy had killed his enemy after all and
+Bellamy had shouldered the blame for him. If the
+mine owner were in love with Ferne Yarnell this
+was a hypothesis more than possible. In either
+case he acquitted the slayer of blame. In his pocket
+was a letter from the sheriff at Nemo, Arkansas,
+stating that his county was well rid of Shep Boone
+and that the universal opinion was that neither
+Bellamy nor young Yarnell had been to blame for
+the outcome of the difficulty. Unless there came
+to him an active demand for the return of Bellamy
+he intended to let sleeping dogs lie.</p>
+<p>No such demand came. Within a month the
+mystery was cleared. The renter Munro delivered
+himself to the sheriff at Nemo, admitting that he
+had killed Shep Boone in self defence. The dead
+man had been drinking and was exceedingly quarrelsome.
+He had abused his tenant and at last
+drawn on him. Whereupon Munro had shot him
+down. At first afraid of what might happen to
+him, he had stood aside and let the blame be shouldered
+upon young Yarnell. But later his conscience
+had forced him to a confession. It is enough here
+to say that he was later tried and acquitted, thus
+closing the chapter of the wastrel&#8217;s tragic death.</p>
+<p>The day after the news of Munro&#8217;s confession
+reached Arizona Richard Bellamy called upon Flatray
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_196' name='page_196'></a>196</span>
+to invite him to his wedding. As soon as his
+name was clear he had asked Ferne Yarnell to
+marry him.</p>
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:1.4em; margin-top:1em;'>PART II</p>
+<p style='font-size:1.4em; margin-bottom:1em;'>DEAD MAN&#8217;S CACHE</p>
+</div>
+
+<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_199' name='page_199'></a>199</span></div>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='I_KIDNAPPED' id='I_KIDNAPPED'></a>
+<h2>CHAPTER I</h2>
+<h3>KIDNAPPED</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>As a lake ripples beneath a summer breeze, so
+Mesa was stirred from its usual languor by
+the visit of Simon West. For the little
+Arizona town was dreaming dreams. Its imagination
+had been aroused; and it saw itself no longer
+a sleepy cow camp in the unfeatured desert, but a
+metropolis, in touch with twentieth-century life.</p>
+<p>The great Simon West, pirate of finance, empire
+builder, molder of the destinies of the mighty
+Southwestern Pacific system, was to touch the adobe
+village with his transforming wand and make of
+it a hive of industry. Rumors flew thick and fast.</p>
+<p>Mesa was to be the junction for the new spur
+that would run to the big Lincoln dam. The town
+would be a division point; the machine shops of the
+system would be located there. Its future, if still
+a trifle vague, was potentially immense. Thus, with
+cheerful optimism, did local opinion interpret the
+visit of the great man.</p>
+<p>Whatever Simon West may have thought of
+Mesa and its prospects, he kept behind his thin,
+close-shut lips. He was a dry, gray little man of
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_200' name='page_200'></a>200</span>
+fifty-five, with sharp, twinkling eyes that saw everything
+and told nothing. Certainly he wore none of
+the visible signs of greatness, yet at his nod Wall
+Street trembled. He had done more to change the
+map of industrial America than any other man,
+alive or dead. Wherefore, big Beauchamp Lee,
+mayor of Mesa, and the citizens on the reception
+committee did their very best to impress him with
+the future of the country, as they motored out to
+the dam.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Most promising spot on earth. Beats California
+a city block on oranges and citrons. Ever see
+an Arizona peach, Mr. West? It skins the world,&#8221;
+the big cattleman ran on easily.</p>
+<p>The financier&#8217;s eye took in the girl sitting beside
+the chauffeur in the front seat, and he nodded assent.</p>
+<p>Melissy Lee bloomed. She was vivid as a wild
+poppy on the hillsides past which they went flashing.
+But she had, too, a daintiness, a delicacy of coloring
+and contour, that suggested the fruit named by
+her father.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You bet we raise the best here,&#8221; that simple
+gentleman bragged patriotically. &#8220;All we need is
+water, and the Lincoln dam assures us of plenty.
+Yes, sir! It certainly promises to be an Eden.&#8221;</p>
+<p>West unlocked his lips long enough to say:
+&#8220;Any country can promise. I&#8217;m looking for one
+that will perform.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re seeing it right now, seh,&#8221; the mayor assured
+him, and launched into fluent statistics.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_201' name='page_201'></a>201</span></p>
+<p>West heard, saw the thing stripped of its enthusiasm,
+and made no comment either for or against.
+He had plenty of imagination, or he could never
+have accomplished the things he had done. However,
+before any proposition appealed to him he had
+to see money in the deal. Whether he saw it in this
+particular instance, nobody knew; and only one person
+had the courage to ask him point-blank what
+his intentions were. This was Melissy.</p>
+<p>Luncheon was served in the pleasant filtered sunlight,
+almost under the shadow of the great dam.</p>
+<p>On the way out Melissy had sat as demure and
+dovelike as it was possible for her to be. But now
+she showed herself to be another creature.</p>
+<p>Two or three young men hovered about her; notable
+among them was a young fellow of not many
+words, good-humored, strong, with a look of power
+about him which the railroad king appreciated.
+Jack Flatray they called him. He was the newly-elected
+sheriff of the county.</p>
+<p>The great man watched the girl without appearing
+to do so. He was rather at a loss to account
+for the exotic, flamelike beauty into which she had
+suddenly sparkled; but he was inclined to attribute
+it to the arrival of Flatray.</p>
+<p>Melissy sat on a flat rock beside West, swinging
+her foot occasionally with the sheer active joy of
+life, the while she munched sandwiches and pickles.
+The young men bantered her and each other, and
+she flashed back retorts which gave them alternately
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_202' name='page_202'></a>202</span>
+deep delight at the discomfiture of some other. Toward
+the close of luncheon, she turned her tilted
+chin from Flatray, as punishment for some audacity
+of his, and beamed upon the railroad magnate.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s very good of you to notice me at last,&#8221; he
+said, with his dry smile.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I was afraid of you,&#8221; she confided cheerfully.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Am I so awesome?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s your reputation, you know. You&#8217;re quite
+a dragon. I&#8217;m told you gobble a new railroad every
+morning for breakfast.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8217;Lissie,&#8221; her father warned.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let her alone,&#8221; the great man laughed. &#8220;Miss
+Lee is going to give me the privilege of hearing the
+truth about myself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I&#8217;m asking. I don&#8217;t know what the truth
+is,&#8221; she protested.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, what you think is the truth.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It doesn&#8217;t matter what we think about you. The
+important thing to know is what you think about
+us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Am I to tell you what I think of you&mdash;with all
+these young men here?&#8221; he countered.</p>
+<p>She was excited by her own impudence. The
+pink had spilled over her creamy cheeks. She
+flashed a look of pretended disdain at her young
+men. Nevertheless, she made laughing protest.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s not me, but Mesa, that counts,&#8221; she
+answered ungrammatically. &#8220;Tell me that you&#8217;re
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_203' name='page_203'></a>203</span>
+going to help us set orchards blossoming in these
+deserts, and we&#8217;ll all love you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You offer an inducement, Miss Lee. Come&mdash;let
+us walk up to the Point and see this wonderful
+country of yours.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She clapped her hands. &#8220;Oh, let&#8217;s! I&#8217;m tired
+of boys, anyhow. They know nothing but nonsense.&#8221;
+She made a laughing moue at Flatray, and
+turned to join the railroad builder.</p>
+<p>The young sheriff arose and trailed to his pony.
+&#8220;My marching orders, I reckon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They walked up the hill together, the great man
+and the untutored girl. He still carried himself with
+the lightness of the spare, wiry man who has never
+felt his age. As for her, she moved as one on
+springs, her slender, willowy figure beautiful in
+motion.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re loyal to Mesa. Born and brought up
+there?&#8221; West asked Melissy.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. I was brought up on the Bar Double G
+ranch. Father sold it not long since. We&#8217;re interested
+in the Monte Cristo mine, and it has done
+so well that we moved to town,&#8221; she explained.</p>
+<p>At the first bend in the mountain road Jack had
+turned in his saddle to look at her as she climbed
+the steep. A quarter of a mile farther up there was
+another curve, which swept the trail within sight
+of the summit. Here Flatray pulled up and got
+out his field glasses. Leisurely the man and the
+maid came into sight from the timber on the shoulder
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_204' name='page_204'></a>204</span>
+of the hill, and topped the last ascent. Jack
+could discern Melissy gesturing here and there as
+she explained the lay of the land.</p>
+<p>Something else caught and held his glasses. Four
+riders had emerged from a little gulch of dense
+aspens which ran up the Point toward the summit.
+One of these had with him a led horse.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, I wonder what that means?&#8221; the sheriff
+mused aloud.</p>
+<p>He was not left long in doubt. The four men
+rode swiftly, straight toward the man and the girl
+above. One of them swung from the saddle and
+stepped forward. He spoke to West, who appeared
+to make urgent protest. The dismounted rider answered.
+Melissy began to run. Very faintly there
+came to Flatray her startled cry. Simultaneously
+he caught the flash of the sun on bright steel. The
+leader of the four had drawn a revolver and was
+covering West with it. Instantly the girl stopped
+running. Plainly the life of the railroad president
+had been threatened unless she stopped.</p>
+<p>The man behind the weapon swept a gesture in
+the direction of the led horse. Reluctantly West
+moved toward it, still protesting. He swung to
+the saddle, and four of the horses broke into a canter.
+Only the man with the drawn revolver remained
+on the ground with Melissy. He scabbarded
+his gun, took a step or two toward her, and made
+explanations. The girl stamped her foot, and half
+turned from him.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_205' name='page_205'></a>205</span></p>
+<p>He laughed, stepped still closer to her, and spoke
+again. Melissy, with tilted chin, seemed to be unaware
+that he existed. Another step brought him
+to her side. Once more he spoke. No stone wall
+could have given him less recognition. Then Jack
+let out a sudden fierce imprecation, and gave his
+pony the spur. For the man had bent forward
+swiftly, had kissed the girl on the lips once&mdash;twice&mdash;three
+times, had swept his hat off in a low, mocking
+bow, and had flung himself on his horse, and
+galloped off.</p>
+<p>Pebbles and shale went flying from the horse&#8217;s
+hoofs as the sheriff tore down the trail toward Melissy.
+He cut off at an angle and dashed through
+cactus and over rain-washed gullies at breakneck
+speed, pounding up the stiff slope to the summit.
+He dragged his pony to a halt, and leaped off at
+the same instant.</p>
+<p>Melissy came to him with flashing eyes. &#8220;Why
+didn&#8217;t you get here sooner?&#8221; she panted, as if she
+had been running; for the blind rage was strong
+in her.</p>
+<p>His anger burst out to meet hers. &#8220;I wish I
+had!&#8221; he cried, with a furious oath.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He insulted me. He laughed at me, and taunted
+me&mdash;and kissed me!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack nodded. &#8220;I saw. If I had only had my
+rifle with me! Who was he?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He wore a mask. But I knew him. It was
+Dunc Boone.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_206' name='page_206'></a>206</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;With the Roaring Fork gang?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know. Is he one of them?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been thinking so for years.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They must have known about our picnic. But
+what do they want with Mr. West?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s one of the world&#8217;s richest men.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But he doesn&#8217;t carry his money with him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He carries his life.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They must mean to hold him for a ransom. Is
+that it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ve guessed it. That&#8217;s the play.&#8221; Jack
+considered, his eyes on the far-away hills. When
+he spoke again it was with sharp decision. &#8220;Hit
+the trail back to town with your motor. Don&#8217;t lose
+a minute on the way. Send a dispatch to Bucky
+O&#8217;Connor. You&#8217;d ought to get him at Douglas.
+If not, some of his rangers will know where to reach
+him. Keep the wires hot till you&#8217;re in touch with
+him. Better sign my name. I&#8217;ve been writing him
+about this outfit. This job is cut out for Bucky,
+and we&#8217;ve got to get him on it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And what are <i>you</i> going to do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can&#8217;t do much&mdash;I&#8217;m not armed. First time
+I&#8217;ve been caught that way since I&#8217;ve been sheriff.
+Came out to-day for a picnic and left my gun at
+home. But if they&#8217;re the Roaring Fork outfit,
+they&#8217;ll pass through the Elkhorn Cañon, heading
+for Dead Man&#8217;s Cache. I&#8217;m going to cut around
+Old Baldy and try to beat them to it. Maybe I
+can recognize some of them.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_207' name='page_207'></a>207</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;But if they see you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I ain&#8217;t aiming to let them see me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Still, they may.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His quiet eyes met hers steadily. &#8220;Yes, they
+may.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They were friends again, though he had never fully
+forgiven her doubt of him. It might be on the cards
+that some day she would be more to him than a
+friend. Understanding perfectly the danger of what
+he proposed, she yet made no protest. The man
+who would storm her heart must be one who would
+go the limit, for her standards were those of the
+outdoor West. She, too, was &#8220;game&#8221; to the core;
+and she had never liked him better than she did
+at this moment. A man must be a man, and take
+his fighting chance.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right, Jack.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Not for years before had she called him by his
+first name. His heart leaped, but he did not let
+even his look tell what he was feeling.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon I&#8217;ll cut right down from here, Melissy.
+Better not lose any time getting to town. So-long!&#8221;
+And with that he had swung to the saddle and
+was off.</p>
+<p>Melissy ran swiftly down to the picnic party and
+cried out her news. It fell upon them like a bolt
+out of a June sky. Some exclaimed and wondered
+and deplored; but she was proud to see that her
+father took instant command, without an unnecessary
+word.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_208' name='page_208'></a>208</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;They&#8217;ve caught us in swimming, boys! We&#8217;ve
+got to burn the wind back to town for our guns.
+Dick, you ride around by the Powder Horn and
+gather up the boys on the ranch. Get Swain to
+swing around to the south and comb the lower
+gulches of the Roaring Fork. Tell him to get in
+touch with me soon as he can. I&#8217;ll come through
+by Elkhorn.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Lee helped his daughter into the machine, and
+took his place beside her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hit the high spots, Jim. I&#8217;ve got an engagement
+in the hills that won&#8217;t wait, prior to which
+I&#8217;ve got to get back to town immediate,&#8221; he told
+the chauffeur cheerfully; for he was beginning to
+enjoy himself as in the old days, when he had been
+the hard-riding sheriff of a border county which
+took the premium for bad men.</p>
+<p>The motor car leaped forward, fell into its pace,
+and began to hum its song of the road as it ate up
+swiftly the miles that lay between the dam and
+Mesa.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='II_A_CAPTURE' id='II_A_CAPTURE'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_209' name='page_209'></a>209</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER II</h2>
+<h3>A CAPTURE</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Flatray swung around Old Baldy through
+the sparse timber that edged its roots. He
+knew this country well; for he had run
+cattle here, and combed the draws and ridges on
+the annual spring and fall round-ups.</p>
+<p>There was no trail to follow. Often the lay of
+the land forced him to a detour; for it was rough
+with washes, with matted cactus, and with a thick
+growth of netted mesquite and underbrush. But
+true as the needle of a compass, he turned back
+always to the direction he was following. He had
+the instinct for direction, sharpened almost to infallibility
+by the experience his work had given him.</p>
+<p>So, hour after hour, he swung forward, pushing
+his horse over the ground in a sort of running walk,
+common to the plains. Sunset found him climbing
+from the foothills into the mountains beyond.
+Starlight came upon him in a saddle between the
+peaks, still plodding up by winding paths to the
+higher altitudes that make the ridge of the continent&#8217;s
+backbone.</p>
+<p>The moon was up long before he struck a gulch
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_210' name='page_210'></a>210</span>
+spur that led to Elkhorn Cañon. Whether he would
+be in time or not&mdash;assuming that he had guessed
+aright as to the destination of the outlaws&mdash;he could
+not tell. It would be, at best, a near thing. For,
+though he had come more directly, they had followed
+a trail which made the going much faster.
+Fast as the cow pony could pick its way along the
+rock-strewn gulch, he descended, eye and ear alert
+to detect the presence of another human being in
+this waste of boulders, of moonlit, flickering shadows,
+of dark awesome peaks.</p>
+<p>His quick ear caught the faintest of sounds. He
+slipped from the saddle and stole swiftly forward
+to the point where the gulch joined the main cañon.
+Voices drifted to him&mdash;the sound of careless laughter,
+wafted by the light night wind. He had missed
+the outlaws by scarce a hundred yards. There was
+nothing for it but to follow cautiously. As he was
+turning to go back for his horse the moon emerged
+from behind a cloud and flooded the cañon with a
+cold, silvery light. It showed Jack a man and a
+horse standing scarce twenty yards from him. The
+man had his back to him. He had dismounted, and
+was tightening the cinches of his saddle.</p>
+<p>Flatray experienced a pang of disappointment.
+He was unarmed. His second thought sent him
+flying noiselessly back to his horse. Deftly he unloosed
+the rope which always hung coiled below
+the saddle horn. On tiptoe he ran back to the gulch
+mouth, bearing to the right, so as to come directly
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_211' name='page_211'></a>211</span>
+opposite the man he wanted. As he ran he arranged
+the lariat to his satisfaction, freeing the loop and
+making sure that the coil was not bound. Very
+cautiously he crept forward, taking advantage for
+cover of a boulder which rose from the bed of the
+gulch.</p>
+<p>The man had finished tightening the girth. His
+foot rose to the stirrup. He swung up from the
+ground, and his right leg swept across the flank of
+the pony. It did not reach the stirrup; for, even
+as he rose, Jack&#8217;s lariat snaked forward and dropped
+over his head to his breast. It tightened sharply
+and dragged him back, pinioning his arms to his
+side. Before he could shake one of them free to
+reach the revolver in his chaps, he was lying on his
+back, with Flatray astride of him. The cattleman&#8217;s
+left hand closed tightly upon his windpipe, while the
+right searched for and found the weapon in the holster
+of the prostrate man.</p>
+<p>Not until the steel rim of it pressed against the
+teeth of the man beneath him did Jack&#8217;s fingers
+loosen. &#8220;Make a sound, and you&#8217;re a dead man.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The other choked and gurgled. He was not yet
+able to cry out, even had he any intention of so
+doing. But defiant eyes glared into those of the
+man who had unhorsed and captured him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where are your pals bound for?&#8221; Flatray demanded.</p>
+<p>He got no answer in words, but sullen eyes flung
+out an obstinate refusal to give away his associates.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_212' name='page_212'></a>212</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon you&#8217;re one of the Roaring Fork outfit,&#8221;
+Jack suggested.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know so darn much I&#8217;ll leave you to guess
+the rest,&#8221; growled the prisoner.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The first thing I&#8217;ll guess is that, if anything
+happens to Simon West, you&#8217;ll hang for it, my
+friend.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll have to prove some things first.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Flatray&#8217;s hand slid into the man&#8217;s coat pocket,
+and drew forth a piece of black cloth that had been
+used as a mask.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Here&#8217;s exhibit A, to begin with.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The man on the ground suddenly gave an upward
+heave, grasped at the weapon, and let out a yell for
+help that echoed back from the cliff, while the cattleman
+let the butt of the revolver crash heavily down
+upon his face. The heavy gun came down three
+times before the struggling outlaw would subside,
+and then not before blood streamed from ugly gashes
+into his eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve had enough, damn you!&#8221; the fellow muttered
+sullenly. &#8220;What do you want with me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll go along with me. Let out another sound,
+and I&#8217;ll bump you off. Get a move on you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack got to his feet and dragged up his prisoner.
+The man was a heavy-set, bowlegged fellow of about
+forty, hard-faced, and shifty-eyed&mdash;a frontier miscreant,
+unless every line of the tough, leathery countenance
+told a falsehood. But he had made his experiment
+and failed. He knew what manner of man
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_213' name='page_213'></a>213</span>
+his captor was, and he had no mind for another
+lesson from him. He slouched to his horse, under
+propulsion of the revolver, and led the animal into
+the gulch.</p>
+<p>Both mounted, Jack keeping the captive covered
+every moment of the time; and they began to retrace
+the way by which the young cattleman had
+just come.</p>
+<p>After they had ridden about a quarter of a mile
+Flatray made a readjustment of the rope. He let
+the loop lie loosely about the neck of the outlaw,
+the other end of it being tied to the horn of his own
+saddle. Also, he tied the hands of the man in such
+a way that, though they were free to handle the
+bridle rein, he could not raise them from the saddle
+as high as his neck.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you make any sudden moves, you&#8217;ll be committing
+suicide. If you yell out, it will amount to
+about the same thing. It&#8217;s up to you to be good,
+looks like.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The man cursed softly. He knew that the least
+attempt to escape or to attract the attention of his
+confederates would mean his undoing. Something
+about this young man&#8217;s cold eye and iron jaw told
+him that he would not hesitate to shoot, if necessary.</p>
+<p>Voices came to them from the cañon. Flatray
+guessed that a reconnaissance of the gulch would
+be made, and prepared himself for it by deflecting
+his course from the bed of the <i>arroyo</i> at a point
+where the walls fell back to form a little valley. A
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_214' name='page_214'></a>214</span>
+little grove of aspens covered densely the shoulder
+of a hillock some fifty yards back, and here he took
+his stand. He dismounted, and made his prisoner
+do the same.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sit down,&#8221; he ordered crisply.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What for?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;To keep me from blowing the top of your head
+off,&#8221; answered Jack quietly.</p>
+<p>Without further discussion, the man sat down.
+His captor stood behind him, one hand on the shoulder
+of his prisoner, his eyes watching the point of
+the gulch at which the enemy would appear.</p>
+<p>Two mounted men showed presently in silhouette.
+Almost opposite the grove they drew up.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mighty queer what has become of Hank,&#8221; one
+of them said. &#8220;But I don&#8217;t reckon there&#8217;s any use
+looking any farther. You don&#8217;t figure he&#8217;s aiming
+to throw us down&mdash;do you, Buck?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Nope. He&#8217;ll stick, Hank will. But it sure looks
+darned strange. Here&#8217;s him a-ridin&#8217; along with us,
+and suddenly he&#8217;s missin&#8217;. We hear a yell, and go
+back to look for him. Nothin&#8217; doin&#8217;. You don&#8217;t
+allow the devil could have come for him sudden&mdash;do
+you, Jeff?&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was said with a laugh, defiantly, but none the
+less Jack read uneasiness in the manner of the man.
+It seemed to him that both were eager to turn back.
+Giant boulders, carved to grotesque and ghostly
+shapes by a million years&#8217; wind and water, reared
+themselves aloft and threw shadows in the moonlight.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_215' name='page_215'></a>215</span>
+The wind, caught in the gulch, rose and fell
+in unearthly, sibilant sounds. If ever fiends from
+below walk the earth, this time and place was a
+fitting one for them. Jack curved a hand around
+his mouth, and emitted a strange, mournful, low cry,
+which might have been the scream of a lost soul.</p>
+<p>Jeff clutched at the arm of his companion. &#8220;Did
+you hear that, Buck?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&mdash;what do you reckon it was, Jeff?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Again Jack let his cry curdle the night.</p>
+<p>The outlaws took counsel of their terror. They
+were hardy, desperate men, afraid of nothing mortal
+under the sun. But the dormant superstition in them
+rose to their throats. Fearfully they wheeled and
+gave their horses the spur. Flatray could hear them
+crashing through the brush.</p>
+<p>He listened while the rapid hoofbeats died away,
+until even the echoes fell silent. &#8220;We&#8217;ll be moving,&#8221;
+he announced to his prisoner.</p>
+<p>For a couple of hours they followed substantially
+the same way that Jack had taken, descending gradually
+toward the foothills and the plains. The stars
+went out, and the moon slid behind banked clouds,
+so that the darkness grew with the passing hours.
+At length Flatray had to call a halt.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll camp here till morning,&#8221; he announced
+when they reached a grassy park.</p>
+<p>The horses were hobbled, and the men sat down
+opposite each other in the darkness. Presently the
+prisoner relaxed and fell asleep. But there was no
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_216' name='page_216'></a>216</span>
+sleep for his captor. The cattleman leaned against
+the trunk of a cottonwood and smoked his pipe. The
+night grew chill, but he dared not light a fire. At
+last the first streaks of gray dawn lightened the sky.
+A quarter of an hour later he shook his captive from
+slumber.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Time to hit the trail.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The outlaw murmured sleepily, &#8220;How&#8217;s that,
+Dunc? Twenty-five thousand apiece!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Wake up! We&#8217;ve got to vamose out of here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Slowly the fellow shook the sleep from his brain.
+He looked at Flatray sullenly, without answering.
+But he climbed into the saddle which Jack had
+cinched for him. Dogged and wolfish as he was,
+the man knew his master, and was cowed.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='III_THE_TABLES_TURNED' id='III_THE_TABLES_TURNED'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_217' name='page_217'></a>217</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER III</h2>
+<h3>THE TABLES TURNED</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>From the local eastbound a man swung to the
+station platform at Mesa. He was a dark,
+slim, little man, wiry and supple, with restless
+black eyes which pierced one like bullets.</p>
+<p>The depot loungers made him a focus of inquiring
+looks. But, in spite of his careless ease, a shrewd
+observer would have read anxiety in his bearing. It
+was as if behind the veil of his indifference there
+rested a perpetual vigilance. The wariness of a
+beast of prey lay close to the surface.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mornin&#8217;, gentlemen,&#8221; he drawled, sweeping the
+group with his eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Mornin&#8217;,&#8221; responded one of the loafers.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I presume some of you gentlemen can direct me
+to the house of Mayor Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The mayor ain&#8217;t to home,&#8221; volunteered a lank,
+unshaven native in butternut jeans and boots.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I think it was his house I inquired for,&#8221; suggested
+the stranger.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Fust house off the square on the yon side of the
+postoffice&mdash;a big two-story brick, with a gallery and
+po&#8217;ches all round it.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_218' name='page_218'></a>218</span></p>
+<p>Having thanked his informant, the stranger
+passed down the street. The curious saw him pass
+in at the mayor&#8217;s gate and knock at the door. It
+opened presently, and disclosed a flash of white,
+which they knew to be the skirt of a girl.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon that&#8217;s Miss &#8217;Lissie,&#8221; the others were informed
+by the unshaven one. &#8220;She&#8217;s let him in and
+shet the door.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Inevitably there followed speculation as to who
+the arrival might be. That his coming had something
+to do with the affair of the West kidnapping,
+all were disposed to agree; but just what it might
+have to do with it, none of them could do more
+than guess. If they could have heard what passed
+between Melissy and the stranger, their curiosity
+would have been gratified.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good mornin&#8217;, miss. Is Mayor Lee at home?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;he isn&#8217;t. He hasn&#8217;t got back yet. Is there
+anything I can do for you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Two rows of even white teeth flashed in a smile.
+&#8220;I thought maybe there was something I could do
+for you. You are Miss Lee, I take it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. But I don&#8217;t quite understand&mdash;unless you
+have news.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I have no news&mdash;yet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You mean&mdash;&mdash;&#8221; Her eager glance swept over
+him. The brown eyes, which had been full of questioning,
+flashed to understanding. &#8220;You are not
+Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Am I not?&#8221; he smiled.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_219' name='page_219'></a>219</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I mean&mdash;are you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;At your service, Miss Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She had heard for years of this lieutenant of
+rangers, who was the terror of all Arizona &#8220;bad
+men.&#8221; Her father, Jack Flatray, the range riders
+whom she knew&mdash;game men all&mdash;hailed Bucky
+O&#8217;Connor as a wonder. For coolness under fire,
+for acumen, for sheer, unflawed nerve, and for his
+skill in that deadly game he played of hunting down
+desperadoes, they called him chief ungrudgingly.
+He was a daredevil, who had taken his life in his
+hands a hundred times. Yet always he came through
+smiling, and brought back with him the man he
+went after. The whisper ran that he bore a charmed
+life, so many had been his hairbreadth escapes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Come in,&#8221; the girl invited. &#8220;Father said, if you
+came, I was to keep you here until he got back or
+sent a messenger for you. He&#8217;s hunting for the
+criminals in the Roaring Fork country. Of course,
+he didn&#8217;t know when you would get here. At the
+time he left we hadn&#8217;t been able to catch you on the
+wire. I signed Mr. Flatray&#8217;s name at his suggestion,
+because he was in correspondence with you
+once about the Roaring Fork outlaws. He is out
+in the hills, too. He started half an hour after the
+kidnappers. But he isn&#8217;t armed. I&#8217;m troubled about
+him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Again the young man&#8217;s white-toothed smile
+flashed. &#8220;You&#8217;d better be. Anybody that goes
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_220' name='page_220'></a>220</span>
+hunting Black MacQueen unarmed ought to be right
+well insured.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She nodded, a shadow in her eyes. &#8220;Yes&mdash;but
+he would go. He doesn&#8217;t mean them to see him,
+if he can help it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Black sees a heap he isn&#8217;t expected to see. He
+has got eyes all over the hills, and they see by night
+as well as by day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes&mdash;I know he has spies everywhere; and he
+has the hill people terrorized, they say. You think
+this is his work?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a big thing&mdash;the kind of job he likes to
+tackle. Who else would dare do such a thing?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s what father thinks. If he had stolen the
+President of the United States, it wouldn&#8217;t have
+stirred up a bigger fuss. Newspaper men and detectives
+are hurrying here from all directions. They
+are sure to catch him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Are they?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She noticed a curious, derisive contempt in the
+man&#8217;s voice, and laid it to his vanity. &#8220;I don&#8217;t mean
+that <i>they</i> are. I mean that <i>you</i> are sure to get him,&#8221;
+she hastened to add. &#8220;Father thinks you are wonderful.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m much obliged to him,&#8221; said the man, with
+almost a sneer.</p>
+<p>He seemed to have so good an opinion of himself
+that he was above praise even. Melissy was
+coming to the decision that she did not like him&mdash;which
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_221' name='page_221'></a>221</span>
+was disappointing, since she had expected to
+like him immensely.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t look for you till night. You wired you
+would be on number seven,&#8221; she said. &#8220;I understood
+that was the earliest you could get here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His explanation of the change was brief, and invited
+no further discussion. &#8220;I found I could make
+an earlier train.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m glad you could. Father says it is always
+well to start on the trail while it is fresh.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you ever seen this MacQueen, Miss Lee?&#8221;
+he asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not unless he was there when Mr. West was
+kidnapped.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did you know any of the men?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She hesitated. &#8220;I thought one was Duncan
+Boone.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What made you think so?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He was the leader, I think, moved the way he
+does.&#8221; Her anger flashed for an instant. &#8220;And
+acted like him&mdash;detestably.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Was he violent to West? Injure him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;he didn&#8217;t do him any physical injury that
+I saw. I wasn&#8217;t thinking about Mr. West.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Surely he didn&#8217;t lay hands on <i>you</i>!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She looked up, in time to see the flicker of amusement
+sponged from his face. It stirred vague anger
+in her. &#8220;He was insolent and ungentlemanly.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;As how?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_222' name='page_222'></a>222</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;It doesn&#8217;t matter how.&#8221; Her manner specifically
+declined to particularize.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Would you recognize him again if you met
+him? Describe him, if you can.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. I used to know him well&mdash;before he became
+known as an outlaw,&#8221; she added after a perceptible
+hesitation. &#8220;There&#8217;s something ravenous
+about him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You mean that he is fierce and bloodthirsty?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;I don&#8217;t mean that; though, for that matter,
+I don&#8217;t think he would stick at anything. What
+I mean is that he is pantherine in his movements&mdash;more
+lithe and supple than most men are.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is he a big man?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;medium size, and dark.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There were four of them, you say?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. Jack saw them, too, but at a distance.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He reached you after they were out of sight?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They had been gone about five minutes when I
+saw him&mdash;five or ten. I couldn&#8217;t be sure.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Boone offered no personal indignity to you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why are you so sure?&#8221; she flashed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The story is that he is quite the ladies&#8217; man.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy laughed scornfully.</p>
+<p>At his request, she went over again the story of
+the abduction, telling everything save the matter of
+the ravished kisses. This she kept to herself. She
+did not quite know why, except that there was
+something she did not like about this Bucky O&#8217;Connor.
+He had a trick of narrowing his eyes and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_223' name='page_223'></a>223</span>
+gloating over her, as a cat gloats over its expected
+kill.</p>
+<p>However, his confidence impressed her. Cocksure
+he was, and before long she knew him boastful; but
+competence sat on him, none the less. She thought
+she could see why he was held to be the most deadly
+bloodhound on a trail that even Arizona could produce.
+That he was fearless she did not need to be
+told, any more than she needed a certificate that on
+occasion he could be merciless. On the other hand,
+he fitted very badly with the character of the young
+lieutenant of rangers, as Jack Flatray had sketched
+it for her. Her friend&#8217;s description of his hero had
+been enthusiastic. She decided that the young cattleman
+was a bad judge of men&mdash;though, of course,
+he had never actually met O&#8217;Connor.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon I&#8217;ll not wait for your father&#8217;s report,
+Miss Lee. I work independent of other men. That
+is how I get the wonderful results I do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His conceit nettled her; also, it stung her filial
+loyalty. &#8220;My father was the best sheriff this county
+ever had,&#8221; she said stiffly.</p>
+<p>He smiled satirically. &#8220;Still, I reckon I&#8217;ll handle
+this my own way&mdash;unless your father&#8217;s daughter
+wants to go partners with me in it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She gave him a look intended to crush his impudence.
+&#8220;No, thank you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He ate a breakfast which she had the cook prepare
+hurriedly for him, and departed on the horse
+for which she had telephoned to the nearest livery
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_224' name='page_224'></a>224</span>
+stable. Melissy was a singularly fearless girl; yet
+she watched him go with a decided relief, for which
+she could not account. He rode, she observed, like
+a centaur&mdash;flat-backed, firm in the saddle with the
+easy negligence of a plainsman. He turned as he
+started, and waved a hand debonairly at her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If I have any luck, I&#8217;ll bring back one of the
+Roaring Fork bunch with me&mdash;a present for a good
+girl, Miss Melissy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She turned on her heel and went inside. Anger
+pulsed fiercely through her. He laughed at her,
+made fun of her, and yet called her by her first
+name. How dared he treat her so! Worst of all,
+she read admiration bold and unveiled in the eyes
+that mocked her.</p>
+<p>Half an hour later Flatray, riding toward town
+with his prisoner in front of him, heard a sudden
+sharp summons to throw up his hands. A man had
+risen from behind a boulder, and held him covered
+steadily.</p>
+<p>Jack looked at the fellow without complying. He
+needed no second glance to tell him that this man
+was not one to be trifled with. &#8220;Who are you?&#8221;
+he demanded quietly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Never mind who I am. Reach for the sky.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The captured outlaw had given a little whoop,
+and was now loosening the rope from his neck.
+&#8220;You&#8217;re the goods, Cap! I knew the boys would
+pull it off for me, but I didn&#8217;t reckon on it so durn
+soon.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_225' name='page_225'></a>225</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Shut up!&#8221; ordered the man behind the gun, without
+moving his eyes from Flatray.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m a clam,&#8221; retorted the other.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m waiting for those hands to go up; but I&#8217;ll not
+wait long, seh.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack&#8217;s hands went up reluctantly. &#8220;You&#8217;ve got
+the call,&#8221; he admitted.</p>
+<p>They led him a couple of hundred yards from
+the trail and tied him hand and foot. Before they
+left him the outlaw whom he had captured evened
+his score. Three times he struck Flatray on the
+head with the butt of his revolver. He was lying
+on the ground bleeding and senseless when they
+rode away toward the hills.</p>
+<p>Jack came to himself with a blinding headache.
+It was some time before he realized what had happened.
+As soon as he did he set about freeing himself.
+This was a matter of a few minutes. With
+the handkerchief that was around his neck he tied
+up his wounds. Fortunately his hair was very thick
+and this had saved him from a fractured skull.
+Dizzily he got to his feet, found his horse, and
+started toward Mesa.</p>
+<p>Not many people were on the streets when the
+sheriff passed through the suburbs of the little
+town, for it was about the breakfast hour. One
+stout old negro mammy stopped to stare in surprise
+at his bloody head.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Laws a mussy, Mistah Flatray, what they done
+be&#8217;n a-doin&#8217; to you-all?&#8221; she asked.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_226' name='page_226'></a>226</span></p>
+<p>The sheriff hardly saw her. He was chewing
+the bitter cud of defeat and was absorbed in his
+thoughts. He was still young enough to have
+counted on the effect upon Melissy of his return
+to town with one of the abductors as his prisoner.</p>
+<p>It happened that she was on the porch watering
+her flower boxes when he passed the house.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jack!&#8221; she cried, and on the heels of her exclamation:
+&#8220;What&#8217;s the matter with you? Been
+hurt?&#8221;</p>
+<p>A gray pallor had pushed through the tan of
+her cheeks. She knew her heart was beating fast.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bumped into a piece of bad luck,&#8221; he grinned,
+and told her briefly what had occurred.</p>
+<p>She took him into the house and washed his head
+for him. After she saw how serious the cuts were
+she insisted on sending for a doctor. When his
+wounds were dressed she fed him and made him
+lie down and sleep on her father&#8217;s bed.</p>
+<p>The sun was sliding down the heavens to a
+crotch in the hills before he joined her again. She
+was in front of the house clipping her roses.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is the invalid better?&#8221; she asked him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;s a false alarm. But he did have a mighty
+thumping headache that has gone now.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve been wondering why you didn&#8217;t meet Lieutenant
+O&#8217;Connor. He must have taken the road
+you came in on.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The young man&#8217;s eyes lit. &#8220;Is Bucky here already?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_227' name='page_227'></a>227</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;He was. He&#8217;s gone. I was greatly disappointed
+in him. He&#8217;s not half the man you think he is.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, but he is. Everybody says so.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I never saw a more conceited man, or a more
+hateful one. There&#8217;s something about him&mdash;oh, I
+don&#8217;t know. But he isn&#8217;t good. I&#8217;m sure of that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;His reputation isn&#8217;t of that kind. They say
+he&#8217;s devoted to his wife and kids.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;His wife and children.&#8221; Melissy recalled the
+smoldering admiration in his bold eyes. She laughed
+shortly. &#8220;That finishes him with me. He&#8217;s married,
+is he? Well, I know the kind of husband
+he is.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack flashed a quick look at her. He guessed
+what she meant. But this did not square at all
+with what his friends had told him of O&#8217;Connor.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did he ask for me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. He said he preferred to play a lone hand.
+His manner was unpleasant all the time. He knows
+it all. I could see that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Anyhow, he&#8217;s a crackerjack in his line. Have
+you heard from your father since he set out?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not yet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I&#8217;m going to start to-night with a posse
+for the Cache. If O&#8217;Connor comes back, tell him
+I&#8217;ll follow the Roaring Fork.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll not go this time without a gun, Jack,&#8221;
+she said with a ghost of a smile.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. I want to make good this trip.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_228' name='page_228'></a>228</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;You did splendidly before. Not one man in
+a hundred would have done so well.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m a wonder,&#8221; he admitted with a grin.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you will take care of yourself&mdash;not be
+foolish.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t aim to take up residence in Boot Hill
+cemetery if I can help it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Boone and his men are dangerous characters.
+They are playing for high stakes. They would
+snuff your life out as quick as they would wink.
+Don&#8217;t forget that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t want me to lie down before Dunc
+Boone, do you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No-o. Only don&#8217;t be reckless. I told father
+the same.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her dear concern for him went to Jack&#8217;s head,
+but he steadied himself before he answered. &#8220;I&#8217;ve
+got one real good reason for not being reckless.
+I&#8217;ll tell you what it is some day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her shy, alarmed eyes fled his at once. She
+began an account of how her father had gathered
+his posse and where she thought he must have
+gone.</p>
+<p>After dinner Jack went downtown. Melissy did
+some household tasks and presently moved out to
+the cool porch. She was just thinking about going
+back in when a barefoot boy ran past and whistled.
+From the next house a second youngster emerged.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That you, Jimmie?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_229' name='page_229'></a>229</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Betcherlife. Say, &#8217;ve you heard about the
+sheriff?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Who? Jack Flatray! Course I have. The
+Roaring Fork outfit ambushed him, beat him up,
+and made him hit the trail for town.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Aw! That ain&#8217;t news. He&#8217;s started back after
+them again. Left jes&#8217; a little while ago. I saw
+him go&mdash;him &#8217;n&#8217; Farnum &#8217;n&#8217; Charley Hymer &#8217;n&#8217;
+Hal Yarnell &#8217;n&#8217; Mr. Bellamy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bet they git &#8217;em.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bet they don&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Aw, course they&#8217;ll git &#8217;em, Tom.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The other youngster assumed an air of mystery.
+He swelled his chest and strutted a step or two
+nearer. Urbane condescension oozed from him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Say, Jimmie. C&#8217;n you keep a secret?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sure. Course I can.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Won&#8217;t ever snitch?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Cross my heart.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, then&mdash;I&#8217;m Black MacQueen, the captain
+of the Roaring Fork bad men.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You!&#8221; Incredulity stared from Jimmie&#8217;s bulging
+eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You betcher. I&#8217;m him, here in disguise as a
+kid.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The magnificent boldness of this claim stole Jimmie&#8217;s
+breath for an instant. He was two years
+younger than his friend, but he did not quite know
+whether to applaud or to jeer. Before he could
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_230' name='page_230'></a>230</span>
+make up his mind a light laugh rippled to them
+from behind the vines on the Lee porch.</p>
+<p>The disguised outlaw and his friend were
+startled. Both fled swiftly, with all the pretense
+of desperate necessity young conspirators love to
+assume.</p>
+<p>Melissy went into the house and the laughter
+died from her lips. She knew that either her
+father&#8217;s posse or that of Jack Flatray would come
+into touch with the outlaws eventually. When the
+clash came there would be a desperate battle. Men
+would be killed. She prayed it might not be one
+of those for whom she cared most.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='IV_THE_REAL_BUCKY_AND_THE_FALSE' id='IV_THE_REAL_BUCKY_AND_THE_FALSE'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_231' name='page_231'></a>231</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV</h2>
+<h3>THE REAL BUCKY AND THE FALSE</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Number seven was churning its way furiously
+through brown Arizona. The day
+had been hot, with a palpitating heat
+which shimmered over the desert waste. Defiantly
+the sun had gone down beyond the horizon, a great
+ball of fire, leaving behind a brilliant splash of bold
+colors. Now this, too, had disappeared. Velvet
+night had transformed the land. Over the distant
+mountains had settled a smoke-blue film, which left
+them vague and indefinite.</p>
+<p>Only three passengers rode in the Pullman car.
+One was a commercial traveler, busy making up his
+weekly statement to the firm. Another was a Boston
+lady, in gold-rimmed glasses and a costume that
+helped the general effect of frigidity. The third
+looked out of the open window at the distant hills.
+He was a slender young fellow, tanned almost to
+a coffee brown, with eyes of Irish blue which sometimes
+bubbled with fun and sometimes were hard
+as chisel steel. Wide-shouldered and lean-flanked
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_232' name='page_232'></a>232</span>
+he was, with well-packed muscles, which rippled like
+those of a tiger.</p>
+<p>At Chiquita the train stopped, but took up again
+almost instantly its chant of the rail. Meanwhile,
+a man had swung himself to the platform of the
+smoker. He passed through that car, the two day
+coaches, and on to the sleeper; his keen, restless
+eyes inspected every passenger in the course of his
+transit. Opposite the young man in the Pullman
+he stopped.</p>
+<p>&#8220;May I ask if you are Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My name, seh.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The young man in the seat had slewed his head
+around sharply, and made answer with a crisp, businesslike
+directness.</p>
+<p>The new-comer smiled. &#8220;I&#8217;ll have to introduce
+myself, lieutenant. My name is Flatray. I&#8217;ve come
+to meet you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad to meet you, Mr. Flatray. I hope that
+together we can work this thing out right. MacQueen
+has gathered a bunch that ought to be cleaned
+out, and I reckon now&#8217;s the time to do it. I&#8217;ve been
+reading about him for a year. I&#8217;ve got a notion
+he&#8217;s about the ablest thing in bad men this Territory
+has seen for a good many years.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Flatray sat down on the seat opposite O&#8217;Connor.
+A smile flicked across his face, and vanished. &#8220;I&#8217;m
+of that opinion myself, lieutenant.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tell me all about this affair of the West kidnapping,&#8221;
+the ranger suggested.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_233' name='page_233'></a>233</span></p>
+<p>The other man told the story while O&#8217;Connor
+listened, alert to catch every point of the narrative.</p>
+<p>The face of the lieutenant of rangers was a boyish
+one&mdash;eager, genial, and frank; yet, none the
+less, strength lay in the close-gripped jaw and in
+the steady, watchful eye. His lithe, tense body was
+like a coiled spring; and that, too, though he seemed
+to be very much at ease.</p>
+<p>With every sentence that the other spoke, O&#8217;Connor
+was judging Flatray, appraising him for a fine
+specimen of a hard-bitten breed&mdash;a vigilant frontiersman,
+competent to the finger tips. Yet he was
+conscious that, in spite of the man&#8217;s graceful ease
+and friendly smile, he did not like Flatray. He
+would not ask for a better man beside him in a
+tight pinch; but he could not deny that something
+sinister which breathed from his sardonic, devil-may-care
+face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So that&#8217;s how the land lies,&#8221; the sheriff concluded.
+&#8220;My deputies have got the pass to the
+south blocked; Lee is closing in through Elkhorn;
+and Fox, with a strong posse, is combing the hills
+beyond Dead Man&#8217;s Cache. There&#8217;s only one way
+out for him, and that is over Powderhorn Pass.
+Word has just reached us that MacQueen is moving
+in that direction. He is evidently figuring to
+slip out over the hills during the night. I&#8217;ve arranged
+for us to be met at Barker&#8217;s Tank by a
+couple of the boys, with horses. We&#8217;ll drop off the
+train quietly when it slows up to water, so that none
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_234' name='page_234'></a>234</span>
+of his spies can get word of our movements to him.
+By hard riding we&#8217;d ought to reach Powderhorn
+in time to head him off.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The ranger asked incisive questions, had the
+topography of the country explained to him with
+much detail, and decided at last that Flatray was
+right. If MacQueen were trying to slip out, they
+might trap him at the pass; if not, by closing it they
+would put the cork in the bottle that held him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll try it, seh. Y&#8217;u know this country better
+than I do, and I&#8217;ll give y&#8217;u a free hand. Unless
+there&#8217;s a slip up in your calculations, you&#8217;d ought
+to be right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good enough, lieutenant. I&#8217;m betting on those
+plans myself,&#8221; the other answered promptly, and
+added, as he looked out into the night: &#8220;By that
+notch in the hills, we&#8217;d ought to be close to the tank
+now. She&#8217;s slowing up. I reckon we can slip out
+to the vestibule, and get off at the far side of the
+track without being noticed much.&#8221;</p>
+<p>This they found easy enough. Five minutes later
+number seven was steaming away into the distant
+desert. Flatray gave a sharp, shrill whistle; and
+from behind some sand dunes emerged two men
+and four horses.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Anything new?&#8221; asked the sheriff as they came
+nearer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not a thing, cap,&#8221; answered one of them.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Boys, shake hands with the famous Lieutenant
+O&#8217;Connor,&#8221; said Flatray, with a sneer hid by the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_235' name='page_235'></a>235</span>
+darkness. &#8220;Lieutenant, let me make you acquainted
+with Jeff Jackson and Buck Lane.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Much obliged to meet you,&#8221; grinned Buck as he
+shook hands.</p>
+<p>They mounted and rode toward the notch in the
+hills that had been pointed out to the ranger. The
+moon was up; and a cold, silvery light flooded the
+plain. Seen in this setting, the great, painted desert
+held more of mystery, of beauty, and less of the
+dead monotony that glared endlessly from arid, barren
+reaches. The sky of stars stretched infinitely
+far, and added to the effect of magnitude.</p>
+<p>The miles slipped behind them as they moved forward,
+hour after hour, their horses holding to the
+running walk that is the peculiar gait of the cow
+country. They rode in silence, with the loose seat
+and straight back of the vaquero. Except the
+ranger, all were dressed for riding&mdash;Flatray in
+corduroys and half-knee laced boots; his men in
+overalls, chaps, flannel shirts, and the broad-brimmed
+sombrero of the Southwest. All four
+were young men; but there was an odd difference
+in the expressions of their faces.</p>
+<p>Jackson and Lane had the hard-lined faces, with
+something grim and stony in them, of men who
+ride far and hard with their lives in their hands.
+The others were of a higher type. Flatray&#8217;s dark
+eyes were keen, bold, and restless. One might have
+guessed him a man of temperament, capable of any
+extremes of conduct&mdash;often the victim of his own
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_236' name='page_236'></a>236</span>
+ungovernable whims and passions. Just as he
+looked a picture of all the passions of youth run
+to seed, so the ranger seemed to show them in
+flower. There was something fine and strong and
+gallant in his debonair manner. His warm smile
+went out to a world that pleased him mightily.</p>
+<p>They rode steadily, untired and untiring. The
+light of dawn began to flicker from one notched
+summit to another. Out of the sandy waste they
+came to a water hole, paused for a drink, and passed
+on. For the delay of half an hour might mean the
+escape of their prey.</p>
+<p>They came into the country of crumbling mesas
+and painted cliffs, of hillsides where greasewood
+and giant cactus struggled from the parched earth.
+This they traversed until they came to plateaus, terminating
+in foothills, crevassed by gorges deep and
+narrow. The cañons grew steeper, rock ridges
+more frequent. Gradually the going became more
+difficult.</p>
+<p>Trails they seldom followed. Washes, with sides
+like walls, confronted them. The ponies dropped
+down and clambered up again like mountain goats.
+Gradually they were ascending into the upper country,
+which led to the wild stretches where the outlaws
+lurked. In these watersheds were heavy pine
+forests, rising from the gulches along the shoulders
+of the peaks.</p>
+<p>A maze of cañons, hopelessly lost in the hill tangle
+into which they had plunged, led deviously to a
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_237' name='page_237'></a>237</span>
+twisting pass, through which they defiled, to drop
+into a vista of rolling waves of forest-clad hills.
+Among these wound countless hidden gulches,
+known only to those who rode from out them on
+nefarious night errands.</p>
+<p>The ranger noted every landmark, and catalogued
+in his mind&#8217;s map every gorge and peak; from what
+he saw, he guessed much of which he could not
+be sure. It would be hard to say when his suspicions
+first became aroused. But as they rode, without
+stopping, through what he knew must be Powderhorn
+Pass, as the men about him quietly grouped
+themselves so as to cut off any escape he might
+attempt, as they dropped farther and farther into
+the meshes of that forest-crowned net which he
+knew to be the Roaring Fork country, he did not
+need to be told he was in the power of MacQueen&#8217;s
+gang.</p>
+<p>Yet he gave no sign of what he knew. As daylight
+came, so that they could see each other distinctly,
+his face showed no shadow of doubt. It
+was his cue to be a simple victim of credulity, and
+he played it to the finish.</p>
+<p>Without warning, through a narrow gulch which
+might have been sought in vain for ten years by
+a stranger, they passed into the rim of a bowl-shaped
+valley. Timber covered it from edge to
+edge, but over to the left a keen eye could see a
+thinning of the foliage. Toward this they went,
+following the sidehill and gradually dipping down
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_238' name='page_238'></a>238</span>
+through heavy underbrush. Before him the officer
+of rangers saw daylight, and presently a corral, low
+roofs, and grazing horses.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Looks like some one lives here,&#8221; he remarked
+amiably.</p>
+<p>They were already riding into the open. In
+front of one of the log cabins the man who had
+called himself Flatray swung from his saddle.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Better &#8217;light, lieutenant,&#8221; he suggested carelessly.
+&#8220;We&#8217;ll eat breakfast here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t care if we do. I could eat a leather mail
+sack, I&#8217;m that hungry,&#8221; the ranger answered, as he,
+too, descended.</p>
+<p>His guide was looking at him with an expression
+of open, malevolent triumph. He could scarce keep
+it back long enough to get the effect he wanted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, we&#8217;ll eat breakfast here&mdash;and dinner, and
+supper, and breakfast to-morrow, and then about
+two more breakfasts.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon we&#8217;ll be too busy to sit around here,&#8221;
+laughed his prisoner.</p>
+<p>The other ignored his comment. &#8220;And after that,
+it ain&#8217;t likely you&#8217;ll do much more eating.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t quite get the point of that joke.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll get it soon enough! You&#8217;d <i>savez</i> it now,
+if you weren&#8217;t a muttonhead. As it is, I&#8217;ll have to
+explain it. Do you remember capturing Tony
+Chaves two years ago, lieutenant?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The ranger nodded, with surprise in his round,
+innocent eyes.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_239' name='page_239'></a>239</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;What happened to him?&#8221; demanded the other.
+A child could have seen that he was ridden by a
+leering, savage triumph.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Killed trying to escape four days later.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Who killed him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I did. It was necessary. I regretted it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A sudden spasm of cruelty swept over the face
+of the man confronting him. &#8220;Tony was my
+partner.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Your partner?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right. I&#8217;ve been wanting to say &#8216;How
+d&#8217;ye do?&#8217; ever since, Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor. I&#8217;m
+right glad to meet you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&mdash;I don&#8217;t understand.&#8221; He did, however.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;ll soak through, by and by. Chew on this:
+You&#8217;ve got just ninety-six hours to live&mdash;exactly
+as long as Tony lived after you caught him! You&#8217;ll
+be killed trying to escape. It will be necessary, just
+as you say it was with him; but I reckon I&#8217;ll not do
+any regretting to speak of.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You would murder me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I ain&#8217;t particular about the word I use.&#8221;
+MacQueen leaned against the side of his horse, his
+arm thrown across its neck, and laughed in slow
+maliciousness. &#8220;Execute is the word I use, though&mdash;if
+you want to know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He had made no motion toward his weapon, nor
+had O&#8217;Connor; but the latter knew without looking
+that he was covered vigilantly by both of the other
+men.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_240' name='page_240'></a>240</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;And who are you?&#8221; the ranger asked, though
+he was quite sure of the answer.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Men call me Black MacQueen,&#8221; drawled the
+other.</p>
+<p>&#8220;MacQueen! But you said&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That I was Flatray. Yep&mdash;I lied.&#8221;</p>
+<p>O&#8217;Connor appeared to grope with this in amazement.</p>
+<p>&#8220;One has to stretch the truth sometimes in my
+profession,&#8221; went on the outlaw smoothly. &#8220;It may
+interest you to know that yesterday I passed as
+Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor. When I was O&#8217;Connor I
+arrested Flatray; and now that I am Flatray I have
+arrested O&#8217;Connor. Turn about is fair play, you
+know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Interesting, if true,&#8221; O&#8217;Connor retorted easily.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You can bank on its truth, my friend.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you&#8217;re actually going to kill me in cold
+blood.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The black eyes narrowed. &#8220;Just as I would a
+dog,&#8221; said the outlaw, with savage emphasis.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t believe it. I&#8217;ve done you no harm.&#8221;</p>
+<p>MacQueen glanced at him contemptuously. The
+famous Bucky O&#8217;Connor looked about as competent
+as a boy in the pimply age.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I thought you had better sense. Do you think
+I would have brought you to Dead Man&#8217;s Cache if
+I had intended you to go away alive? I&#8217;m afraid,
+Lieutenant Bucky O&#8217;Connor, that you&#8217;re a much
+overrated man. Your reputation sure would have
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_241' name='page_241'></a>241</span>
+blown up, if you had lived. You ought to thank
+me for preserving it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Preserving it&mdash;how?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;By bumping you off before you&#8217;ve lost it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sho! You wouldn&#8217;t do that,&#8221; the ranger murmured
+ineffectively.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll see. Jeff, I put him in your charge.
+Search him, and take him to Hank&#8217;s cabin. I hold
+you responsible for him. Bring me any papers you
+find on him. When I find time, I&#8217;ll drop around
+and see that you&#8217;re keeping him safe.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Bucky was searched, and his weapons and papers
+removed. After being handcuffed, he was chained
+to a heavy staple, which had been driven into one
+of the log walls. He was left alone, and the door
+was locked; but he could hear Jeff moving about
+outside.</p>
+<p>With the closing of the door the vacuous look
+slipped from his face like a mask. The loose-lipped,
+lost-dog expression was gone. He looked
+once more alert, competent, fit for the emergency.
+It had been his cue to let his adversary underestimate
+him. During the long night ride he had had
+chances to escape, had he desired to do so. But
+this had been the last thing he wanted.</p>
+<p>The outlaws had chosen to take him to their fastness
+in the hills. He would back himself to use
+the knowledge they were thrusting upon him, to
+bring about their undoing. Only one factor in the
+case had come upon him as a surprise. He had not
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_242' name='page_242'></a>242</span>
+reckoned that they would have a personal grudge
+against him. And this was a factor that might
+upset all his calculations.</p>
+<p>It meant that he was playing against time, with
+the chances of the game all against him. He had
+forty-eight hours in which to escape&mdash;and he was
+handcuffed, chained, locked up, and guarded. Truly,
+the outlook was not radiant.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='V_A_PHOTOGRAPH' id='V_A_PHOTOGRAPH'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_243' name='page_243'></a>243</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER V</h2>
+<h3>A PHOTOGRAPH</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>On the third morning Beauchamp Lee returned
+to Mesa&mdash;unshaven, dusty, and
+fagged with hard riding. He brought
+with him a handbill which he had picked up in the
+street. Melissy hung over him and ministered to
+his needs. While he was eating breakfast he talked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No luck yet, honey. He&#8217;s hiding in some pocket
+of the hills, I reckon; and likely there he&#8217;ll stay till
+the hunt is past. They don&#8217;t make them any slicker
+than Dunc, dad gum his ugly hide!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What is that paper?&#8221; his daughter asked.</p>
+<p>Lee curbed a disposition toward bad language,
+as he viewed it with disgust. &#8220;This here is bulletin
+number one, girl. It&#8217;s the cheekiest, most impudent
+thing I ever saw. MacQueen serves notice to all
+the people of this county to keep out of this fight.
+Also, he mentions me and Jack Flatray by name&mdash;warning
+us that, if we sit in the game, hell will be
+popping for us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What will you do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do? I&#8217;ll get back to my boys fast as horseflesh
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_244' name='page_244'></a>244</span>
+will get me there, once I&#8217;ve had a talk with
+that beef buyer from Kansas City I made an appointment
+to see before this thing broke loose. You
+don&#8217;t allow I&#8217;m going to let any rustler dictate to
+me what I&#8217;ll do and what I won&#8217;t&mdash;do you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where do you reckon he had this printed?&#8221; she
+asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t reckon, I know. Late last night a
+masked man woke up Jim Snell. You know, he
+sleeps in a room at the back of the printing office.
+Well, this fellow made him dress, set up this bill,
+and run off five hundred copies while he stood over
+him. I&#8217;ll swan I never heard of such cheek!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy told what she had to tell&mdash;after which
+her father shaved, took a bath, and went out to
+meet the buyer from Kansas City. His business
+kept him until noon. After dinner Melissy&#8217;s saddle
+horse was brought around, and she joined her father
+to ride back with him for a few miles.</p>
+<p>About three o&#8217;clock she kissed him good-bye, and
+turned homeward. After she had passed the point
+where the Silver Creek trail ran into the road she
+heard the sound of a galloping horse behind. A
+rider was coming along the trail toward town. He
+gained on her rapidly, and presently a voice hailed
+her gayly:</p>
+<p>&#8220;The top o&#8217; the mornin&#8217; to you, Miss &#8217;Lissie.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She drew up to wait for him. &#8220;My name is still
+Miss Lee,&#8221; she told him mildly, by way of correction.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_245' name='page_245'></a>245</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m glad it is, but we can change it in three
+minutes at any time, my dear,&#8221; he laughed.</p>
+<p>She had been prepared to be more friendly toward
+him, but at this she froze again.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did you leave Mrs. O&#8217;Connor and the children
+well?&#8221; she asked pointedly, looking directly at him.</p>
+<p>His smile vanished, and he stared at her in a very
+strange fashion. She had taken the wind completely
+out of his sails. It had not occurred to him that
+O&#8217;Connor might be a married man. Nor did he
+know but that it might be a trick to catch him. He
+did the only thing he could do&mdash;made answer in an
+ironic fashion, which might mean anything or
+nothing.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Very well, thank you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She saw at once that the topic did not allure him,
+and pushed home her advantage. &#8220;You must miss
+Mrs. O&#8217;Connor when you are away on duty.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Must I?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And the children, too. By the way, what are
+their names?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re getting up a right smart interest in my
+family, all of a sudden,&#8221; he countered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;One can&#8217;t talk about the weather all the time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He boldly decided to slay the illusion of domesticity.
+&#8220;If you want to know, I have neither wife
+nor children.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But I&#8217;ve heard about them all,&#8221; she retorted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You have heard of Mrs. O&#8217;Connor, no doubt;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_246' name='page_246'></a>246</span>
+but she happens to be the wife of a cousin of mine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The look which she flashed at him held more than
+doubt.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t believe me?&#8221; he continued. &#8220;I give
+you my word that I&#8217;m not married.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They had left the road, and were following a
+short cut which wound down toward Tonti, in and
+out among the great boulders. The town, dwarfed
+to microscopic size by distance, looked, in the glare
+of the sunlight, as if it were made of white chalk.
+Along the narrow trail they went singly, Melissy
+leading the way.</p>
+<p>She made no answer, but at the first opportunity
+he forced his horse to a level with hers.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well&mdash;you heard what I said,&#8221; he challenged.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The subject is of no importance to me,&#8221; she
+said.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s important to me. I&#8217;m not going to have
+you doing me an injustice. I tell you I&#8217;m not married.
+You&#8217;ve got to believe me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her mind was again alive with suspicions. Jack
+had told her Bucky O&#8217;Connor was married, and he
+must have known what he was talking about.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know whether you are married or not.
+I am of the opinion that Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor has
+a wife and three children. More than once I have
+been told so,&#8221; she answered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You seem to know a heap about the gentleman.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_247' name='page_247'></a>247</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I know what I know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;More than I do, perhaps,&#8221; he suggested.</p>
+<p>Her eyes dilated. He could see suspicion take
+hold of her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Perhaps,&#8221; she answered quietly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Does that mean you think I&#8217;m not Bucky O&#8217;Connor?&#8221;
+He had pushed his pony forward so as to
+cut off her advance, and both had halted for the
+moment.</p>
+<p>She looked at him with level, fearless eyes. &#8220;I
+don&#8217;t know who you are.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But you think I&#8217;m not Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor
+of the rangers?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know whether you are or not.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There is nothing like making sure. Just look
+over this letter, please.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She did so. It was from the governor of the
+Territory to the ranger officer. While he was very
+complimentary as to past services, the governor
+made it plain that he thought O&#8217;Connor must at all
+hazards succeed in securing the release of Simon
+West. This would be necessary for the good name
+of the Territory. Otherwise, a widespread report
+would go out that Arizona was a lawless place in
+which to live.</p>
+<p>Melissy folded the letter and handed it back. &#8220;I
+beg your pardon, Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor. I see that
+I was wrong.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Forget it, my dear. We all make mistakes.&#8221;
+He had that curious mocking smile which so often
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_248' name='page_248'></a>248</span>
+hovered about his lips. She felt as though he were
+deriding her&mdash;as though his words held some hidden
+irony which she could not understand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The governor seems very anxious to have you
+succeed. It will be a black eye for Arizona if this
+band of outlaws is not apprehended. You don&#8217;t
+think, do you, that they will do Mr. West any
+harm, if their price is not paid? They would never
+dare.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He took this up almost as though he resented it.
+&#8220;They would dare anything. I reckon you&#8217;ll have
+to get up early in the mornin&#8217; to find a gamer man
+than Black MacQueen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I wouldn&#8217;t call it game to hurt an old man whom
+he has in his power. But you mustn&#8217;t let it come
+to that. You must save him. Are you making
+any progress? Have you run down any of the
+band? And while I think of it&mdash;have you seen to-day&#8217;s
+paper?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The biggest story on the front page is about
+the West case. It seems that this MacQueen wired
+to Chicago to Mr. Lucas, president of one of the
+lines on the Southwestern system, that they would
+release Mr. West for three hundred thousand dollars
+in gold. He told him a letter had been mailed
+to the agent at Mesa, telling under just what conditions
+the money was to be turned over; and he
+ended with a threat that, if steps were taken to capture
+the gang, or if the money were not handed
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_249' name='page_249'></a>249</span>
+over at the specified time, Mr. West would disappear
+forever.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did the paper say whether the money would be
+turned over?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It said that Mr. Lucas was going to get into
+touch with the outlaws at once, to effect the release
+of his chief.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A gleam of triumph flashed in the eyes of the
+man. &#8220;That&#8217;s sure the best way.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It won&#8217;t help your reputation, will it?&#8221; she
+asked. &#8220;Won&#8217;t people say that you failed on this
+case?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He laughed softly, as if at some hidden source
+of mirth. &#8220;I shouldn&#8217;t wonder if they did say that
+Bucky O&#8217;Connor hadn&#8217;t made good this time.
+They&#8217;ll figure he tried to ride herd on a job too big
+for him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her surprised eye brooded over this, too. Here
+he was defending the outlaw chief, and rejoicing at
+his own downfall. There seemed to be no end to
+the contradictions in this man. She was to run
+across another tangled thread of the puzzle a few
+minutes later.</p>
+<p>She had dismounted to let him tighten the saddle
+cinch. Owing to the heat, he had been carrying
+his coat in front of him. He tossed it on a boulder
+by the side of the trail, in such a way that the inside
+pocket hung down. From it slid some papers and
+a photograph. Melissy looked down at the picture,
+then instantly stooped and picked it up. For it was
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_250' name='page_250'></a>250</span>
+a photograph of a very charming woman and three
+children, and across the bottom of it was written
+a line.</p>
+<table summary='poetry' style='margin:0 auto; '><tr><td>
+<p  style='margin: 0 0 0 0.0em;'>&#8220;To Bucky, from his loving wife and children.&#8221;</p>
+</td></tr></table>
+
+<p>The girl handed it to the man without a word,
+and looked him full in the face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bowled out, by ginger!&#8221; he said, with a light
+laugh.</p>
+<p>But as she continued to look at him&mdash;a man of
+promise, who had plainly traveled far on the road
+to ruin&mdash;the conviction grew on her that the sweet-faced
+woman in the photograph was no loving wife
+of his. He was a man who might easily take a
+woman&#8217;s fancy, but not one to hold her love for
+years through the stress of life. Moreover, Bucky
+O&#8217;Connor held the respect of all men. She had
+heard him spoken of, and always with a meed of
+affection that is given to few men. Whoever this
+graceless scamp was, he was not the lieutenant of
+rangers.</p>
+<p>The words slipped out before she could stop them:
+&#8220;You&#8217;re not Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor at all.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Playing on that string again, are you?&#8221; he
+jeered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m sure of it this time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Since you know who I&#8217;m not, perhaps you can
+tell me, too, who I am.&#8221;</p>
+<p>In that instant before she spoke, while her steady
+eyes rested on him, she put together many things
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_251' name='page_251'></a>251</span>
+which had puzzled her. All of them pointed to one
+conclusion. Even now her courage did not fail
+her. She put it into words quietly:</p>
+<p>&#8220;You are that villain Black MacQueen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He stared at her in surprise. &#8220;By God, girl&mdash;you&#8217;re
+right. I&#8217;m MacQueen, though I don&#8217;t know
+how you guessed it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know how I kept from guessing it so
+long. I can see it, now, as plain as day, in all that
+you have done.&#8221;</p>
+<p>After that they measured strength silently with
+their eyes. If the situation had clarified itself, with
+the added knowledge of the girl had come new
+problems. Let her return to Mesa, and he could
+no longer pose as O&#8217;Connor; and it was just the
+audacity of this double play that delighted him.
+He was the most reckless man on earth; he loved
+to take chances. He wanted to fool the officers to
+his heart&#8217;s content, and then jeer at them afterward.
+Hitherto everything had come his way.</p>
+<p>But if this girl should go home, he could not
+show his face at Mesa; and the spice of the thing
+would be gone. He was greatly taken with her
+beauty, her daring, and the charm of high spirits
+which radiated from her. Again and again he had
+found himself drawn back to her. He was not in
+love with her in any legitimate sense; but he knew
+now that, if he could see her no more, life would
+be a savorless thing, at least until his fancy had
+spent itself. Moreover, her presence at Dead Man&#8217;s
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_252' name='page_252'></a>252</span>
+Cache would be a safeguard. With her in his
+power, Lee and Flatray, the most persistent of his
+hunters, would not dare to move against the outlaws.</p>
+<p>Inclination and interest worked together. He
+decided to take her back with him to the country
+of hidden pockets and gulches. There, in time, he
+would win her love&mdash;so his vanity insisted. After
+that they would slip away from the scene of his
+crimes, and go back to the world from which he
+had years since vanished.</p>
+<p>The dream grew on him. It got hold of his
+imagination. For a moment he saw himself as the
+man he had been meant for&mdash;the man he might
+have been, if he had been able to subdue his evil
+nature. He saw himself respected, a power in the
+community, going down to a serene old age, with
+this woman and their children by his side. Then
+he laughed derisively, and brushed aside the vision.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why didn&#8217;t the real Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor arrive
+to expose you?&#8221; she asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The real Bucky is handcuffed and guarded at
+Dead Man&#8217;s Cache. I don&#8217;t think he&#8217;s enjoying
+himself to-day.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re getting quite a collection of prisoners.
+You&#8217;ll be starting a penitentiary on your own account
+soon,&#8221; she told him sharply.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right. And I&#8217;m taking another one back
+with me to-night.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Who is he?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_253' name='page_253'></a>253</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a lady this time&mdash;Miss Melissy Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His words shook her. An icy hand seemed to
+clamp upon her heart. The blood ebbed even from
+her lips, but her brave eyes never faltered from
+his.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So you war on women, too!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He gave her his most ironic bow. &#8220;I don&#8217;t war
+on you, my dear. You shall have half of my kingdom,
+if you ask it&mdash;and all my heart.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can&#8217;t use either,&#8221; she told him quietly. &#8220;But
+I&#8217;m only a girl. If you have a spark of manliness
+in you, surely you won&#8217;t take me a prisoner among
+those wild, bad men of yours.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Those wild, bad men of mine are lambs when
+I give the word. They wouldn&#8217;t lift a hand against
+you. And there is a woman there&mdash;the mother of
+one of my boys, who was shot. We&#8217;ll have you
+chaperoned for fair.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And if I say I won&#8217;t go?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll go if I strap you to your saddle.&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was characteristic of Melissy that she made no
+further resistance. The sudden, wolfish gleam in
+his eyes had told her that he meant what he said.
+It was like her, too, that she made no outcry; that
+she did not shed tears or plead with him. A gallant
+spirit inhabited that slim, girlish body; and she
+yielded to the inevitable with quiet dignity. This
+surprised him greatly, and stung his reluctant admiration.
+At the same time, it set her apart from
+him and hedged her with spiritual barriers. Her
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_254' name='page_254'></a>254</span>
+body might ride with him into captivity; she was
+still captain of her soul.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re a game one,&#8221; he told her, as he helped
+her to the saddle.</p>
+<p>She did not answer, but looked straightforward
+between her horse&#8217;s ears, without seeing him, waiting
+for him to give the word to start.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='VI_IN_DEAD_MAN_S_CACHE' id='VI_IN_DEAD_MAN_S_CACHE'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_255' name='page_255'></a>255</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI</h2>
+<h3>IN DEAD MAN&#8217;S CACHE</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Not since the start of their journey had
+Melissy broken silence, save to answer, in
+few words as possible, the questions
+put to her by the outlaw. Yet her silence had not
+been sullenness. It had been the barrier which she
+had set up between them&mdash;one which he could not
+break down short of actual roughness.</p>
+<p>Of this she could not accuse him. Indeed, he
+had been thoughtful of her comfort. At sunset they
+had stopped by a spring, and he had shared with
+her such food as he had. Moreover, he had insisted
+that she should rest for a while before they
+took up the last stretch of the way.</p>
+<p>It was midnight now, and they had been traveling
+for many hours over rough mountain trails.
+There was more strength than one would look for
+in so slender a figure, yet Melissy was drooping
+with fatigue.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s not far now. We&#8217;ll be there in a few minutes,&#8221;
+MacQueen promised her.</p>
+<p>They were ascending a narrow trail which ran
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_256' name='page_256'></a>256</span>
+along the sidehill through the timber. Presently
+they topped the summit, and the ground fell away
+from their feet to a bowl-shaped valley, over which
+the silvery moonshine played so that the basin
+seemed to swim in a magic sea of light.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Welcome to the Cache,&#8221; he said to her.</p>
+<p>She was surprised out of her silence. &#8220;Dead
+Man&#8217;s Cache?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It has been called that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>She knew, but she wanted to see if he would
+tell a story which showed so plainly his own ruthlessness.</p>
+<p>He hesitated, but only for a moment.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There was a man named Havens. He had a
+reputation as a bad man, and I reckon he deserved
+it&mdash;if brand blotting, mail rustling, and shooting
+citizens are the credentials to win that title. Hard
+pressed on account of some deviltry, he drifted into
+this country, and was made welcome by those living
+here. The best we had was his. He was fed, outfitted,
+and kept safe from the law that was looking
+for him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You would figure he was under big obligations
+to the men that did this for him&mdash;wouldn&#8217;t you?
+But he was born skunk. When his chance came he
+offered to betray these men to the law, in exchange
+for a pardon for his own sneaking hide. The letter
+was found, and it was proved he wrote it. What
+ought those men to have done to him, Miss &#8217;Lissie?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_257' name='page_257'></a>257</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know.&#8221; She shuddered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s got to be law, even in a place like this.
+We make our own laws, and the men that stay here
+have got to abide by them. Our law said this man
+must die. He died.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She did not ask him how. The story went that
+the outlaws whom the wretched man had tried to
+sell let him escape on purpose&mdash;that, just as he
+thought he was free of them, their mocking laughter
+came to him from the rocks all around. He was
+completely surrounded. They had merely let him
+run into a trap. He escaped again, wandered without
+food for days, and again discovered that they
+had been watching him all the time. Turn whichever
+way he would, their rifles warned him back.
+He stumbled on, growing weaker and weaker. They
+would neither capture him nor let him go.</p>
+<p>For nearly a week the cruel game went on. Frequently
+he heard their voices in the hills about him.
+Sometimes he would call out to them pitifully to put
+him out of his misery. Only their horrible laughter
+answered. When he had reached the limit of endurance
+he lay down and died.</p>
+<p>And the man who had engineered that heartless
+revenge was riding beside her. He had been ready
+to tell her the whole story, if she had asked for it,
+and equally ready to justify it. Nothing could have
+shown her more plainly the character of the villain
+into whose hands she had fallen.</p>
+<p>They descended into the valley, winding in and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_258' name='page_258'></a>258</span>
+out until they came suddenly upon ranch houses
+and a corral in a cleared space.</p>
+<p>A man came out of the shadows into the moonlight
+to meet them. Instantly Melissy recognized
+his walk. It was Boone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, it&#8217;s you,&#8221; MacQueen said coldly. &#8220;Any of
+the rest of the boys up?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Not a dozen words had passed between them, but
+the girl sensed hostility. She was not surprised.
+Dunc Boone was not the man to take second place
+in any company of riff-raff, nor was MacQueen
+one likely to yield the supremacy he had fought to
+gain.</p>
+<p>The latter swung from the saddle and lifted Melissy
+from hers. As her feet struck the ground
+her face for the first time came full into the moonlight.</p>
+<p>Boone stifled a startled oath.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Melissy Lee!&#8221; Like a swiftly reined horse he
+swung around upon his chief. &#8220;What devil&#8217;s work
+is this?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My business, Dunc!&#8221; the other retorted in suave
+insult.</p>
+<p>&#8220;By God, no! I make it mine. This young
+lady&#8217;s a friend of mine&mdash;or used to be. <i>Sabe</i>?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I <i>sabe</i> you&#8217;d better not try to sit in at this game,
+my friend.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Boone swung abruptly upon Melissy. &#8220;How
+come you here, girl? Tell me!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_259' name='page_259'></a>259</span></p>
+<p>And in three sentences she explained.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s your play? Whyfor did you bring her?&#8221;
+the Arkansan demanded of MacQueen.</p>
+<p>The latter stood balanced on his heels with his
+feet wide apart. There was a scornful grin on his
+face, but his eyes were fixed warily on the other
+man.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What was I to do with her, Mr. Buttinski? She
+found out who I was. Could I send her home?
+If I did how was I to fix it so I could go to Mesa
+when it&#8217;s necessary till we get this ransom business
+arranged?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. But you understand she&#8217;s a friend
+of mine. I&#8217;ll not have her hurt.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, go to the devil! I&#8217;m not in the habit of
+hurting young ladies.&#8221;</p>
+<p>MacQueen swung on his heel insolently and
+knocked on the door of a cabin near.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t forget that I&#8217;m here when you need me,&#8221;
+Boone told Melissy in a low voice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll not forget,&#8221; the girl made answer in a
+murmur.</p>
+<p>The wrinkled face of a Mexican woman appeared
+presently at a window. MacQueen jabbered a sentence
+or two in her language. She looked at Melissy
+and answered.</p>
+<p>The girl had not lived in Southern Arizona for
+twenty years without having a working knowledge
+of Spanish. Wherefore, she knew that her captor
+had ordered his own room prepared for her.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_260' name='page_260'></a>260</span></p>
+<p>While they waited for this to be made ready MacQueen
+hummed a snatch of a popular song. It
+happened to be a love ditty. Boone ground his
+teeth and glared at him, which appeared to amuse
+the other ruffian immensely.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t stay up on our account,&#8221; MacQueen suggested
+presently with a malicious laugh. &#8220;We&#8217;re
+not needing a chaperone any to speak of.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The Mexican woman announced that the bedroom
+was ready and MacQueen escorted Melissy to the
+door of the room. He stood aside with mock gallantry
+to let her pass.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have to lock you in,&#8221; he apologized airily.
+&#8220;Not that it would do you any good to escape.
+We&#8217;d have you again inside of twenty-four hours.
+This bit of the hills takes a heap of knowing. But
+we don&#8217;t want you running away. You&#8217;re too tired.
+So I lock the door and lie down on the porch under
+your window. <i>Adios, señorita.</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy heard the key turn in the lock, and was
+grateful for the respite given her by the night.
+She was glad, too, that Boone was here. She knew
+him for a villain, but she hoped he would stand
+between her and MacQueen if the latter proved unruly
+in his attentions. Her guess was that Boone
+was jealous of the other&mdash;of his authority with
+the gang to which they both belonged, and now of
+his relationship to her. Out of this division might
+come hope for her.</p>
+<p>So tired was she that, in spite of her alarms,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_261' name='page_261'></a>261</span>
+sleep took her almost as soon as her head touched
+the pillow. When she awakened the sun was shining
+in at her window above the curtain strung across
+its lower half.</p>
+<p>Some one was knocking at the door. When she
+asked who was there, in a voice which could not
+conceal its tremors, the answer came in feminine
+tones:</p>
+<p>&#8220;&#8217;Tis I&mdash;Rosario Chaves.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The Mexican woman was not communicative, nor
+did she appear to be sympathetic. The plight of
+this girl might have moved even an unresponsive
+heart, but Rosario showed a stolid face to her distress.
+What had to be said, she said. For the rest,
+she declined conversation absolutely.</p>
+<p>Breakfast was served Melissy in her room, after
+which Rosario led her outdoors. The woman gave
+her to understand that she might walk about the
+cleared space, but must not pass into the woods
+beyond. To point the need of obedience, Rosario
+seated herself on the porch, and began doing some
+drawn work upon which she was engaged.</p>
+<p>Melissy walked toward the corral, but did not reach
+it. An old hag was seated in a chair beside one of
+the log cabins. From the color of her skin the girl
+judged her to be an Indian squaw. She wore moccasins,
+a dirty and shapeless one-piece dress, and
+a big sunbonnet, in which her head was buried.</p>
+<p>Sitting on the floor of the porch, about fifteen feet
+from her, was a hard-faced customer, with stony
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_262' name='page_262'></a>262</span>
+eyes like those of a snake. He was sewing on a
+bridle that had given way. Melissy noticed that
+from the pocket of his chaps the butt of a revolver
+peeped. She judged it to be the custom in Dead
+Man&#8217;s Cache to go garnished with weapons.</p>
+<p>Her curiosity led her to deflect toward the old
+woman. But she had not taken three steps toward
+the cabin before the man with the jade eyes stopped
+her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;ll be near enough, ma&#8217;am,&#8221; he said, civilly
+enough. &#8220;This old crone has a crazy spell whenever
+a stranger comes nigh. She&#8217;s nutty. It ain&#8217;t
+safe to come nearer&mdash;is it, old Sit-in-the-Sun?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The squaw grunted. Simultaneously, she looked
+up, and Miss Lee thought that she had never seen
+more piercing eyes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is Sit-in-the-Sun her name?&#8221; asked the girl
+curiously.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s the English of it. The Navajo word is
+a jawbreaker.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Doesn&#8217;t she understand English?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No more&#8217;n you do Choctaw, miss.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A quick step crunched the gravel behind Melissy.
+She did not need to look around to know that here
+was Black MacQueen.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s this&mdash;what&#8217;s this, Hank?&#8221; he demanded
+sharply.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The young lady started to come up and speak to
+old Sit-in-the-Sun. I was just explaining to her
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_263' name='page_263'></a>263</span>
+how crazy the old squaw is,&#8221; Jeff answered with a
+grin.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh! Is that all?&#8221; MacQueen turned to Melissy.</p>
+<p>&#8220;She&#8217;s plumb loony&mdash;dangerous, too. I don&#8217;t
+want you to go near her.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The girl&#8217;s eyes flashed. &#8220;Very considerate of
+you. But if you want to protect me from the really
+dangerous people here, you had better send me
+home.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I tell you they do as I say, every man jack of
+them. I&#8217;d flay one alive if he insulted you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s a privilege you don&#8217;t sublet then,&#8221; she retorted
+swiftly.</p>
+<p>Admiration gleamed through his amusement.
+&#8220;Gad, you&#8217;ve got a sharp tongue. I&#8217;d pity the man
+you marry&mdash;unless he drove with a tight rein.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s not what we&#8217;re discussing, Mr. MacQueen.
+Are you going to send me home?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not till you&#8217;ve made us a nice long visit, my
+dear. You&#8217;re quite safe here. My men are plumb
+gentle. They&#8217;ll eat out of your hand. They don&#8217;t
+insult ladies. I&#8217;ve taught &#8217;em&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Pity you couldn&#8217;t teach their leader, too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He acknowledged the hit. &#8220;Come again, dearie.
+But what&#8217;s your complaint? Haven&#8217;t I treated you
+white so far?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. You insulted me grossly when you brought
+me here by force.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did I lay a hand on you?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_264' name='page_264'></a>264</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;If it had been necessary you would have.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re right, I would,&#8221; he nodded. &#8220;I&#8217;ve taken
+a fancy to you. You&#8217;re a good-looking and a plucky
+little devil. I&#8217;ve a notion to fall in love with you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why not? Say I&#8217;m a villain and a bad lot.
+Wouldn&#8217;t it be a good thing for me to tie up with
+a fine, straight-up young lady like you? Me, I like
+the way your eyes flash. You&#8217;ve got a devil of a
+temper, haven&#8217;t you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>They had been walking toward a pile of rocks
+some little way from the cluster of cabins. Now
+he sat down and smiled impudently across at her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s my business,&#8221; she flung back stormily.</p>
+<p>Genially he nodded. &#8220;So it is. Mine, too, when
+we trot in double harness.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her scornful eyes swept up and down him. &#8220;I
+wouldn&#8217;t marry you if you were the last man on
+earth.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. Well, I&#8217;m not partial to that game myself.
+I didn&#8217;t mention matrimony, did I?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The meaning she read in his mocking, half-closed
+eyes startled the girl. Seeing this, he added with
+a shrug:</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just as you say about that. We&#8217;ll make you
+Mrs. MacQueen on the level if you like.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The passion in her surged up. &#8220;I&#8217;d rather lie
+dead at your feet&mdash;I&#8217;d rather starve in these hills&mdash;I&#8217;d
+rather put a knife in my heart!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He clapped his hands. &#8220;Fine! Fine! That
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_265' name='page_265'></a>265</span>
+Bernhardt woman hasn&#8217;t got a thing on you when
+it comes to acting, my dear. You put that across
+bully. Never saw it done better.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&mdash;coward!&#8221; Her voice broke and she
+turned to leave him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Stop!&#8221; The ring of the word brought her feet
+to a halt. MacQueen padded across till he faced
+her. &#8220;Don&#8217;t make any mistake, girl. You&#8217;re mine.
+I don&#8217;t care how. If it suits you to have a priest
+mumble words over us, good enough. But I&#8217;m the
+man you&#8217;ve got to get ready to love.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I hate you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s a good start, you little catamount.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;d rather die&mdash;a thousand times rather.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not you, my dear. You think you would right
+now, but inside of a week you&#8217;ll be hunting for pet
+names to give me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She ran blindly toward the house where her room
+was. On the way she passed at a little distance
+Dunc Boone and did not see him. His hungry eyes
+followed her&mdash;a slender creature of white and russet
+and gold, vivid as a hillside poppy, compact of
+life and fire and grace. He, too, was a miscreant
+and a villain, lost to honor and truth, but just now
+she held his heart in the hollow of her tightly
+clenched little fist. Good men and bad, at bottom
+we are all made of the same stuff, once we are
+down to the primal emotions that go deeper than
+civilization&#8217;s veneer.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='VII__TRAPPED' id='VII__TRAPPED'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_266' name='page_266'></a>266</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII</h2>
+<h3>&#8220;TRAPPED!&#8221;</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Black MacQueen rolled a cigarette and
+sauntered toward the other outlaw.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon you better saddle up and take
+a look over the Flattops, Dunc. The way I figure
+it Lee&#8217;s posse must be somewhere over there.
+Swing around toward the Elkhorns and get back
+to report by to-morrow evening, say.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Boone looked at him in an ugly manner. &#8220;Nothin&#8217;
+doing, MacQueen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s that?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m no greaser, my friend. Orders don&#8217;t go
+with me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;They don&#8217;t, eh? Who&#8217;s major domo of this
+outfit?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m going to stay right here in this valley to-night.
+See?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s eatin&#8217; you, man?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And every night so long as Melissy Lee stays.&#8221;</p>
+<p>MacQueen watched him with steady, hostile eyes.
+&#8220;So it&#8217;s the girl, is it? Want to cut in, do you?
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_267' name='page_267'></a>267</span>
+Oh, no, my friend. Two&#8217;s company; three&#8217;s a
+crowd. She&#8217;s mine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. And another thing, Mr. Boone. I don&#8217;t
+stand for any interference in my plans. Make a
+break at it and you&#8217;ll take a hurry up journey to
+kingdom come.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Or you will.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t bank on that off chance. The boys are
+with me. You&#8217;re alone. If I give the word they&#8217;ll
+bump you off. <i>Don&#8217;t make a mistake, Boone.</i>&#8221;</p>
+<p>The Arkansan hesitated. What MacQueen said
+was true enough. His overbearing disposition had
+made him unpopular. He knew the others would
+side against him and that if it came to a showdown
+they would snuff out his life as a man does the
+flame of a candle. The rage died out of his eyes
+and gave place to a look of cunning.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s your say-so, Black. But there will be a day
+when it ain&#8217;t. Don&#8217;t forget that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And in the meantime you&#8217;ll ride the Flattops
+when I give the word?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Boone nodded sulkily. &#8220;I said you had the call,
+didn&#8217;t I?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then ride &#8217;em now, damn you. And don&#8217;t show
+up in the Cache till to-morrow night.&#8221;</p>
+<p>MacQueen turned on his heel and strutted away.
+He was elated at his easy victory. If he had seen
+the look that followed him he might not have been
+so quiet in his mind.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_268' name='page_268'></a>268</span></p>
+<p>But on the surface he had cinched his leadership.
+Boone saddled and rode out of the Cache without
+another word to anybody. Sullen and vindictive he
+might be, but cowed he certainly seemed. MacQueen
+celebrated by frequent trips to his sleeping
+quarters, where each time he resorted to a bottle
+and a glass. No man had ever seen him intoxicated,
+but there were times when he drank a good deal for
+a few days at a stretch. His dissipation would be
+followed by months of total abstinence.</p>
+<p>All day the man persecuted Melissy with his attentions.
+His passion was veiled under a manner
+of mock deference, of insolent assurance, but as the
+hours passed the fears of the girl grew upon her.
+There were moments when she turned sick with
+waves of dread. In the sunshine, under the open
+sky, she could hold her own, but under cover of
+the night&#8217;s blackness ghastly horrors would creep
+toward her to destroy.</p>
+<p>Nor was there anybody to whom she might turn
+for help. Lane and Jackson were tools of their
+leader. The Mexican woman could do nothing even
+if she would. Boone alone might have helped her,
+and he had ridden away to save his own skin. So
+MacQueen told her to emphasize his triumph and
+her helplessness.</p>
+<p>To her fancy dusk fell over the valley like a pall.
+It brought with it the terrible night, under cover
+of which unthinkable things might be done. With
+no appetite, she sat down to supper opposite her
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_269' name='page_269'></a>269</span>
+captor. To see him gloat over her made her heart
+sink. Her courage was of no avail against the
+thing that threatened.</p>
+<p>Supper over, he made her sit with him on the
+porch for an hour to listen to his boasts of former
+conquests. And when he let her take her way to
+her room it was not &#8220;Good-night&#8221; but a mocking
+&#8220;Au revoir&#8221; he murmured as he bent to kiss her
+hand.</p>
+<p>Melissy found Rosario waiting for her, crouched
+in the darkness of the room that had been given
+the young woman. The Mexican spoke in her own
+language, softly, with many glances of alarm to
+make sure they were alone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hist, señorita. Here is a note. Read it. Destroy
+it. Swear not to betray Rosario.&#8221;</p>
+<p>By the light of a match Melissy read:</p>
+<div class='blockquot'>
+<p>&#8220;Behind the big rocks. In half an hour.</p>
+<div class='ra'>
+<p>&#8220;<span style='font-variant: small-caps'>A Friend.</span>&#8221;</p>
+</div>
+
+</div>
+<p>What could it mean? Who could have sent it?
+Rosario would answer no questions. She snatched
+the note, tore it into fragments, chewed them into
+a pulp. Then, still shaking her head obstinately,
+hurriedly left the room.</p>
+<p>But at least it meant hope. Her mind flew from
+her father to Jack Flatray, Bellamy, young Yarnell.
+It might be any of them. Or it might be O&#8217;Connor,
+who, perhaps, had by some miracle escaped.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_270' name='page_270'></a>270</span></p>
+<p>The minutes were hours to her. Interminably
+they dragged. The fear rose in her that MacQueen
+might come in time to cut off her escape. At last,
+in her stocking feet, carrying her shoes in her hand,
+she stole into the hall, out to the porch, and from
+it to the shadows of the cottonwoods.</p>
+<p>It was a night of both moon and stars. She had
+to cross a space washed in silvery light, taking the
+chance that nobody would see her. But first she
+stooped in the shadows to slip the shoes upon her
+feet. Her heart beat against her side as she had
+once seen that of a frightened mouse do. It seemed
+impossible for her to cover all that moonlit open
+unseen. Every moment she expected an alarm to
+ring out in the silent night. But none came.</p>
+<p>Safely she reached the big rocks. A voice called
+to her softly. She answered, and came face to face
+with Boone. A drawn revolver was in his hand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You made it,&#8221; he panted, as a man might who
+had been running hard.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; she whispered. &#8220;But they&#8217;ll soon know.
+Let us get away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you hadn&#8217;t come I was going in to kill him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She noticed the hard glitter in his eyes as he
+spoke, the crouched look of the padding tiger ready
+for its kill. The man was torn with hatred and jealousy.</p>
+<p>Already they were moving back through the
+rocks to a dry wash that ran through the valley.
+The bed of this they followed for nearly a mile.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_271' name='page_271'></a>271</span>
+Deflecting from it they pushed across the valley toward
+what appeared to be a sheer rock wall. With
+a twist to the left they swung back of a face of
+rock, turned sharply to the right, and found themselves
+in a fissure Melissy had not at all expected.
+Here ran a little cañon known only to those few
+who rode up and down it on the nefarious business
+of their unwholesome lives.</p>
+<p>Boone spoke harshly, breaking for the first time
+in half an hour his moody silence.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Safe at last. By God, I&#8217;ve evened my score
+with Black MacQueen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>And from the cliff above came the answer&mdash;a
+laugh full of mocking deviltry and malice.</p>
+<p>The Arkansan turned upon Melissy a startled face
+of agony, in which despair and hate stood out of
+a yellow pallor.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Trapped.&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was his last word to her. He swept the girl
+back against the shelter of the wall and ran crouching
+toward the entrance.</p>
+<p>A bullet zipped&mdash;a second&mdash;a third. He stumbled,
+but did not fall. Turning, he came back,
+dodging like a hunted fox. As he passed her, Melissy
+saw that his face was ghastly. He ran with
+a limp.</p>
+<p>A second time she heard the cackle of laughter.
+Guns cracked. Still the doomed man pushed forward.
+He went down, struck in the body, but
+dragged himself to his feet and staggered on.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_272' name='page_272'></a>272</span></p>
+<p>All this time he had seen nobody at whom he
+could fire. Not a shot had come from his revolver.
+He sank behind a rock for shelter. The ping of
+a bullet on the shale beside him brought the tortured
+man to his feet. He looked wildly about him,
+the moon shining on his bare head, and plunged
+up the cañon.</p>
+<p>And now it appeared his unseen tormentors were
+afraid he might escape them. Half a dozen shots
+came close together. Boone sank to the ground,
+writhed like a crushed worm, and twisted over so
+that his face was to the moonlight.</p>
+<p>Melissy ran forward and knelt beside him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;They&#8217;ve got me ... in half a dozen places....
+I&#8217;m going fast.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, no ... no,&#8221; the girl protested.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yep.... Surest thing you know....
+I did you dirt onct, girl. And I&#8217;ve been a bad lot&mdash;a
+wolf, a killer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Never mind that now. You died to save me.
+Always I&#8217;ll remember that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Onct you &#8217;most loved me.... But it
+wouldn&#8217;t have done. I&#8217;m a wolf and you&#8217;re a little
+white lamb. Is Flatray the man?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Thought so. Well, he&#8217;s square. I rigged it up
+on him about the rustling. I was the man you liked
+to &#8217;a&#8217; caught that day years ago.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yep.&#8221; He broke off abruptly. &#8220;I&#8217;m going,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_273' name='page_273'></a>273</span>
+girl.... It&#8217;s gittin&#8217; black. Hold my hand till&mdash;till&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>He gave a shudder and seemed to fall together.
+He was dead.</p>
+<p>Melissy heard the sound of rubble slipping.
+Some one was lowering himself cautiously down the
+side of the cañon. A man dropped to the wash and
+strutted toward her. He kept his eyes fixed on the
+lifeless form, rifle ready for action at an instant&#8217;s
+notice. When he reached his victim he pushed the
+body with his foot, made sure of no trap, and relaxed
+his alertness.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Dead as a hammer.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The man was MacQueen. He turned to Melissy
+and nodded jauntily.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good evening, my dear. Just taking a little
+stroll?&#8221; he asked ironically.</p>
+<p>The girl leaned against the cold wall and covered
+her face with her arm. She was sobbing hysterically.</p>
+<p>The outlaw seized her by the shoulders and
+swung her round. &#8220;Cut that out, girl,&#8221; he ordered
+roughly.</p>
+<p>Melissy caught at her sobs and tried to check
+them.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He got what was coming to him, what he&#8217;s been
+playing for a long time. I warned him, but the fool
+wouldn&#8217;t see it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How did you know?&#8221; she asked, getting out her
+question a word at a time.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_274' name='page_274'></a>274</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Knew it all the time. Rosario brought his note
+to me. I told her to take it to you and keep her
+mouth shut.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You planned his death.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you like to put it that way. Now we&#8217;ll go
+home and forget this foolishness. Jeff, bring the
+horses round to the mouth of the gulch.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy felt suddenly very, very tired and old.
+Her feet dragged like those of an Indian squaw
+following her master. It was as though heavy irons
+weighted her ankles.</p>
+<p>MacQueen helped her to one of the horses Jackson
+brought to the lip of the gulch. Weariness rode
+on her shoulders all the way back. The soul of her
+was crushed beneath the misfortunes that oppressed
+her.</p>
+<p>Long before they reached the ranch houses Rosario
+came running to meet them. Plainly she was
+in great excitement.</p>
+<p>&#8220;The prisoners have escaped,&#8221; she cried to MacQueen.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Escaped. How?&#8221; demanded Black.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Some one must have helped them. I heard a
+window smash and ran out. The young ranger
+and another man were coming out of the last cabin
+with the old man. I could do nothing. They ran.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They had been talking in her own language.
+MacQueen jabbed another question at her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Which way?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Toward the Pass.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_275' name='page_275'></a>275</span></p>
+<p>The outlaw ripped out an oath. &#8220;We&#8217;ve got &#8217;em.
+They can&#8217;t reach it without horses as quick as we
+can with them.&#8221; He whirled upon Melissy.
+&#8220;March into the house, girl. Don&#8217;t you dare make
+a move. I&#8217;m leaving Buck here to watch you.&#8221;
+Sharply he swung to the man Lane. &#8220;Buck, if she
+makes a break to get away, riddle her full of holes.
+You hear me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A minute later, from the place where she lay face
+down on the bed, Melissy heard him and his men
+gallop away.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='VIII_AN_ESCAPE_AND_A_CAPTURE' id='VIII_AN_ESCAPE_AND_A_CAPTURE'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_276' name='page_276'></a>276</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII</h2>
+<h3>AN ESCAPE AND A CAPTURE</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Far up in the mountains, in that section where
+head the Roaring Fork, One Horse Creek,
+and the Del Oro, is a vast tract of wild, untraveled
+country known vaguely as the Bad Lands.
+Somewhere among the thousand and one cañons
+which cleft the huddled hills lay hidden Dead Man&#8217;s
+Cache. Here Black MacQueen retreated on those
+rare occasions when the pursuit grew hot on his
+tracks. So the current report ran.</p>
+<p>Whether the abductors of Simon West were to
+be found in the Cache or at some other nest in the
+almost inaccessible ridges Jack Flatray had no means
+of knowing. His plan was to follow the Roaring
+Fork almost to its headquarters, and there establish
+a base for his hunt. It might take him a week
+to flush his game. It might take a month. He
+clamped his bulldog jaw to see the thing out to a
+finish.</p>
+<p>Jack did not make the mistake of underestimating
+his job. He had followed the trail of bad men
+often enough to know that, in a frontier country,
+no hunt is so desperate as the man-hunt. Such men
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_277' name='page_277'></a>277</span>
+are never easily taken, even if they do not have
+all the advantage in the deadly game of hide and
+seek that is played in the timber and the pockets of
+the hills.</p>
+<p>And here the odds all lay with the hunted. They
+knew every ravine and gulch. Day by day their
+scout looked down from mountain ledges to watch
+the progress of the posse.</p>
+<p>Moreover, Flatray could never tell at what moment
+his covey might be startled from its run. The
+greatest vigilance was necessary to make sure his
+own party would not be ambushed. Yet slowly he
+combed the arroyos and the ridges, drawing always
+closer to that net of gulches in which he knew Dead
+Man&#8217;s Cache must be located.</p>
+<p>During the day the sheriff split his party into
+couples. Bellamy and Alan McKinstra, Farnum
+and Charlie Hymer, young Yarnell and the sheriff.
+So Jack had divided his posse, thus leaving at the
+head of each detail one old and wise head. Each
+night the parties met at the rendezvous appointed
+for the wranglers with the pack horses. From sunrise
+to sunset often no face was seen other than
+those of their own outfit. Sometimes a solitary
+sheep herder was discovered at his post. Always
+the work was hard, discouraging, and apparently
+futile. But the young sheriff never thought of
+quitting.</p>
+<p>The provisions gave out. Jack sent back Hal
+Yarnell and Hegler, the wrangler, to bring in a
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_278' name='page_278'></a>278</span>
+fresh supply. Meanwhile the young sheriff took a
+big chance and scouted alone. He parted from the
+young Arkansan at the head of a gulch which
+twisted snakelike into the mountains; Yarnell and
+the pack outfit to ride to Mammoth, Flatray to dive
+still deeper into the mesh of hills. He had the instinct
+of the scout to stick to the high places as
+much as he could. Whenever it was possible he followed
+ridges, so that no spy could look down upon
+him as he traveled. Sometimes the contour of the
+country drove him into the open or down into hollows.
+But in such places he advanced with the
+swift stealth of an Indian.</p>
+<p>It was on one of these occasions, when he had
+been driven into a dark and narrow cañon, that he
+came to a sudden halt. He was looking at an
+empty tomato can. Swinging down from his saddle,
+he picked it up without dismounting. A little juice
+dripped from the can to the ground.</p>
+<p>Flatray needed no explanation. In Arizona men
+on the range often carry a can of tomatoes instead
+of a water canteen. Nothing alleviates thirst like
+the juice of this acid fruit. Some one had opened
+this can within two hours. Otherwise the sun would
+have dried the moisture.</p>
+<p>Jack took his rifle from its place beneath his legs
+and set it across the saddle in front of him. Very
+carefully he continued on his way, watching every
+rock and bush ahead of him. Here and there in
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_279' name='page_279'></a>279</span>
+the sand were printed the signs of a horse going
+in the same direction as his.</p>
+<p>Up and down, in and out of a maze of crooked
+paths, working by ever so devious a way higher into
+the chain of mountains, Jack followed his leader.
+Now he would lose the hoofmarks; now he would
+pick them up again. And, at the last, they brought
+him to the rim of a basin, a bowl of wooded ravines,
+of twisted ridges, of bleak spurs jutting into late
+pastures almost green. It was now past sunset.
+Dusk was filtering down from the blue peaks. As
+he looked a star peeped out low on the horizon.</p>
+<p>But was it a star? He glimpsed it between trees.
+The conviction grew on him that what he saw was
+the light of a lamp. A tangle of rough country
+lay between him and that beacon, but there before
+him lay his destination. At last he had found his
+way into Dead Man&#8217;s Cache.</p>
+<p>The sheriff lost no time, for he knew that if he
+should get lost in the darkness on one of these forest
+slopes he might wander all night. A rough trail
+led him down into the basin. Now he would lose
+sight of the light. Half an hour later, pushing to
+the summit of a hill, he might find it. After a time
+there twinkled a second beside the first. He was
+getting close to a settlement of some kind.</p>
+<p>Below him in the darkness lay a stretch of open
+meadow rising to the wooded foothills. Behind
+these a wall of rugged mountains encircled the valley
+like a gigantic crooked arm. Already he could
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_280' name='page_280'></a>280</span>
+make out faintly the outlines of the huddled
+buildings.</p>
+<p>Slipping from his horse, Jack went forward cautiously
+on foot. He was still a hundred yards from
+the nearest hut when dogs bayed warning of his
+approach. He waited, rifle in hand. No sign of
+human life showed except the two lights shining
+from as many windows. Flatray counted four other
+cabins as dark as Egypt.</p>
+<p>Very slowly he crept forward, always with one
+eye to his retreat. Why did nobody answer the
+barking of the dogs? Was he being watched all
+the time? But how could he be, since he was completely
+cloaked in darkness?</p>
+<p>So at last he came to the nearest cabin, crept to
+the window, and looked in. A man lay on a bed.
+His hands and feet were securely tied and a second
+rope wound round so as to bind him to the bunk.</p>
+<p>Flatray tapped softly on a pane. Instantly the
+head of the bound man slewed round.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Friend?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The prisoner asked it ever so gently, but the sheriff
+heard.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The top part of the window is open. You can
+crawl over, I reckon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack climbed on the sill and from it through the
+window. Almost before he reached the floor his
+knife was out and he was slashing at the ropes.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Better put the light out, pardner,&#8221; suggested the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_281' name='page_281'></a>281</span>
+man he was freeing, and the officer noticed that
+there was no tremor in the cool, steady voice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s right. We&#8217;d make a fine mark through
+the window.&#8221;</p>
+<p>And the light went out.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m Bucky O&#8217;Connor. Who are you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jack Flatray.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They spoke together in whispers. Though both
+were keyed to the highest pitch of excitement they
+were as steady as eight-day clocks. O&#8217;Connor
+stretched his limbs, flexing them this way and that,
+so that he might have perfect control of them. He
+worked especially over the forearm and fingers of
+his right arm.</p>
+<p>Flatray handed him a revolver.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Whenever you&#8217;re ready, Lieutenant.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. It&#8217;s the cabin next to this.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They climbed out of the window noiselessly and
+crept to the next hut. The door was locked, the
+window closed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ve got to smash the window. Nothing else
+for it,&#8221; Flatray whispered.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Looks like it. That means we&#8217;ll have to shoot
+our way out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>With the butt of his rifle the sheriff shattered the
+woodwork of the window, driving the whole frame
+into the room.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What is it?&#8221; a frightened voice demanded.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Friends, Mr. West. Just a minute.&#8221;</p>
+<p>It took them scarce longer than that to free him
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_282' name='page_282'></a>282</span>
+and to get him into the open. A Mexican woman
+came screaming out of an adjoining cabin.</p>
+<p>The young men caught each an arm of the capitalist
+and hurried him forward.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hell&#8217;ll be popping in a minute,&#8221; Flatray explained.</p>
+<p>But they reached the shelter of the underbrush
+without a shot having been fired. Nor had a single
+man appeared to dispute their escape.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Looks like most of the family is away from
+home to-night,&#8221; Bucky hazarded.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Maybe so, but they&#8217;re liable to drop in any minute.
+We&#8217;ll keep covering ground.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They circled round toward the sheriff&#8217;s horse.
+As soon as they reached it West, still stiff from
+want of circulation in his cramped limbs, was
+boosted into the saddle.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s going to be a good deal of a guess to find
+our way out of the Cache,&#8221; Jack explained. &#8220;Even
+in the daytime it would take a &#8217;Pache, but at night&mdash;well,
+here&#8217;s hoping the luck&#8217;s good.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They found it not so good as they had hoped.
+For hours they wandered in mesquit, dragged themselves
+through cactus, crossed washes, and climbed
+hills.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This will never do. We&#8217;d better give it up till
+daylight. We&#8217;re not getting anywhere,&#8221; the sheriff
+suggested.</p>
+<p>They did as he advised. As soon as a faint gray
+sifted into the sky they were on the move again.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_283' name='page_283'></a>283</span>
+But whichever way they climbed it was always to
+come up against steep cliffs too precipitous to be
+scaled.</p>
+<p>The ranger officer pointed to a notch beyond a
+cowbacked hill. &#8220;I wouldn&#8217;t be sure, but it looks
+like that was the way they brought me into the
+Cache. I could tell if I were up there. What&#8217;s the
+matter with my going ahead and settling the thing?
+If I&#8217;m right I&#8217;ll come back and let you know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack looked at West. The railroad man was
+tired and drawn. He was not used to galloping
+over the hills all night.</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. We&#8217;ll be here when you come back,&#8221;
+Flatray said, and flung himself on the ground.</p>
+<p>West followed his example.</p>
+<p>It must have been half an hour later that Flatray
+heard a twig snap under an approaching foot. He
+had been scanning the valley with his glasses, having
+given West instructions to keep a lookout in
+the rear. He swung his head round sharply, and
+with it his rifle.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re covered, you fool,&#8221; cried the man who
+was strutting toward them.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Stop there. Not another step,&#8221; Flatray called
+sharply.</p>
+<p>The man stopped, his rifle half raised. &#8220;We&#8217;ve
+got you on every side, man.&#8221; He lifted his voice.
+&#8220;Jeff&mdash;Hank&mdash;Steve! Let him know you&#8217;re alive.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Three guns cracked and kicked up the dust close
+to the sheriff.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_284' name='page_284'></a>284</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you want with us?&#8221; Flatray asked,
+sparring for time.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Drop your gun. If you don&#8217;t we&#8217;ll riddle you
+both.&#8221;</p>
+<p>West spoke to Jack promptly. &#8220;Do as he says.
+It&#8217;s MacQueen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Flatray hesitated. He could kill MacQueen probably,
+but almost certainly he and West would pay
+the penalty. He reluctantly put his rifle down.
+&#8220;All right. It&#8217;s your call.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where&#8217;s O&#8217;Connor?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The sheriff looked straight at him. &#8220;Haven&#8217;t
+you enough of us for one gather?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The outlaws were closing in on them cautiously.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not without that smart man hunter. Where is
+he?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The devil you don&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We separated early this morning&mdash;thought it
+would give us a better chance for a getaway.&#8221;
+Jack gave a sudden exclamation of surprise. &#8220;So
+it was Black MacQueen himself who posed as O&#8217;Connor
+down at Mesa.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Guessed it right, my friend. And I&#8217;ll tell you
+one thing: you&#8217;ve made the mistake of your life
+butting into Dead Man&#8217;s Cache. Your missing
+friend O&#8217;Connor was due to hand in his checks to-day.
+Since you&#8217;ve taken his place it will be you
+that crosses the divide, Mr. Sheriff. You&#8217;d better
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_285' name='page_285'></a>285</span>
+tell where he is, for if we don&#8217;t get Mr. Bucky it
+will be God help J. Flatray.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The dapper little villain exuded a smug, complacent
+cruelty. It was no use for the sheriff to remind
+himself that such things weren&#8217;t done nowadays,
+that the times of Geronimo and the Apache Kid
+were past forever. Black MacQueen would go the
+limit in deviltry if he set his mind to it.</p>
+<p>Yet Flatray answered easily, without any perceptible
+hesitation: &#8220;I reckon I&#8217;ll play my hand and
+let Bucky play his.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Suits me if it does you. Jeff, collect that hardware.
+Now, while you boys beat up the hills for
+O&#8217;Connor, I&#8217;ll trail back to camp with these two
+all-night picnickers.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='IX_A_BARGAIN' id='IX_A_BARGAIN'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_286' name='page_286'></a>286</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER IX</h2>
+<h3>A BARGAIN</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>Melissy saw the two prisoners brought in,
+though she could not tell at that distance
+who they were. Her watch told her that
+it was four-thirty. She had slept scarcely at all
+during the night, but now she lay down on the bed
+in her clothes.</p>
+<p>The next she knew, Rosario was calling her to
+get up for breakfast. The girl dressed and followed
+Rosario to the adjoining cabin. MacQueen
+was not there, and Melissy ate alone. She was given
+to understand that she might walk up and down in
+front of the houses for a few minutes after breakfast.
+Naturally she made the most of the little liberty
+allowed her.</p>
+<p>The old squaw Sit-in-the-Sun squatted in front
+of the last hut, her back against the log wall. The
+man called Buck sat yawning on a rock a few yards
+away. What struck Melissy as strange was that
+the squaw was figuring on the back of an old envelope
+with the stub of a lead pencil.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_287' name='page_287'></a>287</span></p>
+<p>The young woman walked leisurely past the cabin
+for perhaps a dozen yards.</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;ll be about far enough. You don&#8217;t want
+to tire yourself, Miss Lee,&#8221; Buck Lane called, with
+a grin.</p>
+<p>Melissy stopped, stood looking at the mountains
+for a few minutes, and turned back. Sit-in-the-Sun
+looked quickly at her, and at the same moment
+she tore the paper in two and her fingers opened to
+release one piece of the envelope upon which she
+had been writing. A puff of wind carried it almost
+directly in front of the girl. Lane was still yawning
+sleepily, his gaze directed toward the spot where
+he presently expected Rosario to step out and call
+him to breakfast. Melissy dropped her handkerchief,
+stooped to pick it up, and gathered at the same
+time in a crumpled heap into her hand the fragment
+of an envelope. Without another glance at the
+squaw, the young woman kept on her way, sauntered
+to the porch, and lingered there as if in doubt.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m tired,&#8221; she announced to Rosario, and
+turned to her rooms.</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Si, señorita,</i>&#8221; answered her attendant quietly.</p>
+<p>Once inside, Melissy lay down on her bed, with
+her back to the window, and smoothed out the torn
+envelope. On one side were some disjointed memoranda
+which she did not understand.</p>
+<table summary='poetry' style='margin:0 auto; '><tr><td>
+<p  style='margin: 0 0 0 0.0em;'>K. C. &amp; T. 93</p>
+<p  style='margin: 0 0 0 0.0em;'>D. &amp; R. B. 87</p>
+<p  style='margin: 0 0 0 0.0em;'>Float $10,000,000 Cortes for extension.</p>
+</td></tr></table>
+
+<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_288' name='page_288'></a>288</span></div>
+<p>That was all, but certainly a strange puzzle for
+a Navajo squaw to set her.</p>
+<p>She turned the paper over, to find the other side
+close-packed with writing.</p>
+<div class='blockquot'>
+<p>Miss Lee:</p>
+<p>In the last cabin but one is a prisoner,
+your friend Sheriff Flatray. He is to be
+shot in an hour. I have offered any sum
+for his life and been refused. For God&#8217;s
+sake save him somehow.</p>
+<div class='ra'>
+<p>Simon West.</p>
+</div>
+
+</div>
+<p>Jack Flatray here, and about to be murdered!
+The thing was incredible. And yet&mdash;and yet&mdash;&mdash; Was
+it so impossible, after all? Some one had
+broken into the Cache and released the prisoners.
+Who more likely than Jack to have done this? And
+later they had captured him and condemned him
+for what he had done.</p>
+<p>Melissy reconstructed the scene in a flash. The
+Indian squaw was West. He had been rigged up
+in that paraphernalia to deceive any chance mountaineer
+who might drop into the valley by accident.</p>
+<p>No doubt, when he first saw Melissy, the railroad
+magnate had been passing his time in making notes
+about his plans for the system he controlled. But
+when he had caught sight of her, he had written
+the note, under the very eyes of the guard, had torn
+the envelope as if it were of no importance, and
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_289' name='page_289'></a>289</span>
+tossed the pieces away. He had taken the thousandth
+chance that his note might fall into the hands
+of the person to whom it was directed.</p>
+<p>All this she understood without giving it conscious
+thought. For her whole mind was filled with
+the horror of what she had learned. Jack Flatray,
+the man she loved, was to be killed. He was to be
+shot down in an hour.</p>
+<p>With the thought, she was at her door&mdash;only to
+find that it had been quietly locked while she lay
+on the bed. No doubt they had meant to keep her
+a close prisoner until the thing they were about to
+do was finished. She beat upon it, called to Rosario
+to let her out, wrung her hands in her desperation.
+Then she remembered the window. It was a cheap
+and flimsy case, and had been jammed so that her
+strength was not sufficient to raise it.</p>
+<p>Her eye searched the room for a weapon, and
+found an Indian tom-tom club. With this she
+smashed the panes and beat down the wooden cross
+bars of the sash. Agile as a forest fawn, she slipped
+through the opening she had made and ran toward
+the far cabin.</p>
+<p>A group of men surrounded the door; and, as
+she drew near, it opened to show three central figures.
+MacQueen was one, Rosario Chaves a second;
+but the most conspicuous was a bareheaded
+young man, with his hands tied behind him. He
+was going to his death, but a glance was enough
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_290' name='page_290'></a>290</span>
+to show that he went unconquered and unconquerable.
+His step did not drag. There was a faint,
+grave smile on his lips; and in his eye was the dynamic
+spark that proclaimed him still master of his
+fate. The woolen shirt had been unbuttoned and
+pulled back to make way for the rope that lay
+loosely about his neck, so that she could not miss
+the well-muscled slope of his fine shoulders, or the
+gallant set of the small head upon the brown
+throat.</p>
+<p>The man who first caught sight of Melissy spoke
+in a low voice to his chief. MacQueen turned his
+head sharply to see her, took a dozen steps toward
+her, then upbraided the Mexican woman, who had
+run out after Melissy.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I told you to lock her door&mdash;to make sure of it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Si, señor</i>&mdash;I did.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then how&mdash;&mdash;&#8221; He stopped, and looked to
+Miss Lee for an explanation.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I broke the window.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The outlaw noticed then that her hand was bleeding.
+&#8220;Broke the window! Why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I had to get out! I had to stop you!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He attempted no denial of what he was about to
+do. &#8220;How did you know? Did Rosario tell you?&#8221;
+he asked curtly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;no! I found out&mdash;just by chance.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What chance?&#8221; He was plainly disconcerted
+that she had come to interfere, and as plainly eager
+to punish the person who had disclosed to her this
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_291' name='page_291'></a>291</span>
+thing, which he would have liked to do quietly,
+without her knowledge.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Never mind that. Nobody is to blame. Say I
+overheard a sentence. Thank God I did, and I am
+in time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>There was no avoiding it now. He had to fight
+it out with her. &#8220;In time for what?&#8221; he wanted to
+know, his eyes narrowing to vicious pin points.</p>
+<p>&#8220;To save him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;no! He must die,&#8221; cried the Mexican
+woman.</p>
+<p>Melissy was amazed at her vehemence, at the passion
+of hate that trembled in the voice of the old
+woman.</p>
+<p>MacQueen nodded. &#8220;It is out of my hands, you
+see. He has been condemned.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But why?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tell her, Rosario.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The woman poured her story forth fluently in
+the native tongue. O&#8217;Connor had killed her son&mdash;did
+not deny that he had done it. And just because
+Tony had tried to escape. This man had freed the
+ranger. Very well. He should take O&#8217;Connor&#8217;s
+place. Let him die the death. A life for a life.
+Was that not fair?</p>
+<p>Flatray turned his head and caught sight of Melissy.
+A startled cry died on his lips.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jack!&#8221; She held out both hands to him as she
+ran toward him.</p>
+<p>The sheriff took her in his arms to console her.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_292' name='page_292'></a>292</span>
+For the girl&#8217;s face was working in a stress of emotion.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, I&#8217;m in time&mdash;I&#8217;m in time. Thank God I&#8217;m
+in time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack waited a moment to steady his voice. &#8220;How
+came you here, Melissy?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He brought me&mdash;Black MacQueen. I hated
+him for it, but now I&#8217;m glad&mdash;so glad&mdash;because I
+can save you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Jack winced. He looked over her shoulder at
+MacQueen, taking it all in with an air of pleasant
+politeness. And one look was enough to tell him
+that there was no hope for him. The outlaw had
+the complacent manner of a cat which has just got
+at the cream. That Melissy loved him would be
+an additional reason for wiping him off the map.
+And in that instant a fierce joy leaped up in Flatray
+and surged through him, an emotion stronger
+than the fear of death. She loved him. MacQueen
+could not take that away from him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s all a mistake,&#8221; Melissy went on eagerly.
+&#8220;Of course they can&#8217;t blame you for what Lieutenant
+O&#8217;Connor did. It is absurd&mdash;ridiculous.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Certainly.&#8221; MacQueen tugged at his little black
+mustache and kept his black eyes on her constantly.
+&#8220;That&#8217;s not what we&#8217;re blaming him for. The indictment
+against your friend is that he interfered
+when it wasn&#8217;t his business.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But it was his business. Don&#8217;t you know he&#8217;s
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_293' name='page_293'></a>293</span>
+sheriff? He had to do it.&#8221; Melissy turned to the
+outlaw impetuously.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So. And I have to play my hand out, too. It
+wipes out Mr. Flatray. Sorry, but business is business.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&mdash;but&mdash;&mdash;&#8221; Melissy grew pale as the icy
+fear gripped her heart that the man meant to go
+on with the crime. &#8220;Don&#8217;t you see? He&#8217;s the
+sheriff?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And I never did love sheriffs,&#8221; drawled MacQueen.</p>
+<p>The girl repeated herself helplessly. &#8220;It was his
+sworn duty. That was how he looked at it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>A ghost of an ironic smile flitted across the face
+of the outlaw chief. &#8220;Rosario&#8217;s sworn duty is to
+avenge her son&#8217;s death. That is how she looks at it.
+The rest of us swore the oath with her.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor had the law back of
+him. This is murder!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not at all. It is the law of the valley&mdash;a life
+for a life.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&mdash;&mdash; Oh, no&mdash;no&mdash;no!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The finality of it appalled her. She felt as if she
+were butting her head against a stone wall. She
+knew that argument and entreaty were of no avail,
+yet she desperately besought first one and then another
+of them to save the prisoner. Each in turn
+shook his head. She could see that none of them,
+save Rosario, bore him a grudge; yet none would
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_294' name='page_294'></a>294</span>
+move to break the valley oath. At the last, she was
+through with her promises and her prayers. She
+had spent them all, and had come up against the
+wall of blank despair.</p>
+<p>Then Jack&#8217;s grave smile thanked her. &#8220;You&#8217;ve
+done what you could, Melissy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She clung to him wildly. &#8220;Oh, no&mdash;no! I can&#8217;t
+let you go, Jack. I can&#8217;t. I can&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon it&#8217;s got to be, dear,&#8221; he told her gently.</p>
+<p>But her breaking heart could not stand that.
+There must somehow be a way to save him. She
+cast about desperately for one, and had not found
+it when she begged the outlaw chief to see her
+alone.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No use.&#8221; He shook his head.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But just for five minutes! That can&#8217;t do any
+harm, can it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And no good, either.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yet I ask it. You might do that much for
+me,&#8221; she pleaded.</p>
+<p>Her despair had moved him; for he was human,
+after all. That he was troubled about it annoyed
+him a good deal. Her arrival on the scene had
+made things unpleasant for everybody. Ungraciously
+he assented, as the easiest way out of the
+difficulty.</p>
+<p>The two moved off to the corral. It was perhaps
+thirty yards distant, and they reached it before
+either of them spoke. She was the first to break
+the silence.</p>
+<div class='figcenter'>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_295' name='page_295'></a>295</span>
+<img src='images/illus-294.jpg' alt='' title='' style='width: 351px; height: 550px;' /><br />
+<p class='caption' style='margin: 0 auto; text-align:center;width: 351px;'>
+&#8220;OH, NO&mdash;NO! I CAN&#8217;T LET YOU GO, JACK. I CAN&#8217;T. I CAN&#8217;T.&#8221; <i>Page 294.</i><br />
+</p>
+</div>
+
+<div><span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_296' name='page_296'></a>296</span></div>
+<p>&#8220;You won&#8217;t do this dreadful thing&mdash;surely, you
+won&#8217;t do it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No use saying another word about it. I told
+you that,&#8221; he answered doggedly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But&mdash;&mdash; Oh, don&#8217;t you see? It&#8217;s one of those
+things no white man can do. Once it&#8217;s done, you
+have put the bars up against decency for the rest
+of your life.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon I&#8217;ll have to risk that&mdash;and down in
+your heart you don&#8217;t believe it, because you think
+I&#8217;ve had the bars up for years.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She had come to an impasse already. She tried
+another turn. &#8220;And you said you cared for me!
+Yet you are willing to make me unhappy for the
+rest of my life.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why, no! I&#8217;m willing to make you happy.
+There&#8217;s fish in the sea just as good as any that
+ever were caught,&#8221; he smirked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;But it would help you to free him. Don&#8217;t you
+see? It&#8217;s your chance. You can begin again, now.
+You can make him your friend.&#8221;</p>
+<p>His eyes were hard and grim. &#8220;I don&#8217;t want
+him for a friend, and you&#8217;re dead wrong if you
+think I could make this a lever to square myself
+with the law. I couldn&#8217;t. He wouldn&#8217;t let me, for
+one thing&mdash;he isn&#8217;t that kind.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you said you cared for me!&#8221; she repeated
+helplessly, wringing her hands in her despair. &#8220;But
+at the first chance you fail me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Can&#8217;t you see it isn&#8217;t a personal matter? I&#8217;ve
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_297' name='page_297'></a>297</span>
+got nothing against him&mdash;nothing to speak of. I&#8217;d
+give him to you, if I could. But it&#8217;s not my say-so.
+The thing is out of my hands.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You could save him, if you set yourself to.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sure, I could&mdash;if I would pay the price. But
+I won&#8217;t pay.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s it. You would have to give Rosario
+something&mdash;make some concession,&#8221; she said
+eagerly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And I&#8217;m not willing to pay the price,&#8221; he told
+her. &#8220;His life&#8217;s forfeit. Hasn&#8217;t he been hunting
+us for a week?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let me pay it,&#8221; she cried. &#8220;I have money in
+my own right&mdash;seven thousand dollars. I&#8217;ll give it
+all to save him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He shook his head. &#8220;No use. We&#8217;ve turned
+down a big offer from West. Your seven thousand
+isn&#8217;t a drop in the bucket.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She beat her hands together wildly. &#8220;There
+must be some way to save him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The outlaw was looking at her with narrowed
+eyes. He saw a way, and was working it out in
+his mind. &#8220;You&#8217;re willing to pay, are you?&#8221; he
+asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes&mdash;yes! All I have.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He put his arms akimbo on the corral fence, and
+looked long at her. &#8220;Suppose the price can&#8217;t be
+paid in money, Miss Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you mean?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Money isn&#8217;t the only thing in this world. There
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_298' name='page_298'></a>298</span>
+are lots of things it won&#8217;t buy that other things
+will,&#8221; he said slowly.</p>
+<p>She groped for his meaning, her wide eyes fixed
+on his, and still did not find it. &#8220;Be plainer, please.
+What can I do to save him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You might marry me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Never!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just as you say. You were looking for a way,
+and I suggested one. Anyhow, you&#8217;re mine.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I won&#8217;t do it!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You wanted me to pay the price; but you don&#8217;t
+want to pay yourself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I couldn&#8217;t do it. It would be horrible!&#8221; But
+she knew she could and must.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why couldn&#8217;t you? I&#8217;m ready to cut loose from
+this way of living. When I pull off this one big
+thing, I&#8217;ll quit. We&#8217;ll go somewhere and begin life
+again. You said I could. Well, I will. You&#8217;ll help
+me to keep straight. It won&#8217;t be only his life you
+are saving. It will be mine, too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;I don&#8217;t love you! How could a girl marry
+a man she didn&#8217;t care for and didn&#8217;t respect?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll make you do both before long. I&#8217;m the
+kind of man women love.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re the kind I hate,&#8221; she flashed bitterly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll risk your hate, my dear,&#8221; he laughed easily.</p>
+<p>She did not look at him. Her eyes were on the
+horizon line, where sky and pine tops met. He knew
+that she was fighting it out to a decision, and he did
+not speak again.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_299' name='page_299'></a>299</span></p>
+<p>After all, she was only a girl. Right and wrong
+were inextricably mixed in her mind. It was not
+right to marry this man. It was not right to let
+the sheriff die while she could save him. She was
+generous to the core. But there was something
+deeper than generosity. Her banked love for Flatray
+flooded her in a great cry of protest against his
+death. She loved him. She loved him. Much as
+she detested this man, revolting as she found the
+thought of being linked to him, the impulse to sacrifice
+herself was the stronger feeling of the two.
+Deep in her heart she knew that she could not let
+Jack go to his death so long as it was possible to
+prevent it.</p>
+<p>Her grave eyes came back to MacQueen. &#8220;I&#8217;ll
+have to tell you one thing&mdash;I&#8217;ll hate you worse than
+ever after this. Don&#8217;t think I&#8217;ll ever change my
+mind about that. I won&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He twirled his little mustache complacently.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll have to risk that, as I said.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll take me to Mesa to-day. As soon as we
+get there a justice of the peace will marry us. From
+his house we&#8217;ll go directly to father&#8217;s. You won&#8217;t
+lie to me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. I&#8217;ll play out the game square, if you do.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And after we&#8217;re married, what then?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You may stay at home until I get this ransom
+business settled. Then we&#8217;ll go to Sonora.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How do you know I&#8217;ll go?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll trust you.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_300' name='page_300'></a>300</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Then it&#8217;s a bargain.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Without another word, they turned back to rejoin
+the group by the cabin. Before they had gone
+a dozen steps she stopped.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What about Mr. Flatray? You will free him,
+of course.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. I&#8217;ll take him right out due north of here,
+about four miles. He&#8217;ll be blindfolded. There
+we&#8217;ll leave him, with instructions how to reach
+Mesa.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll go with you,&#8221; she announced promptly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What for?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;To make sure that you do let him go&mdash;alive.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He shrugged his shoulders. &#8220;All right. I told
+you I was going to play fair. I haven&#8217;t many good
+points, but that is one of them. I don&#8217;t give my
+word and then break it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Still, I&#8217;ll go.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He laughed angrily. &#8220;That&#8217;s your privilege.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She turned on him passionately. &#8220;You&#8217;ve got no
+right to resent it, though I don&#8217;t care a jackstraw
+whether you do or not. I&#8217;m not going into this because
+I want to, but to save this man from the den
+of wolves into which he has fallen. If you knew
+how I despise and hate you, how my whole soul
+loathes you, maybe you wouldn&#8217;t be so eager to go
+on with it! You&#8217;ll get nothing out of this but the
+pleasure of torturing a girl who can&#8217;t defend herself.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll see about that,&#8221; he answered doggedly.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='X_THE_PRICE' id='X_THE_PRICE'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_301' name='page_301'></a>301</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER X</h2>
+<h3>THE PRICE</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>MacQueen lost no time in announcing his
+new program.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Boys, the hanging&#8217;s off. I&#8217;ve decided
+to accept West&#8217;s offer for Flatray&#8217;s life. It&#8217;s too
+good to turn down.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;That&#8217;s what I told you all the time,&#8221; growled
+Buck.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I&#8217;m telling <i>you</i> now. The money will be
+divided equally among you, except that Rosario will
+get my share as well as hers.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Rosario Chaves broke into fierce protests. Finding
+these unheeded, she cursed the outlaws furiously
+and threatened vengeance upon them. She did not
+want money; she wanted this man&#8217;s life. The men
+accepted this as a matter of course, and paid little
+attention to the ravings of the old woman.</p>
+<p>At the first news of his reprieve, Jack saw things
+through a haze for a moment. But he neither broke
+down nor showed undue exultation.</p>
+<p>His first thought was of relief, of profound comfort;
+his next of wonder and suspicion. How under
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_302' name='page_302'></a>302</span>
+heaven had Melissy won his life for him? He
+looked quickly at her, but the eyes of the girl did
+not meet his.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Melissy.&#8221; Flatray spoke very gently, but something
+in the way he spoke compelled the young
+woman to meet his eyes.</p>
+<p>Almost instantly the long lashes went down to
+her pale cheeks again.</p>
+<p>MacQueen cut in suavely: &#8220;I reckon this is the
+time for announcements. Boys, Miss Lee has promised
+to marry me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Before the stir which this produced had died
+away, Flatray flashed a question: &#8220;In exchange for
+my life?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The chief of the outlaws looked at him with insolence
+smoldering in his black eyes. &#8220;Now, I wonder
+when you ever will learn to mind your own
+business, sheriff! Nobody invited you to sit into
+this game.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;This <i>is</i> my business. I make it mine. Give me
+a straight answer, Melissy. Am I right? Is it for
+my life?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221; Her voice was so low he could hardly
+hear it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then I won&#8217;t have it! The thing is infamous.
+I can&#8217;t hide behind the skirts of a girl, least of all
+you. I can die, but, by God, I&#8217;ll keep my self-respect.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s all arranged,&#8221; Melissy answered in a
+whisper.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_303' name='page_303'></a>303</span></p>
+<p>Flatray laughed harshly. &#8220;I guess not. You
+can&#8217;t pay my debts by giving yourself to life-long
+misery.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re right pessimistic, sheriff,&#8221; sneered MacQueen.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you take me for? I won&#8217;t have it.
+I won&#8217;t have it.&#8221; The sheriff&#8217;s voice was rough
+and hoarse. &#8220;I&#8217;d rather die fifty times.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s not up to you to choose, as it happens,&#8221; the
+leader of the outlaws suggested suavely.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You villain! You damned white-livered coward!&#8221;
+The look of the young sheriff scorched.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Speaks right out in meeting, don&#8217;t he?&#8221; grinned
+Lane.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I know what he is, Jack,&#8221; Melissy cried. &#8220;And
+he knows I think he&#8217;s the lowest thing that crawls.
+But I&#8217;ve got to save you. Don&#8217;t you see, I&#8217;ve got
+to do it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, I don&#8217;t see it,&#8221; Flatray answered hotly.
+&#8220;I can take what&#8217;s coming to me, can&#8217;t I? But if
+you save my life that way you make me as low a
+thing as he is. I say I&#8217;ll not have it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy could stand it no longer. She began to
+sob. &#8220;I&mdash;I&mdash;Oh, Jack, I&#8217;ve got to do it. Don&#8217;t
+you see? Don&#8217;t you see? <i>It won&#8217;t make any difference
+with me if I don&#8217;t.</i> No difference&mdash;except
+that you&#8217;ll be&mdash;dead.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She was in his embrace, her arms around his
+neck, whispering the horrible truth in his ear
+brokenly. And as he felt her dear young fragrance
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_304' name='page_304'></a>304</span>
+of hair in his nostrils, the warm, soft litheness of
+her body against his, the rage and terror in him
+flooded his veins. Could such things be? Was it
+possible a man like that could live? Not if he could
+help it.</p>
+<p>Gently he unfastened her arms from his neck.
+MacQueen was standing a dozen feet away, his
+hands behind his back and his legs wide apart. As
+Flatray swung around the outlaw read a warning
+in the blazing eyes. Just as Jack tore loose from
+his guards MacQueen reached for his revolver.</p>
+<p>The gun flashed. A red hot blaze scorched
+through Jack&#8217;s arm. Next instant MacQueen lay
+flat on his back, the sheriff&#8217;s fingers tight around
+his throat. If he could have had five seconds more
+the man&#8217;s neck would have been broken. But they
+dragged him away, fighting like a wild cat. They
+flung him down and tied his hands behind him.</p>
+<p>Melissy caught a glimpse of his bleeding arm,
+his torn and dusty face, the appalling ferocity of
+the men who were hammering him into the ground.
+She took a step forward blindly. The mountains
+in front of her tilted into the sky. She moved forward
+another step, then stumbled and went down.
+She had fainted.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just as well,&#8221; MacQueen nodded. &#8220;Here, Rosario,
+look after the young lady. Lift Flatray to
+a horse, boys, after you&#8217;ve blindfolded him. Good
+enough. Oh, and one thing more, Flatray. You&#8217;re
+covered by a rifle. If you lift a hand to slip that
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_305' name='page_305'></a>305</span>
+handkerchief from your eyes, you&#8217;re giving the signal
+for Jeff to turn loose at you. We&#8217;re going to
+take you away, but we don&#8217;t aim to let you out of
+the Cache for a few days yet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you mean?&#8221;</p>
+<p>MacQueen jeered at his prisoner openly. &#8220;I
+mean, Mr. Sheriff, that you&#8217;ll stay with us till the
+girl does as she has promised. Understand?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I think so, you hellhound. You&#8217;re going to hold
+me against her so that she can&#8217;t change her mind.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Exactly. So that she can&#8217;t rue back. You&#8217;ve
+guessed it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They rode for hours, but in what direction it was
+impossible for Flatray to guess. He could tell when
+they were ascending, when dropping down hill, but
+in a country so rugged this meant nothing.</p>
+<p>When at last he dismounted and the kerchief was
+taken from his eyes he found himself in a little
+pocket of the hills in front of an old log cabin.
+Jeff stayed with him. The others rode away. But
+not till they had him safely tied to a heavy table
+leg within the hut.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='XI_SQUIRE_LATIMER_TAKES_A_HAND' id='XI_SQUIRE_LATIMER_TAKES_A_HAND'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_306' name='page_306'></a>306</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER XI</h2>
+<h3>SQUIRE LATIMER TAKES A HAND</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re to make ready for a trip to town,
+<i>señorita</i>.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;When?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;At once,&#8221; Rosario answered. &#8220;By orders of
+<i>Señor</i> MacQueen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then he is back?&#8221; the girl flashed.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Just back.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tell him I want to see him&mdash;immediately.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I am to take you to him as soon as you are
+ready to ride.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, very well.&#8221;</p>
+<p>In a very few minutes the young woman was
+ready. Rosario led her to the cabin in front of
+which she had seen the old Indian squaw. In it
+were seated Simon West and Black MacQueen.
+Both of them rose at her entrance.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Please take a chair, Miss Lee. We have some
+business to talk over,&#8221; the outlaw suggested.</p>
+<p>Melissy looked straight at him, her lips shut tight.
+&#8220;What have you done with Jack Flatray?&#8221; she presently
+demanded.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_307' name='page_307'></a>307</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Left him to find his way back to his friends.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You didn&#8217;t hurt him ... any more?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you left him alone, wounded as he was.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We fixed up his wound,&#8221; lied MacQueen.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Was it very bad?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;A scratch. I had to do it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You needn&#8217;t apologize to me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not apologizing, you little wild-cat.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you want with me? Why did you
+send for me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;re going to Mesa to see a parson. But before
+we start there&#8217;s some business to fix up. Mr.
+West and I will need your help to fix up the negotiations
+for his release.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My help!&#8221; She looked at him in surprise.
+&#8220;How can I help?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve laid my demands before his friends. They&#8217;ll
+come through with the money, sure. But I want
+them to understand the conditions right plainly, so
+there won&#8217;t be any mistake. What they have got
+to get soaked into their heads is that, if they do
+make any mistakes, they will not see Simon West
+again alive. You put that up to them strong.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not going to be your agent in robbing
+people of their money!&#8221; she told him swiftly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You don&#8217;t understand. Mr. West wants you
+to do it. He wants you to explain the facts to his
+friends, so they won&#8217;t act rash and get off wrong
+foot first.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_308' name='page_308'></a>308</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh! If Mr. West wishes it,&#8221; she conceded.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I do wish it,&#8221; the great man added.</p>
+<p>Though his face and hands were still stained
+with the dye that had been used on them, the railroad
+builder was now dressed in his own clothes.
+The girl thought that he looked haggard and anxious,
+and she was sure that her presence brought
+him relief. In his own way he was an indomitable
+fighter, but his experience had not included anything
+of this nature.</p>
+<p>Jack Flatray could look at death level-eyed, and
+with an even pulse, because for him it was all in
+the day&#8217;s work; but the prospect of it shook West&#8217;s
+high-strung nerves. Nevertheless, he took command
+of the explanations, because it had been his
+custom for years to lead.</p>
+<p>MacQueen, his sardonic smile in play, sat back
+and let West do most of the talking. Both men
+were working for the same end&mdash;to get the ransom
+paid as soon as possible&mdash;and the multimillionaire
+released; and the outlaw realized that Melissy
+would coöperate the more heartily if she felt she
+were working for West and not for himself.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This is Tuesday, Miss Lee. You will reach
+Mesa some time to-night. My friends ought to be
+on the ground already. I want you and your father
+to get in touch with them right away, and arrange
+the details along the line laid down by Mr. MacQueen.
+In case they agree to everything and understand
+fully, have the Stars and Stripes flying
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_309' name='page_309'></a>309</span>
+from your house all day to-morrow as a signal.
+Don&#8217;t on any account omit this&mdash;because, if you do,
+my captors will have to hold me longer, pending
+further negotiations. I have written a letter to Mr.
+Lucas, exonerating you completely, Miss Lee; and
+I have ordered him to comply with all these demands
+without parley.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Our proposition seems to Mr. West very reasonable
+and fair,&#8221; grinned MacQueen impishly,
+paring his finger nails.</p>
+<p>&#8220;At any rate, I think that my life is worth to
+this country a good deal more than three hundred
+thousand dollars,&#8221; West corrected.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Besides being worth something to Simon West,&#8221;
+the outlaw added carelessly.</p>
+<p>West plunged into the details of delivering the
+money. Once or twice the other man corrected him
+or amplified some statement. In order that there
+could be no mistake, a map of Sweetwater Cañon
+was handed to Melissy to be used by the man who
+would bring the money to the rendezvous at the
+Devil&#8217;s Causeway.</p>
+<p>When it came to saying good-bye, the old man
+could scarce make up his mind to release the girl&#8217;s
+hand. It seemed to him that she was the visible
+sign of his safety, and that with her departure went
+a safeguard from these desperate men. He could
+not forget that she had saved the life of the sheriff,
+even though he did not know what sacrifice she
+had made so to do.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_310' name='page_310'></a>310</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;I know you&#8217;ll do your best for me,&#8221; he said, with
+tears in his eyes. &#8220;Make Lucas see this thing right.
+Don&#8217;t let any fool detectives bunco him into refusing
+to pay the ransom. Put it to him as strongly
+as you can, that it will be either my life or the
+money. I have ordered him to pay it, and I want
+it paid.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy nodded. &#8220;I&#8217;ll tell him how it is, Mr.
+West. I know it will be all right. By Thursday
+afternoon we shall have you with us to dinner again.
+Trust us.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I do.&#8221; He lowered his voice and glanced at
+MacQueen, who had been called aside to speak to
+one of his men. &#8220;And I&#8217;m glad you&#8217;re going away
+from here. This is no place for you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;It isn&#8217;t quite the place for you, either,&#8221; she answered,
+with a faint, joyless smile.</p>
+<p>They started an hour before midday. Rosario
+had packed a lunch for both of them in MacQueen&#8217;s
+saddlebags, for it was the intention of the latter to
+avoid ranches and traveled trails on the way down.
+He believed that the girl would go through with
+what she had pledged herself to do, but he did not
+mean to take chances of a rescue.</p>
+<p>In the middle of the afternoon they stopped for
+lunch at Round-up Spring&mdash;a water hole which had
+not dried up in a dozen years. It was a somber
+meal. Melissy&#8217;s spirits had been sinking lower and
+lower with every mile that brought her nearer the
+destiny into which this man was forcing her. Food
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_311' name='page_311'></a>311</span>
+choked her, and she ate but little. Occasionally,
+with staring eyes, she would fall into a reverie,
+from which his least word would startle her to a
+shiver of apprehension. This she always controlled
+after the first instinctive shudder.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What&#8217;s the matter with you, girl? I&#8217;m not going
+to hurt you any. I never hit a woman in my life,&#8221;
+the man said once roughly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Perhaps you may, after you&#8217;re married. It&#8217;s
+usually one&#8217;s wife one beats. Don&#8217;t be discouraged.
+You&#8217;ll have the experience yet,&#8221; she retorted, but
+without much spirit.</p>
+<p>&#8220;To hear you tell it, I&#8217;m a devil through and
+through! It&#8217;s that kind of talk that drives a man
+to drink,&#8221; he flung out angrily.</p>
+<p>&#8220;And to wife beating. Of course, I&#8217;m not your
+chattel yet, because the ceremony hasn&#8217;t been read;
+but if you would like to anticipate a few hours and
+beat me, I don&#8217;t suppose there is any reason you
+shouldn&#8217;t.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Gad! How you hate me!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her inveteracy discouraged him. His good looks,
+his debonair manner, the magnetic charm he knew
+how to exert&mdash;these, which had availed him with
+other women, did not seem to reach her at all. She
+really gave him no chance to prove himself. He
+was ready to be grave or gay&mdash;to be a light-hearted
+boy or a blasé man of the world&mdash;to adopt any rôle
+that would suit her. But how could one play up
+effectively to a chill silence which took no note of
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_312' name='page_312'></a>312</span>
+him, to a depression of the soul which would not
+let itself be lifted? He felt that she was living up
+to the barest letter of the law in fulfilling their contract,
+and because of it he steeled himself against
+her sufferings.</p>
+<p>There was one moment of their ride when she
+stood on the tiptoe of expectation and showed again
+the sparkle of eager life. MacQueen had resaddled
+after their luncheon, and they were climbing a long
+sidehill that looked over a dry valley. With a gesture,
+the outlaw checked her horse.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Look!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Some quarter of a mile from them two men were
+riding up a wash that ran through the valley. The
+mesquite and the cactus were thick, and it was for
+only an occasional moment that they could be seen.
+Black and the girl were screened from view by a
+live oak in front of them, so that there was no danger
+of being observed. The outlaw got out his field
+glasses and watched the men intently.</p>
+<p>Melissy could not contain the question that trembled
+on her lips: &#8220;Do you know them?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon not.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Perhaps&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;May I look&mdash;please?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He handed her the glasses. She had to wait for
+the riders to reappear, but when they did she gave
+a little cry.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It&#8217;s Mr. Bellamy!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_313' name='page_313'></a>313</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, is it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He looked at her steadily, ready to crush in her
+throat any call she might utter for help. But he
+soon saw that she had no intention of making her
+presence known. Her eyes were glued to the glasses.
+As long as the men were in sight she focused her
+gaze on them ravenously. At last a bend in the
+dry river bed hid them from view. She lowered the
+binoculars with a sigh.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Lucky they didn&#8217;t see us,&#8221; he said, with his easy,
+sinister laugh. &#8220;Lucky for them.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She noticed for the first time that he had uncased
+his rifle and was holding it across the saddle-tree.</p>
+<p>Night slipped silently down from the hills&mdash;the
+soft, cool, velvet night of the Arizona uplands. The
+girl drooped in the saddle from sheer exhaustion.
+The past few days had been hard ones, and last
+night she had lost most of her sleep. She had ridden
+far on rough trails, had been subjected to a
+stress of emotion to which her placid maiden life
+had been unused. But she made no complaint. It
+was part of the creed she had unconsciously learned
+from her father to game out whatever had to be
+endured.</p>
+<p>The outlaw, though he saw her fatigue, would
+not heed it. She had chosen to set herself apart
+from him. Let her ask him to stop and rest, if she
+wanted to. It would do her pride good to be humbled.
+Yet in his heart he admired her the more,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_314' name='page_314'></a>314</span>
+because she asked no favors of him and forbore the
+womanish appeal of tears.</p>
+<p>His watch showed eleven o&#8217;clock by the moon
+when the lights of Mesa glimmered in the valley
+below.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll be in now in half an hour,&#8221; he said.</p>
+<p>She had no comment to make, and silence fell
+between them again until they reached the outskirts
+of the town.</p>
+<p>&#8220;We&#8217;ll get off here and walk in,&#8221; he ordered;
+and, after she had dismounted, he picketed the
+horses close to the road. &#8220;You can send for yours
+in the mornin&#8217;. Mine will be in the livery barn
+by that time.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The streets were practically deserted in the residential
+part of the town. Only one man they saw,
+and at his approach MacQueen drew Melissy behind
+a large lilac bush.</p>
+<p>As the man drew near the outlaw&#8217;s hand tightened
+on the shoulder of the girl. For the man was
+her father&mdash;dusty, hollow-eyed, and haggard. The
+two crouching behind the lilacs knew that this iron
+man was broken by his fears for his only child, the
+girl who was the apple of his eye.</p>
+<p>Not until he was out of hearing did Melissy open
+her lips to the stifled cry she had suppressed. Her
+arms went out to him, and the tears rolled down
+her cheeks. For herself she had not let herself
+break down, but for her father&#8217;s grief her heart
+was like water.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_315' name='page_315'></a>315</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;All right. Don&#8217;t break down now. You&#8217;ll be
+with him inside of half an hour,&#8221; the outlaw told
+her gruffly.</p>
+<p>They stopped at a house not much farther down
+the street, and he rang the bell. It took a second
+ring to bring a head out of the open window upstairs.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well?&#8221; a sleepy voice demanded.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Is this Squire Latimer?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Come down. We want to get married.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then why can&#8217;t you come at a reasonable hour?&mdash;consarn
+it!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Never mind that. There&#8217;s a good fee in it.
+Hurry up!&#8221;</p>
+<p>Presently the door opened. &#8220;Come in. You can
+wait in the hall till I get a light.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;I don&#8217;t want a light. We&#8217;ll step into this
+room, and be married at once,&#8221; MacQueen told him
+crisply.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I don&#8217;t know about that. I&#8217;m not marrying
+folks that can&#8217;t be looked at.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll marry us, and at once. I&#8217;m Black MacQueen!&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was ludicrous to see how the justice of the
+peace fell back in terror before the redoubtable bad
+man of the hills.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Well, I don&#8217;t know as a light is a legal necessity;
+but we got to have witnesses.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have you any in the house?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_316' name='page_316'></a>316</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;My daughter and a girl friend of hers are sleeping
+upstairs. I&#8217;ll call them, Mr. Black&mdash;er&mdash;I
+mean Mr. MacQueen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The outlaw went with the squire to the foot of
+the stairs, whence Latimer wakened the girls and
+told them to dress at once, as quickly as possible.
+A few minutes later they came down&mdash;towsled, eyes
+heavy with sleep, giggling at each other in girlish
+fashion. But when they knew whose marriage they
+were witnessing, giggles and sleep fled together.</p>
+<p>They were due for another surprise later. MacQueen
+and his bride were standing in the heavy
+shadows, so that both bulked vaguely in mere outline.
+Hitherto, Melissy had not spoken a word.
+The time came when it was necessary for the justice
+to know the name of the girl whom he was
+marrying. Her answer came at once, in a low,
+scarcely audible voice:</p>
+<p>&#8220;Melissy Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>An electric shock could scarce have startled them
+more. Of all the girls in Mesa none was so proud
+as Melissy Lee, none had been so far above criticism,
+such a queen in the frontier town. She had
+spent a year in school at Denver; she had always
+been a social leader. While she had always been
+friendly to the other girls, they had looked upon
+her with a touch of awe. She had all the things
+they craved, from beauty to money. And now she
+was marrying at midnight, in the dark, the most
+notorious bad man of Arizona!
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_317' name='page_317'></a>317</span></p>
+<p>Here was a wonder of wonders to tell the other
+girls to-morrow. The only pity was that they could
+not see her face&mdash;and his. They had heard that
+he was handsome. No doubt that accounted for it.
+And what could be more romantic than a love match
+with such a fascinating villain? Probably he had
+stormed her heart irresistibly.</p>
+<p>The service proceeded. The responses of the
+man came clearly and triumphantly, those of the
+girl low but distinctly. It was the custom of the
+justice to join the hands of the parties he was marrying;
+but when he moved to do so this girl put both
+of hers quickly behind her. It was his custom also
+to kiss the bride after pronouncing them man and
+wife; but he omitted this, too, on the present occasion.
+Nor did the groom kiss her.</p>
+<p>The voice of the justice died away. They stood
+before him man and wife. The witnesses craned
+forward to see the outlaw embrace his bride. Instead,
+he reached into his pocket and handed Latimer
+a bill. The denomination of it was one hundred
+dollars, but the justice did not discover that
+until later.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon that squares us,&#8221; the bad man said unsentimentally.
+&#8220;Now, all of you back to bed.&#8221;</p>
+<p>MacQueen and his bride passed out into the night.
+The girls noticed that she did not take his arm;
+that she even drew back, as if to avoid touching
+him as they crossed the threshold.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_318' name='page_318'></a>318</span></p>
+<p>Not until they reached the gate of her father&#8217;s
+house did MacQueen speak.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not all coyote, girl. I&#8217;ll give you the three
+days I promised you. After that you&#8217;ll join me
+wherever I say.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes,&#8221; she answered without spirit.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;ll stand pat to our agreement. When they
+try to talk you out of it you won&#8217;t give in?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She was deadly weary, could scarce hold up her
+head.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you lie to me I&#8217;ll take it out on your folks.
+Don&#8217;t forget that Jack Flatray will have to pay if
+you double-cross me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;ll have to pay in full.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You mean you&#8217;ll capture him again.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I mean we won&#8217;t have to do that. We haven&#8217;t
+turned him loose yet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you lied to me?&#8221; She stared at him with
+wide open eyes of horror.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I had to keep him to make sure of you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her groan touched his vanity, or was it perhaps
+his pity?</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not going to hurt him&mdash;if you play fair.
+I tell you I&#8217;m no cur. Help me, girl, and I&#8217;ll quit
+this hell raising and live decent.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She laughed without joy, bitterly.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, I know what you think,&#8221; he continued. &#8220;I
+can&#8217;t blame you. But what do you know about my
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_319' name='page_319'></a>319</span>
+life? What do you know about what I&#8217;ve had to
+fight against? All my life there has been some devil
+in me, strangling all the good. There has been nobody
+to give me a helping hand&mdash;none to hold me
+back. I was a dog with a bad name&mdash;good enough
+for hanging, and nothing else.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He was holding the gate, and perforce she had
+to hear him out.</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do I care about that?&#8221; she cried, in a
+fierce gust of passion. &#8220;I see you are cur and coward!
+You lied to me. You didn&#8217;t keep faith and
+free Jack Flatray. That is enough.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She was the one person in the world who had
+power to wound him. Nor did it hurt the less that
+it was the truth. He drew back as if the lash of a
+whip had swept across his face.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No man alive can say that to me and live!&#8221; he
+told her. &#8220;Cur I may be; but you&#8217;re my wife,
+&#8217;Lissie MacQueen. Don&#8217;t forget that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Go! Go!&#8221; she choked. &#8220;I hope to God I&#8217;ll
+never see your face again!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She flew along the grass-bordered walk, whipped
+open the front door, and disappeared within. She
+turned the key in the lock, and stood trembling in
+the darkness. She half expected him to follow, to
+attempt to regain possession of her.</p>
+<p>But the creak of his quick step on the porch did
+not come. Only her hammering heart stirred in
+the black silence. She drew a long breath of relief,
+and sank down on the stairs. It was over at last,
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_320' name='page_320'></a>320</span>
+the horrible nightmare through which she had been
+living.</p>
+<p>Gradually she fought down her fears and took
+hold of herself. She must find her father and relieve
+his anxiety. Quietly she opened the door of
+the hall into the living room.</p>
+<p>A man sat at the table, with his back to her, in
+an attitude of utter dejection. He was leaning forward,
+with his head buried in his arms. It was her
+father. She stepped forward, and put her hands
+on his bowed shoulders.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Daddy,&#8221; she said softly.</p>
+<p>At her touch the haggard, hopeless, unshaven face
+was lifted toward her. For a moment Lee looked at
+her as if she had been a wraith. Then, with a
+hoarse cry, he arose and caught her in his arms.</p>
+<p>Neither of them could speak for emotion. He
+tried it twice before he could get out:</p>
+<p>&#8220;Baby! Honey!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He choked back the sobs in his throat. &#8220;Where
+did you come from? I thought sure MacQueen had
+you.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He had. He took me to Dead Man&#8217;s Cache
+with him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And you escaped. Praise the Lord, honey!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;he brought me back.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;MacQueen did! Goddlemighty&mdash;he knows
+what&#8217;s best for him!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He brought me back to&mdash;to&mdash;&mdash;&#8221; She broke
+down, and buried her head in his shoulder.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_321' name='page_321'></a>321</span></p>
+<p>Long, dry sobs racked her. The father divined
+with alarm that he did not know the worst.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Tell me&mdash;tell me, &#8217;Lissie! Brought you back
+to do what, honey?&#8221; He held her back from him,
+his hands on her shoulders.</p>
+<p>&#8220;To marry me.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;To marry me. And he did&mdash;fifteen minutes ago,
+I am Black MacQueen&#8217;s wife.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Black MacQueen&#8217;s wife! My God, girl!&#8221; Big
+Beauchamp Lee stared at her in a horror of incredulity.</p>
+<p>She told him the whole story, from beginning
+to end.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='XII_THE_TAKING_OF_THE_CACHE' id='XII_THE_TAKING_OF_THE_CACHE'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_322' name='page_322'></a>322</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER XII</h2>
+<h3>THE TAKING OF THE CACHE</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>It was understood that in the absence of the
+sheriff Richard Bellamy should have charge
+of the posse, and after the disappearance of
+Flatray he took command.</p>
+<p>With the passing years Bellamy had become a
+larger figure in the community. The Monte Cristo
+mine had made him independently wealthy, even
+though he had deeded one-third of it to Melissy
+Lee. Arizona had forgiven him his experiment at
+importing sheep and he was being spoken of as a
+territorial delegate to Congress, a place the mine
+owner by no means wanted. For his interests were
+now bound up in the Southwest. His home was
+there. Already a little toddler&#8217;s soft fat fist was
+clinging to the skirt of Ferne.</p>
+<p>At first Bellamy, as well as Farnum, McKinstra,
+young Yarnell and the rest of the posse looked expectantly
+for the return of the sheriff. It was hard
+to believe that one so virile, so competent, so much
+a dominant factor of every situation he confronted,
+could have fallen a victim to the men he hunted.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_323' name='page_323'></a>323</span>
+But as the days passed with no news of him the
+conviction grew that he had been waylaid and shot.
+The hunt went on, but the rule now was that no
+move should be made singly. Not even for an hour
+did the couples separate.</p>
+<p>One evening a woman drifted into camp just as
+they were getting ready to roll into their blankets.
+McKinstra was on sentry duty, but she got by him
+unobserved and startled Farnum into drawing his
+gun.</p>
+<p>Yet all she said was: &#8220;<i>Buenos tardes, señor</i>.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The woman was a wrinkled Mexican with a close-shut,
+bitter mouth and bright, snappy eyes.</p>
+<p>Farnum stared at her in surprise. &#8220;Who in Arizona
+are you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was decidedly disturbing to think what might
+have happened if MacQueen&#8217;s outfit had dropped
+in on them, instead of one lone old woman.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Rosario Chaves.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad to meet you, ma&#8217;am. Won&#8217;t you sit down?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The others had by this time gathered around.</p>
+<p>Rosario spoke in Spanish, and Bob Farnum answered
+in the same language. &#8220;You want to find
+the way into Dead Man&#8217;s Cache, señor?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do we? I reckon yes!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let me be your guide.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You know the way in?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I live there.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Connected with MacQueen&#8217;s outfit, maybe?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I cook for him. My son was one of his men.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_324' name='page_324'></a>324</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Was?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes. He was killed&mdash;shot by Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor,
+the same man who was a prisoner at the Cache
+until yesterday morning.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Killed lately, ma&#8217;am?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Two years ago. We swore revenge. MacQueen
+did not keep his oath, the oath we all swore together.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Bellamy began to understand the situation. She
+wanted to get back at MacQueen, unless she were
+trying to lead them into a trap.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Let&#8217;s get this straight. MacQueen turned
+O&#8217;Connor loose, did he?&#8221; Bellamy questioned.</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. He escaped. This man&mdash;what you call
+him?&mdash;the sheriff, helped him and Señor West to
+break away.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The mine owner&#8217;s eye met Farnum&#8217;s. They
+were being told much news.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So they all escaped, did they?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Si, señor</i>, but MacQueen took West and the
+sheriff next morning. They could not find their
+way out of the valley.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But O&#8217;Connor escaped. Is that it?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Her eyes flashed hatred. &#8220;He escaped because
+the sheriff helped him. His life was forfeit to me.
+So then was the sheriff&#8217;s. MacQueen he admit it.
+But when the girl promise to marry him he speak
+different.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What girl?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Señorita</i> Lee.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_325' name='page_325'></a>325</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Not Melissy Lee.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;<i>Si, señor</i>.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;My God! Melissy Lee a prisoner of that infernal
+villain. How did she come there?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The Mexican woman was surprised at the sudden
+change that had come over the men. They
+had grown tense and alert. Interest had flamed
+into a passionate eagerness.</p>
+<p>Rosario Chaves told the story from beginning
+to end, so far as she knew it; and every sentence
+of it wrung the big heart of these men. The pathos
+of it hit them hard. Their little comrade, the girl
+they had been fond of for years&mdash;the bravest, truest
+lass in Arizona&mdash;had fallen a victim to this intolerable
+fate! They could have wept with the agony
+of it if they had known how.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Are you sure they were married? Maybe the
+thing slipped up,&#8221; Alan suggested, the hope father
+to the thought.</p>
+<p>But this hope was denied him; for the woman
+had brought with her a copy of the Mesa <i>Sentinel</i>,
+with an account of the marriage and the reason for
+it. This had been issued on the morning after the
+event, and MacQueen had brought it back with him
+to the Cache.</p>
+<p>Bellamy arranged with the Mexican woman a
+plan of attack upon the valley. Camp was struck
+at once, and she guided them through tortuous
+ravines and gulches deeper into the Roaring Fork
+country. She left them in a grove of aspens, just
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_326' name='page_326'></a>326</span>
+above the lip of the valley, on the side least frequented
+by the outlaws.</p>
+<p>They were to lie low until they should receive
+from her a signal that most of the gang had left
+to take West to the place appointed for the exchange.
+They were then to wait through the day
+until dusk, slip quietly down, and capture the ranch
+before the return of the party with the gold. In
+case anything should occur to delay the attack on
+the ranch, another signal was to be given by Rosario.</p>
+<p>The first signal was to be the hanging of washing
+upon the line. If this should be removed before
+nightfall, Bellamy was to wait until he should hear
+from her again.</p>
+<p>Bellamy believed that the Chaves woman was
+playing square with him, but he preferred to take
+no chances. As soon as she had left to return to
+the settlement of the outlaws he moved camp again
+to a point almost half a mile from the place where
+she had last seen them. If the whole thing were a
+&#8220;plant,&#8221; and a night attack had been planned, he
+wanted to be where he and his men could ambush
+the ambushers, if necessary.</p>
+<p>But the night passed without any alarm. As the
+morning wore away the scheduled washing appeared
+on the line. Farnum crept down to the valley lip
+and trained his glasses on the ranch house. Occasionally
+he could discern somebody moving about,
+though there were not enough signs of activity to
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_327' name='page_327'></a>327</span>
+show the presence of many people. All day the
+wash hung drying on the line. Dusk came, the
+blankets still signaling that all was well.</p>
+<p>Bellamy led his men forward under cover, following
+the wooded ridge above the Cache so long
+as there was light enough by which they might be
+observed from the valley. With the growing darkness
+he began the descent into the bowl just behind
+the corral. A light shone in the larger cabin; and
+Bellamy knew that, unless Rosario were playing him
+false, the men would be at supper there. He left
+his men lying down behind the corral, while he crept
+forward to the window from which the light was
+coming.</p>
+<p>In the room were two men and the Mexican
+woman. The men, with elbows far apart, and knives
+and forks very busy, were giving strict attention
+to the business in hand. Rosario waited upon them,
+but with ear and eye guiltily alert to catch the least
+sound. The mine owner could even overhear fragments
+of the talk.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Ought to get back by midnight, don&#8217;t you
+reckon? Pass the cow and the sugar, Buck. Keep
+a-coming with that coffee, Rosario. I ain&#8217;t a mite
+afraid but what MacQueen will pull it off all right,
+you bet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Sure, he will. Give that molasses a shove,
+Tom&mdash;&mdash;&#8221;</p>
+<p>Bellamy drew his revolver and slipped around to
+the front door. He came in so quietly that neither
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_328' name='page_328'></a>328</span>
+of the men heard him. Both had their backs to
+the door.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Figure it up, and it makes a right good week&#8217;s
+work. I reckon I&#8217;ll go down to Chihuahua and
+break the bank at Miguel&#8217;s,&#8221; one of them was
+saying.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Better go to Yuma and break stones for a spell,
+Buck,&#8221; suggested a voice from the doorway.</p>
+<p>Both men slewed their heads around as if they
+had been worked by the same lever. Their mouths
+opened, and their eyes bulged. A shining revolver
+covered them competently.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Now, don&#8217;t you, Buck&mdash;nor you either, Tom!&#8221;
+This advice because of a tentative movement each
+had made with his right hand. &#8220;I&#8217;m awful careless
+about spilling lead, when I get excited. Better
+reach for the roof; then you won&#8217;t have any temptations
+to suicide.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The hard eyes of the outlaws swept swiftly over
+the cattleman. Had he shown any sign of indecision,
+they would have taken a chance and shot it
+out. But he was so easily master of himself that
+the impulse to &#8220;draw&#8221; died stillborn.</p>
+<p>Bellamy gave a sharp, shrill whistle. Footsteps
+came pounding across the open, and three armed
+men showed at the door.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Darn my skin if the old son of a gun hasn&#8217;t
+hogged all the glory!&#8221; Bob Farnum complained
+joyfully. &#8220;Won&#8217;t you introduce us to your friends,
+Bellamy?&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_329' name='page_329'></a>329</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;This gentleman with the biscuit in his hand is
+Buck; the one so partial to porterhouse steak is
+Tom,&#8221; returned Bellamy gravely.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad to death to meet you, gents. Your hands
+seem so busy drilling for the ceiling, we won&#8217;t shake
+right now. If it would be any kindness to you, I&#8217;ll
+unload all this hardware, though. My! You tote
+enough with you to start a store, boys.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How did you find your way in?&#8221; growled Buck.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Jest drifted in on our automobiles and airships,&#8221;
+Bob told him airily, as he unbuckled the revolver
+belt and handed it to one of his friends.</p>
+<p>The outlaws were bound, after which Rosario
+cooked the posse a dinner. This was eaten voraciously
+by all, for camp life had sharpened the appetite
+for a woman&#8217;s cooking.</p>
+<p>One of the men kept watch to notify them when
+MacQueen and his gang should enter the valley,
+while the others played &#8220;pitch&#8221; to pass the time.
+In spite of this, the hours dragged. It was a good
+deal like waiting for a battle to begin. Bellamy and
+Farnum had no nerves, but the others became nervous
+and anxious.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon something is keeping them,&#8221; suggested
+Alan, after looking at his watch for the fifth time
+in half an hour. &#8220;Don&#8217;t you reckon we better go
+up the trail a bit to meet them?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon we better wait here, Alan. Bid three,&#8221;
+returned Farnum evenly.</p>
+<p>As he spoke, their scout came running in.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_330' name='page_330'></a>330</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;They&#8217;re here, boys!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good enough! How many of them?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Four of &#8217;em, looked like. They were winding
+down the trail, and I couldn&#8217;t make out how many.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right, boys. Steady, now, till they get down
+from their horses. Hal, out with the light when I
+give the word.&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was a minute to shake nerves of steel. They
+could hear the sound of voices, an echo of jubilant
+laughter, the sound of iron shoes striking stones in
+the trail. Then some one shouted:</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh, you, Buck!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The program might have gone through as arranged,
+but for an unlooked-for factor in the proceedings.
+Buck let out a shout of warning to his
+trapped friends. Almost at the same instant the
+butt of Farnum&#8217;s revolver smashed down on his
+head; but the damage was already done.</p>
+<p>Bellamy and his friends swarmed out like bees.
+The outlaws were waiting irresolutely&mdash;some
+mounted, others beside their horses. Among them
+were two pack horses.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Hands up!&#8221; ordered the mine owner sharply.</p>
+<p>The answer was a streak of fire from a rifle. Instantly
+there followed a fusillade. Flash after flash
+lit up the darkness. Staccato oaths, cries, a moan
+of pain, the trampling of frightened horses, filled
+the night with confusion.</p>
+<p>In spite of the shout of warning, the situation
+had come upon the bandits as a complete surprise.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_331' name='page_331'></a>331</span>
+How many were against them, whether or not they
+were betrayed, the certainty that the law had at
+last taken them at a disadvantage&mdash;these things
+worked with the darkness for the posse. A man
+flung himself on his pony, lay low on its back, and
+galloped wildly into the night. A second wheeled
+and followed at his heels. Hank Irwin was down,
+with a bullet from a carbine through his jaw and
+the back of his head. A wild shot had brought
+down another. Of the outlaws only MacQueen,
+standing behind his horse as he fired, remained on
+the field uninjured.</p>
+<p>The cattlemen had scattered as the firing began,
+and had availed themselves of such cover as was
+to be had. Now they concentrated their fire on the
+leader of the outlaws. His horse staggered and
+went down, badly torn by a rifle bullet. A moment
+later the special thirty-two carbine he carried was
+knocked from his hands by another shot.</p>
+<p>He crouched and ran to Irwin&#8217;s horse, flung himself
+to the saddle, deliberately emptied his revolver
+at his foes, and put spurs to the broncho. As he
+vanished into the hills Bob Farnum slowly sank to
+the ground.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve got mine, Bellamy. Blamed if he ain&#8217;t
+plumb bust my laig!&#8221;</p>
+<p>The mine owner covered the two wounded outlaws,
+while his men disarmed them. Then he walked
+across to his friend, laid down his rifle, and knelt
+beside him.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_332' name='page_332'></a>332</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Did he get you bad, old man?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Bad enough so I reckon I&#8217;ll have a doc look at
+it one of these days.&#8221; Bob grinned to keep down
+the pain.</p>
+<p>Once more there came the sound of hoofs beating
+the trail of decomposed granite. Bellamy looked
+up and grasped his rifle. A single rider loomed out
+of the darkness and dragged his horse to a halt, a
+dozen yards from the mine owner, in such a position
+that he was directly behind one of the pack
+horses.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Up with your hands!&#8221; ordered Bellamy on suspicion.</p>
+<p>Two hands went swiftly up from beside the saddle.
+The moonlight gleamed on something bright
+in the right hand. A flash rent the night. A jagged,
+red-hot pain tore through the shoulder of Hal Yarnell.
+He fired wildly, the shock having spoiled his
+aim.</p>
+<p>The attacker laughed exultantly, mockingly, as
+he swung his horse about.</p>
+<p>&#8220;A present from Black MacQueen,&#8221; he jeered.</p>
+<p>With that, he was gone again, taking the pack
+animal with him. He had had the audacity to come
+back after his loot&mdash;and had got some of it, too.</p>
+<p>One of the unwounded cowpunchers gave pursuit,
+but half an hour later he returned ruefully.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I lost him somehow&mdash;darned if I know how. I
+seen him before me one minute; the next he was
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_333' name='page_333'></a>333</span>
+gone. Must &#8217;a&#8217; known some trail that led off from
+the road, I reckon.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Bellamy said nothing. He intended to take up
+the trail in person; but first the wounded had to be
+looked to, a man dispatched for a doctor, and things
+made safe against another possible but improbable
+attack. It was to be a busy night; for he had on
+hand three wounded men, as well as two prisoners
+who were sound. An examination showed him that
+neither of the two wounded outlaws nor Farnum
+nor Yarnell were fatally shot. All were hardy outdoors
+men, who had lived in the balsamic air of
+the hills; if complications did not ensue, they would
+recover beyond question.</p>
+<p>In this extremity Rosario was a first aid to the
+injured. She had betrayed the bandits without the
+least compunction, because they had ignored the oath
+of vengeance against the slayer of her son; but she
+nursed them all impartially and skillfully until the
+doctor arrived, late next day.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile Bellamy and McKinstra, guided by
+one of the outlaws, surprised Jeff and released Flatray,
+who returned with them to camp.</p>
+<p>With the doctor had come also four members of
+the Lee posse. To the deputy in charge Jack turned
+over his four prisoners and the gold recovered.
+As soon as the doctor had examined and dressed
+his wound he mounted and took the trail after MacQueen.
+With him rode Bellamy.</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='XIII_MELISSY_ENTERTAINS' id='XIII_MELISSY_ENTERTAINS'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_334' name='page_334'></a>334</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIII</h2>
+<h3>MELISSY ENTERTAINS</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>The notes of Schumann&#8217;s &#8220;Traümerei&#8221; died
+away. Melissy glanced over her music,
+and presently ran lightly into Chopin&#8217;s
+&#8220;Valse Au Petit Chien.&#8221; She was, after all, only
+a girl; and there were moments when she forgot
+to remember that she was wedded to the worst
+of unhanged villains. When she drowned herself
+fathoms deep in her music, she had the best chance
+of forgetting.</p>
+<p>Chaminade&#8217;s &#8220;The Flatterer&#8221; followed. In the
+midst of this the door opened quietly and closed
+again. Melissy finished, fingered her music, and
+became somehow aware that she was not alone. She
+turned unhurriedly on the seat and met the smiling
+eyes of her husband.</p>
+<p>From his high-heeled boots to his black, glossy
+hair, Black MacQueen was dusty with travel. Beside
+him was a gunny sack, tied in the middle and
+filled at both ends. Picturesque he was and always
+would be, but his present costume scarce fitted the
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_335' name='page_335'></a>335</span>
+presence of a lady. Yet of this he gave no sign.
+He was leaning back in a morris chair, rakish,
+debonair, and at his ease. Evidently, he had been
+giving appreciative ear to the music, and more appreciative
+eye to the musician.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So it&#8217;s you,&#8221; said Melissy, white to the lips.</p>
+<p>MacQueen arose, recovered his dusty hat from
+the floor, and bowed theatrically. &#8220;Your long-lost
+husband, my dear.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What are you doing here?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m visiting my wife. The explanation seems
+a trifle obvious.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;What do you want?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Have I said I wanted anything?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then you had better leave. I&#8217;ll give you up if
+I get a chance.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He looked at her with lazy derision. &#8220;I like
+you angry. Your eyes snap electricity, sweet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Oh!&#8221; She gave a gesture of impatience. &#8220;Do
+you know that, if I were to step to that window
+and call out your name, the whole town would be
+in arms against you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why don&#8217;t you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I shall, if you don&#8217;t go.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Are you alone in the house?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Why do you ask?&#8221; Her heart was beating fast.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because you must hide me till night. Is your
+father here?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not now. He is hunting you&mdash;to kill you if he
+finds you.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_336' name='page_336'></a>336</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Servants?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;The cook is out for the afternoon. She will be
+back in an hour or two.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good! Get me food.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She did not rise. &#8220;I must know more. What is
+it? Are they hunting you? What have you done
+now?&#8221; A strong suppressed excitement beat in her
+pulses.</p>
+<p>&#8220;It is not what I have done, but what your friends
+have done. Yesterday I went to exchange West
+for the ransom money. Most of my men I had to
+take with me, to guard against foul play. We held
+the cañon from the flat tops, and everything went
+all right. The exchange was made. We took the
+ransom money back to the Cache. I don&#8217;t know
+how it was&mdash;whether somebody played me false and
+sold us, or whether your friend Flatray got loose
+and his posse stumbled in by accident. But there
+they were in the Cache when we got back.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes?&#8221; The keenest agitation was in Melissy&#8217;s
+voice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;They took us by surprise. We fought. Two
+of my men ran away. Two were shot down. I
+was alone.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;And then?&#8221;</p>
+<p>The devil of torment moved in him. &#8220;Then I
+shot up one of your friend&#8217;s outfit, rode away,
+changed my mind, and went back, shot your friend,
+and hiked off into the hills with a pack horse loaded
+with gold.&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_337' name='page_337'></a>337</span></p>
+<p>Out of all this one thing stood out terribly to
+her. &#8220;You shot Jack Flatray&mdash;again!&#8221;</p>
+<p>He laughed. One lie more or less made no difference.
+&#8220;I sure did.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She had to moisten her lips before she could ask
+the next question: &#8220;You&mdash;killed him?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No&mdash;worse luck!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;How do you know?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;He and another man were on the trail after me
+to-day. I saw them pass up Moose Creek from a
+ledge on which I was lying. If I had had a rifle,
+I would have finished the job; but my carbine was
+gone. It was too far for a six-gun.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;But, if you wounded him last night, how could
+he be trailing you to-day?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon it was a flesh wound. His shoulder
+was tied up, I noticed.&#8221; Impatiently he waved
+Flatray out of the conversation. &#8220;I didn&#8217;t come
+here to tell you about him. I got to get out on tonight&#8217;s
+train. This country has grown too hot for
+me. You&#8217;re going with me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Yes, by God!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll never go with you&mdash;never&mdash;never!&#8221; she
+cried passionately. &#8220;I&#8217;m free of the bargain. You
+broke faith. So shall I.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She saw his jaw clamp. &#8220;So you&#8217;re going to
+throw me down, are you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy stood before him, slim and straight, without
+yielding an inch. She was quite colorless, for
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_338' name='page_338'></a>338</span>
+he was a man with whose impulses she could not
+reckon. But one thing she knew. He could never
+take her away with him and escape. And she knew
+that he must know it, too.</p>
+<p>&#8220;If you want to call it that. You tricked me
+into marrying you. You meant to betray me all
+the time. Go, while there&#8217;s still a chance. I don&#8217;t
+want your blood on my hands.&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was characteristic of him that he always wanted
+more what he could not get.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Don&#8217;t answer so quick, girl. Listen to me.
+I&#8217;ve got enough in that sack to start us in the cattle
+business in Argentina. There&#8217;s more buried in
+the hills, if we need it. Girl, I tell you I&#8217;m going
+to run straight from to-day!&#8221;</p>
+<p>She laughed scornfully. &#8220;And in the same
+breath you tell me how much you have stolen and
+are taking with you. If you were a Cr&oelig;sus, I
+wouldn&#8217;t go with you.&#8221; She flamed into sudden,
+fierce passion. &#8220;Will you never understand that I
+hate and detest you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You think you do, but you don&#8217;t. You love me&mdash;only
+you won&#8217;t let yourself believe it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;There&#8217;s no arguing with such colossal conceit,&#8221;
+she retorted, with hard laughter. &#8220;It&#8217;s no use to
+tell you that I should like to see you dead at my
+feet.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Swiftly he slid a revolver from its holster, and
+presented it to her, butt first. &#8220;You can have your
+wish right easy, if you mean it. Go to it. There&#8217;s
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_339' name='page_339'></a>339</span>
+no danger. All you&#8217;ve got to give out is that I
+frightened you. You&#8217;ll be a heroine, too.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She looked at the weapon and at him, and the
+very thought of it made her sick. She saw the
+thing almost as if it were already done&mdash;the smoking
+revolver in her hand, and the man lying motionless
+before her.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Take it away,&#8221; she said, with a shudder.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You see, you can&#8217;t do it! You can&#8217;t even go
+to the window there and shout out that Black MacQueen
+is with you in the house. You don&#8217;t hate
+me at all, my dear.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Because I won&#8217;t kill you with my own hand?
+You reason logically.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Then why don&#8217;t you betray my presence? Why
+don&#8217;t you call your friends in to take me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;m not sure that I won&#8217;t; but if I don&#8217;t, it will
+be for their sakes, and not for yours. They could
+not take you without loss of life.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re right there,&#8221; he agreed, with a flash of
+his tigerish ferocity. &#8220;They couldn&#8217;t take me alive
+at all, and I reckon before I checked in a few of
+them would.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='major' />
+<div style='margin: auto; text-align: center; padding-top: 2em; padding-bottom: 1em'>
+<a name='XIV_BLACK_MACQUEEN_CASHES_HIS_CHECKS' id='XIV_BLACK_MACQUEEN_CASHES_HIS_CHECKS'></a>
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_340' name='page_340'></a>340</span>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIV</h2>
+<h3>BLACK MACQUEEN CASHES HIS CHECKS</h3>
+</div>
+
+<p>It was part of his supreme audacity to trust
+her. While he was changing his dusty, travel-stained
+clothes for some that belonged to her
+brother she prepared a meal for him downstairs.
+A dozen times the impulse was on her to fly into
+the street and call out that Black MacQueen was
+in the house, but always she restrained herself. He
+was going to leave the country within a few hours.
+Better let him go without bloodshed.</p>
+<p>He came down to his dinner fresh from a bath
+and a shave, wearing a new tweed suit, which fitted
+him a trifle loosely, but was not unbecoming to his
+trim, lithe figure. No commercial traveler at a
+familiar hotel could have been more jauntily and
+blithely at home.</p>
+<p>&#8220;So you didn&#8217;t run away!&#8221; He grinned.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not yet. I&#8217;m going to later. I owe you a meal,
+and I wanted to pay it first.&#8221;</p>
+<p>It was his very contempt of fear that had held
+her. To fool away half an hour in dressing, knowing
+that it was very likely she might be summoning
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_341' name='page_341'></a>341</span>
+men to kill him&mdash;to come down confident and unperturbed,
+possibly to meet his death&mdash;was such a
+piece of dare-deviltry as won reluctant admiration,
+in spite of her detestation of him. Even if she did
+not give him up, his situation was precarious in the
+extreme. All the trains were being watched; and
+in spite of this he had to walk boldly to the station,
+buy a ticket, and pass himself off for an ordinary
+traveler.</p>
+<p>Both knew that the chances were against him,
+but he gave no sign of concern or anxiety. Never
+had Melissy seen him so full of spirits. The situation
+would have depressed most men; him it merely
+stimulated. The excitement of it ran like wine
+through his blood. Driven from his hills, with
+every man&#8217;s hand against him, with the avenues
+of escape apparently closed, he was in his glory.
+He would play his cards out to the end, without
+whining, no matter how the game might go.</p>
+<p>Melissy washed the dishes, in order that the cook
+might not know that she had had a guest for luncheon.
+The two returned to the living room. It was
+his whim to have her play for him; and she was
+glad to comply, because it interfered with his wooing.
+She was no longer greatly afraid of him, for
+she knew that he was on his good behavior to win
+her liking.</p>
+<p>Fortune favored her. For some time they had
+heard the cook moving about in the kitchen. Once
+she had poked her head in to know whether her
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_342' name='page_342'></a>342</span>
+young mistress would like the cherry pie for dinner.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I didn&#8217;t know yez had company, Miss &#8217;Lissie,&#8221;
+she had apologized.</p>
+<p>&#8220;This gentleman will stay to dinner,&#8221; Melissy
+had announced.</p>
+<p>At luncheon Melissy had not eaten with him;
+but at dinner it was necessary, on account of the
+cook, that she sit down, too. The meal had scarce
+begun when Kate came beaming in.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Shure, Miss &#8217;Lissie, there&#8217;s another young gentleman
+at the door. It&#8217;s Mr. Bellamy. I tould him
+to come right in. He&#8217;s washing his face first.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Melissy rose, white as a sheet. &#8220;All right, Kate.&#8221;</p>
+<p>But as soon as the cook had left the room she
+turned to the outlaw. &#8220;What shall I do? What
+shall I do?&#8221;</p>
+<p>Little whimsical imps of mischief shone in his
+eyes. &#8220;Have him in and introduce him to your
+husband, my dear.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You must go&mdash;quick. If I don&#8217;t get rid of him,
+you&#8217;ll be able to slip out the back way and get to
+the depot. He doesn&#8217;t know you are here.&#8221;</p>
+<p>MacQueen sat back and gave her his easy, reckless
+smile. &#8220;Guess again. Bellamy can&#8217;t drive me
+out.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She caught her hands together. &#8220;Oh, go&mdash;go!
+There will be trouble. You wouldn&#8217;t kill him before
+my very eyes!&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not unless he makes the first play. It&#8217;s up to
+him.&#8221; He laughed with the very delight of it.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_343' name='page_343'></a>343</span>
+&#8220;I&#8217;d as lief settle my account with him right now.
+He&#8217;s meddled too much in my affairs.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She broke out in a cry of distress: &#8220;You
+wouldn&#8217;t! I&#8217;ve treated you fair. I could have betrayed
+you, and I didn&#8217;t. Aren&#8217;t you going to play
+square with me?&#8221;</p>
+<p>He nodded. &#8220;All right. Show him in. He
+won&#8217;t know me except as Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor. It
+was too dark last night to see my face.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Bellamy came into the room.</p>
+<p>&#8220;How&#8217;s Jack?&#8221; Melissy asked quickly as she
+caught his hand.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Good as new. And you?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;All right.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The outlaw stirred uneasily in his seat. His vanity
+objected to another man holding the limelight
+while he was present.</p>
+<p>Melissy turned. &#8220;I think you have never met
+Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor, Mr. Bellamy. Lieutenant&mdash;Mr.
+Bellamy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>They shook hands. MacQueen smiled. He was
+enjoying himself.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Glad to meet you, Mr. Bellamy. You and Flatray
+have won the honors surely. You beat us all
+to it, sir. As I rode in this mornin&#8217;, everybody was
+telling how you rounded up the outlaws. Have
+you caught MacQueen himself?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Not yet. We have reason to believe that he
+rode within ten miles of town this morning before
+he cut across to the railroad. The chances are that
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_344' name='page_344'></a>344</span>
+he will try to board a train at some water tank in
+the dark. We&#8217;re having them all watched. I came
+in to telephone all stations to look out for him.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Where&#8217;s Jack?&#8221; Melissy asked.</p>
+<p>&#8220;He&#8217;ll be here presently. His arm was troubling
+him some, so he stopped to see the doctor. Then
+he has to talk with his deputy.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re sure he isn&#8217;t badly hurt?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No, only a scratch, he calls it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Did you happen on Dead Man&#8217;s Cache by accident?&#8221;
+asked MacQueen with well-assumed carelessness.</p>
+<p>Bellamy had no intention of giving Rosario away
+to anybody. &#8220;You might call it that,&#8221; he said
+evenly. &#8220;You know, I had been near there once
+when I was out hunting.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;Do you expect to catch MacQueen?&#8221; the outlaw
+asked, a faint hint of irony in his amused voice.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I can&#8217;t tell. That&#8217;s what I&#8217;m hoping, lieutenant.&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;We hope for a heap of things we never get,&#8221;
+returned the outlaw, in a gentle voice, his eyes half
+shuttered behind drooping lids.</p>
+<p>Melissy cut into the conversation hurriedly.
+&#8220;Lieutenant O&#8217;Connor is going on the seven-five
+this evening, Mr. Bellamy. He has business that
+will take him away for a while. It is time we were
+going. Won&#8217;t you walk down to the train with us?&#8221;</p>
+<p>MacQueen swore softly under his breath, but
+there was nothing he could say in protest. He knew
+he could not take the girl with him. Now he had
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_345' name='page_345'></a>345</span>
+been cheated out of his good-byes by her woman&#8217;s
+wit in dragging Bellamy to the depot with them.
+He could not but admire the adroitness with which
+she had utilized her friend to serve her end.</p>
+<p>They walked to the station three abreast, the outlaw
+carrying as lightly as he could the heavy suitcase
+that held his plunder. Melissy made small talk
+while they waited for the train. She was very nervous,
+and she was trying not to show it.</p>
+<p>&#8220;Next time you come, lieutenant, we&#8217;ll have a fine
+stone depot to show you. Mr. West has promised
+to make Mesa the junction point, and we&#8217;re sure
+to have a boom,&#8221; she said.</p>
+<p>A young Mexican vaquero trailed softly behind
+them, the inevitable cigarette between his lips. From
+under his broad, silver-laced sombrero he looked
+keenly at each of the three as he passed.</p>
+<p>A whistle sounded clearly in the distance.</p>
+<p>The outlaw turned to the girl beside him. &#8220;I&#8217;m
+coming back some day soon. Be sure of that, Mrs.
+MacQueen.&#8221;</p>
+<p>The audacity of the name used, designed as it
+was to stab her friend and to remind Melissy how
+things stood, made the girl gasp. She looked
+quickly at Bellamy and saw him crush the anger
+from his face.</p>
+<p>The train drew into the station. Presently the
+conductor&#8217;s &#8220;All aboard!&#8221; served notice that it was
+starting. The outlaw shook hands with Melissy
+and then with the mine owner.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_346' name='page_346'></a>346</span></p>
+<p>&#8220;Good-bye. Don&#8217;t forget that I&#8217;m coming back,&#8221;
+he said, in a perfectly distinct, low tone.</p>
+<p>And with that he swung aboard the Pullman car
+with his heavy suitcase. An instant later the Mexican
+vaquero pulled himself to the vestibule of the
+smoking car ahead.</p>
+<p>MacQueen looked back from the end of the train
+at the two figures on the platform. A third figure
+had joined them. It was Jack Flatray. The girl
+and the sheriff were looking at each other. With
+a furious oath, he turned on his heel. For the evidence
+of his eyes had told him that they were lovers.</p>
+<p>MacQueen passed into the coach and flung himself
+down into his section discontentedly. The savor
+of his adventure was gone. He had made his escape
+with a large share of the plunder, in spite of spies
+and posses. But in his heart he knew that he had
+lost forever the girl whom he had forced to marry
+him. He was still thinking about it somberly when
+a figure appeared in the aisle at the end of the car.</p>
+<p>Instantly the outlaw came to alert attention, and
+his hand slipped to the butt of a revolver. The
+figure was that of the Mexican vaquero whom he
+had carelessly noted on the platform of the station.
+Vigilantly his gaze covered the approaching man.
+Surely in Arizona there were not two men with
+that elastic tread or that lithe, supple figure.</p>
+<p>His revolver flashed in the air. &#8220;Stand back,
+Bucky O&#8217;Connor&mdash;or, by God, I&#8217;ll drill you!&#8221;
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_347' name='page_347'></a>347</span></p>
+<p>The vaquero smiled. &#8220;Right guess, Black MacQueen.
+I arrest you in the name of the law.&#8221;</p>
+<p>Black&#8217;s revolver spat flame twice before the
+ranger&#8217;s gun got into action, but the swaying of the
+train caused him to stagger as he rose to his feet.</p>
+<p>The first shot of Bucky&#8217;s revolver went through
+the heart of the outlaw; but so relentless was the
+man that, even after that, his twitching fingers emptied
+the revolver. O&#8217;Connor fired only once. He
+watched his opponent crumple up, fling wild shots
+into the upholstery and through the roof, and sink
+into the silence from which there is no awakening
+on this side of the grave. Then he went forward
+and looked down at him.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I reckon that ends Black MacQueen,&#8221; he said
+quietly. &#8220;And I reckon Melissy Lee is a widow.&#8221;</p>
+<hr class='tb' />
+
+<p>Jack Flatray had met O&#8217;Connor at his own office
+and the two had come down to the station on the
+off chance that MacQueen might try to make his
+getaway from Mesa in some disguise. But as soon
+as he saw Melissy the sheriff had eyes for nobody
+else except the girl he loved. One sleeve of his
+coat was empty, and his shoulder was bandaged.
+He looked very tired and drawn; for he had ridden
+hard more than sixteen hours with a painful wound.
+But the moment his gaze met hers she knew that
+his thoughts were all for her and her trouble.</p>
+<p>His free hand went out to meet hers. She forgot
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_348' name='page_348'></a>348</span>
+MacQueen and all the sorrow he had brought
+her. Her eyes were dewy with love and his answered
+eagerly. She knew now that she would
+love Jack Flatray for better or worse until death
+should part them. But she knew, too, that the
+shadow of MacQueen, her husband by law, was
+between them.</p>
+<p>Together they walked back from the depot. In
+the shadow of the vines on her father&#8217;s porch they
+stopped. Jack caught her hands in his and looked
+down into her tired, haggard face all lit with love.
+Tears were in the eyes of both.</p>
+<p>&#8220;You&#8217;re entitled to the truth, Jack,&#8221; she told him.
+&#8220;I love you. I think I always have. And I know
+I always shall. But I&#8217;m another man&#8217;s wife. It
+will have to be good-bye between us, Jack,&#8221; she told
+him wistfully.</p>
+<p>He took her in his arms and kissed her. &#8220;You&#8217;re
+my sweetheart. I&#8217;ll not give you up. Don&#8217;t
+think it.&#8221;</p>
+<p>He spoke with such strength, such assurance, that
+she knew he would not yield without a struggle.</p>
+<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ll never be anything to him&mdash;never. But he
+stands between us. Don&#8217;t you see he does?&#8221;</p>
+<p>&#8220;No. Your marriage to him is empty words.
+We&#8217;ll have it annulled. It will not stand in any
+court. I&#8217;ve won you and I&#8217;m going to keep you.
+There&#8217;s no two ways about that.&#8221;</p>
+<p>She broke down and began to sob quietly in a
+heartbroken fashion, while he tried to comfort her.
+<span class='pagenum pncolor'><a id='page_349' name='page_349'></a>349</span>
+It was not so easy as he thought. So long as MacQueen
+lived Flatray would walk in danger if she
+did as he wanted her to do.</p>
+<p>Neither of them knew that Bucky O&#8217;Connor&#8217;s
+bullet had already annulled the marriage, that happiness
+was already on the wing to them.</p>
+<p>This hour was to be for their grief, the next for
+their joy.</p>
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:2em; font-variant:small-caps;'>The End</p>
+</div>
+
+<hr class='ppg-pb' />
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:1.2em; margin-top:2em;'>NOVELS OF FRONTIER LIFE BY</p>
+<p style='font-size:1.4em;'>WILLIAM MACLEOD RAINE</p>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em; margin-bottom:2em;'>May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap&#8217;s list.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>MAVERICKS</span></p>
+<p>A tale of the western frontier, where the &#8220;rustler&#8221; abounds. One of the sweetest
+love stories ever told.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>A TEXAS RANGER</span></p>
+<p>How a member of the border police saved the life of an innocent man, followed a
+fugitive to Wyoming, and then passed through deadly peril to ultimate happiness.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>WYOMING</span></p>
+<p>In this vivid story the author brings out the turbid life of the frontier with all its
+engaging dash and vigor.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>RIDGWAY OF MONTANA</span></p>
+<p>The scene is laid in the mining centers of Montana, where politics and mining industries
+are the religion of the country.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>BUCKY O&#8217;CONNOR</span></p>
+<p>Every chapter teems with wholesome, stirring adventures, replete with the dashing
+spirit of the border.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>CROOKED TRAILS AND STRAIGHT</span></p>
+<p>A story of Arizona; of swift-riding men and daring outlaws; of a bitter feud between
+cattlemen and sheep-herders.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>BRAND BLOTTERS</span></p>
+<p>A story of the turbid life of the frontier with a charming love interest running
+through its pages.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>STEVE YEAGER</span></p>
+<p>A story brimful of excitement, with enough gun-play and adventure to suit anyone.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>A DAUGHTER OF THE DONS</span></p>
+<p>A Western story of romance and adventure, comprising a vivacious and stirring
+tale.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE HIGHGRADER</span></p>
+<p>A breezy, pleasant and amusing love story of Western mining life.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE PIRATE OF PANAMA</span></p>
+<p>A tale of old-time pirates and of modern love, hate and adventure.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE YUKON TRAIL</span></p>
+<p>A crisply entertaining love story in the land where might makes right.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE VISION SPLENDID</span></p>
+<p>In which two cousins are contestants for the same prizes: political honors and the
+hand of a girl.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE SHERIFF&#8217;S SON</span></p>
+<p>The hero finally conquers both himself and his enemies and wins the love of a
+wonderful girl.</p>
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em;'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Grosset &amp; Dunlap, Publishers, New York</span></p>
+</div>
+
+<hr class='ppg-pb' />
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:1.4em; margin-top:1em;'>JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD&#8217;S</p>
+<p style='font-size:1.2em;'>STORIES OF ADVENTURE</p>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em; margin-bottom:2em;'>May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset &amp; Dunlap&#8217;s list.</p>
+</div>
+
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE RIVER&#8217;S END</span></p>
+<p>A story of the Royal Mounted Police.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE GOLDEN SNARE</span></p>
+<p>Thrilling adventures in the Far Northland.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>NOMADS OF THE NORTH</span></p>
+<p>The story of a bear-cub and a dog.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>KAZAN</span></p>
+<p>The tale of a &#8220;quarter-strain wolf and three-quarters husky&#8221; torn
+between the call of the human and his wild mate.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>BAREE, SON OF KAZAN</span></p>
+<p>The story of the son of the blind Grey Wolf and the gallant part
+he played in the lives of a man and a woman.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE COURAGE OF CAPTAIN PLUM</span></p>
+<p>The story of the King of Beaver Island, a Mormon colony, and his
+battle with Captain Plum.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE DANGER TRAIL</span></p>
+<p>A tale of love, Indian vengeance, and a mystery of the North.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE HUNTED WOMAN</span></p>
+<p>A tale of a great fight in the &#8220;valley of gold&#8221; for a woman.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE FLOWER OF THE NORTH</span></p>
+<p>The story of Fort o&#8217; God, where the wild flavor of the wilderness
+is blended with the courtly atmosphere of France.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE GRIZZLY KING</span></p>
+<p>The story of Thor, the big grizzly.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>ISOBEL</span></p>
+<p>A love story of the Far North.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE WOLF HUNTERS</span></p>
+<p>A thrilling tale of adventure in the Canadian wilderness.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE GOLD HUNTERS</span></p>
+<p>The story of adventure in the Hudson Bay wilds.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>THE COURAGE OF MARGE O&#8217;DOONE</span></p>
+<p>Filled with exciting incidents in the land of strong men and women.</p>
+<p><span style='text-decoration:underline'>BACK TO GOD&#8217;S COUNTRY</span></p>
+<p>A thrilling story of the Far North. The great Photoplay was made
+from this book.</p>
+<div class='ce'>
+<p style='font-size:0.8em;'><span style='font-variant: small-caps'>Grosset &amp; Dunlap, Publishers, New York</span></p>
+</div>
+
+<!-- generated by ppgen.rb version: 2.58 -->
+<!-- timestamp: Sun Dec 07 06:01:41 -0700 2008 -->
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+<pre>
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Brand Blotters, by William MacLeod Raine
+
+*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BRAND BLOTTERS ***
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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of Brand Blotters, by William MacLeod Raine
+
+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: Brand Blotters
+
+Author: William MacLeod Raine
+
+Illustrator: Clarence Rowe
+
+Release Date: December 7, 2008 [EBook #27436]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK BRAND BLOTTERS ***
+
+
+
+
+Produced by Roger Frank and the Online Distributed
+Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+[Illustration: "WHO ARE YOU?" "WATER!" HE GASPED. Page 20.]
+
+
+
+
+BRAND BLOTTERS
+
+By
+
+WILLIAM MacLEOD RAINE
+
+Author Of
+
+Wyoming, Bucky O'Connor, Mavericks,
+A Texas Ranger, Ridgway Of Montana, Etc.
+
+Illustrations By
+
+CLARENCE ROWE
+
+Grosset & Dunlap
+
+Publishers New York
+
+Made in the United States of America
+
+
+
+
+Copyright, 1909, by J. B. Lippincott Co.
+
+Copyright, 1911, by Street & Smith
+
+Copyright, 1912, by G. W. DILLINGHAM COMPANY
+
+Brand Blotters
+
+
+
+
+TO
+FRANK N. SPINDLER
+
+In Memory of Certain Sunday Afternoon Tramps
+Long Ago, During Which We Solved the
+Problems of the Nation
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+PART I
+
+MELISSY OF THE BAR DOUBLE G
+
+ CHAPTER                                            PAGE
+      I  A Crossed Trail                              11
+     II  Brand Blotting                               18
+    III  An Accusation                                35
+     IV  The Man with the Chihuahua Hat               49
+      V  The Tenderfoot Takes up a Claim              61
+     VI  "Hands Up"                                   75
+    VII  Watering Sheep                               98
+   VIII  The Boone-Bellamy Feud is Renewed           109
+     IX  The Danger Line                             121
+      X  Jack Goes to the Head of the Class          141
+     XI  A Conversation                              156
+    XII  The Tenderfoot Makes a Proposition          163
+   XIII  Old Acquaintances                           182
+    XIV  Concerning the Boone-Bellamy-Yarnell Feud   191
+
+PART II
+
+DEAD MAN'S CACHE
+
+ CHAPTER                                            PAGE
+      I  Kidnapped                                   199
+     II  A Capture                                   209
+    III  The Tables Turned                           217
+     IV  The Real Bucky and the False                231
+      V  A Photograph                                243
+     VI  In Dead Man's Cache                         255
+    VII  "Trapped!"                                  266
+   VIII  An Escape and a Capture                     276
+     IX  A Bargain                                   286
+      X  The Price                                   301
+     XI  Squire Latimer Takes a Hand                 306
+    XII  The Taking of the Cache                     322
+   XIII  Melissy Entertains                          334
+    XIV  Black MacQueen Cashes his Checks            340
+
+
+
+
+PART I
+
+MELISSY OF THE BAR DOUBLE G
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+A CROSSED TRAIL
+
+
+The tenderfoot rose from the ledge upon which he had been lying and
+stretched himself stiffly. The chill of the long night had set him
+shivering. His bones ached from the pressure of his body upon the rock
+where he had slept and waked and dozed again with troubled dreams. The
+sharpness of his hunger made him light-headed. Thirst tortured him. His
+throat was a lime-kiln, his tongue swollen till it filled his mouth.
+
+If the night had been bad, he knew the day would be a hundred times worse.
+Already a gray light was sifting into the hollow of the sky. The vague
+misty outlines of the mountains were growing sharper. Soon from a crotch
+of them would rise a red hot cannon ball to pour its heat into the parched
+desert.
+
+He was headed for the Sonora line, for the hills where he had heard a man
+might drop out of sight of the civilization that had once known him. There
+were reasons why he had started in a hurry, without a horse or food or a
+canteen, and these same reasons held good why he could not follow beaten
+tracks. All yesterday he had traveled without sighting a ranch or meeting
+a human being. But he knew he must get to water soon--if he were to reach
+it at all.
+
+A light breeze was stirring, and on it there was borne to him a faint
+rumble as of thunder. Instantly the man came to a rigid alertness. Thunder
+might mean rain, and rain would be salvation. But the sound did not die
+away. Instead, it deepened to a steady roar, growing every instant louder.
+His startled glance swept the canyon that drove like a sword cleft into the
+hills. Pouring down it, with the rush of a tidal wave, came a wall of
+cattle, a thousand backs tossing up and down as the swell of a troubled
+sea. Though he had never seen one before, the man on the lip of the gulch
+knew that he was watching a cattle stampede. Under the impact of the
+galloping hoofs the ground upon which he stood quaked.
+
+A cry diverted his attention. From the bed of the sandy wash a man had
+started up and was running for his life toward the canyon walls. Before he
+had taken half a dozen steps the avalanche was upon him, had cut him down,
+swept over him.
+
+The thud of the hoofs died away. Into the open desert the stampede had
+passed. A huddled mass lay motionless on the sand in the track of the
+avalanche.
+
+A long ragged breath whistled through the closed lips of the tenderfoot.
+He ran along the edge of the rock wall till he found a descent less sharp,
+lowered himself by means of jutting quartz and mesquit cropping out from
+the crevices, and so came through a little draw to the canyon.
+
+He dropped on a knee beside the sprawling, huddled figure. No second
+glance was needed to see that the man was dead. Life had been trampled out
+of him almost instantly and his features battered beyond any possible
+recognition. Unused to scenes of violence, the stranger stooping over him
+felt suddenly sick. It made him shudder to remember that if he could have
+found a way down in the darkness he, too, would have slept in the warm
+sand of the dry wash. If he had, the fate of this man would have been
+his.
+
+Under the doubled body was a canteen. The trembling fingers of the
+tenderfoot unscrewed the cork. Tipping the vessel, he drank avidly. One
+swallow, a second, then a few trickling drops. The canteen had been almost
+empty.
+
+Uncovering, he stood bareheaded before the inert body and spoke gently in
+the low, soft voice one instinctively uses in the presence of the dead.
+
+"Friend, I couldn't save your life, but your water has saved mine, I
+reckon. Anyhow, it gives me another chance to fight for it. I wish I could
+do something for you ... carry a message to your folks and tell them how
+it happened."
+
+He dropped down again beside the dead man and rifled the pockets. In them
+he found two letters addressed in an illiterate hand to James Diller,
+Cananea, Sonora, Mexico. An idea flashed into his brain and for a moment
+held him motionless while he worked it out. Why not? This man was about
+his size, dressed much like him, and so mutilated that identification was
+impossible.
+
+From his own pocket he took a leather bill book and a monogrammed
+cigarcase. With a sharp stone he scarred the former. The metal case he
+crushed out of shape beneath the heel of his boot. Having first taken one
+twenty dollar yellowback from the well-padded book, he slipped it and the
+cigarcase into the inner coat pocket of the dead man. Irregularly in a
+dozen places he gashed with his knife the derby hat he was wearing, ripped
+the band half loose, dragged it in the dust, and jumped on it till the hat
+was flat as a pancake. Finally he kicked it into the sand a dozen yards
+away.
+
+"The cattle would get it tangled in their hoofs and drag it that far with
+them," he surmised.
+
+The soft gray hat of the dead man he himself appropriated. Again he spoke
+to the lifeless body, lowering his voice to a murmur.
+
+"I reckon you wouldn't grudge me this if you knew. I'm up against it. If I
+get out of these hills alive I'll be lucky. But if I do--well, it won't do
+you any harm to be mistaken for me, and it will accommodate me mightily. I
+hate to leave you here alone, but it's what I've got to do to save
+myself."
+
+He turned away and plodded up the dry creek bed.
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+The sun was at the meridian when three heavily armed riders drew up at the
+mouth of the canyon. They fell into the restful, negligent postures of
+horsemen accustomed to take their ease in the saddle.
+
+"Do you figure maybe he's working up to the headwaters of Dry Sandy?" one
+suggested.
+
+A squat, bandy-legged man with a face of tanned leather presently
+answered. "No, Tim, I expect not. The way I size him up Mr. Richard
+Bellamy wouldn't know Dry Sandy from an irrigation ditch. Mr. R. B. hopes
+he's hittin' the high spots for Sonora, but he ain't anyways sure. Right
+about now he's ridin' the grub line, unless he's made a strike
+somewhere."
+
+The third member of the party, a lean, wide-shouldered, sinewy youth, blue
+silk kerchief knotted loosely around his neck, broke in with a gesture
+that swept the sky. "Funny about all them buzzards. What are they doing
+here, sheriff?"
+
+The squat man opened his mouth to answer, but Tim took the word out of his
+mouth.
+
+"Look!" His arm had shot straight out toward the canyon. A coyote was
+disappearing on the lope. "Something lying there in the wash at the bend,
+Burke."
+
+Sheriff Burke slid his rifle from its scabbard. "We'll not take any
+chances, boys. Spread out far as you can. Tim, ride close to the left
+wall. You keep along the right one, Flatray. Me, I'll take the center.
+That's right."
+
+They rode forward cautiously. Once Flatray spoke.
+
+"By the tracks there has been a lot of cattle down here on the jump
+recently."
+
+"That's what," Tim agreed.
+
+Flatray swung from his saddle and stooped over the body lying at the bend
+of the wash.
+
+"Crushed to death in a cattle stampede, looks like," he called to the
+sheriff.
+
+"Search him, Jack," the sheriff ordered.
+
+The young man gave an exclamation of surprise. He was standing with a
+cigarcase in one hand and a billbook in the other. "It's the man we're
+after--it's Bellamy."
+
+Burke left his horse and came forward. "How do you know?"
+
+"Initials on the cigarcase, R. B. Same monogram on the billbook."
+
+The sheriff had stooped to pick up a battered hat as he moved toward the
+deputy. Now he showed the initials stamped on the sweat band. "R. B. here,
+too."
+
+"Suit of gray clothes, derby hat, size and weight about medium. We'll
+never know about the scar on the eyebrow, but I guess Mr. Bellamy is
+identified without that."
+
+"Must have camped here last night and while he was asleep the cattle
+stampeded down the canyon," Tim hazarded.
+
+"That guess is as good as any. They ce'tainly stomped the life out of him
+thorough. Anyhow, Bellamy has met up with his punishment. We'll have to
+pack the body back to town, boys," the sheriff told them.
+
+Half an hour later the party filed out to the creosote flats and struck
+across country toward Mesa. Flatray was riding pillion behind Tim. His own
+horse was being used as a pack saddle.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+BRAND BLOTTING
+
+
+The tenderfoot, slithering down a hillside of shale, caught at a
+greasewood bush and waited. The sound of a rifle shot had drifted across
+the ridge to him. Friend or foe, it made no difference to him now. He had
+reached the end of his tether, must get to water soon or give up the
+fight.
+
+No second shot broke the stillness. A swift zigzagged across the cattle
+trail he was following. Out of a blue sky the Arizona sun still beat down
+upon a land parched by aeons of drought, a land still making its brave show
+of greenness against a dun background.
+
+Arrow straight the man made for the hill crest. Weak as a starved puppy,
+his knees bent under him as he climbed. Down and up again a dozen times,
+he pushed feverishly forward. All day he had been seeing things. Cool
+lakes had danced on the horizon line before his tortured vision. Strange
+fancies had passed in and out of his mind. He wondered if this, too, were
+a delusion. How long that stiff ascent took him he never knew, but at
+last he reached the summit and crept over its cactus-covered shoulder.
+
+He looked into a valley dressed in its young spring garb. Of all deserts
+this is the loveliest when the early rains have given rebirth to the hope
+that stirs within its bosom once a year. But the tenderfoot saw nothing of
+its pathetic promise, of its fragile beauty so soon to be blasted. His
+sunken eyes swept the scene and found at first only a desert waste in
+which lay death.
+
+"I lose," he said to himself out loud.
+
+With the words he gave up the long struggle and sank to the ground. For
+hours he had been exhausted to the limit of endurance, but the will to
+live had kept him going. Now the driving force within had run down. He
+would die where he lay.
+
+Another instant, and he was on his feet again eager, palpitant, tremulous.
+For plainly there had come to him the bleating of a calf.
+
+Moving to the left, he saw rising above the hill brow a thin curl of
+smoke. A dozen staggering steps brought him to the edge of a draw. There
+in the hollow below, almost within a stone's throw, was a young woman
+bending over a fire. He tried to call, but his swollen tongue and dry
+throat refused the service. Instead, he began to run toward her.
+
+Beyond the wash was a dead cow. Not far from it lay a calf on its side,
+all four feet tied together. From the fire the young woman took a red-hot
+running iron and moved toward the little bleater.
+
+The crackling of a twig brought her around as a sudden tight rein does a
+high-strung horse. The man had emerged from the prickly pears and was
+close upon her. His steps dragged. The sag of his shoulders indicated
+extreme fatigue. The dark hollows beneath the eyes told of days of
+torment.
+
+The girl stood before him slender and straight. She was pale to the lips.
+Her breath came fast and ragged as if she had been running.
+
+Abruptly she shot her challenge at him. "Who are you?"
+
+"Water," he gasped.
+
+One swift, searching look the girl gave him, then "Wait!" she ordered, and
+was off into the mesquit on the run. Three minutes later the tenderfoot
+heard her galloping through the brush. With a quick, tight rein she drew
+up, swung from the saddle expertly as a _vaquero_, and began to untie a
+canteen held by buckskin thongs to the side of the saddle.
+
+He drank long, draining the vessel to the last drop.
+
+From her saddle bags she brought two sandwiches wrapped in oiled paper.
+
+"You're hungry, too, I expect," she said, her eyes shining with tender
+pity.
+
+She observed that he did not wolf his food, voracious though he was. While
+he ate she returned to the fire with the running iron and heaped live
+coals around the end of it.
+
+"You've had a pretty tough time of it," she called across to him gently.
+
+"It hasn't been exactly a picnic, but I'm all right now."
+
+The girl liked the way he said it. Whatever else he was--and already faint
+doubts were beginning to stir in her--he was not a quitter.
+
+"You were about all in," she said, watching him.
+
+"Just about one little kick left in me," he smiled.
+
+"That's what I thought."
+
+She busied herself over the fire inspecting the iron. The man watched her
+curiously. What could it mean? A cow killed wantonly, a calf bawling with
+pain and fear, and this girl responsible for it. The tenderfoot could not
+down the suspicion stirring in his mind. He knew little of the cattle
+country. But he had read books and had spent a week in Mesa not entirely
+in vain. The dead cow with the little stain of red down its nose pointed
+surely to one thing. He was near enough to see a hole in the forehead just
+above the eyes. Instinctively his gaze passed to the rifle lying in the
+sand close to his hand. Her back was still turned to him. He leaned over,
+drew the gun to him, and threw out an empty shell from the barrel.
+
+At the click of the lever the girl swung around upon him.
+
+"What are you doing?" she demanded.
+
+He put the rifle down hurriedly. "Just seeing what make it is."
+
+"And what make is it?" she flashed.
+
+He was trapped. "I hadn't found out yet," he stammered.
+
+"No, but you found out there was an empty shell in it," she retorted
+quickly.
+
+Their eyes fastened. She was gray as ashes, but she did not flinch. By
+chance he had stumbled upon the crime of crimes in Cattleland, had caught
+a rustler redhanded at work. Looking into the fine face, nostrils
+delicately fashioned, eyes clear and deep, the thing was scarce credible
+of her. Why, she could not be a day more than twenty, and in every line of
+her was the look of pride, of good blood.
+
+"Yes, I happened to throw it out," he apologized.
+
+But she would have no evasion, would not let his doubts sleep. There was
+superb courage in the scornful ferocity with which she retorted.
+
+"Happened! And I suppose you _happened_ to notice that the brand on the
+cow is a Bar Double G, while that on the calf is different."
+
+"No, I haven't noticed that."
+
+"Plenty of time to see it yet." Then, with a swift blaze of feeling,
+"What's the use of pretending? I know what you think."
+
+"Then you know more than I do. My thoughts don't go any farther than this,
+that you have saved my life and I'm grateful for it."
+
+"I know better. You think I'm a rustler. But don't say it. Don't you dare
+say it."
+
+Brought up in an atmosphere of semi-barbaric traditions, silken-strong,
+with instincts unwarped by social pressure, she was what the sun and wind
+and freedom of Arizona had made her, a poetic creation far from
+commonplace. So he judged her, and in spite of the dastardly thing she had
+done he sensed an innate refinement strangely at variance with the
+circumstances.
+
+"All right. I won't," he answered, with a faint smile.
+
+"Now you've got to pay for your sandwiches by making yourself useful. I'm
+going to finish this job." She said it with an edge of self-scorn. He
+guessed her furious with self-contempt.
+
+Under her directions he knelt on the calf so as to hold it steady while
+she plied the hot iron. The odor of burnt hair and flesh was already acrid
+in his nostrils. Upon the red flank F was written in raw, seared flesh. He
+judged that the brand she wanted was not yet complete. Probably the iron
+had got too cold to finish the work, and she had been forced to reheat
+it.
+
+The little hand that held the running iron was trembling. Looking up, the
+tenderfoot saw that she was white enough to faint.
+
+"I can't do it. You'll have to let me hold him while you blur the brand,"
+she told him.
+
+They changed places. She set her teeth to it and held the calf steady,
+but the brander noticed that she had to look away when the red-hot iron
+came near the flesh of the victim.
+
+"Blur the brand right out. Do it quick, please," she urged.
+
+A sizzle of burning skin, a piteous wail from the tortured animal, an
+acrid pungent odor, and the thing was done. The girl got to her feet,
+quivering like an aspen.
+
+"Have you a knife?" she asked faintly.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Cut the rope."
+
+The calf staggered to all fours, shook itself together, and went bawling
+to the dead mother.
+
+The girl drew a deep breath. "They say it does not hurt except while it is
+being done."
+
+His bleak eyes met hers stonily. "And of course it will soon get used to
+doing without its mother. That is a mere detail."
+
+A shudder went through her.
+
+The whole thing was incomprehensible to him. Why under heaven had she done
+it? How could one so sensitive have done a wanton cruel thing like this?
+Her reason he could not fathom. The facts that confronted him were that
+she _had_ done it, and had meant to carry the crime through. Only
+detection had changed her purpose.
+
+She turned upon him, plainly sick of the whole business. "Let's get away
+from here. Where's your horse?"
+
+"I haven't any. I started on foot and got lost."
+
+"From where?"
+
+"From Mammoth."
+
+Sharply her keen eyes fixed him. How could a man have got lost near
+Mammoth and wandered here? He would have had to cross the range, and even
+a child would have known enough to turn back into the valley where the
+town lay.
+
+"How long ago?"
+
+"Day before yesterday." He added after a moment: "I was looking for a
+job."
+
+She took in the soft hands and the unweathered skin of the dark face.
+"What sort of a job?"
+
+"Anything I can do."
+
+"But what can you do?"
+
+"I can ride."
+
+She must take him home with her, of course, and feed and rest him. That
+went without saying. But what after that? He knew too much to be turned
+adrift with the story of what he had seen. If she could get a hold on
+him--whether of fear or of gratitude--so as to insure his silence, the
+truth might yet be kept quiet. At least she could try.
+
+"Did you ever ride the range?"
+
+"No."
+
+"What sort of work have you done?"
+
+After a scarcely noticeable pause, "Clerical work," he answered.
+
+"You're from the East?" she suggested, her eyes narrowing.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"My name is Melissy Lee," she told him, watching him very steadily.
+
+Once more the least of pauses. "Mine is Diller--James Diller."
+
+"That's funny. I know another man of that name. At least, I know him by
+sight."
+
+The man who had called himself Diller grew wary. "It's a common enough
+name."
+
+"Yes. If I find you work at my father's ranch would you be too particular
+about what it is?"
+
+"Try me."
+
+"And your memory--is it inconveniently good?" Her glance swept as by
+chance over the scene of her recent operations.
+
+"I've got a right good forgettery, too," he assured her.
+
+"You're not in the habit of talking much about the things you see." She
+put it in the form of a statement, but the rising inflection indicated the
+interrogative.
+
+His black eyes met hers steadily. "I can padlock my mouth when it is
+necessary," he answered, the suggestion of a Southern drawl in his
+intonation.
+
+She wanted an assurance more direct. "When _you_ think it necessary, I
+suppose."
+
+"That is what I meant to say."
+
+"Come. One good turn deserves another. What about this?" She nodded toward
+the dead cow.
+
+"I have not seen a thing I ought not to have seen."
+
+"Didn't you see me blot a brand on that calf?"
+
+He shook his head. "Can't recall it at all, Miss Lee."
+
+Swiftly her keen glance raked him again. Judged by his clothes, he was one
+of the world's ineffectives, flotsam tossed into the desert by the wash of
+fate; but there was that in the steadiness of his eye, in the set of his
+shoulders, in the carriage of his lean-loined, slim body that spoke of
+breeding. He was no booze-fighting grubliner. Disguised though he was in
+cheap slops, she judged him a man of parts. He would do to trust,
+especially since she could not help herself.
+
+"We'll be going. You take my horse," she ordered.
+
+"And let you walk?"
+
+"How long since you have eaten?" she asked brusquely.
+
+"About seven minutes," he smiled.
+
+"But before that?"
+
+"Two days."
+
+"Well, then. Anybody can see you're as weak as a kitten. Do as I say."
+
+"Why can't we both ride?"
+
+"We can as soon as we get across the pass. Until then I'll walk."
+
+Erect as a willow sapling, she took the hills with an elastic ease that
+showed her deep-bosomed in spite of her slenderness. The short corduroy
+riding skirt and high-laced boots were made for use, not grace, but the
+man in the saddle found even in her manner of walking the charm of her
+direct, young courage. Free of limb, as yet unconscious of sex, she had
+the look of a splendid boy. The descending sun was in her sparkling hair,
+on the lank, undulating grace of her changing lines.
+
+Active as a cat though it was, the cowpony found the steep pass with its
+loose rubble hard going. Melissy took the climb much easier. In the way
+she sped through the mesquit, evading the clutch of the cholla by supple
+dips to right and left, there was a kind of pantherine litheness.
+
+At the summit she waited for the horse to clamber up the shale after her.
+
+"Get down in your collar, you Buckskin," she urged, and when the pony was
+again beside her petted the animal with little love pats on the nose.
+
+Carelessly she flung at Diller a question. "From what part of the East did
+you say?"
+
+He was on the spot promptly this time. "From Keokuk."
+
+"Keokuk, Indiana?"
+
+"Iowa," he smiled.
+
+"Oh, is it Iowa?" He had sidestepped her little trap, but she did not give
+up. "Just arrived?"
+
+"I've been herding sheep for a month."
+
+"Oh, sheep-herding!" Her disdain implied that if he were fit for nothing
+better than sheep-herding, the West could find precious little use for
+him.
+
+"It was all I could get to do."
+
+"Where did you say you wrangled Mary's little lamb?"
+
+"In the Catalinas."
+
+"Whose outfit?"
+
+Question and answer were tossed back and forth lightly, but both were
+watching warily.
+
+"Outfit?" he repeated, puzzled.
+
+"Yes. Who were you working for?"
+
+"Don't remember his name. He was a Mexican."
+
+"Must have been one of the camps of Antonio Valdez."
+
+"Yes, that's it. That's the name."
+
+"Only he runs his sheep in the Galiuros," she demurred.
+
+"Is it the Galiuros? Those Spanish names! I can't keep them apart in my
+mind."
+
+She laughed with hard, young cruelty. "It is hard to remember what you
+never heard, isn't it?"
+
+The man was on the rack. Tiny beads of perspiration stood out on his
+forehead. But he got a lip smile into working order.
+
+"Just what do you mean, Miss Lee?"
+
+"You had better get your story more pat. I've punched a dozen holes in it
+already. First you tell me you are from the East, and even while you were
+telling me I knew you were a Southerner from the drawl. No man ever got
+lost from Mammoth. You gave a false name. You said you had been herding
+sheep, but you didn't know what an outfit is. You wobbled between the
+Galiuros and the Catalinas."
+
+"I'm not a native. I told you I couldn't remember Spanish names."
+
+"It wasn't necessary to tell me," she countered quickly. "A man that can't
+recall even the name of his boss!"
+
+"I'm not in the witness box, Miss Lee," he told her stiffly.
+
+"Not yet, but you're liable to be soon, I reckon."
+
+"In a cattle rustling case, I suppose you mean."
+
+"No, I don't." She went on with her indictment of his story, though his
+thrust had brought the color to her cheek. "When I offered you Antonio
+Valdez for an employer you jumped at him. If you want to know, he happens
+to be our herder. He doesn't own a sheep and never will."
+
+"You know all about it," he said with obvious sarcasm.
+
+"I know you're not who you say you are."
+
+"Perhaps you know who I am then."
+
+"I don't know or care. It's none of my business. But others may think it
+is theirs. You can't be so reckless with the truth without folks having
+notions. If I were you I'd get a story that will hang together."
+
+"You're such a good detective. Maybe I could get you to invent one for
+me," he suggested maliciously.
+
+Her indignation flashed. "I'm no such thing. But I'm not quite a fool. A
+babe in arms wouldn't swallow that fairy tale."
+
+Awkward as her knowledge might prove, he could not help admiring the
+resource and shrewdness of the girl. She had virtually served notice that
+if she had a secret that needed keeping so had he.
+
+They looked down over a desert green with bajadas, prickly pears, and
+mesquit. To the right, close to a spur of the hills, were the dwarfed
+houses of a ranch. The fans of a windmill caught the sun and flashed it
+back to the travelers.
+
+"The Bar Double G. My father owns it," Miss Lee explained.
+
+"Oh! Your father owns it." He reflected a moment while he studied her.
+"Let's understand each other, Miss Lee. I'm not what I claim to be, you
+say. We'll put it that you have guessed right. What do you intend to do
+about it? I'm willing to be made welcome at the Bar Double G, but I don't
+want to be too welcome."
+
+"I'm not going to do anything."
+
+"So long as I remember not to remember what I've seen."
+
+The blood burned in her cheeks beneath their Arizona tan. She did not look
+at him. "If you like to put it that way."
+
+He counted it to her credit that she was ashamed of the bargain in every
+honest fiber of her.
+
+"No matter what they say I've done. You'll keep faith?"
+
+"I don't care what you've done," she flung back bitterly. "It's none of my
+affair. I told you that before. Men come out here for all sorts of
+reasons. We don't ask for a bill of particulars."
+
+"Then I'll be right glad to go down to the Bar Double G with you, and say
+thanks for the chance."
+
+He had dismounted when they first reached the pass. Now she swung to the
+saddle and he climbed behind her. They reached presently one of the
+nomadic trails of the cattle country which wander leisurely around hills
+and over gulches along the line of least resistance. This brought them to
+a main traveled road leading to the ranch.
+
+They rode in silence until the pasture fence was passed.
+
+"What am I to tell them your name is?" she asked stiffly.
+
+He took his time to answer. "Tom Morse is a good name, don't you think?
+How would T. L. Morse do?"
+
+She offered no comment, but sat in front of him, unresponsive as the
+sphinx. The rigor of her flat back told him that, though she might have to
+keep his shameful secret for the sake of her own, he could not presume
+upon it the least in the world.
+
+Melissy turned the horse over to a little Mexican boy and they were just
+mounting the steps of the porch when a young man cantered up to the house.
+Lean and muscular and sunbaked, he looked out of cool, gray eyes upon a
+man's world that had often put him through the acid test. The plain,
+cactus-torn chaps, flannel shirt open at the sinewy throat, dusty,
+wide-brimmed hat, revolver peeping from its leather pocket on the thigh:
+every detail contributed to the impression of efficiency he created. Even
+the one touch of swagger about him, the blue silk kerchief knotted loosely
+around his neck, lent color to his virile competency.
+
+He dragged his horse to a standstill and leaped off at the same instant.
+"Evenin', 'Lissie."
+
+She was busy lacing her shoe and did not look up. He guessed that he was
+being snubbed and into his eyes came a gleam of fun. A day later than he
+had promised, Jack Flatray was of opinion that he was being punished for
+tardiness.
+
+Casually he explained. "Couldn't make it any sooner. Burke had a hurry-up
+job that took us into the hills. Fellow by the name of Bellamy, wanted for
+murder at Nemo, Arkansas, had been tracked to Mesa. A message came over
+the wires to arrest him. When Burke sent me to his room he had lit out,
+taken a swift hike into the hills. Must a-had some warning, for he didn't
+even wait for a horse."
+
+The dilated eyes of the girl went past the deputy to the man she had
+rescued. He was leaning against one of the porch posts, tense and rigid,
+on his face the look of the hunted brought to bay.
+
+"And did you find him?" she asked mechanically of the deputy.
+
+"We found him. He had been trampled to death by a cattle stampede."
+
+Her mind groped blindly for an explanation. Her woman's instinct told her
+that the man panting on the porch within six feet of the officer was the
+criminal wanted. There must be a mistake somewhere.
+
+"Did you identify him?"
+
+"I guess there is no doubt about it. His papers and belongings all showed
+he was our man."
+
+"Oh!" The excitement of his news had for a moment thawed her, but a
+dignified aloofness showed again in her manner. "If you want to see father
+you'll find him in the corral, Mr. Flatray."
+
+"Well, I don't know as I'm looking for him awful hard," the blue
+kerchiefed youth smiled genially. "Anyway, I can wait a few minutes if I
+have to."
+
+"Yes." She turned away indifferently. "I'll show you your room, Mr.
+Morse."
+
+The deputy watched them disappear into the house with astonishment printed
+on his face. He had ridden twenty-seven miles to see Melissy Lee and he
+had not quite expected this sort of a greeting.
+
+"If that don't beat the Dutch. Looks like I'll do my callin' on the old
+man after all, maybe," he murmured with a grin.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+AN ACCUSATION
+
+
+The rescued man ate, drank, and from sheer fatigue fell asleep within five
+minutes of the time he was shown his bedroom.
+
+Since he was not of the easily discouraged kind, the deputy stayed to
+supper on invitation of Lee. He sat opposite the daughter of his host, and
+that young woman treated him with the most frigid politeness. The owner of
+the Bar Double G was quite unaware of any change of temperature. Jack and
+his little girl had always been the best of friends. So now he discoursed
+on the price of cows, the good rains, the outrages of the rustlers, and
+kindred topics without suspecting that the attention of the young man was
+on more personal matters.
+
+Though born in Arizona, Melissy was of the South. Due westward rolls the
+tide of settlement, and Beauchamp Lee had migrated from Tennessee after
+the war, following the line of least resistance to the sunburned
+territory. Later he had married a woman a good deal younger than himself.
+She had borne him two children, the elder of whom was now a young man.
+Melissy was the younger, and while she was still a babe in arms the mother
+had died of typhoid and left her baby girl to grow up as best she might in
+a land where women were few and far. This tiny pledge of her mother's love
+Champ Lee had treasured as a gift from Heaven. He had tended her and
+nursed her through the ailments of childhood with a devotion the most pure
+of his reckless life. Given to heady gusts of passion, there had never
+been a moment when his voice had been other than gentle and tender to
+her.
+
+Inevitably Melissy had become the product of her inheritance and her
+environment. If she was the heiress of Beauchamp Lee's courage and
+generosity, his quick indignation against wrong and injustice, so, too,
+she was of his passionate lawlessness.
+
+After supper Melissy disappeared. She wanted very much to be alone and
+have a good cry. Wherefore she slipped out of the back door and ran up the
+Lone Tree trail in the darkness. Jack thought he saw a white skirt fly a
+traitorous signal, and at leisure he pursued.
+
+But Melissy was not aware of that. She reached Lone Tree rock and slipped
+down from boulder to boulder until she came to the pine which gave the
+place its name. For hours she had been forced to repress her emotions, to
+make necessary small talk, to arrange for breakfast and other household
+details. Now she was alone, and the floods of her bitterness were
+unloosed. She broke down and wept passionately, for she was facing her
+first great disillusionment. She had lost a friend, one in whom she had
+put great faith.
+
+The first gust of the storm was past when Melissy heard a step on the
+rocks above. She knew intuitively that Jack Flatray had come in search of
+her, and he was the last man on earth she wanted to meet just now.
+
+"'Lissie!" she heard him call softly; and again, "'Lissie!"
+
+Noiselessly she got to her feet, waiting to see what he would do. She knew
+he must be standing on the edge of the great rock, so directly above her
+that if he had kicked a pebble it would have landed beside her. Presently
+he began to clamber down.
+
+She tiptoed along the ledge and slipped into the trough at the farther end
+that led to the top. It was a climb she had taken several times, but never
+in the dark. The ascent was almost perpendicular, and it had to be made by
+clinging to projecting rocks and vegetation. Moreover, if she were to
+escape undetected it had to be done in silence.
+
+She was a daughter of the hills, as surefooted as a mountain goat. Handily
+she went up, making the most of the footholds that offered. In spite of
+the best she could do the rustling of bushes betrayed her.
+
+Jack came to the foot of the trough and looked up.
+
+"So you're there, are you?" he asked.
+
+Her foot loosened a stone and sent it rolling down.
+
+"If I were you I wouldn't try that at night, 'Liss," he advised.
+
+She made sure of the steadiness of her voice before she answered. "You
+don't need to try it."
+
+"I said if I were you, girl."
+
+"But you are not. Don't let me detain you here, Mr. Flatray," she told him
+in a manner of icy precision.
+
+The deputy began the climb too. "What's the use of being so hostile,
+little girl?" he drawled. "Me, I came as soon as I could, burning the
+wind, too."
+
+She set her teeth, determined to reach the top in time to get away before
+he could join her. In her eagerness she took a chance that proved her
+undoing. A rock gave beneath her foot and clattered down. Clinging by one
+hand and foot, she felt her body swing around. From her throat a little
+cry leaped. She knew herself slipping.
+
+"Jack!"
+
+In time, and just in time, he reached her, braced himself, and gave her
+his knee for a foot rest.
+
+"All right?" he asked, and "All right!" she answered promptly.
+
+"We'll go back," he told her.
+
+She made no protest. Indeed, she displayed a caution in lowering herself
+that surprised him. Every foothold she tested carefully with her weight.
+Once she asked him to place her shoe in the crevice for her. He had never
+seen her take so much time in making sure or be so fussy about her
+personal safety.
+
+Safely on the ledge again, she attempted a second time to dismiss him.
+"Thank you, Mr. Flatray. I won't take any more of your time."
+
+He looked at her steadily before he spoke. "You're mighty high-heeled,
+'Lissie. You know my name ain't Mr. Flatray to you. What's it all about?
+I've told you twice I couldn't get here any sooner."
+
+She flamed out at him in an upblaze of feminine ferocity. "And I tell
+_you_, that I don't care if you had never come. I don't want to see you or
+have anything to do with you."
+
+"Why not?" He asked it quietly, though he began to know that her charge
+against him was a serious one.
+
+"Because I know what you are now, because you have made us believe in you
+while all the time you were living a lie."
+
+"Meaning what?"
+
+"I was gathering poppies on the other side of Antelope Pass this
+afternoon."
+
+"What has that got to do with me being a liar and a scoundrel," he wanted
+to know.
+
+"Oh, you pretend," she scoffed. "But you know as well as I do."
+
+"I'm afraid I don't. Let's have the indictment."
+
+"If everybody in Papago County had told me I wouldn't have believed it,"
+she cried. "I had to see it with my own eyes before I could have been
+convinced."
+
+"Yes, well what is it you saw with your eyes?"
+
+"You needn't keep it up. I tell you I saw it all from the time you fired
+the shot."
+
+He laughed easily, but without mirth. "Kept tab on me, did you?"
+
+She wheeled from him, gave a catch of her breath, and caught at the rock
+wall to save herself from falling.
+
+He spoke sharply. "You hurt yourself in the trough."
+
+"I sprained my ankle a little, but it doesn't matter."
+
+He understood now why she had made so slow a descent and he suspected that
+the wrench was more than she admitted. The moon had come out from under a
+cloud and showed him a pale, tear-stained face, with a row of even, little
+teeth set firm against the lower lip. She was in pain and her pride was
+keeping it from him.
+
+"Let me look at your ankle."
+
+"No."
+
+"I say yes. You've hurt it seriously."
+
+"That is my business, I think," she told him with cold finality.
+
+"I'm going to make it mine. Think I don't know you, proud as Lucifer when
+you get set. You'll lame yourself for life if you're not careful."
+
+"I don't care to discuss it."
+
+"Fiddlesticks! If you've got anything against me we'll hear what it is
+afterward. Right now we'll give first aid to the injured. Sit down here."
+
+She had not meant to give way, but she did. Perhaps it was because of the
+faintness that stole over her, or because the pain was sharper than she
+could well endure. She found herself seated on the rock shelf, letting him
+cut the lace out of her shoe and slip it off. Ever so gently he worked,
+but he could tell by the catches of her breath that it was not pleasant to
+endure. From his neck he untied the silk kerchief and wrapped it tightly
+around the ankle.
+
+"That will have to do till I get you home."
+
+"I'll not trouble you, sir. If you'll stop and tell my father that is all
+I'll ask."
+
+"Different here," he retorted cheerfully. "Just so as to avoid any
+argument, I'll announce right now that Jack Flatray is going to see you
+home. It's his say-so."
+
+She rose. None knew better than she that he was a dominating man when he
+chose to be. She herself carried in her slim body a spirit capable of
+passion and of obstinacy, but to-night she had not the will to force the
+fighting.
+
+Setting her teeth, she took a step or two forward, her hand against the
+rock wall to help bear the weight. With narrowed eyes, he watched her
+closely, noting the catches of pain that shot through her breathing. Half
+way up the boulder bed he interposed brusquely.
+
+"This is plumb foolishness, girl. You've got no business putting your
+weight on that foot, and you're not going to do it."
+
+He slipped his arm around her waist in such a way as to support her all he
+could. With a quick turn of the body she tried to escape.
+
+"No use. I'm going through with this, 'Lissie. Someone has been lying to
+you about me, and just now you hate the ground I walk on. Good enough.
+That's got nothing to do with this. You're a woman that needs help, and
+any old time J. F. meets up with such a one he's on the job. You don't owe
+me 'Thank you,' but you've got to stand for me till you reach the house."
+
+"You're taking advantage of me because I can't help myself. Why don't you
+go and bring father," she flung out.
+
+"I'm younger than your father and abler to help. That's why?"
+
+They reached the top of the bluff and he made her sit down to rest. A pale
+moon suffused the country, and in that stage set to lowered lights her
+pallor was accented. From the colorless face shadowy, troubled eyes spoke
+the misery through which she was passing. The man divined that her pain
+was more than physical, and the knowledge went to him poignantly by the
+heart route.
+
+"What is it, 'Lissie? What have I done?" he asked gently.
+
+"You know. I don't want to talk about it."
+
+"But I don't know."
+
+"What's the use of keeping it up? I caught you this afternoon."
+
+"Caught me doing what?"
+
+"Caught you rustling, caught you branding a calf just after you had shot
+the cow."
+
+For an instant her charge struck him dumb. He stared at her as if he
+thought she had gone suddenly mad.
+
+"What's that? Say it again," he got out at last.
+
+"And the cow had the Bar Double G brand, belonged to my father, your best
+friend," she added passionately.
+
+He spoke very gently, but there was an edge to his voice that was new to
+her. "Suppose you tell me all about it."
+
+She threw out a hand in a gesture of despair. "What's the use? Nothing
+could have made me believe it but my own eyes. You needn't keep up a
+pretense. I saw you."
+
+"Yes, so you said before. Now begin at the start and tell your story."
+
+She had the odd feeling of being put on the defensive and it angered her.
+How dared he look at her with those cool, gray eyes that still appeared to
+bore a hole through treachery? Why did her heart convict her of having
+deserted a friend, when she knew that the desertion was his?
+
+"While I was gathering poppies I heard a shot. It was so close I walked to
+the edge of the draw and looked over. There I saw you."
+
+"What was I doing?"
+
+"You were hogtying a calf."
+
+"And then?"
+
+"I didn't understand at first. I thought to slip down and surprise you for
+fun. But as I got lower I saw the dead cow. Just then you began to brand
+the calf and I cried out to you."
+
+"What did I do?"
+
+"You know what you did," she answered wearily. "You broke for the brush
+where your horse was and galloped away."
+
+"Got a right good look at me, did you?"
+
+"Not at your face. But I knew. You were wearing this blue silk
+handkerchief." Her finger indicated the one bound around her ankle.
+
+"So on that evidence you decide I'm a rustler, and you've only known me
+thirteen years. You're a good friend, 'Lissie."
+
+Her eyes blazed on him like live coals. "Have you forgotten the calf you
+left with your brand on it?"
+
+She had startled him at last. "With my brand on it?" he repeated, his
+voice dangerously low and soft.
+
+"You know as well as I do. You had got the F just about finished when I
+called. You dropped the running iron and ran."
+
+"Dropped it and ran, did I? And what did you do?"
+
+"I reheated the iron and blurred the brand so that nobody could tell what
+it had been."
+
+He laughed harshly without mirth. "I see. I'm a waddy and a thief, but
+you're going to protect me for old times' sake. That's the play, is it? I
+ought to be much obliged to you and promise to reform, I reckon."
+
+His bitterness stung. She felt a tightening of the throat. "All I ask is
+that you go away and never come back to me," she cried with a sob.
+
+"Don't worry about that. I ain't likely to come back to a girl that thinks
+I'm the lowest thing that walks. You're not through with me a bit more
+than I am with you," he answered harshly.
+
+Her little hand beat upon the rock in her distress. "I never would have
+believed it. Nobody could have made me believe it. I--I--why, I trusted
+you like my own father," she lamented. "To think that you would take that
+way to stock your ranch--and with the cattle of my father, too."
+
+His face was hard as chiseled granite. "Distrust all your friends. That's
+the best way."
+
+"You haven't even denied it--not that it would do any good," she said
+miserably.
+
+There was a sound of hard, grim laughter in his throat. "No, and I ain't
+going to deny it. Are you ready to go yet?"
+
+His repulse of her little tentative advance was like a blow on the face to
+her.
+
+She made a movement to rise. While she was still on her knees he stooped,
+put his arms around her, and took her into them. Before she could utter
+her protest he had started down the trail toward the house.
+
+"How dare you? Let me go," she ordered.
+
+"You're not able to walk, and you'll go the way I say," he told her
+shortly in a flinty voice.
+
+Her anger was none the less because she realized her helplessness to get
+what she wanted. Her teeth set fast to keep back useless words. Into his
+stony eyes her angry ones burned. The quick, irregular rise and fall of
+her bosom against his heart told him how she was struggling with her
+passion.
+
+Once he spoke. "Tell me where it was you saw this rustler--the exact place
+near as you can locate it."
+
+She answered only by a look.
+
+The deputy strode into the living room of the ranch with her in his arms.
+Lee was reading a newspaper Jack had brought with him from Mesa. At sight
+of them he started up hurriedly.
+
+"Goddlemighty, what's the matter, Jack?"
+
+"Only a ricked ankle, Champ. Slipped on a stone," Flatray explained as he
+put Melissy down on the lounge.
+
+In two minutes the whole house was upset. Hop Ling was heating water to
+bathe the sprain. A rider from the bunkhouse was saddling to go for the
+doctor. Another was off in the opposite direction to buy some liniment at
+Mammoth.
+
+In the confusion Flatray ran up his horse from the pasture, slapped on the
+saddle, and melted into the night.
+
+An hour later Melissy asked her father what had become of him.
+
+"Doggone that boy, I don't know where he went. Reckon he thought he'd be
+in the way. Mighty funny he didn't give us a chanct to tell him to stay."
+
+"Probably he had business in Mesa," Melissy answered, turning her face to
+the wall.
+
+"Business nothing," retorted the exasperated rancher. "He figured we
+couldn't eat and sleep him without extra trouble. Ain't that a fine
+reputation for him to be giving the Bar Double G? I'll curl his hair for
+him onct I meet up with him again."
+
+"If you would put out the light, I think I could sleep, dad," she told him
+in the least of voices.
+
+"Sure, honey. Has the throbbing gone out of the ankle?" he asked
+anxiously.
+
+"Not entirely, but it's a good deal better. Good-night, dad."
+
+"If Doc comes I'll bring him in," Lee said after he had kissed her.
+
+"Do, please."
+
+But after she was left alone Melissy did not prepare herself for sleep.
+Her wide open eyes stared into the darkness, while her mind stormily
+reviewed the day. The man who for years had been her best friend was a
+scoundrel. She had proved him unworthy of her trust, and on top of that he
+had insulted her. Hot tears stung her eyes--tears of shame, of wounded
+self-love, of mortification, and of something more worthy than any of
+these.
+
+She grieved passionately for that which had gone out of her life, for the
+comradeship that had been so precious to her. If this man were a waddy,
+who of all her friends could she trust? She could have forgiven him had he
+done wrong in the heat of anger. But this premeditated evil was beyond
+forgiveness. To make it worse, he had come direct from the doing of it to
+meet her, with a brazen smile on his lips and a lie in his heart. She
+would never speak to him again--never so long as she lived.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE MAN WITH THE CHIHUAHUA HAT
+
+
+A little dust cloud was traveling up the trail toward the Bar Double G,
+the center of which presently defined itself as a rider moving at a road
+gait. He wore a Chihuahua hat and with it the picturesque trappings the
+Southwest borrows on occasion from across the border. Vanity disclosed
+itself in the gold-laced hat, in the silver conchos of the fringed chaps,
+in the fine workmanship of the saddle and bit. The man's finery was
+overdone, carried with it the suggestion of being on exhibition. But one
+look at the man himself, sleek and graceful, black-haired and
+white-toothed, exuding an effect of cold wariness in spite of the masked
+smiling face, would have been enough to give the lie to any charge of
+weakness. His fopperies could not conceal the silken strength of him. One
+meeting with the chill, deep-set eyes was certificate enough for most
+people.
+
+Melissy, sitting on the porch with her foot resting on a second chair,
+knew a slight quickening of the blood as she watched him approach.
+
+"Good evenin', Miss M'lissy," he cried, sweeping his sombrero as low as
+the stirrup.
+
+"_Buenos tardes_, _Senor_ Norris," she flung back gayly.
+
+Sitting at ease in the saddle, he leisurely looked her over with eyes that
+smoldered behind half-shuttered lids. To most of her world she was in
+spirit still more boy than woman, but before his bold, possessive gaze her
+long lashes wavered to the cheeks into which the warm blood was beating.
+Her long, free lines were still slender with the immaturity of youth, her
+soul still hesitating reluctantly to cross the border to womanhood toward
+which Nature was pushing her so relentlessly. From a fund of experience
+Philip Norris read her shrewdly, knew how to evoke the latent impulses
+which brought her eagerly to the sex duel.
+
+"Playing off for sick," he scoffed.
+
+"I'm not," she protested. "Never get sick. It's just a sprained ankle."
+
+"Sho! I guess you're Miss Make Believe; just harrowing the feelings of
+your beaux."
+
+"The way you talk! I haven't got any beaux. The boys are just my
+friends."
+
+"Oh, just friends! And no beaux. My, my! Not a single sweetheart in all
+this wide open country. Shall I go rope you one and bring him in,
+_compadre_?"
+
+"No!" she exploded. "I don't want any. I'm not old enough yet." Her
+dancing eyes belied the words.
+
+"Now I wouldn't have guessed it. You look to me most ready to be picked."
+He rested his weight on the farther stirrup and let his lazy smile mock
+her. "My estimate would be sixteen. I'll bet you're every day of that."
+
+"I only lack three months of being eighteen," she came back indignantly.
+
+"You don't say! You'll ce'tainly have to be advertising for a husband
+soon, Miss Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen. Maybe an ad in the Mesa paper
+would help. You ain't so awful bad looking."
+
+"I'll let you write it. What would you say?" she demanded, a patch of pink
+standing out near the curve of the cheek bone.
+
+He swung from the saddle and flung the reins to the ground. With jingling
+spurs he came up the steps and sat on the top one, his back against a
+pillar. Boldly his admiring eyes swept her.
+
+"_Nina_, I couldn't do the subject justice. Honest, I haven't got the
+vocabulary."
+
+"Oh, you!" Laughter was in the eyes that studied him with a side tilt of
+the chin. "That's a fine way to get out of it when your bluff is called."
+
+He leaned back against the post comfortably and absorbed the beauty of the
+western horizon. The sun had just set behind a saddle of the Galiuros in a
+splash of splendor. All the colors of the rainbow fought for supremacy in
+a brilliant-tinted sky that blazed above the fire-girt peaks. Soon dusk
+would slip down over the land and tone the hues to a softer harmony. A
+purple sea would flow over the hills, to be in turn displaced by a deep,
+soft violet. Then night, that night of mystery and romance which
+transforms the desert to a thing of incredible wonder!
+
+"Did your father buy this sunset with the ranch? And has he got a
+guarantee that it will perform every night?" he asked.
+
+"Did you ever see anything like it?" she cried. "I have looked at them all
+my life and I never get tired."
+
+He laughed softly, his indolent, sleepy look on her. "Some things I would
+never get tired of looking at either."
+
+Without speaking she nodded, still absorbing the sunset.
+
+"But it wouldn't be that kind of scenery," he added. "How tall are you,
+_muchacha_?"
+
+Her glance came around in surprise. "I don't know. About five foot five, I
+think. Why?"
+
+"I'm working on that ad. How would this do? 'Miss
+Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen wants to meet up with gentleman between
+eighteen and forty-eight. Object, matrimony. Description of lady: Slim,
+medium height, brunette, mop of blue-black hair, the prettiest dimple you
+ever saw----'"
+
+"Now I know you're making fun of me. I'm mad." And the dimple flashed into
+being.
+
+"'--mostly says the opposite of what she means, has a----'"
+
+"I don't. I don't"
+
+"'--has a spice of the devil in her, which----'"
+
+"Now, I _am_ mad," she interrupted, laughing.
+
+"'--which is excusable, since she has the reddest lips for kissing in
+Arizona.'"
+
+He had gone too far. Her innocence was in arms. Norris knew it by the
+swiftness with which the smile vanished from her face, by the flash of
+anger in the eyes.
+
+"I prefer to talk about something else, Mr. Norris," she said with all the
+prim stiffness of a schoolgirl.
+
+Her father relieved the tension by striding across from the stable. With
+him came a bowlegged young fellow in plain leathers. The youngster was
+Charley Hymer, one of the riders for the Bar Double G.
+
+"You're here at the right time, Norris," Lee said grimly. "Charley has
+just come down from Antelope Pass. He found one of my cows dead, with a
+bullet hole through the forehead. The ashes of a fire were there, and in
+the brush not far away a running iron."
+
+The eyes of Norris narrowed to slits. He was the cattle detective of the
+association and for a year now the rustlers had outgeneraled him. "I'll
+have you take me to the spot, Charley. Get a move on you and we'll get
+there soon as the moon is up."
+
+Melissy gripped the arms of her chair tightly with both hands. She was
+looking at Norris with a new expression, a kind of breathless fear. She
+knew him for a man who could not be swerved from the thing he wanted. For
+all his easy cynicism, he had the reputation of being a bloodhound on the
+trail. Moreover, she knew that he was no friend to Jack Flatray. Why had
+she left that running iron as evidence to convict its owner? What folly
+not to have removed it from the immediate scene of the crime!
+
+The cattle detective and her father had moved a few steps away and were
+talking in low tones. Melissy became aware of a footfall. The man who
+called himself Morse came around the corner of the house and stopped at
+the porch steps.
+
+"May I speak to you a moment, Miss Lee?" he said in a low voice.
+
+"Of course."
+
+The voice of Norris rose to an irritated snarl. "Tell you I've got
+evidence, Lee. Mebbe it's not enough to convict, but it satisfies me
+a-plenty that Jack Flatray's the man."
+
+Melissy was frozen to a tense attention. Her whole mind was on what passed
+between the detective and her father. Otherwise she would have noticed the
+swift change that transformed the tenderfoot.
+
+The rancher answered with impatient annoyance. "You're 'way off, Norris. I
+don't care anything about your evidence. The idea is plumb ridiculous.
+Twenty odd years I've known him. He's the best they make, a pure through
+and through. Not a crooked hair in his head. I've eat out of the same
+frying pan too often with that boy not to know what he is. You go bury
+those suspicions of yours immediate. There's nothing to them."
+
+Norris grumbled objections as they moved toward the stable. Melissy drew a
+long breath and brought herself back to the tenderfoot.
+
+He stood like a coiled spring, head thrust far forward from the shoulders.
+The look in his black eyes was something new to her experience. For hate,
+passion, caution were all mirrored there.
+
+"You know Mr. Norris," she said quickly.
+
+He started. "What did you say his name was?" he asked with an assumption
+of carelessness.
+
+"Norris--Philip Norris. He is a cattle detective."
+
+"Never heard of Mr. Norris before in my life," he answered, but it was
+observable that he still breathed deep.
+
+She did not believe him. Some tie in their buried past bound these two men
+together. They must have known each other in the South years ago, and one
+of them at least was an enemy of the other. There might come a day when
+she could use this knowledge to save Jack Flatray from the punishment
+dogging his heels. Melissy filed it away in her memory for future
+reference.
+
+"You wanted to speak to me," she suggested.
+
+"I'm going away."
+
+"What for?"
+
+"Because I'm not a hound. I can't blackmail a woman."
+
+"How do you mean?"
+
+"I mean that you've found work here for me because I saw what you did over
+by Antelope Pass. We made a bargain. Oh, not in words, but a bargain just
+the same! You were to keep my secret because I knew yours. I release you
+from your part of it. Give me up if you think it is your duty. I'll not
+tell what I know."
+
+"That wasn't how you talked the other day."
+
+"No. It's how I talk now. I'm a hunted man, wanted for murder. I make you
+a present of the information."
+
+"You make me a present of what I already know, Mr. Diller, alias Morse,
+alias Bellamy."
+
+"You guessed it the first day?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And meant to keep quiet about it?"
+
+"Yes, I meant to shelter you from the punishment you deserve." She added
+with a touch of bitter self-scorn: "I was doing what I had to do."
+
+"You don't have to do it any longer." He looked straight at her with his
+head up. "And how do you know what I deserve? Who made you a judge about
+these facts? Grant for the sake of argument I killed him. Do you know I
+wasn't justified?"
+
+His fierce boldness put her on the defense. "A man sure of his cause does
+not run away. The paper said this Shep Boone was shot from ambush.
+Nothing could justify such a thing. When you did that----"
+
+"I didn't. Don't believe it, Miss Lee."
+
+"He was shot from behind, the paper said."
+
+"Do I look like a man who would kill from ambush?"
+
+She admitted to herself that this clear-eyed Southerner did not look like
+an assassin. Life in the open had made her a judge of such men as she had
+been accustomed to meet, but for days she had been telling herself she
+could no longer trust her judgment. Her best friend was a rustler. By a
+woman's logic it followed that since Jack Flatray was a thief this man
+might have committed all the crimes in the calendar.
+
+"I don't know." Then, impulsively, "No, you don't, but you may be for all
+that."
+
+"I'm not asking anything for myself. You may do as you please after I've
+gone. Send for Mr. Flatray and tell him if you like."
+
+A horse cantered across the plaza toward the store. Bellamy turned quickly
+to go.
+
+"I'm not going to tell anyone," the girl called after him in a low voice.
+
+Norris swung from the saddle. "Who's our hurried friend?" he asked
+carelessly.
+
+"Oh, a new rider of ours. Name of Morse." She changed the subject. "Are
+you--do you think you know who the rustler is?"
+
+His cold, black eyes rested in hers. She read in them something cruel and
+sinister. It was as if he were walking over the grave of an enemy.
+
+"I'm gathering evidence, a little at a time."
+
+"Do I know him?"
+
+"Maybe you do."
+
+"Tell me."
+
+He shook his head. "Wait till I've got him cinched."
+
+"You told father," she accused.
+
+He laughed in a hard, mirthless fashion. "That cured me. The Lee family is
+from Missouri. When I talk next time I'll have the goods to show."
+
+"I know who you mean. You're making a mistake." Her voice seemed to plead
+with him.
+
+"Not on your life, I ain't. But we'll talk about that when the subject is
+riper. There will be a showdown some day, and don't you forget it. Well,
+Charley is calling me. So long, Miss Three-Quarters-Past-Seventeen." He
+went jingling down the steps and swung to the saddle. "I'll not forget the
+ad, and when I find the right man I'll ce'tainly rope and bring him to
+you."
+
+"The rustler?" she asked innocently.
+
+"No, not the rustler, the gent between eighteen and forty-eight, object
+matrimony."
+
+"I don't want to trouble you," she flung at him with her gay smile.
+
+"No trouble at all. Fact is, I've got him in mind already," he assured her
+promptly.
+
+"Oh!" A pulse of excitement was beating in her throat.
+
+"You don't ask me who he is," suggested Norris boldly, crouched in the
+saddle with his weight on the far stirrup.
+
+She had brought it upon herself, but now she dodged the issue. "'Most
+anyone will do, and me going on eighteen."
+
+"You're wrong, girl. Only one out of a thousand will do for your master."
+
+"Master, indeed! If he comes to the Bar Double G he'll find he is at the
+wrong address. None wanted, thank you."
+
+"Most folks don't want what's best for them, I allow. But if they have
+luck it sometimes comes to them."
+
+"Luck!" she echoed, her chin in the air.
+
+"You heard me right. What you need is a man that ain't afraid of you, one
+to ride close herd on you so as to head off them stampede notions of
+yours. Now this lad is the very one. He is a black-haired guy, and when he
+says a thing----"
+
+Involuntarily she glanced at his sleek black head. Melissy felt a sudden
+clamor of the blood, a pounding of the pulses.
+
+"--he most generally means it. I've wrangled around a heap with him and
+there's no manner of doubt he's up to specifications. In appearance he
+looks like me. Point of fact, he's a dead ringer for me."
+
+She saw her chance and flashed out. "Now you're flattering him. There
+can't be two as--as fascinating as Senor Norris," she mocked.
+
+His smoldering eyes had the possessive insolence she resented and yet
+found so stimulating.
+
+"Did I say there were two?" he drawled.
+
+It was his parting shot. With a touch of the spur he was off, leaving her
+no time for an adequate answer.
+
+There were no elusions and inferences about Philip Norris when he wanted
+to be direct. He had fairly taken her breath away. Melissy's instinct told
+her there was something humiliating about such a wooing. But picturesque
+and unconventional conduct excuse themselves in a picturesque personality.
+And this man had that if nothing else.
+
+She told herself she was angry at him, that he took liberties far beyond
+those of any of the other young men. Yet, somehow, she went into the house
+smiling. A color born of excitement burned beneath her sparkling eyes. She
+had entered into her heritage of womanhood and the call of sex was
+summoning her to the adventure that is old as the garden where Eve met
+Adam.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+THE TENDERFOOT TAKES UP A CLAIM
+
+
+Mr. Diller, alias Morse, alias Bellamy, did not long remain at the Bar
+Double G as a rider. It developed that he had money, and, tenderfoot
+though he was, the man showed a shrewd judgment in his investments. He
+bought sheep and put them on the government forest reserve, much to the
+annoyance of the cattlemen of the district.
+
+Morse, as he now called himself, was not the first man who had brought
+sheep into the border country. Far up in the hills were several camps of
+them. But hitherto these had been there on sufferance, and it had been
+understood that they were to be kept far from the cattle range. The
+extension of the government reserves changed the equation. A good slice of
+the range was cut off and thrown open to sheep. When Morse leased this and
+put five thousand bleaters upon the feeding ground the sentiment against
+him grew very bitter.
+
+Lee had been spokesman of a committee appointed to remonstrate with him.
+Morse had met them pleasantly but firmly. This part of the reserve had
+been set aside for sheep. If it were not leased by him it would be by
+somebody else. Therefore, he declined to withdraw his flocks. Champ lost
+his temper and swore that he for one would never submit to yield the
+range. Sharp bitter words were passed. Next week masked men drove a small
+flock belonging to Morse over a precipice.
+
+The tenderfoot retaliated by jumping a mining claim staked out by Lee upon
+which the assessment work had not been kept up. The cattleman contested
+this in the courts, lost the decision, and promptly appealed. Meanwhile,
+he countered by leasing from the forest supervisor part of the run
+previously held by his opponent and putting sheep of his own upon it.
+
+"I reckon I'll play Mr. Morse's own game and see how he likes it," the
+angry cattleman told his friends.
+
+But the luck was all with Morse. Before he had been working his new claim
+a month the Monte Cristo (he had changed the name from its original one of
+Melissy) proved a bonanza. His men ran into a rich streak of dirt that
+started a stampede for the vicinity.
+
+Champ indulged in choice profanity. From his point of view he had been
+robbed, and he announced the fact freely to such acquaintances as dropped
+into the Bar Double G store.
+
+"Dad gum it, I was aimin' to do that assessment work and couldn't jest
+lay my hands on the time. I'd been a millionaire three years and didn't
+know it. Then this damned Morse butts in and euchres me out of the claim.
+Some day him and me'll have a settlement. If the law don't right me, I
+reckon I'm most man enough to 'tend to Mr. Morse."
+
+It was his daughter who had hitherto succeeded in keeping the peace. When
+the news of the relocation had reached Lee he had at once started to
+settle the matter with a Winchester, but Melissy, getting news of his
+intention, had caught up a horse and ridden bareback after him in time to
+avert by her entreaties a tragedy. For six months after this the men had
+not chanced to meet.
+
+Why the tenderfoot had first come West--to hide what wounds in the great
+baked desert--no man knew or asked. Melissy had guessed, but she did not
+breathe to a soul her knowledge. It was a first article of Arizona's creed
+that a man's past belonged to him alone, was a blotted book if he chose to
+have it so. No doubt many had private reasons for their untrumpeted
+migration to that kindly Southwest which buries identity, but no wise
+citizen busied himself with questions about antecedents. The present
+served to sift one, and by the way a man met it his neighbors judged him.
+
+And T. L. Morse met it competently. In every emergency with which he had
+to cope the man "stood the acid." Arizona approved him a man, without
+according him any popularity. He was too dogmatic to win liking, but he
+had a genius for success. Everything he touched turned to gold.
+
+The Bar Double G lies half way between Mammoth and Mesa. Its position
+makes it a central point for ranchers within a radius of fifteen miles.
+Out of the logical need for it was born the store which Beauchamp Lee ran
+to supply his neighbors with canned goods, coffee, tobacco, and other
+indispensables; also the eating house for stage passengers passing to and
+from the towns. Young as she was, Melissy was the competent manager of
+both of these.
+
+It was one afternoon during the hour the stage stopped to let the
+passengers dine that Melissy's wandering eye fell upon Morse seated at one
+of the tables. Anger mounted within her at the cool impudence of the man.
+She had half a mind to order him out, but saw he was nearly through dinner
+and did not want to make a scene. Unfortunately Beauchamp Lee happened to
+come into the store just as his enemy strolled out from the dining-room.
+
+The ranchman stiffened. "What you been doing in there, seh?" he demanded
+sharply.
+
+"I've been eating a very good dinner in a public cafe. Any objections?"
+
+"Plenty of 'em, seh. I don't aim to keep open house for Mr. Morse."
+
+"I understand this is a business proposition. I expect to pay seventy-five
+cents for my meal."
+
+The eyes of the older man gleamed wrathfully. "As for yo' six bits, if you
+offer it to me I'll take it as an insult. At the Bar Double G we're not
+doing friendly business with claim jumpers. Don't you evah set yo' legs
+under my table again, seh."
+
+Morse shrugged, turned away to the public desk, and addressed an envelope,
+the while Lee glared at him from under his heavy beetling brows. Melissy
+saw that her father was still of half a mind to throw out the intruder and
+she called him to her.
+
+"Dad, Jose wants you to look at the hoof of one of his wheelers. He asked
+if you would come as soon as you could."
+
+Beauchamp still frowned at Morse, rasping his unshaven chin with his hand.
+"Ce'tainly, honey. Glad to look at it."
+
+"Dad! Please."
+
+The ranchman went out, grumbling. Five minutes later Morse took his seat
+on the stage beside the driver, having first left seventy-five cents on
+the counter.
+
+The stage had scarce gone when the girl looked up from her bookkeeping to
+see the man with the Chihuahua hat.
+
+"_Buenos tardes, senorita_," he gave her with a flash of white teeth.
+
+"_Buenos_," she nodded coolly.
+
+But the dancing eyes of her could not deny their pleasure at sight of him.
+They had rested upon men as handsome, but upon none who stirred her blood
+so much.
+
+He was in the leather chaps of a cowpuncher, gray-shirted, and a polka dot
+kerchief circled the brown throat. Life rippled gloriously from every
+motion of him. Hermes himself might have envied the perfect grace of the
+man.
+
+She supplied his wants while they chatted.
+
+"Jogged off your range quite a bit, haven't you?" she suggested.
+
+"Some. I'll take two bits' worth of that smokin', _nina_."
+
+She shook her head. "I'm no little girl. Don't you know I'm now half past
+eighteen?"
+
+"My--my. That ad didn't do a mite of good, did it?"
+
+"Not a bit."
+
+"And you growing older every day."
+
+"Does my age show?" she wanted to know anxiously.
+
+The scarce veiled admiration of his smoldering eyes drew the blood to her
+dusky cheeks. Something vigilant lay crouched panther-like behind the
+laughter of his surface badinage.
+
+"You're standing it well, honey."
+
+The color beat into her face, less at the word than at the purring caress
+in his voice. A year ago she had been a child. But in the Southland
+flowers ripen fast. Adolescence steals hard upon the heels of infancy,
+and, though the girl had never wakened to love, Nature was pushing her
+relentlessly toward a womanhood for which her unschooled impulses but
+scantily safeguarded her.
+
+She turned toward the shelves. "How many air-tights did you say?"
+
+"I didn't say." He leaned forward across the counter. "What's the hurry,
+little girl?"
+
+"My name is Melissy Lee," she told him over her shoulder.
+
+"Mine is Phil Norris. Glad to give it to you, Melissy Lee," the man
+retorted glibly.
+
+"Can't use it, thank you," came her swift saucy answer.
+
+"Or to lend it to you--say, for a week or two."
+
+She flashed a look at him and passed quickly from behind the counter. Her
+father was just coming into the store.
+
+"Will you wait on Mr. Norris, dad? Hop wants to see me in the kitchen."
+
+Norris swore softly under his breath. The last thing he had wanted was to
+drive her away. It had been nearly a year since he had seen her last, but
+the picture of her had been in the coals of many a night camp fire.
+
+The cattle detective stayed to dinner and to supper. He and her father had
+their heads together for hours, their voices pitched to a murmur. Melissy
+wondered what business could have brought him, whether it could have
+anything to do with the renewed rustling that had of late annoyed the
+neighborhood. This brought her thoughts to Jack Flatray. He, too, had
+almost dropped from her world, though she heard of him now and again. Not
+once had he been to see her since the night she had sprained her ankle.
+
+Later, when Melissy was watering the roses beside the porch, she heard the
+name of Morse mentioned by the stock detective. He seemed to be urging
+upon her father some course of action at which the latter demurred. The
+girl knew a vague unrest. Lee did not need his anger against Morse
+incensed. For months she had been trying to allay rather than increase
+this. If Philip Norris had come to stir up smoldering fires, she would
+give him a piece of her mind.
+
+The men were still together when Melissy told her father good-night. If
+she had known that a whisky bottle passed back and forth a good many times
+in the course of the evening, the fears of the girl would not have been
+lightened. She knew that in the somber moods following a drinking bout the
+lawlessness of Beauchamp Lee was most likely to crop out.
+
+As for the girl, now night had fallen--that wondrous velvet night of
+Arizona, which blots out garish day with a cloak of violet, purple-edged
+where the hills rise vaguely in the distance, and softens magically all
+harsh details beneath the starry vault--she slipped out to the summit of
+the ridge in the big pasture, climbing lightly, with the springy ease
+born of the vigor her nineteen outdoor years had stored in the strong
+young body. She wanted to be alone, to puzzle out what the coming of this
+man meant to her. Had he intended anything by that last drawling remark of
+his in the store? Why was it that his careless, half insulting familiarity
+set the blood leaping through her like wine? He lured her to the sex duel,
+then trampled down her reserves roughshod. His bold assurance stung her to
+anger, but there was a something deeper than anger that left her flushed
+and tingling.
+
+Both men slept late, but Norris was down first. He found Melissy
+superintending a drive of sheep which old Antonio, the herder, was about
+to make to the trading-post at Three Pines. She was on her pony near the
+entrance to the corral, her slender, lithe figure sitting in a boy's
+saddle with a businesslike air he could not help but admire. The gate bars
+had been lifted and the dog was winding its way among the bleating gray
+mass, which began to stir uncertainly at its presence. The sheep dribbled
+from the corral by ones and twos until the procession swelled to a swollen
+stream that poured forth in a torrent. Behind them came Antonio in his
+sombrero and blanket, who smiled at his mistress, shouted an "_Adios,
+senorita_," and disappeared into the yellow dust cloud which the herd left
+in its wake.
+
+"How does Champ like being in the sheep business," Norris said to the
+girl.
+
+Melissy did not remove her eyes from the vanishing herd, but a slight
+frown puckered her forehead. She chose to take this as a criticism of her
+father and to resent it.
+
+"Why shouldn't he be?" she said quietly, answering the spirit of his
+remark.
+
+"I didn't mean it that way," he protested, with his frank laugh.
+
+"Then if you didn't mean it so, I shan't take it that way;" and her smile
+met his.
+
+"Here's how I look at this sheep business. Some ranges are better adapted
+for sheep than cattle, and you can't keep Mary's little lamb away from
+those places. No use for a man to buck against the thing that's bound to
+be. Better get into the band-wagon and ride."
+
+"That's what father thought," the girl confessed. "He never would have
+been the man to bring sheep in, but after they got into the country he saw
+it was a question of whether he was going to get the government reserve
+range for his sheep, or another man, some new-comer like Mr. Morse, for
+his. It was going to be sheep anyhow."
+
+"Well, I'm glad your father took the chance he saw." He added
+reminiscently: "We got to be right good friends again last night before we
+parted."
+
+She took the opening directly. "If you're so good a friend of his, you
+must not excite him about Mr. Morse. You know he's a Southerner, and he
+is likely to do something rash--something we shall all be sorry for
+afterward."
+
+"I reckon that will be all right," he said evasively.
+
+Her eyes swept to his. "You won't get father into trouble will you?"
+
+The warm, affectionate smile came back to his face, so that as he looked
+at her he seemed a sun-god. But again there was something in his gaze that
+was not the frankness of a comrade, some smoldering fire that strangely
+stirred her blood and yet left her uneasy.
+
+"I'm not liable to bring trouble to those you love, girl. I stand by my
+friends."
+
+Her pony began to move toward the house, and he strode beside, as debonair
+and gallant a figure as ever filled the eye and the heart of a woman. The
+morning sun glow irradiated him, found its sparkling reflection in the
+dark curls of his bare head, in the bloom of his tanned cheeks, made a fit
+setting for the graceful picture of lingering youth his slim, muscular
+figure and springy stride personified. Small wonder the untaught girl
+beside him found the merely physical charm of him fascinating. If her
+instinct sometimes warned her to beware, her generous heart was eager to
+pay small heed to the monition except so far as concerned her father.
+
+After breakfast he came into the office to see her before he left.
+
+"Good-by for a day or two," he said, offering his hand.
+
+"You're coming back again, are you?" she asked quietly, but not without a
+deeper dye in her cheeks.
+
+"Yes, I'm coming back. Will you be glad to see me?"
+
+"Why should I be glad? I hardly know you these days."
+
+"You'll know me better before we're through with each other."
+
+She would acknowledge no interest in him, the less because she knew it was
+there. "I may do that without liking you better."
+
+And suddenly his swift, winning smile flashed upon her. "But you've got to
+like me. I want you to."
+
+"Do you get everything you want?" she smiled back.
+
+"If I want it enough, I usually do."
+
+"Then since you get so much, you'll be better able to do without my
+liking."
+
+"I'm going to have it too."
+
+"Don't be too sure." She had a feeling that things were moving too fast,
+and she hailed the appearance of her father with relief. "Good morning,
+dad. Did you sleep well? Mr. Norris is just leaving."
+
+"Wait till I git a bite o' breakfast and I'll go with you, Phil," promised
+Lee. "I got to ride over to Mesa anyhow some time this week."
+
+The girl watched them ride away, taking the road gait so characteristic of
+the Southwest. As long as they were in sight her gaze followed them, and
+when she could see nothing but a wide cloud of dust travelling across the
+mesa she went up to her room and sat down to think it out. Something new
+had come into her life. What, she did not yet know, but she tried to face
+the fact with the elemental frankness that still made her more like a boy
+than a woman. Sitting there before the looking-glass, she played absently
+with the thick braid of heavy, blue-black hair which hung across her
+shoulder to the waist. It came to her for the first time to wonder if she
+was pretty, whether she was going to be one of the women that men desire.
+Without the least vanity she studied herself, appraised the soft brown
+cheeks framed with ebon hair, the steady, dark eyes so quick to passion
+and to gaiety, the bronzed throat full and rounded, the supple, flowing
+grace of the unrestrained body.
+
+Gradually a wave of color crept into her cheeks as she sat there with her
+chin on her little doubled hand. It was the charm of this Apollo of the
+plains that had set free such strange thoughts in her head. Why should she
+think of him? What did it matter whether she was good-looking? She shook
+herself resolutely together and went down to the business of the day.
+
+It was not long after midnight the next day that Champ Lee reached the
+ranch. His daughter came out from her room in her night-dress to meet
+him.
+
+"What kept you, Daddy?" she asked.
+
+But before he could answer she knew. She read the signs too clearly to
+doubt that he had been drinking.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+"HANDS UP"
+
+
+Melissy had been up the Can del Oro for wild poppies in her runabout and
+had just reached the ranch. She was disposing of her flowers in ollas when
+Jim Budd, waiter, chambermaid, and odd jobs man at the Bar Double G,
+appeared in the hall with a frightened, mysterious face.
+
+"What's the matter, Jim? You and Hop Ling been quarrelling again?" she
+asked carelessly.
+
+"No'm, that ain't it. It's wusser'n that. I got to tell you-all su'thin' I
+hearn yore paw say."
+
+The girl looked up quickly at him. "What do you mean, Jim?"
+
+"That Mistah Norris he come back whilst you wus away, and him and yore paw
+wus in that back room a-talkin' mighty confidential."
+
+"Yes, and you listened. Well?"
+
+Jim swelled with offended dignity. "No'm, I didn't listen neither. I des
+natcherally hearn, 'count of that hole fer the stovepipe what comes
+through the floor of my room."
+
+"But what was it you heard?" she interrupted impatiently.
+
+"I wus a-comin' to that. Plum proverdenshul, I draps into my room des as
+yore paw wus sayin', 'Twenty thousand dollars goin' down to the Fort on
+the stage to-day?' 'Cose I pricks up my ears then and tuk it all in. This
+yere Norris had foun' out that Mistah Morse was shippin' gold from his
+mine to-day on the Fort Allison stage, and he gits yore paw to go in with
+him an' hold it up. Yore paw cussed and said as how 't wus his gold anyhow
+by rights."
+
+The girl went white and gave a little broken cry. "Oh, Jim! Are you
+sure?"
+
+"Yas'm, 'cose I'm suah. Them's his ve'y words. Hope to die if they ain't.
+They wus drinkin', and when 't wus all fixed up that 't wus to be at the
+mouth of the Box canyon they done tore an old black shirt you got for a
+dust-rag and made masks out of it and then rode away."
+
+"Which way did they go?"
+
+"Tow'ds the Box canyon Miss M'lissy."
+
+A slender, pallid figure of despair, she leaned against the wall to
+support the faintness that had so suddenly stolen the strength from her
+limbs, trying desperately to think of some way to save her father from
+this madness. She was sure he would bungle it and be caught eventually,
+and she was equally sure he would never let himself be taken alive. Her
+helplessness groped for some way out. There must be some road of escape
+from this horrible situation, and as she sought blindly for it the path
+opened before her.
+
+"Where is Hop?" she asked quickly.
+
+"A-sleepin' in his room, ma'am."
+
+"Go to the store and tend it till I come back, Jim. I may be an hour, or
+mebbe two, but don't you move out of it for a moment. And don't ever speak
+of any of this, not a word, Jim."
+
+"No'm, 'cose I won't."
+
+His loyalty she did not doubt an instant, though she knew his simple wits
+might easily be led to indiscretion. But she did not stay to say more now,
+but flew upstairs to the room that had been her brother's before he left
+home. Scarce five minutes elapsed before she reappeared transformed. It
+was a slim youth garbed as a cowpuncher that now slipped along the passage
+to the rear, softly opened the door of the cook's room, noiselessly
+abstracted the key, closed the door again as gently, and locked it from
+the outside. She ran into her own room, strapped on her revolver belt, and
+took her empty rifle from its case. As she ran through the room below the
+one Jim occupied, she caught sight of a black rag thrown carelessly into
+the fireplace and stuffed it into her pocket.
+
+"That's just like Dad to leave evidence lying around," she said to
+herself, for even in the anxiety that was flooding her she kept her quiet
+commonsense.
+
+After searching the horizon carefully to see that nobody was in sight,
+she got into the rig and drove round the corral to the irrigating ditch.
+This was a wide lateral of the main canal, used to supply the whole lower
+valley with water, and just now it was empty. Melissy drove down into its
+sandy bed and followed its course as rapidly as she could. If she were
+only in time! If the stage had not yet passed! That was her only fear, the
+dread of being too late. Not once did the risk of the thing she intended
+occur to her. Physical fear had never been part of her. She had done the
+things her brother Dick had done. She was a reckless rider, a good shot,
+could tramp the hills or follow the round-up all day without knowing
+fatigue. If her flesh still held its girlish curves and softness, the
+muscles underneath were firm and compact. Often for her own amusement and
+that of her father she had donned her brother's chaps, his spurs,
+sombrero, and other paraphernalia, to masquerade about the house in them.
+She had learned to imitate the long roll of the vaquero's stride, the
+mannerisms common to his class, and even the heavy voice of a man. More
+than once she had passed muster as a young man in the shapeless garments
+she was now wearing. She felt confident that the very audacity of the
+thing would carry it off. There would be a guard for the treasure box, of
+course, but if all worked well he could be taken by surprise. Her rifle
+was not loaded, but the chances were a hundred to one that she would not
+need to use it.
+
+For the first time in his life the roan got the whip from his mistress.
+
+"Git up, Bob. We've got to hurry. It's for dad," she cried, as they raced
+through the sand and sent it flying from the wheels.
+
+The Fort Allison stage passed within three miles of the Lee ranch on its
+way to Mesa. Where the road met in intersection with the ditch she had
+chosen as the point for stopping it, and no veteran at the business could
+have selected more wisely, for a reason which will hereafter appear. Some
+fifty yards below this point of intersection the ditch ran through a grove
+of cottonwoods fringing the bank. Here the banks sloped down more
+gradually, and Melissy was able to drive up one side, turn her rig so that
+the horse faced the other way, and draw down into the ditch again in order
+that the runabout could not be seen from the road. Swiftly and skilfully
+she obliterated the track she had made in the sandy bank.
+
+She was just finishing this when the sound of wheels came to her. Rifle in
+hand, she ran back along the ditch, stooping to pass under the bridge, and
+waited at the farther side in a fringe of bushes for the coming of the
+stage.
+
+Even now fear had no place in the excitement which burned high in her. The
+girl's wits were fully alert, and just in time she remembered the need of
+a mask. Her searching fingers found the torn black shirt in a pocket and a
+knife in another. Hastily she ripped the linen in half, cut out eyeholes,
+and tied the mask about her head. With perfectly steady hands she picked
+up the rifle from the ground and pushed the muzzle of it through the
+bushes.
+
+Leisurely the stage rolled up-grade toward the crossing. The Mexican
+driver was half asleep and the "shotgun messenger" was indolently rolling
+a cigarette, his sawed-off gun between his knees. Alan McKinstra was the
+name of this last young gentleman. Only yesterday he had gone to work for
+Morse, and this was the first job that had been given him. The stage never
+had been held up since the "Monte Cristo" had struck its pay-streak, and
+there was no reason to suppose it would be. Nevertheless, Morse proposed
+to err on the side of caution.
+
+"I reckon the man that holds down this job don't earn his salt, Jose. It's
+what they call a sinecure," Alan was saying at the very instant the
+summons came.
+
+"Throw up your hands!"
+
+Sharp and crisp it fell on Alan's ears. He sat for a moment stunned, the
+half-rolled cigarette still between his fingers. The driver drew up his
+four horses with a jerk and brought them to a huddled halt.
+
+"Hands up!" came again the stinging imperative.
+
+Now, for the first time, it reached Alan's consciousness that the stage
+was actually being held up. He saw the sun shining on the barrel of a
+rifle and through the bushes the masked face of a hidden cowpuncher. His
+first swift instinct was to give battle, and he reached for the shotgun
+between his knees. Simultaneously the driver's foot gave it a push and
+sent the weapon clattering to the ground. Jose at least knew better than
+to let him draw the road agent's fire while he sat within a foot of the
+driver. His hands went into the air, and after his Alan's and those of the
+two passengers.
+
+"Throw down that box."
+
+Alan lowered his hands and did as directed.
+
+"Now reach for the stars again."
+
+McKinstra's arms went skyward. Without his weapon, he was helpless to do
+otherwise. The young man had an odd sense of unreality about the affair, a
+feeling that it was not in earnest. The timbre of the fresh young voice
+that came from the bushes struck a chord in his memory, though for the
+life of him he could not place its owner.
+
+"Drive on, Jose. Burn the wind and keep a-rollin' south."
+
+The Mexican's whip coiled over the head of the leaders and the broncos
+sprang forward with a jump. It was the summit of a long hill, on the edge
+of which wound the road. Until the stage reached the foot of it there
+would be no opportunity to turn back. Round a bend of the road it swung at
+a gallop, and the instant it disappeared Melissy leaped from the bushes,
+lifted the heavy box, and carried it to the edge of the ditch. She flew
+down the sandy bottom to the place where the rig stood, drove swiftly
+back again, and, though it took the last ounce of strength in her, managed
+to tumble the box into the trap.
+
+Back to the road she went, and from the place where the box had fallen
+made long strides back to the bushes where she had been standing at the
+moment of the hold-up. These tracks she purposely made deep and large,
+returning in her first ones to the same point, but from the marks where
+the falling treasure box had struck into the road she carefully
+obliterated with her hand the foot-marks leading to the irrigation ditch,
+sifting the sand in carefully so as to leave no impression. This took
+scarcely a minute. She was soon back in her runabout, driving homeward
+fast as whip and voice could urge the horse.
+
+She thought she could reason out what McKinstra and the stage-driver would
+do. Mesa was twenty-five miles distant, the "Monte Cristo" mine seventeen.
+Nearer than these points there was no telephone station except the one at
+the Lee ranch. Their first thought would be to communicate with Morse,
+with the officers at Mammoth, and with the sheriff of Mesa County. To do
+this as soon as possible they would turn aside and drive to the ranch
+after they reached the bottom of the hill and could make the turn. It was
+a long, steep hill, and Melissy estimated that this would give her a start
+of nearly twenty minutes. She would save about half a mile by following
+the ditch instead of the road, but at best she knew she was drawing it
+very fine.
+
+She never afterward liked to think of that drive home. It seemed to her
+that Bob crawled and that the heavy sand was interminable. Feverishly she
+plied the whip, and when at length she drew out of the ditch she sent her
+horse furiously round the big corral. Though she had planned everything to
+the last detail, she knew that any one of a hundred contingencies might
+spoil her plan. A cowpuncher lounging about the place would have ruined
+everything, or at best interfered greatly. But the windmill clicked over
+sunlit silence, empty of life. No stir or movement showed the presence of
+any human being.
+
+Melissy drove round to the side door, dumped out the treasure-box, ran
+into the house, and quickly returned with a hammer and some tacks, then
+fell swiftly to ripping the oilcloth that covered the box which stood
+against the wall to serve as a handy wash-stand for use by dusty
+travellers before dining. The two boxes were of the same size and shape,
+and she draped the treasure chest with the cloth, tacked it in place,
+restored to the top of it the tin basin, and tossed the former wash-stand
+among a pile of old boxes from the store, that were to be used for
+kindling. After this she ran upstairs, scudded softly along the corridor,
+and silently unlocked the cook's door, dropping the key on the floor to
+make it appear as if something had shaken it from the keyhole. Presently
+she was in her brother's room, doffing his clothes and dressing herself in
+her own.
+
+A glance out of the window sapped the color from her cheek, for she saw
+the stage breasting the hill scarce two hundred yards from the house. She
+hurried downstairs, pinning her belt as she ran, and flashed into the
+store, where Jim sat munching peanuts.
+
+"The stage is coming, Jim. Remember, you're not to know anything about it
+at all. If they ask for Dad, say he's out cutting trail of a bunch of hill
+cows. Tell them I started after the wild flowers about fifteen minutes
+ago. Don't talk much about it, though. I'll be back inside of an hour."
+
+With that she was gone, back to her trap, which she swung along a trail
+back of the house till it met the road a quarter of a mile above. Her
+actions must have surprised steady old Bob, for he certainly never before
+had seen his mistress in such a desperate hurry as she had been this day
+and still was. Nearly a mile above, a less well defined track deflected
+from the main road. Into this she turned, following it until she came to
+the head-gates of the lateral which ran through their place. The main
+canal was full of water, and after some effort she succeeded in opening
+the head-gates so as to let the water go pouring through.
+
+Returning to the runabout, the girl drove across a kind of natural meadow
+to a hillside not far distant, gathered a double handful of wild flowers,
+and turned homeward again. The stage was still there when she came in
+sight of the group of buildings at the ranch.
+
+As she drew up and dismounted with her armful of flowers, Alan McKinstra
+stepped from the store to the porch and came forward to assist her.
+
+"The Fort Allison stage has been robbed," he blurted out.
+
+"What nonsense! Who would want to rob it?" she retorted.
+
+"Morse had a gold shipment aboard," he explained in a low voice, and added
+in bitter self-condemnation: "He sent me along to guard it, and I never
+even fired a shot to save it."
+
+"But--do you mean that somebody held up the stage?" she gasped.
+
+"Yes. But whoever it was can't escape. I've 'phoned to Jack Flatray and to
+Morse. They'll be right out here. The sheriff of Mesa County has already
+started with a posse. They'll track him down. That's a cinch. He can't get
+away with the box without a rig. If he busts the box, he's got to carry it
+on a horse and a horse leaves tracks."
+
+"But who do you think it was?"
+
+"Don't know. One of the Roaring Fork bunch of bad men, likely. But I don't
+know."
+
+The young man was plainly very much excited and disturbed. He walked
+nervously up and down, jerking his sentences out piecemeal as he thought
+of them.
+
+"Was there only one man? And did you see him?" Melissy asked
+breathlessly.
+
+He scarcely noticed her excitement, or if he did, it seemed to him only
+natural under the circumstances.
+
+"I expect there were more, but we saw only one. Didn't see much of him. He
+was screened by the bushes and wore a black mask. So long as the stage was
+in sight he never moved from that place; just stood there and kept us
+covered."
+
+"But how could he rob you if he didn't come out?" she asked in wide-eyed
+innocence.
+
+"He didn't rob _us_ any. He must 'a' heard of the shipment of gold, and
+that's what he was after. After he'd got us to rights he made me throw the
+box down in the road. That's where it was when he ordered us to move on
+and keep agoing."
+
+"And you went?"
+
+"Jose handled the lines, but 't would 'a' been the same if I'd held them.
+That gun of his was a right powerful persuader." He stopped to shake a
+fist in impotent fury in the air. "I wish to God I could meet up with him
+some day when he didn't have the drop on me."
+
+"Maybe you will some time," she told him soothingly. "I don't think you're
+a bit to blame, Alan. Nobody could think so. Ever so many times I've heard
+Dad say that when a man gets the drop on you there's nothing to do but
+throw up your hands."
+
+"Do you honest think so, Melissy? Or are you just saying it to take the
+sting away? Looks like I ought to 'a' done something mor'n sit there like
+a bump on a log while he walked off with the gold."
+
+His cheerful self-satisfaction was under eclipse. The boyish pride of him
+was wounded. He had not "made good." All over Cattleland the news would be
+wafted on the wings of the wind that Alan McKinstra, while acting as
+shotgun messenger to a gold shipment, had let a road agent hold him up for
+the treasure he was guarding.
+
+"Very likely they'll catch him and get the gold back," she suggested.
+
+"That won't do me any good," he returned gloomily. "The only thing that
+can help me now is for me to git the fellow myself, and I might just as
+well look for a needle in a haystack."
+
+"You can't tell. The robber may be right round here now." Her eyes,
+shining with excitement, passed the crowd moving in and out of the store,
+for already the news of the hold-up had brought riders and ranchmen
+jogging in to learn the truth of the wild tale that had reached them.
+
+"More likely he's twenty miles away. But whoever he is, he knows this
+county. He made a slip and called Jose by his name."
+
+Melissy's gaze was turned to the dust whirl that advanced up the road that
+ran round the corral. "That doesn't prove anything, Alan. Everybody knows
+Jose. He's lived all over Arizona--at Tucson and Tombstone and Douglas."
+
+"That's right too," the lad admitted.
+
+The riders in advance of the dust cloud resolved themselves into the
+persons of her father and Norris. Her incautious admission was already
+troubling her.
+
+"But I'm sure you're right. No hold-up with any sense would stay around
+here and wait to be caught. He's probably gone up into the Galiuros to
+hide."
+
+"Unless he's cached the gold and is trying to throw off suspicion."
+
+The girl had moved forward to the end of the house with Alan to meet her
+father. At that instant, by the ironic humor of chance, her glance fell
+upon a certain improvised wash-stand covered with oilcloth. She shook her
+head decisively. "No, he won't risk waiting to do that. He'll make sure of
+his escape first."
+
+"I reckon."
+
+"Have you heard, Daddy?" Melissy called out eagerly. She knew she must
+play the part expected of her, that of a young girl much interested in
+this adventure which had occurred in the community.
+
+He nodded grimly, swinging from the saddle. She observed with surprise
+that his eye did not meet hers. This was not like him.
+
+"What do you think?"
+
+His gaze met that of Norris before he answered, and there was in it some
+hint of a great fear. "Beats me, 'Lissy."
+
+He had told the simple truth, but not the whole truth. The men had waited
+at the entrance to the Box canyon for nearly two hours without the arrival
+of the stage. Deciding that something must have happened, they started
+back, and presently met a Mexican who stopped to tell them the news. To
+say that they were dazed is to put it mildly. To expect them to believe
+that somebody else had heard of the secret shipment and had held up the
+stage two miles from the place they had chosen, was to ask a credulity too
+simple. Yet this was the fact that confronted them.
+
+Arrived at the scene of the robbery both men had dismounted and had
+examined the ground thoroughly. What they saw tended still more to
+bewilder them. Neither of them was a tenderfoot, and the little table at
+the summit of the long hill told a very tangled tale to those who had eyes
+to read. Obvious tracks took them at once to the spot where the bandit had
+stood in the bushes, but there was something about them that struck both
+men as suspicious.
+
+"Looks like these are worked out on purpose," commented Lee. "The guy's
+leaving too easy a trail to follow, and it quits right abrupt in the
+bushes. Must 'a' took an airship from here, I 'low."
+
+"Does look funny. Hello! What's this?"
+
+Norris had picked up a piece of black cloth and was holding it out. A
+startled oath slipped from the lips of the Southerner. He caught the rag
+from the hands of his companion and studied it with a face of growing
+astonishment.
+
+"What's up?"
+
+Lee dived into his pocket and drew forth the mask he had been wearing.
+Silently he fitted it to the other. The pieces matched exactly, both in
+length and in the figure of the pattern.
+
+When the Southerner looked up his hands were shaking and his face ashen.
+
+"For God's sake, Phil, what does this mean?" he cried hoarsely.
+
+"Search me."
+
+"It must have been--looks like the hold-up was somebody--my God, man, we
+left this rag at the ranch when we started!" the rancher whispered.
+
+"That's right."
+
+"We planned this thing right under the nigger's room. He must 'a' heard
+and---- But it don't look like Jim Budd to do a thing like that."
+
+Norris had crossed the road again and was standing on the edge of the
+lateral.
+
+"Hello! This ditch is full of water. When we passed down it was empty," he
+said.
+
+Lee crossed over and stood by his side, a puzzled frown on his face.
+"There hadn't ought to be water running hyer now," he said, as if to
+himself. "I don't see how it could 'a' come hyer, for Bill Weston--he's
+the ditch rider--went to Mesa this mo'ning, and couldn't 'a' got back to
+turn it in."
+
+The younger man stooped and examined a foot-print at the edge of the
+ditch. It was the one Melissy had made just as she stepped into the rig.
+
+"Here's something new, Lee. We haven't seen this gentleman's track before.
+Looks like a boy's. It's right firm and deep in this soft ground. I'll bet
+a cooky your nigger never made that track."
+
+The Southerner crouched down beside him, and they looked at it together,
+head to head.
+
+"No, it ain't Jim's. I don't rightly _savez_ this thing at all," the old
+man muttered, troubled at this mystery which seemed to point to his
+household.
+
+"By Moses, I've got it! The guy who did the holding up had his horse down
+here. He loaded the sack on its back and drove off up the ditch. All we
+got to do is follow the ditch up or down till we come to the place where
+he climbed out and struck across country."
+
+"That's right, Phil. He must have had a pardner up at the head-gates. They
+had some kind of signal arranged, and when Mr. Hold-up was ready down come
+the water and washed out his tracks. It's a blame' smooth piece of
+business if you ask me."
+
+"The fellow made two bad breaks, though. That piece of shirt is one. This
+foot-print is another. They may land him in the pen yet."
+
+"I don't think it," returned the old man with composure, and as he spoke
+his foot erased the telltale print. "I 'low there won't anybody go to the
+pen for he'pin himself to Mr. Morse's gold dust. I don't give a cuss who
+it was."
+
+Norris laughed in his low, easy way. "I'm with you, Mr. Lee. We'll make a
+thorough job while we're at it and mess up these other tracks. After that
+we'll follow the ditch up and see if there's anything doing."
+
+They remounted their broncos and rode them across the tracks several
+times, then followed the lateral up, one on either side of the ditch,
+their eyes fastened to the ground to see any evidence of a horse having
+clambered over the bank. They drew in sight of the ranch house without
+discovering what they were looking for. Lee's heart was in his mouth, for
+he knew that he would see presently what his eye sought.
+
+"I reckon the fellow went down instead of up," suggested Norris.
+
+"No, he came up."
+
+Lee had stopped and was studying wheel tracks that ran up from the ditch
+to his ranch house. His face was very white and set. He pointed to them
+with a shaking finger.
+
+"There's where he went in the ditch, and there's where he came out."
+
+Norris forded the stream, cast a casual eye on the double track, and
+nodded. He was still in a fog of mystery, but the old man was already
+fearing the worst.
+
+He gulped out his fears tremblingly. For himself, he was of a flawless
+nerve, but this touched nearer home than his own danger.
+
+"Them wheel-tracks was made by my little gyurl's runabout, Phil."
+
+"Good heavens!" The younger man drew rein sharply and stared at him. "You
+don't think----"
+
+He broke off, recalling the sharp, firm little foot-print on the edge of
+the ditch some miles below.
+
+"I don't reckon I know what to think. If she was in this, she's got some
+good reason." A wave of passion suddenly swept the father. "By God! I'd
+like to see the man that dares mix her name up in this."
+
+Norris met this with his friendly smile. "You can't pick a row with me
+about that, old man. I'm with you till the cows come home. But that ain't
+quite the way to go at this business. First thing, we've got to wipe out
+these tracks. How? Why, sheep! There's a bunch of three hundred in that
+pasture. We'll drive the bunch down to the ditch and water them here.
+_Savez?_"
+
+"And wipe out the wheel-marks in the sand. Bully for you, Phil."
+
+"That's the idea. After twelve hundred chisel feet have been over this
+sand I reckon the wheel-tracks will be missing."
+
+They rode up to the house, and the first thing that met them was the
+candid question of the girl:
+
+"Have you heard, Daddy?"
+
+And out of his troubled heart he had answered, "Beats me, 'Lissie."
+
+"They've sent for the officers. Jack Flatray is on the way himself. So is
+Sheriff Burke," volunteered Alan gloomily.
+
+"Getting right busy, ain't they?" Norris sneered.
+
+Again Lee glanced quickly at Norris. "I reckon, Phil, we better drive that
+bunch of sheep down to water right away. I clean forgot them this
+mo'ning."
+
+"Sure." The younger man was not so easily shaken. He turned to McKinstra
+naturally. "How many of the hold-ups were there?"
+
+"I saw only one, and didn't see him very good. He was a slim fellow in a
+black mask."
+
+"You don't say. Were you the driver?"
+
+Alan felt the color suffuse his face. "No, I was the guard."
+
+"Oh, you were the guard."
+
+Alan felt the suave irony that covered this man's amusement, and he
+resented it impotently. When Melissy came to his support he was the more
+grateful.
+
+"And we all think he did just right in using his common sense, Mr.
+Norris," the girl flashed.
+
+"Oh, certainly."
+
+And with that he was gone after her father to help him water the sheep.
+
+"I don't see why those sheep have to be watered right now," she frowned
+to Alan. "Dad _did_ water them this morning. I helped him."
+
+Together they went into the store, where Jose was telling his story for
+the sixth time to a listening circle of plainsmen.
+
+"And right then he come at you and ree-quested yore whole outfit to poke a
+hole in the scenery with yore front feet?" old Dave Ellis asked just as
+Melissy entered.
+
+"_Si, Senor._"
+
+"One of MacQueen's Roaring Fork gang did it, I'll bet," Alan contributed
+sourly.
+
+"What kind of a lookin' guy was he?" spoke up a dark young man known as
+Bob Farnum.
+
+"A big man, _senor_, and looked a ruffian."
+
+"They're always that way until you run 'em down," grinned Ellis. "Never
+knew a hold-up wasn't eight foot high and then some--to the fellow at the
+wrong end of the gun."
+
+"If you mean to say, Dave Ellis, that I lay down to a bluff----" Alan was
+beginning hotly when the old frontiersman interrupted.
+
+"Keep your shirt on, McKinstra. I don't mean to say it. Nobody but a darn
+fool makes a gun-play when the cards are stacked that-a-way. Yore bad play
+was in reaching for the gun at all."
+
+"Well, Jack Flatray will git him. I'll bet a stack of blues on that,"
+contributed a fat ranchman wheezily.
+
+"Unless you mussed up the trail coming back," said Ellis to the
+stage-driver.
+
+"We didn't. I thought of that, and I had Jose drive clear round the place.
+Jack will find it all right unless there's too much travel before he gets
+here," said Alan.
+
+Farnum laughed malevolently. "Mebbe he'll get him and mebbe he won't.
+Jack's human, like the rest of us, if he is the best sheriff in Arizona.
+Here's hoping he don't get him. Any man that waltzes out of the cactus and
+appropriates twenty thousand dollars belonging to Mr. Morse is welcome to
+it for all of me. I don't care if he is one of MacQueen's bad men. I wish
+it had been forty thousand."
+
+Farnum did not need to explain the reasons for his sentiments. Everybody
+present knew that he was the leader of that bunch of cattlemen who had
+bunched themselves together to resist the encroachments of sheep upon the
+range. Among these the feeling against Morse was explosively dangerous. It
+had found expression in more than one raid upon his sheep. Many of them
+had been destroyed by one means or another, but Morse, with the obstinacy
+characteristic of him, had replaced them with others and continually
+increased his herds. There had been threats against his life, and one of
+his herders had been wounded. But the mine-owner went his way with quiet
+fearlessness and paid no attention to the animosity he had stirred up. The
+general feeling was that the trouble must soon come to a head. Nobody
+expected the rough and ready vaqueros, reckless and impulsive as they
+were, to submit to the loss of the range, which meant too the wiping out
+of their means of livelihood, without a bitter struggle that would be both
+lawless and bloody.
+
+Wherefore there was silence after Farnum had spoken, broken at length by
+the amiable voice of the fat ranchman, Baker.
+
+"Well, we'll see what we'll see," he wheezed complacently. "And anyways I
+got to have some horseshoe plug, Melissy."
+
+The girl laughed nervously as she reached for what he wanted. "You're a
+safe prophet, Mr. Baker," she said.
+
+"He'd be a safe one if he'd prophesy that Jack Flatray would have Mr.
+Hold-up in the calaboose inside of three days," put in a half-grown lad in
+leathers.
+
+"I ain't so sure about that. You'll have to show me, and so will Mr.
+Deputy Sheriff Flatray," retorted Farnum.
+
+A shadow darkened the doorway.
+
+"Good afternoon, gentlemen all--and Miss Lee," a pleasant voice drawled.
+
+The circle of eyes focused on the new-comer and saw a lean, muscular,
+young fellow of medium height, cool and alert, with the dust of the desert
+on every sunbaked inch of him.
+
+"I'm damned if it ain't Jack here already!" gasped Baker.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+WATERING SHEEP
+
+
+The deputy glanced quietly round, nodded here and there at sight of the
+familiar face of an acquaintance, and spoke to the driver.
+
+"Let's hear you say your little piece again, Jose."
+
+The Mexican now had it by heart, and he pattered off the thing from
+beginning to end without a pause. Melissy, behind the counter, leaned her
+elbows on it and fastened her eyes on the boyish face of the officer. In
+her heart she was troubled. How much did he know? What could he discover
+from the evidence she had left? He had the reputation of being the best
+trailer and the most fearless officer in Arizona. But surely she had
+covered her tracks safely.
+
+From Jose the ranger turned to Alan. "We'll hear your account of it now,
+seh," he said gently.
+
+While Alan talked, Jack's gaze drifted through the window to the flock of
+sheep that were being driven up from the ditch by Lee and Norris. That
+little pastoral scene had its significance for him. He had arrived at the
+locality of the hold-up a few minutes after they had left, and his keen
+intelligence had taken in some of the points they had observed. A rapid
+circuit of the spot at the distance of thirty yards had shown him no
+tracks leading from the place except those which ran up the lateral on
+either side of it. It was possible that these belonged to the horses of
+the robbers, but if so the fellows were singularly careless of detection.
+Moreover, the booty must be accounted for. They had not carried it with
+them, since no empty box remained to show that they had poured the gold
+into sacks, and it would have been impossible to take the box as it was on
+a horse. Nor had they buried it, unless at the bottom of the irrigating
+ditch, for some signs of their work must have remained.
+
+Balancing probabilities, it had seemed to Flatray that these might be the
+tracks of ranchmen who had arrived after the hold-up and were following
+the escaping bandits up the lateral. For unless these were the robber's,
+there was no way of escape except either up or down the bottom of the
+ditch. His search had eliminated the possibility of any other but the
+road, and this was travelled too frequently to admit of even a chance of
+escape by it without detection. Jack filed away one or two questions in
+his brain for future reference. The most important of these was to
+discover whether there had been any water in the ditch at the time of the
+hold-up.
+
+He had decided to follow the tracks leading up the ditch and found no
+difficulty in doing so at a fast walk. Without any hesitation they
+paralleled the edge of the lateral. Nor had the deputy travelled a quarter
+of a mile before he made a discovery. The rider on the right hand side of
+the stream had been chewing tobacco, and he had a habit of splashing his
+mark on boulders he passed in the form of tobacco juice. Half a dozen
+times before he reached the Lee ranch the ranger saw this signature of
+identity writ large on smooth rocks shining in the sun. The last place he
+saw it was at the point where the two riders deflected from the lateral
+toward the ranch house, following tracks which led up from the bottom of
+the ditch.
+
+An instant later Flatray had dodged back into the chaparral, for somebody
+was driving a flock of sheep down to the ditch. He made out that there
+were two riders behind them, and that they had no dog. For the present his
+curiosity was satisfied. He thought he knew why they were watering sheep
+in this odd fashion. Swiftly he had made a circuit, drawn rein in front of
+the store, and dropped in just in time to hear his name. Now, as with one
+ear he listened to Alan's account of the hold-up, with his subconscious
+mind he was with the sheep-herders who were driving the flock back into
+the pasture.
+
+"Looks like our friend the bad man was onto his job all right," was the
+deputy's only comment when Alan had finished.
+
+"I'll bet he's making his getaway into the hills mighty immediate,"
+chuckled Baker. "He can't find a bank in the mountainside to deposit that
+gold any too soon to suit him."
+
+"Sho! I'll bet he ain't worried a mite. He's got his arrangements all
+made, and likely they'll dovetail to suit him. He's put his brand on that
+gold to stay," answered Farnum confidently.
+
+Jack's mild blue eyes rested on him amiably. "Think so, Bob?"
+
+"I ain't knockin' you any, Jack. You're all right. But that's how I figure
+it out, and, by Gad! I'm hopin' it too," Farnum made answer recklessly.
+
+Flatray laughed and strolled from the crowded room to the big piazza. A
+man had just cantered up and flung himself from his saddle. The ranger,
+looking at him, thought he had never seen another so strikingly handsome
+an Apollo. Black eyes looked into his from a sun-tanned face perfectly
+modelled. The pose of the head and figure would have delighted a
+sculptor.
+
+There was a vigor, an unspoken hostility, in the gaze of both men.
+
+"Mo'nin", Mr. Deputy Sheriff, one said; and the other, "Same to you, Mr.
+Norris."
+
+"You're on the job quick," sneered the cattle detective.
+
+"The quicker the sooner, I expect."
+
+"And by night you'll have Mr. Hold-up roped and hog-tied?"
+
+"Not so you could notice it. Are you a sheep-herder these days, Mr.
+Norris?"
+
+The gentle irony of this was not lost on its object, for in the West a
+herder of sheep is the next remove from a dumb animal.
+
+"No, I'm riding for the Quarter Circle K Bar outfit. This is the first
+time I ever took the dust of a sheep in my life. I did it to oblige Mr.
+Lee."
+
+"Oh! To oblige Mr. Lee?"
+
+"He wanted to water them, and his herder wasn't here."
+
+"Must 'a' been wanting water mighty bad, I reckon," commented Jack
+amiably.
+
+"You bet! Lee feels better satisfied now he's watered them."
+
+"I don't doubt it."
+
+Norris changed the subject. "You must have burnt the wind getting here. I
+didn't expect to see you for some hours."
+
+"I happened to be down at Yeager's ranch, and one of the boys got me on
+the line from Mesa."
+
+"Picked up any clues yet?" asked the other carelessly, yet always with
+that hint of a sneer; and innocently Flatray answered, "They seem to be
+right seldom."
+
+"Didn't know but you'd happened on the fellow's trail."
+
+"I guess I'm as much at sea as you are," was the equivocal answer.
+
+Lee came over from the stable, still wearing spurs and gauntlets.
+
+"Howdy, Jack!" he nodded, not quite so much at his ease as usual. "Got
+hyer on the jump, didn't you?"
+
+"I kept movin'."
+
+"This shorely beats hell, don't it?" Lee glanced around, selected a smooth
+boulder, and fired his discharge of tobacco juice at it true to the inch.
+"Reminds me of the old days. You boys ain't old enough to recall them, but
+stage hold-ups were right numerous then."
+
+Blandly the deputy looked from one to the other. "I don't suppose either
+of you gentlemen happen to have been down and looked over the ground where
+the hold-up was? The tracks were right cut up before I got there."
+
+This center shot silenced Lee for an instant, but Norris was on the spot
+with smiling ease.
+
+"No, Mr. Lee and I have been hunting strays on the mesa. We didn't hear
+about it till a few minutes ago. We're at your service, though, Mr.
+Sheriff, to join any posses you want to send out."
+
+"Much obliged. I'm going to send one out toward the Galiuros in a few
+minutes now. I'll be right glad to have you take charge of it, Mr.
+Norris."
+
+The derisive humor in the newly appointed deputy's eyes did not quite
+reach the surface.
+
+"Sure. Whenever you want me."
+
+"I'm going to send Alan McKinstra along to guide you. He knows that
+country like a book. You want to head for the lower pass, swing up Diable
+canyon, and work up in the headquarters of the Three Forks."
+
+Within a quarter of an hour the posse was in motion. Flatray watched it
+disappear in the dust of the road without a smile. He had sent them out
+merely to distract the attention of the public and to get rid of as many
+as possible of the crowd. For he was quite as well aware as the leader of
+the posse that this search in the Galiuros was a wild-goose chase.
+Somewhere within three hundred yards of the place he stood both the robber
+and his booty were in all probability to be found.
+
+Flatray was quite right in his surmise, since Melissy Lee, who had come
+out to see the posse off, was standing at the end of the porch with her
+dusky eyes fastened on him, the while he stood beside the house with one
+foot resting negligently on the oilcloth cover of the wash-stand.
+
+She had cast him out of her friendship because of his unworthiness, but
+there was a tumult in her heart at sight of him. No matter how her
+judgment condemned him as a villain, some instinct in her denied the
+possibility of it. She was torn in conflict between her liking for him and
+her conviction that he deserved only contempt. Somehow it hurt her too
+that he accepted without protest her verdict, appeared so willing to be a
+stranger to her.
+
+Now that the actual physical danger of her adventure was past, Melissy was
+aware too of a chill dread lurking at her heart. She was no longer buoyed
+up by the swiftness of action which had called for her utmost nerve. There
+was nothing she could do now but wait, and waiting was of all things the
+one most foreign to her impulsive temperament. She acknowledged too some
+fear of this quiet, soft-spoken frontiersman. All Arizona knew not only
+the daredevil spirit that fired his gentleness, but the competence with
+which he set about any task he assigned himself. She did not see how he
+_could_ unravel this mystery. She had left no clues behind her, she felt
+sure of that, and yet was troubled lest he guessed at her secret behind
+that mask of innocence he wore. He did not even remotely guess it as yet,
+but he was far closer to the truth than he pretended. The girl knew she
+should leave him and go about her work. Her role was to appear as
+inconspicuous as possible, but she could not resist the fascination of
+trying to probe his thoughts.
+
+"I suppose your posse will come back with the hold-ups in a few hours.
+Will it be worth while to wait for them?" she asked with amiable
+derision.
+
+The ranger had been absorbed in thought, his chin in his hand, but he
+brought his gaze back from the distance to meet hers. What emotion lay
+behind those cold eyes she could not guess.
+
+"You're more hopeful than I am, Miss Lee."
+
+"What are you sending them out for, then?"
+
+"Oh, well, the boys need to work off some of their energy, and there's
+always a show they might happen onto the robbers."
+
+"Do you think some of the Roaring Fork gang did it?"
+
+"Can't say."
+
+"I suppose you are staying here in the hope that they will drop in and
+deliver themselves to you."
+
+He looked at her out of an expressionless face. "That's about it, I
+reckon. But what I tell the public is that I'm staying so as to be within
+telephone connection. You see, Sheriff Burke is moving up to cut them off
+from the Catalinas, Jackson is riding out from Mammoth to haid them off
+that way, these anxious lads that have just pulled out from here are
+taking care of the Galiuros. I'm supposed to be sitting with my fingers on
+the keys as a sort of posse dispatcher."
+
+"Well, I hope you won't catch them," she told him bluntly.
+
+"That seems to be a prevailing sentiment round here. You say it right
+hearty too; couldn't be more certain of your feelings if it had been your
+own father."
+
+He said it carelessly, yet with his keen blue eyes fixed on her.
+Nevertheless, he was totally unprepared for the effect of his words. The
+color washed from her bronzed cheeks, and she stood staring at him with
+big, fear-filled eyes.
+
+"What--what do you mean?" she gasped. "How dare you say that?"
+
+"I ain't said anything so terrible. You don't need to take it to heart
+like that." He gave her a faint smile for an instant. "I'm not really
+expecting to arrest Mr. Lee for holding up that stage."
+
+The color beat back slowly into her face. She knew she had made a false
+move in taking so seriously his remark.
+
+"I don't think you ought to joke about a thing like that," she said
+stiffly.
+
+"All right. I'll not say it next time till I'm in earnest," he promised as
+he walked away.
+
+"I wonder if he really meant anything," the girl was thinking in terror,
+and he, "she knows something; now, I would like to know what."
+
+Melissy attended to her duties in the postoffice after the arrival of the
+stage, and looked after the dining-room as usual, but she was all the time
+uneasily aware that Jack Flatray had quietly disappeared. Where had he
+gone? And why? She found no answer to that question, but the ranger
+dropped in on his bronco in time for supper, imperturbable and
+self-contained as ever.
+
+"Think I'll stay all night if you have a room for me," he told her after
+he had eaten.
+
+"We have a room," she said. "What more have you heard about the stage
+robbery?"
+
+"Nothing, Miss Lee."
+
+"Oh, I thought maybe you had," she murmured tremulously, for his blue
+eyes were unwaveringly upon her and she could not know how much or how
+little he might mean.
+
+Later she saw him sitting on the fence, holding genial converse with Jim
+Budd. The waiter was flashing a double row of white teeth in deep laughter
+at something the deputy had told him. Evidently they were already friends.
+When she looked again, a few minutes later, she knew Jack had reached the
+point where he was pumping Jim and the latter was disseminating
+misinformation. That the negro was stanch enough, she knew, but she was on
+the anxious seat lest his sharp-witted inquisitor get what he wanted in
+spite of him. After he had finished with Budd the ranger drifted around to
+the kitchen in time to intercept Hop Ling casually as he came out after
+finishing his evening's work. The girl was satisfied Flatray could not
+have any suspicion of the truth. Nevertheless, she wished he would let the
+help alone. He might accidentally stumble on something that would set him
+on the right track.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+THE BOONE-BELLAMY FEUD IS RENEWED
+
+
+"Here's six bits on the counter under a seed catalogue. Did you leave it
+here, daddy?"
+
+Champ Lee, seated on the porch just outside the store door, took the pipe
+from his mouth and answered:
+
+"Why no, honey, I don't reckon I did, not to my ricollection."
+
+"That's queer. I know I didn't----"
+
+Melissy broke her sentence sharply. There had come into her eyes a spark
+of excitement, simultaneous with the brain-flash which told her who had
+left the money. No doubt the quarter and the half dollar had been lying
+there ever since the day last week when Morse had eaten at the Bar Double
+G. She addressed an envelope, dropped the money in, sealed the flap, and
+put the package beside a letter addressed to T. L. Morse.
+
+Lee, full of an unhappy restlessness which he could not control, presently
+got up and moved away to the stables. He was blaming himself bitterly for
+the events of the past few days.
+
+It was perhaps half an hour later that Melissy looked up to see the
+sturdy figure of Morse in the doorway. During the past year he had filled
+out, grown stronger and more rugged. His deep tan and heavy stride
+pronounced him an outdoor man no less surely than the corduroy suit and
+the high laced miners' boots.
+
+He came forward to the postoffice window without any sign of recognition.
+
+"Is Mr. Flatray still here?"
+
+"No!" Without further explanation Melissy took from the box the two
+letters addressed to Morse and handed them to him.
+
+The girl observed the puzzled look that stole over his face at sight of
+the silver in one envelope. A glance at the business address printed on
+the upper left hand corner enlightened him. He laid the money down in the
+stamp window.
+
+"This isn't mine."
+
+"You heard what my father said?"
+
+"That applies to next time, not to this."
+
+"I think it does apply to this time."
+
+"I can't see how you're going to make me take it back. I'm an obstinate
+man."
+
+"Just as you like."
+
+A sudden flush of anger swept her. She caught up the silver and flung it
+through the open window into the dusty road.
+
+His dark eyes met hers steadily and a dull color burned in his tanned
+cheeks. Without a word he turned away, and instantly she regretted what
+she had done. She had insulted him deliberately and put herself in the
+wrong. At bottom she was a tender-hearted child, even though her father
+and his friends had always spoiled her, and she could not but reproach
+herself for the hurt look she had brought into his strong, sad face. He
+was their enemy, of course, but even enemies have rights.
+
+Morse walked out of the office looking straight before him, his strong
+back teeth gripped so that the muscles stood out on his salient jaw.
+Impulsively the girl ran around the counter after him.
+
+He looked up from untying his horse to see her straight and supple figure
+running toward him. Her eager face was full of contrition and the color of
+pink rose petals came and went in it.
+
+"I'm sorry, Mr. Morse. I oughtn't to have done that. I hurt your
+feelings," she cried.
+
+At best he was never a handsome man, but now his deep, dark eyes lit with
+a glow that surprised her.
+
+"Thank you. Thank you very much," he said in a low voice.
+
+"I'm so tempery," she explained in apology, and added: "I suppose a nice
+girl wouldn't have done it."
+
+"A nice girl did do it," was all he could think to say.
+
+"You needn't take the trouble to say that. I know I've just scrambled up
+and am not ladylike and proper. Sometimes I don't care. I like to be able
+to do things like boys. But I suppose it's dreadful."
+
+"I don't think it is at all. None of your friends could think so. Not that
+I include myself among them," he hastened to disclaim. "I can't be both
+your friend and your enemy, can I?"
+
+The trace of a sardonic smile was in his eyes. For the moment as she
+looked at him she thought he might. But she answered:
+
+"I don't quite see how."
+
+"You hate me, I suppose," he blurted out bluntly.
+
+"I suppose so." And more briskly she added, with dimples playing near the
+corners of her mouth: "Of course I do."
+
+"That's frank. It's worth something to have so decent an enemy. I don't
+believe you would shoot me in the back."
+
+"Some of the others would. You should be more careful," she cried before
+she could stop herself.
+
+He shrugged. "I take my fighting chance."
+
+"It isn't much of a one. You'll be shot at from ambush some day."
+
+"It wouldn't be a new experience. I went through it last week."
+
+"Where?" she breathed.
+
+"Down by Willow Wash."
+
+"Who did it?"
+
+He laughed, without amusement. "I didn't have my rifle with me, so I
+didn't stay to inquire."
+
+"It must have been some of those wild vaqueros."
+
+"That was my guess."
+
+"But you have other enemies, too."
+
+"Miss Lee," he smiled.
+
+"I mean others that are dangerous."
+
+"Your father?" he asked.
+
+"Father would never do that except in a fair fight. I wasn't thinking of
+him."
+
+"I don't know whom you mean, but a few extras don't make much difference
+when one is so liberally supplied already," he said cynically.
+
+"I shouldn't make light of them if I were you," she cautioned.
+
+"Who do you mean?"
+
+"I've said all I'm going to, and more than I ought," she told him
+decisively. "Except this, that it's your own fault. You shouldn't be so
+stiff. Why don't you compromise? With the cattlemen, for instance. They
+have a good deal of right on their side. They _did_ have the range
+first."
+
+"You should tell that to your father, too."
+
+"Dad runs sheep on the range to protect himself. He doesn't drive out
+other people's cattle and take away their living."
+
+"Well, I might compromise, but not at the end of a gun."
+
+"No, of course not. Here comes dad now," she added hurriedly, aware for
+the first time that she had been holding an extended conversation with her
+father's foe.
+
+"We started enemies and we quit enemies. Will you shake hands on that,
+Miss Lee?" he asked.
+
+She held out her hand, then drew it swiftly back. "No, I can't. I forgot.
+There's another reason."
+
+"Another reason! You mean the Arkansas charge against me?" he asked
+quietly.
+
+"No. I can't tell you what it is." She felt herself suffused in a crimson
+glow. How could she explain that she could not touch hands with him
+because she had robbed him of twenty thousand dollars?
+
+Lee stopped at the steps, astonished to see his daughter and this man in
+talk together. Yesterday he would have resented it bitterly, but now the
+situation was changed. Something of so much greater magnitude had occurred
+that he was too perturbed to cherish his feud for the present. All night
+he had carried with him the dreadful secret he suspected. He could not
+look Melissy in the face, nor could he discuss the robbery with anybody.
+The one fact that overshadowed all others was that his little girl had
+gone out and held up a stage, that if she were discovered she would be
+liable to a term in the penitentiary. Laboriously his slow brain had
+worked it all out. A talk with Jim Budd had confirmed his conclusions. He
+knew that she had taken this risk in order to save him. He was bowed down
+with his unworthiness, with shame that he had dragged her into this
+horrible tangle. He was convinced that Jack Flatray would get at the
+truth, and already he was resolved to come forward and claim the whole
+affair as his work.
+
+"I've been apologizing to Mr. Morse for insulting him, dad," the girl said
+immediately.
+
+Her father passed a bony hand slowly across his unshaven chin. "That's
+right, honey. If you done him a meanness, you had ought to say so."
+
+"She has said so very handsomely, Mr. Lee," spoke up Morse.
+
+"I've been warning him, dad, that he ought to be more careful how he rides
+around alone, with the cattlemen feeling the way they do."
+
+"It's a fact they feel right hot under the collar. You're ce'tainly a
+temptation to them, Mr. Morse," the girl's father agreed.
+
+The mine owner shifted the subject of conversation. He was not a man of
+many impulses, but he yielded to one now.
+
+"Can't we straighten out this trouble between us, Mr. Lee? You think I've
+done you an injury. Perhaps I have. If we both mean what's right, we can
+get together and fix it up in a few minutes."
+
+The old Southerner stiffened and met him with an eye of jade. "I ain't
+asking any favors of you, Mr. Morse. We'll settle this matter some day,
+and settle it right. But you can't buy me off. I'll not take a bean from
+you."
+
+The miner's eyes hardened. "I'm not trying to buy you off. I made a fair
+offer of peace. Since you have rejected it, there is nothing more to be
+said." With that he bowed stiffly and walked away, leading his horse.
+
+Lee's gaze followed him and slowly the eyes under the beetled brows
+softened.
+
+"Mebbe I done wrong, honey. Mebbe I'd ought to have given in. I'm too
+proud to compromise when he's got me beat. That's what's ailin' with me.
+But I reckon I'd better have knuckled under."
+
+The girl slipped her arm through his. "Sometimes I'm just like that too,
+daddy. I've just _got_ to win before I make up. I don't blame you a mite,
+but, all the same, we should have let him fix it up."
+
+It was characteristic of them both that neither thought of reversing the
+decision he had made. It was done now, and they would abide by the
+results. But already both of them half regretted, though for very
+different reasons. Lee was thinking that for Melissy's sake he should have
+made a friend of the man he hated, since it was on the cards that within a
+few days she might be in his power. The girl's feeling, too, was
+unselfish. She could not forget the deep hunger for friendship that had
+shone in the man's eyes. He was alone in the world, a strong man
+surrounded by enemies who would probably destroy him in the end. There was
+stirring in her heart a sweet womanly pity and sympathy for the enemy
+whose proffer of friendship had been so cavalierly rejected.
+
+The sight of a horseman riding down the trail from the Flagstaff mine
+shook Melissy into alertness.
+
+"Look, dad. It's Mr. Norris," she cried.
+
+Morse, who had not yet recognized him, swung to the saddle, his heart full
+of bitterness. Every man's hand was against his, and every woman's. What
+was there in his nature that turned people against him so inevitably?
+There seemed to be some taint in him that corroded all natural human
+kindness.
+
+A startled oath brought him from his somber reflections. He looked up, to
+see the face of a man with whom in the dead years of the past he had been
+in bitter feud.
+
+Neither of them spoke. Morse looked at him with a face cold as chiselled
+marble and as hard. The devil's own passion burned in the storm-tossed one
+of the other.
+
+Norris was the first to break the silence.
+
+"So it was all a lie about your being killed, Dick Bellamy."
+
+The mine owner did not speak, but the rigor of his eyes did not relax.
+
+"Gave it out to throw me off your trail, did you? Knew mighty well I'd cut
+the heart out of the man who shot poor Shep." The voice of the cattle
+detective rang out in malignant triumph. "You guessed it c'rect, seh.
+Right here's where the Boone-Bellamy feud claims another victim."
+
+The men were sitting face to face, so close that their knees almost
+touched. As Norris jerked out his gun Bellamy caught his wrist. They
+struggled for an instant, the one to free his arm, the other to retain his
+grip. Bellamy spurred his horse closer. The more powerful of the two, he
+slowly twisted around the imprisoned wrist. Inch by inch the revolver
+swung in a jerky, spasmodic circle. There was a moment when it pointed
+directly at the mine owner's heart. His enemy's finger crooked on the
+trigger, eyes passionate with the stark lust to kill. But the pressure on
+the wrist had numbed the hand. The weapon jumped out of line, went
+clattering down into the dust from the palsied fingers.
+
+Lee ran forward and pushed between the men.
+
+"Here. Ain't you boys got ary bettah sense than to clinch like wildcats?"
+he demanded, jerking one of the horses away by the bridle. "No, you don't,
+Phil. I'll take keer of this gun for the present." It was noticeable that
+Beauchamp Lee's speech grew more after the manner of the plantations when
+he became excited.
+
+The cowpuncher, white with anger, glared at his enemy and poured curses at
+him, the while he nursed his strained wrist. For the moment he was
+impotent, but he promised himself vengeance in full when they should meet
+again.
+
+"That'll be enough from you now, Phil," said the old ex-Confederate
+good-naturedly, leading him toward the house and trying to soothe his
+malevolent chagrin.
+
+Bellamy turned and rode away. At the corner of the corral he met Jack
+Flatray riding up.
+
+"Been having a little difference of opinion with our friend, haven't you,
+seh?" the deputy asked pleasantly.
+
+"Yes." Bellamy gave him only the crisp monosyllable and changed the
+subject immediately. "What about this stage robbery? Have you been able to
+make anything of it, Mr. Flatray?"
+
+"Why, yes. I reckon we'll be able to land the miscreant mebbe, if things
+come our way," drawled the deputy. "Wouldn't it be a good idea to offer a
+reward, though, to keep things warm?"
+
+"I thought of that. I made it a thousand dollars. The posters ought to be
+out to-day on the stage."
+
+"Good enough!"
+
+"Whom do you suspect?"
+
+Jack looked at him with amiable imperturbability. "I reckon I better
+certify my suspicions, seh, before I go to shouting them out."
+
+"All right, sir. Since I'm paying the shot, it ought to entitle me to some
+confidence. But it's up to you. Get back the twenty thousand dollars,
+that's all I ask, except that you put the fellow behind the bars of the
+penitentiary for a few years."
+
+Flatray gave him an odd smile which he did not understand.
+
+"I hope to be able to accommodate you, seh, about this time to-morrow, so
+far as getting the gold goes. You'll have to wait a week or two before
+the rest of your expectations get gratified."
+
+"Any reasonable time. I want to see him there eventually. That's all."
+
+Jack laughed again, without giving any reason for his mirth. That ironic
+smile continued to decorate his face for some time. He seemed to have some
+inner source of mirth he did not care to disclose.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+THE DANGER LINE
+
+
+Though Champ Lee had business in Mesa next day that would not be denied,
+he was singularly loath to leave the ranch. He wanted to stay close to
+Melissy until the denouement of the hunt for the stage robber. On the
+other hand, it was well known that his contest with Morse for the Monte
+Cristo was up for a hearing. To stay at home would have been a confession
+of his anxiety that he did not want to make. But it was only after
+repeated charges to his daughter to call him up by telephone immediately
+if anything happened that he could bring himself to ride away.
+
+He was scarcely out of sight when a Mexican vaquero rode in with the
+information that old Antonio, on his way to the post at Three Pines with a
+second drove of sheep, had twisted his ankle badly about fifteen miles
+from the ranch. After trying in vain to pick up a herder at Mesa by
+telephone, Melissy was driven to the only feasible course left her, to
+make the drive herself in place of Antonio. There were fifteen hundred
+sheep in the bunch, and they must be taken care of at once by somebody
+competent for the task. She knew she could handle them, for it had amused
+her to take charge of a herd often for an hour or two at a time. The long
+stretch over the desert would be wearisome and monotonous, but she had the
+slim, muscular tenacity of a half-grown boy. It did not matter what she
+wanted to do. The thing to which she came back always was that the sheep
+must be taken care of.
+
+She left directions with Jim for taking care of the place, changed to a
+khaki skirt and jacket, slapped a saddle on her bronco, and disappeared
+across country among the undulations of the sandhills. A tenderfoot would
+have been hopelessly lost in the sameness of these hills and washes, but
+Melissy knew them as a city dweller does his streets. Straight as an arrow
+she went to her mark. The tinkle of distant sheep-bells greeted her after
+some hours' travel, and soon the low, ceaseless bleating of the herd.
+
+The girl found Antonio propped against a pinon tree, solacing himself
+philosophically with cigarettes. He was surprised to see her, but made
+only a slight objection to her taking his place. His ankle was paining him
+a good deal, and he was very glad to get the chance to pull himself to her
+saddle and ride back to the ranch.
+
+A few quick words sent the dog Colin out among the sheep, by now
+scattered far and wide over the hill. They presently came pouring toward
+her, diverged westward, and massed at the base of a butte rising from a
+dry arroyo. The journey had begun, and hour after hour it continued
+through the hot day, always in a cloud of dust flung up by the sheep,
+sometimes through the heavy sand of a wash, often over slopes of shale,
+not seldom through thick cactus beds that shredded her skirt and tore like
+fierce, sharp fingers at her legging-protected ankles. The great gray
+desert still stretched before her to the horizon's edge, and still she
+flung the miles behind her with the long, rhythmic stride that was her
+birthright from the hills. A strong man, unused to it, would have been
+staggering with stiff fatigue, but this slender girl held the trail with
+light grace, her weight still carried springily on her small ankles.
+
+Once she rested for a few minutes, flinging herself down into the sand at
+length, her head thrown back from the full brown throat so that she could
+gaze into the unstained sky of blue. Presently the claims of this planet
+made themselves heard, for she, too, was elemental and a creature of
+instinct. The earth was awake and palpitating with life, the low,
+indefatigable life of creeping things and vegetation persisting even in
+this waste of rock and sand.
+
+But she could not rest long, for Diablo canyon must be reached before dark.
+The sheep would be very thirsty by the time they arrived, and she could
+not risk letting them tear down the precipitous edge among the sharp rocks
+in the dark. Already over the sand stretches a peculiar liquid glow was
+flooding, so that the whole desert seemed afire. The burning sun had
+slipped behind a saddle of the purple peaks, leaving a brilliant horizon
+of many mingled shades.
+
+It was as she came forward to the canyon's edge in this luminous dusk that
+Melissy became aware of a distant figure on horseback, silhouetted for a
+moment against the skyline. One glance was all she got of it, for she was
+very busy with the sheep, working them leisurely toward the black chasm
+that seemed to yawn for them. High rock walls girt the canyon, gigantic and
+bottomless in the gloom. A dizzy trail zigzagged back and forth to the
+pool below, and along this she and the collie skilfully sent the eager,
+thirsty animals.
+
+The mass of the sheep were still huddled on the edge of the ravine when
+there came the thud of horses' hoofs and the crack of revolvers,
+accompanied by hoarse, triumphant yells and cries. Melissy knew instantly
+what it was--the attack of cattlemen upon her defenseless flock. They had
+waited until the sheep were on the edge of the precipice, and now they
+were going to drive the poor creatures down upon the rocks two hundred
+feet below. Her heart leaped to her throat, but scarce more quickly than
+she upon a huge boulder bordering the trail.
+
+"Back! Keep back!" she heard herself crying, and even as she spoke a
+bullet whistled through the rim of her felt hat.
+
+Standing there boldly, unconscious of danger, the wind draped and defined
+the long lines of her figure like those of the Winged Victory.
+
+The foremost rider galloped past, waving his sombrero and shooting into
+the frightened mass in front of him. Within a dozen feet of her he turned
+his revolver upon the girl, then, with an oath of recognition, dragged his
+pony back upon its haunches. Another horse slithered into it, and a
+third.
+
+"It's 'Lissie Lee!" a voice cried in astonishment; and another, with a
+startled oath, "You're right, Bob!"
+
+The first rider gave his pony the spur, swung it from the trail in a
+half-circle which brought it back at the very edge of the ravine, and
+blocked the forward pour of terror-stricken sheep. Twice his revolver rang
+out. The girl's heart stood still, for the man was Norris, and it seemed
+for an instant as if he must be swept over the precipice by the stampede.
+The leaders braced themselves to stop, but were slowly pushed forward
+toward the edge. One of the other riders had by this time joined the
+daring cowpuncher, and together they stemmed the tide. The pressure on the
+trail relaxed and the sheep began to mill around and around.
+
+It was many minutes before they were sufficiently quieted to trust upon
+the trail again, but at last the men got them safely to the bottom, with
+the exception of two or three killed in the descent.
+
+Her responsibility for the safety of the sheep gone, the girl began to
+crawl down the dark trail. She could not see a yard in front of her, and
+at each step the path seemed to end in a gulf of darkness. She could not
+be sure she was on the trail at all, and her nerve was shaken by the
+experience through which she had just passed. Presently she stopped and
+waited, for the first time in her life definitely and physically afraid.
+She stood there trembling, a long, long time it seemed to her, surrounded
+by the impenetrable blackness of night.
+
+Then a voice came to her.
+
+"Melissy!"
+
+She answered, and the voice came slowly nearer.
+
+"You're off the trail," it told her presently, just before a human figure
+defined itself in the gloom.
+
+"I'm afraid," she sobbed.
+
+A strong hand came from nowhere and caught hers. An arm slipped around her
+waist.
+
+"Don't be afraid, little girl. I'll see no harm comes to you," the man
+said to her with a quick, fierce tenderness.
+
+The comfort of his support was unspeakable. It stole into her heart like
+water to the roots of thirsty plants. To feel her head against his
+shoulder, to know he held her tight, meant safety and life. He had told
+her not to be afraid, and she was so no longer.
+
+"You shot at me," she murmured in reproach.
+
+"I didn't know. We thought it was Bellamy's herd. But it's true, God
+forgive me! I did."
+
+There was in his voice the warm throb of emotion, and in his eyes
+something she had never seen before in those of any human being. Like
+stars they were, swimming in light, glowing with the exultation of the
+triumph he was living. She was a splendid young animal, untaught of life,
+generous, passionate, tempestuous, and as her pliant, supple body lay
+against his some sex instinct old as creation stirred potently within her.
+She had found her mate. It came to her as innocently as the same impulse
+comes to the doe when the spring freshets are seeking the river, and as
+innocently her lips met his in their first kiss of surrender. Something
+irradiated her, softened her, warmed her. Was it love? She did not know,
+but as yet she was still happy in the glow of it.
+
+Slowly, hand in hand, they worked back to the trail and down it to the
+bottom of the canyon. The soft velvet night enwrapped them. It shut them
+from the world and left them one to one. From the meeting palms strange
+electric currents tingled through the girl and flushed her to an ecstasy
+of emotion.
+
+A camp fire was already burning cheerfully when they reached the base of
+the descent. A man came forward to meet them. He glanced curiously at the
+girl after she came within the circle of light. Her eyes were shining as
+from some inner glow, and she was warm with a soft color that vitalized
+her beauty. Then his gaze passed to take in with narrowed lids her
+companion.
+
+"I see you found her," he said dryly.
+
+"Yes, I found her, Bob."
+
+He answered the spirit of Farnum's words rather than the letter of them,
+nor could he keep out of his bearing and his handsome face the exultation
+that betrayed success.
+
+"H'mp!" Farnum turned from him and addressed the girl: "I suppose Norris
+has explained our mistake and eaten crow for all of us, Miss Lee. I don't
+see how come we to make such a blame' fool mistake. It was gitting dark,
+and we took your skirt for a greaser's blanket. It's ce'tainly on us."
+
+"Yes, he has explained."
+
+"Well, there won't any amount of explaining square the thing. We might 'a'
+done you a terrible injury, Miss Lee. It was gilt-edged luck for us that
+you thought to jump on that rock and holler."
+
+"I was thinking of the sheep," she said.
+
+"Well, you saved them, and I'm right glad of it. We ain't got any use for
+Mary's little trotter, but your father's square about his. He keeps them
+herded up on his own range. We may not like it, but we ce'tainly aren't
+going to the length of attackin' his herd." Farnum's gaze took in her
+slender girlishness, and he voiced the question in his mind. "How in time
+do you happen to be sheep-herding all by your lone a thousand miles from
+nowhere, Miss Lee?"
+
+She explained the circumstances after she had moved forward to warm
+herself by the fire. For already night was bringing a chill breeze with
+it. The man cooking the coffee looked up and nodded pleasantly, continuing
+his work. Norris dragged up a couple of saddle blankets and spread them on
+the ground for her to sit upon.
+
+"You don't have to do a thing but boss this outfit," he told her with his
+gay smile. "You're queen of the range to-night, and we're your herders or
+your punchers, whichever you want to call us. To-morrow morning two of us
+are going to drive these sheep on to the trading post for you, and the
+other one is going to see you safe back home. It's all arranged."
+
+They were as good as his word. She could not move from her place to help
+herself. It was their pleasure to wait upon her as if she had really been
+a queen and they her subjects. Melissy was very tired, but she enjoyed
+their deference greatly. She was still young enough to find delight in the
+fact that three young and more or less good-looking men were vying with
+each other to anticipate her needs.
+
+Like them, she ate and drank ravenously of the sandwiches and the strong
+coffee, though before the meal was over she found herself nodding
+drowsily. The tactful courtesy of these rough fellows was perfect. They
+got the best they had for her of their blankets, dragged a pinon root to
+feed the glowing coals, and with cheerful farewells of "_Buenos Noches_"
+retired around a bend in the canyon and lit another fire for themselves.
+
+The girl snuggled down into the warmth of the blankets and stretched her
+weary limbs in delicious rest. She did not mean to go to sleep for a long
+time. She had much to think about. So she looked up the black sheer canyon
+walls to the deep blue, starry sky above, and relived her day in memory.
+
+A strange excitement tingled through her, born of shame and shyness and
+fear, and of something else she did not understand, something which had
+lain banked in her nature like a fire since childhood and now threw forth
+its first flame of heat. What did it mean, that passionate fierceness with
+which her lips had clung to his? She liked him, of course, but surely
+liking would not explain the pulse that her first kiss had sent leaping
+through her blood like wine. Did she love him?
+
+Then why did she distrust him? Why was there fear in her sober second
+thought of him? Had she done wrong? For the moment all her maiden defenses
+had been wiped out and he had ridden roughshod over her reserves. But
+somewhere in her a bell of warning was ringing. The poignant sting of sex
+appeal had come home to her for the first time. Wherefore in this frank
+child of the wilderness had been born a shy shame, a vague trembling for
+herself that marked a change. At sunrise she had been still treading gayly
+the primrose path of childhood; at sunset she had entered upon her
+heritage of womanhood.
+
+The sun had climbed high and was peering down the walls of the gulch when
+she awoke. She did not at once realize where she was, but came presently
+to a blinking consciousness of her surroundings. The rock wall on one side
+was still shadowed, while the painted side of the other was warm with the
+light which poured upon it. The Gothic spires, the Moorish domes, the
+weird and mysterious caves, which last night had given more than a touch
+of awe to her majestic bedchamber, now looked a good deal less like the
+ruins of mediaeval castles and the homes of elfin sprites and gnomes.
+
+"_Buenos dios, muchacha,_" a voice called cheerfully to her.
+
+She did not need to turn to know to whom it belonged. Among a thousand she
+would have recognized its tone of vibrant warmth.
+
+"_Buenos,_" she answered, and, rising hurriedly, she fled to rearrange her
+hair and dress.
+
+It was nearly a quarter of an hour later that she reappeared, her thick
+coils of ebon-hued tresses shining in the sun, her skirt smoothed to her
+satisfaction, and the effects of feminine touches otherwise visible upon
+her fresh, cool person.
+
+"Breakfast is served," Norris sang out.
+
+"Dinner would be nearer it," she laughed. "Why in the world didn't you
+boys waken me? What time is it, anyhow?"
+
+"It's not very late--a little past noon maybe. You were all tired out with
+your tramp yesterday. I didn't see why you shouldn't have your sleep
+out."
+
+He was pouring a cup of black coffee for her from the smoky pot, and she
+looked around expectantly for the others. Simultaneously she remembered
+that she had not heard the bleating of the sheep.
+
+"Where are the others--Mr. Farnum and Sam? And have you the sheep all
+gagged?" she laughed.
+
+He gave her that odd look of smoldering eyes behind half-shut lids.
+
+"The boys have gone on to finish the drive for you. They started before
+sun-up this morning. I'm elected to see you back home safely."
+
+"But----"
+
+Her protest died unspoken. She could not very well frame it in words, and
+before his bold, possessive eyes the girl's long, dark lashes wavered to
+the cheeks into which the hot blood was beating. Nevertheless, the feeling
+existed that she wished one of the others had stayed instead of him. It
+was born, no doubt, partly of the wave of shyness running through her,
+but partly too of instinctive maidenly resistance to something in his
+look, in the assurance of his manner, that seemed to claim too much. Last
+night he had taken her by storm and at advantage. Something of shame
+stirred in her that he had found her so easy a conquest, something too of
+a new vague fear of herself. She resented the fact that he could so move
+her, even though she still felt the charm of his personal presence. She
+meant to hold herself in abeyance, to make sure of herself and of him
+before she went further.
+
+But the cowpuncher had no intention of letting her regain so fully control
+of her emotions. Experience of more than one young woman had taught him
+that scruples were likely to assert themselves after reflection, and he
+purposed giving her no time for that to-day.
+
+He did not count in vain upon the intimacy of companionship forced upon
+them by the circumstances, nor upon the skill with which he knew how to
+make the most of his manifold attractions. His role was that of the
+comrade, gay with good spirits and warm with friendliness, solicitous of
+her needs, but not oppressively so. If her glimpse of him at breakfast had
+given the girl a vague alarm, she laughed her fears away later before his
+open good humor.
+
+There had been a time when he had been a part of that big world "back in
+the States," peopled so generously by her unfettered imagination. He knew
+how to talk, and entertainingly, of books and people, of events and
+places he had known. She had not knowledge enough of life to doubt his
+stories, nor did she resent it that he spoke of this her native section
+with the slighting manner of one who patronized it with his presence.
+Though she loved passionately her Arizona, she guessed its crudeness, and
+her fancy magnified the wonders of that southern civilization from which
+it was so far cut off.
+
+Farnum had left his horse for the girl, and after breakfast the cowpuncher
+saddled the broncos and brought them up. Melissy had washed the dishes,
+filled his canteen, and packed the saddle bags. Soon they were off,
+climbing slowly the trail that led up the canyon wall. She saw the carcass
+of a dead sheep lying on the rocks half way down the cliff, and had spoken
+of it before she could stop herself.
+
+"What is that? Isn't it----?"
+
+"Looks to me like a boulder," lied her escort unblushingly. There was no
+use, he judged, in recalling unpleasant memories.
+
+Nor did she long remember. The dry, exhilarating sunshine and the sting of
+gentle, wide-swept breezes, the pleasure of swift motion and the ring of
+that exultingly boyish voice beside her, combined to call the youth in her
+to rejoice. Firm in the saddle she rode, as graceful a picture of piquant
+girlhood as could be conceived, thrilling to the silent voices of the
+desert. They traveled in a sunlit sea of space, under a sky of blue, in
+which tenuous cloud lakes floated. Once they came on a small bunch of hill
+cattle which went flying like deer into the covert of a draw. A
+rattlesnake above a prairie dog's hole slid into the mesquit. A swift
+watched them from the top of a smooth rock, motionless so long as they
+could see. She loved it all, this immense, deserted world of space filled
+with its multitudinous dwellers.
+
+They unsaddled at Dead Cow Creek, hobbled the ponies, and ate supper.
+Norris seemed in no hurry to resaddle. He lay stretched carelessly at full
+length, his eyes upon her with veiled admiration. She sat upright, her
+gaze on the sunset with its splashes of topaz and crimson and saffron,
+watching the tints soften and mellow as dusk fell. Every minute now
+brought its swift quota of changing beauty. A violet haze enveloped the
+purple mountains, and in the crotch of the hills swam a lake of indigo.
+The raw, untempered glare of the sun was giving place to a limitless pour
+of silvery moonlight.
+
+Her eyes were full of the soft loveliness of the hour when she turned them
+upon her companion. He answered promptly her unspoken question.
+
+"You bet it is! A night for the gods--or for lovers."
+
+He said it in a murmur, his eyes full on hers, and his look wrenched her
+from her mood. The mask of comradeship was gone. He looked at her
+hungrily, as might a lover to whom all spiritual heights were denied.
+
+Her sooty lashes fell before this sinister spirit she had evoked, but were
+raised instantly at the sound of him drawing his body toward her.
+Inevitably there was a good deal of the young animal in her superbly
+healthy body. She had been close to nature all day, the riotous passion of
+spring flowing free in her as in the warm earth herself. But the magic of
+the mystic hills had lifted her beyond the merely personal. Some sense of
+grossness in him for the first time seared across her brain. She started
+up, and her face told him she had taken alarm.
+
+"We must be going," she cried.
+
+He got to his feet. "No hurry, sweetheart."
+
+The look in his face startled her. It was new to her in her experience of
+men. Never before had she met elemental lust.
+
+"You're near enough," she cautioned sharply.
+
+He cursed softly his maladroitness.
+
+"I was nearer last night, honey," he reminded her.
+
+"Last night isn't to-night."
+
+He hesitated. Should he rush her defenses, bury her protests in kisses? Or
+should he talk her out of this harsh mood? Last night she had been his.
+There were moments during the day when she had responded to him as a
+musical instrument does to skilled fingers. But for the moment his power
+over her was gone. And he was impatient of delay.
+
+"What's the matter with you?" he asked roughly.
+
+"We'll start at once."
+
+"No."
+
+"Yes."
+
+Frightened though she was, her gaze held steadily to his. It was the same
+instinct in her that makes one look a dangerous wild beast straight in the
+eye.
+
+"What's got into you?" he demanded sullenly.
+
+"I'm going home."
+
+"After a while."
+
+"Now."
+
+"I reckon not just yet. It's my say-so."
+
+"Don't you dare stop me."
+
+The passion in him warred with prudence. He temporized. "Why, honey! I'm
+the man that loves you."
+
+She would not see his outstretched hands.
+
+"Then saddle my horse."
+
+"By God, no! You're going to listen to me."
+
+His anger ripped out unexpectedly, even to him. Whatever fear she felt,
+the girl crushed down. He must not know her heart was drowned in terror.
+
+"I'll listen after we've started."
+
+He cursed her fickleness. "What's ailin' you, girl? I ain't a man to be
+put off this way."
+
+"Don't forget you're in Arizona," she warned.
+
+He understood what she meant. In the ranch country no man could with
+impunity insult a woman.
+
+Standing defiantly before him, her pliant form very straight, the
+underlying blood beating softly under the golden brown of her cheeks, one
+of the thick braids of her heavy, blue-black hair falling across the
+breast that rose and fell a little fast, she was no less than a challenge
+of Nature to him. He looked into a mobile face as daring and as passionate
+as his own, warm with the life of innocent youth, and the dark blood
+mantled his face.
+
+"Saddle the horses," she commanded.
+
+"When I get good and ready."
+
+"Now."
+
+"No, ma'am. We're going to have a talk first."
+
+She walked across to the place where her pony grazed, slipped on the
+bridle, and brought the animal back to the saddle. Norris watched her
+fitting the blankets and tightening the cinch without a word, his face
+growing blacker every moment. Before she could start he strode forward and
+caught the rein.
+
+"I've got something to say to you," he told her rudely. "You're not going
+now. So that's all about it."
+
+Her lips tightened. "Let go of my horse."
+
+"We'll talk first."
+
+"Do you think you can force me to stay here?"
+
+"You're going to hear what I've got to say."
+
+"You bully!"
+
+"I'll tell what I know--Miss Hold-up."
+
+"Tell it!" she cried.
+
+He laughed harshly, his narrowed eyes watching her closely. "If you throw
+me down now, I'll ce'tainly tell it. Be reasonable, girl."
+
+"Let go my rein!"
+
+"I've had enough of this. Tumble off that horse, or I'll pull you off."
+
+Her dark eyes flashed scorn of him. "You coward! Do you think I'm afraid
+of you? Stand back!"
+
+The man looked long at her, his teeth set; then caught at her strong
+little wrist. With a quick wrench she freed it, her eyes glowing like live
+coals.
+
+"You dare!" she panted.
+
+Her quirt rose and fell, the lash burning his wrist like a band of fire.
+With a furious oath he dropped his hand from the rein. Like a flash she
+was off, had dug her heels home, and was galloping into the moonlight
+recklessly as fast as she could send forward her pony. Stark terror had
+her by the throat. The fear of him flooded her whole being. Not till the
+drumming hoofs had carried her far did other emotions move her.
+
+She was furious with him, and with herself for having been imposed upon by
+him. His beauty, his grace, his debonair manner--they were all hateful to
+her now. She had thought him a god among men, and he was of common clay.
+It was her vanity that was wounded, not her heart. She scourged herself
+because she had been so easily deceived, because she had let herself
+become a victim of his good looks and his impudence. For that she had let
+him kiss her--yes, and had returned his kiss--she was heartily
+contemptuous of herself. Always she had held herself with an instinctive
+pride, but in her passion of abandonment the tears confessed now that this
+pride had been humbled to the dust.
+
+This gusty weather of the spirit, now of chastened pride and now of bitter
+anger, carried her even through the group of live-oaks which looked down
+upon the silent houses of the ranch, lying in a sea of splendid moon-beat.
+She was so much less confident of herself than usual that she made up her
+mind to tell her father the whole story of the hold-up and of what this
+man had threatened.
+
+This resolution comforted her, and it was with something approaching
+calmness that she rode past the corral fence and swung from the saddle in
+front of the house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+JACK GOES TO THE HEAD OF THE CLASS
+
+
+She trailed the bridle reins, went up the porch steps, and drew off her
+gauntlets. Her hand was outstretched to open the door when her gaze fell
+upon a large bill tacked to the wall. Swiftly she read it through, and,
+having read it, remained in suspended motion. For the first time she fully
+realized the danger and the penalty that confronted her.
+
+                          ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS
+                    Will Be Paid By Thomas L. Morse
+  For the arrest and conviction of each of the men who were implicated
+  in the robbery of the Fort Allison stage on April twenty-seventh
+  last. A further reward of $1000 will be paid for the recovery of the
+  bullion stolen.
+
+This was what she read, and her eye was running over it a second time when
+she heard the jingle of a spur approaching.
+
+"We're red-hot after them, you see, Miss Lee," a mocking voice drawled.
+"If you want to round up a thousand plunks, all you've got to do is to
+tell me who Mr. Hold-up is."
+
+He laughed quietly, as if it were a joke, but the girl answered with a
+flush. "Is that all?"
+
+"That's all."
+
+"If I knew, do you suppose I would tell for five thousand--or ten
+thousand?"
+
+For some reason this seemed to give him sardonic amusement. "No, I don't
+suppose you would."
+
+"You'll have to catch him yourself if you want him. I'm not in that
+business, Mr. Flatray."
+
+"I am. Sorry you don't like the business, Miss Lee." He added dryly: "But
+then you always were hard to please. You weren't satisfied when I was a
+rustler."
+
+Her eyes swept him with a look, whether of reproach or contempt he was not
+sure. But the hard derision of his gaze did not soften. Mentally as well
+as physically he was a product of the sun and the wind, as tough and
+unyielding as a greasewood sapling. For a friend he would go the limit,
+and he could not forgive her that she had distrusted him.
+
+"But mebbe you'd prefer it if I was rustling stages," he went on, looking
+straight at her.
+
+"What do you mean?" she asked breathlessly.
+
+"I want to have a talk with you."
+
+"What about?"
+
+"Suppose we step around to the side of the house. We'll be freer from
+interruption there."
+
+He led the way, taking her consent for granted. With him he carried a
+chair for her from the porch.
+
+"If you'll be as brief as possible, Mr. Flatray. I've been in the desert
+two days and want to change my clothes."
+
+"I'll not detain you. It's about this gold robbery."
+
+"Yes."
+
+She could not take her eyes from him. Something told her that he knew her
+secret, or part of it. Her heart was fluttering like a caged thrush.
+
+"Shall we begin at the beginning?"
+
+"If you like."
+
+"Or in the middle, say."
+
+"If only you'll begin anywhere," she said impatiently.
+
+"How will this do for a beginning, then? 'One thousand dollars will be
+paid by Thomas L. Morse for the arrest and conviction of each of the men
+who were implicated in the robbery of the Fort Allison stage on April
+twenty-seventh last.'"
+
+She was shaken, there was no denying it. He could see the ebb of blood
+from her cheeks, the sudden stiffening of the slender figure.
+
+She did not speak until she had control of her voice. "Dear me! What has
+all that to do with me?"
+
+"A good deal, I'm afraid. You know how much, better than I do."
+
+"Perhaps I'm stupid. You'll have to be a great deal clearer before I can
+understand you."
+
+"I've noticed that it's a lot easier to understand what you want to than
+what you don't want to."
+
+Sharply a thought smote her. "Have you seen Phil Norris lately?"
+
+"No, I haven't. Do you think it likely that he would confess?"
+
+"Confess?" she faltered.
+
+"I see I'll have to start at the beginning, after all. It's pretty hard to
+say just where that is. It might be when Morse got hold of your father's
+claim, or another fellow might say it was when the Boone-Bellamy feud
+began, and that is a mighty long time ago."
+
+"The Boone-Bellamy feud," echoed the girl.
+
+"Yes. The real name of our friend Norris is Dunc Boone."
+
+"He's no friend of mine." She flamed it out with such intensity that he
+was surprised.
+
+"Glad to hear it. I can tell you, then, that he's a bad lot. He was driven
+out of Arkansas after a suspected murder. It was a killing from ambush.
+They couldn't quite hang it on him, but he lit a shuck to save his skin
+from lynchers. At that time he was a boy. Couldn't have been more than
+seventeen."
+
+"Who did he kill?"
+
+"One of the Bellamy faction. The real name of T. L. Morse is----"
+
+"--Richard Bellamy."
+
+"How do you know that?" he asked in surprise.
+
+"I've known it since the first day I met him."
+
+"Known that he was wanted for murder in Arkansas?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And you protected him?"
+
+"I had a reason." She did not explain that her reason was Jack Flatray,
+between whom and the consequences of his rustling she had stood.
+
+He pondered that a moment. "Well, Morse, or Bellamy, told me all about it.
+Now that Boone has recognized him, the game is up. He's ready to go back
+and stand trial if he must. I've communicated with the authorities in
+Arkansas and I'll hear from them in a day or two."
+
+"What has this to do with the hold-up?"
+
+"That's right, the hold-up. Well, this fellow Boone got your father to
+drinking, and then sprung it on him to rob the stage when the bullion was
+being shipped. Somehow Boone had got inside information about when this
+was to be. He had been nosing around up at the mine, and may have
+overheard something. O' course we know what your father would have done if
+he hadn't been drinking. He's straight as a string, even if he does go off
+like powder. But when a man's making a blue blotter of himself, things
+don't look the same to him. Anyhow he went in."
+
+"He didn't. I can prove he didn't," burst from Melissy's lips.
+
+"Be glad to hear your proof later. He ce'tainly planned the hold-up. Jim
+Budd overheard him."
+
+"Did Jim tell you that?"
+
+"Don't blame him for that. He didn't mean to tell, but I wound him up so
+he couldn't get away from it. I'll show you later why he couldn't."
+
+"I'm sure you must have been very busy, spying and everything," she told
+him bitterly.
+
+"I've kept moving. But to get back to the point. Your father and Boone
+were on the ground where the stage was robbed _either at the time or right
+after_. Their tracks were all over there. Then they got on their horses
+and rode up the lateral."
+
+"But they couldn't. The ditch was full," broke from the girl.
+
+"You're right it was. You must be some observing to know when that ditch
+is full and empty to an hour. I reckon you've got an almanac of tides," he
+said ironically.
+
+She bit her lip with chagrin. "I just happened to notice."
+
+"Some folks _are_ more noticing than others. But you're surely right. They
+came up the ditch one on each side. Now, why one on each side, do you
+reckon?"
+
+Melissy hid the dread that was flooding her heart. "I'm sure I don't
+know. You know everything else. I suppose you do that, too, if they really
+did."
+
+"They had their reasons, but we won't go into that now. First off when
+they reach the house they take a bunch of sheep down to the ditch to water
+them. Now, why?"
+
+"Why, unless because they needed water?"
+
+"We'll let that go into the discard too just now. Let's suppose your
+father and Boone dumped the gold box down into the creek somewhere after
+they had robbed the stage. Suppose they had a partner up at the
+head-gates. When the signal is given down comes the water, and the box is
+covered by it. Mebbe that night they take it away and bury it somewhere
+else."
+
+The girl began to breathe again. He knew a good deal, but he was still off
+the track in the main points.
+
+"And who is this partner up at the canal? Have you got him located too?"
+
+"I might guess."
+
+"Well?"--impatiently.
+
+"A young lady hailing from this _hacienda_ was out gathering flowers all
+mo'ning. She was in her runabout. The tracks led straight from here to the
+head-gates. I followed them through the sands. There's a little break in
+one of the rubber tires. You'll find that break mark every eight feet or
+so in the sand wash."
+
+"I opened the head-gates, then, did I?"
+
+"It looks that way, doesn't it?"
+
+"At a signal from father?"
+
+"I reckon."
+
+"And that's all the evidence you've got against him and me?" she demanded,
+still outwardly scornful, but very much afraid at heart.
+
+"Oh, no, that ain't all, Miss Lee. Somebody locked the Chink in during
+this play. He's still wondering why."
+
+"He dreamed it. Very likely he had been rolling a pill."
+
+"Did I dream this too?" From his coat pocket he drew the piece of black
+shirting she had used as a mask. "I found it in the room where your father
+put me up that first night I stayed here. It was your brother Dick's room,
+and this came from the pocket of a shirt hanging in the closet. Now, who
+do you reckon put it there?"
+
+For the first time in her life she knew what it was to feel faint. She
+tried to speak, but the words would not come from her parched throat. How
+could he be so hard and cruel, this man who had once been her best friend?
+How could he stand there so like a machine in his relentlessness?
+
+"We--we used to--to play at hold-up when he was a boy," she gasped.
+
+He shook his head. "No, I reckon that won't go. You see, I've found the
+piece this was torn from, _and I found it in your father's coat_. I went
+into his room on tiptoe that same hour. The coat was on the bed. He had
+gone downstairs for a minute and left it there. Likely he hadn't found a
+good chance to burn it yet." Taking the two pieces, he fitted them
+together and held them up. "They match exactly, you see. Did your father
+used to play with you too when he was a boy?"
+
+He asked this with what seemed to her tortured soul like silken cruelty.
+She had no answer, none at least that would avail. Desperately she
+snatched at a straw.
+
+"All this isn't proof. It's mere surmise. Some one's tracks were found by
+you. How do you know they were father's?"
+
+"I've got that cinched too. I took his boots and measured them."
+
+"Then where's the gold, if he took it? It must be somewhere. Where is
+it?"
+
+"Now I'm going up to the head of the class, ma'am. The gold--why, that's a
+dead easy one. _Near as I can make out, I'm sitting on it right now._"
+
+She gave a startled little cry that died in her throat.
+
+"Yes, it's ce'tainly a valuable wash-stand. Chippendale furniture ain't in
+it with this kind. I reckon the king of England's is ace high against a
+straight flush when it bucks up against yours."
+
+Melissy threw up her cards. "How did you find out?" she asked hoarsely.
+
+The deputy forced her to commit herself more definitely. "Find out what?"
+
+"Where I put the box."
+
+"I'll go back and answer some of those other questions first. I might as
+well own up that I knew all the time your father didn't hold up the
+stage."
+
+"You did?"
+
+"He's no fool. He wouldn't leave his tracks all over the place where he
+had just held up a stage. He might jest as well have left a signed note
+saying he had done it. No, that didn't look like Champ Lee to me. It
+seemed more likely he'd arrived after the show than before. It wouldn't be
+like him, either, to go plowing up the side of the ditch, with his partner
+on the other side, making a trail that a blind man could follow in the
+night. Soon as I knew Lee and Boone made those tracks, I had it cinched
+that they were following the lateral to see where the robber was going.
+They had come to the same conclusion I had, that there wasn't any way of
+escape _except by that empty lateral_, _assuming it had been empty_. The
+only point was to find out where the hold-up left the lateral. That's why
+they rode one on each side of it. They weren't missing any bets, you
+see."
+
+"And that's why they drove the sheep down to water--to hide the
+wheel-tracks. I couldn't understand that."
+
+"I must 'a' been right on their heels, for they were jest getting the
+trotters out of the corral when I reached the place where your rig left
+the water. 'Course I fell back into the brush and circled around so as to
+hit the store in front."
+
+"But if dad knew all the time, I don't see--surely, he wouldn't have come
+right after me and made plain the way I escaped."
+
+"That's the point. He didn't know. I reckon he was sort of guessing around
+in the dark, plumb puzzled; couldn't find the switch at all at first. Then
+it come to him, and he thought of the sheep to blind the trail. If I'd
+been half a hour later he would have got away with it too. No, if he had
+guessed that you were in the hold-up, him and Boone would have hiked right
+out on a false trail and led us into the Galiuros. Having no notion of it
+at first, he trails you down."
+
+"And the gold--how did you find that?"
+
+"I knew it was either right around the place or else you had taken it on
+with you when you went to the head-gates and buried it up there somewhere.
+Next day I followed your tracks and couldn't find any place where you
+might have left it. I knew how clever you were by the way you planned your
+getaway. Struck me as mighty likely that you had left it lying around in
+plain view somewhere. If you had dumped it out of the box into a sack, the
+box must be somewhere. You hadn't had time to burn it before the stage got
+back. I drifted back to your kindling pile, where all the old boxes from
+the store are lying. I happened to notice a brass tack in one near the
+end; then the marks of the tack heads where they had pressed against the
+wood. I figured you might have substituted one box for another, and inside
+of ten minutes I stumbled against your wash-stand and didn't budge it.
+Then I didn't have to look any further."
+
+"I've been trying to get a chance to move it and haven't ever found one.
+You were always coming around the corner on me," she explained.
+
+"Sorry I incommoded you," he laughed. "But it's too heavy for a lady to
+lift alone, anyhow. I don't see how you managed it this far."
+
+"I'm pretty strong," she said quietly.
+
+She had no hope of escape from the net of evidence in which he had
+entangled her. It was characteristic of her that she would not stoop to
+tricks to stir his pity. Deep in her heart she knew now that she had
+wronged him when she had suspected him of being a rustler. He _could_ not
+be. It was not in the man's character. But she would ask no mercy of him.
+All her pride rose to meet his. She would show him how game she could be.
+What she had sown she would reap. Nor would it have been any use to
+beseech him to spare her. He was a hard man, she told herself. Not even a
+fool could have read any weakness in the quiet gray eyes that looked so
+steadily into hers. In his voice and movements there was a certain
+deliberation, but this had nothing to do with indecision of character. He
+would do his duty as he saw it, regardless of whom it might affect.
+
+Melissy stood before him in the unconscious attitude of distinction she
+often fell into when she was moved, head thrown back so as to bare the
+rounded throat column, brown little hands folded in front of her, erectly
+graceful in all her slender lines.
+
+"What are you going to do with me?" she asked.
+
+His stone-cold eyes met hers steadily. "It ain't my say-so. I'm going to
+put it up to Bellamy. I don't know what he'll do."
+
+But, cold as his manner was, the heart of the man leaped to her courage.
+He saw her worn out, pathetically fearful, but she could face him with
+that still little smile of hers. He longed to take her in his arms, to
+tell her it would be all right--all right.
+
+"There's one thing that troubles me. I don't know how father will take
+this. You know how quick-tempered he is. I'm afraid he'll shoot somebody
+or do something rash when he finds out. You must let me be alone with him
+when I tell him."
+
+He nodded. "I been thinking of that myself. It ain't going to do him any
+good to make a gun-play. I have a notion mebbe this thing will unravel
+itself if we give it time. It will only make things worse for him to go
+off half-cocked."
+
+"How do you mean it may unravel itself?" she asked.
+
+"Bellamy is a whole lot better man than folks give him credit for being.
+I expect he won't be hard on you when he knows why you did it."
+
+"And why did I do it?" she asked quietly.
+
+"Sho! I know why you did it. Jim Budd told you what he had heard, and you
+figured you could save your father from doing it. You meant to give the
+money back, didn't you?"
+
+"Yes, but I can't prove that either in court or to Mr. Bellamy."
+
+"You don't need to prove it to me. If you say so, that's enough," he said
+in his unenthusiastic voice.
+
+"But you're not judge and jury, and you're certainly not Mr. Bellamy."
+
+"Scrape Arizona with a fine-tooth comb and you couldn't get a jury to
+convict when it's up against the facts in this case."
+
+At this she brightened. "Thank you, Mr. Flatray." And naively she added
+with a little laugh: "Are you ready to put the handcuffs on me yet?"
+
+He looked with a smile at her outstretched hands. "They wouldn't stay
+on."
+
+"Don't you carry them in sizes to fit all criminals?"
+
+"I'll have to put you on parole."
+
+"I'll break it and climb out the window. Then I'll run off with this."
+
+She indicated the box of treasure.
+
+"I need that wash-stand in my room. I'm going to take it up there
+to-night," he said.
+
+"This _isn't_ a very good safety deposit vault," she answered, and,
+nodding a careless good-night, she walked away in her slow-limbed,
+graceful Southern fashion.
+
+She had carried it off to the last without breaking down, but, once in her
+own room, the girl's face showed haggard in the moonlight. It was one
+thing to jest about it with him; it was another to face the facts as they
+stood. She was in the power of her father's enemy, the man whose proffer
+of friendship they had rejected with scorn. Her pride cried out that she
+could not endure mercy from him even if he wished to extend it. Surely
+there must be some other way out than the humiliation of begging him not
+to prosecute. She could see none but one, and that was infinitely worse.
+Yet she knew it would be her father's first impulsive instinct to seek to
+fight her out of her trouble, the more because it was through him that it
+had fallen upon her. At all hazards she must prevent this.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+A CONVERSATION
+
+
+Not five minutes after Melissy had left the deputy sheriff, another rider
+galloped up the road. Jack, returning from his room, where he had left the
+box of gold locked up, waited on the porch to see who this might be.
+
+The horseman proved to be the man Norris, or Boone, and in a thoroughly
+bad temper, as Jack soon found out.
+
+"Have you see anything of 'Lissie Lee?" he demanded immediately.
+
+"Miss Lee has just left me. She has gone to her room," answered Flatray
+quietly.
+
+"Well, I want to see her," said the other hoarsely.
+
+"I reckon you better postpone it to to-morrow. She's some played out and
+needs sleep."
+
+"Well, I'm going to see her now."
+
+Jack turned, still all gentleness, and called to Jim Budd, who was in the
+store.
+
+"Oh, Jim! Run upstairs and knock on Miss Melissy's door and tell her Mr.
+Norris is down here. Ask if she will see him to-night."
+
+"You're making a heap of formality out of this, Mr. Buttinsky," sneered
+the cowpuncher.
+
+Jack made no answer, unless it were one to whistle gently and look out
+into the night as if he were alone.
+
+"No, seh. She doan' wan' tuh see him to-night," announced Jim upon his
+return.
+
+"That seems to settle it, Mr. Norris," said Jack pleasantly.
+
+"Not by a hell of a sight. I've got something to say to her, and I'm going
+to say it."
+
+"To-morrow," amended the officer.
+
+"I said to-night."
+
+"But your say doesn't go here against hers. I reckon you'll wait."
+
+"Not so's you could notice it." The cowpuncher took a step forward toward
+the stairway, but Flatray was there before him.
+
+"Get out of the way, you. I don't stand for any butting-in," the cowboy
+blustered.
+
+"Don't be a goat, Norris. She's tired, and she says she don't want to see
+you. That's enough, ain't it?"
+
+Norris leaped back with an oath to draw his gun, but Jack had the quickest
+draw in Arizona. The puncher found himself looking into the business end
+of a revolver.
+
+"Better change your mind, seh," suggested the officer amiably. "I take it
+you've been drinking and you're some excited. If you were in condition to
+_savez_ the situation, you'd understand that the young lady doesn't care
+to see you now. Do you need a church to fall on you before you can take a
+hint?"
+
+"I reckon if you knew all about her, you wouldn't be so anxious to stand
+up for her," Norris said darkly.
+
+"I expect we cayn't any of us stand the great white light on all our acts;
+but if any one can, it's that little girl upstairs."
+
+"What would you say if I told you that she's liable to go to Yuma if I
+lift my hand?"
+
+"I'd say I was from Missouri and needed showing."
+
+"Put up that gun, come outside with me, and if I take a notion I'll show
+you all right."
+
+Jack laughed as his gun disappeared. "I'd be willing to bet high that
+there are a good many citizens around here haided straighter for Yuma than
+Miss Melissy."
+
+Without answering, Norris led the way out and stopped only when his arm
+rested on the fence of the corral.
+
+"Nobody can hear us now," he said brusquely, and the ranger got a whiff of
+his hot whisky breath. "You've put it up to me to make good. All right,
+I'll do it. That little girl in there, as you call her, is the bad man who
+held up the Fort Allison stage."
+
+The officer laughed tolerantly as he lit a cigarette.
+
+"I hear you say it, Norris."
+
+"I didn't expect you to believe it right away, but it's a fact just the
+same."
+
+Flatray climbed to the fence and rested his feet on a rail. "Fire ahead.
+I'm listenin'."
+
+"The first men on the ground after that hold-up were me and Lee. We
+covered the situation thorough and got hold of some points right away."
+
+"That's right funny too. When I asked you if you'd been down there you
+both denied it," commented the officer.
+
+"We were protecting the girl. Mind you, we didn't know who had done it
+then, but we had reasons to think the person had just come from this
+ranch."
+
+"What reasons?" briefly demanded Flatray.
+
+"We don't need to go into them. We had them, anyhow. Then I lit on a
+foot-print right on the edge of the ditch that no man ever made. We didn't
+know what to make of it, but we wiped it out and followed the ditch, one
+on each side. We'd figured that was the way he had gone. You see, though
+water was running in the ditch now, it hadn't been half an hour before."
+
+"You don't say!"
+
+"There wasn't a sign of anybody leaving the ditch till we got to the
+ranch; then we saw tracks going straight to the house."
+
+"So you got a bunch of sheep and drove them down there to muss things up
+some."
+
+Norris looked sharply at him. "You got there while we were driving them
+back. Well, that's right. We had to help her out."
+
+"You're helping her out now, ain't you?" Jack asked dryly.
+
+"That's my business. I've got my own reasons, Mr. Deputy. All you got to
+do is arrest her."
+
+"Just as soon as you give me the evidence, seh."
+
+"Haven't I given it to you? She was seen to drive away from the house in
+her rig. She left footprints down there. She came back up the ditch and
+then rode right up to the head-gates and turned on the water. Jim Little
+saw her cutting across country from the head-gates hell-to-split."
+
+"Far as I can make out, all the evidence you've given me ain't against
+her, but against you. She was out drivin' when it happened, you say, and
+you expect me to arrest her for it. It ain't against the law to go
+driving, seh. And as for that ditch fairy tale, on your own say-so you
+wiped out all chance to prove the story."
+
+"Then you won't arrest her?"
+
+"If you'll furnish the evidence, seh."
+
+"I tell you we know she did it. Her father knows it."
+
+"Is it worryin' his conscience? Did he ask you to lay an information
+against her?" asked the officer sarcastically.
+
+"That isn't the point."
+
+"You're right. Here's the point." Not by the faintest motion of the body
+had the officer's indolence been lifted, but the quiet ring of his voice
+showed it was gone. "You and Lee were overheard planning that robbery the
+day after you were seen hanging around the 'Monte Cristo.' You started out
+to hold up the stage. It was held up. By your own story you were the first
+men on the ground after the robbery. I tracked you straight from there
+here along the ditch. I found a black mask in Lee's coat. A dozen people
+saw you on that fool sheep-drive of yours. And to sum up, I found the
+stolen gold right here where you must have hidden it."
+
+"You found the gold? Where?"
+
+"That ain't the point either, seh. The point is that I've got you where I
+want you, Mr. Norris, alias Mr. Boone. You're wound up in a net you cayn't
+get away from. You're wanted back East, and you're wanted here. I'm onto
+your little game, sir. Think I don't know you've been trying to
+manufacture evidence against me as a rustler? Think I ain't wise to your
+whole record? You're arrested for robbing the Fort Allison stage."
+
+Norris, standing close in front of him, shot his right hand out and
+knocked the officer backward from the fence. Before the latter could get
+on his feet again the cowpuncher was scudding through the night. He
+reached his horse, flung himself on, and galloped away. Harmlessly a
+bullet or two zipped after him as he disappeared.
+
+The deputy climbed over the fence again and laughed softly to himself.
+"You did that right well, Jack. He'll always think he did that by his
+lone, never will know you was a partner in that escape. It's a fact,
+though, I could have railroaded him through on the evidence, but not
+without including the old man. No, there wasn't any way for it but that
+grandstand escape of Mr. Boone's."
+
+Still smiling, he dusted himself, put up his revolver, and returned to the
+house.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE TENDERFOOT MAKES A PROPOSITION
+
+
+Melissy waited in dread expectancy to see what would happen. Of quick,
+warm sympathies, always ready to bear with courage her own and others'
+burdens, she had none of that passive endurance which age and experience
+bring. She was keyed to the heroism of an occasion, but not yet to that
+which life lays as a daily burden upon many without dramatic emphasis.
+
+All next day nothing took place. On the succeeding one her father returned
+with the news that the "Monte Cristo" contest had been continued to
+another term of court. Otherwise nothing unusual occurred. It was after
+mail time that she stepped to the porch for a breath of fresh air and
+noticed that the reward placard had been taken down.
+
+"Who did that?" she asked of Alan McKinstra, who was sitting on the steps,
+reading a newspaper and munching an apple.
+
+"Jack Flatray took it down. He said the offer of a reward had been
+withdrawn."
+
+"When did he do that?"
+
+"About an hour ago. Just before he rode off."
+
+"Rode off! Where did he go?"
+
+"Heard him say he was going to Mesa. He told your father that when he
+settled the bill."
+
+"He's gone for good, then?"
+
+"That's the way I took it. Say, Melissy, Farnum says Jack told him the
+gold had been found and turned back to Morse. Is that right?"
+
+"How should I know?"
+
+"Well, it looks blamed funny they could get the bullion back without
+getting the hold-up."
+
+"Maybe they'll get him yet," she consoled him.
+
+"I wish I could get a crack at him," the boy murmured vengefully.
+
+"You had one chance at him, didn't you?"
+
+"Jose spoiled it. Honest, I wasn't going to lie down, 'Lissie."
+
+Again the days followed each other uneventfully. Bellamy himself never
+came for his mail now, but sent one of the boys from the mine for it.
+Melissy wondered whether he despised her so much he did not ever want to
+see her again. Somehow she did not like to think this. Perhaps it might be
+delicacy on his part. He was going to drop the whole thing magnanimously
+and did not want to put upon her the obligation of thanking him by
+presenting himself to her eyes.
+
+But though he never appeared in person, he had never been so much in her
+mind. She could not rid herself of a growing sympathy and admiration for
+this man who was holding his own against many. A story which was being
+whispered about reached her ears and increased this. A bunch of his sheep
+had been found poisoned on their feeding ground, and certain cattle
+interests were suspected of having done the dastardly thing.
+
+When she could stand the silence no longer Melissy called up Jack Flatray
+on the telephone at Mesa.
+
+"You caught me just in time. I'm leaving for Phoenix to-night," he told
+her. "What can I do for you, Miss Lee?"
+
+"I want to know what's being done about that Fort Allison stage hold-up."
+
+"The money has been recovered."
+
+"I know that, but--what about the--the criminals?"
+
+"They made their getaway all right."
+
+"Aren't you looking for them?"
+
+"No."
+
+"Did Mr. Morse want you to drop it?"
+
+"Yes. He was very urgent about it."
+
+"Does he know who the criminals are?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"And isn't going to prosecute?"
+
+"So he told me."
+
+"What did Mr. Morse say when you made your report?"
+
+"Said, 'Thank you.'"
+
+"Oh, yes, but--you know what I mean."
+
+"Not being a mind-reader----"
+
+"About the suspect. Did he say anything?"
+
+"Said he had private reasons for not pushing the case. I didn't ask him
+what they were."
+
+This was all she could get out of him. It was less than she had hoped.
+Still, it was something. She knew definitely what Bellamy had done.
+Wherefore she sat down to write him a note of thanks. It took her an hour
+and eight sheets of paper before she could complete it to her
+satisfaction. Even then the result was not what she wanted. She wished she
+knew how he felt about it, so that she could temper it to the right degree
+of warmth or coolness. Since she did not know, she erred on the side of
+stiffness and made her message formal.
+
+  "Mr. Thomas L. Morse,
+  "Monte Cristo Mine.
+  "Dear Sir:
+
+  "Father and I feel that we ought to thank you for your considerate
+  forbearance in a certain matter you know of. Believe me, sir, we are
+  grateful.
+
+                                               "Very respectfully,
+                                                        "Melissy Lee."
+She could not, however, keep herself from one touch of sympathy, and as a
+postscript she naively added:
+
+"I'm sorry about the sheep."
+
+Before mailing it she carried this letter to her father. Neither of them
+had ever referred to the other about what each knew of the affair of the
+robbery. More than once it had been on the tip of Champ Lee's tongue to
+speak of it, but it was not in his nature to talk out what he felt, and
+with a sigh he had given it up. Now Melissy came straight to the point.
+
+"I've been writing a letter to Mr. Morse, dad, thanking him for not having
+me arrested."
+
+Lee shot at her a glance of quick alarm.
+
+"Does he know about it, honey?"
+
+"Yes. Jack Flatray found out the whole thing and told him. He was very
+insistent on dropping it, Mr. Flatray says."
+
+"You say Jack found out all about it, honey?" repeated Lee in surprise.
+
+He was seated in a big chair on the porch, and she nestled on one arm of
+it, rumpled his gray hair as she had always done since she had been a
+little girl, kissed him, and plunged into her story.
+
+He heard her to the end without a word, but she noticed that he gripped
+the chair hard. When she had finished he swept her into his arms and broke
+down over her, calling her the pet names of her childhood.
+
+"Honey-bird ... Dad's little honey-bird ... I'm that ashamed of myse'f.
+'Twas the whisky did it, lambie. Long as I live I'll nevah touch it again.
+I'll sweah that befo' God. All week you been packin' the troubles I
+heaped on you, precious, and afteh you-all saved me from being a
+criminal...."
+
+So he went on, spending his tempestuous love in endearments and caresses,
+and so together they afterward talked it out and agreed to send the letter
+she had written.
+
+But Lee was not satisfied with her atonement. He could not rest to let it
+go at that, without expressing his own part in it to Bellamy. Next day he
+rode up to the mine, and found its owner in workman's slops just stepping
+from the cage. If Bellamy were surprised to see him, no sign of it reached
+his face.
+
+"If you'll wait a minute till I get these things off, I'll walk up to the
+cabin with you, Mr. Lee," he said.
+
+"I reckon you got my daughter's letter," said Lee abruptly as he strode up
+the mountainside with his host.
+
+"Yes, I got it an hour ago."
+
+"I be'n and studied it out, Mr. Morse. I couldn't let it go at that, and
+so I reckoned I'd jog along up hyer and tell you the whole story."
+
+"That's as you please, Mr. Lee. I'm quite satisfied as it is."
+
+The rancher went on as if he had not heard. "'Course I be'n holding a
+grudge at you evah since you took up this hyer claim. I expect that
+rankles with me most of the time, and when I take to drinking seems to me
+that mine still belongs to me. Well, I heerd tell of that shipment you was
+making, and I sets out to git it, for it ce'tainly did seem to belong to
+me. Understand, I wasn't drunk, but had be'n settin' pretty steady to the
+bottle for several days. Melissy finds it out, no matter how, and
+undertakes to keep me out of trouble. She's that full of sand, she nevah
+once thought of the danger or the consequences. Anyhow, she meant to git
+the bullion back to you afteh the thing had blown over."
+
+"I haven't doubted that a moment since I knew she did it," said Bellamy
+quietly.
+
+"Glad to hear it. I be'n misjudgin' you, seh, but you're a white man afteh
+all. Well, you know the rest of the story: how she held up the stage, how
+Jack drapped in befo' our tracks were covered, how smart he worked the
+whole thing out, and how my little gyurl confessed to him to save me."
+
+"Yes, I know all that."
+
+"What kind of a figure do I make in this? First off, I act like a durn
+fool, and she has to step in to save me. Then I let her tote the worry of
+it around while I ride off to Mesa. When Jack runs me down, she takes the
+blame again. To finish up with, she writes you a letter of thanks, jes' as
+if the whole fault was hers."
+
+The old soldier selected a smooth rock and splashed it with tobacco juice
+before he continued with rising indignation against himself.
+
+"I'm a fine father for a gyurl like that, ain't I? Up to date I always
+had an idee I was some sort of a man, but dad gum it! I cayn't see it
+hyer. To think of me lettin' my little gyurl stand the consequences of my
+meanness. No, Mr. Morse, that's one too much for Champ Lee. He's nevah
+going to touch another drop of whisky long as he lives."
+
+"Glad to hear it. That's a square amend to make, one she will
+appreciate."
+
+"So I took a _pasear_ up hyer to explain this, and to thank you for yore
+kindness. Fac' is, Mr. Morse, it would have jest about killed me if
+anything had happened to my little 'Lissie. I want to say that if you had
+a-be'n her brother you couldn't 'a' be'n more decent."
+
+"There was nothing else to do. It happens that I am in her debt. She saved
+my life once. Besides, I understood the motives for her action when she
+broke the law, and I honored them with all my heart. Flatray felt just as
+I did about it. So would any right-thinking man."
+
+"Well, you cayn't keep me from sayin' again that you're a white man, seh,"
+the other said with a laugh behind which the emotion of tears lay near.
+
+"That offer of a compromise is still open, Mr. Lee."
+
+The Southerner shook his grizzled head. "No, I reckon not, Mr. Morse.
+Understand, I got nothin' against you. The feud is wiped out, and I'll
+make you no mo' trouble. But it's yore mine, and I don't feel like taking
+charity. I got enough anyhow."
+
+"It wouldn't be charity. I've always felt as if you had a moral claim on
+an interest in the 'Monte Cristo.' If you won't take this yourself, why
+not let me make out the papers to Miss Lee? You would feel then that she
+was comfortably fixed, no matter what happened to you."
+
+"Well, I'll lay it befo' her. Anyhow, we're much obliged to you, Mr.
+Morse. I'll tell you what, seh," he added as an after-thought. "You come
+down and talk it over with 'Lissie. If you can make her see it that way,
+good enough."
+
+When Champ Lee turned his bronco's head homeward he was more at peace with
+the world than he had been for a long time. He felt that he would be able
+to look his little girl in the face again. For the first time in a week he
+felt at one with creation. He rode into the ranch plaza humming "Dixie."
+
+On the day following that of Lee's call, the mine-owner saddled his mare
+and took the trail to the half-way house. It was not until after the stage
+had come and gone that he found the chance for a word with Melissy alone.
+
+"Your father submitted my proposition, did he?" Bellamy said by way of
+introducing the subject.
+
+"Let's take a walk on it. I haven't been out of the house to-day," she
+answered with the boyish downrightness sometimes uppermost in her.
+
+Calling Jim, she left him in charge of the store, caught up a Mexican
+sombrero, and led the way up the trail to a grove of live-oaks perched on
+a bluff above. Below them stretched the plain, fold on fold to the blue
+horizon edge. Close at hand clumps of cactus, thickets of mesquit,
+together with the huddled adobe buildings of the ranch, made up the
+details of a scene possible only in the sunburnt territory. The
+palpitating heat quivered above the hot brown sand. No life stirred in the
+valley except a circling buzzard high in the sky, and the tiny moving
+speck with its wake of dust each knew to be the stage that had left the
+station an hour before.
+
+Melissy, unconscious of the charming picture she made, stood upon a rock
+and looked down on it all.
+
+"I suppose," she said at last slowly, "that most people would think this
+pretty desolate. But it's a part of me. It's all I know." She broke off
+and smiled at him. "I had a chance to be civilized. Dad wanted to send me
+East to school, but I couldn't leave him."
+
+"Where were you thinking of going?"
+
+"To Denver."
+
+Her conception of the East amused him. It was about as accurate as a New
+Yorker's of the West.
+
+"I'm glad you didn't. It would have spoiled you and sent you back just
+like every other young lady the schools grind out."
+
+She turned curiously toward him. "Am I not like other girls?"
+
+It was on his tongue tip to tell her that she was gloriously different
+from most girls he had known, but discretion sealed his lips. Instead, he
+told her of life in the city and what it means to society women, its
+emptiness and unsatisfaction.
+
+His condemnation was not proof positive to her. "I'd like to go there for
+myself some time and see. And anyhow it must be nice to have all the money
+you want with which to travel," she said.
+
+This gave him his opening. "It makes one independent. I think that's the
+best thing wealth can give--a sort of spaciousness." He waited perceptibly
+before he added: "I hope you have decided to be my partner in the mine."
+
+"I've decided not to."
+
+"I'm sorry. But why?"
+
+"It's your mine. It isn't ours."
+
+"That's nonsense. I always in my heart, recognized a moral claim you have.
+Besides, the case isn't finished yet. Perhaps your father may win his
+contest. I'm all for settling out of court."
+
+"You know we won't win."
+
+"I don't."
+
+She gave him applause from her dark eyes. "That's very fair of you, but
+Dad and I can't do it."
+
+"Then you still have a grudge at me," he smiled.
+
+"Not the least little bit of a one."
+
+"I shan't take no for an answer, then. I'll order the papers made out
+whether you want me to or not." Without giving her a chance to speak, he
+passed to another topic: "I've decided to go out of the sheep business."
+
+"I'm so glad!" she cried.
+
+"Those aren't my feelings," he answered ruefully. "I hate to quit under
+fire."
+
+"Of course you do, but your friends will know why you do it."
+
+"Why do I do it?"
+
+"Because you know it's right. The cattlemen had the range first. Their
+living is tied up in cattle, and your sheep are ruining the feed for them.
+Yesterday when I was out riding I counted the bones of eight dead cows."
+
+He nodded gravely. "Yes, in this country sheep are death to cows. I hate
+to be a quitter, but I hate worse to take the bread out of the mouths of a
+dozen families. Two days ago I had an offer for my whole bunch, and
+to-morrow I'm going to take the first instalment over the pass and drive
+them down to the railroad."
+
+"But you'll have to cross the dead line to get over the pass," she said
+quickly; for all Cattleland knew that a guard had been watching his herds
+to see they did not cross the pass.
+
+"Yes. I'm going to send Alan with a letter to Farnum. I don't think there
+will be any opposition to my crossing it when my object is understood," he
+smiled.
+
+Melissy watched him ride away, strong and rugged and ungraceful, from the
+head to the heel of him a man. Life had gone hard with him. She wondered
+whether that were the reason her heart went out to him so warmly.
+
+As she moved about her work that day and the next little snatches of song
+broke from her, bubbling forth like laughter, born of the quiet happiness
+within, for which she could give no reason.
+
+After the stage had gone she saddled her pony and rode toward the head of
+the pass. In an hour or two now the sheep would be pouring across the
+divide, and she wanted to get a photograph of them as they emerged from
+the pass. She was following an old cattle trail which ran into the main
+path just this side of the pass, and she was close to the junction when
+the sound of voices stopped her. Some instinct made her wait and listen.
+
+The speakers were in a dip of the trail just ahead of her, and the voice
+of the first she recognized as belonging to the man Boone. The tone of it
+was jubilantly cruel.
+
+"No, sir. You don't move a step of the way, not a step, Mr. Alan
+McKinstra. I've got him right where I want him, and I don't care if you
+talk till the cows come home."
+
+Alan's voice rang out indignantly, "It's murder then--just plain, low-down
+murder. If you hold me here and let Morse fall into a death trap without
+warning him, you're as responsible as if you shot him yourself."
+
+"All right. Suits me down to the ground. We'll let it go at that. I'm
+responsible. If you want the truth flat and plain, I don't mind telling
+you that I wouldn't be satisfied if I wasn't responsible. I'm evening up
+some little things with Mr. Morse to-day."
+
+Melissy needed to hear no more to understand the situation, but if she
+had, the next words of Boone would have cleared it up.
+
+"When I met up with you and happened on the news that you was taking a
+message to Farnum, and when I got onto the fact that Morse, as you call
+him, was moving his sheep across the dead line, _relying on you having got
+his letter to the cattlemen to make it safe_, it seemed luck too good to
+be true. All I had to do was to persuade you to stay right here with me,
+and Mr. Morse would walk into the pass and be wiped out. You get the
+beauty of it, my friend, don't you? _I'm_ responsible, but it will be
+Farnum and his friends that will bear the blame. There ain't but one flaw
+in the whole thing: Morse will never know that it's me that killed him."
+
+"You devil!" cried the boy, with impotent passion.
+
+"I've waited ten years for this day, and it's come at last. Don't you
+think for a moment I'm going to weaken. No, sir! You'll sit there with my
+gun poked in your face just as you've sat for six hours. It's my say-so
+to-day, sir," Boone retorted, malevolence riding triumph in his voice.
+
+Melissy's first impulse was to confront the man, her next to slip away
+without being discovered and then give the alarm.
+
+"Yes, sir," continued the cowpuncher; "I scored on Mr. Morse two or three
+nights ago, when I played hell with one of his sheep camps, and to-day I
+finish up with him. His sheep have been watched for weeks, and at the
+first move it's all up with him and them. Farnum's vaqueros will pay my
+debt in full. Just as soon as I'm right sure of it I'll be jogging along
+to Dead Man's Cache, and you can go order the coffin for your boss."
+
+The venom of the man was something to wonder at. It filled the listening
+girl with sick apprehension. She had not known that such hatred could live
+in the world.
+
+Quietly she led her pony back, mounted, and made a wide detour until she
+struck the trail above. Already she could hear the distant bleat of sheep
+which told her that the herd was entering the pass. Recklessly she urged
+her pony forward, galloping into the saddle between the peaks without
+regard to the roughness of the boulder-strewn path. A voice from above
+hailed her with a startled shout as she flew past. Again, a shot rang out,
+the bullet whistling close to her ear. But nothing could stop her till she
+reached the man she meant to save.
+
+And so it happened that Richard Bellamy, walking at the head of his herd,
+saw a horse gallop wildly round a bend almost into his bleating flock. The
+rider dragged the bronco to a halt and slipped to the ground. She stood
+there ashen-hued, clinging to the saddle-horn and swaying slightly.
+
+"I'm in time.... Thank God!... Thank God!" her parched lips murmured.
+
+"Miss Lee! You here?" he cried.
+
+They looked at each other, the man and the girl, while the wild fear in
+her heart began to still. The dust of the drive was thick on his boots,
+his clothes, his face, but the soil of travel could not obscure the power
+of his carriage, the strong lines of his shoulders, the set of his broad,
+flat back, any more than it could tarnish her rarity, the sweetness of
+blood in her that under his gaze beat faintly into her dusky cheeks. The
+still force of him somehow carried reassurance to her. Such virility of
+manhood could not be marked for extinction.
+
+She panted out her story, and his eyes never left her.
+
+"You have risked your life to save mine and my herders," he said very
+quietly.
+
+"You must go back," she replied irrelevantly.
+
+"I can't. The entrance is guarded."
+
+This startled her. "Then--what shall we do?"
+
+"You must ride forward at once. Tell the vaqueros that I am moving my
+sheep only to take them to the railroad. Explain to them how Alan is
+detained with the message I sent Farnum. In a few minutes we shall follow
+with the sheep."
+
+"And if they don't believe that you are going out of the sheep
+business--what then?"
+
+"I shall have to take my chance of that."
+
+She seemed about to speak, but changed her mind, nodded, swung to the
+saddle, and rode forward. After a few minutes Bellamy followed slowly. He
+was unarmed, not having doubted that his letter to the cattleman would
+make his journey safe. That he should have waited for an answer was now
+plain, but the contract called for an immediate delivery of the sheep, as
+he had carefully explained in his note to Farnum.
+
+Presently he heard again the clatter of a horse's hoofs in the loose shale
+and saw Melissy returning.
+
+"Well?" he asked as she drew up.
+
+"I've told them. I think they believe me, but I'm going through the gorge
+with you."
+
+He looked up quickly to protest, but did not. He knew that her thought was
+that her presence beside him would protect him from attack. The rough
+chivalry of Arizona takes its hat off to a woman, and Melissy Lee was a
+favorite of the whole countryside.
+
+So together they passed into the gulch, Bellamy walking by the side of her
+horse. Neither of them spoke. At their heels was the soft rustle of many
+thousands of padding feet.
+
+Once there came to them the sound of cheering, and they looked up to see
+a group of vaqueros waving their hats and shouting down. Melissy shook her
+handkerchief and laughed happily at them. It was a day to be remembered by
+these riders.
+
+They emerged into a roll of hill-tops upon which the setting sun had cast
+a weird afterglow of radiance in which the whole world burned. The cactus,
+the stunted shrubbery, the painted rocks, seemed all afire with some magic
+light that had touched their commonness to a new wonder.
+
+A sound came to them from below. A man, rifle in hand and leading a horse,
+was stealthily crossing the trail to disappear among the large boulders
+beyond.
+
+Melissy did not speak, scarce dared to draw breath, for the man beneath
+them was Boone. There was something furtive and lupine about him that
+suggested the wild beast stalking its kill. No doubt he had become
+impatient to see the end of his foe and had ridden forward. He had almost
+crossed the path before he looked up and caught sight of them standing
+together in the fireglow of the sunset.
+
+Abruptly he came to a standstill.
+
+"By God! you slipped through, did you?" he said in a low voice of
+concentrated bitterness.
+
+Bellamy did not answer, but he separated himself from the girl by a step
+or two. He knew quite well what was coming, and he looked down quietly
+with steady eyes upon his foe.
+
+From far below there came the faint sound of a horse breaking its way
+through brush. Boone paused to listen, but his eye never wandered from the
+bareheaded, motionless figure silhouetted against the skyline in the ruddy
+evening glow. He had shifted his rifle so that it lay in both hands, ready
+for immediate action.
+
+Melissy, horror-stricken, had sat silent, but now she found her voice.
+
+"He is unarmed!" she cried to the cowpuncher.
+
+He made no answer. Another sound in the brush, close at hand, was
+distracting his attention, though not his gaze.
+
+Just as he whipped up his rifle Melissy sprang forward. She heard the
+sound of the explosion fill the draw, saw Bellamy clutch at the air and
+slowly sink to the ground. Before the echoes had died away she had flung
+herself toward the inert body.
+
+The outlaw took a step or two forward, as if to make sure of his work, but
+at the sound of running footsteps he changed his mind, swung to the saddle
+and disappeared among the rocks.
+
+An instant later Bob Farnum burst into view.
+
+"What's up?" he demanded.
+
+Melissy looked up. Her face was perfectly ashen. "Phil Norris ... he shot
+Mr. Morse."
+
+Farnum stepped forward. "Hurt badly, Mr. Morse?"
+
+The wounded man grinned faintly. "Scared worse, I reckon. He got me in the
+fleshy part of the left arm."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+OLD ACQUAINTANCES
+
+
+"You wanted to see me?"
+
+The voice had the soft, slow intonation of the South, and it held some
+quality that haunted the memory. Or so Melissy thought afterward, but that
+may have been because of its owner's appeal to sympathy.
+
+"If you are Miss Yarnell."
+
+"Ferne Yarnell is my name."
+
+"Mr. Bellamy asked me to call on you. He sent this letter of
+introduction."
+
+A faint wave of color beat into the cheek of the stranger. "You know Mr.
+Bellamy then?"
+
+"Yes. He would have been here to meet you, but he met with an accident
+yesterday."
+
+"An accident!" There was a quick flash of alarm in the lifted face.
+
+"He told me to tell you that it was not serious. He was shot in the arm."
+
+"Shot. By whom?" She was ashen to the lips.
+
+"By a man called Duncan Boone."
+
+"I know him. He is a dangerous man."
+
+"Yes," Melissy nodded. "I don't think we know how very dangerous he is. We
+have all been deceived in him till recently."
+
+"Does he live here?"
+
+"Yes. The strange thing is that he and Mr. Bellamy had never met in this
+country until a few days ago. There used to be some kind of a feud between
+the families. But you must know more about that than I do."
+
+"Yes. My family is involved in the feud. Mr. Bellamy is a distant cousin
+of mine."
+
+"So he told me."
+
+"Have you known him long?"
+
+Melissy thought that there was a little more than curiosity in the quick
+look the young woman flung at her.
+
+"I met him when he first came here. He was lost on the desert and I found
+him. After that we became very unfriendly. He jumped a mining claim
+belonging to my father. But we've made it up and agreed to be friends."
+
+"He wrote about the young lady who saved his life."
+
+Melissy smiled. "Did he say that I was a cattle and a stage rustler?"
+
+"He said nothing that was not good."
+
+"I'm much obliged to him," the Western girl answered breezily. "And now do
+tell me, Miss Yarnell, that you and your people have made up your mind to
+stay permanently."
+
+"Father is still looking the ground over. He has almost decided to buy a
+store here. Yet he has been in the town only a day. So you see he must
+like it."
+
+Outside the open second story window of the hotel Melissy heard a voice
+that sounded familiar. She moved toward the window alcove, and at the same
+time a quick step was heard in the hall. Someone opened the door of the
+parlor and stood on the threshold. It was the man called Boone.
+
+Melissy, from the window, glanced round. Her first impulse was to speak;
+her second to remain silent. For the Arkansan was not looking at her. His
+mocking ribald gaze was upon Ferne Yarnell.
+
+That young woman looked up from the letter of introduction she was reading
+and a startled expression swept into her face.
+
+"Dunc Boone," she cried.
+
+The man doffed his hat with elaborate politeness. "Right glad to meet up
+with you again, Miss Ferne. You was in short dresses when I saw you last.
+My, but you've grown pretty. Was it because you heard I was in Arizona
+that you came here?"
+
+She rose, rejecting in every line of her erect figure his impudent
+geniality, his insolent pretense of friendliness.
+
+"My brother is in the hotel. If he learns you are here there will be
+trouble."
+
+A wicked malice lay in his smiling eyes. "Trouble for him or for me?" he
+inquired silkily.
+
+His lash flicked her on the raw. Hal Yarnell was a boy of nineteen. This
+man had a long record as a gunfighter to prove him a desperate man.
+Moreover, he knew how hopelessly heart sick she was of the feud that for
+many years had taken its toll of blood.
+
+"Haven't you done us enough harm, you and yours? Go away. Leave us alone.
+That's all I ask of you."
+
+He came in and closed the door. "But you see it ain't all I ask of you,
+Ferne Yarnell. I always did ask all I could get of a girl as pretty as
+you."
+
+"Will you leave me, sir?"
+
+"When I'm through."
+
+"Now."
+
+"No, I reckon not," he drawled between half shuttered eyes.
+
+She moved toward the door, but he was there before her. With a turn of his
+wrist he had locked it.
+
+"This interview quits at my say-so, honey. Think after so many years of
+absence-makes-the-heart-grow-fonder you're going to trample over me like I
+was a kid? Guess again."
+
+"Unlock that door," she ordered.
+
+"When I get good and ready. We'll have our talk out first."
+
+Her eyes blazed. She was white as paper though she faced him steadily. But
+her heart wavered. She dared not call out for fear her brother might hear
+and come to her assistance. This she must forestall at all costs.
+
+A heel clicked in the alcove. For the first time Norris, or Boone as the
+Southern girl had called him, became aware of a third party in the room.
+Melissy was leaning out of the window. She called down to a man standing
+on the street.
+
+"Jack, come up here quick. I want you."
+
+Boone took a step forward. "You here, 'Lissie Lee?"
+
+She laughed scornfully. "Yes, I'm here. An unexpected pleasure, isn't
+it?"
+
+"Do you know Ferne Yarnell?" he asked, for once taken aback.
+
+"It looks as if I do."
+
+His quick furtive eye fell upon an envelope on the floor. He picked it up.
+Upon it was written, "Miss Ferne Yarnell," and in the corner, "Introducing
+Miss Lee."
+
+A muscle twitched in his face. When he looked up there was an expression
+of devilish malignity on it.
+
+"Mr. Bellamy's handwriting, looks like." He turned to the Arizona girl.
+"Then I didn't put the fellow out of business."
+
+"No, you coward."
+
+The angry color crept to the roots of his hair. "Better luck next time."
+
+The door knob rattled. Someone outside was trying to get in. Those inside
+the room paid no obvious attention to him. The venomous face of the
+cattle detective held the women fascinated.
+
+"When Dick Bellamy ambushed Shep he made a hell of a bad play of it. My
+old mammy used to say that the Boones were born wolves. I can see where
+she was right. The man that killed my brother gets his one of these days
+and don't you forget it. You just stick around. We're due to shoot this
+thing out, him and me," the man continued, his deep-socketed eyes burning
+from the grim handsome face.
+
+"Open the door," ordered a voice from the hall, shaking the knob
+violently.
+
+"You don't know he killed your brother. Someone else may have done it. And
+it may have been done in self defence," the Arkansas girl said to Boone in
+a voice so low and reluctant that it appeared the words were wrung from
+her by torture.
+
+"Think I'm a buzzard head? Why for did he run away? Why did he jump for
+the sandhills soon as the word came to arrest him?" He snapped together
+his straight, thin-lipped mouth, much as a trap closes on its prey.
+
+A heavy weight hurtled against the door and shook it to the hinges.
+Melissy had been edging to the right. Now with a twist of her lissom body
+she had slipped past the furious man and turned the key.
+
+Jack Flatray came into the room. His glance swept the young women and
+fastened on the man. In the crossed eyes of the two was the thrust of
+rapiers, the grinding of steel on steel, that deadly searching for
+weakness in the other that duelists employ.
+
+The deputy spoke in a low soft drawl. "Mornin', Boone. Holding an
+executive session, are you?"
+
+The lids of the detective narrowed to slits. From the first there had been
+no pretense of friendship between these two. There are men who have only
+to look once at each other to know they will be foes. It had been that way
+with them. Causes of antagonism had arisen quickly enough. Both dominant
+personalities, they had waged silent unspoken warfare for the leadership
+of the range. Later over the favor of Melissy Lee this had grown more
+intense, still without having ever been put into words. Now they were face
+to face, masks off.
+
+"Why yes, until you butted in, Mr. Sheriff."
+
+"This isn't my busy day. I thought I'd just drop in to the meeting."
+
+"You've made a mistake. We're not holding a cattle rustlers' convention."
+
+"There are so many ladies present I can't hear you, but maybe if you said
+it outside I could," the deputy suggested gently, a gleam of steely anger
+in his eyes.
+
+"Say it anywhere to oblige a friend," sneered Boone.
+
+From the moment of meeting neither man had lowered his gaze by the
+fraction of an inch. Red tragedy was in the air. Melissy knew it. The
+girl from Arkansas guessed as much. Yet neither of them knew how to avert
+the calamity that appeared impending. One factor alone saved the situation
+for the moment. Flatray had not yet heard of the shooting of Bellamy. Had
+he known he would have arrested Boone on the spot and the latter would
+have drawn and fought it out.
+
+Into the room sauntered Lee. "Hello, 'Lissie. Been looking for you an
+hour, honey. Mornin', Norris. Howdy, Jack! Dad burn yore ornery hide, I
+ain't see you long enough for a good talk in a coon's age."
+
+Melissy seized on her father joyfully as an interposition of Providence.
+"Father, this is Miss Yarnell, the young lady I told you about."
+
+The ranchman buried her little hand in his big paw. "Right glad to meet up
+with you, Miss Yarnell. How do you like Arizona by this time? I reckon
+Melissy has introduced you to her friends. No? Make you acquainted with
+Mr. Flatray. Shake hands with Mr. Norris, Miss Yarnell. Where are you,
+Norris?"
+
+The owner of the Bar Double G swung round, to discover for the first time
+that harmony was not present. Boone stood back with a sullen vindictive
+expression on his face.
+
+"Why, what's up, boys?" the rancher asked, his glance passing from one to
+another.
+
+"You ain't in this, Lee," Boone informed him. Then, to Flatray: "See you
+later."
+
+The deputy nodded carelessly. "Any time you like."
+
+The lank old Confederate took a step forward to call Boone back, but
+Melissy caught him by the sleeve.
+
+"Let him go," she whispered emphatically.
+
+"I know my boss," returned Lee with a laugh.
+
+"If you're quite through with me, Miss Lee, I'll not intrude longer,"
+Flatray said.
+
+"But I'm not," spoke Melissy quickly.
+
+She did not intend to let him get away to settle his quarrel with Boone.
+
+"I'm rather busy," he suggested.
+
+"Your business will have to wait," she came back decisively.
+
+Lee laughed and clapped Jack on the shoulder. "Might as well know your
+boss too, boy."
+
+Melissy flushed with a flash of temper. "I'm nothing of the kind, dad."
+
+"Sho! A joke's a joke, girl. That's twice hand-runnin' I get a call-down.
+You're mighty high-heeled to-day, 'pears like."
+
+Jack smiled grimly. He understood some things that were hidden from Lee.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+CONCERNING THE BOONE-BELLAMY-YARNELL FEUD
+
+
+The story that Ferne Yarnell told them in the parlor of the hotel had its
+beginnings far back in the days before the great war. They had been
+neighbors, these three families, had settled side by side in this new land
+of Arkansas, had hunted and feasted together in amity. In an hour had
+arisen the rift between them that was to widen to a chasm into which much
+blood had since been spilt. It began with a quarrel between hotheaded
+young men. Forty years later it was still running its blind wasteful
+course.
+
+Even before the war the Boones had begun to go down hill rapidly. Cad
+Boone, dissipated and unprincipled, had found even the lax discipline of
+the Confederate army too rigid and had joined the guerrillas, that band of
+hangers-on which respected neither flag and developed a cruelty that was
+appalling. Falling into the hands of Captain Ransom Yarnell, he had been
+tried by drumhead courtmartial and executed within twenty four hours of
+his capture.
+
+The boast of the Boones was that they never forgot an injury. They might
+wait many years for the chance, but in the end they paid their debts.
+Twenty years after the war Sugden Boone shot down Colonel Yarnell as he
+was hitching his horse in front of the courthouse at Nemo. Next Christmas
+eve a brother of the murdered man--Captain Tom, as his old troopers still
+called him--met old Sugden in the postoffice and a revolver duel followed.
+From it Captain Tom emerged with a bullet in his arm. Sugden was carried
+out of the store feet first to a house of mourning.
+
+The Boones took their time. Another decade passed. Old Richard Bellamy,
+father of the young man, was shot through the uncurtained window of his
+living rooms while reading the paper one night. Though related to the
+Yarnells, he had never taken any part in the feud beyond that of
+expressing his opinion freely. The general opinion was that he had been
+killed by Dunc Boone, but there was no conclusive evidence to back it.
+Three weeks later another one of the same faction met his fate. Captain
+Tom was ambushed while riding from his plantation to town and left dead on
+the road. Dunc Boone had been seen lurking near the spot, and immediately
+after the killing he was met by two hunters as he was slipping through the
+underbrush for the swamps. There was no direct evidence against the young
+man, but Captain Tom had been the most popular man in the county. Reckless
+though he was, Duncan Boone had been forced to leave the country by the
+intensity of the popular feeling against him.
+
+Again the feud had slumbered. It was understood that the Yarnells and the
+Bellamys were ready to drop it. Only one of the opposite faction remained
+on the ground, a twin brother of Duncan. Shep Boone was a drunken
+ne'er-do-well, but since he now stood alone nothing more than empty
+threats was expected of him. He spent his time idly with a set of gambling
+loafers, but he lacked the quality of active malice so pronounced in
+Dunc.
+
+A small part of the old plantation, heavily mortgaged, still belonged to
+Shep and was rented by him to a tenant, Jess Munro. He announced one day
+that he was going to collect the rent due him. Having been drinking
+heavily, he was in an abusive frame of mind. As it chanced he met young
+Hal Yarnell, just going into the office of his kinsman Dick Bellamy, with
+whom he was about to arrange the details of a hunting trip they were
+starting upon. Shep emptied his spleen on the boy, harking back to the old
+feud and threatening vengeance at their next meeting. The boy was white
+with rage, but he shut his teeth and passed upstairs without saying a
+word.
+
+The body of Shep Boone was found next day by Munro among the blackberry
+bushes at the fence corner of his own place. No less than four witnesses
+had seen young Yarnell pass that way with a rifle in his hand about the
+same time that Shep was riding out from town. They had heard a shot, but
+had thought little of it. Munro had been hoeing cotton in the field and
+had seen the lad as he passed. Later he had heard excited voices, and
+presently a shot. Other circumstantial evidence wound a net around the
+boy. He was arrested. Before the coroner held an inquest a new development
+startled the community. Dick Bellamy fled on a night train, leaving a note
+to the coroner exonerating Hal. In it he practically admitted the crime,
+pleading self defence.
+
+This was the story that Ferne Yarnell told in the parlor of the Palace
+Hotel to Jack Flatray and the Lees.
+
+Melissy spoke first. "Did Mr. Bellamy kill the man to keep your brother
+from being killed?"
+
+"I don't know. It must have been that. It's all so horrible."
+
+The deputy's eyes gleamed. "Think of it another way, Miss Yarnell. Bellamy
+was up against it. Your brother is only a boy. He took his place. A friend
+couldn't have done more for another."
+
+The color beat into the face of the Arkansas girl as she looked at him.
+"No. He sacrificed his career for him. He did a thing he must have hated
+to do."
+
+"He's sure some man," Flatray pronounced.
+
+A young man, slight, quick of step, and erect as a willow sapling, walked
+into the room. He looked from one to another with clear level eyes. Miss
+Ferne introduced him as her brother.
+
+A thought crossed the mind of the deputy. Perhaps this boy had killed his
+enemy after all and Bellamy had shouldered the blame for him. If the mine
+owner were in love with Ferne Yarnell this was a hypothesis more than
+possible. In either case he acquitted the slayer of blame. In his pocket
+was a letter from the sheriff at Nemo, Arkansas, stating that his county
+was well rid of Shep Boone and that the universal opinion was that neither
+Bellamy nor young Yarnell had been to blame for the outcome of the
+difficulty. Unless there came to him an active demand for the return of
+Bellamy he intended to let sleeping dogs lie.
+
+No such demand came. Within a month the mystery was cleared. The renter
+Munro delivered himself to the sheriff at Nemo, admitting that he had
+killed Shep Boone in self defence. The dead man had been drinking and was
+exceedingly quarrelsome. He had abused his tenant and at last drawn on
+him. Whereupon Munro had shot him down. At first afraid of what might
+happen to him, he had stood aside and let the blame be shouldered upon
+young Yarnell. But later his conscience had forced him to a confession. It
+is enough here to say that he was later tried and acquitted, thus closing
+the chapter of the wastrel's tragic death.
+
+The day after the news of Munro's confession reached Arizona Richard
+Bellamy called upon Flatray to invite him to his wedding. As soon as his
+name was clear he had asked Ferne Yarnell to marry him.
+
+
+
+
+PART II
+
+DEAD MAN'S CACHE
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+
+KIDNAPPED
+
+
+As a lake ripples beneath a summer breeze, so Mesa was stirred from its
+usual languor by the visit of Simon West. For the little Arizona town was
+dreaming dreams. Its imagination had been aroused; and it saw itself no
+longer a sleepy cow camp in the unfeatured desert, but a metropolis, in
+touch with twentieth-century life.
+
+The great Simon West, pirate of finance, empire builder, molder of the
+destinies of the mighty Southwestern Pacific system, was to touch the
+adobe village with his transforming wand and make of it a hive of
+industry. Rumors flew thick and fast.
+
+Mesa was to be the junction for the new spur that would run to the big
+Lincoln dam. The town would be a division point; the machine shops of the
+system would be located there. Its future, if still a trifle vague, was
+potentially immense. Thus, with cheerful optimism, did local opinion
+interpret the visit of the great man.
+
+Whatever Simon West may have thought of Mesa and its prospects, he kept
+behind his thin, close-shut lips. He was a dry, gray little man of
+fifty-five, with sharp, twinkling eyes that saw everything and told
+nothing. Certainly he wore none of the visible signs of greatness, yet at
+his nod Wall Street trembled. He had done more to change the map of
+industrial America than any other man, alive or dead. Wherefore, big
+Beauchamp Lee, mayor of Mesa, and the citizens on the reception committee
+did their very best to impress him with the future of the country, as they
+motored out to the dam.
+
+"Most promising spot on earth. Beats California a city block on oranges
+and citrons. Ever see an Arizona peach, Mr. West? It skins the world," the
+big cattleman ran on easily.
+
+The financier's eye took in the girl sitting beside the chauffeur in the
+front seat, and he nodded assent.
+
+Melissy Lee bloomed. She was vivid as a wild poppy on the hillsides past
+which they went flashing. But she had, too, a daintiness, a delicacy of
+coloring and contour, that suggested the fruit named by her father.
+
+"You bet we raise the best here," that simple gentleman bragged
+patriotically. "All we need is water, and the Lincoln dam assures us of
+plenty. Yes, sir! It certainly promises to be an Eden."
+
+West unlocked his lips long enough to say: "Any country can promise. I'm
+looking for one that will perform."
+
+"You're seeing it right now, seh," the mayor assured him, and launched
+into fluent statistics.
+
+West heard, saw the thing stripped of its enthusiasm, and made no comment
+either for or against. He had plenty of imagination, or he could never
+have accomplished the things he had done. However, before any proposition
+appealed to him he had to see money in the deal. Whether he saw it in this
+particular instance, nobody knew; and only one person had the courage to
+ask him point-blank what his intentions were. This was Melissy.
+
+Luncheon was served in the pleasant filtered sunlight, almost under the
+shadow of the great dam.
+
+On the way out Melissy had sat as demure and dovelike as it was possible
+for her to be. But now she showed herself to be another creature.
+
+Two or three young men hovered about her; notable among them was a young
+fellow of not many words, good-humored, strong, with a look of power about
+him which the railroad king appreciated. Jack Flatray they called him. He
+was the newly-elected sheriff of the county.
+
+The great man watched the girl without appearing to do so. He was rather
+at a loss to account for the exotic, flamelike beauty into which she had
+suddenly sparkled; but he was inclined to attribute it to the arrival of
+Flatray.
+
+Melissy sat on a flat rock beside West, swinging her foot occasionally
+with the sheer active joy of life, the while she munched sandwiches and
+pickles. The young men bantered her and each other, and she flashed back
+retorts which gave them alternately deep delight at the discomfiture of
+some other. Toward the close of luncheon, she turned her tilted chin from
+Flatray, as punishment for some audacity of his, and beamed upon the
+railroad magnate.
+
+"It's very good of you to notice me at last," he said, with his dry
+smile.
+
+"I was afraid of you," she confided cheerfully.
+
+"Am I so awesome?"
+
+"It's your reputation, you know. You're quite a dragon. I'm told you
+gobble a new railroad every morning for breakfast."
+
+"'Lissie," her father warned.
+
+"Let her alone," the great man laughed. "Miss Lee is going to give me the
+privilege of hearing the truth about myself."
+
+"But I'm asking. I don't know what the truth is," she protested.
+
+"Well, what you think is the truth."
+
+"It doesn't matter what we think about you. The important thing to know is
+what you think about us."
+
+"Am I to tell you what I think of you--with all these young men here?" he
+countered.
+
+She was excited by her own impudence. The pink had spilled over her creamy
+cheeks. She flashed a look of pretended disdain at her young men.
+Nevertheless, she made laughing protest.
+
+"It's not me, but Mesa, that counts," she answered ungrammatically. "Tell
+me that you're going to help us set orchards blossoming in these deserts,
+and we'll all love you."
+
+"You offer an inducement, Miss Lee. Come--let us walk up to the Point and
+see this wonderful country of yours."
+
+She clapped her hands. "Oh, let's! I'm tired of boys, anyhow. They know
+nothing but nonsense." She made a laughing moue at Flatray, and turned to
+join the railroad builder.
+
+The young sheriff arose and trailed to his pony. "My marching orders, I
+reckon."
+
+They walked up the hill together, the great man and the untutored girl. He
+still carried himself with the lightness of the spare, wiry man who has
+never felt his age. As for her, she moved as one on springs, her slender,
+willowy figure beautiful in motion.
+
+"You're loyal to Mesa. Born and brought up there?" West asked Melissy.
+
+"No. I was brought up on the Bar Double G ranch. Father sold it not long
+since. We're interested in the Monte Cristo mine, and it has done so well
+that we moved to town," she explained.
+
+At the first bend in the mountain road Jack had turned in his saddle to
+look at her as she climbed the steep. A quarter of a mile farther up there
+was another curve, which swept the trail within sight of the summit. Here
+Flatray pulled up and got out his field glasses. Leisurely the man and the
+maid came into sight from the timber on the shoulder of the hill, and
+topped the last ascent. Jack could discern Melissy gesturing here and
+there as she explained the lay of the land.
+
+Something else caught and held his glasses. Four riders had emerged from a
+little gulch of dense aspens which ran up the Point toward the summit. One
+of these had with him a led horse.
+
+"Now, I wonder what that means?" the sheriff mused aloud.
+
+He was not left long in doubt. The four men rode swiftly, straight toward
+the man and the girl above. One of them swung from the saddle and stepped
+forward. He spoke to West, who appeared to make urgent protest. The
+dismounted rider answered. Melissy began to run. Very faintly there came
+to Flatray her startled cry. Simultaneously he caught the flash of the sun
+on bright steel. The leader of the four had drawn a revolver and was
+covering West with it. Instantly the girl stopped running. Plainly the
+life of the railroad president had been threatened unless she stopped.
+
+The man behind the weapon swept a gesture in the direction of the led
+horse. Reluctantly West moved toward it, still protesting. He swung to the
+saddle, and four of the horses broke into a canter. Only the man with the
+drawn revolver remained on the ground with Melissy. He scabbarded his gun,
+took a step or two toward her, and made explanations. The girl stamped her
+foot, and half turned from him.
+
+He laughed, stepped still closer to her, and spoke again. Melissy, with
+tilted chin, seemed to be unaware that he existed. Another step brought
+him to her side. Once more he spoke. No stone wall could have given him
+less recognition. Then Jack let out a sudden fierce imprecation, and gave
+his pony the spur. For the man had bent forward swiftly, had kissed the
+girl on the lips once--twice--three times, had swept his hat off in a low,
+mocking bow, and had flung himself on his horse, and galloped off.
+
+Pebbles and shale went flying from the horse's hoofs as the sheriff tore
+down the trail toward Melissy. He cut off at an angle and dashed through
+cactus and over rain-washed gullies at breakneck speed, pounding up the
+stiff slope to the summit. He dragged his pony to a halt, and leaped off
+at the same instant.
+
+Melissy came to him with flashing eyes. "Why didn't you get here sooner?"
+she panted, as if she had been running; for the blind rage was strong in
+her.
+
+His anger burst out to meet hers. "I wish I had!" he cried, with a furious
+oath.
+
+"He insulted me. He laughed at me, and taunted me--and kissed me!"
+
+Jack nodded. "I saw. If I had only had my rifle with me! Who was he?"
+
+"He wore a mask. But I knew him. It was Dunc Boone."
+
+"With the Roaring Fork gang?"
+
+"I don't know. Is he one of them?"
+
+"I've been thinking so for years."
+
+"They must have known about our picnic. But what do they want with Mr.
+West?"
+
+"He's one of the world's richest men."
+
+"But he doesn't carry his money with him."
+
+"He carries his life."
+
+"They must mean to hold him for a ransom. Is that it?"
+
+"You've guessed it. That's the play." Jack considered, his eyes on the
+far-away hills. When he spoke again it was with sharp decision. "Hit the
+trail back to town with your motor. Don't lose a minute on the way. Send a
+dispatch to Bucky O'Connor. You'd ought to get him at Douglas. If not,
+some of his rangers will know where to reach him. Keep the wires hot till
+you're in touch with him. Better sign my name. I've been writing him about
+this outfit. This job is cut out for Bucky, and we've got to get him on
+it."
+
+"And what are _you_ going to do?"
+
+"I can't do much--I'm not armed. First time I've been caught that way
+since I've been sheriff. Came out to-day for a picnic and left my gun at
+home. But if they're the Roaring Fork outfit, they'll pass through the
+Elkhorn canyon, heading for Dead Man's Cache. I'm going to cut around Old
+Baldy and try to beat them to it. Maybe I can recognize some of them."
+
+"But if they see you?"
+
+"I ain't aiming to let them see me."
+
+"Still, they may."
+
+His quiet eyes met hers steadily. "Yes, they may."
+
+They were friends again, though he had never fully forgiven her doubt of
+him. It might be on the cards that some day she would be more to him than
+a friend. Understanding perfectly the danger of what he proposed, she yet
+made no protest. The man who would storm her heart must be one who would
+go the limit, for her standards were those of the outdoor West. She, too,
+was "game" to the core; and she had never liked him better than she did at
+this moment. A man must be a man, and take his fighting chance.
+
+"All right, Jack."
+
+Not for years before had she called him by his first name. His heart
+leaped, but he did not let even his look tell what he was feeling.
+
+"I reckon I'll cut right down from here, Melissy. Better not lose any time
+getting to town. So-long!" And with that he had swung to the saddle and
+was off.
+
+Melissy ran swiftly down to the picnic party and cried out her news. It
+fell upon them like a bolt out of a June sky. Some exclaimed and wondered
+and deplored; but she was proud to see that her father took instant
+command, without an unnecessary word.
+
+"They've caught us in swimming, boys! We've got to burn the wind back to
+town for our guns. Dick, you ride around by the Powder Horn and gather up
+the boys on the ranch. Get Swain to swing around to the south and comb the
+lower gulches of the Roaring Fork. Tell him to get in touch with me soon
+as he can. I'll come through by Elkhorn."
+
+Lee helped his daughter into the machine, and took his place beside her.
+
+"Hit the high spots, Jim. I've got an engagement in the hills that won't
+wait, prior to which I've got to get back to town immediate," he told the
+chauffeur cheerfully; for he was beginning to enjoy himself as in the old
+days, when he had been the hard-riding sheriff of a border county which
+took the premium for bad men.
+
+The motor car leaped forward, fell into its pace, and began to hum its
+song of the road as it ate up swiftly the miles that lay between the dam
+and Mesa.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+
+A CAPTURE
+
+
+Flatray swung around Old Baldy through the sparse timber that edged its
+roots. He knew this country well; for he had run cattle here, and combed
+the draws and ridges on the annual spring and fall round-ups.
+
+There was no trail to follow. Often the lay of the land forced him to a
+detour; for it was rough with washes, with matted cactus, and with a thick
+growth of netted mesquite and underbrush. But true as the needle of a
+compass, he turned back always to the direction he was following. He had
+the instinct for direction, sharpened almost to infallibility by the
+experience his work had given him.
+
+So, hour after hour, he swung forward, pushing his horse over the ground
+in a sort of running walk, common to the plains. Sunset found him climbing
+from the foothills into the mountains beyond. Starlight came upon him in a
+saddle between the peaks, still plodding up by winding paths to the higher
+altitudes that make the ridge of the continent's backbone.
+
+The moon was up long before he struck a gulch spur that led to Elkhorn
+canyon. Whether he would be in time or not--assuming that he had guessed
+aright as to the destination of the outlaws--he could not tell. It would
+be, at best, a near thing. For, though he had come more directly, they had
+followed a trail which made the going much faster. Fast as the cow pony
+could pick its way along the rock-strewn gulch, he descended, eye and ear
+alert to detect the presence of another human being in this waste of
+boulders, of moonlit, flickering shadows, of dark awesome peaks.
+
+His quick ear caught the faintest of sounds. He slipped from the saddle
+and stole swiftly forward to the point where the gulch joined the main
+canyon. Voices drifted to him--the sound of careless laughter, wafted by
+the light night wind. He had missed the outlaws by scarce a hundred yards.
+There was nothing for it but to follow cautiously. As he was turning to go
+back for his horse the moon emerged from behind a cloud and flooded the
+canyon with a cold, silvery light. It showed Jack a man and a horse
+standing scarce twenty yards from him. The man had his back to him. He had
+dismounted, and was tightening the cinches of his saddle.
+
+Flatray experienced a pang of disappointment. He was unarmed. His second
+thought sent him flying noiselessly back to his horse. Deftly he unloosed
+the rope which always hung coiled below the saddle horn. On tiptoe he ran
+back to the gulch mouth, bearing to the right, so as to come directly
+opposite the man he wanted. As he ran he arranged the lariat to his
+satisfaction, freeing the loop and making sure that the coil was not
+bound. Very cautiously he crept forward, taking advantage for cover of a
+boulder which rose from the bed of the gulch.
+
+The man had finished tightening the girth. His foot rose to the stirrup.
+He swung up from the ground, and his right leg swept across the flank of
+the pony. It did not reach the stirrup; for, even as he rose, Jack's
+lariat snaked forward and dropped over his head to his breast. It
+tightened sharply and dragged him back, pinioning his arms to his side.
+Before he could shake one of them free to reach the revolver in his chaps,
+he was lying on his back, with Flatray astride of him. The cattleman's
+left hand closed tightly upon his windpipe, while the right searched for
+and found the weapon in the holster of the prostrate man.
+
+Not until the steel rim of it pressed against the teeth of the man beneath
+him did Jack's fingers loosen. "Make a sound, and you're a dead man."
+
+The other choked and gurgled. He was not yet able to cry out, even had he
+any intention of so doing. But defiant eyes glared into those of the man
+who had unhorsed and captured him.
+
+"Where are your pals bound for?" Flatray demanded.
+
+He got no answer in words, but sullen eyes flung out an obstinate refusal
+to give away his associates.
+
+"I reckon you're one of the Roaring Fork outfit," Jack suggested.
+
+"You know so darn much I'll leave you to guess the rest," growled the
+prisoner.
+
+"The first thing I'll guess is that, if anything happens to Simon West,
+you'll hang for it, my friend."
+
+"You'll have to prove some things first."
+
+Flatray's hand slid into the man's coat pocket, and drew forth a piece of
+black cloth that had been used as a mask.
+
+"Here's exhibit A, to begin with."
+
+The man on the ground suddenly gave an upward heave, grasped at the
+weapon, and let out a yell for help that echoed back from the cliff, while
+the cattleman let the butt of the revolver crash heavily down upon his
+face. The heavy gun came down three times before the struggling outlaw
+would subside, and then not before blood streamed from ugly gashes into
+his eyes.
+
+"I've had enough, damn you!" the fellow muttered sullenly. "What do you
+want with me?"
+
+"You'll go along with me. Let out another sound, and I'll bump you off.
+Get a move on you."
+
+Jack got to his feet and dragged up his prisoner. The man was a heavy-set,
+bowlegged fellow of about forty, hard-faced, and shifty-eyed--a frontier
+miscreant, unless every line of the tough, leathery countenance told a
+falsehood. But he had made his experiment and failed. He knew what manner
+of man his captor was, and he had no mind for another lesson from him. He
+slouched to his horse, under propulsion of the revolver, and led the
+animal into the gulch.
+
+Both mounted, Jack keeping the captive covered every moment of the time;
+and they began to retrace the way by which the young cattleman had just
+come.
+
+After they had ridden about a quarter of a mile Flatray made a
+readjustment of the rope. He let the loop lie loosely about the neck of
+the outlaw, the other end of it being tied to the horn of his own saddle.
+Also, he tied the hands of the man in such a way that, though they were
+free to handle the bridle rein, he could not raise them from the saddle as
+high as his neck.
+
+"If you make any sudden moves, you'll be committing suicide. If you yell
+out, it will amount to about the same thing. It's up to you to be good,
+looks like."
+
+The man cursed softly. He knew that the least attempt to escape or to
+attract the attention of his confederates would mean his undoing.
+Something about this young man's cold eye and iron jaw told him that he
+would not hesitate to shoot, if necessary.
+
+Voices came to them from the canyon. Flatray guessed that a reconnaissance
+of the gulch would be made, and prepared himself for it by deflecting his
+course from the bed of the _arroyo_ at a point where the walls fell back
+to form a little valley. A little grove of aspens covered densely the
+shoulder of a hillock some fifty yards back, and here he took his stand.
+He dismounted, and made his prisoner do the same.
+
+"Sit down," he ordered crisply.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To keep me from blowing the top of your head off," answered Jack
+quietly.
+
+Without further discussion, the man sat down. His captor stood behind him,
+one hand on the shoulder of his prisoner, his eyes watching the point of
+the gulch at which the enemy would appear.
+
+Two mounted men showed presently in silhouette. Almost opposite the grove
+they drew up.
+
+"Mighty queer what has become of Hank," one of them said. "But I don't
+reckon there's any use looking any farther. You don't figure he's aiming
+to throw us down--do you, Buck?"
+
+"Nope. He'll stick, Hank will. But it sure looks darned strange. Here's
+him a-ridin' along with us, and suddenly he's missin'. We hear a yell, and
+go back to look for him. Nothin' doin'. You don't allow the devil could
+have come for him sudden--do you, Jeff?"
+
+It was said with a laugh, defiantly, but none the less Jack read
+uneasiness in the manner of the man. It seemed to him that both were eager
+to turn back. Giant boulders, carved to grotesque and ghostly shapes by a
+million years' wind and water, reared themselves aloft and threw shadows
+in the moonlight. The wind, caught in the gulch, rose and fell in
+unearthly, sibilant sounds. If ever fiends from below walk the earth, this
+time and place was a fitting one for them. Jack curved a hand around his
+mouth, and emitted a strange, mournful, low cry, which might have been the
+scream of a lost soul.
+
+Jeff clutched at the arm of his companion. "Did you hear that, Buck?"
+
+"What--what do you reckon it was, Jeff?"
+
+Again Jack let his cry curdle the night.
+
+The outlaws took counsel of their terror. They were hardy, desperate men,
+afraid of nothing mortal under the sun. But the dormant superstition in
+them rose to their throats. Fearfully they wheeled and gave their horses
+the spur. Flatray could hear them crashing through the brush.
+
+He listened while the rapid hoofbeats died away, until even the echoes
+fell silent. "We'll be moving," he announced to his prisoner.
+
+For a couple of hours they followed substantially the same way that Jack
+had taken, descending gradually toward the foothills and the plains. The
+stars went out, and the moon slid behind banked clouds, so that the
+darkness grew with the passing hours. At length Flatray had to call a
+halt.
+
+"We'll camp here till morning," he announced when they reached a grassy
+park.
+
+The horses were hobbled, and the men sat down opposite each other in the
+darkness. Presently the prisoner relaxed and fell asleep. But there was no
+sleep for his captor. The cattleman leaned against the trunk of a
+cottonwood and smoked his pipe. The night grew chill, but he dared not
+light a fire. At last the first streaks of gray dawn lightened the sky. A
+quarter of an hour later he shook his captive from slumber.
+
+"Time to hit the trail."
+
+The outlaw murmured sleepily, "How's that, Dunc? Twenty-five thousand
+apiece!"
+
+"Wake up! We've got to vamose out of here."
+
+Slowly the fellow shook the sleep from his brain. He looked at Flatray
+sullenly, without answering. But he climbed into the saddle which Jack had
+cinched for him. Dogged and wolfish as he was, the man knew his master,
+and was cowed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+
+THE TABLES TURNED
+
+
+From the local eastbound a man swung to the station platform at Mesa. He
+was a dark, slim, little man, wiry and supple, with restless black eyes
+which pierced one like bullets.
+
+The depot loungers made him a focus of inquiring looks. But, in spite of
+his careless ease, a shrewd observer would have read anxiety in his
+bearing. It was as if behind the veil of his indifference there rested a
+perpetual vigilance. The wariness of a beast of prey lay close to the
+surface.
+
+"Mornin', gentlemen," he drawled, sweeping the group with his eyes.
+
+"Mornin'," responded one of the loafers.
+
+"I presume some of you gentlemen can direct me to the house of Mayor
+Lee."
+
+"The mayor ain't to home," volunteered a lank, unshaven native in
+butternut jeans and boots.
+
+"I think it was his house I inquired for," suggested the stranger.
+
+"Fust house off the square on the yon side of the postoffice--a big
+two-story brick, with a gallery and po'ches all round it."
+
+Having thanked his informant, the stranger passed down the street. The
+curious saw him pass in at the mayor's gate and knock at the door. It
+opened presently, and disclosed a flash of white, which they knew to be
+the skirt of a girl.
+
+"I reckon that's Miss 'Lissie," the others were informed by the unshaven
+one. "She's let him in and shet the door."
+
+Inevitably there followed speculation as to who the arrival might be. That
+his coming had something to do with the affair of the West kidnapping, all
+were disposed to agree; but just what it might have to do with it, none of
+them could do more than guess. If they could have heard what passed
+between Melissy and the stranger, their curiosity would have been
+gratified.
+
+"Good mornin', miss. Is Mayor Lee at home?"
+
+"No--he isn't. He hasn't got back yet. Is there anything I can do for
+you?"
+
+Two rows of even white teeth flashed in a smile. "I thought maybe there
+was something I could do for you. You are Miss Lee, I take it?"
+
+"Yes. But I don't quite understand--unless you have news."
+
+"I have no news--yet."
+
+"You mean----" Her eager glance swept over him. The brown eyes, which had
+been full of questioning, flashed to understanding. "You are not
+Lieutenant O'Connor?"
+
+"Am I not?" he smiled.
+
+"I mean--are you?"
+
+"At your service, Miss Lee."
+
+She had heard for years of this lieutenant of rangers, who was the terror
+of all Arizona "bad men." Her father, Jack Flatray, the range riders whom
+she knew--game men all--hailed Bucky O'Connor as a wonder. For coolness
+under fire, for acumen, for sheer, unflawed nerve, and for his skill in
+that deadly game he played of hunting down desperadoes, they called him
+chief ungrudgingly. He was a daredevil, who had taken his life in his
+hands a hundred times. Yet always he came through smiling, and brought
+back with him the man he went after. The whisper ran that he bore a
+charmed life, so many had been his hairbreadth escapes.
+
+"Come in," the girl invited. "Father said, if you came, I was to keep you
+here until he got back or sent a messenger for you. He's hunting for the
+criminals in the Roaring Fork country. Of course, he didn't know when you
+would get here. At the time he left we hadn't been able to catch you on
+the wire. I signed Mr. Flatray's name at his suggestion, because he was in
+correspondence with you once about the Roaring Fork outlaws. He is out in
+the hills, too. He started half an hour after the kidnappers. But he isn't
+armed. I'm troubled about him."
+
+Again the young man's white-toothed smile flashed. "You'd better be.
+Anybody that goes hunting Black MacQueen unarmed ought to be right well
+insured."
+
+She nodded, a shadow in her eyes. "Yes--but he would go. He doesn't mean
+them to see him, if he can help it."
+
+"Black sees a heap he isn't expected to see. He has got eyes all over the
+hills, and they see by night as well as by day."
+
+"Yes--I know he has spies everywhere; and he has the hill people
+terrorized, they say. You think this is his work?"
+
+"It's a big thing--the kind of job he likes to tackle. Who else would dare
+do such a thing?"
+
+"That's what father thinks. If he had stolen the President of the United
+States, it wouldn't have stirred up a bigger fuss. Newspaper men and
+detectives are hurrying here from all directions. They are sure to catch
+him."
+
+"Are they?"
+
+She noticed a curious, derisive contempt in the man's voice, and laid it
+to his vanity. "I don't mean that _they_ are. I mean that _you_ are sure
+to get him," she hastened to add. "Father thinks you are wonderful."
+
+"I'm much obliged to him," said the man, with almost a sneer.
+
+He seemed to have so good an opinion of himself that he was above praise
+even. Melissy was coming to the decision that she did not like him--which
+was disappointing, since she had expected to like him immensely.
+
+"I didn't look for you till night. You wired you would be on number
+seven," she said. "I understood that was the earliest you could get
+here."
+
+His explanation of the change was brief, and invited no further
+discussion. "I found I could make an earlier train."
+
+"I'm glad you could. Father says it is always well to start on the trail
+while it is fresh."
+
+"Have you ever seen this MacQueen, Miss Lee?" he asked.
+
+"Not unless he was there when Mr. West was kidnapped."
+
+"Did you know any of the men?"
+
+She hesitated. "I thought one was Duncan Boone."
+
+"What made you think so?"
+
+"He was the leader, I think, moved the way he does." Her anger flashed for
+an instant. "And acted like him--detestably."
+
+"Was he violent to West? Injure him?"
+
+"No--he didn't do him any physical injury that I saw. I wasn't thinking
+about Mr. West."
+
+"Surely he didn't lay hands on _you_!"
+
+She looked up, in time to see the flicker of amusement sponged from his
+face. It stirred vague anger in her. "He was insolent and ungentlemanly."
+
+"As how?"
+
+"It doesn't matter how." Her manner specifically declined to
+particularize.
+
+"Would you recognize him again if you met him? Describe him, if you can."
+
+"Yes. I used to know him well--before he became known as an outlaw," she
+added after a perceptible hesitation. "There's something ravenous about
+him."
+
+"You mean that he is fierce and bloodthirsty?"
+
+"No--I don't mean that; though, for that matter, I don't think he would
+stick at anything. What I mean is that he is pantherine in his
+movements--more lithe and supple than most men are."
+
+"Is he a big man?"
+
+"No--medium size, and dark."
+
+"There were four of them, you say?"
+
+"Yes. Jack saw them, too, but at a distance."
+
+"He reached you after they were out of sight?"
+
+"They had been gone about five minutes when I saw him--five or ten. I
+couldn't be sure."
+
+"Boone offered no personal indignity to you?"
+
+"Why are you so sure?" she flashed.
+
+"The story is that he is quite the ladies' man."
+
+Melissy laughed scornfully.
+
+At his request, she went over again the story of the abduction, telling
+everything save the matter of the ravished kisses. This she kept to
+herself. She did not quite know why, except that there was something she
+did not like about this Bucky O'Connor. He had a trick of narrowing his
+eyes and gloating over her, as a cat gloats over its expected kill.
+
+However, his confidence impressed her. Cocksure he was, and before long
+she knew him boastful; but competence sat on him, none the less. She
+thought she could see why he was held to be the most deadly bloodhound on
+a trail that even Arizona could produce. That he was fearless she did not
+need to be told, any more than she needed a certificate that on occasion
+he could be merciless. On the other hand, he fitted very badly with the
+character of the young lieutenant of rangers, as Jack Flatray had sketched
+it for her. Her friend's description of his hero had been enthusiastic.
+She decided that the young cattleman was a bad judge of men--though, of
+course, he had never actually met O'Connor.
+
+"I reckon I'll not wait for your father's report, Miss Lee. I work
+independent of other men. That is how I get the wonderful results I do."
+
+His conceit nettled her; also, it stung her filial loyalty. "My father was
+the best sheriff this county ever had," she said stiffly.
+
+He smiled satirically. "Still, I reckon I'll handle this my own
+way--unless your father's daughter wants to go partners with me in it."
+
+She gave him a look intended to crush his impudence. "No, thank you."
+
+He ate a breakfast which she had the cook prepare hurriedly for him, and
+departed on the horse for which she had telephoned to the nearest livery
+stable. Melissy was a singularly fearless girl; yet she watched him go
+with a decided relief, for which she could not account. He rode, she
+observed, like a centaur--flat-backed, firm in the saddle with the easy
+negligence of a plainsman. He turned as he started, and waved a hand
+debonairly at her.
+
+"If I have any luck, I'll bring back one of the Roaring Fork bunch with
+me--a present for a good girl, Miss Melissy."
+
+She turned on her heel and went inside. Anger pulsed fiercely through her.
+He laughed at her, made fun of her, and yet called her by her first name.
+How dared he treat her so! Worst of all, she read admiration bold and
+unveiled in the eyes that mocked her.
+
+Half an hour later Flatray, riding toward town with his prisoner in front
+of him, heard a sudden sharp summons to throw up his hands. A man had
+risen from behind a boulder, and held him covered steadily.
+
+Jack looked at the fellow without complying. He needed no second glance to
+tell him that this man was not one to be trifled with. "Who are you?" he
+demanded quietly.
+
+"Never mind who I am. Reach for the sky."
+
+The captured outlaw had given a little whoop, and was now loosening the
+rope from his neck. "You're the goods, Cap! I knew the boys would pull it
+off for me, but I didn't reckon on it so durn soon."
+
+"Shut up!" ordered the man behind the gun, without moving his eyes from
+Flatray.
+
+"I'm a clam," retorted the other.
+
+"I'm waiting for those hands to go up; but I'll not wait long, seh."
+
+Jack's hands went up reluctantly. "You've got the call," he admitted.
+
+They led him a couple of hundred yards from the trail and tied him hand
+and foot. Before they left him the outlaw whom he had captured evened his
+score. Three times he struck Flatray on the head with the butt of his
+revolver. He was lying on the ground bleeding and senseless when they rode
+away toward the hills.
+
+Jack came to himself with a blinding headache. It was some time before he
+realized what had happened. As soon as he did he set about freeing
+himself. This was a matter of a few minutes. With the handkerchief that
+was around his neck he tied up his wounds. Fortunately his hair was very
+thick and this had saved him from a fractured skull. Dizzily he got to his
+feet, found his horse, and started toward Mesa.
+
+Not many people were on the streets when the sheriff passed through the
+suburbs of the little town, for it was about the breakfast hour. One stout
+old negro mammy stopped to stare in surprise at his bloody head.
+
+"Laws a mussy, Mistah Flatray, what they done be'n a-doin' to you-all?"
+she asked.
+
+The sheriff hardly saw her. He was chewing the bitter cud of defeat and
+was absorbed in his thoughts. He was still young enough to have counted on
+the effect upon Melissy of his return to town with one of the abductors as
+his prisoner.
+
+It happened that she was on the porch watering her flower boxes when he
+passed the house.
+
+"Jack!" she cried, and on the heels of her exclamation: "What's the matter
+with you? Been hurt?"
+
+A gray pallor had pushed through the tan of her cheeks. She knew her heart
+was beating fast.
+
+"Bumped into a piece of bad luck," he grinned, and told her briefly what
+had occurred.
+
+She took him into the house and washed his head for him. After she saw how
+serious the cuts were she insisted on sending for a doctor. When his
+wounds were dressed she fed him and made him lie down and sleep on her
+father's bed.
+
+The sun was sliding down the heavens to a crotch in the hills before he
+joined her again. She was in front of the house clipping her roses.
+
+"Is the invalid better?" she asked him.
+
+"He's a false alarm. But he did have a mighty thumping headache that has
+gone now."
+
+"I've been wondering why you didn't meet Lieutenant O'Connor. He must have
+taken the road you came in on."
+
+The young man's eyes lit. "Is Bucky here already?"
+
+"He was. He's gone. I was greatly disappointed in him. He's not half the
+man you think he is."
+
+"Oh, but he is. Everybody says so."
+
+"I never saw a more conceited man, or a more hateful one. There's
+something about him--oh, I don't know. But he isn't good. I'm sure of
+that."
+
+"His reputation isn't of that kind. They say he's devoted to his wife and
+kids."
+
+"His wife and children." Melissy recalled the smoldering admiration in his
+bold eyes. She laughed shortly. "That finishes him with me. He's married,
+is he? Well, I know the kind of husband he is."
+
+Jack flashed a quick look at her. He guessed what she meant. But this did
+not square at all with what his friends had told him of O'Connor.
+
+"Did he ask for me?"
+
+"No. He said he preferred to play a lone hand. His manner was unpleasant
+all the time. He knows it all. I could see that."
+
+"Anyhow, he's a crackerjack in his line. Have you heard from your father
+since he set out?"
+
+"Not yet."
+
+"Well, I'm going to start to-night with a posse for the Cache. If O'Connor
+comes back, tell him I'll follow the Roaring Fork."
+
+"You'll not go this time without a gun, Jack," she said with a ghost of a
+smile.
+
+"No. I want to make good this trip."
+
+"You did splendidly before. Not one man in a hundred would have done so
+well."
+
+"I'm a wonder," he admitted with a grin.
+
+"But you will take care of yourself--not be foolish."
+
+"I don't aim to take up residence in Boot Hill cemetery if I can help
+it."
+
+"Boone and his men are dangerous characters. They are playing for high
+stakes. They would snuff your life out as quick as they would wink. Don't
+forget that."
+
+"You don't want me to lie down before Dunc Boone, do you?"
+
+"No-o. Only don't be reckless. I told father the same."
+
+Her dear concern for him went to Jack's head, but he steadied himself
+before he answered. "I've got one real good reason for not being reckless.
+I'll tell you what it is some day."
+
+Her shy, alarmed eyes fled his at once. She began an account of how her
+father had gathered his posse and where she thought he must have gone.
+
+After dinner Jack went downtown. Melissy did some household tasks and
+presently moved out to the cool porch. She was just thinking about going
+back in when a barefoot boy ran past and whistled. From the next house a
+second youngster emerged.
+
+"That you, Jimmie?"
+
+"Betcherlife. Say, 've you heard about the sheriff?"
+
+"Who? Jack Flatray! Course I have. The Roaring Fork outfit ambushed him,
+beat him up, and made him hit the trail for town."
+
+"Aw! That ain't news. He's started back after them again. Left jes' a
+little while ago. I saw him go--him 'n' Farnum 'n' Charley Hymer 'n' Hal
+Yarnell 'n' Mr. Bellamy."
+
+"Bet they git 'em."
+
+"Bet they don't."
+
+"Aw, course they'll git 'em, Tom."
+
+The other youngster assumed an air of mystery. He swelled his chest and
+strutted a step or two nearer. Urbane condescension oozed from him.
+
+"Say, Jimmie. C'n you keep a secret?"
+
+"Sure. Course I can."
+
+"Won't ever snitch?"
+
+"Cross my heart."
+
+"Well, then--I'm Black MacQueen, the captain of the Roaring Fork bad
+men."
+
+"You!" Incredulity stared from Jimmie's bulging eyes.
+
+"You betcher. I'm him, here in disguise as a kid."
+
+The magnificent boldness of this claim stole Jimmie's breath for an
+instant. He was two years younger than his friend, but he did not quite
+know whether to applaud or to jeer. Before he could make up his mind a
+light laugh rippled to them from behind the vines on the Lee porch.
+
+The disguised outlaw and his friend were startled. Both fled swiftly, with
+all the pretense of desperate necessity young conspirators love to
+assume.
+
+Melissy went into the house and the laughter died from her lips. She knew
+that either her father's posse or that of Jack Flatray would come into
+touch with the outlaws eventually. When the clash came there would be a
+desperate battle. Men would be killed. She prayed it might not be one of
+those for whom she cared most.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+
+THE REAL BUCKY AND THE FALSE
+
+
+Number seven was churning its way furiously through brown Arizona. The day
+had been hot, with a palpitating heat which shimmered over the desert
+waste. Defiantly the sun had gone down beyond the horizon, a great ball of
+fire, leaving behind a brilliant splash of bold colors. Now this, too, had
+disappeared. Velvet night had transformed the land. Over the distant
+mountains had settled a smoke-blue film, which left them vague and
+indefinite.
+
+Only three passengers rode in the Pullman car. One was a commercial
+traveler, busy making up his weekly statement to the firm. Another was a
+Boston lady, in gold-rimmed glasses and a costume that helped the general
+effect of frigidity. The third looked out of the open window at the
+distant hills. He was a slender young fellow, tanned almost to a coffee
+brown, with eyes of Irish blue which sometimes bubbled with fun and
+sometimes were hard as chisel steel. Wide-shouldered and lean-flanked he
+was, with well-packed muscles, which rippled like those of a tiger.
+
+At Chiquita the train stopped, but took up again almost instantly its
+chant of the rail. Meanwhile, a man had swung himself to the platform of
+the smoker. He passed through that car, the two day coaches, and on to the
+sleeper; his keen, restless eyes inspected every passenger in the course
+of his transit. Opposite the young man in the Pullman he stopped.
+
+"May I ask if you are Lieutenant O'Connor?"
+
+"My name, seh."
+
+The young man in the seat had slewed his head around sharply, and made
+answer with a crisp, businesslike directness.
+
+The new-comer smiled. "I'll have to introduce myself, lieutenant. My name
+is Flatray. I've come to meet you."
+
+"Glad to meet you, Mr. Flatray. I hope that together we can work this
+thing out right. MacQueen has gathered a bunch that ought to be cleaned
+out, and I reckon now's the time to do it. I've been reading about him for
+a year. I've got a notion he's about the ablest thing in bad men this
+Territory has seen for a good many years."
+
+Flatray sat down on the seat opposite O'Connor. A smile flicked across his
+face, and vanished. "I'm of that opinion myself, lieutenant."
+
+"Tell me all about this affair of the West kidnapping," the ranger
+suggested.
+
+The other man told the story while O'Connor listened, alert to catch every
+point of the narrative.
+
+The face of the lieutenant of rangers was a boyish one--eager, genial, and
+frank; yet, none the less, strength lay in the close-gripped jaw and in
+the steady, watchful eye. His lithe, tense body was like a coiled spring;
+and that, too, though he seemed to be very much at ease.
+
+With every sentence that the other spoke, O'Connor was judging Flatray,
+appraising him for a fine specimen of a hard-bitten breed--a vigilant
+frontiersman, competent to the finger tips. Yet he was conscious that, in
+spite of the man's graceful ease and friendly smile, he did not like
+Flatray. He would not ask for a better man beside him in a tight pinch;
+but he could not deny that something sinister which breathed from his
+sardonic, devil-may-care face.
+
+"So that's how the land lies," the sheriff concluded. "My deputies have
+got the pass to the south blocked; Lee is closing in through Elkhorn; and
+Fox, with a strong posse, is combing the hills beyond Dead Man's Cache.
+There's only one way out for him, and that is over Powderhorn Pass. Word
+has just reached us that MacQueen is moving in that direction. He is
+evidently figuring to slip out over the hills during the night. I've
+arranged for us to be met at Barker's Tank by a couple of the boys, with
+horses. We'll drop off the train quietly when it slows up to water, so
+that none of his spies can get word of our movements to him. By hard
+riding we'd ought to reach Powderhorn in time to head him off."
+
+The ranger asked incisive questions, had the topography of the country
+explained to him with much detail, and decided at last that Flatray was
+right. If MacQueen were trying to slip out, they might trap him at the
+pass; if not, by closing it they would put the cork in the bottle that
+held him.
+
+"We'll try it, seh. Y'u know this country better than I do, and I'll give
+y'u a free hand. Unless there's a slip up in your calculations, you'd
+ought to be right."
+
+"Good enough, lieutenant. I'm betting on those plans myself," the other
+answered promptly, and added, as he looked out into the night: "By that
+notch in the hills, we'd ought to be close to the tank now. She's slowing
+up. I reckon we can slip out to the vestibule, and get off at the far side
+of the track without being noticed much."
+
+This they found easy enough. Five minutes later number seven was steaming
+away into the distant desert. Flatray gave a sharp, shrill whistle; and
+from behind some sand dunes emerged two men and four horses.
+
+"Anything new?" asked the sheriff as they came nearer.
+
+"Not a thing, cap," answered one of them.
+
+"Boys, shake hands with the famous Lieutenant O'Connor," said Flatray,
+with a sneer hid by the darkness. "Lieutenant, let me make you acquainted
+with Jeff Jackson and Buck Lane."
+
+"Much obliged to meet you," grinned Buck as he shook hands.
+
+They mounted and rode toward the notch in the hills that had been pointed
+out to the ranger. The moon was up; and a cold, silvery light flooded the
+plain. Seen in this setting, the great, painted desert held more of
+mystery, of beauty, and less of the dead monotony that glared endlessly
+from arid, barren reaches. The sky of stars stretched infinitely far, and
+added to the effect of magnitude.
+
+The miles slipped behind them as they moved forward, hour after hour,
+their horses holding to the running walk that is the peculiar gait of the
+cow country. They rode in silence, with the loose seat and straight back
+of the vaquero. Except the ranger, all were dressed for riding--Flatray in
+corduroys and half-knee laced boots; his men in overalls, chaps, flannel
+shirts, and the broad-brimmed sombrero of the Southwest. All four were
+young men; but there was an odd difference in the expressions of their
+faces.
+
+Jackson and Lane had the hard-lined faces, with something grim and stony
+in them, of men who ride far and hard with their lives in their hands. The
+others were of a higher type. Flatray's dark eyes were keen, bold, and
+restless. One might have guessed him a man of temperament, capable of any
+extremes of conduct--often the victim of his own ungovernable whims and
+passions. Just as he looked a picture of all the passions of youth run to
+seed, so the ranger seemed to show them in flower. There was something
+fine and strong and gallant in his debonair manner. His warm smile went
+out to a world that pleased him mightily.
+
+They rode steadily, untired and untiring. The light of dawn began to
+flicker from one notched summit to another. Out of the sandy waste they
+came to a water hole, paused for a drink, and passed on. For the delay of
+half an hour might mean the escape of their prey.
+
+They came into the country of crumbling mesas and painted cliffs, of
+hillsides where greasewood and giant cactus struggled from the parched
+earth. This they traversed until they came to plateaus, terminating in
+foothills, crevassed by gorges deep and narrow. The canyons grew steeper,
+rock ridges more frequent. Gradually the going became more difficult.
+
+Trails they seldom followed. Washes, with sides like walls, confronted
+them. The ponies dropped down and clambered up again like mountain goats.
+Gradually they were ascending into the upper country, which led to the
+wild stretches where the outlaws lurked. In these watersheds were heavy
+pine forests, rising from the gulches along the shoulders of the peaks.
+
+A maze of canyons, hopelessly lost in the hill tangle into which they had
+plunged, led deviously to a twisting pass, through which they defiled, to
+drop into a vista of rolling waves of forest-clad hills. Among these wound
+countless hidden gulches, known only to those who rode from out them on
+nefarious night errands.
+
+The ranger noted every landmark, and catalogued in his mind's map every
+gorge and peak; from what he saw, he guessed much of which he could not be
+sure. It would be hard to say when his suspicions first became aroused.
+But as they rode, without stopping, through what he knew must be
+Powderhorn Pass, as the men about him quietly grouped themselves so as to
+cut off any escape he might attempt, as they dropped farther and farther
+into the meshes of that forest-crowned net which he knew to be the Roaring
+Fork country, he did not need to be told he was in the power of MacQueen's
+gang.
+
+Yet he gave no sign of what he knew. As daylight came, so that they could
+see each other distinctly, his face showed no shadow of doubt. It was his
+cue to be a simple victim of credulity, and he played it to the finish.
+
+Without warning, through a narrow gulch which might have been sought in
+vain for ten years by a stranger, they passed into the rim of a
+bowl-shaped valley. Timber covered it from edge to edge, but over to the
+left a keen eye could see a thinning of the foliage. Toward this they
+went, following the sidehill and gradually dipping down through heavy
+underbrush. Before him the officer of rangers saw daylight, and presently
+a corral, low roofs, and grazing horses.
+
+"Looks like some one lives here," he remarked amiably.
+
+They were already riding into the open. In front of one of the log cabins
+the man who had called himself Flatray swung from his saddle.
+
+"Better 'light, lieutenant," he suggested carelessly. "We'll eat breakfast
+here."
+
+"Don't care if we do. I could eat a leather mail sack, I'm that hungry,"
+the ranger answered, as he, too, descended.
+
+His guide was looking at him with an expression of open, malevolent
+triumph. He could scarce keep it back long enough to get the effect he
+wanted.
+
+"Yes, we'll eat breakfast here--and dinner, and supper, and breakfast
+to-morrow, and then about two more breakfasts."
+
+"I reckon we'll be too busy to sit around here," laughed his prisoner.
+
+The other ignored his comment. "And after that, it ain't likely you'll do
+much more eating."
+
+"I don't quite get the point of that joke."
+
+"You'll get it soon enough! You'd _savez_ it now, if you weren't a
+muttonhead. As it is, I'll have to explain it. Do you remember capturing
+Tony Chaves two years ago, lieutenant?"
+
+The ranger nodded, with surprise in his round, innocent eyes.
+
+"What happened to him?" demanded the other. A child could have seen that
+he was ridden by a leering, savage triumph.
+
+"Killed trying to escape four days later."
+
+"Who killed him?"
+
+"I did. It was necessary. I regretted it."
+
+A sudden spasm of cruelty swept over the face of the man confronting him.
+"Tony was my partner."
+
+"Your partner?"
+
+"That's right. I've been wanting to say 'How d'ye do?' ever since,
+Lieutenant O'Connor. I'm right glad to meet you."
+
+"But--I don't understand." He did, however.
+
+"It'll soak through, by and by. Chew on this: You've got just ninety-six
+hours to live--exactly as long as Tony lived after you caught him! You'll
+be killed trying to escape. It will be necessary, just as you say it was
+with him; but I reckon I'll not do any regretting to speak of."
+
+"You would murder me?"
+
+"Well, I ain't particular about the word I use." MacQueen leaned against
+the side of his horse, his arm thrown across its neck, and laughed in slow
+maliciousness. "Execute is the word I use, though--if you want to know."
+
+He had made no motion toward his weapon, nor had O'Connor; but the latter
+knew without looking that he was covered vigilantly by both of the other
+men.
+
+"And who are you?" the ranger asked, though he was quite sure of the
+answer.
+
+"Men call me Black MacQueen," drawled the other.
+
+"MacQueen! But you said----"
+
+"That I was Flatray. Yep--I lied."
+
+O'Connor appeared to grope with this in amazement.
+
+"One has to stretch the truth sometimes in my profession," went on the
+outlaw smoothly. "It may interest you to know that yesterday I passed as
+Lieutenant O'Connor. When I was O'Connor I arrested Flatray; and now that
+I am Flatray I have arrested O'Connor. Turn about is fair play, you
+know."
+
+"Interesting, if true," O'Connor retorted easily.
+
+"You can bank on its truth, my friend."
+
+"And you're actually going to kill me in cold blood."
+
+The black eyes narrowed. "Just as I would a dog," said the outlaw, with
+savage emphasis.
+
+"I don't believe it. I've done you no harm."
+
+MacQueen glanced at him contemptuously. The famous Bucky O'Connor looked
+about as competent as a boy in the pimply age.
+
+"I thought you had better sense. Do you think I would have brought you to
+Dead Man's Cache if I had intended you to go away alive? I'm afraid,
+Lieutenant Bucky O'Connor, that you're a much overrated man. Your
+reputation sure would have blown up, if you had lived. You ought to thank
+me for preserving it."
+
+"Preserving it--how?"
+
+"By bumping you off before you've lost it."
+
+"Sho! You wouldn't do that," the ranger murmured ineffectively.
+
+"We'll see. Jeff, I put him in your charge. Search him, and take him to
+Hank's cabin. I hold you responsible for him. Bring me any papers you find
+on him. When I find time, I'll drop around and see that you're keeping him
+safe."
+
+Bucky was searched, and his weapons and papers removed. After being
+handcuffed, he was chained to a heavy staple, which had been driven into
+one of the log walls. He was left alone, and the door was locked; but he
+could hear Jeff moving about outside.
+
+With the closing of the door the vacuous look slipped from his face like a
+mask. The loose-lipped, lost-dog expression was gone. He looked once more
+alert, competent, fit for the emergency. It had been his cue to let his
+adversary underestimate him. During the long night ride he had had chances
+to escape, had he desired to do so. But this had been the last thing he
+wanted.
+
+The outlaws had chosen to take him to their fastness in the hills. He
+would back himself to use the knowledge they were thrusting upon him, to
+bring about their undoing. Only one factor in the case had come upon him
+as a surprise. He had not reckoned that they would have a personal grudge
+against him. And this was a factor that might upset all his calculations.
+
+It meant that he was playing against time, with the chances of the game
+all against him. He had forty-eight hours in which to escape--and he was
+handcuffed, chained, locked up, and guarded. Truly, the outlook was not
+radiant.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+
+A PHOTOGRAPH
+
+
+On the third morning Beauchamp Lee returned to Mesa--unshaven, dusty, and
+fagged with hard riding. He brought with him a handbill which he had
+picked up in the street. Melissy hung over him and ministered to his
+needs. While he was eating breakfast he talked.
+
+"No luck yet, honey. He's hiding in some pocket of the hills, I reckon;
+and likely there he'll stay till the hunt is past. They don't make them
+any slicker than Dunc, dad gum his ugly hide!"
+
+"What is that paper?" his daughter asked.
+
+Lee curbed a disposition toward bad language, as he viewed it with
+disgust. "This here is bulletin number one, girl. It's the cheekiest, most
+impudent thing I ever saw. MacQueen serves notice to all the people of
+this county to keep out of this fight. Also, he mentions me and Jack
+Flatray by name--warning us that, if we sit in the game, hell will be
+popping for us."
+
+"What will you do?"
+
+"Do? I'll get back to my boys fast as horseflesh will get me there, once
+I've had a talk with that beef buyer from Kansas City I made an
+appointment to see before this thing broke loose. You don't allow I'm
+going to let any rustler dictate to me what I'll do and what I won't--do
+you?"
+
+"Where do you reckon he had this printed?" she asked.
+
+"I don't reckon, I know. Late last night a masked man woke up Jim Snell.
+You know, he sleeps in a room at the back of the printing office. Well,
+this fellow made him dress, set up this bill, and run off five hundred
+copies while he stood over him. I'll swan I never heard of such cheek!"
+
+Melissy told what she had to tell--after which her father shaved, took a
+bath, and went out to meet the buyer from Kansas City. His business kept
+him until noon. After dinner Melissy's saddle horse was brought around,
+and she joined her father to ride back with him for a few miles.
+
+About three o'clock she kissed him good-bye, and turned homeward. After
+she had passed the point where the Silver Creek trail ran into the road
+she heard the sound of a galloping horse behind. A rider was coming along
+the trail toward town. He gained on her rapidly, and presently a voice
+hailed her gayly:
+
+"The top o' the mornin' to you, Miss 'Lissie."
+
+She drew up to wait for him. "My name is still Miss Lee," she told him
+mildly, by way of correction.
+
+"I'm glad it is, but we can change it in three minutes at any time, my
+dear," he laughed.
+
+She had been prepared to be more friendly toward him, but at this she
+froze again.
+
+"Did you leave Mrs. O'Connor and the children well?" she asked pointedly,
+looking directly at him.
+
+His smile vanished, and he stared at her in a very strange fashion. She
+had taken the wind completely out of his sails. It had not occurred to him
+that O'Connor might be a married man. Nor did he know but that it might be
+a trick to catch him. He did the only thing he could do--made answer in an
+ironic fashion, which might mean anything or nothing.
+
+"Very well, thank you."
+
+She saw at once that the topic did not allure him, and pushed home her
+advantage. "You must miss Mrs. O'Connor when you are away on duty."
+
+"Must I?"
+
+"And the children, too. By the way, what are their names?"
+
+"You're getting up a right smart interest in my family, all of a sudden,"
+he countered.
+
+"One can't talk about the weather all the time."
+
+He boldly decided to slay the illusion of domesticity. "If you want to
+know, I have neither wife nor children."
+
+"But I've heard about them all," she retorted.
+
+"You have heard of Mrs. O'Connor, no doubt; but she happens to be the
+wife of a cousin of mine."
+
+The look which she flashed at him held more than doubt.
+
+"You don't believe me?" he continued. "I give you my word that I'm not
+married."
+
+They had left the road, and were following a short cut which wound down
+toward Tonti, in and out among the great boulders. The town, dwarfed to
+microscopic size by distance, looked, in the glare of the sunlight, as if
+it were made of white chalk. Along the narrow trail they went singly,
+Melissy leading the way.
+
+She made no answer, but at the first opportunity he forced his horse to a
+level with hers.
+
+"Well--you heard what I said," he challenged.
+
+"The subject is of no importance to me," she said.
+
+"It's important to me. I'm not going to have you doing me an injustice. I
+tell you I'm not married. You've got to believe me."
+
+Her mind was again alive with suspicions. Jack had told her Bucky O'Connor
+was married, and he must have known what he was talking about.
+
+"I don't know whether you are married or not. I am of the opinion that
+Lieutenant O'Connor has a wife and three children. More than once I have
+been told so," she answered.
+
+"You seem to know a heap about the gentleman."
+
+"I know what I know."
+
+"More than I do, perhaps," he suggested.
+
+Her eyes dilated. He could see suspicion take hold of her.
+
+"Perhaps," she answered quietly.
+
+"Does that mean you think I'm not Bucky O'Connor?" He had pushed his pony
+forward so as to cut off her advance, and both had halted for the moment.
+
+She looked at him with level, fearless eyes. "I don't know who you are."
+
+"But you think I'm not Lieutenant O'Connor of the rangers?"
+
+"I don't know whether you are or not."
+
+"There is nothing like making sure. Just look over this letter, please."
+
+She did so. It was from the governor of the Territory to the ranger
+officer. While he was very complimentary as to past services, the governor
+made it plain that he thought O'Connor must at all hazards succeed in
+securing the release of Simon West. This would be necessary for the good
+name of the Territory. Otherwise, a widespread report would go out that
+Arizona was a lawless place in which to live.
+
+Melissy folded the letter and handed it back. "I beg your pardon,
+Lieutenant O'Connor. I see that I was wrong."
+
+"Forget it, my dear. We all make mistakes." He had that curious mocking
+smile which so often hovered about his lips. She felt as though he were
+deriding her--as though his words held some hidden irony which she could
+not understand.
+
+"The governor seems very anxious to have you succeed. It will be a black
+eye for Arizona if this band of outlaws is not apprehended. You don't
+think, do you, that they will do Mr. West any harm, if their price is not
+paid? They would never dare."
+
+He took this up almost as though he resented it. "They would dare
+anything. I reckon you'll have to get up early in the mornin' to find a
+gamer man than Black MacQueen."
+
+"I wouldn't call it game to hurt an old man whom he has in his power. But
+you mustn't let it come to that. You must save him. Are you making any
+progress? Have you run down any of the band? And while I think of it--have
+you seen to-day's paper?"
+
+"No--why?"
+
+"The biggest story on the front page is about the West case. It seems that
+this MacQueen wired to Chicago to Mr. Lucas, president of one of the lines
+on the Southwestern system, that they would release Mr. West for three
+hundred thousand dollars in gold. He told him a letter had been mailed to
+the agent at Mesa, telling under just what conditions the money was to be
+turned over; and he ended with a threat that, if steps were taken to
+capture the gang, or if the money were not handed over at the specified
+time, Mr. West would disappear forever."
+
+"Did the paper say whether the money would be turned over?"
+
+"It said that Mr. Lucas was going to get into touch with the outlaws at
+once, to effect the release of his chief."
+
+A gleam of triumph flashed in the eyes of the man. "That's sure the best
+way."
+
+"It won't help your reputation, will it?" she asked. "Won't people say
+that you failed on this case?"
+
+He laughed softly, as if at some hidden source of mirth. "I shouldn't
+wonder if they did say that Bucky O'Connor hadn't made good this time.
+They'll figure he tried to ride herd on a job too big for him."
+
+Her surprised eye brooded over this, too. Here he was defending the outlaw
+chief, and rejoicing at his own downfall. There seemed to be no end to the
+contradictions in this man. She was to run across another tangled thread
+of the puzzle a few minutes later.
+
+She had dismounted to let him tighten the saddle cinch. Owing to the heat,
+he had been carrying his coat in front of him. He tossed it on a boulder
+by the side of the trail, in such a way that the inside pocket hung down.
+From it slid some papers and a photograph. Melissy looked down at the
+picture, then instantly stooped and picked it up. For it was a photograph
+of a very charming woman and three children, and across the bottom of it
+was written a line.
+
+             "To Bucky, from his loving wife and children."
+
+The girl handed it to the man without a word, and looked him full in the
+face.
+
+"Bowled out, by ginger!" he said, with a light laugh.
+
+But as she continued to look at him--a man of promise, who had plainly
+traveled far on the road to ruin--the conviction grew on her that the
+sweet-faced woman in the photograph was no loving wife of his. He was a
+man who might easily take a woman's fancy, but not one to hold her love
+for years through the stress of life. Moreover, Bucky O'Connor held the
+respect of all men. She had heard him spoken of, and always with a meed of
+affection that is given to few men. Whoever this graceless scamp was, he
+was not the lieutenant of rangers.
+
+The words slipped out before she could stop them: "You're not Lieutenant
+O'Connor at all."
+
+"Playing on that string again, are you?" he jeered.
+
+"I'm sure of it this time."
+
+"Since you know who I'm not, perhaps you can tell me, too, who I am."
+
+In that instant before she spoke, while her steady eyes rested on him, she
+put together many things which had puzzled her. All of them pointed to
+one conclusion. Even now her courage did not fail her. She put it into
+words quietly:
+
+"You are that villain Black MacQueen."
+
+He stared at her in surprise. "By God, girl--you're right. I'm MacQueen,
+though I don't know how you guessed it."
+
+"I don't know how I kept from guessing it so long. I can see it, now, as
+plain as day, in all that you have done."
+
+After that they measured strength silently with their eyes. If the
+situation had clarified itself, with the added knowledge of the girl had
+come new problems. Let her return to Mesa, and he could no longer pose as
+O'Connor; and it was just the audacity of this double play that delighted
+him. He was the most reckless man on earth; he loved to take chances. He
+wanted to fool the officers to his heart's content, and then jeer at them
+afterward. Hitherto everything had come his way.
+
+But if this girl should go home, he could not show his face at Mesa; and
+the spice of the thing would be gone. He was greatly taken with her
+beauty, her daring, and the charm of high spirits which radiated from her.
+Again and again he had found himself drawn back to her. He was not in love
+with her in any legitimate sense; but he knew now that, if he could see
+her no more, life would be a savorless thing, at least until his fancy had
+spent itself. Moreover, her presence at Dead Man's Cache would be a
+safeguard. With her in his power, Lee and Flatray, the most persistent of
+his hunters, would not dare to move against the outlaws.
+
+Inclination and interest worked together. He decided to take her back with
+him to the country of hidden pockets and gulches. There, in time, he would
+win her love--so his vanity insisted. After that they would slip away from
+the scene of his crimes, and go back to the world from which he had years
+since vanished.
+
+The dream grew on him. It got hold of his imagination. For a moment he saw
+himself as the man he had been meant for--the man he might have been, if
+he had been able to subdue his evil nature. He saw himself respected, a
+power in the community, going down to a serene old age, with this woman
+and their children by his side. Then he laughed derisively, and brushed
+aside the vision.
+
+"Why didn't the real Lieutenant O'Connor arrive to expose you?" she
+asked.
+
+"The real Bucky is handcuffed and guarded at Dead Man's Cache. I don't
+think he's enjoying himself to-day."
+
+"You're getting quite a collection of prisoners. You'll be starting a
+penitentiary on your own account soon," she told him sharply.
+
+"That's right. And I'm taking another one back with me to-night."
+
+"Who is he?"
+
+"It's a lady this time--Miss Melissy Lee."
+
+His words shook her. An icy hand seemed to clamp upon her heart. The blood
+ebbed even from her lips, but her brave eyes never faltered from his.
+
+"So you war on women, too!"
+
+He gave her his most ironic bow. "I don't war on you, my dear. You shall
+have half of my kingdom, if you ask it--and all my heart."
+
+"I can't use either," she told him quietly. "But I'm only a girl. If you
+have a spark of manliness in you, surely you won't take me a prisoner
+among those wild, bad men of yours."
+
+"Those wild, bad men of mine are lambs when I give the word. They wouldn't
+lift a hand against you. And there is a woman there--the mother of one of
+my boys, who was shot. We'll have you chaperoned for fair."
+
+"And if I say I won't go?"
+
+"You'll go if I strap you to your saddle."
+
+It was characteristic of Melissy that she made no further resistance. The
+sudden, wolfish gleam in his eyes had told her that he meant what he said.
+It was like her, too, that she made no outcry; that she did not shed tears
+or plead with him. A gallant spirit inhabited that slim, girlish body; and
+she yielded to the inevitable with quiet dignity. This surprised him
+greatly, and stung his reluctant admiration. At the same time, it set her
+apart from him and hedged her with spiritual barriers. Her body might
+ride with him into captivity; she was still captain of her soul.
+
+"You're a game one," he told her, as he helped her to the saddle.
+
+She did not answer, but looked straightforward between her horse's ears,
+without seeing him, waiting for him to give the word to start.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+
+IN DEAD MAN'S CACHE
+
+
+Not since the start of their journey had Melissy broken silence, save to
+answer, in few words as possible, the questions put to her by the outlaw.
+Yet her silence had not been sullenness. It had been the barrier which she
+had set up between them--one which he could not break down short of actual
+roughness.
+
+Of this she could not accuse him. Indeed, he had been thoughtful of her
+comfort. At sunset they had stopped by a spring, and he had shared with
+her such food as he had. Moreover, he had insisted that she should rest
+for a while before they took up the last stretch of the way.
+
+It was midnight now, and they had been traveling for many hours over rough
+mountain trails. There was more strength than one would look for in so
+slender a figure, yet Melissy was drooping with fatigue.
+
+"It's not far now. We'll be there in a few minutes," MacQueen promised
+her.
+
+They were ascending a narrow trail which ran along the sidehill through
+the timber. Presently they topped the summit, and the ground fell away
+from their feet to a bowl-shaped valley, over which the silvery moonshine
+played so that the basin seemed to swim in a magic sea of light.
+
+"Welcome to the Cache," he said to her.
+
+She was surprised out of her silence. "Dead Man's Cache?"
+
+"It has been called that."
+
+"Why?"
+
+She knew, but she wanted to see if he would tell a story which showed so
+plainly his own ruthlessness.
+
+He hesitated, but only for a moment.
+
+"There was a man named Havens. He had a reputation as a bad man, and I
+reckon he deserved it--if brand blotting, mail rustling, and shooting
+citizens are the credentials to win that title. Hard pressed on account of
+some deviltry, he drifted into this country, and was made welcome by those
+living here. The best we had was his. He was fed, outfitted, and kept safe
+from the law that was looking for him.
+
+"You would figure he was under big obligations to the men that did this
+for him--wouldn't you? But he was born skunk. When his chance came he
+offered to betray these men to the law, in exchange for a pardon for his
+own sneaking hide. The letter was found, and it was proved he wrote it.
+What ought those men to have done to him, Miss 'Lissie?"
+
+"I don't know." She shuddered.
+
+"There's got to be law, even in a place like this. We make our own laws,
+and the men that stay here have got to abide by them. Our law said this
+man must die. He died."
+
+She did not ask him how. The story went that the outlaws whom the wretched
+man had tried to sell let him escape on purpose--that, just as he thought
+he was free of them, their mocking laughter came to him from the rocks all
+around. He was completely surrounded. They had merely let him run into a
+trap. He escaped again, wandered without food for days, and again
+discovered that they had been watching him all the time. Turn whichever
+way he would, their rifles warned him back. He stumbled on, growing weaker
+and weaker. They would neither capture him nor let him go.
+
+For nearly a week the cruel game went on. Frequently he heard their voices
+in the hills about him. Sometimes he would call out to them pitifully to
+put him out of his misery. Only their horrible laughter answered. When he
+had reached the limit of endurance he lay down and died.
+
+And the man who had engineered that heartless revenge was riding beside
+her. He had been ready to tell her the whole story, if she had asked for
+it, and equally ready to justify it. Nothing could have shown her more
+plainly the character of the villain into whose hands she had fallen.
+
+They descended into the valley, winding in and out until they came
+suddenly upon ranch houses and a corral in a cleared space.
+
+A man came out of the shadows into the moonlight to meet them. Instantly
+Melissy recognized his walk. It was Boone.
+
+"Oh, it's you," MacQueen said coldly. "Any of the rest of the boys up?"
+
+"No."
+
+Not a dozen words had passed between them, but the girl sensed hostility.
+She was not surprised. Dunc Boone was not the man to take second place in
+any company of riff-raff, nor was MacQueen one likely to yield the
+supremacy he had fought to gain.
+
+The latter swung from the saddle and lifted Melissy from hers. As her feet
+struck the ground her face for the first time came full into the
+moonlight.
+
+Boone stifled a startled oath.
+
+"Melissy Lee!" Like a swiftly reined horse he swung around upon his chief.
+"What devil's work is this?"
+
+"My business, Dunc!" the other retorted in suave insult.
+
+"By God, no! I make it mine. This young lady's a friend of mine--or used
+to be. _Sabe_?"
+
+"I _sabe_ you'd better not try to sit in at this game, my friend."
+
+Boone swung abruptly upon Melissy. "How come you here, girl? Tell me!"
+
+And in three sentences she explained.
+
+"What's your play? Whyfor did you bring her?" the Arkansan demanded of
+MacQueen.
+
+The latter stood balanced on his heels with his feet wide apart. There was
+a scornful grin on his face, but his eyes were fixed warily on the other
+man.
+
+"What was I to do with her, Mr. Buttinski? She found out who I was. Could
+I send her home? If I did how was I to fix it so I could go to Mesa when
+it's necessary till we get this ransom business arranged?"
+
+"All right. But you understand she's a friend of mine. I'll not have her
+hurt."
+
+"Oh, go to the devil! I'm not in the habit of hurting young ladies."
+
+MacQueen swung on his heel insolently and knocked on the door of a cabin
+near.
+
+"Don't forget that I'm here when you need me," Boone told Melissy in a low
+voice.
+
+"I'll not forget," the girl made answer in a murmur.
+
+The wrinkled face of a Mexican woman appeared presently at a window.
+MacQueen jabbered a sentence or two in her language. She looked at Melissy
+and answered.
+
+The girl had not lived in Southern Arizona for twenty years without having
+a working knowledge of Spanish. Wherefore, she knew that her captor had
+ordered his own room prepared for her.
+
+While they waited for this to be made ready MacQueen hummed a snatch of a
+popular song. It happened to be a love ditty. Boone ground his teeth and
+glared at him, which appeared to amuse the other ruffian immensely.
+
+"Don't stay up on our account," MacQueen suggested presently with a
+malicious laugh. "We're not needing a chaperone any to speak of."
+
+The Mexican woman announced that the bedroom was ready and MacQueen
+escorted Melissy to the door of the room. He stood aside with mock
+gallantry to let her pass.
+
+"Have to lock you in," he apologized airily. "Not that it would do you any
+good to escape. We'd have you again inside of twenty-four hours. This bit
+of the hills takes a heap of knowing. But we don't want you running away.
+You're too tired. So I lock the door and lie down on the porch under your
+window. _Adios, senorita._"
+
+Melissy heard the key turn in the lock, and was grateful for the respite
+given her by the night. She was glad, too, that Boone was here. She knew
+him for a villain, but she hoped he would stand between her and MacQueen
+if the latter proved unruly in his attentions. Her guess was that Boone
+was jealous of the other--of his authority with the gang to which they
+both belonged, and now of his relationship to her. Out of this division
+might come hope for her.
+
+So tired was she that, in spite of her alarms, sleep took her almost as
+soon as her head touched the pillow. When she awakened the sun was shining
+in at her window above the curtain strung across its lower half.
+
+Some one was knocking at the door. When she asked who was there, in a
+voice which could not conceal its tremors, the answer came in feminine
+tones:
+
+"'Tis I--Rosario Chaves."
+
+The Mexican woman was not communicative, nor did she appear to be
+sympathetic. The plight of this girl might have moved even an unresponsive
+heart, but Rosario showed a stolid face to her distress. What had to be
+said, she said. For the rest, she declined conversation absolutely.
+
+Breakfast was served Melissy in her room, after which Rosario led her
+outdoors. The woman gave her to understand that she might walk about the
+cleared space, but must not pass into the woods beyond. To point the need
+of obedience, Rosario seated herself on the porch, and began doing some
+drawn work upon which she was engaged.
+
+Melissy walked toward the corral, but did not reach it. An old hag was
+seated in a chair beside one of the log cabins. From the color of her skin
+the girl judged her to be an Indian squaw. She wore moccasins, a dirty and
+shapeless one-piece dress, and a big sunbonnet, in which her head was
+buried.
+
+Sitting on the floor of the porch, about fifteen feet from her, was a
+hard-faced customer, with stony eyes like those of a snake. He was sewing
+on a bridle that had given way. Melissy noticed that from the pocket of
+his chaps the butt of a revolver peeped. She judged it to be the custom in
+Dead Man's Cache to go garnished with weapons.
+
+Her curiosity led her to deflect toward the old woman. But she had not
+taken three steps toward the cabin before the man with the jade eyes
+stopped her.
+
+"That'll be near enough, ma'am," he said, civilly enough. "This old crone
+has a crazy spell whenever a stranger comes nigh. She's nutty. It ain't
+safe to come nearer--is it, old Sit-in-the-Sun?"
+
+The squaw grunted. Simultaneously, she looked up, and Miss Lee thought
+that she had never seen more piercing eyes.
+
+"Is Sit-in-the-Sun her name?" asked the girl curiously.
+
+"That's the English of it. The Navajo word is a jawbreaker."
+
+"Doesn't she understand English?"
+
+"No more'n you do Choctaw, miss."
+
+A quick step crunched the gravel behind Melissy. She did not need to look
+around to know that here was Black MacQueen.
+
+"What's this--what's this, Hank?" he demanded sharply.
+
+"The young lady started to come up and speak to old Sit-in-the-Sun. I was
+just explaining to her how crazy the old squaw is," Jeff answered with a
+grin.
+
+"Oh! Is that all?" MacQueen turned to Melissy.
+
+"She's plumb loony--dangerous, too. I don't want you to go near her."
+
+The girl's eyes flashed. "Very considerate of you. But if you want to
+protect me from the really dangerous people here, you had better send me
+home."
+
+"I tell you they do as I say, every man jack of them. I'd flay one alive
+if he insulted you."
+
+"It's a privilege you don't sublet then," she retorted swiftly.
+
+Admiration gleamed through his amusement. "Gad, you've got a sharp tongue.
+I'd pity the man you marry--unless he drove with a tight rein."
+
+"That's not what we're discussing, Mr. MacQueen. Are you going to send me
+home?"
+
+"Not till you've made us a nice long visit, my dear. You're quite safe
+here. My men are plumb gentle. They'll eat out of your hand. They don't
+insult ladies. I've taught 'em----"
+
+"Pity you couldn't teach their leader, too."
+
+He acknowledged the hit. "Come again, dearie. But what's your complaint?
+Haven't I treated you white so far?"
+
+"No. You insulted me grossly when you brought me here by force."
+
+"Did I lay a hand on you?"
+
+"If it had been necessary you would have."
+
+"You're right, I would," he nodded. "I've taken a fancy to you. You're a
+good-looking and a plucky little devil. I've a notion to fall in love with
+you."
+
+"Don't!"
+
+"Why not? Say I'm a villain and a bad lot. Wouldn't it be a good thing for
+me to tie up with a fine, straight-up young lady like you? Me, I like the
+way your eyes flash. You've got a devil of a temper, haven't you?"
+
+They had been walking toward a pile of rocks some little way from the
+cluster of cabins. Now he sat down and smiled impudently across at her.
+
+"That's my business," she flung back stormily.
+
+Genially he nodded. "So it is. Mine, too, when we trot in double
+harness."
+
+Her scornful eyes swept up and down him. "I wouldn't marry you if you were
+the last man on earth."
+
+"No. Well, I'm not partial to that game myself. I didn't mention
+matrimony, did I?"
+
+The meaning she read in his mocking, half-closed eyes startled the girl.
+Seeing this, he added with a shrug:
+
+"Just as you say about that. We'll make you Mrs. MacQueen on the level if
+you like."
+
+The passion in her surged up. "I'd rather lie dead at your feet--I'd
+rather starve in these hills--I'd rather put a knife in my heart!"
+
+He clapped his hands. "Fine! Fine! That Bernhardt woman hasn't got a
+thing on you when it comes to acting, my dear. You put that across bully.
+Never saw it done better."
+
+"You--coward!" Her voice broke and she turned to leave him.
+
+"Stop!" The ring of the word brought her feet to a halt. MacQueen padded
+across till he faced her. "Don't make any mistake, girl. You're mine. I
+don't care how. If it suits you to have a priest mumble words over us,
+good enough. But I'm the man you've got to get ready to love."
+
+"I hate you."
+
+"That's a good start, you little catamount."
+
+"I'd rather die--a thousand times rather."
+
+"Not you, my dear. You think you would right now, but inside of a week
+you'll be hunting for pet names to give me."
+
+She ran blindly toward the house where her room was. On the way she passed
+at a little distance Dunc Boone and did not see him. His hungry eyes
+followed her--a slender creature of white and russet and gold, vivid as a
+hillside poppy, compact of life and fire and grace. He, too, was a
+miscreant and a villain, lost to honor and truth, but just now she held
+his heart in the hollow of her tightly clenched little fist. Good men and
+bad, at bottom we are all made of the same stuff, once we are down to the
+primal emotions that go deeper than civilization's veneer.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+
+"TRAPPED!"
+
+
+Black MacQueen rolled a cigarette and sauntered toward the other outlaw.
+
+"I reckon you better saddle up and take a look over the Flattops, Dunc.
+The way I figure it Lee's posse must be somewhere over there. Swing around
+toward the Elkhorns and get back to report by to-morrow evening, say."
+
+Boone looked at him in an ugly manner. "Nothin' doing, MacQueen."
+
+"What's that?"
+
+"I'm no greaser, my friend. Orders don't go with me."
+
+"They don't, eh? Who's major domo of this outfit?"
+
+"I'm going to stay right here in this valley to-night. See?"
+
+"What's eatin' you, man?"
+
+"And every night so long as Melissy Lee stays."
+
+MacQueen watched him with steady, hostile eyes. "So it's the girl, is it?
+Want to cut in, do you? Oh, no, my friend. Two's company; three's a
+crowd. She's mine."
+
+"No."
+
+"Yes. And another thing, Mr. Boone. I don't stand for any interference in
+my plans. Make a break at it and you'll take a hurry up journey to kingdom
+come."
+
+"Or you will."
+
+"Don't bank on that off chance. The boys are with me. You're alone. If I
+give the word they'll bump you off. _Don't make a mistake, Boone._"
+
+The Arkansan hesitated. What MacQueen said was true enough. His
+overbearing disposition had made him unpopular. He knew the others would
+side against him and that if it came to a showdown they would snuff out
+his life as a man does the flame of a candle. The rage died out of his
+eyes and gave place to a look of cunning.
+
+"It's your say-so, Black. But there will be a day when it ain't. Don't
+forget that."
+
+"And in the meantime you'll ride the Flattops when I give the word?"
+
+Boone nodded sulkily. "I said you had the call, didn't I?"
+
+"Then ride 'em now, damn you. And don't show up in the Cache till
+to-morrow night."
+
+MacQueen turned on his heel and strutted away. He was elated at his easy
+victory. If he had seen the look that followed him he might not have been
+so quiet in his mind.
+
+But on the surface he had cinched his leadership. Boone saddled and rode
+out of the Cache without another word to anybody. Sullen and vindictive he
+might be, but cowed he certainly seemed. MacQueen celebrated by frequent
+trips to his sleeping quarters, where each time he resorted to a bottle
+and a glass. No man had ever seen him intoxicated, but there were times
+when he drank a good deal for a few days at a stretch. His dissipation
+would be followed by months of total abstinence.
+
+All day the man persecuted Melissy with his attentions. His passion was
+veiled under a manner of mock deference, of insolent assurance, but as the
+hours passed the fears of the girl grew upon her. There were moments when
+she turned sick with waves of dread. In the sunshine, under the open sky,
+she could hold her own, but under cover of the night's blackness ghastly
+horrors would creep toward her to destroy.
+
+Nor was there anybody to whom she might turn for help. Lane and Jackson
+were tools of their leader. The Mexican woman could do nothing even if she
+would. Boone alone might have helped her, and he had ridden away to save
+his own skin. So MacQueen told her to emphasize his triumph and her
+helplessness.
+
+To her fancy dusk fell over the valley like a pall. It brought with it the
+terrible night, under cover of which unthinkable things might be done.
+With no appetite, she sat down to supper opposite her captor. To see him
+gloat over her made her heart sink. Her courage was of no avail against
+the thing that threatened.
+
+Supper over, he made her sit with him on the porch for an hour to listen
+to his boasts of former conquests. And when he let her take her way to her
+room it was not "Good-night" but a mocking "Au revoir" he murmured as he
+bent to kiss her hand.
+
+Melissy found Rosario waiting for her, crouched in the darkness of the
+room that had been given the young woman. The Mexican spoke in her own
+language, softly, with many glances of alarm to make sure they were
+alone.
+
+"Hist, senorita. Here is a note. Read it. Destroy it. Swear not to betray
+Rosario."
+
+By the light of a match Melissy read:
+
+  "Behind the big rocks. In half an hour.
+
+                                                           "A Friend."
+What could it mean? Who could have sent it? Rosario would answer no
+questions. She snatched the note, tore it into fragments, chewed them into
+a pulp. Then, still shaking her head obstinately, hurriedly left the
+room.
+
+But at least it meant hope. Her mind flew from her father to Jack Flatray,
+Bellamy, young Yarnell. It might be any of them. Or it might be O'Connor,
+who, perhaps, had by some miracle escaped.
+
+The minutes were hours to her. Interminably they dragged. The fear rose in
+her that MacQueen might come in time to cut off her escape. At last, in
+her stocking feet, carrying her shoes in her hand, she stole into the
+hall, out to the porch, and from it to the shadows of the cottonwoods.
+
+It was a night of both moon and stars. She had to cross a space washed in
+silvery light, taking the chance that nobody would see her. But first she
+stooped in the shadows to slip the shoes upon her feet. Her heart beat
+against her side as she had once seen that of a frightened mouse do. It
+seemed impossible for her to cover all that moonlit open unseen. Every
+moment she expected an alarm to ring out in the silent night. But none
+came.
+
+Safely she reached the big rocks. A voice called to her softly. She
+answered, and came face to face with Boone. A drawn revolver was in his
+hand.
+
+"You made it," he panted, as a man might who had been running hard.
+
+"Yes," she whispered. "But they'll soon know. Let us get away."
+
+"If you hadn't come I was going in to kill him."
+
+She noticed the hard glitter in his eyes as he spoke, the crouched look of
+the padding tiger ready for its kill. The man was torn with hatred and
+jealousy.
+
+Already they were moving back through the rocks to a dry wash that ran
+through the valley. The bed of this they followed for nearly a mile.
+Deflecting from it they pushed across the valley toward what appeared to
+be a sheer rock wall. With a twist to the left they swung back of a face
+of rock, turned sharply to the right, and found themselves in a fissure
+Melissy had not at all expected. Here ran a little canyon known only to
+those few who rode up and down it on the nefarious business of their
+unwholesome lives.
+
+Boone spoke harshly, breaking for the first time in half an hour his moody
+silence.
+
+"Safe at last. By God, I've evened my score with Black MacQueen."
+
+And from the cliff above came the answer--a laugh full of mocking deviltry
+and malice.
+
+The Arkansan turned upon Melissy a startled face of agony, in which
+despair and hate stood out of a yellow pallor.
+
+"Trapped."
+
+It was his last word to her. He swept the girl back against the shelter of
+the wall and ran crouching toward the entrance.
+
+A bullet zipped--a second--a third. He stumbled, but did not fall.
+Turning, he came back, dodging like a hunted fox. As he passed her,
+Melissy saw that his face was ghastly. He ran with a limp.
+
+A second time she heard the cackle of laughter. Guns cracked. Still the
+doomed man pushed forward. He went down, struck in the body, but dragged
+himself to his feet and staggered on.
+
+All this time he had seen nobody at whom he could fire. Not a shot had
+come from his revolver. He sank behind a rock for shelter. The ping of a
+bullet on the shale beside him brought the tortured man to his feet. He
+looked wildly about him, the moon shining on his bare head, and plunged up
+the canyon.
+
+And now it appeared his unseen tormentors were afraid he might escape
+them. Half a dozen shots came close together. Boone sank to the ground,
+writhed like a crushed worm, and twisted over so that his face was to the
+moonlight.
+
+Melissy ran forward and knelt beside him.
+
+"They've got me ... in half a dozen places.... I'm going fast."
+
+"Oh, no ... no," the girl protested.
+
+"Yep.... Surest thing you know.... I did you dirt onct, girl. And I've
+been a bad lot--a wolf, a killer."
+
+"Never mind that now. You died to save me. Always I'll remember that."
+
+"Onct you 'most loved me.... But it wouldn't have done. I'm a wolf and
+you're a little white lamb. Is Flatray the man?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Thought so. Well, he's square. I rigged it up on him about the rustling.
+I was the man you liked to 'a' caught that day years ago."
+
+"You!"
+
+"Yep." He broke off abruptly. "I'm going, girl.... It's gittin' black.
+Hold my hand till--till----"
+
+He gave a shudder and seemed to fall together. He was dead.
+
+Melissy heard the sound of rubble slipping. Some one was lowering himself
+cautiously down the side of the canyon. A man dropped to the wash and
+strutted toward her. He kept his eyes fixed on the lifeless form, rifle
+ready for action at an instant's notice. When he reached his victim he
+pushed the body with his foot, made sure of no trap, and relaxed his
+alertness.
+
+"Dead as a hammer."
+
+The man was MacQueen. He turned to Melissy and nodded jauntily.
+
+"Good evening, my dear. Just taking a little stroll?" he asked
+ironically.
+
+The girl leaned against the cold wall and covered her face with her arm.
+She was sobbing hysterically.
+
+The outlaw seized her by the shoulders and swung her round. "Cut that out,
+girl," he ordered roughly.
+
+Melissy caught at her sobs and tried to check them.
+
+"He got what was coming to him, what he's been playing for a long time. I
+warned him, but the fool wouldn't see it."
+
+"How did you know?" she asked, getting out her question a word at a time.
+
+"Knew it all the time. Rosario brought his note to me. I told her to take
+it to you and keep her mouth shut."
+
+"You planned his death."
+
+"If you like to put it that way. Now we'll go home and forget this
+foolishness. Jeff, bring the horses round to the mouth of the gulch."
+
+Melissy felt suddenly very, very tired and old. Her feet dragged like
+those of an Indian squaw following her master. It was as though heavy
+irons weighted her ankles.
+
+MacQueen helped her to one of the horses Jackson brought to the lip of the
+gulch. Weariness rode on her shoulders all the way back. The soul of her
+was crushed beneath the misfortunes that oppressed her.
+
+Long before they reached the ranch houses Rosario came running to meet
+them. Plainly she was in great excitement.
+
+"The prisoners have escaped," she cried to MacQueen.
+
+"Escaped. How?" demanded Black.
+
+"Some one must have helped them. I heard a window smash and ran out. The
+young ranger and another man were coming out of the last cabin with the
+old man. I could do nothing. They ran."
+
+They had been talking in her own language. MacQueen jabbed another
+question at her.
+
+"Which way?"
+
+"Toward the Pass."
+
+The outlaw ripped out an oath. "We've got 'em. They can't reach it without
+horses as quick as we can with them." He whirled upon Melissy. "March into
+the house, girl. Don't you dare make a move. I'm leaving Buck here to
+watch you." Sharply he swung to the man Lane. "Buck, if she makes a break
+to get away, riddle her full of holes. You hear me."
+
+A minute later, from the place where she lay face down on the bed, Melissy
+heard him and his men gallop away.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+
+AN ESCAPE AND A CAPTURE
+
+
+Far up in the mountains, in that section where head the Roaring Fork, One
+Horse Creek, and the Del Oro, is a vast tract of wild, untraveled country
+known vaguely as the Bad Lands. Somewhere among the thousand and one
+canyons which cleft the huddled hills lay hidden Dead Man's Cache. Here
+Black MacQueen retreated on those rare occasions when the pursuit grew hot
+on his tracks. So the current report ran.
+
+Whether the abductors of Simon West were to be found in the Cache or at
+some other nest in the almost inaccessible ridges Jack Flatray had no
+means of knowing. His plan was to follow the Roaring Fork almost to its
+headquarters, and there establish a base for his hunt. It might take him a
+week to flush his game. It might take a month. He clamped his bulldog jaw
+to see the thing out to a finish.
+
+Jack did not make the mistake of underestimating his job. He had followed
+the trail of bad men often enough to know that, in a frontier country, no
+hunt is so desperate as the man-hunt. Such men are never easily taken,
+even if they do not have all the advantage in the deadly game of hide and
+seek that is played in the timber and the pockets of the hills.
+
+And here the odds all lay with the hunted. They knew every ravine and
+gulch. Day by day their scout looked down from mountain ledges to watch
+the progress of the posse.
+
+Moreover, Flatray could never tell at what moment his covey might be
+startled from its run. The greatest vigilance was necessary to make sure
+his own party would not be ambushed. Yet slowly he combed the arroyos and
+the ridges, drawing always closer to that net of gulches in which he knew
+Dead Man's Cache must be located.
+
+During the day the sheriff split his party into couples. Bellamy and Alan
+McKinstra, Farnum and Charlie Hymer, young Yarnell and the sheriff. So
+Jack had divided his posse, thus leaving at the head of each detail one
+old and wise head. Each night the parties met at the rendezvous appointed
+for the wranglers with the pack horses. From sunrise to sunset often no
+face was seen other than those of their own outfit. Sometimes a solitary
+sheep herder was discovered at his post. Always the work was hard,
+discouraging, and apparently futile. But the young sheriff never thought
+of quitting.
+
+The provisions gave out. Jack sent back Hal Yarnell and Hegler, the
+wrangler, to bring in a fresh supply. Meanwhile the young sheriff took a
+big chance and scouted alone. He parted from the young Arkansan at the
+head of a gulch which twisted snakelike into the mountains; Yarnell and
+the pack outfit to ride to Mammoth, Flatray to dive still deeper into the
+mesh of hills. He had the instinct of the scout to stick to the high
+places as much as he could. Whenever it was possible he followed ridges,
+so that no spy could look down upon him as he traveled. Sometimes the
+contour of the country drove him into the open or down into hollows. But
+in such places he advanced with the swift stealth of an Indian.
+
+It was on one of these occasions, when he had been driven into a dark and
+narrow canyon, that he came to a sudden halt. He was looking at an empty
+tomato can. Swinging down from his saddle, he picked it up without
+dismounting. A little juice dripped from the can to the ground.
+
+Flatray needed no explanation. In Arizona men on the range often carry a
+can of tomatoes instead of a water canteen. Nothing alleviates thirst like
+the juice of this acid fruit. Some one had opened this can within two
+hours. Otherwise the sun would have dried the moisture.
+
+Jack took his rifle from its place beneath his legs and set it across the
+saddle in front of him. Very carefully he continued on his way, watching
+every rock and bush ahead of him. Here and there in the sand were printed
+the signs of a horse going in the same direction as his.
+
+Up and down, in and out of a maze of crooked paths, working by ever so
+devious a way higher into the chain of mountains, Jack followed his
+leader. Now he would lose the hoofmarks; now he would pick them up again.
+And, at the last, they brought him to the rim of a basin, a bowl of wooded
+ravines, of twisted ridges, of bleak spurs jutting into late pastures
+almost green. It was now past sunset. Dusk was filtering down from the
+blue peaks. As he looked a star peeped out low on the horizon.
+
+But was it a star? He glimpsed it between trees. The conviction grew on
+him that what he saw was the light of a lamp. A tangle of rough country
+lay between him and that beacon, but there before him lay his destination.
+At last he had found his way into Dead Man's Cache.
+
+The sheriff lost no time, for he knew that if he should get lost in the
+darkness on one of these forest slopes he might wander all night. A rough
+trail led him down into the basin. Now he would lose sight of the light.
+Half an hour later, pushing to the summit of a hill, he might find it.
+After a time there twinkled a second beside the first. He was getting
+close to a settlement of some kind.
+
+Below him in the darkness lay a stretch of open meadow rising to the
+wooded foothills. Behind these a wall of rugged mountains encircled the
+valley like a gigantic crooked arm. Already he could make out faintly the
+outlines of the huddled buildings.
+
+Slipping from his horse, Jack went forward cautiously on foot. He was
+still a hundred yards from the nearest hut when dogs bayed warning of his
+approach. He waited, rifle in hand. No sign of human life showed except
+the two lights shining from as many windows. Flatray counted four other
+cabins as dark as Egypt.
+
+Very slowly he crept forward, always with one eye to his retreat. Why did
+nobody answer the barking of the dogs? Was he being watched all the time?
+But how could he be, since he was completely cloaked in darkness?
+
+So at last he came to the nearest cabin, crept to the window, and looked
+in. A man lay on a bed. His hands and feet were securely tied and a second
+rope wound round so as to bind him to the bunk.
+
+Flatray tapped softly on a pane. Instantly the head of the bound man
+slewed round.
+
+"Friend?"
+
+The prisoner asked it ever so gently, but the sheriff heard.
+
+"Yes."
+
+"The top part of the window is open. You can crawl over, I reckon."
+
+Jack climbed on the sill and from it through the window. Almost before he
+reached the floor his knife was out and he was slashing at the ropes.
+
+"Better put the light out, pardner," suggested the man he was freeing,
+and the officer noticed that there was no tremor in the cool, steady
+voice.
+
+"That's right. We'd make a fine mark through the window."
+
+And the light went out.
+
+"I'm Bucky O'Connor. Who are you?"
+
+"Jack Flatray."
+
+They spoke together in whispers. Though both were keyed to the highest
+pitch of excitement they were as steady as eight-day clocks. O'Connor
+stretched his limbs, flexing them this way and that, so that he might have
+perfect control of them. He worked especially over the forearm and fingers
+of his right arm.
+
+Flatray handed him a revolver.
+
+"Whenever you're ready, Lieutenant."
+
+"All right. It's the cabin next to this."
+
+They climbed out of the window noiselessly and crept to the next hut. The
+door was locked, the window closed.
+
+"We've got to smash the window. Nothing else for it," Flatray whispered.
+
+"Looks like it. That means we'll have to shoot our way out."
+
+With the butt of his rifle the sheriff shattered the woodwork of the
+window, driving the whole frame into the room.
+
+"What is it?" a frightened voice demanded.
+
+"Friends, Mr. West. Just a minute."
+
+It took them scarce longer than that to free him and to get him into the
+open. A Mexican woman came screaming out of an adjoining cabin.
+
+The young men caught each an arm of the capitalist and hurried him
+forward.
+
+"Hell'll be popping in a minute," Flatray explained.
+
+But they reached the shelter of the underbrush without a shot having been
+fired. Nor had a single man appeared to dispute their escape.
+
+"Looks like most of the family is away from home to-night," Bucky
+hazarded.
+
+"Maybe so, but they're liable to drop in any minute. We'll keep covering
+ground."
+
+They circled round toward the sheriff's horse. As soon as they reached it
+West, still stiff from want of circulation in his cramped limbs, was
+boosted into the saddle.
+
+"It's going to be a good deal of a guess to find our way out of the
+Cache," Jack explained. "Even in the daytime it would take a 'Pache, but
+at night--well, here's hoping the luck's good."
+
+They found it not so good as they had hoped. For hours they wandered in
+mesquit, dragged themselves through cactus, crossed washes, and climbed
+hills.
+
+"This will never do. We'd better give it up till daylight. We're not
+getting anywhere," the sheriff suggested.
+
+They did as he advised. As soon as a faint gray sifted into the sky they
+were on the move again. But whichever way they climbed it was always to
+come up against steep cliffs too precipitous to be scaled.
+
+The ranger officer pointed to a notch beyond a cowbacked hill. "I wouldn't
+be sure, but it looks like that was the way they brought me into the
+Cache. I could tell if I were up there. What's the matter with my going
+ahead and settling the thing? If I'm right I'll come back and let you
+know."
+
+Jack looked at West. The railroad man was tired and drawn. He was not used
+to galloping over the hills all night.
+
+"All right. We'll be here when you come back," Flatray said, and flung
+himself on the ground.
+
+West followed his example.
+
+It must have been half an hour later that Flatray heard a twig snap under
+an approaching foot. He had been scanning the valley with his glasses,
+having given West instructions to keep a lookout in the rear. He swung his
+head round sharply, and with it his rifle.
+
+"You're covered, you fool," cried the man who was strutting toward them.
+
+"Stop there. Not another step," Flatray called sharply.
+
+The man stopped, his rifle half raised. "We've got you on every side,
+man." He lifted his voice. "Jeff--Hank--Steve! Let him know you're
+alive."
+
+Three guns cracked and kicked up the dust close to the sheriff.
+
+"What do you want with us?" Flatray asked, sparring for time.
+
+"Drop your gun. If you don't we'll riddle you both."
+
+West spoke to Jack promptly. "Do as he says. It's MacQueen."
+
+Flatray hesitated. He could kill MacQueen probably, but almost certainly
+he and West would pay the penalty. He reluctantly put his rifle down. "All
+right. It's your call."
+
+"Where's O'Connor?"
+
+The sheriff looked straight at him. "Haven't you enough of us for one
+gather?"
+
+The outlaws were closing in on them cautiously.
+
+"Not without that smart man hunter. Where is he?"
+
+"I don't know."
+
+"The devil you don't."
+
+"We separated early this morning--thought it would give us a better chance
+for a getaway." Jack gave a sudden exclamation of surprise. "So it was
+Black MacQueen himself who posed as O'Connor down at Mesa."
+
+"Guessed it right, my friend. And I'll tell you one thing: you've made the
+mistake of your life butting into Dead Man's Cache. Your missing friend
+O'Connor was due to hand in his checks to-day. Since you've taken his
+place it will be you that crosses the divide, Mr. Sheriff. You'd better
+tell where he is, for if we don't get Mr. Bucky it will be God help J.
+Flatray."
+
+The dapper little villain exuded a smug, complacent cruelty. It was no use
+for the sheriff to remind himself that such things weren't done nowadays,
+that the times of Geronimo and the Apache Kid were past forever. Black
+MacQueen would go the limit in deviltry if he set his mind to it.
+
+Yet Flatray answered easily, without any perceptible hesitation: "I reckon
+I'll play my hand and let Bucky play his."
+
+"Suits me if it does you. Jeff, collect that hardware. Now, while you boys
+beat up the hills for O'Connor, I'll trail back to camp with these two
+all-night picnickers."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+
+A BARGAIN
+
+
+Melissy saw the two prisoners brought in, though she could not tell at
+that distance who they were. Her watch told her that it was four-thirty.
+She had slept scarcely at all during the night, but now she lay down on
+the bed in her clothes.
+
+The next she knew, Rosario was calling her to get up for breakfast. The
+girl dressed and followed Rosario to the adjoining cabin. MacQueen was not
+there, and Melissy ate alone. She was given to understand that she might
+walk up and down in front of the houses for a few minutes after breakfast.
+Naturally she made the most of the little liberty allowed her.
+
+The old squaw Sit-in-the-Sun squatted in front of the last hut, her back
+against the log wall. The man called Buck sat yawning on a rock a few
+yards away. What struck Melissy as strange was that the squaw was figuring
+on the back of an old envelope with the stub of a lead pencil.
+
+The young woman walked leisurely past the cabin for perhaps a dozen
+yards.
+
+"That'll be about far enough. You don't want to tire yourself, Miss Lee,"
+Buck Lane called, with a grin.
+
+Melissy stopped, stood looking at the mountains for a few minutes, and
+turned back. Sit-in-the-Sun looked quickly at her, and at the same moment
+she tore the paper in two and her fingers opened to release one piece of
+the envelope upon which she had been writing. A puff of wind carried it
+almost directly in front of the girl. Lane was still yawning sleepily, his
+gaze directed toward the spot where he presently expected Rosario to step
+out and call him to breakfast. Melissy dropped her handkerchief, stooped
+to pick it up, and gathered at the same time in a crumpled heap into her
+hand the fragment of an envelope. Without another glance at the squaw, the
+young woman kept on her way, sauntered to the porch, and lingered there as
+if in doubt.
+
+"I'm tired," she announced to Rosario, and turned to her rooms.
+
+"_Si, senorita,_" answered her attendant quietly.
+
+Once inside, Melissy lay down on her bed, with her back to the window, and
+smoothed out the torn envelope. On one side were some disjointed memoranda
+which she did not understand.
+
+                K. C. & T. 93
+                D. & R. B. 87
+                Float $10,000,000 Cortes for extension.
+
+That was all, but certainly a strange puzzle for a Navajo squaw to set
+her.
+
+She turned the paper over, to find the other side close-packed with
+writing.
+
+  Miss Lee:
+
+  In the last cabin but one is a prisoner, your friend Sheriff Flatray.
+  He is to be shot in an hour. I have offered any sum for his life and
+  been refused. For God's sake save him somehow.
+
+                                                           Simon West.
+Jack Flatray here, and about to be murdered! The thing was incredible. And
+yet--and yet---- Was it so impossible, after all? Some one had broken into
+the Cache and released the prisoners. Who more likely than Jack to have
+done this? And later they had captured him and condemned him for what he
+had done.
+
+Melissy reconstructed the scene in a flash. The Indian squaw was West. He
+had been rigged up in that paraphernalia to deceive any chance mountaineer
+who might drop into the valley by accident.
+
+No doubt, when he first saw Melissy, the railroad magnate had been passing
+his time in making notes about his plans for the system he controlled. But
+when he had caught sight of her, he had written the note, under the very
+eyes of the guard, had torn the envelope as if it were of no importance,
+and tossed the pieces away. He had taken the thousandth chance that his
+note might fall into the hands of the person to whom it was directed.
+
+All this she understood without giving it conscious thought. For her whole
+mind was filled with the horror of what she had learned. Jack Flatray, the
+man she loved, was to be killed. He was to be shot down in an hour.
+
+With the thought, she was at her door--only to find that it had been
+quietly locked while she lay on the bed. No doubt they had meant to keep
+her a close prisoner until the thing they were about to do was finished.
+She beat upon it, called to Rosario to let her out, wrung her hands in her
+desperation. Then she remembered the window. It was a cheap and flimsy
+case, and had been jammed so that her strength was not sufficient to raise
+it.
+
+Her eye searched the room for a weapon, and found an Indian tom-tom club.
+With this she smashed the panes and beat down the wooden cross bars of the
+sash. Agile as a forest fawn, she slipped through the opening she had made
+and ran toward the far cabin.
+
+A group of men surrounded the door; and, as she drew near, it opened to
+show three central figures. MacQueen was one, Rosario Chaves a second; but
+the most conspicuous was a bareheaded young man, with his hands tied
+behind him. He was going to his death, but a glance was enough to show
+that he went unconquered and unconquerable. His step did not drag. There
+was a faint, grave smile on his lips; and in his eye was the dynamic spark
+that proclaimed him still master of his fate. The woolen shirt had been
+unbuttoned and pulled back to make way for the rope that lay loosely about
+his neck, so that she could not miss the well-muscled slope of his fine
+shoulders, or the gallant set of the small head upon the brown throat.
+
+The man who first caught sight of Melissy spoke in a low voice to his
+chief. MacQueen turned his head sharply to see her, took a dozen steps
+toward her, then upbraided the Mexican woman, who had run out after
+Melissy.
+
+"I told you to lock her door--to make sure of it."
+
+"_Si, senor_--I did."
+
+"Then how----" He stopped, and looked to Miss Lee for an explanation.
+
+"I broke the window."
+
+The outlaw noticed then that her hand was bleeding. "Broke the window!
+Why?"
+
+"I had to get out! I had to stop you!"
+
+He attempted no denial of what he was about to do. "How did you know? Did
+Rosario tell you?" he asked curtly.
+
+"No--no! I found out--just by chance."
+
+"What chance?" He was plainly disconcerted that she had come to interfere,
+and as plainly eager to punish the person who had disclosed to her this
+thing, which he would have liked to do quietly, without her knowledge.
+
+"Never mind that. Nobody is to blame. Say I overheard a sentence. Thank
+God I did, and I am in time."
+
+There was no avoiding it now. He had to fight it out with her. "In time
+for what?" he wanted to know, his eyes narrowing to vicious pin points.
+
+"To save him."
+
+"No--no! He must die," cried the Mexican woman.
+
+Melissy was amazed at her vehemence, at the passion of hate that trembled
+in the voice of the old woman.
+
+MacQueen nodded. "It is out of my hands, you see. He has been condemned."
+
+"But why?"
+
+"Tell her, Rosario."
+
+The woman poured her story forth fluently in the native tongue. O'Connor
+had killed her son--did not deny that he had done it. And just because
+Tony had tried to escape. This man had freed the ranger. Very well. He
+should take O'Connor's place. Let him die the death. A life for a life.
+Was that not fair?
+
+Flatray turned his head and caught sight of Melissy. A startled cry died
+on his lips.
+
+"Jack!" She held out both hands to him as she ran toward him.
+
+The sheriff took her in his arms to console her. For the girl's face was
+working in a stress of emotion.
+
+"Oh, I'm in time--I'm in time. Thank God I'm in time."
+
+Jack waited a moment to steady his voice. "How came you here, Melissy?"
+
+"He brought me--Black MacQueen. I hated him for it, but now I'm glad--so
+glad--because I can save you."
+
+Jack winced. He looked over her shoulder at MacQueen, taking it all in
+with an air of pleasant politeness. And one look was enough to tell him
+that there was no hope for him. The outlaw had the complacent manner of a
+cat which has just got at the cream. That Melissy loved him would be an
+additional reason for wiping him off the map. And in that instant a fierce
+joy leaped up in Flatray and surged through him, an emotion stronger than
+the fear of death. She loved him. MacQueen could not take that away from
+him.
+
+"It's all a mistake," Melissy went on eagerly. "Of course they can't blame
+you for what Lieutenant O'Connor did. It is absurd--ridiculous."
+
+"Certainly." MacQueen tugged at his little black mustache and kept his
+black eyes on her constantly. "That's not what we're blaming him for. The
+indictment against your friend is that he interfered when it wasn't his
+business."
+
+"But it was his business. Don't you know he's sheriff? He had to do it."
+Melissy turned to the outlaw impetuously.
+
+"So. And I have to play my hand out, too. It wipes out Mr. Flatray. Sorry,
+but business is business."
+
+"But--but----" Melissy grew pale as the icy fear gripped her heart that
+the man meant to go on with the crime. "Don't you see? He's the sheriff?"
+
+"And I never did love sheriffs," drawled MacQueen.
+
+The girl repeated herself helplessly. "It was his sworn duty. That was how
+he looked at it."
+
+A ghost of an ironic smile flitted across the face of the outlaw chief.
+"Rosario's sworn duty is to avenge her son's death. That is how she looks
+at it. The rest of us swore the oath with her."
+
+"But Lieutenant O'Connor had the law back of him. This is murder!"
+
+"Not at all. It is the law of the valley--a life for a life."
+
+"But---- Oh, no--no--no!"
+
+"Yes."
+
+The finality of it appalled her. She felt as if she were butting her head
+against a stone wall. She knew that argument and entreaty were of no
+avail, yet she desperately besought first one and then another of them to
+save the prisoner. Each in turn shook his head. She could see that none of
+them, save Rosario, bore him a grudge; yet none would move to break the
+valley oath. At the last, she was through with her promises and her
+prayers. She had spent them all, and had come up against the wall of blank
+despair.
+
+Then Jack's grave smile thanked her. "You've done what you could,
+Melissy."
+
+She clung to him wildly. "Oh, no--no! I can't let you go, Jack. I can't. I
+can't."
+
+"I reckon it's got to be, dear," he told her gently.
+
+But her breaking heart could not stand that. There must somehow be a way
+to save him. She cast about desperately for one, and had not found it when
+she begged the outlaw chief to see her alone.
+
+"No use." He shook his head.
+
+"But just for five minutes! That can't do any harm, can it?"
+
+"And no good, either."
+
+"Yet I ask it. You might do that much for me," she pleaded.
+
+Her despair had moved him; for he was human, after all. That he was
+troubled about it annoyed him a good deal. Her arrival on the scene had
+made things unpleasant for everybody. Ungraciously he assented, as the
+easiest way out of the difficulty.
+
+The two moved off to the corral. It was perhaps thirty yards distant, and
+they reached it before either of them spoke. She was the first to break
+the silence.
+
+[Illustration: "OH, NO--NO! I CAN'T LET YOU GO, JACK. I CAN'T. I CAN'T."
+_Page 294._]
+
+"You won't do this dreadful thing--surely, you won't do it."
+
+"No use saying another word about it. I told you that," he answered
+doggedly.
+
+"But---- Oh, don't you see? It's one of those things no white man can do.
+Once it's done, you have put the bars up against decency for the rest of
+your life."
+
+"I reckon I'll have to risk that--and down in your heart you don't believe
+it, because you think I've had the bars up for years."
+
+She had come to an impasse already. She tried another turn. "And you said
+you cared for me! Yet you are willing to make me unhappy for the rest of
+my life."
+
+"Why, no! I'm willing to make you happy. There's fish in the sea just as
+good as any that ever were caught," he smirked.
+
+"But it would help you to free him. Don't you see? It's your chance. You
+can begin again, now. You can make him your friend."
+
+His eyes were hard and grim. "I don't want him for a friend, and you're
+dead wrong if you think I could make this a lever to square myself with
+the law. I couldn't. He wouldn't let me, for one thing--he isn't that
+kind."
+
+"And you said you cared for me!" she repeated helplessly, wringing her
+hands in her despair. "But at the first chance you fail me."
+
+"Can't you see it isn't a personal matter? I've got nothing against
+him--nothing to speak of. I'd give him to you, if I could. But it's not my
+say-so. The thing is out of my hands."
+
+"You could save him, if you set yourself to."
+
+"Sure, I could--if I would pay the price. But I won't pay."
+
+"That's it. You would have to give Rosario something--make some
+concession," she said eagerly.
+
+"And I'm not willing to pay the price," he told her. "His life's forfeit.
+Hasn't he been hunting us for a week?"
+
+"Let me pay it," she cried. "I have money in my own right--seven thousand
+dollars. I'll give it all to save him."
+
+He shook his head. "No use. We've turned down a big offer from West. Your
+seven thousand isn't a drop in the bucket."
+
+She beat her hands together wildly. "There must be some way to save him."
+
+The outlaw was looking at her with narrowed eyes. He saw a way, and was
+working it out in his mind. "You're willing to pay, are you?" he asked.
+
+"Yes--yes! All I have."
+
+He put his arms akimbo on the corral fence, and looked long at her.
+"Suppose the price can't be paid in money, Miss Lee."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+"Money isn't the only thing in this world. There are lots of things it
+won't buy that other things will," he said slowly.
+
+She groped for his meaning, her wide eyes fixed on his, and still did not
+find it. "Be plainer, please. What can I do to save him?"
+
+"You might marry me."
+
+"Never!"
+
+"Just as you say. You were looking for a way, and I suggested one. Anyhow,
+you're mine."
+
+"I won't do it!"
+
+"You wanted me to pay the price; but you don't want to pay yourself."
+
+"I couldn't do it. It would be horrible!" But she knew she could and
+must.
+
+"Why couldn't you? I'm ready to cut loose from this way of living. When I
+pull off this one big thing, I'll quit. We'll go somewhere and begin life
+again. You said I could. Well, I will. You'll help me to keep straight. It
+won't be only his life you are saving. It will be mine, too."
+
+"No--I don't love you! How could a girl marry a man she didn't care for
+and didn't respect?"
+
+"I'll make you do both before long. I'm the kind of man women love."
+
+"You're the kind I hate," she flashed bitterly.
+
+"I'll risk your hate, my dear," he laughed easily.
+
+She did not look at him. Her eyes were on the horizon line, where sky and
+pine tops met. He knew that she was fighting it out to a decision, and he
+did not speak again.
+
+After all, she was only a girl. Right and wrong were inextricably mixed in
+her mind. It was not right to marry this man. It was not right to let the
+sheriff die while she could save him. She was generous to the core. But
+there was something deeper than generosity. Her banked love for Flatray
+flooded her in a great cry of protest against his death. She loved him.
+She loved him. Much as she detested this man, revolting as she found the
+thought of being linked to him, the impulse to sacrifice herself was the
+stronger feeling of the two. Deep in her heart she knew that she could not
+let Jack go to his death so long as it was possible to prevent it.
+
+Her grave eyes came back to MacQueen. "I'll have to tell you one
+thing--I'll hate you worse than ever after this. Don't think I'll ever
+change my mind about that. I won't."
+
+He twirled his little mustache complacently.
+
+"I'll have to risk that, as I said."
+
+"You'll take me to Mesa to-day. As soon as we get there a justice of the
+peace will marry us. From his house we'll go directly to father's. You
+won't lie to me."
+
+"No. I'll play out the game square, if you do."
+
+"And after we're married, what then?"
+
+"You may stay at home until I get this ransom business settled. Then we'll
+go to Sonora."
+
+"How do you know I'll go?"
+
+"I'll trust you."
+
+"Then it's a bargain."
+
+Without another word, they turned back to rejoin the group by the cabin.
+Before they had gone a dozen steps she stopped.
+
+"What about Mr. Flatray? You will free him, of course."
+
+"Yes. I'll take him right out due north of here, about four miles. He'll
+be blindfolded. There we'll leave him, with instructions how to reach
+Mesa."
+
+"I'll go with you," she announced promptly.
+
+"What for?"
+
+"To make sure that you do let him go--alive."
+
+He shrugged his shoulders. "All right. I told you I was going to play
+fair. I haven't many good points, but that is one of them. I don't give my
+word and then break it."
+
+"Still, I'll go."
+
+He laughed angrily. "That's your privilege."
+
+She turned on him passionately. "You've got no right to resent it, though
+I don't care a jackstraw whether you do or not. I'm not going into this
+because I want to, but to save this man from the den of wolves into which
+he has fallen. If you knew how I despise and hate you, how my whole soul
+loathes you, maybe you wouldn't be so eager to go on with it! You'll get
+nothing out of this but the pleasure of torturing a girl who can't defend
+herself."
+
+"We'll see about that," he answered doggedly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+
+THE PRICE
+
+
+MacQueen lost no time in announcing his new program.
+
+"Boys, the hanging's off. I've decided to accept West's offer for
+Flatray's life. It's too good to turn down."
+
+"That's what I told you all the time," growled Buck.
+
+"Well, I'm telling _you_ now. The money will be divided equally among you,
+except that Rosario will get my share as well as hers."
+
+Rosario Chaves broke into fierce protests. Finding these unheeded, she
+cursed the outlaws furiously and threatened vengeance upon them. She did
+not want money; she wanted this man's life. The men accepted this as a
+matter of course, and paid little attention to the ravings of the old
+woman.
+
+At the first news of his reprieve, Jack saw things through a haze for a
+moment. But he neither broke down nor showed undue exultation.
+
+His first thought was of relief, of profound comfort; his next of wonder
+and suspicion. How under heaven had Melissy won his life for him? He
+looked quickly at her, but the eyes of the girl did not meet his.
+
+"Melissy." Flatray spoke very gently, but something in the way he spoke
+compelled the young woman to meet his eyes.
+
+Almost instantly the long lashes went down to her pale cheeks again.
+
+MacQueen cut in suavely: "I reckon this is the time for announcements.
+Boys, Miss Lee has promised to marry me."
+
+Before the stir which this produced had died away, Flatray flashed a
+question: "In exchange for my life?"
+
+The chief of the outlaws looked at him with insolence smoldering in his
+black eyes. "Now, I wonder when you ever will learn to mind your own
+business, sheriff! Nobody invited you to sit into this game."
+
+"This _is_ my business. I make it mine. Give me a straight answer,
+Melissy. Am I right? Is it for my life?"
+
+"Yes." Her voice was so low he could hardly hear it.
+
+"Then I won't have it! The thing is infamous. I can't hide behind the
+skirts of a girl, least of all you. I can die, but, by God, I'll keep my
+self-respect."
+
+"It's all arranged," Melissy answered in a whisper.
+
+Flatray laughed harshly. "I guess not. You can't pay my debts by giving
+yourself to life-long misery."
+
+"You're right pessimistic, sheriff," sneered MacQueen.
+
+"What do you take me for? I won't have it. I won't have it." The sheriff's
+voice was rough and hoarse. "I'd rather die fifty times."
+
+"It's not up to you to choose, as it happens," the leader of the outlaws
+suggested suavely.
+
+"You villain! You damned white-livered coward!" The look of the young
+sheriff scorched.
+
+"Speaks right out in meeting, don't he?" grinned Lane.
+
+"I know what he is, Jack," Melissy cried. "And he knows I think he's the
+lowest thing that crawls. But I've got to save you. Don't you see, I've
+got to do it?"
+
+"No, I don't see it," Flatray answered hotly. "I can take what's coming to
+me, can't I? But if you save my life that way you make me as low a thing
+as he is. I say I'll not have it."
+
+Melissy could stand it no longer. She began to sob. "I--I--Oh, Jack, I've
+got to do it. Don't you see? Don't you see? _It won't make any difference
+with me if I don't._ No difference--except that you'll be--dead."
+
+She was in his embrace, her arms around his neck, whispering the horrible
+truth in his ear brokenly. And as he felt her dear young fragrance of
+hair in his nostrils, the warm, soft litheness of her body against his,
+the rage and terror in him flooded his veins. Could such things be? Was it
+possible a man like that could live? Not if he could help it.
+
+Gently he unfastened her arms from his neck. MacQueen was standing a dozen
+feet away, his hands behind his back and his legs wide apart. As Flatray
+swung around the outlaw read a warning in the blazing eyes. Just as Jack
+tore loose from his guards MacQueen reached for his revolver.
+
+The gun flashed. A red hot blaze scorched through Jack's arm. Next instant
+MacQueen lay flat on his back, the sheriff's fingers tight around his
+throat. If he could have had five seconds more the man's neck would have
+been broken. But they dragged him away, fighting like a wild cat. They
+flung him down and tied his hands behind him.
+
+Melissy caught a glimpse of his bleeding arm, his torn and dusty face, the
+appalling ferocity of the men who were hammering him into the ground. She
+took a step forward blindly. The mountains in front of her tilted into the
+sky. She moved forward another step, then stumbled and went down. She had
+fainted.
+
+"Just as well," MacQueen nodded. "Here, Rosario, look after the young
+lady. Lift Flatray to a horse, boys, after you've blindfolded him. Good
+enough. Oh, and one thing more, Flatray. You're covered by a rifle. If you
+lift a hand to slip that handkerchief from your eyes, you're giving the
+signal for Jeff to turn loose at you. We're going to take you away, but we
+don't aim to let you out of the Cache for a few days yet."
+
+"What do you mean?"
+
+MacQueen jeered at his prisoner openly. "I mean, Mr. Sheriff, that you'll
+stay with us till the girl does as she has promised. Understand?"
+
+"I think so, you hellhound. You're going to hold me against her so that
+she can't change her mind."
+
+"Exactly. So that she can't rue back. You've guessed it."
+
+They rode for hours, but in what direction it was impossible for Flatray
+to guess. He could tell when they were ascending, when dropping down hill,
+but in a country so rugged this meant nothing.
+
+When at last he dismounted and the kerchief was taken from his eyes he
+found himself in a little pocket of the hills in front of an old log
+cabin. Jeff stayed with him. The others rode away. But not till they had
+him safely tied to a heavy table leg within the hut.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+
+SQUIRE LATIMER TAKES A HAND
+
+
+"You're to make ready for a trip to town, _senorita_."
+
+"When?"
+
+"At once," Rosario answered. "By orders of _Senor_ MacQueen."
+
+"Then he is back?" the girl flashed.
+
+"Just back."
+
+"Tell him I want to see him--immediately."
+
+"I am to take you to him as soon as you are ready to ride."
+
+"Oh, very well."
+
+In a very few minutes the young woman was ready. Rosario led her to the
+cabin in front of which she had seen the old Indian squaw. In it were
+seated Simon West and Black MacQueen. Both of them rose at her entrance.
+
+"Please take a chair, Miss Lee. We have some business to talk over," the
+outlaw suggested.
+
+Melissy looked straight at him, her lips shut tight. "What have you done
+with Jack Flatray?" she presently demanded.
+
+"Left him to find his way back to his friends."
+
+"You didn't hurt him ... any more?"
+
+"No."
+
+"And you left him alone, wounded as he was."
+
+"We fixed up his wound," lied MacQueen.
+
+"Was it very bad?"
+
+"A scratch. I had to do it."
+
+"You needn't apologize to me."
+
+"I'm not apologizing, you little wild-cat."
+
+"What do you want with me? Why did you send for me?"
+
+"We're going to Mesa to see a parson. But before we start there's some
+business to fix up. Mr. West and I will need your help to fix up the
+negotiations for his release."
+
+"My help!" She looked at him in surprise. "How can I help?"
+
+"I've laid my demands before his friends. They'll come through with the
+money, sure. But I want them to understand the conditions right plainly,
+so there won't be any mistake. What they have got to get soaked into their
+heads is that, if they do make any mistakes, they will not see Simon West
+again alive. You put that up to them strong."
+
+"I'm not going to be your agent in robbing people of their money!" she
+told him swiftly.
+
+"You don't understand. Mr. West wants you to do it. He wants you to
+explain the facts to his friends, so they won't act rash and get off wrong
+foot first."
+
+"Oh! If Mr. West wishes it," she conceded.
+
+"I do wish it," the great man added.
+
+Though his face and hands were still stained with the dye that had been
+used on them, the railroad builder was now dressed in his own clothes. The
+girl thought that he looked haggard and anxious, and she was sure that her
+presence brought him relief. In his own way he was an indomitable fighter,
+but his experience had not included anything of this nature.
+
+Jack Flatray could look at death level-eyed, and with an even pulse,
+because for him it was all in the day's work; but the prospect of it shook
+West's high-strung nerves. Nevertheless, he took command of the
+explanations, because it had been his custom for years to lead.
+
+MacQueen, his sardonic smile in play, sat back and let West do most of the
+talking. Both men were working for the same end--to get the ransom paid as
+soon as possible--and the multimillionaire released; and the outlaw
+realized that Melissy would cooeperate the more heartily if she felt she
+were working for West and not for himself.
+
+"This is Tuesday, Miss Lee. You will reach Mesa some time to-night. My
+friends ought to be on the ground already. I want you and your father to
+get in touch with them right away, and arrange the details along the line
+laid down by Mr. MacQueen. In case they agree to everything and understand
+fully, have the Stars and Stripes flying from your house all day
+to-morrow as a signal. Don't on any account omit this--because, if you do,
+my captors will have to hold me longer, pending further negotiations. I
+have written a letter to Mr. Lucas, exonerating you completely, Miss Lee;
+and I have ordered him to comply with all these demands without parley."
+
+"Our proposition seems to Mr. West very reasonable and fair," grinned
+MacQueen impishly, paring his finger nails.
+
+"At any rate, I think that my life is worth to this country a good deal
+more than three hundred thousand dollars," West corrected.
+
+"Besides being worth something to Simon West," the outlaw added
+carelessly.
+
+West plunged into the details of delivering the money. Once or twice the
+other man corrected him or amplified some statement. In order that there
+could be no mistake, a map of Sweetwater canyon was handed to Melissy to be
+used by the man who would bring the money to the rendezvous at the Devil's
+Causeway.
+
+When it came to saying good-bye, the old man could scarce make up his mind
+to release the girl's hand. It seemed to him that she was the visible sign
+of his safety, and that with her departure went a safeguard from these
+desperate men. He could not forget that she had saved the life of the
+sheriff, even though he did not know what sacrifice she had made so to do.
+
+"I know you'll do your best for me," he said, with tears in his eyes.
+"Make Lucas see this thing right. Don't let any fool detectives bunco him
+into refusing to pay the ransom. Put it to him as strongly as you can,
+that it will be either my life or the money. I have ordered him to pay it,
+and I want it paid."
+
+Melissy nodded. "I'll tell him how it is, Mr. West. I know it will be all
+right. By Thursday afternoon we shall have you with us to dinner again.
+Trust us."
+
+"I do." He lowered his voice and glanced at MacQueen, who had been called
+aside to speak to one of his men. "And I'm glad you're going away from
+here. This is no place for you."
+
+"It isn't quite the place for you, either," she answered, with a faint,
+joyless smile.
+
+They started an hour before midday. Rosario had packed a lunch for both of
+them in MacQueen's saddlebags, for it was the intention of the latter to
+avoid ranches and traveled trails on the way down. He believed that the
+girl would go through with what she had pledged herself to do, but he did
+not mean to take chances of a rescue.
+
+In the middle of the afternoon they stopped for lunch at Round-up
+Spring--a water hole which had not dried up in a dozen years. It was a
+somber meal. Melissy's spirits had been sinking lower and lower with every
+mile that brought her nearer the destiny into which this man was forcing
+her. Food choked her, and she ate but little. Occasionally, with staring
+eyes, she would fall into a reverie, from which his least word would
+startle her to a shiver of apprehension. This she always controlled after
+the first instinctive shudder.
+
+"What's the matter with you, girl? I'm not going to hurt you any. I never
+hit a woman in my life," the man said once roughly.
+
+"Perhaps you may, after you're married. It's usually one's wife one beats.
+Don't be discouraged. You'll have the experience yet," she retorted, but
+without much spirit.
+
+"To hear you tell it, I'm a devil through and through! It's that kind of
+talk that drives a man to drink," he flung out angrily.
+
+"And to wife beating. Of course, I'm not your chattel yet, because the
+ceremony hasn't been read; but if you would like to anticipate a few hours
+and beat me, I don't suppose there is any reason you shouldn't."
+
+"Gad! How you hate me!"
+
+Her inveteracy discouraged him. His good looks, his debonair manner, the
+magnetic charm he knew how to exert--these, which had availed him with
+other women, did not seem to reach her at all. She really gave him no
+chance to prove himself. He was ready to be grave or gay--to be a
+light-hearted boy or a blase man of the world--to adopt any role that
+would suit her. But how could one play up effectively to a chill silence
+which took no note of him, to a depression of the soul which would not
+let itself be lifted? He felt that she was living up to the barest letter
+of the law in fulfilling their contract, and because of it he steeled
+himself against her sufferings.
+
+There was one moment of their ride when she stood on the tiptoe of
+expectation and showed again the sparkle of eager life. MacQueen had
+resaddled after their luncheon, and they were climbing a long sidehill
+that looked over a dry valley. With a gesture, the outlaw checked her
+horse.
+
+"Look!"
+
+Some quarter of a mile from them two men were riding up a wash that ran
+through the valley. The mesquite and the cactus were thick, and it was for
+only an occasional moment that they could be seen. Black and the girl were
+screened from view by a live oak in front of them, so that there was no
+danger of being observed. The outlaw got out his field glasses and watched
+the men intently.
+
+Melissy could not contain the question that trembled on her lips: "Do you
+know them?"
+
+"I reckon not."
+
+"Perhaps----"
+
+"Well!"
+
+"May I look--please?"
+
+He handed her the glasses. She had to wait for the riders to reappear, but
+when they did she gave a little cry.
+
+"It's Mr. Bellamy!"
+
+"Oh, is it?"
+
+He looked at her steadily, ready to crush in her throat any call she might
+utter for help. But he soon saw that she had no intention of making her
+presence known. Her eyes were glued to the glasses. As long as the men
+were in sight she focused her gaze on them ravenously. At last a bend in
+the dry river bed hid them from view. She lowered the binoculars with a
+sigh.
+
+"Lucky they didn't see us," he said, with his easy, sinister laugh. "Lucky
+for them."
+
+She noticed for the first time that he had uncased his rifle and was
+holding it across the saddle-tree.
+
+Night slipped silently down from the hills--the soft, cool, velvet night
+of the Arizona uplands. The girl drooped in the saddle from sheer
+exhaustion. The past few days had been hard ones, and last night she had
+lost most of her sleep. She had ridden far on rough trails, had been
+subjected to a stress of emotion to which her placid maiden life had been
+unused. But she made no complaint. It was part of the creed she had
+unconsciously learned from her father to game out whatever had to be
+endured.
+
+The outlaw, though he saw her fatigue, would not heed it. She had chosen
+to set herself apart from him. Let her ask him to stop and rest, if she
+wanted to. It would do her pride good to be humbled. Yet in his heart he
+admired her the more, because she asked no favors of him and forbore the
+womanish appeal of tears.
+
+His watch showed eleven o'clock by the moon when the lights of Mesa
+glimmered in the valley below.
+
+"We'll be in now in half an hour," he said.
+
+She had no comment to make, and silence fell between them again until they
+reached the outskirts of the town.
+
+"We'll get off here and walk in," he ordered; and, after she had
+dismounted, he picketed the horses close to the road. "You can send for
+yours in the mornin'. Mine will be in the livery barn by that time."
+
+The streets were practically deserted in the residential part of the town.
+Only one man they saw, and at his approach MacQueen drew Melissy behind a
+large lilac bush.
+
+As the man drew near the outlaw's hand tightened on the shoulder of the
+girl. For the man was her father--dusty, hollow-eyed, and haggard. The two
+crouching behind the lilacs knew that this iron man was broken by his
+fears for his only child, the girl who was the apple of his eye.
+
+Not until he was out of hearing did Melissy open her lips to the stifled
+cry she had suppressed. Her arms went out to him, and the tears rolled
+down her cheeks. For herself she had not let herself break down, but for
+her father's grief her heart was like water.
+
+"All right. Don't break down now. You'll be with him inside of half an
+hour," the outlaw told her gruffly.
+
+They stopped at a house not much farther down the street, and he rang the
+bell. It took a second ring to bring a head out of the open window
+upstairs.
+
+"Well?" a sleepy voice demanded.
+
+"Is this Squire Latimer?"
+
+"Yes."
+
+"Come down. We want to get married."
+
+"Then why can't you come at a reasonable hour?--consarn it!"
+
+"Never mind that. There's a good fee in it. Hurry up!"
+
+Presently the door opened. "Come in. You can wait in the hall till I get a
+light."
+
+"No--I don't want a light. We'll step into this room, and be married at
+once," MacQueen told him crisply.
+
+"I don't know about that. I'm not marrying folks that can't be looked
+at."
+
+"You'll marry us, and at once. I'm Black MacQueen!"
+
+It was ludicrous to see how the justice of the peace fell back in terror
+before the redoubtable bad man of the hills.
+
+"Well, I don't know as a light is a legal necessity; but we got to have
+witnesses."
+
+"Have you any in the house?"
+
+"My daughter and a girl friend of hers are sleeping upstairs. I'll call
+them, Mr. Black--er--I mean Mr. MacQueen."
+
+The outlaw went with the squire to the foot of the stairs, whence Latimer
+wakened the girls and told them to dress at once, as quickly as possible.
+A few minutes later they came down--towsled, eyes heavy with sleep,
+giggling at each other in girlish fashion. But when they knew whose
+marriage they were witnessing, giggles and sleep fled together.
+
+They were due for another surprise later. MacQueen and his bride were
+standing in the heavy shadows, so that both bulked vaguely in mere
+outline. Hitherto, Melissy had not spoken a word. The time came when it
+was necessary for the justice to know the name of the girl whom he was
+marrying. Her answer came at once, in a low, scarcely audible voice:
+
+"Melissy Lee."
+
+An electric shock could scarce have startled them more. Of all the girls
+in Mesa none was so proud as Melissy Lee, none had been so far above
+criticism, such a queen in the frontier town. She had spent a year in
+school at Denver; she had always been a social leader. While she had
+always been friendly to the other girls, they had looked upon her with a
+touch of awe. She had all the things they craved, from beauty to money.
+And now she was marrying at midnight, in the dark, the most notorious bad
+man of Arizona!
+
+Here was a wonder of wonders to tell the other girls to-morrow. The only
+pity was that they could not see her face--and his. They had heard that he
+was handsome. No doubt that accounted for it. And what could be more
+romantic than a love match with such a fascinating villain? Probably he
+had stormed her heart irresistibly.
+
+The service proceeded. The responses of the man came clearly and
+triumphantly, those of the girl low but distinctly. It was the custom of
+the justice to join the hands of the parties he was marrying; but when he
+moved to do so this girl put both of hers quickly behind her. It was his
+custom also to kiss the bride after pronouncing them man and wife; but he
+omitted this, too, on the present occasion. Nor did the groom kiss her.
+
+The voice of the justice died away. They stood before him man and wife.
+The witnesses craned forward to see the outlaw embrace his bride. Instead,
+he reached into his pocket and handed Latimer a bill. The denomination of
+it was one hundred dollars, but the justice did not discover that until
+later.
+
+"I reckon that squares us," the bad man said unsentimentally. "Now, all of
+you back to bed."
+
+MacQueen and his bride passed out into the night. The girls noticed that
+she did not take his arm; that she even drew back, as if to avoid touching
+him as they crossed the threshold.
+
+Not until they reached the gate of her father's house did MacQueen speak.
+
+"I'm not all coyote, girl. I'll give you the three days I promised you.
+After that you'll join me wherever I say."
+
+"Yes," she answered without spirit.
+
+"You'll stand pat to our agreement. When they try to talk you out of it
+you won't give in?"
+
+"No."
+
+She was deadly weary, could scarce hold up her head.
+
+"If you lie to me I'll take it out on your folks. Don't forget that Jack
+Flatray will have to pay if you double-cross me."
+
+"No."
+
+"He'll have to pay in full."
+
+"You mean you'll capture him again."
+
+"I mean we won't have to do that. We haven't turned him loose yet."
+
+"Then you lied to me?" She stared at him with wide open eyes of horror.
+
+"I had to keep him to make sure of you."
+
+Her groan touched his vanity, or was it perhaps his pity?
+
+"I'm not going to hurt him--if you play fair. I tell you I'm no cur. Help
+me, girl, and I'll quit this hell raising and live decent."
+
+She laughed without joy, bitterly.
+
+"Oh, I know what you think," he continued. "I can't blame you. But what do
+you know about my life? What do you know about what I've had to fight
+against? All my life there has been some devil in me, strangling all the
+good. There has been nobody to give me a helping hand--none to hold me
+back. I was a dog with a bad name--good enough for hanging, and nothing
+else."
+
+He was holding the gate, and perforce she had to hear him out.
+
+"What do I care about that?" she cried, in a fierce gust of passion. "I
+see you are cur and coward! You lied to me. You didn't keep faith and free
+Jack Flatray. That is enough."
+
+She was the one person in the world who had power to wound him. Nor did it
+hurt the less that it was the truth. He drew back as if the lash of a whip
+had swept across his face.
+
+"No man alive can say that to me and live!" he told her. "Cur I may be;
+but you're my wife, 'Lissie MacQueen. Don't forget that."
+
+"Go! Go!" she choked. "I hope to God I'll never see your face again!"
+
+She flew along the grass-bordered walk, whipped open the front door, and
+disappeared within. She turned the key in the lock, and stood trembling in
+the darkness. She half expected him to follow, to attempt to regain
+possession of her.
+
+But the creak of his quick step on the porch did not come. Only her
+hammering heart stirred in the black silence. She drew a long breath of
+relief, and sank down on the stairs. It was over at last, the horrible
+nightmare through which she had been living.
+
+Gradually she fought down her fears and took hold of herself. She must
+find her father and relieve his anxiety. Quietly she opened the door of
+the hall into the living room.
+
+A man sat at the table, with his back to her, in an attitude of utter
+dejection. He was leaning forward, with his head buried in his arms. It
+was her father. She stepped forward, and put her hands on his bowed
+shoulders.
+
+"Daddy," she said softly.
+
+At her touch the haggard, hopeless, unshaven face was lifted toward her.
+For a moment Lee looked at her as if she had been a wraith. Then, with a
+hoarse cry, he arose and caught her in his arms.
+
+Neither of them could speak for emotion. He tried it twice before he could
+get out:
+
+"Baby! Honey!"
+
+He choked back the sobs in his throat. "Where did you come from? I thought
+sure MacQueen had you."
+
+"He had. He took me to Dead Man's Cache with him."
+
+"And you escaped. Praise the Lord, honey!"
+
+"No--he brought me back."
+
+"MacQueen did! Goddlemighty--he knows what's best for him!"
+
+"He brought me back to--to----" She broke down, and buried her head in his
+shoulder.
+
+Long, dry sobs racked her. The father divined with alarm that he did not
+know the worst.
+
+"Tell me--tell me, 'Lissie! Brought you back to do what, honey?" He held
+her back from him, his hands on her shoulders.
+
+"To marry me."
+
+"What!"
+
+"To marry me. And he did--fifteen minutes ago, I am Black MacQueen's
+wife."
+
+"Black MacQueen's wife! My God, girl!" Big Beauchamp Lee stared at her in
+a horror of incredulity.
+
+She told him the whole story, from beginning to end.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+
+THE TAKING OF THE CACHE
+
+
+It was understood that in the absence of the sheriff Richard Bellamy
+should have charge of the posse, and after the disappearance of Flatray he
+took command.
+
+With the passing years Bellamy had become a larger figure in the
+community. The Monte Cristo mine had made him independently wealthy, even
+though he had deeded one-third of it to Melissy Lee. Arizona had forgiven
+him his experiment at importing sheep and he was being spoken of as a
+territorial delegate to Congress, a place the mine owner by no means
+wanted. For his interests were now bound up in the Southwest. His home was
+there. Already a little toddler's soft fat fist was clinging to the skirt
+of Ferne.
+
+At first Bellamy, as well as Farnum, McKinstra, young Yarnell and the rest
+of the posse looked expectantly for the return of the sheriff. It was hard
+to believe that one so virile, so competent, so much a dominant factor of
+every situation he confronted, could have fallen a victim to the men he
+hunted. But as the days passed with no news of him the conviction grew
+that he had been waylaid and shot. The hunt went on, but the rule now was
+that no move should be made singly. Not even for an hour did the couples
+separate.
+
+One evening a woman drifted into camp just as they were getting ready to
+roll into their blankets. McKinstra was on sentry duty, but she got by him
+unobserved and startled Farnum into drawing his gun.
+
+Yet all she said was: "_Buenos tardes, senor_."
+
+The woman was a wrinkled Mexican with a close-shut, bitter mouth and
+bright, snappy eyes.
+
+Farnum stared at her in surprise. "Who in Arizona are you?"
+
+It was decidedly disturbing to think what might have happened if
+MacQueen's outfit had dropped in on them, instead of one lone old woman.
+
+"Rosario Chaves."
+
+"Glad to meet you, ma'am. Won't you sit down?"
+
+The others had by this time gathered around.
+
+Rosario spoke in Spanish, and Bob Farnum answered in the same language.
+"You want to find the way into Dead Man's Cache, senor?"
+
+"Do we? I reckon yes!"
+
+"Let me be your guide."
+
+"You know the way in?"
+
+"I live there."
+
+"Connected with MacQueen's outfit, maybe?"
+
+"I cook for him. My son was one of his men."
+
+"Was?"
+
+"Yes. He was killed--shot by Lieutenant O'Connor, the same man who was a
+prisoner at the Cache until yesterday morning."
+
+"Killed lately, ma'am?"
+
+"Two years ago. We swore revenge. MacQueen did not keep his oath, the oath
+we all swore together."
+
+Bellamy began to understand the situation. She wanted to get back at
+MacQueen, unless she were trying to lead them into a trap.
+
+"Let's get this straight. MacQueen turned O'Connor loose, did he?" Bellamy
+questioned.
+
+"No. He escaped. This man--what you call him?--the sheriff, helped him and
+Senor West to break away."
+
+The mine owner's eye met Farnum's. They were being told much news.
+
+"So they all escaped, did they?"
+
+"_Si, senor_, but MacQueen took West and the sheriff next morning. They
+could not find their way out of the valley."
+
+"But O'Connor escaped. Is that it?"
+
+Her eyes flashed hatred. "He escaped because the sheriff helped him. His
+life was forfeit to me. So then was the sheriff's. MacQueen he admit it.
+But when the girl promise to marry him he speak different."
+
+"What girl?"
+
+"_Senorita_ Lee."
+
+"Not Melissy Lee."
+
+"_Si, senor_."
+
+"My God! Melissy Lee a prisoner of that infernal villain. How did she come
+there?"
+
+The Mexican woman was surprised at the sudden change that had come over
+the men. They had grown tense and alert. Interest had flamed into a
+passionate eagerness.
+
+Rosario Chaves told the story from beginning to end, so far as she knew
+it; and every sentence of it wrung the big heart of these men. The pathos
+of it hit them hard. Their little comrade, the girl they had been fond of
+for years--the bravest, truest lass in Arizona--had fallen a victim to
+this intolerable fate! They could have wept with the agony of it if they
+had known how.
+
+"Are you sure they were married? Maybe the thing slipped up," Alan
+suggested, the hope father to the thought.
+
+But this hope was denied him; for the woman had brought with her a copy of
+the Mesa _Sentinel_, with an account of the marriage and the reason for
+it. This had been issued on the morning after the event, and MacQueen had
+brought it back with him to the Cache.
+
+Bellamy arranged with the Mexican woman a plan of attack upon the valley.
+Camp was struck at once, and she guided them through tortuous ravines and
+gulches deeper into the Roaring Fork country. She left them in a grove of
+aspens, just above the lip of the valley, on the side least frequented by
+the outlaws.
+
+They were to lie low until they should receive from her a signal that most
+of the gang had left to take West to the place appointed for the exchange.
+They were then to wait through the day until dusk, slip quietly down, and
+capture the ranch before the return of the party with the gold. In case
+anything should occur to delay the attack on the ranch, another signal was
+to be given by Rosario.
+
+The first signal was to be the hanging of washing upon the line. If this
+should be removed before nightfall, Bellamy was to wait until he should
+hear from her again.
+
+Bellamy believed that the Chaves woman was playing square with him, but he
+preferred to take no chances. As soon as she had left to return to the
+settlement of the outlaws he moved camp again to a point almost half a
+mile from the place where she had last seen them. If the whole thing were
+a "plant," and a night attack had been planned, he wanted to be where he
+and his men could ambush the ambushers, if necessary.
+
+But the night passed without any alarm. As the morning wore away the
+scheduled washing appeared on the line. Farnum crept down to the valley
+lip and trained his glasses on the ranch house. Occasionally he could
+discern somebody moving about, though there were not enough signs of
+activity to show the presence of many people. All day the wash hung
+drying on the line. Dusk came, the blankets still signaling that all was
+well.
+
+Bellamy led his men forward under cover, following the wooded ridge above
+the Cache so long as there was light enough by which they might be
+observed from the valley. With the growing darkness he began the descent
+into the bowl just behind the corral. A light shone in the larger cabin;
+and Bellamy knew that, unless Rosario were playing him false, the men
+would be at supper there. He left his men lying down behind the corral,
+while he crept forward to the window from which the light was coming.
+
+In the room were two men and the Mexican woman. The men, with elbows far
+apart, and knives and forks very busy, were giving strict attention to the
+business in hand. Rosario waited upon them, but with ear and eye guiltily
+alert to catch the least sound. The mine owner could even overhear
+fragments of the talk.
+
+"Ought to get back by midnight, don't you reckon? Pass the cow and the
+sugar, Buck. Keep a-coming with that coffee, Rosario. I ain't a mite
+afraid but what MacQueen will pull it off all right, you bet."
+
+"Sure, he will. Give that molasses a shove, Tom----"
+
+Bellamy drew his revolver and slipped around to the front door. He came in
+so quietly that neither of the men heard him. Both had their backs to the
+door.
+
+"Figure it up, and it makes a right good week's work. I reckon I'll go
+down to Chihuahua and break the bank at Miguel's," one of them was
+saying.
+
+"Better go to Yuma and break stones for a spell, Buck," suggested a voice
+from the doorway.
+
+Both men slewed their heads around as if they had been worked by the same
+lever. Their mouths opened, and their eyes bulged. A shining revolver
+covered them competently.
+
+"Now, don't you, Buck--nor you either, Tom!" This advice because of a
+tentative movement each had made with his right hand. "I'm awful careless
+about spilling lead, when I get excited. Better reach for the roof; then
+you won't have any temptations to suicide."
+
+The hard eyes of the outlaws swept swiftly over the cattleman. Had he
+shown any sign of indecision, they would have taken a chance and shot it
+out. But he was so easily master of himself that the impulse to "draw"
+died stillborn.
+
+Bellamy gave a sharp, shrill whistle. Footsteps came pounding across the
+open, and three armed men showed at the door.
+
+"Darn my skin if the old son of a gun hasn't hogged all the glory!" Bob
+Farnum complained joyfully. "Won't you introduce us to your friends,
+Bellamy?"
+
+"This gentleman with the biscuit in his hand is Buck; the one so partial
+to porterhouse steak is Tom," returned Bellamy gravely.
+
+"Glad to death to meet you, gents. Your hands seem so busy drilling for
+the ceiling, we won't shake right now. If it would be any kindness to you,
+I'll unload all this hardware, though. My! You tote enough with you to
+start a store, boys."
+
+"How did you find your way in?" growled Buck.
+
+"Jest drifted in on our automobiles and airships," Bob told him airily, as
+he unbuckled the revolver belt and handed it to one of his friends.
+
+The outlaws were bound, after which Rosario cooked the posse a dinner.
+This was eaten voraciously by all, for camp life had sharpened the
+appetite for a woman's cooking.
+
+One of the men kept watch to notify them when MacQueen and his gang should
+enter the valley, while the others played "pitch" to pass the time. In
+spite of this, the hours dragged. It was a good deal like waiting for a
+battle to begin. Bellamy and Farnum had no nerves, but the others became
+nervous and anxious.
+
+"I reckon something is keeping them," suggested Alan, after looking at his
+watch for the fifth time in half an hour. "Don't you reckon we better go
+up the trail a bit to meet them?"
+
+"I reckon we better wait here, Alan. Bid three," returned Farnum evenly.
+
+As he spoke, their scout came running in.
+
+"They're here, boys!"
+
+"Good enough! How many of them?"
+
+"Four of 'em, looked like. They were winding down the trail, and I
+couldn't make out how many."
+
+"All right, boys. Steady, now, till they get down from their horses. Hal,
+out with the light when I give the word."
+
+It was a minute to shake nerves of steel. They could hear the sound of
+voices, an echo of jubilant laughter, the sound of iron shoes striking
+stones in the trail. Then some one shouted:
+
+"Oh, you, Buck!"
+
+The program might have gone through as arranged, but for an unlooked-for
+factor in the proceedings. Buck let out a shout of warning to his trapped
+friends. Almost at the same instant the butt of Farnum's revolver smashed
+down on his head; but the damage was already done.
+
+Bellamy and his friends swarmed out like bees. The outlaws were waiting
+irresolutely--some mounted, others beside their horses. Among them were
+two pack horses.
+
+"Hands up!" ordered the mine owner sharply.
+
+The answer was a streak of fire from a rifle. Instantly there followed a
+fusillade. Flash after flash lit up the darkness. Staccato oaths, cries, a
+moan of pain, the trampling of frightened horses, filled the night with
+confusion.
+
+In spite of the shout of warning, the situation had come upon the bandits
+as a complete surprise. How many were against them, whether or not they
+were betrayed, the certainty that the law had at last taken them at a
+disadvantage--these things worked with the darkness for the posse. A man
+flung himself on his pony, lay low on its back, and galloped wildly into
+the night. A second wheeled and followed at his heels. Hank Irwin was
+down, with a bullet from a carbine through his jaw and the back of his
+head. A wild shot had brought down another. Of the outlaws only MacQueen,
+standing behind his horse as he fired, remained on the field uninjured.
+
+The cattlemen had scattered as the firing began, and had availed
+themselves of such cover as was to be had. Now they concentrated their
+fire on the leader of the outlaws. His horse staggered and went down,
+badly torn by a rifle bullet. A moment later the special thirty-two
+carbine he carried was knocked from his hands by another shot.
+
+He crouched and ran to Irwin's horse, flung himself to the saddle,
+deliberately emptied his revolver at his foes, and put spurs to the
+broncho. As he vanished into the hills Bob Farnum slowly sank to the
+ground.
+
+"I've got mine, Bellamy. Blamed if he ain't plumb bust my laig!"
+
+The mine owner covered the two wounded outlaws, while his men disarmed
+them. Then he walked across to his friend, laid down his rifle, and knelt
+beside him.
+
+"Did he get you bad, old man?"
+
+"Bad enough so I reckon I'll have a doc look at it one of these days." Bob
+grinned to keep down the pain.
+
+Once more there came the sound of hoofs beating the trail of decomposed
+granite. Bellamy looked up and grasped his rifle. A single rider loomed
+out of the darkness and dragged his horse to a halt, a dozen yards from
+the mine owner, in such a position that he was directly behind one of the
+pack horses.
+
+"Up with your hands!" ordered Bellamy on suspicion.
+
+Two hands went swiftly up from beside the saddle. The moonlight gleamed on
+something bright in the right hand. A flash rent the night. A jagged,
+red-hot pain tore through the shoulder of Hal Yarnell. He fired wildly,
+the shock having spoiled his aim.
+
+The attacker laughed exultantly, mockingly, as he swung his horse about.
+
+"A present from Black MacQueen," he jeered.
+
+With that, he was gone again, taking the pack animal with him. He had had
+the audacity to come back after his loot--and had got some of it, too.
+
+One of the unwounded cowpunchers gave pursuit, but half an hour later he
+returned ruefully.
+
+"I lost him somehow--darned if I know how. I seen him before me one
+minute; the next he was gone. Must 'a' known some trail that led off from
+the road, I reckon."
+
+Bellamy said nothing. He intended to take up the trail in person; but
+first the wounded had to be looked to, a man dispatched for a doctor, and
+things made safe against another possible but improbable attack. It was to
+be a busy night; for he had on hand three wounded men, as well as two
+prisoners who were sound. An examination showed him that neither of the
+two wounded outlaws nor Farnum nor Yarnell were fatally shot. All were
+hardy outdoors men, who had lived in the balsamic air of the hills; if
+complications did not ensue, they would recover beyond question.
+
+In this extremity Rosario was a first aid to the injured. She had betrayed
+the bandits without the least compunction, because they had ignored the
+oath of vengeance against the slayer of her son; but she nursed them all
+impartially and skillfully until the doctor arrived, late next day.
+
+Meanwhile Bellamy and McKinstra, guided by one of the outlaws, surprised
+Jeff and released Flatray, who returned with them to camp.
+
+With the doctor had come also four members of the Lee posse. To the deputy
+in charge Jack turned over his four prisoners and the gold recovered. As
+soon as the doctor had examined and dressed his wound he mounted and took
+the trail after MacQueen. With him rode Bellamy.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+
+MELISSY ENTERTAINS
+
+
+The notes of Schumann's "Trauemerei" died away. Melissy glanced over her
+music, and presently ran lightly into Chopin's "Valse Au Petit Chien." She
+was, after all, only a girl; and there were moments when she forgot to
+remember that she was wedded to the worst of unhanged villains. When she
+drowned herself fathoms deep in her music, she had the best chance of
+forgetting.
+
+Chaminade's "The Flatterer" followed. In the midst of this the door opened
+quietly and closed again. Melissy finished, fingered her music, and became
+somehow aware that she was not alone. She turned unhurriedly on the seat
+and met the smiling eyes of her husband.
+
+From his high-heeled boots to his black, glossy hair, Black MacQueen was
+dusty with travel. Beside him was a gunny sack, tied in the middle and
+filled at both ends. Picturesque he was and always would be, but his
+present costume scarce fitted the presence of a lady. Yet of this he gave
+no sign. He was leaning back in a morris chair, rakish, debonair, and at
+his ease. Evidently, he had been giving appreciative ear to the music, and
+more appreciative eye to the musician.
+
+"So it's you," said Melissy, white to the lips.
+
+MacQueen arose, recovered his dusty hat from the floor, and bowed
+theatrically. "Your long-lost husband, my dear."
+
+"What are you doing here?"
+
+"I'm visiting my wife. The explanation seems a trifle obvious."
+
+"What do you want?"
+
+"Have I said I wanted anything?"
+
+"Then you had better leave. I'll give you up if I get a chance."
+
+He looked at her with lazy derision. "I like you angry. Your eyes snap
+electricity, sweet."
+
+"Oh!" She gave a gesture of impatience. "Do you know that, if I were to
+step to that window and call out your name, the whole town would be in
+arms against you?"
+
+"Why don't you?"
+
+"I shall, if you don't go."
+
+"Are you alone in the house?"
+
+"Why do you ask?" Her heart was beating fast.
+
+"Because you must hide me till night. Is your father here?"
+
+"Not now. He is hunting you--to kill you if he finds you."
+
+"Servants?"
+
+"The cook is out for the afternoon. She will be back in an hour or two."
+
+"Good! Get me food."
+
+She did not rise. "I must know more. What is it? Are they hunting you?
+What have you done now?" A strong suppressed excitement beat in her
+pulses.
+
+"It is not what I have done, but what your friends have done. Yesterday I
+went to exchange West for the ransom money. Most of my men I had to take
+with me, to guard against foul play. We held the canyon from the flat tops,
+and everything went all right. The exchange was made. We took the ransom
+money back to the Cache. I don't know how it was--whether somebody played
+me false and sold us, or whether your friend Flatray got loose and his
+posse stumbled in by accident. But there they were in the Cache when we
+got back."
+
+"Yes?" The keenest agitation was in Melissy's voice.
+
+"They took us by surprise. We fought. Two of my men ran away. Two were
+shot down. I was alone."
+
+"And then?"
+
+The devil of torment moved in him. "Then I shot up one of your friend's
+outfit, rode away, changed my mind, and went back, shot your friend, and
+hiked off into the hills with a pack horse loaded with gold."
+
+Out of all this one thing stood out terribly to her. "You shot Jack
+Flatray--again!"
+
+He laughed. One lie more or less made no difference. "I sure did."
+
+She had to moisten her lips before she could ask the next question:
+"You--killed him?"
+
+"No--worse luck!"
+
+"How do you know?"
+
+"He and another man were on the trail after me to-day. I saw them pass up
+Moose Creek from a ledge on which I was lying. If I had had a rifle, I
+would have finished the job; but my carbine was gone. It was too far for a
+six-gun."
+
+"But, if you wounded him last night, how could he be trailing you
+to-day?"
+
+"I reckon it was a flesh wound. His shoulder was tied up, I noticed."
+Impatiently he waved Flatray out of the conversation. "I didn't come here
+to tell you about him. I got to get out on tonight's train. This country
+has grown too hot for me. You're going with me?"
+
+"No!"
+
+"Yes, by God!"
+
+"I'll never go with you--never--never!" she cried passionately. "I'm free
+of the bargain. You broke faith. So shall I."
+
+She saw his jaw clamp. "So you're going to throw me down, are you?"
+
+Melissy stood before him, slim and straight, without yielding an inch. She
+was quite colorless, for he was a man with whose impulses she could not
+reckon. But one thing she knew. He could never take her away with him and
+escape. And she knew that he must know it, too.
+
+"If you want to call it that. You tricked me into marrying you. You meant
+to betray me all the time. Go, while there's still a chance. I don't want
+your blood on my hands."
+
+It was characteristic of him that he always wanted more what he could not
+get.
+
+"Don't answer so quick, girl. Listen to me. I've got enough in that sack
+to start us in the cattle business in Argentina. There's more buried in
+the hills, if we need it. Girl, I tell you I'm going to run straight from
+to-day!"
+
+She laughed scornfully. "And in the same breath you tell me how much you
+have stolen and are taking with you. If you were a Croesus, I wouldn't go
+with you." She flamed into sudden, fierce passion. "Will you never
+understand that I hate and detest you?"
+
+"You think you do, but you don't. You love me--only you won't let yourself
+believe it."
+
+"There's no arguing with such colossal conceit," she retorted, with hard
+laughter. "It's no use to tell you that I should like to see you dead at
+my feet."
+
+Swiftly he slid a revolver from its holster, and presented it to her, butt
+first. "You can have your wish right easy, if you mean it. Go to it.
+There's no danger. All you've got to give out is that I frightened you.
+You'll be a heroine, too."
+
+She looked at the weapon and at him, and the very thought of it made her
+sick. She saw the thing almost as if it were already done--the smoking
+revolver in her hand, and the man lying motionless before her.
+
+"Take it away," she said, with a shudder.
+
+"You see, you can't do it! You can't even go to the window there and shout
+out that Black MacQueen is with you in the house. You don't hate me at
+all, my dear."
+
+"Because I won't kill you with my own hand? You reason logically."
+
+"Then why don't you betray my presence? Why don't you call your friends in
+to take me?"
+
+"I'm not sure that I won't; but if I don't, it will be for their sakes,
+and not for yours. They could not take you without loss of life."
+
+"You're right there," he agreed, with a flash of his tigerish ferocity.
+"They couldn't take me alive at all, and I reckon before I checked in a
+few of them would."
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+
+BLACK MACQUEEN CASHES HIS CHECKS
+
+
+It was part of his supreme audacity to trust her. While he was changing
+his dusty, travel-stained clothes for some that belonged to her brother
+she prepared a meal for him downstairs. A dozen times the impulse was on
+her to fly into the street and call out that Black MacQueen was in the
+house, but always she restrained herself. He was going to leave the
+country within a few hours. Better let him go without bloodshed.
+
+He came down to his dinner fresh from a bath and a shave, wearing a new
+tweed suit, which fitted him a trifle loosely, but was not unbecoming to
+his trim, lithe figure. No commercial traveler at a familiar hotel could
+have been more jauntily and blithely at home.
+
+"So you didn't run away!" He grinned.
+
+"Not yet. I'm going to later. I owe you a meal, and I wanted to pay it
+first."
+
+It was his very contempt of fear that had held her. To fool away half an
+hour in dressing, knowing that it was very likely she might be summoning
+men to kill him--to come down confident and unperturbed, possibly to meet
+his death--was such a piece of dare-deviltry as won reluctant admiration,
+in spite of her detestation of him. Even if she did not give him up, his
+situation was precarious in the extreme. All the trains were being
+watched; and in spite of this he had to walk boldly to the station, buy a
+ticket, and pass himself off for an ordinary traveler.
+
+Both knew that the chances were against him, but he gave no sign of
+concern or anxiety. Never had Melissy seen him so full of spirits. The
+situation would have depressed most men; him it merely stimulated. The
+excitement of it ran like wine through his blood. Driven from his hills,
+with every man's hand against him, with the avenues of escape apparently
+closed, he was in his glory. He would play his cards out to the end,
+without whining, no matter how the game might go.
+
+Melissy washed the dishes, in order that the cook might not know that she
+had had a guest for luncheon. The two returned to the living room. It was
+his whim to have her play for him; and she was glad to comply, because it
+interfered with his wooing. She was no longer greatly afraid of him, for
+she knew that he was on his good behavior to win her liking.
+
+Fortune favored her. For some time they had heard the cook moving about in
+the kitchen. Once she had poked her head in to know whether her young
+mistress would like the cherry pie for dinner.
+
+"I didn't know yez had company, Miss 'Lissie," she had apologized.
+
+"This gentleman will stay to dinner," Melissy had announced.
+
+At luncheon Melissy had not eaten with him; but at dinner it was
+necessary, on account of the cook, that she sit down, too. The meal had
+scarce begun when Kate came beaming in.
+
+"Shure, Miss 'Lissie, there's another young gentleman at the door. It's
+Mr. Bellamy. I tould him to come right in. He's washing his face first."
+
+Melissy rose, white as a sheet. "All right, Kate."
+
+But as soon as the cook had left the room she turned to the outlaw. "What
+shall I do? What shall I do?"
+
+Little whimsical imps of mischief shone in his eyes. "Have him in and
+introduce him to your husband, my dear."
+
+"You must go--quick. If I don't get rid of him, you'll be able to slip out
+the back way and get to the depot. He doesn't know you are here."
+
+MacQueen sat back and gave her his easy, reckless smile. "Guess again.
+Bellamy can't drive me out."
+
+She caught her hands together. "Oh, go--go! There will be trouble. You
+wouldn't kill him before my very eyes!"
+
+"Not unless he makes the first play. It's up to him." He laughed with the
+very delight of it. "I'd as lief settle my account with him right now.
+He's meddled too much in my affairs."
+
+She broke out in a cry of distress: "You wouldn't! I've treated you fair.
+I could have betrayed you, and I didn't. Aren't you going to play square
+with me?"
+
+He nodded. "All right. Show him in. He won't know me except as Lieutenant
+O'Connor. It was too dark last night to see my face."
+
+Bellamy came into the room.
+
+"How's Jack?" Melissy asked quickly as she caught his hand.
+
+"Good as new. And you?"
+
+"All right."
+
+The outlaw stirred uneasily in his seat. His vanity objected to another
+man holding the limelight while he was present.
+
+Melissy turned. "I think you have never met Lieutenant O'Connor, Mr.
+Bellamy. Lieutenant--Mr. Bellamy."
+
+They shook hands. MacQueen smiled. He was enjoying himself.
+
+"Glad to meet you, Mr. Bellamy. You and Flatray have won the honors
+surely. You beat us all to it, sir. As I rode in this mornin', everybody
+was telling how you rounded up the outlaws. Have you caught MacQueen
+himself?"
+
+"Not yet. We have reason to believe that he rode within ten miles of town
+this morning before he cut across to the railroad. The chances are that
+he will try to board a train at some water tank in the dark. We're having
+them all watched. I came in to telephone all stations to look out for
+him."
+
+"Where's Jack?" Melissy asked.
+
+"He'll be here presently. His arm was troubling him some, so he stopped to
+see the doctor. Then he has to talk with his deputy."
+
+"You're sure he isn't badly hurt?"
+
+"No, only a scratch, he calls it."
+
+"Did you happen on Dead Man's Cache by accident?" asked MacQueen with
+well-assumed carelessness.
+
+Bellamy had no intention of giving Rosario away to anybody. "You might
+call it that," he said evenly. "You know, I had been near there once when
+I was out hunting."
+
+"Do you expect to catch MacQueen?" the outlaw asked, a faint hint of irony
+in his amused voice.
+
+"I can't tell. That's what I'm hoping, lieutenant."
+
+"We hope for a heap of things we never get," returned the outlaw, in a
+gentle voice, his eyes half shuttered behind drooping lids.
+
+Melissy cut into the conversation hurriedly. "Lieutenant O'Connor is going
+on the seven-five this evening, Mr. Bellamy. He has business that will
+take him away for a while. It is time we were going. Won't you walk down
+to the train with us?"
+
+MacQueen swore softly under his breath, but there was nothing he could say
+in protest. He knew he could not take the girl with him. Now he had been
+cheated out of his good-byes by her woman's wit in dragging Bellamy to the
+depot with them. He could not but admire the adroitness with which she had
+utilized her friend to serve her end.
+
+They walked to the station three abreast, the outlaw carrying as lightly
+as he could the heavy suitcase that held his plunder. Melissy made small
+talk while they waited for the train. She was very nervous, and she was
+trying not to show it.
+
+"Next time you come, lieutenant, we'll have a fine stone depot to show
+you. Mr. West has promised to make Mesa the junction point, and we're sure
+to have a boom," she said.
+
+A young Mexican vaquero trailed softly behind them, the inevitable
+cigarette between his lips. From under his broad, silver-laced sombrero he
+looked keenly at each of the three as he passed.
+
+A whistle sounded clearly in the distance.
+
+The outlaw turned to the girl beside him. "I'm coming back some day soon.
+Be sure of that, Mrs. MacQueen."
+
+The audacity of the name used, designed as it was to stab her friend and
+to remind Melissy how things stood, made the girl gasp. She looked quickly
+at Bellamy and saw him crush the anger from his face.
+
+The train drew into the station. Presently the conductor's "All aboard!"
+served notice that it was starting. The outlaw shook hands with Melissy
+and then with the mine owner.
+
+"Good-bye. Don't forget that I'm coming back," he said, in a perfectly
+distinct, low tone.
+
+And with that he swung aboard the Pullman car with his heavy suitcase. An
+instant later the Mexican vaquero pulled himself to the vestibule of the
+smoking car ahead.
+
+MacQueen looked back from the end of the train at the two figures on the
+platform. A third figure had joined them. It was Jack Flatray. The girl
+and the sheriff were looking at each other. With a furious oath, he turned
+on his heel. For the evidence of his eyes had told him that they were
+lovers.
+
+MacQueen passed into the coach and flung himself down into his section
+discontentedly. The savor of his adventure was gone. He had made his
+escape with a large share of the plunder, in spite of spies and posses.
+But in his heart he knew that he had lost forever the girl whom he had
+forced to marry him. He was still thinking about it somberly when a figure
+appeared in the aisle at the end of the car.
+
+Instantly the outlaw came to alert attention, and his hand slipped to the
+butt of a revolver. The figure was that of the Mexican vaquero whom he had
+carelessly noted on the platform of the station. Vigilantly his gaze
+covered the approaching man. Surely in Arizona there were not two men with
+that elastic tread or that lithe, supple figure.
+
+His revolver flashed in the air. "Stand back, Bucky O'Connor--or, by God,
+I'll drill you!"
+
+The vaquero smiled. "Right guess, Black MacQueen. I arrest you in the name
+of the law."
+
+Black's revolver spat flame twice before the ranger's gun got into action,
+but the swaying of the train caused him to stagger as he rose to his
+feet.
+
+The first shot of Bucky's revolver went through the heart of the outlaw;
+but so relentless was the man that, even after that, his twitching fingers
+emptied the revolver. O'Connor fired only once. He watched his opponent
+crumple up, fling wild shots into the upholstery and through the roof, and
+sink into the silence from which there is no awakening on this side of the
+grave. Then he went forward and looked down at him.
+
+"I reckon that ends Black MacQueen," he said quietly. "And I reckon
+Melissy Lee is a widow."
+
+                   *       *       *       *       *
+
+Jack Flatray had met O'Connor at his own office and the two had come down
+to the station on the off chance that MacQueen might try to make his
+getaway from Mesa in some disguise. But as soon as he saw Melissy the
+sheriff had eyes for nobody else except the girl he loved. One sleeve of
+his coat was empty, and his shoulder was bandaged. He looked very tired
+and drawn; for he had ridden hard more than sixteen hours with a painful
+wound. But the moment his gaze met hers she knew that his thoughts were
+all for her and her trouble.
+
+His free hand went out to meet hers. She forgot MacQueen and all the
+sorrow he had brought her. Her eyes were dewy with love and his answered
+eagerly. She knew now that she would love Jack Flatray for better or worse
+until death should part them. But she knew, too, that the shadow of
+MacQueen, her husband by law, was between them.
+
+Together they walked back from the depot. In the shadow of the vines on
+her father's porch they stopped. Jack caught her hands in his and looked
+down into her tired, haggard face all lit with love. Tears were in the
+eyes of both.
+
+"You're entitled to the truth, Jack," she told him. "I love you. I think I
+always have. And I know I always shall. But I'm another man's wife. It
+will have to be good-bye between us, Jack," she told him wistfully.
+
+He took her in his arms and kissed her. "You're my sweetheart. I'll not
+give you up. Don't think it."
+
+He spoke with such strength, such assurance, that she knew he would not
+yield without a struggle.
+
+"I'll never be anything to him--never. But he stands between us. Don't you
+see he does?"
+
+"No. Your marriage to him is empty words. We'll have it annulled. It will
+not stand in any court. I've won you and I'm going to keep you. There's no
+two ways about that."
+
+She broke down and began to sob quietly in a heartbroken fashion, while he
+tried to comfort her. It was not so easy as he thought. So long as
+MacQueen lived Flatray would walk in danger if she did as he wanted her to
+do.
+
+Neither of them knew that Bucky O'Connor's bullet had already annulled the
+marriage, that happiness was already on the wing to them.
+
+This hour was to be for their grief, the next for their joy.
+
+The End
+
+
+
+
+NOVELS OF FRONTIER LIFE BY
+
+WILLIAM MACLEOD RAINE
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+MAVERICKS
+
+A tale of the western frontier, where the "rustler" abounds. One of the
+sweetest love stories ever told.
+
+A TEXAS RANGER
+
+How a member of the border police saved the life of an innocent man,
+followed a fugitive to Wyoming, and then passed through deadly peril to
+ultimate happiness.
+
+WYOMING
+
+In this vivid story the author brings out the turbid life of the frontier
+with all its engaging dash and vigor.
+
+RIDGWAY OF MONTANA
+
+The scene is laid in the mining centers of Montana, where politics and
+mining industries are the religion of the country.
+
+BUCKY O'CONNOR
+
+Every chapter teems with wholesome, stirring adventures, replete with the
+dashing spirit of the border.
+
+CROOKED TRAILS AND STRAIGHT
+
+A story of Arizona; of swift-riding men and daring outlaws; of a bitter
+feud between cattlemen and sheep-herders.
+
+BRAND BLOTTERS
+
+A story of the turbid life of the frontier with a charming love interest
+running through its pages.
+
+STEVE YEAGER
+
+A story brimful of excitement, with enough gun-play and adventure to suit
+anyone.
+
+A DAUGHTER OF THE DONS
+
+A Western story of romance and adventure, comprising a vivacious and
+stirring tale.
+
+THE HIGHGRADER
+
+A breezy, pleasant and amusing love story of Western mining life.
+
+THE PIRATE OF PANAMA
+
+A tale of old-time pirates and of modern love, hate and adventure.
+
+THE YUKON TRAIL
+
+A crisply entertaining love story in the land where might makes right.
+
+THE VISION SPLENDID
+
+In which two cousins are contestants for the same prizes: political honors
+and the hand of a girl.
+
+THE SHERIFF'S SON
+
+The hero finally conquers both himself and his enemies and wins the love
+of a wonderful girl.
+
+Grosset & Dunlap, Publishers, New York
+
+
+
+
+JAMES OLIVER CURWOOD'S
+
+STORIES OF ADVENTURE
+
+May be had wherever books are sold. Ask for Grosset & Dunlap's list.
+THE RIVER'S END
+
+A story of the Royal Mounted Police.
+
+THE GOLDEN SNARE
+
+Thrilling adventures in the Far Northland.
+
+NOMADS OF THE NORTH
+
+The story of a bear-cub and a dog.
+
+KAZAN
+
+The tale of a "quarter-strain wolf and three-quarters husky" torn between
+the call of the human and his wild mate.
+
+BAREE, SON OF KAZAN
+
+The story of the son of the blind Grey Wolf and the gallant part he played
+in the lives of a man and a woman.
+
+THE COURAGE OF CAPTAIN PLUM
+
+The story of the King of Beaver Island, a Mormon colony, and his battle
+with Captain Plum.
+
+THE DANGER TRAIL
+
+A tale of love, Indian vengeance, and a mystery of the North.
+
+THE HUNTED WOMAN
+
+A tale of a great fight in the "valley of gold" for a woman.
+
+THE FLOWER OF THE NORTH
+
+The story of Fort o' God, where the wild flavor of the wilderness is
+blended with the courtly atmosphere of France.
+
+THE GRIZZLY KING
+
+The story of Thor, the big grizzly.
+
+ISOBEL
+
+A love story of the Far North.
+
+THE WOLF HUNTERS
+
+A thrilling tale of adventure in the Canadian wilderness.
+
+THE GOLD HUNTERS
+
+The story of adventure in the Hudson Bay wilds.
+
+THE COURAGE OF MARGE O'DOONE
+
+Filled with exciting incidents in the land of strong men and women.
+
+BACK TO GOD'S COUNTRY
+
+A thrilling story of the Far North. The great Photoplay was made from this
+book.
+
+Grosset & Dunlap, Publishers, New York
+
+
+
+
+
+End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Brand Blotters, by William MacLeod Raine
+
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