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diff --git a/77768-0.txt b/77768-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bf5a429 --- /dev/null +++ b/77768-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8028 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77768 *** + + + + +MARSHAL OF SUNDOWN + + + + + MARSHAL OF + SUNDOWN + + _By_ + JACKSON GREGORY + + [Illustration] + + GROSSET & DUNLAP + _Publishers_ NEW YORK + _By arrangement with Dodd, Mead & Company_ + + + + + COPYRIGHT, 1937, 1938 + BY JACKSON GREGORY + + ALL RIGHTS RESERVED + NO PART OF THIS BOOK MAY BE REPRODUCED IN ANY FORM + WITHOUT PERMISSION IN WRITING FROM THE AUTHOR + + PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA + + + + +MARSHAL OF SUNDOWN + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +When Jim Torrance, riding up from the South, crested the +live-oak-studded knoll from which he saw the rip-roaring little town +of Sundown for the first time, the place looked as clean and pretty +as a fresh picture, and as peaceful as the little dove cooing on a +dead limb over his head. But that was because Sundown was still a good +three miles away, and besides it was only mid-afternoon and not yet +first-drink time. + +“I’m turning off here to go into town, Skeeter,” he told the boy +helping him with his handful of stock. “You go straight on with the +horses. You’ll know the place when you get there; just watch for an +old wheel track turning off where there’s a dead pine leaning over a +big white rock. Likely I’ll overtake you anyhow. It’s only about seven +miles.” + +“Gee, Jim,” said Skeeter, “me, I’d like to see Sundown, too. I’ve heard +a lot about it.” + +“Not today, kid. In two-three days I’ll pay you off and you can ride +where you please. Better hobble Barney and old Molly when you get +there. I’ll see if maybe I can get you a pie in town.” + +The boy, convoying the dozen head of likely looking saddle horses and +the two heavily laden pack mules, rode on through the oaks, down the +farther side of the knoll, into the straggling pines on the slopes +beyond, and vanished in the creases of the hills which grew more +rugged and more thickly timbered as they rolled away toward the far +blue mountains in the north. Jim Torrance sat where he was a moment, +rolling a thoughtful cigarette and looking toward Sundown with +lazy-lidded eyes. + +In the late October sunshine, as yellow as butter, under a sun-drenched +sky as deep a violet hue as the towering mountains in the for +background, at the end of a dusty road, wavering chalk-white across the +valley lined with quivering aspens in their brilliant autumn dress, +was a clutter of houses--and that was Sundown, where colors clashed +and laughed, the warm red of bricks, the white of adobe walls, the +weathered brown of shake roofs--and down in the valley there was a girl +with a bright red neckerchief, riding a dappled gray horse. She was at +considerable distance, on another road approaching Sundown from the +north. + +Jim Torrance and the girl rode into town at the same time; they were +for an instant abreast as they came in front of Stag Horn Saloon. He +was seeing many things today for the first time, since, on the single +other occasion of coming into this neighborhood, he had kept straight +on from the farther side of the knoll where he had left Skeeter, and +had not come any nearer Sundown. So also for the first time he saw +Sally Dawn Cannon. She did not appear to notice him at all, though at +the sound of his horse’s hoofs she glanced his way. It was the most +fleeting of glances, indifferent, flashing elsewhere. + +He had the trick of taking in everything with those keen dark eyes +of his, of registering swift impressions, of filing them away for +possible future reference. He thought, “She’s a little beauty if there +ever was one.” Not quite like other girls either, a sullen, smoldering +beauty, with brooding, smoky eyes. + +He passed her and dismounted under the big poplar with butter-yellow +leaves that cast its black blot of shade in front of the saloon, and +she rode straight on. As he jingled down to the edge of the wooden +sidewalk, he turned his observant eyes upon the two men who were +standing there; they were watching the girl go by and spoke of her. + +“Prettiest girl inside a hundred miles, Bordereau,” said one of them--a +short, stocky, immensely broad man, dressed in store clothes like a +town dweller, yet with the hard hands and weathered face of a rancher. + +“Yes,” nodded Bordereau, and rolled his cigar and squinted after her. +A tall, darkly handsome man in frock coat and high hat, quiet-voiced, +even unctuous, it was a simple thing to mistake Steve Bordereau for a +prosperous undertaker. “Yes,” he said again, “she’s been getting better +looking all the time. Classier now than Florinda, even.” + +“If she was dressed right, she’d be.” Then the heavy-set man laughed. +He said, “Now if you just had a girl like her in your place, you’d +double your intake!” + +Steve Bordereau pursed a full lower lip. + +“It’s an idea, Murdo. I’ll get her.” + +“Like hell you will!” + +“What’s this, Thursday? I’ll have her upstairs at midnight just exactly +one week from tonight. Midnight. Dressed right, too.” + +“Bet?” challenged Murdo. There was only one way to settle things with +men like these two, one of whom owned and the other helped operate the +Stag Horn. + +“Two to one,” said Bordereau coolly. “Five hundred of yours calls a +thousand from me.” + +Murdo stared at him, seemed about to agree, then shook his head. + +“You’ve got something up your sleeve, Steve. I know you. No bets.” + + * * * * * + +Jim Torrance tied his horse at the hitching rail under the poplar, hung +his spurs over the saddle horn and went into the saloon. There were not +half a dozen men in the place, cattle hands from the look of them, and +only one bartender behind the longest and most famous bar in this part +of the country. Torrance photographed them all with that low-lidded +glance characteristic of him; his survey began with the bartender and +came back to him, taking stock of his pale-blue eyes, his pale, sleek +hair that looked like the pictures in the barber shops, his mustaches +like a buffalo’s horns. Jim Torrance spun a silver dollar on the bar, +ordered his drink and asked: + +“Know anyone up around here named Jim Torrance?” + +“Howdy, Stranger,” said the bartender. He set forth bottle and glass +and leaned forward conversationally on his elbows. “Jim Torrance?” he +repeated. “Can’t say as I do. What’s he look like?” + +“About my size and build,” Torrance told him. + +“Who’s he askin’ for, Jurgens?” rapped out a voice from one of the men +lounging over a round table farther down the room. “What’s he want?” + +“You’d be sure to ask, now, Sam, wouldn’t you?” grunted Jurgens. “Well, +he’s asking for a man name of Torrance, Jim Torrance.” + +“What you want him for, Stranger?” demanded Sam, and got to his feet, a +little dried-up man of fifty or thereabouts, seeming to rattle around +in his blue overalls and faded blue denim shirt like a dried pea in +a weathered pod. He had just about the shrewdest, brightest little +eyes that ever twinkled and gleamed and widened and narrowed in a +man’s face, eyes that just now, and at most times, were as eager as a +six-year-old’s at Christmas time. He came hurrying forward. + +“It’s old Sam Pepper,” Jurgens advised Jim Torrance. “The damn’ +grasshopper’s got his nose in everybody’s business and knows most +everything.” + +Old Sam Pepper, a wisp of a graying man standing something like five +feet and a half in his high-heeled half-boots, peered straight up into +Jim Torrance’s face. All the men in the room had looked the stranger +over pretty thoroughly, as was but natural and customary; strangers +weren’t everyday occurrences in and about Sundown; but no man of them +all regarded him with such frank and thoroughgoing interest as did Sam +Pepper. + +He took stock of everything--Torrance’s checkered shirt and neck scarf, +his worn chaps, black and shaggy and dusty, the two crossed belts +dragged low by their twin burdens of guns and cartridges, the worn, +dusty boots beginning to grow lopsided on their high, rocking heels. +But his greatest and gravest concern was the stranger’s face. He made +Jim Torrance out to be tall and lean and gaunt, but as hardy and sinewy +as a man whose muscles and tendons were all fine drawn steel wire; +he stared up into a pair of keen, hard, dark eyes with their trick +of being low-lidded as though always he was squinting at the sun, or +probing under the surface of other men, and a mouth that was set and +stern and somehow grim, a mouth that did not seem ever to have learned +how to smile, a mouth, one would hazard, that knew less how to soften +than to grow savage and cruel. + +Sam Pepper was intrigued, but then, as Jurgens had suggested, he was +forever growing curious about affairs not his own and men with whom he +had no dealings. He said a second time, and more briskly, “What you +want him for, Stranger?” + +The stranger ignored him as a wolf hound ignores a poodle. + +“Seems to me I’ve seen you somewheres,” Sam Pepper hurried on, just to +make way for his second question. “What’s your name, Stranger?” + +Then another man spoke up in a deep, throaty voice that sounded +downright jovial in contrast to Sam Pepper’s reedy, rasping utterance, +and Jim Torrance looked down the shadowy room to the speaker, a big, +sturdy, bald-headed fellow a dozen years younger than Sam Pepper and +some two or three times as big. + +“Askin’ for Jim Torrance, be you?” he demanded. “Well, me, I know him. +Seen him lately, too. I and him was pardners for a short time, over to +Miller’s Camp. A man about your size; yep, about your build, too.” + +Sam Pepper snorted for any to hear. Then in a lowered voice, hardly +above a discreet whisper meant for the stranger alone, he said: “That’s +only Lying Bill talking, Stranger. Lying Bill Yarbo. The truth ain’t in +him and never was. Anything he says goes just the other way round; if +he’d of said he hadn’t never saw or heard of Jim Torrance, well you’d +know they’d been together not ten minutes ago.” + +Lying Bill Yarbo shoved back the little poker table and came stalking +forward. + +“If you’re of a mind to advertise your business all over town, +Stranger,” he said, for men to hear out on the street a block away--and +they were long blocks in Sundown--“why you just let that feller that’s +talking to you--Sam’l Pepper, his name is, whereas it ought to be +Peeper--know about it and you won’t have to pay to get it published.” +Then a heavy frown dragged at his shaggy, black eyebrows. “What’s he +been saying to you about me? What’s he been whispering?” He balled +up an oversized fist and took another forward stride, whereupon Sam +Pepper whipped back and darted toward the door; and men laughed, and +the bartender, bored as most of his fraternity grow to be habitually, +almost smiled. Jim Torrance’s expression, or lack of the same, was +undisturbed. + +“You say you know Jim Torrance?” he said mildly. “Might I ask if he’s +around town, or has been lately?” + +Lying Bill Yarbo took a deep, preparatory breath, then began his +rumbling recital. + +“Like I say, him and me was pardners over to Miller’s. But that was +quite a while ago, ’bout fifteen-sixteen year. Sixteen year, that’s +what; I’m remembering now. It was when there was that big explosion +the Billings boys was to blame for, a dozen men blowed higher’n kites. +I rec’lec’ how a leg with the boot still on it was blowed in through +the cabin door where me and Jim was having us our dinner. That was Cy +Patten’s leg, and Cy got well and made him another one out of one that +got blew off a piano over to Molly Blaine’s place. And now, the other +day, not more’n say two weeks ago, you could of blowed me over with a +puff of smoke when a feller sings out, ‘Hi, Bill!’ and I look around +and see Jim Torrance. Seems as though--” + +Jim Torrance downed his drink and went out; the last words he heard +were Jurgens’, saying, “I never heard tell of that there explosion over +to Miller’s, Bill,” and Lying Bill Yarbo answering crustily, “Shucks, +there’s lots of things you never heard about.” He saw Steve Bordereau +and Murdo standing in the shade where he had left them; the girl had +passed out of sight. He continued along the wooden sidewalk, avoiding +the trap of a broken board for bootheels, and presently heard hurrying +steps behind him. Then Sam Pepper, breathless with haste, his short +legs making two of one of Torrance’s strides, came up with him. + +“Seeing how you’re a stranger in town,” said Sam Pepper, “and are +looking for information, I got to warn you that Lying Bill Yarbo--” + +“I’ve been warned,” said Torrance. + +“I’ll ask folks that I see, folks that might know,” Pepper ran on. +“Who’ll I say is wanting to know? What name, Stranger?” + +For a split second Jim Torrance appeared to be considering. Then +he said, in that same somehow incongruously mild tone of his, “I’m +Torrance. Jim Torrance.” + +Sam Pepper’s eyes flew wide open, his jaw dropped and he came to a dead +halt. Of a sudden there were a dozen questions he was on edge to ask. +But Torrance stopped a moment and looked at him in a way that dried up +all questions. Then Torrance went on, and Sam Pepper, fairly itching +with a brand-new curiosity, stood where he was and watched. + +He saw Jim Torrance go into the one other saloon Sundown boasted--a +squalid, dingy barroom and dance place frequented by the more patently +riffraffian of the community’s population, swarthy breeds for the most +part, with a sprinkling of low-life whites--and still waited. Torrance +came out and Pepper darted in. In short order he ascertained that the +stranger had asked whether a man named Jim Torrance had showed up +there of late. Out Sam Pepper hurried again and saw Torrance go into +the Stage Stop hotel and reappear within two or three minutes. Again +Pepper made inquiries; yes, a stranger asking for a man named Torrance +was just in here. And out Sam popped again, this time to see his latest +and greatest interest in life, his new mystery man, step into the bake +shop. He came out with something in his hand that looked like a pie. No +doubt it was a pie. Just the same, Sam Pepper made sure. + +“Yep, it was a pie!” he said under his breath, out on the street again. +And when the newcomer mounted his horse and rode away, carrying an +apple pie, Sam Pepper goggled after him. It didn’t seem to make sense +somehow. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +Lying Bill Yarbo, the next day, told one of the most intriguing lies of +his Munchausenesque career, in that it was one which later seemed to be +borne out in fact. All this was much to Lying Bill Yarbo’s surprise. + +Sam Pepper, that queer combination of curiosity and cowardice, speaking +about the matter in a way he had, since nothing that happened was out +of the circle of his interest and commentary, made an observation which +fitted the case as a cowboy’s new boots fit his Chinese feet. Sam +Pepper said: + +“Shucks, it’s ag’in natur’ that any man, lyin’ steady with every breath +he draws for twenty year, won’t make a miscue and blunder into the +outside edges of the truth once in a while. It’s like as if you took a +gun and blazed away a thousand times, and even if you tried not to hit +it you’d spot the bull’s-eye sooner-later. Accidents do happen.” + +Lying Bill Yarbo rode into Sundown about noon and was seen--by Sam +Pepper, of course--to rock somewhat unsteadily on his heels, then make +a bee line to Doc Jones’ Drug Store. Sam Pepper sniffed the air like a +hunting dog on a hot scent, and made his own bee line. It wasn’t like +Lying Bill Yarbo to be drunk this time of day, and what did he want at +the drug store anyhow? + +Inside, Lying Bill was getting patched up, painted with iodine until +he looked like an Apache on the war trail, hung together with strips +of bandage and doused with Wizard Oil, so that face and hands were all +criss-crossed, doused with forty-rod whisky that soothed what ailed him +and lubricated the floodgates of his speech. + +“I was riding up in the hills a piece,” said Lying Bill Yarbo. “I +cut acrost Nigger Crick and went up over the saddle and down into +Desolation Valley, and I seen three fellers down in there that I +knowed. One of ’em was that very same Jim Torrance the feller in town +was asking about yestiddy, and another was a half-breed I used to see +around Tucumcari, and one was another feller; and so I rode down to +pass the time o’ day, and I seen three more fellers that was sorta +hiding in the brush. Quick as a flash I made out what they was up to, +’cause they was getting set to murder another feller. Then them fellers +made out that I’d seen what was going on, and they piled onto me. The +whole six of ’em, being it was six that I counted, and there mought of +been more. And we fit.” + +Sam Pepper giggled. + +“Most likely they kilt pore old Bill Yarbo, bein’ so many ag’in him,” +he offered humorously. + +Lying Bill Yarbo glared him down. + +“We fit, like I said,” he said ponderously. “Me, I grabbed one man and +slung him ag’in the crowd, knockin’ ’em all galley-west. And they begun +shootin’ and so did I, and I reckon I kilt some on ’em, and the rest +got enough and run for it. I was that mad by then I’d of kilt ’em all, +only I was sort of shaky and unsteady from fighting so many, all the +same time, and so the living ones escaped.” + +“Most likely,” Sam Pepper observed out of the corner of his mouth to +the druggist’s boy, “he fell off’n his horse and rolled down a ten-foot +drop of cliff somewheres, and most likely he wasn’t inside ten mile of +Desolation Valley, and most likely--” + +That was as far as Sam Pepper got with his surmisings, for Lying Bill +Yarbo had ears like a lynx and heard every word and doubled his fists +and sort of leaned forward. Sam Pepper skipped to the door and stuck +there, too interested to permit of full flight, too much afraid of +Lying Bill Yarbo to draw closer. + +But the tale was told, and, though Lying Bill Yarbo elaborated it and +put in some fancy stitches, nothing of any great import was added. +It was, of course, a lie made out of whole cloth. The truth of the +matter had been expressed unknowingly by Sam Pepper. Lying Bill Yarbo +hadn’t been within miles of Desolation Valley that day, and he had +gotten a bad spill when the young, half-broke horse he was riding shied +at a rock rolling down into a bit of mountain trail. The rider, his +wandering thoughts far afield, had come mighty close to going over a +hundred-foot fall of granite rock instead of a mere ten, and was lucky +to be alive, with no bones broken. + +But the oddest part of the whole thing was to follow. Sam Pepper was +right and knew it in his bones; just the same he couldn’t sit still +until he visited Desolation Valley. It was only a dozen miles or so +to the northwest of Sundown, and within an hour of hearing the story +he rode out of town, heading eastward to fool ’em, then circling and +turning toward Desolation. And he came dangerously close to being the +second man to fall off his horse that day, when he found what he hadn’t +the least expectation of finding. + +Already, high in the blue air, the turkey buzzards were spiraling. +Sam Pepper won the race from them. He found a man lying dead, arms +outflung, wild black hair hanging straight against bloodless temples, a +neat blue hole in his forehead. + +“Why, cripes! I know this feller!” gasped Sam. “I seen him raising +merry hell around Sundown only a coupla days ago. He was looking for +Steve Bordereau, and Steve was out of town right then, and he shot his +mouth off to say some day him or Steve was going to kill each other. +And I’ll bet a man--” + +Lying Bill Yarbo, when the news was brought to him, turned as red as a +beet; even that bald and shiny pate of his, usually a pale pink, became +a rich crimson. He swallowed a time or two; his Adam’s apple went +pumping up and down and he seemed to find difficulty in breathing. But +he was not Lying Bill Yarbo for nothing. He began to laugh. + +“That’s only one of ’em I kilt,” he proclaimed. “I dug a hole and +buried the rest of ’em. Must of overlooked that feller.” + +With much laughter, with men slapping their own legs or the other +fellows’ backs and vowing that Bill Yarbo was the very king of all good +liars, Lying Bill Yarbo himself rode out of town hurriedly and was not +seen for a week. + +“Ashamed, that’s what he is,” proclaimed Sam Pepper gleefully. “He’s +gone to hide his old bald head. Most likely he’s that shamed that he’ll +never come back, which would be a good thing for one and all!” + +And then--as though Sam Pepper didn’t already have enough on his mind +to put a man into what was locally known as a state or a dither--all +he had to do was climb the high pine hill pretty nearly centering his +ranch, and from it look over to the old Hammond place, all of a sudden +and without his knowledge taken over by a stranger who said that he +wanted to see Jim Torrance--and who, if you asked him, said that he +_was_ Jim Torrance! + +“It’s beyant me,” muttered Sam Pepper when he had climbed the hill and +had settled himself on a flat rock whence he could see far and wide. +He saw the stranger going about the small house and barn and bunk +house, pottering like a man at home; he saw the boy Skeeter and the +dozen head of horses, likely looking stock, and the pack mules. “Must +of bought the place,” he speculated. “Wonder how much he paid? Wonder +what he’s up to? Wonder who the kid is? Wouldn’t be his boy; might +be a kid brother. Wonder what makes his face look like it does, like +he was athinking black and mysterious thoughts! I got a notion to go +over--” His spare shoulders twitched and he made a wry face, squinching +up his sharp-pointed nose. “If he is hiding some evil doings, and I +found out--and he kotched me--he’d commit murder as quick as I’d spit +terbaccy juice down a knot hole.” + +Meantime the stranger, all unaware of the fact that he was being spied +on whenever Sam Pepper had the leisure--and Sam always had plenty of +leisure when there was something to be nosed out, and nearly always +there was something afoot that invited his investigation--went about +his work on the old Hammond ranch toward making it again what it had +been a long time before, a tidy place to live on. First of all he and +the boy mended fences; then they restored the old corral down by the +barn, and after that they gave their attention to the barn itself. +Those chores done, they did things to the old house. It was an ancient +adobe with a plank shed addition like some noxious excretion that +needed amputation. They tore the shed down and piled the lumber behind +the house against some future use, as firewood perhaps. Then they +carted out a lot of refuse and burned it; they cleaned out the well and +installed a pair of new buckets on a new rope. Hour by hour the place +brightened. + +Jim Torrance’s premises were at last invaded by Sam Pepper, who +could no longer resist making an exploratory expedition. He came +over ostensibly to be neighborly but with eyes and ears taking in +everything. It happened that at the moment a red hawk lighted on a pine +top within what Sam Pepper would have described as rifle distance. +Jim Torrance snapped a gun up from his dragging belt and set a bullet +free--just like brushing a gnat away--no more premeditation, no more +precision, you would have said; just an involuntary gesture. Yet it +remained that the red hawk came straight down, a dead fluff of feathers. + +“Don’t like ’em,” said Jim Torrance gently, and holstered his gun. He +turned and looked Sam Pepper in the eye exactly as he had done that day +in Sundown. “I’ve got doves around here that I do sort of like. The +hawks bother ’em. Me, I’ve got no use for any sort of birds that go +sticking their beaks into quiet folks’ affairs.” + +And he kept on looking at Sam Pepper exactly as he had done in Sundown. + +Sam Pepper went home. + +As for Jim Torrance, he smiled, if you could call it a smile, and went +into the house. He shed his work clothes and dug some town clothes out +of a canvas roll. He shook them out, brushed them, used a hot stove +lid as an iron and pressed them. He called Skeeter in and said: “Kid, +at last I’ll let you go on your way. Here’s what’s coming to you, with +enough on top of it to buy you board and lodging for a few days. Adios +and luck.” + +It was just one week from the day he had arrived in Sundown, just a +week plus a few hours from the time he had overheard Steve Bordereau +saying to Murdo, “I’ll have her upstairs at midnight a week from now.” + +Jim Torrance rode into Sundown that night about ten o’clock. It was +a Saturday night. That meant that the small town would be swollen +like a tumor with that virulence which a horde of drinking, gambling, +here-we-go, devil-may-care hell-rousers had the knack of injecting into +an evening when they were at large. With them, cowboys and ranchers +and dry-gulchers and mule skinners and desert rats, up from the Big +Sandy, and the rest of the denizens of the ridges between lowlands and +highlands; the thing to do of a Saturday night was come to town. + +They came to town. + +When at ten o’clock Jim Torrance looked in at the Stag Horn Saloon it +was upon no such quiet picture as he had mentally photographed that +still afternoon of his first arrival. Now the place was jammed; the air +was blue with cigarette and cigar smoke; a big, new magical-looking +wheel turned out noisy music if you dropped a quarter into it, and +quarters dropped like rain while voices shouted other voices down; and +along the bar, upon which three busy barkeeps slammed down the drinks +and raked in the silver, there was no space for a new invader unless he +scrimmaged for it. + +Jim Torrance, shaven and with his hair freshly combed, wearing a +brand-new bandana about his throat, walked through the long room, +looking things over. He kept thinking: “He’ll have her here at +midnight. That’s two hours yet. Upstairs.” + +So he had his conventional drink and loafed through the place looking +for its upstairs. He found a staircase, masked, until one looked +sharply for it or knew where it was, by a pair of doors with veilings +over them. As you came in from the street, all you had to do was turn +right, instead of left where the barroom was, buck the doors, go +upstairs and find the room where the wheel spun, where the faro layout +invited, where chuck-a-luck and the rest of the popular games spun +along wide open. + +“I’ll poke along upstairs at twelve o’clock,” said Jim Torrance to +himself. + +A quirk of bitter humor molded his lips into a half smile that was the +next thing to a sneer, for he thought: “I am like Sam Pepper, getting +the disease known as elongated proboscis. What business is it of mine?” +Just the same he was quietly determined to stick his long nose into the +Bordereau-Sally Dawn affair. + +Shortly before midnight he found his way upstairs. On the upper +landing, standing before closed doors, was a thick-bodied, beefy +looking man who challenged him with a long, probing look. + +“Looking for somebody?” he asked. + +“I want a run for my money,” said Torrance. “I can get it up here, +can’t I?” + +The doorkeeper didn’t ask any more questions. The stranger didn’t look +like a tin-horn. Anyhow, ten minutes would show whether he was a cheap +skate or the real goods. He said: “Go ahead, Stranger. Right through +them doors. You’ll find your game.” + +Torrance entered a big room, bigger than the barroom downstairs, that +would have surprised him had it not been that the place was so widely +known that he and thousands of others had heard of it from far off. +It was the particular room to give Bordereau and the Stag Horn their +dubious reputations. Elegance, nothing less, was the keynote here. On +top of elegance you had abundance. Whiskies and brandies were of the +best that the Southwest knew, and the Southwest knew its liquor. There +was champagne that didn’t sicken you; and the whiskies and brandies +and wines flowed as from a spigot that aped the purse of Fortunatus. +What was more to the point, you didn’t have to pay for what your throat +yearned for. There was a sort of politeness in the room; your host was +M. Bordereau, and his one desire appeared to be to go to any extreme to +make you feel at home, to make you feel cordially received, to get you +cordially warmed--and put you in the mood to shoot your wad at one of +his gaming tables. + +Therefore the beefy man at the doors. It was his job to gauge all +comers by the dollars-and-cents measure. You’d get anything liquid in +the house that you wanted, free, not a cent for it; but you’d leave, at +quitting time, nothing less than a hundred dollars. Maybe a thousand or +ten times that. Steve Bordereau was wearing diamonds. + +There were already some forty or fifty people in the room, men +for the most part, though there were a few women, the dazzling, +hit-you-in-the-eye, effulgent type, those adventuresses that the West +drew at that time from all the world. + +And there was Florinda. + +Steve Bordereau himself, in his long-tailed coat and trousers with +stripes down them and patent leather shoes, was very much in evidence. +He knew everyone by his first name and was a genial host and friend. +He was as smooth as an eel in oil, yet remained as hard as lava rock. +Before them all he was a courtly gentleman with Florinda on his arm; +not ten minutes before he had grabbed her by the hair and slapped her +face and told her, as though she needed telling, what she was. But +before his public he bragged about her. + +This part of the establishment had been a gradual, natural growth. At +first there had been just a poker room set aside for those who, when +they wanted poker, wanted high stakes. There were several of them--old +Tom Clark, the mine owner; Gaston Dubordieu, the gambler; three younger +men, Juan Garcia, Walter Voorhees and Dick Hathaway, sons of three of +the biggest cattle kings within a score of miles in any direction--and +twenty miles was quite a step when you did it on horseback. These and +their ilk at times brought others, and Steve Bordereau saw wisdom in +accommodating them. So he had built on the second story, bricks laid on +top of honest adobe, with not only a front but also a back stairway. He +added a roulette wheel and a faro layout and dice and card games, and +he made his regulations to shut out the nickel-shooters and admit only +the dead-game sports. + +Further, of late he had added two other luxuries--a deep Turkey-red +carpet and a young lady in evening dress. + +“She and the carpet add a nice homey touch,” he said sentimentally. + +The young lady--Florinda--greeted the boys smilingly and chatted with +them; she encouraged them in extravagant notions and sat briefly with +them at their tables, dropping in and fluttering away like a butterfly. +She lifted her long-lashed eyes and widened them in horror at pikers’ +bets; she clapped her hands when some young fool took the bit in his +teeth and began to plunge. + +“And she’s a real lady,” Steve Bordereau boasted of her. “One of the +fine old Spanish family of Valdez y Verdugo. The Señorita Florinda de +Valdez y Verdugo, that’s who she is! The real goods, no gutter-snipe. +Not from Mexico--from Spain. You see, she just happened to be visiting +in Mexico City when all her folks got slaughtered in that Jerez +revolution. The family fortune was swept away, nothing left but the +Verdugo jewels that she’s wearing tonight.” Without stint, he had spent +sixty dollars for the double handful of glass diamonds and rubies and +emeralds. + +To Florinda, not ten minutes ago, he had said in one of the private +rooms: “You damn little fool, watch out for the booze tonight. Get +tight just once more and I’ll kick you clean from here to the border +dive where I picked you up, and where that _novio_ of yours will pop a +knife into you like sticking a pig.” + +As Jim Torrance wandered through the long room, looking at the games +that were already running, glancing at faces to see whether any were +familiar, and then stood up at the bar, he saw Florinda for the first +time. She was not six feet away and chanced to turn at that moment and +their eyes met. + +“You!” she exclaimed. + +He stared coldly at her. And Steve Bordereau noted her exclamation and +Torrance’s impassive, masklike face. + +Bordereau came forward and explained to Torrance that up here a man did +not have to pay for his drinks. It was all on the house. + +“Drink hearty,” he said. “Have a good time, Stranger.” + +Jim Torrance set a ten dollar gold coin spinning. + +“I pay for my drinks, unless I’m drinking with a friend, or go +thirsty,” he replied. + +Bordereau shrugged. To the man behind the bar he said: “This gentleman +is new here, Charlie. Let him have things his way.” + +“Sure,” said Charlie, and to Torrance, “What’s your relish, Stranger?” + +Torrance had his drink, but out of the corner of his eye he saw +Bordereau signal the girl aside. He couldn’t overhear their words but +thought that he could come pretty close to guessing their burden. +Bordereau would be saying: “Say, you know that man! Who is he?” She +would have to confess that she didn’t quite know. + +But Florinda was saying more than that. A shiver twitched at her bare +shoulders as though she were cold. She said rapidly: + +“I don’t know who he is, but I am afraid of him! There is something +terrible about him. Did you see how he looked at me?” + +“You do know him,” snapped Bordereau. + +“I saw him once, only once; that’s all. Down in Nacional where I was +dancing at the place of One Eye Perez where you found me. The way he +looked at me just now, he looked at a man like that that night--and +before the sun came up that man was dead. That is all I know. I swear +it!” + +“I wonder!” He looked at her suspiciously. + +Jim Torrance amused himself for a while at one of the tables; faro was +his game when it wasn’t poker, but tonight his eye was less for the +card the dealer slid from its rack than for the several doors opening +into the long room. It was full midnight now, and the sullen little +beauty with the smoky eyes, Sally Dawn, was nowhere in evidence. He was +glad, because he wanted to have Steve Bordereau fail to make good his +boast, yet it remained that he was disappointed, too. + +Then he saw Bordereau look at his heavy gold watch and hurry out +through a door at the far end of the room; that way was the head of the +back staircase, and also, as Torrance later discovered, a series of +small private rooms--a dressing room, an office, small rooms for poker. +He thought--because Bordereau had looked at his watch: “He’s going to +get her now. He looks smug and somehow like he’d raked in a jack pot.” + +He was right. Almost immediately Steve Bordereau returned, and Sally +Dawn came with him. The gambler threw the door wide with a gesture; he +extended a dramatic arm in another wide gesture, ushering her in. Then +a hush fell upon the room as she stood framed in the doorway. + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +Steve Bordereau was a showman of sorts; else he’d never have made the +Stag Horn so widely publicized across hundreds of Southwestern miles. +He knew values and how to emphasize them. + +A murmur went up when all eyes were drawn to Sally Dawn. She was pale, +with no rouge on her cheeks, and her lips were scarlet. She wore long +ruby-red earrings--ruby-red but not rubies. No others of Bordereau’s +glass gems adorned her. Her gown was exquisite, costly and in marked +contrast to La Florinda’s flashy one, a beautifully simple thing of +white satin. She carried a large black ostrich-feather fan in her left +hand. Her eyes looked enormous. + +“My friends!” sang out a triumphant Bordereau, “I have a new surprise +for you, and here she is! It is Miss Sally Dawn Cannon, and I guess +some of you already know her, the daughter of the late cattle king, +Big Bill Cannon. She has consented to come here to be still another +hostess, like the Señorita Florinda de Valdez y Verdugo, and to be +friendly with all my friends. And to start with, she asks everyone +here to drink her a little toast! Nothing in the house is too good for +tonight, and it comes to you with Steve Bordereau’s compliments.” + +Sally Dawn smiled upon them. It was a lovely smile, thought Jim +Torrance, and he thought also, “Well, money can buy most things.” +Bordereau’s announcement was greeted with cheers and hand clappings. +Torrance went on with his faro, playing as though he did not care +whether he won or lost, and so he started winning. He saw Sally Dawn go +straight to the Mexican girl; Florinda showed her beautiful white teeth +in what went for a glad smile of greeting. The two girls spoke together +a moment, Sally Dawn eagerly, Florinda appearing more reserved; perhaps +she was striving for a hauteur to match the proud names Verdugo and +Valdez. + +Then men began surging forward, flocking for the most part about the +new girl; in champagne of Bordereau’s providing or their own choice of +liquor they drank her health and happiness. And to Jim Torrance, still +at his faro table, it seemed that she was the gayest of the gay ones; +he thought that he had never seen eyes sparkle and glimmer as hers did. + +Then she was swept away by a small party who wanted her at their table, +and La Florinda went her own way with her own friends, hovering with +them over a roulette wheel, and Torrance finished his game, pocketed +his winnings and moved farther down the long room. He stood there +at the end of the bar, his glass twirling slowly between lean brown +fingers, his eyes, always low-lidded, looking lazy, yet secretly +watchful. + +He marked the face of every man and woman in the place; he took +stock of winners and losers, of hard drinkers and hard players. When +any newcomer arrived--and men were coming in all the time, the room +filling and overflowing--he saw them. When some went out from time to +time, he took note. + +A very few departed early through the front doors, going down the front +stairs and about their business, homeward bound perhaps. Several went +out through one of the three doors set in the wall toward the rear end +of the room. He gathered, without asking, that these were off to play +poker in private rooms. He spotted the men, two of them, who would play +for the house. Perhaps later Steve Bordereau would play for himself. + +Again the new girl caught his attention, and his eyes still further +narrowed until they were mere light-flickering slits. She seemed gayer +than ever, eager, electric; he thought he had never heard such bright +laughter. The warmth of color now staining her cheeks might have +resulted, along with the exhilaration gripping her, from the wine that +had flowed so generously. + +And then he saw her eyes, and knew instantly that he had her all +wrong. They chanced to meet his across the room--frightened, panicky, +desperate eyes. Whatever reason the girl might have to bring her here, +she was scared half to death. + +She had just risen swiftly from a table where she was being made much +of by four men. Steve Bordereau, who had never lost sight of her, +hastened to her side; his hand, firm and agile and powerful, came to +rest on her arm. As the men at the table rose, too, one of them drunk +and leering, Bordereau said cheerfully: + +“Go on ahead, boys; we’ll be back with you in two shakes.” + +The four went out at one of the rear doors. Bordereau, with his hand +still on the girl’s arm, stooped closer, his face close to hers. His +words, so softly spoken were they, did not carry any farther than he +meant them to carry. Then, though the girl for a moment stood very +stiff, she turned to go with him, out of the room at the rear. The two +passed quite near where Jim Torrance stood at the end of the bar. + +The girl said, “That man is a beast, the one who wants to pay me to be +his mascot--” + +Bordereau said: “Shut up, you little fool! You’ll do what I tell you!” + +She answered, in a queer, strained voice, “You can’t make me do a thing +like that.” + +She had pulled back, but they were passing on again. + +Bordereau said angrily, “You know I can make you do anything!” + +She said, scarcely above a whisper: “I won’t. I’d kill you!” + +They went on then. A door opened and closed after them. + + * * * * * + +“Know a man around here named Jim Torrance?” Jim Torrance asked the +nearest bartender. + +“No. Never heard of him.” + +Jim Torrance paid for his drink with a silver dollar. As things +happened, he did not wait for his change. Above the noise in the room, +he heard the shot, not loud but clear and eloquent enough. Nor did he +wait to note whether any others heard and marked it too. Two or three +swift, long strides brought him to the door through which the gambler +and the girl had just passed. There was a hallway with another set of +doors on the farther side; a couple of shaded lamps gave their dim, +colorful light. He saw Bordereau and Sally Dawn. + +Bordereau had not yet fallen, but had his back against the wall and +appeared to be sliding slowly sideways. The girl had dropped her big +black fan; the only thing she held was a small pistol. There was a +look of horror on Bordereau’s face, a look of horror, almost twin with +it, on hers. Her fingers opened slowly and the pistol clattered to the +floor. + +“I have killed him! I am glad! He--” + +From her, Jim Torrance looked swiftly at Bordereau again. The man was +down now; he had flung up an arm as he lurched; a hand brushed his +face; Torrance saw the bloodstain there. He started to shrug; what +affair was it of his? + +Then he heard a clamor as a door was thrown open against a wall and men +called out and came running. At the same moment he saw the head of the +back staircase. + +“Get out of here, quick; on the run!” he commanded. “They’re all +Bordereau’s friends, not yours.” + +She didn’t move; she didn’t appear to have heard. He stooped to pick up +the fallen pistol and her black fan; he caught her by the arm and ran +with her to the stairs. They plunged downward together, the girl half +falling, half carried by the strong hand that bore her along. Together +they darted out at the rear of the house. + +His one thought was to get her clear until she could have her own +friends at her back, until the Bordereau pack had cooled a bit. He ran +with her to the front of the building where horses were. He meant to +throw her onto a horse, to pile onto another and be off with her that +way. Then he saw the one wheeled rig, a buckboard as lean and light as +a greyhound, with a pole team. + +“Yours?” he demanded, seeing that there was but the one team here, +knowing that most men came on horseback, and arguing that she, if she +had dressed at home, would have mussed her dress on a saddle and hence +had come in the buckboard. + +She gasped out something, he couldn’t make it out. Well, it didn’t +matter. He swung her up bodily over a wheel to the seat; he ran and +untied the horses; he slipped the reins into her hand. + +“Get going, on the run,” he commanded. “I’ll grab my horse and follow.” + +His horse was tied only a few feet away. He jerked the tie rope free, +swung up into the saddle--and saw that she had not stirred; there she +sat, a slim, white, rigid figure on the seat. He rapped out again, “Get +going!” and lashed the horses over their rumps with the end of his tie +rope. The horses were off at a run, frightened; the girl began to sway, +then to lean sideways, reminding him of Bordereau settling to the floor. + +With the horses running, he spilled out of his saddle to the tail end +of the buckboard, keeping the tie rope still in one hand, leading his +own horse. As he came to the back of her seat he saw that the girl’s +hand lay loosely at her sides; she had dropped the reins and they +were about to vanish over the dashboard. He made a wild grab for them, +caught them just in time--and just in time caught her, too. She had +fainted dead away. + +“Here’s hell to pay,” he growled. Never had he had his hands so +filled--with the reins of the runaway team, his own horse’s lead rope, +and now an unconscious Sally Dawn. + +He managed to ease her down on the seat, her head and shoulders on his +knee; he gave the lead rope a couple of turns about the guard rail +at the back of the seat, thrust the free end under him, anchoring it +against any but a severe tug by sitting on it while he used both hands +for a fighting second or two, getting the runaway team under control. +Then he looked back through the starlit dark of the night to see +whether they were followed and made out that they were not as yet. He +looked ahead and briefly wondered where he and the girl were headed. +There had been no time, no chance to choose a direction. + +They were speeding north, and his ranch lay to the north of Sundown, +so, at the first side road, a wavering, little-used lane through the +pines, he swung homeward. If the confounded girl hadn’t slumped into a +faint on him she could tell him where she lived, where she wanted to go +now; he himself hadn’t the least idea. Now the only thing he saw to do +was carry her to his place; they might not look for her there--and even +a Sam Pepper couldn’t see in the dark. + +He kept the horses on the run on the down grades, saving them on the +pulls, letting them blow a time or two. When he pulled up at the side +of the gray and ghostly road where the old dead pine leaned over the +big white rock, the girl stirred and moaned sobbingly and sat up. He +got down, tied the horses in the dark under the pines, put up his hands +to her, and said curtly, “Better hop down.” + +“Where are you taking me?” she asked then. + +“My place. It’s only a step beyond the gate there. Then I’ll come back +and get rid of this team somehow; they won’t be able to follow the +tracks tonight, but tomorrow they will. By that time I can get you +home.” + +She did not stir to get down. + +“Why not now?” she asked. + +“Suit yourself. But if Bordereau’s dead-- Well, where will they look +first of all for you?” + +She put her face down into the shelter of her hands; he stood close +enough to see how she shuddered. + +Once again he tried to shrug away all responsibility, yet somehow he +couldn’t quite make a go of it. He didn’t like Steve Bordereau and +he didn’t care much for the gambler’s crowd of friends; further, he +remembered two things--how the gambler had gripped her by the arm, and +how a strange terror had dilated her eyes. He stood a moment looking up +at her uncertainly; then he simply reached up and lifted her down in +his arms. + +“Come along with me; I won’t hurt you any. Whatever you do now, you had +better take time to think.” + +She slipped out of his arms and answered quickly, “Yes.” + +He led the way, opened the gate and showed her the house; it was dark +but the dull gray adobe walls were revealed by the glimmer of the +stars. He waited for her at the open door; he heard her teeth begin to +chatter. + +“Step in and I’ll light a lamp; we’ll have no light until the door is +shut.” + +With the door shut and a smoky-chimneyed coal oil lamp burning wanly on +a box that served as table, she did not look about her to see what this +bare room was like but lifted her eyes straightway to his; they were no +longer sullen but were bright with burning anguish. + +“I killed him,” she said. “I wanted to kill him--and I did.” + +“Maybe not,” he told her. “A man doesn’t die every time a bullet from a +small caliber gun hits him.” + +“If I did kill him, I can only hope that I won’t live long. If I +didn’t-- Well, I might as well be dead.” And then she demanded: “Why +did you step in? Why are you trying to help me? You don’t even know me.” + +“I meant to take you straight to your folks, but you toppled over and +we had to start on the jump, and I don’t know where you live. That’s +why I brought you here--” + +“I can’t get his face out of my mind--how he looked when he slumped +down. He-- Oh, God!” + +“Look out!” said Jim Torrance sharply. “Don’t you start going to +pieces!” + +There was not a chair in the room, so she dropped down in a corner, her +face hidden in her hands as it had been in the buckboard, as though she +were fighting desperately thus to shut out something she could not +bear to look at. + +“How far from here,” he asked her, “to your home?” + +“It’s not far, just across the hills, but there’s no road.” + +“What do you mean?” + +“I’d have to go back the way we came, almost to Sundown; the road turns +off there. And I’d be sure to meet them--” + +“Just across the hills? We could make it on horseback.” + +“Yes.” She stood up. “I’ll go now, right away. My mother is desperately +ill.” + +“And you left her to go to the Stag Horn!” His tone was as good as a +slap in her face. He softened it somewhat, however, when he saw the +anguish seeming to burn higher and higher in her eyes, and said: “Well, +your folks will be taking care of her. But about going right now--” + +“I haven’t any other folks. There is just Mother, and I think she is +dying. I left her alone with an ignorant, shiftless and pretty nearly +heartless Indian woman. That’s why I must hurry.” + +He realized that there was a lot he did not know about this girl. He +asked: “What about your team? It is yours, isn’t it?” + +“Yes.” She looked down at her gleaming white gown, soiled and rumpled +now, and set her hands to it as though she wanted to rip it off her +body. “I drove over, so as not to muss this thing! The team? What do I +care--” + +“I’m going to ride along with you,” said Torrance, “anyhow until you +sight your house. Now you just wait here while I go saddle a horse for +you; it’s in the pasture, so it’ll be a few minutes.” + +“Hurry!” she begged him. + +He went first of all to where he had left the buckboard. He swung the +team back into the road, still leading his own horse, and drove on at +a run for a good mile. Where there was a possible though roadless way +down into the dark, timbered canyon, he drove down into it, a winding +way among the trees. There he left the buckboard; the horses, hastily +unhitched and unharnessed, he turned loose, trusting that they’d return +home in the course of time but not in any great haste. After that he +hunted in the buckboard against the mere chance that the girl’s fan or +the gun he had dropped there had stayed with them on their rapid flight +from Sundown; he found neither. + +He met Sally Dawn, a slim white satin shape, at the gate. + +“Where have you been? I thought you had gone away!” + +He told her briefly, then at last went for a horse for her, cinched on +his spare saddle, wondering how the devil she was going to manage with +that dress on, and returned to her. + +She managed all right. As a matter of fact she had thought of the +problem before he did and had solved it after a fashion. While he was +away with the team she had found a sharp knife and some string in his +kitchen. With a sort of savage delight she ripped that satin gown fore +and aft so that it hung in two panels like a divided skirt. With the +string she bound the two separate divisions about her legs from ankle +to thigh. When he saw her mount it was like seeing a young page from +some old court. + +The way they rode, the girl leading along dim, dark trails, it was but +four or five miles to the old King Cannon Ranch. The first winking +light which she was first to glimpse was, she told him, home. He +spurred to her side and put his hand on her horse’s reins. + +“Listen! You said you left your mother alone with the Indian woman. +Well, listen!” + +The night was still, and sounds carried far and clearly. There were +men’s voices; there were drumming hoofbeats, still in the distance. +That meant that already there were several men here, others soon to +arrive. + +“I don’t care! I’ve got to go to her. They won’t dare--” + +“Wouldn’t Steve Bordereau have dared a pretty good deal?” + +“He can’t now!” Her voice was brittle. “I’m glad! Now, let me go.” + +“No. Keep your hair on. Wait here for me. I’ll ride down, find out how +things stand, and be back before you know it. You wait here!” + +He dipped forward in the saddle and shot away, and what he had +commanded her to do she did. There was a quality in his voice which as +much as said, “When I say you’ve got to do a thing, you’ve got to do +it.” + +A thin little night breeze blew around her and she shivered, not so +much with cold as with nervous dread. She listened to the hammering +of his horse’s hoofs, and they sounded like far, sinister drumbeats. +She lost sight of him down in a hollow brimming with black night, and +for a little while she stared into the utter dark down there and felt +its symbolism sweep over her like a palpable, drowning tide. When she +raised her eyes and looked straight up at the millions of twinkling +lights bespangling the wide sweep of cloudless sky, they seemed +infinitely farther away than ever before, and as chill as a wintry +morning glinting on frost. + +She began to listen for his return long before she heard it. The thing +that put a new dread into her was the slowness with which he was +riding. She told herself: “He’s just saving his horse. He has ridden it +hard tonight. And it’s uphill.” + +But when he returned to her and didn’t speak out immediately, she +understood that something terrible had happened. He came very close; +this time, instead of putting his hand on her reins, he put it on her +hand. + +“We’ve got to take things the way they come, youngster. In this life, +we don’t deal ourselves all the cards we’ve got to play.” + +“It’s my mother!” she gasped. + +His hand closed, hard and firm on hers. + +“Yes.” + +“She is dead!” + +“Yes.” + +“And I wasn’t there! Let me go now; let me go! Quick!” + +“Hold it. Hold it, youngster.” It was he who held her. “You can’t go +now, not right now. There’s a bunch of roughnecks down there that-- +Well, I’d rather deal with coyotes. They’re a lot of low-lifes of the +Bordereau crowd. They’re half drunk and mean, and they say-- Well, +they’re talking wild. They won’t stay all night. Let them go first.” + +“I don’t care, I don’t care!” She wrenched furiously to break his grip. +“I’m going--” + +“Steve Bordereau’s dead,” he said bluntly. “They were talking about it +down at the house.” + +“I tell you I don’t care about anything now! She wouldn’t be dead if it +weren’t for Steve Bordereau--he ought to have been killed long ago. Let +me go. You can’t stop me--” + +“Can’t I?” + +He removed his hand only to scoop her out of her saddle and onto his +own. Then he swung his horse about and turned back along the way they +had come. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +The following day had Sam Pepper running around in circles. Pop Smith, +down at the General Store, said, “Sam reminds me of a dog chasin’ his +own tail.” Hank Webber, the stage driver, said, “He’ll have a fit afore +the day’s over.” Lying Bill Yarbo remarked, “He’s goin’ to blow up an’ +bust; an’ me, I don’t want to be anywheres near when _that_ happens.” +He put thumb and finger to his nose. + +But under the circumstances there was no one--excepting Lying Bill +Yarbo of course--who really censured the inquisitive little man for +his state of excitement. Things had happened, the sort of things which +were bound to interfere with Sam Pepper’s proper attention to his own +victuals and drink and everyday affairs. + +Sam Pepper fairly danced up and down. + +“It all begun with Sally Dawn Cannon being at Bordereau’s gambling +room! Her! What do you s’pose made her go to a place like that? All +dressed up, they say, like a queen, in white silk with diamonds and +ever’thing. Why wasn’t I there? And then look what happens. She kills +Steve Bordereau! Kills him! Her! What about that? _Why?_ What made her? +And then where’d she go? Talk about mysteries! Just vanished--poof! +Like that. And that ain’t half of it!” + +No, that wasn’t half of it. Sam Pepper was all over town, out of town, +back to town, everywhere; he must have asked ten thousand questions +that day. He said over and over: + +“Sally Dawn’s mother died last night, while all the rest of hell was +popping, and I want to know why. And most of all, tell me this: Can a +dead woman walk? The old woman’s dead body’s vanished, too, ain’t it? +How in hell? Where? _Why?_ A woman dies and her body vanishes, and all +you lunkheads do is squat and let things happen and don’t even try to +find out about ’em!” + +So tremendously did all these occurrences obsess him that for the +moment he lost all interest in Jim Torrance, and so failed of coming +in contact with the one person who, if by any chance he had cared to +do so, could have set Sam Pepper right all along the line. For Jim +Torrance was at home all day, pottering around his ranch and letting +his thoughts travel almost as far afield as curious Sam’s. + +Last night he had prevailed, at first by physical strength and then +by the suasion of cool logic, upon a girl in the grip of such frenzy +as came close to making her into a mad thing. She screamed at him +until he shut off her screams with a hard hand; she fought, scratching +and pummeling and biting. Until she wore herself out, she evinced a +strength surprising in such slender feminine shapeliness. But in the +end she melted, exhausted, in his arms, and he talked with her, and +after a while she listened. + +“It’s tough, but you’ve got to take it. Don’t you suppose other folks +have had to take it, no matter how tough? Your mother, in her time, +your own kids in their time, if you ever have any.” + +“I won’t! I never will! Life is so ugly, like a big fiendish brute, +like a gorilla. I hate it!” + +“Life’s all right,” said Jim Torrance, sounding vastly indifferent. +“It’s sort of like taking a trip through the woods; you’ve got your ups +and you’ve got your downs, all kinds of steep places and level places, +too; and deserts after you pop out of the shade, and sun and rain and +nice little sections of both heaven and hell.” + +“It’s cruel and merciless, and it’s vile.” + +“You knew your mother was a mighty sick woman; you knew she had to die +before long--” + +“I might have saved her! That was why I let Steve Bordereau make me do +things I hated. He--” + +“Never mind Steve Bordereau now. I’m talking about your mother. She is +dead, and you can’t help that. You can go down to the house where she +is if you want to; I won’t hold you back any more after you’ve had time +to think. Only I’ll tell you what’ll happen if you go now. There’s a +tough bunch hanging around, and they’re all Bordereau bums; and they’re +half drunk, some of ’em, and the rest are more so. They’ll grab you; +they’ll yank you off to Sundown or somewhere. God knows what they’ll do +with you, but you could be sure of one thing. By the time you got back +home, if you ever did, your ma’d be buried somewhere. Likely enough +you’d never even know where.” + +He had set her down at the base of a big pine. Slowly she slid down +close to the ground; she lay there, flattened against the earth; he +couldn’t hear a sob from her then and it was too dark for him to see +how she writhed. + +He waited a while, then spoke emotionlessly. + +“I’ll go down to the house again pretty soon. They won’t pay much +attention to me, as why should they? They won’t stick around all night. +There will be only the Indian woman left. I’ll scare her off. Then you +can come.” + + * * * * * + +Late that night it was Jim Torrance who dug the grave on the knoll back +of the house near that other grave, already six years occupied by the +former cattle king, Bill Cannon. He found mattock and shovel in the +tool shed, and some planks. And it was Jim Torrance who, just before +daylight, bore in his arms a thin, wasted figure, blanket-enwrapped. +All had gone; none had any thought of the dead woman except the Indian +woman, and she had been glad to flee the place when Torrance gave her +her chance. The girl had had her vigil on her knees by her mother’s +bedside while Torrance was digging. She did her weeping alone; when he +came for her she stood up and helped him. She said, when they came to +the knoll: + +“I don’t want anyone to know even where she is. They were so cruel +to her. I mean Bordereau and Murdo and those men you say were here +tonight.” + +So they replaced the dry sod over the unmounded grave; they scattered +pine needles over it. Torrance even dug up a couple of small bushes and +planted them on an already pretty nearly obliterated rectangle. + +“And now?” said Jim Torrance. “What about you?” + +“I don’t know. I don’t care. Oh, I’ll go away.” + +“Where? Friends?” + +“Anywhere. Friends? No. I haven’t anyone. I don’t want anyone.” + +“I see.” He rolled a cigarette; rolled and rolled it until it was as +smooth and hard as a lead pencil. + +“I haven’t thanked you--” + +“Don’t.” He kept on rolling that cigarette of his. Then he cocked an +eye at the eastern horizon. “It’ll be sun-up real soon.” + +“Yes. I must hurry. While it’s still dark. I’ve got to slip away as +though--as though I were a murderer!” She broke into a shrill, sobbing +laughter. + +“Slam the brakes on,” he said. He lighted his cigarette, then held it +before his moody eyes, studying the red glow of its burning end. + +“You have been mighty good to me,” she said. “You don’t know me; I +don’t even know who you are. Why?” + +“Why what?” + +“Why have you gone out of your way, gone to so much trouble to treat me +like--like a friend?” + +“I don’t like Steve Bordereau,” he said, clipping his words short. “I +don’t like Murdo, his side-kick.” + +“I see.” And she added, her own words clipped as short as his and +shorter with their bitterness, “It was Clark Murdo first, Steve +Bordereau next and working with him, who ruined us.” + +“You haven’t answered me,” said Jim Torrance, and didn’t seem +interested in her relations with Bordereau and Murdo and her sequential +opinions of them. “Now what?” + +“I’ve told you--” + +“Only it won’t work.” He flipped his cigarette away, then strode to +where it had fallen, to grind it out under the toe of his boot. “I +listened to the men talking at the house before they drifted. Me, being +a Johnny-come-lately, I don’t get it all. But I do get this: Maybe +they won’t string you up the way they’d handle a man--but maybe, too, +there are things a girl like you would hate just about as bad. They’re +plugging all the roads. You try to skip and they’ll get you.” + +“It’s Clark Murdo,” she said angrily. “That’s who it is. If Steve +Bordereau were alive, it would be Bordereau. But with him dead”--she +said it as steadily as though she were not remembering--“it’s Clark +Murdo.” + +He lifted his shoulders as much as to say, “What’s that got to do with +me?” He reached for his Durham bag, then changed his mind and pulled +his hat off to run his brown fingers through his thick black mane of +hair. + +“You’ll come along with me,” he said. “Back to my place. I’ll get you +away, clear, from there. Let’s get going.” + +“I can’t understand--” + +“You don’t have to understand. Anyhow, there’s nothing that wants any +understanding. You’re free, white and--you’re grown up.” She must be +eighteen or nineteen or a barely possible twenty; at that ripe age a +girl was a woman. “I’m asking you to come along. If you don’t want to, +remember the road’s open both ends.” + +She came along. She was half dead with stress, grief and weariness. At +the house she had kicked off that hated white satin gown and donned +riding breeches and boots. She forked her horse the way he did, and +they rode. + +They rode through the dark under the pines, as silent and dark within +themselves as the black pines were. They came up to the top of a thinly +timbered ridge and into the wan glow of a new day, two self-contained +black silhouettes against a pale-blue wall glinting with fading stars. +And when the first roseate flush crept into the lower sky they returned +to Jim Torrance’s new ranch. + +He made coffee, fried bacon, stirred up flapjacks and presented them as +brown as October acorns. She wouldn’t eat, she couldn’t--but she did. +He said: + +“I’ve just moved in here. It’s still mostly like a pigpen. But I’ve got +some clean blankets. You lie down; maybe after while you’ll get some +sleep.” + +He slammed the door after him and concerned himself with various ranch +chores which kept him near the house. Most of the time, under his +low-drawn hat brim, his eyes were watchful. He saw her when, about four +hours later, she came to the door. Before she could get well into the +open he bore down upon her. + +“Get back inside. I’ll tell you a thing or two.” + +First to tell her was something which she already knew but needed to +ponder. Sam Pepper’s ranch was adjoining, and Sam had developed the +habit of going atop a hill to spy on the newcomer. + +“I had a skinny kid named Skeeter helping me,” he said. “He’s gone +now, but most likely nobody noticed. You’ll find some of my old clothes +in that back room; there’s a pack needle and thread. You can make ’em +into the sort of misfits Skeeter wore. From a distance you’d look +enough like him. There’s an old hat of mine in there too. All you got +to do is just be a spindling, gawky boy; that ought to be easy.” + +She didn’t say anything. + +Later Jim Torrance saw several men riding along the road in front of +his place. They passed on and out of sight. Presently they came riding +back. He said to himself, “They found the buckboard.” + +This time they turned in at his gate, and he met them on the wheel +track that served as a rutted road. + +“Howdy,” said Jim Torrance. + +“Where’s the Cannon girl?” said one of them, a skinny man like a hungry +coyote. “Seen anything of her?” + +“Who?” asked Torrance. + +“The Cannon girl. King Cannon’s kid. She killed Steve Bordereau last +night, grabbed all the loose money she could get hold of and made a +get-away.” + +“You don’t say,” murmured Jim Torrance. + +They looked at him shrewdly. One of them, a gimlet-eyed, lanky young +hellion, said sharply: + +“You was in town yourse’f. You know all about it. She headed out this +way. We found her buckboard. Where’s she at now?” + +Torrance’s shrug at its best, as now, was eloquent. + +“Me, I’m a stranger in these parts. I’m up here alone, save for the +kid over yonder,” and his gesture indicated a slim, slight figure on +a hill nearly a mile away working at a fence. “If you think we’ve got +the girl hid up our sleeves, look for her.” His gaze, as stern as an +eagle’s, came back to their faces. “A flock of grown men trying to run +down one lone girl? You make a man laugh.” + +“Got any meanin’ back o’ that, Stranger?” demanded the sharp-eyed, +lanky man. + +For a moment Torrance appeared to consider the matter. Then he gave +them a second shrug and strode away, going off to the corral, which +he, like the slim, slight, distant figure at the fence, was making a +pretence of mending. He knew that in the house they’d find no trace of +her; he himself had seen to that. + +He saw them when they came out. They stood a while talking among +themselves; then they went out to the barn, passing quite near where he +was. He gave no evidence of paying them the slightest attention, but +none the less he noticed when they came to a halt and looked across +the fields to the hilltop where the solitary, unhidden figure was. He +knew, too, how her heart was pumping then under that old ragged shirt +of his which he had made her put on for the masquerade. In that, in old +hacked-off trousers of his and his worst hat, she looked as little like +the Sally Dawn Cannon he had seen in a white satin dress at Bordereau’s +as a scarecrow looks like a crescent moon. They might decide to take +time off for a word with the “kid.” Well, she knew her part. If she saw +them start her way, she was to climb into the saddle of the horse tied +to a fence post, to ride leisurely over the brow of the hill--and then +to dig her spurs in for all she was worth. + +They went on into the empty barn. Torrance heard them talking in +lowered voices before they came out. Again they looked over to the +hilltop where the figure of what was supposed to be Skeeter, the kid +Torrance had brought along to help with the horses, was busier than +ever at the fence. + +“Maybe the kid’s seen her?” said one of the men, looking at Torrance. + +He got a third shrug. + +“Maybe,” said Jim Torrance. + +The men then went away. But they stopped before they got to the gate to +call back: + +“Sorry we bothered you, Stranger. Guess she didn’t come this way after +all.” + +Any man with half his wits about him could have seen through that +studied remark as through a clean windowpane, and Jim Torrance wasn’t +missing anything obvious today. He told himself thoughtfully: “They’ll +be back about dark, or maybe one of them will stick around, hid in the +pines. They know damn well she did come this way.” + +He kept busy another hour at the corral, then went into the house for +ten minutes, smoking and letting time pass. After that he saddled a +horse, got a crowbar, shovel and hammer, and rode lazily across the +fields to lend a hand at fence mending. The girl, watching him coming, +turned frightened eyes upon him. + +“They’ve gone?” + +“Gone, sure. Not far, though. And they’ll be coming back.” + +“You mean--” + +“Yes. They found the buckboard where I ditched it, and back-trailed +this far. They’re not fools--or if they are, they’re not plumb fools. +I’ve a notion anyhow one of them is watching us now.” + +She shivered. She said faintly: + +“I’m afraid. What will they do to me? What am I going to do?” + +“Keep right on mending fence for a spell. You know these folks better +than I do. Does it mean much to you, one way or another, if they get +their hands on you?” + +Her shiver now was a shudder. He was glad of that, glad that she +realized what she might expect. She said all in one breath, “I’d rather +be dead!” + +He helped her set a post straight and began tamping the earth about it. + +“I’ll get you out of this--if you want to go with me.” + +“Yes! Yes, I do! Oh, you are so-- But _why_? Why do you do all these +things for me?” + +The shrug she got from him was worth all the three he had bestowed on +the men seeking her. He said: + +“Pretty soon I’ll go back to the house. You’ll keep on here, working as +hard as you can. But keep an eye open for me. When you see me mosey out +to the barn, you take your time, pile on your horse and ride slow and +lazy-like along the top of the hill, heading south. That will bring you +in ten minutes down into a hollow where you’ll cut into a trail. Turn +north there and keep straight on for about three-four miles, where the +trail forks and there’s a spring. Wait there. You won’t have to wait +long. I’ll be with you.” + +Her eyes had been lowered while he spoke; now there was a flutter of +her lids, and then her eyes, opened wide, looked up at him wonderingly. + +“You haven’t even told me your name,” she said, as though that mattered. + +“Torrance. Jim Torrance.” + +“I’ll do just what you say.” + +So in a little while, with few more words spoken, he left her. She, +though her overtaxed body trembled, kept on at her intrinsically +useless toil. He, pottering about house and barn and corral, kept an +open eye. He saw Sam Pepper come out at his favorite vantage point, and +was relieved rather than discomfited, for seeing what he knew must be +there was easier on the nerves than just fancying it. Also, just once, +he caught a glimpse of a figure skulking among the pines and knew it +for that of the gimlet-eyed young hellion. + +“Now we know,” muttered Jim Torrance. “And knowing is better than +guessing, any day.” + +He bode his time until the sun was red and flattening down by the +western hilltops. Then he gave the signal which he knew King Cannon’s +daughter had so long and anxiously awaited. He did not turn his head +after that to see what response she made. He rode down the wheel track, +out through the gate and toward Sundown. He rode slowly until he had +passed the first timber-masked turn in the road; then he swerved off +into the wood and began circling through it. In twenty minutes or so +he would strike back into the trail the girl was to have taken. Down in +the hollow it would be dusky then; no one should see him come up with +her. + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +“Where are you taking me?” was the first thing she said. Then, ashamed +that she should always be thinking of herself, she added hurriedly: +“But you! What about your ranch? Your horses? Who will take care of +them? Or are you coming right back in an hour or so?” + +“We’re going up into the mountains,” he told her. “No chance down the +other way where they’ll be on the lookout for you. They’d think nobody +would tackle the mountains now.” + +She knew what he meant. It was late October; the days had been full +and ripe with sunshine, but there was in the air the bitter sting of +winter. And when winter came, spring could be very far behind. A sudden +storm would choke the mountain passes with snow. + +Apprehensively, as though the heavens could assure her, she looked up +at the sky. Just now it had been a clear, shiny blue, but in the last +few minutes a film had crept over it. + +“Yes, it’s apt to snow before morning,” he said indifferently. “We’d +better be on our way, hadn’t we?” + +“It’s going to storm. If not tonight, then surely tomorrow or next day. +And can we ever hope to get through to the other side? The passes are +up ten thousand feet!” + +“Sure,” he said. “Sure. Let’s ride.” + +And so they rode. + +Together, they were aloof--she because of her fear, fear of what might +be following and fear of him, the unknown; he because of a strange, +baffling indifference. Why, she kept asking herself, _why_ did he +succor or seem to succor her? She could not at any step make him out. +Maybe he, like the others, was out to drag her down. She did not know. +She only knew she did not want to think of it. Without his aid she was +utterly lost. She merely took the one chance, the one open trail. It +might come to a dead end, to a frightful dead end, but it offered her +the one chance, and King Cannon’s daughter took it. + +Dusk thickened so fast that darkness, like a black blanket, dropped +down over their heads within the first half hour. Still, looking up, +one could see the frail light clinging like a gossamery mantle to the +mountain tops--and she chose to look up. She saw the first star and it +heartened her. + +“Know your way through the mountains?” he asked her, abrupt, out of a +long silence. + +“Not very well. It’s been such a long time--not since I was a little +girl-- No, I don’t!” + +“Neither do I!” + +Then he chuckled. That, like the star, somehow put hope into her. When +a man chuckled-- It was like a boy whistling. It was too dark to see +his face, so she could forget the sinister look of it. She gripped the +horn of her saddle with both hands, clung on tight--and inwardly prayed +to a merciful God. + +Neither spoke again until they came high up on one of the ridges that +flowed down from the loftier mountains, and they stopped to blow the +horses. Then the girl, feeling strangely light-headed and fearless and +utterly indifferent of fate, said unemotionally: + +“The storm is sure to catch us. I suppose we’ll starve and freeze to +death.” + +“We won’t starve,” he said, matter-of-fact about it. “I’ve got a food +pack along, you know. And maybe you noticed the extra blanket thickness +under your saddle? Extra, doubled blankets there, and under mine, too; +so we won’t freeze.” + +“You’d thought of all these things!” + +“Sometimes it pays to think a couple of jumps ahead,” said Jim Torrance. + +“I’ve tried to! I couldn’t. I--I can’t now!” + +“Sometimes,” said Jim Torrance, “it pays to do just what you’ve got to +do--sail ahead and take on your thinking when you can. Let’s ride some +more.” + +He led the way and she followed, because it seemed to her that +everything had gone out of her, leaving in her breast no will of her +own. At every forward step into the ever darkening wilderness her fears +mounted, yet like a chip borne along on a black unseen tide she went +the way the tide commanded. + +Within a couple of hours they came as straight as a string to a little +long-deserted cabin neither of them had ever heard about. Whether they +were led by chance, by the instinct which guides the wanderer through +the proper mountain passes, or by a power she had prayed to, they did +not ponder. After all, their horses were largely responsible; in the +dark they had followed a trail along the bottom of a vast canyon and +had struck into the continuation of that trail across a timbered upland +flat. Torrance’s horse came to a dead stop in front of the cabin before +either of them saw it. + +They went in and he made a fire in a wreck of a rock fireplace. + +“It’s early yet, but we can’t see what we’re doing,” he said. “So we +stay here over night and step along at daybreak.” + +He went out to care for the horses and presently came back with his +blankets and food pack. She was crouching by the fire, head down, her +face in her hands, her hair down about her shoulders. + +“Hungry?” he asked. + +“No. I couldn’t eat.” + +It was a small one-room place. He arranged her blankets on a strip +of canvas in a corner near the fireplace and put his own down in an +opposite corner. + +“Scared?” + +“Yes,” she told him, and looked up then, her eyes full on his. There +was a shadow of fright in her eyes, yet somehow they seemed to remain +fearless. + +He slipped a gun out of its holster and held it out to her. + +“Sleep with that in your hand. You’ll get a better rest.” + +She shook her head. “No. I have shot one man, God forgive me. I’ll +never do it again.” + +He slid the gun back into its place, saying lightly: “Bordereau had it +coming to him. Don’t let a little thing like that ride you. Good night.” + +“Good night,” she said faintly, and went to her corner to lie down and +tuck herself into her blankets. + +It was bitter cold that night, with the wind howling from midnight on, +and putting its fingers like icicles through a hundred cracks in the +cabin walls. Jim Torrance kept the fire going, bringing in dead wood +for which he had groped in the dark under the pines. When dawn came it +was a pale, chill dawn; the ground was white with snow but no snow was +falling. + +Their breakfast, though the fire served them, was sketchy. The best +part of it was the steaming black coffee made in an old tin can. When +he brought the horses up she said, “If they come this far they can +follow our tracks.” + +He didn’t say anything but led the way, steering for a high notched +pass in the mountains some miles ahead. On the more gentle slopes they +rode swiftly; for the most part the climbing was slow and laborious. +The sun rolled up, red and genial, and dissipated some of the morning +chill. But soon thereafter a sharp wind began blowing and a thin gray +film spread widely across the sky and they saw the gossamery snow +wraiths swirling about the higher peaks. + +“Our tracks won’t last long,” he said to her over his shoulder. “It’s +coming on to snow again.” + +She was glad; even now, as through her troubled sleep last night, there +was always the haunting dread of a pack of men, like wolves, hunting +her down. She had never gotten far enough to think what they would do +with her, whether they’d hang her high to some pine tree, as they’d +certainly do with a man, or-- But just the thought of their hands on +her had grown into a nightmare. And now, if God sent His white snow to +cover the earth, she was free! + +But when the snow did come and their faint tracks were lost for all +time, her moment of exultation was short. For the cold penetrated, +biting to the bone, and the mountains grew at every step more rugged +and cold and inhospitable. The mountains grew inimical; rather they +had always been that way, but she had never thought about it until +now. They crushed and killed when they could, which was often enough. +Men had their way down in the valleys and foothills, making things +over--but let them try their puny hands up here! The stern old mountain +straight ahead of them was now as it had been a hundred, a thousand, +ten thousand years ago; august, it was an enemy entrenched behind its +towers. Nor was it merely passively inimical; at times it poured down +torrents of stone and gravel in what folk called landslides, which +buried deep the intrepid invader of its kingly solitude. Itself, never +stirring, was like a general directing devastating forces. On a day +like this it was a simple matter to feel that old mountain’s stubborn +hostility. + +“It’s going to kill us,” she said. “It’s going to mash us like a worm +someone steps on.” + +“You’re all on edge,” said Jim Torrance, and they rode on. + +The skies thickened; the snow came down at first in chilled pellets, +then in fluffy feathers that clung to their shoulders and knees and +whitened the ground. Good-by to tracks now! + +So for a little while both were content; nothing could be more welcome +than a flurry of snow to shut the gate in the face of any possible +pursuit. But within another hour, as they climbed together, it became +obvious that they had to do with something altogether different from +any mere light sifting-down of playful snowflakes. The wind burst +storming through a high pass and flung hard frozen pellets in their +faces. They spurred on; they came swiftly into a more sheltered region, +but here the snow was falling so heavily that the air was gray and +thick with it. This, then, was not just the advance notice that winter +was on its way; it was winter itself, lionesque and raging. + +“You see, I was right,” she said, when they stopped a moment in the lee +of a sheltering cliff. “The mountains and the storm are allied against +us. It will grow dark, we’ll be lost--there’ll just be smooth white +mounds in a day or two for markers, and we’ll be under them.” + +“You don’t sound like you cared much.” + +“You don’t care either. I could tell when I first saw you.” + +But he shook his head, flicking snow right and left from his hat brim. + +“You’re dead wrong. I’ve got me a few jobs to do first. And one of them +is to get you out of this. Let’s poke along.” + +“You _are_ Jim Torrance?” + +“That’s what they told me when I was a little shaver. Why?” + +“There’s been a lot of talk about you; I suppose you know that. I +heard men talking at Steve Bordereau’s place. They said that you came +looking for a man named Jim Torrance, and that that’s what you call +yourself.” + +“Men say lots of things, don’t they?” he said lightly. + +“Let’s poke along,” rejoined Sally Dawn. + + * * * * * + +Hours later--hours of floundering through already accumulated +snowdrifts in the higher passes with scarcely a word spoken, head-down +hours buffeting the storm--the two came to a spot where it seemed they +could go no farther. Iron-flanked mountains, lifting their naked fronts +high above timber line, seemed to constitute an impassable barrier; and +so heavy were the low skies, so thick the air with storm, that dark was +already on its way long before its appointed time. The two wayfarers +came to a halt; their knees brushed as their horses pressed close +together for warmth and the feel of companionship. + +“All I know of this man’s country,” said Torrance, “is from a few words +of hearsay that I didn’t pay much attention to at the time. We can’t be +very far from Pocket Valley, and we’re headed right as far as general +direction goes.” + +“Pocket Valley is the first place they’d look for me,” said the girl, +“if they ever guessed we’d headed this way at all.” + +“Sure. But we needn’t go right into the Valley at first. The man who +told me about it said something about the old Red Shirt Mining Camp on +the ridge above Pocket.” + +“The bottom fell out of it years ago. My father was interested up there +when-- There’s not a soul there, now, especially at this time of year.” + +“That’s what I meant. Some of the old shacks are still standing, I +reckon. We could hole up there a day or two. I could make my way in and +out of Pocket for supplies.” + +“If we can ever find our way!” + +“Sure we can.” She couldn’t be altogether certain, but thought that he +was smiling ever so slightly, and that the smile was quite unforced, as +he added, “You see, we’ve got to!” + +So they rode on, riding this way and that on the steepening slopes, +finding a way where none seemed to be, climbing higher and higher in +order to attain those vantage points which afforded best views across +the broken country and down into any such regions as might prove to be +Pocket Valley. They hurried all they could, running a race with the +swiftly advancing night. Sudden dark overtook them on one of the high, +lonely, storm-battered ridges, in as unlikely a place for a camp on a +night like this as could be imagined; and when on the whistling wind +there was borne the dismal howl of a hungry timber wolf, the girl’s +shoulders twitched with something more than cold, and the man admitted +to himself that things could be far better and cheerier. But he said +steadily enough: “We’ll make out. We’ll find shelter under a cliff. +We’ll get through the night, and in the morning we’ll find Pocket +Valley in two shakes. It ought to be just over yonder to the northeast +and only a few miles off. If it hadn’t got dark so early--” + +“Look!” she exclaimed, and grasped his arm in her eagerness. “A light!” + +His hand gave hers a good hearty squeeze; at the moment both were +unconscious of their involuntary gestures. He, too, glimpsed the light, +weak and wan and seeming far away, somewhere in the black void beyond +and far below them. + +“It’s the settlement down in Pocket Valley,” he said with assurance. +“What we see is the lights shining out of windows. So we must be on the +ridge we were heading for, and the old camp must be so close that we +could throw a rock and hit it.” + +“If we could only see it! But it’s so dark!” + +“We’ll take it slow now; we’ve got some sort of trail under foot; our +horses will take us right. And if we don’t have any luck, well we can +get down to Pocket in no time at all.” + +He led the way and she pressed along close behind him, not to lose him +in the thick night. Twice his voice was hurled back to her by the wind, +but she could not make out his words. Then she almost bumped into him; +he had stopped and was dismounting. + +“We’re there!” he called triumphantly. “Look sharp and you’ll see a +cabin of sorts; it’s so close you could almost reach out and pat it +with your hand. We’ve just passed another. Light down and we’ll take +stock of our night’s quarters.” + +Stiff with cold and weariness she slid down from her saddle; his hand +was out to steady her. Then he shoved a sagging door open and she +stumbled into the cabin’s pitch-black interior. + +“Wait a shake,” he said. “Here are some matches. See what it’s like +inside. I’ll tie the horses and you look around. If it’s all right, +we’ll stay here. Or I can poke into one of the other shacks. I’ll be +back with you in a jiffy.” + +Their cold fingers fumbled together as he handed her a half dozen +sulphur block-matches. He moved a few steps away in quest of a tree to +tie the horses to, lest, seeking shelter from the storm, they wander +off. Almost immediately he returned to meet her at the door, and to +hear her excited whisper: + +“We’re not alone up here! There’s a light in one of the other cabins; I +saw it through a back window, and saw a man moving about. Do you think +it is some of the men from Sundown, looking for me? They might have +ridden ahead and waited here.” + +“Did you strike a match?” + +“No. I was just trying to--my hands were so cold--and I saw the other +light.” + +He went with her to the little window. Fifty or perhaps a hundred yards +away was the other cabin; it, too, had a small square window, and +through this shone glimmeringly the pale light cast by a candle or a +glow from a fireplace. Presently he, too, saw a figure moving across +the window; he couldn’t see at all clearly, but it seemed to him that +the fellow was gesturing as a man might if talking with someone else. + +“Of course it might be anybody,” said Torrance, “but the chances are +it’s some lone crazy prospector and nobody from Sundown at all. Just +the same I’d better step over and take a look-see from close up. And +no matter who it is, I think we’d better stick here for the night. We’d +have a devil’s own time getting down to Pocket, and when we got there +we’d be pretty sure to run into someone that knows about Bordereau. I +won’t be long.” + +“I’m coming with you!” + +“Fair enough. Let’s step.” + +So again they went out into the storm to grope their way toward a light +which for her might have the least or the greatest significance. They +went boldly, since the shrieking wind blotted out any sound they made +and since they need have no fear of being seen. They drew close to the +lighted window. At one end of the room a candle-end on a box, stuck in +its own grease, was guttering out; it left the farther end of the room +in wavering gloom. They saw clearly the man who had been moving about +so restlessly and who now stood still; they made out indistinctly the +form of another man lying on a corner bunk. The two were talking, but +not a word was to be overheard. It seemed that the man standing was +taking orders; that he didn’t like them; that none the less he was +accepting them. + +Sally Dawn gasped out, her lips close to Jim Torrance’s ear: + +“They’re after me! It’s Clark Murdo, Steve Bordereau’s pardner! I can’t +see who the other man is but it’s bound to be another of Bordereau’s +men. What are we going to do?” + +“Let’s get back to our cabin,” said Torrance. They turned away but he +stopped and swung about and seemed tempted to linger. “No use,” he +muttered. “That candle will be out in a minute. I’d give my hat though +to see that other man’s face. I’ve got me a notion, Sally Dawn! I sure +have!” + +“What? What is it?” + +He hesitated, then said roughly: + +“No; I’m crazy, I guess. Come on, let’s get under shelter.” + +“But can’t you see--” + +“No. Neither can you. It’s too dark to see anything. Maybe daylight +will tell us something.” + +They made their retreat as hurriedly as they had advanced. Once she +spoke, saying in a mystified voice: + +“I wonder who that other man was? I can’t understand Clark Murdo being +bossed like that. And he was being ordered about, wasn’t he?” + +“He sure was; he didn’t like it but was taking it. And that’s what gave +me my notion.” + +But beyond that cryptic statement he would not go. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +Torrance brought in a saddle blanket which he fastened snugly over +their window and then with splinters of wood from floor and walls he +made a tiny fire on the rock hearth, purely for the sake of a little +light in which to explore the premises. The place reeked of long +desertion and was as bare as Mother Hubbard’s cupboard, yet walls and +roof were tight and sturdy. There was a rear door that led into a +dugout some ten feet square. + +“I’m going to bring our horses in,” he said. “The dugout will house +them where nobody’s going to find them unless we get found first. And +long before morning their tracks will be wiped out.” + +The horses entered the cabin willingly enough, and, though they sniffed +and snorted when once inside, were at last coaxed and threatened into +the dugout. + +“Now,” said Torrance, “we’ll eat the rest of our larder, make up our +beds the way we did last night and call it a day.” + +“A day! It’s been a year, hasn’t it?” + +But she smiled as she said it, a faint and quivering and altogether +uncertain smile, yet one not without its courage. And she added, “We’ve +at least a few bites of food, but our poor horses--” + +“Each one gets a double handful of grain,” he assured her, and again +she thought, “He thinks of everything!” + +He lifted a corner of the blanket over the window to peer out, and +reported: + +“Our neighbors’ house is dark. Mr. Murdo and his friend have gone to +sleep by now, and you and I are going to build up our fire and keep it +going until nearly morning; there’s not one chance in a million of a +ray of light or a spark giving us away. What’s more, they haven’t the +vaguest notion anyone’s about, or they’d have covered their own light. +I stumbled over a dead pine when I was leading the horses; I’ll have +plenty of wood before you’re ten minutes older.” + +“I’m going to help you,” said Sally Dawn. + +“Look here, you’re tired and--” + +“Have it your way,” she said, and he went out and closed the door--and +she opened it and followed close at his heels. She heard him chuckle. + +They built up their small fire and crouched before it and got warm +and began to yawn. She lay down in her corner and stared up at the +dimly lit rafters and then looked out of the corners of her eyes at +him, still squatting before the fire, and wondered. It was hard to +read anything in that dark face of his, especially by so treacherous a +light; the faint flicker of the flames at times seemed to reveal only a +grim sternness that was twin with brutality, at other times to soften +the features so that they appeared touched by a smile that had actually +in it a hint of tenderness. She fell asleep, with Jim Torrance still +motionless at the hearth. + + * * * * * + +She awoke with a start and sat up rubbing her eyes and staring about +her. The room was ablaze with light and her first thought was that the +cabin was on fire. Then she saw him standing there, looking down at her +in that quizzical way of his, half smiling and half frowning, and saw +that he had an enormous fire blazing in the fireplace; the room was +cozy with heat and as bright as day. She sprang up confused. + +“They’re gone,” said Torrance. “I saw them ride away half an hour ago. +It’s daylight now. They were in their saddles while it was still dark.” + +“You stayed awake all night, watching!” + +“I kept an eye open part of the time,” he admitted. “And I noticed that +though you were asleep you didn’t seem exactly comfortable. A good +thawing out over a hot fire won’t hurt either of us.” + +“Jim Torrance, what on earth are you made of? Steel?” + +Already she had grown to love to hear that chuckle of his. + +“Once upon a time, when I was very young,” he told her, “they taught +me a poem. It was all about what little boys and girls are made of. I +forget about the boys but it said about the girls: + + “‘Sugar and spice + And everything nice, + That’s what little girls are made of.’” + +Suddenly her face clouded; he remembered his first impression of her, a +sullen, smoldering little beauty with brooding, smoky eyes. Her mouth, +which had been softened by sleep, hardened. + +“I haven’t been nice to you,” she said. “I’m afraid I haven’t been +very nice to anybody. The world wasn’t nice to me--it made me hate it +and it made me bitter inside.” + +“Shucks,” he said lightly. “That’s nothing. You’re just a kid, that’s +all, and kids have got a right to cry and then sulk when they get their +fingers burnt.” + +“I’m not a kid! I’m twenty--almost twenty-one.” + +“As bad as all that? Quite an old lady, huh?” + +“A thousand years old this morning; I can almost hear my bones creak +when I move. And what now, Mr. Jim Torrance?” + +“The wind blew itself out about midnight,” he told her, “but it’s been +snowing harder than ever. We’ve got to have something to eat. If we +go on into Pocket Valley you might as well give yourself up. In this +storm no one else is apt to come along this way, so I leave you here +alone for a little while; I poke along into Pocket; I bring back some +provisions. Inside three hours I ought to be back. And, if I hurry +along,” he added, “I can still make out by their tracks the way Murdo +and his friend went. They headed down toward Pocket; I can find out if +they turned off anywhere.” + +She went to the door and looked out over a white world. Snow was +drifting down in large feathery flakes; trees were dressed as in +ermine; the sky was thick and gray. She thought that she had never +looked out over an expanse so still and so lonesome. Her mood was not +one to appreciate its beauty, inescapable though it was. + +“Of course you’re right, and of course I can’t go into Pocket or back +to Sundown, and of course I’m afraid to stay here alone--” + +“I’m going to leave a gun with you.” + +“I told you I’d never touch a gun again!” + +“Oh, but you will, some time.” He slid one of his guns up out of its +leather and dropped it to her blankets. “I’m starting right away. My +horse is already saddled; the quicker I get going the quicker my tracks +will be covered and the quicker you’ll be having breakfast. You can +count on me being back in about four hours at most; if I’m not back +then-- Well, you’d better saddle and go on down into Pocket.” + +She looked startled. + +“Why shouldn’t you come back?” + +He shrugged. + +“I sure expect to. But a man never can tell, can he?” + +A sudden suspicion suggested itself to her. + +“You think you know who the man is with Clark Murdo? Someone you know?” + +“I can’t be sure yet,” he returned, and once more sounded curt and hard. + +“I know! You think it’s that other ‘Jim Torrance’!” + +“You’re doing enough guessing now for both of us,” he grunted, and went +into the dugout for his horse. + +She watched him ride away through gauzy veils of falling snow which +grew heavier until they almost blotted him out before he vanished in a +scattered growth of mountain cedars. She closed the door reluctantly +and went back to the fire for comfort and companionship. + +As for Torrance, he made what speed he could as soon as he turned into +the white furrow, already smoothing over, that Clark Murdo and the +other man had made; for he realized how heavily a few hours in this +solitude could bear down on one--especially on a girl who had endured +as had Sally Dawn Cannon. He had told her he might be gone four hours; +he hoped to return within half that time. + +The track left by the men whom he followed ran straight along the +flank of the ridge, curved about a blunt shoulder of the mountain and +then wavered downward among stunted pines, its course at all times +indicating Pocket Valley as its objective. Now and then Torrance caught +glimpses of the tiny village looking like a child’s toy town roofed and +based in fluffy cotton. As he rode lower down the slope a pine forest, +all black and silver, shut off his view; still the single track left by +Murdo and his mate led on. But when he had penetrated the forest some +five hundred yards, that track split into two fading trails. While one +kept straight on down into the valley, the other turned off almost at a +right angle into a dark and thickly timbered ravine. + +“And now I make a bet,” said Torrance as, without stopping, he kept +on down toward Pocket Valley. “It will be Clark Murdo who has kept +straight on, the other man who has turned off into the canyon.” + +His next glimpse of the settlement, afforded when he was almost at his +destination, showed him several pale smudges of smoke barely visible +against the gray curtain of the sky. He estimated that he had been +nearly an hour making his tortuous way down the mountain; by now it was +long after the time of an invisible dawn and folk would be astir. + +Until now he had followed along the track which he was wagering had +been made by Murdo. At last, however, just before he rode out of the +rim of the wood into the open, he altered his course, keeping to the +timber for half a mile, not quitting it until he could approach Pocket +Valley town from a more southerly direction. + +“No use telling friend Murdo that he and I rode the same way,” he +judged. “And, in case he is curious, by the time he gets around to +looking for my trail it won’t be there.” + +Among the score of houses constituting the town of Pocket Valley he +had no difficulty in picking out the one he wanted, nor was the sign +over its front porch necessary as a guide. It was a long, low building +of rough logs on a foundation of granite blocks; at the rear was an +open shed to which he rode to stable his horse. He saw what he both +hoped and expected to see; another horse, still saddled, was tied here +worrying wisps of straw in a pole manger. He swung down, tied his own +horse, and noiselessly went up the steps to the back door. Before he +knocked he heard voices. + +Then one of those voices called out to him, “Well, why don’t you come +in?” and he opened the door and entered directly upon a big barnlike +room in which a round-bellied stove was blazing red-hot and in which +three men stood about, all three with glasses in their hands. + +One of the men was Clark Murdo. + +“And so I win the first bet,” said Jim Torrance to himself with +considerable satisfaction. + +The other men he had never seen. One he correctly took for the +proprietor of the place. He disposed of the other man with a flick of +his eyes; his real attention, though discreet, was bestowed upon Murdo. +That individual’s eyes were for an instant round with astonishment, +then narrowed and cold and noncommittal. + +“Howdy, Stranger,” said the owner of the place. “Ride in on a +snowflake?” + +“Sort of getting ready to get hungry,” said Torrance, and came on to +the stove, spreading his hands out toward it. “If there’s a store here +I’ve come to the right place, haven’t I?” + +“Right as rain. Store, saloon, hotel and in season a place where you +can try to get your money back. Squat.” + +Torrance moved to the rawhide-bottomed chair indicated, as though +weary, and sat down with a long sigh. Murdo, who had been watching his +every gesture and expression, spoke up then. + +“Hello, Torrance,” he said. “What are you doing up this way?” + +“Hello, Murdo,” said Torrance. + +“Seems as though I’m gettin’ a whale of a lot of comp’ny for this time +of day on a snowy mornin’,” observed the proprietor. “And so you two +boys is acquainted, huh? That’s nice. Me, I’m Andy Stock, an’ though +we ain’t got around to breakfas’ yet, I c’n give you a shot of licker +right now an’ a cup of cawfee in two shakes.” + +“I’ve been sort of thinking about coffee,” said Torrance. + +Andy Stock turned to the other man. + +“How about a fire in the cook stove, Jake? It’s cawfee time anyhow.” + +Jake downed what remained of his drink and moved off through a door at +the side of the room, and almost immediately they heard him banging +at a kitchen stove. Murdo stood twirling his glass, appeared about to +speak, momentarily subdued his impulse, then let it go. + +“Which way’d you come from, Torrance?” he asked, and sounded friendly +and casual. + +“Sundown,” said Torrance. + +“Sure. Of course. Up over the mountain or the roundabout way through +Tucker’s Flats?” + +“Would it make any difference to you which way I came?” asked Torrance. +“And do you want to know why I dropped in and how long I’m staying and +how old I’ll be next birthday?” + +Andy Stock laughed good-humoredly. + +“Murdo just rid in himse’f,” he said. “Kinda early ridin’ for him, too. +I reckon he’s got something on his mind. He’s lookin’ for that girl +that killed his pardner, Steve Bordereau. I reckon he thought maybe you +had saw her somewheres. It ain’t in Murdo, you know, to come straight +forward with what he’s hankerin’ to find out; he’s always beatin’ +around the bushes to get anywheres.” + +“You talk too much, Stock,” growled Murdo. + +“You think so, do you?” snapped Stock, suddenly angry. “Why, damn your +eyes--” + +“Forget it,” said Murdo and stalked away to a window. He tried to peer +out, but the windowpane was filmed over with snow. Coming back he said: + +“Let me have some oats, Andy. There was nothing in your shed but some +dirty straw, and my horse needs a feed if he’s going to carry me any +more today.” + +Stock, still a trifle testy, snorted: “I’d say it’s about time to think +of feedin’ your hoss. You been here half an hour already, swiggin’ +whisky, an’ never thinkin’ of the pore brute.” + +“Oh, hell, let’s have the oats and less conversation,” said Murdo +impatiently. + +Stock went off to his storeroom and returned with a dipper full of +oats; Murdo took it and went out. Stock winked at Torrance. + +“What’d I tell you, Stranger?” he demanded in triumph. “There he goes +in his roundabout way to get him some place. He’d let his horse rest +there a week ’thout feedin’ the pore devil, but he’s jus’ figgered +out he can take a look-see at the tracks you made gettin’ here, an’ +can answer him his own question about whether you rid down over the +mountains or come up from the south by way Tucker’s Flats.” He spat. +“Hell take Clark Murdo an’ all his pack,” he said. “And you, too, if +you’re a friend of his.” + +Now Jim Torrance started asking questions, and asked them curtly and +swiftly to have his answers before Murdo returned. He began, + +“What was it he said about a girl killing Steve Bordereau?” + +“A girl name of Sally Dawn Cannon. Hell, ever’body knows who she +is; ol’ King Cannon’s daughter. She shot Bordereau at his place in +Sundown. Kilt him dead, says Murdo. Then she hightailed out of there +before they could grab her, though what they wanted to pester a girl +like her for, for just beefin’ a rat, me I don’t know. Likely he had +drove her in a corner.” + +“Self-defence?” + +“Murdo don’t say so. Says just plain hate and meanness.” + +“Witnesses?” + +“Murdo says him and four other Bordereau men seen it happen.” + +“And still they let the girl get away? What do they expect to do with +her?” + +“Lynch her, accordin’ to Murdo. But, shucks, the country wouldn’t +let ’em get away with that. Or maybe, would it?” He grimaced. “The +Bordereau gang of late has got a strangle-hold on the country from th’ +other side Sundown to way up here.” + +“There’ll be a big funeral, I suppose.” + +“It’s already been. Murdo must of been in a hurry to see the last of +his pardner. They planted Steve Bordereau early next mornin’ right +after he was shot.” + +Just then Stock’s roustabout stuck his head in through the kitchen +door and bawled: “Cawfee! Come an’ get it.” And a moment later Clark +Murdo came back from ministering to his horse and they all went to the +kitchen together. + +Torrance, from under those lazy eyelids of his, noted two things: Murdo +on first entering looked relieved, and that meant that he had assured +himself that Torrance had ridden up from the south and not over the +mountain trail. Next, he saw that, as the four men chatted idly over +their coffee, Murdo began to tighten up again, to grow restless and +perhaps even anxious. He wondered about that until Murdo’s own words +gave him a clue. Again Murdo was asking questions, striving to be +merely friendly and casual. He said, “Riding on north, Torrance?” + +Torrance seemed thawed by his strong hot coffee. He answered +carelessly, “Not in a hurry in all this weather.” He turned to Stock, +yawned and stretched and asked: “How about a shakedown for a few hours? +I didn’t get much sleep last night.” + +“Sure,” said Stock. “Breakfast will be ready in a minute; then you can +flop long’s you like.” + +“Got a barn where I can put my horse up?” + +The barn, Stock told him, was just back of the shed; he’d find hay +there; help himself. So, while ham was frying and hot cakes were +mixing, he went out to the stable. He unsaddled, gave his horse a +rough-and-ready rubdown and returned for breakfast. Thereafter Stock +led him to a little room, empty save for its bunk and a washstand with +a lamp on it. At the door, as Stock was departing, Torrance called back +to Murdo, who was standing watching from the kitchen doorway. + +“Happen to know a gent who calls himself Jim Torrance, Murdo?” he asked. + +Murdo said, “What?” and it wasn’t because he hadn’t heard; maybe +he wanted to take a moment to think. Then Stock spoke up to say, +mystified, “I thought you was Jim Torrance.” + +“I thought so too,” said Torrance, “but it seems there’s some other +man wearing the same name. Murdo might know him. How about it, Murdo?” + +“No,” said Murdo. “I don’t know him.” + +“Well,” said Torrance, “you might meet up with him some time. When you +do just tell him I’m hoping to see him.” And he closed the door. + +He sat on the edge of his bed and slowly, with profound concentration +on something else, started rolling a cigarette. For a little while he +heard voices, Murdo’s and Stock’s, so clearly that he could catch some +of the words. Suddenly Murdo’s voice was lowered; then a door closed; +then all sounds were gone. He kept on rolling his cigarette, his eyes +the narrowest of slits, his face stern, his jaw set. + +After a while, ten or fifteen minutes, he heard another door being +closed; the sound was faint but distinct against the silence; he judged +someone had gone out the back door. He went to his window and scraped +at it with his finger nail. It was hard to see through the snow-filmed +pane, but at last he found a spot in an upper corner through which the +light filtered less dimly. A moment later he saw Clark Murdo riding +around the corner of the house, headed back toward the mountain trail. +He even made out that Murdo had some sort of bundle on the saddle +before him; it looked like a full barley sack. + +Torrance went back to Andy Stock then, finding him at the hot +pot-bellied stove. Stock looked at him in mild surprise. Then he +blurted out, “What the hell’s going on here anyhow?” + +“Guess I don’t need a sleep after all,” Torrance told him and went to +the door to look out. Murdo was riding as rapidly as the snow would +permit and was already close to the rim of the forest. He turned to +stare the storekeeper in the eye, then to say thoughtfully, “Either +you’re an awful handy liar, Stock, or you haven’t got any more use for +Murdo than I have.” + +“Take your pick, Torrance,” said Stock sharply. “What’s it to you, +anyhow?” + +“Murdo’s out to drag the Cannon girl down. Me, I helped her make her +get-away.” + +Stock nodded. “Murdo told me.” + +“Well, I’ll tell you something else; I was there when the shooting +happened; I saw every bit of it. Until pretty recent I was taking it +for granted, like a man does, that cards were being dealt off the top, +and that things were what they looked like. Not now though. I don’t +believe the girl was the one that killed Bordereau. She shot him all +right; he went down; we got out of there. Then what? Some other person, +maybe Murdo himself, could have shot him again or popped a knife into +him. Anyhow it was Murdo that got him buried so gosh-awful sudden.” + +Stock whistled, frowned and whistled again. + +“What makes you think all that, man?” + +“Two-three things. Maybe I’m right and maybe I’m wrong. Any way you +look at it, Murdo’s got no call to pull the kid down.” + +“I’m with you there,” said Stock. + +“All right. Now tell me a thing or two. Where did Murdo say he was +going? And what did he have in his sack?” + +“He said he was goin’ up to see Pete Conroy. Conroy’s an old prospector +that lives back in the hills a ways. Murdo says Conroy hurt his leg and +couldn’t get out; that he’s takin’ him some grub. An’ grub was in the +sack.” + +“Murdo’s a damn liar, but you don’t have to tell him I said so. Now +suppose you let me have a sack, too, and I’ll put about a tenth as much +stuff in it as Murdo has, and I’ll stagger along too.” + +He laid in a small stock of provisions, making sure of coffee and sugar +and tinned milk, all packed in a can in which the coffee was destined +to come to a boil, and went for his horse. Andy Stock, from his door, +watched him ride away through the swirling snow and tucked in the +corners of his mouth. Jim Torrance rode mountainward in Clark Murdo’s +track. + +“I’d sort of like to be on hand when it happens,” said Stock. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +Jim Torrance was tempted up to the yielding point when he came to that +spot on the mountain flank where a fresh track led deep into the dark +ravine. For this far Clark Murdo had come up from Pocket, and here he +had turned off to rejoin his companion of the earlier morning. And +Torrance, so sorely tempted to follow him, kept saying to himself, “I’d +know a lot if I overtook those two, and I’ve got the crazy hunch that +at last I’d come up with a man I’ve been looking for, for a long, long +time.” + +But there was that girl waiting for him high on the ridge. He couldn’t +quite make a go of just letting her wait. He couldn’t quite get her +face out of his mind’s eye. She had stood pretty nearly all the +punishment you could expect her to stand--alone up there for hours with +only her own tragic thoughts for company. The kid must be nearly at her +rope’s end. In losing her mother it seemed that she had lost all she +loved. On top of that there was a corroding horror in her soul; she’d +be thinking over and over and endlessly over, “I killed a man.” She’d +be remembering the look on his face when he fell; she’d be thinking of +him dead and soon to be dug under. With just those two to think of, +her beloved mother and an ancient enemy, both dead so recently, she +could no longer be left alone by any man who did not love torture for +torture’s sake. + +So, though rage was in his eyes, Torrance rode on and let a chance +slide by. Presently he got to thinking of other things: For one, Clark +Murdo by now knew that he had been tricked into believing that Torrance +had come up through the Flats in the south; he would have noted that +another horse than his had recently traveled this way; he would have +guessed mighty close to the truth. He could scarcely avoid being sure +that Torrance, too, had stopped over last night at the old deserted +mining camp. It was a simple step from that surmise to the next--that +Sally Dawn Cannon had stopped there with him and was perhaps there now; +that Torrance, like himself, had gone down to Pocket Valley seeking +provisions for still another mouth than his own. + +“And he may be showing up as soon as he carries the news along to his +team mate,” mused Torrance. + +Further, he marked that it was no longer snowing so heavily; +considering that this was the first storm of the season it might +reasonably be expected to wear itself out soon. That fact would have +its bearing on events. + + * * * * * + +When he came to the mountain cabin, there was Sally Dawn in the open +doorway waiting for him, a pale and weary, tragic figure with eyes +looking unnaturally large; he knew that in his absence she had broken +down and wept miserably. But a flash of gladness came into her eyes on +seeing him. + +“I had no way of telling how long you were gone-- I began to be +afraid--” + +“You began to wonder whether there was any breakfast coming up, I’ll +bet a man,” he said lightly as he dismounted. + +“Honestly, I forgot about breakfast!” + +“You ought to be starved.” + +“Maybe I am!” She looked at his bundle in the barley sack. “I am +starved!” Then her eyes traveled questioningly back to his. “Tell me +what happened. What about Clark Murdo and the other man?” + +He tethered his horse near the door and they went straightway to the +fireplace where she had a small fire still burning. But she thought to +ask, “Aren’t you bringing your horse inside again?” + +“No. We’ll be riding right away, just as soon as you’ve eaten. And I’ll +tell you about things while ham’s frying and coffee coming to a boil.” + +“Coffee! I’d rather have a cup of hot coffee than a buckskin bag full +of gold dust!” + +“Sure,” he grinned at her. “It’s a lot more inviting this time of day.” + +Together they prepared her breakfast while he explained how first +of all he had eaten down at the Pocket. “I’d have waited for you,” +he told her, “only I wanted things to look natural to Murdo.” Then +he told her briefly of his encounter with Murdo, of Murdo’s having +asked Andy Stock concerning her, of his general tall curiosity about +Torrance’s movements, about his having taken a sack of provisions to +his somehow-mysterious side-kick. + +“They’re after me, of course,” said Sally Dawn. + +“That doesn’t explain their hiding out in that canyon,” he retorted. +“But, yes, of course they’re after you. So as soon as you’ve had all +the coffee and hot cakes and ham you want--yes, I’ve got a couple of +eggs, too--we’ll fork our saddles and get out of here.” + +“But they’ll be watching the trail, won’t they? They’ll see us on our +way down into the Pocket.” + +“No they won’t, because we’re not headed down there. We’re turning +tail right here and drifting back to Sundown. We’ll make an easier and +quicker trip going down, and all by daylight too, than we made coming +up. Even if they follow, I don’t think they’ll overtake us. And if they +do come up with us-- Well, that won’t happen until it happens.” + +Round-eyed and puzzled she heard him out without an interruption; then +she exclaimed: + +“Sundown? You mean we’re to go back there? After all this long ride, +after we’ve almost got away? Back to Sundown?” + +“Here’s sugar for your coffee. Here’s milk.” He jabbed a hole in the +can with his knife. “Yes, back to Sundown. It’s exactly where they +won’t be expecting us to go; likewise, I’m beginning to think it’s +where you’ll be safest. And it’s where you belong; it’s where your +ranch is. Mine, too.” + +“Your ranch, yes. Mine?” She shook her head and sighed. Time was when +she had loved that ranch, King Cannon’s and her mother’s and hers, with +all her heart. “Mine is as good as gone from me for good now.” + +“Maybe,” said Torrance. “A man never knows.” + +“I’m not sure that I want to go back to Sundown,” she said, and sounded +altogether independent about it. + +“Scared?” asked Torrance, and turned the sizzling ham with a stick. +“Here’s a hunk of bread and a dab of butter.” + +“Of course I am! Have you forgotten all the things you said to me about +letting those men grab me?” + +“While you finish eating, I’ll saddle your horse,” said Torrance, and +rose from his squatting position on the hearth. Standing high above +her, looking down on her tumbled brown tresses and then into her +uplifted puzzled gray eyes, he added: “No, I haven’t forgotten. I’ve +sort of changed my mind, that’s all.” + +A faint flush came into her cheeks and a flash as of fire into her +smoky eyes. She could only surmise that he had had enough of their +adventure together. She said swiftly: + +“You can go back! I’m going on. I’m never going near Sundown again as +long as I live.” + +Then she was treated again to the sound of that soft chuckle of his. + +“If you don’t go back, I don’t go either,” he said, and grinned down at +her. “But as it happens, we’re both going. Side by each, as the feller +says.” + +Then he went and saddled her horse. + + * * * * * + +The return journey, as he had predicted, was much easier than had been +their trip up into the high places. By the time they had dropped down +two or three thousand feet there was but an inch or two of melting snow +under foot. And all day long they had met no one and had caught no +glimpse of Clark Murdo or any other following them. + +In the early gray dusk she pointed, saying: “There’s your ranch. We’re +almost there.” + +He seemed to come up out of a deep reverie. + +“Know a funny little rooster named Sam Pepper?” he asked. + +She looked at him wonderingly, he was so grave in his questioning. + +“Of course I do! Everybody knows Sam Pepper. He is funny, but I like +him. What put him into your mind?” + +The gravity slowly faded from his face and in its place came a slow +smile which in the end gave her the warm feeling of being enveloped by +it. + +“When a man needs a helping hand,” he said, “he’s got to think about a +lot of folks he knows. Me, I’ve hit on Sam Pepper!” + +“For help? Mercy! What sort of help? I never knew a more helpless +creature.” + +“Is there by any chance a Mrs. Sam Pepper?” + +“There is. She’s a darling; everybody loves her, the most motherly--” + +But something came into her throat at the last word and she broke off, +averting her face. Torrance didn’t say anything; he leaned outward from +his saddle as though to pat her shoulder, but withdrew his hand without +touching her and without her seeing. + +When they came down along the road in front of his gate he reined in +his horse and said quietly: + +“I want you to stop here a little while. If the coast is as clear at my +place as it looks, and as it ought to be, I’ll poke over to have a word +with Sam Pepper--” + +“I’ll go with you! Let’s go straight on there first of all.” + +“Please!” It was the first time he had ever said that to her. “I’ve +been thinking about this all day. I’ll go alone to Pepper’s first; I’ll +make sure no one else is there. You’ll not be kept waiting more than a +few minutes.” + +She nodded then and they rode on to his ranch house. The place was +empty; there was no sign that any prowlers had been about. He hurried +her into the house and her horse into the barn; it was nearly dark +then. Less than ten minutes later he was leaning from the saddle to rap +on Pepper’s door with the loaded end of his quirt. The door was opened +and a woman looked out, Mrs. Sam without a doubt. Sally Dawn’s epithet +“motherly” just fitted her. Middle-aged, apple-cheeked, comfortable and +cozy looking, she greeted the stranger smilingly. + +“Howdy, Mrs. Pepper,” he said, and smiled back at her. “I’m your new +neighbor, Jim Torrance. Is your husband here?” + +“He ain’t far,” said Mrs. Sam, and stepped out in the yard to call her +bugled notes, “Sam! Here’s company.” + +She was calling and looking toward Sam Pepper’s high hill, calling +needlessly as it proved, for here already came Sam Pepper at a sort of +dog-trot run. + +“I seen you just riding home, Torrance,” he said breathlessly as soon +as he was within hailing distance. “You and somebody else. It was kinda +dark and I couldn’t quite make out for sure-- You see, I just happened +to be up on my hill and--” + +“You two folks alone?” asked Torrance. + +“Sure. Always alone. Better light down--” + +“That was the Cannon girl with me,” said Torrance. He speared the +little man with a glance and, after a fashion, through a long silence, +managed to keep him wriggling on the spear point. Then he added slowly +and significantly, “In case you might be interested I can tell you +several other things, things that a lot of folks are wondering about.” + +Mrs. Sam snorted. “If there’s anything on earth Sam ain’t interested +in, I don’t know what it is. When he was born they say he was tryin’ to +count how many toes he had. But if Sally Dawn, poor little thing, is +over to your place--” + +“Them Bordereau men will tear her to pieces if they find her!” burst +out Sam Pepper. + +“I’ll go over and fetch her,” said Torrance. “We’ll be back right away. +And then I want a good talk with you, Pepper.” + + * * * * * + +When he brought Sally Dawn back with him she ran headlong into Mrs. +Sam’s mothering arms and put her head down on that deep, comforting +bosom--and Torrance and Sam Pepper stepped along outside and sat on a +log. That is, Torrance did; Sam Pepper couldn’t sit still, couldn’t +even stand still. + +“I aim to make a dicker with you, Pepper,” said Torrance. “I need help +and you’re the one man can give it to me. And there are things you’d +like to know about, and I’m the man can tell you things no other man +can.” + +“What sort of help, neighbor?” asked Pepper, all eagerness. + +“I want you to help me find out things, to nose out some facts that are +keeping under cover.” + +“Like what?” asked Sam, growing excited. “What about?” + +“Give me time and I’ll tell you.-- Say, what’s happened to Murdo?” + +“Hanged if I know.” He looked worried. “He’s gone and nobody knows +where! So’s Doc Taylor! So was you and Sally until--” + +“Who’s Doc Taylor? What about him?” + +“He was called in when Bordereau was shot. He went upstairs to look +at Bordereau; I seen him. Next morning nobody could find him. I been +asking folks; nary a one has seen hide nor hair of him.” + +Torrance stared at him through the growing dark for a long while, then +whistled softly. + +“I can tell you what Murdo’s been up to all day and where he’s been,” +he said crisply, and stood up. “And I can ask you this, ‘Why did they +bury Bordereau in such a hurry?’” + +If Pepper had been doing a sort of restrained dance before, now he +fidgeted himself into something between an Apache war dance and an +Irish jig. He was all but frothing at the mouth as he gasped out, “Mr. +Torrance, I’ve been asking myself--” + +“I know,” said Torrance. “I can also tell you where the Cannon girl and +I have been-- I was on hand when Bordereau got shot, so I can tell you +details about that--I can even tell you why I came up here looking for +a man named Jim Torrance--” + +“For God’s sake!” pleaded the little man. + +“Are you with me?” demanded Torrance sharply. “Will you throw in with +me to find about everything? We’ll be helping Sally Dawn Cannon, if +that means anything to you. You’ll learn one hell of a lot--but you’ll +keep your mouth shut about it all until I say the word or I’ll chop you +up into dog meat.” + +He looked as though he meant it. Sam Pepper shivered. Right now he +clamped his mouth shut so tight that there were little puckers at the +corners which Torrance, stooping so close to him, could see even in the +fading light. + +“It’s a deal?” demanded Torrance. + +Sam Pepper didn’t open his mouth even then. But he nodded his head with +a rapidity that made Torrance think of a woodpecker hammering on an oak. + +“Go get your horse,” said Jim Torrance. “We’re riding into Sundown.” + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +Early though the hour was, the Stag Horn was crowded. Excitement had +run high in Sundown, and men clustered here where the current chain of +events had seemed to have its inception; here, if anywhere, they could +get the latest low-down on what it was all about. + +Florinda, extravagantly attired, white-bosomed and sparkling with her +“family jewels,” strutted like a peacock. With Steve Bordereau away, +with Murdo away too, she was more the tinsel queen than ever before. +She disported herself as though it was she, Florinda de Valdez y +Verdugo, who owned the place. + +She saw Jim Torrance, travel-stained and somewhat hollow-eyed, come in +with a furtive and apprehensive Sam Pepper at his heels, and stiffened. + +Torrance’s eyes were hunting her down. When they found her he came to +her as straight as a string. + +“Señorita!” he said to her in Spanish, and his tired eyes mocked her. +“You are lovelier than a little white dove with pink feet; you are +lovelier than a little dove sitting in the hollow of a man’s hand. I am +going to buy you some wine, and you are going to sit with me for three +minutes and smile at me--and answer a question!” + +Her teeth were like pearls, her loveliest and most genuine gems. Though +she looked uncertain and frightened and ready to run, she smiled. She +said, “_Si_, Señor Jeem Torrance,” and made her skirt billow above her +slim ankles as she led in haste the way to a secluded corner table. + +Sam Pepper, goggling wide-eyed in all directions, followed the two +like a little dog with its tail tucked in. He had been upstairs in +these rooms just once before in all his days; that was when Bordereau +had opened for his first night, and Sam’s insatiable curiosity got him +admitted at a cost in dollars which he had never confessed to Mrs. Sam. + +The three sat down. Florinda looked at Sam Pepper as at a bug. The +waiter brought wine. When Torrance began to speak, Sam Pepper ceased +goggling all over the room and distended his ears instead. + +“Florinda,” said Torrance, “we have met before, you and I.” + +She nodded. + +“In Nacional,” she whispered. + +“So you remember?” + +Her eyes became mysterious, unfathomable. She said almost inaudibly, “I +am not going to forget; not ever, Señor.” + +“Bordereau was there that night?” + +“Yes.” + +“A man was killed that night?” + +“Yes! You know--” + +“Who killed him?” + +“But I do not know, Señor! It was-- I thought it was--” + +“I did not kill that man. Did Bordereau?” + +“I thought--I thought you killed him! Bordereau? But I do not know, +Señor! Not anything.” + +He stared at her a long while, trying to make out whether she lied. By +this time there were hot spots of color in Sam Pepper’s tanned cheeks. +Abruptly Torrance switched to other matters. + +“With Steve Bordereau dead,” he said, “who takes over here? Who’s the +big gun now at the Stag Horn?” + +“Murdo. He and Steve were somehow partners.” + +“Are you and Murdo good friends?” + +Her velvet-black eyes unsheathed themselves in a flash. + +“He is a pig. I hate him.” Only she said, “He is a peeg.” + +“Did you see Doc Taylor come in the night after Bordereau was shot?” + +“Yes. I followed into the room. Steve was not dead yet. Then Murdo +t’row me out.” + +“And Doc Taylor?” + +“I do not know, Señor. He was there when I go. Two-t’ree hour after +that a man comes running, telling everybody his little boy baby is +sick; he is crazy to find the doctor quick. He come back two, t’ree +time. He come again today; he say he cannot find the doctor. I do not +know, Señor.” + +Torrance slid some money across the table. “You can go now,” he said. + +She rose slowly with a queer, native dignity. The money she ignored +absolutely, as though she had not seen it. Her eyes were a little +brighter, her face hotter with color. + +“I am your friend, if you will have it that way, Señor,” she said, in +a soft voice which trembled just a trifle and which was very earnest. +Then she hurried away, almost running. + +Sam Pepper, looking about to explode with all that pent-up curiosity +seething within him, began babbling questions, but Torrance promptly +shut him up, saying: + +“Not now, Sam. You’ve got to wait, if it kills you. Right away I want +you to help me. Remember that I’m a stranger here and that you ought to +know everybody. We’ve got us a job of work to do tonight, and it might +come in handy if we had a few other fellows, say four or five, to lend +a hand. Men that are on the up-and-up and that we can trust. How about +it?” + +Sam Pepper’s eyes started roving again. Then he shook his head. + +“Not upstairs, Torrance. Downstairs in the bar I’d be sure to find some +boys like that, that I know and that a man can tie to.” + +“Step down and round ’em up,” said Torrance. “Make it lively. Friends +of the Cannon girl if you can find them. I’ll be with you in no time.” + +Sam slid out of his chair and hurried out of the room. When Torrance +went downstairs a few minutes later he had reason to congratulate +himself on the choice of his ally. Pepper had already gathered half a +dozen dependable looking men. Five of them, especially sought out by +Pepper, were young stock men, and neighbors of the Cannons; the sixth, +older and slightly bald, yet a man ready for anything, had not been +invited but had horned in--and that man was Lying Bill Yarbo. Pepper +looked at him accusingly; as for Jim Torrance, he was glad to have +Yarbo of their number. At a nod from him they followed him outside. + +“I’m playing a wild hunch tonight, boys,” he told them. “I’ll tell you +all about it in a minute. First get this: If I’m wrong we’re apt to +have a fight on our hands, and if I’m right we’ll be turning up to the +light a pretty dirty trick that’s been played and that’s still in play.” + +One of the young fellows, lean and lanky Dave Drennen who had once +worked for King Cannon and who now was running a small spread of his +own, spoke up quietly. + +“Somehow what you’ve got in mind is to help out Sally Cannon? You’re a +friend of hers and you know what’s gone with her?” + +“It’s to help out the Cannon girl, and to help me out, too. Yes, I know +where she is. So does Pepper.” + +“Sure I do,” said Pepper. “Right now she--” + +“Keep it under your hat a little longer,” commanded Torrance. “Now if +you boys will wander along with me we’ll get busy. Likewise I’ll tell +you what I’m banking on.” + +He led the way and the others came along, walking swiftly down the +sidewalk toward a hardware store which he had noted on his first day +in Sundown. It was too early for a store to be closed and there were a +couple of articles he wanted. But the little group of men hadn’t gone +over a block when Sam Pepper, who seemed to have eyes in the back of +his head and whose ears were always registering sounds to which others +gave no attention, came to a sudden halt. + +“Say!” he exclaimed. “There’s Clark Murdo! And there’s someone with +him! Say, he’s got the girl! That’s Sally Dawn he’s yanking along after +him!” + +Three or four riders had drawn up in front of the Stag Horn; that was +what Sam Pepper had heard first of all. They had dismounted; Clark +Murdo had called out sharply, issuing some swift command. Then he and +those with him passed into the Stag Horn. + +“So,” thought Torrance, “Murdo followed us after all, found the girl +and has brought her here.” He said aloud: “We’ll go back, boys, but let +Murdo show his hand first. Funny he has brought her back to Sundown; +with so many folks around, he can’t raise a finger against her. He--” + +“You don’t know what you’re talking about!” snapped Sam Pepper. “He +will hand her over to Rufe Biggs; Rufe’s town marshal, as crooked and +mean as a snake and a skunk--and belongs body and soul to Bordereau. Or +did. With Bordereau dead, I guess he’s in Murdo’s pocket. He could jail +her, couldn’t he? After that, him and Murdo could do as they damned +well pleased.” + +“Just the same, take it slow,” muttered Torrance. “I’ve got something +up my sleeve and we’re going to know right soon whether it’s an ace or +a low card.” + +When they came back into the Stag Horn they saw that Pepper had things +partly right if not entirely. There was Rufe Biggs, town marshal, tall +and yellow-haired and pale-eyed, towering over Sally Dawn, who looked +very small and helpless and weary. There was Murdo, doing a lot of +talking; there was hot fury in his eyes, to be explained perhaps by a +fresh gash on his cheek from which blood was still dribbling. He kept +dabbing at it with his bandana. + +“She’s yours, Rufe,” he said. “I caught her hiding out up at Sam +Pepper’s place. You ought to arrest him, too. You ought to go grab that +damn wife of his; she threw a butcher knife at me. Anyhow here’s this +Cannon girl that murdered my pardner. Me, I say, woman or no woman, let +the law take its course.” + +No one laughed at the thought of Sam Pepper’s wife attacking Murdo with +a butcher knife; that could be explained solely by the fact that nearly +every man here was a follower of the team of Bordereau and Murdo. They +would laugh later, when Murdo wasn’t there. + +Rufe Biggs, stepping closer to the girl, was just lifting his hand to +put it on her shoulder, just opening his mouth to announce her arrest, +when Jim Torrance’s voice, sounding flat and toneless, made itself +heard through the brief silence. + +“Me, I’m a stranger here, but there are some things even a stranger +might like to know about. One is, why did Murdo have to see to it that +Steve Bordereau got buried in such a hurry?” + +Sally Dawn, hearing him, whirled about, all eagerness and expectancy. +Murdo’s black brows came down in a heavy frown. + +“What the hell business is this of yours anyhow?” he demanded. + +“Another thing,” said Torrance in the same expressionless tone, “who +killed Bordereau? This girl here? Well, how many times did she shoot +him?” + +“This ain’t any trial court, brother,” said Rufe Biggs. + +“Of course it was the Cannon girl that killed him, and you know it,” +snapped Murdo. “She shot him twice, close up; once in the body, the +second shot in the head. She--” + +Sally Dawn’s gasp was drowned by Torrance’s reply to Murdo. + +“You’re a damned liar, Murdo,” he said. “She shot him just once.” + +Murdo’s hand went as quick as a flash to his low-slung gun. But Jim +Torrance’s two hands were already on his two guns, and there was a +cold, deadly look in his low-lidded eyes which acted as a deterrent. +Murdo shrugged. + +“There’s one more thing that a man might like to know about,” Torrance +went on after a little pause. “Where’s Doc Taylor? Nobody seems to have +seen him since he went up to take care of Bordereau.” + +A queer look came into Murdo’s eyes at that; the color ran up into his +swarthy cheeks, subsiding slowly. + +“What the hell are you driving at anyhow?” he said thickly. + +Torrance didn’t answer him. Instead he said to Sally Dawn Cannon: +“You’ll be all right now; the marshal will hold you where you’ll be +safe for maybe an hour. Then we’ll come back and see you home or +wherever you want to go.” He turned and went back to the door. “Come +along, boys,” he said, as the eyes of his new allies followed him. +“We’ll know damned quick what it’s all about.” + +This time Sam Pepper was the last to follow. He hung back long enough +to ask of the girl, “Is Molly all right, Sally?” + +“They were brutes to her. They left her tied up, so she couldn’t come +along with us. Yes, she’s all right, Sam--and she was wonderful!” + +Sam Pepper then was sadly torn two ways. He wanted to rush back and +free his wife and hear all details of what had happened; he wanted with +all his heart to find out what Jim Torrance had up his sleeve, whether +ace or deuce. In the end, hurrying after the men who were already +hurrying after Torrance, he found a half-grown, gawky and open-mouthed +youth whom he dispatched to set Mrs. Pepper free. Then at a run he came +up with Jim Torrance. + +“Where we going now, Torrance?” he asked. “What we going to do?” + +“We want a couple of picks and shovels,” said Torrance. “We’re going +out to the graveyard.” + +Sam Pepper’s mouth came open for an exclamation and remained open with +never a sound being made. + +Together with the tools which Torrance had mentioned, they picked up a +couple of lanterns. In the graveyard, companionably close to the edge +of town, they shone the light of their lanterns on a freshly painted +headboard. It advised that Here Lay Steve Bordereau, Gambler, Friend +and Gentleman. + +“Let’s dig,” said Torrance. “We might be interrupted, and there’d be +sure to be some around here who’d say this sort of thing was against +the law. Let’s get busy.” + +Lying Bill Yarbo began swearing in his rich deep voice and was the +first to wield a pick. Sam Pepper shivered delightfully from head to +foot and was of no earthly use. A contagion of excitement spread over +the others. In no time at all they brought the coffin up and pried the +lid off. + +Torrance, stooping to look closely, said only: + +“This isn’t Steve Bordereau. Who is it?” + +A yell burst from Sam Pepper. + +“It’s Doc Taylor! Doc Taylor, by the powers! What’s he doing dead here? +Who done him in? And where’s Steve Bordereau? And what’n hell’s blazes +does it all mean?” + +“Let’s pick up the box and carry it back to the Stag Horn, boys,” said +Torrance. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +Jim Torrance came stalking back into the Stag Horn. He had been away so +short a time that he found things here pretty much as he had left them. +Sally Dawn Cannon stood where he had seen her last and did not seem +to have moved. Only a few paces from her, talking quietly into each +other’s attentive ears, were Clark Murdo and the marshal, Rufe Biggs, +keeping their eyes on her all the time. The only change in grouping +that Torrance could note was this: A dozen men, hard hombres he judged +them, and Murdo men, had gathered just behind Murdo and Biggs; they +looked ready at the drop of the hat for anything they might be called +on to deliver. + +As Torrance entered, the room grew hushed and every eye turned to him. +He stepped to one side of the door and got his back to the wall before +he spoke. Then it was the girl whom he addressed. + +“Everything’s all right now,” he said. “You’ll be free to go in about +two minutes!” + +“Like hell!” roared Murdo, tense and worried and truculent. “All you’re +doing is a lot of wild talking. You’d better fold up and blow before +you get yourself dehorned. _Sabe, hombre?_” + +Torrance ignored him. To Rufe Biggs he said: + +“We stepped out to the graveyard. Somebody seems to have been digging +out there. The boys are bringing you what we found. Here they come +now.” + +They squeezed through the door, carrying the redwood box on their +shoulders. It was Lying Bill Yarbo who set something down on the box +when it had been deposited on the floor before Rufe Biggs. + +“Here’s the headboard that went with the coffin,” said Yarbo. “Step up +and read it, gents.” + +Neither Biggs nor Murdo moved or spoke; they looked swiftly at each +other and looked away even more swiftly. Other men crowded close. One +sang out: “Hell, they’ve dug Bordereau up! Can’t they let a dead man +lie in peace?” + +“Maybe this dead man didn’t want to lie in peace until he’d had his own +funeral and not somebody else’s,” drawled Torrance, and kept watching +Murdo. “Lift the lid off, boys.” + +A shout went up: “It’s Doc Taylor! It ain’t Steve at all! By the Lord, +it’s Doc Taylor in Steve’s box!” + +“You’ll find he’s had his head bashed in,” said Torrance. “Whether that +killed him outright or whether he smothered after his quick burial, I +don’t know. Maybe the coroner can find out. Anyhow, Biggs, he’s yours +now. And you might ask your friend Murdo what he did with Bordereau and +why he put Taylor in his place!” + +“Why, damn you!” yelled Murdo, and again he went for his gun--and again +he thought better of it. + +“That’s twice you’ve done that, Murdo,” said Torrance. “Mean anything +by it?” + +Murdo, like Steve Bordereau in this, was a certain type of gambler, +the cold-blooded, calculating type that will bet as high as any +man--but only on a dead sure thing. Right now, though he had a hard, +gun-slinging pack at his back, the odds for him personally did not +appear to strike him as right. He got himself in hand, throttling down +his anger, which he so seldom let sweep him away, and spoke coolly and +with the affectation of a sneer. + +“Seems like, for a stranger, you’re getting around,” he said. + +“And at that I’ve still got quite some traveling to do,” returned +Torrance. To the roomful of silent, puzzled men he added: “Later on you +boys can figure out just what happened, but one thing ought to be clear +enough to the thickest skull right now: First, Bordereau isn’t any more +dead than you are; he wasn’t even bad hurt. The Cannon girl shot him +high up, in the right shoulder I think it must have been. He put his +hand up as he fell back and got blood on it and got the blood smear +on his forehead. Then he got him his hunch to play dead, and you can +take it from me he had his reasons for wanting to do that! Then some +busybody brought the doctor in, and some helping friend of Bordereau’s +cracked the doc over the head to keep him from going out and spilling +the beans. That done, they have the funeral right away, Doc Taylor +taking Bordereau’s place while Bordereau goes off somewhere and holes +up until his wound heals. I’d say Marshal Biggs would be inside his +rights to gather Murdo in and hold him on suspicion.” + +A lean and foxy-faced young fellow, that same gimlet-eyed young hellion +who had come out to Torrance’s place looking for the vanished girl, +began whispering in Murdo’s ear. Murdo listened, then grinned. + +“You’re right, kid,” he said, and then spoke his piece to all who +cared to listen--and that meant all within earshot. “Torrance and some +other boys go out and do some digging in the graveyard. They come back +with Steve’s headboard and a coffin! Who’s to tell us it was Steve’s +coffin in the first place? And if it was, who’s to say they didn’t lift +Steve out and put Taylor in? Who’s here to say they didn’t kill Taylor +themselves?” + +“That’s right,” said Biggs quickly. “Dammit, that’s right!” + +“Better watch your step, Echo Biggs,” warned Torrance. “Anyhow get this +straight: You can’t arrest this girl for killing Bordereau when more +than one of us knows Bordereau hasn’t been killed. Now I’m going to +tell you all a little story. About six years ago a pardner of mine and +myself were down at a little border town called Las Lunas, sixty miles +from Nacional. We had forty thousand dollars between us and were taking +our time to sink it in a cow outfit. One day when Danny was alone at +the cabin some gent stepped in, shot him in the back of the head and +made off with our stake. And the gent that did that went to a good bit +of trouble to make it look as though I had murdered my own pardner.” + +Murdo, though slow with his gun tonight, was quick with his tongue. + +“A pardner-killer, huh?” he said. “So that’s what you are!” + +“The gent that killed Danny,” Torrance continued imperturbably, +“stepped right along. But he still kept up his play at getting me +blamed for his night’s work. Twenty miles farther along he wrapped a +bandana about his face, held up two sheep men that everybody knew had +been hoarding for a long time, robbed them, killed one, said to the +other, ‘Me, I’m Jim Torrance, and when you hear me coming you better +hide,’ and kept on going. And only a year ago the same gent, or I’m +guessing wrong, plugged a man down in Nacional when I was in town, and +tried to throw that on me. His game was and still is clear enough. He +knows damned well I’ll get him some day, if he can’t fix it up so that +some hot-headed party swings me to a cottonwood first.” + +“What the hell’s this got to do with us?” demanded Rufe Biggs. + +“Plenty. I came up this way looking for a man that calls himself Jim +Torrance whenever he pulls a fast one. I’ve got a reason or two to bet +any man of you a thousand dollars to a hundred that that gent is Steve +Bordereau. And, if you want to know, that’s why Bordereau is playing +dead right now. He’s the sort that shoots a man in the back, that tries +to manhandle a girl, that sets his yellow dog onto smashing Doc Taylor +over the head and burying him just to give him a chance to hide out. He +means to make his final clean-up here, then drift along somewhere else +where they don’t know him, take a new name--and maybe get to be mayor +or something like that.” + +“Got any proof of all this, Stranger?” demanded Biggs, beginning to +look a trifle uncertain. + +“Somebody’s already said,” Torrance told him, “that this place isn’t +any courthouse. Besides, I’ve talked myself out for one night.” He +turned to Sally Dawn Cannon. “If you’re ready we’ll step along.” + +She started forward eagerly. Rufe Biggs put out an involuntary hand to +detain her, but Murdo moodily shook his head. Biggs dropped his hand +and seemed relieved to do so, and Sally Dawn came swiftly to Torrance’s +side. She stepped around the grewsome thing lying there on the floor +staring up at her, and shuddered; but once outside in the clean night +air, with friends about her, shudders were forgotten and an ecstasy +thrilled through her. She put her two hands impulsively on one of Jim +Torrance’s hard brown ones. She said with a catch in her voice: + +“Some day when I can get a good dictionary I’m going to read it all the +way through.” He jerked up his black brows at her, as much as to ask: +“Who’s crazy now? You or me?” Then she ran on: “Maybe that way I can +find the words to thank you! But for you, where’d I be now? But for +you, I’d all my life go on thinking I’d killed a man.” + +He chuckled at last, the way she loved to hear him. + +“Shucks,” he said. “If you’d nailed Steve Bordereau proper, that +wouldn’t have been anything to keep you awake, and you’d have saved me +a job.” + +Then they mounted, all of them, and rode out of town. For a few minutes +Jim Torrance and Sally Dawn rode neck and neck. That was while he said +to her a word or two he felt impelled to speak. He said: + +“You’ve got good friends and unless I’m a liar you’re going to have a +lot more real soon. You can go back to your ranch when you want to. Why +not stay with the Peppers tonight? And when you go back home, why not +have them come along, and Bill Yarbo and a couple of the other boys? +And keep this in mind: You haven’t lost your ranch yet; you can bet +your sweet life that Bordereau pulled a crooked trick or two getting +you folks out on a limb; stick to it and you’ll beat him yet.” + +At the edge of town they rode into the deep dark under a thick grove of +big pines; when she said something to Torrance, still thinking him at +her side, it was Lying Bill Yarbo who answered. + +“Where’s Jim Torrance?” she asked. + +He didn’t exactly know. No one else knew. They called for Torrance and +got no answer. + +He had dropped back, cut into a side trail and was already well ahead +of them hurrying to his own place. He said to his horse, with whom he +grew conversational at times when they had it all to themselves: “Here +we’ve been putting in a lot of time messing around in a girl’s affairs +and letting our own slide. Let’s change all that.” + +At his ranch he went out to the barn and threw down a plentiful lot of +hay into the mangers; the stock would be finding short browsing and +feeling the want of warm shelter. He pulled his saddle and bridle, +gave his horse a good rubdown and a here’s-thanks-old-boy slap on the +rump, went out into the corral and tossed a skilful noose over his +liveliest black mare’s neck. This one he saddled and left in readiness; +thereafter he went into his house for a shave, a bite, and ten minutes’ +relaxation flat on his back. + +And then the thing happened which he might have expected, had he had +all his wits about him. For of course he had lighted a lamp, and he had +not covered his south window--and here came Sam Pepper on the run. + +And Sam’s words, as he bounced into the house, ran even faster than a +spry Sam Pepper could travel. There was a gleam in his eye, there were +red spots in his cheeks, there was something akin to venom on his ready +tongue. From the doorway he cussed Jim Torrance up hill and down dale. + +“What’s eating you?” demanded Torrance, leaning on his elbow. + +“You--you--you--” There Sam bogged down. But he grew vocal instantly. +“You wanted me to help you, and I done it. You was going to let me in +on a lot of secret doings--and, instead, you run out on me! What’s +more, you only set me wondering about a lot of other things! I got a +notion to cut your gizzard out and fry it in hawg fat and make you eat +it!” + +Torrance stood up. Of a sudden Sam Pepper, thinking himself about to +be attacked by a man to whom killing was just a chore, leaped back +out through the door, which, perhaps subconsciously, he had kept open +against retreat. + +“Don’t shoot, Jim. Don’t shoot!” he pleaded. “I was just funning. Shore +I was, Jim.” + +Torrance laughed at him and sat back on the edge of his bed. Pepper +sidled back into the room. And then, brushing him aside, Lying Bill +Yarbo came barging in. + +“What the merry hell’s going on here?” shouted Bill Yarbo, comporting +himself like a storm wind blowing its heartiest. “You’d run out on me, +would you? And connive with this tricky, lying Sam Pepper? The truth +ain’t in him and you ought to know it; and still you let him come in +and powwow with you unbeknownst to others. Torrance, are you a damn’ +fool on top of other things?” + +Here was another cue for a laugh from Jim Torrance that started low +down somewhere in his anatomy and rose into a glorious crescendo. He +got to thinking, “If I went out gunning for a couple of boys to keep me +from going to sleep on my feet, I couldn’t do better than S. Pepper and +L. B. Yarbo.” But all that he said to them about all this was said in +that laugh of his. He was a man with a tight smile, with now and again +a mellow chuckle--with a laugh like that maybe once a year. + +Sam Pepper stared, pop-eyed; Lying Bill glared. It was Lying Bill Yarbo +who spoke. + +“What’n merry hell are you talking about?” he demanded, and his big +burly fists were doubled into young parboiled hams at his sides. + +“Since you ask,” said Torrance, “I’m going for a chat with Steve +Bordereau.” + +“You do know then where he’s at?” gasped Sam Pepper, goggling. + +“I’ve got a notion. My horse is saddled. I’m riding right away.” + +“I’m going along,” said Yarbo heavily. + +“Don’t you let him, Jim!” stuttered Sam Pepper. “There’s like to be +trouble when you find Bordereau. Me, I’m your man. Yarbo here, he’d let +you down--he’s the damnedest coward in seven states and--” + +Lying Bill made a lunge at him but with almost incredible alacrity Sam +Pepper scuttled across the room and established himself behind the +headboard of Torrance’s bed. + +“Pepper’s such a damn little liar,” snorted Lying Bill. + +This time Torrance didn’t laugh; he was no longer in the mood for any +light comedy. He saw what ailed them both, each man hating the hide +the other walked in, each wishing his own subconsciously acknowledged +failing upon the other. He said curtly: + +“You boys stood in with me tonight and I’m obliged. I’ll be glad any +time to do the same for both of you. Now I’ve got me a job that belongs +to me and I’d better take it on single-handed.” + +“Dammit, you ain’t got no gratitude!” yipped Sam Pepper. “If you had, +you’d ask me along. You made a deal with me, remember; me, I done my +part and you ain’t done yours!” + +“Oh, hell, come along if you want to,” grunted Torrance. He got up and +jammed on his hat. “You’ve got a ride ahead of you though.” + +“Me, too!” boomed Bill Yarbo. “If there’s apt to be a showdown with +Steve Bordereau, I’ve got a right to be in it. Hell’s bells, man, I’m +the best friend Sally Dawn’s got; me and her old man, King Cannon, was +boys together and--” + +“He never seen King Cannon but once,” cried Pepper, “and then Cannon +booted him clean off’n his ranch.” + +Yarbo made a dive at him and Pepper slid up close behind Torrance’s +back. Torrance sang out sharply: + +“Look here, you two horn toads! You’re both welcome to trail along if +you’re fools enough to do it, but I can’t bother with you if you can’t +keep your damn mouths shut about each other. If you want to start +something, better stay here and do it. I’ve got something else to do +than trying to stand betwixt you.” + +“I’ll leave him alone if he’ll leave me alone,” muttered Sam Pepper. + +“Me too,” grumbled Lying Bill, though with reluctance. + +“Only,” added Sam, “it would be a heap sight better if he went back +home and stayed there!” + +“You--!” shouted Yarbo. + +But under that cold, low-lidded look that they got from Jim Torrance +they grew silent. And in the end, not over ten minutes later, the three +mismated musketeers rode out together--toward a meeting with Steve +Bordereau. + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +They had made their packs--blankets, bacon and beans, coffee, frying +pan and coffeepot--and headed up into the mountains, riding the same +trails Torrance and Sally Dawn had so recently traveled. They camped +that night at the same deserted shack that had sheltered him and the +girl on the first leg of their journey, and were up and riding at +the first glint of a pale gray daybreak. No snow fell that day; by +mid-forenoon tattered streaks of clear sky were like pale-blue banners +above the far ridges. And when they came to the old mining camp high +above Pocket Valley, the mountains as far as they could see swam in +a diaphanous purple mist, and the western horizon was aflame with a +red-and-gold sunset. + +“Now I’ll tell you boys all I know,” said Torrance, and hooked a leg +over the saddle horn while he reached for the makings. “Murdo and +somebody else camped here night before last. I could see Murdo through +the window; the other man was on a bunk in the corner and I couldn’t +see him. And I couldn’t hear what they were talking about. But I could +tell that the other man was giving orders and that Murdo was taking +them. So it’s a fair bet it was Bordereau.” + +“Where’d they go to?” demanded Sam Pepper. + +“Down trail toward Pocket. But they swung off where there’s a narrow +canyon. Then Murdo went down alone to Pocket, filled his grub bag and +went back up the canyon. So it’s my bet that that’s where Bordereau is +now, hiding out where nobody’d look for him, the same time he gets well +of a bullet hole somewhere in his carcass.” + +“Me, I know that canyon like I know my hat,” said Bill Yarbo. “And I +know right where we’ll find Bordereau, sure. You see, Torrance, about +thirty year ago there was all hell to pay about the mines up here. And +Sally Dawn’s old gent, though he was a stock man first, last and all +the time, took an interest. He was in the money in them days. He come +up here; he bought up some mining properties; and he likewise grabbed +off a little valley all his own for a summer range. What’s more, he +built him a house, and he’d come up here when he felt like loafing, and +go hunting and fishing. That house stands there yet, quite a place, and +it’s up that canyon--and you couldn’t find a likelier place for a man +to hide out and lick his wounds.” + +“And for once he ain’t lying!” said Sam Pepper, in a tone of awe. + +“Far from here?” asked Torrance. + +Bill Yarbo, having glared at Pepper, said, “Hell, no. If we poke right +along we’ll get there before it’s too dark to see the whites of their +eyes. Bordereau won’t be all alone, you know.” + +“No,” admitted Torrance. “He’d have someone--” + +“I know!” exclaimed Sam Pepper. “He’s got anyhow three-four, maybe +more men with him! There’s Hen Billings and Varney Slack and that +half-breed, Joe Tortillas; that’s three of ’em anyhow! And--let’s see--” + +“How would _you_ know?” snorted Bill Yarbo. + +“Me, I sort of notice things,” snapped Pepper. “When I go places, I +look around. Now since the night Bordereau got hurt I ain’t seen hide +nor hair of any one of them three, and they’re always hanging around +where Steve Bordereau is! Yep. And-- Say, I ain’t seen Turkey-trot +Smith or Andy Pollack, and they was both in Sundown when Bordereau got +shot! I’ll bet he’s got the whole gang up there!” + +Torrance shrugged. + +“There’s just one way to find out,” he said, and unhooked his leg from +the saddle horn. + +“Hey, wait!” said Sam Pepper, and looked worried. “It’ll be dark--we +better camp here overnight, anyhow. And maybe--maybe--” + +Bill Yarbo glared at him scornfully, then pretended spontaneous +laughter. Sam Pepper went red to the gills. + +“I ain’t scared!” he sputtered. “I’m just using my brains. If only +three of us go jumping a crowd like Bordereau’s got--” + +“There’s only two of us that counts,” said Yarbo. “Come ahead, Jim, +let’s get along.” + +“There’s something else,” said Pepper hastily. “You can bet your +boots that Bordereau’ll be ready for us! Don’t you suppose Murdo got +word across to him in a hurry? Them two are playing this game close +together.” + +“If Murdo or a messenger had passed us--” + +“He wouldn’t have to. He could have come up by the Flats. Or he could +have sent some sort of signal. Me, I noticed some smoke standing up in +the sky back yonder over High Man’s Ridge; I wondered about it, too.” + +“You would wonder,” guffawed Lying Bill Yarbo. “Come ahead, Jim. Let +the little rooster stick here or run back home to his old woman.” Then +he grinned very broadly, his eyes peering tauntingly at Pepper, as +he added, “Maybe Murdo and a bunch of cutthroats are following along +behind us now, Jim; maybe Mr. Sam Pepper, scooting back home, will run +smack-kerdab into them!” + +Sam Pepper, from red, turned a pasty white, and his eyeballs rolled. +Then, when Torrance pushed on again and Lying Bill Yarbo fell in +behind, Sam Pepper knew a moment of dreadful doubt. It was soon going +to be dark. A timber wolf, perhaps the same hungry old fellow that +Sally Dawn and Jim Torrance had heard, howled after a fashion to make +the white solitudes seem ten thousand times more dreary and lonely. +It wasn’t that Sam was afraid of the wolf; a man in a haunted house +wouldn’t be afraid of the creak of a floor board; such sounds, however, +didn’t perk a man up. He shivered and spurred hastily along after +Torrance and Yarbo. + + * * * * * + +The old house that so long ago had been a sort of vacation home and +hunting lodge to that great-hearted gentleman, King Cannon, when first +glimpsed by Jim Torrance gave him a flick of surprise, despite what +Bill Yarbo had hinted of it. There was a small upland valley with a +round bit of a lake like a dusky mirror in its center; there was a +rushing stream pouring down into the lake; on a narrow bit of bench +land stood the building, massive and four-square, honest granite for +foundation, no less honest and rugged spruce logs for the rest of it. +Candlelight glimmered out through two or three windows. + +There came a hushed bleat from Sam Pepper alternately holding back and +pressing up close to their heels. + +“Listen!” he pleaded. “You damfools listen to me! Ain’t you got any +sense? Look how the place is lighted up! Say, there’s apt to be forty +men there! If we go running into that mess--well, we might’s well cut +us our own throats and save ’em the trouble!” + +“Don’t listen to him, Jim,” muttered Bill Yarbo. And then in a +confidential tone, yet one raised loud enough to make sure Pepper +caught it, he demanded as though in wonder, “Why’d you bring him along +anyhow?” + +“Funny they’ve got the place lighted up like that,” said Torrance. “If +it’s Bordereau, and he’s in hiding, you’d think--” + +“Shucks,” said Yarbo. “He ain’t got the faintest idea that there’s +anyone on his trail. Up here, why a man might hang out all winter and +never have a nose poked in on him. We’ll take him clean by surprise.” + +“You’re c-crazy!” stuttered Pepper. “Murdo’s sure warned him.” + +“Come ahead, Jim,” said Yarbo. + +The two started on again. + +Sam Pepper stopped where he was. + +“Me, I’ll guard the trail,” he said faintly. “In case anyone’s +following us, I’ll head him off.” + +Yarbo laughed and Torrance grunted. Sam Pepper watched them ride on, +but himself sat where he was in the trail and shivered from head to +foot. He saw his two companions draw on closer to the house, then turn +off trail into a grove, then emerge on foot, moving on guardedly. He +was tempted then to turn and scurry back the way he had come, at least +as far as the mining camp, but the thought of being in that lonely +place all night--and of perhaps having some most unwelcome callers drop +in on him--gave him a fresh set of jitters. He dallied with the thought +of going back only as far as the main trail, then down to Pocket +Valley. But suppose he should meet Murdo and his gang coming up from +Sundown by way of the Flats? + +He just shivered and stuck tight where he was. + +Yet he’d have given anyhow a good left hand to know what was ahead +of Torrance and Yarbo, what they were going to find out and just how +things would happen to them. + +“Maybe they’ll be dead inside ten minutes,” his dry lips whispered. His +spare shoulders twitched as he added: “Me, too, maybe. Why’n thunder +did I ever come along with two such crazy fools?” + + * * * * * + +Again Torrance led the way, watchful for some guard who might well +enough be posted outside. It appeared however that Bordereau, as Yarbo +had predicted, was confident that no one was likely to look in on him +here. For when the two men came stealthily up onto the front porch of +the old King Cannon mountain place and looked in at a window, they saw +that the men inside had no thought of anything but of their own affair. +There was Steve Bordereau on his feet and moving about restlessly, +carrying one shoulder stiffly yet beyond that seeming whole and +unharmed. With him were five other men. + +“What’n hell are they doing?” whispered Lying Bill Yarbo. “Tearing the +house down?” + +“Who are they?” asked Torrance. “Know them?” + +“Sure. That little weasel Sam Pepper guessed it; somehow he’s apt to +guess right once in a while. They’re the fellers he said we’d run into. +And take it from me, Torrance, they’re tougher’n saddle leather. If it +comes along to a scrimmage, you better shoot damn fast and twice as +straight--or that little egg-sucking Pepper’ll have the laugh on both +of us.” + +Bordereau’s men, under his orders, were making a wreck of the big +rude-timbered living room. With pick and crowbar and hand ax, they were +tearing up floor boards now, and had already demolished a considerable +section of one wall in a corner near the fireplace. One man, down on +his knees, was prying up stones from the hearth. + +“There’s six of ’em altogether, and maybe more hanging around,” said +Yarbo. “There’s only two of you and me--” + +“Better go back with your little friend Pepper,” said Torrance. + +“Why, damn you!” growled Yarbo. “Me, I can handle that crowd alone and +single-handed. I was just going to say--” + +“Sh! What do they think they’re doing in there? What are they looking +for?” + +Sam Pepper could have told him, nailing the fact on the head; and Sam +would have been in an ecstasy of interest to mark whether they found +it or not. When this country had been filled years before with old +freelance miners, when King Cannon had come up here and looked around +and made him this place, he had grubstaked many a man, he had been a +friend to nearly all of them--and a lot of gold, both raw and minted, +had passed through his hands. Sam Pepper would have explained: “Why he +kept a lot of gold, King Cannon did, and he put it somewhere, didn’t +he? Here in this house, wasn’t it? And it’s never been found in all +these years. Somehow, Steve Bordereau’s got a hunch at last that he can +find it.” + +But Sam Pepper, missing all this, wasn’t on hand to explain, and Bill +Yarbo didn’t know. He relieved himself of a ponderous, thick-shouldered +shrug. + +“After all,” he suggested, “we come up here to gather Bordereau in, +didn’t we? Me, for a long while, I’ve wanted to see that bull dehorned. +Now while he’s busy, no matter what he’s looking for--” + +“The door’ll be locked,” said Torrance. “If we start anything through +the window, they’ll scatter six ways, douse the glim and have us +guessing. Let’s slip around back and see if we can get in.” + +“Fair enough,” agreed Yarbo, and they started to withdraw. Just then +however they were riveted in their tracks by a mighty uproar exploding +in the room on which they had only now turned their backs. There was +an excited yell in a high tenor voice, that of Joe Tortillas; there +was a triumphant, bellowing shout that came from an exultant Steve +Bordereau. And then a half dozen men were shouting like schoolboys. + +Torrance and Yarbo whirled and ran back and peered in again. They saw +what the excitement was all about. Joe Tortillas was the man who had +been ripping up boards near the fireplace; he had come upon a small +wooden box, pretty well rotted away, and from it dumped on the floor +several rusted old tobacco cans--and thus proved that in old rumors +there could be a lot of truth. What gushed forth was gold, some of it +dust and knobby nuggets, some in minted coins. + +“Looks like a million dollars!” gasped Bill Yarbo.-- And, oh, Sam +Pepper, where were you then? + +“Looks like Bordereau’d got it for keeps,” snapped Jim Torrance, +“unless-- Come ahead, Bill! Now’s our chance! At the back door. They +won’t be thinking of anything but that King Cannon gold.” + +He leaped down from the porch and ran, breaking through a deep +snowdrift at the corner of the house, and after him like a lumbering +plow horse came Lying Bill Yarbo. + +They found the back door locked. They tried a window; it, too, was +fastened. They hunted farther, hoping to enter without any splintering +of wood or crash of glass. It was Yarbo who found a narrow door in a +corner and got it open. He was aquiver from stem to stern--just as +Sam Pepper shook through icy fear, so did Yarbo tremble with rage. He +muttered in his throat: + +“Damn him, Jim! That belongs to Sally by rights. It might get her in +the clear again. And if Bordereau thinks for a split second--” + +Again a stone-cold Jim Torrance gave him a soft “Sh!” to bring him back +to some degree of caution. It would be like Bill Yarbo to go bounding +in like a roaring lion. + +“We ought to get the drop on them, Bill, but watch your step. Walk +light and have your gun ready.” + +They entered directly into what had once been a large kitchen, the sort +of place where you’d expect to have the ox roasted whole, the sort of +kitchen a man like King Cannon was sure to dream into being. They saw +strips of light under two doors, both giving entrance to the living +room where Bordereau and his exultant followers were. Jim Torrance +jerked his thumb toward one of these doors, then pointed to the other, +and Bill Yarbo nodded. They’d burst in simultaneously from two points +of vantage upon seven unexpecting, loot-excited men. + +Torrance stepped softly, tiptoeing, toward one of the doors. Bill Yarbo +went his lumbering way like an old bear toward the other. They had +enough light to guide them and to see each other by, due to the two +glass panels set over the two doors. Torrance began a slow opening of +the door to which he had stepped, drawing it inward toward himself. +Bill Yarbo turned a knob, had trouble because of a warped jamb, gave +an impatient tug, found that his door opened the other way, shoved at +it and-- + +Then of a sudden, as he remarked later, on regaining consciousness, it +seemed like all hell broke loose. Certainly these three things happened +simultaneously: The door flew open with a crack and a bang of a heavy +panel striking against a wall; the toe of Bill Yarbo’s boot caught on +the threshold and Bill plunged headlong, sprawling on all fours into +the living room--and from somewhere outside and near by there came the +rapid-fire explosions of gunfire. If every energy had been bent toward +giving Bordereau full warning that an attack was bearing down on him, +the thing couldn’t have been better done. + +Bordereau experienced his instant of consternation; so did Torrance and +Bill Yarbo; not one of them had the least certainty of what those shots +outside meant. + +But Sam Pepper knew! + + * * * * * + +Sam Pepper kept twisting his head this way and that like a little owl +sitting on a post; he wanted to watch for happenings at the old house, +and at the same time in desperate apprehension he kept watching the +trail along which they had ridden. When all of a sudden he saw two men +bulking big as they rode toward him, his heart pounded, fluttered, +threatened to stop for good and all, and the bones within him seemed to +melt. He had been scared many a time in his life but never like this! +He knew these oncomers for what they were--killers who’d make no more +of Sam Pepper than a cat would make of a mouse at breakfast time. + +He wanted to scurry along to the house where Torrance and Yarbo were, +but he couldn’t move. He saw the two men closer; there was enough +light reflected from the white expanse to show him their bulky forms +and, even more clearly, the horses they rode. They were Barty Evans +and Butch Vorich, as sure as he was born, and if there were two more +merciless brutes within a hundred miles of Sundown, he didn’t know +them. He began to wilt and slide down out of his saddle. As he slid he +reached automatically for his belt gun, just as it is said that a man +will grasp at a straw. + +Sam Pepper wore an old Colt forty-four that hadn’t been fired for +years; he wasn’t even dead sure that it was loaded! It was a wonder +that the thing could still shoot. Scared stiff and rigid as he was, +still there were certain uncontrollable, spasmodic jerkings of his +spare frame. A voice yelled at him; a gun roared and spat orange-yellow +flame; he was sure that he felt a lock of hair cut away. + +His hands, despite the cold, were sweaty. That old gun of his got +itself into his grip, he never quite knew how. A slippery finger +slipped on the trigger. And, a wonder again, the bullet went on its way +as from a fresh cartridge. Finally, a thing that cannot altogether be +explained, an act of fate if you like--just one of those things--that +wild bullet took a man, none other than Barty Evans, square between the +small crafty eyes. + +And Sam’s slippery finger kept on slipping. His gun, blazing away as of +its own accord, emptied itself--and a howl of pain shrilled through the +air as the man riding neck and neck with Barty Evans pitched headlong +from his saddle into the snow and lay there moaning and writhing and +trying to get up and falling back and lying where he fell, a black +formless blot on the white of the snow. + +The gun slid out of Sam Pepper’s hand. Sam himself balanced drunkenly +as though he too had been shot, then melted from the saddle and slowly +settled down into a snow bank. He didn’t faint exactly, but for a few +moments he didn’t quite know what it was all about or where he was or +why. He felt sick. + + * * * * * + +He was only vaguely conscious of other shots being fired within the +house, of wild yells and scurryings. He heard more clearly a man +shouting, and recognized Steve Bordereau’s voice: “Get the hell out of +here! There’s a mob after us!” He heard a roar from Bill Yarbo, a roar +cut short off; he heard pistol shots until the world seemed to rock +with them; he heard Steve Bordereau shout again: “The gold, dammit! Get +the gold, Joe! Let’s get the hell out of here!” + +And here came men rushing toward him on horseback, a hundred men he +would have sworn, though there were but half a dozen of them in all. +He cowered deeper in the snow and watched them race past; he saw Barty +Evans’ body trampled, saw stricken Butch Vorich try to wriggle out of +the way, screaming, and saw him too trampled, then lying a still black +spot emphasizing the whiteness around him. They were gone, gone with a +rush as they had come. And Sam Pepper, feeling more dead than alive, +was alone. + +After a while he picked himself up and slunk into deeper shadows. +His brain began functioning again in its own peculiar way. He began +wondering just what had happened there at the house--what about Jim +Torrance? And Bill Yarbo? After Yarbo’s shout there hadn’t been a sound +from them. + +So once again Sam Pepper was torn two ways. He wanted to scramble up +on his horse and get out of here on the dead run, get out and stay out +for good. Also he did want with all his heart and soul to know what had +happened at the house. + +He began inching back into the trail. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +Three men lay sprawled in the house from which Bordereau had fled so +precipitately, all three looking to be dead. In fact one of them was +beyond ever stirring again; that one chanced to be Turkey-trot Smith, +shot close under the heart. + +When, after no little reconnoitering, after many hesitancies and +withdrawals, little Sam Pepper at last came inching into the room still +lighted by three or four candle ends and also by a flickering light +which came from an adjoining room, he saw Bill Yarbo lying on his face +across a threshold, his gun near his lax hand, and saw Jim Torrance +lying half in and half out of another door, as still as the already +dead Turkey-trot Smith. Sam Pepper thought in agony, “Oh, my God, +they’re both dead--and me, me, I’m all alone up here!” + +That flickering light from the next room impressed itself on him. He +went tiptoeing to make out what it was, who was there. It was a lively +young fire just getting well under way. Bordereau, as he ran out, had +thrown a burning candle onto a heap of rubbish in a corner, meaning +to let the house burn down behind him and thus to leave no definite +evidence to the nosey ones, whose bodies, burnt to cinders, lay on the +living room floor, nor when and how they had expired. Sam Pepper, just +in time, began stamping out the flames. He ran to the kitchen, found +two buckets of water, doused the fire with them and so put it out. +Then, slack-jawed in awe, he came back gingerly to the scene of the +indoor battle. + +Two minutes later he and his kind fate were crowning him hero. His +emotions were like those of a proud conquering monarch going to his +coronal, or like those of a young girl being crowned Queen of the May. +Most definitely little Sam Pepper was “Aces.” + +And he had his audience. For Jim Torrance reared up and took stock of +things, and presently Bill Yarbo rolled over and groaned and made it +emphatic that he too was still alive. Both men had been shot, Torrance +once and Yarbo twice, yet neither was in any grave danger. Sam Pepper +saw that immediately. Lying Bill, falling, had struck his head against +the door jamb and was for some few moments out cold. Torrance, taking a +bullet groovingly along his skull, had been within a hair’s breadth of +reaching the end of his earthly trail, yet would be as good as new in a +few hours. He had lost blood, he had suffered shock, but otherwise he +was unimpaired. + +Both men, pulling themselves up into a sitting position, groped for +their guns, then looked in a dazed and questioning way at Sam Pepper. +Bill Yarbo, as soon as he was able to speak, began to curse the little +man. That was because, most of all, he knew that it was his own awkward +blundering that had precipitated disaster, and the words were sweet on +his tongue that strove to put all blame on Sam Pepper. + +Bill Yarbo said: + +“Here me and Jim Torrance has been fighting, doing men’s work, and +you--you little runaway rat! If you’d stuck with us, if you’d done your +part-- Go get out of my sight! You make me sick.” + +“Here’s a dead man,” said Sam Pepper. “It’s old Turkey-trot. He’s been +shot square through the heart, looks like. Must of shot himself, huh?” + +“Why, damn you!” roared Bill Yarbo in weak thunder. “It was me that +plugged him--else it was Jim-- It was me, that’s who. And you! Sticking +your head in a snow bank!” + +Sam Pepper inflated himself. + +“If you two boys,” he told them pompously, “had did your parts as well +as I done mine, you wouldn’t be laying here now for me to have to +tend to. I guarded the trail, like I promised. When two fellers come +storming in, Barty Evans and Butch Vorich they was, why I stopped ’em!” + +“You stopped ’em? Oh, my eye!” groaned Yarbo. “You--” + +“Sure,” said Sam Pepper vaingloriously. “I kilt ’em. Both of ’em. +They’re laying out there in the trail; you can go see for yourself.” + +“Of all the liars I ever knew!” growled Bill Yarbo in disgust. + +He managed to get to his feet and then would have toppled over in a +dead faint if Sam Pepper hadn’t run to him and helped ease his big +bulky body down onto a bench before the fireplace. Jim Torrance looked +at Pepper strangely; he had heard those shots outside and had wondered +about them. He too pulled himself up, retrieved his fallen gun, +and went staggering across the room and out through the front door. +He went weaving along the porch, lurching down the steps, stumbling +along the trail beaten through the snow by several running horses, and +came presently to the spot where Sam Pepper had experienced his great +adventure. There, black blots on the pure white of the snow, lay two +men. It was as Sam Pepper had said, and Jim Torrance, still swaying +slightly though the clear cold outside night air was beginning to +steady him, swore softly under his breath. + +He stood there a while, leaning against a pine, breathing deep, getting +his head clear and his unwilling muscles under control. Then he went +on a few steps, just to make assurance doubly sure about Bordereau’s +departure. The trampled snow told the story; Bordereau and those with +him had ridden on their spurs, going somewhere else. + + * * * * * + +It was Sam Pepper who stabled the horses in a wreck of a shed behind +the house, and who brought their packs in and spread blankets before +the fireplace and made a roaring fire of splintered boards that +cluttered up the place. And it was Sam who made a sort of broth out of +scraps from their provision stock, bacon mostly with beans mashed up +in the concoction; and it was Sam who, despite his patient’s curses, +did the major job of binding up Lying Bill Yarbo’s wounds. Yarbo hadn’t +said much until then; he had looked his questions at Jim Torrance and +had said a bleak: + +“Well? He was lying as usual, I suppose?” + +Torrance leaned against the chimney and stared a long while at Sam +Pepper, then shifted a penetrating gaze to Yarbo. + +“It’s the way Sam says, Bill,” he said. “He shot the two men, one +square between the eyes, the other close to the throat. Damn straight +shooting, if you ask me, with what little light there was. I found his +gun in the trail.” He tossed it to Sam. “Looks like, after he’d emptied +it, he’d thrown it in somebody’s face. If he’d had another gun, likely +he’d have got Bordereau and the whole crowd.” + +Sam Pepper blushed. Bill Yarbo began turning red; he had swallowed some +unwanted pills in his life but never one harder to get down than this. + +“What was happening in here, while I was heading the others off?” asked +Sam, brisk again. He looked all about him cheerfully and wonderingly. + +Torrance told him. Wider and wider did Pepper’s eyes stretch open. + +“With all the noise outside,” Torrance concluded, “Bordereau thought +there was a posse bearing down on him. I guess he thought he’d done for +Yarbo and me anyhow; he was burning down the house to make sure. And he +got away with Sally Dawn’s gold, enough of it, from the looks, to put +her up on easy street again.” + +“Gosh, I’m a sick turkey,” muttered Yarbo. “Bring me a bed and led me +die in peace. After what’s happened tonight--” His roaming eyes rested +for an instant on Sam’s perky face; then he shut them tight. “After +what’s just happened,” he said faintly, “me, I’d ruther be dead anyhow.” + +They holed up there at the old King Cannon mountain house, and were +grateful for its shelter. Sam Pepper was nurse, kitchen hand and +general roustabout. He went down to Pocket Valley for more provisions +and for odds and ends; he kept the fires burning; he ministered to +Lying Bill Yarbo when that bull of a man was delirious and threatened +to tear the house down. Torrance came and helped when Bill was at his +worst, and gave Pepper a hand with his labors. The two of them at times +talked, Sam doing most of the speculating, as they wondered whether +Bordereau and his men were clean gone for good, King Cannon’s gold +along with him. + +From Pocket Valley they sent a man secretly, Andy Stock’s helper, to +carry word to Mrs. Sam, who would pass it along to Sally Dawn, that all +was well and that they would be showing up before very long. The women +were to keep their mouths shut if possible; if Steve Bordereau liked to +consider both Torrance and Yarbo wiped out of the picture, let him. + +“He tried to play dead on us,” said Jim Torrance. “If we sort of do the +same for him, maybe he won’t hurry out of the country. Maybe we can +meet up with him again.” + +“How much in gold do you suppose there was?” asked Sam, on edge. “A +thousand? Ten thousand? Maybe a hundred thousand?” + +It was Torrance who, when he could, went out and scooped shallow graves +for Turkey-trot Smith and the two men Sam Pepper had brought to the end +of their trails; Sam wouldn’t go near them. Torrance got the job done +of a windy afternoon with a storm threatening; it did snow that night +but by morning cleared and a glorious blue sky hung over them. The +sunlight, warm and golden, fell across Bill Yarbo’s bed and heartened +him. + +“Hell’s bells,” he said, “I’ll be up and around tomorrow sure.” Then +he glared at Sam who just then was departing in his chipper fashion +toward the kitchen. “That is,” he said confidentially to Torrance, but +loud enough to make sure that Sam heard him, “I would if I was fed +right instead of being shoveled out the stingy messes that lying little +lizard feeds me.” + + * * * * * + +“I’ve been thinking about things,” said Torrance. + +The three had made themselves as comfortable in the big living room +as circumstances permitted. There was a genial fire going on the +hearth, windows had been blanketed, some of the splintered floor boards +replaced. Bill Yarbo lay in a corner on the bed they had made down for +him; Sam Pepper squatted on the wreck of an old chair, and Torrance had +humped over on the bench at the side of the fireplace. + +“Me, too, I been thinking!” spoke up Sam. “Gosh, if I only knew--” + +“There are some things we do know,” said Torrance. “Steve Bordereau +came here by night, went out in the dark and hasn’t come poking back; +it’s clear enough he’s still playing dead and doesn’t want it generally +known that he was ever up this way. We know, too, that he’s got quite +a gang with him; and that seems sort of funny when you first think of +it, since he is playing dead; and men do talk. Another thing is this: +Those two men that Sam stopped out in the trail were coming straight +here; they were Bordereau men; it’s a ten to one bet Murdo sent ’em +racing with word and warning for Bordereau, and--” + +“Sure,” said Sam, and rubbed his hands, “that’s why I kilt the +son-a-guns!” + +Bill Yarbo, who had given no sign of life, groaned. Torrance ignored +both the little man’s boastfulness and the big man’s pain at having to +swallow it. + +“And so,” Torrance continued, “even yet there’s a chance Bordereau is +pretty much in the dark about what’s happened around Sundown while he +was up here. He’s not apt to know about his grave being opened and +about the stir that made at the Stag Horn.” + +“That’s likely, Jim,” agreed Sam, and could not help adding, “Good +thing I did stop them two messengers of Murdo’s.” + +“What I’m getting at is this,” said Torrance, frowning into the fire +and speaking to himself as much as to the others, “what is Bordereau +up to now? And why those several men with him? He’s got King Cannon’s +gold, and it looked like a sizable pot. Is he running out with it, +skipping the country while the going is good?” + +“No, he ain’t,” said Sam, and sounded cocksure. “For one thing, you +said you thought you nicked him last night before they downed you; +well, that’s two pretty fresh wounds he’s carting around. Another thing +is, like you say, he’s got all those hard hombres along with him; it +means that he plans still playing dead and so playing safe, to do a bit +more hell-raising before he drifts and, when he goes, to go with all +his pockets full. He’s been down in Mexico before; well, likely he’s +headed back there when he’s made things too hot to hold him up here. +Likely he’ll buy him half the damn country and set himself up like a +king. That’s the sort Steve Bordereau is. One thing about him, Jim, he +don’t shoot nickels.” + +Torrance nodded. + +“That’s sort of the way I’ve been figuring it, Sam,” he said. “But +there’s this: When he does find out about Doc Taylor being found in his +grave, what then? It’s going to look to most folks like Bordereau had a +hand in that, huh? And I gather that Doc Taylor was pretty well liked. +Bordereau might do some lively stepping out of here if a lot of the +doc’s friends started looking for him.” + +Yes, there were a good many things to think about, and in the silence +which shut down--broken only by the faint crackle of the fire and a +dull, rhythmic thumping of a board loose somewhere and flapping in the +night wind--they were thoughtful and uncertain. Presently Sam, who +could never be silent for long, started to say something; but he hadn’t +gotten out the first half dozen words when he leaped to his feet, his +eyes goggling, and scurried into a shadowy corner of the chimney behind +Torrance’s bench. + +“Oh, my gosh!” he gasped. “What’s that?” + +Bill Yarbo strove to rear up on an elbow in order to glare at him. He +was in a good bit of pain and his voice was thick and faint, yet he +managed to mutter scathingly: + +“The brave little fighter and man-killer is scared out of his britches +by the wind blowing! Of all the--” + +“Shut up!” commanded Torrance in a whisper. “There is something--” + +All Sam’s terrors, which had left him in peace for a few hours while he +had gloated over his heroism of last night, came back to clutch him by +the throat so that he could scarcely get the whispered words out: + +“It’s s-somebody trying to break in! Somebody at the back +door--t-trying to get in through the k-k-kitchen--” + +Jim Torrance heard it too now and knew that Sam was right. He rose and, +gun in hand, stepped softly toward the kitchen door. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +Whoever it was trying to get in at the rear door suddenly desisted; +Sam Pepper had gone to infinite pains to make sure that all doors were +barred, all windows fastened. There was a brief silence while Torrance +cocked an ear against the slightest sound. Then he heard quiet voices, +though he could not make out the words, and after that there came a +sharp rapping. + +“Well?” demanded Torrance then. “Who’s there?” + +A voice answered quickly, “That you, Torrance?” And then another voice +spoke up, giving him a start, saying eagerly: “Oh, Jim! Let us in!” + +Sally Dawn’s voice! And she should be safely out of all this, many a +mile away. He unbarred the door and jerked it open, and Sally Dawn +hurried in, and with her came a young fellow, lean and lanky, whom +Torrance didn’t recognize at first but presently, in a better light, +remembered as Dave Drennen, that upstanding young rancher who was +neighbor and friend of the Cannons and, if the look in his eye meant +anything, a pretty warm admirer of Sally Dawn. + +“Jim!” she exclaimed. “Oh, I’m so glad! You’re all right then?” + +“Anyone else with you two?” he asked, and when she said, “No, just Dave +and me,” he shut and barred the door and led the way toward the other +room. On his way he demanded, “What in thunder brings you here?” + +“We got the message that Sam sent; that you and Bill Yarbo had been +hurt. And did you think for one minute that I wouldn’t come to try to +help?” + +“Why should you?” he asked curtly. + +“After all you had done for me--did you think--” + +“Here’s company, boys,” said Torrance. + +Sam had already popped out of his corner and came hurrying, the most +relieved looking man imaginable, and Bill Yarbo, also looking glad, +though his face was drawn with pain, again made his attempt to come up +on his elbow. + +“Howdy, Sally! Howdy!” cried Sam. And then, “Howdy, Dave! Say, this is +great!” + +Bill Yarbo muttered something. Sally Dawn, standing in the middle of +the room, her hair wind-blown, her cheeks bright with the nip of the +night air, her eyes shining, looked them all over. Longest of all did +she study Jim Torrance; she saw that his dark lean face looked haggard; +she saw that his eyes looked hard between their narrowed lids; but +she saw too that he was not as badly hurt as she had feared. Then she +hurried to Bill Yarbo and went down on her knees beside him. + +“Poor old Bill,” she said gently. “I’m here to doctor you, Bill.” + +“For which thank God!” said Bill Yarbo fervently. “Sam Pepper’s been +trying his damnedest to kill me.” + +She laughed at him and patted his hand and then held it tightly in her +two. Bill Yarbo settled back with a long sigh. + +Torrance turned to Dave Drennen. + +“Well, what’s it all about?” he asked bluntly. “What are you two doing +up here? What did you let this girl come for?” + +Drennen grinned. + +“You try to stop her when she makes up her mind about anything she’s +got her heart set on. Try it sometime, Torrance.” + +“There’s no sense she should go sticking her nose into any more danger +than she has to.” + +“I’m safer right here than I’d be anywhere around Sundown,” said Sally +Dawn, and sounded triumphant. + +“You are not,” said Torrance angrily. “Steve Bordereau--” + +“We know where Steve Bordereau is at this minute, Dave and I!” she said +exultantly; and, by way of telling Mr. Jim Torrance what she thought of +him for the sort of welcome he had given her, she wrinkled up her nose +and put out the tip of her tongue at him. “Don’t we, Dave?” She fairly +drenched young Drennen with a smile; let Jim Torrance take stock of +that, too! + +“What’s all this?” cried Sam Pepper, electrified. “What do you know +about Bordereau? How do you know where he is? And does he know--” + +“Let’s have it,” said Torrance. + +“And,” said Sally Dawn, still exultant and meaning to let Mr. Jim +Torrance learn that she knew a thing or two that might interest him, +“Steve Bordereau and the men with him have a lot of gold--some looking +like it had just been dug out of the ground, some in what looked like +a lot of twenty dollar pieces! And I hope they get to quarreling over +it--” + +“Why, Sally Dawn!” yipped Sam Pepper. “That’s your gold, every ounce of +it! They--” + +“What!” cried Sally Dawn, her eyes seeming to grow as big and round and +bright as any of those twenty dollar gold pieces. + +“We’re not getting ahead very fast with anything,” grunted Torrance. +“Seems as though the more there is to be explained, the more words get +poured out and the less gets said. Suppose, young lady, that you or +Dave Drennen here tells us what you know about Bordereau and where he +is.” + +She drew a deep breath and pulled off her hat and pushed the tumbled +hair back from her face. Then between them she and Drennen got their +story told. + +Immediately on getting word of a part of what had happened up here, of +both Torrance and Yarbo being wounded, she had insisted on coming to do +her part; if they were hurt it was in her quarrel, wasn’t it? Drennen +had done all that any mere man could to deter her, and that was nothing +at all, so he had come along. They had taken the longer but more open +way coming up through the Flats. It grew dark when they were several +miles south of Pocket Valley. About a mile from the old abandoned mine +road they had glimpsed a light through the trees; Dave Drennen knew the +ranch with its clutter of tumble-down buildings and corrals-- + +“Turkey-trot Smith’s place, I’ll bet a hat!” put in Sam Pepper, and +slapped his bony thigh. “It would be just the place--” + +“We didn’t see Turkey-trot, though,” said Drennen. + +“You wouldn’t!” said Sam. “Jim shot him, and thereby saved Bill Yarbo’s +life!” + +“Liar!” snorted Bill Yarbo, weak but not too weak to refute Sam’s +libel. “Me, I shot him and--” + +“Dave told me about the place,” Sally Dawn hurried on, “and how +Turkey-trot was suspected of hiding stolen stock there, and how he and +Steve Bordereau had been thick as thieves--and we stopped and looked at +the light and got to wondering. And just then we heard somebody coming +up the trail behind us, riding hard, and we ducked into the timber and +watched for him to go by. Only he didn’t go by! He was coming up from +Sundown-way the same as we were; at a dead run he swung into the side +trail and went straight on to Turkey-trot’s ranch. And we followed him!” + +Torrance withdrew his eyes from her to glance accusingly at young +Drennen. Drennen heaved up his shoulders. + +“Me, I couldn’t stop her,” he muttered. “And anyhow, the way things +worked out, it was all right.” + +The man whom they followed at a respectful distance, themselves making +a cautious arc through the timber, proved to be a certain fox-faced, +narrow-eyed youth whom Torrance remembered, a man named Brill, and he +went straight to Bordereau. It seemed that Murdo had sent out two men +the day before to warn Bordereau that trouble was afoot, to tell him of +the discovery in the Sundown graveyard and all the rest of that night’s +events. When no report had come back to Murdo, he had sent Brill out, +and Brill, taking the old road through the Flats, had seen the light at +Turkey-trot Smith’s and judged he’d get the latest word of Bordereau +there. + +He had scarcely called out at the house and swung down and got himself +admitted when Sally Dawn and Dave Drennen, their own horses hidden +among the trees behind the barn, crept up to the rear of the house. +They could peek through a crack in a warped old shutter, could see +quite clearly what was going on inside, and could even catch a few +words. + +“And we saw the gold,” said Sally Dawn. “It was in a heap on a table. +I think Steve Bordereau was keeping nearly all of it for himself, but +doling a little bit out to the others. What did Sam mean by saying it +belonged to me?” + +They told her and she said thoughtfully: “Daddy used to keep a good bit +of gold on hand; he lost a lot in a bank that failed once, and after +that he wouldn’t have anything to do with banks. But we always thought +he kept it down at home, on the ranch. And so now Steve Bordereau has +that, too! Oh!” + +“You say you heard part of what they were saying tonight?” Torrance +prompted her. + +“Yes. That was just after Pete Brill burst in on them. He was telling +them that Murdo had sent him; he told them about you and me coming back +to Sundown and how you knew he was alive and how you brought the body +of Doc Taylor back to the Stag Horn and accused either him or Murdo +or both of the murder. Steve Bordereau was limping up and down--he +seemed to have been hurt in the thigh or side--and I never saw a man +look so furious! He began yelling your name, Jim. And he seemed to +blame me, too; he swore he’d get everything I had on earth and”--she +shuddered--“and that he’d get me, too.” + +“And then?” asked Torrance coldly. + +“That was about all we got to hear, wasn’t it, Dave? The men were all +excited and stirring about and one of them started toward a door and we +ran back to our horses and hurried on here.” + +Torrance, who had been leaning against the chimney, moved toward the +kitchen. + +“Come ahead, Drennen,” he said. “Let’s take care of your horses.” + +“We brought some grain for them,” said Sally Dawn. “And for your +horses too. And we brought some food and some bandages and a bottle of +whisky--” + +Torrance kept on going and Dave Drennen followed him out. A few minutes +later Drennen returned bringing the things Sally Dawn had mentioned. +She was already busy with Bill Yarbo; she gave him a big shot of whisky +and in return he gave her such a look of gratitude as one doesn’t see +often. Drennen then went out again to lend further help to Torrance +with the stock. + +“He pretends his hurt don’t amount to anything,” he said from the door, +“but it sort of looks to me he’s riding on his nerve. He oughtn’t to be +out in the cold.” + +“Make him hurry back in, Dave,” pleaded Sally Dawn. + +But when again the door opened, it was to admit Drennen, returning +alone. + +“Torrance says to tell you, Sally, you better get back to your own +home soon’s you can, and you better stay there, being as after this +you’ll be safer near Sundown than anywhere else. And he says you get +some friends of yours, men like Sam and Bill and me, about half a dozen +good men, he says, to stick close night and day. And he says put ’em +all on your pay roll and you can pay ’em out of that gold when you get +it back, and if you can’t, he’ll pay ’em himself. And he says--” + +She sprang to her feet, exclaiming: “Dave Drennen! What are you talking +about? Why doesn’t Jim--” + +“He’s gone,” said Drennen. “Gone hell-for-leather!” + +“Gone! Where?” + +“How do I know? He didn’t say. He just went.” + +“Why didn’t you stop him?” she wailed. + +“There you go,” muttered Drennen. He wiped his brow with the back of +his hand. “Torrance says why didn’t I stop you--you say why didn’t I +stop him! You two just try stopping each other, once, will you?” + + * * * * * + +Because the night was clear with frosty, glittering stars, and because +there were patches of snow where the side road turned off, Jim Torrance +was enabled to hit upon the trampled trail of many horses leading +through the woods to the Turkey-trot Smith place. Otherwise he must +have passed it, since there was no light in the house to guide him. + +He rode, as Sally Dawn and young Drennen had ridden, in a wide arc +through the timber and to a place behind the old barn. Like them still, +he went forward on foot, but he did his first bit of reconnoitering at +the barn itself; it was dead still, with never the sound of a stamping +horse. He moved on to the house and stood listening; the silence +remained unbroken save for the faint rustle of wind through the tree +tops. + +He went up the back steps and found the door open. After that he knew +that already Steve Bordereau, perhaps because of a new slant at things +afforded by the news brought by Murdo’s messenger, had led his men +elsewhere. Still, to be dead sure, he stepped in through the open door. +Again, after he had waited a long minute and heard never a sound, +he moved forward; he didn’t immediately strike a match, because he +thought: “If any of them are here, the dark’s all in my favor. They +won’t dare indulge in any wild shooting, and there are no friends of +mine here to stop a bullet!” + +At last, however, he did strike a match; he had been on the verge of +retreating without doing so, but knew he’d never be quite satisfied +that way. As the match flared up, his first thought was, “Not a man +here.” And then he saw something, and whipped his gun over and thought, +“There’s one of ’em, sleeping on the floor.” + +The man’s sleep was one that nothing on earth could ever break. +Torrance stooped over him; he lay on his back, his arms outflung, +his eyes glittering ceilingward in the flare of the match. Torrance +didn’t know the man by name but remembered his face well enough, one of +Bordereau’s followers, a burly, beetle-browed, heavy-jawed fellow who +looked stubborn and sullen even in death. He had been shot through the +head. + +Torrance’s match burnt out and he did not strike another. When he +left the room he at least closed the door behind him, a thing that +Bordereau hadn’t troubled to do. He didn’t worry himself greatly trying +to figure out why this man had been killed. Bordereau’s work no doubt, +since Bordereau was undisputed leader over his wolf pack. Maybe Sally +Dawn had been right when she sensed the likelihood of a quarrel over +the division of King Cannon’s gold; this man had the look of one who +would speak up for himself. And if Bordereau had shot him in cold +blood-- Well, those others who still clung to him would be apt to watch +their steps. + +In the saddle again he rode slowly, trying to pick up the trail of +the riders who had so recently departed. He found it with little +difficulty. They had cut straight back into the old road, then had +turned south. That meant back down toward the Flats, toward Sundown. + +But within three or four miles all tracks faded out, because down here +there had been little snow, which had melted already, and there were +many rocky ridges and slopes on which it would be hard to find tracks +even by day. Bordereau might have ridden straight on, hammering out the +miles to Sundown or to some hide-out near town, or just as conceivably +could have turned aside somewhere along the way. + +Jim Torrance didn’t waste time looking for signs which he had such +scant hope of finding, but pressed on toward his own place, which he +reached at that bright moment when all along the crests of the ridges +creating the broken line of the eastern horizon, gleaming strips of red +and gold were being spread as for a carpet for the advent of the new +day. As the rim of a red sun came up he was rapping at Sam Pepper’s +door. Mrs. Sam, already up and dressed, came bustling to open for him. + +“You!” she exclaimed. “But--” + +A couple of men, two of the party who had officiated with him at the +graveyard, both staunch friends of the Peppers as well as of Sally +Dawn, pushed back chairs in an adjoining room and came to the door, as +eager as Mrs. Sam. Torrance got a delectable whiff of breakfast, bacon +and coffee floating out their fragrances on the sweet morning air. + +After breaking off with a “But--,” suspended in mid-air, Mrs. Sam +invited warmly: “But come in, Mr. Torrance. Breakfast is ready, and you +can tell us over a cup of coffee. I’ll bet you haven’t had one yet!” + +“Thank you, ma’am,” said Jim Torrance. + +Over the table he brought them the latest news. They heard him out in +utter silence, their faces tense and earnest. At the end, he said: + +“Me, I’ve got a little of my own business to tend to. It would be a +good idea if several of the boys went straight up to where Sam and +Bill and Sally Dawn and Drennen are, just to be on hand. We’ve had one +storm, we might get another, and it would be tough on them, the way +they are, if they got snowbound. I don’t think you can drag Bill Yarbo +out inside a week. I’ll see you later.” + +He went back to his own place and attended to his stock.... + +A couple of hours later the two men, with Mrs. Sam insisting on going +along, left for King Cannon’s old mountain home. When they arrived, +about the first thing Sally Dawn said was, + +“Where’s Jim Torrance?” + +They didn’t know. + +They had stopped at his house; they found a man there he had sent out +from Sundown to care for the place. Mrs. Sam just shook her head and +said, “Gone.” + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +“Gone,” was all that any one of them could say of Jim Torrance, +and “Gone” was all that they were to know of him for many a day. +Speculation was rife: He had met up with Bordereau somewhere in the +wilderness. Bordereau had killed him and there was an end of him. Or, +he had decided that he had tackled too stiff a job, going up against +Bordereau and his gang, and had ducked out, going fast and far to +save his hide. Or, he still lurked somewhere near Sundown, playing +his lone hand, still hunting down the man he so long had hunted. Or, +after all--for what did anyone really know about him?--he was just one +of those wandering, restless figures always moving across the great +Southwest, and had merely shown up here and passed as he doubtless had +in so many other places, like a comet. + +Sally Dawn returned to the King Cannon ranch, to the sprawling old home +under the oaks, and did not want for company on the way nor friends +about her when she got there. It had been a week before they made +the journey down from the mountains above Pocket Valley, for it was +that long before they dared move Lying Bill Yarbo. Now he reposed in +pampered ease in a bright bedroom at the ranch house and even began to +stir about a little, and there was always Sally Dawn or Mrs. Sam to +make him sort of glad he had been shot up. There was also, a thorn in +his side, Sam Pepper, for the Peppers had closed up their house and +moved over to Sally’s. And further there were other friends, always +two or three of them within calling distance, sometimes six or eight. +Two foot-loose young cowboys, Smudge Talbot and Curly Redmond, well +known to Drennen, had been put on the Cannon pay roll and, after two +days, were taking full advantage of every opportunity to make eyes at +their fair employer; Dick Pardee, one of the three brothers who owned +Cold Spring Ranch, could generally be found here when wanted; and Andy +Forsythe, Art Simmons and Blackie Webb, Cannon friends from nearby +outfits, were always coming and going when they weren’t just lingering. +Sally Dawn felt something rise up in her throat and had her eyes go +wet many and many a time when she saw how old friends rallied about +her as word went to them of what had happened and of the threat that a +vanished Steve Bordereau still constituted. + +For Bordereau, like Jim Torrance, had somehow passed over the horizon +and into a desert of silence, leaving no sign of his whereabouts or of +his intent. About him, too, was much speculation; most men began to +contend that he had played his last card here and was gone for good. +And a good thing that would be--but what about Sally Dawn’s gold, her +last hope, that had gone with him? + +The Stag Horn still flourished, in fact did a bigger business than ever +before, for there was always the chance that Steve Bordereau’s bravado +would bring him back, that the game was not yet played out; and an +intensely interested community, splitting itself fairly in half on the +rock of the Sally Dawn-Steve Bordereau situation, wanted to be on hand +when anything further happened. Murdo, denying all knowledge of the +substitution of Doc Taylor’s dead body for Bordereau’s, still operated +the two bars and the gambling rooms; Florinda still plied her trade and +fished for suckers’ dollars with her exotic lure. + +Despite existent conditions, on the King Cannon ranch Sally Dawn found +herself living a more normal, a brighter life than had been hers for +many a weary day. That smoldering, smoky, sullen look was less in her +eyes now, and something of the infectious gayety came back into her +rippling laughter, and she could again tease a romantically inclined +cowboy in the same playful spirit that had been hers when she was +sixteen. A source of unfailing glee for her existed in the residence +here, cheek by jowl, of Lying Bill Yarbo and Sam Pepper. + +“Don’t you love the two old humbugs?” she laughed to Mrs. Sam. “They +have to try so hard to hate each other.” + +Carrying Bill Yarbo his mid-afternoon nourishment of soup and pie and +strong coffee--he was out on the porch in the mellow sunshine now, +for, with the first storm vanished and the skies blue again, a last +mild period of Indian summer claimed the land--she also bore an olive +branch. She was fully determined to be an intriguing little dove of +peace until she had her way with these two and made them in all things +the staunch friends that she suspected deep down in her wise little +heart that they were--and Sally Dawn Cannon, once she made up her mind +about a thing, was as stubborn as Barney, the old pensioner mule out in +the pasture. + +“Sam Pepper was asking about you, Bill,” she said cheerily. “Do you +know that, if anything happened to you, Sam would be lost! He says--” + +“Don’t tell me what Sam Pepper says!” growled Bill Yarbo. “He’s a man +I don’t want to think about. I can stomach some of his cussedness, but +leastways a man oughtn’t to lie like he does all the time.” + +That tickled her so, it started her laughing so merrily, that Bill got +red in the face. From him she went, as soon as she had a chance, to +speak to Sam of his old friend Bill Yarbo. + +Sam sniffed. + +“Him! Pampering him, Sally, is just like feeding a rattlesnake. He +ain’t the kind you can tie to; he ain’t got no courage and he ain’t +got no stamina. I never knowed a bigger coward and quitter, and once I +knowed a man that set a trap for a bear and caught a rabbit instead and +was scared to take his game out’n the trap lest it bite him! Look how +Bill Yarbo let Jim Torrance down in that mite of a scrimmage up in the +hills! Shucks!” + +Sally Dawn made a good story of all this when she carried it to Mrs. +Sam, but at the end of her recital she asked wonderingly, “Do you +suppose they both actually believe what they say about each other?” + + * * * * * + +It was not that sorrow and mistrust of the future did not visit the +girl during these days. On her return here, had it not been that so +many a true-hearted friend came along to chase shadows away, she must +have wept her heart out. She slipped away as soon as she could and +crept through the dusk to her mother’s grave, that pitiful grave so +hurriedly dug, so unceremoniously filled. She threw herself face down +and hugged the earth to her tortured breast; she shoved herself back +from it and beat the earth with her small clenched fists.... + +But a pair of shrewd and kind eyes had been upon her, and after a +little while Mrs. Sam came out to her and took her into her arms and +let her cry. The very next day a fence was built around the grave, and +Mrs. Sam said to Sam: “It looks mighty pretty out there now, Sam; kind +of bright and gay and cozy. I don’t know where she could get so many +flowers this time of year.” + +Also Sally Dawn knew her times of black depression superinduced by the +vague yet still ominous threat of some further act of a lawless and +desperate Steve Bordereau, by the mess of money affairs which seemed +to make it impossible for her to hold on here much longer--and by a +troubling uncertainty concerning the missing Jim Torrance. + +“Shucks, Sally,” said Mrs. Sam, her hands in biscuit dough and her +round arms floury, “you just get your mind off that roving rascal. +Fellers like him take care of themselves all right; it’s here-they-come +and there-they-go, and you’ve got enough on your mind without pestering +yourself with a lone wolf like Jim Torrance.” She brushed the hair out +of her eyes with a forearm that left a snowy streak on her placid brow +and looked sharply into the girl’s troubled eyes with her shrewd ones. +“I’d say you’re just as well off if you never see hide nor hair of that +man again. Run outside and make Davy Drennen happy.” + +Sally Dawn shook her head. + +“I keep worrying about him,” she said. And then she added thoughtfully: +“He’s no wolf either. He was mighty kind and gentle with me. I’ll never +forget. Why, that first night--” + +Mrs. Sam sighed. + +“I know, child. Well, don’t you fret any; after all, most likely he’ll +come riding back any minute.” + +“Do you think so?” asked Sally Dawn. She idled around the kitchen +aimlessly a few minutes, then drifted out on the porch and stood there +a long while, looking up the long wavering white road, stretching +lonely and empty into the blue hills that were just now turning misty +in the sunset. + +She was still standing there, day-dreaming, when suddenly she became +aware of something that looked like a small blue-gray cloud forming +against the tenderly flushed horizon. There had been no rains for a +week, the roads were dry and that faint blue-gray cloud was a cloud +of dust. For a single instant she tingled from head to foot; then she +relaxed against the pillar supporting the roof over the porch and +sighed. It was Thursday afternoon and time for Hank Webber to bring the +stage, rocking and rumbling, down from Bridgewater to Sundown. There +had been the time when the stage itself--with its speeding horses, +with the mystery it always was, what with its unknown passengers and +mail and, perhaps, money box--had fascinated her. Today she had not +the least interest in stage-coaches. But then she did not know that +Hank Webber was bringing to Sundown word that would put Jim Torrance’s +name on many a tongue that night and keep it rolling there with one +implication or another for days. + +“All hell’s busted loose up around Mountain City,” said Hank as he +booted his brake on in front of the Sundown House. “Three stick-ups in +three days, the Mountain City Bank, the Rock Valley Mine and the Yellow +Pine Lumber Company. Four men killed already, two-three more bad hurt, +and nary a one of the raiders gathered in. It’s a gang’s work, six or +eight or ten of ’em, riding masked and shooting fast and straight; +they’ve got away with some says fifty thousand and some says a hundred +thousand dollars--and everybody says the man that’s leading ’em is Jim +Torrance.” + +The news inundated Sundown in a swelling tidal wave of excitement. +Bridgewater was but sixty miles away; Mountain City lay but a score +of miles southeast of Bridgewater; both the Rock Valley Mine and the +Yellow Pine Lumber outfit were within less than a half day’s ride on +horseback from Mountain City. The result was that many men hereabouts +had friends and acquaintances in the newly raided district, and +presently the names of those who had been ruthlessly shot down were +added to the news which Hank Webber and Will Banks, the guard who rode +with him, had brought. + +By the time word of this back-tracked along the stage road to reach +the King Cannon ranch, Sundown was eddying into a turmoil. There +were hard-eyed, angry men vowing that this was all the work of Steve +Bordereau and that Jim Torrance had nothing to do with it; there were +other men, those who had come to group strongly about Clark Murdo, +who lifted voices no less strong and challenging in placing the onus +of the whole affair where the first rumors had already put it, at Jim +Torrance’s door. + +“There’ll be fights over it tonight,” said Curly Redmond, who had raced +back to the ranch with the news, “and it’ll be lucky for them that +mixes in ’em if they’re only fist fights!” + +“How do they dare say it was Jim Torrance?” cried Sally Dawn hotly. “As +if anybody knew! If the men were all masked and all got away--” + +“That’s what I wanted to know,” answered Curly, “and I asked all over, +and at first nobody could guess at it any better’n I could; and then a +feller told me that he heard Phil Moody say that Hank Webber said--” + +“Just about what I expected!” sniffed Sally Dawn sarcastically. “What +nice straight proof of anything!” + +“Hold on, Sally,” cut in Dave Drennen. “Anyhow let’s get what Curly was +going to say. Go ahead, Curly.” + +“Well, I don’t know anything about it, but they say Hank said that +at the bank hold-up, the bandana that the leader of the raiders was +wearing slipped, and a man that was standing in the bank and skipped +into a corner saw the robber’s face, and he said it was a man he used +to know. He said it was Jim Torrance.” + +Sally Dawn flared out. “It’s a lie!” Save for that single exclamation +from her the little group which had gathered in the yard was hushed. + +“Then there’s something else that they’re saying in town,” Curly went +on. “At the Rock Valley Mine there was a sheet of paper stuck with a +knife to a door. One of the big shots at the mine was killed; his name +was Connoly; and on the paper it said, ‘Connoly did me dirt once, and +this is what he gets for it.’ And it was signed with Jim Torrance’s +name.” + +Mrs. Sam patted Sally Dawn’s shoulder. + +“I reckon that ought to let our Jim out,” she said drily. “He might be +a robber all right, but he ain’t fool enough to do a thing like that.” +And Sally Dawn caught her roughened hand and squeezed it with all her +might. + +But when she slipped away to be all alone and sat in a place that had +been a favorite dreaming and brooding spot since childhood, where a big +flat rock stood up commandingly from the hillside back of the house, +and when she let her eyes traffic with the far-away stars, and the hush +of night over the wide range lands was over her, she asked herself, +“What do I really know about Jim Torrance?” She clung to the fact that +he had been good to her. But how many and many a time had she been +afraid of him? His face seemed to take form between her eyes and the +sky and to come closer and to grow clearer; she could see again those +hard, dark eyes which gave glimpses of mystery and perhaps of menace +through the narrowed lids, and his mouth that at times frightened her, +it could become so cruel and savage. + +She jumped up and hurried back to the house, eager for companionship. + +Rumors, rumors and rumors--they flew as swift and erratic and dark and +elusive as night hawks. Sometimes they dealt with Steve Bordereau; +they had him everywhere, on both sides of the international border. +For the greatest part they bruited Jim Torrance’s name about. Again, +he had fought with Bordereau and had been shot to death; he had been +seen gambling for high stakes at High Crest; he had had a run-in with +a sheriff of Morongo County and had been gathered in and had escaped; +he was leading a bandit band, all killers, down near Nacional; he was +headed back toward Sundown. Those were the tales a-wing, and there were +many more of their sort--until at last a cleancut and definite word was +brought of him. + +It was Sam Pepper this time who brought the news out to the ranch from +Sundown, Sam Pepper wild with excitement, thumping his heels into his +horse’s flanks, beginning to shout through the dusk long before a word +could be made out. So by the time he scrambled up onto the porch to his +swiftly gathering audience, he was so out of breath he could hardly +gasp out what he had to say. + +“Now, Sam,” said Mrs. Sam sharply, “you go easy a minute and get your +breath, else you’re going to bust a boiler, and I’ll be a handsome +young widder woman and will up and marry Bill Yarbo. We ain’t going to +run away, and whatever you’ve got to say will most likely keep.” + +“J-Jim T-Torrance!” stammered Sam. “He--he--” + +Sally Dawn, not in the least patient like Mrs. Sam, pounced on him and +caught him by an arm and began to shake him. Then Sam got his story out. + +“There’s been another hold-up, the biggest of the lot. Over to Canyon +City. The biggest bank in seven counties. Cleaned out. I don’t know +how many men was killed--but they say they nailed the boss robber this +time. They say it sure was Jim Torrance. They say he’s shot all to hell +and was left behind for dead--that he’s dying now--most likely dead +by this time. And down in Sundown, Clark Murdo is serving free drinks +and--” + +He stopped for air. For a long, still moment no one said a word, but +eyes went from Sam’s puckered face to other eyes and they were all +alike in their expressions, all alike in that they stared out from +under frowning brows. All, that is, saving Sally Dawn’s alone. + +Hers were wide with horror. Her lips were parted; she had started to +say something but had not spoken. The color seeped out of her cheeks +until they were white. + +“Sally--” said Mrs. Sam. + +The girl whirled and ran into the house; they heard the door slam. + +“Better go look after her, old lady,” Sam said to his wife. “Seems as +though she’s hit hard; seems as though she’s sort of took a liking to +this Jim Torrance.” + +“Leave her alone,” snapped Mrs. Sam. “She’s all right, that girl is.” + +Very swiftly Sally Dawn showed them just how all right she was. She +came back, out onto the porch, pulling on a pair of gauntlets. In this +short time she had jerked off her house dress and gotten into riding +breeches and boots; she had a sweater over her arm and a little hat +jammed down emphatically over her curls. The color had come back into +her cheeks; there were twin hot spots in them and her eyes were shining. + +“Sally!” + +“Saddle me a horse, will you, Dave?” said Sally Dawn, as cool as “Good +morning.” + +“But where on earth--” began Mrs. Sam, only to be cut short with Sally +Dawn’s counter question, “Where do you suppose?” + +“But--” + +“Will you saddle me a horse, Dave? Or will you, Curly? Or shall I?” + +“It’s fifty mile--” expostulated Mrs. Sam. + +“I don’t care if it’s five hundred!” + +“And it’s almost dark--” + +“Oh!” + +Sally Dawn made a dart for the steps. Both Dave Drennen and Curly +Redmond were galvanized; both sped away to the corrals. And what was +more, when her horse was saddled, their two horses were saddled along +with it. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +Jim Torrance lay flat on his back in bed--and he didn’t know in what +bed or in what house--and he didn’t even know that he was in any bed +at all. He opened his eyes and looked about him dully, puzzled yet not +greatly concerned. Then he strove to move slightly and was so wrenched +with pain that an involuntary groan parted his pallid lips. + +A face bent over him. He saw it only vaguely, an unfamiliar face of a +middle-aged woman, one that looked above all other things capable. Old +Doc Kibbee, of Canyon City, whenever he had a patient who demanded the +best to be had in nursing, sent for Nancy Hamilton. And Nancy Hamilton +now leaned over Torrance and put a calm, steady hand on his forehead +and said gently yet in the tone of one who commands: + +“There now, just you lay still, Mr. Torrance. You’re doing fine.” + +“I don’t know who you are--I don’t know where I am,” he muttered, and +closed his eyes and let his head loll to one side. She stepped to a +table for a bottle and spoon and glass, but a glance over her shoulder +showed her that his eyes were closed, that he was either asleep again +from sheer exhaustion and weakness and the shock of pain, or was dying. +Efficient and practiced as she was, there were times when she couldn’t +tell. She went back to her rocking chair and dropped down heavily into +it; she herself was haggard, worn out, her eyes thumbed deep into their +sockets from all she had gone through since she had been sent for. + +The man in bed lay still a long while, existence become for him a sort +of gray haze twisting into a thousand misty labyrinths. He had moments +of semi-consciousness but nothing mattered, nothing that had happened +or that they did with him. He swallowed the liquids that were forced +between his teeth and lay inert for long periods, neither awake nor +asleep. The doctor came and went, and he knew of the visits but was not +greatly concerned. Doc Kibbee talked aside with the nurse; he did not +even try to listen. + +He went to sleep and slept deeply for two solid hours; Nancy Hamilton +sank gratefully deep down into her big chair and relaxed. She too +slept. But when he awoke, there she was standing over him, saying: +“Just you lay still, Mr. Torrance. You’re doing fine.” + +He nodded this time. Either something they had given him or his rest +made him feel stronger; his head was clearer, he thought. + +Again he slept. Again he woke. This time he stared up in puzzled +fashion, a heavy frown of concentration dragging his black brows down. +He began to grow confused; he guessed his head hadn’t cleared after +all. For the nurse had changed miraculously. Just now she had been a +capable looking middle-aged woman. And here she was young and flushed +and very bright-eyed and incredibly pretty, and she looked just exactly +like Sally Dawn Cannon. + +He closed his eyes an instant. Sally Dawn was as still as a mouse. He +opened them quickly as though to catch the nurse at her tricks if she +was trying any funny business on him. + +“Sally Dawn!” + +“Sh! You’re not to talk.” She stooped closer and for a fleeting second +her cheek was against his on the pillow, her curls making him intensely +aware of their softly brushing caress. “Jim!” she whispered. + +“But look here--” + +She stood erect, rosier than ever, and put a finger ever so softly on +his lips. + +“Your nurse is resting; she said I could sit with you a little while if +I promised to call her if you wouldn’t just be quiet and rest.” + +She always thought of his eyes as being narrowed, as though he were +forever on guard, watchful and suspicious and hard. Now she saw them +open up wide, quite as though they had to do that to take her all in, +and she discovered that they were not absolutely night-black, but that +there was a hint of warm brown in them. She smiled at him and patted +his hand; his fingers curled slowly and with the gentlest pressure +about hers.... + +Sally Dawn had already had a talk with Doc Kibbee, a chubby, +pink-cheeked, hearty old fellow with snow-white mustache and imperial +and sharp, wise eyes. She had commanded anxiously, “Tell me about him!” + +He had hunched up his thick, round shoulders. + +“How should I know? Me, I’m not much of a doctor anyhow. He’s been +shot close up and lost some blood; he was hammered over the head from +behind by a club or a gun barrel, and first I thought he might have a +fractured skull. ’Tain’t so though. That’s what I’m always doing with +patients of mine until they up and die on me--making mistakes and--” + +“Doctor Kibbee! Don’t I know all about you? You’re the finest doctor +that ever was! You--” + +“What do _you_ know about me? I never saw you before!” + +“But you did! You were a friend of King Cannon’s, weren’t you? For +years and years? Well, I’m his daughter.” + +“My, my!” he said. “You, King Cannon’s kid!” + +“Now tell me! And tell me the truth about him.” + +“Hm.” He stared at her and appeared to consider. Then, very gruff about +it, he shot his own question at her: “What are you all warmed up about +it for? Happen to know this Torrance?” + +“Of course I do! That’s why I’m here. He--he’s the finest friend I ever +had!” + +Her words didn’t please him. He snorted at her. + +“You’re a little fool, that’s what you are. All you young pretty girls +seem to be infernal damn fools sooner or later about some no ’count, +and most generally it’s sooner. Know who and what he is--and how come +he’s shot up the way he is?” + +“I’ve heard a lot of crazy rumors--” + +“Rumors, my eye! He’s one of the gang that held up the bank right here +in Canyon City, that killed Phil Gates, the cashier, that’s made off +with Bill Hasbrook, the bank president, and has probably cut his throat +long before now and thrown him down in a gully somewhere. That’s who +your friend Torrance is.” + +“Why, Doctor Kibbee!” she gasped at him. “If anybody’s an old fool--” + +“If you call _him_ a friend,” he cut in bruskly, “you just go and get +down on your knees and pray he dies in bed. Most likely he will anyhow, +being that he’s a patient of mine. That’s what happens with me right +along. Just as sure as he gets well enough to stand the shock, the boys +are going to hang him good and high.” + +“They won’t! They mustn’t! Oh, can’t you see it’s all just a horrible +mistake?” + + * * * * * + +After her visit with Torrance, which lasted two hours, with him +sleeping most of that time, she had a few words with Dave Drennen and +Curly Redmond whom she found waiting for her outside the little house +in which Jim Torrance was hospitalized. They looked unhappy, both of +them, and uncertain; they shifted their boots in the dust of the road +and looked furtively at each other rather than at her. Her little chin, +which was emphatic enough at times despite its lack of ruggedness and +square lines, came up. + +“I know,” she said tartly. “You’ve been over at the saloon having +a drink--and you got to talking and asking questions and getting +answers--and you believe all they tell you. Oh, you make me sick!” + +“It’s tough, Sally, and sorta hard to take,” said Dave doggedly. “But +there’s no use trying to dodge facts. There was a hold-up, there were +men killed and a bank robbed--and he’d been off and away with his crowd +only he got dropped and left behind. He’d have swung for it before +now, only the boys up here can’t see anything in hanging a man while +he’s unconscious first and so damn near dead next. They’re just giving +him time. You better come home.” + +She pointed to the squat, sturdy building next door. + +“That’s the jail, I suppose?” + +“Yes, it is, Sally; and he’d be in there now, only the sheriff--” + +Sally Dawn smiled at the two boys very sweetly, so sweetly indeed that +both began shifting uneasily again. + +“Thank you, boys, for having brought me over,” she said. “You can go +home now if you want to.” + +“Oh, hell,” said Curly Redmond, and Dave silently concurred as Sally +Dawn headed straight to the jail. + +“Drink, Curly?” suggested Dave Drennen. + +“It’s an idea,” admitted Curly gloomily. + + * * * * * + +In an untidy little office cozily close to the strongly barred room +which served Canyon City as its jail, Sally Dawn found the county +sheriff. He was a man of equal vintage with Doc Kibbee, which is to say +somewhere around sixty, and looked like something carelessly hacked out +of mahogany. He was mahogany-colored and wore habitually a perfectly +wooden lack of expression; he had enormous black eyebrows which looked +artificial, great tufts that might have been stuck on for a masquerade, +a heavy, uptwisted, black and impossible mustache and a clean-shaven, +ruthless, square chin. Even his eyes looked false, they were so steady, +and bright and expressionless as shoe buttons. + +His boots were cocked up on top of a table littered with papers, which +gave her the impression of having gathered there undisturbed for years; +and along with the litter were an empty ink bottle, a couple of rusty +pens, an ancient Colt forty-four, with neither hammer nor trigger, +which served as a paper weight, an old long-roweled Mexican spur and +a serviceable Winchester thirty-thirty. A good bit of this detail so +forced itself on her that she took it in with one flick of her eager +eyes; after that she saw only the man. + +“You are Sheriff Evans?” she asked. + +She smiled at him as at an old friend. + +He remained utterly motionless, not so much as a ripple stirring him; +she couldn’t even see that he breathed. Certainly he did not take his +feet down from his table, nor did he remove the broad black hat that +was already pushed as far back on his head as it would go, nor for a +long moment did he speak. He was looking toward her, whether at her or +not, and was perhaps continuing a chain of thought her entrance had +interrupted--provided of course he was even thinking. + +At last he said in a quiet, low-toned voice, “Yes.” + +“I came to talk to you about Jim Torrance. He--he is a friend of mine.” + +She waited for him to speak; he didn’t. He didn’t have anything to say; +in his turn he waited for her to speak. + +“He’s not a bad man,” she said with a passionate fervor that put a +quiver into her voice. “He’s not a robber. He didn’t have anything to +do with that bank hold-up; I know he didn’t!” + +Sheriff Evans didn’t say anything one way or the other. Sally Dawn, +already so overwrought with anxiety, flared up with anger. + +“Do you hear me?” she cried hotly. “Do you hear me? Why don’t you say +something?” + +“What’ll I say?” he asked. + +“Say--say anything! Don’t just sit there like a--like a-- Say that you +don’t believe me, if that’s what you think.” + +“I don’t believe you. Jim Torrance is as guilty as hell. I’d have him +here in jail right now only I’m hoping, give him the best of care, to +do two things. One is, get him to talk. The other is, hang him.” + +“How do you know that he is guilty?” + +“He was one of the gang that robbed the Canyon City Bank. One of ’em +that killed Phil Gates, the cashier. One of ’em that made away with +Will Hasbrook, the bank president. One of the gang that got away with +thirty thousand dollars that day--only he didn’t happen to get away.” + +“You were there? You saw it all? You saw him--” + +“Nope. I wasn’t there. Tom Long was, though; Tom’s a deputy of mine. He +got shot, Tom did, and’s a right sick man now. But he shot Jim Torrance +before he went dark.” + +Sally Dawn whirled about and went to a dingy window and made pretence +of looking out, an utter impossibility, considering the unwashed state +of the windowpane and the watery blur that came into her eyes. She +stood with a small fist clenched, gnawing at her knuckles, biting at +them to keep the tears back, to keep from bursting out hysterically. +Presently in a very small voice, without turning, she said, “You’re +not very sympathetic, are you, Mr. Walt Evans?” + +“No. Not with any friend of this man’s. Happens Phil Gates was a friend +of mine. Happens it’s the same with Will Hasbrook. Happens--” + +“Happens you ever had any other friends? Happens you ever knew a man +named King Cannon?” + +“Hell’s bells!” said Sheriff Evans and sounded almost, not quite, +human. “What about King Cannon? He’s been dead years now.” + +Sally Dawn turned slowly and looked him in the eye. + +“Happens I’m his daughter,” she said coolly. “Happens, when I was a +little tyke, you and Doc Kibbee and Daddy--” + +Walt Evans’ feet came down off the desk then like something hurled by +an explosion, and he surged to his feet as quick as any boy, and his +battered old black hat came off his head with something next door to a +flourish--all this pretty much in one gesture. + +“Sally Dawn Cannon!” he exclaimed, and sounded altogether and warmly +human. “Well, I’m damned!” He looked at her with new eyes; he put out +a big leathery paw and caught her hand and came close to breaking the +bones in it. “And at that I might have known! I always said you’d grow +up into the prettiest girl that ever sprung a dimple. Why, you little +devil! Come here to me!” + +He gathered her into his arms, lifted her clean off the floor and +kissed her. + +“Will you offer me a chair now, Mr. Evans? And will you let us talk +together?” It was a flushed, breathless, and very eager Sally Dawn +speaking. + +“I heard about your good mother--” + +“Don’t! I can’t talk about that. Not yet! And there are other things +that happened down at Sundown--” + +“Yes; I heard about some of them, too. Just garbled gossip, that’s all +I got. I was going down to see you-- Dammit, I haven’t been down that +way since your old man died, have I? I ought to be kicked-- Want to +tell me about all these happenings?” + +“Yes! That way I’ll be telling you about Jim Torrance, all I know about +him, and then-- Well, _you’ll_ see!” + +Long before she had finished, old Walt Evans was frowning and tugging +at a lower lip, and his eyes, from being merely bleak, grew wintery, +the sort of winter that now and again lights up to a flash of lightning. + +“You’re one hell-of-a-lot like your old man, Sally Dawn,” he said +soberly. “He was a man you could tie to, and somehow, kid that you are, +I’d like to string all my chips along with you. Maybe you’re right as +rain--and maybe, just being a girl and having a man like Jim Torrance +look at you, you’ve got your heart, God bless it, all mixed up with +your brains.” + +“No!” said Sally Dawn, knowing what he meant. “No! I tell you this is +all Steve Bordereau’s work, and that Jim Torrance is out with all he’s +got to break Bordereau down, and somehow he’s got caught wrong in the +thing that Bordereau has just pulled off.” + +“Maybe,” said the sheriff. “Maybe. Only it looks bad. It looks so bad +that, while I’d rather cut off a thumb than go against you, I’m as +sure as Billy-be-damned that this Torrance has made a sucker of you. +Here; look at this. Nobody but you and me knows a thing about it; I’ll +ask you to take a look at it and then forget it. That means, keep your +mouth shut.” + +She nodded, he thought, just the way old King Cannon used to do, and +a nod from that old boy was worth as much as reams of legal phrasings +with signatures and seals and notaries’ stamps affixed. + +From the pocket of an open, sagging vest he pulled a folded sheet of +paper. He gave it to her and stood back, watching her read the few +lines: + + Dear Walt: They’ve got me, and it’s going to be up to you whether I + get out alive or not. They’d cut my throat in a minute. So, Walt, + hold your hand. It’s ransom, of course. I’ll be sending you another + note in a day or so. Don’t try to follow the man who brings it; don’t + do anything. Just wait. They hold the cards, and I’d rather pay than + kick off. This is damned serious, Walt. + + Yours, + Bill Hasbrook. + + P.S. They left one of their men behind, pretty badly hurt, I think, a + man named Jim Torrance. Hold on to him; give him the best of care; I + guess they’ll want him sent back to them along with some money; he’s + the boss of the gang. If anything happens to him, they say the same + thing will happen to me. Watch your step, Walt. + + Bill. + +When she had finished reading, “Now what?” said Sheriff Evans. + +“I--I don’t understand,” said Sally Dawn in a small voice. + +He put his big hand very lightly and sympathetically on her shoulder. + +“It’s kind of easy to understand, Sally,” he said gravely. “This +Torrance sort of stands out; he’s not the common run; he’s born to be +a leader. What he is is the head of this gang. You can’t get away from +it.” + +“He isn’t! I know he isn’t! He--he is fine, Walt Evans!” + +And in answer Sheriff Walt Evans leaned comfortably on those two +good old Western Crutches, saying, “_Sure_, Sally Dawn, _sure_.” But +nonetheless he had his mind made up, and she knew it. And her own +mind was terribly unsettled. This letter from Hasbrook, president of +the bank, a captive to the bank robbers, a man being held for ransom, +seemed to come straight from the shoulder; and he said, “He’s the boss +of the gang.” + +She didn’t know what to think--but she did know what to do. She was +going to stick by Jim Torrance through thick and thin, as he had stuck +by her when her need was sorest. She went straight back to his bedside +and there she meant to stay. + +Sheriff Walt Evans went back to his chair, hoisted his boots up on top +of his untidy table and read Hasbrook’s letter all over again. Sally +Dawn would have been greatly surprised if she could have known just how +that shrewd old brain of his was ticking. He started wriggling the +toes in his boots; it must have been to them that he spoke when he said +softly: + +“He called me ‘Walt’ four times in this damfool letter. And he signed +himself ‘Bill.’” + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +“Good morning, Mr. Torrance,” said Sally Dawn. + +“Good morning, Miss Cannon,” said Jim Torrance. + +“It’s a lovely morning. And you’re looking just fine.” + +“It’s more than a lovely morning. And you’re lovelier than any round +dozen of lovely mornings. And--” + +“You’re feeling--” + +“Like being on top of the world. Ready to jump up and go prowling. Like +singing you a song. It goes like this: + + “‘Oh, hand me down my high-heeled boots, + And hand me down my hat; + And hand me down my long-tailed coat, + Likewise my silk cravat.’” + +She laughed at him and wrinkled up her nose in the way she had, and he +grinned at her and, for about two minutes, the world was a mighty nice +place to live in. Then he started frowning. + +“Pain?” she asked solicitously. + +“Yes. The worst one I’ve had yet.” + +“Where, Jim?” + +“In my conscience. You’ve been doing too much for me. You’ve come all +this distance and you’ve stuck here until you’re worn out. I want you +to go home and get years of rest. I’ll ride down and see you later; +I’ll bring you all my thanks then and--and a pinto pony.” + +So she laughed at him again. His frown went away and his grin came +back, but behind the grin, lurking in the dark depths of his eyes, was +a sober thought. He said, looking at her steadily: + +“I’ve been sort of sick. I’ve heard things said while I lay here, and +they didn’t matter and most of the time didn’t even make sense. But now +I’ve got to think ’em over, and--” + +“Convalescents are not supposed to think,” said Sally Dawn. “It’s +against the law.” + +“Tell me this: In Canyon City, who are the two best friends?” + +His hand had stirred slightly; hers sped to a meeting with it like a +little dove coming home. + +“We are, of course.” + +“Right. And as I remember it, a friend can bank on a friend. Now tell +me this: What’s wrong?” + +“Wrong? Why--why, just that you’ve been hurt--” + +“No. The way Doc Kibbee looks at me, the way the sheriff digs into +me with those old fish-eyes of his--even the way Nancy Hamilton +handles herself--dammit, the way that even Sally Dawn Cannon does +sometimes!--all this has got me wondering about something.” + +“About what, Jim?” she asked, getting ready to be brave. + +“We’ll forget it. But there is something you can tell me: Why hasn’t +Hasbrook dropped in?” + +“Hasbrook?” + +“Yes. Bill Hasbrook, the bank president. He hasn’t been in at all, has +he?” + +“I haven’t seen him.” + +“Why? Where is he?” She started tucking her chin down, as though she +could hide behind it, and he demanded sharply, “Well? Where’s Bill +Hasbrook?” + +“I’ve heard that he isn’t here. That he had to go away somewhere.” + +His eyes grew more penetrating, began to grow suspicious. + +“What about Gates? The cashier, Phil Gates?” + +“Jim! They told me that you weren’t really to talk; not about anything +that mattered, anything that might possibly upset you. And if I let you +talk, Mrs. Hamilton will come in and send me away.” + +“I hear tell they’ve got a sheriff up here in Coconambo County, that +is a sheriff,” said Jim. “You, up and around, maybe might know? It +would be kind of nice if he would drop in on me and say hello. Think he +might?” + +She didn’t want to say yes and she didn’t want to say no. She had never +endured such a troublesome moment in all her life. But she had to look +him in the eyes, so did his eyes insist on it, and at last she said: + +“Yes. He will come to see you right away.” + +He squeezed her hand. + +“Thank you a lot, Sally Dawn,” he said. + +Then, when she had darted out, with little delay Sheriff Walt Evans +came stalking in. He said, as crisp as a new-baked biscuit: + +“Well, Torrance? I hear you want to see me.” + +“Squat, Sheriff,” said Torrance. “And tell me.” + +“What’s on your chest, Stranger?” asked the sheriff, having drawn up a +chair. + +“Where’s Hasbrook? Why hasn’t he dropped in to ask me whether I was +dead or alive?” + +“Hasbrook? He ain’t here right now.” + +“What about Phil Gates?” + +“He ain’t here either. Happens he’s dead.” + +Jim Torrance thought that over. Phil Gates had been very much alive not +so long ago, and to be dead now meant that he was out of luck when the +bank hold-up was pulled off and bullets got to roving wild. He didn’t +have to ask Sheriff Evans. But he did have to swing back to Hasbrook, +the bank president, and ask about him. + +“What about Hasbrook?” he asked. “Let’s have it all, Evans.” + +“Maybe you don’t know?” said the sheriff. + +“No. I don’t know much of anything. Somebody hammered me over the +head--” + +“And a good job, too! That was a deputy of mine, a feller named--” + +“Hell with his name! It ought to be John W. Jackass. Tell me about +Hasbrook. They didn’t kill him too, did they?” + +“You wouldn’t know, would you?” + +“If I knew I wouldn’t be asking. Let’s have it. Is Hasbrook alive or +dead?” + +“Pretty much alive,” snapped the sheriff. + +The man in bed filled his lungs; for a moment he had pretty well +stopped breathing. + +“Tell him I want him,” he said. “Tell him to get a move on. I’ve waited +long enough. Get him here on the run.” + +“No can do, Torrance. They’ve nabbed him. That gang of yours is holding +him for ransom. Maybe you didn’t know that, huh?” + +Torrance stared at him. + +“Say it again. What gang of mine? What in hell are you talking about?” + +“You’ll be telling me that you didn’t have anything to do with the +hold-up? Just an innocent bystander when the job was pulled off?” + +“You think I had a hand in that? That I was one of the crowd that stuck +the bank up, killed Phil Gates and grabbed Hasbrook?” + +“There’s not a man in Canyon City who doesn’t know it. What do you take +us for anyhow? Blind men or just plain fools?” + +“Both!” growled Torrance, and sounded downright disgusted. “Good Lord, +man, I went to Hasbrook and told him to watch out for this very thing; +I had a hunch that this was going to happen and--” + +“I guess you did,” said Evans drily. + +“And now Gates is dead and Hasbrook is gone--and your crazy deputy +plugs me--and you figure me for one of that crowd of rats! Haven’t you +got the sense of a little gray seed tick?” + +“Maybe you know who the stick-up gents were?” said Evans, very +sarcastic. + +“Of course I know! It’s a gang of Sundown killers led by Steve +Bordereau.” + +“And you knew ahead of time that they were going to pull off this job?” + +“No, I didn’t know. But I know Bordereau, I have an idea of what’s in +his head, and it was an easy guess he’d strike here. His crowd is the +same one that stuck up the Yellow Pine, Rock Valley and the Mountain +City Bank. They’re out to make a big killing before they blow; and it +was my guess that Canyon City would be next.” + +“Just a wild guess on your part then, huh?” + +“It wasn’t so wild, was it? And now you’re doctoring me, working to get +me on my feet again, just to throw me in jail? That it?” + +“There are a good many boys around here,” said Evans, “friends of +Hasbrook’s and Gates’, that don’t think much of the jail idea. Maybe +I’m going to have my job cut out, as soon’s you’re able to get around, +to keep them from taking you off my hands.” + +“Little hanging party?” grunted Torrance. + +“Your guesses keep right on being good.” + +Torrance lay still a while and stared at the ceiling. + +“You think I’m lying to you, do you?” + +Evans shrugged heavily. + +“I just wish I knew, brother,” he said sourly. + +That was about as far as they got at that time. But a couple of days +later the sheriff dropped in again. This time he found Torrance +dressed, sitting on the edge of his bed, looking gaunt and weak but +with a clear, bold eye. + +“Let’s talk, Torrance.” + +“Shoot. What’s new?” + +From his pocket the sheriff drew a couple of folded sheets of paper. +One was that communication from Hasbrook which he had already shown to +Sally Dawn. Jim Torrance read it carefully, then read the second note +which Evans handed to him with the remark: “This one just got to me +today. I don’t know who brought it; it was shoved under my door last +night.” + +When Torrance had finished reading it also there were spots of color in +his cheeks showing a dull angry red through the dark stubble of beard, +and his eyes were bright and hard. The words that Hasbrook had penciled +were: + + Dear Walt: You’ll have one more letter from me in another few days, + inside the week anyhow. Meantime I want you to raise fifty thousand + dollars in cash and have it ready against demand. That’s my ransom + money. Instructions for delivery will come in my last note to you. + And there is one other thing and, Walt, I’m depending on you for + this. The boys who are holding me have learned that Jim Torrance is + alive and getting well, and they insist that he be returned to them + the same time the money is sent. As I wrote you before, he is one of + the crowd and their leader. I know you won’t want to let him go, but + if you don’t send him back to his men they swear they’ll do me in + even if they lose the ransom. I feel sure I can depend on you, Walt. + So long. + + Bill Hasbrook. + +Jim Torrance didn’t speak immediately; he rolled a cigarette first and +lighted it and sat there, staring for a while at the floor, then into +Sheriff Evans’ gimleting eyes. + +“Bill Hasbrook,” said Torrance at last, “is a dirty rat. On top of +that he is a--” + +“Never mind all that,” cut in Evans. “Hasbrook’s a friend of mine; he’s +the squarest man you ever heard a man tell about.” + +“Is that so? Why, a skunk wouldn’t come near him! He’s two things I +hate, a sneaking cur of a coward and a double crossing sidewinder. +After I went to him and put him wise, after I chipped in with him and +damn near got myself killed in the mixup, look what the yellow louse is +doing to me! Just to save his own dirty hide, he’ll be tickled pink to +have me slaughtered. And I thought--” + +“Easy, Stranger! What’s he doing to you, after all, but just save you +from jail or hanging here, and send you back to your own men?” + +“He knows better than that, and you’d know too, if you had sense enough +to pound sand through a knot hole!” said Torrance hotly. “I tell you, +that’s Steve Bordereau’s gang. Bordereau wants to have the fun of +butchering me, and Hasbrook knows it.” + +Evans made himself a cigarette, yet did not for an instant withdraw +that penetrating gaze of his from Jim Torrance’s angry face. + +“Take it from me, Torrance,” he said evenly, “Will Hasbrook is no +coward, and he’s no crook; he’s known over a good many miles as a man +you can tie to.” + +A queer, puzzled look came into Torrance’s eyes. + +“That’s what I thought,” he muttered. “I’d heard his reputation; I +had a few good talks with him. Dammit, I’d have bet my life on that +man--and I guess that’s what I did.” + +“Yes, a man could bet his life on Hasbrook playing square,” said Evans. + +Torrance got up and stirred about the room restlessly; then he came +back and leaned on the head of the bed and looked down curiously at the +sheriff’s hard-bitten face. + +“You’ve got the name of being a square shooter too, Evans,” he said +thoughtfully. “And I’d say you are. Suppose you tell me the truth about +this bank president; how long have you known him?” + +“Not very long,” said Evans. “Only about forty years.” + +“And he’s neither a coward nor a crook?” + +“The squarest. An old friend of King Cannon’s, if that means anything +to you. And not afraid of all hell on wheels.” + +“That’s how I made him out. And here he is, caving in to those bums, +paying a ransom and letting them make a monkey out of him.” + +“Well, maybe he figures he’d rather be alive than save that fifty +thousand.” + +“And you feel kind of sure that he isn’t the sort of man to save his +own hide by letting another man take his place? A man who he knows +played square with him?” + +“Is this a cigarette I’m smoking? Might be a pipe, might be I’m not +smoking at all but eating a watermelon! I’m just that sure.” + +“Damn it then! He didn’t write these letters at all! They’re forgeries! +I tell you there’s something phony about them!” + +“He wrote ’em all right. I know Will’s hand-of-write; know it as well +as I know my own hat.” + +“Then--” + +“I’ll tell you one thing,” said Evans sharply. He stood up and tapped +Torrance on the shoulder. “Will Hasbrook wrote these letters, and just +the same you’re right; there is something damn phony about them. It’s +a little thing, but it’s something that hit me in the eye right off, +and that stands out a mile after a feller does notice it. Here, squat; +you’re looking white around the gills. I’m going to tell you something.” + +Torrance came back to the bed and sat down. It was Evans’ turn to walk +up and down for a while; his brows were dragged down in tangled thought +and he was taking his last moment to consider all angles of a puzzle +before he committed himself. Then he shrugged and stood in front of +Torrance and spoke his piece. + +“Look here, Torrance, maybe I’m the idiot you’ve called me, but I +believe every word you’ve said to me. That’s partly because of what +Sally Dawn Cannon told me; partly from sizing you up for myself; partly +now for something in Hasbrook’s letters that makes me hunt around for +just the sort of a queer set-up you’ve told me about. Like you said, +there’s something phony here, and Hasbrook’s been to a lot of trouble +to tell me so, and he’s figured it was up to me to find out about +things.” + +He put the two letters, spread out, on the bed. + +“Look at this first one,” he said. “He calls me ‘Walt’ four times in +it! And Will Hasbrook never called me ‘Walt’ in his life. Everybody +else does, but since we were kids he’s always called me Walter. And +I’ve always called him Will--and I guess I’m the only man in the county +that ever called him anything but Bill Hasbrook. And now look at the +second one. He’s got three ‘Walts’ in that. And both of ’em he’s signed +‘Bill.’ And if he’s not trying to fly some sort of signal for me I’m +all that you’ve called me.” + + * * * * * + +By the time Sheriff Walt Evans left, Jim Torrance was ready to crawl +back into bed and just lie there and try to be patient about getting +stronger. They had gone into a conference, planning ways and means, +that had lasted a solid two hours. + +What was more, they had cooked up their plan that had enough hazard in +it to have claimed all Torrance’s thoughts as long as he lay awake. +But, as a matter of record, he wasn’t thinking of this present problem +at all but a vastly more pleasant one. He was wondering when Sally Dawn +would pop in again. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +The third letter reached Sheriff Walt Evans four days later. He +found it, like the two others, stuck under his door. He brought it +straightway to Jim Torrance, whom he found, early in the morning, up +and about and devouring a man’s sized breakfast. He tossed the fresh +news onto Jim’s table and started prowling up and down the room. + +Torrance read it to the neglect of a sort of Tower of Pisa made of rich +brown buckwheat cakes. + + Dear Walt: Be sure you get these details straight: You are to hand + Jim Torrance over to his friends tomorrow night. They don’t want you + to let him know what you’re doing with him; the boys want to have + their fun and give him a surprise. So you’ll put him on horseback + after dark; you’ll have him tied down to the saddle; you’ll tell him + you’re taking him to some other jail to make sure his gang doesn’t + pour down and get him free. Also, you’re to stuff the fifty thousand + into his pockets. Got all that, Walt? + + Next: You and Torrance, alone, ride out on the Bear Creek road about + seven miles, to where the trail cuts up over the mountain to the old + Sun Dodger’s place. When you get up to the mouth of the pass you’ll + tie Torrance’s horse to a tree, make sure he’s tied down hard in the + saddle, and you’ll back off down trail. Got that straight, Walt? + + You’ll wait there for me. I’ll be with you right away. I’ve fixed + things with these boys so that I know I’ll be all right if you just + do what I say-- Walt, old man, my life depends on you and I don’t + want to die. Walt, for God’s sake, do as you’re told. This whole + thing is getting me down. + + Bill Hasbrook. + +Evans, watching Torrance read, said curtly: “Well, you’d take Will +Hasbrook for a yellow skunk, wouldn’t you? And that’s just what he +ain’t! They couldn’t get him down if they took out their pocket knives +and started to skin him. And here again he calls me ‘Walt’ all over the +map.” + +“And I’m to be tied up good and tight,” said Torrance. “No gun on me, +of course. As Hasbrook puts it, ‘The boys want to have their fun and +give him a surprise!’” + +“He says for tomorrow night,” said Evans. “Going to be strong enough +for that sort of ride by then? Anyhow ten miles.” + +“Sure,” said Torrance. “That part of it’s all right. But do you think +it’s possible that Hasbrook has tried to write in anything else between +the lines? And that you’ve missed it?” + +“I’ve read every one of his notes forty times,” growled Evans. “I know +damn well that his ‘Walts’ and ‘Bills’ are stuck in to give me a high +sign. Beyond that I can’t get an inch. He might mean I’m just to stall +along and pay no attention to anything. Or--maybe--” + +“He might mean that you’re to talk things over with me, just as you +have done. That business of having me tied down in the saddle, just for +fun, makes you pretty sure what Bordereau’s game is, I guess!” + +“We start out a little before midnight, Torrance,” said Evans. “That’s +for tomorrow night. You better take things easy today. Will says we’re +to wait for him up at the mouth of the pass; we’ll do that.” + +“There’s the chance, of course, that they’ll be hid in the brush and +burn us down--” + +“Nope. If he hadn’t been sure on that point, Will wouldn’t have written +the way he did.” + +“I’ll be ready,” said Torrance. + +That afternoon Doc Kibbee, who had had a good talk with the sheriff, +came in, looked Torrance over, grunted and went out. + +Later Sally Dawn ran in. + +“Jim Torrance,” she said, “you look as good as brand-new again. You’re +about ready to ride, aren’t you? You’re to come back home with me, you +know, and get a good rest there. Mrs. Sam will feed you and--” + +“Sally Dawn,” said Torrance, “you just travel along back home today, +and you tell Mrs. Sam to start in roasting chickens, baking cakes and +making pies, for just as sure as you’re alive I’ll be dropping in on +you mighty soon. I’ve got a thing or two to tend to here first, and--” + +Sally Dawn looked at him sharply. + +“If you had said you’d promise to come ‘Just as sure as _you’re_ alive’ +it would sound more like you meant it,” she said unhappily. She put +an impulsive hand on his arm. “Jim Torrance, you and Walt Evans are +cooking something up. You’re back on Steve Bordereau’s trail, aren’t +you? Why can’t you just forget he ever existed? He’ll be up and away, +out of the country for good after this.” She pleaded; her eyes and her +softened voice were beseeching. “_Please_, Jim.” + +“Take that back, Sally Dawn,” said Torrance gravely. “I don’t want you +to ask me, ever, anything I can’t do for you. Take it back, Sally Dawn!” + +Sally Dawn turned abruptly and went to the window, giving him her back +to look at. He looked at it and waited. Then she turned again and came +back to him, and somehow it struck him that she was marching like a +little soldier with drums beating and flags flying. + +“I understand, Jim,” she said very softly, and there was only the +vaguest hint of a quiver upon her red lips, though no tremor came into +her steady voice. “I don’t blame you, Jim. I’ll go home now. There’ll +be roast chicken and cakes and pies and--and I’ll be waiting, Jim +Torrance.” + +She darted out of the room then, as swift as a swallow, and it was +not ten minutes later that Jim Torrance, out on the porch in the weak +October sunshine, saw her and Curly Redmond and Dave Drennen swoop by, +riding out of Canyon City, headed south. She didn’t wave good-by, she +didn’t even turn in the saddle. He pulled off his hat and stood with it +turning slowly in his hands until the three riders were out of sight. + + * * * * * + +The next night between eleven o’clock and midnight Torrance and Walt +Evans rode out of Canyon City headed toward Indian Mountain and the +old Sun Dodger’s place and the high pass across the ridge. There was +a packet tied to Torrance’s saddle strings; in it, in gold and bank +notes, was fifty thousand dollars. Torrance’s hands were on his saddle +horn and there was a rope about his wrists. Also there was a rope about +his ankles and under his horse’s belly. You would have said that he +was bound hand and foot; that he was unarmed; that he was still the +helpless prisoner of the sheriff of Coconambo County. + +It was a clear night and there was a moon, and the mountain ridges +stood up sharply defined against a star-strewn sky. It was a fair bet, +both men agreed, that from the time they rode out of the dark alley +behind the livery stable they were being watched. They were equally +aware of the fact, as they left Canyon City behind them and struck into +the road that was like a long winding slash through thick timber, that +a rifle might crack at any minute and a storm of bullets knock them out +of their saddles. They were at Steve Bordereau’s mercy, and Bordereau +was merciless. Just the same, they banked on Will Hasbrook. + +“I know damn well,” said Evans, “that Will wouldn’t have let us in for +this without somehow being pretty sure we’d make out. I don’t see how +he figures it, but a man can gamble on Will Hasbrook and on his keeping +his head. Just the same-- Look here, Torrance, if you want to back out +while you’ve got the chance I can’t say I’ll blame you. If I’ve got you +right, if you haven’t lied me blind, this may be the last night you +ever get a good look at the stars.” + +“We’ll play out our string, Evans,” said Torrance. + +Before they were a mile on their way, a rider, coming on after them +from Canyon City, overtook them and passed on. He called out, “Hello, +Jim! We’ll be waitin’ for you and glad to have you with us again.” They +could make nothing of his face, lost in the shadow of his hat. + +For an instant the sheriffs hand hardened to the butt of his old +walnut-gripped Colt; then he sighed and relaxed in the saddle. + +“Nothing we can do about anything until we get to the rendyvoo,” he +said disgustedly, “and most likely damn little we can do then. Looks +like they had us with our noses shoved down in the dirt.” + +“They’ve got the edge on us,” conceded Torrance coolly. “They’ve got +us guessing more or less, and they’ve got the odds on us. That’s all +they’ve got.” + +“Good Lord, man! Ain’t that a-plenty?” + +“Just the same,” Torrance went on, “you never quit on a proposition +just because it was an uphill pull, did you?” + +Sheriff Walt Evans of Coconambo County swore fluently. At the end he +said: + +“Damn if I don’t sort of like your style, Torrance. And if they get +your hide tonight I’ll do my level damnedest to sort of even things up +with them later on.” + +“Fair enough,” said Torrance. + +They rode on in silence. The road under their horses’ scampering hoofs +started abruptly climbing up Indian Mountain, winding in and out of +graded ravines, and they had to pull down to a swinging walk. Torrance +said: “That hombre took a look-see to make out whether I was tied up +or not. They’ll have some more spies posted along the road, sure as +shooting. And I’m here to bet you we meet up with them quite a spell +before we get to the place where Hasbrook said we were to come.” + +High up on the flank of the mountain they struck into a road that +ran almost level in a high valley, and here they rode hard and were +watchful and suspicious. Every shadow might be a man with a rifle at +his shoulder; the place was lonesome enough for that sort of thing. +But they shot across this bit of mountain meadow without anything +happening, dipped into another canyon and climbed steeply again. Then, +startling them, with their nerves already at stretch, a voice shouted: +“Hello, Jim! Like old times come again, huh?” + +“Damn ’em, they make my flesh creep,” snorted the old sheriff. + +“They’re having them their fun,” said Torrance. + +“We ought to be there in ten-fifteen minutes now, Kid,” said the +sheriff, and for the first time sounded uncertain and uneasy. “If I was +you-- Dammit, Kid, if I was you-- Oh, hell, I dunno! But if you want to +turn tail right now and get the hell out of here, headed back where we +just came from, me I wouldn’t blame you.” + +“We called for cards; let’s play the hand out,” said Torrance. And +after that, if he was ever going to have need of a friend, all he’d +have to do would be send word to the sheriff of Coconambo County. + +Then it wasn’t long before they saw what they recognized as a signal +to halt. In the middle of the trail where there was an opening through +trees, and where the moon and stars made the place bright, a freshly +skinned pole stood upright, based in a nest of stones, and from the top +of the pole a scrap of white cloth drooped and fluttered in the draft +of night air down through a cut in the mountains. They reined in when +they first saw this mast and flag, something like fifty yards before +they came to it. Beyond, so straight-as-a-string was the trail right +here, they could see an open distance of perhaps twice fifty yards. + +“If it comes to fighting it out, Kid,” said Evans in an undertone, “I’m +with you.” + +“No,” said Torrance, and though he too spoke almost under his breath +his tone sounded savage. “No change of plans now, Evans. You get +Hasbrook out of this if you can; all I want is Bordereau.” + +Then they saw three mounted men moving slowly out of the timber ahead +of them and coming toward them down trail. Evans called out sharply: + +“That you, Will?” + +“Yes, it’s me, Walter,” answered the banker. + +“You’re to come ahead alone,” the sheriff called back. “Those coyotes +with you know they can take your word, and I know they’re a pack of +liars whose word is no better than rotten eggs.” + +Another voice spoke up. Jim Torrance felt a tingle run through his +blood as he heard it; he recognized it beyond a doubt as Steve +Bordereau’s. + +“You, Evans!” the voice called. “You’ll do as you’re damn well told, +or the gun I’ve got jammed between Hasbrook’s shoulder blades is going +off; and there’s a rifle trained on you now that will zip you into +kingdom come.” + +“No, by the Lord!” yelled back an angry sheriff. “You’ll do as I say +now. Send Hasbrook down alone to me and let the two of us ride out +of this, and you’ve got my word for it your money is tied to Jim +Torrance’s saddle strings. If you don’t like that, kill Hasbrook and +try to kill me and be damned to you.” + +“Is that Torrance with you?” + +The three oncoming riders had stopped. + +“Yes. It’s Jim Torrance. I’ve done my part; you do yours and do it the +way I say, or else.” + +Then one of the three horsemen came on alone, and Torrance and Sheriff +Evans made out that it was banker Hasbrook. Bordereau called out again, +not waiting for Hasbrook to reach the sheriff’s side: + +“Evans! You give me your word you’ve got the money with you?” + +“Yes.” + +“Is Torrance tied or free?” + +“As if you didn’t know already! He’s got ropes on his wrists and on his +legs, if you call that being tied. The money’s on his saddle; I’ll drop +it into the trail or leave it there. But you’re to let me and Hasbrook +get down trail to the bend before you come on. If you boys had rather +prove yourselves the bunch of liars I’ve called you and would rather +shoot it out, hop to it.” + +“Leave the money where it is,” said Bordereau. “Tie Torrance’s horse to +a tree like I said. Then get to hell out of here.” + +“Here goes,” said Evans. + +Hasbrook came on. By the time he had reached them, Sheriff Evans had +used the tie rope on Torrance’s saddle, an end of which was already +around the horse’s neck; the other end he tied and drew tight with a +jerk around a young tree. Then for a moment or two Torrance and Evans +and Will Hasbrook were together, no Bordereau man in sight but the two +up trail, and they a good seventy-five yards away. Hasbrook, grasping +Evans’ arm, said sharply: + +“Dammit, Walter! Haven’t you and Torrance talked? Hasn’t he told you--” + +Torrance in a savage undertone cut in: + +“We’ve made our plans, Hasbrook. You do what Evans says. What Bordereau +says, too. Get the hell out of here.” + +“I’ll do nothing of the kind! Leaving you tied like this? They’ll +murder you in two minutes!” + +“Hey, there!” shouted Steve Bordereau. “What are you birds talking +about? Break it up and scatter for home--or else, like Evans says.” + +Evans muttered, his voice in Hasbrook’s ear: “He means business. I’ve +done all I could with my eyes shut, Will. Now you do as I say. We’re on +our way.” + +Hasbrook called softly to Jim Torrance: “I don’t get this. Until hell +freezes solid I’m with you, Kid.” + +“Ride then,” snapped Torrance. “Now.” + +Their hushed conference was so short that when Evans sang out to +Bordereau, “All right; me and Hasbrook are on our way,” it was before +Bordereau even called a second command. Evans whirled his horse and +spurred down trail, gone at a run, and with him went a reluctant +Hasbrook. The two vanished around the bend in the trail. + +Bordereau and the man with him came on then, riding at a slow trot; +Torrance could see the metallic gleam of the rifles they carried. He +saw also something else, for those narrowed and watchful eyes of his +were everywhere at once, as they had to be, did he mean to go on living +even a few minutes. He saw a third member of Bordereau’s party; this +man stepped out from under the trees almost at his side. He carried his +belt gun in his hand and was not six paces away when Torrance heard his +soft tread and made him out, close enough to assure himself that Evans +had done a good job of tying the free end of Torrance’s tie rope about +the tree; close enough to see the rope about Torrance’s wrists. He +called out, laughing: + +“Come ahead, boys. He’s tied up tighter’n a drum.” + +A shout and a big booming laugh broke from Steve Bordereau then, and he +and the man with him came on at a swinging gallop. + +“Now!” thought Jim Torrance. “Now!” + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +As Sheriff Evans and Banker Hasbrook rode down trail and around the +bend, Evans slipped a hand under his coat, dragged out two hefty +forty-fours and slid them into Hasbrook’s eager hands. + +“I hope you get a chance to use ’em tonight, that’s all,” growled an +unusually disgruntled sheriff. + +“Me too, dammit,” growled Hasbrook. + +Just then two men rode out into the trail in front of them, and one of +the two called sullenly as Evans and Hasbrook pulled their horses down: + +“You’re to keep on going, and go like hell. Got it?” + +“Got you,” snapped Evans, and started to ride on. + +But already Jim Torrance had muttered to himself, “Now!” That was +uptrail and around the bend, and they couldn’t see him for the trees. +Nor could they see Steve Bordereau and the man riding with him, nor the +other man who had just stepped out so close to Torrance. + +Torrance, having said “Now!” meant “_Now!_” Bordereau and the man with +him wore big bandanas over their faces, for masks; they’d kept their +faces hidden all the while from Will Hasbrook. But as they pulled in +close to where Torrance waited for them, Steve Bordereau jerked the +cloth away from his face. Already he saw Torrance’s hands on the saddle +horn, and saw too the rope about them. + +But there was something he didn’t see. The rope about Torrance’s +horse’s neck went just so far and was pieced out with a bit of cotton +string; the ropes about Torrance’s legs were pieced out in the same +way, as was the rope about his wrists. One jerk, no more emphatic than +that with which Steve Bordereau snatched his handkerchief away, was all +he needed to set him free. + +“Got you at last, damn you!” exulted Bordereau. He reached in leisurely +fashion for his gun. “You’re a dead man in ten seconds, Torrance. +You’ll live just exactly long enough to know who burned you down. Take +this--and like it!” + +“Hold it, Bordereau,” said Torrance quietly. “Me, I want to tell you +something too. I felt sure down to my boots that it was you and your +gang pulling off these jobs, bank robbing, murder and such. Now I know +from seeing you and listening to you. Here’s a tip for you. I don’t +think you’ll live through the night; if you do you’ll be where you put +Doc Taylor before your whiskers grow long enough to shave two-three +times.” + +Bordereau hardly heard him out before he started shooting, and not +ten paces away. But Torrance, whom circumstances forced to make his +final, revised plans in a hurry, wasn’t in the saddle when Bordereau’s +finger hardened to the trigger. Knowing that he could never hope to go +free on horseback, he spilled out of his saddle, breaking the little +cotton strings that bound him, throwing himself against the fellow +who had just stepped from the wood, knocking him endwise. Torrance’s +frightened horse leaped and reared and lunged, and in the narrow trail +caromed flank to flank against Steve Bordereau’s mount. + +By that time Bordereau was firing as fast as he could, not caring in +the least if he knocked over his own man, tangled there on the ground +with Jim Torrance, not caring much about anything, just so Torrance was +one man he killed. But in his excitement and rage he had the poorest +of luck; Torrance was firing back with less excitement, with more +precision. As he threw himself from his horse’s back his gun was in his +hand; he brought it down smashingly on the head of the man against whom +he catapulted himself; thereafter he did his level best to make an end +of Bordereau. But three horses were rearing and snorting their fear, +and trying to run away, and, close as the men were to each other, it +was hard to make sure with any single shot. + +But he came mighty close to making sure with the first bullet he winged +on its way; it carried Steve Bordereau’s hat away and left a bloody +groove along Bordereau’s scalp. The gambler, emulating his enemy, +went down out of the saddle in a hurry, keeping the reins in one +hand, getting behind his horse, and he kept on firing from behind his +restless barricade as fast as he could pull a trigger. + +He did kill his own man, the one whom Torrance had downed; Torrance +heard the thud of the impact in the lax body, thanked his stars for +the eight or ten inches between them, and leaped into the dark of the +wood bordering the trail. Bullets were singing all about him, the other +bandit slamming lead at him as fast as did Steve Bordereau. + +Bordereau too sprang nimbly out of the open trail, ducking behind a +tree. The fellow with him was slower of wit or of bolder mettle; in +any case he stopped one of Torrance’s bullets and went to the ground +headlong. By that time, above the crash and thunder and clamorous +reverberations of gunfire, rose Bordereau’s voice, choking with anger, +yelling savage commands: + +“Varney! Billings! Where the hell are you? Get into it or--” + +Varney Slack and Hen Billings were the two men he had set on guard +lower down the trail, to make sure that the sheriff and Hasbrook +were on their way; for at the time of cooking up his plans Bordereau +hadn’t counted on Torrance bursting his bonds like this. And just now +it happened that Varney and Billings had other matters to attend to +beyond listening to their leader’s commands. For the instant Walt Evans +heard the start of a duello of gunfire, he chose to consider that his +contract with these rats was fulfilled and that he was a free man to do +just what he damn well pleased. He grabbed a gun up out of its holster +where it rested so loosely, yelled downright joyously, “Stick ’em up, +you two, or go for your guns!” and cut loose. For he saw they were +doing what they had to do; they were going for their guns. + +If there was one thing--and there were several--that Walt Evans could +do pretty close up to the fine edge of perfection, it was shoot on the +draw true to the mark. He unlimbered before either of his two opponents +got their guns up six inches from their holsters; they should have +shot from the hip and taken their chances that way, for no other +chance was to be granted them. He shot one man through the throat, the +other man through the gun elbow. And Will Hasbrook by that time was in +action; he drilled with a lucky shot the fellow whom Evans had merely +wounded. + +Then the two went storming back uptrail. + +“Hey there, Jim!” and, “Torrance! Torrance! We’re with you!” yelled +Evans and Hasbrook. And Bordereau, hearing and understanding what must +have happened when he heard the shooting around the bend, got into +the edge of the forest, dragging his horse along, and got up into his +saddle and left behind him only the faint sound of his cursing and the +livelier racket of brush crackling under his precipitate flight. + +Out in the clearing was a rock some five or six feet high. Torrance +with a single leap seemed somehow to be on top of it. From there he +shouted so that his vociferations were like the challenge of a crowing +cock. That was because already he tried to see into that thing that +they call the future--into happenings which, yet unborn, might come out +this way or that. + +“Bordereau!” he shouted, inviting a bullet and feeling in his heart, +standing high just then, that he could dodge it! “Bordereau! You’ve +run off and left your fifty thousand! And I’ve scared you out of the +country, me, Jim Torrance! Hell with you--since I know after this +you’ll never come back! Me, I’ll own this whole damn country a year +from now; and you--you’ll be down below the border with the rest of the +half-breeds, sucking eggs for supper, hungry and dirty and lousy and +down and out. And it was me, Jim Torrance, that ran you out.” + +And for full measure he simulated rollicking spontaneous laughter. + +That extravagance of his nearly cost him his life--but since it was +merely a case of nearly but not quite, he didn’t in the least mind. +Steve Bordereau heard his taunts and stopped and shot at him through +the uncertain region of twigs and shadows and moonlight, and his shots +whistled close but left Torrance unscathed. Nor, after having fired his +verbal volley, did Torrance choose to linger on the rock. He spilled +down again, almost under the running hoofs of the horses bringing Evans +and Hasbrook. + +“There’ll be sure to be more of the rats hid in the brush,” he sang out +warningly. “Better duck for cover among the trees.” + +“I don’t see you ducking,” snorted the sheriff. + +Torrance’s horse had run but a short distance uptrail and stood there +stamping and whirling and jerking its head high, making a lively jingle +of bridle chains. Torrance ran forward, caught up the reins and went up +into the saddle. Then there was a crashing in the underbrush where he +had vanished, going after the already vanished Bordereau. Close behind +him came both the sheriff and Hasbrook. And now Hasbrook, though he was +not going to hang back when the others led, called out a warning: + +“You’ll never get him at night in this rough country--he knows every +step of it--look out or he’ll let you have it before you ever see him.” + +Torrance didn’t stop and didn’t bother to answer. He knew that +Bordereau still fled on somewhere ahead, for he heard the drumming of +speeding hoofs. But he had to swing this way and that among the trees; +his horse balked once where a big fallen tree lay across the way; he +had to draw back and ride around it--and then all sounds of the horse +ahead of him died away. He stopped and listened; the trample of Evans’ +and Hasbrook’s horses, coming closer, was all he heard. + +“Let him go, Torrance,” said Evans bruskly. “You’re no sorrier than I +am to have him slide out on us--but we’ve saved Will’s fifty thousand +dollars for him--and we’ve done what we could to square things for Phil +Gates, potting two of the devils. And tomorrow I’ll come back up here +with a posse and comb these mountains--” + +“You got two of them?” said Torrance. “Well, Bordereau himself got a +third man, plugging wild at me. If we haven’t busted up his gang, at +least we’ve thinned it. And I guess you’re right; it’s about all we can +do for tonight.” + +Evans said to Hasbrook: “This man Jim Torrance is barely up out of bed; +he got himself shot up a bit in the scrap when they grabbed you. It’s +time we rode home with him and tucked him into bed again. Let’s catch +up these horses running free, and be on our way.” + +“Torrance,” said the banker warmly, “if it hadn’t been for you--” + +“Let’s ride,” said Torrance. + +No posse went out the next morning, but just a couple of men with a +buckboard to haul back into town the three dead bandits. That was +because the sheriff and Will Hasbrook had had a good long talk with Jim +Torrance. + +“It’s a funny thing,” said Hasbrook, “how Jim here seems to sort of +know what Bordereau’s apt to do next, what he’s thinking even. He +came to me and told me to look out for this raid, and I did--well, +half-heartedly maybe, still I did feel in my bones that he knew what he +was talking about.” + +“How come?” demanded Evans. “You and this Bordereau bird had lots of +heart-to-heart talks, Jim?” + +“Nary a talk, Walt. But you see, I know the sorts of things Steve +Bordereau has been pulling off for years; I’ve done a lot of thinking +about him; I’ve got a hunch I know what he’s like inside and how he +figures things.” + +“I heard you yelling after him when you stood up there on that rock +last night. You figured he was on his way at last, clean out of the +country.” + +“That was just my way of inviting him to hang around a little longer,” +grinned Torrance, and looked vastly good-natured and hopeful. “After my +reminding him that we still had his fifty thousand, and after my doing +a bit of big-mouth bragging, there’s no more chance of his running +out on us than there is of the world falling apart. If he never does +another thing, he’s going to have a try at me.” His grin passed swiftly +and his eyes darkened and grew low-lidded and moody. “You see,” he said +thoughtfully, “Steve Bordereau is three things by nature. He’s a crook +and a killer--and a gambler. He’s sure by now that his luck is running +high.” + +“After last night?” said Hasbrook, puzzled. + +“He’s got a gang with him, hasn’t he? And he’s raked in several sizable +jack pots already, hasn’t he, grabbing King Cannon’s gold, sticking up +the Yellow Pine and the Mountain City Bank and the Mines? Last night he +lost a trick, yes; but at the same time he had the good luck to have +three of his followers put out of the running; he’ll grab their share, +won’t he? But then you don’t know Bordereau.” + +As it happened, both men did know him, though but slightly; both had +sat in at a poker table with him. They understood. + +“And what next?” demanded Evans. + +“First, there’s Bordereau on the run in the mountains. You know damn +well you could hunt him until the next snowstorm and never catch a +glimpse of him, not up there in the rough country. And after snow +flies, what then? He’ll be well provisioned; he’ll have a snug +hide-out; it’ll be in a place where one man can hold off fifty. And +he’ll still have a few men with him.” + +“And you think he won’t do what you said, duck out for south of the +border?” + +“Not if I know him. He’ll count noses of what’s left of his party, pick +up another three or four of the same kind, and try his luck again while +he still thinks that luck is running high.” + +“And you’ve got a notion where he’ll strike next time?” + +“Sure I have,” said Jim Torrance. + + * * * * * + +They talked the thing out for hours. Then, when Torrance headed back +toward Sundown, Sheriff Evans and Banker Hasbrook rode with him. And, +to meet them at Sundown, went another old-timer of Canyon City, Doc +Kibbee, traveling by stage. Those three, Evans and Hasbrook and Kibbee, +just about ran Coconambo County in those days and had done so for +many years. True, Sundown was over their county border and, rightly +speaking, they had nothing to say about how little Sundown behaved or +misbehaved itself; yet it remained that the influence which these three +hearty old mountain lions could exert extended through many channels +and to considerable distances. + +“We’ll come swooping down on Sundown like the wolf on the fold,” said +Doc Kibbee. + +The three horsemen came abreast of the main gate to the King Cannon +ranch just about sunset. Both Evans and Hasbrook cocked an eye at +Torrance; his face was without expression and he was staring straight +on ahead, giving no sign that he knew where he was. + +“How about turning in here for a while?” said Evans. “The folks might +even feed us. Me, I’m getting hungry and sort of thirsty too.” + +“It’s an idea, Walter,” said Hasbrook. + +So they turned in at the ranch wagon road, and rode up to the house +on its knoll among the trees. Sam Pepper, loafing out by the chicken +yard, saw them and came with all due haste to meet them. + +“Say, it’s you, Jim Torrance!” he exclaimed. “Say, here I been +wondering-- Wipe my eyes if it ain’t Walt Evans! And Bill Hasbrook with +you! Say!” + +Then Mrs. Sam, hearing them, came bustling out of the house, dough +on her hands and her arms all floury--and, while they were all just +shaking hands and saying the first howdys, Sally Dawn made her +appearance, sweet and fresh in a pink dress and with pink in her cheeks +and violet in her eyes. + +The visitors were pressed to have a snack and something cold to drink +and remained for a hot supper. There came a time when by chance Jim +Torrance and Sally Dawn were alone in the early dark on the porch. They +strolled down into the yard. + +“There’s so much left over yet that you haven’t told me, Jim,” said the +girl. + +And he said: “Instead of saying a whole lot more, I’d like to ask you +something. Between my ranch and the upper end of your ranch there’s +only the old Harper place, and the Harpers have been dead ten years and +the ranch is pretty well going to the dogs. What would you say if I +bought the place in? We’d be neighbors then.” + +“Lovely! Only--only, Jim, I’m not sure that I’ll be here much longer. +The ranch is so badly crippled--and what with the mortgage on it and +with Steve Bordereau making all the trouble he can--and--” + +“Shucks, those things are bound to get ironed out smooth, give ’em +time. And don’t forget Bordereau owes you a hatful of money, all that +free gold he dug out of your father’s old house up in the mountains. +When you get that back--” + +“_When_ I get it back!” she said ruefully, and shook her head. + +“You’re going to get it back. You’re going to keep your ranch, too; all +clear and cleaned up. Steve Bordereau thinks he’s riding high, wide and +handsome right now, but don’t let him fool you.” + +“And you, Jim? Do you know, sometimes I think if you just forgot all +about him, if you just settled down to your ranch, your horses--” + +“That’s what I aim to do,” said Torrance. “Right here close to Sundown. +I kind of like it here.” + +“I’m glad,” said Sally Dawn. + +Then he said, almost rough about it: “Look here! You came all the way +up to Canyon City when I was hurt. You--” + +“Hi, Jim!” called Sam Pepper. “That you?” He came along hastily. “Are +you sure it was Bordereau stuck up Canyon City? Think he’s skipped the +country or’s coming back? And what’s brought all those Canyon City +big bugs, Evans and Kibbee and Hasbrook, down here so far off their +stamping grounds? And--” + +“I wonder why somebody hasn’t killed Sam Pepper long ago,” said Jim +Torrance to the girl. + +That made her laugh, and she said, “He makes me wonder, too!” But she +gave Jim’s hand, so lingeringly withdrawing, a good tight squeeze. + +Supper done, the Canyon City big bugs rode on into Sundown, Jim +Torrance with them, and they did not go unaccompanied. Sam Pepper was +on hand to ride neck and neck with the first of them; Bill Yarbo showed +up and went along; Curly Redmond and Dick Pardee and Dave Drennen were +also of the party. + +Within twenty-four hours that hard, tight nucleus of determined men +turned a new page in Sundown’s history. They looked up old friends; +they talked cold turkey. The second night some four or five score of +the squarest-shooting, hardest-riding men of the community met in the +“Hall.” The yellow light of their coal oil lamps shone on grim-jawed +faces. They sent out for the man they wanted, and Biggs was brought in +before them, Rufe Biggs, the town marshal. + +Seth Hathaway, an old stock man of the King Cannon type, spoke to him. + +“Rufe,” he said, “there’s two kinds o’ folks in an’ around Sundown. +There’s folks like us men here; there’s folks like Steve Bordereau and +Clark Murdo and their crowd. Steve Bordereau put you where you are +and our crowd ain’t got any more use for you than a grizzly’s got use +for feathers in his tail. Bordereau’s a killer, a crook, a stick-up +gent, and he’s on the run. Clark Murdo’s just as bad and won’t be here +always. If you, Rufe, have got as much sense as a bedbug, which I +doubt, you’ll resign right here and right now. _Sabe?_” + +Rufe Biggs bristled and did his small amount of unconvincing +blustering, but he looked frightened, and in the end he slammed his +badge of office down on the floor and kicked at it. + +“Hell! I quit,” he said, and got out of the room the quickest way. + +Then the men gathered in the hall took it upon themselves to name their +new town marshal to fill the vacancy voluntarily made by Rufe Biggs. +Someone picked up the fallen badge and handed it to their new law +enforcement officer. + +Jim Torrance’s hands just naturally slid down to the guns at his hips. + +“I’m naming myself two deputies right now,” he said. “Later maybe I’m +going to ask two-three more to kick in with me--that is, if it comes to +a clean-up. You, Sam Pepper; you, Bill Yarbo. You’re both sworn in to +lend a hand. Pop out and get me an ax and a crowbar.” + +Only a block from the hall was the Sundown jail. Torrance knew that +Biggs had the key, hence the ax and crowbar. + +He got the battered door off its hinges and stood it against the side +of the squat, square building. + +“You come out, you fellows in there,” he called. And out came three +untidy men, one swaggering, two cowering, all scared. For they didn’t +like this sort of an exit, and they didn’t like the tone of the voice +commanding them--and the grim-faced crowd that had followed Torrance +looked as much like a lynching party as anything else. + +“We’re not going to need a jail in Sundown any more, boys,” said the +new marshal of Sundown. “If you’re the right kind of men, you don’t +have to go into jail. If you’re not the kind that Sundown hankers +for--well, that’s going to be your hard luck. Now you three--and I +don’t know a damn thing about you--just get the hell out of here as +fast as you can, and keep on going. You don’t have to come back unless +you think it’s healthy here. Just spread the news as you go. That’s +all, boys. Good luck.” + +The suddenly released three vanished in the dark. + +Somebody laughed. + +A cheer went up. + +Jim Torrance hitched up his guns, rolled a cigarette, pushed his hat +pretty far back--and strolled over to the Stag Horn saloon. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +Jim Torrance didn’t stop in the barroom downstairs; he looked in at the +door, saw that Murdo wasn’t there, and went on upstairs. On his way he +was thinking: “I came to Sundown for two reasons--to get to ranching +again and to find Steve Bordereau. I hardly know what my ranch looks +like; I’ve scarcely more than clapped my eyes on Bordereau, though +we’ve tried to shoot it out twice.” + +He entered the main gambling room on the second story and went up to +the bar. The place was pretty well filled; men were drinking and games +were going full blast. But again he failed to see Clark Murdo. + +His thumbs were hooked into his belt as he leaned against the bar. He +was about to call for a drink when he saw Florinda. She was across the +room, standing stock still and looking at him, her eyes enormous, her +face pale, her lips vivid red, her jewels flaming. She made a queer +little gesture, her beringed hands going up to her bosom. But it was +not that that called him; it was the look in her eyes. He went across +the room to a small table and sat down. Instantly she hurried to him; +she gave him a smile which was all too patently made for the occasion, +for he saw that she looked frightened. + +“Sit down, Señorita?” he invited. “We might have something to drink.” + +“_Gracias, Señor!_ Oh, yes, I will be glad.” + +She sat down; a bottle and glasses were brought them; Torrance sat idly +twisting his glass between hard brown fingers while she looked deep +into his eyes in a queer, troubling sort of way. + +“You have come back, Jim Torrance?” Only she called him “Jeem” and +put so many r’s into his name, Torrance, that it sounded like water +rippling over smooth stones. “I have heard so many things, such wild +tales about you! You were hurt, no?” + +He shrugged. “Nothing to matter.” And then he asked abruptly: “Did you +want to see me? You’ve got something to tell me?” + +She snatched up her glass and drank thirstily. She said, as though he +had accused her of something and she were defending herself, “Me, with +something to tell you?” Then she laughed at that. “What could I have to +tell you, Señor Jeem?” + +“I imagine there are a good many things you get to hear about here that +I wouldn’t mind knowing,” he said bluntly. And then he asked: “Where’s +Murdo? I don’t see him here anywhere tonight.” + +“He has not come yet. Maybe he won’t come tonight.” + +“Once you said you were a friend of mine.” + +“I am!” Dramatically she pressed both hands to her breast. “With all my +heart, Señor Jeem!” + +“You are a friend of Murdo’s, too?” + +Those lusciously full red lips of hers hardened and thinned. + +“Clark Murdo to me is the same as Steve Bordereau. They are the two +men I hate!” + +“Why?” + +“There are ten million reasons. Do not ask me, Señor; to talk about it +would make me want to stick a knife in them.” + +“The two are good friends, Murdo and Bordereau? They’re on the level +with each other?” + +She laughed in his face, and her laugh was a sneer. + +“Are you a great big fool, then? Do you think either one of two men +like those could be square with any other man? They are two cheats, +always cheating each other.” + +“I thought so,” said Jim Torrance. + +“Murdo hates you,” she said, and, whispering, her whisper was almost +a hiss, “for what you did when you brought the dead man here from the +graveyard, and maybe for other things. I do not know, but he hates you. +And he is the kind of man, like Steve Bordereau, who would come up +behind you and kill.” + +He nodded. “I generally keep my back to the wall,” he said. + +She gave him an elaborate Southern shrug. About to rise and go, for it +was seldom that she tarried long at any one table, a moment she held +poised, uncertain, undecided. Then she said with a quick, savage flash +of her deep black eyes: + +“Yes! Maybe I will have something to tell you! _Vamos a ver!_ Oh, but +we are going to see!” She rose then, yet finished her thought: “Men are +such fools! They think when they go in a room and shut a door, no one +can listen!” + +“Florinda! Tell me this. Has Bordereau been here lately to see Murdo?” + +But she didn’t stop to answer. He watched her go, an enigma now as +ever; he saw her stop hoveringly like a butterfly at another table +where three men were. + +He saw that Charlie, the bartender with the bull neck, was watching +him. He was conscious too that two other men--men he didn’t know, yet +whose faces he had seen here before, Bordereau’s men or Clark Murdo’s +without a doubt--were watching him even more narrowly than the man +behind the bar. Presently one of them got up and went out, passing +around the end of the bar and through the door which Torrance knew led +into the hallway that gave upon the private rooms. + +“Gone looking for Murdo,” thought Torrance. + +After that he didn’t lose sight of the door, but nevertheless out of +the corner of his eye he saw the several men who came into the room +together, having just come up the stairs from the street. They were +Hasbrook and Kibbee and Evans, leading the way, with Curly Redmond, +Dick Pardee, Dave Drennen, Bill Yarbo and Sam Pepper. Their eyes sought +and found him; when he gave no sign of having seen them, they proceeded +to ignore him after his own fashion. Hasbrook, Kibbee and Evans went +straight to the faro layout and into action, three old stagers who, +when they made their bets, bet ’em high. The others, with the exception +of Sam Pepper, stepped over to a long table where dice were tumbling +and rolling, while, as for Sam, he just hovered. He was so tensely +alert, trying to take in everything, that his eyes looked to be on +fire and his ears seemed actually to quiver like a nervous horse’s. + +Then the narrow door opened and Clark Murdo entered. He stopped and ran +his eyes swiftly over the room. Jim Torrance pushed his chair back and +stood up, and Murdo’s eyes hardened to a meeting with his. Torrance +went across the room to him. + +“Murdo,” he said crisply, “I want a talk with you.” + +“Yes? Well, I’ll listen if you make it snappy,” said Murdo. “What’s on +your mind?” + +“Two-three things. First, maybe you’ve heard that Rufe Biggs has +decided to quit being town marshal?” + +Murdo stepped back through the still open door. + +“Come into a room where we’ll be alone,” he said. + +Torrance followed him, not saying anything. They went into one of the +small poker rooms. Murdo flung open the door and said, “Come in.” + +“After you,” said Torrance, very polite. + +Murdo shrugged and went in first. Torrance, following him, saw that the +room was already occupied by two men; one was the fellow who without +doubt had just come to warn Murdo of Torrance’s presence in the main +gambling room, and who looked like a cross between a seedy fox and a +gaunt bulldog, and the other was that gangling, ferret-eyed man so +nearly always at Murdo’s beck and call whom Torrance remembered having +encountered at least twice already. Their eyes were like snakes’ +eyes, just that cold and void of expression--snakes’ eyes or bright +hard-polished shoe buttons. + +“Sure, let’s talk!” said Murdo, and, having spoken, his jaws suddenly +clamped hard, his lips squeezed together in a bloodless line of hate +and menace; his mouth was then like a frog’s mouth. + +Torrance shut the door; there was a key in the lock and he turned it +and drew it out and dropped it into his pocket. + +“We won’t want to be disturbed,” he said, and took a single sidewise +step which put him snugly in a corner, his back to the wall. His two +thumbs had again hooked themselves into his belt. + +The three pairs of eyes bent so steadily and balefully upon him +flickered then. It had been in Murdo’s mind to lock the door, but +Torrance had been too quick for him; somehow the thing upset him. + +“Well, what’s it all about?” he demanded. “Put a name to it.” + +“Rufe Biggs has quit, like I told you. I think he was wise at that, +don’t you, Murdo?” + +“Biggs is a yellow dog,” said Murdo. “It makes no difference to me what +he does.” + +“He told you who the new town marshal is?” + +“You won’t last long at it, Torrance. You can take that from me.” + +“No, I won’t last long. That’s the way I want it.” + +“What the hell? Are you driving at anything or ain’t you?” + +“Me, I’m a rancher, not a nursemaid for a sick town. Me, I want to get +my job done and go back to my stock. That’s why I won’t last long here +as marshal.” + +Murdo laughed at him, but it wasn’t much of a laugh. Torrance went on +quietly: + +“You, Murdo, are not to last here even as long as I am. One way or +another you are getting out of here now, tonight. One way or another +you’re going fast and far. And you’re not to come back.” + +Murdo, his mind made up, was temporizing, waiting for a break, and +Jim Torrance was no such fool as not to know it. Murdo, affecting a +sneering sort of manner, said: + +“So I’m to just roll my bundle and vamoose, am I? Just let the shop +here run itself--” + +“That needn’t worry you. It’s not your joint anyhow; it’s Steve +Bordereau’s, and Bordereau’s on the run, maybe already streaking for +the border, wanted for robbery and murder. You don’t think he’d be fool +enough to ever come back here for an accounting, do you?” + +He saw that, while Murdo was watching him like a hawk, Murdo’s two +killers now had their eyes bent on their boss, watching for a sign. + +“So I’m invited just to step along and let the place run itself?” said +Murdo. “Maybe you’re thinking of taking it over yourself?” + +“The girl out there, Florinda, can run it. Between her and Charlie, +your barkeep, they’ll do well enough.” + +Murdo strove for a sort of bantering, good-natured laugh--and Jim +Torrance, knowing full well that there was no laughter in the man’s +heart, grew a notch more tense and alert than before. + +“Stop your bluffing, Torrance,” said Murdo, trying to be genial. “Come +on out and I’ll stand you a drink. Why, man alive--” + +Somehow Murdo had given the signal, and Jim Torrance knew it, though +he didn’t quite know how. At the same split second Murdo and his two +gunmen went for their guns. + + * * * * * + +Into the gambling room the noise of a sudden crash of gunfire burst +like rolling thunder through the comparative silence. The first men to +run out of the room and into the hallway were Dick Pardee and Curly +Redmond; close behind them, a sturdy and compact mass of determined +men, came Evans and Hasbrook and Doc Kibbee, with Dave Drennen and Sam +Pepper and Lying Bill Yarbo crowding one another for elbow room, each +striving to get a leap in advance of the others. They came to the door +of the poker room and found it locked; they yelled their demands for +ingress and hurled their weights on the door. Before they could batter +it down, they heard a key shoot the bolt back, the door was opened and +they looked into the small room through a blue haze of powder smoke. + +Clark Murdo leaned back, white-faced, against a wall, his left hand +clutching his right shoulder; his gun lay on the floor at his feet. One +of his men, the gangling youngster with the furtive eyes and rabbit +teeth, crouched down, his gun arm broken, blood dripping from his +finger tips. The other of the Murdo men lay on his side, doubled up in +agony. + +It was therefore Jim Torrance who had opened the door. There was not a +scratch on him. Already he had slid his guns back into their holsters. +He was finishing the cigarette he had been smoking. + +“Boys,” he said as they came in, “can you scare me up a wagon and a +man to drive it? I want these gents hauled out of town. They’re not +supposed to come back any more. Cart ’em out to the graveyard and +dump ’em there. If they’re alive in the morning, they can move on; if +they’re dead by then, we’ll dig ’em under.” + +“I’m damned!” said old Doc Kibbee. “All three of ’em had their guns in +their hands--and not a one of ’em fired a shot! Is this man Torrance +fast? Or is he just chain lightning?” + +After that for a time Sundown called its new marshal Lightning. But +that was too direct and obvious, and also they grew to like him, and +so after a while Marshal Jim Torrance of Sundown was familiarly and +affectionately known as Slow Jim. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +And days passed, as days have a way of doing. That fine old trio from +Canyon City, Evans and Hasbrook and Kibbee, had returned home well +content after seeing the sign nailed to the tree in front of the Stag +Horn. It was painted in big black letters on a pine board; you could +read it across the street: + + NOTICE + + 1. Steve Bordereau is on the run, wanted for murder and robbery. + + 2. Clark Murdo has been kicked out of town. + + 3. Men like them are invited to clear out of Sundown. + + 4. The jail door is busted. So no arrests will be made. + +The town marshal was no longer in town. He went back straightway to his +new ranch; he hired a couple of extra men and was busy from daylight to +dark making improvements, building for the future, digging in for the +winter. He said: + +“I like this country. I’ve moved around enough. I’m here as long as I +live.” + +He looked over the old Harper ranch, one panhandle end of which cut in +between his own place and the King Cannon spread, and found it utterly +to his liking, with its rolling hills, its valley land and meadows, its +water in plenty supplied by Sundown Creek weaving a glinting, laughing +way across it. He opened negotiations with the absent owner, now +enjoying the sunset of his life under a shade tree down in Yuma. And at +times Jim Torrance, riding over these half-wild, half-tamed acres, met +a slim, sweet, eager girl also riding, and they rode together through +sunlight and shadow of days which were crisp and clean with October +merging into November, and which were days never to be forgotten, +subtly touched with green magic. + +The Sam Peppers had returned home. Bill Yarbo had gone back to his own +ragged mountain ranch. At the King Cannon ranch Sally Dawn, with an +Indian woman as housekeeper and chaperon, had launched herself upon a +brave campaign of starting life over. She knew that the chances were +all against her; she dreaded the day when the old home would be hers +no longer, gone, through the trickery of Steve Bordereau, into his +hands or those of some consignee of his--anyhow, irretrievably gone +from hers. Still, since she loved the place so and was so young and +vital, there were times when her hopes were as strong and gay as a +flock of bluebirds. Because of their insistence, she kept on a purely +theoretical pay roll Curly Redmond and Dick Pardee and Dave Drennen. +They, like Jim Torrance and his men, were rebuilding. + +Days shortened; flurries of rain came and were blown away, leaving the +freshly washed sky a wonderful blue; storms gathered and rumbled over +the mountains and painted the heights a dazzling white which was to +last until May, a good five or six months or longer; then the storm +clouds went where all things go, and there were again still, chill, +gloriously bright days, and nights that were velvet-black but sprinkled +with frosty brilliants. + +The Stag Horn still ran full blast. A young man, bloodless looking +and thin and with the stamp of towns on him, came in one day and took +the place over. He had bought it, lock, stock and barrel, from Steve +Bordereau. Jim Torrance, news of this brought him by that carrier +pigeon of a gossip, Sam Pepper, rode into Sundown and in his official +capacity of town marshal had a heart-to-heart talk with Art Pilgrim, +the new owner. + +“Where’d you see Bordereau?” asked Torrance. + +Art Pilgrim’s slim white hands went up to his hollow chest, his thumbs +into the armholes of his flowered vest. + +“Didn’t ever see him, Mr. Town Marshal,” he said. + +“How come?” asked Torrance. + +“Any business of yours?” + +“Yes. You’re a new man here; if you’re on the up-and-up, you’ll last. +If you’re a Bordereau kind of man, and if you’re kicking in with him, +you won’t last.” + +“I don’t know Bordereau. I never saw him. I don’t know anything about +him except that he owned this place and made it pay big money. He knew +about me the same way; I had my own saloon at Alamagordo. I had a +chance to sell and sold. My business with Bordereau was done through a +lawyer over there. That’s all I know.” + +“Fair enough,” said Torrance, and got up to go. Over his shoulder he +said: “If you’ve got a good strong safe here, you better keep your +money in it. And you better go dig a hole somewhere and stick the safe +in it and cover it over.” + +“Now, what’s that mean?” + +“So long,” said Torrance. + +Sam Pepper, living so near Torrance, was in and out at all hours, his +ear to the ground, his nose twitching to any breeze that might bear +even a hint of something. A queer sort of friendship sprang up between +the two; and a friendship also between Torrance and Lying Bill Yarbo +who, like Sam, dropped in frequently. The three were sitting on Jim’s +porch one evening, sampling fresh cider out of a jug that had been sent +over that day from the King Cannon apple orchard, when Sam blurted out: + +“Looky here, Jim! You keep hanging on to the idea that we ain’t seen +the last of Steve Bordereau. What in tarnation makes you so sure?” + +Torrance said promptly, “Bordereau is a gambler first, last and all the +time, isn’t he?” + +“Sure. He’s a lot of other things, killer and highwayman and all round +crook, but the bottom of everything with him is that he’s a gambler. +But what about it?” + +“A gambler always loses,” said Torrance. “Ever notice?” + +Both Sam and Bill thought that over in a silence broken only by +gurglings now and then from the jug. They had known many a gambler in +their time, and had known many a big-time gambler to get into big money. + +“A gambler always loses,” said Torrance. “I’ve noticed. I’ve never +known one of the breed yet to have enough money left to bury him when +he died. It’s like this with Steve Bordereau. He’s made himself a bit +of a stake, and when a gambler makes a stake, right away he’s got to +double it; he can’t quit any more than a booze hound can stop lapping +up his booze. He’s got Sally Dawn’s gold; he’s got what he made from +his stick-ups at the Yellow Pine, the Mountain City and the Rocky. +On top of that he got something out of Canyon City--but he’s not +forgetting that that night I had fifty thousand dollars tied to my +saddle strings, and it was his money--and he lost it. Think he’s going +to let that go? Having played in luck all this time, as he’s got to +figure it, think he’s going to quit? Give a man like that a winning +streak at poker or faro or at the wheel, is he going to stop? The +answer is, Hell no!” + +“What about Murdo?” demanded Sam. + +“That, I don’t know. I wanted him to get out of here alive, and he did. +I hoped he’d know where to find Bordereau and would kick in with him. +I hoped that they’d feel like maybe I owed ’em something, and that +they’d drop in some time to collect. And, talking about gambling, I’ll +bet either one of you two gents, or both of you, a forty dollar Stetson +against a bottle of beer that inside of ten days or two weeks we have +’em, or anyhow Bordereau, with us. Maybe tonight or tomorrow night or +the next.” + +“Got a notion where he’s holing up, I suppose?” said Sam. + +“No. Might be anywhere. Could be up in the hills yet; there’s not too +much snow. Could be within half a dozen miles of Sundown all the time; +could be a day’s ride away. Not any further than that, Sambo.” + +“And you figure him to come down looking for you?” Sam sat back tighter +against the wall, and stared off in all directions into the gathering +dark and began rubbing his hands together as though to get them warm; +well, the evenings did grow cold now. + +“That’s the way I figure it,” said Torrance. + +“How many men you suppose he’s got with him by now, Jim?” asked Bill +Yarbo. + +“Sam can tell you, Bill.” + +“Me?” exclaimed Sam. + +Torrance’s face looked stern in the flare of the match he lifted to +his cigarette, yet there was a humorous quirk coming and going at the +corner of his mouth. + +“Sure,” he said. “You told me only a couple of days ago.” + +“Me?” said Sam again. “You’re crazy, Jim.” + +“You were saying how Sundown had been losing part of its population the +last few weeks. You mentioned the names of several men who used to hang +around the Stag Horn and who’ve gone on somewhere else lately--and you +said ‘Good riddance, anyhow,’ seeing the sort they were!” + +“Why, shoot me down!” gasped Sam. “I never thought of that! You mean +all them boys has kicked in with Steve? Why, say! If you’re right he +must have eight or ten or a dozen boys with him altogether.” + +Torrance stood up to go inside. “Getting cold out here,” he said. + +“But listen!” said Sam. “If Steve Bordereau’s got all those hell +twisters with him-- Say, it’s quite a crowd! And what would he want so +many for?” + +“Maybe he’s figuring on a good sized job of work,” said Torrance. +“Maybe he’s figuring on making his last play up here, then riding +hell-for-leather somewhere else. Anyhow there’s not a bank inside a +hundred miles that I haven’t sent word to that they better sleep with +one eye open; and whenever the stage carries a fat money box they’re +carrying two extra guards inside.” + +Bill Yarbo said ponderously, “If you’re halfway right in your guess +work, Jim, here’s this to chaw on: Steve can still dodge around in the +mountains, what with the way the weather’s been, where a man’s as hard +to find as a flea on a long-haired pup. But come one good storm that +might blow along any day now, and he’d get himself plugged up where it +would take some getting out. What I mean is, if he’s set, like you say +you think he is, for another play, he’ll be making it right soon. It’ll +be right soon or not any this year, Jim.” + +“Right soon, Bill,” said Jim. + + * * * * * + +A new trail, weaving among the little hills, threading through the +pines, came into being across the panhandle of the Harper place and +connected Jim Torrance’s ranch with Sally Dawn’s. Tonight, since it was +early when first Sam and then Bill rode away, Torrance rode that trail. +He said to himself: “That was mighty good cider. I’ll just ride by and +say thanks.” + +But, about midway between his place and Sally Dawn’s, where the winding +trail went over a gentle knoll among both pines and big oaks, he saw +another rider coming to meet him. Wondering who it might be, he eased +himself sideways in the saddle, his right hand on the cantle close to +his hip. He was getting so he watched shadows of late; he had a feeling +in his bones it might pay him to do so. + +It was Sally Dawn, riding alone. + +“Right here,” said Torrance where they met on the top of the knoll, +“I’m going to build me my house--my real home. Think you’d like it?” + +“This spot was made for a home,” said Sally Dawn. “It’s been waiting +for it thousands and thousands of years. Poor little lonely hilltop!” + +“I can pump water up out of the creek,” said Torrance. “I can pipe it +here easy as downing a mug of cider. That was the best cider ever, +Sally Dawn.” + +“Funny we met here; I was sort of restless tonight. Know what I was +going to do? You’ve never asked me to call on you, but I was doing it +anyhow.” + +“That’s great. Come ahead.” + +“Well--no. As long as I’ve had my visit with you, as long as you’ve +made your duty call--I love to ride at night.” + +“I was coming over to thank you for the cider.-- Ever see a nice deep +pool, all shady in summertime, on top of a hill like this?” + +“They don’t grow that way, do they?” + +“Big enough and deep enough for a swim. And ducks always waddling into +it or out of it--” + +“I know. White ducks with nice curly tails. And yellow bills and +feet--they keep them so nice and clean, don’t they?” + +“Look here,” said Torrance, “I don’t like your riding off alone like +this after dark.” + +“Mercy!” cried Sally Dawn. “Sounds like you’d lock me up in a dark +closet and make me go to bed without any supper if I didn’t mind you!” + +“It’s Steve Bordereau,” said Torrance in dead earnest. “He hasn’t +finished down here. He’s got the toughest crowd with him that you +could think of. They’re headed this way before long, and I know it. I +wouldn’t want you running into them.” + +It was too dark for them to see each other’s faces at all clearly, to +capture any play of expression, but he did see the liquid flash of her +eyes in the starlight as she turned slightly and lifted them to his. + +“I don’t believe it,” she said presently. “He has gone for good. You +have just thought about him so much and for so many years--” + +“No. It isn’t that. He is coming back. I don’t know that he will come +near you; but I don’t want to think of your running into that crowd +alone. Not at night, off in the woods like this. Remember what you did +to him once. Think he’s the sort to forget?” + +They rode for an hour, well up to the benchland of the Harper place, +and they stopped many times and looked off across the wide acreage, and +he sketched for her his budding plans against the time when this was +all his, when his ranch and hers had a common boundary line. + +... And somehow, though nothing quite direct was said about it, both +thought: + +“Maybe someday the fence along that line will come down.” + + * * * * * + +By this time Jim Torrance had his bunk house fixed up so that his men, +three of them now, ate and slept there. He himself, though no one knew, +slept in the barn. He’d go to his house first, then after a while put +out his light, lock up and betake himself to a loft over the stalls +where his favorite horses were kept at night. It was his thought that +Steve Bordereau, did his path ever lead him anywhere near the ranch in +passing, might take off time to shoot a few finely bred horses, if he +didn’t find it handy to drive them off. + +Lights in the bunk house were out by nine or ten o’clock. Torrance had +got into the habit of taking a nap in his own house; about two or three +in the morning he saddled and went for a ride; when he got back he went +to the barn for any more sleep he might have coming. + +There were nights when a couple of hours of sleep were all that he +got, all that he wanted. With every passing hour he felt surer and +surer that not much longer did he have to wait; he thought the thing +over from every possible angle, dead set against letting himself +trick himself into the old pit of simply believing what he wanted to +believe; he thought of all that he knew of Steve Bordereau, one way and +another, and could see only the one logical conclusion--Bordereau was +coming back, and soon. + +If Bordereau struck Sundown, thought Torrance, he’d strike where most +loot was to be had, and that was the Stag Horn where games ran high and +where the house made money hand over fist. Wouldn’t Bordereau know all +about that? And just where the money would be kept? And at just what +hour to strike? + +One day Sam Pepper came nosing in, and had hardly had a drink--Sam +always favored a free drink--when he gave speech with the newest of +Sundown news. + +“I just seen a feller,” said Sam, “that I ain’t clapped my peepers on +since Steve Bordereau played dead and buried pore old Doc Taylor. A +feller named LeSarge, Jake LeSarge.” + +“Jake LeSarge? Who’s he? Tell me about him.” + +“I can tell you plenty!” said Sam, and did. + +LeSarge, if you’d take his word for it, was tougher than the plank +steaks they sold over to Joe’s Lunch Counter. Still a young feller, +maybe twenty-three-four, he had hung around Sundown off and on for ten +years. Always in trouble, always hell-raising. Quarrelsome. A cheap +skate, a tin-horn, as crooked as a dog’s hind leg--and a sort of pet of +Steve Bordereau’s. Two years ago he killed Larry McKibben, and Larry +was an up-and-up boy, well liked. LeSarge had skipped out, stayed away +six months or so, and had crept back under Bordereau’s wing. And a good +many things were said of him that nobody could prove--not nice things. + +“And he’s back,” said Sam. “Me, I was wondering, if Steve has a gang +like you say, why Jake LeSarge ain’t one of ’em.” + +Jim Torrance was more interested than Sam had hoped to find him. + +“What’s this LeSarge doing in town now?” he asked. “Where’s he hanging +out?” + +“He’s hanging around the Stag Horn. He’s buying drinks, free with +his money, which he ain’t always. I seen him making a play at the +Señorita--Florinda, you know. Looked like he was stuck on her, trying +to corner her, like maybe he’d like to go out and buy a dog collar that +would fit that white neck of hers. Outside all that, he wasn’t doing +much of anything I could see.” + +Torrance tilted his chair back, his lean brown hands behind his head, +his eyes, with a sort of vacant look in them, going up to the cross +beams and smoky rafters above. + +It was so long before he moved or spoke that Sam began to fidget. At +last, however, he kicked his chair back and stood up. + +“All right, Sam,” he said. “Thanks for the tip-off. And now-- Well, +good night.” + +“Hey!” cried Sam Pepper. But Jim Torrance was gone, off to the barn to +saddle and ride. And Sam Pepper couldn’t even be sure what direction +his ride was taking him, since Torrance cut straight across the road +into the pines and might have gone anywhere. + +So he had to yell after the departing figure: “Hey, Jim! Where are you +going?” + +And it just happened that this time Torrance answered him. + +“Over to the King Cannon Ranch,” he said. + +Only half a dozen words, not an outstanding word among them, but as +things were to happen those six words were fateful. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +Torrance hit the high spots streaking over to the King Cannon Ranch. +But he got only about half way, to the top of that pine-and-oak studded +knoll where some day the home was to be, when he rode into a sudden, +unpresaged rain. It was a rain of bullets, and the streaks of light +were orange-red flames from a rifle, and, like a man shot through the +head, he spilled out of the saddle. As he went down, untouched by any +of those flying leaden pellets, he snatched out a gun with one hand +while with the other he gave his horse a resounding slap to send the +animal racing straight on. And Torrance, striking earth and rolling +adroitly, brought up standing behind a thick-boled oak. + +He had hardly come up erect on his toes when he glimpsed the man +shooting at him. His assailant was scarcely twenty steps away, sitting +a black horse in the shadows and all but invisible, and yet the wonder +remained that Torrance wasn’t killed and that he didn’t shoot the man +dead at the first shot. It was just one of those odd happenings which +so thickly besprinkle life wherever life is running strong and swift. + +The heavy slug from Torrance’s forty-four, winged on its way by the +several chances of haste, uncertain light and moving figures, slammed +into the narrow margin of the other man’s rifle barrel, striking it so +near the trigger guard that the flying wrath of the bullet came next +door to raising a blister on the hardened trigger finger. It was like +slugging the gun with a sledge hammer; anyhow the rifle flew out of the +would-be killer’s hands and the man who thus relinquished his gun gave +voice to an involuntary howl of rage, pain and fright commingled. For +the fragment of a second he thought he had been shot--he didn’t quite +know where. + +And he wasn’t granted much time to think about things. Torrance saw, +because of the star glint on steel, the flash of the weapon flying out +of his attacker’s hands, and then asked no better than to get the man +in his two hands. He had fired the one shot only; he had his gun up +for the second; he was nicely balanced on his toes. Obeying impulse, a +thing he did far more often than most men realized, he hurled himself +forward across the few steps intervening between himself and the man +who had just tried to kill him. And in some few seconds the two were +gripped together like two wildcats. + +There in the dark, shot through with starlight, with their horses +snorting and stamping and watching and wanting to run away, yet not +moving out of their tracks, the two men fought as two men will when +there is only one thought in mind and heart and sinew, to win anyhow. +To win with a blow of a clubbed fist, with a strangle grip, with a +sudden knee or a brutal boot--to save your own life by beating the +other fellow into insensibility or by the directer method of killing +him. Yet, like a small bell beating in his brain, there was in Jim +Torrance the urge: “Get him, but get him alive so he can talk!” + +It was Jake LeSarge whom Jim Torrance jerked down off his horse, though +at the time Torrance had not the least inkling of the man’s identity; +and Jake LeSarge, half Cherokee and sinewy and slippery, was as hard +to deal with as a young panther. He was like a snake for quick-darting +elusiveness, like a driving rod on the new western locomotives for the +blows he struck. Jim Torrance came to know all this within some ten +seconds, during which the two gave and took some measure of each other. + +It just happened that Jim Torrance had what no other man that Sundown +ever knew had in the superlative degree, the something which made him +what he was, the one Town Marshal of Sundown whose memory will linger +a long, long time after so many other things mundane are forgotten. He +had the indestructible spirit. He took a smashing blow in the jaw and +reeled backward and tottered on his heels and took another blow under +his heart and felt the living breath jolted out of him, and all he did +was set his teeth and bore back into the tornado that had struck him. +Head down, chin protected, arms flailing and driving hard fists like +knobby clubs, he paid back in full for all he got. + +He landed by chance, or luck, on LeSarge’s Adam’s apple, corded and +tight and hard, and the blow was like that of a sledge beating on an +anvil. Almost it broke young Jake LeSarge’s neck. It did knock him flat +at the same time that it choked him up so that he thought he was dying +for lack of breath. Before he could master his muscles and command +them to jerk his lean, battling body upright, Jim Torrance was on top +of him, battering him with merciless fists. Then Torrance’s hands, +the fingers like steel hooks, shut down on his throat until LeSarge’s +tongue lolled like a thirsty dog’s, and his eyes bulged. A tremor, +which the other man could feel, ran through his body from head to foot. + +“Got you, damn you!” panted Jim Torrance. + +Then his own head cleared. He kept a strangle-hold on the other man’s +throat, yet he no longer squeezed so hard; he remembered that he did +not want to kill but to ask his questions and get them answered. + +“Who the hell are you?” he demanded. “Quick, or I’ll put a bullet +square between your eyes!” + +The other man, in sudden fear of death, answered: + +“Me, I’m LeSarge, Jake LeSarge. I made a mistake--got the wrong man--” + +“Sure!” said Torrance. “Sure! Now, where’ve you been? Down at the King +Cannon ranch, huh? Lie to me, and I’ll know it! I’ll batter your brains +out!” + +“Yes,” said LeSarge. “Yes. At the Cannon ranch. I just come from there!” + +“Bordereau sent you?” + +“No! I swear--” + +“I tell you I’ll batter your brains out!” + +“Leave up on my throat, will you? Yes, then. Bordereau sent me. He told +me--” + +He stopped there. Torrance eased up on him a bit, came into a +squatting position over his captive and said: + +“He sent you to get me, didn’t he? He told you to snoop around the King +Cannon place, to ride over and meet up with me, or to get me over at my +place or wherever you could find me. Am I right?” + +“I don’t even know who you are! I tell you I made a mistake; I was +looking for another man. Can’t you understand, pardner? I don’t even +know who the hell you are right now!” + +“That’s funny,” said Torrance. He withdrew his hands then entirely from +the other man; balanced on his heels he was grinning the way a wolf +grins at the kill. He said, “It’s mighty funny.” He had jammed his +gun back into its leather; now he jerked it out and set its cylinder +spinning with its small-voiced metallic clicks. He said, “Tell me what +my name is and tell it fast, or so help me I’m going to kill you!” + +Then, in all haste LeSarge, knowing the voice of fate when he heard it +beating on his ear drums, gasped out: + +“You--you’re Torrance, Jim Torrance!” + +“Sure.” Torrance shoved his gun back into its holster. He stood up. + +“You’re coming along with me, LeSarge,” he said. “_Sabe?_ You’re coming +sweet and soft and willing, wherever I say. _Sabe?_” + +“Yes,” said LeSarge. “Yes. I’ll come. You got me, Torrance.” + +“You’re damn well right, I got you,” said Torrance. “Now watch your +step.” + +“All right,” said Jake LeSarge. “All right. I know when I’m licked. I’m +playing good dog. Where do we go?” + +“I don’t know!” said Torrance. “I don’t know. You see, I do know who +you are now; I know you for a crook and a yellow dog. But I don’t know +about you and Steve Bordereau. I don’t know how much he is paying you. +I don’t know how easy it would be to buy you, to get you to double +cross him. You ought to be cheap. Let me get you somewhere in the light +where I can look at you.” + +“I’m on the square, Torrance. I’ve always been on the level--” + +“Shut your trap, you dirty liar! Climb on your horse. Let’s ride. Never +mind about your rifle; I’ll take it for you.” + +“Where’re we going?” + +“It isn’t far to the King Cannon ranch house. We might as well look in +there.” + +There was a light in the bunk house and as they rode nearer the hushed +and sentimental strains of a guitar floated out to them. Then a voice +was raised in song, a doleful rendition, and thereafter something was +thrown, no doubt at the musician; it sounded like a heavy piece of +crockery crashing against the wall. + +“Dry up, can’t you?” said the voice of the man who had been goaded into +throwing things. “I’ve stood all I can.” + +Torrance and his captive dismounted and went to the door. + +“Here’s company, boys,” said Torrance. + +Curly and Drennen and young Pardee--it had been Pardee strumming and +vocalizing--looked at them curiously. + +“Hello,” said Drennen. “This is LeSarge you’ve got with you, Torrance. +What do you want him for?” + +“I’m not sure. Is he any good for anything?” + +“Absolutely not. Unless maybe we could chop him up and use him to +poison coyotes with.” + +LeSarge, sullen and vicious looking, strove also to look bold and +defiant but remained furtive and couldn’t keep the apprehension out of +his restless eyes. + +“I wanted a look at him by lamp light,” said Torrance. “So I’d be sure +and know him if I ever saw him again. Just now he tried to shoot me. +He’s been snooping around the ranch here tonight, I don’t know what +for. You boys wouldn’t know?” + +No, they couldn’t figure it out. And they agreed there was no use +asking him; he couldn’t tell the truth even if he tried, even if you +played Indian with him and cut his hide into strips. + +“What are you going to do with him?” asked Curly. + +“I ought to have shot him while I had the chance,” said Torrance, and +sounded regretful. “At the time, though, I was sort of curious and-- +Oh, we’ll let him go. You can go now, LeSarge. And you’re to keep on +going, _sabe_? And you’re never to come back this way. We’re asking +men like you to keep out of Sundown for good. I’m town marshal now; it +would be just a matter of duty to kill you on sight. Now, scat!” + +LeSarge ducked out through the door, got onto his horse and was off +like a streak. From some little distance he screamed something back, +his voice high and breaking with rage. + +“I don’t like his poking around here,” said Torrance. “He’s one of +Bordereau’s men.” He looked at Curly and Drennen and Pardee. “Sally +Dawn oughtn’t to be out after dark,” he said. “And whenever she is, +can’t one of you boys always be on hand?” + +The three young fellows glanced at one another and seemed anxious. + +“She’s already gone somewhere tonight,” said Dick Pardee. But none of +them knew where. “About half an hour ago.” They were of the opinion +that she had ridden into Sundown for something. + +“I’m going into Sundown now,” said Torrance. He set down LeSarge’s +rifle and went to the door. “I’ll look for her. And it’s just as well +to follow LeSarge a ways; he’s headed back toward town.” + +“It might be an idea if we rode along?” suggested Dave Drennen. + +“It might. I won’t wait, though, for you boys to saddle. You’ll most +likely meet up with me.” + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +Florinda, though as nervous as a cat and all hot impatience, awaited +her chance to slip out of the Stag Horn gambling room without drawing +any curious attention to herself. She found the hallway empty and +darted across it like a vivid flash; she caught up her skirts and ran +down the back stairs. + +At the rear of the Stag Horn was a long low shed where riders left +their horses; between the shed and the main building was a dark, narrow +alley. She sped along this, turned the corner of the house and came +around to the front of the saloon where the continuation of the alley, +making a right angle, gave upon Sundown’s main street. There, lurking +in the shadows, glancing eagerly up and down, she forced herself to +wait another impatient moment. + +She was looking for someone, anyone whom she knew well and could depend +on, someone to carry a message in all haste. She saw a man coming along +the plank sidewalk, a young fellow on high heels with their spurs still +on them and jangling like small iron bells at every stride. She started +to speak to him; she hesitated, frowning; she even put her hand out as +though to stop him and draw him into the shadows with her. + +But she drew back and let him pass on without seeing her. That was +because of a sudden she had heard the measured clop of a horse’s +hoof beats and made out who, of all people, was riding this way. When +the rider was just opposite and but a few feet away, she darted out, +catching the bridle rein. + +“Oh, Señorita!” she gasped. “For the love of God!” + +A startled Sally Dawn stiffened in the saddle, and said coldly: + +“You? What do you want with me?” She stiffened still further, saying, +“Will you please take your hand--” + +“But, Señorita! Quick! I must hide, but you must talk to me for one +minute. Quick! Ride here where it is dark.” + +“Are you crazy! Or do you think I am?” + +“It is maybe life and death! I swear it!” + +“Whose?” said a suspicious, utterly incredulous Sally Dawn. “Yours or +mine?” + +“But neither! Of Señor Jim Torrance. I have to send word to him. I +can’t go because they would miss me and pretty soon they would guess +where I am. So it must be you!” + +Sally Dawn was still inclined to be stand-offish and suspicious. She +didn’t like the Mexican girl; she didn’t trust her--and somehow or +other she didn’t enthuse at the thought of messages passing between her +and Jim Torrance. + +But Florinda was too insistent to be altogether gainsaid. + +“Quick, I tell you!” she exclaimed, and began to sound angry. “Ride +your horse here where it’s dark; let me tell you what it is all about.” + +“Tell me now. Where you are!” + +Then Florinda flamed out: “Don’t you care if they kill him? Don’t you +love him?” + +Sally Dawn pretended to scoff with soft cool laughter at loving any +man, but suddenly shot back, “Maybe it’s you who love him!” + +“I do! Yes, with all my heart. I always have since the time I saw him +first. But that is nothing; he does not love me. It is you he loves! +He loved you that first night, when he ran away with you. And now you +do not want to help him? Well then, little crazy fool, go away! I will +find some man--” + +Sally Dawn at last rode into the dark mouth of the alley. + +“Tell me! What is it all about?” + +“It’s about Steve Bordereau. He’s in town! It’s about Clark Murdo; he’s +here, too, with Steve. They’ve got a gang with them-- Oh, I don’t know +how many men; maybe ten, maybe twenty. They’re out for trouble; then +they’re off on the run for the other side of the Mexico border. But +what Steve wants most of all, and what I guess Murdo wants just the +same, is to kill Jim Torrance.” + +“But--but,” stammered Sally Dawn, beginning to believe, yet not sure, +and finding it hard to understand, “how do you know all these things?” + +Florinda lifted her clenched hands above her head, her rings glowing in +what faint light there was, and shook them and came near screaming. But +she contained herself and said in a hushed voice: + +“I can’t talk all night. Well, then, a man told me some of this; he is +one of Steve’s men, he is young and a little bit drunk and he loves +me and wants me to go with them, back to the border. And I have told +you all I know. And if you will ride out to Jim’s ranch--if you’ll ride +like the devil--before they finish up here and then go out to get him--” + +“I’m going!” said Sally Dawn breathlessly. “And I’ll tell him you sent +me.” + +She whirled her horse and raced away. And Florinda, catching up her +skirts again, ran back down the alley and to the rear of the house--and +then crept softly up the back stairs. + + * * * * * + +While the two girls were talking, while Sally Dawn thereafter was +racing on her errand, Jim Torrance was riding toward Sundown from the +King Cannon ranch; and some minutes before he came within sight of the +few lights of the little town, Sally Dawn had struck off into the north +road which led to his place. + +He had quitted the Cannon bunk house so sharply on the heels of +LeSarge’s precipitate departure that when he came out into the county +road and rose to the crest of the first low-lying hill he not only +heard the beat of flying hoofs somewhere ahead but, a moment later, +caught a glimpse of the dark, hurrying silhouette of horse and rider. +There went LeSarge straight back toward Sundown as fast as he could +go. Torrance dipped his spurs as he shot down the hill; from the next +rise he again saw and heard the horse and rider ahead of him, hammering +straight along the road. + +Torrance didn’t try to overtake the other; he merely meant to keep +him in sight for a while. LeSarge might turn to look back; not likely, +though, since he’d ridden off in such rage, in such haste and without +having any inkling that he might be followed. + +Torrance saw him come to the crossroads and pass on, then swing into +the main street, clattering straight on into town. He saw him with +the dim street lights making him a more distinct figure, lights above +and below the swing doors of saloons, when at last he made a swerve. +LeSarge had come to the alley flanking the Stag Horn and had swung into +it. He had had his warning to keep away from Sundown and was ignoring +it. It might be that he had important business here tonight-- + +After that for a few minutes Torrance proceeded leisurely, jogging +slowly along the street, watching for some sign of Sally Dawn or of +her horse. She might have dropped in at the general store, at the post +office, at the drug store. He saw nothing of her anywhere, for the +good and sufficient reason that she was already out on the north road, +hurrying to his place. + +He thought, not exactly anxious yet: “Where in thunder did she go? Just +out for a ride maybe? Maybe over to drop in on the Sam Peppers? Well, +as long as she keeps to the county road I guess she’s all right.” So he +dismounted in front of the Stag Horn, tied his horse, hitched up his +guns and stepped around the corner into the darkness of the alley which +had swallowed up Jake LeSarge. + +At the rear of the building he saw that in the long shed there were +several horses, a dozen or so. They were fidgety and kept stamping +and blowing. He put his hand on three of them and discovered they were +still hot and wet. That made his brows cock up. Something like a dozen +men just arrived--and all together! And Jake LeSarge, though warned, +had come hurrying, and LeSarge was a Bordereau man-- + +Torrance returned to the front entrance. He went into the downstairs +bar, pausing just within the door, looking things over. The place was +quiet; there were only eight or ten men there, all peacefully minding +their business, which had to do with putting raw, red likker down where +it would do the most good--not a man in the place whom he had anything +against. + +He went upstairs. + +He came into the gambling room just on time. + +It was a Saturday night and the place was jammed, and games were +running high even for the Stag Horn. And every man there who had been +playing or drinking stood with both arms stretched straight up in the +air. Six or eight other men, all wearing bandanas for masks over their +faces, were busy cleaning till and tables and pockets down to the last +dime. + +The instant Jim Torrance came to the threshold a voice shouted, “Stick +’em up!” It was a voice Torrance didn’t recognize. But before the three +crisp words were finished, another voice boomed out, and Torrance did +know whose it was; and this voice yelled joyously, “You! Take this, +you--!” + +That was Steve Bordereau. His shout and his act precipitated turmoil. +His bullet cut through Torrance’s coat. Torrance, not being sure +which of the masked men was Bordereau, yet making his guess without +worrying, had both guns in his hands and blazing before they came up +waist high. With this diversion created, men who had been taken by +surprise by the raid and who had paid to the high card in jerking their +hands up, now went for their guns, and the room was filled with the +thunder of shots and the acrid bite of powder smoke. + +Then some one of the raiders yelled, “Let’s go! We’ve finished here,” +and he or someone else started shooting the lights out. There were six +coal oil lamps in the room; as fast as six bullets could go streaking +out of the barrel of a quick six gun, the six lights were out, with +glass tinkling and the smell of oil mingling with burnt powder. Then +there was a concerted rush for the rear door. + +That way, Torrance knew, Bordereau and his men were departing. He +whipped about and ran back to the front stairs. He hadn’t seen Florinda +until then; even now he didn’t see her immediately, but heard her +voice. From the top of the stairs when he was half way down she was +calling him, and in her words, and most of all in the tone of her +voice, there was something that checked him almost in mid-air. + +“Jim! Señor Jim! For the love of God!-- Oh, one little minute, Jim!” + +“Quick! What?” he called back. + +She started down the stairs; he could see her dimly because of the +light in the room below, flowing out into the lower hall. She balanced +strangely, then plunged down toward him headlong, falling like a dead +weight. She struck against him; he gathered her up in his arms, at +first impatient and angry, thinking, “The fool girl has fainted.” But +his hand, touching her breast, was wet; wet and hot with Florinda’s +blood. A convulsive shudder shook her; she tried to speak coherently +and gasped out: + +“He shot me. I saw. It was Steve. I don’t care. I want to be dead. I +love you, Jim Torrance.” Only she said it all in Spanish, and it was +“Jeem,” and the “Tor-r-r-ance” still was softly running water, very +faint yet softly musical. “And, Señor Jim--” + +“Listen, Florinda.” He stood there on the stairs holding her in his +arms; her own arms, with a spasmodic effort, their last, went up about +his neck. “Listen,” he told her. “You’re not going to die; you’re too +young and beautiful and gay. I’ll have a doctor--” + +“I am not gay any more, Señor Jim. And in a few minutes I am not going +to be young and beautiful any longer. So now I can tell you without +shame what you know already in your heart. _Yo te amo con toda mi +corazon._-- But there are other things; they won’t matter to me, but to +you who will go on living. Steve is here to kill you. He sent some of +his men to rob the bank while he and the others robbed the place here. +Next, they were going to ride to your ranch, to kill you--” + +“But I’m here, Florinda. And now I am going to carry you--” + +“So I saw your Sally Dawn. And she rode to your ranch to warn you. Oh, +only a few minutes ago. And if Steve and Murdo and all the rest go +there they will find her--or meet her coming back--and Steve hates her +like he hates you. And then they are riding to Mexico.--And--Jim-- Oh, +Jim, kiss me just the one time! And hold me tight--tighter--very much +tighter, Jim--and say, ‘_Hasta la vista, Florinda mia!_’--That would be +funny, no?” + +Then she tried to laugh, but when her head dropped down against his +chest he knew that Florinda was dead. + +He carried her the few steps down to the room below; the best he could +do for her was to lay her slim, still body on the bar. Men, already +excited from the shots they had heard upstairs, looked at him and his +burden with bulging eyes. He spoke briefly to the bartender. + +“She is dead,” he said. “Steve Bordereau shot her. Get some women to +take care of her--women who will treat her tenderly--or I’ll come back +and kill you, so help me God.” + +Then he ran out of the room. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +Jim Torrance dabbed at his eyes as he ran, and cursed under his breath +and longed with all his heart for just one thing then--to come up with +Steve Bordereau. Perhaps because his sight was at the moment blurred, +he crashed full tilt into three men advancing across the sidewalk +in front of the Stag Horn like the three Musketeers. They were Dave +Drennen, Dick Pardee and Curly Redmond, just arrived from the King +Cannon ranch. + +He told them in few words, low-toned but as emphatic as the crack of a +whip, what had happened; how Bordereau and his men had got away with +their fresh loot; how Sally Dawn had ridden only a few minutes ago out +to his place; how the Bordereau crowd were on their way at last to the +border. + +“They killed Florinda. She told me that they were headed out to my +place to get me. Now they know I’m in town, they may not ride that way. +But maybe their plans, already made, call for that direction. They may +run into Sally Dawn. Unless you boys, riding in just now, met them on +the county road?” + +They hadn’t seen any riders, hadn’t heard anything. + +“I’m on my way back to my place,” said Torrance, and went up into his +saddle. + +“We’re with you,” said one of them and the three hurried to their +horses. As they did so several men came out of the Stag Horn; one of +them was Bill Yarbo. He shouted: + +“What’s up, Jim? Where you headed for? After them fellers?” + +“To my ranch,” Torrance called back as his horse jumped under him. “All +you boys that are not friends of Steve Bordereau come along.” + +He rode first, taking chances of an ambush, into the alley and to the +shed where he had found the sweat-wet saddle horses; there was not a +horse there now, not a man. He spurred on and into the back road and +out of town to the north road, and still had no sight and caught no +sound of the raiding party. Already they must be well on their way. +And he began to feel pretty sure that they were headed back toward the +hills, toward his ranch--in the direction Sally Dawn had taken. So he +took that same road, shook out his bridle reins and touched his horse +with the spurs. + +He reloaded before he was out of town; both guns were empty. How many +men had been burned down there in the gambling room before the lights +went out--and even after--he did not know. But already Bordereau knew +that he had left three of his band behind him. And that did not trouble +Steve Bordereau, so long as he sped on his way with a whole skin and +his job up here done. There’d be fewer men to pay off, more money for +him from the loot already taken and slung to his saddle strings. + +Torrance had not ridden far before he heard the hammering of hoofs; at +first he thought they were ahead of him but presently realized they +were at some considerable distance behind; they told him that Curly +and Pardee and Drennen, perhaps Bill Yarbo and others were following +him; their horses’ hoofs rang out on a bit of hard road where they +swung off from the main street. + +He kept storming along, anger in his heart, and sorrow, too, for he +could not forget bright Florinda dying in his arms--and fear, too, for +Sally Dawn. He would put nothing beyond Steve Bordereau tonight, and +he knew Bordereau must hate the girl if only for all the wrongs he had +done her. + +Ten minutes later he again heard, faint and far, the hammering of +rushing hoofs, and this time he thought at first that he was hearing +again the men behind him, though he had thought to have outdistanced +them. But listening intently, hearing the faint flutter of sound above +the pounding of his own horse’s hoofbeats, he made out that it was +ahead of him. This time it was Bordereau and his men that he heard, and +they were speeding on northward, still on the road toward his ranch, +and he was slowly coming up with them. + +But before he had covered another mile he was delayed by Sam Pepper, +riding in furious haste toward a meeting with him. Torrance would have +pressed on but for Sam’s insistence; Sam had a lot to say and said it. + +“I was on my way when I heard them hellions come swooping along,” said +Sam. “Me, I pulled aside the road and let ’em have it. But I was close +enough and there was light enough for me to make ’em out; there was one +man leading the way and if he wasn’t Steve Bordereau I’ll swallow your +spurs.” + +“Sally Dawn--” + +“I know about her, too. She rode over to your place just a little while +ago; I was still there; had went out to the bunk house and was gabbing +with your men. She was looking for you; said Florinda sent her and she +was to tell you Bordereau was high-tailing out this way to get your +scalp. I told her you’d cut cross the hills to her place; so she done +the same. Then I told your hired hands that they’d better look out for +Bordereau and his killers, and I did some high-tailing on my own.” + +Torrance breathed easier. + +“So Sally Dawn’s left and gone home? That’s good news, Sam. Now in a +couple of minutes you will meet up with some of the boys following me; +tell them what you’ve told me. I’m on my way.” + +“Hey, there!” yipped Sam. “There must be ten or a dozen of them boys +with Steve. You better--” + +But Torrance was already off, his horse at a run. Sam sat undecided +a moment; then he heard a drumming of hoofs coming along from +Sundown-way, knew that here must come the boys who Torrance had said +were following him, and waited out in the middle of the road for their +arrival. As they slowed down he made out who several of them were, +friends all, and called to them all he knew of the night’s happenings. + +“Jim’s overtaking them hellers,” he said, “and he’ll do it, and it’s +just him against the crowd. His men, this being no fight of their’n, +skipped out of the bunk house as soon’s they heard what Sally Dawn had +to say. And--” + +“Come ahead!” sang out Dave Drennen. “We’ll be with Torrance before +they can burn him down.” + +“Listen to me--” began an excited Sam. + +They listened no longer. Bill Yarbo, riding by him, almost riding him +down, drenched him with big, booming, mocking laughter. + +“You hang back here, Sam,” he said. “Safer. Or run get Mrs. Sam to hide +you under her apron!” + +Whatever Sam screamed after him was drowned out by the thunder of +hoofs. Sam whirled his own horse about, dug his heels in and followed +them. But long before any of them got to Jim Torrance’s ranch, before +even Jim himself had reached there, they knew that Bordereau had +already arrived, had tarried briefly and had gone on his way. + +That was because they saw the red flare in the night sky. Jim’s house, +his bunk house, his barn, all were in flames. + +So it was as bright as day out in the road when they pulled in at +Torrance’s gate and came up with him. He was on foot, and waved them to +a stop; he was stooping low, looking for tracks in the road. + +When he straightened up, “They’ve cut across the road here,” he +said. “They’re headed across the hills, over the old Parker place. +They’re headed toward the King Cannon ranch. And they’re riding +hell-for-leather!” + +Again he led the way, this time with the others keeping as close to him +as they could; very close at first, but within ten minutes he was far +out ahead of them. + +So he came alone through the trees dotting the hills of the old Parker +ranch to an open spot from which he could look down into the valley +that was the heart of the King Cannon ranch, and he saw first of all +a flush against the sky, like a hot summer dawn. But it wasn’t dawn +and it wasn’t summer, and he knew that he was right in judging that +Bordereau had come this way. That rosy, softly fluttering light was the +light of a fire down where the ranch buildings were. + +It struck Torrance that Bordereau must be mighty sure of himself! +Already the bunk house was blazing; the first spears of flame began +to stab through the barn’s walls. Torrance came rushing on. He saw +men--just dark, running figures--and he thought: “The house isn’t +burning. Why?” And then he was so close that he slid down from his +saddle and ran forward on foot. + +A woman--the light was so flickering and false and filled with trickery +that at first he thought it was Sally Dawn--came running out of the +ranch house back door. She was screaming as she darted out into the +yard, trying frantically to gain the grove just back of the house. It +was the Indian woman who worked for Sally Dawn; Torrance made that +out just as he saw a running figure pounce upon her. Torrance, still +running, shot the man and saw him fall and saw the woman scramble to +her feet and vanish among the trees. He himself kept straight on to the +house, not stopping even while he fired and glanced aside. He thought: +“She’s running out of the house, so the house is being attacked. Maybe +Sally Dawn is in there now. Then Bordereau will be there.” + +The first door he came to, at the side of the house, was locked. He +ran around to the rear and up the three steps to the kitchen porch. The +door there, too, was locked. He threw his weight against it. + +Just then several men, he never knew how many, whether four or five or +six, came running from the direction of the barn shouting, “That you, +Steve?” + +“You rats!” shouted Torrance. “Get to hell out of here if you can +travel any faster than a bullet!” + +They opened fire on him, all of them together, and he, with his back +against the wall and a gun in each hand, his body partly in shadow, +gave them as good as they sent. How many of them he hit, how many he +missed, he was never to know. But he did see three men drop before, +simultaneously, two things happened. One was that the boys from Sundown +came swooping down the slope of the timbered hill, yelling like +Comanches and already beginning to shoot at what running targets they +saw. The other was that Jim Torrance’s two guns, both with cylinders +emptied, brought their hammers down with a click. + +That was two things. A third came so swiftly that Torrance had not even +reloaded when he got its import. From within the house came the sounds +of an angry voice, shouting, and of the explosion of a shotgun. The +voice was Steve Bordereau’s! Who but Sally Dawn had fired the shotgun? + +Torrance struck the door again with his shoulder, and this time its +ancient bolt dragged old screws out of the woodwork, and the door flew +open and Torrance burst in. + +There was a coal oil lamp burning in the dining room, and the door was +open, so he had light enough to guide him. He hurried on through the +dining room. Just then all within the ranch house was perfectly still. +Outside, however, there was an inferno of noise; shots were popping +like firecrackers on the Fourth of July. Out there hell was riding on +bullets. + +Then, above the lively young inferno outside, he again heard sounds +within the house. They came from upstairs; it sounded like a man +battering a door down. He ran to the staircase and when his foot was at +the bottom step he heard quite clearly Steve Bordereau saying stormily: + +“Out you come and quick, and I won’t hurt you. Stay in there and I’ll +burn the house down, you in it. I’ve already set fire to your other +buildings. And when you open the door, shove that shotgun through, +butt-end first, or--” + +No, Jim Torrance hadn’t heard all this from the bottom of the stairs. +By the time Bordereau had got that far he was nearly at the top, making +his rush in a sort of twilight, for all the light that came into the +upper hall was from the burning buildings, flickering through the +muslin curtains. Bordereau heard him and broke off and was still a +minute, then called out: + +“Who’s there? That you, Clark? I told you--” + +As Torrance’s eyes reached the level of the second story floor they +discovered Bordereau, who had quitted the locked door behind which +Sally Dawn was, and had turned to make out who came. And when no one +answered and he knew it wasn’t Clark Murdo his gun was in his hand. + +Torrance knew the shot was coming and lurched sideways before it came, +and completed his upward rush. Bordereau fired again and at the same +instant Torrance hurled a heavy forty-four, useless now save as missile +or club, and heard the thud of it as it struck the other man somewhere +in the body. + +“Torrance!” yelled Bordereau, and there was a world of gloating in his +voice, and triumph. “I’ve been waiting for now!” + +He waited a split second too long, for while he was speaking, realizing +that he had his enemy unarmed and so sure of shooting him dead, +Torrance hurled his forty-four straight into Bordereau’s face, and +followed it up by catapulting his own body on Bordereau’s as the man +reeled back. Bordereau came up with his shoulders against the wall; he +fired a third time. + +But now Torrance was on him and had locked one hand about Bordereau’s +gun wrist, and with the other was battering into an already bleeding +face. An instant later the two crashed to the floor, and a door was +whipped open and Sally Dawn came running to stand over them, a shotgun +in her hands. + +“Jim! Jim!” she cried wildly. “Let him go--get away from him--give me a +chance--I’m going to shoot him--” + +Torrance snapped at her: + +“Stand back! Keep out. He’s got a gun in his hand! You run!” + +“I won’t run! I’m not going to let him kill you! I tell you I am going +to kill him this time!” + +She would have asked nothing better just then, knowing that it was +going to be Jim Torrance’s life or Steve Bordereau’s. But in the faint +light, with the two men now battling like a grim pair of wolves, never +still for an instant, rolling and twisting and flailing about, she +couldn’t even make out which one of them was Jim, which Bordereau. + +Those moments were to her like a nightmare. She could hear the shouts +outside and the gunfire; a man screamed terribly and an even more +terrible sound in her ears was another man’s laugh cutting across the +tragic outcry. And she could see on the wall down the staircase the +flicker of a light that grew rosier and brighter as buildings burned +with higher leaping flames. And worst of all was it to stand there, her +weapon gripped so determinedly in her hands, and not be able to shove +its muzzle down against Steve Bordereau’s body and so end the thing. At +that second she would have pulled the trigger with no more compunction +than she would have slapped at a mosquito. + +The two men in that fierce death-grip of theirs rolled to the top of +the staircase. Somehow Bordereau wrenched free and stood up. Sally +Dawn saw him clearly enough to make out who he was, and jerked up her +shotgun. At that same instant two other things happened. Bordereau +still had his gun in his hand and crooked his finger to the trigger, +sure this time he had Jim Torrance where he had long wanted him. But +Torrance wasn’t out of the fight yet; he rose as Bordereau rose, and +hurled himself forward. Bordereau’s gun exploded; a terrified Sally +Dawn didn’t know whether it had found its mark or not; all she knew was +what she saw, and that was the two bodies hurtling down the stairs, all +the way to the floor below. + +Down there men were running into the house through the kitchen. +She couldn’t tell who they were but supposed and feared they were +Bordereau’s men. She was at the head of the stairs; she was on the +verge of emptying a shotgun among them when a roaring voice which she +knew, the voice of Lying Bill Yarbo, shouted: + +“Jim! Where are you? We got ’em on the run.” + +Sally Dawn screamed down to him: + +“He and Steve Bordereau--they’re fighting. Bordereau has a gun--” + +She ran down then, only to encounter the same condition which had +already made impossible her taking any hand. Torrance and Bordereau +were again struggling hand to hand, body to body. Then she heard Jim +Torrance laugh. Never in her life had she heard a man laugh like that; +never would she forget it. + +“Bordereau!” he shouted. “You’ve dropped your gun--and now I’m going +to kill you! For what you’ve done to Florinda tonight, for what you’ve +done to Sally Dawn, and to me, and to a lot of others--I’m going to +kill you--now--with my hands!” + +“Jim! You damn fool!” roared Lying Bill Yarbo. “Stand out of my way. +Let me shoot the ---- ---- ----!” + +But Jim Torrance didn’t have it in him to stand aside for any man. His +lean hard fist was already on its way, and caught Bordereau under the +chin and sent him staggering back so that he came close to falling and +only gained his uncertain balance when he brought up against the hall +door which happened to be closed. He saw other men come running in from +the kitchen until the hall was filled with them, and in desperation he +tried to get the door open behind him and make his escape. + +Then Jim Torrance laughed again, and again bore down on him. For as +long as it takes two infuriated men to exchange a dozen blows, they +stood there, hammering at each other. Again Torrance’s fist beat +Bordereau back as a club beats a man, and again Bordereau tottered--and +this time, before he could get control of himself, Torrance was again +on him, battering him. Once more the two men went down. They lay on the +floor rather more quietly this time. Their hands were at each other’s +throats. + +Now and then a convulsive shudder shook them. Men crowded close; one of +them brought the lamp from the kitchen. Bordereau lay on his back; Jim +Torrance was on top of him; Torrance’s hands were at his throat, the +fingers almost sunk out of sight. Bordereau’s glaring eyes, horrible to +look at, seemed about to spring from his head-- + +It took four men to pull Torrance off, and when he was on his feet and +stood and looked down at the man he had beaten so close to death, Sally +Dawn saw his eyes and was afraid of him. + +She threw the shotgun down and came running to him and caught his arm +in both her hands. + +“Jim! Jim! Oh, Jim, please--for God’s sake, don’t! Just let them take +him away.” + +At first he just tried to shake her off; he didn’t hear what she was +saying; he didn’t even know who she was. + +“Let him get up,” he said to the men standing over the fallen man. +“Let him up. I’m going to beat hell out of him. Then I’m going to kill +him just as sure as he killed Florinda--just as sure as he killed my +pardner six years ago.” + +Sally Dawn kept clinging to him, shaking his arm, pleading. He couldn’t +seem to brush her aside. Angrily he looked down at her and saw that it +was Sally Dawn. + +“Jim!” she pleaded. And then, there before them all, she said huskily, +“Jim--if you love me--” + +He put a hand up to his face; it was battered and torn and bloody. He +shook his head as though to get his thoughts clear, the way a horse +shakes its head when summer flies are at its eyes. Then he put his hand +down on her two and patted them gently. + +“I won’t kill him, boys,” he said. “Maybe it’ll be a good thing if we +let this country know that the law is nosing in here and is coming to +stay. The law will hang him. Take him away.” + +They took him away swiftly, men thick about him. And under a big oak, +from which Bordereau could take full advantage of the spectacular view +of buildings burning, they hanged him and let him kick his life out. +By this time there were thirty Sundown men on hand to officiate; not a +single dissenting voice was lifted when someone called for a rope. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + + +Men stood around and watched the outbuildings burn to the ground. There +was nothing they could do beyond making sure that the fires did not +spread, an unlikely thing at this time of year after the first rains +and snow flurries. Jim Torrance, staring frowningly at the devastating +flames, suddenly awoke to the fact that he was standing slightly apart +from the rest of the men but that he was not alone. At his side was +Sally Dawn Cannon, and for a little while she didn’t seem to realize +any more than he did that they were holding hands. + +But this inactivity was of the shortest duration. Men scouted around to +check up on the results of the battle in loss of lives and injuries to +combatants on both sides. Dave Drennen, clutching a bleeding shoulder +on his way to the house and first aid, said in passing Torrance, + +“They say Bordereau’s gang was thirteen strong tonight in Sundown. +Three of them got shot down at the Stag Horn. The boys have picked +up five more out here, dead or as good as dead. That’s not counting +Bordereau. Murdo was along; he’s dead out by the barn, shot through the +head.” + +“Better go get that shoulder fixed up, Dave,” said Torrance. And to +young Pardee, passing close, he called: “Will you streak for a doctor? +Or be sure someone else goes?” + +Just then a newcomer rode up, swung a pair of saddlebags down into +Pardee’s hands and dismounted. + +“I thought there’d be a job for me,” he said. “So I followed on just +as soon as I heard there was apt to be a scrimmage tonight.” It was +Dr. Frank, the new man who had settled in Sundown recently, after the +taking off of Doc Taylor. + +“There’s something else that’s got to be done right away,” said +Torrance to the several men who began to gather where he was. “Catch up +all the Bordereau horses; see how many are missing. Remember, he was +on his way out of here; there’s every chance he was carrying a lot of +money with him down to the border. And there happens to be a sizable +amount of gold that belongs to Sally Dawn Cannon. If the stuff is +missing, if some of the men got away on horseback, we’ve got to run ’em +down while the trail’s hot.” + +They scattered on the run, and the round-up began. + +Curly Redmond was carried into the house with three bullet holes in +him; Dr. Frank immediately set to work, and Sally Dawn, though pale and +shaken, aided him so ably that he grinned at her and patted her on the +curly head and said, “Good kid.” + +One of Bordereau’s men, badly wounded, was brought to where Torrance +was. It was Joe Tortillas. Questioned, he was sullenly stubborn until +a rope was mentioned; then, in exchange for a promise not to hang him, +he answered. Yes, Steve had all the moneys with him; they were always +on his saddle. He rode the same horse he nearly always rode, a big bay +with white forefeet and a white nose. The horse had been left with the +other horses, two men guarding them; Joe didn’t know what had happened +to any of them, but thought they had stampeded when the shooting began. + +Bill Yarbo came swaggering up. He had a lot to tell. You would have +thought--if you didn’t know him!--that he had just about cleaned up on +the whole gang single-handed. He himself had killed Clark Murdo; he had +shot Joe Tortillas; he had clubbed a couple of other jaspers over the +heads with his gun, saving ammunition-- + +“Here’s Bordereau’s horse!” someone sang out. + +And here indeed came Bordereau’s horse from somewhere in the semi-dark +on the side of the house farthest from the fires. A man was riding it, +a little man looking all the littler from being established so high up +on such a big animal. + +“Here she is, Jim,” the little man called down, and only then they +recognized Sam Pepper. “I grabbed Bordereau’s cayuse soon’s I seen it, +thinking most likely Steve would have Sally Dawn’s gold with him. Got +it, too.” + +A man laughed and said: “Why, old Sam’s got more sense than all the +rest of us put together! He kept his mind on what counted.” + +“Hell,” snorted Lying Bill Yarbo. “What Sam did was see a chance to +grab a horse and run for it! And it just happened to be Bordereau’s +horse!” + +“The way I found the horse,” said Sam Pepper waspishly, “was that I +made out Clark Murdo running to grab it and skip out. I reckoned it +would be like him to grab all the loot, give him a chance.” He looked +down on Lying Bill, took a long, deep breath and rapped out, “So, me, I +shot Clark Murdo down, shot him through the head and--” + +“You damn little liar!” roared Bill Yarbo. “You must of been +eavesdropping just now and heard me--” + +A shout of laughter went up, drowning his voice. + + * * * * * + +“Seems to me,” said Jim Torrance, formerly marshal of Sundown, now +just an enthusiastic young rancher to whom the country looked for big +things, “that we’ve got a bully good chance--Steve Bordereau gave it to +us!--to save ourselves a lot of money right at the jump.” + +Maybe Sally Dawn guessed what was coming, for she smiled at him and +made a brave endeavor to stifle her smile, and her cheeks grew a bit +pinker. It was a glorious winter morning. There had been rain and hail +and a light snowfall during the night, but now the skies were blue and +the sun was bright, and there was just enough snappy cold in the air to +make breathing a delight and to send one’s blood along dancingly. + +“So we’re going to save some money,” she said, “when I feel so rich so +all of a sudden, and so unexpectedly?” + +They rode on through the pines. She said, “Where do you think we are +going?” quite as though she didn’t know perfectly well. + +On top of the gentle oak-and-pine-studded knoll where once he had +said something about one day building a home--not just a house, but a +home--they stopped. He said: + +“I got a letter yesterday from three old friends of yours up in Canyon +City, sheriff, banker and medico. The banker suggested that someday I +might be able to use some additional funds, developing here; he said, +‘Come and get it; the bank’s yours.’ And the two other old boys wrote +together, ‘Let us know, so we can dance at the wedding, for we’re the +two damn best dancers either side the Rockies.’” + +“Wedding?” said Sally Dawn. “What wedding?” + +Jim Torrance eased himself sideways in the saddle and started rolling a +cigarette that never got rolled to completion. + +“I was thinking,” he said. “My place is pretty well burned down, thanks +to Bordereau. So’s yours. Now, if we tore all the fences down between +us, and if we made us a place right here--” + +“Duck pond, and everything?” said Sally Dawn. + +It was then that he threw his cigarette away. + + +END + + + + +TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: + + + Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_. + + Perceived typographical errors have been corrected. + + Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized. + + Archaic or variant spelling has been retained. + + Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright + on this publication was renewed. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77768 *** |