CHAPTER XILOVE'S AVOWAL
A distinct path, in places almost a beaten road, connected the Box R and the Baker ranches. Along it a tall slim youth was riding a buckskin pony. He was clean-shaven and clean-shirted; but the shirt was of rough brown flannel. His leather trousers were creased and baggy at the knees. At his hip protruded the butt of a big revolver. Upon his head, seemingly a load in itself, was a broad sombrero; and surrounding it, beneath a band which at one time had been very gaudy but was now sobered by sun and rain, were stuck a score or more of matches. Despite the motion of the horse the youth was steadily smoking a stubby bull-dog pipe.
The time was morning, early morning; it was Winter, and the sun was still but a little way up in the sky. The day, although the month was December, was as warm as September. There had not even been a frost the previous night. Mother Nature was indulging in one of her many whims, and seemed smiling broadly at the incongruity.
Though the rider was out thus early, his departure had been by no means surreptitious. "I'm going over to Baker's, and may not be back before night," he had said at the breakfast table; and, impassive as usual, the olderman had made no comment, but simply nodded and went about his work. Likewise there was no subterfuge when the youth arrived at his destination. "I came to see Florence," he announced to Scotty in the front yard; then, as he tied the pony, he added: "I spoke to Grannis, and he said he'd come over and help you. Do you know exactly when you'll want him?"
"Yes, day after to-morrow. This weather is too good to waste."
Ben turned toward the house. "All right. I'll see that he's over here bright and early."
The visitor found the interior of the Baker home looking like a corner in a storage warehouse. Florence, in a big checked apron reaching to her chin, her sleeves rolled up to her elbows, was busily engaged in still further dismantling the once cosey parlor. Amidst the confusion, and apparently a part of it, Mrs. Baker wandered aimlessly about. The front door was wide open, letting in a stream of sunlight.
"Good-morning," said Ben, appearing in the doorway.
Mrs. Baker stopped long enough to nod, and Florence looked up from her work.
"Good-morning," she replied. A deliberate glance took in the new-comer's dress from head to foot, and lingered on the exposed revolver hilt. "Are you hunting Indians or bear?"
Ben Blair returned the look, even more deliberately.
"Bear, I judge from the question. I came in search of you."
There was no answer, and the man came in and satdown on the corner of a box. "You seem to be very busy," he said.
The girl went on with her packing. "Yes, rather busy," she said indifferently.
Ben dangled one long leg over the side of the box.
"Are you too busy to take a ride with me? I want to talk with you."
"I'm pretty busy," non-committally.
"Suppose I should ask it as a favor?"
"Suppose I should decline?"
The long leg stopped its swinging. "You wouldn't, though."
The girl's brown eyes flashed. "How do you know I wouldn't?"
Ben stood up and folded his arms. "Because it would be the first favor I ever asked of you, and you wouldn't refuse that."
They eyed each other a moment.
"Where do you want to go?" temporized Florence.
"Anywhere, so it's with you."
"You don't want to stay long?"
"I'll come back whenever you say."
Florence rolled down her sleeves and sighed with assumed regret. "I ought to stay here and work."
"I'll help you when we come back, if you like."
"Very well." She said it hesitatingly.
"All right. I'll get your horse ready for you."
Scotty watched them peculiarly, Molly doubtfully, as they rode out of the ranch yard; but neither made any comment, and they moved away in silence.
"That's an odd looking pony you've got there," remarked the girl critically, when they had turned into the half-beaten trail which led south. "How does it happen you're on him instead of the other?"
Ben patted the smooth neck before him, and the pony twitched his ears appreciatively.
"Buckskin and I had the misfortune not to meet until lately. We just got acquainted a few days ago."
The girl glanced at her companion quickly and caught the look upon his face.
"I believe you're fonder of your horses and cattle and things than you are of people," she flashed.
The man's hand continued patting the pony's yellow neck.
"More fond than I am of some people, maybe you meant to say."
"Perhaps so," she conceded.
"Yes, I think I am," he admitted. "They're more worthy. They never abuse a kindness, and never come down to the insult of class distinctions. They're the same to-day, to-morrow, a year from now. They'll work themselves to death for you, instead of sacrificing you to their personal gain. Yes, they make better friends than some people."
Florence smiled as she glanced at her companion.
"Is that what you want to tell me? If it is, seeing I've just made my choice and decided to return to civilization and mingle with human beings of whom you have such a poor opinion, I think we may as well go back. Mamma and I have been racking our brains for two daysto find a place for the china, and I've just thought of one."
Blair was silent a moment; then he said, "I promised to return whenever you wished, but I've not said what I wanted to say yet."
Florence looked at the speaker with feigned surprise. "Is that so? I'm very curious to hear!"
Ben returned the look deliberately. "You'd like to hear now what I have to say?"
The girl's breath came more quickly, but she persisted in her banter. "I can scarcely wait!"
The line of the youth's big jaw tightened, "I won't keep you in suspense any longer then. First of all, I want to relate a little personal history. I was eight years old, as you know, when I was taken into the Box R ranch. In those eight years, as far as I can remember, not one person except Mr. Rankin ever called at my mother's home."
Again the girl felt a thrill of anticipation, but the brown eyes opened archly. "You must have kept a big fierce dog, or—or something."
"No, that was not the reason."
"I can't imagine what it could be, then."
"The explanation is simple. My mother and Tom Blair were never married."
Swiftly the color mounted into Florence's cheeks, and she drew up her horse with a jerk.
"So that is what you brought me out here to tell me!" she blazed.
Ben drew up likewise, and wheeled his pony facing hers.
"I beg your pardon, but I'm not to blame for the wayI told you—of myself. You forced it. For once in my life at least, Florence, I'm in dead earnest to-day."
The girl hesitated. Tears of anger, or of something else, came into her eyes. "I'm going home," she announced briefly, and turned back the way they had come.
The man silently wheeled his buckskin and for five minutes, ten minutes, they rode toward home together.
"Florence," said the youth steadily, "I had something more I wished to say to you; will you listen?"
No answer—only the sound of the solid steps of the thoroughbred and the daintier tread of the mustang.
"Florence," he repeated, "I asked you a question."
The girl's face was turned away. "Oh, you are cruel!" she said.
Ben touched his pony, advanced, caught the bridle of the girl's horse, and brought both to a standstill. The girl did not turn her head to look at him, but she did not resist. Deliberately the man dismounted, loosed the rolled blanket he carried back of his saddle, spread it upon the ground, then looked fairly up into her brown eyes.
"Florence," he said, as he held out his hand to assist her to dismount, "I've something I wish very much to say to you. Won't you listen?"
Florence Baker looked steadily down into the clear blue eyes. Why she did not refuse she could not have told, could never tell. As well as she knew her own name she realized what was coming—what it was the man wished to say to her; but she did not refuse to listen.
"Florence," he said gently, "I'm waiting," and as in adream she stepped into the proffered hand, felt herself lowered to the ground, followed the young man over to the blanket, and sat down. The sun, now high above them, shone down warmly and approvingly. Scarcely a breath of air was stirring. Not a sound came from over the prairies. As completely as though they were the only two people on the earth, they were alone.
The man stretched himself at his companion's feet, where he could look into her face and catch its every expression.
"Florence Baker," his voice came to her ears like the sound of one speaking afar off, "Florence Baker, I love you. In all that I'm going to say, bear this in mind; don't forget it for a moment. To me you will always be the one woman on earth. Why I haven't told you this before, why I waited until you were passing from my life before I said it, I don't know; but now I'm as sure as that I'm looking at you that it is so." The blue eyes never shifted. Presently one big strong hand reached over and enfolded within its grasp another tiny resistless hand, which lay there passive.
"You're getting ready to go away, Florence," he went on, "leaving this country where you've spent almost your life, changing it for an uncertainty. Don't do it—not for my sake, but for your own. You know nothing of the city, its pleasures, its rush, its excitement, its ambitions. Granted that you've been there, that we've both been there; but we were only children then and couldn't see beneath the thinnest surface. Yet there must be something beneath the glitter, something you've never thoughtof and cannot realize; something which makes the life hateful to those who have felt and known it. I don't know what it is, you don't; but it must be there. If it weren't so, why would men like your father, like Mr. Rankin, college men, men of wealth, men who have seen the world, leave the city and come here to stay? They were born in cities, raised in cities. Thecitywas a part of their life; but they left it, and are glad." The man clasped the little hand more tightly, shook it gently. "Florence, are you listening?"
"Yes, I'm listening."
"I repeat then, don't go. You belong here. This life is your life. Everything that is best for your happiness you will find here. You spoke the other day of your birthright—to love and to be loved—as though this could only be realized in a city. Do you think I don't care for you as much as though my home were in a town?"
Passive, motionless, Florence listened, feeling the subtle sympathy which ever existed between her and this boy-man drawing them closer together. His strong magnetism, never before so potent, gripped her almost like a physical force. His personality, original, masterful, convincing, fascinated her. For the time the tacit consent of her position never occurred to her. It seemed but natural and fitting that he should hold her hand. She had no desire to speak or move, merely to listen.
"Florence," the voice was very near now, and very low. "Florence, I love you. I can't have you go away, can't have you pass out of my life. I'll do anything for you,—live for you, die for you, fight for you, slave foryou,—anything but give you up." Of a sudden his arms were about her, his lips touched her cheek. "Can't you love me in return? Speak to me, tell me—for I love you, Florence!"
The girl started, and drew away involuntarily. "Oh, don't, don't! please don't!" she pleaded. The dream faded, and she awoke to the reality of her position. The brown head bowed, dropped into her hands. Her whole body shook. "Oh, what have I done!" she sobbed. "Oh, what have I done! Oh—oh—oh—"
For a time, neither of them realized nor cared how long, they sat side by side, though separate now. Warmly and brightly as before, the sun shone down upon them. A breath of breeze, born of the heated earth, wandered gently over the land. The big thoroughbred shifted on its feet and whinnied suggestively.
Gradually the girl's hysterical weeping grew quieter. The sobs came less frequently, and at last ceased. Ben Blair slowly arose, folded his arms, and waited. Another minute passed. Florence Baker, the storm over, glanced up at her companion—at first hesitatingly, then openly and soberly. She stood up, almost at his side; but he did not turn. Awe, contrition, strange feelings and emotions flooded her anew. She reached out her hand and touched him on the arm; at first hesitatingly, then boldly, she leaned her head against his shoulder.
"Ben," she pleaded, "Ben, forgive me. I've hurt you terribly; but I didn't mean to. I am as I am; I can't help it. I can't promise to do what you ask—can't say I love you now, or promise to love you in thefuture." She looked up into his face. "Won't you forgive me?"
Still the man did not turn. "There's nothing to forgive, Florence," he said sadly. "I misunderstood it all."
"But there is something for me to say," she went on swiftly. "I knew from the first what you were going to tell me, and knew I couldn't give you what you asked; yet I let you think differently. It's all my fault, Ben, and I'm so sorry!" She gently and timidly stroked the shoulder of the rough flannel shirt. "I should have stopped you, and told you my reasons; but they seemed so weak, and somehow I couldn't help listening to you." There was a hesitating pause. "Would you like to hear my reasons now?"
"Just as you please." There was no unkindness in the voice—only resignation and acceptance of the hard fact she had already made known to him.
Florence hesitated. A catch came into her throat, and she dropped her head to the broad shoulder as before.
"Ben, Ben!" she almost sobbed, "I can't tell you, after all. It'll only hurt you again."
He was looking out over the prairies, watching the heat-waves that arose in fantastic circles, as in Spring. "You can't hurt me again," he said wearily.
The vague feeling of irreparable loss gripped the girl anew; but this time she rushed on desperately, in spite of it. "Oh, why couldn't I have met you somewhere else, under different circumstances?" she wailed. "Why couldn't your mother have been—different?" She paused, the brown head raised, the loosened hair tossedback in abandon. "Maybe, as you say, it's a rainbow I'm seeking. Maybe I'll be sorry; but I can't help it. I want them all—the things of civilization. I want them all," she finished abruptly.
Gently the man disengaged himself. "Is that all you wished to say?"
"Yes," hesitatingly, "I guess that's all."
Ben picked up the blanket and returned it to his saddle; then he led the horse to the girl's side. "Can I help you up?"
His companion nodded. The youth held down his hand, and upon it Florence mounted to the saddle as she had done many times before. The thought came to her that it might be the last time.
Not a word did Ben speak as they rode back to the ranch-house; not once did he look at his companion. At the door he held out his hand.
"Good-bye," he said simply.
"Good-bye," she echoed feebly.
Ben made his adieu to Mrs. Baker, and then rode out to the barn where Scotty was working. "Good-bye," he repeated. "We'll probably not meet again before you go." The expression upon the Englishman's face caught his eye. "Don't," he said. "I'd rather not talk now."
Scotty gripped the extended hand and shook it heartily.
"Good-bye," he said, with misty eyes.
The youth wheeled the buckskin and headed for home. Florence and her mother were still standing in the doorway watching him, and he lifted his big sombrero; but he did not glance at them, nor turn his head in passing.
CHAPTER XIIA DEFERRED RECKONING
Time had dealt kindly with the saloon of Mick Kennedy. A hundred electric storms had left it unscathed. Prairie fires had passed it by. Only the relentless sun and rain had fastened the mark of their handiwork upon it and stained it until it was the color of the earth itself. Within, man had performed a similar office. The same old cottonwood bar stretched across the side of the room, taking up a third of the available space; but no stranger would have called it cottonwood now. It had become brown like oak from continuous saturation with various colored liquids; and upon its surface, indelible record of the years, were innumerable bruises and dents where heavy bottles and glasses had made their impress under impulse of heavier hands. The continuous deposit of tobacco smoke had darkened the ceiling, modulating to a lighter tone on the walls. The place was even gloomier than before, and immeasurably filthier under the accumulated grime of a dozen years. Once in their history the battered tables had been recovered, but no one would have guessed it now. The gritty decks of cards had been often replaced, but from their appearance they might have been those with which Tom Blair long ago bartered away his honor.
Time had left its impress also on bartender Mick. A generous sprinkling of gray was in his hair; the single eye was redder and fiercer, seeming by its blaze to have consumed the very lashes surrounding it; the cheeks were sunken, the great jaw and chin prominent from the loss of teeth. Otherwise Mick was not much changed. The hand which dealt out his wares, which insisted on their payment to the last nickel, was as steady as of yore. His words were as few, his control of the reckless and often drunken frequenters was as perfect. He was the personified spirit of the place—crafty, designing, relentless.
Bob Hoyt, the foreman, shambled into Mick's lair at the time of day when the lights were burning and smoking on the circling shelf. He peered through the haze of tobacco smoke at the patrons already present, received a word from one and a stare from another, but from none an invitation to join the circle.
Bob sidled up to the bar where Kennedy was impassively waiting. "Warmer out," he advanced.
Mick made no comment. "Something?" he suggested.
Bob's colorless eyes blinked involuntarily. "Yes, a bit of rye."
Mick poured a very small drink into a whiskey glass, set it with another of water before the customer, on a big card tacked upon the wall added a fresh line to those already succeeding the other's name, and leaned his elbows once more upon the bar.
Upon the floor of his mouth Bob Hoyt laid a foundation of water, over this sent down the fiery liquor with a gulp,and followed the retreat with the last of the water, unconsciously making a wry face.
Kennedy whisked the empty glasses through the doubtful contents of a convenient pail, and set them dripping upon a perforated shelf. "Found the horses yet?" he queried, in an undertone.
Bob shifted uncomfortably and searched for a place for his hands, but finding none he let them hang awkwardly over the rail of the bar.
"No, not even a trail."
"Looked, have you?" The single searchlight turned unwinkingly upon the other's face.
"Yes, I've been out all day. Made a circle of the places within forty miles—Russel's of the Circle R, Stetson's of the 'XI,' Frazier's, Rankin's—none of them have seen a sign of a stray."
"That settles it, then. Those horses were stolen." The red face with its bristle of buff and gray came closer. "I didn't think they'd strayed. The two best horses on a ranch don't wander off by chance; if they'd been broncos it might have been different. It's the same thing as three years ago; pretty nearly the same date too—early in January it was, you remember!"
Bob's long head nodded confirmation. "Yes. We thought then they'd come around all right in the next round up, but they didn't, and never have."
Kennedy stepped back, spread his hands palm down upon the bar, leaned his full weight upon them, and gazed meditatively at the other occupants of the room. A question was in his mind. Should he take these men intohis confidence and trust to their well-known method of dealing with rustlers—a method very effective when successful in catching the offender, but infinitely deficient in finesse—or depend wholly upon his own ingenuity? He decided that in this instance the latter offered little hope. His province was in dealing with people at close range.
"Boys,"—his voice was normal, but not a man in the room failed to give attention,—"boys, line up! It's on the house."
Promptly the card games ceased. In one, the pot lay as it was, its ownership undecided, in the centre of the table. The loungers' feet dropped to the floor. An inebriate, half dozing in the corner, awoke. Well they knew it was for no small reason that Mick interrupted their diversions. Up they came—Grover of the far-away "XXX" ranch, who had been here for two days now, and had lost the price of a small herd; Gilbert of the "Lost Range," whose brand was a circle within a circle; Stetson of the "XI," a short heavy-set man, with an immovable pugilist's face, to-night, as usual, ahead of the game; Thompson, one-armed but formidable, who drove the stage and kept the postoffice and inadequate general store just across to the north of the saloon; McFadden, a wiry little Scotchman with sandy whiskers, Rankin's nearest neighbor to the south; a half-dozen lesser lights, in distinction from the big ranchers called by their first names, "Buck" or "Pete" or "Bill" as the case might be, mere cowmen employed at a salary. Elbow to elbow they leaned upon the supporting bar, awaiting with interest the something they knew Kennedy had to say.
Kennedy did not ask a single man what he would have. It was needless. Silently he placed a glass before each, and starting a bottle of red liquor at one end of the line, he watched it, as, steadily emptying, it passed on down to the end.
"I never use it, you know," he explained, as, the preparation complete, they looked at him expectantly.
"Take something else, then," pressed McFadden.
Mick poured out a glass of water and set it on the bar before him; but not an observer smiled. They knew the man they were dealing with.
"All right, boys,"—McFadden's glass went up on a level with his eye, and one and all the others followed the motion,—"all right, boys! Here's to you, Kennedy!"—mouthing the last word as though it were a hot pebble, and in unison the dozen odd hands led the way to their respective owners' mouths. There was a momentary pause; then a musical clinking, as the empty glasses returned to the board. Silence, expectant silence, returned.
"Boys,"—Mick looked from face to face intimately,—"we've got work ahead. Hoyt here reported this morning that two of the best horses on the Big B were missing. He's made a forty-mile circuit to-day, and no one has seen anything of them. You all know what that means."
Stetson turned to the foreman. "What time did you see them last, Hoyt?"
"About nine last evening."
"Sure?"
Bob's long head nodded emphatically. "Yes, one of the boys had the team out mending fence in the afternoon,and when he was through he turned them into the corral with the broncos. I'm sure they were there."
"I'm not surprised," commented Thompson, swinging on his single elbow to face the others. "It's been some time now since we've had a necktie party and it's bound to come. The wonder is it hasn't come before."
Gilbert and Grover, comparatively elderly men, said nothing, looked nothing; but upon the faces of the half-dozen cowboys there appeared distinct anticipation. The hunt of a "rustler" appealed to them as a circus does to a small boy, as the prospect of a football game does to a college student.
Meanwhile, McFadden had been thinking. One could always tell when this process was taking place with the Scotchman, from his habit of tapping his chest with his middle finger as though beating time to the movement of his mental machinery.
"Got any plan, Kennedy?" he queried. "Whoever's done you has got a good start by this time; but if we're going to do anything, there's no use in giving him longer. How about it?"
Mick's single eye shifted as before, and went from face to face. "No, I haven't; but I've got an idea." A pause. "How many of you boys remembers Tom Blair?" he digressed.
"I do," said Grover.
"Same here." It was Gilbert of the Lost Range who spoke.
"I've heard of him," commented one of the cowboys.
"I guess we all have," added another.
Again Mick's eye, like a flashlight, passed from man to man.
"Well," he announced, "I may be wrong, but I've got reason to believe it was Tom Blair who did the job last night, and that he's somewhere this side the river right now."
For a moment there was silence, while the idea took root.
"I supposed he was dead long ago," remarked Stetson at last.
"So did I, until a month ago—until the last time I was in town stocking up. I met a fellow there then from the country west of the river, and it all came out. Blair's been stampin' that range for a year, and they're suspicious of him. He disappears every now and then, and they think he keeps in with a gang of rustlers who have their headquarters over in the Johnson's Hole country in Wyoming. The fellow said he kept up appearances by claiming he owned a ranch on this side—the Big B. That's how we came to speak of him."
"Queer," commented Stetson, "that if it's Blair, he hasn't been around before. It's been ten years now since he disappeared, hasn't it?"
"More than that," corrected Mick. "That's another reason I believe it's him; that, and the fact that I didn't do nothin' the last time I was held up. It must be one lone rustler who's operating or there'd be more'n a couple of hosses missing. Then it must be some feller that knows the Big B, and has a particular grudge against it, or why would they have passed the Broken Kettle or theLone Buffalo on the west? Morris has a whole herd, and his main hoss sheds are in an old creek-bed a mile away from the ranch-house. I tell you it's some feller who knows this country and knows me."
"I believe you're right about him being this side of the river," broke in Thompson. "When I was over after the mail two days ago there was water running on the ice; and it's been warmer since. It must be wide open in spots now. A man who knows the crossings might make it afoot, but he couldn't take a hoss over."
Mick's lone eye burned more ominously than before. "Of course he can't. He's run into a trap, and all we've got to do is to make a spread and round him up. I'll bet a hundred to one we find him somewhere this side, waiting for a freeze." Again the half-emptied bottle came from the shelf and passed to the end of the line. "Have another whiskey on me, boys."
They silently drank. Then grim Stetson suggested that they drink again—"to our success"; and cowboy Buck, not to be outdone, proposed another toast—"to the necktie party—after." The big bottle, empty now, dinned on the surface of the bar.
"By God! I hope we get him," flamed Grover. "He ought to be hung, anyway. He killed his wife and burned up the body, they say, before he left!"
"Someone must call for Rankin and Ben," suggested another, "Ben particularly. He ought to be there at the finish. Lord knows he's got grudge enough."
"We'll let him pull the trap," broke in Stetson grimly.
Of a sudden above the confusion there sounded a snarl,almost like the cry of an animal. Surprised, for the moment silenced, the men turned in the direction whence it had come.
"Rankin!" It was Mick Kennedy who spoke, but it was Mick transformed. "Rankin!" The great veins of the bartender's neck swelled; the red face congested until it became all but purple. "No! We won't go near him! He'd put a stop to the whole thing. What we want is men, not cowards!"
A moment only the silence lasted. "All right," agreed Stetson. "Have another, boys! We'll drop Rankin!"
Anew, louder than before, broke forth the confusion. The games of a short time ago were forgotten. A heap of coin lay on the shelf behind the bar where Mick, the banker, had placed it; but winner and loser alike ignored its existence. The savage, ever so near the surface of these rough frontiersmen, had taken complete possession of them. Drop Rankin—forget civilization—ignore the slow practices of law and order!
"Come on!" someone yelled. "We're enough to do the business. To the river!"
Instantly the crowd burst through the single front door. Momentarily there followed a lull, while in the half darkness each rider found his mount. Then sounded an "All ready!" from cowboy Buck, first in motion, a straining of leather, a swish of quirts, a grunting of ponies as the spurs dug into their flanks, a rush of leaping feet, a wild medley of yells, and westward across the prairie, beneath the stars, there passed a swiftly moving black shadow that grew momentarily lighter, and back from which came a patter,patter, patter, that grew softer and softer; until at last over the old saloon and its companion store fell silence absolute.
It was 10:28 when they left Kennedy's place. It was 12:36 when, without having for a moment stopped their long swinging gallop, they pulled up at the "Lone Buffalo" ranch, twenty-five miles away, and the last ranch before they reached the river. The house was dark and silent as the grave at their approach; but it did not remain so long. The display of fireworks with which they illumined the night would have done credit to an Independence Day celebration. The yells which accompanied it were hair-raising as the shrieks from a band of maniacs. Instantly lights began to burn, and the proprietor himself, Grey—a long Southerner with an imperial—came rushing to the door, a revolver in either hand.
But the visitors had not waited for him. With one impulse they had ridden straight into the horse corral, had thrown off saddles and bridles from their steaming mounts, and, every man for himself, had chosen afresh from the ranch herd. Passing out in single-file through the gate, they came upon Grey; but still they did not stop. The one word "rustler" was sufficient password, and not five minutes from the time they arrived they were again on the way, headed straight southwest for their long ride to the river.
Hour after hour they forged ahead. The mustangs had long since puffed themselves into their second wind, and, falling instinctively into their steady swinging lope, they moved ahead like machines. The country grew more andmore rolling, even hilly. From between the tufts of buffalo grass now and then protruded the white face of a rock. Over one such, all but concealed in the darkness, Grover's horse stumbled, and with a groan, the rancher beneath, fell flat to earth. By a seeming miracle the man arose, but the horse did not, and an examination showed the jagged edge of a fractured bone protruding through the hide at the shoulder. There was but one thing to do. A revolver spoke its message of relief, a hastily-cast lot fell to McFadden, and without a word he faced his own mount back the way they had come, assisted Grover to a place behind him, turned to wish the others good luck, and found himself already too late. Where a minute ago they had been standing there was now but vacancy. The night and the rolling ground had swallowed the avengers up as completely as though they had never existed; and the Scotchman rode slowly back.
It was yet dark, but the eastern sky was reddening, when they reached the chain of bluffs bordering the great river. They had made their plans before, so that now without hesitating they split as though upon the edge of a mighty wedge, half to the right, half to the left, each division separating again into its individual members, until the whole, like two giant hands whereof the cowboys, half a mile apart from each other, were the fingers, moved forward until the end finger all but touched the river itself.
Still there was no pause. The details had been worked out to a nicety. They had bent far to the south, miles farther than any man aiming at the Wyoming borderwould have gone, and now, having arrived at the barrier, they wheeled north again. It was getting daylight, and cowboy Pete,—in our simile the left little finger,—first to catch sight of the surface of the stream, waved in triumph to the nearest rider on his right.
"We've got him, sure!" he yelled. "She's open in spots"; and though the others could not hear, they understood the meaning, and the message went on down the line.
On, on, more swiftly now, at a stiff gallop, for it was day, the riders advanced. As they moved, first one rider and then another would disappear, as a depression in the uneven country temporarily swallowed them up—but only to reappear again over a prominent rise, still galloping on. They watched each other closely now, searching the surrounding country. They were nearing a region where they might expect action at any moment,—the remains of a camp-fire, a clue to him they sought,—for it was on a line directly west of the Big B ranch.
And they were not to be disappointed. Observing closely, Stetson, who was nearest to Pete, saw the latter suddenly draw up his horse and come to a full stop. At last the end had arrived—at last; and the rancher turned to motion to his right. Only a moment the action took, but when he shifted back he saw a sight which, stolid gambler as he was, sent a thrill through his nerves, a mumbling curse to his lips. Coming toward him, crazy-scared, bounding like an antelope, mane flying, stirrups flapping, was the pony Pete had ridden, but now riderless. Of the cowboy himself there was not a sign. Stetson had notheard a sound or caught a motion. Nevertheless, he understood. Somewhere near, just to the west, lay death, death in ambush; but he did not hesitate. Whatever his faults, the man was no coward. A revolver in either hand, the reins in his teeth, he spurred straight for the river.
It took him but a minute to cover the distance—a minute until, almost by the rivers bank, he saw ahead on the brown earth the sprawling form of a dead man. With a jerk he drew up alongside, and, the muzzles of big revolvers following his eye, sent swiftly about him a sweeping glance. Of a sudden, three hundred yards out, seemingly from the surface of the river itself, he caught a tiny rising puff of smoke, heard simultaneously a sound he knew so well,—the dull spattering impact of a bullet,—realized that the pony beneath him was sinking, felt the shock as his own body came to earth, and heard just over his head the singing passage of a rifle-ball.
Unconscious profanity flowed from the rancher's lips in a stream; but meanwhile his brain worked swiftly, and, freeing himself, he crawled back hand over hand until a wave in the ground covered the river from view; then springing to his feet he ran toward the others, approaching now as fast as spurs would bring them, waving, shouting a warning as he went. Within a minute they were all together listening to his story. Within another, the rifles from off their saddles in their hands, the ponies left in charge of lank Bob Hoyt, the eight others now remaining moved back as Stetson had come: at first upright, then, crawling, hand over hand until, peeping over the intervening ridge, they saw lying before them the mingled icepatches and open running water of the low-lying Missouri. Beside them at their left, very near, was the body of Pete; but after a first glance and an added invective no man for the present gave attention. He was dead, dead in his tracks, and their affair was not with such, but with the quick.
At first they could see nothing which explained the mystery of death, only the forbidding face of the great river; then gradually to one after another there appeared tell-tale marks which linked together into clues.
"Ain't that a hoss-carcass?" It was cowboy Buck who spoke. "Look, a hundred yards out, down stream."
Gilbert's swift glance caught the indicated object.
"Yes, and another beyond—farther down—amongst that ice-pack! Do you see?"
"Where?" Mick Kennedy trained his one eye like a fieldpiece upon the locality suggested. "Where? Yes! I see them now—both of them. Blair's own horse, if he had one, is probably in there too, somewhere."
Meanwhile Stetson had been scrutinizing the spot on the river's face from which had come the puff of smoke.
"Say, boys!" a ring as near excitement as was possible to one of his temperament was in his voice. "Ain't that an island, that brown patch out there, pretty well over to the other side? I believe it is."
The others followed his glance. Near the farther bank was a long low-lying object, like a jam of broken ice-cakes, between which and them the open water was flowing. At first they thought it was ice; then under longer observation they knew better. They had seen too many otherformations of the kind in this shifting treacherous stream to be long deceived. A flat sandy island it was, sure enough; and what they thought was ice was driftwood.
Almost simultaneously from the eight there burst forth an exclamation, a rumbling curse of comprehension. They understood it all now as plainly as though their own eyes had seen the tragedy. Blair had reached the river and, despite its rotten ice, had tried to cross. One by one the horses had broken through, had been abandoned to their fate. He alone, somehow, had managed to reach this sandy island, and he was there now, intrenched behind the driftwood, waiting and watching.
In the brain of every cowboy there formed an unuttered curse. Their impotence to go farther, to mete out retribution to this murderer of their companion, came over them in a blind wave of fury. The sun, now well above the horizon, shone warmly down upon them. They were in the midst of an infrequent Winter thaw. The full current of the river was between them and the desperado. It might be days, a week, before ice would again form; yet, connecting the island with the western bank, it was even now in place. Blair had but to wait until cover of night, and depart in peace—on foot, to be sure, but in the course of days a man could travel far afoot. Doubtless he realized all this. Doubtless he was laughing at them now. The curses redoubled.
Stetson had been taking off his coat. He now draped it about his rifle-stock, and placed his sombrero on top. "All ready, boys," he cautioned, and raised it slowly into view.
Instantly from the centre of the driftwood heap there arose a tracing of blue smoke. Simultaneously, irregular in outline as though punched by a dull instrument, a jagged hole appeared in the felt of the hat.
As instantly, eight rifles on the bank began to play. The crackling of their reports was like infantry, the sliding click of the ejecting mechanism as continuous and regular as the stamp-stamp of many presses. The smoke rose over their heads in a blue cloud. Far out on the river, under impact of the bullets, splinters of the rotted driftwood leaped high into the air. Now and then the open water in front splashed into spray as a ball went amiss. Not until the rifle magazines were empty did they cease, and then only to reload. Again and once again they repeated the onslaught, until it would seem no object the size of a human being upon the place where they aimed could by any possibility remain alive. Then, and not until then, did silence return, did the dummy upon Stetson's rifle again raise its head.
But this time there was no response. They waited a minute, two minutes—tried the ruse again, and it was as before. Had they really hit the man out there, as they hoped, or was he, conscious of a trick, merely lying low? Who could tell? The uncertainty, the inaction, goaded all that was reckless in cowboy Buck's nature, and he sprang to his feet.
"I'm going out there if I have to walk on the bottom of the river!" he blazed.
Instantly Stetson's hands were on his legs, pulling him, prostrate.
"Down, you fool!" he growled. "At the bottom of the river is where you'd be quick enough." The speaker turned to the others. "One of us is done for already. There's no use for the rest to risk our lives without a show. We've either potted Blair or we haven't. There's nothing more to be done now, anyway. We may as well go back."
For a moment there was a murmur of dissent, but it was short-lived. One and all realized that what the rancher said was true. For the present at least, nature was against them, on the side of the outlaw; and to combat nature was useless. Another time—yes, there would surely be another time; and grim faces grew grimmer at the thought. Another time it would be different.
"Yes, we may as well go." It was Mick Kennedy who spoke. "We can't stay here long, that's sure." He tossed his rifle over to Stetson. "Carry that, will you?" and rising, regardless of danger, he walked over to cowboy Pete, took the dead body in his arms, without a glance behind him, stalked back to where the horses were waiting, laid his burden almost tenderly across the shoulder of his own mustang, and mounted behind. Coming up, the others, likewise in silence, got into their saddles, not as at starting, with one bound, but heavily, by aid of stirrups. Still in silence, Mick leading, the legs of dead Pete dangling at the pony's shoulder, they faced east, and started moving slowly along the backward trail.