Bancroft lingered, flicking the ashes from his cigar. “I—I know nothing about it,” he blurted out, uncertainly. “If Don Dellmey had anything to say to you I suppose he said it.”
As he turned away he heard the man say gently, “Thank you, Señor Bancroft. I shall not forget our talk.” There was no reply, and the Mexican, whistling a Spanish love tune, disappeared down the hill in the weird mixed lights of the fading day and the brilliant moon.
Alone on the veranda, Alexander Bancroft walked restlessly to and fro, stopping now and again as if to listen to the music from within, which he did not hear, or to look at themoonlit landscape, which he did not see. Over and over he was saying to himself that he had no idea what Dellmey Baxter had said to this Mexican, and, whatever it was, he had distinctly told the creature that he knew nothing about it. The man had come to him recommended as an expert cowboy, he had passed the recommendation on to Conrad, and that was all there was about it.
Nevertheless, he knew he had reason to believe—the Congressman had intimated as much in his letter—that the man who called himself José Gonzalez was in reality Liberato Herrara, guilty of at least one murder and probably of others, whom Baxter’s legal skill had saved from the gallows. Curtis had said that he should carry the man behind him to the ranch that night. Before Bancroft’s inward eye a sudden vision opened: wide miles of silent plain, a great white moon hanging low in the sky, a long stretch of deserted road, and then two men on a single horse—and the light gleaming on a long knife! He shuddered as the blade flashed, and turned his face away from the plain. Then, as there came to him a sudden sense of tremendous relief, with breath and thought suspended he turned slowly, fascinatedly, and with greedyeyes searched the distant plain, as if eager to find in it some proof, at last, of his own safety.
Lucy’s voice rose in a gay little song above the piano and fell upon his ears. With a deep, long-drawn breath his thought leaped out and seized upon all that freedom from Curtis Conrad’s pursuit would mean for him. José Gonzalez would sink out of sight, and Liberato Herrara would be back in his own home, unsuspected and silent. Some excitement would follow, search would be made, a body would be found in a mesquite thicket,—and then the interest would die out, and there would be only another grewsome tale of mystery to be added to the hundreds already told through the Southwest. And he—Alexander Bancroft—would be safe—secure in fortune and reputation and the love and honor of his daughter as long as they should live.
The music within ceased and Lucy’s voice rippled out in girlish laughter. His heart sank as he seemed to hear again her hot denunciation of Baxter’s loan and mortgage operations. “I’ll sell out to Dell and she’ll never know I’ve had anything to do with it,” he thought. Then there came ringing through his memory, as he had heard them so manytimes since they rode home from the Socorro Springs ranch, her passionate words, “He must have been a wicked man,” and “I should hate him, with all my strength,” and again his longing face turned impulsively toward the plain.
“I’d kill him myself, rather than let her find out,” he whispered, with teeth set. “And a man has got to protect himself out here!” his urgent thought went on. “I’ll be a fool if I don’t stop him before he gets his chance at me!” With a sudden stirring of conscience he remembered that this man whose death he was so ardently desiring was his friend and trusted his friendship. “I—I don’t want him stuck in the back,” he muttered. “I might warn him. He may not have started yet.”
He walked uncertainly toward the veranda steps. There was a flutter of white drapery and Lucy was laying an affectionate hand on his arm. “Oh, daddy dear,” she coaxed, “won’t you come in and try this duet with us? Dearie will play the accompaniment for us to sing. She brought it to me, and I’m dying to try it.”
“Yes, if you wish it, daughter,” the banker replied, hesitation in his voice, “but I wasthinking of going down town.” He saw the shade of disappointment that crossed her face, and drew her hand into his arm. “It doesn’t matter,” he went on, “and I would rather stay at home.” To himself he said as they moved to the door, “Conrad has gone by this time, and, anyway, I’ve no reason to think this Mexican intends to do him any harm.”
Restless was the night that followed for Alexander Bancroft; his sleep was troubled by many a dream in which one friend after another moved swiftly on to violent death. With the coming of dawn he arose to look out from the eastern windows of his room. The sky was a dome of rosy light and below lay the vast plain, dim but colorful, its gray-green mottled with vague bands and patches of opalescent lights and shadows and dotted with little islands of vivid green. His eyes clung to these darker spots, which he knew to be thickets of mesquite; piercing their shade his inner vision showed him the still body of his friend. So real was the mental picture that he turned pale about the lips and abruptly left the window.
If anything had happened, he kept reassuring himself, it had been at Dellmey Baxter’s instigation. He himself had had nothing to do with it. If Baxter had decided that hisaffairs would go more smoothly with Conrad out of the way, why should he, Alexander Bancroft, trouble himself further? And if—anything had happened—again he felt the loosening of mental strain and his spirits rose in exultation at the prospect of freedom and safety. Life was more attractive than ever with that menacing figure no longer threatening him with disclosure, disgrace, and death. He could go on with his plans for the accumulation of fortune and the enjoyment of life. He could still hold Lucy’s love and honor, travel with her, marry again, work his way to a commanding place in the world of business. The future opened before him as easy and inviting as the stairs down which he went to breakfast.
Lucy ran to meet him with a good-morning kiss and a rose for his buttonhole. “It’s the prettiest I could find in my conservatory,” she smiled at him; “but it isn’t half nice enough for my daddy dear. You don’t look well this morning, daddy,” she went on anxiously. “Is anything the matter?”
His hand slipped caressingly down over her curls and drew her to his breast in a quick embrace, instinct with the native impulse of the animal to protect its offspring. “Sheshall never know,” was the thought in his mind.
“Daddy! What a bear hug that was!” she laughed, “like those you used to give me when I was a little girl. It didn’t feel as if you were ill.”
“I’m not,” he answered lightly, kissing her pink cheek. “I guess I smoked too much yesterday, and so didn’t sleep very well. Yes; I promise; I’ll be more careful to-day.”
At breakfast his eyes dwelt much upon Louise Dent’s face, gentle and pleasant. He had always liked her, and since her coming on this visit she had seemed very attractive. He knew she had strength and poise of character and a nature refined and cheerful. These qualities in her, with a certain genial, unobtrusive companionableness, had long ago won his warm friendship. But was there not in her steady gray eyes a hint of passionate depths he had never thought of before? It stirred him so deeply that for a little while, as they lingered over the breakfast table, he forgot the other facts of life, noting the faint rose flush in her cheeks, the graceful turn of her wrists, and the soft whiteness of her throat as she threw back her head and laughed. And Lucy loved her so devotedly! If she werewilling to marry him their household would surely be harmonious and happy.
Lucy fluttered beside him to the gate, her arm in his, as she chattered to him of the funny things her Chinese cook had been saying and doing. She lingered there, her eyes following his figure, until he turned, half a block away, to wave his hat in response to her farewell handkerchief.
By the time he reached the foot of the hill Bancroft’s mind was once more engrossed with the need of knowing whether or not he was at last secure from ignominious exposure. He no longer disguised from himself the fact that news of Conrad’s death would be most welcome. He looked eagerly up and down the main streets; there was no sign of excitement. Had nothing happened, then? But it was still early; moreover, news of the affair might not reach the town for a day or two. The sound of horses’ feet coming at a swift trot down the street on the other side of the stream made his heart beat quickly. He lingered at the door of his bank until the horseman came into view under the big cottonwoods at the next corner. It was Red Jack from the Socorro Springs ranch. At once his heart leaped to certainty. He turned to enter the bank, but stopped andlooked back, undecidedly. Red Jack had not dismounted, but had drawn rein in front of the court-house at the next corner, and was sitting there quietly, looking up and down the road as if expecting somebody. He led a saddled horse. Perhaps he was to take a physician back with him. But he seemed in no haste, and in his manner there was neither excitement nor anxiety. Bancroft could wait no longer to learn what had happened. With hands in pockets he sauntered down the street.
“Hello, Jack,” he said indifferently to the waiting horseman. “You’re in town early this morning.”
“I sure hiked along from the ranch early enough,” the cowboy replied. “The boss hired a new man last night; and I had to come over this morning after him.”
Bancroft’s eyes were on the cigar he was taking from his pocket, which he handed to the cowboy, saying idly, “Why, he intended last night to carry the man behind him. Did he change his mind? The man was a Mexican, wasn’t he?”
“Y-e-s; a measly coyote! The boss didn’t bring him last night because he thought it would be too hard on Brown Betty to carry double. I wonder if mebbe that ain’t my mancomin’ down the street right now! I’ve done forgot his name; do you happen to know it, Mr. Bancroft?”
“I think it’s José Gonzalez. He came here from Dellmey Baxter, who recommended him to me as a first-rate cowboy.”
“Well, he’ll have to be a peach if he strikes the boss’s gait,” Red Jack rejoined, motioning to the Mexican.
Bancroft walked back to his place of business with brows knitted and mouth drawn into grim lines. His mind was acting rapidly and ruthlessly. The sudden collapse of his house of cards, the knowledge that danger was still as imminent as ever, left him savage with desire for Curtis Conrad’s death, or, rather, for the delectable land that lay beyond it. Nobody but this young hothead with his insensate desire for revenge knew or cared anything about that old affair now. With him out of the way there would be no danger from anybody or anything. Why wasn’t the man sensible enough to take the money he was willing to pay, and be satisfied? Perhaps the receipt of another check or two would soften his purpose; it was worth trying. And—there was still the Mexican! Baxter had surely said something to him, and the fellow seemedto understand that he, also—but he had said nothing about it, and whatever the creature suspected was his own inference. Evidently the Mexican did suspect something and had some purpose in his mind. With Conrad so intent upon his destruction had he not every right to protect himself and his child? Of course he had, he told himself fiercely, and what means he might use were his own affair.
At the door of the bank Rutherford Jenkins met him with a smiling salutation: “Good-morning, Mr. Bancroft; this is lucky! I was waiting for you here, but I’ve got so much to do that I’d begun to be afraid I wouldn’t be able to see you before I go back.”
Bancroft greeted him pleasantly. “What do you mean, Jenkins,” he went on, “by deserting to Martinez? Hadn’t you better think again about that? We need you on our side.”
“That’s exactly what I want to see you about,” said Jenkins in a confidential tone. “Can’t you come over with me to Bill Williams’s hotel for a few minutes? I want to have a talk with you.”
They went back together, Bancroft wondering if Jenkins, who was regarded as a desirable ally by both parties, notwithstanding his character, was about to make overtures to himfor deserting the Martinez fold and coming back to Baxter’s. “Perhaps that spanking Curt gave him has set him against the whole Martinez following,” he thought. “Baxter will be mighty glad to get him back, and I’ll do my best to cinch the bargain so he can’t crawl.”
When they entered the hotel room Jenkins moved leisurely about, got out a bottle of whiskey, and hunted up some cigars, talking all the time glibly about other matters and jumping inconsequently from one subject to another. Bancroft made several attempts to bring the conversation to the point, but each time Jenkins either blandly ignored or skilfully evaded his leading. Finally Bancroft said, looking at his watch: “Well, Jenkins, I’ve got to be at the bank very soon, and if there’s anything particular you want to say suppose we get down to business.”
“Yes, yes, certainly,” Jenkins replied unconcernedly. “That’s what I’m coming to right now.” He gave Bancroft a cigar, lighted one himself, made some jokes as he bustled aimlessly around the room, and at last sat down on the foot of the bed, facing the banker, who occupied the only chair in the little room. He ceased speaking, andBancroft, looking up suddenly, caught in his face an expression of expectant triumph. The tip of his tongue was darting over his lips, and his small dark eyes were fixed on his guest with a look of malicious satisfaction. Instantly Bancroft’s nerves were alert with the sense of coming danger. He blew out a whiff of smoke and calmly returned the other’s gaze. Their eyes met thus, the one gloating, the other outwardly unmoved but inwardly astart with sudden alarm. Then Jenkins began, in a blandly insinuating tone:
“Before we come to that matter about Martinez, I want to ask you, Mr.—ah—Mr. Dela—ah, I beg your pardon, Mr. Bancroft—I thought I would ask you—you’ve poked about a good deal, out here in the West—and in out-of-the-way places, too—and I’ve been wondering—I thought I’d ask you—if you’ve ever run across a gentleman of the name of—of—Dela—Dela—let me see—yes, Delafield—that’s it—Sumner L. Delafield, of Boston. Do you remember whether or not you’ve ever met him?”
Bancroft did not blanch nor flinch. For so many years he had schooled himself to such constant watchfulness and incessant self-control that an impassive countenanceand manner had become a habit. Lucy, with her uncompromising moral decisions and her swift, unsparing condemnations, could come nearer to unnerving him than could any bolt from the blue like this. He flicked the ash from his cigar, hesitating a moment as if searching his memory, but really wondering whether Jenkins knew anything or was merely guessing and trying to draw him out. The latter seemed much the more likely.
“I can’t say on the instant whether I ever met such a man or not. As you say, I have gone about a good deal and, as my business most of the time has been that of mining and trading in mines, it has often taken me into out-of-the-way places, and I have met a great many people. At this moment I don’t recall the name.”
“Don’t you? I’m sorry, for I thought perhaps you could verify for me a curious story about the man that has just come to my knowledge. You know I’m always picking up information about people—I find it comes in handy now and then. Well, if you’ve never met him, have you ever, in the course of your Western travels, run across a man—he was a mining man, too—a mining man named Hardy—John Mason Hardy?There’s a curious story about him, too, or, rather, about a man who was associated with him in a mining enterprise down in old Mexico. The other man’s name was Smith—a very serviceable name is Smith; sort of like a black derby hat; no distinguishing mark about it and easy to exchange by mistake if you’d rather have some other man’s.”
Bancroft rose and looked at his watch. “If there’s anything of particular interest or importance in this, Mr. Jenkins, I’ll be very glad to listen to it some other time; but I can’t stay any longer this morning. I ought to have been at my desk half an hour ago.”
Jenkins sat still and waved him back with insistent politeness. “One moment more, Mr. Bancroft, if you please. I’m coming to the point right away. This story is of some consequence to me, and I’d like to know if you can verify it. Have another drink.”
Bancroft swallowed the whiskey at a gulp and Jenkins noticed that his fingers trembled as he took the glass. He was thinking, “I’d better stay and find out exactly how much he knows.” Jenkins smiled under his hand as he smoothed his straggling moustache and watched Bancroft wipe the sweat from his forehead.
“This man Smith,” Jenkins continued, “John was his name, too—John Smith and John Mason Hardy were partners in a mining enterprise down in Mexico. One of them died down there—died, you know, in a quiet, private sort of way, and the one that came up to the States again was named Hardy, but it wasn’t the same Hardy that had gone down there. You might guess, if you wanted to, that Smith killed Hardy and took his name—”
He stopped and drew back suddenly, for Bancroft had sprung forward with a white, angry face and was shaking a trembling fist under his nose.
“Stop there, you liar!” he exclaimed in low, tense tones. “I didn’t do that. He died a natural death—of fever—and I took care of him and did my best to save his life.”
Jenkins recovered his self-possession first. “Oh; then you know all about it!” he said dryly, with a malicious smile.
Bancroft sank back in his chair drawing his hand across his eyes and wondering why his self-control had so suddenly gone to pieces. He had thought himself proof against any surprise, but this man’s sudden blow and persistent baiting had screwed his nerve tension tothe snapping point. But he told himself that it probably did not matter anyway, as Jenkins evidently knew the whole story. With a desperate, defiant look he turned upon his tormentor.
“Well, what do you want?” he demanded sharply. “Why have you raked up this old story?”
“Oh, I found it interesting,” Jenkins responded in a leisurely way, “as an instance of the way things are done on the frontier and, as I told you at first, I thought you might be able to verify it. For I was inclined not to believe it, especially as it was about one of the most prominent and respected citizens of New Mexico. But since you’ve confessed its truth yourself—well, I’ve got to believe it now. It has been a very blind trail I’ve followed, crooked and well hidden—wonderfully well hidden, Mr. Bancroft—and the number of names you’ve hoisted along its course has been bewildering. But I’ve managed to track you through ’em all, and to discover in Alexander Bancroft, the upright, honored, public-spirited citizen of New Mexico, the identical person of Sumner L. Delafield, the defaulting and absconding financier of Boston.”
Bancroft looked Jenkins sullenly in the eye. “Well, now that you have it all, what are you going to do about it?”
“Pardon me, Mr. Bancroft,” said Jenkins with exaggerated suavity, “ah, excuse me, I mean Mr. Delafield—that is for you to say.”
The banker considered for a moment only. Evidently this man knew exactly what he was about and exactly what he wanted, so that it would be of no use to beat around the bush. “Will you please say precisely what you mean?” was his answer.
“That is just what I have been doing, Mr. Delafield.”
“Excuse me, Jenkins, but my name is Bancroft, not Delafield. I have a legal right to the name of Bancroft, given me by the legislature of Arizona. You will oblige me by addressing me in that way.”
“Oh, yes; I know that; and a lot of trouble I had with this chase until I found it out! But I thought you might like to hear yourself called Delafield once more—sort of like meeting an old friend, you know. Won’t you have another cigar, Mr. Bancroft? No? Well, then, let’s have another drink.” He poured out two glasses of whiskey. Bancroftdrank his without demur, but Jenkins barely touched his glass to his lips.
“Well, now, Mr. Bancroft,” Jenkins went on affably, smiling and rubbing his hands together, “let’s get down to the practical side of this romantic story from real life. You are getting on so well here under your present name, and you have a young daughter—” he saw his listener wince at this, and then carefully repeated his words—“and you have such a beautiful and charming young daughter, who, as the heiress of a father who is making a fortune with clean hands and no cloud on his past, can be taken about the world and can make a good marriage some of these days; considering all this, I take it for granted that you would prefer to have this story buried too deep for resurrection. And it is for you to say whether it shall be buried or not.”
Bancroft sat in silence for a full minute, glaring at the man opposite, his lips set in a livid line. Jenkins grew nervous in the dead stillness of the room, and began to fidget. He cautiously rested his right hand on the bed close by his pistol pocket, and kept his eyes on the banker, watchful for the first hostile movement. There was need ofwariness, for Bancroft was debating with himself whether it would be better to go on to the dreary end of this business and leave the room with a blackmailer’s noose around his neck, or to whip out his gun, put a bullet through this man’s brain, and another through his own.
But the fragrance of life rose sweet to his nostrils, and his innate virility spurred him on to keep up the fight. Apparently he had brought up against a stone wall, but he had fought too long and too desperately to be willing to confess himself beaten until he could struggle no longer. He felt sure that money would keep Jenkins quiet, and after a while he might find some other means of stopping the man’s mouth for good. The fellow was always in some dirty job or other, and before long doubtless some hold on him would become possible. There was Conrad still to be reckoned with—but that could wait, at least until this man was silenced.
“Well,” he said quietly, “what do you want? For God’s sake, come to the point!”
Jenkins drew a breath of relief. “Well, Mr. Bancroft, I’m interested this year in the success of Johnny Martinez. It’s a matter of the first importance to me for him to beelected. But I’m afraid he hasn’t got much chance if Silverside County and the rest of the South should go against him. Now, you’ve got more influence down here than anybody else, and you can swing it for him if you want to. That’s what I want you to do.”
Bancroft looked up in sudden dismay. He had not expected anything of this sort. “You know I’m committed to Baxter,” he said.
“Oh, yes; I know. But that’s nothing. In New Mexico it’s not difficult to change your politics. Why, I thought of coming out for Baxter myself at first; but I’m solid for Martinez now.”
Bancroft rose and began pacing the half-dozen steps to and fro that the room afforded, seeking some loophole of escape from his obligations to Baxter. There were mortgages the Congressman could foreclose that would balk some of the banker’s most promising plans should he attempt political treachery. He could, and undoubtedly would, reveal his associate’s connection with the loan and mortgage operations in the Rio Grande valley; and Bancroft winced as he thought of this coming to Lucy’s ears. And in thatmatter of Curtis Conrad and José Gonzalez—had he not put himself at Baxter’s mercy? In this moment of supreme necessity the naked truth came before him; and he knew it to be true that he was primarily responsible for any harm that might come to the young cattleman through Gonzalez. If he did not keep faith with Baxter the Congressman would tell Curtis who it was that desired his death; and then Conrad would know where to find Delafield. In short, he knew that Baxter would stop at nothing to compel his loyalty or punish his treason. Having contemplated no course except that of fidelity in his business and political relations with Baxter, the closeness of their alliance had heretofore given him little uneasiness; and now, in this crisis, he found himself wholly in the other’s power. He flung himself into his chair, his face pallid and the perspiration standing in great drops on his forehead. His breath came hard and his voice was thick as he asked:
“Is there no alternative?”
“Well, no; none that I can accept,” Jenkins replied meditatively. “You see, it’s a very important matter for me to be able to make this present to Johnny. If he wins this fight there’ll be something big in it for me.No; I’ll have to insist upon this as the first condition.”
Bancroft’s lips moved soundlessly as he stared at the man sitting on the edge of the bed, nursing his knee and showing his white teeth in a triumphant smile. Then, suddenly, without a word of warning, the banker leaped forward and seized his companion around the throat. Jenkins, taken entirely off his guard, succeeded only in grasping his assailant’s coat as they went down on the bed together in a noiseless scuffle. Bancroft’s hands closed around his tormentor’s throat, and a savage, elemental satisfaction thrilled in him and goaded him on. More and more tightly his fingers clutched as Jenkins struggled under his grip. Neither of them uttered a sound, and the silence of the room was broken only by the creaking of the bed or the occasional knocking of a foot against the chair.
Bancroft’s face was snarled like that of a wild beast as he watched Jenkins’s visage grow livid and his struggles weaken. Of a sudden reason returned to him. If this man were to die under his hand there would be grewsome consequences—and he had enough to deal with already. He stood up, trembling, and looked anxiously at the still form on the bed.
“You—you’re not dead, Jenkins, are you?” he stammered awkwardly.
Jenkins stirred a little, opened his eyes, put his hand to his throat, and got up, looking warily at his assailant. “It’s no thanks to you that I’m not,” he responded sullenly.
“I didn’t mean to kill you—but you—you struck me too hard—it drove me wild—and for a minute I didn’t know what I was doing.” Jenkins scowled, rubbed his throat again, and drank a glass of whiskey. Bancroft helped himself likewise, following it with a copious draught of water. As they faced each other again Jenkins edged away suspiciously toward the door; but Bancroft went back at once to the unsettled question.
“It would ruin me, financially and in every other way, to go back on Baxter. You might just as well kill me outright as insist upon that.”
“But I’m going to insist upon it,” was Jenkins’s sullen answer.
Bancroft made a despairing gesture. “But I tell you, Jenkins, the thing’s impossible! It would ruin me just as surely as for you to tell all you know. You’ll have to be satisfied with something else.”
Jenkins leaned against the bed and staredangrily at Bancroft. Physical pain had made him obstinate and determined him to press his point, more to return injury for injury than because he wanted that particular thing.
“I tell you now,” Bancroft went on, “that I’d rather take the last way out than try to go back on Baxter. It wouldn’t be the healthiest thing in the world for you if I should kill myself shut up in this room with you, would it?”
“Well, I’ll waive that for the present,” Jenkins replied unwillingly; “but, mind you, it’s only for the present. We’ll talk about it again, later in the season. For the present I want a good, big sum before you leave this room, and hereafter I’ve got to have a regular monthly payment, a check on the first of every month when I don’t come after the cash myself.”
Bancroft considered for only a moment. His dilemma was clear: he must either buy this haltered freedom from Jenkins or kill him in his tracks. This latter alternative was not to be considered; and doubtless before long it would be possible to turn the tables on the creature and escape from his clutches.
Jenkins folded away in his pocket-book a check and a roll of bills and smiled as helooked at Bancroft’s haggard face. “I hope, Mr. Dela—ah, pardon me,—Mr. Bancroft, that I have not kept you too long from your affairs at the bank.” As his eyes followed the banker’s disappearing figure with a gleam of satisfaction, he patted his breast pocket and whispered:
“Now for the other score!”
Red Jack and José Gonzalez joined the forces of the Socorro Springs ranch while the cattle of the morning’s round-up were being driven to the watering-place near the ranch house. Across the road from the house stood a large grove of cottonwoods; a little beyond that, in the valley, a deep pond had been dug, into which flowed the outlets from the several springs. The cattle from a score of miles roundabout were accustomed to come to this pond, with its circling belt of trees, for water and for midday rest in the shade.
Here the round-up was in progress, and Conrad galloped out to meet the new hand and give him instructions. As he rode off toward the hills after a bunch of straggling cattle Curtis looked after him with an approving eye. “He knows how to fork a horse, at least,” he thought. In the afternoon José was set to work cutting out and bunching thetwo- and three-year-old steers and later at helping with the branding. Conrad watched his handling of the branding irons, and he and all the rest stopped their work to follow his movements with critical eyes as he roped and brought to the ground a belligerent steer. The superintendent was well satisfied. “At last I’ve got a man who knows the business and has somesabe,” he thought. “If he goes on as well as he begins I’ll keep him after the shipping is done.”
The next day the round-up crept slowly southward, accompanied by the chuck-wagon and a drove of fresh horses. At noon the cattle gathered during the morning were bunched at Adobe Springs, the next watering-place toward the Mexican border. Gonzalez was the only Mexican among the cowboys, the rest being Americans of one sort or another—from Texas, Colorado, the Northwest, and the Middle West. All felt toward him the contemptuous scorn born of difference in race and consequent conviction of superior merit. They had no scruples about making known their prejudice, and more than once his face flushed and his hand darted toward the knife hidden in his bosom. Yet, as the day wore on and they saw that he excelled thebest of them in handling the lasso and in the cunning of his movements when cutting out the steers from the herd, they began to show him the respect that skill of any sort inspires in those who know with what effort it is acquired.
After supper, when they gathered about the campfire, smoking, and scoffing good-naturedly at one another’s tales of wondrous experiences, and talking over the events of the day just gone, they received him upon an equality with themselves which was only slightly grudged. He told them, in English more precise than any of them could speak, of Conrad’s encounter with Rutherford Jenkins in the Blue Front, and their appreciation of the tale completed the work which his skill as a cowboy had begun. Thereafter they looked upon José as a comrade and a good fellow.
Three small adobe houses, of one room each, with flat roofs and earthen floors, had been built here, as the large and never-failing springs made the spot a sure rendezvous for every round-up. The locality was infested by skunks, and the cowboys, who greatly feared midnight bites from the prowling animals, believing hydrophobia a sure consequence,usually preferred to sleep inside the houses, on bunks filled with alfalfa hay. If they ventured to sleep out-of-doors, they kept small cans of coal oil ready and, whenever a wakeful man saw one of the small creatures near, a quick turn of the wrist drenched its fur with the fluid and a brand from the smouldering campfire tossed after it sent a squealing pillar of flame flying up the hill and saved them from further disturbance that night.
A board nailed across a corner of the largest house served Conrad as a desk. He kept there a lamp, writing materials, and a few books. While the men sprawled around the campfire and the last gleams of dusky red faded from the west and the moon bounded up from behind the eastern hills, he made his memoranda, wrote a letter to be sent to the post-office by the first chance comer, and lost himself for an hour in a volume of Shakespeare. When he went outside the men were walking about, yawning and stretching, ready for sleep. Curtis’s imagination was still astir from his reading, and the presence of any other human being seemed an impertinence. But he said, genially:
“Well, boys, you begin to look as if you wanted to turn in. Take whatever bunks youlike, if you want to go inside. I’m going to sleep out here.”
“Better have a tin of ile handy,” said Red Jack. “The polecats are sure likely to nibble your toes if you don’t. The night I slept here last week I never saw the cusses so bad; durned if one of the critters didn’t get inside and wake me up smellin’ of my ear. I was some skeered of him stinkin’ up the place so it couldn’t be slept in for a year, so I jest had to lay low and wait for him to go outside, and then I doused him good with ile and throwed the candle at him. I sure reckon he’s holed up somewhere now, waitin’ till he can afford a new sealskin sacque before he shows hisself in good sassiety ag’in.”
“I don’t think they’ll bother me to-night,” Curtis responded. At that moment he felt that nothing could disturb him, if only he could be left alone with the moonlight and the plain. “I’ll sleep with my boots on, and my cheeks are not as fat as yours, Jack, so there’ll be no temptation. Where do you want to bunk, José? You can sleep outside or in, just as you like.”
Gonzalez replied respectfully that he would rather go in. But presently he came out again with his blanket and chose a spot against thewall of one of the houses. Conrad had gone out to the herd to speak with the man on patrol and to make sure that all was well. When he returned the men had disappeared. “Good!” he said to himself. “They’ve all gone inside and I’ve got the universe to myself.” He did not see the still form in its gray blanket close against the wall.
Curtis took the red bandanna from his neck and tied it over his ears, to keep out the tiny things that crawl o’ nights, and couched himself in his blanket on the gently rising ground with his saddle for a pillow. He lay down with his face to the east, where the dim and mellow sky, flooded with moonlight, seemed to recede far back, to the very limits of space, and leave the huge white globe suspended there in brooding majesty just above the plain. With long legs outstretched and muscles relaxed, he lay as still as if asleep, his eyes on its glowing disk. He knew all that science had discovered or guessed about the moon’s character and history. But it had companioned him on so many a silent ride across long miles of dimly gleaming plain, and on so many nights like this as he lay upon the earth it had gathered his thoughts into its great white bosom, that he could not imageit to himself as a mere dead and barren satellite of the earth. More easily could he understand how the living Cynthia had once leaped earthward and been welcomed with belief and love.
Conrad’s mind busied itself at first with the play he had just been reading, but presently wandered to his own affairs and the purpose that had been the dominant influence of half his life. He chuckled softly as he remembered the check he had recently received. “I’ve got him on the run,” he thought, “and I’m bound to lay him out sooner or later. Lord, but it will be a satisfaction to face him finally! And he’ll not get the drop on me first, either, unless Providence takes as good care of rascals as they say it does of fools.” He recalled himself now and then to listen to the sounds from the sleeping herd, to the hoof-beats of the horse as the cowboy on watch rode round and round the bunch, and to his voice singing in a lulling monotone. But gradually thought and will and sense sank back toward the verge of that great gulf out of which they spring.
When next he opened his eyes the moon was dropping toward the western horizon, but he had turned in his sleep and its lightwas still upon his face. Lying motionless, Curtis listened to the sounds from the herd, his first thought being that something unusual there must have awakened him. The coyotes were yelping at one another from hill and plain, but through their barking he could hear the snorting sigh of a steer turning in its sleep, the tramp of the horse, and the cowboy’s lullaby. He recognized the voice as that of Peters, who was to have the third watch, and so knew that it must be well on toward morning. He was about to sink into slumber again when his gaze fell upon a small black and white animal nosing among some rocks near by. “Poor little devil! If it wakens any of the boys it will get a taste of hell out of proportion to its sins,” he thought, and decided that he would drive it away before any one else discovered it. But the languor of sleep still held him and not a muscle moved as his eyelids began to droop. Then, through his half-shut eyes, he became conscious that something was moving, over against one of the houses, among the shadows. His eyelids lifted again and he saw the Mexican rise out of his blanket, look about, and in a crouching posture move stealthily toward him. Something in his hand glittered in the moonlight.
“It’s José,” thought Conrad. “He’s coming for the skunk with a can of oil. Quick, or I’ll be too late!” He sprang to a sitting posture and flung out one arm. As he did so he noticed with sleepy surprise that José was not facing toward the animal but was coming toward him. Then, before he had time to speak, the Mexican turned, a flying something shone in the moonlight like an electric flash, and Conrad’s eyes, following the gleam, saw the little creature pinned to the ground with a long knife through its neck and the gray sand darkening with its blood.
“Why, José, that was a wonderful throw!” he exclaimed.
“Yes, señor,” the man replied quietly, as he stooped to draw out the knife and wipe it on the sand, “I am rather good at that sort of thing.”
Curtis Conrad rode to the farther side of a hill sloping gently northeast of the houses as the outfit was getting under way the next morning. He remembered having seen there a rather uncommon species of cactus, and he thought to make sure of it in order to secure a specimen for Lucy Bancroft’s collection when next he should pass that way on a homeward trip. José Gonzalez noted his action and presently, when a steer broke wildly from the herd and ran back, it was José who dashed after it. But, instead of heading it off and driving it back, he so manœuvred that he contrived to get it around the hill behind which he had seen Conrad disappear. The superintendent was digging busily in the ground with his pocket-knife, having decided to take up the plant and leave it in the house in readiness for his return journey.
Assured that the rest of the outfit was out of sight beyond the hill, Gonzalez left the steer to its own devices and galloped straight toward and behind the kneeling figure, his long knife drawn but concealed against his leg. Conrad’s attention was engrossed in what he was doing and his thoughts were all of Lucy Bancroft, of how pleased she would be to get this rare specimen, and of how necessary it would be for him to help her plant it. José checked his horse into a walk and leaned forward, his eyes fastened on the other’s back, his knife lying half hidden in his palm. On the soft ground the hoof-beats of the horse made little sound and their faint, unresounding thud was masked by the noises from the moving herd.
Gonzalez drew rein within a few yards of his object and lifted his arm, with the knife balanced in his hand. At that instant the steer bellowed, and Curtis leaped to his feet, on the alert at once lest something had gone wrong with the herd. He saw the single steer and, wheeling around to look for others, his glance took in the Mexican, swerving his horse down the hill and deftly returning the knife to his belt. “Are you after the steer, José?” he called. “Is that the only one loose?”
“Yes, señor. The rest are all right. This one has given me a chase, but I’ll have him back right away.”
“Stop a minute, José. Would you mind letting me use your knife? Mine’s too short and I haven’t anything else.”
Gonzalez rode up, dismounted, and held out the knife with a courteous smile. As he stood back with one leg forward, arms folded, and head held high, Curtis thought him an image of dashing, picturesque, masculine comeliness. “José,” he said, “how did you get such skill in throwing the knife? I never saw anybody do the trick better than you did it last night. I shouldn’t like to have you,” and he smiled as he returned the weapon, “aim this thing at me as you did at that polecat.”
An answering smile flashed over José’s dark face, lighting up his eyes and showing a row of white teeth beneath his moustache. “I have practised it much, señor. It is not easy.”
The next day, Conrad, Gonzalez, and several others were getting together some cattle in the foot-hills when three of the largest steers broke away and raced wildly back toward their grazing grounds. The superintendentcalled the Mexican to help him, and told the others to take the remainder of the cattle, with all they might find on the way, back to the day herd.
Two gallant figures they made as they galloped across the plain, the wind blowing up the wide brims of their hats, the grace and freedom of strength and skill in every movement of body and limb. Lariats were at their saddle horns, and Curtis carried a six-shooter in his belt, but Gonzalez had only his knife, thrust into his boot leg. They circled and headed off the steers, which eluded and dashed past them again and again, until presently Conrad noticed that the largest of the three acted as a sort of leader. “Rope him, José,” he called, “and then we can manage the others.”
As Gonzalez in response came galloping toward the animal from one side, Curtis rushed past it on the other to prevent it from getting away and giving another chase. He glanced at the loop that came whirring through the air and his heart gave a bound of vexation. “The fool greaser is throwing too far,” he muttered. With an instinct of sudden peril he dug in his spurs and his horse made a quick, long leap. He whirled aboutin time to see the snakey noose fall on the spot whence they had jumped.
“What’s the matter with you, José?” he shouted. “You nearly roped me instead of the steer! Try it again.” Gonzalez coiled his rope and galloped after the steer and half an hour later the two men rode into the round-up, driving the panting and humbled animals.
One of the younger and less experienced men, Billy Black, generally known as “Billy Kid,” happened to lame his horse and bruise himself that day, and was ordered to stay in camp to nurse his knee. At Rock Springs, where they made camp next day, a man who gave his name as Andy Miller rode up and asked for a job. He explained that he had been working on a little ranch over toward Randall but had got tired of the place and was pushing for the railroad. Hampered by Billy Black’s accident, Conrad was glad of the opportunity and tested his skill with horse and rope.
“You’ll do,” he said. “I’m short of hands, and you can stay with us until we get to the railroad if you like.”
The new man was stockily built, and looked strong and agile. Around the campfire thatnight he won his way at once into the good graces of the other men, cracking jokes, telling stories, and roaring out cowboy songs until bedtime. They were so hilarious that Conrad joined their circle, smoked his after-supper pipe with them, and laughed at Miller’s jokes and yarns.
The Rock Springs watering-hole was in a hilly region, broken here and there by stony gulches. The outflow from the springs ran through a ravine which furrowed the hillside to its foot, turned abruptly westward, and widened out into a goodly pool, where the cattle waded and drank. The camp lay on the hillside above the springs, and the cattle were bunched over its brow on the other side.
Conrad wakened early and an inviting image came to him of that pool, lying still and clear in the dim gray light, untroubled by the miring hoofs of the cattle. No one else, except the Chinese cook, busy with his breakfast fire, seemed to be awake, and no one stirred as Curtis moved down the hill, past the springs, and over the rise beyond. But Gonzalez, motionless in his blanket, watched his departure. And presently, when the cook had disappeared in the chuck-wagon, José rose, cast a cautious glance over the sleeping camp,and followed Conrad, taking advantage of occasional boulders, clumps of mesquite, greasewood, and yucca to conceal his movements. At the springs he turned down the gulch, following its course to the basin of the drinking hole, where he hid behind a great boulder, barely ten feet from the bank where lay the other’s clothing.
With wary eyes he watched while the superintendent waded out to the deepest part of the pool, ducked and splashed, swam a little, and presently returned to the shore. Through the brightening air the lean and sinewy body with its swelling muscles gleamed like rose-tinted marble below the tanned face and neck. Behind the boulder José crouched closer and drew the knife from his belt, while his body grew tense as he watched Conrad rub himself down and put on his clothes.
“Will he never keep still a second?” Gonzalez asked himself impatiently, as he poised his knife. Curtis sat down on a flat stone and reached for his shoes and stockings, whistling a gay little melody from the last comic opera he had heard in San Francisco.
A sound of shouting and the muffled noise of rushing cattle broke through the morning air, which had been as still and untroubledas the surface of the pool. Conrad, his music silenced and nerves alert, faced quickly toward the camp, turning his body from the waist upward and giving Gonzalez a fair three-quarters view of his torso.
The Mexican, ready and waiting, seized an instant of arrested motion, and sent the poised weapon straight for his heart. As it left José’s hand, the stone on which Curtis sat, yielding to the twisting motion of his body, slipped under him, and he threw out his left arm to preserve his balance. He was aware of something bright cleaving the air, of a sudden pain in his arm, and a stinging point in his side. But before his brain could realize what had happened, he saw José Gonzalez leap from behind the boulder and rush toward him, befouling the air with a string of Spanish oaths.
Conrad sprang to his feet and wheeled, with right fist ready to meet the attack, before José could reach him. The Mexican flew at him with both arms outstretched, meaning to seize his throat and throttle him before he could comprehend his danger. Curtis saw the open guard and landed a blow on his chest which sent him staggering backward. But he returned at once, with left arm raisedin defence and right hand ready to seize the other’s shirt collar and choke him senseless.
For a moment only was Conrad at a disadvantage by reason of the suddenness of the assault. But with the knife still bedded in his bleeding and helpless left arm, his only weapon was his right fist, which he must use for both defence and attack. The Mexican’s eyes were fired with the passion of combat, and the other, ignorant of why they were fighting, knew only, by his blanched face and set jaws, that his purpose was deadly.
Gonzalez, after that first blow upon his chest, was wary. He danced around Conrad, making feints and trying to get inside his guard. But Curtis, whose brain was working in lightning-like flashes, did not waste his strength pounding the air. He kept his assailant eluding his feints and jumping to escape pretended charges, thinking to wear him out in that way. He soon saw that he was the superior in boxing skill, as well as being both taller and heavier than his foe, and he began to feel assured of final victory, notwithstanding his useless hand and disabled arm.
José’s effort was constantly toward Conrad’s left side, and Curtis guessed that he wastrying to get possession of the knife still sticking in his arm. He knew that if Gonzalez recovered that weapon his chance of life would be small indeed. His bare feet were bleeding from the sharp little stones on the bank of the pool, but he was conscious neither of that nor of pain in arm or side, though the blood from his wound was making a red streak down his shirt and trousers. But he continued to hear, with a kind of divided consciousness, the sound of shouts, the rushing of cattle, and the hoofs of galloping horses. In the back of his brain he knew that there had been a stampede of the herd, and with attention absorbed in his fight for life, the thought that he was needed at the camp spurred him on to more desperate effort.
José made a dash for his left side, but Curtis turned and with all his force sent a blow which caught the Mexican, intent on the knife, with shoulder unguarded. Gonzalez spun half round and reeled backward. Conrad had planted one foot on a rounding stone, and as he delivered the blow it slipped and sent him headlong. He was up again in an instant, barely in time to save himself from José’s fingers, which clutched at his throat. But Gonzalez had got inside his guard andthey gripped, the one with one arm and the other with two, for what each felt must be the final struggle. The American caught José’s left arm between their two bodies and, reaching around him, grasped the other wrist in his right hand. They swayed back and forth, José exerting all the strength of his muscles to free his arms, while Conrad, gripping him close, used all the remnant of his strength to throw him down.
By this time the Mexican’s eyes were gleaming with an ugly light and his olive cheeks were flushed with anger. Whatever the purpose that had moved him at first, Curtis saw that he was fighting now with the aboriginal rage of conflict, with the fierce hate born of the blows he had received. He kicked wildly at the superintendent’s shins and accidentally planted the heel of his boot squarely upon the other’s bare foot. Conrad’s face twitched with the hurt, and with a snarling grin Gonzalez lifted the other for similar purpose, forgetting shrewd tactics of battle in the lust of giving pain to his opponent. But Curtis caught the momentary advantage of unstable balance and with a twist and a lunge they came down together, Conrad’s left shoulder striking against a stone beside whichthe Mexican fell. Thrilling with the surety of triumph, his enemy pinned to the ground, Curtis was barely conscious of a snapping in his shoulder and a sharp pain in his collar bone. With one knee on Gonzalez’s chest, he pulled the knife from his left arm, broke it across the boulder, and threw the bloodstained pieces far out into the pond. His assailant was at his mercy now and the heat and anger of combat ebbed from his veins as he looked down at the Mexican’s unresisting figure.
“You have bested me this time, Don Curtis,” said Gonzalez quietly.
“Get up, José,” replied Conrad rising, and the two men, panting from their conflict, faced each other. José stood with his arms folded and head erect and looked at his employer with unafraid eyes, in which smouldered only the traces of his recent rage. Conrad surveyed him thoughtfully for a moment before he spoke.
“José, what did you do it for?”
The Mexican smiled but made no reply.
“Have you got anything against me?” Conrad persisted. “Do you think I’ve mistreated you or injured you in any way?”
“No, señor, I have nothing against you.”
“Then what—by God, are you one of Dell Baxter’s thugs? Has he sent you down here to stick me in the back?” Impelled by the flash of sudden conviction, Conrad thrust his face close to the other’s and glared into his eyes. Gonzalez stepped back a pace and looked gravely across the hill at the reddening sky. His composed face and closely shut lips showed that he did not intend to answer.
“Oh, all right!” Curtis exclaimed. “I don’t expect you to peach on your pal. But I reckon I’ve sure struck the right trail this time. And look here, José! Was it me you were after when you stuck your knife in that skunk?”
The Mexican’s eyes fell and his black brows met in a frown. He was thinking how much trouble this man had given him by springing up so unexpectedly that night. But for that it would all have been so easy and simple!
“I reckon it was!” Conrad went on hotly. “And I reckon it was me instead of the steer you rode after the next morning, with your knife ready when I looked up. And I reckon it was me instead of the steer you tried to rope when you made that remarkable miss. I’ve been a fool to trust a damned greaser, even when he was in plain sight. But lookhere, José Gonzalez!” Conrad stopped and glared into the Mexican’s sombre and inscrutable eyes. Holding his bleeding left arm in his right hand he leaned forward, head thrust out and eyes blazing.
“Just you look here, José Gonzalez!” he repeated. “I’m onto your little game now, and if I can’t be a match for any greaser that ever tried to stick a man in the back, I’ll deserve all I’ll get! Just come on and try it again whenever you like! Keep at work with the round-up if you want to—I’m not going to give you your time for this. But I am going to write to Dell Baxter that I’m onto his scheme and that the minute you make another crack at me there’ll be a bullet in your brain—and another in his as soon as I can get to Santa Fe to put it there, and that he’d better call you off if he wants to save his own skin. But if you can get me without my catching on first you’re welcome, that’s all!”
The rush of running cattle swept across their preoccupied ears, and both men turned to see a dozen steers sweep past the other end of the pond and up the hill.
“Quick, José! Help me head them off and turn them into the pond!” Conrad exclaimedas he started off in his bare feet. His long strides covered the distance quickly, and with hoots and yells and waving arm he soon turned their course down the hillside toward the water. Gonzalez was close behind, and together they manœuvred the frightened beasts to the pond, where the animals forgot their panic, waded in quietly, and began to drink.
“José,” said the superintendent, as he sat down at the water’s edge and began to bathe his muddy, bleeding feet, “I shall not mention this affair to any one here. I’ll say that a steer horned me just now. I’ve broken my collar bone, I think, and I’ve got this cut in my arm, and I’ll have to go to Golden at once to get patched up. When I come back I want you to remember what I just told you about getting daylight through your skull if you try any of your tricks on me again. There comes Red Jack after these cattle. Go and help drive them back to camp.”
The shadows of the little rolling hills still sprawled across the intervening valleys when Curtis Conrad started back at a gallop over the road which his outfit had been slowly traversing for four days. To his foreman, Hank Peters, he had said that he had been thrown and gored by a steer and must go to Golden to have his collar bone set, and ordered him to stay where he was, cutting out and branding, that day and night, and camp the day after at Five Cottonwoods, where he would rejoin them.
The men puzzled and gossiped about the accident to their employer. “I don’t see how it was possible,” said Peters, “for such a thing to happen to a man that’s got the boss’s gumption about cow-brutes.”
“None of ’em was on the prod when I got to the pond,” Red Jack declared. “José, you was with him. Did you see the scrimmage?”
“I did not see the boss when he was down,” Gonzalez replied in his precise, slightly accented English. “I was at the spring and heard him yell and I ran down to the pond at once, for I thought he needed help. I stumbled and fell and sprained my shoulder—it hurts me yet—so that when I reached the pond he was on his feet again and trying to drive the cattle into the water. I helped him and then we went back to where his shoes were. That was where Jack saw us. His arm bled a good deal there.”
“Somethin’ happened,” observed Hank Peters, “and if the boss says it was a steer on the prod, I sure reckon it was. But the thing that’s troublin’ me most is what started them critters off. I didn’t see or hear a blamed thing likely to set ’em goin’. Did any of you?”
“I didn’t,” Texas Bill spoke up; “but Andy was there first. Did you see what it was, Andy?”
Andy Miller, the new hand, stopped to draw several deep whiffs from his newly lighted pipe before he replied. “No; I couldn’t make out anything, and I was right at the edge of ’em, too. They jumped andstarted all at once, as crazy as I ever see a bunch of critters.”
“Mebbe you skeered ’em some, they not bein’ used to you,” suggested Billy Kid.
Andy grinned. “Well, I sure ain’t boastin’ none about the beauty of my phiz, but no gal ain’t told me yet that I was ugly enough to stampede a herd of cow-brutes,” and the subject was dropped with the laugh that followed.
Conrad’s mare, larger and of better breed than the cow ponies, put the ground rapidly under her feet throughout the early morning. Though never trained for range work and used only for riding, he always took her on the round-up, in readiness for emergencies. His habit of talking to himself, engendered by much solitary riding, was often varied by one-sided conversations with the mare, and whatever the subject which occupied his thoughts and found fragmentary utterance in speech, his sentences were interspersed with frequent remarks to Brown Betty. Apparently she found this custom as companionable as he did, for she was sure to protest at a long period of silence.
“So, ho, my pretty Brown B.,” said Conrad gently, as he patted the mare’s sleek neck, “that’s the pace to give ’em!” A sharptwinge in his shoulder set his lips together, and an oath, having Congressman Baxter as its objective, came from between his teeth. “I’ll write that damned Baxter a letter,” he broke out savagely, “that will singe his eyelashes when he reads it!”
His thoughts went back to the subject which so frequently occupied them—his lifelong, vengeful quest of the man who had despoiled his father, wrought destruction upon their home, and changed the current of his own life. His heart waxed hot as he recalled his interview with Rutherford Jenkins. Never for an instant had he doubted that Jenkins’s statement was a deliberate lie. Smiling grimly, he stroked the mare’s mane. “I was a fool, wasn’t I, Betty, to suppose I’d get straight goods out of him. It cost me five hundred dollars to find out that he’s a skunk,—which I knew before. I deserved all I got, didn’t I, Betty, for not having more gumption.”
The frontiersman’s caution, which grows almost instinctive in one who rides much alone over plain and mountain, sent his eyes now and again to search the long stretch of road that trailed its faint gray band across the hills behind and before him and to scanthe sun-flooded reach from horizon to horizon. A red stain accentuated the meeting line of sky and plain in the west.
“Betty Brown, do you see that red mark yonder?” he said, gently pulling her ear. “That means a sand-storm, and we’ve got to hike along at a pretty stiff pace while we can. What do you think about it, my lady?” The mare raised her head and gave a little snort. “Smell it, don’t you?” he went on as he patted her approvingly. “Well, that’s where you’re smarter than I am, for I reckon I shan’t be able to do that for another hour.”
He fell silent again, thinking of the Delafield matter and Jenkins’s assertion that Bancroft was Delafield. “He sure knows who Delafield is,” was his conclusion, announced aloud, “but he’s not going to tell. He’s probably blackmailing the man, whoever he is, and he won’t take any chances that would be likely to spoil his income. Well, that proves that Delafield is somebody in New Mexico rich enough and prominent enough to make it worth while for Jenkins to keep his knowledge to himself. I’ve got that much for my five hundred, anyway. Lord, Betty, wasn’t I a tenderfoot!” and he swore under his breath, half angrily, half amusedly, as heturned again to study the road and the plain. The heat haze was rising, and the clear white sunlight was master of earth and sky. Far to one side he noted the silvery lake of a mirage. But the red line had mounted higher, and become a low, dirty-red wall that seemed to fence the western expanse from north to south. “It sure looks like a bad one, Betty, and I’m afraid we shan’t be able to get home to-night after all. But we’ll make Adobe Springs anyway, if it doesn’t catch us too soon.”
The pain in his shoulder brought his mind back to the conviction that Baxter had instigated the assault upon him, and he began searching for the motive. Did the Congressman think his political opposition important enough to make his taking off desirable? Suddenly he slapped his thigh and broke out aloud: “Lord! what if Baxter should be Delafield! He sure ought to be if there’s anything in the eternal fitness of things. If he should be—ah-h,” and he broke off with a hard, unmirthful laugh. Ransacking his memory for all he knew of Baxter’s life he presently shook his head regretfully. “No; the facts are against it. There’s nothing in that lead. It’s a pity, though, for it wouldbe a satisfaction—to say nothing of the public benefit—to knock ’em both off the roost at one pop.” His mind busied itself with conjectures about Delafield’s identity, as he considered first one and then another of the more prominent men in the Territory. He was silent so long that the mare tossed her head impatiently and whinnied. Curtis smiled and stroked her mane.
“Hello, old girl!” he said aloud, “getting lonesome, are you, and you want to be talked to. Oh, you’re spoiled, Betty B., that’s what you are. We’ll go up the hill and see Miss Bancroft, won’t we, Betty, while we’re in Golden; and we’ll take that cactus to her, and help her plant it. And she’ll come out to the fence to see you, Betty; and she’ll give you a lump of sugar, and pat your nose, and look as sweet as a pink rose with brown velvet eyes. She’s a bully fine girl and we like her, don’t we, Betty Brown? The way she sticks by her father is great; he couldn’t help being a first-class fellow, could he, B. B., with such a daughter as that?”
The red wall was rising in the sky, devouring its sunlit blue and spreading out into smoky-red, angry-looking clouds. A high wind, hot and dry, swept across the plainfrom the west. All the cattle within Conrad’s range of vision had turned their heads to the east and, although they were still grazing, moved only in that direction. Seeing a herd of antelope headed the same way, Curtis took the red bandanna from his neck and waved it toward them. As the bright signal floated in the wind their leader turned, stared, and began to walk back, the whole herd following with raised heads and gaze fixed in fascinated interest. He flaunted the red square and they came steadily on, until presently the warning of danger in the hot wind and the odor of the approaching storm overcame the compulsion of curiosity, and they wheeled again, away from the threatened peril.
The small life of the plain was fleeing before the furnace-like breath of those red, surging clouds. Jackrabbits leaped across the road on fleet legs, and occasionally Conrad saw coyotes, singly or in packs, running eastward as for their lives. Fat carrion crows hurried their unwieldy flight and, higher in the air, a frequent lone hawk sailed out of the west, while now and then a road-runner cut across his path with hasting feet.
“It’s going to be a bad one, I guess,” Curtis muttered, jamming his soft hat downcloser on his head. The mare seemed to be trying of her own accord to escape the storm, and her swinging lope was steadily leaving the miles behind. “Keep it up, Betty, keep it up,” he said encouragingly. “I want to reach Adobe Springs and get this message to Baxter off my mind. My shoulder’s aching, old girl, but it ain’t aching a bit more than I am to tell him what I think of him.”
Soon the sand-storm was upon them, concealing the landscape and covering the sky with its clouds. Upon man and beast it beat as bitterly as a sand-blast. It pelted and stung Conrad’s face and neck, and filled his eyes and ears and nostrils until he was forced now and again to pull his hat over his face for a moment’s respite in which to draw a less choking breath. “It looks as if all Arizona had got up and dusted, and was hell-bent to get out of here,” he jested grimly, as he bent over the mare’s neck and encouraged her with voice and gentle stroke. “That shows good sense, Betty, though it’s mighty hard on us. Come right along, old girl; we must get to Adobe Springs.”