"I—I kept your coat," she said, "though I never thought of it—till just now."She was trembling all over, hot and cold by turns, afraid to look up at him, yet immensely proud of him, with a strange, sickening dread. He walked rather dejectedly now, or else bent somewhat from weakness. She stole a quick glance at his face. It was white as a sheet. Suddenly she felt something wet and warm trickle from his arm down into her hand. Blood! She shuddered, but did not lose her hold. After a faintish instant there came a change in her."Are you—hurt?" she asked."I guess—not. I don't know," he said."But the—the blood," she faltered.He held up his hands. His knuckles were bloody and it was impossible to tell whether from injury to them or not. But his left forearm was badly cut."The gun cut me.… And he bit me, too," said Dorn. "I'm sorry you were there.… What a beastly spectacle for you!""Never mind me," she murmured. "I'm all rightnow!… But, oh!—"She broke off eloquently."Was it you who had the cowboys pull me off him? Jake said, as he broke me loose, 'For Miss Lenore's sake!'""It was dad who sent them. But I begged him to.""That was Glidden, the I.W.W. agitator and German agent.… He—just the same as murdered my father.… He burned my wheat—lost my all!""Yes, I—I know, Kurt," whispered Lenore."I meant to kill him!""That was easy to tell.… Oh, thank God, you did not!… Come, don't let us stop." She could not face the piercing, gloomy eyes that went through her."Why should you care?.… Some one will have to kill Glidden.""Oh, do not talk so," she implored. "Surely, now you're glad you did not?""I don't understand myself. But I'm certainly sorry you were there.… There's a beast in men—in me!… I had a gun in my pocket. But do you think I'd have used it?… I wanted to feel his flesh tear, his bones break, his blood spurt—""Kurt!""Yes!… That was the Hun in me!" he declared, in sudden bitter passion."Oh, my friend, do not talk so!" she cried. "You make me—Oh, there isnoHun in you!""Yes, that's what ails me!""There isnot!" she flashed back, roused to passion. "You had been made desperate. You acted as any wronged man! You fought. He tried to kill you. I saw the gun. No one could blame you.… I had my own reason for begging dad to keep you from killing him—a selfish woman's reason!… But I tell you I was so furious—so wrought up—that if it had been any man butyou—he should have killed him!""Lenore, you're beyond my understanding," replied Dorn, with emotion. "But I thank you—for excusing me—for standing up for me.""It was nothing.…Oh, how you bleed!.… Doesn't that hurt?""I've no pain—no feeling at all—except a sort of dying down in me of what must have been hell."They reached the house and went in. No one was there, which fact relieved Lenore."I'm glad mother and the girls won't see you," she said, hurriedly. "Go up to your room. I'll bring bandages."He complied without any comment. Lenore searched for what she needed to treat a wound and ran up-stairs. Dorn was sitting on a chair in his room, holding his arm, from which blood dripped to the floor. He smiled at her."You would be a pretty Red Cross nurse," he said.Lenore placed a bowl of water on the floor and, kneeling beside Dorn, took his arm and began to bathe it. He winced. The blood covered her fingers."My blood on your hands!" he exclaimed, morbidly. "German blood!""Kurt, you're out of your head," retorted Lenore, hotly. "If you dare to say that again I'll—" She broke off."What will you do?"Lenore faltered. What would she do? A revelation must come, sooner or later, and the strain had begun to wear upon her. She was stirred to her depths, and instincts there were leaping. No sweet, gentle, kindly sympathy would avail with this tragic youth. He must be carried by storm. Something of the violence he had shown with Glidden seemed necessary to make him forget himself. All his whole soul must be set in one direction. He could not see that she loved him, when she had looked it, acted it, almost spoken it. His blindness was not to be endured."Kurt Dorn, don't dare to—to say that again!"She ceased bathing his arm, and looked up at him suddenly quite pale."I apologize. I am only bitter," he said. "Don't mind what I say.… It's so good of you—to do this."Then in silence Lenore dressed his wound, and if her heart did beat unwontedly, her fingers were steady and deft. He thanked her, with moody eyes seeing far beyond her."When I lie—over there—with—""If you go!" she interrupted. He was indeed hopeless. "I advise you to rest a little.""I'd like to know what becomes of Glidden," he said."So should I. That worries me.""Weren't there a lot of cowboys with guns?""So many that there's no need for you to go out—and start another fight.""I did start it, didn't I?""You surely did," She left him then, turning in the doorway to ask him please to be quiet and let the day go by without seeking those excited men again. He smiled, but he did not promise.For Lenore the time dragged between dread and suspense. From her window she saw a motley crowd pass down the lane to the main road. No harvesters were working. At the noon meal only her mother and the girls were present. Word had come that the I.W.W. men were being driven from "Many Waters." Mrs. Anderson worried, and Lenore's sisters for once were quiet. All afternoon the house was lifeless. No one came or left. Lenore listened to every little sound. It relieved her that Dorn had remained in his room. Her hope was that the threatened trouble had been averted, but something told her that the worst was yet to come.It was nearly supper-time when she heard the men returning. They came in a body, noisy and loitering, as if reluctant to break away from one another. She heard the horses tramp into the barns and the loud voices of drivers.When she went down-stairs she encountered her father. He looked impressive, triumphant! His effort at evasion did not deceive Lenore. But she realized at once that in this instance she could not get any news from him. He said everything was all right and that I.W.W. men were to be deported from Washington. But he did not want any supper, and he had a low-voiced, significant interview with Dorn. Lenore longed to know what was pending. Dorn's voice, when he said at his door, "Anderson, I'll go!" was ringing, hard, and deadly. It frightened Lenore. Go where? What were they going to do? Lenore thought of the vigilantes her father had organized.Supper-time was an ordeal. Dorn ate a little; then excusing himself, he went back to his room. Lenore got through the meal somehow, and, going outside, she encountered Jake. The moment she questioned him she knew something extraordinary had taken place or was about to take place. She coaxed and entreated. For once Jake was hard to manage. But the more excuses he made, the more he evaded her, the greater became Lenore's need to know. And at last she wore the cowboy out. He could not resist her tears, which began to flow in spite of her."See hyar, Miss Lenore, I reckon you care a heap fer young Dorn—beggin' your pardon?" queried Jake."Care for him!… Jake, I love him.""Then take a hunch from me an' keep him home—with you—to-night.""Does father want Kurt Dorn to go—wherever he's going?""Wal, I should smile! Your dad likes the way Dorn handles I.W.W.'s," replied Jake, significantly."Vigilantes!" whispered Lenore.CHAPTER XXLenore waited for Kurt, and stood half concealed behind the curtains. It had dawned upon her that she had an ordeal at hand. Her heart palpitated. She heard his quick step on the stairs. She called before she showed herself."Hello!… Oh, but you startled me!" he exclaimed. He had been surprised, too, at the abrupt meeting. Certainly he had not been thinking of her. His pale, determined face attested to stern and excitable thought.He halted before her."Where are you going?" asked Lenore."To see your father.""What about?""It's rather important," he replied, with hesitation."Will it take long?"He showed embarrassment. "I—He—We'll be occupied 'most all evening.""Indeed!… Very well. If you'd rather be—occupied—than spend the evening with me!" Lenore turned away, affecting a disdainful and hurt manner."Lenore, it's not that," he burst out. "I—I'd rather spend an evening with you than anybody else—or do anything.""That's very easy to say, Mr. Dorn," she returned, lightly."But it's true," he protested."Come out of the hall. Father will hear us," she said, and led him into the room. It was not so light in there, but what light there was fell upon his face and left hers in shadow."I've made an—an appointment for to-night," he declared, with difficulty."Can't you break it?" she asked."No. That would lay me open to—to cowardice—perhaps your father's displeasure.""Kurt Dorn, it's brave to give up some things!… And if you go you'll incurmydispleasure.""Go!" he ejaculated, staring at her."Oh, I know!… And I'm—well, not flattered to see you'd rather go hang I.W.W.'s than stay here with me." Lenore did not feel the assurance and composure with which she spoke. She was struggling with her own feelings. She believed that just as soon as she and Kurt understood each other—faced each other without any dissimulation—then she would feel free and strong. If only she could put the situation on a sincere footing! She must work for that. Her difficulty was with a sense of falsity. There was no time to plan. She must change his mind.Her words had made him start."Then you know?" he asked."Of course.""I'm sorry for that," he replied, soberly, as he brushed a hand up through his wet hair."But you will stay home?""No," he returned, shortly, and he looked hard."Kurt, I don't wantyoumixed up with any lynching-bees," she said, earnestly."I'm a citizen of Washington. I'll join the vigilantes. I'm American. I've been ruined by these I.W.W.'s. No man in the West has lost so much! Father—home—land—my great harvest of wheat!… Why shouldn't I go?""There's no reason except—me," she replied, rather unsteadily.He drew himself up, with a deep breath, as if fortifying himself. "That's a mighty good reason.… But you will be kinder if you withdraw your objections.""Can't you conceive of any reason why I—I beg you not to go?""I can't," he replied, staring at her. It seemed that every moment he spent in her presence increased her effect upon him. Lenore felt this, and that buoyed up her failing courage."Kurt, you've made a very distressing—a terrible and horrible blunder," she said, with a desperation that must have seemed something else to him."My heavens! What have I done?" he gasped, his face growing paler. How ready he was to see more catastrophe! It warmed her heart and strengthened her nerve.The moment had come. Even if she did lose her power of speech she still could show him what his blunder was. Nothing in all her life had ever been a hundredth part as hard as this. Yet, as the words formed, her whole heart seemed to be behind them, forcing them out. If only he did not misunderstand!Then she looked directly at him and tried to speak. Her first attempt was inarticulate, her second was a whisper, "Didn't you ever—think I—I might care for you?"It was as if a shock went over him, leaving him trembling. But he did not look as amazed as incredulous. "No, I certainly never did," he said."Well—that's your blunder—for I—I do. You—you never—never—asked me.""You do what—care for me?… What on earth do you mean by that?"Lenore was fighting many emotions now, the one most poignant being a wild desire to escape, which battled with an equally maddening one to hide her face on his breast.Yet she could see how white he had grown—how different. His hands worked convulsively and his eyes pierced her very soul."What should a girl mean—telling she cared?""I don't know. Girls are beyond me," he replied, stubbornly."Indeed that's true. I've felt so far beyond you—I had to come to this.""Lenore," he burst out, hoarsely, "you talk in riddles! You've been so strange, yet so fine, so sweet! And now you say you care for me!… Care?… What does that mean? A word can drive me mad. But I never dared to hope. I love you—love you—love you—my God! you're all I've left to love. I—""Do you think you've a monopoly on all the love in the world?" interrupted Lenore, coming to her real self. His impassioned declaration was all she needed. Her ordeal was over.It seemed as if he could not believe his ears or eyes."Monopoly! World!" he echoed. "Of course I don't. But—""Kurt, I love you just as much as—as you love me.… So there!"Lenore had time for one look at his face before he enveloped her. What a relief to hide her own! It was pressed to his breast very closely. Her eyes shut, and she felt hot tears under the lids. All before her darkened sight seemed confusion, whirling chaos. It seemed that she could not breathe and, strangely, did not need to. How unutterably happy she felt! That was an age-long moment—wonderful for her own relief and gladness—full of changing emotions. Presently Kurt appeared to be coming to some semblance of rationality. He released her from that crushing embrace, but still kept an arm around her while he held her off and looked at her."Lenore, will you kiss me?" he whispered.She could have cried out in sheer delight at the wonder of that whisper in her ear. It had been she who had changed the world for Kurt Dorn."Yes—presently," she replied, with a tremulous little laugh. "Wait till—I get my breath—""I was beside myself—am so yet," he replied, low voiced as if in awe. "I've been lifted to heaven.… It cannot be true. I believe, yet I'll not be sure till you kiss me.… You—Lenore Anderson, this girl of my dreams! Do you love me—is it true?""Yes, Kurt, indeed I do—very dearly," she replied, and turned to look up into his face. It was transfigured. Lenore's heart swelled as a deep and profound emotion waved over her."Please kiss me—then."She lifted her face, flushing scarlet. Their lips met. Then with her head upon his shoulder and her hands closely held she answered the thousand and one questions of a bewildered and exalted lover who could not realize the truth. Lenore laughed at him and eloquently furnished proof of her own obsession, and told him how and why and when it all came about.Not for hours did Kurt come back to actualities. "I forgot about the vigilantes," he exclaimed, suddenly. "It's too late now.… How the time has flown!… Oh, Lenore, thought of other things breaks in, alas!"He kissed her hand and got up. Another change was coming over him. Lenore had long expected the moment when realization would claim his attention. She was prepared."Yes, you forgot your appointment with dad and the vigilantes. You've missed some excitement and violence."His face had grown white again—grave now and troubled. "May I speak to your father?" he asked."Yes," she replied."If I come back from the war—well—not crippled—will you promise to marry me?""Kurt, I promise now."That seemed to shake him. "But, Lenore, it is not fair to you. I don't believe a soldier should bind a girl by marriage or engagement before he goes to war. She should be free.… I want you to be free.""That's for you to say," she replied, softly. "But for my part, I don't want to be free—if you go away to war.""If!… I'm going," he said, with a start. "You don't want to be free? Lenore, would you be engaged to me?""My dear boy, of course I would.… It seems Iam,doesn't it?" she replied, with one of her deep, low laughs.He gazed at her, fascinated, worked upon by overwhelming emotions. "Would you marry me—before I go?""Yes," she flashed.He bent and bowed then under the storm. Stumbling to her, almost on his knees, he brokenly expressed his gratitude, his wonder, his passion, and the terrible temptation that he must resist, which she must help him to resist."Kurt, I love you. I will see things through your eyes, if I must. I want to be a comfort to you, not a source of sorrow.""But, Lenore, what comfort can I find?… To leave you now is going to be horrible!… To part from you now—I don't see how I can."Then Lenore dared to broach the subject so delicate, so momentous."You need not part from me. My father has asked me to try to keep you home. He secured exemption for you. You are more needed here than at the front. You can feed many soldiers. You would be doing your duty—with honor!… You would be a soldier. The government is going to draft young men for farm duty. Why not you? There are many good reasons why you would be better than most young men. Because you know wheat. And wheat is to become the most important thing in the world. No one misjudges your loyalty.… And surely you see that the best service to your country is what you can do best."He sat down beside her, with serious frown and somber eyes. "Lenore, are you asking me not to go to war?""Yes, I am," she replied. "I have thought it all over. I've given up my brother. I'd not ask you to stay home if you were needed at the front as much as here. That question I have had out with my conscience.… Kurt, don't think me a silly, sentimental girl. Events of late have made me a woman."He buried his face in his hands. "That's the most amazing of all—you—Lenore Anderson, my American girl—asking me not to go to war.""But, dear, it is not so amazing. It's reasonable. Your peculiar point of view makes it look different. I am no weak, timid, love-sick girl afraid to let you go!… I've given you good, honorable, patriotic reasons for your exemption from draft. Can you see that?""Yes. I grant all your claims. I know wheat well enough to tell you that if vastly more wheat-raising is not done the world will starve. That would hold good for the United States in forty years without war.""Then if you see my point why are you opposed to it?" she asked."Because I am Kurt Dorn," he replied, bitterly.His tone, his gloom made her shiver. It would take all her intelligence and wit and reason to understand him, and vastly more than that to change him. She thought earnestly. This was to be an ordeal profoundly more difficult than the confession of her love. It was indeed a crisis dwarfing the other she had met. She sensed in him a remarkably strange attitude toward this war, compared with that of her brother or other boys she knew who had gone."Because you are Kurt Dorn," she said, thoughtfully. "It's in the name, then.… But I think it a pretty name—a good name. Have I not consented to accept it as mine—for life?"He could not answer that. Blindly he reached out with a shaking hand, to find hers, to hold it close. Lenore felt the tumult in him. She was shocked. A great tenderness, sweet and motherly, flooded over her."Dearest, in this dark hour—that was so bright a little while ago—you must not keep anything from me," she replied. "I will be true to you. I will crush my selfish hopes. I will be your mother.… tell me why you must go to war because you are Kurt Dorn.""My father was German. He hated this country—yours and mine. He plotted with the I.W.W. He hated your father and wanted to destroy him.… Before he died he realized his crime. For so I take the few words he spoke to Jerry. But all the same he was a traitor to my country. I bear his name. I have German in me.… And by God I'm going to pay!"His deep, passionate tones struck into Lenore's heart. She fought with a rising terror. She was beginning to understand him. How helpless she felt—how she prayed for inspiration—for wisdom!"Pay!… How?" she asked."In the only way possible. I'll see that a Dorn goes to war—who will show his American blood—who will fight and kill—and be killed!"His passion, then, was more than patriotism. It had its springs in the very core of his being. He had, it seemed, a debt that he must pay. But there was more than this in his grim determination. And Lenore divined that it lay hidden in his bitter reference to his German blood. He hated that—doubted himself because of it. She realized now that to keep him from going to war would be to make him doubt his manhood and eventually to despise himself. No longer could she think of persuading him to stay home. She must forget herself. She knew then that she had the power to keep him and she could use it, but she must not do so. This tragic thing was a matter of his soul. But if he went to war with this bitter obsession, with this wrong motive, this passionate desire to spill blood in him that he hated, he would lose his soul. He must be changed. All her love, all her woman's flashing, subtle thought concentrated on this fact. How strange the choice that had been given her! Not only must she relinquish her hope of keeping him home, but she must perhaps go to desperate ends to send him away with a changed spirit. The moment of decision was agony for her."Kurt, this is a terrible hour for both of us," she said, "but, thank Heaven, you have confessed to me. Now I will confess to you.""Confess?… You?… What nonsense!" he exclaimed. But in his surprise he lifted his head from his hands to look at her."When we came in here my mind was made up to make you stay home. Father begged me to do it, and I had my own selfish motive. It was love. Oh, I do love you, Kurt, more than you can dream of!… I justified my resolve. I told you that. But I wanted you. I wanted your love—your presence. I longed for a home with you as husband—master—father to my babies. I dreamed of all. It filled me with terror to think of you going to war. You might be crippled—mangled—murdered.… Oh, my dear, I could not bear the thought!… So I meant to overcome you. I had it all planned. I meant to love you—to beg you—to kiss you—to make you stay—""Lenore, what are you saying?" he cried, in shocked amaze.She flung her arms round his neck. "Oh, I could—I could have kept you!" she answered, low voiced and triumphant. "It fills me with joy.… Tell me I could have kept you—tell me.""Yes. I've no power to resist you. But I might have hated—""Hush!… It's all might have.… I've risen above myself.""Lenore, you distress me. A little while ago you bewildered me with your sweetness and love.… Now—you look like an angel or a goddess.… Oh, to have your face like this—always with me! Yet it distresses me—so terrible in purpose. What are you about to tell me? I see something—""Listen," she broke in. "I meant to make you weak. I implore you now to be strong. You must go to war! But with all my heart and soul I beg you to go with a changed spirit.… You were about to do a terrible thing. You hated the German in you and meant to kill it by violence. You despised the German blood and you meant to spill it. Like a wild man you would have rushed to fight, to stab and beat, to murder—and you would have left your breast open for a bayonet-thrust.… Oh, I know it!… Kurt, you are horribly wrong. That is no way to go to war.… War is a terrible business, but men don't wage it for motives such as yours. We Americans all have different strains of blood—English—French—German. One is as good as another. You are obsessed—you are out of your head on this German question. You must kill that idea—kill it with one bayonet-thrust of sense.… You must go to war as my soldier—with my ideal. Your country has called you to help uphold its honor, its pledged word. You must fight to conquer an enemy who threatens to destroy freedom.… You must be brave, faithful, merciful, clean—an American soldier!… You are only one of a million. You have no personal need for war. You are as good, as fine, as noble as any man—my choice, sir, of all the men in the world!… I am sending you. I am giving you up.… Oh, my darling—you will never know how hard it is!… But go! Your life has been sad. You have lost so much. I feel in my woman's heart what will be—if only you'll change—if you see God in this as I see. Promise me. Love that which you hated. Prove for yourself what I believe. Trust me—promise me… Then—oh, I know God will send you back to me!"He fell upon his knees before her to bury his face in her lap. His whole frame shook. His hands plucked at her dress. A low sob escaped him."Lenore," he whispered, brokenly, "I can't see God in this—for me!… I can't promise!"CHAPTER XXIThirty masked men sat around a long harvest mess-table. Two lanterns furnished light enough to show a bare barnlike structure, the rough-garbed plotters, the grim set of hard lips below the half-masks, and big hands spread out, ready to draw from the hat that was passing.The talk was low and serious. No names were spoken. A heavy man, at the head of the table, said: "We thirty, picked men, represent the country. Let each member here write on his slip of paper his choice of punishment for the I.W.W.'s—death or deportation.…"The members of the band bent their masked faces and wrote in a dead silence. A noiseless wind blew through the place. The lanterns flickered; huge shadows moved on the walls. When the papers had been passed back to the leader he read them."Deportation," he announced. "So much for the I.W.W. men.… Now for the leader.… But before we vote on what to do with Glidden let me read an extract from one of his speeches. This is authentic. It has been furnished by the detective lately active in our interest. Also it has been published. I read it because I want to bring home to you all an issue that goes beyond our own personal fortunes here."Leaning toward the flickering flare of the lantern, the leader read from a slip of paper: "If the militia are sent out here to hinder the I.W.W. we will make it so damned hot for the government that no troops will be able to go to France.… I don't give a damn what this country is fighting for.… I am fighting for the rights of labor.… American soldiers are Uncle Sam's scabs in disguise."The deep, impressive voice ended. The leader's huge fist descended upon the table with a crash. He gazed up and down the rows of sinister masked figures. "Have you anything to say?""No," replied one."Pass the slips," said another.And then a man, evidently on in years, for his hair was gray and he looked bent, got up. "Neighbors," he began "I lived here in the early days. For the last few years I've been apologizing for my home town. I don't want to apologize for it any longer."He sat down. And a current seemed to wave from him around that dark square of figures. The leader cleared his throat as if he had much to say, but he did not speak. Instead he passed the hat. Each man drew forth a slip of paper and wrote upon it. The action was not slow. Presently the hat returned round the table to the leader. He spilled its contents, and with steady hand picked up the first slip of paper."Death!" he read, sonorously, and laid it down to pick up another. Again he spoke that grim word. The third brought forth the same, and likewise the next, and all, until the verdict had been called out thirty times."At daylight we'll meet," boomed out that heavy voice. "Instruct Glidden's guards to make a show of resistance.… We'll hang Glidden to the railroad bridge. Then each of you get your gangs together. Round up all the I.W.W.'s. Drive them to the railroad yard. There we'll put them aboard a railroad train of empty cars. And that train will pass under the bridge where Glidden will be hanging.… We'll escort them out of the country."That August dawn was gray and cool, with gold and pink beginning to break over the dark eastern ranges. The town had not yet awakened. It slept unaware of the stealthy forms passing down the gray road and of the distant hum of motor-cars and trot of hoofs.Glidden's place of confinement was a square warehouse, near the edge of town. Before the improvised jail guards paced up and down, strangely alert.Daylight had just cleared away the gray when a crowd of masked men appeared as if by magic and bore down upon the guards. There was an apparent desperate resistance, but, significantly, no cries or shots. The guards were overpowered and bound.The door of the jail yielded to heavy blows of an ax. In the corner of a dim, bare room groveled Glidden, bound so that he had little use of his body. But he was terribly awake. When six men entered he asked, hoarsely: "What're you—after?… What—you mean?"They jerked him erect. They cut the bonds from his legs. They dragged him out into the light of breaking day.When he saw the masked and armed force he cried: "My God!… What'll you—do with me?"Ghastly, working, sweating, his face betrayed his terror."You're to be hanged by the neck," spoke a heavy, solemn voice.The man would have collapsed but for the strong hands that upheld him."What—for?" he gasped."For I.W.W. crimes—for treason—for speeches no American can stand in days like these." Then this deep-voiced man read to Glidden words of his own."Do you recognize that?"Glidden saw how he had spoken his own doom. "Yes, I said that," he had nerve left to say. "But—I insist on arrest—trial—justice!… I'm no criminal.… I've big interests behind me.… You'll suffer—"A loop of a lasso, slung over his head and jerked tight, choked off his intelligible utterance. But as the silent, ruthless men dragged him away he gave vent to terrible, half-strangled cries.The sun rose red over the fertile valley—over the harvest fields and the pastures and the orchards, and over the many towns that appeared lost in the green and gold of luxuriance.In the harvest districts west of the river all the towns were visited by swift-flying motor-cars that halted long enough for a warning to be shouted to the citizens, "Keep off the streets!"Simultaneously armed forces of men, on foot and on horseback, too numerous to count, appeared in the roads and the harvest fields.They accosted every man they met. If he were recognized or gave proof of an honest identity he was allowed to go; otherwise he was marched along under arrest. These armed forces were thorough in their search, and in the country districts they had an especial interest in likely camping-places, and around old barns and straw-stacks. In the towns they searched every corner that was big enough to hide a man.So it happened that many motley groups of men were driven toward the railroad line, where they were held until a freight-train of empty cattle-cars came along. This train halted long enough to have the I.W.W. contingent driven aboard, with its special armed guard following, and then it proceeded on to the next station. As stations were many, so were the halts, and news of the train with its strange freight flashed ahead. Crowds lined the railroad tracks. Many boys and men in these crowds carried rifles and pistols which they leveled at the I.W.W. prisoners as the train passed. Jeers and taunts and threats accompanied this presentation of guns.Before the last station of that wheat district was reached full three hundred members of the I.W.W., or otherwise suspicious characters, were packed into the open cars. At the last stop the number was greatly augmented, and the armed forces were cut down to the few guards who were to see the I.W.W. deported from the country. Here provisions and drinking-water were put into the cars. And amid a hurrahing roar of thousands the train with its strange load slowly pulled out.It did not at once gather headway. The engine whistled a prolonged blast—a signal or warning not lost on many of its passengers.From the front cars rose shrill cries that alarmed the prisoners in the rear. The reason soon became manifest. Arms pointed and eyes stared at the figure of a man hanging from a rope fastened to the center of a high bridge span under which the engine was about to pass.The figure swayed in the wind. It turned half-way round, disclosing a ghastly, distorted face, and a huge printed placard on the breast, then it turned back again. Slowly the engine drew one car-load after another past the suspended body of the dead man. There were no more cries. All were silent in that slow-moving train. All faces were pale, all eyes transfixed.The placard on the hanged man's breast bore in glaring red a strange message:Last warning. 3-7-77.The figures were the ones used in the frontier days by vigilantes.CHAPTER XXIIA dusty motor-car climbed the long road leading up to the Neuman ranch. It was not far from Wade, a small hamlet of the wheat-growing section, and the slopes of the hills, bare and yellow with waving grain, bore some semblance to the Bend country. Four men—a driver and three cowboys—were in the automobile.A big stone gate marked the entrance to Neuman's ranch. Cars and vehicles lined the roadside. Men were passing in and out. Neuman's home was unpretentious, but his barns and granaries and stock-houses were built on a large scale."Bill, are you goin' in with me after this pard of the Kaiser's?" inquired Jake, leisurely stretching himself as the car halted. He opened the door and stiffly got out. "Gimme a hoss any day fer gittin' places!""Jake, my regard fer your rep as Anderson's foreman makes me want to hug the background," replied Bill. "I've done a hell of a lot these last forty-eight hours.""Wal, I reckon you have, Bill, an' no mistake.… But I was figgerin' on you wantin' to see the fun.""Fun!… Jake, it 'll be fun enough fer me to sit hyar an' smoke in the shade, an' watch fer you to come a-runnin' from thet big German devil.… Pard, they say he's a bad man!""Sure. I know thet. All them Germans is bad.""If the boss hadn't been so dog-gone strict about gun-play I'd love to go with you," responded Bill. "But he didn't give me no orders. You're the whole outfit this round-up.""Bill, you'd have to take orders from me," said Jake, coolly."Sure. Thet's why I come with Andy."The other cowboy, called Andy, manifested uneasiness, and he said: "Aw, now, Jake, you ain't a-goin' to ask me to go in there?… An' me hatin' Germans the way I do!""Nope. I guess I'll order Bill to go in an' fetch Neuman out," replied Jake, complacently, as he made as if to re-enter the car.Bill collapsed in his seat. "Jake," he expostulated, weakly, "this job was given you because of your rep fer deploomacy.… Sure I haven't none of thet.… An' you, Jake, why you're the smoothest an' slickest talker thet ever come to the Northwest."Evidently Jake had a vulnerable point. He straightened up with a little swagger. "Wal, you watch me," he said. "I'll fetch the big Dutchman eatin' out of my hand.… An' say, when we git him in the car an' start back let's scare the daylights out of him.""Thet'd be powerful fine. But how?""You fellers take a hunch from me," replied Jake. And he strode off up the lane toward the ranch-house.Jake had been commissioned to acquaint Neuman with the fact that recent developments demanded his immediate presence at "Many Waters." The cowboy really had a liking for the job, though he pretended not to.Neuman had not yet begun harvesting. There were signs to Jake's experienced eye that the harvest-hands were expected this very day. Jake fancied he knew why the rancher had put off his harvesting. And also he knew that the extra force of harvest-hands would not appear. He was regarded with curiosity by the women members of the Neuman household, and rather enjoyed it. There were several comely girls in evidence. Jake did not look a typical Northwest foreman and laborer. Booted and spurred, with his gun swinging visibly, and his big sombrero and gaudy scarf, he looked exactly what he was, a cowman of the open ranges.His inquiries elicited the fact that Neuman was out in the fields, waiting for the harvest-hands."Wal, if he's expectin' thet outfit of I.W.W.'s he'll never harvest," said Jake, "for some of them is hanged an' the rest run out of the country."Jake did not wait to see the effect of his news. He strode back toward the fields, and with the eye of a farmer he appraised the barns and corrals, and the fields beyond. Neuman raised much wheat, and enough alfalfa to feed his stock. His place was large and valuable, but not comparable to "Many Waters."Out in the wheat-fields were engines with steam already up, with combines and threshers and wagons waiting for the word to start. Jake enjoyed the keen curiosity roused by his approach. Neuman strode out from a group of waiting men. He was huge of build, ruddy-faced and bearded, with deep-set eyes."Are you Neuman?" inquired Jake."That's me," gruffly came the reply."I'm Anderson's foreman. I've been sent over to tell you thet you're wanted pretty bad at 'Many Waters.'"The man stared incredulously. "What?… Who wants me?""Anderson. An' I reckon there's more—though I ain't informed."Neuman rumbled a curse. Amaze dominated him. "Anderson!… Well, I don't want to see him," he replied."I reckon you don't," was the cowboy's cool reply.The rancher looked him up and down. However familiar his type was to Anderson, it was strange to Neuman. The cowboy breathed a potential force. The least significant thing about his appearance was that swinging gun. He seemed cool and easy, with hard, keen eyes. Neuman's face took a shade off color."But I'm going to harvest to-day," he said. "I'm late. I've a hundred hands coming.""Nope. You haven't none comin'," asserted Jake."What!" ejaculated Neuman."Reckon it's near ten o'clock," said the cowboy. "We run over here powerful fast.""Yes, it's near ten," bellowed Neuman, on the verge of a rage.… "I haven't harvest-hands coming!… What's this talk?""Wal, about nine-thirty I seen all your damned I.W.W.'s, except what was shot an' hanged, loaded in a cattlecar an' started out of the country."A blow could not have hit harder than the cowboy's biting speech. Astonishment and fear shook Neuman before he recovered control of himself."If it's true, what's that to me?" he bluffed, in hoarse accents."Neuman, I didn't come to answer questions," said the cowboy, curtly. "My boss jest sent me fer you, an' if you bucked on comin', then I was to say it was your only chance to avoid publicity an' bein' run out of the country."Neuman was livid of face now and shaking all over his huge frame."Anderson threatens me!" he shouted. "Anderson suspicions me!…Gott in Himmel!… Me he always cheated! An' now he insults—""Say, it ain't healthy to talk like thet about my boss," interrupted Jake, forcibly. "An' we're wastin' time. If you don't go with me we'll be comin' back—the whole outfit of us!… Anderson means you're to face his man!""What man?""Dorn. Young Dorn, son of old Chris Dorn of the Bend.… Dorn has some things to tell you thet you won't want made public.… Anderson's givin' you a square deal. If it wasn't fer thet I'd sling my gun on you!… Do you git my hunch?"The name of Dorn made a slack figure of the aggressive Neuman."All right—I go," he said, gruffly, and without a word to his men he started off.Jake followed him. Neuman made a short cut to the gate, thus avoiding a meeting with any of his family. At the road, however, some men observed him and called in surprise, but he waved them back."Bill, you an' Andy collect yourselves an' give Mr. Neuman a seat," said Jake, as he opened the door to allow the farmer to enter.The two cowboys gave Neuman the whole of the back seat, and they occupied the smaller side seats. Jake took his place beside the driver."Burn her up!" was his order.The speed of the car made conversation impossible until the limits of a town necessitated slowing down. Then the cowboys talked. For all the attention they paid to Neuman, he might as well not have been present. Before long the driver turned into a road that followed a railroad track for several miles and then crossed it to enter a good-sized town. The streets were crowded with people and the car had to be driven slowly. At this juncture Jake suggested."Let's go down by the bridge.""Sure," agreed his allies.Then the driver turned down a still more peopled street that sloped a little and evidently overlooked the railroad tracks. Presently they came in sight of a railroad bridge, around which there appeared to be an excited yet awestruck throng. All faces were turned up toward the swaying form of a man hanging by a rope tied to the high span of the bridge."Wal, Glidden's hangin' there yet," remarked Jake, cheerfully.With a violent start Neuman looked out to see the ghastly placarded figure, and then he sank slowly back in his seat. The cowboys apparently took no notice of him. They seemed to have forgotten his presence."Funny they'd cut all the other I.W.W.'s down an' leave Glidden hangin' there," observed Bill."Them vigilantes sure did it up brown," added Andy. "I was dyin' to join the band. But they didn't ask me.""Nor me," replied Jake, regretfully. "An' I can't understand why, onless it was they was afeared I couldn't keep a secret.""Who is them vigilantes, anyhow?" asked Bill, curiously."Wal, I reckon nobody knows. But I seen a thousand armed men this mornin'. They sure looked bad. You ought to have seen them poke the I.W.W.'s with cocked guns.""Was any one shot?" queried Andy."Not in the daytime. Nobody killed by this Citizens' Protective League, as they call themselves. They just rounded up all the suspicious men an' herded them on to thet cattle-train an' carried them off. It was at night when the vigilantes worked—masked an' secret an' sure bloody. Jest like the old vigilante days! … An' you can gamble they ain't through yet.""Uncle Sam won't need to send any soldiers here.""Wal, I should smile not. Thet'd be a disgrace to the Northwest. It was a bad time fer the I.W.W. to try any tricks on us."Jake shook his lean head and his jaw bulged. He might have been haranguing, cowboy-like, for the benefit of the man they feigned not to notice, but it was plain, nevertheless, that he was angry."What gits me wuss 'n them I.W.W.'s is the skunks thet give Uncle Sam the double-cross," said Andy, with dark face. "I'll stand fer any man an' respect him if he's aboveboard an' makes his fight in the open. But them coyotes thet live off the land an' pretend to be American when they ain't—they make me pisen mad.""I heerd the vigilantes has marked men like thet," observed Bill."I'll give you a hunch, fellers," replied Jake, grimly. "By Gawd! the West won't stand fer traitors!"All the way to "Many Waters," where it was possible to talk and be heard, the cowboys continued in like strain. And not until the driver halted the car before Anderson's door did they manifest any awareness of Neuman."Git out an' come in," said Jake to the pallid, sweating rancher.He led Neuman into the hall and knocked upon Anderson's study door. It was opened by Dorn."Wal, hyar we are," announced Jake, and his very nonchalance attested to pride.Anderson was standing beside his desk. He started, and his hand flashed back significantly as he sighted his rival and enemy."No gun-play, boss, was your orders," said Jake. "An' Neuman ain't packin' no gun."It was plain that Anderson made a great effort at restraint. But he failed. And perhaps the realization that he could not kill this man liberated his passion. Then the two big ranchers faced each other—Neuman livid and shaking, Anderson black as a thunder-cloud."Neuman, you hatched up a plot with Glidden to kill me," said Anderson, bitterly.Neuman, in hoarse, brief answer, denied it."Sure! Deny it. What do we care? … We've got you, Neuman," burst out Anderson, his heavy voice ringing with passion. "But it's not your low-down plot thet's r'iled me. There's been a good many men who've tried to do away with me. I've outplayed you in many a deal. So your personal hate for me doesn't count. I'm sore—an' you an' me can't live in the same place, because you're a damned traitor. You've lived here for twenty years. You've grown rich off the country. An' you'd sell us to your rotten Germany. What I think of you for that I'm goin' to tell you."Anderson paused to take a deep breath. Then he began to curse Neuman. All the rough years of his frontier life, as well as the quieter ones of his ranching days, found expression in the swift, thunderous roll of his terrible scorn. Every vile name that had ever been used by cowboy, outlaw, gambler, leaped to Anderson's stinging tongue. All the keen, hard epithets common to the modern day he flung into Neuman's face. And he ended with a profanity that was as individual in character as its delivery was intense."I'm callin' you for my own relief," he concluded, "an' not that I expect to get under your hide."Then he paused. He wiped the beaded drops from his forehead, and he coughed and shook himself. His big fists unclosed. Passion gave place to dignity."Neuman, it's a pity you an' men like you can't see the truth. That's the mystery to me—why any one who had spent half a lifetime an' prospered here in our happy an' beautiful country could ever hate it. I never will understand that. But I do understand that America will never harbor such men for long. You have your reasons, I reckon. An' no doubt you think you're justified. That's the tragedy. You run off from hard-ruled Germany. You will not live there of your own choice. You succeed here an' live in peace an' plenty.… An', by God! you take up with a lot of foreign riffraff an' double-cross the people you owe so much!… What's wrong with your mind?… Think it over.… An' that's the last word I have for you."Anderson, turning to his desk, took up a cigar and lighted it. He was calm again. There was really sadness where his face had shown only fury. Then he addressed Dorn."Kurt, it's up to you now," he said. "As my superintendent an' some-day partner, what you'll say goes with me.… I don't know what bein' square would mean in relation to this man."Anderson sat down heavily in his desk chair and his face became obscured in cigar smoke."Neuman, do you recognize me?" asked Dorn, with his flashing eyes on the rancher."No," replied Neuman."I'm Chris Dorn's son. My father died a few days ago. He overtaxed his heart fighting fire in the wheat … Fire set by I.W.W. men. Glidden's men! … They burned our wheat. Ruined us!"Neuman showed shock at the news, at the sudden death of an old friend, but he did not express himself in words."Do you deny implication in Glidden's plot to kill Anderson?" demanded Dorn."Yes," replied Neuman."Well, you're a liar!" retorted Dorn. "I saw you with Glidden and my father. I followed you at Wheatly—out along the railroad tracks. I slipped up and heard the plot. It was I who snatched the money from my father."Neuman's nerve was gone, but with his stupid and stubborn process of thought he still denied, stuttering incoherently."Glidden has been hanged," went on Dorn. "A vigilante band has been organized here in the valley. Men of your known sympathy will not be safe, irrespective of your plot against Anderson. But as to that, publicity alone will be enough to ruin you.… Americans of the West will not tolerate traitors.… Now the question you've got to decide is this. Will you take the risks or will you sell out and leave the country?""I'll sell out," replied Neuman."What price do you put on your ranch as it stands?""One hundred thousand dollars."Dorn turned to Anderson and asked, "Is it worth that much?""No. Seventy-five thousand would be a big price," replied the rancher."Neuman, we will give you seventy-five thousand for your holdings. Do you accept?""I have no choice," replied Neuman, sullenly."Choice!" exclaimed Dorn. "Yes, you have. And you're not being cheated. I've stated facts. You are done in this valley. You're ruinednow!And Glidden's fate stares you in the face.… Will you sell and leave the country?""Yes," came the deep reply, wrenched from a stubborn breast."Go draw up your deeds, then notify us," said Dorn, with finality.Jake opened the door. Stolidly and slowly Neuman went out, precisely as he had entered, like a huge man in conflict with unintelligible thoughts."Send him home in the car," called Anderson.
"I—I kept your coat," she said, "though I never thought of it—till just now."
She was trembling all over, hot and cold by turns, afraid to look up at him, yet immensely proud of him, with a strange, sickening dread. He walked rather dejectedly now, or else bent somewhat from weakness. She stole a quick glance at his face. It was white as a sheet. Suddenly she felt something wet and warm trickle from his arm down into her hand. Blood! She shuddered, but did not lose her hold. After a faintish instant there came a change in her.
"Are you—hurt?" she asked.
"I guess—not. I don't know," he said.
"But the—the blood," she faltered.
He held up his hands. His knuckles were bloody and it was impossible to tell whether from injury to them or not. But his left forearm was badly cut.
"The gun cut me.… And he bit me, too," said Dorn. "I'm sorry you were there.… What a beastly spectacle for you!"
"Never mind me," she murmured. "I'm all rightnow!… But, oh!—"
She broke off eloquently.
"Was it you who had the cowboys pull me off him? Jake said, as he broke me loose, 'For Miss Lenore's sake!'"
"It was dad who sent them. But I begged him to."
"That was Glidden, the I.W.W. agitator and German agent.… He—just the same as murdered my father.… He burned my wheat—lost my all!"
"Yes, I—I know, Kurt," whispered Lenore.
"I meant to kill him!"
"That was easy to tell.… Oh, thank God, you did not!… Come, don't let us stop." She could not face the piercing, gloomy eyes that went through her.
"Why should you care?.… Some one will have to kill Glidden."
"Oh, do not talk so," she implored. "Surely, now you're glad you did not?"
"I don't understand myself. But I'm certainly sorry you were there.… There's a beast in men—in me!… I had a gun in my pocket. But do you think I'd have used it?… I wanted to feel his flesh tear, his bones break, his blood spurt—"
"Kurt!"
"Yes!… That was the Hun in me!" he declared, in sudden bitter passion.
"Oh, my friend, do not talk so!" she cried. "You make me—Oh, there isnoHun in you!"
"Yes, that's what ails me!"
"There isnot!" she flashed back, roused to passion. "You had been made desperate. You acted as any wronged man! You fought. He tried to kill you. I saw the gun. No one could blame you.… I had my own reason for begging dad to keep you from killing him—a selfish woman's reason!… But I tell you I was so furious—so wrought up—that if it had been any man butyou—he should have killed him!"
"Lenore, you're beyond my understanding," replied Dorn, with emotion. "But I thank you—for excusing me—for standing up for me."
"It was nothing.…Oh, how you bleed!.… Doesn't that hurt?"
"I've no pain—no feeling at all—except a sort of dying down in me of what must have been hell."
They reached the house and went in. No one was there, which fact relieved Lenore.
"I'm glad mother and the girls won't see you," she said, hurriedly. "Go up to your room. I'll bring bandages."
He complied without any comment. Lenore searched for what she needed to treat a wound and ran up-stairs. Dorn was sitting on a chair in his room, holding his arm, from which blood dripped to the floor. He smiled at her.
"You would be a pretty Red Cross nurse," he said.
Lenore placed a bowl of water on the floor and, kneeling beside Dorn, took his arm and began to bathe it. He winced. The blood covered her fingers.
"My blood on your hands!" he exclaimed, morbidly. "German blood!"
"Kurt, you're out of your head," retorted Lenore, hotly. "If you dare to say that again I'll—" She broke off.
"What will you do?"
Lenore faltered. What would she do? A revelation must come, sooner or later, and the strain had begun to wear upon her. She was stirred to her depths, and instincts there were leaping. No sweet, gentle, kindly sympathy would avail with this tragic youth. He must be carried by storm. Something of the violence he had shown with Glidden seemed necessary to make him forget himself. All his whole soul must be set in one direction. He could not see that she loved him, when she had looked it, acted it, almost spoken it. His blindness was not to be endured.
"Kurt Dorn, don't dare to—to say that again!"
She ceased bathing his arm, and looked up at him suddenly quite pale.
"I apologize. I am only bitter," he said. "Don't mind what I say.… It's so good of you—to do this."
Then in silence Lenore dressed his wound, and if her heart did beat unwontedly, her fingers were steady and deft. He thanked her, with moody eyes seeing far beyond her.
"When I lie—over there—with—"
"If you go!" she interrupted. He was indeed hopeless. "I advise you to rest a little."
"I'd like to know what becomes of Glidden," he said.
"So should I. That worries me."
"Weren't there a lot of cowboys with guns?"
"So many that there's no need for you to go out—and start another fight."
"I did start it, didn't I?"
"You surely did," She left him then, turning in the doorway to ask him please to be quiet and let the day go by without seeking those excited men again. He smiled, but he did not promise.
For Lenore the time dragged between dread and suspense. From her window she saw a motley crowd pass down the lane to the main road. No harvesters were working. At the noon meal only her mother and the girls were present. Word had come that the I.W.W. men were being driven from "Many Waters." Mrs. Anderson worried, and Lenore's sisters for once were quiet. All afternoon the house was lifeless. No one came or left. Lenore listened to every little sound. It relieved her that Dorn had remained in his room. Her hope was that the threatened trouble had been averted, but something told her that the worst was yet to come.
It was nearly supper-time when she heard the men returning. They came in a body, noisy and loitering, as if reluctant to break away from one another. She heard the horses tramp into the barns and the loud voices of drivers.
When she went down-stairs she encountered her father. He looked impressive, triumphant! His effort at evasion did not deceive Lenore. But she realized at once that in this instance she could not get any news from him. He said everything was all right and that I.W.W. men were to be deported from Washington. But he did not want any supper, and he had a low-voiced, significant interview with Dorn. Lenore longed to know what was pending. Dorn's voice, when he said at his door, "Anderson, I'll go!" was ringing, hard, and deadly. It frightened Lenore. Go where? What were they going to do? Lenore thought of the vigilantes her father had organized.
Supper-time was an ordeal. Dorn ate a little; then excusing himself, he went back to his room. Lenore got through the meal somehow, and, going outside, she encountered Jake. The moment she questioned him she knew something extraordinary had taken place or was about to take place. She coaxed and entreated. For once Jake was hard to manage. But the more excuses he made, the more he evaded her, the greater became Lenore's need to know. And at last she wore the cowboy out. He could not resist her tears, which began to flow in spite of her.
"See hyar, Miss Lenore, I reckon you care a heap fer young Dorn—beggin' your pardon?" queried Jake.
"Care for him!… Jake, I love him."
"Then take a hunch from me an' keep him home—with you—to-night."
"Does father want Kurt Dorn to go—wherever he's going?"
"Wal, I should smile! Your dad likes the way Dorn handles I.W.W.'s," replied Jake, significantly.
"Vigilantes!" whispered Lenore.
Lenore waited for Kurt, and stood half concealed behind the curtains. It had dawned upon her that she had an ordeal at hand. Her heart palpitated. She heard his quick step on the stairs. She called before she showed herself.
"Hello!… Oh, but you startled me!" he exclaimed. He had been surprised, too, at the abrupt meeting. Certainly he had not been thinking of her. His pale, determined face attested to stern and excitable thought.
He halted before her.
"Where are you going?" asked Lenore.
"To see your father."
"What about?"
"It's rather important," he replied, with hesitation.
"Will it take long?"
He showed embarrassment. "I—He—We'll be occupied 'most all evening."
"Indeed!… Very well. If you'd rather be—occupied—than spend the evening with me!" Lenore turned away, affecting a disdainful and hurt manner.
"Lenore, it's not that," he burst out. "I—I'd rather spend an evening with you than anybody else—or do anything."
"That's very easy to say, Mr. Dorn," she returned, lightly.
"But it's true," he protested.
"Come out of the hall. Father will hear us," she said, and led him into the room. It was not so light in there, but what light there was fell upon his face and left hers in shadow.
"I've made an—an appointment for to-night," he declared, with difficulty.
"Can't you break it?" she asked.
"No. That would lay me open to—to cowardice—perhaps your father's displeasure."
"Kurt Dorn, it's brave to give up some things!… And if you go you'll incurmydispleasure."
"Go!" he ejaculated, staring at her.
"Oh, I know!… And I'm—well, not flattered to see you'd rather go hang I.W.W.'s than stay here with me." Lenore did not feel the assurance and composure with which she spoke. She was struggling with her own feelings. She believed that just as soon as she and Kurt understood each other—faced each other without any dissimulation—then she would feel free and strong. If only she could put the situation on a sincere footing! She must work for that. Her difficulty was with a sense of falsity. There was no time to plan. She must change his mind.
Her words had made him start.
"Then you know?" he asked.
"Of course."
"I'm sorry for that," he replied, soberly, as he brushed a hand up through his wet hair.
"But you will stay home?"
"No," he returned, shortly, and he looked hard.
"Kurt, I don't wantyoumixed up with any lynching-bees," she said, earnestly.
"I'm a citizen of Washington. I'll join the vigilantes. I'm American. I've been ruined by these I.W.W.'s. No man in the West has lost so much! Father—home—land—my great harvest of wheat!… Why shouldn't I go?"
"There's no reason except—me," she replied, rather unsteadily.
He drew himself up, with a deep breath, as if fortifying himself. "That's a mighty good reason.… But you will be kinder if you withdraw your objections."
"Can't you conceive of any reason why I—I beg you not to go?"
"I can't," he replied, staring at her. It seemed that every moment he spent in her presence increased her effect upon him. Lenore felt this, and that buoyed up her failing courage.
"Kurt, you've made a very distressing—a terrible and horrible blunder," she said, with a desperation that must have seemed something else to him.
"My heavens! What have I done?" he gasped, his face growing paler. How ready he was to see more catastrophe! It warmed her heart and strengthened her nerve.
The moment had come. Even if she did lose her power of speech she still could show him what his blunder was. Nothing in all her life had ever been a hundredth part as hard as this. Yet, as the words formed, her whole heart seemed to be behind them, forcing them out. If only he did not misunderstand!
Then she looked directly at him and tried to speak. Her first attempt was inarticulate, her second was a whisper, "Didn't you ever—think I—I might care for you?"
It was as if a shock went over him, leaving him trembling. But he did not look as amazed as incredulous. "No, I certainly never did," he said.
"Well—that's your blunder—for I—I do. You—you never—never—asked me."
"You do what—care for me?… What on earth do you mean by that?"
Lenore was fighting many emotions now, the one most poignant being a wild desire to escape, which battled with an equally maddening one to hide her face on his breast.
Yet she could see how white he had grown—how different. His hands worked convulsively and his eyes pierced her very soul.
"What should a girl mean—telling she cared?"
"I don't know. Girls are beyond me," he replied, stubbornly.
"Indeed that's true. I've felt so far beyond you—I had to come to this."
"Lenore," he burst out, hoarsely, "you talk in riddles! You've been so strange, yet so fine, so sweet! And now you say you care for me!… Care?… What does that mean? A word can drive me mad. But I never dared to hope. I love you—love you—love you—my God! you're all I've left to love. I—"
"Do you think you've a monopoly on all the love in the world?" interrupted Lenore, coming to her real self. His impassioned declaration was all she needed. Her ordeal was over.
It seemed as if he could not believe his ears or eyes.
"Monopoly! World!" he echoed. "Of course I don't. But—"
"Kurt, I love you just as much as—as you love me.… So there!"
Lenore had time for one look at his face before he enveloped her. What a relief to hide her own! It was pressed to his breast very closely. Her eyes shut, and she felt hot tears under the lids. All before her darkened sight seemed confusion, whirling chaos. It seemed that she could not breathe and, strangely, did not need to. How unutterably happy she felt! That was an age-long moment—wonderful for her own relief and gladness—full of changing emotions. Presently Kurt appeared to be coming to some semblance of rationality. He released her from that crushing embrace, but still kept an arm around her while he held her off and looked at her.
"Lenore, will you kiss me?" he whispered.
She could have cried out in sheer delight at the wonder of that whisper in her ear. It had been she who had changed the world for Kurt Dorn.
"Yes—presently," she replied, with a tremulous little laugh. "Wait till—I get my breath—"
"I was beside myself—am so yet," he replied, low voiced as if in awe. "I've been lifted to heaven.… It cannot be true. I believe, yet I'll not be sure till you kiss me.… You—Lenore Anderson, this girl of my dreams! Do you love me—is it true?"
"Yes, Kurt, indeed I do—very dearly," she replied, and turned to look up into his face. It was transfigured. Lenore's heart swelled as a deep and profound emotion waved over her.
"Please kiss me—then."
She lifted her face, flushing scarlet. Their lips met. Then with her head upon his shoulder and her hands closely held she answered the thousand and one questions of a bewildered and exalted lover who could not realize the truth. Lenore laughed at him and eloquently furnished proof of her own obsession, and told him how and why and when it all came about.
Not for hours did Kurt come back to actualities. "I forgot about the vigilantes," he exclaimed, suddenly. "It's too late now.… How the time has flown!… Oh, Lenore, thought of other things breaks in, alas!"
He kissed her hand and got up. Another change was coming over him. Lenore had long expected the moment when realization would claim his attention. She was prepared.
"Yes, you forgot your appointment with dad and the vigilantes. You've missed some excitement and violence."
His face had grown white again—grave now and troubled. "May I speak to your father?" he asked.
"Yes," she replied.
"If I come back from the war—well—not crippled—will you promise to marry me?"
"Kurt, I promise now."
That seemed to shake him. "But, Lenore, it is not fair to you. I don't believe a soldier should bind a girl by marriage or engagement before he goes to war. She should be free.… I want you to be free."
"That's for you to say," she replied, softly. "But for my part, I don't want to be free—if you go away to war."
"If!… I'm going," he said, with a start. "You don't want to be free? Lenore, would you be engaged to me?"
"My dear boy, of course I would.… It seems Iam,doesn't it?" she replied, with one of her deep, low laughs.
He gazed at her, fascinated, worked upon by overwhelming emotions. "Would you marry me—before I go?"
"Yes," she flashed.
He bent and bowed then under the storm. Stumbling to her, almost on his knees, he brokenly expressed his gratitude, his wonder, his passion, and the terrible temptation that he must resist, which she must help him to resist.
"Kurt, I love you. I will see things through your eyes, if I must. I want to be a comfort to you, not a source of sorrow."
"But, Lenore, what comfort can I find?… To leave you now is going to be horrible!… To part from you now—I don't see how I can."
Then Lenore dared to broach the subject so delicate, so momentous.
"You need not part from me. My father has asked me to try to keep you home. He secured exemption for you. You are more needed here than at the front. You can feed many soldiers. You would be doing your duty—with honor!… You would be a soldier. The government is going to draft young men for farm duty. Why not you? There are many good reasons why you would be better than most young men. Because you know wheat. And wheat is to become the most important thing in the world. No one misjudges your loyalty.… And surely you see that the best service to your country is what you can do best."
He sat down beside her, with serious frown and somber eyes. "Lenore, are you asking me not to go to war?"
"Yes, I am," she replied. "I have thought it all over. I've given up my brother. I'd not ask you to stay home if you were needed at the front as much as here. That question I have had out with my conscience.… Kurt, don't think me a silly, sentimental girl. Events of late have made me a woman."
He buried his face in his hands. "That's the most amazing of all—you—Lenore Anderson, my American girl—asking me not to go to war."
"But, dear, it is not so amazing. It's reasonable. Your peculiar point of view makes it look different. I am no weak, timid, love-sick girl afraid to let you go!… I've given you good, honorable, patriotic reasons for your exemption from draft. Can you see that?"
"Yes. I grant all your claims. I know wheat well enough to tell you that if vastly more wheat-raising is not done the world will starve. That would hold good for the United States in forty years without war."
"Then if you see my point why are you opposed to it?" she asked.
"Because I am Kurt Dorn," he replied, bitterly.
His tone, his gloom made her shiver. It would take all her intelligence and wit and reason to understand him, and vastly more than that to change him. She thought earnestly. This was to be an ordeal profoundly more difficult than the confession of her love. It was indeed a crisis dwarfing the other she had met. She sensed in him a remarkably strange attitude toward this war, compared with that of her brother or other boys she knew who had gone.
"Because you are Kurt Dorn," she said, thoughtfully. "It's in the name, then.… But I think it a pretty name—a good name. Have I not consented to accept it as mine—for life?"
He could not answer that. Blindly he reached out with a shaking hand, to find hers, to hold it close. Lenore felt the tumult in him. She was shocked. A great tenderness, sweet and motherly, flooded over her.
"Dearest, in this dark hour—that was so bright a little while ago—you must not keep anything from me," she replied. "I will be true to you. I will crush my selfish hopes. I will be your mother.… tell me why you must go to war because you are Kurt Dorn."
"My father was German. He hated this country—yours and mine. He plotted with the I.W.W. He hated your father and wanted to destroy him.… Before he died he realized his crime. For so I take the few words he spoke to Jerry. But all the same he was a traitor to my country. I bear his name. I have German in me.… And by God I'm going to pay!"
His deep, passionate tones struck into Lenore's heart. She fought with a rising terror. She was beginning to understand him. How helpless she felt—how she prayed for inspiration—for wisdom!
"Pay!… How?" she asked.
"In the only way possible. I'll see that a Dorn goes to war—who will show his American blood—who will fight and kill—and be killed!"
His passion, then, was more than patriotism. It had its springs in the very core of his being. He had, it seemed, a debt that he must pay. But there was more than this in his grim determination. And Lenore divined that it lay hidden in his bitter reference to his German blood. He hated that—doubted himself because of it. She realized now that to keep him from going to war would be to make him doubt his manhood and eventually to despise himself. No longer could she think of persuading him to stay home. She must forget herself. She knew then that she had the power to keep him and she could use it, but she must not do so. This tragic thing was a matter of his soul. But if he went to war with this bitter obsession, with this wrong motive, this passionate desire to spill blood in him that he hated, he would lose his soul. He must be changed. All her love, all her woman's flashing, subtle thought concentrated on this fact. How strange the choice that had been given her! Not only must she relinquish her hope of keeping him home, but she must perhaps go to desperate ends to send him away with a changed spirit. The moment of decision was agony for her.
"Kurt, this is a terrible hour for both of us," she said, "but, thank Heaven, you have confessed to me. Now I will confess to you."
"Confess?… You?… What nonsense!" he exclaimed. But in his surprise he lifted his head from his hands to look at her.
"When we came in here my mind was made up to make you stay home. Father begged me to do it, and I had my own selfish motive. It was love. Oh, I do love you, Kurt, more than you can dream of!… I justified my resolve. I told you that. But I wanted you. I wanted your love—your presence. I longed for a home with you as husband—master—father to my babies. I dreamed of all. It filled me with terror to think of you going to war. You might be crippled—mangled—murdered.… Oh, my dear, I could not bear the thought!… So I meant to overcome you. I had it all planned. I meant to love you—to beg you—to kiss you—to make you stay—"
"Lenore, what are you saying?" he cried, in shocked amaze.
She flung her arms round his neck. "Oh, I could—I could have kept you!" she answered, low voiced and triumphant. "It fills me with joy.… Tell me I could have kept you—tell me."
"Yes. I've no power to resist you. But I might have hated—"
"Hush!… It's all might have.… I've risen above myself."
"Lenore, you distress me. A little while ago you bewildered me with your sweetness and love.… Now—you look like an angel or a goddess.… Oh, to have your face like this—always with me! Yet it distresses me—so terrible in purpose. What are you about to tell me? I see something—"
"Listen," she broke in. "I meant to make you weak. I implore you now to be strong. You must go to war! But with all my heart and soul I beg you to go with a changed spirit.… You were about to do a terrible thing. You hated the German in you and meant to kill it by violence. You despised the German blood and you meant to spill it. Like a wild man you would have rushed to fight, to stab and beat, to murder—and you would have left your breast open for a bayonet-thrust.… Oh, I know it!… Kurt, you are horribly wrong. That is no way to go to war.… War is a terrible business, but men don't wage it for motives such as yours. We Americans all have different strains of blood—English—French—German. One is as good as another. You are obsessed—you are out of your head on this German question. You must kill that idea—kill it with one bayonet-thrust of sense.… You must go to war as my soldier—with my ideal. Your country has called you to help uphold its honor, its pledged word. You must fight to conquer an enemy who threatens to destroy freedom.… You must be brave, faithful, merciful, clean—an American soldier!… You are only one of a million. You have no personal need for war. You are as good, as fine, as noble as any man—my choice, sir, of all the men in the world!… I am sending you. I am giving you up.… Oh, my darling—you will never know how hard it is!… But go! Your life has been sad. You have lost so much. I feel in my woman's heart what will be—if only you'll change—if you see God in this as I see. Promise me. Love that which you hated. Prove for yourself what I believe. Trust me—promise me… Then—oh, I know God will send you back to me!"
He fell upon his knees before her to bury his face in her lap. His whole frame shook. His hands plucked at her dress. A low sob escaped him.
"Lenore," he whispered, brokenly, "I can't see God in this—for me!… I can't promise!"
Thirty masked men sat around a long harvest mess-table. Two lanterns furnished light enough to show a bare barnlike structure, the rough-garbed plotters, the grim set of hard lips below the half-masks, and big hands spread out, ready to draw from the hat that was passing.
The talk was low and serious. No names were spoken. A heavy man, at the head of the table, said: "We thirty, picked men, represent the country. Let each member here write on his slip of paper his choice of punishment for the I.W.W.'s—death or deportation.…"
The members of the band bent their masked faces and wrote in a dead silence. A noiseless wind blew through the place. The lanterns flickered; huge shadows moved on the walls. When the papers had been passed back to the leader he read them.
"Deportation," he announced. "So much for the I.W.W. men.… Now for the leader.… But before we vote on what to do with Glidden let me read an extract from one of his speeches. This is authentic. It has been furnished by the detective lately active in our interest. Also it has been published. I read it because I want to bring home to you all an issue that goes beyond our own personal fortunes here."
Leaning toward the flickering flare of the lantern, the leader read from a slip of paper: "If the militia are sent out here to hinder the I.W.W. we will make it so damned hot for the government that no troops will be able to go to France.… I don't give a damn what this country is fighting for.… I am fighting for the rights of labor.… American soldiers are Uncle Sam's scabs in disguise."
The deep, impressive voice ended. The leader's huge fist descended upon the table with a crash. He gazed up and down the rows of sinister masked figures. "Have you anything to say?"
"No," replied one.
"Pass the slips," said another.
And then a man, evidently on in years, for his hair was gray and he looked bent, got up. "Neighbors," he began "I lived here in the early days. For the last few years I've been apologizing for my home town. I don't want to apologize for it any longer."
He sat down. And a current seemed to wave from him around that dark square of figures. The leader cleared his throat as if he had much to say, but he did not speak. Instead he passed the hat. Each man drew forth a slip of paper and wrote upon it. The action was not slow. Presently the hat returned round the table to the leader. He spilled its contents, and with steady hand picked up the first slip of paper.
"Death!" he read, sonorously, and laid it down to pick up another. Again he spoke that grim word. The third brought forth the same, and likewise the next, and all, until the verdict had been called out thirty times.
"At daylight we'll meet," boomed out that heavy voice. "Instruct Glidden's guards to make a show of resistance.… We'll hang Glidden to the railroad bridge. Then each of you get your gangs together. Round up all the I.W.W.'s. Drive them to the railroad yard. There we'll put them aboard a railroad train of empty cars. And that train will pass under the bridge where Glidden will be hanging.… We'll escort them out of the country."
That August dawn was gray and cool, with gold and pink beginning to break over the dark eastern ranges. The town had not yet awakened. It slept unaware of the stealthy forms passing down the gray road and of the distant hum of motor-cars and trot of hoofs.
Glidden's place of confinement was a square warehouse, near the edge of town. Before the improvised jail guards paced up and down, strangely alert.
Daylight had just cleared away the gray when a crowd of masked men appeared as if by magic and bore down upon the guards. There was an apparent desperate resistance, but, significantly, no cries or shots. The guards were overpowered and bound.
The door of the jail yielded to heavy blows of an ax. In the corner of a dim, bare room groveled Glidden, bound so that he had little use of his body. But he was terribly awake. When six men entered he asked, hoarsely: "What're you—after?… What—you mean?"
They jerked him erect. They cut the bonds from his legs. They dragged him out into the light of breaking day.
When he saw the masked and armed force he cried: "My God!… What'll you—do with me?"
Ghastly, working, sweating, his face betrayed his terror.
"You're to be hanged by the neck," spoke a heavy, solemn voice.
The man would have collapsed but for the strong hands that upheld him.
"What—for?" he gasped.
"For I.W.W. crimes—for treason—for speeches no American can stand in days like these." Then this deep-voiced man read to Glidden words of his own.
"Do you recognize that?"
Glidden saw how he had spoken his own doom. "Yes, I said that," he had nerve left to say. "But—I insist on arrest—trial—justice!… I'm no criminal.… I've big interests behind me.… You'll suffer—"
A loop of a lasso, slung over his head and jerked tight, choked off his intelligible utterance. But as the silent, ruthless men dragged him away he gave vent to terrible, half-strangled cries.
The sun rose red over the fertile valley—over the harvest fields and the pastures and the orchards, and over the many towns that appeared lost in the green and gold of luxuriance.
In the harvest districts west of the river all the towns were visited by swift-flying motor-cars that halted long enough for a warning to be shouted to the citizens, "Keep off the streets!"
Simultaneously armed forces of men, on foot and on horseback, too numerous to count, appeared in the roads and the harvest fields.
They accosted every man they met. If he were recognized or gave proof of an honest identity he was allowed to go; otherwise he was marched along under arrest. These armed forces were thorough in their search, and in the country districts they had an especial interest in likely camping-places, and around old barns and straw-stacks. In the towns they searched every corner that was big enough to hide a man.
So it happened that many motley groups of men were driven toward the railroad line, where they were held until a freight-train of empty cattle-cars came along. This train halted long enough to have the I.W.W. contingent driven aboard, with its special armed guard following, and then it proceeded on to the next station. As stations were many, so were the halts, and news of the train with its strange freight flashed ahead. Crowds lined the railroad tracks. Many boys and men in these crowds carried rifles and pistols which they leveled at the I.W.W. prisoners as the train passed. Jeers and taunts and threats accompanied this presentation of guns.
Before the last station of that wheat district was reached full three hundred members of the I.W.W., or otherwise suspicious characters, were packed into the open cars. At the last stop the number was greatly augmented, and the armed forces were cut down to the few guards who were to see the I.W.W. deported from the country. Here provisions and drinking-water were put into the cars. And amid a hurrahing roar of thousands the train with its strange load slowly pulled out.
It did not at once gather headway. The engine whistled a prolonged blast—a signal or warning not lost on many of its passengers.
From the front cars rose shrill cries that alarmed the prisoners in the rear. The reason soon became manifest. Arms pointed and eyes stared at the figure of a man hanging from a rope fastened to the center of a high bridge span under which the engine was about to pass.
The figure swayed in the wind. It turned half-way round, disclosing a ghastly, distorted face, and a huge printed placard on the breast, then it turned back again. Slowly the engine drew one car-load after another past the suspended body of the dead man. There were no more cries. All were silent in that slow-moving train. All faces were pale, all eyes transfixed.
The placard on the hanged man's breast bore in glaring red a strange message:Last warning. 3-7-77.
The figures were the ones used in the frontier days by vigilantes.
A dusty motor-car climbed the long road leading up to the Neuman ranch. It was not far from Wade, a small hamlet of the wheat-growing section, and the slopes of the hills, bare and yellow with waving grain, bore some semblance to the Bend country. Four men—a driver and three cowboys—were in the automobile.
A big stone gate marked the entrance to Neuman's ranch. Cars and vehicles lined the roadside. Men were passing in and out. Neuman's home was unpretentious, but his barns and granaries and stock-houses were built on a large scale.
"Bill, are you goin' in with me after this pard of the Kaiser's?" inquired Jake, leisurely stretching himself as the car halted. He opened the door and stiffly got out. "Gimme a hoss any day fer gittin' places!"
"Jake, my regard fer your rep as Anderson's foreman makes me want to hug the background," replied Bill. "I've done a hell of a lot these last forty-eight hours."
"Wal, I reckon you have, Bill, an' no mistake.… But I was figgerin' on you wantin' to see the fun."
"Fun!… Jake, it 'll be fun enough fer me to sit hyar an' smoke in the shade, an' watch fer you to come a-runnin' from thet big German devil.… Pard, they say he's a bad man!"
"Sure. I know thet. All them Germans is bad."
"If the boss hadn't been so dog-gone strict about gun-play I'd love to go with you," responded Bill. "But he didn't give me no orders. You're the whole outfit this round-up."
"Bill, you'd have to take orders from me," said Jake, coolly.
"Sure. Thet's why I come with Andy."
The other cowboy, called Andy, manifested uneasiness, and he said: "Aw, now, Jake, you ain't a-goin' to ask me to go in there?… An' me hatin' Germans the way I do!"
"Nope. I guess I'll order Bill to go in an' fetch Neuman out," replied Jake, complacently, as he made as if to re-enter the car.
Bill collapsed in his seat. "Jake," he expostulated, weakly, "this job was given you because of your rep fer deploomacy.… Sure I haven't none of thet.… An' you, Jake, why you're the smoothest an' slickest talker thet ever come to the Northwest."
Evidently Jake had a vulnerable point. He straightened up with a little swagger. "Wal, you watch me," he said. "I'll fetch the big Dutchman eatin' out of my hand.… An' say, when we git him in the car an' start back let's scare the daylights out of him."
"Thet'd be powerful fine. But how?"
"You fellers take a hunch from me," replied Jake. And he strode off up the lane toward the ranch-house.
Jake had been commissioned to acquaint Neuman with the fact that recent developments demanded his immediate presence at "Many Waters." The cowboy really had a liking for the job, though he pretended not to.
Neuman had not yet begun harvesting. There were signs to Jake's experienced eye that the harvest-hands were expected this very day. Jake fancied he knew why the rancher had put off his harvesting. And also he knew that the extra force of harvest-hands would not appear. He was regarded with curiosity by the women members of the Neuman household, and rather enjoyed it. There were several comely girls in evidence. Jake did not look a typical Northwest foreman and laborer. Booted and spurred, with his gun swinging visibly, and his big sombrero and gaudy scarf, he looked exactly what he was, a cowman of the open ranges.
His inquiries elicited the fact that Neuman was out in the fields, waiting for the harvest-hands.
"Wal, if he's expectin' thet outfit of I.W.W.'s he'll never harvest," said Jake, "for some of them is hanged an' the rest run out of the country."
Jake did not wait to see the effect of his news. He strode back toward the fields, and with the eye of a farmer he appraised the barns and corrals, and the fields beyond. Neuman raised much wheat, and enough alfalfa to feed his stock. His place was large and valuable, but not comparable to "Many Waters."
Out in the wheat-fields were engines with steam already up, with combines and threshers and wagons waiting for the word to start. Jake enjoyed the keen curiosity roused by his approach. Neuman strode out from a group of waiting men. He was huge of build, ruddy-faced and bearded, with deep-set eyes.
"Are you Neuman?" inquired Jake.
"That's me," gruffly came the reply.
"I'm Anderson's foreman. I've been sent over to tell you thet you're wanted pretty bad at 'Many Waters.'"
The man stared incredulously. "What?… Who wants me?"
"Anderson. An' I reckon there's more—though I ain't informed."
Neuman rumbled a curse. Amaze dominated him. "Anderson!… Well, I don't want to see him," he replied.
"I reckon you don't," was the cowboy's cool reply.
The rancher looked him up and down. However familiar his type was to Anderson, it was strange to Neuman. The cowboy breathed a potential force. The least significant thing about his appearance was that swinging gun. He seemed cool and easy, with hard, keen eyes. Neuman's face took a shade off color.
"But I'm going to harvest to-day," he said. "I'm late. I've a hundred hands coming."
"Nope. You haven't none comin'," asserted Jake.
"What!" ejaculated Neuman.
"Reckon it's near ten o'clock," said the cowboy. "We run over here powerful fast."
"Yes, it's near ten," bellowed Neuman, on the verge of a rage.… "I haven't harvest-hands coming!… What's this talk?"
"Wal, about nine-thirty I seen all your damned I.W.W.'s, except what was shot an' hanged, loaded in a cattlecar an' started out of the country."
A blow could not have hit harder than the cowboy's biting speech. Astonishment and fear shook Neuman before he recovered control of himself.
"If it's true, what's that to me?" he bluffed, in hoarse accents.
"Neuman, I didn't come to answer questions," said the cowboy, curtly. "My boss jest sent me fer you, an' if you bucked on comin', then I was to say it was your only chance to avoid publicity an' bein' run out of the country."
Neuman was livid of face now and shaking all over his huge frame.
"Anderson threatens me!" he shouted. "Anderson suspicions me!…Gott in Himmel!… Me he always cheated! An' now he insults—"
"Say, it ain't healthy to talk like thet about my boss," interrupted Jake, forcibly. "An' we're wastin' time. If you don't go with me we'll be comin' back—the whole outfit of us!… Anderson means you're to face his man!"
"What man?"
"Dorn. Young Dorn, son of old Chris Dorn of the Bend.… Dorn has some things to tell you thet you won't want made public.… Anderson's givin' you a square deal. If it wasn't fer thet I'd sling my gun on you!… Do you git my hunch?"
The name of Dorn made a slack figure of the aggressive Neuman.
"All right—I go," he said, gruffly, and without a word to his men he started off.
Jake followed him. Neuman made a short cut to the gate, thus avoiding a meeting with any of his family. At the road, however, some men observed him and called in surprise, but he waved them back.
"Bill, you an' Andy collect yourselves an' give Mr. Neuman a seat," said Jake, as he opened the door to allow the farmer to enter.
The two cowboys gave Neuman the whole of the back seat, and they occupied the smaller side seats. Jake took his place beside the driver.
"Burn her up!" was his order.
The speed of the car made conversation impossible until the limits of a town necessitated slowing down. Then the cowboys talked. For all the attention they paid to Neuman, he might as well not have been present. Before long the driver turned into a road that followed a railroad track for several miles and then crossed it to enter a good-sized town. The streets were crowded with people and the car had to be driven slowly. At this juncture Jake suggested.
"Let's go down by the bridge."
"Sure," agreed his allies.
Then the driver turned down a still more peopled street that sloped a little and evidently overlooked the railroad tracks. Presently they came in sight of a railroad bridge, around which there appeared to be an excited yet awestruck throng. All faces were turned up toward the swaying form of a man hanging by a rope tied to the high span of the bridge.
"Wal, Glidden's hangin' there yet," remarked Jake, cheerfully.
With a violent start Neuman looked out to see the ghastly placarded figure, and then he sank slowly back in his seat. The cowboys apparently took no notice of him. They seemed to have forgotten his presence.
"Funny they'd cut all the other I.W.W.'s down an' leave Glidden hangin' there," observed Bill.
"Them vigilantes sure did it up brown," added Andy. "I was dyin' to join the band. But they didn't ask me."
"Nor me," replied Jake, regretfully. "An' I can't understand why, onless it was they was afeared I couldn't keep a secret."
"Who is them vigilantes, anyhow?" asked Bill, curiously.
"Wal, I reckon nobody knows. But I seen a thousand armed men this mornin'. They sure looked bad. You ought to have seen them poke the I.W.W.'s with cocked guns."
"Was any one shot?" queried Andy.
"Not in the daytime. Nobody killed by this Citizens' Protective League, as they call themselves. They just rounded up all the suspicious men an' herded them on to thet cattle-train an' carried them off. It was at night when the vigilantes worked—masked an' secret an' sure bloody. Jest like the old vigilante days! … An' you can gamble they ain't through yet."
"Uncle Sam won't need to send any soldiers here."
"Wal, I should smile not. Thet'd be a disgrace to the Northwest. It was a bad time fer the I.W.W. to try any tricks on us."
Jake shook his lean head and his jaw bulged. He might have been haranguing, cowboy-like, for the benefit of the man they feigned not to notice, but it was plain, nevertheless, that he was angry.
"What gits me wuss 'n them I.W.W.'s is the skunks thet give Uncle Sam the double-cross," said Andy, with dark face. "I'll stand fer any man an' respect him if he's aboveboard an' makes his fight in the open. But them coyotes thet live off the land an' pretend to be American when they ain't—they make me pisen mad."
"I heerd the vigilantes has marked men like thet," observed Bill.
"I'll give you a hunch, fellers," replied Jake, grimly. "By Gawd! the West won't stand fer traitors!"
All the way to "Many Waters," where it was possible to talk and be heard, the cowboys continued in like strain. And not until the driver halted the car before Anderson's door did they manifest any awareness of Neuman.
"Git out an' come in," said Jake to the pallid, sweating rancher.
He led Neuman into the hall and knocked upon Anderson's study door. It was opened by Dorn.
"Wal, hyar we are," announced Jake, and his very nonchalance attested to pride.
Anderson was standing beside his desk. He started, and his hand flashed back significantly as he sighted his rival and enemy.
"No gun-play, boss, was your orders," said Jake. "An' Neuman ain't packin' no gun."
It was plain that Anderson made a great effort at restraint. But he failed. And perhaps the realization that he could not kill this man liberated his passion. Then the two big ranchers faced each other—Neuman livid and shaking, Anderson black as a thunder-cloud.
"Neuman, you hatched up a plot with Glidden to kill me," said Anderson, bitterly.
Neuman, in hoarse, brief answer, denied it.
"Sure! Deny it. What do we care? … We've got you, Neuman," burst out Anderson, his heavy voice ringing with passion. "But it's not your low-down plot thet's r'iled me. There's been a good many men who've tried to do away with me. I've outplayed you in many a deal. So your personal hate for me doesn't count. I'm sore—an' you an' me can't live in the same place, because you're a damned traitor. You've lived here for twenty years. You've grown rich off the country. An' you'd sell us to your rotten Germany. What I think of you for that I'm goin' to tell you."
Anderson paused to take a deep breath. Then he began to curse Neuman. All the rough years of his frontier life, as well as the quieter ones of his ranching days, found expression in the swift, thunderous roll of his terrible scorn. Every vile name that had ever been used by cowboy, outlaw, gambler, leaped to Anderson's stinging tongue. All the keen, hard epithets common to the modern day he flung into Neuman's face. And he ended with a profanity that was as individual in character as its delivery was intense.
"I'm callin' you for my own relief," he concluded, "an' not that I expect to get under your hide."
Then he paused. He wiped the beaded drops from his forehead, and he coughed and shook himself. His big fists unclosed. Passion gave place to dignity.
"Neuman, it's a pity you an' men like you can't see the truth. That's the mystery to me—why any one who had spent half a lifetime an' prospered here in our happy an' beautiful country could ever hate it. I never will understand that. But I do understand that America will never harbor such men for long. You have your reasons, I reckon. An' no doubt you think you're justified. That's the tragedy. You run off from hard-ruled Germany. You will not live there of your own choice. You succeed here an' live in peace an' plenty.… An', by God! you take up with a lot of foreign riffraff an' double-cross the people you owe so much!… What's wrong with your mind?… Think it over.… An' that's the last word I have for you."
Anderson, turning to his desk, took up a cigar and lighted it. He was calm again. There was really sadness where his face had shown only fury. Then he addressed Dorn.
"Kurt, it's up to you now," he said. "As my superintendent an' some-day partner, what you'll say goes with me.… I don't know what bein' square would mean in relation to this man."
Anderson sat down heavily in his desk chair and his face became obscured in cigar smoke.
"Neuman, do you recognize me?" asked Dorn, with his flashing eyes on the rancher.
"No," replied Neuman.
"I'm Chris Dorn's son. My father died a few days ago. He overtaxed his heart fighting fire in the wheat … Fire set by I.W.W. men. Glidden's men! … They burned our wheat. Ruined us!"
Neuman showed shock at the news, at the sudden death of an old friend, but he did not express himself in words.
"Do you deny implication in Glidden's plot to kill Anderson?" demanded Dorn.
"Yes," replied Neuman.
"Well, you're a liar!" retorted Dorn. "I saw you with Glidden and my father. I followed you at Wheatly—out along the railroad tracks. I slipped up and heard the plot. It was I who snatched the money from my father."
Neuman's nerve was gone, but with his stupid and stubborn process of thought he still denied, stuttering incoherently.
"Glidden has been hanged," went on Dorn. "A vigilante band has been organized here in the valley. Men of your known sympathy will not be safe, irrespective of your plot against Anderson. But as to that, publicity alone will be enough to ruin you.… Americans of the West will not tolerate traitors.… Now the question you've got to decide is this. Will you take the risks or will you sell out and leave the country?"
"I'll sell out," replied Neuman.
"What price do you put on your ranch as it stands?"
"One hundred thousand dollars."
Dorn turned to Anderson and asked, "Is it worth that much?"
"No. Seventy-five thousand would be a big price," replied the rancher.
"Neuman, we will give you seventy-five thousand for your holdings. Do you accept?"
"I have no choice," replied Neuman, sullenly.
"Choice!" exclaimed Dorn. "Yes, you have. And you're not being cheated. I've stated facts. You are done in this valley. You're ruinednow!And Glidden's fate stares you in the face.… Will you sell and leave the country?"
"Yes," came the deep reply, wrenched from a stubborn breast.
"Go draw up your deeds, then notify us," said Dorn, with finality.
Jake opened the door. Stolidly and slowly Neuman went out, precisely as he had entered, like a huge man in conflict with unintelligible thoughts.
"Send him home in the car," called Anderson.