Hal and Bill were well mounted, had an excellent start, and before the members of the peace conference had recovered from their astonishment the two horsemen were out of sight and night had fallen. As they left the Agency behind the heart of Big Bill grew lighter. The fact that Hal had not taken him into his confidence did not worry the simple-minded Bill, but he rejoiced that at last they were on the straight and narrow way and had left behind them the world, the flesh, and the devil, always and everywhere of the female gender. The fact that they had a dangerous job ahead of them did not worry Bill, for it involved nothing more serious than just men. Bill had dealt with men as men and in a straight and fearless way had found himself capable, but where woman was involved, with nothing like the experience to justify it, he had arrived at the conclusion of the wise man who said: "Can a man take fire into his bosom and his clothes not be burned?" Indeed, greater minds than gentle Bill's have felt bewildered by "the way of a man with a maid." In his role of parent and guardian he had several times started to speak to his companion in words of commendation and encouragement, but impenetrable gloom enveloped the boy and the words died unborn. He essayed blithesome song, but even this personal expression degenerated into a whistle and dribbled feebly away, so, finally, the big man shook himself down into his saddle and they rode in silence—a silence that seemed to drip with a chilling mist. So they rode on into the radiant night indifferent to its splendors. They knew that the horses' stride was steady and strong in the clean, cool air that romped down from the snows, laden with the perfume of the pines, and that a matchless moon made it possible for them to leave the road at every opportunity and hit the trails and short cuts, but the poem of the night was not for them, its melody and its mystery.Wah-na-gi—"the soul when separated from the body!" That was the meaning of her name. The young man had a queer feeling thathisbody was riding away from his soul into the night, into the unknown, into the far away. All of a sudden it came to him that he had been very happy at the Agency. Why was he riding away? What was this asphalt that made men lie and steal and jump at each other's throats? What was it to him?What did he care for the Red Butte Ranch, except that his mother was buried there? That it was rich in minerals which could be exchanged for money, wealth, was outside his purposes. It was not the legal but the spiritual ownership which determined him. When we understand more about psychical phenomena we shall know more about our Indians. It wasn't only that the big appeal of the open was here intensified. Half memories, vague instincts, ghostly and subliminal concords met him here, took him by the hand, and said: "Come apart and be at peace." But all this was there, would wait. He never doubted his ultimate possession of the ranch. The Shades who owned it would eventually hand it over to him, their rightful heir. All that was only a matter of time. It could wait. Meantime, what was he doing? He was riding into the future unwillingly. He had left the Agency, and knew it was forever. He knew in a dull way that he had finished a chapter in his life, and that it would never be quite the same again. How did it happen? Ought he to have prevented it?His thought wandered back over the devious ways he had come. His life seemed so impersonal, his own will and purpose had had so little to do with it. He could only think of a boat swept from its moorings, floating about on the waves of circumstance, driven before this wind, twisted by that current, tossed on the shore to be caught up again in the high tide and taken back to the deeps, back to the wanton winds and waves. He knew it would be useless to turn the horses' heads and try to go back. Always before he had submitted; what did it matter? Now it mattered. When was it he first cared? Swiftly his thought travelled back until it focussed on those two rough men in the library at Portman Square—awkward, shy, fumbling their broad-brimmed hats in their hands, dressed in their "store clothes"; all the more unmistakable for the London setting and for the contrast with his father with whom they were talking! He recalled his own wonder that the high-bred, delicate man with his distinguished face could ever have been tanned and weather-stained like these uncouth men and been their companion on the frontier. He recalled his own surprise at the familiarity of his father with them. The Earl had called them "Andy" and "Shorty," and he was rather punctilious about the forms and ceremonies. It was a revelation of a hitherto unsuspected talent for unbending. How his father had plied them with cigars and liquors, and their astonishing capacity! The amount of neat liquor they had taken at a gulp!These men, so different from all the types with which he had been familiar, and each so unlike the other! "Andy," an Austrian Jew, was so determined to be conciliatory and ingratiating that he had developed a conservative stutter which, with its saving clauses and roundabout phrases, enabled him to estimate the effect upon his listener even before he had actually committed himself to the proposition in hand. "Shorty," quick, sharp, explosive, going direct to the point and disarming suspicion by a method the reverse of the other! There was something about these men that had interested him from the first, then amused him, then fascinated him. The subject of the talk did not immediately claim his attention. Every one knew that the ranch had been an expensive experience to the Earl, and it was a foregone conclusion that he would jump at the chance to sell it. The negotiations had gone quickly to a conclusion. The Earl had accepted their first offer and a deed had been prepared and was about to be signed. Then the young man interposed for the first time. He had suddenly received an impression, a "hunch," as the cowboys say, that seemed later to be clairvoyant. At first it was only a vague sentiment, too vague to be expressed, too vague to be used as an argument, or to influence practical men, so he only asked that the matter might be postponed until the following morning. His father and the Westerners were annoyed by this freak of eccentricity, but humored him as we humor children, or the irresponsible, for he remembered that he had been drinking, was perhaps drunk, as he often was in those evil days. The following morning a cable came from Big Bill saying: "Don't sell ranch. Have sent letter." The letter which followed explained what we already know, that asphalt had been found, that in Bill's opinion a lot of this valuable mineral was on the ranch, which had been "jumped" by the cowboys, and he strongly advised the Earl to send some one out there to investigate the matter; he suggested that this investigation should be conducted as secretly as possible; that he was himself too well known, and his former affiliations with the Earl were too well known, to permit of his doing this successfully. There was a job open at the Agency, the chief of Indian police, and Bill offered to use his influence to get it for any one the Earl would send out to look after his interests.Then something in the young man's soul rose up and said: "Here am I." And when he turned his face to the West the winds and the waves beckoned to him and recognized him and led him to his own. Then for the first time he recognized purpose in his life. Ladd had seen in him only the usual adventurer trying to hide away from his past and one likely to be amenable and useful. It would have been difficult to find any one more suitable to the position of chief of police. In a country where men required initiative, self-reliance, and courage he had found conditions suitable to his temperament and abilities. He had felt "at home" and had been a success from the start. About the time that he took charge of the police, Wah-na-gi returned from Carlisle, and every phase of her struggle with her environment and heredity was obvious to him. He saw at once what she did not see, that it was hopeless, but it lent to her the charm of poetry and romance, and she was pretty enough not to require such assistance. For a long time he was very cunning in concealing and disguising his interest in the girl, and he continued to fool himself long after he had ceased to fool any one else. And now he was riding away from everything that made life worth living, and the fact that he had just come successfully through a big fight meant nothing to him. He would have liked to go back, but that was impossible, and he rode in bitterness and rebellion.The cowboys had found the holding of the asphalt territory rather irksome. At first it had been all hurrah, but as week followed week and month followed month, and no armed conflict took place, they grew very tired. The Trust had entered upon the long siege with bomb-proof galleries and an elaborate system of underground approaches. No isolated fort ever successfully withstood such a siege. The asphalt vein stretched across considerable country and to police it all and hold it by force of arms against an invisible enemy that did not materialize but might at any moment do so, and at some unexpected place, was a nerve-racking job for a time, and then grew monotonous, and with monotony came carelessness. The Red Butte Ranch was their base of supplies and operations, and in possession of this they felt legally and morally secure, having been held up for it by two robbers in the usual and conventional way of the business world.The majority of their men were therefore, as Hal knew, distributed along the asphalt vein, but he also knew that there were more than enough left at the ranch to put up a winning fight against two men. So it was necessary to exercise caution and strategy, and fight only if cornered and compelled to.In his capacity of chief of police, Hal had ridden over every foot of the country and knew it as well as Bill. It was therefore greatly to the surprise of the latter when the young man, after crossing a spur of the Bad Lands, left the trail and struck into the hills."Where you goin', son?" he asked with obvious disapproval."We got to do this on the jump, Bill, or not at all. Time is the important thing, particularly if any of those bandits try to follow us. It's an awful bluff, but we'll get away with it.""You can't git through that-a-way. You'll just run up against the 'Knife-edge'!""That's right. I'm going to cross it.""Why, you're crazy. You can't do it.""I've done it.""Gosh! Honest? I never heard of any one fool enough to try it.""My Indian police and I have done it.""But, gosh-a-mighty, not at night!""No; but it's almost as light as day. My horse saveys it. Just shut your eyes, leave the reins on your horse's neck, and let him follow me.""All right, son. I've had my innings. A Big Bill more or less don't matter. Go ahead."The Knife-edge was a narrow ledge of sandstone that crossed a deep gash in the hills. It was not over one hundred yards in length, but its negotiation was apparently impossible. A single false step meant precipitation into the arid abyss, a thousand feet below. It was wonderful the way these Indian ponies felt their way across, a sort of equine tight-rope performance. Hal was right. The rider had nothing to do with it, except to sit straight and easily, without strain or fear, and let the pony do the rest. It was a test of nerves, and Bill, whose avoirdupois was not adjustable to tight-rope niceties, was in a profuse perspiration when his pony had taken the last careful step that put the Knife-edge into the background of things one would willingly forget. Bill had spent the best days of his life as foreman at the ranch, and could have found his way about blindfold, so when they were about a mile from the ranch Bill took the lead.After riding a few moments over some bare clay hills they descended into an arroyo and followed its tortuous course unseen and unheard, for the horses' footfalls made no noise on the silent sands. It was necessary to dismount and lead the horses, and it was slow work. Suddenly Bill stopped short and pointed. It was an effulgent night and there against the skyline was limned the figure of a sentry, sitting before a little camp-fire, serenely smoking. He was perched on a little elevation just where the arroyo took a sharp bend, his rifle leaning against some greasewood near at hand. Bill unlimbered his gun, but Hal put his hand out and made a sign to stay him. The young man then uncoiled his lariat from his saddle and, hugging the walls of the dead stream, he crept to within reach of the dark figure and, with a hand that had become more than expert, coiled the deadly loop, then sent it into the silent air, where it poised for a moment like a snake about to strike, then it settled down about the body of its victim with the incredible squeeze of a constrictor. With a swift jerk the figure tumbled into the dry gulch and, before he realized what had happened to him, Hal's knee was on his chest and his gun-barrel at his head. Bill immediately disarmed the prostrate figure, taking his pistol from its holster as Hal said: "Don't speak." Indeed, there was really no need for this injunction. It had happened so quickly and the sentry was so unprepared that he hadn't a sound in him. It took him several valuable seconds to realize just what had happened, and by that time it was obvious that he was a prisoner. Bill took a hitch knot in the lariat and Hal ordered the man to stand up."Do as you're told and no harm'll come to you," he said quietly. Then he turned to Bill and said: "Shall we go on or shall we wait for the others? They must have the ranch surrounded by this time.""I guess you and I can persuade 'em resistance would be useless."This was to impress the prisoner who was by this time in an impressionable frame of mind."All right. Now, Curley," he said to the man whom he recognized; "we got the drop on you fellows. While McShay and your crowd have been gabbing over at the Agency we've got you cornered. Now I want you to walk ahead of us to the house, then call Coyote Kal out and we'll do the rest. Bill will have you covered from the stable and I will have you covered from behind the rock (meaning the rock that marked Nat-u-ritch's grave). If you give us away, neither of us could miss you. You're a dead man twice," he added with a laugh. His ill-humor always vanished in action. When the three men reached the barns, Hal made a short detour, crawling on his hands and knees until he was in the shelter of the rough, undressed bowlder which his father had hauled down from the canyons to mark the grave of the little Indian woman who had been his wife and the mother of the son who now crouched behind it, oblivious for the moment of everything except the dangerous business in hand. Then Bill untied Curley and pointed to the house opposite. The space over which Curley walked slowly was bathed in a flood of light. There didn't seem any way out of the predicament, so Curley stood before the adobe house and called softly: "Kal—Kal."As this was repeated a sleepy voice within growled: "What the hell?" Then a tousled head appeared at the window and said: "That you, Curley? What's up? Has a messenger come from the Agency?""Yes. Come on out," urged Curley. "It's important."The other man drew his trousers on and came out into the moonlight."What is it?" Then he noticed. "Where's your gun?""They took it away from me.""They? What are you talking about?""It's no use, Kal; they got us surrounded."With an oath the man addressed as Kal backed toward the house. Instantly Bill and Hal stepped into the light and covered him."Don't move," said Hal, and Coyote Kal had a solemn moment when the issue was uncertain.Curley decided for him."Don't be a damn fool, Kal; they got us. What's the use?""Why didn't you ring the bell," said Kal surlily, "and call the men in?""Ring the bell?" sneered Curley. "Ring the bell? Say, wake up. Ring the bell with a couple of cannon up against your bowels? Does it take you a week to tumble? It didn't me. They stole up the dry crik and lassoed me; jerked me into the middle of next week before I knowed what ailed me. Ring the bell! I'll wring your neck if you say that to me ag'in.""Bill, get that bench against the wall and put it there," indicating the middle of the court-yard. Bill did this with alacrity."Now, gentlemen, we're not going to fatigue you. We're going to treat you with distinguished consideration. Please be seated side by side on that bench. You can hold each other's hands if you get lonesome."The two men obeyed in an apologetic way. Kal growled: "Why don't you tell us what you're up to and be done with it?""Now, Bill, ring that anxious bell for Coyote Kal."Bill stepped over to the barn and rung a small bell affixed to its outer wall."Now, Kal, I want you to tell your men that they are trespassers on this property, and that you will be graciously permitted to withdraw if you do so at once and without trouble. If they stop to discuss the matter, there'll be a fight, and I don't think there'll be enough of you left to get away. Bill will occupy the stable and I will occupy the house, and if there is any show of resistance by your men you and Curley will be the first to meet your Maker; and I think you need more time for preparation.""You sure ain't prepared," ejaculated Bill. "You sure ain't."The ranch house was a mixture of styles. A log-cabin met an adobe addition at right angles. Each was supplied with a door, flanked by a window, and a portico leaned wearily against the house in various attitudes of discouragement. Hal took his stand in the shelter of the angle. He had the house on two sides of him. His position was exposed to the stable, where Bill was secreted, and the space between the house and stable was completely dominated by them both. One could have read a paper in the moonlight."My, it's clear to-night," said Hal, surveying the situation with a grin of satisfaction. "Anyway it happens it looks to me as if you two out there were a sure thing."This was perfectly plain to Kal and Curley, but outside the purely physical situation they were completely dazed. McShay and his men were supposed to be looking out for their interests at the conference at the Agency, and here was Ladd's chief of police claiming their ranch and putting them forcibly off the ground they had bought and paid for.They merely got a vague impression that this was just an effort on the part of Ladd to shift the battle ground. But as their brains worked slowly over it nothing seemed to fit into this theory. And it was part of Hal's plan to leave them no time to think. He realized that his only chance of success was in rushing them off their feet. It was a perilous game in which time was to be a deciding factor.As suggested by Kal, the bell was an alarm that called all the men on the ranch in for instructions. They came, and quickly, and all armed; some fifteen men. As they came into view their amazement was comic at the sight of Curley and their boss sitting on a bench side by side in the moonlight like two naughty boys kept in at school."Speak your little piece, Kal," urged Hal."Well, boys," said their leader, shamefaced; "I don't know how it happened, but the Agency folks got the bulge on us, got us corralled, Curley says, and it's fight or surrender. As they got a bead on me from the house and the stable, surrender looks a whole lot better to me. We can come back and fight 'em for it afterwards."Instinctively there was a simultaneous movement for cover. The dilapidated sheds leaning against the barn with their bags, barrels, bales of hay, etc., were selected by those nearest to them. Carroll and the rest put the rock that marked Nat-u-ritch's grave in front of them. "Humpy" Carroll, as his name indicated, was a humpbacked little man with ambitions. He had always fallen just short of being a leader and it made him a chronic insurgent. His insubordination had brought him into frequent conflict with Kal, whose place he coveted, and the latter's uncomfortable position afforded him keen satisfaction. In fact, Kal's taking off would not have appealed to Humpy as an irreparable loss.Kal knew this and it filled him with helpless rage."Surrender without a fight?" inquired Humpy in a tone that made Kal squirm.But he replied calmly with a slow drawl: "You got a nice fat rock in front of you, Humpy.""I don't mind kickin' the bucket with a gun in my hand," chimed in Curley; "but give us achanceto fight, Humpy?""'Tain't our fault if you let 'em rope you.""Say," said Kal, "if these fellers'll give me a gun, and will stand by, I'll fightyou, Humpy; and the feller that gits over it—his word goes.""Say, that's sporty," exclaimed Hal, delighted; "I'll stand for that."Humpy's sardonic face grinned."Say, you'd like to get us a killin' each other, wouldn't you? Got us 'surrounded' have you? Well, we'll just have a look around and see.""No, you don't." cut in Hal with decision. "You surrender or fightnow.""Boys," called out Kal, "you know I'm no coward, but I think you owe it to me and Curley to give us a chance. I'll give you your innings later. They can't keep what they've took, and no man of you'll beat me in comin' back after it.""I'll give you 'till I count ten," said Hal.Voices came spontaneously from various places: "Kal's right"—"Lethimdecide"—"Leave it to Kal," and similar expressions. It was obvious that the men realized the position of their leader and would temporarily surrender possession of the ranch rather than see him sacrificed. Curley's fate was thrown in for good measure."Your men are with you, Kal," said Hal, eager to consummate the precarious deal. "Tell them to put their weapons in a pile back of you and Curley."Kal repeated these instructions, but with evident reluctance. It was obvious that the fact that he was getting away with his life was hardly compensation for the humiliation suffered before Humpy and his comrades. As the men came forward from their hiding places Hal relaxed his tension. It came to him that he was very tired, and he leaned against the window of the log-cabin, the window Kal had opened before leaving the house. Just then a warning shout came from the stable. "Look out, boy! Look out!"Bill had time to say no more. It all happened in a flash. Two sinewy bronze arms darted from the window and pinioned Hal from behind in a vise-like grip. Hal knew instinctively that it was Appah. Bill, as he was in the act of warning Hal, was over-powered from behind and bound by Appah's men so quickly that he had only time to see that his warning to the boy had come too late.This had occurred without the cowboys being aware of it, so intent were they on their own part in the drama. Kal's head drooped with shame as he looked at the ground and said:"We surrender.""Surrender? Surrender? What are you talkin' about?"It was Agent Ladd's voice as he strode nervously through the crowd of ranchmen. He stopped in front of Kal and Curley, his eyes blazing with excitement."Surrender this ranch to a couple of bluffs? You're a nice chicken-hearted lot!"CHAPTER IXAs the cowboys turned and saw Hal and Bill with their arms pinioned and in the custody of Appah's men, they suffered a revulsion of feeling that boded no good to the men whose bluff had been called."And two of 'em,twoof 'em hold you up. Why, you'll be the laughing stock of the country."Ladd lost no time in fanning their smouldering pride into a relentless blaze."Gosh-a-mighty; ain't these your men?" gasped Kal.It seemed such a useless question at this juncture to Ladd that he didn't stop to answer it."You lynch cattle thieves out in this country, but you 'surrender' to land thieves."Hal looked at his adversary with admiration. He hadn't supposed that Ladd would follow him, that he would trust himself in the enemy's country; but here he was in time to turn victory into defeat, and he was appealing to this mob with all the cunning of a skilled demagogue and with the ferocity of a tiger.Kal came over to Calthorpe and, looking him in the eye, said slowly—emphasizing every word:"You made me look foolish, boy."That is an unforgivable sin. You may take a man's honor or his money or his wife, and indeed have his life, and forgiveness is still possible; but don't expect mercy if you have made him look foolish."And youroped me," added Curley. "Ropin' bein' in fashion, we'll let you in on it." And he threw around Hal's neck a coil of the rope the latter had used on him."Wait a minute," said the irreconcilable Humpy. "If this feller ain't your man, Mr. Agent; who the hell is he?""He's the legal owner of this ranch," declared Bill with emphasis; "and if you lynch him you'll be guilty of committin' murder.""Oh, no," said Kal grimly; "we'll just be guilty of a mistake.""Fer which," added Humpy, "we kin apologize later.""Is that right?" demanded Kal. "Do you claim this ranch and the asphalt on it?""I do. It's mine.""Well, I guess that'll be about all.""I guess we'll have to give your imagination an extra stretch.""I can prove it.""'Tain't open to argyment.""If you git a chance to prove it, it'll sure be contributory negligence on our part. Ain't that right, boys?"Everybody was in on the conversation now. The men gathered around Hal and Bill like carnivorous beasts at the smell of blood. Nothing stirs the average man's imagination like gold. Each one of these rough men had seen visions and had fashioned elaborate impossibilities out of this mysterious asphalt. They told each other apocryphal stories of its enormous value. Each saw himself fabulously rich. There was enormous potential wealth here, but nothing could have corresponded to their grotesque dreams, and the more nebulous and vapory they were the more these rough men clung to them, and at the mention of their "rights" they became feverish, fanatical, ready to tear into pieces whoever looked toward their disputed treasures; ready to tear each other to pieces for the fraction of a claim to that which they did not possess."Lynch him first and discuss it afterwards," suggested Ladd, seeing the temper of his audience and playing to its sardonic humor."You know what's eatin'him?" said Bill, pointing an angry finger at the agent. "The kid showed him up as a crook and a thief. When he's got you so deep in this you can't git out, he'll be the first to turn on you and sic justice onto you."The eyes of all turned from the prisoner to Ladd, and Humpy expressed the prevailing suspicion of the man they had no reason to trust:"It ain't been supposed that Mr. Ladd was a sittin' up at nights a tryin' to think of ways to help us."Ladd faced them with courage and an air of apparent candor."I've fought you, but fair and in the open, and I'm goin' to fight you for the land that's on the Reservation, but this land, as I understand it, is yours, bought and paid for."There was a chorus of fierce assent to this."You're in for a long and a losing fight against the Government; so if you losethis ranchyou lose everything."There was no approving shout for this, but the force of it was felt by all."But this feller here," said the tenacious Humpy, pointing to the prisoner and not to be diverted by the agent; "what about him?"Ladd looked at the wild animals with their fangs frankly bared and knew that they were easy. Then he played his trump card."As for this land-grabber, the best I know of him and the best he can say for himself is that he's a half-breed."This irrelevant appeal to prejudice was so crude, raw, and unblushing as to be obvious to a child, but its effect was instantaneous. Every vestige of restraint, of irresolution disappeared in the faces of the mob. Human equality! There is no such thing even theoretically. There are differences which separate human beings and will always separate them, but they are moral and intellectual differences. No one admits the principle of human equality, because:"The principle of human equality takes away the right of killing so-called inferior peoples, just as it destroys the right claimed by some of dominating others. If all peoples are equal, if their different appearances are only the result of changing circumstances, in virtue of what principle is it allowable to destroy their happiness and to compromise their right to independence?"[1][1] Finot.The logic of prejudice is a strange and wonderful thing.That some criminals were also half-breeds, that many half-breeds were undesirable citizens has crystallized into the conviction in most Western communities that all half-breeds are worthless and dangerous, and are therefore capable of any and all crimes. This has nothing to do with any ascertainable facts, and if opposite to Agent Ladd had arisen a man of intellect who had devoted his life and all the energies of a noble mind to finding out the truth, and had said: "If the word half-breed was strictly applied to the progeny which has really issued from a mixture of varieties, it would be necessary to include under this denomination all human beings with rare exceptions"[2]—it would have meant nothing to the audience to whom Ladd's appeal meant everything. As one man they turned upon Hal, their brows lowering and the pupils of their eyes contracting.[2] Finot."Is it true," said Kal, "that you're a half-breed?"The boy did not reply at once, but drew himself up proudly and looked them over contemptuously; he saw his last chance was gone, so he took his time and said very slowly:"I'm the son of the Earl of Kerhill and of Nat-u-ritch, an Indian woman; and I've got better blood in my veins than any man here, you swine!""Throw the rope over that beam," said Kal, pointing to the timber that projected over the loft on the barn."Yes," added Humpy; "it's time we made an example of some one. Land-grabbin' and half-breeds has got to be discouraged.""You haven't anything against Bill. Let him go," said Hal quickly."He'll be a witness against us.""You bet I will," said Bill promptly."No; he'll leave the country.""I'll camp on the trail of these murderers as long as I live.""For God's sake, shut up, Bill," begged Hal, as his eyes filled with involuntary tears."Sorry you feel that-a-way," said Humpy; "leaves us no choice. Up with 'em.""Hold on there—you!"The cowmen turned to see McShay sitting on a smoking, gasping horse with quivering nostrils and trembling flanks, and mopping his dripping brow first with his sleeve and then with a huge bandanna handkerchief."Say, I ain't had a ride like this since I was a kid. Well, you beat me to it, Mr. Agent; didn't you? I guess your Injins showed you a short cut. Some of you hold up this horse, and some more of you help me off'n him, though I don't know's I can stand much."The interjection of this cool personality seemed to lower the temperature several degrees. While McShay was dismounting, Smith and Lee rode in on horses which showed similar evidence of hard usage."If these are my leags as I'm a standin' on, I want to observe that you are gittin' precipitate a whole lot. I move to reconsider.""What fer?""Well, boys, I'm afraid we're on the young feller's land."This declaration from their leader would have made a sensation if it had come before their passions had gained momentum. It might have changed the progress of events, but now Kal voiced the general sentiment in a surly: "We'll give him some of it—just about six feet of it."There is no use talking temperance to the drunkard who has already started on his debauch. The unacknowledged fear that their acts would not bear examination made them fiercely resentful of interference, and there was an unacknowledged conviction that what was done and could not be undone justified itself as inevitable."Even Judge Lynch usually holds court," suggested McShay."We've heard what he's got to say.""Say; you're foolish to interfere.""Interferin' is my long suit," drawled McShay. "I ain't happy unless I'm interferin'. Now there are two ways of lynchin' a man. One is to git hysterical and borey-eyed, and lose yer re-pose. The other is to proceed in a regular and high-toned way. Now these fellers has the right to a ca'm judgment, and they will git it.""They will," glared Humpy; "if you'll agree to abide by the decision of the majority.""I've always found I had to do that; so I usually fixed the majority."McShay's imperturbability was irresistible."Now, I've mostly presided at functions like this, but I ain't a-pushin' my claims. Who do you want fer judge? Show of hands—who's fer me?"Up went the hands of the two faithful retainers, Orson and Silent, and Mike saw that his effort to stampede the proceedings was late, perhaps too late. Before the "opposed" were called for there was a concerted shout for Kal."Majorities are always wrong," commented the experienced McShay; "you git it, Kal."Kal took his seat on the bench where he had lately been the prisoner and Hal and Bill sat in the centre of the motley group of men who were accusers, witnesses, jurymen, and executioners.Perhaps there have been times and conditions when Judge Lynch served a useful purpose, but even when the judge happened by accident to be right, the resulting demoralization must have been worse than the initial crimes. Now that McShay had entered the arena, Ladd retired to the outskirts of the crowd and, having fired the house, was content to stand by and see it burn."I got to have an office," said McShay. "Not gittin' judge, I'm attorney for the defence.""All right," said the judge, getting quickly to business. "You have first innin's. How do you come to know mor'n and better'n us?""Well, I know a face card when I see it face up. I'm as good as that.""He says he owns this ranch," interjected Humpy who was the self-appointed prosecuting attorney. The offices Humpy got were self-appointed."The worst of it is," answered McShay, "I'm afraid he does.""You got to showus," said the judge in a tone that indicated the difficulty of such a proceeding."Well," replied McShay; "we bought it of Andy and Shorty, and we know they were crooks, 'cause they were crooked with us. Bill here says the signature to the deed is a forgery; and Bill knows the Earl's hand-writin'. That's all.""Well," smiled Humpy, "that don't go very strong with me. Bill may be mistaken or he may be lyin'.""Peradventure he ain't," retorted Mike. "Bill couldn't lie. He ain't gifted. Bill's the shortest distance between two points. I've knowed him fer an awful long time, and I wouldn't trust him to lie.""Is that all?" asked the judge, obviously refusing to be impressed."That's all.""'Tain't conclusive," said Humpy, trying to get the impressive lingo of opposing counsel."By the eternal it's presumptive," bellowed McShay. "Let the young feller go. If it should turn out that he owns the land, somebody might insist on making it awkward for some of us; if he don't own it, he can't prove it; he can't hold it, and no harm done.""If he owns the land," said the judge, taking a hand; "why didn't he go to court in a regl'r way?"Hal almost laughed aloud.It was the first time he seemed to be even an interested listener. After his outburst of a moment ago his thought had gone back to the Agency and had left in his face a vacant and far-away look."Go to court, eh? Judge Swayback owns a nice thick wad of your stock and Sheriff Black owns another. And you have no difficulty in packing any jury in this part of the State.""The prisoner seems to be unusually well informed," drawled McShay. "In resortin' to violence the defendant is at fault, but it is the indiscretion and exuberance of youth, gentlemen. I sometimes find myself resortin' to violence, and perhaps you gentlemen may remember in your own peace-lovin' and law-abidin' careers the sudden impulse to go and take what you thought was yourn. As a failin' it's distinctly human.""I think we've heard enough," remarked the judge. "McShay's full of presumin's and peradventurin's, and such misleadin' legal gab, but no feller is agoin' to come around and hold me up at the muzzle of a gun and git away with it.""Say, you're a judge; you ain't no right to argue.""I ain't a-arguin'. It's a fact."Humpy arose and advanced a step as if he felt the importance of the blow he was about to deliver."Testimony is conflictin'. Bill says he's all right. Ladd says he's all wrong. Testimony ain't no good any way. Never knew a feller as wouldn't lie if he had ter. This is the point. This feller wants land we bought and paid for, and he sets an awful bad example by comin' after it with a gun. That's enough fer me."There were murmurs of approval at this simple statement and impatient cries of "Vote—vote.""Say, Kid," said McShay to the prisoner; "you better offer to give up your claims and save your life.""No half-breed would keep such a promise," said Ladd quickly.McShay turned on the agent a look that held the other in a breathless grip for a second; then he only said: "Don't you interfere in this.""And I won't make such a promise," said Hal simply."Vote—vote," came impatiently from all directions."All in favor of lettin' the prisoner go hold up the right hand."McShay was always sure of the absolute support of Lee and Silent Smith on any side of any question."Three!" announced the judge grimly. "All in favor of hangin' the prisoner, similar!""He swings!" laconically added Kal."Now about Bill. I'm in favor of givin' Bill twenty-four hours to quit the country. If he's caught after that we'll string him up. All in favor hold up their hand. Carried! Curley, you're the feller that got us into this trouble. I'll appoint you to stay on guard, for to see that no one interferes with the course of justice. The prisoner has a couple of minutes with his friends."The court, jury, and executioners considerately moved away, just out of hearing."Boy," said McShay with the shadow of a quiver in his voice; "I can't prevent this.""I know you can't, McShay; but I thank you just the same for what you've done. You're a square man. I wish I'd known it sooner."The two men looked each other in the eye for a second and in that silence was born an understanding and a fellowship that each knew to be proof against time, self-interest, and life's vicissitudes.Bill muttered more to himself than to them: "I'm an old man. It wouldn't have mattered about me.""Is there anything Bill or I could do for you?" asked McShay, trying hard to keep his voice even and his eye clear."Yes; I'm troubled about Wah-na-gi," and Hal's voice shook in spite of himself. "Tell John McCloud I want him to adopt her. He has influential friends in the Indian Office. He's the best man I've ever known. Tell him it's my last request, the only one I have to make. I want him to get control of her and take her away from the Agency. Write my father, Bill, that I'd like the two of them to have this ranch. And tell the governor I took my medicine like a gentleman's son. Don't forget about Wah-na-gi.""She shan't want a friend while me or Bill lives; ain't that right, Bill?"Bill was crying and couldn't answer."Time's up," announced Kal.Hal's hands had been tied ever since he had been caught through the window by the Indians and disarmed. Now they led him over to the barn, tied his feet together, and Curley was placing a bandanna handkerchief over his eyes."I rather you wouldn't do that, if you don't mind," said Hal."It's ferme," explained Curley in an almost tender voice. "I got to stay here with you, and I—Well, you understand."Hal understood and made no further protest."Boys," said McShay with a solemnity most unusual to him, "I think you're a committin' murder, and I won't stay and see you do it. You can have my share of the asphalt—I wouldn't have it. It's blood money."And he walked off, followed by Smith and Lee, and they made the greatest haste to secure their horses and get away before the silent thing hung in the silent air."You might as well make it two instead of one, for I won't quit the country. I'll bring some one to justice for this," said Bill through his tears."Bill," called the victim in a pleading voice, "live to do what I told you, for my sake.""Johnson and McMurdy," said Kal, pointing to Bill; "take him to Carbon and put him on the train."The two burly cowmen hustled Bill over to the corral, and Bill was thankful that fate had decreed that he need not be present at the ghastly moment. Kal looked the situation over calmly."When it is done, every one but Curley hit the trail and forget it. Are you ready, Calthorpe?""Ready!" and the voice was calm and steady now."Anything to say?""Nothing.""Let her go."Up went the body into the air that seemed to grow suddenly still and cold.In a twinkling the end of the rope was made fast to a cleat in the side of the barn, and almost before this was done the crowd melted—vanished. There was, in fact, a horrible haste to leave the uncanny thing behind. Almost before it had begun to twist and twirl, Curley found himself alone with It. He shuddered, turned away, pulled a flask from his pocket and took a long pull, put the cork back, and tried once more to look at It. His legs kind of faded under him and he sat down at the foot of the rock that was Nat-u-ritch's grave; his jaw fell open and he stared at It, not being able now to look away. He stood this for a moment, then he succumbed to an overpowering sense of horror."I ain't agoin' to stay here and watchthat," he gasped.Then he drew his gun and took deliberate aim at the twisting target. His hand shook. He steadied it and got his aim. There was a flash from the loft of the stable and Curley sank back against the rock, bleeding.Then a slender girlish figure leaned out from the loft, a big blade gleamed in the moonlight, and the horrible twisting thing crumpled to the ground.
Hal and Bill were well mounted, had an excellent start, and before the members of the peace conference had recovered from their astonishment the two horsemen were out of sight and night had fallen. As they left the Agency behind the heart of Big Bill grew lighter. The fact that Hal had not taken him into his confidence did not worry the simple-minded Bill, but he rejoiced that at last they were on the straight and narrow way and had left behind them the world, the flesh, and the devil, always and everywhere of the female gender. The fact that they had a dangerous job ahead of them did not worry Bill, for it involved nothing more serious than just men. Bill had dealt with men as men and in a straight and fearless way had found himself capable, but where woman was involved, with nothing like the experience to justify it, he had arrived at the conclusion of the wise man who said: "Can a man take fire into his bosom and his clothes not be burned?" Indeed, greater minds than gentle Bill's have felt bewildered by "the way of a man with a maid." In his role of parent and guardian he had several times started to speak to his companion in words of commendation and encouragement, but impenetrable gloom enveloped the boy and the words died unborn. He essayed blithesome song, but even this personal expression degenerated into a whistle and dribbled feebly away, so, finally, the big man shook himself down into his saddle and they rode in silence—a silence that seemed to drip with a chilling mist. So they rode on into the radiant night indifferent to its splendors. They knew that the horses' stride was steady and strong in the clean, cool air that romped down from the snows, laden with the perfume of the pines, and that a matchless moon made it possible for them to leave the road at every opportunity and hit the trails and short cuts, but the poem of the night was not for them, its melody and its mystery.
Wah-na-gi—"the soul when separated from the body!" That was the meaning of her name. The young man had a queer feeling thathisbody was riding away from his soul into the night, into the unknown, into the far away. All of a sudden it came to him that he had been very happy at the Agency. Why was he riding away? What was this asphalt that made men lie and steal and jump at each other's throats? What was it to him?
What did he care for the Red Butte Ranch, except that his mother was buried there? That it was rich in minerals which could be exchanged for money, wealth, was outside his purposes. It was not the legal but the spiritual ownership which determined him. When we understand more about psychical phenomena we shall know more about our Indians. It wasn't only that the big appeal of the open was here intensified. Half memories, vague instincts, ghostly and subliminal concords met him here, took him by the hand, and said: "Come apart and be at peace." But all this was there, would wait. He never doubted his ultimate possession of the ranch. The Shades who owned it would eventually hand it over to him, their rightful heir. All that was only a matter of time. It could wait. Meantime, what was he doing? He was riding into the future unwillingly. He had left the Agency, and knew it was forever. He knew in a dull way that he had finished a chapter in his life, and that it would never be quite the same again. How did it happen? Ought he to have prevented it?
His thought wandered back over the devious ways he had come. His life seemed so impersonal, his own will and purpose had had so little to do with it. He could only think of a boat swept from its moorings, floating about on the waves of circumstance, driven before this wind, twisted by that current, tossed on the shore to be caught up again in the high tide and taken back to the deeps, back to the wanton winds and waves. He knew it would be useless to turn the horses' heads and try to go back. Always before he had submitted; what did it matter? Now it mattered. When was it he first cared? Swiftly his thought travelled back until it focussed on those two rough men in the library at Portman Square—awkward, shy, fumbling their broad-brimmed hats in their hands, dressed in their "store clothes"; all the more unmistakable for the London setting and for the contrast with his father with whom they were talking! He recalled his own wonder that the high-bred, delicate man with his distinguished face could ever have been tanned and weather-stained like these uncouth men and been their companion on the frontier. He recalled his own surprise at the familiarity of his father with them. The Earl had called them "Andy" and "Shorty," and he was rather punctilious about the forms and ceremonies. It was a revelation of a hitherto unsuspected talent for unbending. How his father had plied them with cigars and liquors, and their astonishing capacity! The amount of neat liquor they had taken at a gulp!
These men, so different from all the types with which he had been familiar, and each so unlike the other! "Andy," an Austrian Jew, was so determined to be conciliatory and ingratiating that he had developed a conservative stutter which, with its saving clauses and roundabout phrases, enabled him to estimate the effect upon his listener even before he had actually committed himself to the proposition in hand. "Shorty," quick, sharp, explosive, going direct to the point and disarming suspicion by a method the reverse of the other! There was something about these men that had interested him from the first, then amused him, then fascinated him. The subject of the talk did not immediately claim his attention. Every one knew that the ranch had been an expensive experience to the Earl, and it was a foregone conclusion that he would jump at the chance to sell it. The negotiations had gone quickly to a conclusion. The Earl had accepted their first offer and a deed had been prepared and was about to be signed. Then the young man interposed for the first time. He had suddenly received an impression, a "hunch," as the cowboys say, that seemed later to be clairvoyant. At first it was only a vague sentiment, too vague to be expressed, too vague to be used as an argument, or to influence practical men, so he only asked that the matter might be postponed until the following morning. His father and the Westerners were annoyed by this freak of eccentricity, but humored him as we humor children, or the irresponsible, for he remembered that he had been drinking, was perhaps drunk, as he often was in those evil days. The following morning a cable came from Big Bill saying: "Don't sell ranch. Have sent letter." The letter which followed explained what we already know, that asphalt had been found, that in Bill's opinion a lot of this valuable mineral was on the ranch, which had been "jumped" by the cowboys, and he strongly advised the Earl to send some one out there to investigate the matter; he suggested that this investigation should be conducted as secretly as possible; that he was himself too well known, and his former affiliations with the Earl were too well known, to permit of his doing this successfully. There was a job open at the Agency, the chief of Indian police, and Bill offered to use his influence to get it for any one the Earl would send out to look after his interests.
Then something in the young man's soul rose up and said: "Here am I." And when he turned his face to the West the winds and the waves beckoned to him and recognized him and led him to his own. Then for the first time he recognized purpose in his life. Ladd had seen in him only the usual adventurer trying to hide away from his past and one likely to be amenable and useful. It would have been difficult to find any one more suitable to the position of chief of police. In a country where men required initiative, self-reliance, and courage he had found conditions suitable to his temperament and abilities. He had felt "at home" and had been a success from the start. About the time that he took charge of the police, Wah-na-gi returned from Carlisle, and every phase of her struggle with her environment and heredity was obvious to him. He saw at once what she did not see, that it was hopeless, but it lent to her the charm of poetry and romance, and she was pretty enough not to require such assistance. For a long time he was very cunning in concealing and disguising his interest in the girl, and he continued to fool himself long after he had ceased to fool any one else. And now he was riding away from everything that made life worth living, and the fact that he had just come successfully through a big fight meant nothing to him. He would have liked to go back, but that was impossible, and he rode in bitterness and rebellion.
The cowboys had found the holding of the asphalt territory rather irksome. At first it had been all hurrah, but as week followed week and month followed month, and no armed conflict took place, they grew very tired. The Trust had entered upon the long siege with bomb-proof galleries and an elaborate system of underground approaches. No isolated fort ever successfully withstood such a siege. The asphalt vein stretched across considerable country and to police it all and hold it by force of arms against an invisible enemy that did not materialize but might at any moment do so, and at some unexpected place, was a nerve-racking job for a time, and then grew monotonous, and with monotony came carelessness. The Red Butte Ranch was their base of supplies and operations, and in possession of this they felt legally and morally secure, having been held up for it by two robbers in the usual and conventional way of the business world.
The majority of their men were therefore, as Hal knew, distributed along the asphalt vein, but he also knew that there were more than enough left at the ranch to put up a winning fight against two men. So it was necessary to exercise caution and strategy, and fight only if cornered and compelled to.
In his capacity of chief of police, Hal had ridden over every foot of the country and knew it as well as Bill. It was therefore greatly to the surprise of the latter when the young man, after crossing a spur of the Bad Lands, left the trail and struck into the hills.
"Where you goin', son?" he asked with obvious disapproval.
"We got to do this on the jump, Bill, or not at all. Time is the important thing, particularly if any of those bandits try to follow us. It's an awful bluff, but we'll get away with it."
"You can't git through that-a-way. You'll just run up against the 'Knife-edge'!"
"That's right. I'm going to cross it."
"Why, you're crazy. You can't do it."
"I've done it."
"Gosh! Honest? I never heard of any one fool enough to try it."
"My Indian police and I have done it."
"But, gosh-a-mighty, not at night!"
"No; but it's almost as light as day. My horse saveys it. Just shut your eyes, leave the reins on your horse's neck, and let him follow me."
"All right, son. I've had my innings. A Big Bill more or less don't matter. Go ahead."
The Knife-edge was a narrow ledge of sandstone that crossed a deep gash in the hills. It was not over one hundred yards in length, but its negotiation was apparently impossible. A single false step meant precipitation into the arid abyss, a thousand feet below. It was wonderful the way these Indian ponies felt their way across, a sort of equine tight-rope performance. Hal was right. The rider had nothing to do with it, except to sit straight and easily, without strain or fear, and let the pony do the rest. It was a test of nerves, and Bill, whose avoirdupois was not adjustable to tight-rope niceties, was in a profuse perspiration when his pony had taken the last careful step that put the Knife-edge into the background of things one would willingly forget. Bill had spent the best days of his life as foreman at the ranch, and could have found his way about blindfold, so when they were about a mile from the ranch Bill took the lead.
After riding a few moments over some bare clay hills they descended into an arroyo and followed its tortuous course unseen and unheard, for the horses' footfalls made no noise on the silent sands. It was necessary to dismount and lead the horses, and it was slow work. Suddenly Bill stopped short and pointed. It was an effulgent night and there against the skyline was limned the figure of a sentry, sitting before a little camp-fire, serenely smoking. He was perched on a little elevation just where the arroyo took a sharp bend, his rifle leaning against some greasewood near at hand. Bill unlimbered his gun, but Hal put his hand out and made a sign to stay him. The young man then uncoiled his lariat from his saddle and, hugging the walls of the dead stream, he crept to within reach of the dark figure and, with a hand that had become more than expert, coiled the deadly loop, then sent it into the silent air, where it poised for a moment like a snake about to strike, then it settled down about the body of its victim with the incredible squeeze of a constrictor. With a swift jerk the figure tumbled into the dry gulch and, before he realized what had happened to him, Hal's knee was on his chest and his gun-barrel at his head. Bill immediately disarmed the prostrate figure, taking his pistol from its holster as Hal said: "Don't speak." Indeed, there was really no need for this injunction. It had happened so quickly and the sentry was so unprepared that he hadn't a sound in him. It took him several valuable seconds to realize just what had happened, and by that time it was obvious that he was a prisoner. Bill took a hitch knot in the lariat and Hal ordered the man to stand up.
"Do as you're told and no harm'll come to you," he said quietly. Then he turned to Bill and said: "Shall we go on or shall we wait for the others? They must have the ranch surrounded by this time."
"I guess you and I can persuade 'em resistance would be useless."
This was to impress the prisoner who was by this time in an impressionable frame of mind.
"All right. Now, Curley," he said to the man whom he recognized; "we got the drop on you fellows. While McShay and your crowd have been gabbing over at the Agency we've got you cornered. Now I want you to walk ahead of us to the house, then call Coyote Kal out and we'll do the rest. Bill will have you covered from the stable and I will have you covered from behind the rock (meaning the rock that marked Nat-u-ritch's grave). If you give us away, neither of us could miss you. You're a dead man twice," he added with a laugh. His ill-humor always vanished in action. When the three men reached the barns, Hal made a short detour, crawling on his hands and knees until he was in the shelter of the rough, undressed bowlder which his father had hauled down from the canyons to mark the grave of the little Indian woman who had been his wife and the mother of the son who now crouched behind it, oblivious for the moment of everything except the dangerous business in hand. Then Bill untied Curley and pointed to the house opposite. The space over which Curley walked slowly was bathed in a flood of light. There didn't seem any way out of the predicament, so Curley stood before the adobe house and called softly: "Kal—Kal."
As this was repeated a sleepy voice within growled: "What the hell?" Then a tousled head appeared at the window and said: "That you, Curley? What's up? Has a messenger come from the Agency?"
"Yes. Come on out," urged Curley. "It's important."
The other man drew his trousers on and came out into the moonlight.
"What is it?" Then he noticed. "Where's your gun?"
"They took it away from me."
"They? What are you talking about?"
"It's no use, Kal; they got us surrounded."
With an oath the man addressed as Kal backed toward the house. Instantly Bill and Hal stepped into the light and covered him.
"Don't move," said Hal, and Coyote Kal had a solemn moment when the issue was uncertain.
Curley decided for him.
"Don't be a damn fool, Kal; they got us. What's the use?"
"Why didn't you ring the bell," said Kal surlily, "and call the men in?"
"Ring the bell?" sneered Curley. "Ring the bell? Say, wake up. Ring the bell with a couple of cannon up against your bowels? Does it take you a week to tumble? It didn't me. They stole up the dry crik and lassoed me; jerked me into the middle of next week before I knowed what ailed me. Ring the bell! I'll wring your neck if you say that to me ag'in."
"Bill, get that bench against the wall and put it there," indicating the middle of the court-yard. Bill did this with alacrity.
"Now, gentlemen, we're not going to fatigue you. We're going to treat you with distinguished consideration. Please be seated side by side on that bench. You can hold each other's hands if you get lonesome."
The two men obeyed in an apologetic way. Kal growled: "Why don't you tell us what you're up to and be done with it?"
"Now, Bill, ring that anxious bell for Coyote Kal."
Bill stepped over to the barn and rung a small bell affixed to its outer wall.
"Now, Kal, I want you to tell your men that they are trespassers on this property, and that you will be graciously permitted to withdraw if you do so at once and without trouble. If they stop to discuss the matter, there'll be a fight, and I don't think there'll be enough of you left to get away. Bill will occupy the stable and I will occupy the house, and if there is any show of resistance by your men you and Curley will be the first to meet your Maker; and I think you need more time for preparation."
"You sure ain't prepared," ejaculated Bill. "You sure ain't."
The ranch house was a mixture of styles. A log-cabin met an adobe addition at right angles. Each was supplied with a door, flanked by a window, and a portico leaned wearily against the house in various attitudes of discouragement. Hal took his stand in the shelter of the angle. He had the house on two sides of him. His position was exposed to the stable, where Bill was secreted, and the space between the house and stable was completely dominated by them both. One could have read a paper in the moonlight.
"My, it's clear to-night," said Hal, surveying the situation with a grin of satisfaction. "Anyway it happens it looks to me as if you two out there were a sure thing."
This was perfectly plain to Kal and Curley, but outside the purely physical situation they were completely dazed. McShay and his men were supposed to be looking out for their interests at the conference at the Agency, and here was Ladd's chief of police claiming their ranch and putting them forcibly off the ground they had bought and paid for.
They merely got a vague impression that this was just an effort on the part of Ladd to shift the battle ground. But as their brains worked slowly over it nothing seemed to fit into this theory. And it was part of Hal's plan to leave them no time to think. He realized that his only chance of success was in rushing them off their feet. It was a perilous game in which time was to be a deciding factor.
As suggested by Kal, the bell was an alarm that called all the men on the ranch in for instructions. They came, and quickly, and all armed; some fifteen men. As they came into view their amazement was comic at the sight of Curley and their boss sitting on a bench side by side in the moonlight like two naughty boys kept in at school.
"Speak your little piece, Kal," urged Hal.
"Well, boys," said their leader, shamefaced; "I don't know how it happened, but the Agency folks got the bulge on us, got us corralled, Curley says, and it's fight or surrender. As they got a bead on me from the house and the stable, surrender looks a whole lot better to me. We can come back and fight 'em for it afterwards."
Instinctively there was a simultaneous movement for cover. The dilapidated sheds leaning against the barn with their bags, barrels, bales of hay, etc., were selected by those nearest to them. Carroll and the rest put the rock that marked Nat-u-ritch's grave in front of them. "Humpy" Carroll, as his name indicated, was a humpbacked little man with ambitions. He had always fallen just short of being a leader and it made him a chronic insurgent. His insubordination had brought him into frequent conflict with Kal, whose place he coveted, and the latter's uncomfortable position afforded him keen satisfaction. In fact, Kal's taking off would not have appealed to Humpy as an irreparable loss.
Kal knew this and it filled him with helpless rage.
"Surrender without a fight?" inquired Humpy in a tone that made Kal squirm.
But he replied calmly with a slow drawl: "You got a nice fat rock in front of you, Humpy."
"I don't mind kickin' the bucket with a gun in my hand," chimed in Curley; "but give us achanceto fight, Humpy?"
"'Tain't our fault if you let 'em rope you."
"Say," said Kal, "if these fellers'll give me a gun, and will stand by, I'll fightyou, Humpy; and the feller that gits over it—his word goes."
"Say, that's sporty," exclaimed Hal, delighted; "I'll stand for that."
Humpy's sardonic face grinned.
"Say, you'd like to get us a killin' each other, wouldn't you? Got us 'surrounded' have you? Well, we'll just have a look around and see."
"No, you don't." cut in Hal with decision. "You surrender or fightnow."
"Boys," called out Kal, "you know I'm no coward, but I think you owe it to me and Curley to give us a chance. I'll give you your innings later. They can't keep what they've took, and no man of you'll beat me in comin' back after it."
"I'll give you 'till I count ten," said Hal.
Voices came spontaneously from various places: "Kal's right"—"Lethimdecide"—"Leave it to Kal," and similar expressions. It was obvious that the men realized the position of their leader and would temporarily surrender possession of the ranch rather than see him sacrificed. Curley's fate was thrown in for good measure.
"Your men are with you, Kal," said Hal, eager to consummate the precarious deal. "Tell them to put their weapons in a pile back of you and Curley."
Kal repeated these instructions, but with evident reluctance. It was obvious that the fact that he was getting away with his life was hardly compensation for the humiliation suffered before Humpy and his comrades. As the men came forward from their hiding places Hal relaxed his tension. It came to him that he was very tired, and he leaned against the window of the log-cabin, the window Kal had opened before leaving the house. Just then a warning shout came from the stable. "Look out, boy! Look out!"
Bill had time to say no more. It all happened in a flash. Two sinewy bronze arms darted from the window and pinioned Hal from behind in a vise-like grip. Hal knew instinctively that it was Appah. Bill, as he was in the act of warning Hal, was over-powered from behind and bound by Appah's men so quickly that he had only time to see that his warning to the boy had come too late.
This had occurred without the cowboys being aware of it, so intent were they on their own part in the drama. Kal's head drooped with shame as he looked at the ground and said:
"We surrender."
"Surrender? Surrender? What are you talkin' about?"
It was Agent Ladd's voice as he strode nervously through the crowd of ranchmen. He stopped in front of Kal and Curley, his eyes blazing with excitement.
"Surrender this ranch to a couple of bluffs? You're a nice chicken-hearted lot!"
CHAPTER IX
As the cowboys turned and saw Hal and Bill with their arms pinioned and in the custody of Appah's men, they suffered a revulsion of feeling that boded no good to the men whose bluff had been called.
"And two of 'em,twoof 'em hold you up. Why, you'll be the laughing stock of the country."
Ladd lost no time in fanning their smouldering pride into a relentless blaze.
"Gosh-a-mighty; ain't these your men?" gasped Kal.
It seemed such a useless question at this juncture to Ladd that he didn't stop to answer it.
"You lynch cattle thieves out in this country, but you 'surrender' to land thieves."
Hal looked at his adversary with admiration. He hadn't supposed that Ladd would follow him, that he would trust himself in the enemy's country; but here he was in time to turn victory into defeat, and he was appealing to this mob with all the cunning of a skilled demagogue and with the ferocity of a tiger.
Kal came over to Calthorpe and, looking him in the eye, said slowly—emphasizing every word:
"You made me look foolish, boy."
That is an unforgivable sin. You may take a man's honor or his money or his wife, and indeed have his life, and forgiveness is still possible; but don't expect mercy if you have made him look foolish.
"And youroped me," added Curley. "Ropin' bein' in fashion, we'll let you in on it." And he threw around Hal's neck a coil of the rope the latter had used on him.
"Wait a minute," said the irreconcilable Humpy. "If this feller ain't your man, Mr. Agent; who the hell is he?"
"He's the legal owner of this ranch," declared Bill with emphasis; "and if you lynch him you'll be guilty of committin' murder."
"Oh, no," said Kal grimly; "we'll just be guilty of a mistake."
"Fer which," added Humpy, "we kin apologize later."
"Is that right?" demanded Kal. "Do you claim this ranch and the asphalt on it?"
"I do. It's mine."
"Well, I guess that'll be about all."
"I guess we'll have to give your imagination an extra stretch."
"I can prove it."
"'Tain't open to argyment."
"If you git a chance to prove it, it'll sure be contributory negligence on our part. Ain't that right, boys?"
Everybody was in on the conversation now. The men gathered around Hal and Bill like carnivorous beasts at the smell of blood. Nothing stirs the average man's imagination like gold. Each one of these rough men had seen visions and had fashioned elaborate impossibilities out of this mysterious asphalt. They told each other apocryphal stories of its enormous value. Each saw himself fabulously rich. There was enormous potential wealth here, but nothing could have corresponded to their grotesque dreams, and the more nebulous and vapory they were the more these rough men clung to them, and at the mention of their "rights" they became feverish, fanatical, ready to tear into pieces whoever looked toward their disputed treasures; ready to tear each other to pieces for the fraction of a claim to that which they did not possess.
"Lynch him first and discuss it afterwards," suggested Ladd, seeing the temper of his audience and playing to its sardonic humor.
"You know what's eatin'him?" said Bill, pointing an angry finger at the agent. "The kid showed him up as a crook and a thief. When he's got you so deep in this you can't git out, he'll be the first to turn on you and sic justice onto you."
The eyes of all turned from the prisoner to Ladd, and Humpy expressed the prevailing suspicion of the man they had no reason to trust:
"It ain't been supposed that Mr. Ladd was a sittin' up at nights a tryin' to think of ways to help us."
Ladd faced them with courage and an air of apparent candor.
"I've fought you, but fair and in the open, and I'm goin' to fight you for the land that's on the Reservation, but this land, as I understand it, is yours, bought and paid for."
There was a chorus of fierce assent to this.
"You're in for a long and a losing fight against the Government; so if you losethis ranchyou lose everything."
There was no approving shout for this, but the force of it was felt by all.
"But this feller here," said the tenacious Humpy, pointing to the prisoner and not to be diverted by the agent; "what about him?"
Ladd looked at the wild animals with their fangs frankly bared and knew that they were easy. Then he played his trump card.
"As for this land-grabber, the best I know of him and the best he can say for himself is that he's a half-breed."
This irrelevant appeal to prejudice was so crude, raw, and unblushing as to be obvious to a child, but its effect was instantaneous. Every vestige of restraint, of irresolution disappeared in the faces of the mob. Human equality! There is no such thing even theoretically. There are differences which separate human beings and will always separate them, but they are moral and intellectual differences. No one admits the principle of human equality, because:
"The principle of human equality takes away the right of killing so-called inferior peoples, just as it destroys the right claimed by some of dominating others. If all peoples are equal, if their different appearances are only the result of changing circumstances, in virtue of what principle is it allowable to destroy their happiness and to compromise their right to independence?"[1]
[1] Finot.
The logic of prejudice is a strange and wonderful thing.
That some criminals were also half-breeds, that many half-breeds were undesirable citizens has crystallized into the conviction in most Western communities that all half-breeds are worthless and dangerous, and are therefore capable of any and all crimes. This has nothing to do with any ascertainable facts, and if opposite to Agent Ladd had arisen a man of intellect who had devoted his life and all the energies of a noble mind to finding out the truth, and had said: "If the word half-breed was strictly applied to the progeny which has really issued from a mixture of varieties, it would be necessary to include under this denomination all human beings with rare exceptions"[2]—it would have meant nothing to the audience to whom Ladd's appeal meant everything. As one man they turned upon Hal, their brows lowering and the pupils of their eyes contracting.
[2] Finot.
"Is it true," said Kal, "that you're a half-breed?"
The boy did not reply at once, but drew himself up proudly and looked them over contemptuously; he saw his last chance was gone, so he took his time and said very slowly:
"I'm the son of the Earl of Kerhill and of Nat-u-ritch, an Indian woman; and I've got better blood in my veins than any man here, you swine!"
"Throw the rope over that beam," said Kal, pointing to the timber that projected over the loft on the barn.
"Yes," added Humpy; "it's time we made an example of some one. Land-grabbin' and half-breeds has got to be discouraged."
"You haven't anything against Bill. Let him go," said Hal quickly.
"He'll be a witness against us."
"You bet I will," said Bill promptly.
"No; he'll leave the country."
"I'll camp on the trail of these murderers as long as I live."
"For God's sake, shut up, Bill," begged Hal, as his eyes filled with involuntary tears.
"Sorry you feel that-a-way," said Humpy; "leaves us no choice. Up with 'em."
"Hold on there—you!"
The cowmen turned to see McShay sitting on a smoking, gasping horse with quivering nostrils and trembling flanks, and mopping his dripping brow first with his sleeve and then with a huge bandanna handkerchief.
"Say, I ain't had a ride like this since I was a kid. Well, you beat me to it, Mr. Agent; didn't you? I guess your Injins showed you a short cut. Some of you hold up this horse, and some more of you help me off'n him, though I don't know's I can stand much."
The interjection of this cool personality seemed to lower the temperature several degrees. While McShay was dismounting, Smith and Lee rode in on horses which showed similar evidence of hard usage.
"If these are my leags as I'm a standin' on, I want to observe that you are gittin' precipitate a whole lot. I move to reconsider."
"What fer?"
"Well, boys, I'm afraid we're on the young feller's land."
This declaration from their leader would have made a sensation if it had come before their passions had gained momentum. It might have changed the progress of events, but now Kal voiced the general sentiment in a surly: "We'll give him some of it—just about six feet of it."
There is no use talking temperance to the drunkard who has already started on his debauch. The unacknowledged fear that their acts would not bear examination made them fiercely resentful of interference, and there was an unacknowledged conviction that what was done and could not be undone justified itself as inevitable.
"Even Judge Lynch usually holds court," suggested McShay.
"We've heard what he's got to say."
"Say; you're foolish to interfere."
"Interferin' is my long suit," drawled McShay. "I ain't happy unless I'm interferin'. Now there are two ways of lynchin' a man. One is to git hysterical and borey-eyed, and lose yer re-pose. The other is to proceed in a regular and high-toned way. Now these fellers has the right to a ca'm judgment, and they will git it."
"They will," glared Humpy; "if you'll agree to abide by the decision of the majority."
"I've always found I had to do that; so I usually fixed the majority."
McShay's imperturbability was irresistible.
"Now, I've mostly presided at functions like this, but I ain't a-pushin' my claims. Who do you want fer judge? Show of hands—who's fer me?"
Up went the hands of the two faithful retainers, Orson and Silent, and Mike saw that his effort to stampede the proceedings was late, perhaps too late. Before the "opposed" were called for there was a concerted shout for Kal.
"Majorities are always wrong," commented the experienced McShay; "you git it, Kal."
Kal took his seat on the bench where he had lately been the prisoner and Hal and Bill sat in the centre of the motley group of men who were accusers, witnesses, jurymen, and executioners.
Perhaps there have been times and conditions when Judge Lynch served a useful purpose, but even when the judge happened by accident to be right, the resulting demoralization must have been worse than the initial crimes. Now that McShay had entered the arena, Ladd retired to the outskirts of the crowd and, having fired the house, was content to stand by and see it burn.
"I got to have an office," said McShay. "Not gittin' judge, I'm attorney for the defence."
"All right," said the judge, getting quickly to business. "You have first innin's. How do you come to know mor'n and better'n us?"
"Well, I know a face card when I see it face up. I'm as good as that."
"He says he owns this ranch," interjected Humpy who was the self-appointed prosecuting attorney. The offices Humpy got were self-appointed.
"The worst of it is," answered McShay, "I'm afraid he does."
"You got to showus," said the judge in a tone that indicated the difficulty of such a proceeding.
"Well," replied McShay; "we bought it of Andy and Shorty, and we know they were crooks, 'cause they were crooked with us. Bill here says the signature to the deed is a forgery; and Bill knows the Earl's hand-writin'. That's all."
"Well," smiled Humpy, "that don't go very strong with me. Bill may be mistaken or he may be lyin'."
"Peradventure he ain't," retorted Mike. "Bill couldn't lie. He ain't gifted. Bill's the shortest distance between two points. I've knowed him fer an awful long time, and I wouldn't trust him to lie."
"Is that all?" asked the judge, obviously refusing to be impressed.
"That's all."
"'Tain't conclusive," said Humpy, trying to get the impressive lingo of opposing counsel.
"By the eternal it's presumptive," bellowed McShay. "Let the young feller go. If it should turn out that he owns the land, somebody might insist on making it awkward for some of us; if he don't own it, he can't prove it; he can't hold it, and no harm done."
"If he owns the land," said the judge, taking a hand; "why didn't he go to court in a regl'r way?"
Hal almost laughed aloud.
It was the first time he seemed to be even an interested listener. After his outburst of a moment ago his thought had gone back to the Agency and had left in his face a vacant and far-away look.
"Go to court, eh? Judge Swayback owns a nice thick wad of your stock and Sheriff Black owns another. And you have no difficulty in packing any jury in this part of the State."
"The prisoner seems to be unusually well informed," drawled McShay. "In resortin' to violence the defendant is at fault, but it is the indiscretion and exuberance of youth, gentlemen. I sometimes find myself resortin' to violence, and perhaps you gentlemen may remember in your own peace-lovin' and law-abidin' careers the sudden impulse to go and take what you thought was yourn. As a failin' it's distinctly human."
"I think we've heard enough," remarked the judge. "McShay's full of presumin's and peradventurin's, and such misleadin' legal gab, but no feller is agoin' to come around and hold me up at the muzzle of a gun and git away with it."
"Say, you're a judge; you ain't no right to argue."
"I ain't a-arguin'. It's a fact."
Humpy arose and advanced a step as if he felt the importance of the blow he was about to deliver.
"Testimony is conflictin'. Bill says he's all right. Ladd says he's all wrong. Testimony ain't no good any way. Never knew a feller as wouldn't lie if he had ter. This is the point. This feller wants land we bought and paid for, and he sets an awful bad example by comin' after it with a gun. That's enough fer me."
There were murmurs of approval at this simple statement and impatient cries of "Vote—vote."
"Say, Kid," said McShay to the prisoner; "you better offer to give up your claims and save your life."
"No half-breed would keep such a promise," said Ladd quickly.
McShay turned on the agent a look that held the other in a breathless grip for a second; then he only said: "Don't you interfere in this."
"And I won't make such a promise," said Hal simply.
"Vote—vote," came impatiently from all directions.
"All in favor of lettin' the prisoner go hold up the right hand."
McShay was always sure of the absolute support of Lee and Silent Smith on any side of any question.
"Three!" announced the judge grimly. "All in favor of hangin' the prisoner, similar!"
"He swings!" laconically added Kal.
"Now about Bill. I'm in favor of givin' Bill twenty-four hours to quit the country. If he's caught after that we'll string him up. All in favor hold up their hand. Carried! Curley, you're the feller that got us into this trouble. I'll appoint you to stay on guard, for to see that no one interferes with the course of justice. The prisoner has a couple of minutes with his friends."
The court, jury, and executioners considerately moved away, just out of hearing.
"Boy," said McShay with the shadow of a quiver in his voice; "I can't prevent this."
"I know you can't, McShay; but I thank you just the same for what you've done. You're a square man. I wish I'd known it sooner."
The two men looked each other in the eye for a second and in that silence was born an understanding and a fellowship that each knew to be proof against time, self-interest, and life's vicissitudes.
Bill muttered more to himself than to them: "I'm an old man. It wouldn't have mattered about me."
"Is there anything Bill or I could do for you?" asked McShay, trying hard to keep his voice even and his eye clear.
"Yes; I'm troubled about Wah-na-gi," and Hal's voice shook in spite of himself. "Tell John McCloud I want him to adopt her. He has influential friends in the Indian Office. He's the best man I've ever known. Tell him it's my last request, the only one I have to make. I want him to get control of her and take her away from the Agency. Write my father, Bill, that I'd like the two of them to have this ranch. And tell the governor I took my medicine like a gentleman's son. Don't forget about Wah-na-gi."
"She shan't want a friend while me or Bill lives; ain't that right, Bill?"
Bill was crying and couldn't answer.
"Time's up," announced Kal.
Hal's hands had been tied ever since he had been caught through the window by the Indians and disarmed. Now they led him over to the barn, tied his feet together, and Curley was placing a bandanna handkerchief over his eyes.
"I rather you wouldn't do that, if you don't mind," said Hal.
"It's ferme," explained Curley in an almost tender voice. "I got to stay here with you, and I—Well, you understand."
Hal understood and made no further protest.
"Boys," said McShay with a solemnity most unusual to him, "I think you're a committin' murder, and I won't stay and see you do it. You can have my share of the asphalt—I wouldn't have it. It's blood money."
And he walked off, followed by Smith and Lee, and they made the greatest haste to secure their horses and get away before the silent thing hung in the silent air.
"You might as well make it two instead of one, for I won't quit the country. I'll bring some one to justice for this," said Bill through his tears.
"Bill," called the victim in a pleading voice, "live to do what I told you, for my sake."
"Johnson and McMurdy," said Kal, pointing to Bill; "take him to Carbon and put him on the train."
The two burly cowmen hustled Bill over to the corral, and Bill was thankful that fate had decreed that he need not be present at the ghastly moment. Kal looked the situation over calmly.
"When it is done, every one but Curley hit the trail and forget it. Are you ready, Calthorpe?"
"Ready!" and the voice was calm and steady now.
"Anything to say?"
"Nothing."
"Let her go."
Up went the body into the air that seemed to grow suddenly still and cold.
In a twinkling the end of the rope was made fast to a cleat in the side of the barn, and almost before this was done the crowd melted—vanished. There was, in fact, a horrible haste to leave the uncanny thing behind. Almost before it had begun to twist and twirl, Curley found himself alone with It. He shuddered, turned away, pulled a flask from his pocket and took a long pull, put the cork back, and tried once more to look at It. His legs kind of faded under him and he sat down at the foot of the rock that was Nat-u-ritch's grave; his jaw fell open and he stared at It, not being able now to look away. He stood this for a moment, then he succumbed to an overpowering sense of horror.
"I ain't agoin' to stay here and watchthat," he gasped.
Then he drew his gun and took deliberate aim at the twisting target. His hand shook. He steadied it and got his aim. There was a flash from the loft of the stable and Curley sank back against the rock, bleeding.
Then a slender girlish figure leaned out from the loft, a big blade gleamed in the moonlight, and the horrible twisting thing crumpled to the ground.