During the absence of Macdonald the field agent saw less of Sheba than he had expected, and when he did see her she had an abstracted manner he did not quite understand. She kept to her own room a good deal, except when she took long walks into the hills back of the town. Diane had a shrewd idea that the Alaskan had put his fortune to the test, and she not only let her cousin alone herself, but fended Gordon from her adroitly.
The third day after the dinner Elliot dropped around to the Pagets with intent to get Sheba into a set of tennis. Diane sat on the porch darning socks.
"Sheba is out walking with Mr. Macdonald," she explained in answer to a question as to the whereabouts of her guest.
"Oh, he's back, is he?" remarked Gordon moodily.
Mrs. Paget was quite cheerful on that subject. "He came back this morning. Sheba has gone up with him to see the Lucky Strike."
"You're going to marry her to that man if you can, aren't you?" he charged.
"If I can, Gordon." She slipped a darning-ball into one of little Peter's stockings and placidly trimmed the edges of the hole.
"It's what I call a conspiracy."
"Is it?" Diane smiled.
Gordon understood her smile to mean that he was jealous.
"Maybe I am. That's not the point," he answered, just as if she had made her accusation in words.
"Suppose you tell me what the point is," she suggested, both amused and annoyed.
"He isn't good enough for her. You know that perfectly well."
"Good enough!" She shrugged her shoulders. "What manisgood enough for a nice girl if you come to that? There are other things beside sugary goodness. Any man who is strong can make himself good enough for the woman he loves."
"Generally speaking, yes. But Colby Macdonald is different."
"Thank Heaven he is," she retorted impatiently. Then added after a moment: "He isn't a Sunday-School superintendent if that's what you mean."
"That isn't what I mean at all. But there's such a thing as a difference between right and wrong, isn't there?"
"Oh, yes. For instance, Mr. Macdonald isright about the need of developing Alaska and the way to do it, and you are wrong."
He could not help smiling a little at the adroit way she tried to sidetrack him, even though he was angry at her. But he had no intention of letting her go without freeing his mind.
"I'm talking about essential right and wrong. Miss O'Neill is idealizing Macdonald. I don't suppose you've told her, for instance, that he made his first money in the North running a dance hall."
"No, I haven't told her any such thing, because it isn't true," she replied scornfully. "He owned an opera house and brought in a company of players. I dare say they danced. That's very different, as you'd know if you didn't have astigmatism of the mind."
"Not the way the story was told me. But let that pass. Does she know that Macdonald beat her father out of one of the best claims on Bonanza and was indirectly responsible for his death?"
"What's the use of talking nonsense, Gordon. You know you can't prove that," his friend told him sharply.
"I think I can—if it is necessary."
Diane looked across at him with an impudent little tilt of the chin. "I don't think I like you as well as I used to."
"Sorry, because I'd like you just as well, Diane, if you would stop trying to manage your cousin into a marriage that will spoil her life," he answered gravely.
"How dare you say that! How dare you, Gordon Elliot!" she flung back, furious at him. "I won't have you here talking that way to me. It's an insult."
The fearless, level eyes of her friend looked straight at her. "I say it because the happiness of Miss O'Neill is of very great importance to me."
"Do you mean—?" Wide-eyed, she looked her question straight at him.
"That's just what I mean, Diane."
She darned for a minute in silence. It had occurred to Diane before that perhaps Gordon might be in love with Sheba, but she had put the thought from her because she did not want to believe it.
"That's different, Gordon. It explains—and in a way excuses—your coming here and trying to bully me." She stopped her work to flash a question at him. "Don't you think that maybe it's only a fancy of yours? I remember you used—"
He shook his head. "No chance, Diane. I'm hard hit. She's the only girl I ever met that suited me. Everything she does is right. Every move she makes is wonderful."
The eyes with which she looked at him were softer, as those of women are wont to be for the true romance.
"You poor boy," she murmured, and let her hand for a moment rest on his.
"Meaning that I lose?" he asked quickly.
"I think you do. I'm not sure."
Elliot leaned forward impulsively. "Be a good sport, Diane. Let me have my chance too. Why do you make it easy for Macdonald and hard for me? Isn't it because the glamour of his millions blinds you?"
"He's a big, splendid man, but I don't like him any the less because he has the power to make life easy and comfortable for Sheba," she defended sturdily.
"Yet you turned down Arthur West, the best catch in your set, to marry Peter, who was the worst," he reminded her. "Have you ever been sorry for it?"
"That's different. Peter and I fit. It was one case out of a million." She gave him her old, friendly smile. "But I don't want to be hard on you, Gord. I'll be neutral. Come and see Sheba as often as she'll let you."
Gordon beamed as he shook hands with her. "That sounds like the Di Paget I used to know."
She recurred to the previous question. "Sheba knows more about Mr. Macdonald than youthink. And about how he got her father's claim, for instance,—she has heard all that."
"You told her?"
"No. Colby Macdonald told her. He said he practically robbed her father, and he gave her a check for nearly two hundred thousand to cover the clean-up from the claim and interest."
"Bully for him." On the heel of this he flung a question at her. "Did Macdonald ask her to marry him the night of the dinner?"
A flash of whimsical amusement lit her dainty face. "You'd better ask him that. Here he comes now."
They were coming down the walk together, Macdonald and Sheba. The young woman was absorbed in his talk, and she did not know that her cousin and Elliot were on the porch until she was close upon them. But at sight of the young man her eyes became warm and kind.
"I'm sorry I was out yesterday when you called," she told him.
"And you were out again to-day. My luck isn't very good, is it?"
He laughed pleasantly, but his heart was bitter. He believed Macdonald had won. Some hint of proprietorship in his manner, together with her slight confusion when she saw them on the porch, had weighted his heart with lead.
"We've had such a good walk." Sheba wenton quickly. "I wish you could have heard Mr. Macdonald telling me how he once had a chance to save a small Esquimaux tribe during a hard winter. He carried food five hundred miles to them. It was a thrilling experience."
"Mr. Macdonald has had a lot of very interesting experiences. You must get him to tell you about all of them," answered Gordon quietly.
The eyes of the two men met. The steel-gray ones of the older man answered the challenge of his rival with a long, steady look. There was in it something of triumph, something of scornful insolence. If this young fellow wanted war, he did not need to wait long for it.
"Time enough for that, man. Miss O'Neill and I have the whole Arctic winter before us for stories."
The muscles in the lean jaws of Gordon Elliot stood out like steel ropes. He turned to Sheba. "Am I to congratulate Mr. Macdonald?"
The color in her cheeks grew warmer, but her shy glance met his fairly. "I think it is I that am to be congratulated, Mr. Elliot."
Diane took her cousin in her arms. "My dear, I wish you all the happiness in the world," she said softly.
The Irish girl fled into the house as soon as she could, but not before making an announcement.
"We're to be married soon, very quietly. Ifyou are still at Kusiak we want you to be one of the few friends present, Mr. Elliot."
Macdonald backed her invitation with a cool, cynical smile. "Miss O'Neill speaks for us both, of course, Elliot."
The defeated man bowed. "Thanks very much. The chances are that I'll be through my business here before then."
As soon as his fiancée had gone into the house, the Scotchman left. Gordon sat down in a porch chair and stared straight in front of him. The suddenness of the news had brought his world tumbling about his ears. He felt that such a marriage would be an outrage against Sheba's innocence. But he was not yet far enough away from the blow to ask himself how much the personal hurt influenced his opinion.
Though she was sorry for him, Diane did not think it best to say so yet.
Presently he spoke thickly. "I suppose you have heard that he was a squawman."
His friend joined battle promptly with him. "That's ridiculous. Don't be absurd, Gordon."
"It's the truth. I've seen the woman. She was pointed out to me."
"By old Gideon Holt, likely," she flashed.
"One could get evidence and show it to Miss O'Neill," he said aloud, to himself rather than to her.
Diane put her point of view before him with heated candor. "Youcouldn't. Nobody but a cad would rake up old scandals about the man who has beaten him fairly for a woman's love."
"You beg the question.Hashe won fairly?"
"Of course he has. Be a good sport, Gordon. Don't kick on the umpire's decision. Play the game."
"That's all very well. But what about her? Am I to sit quiet while she is sacrificed to a code of honor that seems to me rooted in dishonor?"
"She is not being sacrificed. I'm her cousin. I'm very fond of her. And I'd trust her with Colby Macdonald."
"Play fair, Diane. Tell her the truth about this Indian woman and let your cousin decide for herself. You can't do less, can you?"
Mrs. Paget was distinctly annoyed. "You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Gordon Elliot. You take all the gossip of a crack-brained old idiot for gospel truth just because you want to believe the worst about Mr. Macdonald. Don't you know that people will say anything about a man who succeeds? Colby Macdonald is too big and too aggressive not to have made hundreds of enemies. His life has been threatened dozens of times. But he pays no attention toit—goes right on building-up this country. Yet you'd think he had a cloven hoof to hear some people talk. I've no patience with them."
"The woman's name is Meteetse," Gordon said in an even voice, just as if he were answering a question. "She is young and good-looking for an Indian. Her boy is four or five years old. Colmac, they call him, and he looks just like Macdonald."
"People are always tracing resemblances. There's nothing to that. But suppose his lifewasirregular—years ago. This isn't Boston. It used to be the fringe of civilization. Men did as they pleased in the early days. We don't ask a man up here what he has been, but what he is. You ought to know that by this time."
"This wasn't in the early days. It was five years ago, when Macdonald was examining the Kamatlah coal-field. I'm told he sends a check down the river once a month for the woman."
"All the more credit to him if he does." Diane rose and looked stormily down at her friend. "You're about as broad as a clam, Gordon. Can't you see that even if it's true, all that is done with? It is a part of his past—and it's finished—trodden under foot. It hasn't a thing to do with Sheba."
"I don't agree with you. A man can't cut loose entirely from his past. It is a part ofhim—and Macdonald's past isn't good enough for Sheba O'Neill."
Diane tapped her little foot impatiently on the floor. "Do you know many men whose pasts are good enough for their wives? Are you a plaster-cast saint yourself? You know perfectly well that men trample down their pasts and begin again when they are married. Colby Macdonald is good enough for any woman alive if he loves her enough."
"You don't know him."
"I know him far better than you do. He is the biggest man I know, and now that he is in love with a good woman he'll rise to his chance."
"She ought to be told the truth about Meteetse and her boy," he insisted doggedly.
"I'm not going to disturb her with a lot of old maids' gossip. That's flat."
"But if I prove to you that it isn't gossip."
Mrs. Paget lost her temper completely. "Does the Government pay you to mind other people's business, Gordon?" she snapped.
"I wouldn't be working for the Government then, but for Sheba O'Neill."
"And for Gordon Elliot. You'd be doing underhand work for him too. Don't forget that. You can't do it. You're not that kind of a man. It isn't in you to go muckraking in the past of the man Sheba is going to marry."
Elliot rose and looked across at the blue-ribbed mountains. His square jaw was set when he turned it back toward Diane.
"She isn't going to marry him if I can help it," he said quietly.
He walked out of the gate and down the walk toward his hotel.
A message was waiting for him there from his chief in Seattle. It called him down the river on business.
Inside of an hour the news of the engagement of Macdonald was all over Kusiak. It was through a telephone receiver that the gossip was buzzed to Mrs. Mallory by a friend who owed her a little stab. The voice of Genevieve Mallory registered faint amusement, but as soon as she had hung up, her face fell into haggard lines. She had staked a year of her waning youth on winning the big mining man of Kusiak, together with all the money that she had been able to scrape up for a campaign outfit. Moreover, she liked him.
It was not in the picture that she should fall desperately in love with any man. A woman of the world, she was sheathed in the plate armor of selfishness. But she was as near to loving Macdonald as was possible for her. She had a great deal of admiration for his iron strength, for the grit of the man. No woman could twist him around her finger, yet it was possible to lead him a long way in the direction one wanted.
Mrs. Mallory sat down in the hall beside the telephone, her fingers laced about one crossed knee. She knew that if Sheba O'Neill had notcome on the scene, Macdonald would have asked her to marry him. He had been moving slowly toward her for months. They understood each other and were at ease together. Between them was a strong physical affinity. Both were good-tempered and were wise enough to expect human imperfection.
Then Diane Paget had brought in this slim, young cousin of hers and Colby Macdonald had been fascinated by the mystery of her innocent youth. Mrs. Mallory was like steel beneath the soft and indolent surface. Swiftly she mapped her plan of attack. The Alaskan could not be moved, but it might be possible to startle the girl into breaking the engagement. Genevieve Mallory would have used the weapon at hand without scruple in any case, but she justified herself on the ground that such a marriage could result only in unhappiness.
But before she made any move Mrs. Mallory intended to be sure of her facts. It was like her to go to headquarters for information. She got Macdonald on the wire.
"I've just heard something nice about you. Do tell me it's true," she said, her voice warm with sympathy.
Macdonald laughed with an almost boyish embarrassment. "It's true, I reckon."
"I'm so glad. She's a lovely girl. The sweetestthing that ever lived. I'm sure you'll be happy. I always did think you would make a perfect husband. Of course, I'm simply green with envy of her."
Her little ripple of laughter was gay and care-free. The man at the other end of the line never had liked her better. Since he was not a fool he had guessed pretty closely how things stood with her. She was a game little sport, he told himself approvingly. It appealed to him immensely that she could take such a facer and come up smiling.
There were no signs of worry wrinkles on her face when the maid admitted a caller half an hour later. Oliver Dustin was the name on the card. He was a remittance man, a tame little parlor pet whose vocation was to fetch and carry for pretty women, and by some odd trick of fate he had been sifted into the Northland. Mrs. Mallory had tolerated him rather scornfully, but to-day she smiled upon him.
Propped up by pillows, she reclined luxuriously on a lounge. A thin spiral of smoke rose like incense to the ceiling from her lips. The slow, regular rise and fall of her breathing beneath the filmy lace of her gown accented the perfect fullness of bust and throat.
Dustin helped himself to a cigarette and made himself comfortable.
She set herself to win him. He was immensely flattered at her awakened interest. When she called him by his first name, he wagged all over like a pleased puppy.
It came to him after a time that she was considering him for a confidential mission. He assured her eagerly that there was no trouble too great for him to take if he could be of any service to her. She hesitated and doubted and at last as a special favor to him accepted his offer. Their heads were close in whispered talk for a few minutes, at the end of which Dustin left the room with his chin in the air. He was a knight errant in the employ of the most attractive woman north of fifty-three.
When Elliot took the down-river boat he found Oliver Dustin was a fellow passenger. The little man smoked an occasional cigar with the land agent and aired his views on politics and affairs social. He left the boat at the big bend. Without giving him much of his thought Gordon was a little surprised that the voluble remittance man had not told him where he was going.
Not till a week later did Elliot return up the river. He was asleep at the time the Sarah passed the big bend, but next morning he discovered that Selfridge and Dustin had come aboard during the night. In the afternoon he came upon a real surprise when he found Meteetse and herlittle boy Colmac seated upon a box on the lower deck where freight for local points was stored.
His guess was that they were local passengers, but wharf after wharf slipped behind them and the two still remained on board. They appeared to know nobody else on the Sarah, though once Gordon met Dustin just as he was hurrying away from the Indian woman. The little remittance man took the pains to explain to Elliot later that he was trying to find out whether the Indians knew any English.
Meteetse transferred with the other Kusiak passengers at the river junction. The field agent was not the only one on board who wondered where she was going. Selfridge was consumed with curiosity, and when she and the boy got off at Kusiak, he could restrain himself no longer. Gordon saw Wally talking with her. Meteetse showed him an envelope which evidently had an address written upon it, for the little man pointed out to her the direction in which she must go.
Since leaving Kusiak nearly two weeks before, no word had reached Gordon of Sheba. As soon as he had finished dinner at the hotel, he walked out to the Paget house and sent in his card.
Sheba came into the hall to meet him from the living-room where she had been sittingwith the man she expected to marry next week. She gave a little murmur of pleasure at sight of him and held out both hands.
"I was afraid you weren't going to get back in time. I'm so glad," she told him warmly.
He managed to achieve a smile. "When is the great day?"
"Next Thursday. Of course, we're as busy as can be, but Diane says—"
A ring at the door interrupted her. Sheba stepped forward and let in an Indian woman with a little boy clinging to her hand.
"You Miss O'Neill?" she asked.
"Yes."
From the folds of her shawl she drew a letter. The girl glanced at the address, then opened and read what was written. She looked up, puzzled, first at the comely, flatfooted Indian woman and afterward at the handsome little brown-faced papoose. She turned to Gordon.
"This letter says I am to ask this woman who is the father of her boy. What does it mean?"
Gordon knew instantly what it meant, though he could not guess who had dealt the blow. He hesitated for an answer, and in his embarrassment she felt that which began to ring a bell of warning in her heart.
The impulse to spare her pain was stronger inhim than the desire that she should know the truth.
"Send her away," he urged. "Don't ask any questions. She has been sent to hurt you."
A fawnlike fear flashed into the startled eyes. "To hurt me?"
"I am afraid so."
"But—why? I have done nobody any harm." She seemed to hold even her breathing in suspense. Only a pulse beat wildly in her white throat like the heart of an imprisoned thrush.
"Perhaps some of Macdonald's enemies," he suggested.
And at that there came a star-flash into the soft eyes and a lifted tilt to the chin cut fine as a cameo. She turned proudly to the Indian woman.
"What is it that you have to tell me about this boy's father?"
Meteetse began to speak. At the first mention of Macdonald's name Sheba's eyes dilated. Her smile, her sweet, glad pleasure at Gordon's arrival, were already gone like the flame of a blown candle. Clearly her heart was a-flutter, in fear of she knew not what. When the Indian woman told how she had first crossed the path of Macdonald, the color flamed into the cheeks of the Irish girl, but as the story progressed, the blood ebbed even from her lips.
With a swift movement of her fingers she flashed on the hall light. Her gaze searched the brown, shiny face of the little chap. She read there an affidavit of the truth of his mother's tale. The boy had his father's trick of squinting a slant look at anything he found interesting. It was impossible to see him and not recognize Colby Macdonald reincarnated.
"What is your name?" asked Sheba suddenly.
The youngster hung back shyly among the folds of the Indian woman's skirt. "Colmac," he said at last softly.
"Come!" Sheba flung open the door of the living-room and ushered them in.
Macdonald, pacing restlessly up and down the room during her absence, pulled up in his stride. He stood frowning at the native woman, then his eyes passed to Elliot and fastened upon him. The face of the Scotchman might have been chipped from granite. It was grim as that of a hanging judge.
Gordon started to explain, then stopped with a shrug. What was the use? The man would never believe him in the world.
"I'll remember this," the Alaskan promised his rival. There was a cold glitter in his eyes, a sudden flare of the devil that was blood-chilling.
"It's true, then," broke in Sheba. "You're a—a squawman. You belong to this woman."
"Nothing of the kind," he cried roughly. "That's been ended for years."
"Ended?" Sheba drew Colmac forward by the wrist. "Do you deny that this is your boy?"
The big Alaskan brushed this aside as of no moment. "I dare say he is. Anyhow I'm paying for his keep. What of it? That's all finished and done with."
"How can it be done with when—when she's the mother of your child, your wife before God?" The live eyes attacked him from the dusk that framed the oval of her pale face. Standing there straight as an aspen, the beautiful bosom rising and falling quickly while the storm waves beat through her blood, Sheba O'Neill had never made more appeal to the strong, lawless man who desired her for his wife.
"You don't understand." Macdonald's big fists were clenched so savagely that the knuckles stood out white from the brown tan of the flesh. "This is a man's country. It's new—close to nature. What he wants he takes—if he's strong enough. I'm elemental. I—"
"You wanted her—and you took her. Now you want me—and I suppose you'll take me too." Her scornful words had the sting of a whiplash.
"I've lived as all men live who have red blood in them. This woman is an incident. I've beenaboveboard. She can't say I ever promised more than I've given. I've kept her and the boy. It's been no secret. If you had asked, I would have told you the whole story."
"Does that excuse you?"
"I don't need any excuse. I'm a man. That's excuse enough. You've been brought up among a lot of conventions and social lies. The one big fact you want to set your teeth into now is that I love you, that there isn't another woman on God's earth for me, and that there never will be again."
Her eyes flashed battle. "The one big fact I'm facing is that you have insulted me—that you insult me again when you mention love with that woman and boy in the room. You belong to them—go to them—and leave me alone." She had been fighting for self-control, to curb her growing resentment, but now it flamed passionately into words. "I hate the sight of you. Why don't you go—all of you—and leave me in peace?"
It was a cry of bruised pride and wounded love. Elliot touched the Indian woman on the shoulder. Meteetse turned stolidly and walked out of the room, still leading Colmac by the hand. The young man followed.
Macdonald closed the door behind them, then strode frowning up and down the room. Thefear was growing on him that for all his great driving power he could not shake this slim girl from the view to which she clung. If the situation had not been so serious, it would have struck him as ridiculous. His relation with Meteetse had been natural enough. He believed that he had acted very honorably to her. Many a man would have left her in the lurch to take care of the youngster by herself. But he had acknowledged his obligation. He was paying his debt scrupulously, and because of it the story had risen to confront him. He felt that it was an unjust blow of fate. Punishment was falling upon him, not for what he had done, but because he had scorned to make a secret of it.
He knew that he must justify himself before Sheba or lose her. As she stood in the dusk so tall and rigid, he knew her heart was steel to him. Her finely chiseled face had the look of race. Never had the spell of her been more upon him. He crushed back a keen-edged desire to take her supple young body into his arms and kiss her till the scarlet ran into her cheeks like splashes of wine.
"You haven't the proper slant on this, Sheba. Alaska is the last frontier. It's the dropping-off place. You're north of fifty-three."
"Am I north of the Ten Commandments?" she demanded with the inexorable judgment ofyouth. "Did you leave the moral code at home when you came in over the ice?"
He smiled a little. "Morality is the average conduct of the average man at a given time and place. It is based on custom and expediency. The rules made for Drogheda won't fit Dawson or Nome. The laws made to protect young women in Ireland would be absurd if applied to half-breed squaws in Alaska. Meteetse does not hold herself disgraced but honored. She counts her boy far superior to the other youngsters of the village, and he is so considered by the tribe. I am told she lords it over her sisters."
A faint flush of anger had crept into her cheeks. "Your view of morality puts us on a level with the animals. I will not discuss the subject, if you please."
"We must discuss it. I must get you to see that Meteetse and what she stood for in my life have nothing to do with us. They belong to my past. She doesn't exist for either of us—isn't in any way a part of my present or future."
"She exists for me," answered Sheba listlessly. She felt suddenly old and weary. "But I can't talk about it. Please go. I want to be alone."
Again Macdonald paced restlessly down the room and back. He moved with a long, easy, tireless stride. The man was one among tenthousand, dominant, virile, every ounce of him strong as tested steel. But he felt as if all his energy were caged.
"Why don't you go?" the girl pleaded. "It's no use to stay."
He stopped in front of her. "I'm going to marry you, Sheba. Don't think I'll let that meddler interfere with our happiness. You're mine."
"No. Never!" she cried. "I'll take the boat and go home first."
"You've promised to marry me. You're going to keep your word and be glad of it all your life."
She shook her head. "No."
"Yes." Macdonald had always shown remarkable restraint with her. He had kissed her seldom, and always with a kind of awe at her young purity. Now he caught her by the shoulders. His eyes, deep in their sockets, mirrored the passionate desire of his heart.
The color flamed into her face. She looked hot to the touch, an active volcano ready to erupt. There was an odd feeling in her mind that this big man was a stranger to her.
"Take your hands from me," she ordered.
"Do you think I'm going to give you up now—now, after I've won you—because of a damfool scruple in your pretty head? You don'tknow me. It's too late. I love you—and I'm going to protect both of us from your prudishness."
His arms closed on her and he crushed her to him, looking down hungrily into the dark, little face.
"Let me go," she cried fiercely, struggling to free herself.
For answer he kissed the red lips, the flaming cheeks, the angry eyes. Then, coming to his senses, he pushed her from him, turned, and strode heavily from the room.
Selfridge was not eager to meet his chief, but he knew he must report at once. He stopped at his house only long enough to get into fresh clothes and from there walked down to the office. Over the Paget telephone he had got into touch with Macdonald who told him to wait at headquarters until he came.
It had been the intention of Macdonald to go direct from Sheba to his office, but the explosion brought about by Meteetse had sent him out into the hills for a long tramp. He was in a stress of furious emotion, and until he had worked off the edge of it by hard mushing, the cramped civilization of the town stifled him.
Hours later he strode into the office of the company. He was dust-stained and splashed with mud. Fifteen miles of stiff heel-and-toe walking had been flung behind him.
Wally lay asleep in a swivel chair, his fat body sagging and his head fallen sideways in such a way as to emphasize the plump folds of his double chin. His eyes opened. They took in his chief slowly. Then, in a small panic, he jumped to his feet.
"Must 'a' been taking thirty winks," he explained. "Been up nights a good deal."
"What doing?" demanded the Scotchman harshly.
In a hurried attempt to divert the anger of Macdonald, his assistant made a mistake. "Say, Mac! Who do you think came up on the boat with me? I wondered if you knew. Meteetse and her kid—"
He stopped. The big man was glaring savagely at him. But Macdonald said nothing. He waited, and under the compulsion of his forceful silence Wally stumbled on helplessly.
"—They got off here. 'Course I didn't know whether you'd sent for her or not, so I stopped and kinder gave her the glad hand just to size things up."
"Yes."
"She had the address of Miss O'Neill, that Irish girl staying at the Pagets, the one that came in—"
"Go on," snapped his chief.
"So I directed her how she could get there and—"
Wally found himself lifted from the chair and hammered down into it again. His soft flesh quaked like a jelly. As he stared pop-eyed at the furious face above him, the fat chin of the little man drooped.
"My God, Mac, don't do that!" he whined.
Macdonald wheeled abruptly away, crossed the room in long strides, and came back. He had a grip on himself again.
"What's the use?" he said aloud. "You're nothing but a spineless putterer. Haven't you enough sense even to give me a chance to decide for myself? Why didn't you keep the woman with you till you could send for me, you daft donkey?"
"I swear I never thought of that."
"What have you got up there in your head instead of brains? I send you outside to look after things and you fall down on the job. I give you plain instructions what to do at Kamatlah and you let Elliot make a monkey of you. You see him on the boat with a woman coming to make trouble for me, and the best you can do is to help her on the way. Man, man, use your gumption."
"If I had known—"
"D'ye think you've got sense enough to take a plain, straight message as far as the hotel? Because if you have, I've got one to send."
Wally caressed tenderly his bruised flesh. He had a childlike desire to weep, but he was afraid Macdonald would kick him out of the office.
"'Course I'll do whatever you say, Mac," he answered humbly.
The Scotch-Canadian brushed the swivel chair and its occupant to one side, drew up another chair in front of the desk, and faced Selfridge squarely. The eyes that blazed at the little man were the grimmest he had ever looked into.
"Go to the hotel and see this man Elliot alone. Tell him he's gone too far—butted into my affairs once too often. There's not a man alive I'd stand it from. My orders are for him to get out on the next boat. If he's here after that, I'll kill him on sight."
The color ebbed out of the florid face of Wally. He moistened his lips to speak. "Good God, Mac, you can't do that. He'll go out and report—"
"To hell with his report. Let him say what he likes. Put this to him straight: that he and I can't stay in this town—and both of us live."
Wally had lapped up too many highballs in the past ten years to relish this kind of a mission. He had depressed his nerves with overmuch tobacco and spurred them with liquors, had dissipated his force in many small riotings. His nerve was gone. He had not the punch any more. Yet Mac was always expecting him to help out with his rough stuff, he reflected fretfully. This was the third time in a month that he had been flung headlong into trouble. Take this messagenow. There was no sense in it. Selfridge plucked up his courage to say so.
"That won't buy us anything but trouble, Mac. In the old days you could put over—"
The little man never guessed how close he came to being flung through the transom over the door, but his instinct warned him to stop. His objection died away in a mumble.
"O' course I'll do whatever you say," he added a second time.
"See you do," advised his chief, an ugly look in his eyes. "Tell him he gets till the next boat. If he's here after that, he'd better go heeled, for I'll shoot on sight wherever we meet."
Selfridge went on his errand with lagging feet. On the way he stopped at the Pay-Streak Saloon to fortify himself with a cocktail. He found Elliot sitting moodily alone on the porch of the hotel.
In Gordon's pocket there was a note to Macdonald explaining that he had nothing to do with the coming of Meteetse. He had expected to send it by the hotel porter that evening, but the curt order to leave town filled him with a chill anger. The dictator of affairs at Kusiak might think what he pleased for all the explanation he would get from him. As for taking the next boat, Elliot did not even give that consideration.
"Tell your master I don't take orders from him," he told Wally quietly. "I'll stay till my work here is done."
They had moved a few yards down the street. Now Gordon turned, lean-loined and active, and trod with crisp, confident step back to the hotel. He had said all that was necessary to say.
Two men standing on the porch nodded a good-evening to him. Gordon, about to pass, glanced at them again. They were Northrup and Trelawney, two of the miners who had had trouble with Macdonald on the boat.
On impulse he stopped. "Found work yet?" he asked.
"Found a job and lost it again," Northrup answered sullenly.
"Too bad."
"Macdonald passed the word along that we weren't to get work. So our boss fired us. The whole district is closed to us. We been blacklisted," explained Trelawney.
"And we're busted," added his mate.
Elliot was always free-handed. Perhaps he felt just now unusually sympathetic towards these victims of the high-handed methods of Macdonald. From his pocket he took a small leather purse and gave a piece of gold to each of them.
"Just as a loan to carry you for a couple ofdays till you get something to do," he suggested.
Northrup demurred, but after a little pressure accepted the accommodation.
"I pay you soon back," he promised.
Trelawney laughed recklessly. He had been drinking.
"You bet. Me too."
His companion flashed a look of warning at him and explained that they were going down the river to look for work outside of the district.
Suddenly Trelawney broke loose and began to curse Macdonald with a bitterness that surprised the Government agent. What struck him most, though, was the obvious anxiety of Northrup to quiet his partner and to gloss over what he had said. Thinking of it later, Gordon wondered why the Dane, who had as much cause to hate Macdonald as the other, should be at such pains to smooth down the man and explain away his threats.
Elliot bought an automatic revolver next morning and a box of cartridges. He was not looking for trouble, but he intended to be prepared for it when trouble came looking for him. With a rifle he was a fair shot, but he lacked experience with the revolver. In the afternoon he walked out of town and practiced shooting at tin cans for a half an hour. On his way back he met Peter Paget.
The engineer came straight to the subject in his mind.
"Selfridge came to see me last night. He told me about the trouble between you and Macdonald, Gordon. You must leave town till he cools down. Macdonald is a bad man with a gat."
"Is he?"
"You can drop down the river on business for a few weeks. After a while—"
His friend looked at him coolly. "I can, but I'm not going to. Where do you get this stuff about me being a quitter, Pete?"
Peter laid a hand on his shoulder. "Now, look here, Gordon. Don't be a kid and foolhardy. Duck. I'm your friend—"
"You're his, too, aren't you?"
"Yes, of course, but—"
"All right. Tell him to duck. There'll be no trouble of my making. But if he starts any I'll be there. Macdonald doesn't own the earth, you know. I've been sent up here by Uncle Sam on business, and you can bet your last dollar I'll stay on the job till I'm through."
"Of course you've got to finish your job. But it doesn't all have to be done right here. Just for a week or two—"
"Tell your friend something else while you're on the subject. If I drop him, I go scot free becausehe is interfering with me in my duty. I'll put Selfridge on the stand to prove it. But if he should kill me, his last chance for getting the Macdonald claims patented would be gone. The public would raise such a howl that the Administration would have to throw your friend and the Guttenchilds overboard to save itself. I know that—and Macdonald knows it. So he stands to lose either way."
Paget knew this was true. He knew, too, there was no use in arguing with this young athlete. That close-gripped jaw and salient chin did not belong to a slacker. Gordon would stick and see the thing out. But Peter could not drop the subject without one more appeal.
"He's not sore at you about the claims. You know that. It's because you brought the squaw up the river to see Sheba."
"I didn't bring her—hadn't a thing to do with that. I don't know who brought her, though I could give a good guess."
A gleam of hope showed in the eye of the engineer. "You didn't bring her? Diane said you threatened—"
"Maybe I did say I would. Anyhow, I thought better of it. But I'm glad some one had the sense to tell Miss O'Neill the truth."
"Who do you think brought her?"
"I'm not thinking on that subject out loud."
"But if we could show Mac—"
"That's up to you. I'll not lift a finger. Your king of Kusiak has to learn some time that everybody isn't going to sidestep him and pussyfoot when he's around. I didn't start this war and I'm not making any peace overtures."
"You're as obstinate as the devil," smiled Peter, but in his heart he admired the dourness of his friend.
The engineer went to Macdonald and gave a deleted version of his talk with Elliot. The Scotchman listened, a bitter, incredulous smile on his face.
"Says he didn't bring her, does he? Tell him from me that he lies. Your wife let out to me by accident that he threatened to bring her. Meteetse and he came up on the boat together. He was with her at your house when she told her story. He's trying to save his hide. No chance."
"Elliot isn't a liar. When he says he didn't bring the woman, that satisfies me. I know he didn't do it," insisted Paget stiffly.
"Different here. Who else had any interest in bringing her except him? Nobody. Use your brains, Peter. He takes the first boat down the river. He comes back on the next one. She comes back, too. They couldn't figure I'd be at your house when they showed up there to tellthe story. That's where Mr. Elliot slipped up."
Peter was of different stuff from Selfridge. He had something to say. So he said it.
"Times have changed, Mac. You can't shoot down this young fellow without making all kinds of trouble. First thing we'd lose the claims. The Administration would drop you like a hot potato if you did a thing like that. Sheba would never speak to you again. Your friends would know in their hearts it was murder. You can't do it."
Macdonald's jaw clamped. "Then let him get out. That's my last word to him."