CHAPTER XXI
MURDER in the first-degree.
Not a muscle of the prisoner’s face moved as the clerk of the court read the verdict. He gave no sign whatever of emotion. Since Silcott’s testimony he had expected nothing less. Now his grave eyes rested on the face of the clerk with steady composure.
The reporters, watching him for copy, would have been disappointed if they had had to depend upon him for it. But into the dead silence of the courtroom was lifted the low, sobbing wail of a woman. Ruth had collapsed into the ample bosom of Mrs. Flanders.
The face of the convicted man twitched, but he did not look around. Without the evidence of his eyes he knew who had broken down under the strain, whose game will had weakened at the blow. In that moment he thought wholly of her, not at all of himself.
A grizzled old cattleman pushed his broad shoulders through the crowd toward the condemned raider. “This ain’t the end, boy. We’ll work like sixty to get you a new trial. This will never go through—never in the world!” His strong arm fell with frank affection across the shoulders of his friend. “It don’t matter what names they call you, son. You’re the same old Mac to all of us.”
“This is when a fellow finds out who his friends are, Roswell,” answered Rowan simply.
He had many of them. They rallied to him by scores—long, loose-jointed, capable men with leathery brown faces, men who had fought with him against Wyoming blizzards for the lives of driven cattle, men who had slept beside him under the same tarp by many a campfire. From Rawlins and Casper and Cheyenne, and even far-away Denver, came words of good cheer. They stressed the point that the fight for his life was just beginning and that the verdict of the jury would not be accepted as final.
A telegram from Pendleton, Oregon, touched him deeply. It was signed by four bronco busters whom he had beaten for the championship at Bad Ax:
Stick to the saddle, Mac. Don’t you pull leather, old scout. We’re here hollering our heads off for the best rider that ever slapped a saddle on an outlaw. Clamp your knees and hang on tight. Say, Mac, we got a little pile of chips to shove into the game any time you’re shy of blues.Roady Dunn.J. C. Morgan.Slats Hoffman.Tex Green.
Stick to the saddle, Mac. Don’t you pull leather, old scout. We’re here hollering our heads off for the best rider that ever slapped a saddle on an outlaw. Clamp your knees and hang on tight. Say, Mac, we got a little pile of chips to shove into the game any time you’re shy of blues.
Roady Dunn.J. C. Morgan.Slats Hoffman.Tex Green.
Roady Dunn.J. C. Morgan.Slats Hoffman.Tex Green.
Roady Dunn.
J. C. Morgan.
Slats Hoffman.
Tex Green.
Mrs. Stovall, who had been a very unwilling witness for the prosecution, brought a cake and a cherry pie to the jail for him. Incidentally, she delivered a message with which she had been commissioned.
“Norma says for me to tell you that this trial doesn’t fool her any. She knows you’re being punished for some of the other boys. She wanted I should tell you that she knows you didn’t intend to kill Joe.”
This was an opinion becoming every day more widespread. Men began to say that McCoy was the victim of evil chance. Shoshone County was still determined to see justice done the murderers of Dan Gilroy, but it hoped Rowan would escape the gallows. He had been so game throughout the trial, so careful to bring out nothing to the prejudice of his fellow prisoners that the hearts of men turned toward him.
The financial side of the affair was troubling the officials of the county. The trial had been a long and expensive one. It had cost many thousand dollars, and there was talk of grounds for an appeal. With four other trials yet to come, it became apparent that Shoshone County would be bankrupt long before the finish.
Roswell, acting for a group of friends, went to the prosecuting attorney.
“Look here, Haight. You’re up against it. Maybe you’ve got evidence to convict these boys. Maybe you haven’t.”
“There’s no maybe about that—I have,” Haight broke in grimly.
“Well, say you have. That ain’t the point. The county can’t stand the expense of all those trials. You know that. What are you going to do about it?”
“Going right ahead with the trials. We begin with Brad Rogers to-morrow.”
“Oh, well! We got to be reasonable—all of us. Now here’s my proposition: Let me talk with the boys and their lawyers. If I could get them to plead guilty it would save a heap of trouble all around.”
Haight had looked at the matter from this angle before. He nodded. “All right. See what you can do, Mr. Roswell. If they will save us the expense of trying them, I think I can arrange for life imprisonment.”
“For all of them?” demanded the cattleman shrewdly.
“For all the rest of them.”
“How about Rowan?”
“He’s not included. We’ve got to make an example of him. He led the raid.”
Roswell fought it out with the lawyer for an hour, but on this point Haight stood firm. McCoy had to pay the extreme penalty for his crime. That was not even open to argument.
The old cattleman called at once upon the leading lawyer for the defense, and with him visited the cell of Yerby. The Texan was greatly depressed at the issue of the trial. He could not get over his bitterness at the part Silcott had played.
“I reckon he’s up at the ho-tel eating fried chicken and watermelon. Well, he’s welcome. I wouldn’t swap places with him. Neither would Mac. We all had our chance to do like he done.”
“No, Silcott’s still in jail. He asked Matson to keep him there till the trials are over and he can light out. I expect he don’t like to trust himself outside. Some of the boys are a mite vexed at him.” Roswell came abruptly to the object of his call. “Sam, we got to face facts. Haight has the goods on you boys. He’ll sure convict you.”
“Looks like,” agreed the Texan dejectedly.
“We’ll have to fix up a compromise. If you’ll all plead guilty Haight is willing to call it life imprisonment.”
“What do the other boys say?”
“They are willing, I reckon, to take the best terms they can get.”
“I’d as lief be dead as locked up in jail for the rest of my life.”
“We’ll get you out on parole in two or three years. The worst of it is that Mac ain’t included in the arrangement. Haight swears he has got to hang.” Eyes narrowed to slits, Roswell watched the Texan while he fired his next shot. “Mac was the leader. There wouldn’t ’a’ been any killing except for him. He’s the responsible party. So Haight says that——”
“Got it all figured out, have you? Mac did the killing. Mac was to blame. I’ll tell you this: If Mac had had his way there wouldn’t have been any killing. Just because he shuts his mouth and stands the gaff—— Dog-gone it, you and Haight can take yore compromise plumb to hell!” decided the Texan, his anger rising.
Roswell gave a low whoop and fell upon him. “That’s the way to talk, old-timer. We’ve got Haight on the hip. The county’s busted high and dry. Folks are beginning to holler already about the expense of the trials. If Haight were to come up for reëlection along with a special tax levy to pay for the trials the dear pee-pul wouldn’t do a thing to him. He’s ready to talk turkey. If you lads will stand pat, it’s an even bet that he’ll have to crawfish about Mac.”
“I ’low we’ll stay hitched—all of us that haven’t a big yellow streak up our backs. Why-for should we let Mac get the worst of the deal? You go tell Haight he can’t stack the cards that-a-way.”
Rogers, coming up for trial next day, was anxious to get the matter settled. But he, too, declined the terms.
“I’ll take my chance before a jury unless Haight agrees to lump Mac in with the rest of us. Mac would see Haight in blazes before he would agree to any such raw deal if he were in my place. You can let Mr. Prosecuting Attorney start the fireworks soon as he’s a mind to. I’m willing to go as far as I can. I reckon all the boys are. But I’m too old and tough and stubborn to whine out of it like Larry Silcott. What’s sauce for the goose is sauce for the gander. When I see Mac’s name at the head of the list, I’ll sign a compromise.”
Cole and Falkner in turn were visited. The former refused flatly to consider any arrangement which did not include McCoy.
In the interest of psychology or to satisfy his own curiosity Roswell ventured on debatable ground with Falkner.
“Course you don’t owe Mac anything. He led you into this trouble. The whole thing is his fault. Silcott as good as admitted that Rowan did the actual killing himself. Naturally you would be sore on him. Now by accepting Haight’s proposition Mac will be hanged and you other lads——”
“Mac will be hanged, will he?” growled Falkner.
“Sure thing. Nothing can save him if you accept Haight’s terms. But, after all——”
The prisoner looked at the old cattleman blackly. Whatever faults he had, Falkner was not a sneak. McCoy had kept quiet when he might have told the others who had done the killing. McCoy had stood pat from start to finish. He had taken his share of blame when he might fairly enough have shifted it to other shoulders. If Mac had given the word, it would have been Falkner who would have been hanged while the others got off with prison sentences. The young cow-puncher knew he was to blame for the predicament in which they all stood. His ungovernable rage at Tait was responsible for the killings. Hard citizen though he was, the man was game to the core.
“Who in Mexico wants to accept Haight’s offer?” he snarled. “I’ve lived a wolf, by some folks’ way of it. I reckon I’ll die one. But I’m no coyote. Make another crack like that and there’ll be trouble right here in Cell Fifteen.”
Roswell grinned. To the prosecuting attorney he carried back word that his proffer had been rejected. No compromise would be considered which did not include McCoy.
The hotel where Roswell and his friends stayed became active as a hive of bees. From it cow-punchers and cattlemen issued to make a quiet canvass of the leading citizens of Shoshone County. The result was that Haight and his political friends were besieged for twelve hours by taxpayers who insisted on a compromise being arranged. The long-distance telephone called him up three times that night to carry protests against his policy.
“What’s the idea, Haight?” asked a prominent irrigation engineer in charge of a project under construction. “We stand for the law. We want to see every man punished that was in the sheep raid. But there’s no object in starting trouble with the cattlemen, and that’s what it will amount to if you hang Rowan McCoy. Tait and Gilroy weren’t blameless. They knew what they were going up against. They didn’t have to cross the dead line and ruin the ranchmen on the Fryingpan. A prison sentence all around hits me as about right. I’ve talked with lots of people, and that’s the general sentiment.”
Just before Rogers was to be brought into the courtroom for trial Haight gave way. He had a long conference with the lawyers for the defense and the presiding judge. As a result of this it was announced that the prisoners would plead guilty.
Before sunset each of the five had been sentenced to life imprisonment.
CHAPTER XXII
WITH the news that Rowan would not have to pay with his life, Ruth’s anxiety took on another phase. Their happiness had come to grief. It was likely that the tentative separation caused by her anger at his unfaithfulness would prove to be a final one. But her imperative need was to demand the truth about the sheep raid killings. At the bottom of her heart was still a residuum of deep respect for him. It was impossible to believe that this clean, lean-flanked Westerner with the steadfast eyes was a common murderer who had stolen up at night to compass the death of his enemy from cover. Moreover, there was a reason—a vital, urgent, compelling one—why she must think the best she could of the man she had married.
This reason took her to Sam Yerby’s cell at the county jail. She and the Texan had struck up one of the quick, instinctive friendships that were scattered along Ruth’s pathway. They had a common sense of humor. When she poked friendly fun at his speech he did not resent it. The girl had completed her conquest of him by taking a great interest in Missie and the baby. She had embroidered for the little fellow a dress which Sam thought the daintiest in the world.
The tired eyes of the old cattleman lit when she came to the door of his prison.
“It’s right good of you, Miss Ruth, to come and see the old man before he goes over the road.”
“I’m so sorry, Mr. Yerby.” She choked up. “But everybody tells me you won’t have to stay in very long, and I’m going to look out for Missie and Boy.”
Tears filmed his eyes. The muscles of the leathery face worked with emotion.
“I cain’t thank you, Miss Ruth, but I reckon you know what I’m thinking.”
“Missie is going to teach Boy what a good man his father is, and when you come out you and he will be great friends.”
He nodded. Speech at that moment was beyond him.
“All the boys are going to look after your stock just as if it belonged to them. They’ll take care of your brand at the round-up and make the beef cut for you just the same.”
“That’s right kind of them. I sure do feel grateful.” He looked shyly at his visitor. Sam knew that all was not well between her and Rowan. “What about you, Miss Ruth? You-all are losing a better man than Missie ever had. He’s a pure, Mac is.”
Her live eyes fixed themselves on him. “There’s something I want to know, Mr. Yerby—something I have a right to know. It’s—it’s about the sheep raid.”
“Why don’t you-all go to Mac and ask him?”
“I’ve been to him. He wouldn’t tell me; said he couldn’t.”
A puzzled expression of doubt lifted his eyebrows. “I don’t reckon I can tell you then.”
“You’ve got to tell me. I’ve a right to know. I’m going to know.” She said it with an imperious little accent of feminine ferocity.
“O’ course in regards to what took place——”
“Did you start that night intending to kill Joe Tait?”
“No, ma’am, we didn’t. Rowan told the boys time and again there wasn’t to be any killing. He planned it so it wouldn’t be necessary.”
“Then how was it?”
“I’ll tell you this much: Someone went out of his haid and began shooting. Inside of three minutes it was all over.”
“Did—did Rowan kill either of them?” she whispered.
“I don’t know who killed Tait. Several of the boys were firing. Mac didn’t kill Gilroy. I’m ’most sure of that.”
“You’re not dead sure,” she insisted.
“I’m what you might call morally certain. But there’s one man can set yore mind at rest, if you can get him to talk.”
“Who?”
“Hal Falkner. He knows who started the shooting and who killed Dan Gilroy.”
“I’ve hardly met him. Do you think he would tell me?”
“Maybe he would.” He smiled a little. “I notice you mostly get yore way. Hal’s rough-and-ready. Don’t you mind it if he acts gruff. That’s just his way.”
“I’ll go see him.”
“I reckon it won’t do any harm. But I can tell you one thing, anyhow. If you give Mac the benefit of all the doubts, it will be about what’s right. He saved the herders from Falkner. Silcott testified to that. Before Gilroy was shot I heard yore husband holler to stop firing. Now wouldn’t it be onreasonable to figure that he gunned Dan himself right away? If Mac wouldn’t tell you-all what happened it was because we had all made a solemn agreement not to talk.”
“Do you think that is it?”
“I shorely do.”
“I’m so glad.”
“An’, Miss Ruth?”
“Yes, Mr. Yerby?”
He hesitated before he made the plunge. “I won’t see you-all again for a long time, maybe never. You’re young and proud and high-heeled, like you-all got a perfect right to be. But I want to say this: If you live to be a hundred, yo’ll never meet any one that’s more of a man than Rowan McCoy. He’s white clear through. I’ve seen a right smart of men in my time. Most o’ them had a streak of lean and a streak of fat, as the old saying goes. But yore husband, he assays ’way up all the time. Good luck or bad makes no difference with him. He’s the real stuff.”
A wistful little smile touched her face. “He has one good friend, anyhow.”
“He has hundreds. He deserves them, too.”
“I’ve got to say good-bye now, Mr. Yerby.” She gave him both hands. Tears blurred her eyes so that she could scarcely see him. “Good-bye. Heaps of luck—oh, lots of it! And don’t worry about Missie and Boy.”
“I’ll not worry half so much now, little friend. And I’m hoping all that luck will come to you, too.”
From Sheriff Matson Ruth secured a permit to see Falkner.
The cow-puncher was brought, hand-cuffed, into the office of the jailer. It was an effect of his sudden, furious temper that his guards never took any chances with him. None of the friendly little privileges that fell to the other prisoners came his way.
“Mrs. McCoy wants to talk with you, Hal,” explained Ackerman, the jailer. “Don’t make any mistake about this. I’ll be in the outer room there with a gat. I’ve got a guard under the window. This is no time to try for a get-away.”
Falkner looked at him with an ugly sneer. “Glad you mentioned it, Steve. I’ll postpone any notions I may have in that line, but, take it from me, they are merely postponed. When the time comes I’m going.”
Ackerman shrugged his shoulders and left the room. He thought it altogether likely that some day Falkner would have the top of his head blown off, but he did not want to have to do the job.
“I’ve come to ask a favour of you, Mr. Falkner,” Ruth blurted out.
Her courage was beginning to ebb. The man looked so formidable now that she was alone with him. His reputation, she knew, was bad. More than once, when she had met him on horseback in the hills, the look in his burning black eyes had sent little shivers through her.
“A favour of me, Mrs. McCoy! Ain’t that a come-down? Didn’t know you knew I was on the map. You’re sure honouring me,” he jeered.
It was his habit to take note in his sullen fashion of all good-looking women. When he had seen her about the ranch or riding with her husband or Larry Silcott he had resented it that this slender, vivid girl who moved with such quick animal grace, whose parted lips and shining eyes were so charmingly eager, had taken him in apparently only as a detail of the scenery.
Now his dark eyes, set deep in the sockets, narrowed suspiciously. What did she want of him? What possible favour was there that he could give her?
“I want to know about the Bald Knob raid,” she hurried on. “Maybe I oughtn’t to come to you. I don’t know. But I’ve got to know the truth of what happened that night.”
“Why don’t you go to your husband, then?” he demanded. “Mac knows as much about it as I do.”
“I went to him. He wouldn’t tell me; said it wouldn’t be right to tell anything he knew.”
“That so?” From his slitted eyelids he watched her closely, not at all certain of what was her game. “Then if it wouldn’t be right for Mac to tell you, it wouldn’t be right for me, would it?” The strong white teeth in his coffee-brown face flashed in a mocking grin.
“That was before the trial. Mr. Yerby said he wouldn’t talk then because you had agreed not to.”
“Oh! So you’ve been to Yerby?”
“Yes. He couldn’t tell me what I want to know.”
“And what is it you want to know particularly?”
“You know what Mr. Silcott testified about—about where the shooting started from and about where the shot came from that killed Mr. Gilroy. I want you to tell me that it wasn’t Rowan fired those shots.”
He considered her a moment warily, his mind loaded with suspicions. Was this a frame-up of some sort? Was she trying to trap him into admissions that would work against him later?
“Well, the trial is past now. Mac can talk if he wants to. Why don’t you go to him?” he asked.
“I’d rather you would tell me.”
He grinned. “Nothing doing to-day, my dear.”
Then Falkner met one of the surprises of his life. Fire flashed from this slim slip of a girl. Her eyes attacked him fearlessly.
“You wouldn’t dare say that if you and Rowan were free,” she blazed.
He let slip a startled oath. “That’s right. I wouldn’t.” The cow-puncher laughed hardily. He could afford to make this admission. Nobody had ever questioned his courage. “All right, ma’am. Objection sustained, as the judge said when Haight kicked on any answer to one of his fool questions. I’ll take back that ‘my dear.’ ”
“And will you tell me what I want to know?”
“That’s another proposition. You got to give me better reasons than you have yet why I should. Do you reckon I’m going to put my cards down on the table while you pinch yours up close? What’s the game? What are you aiming to do with what I tell you?”
“Nothing. I just want to know.”
“What for?”
A little wave of pink beat into her cheeks. “I don’t want—if I can help it—to think of my husband as—as a——”
“A murderer. Is that it?” he flung at her brutally.
She nodded her head twice. The word hit her, in his savage voice, like a blow in the face.
“Then why don’t you ask Mac? Are you afraid he’d lie to you?”
“I know he wouldn’t,” she answered with spirit.
“Well, then?” He watched her with hard eyes, still doubtful of her.
“I’m his wife. Isn’t it natural I should want to know the truth?”
“What are you trying to put over on me? Why don’t you go to Mac and ask him?”
She threw herself on his mercy. “We—we’ve quarrelled. I can’t go to him. There’s nobody else to tell me but you.”
There were dark shadows under the big eyes in the colourless face. She had suffered, he guessed, during these last weeks as she never had before. Life had taken toll of her pride and her gaiety. She looked frail and spent.
Something in the dreariness of her stricken youth touched him. He spoke more gently:
“According to Silcott’s story it lies between me and Mac. If he didn’t fire those shots, I did. Do you reckon I’m going to tell you that he didn’t fire them? Why should I?”
Her eyes fell full in his. “Because I’m entitled to know the truth. I’m in trouble and you can help me. You’re no Larry Silcott. You’re a man. You stood firm at the risk of your life. Even if it is at your own expense, you’ll tell me. Rowan would do as much for your wife if you had one.”
Ruth had said the right word at last, had in two sentences touched both his pride and his gratitude.
“I reckon that beats me, ma’am,” he said. “I owe Mac a lot, and I’ll pay an installment of it right now. Yore husband never fired his gun from start to finish of the Bald Knob raid.”
The light in her eyes thanked him more than words could have done.
“While I’m at it I’ll tell you more,” he went on. “Mac laid the law down straight that we weren’t gunning for Tait. He didn’t want to take me along because he knew I was sore at the fellow, but when I insisted on going the others overruled him. After the killing Mac never once said ‘I told you so’ to the others for letting me go along. What’s more, when they asked questions about who killed Gilroy and who started the shooting, he gave them no satisfaction. He let the boys guess who did it. If Mac had said the word, the rest would have rounded on me. I would have been hanged, and they would have got short sentences. Your husband is a prince, ma’am.”
“Thank you.”
“I got him and the other boys into all this trouble. He hasn’t flung it up to me once. What do you know about that?”
“I’m so glad I came to see you. It’s going to make a great difference to me.” There was a tremor in her voice that told of suppressed tears.
Ackerman came to the door: “About through?”
The prisoner lifted his upper lip in a sneer. “Better throw your gat on me, Steve. I might make trouble, you know.”
CHAPTER XXIII
ACKERMAN followed Rowan into the sheriff’s office. Matson looked up from the desk where he was working.
“All right, Steve. You needn’t wait.”
When he had signed his name to the letter he was writing, Matson turned to his prisoner.
“We’re going to start on the eleven-thirty, Mac. Your wife is down at the house with Mrs. Matson. She wants to say good-bye there instead of at the depot. I’ve got considerable business to clean up before train time, so I’ll stay on the job. Be back here in an hour.”
“You mean that I’m to go there alone?”
“Why not? I’ll ask you to go through the alleys if you don’t mind. I don’t want the other boys to feel that I’m playing favourites.”
“I’ll not forget this, Aleck.”
“Sho! You never threw a man down in your life, Mac. I don’t reckon you’re going to begin now. Hit the dust. I’m busy.”
Rowan crossed the square to a street darkened by shade trees, and followed it to the alley. Down this he passed between board fences. He took his hat off and lifted his face to the star-strewn sky. It would be many years before he walked again a free man beneath the Milky Way. Society was putting him behind bars because he had broken its laws. He did not dispute the justice of its decision. His punishment was fair enough. When he and his friends decided to be a law to themselves, to right one wrong by doing another, they had laid themselves open to blame. A man must be held responsible for his actions, even when the result is different from what he anticipates.
Behind his self-containment McCoy was suffering poignantly. He was on his way to say good-bye to the girl wife he loved. It was his conviction that when he emerged from the shadow now closing in upon him Ruth would have passed out of his life. Already she had wearied of what he had to offer. There was no likelihood that she would waste her young years waiting for a man shut up in prison for his misdeeds. Far better for her to cut loose from him as soon as possible. He intended to advise her to sell the ranch, realize what she could in cash from it, and then file an action for divorce. The law would operate to release her almost automatically from a convict husband.
Mrs. Matson met him at the back door. She led the way to a living room and stood aside to let him pass in. Then she closed the door behind him, shutting herself out.
The parlour was lit only by shafts of moonlight pouring through the windows. Ruth stood beside the mantel. She wore a white dress that had always been a favourite of Rowan’s.
Neither of them spoke. He noticed that she was trembling. From out of the darkness where she stood came a strangled little sob.
Rowan took the distance between them in two strides. He gathered her into his arms, and she hid her face against his woollen shirt. She wept, clinging to him, one arm tight about his neck.
He caressed her hair softly, murmuring the sweetheart words his thoughts had given her through all the days of their separation. Not for many years had he been so near tears himself.
Presently the sob convulsions that shook her slight body grew less frequent. She dabbed at her eyes with a lace handkerchief.
“I’ve not been a good wife to you, Rowan,” she whispered at last. “You don’t know how sometimes I’ve—hated you—and distrusted you. I’ve thought all sorts of bad things about you, and some of them aren’t true.”
His arms tightened. The wild desire was in him to hold her against the world.
“I flirted with Larry Silcott,” she confessed. “I did it to—to punish you. I’ve been horrid. But I loved you all the time. Even while I hated you I loved you.”
The blood sang through his veins. “Why did you hate me?”
“I—I can’t tell you that. Not yet; some day maybe.”
“Was it something I did?”
“Y-yes. But I don’t want to talk about that now. They’re going to take you away from me. We’ve only got a few minutes. Oh, Rowan, I don’t see how I’m going to let you go!”
His heart overflowed with tenderness and pride. Every one of her broken little endearments filled him with joy. Her dear sweetness was balm to his wounded soul.
“Let me tell you this, Ruth. I’m happier to-night than I’ve been for a long time. They can’t separate us if we keep each other in our hearts. I thought I’d lost you. I’ve been through hell because of it, my dear.”
“You do—love me,” she murmured.
He did not try to tell her in words how much. His reassurance was in the lovers’ language of eyes and lips and the soft touch of hands.
They came again to the less perfect medium of words, and she told him of her visits to Yerby and Falkner.
“I knew all the time you couldn’t have done what Mr. Haight said you did; ’way down deep in my heart I knew it. But I wanted to hold a grudge against you because you didn’t confide in me. I wanted to think bad things about you, and yet they made me so dreadfully unhappy, Rowan. And all the time you were sacrificing yourself for the man who brought you into the trouble. I might have known it.”
He shook his head. “No, honey. I wasn’t doing any more than I had to do. We were all partners in the raid. What one did all did. I’ve had plenty of time to think it out, and I know that I’m just as guilty as Falkner. We ought never to have ridden on the raid. If I had set myself against it, the others would have given it up. But I led them. I’m responsible for what happened. So I couldn’t throw Falkner down just because he was the instrument. That wouldn’t have been square.”
“I don’t agree with you at all. If he had done as you said there wouldn’t have been any lives lost. They’ve no right to hold you for it, and I’m going to begin working right away to get you out. I went to school with the governor’s wife, you know. They have just been married—oh, scarcely a year. He’s a lot older than she is and very much in love with her, Louise says. So she’ll make him give you a pardon.”
Rowan smiled. “I’m afraid it isn’t going to be so easy as that, dear. The governor couldn’t pardon me on account of public opinion even if he wanted to do it. I know him. He’s a good fellow. But the Bald Knob raid has made too big a stir for him to interfere now.”
“He’s got to. I’ll show you. I want you home.” She broke down and sought again the sanctuary of his shoulder.
While she cried he petted her.
After a time she began to talk in whispered fragments.
“I’m going to need you so much. I can’t stand it, Rowan, to have you away from me now. I want my man. I want you—oh, I want you so badly! It isn’t fair. It isn’t right—now.”
Something in her voice startled him. He took her by the shoulders and held her gently from him while he looked into her eyes.
“You mean——”
She broke from his hands and clung to him. He knew her secret now. His heart beat fast as he held her in his strong arms. Joy, exultation, humility, fear, infinite tenderness—he tasted them all. But the emotion that remained was despair.
He had forfeited his right to protect and cherish her in her hour of need. She must go through the dark valley of the shadow alone, while he was shut up away from her. What kind of a husband had he been ever to let himself be put in such a position? All his strength and capacity would go for nothing. Because of his folly, her inexperience, her fragile youth would have to face the world unprotected, and even these were to be handicapped by the new life on the way. With what generous faith had she given herself into his keeping, and how poorly had he requited her! That very night he must take the journey at the end of which he was to be buried alive, must turn his back on her and leave her to make the fight alone.
He groaned. Ruth heard him murmur, “My love! My precious lamb!” She read the burning misery in his eyes. Womanlike, she flew to comfort him.
“I’m glad—oh, you don’t know how glad I am—now that we aretillicumsagain! I wouldn’t have it any other way, Rowan. If it weren’t for what’s going to happen—I couldn’t stand it to wait for you. Don’t you see? I’ll have a pledge of you with me all the time. When I’m loving it, I’ll be loving you.”
What she said was true. There had been forged a bond irrevocable between them. He recognized it with a lifted heart. The cross-current of fate that was snatching him from her must at last yield to the sweep of the tide that would bring them together.
“I’ve made my plans,” she went on. “I know just what I’m going to do—if you’ll let me. I want to go back to the ranch and run it.”
“I’m afraid that isn’t possible. This trial has cost me a lot of money. I’m mortgaged and in debt. Besides, ranching takes expert knowledge. It’s doubtful whether I could have held the ranch, anyhow. The government is creating forest reserves up in the hills. That will cut off the free range. Sheep are pushing in, and they’ll get what is left. We’d better sell out and save for you what little we can. It won’t be much, but if the stock brings a good price it will be something.”
“Please, Rowan. I want so much to try it,” she pleaded. “I haven’t ever been any help to you—thought of nothing but having a good time. You were too good to me—let me spend far more money than I ought. You see, I didn’t realize how hard up you were. But now I’m going to be such a tiptop manager, if you’ll only let me.”
“I would, dear—if it were any use,” he told her gently. “But you would have all your worry for nothing. The new conditions make the old ways impossible. I’m sorry.”
Her coaxing smile refused to accept his decision. “My aunt left me her money, you know. I don’t know how much it is yet. Most of it is property that must be sold. But I can use it when it comes to save the ranch. I’d love to. I want to be helping you.”
“Ask Tim Flanders if I’m not right, sweetheart. He has a level head. He’ll tell you just what I’m telling you.”
“All right. I’ll ask him. We don’t need to decide my future now. There will be lots of time after you have gone.”
Rowan drew her to a chair, and sat down with her in his arms. For once his tongue was not tied. The ten minutes that were left he packed full of all the love that had so long been waiting in his heart for expression.
When she said good-bye to him it was with a wan, twitchy little smile on her face. But as soon as he was out of the room she flung herself down, weeping, beside the lounge.
She was still lying crouched there when McCoy climbed to the vestibule of the through train. He moved awkwardly because his left wrist was shackled to the right one of Cole.
CHAPTER XXIV
ROWAN’S decision to sell the ranch was on the face of it a wise one. Ruth recognized this. She knew nothing of cattle, nothing of farming.
But she told herself she could learn. Her interest was very greatly engaged in saving the Circle Diamond for Rowan. Other women had done well homesteading. She knew one widow who raised cattle, another who made money on sheep. Why should she not do the same? It was all very well to say that she had no business experience, but she had as much as other people had when they began. If she did not succeed, the failure would hurt her rather than Rowan.
She talked it all over with Flanders, a long-headed business man who knew cattle from hoof to horn.
“The cattleman sure has his troubles aplenty,” he told her. “Short summers, long winters, deep snows, blizzards, bad roads, heavy railroad rates, a packers’ trust to buck, drought, and now sheep. A cowman has got to bet before the draw; he can’t ever tell whether he’s going to finish with a hand all blue or a busted flush.”
“Yes, but I’ve heard you say yourself that cattle-raising used to be a gamble and that from now on it’s going to be a business instead,” she reminded him.
He took off his big white hat and rubbed a polka-dot handkerchief over his bald head.
“Tha’s right, too. Government reports show there’s several million fewer cattle in the country than there was five years ago. That spells good prices. There’s a good side to this forest-reserve business, too. It keeps the range from being overcrowded, and it settles the sheep and cattle war. I’ve got a hunch there would be money in leasing the range and putting cattle to run on it.”
“Well, then?” she demanded triumphantly.
“That ain’t sayingyoucould make money. Jennings is a good foreman, but it takes a boss to run any shebang right.”
“When the boss is in doubt she could telephone to you.”
Ruth always had been a favourite of Flanders’s. It pleased him that he could help her in her affairs, and it flattered him to think that he could help her make a success of the Circle Diamond. The conspiracy she proposed intrigued his interest. She had some money. Why not use it to save the ranch for Rowan? Why not let her have the pleasure of showing her husband later how well she had done in his absence? It would give a zest to her life that would otherwise be lacking. Moreover, it would be another tie to bind her to McCoy.
He yielded to the temptation, fell into her plans, grew eager over them. There was a good deal of sympathy for her in the country, so that she had little difficulty in securing a permit for her cattle to range on the reserve at the usual price.
In a letter, Ruth wrote her husband that Flanders thought it better not to sell out just yet, but she gave no details of what she was doing in a business way. She left him to gather that they were watching their chance to get a good figure for the place. There was, she felt, no use worrying him about the venture she was making.
Her interest in the ranch developed amazingly. Jennings was an experienced cattleman and devoted to Rowan. It had been his curt opinion that McCoy was a fool for marrying this feather-footed girl from the East. Her gaiety and extravagance had annoyed him. The flirtation with Silcott had set him flatly against her. But now he began to revise his estimate. He liked the eagerness with which she flung herself into this exciting game of saving the Circle Diamond. He liked the deference she paid his judgment, and he admired the courage with which once or twice she decided flatly against him.
“Dinged if she ain’t got more sense than half the men you meet!” chuckled the foreman on one occasion when her verdict had proved more discriminating than his advice. “The little boss done right not to take that Cheyenne bid for the dogies.” He did not know that it was really Flanders who was responsible for vetoing the sale.
There were hours, of course, when the loneliness of her life swept over Ruth in waves, when she fought desperately for a footing against despair. It was her inheritance to tread the hilltops or the valleys rather than the dusty road. But in general she was almost happy. A warm glow flushed her being when she thought of Rowan. Some sure voice whispered to her that however long he might be kept from her the flame of love would burn bright in his heart.
He had sinned against her pride and self-esteem, and she had forgiven him. He had brought to her trouble and distress by breaking the law of the land. All her Eastern friends pitied her. They pelted her with letters beginning, “Poor dear Ruth.” But she refused to feel humiliated. Rowan was Rowan, the man she loved, no matter what wrong he had done. There burned bright in him a dynamic spark of self-respect that would never be quenched. She clung to this. She never let herself doubt it now, even though one memory of him still stung her to shame.
Ruth was coming through storm to her own. A shock, a sorrow, a sin that by reason of its consequence cuts to the quick—any of these may lead to spiritual crises resulting in a convulsively sudden soul birth. But growth is slow, imperceptible. The young wife had lived for her own pleasure. Now the self was being burned out of her. She came to her new life with humility, with a steadfast purpose, with self-abnegation no less real because it brought to her a great and quiet joy. For the first time in her life she lived with another in view rather than herself. It would be long before she could move in a universe of peace and serenity, but at least she was on the road to self-mastery.