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into Turner’s. So I followed. It was ‘most

dark. Beasley an’ Riggs an’ Mulvey an’ some more were

drinkin’ an’ powwowin’. So I just braced him right then.”

 

“Roy! Oh, the way you boys court danger!”

 

“But, Miss Helen, thet’s the only way. To be afraid MAKES

more danger. Beasley ‘peared civil enough first off. Him an’

me kept edgin’ off, an’ his pards kept edgin’ after us, till

we got over in a corner of the saloon. I don’t know all I

said to him. Shore I talked a heap. I told him what my old

man thought. An’ Beasley knowed as well as I thet my old

man’s not only the oldest inhabitant hereabouts, but he’s

the wisest, too. An’ he wouldn’t tell a lie. Wal, I used all

his sayin’s in my argument to show Beasley thet if he didn’t

haul up short he’d end almost as short. Beasley’s

thick-headed, an’ powerful conceited. Vain as a peacock! He

couldn’t see, an’ he got mad. I told him he was rich enough

without robbin’ you of your ranch, an’ — wal, I shore put

up a big talk for your side. By this time he an’ his gang

had me crowded in a corner, an’ from their looks I begun to

get cold feet. But I was in it an’ had to make the best of

it. The argument worked down to his pinnin’ me to my word

that I’d fight for you when thet fight come off. An’ I shore

told him for my own sake I wished it ‘d come off quick
 .

Then — wal — then somethin’ did come off quick!”

 

“Roy, then he shot you!” exclaimed Helen, passionately.

 

“Now, Miss Helen, I didn’t say who done it,” replied Roy,

with his engaging smile.

 

“Tell me, then — who did?”

 

“Wal, I reckon I sha’n’t tell you unless you promise not to

tell Las Vegas. Thet cowboy is plumb off his head. He thinks

he knows who shot me an’ I’ve been lyin’ somethin’

scandalous. You see, if he learns — then he’ll go gunnin’.

An’, Miss Helen, thet Texan is bad. He might get plugged as

I did — an’ there would be another man put off your side

when the big trouble comes.”

 

“Roy, I promise you I will not tell Las Vegas,” replied

Helen, earnestly.

 

“Wal, then — it was Riggs!” Roy grew still paler as he

confessed this and his voice, almost a whisper, expressed

shame and hate. “Thet four-flush did it. Shot me from behind

Beasley! I had no chance. I couldn’t even see him draw. But

when I fell an’ lay there an’ the others dropped back, then

I seen the smokin’ gun in his hand. He looked powerful

important. An’ Beasley began to cuss him an’ was cussin’ him

as they all run out.”

 

“Oh, coward! the despicable coward!” cried Helen.

 

“No wonder Tom wants to find out!” exclaimed Bo, low and

deep. “I’ll bet he suspects Riggs.”

 

“Shore he does, but I wouldn’t give him no satisfaction.”

 

“Roy, you know that Riggs can’t last out here.”

 

“Wal, I hope he lasts till I get on my feet again.”

 

“There you go! Hopeless, all you boys! You must spill

blood!” murmured Helen, shudderingly.

 

“Dear Miss Helen, don’t take on so. I’m like Dale — no man

to hunt up trouble. But out here there’s a sort of unwritten

law — an eye for an eye — a tooth for a tooth. I believe

in God Almighty, an’ killin’ is against my religion, but

Riggs shot me — the same as shootin’ me in the back.”

 

“Roy, I’m only a woman — I fear, faint-hearted and unequal

to this West.”

 

“Wait till somethin’ happens to you. ‘Supposin’ Beasley

comes an’ grabs you with his own dirty big paws an’, after

maulin’ you some, throws you out of your home! Or supposin’

Riggs chases you into a corner!”

 

Helen felt the start of all her physical being — a violent

leap of blood. But she could only judge of her looks from

the grim smile of the wounded man as he watched her with his

keen, intent eyes.

 

“My friend, anythin’ can happen,” he said. “But let’s hope

it won’t be the worst.”

 

He had begun to show signs of weakness, and Helen, rising at

once, said that she and Bo had better leave him then, but

would come to see him the next day. At her call Carmichael

entered again with Mrs. Cass, and after a few remarks the

visit was terminated. Carmichael lingered in the doorway.

 

“Wal, Cheer up, you old Mormon!” he called.

 

“Cheer up yourself, you cross old bachelor!” retorted Roy,

quite unnecessarily loud. “Can’t you raise enough nerve to

make up with Bo?”

 

Carmichael evacuated the doorway as if he had been spurred.

He was quite red in the face while he unhitched the team,

and silent during the ride up to the ranch-house. There he

got down and followed the girls into the sitting room. He

appeared still somber, though not sullen, and had fully

regained his composure.

 

“Did you find out who shot Roy?” he asked, abruptly, of

Helen.

 

“Yes. But I promised Roy I would not tell,” replied Helen,

nervously. She averted her eyes from his searching gaze,

intuitively fearing his next query.

 

“Was it thet — Riggs?”

 

“Las Vegas, don’t ask me. I will not break my promise.”

 

He strode to the window and looked out a moment, and

presently, when he turned toward Bo, he seemed a stronger,

loftier, more impelling man, with all his emotions under

control.

 

“Bo, will you listen to me — if I swear to speak the truth

— as I know it?”

 

“Why, certainly,” replied Bo, with the color coming swiftly

to her face.

 

“Roy doesn’t want me to know because he wants to meet thet

fellar himself. An’ I want to know because I want to stop

him before he can do more dirt to us or our friends. Thet’s

Roy’s reason an’ mine. An’ I’m askin’ YOU to tell me.”

 

“But, Tom — I oughtn’t,” replied Bo, haltingly.

 

“Did you promise Roy not to tell?”

 

“No.”

 

“Or your sister?”

 

“No. I didn’t promise either.”

 

“Wal, then you tell me. I want you to trust me in this here

matter. But not because I love you an’ once had a wild dream

you might care a little for me —”

 

“Oh — Tom!” faltered Bo.

 

“Listen. I want you to trust me because I’m the one who

knows what’s best. I wouldn’t lie an’ I wouldn’t say so if I

didn’t know shore. I swear Dale will back me up. But he

can’t be here for some days. An’ thet gang has got to be

bluffed. You ought to see this. I reckon you’ve been quick

in savvyin’ Western ways. I couldn’t pay you no higher

compliment, Bo Rayner
 . Now will you tell me?”

 

“Yes, I will,” replied Bo, with the blaze leaping to her

eyes.

 

“Oh, Bo — please don’t — please don’t. Wait!” implored

Helen.

 

“Bo — it’s between you an’ me,” said Carmichael.

 

“Tom, I’ll tell you,” whispered Bo. “It was a lowdown,

cowardly trick
 . Roy was surrounded — and shot from

behind Beasley — by that four-flush Riggs!”

CHAPTER XIX

The memory of a woman had ruined Milt Dale’s peace, had

confounded his philosophy of self-sufficient, lonely

happiness in the solitude of the wilds, had forced him to

come face to face with his soul and the fatal significance

of life.

 

When he realized his defeat, that things were not as they

seemed, that there was no joy for him in the coming of

spring, that he had been blind in his free, sensorial,

Indian relation to existence, he fell into an inexplicably

strange state, a despondency, a gloom as deep as the silence

of his home. Dale reflected that the stronger an animal, the

keener its nerves, the higher its intelligence, the greater

must be its suffering under restraint or injury. He thought

of himself as a high order of animal whose great physical

need was action, and now the incentive to action seemed

dead. He grew lax. He did not want to move. He performed his

diminishing duties under compulsion.

 

He watched for spring as a liberation, but not that he could

leave the valley. He hated the cold, he grew weary of wind

and snow; he imagined the warm sun, the park once more green

with grass and bright with daisies, the return of birds and

squirrels and deer to heir old haunts, would be the means

whereby he could break this spell upon him. Then he might

gradually return to past contentment, though it would never

be the same.

 

But spring, coming early to Paradise Park, brought a fever

to Dale’s blood — a fire of unutterable longing. It was

good, perhaps, that this was so, because he seemed driven to

work, climb, tramp, and keep ceaselessly on the move from

dawn till dark. Action strengthened his lax muscles and kept

him from those motionless, senseless hours of brooding. He

at least need not be ashamed of longing for that which could

never be his — the sweetness of a woman — a home full of

light, joy, hope, the meaning and beauty of children. But

those dark moods were sinkings into a pit of hell.

 

Dale had not kept track of days and weeks. He did not know

when the snow melted off three slopes of Paradise Park. All

he knew was that an age had dragged over his head and that

spring had come. During his restless waking hours, and even

when he was asleep, there seemed always in the back of his

mind a growing consciousness that soon he would emerge from

this trial, a changed man, ready to sacrifice his chosen

lot, to give up his lonely life of selfish indulgence in

lazy affinity with nature, and to go wherever his strong

hands might perform some real service to people.

Nevertheless, he wanted to linger in this mountain fastness

until his ordeal was over — until he could meet her, and

the world, knowing himself more of a man than ever before.

 

One bright morning, while he was at his campfire, the tame

cougar gave a low, growling warning. Dale was startled. Tom

did not act like that because of a prowling grizzly or a

straying stag. Presently Dale espied a horseman riding

slowly out of the straggling spruces. And with that sight

Dale’s heart gave a leap, recalling to him a divination of

his future relation to his kind. Never had he been so glad

to see a man!

 

This visitor resembled one of the Beemans, judging from the

way he sat his horse, and presently Dale recognized him to

be John.

 

At this juncture the jaded horse was spurred into a trot,

soon reaching the pines and the camp.

 

“Howdy, there, you ole b’ar-hunter!” called John, waving his

hand.

 

For all his hearty greeting his appearance checked a like

response from Dale. The horse was mud to his flanks and John

was mud to his knees, wet, bedraggled, worn, and white. This

hue of his face meant more than fatigue.

 

“Howdy, John?” replied Dale.

 

They shook hands. John wearily swung his leg over the

pommel, but did not at once dismount. His clear gray eyes

were wonderingly riveted upon the hunter.

 

“Milt — what ‘n hell’s wrong?” he queried.

 

“Why?”

 

“Bust me if you ain’t changed so I hardly knowed you. You’ve

been sick — all alone

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