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CHAPTER XXIV
WEST MAKES A DECISION
Came to those in the cabin a string of oaths, the crack of a whiplashing out savagely, and the yelps of dogs from a crouching, coweringteam.
Whaley slipped a revolver from his belt to the right-hand pocket ofhis fur coat.
The door burst open. A man stood on the threshold, a huge figurecrusted with snow, beard and eyebrows ice-matted. He looked like thestorm king who had ridden the gale out of the north. This on theoutside, at a first glance only. For the black scowl he flung at hispartner was so deadly that it seemed to come red-hot from a furnace ofhate and evil passion.
"Run to earth!" he roared. "Thought you'd hole up, you damned fox,where I wouldn't find you. Thought you'd give Bully West the slip,you'n' that li'l' hell-cat. Talk about Porcupine Creek, eh? Tried tosend me mushin' over there while you'n' her--"
What the fellow said sent a hot wave creeping over the girl's face tothe roots of her hair. The gambler did not speak, but his eyes, filmedand wary, never lifted from the other's bloated face.
"Figured I'd forget the ol' whiskey cache, eh? Figured you could gimmethe double-cross an' git away with it? Hell's hinges, Bully West's nofool! He's forgot more'n you ever knew."
The man swaggered forward, the lash of the whip trailing across thepuncheon floor. Triumph rode in his voice and straddled in his gait.He stood with his back to the fireplace absorbing heat, hands behindhim and feet set wide. His eyes gloated over the victims he hadtrapped. Presently he would settle with both of them.
"Not a word to say for yoreselves, either one o' you," he jeered."Good enough. I'll do what talkin' 's needed, then I'll strip the hideoff'n both o' you." With a flirt of the arm he sent the lash of thedog-whip snaking out toward Jessie.
She shrank back against the wall, needlessly. It was a threat, not anattack; a promise of what was to come.
"Let her alone." They were the first words Whaley had spoken. In hissoft, purring voice they carried out the suggestion of his crouchedtenseness. If West was the grizzly bear, the other was the forestpanther, more feline, but just as dangerous.
The convict looked at him, eyes narrowed, head thrust forward anddown. "What's that?"
"I said to let her alone."
West's face heliographed amazement. "Meanin'--?"
"Meaning exactly what I say. You'll not touch her."
It was a moment before this flat defiance reached the brain of the bigman through the penumbra of his mental fog. When it did, he strodeacross the room with the roar of a wild animal and snatched the girlto him. He would show whether any one could come between him and hiswoman.
In three long steps Whaley padded across the floor. Something cold andround pressed against the back of the outlaw's tough red neck.
"Drop that whip."
The order came in a low-voiced imperative. West hesitated. Thisman--his partner--would surely never shoot him about such a trifle.Still--
"What's eatin' you?" he growled. "Put up that gun. You ain't foolenough to shoot."
"Think that hard enough and you'll never live to know better. Handsoff the girl."
The slow brain of West functioned. He had been taken wholly bysurprise, but as his cunning mind Worked the situation out, he saw howmuch it would be to Whaley's profit to get rid of him. The gamblerwould get the girl and the reward for West's destruction. He wouldinherit his share of their joint business and would reinstate himselfas a good citizen with the Mounted and with McRae's friends.
Surlily the desperado yielded. "All right, if you're so set on it."
"Drop the whip."
The fingers of West opened and the handle fell to the floor. Deftlythe other removed a revolver from its place under the outlaw's leftarmpit.
West glared at him. That moment the fugitive made up his mind that hewould kill Whaley at the first good opportunity. A tide of poisonoushatred raced through his veins. Its expression but not its virulencewas temporarily checked by wholesome fear. He must be careful that thegambler did not get him first.
His voice took on a whine intended for good-fellowship. "I reckonI was too pre-emtory. O' course I was sore the way you two left meholdin' the sack. Any one would 'a' been now, wouldn't they? But nouse friends fallin' out. We got to make the best of things."
Whaley's chill face did not warm. He knew the man with whom he wasdealing. When he began to butter his phrases, it was time to look outfor him. He would forget that his partner had brought him from Farawaya dog-team with which to escape, that he was supplying him with fundsto carry him through the winter. He would remember only that he hadbalked and humiliated him.
"Better get into the house the stuff from the sled," the gambler said."And we'll rustle wood. No telling how long this storm'll last."
"Tha's right," agreed West. "When I saw them sun dogs to-day I figuredwe was in for a blizzard. Too bad you didn't outfit me for a longertrip."
A gale was blowing from the north, carrying on its whistling breatha fine hard sleet that cut the eyeballs like powdered glass. The menfought their way to the sled and wrestled with the knots of the frozenropes that bound the load. The lumps of ice that had gathered roundthese had to be knocked off with hammers before they could be freed.When they staggered into the house with their packs, both menwere half-frozen. Their hands were so stiff that the fingers werejointless.
They stopped only long enough to limber up the muscles. Whaley handedto Jessie the revolver he had taken from West.
"Keep this," he said. His look was significant. It told her that inthe hunt for wood he might be blinded by the blizzard and lost. If hefailed to return and West came back alone, she would know what to dowith it.
Into the storm the two plunged a second time. They carried ropes andan axe. Since West had arrived, the gale had greatly increased. Thewind now was booming in deep, sullen roars and the temperature hadfallen twenty degrees already. The sled dogs were nowhere to be seenor heard. They had burrowed down into the snow where the house wouldshelter them from the hurricane as much as possible.
The men reached the edge of the creek. They struggled in the frozendrifts with such small dead trees as they could find. In the darknessWhaley used the axe as best he could at imminent risk to his legs.Though they worked only a few feet apart, they had to shout to maketheir voices carry.
"We better be movin' back," West called through his open palms. "Wegot all we can haul."
They roped the wood and dragged it over the snow in the directionthey knew the house to be. Presently they found the sled and from itdeflected toward the house.
Jessie had hot tea waiting for them. They kicked off their webs andpiled the salvaged wood into the other end of the cabin, after whichthey hunkered down before the fire to drink tea and eat pemmican andbannocks.
They had with them about fifty pounds of frozen fish for the dogs andprovisions enough to last the three of them four or five meals. Whaleyhad brought West supplies enough to carry him only to Lookout, wherehe was to stock for a long traverse into the wilds.
As the hours passed there grew up between the gambler and the girl atacit partnership of mutual defense. No word was spoken of it, buteach knew that the sulky brute in the chimney corner was dangerous. Hewould be held by no scruples of conscience, no laws of friendship ordecency. If the chance came he would strike.
The storm raged and howled. It flung itself at the cabin with whatseemed a ravenous and implacable fury. The shriek of it was nowlike the skirling of a thousand bagpipes, again like the wailing ofnumberless lost souls.
Inside, West snored heavily, his ill-shaped head drooping on the bigbarrel chest of the man. Jessie slept while Whaley kept guard. Latershe would watch in her turn.
There were moments when the gale died down, but only to roar againwith a frenzy of increased violence.
The gray day broke and found the blizzard at its height.