by Max Brand
"More'n that His hoss would get pretty tired before it hit the last mile and a half at that clip."
"Well, that's good! Willie, you know the Chalmers boy?"
"Joe Chalmers? Sure, him and me fought every other week last year. I busted his face good for him. Sure I know Joe. Him and me are chums. We're going shooting next month!"
She was too serious to smile at this strange recital of the bases of friendship among the young.
"Willie," she said, "this is to be kept a dead secret, you see?"
His eyes grew very wide.
"Cross my heart to die!" whispered Willie in delight. "I sure won't breathe a word of it to nobody!"
"Then you come running to the hotel to-night at a quarter to eight mind you, at seven-forty-five sharp! And you come shouting for the doctor!"
"Why for the doctor?"
"Because the Chalmers boy has been thrown from a horse and broken his leg."
"Thrown from a hoss? Why, there ain't a hoss in the world that could throw oh!"
With this exclamation the light dawned upon Willie in a great and a blinding burst, so that he gasped, choked, and then was silent.
"Will you do it?" she asked.
"Will I do it?" exclaimed Willie. "Didn't that damn doctor excuse me for swearing, Elsie pretty near raise me on castor oil?"
Chapter XXXVIII. A FORMULA FOR HAPPINESS
Perhaps the agreement at which Ronicky Doone arrived with the rancher was not large in words, but it was eloquent in substance.
"How come you've lost so much coin?" asked Ronicky when he came to the gist of his argument in the growing twilight before the ranch house.
"By bad luck," said the other sadly. "Nobody in the world, hardly, has had such bad luck as I've had!"
"At what?"
"Cows men everything that I count on goes wrong."
"Chiefly cards, though," said Ronicky.
"Eh? The cards? I've had my ups and downs with 'em! Are you feeling up to a small game of stud?"
But Ronicky was shaking his head and grinning scornfully.
"I can see through you like glass, Bennett," he said. "It's the cards that have taken everything away from you. If you and me hit up for an agreement, we got to start right there!"
"Right where?" asked the rancher, dismayed.
"Right at the cards! Bennett, you're through. You never lay a bet on the turn of a card again so long as you live. Understand?"
Steve Bennett gasped a protest, but Ronicky raised his hand to silence the older man.
"These boys I brung down here," he said, "will be plumb happy to work for you and to clean up on Jenkins' men. But the minute I give 'em the word they'll be against you and for Jenkins. And the first time that I hear of you putting up some stakes I'm going to send word to the boys. Is that clear, and does that go?"
Bennett swallowed and nodded sadly.
"I was thinking of keeping 'em amused," he began.
"You keep 'em amused," said Ronicky, "by starting your chink to cooking the best dinner that he ever turned out. That's the best way to keep them amused. And don't mind it if they make a mite of racket. They're that kind."
Again Bennett could only mutely agree with the terms laid down by the dictator.
"I'm going to slide off to Twin Springs," said Ronicky. "But tell the boys that I'm coming back to-night. There ain't going to be no trouble and no shooting scrapes come out of this little party. Everything is going to be plumb quiet, but to-morrow morning early I'm going to be back on the job, rounding up all the chances for a fight with Jenkins' gang. But I think we've got 'em beat!"
"We have!", shouted Bennett savagely. "We've beat 'em, and when I see him again, the skunk, I'm going to tell him just what I "
But Ronicky had no desire to hear more of this meaningless boasting. He turned Lou with a twist of his body and, waving farewell to Bennett, galloped down the valley toward the little town.
It was completely dark before he had covered more than half of the distance. In the shadows of the full night he swung down the street of Twin Springs, the bay mare rocking along as tirelessly as when he began the long run of that day's journeying. And so he came to the hotel.
But he did not choose to enter from the front. There might be too much talk, too much comment from the other men of the town. It seemed far better to Ronicky to send Lou between the two buildings next to the hotel and so around to the rear of the place. Here he dismounted and slipped up onto the veranda.
There he paused, recalling the picture which he had last seen from that veranda, looking through the big window into the room where Blondy Loring lay. Now, stepping close to the outside edge, so that the boards would not creak under his weight, he stole softly on.
As he went he heard a regular murmuring from the room the low, low voice of the girl the voices of two men but all was kept so indistinct that he could not understand a syllable of it until he came opposite the window, and then a single glance was more eloquent with meaning than a thousand words.
For there sat Elsie Bennett, wonderfully beautiful in an old yellow dress, with little flowers worked obscurely upon it in pastel shades, her blonde hair done low upon her forehead and upon her neck, her face quite pale with emotion that seemed to Ronicky to be fear. But with all her heart and soul she seemed to be driving herself forward.
Beside her lay Blondy Loring, one hand stretched out from the bed and holding her hand. Over them stood a man reading from a book, a little man, with a high light thrown from the lamp on the back of his very bald head, and the light also shining in the aureole of misty hair which floated around the edge of the bald spot.
And now the voice of Blondy, repeating the words of the minister, rose in a deep, heavy volume: "With this ring I thee wed!" And then the pale face of the girl was bowed over Blondy to kiss him.
One step took Ronicky to the window, and another carried him over the low ledge and into the room. At the very shadow of his coming Elsie Bennett had started back. In vain Blondy strove to detain her with his big arm. She slipped out of his grasp and stood back against the farther wall, gasping, while the minister turned agape to face the intruder. Blondy was barely able to turn his head to view Ronicky.
"You're too late for the fun, son," he sneered at Ronicky. "I'm sorry you didn't come for the rest of the show!"
"I've come to give it the last send-off, though," said Ronicky grimly. "I've come to bring you good news."
"What news?"
"A son has been born to your wife, and she's sent for you she needs you, Christopher!"
He could not tell that this last name was already known to the girl. But it was not the name which struck her dumb; it was that first horrible message. Little Philip Walton reached her in time to lower her into a chair, where she sat nearly fainting and staring at Ronicky with uncomprehending eyes.
Ronicky stepped to the bed and towered over the cringing, trembling outlaw. All the courage had gone out of the body of the bold Christopher, like the water out of a squeezed sponge.
"I'm going to get you safe out of this," said Ronicky Doone. "But when you're safe and well, I'm going to run you down and kill you, you hound. At first I thought you were a sort of hero, and then I took you for a wolf of a man, Blondy, but finally I seen that all you were was just a miserable, sneaking coyote. And that's the way I'm going to hound you, and I'm going to kill you in the end! But the time ain't come yet. I'm not going to let the law finish you. I want to leave that for myself!"
And to crown the horror, when the girl finally looked at her pseudo husband, she found him shaking and quivering and begging like a whipped dog. She got up from the chair, cold and perfectly calm, and walked straight to Ronicky and took his hand in both of hers.
"I've been a great fool," she said, "and you've saved me from myself!"
So she turned and left the room, as quietly as though she were slipping out to let the patient get his rest undisturbed.
"Ah," said the minister, "what a woman she is! And what a God's blessing, young
man, that you came when you did. Now let's find the sheriff!"
But from that resolution Ronicky carefully dissuaded him in a long argument which lasted until the light burned low and until Christopher was nearly dead with fear and shame on the bed. Then the minister gave in, and he took Ronicky home with him.
At the gate they parted.
"It's made me young again." said the minister, "listening to you talk. It's made me young again. But what I continually wonder at, Ronicky Doone, is where you get your reward?"
"Why," said Ronicky, "I've been thinking about that myself. I figure a gent gets his reward when he sees other people happy. As long as I can help other people to their happiness, I don't require no other reward. But I'm going to stay around here and wait."
He added this with a little emphasis, and the minister chuckled.
"I see," he said. "I see perfectly. Yes, I think that would be the best thing to do after all just wait!"
And he was still chuckling when he went into his house.
But Ronicky went back down the street full of a sad happiness and with his brain full of Elsie Bennett. He could not guess that night that she was watching from an upper window of the hotel every step he took that night.
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