by Max Brand
Behind them rose fresh yells of dismay, and the firing ceased. Of course they would pursue, but unless Ronicky were hugely mistaken, they would not pursue far through the darkness of the woods. Dawn was indeed beginning in the east, but the pines were thick enough to shut out the scattered rays of light and leave deep night beneath the lower branches.
And to follow an armed enemy who had proved the sharpness of his teeth through such a thicket as this would probably overtask the worn nerves of the outlaws. Besides, he shrewdly guessed that they had had enough of fighting to last them for many days.
Another interest was larger in the mind of Ronicky. He plunged with Hugh Dawn straight up the slope until he came to the clearing where Treat had said Jack Moon had last gone with the girl.
It was quite empty, as he broke into the open space with his revolver poised. Drawing up his horse with a groan, he cried to Dawn: “Treat was right. The devil has taken Jerry.”
“Ay,” said the despairing father, “devil he is and doubly a devil, but well never get him tonight, Ronicky. He’s taken the grays. I seen that they weren’t among the rest of the hosses, though I looked for ’em. On the grays he’ll shake his heels in our faces, lad, or the faces of any hosses in these parts. They’ve got the foot. We can’t catch ’em!”
For answer Ronicky looked a moment in silence at his companion and then whistled a peculiarly high and piercing note, long held. Then he sat with his head canted a little to one side, listening intently.
“How come?” growled Hugh Dawn uneasily. “Calling up Moon’s gang of cutthroats?”
But far away, faint as a small echo, the answer came in the form of a neigh. Ronicky smiled and shook his head at his companion.
“You hear?”
“It’s Lou,” said the other, a little awed. “She’s like a man for sense, Ronicky.”
“Better’n most men,” answered Ronicky tersely and whistled again.
The answer this time was much closer. Then they heard a crashing in the underbrush, and the beautiful mare came like a bullet out of the trees and glinted in the dawnlight of the clearing. Beside Ronicky she drew up, snorting her pleasure at the reunion.
A change of saddles was quickly made, and now, on the back of the mare, Ronicky laughed with joy.
“Now let Jack Moon ride hard,” he said, “because, no matter how much foot the grays have, I’m going to run ’em into the ground—if I can ever pick up the trail. But Lord knows where they’ve gone. Can you guess, Hugh?”
“Can’t make a good guess,” the older man returned, watching with an appreciative eye while the bay mare danced in her eagerness to be off. “But how’m I to keep up with that little streak of lightning you’re on now?”
“You won’t keep up,” answered Ronicky. “Never come across a hoss in the mountains that could keep up, partner.”
Now the gray morning was brightening each moment, and already the light was so clear that they could look back into the heart of the hollow and see the clearing and the shacks. There was no pursuit apparently. Small figures of men moved here and there hurriedly. There was a knot of horses, looking as small as ants in the distance, in the central space.
“I knew,” muttered Ronicky Doone, “that there was a curse on that treasure of Cosslett’s. We ain’t the men that dug the stuff out of the ground in the first place, and neither did they give it to us. Hugh, they’s going to be a curse wherever that gold travels!”
“I got none of it,” said Hugh Dawn almost cheerfully. “Left it all behind in the shack. And I think you’re right, Ronicky. But now where do we head?”
“We can only guess. Where would a smart gent like Jack Moon go if he wanted to throw folks off the trail?”
“North was where he and the band expected to head.”
“That’s why he won’t head there. And over to the east the ground slopes too easy and smooth. That’s where folks would naturally think that Moon had gone trying to get away. But most like, just to throw us off, Moon has taken the west road, through those hills. The harder the road, the less chance we’d have to foller him on it. Ain’t that the way he’d think?”
“I dunno, Ronicky. But it sounds pretty reasonable, except that for my part I’d take the east road. That’s where he must of gone.”
“Take it if you want. I go west.”
“Take it, then. We’ll each try a road. And if we both miss?”
“I’ll see you in Trainor—if I come through alive.”
“Good-by, Ronicky—and Heaven bless you!”
Ronicky Doone waved his hand cheerfully.
“You look happy,” said the older man curiously, “like you was going to a party, son!”
“I am,” said Ronicky Doone. “I’m going on the trail of the gent I’d rather meet than anybody in the world. Good luck, Hugh!”
Hugh Dawn waved again and then watched Ronicky send his mare at a gallop down through the sparsely wooded slope leading toward the west. He kept on watching as the rider disappeared in the thicket in the lower hollow, and until Ronicky came into view again on the farther slope. He was still allowing Lou to keep a swift pace, and he was riding jauntily erect, as though he rode to a feast.
Then Hugh Dawn turned his face east and trotted down through the trees.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
The Threat
It was, indeed, down the western trail taken by Ronicky, that Jack Moon had urged his horses with Jerry Dawn at his side, and never before had the leader ridden with such high hopes of great success to lure him on. The weariness of the girl was a great part in his favor. He had well nigh convinced her of the honesty of his intentions during the first part of the ride, and now, as the long strain of anxiety and of physical effort during the past few days began to tell upon her, she turned to the strong man beside her automatically for assistance and guidance. If she had been in full possession of her natural keenness, she might have probed motives and probabilities far more deeply. But as it was, she took for granted, it seemed, in the mental fog that springs out of physical exhaustion, that Jack Moon was a rock of support.
She had ceased riding erect and lightly in the saddle by the time the sun pushed up out of the eastern trees and looked down at them as they twisted along a narrow trail on a mountainside. Now her head had lowered a little, and one hand rested heavily on the pommel of the saddle. Sometimes he thought that she was on the verge of falling asleep, so heavily she swung to one side or another as the big gray turned a sharp corner of the trail, but these swerves always wakened her a little and made her smile at her companion with dim amusement. The outlaw pressed close to her side to make sure that she should not fall.
In all his dark and cruel career he had never come so close to a good and pure emotion as he had come now. To him the girl in her weariness and helplessness was a more controlling power than a hundred men with guns rushing at him. The night of sleeplessness, with other dreary nights of watching before, had robbed her of all sprightliness of mind, all elasticity of body. She had become, mentally and physically, a child. He could mold her as he would. Should he take advantage of her now, to press on her the great desire which had been beating at his brain since he first saw her those few short days before?
Watching her wavering in the saddle, he decided that for very shame he could not trouble her with his importunities. But looking more closely again, and this time at her bowed face, it seemed to Jack Moon that there was nothing in the world so tender or so perfectly beautiful as the line of her profile, curving over brow and nose and lips and chin and rounded throat. Behind all the gentleness, he knew there was more courage than ordinarily comes to the lot of woman. All in all, it seemed to him that he had at last found a helpmate—the woman he wished to make his wife.
It must be said in justice to the man that in his associations with women he had ever played an honorable role. Whatever his ways with men, he had kept his trickery for them alone, and he had reserved for womankind as much reverence as he possessed. He was one of those
odd fellows who, in the midst of a thousand crimes, retain a measure of self-respect by adhering to standards of one kind or another. It is not an unusual characteristic of criminals. There are murderers who kill for a price, and a cheap price, at that, who would scorn to commit an act of thievery. There are robbers who would not keep themselves from starving by descending to such a pitifully small act as picking a pocket. But with Jack Moon the exception had been a very large one—he had built a solid reputation as a man who never broke his word.
He writhed with shame and anguish of spirit to think that at last he had shattered the painfully acquired repute. He had betrayed his own followers, he had tricked and betrayed Ronicky Doone, he had betrayed Hugh Dawn. But he had lied and perjured himself for the sake of the girl, and he had the price of his sin with him. At least he had her presence. How far he was from having won her confidence, her affection, remained to be seen. In the meantime, she was here beside him, and as the miser, looking at his gold, makes small the privations he has endured to heap up the money, so Jack Moon, looking at the girl, sneered at the lost honor which she had cost him.
Yet, how much of her was his? How truly did she trust him? Might it not be that he had paid the terrible price simply for the sake of a single ride with her? All of these possibilities swarmed through the tormented mind of the outlaw, but he forced them away. It was too much to be considered. Never before had he laid siege to the mind of a man without eventually winning him over, and surely a single, weak woman could not endure against his persuasiveness!
But before she could even listen to him, she must be stimulated to complete wakefulness. He halted his party, helped the girl dismount, and built a camp fire hastily. Over it he made coffee, finding all the materials necessary in the pack which was behind the saddle on Jerry’s horse. Having prepared a steaming cup of the coffee, he gave it to the girl. Bacon and cracker sandwiches completed the meal, but they both ate ravenously; and before the brief repast was ended, the color was coming back into the face of the girl. Still he did not begin his talk, but waited until they were once more on the trail.
Of course there was not a chance in a thousand that he would be pursued—not a chance, unless Ronicky Doone escaped from the band—which was absurd—and then was able to guess what trail the fugitive leader had taken. But there was not a single danger in a thousand possibilities that Ronicky Doone, if he escaped from the besieged shack, would even be able to guess that the leader of the outlaws was a fugitive! Still Jack Moon preferred to make surety doubly sure. So he pressed steadily westward. Before long they would come down into the lowlands; they would begin to enter a district where the plain was green with irrigation, and where little agricultural villages were dotting the green here and there. In one of these, if his persuasions took effect, he could find the minister. In one of these the ceremony could be performed.
Still he delayed beginning the talk. It was hard to find the right opening. His heartbeat began to quicken; and he could have blessed her when she said suddenly: “It’s all like a happy dream, you know. We’ve been through a nightmare time; it’s unreal. I’ve been trying to convince myself that I’ve actually seen Cosslett’s gold, but I can’t.”
“And yet we have four horses here, all loaded with it! More than a hundred thousand dollars, Jerry!”
“I wish it weren’t here!” she answered. “There’s no luck about it.”
“If you want,” he answered, “I’ll pitch the gold down into that ravine and let it lie there. Just say the word!”
The violence of his expression made her glance up to his face, startled; she glanced away as quickly. Such talk as this could mean only one thing. Moreover, she had seen a pale, intense face and eyes that burned out of it at her. The usual pale calm was gone from Jack Moon. He was no longer the aloof, superior leader. He was simply a man, a man in love. She was frightened, but she was not altogether displeased. She cast about, however, for some other topic to carry the talk away from the danger point.
“Perhaps you should. I don’t know. Perhaps Ronicky was right.”
Moon, gritting his teeth, saw that he must not take up the subject. Apparently the girl had recovered from her former aversion to Ronicky.
“Doone is all right,” he said mildly. “Anyway, he stuck by your father in the last pinch.”
“I don’t know what to make of it,” she murmured. “First he seems to throw his own life away, fighting for us against you and your men. He does it for nothing—without a hope of reward. Then he sells his honor and becomes one of your band. Next he leaves the band and at the last moment throws himself on the side of my father again. How do you explain him?”
“I don’t try to,” said the leader carelessly, far more carelessly than he really wished to speak. “He’s just a wild man. That’s all! Some gents are all straight and sane about most things, but go off on one subject. That’s the way with Doone. Talks straight till he gets a chance to fight. Then he goes mad.
“There’s only one thing I’m sorry about,” went on Moon, changing the subject, “and that’s the gold. I promised to get all of it for your father. But all I can give him is the stuff we have with us.”
“You’re going to give that to him?”
“Do you think I’m carrying it for my own use?” asked the bandit sorrowfully.
That won him a smile of gratitude.
“I knew you were brave,” she said, “and I knew you could be gentle and kind, but I didn’t know that you could be so generous.”
“It’s not for my sake or for his,” answered Jack Moon. “It’s you that have taught me what to do.”
He had come close to the point now, and he must press on.
“Will you let me tell you what I’ve been planning?”
She knew well enough what direction he was taking now, yet she could not stop him.
“I’m going East,” said Jack Moon. “You might think that that’s a fool play to make. But mighty few people have ever seen my face. And them that have, would never know me when I’m dressed up in store clothes and wearing gloves and talking smooth. I can put on smooth talk well enough, and lay off on the bum grammar, too, Jerry. You trust to that! So what’s to keep me from popping up in the East—in New York, say, with a new name and plenty of money to start me off in business of some kind? What’s to stop me from all of that?”
“Nothing,” said the girl heartily. “I wish you joy with all my heart. I know you can win out. Nobody would trail you there.”
“Nobody,” echoed Jack Moon. “And by the same way that I’ve made a place for myself in the mountains, I’ll make a place for myself in business, and I’ll make money for myself, too. It won’t be hard!”
“No,” agreed the girl. “You were born to lead men, Jack, and you can lead them in cities as well as you can in the mountains!”
“Yet,” said Jack Moon, “all the money in the world, tied up with a life in a city, wouldn’t make up for the freedom I have in the mountains. Up here I’m a king. Down there I’ll be just lost in the crowd. You see?”
She nodded, dreading what was to come.
“But there’s one thing that would make me go—one thing that would lead me anywhere, Jerry, and that’s you! Understand? You, Jerry!”
He swerved his horse close to her and rode with his left hand on the cantle of her saddle. He was leaning so that, when she looked up to him, his tensed face was hardly an inch away. Jerry Dawn grew pale. His words came in a stream now.
“Since I met you, Jerry, I’ve wanted one thing in the world more than all the rest of it, and that’s you. I’ve quit the band, to follow you. I’ve given up what it’s taken me years to build, to follow you. Understand? I’m through with the mountains—I’m through with the men. I’ve given it up for a new life, and the heart of the new life is you, Jerry. Without you, it’s nothing to me. With you, it’s everything. You’re getting pale, honey, but it’s not because you’re afraid. You’re too steady to do that. You know that, whatever I’ve been to the rest
of the world, you can trust me to the finish. Will you tell me that, Jerry? Look up and tell me that!”
She flushed, frightened and miserable.
“But don’t you see. Jack, that I can only answer you—honestly—in one way, if I answer yes to all that?”
“What way?”
“I can only say that I care for you as you care for me. I—I don’t, Jack.”
“You couldn’t,” went on Moon. “It ain’t possible that you could. I don’t expect you to—yet. But with time, Jerry, I’ll pour so much love around you that you can’t help giving some of it back, any more than a mirror can help shining back some firelight! Will you believe that, or d’you see me only as an outlaw talking crazy words that mean nothing?”
“Whatever you may have been,” she answered, “I tell you truly now that you’ve honored me by saying all this to me. But what can I do? I simply don’t care for you in that way, Jack. I know that I owe the life of my father to you, and still—”
“Jerry,” he implored her, “think it over. Think quick and hard. If you turn me down, I go back where I started. I build a new band. I run the mountains again. But if you say the word, I’ll leave the hills. I’ll go to the city. I’ll work to make you a home and happiness as no other man ever worked for a woman.”
Sincerity was in his voice and in his heart. The very fact that she was repulsing him made her the more desirable to Jack Moon. It seemed to him then that the cool gray eyes and the pale, trembling lips of the girl were worth more to him than ten thousand treasures as rich as the treasure of Cosslett.
