by Grey, Zane
"Wat-er!" choked Gloriana, huskily, as she sank down on the sward.
"Alia! Spittin' cotton, my proud beauty?" ejaculated the outlaw.
"Reckon you'd better have a drink out of my bottle." But she waved the suggestion aside with a gesture of abhorrence. And when Molly came carrying a dipper of water, Gloriana's great tragic eyes lit up. She drank the entire contents of the rather large vessel.
"Wal, Glory, you have to go through a good deal before you find the real value of things," remarked Stone, thoughtfully. "You see, most folks have life too easy. Take the matter of this drink of cold pure spring water. Sweet, wasn't it? You never knowed before how turrible sweet water could be, did you? It's the difference between life an' death."
"Thanks, Molly," said Gloriana, gratefully. "Aren't you--thirsty?"
"Not very. You see, out heah we train ourselves to do without water an' food. Like Indians, you know, Glory," replied Molly.
Plain indeed was it that Gloriana did not know; and that she was divided in emotion between her pangs and the surprise of this adventure.
"Hey, Molly, stop gabbin' an' get to work," ordered Stone, dryly. "Our St. Louis darlin' here will croak on us, if we ain't careful."
He slipped the axe out from under a rope on the pack, and proceeded to a nearby spruce, from which he cut armloads of the thick fragrant boughs. These he spread under an oak tree, and went back for more, watching the girls out of the tail of his eye. Once he caught Gloriana's voice in furious protest--"the lazy brute! Look at the size of him--and he makes you lift those packs!" And Molly's reply: "Aw, this heah's easy, Glory. An' I'm tellin' you again--don't make this desperado mad."
Then Stone slipped behind the spruce and peered through the branches. Molly did lift off those heavy packs, and unsaddled the animal. Next she turned to remove the saddle from her horse. At this Gloriana arose with difficulty, and limping to the horse she had ridden she tugged at the cinches, and laboured until she got them loose. Then she slid the big saddle off. It was a man's saddle and heavy, which of course she had not calculated upon, and down she went with it, buried almost out of sight. Molly ran to lift it off. Stone saw the Eastern girl wring her helpless hands. "Dog-gone tough on her," he soliloquised, and proceeded to get another load of spruce boughs, which he carried over to the oak tree.
"Hey, Gloriana, fetch over thet bed roll," he called.
She paid no attention to him. Then he bellowed the order in the voice of a bull. He heard Molly advise her to rustle. Whereupon Gloriana lifted the roll in both arms and came wagging across the grass.
"Untie the rope," he said, not looking at her, and went on spreading the boughs evenly. Presently, as she was so slow, he looked up. She was wearily toiling at the knot.
"I--I can't untie it," she said.
"Wal, you shore are a helpless ninny," he returned, in disgust. "What in Gawd's name can you do, Miss Traft? Play the concertina huh? An' fix your hair pretty, huh? It's shore thunderin' good luck for some fine cowboy thet I happened along an' saved him from marryin' you."
The marvel of that speech lay in its effect upon Gloriana, whose piteous mute appeal to Molly showed she had been driven to believe it was true.
"See heah, Jed Stone," demanded Molly, loyally, "how could Glory help the way she was brought up? Everybody cain't be born in Arizona."
"Misfortune, I call thet... But see heah, yourself, Molly Dunn. The more you stick up fer this wishy-washy tenderfoot the wuss I'll be. Savvy?"
"You bet I savvy," rejoined Molly, resignedly.
"Wal then, rustle supper. I'm tired after thet ride. My neck's stiff from turnin' round to watch Miss Traft. It was a circus, though... Gather some wood, start a fire, put on the water to boil, mix biscuits, an' so forth."
No one could ever have guessed that Molly Dunn had packed a horse and led him, and had ridden over thirty miles of rough wilderness during the hours of daylight. She was quick, deft, thorough in all camp tasks; and it gave the outlaw pleasure to watch her, outside of his diabolical plot to subjugate the Eastern girl.
"Say, if this heah's all the grub you fetched we'll eat it tonight," said Molly.
"Go light on grub, I tell you. Mebbe I didn't pack enough. But I was a-rarin' to get away from Tobe's Well."
"Molly, I'll help you or die trying," offered Gloriana. "But if that queer pain comes to my side again--farewell."
"What pain, honey?"
"Reckon she's got appendicitis," drawled Stone, who allowed no word to get by him unheard.
"It was in my left side--and, oh, it was awful!"
"Thet comes from ridin' a hoss when you're not used to it. But it'll not kill you."
"Yes, it will, if I live long enough to mount that wild mustang again," avowed Gloriana. Then in a lower tone she added, "Molly, I thought Ed Darnell was a villain. But, my, oh!--he's a saint compared with this desperado."
"Oh, no, Glory. Jed Stone is an honestto-Gawd desperado," expostulated Molly.
"What's she sayin' aboot thet fellar Darnell an' me?" demanded Stone, going to the fire.
"Jed, she saw Darnell back in Missouri," explained Molly.
"You don't say. Wal, thet's interestin'. Hope she didn't compare me to him. Two-bit caird-sharp before he hit the West. An' then, like a puff of smoke, he lit into crooked cattle-dealin'... An' did he last longer than any of them dude Easterners who reckon they can learn us Westerners tricks? He did not."
"What do you mean, Jed?" queried Molly, who divined when he was lying and when he was not.
"Croak Malloy was in thet outfit Traft's cowboys rounded up in a cabin down below Yellow Jacket. They'd been rustlin' the new Diamond stock an' had to ride fer their lives. Wal, they didn't ride fer, not with your redskin brother an' Curly Prentiss an' thet rodeo-ridin' bunch after them. Croak said they set fire to the cabin, an' burned them out, an' he got shot in the laig. But he escaped, an' it was when he was hidin' in he brush thet he saw the cowboys string up Darnell along with two rustlers. Croak said he never see a man kick like thet white-cuff, caird-slicker, Darnell."
Gloriana's eyes were great black gulfs. "Mr. Stone, among other things you're a liar," she said, deliberately.
"Wal, I'll be dog-goned!" ejaculated the outlaw, genuinely surprised and not a little hurt. "I am, am I? Wal, you'll see, Miss Traft."
"You're trying to to frighten me," she faltered, weakening. "Have you no heart--no mercy?... I was once engaged to--to marry Darnell, or thought I was. He followed me out here."
"Ahuh. What'd he foller you out heah for?"
"He swindled my father out of money, and I suppose he thought he could do the same with Uncle Jim."
"Not old Jim Traft. Nix come the weasel! Old Jim cain't be swindled... Wal, Miss Gloriana, I must say you was lucky to have Darnell stack up against Curly Prentiss. I remember now thet Madden was in Snell's gamblin'-den when Curly ketched Darnell cheatin' an' drove him out of Flag. Funny he didn't bore thet caird-sharp. Reckon he savvied how soon Darnell would come to the end of his rope. He did come soon--an' it was a lasso."
"I don't believe you," replied Gloriana, steadily.
"Sweet on him yet, huh?"
"No, I despise him. Any punishment, even hanging, would be too good for him," retorted Gloriana, with passion.
"See there, Molly. She's comin' round," drawled Stone. "We'll make a Westerner of her yet."
"Jed, was there a fight down below Yellow Jacket?" asked Molly, with agitation.
"Shore was. Malloy said he seen two cowboys shot, one of which he accounted fer himself. But he didn't know either. An' so they couldn't have been Jim or Slinger or Prentiss."
"Oh how'll we find out?" cried Molly in honest agony. And the tone of her voice, the look of her, about finished Gloriana, who fell in a heap.
"Wal, what difference does it make," queried Stone, "to one of you, anyhow? One of you girls is shore goin' with me, an' cowboys won't never be no more in your young life. Haw haw!"
"I could stick this in you, Jed Stone," cried Molly, bran
dishing the wicked butcher knife.
The outlaw reached down and lifted Gloriana upright. Gloriana's head rolled. "Brace up," he said, and shook her. She found strength left to resist. Then he clasped her in his arms and hugged her tight. And while he did this he winked and grinned at Molly, who stood there aghast. "You need a regular desperado hug to stiffen your spine... There! Now you stand up an' do your work."
She did keep her feet, too, when he released her, and such eyes Jed Stone had never seen. If he had been the real desperado he pretended, he would have flinched and quailed under their magnificent fury.
While they sat at the meagre supper, Stone bedevilled Gloriana in every way conceivable, yet to his satisfaction it did not prevent her from eating her share. That was the answer. Let even the effete Easterner face the facts of primal life and the balance was struck.
Darkness soon settled down, and twice Gloriana fell asleep beside the fire. "Let's sit up--all night," she begged of Molly.
"I'd be willin', if he'd let us. But, Glory, dear, you jest couldn't. You'd fall over. An' by mawnin' you'd be froze. We'll have to sleep with Stone. He's put all the blankets on thet bed. An' I'll sleep in the middle--so he cain't touch you."
"You'll do nothing of the sort," retorted Gloriana. And when they reached the wide bed under the oak tree she crawled in the middle and stretched out, as if she did not care what happened.
"Wal, now, thet's somethin' like," declared the outlaw, as he saw the pale faces against the background of blankets. He sat down on the far side of the bed and in the gloom contrived to remove his boots and spurs. "Gurls, I'm liable to have nightmare. Often do when I'm scared or excited. An' I'm powerful dangerous then. Shot a bedfellow once, when I had a nightmare. So you wanta kick me awake in case I get to dreamin'."
It was not remarkable to Stone that almost before he had ceased talking Gloriana was asleep. He knew what worn-out nature would do. Nevertheless, as soon as Molly had dropped off he made such a commotion that he would almost have awakened the dead. Then he began to snore outrageously, and between snores he broke out into the thick weird utterance of a man in a nightmare.
"Molly--Molly!" cried Gloriana, in a shrill whisper, as she clutched her friend madly. "He's got it!"
"Sssh! Don't wake him. He won't be dangerous unless he wakes," replied Molly.
Jed made the mental reservation that his little ally was all right, and began to rack his brain for appropriate exclamations:
"AGGH! I'll--carve--your--gizzard!"
And he sprang up to thump back. Then he gave a capital imitation of Malloy's croaking laugh. Then he shouted: "You can't have the gurl! She's mine, Croak, she's mine!... I'll have your heart's blood!"
After which he snored some more, while listening intently. He did not hear anything, but he thought he felt the bed trembling. Next he rolled over, having thrown the blankets, to bump hard into Gloriana. But that apparently did not awaken him. He laid a heavy arm across both the girls and went on snoring blissfully.
"Molly," whispered Gloriana, in very low and blood-curdling voice. "Let's--kill him--in his sleep!"
"Oh I wish we could, but we're not strong enough," replied Molly, horrified. "Don't you dare move!"
In the grey of dawn he got up, pulled on his big boots, and went at the camp-fire tasks, careful not to make noise. His two babes in the woods were locked in sleep, also in each other's arms. Stone cooked the last of the meat and boiled the last of the coffee. A few biscuits were left, hard as rocks. Then he went to awaken the girls. Their heads were close together, one dark, the other amber, and their sweet pale faces took the first flush of the sunrise. It was a picture the outlaw would carry in his memory always, and he found himself thanking God that he had come upon Croak Malloy before they had suffered harm.
"Gurls, roll out," he called.
Molly awakened first and was bright and quick in an instant. She smiled, and Jed thought he would treasure that smile. Then Gloriana's eyes popped open. Dim gulfs of sleep! Stone turned away from them with a conscience-stricken pang.
"Rustle an' eat. I gotta hunt the horses," he said.
Upon his return they had finished eating. Molly said: "Glory's bag is missin'. With all her outdoor clothes!"
"Shore. I hid it. I don't want her dressin' up. She looks so cute in thet outfit," he replied. "Saddle your hoss, you starin' idgit," he said to Gloriana. "An' Molly, rustle with the bed an' packs while I eat."
Molly proved as capable as any cowboy, but poor Gloriana could not get the saddle up, and when the pinto bit and kicked at her, which was no wonder, she gave up coaxing and struck it smartly with a branch.
"Hyar! Don't beat thet pony," expostulated Stone. "Who'd ever think you'd show cruelty to a dumb beast?"
"Dumb! He sure is," replied Gloriana, "and he's not the only ---- thing around that ought to be beaten."
"Molly, you cain't never tell aboot people till you get them in the woods," said Stone, reflectively. "Their real natoor comes out. I reckon Glory, hyar, would have murdered Croak Malloy in cold blood if he'd got away with her. It's turrible to contemplate."
Soon they were mounted and riding in single file, as on the day before. Stone led them out of this gorge, miles and miles through the forest, out into the sunny desert, and back again, and finally, without a halt to the rim of the Black Brakes. He followed along that until mid-afternoon, when he came to a trail he knew, which was seldom used even by rustlers, unless pressed. Here they had to walk down and it was no fun. "Don't let your hoss fall on you," was all Stone said. At a particularly bad descent Gloriana and her pinto both fell, and she miraculously escaped being rolled on. "Whew!" ejaculated Stone. "I reckoned you was a goner then. The Lord shore watches over you."
"I don't care," panted the girl. "I'd sooner die--that way--than some other way." Her spirit was hard to break. She seemed to recover her courage after each successive trial. But her strength was almost spent. Stone calculated their position at that hour was less than a dozen miles below Yellow Jacket. And his intention was, if Gloriana could stand it, to climb out of the brakes and ride to the head of Yellow Jacket, where he could show the girls their way and then take leave of them. There was a risk of being held up along the trail by one or more of the Diamond outfit, but since he had the girls to credit him with their rescue he had little to worry about. Still, he did not want that to happen. He had planned a climax to his plot.
The sun set behind the western wall of the brakes; a mellow roar of running water filled the forest with dreaming music. Stone thought it about time to choose a place to camp, and he desired it to be remote from the trail, which he believed ran somewhat to his left along the stream. With this end in view he wormed his way through the woods toward the wall they had long since descended.
It loomed above him, grey and lofty, always silent and protective. And suddenly he emerged into an open space, where tall spruces and wide-spreading sycamores dominated the green. The glade appeared familiar, and as Gloriana and Molly rode out of the forest he reined his horse.
"0 my God--look!" cried Molly, in accents of horror.
Simultaneously, then, Stone's sense accounted for a smell of burned wood, the pile of charred logs that was once the trapper's cabin, and three grotesque and hideously swaying figures of men, hanging limp by their necks from a prominent branch of a sycamore.
Stone's shock had its stimulus in Gloriana's shriek. She swayed and slid out of the saddle. He caught her and lifted her in front of him, a dead weight.
"Jed--this heah is too much," expostulated Molly, hoarsely. She looked as if she, too, would faint.
Cursing under his breath, he turned to the girl. "I swear it was accident," he vowed, earnestly. "We were east of the trail, an' if I thought aboot it at all, I reckoned we were far from thet old cabin. By Gawd! I'm sorry, Molly. It is too much."
"Jed, I'll be--keelin' over, too," gasped Molly. "Thet's a hard sight for me, let alone Glory... If I recognised Darnell, she recognised him, you bet."
"S
hore she did. I never seen him but once, an' I knew him. An' there's my old Sheriff Lang, his star still a-shinin' on his vest. An' Joe Tanner... Wal, thet's shore a cowboy job, slick an' clean. Thet's the way of the West!"
Stone halted in the first likely spot for camp, and slipping out of his saddle with Gloriana in his arms, he laid her down on a soft pine-needle mat. She was conscious.
"Tend to her, Molly," said Stone, briefly, and he turned to look after the horses. Then he cut ample spruce boughs for two beds, and made them, one of which, for the girls, he laid in a protected niche of the cliff. Having finished these tasks, he approached his prisoners.
"There's nothin' to eat."
"Small matter, Jed. Our appetites are shore not a-rarin'," replied Molly.
Gloriana transfixed him with solemn tragic eyes.
"I take back--calling you a liar," she said, simply.
"Thanks. I accept your apology."
"Who--who did that?" she asked, with gesture to indicate the tragedy down the valley.
"What? Who did what?"
"Hanged those men?"
"I reckon thet was Curly Prentiss an' his pards. Shore young Jim had a hand in it, onless, of course, Curly an' Jim got killed by the rustlers. Some of the Diamond were done for, thet's shore."
"But--you--said--" she faltered, piteously.
"Shore. I said I reckoned it wasn't Jim or Curly. I forgot thet. Must have been one or more of them daredevils. Bud or Lone-star--an' mebbe Slinger. I seen where blood had dripped on the leaves, about saddle-high, along the trail. Some cowboys packed out, shore."
That surely finished Gloriana and all but did the same for Molly. She had just strength left to help Stone carry Gloriana to bed. The outlaw then sought his own rest, and the meditations inspired by the latest developments. This adventure had not lost its sting, despite the knocking at the gate of his conscience. Tomorrow would see the end of it and he must not fail in the task he had set himself.
Morning disclosed Molly to be herself again, and Gloriana able to get up, though she could not stand erect. She could do nothing but watch the others saddle and pack. Still, her perceptions were all the keener, and she paid Molly mute and eloquent tribute of appreciation.
