The Charles Alden Seltzer Megapack

by Charles Alden Seltzer

  “I’m pretty well knocked out, Betty,” he said. “My neck hurts, sorta. I’ll send Bob in to keep you company.”

  The girl cast a sharp, eloquent glance at Calumet and smiled with straight lips.

  “Don’t bother to send Bob,” she replied; “I am not afraid.”

  The grandfather went out, leaving the door open. While the girl stood listening to his retreating steps, Calumet considered her. She had said that she was not afraid of him—he believed her; her actions showed it. He said nothing until after her grandfather had vanished and his step was no longer heard, and then when she turned to him he said shortly:

  “So your name’s Betty. Betty what?”

  “Clayton.”

  “An’ your grandpap?”

  “Malcolm Clayton.”

  “Who’s Bob?”

  “My brother.”

  “Any more Claytons around here?” he sneered.

  “No.”

  “Well,” he said with truculent insolence; “what in Sam Hill are you-all doin’ at the Lazy Y, anyway?”

  “I am coming to that presently,” she returned, unruffled.

  “Goin’ to work your jaw again, I reckon?” he taunted.

  The hard calm came again into her face as she looked at him, though behind it was that subtle quality that hinted of her possession of advantage. Her manner made plain to him that she held some mysterious power over him, a power which she valued, even enjoyed, and he was nettled, baffled, and afflicted with a deep rage against her because of it. Dealing with a man he would have known what to do, but he felt strangely impotent in the presence of this girl, for she was not disturbed over his insults, and her quiet, direct glances affected him with a queer sensation of guilt, even embarrassed him.

  “Well?” he prompted, after a silence.

  “I am going to tell you about your father,” she said.

  “Make it short,” he said gruffly.

  “Five years ago,” said the girl, ignoring the insolent suggestion; “my father and mother died. My father had been a big cattle owner,” she added with a flash of pride. “He was very wealthy; he was educated, refined—a gentleman. We lived in Texas—lived well. I attended a university in the South. In my second year there I was called home suddenly. My father was ill from shock and disappointment. He had invested heavily in some northern enterprise—it will not interest you to know the nature of it—and had lost his entire fortune. His ranch property was involved and had to be sold. There was barely enough to satisfy the creditors. Father died and mother soon followed him. Grandfather, Bob, and I were left destitute. We left the ranch and took up a quarter section of land on the Nueces. We became nesters and were continually harassed by a big cattle owner nearby who wanted our range. We had to get out. Grandfather thought there might be an opportunity to take up some land in this territory. Bob was—well, Bob took mother’s death so hard that we didn’t want to stay in Texas any longer. The outlook wasn’t bright. Bob was too young to work—”

  “Lazy, I reckon,” jeered Calumet.

  The girl’s eyes flashed with a swift, contemptuous resentment and her voice chilled. “Bob’s leg was hurt,” she said. She waited for an instant, watching the sneer on Calumet’s face, and then went on firmly, as though she had decided not to let anything he said disturb her. “So when Grandfather proposed coming here I agreed. We took what few personal effects that were left us. We traveled for two months—”

  “I ain’t carin’ to hear your family history,” interrupted Calumet. “You started to tell me about my dad.”

  “We were following the river trail near here,” the girl went on firmly, scorning to pay any attention to this insult; “when we heard shooting. I stayed with the wagon while grandfather went to investigate. We found two men—Tom Taggart and his son Neal—concealed in the cottonwood, trying to shoot your father, who was in the house. Your father had been wounded in the shoulder and it would not have been long before—”

  “Who are the Taggarts?” questioned Calumet, his lips setting strangely.

  “They own a ranch near here—the Arrow. The motive behind their desire to kill your father makes another story which you shall hear some time if you have the patience,” she said with jeering emphasis.

  “I ain’t particular.”

  The girl’s lips straightened. “Grandfather helped your father drive the Taggarts away,” she went on. “Your father was living here alone because several of his men had sought to betray him and he had discharged them all. Your father was wounded very badly and grandfather and I took care of him until he recovered. He liked us, wanted us to stay here, and we did.”

  “Pretty soft for a pair of poverty-stricken adventurers,” commented Calumet.

  The girl’s voice was cold and distinct despite the insult.

  “Your father liked me particularly well. A year ago he drew up a will giving me all his property and cutting you off without a cent. He gave me the will to keep for him.”

  “Fine!” was Calumet’s dryly sarcastic comment.

  “But I destroyed the will,” went on the girl.

  Calumet’s expression changed to surprised wonder, then to mockery.

  “You’re locoed!” he declared. “Why didn’t you take the property?”

  “I didn’t want it; it was yours.”

  Calumet forgot to sneer; his wonder and astonishment over the girl’s ability to resist such a temptation were so great as to shock him to silence. She and her grandfather were dependants, abroad without means of support, and yet the girl had refused a legacy which she and her relative had undoubtedly earned. Such sturdy honesty surprised him, mystified him, and he was convinced that there must have been some other motive behind her refusal to become his father’s beneficiary. He watched her closely for a moment and then, thinking he had discovered the motive, he said in a voice of dry mockery:

  “I reckon you didn’t take it because there was nothin’ to take.”

  “Besides the land and the buildings, he left about twenty thousand dollars in cash,” she informed him quietly.

  “Where is it?” demanded Calumet quickly.

  Betty smiled. “That,” she said dryly, “is what I want to talk to you about.” Again the consciousness of advantage shone in her eyes. Calumet felt that it would be useless to question her and so he leaned back in his chair and regarded her saturninely.

  “Soon after your father became afflicted with his last sickness,” continued Betty; “he called me to him and took me into his confidence. He talked to me about you—about the way he had treated you. Both he and your mother had been, he said, victims of uncontrollable tempers, and were beset with elemental passions which he was certain had descended to you. In fact, because of the hatred your mother bore you—” She hesitated.

  “Well, that too, belongs to the story which you will hear about Taggart when you have the patience,” she continued. “But your father repented; he saw the injustice he had done you and wanted to repair it. He was certain, though, that this curse of temper was deep-seated in you and he wanted to drive it out. He felt that when you finally came home you would need reforming, and he did not want you to profit by his money until you forgave him. He had strange notions regarding your reformation; he declared he would not take your word for it, but would insist on a practical demonstration. When he had fully explained his ideas on the subject he made me swear that I would carry them out.” She paused and looked at Calumet and he saw that the expression of advantage that had been in her eyes all along was no longer a subtle expression, but plain and unmistakable.

  Calumet watched her intently, silently, his face a battleground for the emotions that rioted within him. The girl watched him with covert vigilance and he felt that she was enjoying him. And when finally she saw the rage die out of his eyes, saw the color come slowly back into his cheeks and his face become a hard, inscrutable mask, she knew that the coming struggle between them was to be a bitter one.

  “So,” he said, after a while; “I do
n’t get the coin until I become a Sunday school scholar?”

  “It is specified that you give a practical demonstration of reform in character. You must show that you forgive your father.”

  “You’re goin’ to be my guardian?”

  “Your judge,” corrected the girl.

  “He’s got all this in the will?”

  “Yes, the last one he made.”

  “You don’t reckon I could break that will?” he sneered.

  “Try it,” she mocked. “It has been probated in Las Vegas. The judge happens to be a friend of your father’s and, I understand, sympathized with him.”

  “Clever, eh?” said Calumet, grinning crookedly.

  “I am glad you think so,” she taunted.

  CHAPTER IV

  CALUMET PLAYS BETTY’S GAME

  The silence between Betty and Calumet continued so long that it grew oppressive. The night noises came to their ears through the closed door; a straggling moonbeam flittered through the branches of a tree in the wood near the ranchhouse, penetrated the window and threw a rapier-like shaft on Calumet’s sneering face. Betty’s eyes in the flickering glare of the candle light, were steady and unwavering as she vainly searched for any sign of emotion in the mask-like features of the man seated before her. She saw the mask break presently, and a cold, mirthless smile wreathe his lips.

  “You make me sick,” he said slowly. “If you’d had any sense you’d have told the old fool to go to hell! You’re goin’ to reform me? You’re goin’ to be my judge? You—you—you! Why you poor little sufferin’ innocent, what business have you got here at all? What right have you got to be settin’ there tellin’ me that you’re goin’ to be my judge; that you’re goin’ to butt into my game at all? Where’s the money?” he demanded, his voice hard and menacing.

  “The money is hidden,” she returned quietly.

  “Where?”

  “That is my business,” she returned defiantly. “Where it is hidden no one but me knows. And I am not going to tell until the time comes. You are not going to scare me, either,” she added confidently. “If you don’t care to abide by your father’s wishes you are at liberty to go—anywhere you please.”

  “Who’d get the money then?”

  “You have a year in which to show that you forgive your father. If at the end of that time you have not forgiven him, or if you leave the ranch without agreeing to the provisions of the will, the entire property comes to me.”

  “I reckon you’d like to have me leave?” he sneered.

  “That,” she returned, unruffled, “is my business. But I don’t mind telling you that I have no interest in the matter one way or another. You may leave if you like, but if you stay you will yield to your father’s wishes if you are to receive the money and the property.”

  There was finality in her voice; he felt it and his face darkened with passion. A sneer replaced the mirthless grin on his lips, and when he got up and moved slowly toward Betty she sat motionless, for there was a repressed savagery in his movements that chilled her blood. He came and stood in front of her, towering over her; she saw that his hands were clenched, the fingers working. Twice she tried to look up at him, but each time her gaze stopped at his hands—they fascinated her. She tried to scream when she finally saw them come out toward her, but succeeded in emitting only a breathless gasp, for a broad, rough palm suddenly enclosed each of her cheeks and her head was forced slowly and resistlessly back until she found herself looking straight up at him.

  “Why, you,” he said, his voice vibrating with some strange passion, while he shook her head slowly from side to side as though he were resisting an impulse to throttle her; “why, you—you—” he repeated, his voice a sudden, tense whisper; “for two bits I’d—”

  He hesitated, for she had recovered from her momentary physical and mental paralysis, roused by the awful threat in his voice and manner, and was fighting to free herself, clawing at his hands, kicking, squirming, but ineffectively, for his hands were like bands of steel. Finding resistance useless she sat rigid again, her eyes flashing impotent rage and scorn.

  “Coward!” she said breathlessly.

  For an instant longer he held her and then laughed and dropped his hands to his sides.

  “Shucks,” he said, his voice expressing disgust; “I reckon the old man knowed what he was doin’ when he appointed you my guardian! A man can’t fight a woman—like that!”

  He walked to the chair upon which he had been sitting, turned it around so that its back was toward Betty, and straddled it, leaning his arms on its back and resting his chin on them.

  “Well,” he said, with a slow grin at her; “if it will do you any good to know, I’ve decided to stay here and let you practice on me. What’s the first move?”

  But his action had aroused her; she stood up and confronted him, her face flushed with shame and indignation.

  “Leave this house!” she commanded, taking a step toward him and speaking rapidly and hoarsely, her voice quivering as though she had been running; “leave it instantly!” She stamped a foot to emphasize the order.

  Calumet did not move. He watched her, a smile on his lips, his eyes narrowed. When she stamped her foot the smile grew to a short, amused laugh.

  “Sorta riled, eh?” he jeered. “Well, go as far as you like—you’re sure amusin’. But I don’t reckon that I’ll be leavin’ here in a hurry. Didn’t the old man tell you I could stay here a year? What’s the use of me goin’ now, just when you’re goin’ to start to reform me? Why,” he finished, surveying her with interest; “I reckon the old man would be plumb tickled to see the way you’re carryin’ on—obeyin’ his last wishes.” He rested his head on his arms and laughed heartily.

  He heard her step across the floor, and raised his head again, to look into the muzzle of the pistol he had laid on the desk. It was close to him, steady in her hands, and behind it her eyes were blazing with wrath and determination.

  “Go!” she ordered sharply; “go now—this minute, or I will shoot you!”

  He laughed recklessly into the muzzle of the weapon and then without visible excitement turned in his chair, reached out a swift hand, grasped the weapon by the barrel and depressed the menacing muzzle so that it pointed straight downward. Holding it thus in spite of her frantic efforts to wrench it free, he got to his feet and stood in front of her.

  “Why, Betty,” he jeered; “you’re sure some excited.” Seizing her other hand, he turned her around so that she faced him fairly, holding her with a grip so tight that she could not move.

  “It’s your game, ain’t it?” he said mockingly. “Well, I’m playin’ it with you. Somethin’ seems to tell me that we’re goin’ to have a daisy time makin’ a go of it.”

  He suddenly released her hands and stepped back, leaving her in possession of the pistol.

  “Usin’ it?” he questioned, drawling, nodding toward the weapon. Betty looked down at it, shuddered, and then with an expression of dread and horror reached out and laid it gingerly on the desk top.

  The next instant Calumet stood alone, grinning widely at the door through which Betty had vanished. Listening, he heard her retreating steps, heard a distant door slam. He walked to the desk and looked at the pistol, then turned and surveyed the room with a speculative eye.

  “She didn’t even offer me a place to sleep,” he said mockingly.

  He stood for an instant longer, debating the situation. Then he crossed the floor, closed the dining-room door, fastened it securely and recrossing to the outside door stepped down from the porch and sought his pony. Ten minutes later he carried the saddle in, threw it on the floor, folded the saddle blanket and placed it on the sofa, closed the outside door, opened the window, snuffed out the candle, stretched himself out on the sofa and went to sleep.

  CHAPTER V

  THE FIRST LESSON

  Shortly after daybreak the following morning Calumet turned over on his back, stretched lazily and opened his eyes. When a recollection of t
he events of the previous night forced themselves into his consciousness he scowled and sat erect, listening. From beyond the closed dining-room door came sundry sounds which told him that the Claytons were already astir. He heard the rattle of dishes, and the appetizing aroma of fried bacon filtered through the crevices in the battered door and assailed his nostrils.

  He scowled again as he rose and stood looking down at his saddle. When beginning his homeward journey he had supplied himself with soda biscuit and jerked beef, but he had consumed the last of his food at noon the day before and the scent of the frying bacon aroused him to the realization that he was ravenously hungry. As he meditated upon the situation the scowl on his face changed to an appreciative grin. Now that he had decided to stay here he did not purpose to go hungry when there was food around.

  Shouldering his saddle he left the office and proceeded to the stable, in which he had placed his pony the night before. He fed the animal from a pitiful supply of grain in a bin, and after slamming the door of the stable viciously, sneering at it as it resisted, he stalked to the ranchhouse.

  There was a tin basin on a bench just outside the kitchen door. He poured it half full of water from a pail that sat on the porch floor, and washed his hands and face, noting, while engaged in his task, a clean towel hanging from a roller on the wall of the ranchhouse. While drying his face he heard voices from within, subdued, anxious. Completing his ablutions he stepped to the screen door, threw it open and stood on the threshold.

  In the center of the kitchen stood a table covered with a white cloth on which were dishes filled with food from which arose promising odors. Beside a window in the opposite wall of the kitchen stood Malcolm Clayton. He was facing Calumet, and apparently had recovered from the encounter of the night before. But when he looked at Calumet he cringed as though in fear. Betty stood beside the table, facing Calumet also. But there was no fear in her attitude. She was erect, her hands resting on her hips, and when Calumet hesitated on the threshold she looked at him with a scornful half smile. Yielding to the satanic humor which had received its birth the night before when he had made his decision to remain at the Lazy Y, he returned Betty’s smile with a derisive grin, walked to the table, pulled out a chair, and seated himself.