The Best Western Novels of William MacLeod Raine. William MacLeod Raine

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СКАЧАТЬ his hand around the horizon. "Ask anybody. They'll all give me the same certificate of character. And I reckon they ain't so far out, either," he added grimly.

      "Perhaps they are all right, and yet all wrong too."

      He looked at her in surprise. "What do you mean?"

      "Maybe they don't see the other side of you" said Phyllis gently.

      "How do you know there's another side?"

      "I don't know how, but I do."

      "I reckon it must be a right puny one."

      "It has a good deal to fight against, hasn't it?"

      "You're right it has. There's a devil in me that gets up on its hind legs and strangles what little good it finds. But it certainly beats me how you know so much that goes on inside a sweep like me."

      "You forget. I'm not very good myself. You know my temper runs away with me, too."

      "You blessed lamb!" she heard him say under his breath; and the way he said it made the exclamation half a groan.

      For her naive confession emphasized the gulf between them. Yet it pleased him mightily that she linked herself with him as a fellow wrongdoer.

      "I suppose you've been wondering why your people have made no attempt to rescue you," he said presently; for he saw her eyes were turned toward the hills beyond which lay her home.

      "I'm glad they haven't, because it must have made trouble; but I am surprised," she confessed.

      "They have tried it—twice," he told her. "First time was Saturday morning, just before daylight. We trapped them as they were coming through the Box Cañon. I knew they would come down that way, because it was the nearest; so I was ready for them."

      "And what happened?" Her dilated eyes were like those of a stricken doe.

      "Nothing that time. I let them see I had them caught. They couldn't go forward or back. They laid down their arms, and took the back trail. There was no other way to escape being massacred."

      "And the second time?"

      Buck hesitated. "There was shooting that time. It was last night. My riders outnumbered them and had cover. We drove them back."

      "Anybody hurt?" cried Phyllis.

      "One of them fell. But he got up and ran limping to his horse, I figured he wasn't hurt badly."

      "Was he—could you tell—" She leaned against the rock wall for support.

      "No—I didn't know him. He was a young fellow. But you may be sure he wasn't hit mortally. I know, because I shot him myself."

      "You!" She drew back in a sudden sick horror of him.

      "Why not?" he answered doggedly. "They were shooting at me—aiming to kill, too. I shot low on purpose, when I might have killed him."

      "Oh, I must go home—I must go home!" she moaned.

      "I've got the sheriff's orders to hold you pending an investigation. What harm does it do you to stay here a while?" he asked doggedly.

      "Don't you see? When my father hears of it he will be furious. I made Phil promise not to tell him. But he'll hear when he comes back. And then—there will be trouble. He'll drag me from you, or he'll die trying. He's that kind of man."

      A pebble rolled down the face of the wall against which she leaned. Weaver looked up quickly—to find himself covered by a carbine.

      "Hands up, seh! No—don't reach for a gun."

      "So it's you, Mr. Keller! Homesteading up there, I presume?"

      "In a way of speaking. You remember I asked you a question."

      "And I told you to go to Halifax."

      "Well, I came back to answer the question myself. You're going to turn the young lady loose."

      "If you say so." Weaver's voice carried an inflection of sarcasm.

      "That's what I say. Miss Sanderson, will you kindly unbuckle that belt and round up the weapons of war? Good enough! I'll drift down that way now myself."

      Keller lowered himself from Flat Rock, keeping his prisoner covered as carefully as he could the while. But, though Keller came down the steep bluff with infinite pains, the rough going offered a chance of escape to one so reckless as Weaver, of which he made not the least attempt to avail himself. Instead, he smiled cynically and waited with his hand in the air, as bidden. Keller, coming forward with both eyes on his prisoner, slipped on a loose boulder that rolled beneath his foot, stumbled, and fell, almost at the feet of the cattleman. He got up as swiftly as a cat. Weaver and his derisive grin were in exactly the same position.

      Keller lowered his carbine instantly. This plainly was no case for the coercion of arms.

      "We'll cut out the gun play," he said. "Better rest the hand that's reaching for the sky. I expect hostilities are over."

      "You certainly had me scared stiff," Weaver mocked.

      From the first roll of the pebble that had announced the presence of a third party, Phyl had experienced surprise after surprise. She had expected to see one of the Seven Mile boys or her brother instead of Keller—had looked with a quaking heart for the cattleman to fling back the swift challenge of a bullet. His tame surrender had amazed her, especially when Keller's fall had given him a chance to seize the carbine. His drawling, sarcastic badinage pointed to the same conclusion. Evidently he had no desire to resist. Behind this must be some purpose which she could not fathom.

      "Elected yourself chaperon of the young lady, have you, Mr. Keller?" Buck asked pleasantly.

      The young man smiled at the girl before he answered. "You've been losing too much time on the job, Mr. Weaver. Subject to her approval, I got a notion I'd take her back home."

      "Best place for her," assented Weaver promptly. "I've been thinking for a day or two that she ought to get back to those school kids of hers. But I'm going to take her there myself."

      "Yourself!" Phyllis spoke up in quick surprise.

      "Why not?" The cattleman smiled.

      "Do you mean with your band of thugs?"

      "No, ma'am. You and I will be enough."

      The suggestion was of a piece with his usual audacity. The girl knew that he would be quite capable of riding with her into the hills, where he had a score of bitter, passionate enemies, and of affronting them, if the notion should come into his head, even in their stronghold. Within twenty-four hours he had shot one of them; yet he would go among them with his jaunty, mocking smile and that hateful confidence of his.

      "You would not be safe. They might kill you."

      "Would that gratify you?"

      "Yes!" she cried passionately.

      He bowed. "Anything to give pleasure to a lady."

      "No—you СКАЧАТЬ