He shrugged his shoulders.
"Of course, my dear, but a little sport to kill the tedium of this
infernal wait--the monotony of the thing is getting on my nerves. John,
will you look after Di while I at least watch the game?"
"Delighted," Sir John replied, but his anxious face showed that he
thoroughly disapproved of the proceedings. "Really, Diana," he began,
"let me prevail upon you to leave here. Any one who remains in a place
of this kind is taking chances--oh, believe me--"
"Nonsense; it all looks deadly dull to me."
The men, recognizing a quietly gowned gentle-woman, paid no attention to
them.
"Why, I'm not afraid, John. What's liable to happen?"
Sir John Applegate's mind was filled with stories of the West he had
heard and read in his boyhood days.
"Why, these desperadoes are liable to come in here and request you to
dance--dance for their amusement, by Jove!"
"Well, what of that? We don't do it," Diana teasingly interrupted.
"Oh yes, my dear Diana, we _do_ do it. The request is an order, you
know--obligatory--oh, quite? Because, believe me, if we do not accede to
their absurd request, they playfully shoot your toes off, by Jove! They
are shockingly rude, by Jove! these chaps, believe me--oh, shockingly!"
Diana looked about the room.
"I've read of such things, but I don't believe they happen--do you?"
Henry was lost to them in the crowd around the faro-table. Several
other passengers from the train had joined him. Sir John really did not
like the look of the place; at the moment he caught Pete's eyes fastened
in amusement on him. He drew Diana to one corner, and as he did so they
came within range of Jim's sight. He was coming in to join Shorty and
explain what he and Bill had decided to do when Cash returned. As he
saw Diana he involuntarily drew back. It was only one of the old
tormenting visions that had returned, he thought. He drew his hands
over his eyes--but no, he saw her again! Impossible! He leaned
forward--it was Di, and in Maverick! In spite of the sudden pain and
bewilderment he smiled as he realized how the unexpected played its part
in life. Di in Maverick!
There was no time to reason it out. He could not see Henry, only Sir
John. He saw Diana watching with curiosity the place and its occupants.
He mingled quickly with the crowd at the bar, hoping they would leave
shortly.
Sir John was continuing his tirade against the ranchmen, and vainly
trying to persuade Diana to return to the car. She was examining some
crude pictures on the walls.
"When they wish," Sir John said, "these fellows shoot out the lights,
the windows, and the bar furnishings. They are very whimsical--that's
the American humor that they talk so much about. I don't care for
whimsies myself." Diana began to laugh. Really, she was thinking, she
had never known how absurd and old-womanish Sir John could be. But he
continued: "Then, if you don't see fit to respond to their silly gayety,
they kill you, by Jove! that's all. I can't see the joke of it, you
know. For example, one of them comes in here and invites us all,
believe me, to drink with him. It's not the proper thing to reply,
'Thanks awfully, old chap, but I'm not thirsty,' or 'I've just had a
drink,' or 'Excuse me, won't you,' because if you say that, he's very
angry, don't you know. You have offered him a deadly insult; he does
not know you, never saw you before, hopes never to see you again, and
yet if you do not drink something which you do not want he kills you.
That's deliciously whimsical now, isn't it?"
"Cousin John, if I didn't know your reputation as a soldier, I'd think
you were afraid." Diana, followed by Sir John, moved nearer the corner
where Jim was standing.
Jim could see the sweet beauty of her face. He felt a sudden dizziness.
It was more than he could endure. He started to leave, when he felt
Bill's hand on his shoulder.
"This place is too stuffy for me; I must get out into the air," he
explained.
"Leave the saloon now, Jim!" Bill exclaimed, in amazement. Surely Jim
was not weakening. "If you ain't here to face Cash Hawkins when he
comes back you lose your standing among the people with whom you live.
You ain't agoin' to do that, are you, boy?"
"Oh yes--Cash." With the remembrance of Hawkins came the resolve to
remain in the saloon until Diana left. He must be there to protect her
if necessary. "I'd forgotten Cash; I was thinking of something else,
Bill." Then, as he encountered Bill's searching eyes, he added, "Oh
yes; remember, if Cash returns, each of you pick your man and leave him
to me."
He drew closer to the crowd at the bar; Diana was not likely to venture
there. She had joined Henry, and, with Sir John, they were about to
leave the place.
Suddenly there was the sound of the clattering of a troop outside. At
every entrance to the saloon--and there were four--a man entered
flourishing a gun, while through the centre door rushed Cash, who by
this time had worked himself up into a frenzy of passion. Straight into
the ceiling he shot his revolver, and said:
"Nick, every one in the Long Horn drinks with me."
Every means of egress was barred by Hawkins's men. Jim drew behind
Bill's burly figure. If only Cash would allow the strangers to go, was
his one thought. Henry looked at Sir John; Diana, half frightened,
grasped a chair. The men in the place made a hurried rush towards the
bar; deep in rows they stood there. Then Cash noticed the three
figures; but it only added to the zest of the situation for him. Diana,
watching his cruel face, realized that Sir John's yarn of adventure
might prove a true one.
The saloon waited in silence.
*CHAPTER XVI*
Cash had been drinking heavily all day, but there was no sign that it
had weakened his faculties. On the contrary, the exhilaration of the
liquor served to strengthen his dogged humor as he compelled the inmates
of the saloon, strangers and all, to do his bidding.
"By Jove, Di, we are in for it," Sir John muttered. Then he turned
irritably to Henry, who was close to him, "You have let us get in for a
nice mess up." He was not afraid, but more than anything in the world
he disliked a scene. He had travelled enough to know that they were at
the mercy of the rough humor of these men. When occasion warranted he
could match others in decision and courage, but he also knew that the
consequences of the present situation were apt to be needlessly
unpleasant. From the beginning he had been averse to Henry's allowing
Diana to come with them; however, they must find a way out of it. He
began to survey the crowd of men critically.
Jim, who was watching Diana, spoke, though still hidden among the crowd
at the bar.
"There are some outsiders, Hawkins, from the train. You don't care to
mix them up in our festivities, I suppose." By humoring Cash he also
hoped to find a way out for Diana and the others. His voice attracted
Sir John's attention.
[Illustration: "SHE DREW HERSELF UP CLOSE TO HIM, AND SAID 'ME KILL
'UM'" See page 202]
"Quite so," he rejoined. "We have had a delightful time, don't you
know." Then he turned to the desperado, who, with the smoking pistol
still in his hand, was leaning against the centre-table and laughing at
the strangers' discomfiture. "Awfully jolly of you to invite us, but
circumstances over which we have no control, don't you know--" He grew
painfully muddled.
"That's right, pane in the face," said Cash.
Sir John dropped his eye-glass in disgust.
"Circumstances over which you have no control," sneered Cash. "You
describe the situation accurate. I'm a-runnin' this here garden-party,
and I ain't agoin' to let anybody miss the fun--savvy?"
Jim's intervention had only hurt their chances of escaping from the
saloon. Cash motioned his men, with their drawn guns, to stand close at
the entrances. Jim saw Diana turn pale. He forgot everything; he only
knew that she stood there--that at this moment Henry and Sir John were
powerless to help her. He must get her away from the place; he would
agree promise Cash whatever he wished in return--only Diana must be
allowed to leave.
"But the lady--you won't detain the lady against her will?" He knew the
weakness of Cash's nature; to appeal to him as a gallant might be
efficacious. In his earnestness to carry his point Jim stepped out from
among the men around the bar.
Almost simultaneously a low cry of "Jim" broke from Henry and Diana. It
was followed by an ejaculation from Sir John. It passed unremarked, and
Jim determined to ignore what his impetuous folly had brought upon him.
Cash was oblivious of everything save his revenge. He bowed low to
Diana--he would be polite to the lady, even if the request came from
Jim.
"I am going to give the lady the chance to see how an Englishman looks
when he has to take his medicine." He looked at Diana. "She's sure a
thoroughbred--she ain't batted an eye nor turned a hair. I'll bet a
hundred to one she stays."
Diana could at that moment have passed out of the saloon, leaving Henry
and Sir John there, but she saw only Jim. It _was_ Jim--Jim in those
strange clothes--Jim so bronzed, so strong, so masterful. What a
contrast to Henry!
Cash waited for her answer. He adored playing to the gallery--this was
heightening the situation beyond all expectation.
"She stays," he finally said. "Good! Gents, this is to be a nice,
quiet, sociable affair--ladies are present. Any effort to create
trouble will be nipped in the bud. Gents, to the bar."
He turned to Henry and Sir John as he spoke. He had a contempt for the
men, but there was something about this quiet, dignified woman that
embarrassed him, though he would have been the last to admit it. A few
more drinks and he might be dangerous, but at present he was still
master of himself. His game was to make Jim and his gang ridiculous
before the strangers. Afterwards--well, then the serious settling of
their score should come. He took a glass that was handed him across the
bar and gulped down its contents.
Henry was whispering to Diana, "For God's sake, go--you can, and later
we will follow you. This will be over in a minute." But Diana only
held tighter the rail of the chair.
"We can't drink with this confounded bounder, Henry," Sir John
expostulated. "It's too absurd, you know. Her Majesty's officers can't
do a thing like that, now can they?"
"We must humor the drunken brute, Sir John, that's the only way out of
it."
That Jim was there none of them acknowledged to each other. Events were
assuming a strange unreality. What had been meant for a half-hours
diversion was involving them in a highly dangerous situation. The
saloon grew hotter--little air reached them through the barred doorway.
Still Diana did not go. The old imperative cry, stifled for the last
two years, awoke again. She forgot the dust, the hot saloon, the
swaggering crowd of ranchmen. The noise and wild excitement fell on her
unheeding ears. Jim was there, and his presence held her rooted to the
spot.
Jim had moved into a corner at the lower end of the bar, and furtively
watched Cash and his men.
"Step up lively, sonny," Cash called to Sir John and Henry, "or you may
have to dance the Highland fling."
Sir John stole a look of self-justification at Diana, but she did not
see it. It was turning out just as he had told her.
"And shoot our toes off, by Jove," he whispered to Henry. "And he'll do
it, too, confounded bounder!" he muttered, as both men went towards the
bar and were met by Pete, who handed them each a glass of evil-looking
whiskey.