The time of Dan McGrew's arrival was not long left in doubt; for, on the
third day following Tom's letter, Jim received one from Dan himself.
_Dear Jim_:
Am back again in the old home after five years, and have grown
rich. Am coming right down to see you and my old sweetheart,
Lou. I can still hardly forgive you for winning her from me,
but I suppose you're the better man. I am still the same
rolling stone, ever seeking the gold that seems to get further
away as I approach. Will reach your place the Tuesday following
your receipt of this letter.
Sincerely,
DAN MCGREW.
So, on the appointed Tuesday, Jim drove in his light, covered buggy to
the town, to meet the through train from the East. With him, mounted on
her pony, went Nell. She wore the precious locket proudly displayed
against her trim khaki coat, and she rode in happy excitement, for the
trip to her was a great adventure, and there was, in addition, the
thrilling novelty of this stranger's coming, who might be a prince in
disguise.
When, at last, the limited roared into the station at Coverdale, and Dan
McGrew swung himself down from the Pullman's steps, Jim went forward and
seized his visitor's hand in a warm clasp.
"It's good to see you again, after all these years," he cried heartily.
At this moment, there was only kindness in his feeling toward the tall,
handsome man who returned his greeting so genially. He meant to be as
friendly as he could to this guest, to be helpful and loyal, so far as
he might, though the other had no claim upon his friendship, and though
he himself had neither liking nor respect for Dan McGrew.
After the first exchange of exclamations between the two, Jim called to
Nell, who had remained standing diffidently at a little distance, her
deeply tanned face, under the dark masses of hair, tense with interest,
as her eyes searched the newcomer in vast curiosity. A great shyness was
upon her as she approached.
"This is my daughter, Nell," Jim said, with manifest pride in the
winsome creature.
"And Lou's!" the other muttered, under his breath. But Jim caught the
words, and was moved to a fleeting pity for the man who had failed in
love.
Nell murmured a stilted phrase in expression of her pleasure at meeting
Mr. McGrew. But as the stranger bent and kissed her, she felt a sudden
instinct of distaste under the caress that both frightened and puzzled
her. For, hitherto in her childish experience, embraces and kisses had
been matters either of pleasure, as in the case of her father and mother
and others dear to her, or of utter indifference, as in the case of
those for whom she cared nothing. Now, for the first time, a kiss was
disagreeable. She felt herself somehow frightened by this fine
gentleman, who might be a prince. She could not understand it.
The child could not have understood even had she been able to look into
the heart of Dangerous Dan McGrew, there to see the black malice that
fouled it.
For such was the fact. There was evil in the mind and in the soul of Dan
McGrew. Through all the years since he had lost Lou Ainsworthy, he had
longed for her. The circumstance that she was married to another man put
no curb on his fierce desire for her. Unlawful passion throbbed in his
blood. It was this that had driven him to the long journey. A man wholly
without scruple, without care for any other than himself, save only the
woman to possess whom he so craved, Dan McGrew was resolved to woo that
woman anew, to win her for himself by any means, no matter how false or
vile.
Thus, it came to pass that, in the days of his dwelling under the roof
of the man whom he was determined to wrong, the visitor played the
hypocrite with his host, aping a manner of bluff, candid
good-fellowship. With the wife, too, he played the hypocrite. He dared
not let her so much as suspect the hot fires that burned in him as he
looked yearningly on her loveliness. He realized, at the outset, that
her devotion to the man of her choice remained unaltered. He knew that
the open confession of his illicit love would move her to scorn and
loathing. Only by guile, and that of the craftiest, could he hope for
triumph over loyalty and love. With the passing days, the task loomed
before him as one almost impossible of achievement. From all that he
knew of Jim's past life and all that he could learn concerning the
husband's reputation in the community, there showed nowhere any least
opportunity for attack. And attack must be made, for only by destroying
the wife's faith could he have any opportunity to gain her favor. It
occurred to him that, in a conspiracy, he would have need of
accomplices. To get some information concerning such as might serve his
end, he often rode alone to the town, while Jim was occupied with ranch
affairs. There, he entered easily into the vulgar dissipations of the
place, making himself hail-fellow-well-met with the riff-raff of the
saloons and dance-houses, both men and women. The occupation was, in
truth, congenial enough to him; for there was a coarseness in his nature
that found satisfaction in loose living. Before he had been a week at
the ranch, he had become known to all the blear-eyed habitues of
Murphy's saloon--to some of the women frequenters there as well, and to
certain men who were not blear-eyed; for they drank little, but played
poker much. With these latter, especially, Dangerous Dan fraternized,
since, like many a wiser man and better, he greatly admired poker--and
his own playing of it.
Dan won the first day, and the second, and the third--as those playing
with him meant that he should. But the stakes were small. Dan himself
fretted because they were so small. It was his own suggestion, his own
insistence, that the stakes should be raised. Immediately, then, Dan's
luck slumped. It worried him only a little at first--more, as the ill
fortune continued.
On the fourth day, Jess, one of the painted women of the place, leaned
over him so closely that the heavy musk of her perfume deadened his
senses. She whispered her admiration of his play. Dan forgot that she
was the wife without the law of Fingie Whalen, who sat across the table
from him, ferret-faced and with slender, agile fingers that touched the
deck of cards always with the soft delicacy of a caress. Jess's praise
fattened Dan's pride in his own skill. He insisted loudly on larger
stakes, which were accepted grudgingly by his fellow players. There were
four others at the table with him. Despite his experience in cities
further East, he had no least suspicion that the odds of the game were
four to one. He lost a most attractive pot on a full house of kings with
treys. The event angered him. A little later, a pot that had been raised
around the board until it was of admirable proportions, was lost by him
to one who held a humble, but efficient, flush.
Dan was not an honest man. His losses irritated him. He believed, by
reason of a certain dexterity in legerdemain, that he could thus cajole
fortune. He misjudged his company. When he possessed himself of four
aces, and held them concealed in his hand, he failed to note the eyes of
Fingie Whalen, which had followed his every movement.
But this same Fingie, being a master of his craft, said nothing until
after the bets had run high and it had come to the show-down. Dan had
forced the betting to a point where the chips and bills and gold on the
table totaled a most respectable sum. He swept the pot toward him, after
a contemptuous glance at the four-of-a-kind which Fingie had offered
against him. His own four aces were indisputably winners.
But Fingie Whalen thrust out an imperative hand in restraint.
"Nothin' doin'!"
In the same instant, his fingers closed in a viselike grip on Dan's left
hand. Dan was the stronger man. But, in the moment of surprise, his
muscles yielded. His hand was pulled forward--it lay open on the table.
Within his palm four cards were lying. With his free hand Fingie flipped
the four cards upon the table. They were inconsiderable--a deuce, a
nine, a pair of sevens.
His trickery thus baldly revealed, Dan would have acted, but he was too
late. As he pulled the automatic from his pocket, the man next him
thrust an elbow forward and the shot went wild. In the next instant, the
pistol had been knocked from his grasp, and four men bore down upon him.
Dan was a strong man, and, whatever his faults, absolutely fearless. He
struck out vigorously, but the slender, silk-ankled foot of Jess caught
him so that he stumbled and missed his blow. The fists of the four beat
him to the floor.
It was then that Jim entered the room. He had business in town, and, on
learning at the ranch-house that his guest had preceded him, he had felt
it incumbent upon him to seek out Dan. He had acted from a rather futile
sense of duty toward the man who, as Tom had put it, required the strong
hands of a friend to keep him in the straight path.
At the hotel, he made inquiry of the clerk:
"Have you seen anything of Mr. McGrew?"
The clerk permitted himself an indulgent grin at the question. He
admired Jim Maxwell, as did all the better element in the community, and
he found himself wondering over the disreputable associations of the
stranger who was the ranch-owner's guest. His answer was prompt:
"You're pretty sure to find him in the back room over to Murphy's.
Usually, when he hits this burg, he sets in a game with the gang over
there."
Jim's face lined grimly. He felt a great distaste for his mission. He
was no precisian. He was not above taking a glass on occasion at
Murphy's bar. But he had no liking for the vicious. The coarse
debauchery of such a place was repulsive to him, as it must be to any
decent man. Nevertheless, he went out of the hotel, and strode rapidly
toward the corner on which stood the rough frame building of the saloon.
As he drew near, the report of a shot came sharply.
"What hell's mess is on now?" he muttered savagely, and broke into a
run. In the next instant, he had leaped through the door to the back
room. He could not see clearly for a few seconds in the gloomy place,
after the glaring sunlight of outdoors. But the evidences of conflict
were plain enough from the sounds of stamping boots upon the boarded
floor, the soft thudding of fists against flesh, the snarling curses,
gaspings and guttural gruntings of the combatants, the shrill screams
and whimperings of women. Then his eyes adjusted themselves to the dim
light, and he made out the form of Dan McGrew, girt about with the
thrashing arms and legs of his assailants. Without any hesitation, Jim
plunged into the fray. His fists shot home in sledge-hammer blows,
against which the four, taken completely by surprise, were defenseless.
As they fell away from their victim, Jim saw the automatic lying where
it had fallen on the floor during the scuffle. Before his adversaries
could rally to the attack, he had pounced upon it, and had sprung back
against the wall of the room, whence he menaced the four, who halted in
fear of the weapon.
"There's been enough of this," Jim declared, and his voice was ominous,
heavy with authority. "I don't know the rights of the fuss, and I don't
care a damn, I guess. But there'll be no murder done here--unless it's
been done already."
There came some profane grumblings from the discomfited quartette, but
they ventured no other opposition to Jim's will, for they feared this
man, and he knew it, and he did not fear them in the least.
"We caught 'im cheatin'--blast 'im!" Fingie affirmed, sullenly.
"I'm not interested in the history of the row," was the contemptuous
retort; "only in the end of it." Jim thrust the revolver in his pocket,
assured that there would be no further trouble; for now the bartender
and Murphy had made a belated appearance on the scene. He stooped over
the beaten man, who had already begun to show signs of returning
consciousness. Presently, in fact, Dan was able to sit up, and to
swallow the brandy Murphy had brought. His injuries, though painful
enough, were superficial, and after a little he was able to clamber into
the buggy, which Jim had hired from the hotel livery for the return to
the ranch.
They had gone a mile from the village, when Dan spoke for the first
time:
"It was all a devilish frame-up to rob me," he asserted. His tone was
vindictive, but, somehow, not quite convincing.
Jim could not keep the scorn from his own voice as he answered:
"You can't complain--you knew what sort they were."
Under the lash of justice in the taunt from the man who had rescued him,
Dan McGrew was silent; but the black malice in his heart seethed still
more fiercely from quickened fires of hate.