Dan McGrew had plotted with devilish cleverness. He had seized on the
fact of Jim's attendance at the bank-meeting as timely to his purpose.
He had, indeed, made it the pivot about which the details of his
scheming were grouped. As a result of his carefulness in planning,
during the hour of his interview with Lou, Fingie Whalen was stationed
in the street outside Murphy's saloon. He sat on a bench that stood
against the wall of the structure, and smoked incessant cigarettes, the
while his ferret eyes scanned closely the length of the main street,
down which Jim Maxwell must ride on his way to the bank. Just before
him, a saddled horse stood patiently, with the bridle-rein trailing.
Within the saloon, Jess, also, waited--with a drink, as well as a
cigarette, to comfort her in the interval. Thus, it befell that, when
Jim Maxwell came riding briskly into the town, his approach was noted
from afar by eyes hired for the purpose. Instantly, then, Fingie acted.
He sprang up, and darted into the back room of the saloon, where he
called Jess's name, and beckoned. The response of the woman was no less
prompt. She stood up quickly, and hurried out of the place, while Fingie
himself remained to peer anxiously from the window that gave on the
street. There, for a minute, he observed events outside. Afterward, he
lounged against the bar with a gratified smirk.
Jim, as he rode slowly down the main street, idly noted the woman who
hastened out of Murphy's, and mounted astride the horse. He wondered a
little that she did not start away. But, as he drew closer, his keen
eyes perceived that the form of the woman was swaying unsteadily in the
saddle. Alarmed for her safety, though with a suspicion that only excess
of drink ailed her, Jim quickened his horse's pace--too late. Before he
could reach her, the woman lurched, and fell heavily to the ground,
where she lay motionless, evidently stunned, if not more seriously
injured, while the startled horse backed away snuffing.
Jim was on the ground almost as quickly as the woman herself, and was
beside her before the few others in the street who came running. He did
the natural thing under the circumstances, precisely as Dan McGrew had
expected that he would. Since the woman lay with closed eyes, showing no
signs of consciousness, unless in the faint moaning that issued from her
rouged lips, Jim lifted her in his arms, and bore her through the side
door, which Fingie had thoughtfully left ajar, into the back room of
Murphy's saloon.... It was at this moment that the gambler left the
window to lounge unconcernedly against the bar. Jim carried his burden
to one of the round tables which was empty, and placed her gently upon
it, continuing to support her with his arms about the waist and
shoulders.
[Illustration: JIM CARRIED HIS BURDEN TO ONE OF THE ROUND TABLES.]
"Bring brandy!" he called out sharply to the nearest of the occupants of
the room, who now came crowding forward with ejaculations of dismay. The
man addressed was Fingie Whalen himself. He stared down at the woman
with shocked surprise writ large on his sullen features.
"Why, it's Jess!" he mumbled, in a voice that he vainly strove to fill
with distress. "Whatever has she been an' gone, an' done?"
"Get that brandy!" Jim reiterated the command curtly.
"Yes, sir," Fingie answered humbly, and hurried off to the bar. In a
moment, he was back with the liquor, which he held to the woman's lips.
To Jim's relief, Jess swallowed the draft easily enough--to tell the
truth, rather greedily; but of that fact her rescuer was quite unaware,
and from it he augured well.
Jess managed her apparent recovery from the effects of the fall with
such art as she possessed, which, in truth, was not of the highest,
though ample for the beguiling of a man who was honest and kindly and
wholly unsuspecting. Soon, her eyes unclosed a little, and she breathed
more deeply, and the moaning, which had been interrupted by the brandy,
was resumed more vigorously. Through the paint on her cheeks showed the
deeper red of a genuine flush, the natural result of the dram, but a
sure evidence of vitality, none the less. Jim rejoiced over these signs
of restoration, and even smiled on Fingie, as he bade him continue the
chafing of the woman's hands.
"She's not seriously hurt," he remarked, with much satisfaction in his
voice; "though the way she flopped off that horse was enough to jar her
teeth loose." Being ignorant of the fact that Jess had been a member of
a circus troupe before she yielded to the blandishments of the gambler,
Jim wondered mightily that so severe a fall should have had no worse
effect.
Jess opened her eyes wide, and stared up blankly into the face of the
man who held her in his arms.
"Where am I?" she asked, with the languid air of her favorite stage
heroine when swooning.
"It's all right," Jim hastened to explain soothingly, having due regard
to her dazed condition. "You were dizzy for a second, I suspect, and
fell from your horse. But there doesn't seem to be anything much the
matter, and you'll be all right in a jiffy." He addressed Fingie.
"Bring her another nip of the brandy."
The gambler would have remonstrated against this unnecessary
extravagance, but could find no plausible reason for refusal, and Jess,
who was enjoying herself hugely, offered him no assistance. When the
drink had been brought, she swallowed it without too much display of
eagerness, and coughed as a lady should who is unaccustomed to strong
waters. At once thereafter, she straightened up to a sitting posture on
the table, though she still accepted the support of Jim's arms to his
discomfiture, and regarded him with coquettish glances of gratitude,
which were offensive to him, and to Fingie Whalen as well. He tried to
withdraw his arms, but she leaned upon him too heavily, and he was
forced for a few minutes longer to retain her in a passive embrace. But,
as he repeated the effort tentatively, Jess bethought herself that her
recovery had now advanced so far as to make such support unnecessary.
Therefore, to play her part, she withdrew herself, and sat up
unassisted, but with a hand to her brow to indicate that her brain had
not yet wholly cleared.
"Oh, you have been so good to me, Mister!" she gushed. "I shall be
thankful to you to my dying day. Why," she added in a burst of
imagination, "the horse might have stepped on me, if you hadn't been
right there to save me."
"Nothing like that, I'm sure," Jim declared, as amiably as he could
contrive. "The horse seemed to be doing his best not to step on you
without any help from me. You don't owe me any thanks, really."
Jess put out an appealing hand. It was accepted reluctantly by Jim, and,
with his assistance, and that of Fingie on the other side, she got down
from the table totteringly, and sank into a chair, where she sat limply,
with closed eyes, following her role devotedly to the end.
"You'll have a drink with us, Mr. Maxwell," Fingie urged, twisting his
lowering features to an expression of affability. "What's past is past
an' done. You sure did give me an almighty swat on the jaw t'other day,
but I ain't one to nuss no grouch, an' Jess here, an' me, we're plumb
grateful for yer kindness to her this mornin'. What'll you have, Mr.
Maxwell? I'll bring it."
Jim shook his head in refusal. He, too, had no wish to nourish a grudge;
but he had no liking for the gambler--less for the woman, whose tawdry
airs nauseated him. He was already a little disgusted, with the episode,
and desirous to end it.
Jess saw the refusal in his face, and was quick to intervene; for
failure now would mean the utter collapse of all their plotting. She
spoke gently, and, in the genuineness of her anxiety, her voice trembled
with appeal:
"Please, sir--please, Mr. Maxwell!" she besought him.
Jim, in spite of his repulsion, was touched by the woman's earnestness.
His sense of chivalry impelled him to yield to a plea so natural and so
ingenuous on her part. He smiled, a bit wryly, in answer to her
imploring look, and nodded assent.
"I'll have a glass of beer," he said to Fingie, and, as the gambler
hurried off to the bar, he seated himself at the table beside Jess.
The woman prattled nervously, made garrulous by the brandy, and by
fatuous ambition to impress this aloof companion with her charms. As a
matter of fact, the conspiracy came perilously near to failure in
consequence of her chatting, which almost drove Jim to flight. His
instinct of politeness, however, conquered inclination, and he remained
in his place, listening with a forced semblance of interest to hide how
desperately he was bored. Yet, throughout, he rested without a faintest
suspicion that this affair was aught beyond the innocent thing it
seemed. To him, the happening was merely a nuisance--nothing more,
nothing in any wise sinister. It did not occur to him to wonder why
Fingie should have volunteered to serve as their waiter. He did not
trouble even to follow the gambler with his eyes, as the fellow went to
the bar.
For that matter, it would have availed Jim nothing, had he watched never
so closely. The card-sharp possessed the dexterity of his trade. Those
long, slender, mobile fingers of his had been fashioned by fate for a
surgeon, a conjurer, a gambler, or a pick-pocket. Not even the keen-eyed
bartender, who was close to him, noticed the tiny vial in Fingie's hand,
as it hovered over the frothing glass of beer on the counter, or saw the
trickle of the colorless drops into the brew. So, the gambler came back
to the table presently, with a tray, on which were two glasses of
brandy--one for himself, of generous size; the other for Jess, so tiny
that she frowned indignantly at sight of it--and the glass of beer for
Jim. The three drank together.... Then, the gambler and his woman
watched avidly for what should befall.
There was no delay. Jim, glad that the ordeal was at last done, would
have risen to leave. But a strange lethargy held him fastbound. A black
cloud descended on his brain; thought ceased. Suddenly, he slumped in
his chair. His arms dropped heavily on the table. His head fell on them.
Fingie and Jess chuckled aloud in gloating over the inert form of the
man. They were not afraid lest he hear them, now.