Two horsemen rode into Millikan's Draw and drew up in front of the big
ranch house. To the girl who stepped to the porch to meet them they gave
friendly greeting. One of them asked:
“How're things coming, Arlie?”
“Better and better every day, Dick. Yesterday the doctor said he was out
of danger.”
“It's been a tough fight for Steve,” the other broke in. “Proper nursing
is what pulled him through. Doc says so.”
“Did he say that, Alec? I'll always think it was doc. He fought for that
life mighty hard, boys.”
Alec Howard nodded: “Doc Lee's the stuff. Here he comes now, talking of
angels.”
Doctor Lee dismounted and grinned. “Which of you lads is she making love
to now?”
Arlie laughed. “He can't understand that I don't make love to anybody
but him,” she explained to the younger men.
“She never did to me, doc,” Dick said regretfully.
“No, we were just talking about you, doc.”
“Fire ahead, young woman,” said the doctor, with assumed severity. “I'm
here to defend myself now.”
“Alec was calling you an angel, and I was laughing at him,” said the
girl demurely.
“An angel--huh!” he snorted.
“I never knew an angel that chewed tobacco, or one that could swear the
way you do when you're mad,” continued Arlie.
“I don't reckon your acquaintance with angels is much greater than mine,
Miss Arlie Dillon. How's the patient?”
“He's always wanting something to eat, and he's cross as a bear.”
“Good for him! Give him two weeks now and he'll be ready to whip his
weight in wild cats.”
The doctor disappeared within, and presently they could hear his loud,
cheerful voice pretending to berate the patient.
Arlie sat down on the top step of the porch.
“Boys, I don't know what I would have done if he had died. It would have
been all my fault. I had no business to tell him the names of you boys
that rode in the raid, and afterward to tell you that I told him,” she
accused herself.
“No, you had no business to tell him, though it happens he's safe as a
bank vault,” Howard commented.
“I don't know how I came to do it,” the girl continued. “Jed had made me
suspicious of him, and then I found out something fine he had done
for me. I wanted him to know I trusted him. That was the first thing
I thought of, and I told it. He tried to stop me, but I'm such an
impulsive little fool.”
“We all make breaks, Arlie. You'll not do it again, anyhow,” France
comforted.
Doctor Lee presently came out and pronounced that the wounded man was
doing well. “Wants to see you boys. Don't stay more than half an hour.
If they get in your way, sweep 'em out, Arlie.”
The cowpunchers entered the sick room with the subdued, gingerly tread
of professional undertakers.
“I ain't so had as that yet, boys,” the patient laughed. “You're allowed
to speak above a whisper. Doc thinks I'll last till night, mebbe, if I'm
careful.”
They told him all the gossip of the range--how young Ford had run
off with Sallie Laundon and got married to her down at the Butte; how
Siegfried had gone up and down the valley swearing he would clean out
Jack Rabbit Run if Steve died; how Johnson had had another row with Jed
and had chosen to take water rather than draw. Both of his visitors,
however, had something on their minds they found some difficulty in
expressing.
Alec Howard finally broached it.
“Arlie told you the names of some of the boys that were in the Squaw
Creek sheep raid. She made a mistake in telling you anything, but we'll
let that go in the discard. It ain't necessary that you should know the
names of the others, but I'm going to tell you one of them, Steve.”
“No, I don't want to know.”
“This is my say-so. His name is Alec Howard.”
“I'm sorry to hear that, Alec. I don't know why you have told me.”
“Because I want you to know the facts of that raid, Steve. No killing
was on the program. That came about in a way none of us could foresee.”
“This is how it was, Steve,” explained Dick. “Word came that Campeau was
going to move his sheep into the Squaw Creek district. Sheep never had
run there. It was understood the range there was for our cattle. We had
set a dead line, and warned them not to cross it. Naturally, it made us
sore when we heard about Campeau.
“So some of us gathered together hastily and rode over. Our intentions
were declared. We meant to drive the sheep back and patrol the dead
line. It was solemnly agreed that there was to be no shooting, not even
of sheep.”
The story halted here for a moment before Howard took it up again.
“Things don't always come out the way you figure them. We didn't
anticipate any trouble. We outnumbered them two to one. We had the
advantage of the surprise. You couldn't guess that for anything but a
cinch, could you?”
“And it turned out different?”
“One of us stumbled over a rock as we were creeping forward. Campeau
heard us and drew. The first shot came from them. Now, I'm going to tell
you something you're to keep under your own hat. It will surprise you a
heap when I tell you that one man on our side did all the damage. He was
at the haid of the line, and it happens he is a dead shot. He is liable
to rages, when he acts like a crazy man. He got one now. Before we could
put a stopper on him, he had killed Campeau and Jennings, and wounded
the herders. The whole thing was done before you could wink an eye six
times. For just about that long we stood there like roped calves.
Then we downed the man in his tracks, slammed him with the butt of a
revolver.”
Howard stopped and looked at the ranger before he spoke again. His voice
was rough and hoarse.
“Steve, I've seen men killed before, but I never saw anything so
awful as that. It was just like they had been struck by lightning for
suddenness. There was that devil scattering death among them and the
poor fellows crumpling up like rabbits. I tell you every time I think of
it the thing makes me sick.”
The ranger nodded. He understood. The picture rose before him of a man
in a Berserk rage, stark mad for the moment, playing Destiny on that
lonely, moonlit hill. The face his instinct fitted to the irresponsible
murderer was that of Jed Briscoe. Somehow he was sure of that, beyond
the shadow of a doubt. His imagination conceived that long ride back
across the hills, the deep agonies of silence, the fierce moments of
vindictive accusation. No doubt for long the tug of conscience was with
them in all their waking hours, for these men were mostly simple-minded
cattlemen caught in the web of evil chance.
“That's how it was, Steve. In as long as it takes to empty a Winchester,
we were every one of us guilty of a murder we'd each have given a laig
to have stopped. We were all in it, all tied together, because we had
broke the law to go raiding in the first place. Technically, the man
that emptied that rifle wasn't any more guilty than us poor wretches
that stood frozen there while he did it. Put it that we might shave the
gallows, even then the penitentiary would bury us. There was only one
thing to do. We agreed to stand together, and keep mum.”
“Is that why you're telling me, Alec?” Fraser smiled.
“We ain't telling you, not legally,” the cow-puncher answered coolly.
“If you was ever to say we had, Dick and me would deny it. But we ain't
worrying any about you telling it. You're a clam, and we know it. No,
we're telling you, son, because we want you to know about how it was.
The boys didn't ride out to do murder. They rode out simply to drive the
sheep off their range.”
The Texan nodded. “That's about how I figured it. I'm glad you told
me, boys. I reckon I don't need to tell you I'm padlocked in regard to
this.”
Arlie came to the door and looked in. “It's time you boys were going.
Doc said a half hour.”
“All right, Arlie,” responded Dick. “So-long, Steve. Be good, you old
pie eater.”
After they had gone, the Texan lay silent for a long time. He
understood perfectly their motive in telling him the story. They had not
compromised themselves legally, since a denial would have given them
two to one in the matter of witnesses. But they wished him to see that,
morally, every man but one who rode on that raid was guiltless of the
Squaw Creek murders.
Arlie came in presently, and sat down near the window with some
embroidery.
“Did the boys tire you?” she asked, noting his unusual silence.
“No. I was thinking about what they told me. They were giving me the
inside facts of the Squaw Creek raid.”
She looked up in surprise. “They were?” A little smile began to dimple
the corners of her mouth. “That's funny, because they had just got
through forgiving me for what I told you.”
“What they told me was how the shooting occurred.”
“I don't know anything about that. When I told you their names I was
only telling what I had heard people whisper. That's all I knew.”
“You've been troubled because your friends were in this, haven't you?
You hated to think it of them, didn't you?” he asked.
“Yes. It has troubled me a lot.”
“Don't let it trouble you any more. One man was responsible for all the
bloodshed. He went mad and saw red for half a minute. Before the rest
could stop him, the slaughter was done. The other boys aren't guilty of
that, any more than you or I.”
“Oh, I'm glad--I'm glad,” she cried softly. Then, looking up quickly to
him: “Who was the man?” she asked.
“I don't know. It is better that neither of us should know that.”
“I'm glad the boys told you. It shows they trust you.”
“They figure me out a white man,” he answered carelessly.
“Ah! That's where I made my mistake.” She looked at him bravely, though
the color began to beat into her cheeks beneath the dusky tan. “Yet I
knew it all the time--in my heart. At least, after I had given myself
time to think it over. I knew you couldn't be that. If I had given you
time to explain--but I always think too late.”
His eyes, usually so clear and steely, softened at her words. “I'm
satisfied if you knew--in your heart.”
“I meant----” she began, with a flush.
“Now, don't spoil it, please,” he begged.
Under his steady, half-smiling gaze, her eyes fell. Two weeks ago she
had been a splendid young creature, as untaught of life as one of the
wild forest animals and as unconsciously eager for it. But there had
come a change over her, a birth of womanhood from that night when she
had stood between Stephen Fraser and death. No doubt she would often
regret it, but she had begun to live more deeply. She could never go
back to the care-free days when she could look all men in the face
with candid, girlish eyes. The time had come to her, as it must to all
sensitive of life, when she must drink of it, whether she would or no.
“Because I'd rather you would know it in your heart than in your mind,”
he said.
Something sweet and terrifying, with the tingle and warmth of rare wine
in it, began to glow in her veins. Eyes shy, eager, frightened, met his
for an instant. Then she remembered the other girl. Something hard as
steel ran through her. She turned on her heel and left the room.