This particular August evening was destined to be the most eventful
one in Lemuel Huntington’s life, for hardly had he recovered from
the shock occasioned by Billy Gee’s visit, ere he received a
glorious surprise—Dot’s unannounced arrival from San Francisco. She
came bounding into the house, followed by Mrs. Liggs, caught her
astonished father in an ecstatic embrace, stifled his ejaculations
with kisses, and told him breathlessly the reason for her return
home. Even Warburton, scowling and furious over the outlaw’s escape,
came in for his share of Dot’s effusiveness and forgot for the time
the responsibilities of his office.
It appeared that Mrs. Liggs having received a letter from Tinnemaha
Pete, containing the disturbing news that Sheriff Warburton was
again in the neighborhood, presumably searching for her son, that
loyal little mother after consulting with Dot decided on returning
to Soapweed Plains and, regardless of Billy Gee’s intentions to see
that his old friend obtained ultimate possession of the new gold
strike, try to persuade him to leave the country and take up his
residence with her in the metropolis. Since the trip would not
occupy longer than a week, Dot had made up her mind to go along—so
Mrs. Liggs would not be lonesome, she had said. Though the truth
was, she felt a consuming desire to meet and talk again with this
romantic hero of her girlish dreams, to see how he looked and acted
in the full flush of health, to find out if he had forgotten that
tragic day of his advent at the ranch. She was curious to know how
he would treat her, what he would say to her, and she secretly told
herself that, once having met him, she could bring back with her
certain happy memories which would do much to make her studies at
the university more apparently worth while. Besides, there was the
novel she was writing around this knight of Soapweed Plains, without
knowing just exactly his character.
But Dot said nothing of all this to her father. According to the
agreement she made with Mrs. Liggs, the girl simply told Lemuel that
the little old lady had some important business to transact in
Geerusalem, and that she, Dot, had taken advantage of the
opportunity to pay a visit home. She went on to say that Lemuel must
accompany them back to San Francisco. He must see the adorable
bungalow where she and Mrs. Liggs lived. Then he would have to spend
a day at the University of California, and—— Oh, he must hear what
she had written on her novel!
She talked on breathlessly, recounting her adventures, plying him
with questions. Lemuel listened, open-mouthed, replying vaguely, his
eyes brilliant with admiration. She looked queenly and so thoroughly
refined, he thought, and she was prettier and far more vivacious
than he had ever seen her before.
Once he leaned over and whispered into Sheriff Warburton’s ear:
“Bob, you notice them big words she’s slingin’? Hear ’em? That’s one
of ’em—conspicuously. That’s what edjucation does. Listen to that,
will you! Rattles ’em off, like nuthin’.”
It was an epochal homecoming. Until after midnight, Dot regaled them
with incidents and painted glowing pictures of San Francisco for
them. Around one o’clock, Sheriff Warburton suddenly recalled that
the unexpected arrival of the two women robbed him of his chances of
a bed for the night.
Reluctantly he struck out for his own blankets at Blue Mud Spring,
getting a little comfort out of the thought that, although Billy Gee
had eluded him, he would be able to grill Tinnemaha Pete on the
habits and the probable whereabouts of the bandit the first thing in
the morning. None the less gratifying was the fact that Mrs. Liggs
was back in the district, where he could reach her when he needed
her. Why had she returned, he wondered? Unquestionably, her presence
had to do with Billy Gee. But what? Well, no matter. He’d force it
out of Tinnemaha Pete. The old fellow would give him a
straightforward story, or go to jail. Too bad, but he, Warburton,
had to do his duty.
However, when Sheriff Warburton reached Blue Mud Spring, the camp
fire was ashes, stone cold, and Tinnemaha Pete and his pair of
burros were gone. Warburton looked back undecidedly through the
gloom of the cool desert night in the direction of the Huntington
ranch. After an interval, he dismounted, unsaddled his mule, spread
out his blankets on the ground, and turned in, cursing. Billy Gee
had outwitted him a second time. The third time was a charm, he told
himself as he dropped off to sleep.
Lex Sangerly, however, was not so fortunate as Warburton. He could
not compose himself to rest. Shortly after the sheriff left the
ranch, he had driven in from his trip to the railroad construction
camp and found Lemuel waiting up for him, entertaining Lennox with a
detailed account of Billy Gee’s career of crime. After relating to
Lex the stirring events of the night, including the unannounced
arrival of Dot and Mrs. Liggs, the rancher concluded with a
dissertation on the virtues of education as manifested by the ease
with which his daughter handled words, that he proudly declared were
“jaw-breakers” of an unusual type.
Just now, Lex lay in Lemuel’s bed and tossed about nervously in the
grip of disturbing thoughts. From the parlor lounge across the hall
came sonorous evidence of Huntington’s blissful state of mind,
rumbling rhythmically through the house. The night was tomblike.
Lex rehearsed again and again the talk he had had that afternoon
with Jule Quintell, and on the heels of this there paraded before
his mind’s eye the damaging information he had gathered against the
broker from confidential sources in Geerusalem. These had
substantiated all that he had heard heretofore, and briefly, went to
describe Quintell as a tricky, unscrupulous wildcatter, associated
with a coterie of other like gentry, polished crooks all, whose sole
aim was to fleece the unwary, and who exercised their power in camp
by their manipulation of the ruthless “stingaree” element and
control of the civil authorities.
This meant to Lex nothing less than that Quintell and his
placer-claim partners were banded together to make the Mohave &
Southwestern Company pay heavily for the privilege of laying its
tracks across their ground. In other words, the broker’s reference
to fabulous gold-bearing gravel existing in Geerusalem Gulch was
true, but owing to the fact only that the ground had been salted to
show the existence of gold. He had heard of many cases where
worthless mines had been sold by the employment of such tactics. Why
not in this instance? He was suspicious of the whole matter, and had
there been another likely approach into the camp, he would have
urged abandonment of the gulch route. But there was not.
The Quintell forces held the gates of Geerusalem, as it were. Though
his surmise might be correct that they were faking their
representations to make his company meet their demands, how could he
prove it? How could he find out that they had salted those claims?
They had doubtless done it cunningly, secretly, for proof of such an
act laid them liable to arrest and prosecution.
Complicating the situation still more was the telegram he had
received that same day from his father, directing that negotiations
with Quintell be hastened, and details as to terms wired at the
earliest possible moment. Quite the contrary, it seemed as if the
broker was sparring for time. He had stated that the valuation of
the ground to be covered by the right of way must be determined by
the content of gold per cubic yard of gravel occupied by the
roadbed. This meant assaying the gulch, and assaying took time. And
it followed that the richer the ground, the greater would be the
price demanded. Lex sensed the scheme and writhed at the realization
that he was powerless to frustrate it. The mining laws of California
favored the owner who could show mineral in paying quantities.
His gloomy reflections were startlingly interrupted by a violent
pounding on the front door. Of a sudden, the silent night roared out
with a bedlam of men’s voices. From the rear of the house came the
crack of a revolver, the crash of glass from one of the kitchen
windows, Lennox’s terrified cry.
Lex sprang out of bed, pulled a curtain aside, and peered into the
darkness. The porch was jammed with men. He could hear the hurried
tramp of boots on the driveway leading to the barn, the blows of an
ax wielded on the barn door, breaking its padlock. The pounding at
the front of the house was resumed, accompanied by kicks.
“Huntington, open up or we’ll bust her in!” shouted a man, with an
oath.
Lex groped about for matches and lighted a lamp. “Hold on there a
minute!” he yelled back. He began hurrying into his clothes. A
strange nervousness seized him. Vigilantes—a mob—had crept up and
surrounded the place. They had come to exact some tribute, to wreak
vengeance, to enforce summary justice. Which, and on whom? He heard
Dot’s voice in the hall, vibrant and fearless.
“What do you want?”
“Bust down the door!” chorused the crowd.
“We want the man who’s been befriending Billy Gee,” cried the first
speaker. “Are you opening this door or do we break it in?”
At this juncture Lex stepped into the hall. Lemuel stood half
dressed, pale with fright, holding a candle in one trembling hand.
Dot, clad in a dressing gown, her thick, wavy hair tumbled
charmingly over her shoulders, her eyes glinting with a strange
fire, was standing before the door, firmly gripping a six-shooter.
Huddled up against the wall, some distance back, was Mrs. Liggs
wringing her thin hands distractedly.
“The man who tries to come in here, dies! Do you understand that?”
called out the girl in harsh tones.
A wild jeer went up. The mob howled for action, and heavy shoulders
started heaving against the panels. Dot fired. The bullet tore
through the lintel, whined spitefully over the heads of the crowd.
“Atta boy! Now, altogether! Get the back door, Shorty!” bellowed the
leader.
The front door bulged and creaked under a second attack, and again
Dot fired. A howl of rage broke from one of the men. There was a mad
scramble out of range.
“Smoke ’em out! Smoke ’em out!” rose the furious cry.
“Good Lord! They’re goin’ to burn down the house,” wailed Lemuel
hysterically.
“Say, men!” shouted Lex. “There’s some mistake. This is Sangerly of
the Mohave & Southwestern speaking. I’ll vouch for Mr. Huntington.
He’s never had any friendly relations with this outlaw——”
“Is that so, Sangerly?” sneered the leader of the mob. “Well, you’re
not such a wise guy as you think you are. Huntington was
entertaining Billy Gee here this evening. He’s been hanging out at
this ranch right along. Say, Huntington, are you delivering yourself
up, or do we burn you out?”
Lennox, listening fearfully from his cot in the little room off the
kitchen, recognized the speaker as Big George Rankin, czar of
Geerusalem’s underworld.
“Why, that’s ridiculous,” cried Lex. “Mr. Huntington captured Billy
Gee and turned him over to the authorities——”
The roar of voices which had ceased during the brief parley, rose
again now, violent and menacing.
“It’s a lie! It’s a lie! I ain’t bin friends with the measly skunk,”
moaned Lemuel. Mrs. Liggs was staring at him, in a dumb, bewildered
way.
Dot still watched the door. Her eyes were glittering dangerously,
her whole manner betokening cool, desperate determination. Lex,
unused to frontier crises of this kind, had left his revolver in his
room. He now ran in to get it and found that the men on the porch
were trying the windows. He had barely discovered this fact, when a
revolver ripped suddenly down through the panes, showering him with
glass. At the same instant, he heard the kitchen door fall in with a
crash. Rushing back into the hall, he was just in time to come under
a bristling array of leveled guns in the hands of bandanna-masked
men, trained on the Huntington household.
In a trice, Dot was disarmed and Lemuel hurled into his room to
dress. The place was quickly overrun by the mob, rummaging and
ransacking bureaus, closets, trunks. Even the cupboard was swept
clean. To Lex, it seemed as if they went about their work with a
thoroughness that was almost painstakingly vicious. It was as if
they were following out some plan to render the house untenantable,
to strip its owner of his belongings.
Rankin, big and burly, his cruel eyes fiery over his red mask,
stopped before Dot.
“You be on your way out of the country before morning, kid! Get me?”
he growled. “And take this old dame along with you,” indicating the
half-fainting Mrs. Liggs whom the girl held in her arms. “Get out
and stay out!” He turned to Lex. “As for you, Mr. Sangerly, you’ve
got a room in the Miners’ Hotel. See that you occupy it, if you’re
not looking for a coat of tar. Outside, gang, and clean up the
works!”
The majority of the mob went trooping away in obedience to the
command, and presently Lex heard sounds which proclaimed the
destruction of the outbuildings, coupled with the frantic clamor of
the occupants of coop and sty.
A man hurried in from the kitchen and beckoned Rankin to one side.
“Lennox’s layin’ in there with a busted leg,” he whispered.
“Hell he is! Well, you know your orders, Shorty. Bump him off, but
wait till we leave, see? Tell Logan to help you. Make a good job of
it.”
A number of men dragged Lemuel from his room. He was in a state of
collapse. Dot relinquished Mrs. Liggs to Lex, and rushing forward,
threw her arms around her father’s neck, begging, pleading
hysterically with Rankin, to no purpose. Sangerly began an
impassioned appeal also, and received a brutal blow in the face for
his interference.
Out through the front door they hustled Lemuel. They bundled him on
a horse and set a guard over him, while Rankin rounded up his gang
preparatory to departing. At last, with a parting six-shooter volley
into the air and a chorus of wild shouts, the mob spurred away. The
first faint shafts of light were beginning to silver the eastern
sky. Soapweed Plains had never seemed so tragically silent, so
filled with woe and frightful foreboding.
Out on the front porch, Lex stood holding Mrs. Liggs. The little old
lady was moaning pitifully, clutching Dot’s hand in her own
trembling one. The girl was, for the moment, stricken dumb by the
suddenness of it all—the destruction of the ranch, the bold
abduction of her father, horror over his possible fate at the hands
of that lawless crowd. Then she roused herself and darted into the
house. The next instant she reappeared, hatted and cloaked, and sped
down the steps and along the walk leading to the rear of the
premises. Alarmed at her action, Lex helped Mrs. Liggs to a porch
chair and hurried after her. He overtook her as she was scrambling
through the wire fence into the field.
“Miss Huntington, where are you going?” he panted.
“I’m following them. Please help me catch a horse!” she cried
wildly. “Oh, the beasts! The beasts! They’re——” She broke off and
listened frantically into the night. “Hear them? They’re taking him
toward camp, but there is a trail branching off. They’re going that
way. I heard one of them say they intend to set him afoot in Lone
Mountain Pass. He’ll die out there. Quick! Mr. Sangerly, I——”
“My car,” he burst out. “If they haven’t destroyed it—tampered with
it.” He grasped her arm, and together they raced for the roadster
standing to one side of the driveway. “But we ought to run into camp
and report the matter to the authorities. We can’t hope to do
anything alone, Miss Huntington. It would be madness to oppose
them,” he argued, as they sprang into the machine.
By a streak of good fortune—which that arch-plotter Jule Quintell
could have easily explained, considering that he felt confident of
putting over the right of way deal—the night riders had left the
roadster severely alone.
Dot made no reply, and Lex started turning the roadster around in
the wide space of yard. At this juncture, two shots rang out inside
the house, followed by Mrs. Liggs’ terrified scream from the front
porch. A hoarse cry broke from Lex. He brought the car to a sudden
halt.
“My God—Lennox! I’d forgotten him. They’ve killed——”
There was a sound of blundering footfalls across the bare kitchen
floor. The next instant, a man staggered out of the back door,
toppled down the steps, and pitched headlong to the ground, in the
full glare of the headlights. Blood was issuing from his mouth.
Then, while Dot and Lex gazed horrified at the prostrate form, a
shriveled-up little figure appeared in the kitchen door, clutching a
revolver in one bony hand. It was Tinnemaha Pete.
“That you, Spangaree?” he cackled excitedly at the roadster. “Son of
a gun! Got ’em both—first pop. They was goin’ to drill Mr. Lummox,
an’ I dropped ’em. Poorty as ye please. First pop. Son of a gun!
Ain’t killed a man afore, either. That’s one of ’em. First pop,
Spangaree. Agatha! Looket, Agatha——” He went trotting through the
house, calling to Mrs. Liggs.
Dot, staring at the dead man, shivered.
Lex got the roadster under way. It sped out of the driveway and into
the road, gathering speed; plunging and swaying along, the sand
rattling like machine-gun fire against the under side of the
fenders. The girl, wide-eyed, her face bloodless, drawn with fear,
watched in awful suspense for sight of the mob.
“We’d better drive to camp, Miss Huntington, and get out the
constable—have him lead a posse after them. It’s the safest course,
all around,” said Lex presently.
A sob broke from her. “Oh, what terrible thing are they going to
do!” she cried in anguish. “We’ll have to save him. Can’t you see?
We can’t leave him. It’ll take time to get help. Oh, Mr. Sangerly——”
“It’s a terrible situation, I know,” he interrupted gently; “but you
must understand that these ruffians will hesitate at nothing. When
they would plan to murder poor Lennox, lying in bed, unable to
defend himself, what consideration would they give us?”
“Oh, I don’t know! I don’t know!” she moaned. “Perhaps you’re right.
I can’t think clearly. Merciful Father, have pity on——” She broke
off, glaring intently ahead. “There they are! There they are!”
As she spoke, the galloping mass of the night riders came into view.
The roadster bore down on it rapidly, and the powerful rays of the
headlights growing brighter and brighter, startled the horses. Those
in the rear began bolting in fright, swerving sharply, unmanageable
for the instant. But that instant proved sufficient in which to
throw the entire body into confusion. It split, scattering to either
side of the road, and Lex, a cold hand clutching his heart, steered
the car into the breach, stepping on the gas as he did so.
A deafening roar went up from the cavalcade. A hail of bullets
riddled the radiator. Racing alongside, several of the riders thrust
their six-shooters down on Lex and the girl, commanding a halt. Dot
got a fleeting glimpse of her father, bareheaded, his face ashen
with terror. He sat astride a horse, his hands tied behind him. Lex
brought the machine to a stop, and the mob surrounded it.
“Out of that buzz wagon, partner!” cried Big George Rankin, spurring
forward. “It seems to me you’re itching for that coat of tar I
promised you. You can’t monkey with a law-and-order bunch in these
parts without getting your feet wet. Kid,” addressing Dot, “you hop
out of there, too. I suppose, Mr. Sangerly, you were on your way to
spread the alarm, eh? Well, we’ll attend to you before we do
anything else. You’re a pretty wise bird—in Los Angeles,” he added
significantly.
The whole troop was by now drawn around the roadster—a grim company,
surely, what with their grotesque, blood-red handkerchief masks and
attitude of lawless abandon. Lex and Dot stood on the ground near
the roadster. The girl was weeping audibly, gazing with distracted
eyes through the press of horsemen for sight of Lemuel.
“Father!” she cried again and again, her agonized voice rising above
the chorus of menacing suggestions as to what should be done with
the meddlers of the night’s business. But she got no answer to her
passionate cry.
Day was breaking fast, as is usual on the Southwestern deserts.
Soapweed Plains lay cold and gray and mysterious to the eye, its
vast stretches of brush and sand resembling some gigantic
crazy-quilted design. The Geerusalem Hills rose near at hand,
looking like a great dab of mixed paint—a vividly mineralized pile
of granite and porphyritic rock.
Rankin and two other men were conversing in low animated tones,
trying to arrive at some decision concerning the disposal of Dot and
Lex. They were not agreeing.
Suddenly a shot rang out from beyond the circle, followed by the
gurgling cry of a man. There was a wild scamper of hoofs, then the
sharp crack of a quirt across a horse’s withers. A volley screamed
over the roadster. The riders clustered around it hesitated an
instant. Another volley scattered them like chaff, dropping three of
their number. This way and that they dashed madly, every man for
himself. Rankin roared out a command, hurling a string of oaths
after them.
“If you’re lookin’ for Billy Gee, here he is. Come take him! Come
on, you brave wallopers! You—Rankin!” shouted a lone horseman,
sitting his mount some distance away. He fired, and the leader’s hat
went sailing off his head. Emptying his revolver wildly at the
other, Rankin, fuming with rage, swung his horse about and sped
after his followers.
A wild thrill swept Dot. She stared in blank amazement at the erect
slim figure of their rescuer. Far behind him, racing across the
plains like mad, went another rider, her father, and Billy Gee, the
outlaw, the hero of her romantic dreams, was covering his retreat,
holding in nervous indecision two score ruffians who faltered at the
mere mention of that magic name, which stood for open defiance of
law! She knew that Billy Gee must have been a member of that mob,
that he had joined it with the express purpose of liberating her
father at the first opportunity.
While she gazed at him these things flashed through her mind; and
into her bosom came an ecstasy, sweeter than any she had ever known.
Out there in the cold gray dawn of Soapweed Plains, was the man she
loved, alone, dauntlessly challenging a heavily armed cavalcade that
had visited its wrath on the Huntington home because of him, a
cowardly crew whom he had dispersed with a dozen shots!
On and on, dashed Lemuel, horse and rider growing smaller and
smaller in the distance. The enemy, under Rankin’s repeated abuse
and threats, had drawn rein a few hundred yards away. It began a
cautious approach, firing as it came. Billy Gee waited. Dot,
becoming alarmed at his inactivity, now noticed that, besides being
out of revolver range, he gripped a rifle. In that he had a decided
advantage—one which he proceeded to put to use with demoralizing
effect.
He brought up the weapon suddenly. There was a flash, and one of the
horsemen slumped in the saddle. Again and again the rifle cracked.
The morale of the mob ebbed in the face of that unerring
marksmanship. The outlaw reloaded, and with something of that
dare-devil spirit which had made him the terror of the region, dug
spurs to his horse and charged straight for the nearest group of
riders, firing with deadly precision as he rode. The group made to
stand its ground, but the very fact that this advancing foe was the
dreaded bandit of the Mohave, whose past death-defying exploits had
set them agog with awe and wonder, proved too much for their vaunted
temerity. They whirled about in a panic, and after them went the
remaining members of the band, the rifle bullets whining in their
ears.
Billy Gee reined in his horse and watched the rout he had caused.
Then the very thing he could have predicted came to pass. The
horsemen stopped a quarter of a mile off, congregated to talk over a
plan of action. Rankin was not for giving up. Billy could hear him
bellowing out commands, urging his fellows with curse and taunt back
to the attack and the extermination of the outlaw.