As the empty stage reached the edge of the town on its homeward trip, it
slowed up and stopped in front of Major Dudley’s house. Dooley, the
young fellow who now had the proud distinction of driving Red Valley’s
only means of rolling transportation, climbed down from his high perch.
To the casual observer he would have appeared to be examining one of the
wheels. As a matter of fact, his sharp eyes were carefully scrutinizing
the surrounding territory. After a little, he began to whistle.
Almost immediately, the door of the house opened, and Jeanne Dudley
hurried out. He whispered earnestly in her ear.
“That’s fine, Jimmie,” she answered, elated. “But we haven’t a minute to
waste! I’ll have to be a bit careful with this shoulder, but I think we
can manage it. Let’s get to work!”
“He shore paid—for—what he done to you. Miss Jeanne,” Jimmie panted,
struggling with a heavy box in the interior of the coach. “Rand didn’t
waste no time in givin’ him what he desarved!”
Together they began to lower the box to the road. They had nearly
succeeded when the young fellow caught his foot on something inside. His
momentary loss of balance tilted the box, jamming the girl’s left
shoulder between it and the side of the coach. With a sharp gasp of
pain, she started back, losing her hold. She tried to recover it again,
but failed. The box fell to the ground with a heavy thud and split wide
open. Bolts of black cloth, and several large pieces of red, were
revealed.
For a moment they stood eying the catastrophe in silent consternation,
the girl biting her lips to keep back sobs of pain, and the driver
flushing in mortification. Then she sprang again to the broken
container.
“Quick, Jimmie! If we get it into the yard and under the bushes, there
is no harm done. Hurry! Some one may be coming.”
With considerable difficulty they managed at last to get the wrecked
packing case and its contents into the yard. They concealed it as well
as they could under a big laurel. Breathing heavily, she sat down upon
it. She leaned back with closed eyes, and fought to keep down the tears
which insisted on welling out between the long, dark lashes. The boy
eyed her miserably.
“Gawd, Miss Jeanne,” he burst out, “I’m hell-fired sorry! I wouldn’t ’a’
hurt that shoulder o’ yores for all the dust in Ramapo! Damn Simpson!”
“Steady, Jimmie, steady,” she said, trying to smile. “My shoulder will
be all right in a minute or two. Don’t worry about it—it was just an
accident, anyway. And you’ve done wonderfully, Jimmie, wonderfully! Now
hurry along or some one will be passing and wondering what the coach is
doing there!”
Somewhat relieved, but bitterly cursing his clumsiness, the young fellow
trudged reluctantly away. A minute later, as the lumbering old vehicle
gathered headway, he turned around on the box and lifted his
broad-brimmed hat in a gallant, if somewhat awkward, salute. He saw a
white handkerchief flutter in answer. Vastly heartened, he lashed the
horses into a gallop.
For several minutes Jeanne Dudley remained sitting on the box under the
laurel. Then, having regained her composure, she started to rise.
A man suddenly stepped around a thick fringe of shrubbery, vaulted
lightly over the low fence, and stood before her. Her startled eyes met
the leering gaze of “Wasp” Williams.
“Evening, Jeanne,” he said. He lifted his hat and swept it almost to the
ground in his usual mocking manner.
The girl stepped back a pace. Her face alternately flamed and paled.
“Don’t seem to be particular cordial in welcomin’ your guests,” he
grinned, putting the hat on again. “Thought all us Southerners had the
name o’ bein’ mighty generous that-away!”
“Apparently,” she answered through set teeth, “you have forgotten what I
told you some time ago.”
“You can’t kill with conversation,” he replied calmly. “So I guess
you’ll jest have to have a nice little chat with me instead.”
The girl’s hand dropped quickly to her waist, and she reddened. In her
hurry to come out, she had not thought to strap on her belt and
revolver!
“No, I ain’t goin’ to forgit what you said,” he continued. “An’ what’s
more, I ain’t goin’ to forgit what I seen out here on the road a few
minutes ago, either!”
During the last few years, Jeanne Dudley had undergone hard training in
a rough school. Many things had been indelibly graven on her mind that
had had little effect upon her in her untroubled, girlhood days in the
far Southland. Not the least important of these was the value of keeping
cool under all circumstances, and steeling the face never to betray the
thought that lay behind it. But the remark of the man before her was a
bolt from the blue; and the significant tone in which he made it was not
to be misunderstood. For an instant, in spite of herself, her eyes were
wide and frightened.
“Well, what do you think you can do about it?” she asked coolly. “By the
way, I understand that you and some of your friends are going to leave
town to-day or to-morrow.”
The ugly grin vanished from his lips. “I wouldn’t risk no dust on that,”
he remarked scowling. He stared silently at the lovely, scornful face
before him for several moments. His expression slowly changed. Finally,
he came a step nearer.
“Listen, Jeanne,” he said in an oddly pleading tone, “I—I ain’t a-goin’
to do nothin’ about it—give you my word for it—if—if—”
“What?” The question cut through his sentence like a knife.
“—if you—treat me right! I ain’t never done nothin’ to you to git
treated like—a dog! Ain’t I al’ays been respectful an’—an’ decent?”
“Oh, remarkably so!” Her voice was so soft, her face became so pleasant,
that he was actually deceived. “You have always been a gentleman, at the
least! Really, I _have_ been rather unkind to you, haven’t I?”
“I ain’t a-goin’ to say no more about it,” he said, surprised and
encouraged. “I’m a good man to them I likes—an’—an’ I shore likes you,
Jeanne! I’d shore treat you mighty fine! I’m askin’—I’m askin’ you to
marry me!” The last words came out in a rush.
For a moment the girl’s steady eyes gazed into his. Then suddenly she
burst into laughter, high, clear trills of genuine amusement. Astounded
by this remarkable change, he stared at her uncertainly. Finally she
regained her calm.
“Get out!” she ordered briefly. “I warn you for the last time not to
come here again!”
It took him several seconds to realize that he had been duped. Then,
with an oath, he sprang. He gripped her fiercely by the shoulders.
“You little cat,” he snarled. “I’ll learn you to fool with a he-man!”
The girl struggled fiercely in his grasp and struck again and again at
the vicious face before her. She was young and strong; but the fearful
agony of her wounded shoulder rapidly weakened her. The miner, though
thin, was sinewy, and not without a sort of wiry power. Gradually he
pinned both her arms behind her and held them there. He forced her
writhing shoulders against him, and began to press kiss after kiss upon
the white face.
Then suddenly she was released! He seemed to fly from before her face
and to go tumbling over and over into the bushes!
Sobbing weakly, the girl sank to the ground.
When she could open her eyes, she saw Rand Cameron standing over the
fallen miner.
“You yellow hound!” he was muttering with murderous intensity. “I’m
going to send you to join the rest of your crew in hell!”
He extracted both of the other’s pistols from their holsters. It is
highly probable that, in the violence of his rage, he would have slain
the brute without mercy, had not the girl, with a cry, thrust herself
between.
“Don’t, Rand!” she begged wildly. “Don’t, for God’s sake!”
He would have pushed her aside even then; but she clung to his arms. The
fury of the man was almost uncontrollable. His baleful eyes glared past
her. At length, with a tremendous effort, he regained some measure of
control. But it was long before his heavy breathing calmed.
Finally, he drew a deep breath and lifted her to her feet. He tenderly
assisted her to a seat on the stump of a tree.
Then he turned again to the stingless “Wasp.” “Get up! You’re not
through yet!”
When the dazed creature did not respond quickly enough, he roughly
dragged him to his feet. Without giving him time to speak, he hustled
him toward the girl.
“Now,” he commanded grimly, “get down and beg her pardon on your knees!”
At last beginning to recover his senses, Williams declared with violent
profanity that he would not get down on his knees to any woman alive. He
started to back away.
In an instant Cameron was upon him. Breaking down the miner’s resistance
as one might crush the puny efforts of a child, he seized his wrist, and
forced it around behind his back and upward. Then he began to twist.
That hold, properly taken, is one of the most terrible tortures to which
a man can be subjected. Each attempt to escape only increases the agony.
Under its deadly punishment, strong men break down and cry like
children.
That is exactly what Williams did. His breath coming in harsh sobs, he
at length muttered the words of the required apology.
Cameron instantly released him. Again jerking him to his feet, he
hurried him to the gate and shoved him out.
“Now go,” he ground out, “and thank God, if you know who He is, that
you’re alive! Never mind the revolvers! I’ll take charge of them. And,
if I ever catch you around here again, I’ll shoot you on sight!”
He watched the man as he made his way, humiliated, venomous, muttering,
into the town. Then he hastened back to the girl.
“Oh, Rand, oh, Rand,” she whispered through white lips, “I wish I had
never seen this place!”
“Don’t feel so badly, Jeanne,” he pleaded unhappily. “It will soon be
the town you used to love. We have little to fear from that beast now.
And I think, sweet—er—I think we have almost reached the goal! Our work
the other night won all of the good element over, and most of the
doubtful ones. The big majority are eager for the election. I feel sure
we are nearly at the end of our troubles!”
But had he known of a bitter meeting which took place that night between
a certain seventeen, he would not have been so confident.
“I know who’s at the head o’ this thing now,” one of them was muttering
savagely. “I seen somethin’ to-day, an’ I know all I needs to know! I
figgers that if we can git rid o’ the leaders—or any o’ the rest o’
them, in the meanwhile—we can put a stop to it yet! An’ I’m not a-goin’
to leave Red Valley until I gits one o’ them myself!”