I
Mike Clinch regarded the jewels taken from Jose Quintana as legitimate
loot acquired in war.
He was prepared to kill anybody who attempted to take the gems from him.
At the very possibility his ruling passion blazed--his mania to make of
Eve Strayer a grand lady.
But now, what he had feared for years had happened. Quintana had found
him,--Quintana, after all these years, had discovered the identity and
dwelling place of the obscure American soldier who had robbed him in the
wash-room of a Paris cafe. And Quintana was now in America, here in this
very wilderness, tracking the man who had despoiled him.
* * * * *
Clinch, in his shirt-sleeves, carrying a rifle, came out on the log
veranda and sat down to think it over.
He began to realise that he was likely to have trouble with a man as
cold-blooded and as dogged as himself.
Nor did he doubt that those with Quintana were desperate men.
On whom could he count? On nobody unless he paid their hire. None among
the lawless men who haunted his backwoods "hotel" at Star Pond would
lift a finger to help him. Almost any among them would have robbed
him,--murdered him, probably,--if it were known that jewels were hidden
in the house.
He could not trust Jake Kloon; Leverett was as treacherous as only a
born coward can be; Sid Hone, Harvey Chase, Blommers, Byron
Hastings,--he knew them all too well to trust them,--a sullen,
unscrupulous pack, partly cowardly, always fierce,--as are any creatures
that live furtively, feed only by their wits, and slink through life
just outside the frontiers of law.
And yet, one of this gang had stood by him--Hal Smith--the man he
himself had been about to slay.
Clinch got up from the bench where he had been sitting and walked down
to the pond where Hal Smith sat cleaning trout.
"Hal," he said, "I been figuring some. Quintana don't dare call in the
constables. I can't afford to. Quintana and I've got to settle this on
our own."
Smith slit open a ten-inch trout, stripped it, flung the entrails out
into the pond, soused the fish in water, and threw it into a milk pan.
"Whose jewels were they in the beginning?" he enquired carelessly.
"How do I know?"
"If you ever found out----"
"I don't want to. I got them in the war, anyway. And it don't make no
difference how I got 'em; Eve's going to be a lady if I go to the chair
for it. So that's that."
Smith slit another trout, gutted it, flung away the viscera but laid
back the roe.
"Shame to take them in October," he remarked, "but people must eat."
"Same's me," nodded Clinch; "I don't want to kill no one, but Eve she's
gotta be a lady and ride in her own automobile with the proudest."
"Does Eve know about the jewels?"
Clinch's pale eyes, which had been roving over the wooded shores of Star
Pond, reverted to Smith.
"I'd cut my throat before I'd tell her," he said softly.
"She wouldn't stand for it?"
"Hal, when you said to me, 'Eve's a lady, by God!' you swallered the
hull pie. That's the answer. A lady don't stand for what you and I don't
bother about."
"Suppose she learns that you robbed the man who robbed somebody else of
these jewels."
Clinch's pale eyes were fixed on him: "Only you and me know," he said in
his pleasant voice.
"Quintana knows. His gang knows."
Clinch's smile was terrifying. "I guess she ain't never likely to know
nothing, Hal."
"What do you purpose to do, Mike?"
"Still hunt."
"For Quintana?"
"I might mistake him for a deer. Them accidents is likely, too."
"If Quintana catches you it will go hard with you, Mike."
"Sure. I know."
"He'll torture you to make you talk."
"You think I'd talk, Hal?"
Smith looked up into the light-coloured eyes. The pupils were pin
points. Then he went on cleaning fish.
"Hal?"
"What?"
"If they get me,--but no matter; they ain't a-going to get me."
"Were you going to tell me where those jewels are hidden, Mike?"
enquired the young man, still busy with his fish. He did not look around
when he spoke. Clinch's murderous gaze was fastened on the back of his
head.
"Don't go to gettin' too damn nosey, Hal," he said in his always
agreeable voice.
Smith soused all the fish in water again: "You'd better tell somebody if
you go gunning for Quintana."
"Did I ask your advice?"
"You did not," said the young man, smiling.
"All right. Mind your business."
Smith got up from the water's edge with his pan of trout:
"That's what I shall do, Mike," he said, laughing. "So go on with your
private war; it's no button off _my_ pants if Quintana gets you."
He went away toward the ice-house with the trout. Eve Strayer, doing
chamber work, watched the young man from an upper room.
The girl's instinct was to like Smith,--but that very instinct aroused
her distrust. What was a man of his breeding and education doing at
Clinch's dump? Why was he content to hang around and do chores? A man of
his type who has gone crooked enough to stick up a tourist in an
automobile nourishes higher--though probably perverted--ambitions than a
dollar a day and board.
She heard Clinch's light step on the uncarpeted stair; went on making
up Smith's bed; and smiled as her step-father came into the room, still
carrying his rifle.
He had something else in his hand, too,--a flat, thin packet wrapped in
heavy paper and sealed all over with black wax.
"Girlie," he said, "I want you should do a little errand for me this
morning. If you're spry it won't take long--time to go there and get
back to help with noon dinner."
"Very well, dad."
"Go git your pants on, girlie."
"You want me to go into the woods?"
"I want you to go to the hole in the rocks under Star Peak and lay this
packet in the hootch cache."
She nodded, tucked in the sheets, smoothed blanket and pillow with deft
hands, went out to her own room. Clinch seated himself and turned a
blank face to the window.
It was a sudden decision. He realised now that he couldn't keep the
jewels in his house. War was on with Quintana. The "hotel" would be the
goal for Quintana and his gang. And for Smith, too, if ever temptation
overpowered him. The house was liable to an attempt at robbery any
night, now;--any day, perhaps. It was no place for the packet he had
taken from Jose Quintana.
Eve came in wearing grey shirt, breeches, and puttees. Clinch gave her
the packet.
"What's in it, dad?" she asked smilingly.
"Don't you get nosey, girlie. Come here."
She went to him. He put his left arm around her.
"You like me some, don't you, girlie?"
"You know it, dad."
"All right. You're all that matters to me ... since your mother went
and died ... after a year.... That was crool, girlie. Only a year.
Well, I ain't cared none for nobody since--only you, girlie."
He touched the packet with his forefinger:
"If I step out, that's yours. But I ain't a-going to step out. Put it
with the hootch. You know how to move that keystone?"
"Yes, dad."
"And watch out that no game protector and none of that damn
millionaire's wardens see you in the woods. No, nor none o' these here
fancy State Troopers. You gotta watch out _this_ time, Eve. It means
everything to us--to you, girlie--and to me. Go tip-toe. Lay low, coming
and going. Take a rifle."
Eve ran to her bed-room and returned with her Winchester and belt.
"You shoot to kill," said Clinch grimly, "if anyone wants to stop you.
But lay low and you won't need to shoot nobody, girlie. G'wan out the
back way; Hal's in the ice house."