THE TRAP SHUTS
In one matter Lew Hervey had acted none too quickly. Shorty and Little
Joe arrived at the corral in time to find Marianne in the very act of
leading out her pony. They told her firmly and gently that the horse
must go back, and when she defied them, they astonished her by simply
removing her hand from the lead-rope and taking the horse away. In
vain she stormed and threatened. In vain, at length, she broke into
tears. Either of them would have given an arm to serve her. But in
fact they considered they were at that moment rendering the greatest
service possible. They were saving her from herself.
She fled back to the house again, finally, and threw herself face down
on her bed in an agony of dread, and helplessness, and shame. Shame
because from Little Joe's brief remarks, she gathered that Hervey had
already spread the news of her confession. But shame and fear were
suddenly forgotten. She found herself sitting wide-eyed on the edge
of the bed repeating over and over in a shaking voice "I have to get
there! I have to get there!"
But how utterly Hervey had tied her hands! She could not budge to warn
Perris or to join him!
The long night wore away with Marianne crouched at the window
straining her eyes towards the corrals. Night was the proper time for
such a thing as the murder of Red Perris. They would not dare, she
felt, for all their numbers, to face him in the honest sunshine. So
she peered eagerly towards the shadowy outlines of the barns and sheds
until at length a wan moon rose and gave her blessed light.
But no one approached the corrals from the bunkhouse, and at length,
when the dawn began to grow, she fell asleep. It was a sleep filled
with nightmares and before the sun was well up she was awake again,
and at watch.
Mid-morning came, yet still none of the men rode out to their ordinary
work. There could be only one meaning. They were held back to join the
expedition. They were at this very moment, perhaps, cleaning their
guns in the bunkhouse. Noon brought no action. They trooped cheerfully
towards the house in answer to the noon-gong. She heard them laughing
and jesting. What cold-blooded fiends they were to be able to conduct
themselves in this manner when they intended to do a murder before the
day had ended! And indeed, it was only for this meal they seemed to
have planned to wait.
Before the afternoon was well begun, there was saddling and mounting
and then Hervey, Little Joe, Shorty, Macintosh, and Scotty climbed
onto their mounts and jogged out towards the east. Her heart leaped
with only a momentary hope when she saw the direction, but instantly
she undeceived herself. They would, of course, swing north as soon as
they were well out of sight from the house, and then they would head
for the shack on the mountain-side, aiming to reach it at about the
fall of twilight. And what could she do to stop them?
She ran out through the patio and to the front of the house. The
dust-cloud already had swallowed the individual forms of the riders.
And turning to the left, she saw McGuire and Hastings lolling in full
view near the corrals. With consummate tact, Hervey had chosen those
of his men who were the oldest, the hardest, the least liable to be
melted by her persuasions.
Moaning, she turned back and looked east. The dust-cloud was dwindling
every minute. And without hope, she cast another glance towards the
corrals. Evidently, the men agreed that it was unnecessary for two of
them to stay in the heat of the sun to prevent her from getting at
a horse. Hastings had turned his back and was strolling towards the
bunkhouse. McGuire was perched on a stump rolling a cigarette and
grinning broadly towards her.
He would be a hard man to handle. But at least there was more hope
than before. One man was not so hard to manage as two, each shaming
the other into indifference. She went slowly towards McGuire, turning
again to see the dust-cloud roll out of view over a distant hill.
In that cloud of dust, Hervey kept the pace down to an easy dog-trot.
From mid-afternoon until evening--for he did not intend to expose
himself primarily and his men in the second place, to the accurate gun
of Red Jim in broad daylight--was a comfortable stretch in which
to make the journey to the shack on the mountain-side. Like a good
general, he kept the minds of his followers from growing tense by
deftly turning the talk, on the way, to other topics, as they swung
off the east trail towards Glosterville and journeyed due north over
the rolling foothills. There was only one chance in three that he
could have deceived the girl by his first direction, but that chance
was worth taking. He had a wholesome respect for the mental powers
of Oliver Jordan's daughter and he by no means wished to drive her
frantic in the effort to get to Perris with her warning. Of course
it would be impossible for her to wheedle McGuire and Hastings into
letting her have a horse, but if she should----
Here Hervey abruptly turned his thoughts in a new direction. The old
one led to results too unpleasant.
In the meantime, as they wore out the miles and the day turned towards
sunset time, the cheery conversation which Little Joe had led among
the riders fell away. They were coming too close to the time and place
of action. What that action must be was only too easy to guess. It
was simply impossible to imagine Red Perris submitting to an order to
leave. He had already defied their assembled forces once. He would
certainly make the attempt again. Of course odds of five to one were
too great for even the most courageous and skilful fighter to face.
But he might do terrible damage before the end.
And it was a solemn procession which wound up the hillside through
the darkening trees. Until at length, at a word from Hervey, they
dismounted, tethered their horses here and there where there was
sufficient grass to occupy them and keep them from growing nervous and
neighing, and then started on again on foot.
At this point Hervey took the lead. For that matter, he had never been
lacking in sheer animal courage, and now he wound up the path with
his long colt in his hand, ready to shoot, and shoot to kill. Once or
twice small sounds made him pause, uneasy. But his progress was fairly
steady until he came to the edge of the little clearing where the
shack stood.
There was no sign of life about it. The shack seemed deserted. Thick
darkness filled its doorway and the window, though the rest of the
clearing was still permeated with a faint afterglow of the sunset.
"He ain't here," said Little Joe softly, as he came to the side of the
watchful foreman.
"Don't be too sure," said the other. "I'd trust this Perris and
take about as many chances with him as I would with a rattler in a
six-by-six room. Maybe he's in there playing possum. Waiting for us to
make a break across the clearing. That'd be fine for Red Jim, damn his
heart!"
Little Joe peered back at the anxious faces of the others, as they
came up the path one by one. He did not like to be one of so large
a party held up by a single man. In fact, Joe was a good deal of a
warrior himself. He was new to the Valley of the Eagles, but there
were other parts of the mountain-desert where his fame was spread
broadcast. There were even places where sundry officers of the law
would have been glad to lay hands upon him.
"Well," quoth Joe, "we'll give him a chance. If he ain't a fighting
man, but just a plain murderer, we'll let him show it," and so saying,
he stepped boldly out from the sheltering darkness of the trees and
strode towards the hut, an immense and awesome figure in the twilight.
Lew Hervey followed at once. It would not do to be out-dared by one of
his crew in a crisis as important as this. But for all his haste the
long strides of Joe had brought him to the door of the hut many yards
in the lead, and he disappeared inside. Presently his big voice
boomed: "He ain't here. Plumb vanished."
They gathered in the hut at once.
"Where's he gone?" asked the foreman, scratching his head.
"Maybe he ain't acting as big as he talked," said Shorty. "Maybe he's
slid over the mountains."
"Strike a light, somebody," commanded the foreman.
Three or four sulphur matches were scratched at the same moment on
trousers made tight by cocking the knee up. Each match glimmered
through sheltering fingers with dull blue light, for a moment, and
then as the sulphur was exhausted and the flame caught the wood, the
hands opened and directed shafts of light here and there. The whole
cabin was dimly illumined for a moment while man after man thrust his
burning match towards something he had discovered.
"Here's his blankets. All mussed up."
"Here's a pair of boots."
"Here's the frying pan right on the stove."
They wandered here and there, lighting new matches until Little Joe
spoke.
"No use, boys," he declared. "Perris has hopped out. Wise gent, at
that. He seen the game was too big for him. And I don't blame him for
quitting. Ain't nothing here that he'd come after. Them boots are wore
out. The blankets and the cooking things he got from the ranch. Look
at the way the blankets are piled up. Shows he quit in a rush and
started away. When a gent figures on coming back, he tidies things
up a little when he leaves in the morning. No, boys, he's gone. Main
thing to answer is: If he ain't left the valley why ain't he here in
his shack now?"
"Maybe he's hunting that damn hoss?" suggested the foreman, but his
voice was weak with uncertainty.
"Hunting Alcatraz after dark?" queried Little Joe.
There was no answer possible. The last glow of twilight was fading
to deep night. The trees on the edge of the clearing seemed to grow
taller and blacker each moment. Certainly if it were well-nigh
impossible to hunt the stallion effectively in daylight it was sheer
madness to hunt him at night. Every moment they waited in the cabin,
the certainty that Perris had left the valley grew greater. It showed
in their voices, for every man had spoken softly at first as though
for fear the spirit of the inhabitant of the shack might drift near
unseen and overhear. Now their words came loud, disturbing and
startling Hervey in the midst of his thoughts, as he continued
wandering about the cabin, lighting match after match, striving in
vain to find something which would reawaken his hopes. But there was
nothing of enough worth to induce Perris to return, and finally Hervey
gave up.
"We'll start on," he said at length. "You boys ride along. I'll give
the place another look."
As a matter of fact, he merely wished to be alone, and he was dimly
pleased as they sauntered off through the trees, their voices coming
more and more vaguely back to him, until the far-off rattle of
hoofs began. The last he heard of them was a high-pitched laugh. It
irritated Hervey. It floated back to him thin and small, like mockery.
And indeed he had failed miserably. How great was his failure he could
hardly estimate in a moment and he needed quiet to sum up his losses.
First of all, he had hopelessly alienated the girl and while offending
her he had failed to serve the rancher. For Red Jim Perris, driven by
force from the ranch, would surely return again to exact payment
in full for the treatment he had received. The whole affair was a
hopeless muddle. He had staked everything on his ability to trap
Perris and destroy him, thereby piling upon the shoulders of Oliver
Jordan a burden of gratitude which the rancher could never repay. But
now that Perris was footloose he became a danger imperilling not only
Jordan but Hervey himself. The trap had closed and closed on nothing.
The future presented to Hervey stark ruin.
So enthralling was the gloom of these thoughts that the foreman did
not hear the thudding hoofs of a horse which trotted up through the
trees. Not until horse and rider appeared in the clearing was Hervey
roused and then in the first glance by the size and the tossing head
of the approaching pony, he recognized the horse of Red Perris!