HALF-CONFIDENCES
Whatever Stutter Brown may secretly have thought concerning this new
arrangement of his affairs, he indulged in no outward manifestations.
Not greatly gifted in speech, he was nevertheless sufficiently prompt
in action. The swift, nervous orders of the impulsive Mexican dancer
had sufficiently impressed him with one controlling idea, that
something decidedly serious was in the air; and, as she flitted across
the room, looking not unlike a red bird, he watched her make directly
toward a man who was leaning negligently back in a chair against the
farther wall. For a moment he continued to gaze through the obscuring
haze of tobacco smoke, uncertain as to the other's identity, his eyes
growing angry, his square jaw set firm.
"W-who is the f-f-feller?" he questioned gruffly. "Wh-what 's she
m-mean l-leavin' me to go over th-thar ter h-him?"
Beth Norvell glanced up frankly into his puzzled face.
"She has gone to keep him away from me," she explained quietly. "His
name is Farnham."
Brown's right hand swung back to his belt, his teeth gripped like those
of a fighting dog.
"Hell!" he ejaculated, forgetting to stutter. "Is that him? Biff
Farnham? An' he 's after you is he, the damned Mormon?"
She nodded, her cheeks growing rosy from embarrassment. Brown cast a
quick, comprehensive glance from the face of the woman to where the man
was now leaning lazily against the wall.
"All r-right, little g-girl," he said slowly, and with grave
deliberation. "I-I reckon I n-never went b-back on any p-pard yet.
B-blamed if y-y-you hate thet c-cuss any worse th-than I do. Y-you
bet, I 'll take you out o' h-h-here safe 'nough."
He drew her more closely against his side, completely shielding her
slender figure from observation by the intervention of his giant body,
and thus they passed out together into the gloomy but still riotous
street. A block or more down, under the glaring light of a noisy
saloon, the girl looked up questioningly into his boyish face.
"Are you Stutter Brown, of the 'Little Yankee'?" she asked doubtfully.
"I-I reckon you've c-c-called the t-turn, Miss."
She hesitated a moment, but there was something about this big, awkward
fellow, with his sober eyes and good-natured face, which gave her
confidence.
"Do--do you know a Mr. Ned Winston?"
He shook his head, the locks of red hair showing conspicuously under
the wide hat-brim.
"I r-reckon not. Leastwise, don't s-s-sorter seem to r-recall no such
n-name, Miss. Was the g-gent a f-friend o' your 'n?"
"Y-yes. He is a mining engineer, and, I have been told, is under
engagement at the 'Little Yankee.'"
Brown's eyes hardened, looking down into the upturned face, and his
hands clinched in sudden awakening suspicion.
"You d-did, hey?" he questioned sullenly. "Wh-who told you that r-rot?"
"Farnham."
The man uttered an unrestrained oath, fully believing now that he was
being led into a cunningly devised trap. His mental operations were
slow, but he was swift and tenacious enough in prejudice. He stopped
still, and the two stood silently facing each other, the same vague
spectre of suspicion alive in the minds of both.
"Farnham," the man muttered, for one instant thrown off his guard from
surprise. "How th-the hell d-d-did he g-git hold o' that?"
"I don't know; but is n't it true?"
He turned her face around toward the light, not roughly, yet with an
unconscious strength which she felt irresistible, and looked at her
searchingly, his own eyes perceptibly softening.
"Y-you sure l-l-look all right, little g-girl," he admitted, slowly,
"but I 've h-heard th-th-that feller was hell with w-women. I-I reckon
you b-better go b-back to Farnham an' find out."
He paused, wiping his perspiring face with the back of his hand, his
cheeks reddening painfully under her unfaltering gaze. Finally he
blurted out:
"Say, w-who are you, anyhow?"
"Beth Norvell, an actress."
"You kn-kn-know Farnham?"
She bent her head in regretful acknowledgment.
"An' you kn-kn-know the señorita?"
"Yes, a very little."
Stutter Brown wet his lips, shifting awkwardly.
"Well, y-you 'll excuse me, M-Miss," he stuttered in an excess of
embarrassment, yet plunging straight ahead with manly determination to
have it out. "I-I ain't much used t-t-to this sorter th-thing, an'
maybe I-I ain't got no r-r-right ter be a-botherin' you with m-my
affairs, nohow. But you s-see it's th-this way. I 've sorter t-took a
big l-l-likin' to that dancin' girl. Sh-she 's a darn sight n-n-nearer
my s-style than anything I 've been up a-against fer s-some time. I-I
don't just kn-know how it h-h-happened, it was so blame s-sudden, b-but
she 's got her l-l-lasso 'bout me all r-right. But Lord! sh-she 's all
fun an' laugh; sh-sh-she don't seem to take n-nothin' serious like, an'
you c-can't make much ou-ou-out o' that kind; you n-never know just how
to t-take 'em; leastwise, I don't. N-now, I 'm a plain s-s-sorter man,
an' I m-make bold ter ask ye a m-mighty plain sorter qu-question--is
that there M-M-Mercedes on the squar?"
He stood there motionless before her, a vast, uncertain bulk in the dim
light, but he was breathing hard, and the deep earnestness of his voice
had impressed her strongly.
"Why do you ask me that?" she questioned, for the moment uncertain how
to answer him. "I scarcely know her; I know almost nothing regarding
her life."
"Y-you, you are a w-woman, Miss," he insisted, doggedly, "an', I t-take
it, a woman who will u-understand such th-th-things. T-tell me, is she
on the squar?"
"Yes," she responded, warmly. "She has not had much chance, I think,
and may have made a mistake, perhaps many of them, but I believe she 's
on the square."
"Did--did sh-she come out t-to our m-m-mine spying for Farnham?"
"Really, I don't know."
His grave face darkened anxiously; she could perceive the change even
in that shadow, and distinguish the sharp grind of his teeth.
"Damn him," he muttered, his voice bitter with hate. "It w-would be
l-l-like one of his l-low-lived tricks. Wh-what is that g-girl to him,
anyhow?"
It was no pleasant task to hurt this man deliberately, yet, perhaps, it
would be best. Anyway, it was not in Beth Norvell's nature either to
lie or to be afraid.
"He has been her friend; there are some who say her lover."
He stared fixedly at her, as though she had struck him a stinging,
unexpected blow.
"Him? A-an' you s-s-say she 's on the squar?"
"Yes; I say she is on the square, because I think so. It's a hard life
she 's had to live, and no one has any right to judge her by strict
rules of propriety. I may not approve, neither do I condemn. Good
women have been deceived before now--have innocently done wrong in the
eyes of the world--and this Mercedes is a woman. I know him also, know
him to be a cold-blooded, heartless brute. She is merely a girl,
pulsating with the fiery blood of the South, an artist to her fingers'
tips, wayward and reckless. It would not be very difficult for one of
that nature to be led astray by such a consummate deceiver as he is. I
pity her, but I do not reproach. Yet God have mercy on him when she
awakes from her dream, for that time is surely coming, perhaps is here
already; and the girl is on the square. I believe it, she is on the
square."
For a silent, breathless moment Brown did not stir, did not once take
his eyes from off her face. She saw his hand slip down and close hard
over the butt of his dangling revolver. Then he drew a deep breath,
his head thrown back, his great shoulders squared.
"D-damn, but that helps me," he said soberly. "It--it sure does.
G-good-night, little g-girl."
"Are you going to leave me now?"
"Why, sure. Th-this yere is the h-h-hotel, ain 't it? W-well, I 've
got t-to be back to th-the 'Little Yankee' afore d-d-daylight, or thar
'll be h-hell to pay, an' I sure m-mean to see her first,
an'--an'--maybe h-him."
She stood there in thoughtful perplexity, oblivious to all else in her
strange surroundings, watching the dark shadow of his burly figure
disappear through the dim light. There was a strength of purpose, a
grim, unchangeable earnestness about the man which impressed her
greatly, which won her admiration. He was like some great faithful
dog, ready to die at his master's bidding. Down in her heart she
wondered what would be the tragic end of this night's confidence.
"There goes a good friend," she said slowly, under her breath, "and a
bad enemy." Then she turned away, aroused to her own insistent mission
of warning, and entered the silent hotel.
The night clerk, a mere boy with pallid cheeks and heavy eyes
bespeaking dissipation, reclined on a couch behind the rough counter,
reading a Denver paper. He was alone in the room, excepting a drunken
man noisily slumbering in an arm-chair behind the stove. Miss Norvell,
clasping her skirts tightly, picked her way forward across the littered
floor, the necessity for immediate action rendering her supremely
callous to all ordinary questions of propriety.
"Can you inform me if Mr. Winston is in his room?" she questioned,
leaning across the counter until she could see the clerk's surprised
face.
The young fellow smiled knowingly, rising instantly to his feet.
"Not here at all," he returned pleasantly. "He left just before noon
on horseback. Heard him say something 'bout an engineering job he had
up Echo Canyon. Reckon that 's where he 's gone. Anything important,
Miss Norvell?"