"I—I dunno what you mean," he quavered. "I'll call Dug if you wanta see him." He began to shuffle toward the inner room.

"Hold yore hawsses, Brad. I asked you a question." The cold eyes of the gunman bored into those of the other man. "Howcome you to hire Dug to burn the range?"

"You know I wouldn't do that," the older man whined. "I got sheep, ain't I? Wouldn't be reasonable I'd destroy their feed. No, you got a wrong notion about—"

"Yore sheep ain't on the south slope range." Shorty's mind had moved forward one notch toward certainty. Steelman's manner was that of a man dodging the issue. It carried no conviction of innocence. "How much you payin' him?"

The door of the inner room opened. Dug Doble's big frame filled the entrance. The eyes of the two gunmen searched each other. Those of Doble asked a question. Had it come to a showdown? Steelman sidled over to the desk where he worked and sat down in front of it. His right hand dropped into an open drawer, apparently carelessly and without intent.

Shorty knew at once that Doble had been drinking heavily. The man was morose and sullen. His color was high. Plainly he was primed for a killing if trouble came.

"Lookin' for me, Shorty?" he asked.

"You fired Bear Canon," charged the cowpuncher.

"So?"

"When I went to saddle."

Doble's eyes narrowed. "You aimin' to run my business, Shorty?"

Neither man lifted his gaze from the other. Each knew that the test had come once more. They were both men who had "gone bad," in the current phrase of the community. Both had killed. Both searched now for an advantage in that steady duel of the eyes. Neither had any fear. The emotions that dominated were cold rage and caution. Every sense and nerve in each focalized to one purpose—to kill without being killed.

"When yore's is mine, Dug."

"Is this yore's?"

"Sure is. I've stood for a heap from you. I've let yore ugly temper ride me. When you killed Tim Harrigan you got me in bad. Not the first time either. But I'm damned if I'll ride with a coyote low-down enough to burn the range."

"No?"

"No."

From the desk came the sharp angry bark of a revolver. Shorty felt his hat lift as a bullet tore through the rim. His eyes swept to Steelman, who had been a negligible factor in his calculations. The man fired again and blew out the light. In the darkness Shorty swept out both guns and fired. His first two shots were directed toward the man behind the desk, the next two at the spot where Doble had been standing. Another gun was booming in the room, perhaps two. Yellow fire flashes ripped the blackness.

Shorty whipped open the door at his back, slid through it, and kicked it shut with his foot as he leaped from the porch. At the same moment he thought he heard a groan.

Swiftly he ran to the cottonwood where he had left his horse tied. He jerked loose the knot, swung to the saddle, and galloped out of town.

The drumming of hoofs came down the wind to a young fellow returning from a late call on his sweetheart. He wondered who was in such a hurry.



CHAPTER XXXVIII

DUG DOBLE RIDES INTO THE HILLS

The booming of the guns died down. The acrid smoke that filled the room lifted to shredded strata. A man's deep breathing was the only sound in the heavy darkness.

Presently came a soft footfall of some one moving cautiously. A match flared. A hand cupped the flame for an instant to steady it before the match moved toward the wick of a kerosene lamp.

Dug Doble's first thought was for his own safety. The house door was closed, the window blinds were down. He had heard the beat of hoofs die away on the road. But he did not intend to be caught by a trick. He stepped forward, locked the door, and made sure the blinds were offering no cracks of light. Satisfied that all was well, he turned to the figure sprawled on the floor with outflung arms.

"Dead as a stuck shote," he said callously after he had turned the body over. "Got him plumb through the forehead—in the dark, too. Some shootin', Shorty."

He stood looking down at the face of the man whose brain had spun so many cobwebs of deceit and treachery. Even in death it had none of that dignity which sometimes is lent to those whose lives have been full of meanness and guile. But though Doble looked at his late ally, he was not thinking about him. He was mapping out his future course of action.

If any one had heard the shots and he were found here now, no jury on earth could be convinced that he had not killed Steelman. His six-shooter still gave forth a faint trickle of smoke. An examination would show that three shots had been fired from it.

He must get away from the place at once.

Doble poured himself half a tumbler of whiskey and drank it neat. Yes, he must go, but he might as well take with him any money Steelman had in the safe. The dead man owed him a thousand dollars he would never be able to collect in any other way.

He stooped and examined the pockets of the still figure. A bunch of keys rewarded him. An old-fashioned safe stood in the corner back of the desk. Doble stooped in front of it, then waited for an instant to make sure nobody was coming. He fell to work, trying the keys one after another.

A key fitted. He turned it and swung open the door. The killer drew out bundles of papers and glanced through them hurriedly. Deeds, mortgages, oil stocks, old receipts: he wanted none of these, and tossed them to the floor as soon as he discovered there were no banknotes among them. Compartment after compartment he rifled. Behind a package of abstracts he found a bunch of greenbacks tied together by a rubber band at each end. The first bill showed that the denomination was fifty dollars. Doble investigated no farther. He thrust the bulky package into his inside coat pocket and rose.

Again he listened. No sound broke the stillness of the night. The silence got on his nerves. He took another big drink and decided it was time to go.

He blew out the light and once more listened. The lifeless body of his ally lying within touch of his foot did not disturb the outlaw. He had not killed him, and if he had it would have made no difference. Very softly for a large man, he passed to the inner room and toward the back door. He deflected his course to a cupboard where he knew Steelman kept liquor and from a shelf helped himself to an unbroken quart bottle of bourbon. He knew himself well enough to know that during the next twenty-four hours he would want whiskey badly.

Slowly he unlocked and opened the back door. His eyes searched the yard and the open beyond to make sure that neither his enemy nor a sheriff's posse was lurking in the brush for him. He crept out to the stable, revolver in hand. Here he saddled in the dark, deftly and rapidly, thrusting the bottle of whiskey into one of the pockets of the saddlebags. Leading the horse out into the mesquite, he swung to the saddle and rode away.

He was still in the saddle when the peaks above caught the morning sun glow in a shaft of golden light. Far up in the gulches the new fallen snow reflected the dawn's pink.

In a pocket of the hills Doble unsaddled. He hobbled his horse and turned it loose to graze while he lay down under a pine with the bottle for a companion.

The man had always had a difficult temper. This had grown on him and been responsible largely for his decline in life. It had been no part of his plan to "go bad." There had been a time when he had been headed for success in the community. He had held men's respect, even though they had not liked him. Then, somehow, he had turned the wrong corner and been unable to retrace his steps.

He could even put a finger on the time he had commenced to slip. It had begun when he had quarreled with Emerson Crawford about his daughter Joyce. Shorty and he had done some brand-burning through a wet blanket. But he had not gone so far that a return to respectability was impossible. A little rustling on the quiet, with no evidence to fasten it on one, was nothing to bar a man from society. He had gone more definitely wrong after Sanders came back to Malapi. The young ex-convict, he chose to think, was responsible for the circumstances that made of him an outlaw. Crawford and Sanders together had exposed him and driven him from the haunts of men to the hills. He hated them both with a bitter, morose virulence his soul could not escape.

Throughout the day he continued to drink. This gave him no refuge from himself. He still brooded in the inferno of his own thought-circle. It is possible that a touch of madness had begun to affect his brain. Certainly his subsequent actions would seem to bear out this theory.

Revenge! The thought of it spurred him every waking hour, roweling his wounded pride cruelly. There was a way within reach of his hand, one suggested by Steelman's whisperings, though never openly advocated by the sheepman. The jealousy of the man urged him to it, and his consuming vanity persuaded him that out of evil might come good. He could make the girl love him. So her punishment would bring her joy in the end. As for Crawford and Sanders, his success would be such bitter medicine to them that time would never wear away the taste of it.

At dusk he rose and resaddled. Under the stars he rode back to Malapi. He knew exactly what he meant to do and how he meant to do it.



CHAPTER XXXIX

THE TUNNEL

Dave knew no rest that night. He patrolled his line from San Jacinto to Cattle and back again, stopping always to lend a hand where the attack was most furious. The men of his crew were weary to exhaustion, but the pressure of the fire was so great that they dared not leave the front. As soon as one blaze was beaten out, another started. A shower of sparks close to Cattle Canon swept over the ridge and set the thick grass afire. This was smothered with saddle blankets and with sand and dirt thrown from shovels.

Nearer to San Jacinto Canon the danger was more acute. Dave did not dare back-fire on account of the wind. He dynamited the timber to make a trail-break against the howling, roaring wall of fire plunging forward.

As soon as the flames seized the timber the heat grew more intense. The sound of falling trees as they crashed down marked the progress of the fire. The men retreated, staggering with exhaustion, hands and faces flayed, eyes inflamed and blinded by the black smoke that rolled over them.

A stiff wind was blowing, but it was no longer a steady one. Sometimes it bore from the northeast; again in a cross-current almost directly from the east. The smoke poured in, swirling round them till they scarce knew one direction from another.

The dense cloud lifted for a moment, swept away by an air current. To the fire-fighters that glimpse of the landscape told an appalling fact. The demon had escaped below from San Jacinto Canon and been swept westward by a slant of wind with the speed of an express train. They were trapped by the back-fire in a labyrinth from which there appeared no escape. Every path of exit was blocked. The flames had leaped from hilltop to hilltop.

The men gathered together to consult. Many of them were on the verge of panic.

Dave spoke quietly. "We've got a chance if we keep our heads. There's an old mining tunnel hereabouts. Follow me, and stay together."

He plunged into the heavy smoke that had fallen about them again, working his way by instinct rather than by sight. Twice he stopped, to make sure that his men were all at heel. Several times he left them, diving into the smoke to determine which way they must go.

The dry, salt crackle of a dead pine close at hand would have told him, even if the oppressive heat had not, that the fire would presently sweep over the ground where they stood. He drew the men steadily toward Cattle Canon.

In that furious, murk-filled world he could not be sure he was moving in the right direction, though the slope of the ground led him to think so. Falling trees crashed about them. The men staggered on in the uncanny light which tinged even the smoke.

Dave stopped and gave sharp, crisp orders. His voice was even and steady. "Must be close to it now. Lie back of these down trees with your faces close to the ground. I'll be back in a minute. Shorty, you're boss of the crew while I'm away."

"You're gonna leave us to roast," a man accused, in a voice that was half a scream.

Sanders did not stop to answer him, but Shorty took the hysterical man in hand. "Git down by that log pronto or I'll bore a hole in you. Ain't you got sense enough to see he'll save us if there's a chance?"

The man fell trembling to the ground.

"Two men behind each log," ordered Shorty. "If yore clothes git afire, help each other put it out."

They lay down and waited while the fire swept above and around them. Fortunately the woods here were not dense. Men prayed or cursed or wept, according to their natures. The logs in front of some of them caught fire and spread to their clothing. Shorty's voice encouraged them.

"Stick it out, boys. He'll be back if he's alive."

It could have been only minutes, but it seemed hours before the voice of Sanders rang out above the fury of the blast.

"All up! I've found the tunnel! Step lively now!"

They staggered after their leader, Shorty bringing up the rear to see that none collapsed by the way. The line moved drunkenly forward. Now and again a man went down, overcome by the smoke and heat. With brutal kicks Shorty drove him to his feet again.

The tunnel was a shallow one in a hillside. Dave stood aside and counted the men as they passed in. Two were missing. He ran along the back trail, dense with smoke from the approaching flames, and stumbled into a man. It was Shorty. He was dragging with him the body of a man who had fainted. Sanders seized an arm and together they managed to get the unconscious victim to the tunnel.

Dave was the last man in. He learned from the men in the rear that the tunnel had no drift. The floor was moist and there was a small seepage spring in it near the entrance.

Some of the men protested at staying.

"The fire'll lick in and burn us out like rats," one man urged. "This ain't no protection. We've just walked into a trap. I'll take my chance outside."

Dave reached forward and lifted one of Shorty's guns from its holster. "You'll stay right here, Dillon. We didn't make it one minute too soon. The whole hill out there's roaring."

"I'll take my chance out there. That's my lookout," said the man, moving toward the entrance.

"No. You'll stay here." Dave's hard, chill gaze swept over his crew. Several of them were backing Dillon and others were wavering. "It's your only chance, and I'm here to see you take it. Don't take another step."

Dillon took one, and went crumpling to the granite floor before Dave could move. Shorty had knocked him down with the butt of his nine-inch-barrel revolver.

Already smoke was filling the cave. The fire had raced to its mouth and was licking in with long, red, hungry tongues. The tunnel timbers were smouldering.

"Lie down and breathe the air close to the ground," ordered Dave, just as though a mutiny had not been quelled a moment before. "Stay down there. Don't get up."

He found an old tomato can and used it to throw water from the seep-spring upon the burning wood. Shorty and one or two of the other men helped him. The heat near the mouth was so intense they could not stand it. All but Sanders collapsed and staggered back to sink down to the fresher air below.

Their place of refuge packed with smoke. A tree crashed down at the mouth and presently a second one. These, blazing, sent more heat in to cook the tortured men inside. In that bakehouse of hell men showed again their nature, cursing, praying, storming, or weeping as they lay.

The prospect hole became a madhouse. A big Hungarian, crazed by the torment he was enduring, leaped to his feet and made for the blazing hill outside.

"Back there!" Dave shouted hoarsely.

The big fellow rushed him. His leader flung him back against the rock wall. He rushed again, screaming in crazed anger. Sanders struck him down with the long barrel of the forty-five. The Hungarian lay where he fell for a few minutes, then crawled back from the mouth of the pit.

At intervals others tried to break out and were driven back.

Dave's eyebrows crisped away. He could scarcely draw a breath through his inflamed throat. His eyes were swollen and almost blinded with smoke. His lungs ached. Whenever he took a step he staggered. But he stuck to his job hardily. The tomato can moved more jerkily. It carried less water. But it still continued to drench the blazing timbers at the mouth of the tunnel.

So Dave held the tunnel entrance against the fire and against his own racked and tortured men. Occasionally he lay down to breathe the air close to the floor. There was no circulation, for the tunnel ended in a wall face. But the smoke was not so heavy close to the ground.

Man after man succumbed to the stupor of unconsciousness. Men choked, strangled, and even died while their leader, his hair burnt and his eyes almost sightless, face and body raw with agonizing wounds, crept feebly about his business of saving their lives.

Fire-crisped and exhausted, he dropped down at last into forgetfulness of pain. And the flames, which had fought with such savage fury to blot out the little group of men, fell back sullenly in defeat. They had spent themselves and could do no more.

The line of fire had passed over them. It left charred trees still burning, a hillside black and smoking, desolation and ruin in its path.

Out of the prospect hole a man crawled over Dave's prostrate body. He drew a breath of sweet, delicious air. A cool wind lifted the hair from his forehead. He tried to give a cowpuncher's yell of joy. From out of his throat came only a cracked and raucous rumble. The man was Shorty.

He crept back into the tunnel and whispered hoarsely the good news. Men came out on all fours over the bodies of those who could not move. Shorty dragged Dave into the open. He was a sorry sight. The shirt had been almost literally burned from his body.

In the fresh air the men revived quickly. They went back into the cavern and dragged out those of their companions not yet able to help themselves. Three out of the twenty-nine would never help themselves again. They had perished in the tunnel.



CHAPTER XL

A MESSAGE

The women of Malapi responded generously to the call Joyce made upon them to back their men in the fight against the fire in the chaparral. They were simple folk of a generation not far removed from the pioneer one which had settled the country. Some of them had come across the plains in white-topped movers' wagons. Others had lain awake in anxiety on account of raiding Indians on the war-path. All had lived lives of frugal usefulness. It is characteristic of the frontier that its inhabitants help each other without stint when the need for service arises. Now they cooked and baked cheerfully to supply the wants of the fire-fighters.

Joyce was in command of the commissary department. She ordered and issued supplies, checked up the cooked food, and arranged for its transportation to the field of battle. The first shipment went out about the middle of the afternoon of the first day of the fire. A second one left town just after midnight. A third was being packed during the forenoon of the second day.

Though Joyce had been up most of the night, she showed no signs of fatigue. In spite of her slenderness, the girl was possessed of a fine animal vigor. There was vitality in her crisp tread. She was a decisive young woman who got results competently.

A bustling old lady with the glow of winter apples in her wrinkled cheeks remonstrated with her.

"You can't do it all, dearie. If I was you I'd go home and rest now. Take a nice long nap and you'll feel real fresh," she said.

"I'm not tired," replied Joyce. "Not a bit. Think of those poor men out there fighting the fire day and night. I'd be ashamed to quit."

The old lady's eyes admired the clean, fragrant girl packing sandwiches. She sighed, regretfully. Not long since—as her memory measured time—she too had boasted a clear white skin that flushed to a becoming pink on her smooth cheeks when occasion called.

"A—well a—well, dearie, you'll never be young but once. Make ye the most of it," she said, a dream in her faded eyes.

Out of the heart of the girl a full-throated laugh welled. "I'll do just that, Auntie. Then I'll grow some day into a nice old lady like you." Joyce recurred to business in a matter-of-fact voice. "How many more of the ham sandwiches are there, Mrs. Kent?"

About sunset Joyce went home to see that Keith was behaving properly and snatched two hours' sleep while she could. Another shipment of food had to be sent out that night and she did not expect to get to bed till well into the small hours.

Keith was on hand when she awakened to beg for permission to go out to the fire.

"I'll carry water, Joy, to the men. Some one's got to carry it, ain't they, 'n' if I don't mebbe a man'll haf to."

The young mother shook her head decisively. "No, Keithie, you're too little. Grow real fast and you'll be a big boy soon."

"You don't ever lemme have any fun," he pouted. "I gotta go to bed an' sleep an' sleep an' sleep."

She had no time to stay and comfort him. He pulled away sulkily from her good-night kiss and refused to be placated. As she moved away into the darkness, it gave Joyce a tug of the heart to see his small figure on the porch. For she knew that as soon as she was out of sight he would break down and wail.

He did. Keith was of that temperament which wants what it wants when it wants it. After a time his sobs subsided. There wasn't much use crying when nobody was around to pay any attention to him.

He went to bed and to sleep. It was hours later that the voice of some one calling penetrated his dreams. Keith woke up, heard the sound of a knocking on the door, and went to the window. The cook was deaf as a post and would never hear. His sister was away. Perhaps it was a message from his father.

A man stepped out from the house and looked up at him. "Mees Crawford, ees she at home maybeso?" he asked. The man was a Mexican.

"Wait a jiffy. I'll get up," the youngster called back.

He hustled into his clothes, went down, and opened the door.

"The senorita. Ees she at home?" the man asked again.

"She's down to the Boston Emporium cuttin' sandwiches an' packin' 'em," Keith said. "Who wants her?"

"I have a note for her from Senor Sanders."

Master Keith seized his opportunity promptly. "I'll take you down there."

The man brought his horse from the hitching-rack across the road. Side by side they walked downtown, the youngster talking excitedly about the fire, the Mexican either keeping silence or answering with a brief "Si, muchacho."

Into the Boston Emporium Keith raced ahead of the messenger. "Joy, Joy, a man wants to see you! From Dave!" he shouted.

Joyce flushed. Perhaps she would have preferred not to have her private business shouted out before a roomful of women. But she put a good face on it.

"A letter, senorita," the man said, presenting her with a note which he took from his pocket.

The note read:

MISS JOYCE:

Your father has been hurt in the fire. This man will take you to him.

DAVE SANDERS

Joyce went white to the lips and caught at the table to steady herself. "Is—is he badly hurt?" she asked.

The man took refuge in ignorance, as Mexicans do when they do not want to talk. He did not understand English, he said, and when the girl spoke in Spanish he replied sulkily that he did not know what was in the letter. He had been told to deliver it and bring the lady back. That was all.

Keith burst into tears. He wanted to go to his father too, he sobbed.

The girl, badly shaken herself in soul, could not refuse him. If his father was hurt he had a right to be with him.

"You may ride along with me," she said, her lip trembling.

The women gathered round the boy and his sister, expressing sympathy after the universal fashion of their sex. They were kinder and more tender than usual, pressing on them offers of supplies and service. Joyce thanked them, a lump in her throat, but it was plain that the only way in which they could help was to expedite her setting out.

Soon they were on the road, Keith riding behind his sister and clinging to her waist. Joyce had slipped a belt around the boy and fastened it to herself so that he would not fall from the saddle in case he slept. The Mexican rode in complete silence.

For an hour they jogged along the dusty road which led to the new oil field, then swung to the right into the low foothills among which the mountains were rooted.

Joyce was a bit surprised. She asked questions, and again received for answers shrugs and voluble Spanish irrelevant to the matter. The young woman knew that the battle was being fought among the canons leading to the plains. This trail must be a short cut to one of them. She gave up trying to get information from her guide. He was either stupid or sulky; perhaps a little of each.

The hill trail went up and down. It dipped into valleys and meandered round hills. It climbed a mountain spur, slipped through a notch, and plumped sharply into a small mountain park. At the notch the Mexican drew up and pointed a finger. In the dim pre-dawn grayness Joyce could see nothing but a gulf of mist.

"Over there, Senorita, he waits."

"Where?"

"In the arroyo. Come."

They descended, letting the horses pick their way down cautiously through the loose rubble of the steep pitch. The heart of the girl beat fast with anxiety about her father, with the probability that David Sanders would soon come to meet her out of the silence, with some vague prescience of unknown evil clutching at her bosom. There had been growing in Joyce a feeling that something was wrong, something sinister was at work which she did not understand.

A mountain corral took form in the gloom. The Mexican slipped the bars of the gate to let the horses in.

"Is he here?" asked Joyce breathlessly.

The man pointed to a one-room shack huddled on the hillside.

Keith had fallen sound asleep, his head against the girl's back. "Don't wake him when you lift him down," she told the man. "I'll just let him sleep if he will."

The Mexican carried Keith to a pile of sheepskins under a shed and lowered him to them gently. The boy stirred, turned over, but did not awaken.

Joyce ran toward the shack. There was no light in it, no sign of life about the place. She could not understand this. Surely someone must be looking after her father. Whoever this was must have heard her coming. Why had he not appeared at the door? Dave, of course, might be away fighting fire, but someone....

Her heart lost a beat. The shadow of some horrible thing was creeping over her life. Was her father dead? What shock was awaiting her in the cabin?

At the door she raised her voice in a faint, ineffective call. Her knees gave way. She felt her body shaking as with an ague. But she clenched her teeth on the weakness and moved into the room.

It was dark—darker than outdoors. But as her eyes grew accustomed to the absence of light she made out a table, a chair, a stove. From the far side of the room came a gurgle that was half a snore.

"Father," she whispered, and moved forward.

Her outstretched hand groped for the bed and fell on clothing warm with heat transmitted from a human body. At the same time she subconsciously classified a strong odor that permeated the atmosphere. It was whiskey.

The sleeper stirred uneasily beneath her touch. She felt stifled, wanted to shout out her fears in a scream. Far beyond the need of proof she knew now that something was very wrong, though she still could not guess at what the dreadful menace was.

But Joyce had courage. She was what the wind and the sun and a long line of sturdy ancestors had made her. She leaned forward toward the awakening man just as he turned in the bunk.

A hand fell on her wrist and closed, the fingers like bands of iron. Joyce screamed wildly, her nerve swept away in a reaction of terror. She fought like a wildcat, twisting and writhing with all her supple strength to break the grip on her arm.

For she knew now what the evil was that had been tolling a bell of warning in her heart.



CHAPTER XLI

HANK BRINGS BAD NEWS

The change in the wind had cost three lives, but it had saved the Jackpot property and the feed on the range. After the fire in San Jacinto Canon had broken through Hart's defense by its furious and persistent attack, nothing could have prevented it from spreading over the plains on a wild rampage except a cloudburst or a decided shift of wind. This last had come and had driven the flames back on territory already burnt over.

The fire did not immediately die out, but it soon began to dwindle. Only here and there did it leap forward with its old savage fury. Presently these sporadic plunges wore themselves out for lack of fuel. The devastated area became a smouldering, smoking char showing a few isolated blazes in the barren ruin. There were still possibilities of harm in them if the wind should shift again, but for the present they were subdued to a shadow of their former strength. It remained the business of the fire-fighters to keep a close watch on the red-hot embers to prevent them from being flung far by the breeze.

Fortunately the wind died down soon, reducing the danger to a minimum.

Dave handed back to Shorty the revolver he had borrowed so peremptorily from his holster.

"Much obliged. I won't need this any more."

The cowpuncher spoke grimly. "I'm liable to."

"Mexico is a good country for a cattleman," Sanders said, looking straight at him.

Shorty met him eye to eye. "So I've been told."

"Good range and water-holes. Stock fatten well."

"Yes."

"A man might do worse than go there if he's worn out this country."

"Stage-robbers and rustlers right welcome, are they?" asked Shorty hardily.

"No questions asked about a man's past if his present is O.K."

"Listens good. If I meet anybody lookin' to make a change I'll tell him you recommended Mexico." The eyes of the two men still clashed. In each man's was a deep respect for the other's gameness. They had been tried by fire and come through clean. Shorty voiced this defiantly. "I don't like a hair of yore head. Never did. You're too damned interferin' to suit me. But I'll say this. You'll do to ride the river with, Sanders."

"I'll interfere again this far, Shorty. You're too good a man to go bad."

"Oh, hell!" The outlaw turned away; then thought better of it and came back. "I'll name no names, but I'll say this. Far as I'm concerned Tim Harrigan might be alive to-day."

Dave, with a nod, accepted this as true. "I guessed as much. You've been running with a mighty bad pardner."

"Have I?" asked the rustler blandly. "Did I say anything about a pardner?"

His eye fell on the three still figures lying on the hillside in a row. Not a twitching muscle in his face showed what he was thinking, that they might have been full of splendid life and vigor if Dug Doble had not put a match to the chaparral back of Bear Canon. The man had murdered them just as surely as though he had shot them down with a rifle. For weeks Shorty had been getting his affairs in order to leave the country, but before he went he intended to have an accounting with one man.

Dillon came up to Sanders and spoke in an awed voice. "What do you aim to do with ... these, Sanders?" His hand indicated the bodies lying near.

"Send horses up for them," Dave said. "You can take all the men back to camp with you except three to help me watch the fire. Tell Mr. Crawford how things are."

The men crept down the hill like veterans a hundred years old. Ragged, smoke-blackened, and grimy, they moved like automatons. So great was their exhaustion that one or two dropped out of line and lay down on the charred ground to sleep. The desire for it was so overmastering that they could not drive their weighted legs forward.

A man on horseback appeared and rode up to Dave and Shorty. The man was Bob Hart. The red eyes in his blackened face were sunken and his coat hung on him in crisped shreds. He looked down at the bodies lying side by side. His face worked, but he made no verbal comment.

"We piled into a cave. Some of the boys couldn't stand it," Dave explained.

Bob's gaze took in his friend. The upper half of his body was almost naked. Both face and torso were raw with angry burns. Eyebrows had disappeared and eyes were so swollen as to be almost closed. He was gaunt, ragged, unshaven, and bleeding. Shorty, too, appeared to have gone through the wars.

"You boys oughtta have the doc see you," Hart said gently. "He's down at camp now. One of Em's men had an arm busted by a limb of a tree fallin' on him. I've got a coupla casualties in my gang. Two or three of 'em runnin' a high fever. Looks like they may have pneumonia, doc says. Lungs all inflamed from swallowin' smoke.... You take my hawss and ride down to camp, Dave. I'll stick around here till the old man sends a relief."

"No, you go down and report to him, Bob. If Crawford has any fresh men I'd like mine relieved. They've been on steady for 'most two days and nights. Four or five can hold the fire here. All they need do is watch it."

Hart did not argue. He knew how Dave stuck to a thing like a terrier to a rat. He would not leave the ground till orders came from Emerson Crawford.

"Lemme go an' report," suggested Shorty. "I wanta get my bronc an' light out pronto. Never can tell when Applegate might drap around an' ask questions. Me, I'm due in the hills."

"All right," agreed Bob. "See Crawford himself, Shorty."

The outlaw pulled himself to the saddle and cantered off.

"Best man in my gang," Dave said, following him with his eyes. "There to a finish and never a whimper out of him. Dragged a man out of the fire when he might have been hustling for his own skin."

"Shorty's game," admitted Hart. "Pity he went bad."

"Yes. He told me he didn't kill Harrigan."

"Reckon Dug did that. More like him."

Half an hour later the relief came. Hart, Dave, and the three fire-fighters who had stayed to watch rode back to camp.

Crawford had lost his voice. He had already seen Hart since the fire had subsided, so his greeting was to Sanders.

"Good work, son," he managed to whisper, a quaver in his throat. "I'd rather we'd lost the whole works than to have had that happen to the boys, a hundred times rather. I reckon it must 'a' been mighty bad up there when the back-fire caught you. The boys have been tellin' me. You saved all their lives, I judge."

"I happened to know where the cave was."

"Yes." Crawford's whisper was sadly ironic. "Well, I'm sure glad you happened to know that. If you hadn't...." The old cattleman gave a little gesture that completed the sentence. The tragedy that had taken place had shaken his soul. He felt in a way responsible.

"If the doc ain't busy now, I reckon Dave could use him," Bob said. "I reckon he needs a li'l' attention. Then I'm ready for grub an' a sleep twice round the clock. If any one asks me, I'm sure enough dead beat. I don't ever want to look at a shovel again."

"Doc's fixin' up Lanier's burnt laig. He'd oughtta be through soon now. I'll have him 'tend to Dave's burns right away then," said Crawford. He turned to Sanders. "How about it, son? You sure look bunged up pretty bad."

"I'm about all in," admitted Dave. "Reckon we all are. Shorty gone yet?"

"Yes. Lit out after he'd made a report. Said he had an engagement to meet a man. Expect he meant he had an engagement not to meet the sheriff. I rec'lect when Shorty was a mighty promisin' young fellow before Brad Steelman got a-holt of him. He punched cows for me twenty years ago. He hadn't took the wrong turn then. You cayn't travel crooked trails an' not reach a closed pocket o' the hills sometime."

For several minutes they had heard the creaking of a wagon working up an improvised road toward the camp. Now it moved into sight. The teamster called to Crawford.

"Here's another load o' grub, boss. Miss Joyce she rustled up them canteens you was askin' for."

Crawford stepped over to the wagon. "Don't reckon we'll need the canteens, Hank, but we can use the grub fine. The fire's about out."

"That's bully. Say, I got news for you, Mr. Crawford. Brad Steelman's dead. They found him in his house, shot plumb through the head. I reckon he won't do you any more meanness."

"Who killed him?"

"They ain't sayin'," returned the teamster cautiously. "Some folks was guessin' that mebbe Dug Doble could tell, but there ain't any evidence far's I know. Whoever it was robbed the safe."

The old cattleman made no comment. From the days of their youth Steelman had been his bitter enemy, but death had closed the account between them. His mind traveled back to those days twenty-five years ago when he and the sheepman had both hitched their horses in front of Helen Radcliff's home. It had been a fair fight between them, and he had won as a man should. But Brad had not taken his defeat as a man should. He had nourished bitterness and played his successful rival many a mean despicable trick. Out of these had grown the feud between them. Crawford did not know how it had come about, but he had no doubt Steelman had somehow fallen a victim in the trap he had been building for others.

A question brought his mind back to the present. The teamster was talking: "... so she started pronto. I s'pose you wasn't as bad hurt as Sanders figured."

"What's that?" asked Crawford.

"I was sayin' Miss Joyce she started right away when the note come from Sanders."

"What note?"

"The one tellin' how you was hurt in the fire."

Crawford turned. "Come here, Dave," he called hoarsely.

Sanders moved across.

"Hank says you sent a note to Joyce sayin' I'd been hurt. What about it?"

"Why would I do that when you're not hurt?"

"Then you didn't?"

"Of course not," answered Dave, perplexed.

"Some one's been stringin' you, Hank," said Crawford, smiling.

The teamster scratched his head. "No, sir. I was there when she left. About twelve o'clock last night, mebbe later."

"But Sanders says he didn't send a note, and Joyce didn't come here. So you must 'a' missed connections somewhere."

"Probably you saw her start for home," suggested Dave.

Hank stuck to his guns. "No, sir. She was on that sorrel of hers, an' Keith was ridin' behind her. I saddled myself and took the horse to the store. They was waitin' there for me, the two young folks an' Juan."

"Juan?"

"Juan Otero. He brought the note an' rode back with her."

The old cattleman felt a clutch of fear at his heart. Juan Otero was one of Dug Doble's men.

"That all you know, Hank?"

"That's all. Miss Joyce said for me to get this wagonload of grub out soon as I could. So I come right along."

"Doble been seen in town lately?" asked Dave.

"Not as I know of. Shorty has."

"Shorty ain't in this."

"Do you reckon—?"

Sanders cut the teamster short. "Some of Doble's work. But I don't see why he sent for Keith too."

"He didn't. Keith begged to go along an' Miss Joyce took him."

In the haggard, unshaven face of the cattleman Dave read the ghastly fear of his own soul. Doble was capable of terrible evil. His hatred, jealousy, and passion would work together to poison his mind. The corners of his brain had always been full of lust and obscenity. There was this difference between him and Shorty. The squat cowpuncher was a clean scoundrel. A child, a straight girl, an honest woman, would be as safe with him as with simple-hearted old Buck Byington. But Dug Doble—it was impossible to predict what he would do. He had a vein of caution in his make-up, but when in drink he jettisoned this and grew ugly. His vanity—always a large factor in determining his actions—might carry him in the direction of decency or the reverse.

"I'm glad Keith's with her," said Hart, who had joined the group. "With Keith and the Mexican there—" His meaning did not need a completed sentence.

"Question is, where did he take her," said Crawford. "We might comb the hills a week and not find his hole. I wish to God Shorty was still here. He might know."

"He's our best bet, Bob," agreed Dave. "Find him. He's gone off somewhere to sleep. Rode away less than half an hour since."

"Which way?"

"Rode toward Bear Canon," said Crawford.

"That's a lead for you, Bob. Figure it out. He's done—completely worn out. So he won't go far—not more than three-four miles. He'll be in the hills, under cover somewhere, for he won't forget that thousand dollars reward. So he'll be lying in the chaparral. That means he'll be above where the fire started. If I was looking for him, I'd say somewhere back of Bear, Cattle, or San Jacinto would be the likeliest spot."

"Good guess, Dave. Somewheres close to water," said Bob. "You goin' along with me?"

"No. Take as many men as you can get. I'm going back, if I can, to find the place where Otero and Miss Joyce left the road. Mr. Crawford, you'd better get back to town, don't you think? There may be clues there we don't know anything about here. Perhaps Miss Joyce may have got back."

"If not, I'll gather a posse to rake the hills, Dave. If that villain's hurt my li'l' girl or Keith—" Crawford's whisper broke. He turned away to conceal the working of his face.

"He hasn't," said Bob with decision. "Dug ain't crazy even if his actions look like it. I've a notion when Mr. Crawford gets back to town Miss Joyce will be there all right. Like as not Dug brought her back himself. Maybe he sent for her just to brag awhile. You know Dug."

That was the worst of it, so far as any allaying of their fear went. They did know Doble. They knew him for a thorough black-hearted scoundrel who might stop at nothing.

The three men moved toward the remuda. None of them had slept for forty-eight hours. They had been through a grueling experience that had tried soul and body to the limit. But none of them hesitated for an instant. They belonged to the old West which answers the call no matter what the personal cost. There was work to do. Not one of them would quit as long as he could stick to the saddle.



CHAPTER XLII

SHORTY IS AWAKENED

The eyes that looked into those of Joyce in the gloom of the cabin abruptly shook off sleep. They passed from an amazed incredulity to a malicious triumph.

"So you've come to old Dug, have you, my pretty?" a heavy voice jeered.

The girl writhed and twisted regardless of the pain, exerting every muscle of the strong young arm and shoulder. As well she might have tried to beat down an iron door with her bare hands as to hope for escape from his strong grip. He made a motion to draw her closer. Joyce flung herself back and sank down beside the bunk, straining away.

"Let me go!" she cried, terror rampant in her white face. "Don't touch me! Let me go!"

The force of her recoil had drawn him to his side. His cruel, mirthless grin seemed to her to carry inexpressible menace. Very slowly, while his eyes taunted her, he pulled her manacled wrist closer.

There was a swift flash of white teeth. With a startled oath Doble snatched his arm away. Savage as a tigress, Joyce had closed her teeth on his forearm.

She fell back, got to her feet, and fled from the house. Doble was after her on the instant. She dodged round a tree, doubled on her course, then deflected toward the corral. Swift and supple though she was, his long strides brought him closer. Again she screamed.

Doble caught her. She fought in his arms, a prey to wild and unreasoning terror.

"You young hell-cat, I'm not gonna hurt you," he said. "What's the use o' actin' crazy?"

He could have talked to the waves of the sea with as much effect. It is doubtful if she heard him.

There was a patter of rapid feet. A small body hurled itself against Doble's leg and clung there, beating his thigh with a valiant little fist.

"You le' my sister go! You le' my sister go!" the boy shouted, repeating the words over and over.

Doble looked down at Keith. "What the hell?" he demanded, amazed.

The Mexican came forward and spoke in Spanish rapidly. He explained that he could not have prevented the boy from coming without arousing the suspicions of his sister and her friends.

The outlaw was irritated. All this clamor of fear annoyed and disturbed him. This was not the scene he had planned in his drink-inspired reveries. There had been a time when Joyce had admired the virile force of him, when she had let herself be kind to him under the impression she was influencing him for his good. He had misunderstood the reaction of her mind and supposed that if he could get her away from the influence of her father and the rest of his enemies, she would again listen to what he called reason.

"All right. You brought the brat here without orders. Now take him home again," directed Doble harshly.

Otero protested fluently, with gestures eloquent. He had not yet been paid for his services. By this time Malapi might be too hot for him. He did not intend ever to go back. He was leaving the country pronto—muy pronto. The boy could go back when his sister went.

"His sister's not going back. Soon as it gets dark we'll travel south. She's gonna be my wife. You can take the kid back to the road an' leave him there."

Again the Mexican lifted hands and shoulders while he pattered volubly, trying to make himself heard above the cries of the child. Dug had silenced Joyce by the simple expedient of clapping his big hand over her mouth.

Doble's other hand went into his pocket. He drew out a flat package of currency bound together with rubber bands. His sharp teeth drew off one of the rubbers. From the bundle he stripped four fifty-dollar bills and handed them to Otero.

"Peel this kid off'n my leg and hit the trail, Juan. I don' care where you leave him so long as you keep an eye on him till afternoon."

With difficulty the Mexican dragged the boy from his hold on Doble and carried him to a horse. He swung to the saddle, dragged Keith up in front of him, and rode away at a jog-trot. The youngster was screaming at the top of his lungs.

As his horse climbed toward the notch, Otero looked back. Doble had picked up his prisoner and was carrying her into the house.

The Mexican formulated his plans. He must get out of the country before the hue and cry started. He could not count on more than a few hours before the chase began. First, he must get rid of the child. Then he wanted to go to a certain tendejon where he would meet his sweetheart and say good-bye to her.

It was all very well for Doble to speak of taking him to town or to the road. Juan meant to do neither. He would leave him in the hills above the Jackpot and show him the way down there, after which he would ride to meet the girl who was waiting for him. This would give him time enough to get away safely. It was no business of his whether or not Doble was taken. He was an overbearing brute, anyhow.

An hour's riding through the chaparral brought him to the watershed far above the Jackpot. Otero picked his way to the upper end of a gulch.

"Leesten, muchacho. Go down—down—down. First the gulch, then a canon, then the Jackpot. You go on thees trail."

He dropped the boy to the ground, watched him start, then turned away at a Spanish trot.

The trail was a rough and precipitous one. Stumbling as he walked, Keith went sobbing down the gulch. He had wept himself out, and his sobs had fallen to a dry hiccough. A forlorn little chap, tired and sleepy, he picked his way among the mesquite, following the path along the dry creek bed. The catclaw tore his stockings and scratched him. Stone bruises hurt his tender feet. He kept traveling, because he was afraid to give up.

He reached the junction of the gulch and the canon. A small stream, which had survived the summer drought, trickled down the bed of the latter. Through tangled underbrush Keith crept to the water. He lay down and drank, after which he sat on a rock and pitied himself. In five minutes he would have been asleep if a sound had not startled him. Some one was snoring on the other side of a mesquite thicket.

Keith jumped up, pushed his way through, and almost stumbled over a sleeping man. He knelt down and began to shake the snorer. The man did not awaken. The foghorn in his throat continued to rumble intermittently, now in crescendo, now in diminuendo.

"Wake up, man!" Keith shouted in his ear in the interval between shakes.

The sleeper was a villainous-looking specimen. His face and throat were streaked with black. There was an angry wheal across his cheek. One of the genus tramp would have scorned his charred clothes. Keith cared for none of these details. He wanted to unload his troubles to a "grown-up."

The youngster roused the man at last by throwing water in his face. Shorty sat up, at the same time dragging out a revolver. His gaze fastened on the boy, after one swift glance round.

"Who's with you, kid?" he demanded.

Keith began to sniffle. "Nobody."

"Whadya doin' here?"

"I want my daddy."

"Who is yore daddy? What's yore name?"

"Keith Crawford."

Shorty bit off an oath of surprise. "Howcome you here?"

"A man brought me."

The rustler brushed the cobwebs of sleep from his eyes and brain. He had come up here to sleep undisturbed through the day and far into the night. Before he had had two hours of rest this boy had dragged him back from slumber. He was prepared to be annoyed, but he wanted to make sure of the facts first.

As far as he understood them, the boy told the story of the night's adventures. Shorty's face grew grim. He appreciated the meaning back of them far better than the little fellow. Keith's answers to his questions told him that the men figuring in the episode must be Doble and Otero. Though the child was a little mixed as to the direction from which Otero had brought him, the man was pretty sure of the valley where Doble was lying hid.

He jumped to his feet. "We'll go, kid."

"To daddy?"

"Not right away. We got hurry-up business first."

"I wanta go to my daddy."

"Sure. Soon as we can. But we'll drift over to where yore sister's at first off. We're both wore to a frazzle, mebbe, but we got to trail over an' find out what's bitin' Dug."

The man saddled and took the up-trail, Keith clinging to his waist. At the head of the gulch the boy pointed out the way he and Otero had come. This confirmed Shorty's opinion as to the place where Doble was to be found.

With the certainty of one who knew these hills as a preacher does his Bible, Shorty wound in and out, always moving by the line of least resistance. He was steadily closing the gap of miles that separated him from Dug Doble.



CHAPTER XLIII

JUAN OTERO IS CONSCRIPTED

Crawford and Sanders rode rapidly toward Malapi. They stopped several times to examine places where they thought it possible Otero might have left the road, but they looked without expectation of any success. They did not even know that the Mexican had started in this direction. As soon as he reached the suburbs, he might have cut back across the plain and followed an entirely different line of travel.

Several miles from town Sanders pulled up. "I'm going back for a couple of miles. Bob was telling me of a Mexican tendejon in the hills kept by the father of a girl Otero goes to see. She might know where he is. If I can get hold of him likely I can make him talk."

This struck Crawford as rather a wild-goose chase, but he had nothing better to offer himself in the way of a plan.

"Might as well," he said gloomily. "I don't reckon you'll find him. But you never can tell. Offer the girl a big reward if she'll tell where Doble is. I'll hustle to town and send out posses."

They separated. Dave rode back up the road, swung off at the place Hart had told him of, and turned up a valley which pushed to the roots of the hills. The tendejon was a long, flat-roofed adobe building close to the trail.

Dave walked through the open door into the bar-room. Two or three men were lounging at a table. Behind a counter a brown-eyed Mexican girl was rinsing glasses in a pail of water.

The young man sauntered forward to the counter. He invited the company to drink with him.

"I'm looking for Juan Otero," he said presently. "Mr. Crawford wanted me to see him about riding for him."

There was a moment's silence. All of those present were Mexicans except Dave. The girl flashed a warning look at her countrymen. That look, Sanders guessed at once, would seal the lips of all of them. At once he changed his tactics. What information he got would have to come directly through the girl. He signaled her to join him outside.

Presently she did so. The girl was a dusky young beauty, plump as a partridge, with the soft-eyed charm of her age and race.

"The senor wants to see me?" she asked.

Her glance held a flash of mockery. She had seen many dirty, poverty-stricken mavericks of humanity, but never a more battered specimen than this gaunt, hollow-eyed tramp, black as a coal-heaver, whose flesh showed grimy with livid wounds through the shreds of his clothing. But beneath his steady look the derision died. Tattered his coat and trousers might be. At least he was a prince in adversity. The head on the splendid shoulders was still finely poised. He gave an impression of indomitable strength.

"I want Juan Otero," he said.

"To ride for Senor Crawford." Her white teeth flashed and she lifted her pretty shoulders in a shrug of mock regret. "Too bad he is not here. Some other day—"

"—will not do. I want him now."

"But I have not got him hid."

"Where is he? I don't want to harm him, but I must know. He took Joyce Crawford into the hills last night to Dug Doble—pretended her father had been hurt and he had been sent to lead her to him. I must save her—from Doble, not from Otero. Help me. I will give you money—a hundred dollars, two hundred."

She stared at him. "Did Juan do that?" she murmured.

"Yes. You know Doble. He's a devil. I must find him ... soon."

"Juan has not been here for two days. I do not know where he is."

The dust of a moving horse was traveling toward them from the hills. A Mexican pulled up and swung from the saddle. The girl called a greeting to him quickly before he could speak. "Buenos dios, Manuel. My father is within, Manuel."

The man looked at her a moment, murmured "Buenos, Bonita," and took a step as though to enter the house.

Dave barred the way. The flash of apprehension in Bonita's face, her unnecessary repetition of the name, the man's questioning look at her, told Sanders that this was the person he wanted.

"Just a minute, Otero. Where did you leave Miss Crawford?"

The Mexican's eyes contracted. To give himself time he fell again into the device of pretending that he did not understand English. Dave spoke in Spanish. The loafers in the bar-room came out to listen.

"I do not know what you mean."

"Don't lie to me. Where is she?"

The keeper of the tendejon asked a suave question. He, too, talked in Spanish. "Who are you, senor? A deputy sheriff, perhaps?"

"No. My name is Dave Sanders. I'm Emerson Crawford's friend. If Juan will help me save the girl he'll get off light and perhaps make some money. I'll stand by him. But if he won't, I'll drag him back to Malapi and give him to a mob."

The sound of his name was a potent weapon. His fame had spread like wildfire through the hills since his return from Colorado. He had scored victory after victory against bad men without firing a gun. He had made the redoubtable Dug Doble an object of jeers and had driven him to the hills as an outlaw. Dave was unarmed. They could see that. But his quiet confidence was impressive. If he said he would take Juan to Malapi with him, none of them doubted he would do it. Had he not dragged Miller back to justice—Miller who was a killer of unsavory reputation?

Otero wished he had not come just now to see Bonita, but he stuck doggedly to his statement. He knew nothing about it, nothing at all.

"Crawford is sending out a dozen posses. They will close the passes. Doble will be caught. They will kill him like a wolf. Then they will kill you. If they don't find him, they will kill you anyhow."

Dave spoke evenly, without raising his voice. Somehow he made what he said seem as inevitable as fate.

Bonita caught her lover by the arm and shoulder. She was afraid, and her conscience troubled her vicariously for his wrongdoing.

"Why did you do it, Juan?" she begged of him.

"He said she wanted to come, that she would marry him if she had a chance. He said her father kept her from him," the man pleaded. "I didn't know he was going to harm her."

"Where is he? Take me to him, quick," said Sanders, relapsing into English.

"Si, senor. At once," agreed Otero, thoroughly frightened.

"I want a six-shooter. Some one lend me one."

None of them carried one, but Bonita ran into the house and brought back a small bulldog. Dave looked it over without enthusiasm. It was a pretty poor concern to take against a man who carried two forty-fives and knew how to use them. But he thrust it into his pocket and swung to the saddle. It was quite possible he might be killed by Doble, but he had a conviction that the outlaw had come to the end of the passage. He was going to do justice on the man once for all. He regarded this as a certainty.



CHAPTER XLIV

THE BULLDOG BARKS

Joyce fainted for the first time in her life.

When she recovered consciousness Doble was splashing water in her face. She was lying on the bunk from which she had fled a few minutes earlier. The girl made a motion to rise and he put a heavy hand on her shoulder.

"Keep your hand off me!" she cried.

"Don't be a fool," he told her irritably. "I ain't gonna hurt you none—if you behave reasonable:"

"Let me go," she demanded, and struggled to a sitting position on the couch. "You let me go or my father—"

"What'll he do?" demanded the man brutally. "I've stood a heap from that father of yore's. I reckon this would even the score even if I hadn't—" He pulled up, just in time to keep from telling her that he had fired the chaparral. He was quite sober enough to distrust his tongue. It was likely, he knew, to let out some things that had better not be told.

She tried to slip by him and he thrust her back.

"Let me go!" she demanded. "At once!"

"You're not gonna go," he told her flatly. "You'll stay here—with me. For keeps. Un'erstand?"

"Have you gone crazy?" she asked wildly, her heart fluttering like a frightened bird in a cage. "Don't you know my father will search the whole country for me?"

"Too late. We travel south soon as it's dark." He leaned forward and put a hand on her knee, regardless of the fact that she shrank back quivering from his touch. "Listen, girl. You been a high-stepper. Yore heels click mighty loud when they hit the sidewalk. Good enough. Go far as you like. I never did fancy the kind o' women that lick a man's hand. But you made one mistake. I'm no doormat, an' nobody alive can wipe their feet on me. You turned me down cold. You had the ol' man kick me outa my job as foreman of the ranch. I told him an' you both I'd git even. But I don't aim to rub it in. I'm gonna give you a chance to be Mrs. Doble. An' when you marry me you git a man for a husband."

"I'll never marry you! Never! I'd rather be dead in my grave!" she broke out passionately.

He went to the table, poured himself a drink, and gulped it down. His laugh was sinister and mirthless.

"Please yorese'f, sweetheart," he jeered. "Only you won't be dead in yore grave. You'll be keepin' house for Dug Doble. I'm not insistin' on weddin' bells none. But women have their fancies an' I aim to be kind. Take 'em or leave 'em."

She broke down and wept, her face in her hands. In her sheltered life she had known only decent, clean-minded people. She did not know how to cope with a man like this. The fear of him rose in her throat and choked her. This dreadful thing he threatened could not be, she told herself. God would not permit it. He would send her father or Dave Sanders or Bob Hart to rescue her. And yet—when she looked at the man, big, gross, dominant, flushed with drink and his triumph—the faith in her became a weak and fluid stay for her soul. She collapsed like a child and sobbed.

Her wild alarm annoyed him. He was angered at her uncontrollable shudders when he drew near. There was a savage desire in him to break through the defense of her helplessness once for all. But his caution urged delay. He must give her time to get accustomed to the idea of him. She had sense enough to see that she must make the best of the business. When the terror lifted from her mind she would be reasonable.

He repeated again that he was not going to hurt her if she met him halfway, and to show good faith went out and left her alone.

The man sat down on a chopping-block outside and churned his hatred of Sanders and Crawford. He spurred himself with drink, under its influence recalling the injuries they had done him. His rage and passion simmered, occasionally exploded into raucous curses. Once he strode into the house, full of furious intent, but the eyes of the girl daunted him. They looked at him as they might have looked at a tiger padding toward her.

He flung out of the house again, snarling at his own weakness. There was something in him stronger than passion, stronger than his reckless will, that would not let him lay a hand on her in the light of day. His bloodshot eyes looked for the sun. In a few hours now it would be dark.

While he lounged sullenly on the chopping-block, shoulders and head sunken, a sound brought him to alert attention. A horseman was galloping down the slope on the other side of the valley.

Doble eased his guns to make sure of them. Intently he watched the approaching figure. He recognized the horse, Chiquito, and then, with an oath, the rider. His eyes gleamed with evil joy. At last! At last he and Dave Sanders would settle accounts. One of them would be carried out of the valley feet first.

Sanders leaped to the ground at the same instant that he pulled Chiquito up. The horse was between him and his enemy.

The eyes of the men crossed in a long, level look.

"Where's Joyce Crawford?" asked Dave.

"That yore business?" Doble added to his retort the insult unmentionable.

"I'm makin' it mine. What have you done with her?" The speech of the younger man took on again the intonation of earlier days. "I'm here to find out."

A swish of skirts, a soft patter of feet, and Joyce was beside her friend, clinging to him, weeping in his arms.

Doble moved round in a wide circumference. When shooting began he did not want his foe to have the protection of the horse's body. Not even for the beat of a lid did the eyes of either man lift from the other.

"Go back to the house, Joyce," said Dave evenly. "I want to talk with this man alone."

The girl clung the tighter to him. "No, Dave, no! It's been ... awful."

The outlaw drew his long-barreled six-shooter, still circling the group. He could not fire without running a risk of hitting Joyce.

"Hidin' behind a woman, are you?" he taunted, and again flung the epithet men will not tolerate.

At any moment he might fire. Dave caught the wrists of the girl, dragged them down from his neck, and flung her roughly from him to the ground. He pulled out his little bulldog.

Doble fired and Dave fell. The outlaw moved cautiously closer, exultant at his marksmanship. His enemy lay still, the pistol in his hand. Apparently Sanders had been killed at the first shot.

"Come to git me with that popgun, did you? Hmp! Fat chance." The bad man fired again, still approaching very carefully.

Round the corner of the house a man had come. He spoke quickly. "Turn yore gun this way, Dug."

It was Shorty. His revolver flashed at the same instant. Doble staggered, steadied himself, and fired.

The forty-fives roared. Yellow flames and smoke spurted. The bulldog barked. Dave's parlor toy had come into action.

Out of the battle Shorty and Sanders came erect and uninjured. Doble was lying on the ground, his revolver smoking a foot or two from the twitching, outstretched hand.

The outlaw was dead before Shorty turned him over. A bullet had passed through the heart. Another had struck him on the temple, a third in the chest.

"We got him good," said Shorty. "It was comin' to him. I reckon you don't know that he fired the chaparral on purpose. Wanted to wipe out the Jackpot, I s'pose. Yes, Dug sure had it comin' to him."

Dave said nothing. He looked down at the man, eyes hard as jade, jaw clamped tight. He knew that but for Shorty's arrival he would probably be lying there himself.

"I was aimin' to shoot it out with him before I heard of this last scullduggery. Soon as the kid woke me I hustled up my intentions." The bad man looked at Dave's weapon with the flicker of a smile on his face. "He called it a popgun. I took notice it was a right busy li'l' plaything. But you got yore nerve all right. I'd say you hadn't a chance in a thousand. You played yore hand fine, keelin' over so's he'd come clost enough for you to get a crack at him. At that, he'd maybe 'a' got you if I hadn't drapped in."

"Yes," said Sanders.

He walked across to the corral fence, where Joyce sat huddled against the lower bars.

She lifted her head and looked at him from wan eyes out of which the life had been stricken. They stared at him in dumb, amazed questioning.

Dave lifted her from the ground.

"I... I thought you... were dead," she whispered.

"Not even powder-burnt. His six-shooter outranged mine. I was trying to get him closer."

"Is he...?"

"Yes. He'll never trouble any of us again."

She shuddered in his arms.

Dave ached for her in every tortured nerve. He did not know, and it was not his place to ask, what price she had had to pay.

Presently she told him, not in words, without knowing what he was suffering for her. A ghost of a smile touched her eyes.

"I knew you would come. It's all right now."

His heart leaped. "Yes, it's all right, Joyce."

She recurred to her fears for him. "You're not ... hiding any wounds from me? I saw you fall and lie there while he shot at you."

"He never touched me."

She disengaged herself from his arms and looked at him, wan, haggard, unshaven, eyes sunken, a tattered wretch scarred with burns.

"What have you done to yourself?" she asked, astonished at his appearance.

"Souvenirs of the fire," he told her. "They'll wash and wear off. Don't suppose I look exactly pretty."

He had never looked so handsome in her eyes.



CHAPTER XLV

JOYCE MAKES PIES

Juan Otero carried the news back to Malapi. He had been waiting on the crest of the hill to see the issue of the adventure and had come forward when Dave gave him a signal.

Shorty brought Keith in from where he had left the boy in the brush. The youngster flew into his sister's arms. They wept over each other and she petted him with caresses and little kisses.

Afterward she made some supper from the supplies Doble had laid in for his journey south. The men went down to the creek, where they bathed and washed their wounds. Darkness had not yet fallen when they went to sleep, all of them exhausted by the strain through which they had passed.

Not until the cold crystal dawn did they awaken. Joyce was the first up. She had breakfast well under way before she had Keith call the still sleeping men. With the power of quick recuperation which an outdoor life had given them, both Shorty and Dave were fit for any exertion again, though Sanders was still suffering from his burns.

After they had eaten they saddled. Shorty gave them a casual nod of farewell.

"Tell Applegate to look me up in Mexico if he wants me," he said.

Joyce would not let it go at that. She made him shake hands. He was in the saddle, and her eyes lifted to his and showered gratitude on him.

"We'll never forget you—never," she promised. "And we do so hope you'll be prosperous and happy."

He grinned down at her sheepishly. "Same to you, Miss," he said; and added, with a flash of audacity, "To you and Dave both."

He headed south, the others north.

From the hilltop Dave looked back at the squat figure steadily diminishing with distance. Shorty was moving toward Mexico, unhasting and with a certain sureness of purpose characteristic of him.

Joyce smiled. It was the first signal of unquenchable youth she had flashed since she had been trapped into this terrible adventure. "I believe you admire him, Dave," she mocked. "You're just as grateful to him as I am, but you won't admit it. He's not a bad man at all, really."

"He's a good man gone bad. But I'll say this for Shorty. He's some man. He'll do to ride the river with."

"Yes."

"At the fire he was the best fighter in my gang—saved one of the boys at the risk of his own life. Shorty's no quitter."

She shut her teeth on a little wave of emotion. Then, "I'm awful sorry for him," she said.

He nodded appreciation of her feeling. "I know, but you don't need to worry any. He'll not worry about himself. He's sufficient, and he'll get along."

They put their horses to the trail again.

Crawford met them some miles nearer town. He had been unable to wait for their arrival. Neither he nor the children could restrain their emotion at sight of each other. Dave felt they might like to be alone and he left the party, to ride across to the tendejon with Bonita's bulldog revolver.

That young woman met him in front of the house. She was eager for news. Sanders told her what had taken place. They spoke in her tongue.

"And Juan—is it all right about him?" she asked.

"Juan has wiped the slate clean. Mr. Crawford wants to know when Bonita is to be married. He has a wedding present for her."

She was all happy smiles when he left her.

Late that afternoon Bob Hart reached town. He and Dave were alone in the Jackpot offices when the latter forced himself to open a subject that had always been closed between them. Sanders came to it reluctantly. No man had ever found a truer friend than he in Bob Hart. The thing he was going to do seemed almost like a stab in the back.

"How about you and Joyce, Bob?" he asked abruptly.

The eyes of the two met and held. "What about us, Dave?"

"It's like this," Sanders said, flushed and embarrassed. "You were here first. You're entitled to first chance. I meant to keep out of it, but things have come up in spite of me. I want to do whatever seems right to you. My idea is to go away till—till you've settled how you stand with her. Is that fair?"

Bob smiled, ruefully. "Fair enough, old-timer. But no need of it. I never had a chance with Joyce, not a dead man's look-in. Found that out before ever you came home. The field's clear far as I'm concerned. Hop to it an' try yore luck."

Dave took his advice, within the hour. He found Joyce at home in the kitchen. She was making pies energetically. The sleeves of her dress were rolled up to the elbows and there was a dab of flour on her temple where she had brushed back a rebellious wisp of hair.

She blushed prettily at sight of her caller. "I didn't know it was you when I called to come in. Thought it was Keith playing a trick on me."

Both of them were embarrassed. She did not know what to do with him in the kitchen and he did not know what to do with himself. The girl was acutely conscious that yesterday she had flung herself into his arms without shame.

"I'll go right on with my pies if you don't mind," she said. "I can talk while I work."

"Yes."

But neither of them talked. She rolled pie-crust while the silence grew significant.

"Are your burns still painful?" she asked at last, to make talk.

"Yes—no. Beg pardon, I—I was thinking of something else."

Joyce flashed one swift look at him. She knew that an emotional crisis was upon her. He was going to brush aside the barriers between them. Her pulses began to beat fast. There was the crash of music in her blood.

"I've got to tell you, Joyce," he said abruptly. "It's been a fight for me ever since I came home. I love you. I think I always have—even when I was in prison."

She waited, the eyes in her lovely, flushed face shining.

"I had no right to think of you then," he went on. "I kept away from you. I crushed down hope. I nursed my bitterness to prove to me there could never be anything between us. Then Miller confessed and—and we took our walk over the hills. After that the sun shone. I came out from the mists where I had been living."

"I'm glad," she said in a low voice. "But Miller's confession made no difference in my thought of you. I didn't need that to know you."

"But I couldn't come to you even then. I knew how Bob Hart felt, and after all he'd done for me it was fair he should have first chance."

She looked at him, smiling shyly. "You're very generous."

"No. I thought you cared for him. It seemed to me any woman must. There aren't many men like Bob."

"Not many," she agreed. "But I couldn't love Bob because"—her steadfast eyes met his bravely—"because of another man. Always have loved him, ever since that night years ago when he saved my father's life. Do you really truly love me, Dave?"

"God knows I do," he said, almost in a whisper.

"I'm glad—oh, awf'ly glad." She gave him her hands, tears in her soft brown eyes. "Because I've been waiting for you so long. I didn't know whether you ever were coming to me."

Crawford found them there ten minutes later. He was looking for Joyce to find him a collar-button that was missing.

"Dawggone my hide!" he fumed, and stopped abruptly, the collar-button forgotten.

Joyce flew out of Dave's arms into her father's.

"Oh, Daddy, Daddy, I'm so happy," she whispered from the depths of his shoulder.

The cattleman looked at Dave, and his rough face worked. "Boy, you're in luck. Be good to her, or I'll skin you alive." He added, by way of softening this useless threat, "I'd rather it was you than anybody on earth, Dave."

The young man looked at her, his Joy-in-life, the woman who had brought him back to youth and happiness, and he answered with a surge of emotion:

"I'll sure try."

THE END