"Oh, I'm so sorry," said Helen, with intense relief.

"I don't know where she went either," the mother went on. "She was out for a few minutes soon after you left, Gordon. Then she came back and called out something to me, but I didn't catch what she said. Before I knew what she was doing she had saddled her pony and ridden off. But come right in. I don't think she'll be gone long."

They entered and Helen, graciously choosing to overlook the fact that this was evidently Wade's second visit there within a very short time, sought to impress him with her tactfulness to Mrs. Purnell. She would have been amazed could she have guessed that she was actually arousing him to resentment. He felt, somehow, that she was patronizing their hostess, who was a woman of refinement, even if she lacked the artificiality of manner that Helen affected. He was sincerely glad when the visit came to an end.

"You must come again," said Mrs. Purnell, in a spirit of friendliness.

"So glad to have met you," Helen replied. "I hope to have the pleasure of meeting your daughter, too, before we leave Crawling Water."

"They're splendid women, both of them," Wade remarked, as they walked back toward the center of the town.

"Oh, yes," Helen agreed, without much spirit. "Nice, comfortable home people, I suppose."

"Best kind in the world."

"Gordon!" Helen laughed good-naturedly, facing him as she walked. "What in the world has been the matter with you to-day? We usually get on so well together, and to-day, if I do say it, only my unwillingness to quarrel has kept us from it."

"Oh, no!" He smiled, too. "Maybe that New York and London business rubbed me the wrong way; that's all. I have plenty of faults, but I'm loyal to my friends. I don't like even hints that they aren't the best friends a man could have."

"Surely, I haven't...."

"Maybe not. Maybe I imagined it. But Crawling Water is a lot more real than London, to my way of thinking."

"You haven't been to London."

"I'm not likely to go, either," he retorted.

Her red lips curled in a way that seemed to indicate that she thought he would go. Already, she was planning to get him out of Crawling Water and beyond the influence of Dorothy Purnell.

As they turned into the main street again, a man leaving a group near the livery stable, and mounting a horse, rode toward them.

"I wonder what's up now?" Wade muttered, recognizing the horseman as one of the Trowbridge outfit.

"Mr. Wade. Just a minute." With the grace of a Centaur, the rider swung his mount in beside them and doffed his hat. "Two of Jensen's herders have been shot. I thought you ought to know about it."

"What?" The ranch owner's jaw dropped at the news.

"It's true, sir. Word just came in."

"Thanks, Barker." Wade pulled himself together, as the restless pony raced back to the barn. "I must go, Helen," he went on, turning to the girl at his side. "There's been fighting—murder, perhaps—out near the ranch. Santry will need me." He was uneasy lest the old plainsman should have been concerned in the shooting.

"You'll take me to the hotel?"

"Of course, yes! Would you mind walking a little faster?" They quickened their pace. "I'm sorry, Helen; but I must hurry to the ranch." Even at that moment he could not but reflect that there would have been no need to take Dorothy home. Somehow, the ways of the East seemed to fit less and less aptly into the life of Crawling Water.

On his way to the livery stable after his horse, Wade did some rapid thinking. Santry might have been concerned in the shooting, but his employer thought not. The old fellow had promised to stay at home, and his word was as good as another man's bond. It was too bad, certainly, that the thing should have happened just when Senator Rexhill's promised aid had seemed in a fair way to settle the controversy. Now, the whole thing was more upset than ever, for Moran and Rexhill could hardly be blamed if they backed up their own men, especially if the herders had been blameless, as was probably the case. Yet if the Senator did this, Wade knew that a bloody little war would be the outcome.

"Where's Trowbridge, Barker?" he asked of the cowpuncher, whom he found waiting at the stable.

"At the ranch, I think."

Wade nodded. Ten minutes later he was in the saddle and headed for the mountains, just as dusk began to fall. The cool night air, blowing against his face as he reached the higher levels, was delightfully refreshing after the heat of the day. He took off his hat and opened the neck of his shirt to the breeze, which revived his energies like wine. He knew that as he felt, so his horse felt, and he was glad, for the animal would have to make a fast, hard trip. At the crest of the first hills, before dipping into the valley, he turned for an instant in his saddle to look backward over his trail toward the twinkling lights of Crawling Water in the distance below.

He had covered some five miles of his journey, to no other sound than the occasional note of some bird, when his quick ears caught the thud of a horse's feet on the trail ahead, with now and then a sharp clatter as the animal slipped on the stones. Wade slowed his own horse down to a walk, and eased his Colt in its holster. He expected to meet some harmless wayfarer, but, under the circumstances, it was just as well to be prepared for trouble. Soon, however, he smiled to himself, for whoever rode toward him made too much noise for any but a peaceful mission. The other horse, too, had been slowed down and the two riders approached each other with such caution that the rancher finally became impatient and pressed forward recklessly.

Out of the night the stranger came on, still slowly, until a turn in the trail brought them face to face.

"Don't shoot!" said a woman's contralto. "I'm a friend."

"Dorothy!" Wade ejaculated, at once recognizing the voice, although he could not see the girl distinctly in the darkness. "In Heaven's name, what are you doing out here?"

"Is it you, Gordon?" In her relief, she laughed softly as she pulled her pony up side of him. "I was a little scared for a second or two. I've awfully bad news, I'm afraid," she added, immediately serious. "I've been trying to find you. I went to the hotel and they told me you'd gone somewhere."

"Miss Rexhill and I went to call on you."

"You did? If I'd only known. I've been clear out to the ranch."

"Is Santry there?" In his anxiety he forgot momentarily the loneliness of her long ride. "They say some of Jensen's men have been shot up; and I'm anxious to find out what Bill knows."

"That's just what I want to tell you. I heard of the shooting before I left town. Whoa, Gypsy!" She reined up her pony, nervously, for it would not stand still. Wade seized the animal's bridle and quieted it. "I don't know if he's there or not," the girl went on. "I couldn't see. The ranch house is full of men."

"Men? What men?" Wade demanded sharply.

"Race Moran's crowd. They went out to arrest Santry. The Sheriff is with them. I heard part of it in town, and that's why I tried to find you." Wade groaned. "I peeped in at a window, and when I could see neither you nor Santry I slipped away without being seen and took the old trail back because it was shorter."

"Lord, what a mess!" Wade ground his teeth savagely. "Poor old Bill was all alone there and they must have surprised him. But I don't see why Barker didn't mention the posse when he told me of the shooting?"

"He didn't know of it, probably. They left town very quietly. I happened to be out back of the house and I heard one of them talking as they rode by."

"Good Lord!" Wade's head drooped. "I told Bill to stay at the ranch, and he promised me...."

"I don't believe he shot Jensen at all," Dorothy declared, with spirit. "Yes, it was Jensen himself and one of his herders. Both in the back—killed."

"Bill Santry never shot any man in the back," Wade declared, in a relieved tone. "If you're sure of the facts, Santry will come clear all right."

"It's just a devilish scheme of Moran's, that's all, to put it on you and Santry. I'm sure it is. He hates you both. Whoa, Gypsy!" She reined the little mare in again. "No, it's all right, Gordon. I can manage her," she remonstrated, as he reached for the bridle once more.

"So that's their game, eh? By Heaven, I more than half believe you're right." His face grew ugly with rage. "Dorothy," he continued grimly, "thanks are useless. You're a brick, that's all. Do one thing more for us, will you?"

"Anything," she replied simply, her eyes shining with devotion to him, but he was too overwrought to read them in the darkness.

"When you get back to town get word to some of the men for me. You may meet them on the way out, if not they'll be around the barn. Tell them to meet me at the big pine, on the old trail."

His horse had grown restless and now he allowed it to have its head; he was moving past her when she clutched his arm.

"Gordon!"

She loved him dearly, too dearly to let him know how well until he should speak, if he ever did speak; but above them was the starlit sky and over them hovered the wondrous spirit of the Western night. Her pulse was beating, too, to the call of danger, and despite the control which she had over her nerves, she was just a bit hysterical beneath the surface. She knew that ahead of him was a little army of hostile men, and already that day two men had been killed. So, tremulously, she held on to his sleeve, until she stopped him.

"What are you going to do? You can't do anything alone against so many. They may kill you."

Her sympathy was very sweet to him and he warmly squeezed the little hand which had held him back.

"Don't you be afraid, little girl," he said tenderly. "I shall not get hurt if I can help it."

"Wait until the others come, won't you?"

"Surely," he answered readily, touched by the anxiety in her voice. "I'm going to look around—just as you did—on the quiet. You wouldn't hold me back, where you went in, now would you?"

"No—!" She smiled a little into his face.

"That's the stuff! Then I'm coming back to the big pine, and you'll send the boys there. They'll not put Santry in jail if we can prevent them. They've played their last card to-night. It's war from now on."

"All right, Gordon, I'll go." Her voice was full of courage again; the moment of weakness had passed. "Remember now, take good care of yourself."

"You bet," he retorted cheerily, and as her mare moved ahead, he caught her arm as she had caught his. She went quite limp in her saddle and swayed toward him, but he merely added: "You're a wonder, Dorothy."

He released her then, and with a wave of her hand she disappeared into the night. Not until she was beyond recall did he realize that he might have kissed her; that she had wanted him to kiss her, for the first time since they had known each other. He sat in abstraction for several moments before he shook the reins in his hand and his horse sprang forward.

"I've kissed one girl to-day," he muttered aloud, "and I reckon that's enough."



CHAPTER VII

THE OLD TRAIL

For another mile Wade followed the main road and then diverged sharply to the left into what was known as the old, or upper, trail. This had formerly been the valley road until made dangerous by a wash-out a year or two previous. In the following spring the wash-out had been partially repaired, but the going was still so rough that the new road was widened, and had been used by preference ever since. The old trail, however, was nearly four miles the shorter of the two, and was still traveled in cases of emergency, although to do so at speed and in the dark was hazardous.

Wade's promise to Dorothy to take good care of himself had been made with mental reservation, for, obsessed by his anxiety over Santry, the young ranchman was in no mood to spare either himself or his horse. His going was marked by a constant shower of stones, sometimes behind him, as the wiry cayuse climbed like a mountain goat; but as often in front, as horse and rider coasted perilously down some declivity. The horse sweated and trembled with nervousness, as a frightened child might, but never refused to attempt what its master demanded of it. One might almost say that there existed a human understanding between man and beast as to the importance of their errand; a common impulse, which urged them onward.

When Wade reflected that Dorothy, too, had come over that trail by night in his interest, he thought her more than ever a wonderful girl. Even to one born and raised in the cattle country, the trip would have been difficult; but then he realized that Dorothy seemed much like a ranch-bred girl in her courage and frank womanliness, nor was she any less charming on that account. After all, he thought, women paid too highly for little accomplishments, if to gain them they had to sacrifice the vital points of character. He could not help but contrast Helen's insistence that she should be escorted back to the hotel with Dorothy's brave ride alone, and while he was too loyal to Helen Rexhill to blame her in this respect, the thing made a deep impression upon him.

The way was long, and he had time for many thoughts. It was natural, in the still night, with Dorothy only a little while gone, that he should think tenderly of her, for this cost Santry nothing. For Santry, Wade was reserving not thought but action. He was making up his mind that if Moran had taken the foreman into custody on a trumped up charge of murder, the agent should feel the power of a greater tribunal than any court in the locality—the law of the Strong Arm! Behind him in this, the ranchman knew, was the whole of the cattle faction, and since war had been thrust upon them he would not stop until the end came, whatever it might be. His conscience was clean, for he had exerted himself manfully in the cause of peace, even to the point where his own character had suffered, and now the hour of reprisal was at hand.

He rode, at last, over the top of the Divide and into the little draw that led up to the ranch buildings, in the windows of which lights gleamed. With an imprecation at sight of them, he tied his horse to a post, and, revolver in hand, crept toward the house as quietly as a Sioux.

Except for the light, there was no sign of life about the place, and Wade craftily advanced into the deeper shadows close to the wall of the house. Taking off his hat, so that the crown might not betray him, he peeped through a window. What he saw made him clinch his fingers and grit his teeth in rage.

Inside were half a dozen men, besides three of his own ranch hands who lay trussed up like turkeys in one corner of the room; doubtless they had been surprised by the posse before they had opportunity to run or put up a fight. Moran was there, stretched comfortably on Wade's own cot, smoking a cigar. Once, he looked directly toward the window at which the watcher had placed himself, but the latter did not move. Instead, he fingered his gun and waited; he was not sure that he really wanted to avoid detection; if it came, Moran would pay, and the rest, at the moment, did not seem to matter. He had forgotten Dorothy entirely.

But Santry was not there and this fact puzzled Wade. The Sheriff was not there either, and presently it occurred to the cattleman that a part of the posse, with Santry, might have returned to Crawling Water over the main trail. Probably Moran, with the rest, was waiting for him. The mere thought of Santry already on his way to jail filled Wade with a baffling sense of rage, and creeping from the house, he examined the surrounding turf by the faint rays of the moon. It was badly cut up by the feet of many horses, and several minutes passed before Wade was really sure that a number of mounted men had taken the trail back to town. Satisfied of this at length, he untied his horse and swung into the saddle.

Before riding away he considered the advisability of driving off the horses belonging to Moran's party, but there would still be others in the corral, and besides their absence, when discovered, would give warning of the impending attack. On second thought, however, he quietly made his way to the corral and caught a fresh horse of his own. When he had saddled it he set out over the old trail for the big pine.

When he reached the rendezvous his men were not there; but knowing that he must meet them if he followed the road from there on he did not stop. He came upon them in a few minutes, riding toward him at full speed, with Tim Sullivan in the van, too drunk to stand erect, but able to balance himself on a horse's back, drunk or sober.

"We come acrost Santry and the Sheriff a while back," explained Big Bob Lawson, one of Wade's own punchers. "They must be in town by now. We was aimin' to light into 'em, but Santry wouldn't hear of it. Course, we took our orders from him same as usual. He said to tell you that you wanted him to keep quiet, an' that's what he aimed to do."

"He said we wasn't to tell you that he didn't shoot them Swedes," put in another of the men.

"What?" Wade demanded sharply.

"He said—hic!" broke in Tim Sullivan, with drunken gravity. "He said—hic!—that if you didn't know that without—hic!—bein' told, you wasn't no friend of his'n, an'—hic!—you could go to hell."

"Shut up, you drunken fool!" Lawson snapped out.

"Jensen and his herder were shot in the back, they say. That clears Santry," Wade declared, and sat for some moments in deep thought, while the men waited as patiently as they could. "Lawson," he said, at last. "You're in charge for the present. Take the boys to the big pine and camp there quietly until I come back. I'm going into town."

"Hadn't you better take us with you, boss? We'll stick. We're for you an' Bill Santry an' ag'in' these—sheepherders, whenever you say the word."

"That's—hic—what we are!" Sullivan hiccoughed.

Wade shook his head.

"No. You wait for me at the pine. You'll have to rustle your grub the best way you can. I may not get back until to-morrow—until this evening—it's morning now. But wait until I come. There will be plenty for you to do later on and there is no use of you going back to town with me. It might get you into worse trouble than you're headed for already, and what I've got to do, I can do alone."

Wheeling his horse, he rode off toward Crawling Water.

That he could take his men with him, storm the jail and release Santry, Wade did not doubt, but to do so would be to bring each of the men into open conflict with the law, a responsibility which he was resolved to bear alone. Then, too, because his long ride had cooled him somewhat, he intended to make one more appeal to the Senator. Possibly, Moran had exceeded his instructions, and if this were so, it was no more than just that Rexhill, who had seemed to evince a willingness to be helpful, should have the opportunity to disown the act of his agent. Besides, if Santry could be peaceably released, he would be freed of the charge hanging over him, which would not be the case if he were taken from the jail by strategy or violence.

* * * * *

With haggard countenance and inflamed eyes, Wade bore little resemblance to his normal self when he again appeared before the Senator, who received him in his dressing-gown, being just out of bed. Rexhill listened with a show of sympathy to the cattleman's story, but evidently he was in a different mood from the day before.

"My boy, your friendship for your foreman is leading you astray. Your faith in him, which is natural and does you credit, is blinding you to an impartial view of the case. Why not let the law take its course? If Santry is innocent his trial will prove it. At any rate, what can I do?"

"Senator—" Wade spoke with intense weariness. "Only yesterday you offered to help us. The situation, as I explained it then, is unchanged now, except for the worse. Bill Santry is free of any complicity in Jensen's death. I am positive of it. He sent me word that he had not left the ranch, and he would not lie to save himself from hanging. Besides, the men were shot in the back, and that is absolute proof that Santry didn't do it."

"Mere sentiment, Gordon; mere sentiment. Proof? Pooh!"

Rexhill's slightly contemptuous tone worked upon Wade in his exhausted, overwrought condition, and stung him. A strange look of cunning appeared in his eyes, as he leaned across the table which separated them.

"Senator, Moran made me an offer the other day for my land. If—I accept that offer, will you exert your influence in Santry's behalf?"

Coming so swiftly upon his planning, the prospect of such signal success was so gratifying to Rexhill that only in halting speech could he maintain a show of decorous restraint. His countenance expressed exultant relief, as well it might, since he seemed to see himself snatched out of the jaws of ruin.

"Why, Gordon, I—Of course, my boy, if you were to show such a generous spirit as that, I—er—should feel bound...." The sense of his remarks was lost in the crash of Wade's fist upon the table.

"Damn you!" The cattleman was beyond himself with fatigue, rage, and a rankling sense of injustice. "They told me that was your game. I believed it of Moran, but I thought you were square. So you're that sort, too, eh? Well, may you rot in hell before you get my land, you robber! Now listen to me." He waved his hand in the direction of the street. "Out there's a hundred men—real men—who're waiting the word to run you out of this country, you and Moran, too, and by God we'll do it—we'll do it—and we'll begin right away!" Again his heavy fist crashed down on the table "Never mind Bill Santry"—the instinct of discretion was gaining in Wade.—"He can stay where he is for the present. First, we'll attend to you pirates—then we'll see."

He stopped suddenly at sight of Helen, who attracted by the noise, had entered the room, and stood before him in a filmy negligee.

"What is the matter, Gordon?" she demanded anxiously.

"I beg your pardon." Wade spoke awkwardly, unashamed of himself, except for her. "I'm worn out and I—I lost my temper."

"Will you—er—leave this room!" The Senator was beginning to pull himself together. It was the first time he had ever been ragged in such a way, and his composure had suffered; he spoke now with more than his usual pomposity.

"I will," Wade answered curtly, as he turned on his heel and departed.

The Senator, puffing slightly, fiddled with his glasses.

"Your young friend has seen fit to accuse me of—of—" For the life of him, he could not at once say of just what he had been accused, unless he allowed self-accusation to prompt his words. "Some sheepherders have been murdered, I believe," he went on, "and Wade seems to think that Moran and I are implicated."

"You!" his daughter exclaimed; evidently her amazement did not extend to Moran.

"Preposterous nonsense!"

"Yes, of course." Helen walked to the window and stood looking down into the street. "I'm afraid Gordon hasn't improved since we saw him last," she added, finally. "He seems quite a different person from the man I used to know. What are you going to do about it?"

"Crush him!" The Senator's lips set in a thin, white line, as his hand descended on the table on the spot where Wade's fist had fallen. "This, apparently, is his gratitude to me for my interest in him. Now I intend to show him the other side of me."

"Certainly, no one could blame you for punishing him. Oh, everything between him and me is quite over," said the girl, with a peculiar smile. "He's a perfect bear."

"I'm glad you feel that way about it, Helen." Her father's set lips relaxed into a responsive smile. "You couldn't be my daughter and not have some sense."

"Have I any?" Helen naively asked.

She was gazing out of the window again, and to her mind's eye the dusty, squalid street became a broad highway, with jewelers' shops on either side, and modistes, and other such charming things, just as they are found in New York, or—Paris!



CHAPTER VIII

HIGHER THAN STATUTE LAW

Wade descended the stairs of the hotel and went into the barroom, fuming with rage and chagrin because Helen had seen him in such a temper. Like most men of action, he took pride in his self-control, which seldom failed him, but the villainy of the Senator's attitude had momentarily mastered his patience.

Gathered about the bar were a number of men whom he knew, but beyond a nod here and there he took no notice of them, and went to sit down alone at a small table in the corner. His friends respected his desire to be left alone, although several eyed him curiously and exchanged significant remarks at his appearance. They seemed to be of the opinion that, at last, his fighting blood had been aroused, and now and then they shot approving glances in his direction.

"Whiskey," Wade called to the bartender, and a bottle and glass were placed on the table in front of him.

With a steady hand the ranchman poured out and quickly swallowed two stiff drinks of the fiery liquor, although he was not ordinarily a drinking man. The fact that he drank now showed his mental state more clearly than words could have expressed it. Searching in his pockets, he found tobacco and papers and rolled and lighted a cigarette. Nothing could be done for Santry until night, and meanwhile he intended to get something to eat and take the sleep that he needed to fit himself for the task ahead of him. He ordered a steak, which on top of the whiskey put new life into him.

The more he thought of his outburst of temper before Helen the more it annoyed him, for he realized that he had "bitten off a bigger wad than he could chew," as Bill Santry would have expressed it. Rascal though the Senator was, so far as he was concerned, Wade felt that his hands were tied on Helen's account. For her sake, he could not move against her father in a country where the average man thought of consequences after the act rather than before it. In a sense Wade felt that he stood sponsor for Crawling Water in the hospitality which it offered Helen, and he could not bring peril down on her head.

But as for Moran and his hirelings, that was a different matter! When the ranchman thought of Moran, no vengeance seemed too dire to fit his misdeeds. In that direction he would go to the limit, and he only hoped that he might get his hands on Moran in the mix-up. He still looked upon his final visit to Rexhill as a weakness, but it had been undertaken solely on Santry's account. It had failed, and no one now could expect tolerance of him except Helen. If the posse was still at the ranch, when he and Santry returned there at the head of their men, they would attack in force, and shoot to kill if necessary.

He learned from Lem Trowbridge, who presently joined him at the table, that the posse would probably still be there, for the report in town was that Moran had taken possession of the property and meant to stay there.

"He does, eh?" Wade muttered grimly. "Well, he may, but it will be with his toes up. I'm done, Lem. By Heaven, it's more than flesh and blood can stand!"

"It sure is! We're with you, Gordon. Your men were over at my place a few hours ago. We grubbed them and loaned them all the guns we could spare. I sent over my new Winchester and a belt of shells for you."

"Thanks."

"That's all right. You're more than welcome to all the help I can give you, not only against Moran and his gang, but against Rexhill. If you like, we'll run him out of town while you're putting the fear of God into Moran. Lord! I sure would like to go back to the ranch with you, but it's your own quarrel and I won't butt in."

Wade briefly explained his attitude toward the Rexhills and added that their cause would not be helped by violence toward the Senator, who was a big man at Washington, and might stir the authorities into action on his behalf if he could prove personal abuse. The noise that would be made by such a happening might drown out the justice of the cattlemen's claim.

"Well, that's true, too," Trowbridge admitted. "I can see the point all right. What we want to do is to get something 'on' the Senator. I mean something sure—something like this Jensen shooting."

Wade nodded slowly.

"That's the idea, but I'm afraid we can't do it, Lem. I haven't a doubt but that Moran is mixed up in the killing, but I hardly believe Rexhill is. Anyhow, they've probably covered their tracks so well that we'll never be able to connect them with it."

"Oh, I don't know. You can't always tell what time'll bring to light." Trowbridge lowered his voice. "What's your idea about Santry? Do you want help there?"

"No." Wade spoke with equal caution. "I believe I can manage all right alone. The Sheriff will probably be looking for us to rush the jail, but he won't expect me to come alone. Bat Lewis goes on duty as the relief, about nine o'clock. I mean to beat him to it, and if the Sheriff opens up for me I'll be away with Santry before Bat appears. But I must get some sleep, Lem."

The two men arose.

"Well, good luck to you, Gordon." Trowbridge slapped his friend on the shoulder, and they separated.

"Frank, can you let me have a bed?" Wade asked of the hotel proprietor, a freckled Irishman.

"Sure; as many as you want."

"One will do, Frank; and another thing," the ranchman said guardedly. "I'll need an extra horse to-night, and I don't want to be seen with him until I need him. Can you have him tied behind the school-house a little before nine o'clock?"

"You bet I can!" The Irishman slowly dropped an eyelid, for the school-house was close by the jail.

Wade tumbled into the bed provided for him and slept like a log, having that happy faculty of the healthy man, of being able to sleep when his body needed it, no matter what impended against the hour of awakening.

When he did wake up, the afternoon was well advanced, and after another hearty meal he walked over to the Purnells' to pass the time until it was late enough for him to get to work.

"Now, Gordon will tell you I'm right," Mrs. Purnell proclaimed triumphantly, when the young man entered the cottage. "I want Dorothy to go with me to call on Miss Rexhill, and she doesn't want to go. The idea! When Miss Rexhill was nice enough to call on us first."

Mrs. Purnell set much store upon her manners, as the little Michigan town where she was born understood good breeding, and she had not been at all annoyed by Helen Rexhill's patronage, which had so displeased Wade. To her mind the Rexhills were very great people, and great people were to be expected to bear themselves in lofty fashion. Dorothy had inherited her democracy from her father and not from her mother, who, indeed, would have been disappointed if Helen Rexhill appeared any less than the exalted personage she imagined herself to be.

"Oh, I'd like to meet her well enough, only...." Dorothy stopped, unwilling to say before Wade that she did not consider the Rexhills sufficiently good friends of his, in the light of recent developments, for them to be friends of hers.

"Of course, go," he broke in heartily. "She's not responsible for what her father does in the way of business, and I reckon she'd think it funny if you didn't call."

"There now!" Mrs. Purnell exclaimed triumphantly.

"All right, I'll go." In her heart Dorothy was curious to meet the other woman and gauge her powers of attraction. "We'll go to-morrow, mother."

Quite satisfied, Mrs. Purnell made some excuse to leave them together, as she usually did, for her mother heart had traveled farther along the Road to To-morrow than her daughter's fancy. She secretly hoped that the young cattleman would some day declare his love for Dorothy and ask for her hand in marriage.

In reply to the girl's anxious questions Wade told her of what had happened since their meeting on the trail, as they sat together on the porch of the little cottage. She was wearing a plain dress of green gingham, which, somehow, suggested to him the freshness of lettuce. She laughed a little when he told her of that and called him foolish, though the smile that showed a dimple in her chin belied her words.

"Then the posse is still at the ranch?" she asked.

"I think so. If they are, we are going to run them off to-morrow morning, or perhaps to-night. I've had enough of this nonsense and I mean to meet Moran halfway from now on."

"Yes, I suppose you must," she admitted reluctantly. "But do be careful, Gordon."

"As careful as I can be under the circumstances," he said cheerfully, and told her that his chief purpose in coming to see her was to thank her again for the service she had rendered him.

"Oh, you don't need to thank me for that. Do you know"—she puckered up her brows in a reflective way—"I've been thinking. It seems very strange to me that Senator Rexhill and Moran should be willing to go to such lengths merely to get hold of this land as a speculation. Doesn't it seem so to you?"

"Yes, it does, but that must be their reason."

"I'm not so sure of that, Gordon. There must be something more behind all this. That's what I have been thinking about. You remember that when Moran first came here he had an office just across the street from his present one?"

"Yes. Simon Barsdale had Moran's present office until he moved to Sheridan. You were his stenographer for a while, I remember." Wade looked at her curiously, wondering what she was driving at.

"Moran bought Mr. Barsdale's safe." Her voice sounded strange and unnatural. "I know the old combination. I wonder if it has been changed?"

"Lem Trowbridge was saying only this morning," said Wade thoughtfully, for he was beginning to catch her meaning, "that if we could only get proof of something crooked we might...."

"Well, I think we can," Dorothy interrupted.

They looked searchingly at each other in the gathering dusk, and he tried to read the light in her eyes, and being strangely affected himself by their close proximity, he misinterpreted it. He slipped his hand over hers and once more the desire to kiss her seized him. He let go of her hand and was just putting his arm around her shoulders when, to his surprise, she appeared suddenly indignant.

"Don't!"

He was abashed, and for a moment neither said a word.

"What is the combination?" he finally asked hoarsely.

"I promised Mr. Barsdale never to tell any one." Her lips wreathed into a little smile. "I'll do it myself."

"No, you won't." Wade shook his head positively. "Do you suppose I'm going to let you steal for me? It will be bad enough to do it myself; but necessity knows no law. Well, we'll let it go for the present then. Don't you think of doing it, Dorothy. Will you promise me?"

"I never promise," she said, smiling again, and ignoring her last words in womanly fashion, "but if you don't want me to...."

"Well, I don't," he declared firmly. "Let it rest at that. We'll probably find some other way anyhow."

She asked him then about Santry, but he evaded a direct answer beyond expressing the conviction that everything would end all right. They talked for a while of commonplaces, although nothing that he said seemed commonplace to her and nothing that she said seemed so to him. When it was fully dark he arose to go. Then she seemed a little sorry that she had not let him put his arm around her, and she leaned toward him as she had done on the trail; but he was not well versed in woman's subtleties, and he failed to guess her thoughts and walked away, leaving her, as Shakespeare put it, to

"Twice desire, ere it be day, That which with scorn she put away."

Having mounted his horse at the livery stable, he first made sure that the extra horse was behind the school-house, where he tied his own, and then walked around to the jail. On the outside, this building was a substantial log structure; within, it was divided into the Sheriff's office and sleeping room, the "bull pen," and a single narrow cell, in which Wade guessed that Santry would be locked. After examining his revolver, he slipped it into the side pocket of his coat and walked boldly up to the jail. Then, whistling merrily, for Bat Lewis, the deputy, was a confirmed human song-bird, he knocked sharply on the door with his knuckles.

"It's me—Bat," he called out, mimicking Lewis' voice, in answer to a question from within.

"You're early to-night. What's struck you?" Sheriff Thomas opened the door, and turning, left it so, for the "relief" to enter. He had half feared that an attempt might be made to liberate Santry, but had never dreamed that any one would try the thing alone. He was glad to be relieved, for a poker game at which he wanted to sit in would soon start at the Gulch Saloon.

He was the most surprised man in Wyoming, when he felt the cold muzzle of Wade's Colt boring into the nape of his neck and heard the ranchman's stern warning to keep quiet or take the consequences. Sheriff Thomas had earned his right to his "star" by more than one exhibition of nerve, but he was too familiar with gun ethics to argue with the business end of a "45."

"Not a sound!" Outwardly cold as ice, but inwardly afire, Wade shoved the weapon against his victim's neck and marched him to the middle of the room. "I've got the upper hand, Sheriff, and I intend to keep it."

"You're a damn fool, Wade." The Sheriff spoke without visible emotion and in a low tone. "You'll go up for this. Don't you realize that...."

"Can it!" snapped Wade, deftly disarming the officer with his free hand. "Never mind the majesty of the law and all that rot. I thought that all over before I came. Now that I've got you and drawn your teeth, you'll take orders from me. Get my foreman out of that cell and be quick about it!"

There was nothing to do but obey, which Thomas quietly did, although somewhat in fear of what Santry might do when at liberty. When the cell door was unlocked, the old plainsman, in a towering rage at the injustice of his incarceration, seemed inclined to choke his erstwhile jailer.

"None of that, Bill," Wade admonished curtly. "He's only been a tool in this business, although he ought to know better. We'll tie him up and gag him; that's all. Rip up one of those blankets."

"I knew you'd come, boy!" The foreman's joy was almost like that of a big dog at sight of his master. "By the great horned toad, I knew it!" With his sinewy hands he tore the blanket into strips as easily as though the wool had been paper. "Now for him, drat him!"

Wade stood guard while the helpless Sheriff was trussed up and his mouth stopped by Santry, and if the ranch owner felt any compunction at the sight, he had only to think of his own men as he had seen them the night before, lying on the floor of the ranch house.

"Make a good job of it, Bill," was his only comment.

"You bet!" Santry chuckled as he drew the last of the knots tight. "That'll hold him for a spell, I reckon. How you feel, Sheruff, purty comfortable?" The flowing end of the gag so hid the officer's features that he could express himself only with his eyes, which he batted furiously. "Course," Santry went on, in mock solicitude, "if I'd thought I mighta put a bit of sugar on that there gag, to remind you of your mammy like, but it ain't no great matter. You can put a double dose in your cawfee when you git loose."

"Come on, Bill!" Wade commanded.

"So long, Sheruff," Santry chuckled.

There was no time to waste in loitering, for at any moment Bat Lewis might arrive and give an alarm which would summon reenforcements from amongst Moran's following. Hurrying Santry ahead of him, Wade swung open the door and they looked out cautiously. No one was in sight, and a couple of minutes later the two men were mounted and on their way out of town.

"By the great horned toad!" Santry exulted, as they left the lights of Crawling Water behind them. "It sure feels good to be out of that there boardin'-house. It wasn't our fault, Gordon, and say, about this here shootin'...."

"I know all about that, Bill," Wade interposed. "The boys told me. They're waiting for us at the big pine. But your arrest, that's what I want to hear about."

"Well, it was this-a-way," the old man explained. "They sneaked up on the house in the dark and got the drop on us. Right here I rise to remark that never no more will I separate myself from my six-shooter. More'n one good man has got hisself killed just because his gun wasn't where it oughter be when he needed it. Of course, we put up the best scrap we could, but we didn't have no chance, Gordon. The first thing I knew, while I was tusslin' with one feller, somebody fetched me a rap on the head with a pistol-butt, an' I went down for the count. Any of the boys shot up?"

Wade described the appearance of the ranch house on the previous night, and Santry swore right manfully.

"What's on the cards now?" he demanded. "How much longer are we goin' to stand for...."

"No longer," Wade declared crisply. "That's why the boys are waiting for us at the pine. We're going to run Moran and his gang off the ranch as soon as we can get there, and then we're going to run them out of the country."

"Whoop-e-e-e-e-e!" The old plainsman's yell of exultation split the night like the yelp of a coyote, and he brought his hand down on Wade's back with a force which made the latter wince. "By the great horned toad, that's talkin! That's the finest news I've heard since my old mammy said to the parson, 'Call him Bill, for short.' Whoop-e-e-e-e!"

Wade's warning to keep still was lost on the wind, for Santry stuck his spurs into his horse's flanks and charged along the trail like an old-time knight. With a grim smile his employer put on speed and followed him.



CHAPTER IX

THE BATTLE AT THE RANCH

When Wade and Santry approached the big pine, the waiting men came out from its shadow and rode forward, with the borrowed rifles across their saddle horns.

"All right, boys?" the rancher asked, taking Trowbridge's new rifle, a beautiful weapon, which Lawson handed to him.

"All right, sir," answered Tim Sullivan, adding the "sir" in extenuation of his befuddled condition the night before, while each man gave Santry a silent hand-shake to welcome him home.

Grimly, silently, then, save for the dashing of their horses' hoofs against the loose stones, and an occasional muttered imprecation as a rider lurched in his saddle, the seven men rode rapidly toward the mountains. In numbers, their party was about evenly matched with the enemy, and Wade meant that the advantage of surprise, if possible, should rest with him in order to offset such advantage as Moran might find in the shelter of the house. But, however that might be, each man realized that the die had been cast and that the fight, once begun, would go to a finish.

"I only hope," Santry remarked, as a steep grade forced them to lessen their speed, "I can get my two hands on that cussed tin-horn, Moran. Him and me has a misunderstandin' to settle, for sure."

"You leave him to me, Bill." Wade spoke vindictively. "He's my meat."

"Well, since you ask it, I'll try, boy. But there's goin' to be some fightin' sure as taxes, and when I get to fightin', I'm liable to go plumb, hog wild. Say, I hope you don't get into no trouble over this here jail business o' mine. That 'ud make me feel bad, Gordon."

"We'll not worry about that now, Bill."

"That's right. Don't worry till you have to, and then shoot instead. That's been my motto all my born days, and it ain't such durn bad philosophy at that. I wonder"—the old man chuckled to himself—"I wonder if the Sheruff et up most of that there gag before Bat let him loose?"

Wade laughed out loud, and as though in response, an owl hooted somewhere in the timber to their right.

"There's a durned old hoot owl," growled Santry. "I never like to hear them things—they most always mean bad luck."

He rode to the head of the little column, and the rest of the way to the ranch was passed in ominous silence. When they finally arrived at the edge of the clearing and cautiously dismounted, everything seemed from the exterior, at least, just as it should be. The night being far gone, the lights were out, and there was no sign of life about the place. Wade wondered if the posse had gone.

"There ain't no use in speculatin'," declared Santry. "They may be asleep, and they may be layin' for us there in the dark. This will take a rise out of 'em anyhow."

At sight of the old fellow, pistol in hand, Wade called to him to wait, but as he spoke Santry fired two quick shots into the air.

There was an immediate commotion in the ranch house. A man inside was heard to curse loudly, while another showed his face for an instant where the moonlight fell across a window. He hastily ducked out of sight, however, when a rifle bullet splintered the glass just above his head. Presently a gun cracked inside the house and a splash on a rock behind the attackers told them where the shot had struck.

"Whoop-e-e-e-e!" Santry yelled, discharging the four remaining shots in his revolver at the window. "We've got 'em guessin'. They don't know how many we are."

"They were probably asleep," said Wade a bit sharply. "We might have sneaked in and captured the whole crowd without firing a shot. That's what I meant to do before you cut loose."

Santry shook his grizzled head as he loaded his revolver.

"Well, now, that would have been just a mite risky, boy. The way things stand we've still got the advantage, an'...." He broke off to take a snapshot at a man who showed himself at the window for an instant in an effort to get a glimpse of the attacking force. "One!" muttered the old plainsman to himself.

By this time Wade had thrown himself down on his stomach behind a bowlder to Santry's left and was shooting methodically at the door of the house, directly in front of him. He knew that door. It was built of inch lumber and was so located that a bullet, after passing through it, would rake the interior of the cabin from end to end. The only way the inmates could keep out of the line of his fire was by hugging the walls on either side, where they would be partially exposed to the leaden hail which Santry and the punchers were directing at the windows.

There was a grim, baleful look on the young man's usually pleasant face, and his eyes held a pitiless gleam. He was shooting straight, shooting to kill, and taking a fierce delight in the act. The blood lust was upon him, that primal, instinctive desire for combat in a righteous cause that lies hidden at the very bottom of every strong man's nature. And there came to his mind no possible question of the righteous nature of his cause. He was fighting to regain possession of his own home from the marauders who had invaded it. His enemies had crowded him to the wall, and now they were paying the penalty. Wade worked the lever of his Winchester as though he had no other business in life. A streak of yellow clay mingled with a bloody trickle from a bullet scratch on his cheek gave his set features a fairly ferocious expression.

Santry, glancing toward him, chuckled again, but without mirth. "The boy's woke up at last," he muttered to himself. "They've drove him to it, durn 'em. I knew almighty well that this law an' order stunt couldn't last forever. Wow!"

The latter exclamation was caused by a bullet which ricocheted from a rock near his head, driving a quantity of fine particles into his face.

"Whoop-e-e-e-e!" he howled a moment later. "We got 'em goin'. It's a cinch they can't stand this pace for more'n a week."

Indeed, it was a marvel that the defenders kept on fighting as long as they did. Already the door, beneath Wade's machine-like shooting, had been completely riddled; the windows were almost bare of glass; and great splinters of wood had been torn from the log walls by the heavy rifle bullets on their way through to the interior. Soon the door sagged and crashed inward, and into the gaping hole thus made Wade continued to empty his rifle.

At last, the fire of those within slackened and temporarily ceased. Did this mean surrender? Wade asked himself and ordered his men to stop shooting and await developments. For some moments all was still, and the advisability of rushing the house was being discussed when all at once the fire of the defenders began again. This time, however, there was something very odd about it. There was a loud banging of exploding cartridges, but only a few shots whistled around the heads of the cattlemen. Nevertheless, Wade told his men to resume shooting, and once more settled down to his own task.

"What'n hell they tryin' to do?" Santry demanded. "Sounds like a Fourth o' July barbecue to me."

"I don't know," Wade answered, charging the magazine of his rifle, "but whatever it is they'll have to stop mighty soon."

Then gradually, but none the less certainly, the fire from within slackened until all was still. This seemed more like a visitation of death, and again Wade ordered his men to stop shooting. They obeyed orders and lay still, keenly watching the house.

"Do you surrender?" Wade shouted; but there was no reply.

Santry sprang to his feet.

"By the great horned toad!" he cried. "I'm a-goin' in there! Anybody that wants to come along is welcome."

Not a man in the party would be dared in that way, so, taking advantage of such cover as offered, they advanced upon the cabin, stealthily at first and then more rapidly, as they met with no resistance—no sign whatever of life. A final rush carried them through the doorway into the house, where they expected to find a shambles.

Wade struck a light, and faced about with a start as a low groan came from a corner of the back room. A man lay at full length on the floor, tied hand and foot, and gagged. It was Ed Nelson, one of the Double Arrow hands who had been surprised and captured by the posse, and a little farther away in the shadow against the wall his two companions lay in a like condition. With his knife Wade was cutting them loose, and glancing about in a puzzled search for the wounded men he expected to find in the house, when Santry shouted something from the kitchen.

"What is it, Bill?" the ranch owner demanded.

Santry tramped back into the room, laughing in a shamefaced sort of way.

"They done us, Gordon!" he burst out. "By the great horned toad, they done us! They chucked a bunch of shells into the hot cook-stove, an' sneaked out the side door while we was shootin' into the front room. By cracky, that beats...."

"That's what they did," spoke up Nelson, as well as his cramped tongue would permit, being now freed of the gag. "They gagged us first, so's we couldn't sing out; then they filled up the stove an' beat it."

What had promised to be a tragedy had proved a fiasco, and Wade smiled a little foolishly.

"The joke's on us, I guess, boys," he admitted. "But we've got the ranch back, at any rate. How are you feeling, Ed, pretty stiff and sore?"

"My Gawd, yes—awful!"

"Me, too," declared Tom Parrish, the second of the victims; and the third man swore roundly that he would not regain the full use of his legs before Christmas.

"Well, you're lucky at that," was Santry's dry comment. "All that saved you from gettin' shot up some in the fight was layin' low down in that corner where you was." He let his eyes travel around the littered, blood-spattered room. "From the looks o' this shebang we musta stung some of 'em pretty deep; but nobody was killed, I reckon. I hope Moran was the worst hurt, durn him!"

"He'll keep," Wade said grimly. "We've not done with him yet, Bill. We've only just begun."



CHAPTER X

THE SENATOR GETS BUSY

It was daylight when the routed posse, with Race Moran in the lead, his left arm tied up in a blood-stained handkerchief, rode into Crawling Water. A bullet had pierced the fleshy part of the agent's wrist, a trifling wound, but one which gave him more pain than he might have suffered from a serious injury. None of the members of the posse had been dangerously wounded; indeed, they had suffered more in the spirit than in the flesh; but there had been a number of minor casualties amongst the men, which made a sufficiently bloody display to arouse the little town to active curiosity.

Under instructions from the leader, however, the fugitives kept grouchily silent, so that curiosity was able to feed only on speculations as to Wade's temper, and the fact that he had brought about Santry's release from jail. The story of that achievement had been bruited about Crawling Water since midnight, together with the probability that the Law would be invoked to punish the ranchman for his defiance of it. Popular sentiment was running high over the likelihood of such a step being taken, and the members of the posse were the targets of many hostile glances from the townspeople. At least two-thirds of the citizens were strongly in favor of Wade, but before they took active steps in his behalf they waited for the return of a horseman, who had hurried out to the ranch to learn at first hand exactly what had happened there.

Meanwhile Moran, in an ugly mood, had awakened the Senator from the troubled sleep which had come to him after much wakeful tossing. Rexhill, with tousled hair, wrapped in a bathrobe, from the bottom of which his bare ankles and slippered feet protruded, sat on the edge of his bed, impatiently chewing an unlighted cigar while he listened to Moran's account of the fracas.

"You went too far, Race,—you went too far," he burst out angrily at last. "You had no orders to jump the ranch. I told you...."

"We've been fooling around long enough, Senator," Moran interrupted sullenly, nursing his throbbing wrist. "It was high time somebody started something, and when I saw my chance I seized it. You seem to think"—his voice trailed into scorn—"that we are playing marbles with boys, but, I tell you, it's men we're up against. My experience has shown me that it's the first blow that counts in any fight."

"Well, who got in the hardest lick, eh?" Rexhill snorted sarcastically. "The first blow's all right, provided the second isn't a knockout from the other side. Why, confound it, Race, here we had Wade at our mercy. He'd broken into jail and set free a suspected murderer—a clear case of criminality. Then you had to spoil it all."

Moran smothered an imprecation.

"You seem to forget, Senator, that we had him at our mercy before, and you wouldn't hear of it. If you'd taken my advice in the first place, we'd have had Wade in jail instead of Santry and things might have been different."

"Your advice was worthless under the circumstances; that's why I didn't take it." Rexhill deliberately paused and lighted his cigar, from which he took several soothing puffs. To have been aroused from his bed with such news had flustered him somewhat; but he had never known anything worth while to come out of a heated discussion, and he sought now to calm himself. Finally, he spoke slowly. "What you proposed to me then was a frame-up, and all frame-ups are dangerous, particularly when they have little to rest upon. For that reason I refused to fall in with your ideas, Race. This release of Santry from jail is—or was—an entirely different thing, an overt criminal act, with Sheriff Thomas on our side as an unimpeachable witness."

Moran was suffering too keenly from his wound and smarting under his defeat too much to be altogether reasonable. His manner was fast losing the appearance of respect which he had previously shown his employer. His expression was becoming heated and contemptuous.

"You didn't base your refusal on logic at the time, Senator," he said. "It was sentiment, if I remember right. Wade had broken bread with you, and all that. I don't see but what that applies just as well now as it did then."

"It doesn't," the Senator argued smugly, still rankling from Wade's arraignment of him the day before, "because even hospitality has its limits of obligation. So long as I knew Wade to be innocent, I did not care to have him arrested; but I don't admit any sentiment of hospitality which compels me to save a known criminal from the hand of justice. Sheriff Thomas came in to see me last night and I agreed with him that Wade should be brought to account for his contempt of the law. Wade forced his way into the jail and released his foreman at the point of a gun. Even so, I feel sorry for Wade and I am a little apprehensive of the consequences that will probably develop from his foolhardiness."

"Well, by God, if there's any sympathy for him floating around this room, it all belongs to you, Senator." Moran tenderly fingered his aching wrist. "I'm not one of these 'turn the other cheek' guys; you can gamble on that!"

"But now where are we?" Rexhill ignored the other's remarks entirely. "We are but little better off than Wade is. He pulled Santry out of jail, and we tried to steal his ranch. The only difference is that so far he has succeeded, and we have failed. He has as much law on his side now as we have on ours."

Moran's head drooped a little before the force of this argument, although he was chiefly impressed by the fact that he had failed. His failures had been few, because Fortune had smiled upon him in the past; and doubtless for this reason he was the less able to treat failure philosophically. His plans at the ranch house had gone awry. He had counted on meeting Wade there in the daytime, in the open, and upon provoking him, before witnesses, into some hot-headed act which would justify a battle. The surprise attack had left the agent without this excuse for the hostilities which had occurred.

Rexhill arose and walked up and down the room in thought, his slippered feet shuffling over the floor, showing now and then a glimpse of his fat, hairy legs as the skirt of his bathrobe fluttered about. A cloud of fragrant smoke from his cigar trailed him as he walked, and from the way he chewed on the tobacco his confreres in the Senate could have guessed that he was leading up to one of his Czar-like pronouncements. Presently he stopped moving and twisted the cigar in his mouth so that its fumes would be out of his eyes, as his glance focused on Moran.

"There's just one way out of this mess, Race," he began. "Now heed what I say to you. I'm going to send a telegram to the Department of the Interior which will bring a troop of cavalry down here from Fort Mackenzie. You must go slow from now on, and let the authorities settle the whole matter."

The agent sat up alertly, as his employer, wagging a ponderous forefinger impressively, proceeded.

"You were not on the ranch for the purpose of jumping it at all. Mind that now! You and I stand for the majesty of the law in this lawless community." Moran's eyes began to twinkle at this, but he said nothing. "When you and Sheriff Thomas went out to the ranch, you carried two warrants with you, one for Santry, as the accessory, and one for Wade, as the principal, in the Jensen shooting. Yes, yes, I know what you are going to say; but I must save my own bacon now. Since Wade has proved himself to be a lawbreaker, I'm not going to protect him."

"Now, you're talking!" exclaimed Moran, delighted at the prospect of what such a course would start going.

"I'll have the matter of the warrants fixed up with Thomas," the Senator continued. "Now, follow me carefully. Thomas arrested Santry at the ranch, and then left you, as his deputy, to serve the other warrant on Wade when he came home. It was because of his knowledge of what was in store for him that Wade, after getting Santry out of jail, attacked you and your men, and it was in defense of the law that you returned their fire. It will all work out very smoothly, I think, and any further hostilities will come from the other side and be to our great advantage."

Moran looked at his employer in admiration, as the latter concluded and turned toward his writing table.

"Senator," the agent declared, as Rexhill took up his fountain pen and began to write on a telegraph form, "you never should have started in Denver. If you'd been born in little old New York, you'd be in the White House now. From this minute on you and I are going to carry this whole valley in our vest-pockets."

"You take this over and put it on the wire right away, Race. It's to the Secretary of the Interior and my signature on it should get immediate attention." Senator Rexhill handed over the telegraph form he had filled out.

"But what about State rights in this business?" Moran asked, anxiously. "Will they send Government troops in here on your say so?"

The Senator waved his hand in dismissal of the objection.

"I'll have Thomas wire the Governor that the situation is beyond control. This town is miles from nowhere, and there's no militia within easy reach. The State will be glad enough to be saved the expense, especially with the soldiers close by at Fort Mackenzie. Besides, you know, although Wade's ranch is inside the State, a good deal of his land is Government land, or was until he filed on it."

When Moran had left the room in a much easier frame of mind than he came into it, the Senator sat down heavily on the bed. He was puffing at his cigar and thinking intently, when he caught sight of the white, startled face of his daughter in the mirror of the bureau across the room. Whirling about, he found her standing in the doorway looking at him. Rexhill had never before been physically conscious of the fact that he had a spine, but in that moment of discovery a chill crept up and down his back, for her expression told him that she had heard a good deal of his conversation with Moran. The most precious thing to him in life was the respect of his child; more precious even, he knew, than the financial security for which he fought; and in her eyes now he saw that he was face to face with a greater battle than any he had ever waged.

"Father!"

"What, are you awake, my dear?"

He tried hard to make his tone cheery and natural, as he stood up and wrapped the bathrobe more closely around him.

"I heard what you said to Race Moran."

Helen came into the room, with only a dressing wrapper thrown over her thin night-dress, and dropped into a chair. She seemed to feel that her statement of the fact was accusation enough in itself, and waited for him to answer.

"You shouldn't have listened, Helen. Moran and I were discussing private business matters, and I thought that you were asleep. It was not proper...."

Her lips, which usually framed a smile for him, curled disdainfully and he winced in spite of himself. He avoided the keen appraisement of her gaze, which seemed now to size him up, as though to probe his most secret thoughts, whereas before she had always accepted him lovingly on faith.

"Certainly, they were not matters that you would want an outsider to hear," she said, in a hard voice, "but I am very glad that I listened, father. Glad"—her voice broke a little—"even though I shall never be able to think of you again as I...."

He went to her and put his heavy hands on her shoulders, which shrank under his touch.

"Now, don't say things that you'll regret, Helen. You're the only girl I have, and I'm the only father you have, so we ought to make the best of each other, oughtn't we, eh? You're prone to hasty judgments. Don't let them run away with you now."

"Don't touch me!" He made way for her as she got to her feet. "Father,"—she tremblingly faced him, leaning for support against a corner of the bureau,—"I heard all that you said to Mr. Moran. I don't want you to tell me what we've been to each other. Don't I know that? Haven't I felt it?"

The Senator swallowed hard, touched to the quick at the sight of her suffering.

"You want me to explain it—more fully?"

"If you can. Can you?" Her lips twitched spasmodically. "I want you to tell me something that will let me continue to believe that you are—that you are—Oh, you know what I want to say." Rexhill blushed a deep purple, despite his efforts at self-control. "But what can you say, father; what can you say, after what I've heard?"

"You mean as regards young Wade? You know, I told you last night about his attack on the Sheriff. You know, too"—the blush faded as the Senator caught his stride again—"that I said I meant to crush him. You even agreed with me that he should be taught a lesson."

"But you should fight fairly," Helen retorted, with a quick breath of aggression. "Do you believe that he killed Jensen? Of course you don't. The mere idea of such a thing is absurd."

"Perhaps he planned it."

"Father!" The scorn in her tone stung him like a whip-lash. "Did he plan the warrants, too? The warrant that hasn't been issued yet, although you are going to swear that it was issued yesterday. Did he plan that?"

Once in his political career, the Senator had faced an apparent impasse and had wormed out of it through tolerant laughter. He had laughed so long and so genially that the very naturalness of his artifice had won the day for him. Men thought that if he had had a guilty conscience, he could not have seemed so carefree. He tried the same trick now with his daughter; but it was a frightful attempt and he gave it up when he saw its ill-success.

"See here, Helen," he burst out, "it is ridiculous that you should arraign me in this way. It is true that no warrant was out yesterday for Wade, but it is also true that the Sheriff intended to issue one, and it was only through my influence that the warrant was not issued. Since then Wade, besides insulting me, has proved himself a lawbreaker. I have nothing to do with the consequences of his actions, which rest entirely with him. You have overheard something that you were not intended to hear, and as is usually the case, have drawn wrong conclusions. The best thing you can do now is to try to forget what you have heard and leave the matter in my hands, where it belongs."

He had spoken dominantly and expected her to yield to his will. He was totally unprepared, well as he knew her spirit, for what followed.

She faced him with glowing eyes and her trembling lips straightened into a thin, firm line of determination. He was her father, and she had always loved him for what she had felt to be his worth; she had given him the chance to explain, and he had not availed himself of it; he was content to remain convicted in her eyes, or else, which was more likely, he could not clear himself. She realized now that, despite what she had said in pique, only the night before, she really loved Wade, and he, at least, had done nothing, except free a friend, who, like himself, was unjustly accused. She could not condemn him for that, any more than she could forget her father's duplicity.

"I won't forget it!" she cried. "If necessary, I will go to Gordon and tell him what you've done. I'll tell it to every one in Crawling Water, if you force me to. I don't want to because, just think what that would mean to you! But you shall not sacrifice Gordon. Yes, I mean it—I'll sacrifice you first!"

"Don't talk so loud," the Senator warned her anxiously, going a little white. "Don't be a fool, Helen. Why, it was only a few hours ago that you said Wade should be punished."

She laughed hysterically.

"That was only because I wanted to get him away from this awful little town. I thought that if he were—punished—a little, if he was made a laughing stock, he might be ashamed, and not want to stay here. Now, I see that I was wrong. I don't blame him for fighting with every weapon he can find. I hope he wins!"

Rexhill, who had been really frightened at her hysterical threat of exposure, and assailed by it in his pride as well, felt his fear begin to leave him and his confidence in himself return. In the next minute or two, he thought rapidly and to considerable purpose. In the past he had resolutely refused to use his child in any way to further his own ends, but the present occasion was an emergency, and major surgery is often demanded in a crisis. If she were willing, as she said, to sacrifice him, he felt that he might properly make use of her and her moods to save himself and her as well. He realized that if she were to shout abroad through Crawling Water the conversation that had passed between him and Moran, the likelihood of either of the two men getting out of the county alive would be extremely remote.

"So that was it, eh? And I complimented you upon your good sense!" His laugh was less of an effort now. "Well, doesn't it hold good now as well as it did then? Come, my dear, sit down and we'll thresh this out quietly."

She shook her head stubbornly, but the woman in her responded to the new note of confidence in his voice, and she waited eagerly for what he had to say, hopeful that he might still clear himself.

"You tell me that I must fight fair. Well, I usually do fight that way. I'm doing so now. When I spoke yesterday of crushing Wade, I meant it and I still mean it. But there are limits to what I want to see happen to him; for one thing, I don't want to see him hung for this Jensen murder, even if he's guilty."

"You know he isn't guilty."

"I think he isn't." Her eyes lighted up at this admission. "But he must be tried for the crime, there's no dodging that. The jury will decide the point; we can't. But even if he should be convicted, I shouldn't want to see him hung. Why, we've been good friends, all of us. I—I like him, even though he did jump on to me yesterday. That was why"—he leaned forward, impelled to the falsehood that hung upon his tongue by the desperate necessity of saving himself his daughter's love and respect—"I arranged with Moran to have the boy arrested on such a warrant. He is bound to be arrested"—Rexhill struck the table with his fist—"and if he should need a basis for an appeal after conviction, he could hardly have a better one than the evidence of conspiracy, which a crooked warrant would afford. I wanted to give him that chance because I realized that he had enemies here and that his trial might not be a fair one. When the right moment came I was going to have that warrant looked into."

"Father!"

Helen dropped on her knees before him, her eyelashes moist with tears and her voice vibrant with happiness.

"Why didn't you explain all that before, Father? I knew that there must be some explanation. I felt that I couldn't have loved you all my life for nothing. But do you really believe that any jury would convict Gordon of such a thing?"

"I hope not."

Never had Senator Rexhill felt himself more hopelessly a scoundrel than now as he smoothed her hair from her forehead; but he told himself that the pain of this must be less than to be engulfed in bankruptcy, or exposure, which would submerge them all. Moreover, he promised himself that if future events bore too heavily against Wade, he should be saved at the eleventh hour. The thought of this made the Senator's position less hard.

"I hope not, Helen," he repeated. "Of course, the serving of the warrant at this time will help my own interests, but since a warrant must be served, anyway, I feel justified, under the circumstances, in availing myself of this advantage."

"Y-e-s, of course," Helen agreed doubtfully. "Oh, it is all too bad. I wish none of us had ever heard of Crawling Water."

"Well, maybe the Grand Jury will not indict him, feeling runs so strong here," her father continued, and she took fresh hope at this prospect. "But, anyway, he will feel the pressure before all is done with, and very likely he'll be only too glad to dispose of his ranch and say good-by to Wyoming when he is free to do as he pleases. Then you and he can make a fresh start, eh? All will be sunshine and roses then, maybe, forever and aye."

"That's what I want to do—get away from here; and that was all I meant when I said to punish Gordon."

The Senator patted her cheek tenderly and drew a deep breath of relief.

"By the way, father," Helen said casually, when she started back to her room, a little later, "I saw Miss Purnell on the street yesterday. You know, she was out when Gordon took me to see her."

"Well, is she dangerous?"

Helen looked at him in amusement, and shrugged her shoulders.



CHAPTER XI

TANGLED THREADS

Relieved though Helen was to some extent, by her father's assurances and by the explanation which he had given, she was far from being in a tranquil frame of mind.

She knew that whatever might be the outcome of the graver charge against Gordon, he would probably have to suffer for his release of Santry, and she found herself wishing more than ever that her lover had never seen the West. What little it had contributed to his character was not worth what it had cost already and would cost in the future. Surely, his manhood was alive enough not to have needed the development of such an environment, and if his lot had been cast in the East, she could have had him always with her. A long letter, which she had recently received from Maxwell Frayne, recounting the gayeties of New York and Washington, made her homesick. Although she could scarcely think of the two men at the same moment, still, as she sat in the crude little hotel, she would have welcomed a little of young Frayne's company for the sake of contrast. She was yearning for the flesh-pots of her own Egypt.

From the news of the fight at the ranch, which had been brought to town by the messenger, she gathered that Wade meant to intrench himself on the ranch and defy the law, which would probably embroil him in other criminal acts. Crawling Water, too, was rapidly filling up with armed cattlemen, who, she thought, would do Gordon's cause more harm than good. Toward afternoon, word came of a bloody skirmish on the Trowbridge range, between a number of his punchers and some of Moran's hired men, and that added to the tension among those crowding the main street.

From the parlor windows of the hotel she watched what was going on outside, not without alarm, so high did feeling seem to run. The threats of the ranch men, handed about amongst themselves but loud enough for her to catch a word now and then, made her wonder if the town was really safe for her father, or for herself. A storm was coming up, and the rising wind whipped the flimsy lace curtains of the windows and kept them fluttering like flags. The distant muttering of the thunder and an occasional sharp flash of lightning wore on her tired nerves until she could sit still no longer.

For the sake of something to do, she went up to her room, intending to write some letters there, but her bed had not been made up, so she returned to the parlor with her fountain pen and writing-pad. To Maxwell Frayne she wrote a brief note, which was not likely to cheer him much. She had become so in the habit of taking her moods out on Maxwell that to do so, even with a pen, was second nature to her. She despised him for his tolerance of her tyranny, never realizing that he reserved to himself the privilege of squaring their account, if she should ever become his wife.

Then to ease her mind of the strain it bore, she wrote at some length to her mother; not telling the whole truth but enough of it to calm her own nervousness. She said nothing of the conversation she had overheard, but went fully into the scene between her father and Gordon Wade. With a little smile hovering on her lips, she wrote dramatically of the Senator's threat to crush the ranchman. "That will please mother," she said to herself, as her pen raced over the paper. "Gordon felt, you see, that"—she turned a page—"father knew Santry had not killed Jensen, and...."

The hotel-keeper poked his head in at the doorway.

"Two ladies to see you, Miss," he announced. "Mrs. Purnell and daughter."

He gave Helen no chance to avoid the visit, for with the obviousness of the plains, he had brought the visitors upstairs with him, and so, blotting what she had written and weighing down her letter against the breeze, she arose to greet them.

"This is good of you, Mrs. Purnell, and I am so glad to meet your daughter. I've been lonely and blue all day and now you have taken pity on me."

Mrs. Purnell shot an "I told you so" glance at Dorothy, which made that young lady smile to herself.

"I was sorry not to have been at home when you called, Miss Rexhill."

The two girls looked at each other, each carefully veiling hostility, Dorothy beneath a natural sweetness of disposition, and Helen with the savoir faire of social experience. Each felt and was stung by a realization of the other's points of advantage. Dorothy saw a perfection of well-groomed poise, such as she could hardly hope to attain, and Helen was impressed with her rival's grace and natural beauty.

"Won't you sit down?"

"But aren't we disturbing you?" Mrs. Purnell asked, with a glance toward the writing materials.

"Indeed, you are not. I was writing some duty letters to kill time. I'm only too glad to stop because I'm really in no writing mood and I am most anxious to hear what is going on outside. Isn't it dreadful about Mr. Wade?"

"You mean his helping Santry?" Dorothy asked, with a little touch of pride which did not escape her hostess.

"Partly that; but more because he is sure to be arrested himself. I've been terribly worried."

Dorothy glanced at her keenly and smiled.

"I have an idea that they may find Gordon hard to arrest," she remarked.

"Yes," Mrs. Purnell put in. "He is so popular. Still, I agree with you that there is every cause for anxiety." The good lady did not have a chance every day to agree with the daughter of a United States Senator, and the opportunity was not to be overlooked.

"The people feel so strongly that Santry should never have been arrested that they are not likely to let Gordon be taken just for freeing him," Dorothy explained.

Helen shook her head with every indication of tremulous worry.

"But it isn't that alone," she insisted. "He's to be arrested for the Jensen shooting. That was why the posse waited at his ranch after Santry had been caught."

"For the Jensen shooting?" Dorothy showed her amazement very plainly. "Are you sure?" she demanded, and when Helen nodded, exclaimed: "Why, how utterly absurd! I understood that you were with him yourself when he received word of it?"

"I was," Helen admitted. "He is supposed only to have planned the crime, I believe. He's supposed to have been the principal, isn't that what they call it?" She appealed to Mrs. Purnell.

"Oh, but do you think he could do such a thing?" Mrs. Purnell asked, much shocked.

"I don't know. I hope not."

"I do know!" Dorothy burst out emphatically. "I know Gordon Wade too well to think for one minute that he did it; and every true friend of his ought to speak out at once and say the same thing."

The challenge in her voice was unmistakable, and Mrs. Purnell moved uneasily in her chair. She glanced anxiously at Helen and was relieved to see that the latter had lost none of her poise.

"I hope so as fully as you do," Helen said sweetly, "but things move so fast here in these mountains that I find it hard to keep up with them."

"Of course," Mrs. Purnell soothed, with a troubled look at her daughter.

"Who swore out the warrant, I wonder?" Dorothy asked, in a more tranquil tone, a bit ashamed of her outburst. "Was it Mr. Moran?"

"I'm sure I don't know," Helen answered. "I supposed it was the Sheriff. Why should Mr. Moran have anything to do with it?"

"Because he seems to have been concerned in all the trouble we have had," Dorothy replied calmly. "This was a peaceful little community until Mr. Moran moved into it."

Helen made no direct reply to this, and for awhile Dorothy allowed her mother to sustain the conversation. She had no doubt but that Moran was back of it all, and she was thinking of what Lem Trowbridge had said; that if they could only "get something on" Moran and the Senator, a solution of the whole problem would be at hand. She thought that she had detected a defensive note in Helen's voice, and she was wondering why it should have been there.

"But you haven't answered my question yet about Mr. Moran," Helen presently challenged her. "You seemed to have something more in mind than what you said. Would you mind telling me?"

Dorothy looked steadily but not offensively at her.

"Oh, it's nothing, Miss Rexhill. I was only thinking that he has gone rather far: been very zealous in your father's interests. Probably...."

"Why, Dorothy—!" her mother interposed, in a shocked tone.

"Miss Rexhill asked me, mother, and you know that I always speak frankly."

"Yes, do go on," Helen urged, with even an added touch of sweetness in her manner. "I really want to know. I am so out of touch with things here, so ill informed."

"Well, you can sit here at the windows and learn all you wish to know. There isn't a man in this town that would see Gordon arrested and not fight to free him. Feeling is running high here now. You know, it's something like a violin string. You can stretch it just so far and then it snaps. That's all."

"Dorothy, I'm really mortified that you...."

"Oh, you've no occasion to be, Mrs. Purnell," Helen interrupted, smiling. "I asked for the plain truth, you know."

Mrs. Purnell laughed feebly.

"Dorothy has known Mr. Wade so long and we both like him so well that she can't bear to hear a word against him," she explained. Her sense of lese majeste was running away with her judgment, and Dorothy shot an irritated glance at her. "Not that I think he did it at all, you understand; but...."

"Oh, perfectly," declared Helen, with rising color and an equal feeling of annoyance. "Oh, dear me, do look at my poor letters!"

A gust of wind, stronger than any that had come before, had swept the weight to the floor and scattered letter paper, envelopes, and blotter about the room. Helen was just able to catch the writing-pad as it slid to the floor, while Dorothy and her mother laughingly salvaged the rest. The incident happily relieved the awkward drift of their conversation, and they all felt relieved.

"Well, now, did you ever?" Mrs. Purnell ejaculated, looking at the lithographed blotter, which she held in her hand. "I declare this picture of a little girl reminds me of Dorothy when she was that age."

"Oh, mother!"

"Really?" Helen broke in. "How interesting. I hadn't noticed the picture. Do let me see."

To be courteous, she agreed with Mrs. Purnell that there was a strong likeness, which Dorothy laughingly denied.

"I guess I know what you looked like when you were five better than you do," Mrs. Purnell declared. "It's the image of you as you were then, and as Miss Rexhill says, there is a facial resemblance even yet."

"Perhaps you would like to take it with you, then," Helen suggested, to Mrs. Purnell's delight, who explained that the only picture she had of Dorothy at that age had been lost.

"If it wouldn't deprive you?"

"No, indeed. You must take it. I have a large blotter in my writing-pad, so I really don't need that one at all. So many such things are sent to father that we always have more than we can use up."

When Dorothy and her mother left the hotel, urged homeward by the first big drops of the coming rain, Mrs. Purnell tucked the blotter in the bosom of her dress, happy to have the suggestion of the picture to recall the days when her husband's presence cheered them all. Her world had been a small one, and little things like this helped to make it bright.

Soon afterward the supper bell rang, and during the meal Helen told the Senator, who seemed somewhat morose and preoccupied, of the visit she had had.

"Sure tiresome people. Goodness! I was glad to see them at first because I thought they would help me to pass the afternoon, but instead I was bored to death. That little minx is crazy about Gordon, though. I could see that."

"Um!"

"And the worst of it is that she just fits into the scenery here, and I don't. You know, father, I never could wax enthusiastic over shooing the cows to roost and things like that."

"Um!"

"I feel like a deaf person at a concert, here in this town."

This remark brought a wry laugh from her father, and Helen smiled.

"Well, I've made you laugh, anyway," she said. "You're frightfully grouchy this evening."

"My dear, I'm busy, very busy, and I haven't time to think of trifles. I'll be at it most of the night."

"Oh, shall you? Goodness, that's cheerful. I wish I had never come to this awful little place. I suppose I must go back to my letters for something to do. And, father," she added, as he lingered with her for a moment in the hallway, "the Purnells seem to think that you and Mr. Moran had better not go too far. The people here are very much wrought up."

He patted her shoulder affectionately.

"You leave all that to me and go write to your mother."

There was nothing else for her to do, so she returned to the parlor. When she had finished her letters, she idly picked up a week-old copy of a Denver newspaper which lay on the table and glanced through the headlines. She was yawningly thinking of bed, when Moran came into the room.

"Oh, are you and father through at last?"

"Yes," he answered, smiling. "That is, we're through upstairs. I'm on my way over to the office to straighten up a few loose ends before I turn in. There's no rest for the weary, you know."

"Don't let me keep you, then," she said dryly, as he lingered. "I'm going to bed."

"You're not keeping me. I'm keeping myself." He quite understood her motive, but he was not thin-skinned, and he had learned that he had to make his opportunities with her. "Your father told me you were getting anxious."

"Not anxious, tired."

"Things are getting a little warm here, but before there's any real danger we expect to have the soldiers here to take charge."

He rather ostentatiously displayed his bandaged wrist, hoping to win her sympathy, but she professed none. Instead, she yawned and tapped her lips with her fingers, and her indifference piqued him.

"I was talking with Dorothy Purnell this afternoon," Helen finally remarked, eyeing him lazily, "and she seems to be of the opinion that you'll have hard work arresting Gordon Wade. I rather hope that you do."