"I want to tell you," said Lowell, "that I appreciate such confidence as you have reposed in me. I won't urge you to tell more but I'm going to be around in the offing, and, if things don't go right, and especially if Bill Talpers—"

There was so much terror in the girl's eyes that Lowell's assurances came to a lame ending. She turned and ran into the house, after a fluttering word of thanks for the ride, and Lowell, more puzzled than ever, drove thoughtfully away.



CHAPTER VI

White Lodge was a town founded on excitement. Counting its numerous shootings and consequent lynchings, and proportioning them to its population, White Lodge had experienced more thrills than the largest of Eastern cities. Some ribald verse-writer, seizing upon White Lodge's weakness as a theme, had once written:

We can put the card deck by us, We can give up whiskey straight; Though we ain't exactly pious, We can fill the parson's plate; We can close the gamblin' places, We can save our hard-earned coin, BUT we want a man for breakfast In the mor-r-rnin'.

But of course such lines were written in early days, and for newspaper consumption in a rival town. White Lodge had grown distinctly away from its wildness. It had formed a Chamber of Commerce which entered bravely upon its mission as a lodestone for the attraction of Eastern capital. But the lure of adventurous days still remained in the atmosphere. Men who were assembled for the purpose of seeing what could be done about getting a horseshoe-nail factory for White Lodge wound up the session by talking about the days of the cattle and sheep war. All of which was natural, and would have taken place in any town with White Lodge's background of stirring tradition.

Until the murder on the Dollar Sign road there had been little but tradition for White Lodge to feed on. The sheriff's job had come to be looked upon as a sinecure. But now all was changed. Not only White Lodge, but the whole countryside, had something live to discuss. Even old Ed Halsey, who had not been down from his cabin in the mountains for at least five years, ambled in on his ancient saddle horse to get the latest in mass theory.

So far as theorizing was concerned, opinion in White Lodge ran all one way. The men who had been arrested were guilty, so the local newspaper assumed, echoing side-walk conversation. The only questions were: Just how was the crime committed, and how deeply was each man implicated? Also, were there any confederates? Some of the older cattlemen, who had been shut out of leases on the reservation, were even heard to hint that in their opinion the whole tribe might have had a hand in the killing. Anyway, Fire Bear's cohorts should be rounded up and imprisoned without delay.

Lowell was not surprised to find that he had been drawn into the vortex of unfriendliness. More articles and editorials appeared in the "White Lodge Weekly Star," putting the general blame for the tragedy upon the policy of "coddling" the Indians.

"The whole thing," wound up one editorial, "is the best kind of an argument for throwing open the reservation to white settlement."

"That is the heart of the matter as it stands," said Lowell, pointing out the editorial to his chief clerk. "This murder is to be made the excuse for a big drive on Congress to have the reservation thrown open."

"Yes," observed Rogers, "the big cattlemen have been itching for another chance since their last bill was defeated in Congress. They remind me of the detective concern that never sleeps, only they might better get in a few honest, healthy snores than waste their time the way they have lately."

Lowell paid no attention to editorial criticism, but it was not easy to avoid hearing some of the personal comment that was passed when he visited White Lodge. In fact he found it necessary to come to blows with one cowpuncher, who had evidently been stationed near Lowell's automobile to "get the goat" of the young Indian agent. The encounter had been short and decisive. The cowboy, who was the hero of many fistic engagements, passed some comment which had been elaborately thought out at the camp-fire, and which, it was figured by his collaborators, "would make anything human fight or quit."

"That big cowpuncher from Sartwell's outfit sure got the agent's goat all right," said Sheriff Tom Redmond, in front of whose office the affair happened. "That is to say, he got the goat coming head-on, horns down and hoofs striking fire. That young feller was under the cowpuncher's arms in jest one twenty-eighth of a second, and there was only two sounds that fell on the naked ear—one being the smack when Lowell hit and the other the crash when the cowpuncher lit. If that rash feller'd taken the trouble to send me a little note of inquiry in advance, I could have told him to steer clear of a man who tied into a desperate man the way that young agent tied into Jim McFann out there on the reservation. But no public or private warnings are going to be necessary now. From this time on, young Lowell's going to have more berth-room than a wildcat."

Such matters as cold nods from former friends were disregarded by Lowell. He had been through lesser affairs which had brought him under criticism. In fact he knew that a certain measure of such injustice would be the portion of any man who accepted the post of agent. He went his way, doing what he could to insure a fair trial for both men, and at the same time not overlooking anything that might shed new light on a case which most of the residents of White Lodge seemed to consider as closed, all but the punishment to be meted out to the prisoners.

The hearing was to be held in the little court-room presided over by Judge Garford, who had been a figure at Vigilante trials in early days and who was a unique personification of kindliness and firmness. Both prisoners had refused counsel, nor had any confession materialized, as Tom Redmond had prophesied. McFann had spent most of his time cursing all who had been concerned in his arrest. Talpers had called on him again, and had whispered mysteriously through the bars:

"Don't worry, Jim. If it comes to a showdown, I'll be there with evidence that'll clear you flyin'."

As a matter of fact, Talpers intended to play a double game. He would let matters drift, and see if McFann did not get off in the ordinary course of events. Meantime the trader would use his precious possession, the letter written by Helen Ervin, to terrify the girl. In case the girl proved defiant, why, then it would be time to produce the letter as a law-abiding citizen should, and demand that the searchlight of justice be turned on the author of a missive apparently so directly concerned with the murder. If it so happened that the letter in his hands proved to be a successful weapon, and if Bill Talpers were accepted as a suitor, he would let the matter drop, so far as the authorities were concerned—and Jim McFann could drop with it. If the half-breed were to be sacrificed when a few words from Bill Talpers might save him, so much the worse for Jim McFann! The affairs of Bill Talpers were to be considered first of all, and there was no need of being too solicitous over the welfare of any mere cat's-paw like the half-breed.

If Jim McFann had known what was passing in the mind of the trader, he would have torn his way out of jail with his bare hands and slain his partner in bootlegging. But the half-breed took Talpers's fair words at face value and faced his prospects with a trifle more of equanimity.

Fire Bear continued to view matters with true Indian composure. He had made no protestations of innocence, and had told Lowell there was nothing he wanted except to get the hearing over with as quickly as possible. The young Indian, to Lowell's shrewd eye, did not seem well. His actions were feverish and his eyes unnaturally bright. At Lowell's request, an agency doctor was brought and examined Fire Bear. His report to Lowell was the one sinister word: "Tuberculosis!"

When the men were brought into the court-room a miscellaneous crowd had assembled. Cowpunchers from many miles away had ridden in to hear what the Indian and "breed" had to say for themselves. The crowd even extended through the open doors into the hallway. Late comers, who could not get so much as standing room, draped themselves upon the stairs and about the porch and made eager inquiry as to the progress of affairs.

Helen Ervin rode in to attend the hearing, in response to an inner appeal against which she had struggled vainly. She met Lowell as she dismounted from the old white horse in front of the court-house. Lowell had called two or three times at the ranch, following their ride across the reservation. He had not gone into the house, but had merely stopped to get her assurance that everything was going well and that the sick man was steadily progressing toward convalescence.

"Why didn't you tell me you were coming over?" asked Lowell. "I would have brought you in my machine. As it is, I must insist on taking you back. I'll have Plenty Buffalo lead your pony back to the ranch when he returns to the agency."

"I couldn't help coming," said Helen. "I have a feeling that innocent men are going to suffer a great injustice. Tell me, do you think they have a chance of going free?"

"They may be held for trial," said Lowell. "No one knows what will be brought up either for or against them in the meantime."

"But they should not spend so much as a day in jail," insisted Helen. "They—"

Here she paused and looked over Lowell's shoulder, her expression changing to alarm. The agent turned and beheld Bill Talpers near them, his gaze fixed on the girl. Talpers turned away as Lowell escorted Helen upstairs to the court-room, where he secured a seat for her.

As the prisoners were brought in Helen recognized the unfriendliness of the general attitude of White Lodge toward them. Hostility was expressed in cold stares and whispered comment.

The men afforded a contrasting picture. Fire Bear's features were pure Indian. His nose was aquiline, his cheek-bones high, and his eyes black and piercing, the intensity of their gaze being emphasized by the fever which was beginning to consume him. His expression was martial. In his football days the "fighting face" of the Indian star had often appeared on sporting pages. He surveyed the crowd in the court-room with calm indifference, and seldom glanced at the gray-bearded, benign-looking judge.

Jim McFann, on the contrary, seldom took his eyes from the judge's face. Jim was not so tall as Fire Bear, but was of wiry, athletic build. His cheek-bones were as high as those of the Indian, but his skin was lighter in color, and his hair had a tendency to curl. His sinewy hands were clenched on his knees, and his moccasined feet crossed and uncrossed themselves as the hearing progressed.

Each man testified briefly in his own behalf, and each, in Helen's opinion, told a convincing story. Both admitted having been on the scene of the crime. Jim McFann was there first. The half-breed testified that he had been looking for a rawhide lariat which he thought he had dropped from his saddle somewhere along the Dollar Sign road the day before. He had noticed an automobile standing in the road, and had discovered the body staked down on the prairie. In answer to a question, McFann admitted that the rope which had been cut in short lengths and used to tie the murdered man to the stakes had been the lariat for which he had been searching. He was alarmed at this discovery, and was about to remove the rope from the victim's ankles and wrists, when he had descried a body of horsemen approaching. He had thought the horsemen might be Indian police, and had jumped on his horse and ridden away, making his way through a near-by gulch and out on the prairie without being detected.

"Why were you so afraid of the Indian police?" was asked.

The half-breed hesitated a moment, and then said:

"Bootlegging."

There was a laugh in the court-room at this—a sharp, mirthless laugh which was checked by the insistent sound of the bailiff's gavel.

Jim McFann sank back in his chair, livid with rage. In his eyes was the look of the snarling wild animal—the same look that had flashed there when he sprang at Lowell in his camp. He motioned that he had nothing more to say.

Fire Bear's testimony was as brief. He said that he and a company of his young men—perhaps thirty or forty—all mounted on ponies, had taken a long ride from the camp where they had been making medicine. The trip was in connection with the medicine that was being made. Fire Bear and his young men had ridden by a circuitous route, and had left the reservation at the Greek Letter Ranch on the same morning that McFann had found the slain man's body. They had intended riding along the Dollar Sign road, past Talpers's and the agency, and back to their camp. But on the big hill between Talpers's and the Greek Letter Ranch they had found the automobile standing in the road, and a few minutes later had found the body, just as McFann had described it. They had not seen any trace of McFann, but had noticed the tracks of a man and pony about the automobile and the body. The Indians had held a quick consultation, and, on the advice of Fire Bear, had quit the scene suddenly. It was the murder of a white man, off the reservation. It was a case for white men to settle. If the Indians were found there, they might get in trouble. They had galloped across the prairie to their camp, by the most direct way, and had not gone on to Talpers's nor to the agency.

Helen expected both men to be freed at once. To her dismay, the judge announced that both would be held for trial, without bail, following perfunctory statements from Plenty Buffalo, Walter Lowell, and Sheriff Tom Redmond, relating to later events in the tragedy. As in a dream Helen saw some of the spectators starting to leave and Redmond's deputy beckon to his prisoners, when Walter Lowell rose and asked permission to address the court in behalf of the Government's ward, Fire Bear.

Lowell, in a few words, explained that further imprisonment probably would be fatal to Fire Bear. He produced the certificate of the agency physician, showing that the prisoner had contracted tuberculosis.

"If Fire Bear will give me his word of honor that he will not try to escape," said the agent, "I will guarantee his appearance on the day set for his trial."

A murmur ran through the court-room, quickly hushed by the insistent gavel.

Lowell had been reasonably sure of his ground before he spoke. The venerable judge had always been interested in the work at the agency, and was a close student of Indian tradition and history. The request had come as a surprise, but the court hesitated only a moment, and then announced that, if the Government's agent on the reservation would be responsible for the delivery of the prisoner for trial, the defendant, Fire Bear, would be delivered to said agent's care. The other defendant, being in good health and not being a ward of the Government, would have to stand committed to jail for trial.

Fire Bear accepted the news with outward indifference. Jim McFann, with his hands tightly clenched and the big veins on his forehead testifying to the rage that burned within him, was led away between Redmond and his deputy. There was a shuffling of feet and clinking of spurs as men rose from their seats. A buzz came from the crowd, as distinctly hostile as a rattler's whirr. Words were not distinguishable, but the sentiment could not have been any more distinctly indicated if the crowd had shouted in unison.

Judge Garford rose and looked in a fatherly way upon the crowd. At a motion from him the bailiff rapped for attention. The judge stroked his white beard and said softly:

"Friends, there is some danger that excitement may run away with this community. The arm of the law is long, and I want to say that it will be reached out, without fear or favor, to gather in any who may attempt in any way to interfere with the administration of justice."

To Helen it seemed as if the old, heroic West had spoken through this fearless giant of other days. There was no mistaking the meaning that ran through that quietly worded message. It brought the crowd up with a thrill of apprehension, followed by honest shame. There was even a ripple of applause. The crowd started once more to file out, but in different mood. Some of the more impetuous, who had rushed downstairs before the judge had spoken, were hustled away from the agent's automobile, around which they had grouped themselves threateningly.

"The judge means business," one old-timer said in an awe-stricken voice. "That's the way he looked and talked when he headed the Vigilantes' court. He'll do what he says if he has to hang a dozen men."

When Lowell and Helen came out to the automobile, followed by Fire Bear, the court-house square was almost deserted. Fire Bear climbed into the back seat, at Lowell's direction. He was without manacles. Helen occupied the seat beside the driver. As they drove away, she caught a glimpse of Judge Garford coming down the court-house steps. He was engaged in telling some bit of pioneer reminiscence—something broadly pleasant. His face was smiling and his blue eyes were twinkling. He looked almost as any grandparent might have looked going to join a favorite grandchild at a park bench. Yet here was a man who had torn aside the veil and permitted one glimpse at the old, inspiring West.

Helen turned and looked at him again, as, in an earlier era, she would have looked at Lincoln.



CHAPTER VII

The stage station at White Lodge was a temporary center of public interest every afternoon at three o'clock when Charley Hicks drove the passenger bus in from Quaking-Asp Grove. After a due inspection of the passengers the crowd always shifted immediately to the post-office to await the distribution of mail.

A well-dressed, refined-looking woman of middle age was among the passengers on the second day after the hearing of Fire Bear and Jim McFann. She had little or nothing to say on the trip—perhaps for the reason that speech would have been difficult on account of the monopolizing of the conversation by the other passengers. These included two women from White Lodge, one rancher from Antelope Mesa, and two drummers who were going to call on White Lodge merchants. The conversation was unusually brisk and ran almost exclusively on the murder.

Judge Garford's action in releasing Fire Bear on the agent's promise to produce the prisoner in court was the cause of considerable criticism. The two women, the ranchman, and one of the drummers had voted that too much leniency was shown. The other drummer appealed to the stage-driver to support his contention that the court's action was novel, but entirely just.

"Well, all I can say is," remarked the driver, "that if that Injun shows up for trial, as per his agreement, without havin' to be sent for, it's goin' to be a hard lesson for the white race to swaller. You can imagine how much court'd be held if all white suspects was to be let go on their word that they'd show up for trial. Detectives 'd be chasin' fugitives all over the universe. If that Injun shows up, I'll carry the hull reservation anywheres, without tickets, if they'll promise to pay me at the end of the trip."

The driver noticed that the quiet lady in the back seat, though taking no part in the conversation, seemed to be a keenly interested listener. No part of the discussion of the murder escaped her, but she asked no questions. On alighting at White Lodge, she asked the driver where she could get a conveyance to take her to Willis Morgan's ranch.

The driver looked at her in such astonishment that she repeated her question.

"I'd 'a' plum forgot there was such a man in this part of the country," said Charley, "if it hadn't 'a' been that sometime before this here murder I carried a young woman—a stepdaughter of his'n—and she asked me the same question. I don't believe you can hire any one to take you out there, but I'll bet I can get you took by the same young feller that took this girl to the ranch. He's the Indian agent, and I seen him in his car when we turned this last corner."

Followed by his passenger the driver hurried back to the corner and hailed Walter Lowell, who was just preparing to return to the agency.

On having matters explained, Lowell expressed his willingness to carry the lady passenger over to the ranch. Her suitcase was put in the automobile, and soon they were on the outskirts of White Lodge.

"I ought to explain," said the agent's passenger, "that my name is Scovill—Miss Sarah Scovill—and Mr. Morgan's stepdaughter has been in my school for years."

"I know," said Lowell. "I've heard her talk about your school, and I'm glad you're going out to see her. She needs you."

Miss Scovill looked quickly at Lowell. She was one of those women whose beauty is only accentuated by gray hair. Her brow and eyes were serene—those of a dreamer. Her mouth and chin were delicately modeled, but firm. Their firmness explained, perhaps, why she was executive head of a school instead of merely a teacher. Not all her philosophy had been won from books. She had traveled and observed much of life at first hand. That was why she could keep her counsel—why she had kept it during all the talk on the stage, even though that talk had vitally interested her. She showed the effects of her long, hard trip, but would not hear of stopping at the agency for supper.

"If you don't mind—if it is not altogether too much trouble to put you to—I must go on," she said. "I assure you it's very important, and it concerns Helen Ervin, and I assume that you are her friend."

Lowell hastened his pace. It all meant that it would be long past the supper hour when he returned to the agency, but there was an appeal in Miss Scovill's eyes and voice which was not to be resisted. Anyway, he was not going to offer material resistance to something which was concerned with the well being of Helen Ervin.

They sped through the agency, past Talpers's store, and climbed the big hill just as the purples fell into their accustomed places in the hollows of the plain. As they bowled past the scene of the tragedy, Lowell pointed it out, with only a brief word. His passenger gave a little gasp of pain and horror. He thought it was nothing more than might ordinarily be expected under such circumstances, but, on looking at Miss Scovill, he was surprised to see her leaning back against the seat, almost fainting.

"By George!" said Lowell contritely, "I shouldn't have mentioned it to you."

He slowed down the car, but Miss Scovill sat upright and recovered her mental poise, though with evident effort.

"I'm glad you did mention it," she said, looking back as if fascinated. "Only, you see, I'd been hearing about the murder most of the day in the stage, and then this place is so big and wide and lonely! Please don't think I'm foolish."

"It's all because you're from the city and haven't proportioned things as yet," said Lowell. "Now all this loneliness seems kindly, to me. It's only crowds that seem cruel. I often envy trappers dying alone in such places. Also I can understand why the Indians wanted nothing better in death than to have their bodies hoisted high atop of a hill, with nothing to disturb."

As they rounded the top of the hill and the road came up behind them like an inverted curtain, Miss Scovill gave one last backward look. Lowell saw that she was weeping quietly, but unrestrainedly. He drove on in silence until he pulled the automobile up in front of the Morgan ranch.

"You'll find Miss Ervin here," said Lowell, stepping out of the car. "This is the Greek Letter Ranch."

If the prospect brought any new shock to Miss Scovill, she gave no indication of the fact. She answered Lowell steadily enough when he asked her when he should call for her on her return trip.

"My return trip will be right now," she said. "I've thought it all out—just what I'm to do, with your help. Please don't take my suitcase from the car. Just turn the car around, and be ready to take us back to-night—I mean Helen and myself. I intend to bring her right out and take her away from this place."

Wonderingly Lowell turned the car as she directed. Miss Scovill knocked at the ranch-house door. It was opened by Wong, and Miss Scovill stepped inside. The door closed again. Lowell rolled a cigarette and smoked it, and then rolled another. He was about to step out of the car and knock at the ranch-house door when Helen and Miss Scovill came out, each with an arm about the other's waist.

Miss Scovill's face looked whiter than ever in the moonlight.

"Something has happened," she said—"something that makes it impossible for me to go back—for Helen to go back with me to-night. If you can come and get me in the morning, I'll go back alone."

Lowell's amazement knew no bounds. Miss Scovill had made this long journey from San Francisco to get Helen—evidently to wrest her at once away from this ranch of mystery—and now she was going back alone, leaving the girl among the very influences she had intended to combat.

"Please, Mr. Lowell, do as she says," interposed Helen, whose demeanor was grave, but whose joy at this meeting with her teacher and foster mother shone in her eyes.

"Yes, yes—you'll have our thanks all through your life if you will take me back to-morrow and say nothing of what you have seen or heard," said Miss Scovill.

Lowell handed Miss Scovill's suitcase to the silent Wong, who had slipped out behind the women.

"I'm only too glad to be of service to you in any way," he said. "I'll be here in the morning early enough so you can catch the stage out of White Lodge."

Much smoking on the way home did not clear up the mystery for Lowell. Nor did sitting up and weighing the matter long after his usual bedtime bring him any nearer to answering the questions: Why did Miss Scovill come here determined to take Helen Ervin back to San Francisco with her? Why did Miss Scovill change her mind so completely after arriving at Morgan's ranch? Also why did said Miss Scovill betray such unusual agitation on passing the scene of the murder on the Dollar Sign road—a murder that she had been hearing discussed from all angles during the day?

This last question was intensified the next morning, when, with Helen in the back seat with Miss Scovill, Lowell drove back to White Lodge. When they passed the scene of the murder, Lowell took pains to notice that Miss Scovill betrayed no signs of mental strain. Yet only a few hours before she had been completely unnerved at passing by this same spot.

The women talked little on the trip to White Lodge. What talk there was between them was on school matters—mostly reminiscences of Helen's school-days. Lowell could not help thinking that they feared to talk of present matters—that something was weighing them down and crushing them into silence. But they parted calmly enough at White Lodge. After the stage had gone with Miss Scovill, Helen slipped into the seat beside Lowell and chatted somewhat as she had done during their first journey over the road.

As for Lowell, he dismissed for the moment all thoughts of tragedy and mystery from his mind, and gave himself up to the enjoyment of the ride. They stopped at the agency, and Helen called on some of the friends she had made on her first journey through. Lowell showed her about the grounds, and she took keen interest in all that had been done to improve the condition of the Indians.

"Of course the main object is to induce the Indian to work," said Lowell. "The agency is simply an experimental plant to show him the right methods. It was hard for the white man to leave the comfortable life of the savage and take up work. The trouble is that we're expecting the Indian to acquire in a generation the very things it took us ages to accept. That's why I haven't been in too great a hurry to shut down on dances and religious ceremonies. The Indian has had to assimilate too much, as it is. It seems to me that if he makes progress slowly that is about all that can be expected of him."

"It seems to me that saving the Indian from extermination, as all this work is helping to do, is among the greatest things in the world," said Helen. "The sad thing to me is that these people seem so remote from all help. The world forgets so easily what it can't see."

"Yes, there are no newspapers out here to get up Christmas charity drives, and there are few volunteer settlement workers to be called on for help at any time. And there are no charity balls for the Indian. It isn't that he wants charity so much as understanding."

"Understanding often comes quickest through charity," interposed Helen. "It seems to me that no one could ask a better life-work than to help these people."

"There's more to them than the world has been willing to concede," declared Lowell. "I never have subscribed to Parkman's theory that the Indian's mind moves in a beaten track and that his soul is dormant. The more I work among them the more respect I have for their capabilities."

Further talk of Indian affairs consumed the remainder of the trip. Lowell was an enthusiast in his work, though he seldom talked of it, preferring to let results speak for themselves. But he had found a ready and sympathetic listener. Furthermore, he wished to take the girl's mind from the matters that evidently were proving such a weight. He succeeded so well that not until they reached the ranch did her troubled expression return.

"Tell me," said Lowell, as he helped her from the automobile, "is he—is Morgan better, and is he treating you all right?"

"Yes, to both questions," said she. Then, after a moment's hesitation, she added: "Come in. Perhaps it will be possible for you to see him."

Lowell stepped into the room that served as Morgan's study. One wall was lined with books, Greek predominating. Helen knocked at the door of the adjoining room, and there came the clear, sharp, cynical voice that had aroused all the antagonism in Lowell's nature on his first visit.

"Come in, come in!" called the voice, as cold as ice crystals.

Helen entered, and closed the door. The voice could be heard, in different modulations, but always with profound cynicism as its basis.

Lowell, with a gesture of rage, stepped to the library table. He picked up a volume of Shakespeare's tragedies, and noticed that all references to killing and to bloodshed in general had been blotted out. Passage after passage was blackened with heavy lines in lead pencil. In astonishment, Lowell picked up another volume and found that the same thing had been done. Then the door opened and he heard the cutting voice say:

"Tell the interesting young agent that I am indisposed. I have never had a social caller within my doors here, and I do not wish to start now."

Helen came out and closed the door.

"You heard?" she asked.

"Yes," replied Lowell. "It's all right. I'm only sorry if my coming has caused you any additional pain or embarrassment. I won't ask you again what keeps you in an atmosphere like this, but any time you want to leave, command me on the instant."

"Please don't get our talk back where it was before," pleaded Helen, as they stepped out on the porch and Lowell said good-bye. "I've enjoyed the ride and the talk to-day because it all took me away from myself and from this place of horrors. But I can't leave here permanently, no matter how much I might desire it."

"It's all going to be just as you say," Lowell replied. "Some day I'll see through it all, perhaps, but right now I'm not trying very hard, because some way I feel that you don't want me to."

She shook hands with him gratefully, and Lowell drove slowly back to the agency, not forgetting his customary stop at the scene of the murder—a stop that proved fruitless as usual.

When he entered the agency office, Lowell was greeted with an excited hail from Ed Rogers.

"Here's news!" exclaimed the chief clerk. "Tom Redmond has telephoned over that Jim McFann has broken jail."

"How did he get away?"

"Jim had been hearing all this talk about lynching. It had been coming to him, bit by bit, in the jail, probably passed on by the other prisoners, and it got him all worked up. It seems that the jailer's kid, a boy about sixteen years old, had been in the habit of bringing Jim's meals. Also the kid had a habit of carrying Dad's keys around, just to show off. Instead of grabbing his soup, Jim grabbed the kid by the throat. Then he made the boy unlock the cell door and Jim slipped out, gagged the kid, and walked out of the jail. He jumped on a cowboy's pony in front of the jail, and was gone half an hour before the kid, who had been locked in Jim's cell, managed to attract attention. Tom Redmond wants you to get out the Indian police, because he's satisfied Jim has skipped to the reservation and is hiding somewhere in the hills."



CHAPTER VIII

"That there girl down at the Greek Letter Ranch is the best-lookin' girl in these parts. I was goin' to slick up and drop around to see her, but this here Injun agent got in ahead of me. A man with nothin' but a cowpony don't stand a show against a feller with an auto when it comes to callin' on girls these days."

The nasal, drawling voice of Andy Wolters, cowpuncher for one of the big leasing outfits on the Indian reservation, came to the ears of Bill Talpers as the trader sat behind his post-office box screen, scowling out upon a sunshiny world.

A chorus of laughter from other cowpunchers greeted the frank declaration of Mr. Wolters.

"Agent or no agent, you wouldn't stand a show with that girl," chimed in one of the punchers. "The squaw professor'd run you through the barb-wire fence so fast that you'd leave hide and clothes stickin' to it. Willis Morgan ain't ever had a visitor on his place sence he run the Greek Letter brand on his first steer."

"Well, he ain't got any more steers left. That old white horse is all the stock I see of his—anyways, it's all that's carryin' that pitchfork brand."

"You know what they say about how old Morgan got that pitchfork brand, don't you?—how he was huntin' through the brand book one night, turnin' the pages over and cussin' because nothin' seemed to suit his fancy, when all of a sudden there was a bright light and a strong smell of sulphur, and the devil himself was right there at Morgan's side. 'Use this for a brand,' says the devil, and there was the mark of his pitchfork burnt on Morgan's front door, right where you'll see it to-day if you ever want to go clost enough."

"Anyway, git that out of your head about Morgan's ranch never havin' any visitors," said another cowboy. "This here Injun agent's auto runs down there reg'lar. Must be that he's a kind of a Trilby and has got old Morgan hypnotized."

"Aw, you mean a Svengali."

"I bet you these spurs against a package of smokin' tobacco I know what I mean," stoutly asserted the cowpuncher whose literary knowledge had been called in question, and then the talk ran along the familiar argumentative channels that had no interest for Bill Talpers.

The trader looked back into the shadowy depths of his store. Besides the cowboys there were several Indians leaning against the counters or sitting lazily on boxes and barrels. Shelves and counters were piled with a colorful miscellany of goods calculated to appeal to primitive tastes. There were bright blankets and shawls, the latter greedily eyed by every Indian woman who came into the store. There were farming implements and boots and groceries and harness. In the corner where Bill Talpers sat was the most interesting collection of all. This corner was called the pawnshop. Here Bill paid cash for silver rings and bracelets, and for turquoise and other semi-precious stones either mounted or in the rough. Here he dickered for finely beaded moccasins and hat-bands and other articles for which he found a profitable market in the East. Here watches were put up for redemption, disappearing after they had hung their allotted time.

Traders on the reservation were not permitted to have such corners in their stores, but Bill, being over the line, drove such bargains as he pleased and took such security as he wished.

As Bill looked over his oft-appraised stock, it seemed to have lost much of its one-time charm. Storekeeping for a bunch of Indians and cowpunchers was no business for a smart, self-respecting man to be in—a man who had ambitions to be somebody in a busier world. The thing to do was to sell out and clear out—after he had married that girl at Morgan's ranch. He had been too lenient with that girl, anyway. Here he held the whip-hand over her and had never used it. He had been waiting from day to day, gloating over his opportunities, and this Indian agent had been calling on her and maybe was getting her confidence.

Maybe it had gone so far that the girl had told Lowell about the letter she had mailed and that Bill had held up. Something akin to a chill moved along Bill's spinal column at the thought. But of course such a thing could not be. The girl couldn't afford to talk about anything like that letter, which was certain to drag her into the murder.

Bill looked at the letter again and then tucked it back in the safe. That was the best place to keep it. It might get lost out of his pocket and then there'd be the very devil to pay. He knew it all by heart, anyway. It was enough to give him what he wanted—this girl for a wife. She simply couldn't resist, with that letter held over her by a determined man like Bill Talpers. After he had married her, he'd sell out this pile of junk and let somebody else haggle with the Injuns and cowpunchers. Bill Talpers'd go where he could wear good clothes every day, and his purty wife'd hold up her head with the best of them! He'd go over and state his case that very night. He'd lay down the law right, so this girl at Morgan's 'd know who her next boss was going to be. If Willis Morgan tried to interfere, Bill Talpers 'd crush him just the way he'd crushed many a rattler!

As a preliminary to his courting trip, Bill took a drink from a bottle that he kept handy in his corner. Then he walked out to his sleeping-quarters in the rear of the store and "slicked up a bit," during which process he took several drinks from another bottle which was stowed conveniently there.

Leaving his store in charge of his clerk, Bill rode over the Dollar Sign highway toward Morgan's ranch. The trader was dressed in black. A white shirt and white collar fairly hurt the eye, being in such sharp contrast with Bill's dark skin and darker beard. A black hat, wide of brim and carefully creased, replaced the nondescript felt affair which Bill usually wore. He donned the best pair of new boots that he could select from his stock. They hurt his feet so that he swung first one and then the other from the stirrups to get relief. There was none to tell Bill that his broad, powerful frame looked better in its everyday habiliments, and he would not have believed, even if he had been told. He had created a sensation as he had creaked through the store after his dressing-up operations had been completed, and he intended to repeat the thrill when he burst upon the vision of the girl at Morgan's.

* * * * *

Wong had cleared away the supper dishes at the Greek Letter Ranch, and had silently taken his way to the little bunkhouse which formed his sleeping-quarters.

In the library a lamp glowed. A gray-haired man sat at the table, bowed in thought. A girl, sitting across from him, was writing. Outside was the silence of the prairie night, broken by an occasional bird call near by.

"It is all so lonely here, I wonder how you can stand it," said the man. There was deep concern in his voice. All sharpness had gone from it.

"It is all different, of course, from the country in which I have been living, and it is lonely, but I could get used to it soon if it were not for this pall—"

Here the girl rose and went to the open window. She leaned on the sill and looked out.

The man's gaze followed her. She was even more attractive than usual, in a house dress of light color, her arms bare to the elbows, and her pale, expressive face limned against the black background of the night.

"I know what you would say," replied the man. "It would be bearable here—in fact, it might be enjoyable were it not for the black shadow upon us. Rather it is a shadow which is blood-red instead of black."

His voice rose, and excitement glowed in his deep-set, clear gray eyes. His face lost its pallor, and his well-shaped, yet strong hands clutched nervously at the arms of his chair.

The girl turned toward him soothingly, when both paused and listened.

"It is some Indian going by," said the man, as hoof-beats became distinct.

"The Indians don't ride this late. Besides, no Indian would stop here."

The man stepped to an adjoining room. As he disappeared, there came the sound of footfalls on the porch and Bill Talpers's heavy knock made the front door panels shake.

The girl hesitated a moment, and then opened the door. The trader walked in without invitation, his new boots squeaking noisily. If he had expected any exhibition of fear on the part of the girl, Talpers was mistaken. She looked at him calmly, and Bill shifted uneasily from one foot to another as he took off his hat.

"I thought I'd drop in for a little social call, seein' as you ain't called on me sence our talk about that letter," said Bill, seating himself at the table.

"It was what I might have expected," replied the girl.

"That's fine," said Bill amiably. "I'm tickled to know that you expected me."

"Yes, knowing what a coward you are, I thought you would come."

Talpers flushed angrily, and then grinned, until his alkali-cracked lips glistened in the lamplight.

"That's the spirit!" he exclaimed. "I never seen a more spunky woman, and that's the kind I like. But there ain't many humans that can call me a coward. I guess you don't know how many notches I've got on the handle of this forty-five, do you?" he asked, touching the gun that swung in a holster at his hip under his coat. "Well, there's three notches on there, and that don't count an Injun I got in a fair fight. I don't count any coups unless they're on white folks."

"I'm not interested in your record of bloodshed." The girl's voice was low, but it stung Bill to anger.

"Yes, you are," he retorted. "You're goin' to be mighty proud of your husband's record. You'll be glad to be known as the wife of Bill Talpers, who never backed down from no man. That's what I come over here for, to have you say that you'll marry me. If you don't say it, I'll have to give that letter over to the authorities at White Lodge. It sure would be a reg'lar bombshell in the case right now."

The trader's squat figure, in his black suit, against the white background made by the lamp, made the girl think of a huge, grotesque blot of ink. His broad, hairy hand rested on the table. She noticed the strong, thick fingers, devoid of flexibility, yet evidently of terrific strength.

"Now you and me," went on Talpers, "could get quietly married, and I could sell this store of mine for a good figger, and I'd be willin' to move anywheres you want—San Francisco, or Los Angeles, or San Diego, or anywheres. And I could burn up that letter, and there needn't nobody know that the wife of Bill Talpers was mixed up in the murder that is turnin' this here State upside down. Furthermore, jest to show you that Bill Talpers is a square sort, I won't ever ask you myself jest how deep and how wide you're in this murder, nor why you wrote that letter, nor what it was all about. Ain't that fair enough?"

The girl laughed.

"It's too fair," she said. "I can't believe you'd hold to such a bargain."

"You try me and see," urged Bill. "All you've got to do is to say you'll marry me."

"Well, I'll never say it."

"Yes, you will," huskily declared Bill, putting his hat on the table. "You'll say it right here, to-night. Your stepfather's sick, I hear. If he was feelin' his best he wouldn't be more'n a feather in my way—not more'n that Chinaman of yours. I've got to have your word to-night, or, by cripes, that letter goes to White Lodge!"

The girl was alarmed. She was colorless as marble, but her eyes were defiant. Talpers advanced toward her threateningly, and she retreated toward the door which opened into the other room. Bill swung her aside and placed himself squarely in front of the door, his arms outspread.

"No hide and seek goes," he said. "You stay in this room till you give me the right answer."

The girl ran toward the door opening into the kitchen. Talpers ran after her, clumsily but swiftly. The girl saw that she was going to be overtaken before reaching the door, and dodged to one side. The trader missed his grasp for her, and pitched forward, the force of his fall shaking the cabin. He struck his head against a corner of the table, and lay unconscious, spread out in a broad helplessness that made the girl think once more of spilled ink.

The white-haired man stood in the doorway to the other room. He held a revolver, with which he covered Talpers, but the trader did not move. The white-haired man deftly removed Talpers's revolver from its holster and put it on the table. Then he searched the trader's pockets.

"I'm glad I didn't have to shoot this swine," he said to the girl. "Another second and it would have been necessary. The letter isn't here, but you can frighten him with these trinkets—his own revolver and this watch which evidently he took from the murdered man on the hill. You know what else of Edward Sargent's belongings were taken."

The girl nodded.

"He will recover soon," went on the gray-haired man. "You will be in no further danger. He will be glad to go when he sees what evidence you have against him."

The white-haired man had taken a watch from one of Talpers's pockets. He put the timepiece on the table beside the trader's revolver. Then the door to the adjoining room closed again, and the girl was alone with the trader waiting for him to recover consciousness.

Soon Bill Talpers sat up. His hand went to his head and came away covered with blood. The world was rocking, and the girl at the table looked like half a dozen shapes in one.

"This is your own revolver pointed at you, Mr. Talpers," she said, "but this watch on the table, by which you will leave this house in three minutes, is not yours. It belonged once to Edward B. Sargent, and you are the man who took it."

Talpers tried to answer, but could not at once.

"You not only took this watch," said the girl slowly, "but you took money from that murdered man."

"It's all a lie," growled Bill at last.

"Wait till you hear the details. You took twenty-eight hundred dollars in large bills, and three hundred dollars in smaller bills."

Talpers looked at the girl in mingled terror and amazement. Guilt was in his face, and his fears made him forget his aching head.

"You kept this money and did not let your half-breed partner in crime know you had found it," went on the girl. "Also you kept the watch, and, as it had no mark of identification, you concluded you could safely wear it."

Talpers struggled dizzily to his feet.

"It's all lies," he repeated. "I didn't kill that man."

"You might find it hard to convince a jury that you did not, with such evidence against you."

The trader looked at the watch as if he intended to make a dash to recover it, but the girl kept him steadily covered with his own revolver. Muttering curses, and swaying uncertainly on his feet, Talpers seized his hat and rushed from the house. He could be heard fumbling with the reins at the gate, and then the sound of hoofs came in diminuendo as he rode away.



CHAPTER IX

In his capacity of Indian agent Walter Lowell often had occasion to scan the business deals of his more progressive wards. He was at once banker and confidant of most of the Indians who were getting ahead in agriculture and stock-raising. He did not seek such a position, nor did he discourage it. Though it cost him much extra time and work, he advised the Indians whenever requested.

One of the reservation's most prosperous stock-raisers, who had been given permission to sell off some of his cattle, came to Lowell with a thousand-dollar bill, asking if it were genuine.

"It's all right," said Lowell, "but where did you get it?"

The Indian said he had received it from Bill Talpers in the sale of some livestock. Lowell handed it back without comment, but soon afterward found occasion to call on Bill Talpers at the trader's store.

Bill had been a frequent and impartial visitor to the bottles that were tucked away at both ends of his store. His hands and voice were shaky. His hat was perched well forward on his head, covering a patch of court-plaster which his clerk had put over a scalp wound, following a painful process of hair-cutting. Bill had just been through the process of "bouncing" Andy Wolters, who remained outside, expressing wonder and indignation to all who called.

"All I did was ask Bill where his favorite gun was gone," quoth Andy in his nasal voice, as Lowell drove up to the store platform. "I never seen Bill without that gun before in my life. I jest started to kid him a little by askin' him who took it away from him, when he fired up and throwed me out of the store."

Lowell stepped inside the store.

"Bill," said Lowell, as the trader rose from his chair behind the screen of letter-boxes, "I want you to help me out in an important matter."

Bill's surprise showed in his swollen face.

"It's this," went on Lowell. "If any of the Indians bring anything here to pawn outside of the usual run of turquoise jewelry and spurs, I want you to let me know. Also, if they offer any big bills in payment for goods—say anything like a thousand-dollar bill—just give me the high sign, will you? It may afford a clue in this murder case."

Talpers darted a look of suspicion at the agent. Lowell's face was serene. He was leaning confidentially across the counter, and his eyes met Bill's in a look that made the trader turn away.

"You know," said Lowell, "it's quite possible that money and valuables were taken from Sargent's body. To be sure, they found his checkbook and papers, but they wouldn't be of use to anyone else. A man of Sargent's wealth must have had considerable ready cash with him, and yet none was found. He would hardly be likely to start out on a long trip across country without a watch, and yet nothing of the sort was discovered. That's why I thought that if any Indians came in here with large amounts of money, or if they tried to pawn valuables which might have belonged to a man in Sargent's position, you could help clear up matters."

Hatred and suspicion were mingled in Talpers's look. The trader had spent most of his hours, since his return from Morgan's ranch, cursing the folly that had led him into wearing Sargent's watch. And now came this young Indian agent, with talk about thousand-dollar bills. There was another mistake Bill had made. He should have taken those bills far away and had them exchanged for money of smaller denomination. But he had been hard-pressed for cash, and suspicion seemed to point in such convincing fashion toward Fire Bear and the other Indians that it did not seem possible that it could be shifted elsewhere. Yet all his confidence had been shaken when Helen Ervin had calmly and correctly recounted to him the exact things that he had taken from that body on the hill. Probably she had been talking to the agent and had told him all she knew.

"I know what you're drivin' at," snarled Bill, his rage getting the better of his judgment. "You've been talkin' to that girl at Morgan's ranch, and she's been tellin' you all she thinks she knows. But she'd better go slow with all her talk about valuables and thousand-dollar bills. She forgets that she's as deep in this thing as anybody and I've got the document to prove it."

The surprise in the Indian agent's face was too genuine to be mistaken. Talpers realized that he had been betrayed into overshooting his mark. The agent had been engaged in a little game of bluff, and Talpers had fallen into his trap.

"All this is mighty interesting to me, Bill," said Lowell, regaining his composure. "I just dropped in here, hoping for a little general cooperation on your part, and here I find that you know a lot more than anybody imagined."

"You ain't got anything on me," growled Bill, "and if you go spillin' any remarks around here, it's your death-warrant sure."

Lowell did not take his elbow from the counter. His leaning position brought out the breadth of his shoulders and emphasized the athletic lines of his figure. He did not seem ruffled at Bill's open threat. He regarded Talpers with a steady look which increased Bill's rage and fear.

"The trouble with you is that you're so dead set on protectin' them Injuns of yours," said the trader, "that you're around tryin' to throw suspicion on innocent white folks. The hull county knows that Fire Bear done that murder, and if you hadn't got him on to the reservation the jail'd been busted into and he'd been lynched as he ought to have been."

Bill waited for an answer, but none came. The young agent's steady, thoughtful scrutiny was not broken.

"You've coddled them Injuns ever sence you've been on the job," went on Bill, casting aside discretion, "and now you're encouragin' them in downright murder. Here this young cuss, Fire Bear, is traipsin' around as he pleases, on nothin' more than his word that he'll appear for trial. But when Jim McFann busts out of jail, you rush out the hull Injun police force to run him down. And now here you are around, off the reservation, tryin' to saddle suspicion on your betters. It ain't right, I claim. Self-respectin' white men ought to have more protection around here."

Talpers's voice had taken on something of a whine, and Lowell straightened up in disgust.

"Bill," he said, "you aren't as much of a man as I gave you credit for being, and what's more you've been in some crooked game, just as sure as thousand-dollar bills have four figures on them."

Paying no attention to the imprecations which Talpers hurled after him, the agent went back to his automobile and turned toward the agency. He had intended going on to the Greek Letter Ranch, but Talpers's words had caused him to make a change in his plans. At the agency he brought out a saddle horse, and, following a trail across the undulating hills on the reservation, reached the wagon-road below the ranch, without arousing Talpers's suspicion.

As he tied his pony at the gate, Lowell noticed further improvement in the general appearance of the ranch.

"Somebody more than Wong has been doing this heavy work," he said to Helen, who had come out to greet him. "It must be that Morgan—your stepfather is well enough to help. Anyway, the ranch looks better every time I come."

"Yes, he is helping some," said Helen uneasily. "But I'm getting to be a first-rate ranch-woman. I had no idea it was so much fun running a place like this."

"I came over to see if you couldn't take time enough off for a little horseback ride," said Lowell. "This is a country for the saddle, after all. I still get more enjoyment from a good horseback ride than from a dozen automobile trips. I'll saddle up the old white horse while you get ready."

Helen ran indoors, and Lowell went to the barn and proceeded to saddle the white horse that bore the Greek Letter brand. The smiling Wong came out to cast an approving eye over the work.

"This old fly-fighter's a pretty good horse for one of his age, isn't he, Wong?" said Lowell, giving a last shake to the saddle, after the cinch had been tightened.

In shattered English Wong went into ecstasies over the white horse. Then he said, suddenly and mysteriously:

"You know Talpels?"

"You mean Bill Talpers?" asked Lowell. "What about him?"

Once more the dominant tongue of the Occident staggered beneath Wong's assault, as the cook described, partly in pantomime, the manner of Bill Talpers's downfall the night before.

"Do you mean to say that Talpers was over here last night and that here is where he got that scalp-wound?" demanded Lowell.

Wong grinned assent, and then vanished, after making a sign calling for secrecy on Lowell's part, as Helen arrived, ready for the ride.

Lowell was a good horseman, and the saddle had become Helen's chief means of recreation. In fact riding seemed to bring to her the only contentment she had known since she had come to the Greek Letter Ranch. She had overcome her first fear of the Indians. All her rides that were taken alone were toward the reservation, as she had studiously avoided going near Talpers's place. Also she did not like to ride past the hill on the Dollar Sign road, with its hints of unsolved mystery. But she had quickly grown to love the broad, free Indian reservation, with its limitless miles of unfenced hills. She liked to turn off the road and gallop across the trackless ways, sometimes frightening rabbits and coyotes from the sagebrush. Several times she had startled antelope, and once her horse had shied at a rattlesnake coiled in the sunshine. The Indians she had learned to look upon as children. She had visited the cabins and lodges of some of those who lived near the ranch, and was not long in winning the esteem of the women who were finding the middle ground, between the simplicity of savage life and the complexities of civilization, something too much for mastery.

Lowell and Helen galloped in silence for miles along the road they had followed in the automobile not many days before. At the crest of a high ridge, Helen turned at right angles, and Lowell followed.

"There's a view over here I had appropriated for myself, but I'm willing to share it with you, seeing that this is your own particular reservation and you ought to know about everything it contains," said Helen.

The ridge dipped and then rose again, higher than before. The plains fell away on both sides—infinite miles of undulations. Straight ahead loomed the high blue wall of the mountains. They walked their horses, and finally stopped them altogether. The chattering of a few prairie dogs only served to intensify the great, mysterious silence.

"Sometimes the stillness seems to roll in on you here like a tide," said Helen. "I can positively feel it coming up these great slopes and blanketing everything. It seems to me that this ridge must have been used by Indian watchers in years gone by. I can imagine a scout standing here sending up smoke signals. And those little white puffs of clouds up there are the signals he sent into the sky."

"I think you belong in this country," Lowell answered smilingly.

"I'm sure I do. You remember when I first saw these plains and hills I told you the bigness frightened me a little when the sun brought it all out in detail. Well, it doesn't any more. Just to be unfettered in mind, and to live and breathe as part of all this vastness, would be ideal."

"That's where you're in danger of going to the other extreme," the agent replied. "You'll remember that I told you human companionship is as necessary as bacon and flour and salt in this country. You're more dependent on the people about you here, even if your nearest neighbor is five or ten miles away, than you would be in any apartment building in a big city. You might live and die there, and no one would be the wiser. Also you might get along tolerably well, while living alone. But you can't do it out here and keep a normal mental grip on life."

"My, what a lecture!" laughed the girl, though there was no merriment in her voice. "But it hardly applies to me, for the reason that I always depend upon my neighbors in the ordinary affairs of life. I'm sure I love to be sociable to my Indian neighbors, and even to their agent. Haven't I ridden away out here just to be sociable to you?"

"No dodging! I promised I wouldn't say anything more about the matters that have been disturbing you so, but that promise was contingent on your playing fair with me. I understand Bill Talpers has been causing you some annoyance, and you haven't said a word to me about it."

Helen flashed a startled glance at Lowell. He was impassive as her questioning eyes searched his face. Amazement and concern alternated in her features. Then she took refuge in a blaze of anger.

"I don't know how you found out about Talpers!" she cried. "It is true that he did cause a—a little annoyance, but that is all gone and forgotten. But I am not going to forget your impertinence quite so easily."

"My what?"

"Your impertinence?"

The girl was trembling with anger, or apprehension, and tapped her boot nervously with her quirt as she spoke.

"You've been lecturing me about various things," she went on, "and now you bring up Talpers as a sort of bugaboo to frighten me."

"You don't know Bill Talpers. If he has any sort of hold on you or on Willis Morgan, he'll try to break you both. He is as innocent of scruples as a lobo wolf."

"What hold could he possibly have on me—on us?"

She looked at Lowell defiantly as she asked the question, but he thought he detected a note of concern in her voice.

"I didn't say he had any hold. I merely pointed out that if he were given any opportunity he'd make life miserable for both of you."

Lowell did not add that Talpers, in a fit of rage and suspicion, augmented by strong drink, had hinted that Helen knew something of the murder. He had been inclined to believe that Talpers had merely been "fighting wild" when he made the veiled accusation—that the trader, being very evidently only partly recovered from a bout with his pet bottles, had made the first counter-assertion that had come into his head in the hope of provoking Lowell into a quarrel. But there was a quality of terror in the girl's voice which struck Lowell with chilling force. Something in his look must have caught Helen's attention, for her nervousness increased.

"You have no right to pillory me so," she said rapidly. "You have been perfectly impossible right along—that is, ever since this crime happened. You've been spying here and there—"

"Spying!"

"Yes, downright spying! You've been putting suspicion where it doesn't belong. Why, everybody believes the Indians did it—everybody but you. Probably some Indians did it who never have been suspected and never will be—not the Indians who are under suspicion now."

"That's just about what another party was telling me not long ago—that I was coddling the Indians and trying to fasten suspicion where it didn't rightfully belong."

"Who else told you that?"

"No less a person than Bill Talpers."

"There you go again, bringing in that cave man. Why do you keep talking to me about Talpers? I'm not afraid of him."

Most girls would have been on the verge of hysteria, Lowell thought, but, while Helen was plainly under a nervous strain, her self-command returned. The agent was in possession of some information—how much she did not know. Perhaps she could goad him into betraying the source of his knowledge.

"I know you're not afraid of Talpers," remarked Lowell, after a pause, "but at least give me the privilege of being afraid for you. I know Bill Talpers better than you do."

"What right have you to be afraid for me? I'm of age, and besides, I have a protector—a guardian—at the ranch."

Lowell was on the point of making some bitter reply about the undesirability of any guardianship assumed by Willis Morgan, squaw man, recluse, and recipient of common hatred and contempt. But he kept his counsel, and remarked, pleasantly:

"My rights are merely those of a neighbor—the right of one neighbor to help another."

"There are no rights of that sort where the other neighbor isn't asking any help and doesn't desire it."

"I'm not sure about your not needing it. Anyway, if you don't now, you may later."

The girl did not answer. The horses were standing close together, heads drooping lazily. Warm breezes came fitfully from the winds' playground below. The handkerchief at the girl's neck fluttered, and a strand of her hair danced and glistened in the sunshine. The graceful lines of her figure were brought out by her riding-suit. Lowell put his palm over the gloved hand on her saddle pommel. Even so slight a touch thrilled him.

"If a neighbor has no right to give advice," said Lowell, "let us assume that my unwelcome offerings have come from a man who is deeply in love with you. It's no great secret, anyway, as it seems to me that even the meadow-larks have been singing about it ever since we started on this ride."

The girl buried her face in her hands. Lowell put his arm about her waist, and she drooped toward him, but recovered herself with an effort. Putting his arm away, she said:

"You make matters harder and harder for me. Please forget what I have said and what you have said, and don't come to see me any more."

She spoke with a quiet intensity that amazed Lowell.

"Not come to see you any more! Why such an extreme sentence?"

"Because there is an evil spell on the Greek Letter Ranch. Everybody who comes there is certain to be followed by trouble—deep trouble."

The girl's agitation increased. There was terror in her face.

"Look here!" began Lowell. "This thing is beyond all promises of silence. I—"

"Don't ask what I mean!" said the girl. "You might find it awkward. You say you are in love with me?"

"I repeat it a thousand times."

"Well, you are the kind of man who will choose honor every time. I realize that much. Suppose you found that your love for me was bringing you in direct conflict with your duty?"

"I know that such a thing is impossible," broke in Lowell.

Helen smiled, bitterly.

"It is so far from being impossible that I am asking you to forget what you have said, and to forget me as well. There is so much of evil on the Greek Letter Ranch that the very soil there is steeped in it. I am going away, but I know its spell will follow me."

"You are going?" queried Lowell. "When?"

"When these men now charged with the murder are acquitted. They will be acquitted, will they not?"

The eager note in her question caught Lowell by surprise.

"No man can tell," he replied. "It's all as inscrutable as that mountain wall over there."

Helen shaded her eyes with her gauntleted hand as she looked in the direction indicated by Lowell. Black clouds were pouring in masses over the mountain-range. The sunshine was being blotted out, as if by some giant hand. The storm-clouds swept toward them as they turned the horses and started back along the ridge. A huge shadow, which Helen shudderingly likened to the sprawling figure of Talpers in the lamplight, raced toward them over the plains.

"There isn't a storm in all that blackness," Lowell assured her. "It's all shadow and no substance. Perhaps your fears will turn out that way."

The girl regarded him gravely.

"I've tried to hope as much, but it's no use, especially when you've felt the first actual buffetings of the storm."

The approaching cloud shadow seemed startlingly solid. The girl urged her horse into a gallop, and Lowell rode silently at her side. The shadow overtook them. Angry winds seemed to clutch at them from various angles, but no rain came from the cloud mass overhead. When they rode into the ranch yard, the sun was shining again. They dismounted near the barn, and Wong took the white horse. Lowell and the girl walked through the yard to the front gate, the agent leading his horse. As they passed near the porch there came through the open door that same chilling, sarcastic voice which stirred all the ire in Lowell's nature.

"Helen," the voice said, "that careless individual, Wong, must be reprimanded. He has mislaid one of my choicest volumes. Perhaps it would be better for you to attend to replacing the books on the shelves after this."

Every word was intended to humiliate, yet the voice was moderately pitched. There was even a slight drawl to it.

Lowell's face betrayed his anger as he glanced at the girl. He made a gesture of impatience, but Helen motioned to him, in warning.

"Some day you're going to let me take you away from this," he said grimly, looking at her with an intensity of devotion which brought the red to her cheeks. "Meantime, thanks for taking me out on that magic ridge. I'll never forget it."

"It will be better for you to forget everything," answered the girl.

Lowell was about to make a reply, when the voice came once more, cutting like a whiplash in a renewal of the complaint concerning the lost book. The girl turned, with a good-bye gesture, and ran indoors. Lowell led his horse outside the yard and rode toward Talpers's place, determined to have a few definite words with the trader.

When Lowell reached Talpers's, the usual knot of Indians was gathered on the front porch, with the customary collection of cowpunchers and ranchmen discussing matters inside the store.

"Bill ain't been here all the afternoon," said Talpers's clerk in answer to Lowell's question. "He sat around here for a while after you left this morning, and then he saddled up and took a pack-horse and hit off toward the reservation, but I don't know where he went or when he'll be back."

Lowell rode thoughtfully to the agency, trying in vain to bridge the gap between Talpers's cryptic utterances bearing on the murder, and the not less cryptic statements of Helen in the afternoon—an occupation which kept him unprofitably employed until far into the night.



CHAPTER X

Bill Talpers's return to sobriety was considerably hastened by alarm after the trader's words with Lowell. As long as matters were even between Bill Talpers and the girl, the trader figured that he could at least afford to let things rest. The letter in his possession was still a potent weapon. He could at least prevent the girl from telling what she seemed to know of the trader's connection with the murder. He had figured that the letter would be the means of bringing him a most engaging bride. It would have done so if he had not been such a fool as to drink too much. Talpers usually was a canny drinker, but when a man goes asking—or, in this case, demanding—a girl's hand in marriage, it is not to be wondered at if he oversteps the limit a trifle in the matter of fortifying himself with liquor. But in this case Bill realized that he had gone beyond all reasonable bounds. That fall had been disastrous in every way. She was clever and quick, that girl, or she never would have been able to turn an incident like that to such good advantage. Most girls would have sniveled in a corner, thought Bill, until he had regained his senses, but she started right in to look for that letter. He had been smart enough to leave the letter in the safe at the store, but she had found plenty in that watch!

Another thought buzzed disturbingly in Bill's head. How did she know just how much money had been taken from Sargent's body? Also, how did she know that the watch was Sargent's, seeing that it had no marks of identification on it? If there had been so much as a scratch on the thing, Talpers never would have worn it. She might have been making a wild guess about the watch, but she certainly was not guessing about the money. Her certainty in mentioning the amount had given Bill a chill of terror from which he was slow in recovering. Another thing that was causing him real agony of spirit was the prominence of Lowell in affairs at the Greek Letter Ranch. It would be easy enough to hold the girl in check with that letter. She would never dare tell the authorities how much she knew about Talpers, as Bill could drag her into the case by producing his precious documentary evidence. But the agent—how much was he learning in the course of his persistent searching, and from what angle was he going to strike? Would the girl provide him with information which she might not dare give to others? Women were all weaklings, thought Bill, unable to keep any sort of a secret from a sympathetic male ear, especially when that ear belonged to as handsome a young fellow as the Indian agent! Probably she would be telling the agent everything on his next trip to the ranch. Bill had been watching, but he had not seen the young upstart from the agency go past, and neither had Bill's faithful clerk. But the visit might be made any day, and Talpers's connection with the tragedy on the Dollar Sign road might at almost any hour be falling into the possession of Lowell, whose activity in running down bootleggers had long ago earned him Bill's hatred.

Something would have to be done, without delay, to get the girl where she would not be making a confidant of Lowell or any one else. Scowlingly Bill thought over one plan after another, and rejected each as impractical. Finally, by a process of elimination, he settled on the only course that seemed practical. A broad fist, thudding into a leather-like palm, indicated that the Talpers mind had been made up. With his dark features expressing grim resolve, Bill threw a burden of considerable size on his best pack-animal. This operation he conducted alone in the barn, rejecting his clerk's proffer of assistance. Then he saddled another horse, and, without telling his clerk anything concerning his prospective whereabouts or the length of his trip, started off across the prairie. He often made such excursions, and his clerk had learned not to ask questions. Diplomacy in such matters was partly what the clerk was paid for. A good fellow to work for was Bill Talpers if no one got too curiously inclined. One or two clerks had been disciplined on account of inquisitiveness, and they would not be as beautiful after the Talpers methods had been applied, but they had gained vastly in experience. Some day he would do even more for this young Indian agent. Bill's cracked lips were stretched in a grin of satisfaction at the very thought.

The trader traveled swiftly toward the reservation. He often boasted that he got every ounce that was available in horseflesh. Traveling with a pack-horse was little handicap to him. Horses instinctively feared him. More than one he had driven to death without so much as touching the straining animal with whip or spur. Nothing gave Bill such acute satisfaction as the knowledge that he had roused fear in any creature.

With the sweating pack-animal close at the heels of his saddle pony, Talpers rode for hours across the plains. Seemingly he paid no attention to the changes in the landscape, yet his keen eyes, buried deeply beneath black brows, took in everything. He saw the cloud masses come tumbling over the mountains, but, like Lowell, he knew that the drought was not yet to be ended. The country became more broken, and the grade so pronounced that the horses were compelled to slacken their pace. The pleasant green hills gave place to imprisoning mesas, with red sides that looked like battlements. Beyond these lay the foothills—so close that they covered the final slopes of the mountains.

It was a lonely country, innocent of fences. The cattle that ran here were as wild as deer and almost as fleet as antelope. Twice a year the Indians rounded up their range possessions, but many of these cattle had escaped the far-flung circles of riders. They had become renegades and had grown old and clever. At the sight of a human being they would gallop away in the sage and greasewood.

Once Talpers saw the gleam of a wagon-top which indicated the presence of a wolf hunter in the employ of the leasers who were running cattle on the reservations and who suffered much from the depredations of predatory animals. By working carefully around a hill, the trader continued on his way without having been seen.

Passing the flanking line of mesas, Bill pushed his way up a watercourse between two foothills. The going became rougher, and all semblance of a trail was lost, yet the trader went on unhesitatingly. The slopes leading to the creek became steeper and were covered with pine and quaking aspen, instead of the bushy growths of the plains. The stream foamed over rocks, and its noise drowned the sound of the horses' hoofs as the animals scrambled over the occasional stretches of loose shale. With the dexterity of the born trailsman, Talpers wormed his way along the stream when it seemed as if further progress would be impossible. In a tiny glade, with the mountain walls rising precipitously for hundreds of feet, Talpers halted and gave three shrill whistles. An answer came from the other end of the glade, and in a few minutes Talpers was removing pack and saddle in Jim McFann's camp.

Since his escape from jail the half-breed had been hiding in this mountain fastness. Talpers had supplied him with "grub" and weapons. He had moved camp once in a while for safety's sake, but had felt little fear of capture. As a trailer McFann had few equals, and he knew every swale in the prairie and every nook in the mountains on the reservation.

Talpers brought out a bottle, which McFann seized eagerly.

"There's plenty more in the pack," said the trader, "so drink all you want. Don't offer me none, as I am kind o' taperin' off."

"Did you see any Indian police on the way?" asked the half-breed.

"No—nothin' but Wolfer Joe's wagon, 'way off in the hills. I guess the police ain't lookin' for you very hard. That ain't the fault of the agent, though," added Talpers meaningly. "He's promised he'll have you back in Tom Redmond's hands in less'n a week."

The half-breed scowled and muttered an oath as he took another drink. Talpers had told the lie in order to rouse McFann's antagonism toward Lowell, and he was pleased to see that his statement had been accepted at face value.

"But that ain't the worst for you, nor for me either," went on the trader. "That girl at the Greek Letter Ranch knows that you and me took the watch from the man on the Dollar Sign road."

"How did she know that?" exclaimed McFann in amazement.

"That's somethin' she won't tell, but she knows that you and me was there, and that the story you told in court ain't straight. I'm satisfied she ain't told any one else—not yet."

"Do you think she will tell any one?"

"I'm sure of it. You see, she sorter sprung this thing on me when I was havin' a little argyment about her marryin' me. She got spiteful and come at me with the statement that the watch I was wearin' belonged to that feller Sargent."

Bill did not add anything about the money. It was not going to do to let the half-breed know he had been defrauded.

McFann squatted by the fire, the bottle in his hand and his gaze on Talpers's face.

"She mentioned both of us bein' there," went on the trader. "She give the details in a way that I'll admit took me off my feet. It's an awkward matter—in fact, it's a hangin' matter—for both of us, if she tells. You know how clost they was to lynchin' you, over there at White Lodge, with nothin' so very strong against you. If that gang ever hears about us and this watch of Sargent's, we'll be hung on the same tree."

Talpers played heavily on the lynching, because he knew the fear of the mob had become an obsession with McFann. He noticed the half-breed's growing uneasiness, and played his big card.

"I spent a long time thinkin' the hull thing over," said Talpers, "and I've come to the conclusion that this girl is sure to tell the Indian agent all she knows, and the best thing for us to do is to get her out of the way before she puts the noose around our necks."

"Why will she tell the Indian agent?"

"Because he's callin' pretty steady at the ranch, and he's made her think he's the only friend she's got around here. And as soon as he finds out, we might as well pick out our own rope neckties, Jim. It's goin' to take quick action to save us, but you're the one to do it."

"What do you want me to do?" asked McFann suspiciously.

"Well, you're the best trailer and as good a shot as there is in this part of the country. All that's necessary is for you to drop around the ranch and—well, sort of make that girl disappear."

"How do you mean?"

Talpers rose and came closer to McFann.

"I mean kill her!" he said with an oath. "Nothin' else is goin' to do. You can do it without leavin' a track. Willis Morgan or that Chinaman never'll see you around. Nobody else but the agent ever stops at the Greek Letter Ranch. It's the only safe way. If she ever tells, Jim, you'll never come to trial. You'll be swingin' back and forth somewheres to the music of the prairie breeze. You know the only kind of fruit that grows on these cotton woods out here."

Jim McFann had always been pliable in Talpers's hands. Talpers had profited most by the bootlegging operations carried on by the pair, though Jim had done most of the dangerous work. Whenever Jim needed supplies, the trader furnished them. To be sure, he charged them off heavily, so there was little cash left from the half-breed's bootlegging operations. Talpers shrewdly figured that the less cash he gave Jim, the more surely he could keep his hold on the half-breed. McFann had grown used to his servitude. Talpers appeared to him in the guise of the only friend he possessed among white and red.

Jim rose slowly to his moccasined feet.

"I guess you're right, Bill," he said. "I'll do what you say."

The trader's eyes glowed with satisfaction. The desire for revenge had come uppermost in his heart. The girl at the ranch had outwitted him in some way which he could not understand. Twenty-four hours ago he had confidently figured on numbering her among the choicest chattels in the possession of William Talpers. But now he regarded her with a hatred born of fear. The thought of what she could do to him, merely by speaking a few careless words about that watch and money, drove all other thoughts from Talpers's mind. Jim McFann could be made a deadly and certain instrument for insuring the safety of the Talpers skin. One shot from the half-breed's rifle, either through a cabin window or from some sagebrush covert near the ranch, and the trader need have no further fears about being connected with the Dollar Sign murder.

"I thought you'd see it in the right light, Jim," approved Talpers. "It won't be any trick at all to get her. She rides out a good deal on that white horse."

Jim McFann did not answer. He had begun preparations for his trip. Swiftly and silently the half-breed saddled his horse, which had been hidden in a near-by thicket. From the supply of liquor in Talpers's pack, Jim took a bottle, which he was thrusting into his saddle pocket when the trader snatched it away.

"You've had enough, Jim," growled Talpers. "You do the work that's cut out for you, and you can have all I've brought to camp. I'll be here waitin' for you."

McFann scowled.

"All right," he said sullenly, "but it seems as if a man ought to have lots for a job like this."

"After it's all done," said Talpers soothingly, "you can have all the booze you want, Jim. And one thing more," called the trader as McFann rode away, "remember it ain't goin' to hurt either of us if you get a chance to put the Indian agent away on this same little trip."

Jim McFann waved an assenting sign as he disappeared in the trees, and the trader went back to the camp-fire to await the half-breed's return. He hoped McFann would find the agent at the Greek Letter Ranch and would kill Lowell as well as the girl. But, if there did not happen to be any such double stroke of luck in prospect, the removal of the Indian agent could be attended to later on.

When he reached the mesas beyond the foothills, the half-breed turned away from the stream and struck off toward the left. He kept a sharp lookout for Indian police as he traveled, but saw nothing to cause apprehension. Night was fast coming on when he reached the ridge on which Lowell and Helen had stood a few hours before. Avoiding the road, the half-breed made his way to a gulch near the ranch, where he tied his horse. Cautiously he approached the ranch-house. The kitchen door was open and Wong was busy with the dishes. The other doors were shut and shades were drawn in the windows. Making his way back to the gulch, the half-breed rolled up in his blanket and slept till daybreak, when he took up a vantage-point near the house and waited developments. Shortly after breakfast Wong came out to the barn and saddled the white horse for Helen. The half-breed noticed with satisfaction that the girl rode directly toward the reservation instead of following the road that led to the agency. Hastily securing his horse the half-breed skirted the ranch and located the girl's trail on the prairie. Instead of following it he ensconced himself comfortably in some aspens at the bottom of a draw, confident that the girl would return by the same trail.

If McFann had continued on Helen's trail he would have followed her to an Indian ranch not far away. A tattered tepee or two snuggled against a dilapidated cabin. The owner of the ranch was struggling with tuberculosis. His wife was trying to run the place and to bring up several children, whose condition had aroused the mother instinct in Helen. Though she had found her first efforts regarded with suspicion, Helen had persisted, until she had won the confidence of mother and children. Her visits were frequent, and she had helped the family so materially that she had astonished the field matron, an energetic woman who covered enormous distances in the saddle in the fulfillment of duties which would soon wear out a settlement worker.

The half-breed smoked uneasily, his rifle across his knees. Two hours passed, but he did not stir, so confident was he that Helen would return by the way she had followed in departing from the ranch.

McFann's patience was rewarded, and he tossed away his cigarette with a sigh of satisfaction when Helen's voice came to him from the top of the hill. She was singing a nonsense song from the nursery, and, astride behind her saddle and clinging to her waist, was a wide-eyed Indian girl of six years, enjoying both the ride and the singing.

Here was a complication upon which the half-breed had not counted. In fact, during his hours of waiting Jim had begun to look at matters in a different light. It was necessary to get Helen away, where she could not possibly tell what she knew, but why not hide her in the mountains? Or, if stronger methods were necessary, let Talpers attend to them himself? For the first time since he had come under Talpers's domination, Jim McFann was beginning to weaken. As the girl came singing down the hillside, Jim peered uneasily through the bushes. Talpers had shoved him into a job that simply could not be carried out—at least not without whiskey. If Bill had let him bring all he wanted to drink, perhaps things could have been done as planned.

Whatever was done would have to be accomplished quickly, as the white horse, with its double burden, was getting close. Jim sighted once or twice along his rifle barrel. Then he dropped the weapon into the hollow of his arm, and, leading his horse, stepped in front of Helen.

The parley was brief. McFann sent the youngster scurrying along the back trail, after a few threats in Indian tongue, which were dire enough to seal the child's lips in fright. Helen was startled at first when the half-breed halted her, but her composure soon returned. She had no weapon, nor would she have attempted to use one in any event, as she knew the half-breed was famous for his quickness and cleverness with firearms. Nor could anything be gained by attempting to ride him down in the trail. She did not ask any questions, for she felt they would be futile.

The half-breed was surprised at the calmness with which matters were being taken. With singular ease and grace—another gift from his Indian forbears—Jim slid into his saddle, and, seizing the white horse by the bridle, turned the animal around and started it up the trail beside him. In a few minutes Jim had found his trail of the evening before, and was working swiftly back toward the mountains. When Helen slyly dropped her handkerchief, as an aid to any one who might follow, the half-breed quietly turned back and, after picking it up, informed her that he would kill her if she tried any more such tricks. Realizing the folly of any further attempts to outwit the half-breed, Helen rode silently on. Not once did McFann strike across a ridge. Imprisoning slopes seemed to be shutting them in without surcease, and Helen looked in vain for any aid.

As they approached the foothills, and the travel increased in difficulty, McFann told Helen to ride close behind him. He glanced around occasionally to see that she was obeying orders. The old white horse struggled gamely after the half-breed's wiry animal, and McFann was compelled to wait only once or twice. Meanwhile Helen had thought over the situation from every possible angle, and had concluded to go ahead and not make any effort to thwart the half-breed. She knew that the reservation was more free from crime than the counties surrounding it. She also knew that it would not be long before the agent was informed of her disappearance, and that the Indian police—trailers who were the half-breed's equal in threading the ways of the wilderness—would soon be on McFann's tracks. After her first shock of surprise she had little fear of McFann. The thought that disturbed her most of all was—Talpers. She knew of the strange partnership of the men. Likewise she felt that McFann would not have embarked upon any such crime alone. The thought of Talpers recurred so steadily that the lithe figure of the half-breed in front of her seemed to change into the broad, almost misshapen form of the trader.

The first real fear that had come to her since the strange journey began surged over Helen when McFann led the way into the glade where he had been camped, and she saw a dreaded and familiar figure stooped over a small fire, engaged in frying bacon. But there was nothing of triumph in Talpers's face as he straightened up and saw Helen. Amazement flitted across the trader's features, succeeded by consternation.

"Now you've done it and done it right!" exclaimed the trader, with a shower of oaths directed at Jim McFann. "Didn't have the nerve to shoot at a purty face like that, did you? Git her into that tent while you and me set down and figger out what we're goin' to do!"

The half-breed helped Helen dismount and told her to go to his tent, a small, pyramid affair at one end of the glade. Jim fastened the flaps on the outside and went back to the camp-fire, where Talpers was storming up and down like a madman. Helen, seated on McFann's blanket roll, heard their voices rising and falling, the half-breed apparently defending himself and Talpers growing louder and more accusative. Finally, when the trader's rage seemed to have spent itself somewhat, the tent flaps were opened and Jim McFann thrust some food into Helen's hands. She ate the bacon and biscuits, as the long ride had made her hungry. Then Talpers roughly ordered her out of the tent. He and the half-breed had been busy packing and saddling. They added the tent and its contents to their packs. Telling Helen to mount the white horse once more, Talpers took the lead, and, with the silent and sullen half-breed bringing up the rear, the party started off along a trail much rougher than the one that had been followed by McFann and the girl in the morning.



CHAPTER XI

It was fortunate that Helen had accustomed herself to long rides, as otherwise she could not have undergone the experiences of the next few hours in the saddle. All semblance of a trail seemed to end a mile or so beyond the camp. The ride became a succession of scrambles across treacherous slides of shale, succeeded by plunges into apparently impenetrable walls of underbrush and low-hanging trees. The general course of the river was followed. At times they had climbed to such a height that the stream was merely a white line beneath them, and its voice could not be heard. Then they would descend and cross and recross the stream. The wild plunges across the torrent became matters of torture to Helen. The horses slipped on the boulders. Water dashed over the girl's knees, and each ford became more difficult, as the stream became more swollen, owing to the melting of near-by snowbanks. One of the pack-horses fell and lay helplessly in the stream until it was fairly dragged to its feet. The men cursed volubly as they worked over the animal and readjusted the wet pack, which had slipped to one side.