"Easy, boys!" Lawler called to the men. "Don't let them suspect you know they've been trailing us. They've got us two to one, almost—if they mean trouble we'll have to work easy!"

He saw the men relax; and several of them resumed their former positions at the fire.

The strange riders were coming steadily onward; they were not more than a hundred yards distant when Blackburn exclaimed, hoarsely:

"Lawler; it's Blondy Antrim an' his gang! Damn his hide! We're in for it!"

For the first time since Garvin had told him of the presence of the men on the trail behind the herd, Lawler's face betrayed passion—the glow in his eyes rivaled that in the giant's.

During the past year or so word had reached him—rumor unfounded, but insistent—that more than once Singleton and Blondy Antrim, the outlaw, had been seen together. He had placed no credence in the rumors, ascribing them to the imaginations of mischievous brains, prejudiced against Singleton because of his bluff, dominant manner. He first had suspected there might be truth in them when Joe Hamlin had told him that he had rustled cattle for Singleton. He now believed that Singleton had disposed of the stolen cattle through Antrim and the conviction that Singleton was behind the action of the outlaw in trailing the herd through the country seized him.

In an instant—following Blackburn's exclamation—he was aroused to the danger that confronted himself and his men. As though by previous arrangement, the men looked at him, noted the tenseness that had come over him, listened attentively when he spoke.

"Boys; don't offer to throw a gun. I know Antrim. He's a killer, and his men are like him. Take it easy—keep cool. The man who loses his temper will be guilty of the wholesale murder that will follow. When Antrim rides up, send him after me!"

He had not unsaddled Red King. He strode to the horse, swung into the saddle, and rode eastward, away from the advancing riders.

Blank astonishment, puzzled bewilderment shone in the eyes of the Circle L men as they watched him, and into the hearts of some of them crept the conviction that Lawler had deserted them; that he was afraid of the outlaw chief.

Blackburn saw what they thought, and his burning eyes bored into them with sarcasm unutterable. He laughed, hoarsely, with a grim mirth that startled them.

"Don't you worry about Lawler's nerve, boys; he's got more of it than the bunch of us put together! He's got some scheme in mind. You guys just set tight until you find out what it is. Do as he told you. Don't let that scurvy gang know that you're flabbergasted!"

When Lawler rode away there was a noticeable commotion in the group of advancing horsemen. One of them left the group, spurring his horse in the direction taken by Lawler. He must have been called back, for he wheeled his horse after he had ridden a dozen paces or so, and rejoined the group, which came on as before.

When the horsemen came to a halt near the fire, they were spread in a semi-circle about the Circle L men, and in their bronzed immobile faces was no answer to the question that agitated Blackburn and the other men. They had halted at a little distance from the fire, and one of them, a tall, slender, keen-eyed, thin-lipped man, urged his horse out of the circle and insolently inspected Blackburn and his cowboys. He lounged loosely in the saddle.

There was a sinister light in his eyes, a lurking threat in his manner.

"What outfit is this?" he demanded.

"Circle L, from Wolf River," answered Blackburn.

"Where you headin'?"

"To Red Rock."

"Railroad out of business?" jeered the outlaw.

"Far as the Circle L is concerned, it is, Antrim," smiled Blackburn. "We had a fuss, an' quit 'em."

The outlaw peered intently at the other. Then he grinned.

"It's Andy Blackburn!" he said. "Glad to meet you, Blackburn. This seems like old times—before the railroad went through; when old Luke Lawler used to jam 'em to Red Rock—sometimes—when he didn't pick up too many strays on the way." He laughed as though pleased over the recollection. "Got this stock vented, Blackburn?"

"Nary a vent, Antrim; the inspector wasn't feelin' in the humor."

"Ha!" exclaimed Antrim; "so you didn't get no vent. Well, we're aimin' to look through your herd. We've been missin' cattle all summer—from my ranch, the Circle Bar. About three thousand head. We've traced 'em as far as Kinney's canon, an' lost 'em. But we've been thinkin', Blackburn, that it ain't no hard job to make a passable Circle L out of a Circle Bar. That's why we aim to look your cattle over."

He grinned slightly at Blackburn's scowl, aware of the impotent rage the latter felt over the worst insult that could be offered an honest cattleman. For an instant he watched Blackburn keenly, his lips sneering; and then when he saw that Blackburn had mastered his rage, he said, sharply:

"Who was that guy that rode away as we come up?"

"Lawler," said Blackburn. "He's figurin' on seein' you alone, looks like. He left word that when you come I was to tell you he wanted to see you."

The outlaw's eyes glowed with swift suspicion.

"He knowed me, eh?" he said. He glanced keenly over the level floor of the desert. Dimly, in the dusk, he could see Lawler riding near the herd. For an instant Antrim hesitated, plainly debating the wisdom of leaving his men; then he smiled with whimsical recklessness. And his movements became rapid, jerky.

"Slade," he said, addressing a rider near him; "you're runnin' things till I get back."

He wheeled his horse and sent him into the dusk toward the herd, riding cautiously, evidently not entirely convinced of the peaceableness of Lawler's intentions.

He rode a quarter of a mile before he came upon Lawler; and though the light was fading he could plainly see Lawler's face, set, expressionless.

The outlaw brought his horse to a halt within three or four paces of Red King. Antrim's manner exuded the insolent tolerance of the master, who has the confidence that comes from thoughts of an overwhelming advantage.

He knew Lawler; knew him as perhaps no other man in the section knew him. For he had seen Lawler using his gun. It had been some years before, when Lawler had been proving himself—proving that he had a right to the respect and consideration of his fellow-men; proving that no man could trifle with him.

Antrim had been a witness to the shooting. He had marked Lawler's coolness, the evenness of his temper; and had noted the deadly swiftness and precision of his movements when he had drawn his pistol. Lawler had not been the aggressor—a dozen other men had testified to that.

Antrim had not seen Lawler since, until now. And as he looked at him he saw that the years had brought a change in the man. He had been a tall, bold, reckless-looking youth then, with a certain wild waywardness in his manner that might have destroyed him, had he yielded to it. Now he was cold, calm, deliberate, imperturbable. The recklessness had disappeared from his eyes; they were now aglow with quiet determination. The waywardness had gone—ironlike resolution marked his manner.

And yet behind it all, Antrim could see the threat of those youthful passions; the lurking eagerness for violent action; the hint of preparedness, of readiness.

Antrim was startled, uneasy. He saw now that he should not have left his men; that he had made a mistake in coming alone to meet Lawler.

He was certain of it now, when he heard Lawler's voice, saw the cold, smiling light in his eyes.

"You're wanting my cattle, Antrim. Your men have been trailing me for two weeks. You don't get them. You've got thirty-nine men, and there are only twenty-three Circle L men over there. I'm not getting any of them killed. This thing is between you and myself. Get your hand away from your gun or I'll bore you!"

He moved his hand—where it had been—seemingly—lying on Red King's neck, under the mane; and Antrim saw the dark muzzle of a pistol showing in the hand.

"I'm not taking any chances, Antrim—you can see that. I'm not going to take any. If you do anything to attract the attention of your men, I'll kill you. Drop your guns, using your thumbs and forefingers." He waited, watching keenly, until the outlaw had complied with the demand, the two big pistols thudding dully into the sand beside his horse.

Then Lawler resumed, his voice low and even, as before:

"Now we're riding back to the fire, Antrim. Listen hard, for this means life or death to you.

"We're going back to the fire. You're going to act as though nothing had happened; and you are to tell your men that you have changed your mind about the cattle—you are to tell them that you are going with me to Red Rock; and you are sending them back to where you came from, to wait for you."

Antrim stiffened, and his face bloated poisonously. But he did not answer, for there was that in Lawler's eyes that convinced him of the futility of attempting resistance.

"You're going to Red Rock with me," went on Lawler. "I'm going to be personally responsible for you. I'm going to watch you; you're going to ride ahead of me. If you talk, or make any motion that brings any of your men back, you'll die so quick you won't know it happened! Do you understand?"

"Damn you, Lawler; you'll pay for this!" muttered the outlaw. "I'll go on your trail and I'll never let up till I get you!"

Lawler laughed, lowly. "Just be careful not to get any of that poison in your voice when you tell your men what I told you, Antrim, or you'll never go on anybody's trail. Get going, now; and be careful."

Antrim wheeled his horse, and Lawler spurred Red King beside him.

"I'll be watching you, Antrim," he warned. "If your men show they suspect anything wrong you go down, mighty rapid. You don't get off your horse until your men go. And there is to be no playing for time. You talk fast and earnest, and carefully. Go ahead."

Riding slightly in Antrim's rear, Lawler followed the outlaw to the fire. There had come no change in the positions of the outlaws or of the Circle L men. And when Antrim and Lawler rode up there was a silence during which the men of both factions looked interrogatively at their leaders.

Antrim's face was pale, and his voice was vibrant with emotion. But he did not hesitate.

"Slade," he said to the man he had left in charge; "I've changed my mind about those cattle. Lawler has given me proof that none of our stock is with them. I'm hittin' the trail to Red Rock with Lawler. You take the boys back to the ranch an' wait for me."

Slade's eyes widened; he flushed and peered keenly at Antrim. "You—why, hell's fire, Antrim; we——"

"Slade, do as I tell you!" said Antrim, coldly. "Are you runnin' my affairs? You hit the breeze, right now—you hear me!"

Slade grinned venomously, and waved a violent hand around the circle. "You hear your boss, boys!" he said; "Slope!"

The men hesitated an instant, sending sharp, incredulous glances at their leader. But Antrim, pale, knowing that if he betrayed the slightest sign of insincerity his men would suspect, met their looks steadily. The men wheeled their horses, muttering profanely, and rode slowly westward into the growing darkness.

When they had disappeared, Lawler smiled faintly at the outlaw chief.

"You can get down, now, Antrim." He drew the pistol from Red King's mane, where it had been concealed during Antrim's talk with his men, and sheathed it. And then Blackburn, who had been a silent, amazed witness to what had occurred, whistled softly, covertly poking Shorty in the ribs.

"There's one thing that's as good as a vent, ain't there, Shorty?" he said. "That's a gun in the hand of a man who's got plenty of nerve!"



CHAPTER XV

CONCERNING AN OUTLAW

Early in the afternoon of the first day of December the sky darkened, and a cold, raw wind began to shriek through Willets. The company corral was empty; and again, as on the day before Kane Lawler had visited him, Gary Warden stood at one of the windows of his office smiling. Warden was almost satisfied.

Only one disturbing thought persistently recurred; Lawler had got his cattle through to Red Rock.

A crimson stain appeared in Warden's cheeks as his thoughts reverted to Lawler's return to Willets, after disposing of his cattle to the Red Rock buyer. And Warden's shoulders sagged a little, the smile faded and he glared malignantly at the bleak, gray clouds that sailed over town on the chill, bitter wind.

Oddly, at the instant Warden's memory was dwelling upon the incident of Lawler's return to Willets, Lafe Corwin, the storekeeper, was mentally reviewing the incident.

Willets was a cow-town, and for the winter its activity was over. All the beef cattle in the section, with the exception of three thousand head still held by Lawler, at the Circle L, had been shipped eastward, and Willets would now descend to supine indifference to considerations of gain.

Lafe Corwin was tilted back in a big wooden chair near the big, roaring-hot stove in the lounging-room of the Willets Hotel. His clerk could attend to the store. Until spring came, Corwin would spend much of his leisure near the big stove in the hotel, talking politics and cattle—two subjects of paramount importance.

But just at this instant Corwin was thinking of Lawler's return to Willets. Little wrinkles gathered around his eyes—which were twinkling; and he chuckled lowly as his gaze roved from one to the other of the men who, like himself, were enjoying the warmth of the stove and listening, between words, to the howling and moaning of the wind.

Three or four times, during silences, Corwin chuckled. And when at last he saw Dave Rankin, the blacksmith, watching him curiously, he guffawed aloud, rubbing his hands gleefully.

"I don't reckon I ever seen no mournfuller sight than that!" he declared.

"Meanin' which?" asked the blacksmith, his eyes alight with truculent inquiry. The others sat erect, attentive.

"Meanin' that mornin' when Kane Lawler hopped off the train with his bunch of cowhands—an' Blondy Antrim," snickered Corwin. "Dave Singleton an' Gary Warden an' Jordan an' Simmons an' that pony-built girl which is stayin' over to the Two Diamond with that ossified woman she calls 'Aunt Hannah,' was on the platform waitin' for the six o'clock train from the east. It appears that pony-built—Della Wharton, her name is—was expectin' some gimcracks, an' Warden an' her was waitin' for them. Anyways, they was there. It sure was medium mournful!" declared Corwin.

He appeared to hesitate; and Rankin grinned.

"We've heard it before; but I reckon we can stand listenin' ag'in. Tell it, Corwin."

"As I was sayin' when you interrupted me—it was medium mournful," resumed Corwin. "Shorty—who was with Lawler on the drive—has told me since; but at that time I didn't know—that Jordan had refused to vent Lawler's cattle.

"Well, I'd come down to see the train come in, too. We was all standin' there when she come a-steamin' up, an' stopped. An' who clumb off but Lawler an' his trail crew—twenty-three of 'em. An' Blondy Antrim in the midst of 'em, lookin' like a sheep-killin' dog.

"Well, gentlemen, they was a scene. Warden got his face all screwed up an' couldn't get it unscrewed ag'in. He looked like he'd swallered a hot brandin' iron an' it didn't lay easy on his stummick. Singleton was a-standin' there with his mouth open an' his eyes a-poppin' out; an' Jordan was plumb flabbergasted. Simmons was leanin' ag'in' the side of the station buildin', lookin' like he was expectin' to be shot the next minute.

"That Della Wharton girl was the only one that seemed to have any wits a-tall. I seen her grin eloquent at Lawler, an' look him straight in the eye like she was tellin' him somethin' intimate.

"Well, as I was sayin', Lawler an' his boys got off with Blondy Antrim. Antrim looks wild an' flighty—like you've seen a locoed steer on the prod. His eyes was a-glarin' an' he was mutterin' cusses by the mouthful. All of which didn't seem to faze Lawler none.

"Lawler was as cool as an iceberg which had just arrove from the North Pole—an' then some. An' he got a mean, mild grin on his face when he saw the reception committee that had come to meet him. They was a twinkle in his eyes when he looked at Della Wharton; but when Warden blows into his line of vision he looked mighty wicked.

"Lawler an' his gang had brought their hosses from Red Rock in two cars—they'd sold some of the remuda in Red Rock, not carin' to ship 'em home. Anyways, the gang didn't appear in no hurry to unload the hosses; an' a trainman yells to them, sayin' they'd have to hurry.

"But the boys was too interested just then. 'Unload 'em yourself, you sufferin' yap!' yells Shorty. 'If you pull out of here with them hosses I'll blow your damned railroad over into the next county!' Shorty sure does love the railroad!

"As I was sayin' when you interrupted me: Lawler looked mighty wicked. But he's cold an' polite—an' ca'm. An' he escorts Antrim over to where Warden was standin', an' says, quiet an' low:

"Warden, I have brought back my vent. He sure was a heap of trouble, an' he got himself attached to us right close. But as we haven't got no further use for him we're turnin' him over to you. I reckon he's lookin' to you an' Singleton to pay him for the trouble of trailin' us for two weeks, an' for keepin' me company as far as Red Rock, to see that my herd got there right an' proper. 'Antrim,' he says; 'go to your boss!' And he gives him a little shove toward Warden.

"Warden didn't say nothin'—he'd lost his voice, I reckon. But Antrim goes off the handle complete.

"'The damned sneak lifted my guns!' he yells.

"'You wantin' a gun?' says Lawler, cold an' ca'm. He backs up an' lifts one of Shorty's. Then he walks close to Antrim an' shoves it into his right hand.

"'There's a gun, you polecat,' he says. 'Fan it. I'd admire to blow the gizzard outen you!'

"But Antrim didn't seem to be none tickled, now that he'd got the gun. He stood, lookin' at it, like it was somethin' strange an' unusual, an' he was wonderin' whether he ought to hang onto it or drop it. Finally he grins sorta sheepishlike, an' hands it back to Lawler, butt first.

"'I ain't aimin' to fight you today, Lawler,' he says, his face bloomin' like a cactus.

"Lawler laughs, an' gives Shorty his gun back. Shorty grins like a tiger. 'Mebbe Singleton wouldn't mind acceptin' your kind offer, Boss?' he says.

"But Singleton don't break his neck reachin' for his gun, neither. He stands there, lookin' like a calf that's lost its mother. An' then Lawler laughs again, an' says:

"'Well, boys, seein' that the reception committee has received us, an' the honors has all been done, I reckon we'd better get the hosses off the cars an' hit the breeze for home!'

"An' they done so. But before they went they smoked up the town considerable—as you all seen. Them boys had divided twenty-five thousand dollars between them, which Lawler give 'em for makin' the drive. An' they sure did celebrate. Except Lawler. He went right home, an' I ain't seen him since. But I reckon Warden an' the rest of them ain't had no regrets. I ain't never seen no mournfuller sight than them folks sneakin' away from the station. All but Della Wharton. She was a-grinnin' sorta slylike, as though somethin' pleased her."



CHAPTER XVI

A "NORTHER"

When Lawler returned to the Circle L ranchhouse he found that Mary had gone East, to school. She had left for Willets on the second day following Lawler's departure; and Mrs. Lawler had already received two letters from her. Mrs. Lawler watched her son keenly when she told him that Joe Hamlin had brought a letter stating that Hamlin was to be permitted to take a number of mixed cattle from the Circle L—and that he had driven away one hundred. She smiled gently when she told Lawler that on the day before her departure Mary had visited Ruth Hamlin—had spent the whole day with her, and had come home, mysteriously delighted. Ruth had given up the school.

"Mary loves her, Kane," said Mrs. Lawler. And she smiled again when she saw a flush reach Lawler's face.

Lawler intended to ride to the Hamlin cabin this morning. It was the third day following his arrival at the ranch; and until now he had had no time for anything except to attend to the many details of work that had been neglected during his absence.

There were still three thousand head of cattle on the Circle L range—the men had held them in the valley for a time during his absence on the trail, but the grass had grown sparse, and the herd was now grazing on the big plain beyond the northern slope of the valley.

During the time he had been home the outfit had been busy. The Circle L had a dozen line camps—little adobe cabins scattered over the range, occupied during the winter by Circle L cowboys whose duty it was to guard the cattle against the aggressions of timber wolves, rustlers, cold, and starvation.

For two days the chuck-wagon had been sent rattling to the various line camps, stocking them with supplies against the winter. As the weather was threatening the hoodlum wagon had been pressed into service this morning; and all the men, with the exception of the blacksmith—who was working diligently in his shop near the corral; and two punchers—Davies and Harris, who had been assigned to Number One camp—were away with the two wagons.

Davies and Harris had not been able to resist the lure of "town." The prosperity that had descended upon them had made them restless, and the night before they had importuned Lawler to permit them to spend "one more night in town before holin' up for the winter."

Lawler had consented; and now he was wishing that he hadn't. For when he emerged from the ranchhouse this morning he saw a dark cloud bank far in the north, moving southward on the chill wind.

The herd, he knew, was somewhere on the big level beyond the slope of the valley, in the vicinity of Number One line camp. It was an isolated section, off the trail that led to town—a section of featureless level near a big break in the valley. The break opened upon another big level that stretched southward for a hundred miles. In other days Luke Lawler had lost many cattle here; they had drifted through the break by hundreds, with a blizzard behind them; and had been swallowed by the great waste.

Two years before—aware of the previous losses—Lawler had erected a wire fence across the big break, extending from a craggy mountain wall on the western end, to a sheer butte that marked the end of the break, eastward.

Lawler had sent Red King to the crest of the valley on his way to the Hamlin cabin, when he noted that the cloud bank in the north had grown denser, nearer. The wind had increased in velocity, and he had to lean against it as he rode; and it was so cold and raw that he drew his heavy cap down over his eyes to shield them, and drew over his mouth the heavy woolen scarf he wore around his neck.

He rode on a short distance, casting troubled glances into the north. He found himself wondering if Davies and Harris had gone to the line camp. If they hadn't, and a storm broke, the herd on the big level was in danger.

He brought Red King to a halt. The big horse pranced, whistling eagerly. He champed on the bit, tossed his head, raising it finally and staring straight into the north.

"You see it too, eh, King?" said Lawler. "Well, we can't take that chance; we'll have to go to the camp."

He headed Red King down into the valley again, where the bitter wind did not strike them, riding westward rapidly.

It was noon before Lawler and Red King had traveled half the distance to the line camp. A dull, gray haze was sweeping southward. It mingled with the southern light and threw a ghostly glare into the valley, making distance deceptive, giving a strange appearance to the landmarks with which Lawler and the horse were familiar.

Lawler increased Red King's pace. He saw that the storm was nearer than he had thought, and he would have to work fast to get the cattle headed into the valley before it broke.

The distance from the Circle L ranchhouse to the big plain near the line cabin was about fifteen miles, and the trail led upward in a long, tiresome rise. Yet Red King struck the level with a reserve strength that was betrayed by the way he fought for his head as he saw the level stretch before him. He was warmed up—he wanted to run.

But Lawler drew him down in an effort to locate the herd before he started toward it.

Man and horse made a mere blot on the yawning expanse of land that stretched away from them in all directions. A lone eagle in the sky or a mariner adrift on a deserted sea could not have seemed more isolated than Lawler and Red King. In this limitless expanse of waste land horse and rider were dwarfed to the proportion of atoms. The yawning, aching, stretching miles of level seemed to have no end.

Several miles into the north Lawler saw the herd. Directly westward, at a distance of about a mile, he saw the line cabin. No smoke was issuing from the chimney; and so far as he could discern, there were no men with the cattle.

Harris and Davies had overstayed. That knowledge might have been responsible for the grim humor in Lawler's eyes; but the rigidness of his body and the aggressive thrust to his chin were caused by knowledge of a different character. The storm was about to break.

The sun was casting a dull red glow through the gray haze. It was blotted out as he looked. Southward from the horizon ends extended a broad sea of shimmering, glittering sky that contrasted brilliantly to the black, wind-whipped clouds that had gathered in the north. Fleecy gray wisps, detached from the heavy, spreading mass northward, were scurrying southward, streaking the shimmering brilliance and telling of the force of the wind that drove them.

A wailing note came from the north, a sighing vague with a portent of force; a whisper of unrest, a promise of fury. Far in the north, its blackness deepening with distance, stretched the menace, arousing awe with its magnitude.

Nature seemed to know what impended, for on the vast level where the storm would have a clear sweep the dried grass, bronzed by the searing autumn sun, was rustling as it bent far southward; the hardy sage bowed reluctantly to the fitful blasts, and the scraggly, ugly yucca resentfully yielded to the unseen force.

A wide, shallow gully ran northwestward from a point near Red King, almost in a straight line toward the herd. Lawler urged the big horse into the gully and rode hard. The distance was several miles, but when Red King came to the gully end he flashed out of it like a streak of red flame. He was drawn down, instantly, however, snorting and pawing impatiently, while Lawler shielded his eyes with his hands and again scanned the country.

He saw the herd; and as he watched it began to move. There were no men near the cattle.

They started slowly, seemingly reluctant to leave the level. They moved sullenly, closely massed, their heads lowered, their tails drooping. The wind, now beginning to carry a vicious note with its whine, drove a heavy dust cloud against them, warning them. The wind was icy, giving the cattle a foretaste of what was to come. And mingling with the dust were fine, flinty snow particles that came almost horizontally against their rumps, stinging them, worrying them. They increased their pace, and soon were running with a swinging, awkward stride, straight toward the wire fence, several miles distant.

If they saw Lawler they gave no sign, for they went lumbering on, snorting and bawling their apprehension.

Lawler was about to start Red King toward them, when he noted movement on the level a little northwestward from the cattle. Peering intently, he saw two horsemen racing southward, a little distance ahead of the cattle, parallel with them.

At first Lawler was certain the men were Davies and Harris, and he smiled, appreciating their devotion to duty. But when he saw them race past the cattle, not even halting to head them in the right direction—which would have been slightly eastward, so that they would enter the valley before reaching the fence—he frowned, wheeled Red King sharply, and sent him back into the gully from which he had emerged.

"They're strangers, King," he said, shortly to the horse as the latter fled headlong down the gully toward the point from which he had started; "Davies and Harris wouldn't leave the herd with that norther coming on."

The big horse made fast time down the gully. He brought Lawler to a point near the fence where it crossed the gully at about the instant the two riders were dismounting some distance away.

Lawler rode out of the gully and brought Red King to a halt. There was no danger that the two men would discover him, for all objects in the vicinity were rapidly being blotted out by the dancing smother of dust that was riding the north wind. Lawler was to the north of the men, slightly eastward, and they could not have faced the smother of dust to look toward him.

Lawler could dimly see the herd moving toward the fence; he could see the men plainly; and as he watched them his eyes narrowed. The big horse leaped with the word he caught from his rider's lips, racing lightly with the wind toward the fence where the men were working.

Lawler's approach was noiseless, for all sound was engulfed in the steady, roaring whine of the storm. Neither of the two men, working at the fence, heard Lawler as he brought the big horse to a halt within half a dozen paces of them.

The taller of the two, plying a pair of wire-nippers, completed his work at a fence post and turned to leap toward another. The movement brought him against the muzzle of Lawler's horse. He halted jerkily, retreated a step, and looked up, to see Lawler looking at him from behind the muzzle of the big pistol that had leaped into his hand.

There was no word spoken—none could be heard at the moment. What followed was grim pantomime, with tragedy lurking near.

The tall man held his position. He had tentatively extended his right hand, the fingers spread, clawlike. Now the hand was going upward, accompanied by the other. When the man had stepped backward to escape a collision with Lawler's horse, the wind had whipped his hat from his head. He now stood there, his hair waving to the vicious whims of the gale, veiling his eyes and he not daring to lower his hands to brush it away.

The shorter man, too, had assumed a statuesque pose. He had turned when he had noted his companion's startled movement, and he, too, had seen an apparition that had sent his hands swiftly upward.

The big horse stood motionless, his back to the wind. He did not move as Lawler leaped from his back—smoothly, quickly, his eyes alert, his muscles tensed for violent action.

The men stood rigid while Lawler jerked their pistols from their holsters and tossed them into the dust waves that danced and swirled around them. The short man was catapulted against the tall one with a viciousness that staggered both; and then they heard Lawler's voice, sharp and penetrating, above the shrieking of the wind:

"Those cattle will be here in five minutes! If you don't have that fence repaired before then, you drift with them, hoofing it!"

In the allotted time they repaired the fence, working with breathless energy, while Lawler stood near, the menacing gun in hand, a saturnine smile wreathing his face.

When the herd reached the fence there was no break in it. More—where the break had been were three men on horses who took instant charge, easing the cattle down along the fence, heading them eastward toward the shelter they were sure to find if they kept going.

The three men followed the cattle for a mile—until they were going straight and fast toward the home ranch. Then Lawler, smiling with bitter humor, motioned the men toward the back trail.

They seemed to know what was demanded of them. They wheeled their horses, sending them into the billowy white smother that was now coming in a gigantic wave toward them.

The southern light had gone. A dense blackness, out of which roared a gale that robbed them of their breath, struck them. The snow was hurled against them like a sand blast, biting deep, blinding them.

It took them more than an hour to travel the distance that lay between the point at which they had cut the fence, and the line cabin. And when they reached a windbreak near the structure the two men rode behind it, silent, thankful.

Lawler had ridden forth, prepared for bad weather. His face was now muffled in a huge scarf that encircled his neck, and his eyes were shielded by the peak of the fur cap he wore. He dismounted, waved the men toward a dugout, and watched them as they dismounted and led their horses through a narrow door. When the men emerged Lawler led the big red horse in, leaving the men to stand in the white gale that enveloped them.

The wind was now roaring steadily, and with such force that no man could have faced it with uncovered face. It came over the vast emptiness of the northern spaces with a fury that sent into one the consciousness that here was an element with which man could not cope.

Lawler emerged from the dugout and closed the door behind him. He barred it, turned and motioned the two men toward the cabin. He followed them as they opened the door and entered. Then, after closing the door and barring it, he lifted the peak of his cap, removed the scarf from his neck, glanced around the interior of the cabin and looked coldly at the men.

"Well," he said; "there's a heap of explaining to be done. You can begin now—one at a time!"



CHAPTER XVII

THE LINE CABIN

The two men had walked to a point near the big fireplace that occupied the greater part of one end of the cabin. The hatless one, big, assertive, belligerent, grinned defiantly, saying nothing in answer to Lawler's words.

The other man, slighter, and plainly apprehensive, glanced swiftly at his companion; then dropped his gaze to the floor.

"You skunks bunked here last night!" charged Lawler, sharply. "When I was here, yesterday, these bunks were made up. Look at them now! Talk fast. Were you here last night?"

The smaller man nodded.

"Why didn't you cut the fence last night?"

The smaller man grinned. "We wasn't aimin' to get caught."

"Expected there'd be line riders here, eh?"

The other did not answer. Lawler watched both men derisively.

"Then, when you saw no one was here, and that it was likely the norther would keep anyone from coming, you cut the fence. That's it, eh?"

The two men did not answer, regarding him sullenly.

Lawler smiled. This time there was a cold mirth in his smile that caused the two men to look quickly at each other. They paled and scowled at what they saw in Lawler's eyes.

Half a dozen bunks ranged the side walls of the cabin, four on one side, two on the other, arranged in tiers, upper and lower. A rough, square table stood near the center of the room, with a low bench on one side of it and several low chairs on the other. A big chuck-box stood in a corner near the fireplace, its top half open, revealing the supplies with which the receptacle was filled; some shelves on the other side of the fireplace were piled high with canned foods and bulging packages. The bunks were filled with bedclothing; and an oil-lamp stood on a triangular shelf in a corner near the door. The walls were bare with the exception of some highly colored lithographs that, evidently, had been placed there by someone in whom the love of art still flourished.

It was cold in the cabin. A window in the north wall, with four small panes of glass in it, was slowly whitening with the frost that was stealing over it. In the corners of the mullions were fine snow drifts; and through a small crevice in the roof a white spray filtered, ballooning around the room. The temperature was rapidly falling.

During the silence which followed Lawler's words, and while the two fence cutters watched each other, and Lawler, all caught the voice of the storm, raging, furious, incessant.

With his free hand Lawler unbuttoned his coat, tossed his cap into a bunk and ran a hand through his hair, shoving it back from his forehead. His movements were deliberate. It was as though catching fence cutters was an everyday occurrence.

Yet something in his eyes—the thing the two men had seen—gave the lie to the atmosphere of deliberate ease that radiated from him. In his eyes was something that warned, that hinted of passion.

As the men watched him, noting his muscular neck and shoulders; the slim waist of him, the set of his head—which had that hint of conscious strength, mental and physical, which marks the intelligent fighter—they shrank a little, glowering sullenly.

Lawler stood close to the door, the pistol dangling from his right hand. He had hooked the thumb of the left hand into his cartridge belt, and his eyes were gleaming with feline humor.

"There's a heap to be told," he said. "I'm listening."

A silence followed his words. Both men moistened their lips; neither spoke.

"Get going!" commanded Lawler.

"We was headin' south," said the small man. "We cut the fence to git through."

Lawler's eyelids flickered slightly. The heavy pistol swung upward until the dark tube gaped somberly into the small man's eyes.

"I've got loads of time, but I don't feel like wasting it," said Lawler. "You've got one minute to come clean. Keep your traps shut for that time and I bore you—both—and chuck you outside!"

His smile might have misled some men, but the small man had correctly valued Lawler.

"Gary Warden hired us to cut the fence."

The man's voice was a placative whine. His furtive eyes swept Lawler's face for signs of emotion.

There were no signs. Lawler's face might have been an expressionless mask. Not a muscle of his body moved. The offense was a monstrous one in the ethics of the country, and the fence cutter had a right to expect Lawler to exhibit passion of some kind.

"Gary Warden, eh?" Lawler laughed quietly. "If you're lying——"

The man protested that he was telling the truth.

At this point the tall man sneered.

"Hell," he said; "quit your damn blabbin'!"

"Yes," grinned Lawler, speaking to the small man. "You're quitting your talk. From now on your friend is going to do it. I'm asking questions a heap rapid, and the answers are going to jump right onto the tails of the questions. If they don't, I'm going to see how near I can come to boring a hole in the place where he has his brains cached."

The man glared malignantly at Lawler; but when the first question came it was answered instantly:

"How much did Warden pay you?"

"A hundred dollars."

"When were you to cut the fence?"

"When the norther struck."

"You saw us cache grub in the cabin?"

The man nodded.

"What if you had found a couple of line riders here? What were you told to do if you found line riders here? I'm wanting the truth—all of it!"

The man hesitated. Lawler's pistol roared, the concussion rocking the air of the cabin. The man staggered back, clapping a hand to his head, where, it seemed to him, the bullet from the pistol had been aimed.

The man brought up against the rear wall of the cabin, beside the fireplace; and he leaned against it, his face ghastly with fright, his lips working soundlessly. The little man cowered, plainly expecting Lawler would shoot him, too. And Lawler's gun did swing up again, but the voice of the tall man came, blurtingly:

"Warden told us to knife any men we found here."

Lawler's lips straightened, and his eyes glowed with a passion so intense that the men shrank, gibbering, in the grip of a mighty paralysis.

Lawler walked to the table and sat beside it, placing the gun near his right hand. The men watched him, fascinated; noting his swift movements as he plunged a hand into a pocket and drew out a small pad of paper and a pencil. He wrote rapidly upon a leaf of the pad; then got up, stepped back and ordered the tall man to approach the table.

"Write your name below what I have written—and date it."

When both men had signed the paper, Lawler folded it, stuck it between some leaves of the pad, and replaced pad and pencil in his pocket.

"That's all," he said. "You'll hang out here until the norther blows itself out; then you'll hit the trail to town and tell your story to the sheriff. I'll be doing the honors."

He sheathed his gun and flung open the door, stepping back as a white avalanche rushed in; grinning broadly as he saw the men shrink from it. He divined that the men thought he was going to force them out into the storm immediately, and he grinned coldly.

"You can be tickled that I'm not sending you out into it, to drift with the cattle you tried to kill," he said. "You'd deserve that, plenty. You'll find wood beside the dugout. Get some of it in here and start a fire. Move; and don't try any monkey business!"

He closed the door as the men went out. He had no fear that they would try to escape—even a threat of death could not have forced them to leave the cabin.

When they came in they kindled a fire in the big fireplace, hovering close to it after the blaze sprang up, enjoying its warmth, for the interior of the cabin had become frigid.

Lawler, however, did not permit the men to enjoy the fire. He sent them out for more wood, and when they had piled a goodly supply in a corner, and had filled a tin water pail from a water hole situated about a hundred feet straight out from the door of the cabin, he sent them again to the dugout after their ropes. With the ropes, despite the sullen objections of the men, he bound their hands and feet tightly, afterward picking the men up and tossing them ungently into upper bunks on opposite sides of the room.

He stood, after watching them for a time, his face expressionless.

"That's just so you won't get to thinking you are company," he said. "We're holed up for a long time, maybe, and I don't want you to bother me, a heap. If you get to bothering me—disturbing my sleep trying to untangle yourselves from those ropes, why——"

He significantly tapped his pistol. Then he pulled a chair close to the fire, dropped into it, rolled a cigarette, and calmly smoked, watching the white fleece trail up the chimney.



CHAPTER XVIII

STORM-DRIVEN

For an hour there was no sound in the cabin. Lawler smoked several cigarettes. Once he got up and threw more wood upon the fire, standing in front of the blaze for several minutes stretching his long legs, watching the licking tongues as they were sucked up the chimney by the shrieking wind.

Then, for a time, he lounged in the chair, gazing meditatively at the north window, noting how the fine, frozen snow meal clung to the glass; watching the light fade, listening to the howling white terror that had seized the world in its icy grip.

At the end of an hour it grew dark in the cabin. Lawler got up, lighted the kerosene lamp, placed it on the table, seated himself on a bench and again meditatively watched the leaping flames in the fireplace.

Satisfaction glowed in his eyes as he thought of what would have happened had he not decided to substitute for Davies and Harris. Undoubtedly by this time the two men were on their way to the camp. They would certainly have noticed the warning bleak northern sky and other indications of the coming storm. And undoubtedly, if they had started toward the camp, they were by this time being punished for their dereliction. They would make the camp, though, he was sure, for they had the wind at their backs, and they knew the trail. He expected, any minute, to hear them at the door. He grinned, his face a trifle grim as he anticipated their astonishment at finding him there, with the two fence cutters occupying the bunks.

He had not followed the herd to the Circle L shelters because he had had small hope of keeping close to the fence cutters in the storm. And he had brought them back to the cabin to make sure of them. As he sat at the table he drew out the paper the men had signed and read their names:

"Lay Givens."

"Ben Link."

Their confession would convict Gary Warden of a crime that—if it did not open the doors of the penitentiary to him—would bring upon him the condemnation of every honest man in the state. In his anxiety to inflict damage upon Lawler, Warden had overstepped himself.

Lawler had betrayed no passion that day when he had got off the train at Willets with his men and Blondy Antrim. He had not permitted any of them to suspect that the incident of the attempted theft of a portion of the trail herd had affected him. But it had affected him. It had aroused him as he never had been aroused before; it had filled him with a passionate hatred of Gary Warden so intense that when his thoughts dwelt upon the man he felt a lust to destroy him. Not even Lafe Corwin, watching him that day at Willets, knew how he had fought to overcome the driving desire to kill Warden, Singleton, and Antrim, as they had stood there on the platform.

His eyes chilled now, as he thought of Warden and the others. He got up, his blood pulsing heavily, and started toward the fire. He had reached it, and was standing before it, when he heard a sound at the door—a faint knocking, and a voice.

Davies and Harris were coming now. They were cold, he supposed, had seen the light in the window—perhaps had tried the door; the wind drowning the noise so that he had not heard it before. They were in a hurry to get in, to the warmth the cabin afforded.

He was in no hurry to let them in, and he walked deliberately to the table and stood beside it, his back to the fire, smiling ironically.

He heard no further sound, and he supposed the men had gone to the dugout to turn their horses into its shelter before again trying the door.

He was in a grimly humorous mood now, and he stooped, blew out the light and stepped toward the door, standing back of it, where it would swing against him when the men opened it.

He loosened the fastenings, stealthily. He wanted them to come in and find the two fence cutters there.

He stood for a long time at the door, listening, waiting. No sound reached his ears, and he scowled, puzzled. Then, above the wailing voice of the storm, came the shrill, piercing neigh of a horse.

Several times in his life had Lawler heard that sound—once when a cow-pony which had been bogged down in quicksand had neighed when he had been drawn under; and again when a horse which he had been riding had stepped into a gopher hole and had broken a leg. He had been forced to shoot the animal, for which he had formed a sincere attachment; and it had seemed to him that when he drew the pistol the horse knew what impended—for its shrill neigh had been almost human in its terrible appeal.

It was such a sound that now reached his ears above the roar of the storm.

Davies and Harris were in trouble.

With a bound Lawler tore the door open and stood, leaning against the terrific wind, trying to peer out into the white smother that shrieked around him. When he made out the outlines of a horse not more than half a dozen feet from the open doorway—the animal so encrusted with snow that he looked like a pallid ghost—and a shapeless bundle on his back that seemingly was ready to pitch into a huge drift that had formed in front of the cabin—he leaped outward, a groan of sympathy breaking from him.

In an instant he was inside again, carrying the shapeless bundle, his lips stiff and white as he peered close at it as he tenderly laid it on the floor of the cabin.

With swift movements he lighted the lamp again, and then returning to the bundle, leaned over it, pulling away a scarf that covered its head and disclosing a white, drawn face—the face of the woman he had met, in Willets, at the foot of the stairs leading to Gary Warden's office!

Lawler wheeled swiftly, leaping to first one and then to the other of the bunks where the fence cutters lay, tearing the ropes from them.

The tall man tumbled out first, urged by what he had seen and by the low tense voice of his captor. He seized a tin pan and dove out of the open doorway, returning instantly, the pan heaped high with snow. The other man, following the first quickly, dove through the snow drifts to the dugout where he fumbled in the slicker on Lawler's saddle until he found a flask.

By the time the little man returned the woman was in one of the lower bunks. A pair of bare feet, small and shapely, were sticking out over the edge of the bunk, and the tall fence cutter was vigorously rubbing snow upon them. A pair of small, high-top riding boots of soft, pliable leather, was lying beside the bunk near some pitiably thin stockings.

At the other end of the bunk Lawler was bathing, with ineffable tenderness and care, a face that had been swathed in the scarf he had previously removed. The long, glistening, black hair had been brushed back from its owner's forehead by Lawler; and a corner of a blanket had been modestly folded over a patch of white breast, exposed when Lawler had ruthlessly torn away the flimsy, fluffy waist.

"It was the scarf that saved her face," said Lawler, after he had worked over the unconscious form for a quarter of an hour. The face was flushed, now—which was a good sign; and the feet and ankles were beginning to show signs of restored circulation also—though more reluctantly.

"How she ever got through it I'm not pretending to say," declared Lawler, grimly. "But she did it, and the frost didn't get her, much. She'll be fresh as a daisy in a couple of hours."

The tall man—Link—had ceased his labors with the woman, and was standing near Lawler. He grinned at Lawler's words.

His face was flushed, his eyes were glowing with passion as he watched the inert form on the bunk.

"She's a peach," he said, thickly. Lawler was not looking at him; he was giving all his attention to the woman.

"Della Wharton," continued Link. "I've seen her at the Two Diamond—runnin' around with Warden. Warden's took a shine to her. Don't blame him." He muttered something else that Lawler did not hear, for Lawler was paying no attention to him.

Lawler held the flask to the woman's half-open mouth, and smiled when several drops of the strong spirits trickled over her tongue. Then he walked to the wood pile and replenished the fire. Returning, he saw Link standing close to the bunk, smiling bestially at the upturned face. When Lawler caught sight of him he was fingering the disordered hair, lifting it and letting it filter through his fingers.

Without a word, Lawler leaped and struck with bitter malignance. Not a sound escaped Link as he fell. Lawler lifted him bodily, threw him upon the pile of wood in the corner, where he lay huddled up, unconscious.

Wheeling swiftly, his eyes ablaze with the terrible passion that had seized him, Lawler faced the bunk. The woman's head was moving slowly from side to side, as though she were making an effort to lift it; her eyelids were fluttering, and her hands were straying over the bedclothing, the fingers closing and unclosing.

Lawler made a horrible grimace at Givens.

"Get out of here, damn you!" he said. "Go out and take care of her horse—anything! If you are in here when she wakes up, I'll kill you! And take that other skunk out of here, too—take him to the dugout, and don't come back here for an hour!"

He watched impatiently while Givens seized his companion and dragged him outside. Then Lawler fastened the door, and standing near it, watched the woman.

Her eyes were open. He could see them, even though he stood slightly behind her. She moved her head, lifted it and gazed around the room, seemingly bewildered at what she saw. Then she twisted her body around; saw her bare feet, and quickly drew an end of the bunk blanket over them.

And then she saw Lawler. Her eyes opened wide, filling with satisfaction, and she sat up, holding one hand to her throat, tight against the flesh, covering it with the other.

"Oh!" she said, thinly; "I—I got here, didn't I? But I didn't expect to find you here!"



CHAPTER XIX

DEATH AT A DOOR

Lawler smiled. "Then I reckon we're both surprised, ma'am," he said. "I certainly wasn't expecting the norther to bring you. You had a mighty narrow squeeze. You were pretty near all in when I opened the door and saw you."

The girl drew a long, quavering breath and leaned back against the wall of the bunk, closing her eyes.

Her hair had fallen about her shoulders, showing the white throat through the damp, glistening folds; and when she again opened her eyes, they were big and luminous—and brown, Lawler took note of that, for the glare from the lamp was directly upon them.

Renewed life—animation—certainly beautified her. While Lawler had been working with her to restore her suspended vitality he had felt no emotion beyond an eagerness to restore her to consciousness. Now he was vibrant with sympathy, with pity, and with wonder.

Why had she come here? It was quite evident that she had come intentionally, for her words: "I got here, didn't I?" seemed to be proof of that. Also, she had not anticipated finding him at the cabin, for she had said so in as many words.

She gathered the blanket closer around her, noting that her feet were wrapped in it and that one end of it covered her throat. Lawler saw the blushes come and go in her face as she worked with the blanket, and he secretly applauded her modesty.

When she had arranged the blanket she looked straight at him. She studied his face long before she spoke, and his eyes gleamed with satisfaction when he saw her lips form a faint, half-smile. She had decided she was not afraid of him.

She was embarrassed, but not to the point of prudishness. Her gaze was direct, frankly grateful. But there was something else in her eyes—a vague uneasiness, curiosity, repressed eagerness. She glanced swiftly around the interior of the cabin, and into the other bunks. And when she saw Lawler watching her keenly she blushed. And now, as she dropped her gaze, he saw her start as her eyes rested on the tangled ropes that Lawler had torn from the two fence cutters when he had released them after he had carried her into the cabin. The ropes were lying on the floor where he had thrown them in his haste.

"Has—has anything happened?" she asked, looking swiftly at him, blushing again.

"Plenty," he said; "you came."

"I—I mean—that is, has anything else happened?" she added. She seemed to hold her breath, for his answer.

"I caught two fence cutters."

"Did they cut the fence?" She was rigid, tense.

Lawler nodded, and he saw her hands clench.

"But there wasn't any damage done. I caught them just after they cut it, and I made them repair it before the cattle got through."

"And the two men?" she questioned, breathlessly.

"They're in the dugout—with the horses. They were in here, until you came."

She leaned back, breathing fast. Her color was high, her eyes were shining with satisfaction. And while Lawler watched her she laughed quaveringly.

"Then I had that long, cold ride for nothing," she said.

Lawler looked straight at her. "You knew the fence was to be cut?"

Her color receded and she met his gaze unflinchingly, resolutely.

"Yes. I overheard Gary Warden telling two of the Two Diamond men—Link and Givens—to cut it. Warden wanted to destroy all your cattle. It seems he has had men watching them—and your men. And he learned the herd was on the level near here. He told the men to wait until a storm threatened. Gary didn't know I overheard him telling the men to cut the fence; and I said nothing to him. But I waited until I saw an opportunity, and then I came, to warn the men I expected would be here. I didn't expect to find you here; and I intended to keep silent regarding what I had heard."

"Why are you telling it, now?"

She blushed again and gazed downward. Then she looked at him with direct, puzzled eyes.

"I—I really don't know," she said, hesitatingly. "I expect it was because I felt guilty—or because I thought I saw something in your eyes that made me think you knew that I hadn't ridden over here for the fun of it. It was a very cold and disagreeable ride.

"And, somehow, I—I think you ought to know it. When I overheard Gary telling those men to cut the fence it seemed to me that it was the meanest scheme I ever had heard of. I was so angry I could have horse-whipped Gary. At the time I believe I wasn't thinking of you at all—I just kept seeing those poor cows wandering away in the storm, to freeze to death in the open. And I determined to ride over here and prevent it. I suppose what I have told you will make trouble for Gary. I suppose I shouldn't have told you."

"Givens and Link told me."

"Oh! You made them tell, of course—you would do that. What are you going to do about it?"

"What would you do—Miss—" Lawler paused.

"I am Della Wharton," smiled the girl.

"Well, what would you do, Miss Wharton?"

The girl flashed a quick glance at him. "Considering that the plan didn't succeed, and that I rode clear over here to tell you about it—don't you think you ought to keep silent, Mr. Lawler?"

Whatever Lawler intended to do later, he was silent now. He was puzzled, amazed, over the startling frankness the girl had exhibited. He had heard, from Blackburn—or somebody—it wasn't important whom—that this girl was staying at the Two Diamond. He believed Blackburn had hinted at relations more intimate. And she was at this moment betraying Warden—delivering him into the hands of a man the latter hated.

"Miss Wharton," said Lawler gravely; "I confess I am puzzled. You accept Warden's hospitality, and yet you come here to betray him."

She laughed. "I am not accepting Gary's hospitality. My father is a member of the company that bought the Two Diamond, and I have as much right to be there as Gary has. We live East—in New York. I came West out of curiosity. I wanted to see the ranch. And now that I am here I intend to stay. I have always been eager to live in the West."

"Then you don't like Gary Warden?"

The girl's face sobered. "I like him. That is all."

Lawler's eyes were still grave. "Miss Wharton," he said slowly; "do you know what Gary Warden is doing—what the company with which your father is connected, is doing?"

"Yes," said the girl, frankly; "they—all of them—are trying to control the western cattle market." She looked straight at him, with no sign of embarrassment.

"That is business, isn't it? It is what men are beginning to call 'big business.' It means centralization of power, resources—and a number of things that go with it. It is an admirable scheme—don't you think? It eliminates uncertainty, risk of loss. It means the stabilizing of the cattle industry; it means gigantic profits to the men who have brains big enough to control it."

Lawler smiled. "Also, Miss Wharton, it means the complete subjection of the cattle raiser. It means that competition will be stifled; that the cattle owner will be compelled to take what prices the buyers offer. It means that the incentive to raise cattle will be destroyed. It means the end of the open market—which has always been a spur to industry. It is evil."

The girl laughed. "How tragic!" she mocked. "One would think we were facing a cataclysm, whereas business men are merely just beginning to take advantage of some of the opportunities that are everywhere around them. It is all perfectly legal, isn't it? I have heard my father say that it is."

Lawler's smile grew slightly bitter. He saw that the girl's mind was merely skipping over the surface of the commercial sea upon which her father sailed a pirate craft; she had not plunged into the depths where she might have found the basic principles of all business—fairness; she had taken no account of the human impulse that, in just men, impels them to grant to their fellows a fighting chance to win.

Watching her closely, Lawler saw in her the signs of frivolity and vanity that he had failed to see that day when he had met her in Willets. Her attitude now revealed her as plainly as though he had known her all her days. She comprehended none of life's big problems; the relations of men to one another had not compelled her attention; the fine, deep impulses of sympathy had not touched her. She was selfish, self-centered, light, inconsequential—a woman who danced from under the burdens of life and laughed at those who were forced to bear them for her.

And yet she was a woman, demanding respect from his sex. He smiled as he turned from her to fix the fire, wondering at the courage that had driven her to ride to the cabin in the storm. His smile broadened when he remembered she had said she sympathized with the "cows"—that motive, while not a high one, was as good as another since the pursuing of it had meant good for him in the end.

"Do you like this country?" she asked, as he turned.

"It isn't a half bad place. If it wasn't for some persons—and northers——"

She laughed. "There are bad people everywhere. As for the 'norther'—I enjoyed it very much until—until it got so bad that I just couldn't see where I was going. I began to be afraid that I was lost and that I'd freeze to death. And then I saw the light in the window—a little square that flickered feebly in the distance, and which sometimes seemed to disappear completely." She smiled, tremulously.

"It seemed that—after I got here—I was to freeze to death, anyway. For I couldn't make you hear me. I rode close to the door and pounded on it. I was afraid to get off, for fear I would fall in that big drift near the door and not be able to get up again. I was so cold and stiff——"

She hesitated, and Lawler saw tears in her eyes.

It was the reaction, delayed by their talk. Self-accusation shone in Lawler's eyes as he started toward her.

"I'm a box-head, Miss Wharton, for standing here, talking about nothing at all, and you nearly freezing to death."

And then he halted, midway of the distance toward her, aware that he could do nothing when he did reach her. And her manner warned him of that, too, for she pulled the blanket closer around her and crowded as far back into the bunk as she could get, looking at him with embarrassed eyes.

"If you could get your clothes fixed," he began. "You see, Miss Wharton, there wasn't much time, and we had to get them off mighty rapid. You can see that we were none too gentle about it."

She blushed, and he abruptly turned his back and walked to the fireplace. He stuck close to it until he heard her say:

"Won't you please hang my stockings up somewhere? They are so wet I can't get them on."

The stockings, wet and limp, fell close beside him. He snatched them up, grinning widely, though fearful that she might see the grin, and carefully laid them over the back of a chair, pulling the chair close to the fire.

Then he got out a frying-pan and began to prepare supper for her. When the aroma of the sizzling bacon was wafted to her, he heard her exclaim:

"U-um, that smells good! Why, I am almost famished!"

Five minutes later, with a plate in her lap and a cup of steaming coffee resting on the rail of the bunk, she was eating. Her eyes were bright and her color high as she watched Lawler, who was seated at the table with his back to her.

"You don't feel much like talking, do you?"

"No," he said. "According to the way this norther is whooping it up we'll run out of talk before we can break trail out of here."

"Do you mean that the storm may last some days?"

"There is no telling. At this time of the year they are mighty uncertain. I've known them to stick around for a month or more."

She sat very silent, and for a time did not even move her lips. Stealing a swift glance at her, expecting to see a worried light in her eyes, Lawler noted that there was a slight—a very slight smile on her lips.

He was amazed, incredulous, and he stole another glance at her to make certain. There was no denying it—there was a smile in the eyes that were gazing meditatively past him into the fire; a smile on her lips—giving him proof that the prospect of remaining alone in the cabin with him had not crushed her—had not brought the hysterical protests that he had feared. She was plainly pleased, possibly considering the thing an adventure which would have no damaging consequences.

With a malice in his eyes that she did not see—for he looked gravely at her, he said, slowly:

"Listen, Miss Wharton!"

He raised a hand and looked at the north window. Following his gaze she saw the snow whipping against the glass, rattling against the panes like small hailstones hurled with frightful velocity. The incessant droning whine of the wind reached their ears, deep in volume as though it would tell them of its interrupted sweep across the vast plains; as though to convince them of its unlimited power and ferocity. She knew as well as he that the big drifts around the cabin had grown bigger; that other drifts were forming around the walls. For the sounds were muffled, and a great, weird calm had settled inside the cabin. The walls, snow-banked, were deadening outside sound.

"A man couldn't go half a mile in that, now, Miss Wharton. And it will be days before anybody can reach us. I am afraid we are in for a long spell of monotony."

"Well," she said, gazing straight at him; a glow in her eyes that puzzled him; "we can't help it, can we? And I suppose we shall have to make the best of it."

Lawler, however, did not expect the storm to last more than a day or so. They seldom did, at this time of the year. He had drawn the gloomy picture merely in an attempt to force Miss Wharton to realize the indelicacy of her position. He had thought she would have exhibited perturbation. Instead, she was calm and plainly unworried.

Puzzled, Lawler leaned an elbow on the table and scowled into the fire. There was no apparent reason why he should object to remaining in the cabin with a pretty woman who did not seem eager to leave it. And yet he was afflicted with a grave unrest.

Givens and Link were in the dugout, and presently they would return to the cabin. They would have to remain in the cabin, for it would be inhuman of him to compel them to stay very long in the dugout with the horses. Thus was Miss Wharton shielded against the impropriety of staying for any length of time in the cabin with him, alone.

But the safeguard of propriety was also a danger. Because Link had permitted a certain light to glow in his eyes Lawler had knocked him down. If the four of them were to remain in the cabin for any length of time, there would be periods when he must sleep. And then Link——

Lawler's thoughts broke off here, for he heard a sound at the door—Givens' voice, saying hoarsely:

"For God's sake, Boss, let us in! We're freezin' to death!"

Lawler got up and walked to the door. He hesitated as he lifted the bar, telling Miss Wharton to wrap the blanket tightly around her in anticipation of the rush of wind. When he saw that she obeyed him, he swung the door open.

As Lawler opened the door he stepped back with it, escaping by inches the sweep of an axe blade that caught the light from the lamp and shimmered brightly in a half-circle as it was swung with the malignant force of Link's arms.

The blade of the axe struck the floor, sinking deep into the boards; while Link, hurled off balance by the viciousness of his attack, tumbled headlong after the axe, sprawling on his hands and knees on the cabin floor, muttering curses.



CHAPTER XX

THE "KILLING"

For an instant following the attack there was no change in the scene inside the cabin. Surprise that Lawler had escaped his blow seemed to retard Link's movements quite as much as the force of his fall. For he floundered on the floor, unable to get his feet under him; while the bitter wind, howling in through the open door, hurled a blinding avalanche of white clear to the fireplace. On the floor in the smother of white was Link, and near him the handle of the axe stuck rigidly upward, its blade buried deeply in the floor.

Della Wharton had been watching Lawler as he opened the door, and she had seen what quickly had followed. Now, though a nameless terror had seized her, she still watched, unable to withdraw her gaze, powerless to move or to open her lips.

She saw Lawler standing where he had halted when he had opened the door—one hand grasping the bar that he had lifted when he had drawn the door back; the other hanging at his side. She saw him dimly through the driving mist that was between them, but he loomed big, gigantic, as he stood there, motionless in the instant following the attack, watching Link.

Then the scene changed swiftly. Link was still on the floor when Givens leaped into the cabin. He held a heavy piece of cordwood in one hand, and as he entered the door he paused for an instant, plainly blinded by the light and the snow. His face was hideous with passion.

Until now, the lamp had been fluttering in the rush of wind. As Givens stood, trying to peer around him, the light spluttered and went out, plunging the cabin into a darkness but little relieved by the dull, red flames in the fireplace.

It was still light enough for the girl to see, however; and she gasped as she watched Link scramble to his feet and lunge toward the axe. Then the semi-darkness was rent by a flame streak that started from where Lawler stood, and the air of the cabin rocked with a deafening roar. She saw Link go down in a heap, and before she could draw a breath another lancelike flame darted from the point where Lawler stood. She saw Givens stagger; heard the heavy piece of cordwood thud to the floor; saw Givens plunge backward through the door to land in the big drift outside.

Then she huddled down into the bunk, covering her face with her hands, shuddering, cringing from the horror she had witnessed.

When she again opened her eyes the lamp had been lighted and the door closed. For a long time she did not move, dreading to peer from the bunk, lest she see a thing that would remind her of the tragedy.

But when, after a while, she found courage to look, she saw Lawler standing near the fireplace, looking down into the flames, his back to her.

The axe, she noted, shuddering, was standing on the floor near the woodpile; and there was no sign of Link or Givens.

For a long time she was silent, watching Lawler, a dread wonder filling her. And at last, when the continuing silence began to affect her with its horrible monotony, she said, quaveringly:

"Did—you—Are they dead?"

"Yes," said Lawler, gruffly; "I took them out back of the windbreak." He wheeled, to look straight at her, his gaze level and somber.

"I had to do it—there was no other way. I'm sorry you had to see it."

That was all. He did not speak to her again. For a long time she watched him, but he did not change position—standing there, tall, big, seeming to brood into the dancing flames that cast grotesque figures over the walls of the cabin.



CHAPTER XXI

CHANCE—AND A MAN

Della must have slept, for when she again opened her eyes the light had been extinguished and a gray glow was coming through the north window.

Morning had come. She gathered the bedclothes around her and sat up, glancing around the cabin for Lawler. He must have gone out, for the heavy wooden bar had been removed from the door—it was standing in a corner. She suspected Lawler had gone out to care for the horses, and she hurriedly got out of the bunk, ran to the door and barred it, and began to dress.

A fire roared in the fireplace, and it was warm in the cabin. But she noted, with an interest that was almost calm, that the storm still raged as furiously as the night before. There was this difference. Last night the wind had been driven against the cabin in fitful blasts, for the most part; now to her ears there came a ceaseless, droning hum with no intervals of silence between—a steady, vicious, incessant rushing roar that made her fear the cabin walls could not long resist it.

When she thought of last night's tragedy it seemed almost remote to her—a thing that had happened long ago; an incident that time had robbed of its gruesomeness.

For she saw, now, that it had been inevitable—that Lawler had acted in self-defense. There had been no other way. She shuddered when she thought of the ghastly things that were lying under the windbreak; but her own comfort became instantly paramount, and she drew a chair close to the fire and enjoyed its welcome warmth while dressing.

After dressing she got up from the chair and walked over to the chuck-box, smiling as she noted the bulging sides; her eyes glowing with satisfaction when she lifted the lid and saw the well-filled interior. She paused before the shelf upon which reposed a supply of canned foods; and exclaimed with delight when she saw, affixed to the wall near the door, a piece of broken mirror. She spent some time looking into the glass, combing her hair with a fragment of comb she found on a shelf beside the mirror.

She had finished when she heard a knock on the door. She removed the bar, and when Lawler stepped in, closing the door instantly to keep out the rush of wind, she was standing in a corner, smiling demurely at him.

His face was grave, and he did not respond to her mood as he stood there, watching her.

"Well," she said, after a silence, during which his face did not change expression; "can't you say something complimentary?" She lifted her eyes challengingly, as though to invite his inspection.

He saw that the tragedy had not affected her as it would have affected some women—his mother and Ruth Hamlin, for example—though he veiled the reproof in his eyes with a smile. The vanity she exhibited, her self-interest, egotism disgusted him.

"You've found the mirror," he said. "Well, you look pretty well slicked up. What happened last night seems to have affected you very little."

"Why should it?" she demanded, defiantly. "I don't intend to brood over two men that I did not know—two men who attempted to commit murder! Of course, it was an awful shock, and all that, but I am not going into hysterics over it. Besides, I didn't kill them."

Lawler abruptly turned away from her and walked to the fireplace. His face was pale and his eyes were glowing with contempt. She followed him as far as the table, her lips in a pout—and stood there watching him, her gaze mocking, defiant.

He finally turned and looked at her, his lips set in straight lines.

"Yes, I killed them, Miss Wharton," he said, evenly. "Do you know why?"

"Because they seemed determined to kill you—because they attacked you, I suppose," she returned.

"You are wrong, Miss Wharton. There was nothing personal in that killing. Those men were carrying out a principle of the unscrupulous system you defended in our talk last night. If there had been no system those men would not have attempted to cut my fence, I would not have captured them, and they would not have attempted to kill me. Do you see what I meant last night when I said the system was evil?"

She held his gaze unflinchingly. "Mr. Lawler," she said; "those men had no orders to kill you—they attempted that because you captured them, I suppose. And I did not, last night, attempt to defend Gary Warden's action in sending them here. In fact—if you remember—I came over here purposely to defeat them."

"But if there was no scheme to control cattle there would have been no incentive to cut my fence," he said, impatiently.

"Perhaps some other persons would have cut it," she answered; "criminals are everywhere. Please don't preach to me, Mr. Lawler," she added, pleadingly. "I—I think you ought to be glad that I came—aren't you?"

He smiled grimly. "Well, I am not going to turn you out into the storm."

Getting out some cooking utensils he began to prepare breakfast. She watched him for an instant, and then went to the north window, rubbed a hole through the frost and tried to look out. She could not see more than a few inches into the white blur that roared against the glass, and so she turned, sought a chair near the table, and resumed watching Lawler. And her eyes filled with a warm light as they followed his movements—noting that he seemed handsomer now than he had appeared when she had met him that day at the foot of the stairs. And she smiled at his back, exulting in the continued fury of the storm. For it meant that she would be alone with him for days—many, perhaps. And she told herself that she loved Lawler; that she had loved him since the day she had encountered him at the foot of the stairs leading to Warden's office. He was wealthy, handsome; and in her code of morals it was no crime to take advantage of every opportunity that chance presented. And chance——

Here Gary Warden's face flashed in her mental vision. And she smiled. For Warden had never thrilled her as this man had thrilled her. Warden was cold, coarse, gross. This man was vibrant with life, with energy—there was fire in him. And it had been Warden's scheming that had sent her to Lawler. She laughed and snuggled contentedly down in the chair.



CHAPTER XXII

THE WHITE WASTE

Warden and Singleton had been in Willets on the day the storm broke. They had ridden into town early, and when they saw the low-flying clouds sweeping down from the north Singleton grinned maliciously, with a significance that Warden could not mistake.

"Warden, it's goin' to storm," he said.

Warden glanced at the other, understandingly.

"Looks a whole lot like it, Singleton. And we can be more comfortable at the Two Diamond than in town."

"Right," grinned Singleton. "An' we'd better hit the breeze right now, for she's comin' fast."

As they mounted their horses in front of the building that contained Warden's office, the latter looked sharply at Singleton.

"Givens and Link ought to be busy by now. You say your men reported that the Circle L men stocked Number One line camp yesterday?"

"She's stocked!" laughed Singleton; "Tulerosa an' Denver brought word. An' the herd was on the big level north of the camp. They'll head straight for that break because they'll hit it before they hit the basin. An' Givens an' Link will send 'em through, to hell—an' then some. An' them damn fools, Davies an' Harris, is layin' in the back room of the Wolf, paralyzed by that forty-rod that Big Jim Lafflin has been slippin' over the bar to 'em. They won't know they're alive until this time tomorrow, an' then they'll be so scared that they'll just keep right on hittin' the forty-rod for fair! I reckon we've got Lawler goin', now, the damn maverick!"

Warden and Singleton rode fast, but the storm caught them. Midway on the ten-mile stretch of plain between Willets and the Two Diamond they turned their backs to the white smother and sent their horses racing headlong away from the storm.

"She's a humdinger!" yelled Singleton to Warden as the wind shrieked and howled about them. "If Givens an' Link git them cattle started they'll drift clear into Mexico. Three thousand! I reckon that'll set the damn fool back some!"

The two men had only five miles to ride when the storm struck, and Singleton was experienced. And yet when they rode into the Two Diamond stable and dismounted, both men were breathless and tired; their legs and arms stiff with cold and their faces raw and blue from the bitter wind that had swirled around them.

"Another five miles of that an' we wouldn't be as active as we are now!" said Singleton, grimly. "She's got a worse bite than any wind I ever seen!"

Warden's hands were so cold he could not remove the saddle from his horse. A Two Diamond man performed that service for him, and for Singleton. While Warden and Singleton were stamping their feet in an effort to restore circulation, the Two Diamond man called to them from the far end of the stable:

"You run into Miss Della?"

Warden wheeled toward the man. "What do you mean, Lefty? What about Miss Della? Isn't she at the ranchhouse?"

"She rode away about three hours ago—on that big roan of hers. Went to town, most likely. She didn't say. I reckoned that if she had gone to town, you'd have run into her."

Warden ran stiffly to the ranchhouse, where he came upon Aunt Hannah in the kitchen.

"Where's Della?" he demanded, excitedly.

The woman looked at Warden in mild surprise.

"Why, didn't she come with you, Mr. Warden? She told me she intended to." And then her face blanched at the wild excitement Warden betrayed.

"She isn't with you—you didn't meet her? Oh, she'll be frozen to death in this terrible storm!"

"Damn you!" cursed Warden, gripping the woman's arm until she cried out in pain; "didn't I tell you not to let her go alone—anywhere?"

He released the woman and plunged out, running blindly back to the stable. He collided with Singleton at the stable door. His face was ghastly, his eyes bulging.

"Della's gone, Singleton!" he gasped. "She went to town. For God's sake, get those saddles on again! We've got to go back!"

"Warden, it can't be done," said Singleton in a low voice; "you'd freeze to death before you went a mile. There ain't any man can face that storm an' live. Man," he added when Warden made a violent gesture of impatience; "use your reason. We've just come five miles, with the wind at our backs—an' we're half froze. Lefty just told me that Miss Della left about three hours ago. If that's the case she's likely in town, snug an' warm, somewheres. We'd ought to have nosed around a little before we left, but we didn't, an' mebbe she rode right by your place, thinkin' to stop in on the way back. You left early, you know. Anyway, Warden, if she's in town she'll stay there till the storm is over—snug an' warm. And if she didn't go to town there wouldn't be no use lookin' for her. Why, man, look out there! you can't see your hand before you!"

Warden raged insanely, stalking back and forth through the stable; and finally to the ranchhouse again, where he bitterly arraigned Aunt Hannah. But in the end he stayed in the ranchhouse, close beside a window, out of which he watched until the night came to shut off his view of the great, white world.

Over at the Circle L ranchhouse were other anxious watchers—men whose steady eyes held a haunting gleam of worry, and whose rugged faces grew grim and long as the days passed and the storm did not abate. From their bunkhouse they watched, day and night, for the end; their horses ready, heavy clothing at hand for a plunge into the white waste that stretched on all sides of them. Had they known which way Lawler had gone when he left the Circle L they would have searched for him despite the frigid danger that gripped the world. But Lawler had gone, leaving no word; and there was nothing the men could do.

Through a window in the Circle L ranchhouse anxious eyes peered also—those of a gray-haired woman with a kindly, gentle face into which, as the long days passed, came lines that had not been there before. And yet in the watching eyes was a gleam of hope—of calm confidence in the big son who was somewhere in the white waste—a conviction that he was safe, that he would survive and return to her.



CHAPTER XXIII

A WOMAN'S WILES

From the ceiling of the cabin Lawler had suspended a spare blanket. It hung between the two tiers of bunks, thus providing a certain privacy for both Miss Wharton and Lawler.

Lawler had been scrupulously considerate, and with a delicacy that must have earned her applause—had she been serious-minded—he had sought to seem unaware or indifferent to the many inevitable intimacies forced upon them by the nature of their association.

He knew, however, that the girl was secretly laughing at him. Certain signs were convincing. On the first night of their enforced joint occupancy of the cabin, she had silently watched him tack the blanket to the ceiling; and though she had said nothing, he had noted a gleam in her eyes which had made him wonder if he should not have waited until she suggested it.

At other times he felt her gaze upon him—her eyes always glowing with the suggestion of silent mirth. She seemed to be amused over the delicacy he exhibited—to be wondering at it. Whether she appreciated it or not he did not know, or care. For he had noted other things that had increased his contempt of her. She was betraying absolutely no perturbation over her enforced stay in the cabin with him. On the contrary, her manner gave him the impression that she was enjoying herself and not thinking of the future. She was contented with the present.

Moreover, he could not fail to be aware of her interest in him; for the many signs were infallible. Glances, the intonations of her voice, a way she had of standing close to him, of touching his hands or his shoulders—all was evidence of the guile he had detected in her, convincing him that she thought him desirable, and that she had decided to win him.

But vanity in Lawler had long since been ruthlessly overwhelmed by the serious business of life. He had never had time—in his later years—to yield to the fatuous imaginings of youth. He had lived a rough, hard life, in which values were computed by the rule of sheer worth—a life that had taught him that performance, and not appearances, must be the standard by which all men and women must ultimately be judged.

Lawler was not flattered by Della Wharton's feminine blandishments. He was grimly amused—when he was not disgusted; though he continued to treat her with the utmost courtesy and gentleness, trying to keep her from divining his emotions.

Also, he had tried to lessen the dread monotony that encompassed them. There was nothing they could do. Beyond the mechanical tasks of eating, or of cooking and sleeping, of plunging outside to the water hole for water, or of caring for the horses and bringing wood for the fire, there was no diversion except that of talking. And, as the days dragged and the storm did not abate, even talking began to irk Lawler. There would be periods during which they would be silent, listening to the howling and moaning of the wind—hours at a stretch when the cold outside would seem to threaten, to tighten its constricting circle, when a great awe oppressed them; when it seemed that the whole world was snowbound, and that it would keep piling over and around them and all life would be extinct.

It was on the morning of the tenth day that Lawler began to notice that the dread monotony and the white, ever-present menace were beginning to affect the girl. Her face was white and in her eyes was a haunting gleam of fear. He noted how she clasped her hands; how she nervously twined and untwined her fingers, and how she kept pushing her chair toward him, as though for protection.

A swift sympathy seized him; he laughed, lowly, reaching out a hand and laying it lightly on her shoulder as she started at the sound of his voice and drew a quick, startled breath.

"Oh!" she said; "will it never end?"

"It can't last much longer, Miss Wharton," he smiled. "It has held on longer, now, than it should at this season."

The sound of his voice reassured her—it was calm, quiet, confident. Some color came back into her face, and she smiled.

"I believe I was beginning to get the doldrums," she said.

"That wouldn't be startling, Miss Wharton. Life in a line camp does become monotonous. It is to be expected. It becomes tragic. Also, it has a humorous side—viewed from a distance—chiefly afterward. In the fall, men go into line camps fast friends. We always pair them that way. Any other method would be fatal, for when the men come out in the spring they invariably are deadly enemies. You can imagine what would happen if we sent into a line cabin two men who did not think well of each other."

She shuddered and snuggled closer to him, letting her head fall to his shoulder. A pulse of pity stirred him, and he permitted her head to stay where she had laid it, while he gently smoothed her hair.

He would have done as much for any woman in her position; the emotion that filled him was entirely that of pity. She was vain and frivolous—employing every artifice, but she was a woman despite that, and entitled, in the present circumstances, to what comfort and sympathy he could give her.