Kings of the Missouri. Hugh Pendexter
God is good! It is unsaid. No name has been spoken!" cried the little Frenchman, sweeping off his shabby fur cap and bowing low to some Imaginary princess. "Your high heart does you great honor. Your knife will sing the sweeter when we find honest work for it to do. The divinity of woman must always protect her men from her lover."
"There are three things I must do at once," mumbled Lander. "I must get work. Parker says the A. F. C. will stop me getting work in St. Louis unless I work on the levee."
"His father was a liar! There is always much work for honest men. Go on."
"I must settle my score with Phinny. He has told tales and set Parker against me."
"Surely he shall be paid. The third?"
"I must see—I mention no names."
"Of course. Etienne Clair understands." And again the low bow till the cap brushed the dirt. "It is delicate, eh? Now a message. Behold, I can carry a message with eyes that turn in and see nothing, with a tongue to bring an answer which my ears do not hear."
"I have arranged for meeting her unless she is kept in the house."
"She shall not be kept in. I will enter from the rear and release her and——"
"No, no! I believe she will meet me. The hour is early as it was fixed before I knew what was to happen to me. I shall walk by the scholar Tradeau's house on Pine Street at eight o'clock."
"Most good! Then this scoundrel Phinny? You can look for work to-morrow but you should look for him to-night."
"I must find him to-night if I would sleep to-night."
"Brave spirit! I will go with you when you seek him."
Lander pondered for a moment, then said:
"Be in Tilton's drinking-place at nine. Wait for me until ten. He goes there. I've heard him speak of the place often."
"A vile place. Scum and cutthroats. I will wait for you."
They separated and Lander returned to his room to brood and rage until the soft twilight hour was come.
He dressed in his best but looked forlorn for a lover as he made for the door and halted to stare at a plain leather scabbard on the wall. He slowly took it down. It was made to go inside his boot, and from it he drew the Frenchman's gift knife, a wonderfully effective weapon in the hands of a master. It was ground to a razor's edge, wath a weight and solidity of haft and a length of blade that satisfied all exactions made upon it. It was a queer thing for a lover to take to his tryst, yet he pulled up his trousers leg and slipped the scabbard inside his boot.
His act was partly prompted by his affection for Papa Clair. He knew he was facing a crisis, and somehow it strengthened him to have with him a token from one he loved. Papa Clair had a superstitious regard for his knives. Lander had known him for two years and perhaps had absorbed some of his fancies. The old man had made him master of the knife; only there was none in all St. Louis outside the teacher who suspected the fact.
Chapter II AT TILTON'S PLACE
TURNING in from Main to Pine Street Lander loitered along until he reached a position under some garden bushes which rose high above a fence and afforded a deep splotch of shadow. Two houses below was the home of Jean Baptiste Tradeau who tutored the youth of St. Louis. The lover's gaze was directed through the dusk over the way he had come, for the Parker home was beyond the intersection of Main Street, and it lacked fully fifteen minutes of the hour.
When he halted by the bushes he had the street to himself but now he heard steps and the low murmur of voices from the direction of the Tradeau house. He gave these sounds no attention, as he was now glimpsing a slim, erect figure gowned in white, passing through the shaft of light of a window up the street. His heart began beating rapidly for he knew Susette would be at his side in another minute, and he tried to arrange his words for a coherent explanation. She would be deeply grieved and very indignant once she learned what had happened.
Then the steps behind grew louder. Two men were passing him and one of them laughed. Lander all but attracted their attention, for there was no one who laughed like Malcom Phinny.
"It wa'n't any of my business, mebbe, and yet I reckoned it was a bit, seeing as how you're the boss," Phinny was saying, thus establishing the identity of the second figure as that of Hurry-Up Parker. "I'd known for a long time he was shining up to Miss Susette."
"You had? Then why the devil didn't you tell me?" snarled Parker.
Phinny's apologetic answer was lost on Lander as the two were now drawing away from him. He was mightily concerned over what would happen in the next few rods, when the two men must meet the girl. Luck was badly against him. Had he named any other meeting-place there would not have been this interruption.
Slipping along the fence he took after the two men for a bit, then shifted across the walk and stood behind a tree. Susette was now discernible in the gloaming, a little white patch against the gathering darkness. She took the outside of the walk and would have passed her father unrecognized had not Phinny, falling behind his employer a few steps, thrust out his head to peer imprudently into her face.
"Why, Miss Susette! Ain't you lost?" he laughingly greeted.
Parker halted and swung on his heel, demanding, "You out walking alone?"
"Good evening, papa," she pertly responded. "It's perfectly proper to walk alone."
"It's also proper for you to walk with your father. Take my arm."
"But I wanted to go down the street a bit. I've been in the house for hours."
"Can't you get air enough on your own porch?" grumbled Parker.
"That's not exercise."
"Exercise, eh? Very well. Be back by nine. Phinny, you keep my daughter company. There are too many rough characters loose in this town for a young girl to be out alone."
"Yes, sir. Glad to look after Miss Susette," eagerly replied Phinny.
"You needn't put yourself out, Mr. Phinny," shortly spoke up the girl. "If I can't stroll to the end of the street without a guard I'll go back home."
Although accustomed to having her own way with her surly father there were times when he enforced the law and when she knew it would be useless to rebel. Such was the occasion now; and when he commanded "Back home it is then," she dutifully took his arm and skipped along beside him. When they passed through the next shaft of light the disgruntled lover saw she was twisting her head to look in his direction. On the other side of Parker was Phinny, and he too was glancing back.
For a moment he blamed her for not making more of an effort to keep the appointment, then remembered she knew nothing of his encounter with her father. She'd console herself with thinking that the morrow would see him at the house.
"And I can't go to her," he groaned, moving slowly away toward Third Street. "After all, I reckon I'll have to send Papa Clair with a note. That's it. He shall take a note and she can meet me somewhere. But, that Phinny! One would think he was a member of the family."
An hour later Lander was at the Washington Avenue store of Sublette and Company, or the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, which was to give the American Fur Company the strongest opposition it had ever contended against. Ordinarily the store would have been closed, but Lander hoped the work of getting up the new equipment for the expedition about to start for the mountains would necessitate its being kept open. Nor was he disappointed, for although the store was dark there was a glimmer of light at one end. Making his way to the office entrance he looked through the window and saw Jim Bridger busily checking up some lists.
"Come in