The Collected Western Classics & Adventures Novels. William MacLeod Raine
just starting a waltz. She leaned slightly toward Jed, and said, in a low voice:
“Did you ask me to dance this with you?”
He had not, but he did now. He got to his feet, with shining eyes, and whirled her off. The girl did not look toward the Texan. Nevertheless, as they circled the room, she was constantly aware of him. Sitting there, with a smile on his strong face, apparently unperturbed, he gave no hint of the stern fact that he was circled by enemies, any one of whom might carry his death in a hip pocket. His gaze was serene, unabashed, even amused.
The young woman was irritably suspicious that he found her anger amusing, just as he seemed to find the dangerous position in which he was placed. Yet her resentment coexisted with a sympathy for him that would not down. She believed he was marked for death by a coterie of those present, chief of whom was the man smiling down into her face from half-shut, smouldering eyes.
Her heart was a flame of protest against their decree, all the more so because she held herself partly responsible for it. In a panic of repentance, she had told Dick of her confession to the ranger of the names of the Squaw Creek raiders, and France had warned his confederates. He had done this, not because he distrusted Fraser, but because he felt it was their due to get a chance to escape if they wanted to do so.
Always a creature of impulse, Arlie had repented her repentance when too late. Now she would have fought to save the Texan, but the horror of it was that she could not guess how the blow would fall. She tried to believe he was safe, at least until the week was up.
When Dick strolled across the floor, sat down beside Steve, and began casually to chat with him, she could have thanked the boy with tears. It was equivalent to a public declaration of his intentions. At least, the ranger was not friendless. One of the raiders was going to stand by him. Besides Dick, he might count on Howard; perhaps on others.
Jed was in high good humor. All along the line he seemed to be winning. Arlie had discarded this intruder from Texas and was showing herself very friendly to the cattleman. The suspicion of Fraser which he had disseminated was bearing fruit; and so, more potently, was the word the girl had dropped incautiously. He had only to wait in order to see his rival wiped out. So that, when Arlie put in her little plea, he felt it would not cost him anything to affect a large generosity.
“Let him go, Jed. He is discredited. Folks are all on their guard before him now. He can’t do any harm here. Dick says he is only waiting out his week because of your threat. Don’t make trouble. Let him sneak back home, like a whipped cur,” she begged.
“I don’t want any trouble with him, girl. All I ask is that he leave the valley. Let Dick arrange that, and I’ll give him a chance.”
She thanked him, with a look that said more than words.
It was two hours later, when she was waltzing with Jed again, that Arlie caught sight of a face that disturbed her greatly. It was a countenance disfigured by a ragged scar, running from the bridge of the nose. She had last seen it gazing into the window of Alec Howard’s cabin on a certain never-to-be-forgotten night.
“Who is that man—the one leaning against the door jamb, just behind Slim Leroy?” she asked.
“He’s a fellow that calls himself Johnson. His real name is Struve,” Jed answered carelessly.
“He’s the man that shot the Texas lieutenant,” she said.
“I dare say. He’s got a good reason for shooting him. The man broke out of the Arizona penitentiary, and Fraser came north to rearrest him. At least, that’s my guess. He wouldn’t have been here to-night if he hadn’t figured Fraser too sick to come. Watch him duck when he learns the ranger’s here.”
At the first opportunity Arlie signaled to Dick that she wanted to see him. Fraser, she observed, was no longer in the dancing rooms. Dick took her out from the hot room to the porch.
“Let’s walk a little, Dick. I want to tell you something.”
They sauntered toward the fine grove of pines that ran up the hillside back of the house.
“Did you notice that man with the scar, Dick?” she presently asked.
“Yes. I ain’t seen him before. Must be one of the Rabbit Run guys, I take it.”
“I’ve seen him. He’s the man that shot your friend. He was the man I shot at when he looked in the window.”
“Sure, Arlie?”
“Dead sure, Dick. He’s an escaped convict, and he has a grudge at your friend. He is afraid of him, too. Look out for Lieutenant Fraser to-night. Don’t let him wander around outside. If he does, there may be murder done.”
Even as she spoke, there came a sound from the wooded hillside—the sound of a stifled cry, followed by an imprecation and the heavy shuffling of feet.
“Listen, Dick!”
For an instant he listened. Then: “There’s trouble in the grove, and I’m not armed,” he cried.
“Never mind! Go—go!” she shrieked, pushing him forward.
For herself, she turned, and ran like a deer for the house.
Siegfried was sitting on the porch, whittling a stick.
“They—they’re killing Steve—in the grove,” she panted.
Without a word he rolled off, like a buffalo cow, toward the scene of action.
Arlie pushed into the house and called for Jed.
Chapter XIII.
The Wolf Howls
As Steve strolled out into the moonlight, he left behind him the monotonous thumping of heavy feet and the singsong voice of the caller.
“Birdie fly out,
Crow hop in,
Join all hands
And circle ag’in.”
came to him, in the high, strident voice of Lute Perkins. He took a deep breath of fresh, clean air, and looked about him. After the hot, dusty room, the grove, with its green foliage, through which the moonlight filtered, looked invitingly cool. He sauntered forward, climbed the hill up which the wooded patch straggled, and sat down, with his back to a pine.
Behind the valley rampart, he could see the dim, saw-toothed Teton peaks, looking like ghostly shapes in the moonlight. The night was peaceful. Faint and mellow came the sound of jovial romping from the house; otherwise, beneath the distant stars, a perfect stillness held.
How long he sat there, letting thoughts happen dreamily rather than producing them of gray matter, he did not know. A slight sound, the snapping of a twig, brought his mind to alertness without causing the slightest movement of his body.
His first thought was that, in accordance with dance etiquette in the ranch country, his revolver was in its holster under the seat of the trap in which they had driven over. Since his week was not up, he had expected no attack from Jed and his friends. As for the enemy, of whom Arlie had advised him, surely a public dance was the last place to tempt one who apparently preferred to attack from cover. But his instinct was certain. He did not need to look round to know he was trapped.
“I’m unarmed. You’d better come round and shoot me from in front. It will look better at the inquest,” he said quietly.
“Don’t move. You’re surrounded,” a voice answered.
A rope snaked forward and descended over the ranger’s head, to be jerked tight, with a suddenness that sent a pain like a knife thrust through the wounded shoulder. The instinct for self-preservation was already at work in him. He fought his left arm free from the rope that pressed it to his side, and dived toward the figure at the end of